Hey everyone, I was hoping you guys (and girls) would lend me your ears and brains. The current script I'm writing is about a Prison Break on a prison planet with high gravity. My MC is left for the space cops and sent to this prison after a member of his crew turns on him, purposely foils a heist so he can escape with a large amount of diamonds, and runs him off the road while evading said space cops. I already have the prison stuff worked out, and how my MC plans to escape. My only issue is keeping the Backstabber busy so that the reader doesn't forget he's still there because we have to come back to him in the end so my MC can get his payback. I originally had him with a new team, ready to pull off another heist to get even richer, and the finale is my MC tracking him down once he escapes, foiling that heist while it's happening, and getting his revenge there. But I didn't want the script to be one part Prison Break and one part Heist movie. It would seem like a bit much, mixing genres and all. I don't know, what do you all think?
My thought is that the Backstabber made a new life with all that money, and now has a ton to lose--wife, kids, house, normal life, friends, PTA president, all that.
Could this be better as a series? Maybe the first book is about the escape, the second book is about him trying to get revenge and it not working, and the exact details of the failure make it that much harder for him to succeed in the third book? If this is all going to be one book, I'd recommend either Put the escape closer to the middle of the story than to the end If you need to save the revenge for the very end, then maybe make it part of the escape in some way?
Let me ask you this: why did the first gang steal the diamonds? What did Mr. Backstabber need the money for so badly that he turned against his people? Was he close with them or were they just useful tools to get the loot? Generally, greed alone is a poor motivator to turn against your fellow thieves, as you know you're setting yourself up to be robbed. Maybe Mr. Backstabber needs to pay off a crushing debt. Hey! Maybe he needs to pay a ransom to free a loved one before they get offed by a space crimelord! Maybe the backstabber is the good guy of his own story.
I currently do have the escape close to the middle. I didn't want to make it too long so that it didn't bleed over into the end too much. Oooooooh, I like that. Jeez, I feel like a simpleton. Those ideas never even crossed my mind. The whole, "useful tools to get the loot" was what I had originally, but the more I read over it, it was really bland, and I needed something else, but couldn't quite put my finger on what it was.
Well, when presented with almost unlimited potential character ideas, it can be hard to figure out which one is right. I would also suggest that the Backstabber seeing the others as pawns to get to his objective can still work well with him (I assume it's a guy, wasn't it?) needing the money for a greater goal. It would be cool for the guy to need to money to do something genuinely selfless, like a ransom or whatever, and still be a selfish asshole who would throw the lives of those he works with to the dogs to get him closer to his goal.
