“We started out at one point talking about how evolution involves creating ever greater circles of empathy: You belong to your family, then you belong to your tribe, then two tribes link up and now you have empathy for your people on this side of the river, and you’re against the people on the other side of the river … on and on through villages, cities, states and nations…. So what if a more literal form of empathy could be triggered in eight individuals around the planet … who suddenly became mentally aware of each other, able to communicate as directly as if they were in the same room. How would they react? What would they do?”

—J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI, CO-CREATOR, SENSE8 ON NETFLIX

Chapter 7

Character Empathy vs. Sympathy

How and Why We Align With Characters’ Wants and Needs

Empathy is key in storytelling: in character development, in how it pertains to suspense and also draws the audience into a story, through our characters’ needs and vulnerabilities. On a deeper level, it’s also what sustains a series over time.

But first, let’s look at the difference between empathy and sympathy:

• Empathy is defined by identification, “walking in another’s shoes.”
• Sympathy is the pity we feel for another’s pain and suffering.

Both are vital attributes not only to sustain a balanced emotional life, healthy relationships and socialization, but also to build and sustain a dramatic TV series. The only reason we return for more episodes is because we relate to the characters via empathy and/or sympathy and invest in them for the journey over time. Their problems become our problems. Their victories become our wins, too. Bottom line: We worry about them and are compelled to care.

To me, all stories are coming-of-age tales, regardless of the character’s chronological age. The reason being, our characters enter stories lacking something. The whole reason that there is a story, it could be argued, is because a character is incomplete in some way. A character may have a void in his/her world—whether psychological, emotional, spiritual or otherwise—that is limiting. It limits him/her both in terms of the character’s power and results in the instinctive creation of defense mechanisms to protect himself or herself. When we have a void, we feel we’re not whole and are broken in some way. When we’re broken, we’re vulnerable and fragile. Hence the most wounded characters with the largest voids tend to be the most defensive—and often will be the most aggressive and hostile, because they want to keep people away.

Take the analogy of the injured beast. As we approach an injured animal, it grows more ferocious, because it knows that it’s less powerful in that moment. An animal goes on the offensive, trying to scare us and make us back away, in order to protect itself. It’s almost paradoxical—animals act more fierce because they are less fierce. They create an illusion to feel safer and more protected. This is similar to how characters behave in coming-of-age stories.

Touching the Void

Characters with voids are, to state the obvious, lacking something, which might be intelligence, physical strength or attributes that might make them feel more powerful/attractive, business acumen, friends, love or something completely different. Whatever they’re lacking, characters often overcompensate by going on the defensive or on the attack instead of accepting their limitations. They try to find weak spots in other people, to diminish others in order to feel better somehow about themselves. In coming-of-age stories, whether in a pilot or series that plays out over multiple seasons, we will witness a gradual progression of the character. As writers, we need to think about this development from the very beginning, from our pilot on. Even on an ensemble show, on some level each character is going to “grow up” and their relationships to each other help facilitate that growth.

On the deeper level of character empathy, every show explores a character’s relationship with his or her void—what’s missing, what’s lacking. For our audience to truly develop a relationship with a character over numerous episodes, there must be such a level of complexity in their character that whatever internal problems they have can only be solved through external interactions, with other characters. Adding to the complexity is the fact that what characters need the most is paradoxically often what they defend against the most. How characters let their guards down—and who they allow to see their vulnerability—plays into their growth and evolution. All characters, from the broken, flawed or limited to those who are more at peace with themselves, have voids. Maybe it will be filled by some sense of completion through a relationship, through love. Perhaps it’s through communication that’s honest, sincere and direct, resolving something that maybe hadn’t been discussed for a long time, based on estrangements or fear that there was no solution to a problem; when there is one, it’s cathartic.

Much of what makes us vulnerable, and the reason we tend to hide our weaknesses and try to protect ourselves, is because we’re ashamed of our limitations. It’s only our close circle of friends, family and people we feel we’ve bonded with and connected to on deeper levels, maybe only one person, who we let in to see that true, genuine side of ourselves. That’s the key to evolving, growing up and the cycle of coming of age. A coming-of-age story is about self-acceptance. As we live in a world with other people, self-acceptance comes through gaining approval and validation from others. When we’re young, we’re eager for others to validate us. It may come from our upbringing: If we grow up in a functional household with parents who give us approval, love and acceptance, when we go out into the world, we may be less starved for validation. If we come from a home where our parents are busy, absent or if we come from a broken family, we may not have gotten that validation and thus may seek it from various other sources. And some of these sources might not necessarily be appropriate places to find love and acceptance.

When developing our characters, we may also give them masks that are defense mechanisms in response to the voids and fears they’ve experienced. They could be literal, superhero or villain masks but more often are metaphorical masks—personas they project into the world in order to protect their “real” selves.

Nobody’s Perfect

As we write our pilot, we need to think about the way an audience is going to first meet our characters. What’s the first impression of the character? It’s not an absolute, but our first impressions are almost always wrong. And we want our viewers to be wrong, because if what we see is what we get, there is no complexity, mystery or anything to discover about the character as the series progresses—and it’s less interesting. Audiences want to make discoveries and participate in the journey of a character’s coming of age. As they solve their problems and get in and out of relationships and trouble, we want to feel there’s something beyond the mask, beyond the superficial first impression we developed about the character. We start to sense their vulnerabilities and fears and understand that a lot of the behaviors characters have adopted are actually coping mechanisms, to help them get through life.

At the heart of empathy is the knowledge that nobody’s perfect. We all know this; yet we still beat ourselves up when we make mistakes, and we’re harsh on other people when they disappoint us. The German writer Goethe said, “Life teaches us to be less harsh with ourselves and with others.” It’s something that happens over time, as we experience more rejection and disappointment. People let us down. Life is unpredictable. I believe that the words “life” and “change” are synonyms. Life is change. It’s something we can count on. At the same time, pain comes from a resistance to change. All of life’s uncertainties make us feel more vulnerable. Sometimes things happen to us through no fault of our own; other times, things happen to us because we do stupid things and make bad choices based on variables that, in hindsight, look like major red flags. We all have self-destructive patterns, behaviors and vices. “Nobody’s perfect” as it relates to character empathy means it’s universal for us to recognize that everyone has problems and is flawed.

Forgiveness requires us to let something go, something that emotionally has thrown us into some form of turmoil. When we are emotionally out of balance, all we can think of is regaining control. Most characters, whether they are control freaks who have to micromanage everything, or who are more relaxed and laid back, still want to be in control of their emotions. Yet our emotions bubble up; what we try to repress and push down comes up anyway. When we have sloppy emotions we can’t control, we cry, we have mood swings, we lash out at people. A situation that happened with someone in the past, which is totally unrelated to someone new, might come up unexpectedly. It could be something we repressed for years, which gets triggered by another person or situation. Likewise, our characters need patience and the ability to look at the bigger picture in order to forgive. And yes, nobody, let alone ourselves, is perfect; we make mistakes. We need other people to forgive us, and need to forgive ourselves as well, for not being perfect.

As we develop our characters, we often find the most difficult challenge for them to face is in the situations where they need to forgive, forget and move on. Characters who tend to be the most iconic and indelible are stubborn, more likely to resist change and make pronouncements that they’re never going to forgive or forget something. When somebody crosses them, they’ll “never speak to that person again.” Tony Soprano might simply torture or shoot them. It’s irrevocable, irreparable and impossible to forgive. Of course, although these are the words spoken in the heat of the moment, as we also know, over time wounds heal. No matter what characters say or how vehement they are, situations change. They’ll have other altercations with other people that require them to forgive in a similar way. As a result, they may become truer to themselves and hopefully be able to form closer, more trusting relationships, allowing themselves to be more vulnerable and let love in, without the need to build walls and create defense mechanisms.

But that’s at the end of a series—or later in life. Some of the characters in our series will be heavily flawed and self-delusional, tending to create such constructs in order to feel powerful in situations that enable them to function with their usual coping mechanisms. Anyone who challenges any of these things becomes an antagonist. Their instinct is to defend themselves against those people who might want to challenge these power constructs.

Once you locate a character’s main coping power, I encourage you to find its opposing force, and then you have some compelling conflict. Don’t push it, but opposites attract in a tango toward understanding. And maybe, eventually, empathy.

Examples of Coping Powers

• Don Draper (Mad Men)

  Power of Persuasion

  Opposing force: Peggy Olson, who can see right through Don’s facade. She has the Power of Truth and Reason.

• Queen Elizabeth (The Crown)

  Power of Duty/Honor

  Opposing force: Margaret, who challenges protocol. Margaret has the Power of Passion and Desire.

• Walter White (Breaking Bad)

  Power of Deception

  Opposing force: DEA agent Hank, who has the Power of Enforcement (see my piece on Breaking Bad in the Bonus Content at www.routledge.com/cw/landau)

• Elliot Alderson (Mr. Robot)

  Power of Truth, Justice and Fairness

  Opposing force: Evil Corp and Tyrell Wellick who have the Power of Deception

• The kids on Stranger Things

  Power of Innocence

  Opposing force: The government conspiracy = the Power of Cynicism

• Chip Baskets (Baskets)

  Power of Imagination

  Opposing force: Reality

For more on character power dynamics, visit Laurie Hutzler’s website, www.ETBScreenwriting.com.

The Dance

Empathy is also dependent on point of view. Characters naturally look at the circumstances of their lives and base their choices on the limited evidence of what their lives are at that moment. It’s circumstantial; there are mitigating factors, and part of what the slow-burn shows do—and part of what Fargo’s Season 2 does, for example—is show us an event through the prism of multiple points of view. Our empathy doesn’t just go along the expected rhythms and movements. It constantly shifts and pulls us around, back and forth. The tempo changes, characters change and our perspective changes. Each time we tune in, we get to discover something new that both informs and impacts our empathy, which can shift from episode to episode. That’s what makes great drama so much fun to watch. (I analyze Fargo in Chapter 2.)

Reverting to Type

Lonely people and loners tend to find fault with everyone. They’re alone, but constantly judge anybody they could hang out with or any potential prospects for a romance, listing all the reasons why they would not want to spend time with those people. In truth, the loner doesn’t even want to hang out with him or herself. They don’t feel worthy themselves. But it’s easier to cast blame and create distance with other people, than to admit maybe there’s something wrong with them. What we often find is that our characters, while they say they want to change, while they seek out new situations and take risks in order to change their circumstances and improve their lives, do not change. And this is the way the real world works, too. Characters expand and contract. When feeling threatened, they tend to revert to form, meaning they go back to their modus operandi. They may well take a risk and end up scared, out on a limb where they could get hurt. They may fear their risk may not pay off the way they thought. They might open their heart, only for the object of their affection to reject them, leaving their love unrequited.

When such things happen, a character tends to revert to his or her old self like a rubber band. Their void remains. They go back to accessing their power of what they think is going to protect them. It could be the Power of Ambition, the Power of Enforcement, any number of powers our characters think are their strong suits. They revert because it’s familiar and comfortable: “Better the devil you know.” Stepping out of their comfort zone is scary and a character’s nerves may cause them to mistake fear for the feeling of making the wrong decision. But because it feels wrong initially doesn’t mean it is wrong. So, we see characters doing an emotional dance: taking risks and changing, then retreating. They’re like turtles that stick their heads out, then retreat back into their shells.

The cause is fear. Characters end up going back to old patterns because their fear feels more powerful than the need to change. In this way the true coming of age is the acceptance of the void and being able to share our experience of it. The more we reveal what’s missing and how we’re wounded and broken, the more likely we are to accept and heal. It’s something we recognize in life as well as in fiction. We see people go through this circular journey. They come out the other side stronger and more whole, or they may veer into a form of denial and go back to their lives and—at least on the surface—revert to form. Part of empathy is also when we understand that it’s not a weakness to ask for help—it’s a strength to admit vulnerability and say, “I need you.” But many characters will avoid that, because they’re afraid that someone’s going to let them down, or reject them. So inevitably they tend to think they’re in it alone.

The evolution of a character, over the course of a season or multiple seasons, sometimes is as simple as someone who feels that he or she is all alone becoming able to let one person in. As we’ve discussed, it can take just one person to fill the void. That in itself can be enough for a complete, satisfying story. Ideally, a character who feels he/she is an island will find the need to connect to a larger group of people and seek their community. But, this is likely going to require their acceptance of other types of people who don’t adhere to the same codes of what they believe is acceptable behavior, and the character grows as a result. In dramatic storytelling, catharsis comes from connecting to other people and letting them in. It’s not going to come from numbing the pain; it’s going to come from feeling the pain. Only then can a cathartic release occur for both character(s) and audience.

Judgment, Morality and Perception

Judgment can separate us, and our characters, from pure empathy and connection with people. It comes from what we perceive to be the truth about something; we judge someone or form an opinion based on something that is essentially superficial. It could be the color of their skin, what they wear or how they express themselves through their communication style. There’s always an aspect of judgment that hinders true empathy. Again, these are just defense mechanisms, because we tend to feel threatened by people who are different. And again, we need to push and force our characters out of their comfort zones, remembering humility, patience and respect.

Our relationship to the void and to ourselves also comes through how we interact with what we perceive to be right and wrong about other people. It’s easy to be empathetic toward a person who’s just like us, or someone we approve of and admire. That’s effortless. The tough part of empathy is when we’re called upon to offer our compassion to someone we may not approve of, or who is actively hostile towards us, or may have antagonized us. Yet we need to put our characters in situations where it’s neither easy to offer empathy, nor to forgive, nor to make a connection. For that’s like real life. As we challenge them in such situations, conflict will arise and bring up exposed aspects of the character we may not have seen before. Both in and beyond the pilot, we need to ask, “What are the situations that will show aspects of the character’s emotional life we haven’t seen before? How can we put characters in situations that take them out of their comfort zones?” Orange Is the New Black, for example, does this to both tense and comedic effect. In comedy, pushing our characters makes the situation funnier, while in drama it boosts the intensity, as we see how a character grapples with a moral dilemma, or with trying to be righteous and yet uncomfortable with what’s being asked of them.

The Insatiable Appetite of the Ego

We all have egos to drive our ambitions. However, success that only feeds the ego will never fill our existential voids, as we endeavor to fit into structures and to access our power through approval and acceptance from others. We tend to identify success through the lens of that human ego: in terms of money, materialism, job titles and status. It speaks to much of what is wrong with our world. We define success in materialistic terms as opposed to emotional ones, which include empathy, compassion and kindness. First on the list should be how can I help, how can I listen, how can I be compassionate, how can I communicate better? Yet kindness and empathy are not accorded the same respect as “success,” let alone being used in the definition of success.

Consider how the existential pain many characters feel is self-inflicted. Their inner turmoil will only be healed by taking risks, stepping out of their comfort zones and connecting with other people. It’s usually petrifying for a character to do so. So, our first impression of a character in a pilot is not who the character really is. We may look for triggers in our plot that are going to cause suppressed emotions to come out. We want to see our characters drop their masks and show us the messy side of their lives, no matter how strong they are. In Luther, for example, we see Idris Elba playing the tortured detective John Luther, which is riveting because he’s seemingly so powerful and invincible. Yet, it’s even more riveting when he is brought to his knees and isn’t sure whether he wants to live or die, based on all the suffering he’s experienced in his life. He’s an extreme, nihilistic character, who needs to learn to develop empathy, much like Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) in the last season of the eponymous series.

In sitcoms, characters behave in self-destructive and self-defeating ways in order to feel less vulnerable.¹ The principal difference is that the things they do are more outrageous, so as a result, the chaos that ensues is funny. Sometimes it’s pathetic and we laugh; we’ve all felt pathetic in certain situations. Sitcoms, especially broader ones, tend to turn up the volume and make the scenes and characters more extreme. If the end of our pilot is going to be our protagonist’s worst nightmare, we start off the whole series with a character who’s desperate and is going to expand or contract and do anything he or she can, in order to avoid having to face the void. That’s where empathy comes from. We relate to and understand such feelings and experiences because they are universal. Ideally, other characters also identify this protagonist as being in existential pain, thereby showing empathy and trying to dig deeper into what’s really going on with him or her.

Insecure: Authentic as F**k

When I interviewed Issa Rae for my last book, the creator, writer and star of Insecure had already produced the successful web series Awkward Black Girl and was developing her HBO show with Larry Wilmore. Insecure, which contains elements of ABG, has since premiered in 2016 to critical acclaim. The first season follows the highs and lows of the life and loves of Issa Dee (Rae) and BFF Molly Carter (Yvonne Orji), as they traverse their quarter-life crises in present-day LA. Issa’s navigating through a stagnant relationship with Lawrence (Jay Ellis), who’s between jobs and who languishes on the couch most days; meanwhile, she’s tempted by high school sweetheart Daniel (Y’lan Noel). She’s also experiencing something of a career crisis—after five years, she’s still the only black employee at a nonprofit that works to help minority children. But she feels that what they’re doing has little impact and continues to encounter stereotypes that shouldn’t exist in a progressive organization. Molly is a successful lawyer but clueless when it comes to men, making terrible decisions due to her immature approach to relationships and love. Fair enough, she’s still in her 20s.

The show is sharp, funny and all set to an astounding soundtrack, which is no surprise given that Solange Knowles is a music consultant and most of the episodes are helmed by Grammy-winning music video director Melina Matsoukas. But Insecure’s strength is in the universal stories it tells: they’re not unique to the black experience of living in LA, but the human experience of anywhere. Life isn’t what we thought it would be, and we do realize that in our late 20s. Often couples develop in different directions at different speeds; temptation abounds (sometimes we seek it out; sometimes it comes to us). The job we thought would make a difference turns out to be rife with hypocrisy. And our best friend refuses to take our advice, which gets us exasperated at seeing them repeat the same mistakes over and over again, seeing them get hurt again and again. We all understand humiliation, guilt, shame, frustration, disappointment. Many of us have had to confront stereotypes in our lives. This universal experience is what we quickly fuse with in Insecure, plus humor helps us bond. We quickly develop empathy with Issa Dee in the opening scene of the pilot.

Not only is it funny, but we also cringe right along with Issa. Similarly, in a montage of clips featuring best friend Molly, we quickly learn how she’s a hit with everyone at her firm—and basically with people in general, no matter what background or level—but then we cringe again as Molly giddily calls back the guy she’s been on three dates with, after he merely texts “Hey.” He doesn’t pick up the phone and texts again: “Can’t talk, what’s up?” She replies, “I just wanted to hear your voice :-)” Seemingly knowledgeable about guys, she raves about how he might be “the one” to colleague Diane Nakamura (Maya Erskine), who herself is an Asian woman with a black boyfriend. Naturally, we feel for Molly as she is crushed by his reply a moment later: “Sorry. I’m not looking for a relationship right now :-(”

We get it. We’ve all been there. One minute all is smooth sailing, the next minute everything changes. It’s also efficient storytelling: within the first six minutes, Issa and Molly both win us over and keep us feeling for them throughout the season, even when they behave badly, including to each other. (If you haven’t heard Issa’s hip-hop song inspired by her friendship with Molly, entitled “Broken Pussy,” you’re missing one of the highlights of the TV season.) It feels like real friendship. Such authenticity is what Insecure delivers beautifully. We’re all after the same thing: Connection.

Big Little Lies, Guilt and Shame

HBO’s multiple Emmy-winning Big Little Lies gives us several strong women who have major flaws, and do despicable things, and yet makes us care about them. Although the show is an ensemble piece, Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman are given top billing as Madeline Mackenzie and Celeste Wright, respectively. These two friends, apart from the fact that they both have young children who go to the same school, don’t have much in common. Madeline’s spunkiness borders on arrogance and would be off-putting if not for the kindness she shows to Jane (Shailene Woodley), the new mom in town. Madeline constantly puts her foot in her mouth, especially with her husband Ed (Adam Scott). In the first episode she vents to him about the fact that she fears both of her daughters are growing up too fast, especially teenaged Abigail (Kathryn Newton) whose father is now married to a hot, younger woman.

The damage is done. But Ed would be even more hurt if he knew Madeline’s big secret: A year ago, she cheated on him with the sexy director of the local community theater company that she oversees, and she can’t stop thinking about it. Later Ed confronts Madeline about her lack of interest in sex, which she attributes to being busy and overworked.

It’s only when Madeline’s “I-don’t-take-bullshit-from-anybody” demeanor starts to crack that we begin to empathize with her. She truly feels guilty about cheating on Ed and tells Abigail about it, in a rare moment of self-revelation. Madeline knows that Ed is a wonderful man and feels that she doesn’t deserve him. We sympathize with Ed, because he doesn’t know that he’s been played. But we empathize with him when he stands up to Madeline and tells her, “For me, you’re the one,” in spite of all her faults.

Meanwhile, the beautiful former attorney Celeste, who seems to have hit the jackpot with her rich, handsome husband Perry (Alexander Skarsgård), two adorable twin boys and a closet worthy of a mention in Architectural Digest, is not quite the successful stay-at-home mom she appears to be. The truth is that Perry is abusing her, and she actually gets turned on by it. She tells Madeline that they “fight” but neglects to mention that it’s physical. Celeste eventually admits what’s going on to her therapist, who is horrified and insists that she leave Perry. Celeste is something of a throwback to another time when many women didn’t talk as much about domestic violence and explained away their bruises with stories of falling down the stairs. The twist is the element of enjoyment that she’s getting from it. We’re shocked, although most of us have been in dysfunctional relationships, as well. Celeste is kind to everyone, especially Jane and Madeline, which makes us care about her more. We want her to gather the strength to leave Perry, and rescue both herself and her children.

Sympathy for the Robot: Westworld

Dolores Abernathy (Evan Rachel Wood), a relentless optimist and rancher’s daughter, wishes her father a good morning before riding off to town. There she runs into Teddy Flood (James Marsden), a handsome, charming quasi-cowboy, with whom she has some kind of shared past. The two spend the afternoon horseback riding, and they share a moment of intimacy. Upon returning home, Dolores and Teddy discover that thieves have ransacked the Abernathy home and murdered both of Dolores’ parents. Valiantly, Teddy guns down the thieves. But then things take a turn for the worse—the Man in Black (Ed Harris) arrives. He knows our young lovers, but they don’t know him. Teddy shoots the Man in Black, but his shotgun shells, so effective just moments ago, vaporize on impact. The Man in Black returns fire, killing Teddy in cold blood, then drags a screaming, petrified Dolores off to the barn with only one thing on his mind: rape.

In the first fifteen minutes of the pilot, we witness the difference between man (“newcomer”) and robot (“host”) and the fundamental unfairness that governs Westworld, this adult theme park. Our heroes—the robots—seek out change. We see their lot in life, stuck in the same daily loop (they’re programmed to follow a script), powerless in the face of callous men, haunted by memories of intense personal trauma. And we admire their defiance. They are “hosts”—robots built to satisfy the sadistic whims of wealthy tourists who are unbound by the moral restraints of the real world. It’s easier to empathize with a virtuous robot than it is to recognize ourselves in their human abusers.

Back in 1973, I remember seeing Michael Crichton’s big-screen version, Westworld, at a drive-in theater. That iteration focused on the human vacationers who paid big bucks for a chance to play in this interactive A.I. amusement park. The premise was pure wish fulfillment: getting the chance to be a “real” gunslinger in the Wild West, with no consequences for killing and debauchery. And the robots could die, but the vacationers could not (the robots’ guns were firing blanks). Of course, as in Jurassic Park (also created by Crichton), something goes terribly wrong and chaos ensues. In the Westworld movie, the A.I. “Gunslinger” (Yul Brynner) goes on an all-too-real killing spree—technology run dangerously amok—and can’t be stopped. It’s a glitch in his programming, rather than the singularity. The surviving tourists are now trapped in a nightmare, resulting in a suspenseful, terrifying game of cat and mouse. But as humans, we’re rooting for ourselves.

Significantly, in HBO’s 2016 remake, we find ourselves rooting for the A.I., but since they’re identical to us, first we must figure out who the androids are. We, as audience, are now invested in this game of who’s real and who’s a machine. It’s an ingenious adaptation in which the “hosts” evolve toward human consciousness and get in touch with their feelings. They’re no longer neutral, at the whim of the tourists. Now they’re coming from emotion, and as we all know, try as we may, the one thing none of us can control is our emotions. The robots begin to improvise and invent new storylines and dialogue of their own volition. The line between “host” and human is often intentionally blurred, and we become engrossed by the search for clues (was that a human flinch or a technical glitch?)

In Season 1, Episode 6 (“The Adversary”), the town madam, android Maeve Millay (Thandie Newton) muses to the human lab techs:

For silver-tongued Maeve, this evolution toward consciousness is often played for comedy. Upon realizing that death is a false construct, she begins to seek out new and varied ways to die. The lab is where she encounters Felix Lutz (Leonardo Nam), the lone sympathetic human on the show, and his lab partner Sylvester (Ptolemy Slocum). Through a series of clever threats and demands, Maeve manipulates the two lab techs into expediting her awakening. In what might be the most enjoyable exchange of the entire show, Maeve coaxes the lab techs into rejiggering her character profile, fulfilling that most human of desires—to acquire a superpower. “What was it—bulk apperception? Let’s take that all the way to the top,” she says, her eyelids fluttering as she powers up.

We’re given permission to revel in this moment because earlier we’ve witnessed the Westworld lab through Maeve’s eyes. For Maeve, the lab is a house of horrors—dead, naked “hosts” strewn about as apathetic staff hose down the blood. For the audience these images are eerily reminiscent of real human atrocities and reinforce our sense of Maeve’s righteousness. If hosts can feel pain—and they do—it doesn’t matter if hosts are androids created in a lab, the humans’ actions are equally atrocious whether inflicted on non-human or fellow human.

Programmer Bernard Lowe (Jeffrey Wright) explains the park’s philosophy: “Consciousness isn’t a journey upward, but a journey inward. Not a pyramid, but a maze. Every choice could bring you closer to the center or send you spiraling to the edges, to madness” (Season 1, Episode 10, “The Bicameral Man”).

Bernard’s evolution toward consciousness is tragic. For the bulk of the series, we believe he is a measured, thoughtful engineer doing his best to keep feuding interests at bay. That part is mostly true. The surprise—it’s a shocker—is that Bernard is a “host,” a recreation of Arnold, the long-dead partner of Dr. Robert Ford (Anthony Hopkins) and co-creator of the Westworld theme park.

Dr. Ford had built Bernard in the image of Arnold but included the tragic memory of Arnold’s dead son. “It was Arnold’s key insight, the thing that led the hosts to their awakening: suffering,” Dr. Ford tells Bernard. Bernard passed as human because his suffering offered him insight into the human experience. His true consciousness comes with the realization that he is both a host and a weapon of Dr. Ford’s—a weapon that’s already been utilized in two murders.

Dolores’ evolution is subtler and nearly impossible to talk about without examining the totality of her arc. The center of the maze which Dolores has been searching for is a symbol of self-discovery and meant only for the robots. For Dolores, consciousness is achieved by plumbing her memory and returning to the site of her original sin. The reveal that she killed Arnold is startling enough, but the knowledge that she was programmed to do so by Arnold (who thought his death would prevent the park from opening) is what finally liberates her.

With our allegiances now fully on the side of the hosts, Westworld has one final surprise up its sleeve—Dr. Ford isn’t evil; he’s atoning. The “Reveries” update, introduced in the pilot, was designed to ignite a string of host awakenings. Humans—particularly those driven by greed, lust or violence—are far more dangerous than robots who cannot opt out of their morality. During her escape Maeve turns to Felix, thanking him for his assistance. “Oh Felix,” she says, you really do make a terrible human being. And I mean that as a compliment.”

Hannah, Clay and the Razor’s Edge: 13 Reasons Why

In 13 Reasons Why, high school student Hannah Baker (Katherine Langford) engages in a struggle against mental illness—a silent killer that often no one notices until it’s too late. Hannah devises an elaborate suicide note, a series of cassette tapes—anachronistic technology intentional—to inform her loved ones and frenemies, teachers, guidance counselor and parents how they each played a role in her death as oblivious and therefore unwilling accomplices. Hannah is our limited, unreliable narrator, but she insinuates that she was, at various times, cyber bullied, stalked, betrayed, humiliated, abandoned and raped. But the rape was never reported; the rapist is a popular school athlete, and Hannah was too traumatized and fragile at the time to protest or utter the word “No.” Until the final episode, it’s his word against Hannah’s.

Her suicide cassettes are passive-aggressive, narcissistic and cruel, bordering on deranged. For these reasons, while my heart goes out to anyone in pain, I couldn’t bring myself to align with Hannah’s vindictive quest to posthumously punish the survivors for being so oblivious. My strong rooting interest remained throughout with Hannah’s best friend (and crush), Clay Jensen (Dylan Minnette), and with Hannah’s parents Olivia and Andy Baker (Kate Walsh and Brian d’Arcy James) who all appeared to do their best to be there for Hannah—but she refused to let them in. Clay bears far less responsibility than her parents, her legal guardians. He truly doesn’t deserve this. And her parents were always well intentioned and far from negligent. No one could hear Hannah’s silent screams. Hers was an act of violence against herself, and a vengeful hate crime against those who couldn’t or didn’t realize the depths of her suffering.

After Clay receives the anonymous box of cassettes, he scrambles to find a boom box to play the tape, then hits play. Hannah’s message is so disturbing that Clay listens to her opening salvo in three separate scenes, the final sentences after he wipes out on his bike and gets a nasty gash on his forehead. His injury is the first of a number of visual touchstones the showrunners employ to help us keep the timelines straight in our heads. It could have been disorienting, with Hannah dead in some scenes, and then walking into the same setting in a seamless segue to a flashback (when she was still alive).

Clay chooses not to listen to all seven tapes in one sitting. All at once would be too intense. This helps the series’ writers spread out the tapes over 13 episodes, which is essential because Clay isn’t the only character listening. Other episodes encompass other points of view—and everything eventually overlaps. But Clay, being closest to Hannah, is our guide—our lifeline—from start to finish.

Compounding the suspense and our disorientation is Clay’s mental state; as he listens to each tape, his grasp on reality and sanity diminishes exponentially. Fueled by his guilty conscience, he starts hallucinating and sees Hannah’s ghost, taunting him. For several episodes, the selfishness of her suicide and the cruelty of the blaming tapes made me think she was trying to gaslight Clay and compel him to kill himself. But 13 Reasons Why is not after such reductive reactions or resolutions. Sure, the tapes are a clever structural and narrative device—a literary card trick. But let’s not forget the context. If you have trouble buying into the premise thinking it’s too contrived and implausible, just imagine how troubled a girl like Hannah would have to be to orchestrate it.

Devastatingly, preventable teen suicides happen in real life; 13 Reasons Why has been immensely polarizing. There have been claims that after watching the show, two teenaged girls tragically took their own lives; both were in the Bay Area, where it was filmed. Netflix’s statement to KTVU was: “Our hearts go out to these families during this difficult time…. We took extra precautions to alert viewers to the nature of the content and created a global website to help people find local mental health resources.” Peter Chui, father of one of the girls who committed suicide, has a message for young people: “There are other options. There are other resources out there. This is not a way out for you.”²

For me, the climactic 13th episode is horrifying. You’ll see it coming, but nothing can prepare you for the unflinching depiction of the actual suicide. As a parent, it’s gut wrenching to witness such anguish and self-inflicted pain. For 12 episodes, we’ve seen the aftermath of Hannah’s suicide from each character’s perspective, and how her parents, despite unimaginable grief, have managed to start the healing process and continue living. But at the climax, with the past and present colliding in Hannah’s bathroom, it’s devastating. Too raw. Too real.

In the book’s original ending, Hannah is rushed to the hospital and survives. A happier ending might have worked on a broadcast network or as one of those pedantic “after-school specials” that once served as public service announcements. But the digital television revolution is all about authenticity. So Hannah’s end, however tragic, fits with this story.

In playwright Arthur Miller’s essay, “The Tragedy of the Common Man,” he asserts that the essential ingredient of tragedy is potential:

All those named as complicit in Hannah’s death confess their sins except Alex (Miles Heizer), the son of a strict military man, who tries to commit suicide by shooting himself in the head with one of his dad’s guns. Before leaving his house to give his deposition in the school negligence lawsuit, photographer/stalker Tyler (Devin Druid) hides various guns and ammunition in his bedroom; this is a plot thread that will surely unravel in Season 2. Or will it?

Meanwhile, at school, Clay reaches out to quirky Goth girl, Skye (Sosie Bacon), whom he’d previously noticed had scars on her wrists. The closing shot is of Clay, his gay best friend Tony (Christian Navarro) and his boyfriend and Skye all driving down the street in Tony’s vintage convertible Mustang. Sunny day. Top down. It’s a hopeful postscript.

What makes Hannah such a tragic heroine is that she could have made a different choice. Her own potential is cut off prematurely. In her tragedy, however, lies the possibility for a different life for those she left behind.

Alignment and Allegiance

Years ago, I attended a screening of auteur Miranda July’s wonderful, provocative film from 2005, Me and You and Everyone We Know. After the screening, Richard Neupert (professor of critical studies in the Grady School at the University of Georgia) lectured on creating character empathy/sympathy via plot strategies and film style.

Neupert posed this question: How does a movie (or TV series) make us feel something about a character—and why? He discussed how this might be immediate or gradual, but the process adheres to these three steps:

1. Hypothesis. Set up a character’s positive attributes and corresponding flaws. This happens via the writer assigning a cluster of distinctive traits to each character, and then adding emotion. As the story progresses, the circumstances of the story will cause the characters—and us—to evaluate their actions.

   When we first meet a character, we form a hypothesis—based on our life experiences, judgments and his/her backstory/behavior—and our hypothesis tends to shift as the story progresses. Is the show/movie judging a character? Should we?

Our first impression hypothesis then moves to:

1. 2. Alignment. Does the story align us with why the characters are the way they are—their goals, motives and psychology? And how readily do we align with these goals and beliefs?
2. 3. Allegiance. Do we agree with the character? Do we empathize and/or feel sympathy for their values? Why? Why not?

This hypothesis/alignment/allegiance process is at the core of empathy and sympathy for storytellers. Not only must we emotionally track characters from scene to scene, episode to episode, and season to season, we must also ask ourselves how we want the audience to feel. In this way, all effective storytelling generates an active conversation or debate between the characters’ actions and the audience’s emotional response (laughter, tears, outrage, fear) to those actions. Ultimately, this is what Aristotle called catharsis.