PLOT THREAD: Institution

The core conflict in an Institutional Plot Thread is the individual fighting the group. The group could be the family unit, the church, the legal system, an underground subculture, or even society as a whole (e.g. institutionalized racism).

The institution (or system) has a set of rules, values, accepted behaviors, roles, and an “other” they’re against. In these stories, the Prot questions, and/or openly rebels against it, or even outright seeks to destroy it.

A few examples of these stories could be…

• SHAKEN FAITH: Someone who believes in, lives in, or is immersed in the system suddenly has a crisis of faith and questions the system: how they do things, why they do it, who they imbue with power, what the hidden costs are, etc.
• ABUSED ROOKIE: Someone who always wanted to be a part of the system finally gets in, but is assigned an “Evil Mentor” who starts exploiting the naiveté of the Prot. The “Evil Mentor” shows the audience how corrupt the system actually is.
• REBELLION: The Prot has finally had it with the system and starts rebelling. It could be the Prot making a legal case, to passive-aggressively wasting company resources, leading up to leading a resistance army against the evil empire.

A lot of the fun in these stories is learning about subcultures, underground worlds, niches/cults, foreign culture, unique professions… where you see the social/power dynamics of a group you may not be familiar with. You learn their ways and “the rules” they live under. (e.g. The Mafia, air traffic controllers, 70s era porn, a rural cult, the rave culture, the high-end fashion world, corporate culture, network TV, shady real estate office, penny stock brokerage, etc.)

Institutional Plot Thread: Key Elements

• GROUP: could be family, religion, corporation, friends, school, local council, military, an “issue” based on values and the institutions that uphold them (LGBTQ rights, marriage, racism, sexism), a political office, society… which have rituals, traditions, ethics, values, bonds of loyalties, and rules that put the group above the individual.
• INDIVIDUAL: The hero could be a rebel, an antihero, or someone who is super loyal to the system until one day, they “wake up” and question it. Or maybe it’s someone who’s already burnt out and just needs to be pushed over the edge by the system. There might be a rookie (as prot or sidekick) who is new to this world (just started, or about to join). They are the stand-in for us.
• CHOICE: Will they stay or quit? Will they stay loyal or betray the group? Will they keep secrets of leak? Will they grind and burn out or leave the group? Will they surrender their individuality or destroy the institution? When they give in to the group, it’s often a cautionary tale, because the prot gives up their individuality and/or sacrifices other aspects of their life (e.g. family, love, or freedom). Often, they end up dying (literally or symbolically) for the group. They destroy their sense of self in order to serve the group.¹
• THE LOYALIST: You want a character to exemplify the group’s ideals. The paragon. (May sometimes be the protagonist). But you contrast this life with the one rebelling/questioning. Or if the Prot is the loyalist… you show their internal struggle as they figure out their beliefs with what they know now.

Institutional Plot Thread: Progress Bar

A SERIES OF ARGUMENTS: The key here is to show clear arguments for both sides. If you don’t, you run the risk of becoming a polemic/propaganda, a preachy story nobody wants (except a targeted audience that wants to be sold one-sided beliefs, of course). In a good “issue story”, you want to raise questions, not answer them. Your job is to arm the audience with understanding why characters from both sides are the way they are even if they might not agree with their methods. Even in the “Abused Rookie” type of story, you want to contrast what the rookie thought was positive about the institution through their innocent eyes, while you compare/contrast it to how the Evil Mentor exemplifies its rotten core. In “corrupt police/politic” stories, you might want to show how there’s potential to clear out the corruption and restore order. The opening parts present all the pros and cons of the world as we explore it. Then the rebel/anti-hero starts to question and fight the system or escape it. If it’s a SHAKEN FAITH story, the prot is investigating and questioning their faith. There’s a lot of debate. If it’s a REBELLION, you get a spy-ish story where the prots take down the system. For those stories, you really need to dramatize how the system dehumanizes, exploits, and abuses its people.

Institutional Plot Thread: Plot Beats

“Shaken Faith” Institutional Plot Thread

• STASIS: Dramatize or show the group/establishment doing what it does best, a ritual/tradition. Maybe show how rigid the system is. Maybe show the group dynamics (a tour of the different parts). Maybe show how some people are lost, exploited, or neglected in the system. Maybe show an appeal to authority where a case of neglect happened.
• DISRUPTION: Maybe it’s something they accidentally saw and they start to realize that the system isn’t perfect, and curious, they will start teasing this loose thread. A brief glimpse at corruption, imperfection, or incompetence. Nepotism, bribery, covering a mistake as in “you weren’t supposed to see that” or “it’s not what you think”. Or it’s a percolating issue that’s always been there and it’s coming to light again (an issue like racism, sexism, abuse, gang violence, etc.) but the prot is seeing it in a renewed light.
• B-WORLD: The prot begins to suspect more and sees the system in a new light. Chases down things off-the-books in their off-time. Their faith is shaken and they want to believe what they saw was a one-off. They investigate. They do things to protect themselves. They want to believe.
• MIDPOINT-to-LOWPOINT: The prot digs too deep. Gets caught or in trouble. Or gets too obsessed and screws up on the job they’re supposed to be doing. Or they get a friend killed or in serious trouble.
• CLIMAX: The Prot finds a lead. Follows it. Confirms suspicion. Their world is shattered. Or they go through a crucible and their faith is renewed in the system.

“Abused Rookie” Institutional Plot Thread

• STASIS: This can be done very fast if it’s a known system, like the police department, legal system, or military-industrial complex. Since, we’re showing the corruption of the system, and the destruction of an innocent prot, maybe show how proud they are of graduating from the academy or whatever. Dramatize their naiveté, idealism, or some reason-why origin story of why they decided to fight so hard to be a part of this institution.
• CATALYST: The ingenue prot who just “joined the force” (or whatever group) is assigned a mentor/partner/trainer (the antag), but the antag is asking the prot to do things that are slightly wrong, unethical, or off-the-books. However, the prot doesn’t question the antag because the prot “wanted their whole life” to join this institution. Antag gives prot a series of “tests” that progressively get more and more borderline insane. Or the abuse goes from “small tests” to increasingly exploitative/abusive. This antag is obviously evil and has chewed up and exploited many others before this prot.
• B-WORLD: Antag shows the Prot “the real way of things work around here”. It goes against everything the Prot learned in school. The Prot could be sexually/violently/psychologically abused, harassed, or told to “unlearn everything” they did in school/academy/whatever. The Prot is so eager to “do well” that they go along with the mentor’s abuse, but we as an audience see how fucked up this situation is.
• MIDPOINT-to-LOWPOINT**: Abusive antag involves prot in a crime, conspiracy, or scheme that will get them in a lot of trouble. So now the prot is trapped and miserable. Prot gets a cut of the dirty money, “gets the girl” but in an unethical way, or some other “thing they always wanted, but not in this way”. Prot has to do something gross, negligent, against everything they thought this institution stood for. Maybe they’re left holding the bag in a crime. They’re the sacrificial lamb for the mentor. They get fired, or demoted, or silenced.
• CLIMAX: Prot gets out of the conundrum antag put them in. Prot is wiser now. Prot is pissed off now and has to take down the antag. Or Prot works up the courage to quit (for a while). Maybe prot sets up the antag, or just plains fight them, or through a legal case, bring them down. Or uses the same dirty tricks they learned from the antag to use back against them (a taste of their own medicine), and actually wins their respect. Chewed up by the system, prot escapes, but tainted. Or if a darker ending, they replace the mentor/teacher/partner and the cycle begins anew.

“Rebellion” Institutional Plot Thread

• STASIS: Dramatize how the system crushes, exploits, and dehumanize people. It could be from the perspective of the worker bees. It could be an invasion. Maybe show how some people are neglected, exploited, and/or abused. Maybe the prot’s family/village/community is threatened, bankrupt, destroyed, or murdered.
• DISRUPTION: Maybe it’s something they’ve always known about but they just can’t put up with it anymore. Maybe they’re accused of something they did (or didn’t do) but it’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back on how horrible the system is. Maybe the boss assigns yet another shitty job, or pontificates on why they’re a fuck up and always will be. Maybe there’s an unusually cruel ritual the system enforces in order to maintain control… and the prot, or someone close to the prot is sacrificed to this ritual. The prot has “awoken” and can’t just live this way anymore.
• B-WORLD: Prot starts to rebel in their own way. Maybe they goof-off and waste company time/resources. Maybe they start a “secret club”, or an openly, passive-aggressive public one. Something, anything to undermine the system. Or humanize it in the face of the dehumanizing system. It can be play, games, fun, creating art, putting on a play. It’s about being human. It’s about breaking the rules, laws, or whatever the bosses say you have to do. Or at the other end of the extreme, they organize. They covertly start building (or joining) an underground resistance (union, rebel alliance, secret department, etc.). They get assigned their first few errands to test their loyalty. Maybe there’s a training montage or a introduction to the key allies.
• MIDPOINT-to-LOWPOINT: A mole is discovered. A leak occurs. A cell is discovered or attacked. Their plan to rebel went awry. They get noticed. They get caught. Stakes are raised. Someone dies. The bosses put a stop to the fun. They set more rules. They punish people. They have a talk with the organizers. They hire consultants.
• CLIMAX: Prot gets a breakthrough. They get the secret plans. They get a “narrow window of opportunity” to make an attack. They plan and execute a sabotage, leak, assassination or something to take down the system. Or at least begin to. Or there’s a scheme to expose the company, embezzle money, or destroy it from within. OR all this was started in Act 2 and now it’s coming to fruition. They either succeed and it’s a triumph of taking down unchecked power, or it’s a failure and terrorists (resistance/partisan fighters) are crushed.

Sources & Resources

• Snyder, Blake. Save the Cat Goes to the Movies. Michael Wiese Productions, 2007.
• Sanderson, Brandon, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler, and Dan Wells, hosts. “11.45: Elemental Issue, with Desiree Burch.” Writing Excuses, season 11, episode 45, Dragonsteel Production, 6 November 2016, https://writingexcuses.com/11-45-elemental-issue-with-desiree-burch/
• Sanderson, Brandon, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler, and Dan Wells, hosts. “11.47: Issue as a Subgenre, with Steven Barnes.” Writing Excuses, season 11, episode 47, Dragonsteel Production, 20 November 2016, https://writingexcuses.com/11-47-issue-as-a-subgenre-with-steven-barnes/
• Sanderson, Brandon, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler, and Dan Wells, hosts. “11.48: Elemental Issue Q&A, with DongWon Song.” Writing Excuses, season 11, episode 48, Dragonsteel Production, 27 November 2016, https://writingexcuses.com/11-48-elemental-issue-qa-with-dongwon-song/
• “Lecture #2: Plot Part 1 — Brandon Sanderson on Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy” YouTube, uploaded by Brandon Sanderson, January 29, 2020, https://youtu.be/jrIogch5DBU
• “Lecture #3: Plot Part 2 — Brandon Sanderson on Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy” YouTube, uploaded by Brandon Sanderson, February 12, 2020, https://youtu.be/Qgbsz7Gnrd8

All other plot thread notes here