
The
Inciting Incident rocks your hero's world to its foundations. It is
always a conflict between your hero and the antagonist. It should be
obvious to the reader that after this confrontation (direct or by proxy)
your hero cannot go back to his normal life.
The Inciting Incident should be logically connected to your Hook, even if the connection is full of bending and backtracking.
The
Inciting Incident is usually imagined as a direct confrontation between
your main antagonist. But if you plan to have your main antagonist stay
in the shadows until the final show-down, you can use a proxy. That's proxy not proxies.
Even if your hero faces off against a group, one opponent should stand
out from the crowd and be the main opponent. This gives the reader
someone to fixate on.
The
Inciting Incident often includes a reaction section in which the hero
internally commits to the journey. No matter how violent the Inciting
Incident – even if he is bodily thrown from the Ordinary World into the
Adventure World – the transition is not complete until he recognizes
there has been a change. He doesn't have to be happy about it, he can
resolve to get his ordinary life back, but he has to recognize that
things have taken a dramatic turn.
Even
adventurers – those heroes who go looking for change – have an Inciting
Incident that propels them through this first point-of-no-return. Their
Inciting Incident is still (traditionally) some sort of conflict and
confrontation.
Whether
your hero is kicked out of the Ordinary World or is leaping at the
chance to leave, the Inciting Incident marks the place and time when the
inner conflict is jolted into motion. There are two main scenarios
here. 1) The inner conflict was static before. 2) The external conflict
creates an inner conflict. More than one inner conflict can be put into
motion. In either case, the resolution of this conflict should feed into
how the final showdown plays out.
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