I just finished watching The Office again. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve gone through the series. My pattern is to watch The Office, move on to Parks and Rec, then back to The Office. I’ll add The Good Place to the mix, once the last season is on Netflix.
(aside: I may have to dump Netflix once The Peacock has all the best shows)
(another aside: I guess I like Mike Schur)
Season 9 of the The Office has always bothered me. I find myself skipping entire episodes, and of the episodes I watch, I find myself skipping entire storylines.
This time was no different. I skipped my way through the last season, but this time, I realized what I didn’t like. This was the first time I watched The Office as a writer (rather, someone aspiring to be a writer). The writers and showrunners of The Office fell (or were pushed?) into what I now call the Jam Trap.
As an aspiring novelist, I live in mortal fear of the Jam Trap. I was introduced to its underlying concepts by an author/podcaster named Brad Reed (no relation). Several of his podcasts (here and here) solidified two important concepts in my brain:
- In the context of my writing, I am omnipotent. Anything I can imagine, I can make happen. Anyway I want. To, with or about anyone I want. Wherever I want. I have complete control.
- With great power comes great responsibility (thanks Uncle Ben!), and there are devastating consequences when I abuse my authorial might. Specifically, my readers will consciously or subconsciously get turned off of my characters and/or story.
The Jam Trap is this: forcing characters to act out of character, just because the author needs/wants them to.
Brad Reed talked about ‘fictionalizing your audience’ (in essence, inviting your audience into your story) and ‘keeping your characters alive’ (helping characters seem real, even though they’re not). These are different facets of suspension of disbelief.
An author falls into the Jam Trap whenever he/she, intentionally or unintentionally, reminds readers they’re reading fiction. Anytime readers scratch their heads and think, “That just doesn’t seem right,” the illusion is gone.
I fell into this trap almost immediately. Check out this feedback from one of my beta readers:
“I note this below, but Henry got on my nerves a little when he was going on about needing to find a “respectable job” to repay Smith and Davis. The sentiment is well placed, but his irrationality got to me. I don’t think his skepticism of joining Will and Claire in a treasure hunt would be misplaced. It was more his alternate plan of impossibly earning back all the money that stood out to me. I kept thinking that if his desire was to return to Smith to explain what had happened regardless of consequence, that would be a more plausible conflict and reason to be reluctant in joining in the hunt.”
Ouch.
The reader was exactly right. I forced a character to act a certain way to meet the needs of the plot I’d imagined, even when the character’s irrationality broke my readers suspension of disbelief. This was some of the most valuable feedback I received from my beta readers, and it helped me reformulate my plot and characters to feel more real. I’ve found beta readers have a sixth sense for the Jam Trap, even if they can’t fully articulate what’s wrong. If a reader says, “This seems weird,” beware!
Which brings me back to The Office. I can’t stand the Jim/Pam (Jam – get it?) Conflict storyline of season 9, and I realized, for me, it’s because their behavior is too out of character for both of them. They’re both too irrational, and as I thought about it, subject to the fiat of their writers. Spell broken.
In leveling this criticism, I recognize the difficult, maybe impossible, situation the writers were in. No Michael Scott (unexpectedly, given recent reports). No Robert California (the unsung, perverted hero of season 8 – “Sometimes I feel you don’t know food at all!”). They had to do something.
And they did, at least for two characters, in what I’ll call the Handsome and Stinky Prototype. As much as I dislike the Jam storyline, I love the evolution of Dwight and Jim’s relationship. These two went from mortal enemies, to having a ‘charming back and forth’, to working well together (you know, as RM and ARM and AARM). The Dwight/Jim arch never felt forced (ok, some of the fist pumping in Dwight’s Christmas felt forced, but that’s more about Jam than Handsome and Stinky), but a natural consequence of enduring the many changes at Dunder Mifflin together.
The Jam Trap, and the Handsome and Stinky Prototype, taught me another writing lesson: the more developed a character, the more care is needed when changing that character. Jim and Pam’s relationship drastically changed in season 9, which broke my suspension of disbelief. Jim and Dwight’s relationship evolved through seasons 5-9, which enhanced my suspension of disbelief.
So how does an author get out of the Jam Trap? In my limited experience, the best ways to free myself have been awareness, and beta readers. Just knowing about The Jam Trap helps me avoid it, makes me think about characters, character interactions and plot in a different light. I find myself wrestling with characters a lot more than when I first started, trying to bring plot, character and theme into harmony in a way that invites readers into my story.
And I can’t say enough about beta readers. I need someone to tell me the truth about what works and what doesn’t. I ask my beta readers questions specifically designed to ferret out places where I’ve fallen into the Jam Trap, like “Are any of the characters’ interactions unbelievable or unrealistic?” This feedback is sometimes difficult to swallow, but is vital to shaping a compelling story.
I’m sure as I gain experience, I’ll need to revisit this topic. I’d love to hear your comments of other instances of The Jam Trap, or ways your favorite authors draw you into their books. And if you have opinions about The Office, let them fly. I have a feeling I’m going to get flamed.
