What’s the easiest way to identify your story’s theme? How do you make sure your theme ties to character arcs so that it stays at the center of your narrative?
To answer those questions, you must look at the characters in your story. As the life force of your story, your characters reflect the human component that grounds everything in a reality we can all relate to. If we don’t care about those characters, no amount of plot or action will breathe life into their story.
In this article, I’ll use The Matrix as a case study to show you how to properly align your character arcs with your story’s thematic truth.
Four Ways Theme To Use Theme To Write Strong Character Arcs:
Character arcs are most effective when you know how to tie them directly with your thematic premise. There are limitless ways to express that premise, but ultimately, it should produce a question designed to drive your character’s inner and outer transformation through conflict.
While it’s easy to focus on the intricacies of plot as it relates to the outer conflict, your character’s inner conflict reveals the underlying truths they need to accept in order to align with your thematic premise. If your story is simply a series of events that happen to someone, your reader will find it difficult to care. But if you infuse your characters with inner conflict that influences their choices amid external conflict, then you’ve successfully unlocked how to tie them together. And it’s when those two intersect that your theme is ultimately revealed.
Lie vs. Truth
To see how theme ties directly with your character arc, you must start with the lie they believe about themselves and the world around them. That lie is an inherent flaw in their way of thinking from the beginning. And yet, it’s often ignored because they’ve lived a life where that lie has gone unchallenged.
Your character’s inner conflict starts when the story’s central truth directly opposes the lie they believe. While the external conflict serves as the stage where that struggle unfolds, that inner battle ultimately reveals your story’s theme.
Take a look at The Matrix. We meet Thomas Anderson, a computer programmer who moonlights as a hacker named Neo. He has suspicions about his world but buys the lie that he’s living an insignificant life where he controls his own fate. His inner conflict begins when Morpheus challenges that lie with the truth about the Matrix.
The story’s central theme is that enlightenment isn’t found in what can be seen or touched but in matters that require faith and belief. Neo must come to believe this truth if he is going to become who he was meant to be.
Want vs. Need
The lie your character believes is rooted in what your character wants. This usually leads them to formulate goals they believe will satisfy that desire. They often don’t realize that those wants inevitably attract external opposition because they’re adhering to a lie that opposes the story’s truth.
Your characters’ struggle with their specific lie ultimately reveals what they want, while the story’s theme reveals what they need. Their acceptance of that truth requires that they give up what they want so they can attain something more significant.
In The Matrix, Neo wants to know the truth about his world. That desire leads him to seek out Morpheus. But once Morpheus reveals the truth, Neo is unwilling to accept it, mainly because there is now a responsibility that comes with it His want changes. He immediately desires go back to his life before he knew the truth—to remain a regular guy in control of his own life. But the truth of his existance has changed things. Neo needs to let go of the lie he once believed and accept the responsibility before him if he’s going to discover his true potential and reach a more enlightened state.
Thematic Choice
The outer conflict is where your character’s inner conflict is played out—where the truth challenges the lie, and their want is rewarded by need. These threads tie into your character’s choice to align themselves with your story’s theme.
In The Matrix, Neo’s inner struggle with belief leads him to the Oracle. What follows is a scene that masterfully highlights the lie Neo is clinging to while pointing him to the thematic choice that will ultimately define who he is.
When things play out exactly as predicted, Neo sets aside his doubts and embraces the belief that he can save Morpheus, thereby assuming the role of The One. This choice to embrace the truth puts him into direct conflict with Smith and his minions, allowing the outer conflict to be the stage where his inner conflict is resolved.
Thematic Change
Your theme is the active force that elicits change in your characters. It ultimately leads them to resolve their inner conflict and initiate change in the external conflict. Without this thematic change, your story will be fundamentally problematic.
Neo’s choice to believe in his ability leads to change that affects his character and the overall story. Not only is he able to save Morpheus, but his new-found confidence empowers him to go toe-to-toe with Agent Smith. But belief is to merely ‘know the path’ before him. Ultimately, to ‘walk the path’, Neo must figuratively die to his old self and be reborn as The One.
Neo’s transformation not only resolves his own inner conflict but it also drives the outcome of the external conflict. And while the overarching conflict of the war between humanity and the machines is still very much alive, Neo’s choices have essentially changed the game.
Summing it up
I hope this article helped you understand the importance of character arcs as they relate to your story’s theme. When you allow your character’s inner conflict to intersect with your story’s external conflict, your thematic truth will beautifully emerge in the middle. Strive for that organic approach as you work to craft your stories. Look for additional ways to make this work for you. And above all, keep writing!
Until next time,
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