You’ve become a follower of my thinking, more than I am myself!

It makes a lot of sense to consider that ‘twist’ the actual end of the act, as it often comes with a mini-climax. I like to think of such a cliffhanger as a perfect act-ender as you can transport it straight to television, where each act badly needs this.

But for film, this is often a matter of execution. Personally, I see scenes from the POV of the antagonist as the opening of Act 2, although they seem to fall under your definition of ‘newest and biggest obstacle’.

There is also the matter of the ‘threshold journey’. If there is a significant sequence going from 1 into 2, do you consider this as the end of 1, or beginning of 2, or something different altogether that separates them? I think this becomes a matter of semantics.

Dramatically however – and in terms of what your story is really about – the character’s determination/decision to respond to the inciting incident/CTA is still what concludes the setup.

“Show, don’t tell” – that subject needs its own post, I reckon. One flub I’ve been guilty of in the past is “showing and telling”, i.e. showing an emotional reaction and then unnecessarily reiterating that emotion in dialogue.

As for goal establishment being the end of Act 1 – personally, I feel Act 1 ends a little bit after that. Once you’ve established the twist into Act 2, i.e. what the newest and biggest obstacle is going to be to the hero’s goal for the rest of the story… then I reckon you’re off to the races.

What say you?