Get Smart, the movie

Don't leave! Also, don't punch me in the nose! Movies are fine, really!

I recently saw Get Smart, and while I don't have the patience to write a real review, I will say that it's awesome (also, frikkin sweet). However, the point of this blog isn't so much to talk about how great it was, but to analyze one of the things that worked, which can be applied to fiction writing in general.

I'm referring to the character of Maxwell Smart. He underscores the failure of all other writers to produce a believable highly-trained-yet-inept main character. Think of any movie starring a cop/spy/CEO/coach who is incapable of doing his job, but due to a series of coincidences and a whole lotta heart, he is able to save the day and get the girl. These movies are typically comedies, and we typically forgive the writers for this because we don't know any better.

The key to Max's success as a character is that he is not inept. Far from it! He's meticulous, fluent in Russian, a good shot, a quick thinker, and generally has good people skills. Additionally, he is accident prone, a little too detail-oriented at times, and sometimes says or does the wrong thing, but for reasons that make sense on some level.

In other words, he's a pretty well-rounded character whose more hilarious aspects are played up for the sake of comedy. The laughter comes from thinking, "This guy is highly trained! How can he do that?", rather than the typical, "Wow, that guy is not even qualified for the insane levels of responsibility he has! He would never even be in that position in the real world!"

See the difference? In Max's case, the audience believes his character earned his position, and the tension comes from seeing character flaws in action. In other comedies in this vein, the source of tension is the audience's disbelief that "that idiot" ever got to "where he's at." Overall, I think Maxwell Smart is more successful.

But hey, that's just me...