Written-By-Numbers Drinking Game: Madlib Mystery Shows

It’s been a long time since our previous games, but it’s time for another written-by-the-numbers drinking game!

Yet again we are putting both our drinks cabinets and livers in severe jeopardy, now we’ve properly recovered it’s time to tackle another sobriety busting challenge: Madlib Mystery shows

Those shows which decide to keep us all in the dark as they tell an ever more evolving story without ever answering any questions. Lost, Leftovers, Under the Dome, 12 Monkeys, Alcatraz, Helix, Between, Fringe - and so many others. There are no shortages

While drinking copious amounts of vodka will not help you understand their plot lines, at least you have a legitimate reason for not understanding and it may convince you that shit isn’t just being thrown against a wall.

• Overarching Plot:
• +1 drink per episode where no new information is added to the Main Mystery
• Empty the glass if you reach the end of the first season with no new information
• Empty the bottle if you finish the second season and still have no new information
• Grab another bottle and empty it if you reach the end of the third season and still have no new information
• Open a brewery and proceed to drain it if you go beyond the fourth season and STILL HAVE NO FECKING ANSWERS
• +1 drink per blatant filler episode
• +1 drink per episode where the protagonist makes no effort to find any answer
• +1 drink per inexplicable action a character takes to make the mystery harder to solve
• Empty the damn glass if their action is never explained and they’re not an antagonist
• Refill the glass and empty again if they’re actually the protagonist trying to find answers

• Antagonists:
• + 1 drink if the motives of the antagonists is unknown after 5 episodes
• +1 additional drink for every episode after 5 where the antagonists still seem to be acting at random
• Empty the glass if you reach the end of the first season and still don’t have a clue why the antagonists are doing what they’re doing
• +1 drink if the the motivation is hopelessly vague (power without definition. Or Freedom”
• Empty the glass if the antagonists blatantly HAVE that already (so a super rich organisation that has a global conspiracy looking for power)
• Refill the glass and empty again if they literally couldn’t be antagonists without this quality they already have
• Empty the glass if you reach the midseason finale and still don’t know who the antagonists are
• Refill the glass and empty again if you reach the end of the first season and you’re still referring to the antagonists as “shadowy unknowns”
• +1 drink if you learn the antagonists names and someone has clearly sat down and TRIED to think of a sinister name
• +1 drink if “Shadowy Unknowns” would actually be a better name
• Empty the glass if major figures among the antagonists never get a damn name so you have to refer to them by descriptions all the time
• Empty the damn bottle if these masters of shadowy secrets STILL feel the name to exposition their entire plan and raise d’etre to the protagonist!
• Refill the bottle and empty again if they don’t even reasonably try to kill the protagonist quickly and easily
• + 1 drink if the antagonist is a shadowy secret organisation
• +1 drink per element that is ridiculous for a secret organisation
• +1 drink per huge, expensive, showy base
• +1 drink per celebrity member
• +1-3 drinks per ostentatious displays of wealth
• +1 drink per very public fight scene
• +1 drink per public landmark destroyed
• +1 drink per involvement in an industry that should have heavy government oversight

Mystery Shows - Madlibs as Plot

A number of the shows we’ve been following defy genre. When we start watching them we can’t be sure if they’re sci-fi, urban fantasy, horror or even something completely different.

Is this because they are so nuanced, so complex or so groundbreaking that they can’t be so easily categorised?

Usually no - they’re just so lacking in information or definition that there’s no way of knowing what genre they are. Ultimately they are tagged as “Mystery” because that becomes their sole defining feature, mystery. Lots of questions with few if any answers and little real coherent world building - and this will go on for episode after episode, season after season.

Of course, a mystery isn’t necessarily a bad - but all too often this “mystery” is an excuse for some horrendously lazy writing. Sometimes I think the writers just paste story ideas on a board and then throw darts at them at random to see what plot line they’re going to pull out of nowhere next. We end up with a long string of “monster of the week” episodes, without even the excuse of monsters to justify it!

This is a different trope from shows which use random ill-explained and completely unjustified decisions or events within a show to drive the plot forward (for example, Falling Skies) because those shows do have a plot - it’s just a terribly executed plot that the writers should be forever shame for inflicting on the public. No, a Mystery doesn’t even have that - Something happens for Reasons and now everyone needs to deal with the Something and next week something else completely random will happen, also without explanation

As the mystery drags without any kind of answers the plot grows steadily more irritatingly empty and pointless - but always teasing the possibility of answers to try and keep fans engaged. Eventually when the writers finally do get round to providing answers they’ve written themselves into a corner - their episodes have been so random and so lacking in coherence that their big reveal can’t possibly answer all of the mysteries they’ve raised

Lost really started the trend of writers including mysteries into a series with viewers watching each week desperately looking for hidden clues. Lost was so popular in part because they convinced viewers that they had a grand narrative which would play out over time and have a spectacular end. From the moment we found that the survivors landed on an island and were not alone, the mystery began. Writers included: Hurley’s obsession with the numbers 4 8 15 16 23 42, polar bears on a tropical island, a plane filled with drugs crash landed on the island.  Who was Jacob and what was his purpose? Who could forget the Dharma Initiative? Both the flashbacks and the flashforwards were absolutely meant to give the viewer a sense that the writers were falling a strict plan. Viewers made excuses for the slow pace of the show claiming that the authors were forced to keep drawing it out because they had no end date.  What started as a very popular show found that it steadily lost viewership for the simple fact that the writers kept asking questions. In fact questions inside of questions would be a more accurate statement.  In the end, it turned out just as viewers had always feared, the writers were making it up as they went along.  As a viewer I can think of no greater slap in the face.  Just throwing things against a wall for funsies while having people spend hours contemplating the meaning of your supposedly deep and detailed show is just plain and simple an asshole thing to do. Well done Lost.