Joy is the story's hero, and starts out at the top: she is in control of headquarters, Riley's memories are largely happy, and the other emotions—Anger, Fear, Disgust, and Sadness—are small players in Riley's life. Joy shows particular disdain for Sadness and works to keep her contained, often literally.

This setup tells us that Joy will fall and the story question is: can Joy overcome her internal obstacles to ultimately succeed?

But for a hero to grow, you have to first break them down so much they're left with no other choices but to change. So: how do you break a hero? Inside Out is a case study on how to break a hero in three easy steps.

Step 1: Rip the Hero's World Away

If a hero is successful, it's because the way the hero works fits with the world as it is. To break the hero, the first thing a story must do is rip their world away.

In the beginning, Joy is able to maintain control because Riley is, for the most part, happy. Most of her memories are happy ("... not to brag", Joy says) and so is every one of her core memories. As Joy tells us at the beginning of the story: "[Riley's] got great friends and a great house. Things couldn’t be better." So the story rips Joy's world away: Riley moves from Minnesota to a new house in a foreign place (San Francisco) with no friends.

What follows is a slow progression from bad to worse, and Joy fights to maintain the status quo every step of the way:

• Riley's new house is small, run-down, and dirty. Riley's room is tiny and dark. Joy reacts: "I read somewhere that an empty room is an opportunity."

• The moving van is delayed so Riley doesn't have anything to make the new house familiar. Joy reacts: she gives Riley the idea to play hockey in the house with her parents.

• The hockey game is quickly interrupted by a phone call, and Riley's dad is preoccupied and distracted by work. Sadness tries to take control, but Joy blocks her and suggests one of Riley's favourites: pizza!

• But even the pizza is wrong: it's topped with broccoli, which Riley hates.

At every disappointment and every opportunity for Sadness to play a role, Joy rejects it and redirects Riley towards happiness. But every one of Joy's attempts fails.

It continues and escalates as Sadness more directly interferes:

• Joy plays a memory of the road trip to San Francisco for Riley, but Sadness touches it and turns it blue, revealing a sad side of the memory. Joy reacts: she demands Sadness not touch any more memories.

• Joy has Riley slide down the banister, reflecting her goofball personality, but Sadness accidentally knocks the core memory powering Goofball Island loose. Joy is able to replace it, but...

• Sadness touches a core memory and almost turns it blue before Joy is able to stop her, just in time.

Rather than accepting Sadness, Joy tries to change her:

• Joy suggests Sadness think of something funny. Sadness suggests "the funny movie where the dog dies".

• Joy suggests Sadness think of Riley's favourite things to do, but Sadness can only think of rain making them cold, their shoes soggy, and everything starts feeling droopy.

Joy gives up and instead tries to distract Sadness with giant technical manuals to read, front to back.

As the day ends, Joy refuses to accept that Riley shouldn't be happy despite the mounting bad news. But finally, when Riley's dad is once again called away for work and his stress is obvious, Joy relinquishes control... momentarily. Riley's mom enters at bedtime and says that her dad needs them and needs Riley to stay their "happy girl". Joy jumps at the opportunity to take back control.

This progression of events builds Joy's desperation to maintain the status quo—a happy Riley, and Joy in control—and we see her desperation as she crosses a line for the first time. While Joy is on dream duty, she sees Riley having bad dreams. Joy is desperate to end the day on a happy note. "I know I'm not supposed to do this," Joy says, and unplugs the dream machine. She replaces the bad dreams by replaying happy memories from Minnesota.

The next day, it’s Riley's first day in her new school, and Joy has a plan to guarantee it's a happy day. Joy makes the stakes from her perspective clear: "We are gonna to have a good day, which will turn into a good week, which will turn into a good year, which turns into a good LIFE!" Sadness is not an option, and Joy will do anything to prevent it.

Joy delegates jobs to Fear, Disgust, Anger—everyone except Sadness. Joy has a "super important job just for [Sadness]": Joy draws a small chalk circle on the floor and asks that "all the Sadness stays inside of it".

As with all of Joy's previous efforts to deny Sadness, this backfires. Riley introduces herself to her class, describing happy memories from Minnesota that Joy is carefully choosing in headquarters. But Sadness leaves her chalk circle and touches the memory, and Riley's thoughts turn to her loss of those happy times back home. Riley cries in front of her class, and a new sad core memory is created.

From Joy's point of view, this is a disaster: every core memory has been a happy one. Again crossing a line, she grabs it before it can enter the core memory holder and rushes to flush it to Long-Term through a vacuum tube. Sadness tries to stop her—they struggle, knocking all the core memories out of the holder, and suddenly Joy, Sadness, and all the core memories are sucked up the vacuum tube and ejected into Long-Term.

Step by step, Inside Out depicts Joy's control slipping away. But more importantly, the story shows how Joy's increasingly desperate clinging to the status quo ultimately causes her world to be ripped away, literally and figuratively: Riley is no longer happy, Joy is no longer in control, and Joy is not in Kansas Headquarters anymore.

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Step 2: The Hero Refuses to Change.

Joy and Sadness land in Long-Term after their ejection from Headquarters and quickly find the happy core memories. (The new blue core memory was sorted to a separate side tube—Joy doesn't care, of course.) Without the core memories in Headquarters, the islands of personality have broken down. Joy's new plan: "We—we can fix this. We just have to get back to Headquarters, plug the core memories in, and Riley will be back to normal." In other words, Joy's plan is to return to the status quo as quickly as possible.

Through their attempts to get back to Headquarters, we see Joy still sees no purpose to Sadness:

• When Sadness doubts the plan, Joy dismisses her and tells her to "think positive".

• Any time Sadness touches memories, Joy tells her to stop since they'll stay blue—in other words, Sadness is bad.

• When Riley's old imaginary friend, Bing Bong, is sad that Riley is forgetting him, Joy interrupts him and makes empty promises to persuade him to help: "Hey, hey, don't be sad. Tell you what, when I get back up to Headquarters, I’ll make sure Riley remembers you." Bing Bong has an undeniable reason to feel sad, but Joy reacts as she always does: by denying it.

But, along the way Sadness starts to prove useful to Joy. These build the bond between Joy and Sadness as they find common ground despite their conflicting personalities, as you'd expect in any buddy cop movie.

• Because Sadness had studied the manuals, she knows the way back to Headquarters through the maze of Long-Term and is able to lead Joy.

• Bing Bong sees his rocket wagon dumped into the Memory Dump, where memories are permanently forgotten. Bing Bong is devastated and doesn't respond to Joy's repeated attempts to cheer him into moving on ("Hey, it’s going to be okay. We can fix this! We just need to get back to Headquarters."). Sadness instead sits with Bing Bong and truly hears him: "I’m sorry they took your rocket. They took something that you loved. It’s gone, forever." Bing Bong cries and is then able to move on.

• The Train of Thought (their way back to Headquarters) stops because Riley is sleeping. Sadness suggests they wake her up... though Joy promptly takes the idea as her own. Joy plans to create a dream for Riley that is so happy she wakes up from excitement (Sadness: "That's never happened before."), but it's Sadness who pushes for a scary dream which ultimately works.

• After Bing Bong is locked up in the Subconscious, Sadness cleverly tricks the guards into letting them in by pretending they just escaped. Joy gives Sadness an approving nod.

Through this stage of the story, Joy and Sadness increasingly work as a team instead of adversaries. But Joy only values Sadness in so far as she's useful, and Joy's beliefs remain unchanged:

• Joy watches Sadness help Bing Bong, but she can’t understand why it worked and asks "how did you do that?"

• After waking up Riley, Joy says to Sadness: "Hey, that was a good idea. About scaring Riley awake. You're not so bad." And in the next breath: "I can’t wait to get the old Riley back. As soon as we get there I’m going to fix this whole mess."

• Joy lovingly looks at the core memory of Riley's hockey team cheering for Riley. Sadness says she loves that memory too... "It was the day the Prairie Dogs lost the big playoff game. Riley missed the winning shot. She felt awful. She wanted to quit." Realizing she "went sad again", Sadness apologizes. Joy promises they'll keep working on it when they get back.

Despite seeing the purpose of Sadness with her own eyes, Joy still can't see it. So when the pressure mounts—the Train of Thought crashes, stranding them in Long Term once again, and Joy learns that Riley is running away—Joy reacts in desperation and reveals her true beliefs.

Joy and Sadness try to get into a recall tube back to Headquarters, but Sadness presses against the core memories and they start to turn blue. Joy pushes Sadness out of the tube: "Sadness, stop! You're hurting Riley!" Joy still—despite everything they've been through—believes Sadness is bad for Riley. And so Joy betrays Sadness: she locks her out of the tube to return Headquarters alone, saying "Riley needs to be happy."

Joy's betrayal of Sadness is the ultimate crossing of the line, and leads to the ultimate disaster: the recall tube breaks, and Joy falls into the Memory Dump.

Step 3: Rock Bottom and the Revelation.

Joy immediately reacts as she always does: she sticks to her plan. She gathers up the core memories and desperately tries to claw her way up and out of the Memory Dump. But Bing Bong, who fell into the dump while trying to save Joy, begs her: "Will you stop it please? Don't you get it, Joy? We're stuck down here. We're forgotten."

Finally, Joy stops. The hopelessness sinks in. Despite all her efforts, trying everything—the harder she tried, the further she got from her goal. And it all led her here: rock bottom. In the depths of the Memory Dump, Joy finally accepts that she has failed. "I just wanted Riley to be happy. And now..." Joy’s lost everything. She gives up, lets go, and cries. Joy herself feels sadness.

This sets the stage. As long as Joy's beliefs worked—as it had when Riley was happy, when Joy was in control—she would never change. When her world changed, Joy clung to her beliefs and doubled down with each failure. So to get Joy ready to change, the story had to break her—to bring her to rock bottom. Because at rock bottom, change is the only option left.

Joy looks at the happy core memory of Riley's hockey team cheering for her. A tear falls on the memory and Joy wipes it away. As she does, the memory rewinds and turns sad: Riley is sitting in the tree alone, crying. She remembers what Sadness said about the memory: "It was the day the Prairie Dogs lost the big playoff game. Riley missed the winning shot. She felt awful. She wanted to quit." As the memory plays, Riley's Mom and Dad come to console her. Her hockey team joins and lifts her onto their shoulders.

This brings Joy to her revelation: "Sadness. Mom and Dad, the team... they came to help because of Sadness." Sadness has purpose.

The revelation brings Joy another realization: Sadness is the key to truly helping Riley. Joy is spurred back into action with a new plan: get out of the pit, find Sadness, and bring her back to Headquarters.

We see a new energy and confidence in Joy, replacing her "think positive" rejection of her reality. She leverages her environment instead of fighting it: finding Bing Bong's rocket wagon, using Sadness's blue-memory trail to track her down, and using the Boyfriend Generator to build a tower so she can reach Sadness as she floats by on her sad cloud.

They reach Headquarters just in time, and Joy invites Sadness to take control—Riley is finally able to feel. Waking up from her emotional numbness, Riley gets off the bus and returns home to her parents. She drops the mask of the happy girl and cries. Her mom and dad hug her and share their own sadness about what they've lost in the move. In sadness, Riley also found connection and support.

The movie closes with Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, and Fear sharing a new, enlarged control panel. Joy now knows what Riley needs: not to be happy, but to be whole.

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Why is a setup important? A setup in a story is something planted for the audience which will pay off later. It creates anticipation and, when realized, delivers a feeling of satisfaction. This is often referred to as Chekhov's gun: if you show a gun in the story, it must be fired later. A set up is sometimes obvious, like ominous foreshadowing or Q’s gadgets in James Bond movies, but is often subtle like the clues in the Harry Potter mysteries.

So how does Inside Out set up the rest of the story?

The Setup for the Middle

Inside Out is a story about the inner emotions of 11-year-old Riley personified (Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, Fear). The movie opens on black with a voice over "Do you ever look at someone and wonder 'what is going on inside their head?' Well, I know. I know Riley's head." With a fade in, a baby Riley is introduced before cutting back to the inside of Riley's head and introducing Joy, the story's hero, stepping out of the blackness. Joy watches baby Riley's interactions with her parents through a large, eye-shaped screen. She discovers a button on a control panel and presses it: baby Riley gurgles happily. We see Riley's parents welcome her to the world on screen. Then, a golden, glowing sphere rolls out from behind the screen, and we see it holds a memory of what we just saw on screen. Joy looks at it and places it back on its track, where it continues on and illuminates a magical, glowing machinery around Joy.

2 minutes and 30 seconds into the movie, and a remarkable amount has been established:

• The perspective of the story will be told from the inside of Riley's head, looking out. In other words, inside out.

• The story's hero, Joy, triggers moments of joy in Riley through a control panel.

• Joy's own personality mirrors the emotions she triggers in Riley: she greets each new experience with a sense of wonder.

• Memories are stored in glowing spheres which are then processed by rapidly developing machinery in Riley's head.

• The room Joy is in (which we later learn to be headquarters) starts out black and reveals one new story element at a time: the story's hero, Joy; the screen through which Joy watches Riley's experiences; the control panel; the memory sphere; and the machinery. This avoids overwhelming the audience with unnecessary information, and experiencing it through Joy's perspective ensures each element is given the importance it needs.

While this is an effective introduction of an unfamiliar story world to the audience, more importantly every single element introduced is also central to the rest of the story: the control Joy has over Riley, the memory spheres, and the changing nature of Riley's mind. There are no extraneous details included and cutting anything would hurt the storytelling.

The movie continues with Joy's voice over: "It was amazing. Just Riley and me, forever..." Which, of course, leads to a reversal: baby Riley cries and Joy looks to see a new, droopy blue character pressing the button. Joy and Sadness meet for the first time, and Joy immediately tries to regain control of the button.

And now, within 3 minutes, the movie has also established the central conflict in the story: Joy struggling to—from her perspective—protect Riley from Sadness, and Joy's ego preventing her from seeing the truth that Sadness is an important and necessary emotion.

A montage follows, introducing the supporting cast of emotions while Joy explains their role in Riley's development as she ages: Fear, Disgust, and Anger. All the while, Joy jumps back into control at every opportunity. But turning back to Sadness, Joy says: "I’m not actually sure what she does."

Joy brings the audience to a wall of memory spheres and explains them to the audience, saying "and they're mostly happy... not to brag". Then, she introduces the core memories, each capturing a super-important time in Riley's life. All of Riley's core memories are a golden happy memory

These scenes further establish Joy's character, showing her ego and disdain for Sadness, while also introducing key elements of the story that follows.

A new core memory rolls in, causing a new island of personality to form in the distance. Joy explains that each core memory powers an island (Hockey Island, Goofball Island, Friendship Island, Honesty Island, Family Island), and the islands "are what make Riley... Riley!"

And while there's no immediate danger, now the audience anticipates a disruption to Joy's ordinary world and knows the stakes of the story: something will happen to the core memories, and without the core memories the islands will fail and Riley will no longer be Riley.

The montage continues, showing Joy's ordinary world and Riley's day-to-day, largely happy, life. Riley goes to sleep—Joy remarks "another perfect day!"—and they send her new memories flying into the distance to Long Term (setting up another part of the story world the audience can anticipate exploring).

Finally, the first 8 minutes also sets up Joy’s character arc: she’s in control in headquarters, and Riley is largely happy with every core memory being a happy one. Because the hero of a story is rarely static, we know this story will be about Joy’s fall—losing control and Riley becoming unhappy—and how she must grow and overcome her ego to ultimately succeed.

Joy closes with "And that’s it! We love our girl. She’s got great friends and a great house. Things couldn’t be better. After all, Riley’s 11 now. What could happen?"

And, of course, this is immediately followed by a reversal: Riley's family is moving, which is the inciting incident that sets the story into motion.

The Setup for the End

The first 8 minutes not only sets up the middle of the story—the story world, central conflict, and Joy’s character arc—but it also sets up the end. It’s common for a movie’s end to mirror the beginning to emphasize what’s changed as a result of the story. Inside Out does exactly that.

The opening scene shows Joy in control and obsessed with Riley’s memories being exclusively happy. When Anger, Fear, or Disgust take over the control panel, Joy is quick to make sure it’s temporary. And, Joy has special disdain for Sadness and limits her influence as much as possible.

The end of the movie shows a changed headquarters and a changed Joy: the upgraded control panel now allows Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust to simultaneously control Riley. We see Riley in a hockey game and the seamless cooperation of the emotions. We also see Riley’s new core memories are no longer exclusively happy—instead, they are each a blend of emotions. Joy has overcome her ego and relinquished control, and a new harmony has grown in its place.

The opening ends with Joy saying:

“And that’s it! We love our girl. She’s got great friends and a great house. Things couldn’t be better. After all, Riley’s 11 now. What could happen?"

In an almost perfect mirror, the movie closes with Joy:

“We’ve been through a lot lately, that’s for sure. But we still love our girl. She has great new friends, a great new house… things couldn’t be better! After all, Riley’s 12 now. What could happen?”

This ties the end to the beginning for the audience, letting us know it’s over with a final payoff.

Conclusion

Inside Out is a case study in setups, payoffs, and efficient storytelling. And while the setups in the opening scenes lead to some predictability, the middle of the story still has plenty of surprises in exactly how it plays out.

It’s also a case study in direct storytelling: the important parts are said out loud so the audience doesn’t have to hunt for them. Instead, they know exactly what the story is about and what to expect and can enjoy watching it unfold.

The story: A middle-aged father of 3 starts writing stories for his children during the covid lockdowns and rediscovers his passion for storytelling. Determined to turn his hobby into a career, he braves the competitive world of self-publishing. But will he make it?

Fraser held the book in his hands:

His first self-published book Ben and His Elf Save Christmas turned out just the way he wanted. He had put a lot of time, effort, and love into it. He had used fiverr to contract cover art, developmental editing, and line editing. He was proud of it: the story, the themes, the writing, and the finished product. And, he had released it just in time for Christmas.

He hadn't written it to sell. He wrote it for his seven-year-old son, Ben. But he had still hoped it would sell. So he announced the book on Twitter, LinkedIn, and quickly set up an ad campaign on Amazon Advertising. Then, he waited.

A few weeks later, he refreshed the sales page for the hundredth time. It wasn't selling:

47 copies is more than zero, he thought. But 45 of those are probably people I know. And the ad campaigns had only yielded four sales.

I guess hope isn't a plan, Fraser thought. If I want this to be more than a hobby, I have work to do.

Over the next few days, he read Chris Fox's Write to Market. It was the fourth book he'd read on successful self-publishing. The books had a lot in common, and they were all lists of things Fraser hadn't done:

• Pick a market (i.e. an audience and a genre) with high demand (hungry readers) and low supply (not enough books). He was writing for middle grade kids, roughly 8-12 years old, since that's about where Ben was. But he hadn't thought a lot about the specific genre he wanted to write in and hadn’t done any market research.

• Research the tropes used in the genre by reading many books in the genre. While he loved storytelling and what makes a story great—especially character development—he hadn't done a lot of research into tropes. A trope is a recurring plot device or character type which is familiar to readers. He learned that using tropes helps a writer meet reader expectations in a genre. Like, Luke Skywalker as the farm boy who becomes a hero.

• Figure out which books sell in the genre and why, using Amazon to analyze the sales rank and reviews of books.

Fraser's first reaction was tropes sounded predictable. But after some more thought, he recognized that his own favourite stories made heavy use of tropes:

• Harry Potter and The Matrix use the chosen one: Harry Potter and Neo are destined for greatness right from the first act.

• Die Hard uses one man army: John McClane is alone and up against an organized, heavily armed group of terrorists.

• Pitch Perfect uses underdog: the Barden Bellas start out the story without a hope of beating the Treblemakers.

• Edge of Tomorrow and Groundhog Day use time loop: William Cage and Phil are stuck repeating the same day over and over and must figure out how to escape.

The broad strokes of these stories weren't surprising, once you recognized the trope. They all ended just the way he expected them to. Of course Neo really is the chosen one. Of course the Barden Bellas beat the Treblemakers in the 2012 ICCA Regional Finals. But they were still great because of the execution and details of the stories.

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Fraser's second reaction: this sounds like a lot of work. I want to write. I don't want to read a dozen books just to pick a genre for my next story. And I have kids and a job.

And, he'd already had a story he wanted to finish. He'd started it two years ago but had gotten stuck. He liked the premise: one of Ben's friends gets sucked into a Minecraft story on his kindle, and the kids have to figure out how to save him. But he'd reread his draft so far and realized he had an idea, but not a story.

There's got to be a faster way, he thought. Fraser had worked as a software developer for years, and he'd learned to be lazy: don't do work that a computer can do for you.

He pulled up ChatGPT on his computer, a chatbot recently released by OpenAI. He'd played with it a bit and had been shocked at the quality of the dialogue. Worth a shot, he shrugged.

He typed first question in:

What are common themes in middle grade books?

ChatGPT answered:

Common themes in middle grade books include friendship, teamwork, coming of age, and the exploration of new experiences. These books often focus on the challenges and adventures of young protagonists as they navigate the complexities of growing up and finding their place in the world. Other common themes include family, school, and self-discovery. Many middle grade books also deal with important social and emotional issues, such as bullying, fitting in, and dealing with difficult emotions.

Good start, he thought. Teamwork is a perfect theme to explore in this Minecraft story, since the kids will have to work together to rescue their friend.

That's great, thanks. What kind of tropes should I include in a story about teamwork?

ChatGPT answered:

Some common tropes associated with stories about teamwork include characters coming together to achieve a common goal, the development of strong bonds and friendships among the team members, and the overcoming of obstacles and challenges through the power of collaboration. Other tropes that are often associated with stories about teamwork include the mentorship of a more experienced character by a younger or less experienced one, the emergence of a natural leader among the team members, and the growth and development of each character as a result of their participation in the team.

This feels a bit generic, he thought. But maybe I can get it to go deeper:

Thanks, can you give a brief example of storylines that use each of those tropes?

ChatGPT obliged:

Sure, here are some brief examples of storylines that use each of the tropes you mentioned:

• Characters coming together to achieve a common goal: In this storyline, a group of friends must work together to complete a project, win a competition, or save their community from a threat.

• The development of strong bonds and friendships among team members: In this storyline, the characters start off as strangers or acquaintances, but as they work together, they learn to trust and rely on each other, forming deep and lasting friendships.

• The overcoming of obstacles and challenges through the power of collaboration: In this storyline, the characters face a series of challenges, such as natural disasters, villains, or personal struggles, and they must work together to overcome these obstacles and achieve their goals.

• The mentorship of a more experienced character by a younger or less experienced one: In this storyline, an older or more experienced character takes a younger or less experienced one under their wing, teaching them valuable skills and helping them grow and develop.

• The emergence of a natural leader among the team members: In this storyline, the characters initially struggle to decide who will lead their group, but as they work together, one member emerges as a natural leader, guiding the team and helping them achieve their goals.

• The growth and development of each character as a result of their participation in the team: In this storyline, each character begins the story with their own strengths and weaknesses, but as they work together, they learn from each other, develop new skills, and grow as individuals.

It wasn't groundbreaking. He knew a lot of this stuff, on some level. He'd watched enough teamwork movies like The Avengers and The Mighty Ducks. But having it laid out in a structured way helped him draw connections to the exact problem he was struggling with in his Minecraft story: the lack of a structured story. He'd tried to write it by the seat of his pants, but he was coming to the realization he was a planner through-and-through.

Fraser's mind started working: what are the strengths and weaknesses of each of his characters? How would they create conflict and tension? How would the story put them under greater and greater pressure until the only way to succeed was to work as a team?

He didn't have the answers, but he had the questions. That was a good start.

Bonus, he had some content for his first blog post. He drafted the post on a Monday morning and hit publish. But will anyone read it? he wondered as he pushed his chair from his desk. I guess I can always add "failed blogger" to my resumé.

To be continued...