Whether it’s a car insurance quote or writing a script, timing is incredibly important. In car insurance, getting a quote after that speeding ticket falls off your record will produce a much better quote than if you go policy-shopping just after getting a ticket.
In storytelling, timing is partly about pacing, but timing can also be about offering up the right sort of story at the right time. In fact, it can make or break a project.
As an example, look at the Fall 2001 television season, which gave birth to a couple of hits that are still popular today: Smallville and 24.
While there was no way to know that September 11 was going to happen that fall when series proposals were worked out the previous winter and decided on by the networks in Spring 2001, both series benefited from fortunate timing.
In the wake of the September 11 tragedy, America had never been more ready for the escapism of a Superman-based TV show like Smallville. The hope, optimism and patriotism of the Superman character played well into a post-9/11 atmosphere. The selection of “Save Me” as a theme song was also fortunate, as America was completely ready to express a need to be saved in the wake of the terrorist attacks.
On the darker side of timing, 24’s concept of a “do anything to thwart terrorists” hero like Jack Bauer, and the concept of a terrorism-fighting arm of the US government couldn’t have been more perfectly timed. At a time when all of America wanted to strike back at those who’d attacked us, 24 was just the kind of escapism we needed on the “need for revenge” side of the 9/11 equation.
While the Superman mythos plays well nearly every time it’s tried and done well, one has to wonder if, from a timing perspective, 24 would have even made any network’s fall schedule if it had been proposed in Spring 2007, rather than in Spring 2001.
Timing, sometimes, can mean everything.
