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Q&A Skipping the first act?

In traditional story structure theory, the ACT 1 is made to set up the world and host the inciting incident, the ACT 2 is made for the main quest and sequence of obstacles, and ACT 3 is made for th...

1 answer  ·  posted 7y ago by FraEnrico‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Question structure 3-acts
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T07:09:11Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/30794
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar FraEnrico‭ · 2019-12-08T07:09:11Z (almost 5 years ago)
In traditional story structure theory, the ACT 1 is made to set up the world and host the inciting incident, the ACT 2 is made for the main quest and sequence of obstacles, and ACT 3 is made for the resolution.

Is it possible to completely skip ACT 1 and begin a story right in the second act, where heroes are already in the middle of the quest? I'm not just talking about medias res. I'm talking about making implicit all the background and establishing scenes, and to summarize them in memories or tales. I would like to write a novel which shows the heroes' quests rather than "wasting time" with all the "normal world" to be created and then destroyed.

For instance, _The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring_ would begin with the hobbits marching to Bree, and the reason why they are doing so would come out in their conversations, in their memories, and so on.

The movie _Dunkirk_ for instance gives all the context for granted, and proceed to a full-feature of action and resolution.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-10-13T09:41:39Z (about 7 years ago)
Original score: 8