Let’s be honest, fight scenes are one of those things that can either make or break the believability of a story. If they’re really good, they have the audience rooting for the hero and fearing for their lives, or perhaps feeling as cocky as the hero that he’ll win because he’s the hero. On the other hand, if the fight scenes are really bad, the audience will instead read on in confusion wondering what the heck is happening and why the hero doesn’t just do this or use that knife that has been alluded to a hundred times by now. It’s even worse if the fight seems useless to begin with, which is why it’s time to talk about how to write a good fight.
First of all, there’s different types of fights that I feel can be grouped into two main categories: emotional and physical. There can be some overlap between these two, but these are the most general ones and are the ones that will pop up the most often.
Emotional fights are pretty much what they sound like. They are filled with emotions and don’t really use fists or sharp, pointy objects to wound the character’s opponent. Instead, they use words and the characters are either trying to tear each other down, give advice to the second party who won’t listen, etc. To some extent, these are the easiest fight scenes to write as long as there is context to the fight and it doesn’t just pop up out of nowhere. Inspiration for these types of fights can come from your own experiences and can become pretty dark depending on what the characters are fighting about, so you will need to have some amount of emotional fortitude to write them as well as having a good way to end them. If you don’t have a good way to end the fight, it will feel jarring when you switch to the next topic.
Something to keep in mind with this, however, is that both characters do not necessarily need to be being overtly loud and aggressive. Some of the best emotional fight scenes have had at least one character who is being vulnerable or just eerily calm while the other person rages on or simply reprimands them in an calm, but aggressive manner. An example of an emotional fight where someone is being very vulnerable while the other is being aggressive, but calm is the scene where Prince Zuko from Avatar: The Last Airbender is begging his father’s forgiveness during the Agni Kai where he gained his scar in Season 1. You can see through Zuko’s body language and voice that he his not eager to fight Ozai, but Ozai is perfectly fine with hurting his son, even in that state of vulnerability. That argument also sets up Zuko’s later fights with Iroh and with himself, which leads me to my next point….
Emotional fights also don’t need to be between two characters. They can also be between the character and himself. Perhaps the character is upset about something in his life and is fighting his mind as he tries to fix it. Maybe the character is fighting with mental health. An example of this type of fight is Smeagol/Gollum in Lord of the Rings, who constantly has emotional fights with himself as he decides which path he’ll take.
The second type of fight is physical and – depending on how much you know about fights in real life – can be very hard to write in a convincing manner. Physical fights need quite a bit of detail and description to sound realistic and if your fighting lingo only extends to “stab”, “slash”, “punch”, etc. and there’s nothing to describe those actions, it will sound like the fight was written by someone who has never watched an action movie. There needs to be visceral descriptions of what’s happening and what the characters are feeling as they fight. Before writing these fight scenes, I would highly suggest watching some videos or movies that depict real-life fight tactics and brushing up on your fighting lingo. Depending on what type of fight you’re writing (melee, long-distance, a full battle, etc.), also brush up on your history. History can teach you a lot about what tactics work and what doesn’t.
When writing physical fight scenes, you also need to include realistic dialogue, advantages, and movements. In real life, a fight will often be all over the place, moving quickly from one place to another over a span ranging from a few feet or yards (if you’re talking about melee combat) to several miles (if you’re talking about characters on the run or a full battle). In real fights, people will use whatever they have on hand, be that dirt, rocks, the weapons they have, etc. Don’t keep your characters in one spot at a time using only their weapons. Going back to using ATLA as an example of good writing, in the episode where the character Sokka is being trained by the sword master, he constantly is jumping around from wall to wall and is cutting down bamboo stalks to try and slow down his opponent and is praised for it later in the episode.
Witty banter is also something that needs to be in a fight scene, especially if it’s a one on one. It makes the characters seem more personable, can add some lightheartedness, or just straight up explain people’s motives. The fight between The Man in Black and Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride is a perfect example of how a conversation during a fight can aid it. It can also show who is winning and who isn’t, which is especially important when writing books, as books are a medium that rely on telling what’s going on.
Lastly, when writing a fight scene, show who has an advantage and who doesn’t and make them use what they have to their advantage. One of my personal pet peeves when reading or watching any fight scene is when characters have something they can use and just don’t use it. If your characters have magic powers, use them. If they have extra limbs (like, say, a tail or wings), use them. If you don’t not only will your character look stupid, but the reader will also be wondering why they have that power in the first place if they aren’t using it.
Until next time,
M.J.
The Tanuki Corner 
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