Week 2 Seminar: The Bible

The document a writers' room checks before it breaks a story, what goes in one, and what happens when nobody checks it.

3 March 2027

The technique#

A continuity bible is the reference a writers’ room checks before it commits to a story. It holds four things: a timeline, a register of who is who, the rules of the world, and a canon policy that says what counts. It is the record from week 1, written down before the audience has to write it for you.

The case: eight years later#

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) opens in the wreckage of the Battle of New York from The Avengers (2012), then cuts forward with a title card: “Eight years later”. The rest of the film follows straight on from Peter Parker’s trip to Berlin in Captain America: Civil War (2016). Both cannot be true. One line in a bible, the year each film is set, would have caught it before the card was made.

In the seminar#

We build the bible entry Homecoming needed: Peter Parker’s timeline, from the facts you bring. Then you start your own. The Capstone bible begins here, so the universe you pitch today is the one a stranger will try to write into at the end of semester. Continuity Briefing rosters are set before you leave.