Scriptwriters love to complain．They are disrespected by producers，regarded dispensable （可有可无的） by directors，not duly credited by critics，treated like employees by actors-although few complain about being historically and chronically overpaid．Another thing they don't complain about is"the exhaustion of narrative"，though it weighs very much on their minds．For scriptwriters to complain about the insufficiency of original ideas would be like a salesman complaining about a lack of inventory．It's not good for business．

Writers have always known there are a limited number of storylines．And it is increasingly difficult to get out in front of a viewer's expectations．Almost every possible subject has not only been covered but covered exhaustively．How many hours of serial killer plot has the average viewer seen？Fifty？A hundred？This becomes painfully clear to any writer who attempts to orally tell his story （scriptwriter is closer to the oral tradition than it is to literature）．Originality has always been in short supply．Does the proliferation （泛滥） of media mean that it is harder to be original today than it was 50years ago？Well，yea．Today's viewers live in a biosphere of narrative．Twenty-four-seven，multimedia，all the time．When a storyteller competes for a viewer's attention，he not only competes with simultaneously occurring narratives，he competes with the variations of his own narrative．That's real competition．This exhaustion of narrative is behind the rise of recent"counter-narrative"entertainments，such as：

1．Reality TV．Any regular viewer knows that reality television follows its own scripted formulas，but the appearance of being unscripted is essential to its appeal．Weary of so much predicable plot，the jaded viewer turns to reality．

2．Anecdotal narrative．The attraction of films such as Slacker and its mumblecore progeny （呢喃类） is the enjoyment of watching behavior impeded by the artifice of plot．It is not"fake"，not&q