Mfonobong Inyang: Exploring Stories With Shock Value

In this instalment of perspectives on storytelling, I want to explore how shock value and outrageous plots have been used to shape communication. Some of these stories are fictional, while others are factual; however, they illuminate how the abnormal can be normalised. 

Acrimony

If you watched Tyler Perry’s Acrimony and you weren’t conflicted on who should assume mea culpa between Melinda and Robert, then you’re special because even seven years later, fierce arguments still ensue about which person should have done better. Melinda and Robert met in college under dire personal circumstances. Despite being academically gifted, Robert couldn’t afford a roof over his head and had to settle for an RV. Melinda had a decent socio-economic background, but she wasn’t exactly the brightest student in class. Robert’s move to help Melinda with her grades sees the platonic relationship quickly evolve to a romantic one, and despite Robert cheating on Melinda with Diana, they both get married. It can be tempting to put Melinda in the crazy wife group chat, but here wa a woman who gave up her boyfriend, her womb and basically her life to support Robert’s dream. Yes, she got tired and walked away, but seeing him reunited with the same girl that he had cheated on her with many years ago, stirred up something in her that few people are equipped to manage. Indeed, hell has no fury like a woman scorned.

Robert argued that he had never cheated on Melinda since then. Yes, she carried the financial weight of the family as he spent years trying to launch the Gayle Force Winds. In his defence, he didn’t stake out Prescott’s office with Diana in mind; Diana was employed much later. She didn’t just give him a place to stay, help him get in the door to pitch his idea, but also played no small part in ensuring he got the partnership while retaining the product’s intellectual property. Robert acknowledged Melinda’s contributions and gave her a generous cheque in appreciation. Did he go too far when he did exactly what she promised Melinda for Diana? You see why that movie is crazy; each side has valid arguments.

The Yassification of Absurdities

There is a quote I don’t like to reference about Nigeria. Still, when I was writing this, it unfortunately captured a dystopian perspective of the country: “if someone explains Nigeria to you and you understand, it means the person didn’t do a go job of explaining to you”. I had to insert this because of the narrative that those who know nothing about nation-building love to push; how those who call out the ills in the governance of the country are somehow de-marketing Nigeria. For a moment, let’s go through some headlines and, at the end, evaluate in your own words how such stories resonate in the minds of right-thinking people around the world.

It’s bad enough that we’re still spending a ton of money on needless commissioning, but how do you explain that there is pomp and circumstance over the commissioning of less than 5% of a project? The same government that claims to have saved billions from removing subsidies and recovering illicit funds is still requesting external loans? Do you know that the biggest infrastructure project in Nigeria was commenced without the legally required environmental and social impact assessment? In a well-governed country, allegations of the budget being padded to the tune of billions should be the biggest news, but it’s not. The good people at 1BudgIT did the Lord’s work of highlighting, amongst other things, that N390bn was being budgeted for 1,477 streetlights – amounting to a staggering N266m for a single streetlight!

In 2025, some pupils had to sit for their WASSCE at night and with the aid of candlesticks, and we are moving around as though this is a normal thing? You don’t need to be a child psychologist to know that the event is sowing seeds of trauma in the psyche of those kids. When next you are eager to tell people that they are de-marketing Nigeria, ask yourself: “Are these the best stories we can tell the world?”

Bran The Broken

HBO’s Game of Thrones is one of my favourite series of all time. Based on the fantasy novels of George R.R. Martin, an unlikely hero was ultimately elected to sit on the Iron Throne to the amazement of audiences. Bran was one of the two sons of Lord ‘Ned’ Eddard and Lady Catelyn Stark of Winterfell, the ancient capital North of Westeros. Aegon the Conqueror had made a throne from a thousand swords, which was fused by dragonfire. Many characters had fought and died in a bid to sit on the throne, which came to symbolise leadership of Westeros. Two famous characters that desired to sit on the Iron Throne were Daenerys Targaryen and Jon Snow; at some point, they forged an unlikely alliance ahead of the Battle of Winterfell, in which they ultimately defeated the Night King and the White Walkers. Their relationship gradually morphed from a military pact to a romantic one, which led to the tragic necessity of Jon killing Danny to prevent a further descent into a dark path. With Jon Snow being banished, who then should sit on the Iron Throne? 

Many years prior, Jon’s half-brother, Bran, had stumbled upon an incestuous relationship between Cersei Lannister and her twin brother, Jamie. Jamie, in trying to get rid of the human evidence, threw Bran from a tower, and the fall not only paralyses him but leaves him unconscious. After awaking from months of being in a coma, Bran is plagued by intense dreams of a figure urging him to travel north beyond the Wall. He would later embrace those nudges and develop mystic abilities. This background is important because here is a young man who had dreams of becoming a knight since childhood, physically incapacitated by sheer wickedness, but willed into a leadership role despite his limitations. So when a vacancy for the Iron Throne had to be filled, the genius himself and Hand of the Queen, Tyrion Lannister, came up with a brilliant pitch for who he considers the best candidate: a storyteller!

Tyrion’s words: “What unites people? Armies? Gold? Flags? It’s stories. There’s nothing in the world more powerful than a good story. Nothing can stop it. No enemy can defeat it. And who has a better story than Bran the Broken? The boy who fell from a high tower and lived. He knew he would never walk again, so he learnt to fly. He crossed beyond the Wall, a crippled boy and became the three-eyed raven. He’s our memory. The keeper of all our stories. The wars, weddings, births, massacres, famines, our triumphs, our defeats, our past. Who better to lead us into the future?”

The Good News: Almost Too Good To Be True

Whenever I read the Bible, my mind just goes all over the place. Pictures of those events are somewhat created in my imagination, and sometimes I simulate scenarios. There are many instances when I wonder what would have happened that wasn’t expressly documented, and here are three such examples of stories that had the elements of possible awkward conversations:

Abraham and his wife, Sarah, tried unsuccessfully to have a child, and even after God promised that they would have their own biological child, they had to wait for 25 years for Isaac to be born. Fast forward many years later, God tells Abraham to take that same Isaac that he and his wife had waited many years to have and offer him up as a sacrifice upon the mountains of Moriah. The very next morning, Abraham got with the programme and headed for the place he was instructed. I’m not sure Sarah was cc-ed in that email because Abraham went to explain the tire. What story do you tell to convince a woman who had waited decades to have a child, who was named Isaac because he literally made her laugh? Indeed, Abraham deserved to be called the Father of faith because he ultimately cast a powerful shadow of Jesus Christ’s death, burial and resurrection; he believed that God would somehow bring Isaac back to life even if he sacrificed him.

There is no documented evidence that Jonah was married. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when he was gisting with his wife upon his return from his missionary trip. How awkward would recounting be? Here was a guy that God told to go and preach in Nineveh so the people could change from their wicked ways, but Jonah had other ideas – he took a ship that headed for Tarshish instead. In his mind, he thought he was running away from a God who is omnipresent, e think say e dey wise. God jejely arranged one huge fish to swallow him for three days and three nights. What Jonah didn’t know was that God wanted to use him to cast a powerful shadow of Christ and the gospel of grace. Not only did the Ninevites repent from their wrongdoings after he eventually preached to them, but Jesus would personally reference this episode: “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth”

An angel appears to Mary and informs her that she will conceive a child supernaturally without the seed of a man; she somehow believes, but there’s a small problem – she was engaged to Joseph. How would she explain that story to anybody, let alone her fiancé? In the history of humanity, there had never been a pregnant virgin before. That description itself is an oxymoron because you cannot be pregnant and remain a virgin, nor can you maintain your virginity and get pregnant. So I don’t blame Joseph for planning to quit the relationship because the story sounded crazy to any right-thinking person. That’s why an angel also had to appear to him to dispel any insinuation of infidelity. For the very first time, the world would witness an immaculate conception to fulfil what God said in the Garden of Eden about the “seed of the woman”. Biology teaches us that it’s the seed of the male that fertilises the eggs of a woman, hence the incarnation of Jesus (the last Adam) as God in the flesh makes sense because he was not fathered by the sperm of a mortal man.

I’m Not Black, I’m OJ!

Orenthal James Simpson, better known as O.J. Simpson, was a football star and a famous actor at the time. He was also married to Nicole Brown Simpson. Long story short, Nicole and her friend Ron were stabbed to death outside Simpson’s apartment. Simpson was then charged with both murders. Instead of turning himself in to law enforcement, he chose to be a fugitive. The infamous car chase between him and the cops would follow. Given his celebrity status, the racial undertones and other distinct elements, his criminal trial was dubbed by the media as The Trial of the Century. The coverage gripped even political coverage such that the first question then Russia’s president, Boris Yeltsin, asked Bill Clinton, who was the president of the United States of America at the time, was this: “Do you think O.J. did it?” Depending on who you asked, Simpson was either guilty or innocent. 

Getting unbiased members of the jury was a huge task by itself; it wasn’t just Simpson that was on trial, the city, the LAPD, the media and the judicial system were also on trial. Despite the circumstantial and forensic evidence, his defence lawyers, collectively known as the Dream Team, simply told a better story than the prosecution. The most memorable line in the trial was from Johnnie Cochran: “If the glove doesn’t fit, you must acquit!” That, right there, was the killshot.