How do you make an emotional heart string pulling moment

[Chronitis]

And not a melodramatic one? Is it the writing? The mood at the beginning of the series? What will make someone feel emotions and not just write off a sad moment as being melodramatic?

[Momomori]

i dont know how one exactly does it. aparently ive made that moment happen once (not sure how i did it) but if it's enough to make you cry then its for sure good

[YangKoete]

Usually it has to be;

-Testing a character's bonds with another.
-Testing a character's desires in a crises.
-Testing a character's flaws to push them to work around them.

All while;

-Making the reader feel emotions.
-Not making the story seem rushed.
-Not making the situtation be there just for plot development.

[MidZM]

Oohhhh, SOO many things go into tugging at the heart strings and turning an mild emotional moment into complete wreck. For one you have to write good characters, people have to like the characters they are reading, you have to make the characters involved someone who the audience can either relate too or just want to see them succeed. Then comes the writing, there are many ways to write the emotional moment, one way would be to build it up and then just let the entire thing flow into emotional moment leaving the reader confused, emotional, and wanting more to understand what just happened. After that comes the art (Unless it's a novel in which the writing of the environment comes into play here), using the environment, colors (Or Tones), and making everyone in the story feel the emotional impact of what happened and showing their personalities come into play (In a sad emotional moment, a tough guy might hide his emotions and then explode on someone or something later down the line, an attached character might break down crying, etc).

Writing something emotional may take a while to figure out (I'm hoping to make a certain moment in my comic an extreme explosion of emotion), but if done right your readers will either love you, hate you, and/or have a combination of love/hate. But they might end up wanting so much more

[joannekwan]

First thing's first, establish the characters, their personalities and relationships with one another.
Then show how that relationship grows. Sprinkle in some trials and tribulations.Also express the characters' goals, whether from the start or after the obstacle.
Throw in the sad moment, whether it be a death or something else with permanence.
Show how the character(s) handle it, how it changes them, etc. Bonus points if there is a saying or memento that harkens back before the sad moment, during the relationship growth phase.

I boiled all this down from looking at the first 10 minutes of Up with Carl and Ellie's relationship. I highly recommend watching it, if not just for that opening bit that establishes what Carl is about at the movie's present.

[keii4ii]

I read somewhere that the reader has to know, in advance, what the event (e.g. the loss of their ill father) would do to the character, even if they don't know that event is going to happen. That made a lot of sense to me. It's the difference between watching a stranger go through a tragedy VS watching a close friend go through the same thing. You have to know what it means to the character.

So it's not just the scene itself that's important... it's all the relevant development that comes before it.

[melindemari]

I find that writing any kind of scene up to any emotion; be it sorrowful or excitement; requires you to vividly picture it, don't just think up sad sounding words, or happy ones if the scene is to be a blessed one... instead, if you want to write up a chaotic scene where a person is in true turmoil over the loss of something or someone special, just sit and think for a moment how you would feel if you lost your the person you loved most, don't just think it, let it play out in different ways until you actually cry yourself! Then remember how you that felt and went and interpret it into your writing; nothing is melodramatic when it comes to emotions, unless you play it off as such purposefully!!!

Here's a few example:

She hugged her legs close to her chest, her back against the door, trying her best to hold back the tears...

"Sandra, please... I know you're home... Open up! I'm sorry, alright!" He pleaded with her. She wanted to open the door only to throw it shut in his! But doing so... She knew she'd just forgive him all over. She loved him, yet... She had caught him cheating on her for the last time!

I'd say that is good as 'emotional'

_She held onto the door-knob as if anticipating when John would have showed up; she didn't expect him to already be waiting outside! _

The scene she played out in her mind of walking out just as he would walk up to her front door to beg for forgiveness as he always would and her flipping him off before throwing the door shut on his face!

_"Sandra, please... I know you're home... Open up! I'm sorry, alright!" He pleaded with her. _

"Screw you, John!" she yelled through the door, flipping her hair in jest as if throwing a show for her college friends.

"Sandra..."

And that is a bit more melodramatic yet, still very possible scenario to play out in life!
So it just takes some roleplaying...

[Chroma]

I think really, based on my own experience, the way to really get to your audience's tear ducts is in one simple word: "injustice".

Some of the most heart wrenching moments in most mediums I've seen have come from when a character gets something they just don't deserve. Take The Pursuit of Happyness for instance.

Throughout the movie, Will Smith's character separates from his wife, is kicked out of his home, and winds up in an unpaid internship while he and his child sleep in a public bathroom. The whole movie, I couldn't help but feel awful, nearly on the verge of tears at points. And why? Not just because they were in a bad situation. Because they didn't deserve to be. Throughout the film, his character does nothing but work hard, do everything right, and it still gets him nowhere.

There are other really great examples, although I'll leave out details to avoid spoiling good movies:

One film had a prisoner who was wrongly accused get sentenced to the electric chair, even though he was the kindest and most gentle character in the film.

Another robbed their leading character's right to see his children grow up, even though he left to secure their future.

What hurts the most as an audience member is seeing a character do everything right and still hurt. That's why shows like the Walking Dead are so sad, when one of the kindest and most helpful people are murdered for no good reason.

[dawgofdawgness]

It's all about build up and tension.
Make the reader fall in love with your characters, and then break their hearts.

Also, SUBTLY is the key in many successful heart breaking moments. In-your-face incidents are just gonna make your readers shocked. A lot of the time, letting the reader slowly realize what happened in your story is what really gets to them. ^_^

[mpiradarada]

I suggest revisiting comics and TV shows that pulled your heartstrings and try to figure out how they did it.

So far, my greatest teacher has been the Korean drama 'Reply 1988'.
What I got from it is that you need to create anticipation for the pay-off, keep the emotions bubbling and raging inside until you let them all explode at the end, in a glorious fountain of sweet, sweet tears.

[zetina]

Short answer: by not trying to.

If you try to do it purposefully, that means you're thinking about techniques - clichés, tropes. And people who've read/seen a lot will notice they're being manipulated.

You can sometimes hear about authors crying while drawing/writing a scene or expressing how difficult a scene in their work was for them emotionally. That sort of thing comes from having clearly defined characters with their motivations and feelings conveyed in the work. Sometimes even a small expression on a character's face in response to a small line of dialogue can be heart-wrenching just because you know what it means to them. And in that moment, because you realized after connecting the dots, understanding those characters, you feel so much closer to them. You empathize. Your heart strings are pulled.

A more helpful answer might be... to explore the feelings in yourself and put that in your work. I realize this is not very practical advice but I guess I operate more intuitively with this stuff...