I love stories where characters whose lives wouldn't normally cross paths or connect end up doing so while they go through a dangerous situation or crisis together. I always wanted to write my own spin on this trope but never really found my footing. Any tips?
War stories are classic examples. Conscripts from all over a country going to boot camp and training together, then heading off to battle and the intensity there. Take a look at the news. With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, I'm sure that there are hundreds of real-life bondings occurring on both sides of the line at this moment.
It is time to step away from the keyboard and start experiencing real life. I have lots of stories about near death experiences and adrenaline laced moments. Put yourself in some sport, any event, or any situation that has consequences. Go rock climbing, visit the wrong part of town, go talk to a crazy guy. Do something you always dreamed of doing, but were afraid to try. Figure out what scares you the most, and do it. My personal motto has always been, if you can't die doing it, what is the point. Your next story is about you, make it interesting. The old saying about writing what you know is as true as it gets.
I think The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne is a great example: An engineer, a newspaper reporter, a sailor and the sailor's adopted son get stranded together on an island that shouldn't exist and have to conqueror their environment.
[edit] I retract my previous comment which was written the wrong spirit. It’s been a long year so far.
You would probably start with cultural and/or fiscal difference, sort of the big two that affect daily life the most. Once you've established those in a few characters, you add The Great Equalizer (apocalypse, catastrophe, war, isolation). The typical class trope is ruthless businessmen realise that commoners have great merit compared to them when it comes to more basic survival; Mr. Suit can survive Wall St. just fine but doesn't know how to jumpstart a car, or he can calculate compounding interest on a napkin but not dress a wound. This is also applied to morals, too. Mr. Suit has to learn to practise tribal reciprocation rather than solo interest. Train to Busan (2016) comes to mind. I'm not smart enough to do this, but I think a reversal of the trope would be great. The cultural trope seems less common or nuanced these days, but maybe it's just me. For example movies think Dances with Wolves (1990), or Silent Night (2002). People learn that they have more similarities than differences despite nationality, ethnicity, religion etc...
I also love those types of stories for various reasons. One reason is that those bring in fun drama and interesting conversations that we rarely get to experience. If dangerous situations rarely happen or if life is mostly routine, having a chance to meet people you don't ever expect to meet feels more precious and memorable. (I don't know how it would feel if dangerous situations are common). One thing I'm curious about is what a scary situation would do to a relationship. I witnessed a bank robbery once. It happened when I was living far away from my original home, so I was already experiencing things that were unique to me. The bank robber was very sneaky and quiet. Most of the people there including myself didn't know it was happening when it did. What made it dangerous was that the robber was actually standing in line in front of me. Because he was wearing a long coat, his gun was concealed to everyone else except for the bank teller in front of him. After the robber left the building with the money, I saw the shaking bank teller get escorted away by someone who seemed to be her manager. Someone announced that a bank robbery had just happened. I didn't leave right away because I had to open a bank account, but the bank stopped working. The cops came soon after and had everyone stay inside for questioning and background checks. While we were waiting, I had an interesting conversation with an international student and a local customer. I had other experiences that got me with people I never expected to meet. I remember all of them clearly after all those many years.
Don't know if this info helps or not but sometimes different people get to know each other in slasher movies because they are all chased or being hunted by the same killer.
My #1 piece of advice is this: Do not start them out close. Overall, if you are bonding two characters who would not normally be close, you need to keep that in mind. They should fight, they should disagree. But as you said, it is a moment of crisis, and they should have to put their differences aside to survive/succeed. And that is where they get to bond.
Don't know if this would be of any use to to you, but it just popped into my mind. Breakfast Club. I haven't seen it in almost a lifetime, but one thing that always stuck with me was a review in a physical magazine that talked about how several types of people who would otherwise never meet come together. It's not really a crisis situation from my current point of view, but I suppose detention would be to someone in that period of their life.
I like to write adventures and fantasy. It is easier to put the story into fantasy world, where anything can happen. But the events can be also happening in normal world. One idea could be: the main character lives peaceful life until the 2nd character sudenly enters the scene (they can bump into each other or 1st character saves the 2nd, etc.). And then the 1st one have to help the 2nd solve the problems and it leads to other dangerous situations.
