This is my favorite so far.

Solidly written - gripping story.

The fucks seemed out of place in some of the dialogue - got me from inventive scientist to dumb ass too much. Made the voice a bit inconsistent.

For an OWC - outstanding effort.

Revisiting my favourites, just to see which I really like the best.

On the second read, I still like this a lot.

The logic of the "disease" does seem to be lacking, however. We see on the screen some images that strongly suggest he's very much an actual werewolf. The main problem is the image of the sheep.

It seems a stretch that such a change could be effected through making bad choices, as we see here. It's hard to swallow that he believes losing his memory could cure such an OVERT problem.

I mentioned in my first review that I think it would play better if it was either purely human evil, or the monster part was kept metaphorical. My suggestion would be to remove the image of the sheep on the video display.

A very small change that would improve the script's logic, in my humble opinion.

Good work, and a production worthy story. Particularly impressive as it is a genuine twist on werewolf lore.

Rick

*Small spoilers*

Nice!  On my top tier list.  IMHO: A *little* overwritten - but that can be easily streamlined.  Phelan's a tiny bit repetitive... it's not necessary to give us his motives so many times.  And - one recommendation.  Shouldn't Lupus at least scratch Phelan?  That really makes the ending satisfactory and plausible.

But very nicely done...!

Good premise and title. I wasn't hoping for much after the first page, but it quickly picked up and got interesting fast.

I'd have bought it more if he'd paid cash. The bank transfer thing felt a little hokey to me.

Not a bad little story. It needs polishing in parts but I did quite enjoy it.

R

Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind (love that film, btw) for monsters.

I liked the opening. And, the premise is sound, but it didn't work for me mainly because I found the characters unlikable.

The key is always that the monster be not so much likable but that I want him to triumph, despite his flaws and also because of those flaws, but I didn't like either character, and I'm sorry to say I found the dialogue grating. No offence to you personally, writer, your story obviously has its fans and I do appreciate your originality.

Btw, and clearly this is just me - I really hate when inanimate objects (the computers, in this case) are written as 'resting'/'rests'.  A bugbear of mine obviously.

A big positive I must mention: I really liked the Series Of Shots documenting Lupus' past 'activities' - showing us the true monster he is. That added depth to the story. And, you nailed a lot of the mood and visuals.

NOT BORN A MONSTER

The story's good so far, and I don't know why you began to use clichés like following

"And I mean in
my bank account, no bouncing
cheques after you blame me"

Have heard it like – quite often. Probably it should sound cool. A lot of dialogue is not moving anything forward. Cut it if you like.

Then the thing with the money transfer - That didn't grab me at all.

Story's complete somehow; just too much dialogue used, hurting the interesting stuff here imo

Somehow it's pretty dark, but the talkativeness, overshadowing everything, never made me feel there is conviction to serve something new, or perhaps risky. Instead you made it safe,
for what?

Good title and great opening. Lupus' intro is really well done - 'character is action, action is character' is a good rule to write by, and having him lick the blood from his fingers says a lot very quickly. Good work there.

But... for me it lost momentum once we stepped inside. I found the dialogue unnatural and a bit repetitive - Phelan's especially - and not a lot actually happened. We're told about (and briefly shown) the monstrous things Lupus has done, but that's nowhere near as interesting dramatically as being present for some of them. As a film I'm sure this would be heavy on atmosphere, and the one location obviously helps with your budget, but by the end I was a bit bored. I liked the actual finish - greed is the disease, anyone can be a monster - but the getting there was heavy going for me.

I was sort of left wondering if I'd read the same script as everyone else? Didn't love it as much as some above, sorry. I seem to be disagreeing with the majority on quite a few of these OWC entries, though, so you can probably safely ignore my opinion.

Eternal Sunshine of the Werewolf Mind

“PHELAN: Look man, I need a fix. Let's get to it.”  Would a person with access to this kind of tech really be jonesing for a fix? It makes it sound like he’s broke; like performing complicated procedures with state of the art technology is about the same as sucking cock for crack.

It’s no wonder Phelan gets screwed over so much if he leaves his bank account details on the table for strangers.

A lot of interesting ideas in here. The way the werewolf curse ‘transmits’ and the idea of erasing one’s memory to get rid of it. It’s almost used more as a metaphor for evil than an actual curse, which I like (My interpretation was the act of murder caused the transmission. Certainly that’s the metaphor).

I wonder if Lupus wouldn’t work better as a more sympathetic/haunted individual. He calls himself a monster and wants to be better, but he also had a “last meal” before coming and says, rather nonchalantly, that children taste sweet. I think his predicament and murder would be more powerful if he seemed desperate and remorseful.

Also, he says he’s doing this to keep from hurting his daughter’s son, but how did he keep from hurting his daughter? Once again, it might be cleaner if he just didn’t want to hurt anyone anymore.

One of my favorites, though. Congrats.

Hi folks

Thanks for the reads and feedback.

Eternal sunshine for the werewolf mind - pretty much sums it up.

This was a little more rushed than normal so I'm not surprised weaknesses popped up and threw people. I added a few things on a final late night read, and they pretty much were all mistakes.

Concept - I may need to make this clearer, it does need some fine tuning. In essence the script tries to blend monster genre with psychological drama. The idea being that the monster exists because of its human character., so you are not born this way, instead you pick it up through your actions and deeds. When Phelan kills he becomes a monster.

However, I think I need to drop some of the monster attributes - eg licking blood off his hands - and just make him a normal human killer that sees the monster in the mirror and likes it. As though they bask in the bad aspect of themselves. In this way I would drop the sheep killing and the visual of the claws and just remain with normal kills.

Treatment - I saw this as a near future , back street procedure, something you couldn't get in the hospital. Like Tom cruise requires in Minorty report.

Lupus has realised he became a monster on the back of what he learnt to do. If he forgets all this he won't be a monster anymore and won't be a risk to his daughter's son. The irony, hopefully, is that we sympathise a little with the monster because he is sacrificing what he likes for another. Like an addict trying to get clean.

Names - yup will change these. They are actually both wolf names. There are web sites for this type of thing, can you believe it?

Dialogue - yes I wanted Phelan to be an arsehole, so that we can believe his deeds and transformation,  but the feedback I've got it that whilst this was achieved it went too far and became annoying. Good tip to rememeber, don't over do the salt

But for a contained short,  which shouldn't be too bad to film, I quiet like it and will give it a good tidy up.

Thanks Don for the OWC.

Cheers all