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I really enjoyed this one. Very well written and, with its slow pace, this one became more and more intriguing as I read on. And I don't agree with Wesley, this had both a beginning, a middle and an end. Actually I thought the structure was spot on for a 12-pager. The descriptions might have been a little too poetic for my taste - but I like the ingenuity of it. I thought Mason's and Gerald's short relationship was done really well and I liked Gerald's paranoia trip.
All in all I thought this was a damn good script and a clever one too.
Too bad it strayed pretty far from the assigned OWC theme.
Cheers Rob
PS: To me, this feels like it was set in a not too distant future. I mean. the pneumatic mail delivery system seems a little high-tech for a prison (in present time).
Down in the hole / Jesus tries to crack a smile / Beneath another shovel load
This is my first OWC read and I'm sorry, but I didn't care much for this one. It seemed so disjointed. You have a ponderous first page, with lots of description. Some of it I didn't understand. It has a futuristic, Sci-fi element, which seemed intriguing but left me with questions. It also seemed like you rammed together two genres: A prison break drama and a futuristic zombie outbreak. It could work, but it would need rewriting and more pages.
Good formatting. But you took a lot of liberties with the theme, haha.
I kind of get the reaction by Gerald, when he attacks Mason, but thought that it was for the wrong reasons. Maybe Gerald turns on Mason because he wants the patch; it's all about self-preservation. One man to a patch. Survival of the fittest. The zombie part really came out of left field and seemed to be dove-tailed on the story (did I miss some foreshadowing?).
What if Gerald and Mason fight each other over the patch, then realize there is a zombie in their midst. Then we'll see that Gerald has taken the patch and has left Mason to fight off the zombie. -- I'm thinking you wanted to avoid any kind of blood-and-gore confrontation between humans and zombies, so you can stay closer to a theme.
Anywho, I liked that Gerald claims the patch, but in the end, his greed leads him to the zombie nest. That part would have been more effective with a slight skewing of the setup.
I felt you spent a long time in establishing your story, which at times seemed to labor. Then the action part, the zombie thing came in a flash at the end. The payoff was too short. I'd cut out some of the set up and do more with the final scenes. And I would like to see some kind of wrap-up. You conclude with Mason continuing his cross-country walk -- albeit with one messed-up foot. You left it hanging... not Mason's foot, but the story.
One more thing I forgot to mention. Your main character is too passive. All the good stuff is initiated by the antagonist. Gerald might be a scoundrel, but at least he brings the story to life... and death.
Something tells me that, if the genre/theme was drama/fruit stand, this author would've written a zombie script. There is a time and a place for zombies and this wasn't it. In fact, if I knew i was a zombie script, I wouldn't have read it.
All this aside, this story didn't do anything for me. It was two guys walking aimlessly through the woods and talking aimlessly through the woods.
This one was very creative. The OWC theme has already been pointed out enough, I think, so I will just give some opinions.
The line where Mason says "Good to meet you" just threw me off. Mason was giving short answers to every question revealing a very reserved sort of guy and the GTMY just seemed out of character. It seems picky, but this one was written well so I'm just throwing in something to think about.
And then there were zombies. I have a friend who tells really boring stories (or is a boring storyteller) and at the end of every story, when he realizes he has nothing, everybody dies. This reminded me of him when the zombies came out. What?!? Zombies?!? I was shocked and a little dismayed.
I guess my main gripe here is that Mason is too passive. For a main character, he doesn't make many choices. Gerald makes active, conscious moves but everything seems to be happening TO Mason and not BECAUSE of Mason.
The tale was alright. I'm conflicted in finding the zombies as a postive or negative aspect of the story. Its a fresh take to the theme but it gets kind of old though. It was all written well and diagloue was good. Character wise, I guess it was alright for a short. Needs rewrite if you ever plan to make this longer.
Hope this helps, Gabe
Just Murdered by Sean Elwood (Zombie Sean) and Gabriel Moronta (Mr. Ripley) - (Dark Comedy, Horror) All is fair in love and war. A hopeless romantic gay man resorts to bloodshed to win the coveted position of Bridesmaid. 99 pages. https://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-comedy/m-1624410571/
This one kinda tugged me around a bit. At first, it was just boring and all the talking seemed a bit pointless and random. Then things started to get slightly interesting when Mason revealed that he was paroled. I kinda wanted to see where this was leading, and then you through zombies into the mix. What!?
I didn't see the theme in this anywhere... maybe because all of the talking kinda bored me. There was some drama, but I wouldn't consider it a drama. It's more horror because of the zombies.
Guess this is my retort time. I'll try to keep the whimpering to a min. And before I start, let me just say thanks to everyone who took a look.
Theme. Geez I knew I was gonna take a hit on this one. Drama was a little hard to find. For clarification I consulted good ol' Screenwriter's Bible to find drama is not a genre. Drama is just so broad. Drama is what makes things interesting. So I figured I'd take a liberal approach.
Why Zombies? I never did anything with "zombies" before and I figure I'd take a stab. To not stray too much into the horror, I made sure not to include any actual zombie violence. While their aftermath is visible as well as their rage, they never actually get anyone. They aren't the main point of the story. The tension and betrayal of the leads are.
How they came out of nowhere, I don't know. I tried to include enough hints as to their existence as possible with my original intention being to lead the reader to think that "the law" and not zombies are out there. At one point, when M and G are in a cave during the day, Gerald even says "Don't think they're here for us. Just searching." I even tried to make them a little unique in that the only prowl in the day because of some psuedo-cold blooded traits. (Hints: Mason consults his thermometer, M and G only travel at night). It's just funny cause i had one friend read it before I submitted it and he said he sensed them by page 3!
As for the cell, there are two in the story, the first literal and the second metaphorical. No not the open ground with no where safe. The second one is the hatch at the bottom of the ladder. Think about it. It's locked at the top exit and the door is blocked by the zombies. There's no way out. Even more fitting, of the two men, the parolee doesn't get locked in. The escaped felon does. The one that didn't serve his time. I figured that twist would be more than enough to qualify for the prison cell requirement but really no one made that connection.
I can see how the environment could be confusing. There's little to piece together a fair amount of exposition. I could explain it all but I'll wait for re-write time. As for the writing, it's fairly wordy but doesn't break convention to much. Maybe a little bit too many -ing words but it's better than a million sentences starting with "he" or "the." And not for nothing else but if you take the time to read the dialogue, you'll see there are pretty much no pointless throwaway lines.
Obvisiously I got some tweaking to do. It's weird cause it's gotten mixed review so I'll have to be careful what I tweak. I want it to be more accesible without Barney-ing it down. Anyway, enough of my whines. Thanks again for reading.
on my original review I said I didn't know if it fit the genre/theme and in retrospect, I was wrong. I honestly don't know what I was thinking. I did like this entry alot though, good work.
plus I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who keeps the screenwriter's bible handy