Mark, twisted little tale you've got here. I'm almost scared to ask how you came up with the idea for it!  

I thought that this had been going on between them since before the accident, but I wasn't 100% sure. It was kind of alluded to, but never explicitly stated. I don't know if your intention was to leave it up to the reader to decide, or not.

I had to go back and read it again to try and pick up on little things. Things like when he says 'Her mind is mush. She doesn't feel a thing', makes me wonder if he is meaning she doesn't feel a thing when he's having sex with her. It's easy to look at every bit of dialogue for some extra meaning that possibly isn't there.

With the condoms in her bedside table, was he using those just for the urine or when he was fucking his mum too? (There's a sentence I never thought I'd write) Was it just a condom breaking then that led to her getting pregnant? Or in his drugged out state did he use one of the condoms on his mum that had a hole in it from the drug test?

Overall it's nicely written, I think the ending needs something though. It kind of feels like you didn't quite know how to end it, and it just sort of stops rather than having an ending that really packs a punch. I think because the twist is so shocking it's hard to top that. And after the twist is revealed there's another couple of pages left, and it gradually deflates IMHO. I think the more you can try and get the twist to come as close to the end of the story as possible, the more effective it will be.

Cheers,
Tim.

Mark,

This is the first script I've read since being gone for a month.  Very well written.  The dialogue flowed perfectly for me.  Aside from the disturbing subject matter this is probably my favorite of all your scripts so far.   Good job.  I agree with Tim, though.  The ending drags on just a little too long.

Hey Tim and Michael,

Thank you guys for taking a look at this one.

The idea for this?  That's actually a good question, because I have no idea.  I promise you it's not based on a true story (at least not mine) or anything like that.  Most of my stories I usually base on a weird dream I have or something like that, but this one just kind of popped into my head back in January of last year and I remember thinking, 'Ooh.  That'd be kind of a sick story.'  So I sat down and gave it a shot.

Quoted from trojan I thought that this had been going on between them since before the accident, but I wasn't 100% sure.

I'll have to go back and look at making that more clear, then, because that's one thing I definately wanted to come across was that they were 'loving' each other even before the accident.  (In the last scene, Edward talks about how it wasn't rape, even when his mother was diong it to him when he was a little boy.)  :-)  As nasty as it seems, I'll have to go back and make it stand out even more.  Sorry it wasn't clear.

The condoms on the bedside table were meant strictly for the urine-penis.  I wanted to make that clear after the reveal, but things were getting bulky as it was and I didn't want to overload it.

Quoted from trojan and screenrider, respectively And after the twist is revealed there's another couple of pages left, and it gradually deflates IMHO.  ....   I agree with Tim, though.  The ending drags on just a little too long.

Guess I overloaded it, anyway.  :-)  I'll have to see what I can do about that last page or two.

Quoted from screenrider Very well written.  The dialogue flowed perfectly for me.  Aside from the disturbing subject matter this is probably my favorite of all your scripts so far.   Good job.

Awesome.  Glad you liked it.  And good to see you again, by the way.


Thank you guys both again for reading this.  I'll have to do some more thinking on that ending.

- Mark

Have you considered turning this into a comedy and selling it to the Farrelly brothers? You'd just need to add a couple of retards and a midget and you're all set  

Me, Myself and My Milf
There's Something about Mom
The Vegetarian

(Sorry, couldn't resist)

Mark,

good work on this one. Very white pages.  I liked this one so don't let the following let you think otherwise. It's only my thoughts.

We kind of have three shockers here. The first one being using the mother's urine. I liked that idea btw. Very good. Don't spotters have to actually watch? They do with women. They stand in front of you and watch...   Second shocker is the pregnancy thing. Somehow I wasn't as shocked by that one even though I should be. I think it might have to do with your title and logline. Those two together made my mind think along those lines right away. I would suggest changing the title. Since I was already suspecting the incest with the mother, the mother/little boy incest which is the third shocker wasn't really that far fetched to me. That does by no means mean I didn't like the story! Besides the title change, if you could delay the reveal of the two last shockers to come later it might be more effective. That's just IMHO of course.

Also thought Edward went on a little too much in the end. Some of it started seeming repetitive.

Great work!!  

Quoted from rc1107 Lol.  Which part?  I hope you didn't mean the motherloving.  :-

Ha, not at all. It was this lengthy and detailed message from the parole boards office...

WOMAN
(filter)
You've reached Mahoning County TASC
services for Tuesday, March twenty-
second. The following are to report
for urine screen today. TASC Track
One, Judge Henry's Juvenile Court
Phase One, and TASC Track Four, are all
to report for urine screen today...
You've reached Mahoning County TASC-

Not much of that made a whole lot of sense to me, but I said to myself "Wonder if he's had to call that number before?"

James

Hey pia, thanks for taking a look at this one.

It's funny, I was thinking about it earlier today after I read your story.  It's actually a really weird coincidence how Don posted our stories at the same time.  Your story's called 'The End', which is also the name of a song by The Doors.  Well, the Doors' 'The End' was inspired by the story of Oedipus, which is the story of a king who ends up sleeping with his mother.  That's kind of weird.  (Or, maybe Don knew what he was doing.  :-)  )

Quoted from pia Don't spotters have to actually watch?

Unfortunately, I have to speak out of experience on this one.  Whenever I had to drop, I always had one of three guys who came in with me.  Two of them just stood back against the wall behind my back much like in the script, but the third one always stood close and watched with an eagle eye.  (It's weird, I've never gotten in trouble for drugs and I've only ever even tried them once or twice in high school, but when I got into some trouble a little while ago, I still had to drop.)

Ahh!  I'm going to get blasted for my title again!  I was hoping to squeek by this time without anybody mentioning anything.  Actually, when I first wrote this about a year and a half ago, one of Edward's lines was actually that a few would find his story difficult.  But when I did the overhaul for this, his dialogue bit sounded on the nose and fake, so it disapeared from the story.  However, I still thought that title was catchy so I kept it.  I realize it probably does give away the story, though.

I'll also be reworking the end a little bit, too, so it doesn't get dragged out any longer than it needs to.

Thank you very much for telling me what you thought about what changes need made and I'm really glad you liked it.

I'll be seeing you around, Pia.

- Mark

Quoted from jwent but I said to myself "Wonder if he's had to call that number before?"

Lol.  Everyday for about six months.  I was on Track 4, though, and they only called for us about once a month, and it was always Saturday.  I would never want to be in Track 1.

And, for the record, no, I've never had to fill a condom with someone's urine to pass a test, but a friend of mine did it twice.  The first time, he used my urine and everything went fine.  The second time, he said when he pricked the condom, it kind of busted the condom and the urine fell all over.

Mark,

Good script. Well, written.  Quite a bit of a shocker. I liked that you didn't show us the actual act and let us discover it without actually mentioning it.   I would suggest you continue that trend and remove the dialogue about the fluids or other specifics.  An act of love can't really be couched in physical terms after all.  I would also suggest that the last speech be cut down because it's repetitive.      

SPOILERS

Page 10:  "I felt her spasming when I was inside..."  This is the point where everything becomes gratuitous.  Edward wouldn't just volunteer the whole sickening monologue at the end.  We have to see Savannah push for it.  What's exciting about the darkness is the process of uncovering it, not the actual darkness.  Pretty much anyone can think up something really gross and write a story of a guy confessing to it.

Savannah's the one that's going to guide us down through this whole nasty story into the deepest, darkest parts of it.  But she has to actually take us there.  We want to follow her in a search for truth, not just have the story laid out in front of us.  Imagine if the final dark revelation in Chinatown had come about when Gittes right off the top politely asked Evelyn Mulwray about her family history and she just told him everything.  Bullshit, right?  Gratuitous, disturbing, bullshit.

The story here is tight and interesting, but for the darkness to sell Savannah has to earn it.  I'm not interested in someone's disgusting story; I can think up as many of those as I want.  I'm interested in the story of someone who seeks out the truth and finds that it's horrible.

So what am I saying?  I guess I'm saying that I need to know a bit more about Savannah, I need her to push Edward a lot more, I need to understand why she keeps going, why she has to know the truth.  How she feels about that truth.  How it relates to her.  There's a good story here, but it needs to be about Savannah, not about Edward.  The way it is now, it's just sensationalism, and I don't like it.

Also, Edward's last speech is just plain boring and reduces the impact of the sucker punch realization moment.

Hey Mark,

Nice little feel good script you have here. Right up my alley. I like how you take some of the things that otherwise might be overlooked and draw attention to them such as-

He flicks a lighter under the ladle and heats it. Blows a waxy film off to the side of the spoon. He draws the liquid up in a syringe.

That's shooter talk. Really detailed. I liked that.

Also the use of the condom/piss.

Someones been on an aftercare program before...
LOL.

I do wish you could give a bit more description to you charectors when you Intr them. Small bitch though.

You know what I thought would have been a good touch when I read this a second time. Him explaining at the end about how she must have enjoyed it by the way her heart monitor beeped faster when he was on top of her.

Sick little thought, I know.

I have to tell you, this was really decent and had a creepy enough of a feel to work.

Good job!

Shawn.....><

Well... That was uncomfortable. lol A seriously interesting read though. The writing was tight and the story had a nice flow to it. I do have one question. Did the mom willingly have sex with her son when she was healthy? That's what i took from it. All in all some good work here man. Thumbs up.

~Zack~

Hey Michael and Heretic,

Thanks, guys, for checking this out and letting me know what you think.  Yeah, Michael, I figured this might be one story I won't get bashed for telling and not showing.

Quoted from mcornetto and Heretic, respectively I would also suggest that the last speech be cut down because it's repetitive.   ....   Edward's last speech is just plain boring and reduces the impact of the sucker punch realization moment

I'll be working on the end of this, take a little bit of the monotony out, see if I can get the information in that scene out in a better way.  I think the information in that scene is important to know, and I didn't want to put it in the beginning to give away the reveal, but I'll look for a better way to show that information.

Quoted from Heretic We have to see Savannah push for it.  ...  Savannah's the one that's going to guide us down through this whole nasty story into the deepest, darkest parts of it  ...  I need to know a bit more about Savannah, I need her to push Edward a lot more

I actually really liked Savannah's character and, when I was writing the first scene, knew that there was a lot more I could do with her.  I think you're right, she could push Edward a lot more like any good journalist would.

The reason why I didn't explore Savannah any further is because I wanted to keep the story brief, and expanding the story, I felt I would lose some people's interest.  When the story occured to me, the heart of it was the deranged love between a disturbed mother and son and I didn't want to stray too far away from that.

But you're right.  It would be interesting to see Samantha have to work for the answers.  Edward does tell the story all too comfortably to her.  But I kind of wanted that, too, because in no way did I want Edward to show that he was ashamed of what he was doing.  To him he wasn't doing anything wrong.  To him, it was natural.

Thank you again, Michael and Heretic, for reading this.  And thank you for your thoughts and ideas.

- Mark

Hey Shawn,

Quoted from ledbetter Nice little feel good script you have here.

Thank you!  I'm in the middle right now of making Edward younger and doing it as an animation for Disney/Pixar.  They really don't have many stories geared for the West Virginian drug addict demographic.

Quoted from ledbetter That's shooter talk. Really detailed. I liked that.  Also the use of the condom/piss.  Someones been on an aftercare program before...  LOL.

Lol.  Actually, I've never had a problem with drugs.  (Only experimentation in high school.)  I've never liked drugs.  They always got in the way of my drinking.  (I have done some alcohol programs, though.)

All the shooter talk, unfortunately, I got online.  It's kind of sick when there's a site out there dedicated to teaching you how to shoot up properly.

I didn't really do much character description at all, did I?  Guess I just wanted to jump right into the story.  I'll go back and see if I can throw little somethings in.

Quoted from ledbetter I read this a second time.

Ew.  You're a friggin' pervert.  You really read this a second time?  I didn't even want to do a second draft, let alone want to read it again.  :-)

Quoted from ledbetter You know what I thought would have been a good touch?  Him explaining at the end about how she must have enjoyed it by the way her heart monitor beeped faster when he was on top of her.

Yes, it is a sick little thought.  I love it!  That's awesome!  I'm going to fit that in somehow.  (Don't worry, I'll give you a percentage of whatever Pixar pays me.)


Hey Zack,

Thanks for taking a look at this.  Glad you thought it was interesting.  And uncomfortable.  :-)

Quoted from Zack Did the mom willingly have sex with her son when she was healthy?

Yeah.  They were lovin' it up since Eddie was a little kid.  Edward briefly mentions it in the scene at the end.

Anyway, thanks, both of you guys, for checking it out.  I'm really glad both of you liked it.


Hmm.  So far nobody's brought up what I thought might get noticed right away here, especially for those people who look for secret meanings.

Hey Mark,

I'm pleased to see you getting a lot of feedback on this one.
This is very well written, save for weak flashback labeling and thin character descriptions.
I tried hard to avoid the spoilers in this thread.
You caught me napping with the pregnancy.
Your writing cadence lulls me into a narrative slumber and I'm in the moment.
I like this very much, but two things bother me about the tale.

1) I get the impression you were unsure how you wanted to end this story.
    When Edward rambles, he loses his power and hence my interest waned a bit.
    Perhaps this dramatic fizzle is tied to my second point.

2) Savannah Bean (great name!) is a bit of a wet noodle on the page.
    In order to complete the proverbial circuit, I need to know more about her.
    It's not just about Edward, how does this affect her own personal demons?

For this script to fully blossom, we need a dynamic link between the two.
He lures her in like telling Savannah where she can find old letters or something.
Some kind of proof of the childhood deal, now she's hooked.
But why is she hooked? Was is it about Savannah that needs to dig deeper?
It has to be more than a headline grabbing court case.
Does she need to vilify Edward for her own reasons?

I think when you can answer these questions, Savannah will tell you what she needs.

Fine work, look forward to seeing where you take this one.

Regards,
E.D.