Smoke and Roses by Lee Pierce - Action - A vampire hunter living in the big city is faced with his reasons for hunting, an ancient prophecy, and a mysterious woman at the center of it all. 97 pages - pdf, format

Just wanted to thank everyone for taking the time to read this.

Let me first say the logline wasn't all that appealing. TBH i only read it because I had the time to.

The point of the story was okay. I'm a little biased to prophecies and ancient texts because it seems everyone has one or the other, but for what it's worth it was an interesting read. I felt some of the things in this script were a little ridiculous and could have been executed better, but there were a few things I genuinly liked.

The opening was good, it set up the story and it caught my interest. I'm normally not really into the whole vampire hunter thing unless it has something unique to offer right off the bat, but the opening definitely caught my interest.

Then of course, there were things I didn't like and found a little ridiculous...

Fro example the introduction of the katana with no prior setup or reference it's like...

"Hey, how's it going?"

"It's going great, nice weather huh?"

"Yeah, it's nice. Look at my Katana.."

Ridiculous.

Also that, "do you trust me" line is too cliche i feel. That particular scene would be better without the line. I understand there is some sort of...repetition you wanted with that line when Jake says it later, but i think it's better without that line. That line is too Aladdin ish for me (it took me so long to figure out where i've heard that before)

Last but definitely not least, that scene where Maddie pulls out that guys heart? Ridiculous. I felt as thought you put that in their just to prove she had balls or something. Yeah I get it she can handle herself, but that was a little too much.  If she were to mention before that scene something like "When I see him I'm going to pull that bastards heart out with my hands!" then it would have made sense. If she was so beaten and tired that in the last moment where victory is finally hers, she becomes so angry and enraged that it drives her to actually fufill that promise, that would make sense...but NONE of that is in the story. Again it's like ...

'"Hey how's it going"

"It's going great, nice weather we're having huh?"

"Oh yeah, lovely." *pulls out other person's heart*

Crazy.

All that being said though, I thought the script was Okay. It reminded me a lot of Underworld with the whole, mixing of blood and what not. I have to give you credit because alot of the scenes were really tight and well constructed and the dialogue for the most part flowed well.

The interesting part about this script is that it has also kind of a weird shaun of the dead feel to it. Like, i could see it being a dark comedy but I don't think it was supposed to be that. Like the whole lines about Martin Luther king but with vampires made me laugh and the last line was funny as well. Maybe you should play with that a little bit? Bring a little more humour into the mix. I realize this is in the action section and not the comedy section but there seems to be A LOT more dialogue then action in this story, which is not a bad thing, but  if that is the way you want it to be there is definitely potential for something less ..i hate to say it, but boring. The story was good while reading but now that I look back on it there wasn't anything really that stuck with me. It definitely feels like more of a work in progress than a finished work. Good Job on what you have so far though.

Thanks for the critique.  I appreciate you taking the time to read it and I will take this into consideration.