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SimplyScripts Screenwriting Discussion Board    Unproduced Screenplay Discussion    Sci Fi and Fantasy Scripts  ›  Sunstorm Moderators: bert
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Don
Posted: June 14th, 2013, 11:43pm Report to Moderator
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So, what are you writing?

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Sunstorm by James McCormick - Sci Fi, Fantasy - A small time smuggler lands a high priced contract but is hunted by a superhuman assassin intent on stopping him from delivering a mysterious device that could save millions of Martian colonists from an impending solar storm. 99 pages - pdf, format


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James A McCormick
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Hi everyone,

I have been playing around with the logline for my script and have an alternative:

A hapless smuggler must outrun a superhuman assassin and deliver a mysterious device before a solar storm wipes out millions of Martian colonists.

I would be very interested to know which one you grabs you the most

thanks

James

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Majorgeneral316
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Hey James,

Sci Fi is sort of my thing and I've been meaning to get back involved with the website.

You've got something here. I've read the first ten pages. There are some problems. Some of the actions and description lines don't read well. It's a bit over written. On further drafts you'll need to strip that baby down.

I love political Sci Fi. The Foundation series are some of my favourite books. I'm yet to finish them though. But back to the script, you set up a political background within the first 10 pages which I like.

The next part with Saul (haha name choice), Hanna and Kane tumbles into the cliche.

12 Pages in, I'm more interested in the socio-political ideas than the characters. It is exposition heavy, but that's how Sci Fi has to be some times. Look at Oblivion and Looper's use of voice over to get exposition out. It's not nice, but you have to get it out there.

Anyway, the point is that you need to get me care about the character's a bit more. Let's see if that happens.

I'll continue to read and get back to you when I can.

Cool

Matthew



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James A McCormick
Posted: July 1st, 2013, 2:56am Report to Moderator
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Hi Matthew,

thanks for the feedback so far.

I agree about the cliche element. I used Blake Snyder's beat sheet to plot out much of this and wanted to get the "save the cat" moment to also be the inciting incident - I managed it at the expense of originality I guess.

As for caring about the characters - I really tried to make this happen, Hanna losing her mother and Saul being a down on his luck social outcast. If you didn't care then maybe I need to rethnk it.

I'm also very interested in the political side of SF as I believe we can already see the emerging corporotocracy taking shape, reading up about Monsanto gave me the idea for the HEX corporation.

Anyway, I'd be very interested to hear any more feedback you have. Thanks again.

regards

Jimbo
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the goose
Posted: July 1st, 2013, 10:43am Report to Moderator
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Love a bit of sci-fi, and as I've been playing Mass Effect 3 lately I'm quite into it at the minute so I thought I'd give this a read. Also, from the logline, it sounded a bit like a Han Solo-esque character might be involved, and he is easily my favourite Star Wars hero. Maybe even with a Boba Fett type as the superhuman assassin? I'll try and kerb the Star Wars comparisons here - because, let's face it, what futuristic sci-fi action flicks don't borrow from star wars?!

- HEREIN YE FIND SPOILERS -

I'll add some notes as I go:

- 'delicately pretty' love this simple little phrase, because I know exactly what you mean.

-  was this written with celtx? If so, I've had the same problem with parentheticals as well.

- Katanas in the future?

-  SAUL (CONT'D)
(Tapping a line) Here.
SAUL (CONT'D)
Twenty four hours lady.

Should be all the same dialogue?

- I could visualise this scene with Kubo taking out the fat guy - Goldberg, reminded me of a film or sequence I'd seen- can't think which.

- Bearded man could do with a name maybe?

- HANNA
That was extremely courageous.

this scene is good - it breaks cliche, normally in something like this Saul would suddenly turn out to be really tough. However this piece of dialogue doesn't quite
ring right for me - little forced, contrived maybe. I'm not sure. The following bit
where she hires him - maybe a little too soon. After all he's pretty much just been knocked out in a bar by someone, if I was her I wouldn't be too quick to hire someone who doesn't seem to be too tough.

- cenobite? This a hellraiser reference? Seems a funny choice of words.

- Definitely a quick starting script - contemporary cinema is a sucker for a quick starter these days, too much of a build-up isn't appreciated as much now - which is good, and a plus, as long as it is correctly paced.

- where's Da Silva suddenly sprung up from!?

- he's snorting cigars? haha!

- Nice bit of hostility now between Hanna and Saul, good way to bring the character together.

- wow, I didn't expect for all Wexler etc to be killed so soon. Good scene though.

- "The little scientist works frantically importing and exporting
countless programme commands, trillions and trillions of bytes.
Finally he's finished." - how long would this last? Might be a little boring on screen if it goes on too long.

- Any reason why it kills Kane?

- Great bit of dialogue between Saul and Hanna when they talk about him buying land in Hazard etc. Good chemistry coming.

- great description: The craft's hull is covered with explosive devices, choking it
like some deep sea creature devoured slowly by sea anemones.

- I assume Saxon was once called Harry? Few inconsistencies there.

Plot wise this was really good, it moves slickly enough to engage the reader or viewer and the characters of Hanna and Saul were really well depicted, he's extremely likeable as is she and both of them behave as you'd expect them to in the situations. In short, it's believable.

There's a lot of action in it - and sometimes I was struggling to visualise certain things, but in most parts I was able to completely visualise whatever it was you were trying to get across. The Amitar was a good touch; however it might have been more engaging if he had shown signs of his human half a little earlier.

There's a nice political edge to this which distances it from being the usual kind of sci-fi thriller, gives it substance as well as style - which is a tough balance to draw. But, you managed it well here. I'm sure some re-writes might be necessary to make sure your vision of the story is entirely concrete, but this is definitely one of the better sci-fi pieces. Your logline did sound a tad cliched I must admit, and let's face it sci-fi is a genre where its difficult to avoid cliches, but you've done a good sterling job here.

If there's anything else you'd like to ask me for feedback on please feel free. Hopefully you'll get a few more reads and reviews on here. You use some great descriptive phrases that wouldn't look out of place in a novel or short story as well, somethin to cosnider.


"We don't make movies for critics, since they don't pay to see them anyhow."

-- Charles Bronson.
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James A McCormick
Posted: July 2nd, 2013, 5:11am Report to Moderator
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Hi Goose,

thanks so much for the comments, happy you liked it for the most part - I spent a long, long time plotting this one out before I ever started writing. I'm glad it shows.

I will definitely re-write the inciting incident in the bar and do some more proofs now I've had a couple of months break from it.

thanks again

Jimbo




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Majorgeneral316
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Hey Jimbo,

So I continued reading. Unfortunately I had to stop after 40 pages. I wanted to continue but I think this needs a few more drafts.

These are a few of my notes:

- You need to capitalize WEXLER and KRIVOY when they are introduced on page 13.

- I've noticed how you have juxtaposed the characters of Hanna and Saul. Hanna is posh, well spoken, formal - whilst Saul is the opposite. Maybe a bit cliched, but I didn't have a problem with it.

- On Page 18 Saul has a piece of dialogue where he effectively says he's not a hero and 'most consider him a loser'. You don't need this dialogue. The audience and reader know this through his actions. Which was nicely done. That added dialogue is redundant in my opinion.

- The dialogue throughout can be worked on and tightened up.

- I was wondering, how did the Amitar get through space port security?

- Things are taking too long to get going. It's become an almost cat and mouse chase. You could argue its even comedic. I don't know if that was the intention. All of this stuff on Solon just seems boring to me.

After I read the political things you introduced: Mars, colonization and sanctions, I thought this was going to be a Sci Fi Thriller. Instead it's turned into a Sci Fi action film, which I don't enjoy as much. All this chasing around is irrelevant to me. I think you need to find a way of getting to Mars quicker. Too many things are going on which aren't really moving the story forward. Who cares about these silly gangsters, let's get to the interesting parts.

I think you do have something here.

Just keep writing.

I want to read further drafts in the future.

Take care.

Matthew



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James A McCormick
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Well - thanks for taking a crack at it Matthew - I appreciate your comments

to be honest, cat and mouse with comedy elements is exactly how I meant it - if you've ever seen a low budget SF called Space Truckers by Stuart Gordon (most famous for bringing Lovecraft tales to the screen) you'll see the tone I was after. Its not exactly one of the most cerebral film ever made and wasn't exactly a big hit but I love this film for some reason.

As for the getting to Mars, I structured this script as Act 1 - Earth/  Act 2  (first half)- space (mostly)/ Act 2 (secong half) -space station/ Act 3-  Mars

Anyway, I saw your comments for Intellectual Property as well - thanks  
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James A McCormick
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I’ve not done much scriptwriting for the last few months- working on prose instead- but plan on getting back into it seriously this month.
I just wanted to thank The Goose for the comments he made back in July last year. If it wasn’t for the feedback I would have given up on this one. Instead I re-wrote it as a novel “SUNFALL” and it is now being published by Class Act Books next week. They published another of my sci-fi novels, ‘Dragon’ last October.
Can’t thank you enough man- taking the time to comment made all the difference.
All the best

James McCormick
http://jimbomcc.wix.com/jimbostories
@Jimbomcc69
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Rolandabc
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So I've read up to page 31 and I love it so far, but I have a few minor notes to make.

- How corrupt exactly is the society presented here? Mr. Kubo outright murders HEX's president in front of an entire board room full of witnesses and not only gets away with it, but manages get himself promoted for it. This seems like an extremely archaic method that usurpers would use in the days of Ancient Rome or whatnot (sorry, my history is a bit shaky). Is this setting (in the words of Obi-Wan Kenobi) a wretched hive of scum and villany where anyone can get away with anything if they have the politcal clout and money (or rather, aurum) to pay off the authorities? If so, I'd like to see more of that.

- Is Saul the protagonist, or are he and Hanna dual protagonists? If the latter, than I find having Hanna to be a protagonist to be a little awkward, since I'm used to seeing the story from the protagonist's eyes, and Hanna clearly knows stuff that the audience doesn't (mainly what she could accomplish by going to Mars).

- Galt Talat being described as a toad. Being any other genre, I would have figured out that this is metaphorical, but since this is an adventure story set in space, I briefly wondered if he was literally a toad. Only after I noted that no alien species were established to exist in this setting did I come to the conclusion that Talat is in fact, a toadlike person.

- Where do the opening scenes (with Dr. Altus's assassination) take place? I assumed at first that it was on Mars, since the prior scene zoomed us into Mars. Does it take place on Solon Station? On Earth? If it takes place on Earth, (which I will assume it does, since the scene heading describes night, which doesn't really happen in space) how did Hanna get to Solon station? And why would she need Saul if she already found transport to the station. If (for example) she took a shuttle that can't travel between planets, I'd like to see this mentioned somewhere.

- Mr. Kubo does his own dirty work. For the vice president of a large megacorp like HEX, I'd expect him to hire out some of his goons to do stuff for him.

- Minor note (on page 34): Kubo says "If the board knew about this I'd lose their confidence." Considering that he just intimidated the board into promoting him to president by murdering the last one. You'd think he'd have ways of keeping their confidence.

- I noticed that by page 40, most of the minor characters (Da Silva, Wexler, Krivoy, Kane) are dead. A shame. It seemed like you were setting them up to be henchmen who would chase our heroes throughout most of the story (kind of like Boba Fett/Han Solo, or any manner of James Bond henchmen who keep on popping up). Guess not. In other words, I liked the setup of being introduced to these characters, but the payoff (them dying) came too quickly.

- I'd like to see more setup with Kubo's dead son. It gets mentioned once in the beginning, then he completely disappears and doesn't get mentioned again until halfway through. I haven't finished the script yet, but I get the sense that this is an important plot thread. I'd like for it to have more presence.

- The asteroid chase was a little too reminiscent of a certain scene in The Empire Strikes Back. I think you know the one I'm referring to. I got excited when I saw the Mining Area sign, and thought they were going to be weaving between mining craft, through asteroid mine shafts or other mining equipment like that, but that didn't really happen.

Anyways, that's all I've read for now. I'll post more notes when I finish (which will be by tomorrow, at the latest), as well as my thought on the script overall.

EDIT: As promised, I've finished reading the script and I have a few things to say about the overall story.

I enjoyed it. A lot. The plotting is tight, there's good characterization and development, and the script hits all of its storytelling beats quite well. So my points will be minor ones.

- Novus needs to have more of a presence throughout. They get mentioned a few times, and that's it before we finally meet them. Compare the rebels from Star Wars and Total Recall. The heroes from Star Wars spend most of the movie trapped on the Death Star before they finally meet the Rebel Alliance, but they have presence throughout. Princess Leia continuously brings them up, and we even get a scene featuring them in the beginning. Or in Total Recall, the Mars freedom fighters (don't remember what they call themselves) periodically show up in newscasts or even start fighting in the middle of the streets. Basically, all I'm saying is that Novus should have more presence so that we don't forget they exist.

- Kubo's downfall doesn't really have anything to do with the actions of Saul or Hanna. Generally, I'm most invested in a story the more the protagonists directly affect events. Is there any way to tie Kubo and the Corporate League's downfall directly to the activation of the Obex vial?

- The way the Amitar reveals his true identity to Hanna is a bit awkward, mainly because he just straight out tells her who he is. Did you see the new Captain America yet? There's a similar reveal in that movie (everyone knows what it is, but I won't spoil it anyways), and it's quick, to the point, and more showy than talky.

- Speaking of the Amitar, I'd like to know more of Hanna's history with Kyle. That way, it's so much more of an impact when we find out what's happened to him.

- I don't buy that the public masses would rise up against the Corporate League and HEX, because I didn't see much of the public masses. I get the sense that Susan's exposure of their data was the spark that lit the powder keg, but the problem is that I know that there was a powder keg to begin with. I'd like to see more of how the League has been mistreating the public.

But all in all, this was a great script! I personally don't share some of the previous reviewers' complaints that this turned into a sci-fi action-adventure rather than a political thriller, since I never really got the vibe that this would be a political thriller. If that does bother you, you could always tone down the political setup and find a different setup. Really, all that's important is that some powerful organization plans on conquering Mars by denying them the Obex. There can be a myriad of motivations to do that.

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the goose
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Quoted from James A McCormick
I’ve not done much scriptwriting for the last few months- working on prose instead- but plan on getting back into it seriously this month.
I just wanted to thank The Goose for the comments he made back in July last year. If it wasn’t for the feedback I would have given up on this one. Instead I re-wrote it as a novel “SUNFALL” and it is now being published by Class Act Books next week. They published another of my sci-fi novels, ‘Dragon’ last October.
Can’t thank you enough man- taking the time to comment made all the difference.
All the best

James McCormick
http://jimbomcc.wix.com/jimbostories
@Jimbomcc69



Immensely flattering to hear, James. I still remember the story now even though it was nearly a year since I read it and it still stands out as a story I really enjoyed.

I always enjoying reading things and I go for the story first over the format so to hear that you've taken the great story and actually put it into a novel is great praise. I will reply to your message soon.


"We don't make movies for critics, since they don't pay to see them anyhow."

-- Charles Bronson.
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James A McCormick
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Quoted from Rolandabc
So I've read up to page 31 and I love it so far, but I have a few minor notes to make.

- How corrupt exactly is the society presented here? Mr. Kubo outright murders HEX's president in front of an entire board room full of witnesses and not only gets away with it, but manages get himself promoted for it. This seems like an extremely archaic method that usurpers would use in the days of Ancient Rome or whatnot (sorry, my history is a bit shaky). Is this setting (in the words of Obi-Wan Kenobi) a wretched hive of scum and villany where anyone can get away with anything if they have the politcal clout and money (or rather, aurum) to pay off the authorities? If so, I'd like to see more of that.

- Is Saul the protagonist, or are he and Hanna dual protagonists? If the latter, than I find having Hanna to be a protagonist to be a little awkward, since I'm used to seeing the story from the protagonist's eyes, and Hanna clearly knows stuff that the audience doesn't (mainly what she could accomplish by going to Mars).

- Galt Talat being described as a toad. Being any other genre, I would have figured out that this is metaphorical, but since this is an adventure story set in space, I briefly wondered if he was literally a toad. Only after I noted that no alien species were established to exist in this setting did I come to the conclusion that Talat is in fact, a toadlike person.

- Where do the opening scenes (with Dr. Altus's assassination) take place? I assumed at first that it was on Mars, since the prior scene zoomed us into Mars. Does it take place on Solon Station? On Earth? If it takes place on Earth, (which I will assume it does, since the scene heading describes night, which doesn't really happen in space) how did Hanna get to Solon station? And why would she need Saul if she already found transport to the station. If (for example) she took a shuttle that can't travel between planets, I'd like to see this mentioned somewhere.

- Mr. Kubo does his own dirty work. For the vice president of a large megacorp like HEX, I'd expect him to hire out some of his goons to do stuff for him.

- Minor note (on page 34): Kubo says "If the board knew about this I'd lose their confidence." Considering that he just intimidated the board into promoting him to president by murdering the last one. You'd think he'd have ways of keeping their confidence.

- I noticed that by page 40, most of the minor characters (Da Silva, Wexler, Krivoy, Kane) are dead. A shame. It seemed like you were setting them up to be henchmen who would chase our heroes throughout most of the story (kind of like Boba Fett/Han Solo, or any manner of James Bond henchmen who keep on popping up). Guess not. In other words, I liked the setup of being introduced to these characters, but the payoff (them dying) came too quickly.

- I'd like to see more setup with Kubo's dead son. It gets mentioned once in the beginning, then he completely disappears and doesn't get mentioned again until halfway through. I haven't finished the script yet, but I get the sense that this is an important plot thread. I'd like for it to have more presence.

- The asteroid chase was a little too reminiscent of a certain scene in The Empire Strikes Back. I think you know the one I'm referring to. I got excited when I saw the Mining Area sign, and thought they were going to be weaving between mining craft, through asteroid mine shafts or other mining equipment like that, but that didn't really happen.

Anyways, that's all I've read for now. I'll post more notes when I finish (which will be by tomorrow, at the latest), as well as my thought on the script overall.

EDIT: As promised, I've finished reading the script and I have a few things to say about the overall story.

I enjoyed it. A lot. The plotting is tight, there's good characterization and development, and the script hits all of its storytelling beats quite well. So my points will be minor ones.

- Novus needs to have more of a presence throughout. They get mentioned a few times, and that's it before we finally meet them. Compare the rebels from Star Wars and Total Recall. The heroes from Star Wars spend most of the movie trapped on the Death Star before they finally meet the Rebel Alliance, but they have presence throughout. Princess Leia continuously brings them up, and we even get a scene featuring them in the beginning. Or in Total Recall, the Mars freedom fighters (don't remember what they call themselves) periodically show up in newscasts or even start fighting in the middle of the streets. Basically, all I'm saying is that Novus should have more presence so that we don't forget they exist.

- Kubo's downfall doesn't really have anything to do with the actions of Saul or Hanna. Generally, I'm most invested in a story the more the protagonists directly affect events. Is there any way to tie Kubo and the Corporate League's downfall directly to the activation of the Obex vial?

- The way the Amitar reveals his true identity to Hanna is a bit awkward, mainly because he just straight out tells her who he is. Did you see the new Captain America yet? There's a similar reveal in that movie (everyone knows what it is, but I won't spoil it anyways), and it's quick, to the point, and more showy than talky.

- Speaking of the Amitar, I'd like to know more of Hanna's history with Kyle. That way, it's so much more of an impact when we find out what's happened to him.

- I don't buy that the public masses would rise up against the Corporate League and HEX, because I didn't see much of the public masses. I get the sense that Susan's exposure of their data was the spark that lit the powder keg, but the problem is that I know that there was a powder keg to begin with. I'd like to see more of how the League has been mistreating the public.

But all in all, this was a great script! I personally don't share some of the previous reviewers' complaints that this turned into a sci-fi action-adventure rather than a political thriller, since I never really got the vibe that this would be a political thriller. If that does bother you, you could always tone down the political setup and find a different setup. Really, all that's important is that some powerful organization plans on conquering Mars by denying them the Obex. There can be a myriad of motivations to do that.


Thanks Roland- wow- what incredible and helpful feedback - I agree 100% with everything you said- some points are so obvious yet I never saw them.
Thanks for reading and I'm glad you liked it - just trying to decide now whether I should resurrect this one - I think in terms of being marketable it might just not be original enough, okay for a short novel but not for attracting film makers)
thanks again

James
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