Re(t)con by Moustache de Plume - Short, Thriller - A hooded teenager learns that, sometimes, being in the wrong place at the wrong time proves beneficial. - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

The failure to give the characters names in the opening makes everyone seem like a stereotype and it's hard to care what's going on. Thug, hoodie, clerk.

They're is the word for They are, not their.

There was a lot of good stuff in this. The beginning of an epic story, and a revolution of children led by a mysterious figure in a Hood. I think I'd have liked to have understand the reason why there needs to be this coming war between the young and old. More of a tone of how this world is not working in some way. Maybe a tough ask, though.

Pretty good. Best I've read so far.

Quoted Text No customers in the store just the CLERK, who intently watches a nightly special. He doesn't even notice Hoodie when he walks in and beelines straight for the burritos.

I would at least give the age of the clerk - I imagined younger as I read on and realized he was a father. Also - Nightly Special doesn't really add much. I would just go with a talking head on TV.

Quoted Text REPORTER Their dangerous, their powerful, and they are not on our side. 'The Universes Lil Bastards'

You just introduced Michael Brim – shouldn’t that be the character name rather than reporter. Also, should be They’re.

Quoted Text Two of the Thugs come into the store. He notices them immediately. He smiles while and reaches for his gun box under the register

He smiles while….is there something missing after that?

I would give the character names – it became difficult to follow the action in some places.

An interesting premise. Well written for the most part - Another pass at this could make it solid.

Wow...very problematic.

No named characters.  Characters that actually have names don't get named.

Action is all over the place, and as written makes very little sense.

Lots and lots of mistakes of all kinds all over the place.  Glaring misspellings, extremely awkward phrasing, poor sentence structure.

Very little story here that I can get and the read itself was so difficult.

No clue what the title means or has to do with the script.

Doesn't work at all for me, sorry to say.

I really enjoy stories like this, but I think this one fell just a little short for me.  I want to know more about Hoodie and what he's all about.  With more into this, I could see myself really enjoying it.

Nolan  

This was a kind of gender less story. Except for Kai is obviously a boy. The rest you haven't named except for the dr. I can understand why you didn't name the thugs though.
You could have one thug by the way - don't see the reason behind having two.
The Clerk says "my son" when talking to his son - that sound strange.
Some of the description doesn't work for me - like when Kai disappears. He said something, then there's an action line about him gone.
Also, at the very beginning when you said horse play - I always have trouble visualizing what exactly they might be doing. I think you could get rid of that scene altogether by the way.
And I think you could start with your main character perhaps, have us learn a little about him and then go on with your story.
I liked the story though, you wrapped it up well I think but the descriptions aren't very clear.  Maybe with a rewrite it could be very good.

Hmm I almost gave up on this as it wasn't doing much. But when the action began it was ok.

Very good concept but not quite fulfilled. I think the author (Libby?) ran out of time near the end as some of the grammar goes arseup. This is a bit of a prob with the guy talking on the telly as his words are kind of skimmable - they need to be more...interesting.

one line really stood out for me too - when the microwave beeps. That was cool for some reason. It meant that the writer hadn't forgotten about it and acted too as a kind of timer for the pace of the script.

Haha, Caught myself disqualifying this right away for having males in the opening scene. Forgot that women were in the contest as well. :)

No need to say let's call Hoodie, Hoodie. Just call him Hoodie.

Who this asshole?

You could call Thug 1 and 2 those names but I found it'd better to at least give them a name that helps describe them at least like you did with Hoodie. Call one SKINNY or FRECKLES or BEANIE. Something simple like that gives them a little more personality and helps the reader tell the difference between them as they read.

They're dangerous. They're powerful

The TV show is too on the nose with dialogue.

This seems like the intro to a movie or a TV show, not enough meat in the story Plus it could ended a few pages early once Hoodie healed the boy and took off. 7 pages is quite short but for a story like this seems too long. I think a tighter plot would make it flow better and then give you room to expand on the story in some way. Lots of typos as well.

“They’re dangerous, they’re powerful…”

there's a cool story in here somewhere... i think, but something didn't work for me.  I think it was the TV analysis that basically gave us the backdrop of what happened.  I can't think of a better way to go about it, so this note isn't really helpful.

Definitely think Hoodie should have had a name, something other than being a figure in a hoody.  Would have liked the necklace featured more earlier as well.

Solid attempt.  I don't have much more to say.  I think this has the makings of a cool story, I'm just not sure it is.

I also don't understand the title.

What a great father "Jesus, Kid, I forgot you were there."

The TV show dialog is quite extensive. Does the camera zoom into the screen and put you in the studio? Or are we watching the show over the clerks shoulder? Just wondering how that would be filmed.

An explanation or hint of this hoodie guy would be nice. Otherwise I just don't care.

Sorry, just didn't work for me.

I'm more or less in agreement with the comments thus far. There's a cool idea here, and a not so bad story to go along with it. But not giving the character’s names deadened the impact of it. Some of the action seemed a little rushed through. And I don't think the reporters were necessary either. I'd read it through without them. You might be surprised how much the gist of the tale holds up.

You could maybe intro the kid a little earlier too, and give the impression that he's not completely normal. And I’d have the moment play between Hoodie and the Kid instead of Thug and the Kid to foreshadow their connection. Thug doesn't need a moment involving the kid’s drawing as much as Hoodie does, I think.

Hey writer,

Some obvious typos with the "their" vs "they're" lines, that got my goat early. But you know what? It was alright in the end.

Starts slow and mysterious, enters a speedy bit and then decelerates towards the end, nice simple pacing. I think the writing overall could be tidied up a fair bit, but there's an idea here which kinda worked for me so it was definitely worth the read.

One last observation, not sure that this is really a thriller but more sci-fi with the way it panned out in the end.

Decent effort

Cam

ret·con
ˈretkän/
noun
1.
(in a film, television series, or other fictional work) a piece of new information that imposes a different interpretation on previously described events, typically used to facilitate a dramatic plot shift or account for an inconsistency.
"we're given a retcon for Wilf's absence from Donna's wedding in ‘The Runaway Bride’: he had Spanish Flu"
verb
1.
revise (an aspect of a fictional work) retrospectively, typically by introducing a piece of new information that imposes a different interpretation on previously described events.
"I think fans get more upset when characters act blatantly out of established type, or when things get retconned"


Not saying this is mine, not saying this isn't mine. Just saying Goggle is your friend sometimes.

Solid title
logline says nothing

This reads completely unfocused, no clear storyline, no structure, countless characters jump in from all sides.

For me, you fail to order your thoughts and express something with precision here. The connection how the reader perceives what you do, and their identification with story, should be the most important aspect of the delivery.  Whatever, I made this mistake myself in earlier times…

I like the idea although it was awkward to read.  With generic words like thug or hoodie, you could guess the characters might be a male or female, but as the boy was in the script, I'll assume the boy wasn't a mistake and that all characters are male.

I think with a rewrite, shorten some of the long dialogue, this could make for a good script.

All the best,

Javier

There's a great story in here somewhere bursting to get out but it's lost in a confused bit of a mess at the moment.

OWC's inevitably lead to typos here and there but there's lots in this which really distract. When you are trying to get a lot across, this makes it harder for the reader to get your story.

The TV show is obvious exposition and highlights a flaw in your story. If we didn't have the TV show and the on the nose dialogue, we simply wouldn't have a clue what is going on.  The bit straight after when the Clerk suddenly realizes his kid is there makes it very obvious this is all for the audience's benefit and not a naturally flowing scene.

As it is, I still wasn't sure what was going on.  There's hints of something to do with kids gaining power and taking over the world, or already have taken over the world and we've all forgot. The hoodie stops the kid from shooting the thugs but then heals the kid so is the hoodie helping or against the kids? What has a gull got to do with all this?

To highlight my confusion, here's a section of the script:

"Hoodie appears behind the little boy. Startled the little boy falls back and BANG the gun goes off. Hoodie reaches down and picks up the gun. "

Which gun is Hoodie picking up? As far as I know there's no gun on the floor.

"He steps from behind the aisles and is gun to gun with the Thugs."

Overuse of the word gun is really confusing matters. If this is the Hoodie, why is he shooting at them instead of using his powers?

"In a blink SHOTS fire. The Thugs grab their shoulders that now have holes in them."

What? Have the thugs been shot or have holes just appeared in their shoulders?

You have the beginning of a nice piece of science fiction here, it just needs a major polish and a lot of development but a nice effort for one week.

-Mark

I have to admit that I didn't follow what was going on.  I think you made a mistake by not giving anyone a name and an identity.  

I didn't understand the talk show at all.  That needs to be cleared up.

SPOILERS

So, the guy mystically saved the child, then the child has to join his cult??  Do the kids give him power due to their ability to believe in the unbelievable?   Like I said, I'm confused.

Good luck
Dan

Writer,

This was very hard to follow. You should have provided some names to the thugs - but that's not the real issue here. The action was so start and stop I lost where I was at times. This piece is very busy, there's a lot going on. At times I couldn't figure out where anyone was in the store - like I said, hard to follow along. You had two thugs, hoodie, clerk, a little boy and two people talking on the TV! Not to mention a group of children at the end! Character-wise,  thats 7 in an 8 page script! That's an awful lot - no wonder I was confused. However, there were certain instances where the writing flowed like wine - and I'm talking about when hoodie was nuking his burrito. For some reason I really like that passage! Shows promise. Good writing in spots, convoluted story took me right out and I just couldn't get into it.

Steve

I don't think there's enough mystery or reversal in this one.  The drawing kid is predictable, the hoodie seems to be too, even the thugs.  Now, if the kid draws his father dying because his mother asked him to....oops.  Good luck.

I'd definitely name the characters, feels like a script populated with extras...

But I did like the premise here, and whilst this particular tale is a little straightforward I'd consider expanding a little, would like t see where this goes.

Last one for me. This better be good.

What in the hell font did you use? That does NOT look like 12pt Courier. It looks semi-bold, too thick. I'm not even sure it's Courier New!

[Copy/pasting an excerpt into Word, the closest font is 12pt Courier Prime, which, to me, looks slightly bolder than regular Courier. It's still not the same font you used. This is not a Courier font, as it has serifs.]

Speaking of bold, your slugs are chock-full of it.

"Nightly special"?? Huh???

"sets the timer for five (no hyphen) minutes."

Comma issues. Characters don't have names. This is testing my patience/endurance.

TV is capitalized, usually no periods.

ON SCREEN (no colon)

Ugh. I give up. Out on P1. Meh.

Two lines of dialogue stood out. "They're dangerous... " and " Jesus, kid, ..." (corrections added). They captured the characters nicely. Avoid or minimize the use of TV or radio to insert exposition in the story. The naming conventions in the story were odd. Gender could be male or female. Problems to fix but the dialogue had a couple of bright spots.

I found this a Little tricky to follow, and the overall concept I wasn't wholly sure about, other than a child fraternity looking after each other

I like the tension in the shop. The kids mucking about is a little well used, but the different aspects of strange young child,  pictures, disappearing hoodie etc adds to the tension and intrigue.

Imagine if the little boy left a pad of drawings all seeing the future with the last one missing as he ran off with it - could be an intriguing aspect.

I want to thank everyone for the reads. THANK YOU! I have never written a short and after this I may never write another again.

Q&A

Q: Title? Retcon? HMMM?

A: Retroactive continuity, or retcon for short is a literary device in which new information is added to already established facts in the continuity of a fictional work.

I.e. Comic books do this a lot.

That’s where the title comes from. There you go.

Q: But is this Thriller?

Uhhhhhhhhhh. Technically, yes. Thriller to me is an umbrella term for a myriad of genres. Noir is technically a thriller as well as Superhero movies.

Q: So, what up with the no-names?

It wasn’t intended to come across as lazy. But, in my mind, not one of these character’s would ever mention their name. Except for the guys on the t.v.  

The clerk, I could have done way better on,  It was truly an oversight on my part. He could have a name tag and I did not describe him. Oversight. Sorry.

Q: Typos?

I blame the inner city public school system. No child left behind...amiright?
But, to be truthful, i am working overtime to remedy my lack of knowledge when it comes to spelling and grammar. It has been noted.

Q: So the dudes on the t.v. what’s that about? I’m confused.

Good. lol. In my mind the t.v. situation would be downplayed greatly on film. If we took it out there would be ‘no dialogue’ until way later during the stick up. It is meant to play out over the scene instead of being a scene in and of itself. Not clear, I know. And even if it’s cut or edited, I still have to write it out as a scene. Lengthy dialogue and all.

Q:  But do we really need all that expositional dialogue?

What many of you consider expositional….I consider a bit of foreboding,

Q: What’s this about? Hoodie? All of it.

This one threw me because I assumed it was pretty clear that HOODIE was KAI from the future….future...future. I guess not.

So Kai is clearly unhinged. And if you listened to the t.v. guys you may have noted that they were discussing a book (fiction?) containing shadow history.

Shadow history: is a revisionist interpretation of either fictional or real history which is claimed to have been deliberately suppressed, forgotten, or ignored by established scholars.

In which there was a children uprising and (spoiler) the children were taken out. But not before some serious ass-kicking went down. Anyway, that’s the ‘Universe's lil bastards’ that was discussed on the show.

Some believe it happened and wiped from history while others just think it’s fiction. Kids have vanished and the whole thing comes across as a prank. Not so. Kai is the leader of this new uprising. And let’s just say his notepad with drawings of the future are childsplay compared to what he is capable of in the future. HOODIE is that. By the way one of his powers is persuasion. Take that what you will.

Q: So, Hoodie from future, why is he here?

Well, let’s just say history has a bad habit of repeating itself. And he wanted a burrito from his dad’s store. AWW.

Q: Why shoot the thugs?

Let’s just say...doing something inherently good like letting them go puts a major chink in his armor.

That’s all for now? I know I forgot something.

Hey Ashlie, congrats on writing your first short! They are a lot of fun and they are my first love as far as screenwriting goes.  

I only got around to read two due to a bunch of stuff going on in my real life, but I do remember going through all the titles and loglines when they were first posted. I see your explanation for the title, but I have to be honest. That title was one reason I didn't read yours. I had no idea what it meant and I didn't feel like google it just to know what it was. I'm very undereducated, so maybe everyone else knew it, but I didn't. Just thought I should mention it in case some other readers skip over your script too for the same reason.  :)

This story has a lot of potential. It is just a bit confusing and could easily be fixed. I encourage you to continue with it and to carry on writing shorts. This is not bad at all for your first short.

-Mark

Quoted from Grandma Bear Hey Ashlie, congrats on writing your first short! They are a lot of fun and they are my first love as far as screenwriting goes.   I only got around to read two due to a bunch of stuff going on in my real life, but I do remember going through all the titles and loglines when they were first posted. I see your explanation for the title, but I have to be honest. That title was one reason I didn't read yours. I had no idea what it meant and I didn't feel like google it just to know what it was. I'm very undereducated, so maybe everyone else knew it, but I didn't. Just thought I should mention it in case some other readers skip over your script too for the same reason.  :)

I kinda figured as much. I'm a weirdo about my titles. They just gotta be obscure. lol

Thanks.

Quoted from MarkRenshaw This story has a lot of potential. It is just a bit confusing and could easily be fixed. I encourage you to continue with it and to carry on writing shorts. This is not bad at all for your first short. -Mark

If/when I continue on this it will be full-length. This is more so a teaser? Maybe even a one-off epilogue? Idk.

Thanks though. Congrats.

Yeah your explanation made me read this again Ash, as I love anything connected to time travel and such, and so it made more sense to me.

Great concept, it prolly just needed some fine tuning so the true meaning shone through. Well done!

Quoted from stevie Yeah your explanation made me read this again Ash, as I love anything connected to time travel and such, and so it made more sense to me. Great concept, it prolly just needed some fine tuning so the true meaning shone through. Well done!

Thanks for re-reading it. I did write this on a bender, though, like that morning. So, I'm pretty pleased with it for the most part.

Well, I'm floored.  Time Travel.  Never had a clue.  That certainly didn't show up in my tiny man-brain for stuff...

Please write some more shorts.  They are easier to sell and help you get better.

Here's the truth about screenwriting.  

Writing a story is an orgy of words.  You start with a few more, they have sex and suddenly, you have a story.  But, screenwriting is a duel of words.  Each word has to justify its purpose on the page.  

Anyone can write a 400-page novel.  No one can write a 300-page screenplay.  Hell, I don't think anyone can write a 250 or even a 200-page screenplay and have any realistic hopes in it getting sold.

So, shorts helps you look for things like word usage, orphans, and planning, all of which go into writing a feature.

I know I've become a better writer since I started doing these OWC.  Many of the other peeps that are regulars feel the same way.

And the greatest compliment that I've really gotten is that everyone knew the first 2 OWC that I entered.  But, no one guessed the last 2 that I entered.  That's awesome.  To be able to delve into other ideas and genres is the best thing we can do as screenwriters.

End rant.  

Dan

Quoted from DanC Well, I'm floored.  Time Travel.  Never had a clue.  That certainly didn't show up in my tiny man-brain for stuff... Please write some more shorts.  They are easier to sell and help you get better. Here's the truth about screenwriting.   Writing a story is an orgy of words.  You start with a few more, they have sex and suddenly, you have a story.  But, screenwriting is a duel of words.  Each word has to justify its purpose on the page.   Anyone can write a 400-page novel.  No one can write a 300-page screenplay.  Hell, I don't think anyone can write a 250 or even a 200-page screenplay and have any realistic hopes in it getting sold. So, shorts helps you look for things like word usage, orphans, and planning, all of which go into writing a feature. I know I've become a better writer since I started doing these OWC.  Many of the other peeps that are regulars feel the same way. And the greatest compliment that I've really gotten is that everyone knew the first 2 OWC that I entered.  But, no one guessed the last 2 that I entered.  That's awesome.  To be able to delve into other ideas and genres is the best thing we can do as screenwriters. End rant.   Dan

lol. not really a rant. But, I will most likely work on some more, even if no one reads them. I got some brevity issues I need to work on if I'm being honest.