This is a linear story told in reverse and while there are some dramatic moments leading to Guy's eventual breaking, for me it's not fully explained what the final nail in the coffin was. I did like it but not enough to love it.
Well done.

Though I picked up that this is reverse chronology, I knew what to expect from the challenge parameters. I don't think it'd be immediately obvious to an audience (or uninitiated reader). Maybe having a clock somewhere in frame for the first few scenes will help explain it.

Mostly good job of linking the scenes as effect-then-cause, though the social worker probably should say that Guy is now a ward of the state. As written in this draft, there's nothing about Guy's comment that should strike the social worker as using humor as a coping mechanism, but with less time pressure I'm sure an appropriate wise-crack will find its way into a rewrite.

That one leap-of-logic aside, the story flows well. It also reminds me of the spores that took over a WWII bomber not so long ago.

Good job!

I liked how this ended, or started as per reading it... the idea of the spores and him up on the roof was effective and would be great visually.

But personally thought it went into more melodrama territory as it went backwards into his life.

Good effort

Loved the overall premise but the reverse buildup was somewhat anticlimactic...but I did love the last line. I know peeps are kind of over the whole zombie genre yet this would still succeed if that word was just removed. Good work - needs development.

I like it.  Not a whole lot of impact (for me) but a smooth read - clear and concise with a simple to follow narrative told in reverse order.  Nice use of visuals with the book ending of Guy as an infant to the antenna ending - plus the nod to the worker ant locked onto the leaf.

Maybe could have worked in a little more as to the consequences of Guy’s actions just to foreshadow the horrors he’s about to unleash on the world.  Seeing the Security Guard stumbling zombie-like after him towards the end/beginning might have given you something to that effect.

That was certainly different. I liked a lot of this, wasn't afraid to be weird. It veered from silly to dark a little too much for me. Not that you can't make that work, but I don't think it's quite there yet.

Might be something to the suggestion I saw about having the present run parallel instead of reverse order. Mushroom Guy going on a rampage could be more fun with some kind of context.

Nothing much to add about this. It is as it says on the tin, a story about a guy who snaps after a lifetime of abuse and decides to kill himself but take the world with him in spectacular fashion.

I loved writing this and despite the lacklustre reviews I really do love the premise. I'm definitely going to do another draft and enter it into a few competitions. Thanks for all the advice- I think the consensus has persuaded me to try a mixed narrative with this rather than a reverse one but I'll have a think and beef up the build-up as well as fix some of the awkward writing.

Any further suggestions on how I can make this better are welcome.

New draft is up. I kept it reverse narrative but fleshed it out and generally gave it a polish. I do feel that this is the best thing I've written in ages and I recently won a draw for some free notes from Wescreenplay for any short I wanted to submit. I thought I may as well submit this draft of Fun Guy and see what they say. The report blew me away! The reader gave me such amazing praise and understood every word, nuance and subtext I'd squeezed in which was a breath of fresh air. The quote from the feedback I'm going to requote for the rest of my life is:

"It may sound blasphemous to some, but I truly believe what Todd Philips and Scott Silver achieved in 122 minutes of Joker, the writer of this script has managed to achieve in less than 8 minutes."

I've been on cloud 9 ever since, so I'll certainly be entering this into competitions. Thank you so much for the brilliant feedback and ideas.

Quoted from MarkRenshaw "It may sound blasphemous to some, but I truly believe what Todd Philips and Scott Silver achieved in 122 minutes of Joker, the writer of this script has managed to achieve in less than 8 minutes." I've been on cloud 9 ever since, so I'll certainly be entering this into competitions. Thank you so much for the brilliant feedback and ideas.

Wow, you must be chuffed! That's some high praise indeed.