Tic Tac by Bob Lazar - A naive recruit's first mission is not what it seems.  Short, Sci fi, Comedy

Okay, this was a fun little.   A good take on a current topic too!  Though I did wonder how he was trapped.  I guess from having to be put in the pod by his supervisor?  Clever ending as well.

All around, well-written and a breeze to read.  Great job on this.

A fun, easy read is always nice. I like the freshness of the set-up you've given us. The ending was just okay, IMO.  I've read your stuff before and It's always of a high quality. This is no exception, I just didn’t quite enjoy it as some of the other stuff.

Reg

Tic Tac and Bob Lazar, someone knows their UFOs.

Well not what I expected and I didn't really see him as trapped... unless in the grooves of an old vinyl record

But it was quite fun and I liked seeing it from the alien POV for a change.

Wasn't entirely sure about some of the dialogue and a couple of transitions made me re-read to get my bearings, but overall decent effort.

I like the concept of a bunch of Grays being subject to the basic ‘Henchman’ protocol; they’re probably not the engineers that design the spacecraft, just a bunch of low IQ clones, mind you, I’d assume their low IQ clones are still light years ahead of human (IQs).

Anyway, yeah… you could be an ‘Arbitrary Knob Turner’, ‘Haphazard Toggle Slider’, ‘Inconsistent Button Presser’, or in Mike’s case; a ‘Non-selective Pod Traveler’ and fear the effects of being confined to a small space to boot.

I kept thinking “Mike Wazowski” from Monsters Inc… so that put a fun spin on the whole angle of him being inept. Then landing in an obscure warehouse somewhere in deep space, probably wedged in and amongst some of Indiana Jones’ crated conquests, wherein they have ‘Top Men’ working on the situation… ‘Top Men’. Fun ride, best of luck.

Interesting, but didn't really get the sense that anyone was trying to 'escape' from anything. The ages of the characters didn't work for me because I didn't know what to picture. Sure, someone is over 600 years old but they probably don't look it on screen, right?
Hard to follow at first but comes off as a Spaced Invaders/Red Dwarf sci-fi comedy.  

Cool Idea and I really liked Mike.

There were certain parts where I just wasn't able to follow along or get a clear picture  of the scene, but the red buttons' idea was brilliant.

Thank you  

Great little tale. The only thing that bothered me were your scene headings/slugs. From Ext. Ocean to Ext. Cabin to Ext. Suburb (but it seemed like the same scene) to Ext. California...dizzying.

Fun stuff - good work.

Pretty creative, almost reads like a Pixar animated short. The writing is competent, but could use a good clean-up. It gets pretty sloppy as it goes along. Nothing horrible, just some minor punctuation and format errors.

So, the end is implying that this is just a hazing joke between co-workers?

Didn't really get a "trapped" feeling from this. At no point did Mike ask to be let out or try to escape. Could just be me.

Still, a really good effort. Wouldn't mind seeing a rewrite of this one.

Hello Writer,

Congrats on finishing the challenge.

Notes:

Kinda find it hard to believe that a recruit will be put into that type of situation with no experience at all. I think it would been better if this was a training course that Trask made Ledgerwood believe is a real mission. Trask appears to be a d-ck so it'll fit his persona lol.

Enjoyed the dialogue and the world you built here.

Hope this helps,
Gabe

I'm not in this challenge, but I'm reading.

"so many red buttons." Big laugh from me. Love the visual.

Fun stuff. Thanks for sharing.

This story was a little over my pinhead. With that said, I liked the concept. I really thought those 2 yokels on earth were gonna get beamed up. They seemed like prime candidates for a UFO abduction.
I like that the spacecraft gets dumped in a warehouse, but wish Ledgerwood would have been deposited on earth with the yokels. Anyway, funny stuff but as someone pointed out, I'm not sure if a real mission makes sense if this was just a hazing.

Twas a little over my pinhead in parts too...But I thoroughly enjoyed the wit and humour throughout.

I think he was trapped in that he was recruited to act without any choice and then thrown in the deep end? Definitely a situation many of us have found ourselves in and it also provoked empathy for the lead character.

I laughed at the Clockwork Orange reference. Great kickoff, Bob.  
Overall, nice one. I think I get the world I was plunged into. Kept me entertained for sure.

Love the title page too. Set the tone and enabled me to get in the groove.

P.S. This would make a nice short episode for Hyper Epics, or Love, Death + Robots, imho. Season 2 of the latter, minus a couple of iffy ones, was a cracker

It was a little hard to follow the action, but a few fixes is all it takes to make this a better read.

The opening slug:
     INT. UNDERWATER BASE, BREAK ROOM – DAY (2004)
Since we’re dealing with aliens, I think it would be helpful to indicate this base is located on Earth.
And why do the aliens have human names? Is this just to make it easier for the reader to identify them?

The slug on the second page:
     EXT. OCEAN – DAY
The action would read better if it went something like: “The pod shoots up out of the water, then vanishes.”

Remaining on the second page:
     EXT. CABIN – NIGHT
     EXT. SUBURB – NIGHT
It seems as if these two slugs are actually indicating the same location because they both have two men.   If this is so, then you should stick with one slug.
In any event, I think you need to show the pod landing.

Disintegrating the two men by accident is great, because it shows that the gray aliens aren’t the smartest guys in the galaxy. And all the red buttons on the control panel is a nice touch, because it shows the aliens build lousy spacecraft and/or their pilots all suck.

This is a pretty good premise you might want to build on.