Not Even God Himself by Buckwheat - Short, Sci Fi, Drama - When a travel agency undertakes the most ambitious voyage into space in the history of mankind, the men responsible are faced with the consequences of endangering a hundred thousand lives.  13 pages - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Hey writer,

So this is very well written. I like the prose in the action as well as the dialogue.

I'm assuming the event that never happened was that the Titanic never sank. I'm having a hard time though drawing a parallel from that event to hundreds of years in the future. Is it that man's hubris became unchecked? Did we then have a series of successes in technology that we would otherwise had not have had? I'm confused on this point, but it could be me. Interested to know what others say.

Also confused a bit on the science. Is there a basis for "gravitional duration" travel? And by basis I mean a pseudo-science, Star Trek type basis? I believe our galaxy is about 250,000 light years across, and even Star Trek didn't attempt to go outside the galaxy. I think the challenge of even identifying a world that could host human life at 11 million light years away is next to impossible, let alone trying to build a ship to get there. Also, you seem to concentrate on solar sails as the main point of technological brilliance that will propel us to this destination; however solar sails alone can't propel a ship to beyond the speed of light, and you'd have to travel an unimaginable speed to reach a destination that is 11 million light years away. Just curious on the research you did to come up with these figures.

Lastly, I'm not sure I understand the plot? Greg's motives are lost on me. Why does he want 100,000 people to die? Did he silence Ben because he was afraid he'd say the craft wouldn't survive? And why must Miesha die when it looks as if she's already going to get on the ship? Will be interested to hear your explanations.

Again, very well written, contains the bones for a good sci-fi script apart from this challenge, however I think it's a bit cryptic and dense and it left me with more questions than answers.

Very well written and imaginative. You created an entire world in one week which is very impressive.
I was a little confused by the characters motivations towards the end. Maybe i missed something?

I wasn�t too sure what the threat was. I didn�t know Ben's life was in danger until that point so i didn�t feel on edge. I also didn't know why anyone wanted to leave earth. It had floating parks!  

You�re very good at delivering exposition through dialogue. not an easy thing to do.

Great world and great writing, I just didn't really understand why things  happened the way they did.


Sam

I am also confused.

So, SPOILERS

YOU'RE saying that if the Titanic never sinks that we get space travel?  Unlike some, I found the prose to be too much.  I didn't mind some, but, this really goes to town.

I didn't understand the plot at all.  Why does Greg want 100K people to die?  He knows the odds for survival are 0.  What's the connection?

We need a lot more info on this story to care for the characters.  Like why wouldn't Ben tell her the truth?  Why the assassination?  Why the double assassination for that matter?  

Too much that doesn't make sense.  

For a OWC, this was very very ambitious.  I'd like to have seen more time spent with the "science" behind this.  I mean, even in Avatar, they talked about the space travel.

Good luck.  And I hope you rewrite it.  

Dan

I get the feeling the writer wasn't sure where he was going with this -- or if he did know, he wasn't sure how to get there.
I say this partly because there's a great deal of filler detail (characters walking here and there, etc.), all of which seems like stalling. A lot of this should be trimmed out to enhance your focus. That's the overall problem -- lack of focus.
My opinion on random things:
* We don't know whether the Titanic sank or not, but it doesn't really matter. The old White Star Line survives.
* Greg's motivation is money/stockholders. He doesn't necessarily want 100,000 people to die; he just doesn't care. The ship MUST launch.
* Should gravitational time duration be time DILATION? Traveling at the speed of light means the ship would take 11 million years to get to the planet. Maybe time dilation means a quicker trip?
* I see quite a few mistakes (apostrophes, slugs, commas, etc) that I won't catalogue.
* Boring Tunnel Company sounds funny.
* I'm not sure why Meisha gets so mad at Ben for urging her not to go. This a first date. She's leaving. For that matter, why did she bother dragging a stranger out to the checkpoint.

Henry

True, it could be dilation instead of duration.

The trouble with traveling to a planet 11 million light years away is this - when we see the light coming from it, which allows us to observe it, we're seeing the planet as it looked 11 million years ago. Assuming it takes even just a few seconds to get there, by whatever futuristic travel that's been invented, you're still visiting the planet 11 million years after you've observed it. The likelihood that it's still even there would be small, and if it is still there, the habitability of it would almost certainly have changed.

Ajr -- You're exactly right. It needs to fixed.
Henry

It was an interesting read but not that it really held my attention. I started skimming in places, especially with a whole page of action. So many questions that have already been asked that I think we'll all have and want to know. PLEASE post a reply after all this is said and done (meaning after Don reveals writers) so we can know where you intended this to go.

Don't get me wrong. I think you're a helluva writer. This is definitely something to continue working on. Great job for a two week challenge.

Logline is a bit specific. How come exactly one hundred thousand lives are at risk?

White Star? Isn't that the company that built the Titanic? Ah, now I get the title and I can guess as to what didn't happen in history. I don't see how the Titanic not sinking leads to space travel though, I don't really buy that.

The script is is very wordy. There is a lot of unnecessary descriptions, this reads very much like a short story.  I get that you have to get across the sci-fi elements but you can make this a lot leaner. For example cut 'Without a moments hesitation' and you lose nothing from the line. A polish of the script can easily rectify such issues.

Greg's opening speech is very on the nose.

Page 4 and I'm starting to skip. I'm finding this hard going. Why are people being shot in this Boring Tunnel? Ah I see it is some sort of flashback maybe? What has all this got to do with the big spaceship?

You have a great imagination but I'm just not getting this, sorry.


I have to say and I'm going to say this for every script in this challenge (so I'm basically cut and pasting this last bit into all of them lol) that well done on entering! This was creatively an extremely challenging outline, one in which quite a few didn't even attempt or dropped out of. To have a completed script in the running deserves a pat on the back and a collective high-five!

-Mark

Opening passage is awkwardly written and over written, which leads me to believe I'm in for a tough slog.  Let's see...

Yeah, as I thought...the writing just doesn't work here as is, but it's not terrible, either.  You're missing some punctuation, overwriting, over describing, and even using the same words multiple times in passages, which is a mistake for sure.

Turn off the "CONTINUEDs" on the tops and bottoms of pages - looks terrible and is just an obvious rookie mistake.

On Page 2, you change scenes but don't have a new Slug...and now looking back at your 1st Slug, it's not really correct.

In dialogue, when using a name or anything that can be inferred as a name, it must be set off with a comma (s).

Lots and lots of totally unnecessary orphans on display.

Slugs just don't work as written.  Way too much minuscule, unimportant info being given, when in reality, you need much more detail into the bigger things in this brave new world you've created.

OK, listen...the scene where Meisha and Ben have left the bar is just plain odd, as they're apparently quite far from the city...or anything, really, on a dirt road.  How did they get here?  Did they walk?  Why?  Just doesn't make alot of sense and the banter between them, although more than just decent, is also very long winded and not adding anything really.

Page 9 - "Miesha pulls away from Ben. She leans away to get more distance between them." - Here's a great example of something that will really help your writing, if you take it to heart and really try to understand what I'm saying.  We know that there are only 2 peeps in this scene - Meisha and Ben.  If Meisha pulls away from just kissing Ben, we know who she's pulling away from - you don't need to include "from Ben".  The 2nd sentence doesn't add a single thing and isn't necessary.  The vast majority of your action/description lines and passages include such stuff, which creates wasted space - space that you definitely needed here to build your world better.

The Montage does not work at all as written.  Very poor choice to include this.

Wow...this is going downhill very fast, sorry to say.  The writing is poor now and it appears you were in a mad rush to finish.  And the end you chose, IMO, is very poor and rather senseless, as in, I don't get it.  I don't get Greg's motives at all.

IMO, this is WAY TOO BIG a concept for a 12 1/2 page short and making things even tougher are the fact that you wasted literally probably 2 pages with overwriting and the like.

I do give credit for creativity here, but over all, this does not work at all, as written, but it's a solid effort in a tough challenge.

You give a lot of detail of small action which makes it harder to read for me.
For example here I have no idea what's it about (p2) "He points a finger at a nearby cubicle..." Next we see a man running out of a cubicle and pushing some table back. Instances like this are all over.

You also overwrite in my opinion. Like here on p1 you say "As he makes his way down the long aisle he looks into random cubicles as he passes them" - told us about him passing the cubicles twice.

About the story - I don't get why Greg wants her alive and on board. Is he in love with her and that's why he keeps killing everyone related to her or the ones that show interest in her? I didn't like that last part - it's about Greg and his malicious plan, the one I don't know anything about.

I like Ben and Miesha, their date and her story. The thing that happened to Ben made an impact if only there was a better explanation to it. Nice work overall

Inventive and creative and plenty of pathos and I really like the story in general and the whole feeling of this being another world but it was nevertheless confusing. A journey that's destined to fail by the company's own admission? 100, 000 people embarking on this same  journey despite the top dogs knowing it'll combust? I don't get that.

The writing from a construct point of view definitely needs streamlining.
But I loved the feel of this and the world you created even though I didn't understand a lick of the major 'thrust' of it.

Btw, are they in love? Second date? Maybe them seeing each other for a good while and actually being in love could add more to the story.

She feels compelled to go despite educated warnings,  because her son and husband died in the process of getting over the armed border presumably?  I don't get it, like I said, but I don't get half of what Lynch does either but still enjoy most of his stuff, except the most recent incarnation of Twin Peaks which was just nuts.

Pare it back a bit. Elucidate a bit.
Nice job.

Good character intro and world building

Check page break, end with full sentence

spell out numbers in dialogue

p3 upper half, spoken sentences too long, reads very exposition feeding – cut every word not needed and maybe find an active angle that is in foreground while respective information is delivered in background

Is it a Titanic reference, not sure, I google… yes, should be it.

Additional note: I like your, what I call here "charming audience connectors", like: Greg stepping on the table, or him dropping the plague on Ben's desk. You really know what you do and I just want to confirm that you're on a right track with placing those beats. It works.

P4 love it, it's good and clean presented. Nice choice to go for another worldbuilding experience "outside", and looking forward to the conflict now…

I also like the writing, no problems in the delivery area at all.

(((Reads like a Mark Renshaw script, check this writer's SF stuff if you like.)))

Dialogue bottom p6 is bad

Upper half 7 you're back in exposition feeding mode here

P8 good take on drama and emotions.

" Yeah,on the ship to Holmberg II."

Now we're talking and hell were you in need of that connecting element. Very anticlimactic, in a good way and now I'm ready for act 3.

Btw get rid of continued at page break, reads technical, and as you wonderfully see here, takes attention from story…

P10 "starts" - use different description

first half p10 – spoken sentences from Miesha too long, unnatural

p11 A man – A MAN

Ben is shot?

Okay. The ending is a bit unclear yet. As I see it, Greg ordered to take out Ben and when he realized Miesha saw it, both Misha and the killer needed to disappear, but I for one thing didn't really get how Greg identified Miesha, or her reaction on Ben's demise within the crowd and for another thing I don't think it's the right ending in general.

It's interesting nevertheless. Going "away", connected to taking risks coming with it, is a future (even present) topic for sure. So, a strong theme you got. I like the anticlimactic storytelling. It's a bit overwritten partly-

An enjoyable experience.


@@ ajr Miesha does not die, as I see it. At least not yet. Ben, the supervisor of the travel company, proofed that the enterprise does not work. So, as the host, Greg must get rid of him to get it started without running into the backlash and responsibility later. In Miesha's case, Greg must only be sure she gets on ship because of the exact reason I said before and that's what he says in his final dialogue. The killer of Ben was shot by Greg because there was a witness of the murder, her, and Greg is an a++hole... at least as I saw it


@@@  Libby, nice to see you around.  Good review, I like the streamlining call… true
"A journey that's destined to fail by the company's own admission? 100, 000 people embarking on this same  journey despite the top dogs knowing it'll combust? I don't get that. " Yes, for money. The writer deliberately chose to go with that statement.  It's somehow political. Is it so far off from today, weighing life against money? I'm a SF writer myself and it's a pretty humanistic concept in case of "beware of the beginnings"… the English colloquial tells me "nip in the bud" not sure if it can be seen 1 on 1 though. All in all, it's an anti ultra-capitalistic message, so to say.

Writer,

Very bold idea you have here. Love your choice of the sinking of the Titanic being the event that didn't happen. Original! However, this script gets bogged down early by a lot of overwriting and passive phrasing. It was a tough read out of the gate, though it did seem to loosen up during the second half. Overall, I liked this one a lot. Good descriptions, good sense of place and I had no problem visualizing your world. Overall, a fine effort!

Steve

Code that can project images in three dimensional space.

Holograms?

Code They move charts and figures around with one free hand as the other slips across the keyboard.

A keyboard seems out of place amidst this technology.

Code Greg walks over to a nearby table, clears the top of it with one broad sweep of his hand, and grips the sides of the table.

'Greg walks over' is weak. Rewrite to something like this:

Greg clears a nearby table with one broad sweep of his hand
then grips tightly at the sides.

Leave the director to decide how the actor gets to the table... or simply rewrite with a stronger verb choice like 'strides'. Try not to repeat keywords within the same sentence.

Yeah, bored now. Seems this is going to be a slog.

Title gives off religious connotations. HUGE turn off for me.

Sci-Fi. I can dig it.

Logline is very detailed. Don't know if that's a good or a bad thing.

Title should be all caps.

White Star Line makes me think of Titanic. But they're going to space? This should be fun.

You could use some commas.

400 years? That would be 2245... 311 years after WSL ceased operations in real life.

For the most part, "CONT'D" is unnecessary. "(CONTINUED)" / "CONTINUED:" is always unnecessary; it eats up white space. You're not writing a shooting script.

Quoted Text table[']s original spot.

Quoted Text ’BENJAMIN HALSEY - CHIEF TECHNICAL OfFICER’.

Lowercase f intentional? Trying to be futuristic/spacey? Halsey. Huge fan of hers.

Quoted Text When it finally stops, the last data set is marked in red, marked ’critical failure:survival rate-0’.

What are my chances?
Does not cumpute.

Quoted Text BEN One week? GREG One week and ten years.

It's been... one week and ten years since you looked at me.  

Always offset names and interjections with commas.

Quoted Text Don’t talk to me like I’m one [of] your goddamn stockholders[,] Greg.

Quoted Text Stockholders who are expecting a ship with a multi-trillion dollar solar sail apparatus that we promised will fly [eleven] million light years across space to populate some god forsaken planet.

What's a GTD satellite?

Numbers in dialogue should be spelled out, especially numbers below 21.

Quoted Text EEXT. OUTSIDE

Redundant.

A specific "Century" should be capitalized.

Quoted Text The landscape of the city is mismatched 19th century brick buildings next to 21st century skyscrapers next to 22nd century carbon fiber domes below 23rd century floating islands. The islands float above the water, above buildings, anywhere. On a single island could be as much as an entire city block, or as little as a single plot of grass used as a park.

Sounds like you're combining two James Cameron movies -- Titanic and Avatar. Three, if you count Aliens, but that one hasn't really creped up yet. What's next? The Terminator?

Quoted Text Bullet[-]shaped vehicles hover around the city, organized by the blinking light projections of road paint that is built onto [three] dimensions of axis’. [??? I think you mean "axes," the plural of "axis"; "axis'" is possessive. Even if it's meant to be possessive, it should be "axis's" or "axes'" as per above.]

Quoted Text three[-]dimensional

I can't believe there's an actual Boring Tunnel Company. I'd prefer the Exciting Tunnel Company. Or Totally Rad. But that's just me.  

When I google BTC, I get bitcoin. (Still don't know what the hell that bitcoin/cryptocurrency stuff is.) Oh, that's right. Boring Tunnel Company.

I'm not sure if the AI should be tagged with a V.O. I probably would.

Quoted Text One after another[,] gun shots get louder and louder

Quoted Text The miles[-]long dirt road

Quoted Text one direction

Please! Anybody but One Direction! Anything but One Direction!  

Genre-savvy main characters? LOL. Nice.

wavers = shakes, quivers
waivers = documents in which a person relinquishes a right or claim

Quoted Text almost [as] large as the horizon.

Quoted Text three[-]story[-]tall projection screens.

Pretty good story. I would have cut a few pages, cut to the chase quicker. I don't quite get

SPOILER

The guy in the hat and sunglasses. Who is he? An assassin? A hitman? What does he want?

END SPOILER

As for the changed event? You indicate that the Titanic didn't sink. Overall, not too shabby. Good job.

The only connection I noted to the premise of the challenge was an implied reference to the Titanic.  I guess this is supposed to be a foreshadowing of the fate about to befall the giant colony ship. My first question is why are they flying to a planet 11 million light years away? Our own galaxy is only 100,000 light years in diameter and contains over 200 billion stars. Aside from that, what is the point of sending out a hugely expensive ship that’s guaranteed to fail? And 100,000 passengers? Such a huge ship would require solar sails of a tremendous size. It makes no financial sense, whatever the motivation for the project. And I think motivation would help explain why Greg is so insistent that the ship must be launched on schedule. And why he kills Ben.

I found this one dense - long action descriptions and lengthy dialogue too. Combine that with an involved premise... and it took a bit of work to get my head into this game.

However, there is a real plot here. An interesting tangle that gets untangled.

I agree with one or two other comments about the mysteriously dastardly motivations of Greg. He’s a ferocious capitalist, no? He just needs to avoid displeasing his shareholders at any price. But he does turn out to be inhumane beyond the normal scheme of things, and that’s not particularly shown in his dialogue or actions - until the final moments, that is.

Interesting way of using the Brave New World premise too. This is my interpretation of what I read: If mankind’s ambition is never checked by catastrophic failure (i.e. the sinking of the Titanic), then failure becomes something that we all must avoid at absolutely any cost. Escalating stakes unchecked.

Make sure to cap characters when we first see them in action. an office full of PEOPLE for example.

Write out numbers in dialouge. four-hundred not 400.

White Star Line? So the Titanic didn't sink and now the White Star company is launching people into space? Kinda funny.

lots of world building here with the city, which I do like. However it can be a little heavy handed. The trick is to give just enough info to the reader to imagine without overkill. This isn't a novel. Hard to do in a short when your space is limited enough already.

Is the world over populated? Or is this just a mega big city? Unclear.

Page 7 and I'm not sure what his story is about. Is it about the rocket doomed to fail or Miesha? What is Miesha doing? I have no idea as she's just traveling he city and dating????

What does her being an immigrant have to do with an interstellar spaceship?

Ok I'm skimming again. This could be interesting as there is a lot going on here. But it's too much for a short. As a result nothing jells or makes much sense to me. On top of this, the script is very overwritten I'd  say. We don't need to know about Ben kicking up dirt (lots of dirt in this script for some reason) for example at the end of the date. Keep everything related to the story and if it doesn't help or advance it, then it needs to be cut.

A shame as this writer can write. But maybe a novel might be more up their alley?

Also, why not name the new spaceship the Titanic II? Help build the world AND meet the challenge of the script by implying the first one never sunk and become celebrated while the reader knows because of history what fate could await the ship's maiden voyage. Missed opportunity.