This is cute, and it has some excellent characters even if they are cliché. Maybe that's what works about them.

You don't need ages. They're animals. Even if we get to know how old they are as readers, there's no way anyone would be able to tell visually unless they're very young. And, more importantly, it doesn't matter.

The world is compelling and well-conceived. I was on board for all of it. It reminded me of the sewers in The Secret Life of Pets, and so did the characters (inspiration, perhaps?). Nothing wrong with that. What I didn't get is the animals talking to people in the market. If everyone in this world can talk to each other, then I'd expect a greater meshing. Where are the working animals?

What kills this is that you give everything away and all that's left is to watch it play out. That isn't entertaining. Letting the audience in on what's going to happen only works if we care about what's going to happen. The only reason we're watching is so Chester gets his comeuppance, but I have no reason to dislike Chester except because we're told to. But you take it even further and tell us exactly what's going to happen...and then it happens, exactly like that. There's no surprise, no anticipation, nothing rewarding about it. You could have set up the ghost peppers as just another purchase, raising the question of why Francesca would need those, but then we would get it when the ghosts appeared in Chester's trough.

Only you gave it away even earlier. How does Big Al even know what Chester is up to when Chester hasn't even gotten up to it yet? If we didn't know that, Chester would have plotted against the feast for selfish reasons, Francesca would have gone about her business seemingly oblivious only she buys those ghost peppers, and Chester gobbles the bait and we get our aha! moment.

I enjoyed this a lot, which is why I want to see it done better. Great writing, great characters, the story should have worked but it doesn't as written. It's just flat.

Hi Writer,

You put a fair share of work into this.

The story is simple, but it works thanks to the colorful world you built.

There are a lot of characters, but I wasn't lost because you made them distinguishable. Kudos for that.

The use of the whistle is light, but it was there, as the humor and the sewer, so all the parameters were met.

I liked that you used animation, it feels fresh, though there's no need for this note imho:

Quoted Text Entire script is animated.

Overall, a good entry, with great writing and good characters.

Well done,
David

I'm going to say that at first I thought, "oh no, there's way too many characters being introduced" and that I would have difficulty following along.  Wasn't the case, maybe because I could easily picture each character (being animals and all).  

Chester and his gang were pretty lightweight.  Not much at all was happening with them and the conflict felt almost non-existent.

The humor in the dialogue was lacking a bit, I didn't care much for it, but I'm not dinging you on the comedy aspect -- you hit all the notes on the parameters.

I wasn't wowed by it, but it didn't offend me.  Unfortunately you were just in that land of in-between on how it made me feel.

Best of luck,
Gary

Hello ,

Neat little story.  I liked the pepper ghosts. Nice visual to signify what they are.
Frenchy was a cool cat...for a skunk.  
Maybe instead telling how they are going to get revenge , show it. Which you did but it was like pulling the curtain back to early. Dialogue gave it away a little bit.
You did good working in so many characters. They all played their part and the story moved forward.
Franky singing was a good choice. His line “one of these days.” Really relatable. We all hope for that.
Albino alligator was different.  He got what he deserved.

Good luck!

I don’t watch animation, but I liked this script a lot. Great characters. Especially enjoyed the vengeful pepper ghosts. Very nice work.

Picked this one because it was the first one on the list of scripts. After a double-check, I see that it was actually second, but oh well. Already read it now.

Rather long title for such a short.

A bit confused right off the bat. LOWER MANHATTAN SEWER - LOUNGE??? What is that? Having a hard time picturing this. Perhaps some descriptions in the following paragraph would aid in picturing this.

Animated cartoons. Aren't cartoons animated?

On page 3, I think you can write a simple LATER instead of the same slug, but with CONTINUOUS.

Finished. Not sure what to say here. I enjoyed some of it, but at the same time, it left me cold.

First off, I think it has too many characters for a short. I hd to scroll up to read the introductions over and over just to remember who was who.

Not sure about the goal here. Make a 4th of July feast? IMHO, I would have liked to see the goal being more clear and important. Fewer characters.

The script is cute, but it doesn't hit the funny bone completely. Could've been made more funny by just having the goal more clear and important/urgent.

It takes place in the sewer. It's comedic. A whistle is used. So, you hit all the points, just could be re-written better for a short short like this.

Cute title... several ideas popped into my head at this title.

No need to do the 'animation' thing..

OH how cool. All animals! Great original idea here.

Hmmm wow ... too many characters on page 1 for me. Causing me anxiety Where's the Xanax!!??
And even several more on page 2. Way too many for a five page story IMO.

Not sure I understand this story, but you end with a fart I guess.

Good job completing. Nice idea to use animals.

A lot going on in this one. Too many characters to keep straight and I found myself skimming near the end. Very creative, good work but not one of my faves. Not sure that taking time to give the animals an age is necessary. Good job, writer. Quite the imagination.

Underneath The Streets of New York

This is a demanding read because of the huge amount of characters, and me wanting to have a clear picture and identify which animal is which character.  

Then, I don't think the character count is justified. This way the story never developed to a clear, consistent experience. The antagonistic rat pack had so little space here. I think I get the overall concept of tricking them with the "ghost spices" but that plot felt rather superficially handled because so many characters are speaking about not truly essential things. Too overladen for my taste. However, a serious attempt which gets you some points from my sight.

Ok, now I understand why Jeff is upset.

Sorry, just reading this now. I started reading scripts from the bottom of Don's list, and didn't get to the top three on the list before voting. Really sorry. I would have scored this very well.

Jeff's first round entry was so bad all I could comment on it at the time was something about "way to stay in the game". I opened this script at this late date, knowing it was Jeff's, with a bit of fear and low expectation.

I was wrong. Very wrong.

This script is in SOME ways the best of the bunch. I never thought I'd say that about a Jeff Bush script, since we're being honest. Especially in a group of such talented short script writers.

I can also see why the script did not score well on story.

I have to try to imagine how I would have read this story without knowing the author. I think my first reaction would be to recognize the enormous effort and craftsmanship that went into the work. When I see effort and craftsmanship, I'm inclined to give a story a lot more rope, to try and read it more carefully. As screenwriters we should understand that not all scripts are designed for easy reading. Some scripts that would look great on film are, in their nature, more work to read. If the script is sloppy, it's not worth the effort. But if it's quality, it's worth giving it a chance.

why the script worked(or at least should have scored well):

- the characterization was excellent for a 5 page short
- the dialog was also excellent given 72 hours
- as was the prose. I actually liked the visual of the ghosts leaving the pepper. That's perfect for an animation.
- the imagery was outstanding for an animation

why it didn't work
- it's not an easy read, despite the excellent writing.

Understanding why is critical if the goal is winning these challenges. It's not an easy read for two reasons: one, the are a lot of characters. Two, the story line gets lost in the reader's effort to absorb the characters and other details.

The storyline is this: a feast is being planned. Chester, the chief's wayward son, wants to sabotage it with his rat pack by stealing the food for the meal. Francesca, anticipating his move, has the food rigged with spicy hot peppers to make him pay for his deed.

It's easy to lose some of that with all the characters and images. The mind can only process so much in reading. This is why it is said you can open a movie in a court room but not a screenplay.

Also, there is no real main character. Francesca and Chester come closest, but we don't meet them til relatively late on the character list. There's not a compelling reason for us to care whether the dinner succeeds or not. And the stakes related to that dinner are not strong.

I have one more script to read, but I WOULD have given this the highest score. It hits on character, prose and dialog. It does not hit a homerun on story, but to be fair, NONE of these challenge stories came close to doing that. There was plenty of talented writing on display, but the stories were utterly forgettable.

I do wish this story here didn't end with a fart joke and a Simpsons reference. That felt tacked on.

But I do understand why Jeff is upset. He clearly put a ton of work into this and for once(in my experience) he actually did come close to cranking one out of the park on a challenge. That's not the knock it sounds like, I've never hit one out, I suspect there are writers here much better than me who have not, it's very hard to do.

I'm not excusing any of the comments or accusations that Jeff made in his frustration. But this script DID deserve to be higher in the ranking this round. I think it sank just because the detail and number of characters made it a hard script to just breeze through and give it a score.

It's not true that the best scripts always rise to the top. But I think it IS true that scripts that are easy to read, AND have other strengths, such as decent story, characters, etc, rise to the top.

This is all your opinion, Kev. I've looked at the script and I feel it is where it deserves to be.

Of course, Dustin. Looking back, I see you didn't review it, so hard to compare my thoughts to yours here

I have absolutely ZERO REASON to defend Jeff or his work. He generally dismisses any script I've ever written on some flimsy ground and takes much the same approach to my opinions. I only say this to support the fact that I am giving my honest opinion on the script, not taking up some pro-Jeff cause. I am actually shocked the story had this kind of quality after his first round entry.

But of course, just my opinion on the script. And I believe it didn't score well because it was more work to read.

I could honestly take this script apart... do to him what he does to others... but it will be too time consuming and people will know I've only done it because I know it is Jeff's.

This script was 4th on my scorecard for the round.

As my review says, I thought the number of characters was handled deftly. It's not perfect, as others have pointed out, but it's very good.

Some obviously weighted the flaws more heavily than I did.

If Jeff were to write more like this, he'd hit on some that win. But, I don't think this is the style he likes to write, so, I think we'll see more of his shock scripts. And, obviously, that's his prerogative. You gotta write what motivates you.

Good point, PK(sorry, I don't know your name). I was also encouraged to see Jeff breaking what he normally considers rules. That might be what Dustin is referring to, not sure.

A script like this is simply going to be harder to digest because of the character count. But let's say you were hired by Pixar for their next big project. They won't care about character count or ease of read, they're selling a movie, not a script.

It goes back to what Dave said: if your goal is to win a challenge you need to design your script a certain way.

The reason I said I would have scored this at the top is because of the criteria breakdown in this challenge. Maybe I'd break this down:

story 2 or 3
char 4
dialog 4
prose 4(people will always quibble, but the action was clear and visual)

That would have been on top of my list.

By comparison, I might have had yours:
story: 4
char 3
dialog 3
prose 3

Which would have also been near the top. Sorry I missed the vote.

Last round I gave one 4, just to explain my scoring.

So while if this had been an OWC Jeff's would not have been on top for me. But with these criteria it was.