I was into this story, then you lost me at the end.  You managed to build an ominous undertone quickly and kept building it.  The climax, however, just seemed so bizarre.  I've never heard of a local Halloween festival that had the kind of bucks to construct such massive structures.  That scene between the two construction workers is a dead giveaway of what is going to happen, BTW.  As for the odd things happening around Wesley, I guessed pretty quickly that he had some sort of mischievous ghost following him along, so the boy's appearance at the end didn't come as a surprise.  My only question would be, did only Wesley see him, or could his Mom and the cop also see him at that point?

Despite some large, chunky paragraphs, I think your sentences were clean and concise.  The story moved right along.  This was a solid effort.

I liked this one a lot - well written, creepy, unusual characters, nicely structured.

The ending was a bit anti-climatic - the tower really needed to kill a few people after this build up! And I am not sure why Wesley went to the Festival if he was so afraid of going, but these are minor quibbles that could be ironed out in a longer rewrite.

Best one I've read yet.

Autistic boy - building blocks - portents. Hmm can't quite remember the TV series this was on, but in it the boy builds a replica of something, so I suppose this is a little different in that he speaks.

Nicely written and I wasn't too worried about the  around the world theme at the festival.

Sorry. I can't get over the fact that I've seen something very close to this before. When I pin it down, I'll edit this and stick any links I find to it. Hopefully you'll be able to see what I mean.

Someone pointed out that another entry was very similar to a tv show episode - in this age of media saturation it is not surprising that we absorb ideas and images from other tv shows and films, whether consciously or not.

When most of the ideas out there have already been saturated, you're left putting your own spin on an old idea. =)

Yeah. Absolutely agree with the last two comments. Everythings been done to some extent. My biggest problem with the scene I mentioned, was that it was a little too close for comfort for me and distracted from my reading of what was otherwise a fine script.

I was in no way implying it was a deliberate rip-off

There's an old saying about writers -

All you need to be a good writer is an original idea.

But it does not have to be your original idea!

This one had a really good story, but like some people said, the writer did not execute some of it well. Especially the ending. That was really out of the blue. The part where the tower falls was suspenseful as well, but it just happened so quickly and ended so quickly (with the quick cut to the hospital) just made all that suspense go to waste. I think that the officer should have died (since he said that someone is going to die), and that Wesley should have seen the boy standing there. It probably would have made it look like Wesley was following the boys orders or something, being the trap set for the officer, so that when he pushed Wesley out of the way, the officer gets crushed and killed. But that's a bit violent for a family horror (well, someone can die, I guess. But not that violently).

Other than that, writing was good, dialogue was good (some times), but overall, not executed as well as it should have been. Good story, though!

Sean

I was drawn into this story.  I enjoyed reading it at first but was left with nothing when it was over.  

Does this qualify for a family horror...my gut feeling is, just because there is a young boy in the story is not enough to justify it being a kid/family show.  

I personally hate it when a child is portrayed as having an evil or dark side because it is so creepy and unnatural.  I do understand that Wesley is not evil or dark...but the boy that follows him, plays games and eats candy his mother doesn't want him to eat before dinner, is.

Someone did die at the festival...it was the boy that Wesley saw in the hospital room...but there's no resolution here for me...no lesson learned.

Morgan  

I want to thank everyone who took the time to read and review Wesley.  I drew my inspiration from my 9-year-old autistic nephew.  He was non-verbal until he was nearly 4 and in that time, I often wondered what was going on inside his head.  Could he understand what was going on around him?  Was there a verbal child trapped inside,  screaming to get out?  Of course, I didn't have the page count to expand that deeply into it, but I hope to somehow work this into a feature length script in the future.  

I apologize about the confusion with the Leaning Tower.  Whoever made mention of Disneyworld and the different country themes, that's kind of what I was going for.  However, when I read it back it sounded really lame so I removed all references to the Leaning Tower and replaced it with just a big creepy haunted house type building.  Then I stupidly submitted the wrong draft.  It wasn't until I was reading the feedback and noticed the reference to the Leaning Tower that I realized I had screwed up.

Again, thank you all for the feedback

Interesting.  I think this would have been much better without the Pisa and Eiffel towers.  That's what a time rush will do you to you...make you screw up!

Good effort in this tough OWC!

I have a suggestion for you:

don't go back to a haunted house, that will suck originality out of it. Wesley is creeped out when he sees a haunted house - that's no news, every kid is... well, almost every...

I'd keep the leaning tower of Pisa but instead of Eithel Tower would have let's say Stonehenge - blocks of stone almost hanging in the air - any creepy construction will do. Empasize that it's not different country theme but a weird building theme, "inclined to fall" buildings theme...

building/construction/man made or not...

This was a curious story. It did capture my interest, but I found it rather odd that you used "The Leaning Tower of Pisa" in it for a Halloween deal. What did it mean? I'd almost think that something there is real or you wouldn't have written it.

Anyways, that part didn't jive for me. If you had all sorts of oddities, it would work, but that alone I think makes it miss the mark.

The ending seemed forced to me with the strange boy/evil twin ghost showing up all of a sudden. I know what you were going for, but you should have probably shown him in the boy's pov earlier on.

This is definitely a memorable one. One of the most unique entries I'd say.

Sandra

About The Leaning Tower - seems like I'm outnumbered.

Yet it's the creepiest tower ever... I think

I appreciate your enthusiasm, khamanna  

Sandra, I honestly don't know what possessed me to use it to begin with.  Like I said, I took it out but then submitted the wrong draft.  I didn't realize it would distract so many from liking the story.  I would have liked to have seen how the script would have been received had I not screwed up.