The Final Piece by Grace Beaumont - Short, Horror - A lonely old woman loves nothing more than completing her jigsaw puzzles.  But when a mysterious box arrives on her doorstep one night, her life is about to take a horrifying turn. - pdf, format

Not bad.


Doesn't try to do anything dramatically new with the Legend, just adds a twist at the end, but it works.

Great idea using the jigsaw puzzles.

Felt as if Margot's early to-self-dialogue didn't need to be there (though it foreshadows her need for a challenge).

Her putting together the mystery puzzle was fun, to a point. We know where it's going (Night Gallery, for example).

Also, I guess we just have to accept that the ax man could create the mystery puzzle on the spot?

Nifty idea with the "final puzzle." Didn't quite buy that she would do such a thing, however.

Henry

I loved the reveal of the threat via the jigsaw, think this would work well on screen.

Less convinced by the ending as it seemed a little bit of a leap to me.

But a solid effort overall.

Anthony

A solid effort. Some of the description was riveting - there were other places where it lagged a bit.

A real nit -but there were a couple of places where the action had an extra word or two. e.g.,

Quoted Text She steps back in and closes the door. Then she picks up the box, inspects it, tears off the wrapping.

Don't need "then".  Several instances of this.

Love the ending. A very nice turn of events.

Starting out, I like the title and your logline here. It fits well with the story

I think you could have done away with most of Margot's talking. For example, when she says "Oh well, no sense in waiting." We already KNOW by your good use of visuals(the box of puzzles) that she is really into this. Then you have Margot say what you have already established. Show. Don't tell.

You use LATER to show us time has passed, but I believe it was Phil that once told me, find a clever way to show this or it will feel like gaps as you watch this film. It's obvious she couldn't sit down and put the thing together in thirty seconds, but even if you showed her making a pot of coffee or used the clock time changing, or the daylight turning to night or anything to 'show' this instead of using LATER.

I get where you were going with the end, but I think the end needs a bit of work. The rest of the story plays out good and it is ironic and twisty that Margot is the one that kills the man in the end(LOVE this) but perhaps instead of us finding this out then stopping with the possible phone call then going back to the body parts part, you could keep us going better and the twist would be more fulfilling if we hear the bone/wood whack and then we see the guy left there to try to put back the pieces of his parts...body parts. I dunno....just thinking out loud not sure that helps.

Good story. Enjoyed this. Like Margot

SPOILERS

This is smoothly written; the descriptive passages relay the entire story without slowing it down.  The plot turns were unexpected and very dramatic, the assembled puzzle shows a violation of Margot's world and at that moment her life goes into another fraction of a dimension where nothing makes sense except that a puzzle is created by taking something apart and Margot loves puzzles.

Filmed, this might move too quickly -- might work better as a subplot of some dialogue heavy psychological drama.

Nice double twist at the end, definitely read it somewhere, wasn't expecting that ending at all. Creepy, and doesn't need a story to work either. A solid effort. My only gripe might be that the Man just seems like a place holder, I mean we can guess where he came from but I would've liked more. Although that might have screwed the pacing up. Probably one of the few I've read that I quite liked.

Good job.

I really like the concept here.  I have never heard of such a "legend", but it plays out well.

I can respect what you are doing with the reversal near the end, but at the same time, I cannot help feeling that this story is really over once she completes the puzzle and peers out of her window.

That seems enough.  Solid work, though.

Quoted from bert I really like the concept here.  I have never heard of such a "legend", but it plays out well. I can respect what you are doing with the reversal near the end, but at the same time, I cannot help feeling that this story is really over once she completes the puzzle and peers out of her window. That seems enough.   Solid work, though.

The story you have described is the actual Urban Legend.

This is the problem with each and every story on here: They are all just extended versions of an extant story...with extraneous bits added.

Code MARGOT Well, who could of...

I think I know who this is. The correct word is 'have', not 'of'.

OK. That was good. A definite consider, maybe even a recommend. Nice job.

My thoughts on the script - all completely subjective:

This one was good and I wouldn't be surprised if it got picked up to film a neat horror short.

I liked this! From the urban legend choice to the added twist -- that was certainly as good and maybe even better than the one in the urban legend. Scar's above observation is interesting, but isn't this putting an unique spin on the story, which the topic was? Maybe I just haven't read enough of these to get sick of the method already.

The one thing I was disappointed in was how the woman's ending dialogue was turned bad-ass. It would work better if the ending dialogue had more unique character to it and didn't feel like something out of an action movie.

The runtime looks very fast, too. Right now the script is good, but I feel it could get even better with more meat on its bones. The urban legends speak of the woman's loneliness, I'd recommend dedicating more time to that and her character along with exploring the man more, too.

Good luck with this, writer.

This piece is one of the best written ones I've come across.  Very tight, very much of a twist at the end.  Didn't exactly see that one coming. Liked pretty much everything about this one. Could easily see this one being filmed.

My only quibble, and it's a completely minor one, is that you say that only two pieces are left to complete the puzzle -- and it's of the bay window and the man in the window. I would probably make it a few more pieces than two. Just a thought. Seems like it would be a giveaway otherwise.  When filming, I'm guessing it won't matter though, because you wouldn't focus on that aspect anyway.

Excellent work here on this one!

Gary

Love the title of this.

Nice effort. The writing is crisp and fluidly moves along. I hadn't heard of the UL so had to google for the background. Perhaps if it's presaged that the old girl is a bit 'nuttier'?

Good job and I liked it

Well, this one was apparently written by Brian Williams, so it must be true.  I knew this story sounded familiar as I went along, then I realized it was the urban legend they mentioned in Dead Poets Society.

Moves along at a good pace, and the format seemed solid, although there were a couple typos.  

I think Rick raises a good point that most of the enduring urban legends don't need any additional twists or expansions because they are already complete stories with beginning, middle and twist ending.  That being said, since the whole idea of this owc was to throw a wrinkle into an urban legend, I liked seeing the maniac killer get his comeuppance, and the old lady teaches him what a psycho really looks like.  As I read that ending, for some reason that old song Bad Bad Leroy Brown popped in my head: "Leroy looked like a jigsaw puzzle with a couple of pieces gone."