Goodness.  More words devoted to dissecting this story than contained in the script itself.

No dialogue is fine, and whether or not you are too verbose with your descriptions is a matter of taste.  There is nothing egregious here, and I had no problems with the style itself.

Had I written one of these, I would have skipped the Queen and Lon Chaney, though.  It just feels so forced.

This scenario might be "incongruous" without the song backing it up, but with the source-song providing clear context, you might be beating that drum a little hard.  But you are excused for that, as Jeff can be maddening sometimes, though I suspect he means well when all is said and done.

My biggest problem is your final line.  That payoff is mildly amusing to the reader, but would mean nothing to the viewer, if you catch my meaning.  You seem experienced enough to understand the show-don't-tell mantra, and you've got a violation there.

Thank you both for commenting on the writing itself, and not getting sucked in the story meta-analysis trap I fell into and have since come to regret. But lesson learned.

John, I just don't get this.

You continue to skirt around the very, very simple point I continue to make, by going on and on about all these other scenarios that have absolutely nothing to do with the question and point of all these back and forths, which is the "story" of your script, as written, right here in black and white.

I do not want this to be a pissing match.  I am far from a troll on these boards. And Bert, I don't appreciate the comment about how maddening I am...or can be.  It's shit like this that make me mad, make me go mad, and cause me to be maddening.  AAARRRGGHHH!!!!!

If you can't answer this question logically, I'll let it die, otherwise, we'll see where it goes.

WOULD YOUR SCRIPT, AS WRITTEN ON THIS THREAD, BE ANY DIFFERENT IF THE LEAD CHARACTER WAS ANYTHING OTHER THAN A WEREWOLF?

The answer is obviously, "NO".  The type of character has nothing to do with the story, or the actions that take place in a script, as you have laid them out here.  The string of events are the string of events...they wouldn't change one bit.  It has nothing to do with being incongruous, congruous, or anything else for that matter.

How can you argue this logic?  And why won't you simply answer the question, without going into these long winded diatribes that go completely off course?

Having read this script, I would have to say you could very easily pick a character that would change the script entirely.   I think you're generalising way too much here Jeff.  

What if the main character were a priest?  A little girl?  An accountant with a bowler?  All of those changes would give an entirely different spin to the script.  

Now if it were another monster, like a Troll, or a slimy alien, then it would be about the same.  So, let's examine the logic here, if you were to replace the monster with another monster then it's still a script about a monster.  

Like, duh, of course that's going to be true - hardly anything to devote tons of posts too.

I read the scritpt, to see what all the fuss was about.

Without agreeing or disagreeing with bro' Jeff or John, the werewolf is the key to this particular 'story' because the challenge was based entirely on the song.

Thus, no other type of animal character or animal would've sufficed because the song is about werewolves.

If Babz had've said write a script using the lyrics of, say, 'Octopus's Garden' or 'Piggies', then the main character would be an octopus or a pig.

Cheers stevie

A story is a series of events recorded in their chronological order.  Or as Miriam-Webster says, it's an account of incidents or events.

Thus, the story in question here would not change with a different lead character, except that in place of the werewolf, you would insert the name, or the kind of creature it was.

Would the "story" be viewed differently with a different character?  Of course it would, but that has not been the issue here.

It would entirely depend on the creature.  

The story would not work as is with the invisible man.  It wouldn't work as it is with the blob.  It wouldn't work with a priest.  It wouldn't work with a little girl.  

Insert monster with hands (claws or the ability to mutilate) and then it would work as is, except it wouldn't fit the song.  

Honestly Jeff, give it a break.  

OK, you nuts.  My final post here...

Michael, I never said anything about the "story" or script not fitting the challenge.

Inserting an invisible man would be dumb and pretty hard to visualize anything.  Inserting a blob would not alter the "story" or events at all.

What I said was the story was minimal at best, and that the punch line that the entire thing was centered on, was an unfilmable, as Bert agreed.

If there was a final line from Mrs. Werewolf, saying,

"Damnit, you old drunkard, I told you to stay away from Trader Vick's...I can smell the pina coladas on your snout from here.   And don't even start telling me you saw Lon Chaney and the queen, cause I'm fucking tired of hearing it.  Now get your werewolf ass in here. I'm starving and I've been waiting for my beef chow mein for 2 hours."

Then, it would be semi-effective.

Does that not make sense to anyone here?

Sorry Jeff, at this point we're into that scene from City Slickers during the cattle drive where Billy Crystal is trying to explain to his friend how to the program the VCR, and the other guy blurts out to just give up already, he just doesn't get it, the cows could program the VCR by now.

I'm sorry if I implied you might be a troll, I think you are genuine in your disagreement, and we can just agree to disagree, but I don't want to discuss this any further.

Quoted from Dreamscale Not sure what your experience is, but this appears to be either an experiment-type script, or a first effort-type script.

After reading over this entire thread, I am going to go out on a limb and speculate that this little quote is what really got under your skin.

Jeff gets page after page of rebuttal -- while every other reader gets a token "thanks" -- if that.

Did you even notice that you have virtually ignored every other post on this thread?  People trying to help you change the subject?  But you always went right back to Jeff.

It takes two to tango, John -- you may be more guilty here than you think  

Don't worry, I'm not denying my role in all this. I'm fully aware that I'm part of the problem. I'll try to avoid a repeat in the future. And if I don't comment more to the other responses, it's because at this point I'm so sick of my own story, that I have little left to say about it. So my apologies to everyone, as well as to Jeff. Live and learn.

Sincere apologies to all as well, and mostly John.  I didn't mean to come off as an ass-troll, and everything I did say was meant as constructive criticism and advice.  It was only my personal point of view, and that means squat.

Sorry guys...

Once upon a time, I always thought it would be a cool thing to dramatize, in live action, The Eagle's "Life In The Fast Lane" or The Ramones "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" (don't ask)...I never did it. So imagine my amusement when I thought this was just a horror short and it winds up being, for the most part, a spoof-like take on the Warren Zevon song.

Maybe I myself might have thrown in a scene of the Werewolf playing pool (as a nod to 'The Color Of Money'-I always think of a high haired Tom Cruise doing his jig in the Scorcese film, at least for a few moments) But then I read some of these comments.

My heart sank.

See, I take this from an entire different approach. I get the joke (at least I'd like to think so) but at the same time as I read, I played the song on my iTunes. Just because, on the second read. This is innocent stuff. Way I call it is that...

Well it's like this... I have witnessed many "rock videos" on You Tube which are not the official music videos of the artists. Some of these are fan-made and/or edited. I don't know if the late Zevon had any music videos other than maybe a taped performance, but as far as concept videos, I have no clue. If I were to visualize this as a "music video" of some sort, I think this small short loosely works.

But only on that level.


-DjS