Hey Alffy.

Yeah the mini slugs will be added to the future draft(s). I had them in originally but took them out to make it shorter which was a mistake.

As for the dialogue the general consensus seems to be it needs work. As I had a kids story in mind I guess I thought it would hold up the way it is, and although you didn't hate it it can be worked on for sure.

I wrote the ending to be cheesy. It seemed like a good way to finish. I'm still a bit torn on it, part of me loves it but part of me isn't sure. Also I couldn't really come up with anything better so it seemed a good way to go.

Glad you liked it overall, it's always a bonus to know I appear to be on the right track with my writing, now I just need to be better.

Thanks for your time.

Hey ADY

Managed to get around to reading this, although didn't have the chance to make notes so this is from memory.

Title - i'm a bit so so on this. It is descriptive but at the same time a bit clunky. Would be interested to see whats others were possible. e.g. "Thiner, Wiser", "An African Tug of War".

Concept - i thought i had cornered the market in short scripts that won't be filmed but you may have topped me with this. Buffalo, Lions and crocodile, altogether, oh and also in Africa. Other than that, easy peasy.

I haven't read the other posts but my overriding thoughts are

1] the tug of war is the main story so needs more drama and tension and emphasis. slow it down, stretch the emotions.

2] Sorry, didn't like the ending, this respect element didn't work for me. i would have preferred,  I'll see you next time" style finish, etc

Otherwise an enjoyable story.

cheers

bill

I meant to read this when it first came out, but the link was broken for a while. Then I kept seeing it on the portal, and for some reason, the name kind of has a draw to it. Very distinct.

I'm not sure what think of the story, to be honest. I know that's not helpful. It did manage to create some tension, so for this type of story, that's pretty neat.

I'm not really sure what the intended audience is here. Is this for kids? I guess it's designed to convey certain morals, such as obedience, loyalty, honor, duty, love, compassion.

Only question: why is the croc smiling? the meal got away!

as soon as the croc showed up i remembered this incident from watching it a few months ago on Youtube. very impressive clip.... i watched it a couple times actually completely shocked.

its actually i believe the most watched "animal attack" video on the web. i think it had something like 2 million views?

anyway.... your discripts are well written. kind of the opposite problem i have.

the ending lacked a little bit i think - the suprise in that video is the baby buffalo was alive when we all thought he was dead....you should elude that in your script. there needs to be more tension in the standoff.

it's your dialogue i suggest you keep working on. its a bit on-the-nose and stilted in spots...overritten too. with action driven stories, sometimes less is more. just takes practice.

my two cents. for whats it worth.

Hey Arty.

I haven't been able to get online much lately, but I saw the title to this one and immediately printed it out so I could read it later.  So great job on the title.  It really jumps out.

Taking a read through some other comments, I won't harp on the same subjects everybody has been bringing up, about the dialogue and the slugs for when the lioness' are stalking.  Though they are right.

Not having the slugs there kind of threw the picture out of my head of what was going on.  We need a little more clarification on who's what and where.

As for the dialogue, I think Penoyer said it best when he said it was a bit on-the-nose and stilted in places.  IN PLACES being the key words there.  A lot of the dialogue fit and wasn't bad, but the lines that were on-the-nose really stuck out.

I think the descriptions (except for the non-slug use) were great and put a clear picture in my head.

FOR THE MOST PART.  By that, I mean that I don't know if you meant this to be as an animation cartoon or computer-generized cartoon or live-action or documentary with voiceovers.  (I read this before I ever knew about the 'Battle of Kruger' youtube clip, though.)  Because I didn't know about that clip, I was lost as to how to picture it, as cartoon or live-action.

I also noted in my head the violence.  I noted before that there was too much violence done to the poor baby buffalo and it came off as totally unbelievable that he would ever survive anything like that.  After watching the youtube clip just now, you can scratch that.  I'll just admit that I have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to violence.

As for the fact that it was a youtube clip first and you based it off that, I gotta say you were pretty clever to come up with a story behind the attack.  I'm assuming this was only done as an exercise in writing, but good job nonetheless.

- Mark