The Children by Omar - Short, Horror - When a series of gruesome murders arise, Detective Sandy is called to investigate. Her troubled past is the key to finding the murderer.  29 pages - pdf, format

Thanks for posting this up. This is a short I plan on shooting in a few months. Feedback would be great. I am new here and have read many scripts on here. I will start posting reviews on the ones I've read. Thanks again everyone!

Omar,

many comments should be aborted before they're read.  Toss anything that doesn't pass muster.

We start with the attack.  It’s described well and works.  Why does the doctor speak?  And if he does, why doesn’t Sandy recognize his voice?  If she was the best nurse in his class, she would be intimately familiar with his voice.  Another reason to keep him silent, no?
Then to the lab.  When did she dress?  Assuming she was naked in scene one, did the doc dress her?  Why?  And why does he keep talking?  Every word is a terrific risk.
15 years later, she’s an FBI agent with a love life.  I’ll buy that.  And she’s been invited to assist the locals with a serial killer.  Works.
The murders.  Here is where this one breaks down for me.  Why does the doc start killing these women?  He’s not killed anyone for 15 years, and now he suddenly gets morals?  
Flashback.  In the operating room she wore black underwear.  In this scene it’s white…hmmm  And she lost her baby.  I’ll buy that.  I’m not sure why this particular murder triggered the flashback, but I’ll buy it.  How can Sandy know that the killer is the ‘reason she joined the fbi’?  Does she have a message on her leg?
We get the proverbial TV reporter to give us some news.  But it’s not much that we don’t already know.  People are dying, and no one can guess why.
On the run, we meet Eve.  If Eve is the product of the doc’s and Sandy’s genes, she can’t be more than 15, right?  And why would Sandy chase Eve just because of eye contact?  Sandy just gets a good vibe or something?  
And someone sneaks into her apt. to steal a file.  Why?
We add the irascible captain who demands action.  Standard fare.  Creating a map of the crimes is pretty standard fare also.  Wouldn’t she have a white board full of photos and data?  And they wouldn’t need a map to learn that the women all had abortions.  I would think that sort of common data point would be discovered early, probably by the police.
The meet the doc who was her teacher.  Still no voice recognition.  They get the name of the former head of the clinic, and off they go.
And their car gets clipped by some other car.  They immediately give chase, forgetting about the old doc.  OK, since the car came from the house, I’ll go along with it.  Although, they would be just as likely to get the tag on the car and then investigate the house?
They follow to the warehouse and gear up, calling for backup.  Henry takes a hit.  Sandy gets into the operating room and has a  melt down.  Another flash back.  Is it necessary?
Eve steps up and disarms Sandy.  The doc is there.  And now the doc reveals that somehow he managed to intercept their call for backup?  How would that work?
And we get to the doc’s real business, trying to turn out perfect children who will what? Repopulate the earth?  But they’re not all perfect, yet he keeps them.  I still don’t know why he has the children or Eve’s connection to Sandy.  
And Sandy appeals to Eve’s better nature and turns her?  Am I to believe that Eve is Sandy’s aborted daughter?  Saved at 6 weeks?  I’m still confused.  
The doc uses a dog whistle?  How do the kids hear that?
A firefight that turns into an inferno.  The doc conveniently dies.  Henry is lost.  Eve saves Sandy again.  Adam escapes as do some of the kids.  
And now the FBI show up.  How did they know that this wasn’t anything more than shots fired and a warehouse fire?  They save Sandy.  
The end.  For me, this one is full of logic holes.  I have a hard time figuring out why the doc would start murdering now.  I wonder how he could ever know that Sandy would investigate the murders.  Lucky break?  
Take a look at this one from the audience point of view.  What do they see, what can they know?  As the writer, you’re privy to everything, all the back story, all the stuff the audience can’t know.  Don’t write from that, write from what the reader will know.  If you haven’t put it on the page, the audience won’t get it.  Don’t force a character to do something stupid just because the story needs it done.  


Best
Richard