A Figurine by Mason - Flower Vase, Mason, College Dorm - Short, Western

This is kinda like vengeful comedy coz I liked the ending. A lot happens but it is understandable, nothing's confusing. A friendship that shall not be broken.

Good luck.

Lots going on in this one.

Is it a Western, well a bit of it is set in the West and in a Dorm - okay.

Are the variables important, well it is week 4 - okay.

I don't think this fits everything well and it was a little hard to follow in places but...

Was I entertained?

Yes, I was.

Okay, is the dorm room present day?

There's some really rough writing on this first page and a half...hmmm...maybe should have Damon start off with 'Let me tell you a little story' instead of jumping to a flashback. The jump back to Nevada 1881 should be a SUPER not a slug.

Man, this is all over the place. "Don't worry. I got his hat." I think both Diane and Sean would've been a little more reactionary than that! It's okay, he got a vase out of it.

The dialogue is not very realistic for the time/place. It could work if it was Damon telling the story in his words like "And then she says...and Sean replies..."

An interesting and entertaining tale that needs some work. Good work fitting those parameters in a western. 'A' for creativity.

EDIT: Oh, yeah. An 80 year old Indian woman named Theresa? Oh, okay.

It was a stretch but pulled off pretty well. Can't tell which was more of a stretch -- the western setting or the present-day college dorm. Both could be accused of just being stuck in there to fit the variables, but -- they both worked!

It's hard to find out who the villain is supposed to be in some of these, but there always is one. Damon was more of the supporting character, but he plays the undermining trick and we get it at the end.

First review and it’s an ambitious script.  A lot going on here and it needs a couple of flashbacks. Has a nice vibe. The variables are used pretty well (they were quite easy ones I guess unlike the monstrosities thrown my way by the Blonde one).

The dialogue was a bit odd, almost like Shakespeare stuff but overall it was a decent effort.

Props for naming one of the characters Sean!

Lol, I'm not a western expert but your character says "I'm kidding, my lady" or something like that. I don't think that's how they used to talk but okay.

this was entertaining and I guess it's a western since more than half of it is set in the west. You should watch that wriitng but which one of us shouldn't - my own script is rushed to the extreme.
It was funny and I was entertained. And I really liked the ending - glad you didn't go for cliched 'get the girl'.
Overal, good job I say.

Reads rushed (understandable)  but this makes it hard to follow with the two different time zones in such a short story and I struggled to figure(ine) out what was going on. You got the elements in though.

The western part doesn't feel authentic, particularly the dialogue but this can all be fixed in a second draft.

-Mark

This bit is not too bad, despite some grammar errors and placeswhere I found the story   a bit of a head scratcher in the dorm and western scenes.

Two college guys. One of them has a diamond ring. I suggest throwing in a line that suggests the ring being in Kyle's family for a generation or so. I mean, you know, he doesn't have a job to afford it yet and he's still in college    I find it strange that Damon yanks it away to try it on (?) but alright, I guess, considering the end...no...I still think its odd.

Quoted Text ALICIA Your mailman asked me to give this to you. He was told it's a family relic.

Better if Damon identifies it as such. The mailman wouldn't know (who told HIM?). It might say 'fragile'on the box, but that's about it. Likewise, the mailman would most likely leave the package at the dorm office where Damon would pick it up himself.

Damon reads the note, which is from his brother:

Quoted Text DAMON (reading from the note) My brother Matt wants me to take care of it,

That's written in the note? At the end, he sends Matt a text.  The reveal suggests he was expecting it, so this wouldn't be in the note.

Quoted Text ALICIA Hey, Nostradamus made a doll for Margarita Navarskaya to make a guy she liked fall in love with her

I know who Nostradmus is, but that other name escapes me.  l. Nostradamus also didn't make dolls, so these references don't make sense - unless it's something the writer alone knows.

Quoted Text he shoots into someone approaching

I'd much rather him shoot a can or bottle. If he randomly shoots into someone, he sure didn't just knock off the man's hat.  Turns out the someone is Sean, Diane's fiancee. No concern, no alarm.  Oh...Sean's also "another rider" when introduced a second time.

As it is, the whole bit about the mason being a gunslinger isn't important at all. Damon's history lies with Diane and Sean. I'm not sure who the bad ass in the family is. The story clearly states it isn't Aldous, even though he's the gunfighter - mason.  

Quoted Text INT. COLLEGE DORM - CONTINUOUS Damon finishes his story.

Since the western part is a flashback, BACK TO SCENE might be better than CONTINUOUS.
The next line isn't needed. If you needed some other narrative, you can focus again on the figurine or a reaction from Alicia.

The breakup offscreen with Alicia and Kyle. Kyle was rushing into things, that may be true, but I think it would take a little more than that to cause a sudden breakup. Unless ...

Damon and Kyle are something other than "bros"?  

Hi,

I always imagined a figurine as being made of china not stone but hey ho, I'm not an expert.
I did get a little lost during the Western scene but the dorm was nicely set up.
Nice twist at the end.

Well done.

Two things stood out to me, in a positive way: 1. splitting the time in order to handle two elements in seeming opposition (dorm room and Western). That was really creative. And, 2. the twist. That was fun.

The execution is a little clunky, and it reads like a bit of a first draft, but that's the nature of these challenges, isn't it?

There's quite a bit to like here storywise, so I hope you take the time to rewrite once all the madness is over.

Interesting idea here but you list me a few times. Like how would a mailman know what's in the package is a family relic? Is he looking in people's boxes? And one example of an area I had to read several times was the whole Nostradamus/voodoo doll exchange. I was like...where does it say this figurine has some kind of powers?

So albeit confusing in some places, it was entertaining.

Best of luck, writer.

Confused about who the villain is - and who the protag is, for that matter. Is it Damon, for trying to bust up his best friend's engagement? Or is it Aldous?

Really tough combination of elements, which I suppose forced you to put college dorm with Western, which on the surface do not go together in a million years. Kudos for finding a way, however because you flashed back it really didn't give me a Western vibe.

Lots of machinations and hoops to go through in order to get Alicia not to marry Kyle, and I'm still not quite sure what the linch pin is that makes Alicia leave. I know it's supposed to be the figurine?

AJR

Getting these elements to work together was a Herculean task, I was expecting a duel in a video game, so glad it wasn’t. Mason, dorm, and western all checked satisfactorily. But the vase was just there. Not sure how to work it in better other than have Alicia hit Kyle with one for having the gall to propose.

Some formatting issues, like a slug being the last line on a page and missing FADE OUT, which both coincidentally save some space   Easy fixes on a re-write, and you can also tweak the dialog to be more natural.

Overall, managed to make an incel’s selfishness entertaining.

Well I wanted to challenge myself to a Western! But neither of the locs Fit the circa. I mean I can't disclose what we were left with but the rest would have been worse. So had to combine two worlds.

And

in the middle there I say what Nostradamus did to help Margo - forgot that Margarita Navarrskaya is her Russian name. She's Margarita de Navarro and in Dumas' novel La Reigne Margo (Queen Margo) he had Nostradamus piercing the heart of a doll to make a guy Margo liked fall in love with her.

Oh, and he did! Maybe someone needs to study the technique and use it or something