Intelligent Design by Roberta Sparrow, - Short, Sci Fi  - A movie theater tests a brand new state-of-the-art popcorn machine with the ability to recycle waste into fuel but things go horribly wrong when human DNA gets thrown into the mix. 12 pages - pdf, format 8)

Wowee! This was a crazy one! I liked how you used the essentials to make popcorn: salt, oil, and popcorn seeds. I just don't understand what the salt did. Did it blind the customers? Or just keep them from escaping? This sort of reminded me of War of the Worlds, with the tentacles and the different uses they come in.

Your descriptions about everything were great and I was able to visualize it, along with your dialogue which was top-notch.

The only thing that puzzled me was how Dr. Orville knew that human DNA got in the machine. Did the manager's cry of help of how the machine came to life give him a hint that the machine had ingested human DNA?

I think you should extend this into a longer story. I think you have something here, even if it doesn seem a little silly. :P

Sean

This script was pretty good - definitely good characters and plot - but it felt like there was something missing.  It seemed to me like the climax of something longer.  I think this should be expanded.  I would be interested in seeing the expanded version.

Well that was nothing short of horrifying. It made me feel kinda sick but no doubt it was a great short.

About expanding the story further, I guess that would be okay, though it is a pretty silly short, even though it's sorta intelligent and unique. I wouldn't mind giving an extended version a read, so great job with this one. You certainly put both sci-fi and popcorn in this so kudos.

Yeah it is a great short script! Doc Orville is a great name for a nuts scientist! Well written as well as said Kevan and Robert Newcomer you did it very nice, dude!

BTW, movie theaters appear in many of OWC scripts!  

Quite an original take on the theme and premise, good job on that. It was creative how the machine used pop corn ingredients as weapons. It fells a little bit short on the story department; the plot is overly simple. Seemed like the end was missing something, as other reader already mentioned.

Still, it’s a solid entry.

Not bad. Well written, good plot, interesting explanations and story behind the popcorn machine. Taking that much of a risk turning the blaster into a killing machine with blood in the garbage seemed a little unrealistic, but that's forgivable. Good job.

I'm reading over these, and I realize that...popcorn just is not that exciting.  I think the sci-fi/popcorn blends nicely here, and I don't mean to be a party pooper, but I just felt empty at the end of this one.  Don't get me wrong, the writing is good and it's got a kind of comic flow and dark humor throughout it, but as I said, I just don't think popcorn is that exciting, not that anything can really be done about that.

Overall it still flowed nicely and some cool concepts in it and kept me amused.  Good job.

Whoa, this one is very neat. I was quite impressed with your writing!

Hey.

This was alright.  I feel like your main problem was that you were trying to have it be scary and action packed, and while you succeeded in action, the idea of a man eating popcorn machine is just hilarious and that made it impossible for it to be scary. You did come pretty close though, so  good job.

-Tyler

I liked this one a lot.  IT started off funny, then the story got into a kill crazy rampage.

I think this fit the exercise quite well, I liked the banter between Rusty and Gus, in fact the characters were pretty well drawn out in this one.

anyways this worked well, you stuck with the theme and genre and came up with an original way to do it.

good one :)

While I said I wasn’t reading anything for a while -- and that still stands -- I just couldn’t resist having a look at this piece that several people thought I had written.

And having read it now, I can certainly see that.

*  Hey, is that supposed to be Orville Redenbacher, the popcorn guy?  I do love a good pop culture reference.  (Get it?  POP culture?!  Ahahaha…)
*  It's state of the "art", not "arc".
*  Now, just to be a jerk, I would say that blood constitutes organic waste.  In fact, any organic waste will contain DNA.  While feeding the machine napkins and such, your good doctor should state that the machine runs on inorganic waste.  (Here is your clue that this story ain’t mine haha.)
*  On a technical note, on several occasions you go from a slug line right into dialogue.  I have read several times that this is incorrect, and it does look wrong on the page.  At least to me.

And I like what happens to Orville.  Great way to end it.  And, oddly, I have used white eyes without pupils in one of my own stories.  Weird.

Yeah -- I am very curious to know who wrote this one.  Nice work.

This kind of reminded me of Short Circuit but the evil version. I like those uprising of machines type films. Maximum Overdrive as well.

Anyway the dialogue and action was pretty good. I think this was more of a scene to something bigger which begs the question... Why bother?

You set up the two guys as main characters and kill them off first. basically doing everything you are trained not to do.

I enjoyed it because it was well written and the action makes one want to read more by the writer.

We all know now that Bert did not write this, but anyone familiar with his sharp writing would have known after the first paragraph that this was written by someone else.

This one was okay. The writing was nice, the story was nice, I don't really have anything to complain about. Maybe like some of the others said, it reminds us of War of the Worlds. I hated that movie! I started watching it several times and I just could never make it to the end and I'm a big Tom Cruise fan!

Don't let my opinion bug you though, I'm probably not your intended demographics group.

Pia :-)

Thanks for reading, everyone!

I'm actually quite surprised at the amount of War of the Worlds comparisons that popped up in reviews. I mean, it makes sense but still. That movie couldn't have been further from my mind (Tom Cruise is a douchebag). This was actually inspired by the many times I've had to clean out the popcorn machine (which, by the way, does have a revolving bar inside) at my previous work place. I'm telling you, it's not fun. To say the least... it sucks! And I've been burned, just like poor Gus, although his burns were considerably exaggerated.

A special thanks to Kevan and Helio for thinking Bert wrote my script and to Bert for temporarily breaking hiatus just to read this little piece of sci-fi schlock. To you, gentlemen, I tip my hat.