Project: Beatitude by One Who Watches - Short, Apocalypse, Sci Fi - As billions slip into an irreversible coma, the fate of humanity hinges on a gutless man battling the ultimate evil. 13 pages - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

I actually had to look up the meaning of title - could be interesting

Logline is ok, but lacks a hook IMO

Let's see...

I like the challenge of a shy coward type character facing a foe. This one seemed to wander around then went left field at the end

Not for me

First read - I picked the bottom one.

Interesting mish mash of ideas here. I didn't google the subject matter but I got the gist of it. Some of the writing was pretty good but other bits descended into cliche.

Has some cool concepts but needs a careful structured rewrite.

I was into this with the setup of the comas and tiny TVs, far-fetched but interesting and I was wanted to know where it was going.

Then the twist and the story went left field, then left woods, then left mountains, just felt too much of a shift.

And then the Baku and we're on a new planet, to the left of course!

I think the problem is that the story starts in one place and then drifts off into a world populated by D&D monsters, and I don't think they fit together.

Think I know who's this is though.
  

Hey writer,

Absolutely nuts! The writing was pretty good, the story built and built until WHAM! Crazy spirit/monster madness!

This sort of script isn't really my thing. I can appreciate the build up and craft involved in piecing this together, but the story was never going to absorb me when the crazy surreal horror started.

That's not to say this is a bad script, not at all, it just didn't do it for me but I know some others will really dig it.

Regardless, well done,

Cam

Okay, I’m gonna have to admit that I had to look up “Beatitude”. Now I get the title.
Billy’s character is well established.
Dialogue is good.
I was really enjoying the story.
Then the tapir, inexplicably, obnoxiously, jumps off of Billy’s shirt.
Nice work. Just a really convenient end.

I was on board with this until the ending, which completely went over my head, but it sounds like an adult version of Monsters, Inc. gone bad.  I'm just not sure exactly what happened, other than Billy finally stood up to the bad guy.  That's the most I got out of it.

So writing wise, it was fine, I guess it played into the apocalypse theme, but I would give serious consideration to changing that ending in a future re-write so others will be able to follow.

Still a good effort until the ending.

Best,
Gary

Had to look up the title - my sunday schooling was limited...  I like the logline - irreversible coma is an interesting take on the challenge and with a unwilling hero at the centre of it all.  Keen to see how this plays out...

Felt like you were building up to something with all the set-up.  Unfortunately (for me) this was too big an idea crammed into a single showdown scene.  It leaves you scrabbling to explain everything through the dialogue, capped with a deus ex machina ending with the Baku Tapir magic T-shirt.  Lots of imagination on display, just too much too late.

The coma/nightmare concept wasn’t bad - maybe one to come back to.  Not sure where the title really played into this?

Pretty sure I know wrote this one.

Unfortunately it doesn't really work for me. I really like the concept behind this one. The worlds population falling into a never ending coma, one by one. That's creepy as fuck. It just seems like you were really held back by the page limit here.

Some really cool images on display, but this is a concept that is much more suited for a feature.

Good luck with this and good job on entering.

~Zack~

This was ticking along nicely. People going to sleep and never waking up seemed eerie and different. You built Billy up well as a cowardly underachiever. I was even liking the twist of the mad scientist putting people into TVs forever. Something Black Mirror-ish.

Then....

You lost me when Nightmare showed up. It didn't seem to fit and was totally batshit crazy. I just couldn't get on board.

Good job up until then though.

I also had to look up Beatitude. Personally I do think it is a good thing to learn something new but from a script reading point of view, anything which distracts the reader and gives them cause to drop the script in the reject pile should be avoided.

You spent a lot of time telling us Billy is basically a coward with a big heart. Nearly 3 pages is a lifetime in a short. As it is, then you have to start the story just as we are getting into the backstory.

The story itself is a decent premise and there was some creepy moments with the guys all screaming on the TV, especially when you realize everyone is supposed to be in a kind of a heaven but they've been tricked.

Then it goes nuts and very much left-field. Not only that, you have the cliche of the bad guys telling us what their evil schemes are.

I think you are onto a good idea here. I'd lose the first three pages, let Billy's actions let us know what type of person he is. I'd also have a look at the third act and see what you can do to reign it in and show us what is happening rather than having the characters tell us.

-Mark

Even after looking up the title, i don't think it's particularly strong.

so many unnamed characters in this challenge

I got it, Billy's a coward... ok...  did i need 4 pages and 4 or 5 flashes through his life to show that?  probably not.  i mean, it could have been shorter.

not a bad idea - people just pass out and never wake up.  i could see that being scary

Jeton quick to spill the beans...

this being is 8 feet tall?

this script has a lot of the dreaded "tell"  needs more "show"

yeah, you gave all those early scenes just so Nightmare can remind us of the exact scenes.  there was no need to do that.

"Tapir shaped Baku" how many people know what a tapir is, let alone a baku?  why does this feel completely out of left field?  what line did i miss earlier about Billy having powers?

That was a weird story with some potentially cool elements, but not as written.

Had to look up the meaning of the title, which IMO, is never a good thing.

Well, right off the bat, we have some potential issues going on.  Mama and Dad are late 20's (why don't you just give them an age?), and the oldest daughter, Sis, is 12, meaning Mam and Dad were a maximum of 17 years old each when she was born.  Not impossible, but unlikely and a little weird to me.

Hmmm, why are we jumping 3 years ahead?  Was that opening scene really that important?

Wait a minute...now we're jumping 5 years forward?  After a scene on a slide in grade school?

Oh boy, Kid 1, Kid 2, and Kid 3.  There's been an awful lot of kids so far, already!!!

Damn, now we're 12 years later?  No...no...no...BIG MISTAKE going on here.

Lays/lies - please learn the difference...it's so simple...

Why doesn't the girlfriend have a name?  She just gave birth to Billy's first son...she's not significant enough to warrant a name?

3 years later again?  Damn, bro...this is crazy!!!!  CRAZY!!!!  Way too many flash forwards going on.

Dialogue on Page 4 is pretty weak.

Tiny TV like things contain people?  Have the people been shrunk?

Wait, now the latest coma patient, the janitor is sitting on top of one of the tiny TV things?  I thought they were inside them, now they're on top of them?  I'm completely lost.

Wait...so this doctor who is doing whatever he's doing, decides to tell a lowly janitor about what he's done?  Not!!

Lots of typos popping up.

Wooo, a being just walked out of the Doc's chest?  WTF is happening here?

Nightmare?  Oh man...oh man...NO!!!!  Say it isn't so!!!

Now Billy's tapir jumps off his shirt?  This is insane...

Baku?  WTF is going on?

Oh boy.  Well...uh...hmmm...uh...

Very creative.  Not very realistic or believable.  Way too big a story for a 12 page short.  Just doesn't make any sense whatsoever and is very goofy.  Sorry.

Score - 1.5.

4 - Exposition is pretty clunky here.

***

Exposition is pretty clunky all the way through, and it's because Nightmare doesn't have much to do but stand there and Bond-villain his plan out.

I love that it goes crazy halfway through but I think the Baku MUST be set up at the start of the story, in childhood. His first turn to fear was in childhood and the first sign of his full strength should be there too.

I'd lose most of the start. One key scene from childhood setting up the fears, then cut to adulthood, where he's got a newborn kid in a crazy world. Get to the craziness faster, so that you can take more time with each stage of it.

It's clear what the story is and how it hangs together, but there's a lot of extraneous stuff in the way. I think this has to be pared way down and then filled out -- with action and visuals, ideally.

It's a kooky mess right now, but I can see this turning into some really fun stuff with rewriting.

Really liked the idea of preserving people's souls so that they feel good as if in heaven.

I think you could start late, not waste first scenes to show that Billy is a coward. It got interesting when I learned about the soul preserving and when later Being appeared.
I'd also prefer that it finished early - as soon as Billy eliminates the Being. The rest that follows reads a bit pompous for my tastes.
Being - better cap it I think

I thought this was pretty good.  Insane, but, good.  I mean, there's no clue to the existence of N

SPOILERS
Nightmare and the Baku.  No real explanation where they come from.  Too much time showing Billy as a coward.  

Where does the title fit in?  

Don't you love it when the bad guys just tell what all the secrets are without any real reason to do so,  First, the Dr, then Nightmare.

So, why did he have to die?  It's never really said.  We get it, a coward can get brave to save his child...

The page limit hurt you.

Dan

I have no clue what I just read. But I do know that Transcendence did it better.

Not my bowl of cereal. Sorry.

Title is not centered

P6 Hmm, Transcendence…?

All right. This has its moments for sure. The story has a nice B-movie vibe, a bit trashy, in a positive way. I also like the presentation and especially enjoyed flying through all the quickly readable passages everywhere - definitely the other side of the spectrum when regarding long winded prose writing. I like how you handle things your way. Such brevity, for me, clearly is a respected tool that belongs to the craft of good screenwriting.

The Baku creatures came out of nothing. I enjoyed following the story. It was constantly moving forward. In hindsight so many things happened, however, I always felt being live in the moment and something kept my attention. Well done.

This was a wild ride. Yes, there were some typos and the early memories were redundant, but I kinda dug the story once I realized he was comatose battling the nightmare being. Did his dream-state action help all the others in comas? That's the big question. With a revision or two, this could be an awesome little story. Also, was it critical for the doctor to be Albanian? Just curious. Good work!

Writer,

This story didn't grab me, sorry to say. There's lots of on the nose dialogue, and nothing really pops. You need to give your characters names, too. Girlfriend just doesn't work. I found nothing that really connected me to Billy, even though he had a bit of a rough past. Too many vignettes on him growing up, but they all said the same thing - he's a wimp. Your writing needs to make me feel something. As is, it just doesn't work. Lots of rookie mistakes. Keep at it though. The more you write the better you get! Decent effort.

Steve

I really like the turns in this and the structure. REally good job on that and it matters a lot.

One thing I did not like was all the dialogue explaining everything. There has to be a quicker way or a way to show it. If you have to have the dialogue, at least streamline it so that it doesn't drag the story down.

For me this got a bit too weird at the end but kudos on the original going.

Good job.

I like it when small details tell a story, and right now the ages of your characters are telling me that when Mom and Dad were 16 they couldn't keep it in their pants.

“Once you fall into the coma, there’s nothing left of your brain, at all.”  That's not really a coma than, is it? Aren't they just dead?

The visuals of the screens and the people inside them could be better described. Is this surveillance video? Are they in white rooms? What are they wearing? Considering how strange it is to see a comatose person screaming on TV, I really think more detail is needed to understand what exactly is being implied with this image.

“If these are to be my last words, then I have one question.” The dialogue is really heavy handed through this whole scene.

Jeton never looked at his own screens?

There's some interesting ideas here, but the execution feels more rushed than most. This would need a serious rewrite to tie all the elements together in a way that makes sense and is reasonably paced.

Project: Beatitude - Apocalypse, Sci Fi - As billions slip into an irreversible coma, the fate of humanity hinges on a gutless man battling the ultimate evil. 

Rating: 1
Thoughts: I get these loglines all the time that end in the most vague terms possible.  "battling the ultimate evil."  I don't know what that means so how can I be invested in the idea?


TITLE: Project Beatitude

STORY

Concept is fresh/and or original - 3

Theme is well executed/interweaved - 2

Stakes are clear/conflict is strong and or compelling - 3

Story - 1

Ending - 2

CHARACTER/DIALOGUE

Protagonist(s) is (are) likable and/or compelling - 2

Dialogue reads naturally/believable within this story - 1

Dialogue reveals character -  1

READABILITY

Action text "shows" instead of "tells" - 3

Overall readability - 2

Total: 2.0

Hey guys,
    I wrote this one.  Thanks for all the reads and comments.

I gotta admit, I was totally lost what to write.  I wanted to write a big story with a small set of pages.  But, I used them badly.

I should have started the story in the break room and perhaps shown a flashback when Nightmare shows up.  Same for the Baku.

I wanted to do something odd, but, still scary as hell.  And I learned a lot, but, now, am confused about loglines a bit.  I will read stories that got higher than mine and figure out what I did wrong by seeing what they did right.

And this really proves what I have been saying, the gatekeepers are brutal.  They are overworked and willing to skim or toss a script aside for nearly any reason.

The other mistake I made was that no one caught my "easter eggs" or clues about what was going on.  Some of the names meant stuff if anyone googled them.  For the future, if I do something like that again, I will have to make sure the references are very obvious.  

I am happy because I felt that I showed a bit of growth for the OWC rules.  The page limit has hurt me for each OWC and this was the first one that I didn't have to cut pages.  I structured it better.  

I still have to use my time better.  As most can tell, I wrote prose for years and switching to screenwriting is difficult since it is such a different medium.  

Thanks again and let me know if anyone wants a deeper explanation for their stories.

Dan

Hi Dan,

Loglines are tough cookies. All the advice from all the books I've every read say to come up with the logline first. I never do lol but I should really. The reason, they say, is if you can't come up with a compelling logline which encapsulates your story in a couple of sentences, there's something wrong with your story before you've even begun writing it.

How much do you give away in a logline? You give away enough to tell people what your story is about without telling them the whole story. You don't confuse them with obscurity but at the same time you don't tell them the ending. Here's a great article which I found helpful.

http://noamkroll.com/an-easy-guide-to-writing-the-perfect-logine-why-its-as-important-as-your-screenplay/

-Mark