Somewhere Beyond the Sea by Nemo - Special Forces Marines undertake a time-critical mission and find something unexpected beneath the waves. Location: Body of water. Object: Item of advanced or electronic technology.  Short, Sci Fi

Lots of technical jargon made this one tough to get into.

Light-hearted time travel twist feels kind of random.

Sorry, this just wasn't my thing. Still, good job on getting something into round 2. :)

Quoted Text EXT. DECK OF FB MIL¬50P NAVY SPEEDBOAT ¬ NIGHT

No one is going to be able to make sense of that header without Google. Use something else.

Quoted Text Four Special Boat Service Royal Navy Marines crouch down on the boat as it comes to a stop in the water, moonlight the only illumination for their clandestine activities

Again - just fo with Royal Naval Marines - don't need special boat services - it means nothing to anyone and adds confusion.

Okay - done with the nits.

I liked this story - the premise was very cool - thanks for the entertainment

Interesting reveal at the end. Some good imagery, here. I thought the jet propulsion suits were pretty cool. Pretty good writing, too.

Good job.

-- Michael

Nice reveal but a long time getting there. Gotta love a good time travel story - Kudos.

I think some slugs and description could be cleaned up but, all in all, a decent Twilight Zone-ish story.

Good story. However, it calls for a big budget and major special effects, which is exactly the opposite of what the challenge was going for. It's fun that the UFO turned out to be an experimental craft from the future, and that the occupant has no Terminator-like tendencies, but it sucked all the tension out of a story with a very interesting opening.

Was thrown off by Royal Navy Marines using miles. Doesn't everywhere outside the US use metric? :)

CONTINUOUS isn't necessary, there seems to be some time between those scenes.

This works really well, lots of short dialog clips will make it move by fast on screen, but it leaves us hanging at the reveal. There's no obvious implication of what will happen next, so it doesn't really consistute an end to the story. Great opening to a longer story, just not a contained story.

Great effort!

Quoted from FrankM Was thrown off by Royal Navy Marines using miles. Doesn't everywhere outside the US use metric? :)

It's impossible to understand why we Brits do or use anything, we are strange. We are officially metric, but remain imperial for road distances (So yea, we use miles  :) )

Writer

The writing wasn't too bad but can be made sharper. Was interesting enough to keep me engaged until the end although the ending was a bit of a come-down.

Can't see how this can be filmed on a tight budget though lol

Still, decent effort

Certainly not low budget by a mile. Invasion by tic tacs? That's a new one.

Nitpicks aside, a good read with a nice, if not familiar, twist at the end.  

A lot of technical jargons here. Decent time travel piece but not my cup of tea though.  

Not a fan of bold sluglines.

First action line irked me right off for two reasons, but this just may be preference so do what you want to do, but.. All caps those NAVY MARINES since this is the first time we see them.  And I like to know where we are before dealing with the action, so I favor the first action line of each new location to describe the area, then focus on what is happening.  "A boat drifts to a stop beneath reflected moonlight. Four NAVY MARINES...etc"

Char intro's are bland.  I've done this intentionally in shorts to save space, maybe the writer did, too.

Confusing action line.  Why call it a bulky figure-of-eight shaped tubular unit? Just say jet pack.

Dialogue also bland and didn't feel realistic, possibly in part due to lack of char intro's so we never get a feel for the them.  It  just didn't work for me.  

Stories, to me, should end with resolution or a cliff hanger.  Not sure this qualifies as either, it felt like a let down.

I get this and I liked it. Well written, great idea but a few niggles.
Clandestine activities with jet propelled equipment would negate each other, too noisy to be clandestine and the visors which glow would also negate the marines internal night vision and may be seen by others so again, not clandestine.
Well done.

Like the title.

Decent enough concept, though logic suggests they’d send drones or some kind of remote device in for a closer look.  But that wouldn’t leave you with much of a story I suppose, so…

Dialogue doesn’t feel very military - these guys are supposed to be elite. Lots of questions - rather they’d just get on with the mission in hand.

Does the light rise to the surface or the Tic Tac?  When the hatch opens, I thought the craft was still submerged.

Ending left me confused.  Turner’s reaction suggests he knows something the others don’t - a danger of some sort.  Yet Samuel the man-alien seems harmless leaving me with a mixed message to end on.  Not sure what the intent is here.  Too many questions.

Another time traveling script..

It was a hard read with all the jargon but I actually enjoyed it.

Creative and well written.

A good entry

Nemo,

Pretty good. You had my attention, found it interesting. Personally, two things the almost ruined it for the. You choosing to call it a tic-tac made me think of, well, a freakin tic-tac. Second, the alien/human voice was way too casual for my taste. He’s kinda like no big deal, nothing to see here. Felt off. Otherwise, pretty good story here!

Steve

Funny, I just read a news story yesterday where a pilot described the UFO he had seen as "like a large tic tac."

I enjoyed this. Definitely laughed out loud when the "alien" waves. (There are definite comedic elements in this script.)

Yes, it's a bit inconsistent. Military guys don't sound all that elite. And, I don't understand the "not what you think" line. Why introduce that element if you can't pay it off?

Still, I liked it.

For all that setup, the ending was like a balloon rapidly deflating. It's an effective reveal, it just doesn't carry any weight. So he's actually human and he's from the future. It plays like that's a good thing, a happy ending, but after all that tension at the start it's a let down. More interesting is a consequence of action, either from his coming back too far into the past (it doesn't seem like he meant to end up in that time period) or from their hostility, or even a warning of some sort. All the possible hooks that Captain Turner cautions against go out the window with that ending too, they don't lead to anything.

The writing is good, but wrong for the pace this should be. It's too wordy, it holds the action back. It's imaginative and solidly sci-fi, it just needs something more for an ending.

Hi writer,

Quoted Text DECK OF FB MIL­50P NAVY SPEEDBOAT

Maybe just NAVY SPEEDBOAT, I don't think many people will know the rest.

Quoted Text The glow is Tic Tac shaped, fifty feet long, twenty wide, rounded ends, sitting ten feet below the water's surface.

Is this based off that recent interview with 60 Minutes, I think it was?

I enjoyed some of the comedic moment, good job with that.

Could use a bit of a polish after the challenge.

All the best.

It seemed like a lot of build up to get to the payoff.

I think if you focused less on the soldiers and their military talk and more on the mystery it would work a lot better.

I have a thing for military oriented stuff so this had me hooked. Solid reveal at the end as well.

I wanted to like this more than I did unfortunately. Not that the writing wasn't good, it just wasn't clear enough at times for me.

Interesting premise though.

Good luck.

I think Whittier is what's wrong with authority these days. Just wanting to shoot.

Interesting idea. Took a while to get there though. The 3 Marines all sounded the same. Not sure you need 3. Maybe cut it down to two and give them a distinct personality or quirk so we can make out a difference.

Not a bad entry though. Good work.