Alright, so the top 25 scripts in the Scriptshadow 250 Contest have been announced. And while I’m sure many of you are happy for the finalists, let’s be honest. You want to know why the hell your script didn’t make the list. I’ve already seen people complaining about the loglines. “This is it??” they’re saying, forgetting that we’re not running a contest for best logline here. If we were, yesterday’s list would be a lot different. We’re looking for the best scripts. And because of that, a lot of the best loglines fell by the wayside. Believe me, I was pulling for them. The holy grail is the great concept WITH the great execution. But those scripts are like unicorns, appearing once or twice a year.

But let’s get back to that question: Why didn’t I make it? In some cases, the answer was specific to the script. I had one script that didn’t advance because the character naming was so ridiculous, it became impossible to take the script seriously. Imagine someone named Clarkwardenfall. IN A DRAMA. Then multiply that by 20 characters. But for most of the misses, there were patterns. The same issues kept coming up. Maybe by highlighting these issues, I can help you do better in your next contest.

1) LACK OF CREATIVITY – By far, the biggest issue was a lack of creativity in the storytelling. Everyone’s writing the same scenes, the same characters, the same plot beats. Nothing fresh or creative or unexpected or unique is happening on any level. I was a million pages ahead of writers on so many of these scripts. This is why the industry values “voice” so much, since voice is the antithesis of this. Writers with voice are constantly making unexpected choices that are keeping the reader on their toes. But you don’t need to be blessed with a unique voice to thrive in this area. Creative choices can be learned. You have to a) be more aware of how original your choices are and b) hold yourself to a higher standard once you recognize low-quality choices (by digging in and coming up with something better). Be brave. Do a few things that surprise even you when you tell a story.

2) TOO MUCH CREATIVITY – There’s a type of writer who writes in the opposite manner to what I just described. They don’t see behind or in front of them, but focus only on the present, writing their stories “off-the-cuff.” Because of this, their screenplays keep the reader guessing (unlike the uncreative folks). But since the writer possesses no plan, their choices usually lead you down paths to nowhere. These writers need to learn how a story is structured (beginning, middle, and end) and they need to spend more time outlining, so that their choices contain a plan behind them. As soon as I realize you don’t have a plan or as soon as things get too scattered or unfocused, I’m out.

3) LACK OF SOPHISTICATION – In a good 20 of the scripts I read, writers tackled subject matter that was well beyond their level of sophistication. For example, a writer might have written about a tragic World War 1 story, yet the writing was simplistic, lacked detail, and didn’t possess the proper mood or tone to capture the period. If you’re going to tackle weightier subject matter, make sure you possess the writing skills to do so. If you want to get better in this area, read strong literary material, carry a curiosity for vocabulary and grammar, and practice your ass off.

4) SECOND ACT BLUES – There are still too many writers who don’t have a clue of what to do once they reach the second act. One of the scripts I read was cruising through its first act. I was like, “This might make the top 5!” And then the writer spent the first 25 pages of his second act giving us extensive background on his 12 main characters. The screenplay lost all its momentum and never recovered. The second act should be doing three things. 1) Every scene should be moving your hero closer to his goal. 2) The second act should be exploring the major lines of conflict between your key characters, and 3) The second act should be placing obstacles in front of your characters so that they have things to overcome in order to achieve their goal. The second act is the act of “conflict,” so every scene should contain conflict on some level. Even if it’s just two people in a room, there needs to be something unresolved there, something that starts off negative and poses a problem that must be solved, for one or both of the characters.

5) ROSES ARE RED, PROSES ARE DEAD – I read three scripts from writers who may have made the top 25 if they didn’t grind their scripts to a standstill with walls of text. And guys, just because you divide 50 lines of description into 3 and 4 line paragraph chunks? THAT’S STILL A WALL OF TEXT. I’ve found that these writers fall into two categories. The first is the “need to impress” category. These writers tend to be young and believe it’s their job to impress you with their word-skills. The second is the “show-off” category. These are writers who are genuinely talented writers and want to show that off, but don’t realize their scripts aren’t being read in a breakfast nook with a blanket and a hot coffee, like novels are. Screenplays are meant to be read quickly, in a high-pressure industry where people are constantly asking for the new hot thing. So fair or not, it feels like WORK if we’re reading a lot of words to describe simple things. Once your script starts feeling like work ON ANY LEVEL, you’re done.

6) LACK OF NUANCE – There were a lot of scripts where writers weren’t nuanced in their writing. So a character would be really angry one second, then really nice the next, with no insight into why their mood changed so suddenly. Or a character would wake up in the middle of the night, walk outside, and all of a sudden be fighting a bunch of bad guys. How did we get here? Where did these bad guys come from? How did this character even know to wake up and check outside in the first place? There was a TON of this, and I call it “In Your Head Writing.” “In Your Head Writing” is when you’re thinking about what makes sense TO YOU (in your head) and not someone who will be reading this for the first time. To you, you may have thought, “My angry character is done being angry, he’ll be nice now,” so you make him nice. But you never shared with us (the people outside of your head) why that transition took place. If you’re being told that your writing is confusing a lot, step outside of your head and see if your writing makes sense from a third-person’s perspective.

But the biggest thing, guys, is to keep practicing. As hard as this is to hear, you may not be ready yet. I know that sucks but you may need to work more on structure or character development or dialogue. All that stuff takes time to grasp. So keep writing, keep reading (scripts), and keep studying. I’d even add “get more feedback” to that list. How can you know if you’re writing “in your head” if you don’t have a third party giving you feedback? Now get back on the horse and write something great.

As I mentioned yesterday, I’m not posting anything this week due to Scriptshadow 250 Contest duties (FINALLY finishing all the scripts!). But I haven’t forgotten about you guys. Here’s the deal. Today is a day for you to share your loglines, pages, entire scripts, whatever, and get feedback from your peers. But there’s a bonus! “Bonus, you say, Carson? Whatever could this bonus be?” Whichever idea or pages get the most up-votes in the comments section, I will read and give notes on the first ten pages of your script. So the challenge is on. If you don’t win, you can always hire me for a full consultation. So all is not lost!

So they’re making a TV series about the Angriest Woman in The World, the same subject matter that Michael Whatling won Amateur Offerings with. If you remember, I wondered if anybody would want to make something so uncommercial. Well, somebody is. This goes to show that the entertainment world is full of opinions and a lot of those opinions turn out to be wrong. If you feel passionately about something, don’t listen to me or anybody else who tells you no. Keep pushing your script until you find the person who connects with it.

Next week is Amateur Offerings Pilot Week. Send in your pilot scripts to carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Include the title, genre, logline, and why you think it deserves to be chosen. If all goes well, we’ll find the next Ozark. Rock and roll people. You know what to do next. Read the below scripts and vote on your favorite! And no, you can’t revote for Time Shark.

Title: A Change Is Gonna Come
Genre: Sci-Fi Biography
Logline: In 1965 a white musician struggles to pursue a music career with his black friends, until he crosses paths with a singer who oddly resembles his lamented hero, Sam Cooke.
Why You Should Read: I’m a huge fan of alt-history and what-if scenarios. I’m going to be honest, this premise is very unique. It revolves around one of America’s greatest Soul singers, Sam Cooke, and sort of acts his biopic, but not to the point of boring facts and situations. The story is seen through the eyes of his biggest fan, Jeffrey, and starts on the day that Cooke was murdered in the 1960s. It creates a whole new set of rules for time travel and fuses its sci-fi characteristics with themes of race and breaking down barriers. With everything going on these days with police brutality, and even the more-frivolous “OscarsSoWhite” controversy, this story may be more relevant than ever. It’s intense at times, but also does it with an appropriate sense of levity. I guarantee you this will be a very fun read of epic proportions. Thank you for your consideration.

Title: The Devil’s Workshop
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Premise: After accepting a gig to craft a demon mask, a makeup effects artist must protect her and her daughter from her abusive husband and the sinister forces that stalk them.
Why You Should Read: I’m not a mother but I want to be (eventually). I also want to be a paid screenwriter, proficient Japanese speaker, dog owner and in another life, Cirque du Soleil performer. What most people know (especially in this industry), is it’s really hard to find balance and sometimes you must sacrifice something to get your heart’s desire.
Besides that idea, I wanted to pair movie horror with the real horror of domestic violence. I researched, googled and trolled forums to craft my story. It wasn’t until after a reading when a woman approached me that I realized I was telling her story. It hurt to hear her share her accounts of abuse that she’d mostly kept to herself. I hope if anything this story inspires people to take control of their own lives.

Title: The Playhouse
Genre: Contained horror
Logline: When seven strangers, with no memory of who they are, wake up inside an old, dark house with no way out, they become victims to a series of terrifying supernatural encounters… but if they ever want to escape this place alive, they’ll have to unlock the mystery of who they are, why they’re here, and what this place really is.
Why You Should Read: I want to do something a little different and a little special with my submission today, and take this opportunity to use Scriptshadow as the mighty marketing tool which I know it can be. Carson’s site is immensely powerful and it has already brought several writers and scripts to the attention of Hollywood producers. I want to see if we can make this happen again. — Firstly, for anyone reading, it’s important to think of The Playhouse, not as a single screenplay, but instead the beginning of a franchise. It’s true to say that the script is a self-contained story with a beginning, a middle and an end, but built into the fabric of its DNA is the potential for the continued expansion of its central concept. — The script is, essentially, a low-budget contained horror, but it has a unique hook at its heart. Without revealing any spoilers, what begins in the traditional haunted house genre quickly elevates into entirely new territory in the final act (while also keeping its hooks firmly within the conventions of horror). — Now, the interesting part: if my script gets enough votes and is chosen to be reviewed by Carson, I’ll be releasing a special pitch document attached to the script for you guys to read which will contain a synopsis for the next two sequels as well as outlining my vision for the evolution of the series as a whole, showcasing why this is the next horror franchise to step up after The Purge, Saw and Final Destination series. — I will also simultaneously be pitching the script to producers at the same time it’s featured here on scriptshadow, and I’ll be doing my best to keep you guys updated during this process. — My real hope, however, is that producers will concurrently find the script themselves through this amazing site. If you’re a fan of my project and you choose to vote for me, I hope you can help out by creating buzz, using social media to direct producers and industry professionals, that you either know personally or online, here. — You can consider this an exercise in hype, word of mouth, marketing or even a type of social experiment. Thank you for reading.

Title: Intelligent Design
Genre: Gothic Horror/Sci-fi/Crime
Logline: A grisly vampire-like murder sends an NYC Detective in way over his head when he suspects that the culprit he’s after might actually be a real vampire.
Why You Should Read: You’ve actually read this before, but a moderately longer version. It was in the “Almost Top 25” category for the Scriptshadow 250. The feedback I received from your site was that it was too long. Funny part was a management company (a very good one too) who saw the logline asked to read it, liked it, and had the exact same feedback. So, I spent the last month slowly killing my darlings a bit. I managed to shave off 8 pages from the script, 120 down to 112. Is it enough? I definitely think it reads quicker, but you never what you have until someone else reads it. I made a few narrative changes. I swapped the opening “teaser” with something that felt a little more gripping. I think the previous opening could easily be mistaken for weird pillow-talk. I tweaked the ending as well. I also did my best to get rid of over-description, which I think was one of the major hurdles when reading it. Alas, hope it makes the cut again…

Title: Wild
Genre: Crime/Thriller/Drama
Logline: In 18th century London, a con artist becomes the head of the police and uses this new power to secretly rise to the top of the organized crime world.
Why Read?: It’s the type of story that people can’t believe could be true, except it is! It’s based off of the real life story of Jonathan Wild, one of England’s most notorious criminals. This script was a Quarterfinalist in the 2015 Nicholl Fellowship, and a Finalist in the 2015 Scriptapalooza Screenplay Competition, so we’ve gotten a little bit of attention from some management companies, but haven’t been signed.

One of the misconceptions I had when I first started sending my screenplays out was that they were special. That the endless months of hard work and care I put into creating them would be celebrated by those who read them – like the way an Olympic judge would lock in to a figure skating routine, marking scores for every little spin and jump. Now that I’ve been on the other side, I realize just how many scripts are being read, and for that reason, how quickly a reader can tune out if your script isn’t grabbing them.

I was talking about this very issue today with a manager, which led to a debate on what makes a script stand out from the pack. The first answer we agreed on was “voice.” But that’s become such a watered down buzzword at this point that further examination was required. We moved on to other topics before we could come to a consensus, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the question on the way home, especially with all the scripts I’ve been reading for the Scriptshadow 250. I can tell with 99% certainty if a script isn’t going to deliver by page 5. But then, every 20 scripts or so, a script will grab me. Just like that. BAM! I’m in it. I can’t wait to find out what happens next. How did this happen? How is this script so much better than the other ones?

Today, I want to identify that secret sauce, that difference between “stand out” and “standard.” You’re probably thinking there’s no way to determine this. The process of creating art is like magic. It arrives at the crossroads between talent and inspiration. But I refuse to believe that. Even the least talented writers can be taught to identify when they’re making bad choices. And if you can identify that, there’s no reason you can’t start making original choices. And original choices are the heart of what makes a screenplay stand out. Let’s see what some of the other ingredients are.

CONCEPT

A stand-out screenplay usually has a concept that’s a little weird, a little “off.” “Bubbles,” the number 1 script on last year’s Black List comes to mind (A biopic of Michael Jackson told through the eyes of his pet monkey, Bubbles). Fight Club is another one (who makes a movie about bored people fighting??). Stand-out writers tend to stand out because they do things differently. If they were doing things the same, then by definition, they wouldn’t be standing out. So while a unique concept isn’t required for stand-out material, it’s an indication that the writer enjoys exploring the less-traveled path.

SPECIFICITY

One of the things I’ve noticed with stand-out writers is that there’s a specificity to their writing. They don’t describe things in generalities. They add detail to better bring you into their world. Here’s a line I recently read from a generic amateur script: “Joe changes into his uniform. That of a chef. The head chef.” Then here’s a professional writer describing a similar moment in his script: “Now dressed in a puffy black snow jacket, Rose steps into a pair of snow boots, pulling on a pair of mittens.” It’s so much easier to see what’s going on in the second example, because of the detail. There’s a ceiling to this, of course. You can’t write too much description or you’ll gum up the read. But specific writers also tend to abide by one of the core rules of screenwriting: Say as much as possible in as few words as possible. They just do so with more detail.

POINT-OF-VIEW

The first two elements I mentioned are icing, but point-of-view is cake. “Point-of-view” is how you see the world, and is one of the most important factors in standing out. A unique point of view takes any situation and finds a new way to look at it. So for example, if I asked you what “romance” looked like in your head, you might answer, “When a man and a woman are deeply in love with each other.” When Spike Jonez is asked that question, though, he’d answer, “When a man and a computer are in love with each other,” as explored in his movie, “Her.” Or if I asked you to write a story about a woman and her son being held hostage by a man, your first instinct would probably be to tell the story through the mother’s eyes. Emma Donahue, the author of “Room,” however, decided to explore the situation through the eyes of the small child. Point of view isn’t just about concept. It extends to any choice you make in the story. If I told you to write a story about stock traders, your instinct would probably be to make all your characters overgrown frat boys with perfectly tailored suits and a penchant for swearing. The architect in The Big Short, Christian Bale’s character, however, has one glass eye, wears jeans and a t-shirt, is anti-social, and holds meetings in his office with heavy metal music blasting. Your point-of-view must be unique if you want your script to stand out in any way.

DO THE UNEXPECTED

I want to bring up a common misconception. That “instinct” is a good thing. Instinct is the unintentional repetition of an expected outcome. For example, say you have a scene with a guy and a girl in the rain. Your “instinct” may be to have those characters kiss. But the only reason your instinct is telling you that is because you’ve seen dozens of movies where a guy and a girl in the rain kiss. The stand-out writer, however, will show our awkward male character struggling to open an umbrella. As the girl waits impatiently, getting colder and wetter by the second, the guy can’t seem to trip the click device above the handle. As the girl starts to get pissed, the umbrella pops up, hitting the girl in the face. She grabs her nose, which is now bleeding. And the guy steps forward to help her only to have the umbrella get struck by lightning. That’s a more unexpected choice, and one that only comes to you if you greet instinct with skepticism. Here’s where things get tricky though. There are two types of writers. Writers who are truly original. Charlie Kaufman is the prototype for this group. Then there are the rest of us – people who see the world at face value. For the truly original, their instincts ARE unique, and therefore should be followed as-is. For the rest of us, we must learn to challenge our instincts. Every choice must be accompanied by a question: “Is this what usually happens?” Because if it is, then you probably shouldn’t write it. This is a long-winded way of saying that the stand-out scripts always keep me guessing. The writer is always ahead of me because he’s making unexpected choices.

UNIQUE PRESENTATION
To best understand what unique presentation looks like, I’ll present you with the opposite: Taken. “Taken” follows a single guy on a single mission to get his daughter back. It’s a straight-forward first person story. A unique presentation, on the other hand, changes things up in one of two categories: character or structure. Pulp Fiction’s structure jumps back and forth in time. Gone Girl’s first half tells the story through our protagonist’s eyes, but then switches over to its antagonist for the second half. Steve Jobs tells three 40 minute contained stories. As for character, the idea is to use your characters to help the reader experience the story in a unique way. The most recent example of this was Deadpool – our fourth-wall breaking never-stops-narrating main character. That character was partially inspired by another fourth-wall breaker, Ferris Bueller. “Bubbles” uses an animal to narrate its story. The Big Short uses celebrity cutaways to convey complex exposition. You never want to use these tools just to use them. They need to make sense within the story you’re telling. But an offbeat presentation is an easy way to make your script stand out.

DIALOGUE

The dialogue in a stand-out script tends to be more inspired than in lesser scripts. There’s a pop to it. And it’s hard to quantify what that pop is made up of. But for starters, the dialogue should be clever. You get the sense the writer really thought about each response. The vocabulary is more extensive than your average screenwriter. The writer must have a unique sense of humor, whether it’s dry, morbid, over-the-top, or just plain weird. There’s a specificity to the dialogue. “You get drunk at the bar last night again?” probably reads better as, “You chuggin Mai Tais at Finnegans all night again?” There’s a naturalism to the way characters speak. They use contractions. They use slang. They use nicknames. Words come out fast and loose instead of stilted and robotic (unless the script calls for a robotic character). Mostly there’s a freedom to the dialogue that mirrors the way we speak in real life, but at the same time, the wisecracks are wiser, the comebacks are sharper, and the vocabulary is more advanced.

EMBRACE THE WEIRD

Finally, embrace the weird, the offbeat, the macabre. If you want to stand out, you have to remove yourself from group-think and explore the oddities of life. I just heard about a script where a guy sheds his skin every day and turns into a different person. Those are the kinds of scripts people remember. What are you writing that will stand out?

I’m off for the day guys. I’ve been reading Scriptshadow 250 Contest scripts all weekend and need a breather. I know there was a big hubbub over a certain script submitted to Amateur Offerings on Saturday. Guys, honestly? Don’t get your skivvies in a bunch over it. A “Get Noticed” script is a perfectly viable approach to marketing yourself in this industry.

Less and less specs are selling each year so you’re not so much writing to sell as you are writing to get noticed. If someone wants to break the rules and write first-person action lines, it’s not a big deal. We’ve seen Black List scripts do this. We’ve seen Nicholl finalists do this. And hell, we just saw a movie dominate the box office that embraced this mentality. I’m not sure why people were freaking out about it so much.

Moving on, here are 5 scripts that you don’t want to write, derived from the last 5 Scriptshadow 250 scripts I read. I know you’ll all ask, “When will you announce the winner, Carson??” I refuse to answer that question as I haven’t met any of my previous deadlines. All I can say is that I have 18 of the 25 finalists so far and that I continue to read!

1) The “By-the-books” script – I read a biopic and the writing was actually really good. But the writer hit all the biopic beats right down to the childhood flashbacks. There wasn’t a single moment that surprised me. I was 50 pages ahead of the writer, and that was on page 5! You have to infuse some unexpected choices into your scripts guys! Don’t just use a template from a successful script in your genre and follow it to a ‘t.’

2) The “Can’t Get Out of My Own Way” script – This script came from one of my favorite commenters on Scriptshadow so I was really looking forward to it. But the writer was so set on impressing us with his writing that every paragraph was 15 words longer than it needed to be. I had to keep going back through sentences to understand what I’d just read. Just getting through the script became a chore. Stop overcomplicating things. Write in a simple manner that’s easy to read!

3) The “Flashbacks For No Reason” script – Oh boy. This script kept jumping back into flashbacks that would REPEATEDLY tell me things I already knew. The main character liked chocolate. So the flashback would be of the hero as a child buying chocolate from a candy store. No, guys. No. If you’re going to include a flashback, it better have a point that relates to the story!

4) The “I Haven’t Done A Lick of Research Into the World of the Story I’m Telling” script – This particular script was about a bunch of hardcore thugs who came from a rough neighborhood. Though it was clearly written by an upper middle class white dude who’d never spent a day in the hood in his life. If you’re going to write about a world you know nothing about, you better take the time to research that world. The page don’t lie.

5) The “I’m Not Bringing Anything New To The Party” script – It’s perfectly okay to want to bring back a genre. For example, writers have been trying to bring back the Spielberg 80s movies for 20 years now. But there’s a difference between bringing a fresh new angle to these movies, and bringing us the exact same movies we’ve already seen. If you don’t bring the fresh new angle, your script will feel dated, like something that was written in the 80s, and that’s not what you want.

Hope that helps. Oh, and check out both 11/22/63 on Hulu and Love on Netflix. Both rock and are very well-written!