Jessica Hall back again, doing what she does best. And no, for all you e-mailers asking, Jessica is not the love child of the mega-sensation 80s pop group “Hall and Oats.” There’s enough juiciness in here to open a Robek’s. Superman being re-re-re-re-booted by Goyer. The It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia boys selling a Hangover clone. Christensen getting another million dollar payday when life has already been too kind to him (he’s a rock star). A project about politeness and manners is being put into the pipeline. David Gordon Green is staying in the mainstream by directing The Sitter. And they’re making a Zoolander 2 with Jonah Hill as the villain. And Russel hid Boston Rob’s hat. Wow, we could talk about this stuff for months. — My ass is too lazy to embed the links right now so you’ll have to wait your equally lazy asses until later.

New spec KILLER by Kenny Golde (dir. THE JOB) sold to Parkes/MacDonald and Hyde Park in a bidding war. Script uses the documentary-style footage (à la PARANORMAL ACTIVITY) to tell the story of a serial killer and the detectives trying to catch him. (http://bit.ly/cNFpJj)

Paramount and Montecito picked up Lee & Walsh’s (“It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia “) spec 21 SHOTS. It’s based on an idea by writers Hurwitz & Schlossberg (GRANDMA VS. GRANDMA) who are also producing. While they’ve sold pilots to FBC and ABC, this is Lee & Walsh’s first spec. 21 Shots centers around a guy who, on his 21st birthday, loses his I.D. and needs to track it down over the course of a day. Montecito bought the spec preemptively through their Paramount discretionary fund. (http://bit.ly/ceUnXR)

It took over a week, but Lionsgate finally won the bidding war over Shawn Christensen’s (KARMA COALITION) spec ABDUCTION, reportedly for nearly $1 million. Taylor Lautner is attached to star. Lionsgate is expected to rush to get a director on the project and begin production before they lose Lautner to his many other commitments. (http://bit.ly/aKaAho)

Warner Bros. is out to writers after picking up a pitch from Underground Films’ Nick Osborne. Untitled picture is based on Emily Post’s bestselling book “Etiquette” and is billed as “My Fair Lady” with the genders reversed. (http://bit.ly/cs0aOr)

Erin Cressida Wilson (CHLOE) is set to adapt Lisa See’s book “Peony in Love” for Fox 2000 and Scott Free. Set in 17th century China, the book revolves around a young woman who starves herself to death after falling in love with a man she fears she’ll never be allowed to wed. (http://bit.ly/9Cua2m)

It’s a good week for writing team Posamentier & Moore. In addition to writing GRANDMA’S INTERGALACTIC BED & BREAKFAST for Disney and Mandeville, they will make their directing debut with BETTER LIVING THROUGH CHEMISTRY. INTERGALACTIC, an adaptation of the first book in Clete Smith’s series that Disney optioned last year, is about a boy who goes to visit his hippie grandmother and discovers her inn caters to vacationing aliens. CHEMISTRY centers on a meek small-town pharmacist who begins an affair with a trophy wife who introduces him to the wonderful world of prescription drugs. But when they begin to plot her husband’s murder, everything falls apart. The duo, former execs at Double Feature and Mad Chance Prods., respectively, are also penning “Oh Happy Day” for Disney and Mandeville. (http://bit.ly/bzy8qx, http://bit.ly/b3fEjt)

Fox announced that Alex Tse (WATCHMEN) will adapt the first book in John Twelve Hawks’ Fourth Realm Trilogy. THE TRAVELER is set in a U.S. society run by a secret organization who control the population via constant observation. Seeking to rebel against these constraints are an almost extinct group of people called Travelers, who can project their spirit into other dimensions, and their protectors, called Harlequins. Project was previously set up at Universal and Kennedy/Marshall with a script by Miro & Bernard (PRINCE OF PERSIA). (http://bit.ly/d6ph07)

Gregory Allen Howard (REMEMBER THE TITANS) is back to football for his next project. He’ll write THE MAGICIAN, a biopic about Marlin “The Magician” Briscoe, the first black starting quarterback. (http://bit.ly/aZ1VCs)

Greg Berlanti will rewrite and direct comic adaptation THE FLASH for Warner Bros. Previous draft was by Dan Mazeau (JONNY QUEST). Berlanti wrote GREEN LANTERN and was attached to direct until Martin Campbell boarded that project. (http://bit.ly/dj7iXX – subscription required).

David Gordon Green (PINEAPPLE EXPRESS) will direct Gatewood & Tanaka’s 2009 spec THE SITTER. Comedy, a cross between SUPERBAD and ADVENTURES IN BABYSITTING, sold to Fox in a bidding war. Jonah Hill (SUPERBAD) will star. (http://bit.ly/aSrCKM)

Ben Stiller will re-team with writer Justin Theroux (TROPIC THUNDER) for ZOOLANDER 2 at Paramount. It’s not known if Owen Wilson will return, but Jonah Hill is in negotiations to play the villain. (http://bit.ly/crcOxs)

David Goyer (THE DARK NIGHT story) will write the UNTITLED SUPERMAN REBOOT for Warner Bros. Director Christopher Nolan (THE DARK NIGHT) is also involved as an advisor. Goyer is currently working with Jonathan Nolan on a script for the next Batman installment. (http://bit.ly/94Unli)

Oscar nominated writer Sheldon Turner (UP IN THE AIR) will write and produce KISS AND TELL, a rom-com, based on a pitch by Shelby & Stevens (A FAMILY AFFAIR). The Universal pick up is about a woman who discovers she has the power to see exactly how a long-term relationship will unfold with a man after kissing him. (http://bit.ly/dej3Kb)

Antonio Banderas will produce, write, direct and act in a biopic on Boabdil (Abu Abdullah Muhammad XII), the last Muslim ruler of Granada, Spain. Antonio Soler (SUMMER RAIN) will co-write. Project is still seeking financing. (http://bit.ly/9jGpKz)

One of the weirdest coolest crossovers I’ve ever read. Everything Everywhere All at Once meets Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind meets When Harry Met Sally!

Genre: Rom-Com/Quirky/Sci-Fi/Drama
Premise: A relationship is put to the ultimate test when time ripples keep reinventing one of the partners, forcing the relationship to begin again… and again… and again… and again… and again…
About: I know Max Taxe has been writing since, at last, 2010, as I received a few e-mails from him back then. All that hard work is finally starting to pay dividends as he got a movie on HBO Max last year called, “Moonshot.” And now, this script is headed to Netflix via mega-production company, 21 Laps. I’m about to share some news that some of you may not like. But yes, this is yet another project that started out as a SHORT STORY. That’s how it was purchased (a pitch with a short story). Taxe then adapted it after he sold the rights into a full screenplay.
Writer: Max Taxe
Details: 98 pages

Donald Glover for Miles?

Writers are back!

It looks like the studios and streamers finally wised up, realizing that every story AI produces reads like a fairy tale written by the Terminator. I’m not all mad at the strike though. It did give us The Golden Bachelor and 90 minute episodes of Survivor. And, of course, where we would be if Dave Filoni couldn’t write more episodes of Ahsoka? I’m not sure my Wednesdays could survive such a calamity. I need to find out what those space whales are up to!

I’ll be honest, I wonder how many professional writers wrote during the strike. Cause I know all any TV writer says is, “There’s not enough time.” So imagine if you had six months to catch up on your scriptwriting. Would Craig Maizon take that opportunity to scribble out a few Season 2 episodes of The Last of Us?

I guess we’ll never know.

But here’s something I do know. Today’s script subject matter is my kind of jam. You’ve got a little love. A little comedy. An offbeat writing voice. And then you’ve got a splash of sci-fi to disrupt it all.

Still one of my favorite scripts (that was sadly ruined by Pete Davidson, just like he ruined my chances with Emily Ratajkowski) was Meet Cute. It was similar to this premise. Girl uses a time machine to construct the perfect date. Why couldn’t the writer’s strike have disrupted that casting?

But will Ripple’s quirkiness overwhelm its charming premise? I’m going to channel my own personal 1.21 gigawatts to find out.

Miles and Sadie are two 30-somethings who have been unlucky in love. So much so that when they first meet, they openly admit that they expect their date to be a failure. But by doing so, they strip all expectations from the date, which allows them to have the best date of their lives and fall in love.

A few weeks later, some internet poster named XxNavi47xX says he’s from the future and provides winning lottery numbers to prove it. These numbers turn out to be correct and a bunch of people win money. However, this causes the first of many time ripples. Miles and Sadie’s cat, Trouble, turns into a dog. The way a ripple works is that you remember your past existence for about an hour, but that memory permanently disappears afterwards.

After this happens a few more times, Miles starts getting scared that a ripple may disappear Sadie (it already disappeared the all-girl band, Haim!). The internet connects him with a guy named Oz who has developed a system to help memories survive ripples. You write down your memories and a server bounces them back and forth a million times a second continuously so that they can migrate from one ripple to the next.

This way, when Sadie does, of course, disappear, Miles remembers her and goes after her. But, unfortunately for our lovebirds, the craziness is just getting started. It’s followed a month later by another one. And then a few weeks later by another one. In one reality, she’s the lawyer she was originally going to be before her lawyer father committed suicide. In another, she’s a hairdresser. In yet another, she’s a movie star.

Miles is able to keep finding her and get back together with her but then Navi is forced to go on the run which really starts affecting the timeline. Miles is forced to through thousands of ripple variations to find Sadie again. We can see the toll it’s taking on him and realize it’s not sustainable. At a certain point, Miles is going to have to decide whether his love for Sadie is strong enough to live this hell of an existence.

You know, I always say, if a script takes more than two genres to label, that means you’ve got a script that doesn’t work. Well, this might be the first exception. It really is a myriad of different genres and yet, somehow, it works.

I’m surprised they bought this concept as a short story pitch. Because with a script like this, it’s all about the execution. And the execution for something that exists in the murky world of time travel can go bad quickly. It’s a testament to the power of short stories in this new ultra-attention-deficit-disorder industry. I don’t think this sells if it’s only a pitch. The short story was enough of a bridge to allow 21 Laps to see where the script might go.

And it goes to some interesting places.

It starts off as this straight up rom-com, almost to the point of being cloying. The “meet cute” at The Apple Pan restaurant is too cutesy-pootsy for its own good, even as it attempts to subvert expectations.

I wouldn’t even say the script was saved by its first ripple. Because when that first ripple happens, we don’t know how deep into the concept the writer is going to go yet. It turns out, very deep.

Once we’re in the throes of over a hundred ripples, we start to feel the desperation of Miles, as well as the realization that he may have to come to terms with letting Sadie go. Cause the ripples just keep happening and his entire existence is dedicated to re-finding Sadie and starting their love story over again.

But just imagine how taxing it must be to do that hundreds of times over, with a new person that has a completely different past, only to lose them again a week later. It’s pure misery. And one of the most powerful moments in the script is when the 700th version of Sadie says to him, I’m not the person you met. I’m a copy of a fragment of a reincarnation of that person. You just need to move on.

It was heartbreaking.

But I think where Taxe really earns his writer’s stripes is in how he controls the technical side of the story. He uses this time traveler guy – Navi – as a way to influence the frequency and severity of the ripples. At first, when he’s in hiding, just posting anonymous internet comments, the ripples are soft and spaced out. But when he goes on the run, the ripples start getting more intense. Then, as the government closes in on him, they grow more intense still.

This ensures that the script is constantly changing. I always complain about how screenplays get predictable, both with what happens and how the story is paced. The way Taxe treats Navi guarantees a lot of variety in both these departments.

And I loved how, when the government finally caught him, it meant that whatever timeline we were in was the final one. No more Ripples. And in this timeline, Miles and Sadie had decided never to be together. So we’re really sad that their love story is over.

I will say this as a sci-fi geek (spoiler adjacent). There was a part of me that REALLY WANTED Sadie to be Navi. And we find out that the reason she’s been resetting her timelines was to get to a timeline where her dad was still alive. But, of course, that would’ve created some other plot messiness that might not have been able to be explained. So I’m okay with Navi being random.

I went back and forth on whether this was a double worth the read or an impressive. Cause the first half is above average. It’s enough to keep you turning the pages. But it wasn’t until I got to the last 40 pages that I truly got pulled into the story. You know what, though? It got me at the end. That final ending beat was perfect. And when a script leaves me on that high of a note, I gotta give it an impressive, man!

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: One of the best ways to get noticed is to deconstruct a genre. Take a well-known genre in a direction we don’t expect. This script takes romantic comedy to the last place I expected it to go. If you want to learn how to deconstruct a genre, read “Ripple.”

“What’s that, brother?  My logline didn’t make the showdown???”

It’s time to play that most wonderful of games: “Why didn’t my logline get picked for Logline Showdown?” This month, though, we’re going to do something special. We’re going to focus on submissions that need to retire.  As much as I’m rooting for everyone on today’s post, it’s time to move forward with new scripts.  Cause I want you to have a chance!  The below loglines are never going to get that chance, no matter how many times they’re submitted.

And a reminder that, tomorrow, we have a script review of this month’s Logline Showdown winner, “Wayward Son.” The logline for that was: “When her estranged son returns and takes her grandson in the night, a veteran park ranger sets out to rescue him from the clutches of a mysterious cult deep in the Oregon woods.” Tune in to see what I thought AND to read the script yourself.

Okay, are we ready? Here we go…

Title: My Lonely Earth
Genre: Sci-fi
Logline: At a top-secret lab, a psychotherapist battling nightmares of an alien abduction learns that not only are her nightmares real, but that her alien child is being kept in the facility, and she’s running out of time to save him.

Analysis: Full disclosure. I helped Nicholas with his logline here. I’ll let him decide if he wants to post the original logline so you can see where he started. My issue with My Lonely Earth is that it feels like an overly familiar premise that doesn’t have that “strange attractor” that makes the idea stand out. I read sooooo many scripts that take place in secret labs. There’s an outbreak or an alien and the scripts follow the characters running around the lab hallways, hiding in rooms, and it just gets tediously repetitive. So unless you’re going to add some strange attractor that helps me think of something *other* than that, then any contained thriller that takes place in a lab probably isn’t going to get my juices flowing.

Title: Plagued With Love!
Genre: Musical Comedy
Logline: An overconfident plague doctor and his bumbling partner must find a cure for the plague before King Louis XIII executes them for their numerous failures, and so off they go on an adventure full of song, dance, romance… and swollen lymph nodes!  (Galavant meets The Road to El Dorado)

Analysis: Every time I see this logline, I consider posting it in the showdown but then I realize that the only reason I’m considering it is because I like Katherine. But if this logline came from “Joey Franzone” as opposed to “Katherine Botts,” I wouldn’t consider it. What’s interesting here is that this concept has the opposite problem that My Lonely Earth has. It is one GIANT strange attractor. It’s so off the reservation that I’m imagining something too wacky, too goofy. But the deciding factor is that it’s not clever enough. And I can give you a comp that was clever enough to get my attention. It’s a pilot I reviewed recently: “During the Black Plague, a group of rich Italians head off into the countryside to party out the plague in a beautiful villa.” Notice the irony in the concept. Notice the commentary on the rich (they’re so clueless they think they can party their way through the worst plague in history). There’s a cleverness there that’s not quite present in Plagued With Love. I wouldn’t tell Katherine to ditch the script entirely because it’s unique enough that there may be someone out there who falls in love with it. It’s just not my jam.

Title: Runaway Car
Genre: Thriller
Logline: When a hacker takes control of a driverless car in order to get revenge against her abusive ex-boss, an innocent new employee in the passenger’s seat has to fight for survival against both of her new adversaries.

Analysis: Point blank, I’m done with driverless car scripts. I’ve read a dozen of them. I’ve been pitched three times that number. Unfortunately, it’s that idea every writer in town wanted to write. This happens every couple of years where a new technology or pop culture phenomenon or viral idea pops up and everybody wants to write about it. I always tell writers if you’re going to write about something ubiquitous, come up with a really fresh or weird angle so that your script stands out from the pack.

Title: We Band of Angels
Genre: Historical
Logline: An Army nurse arrives in the Philippines just before the Japanese attack and throw her into one of the most ruthless POW camps of WW2.  Based on a true story.

Analysis: I feel bad because I know how much Montana loves this story. He came to me for a logline consult. Then I think he workshopped it with you guys. This latest iteration is, I believe, something he’s come up with himself. There’s something missing from this concept, though (I’m not talking about the logline, I’m talking about the *concept*). Remember that World War 2 is one of the most competitive movie concept spaces. So “decent” won’t cut it. You have to have that strange attractor or “next level” component that makes the idea stand out. Especially in the wake of Oppenheimer, which covered the life of, arguably, the most important man in World War 2. This logline is not convincing me why I’d want to watch a woman in a Japanese POW camp. Maybe this logline makes it into the mix for a World War 2 Logline Showdown. Otherwise, I don’t ever see it making the cut.

Title: WARLOCK DOWN
Genre: Action
Logline: A failed magician turned cop must defeat a group of evil warlocks who have taken the residents of a magical boarding school hostage – including the love of his life.

Analysis: I know this is Tal’s most popular logline but there’s something about it that feels overly constructed to me. It’s like a group of movie execs got together and tried to come up with the most high concept idea ever and just started haphazardly pairing movies up. “Beverly Hills Cop meets Frozen!” “No.” “King Kong meets Barbie!” “No.” “Iron Man meets Armageddon!” “No.” “Die Hard meets Harry Potter!” “Yes!” There’s nothing organic about it. It really does feel like the kind of thing an AI program would come up with. I just don’t see a scenario where I would include this in a Logline Showdown. And yes, I know Tal is coming with a list of 10,000 managers and producers who requested the script off the logline. I’m just not going to be one of them.

Title: There’s An Alien In My Bathtub
Genre: Sci-Fi/Comedy
Logline: A nerdy germaphobe and a clumsy extra-terrestrial become unlikely heroes during a worldwide pandemic.

Analysis: I can say with certainty that this will not make a Logline Showdown. When you say, “There’s an alien in my bathtub,” that’s the literal movie I’m imagining. I’m imagining a single shot of an alien in a bathtub talking for 120 minutes. Which sounds like the most boring movie ever. But even if that’s not the actual movie, the whole concept doesn’t feel big enough to me. It’s too silly. The stakes are too low. There’s no dominant source of conflict to cause uncertainty in the story. And, no, there’s not going to be anything that can be said to convince me otherwise. So for Randall, I would start submitting a new script. And make sure you come to me before you write it for a logline consult (carsonreeves1@gmail.com). I can make sure you don’t make this mistake again.

Title: BACKPACKER ROAD
Genre: Comedy
Logline: While on a group tour of South East Asia, a sorry traveler is stuck sharing a room with a sex tourist while sparking up a relationship with a pretty, charismatic girl.

Analysis: I know John gets passionate when he talks about this idea. I know John isn’t interested in writing anything mainstream. He fully embraces that his idea doesn’t perfectly fit into the Hollywood mold. But, because of that, he has to understand that his ideas are not going to be everyone’s cup of tea. And this isn’t my cup of tea. The sex tourist part feels random. A guy meets a girl while he’s on vacation and, oh, there’s also a sex tourist in the story! What?? How do these two things connect? Do they just swap stories at the end of each day? “We toured the lake.” “That’s cool, I scoped out some 15 year old prostitutes.” I’m not interested in reading that story. And I know FOR A FACT that John is going to explain that that’s not what his story is about. But it doesn’t matter. This logline is not going to make the Logline Showdown. It feels more like a darker version of The Beach. So write it as a novel.

Look, I love all of you. And just because I don’t like your logline doesn’t mean someone else won’t. But I want the longtime readers of this site to have the best shot at making the Showdown which is why I’m encouraging you to come up with something new. Cause I want you competing! I want your loglines to be featured in the big bright lights. I don’t want you to continually send me these loglines that don’t have a shot.

HOWEVER! There’s some news everyone here might find interesting. You may have one final showdown you can enter these scripts into next month BECAUSE the deciding factor of the next showdown will NOT be your concept. I’ll announce what it WILL BE in the newsletter, which I’m sending out this Friday. E-mail me at carsonreeves1@gmail.com if you aren’t already on the newsletter list.

Darnit, I was going to release the newsletter today and have that be it. But now the Black List has come out and you know the game here at Scriptshadow. Once the Black List is out, I have to go over each and every one of the loglines! I have to make grand pronouncements, ignorant quips, praise certain concepts, shake my head at others. It’s a thing here at the site. Looks like I’ll have to release the newsletter tomorrow.

Okay, let’s get into it!

25 votes
Pure by Catherine Schetina
Obsessed with food purity, Hannah’s trip to her sister’s destination wedding descends into madness when she contracts a mysterious foodborne illness that threatens to destroy her from within.

Thoughts: Points for a unique conflict at the center of the story. I’ve never heard of an idea built around a foodborne illness. I’m a little frustrated as to the vagueness. It seems like this could be a horror script? That she turns into a zombie or something. Need more info!

22 votes
Court 17 by Elad Ziv
An over-the-hill tennis pro, trying to salvage her career, finds herself stuck playing the first round of the US Open over and over again against one of the top players in the world. The only way to stop the loop is to win the match, a seemingly impossible task due to how overmatched she is.

Thoughts: This one I have some history with as I helped Elad develop the original version of the screenplay. I’m still in love with the idea of a tennis player who gets trapped in a living hell of having to play the same unbeatable player over and over again. But it looks like the script has changed significantly since I left it as the main character is now a woman as opposed to a man. I was resistant to this choice when we were working on it (it was discussed) because I felt like ego needed to be a big part of the main character. And ego is more of a male thing. But maybe it was the female lead decision that put it over the top with voters. Who knows? Thanks to everyone here who read this script and gave notes on it.  I know it helped me see the script’s weaknesses better at the time and I know it was helpful to Elad as well. You are welcome to discuss it in the comments.  Do not feel like you need to be nice.  There is no preferential treatment here!  I still think it could be the greatest tennis movie ever made but, as Elad and I discussed at the time, the bar for that honor is pretty low, lol.

22 votes
Pumping Black by Haley Bartels
A desperate cyclist and his charismatic new team doctor concoct a dangerous training program in order to win the Tour de France. But as the race progresses and jealous teammates, suspicious authorities, and the racer’s own paranoia close in, they must take increasingly dark measures to protect both his secret and his lead.

Thoughts: Look at this. Two sports scripts in the top 3! Is this a new trend? The logline reads like a true story chronicling Lance Armstrong’s plight. But I would much rather this be a fictional movie as you have so much more leniency to make it cool. I like the hint of “increasingly dark measures.” Now you’re talking my language.

21 votes
Pizza Girl by Jean Kyoung Frazier
An 18-year-old pregnant pizza delivery girl falls into an obsession with a stay-at-home mother who is new to the neighborhood.

Thoughts: A modern day Juno? I like the oddness of this logline. There’s something ironic about an 18 year old pregnant delivery girl. It’s not exactly who you expect to be delivering your pizza. And I love weird stalker movies. This could be good.

20 votes
Beachwood by Briggs Watkins & Wes Watkins
Shunned by elite society as a member of the gig economy, a sociopathic dog walker infiltrates an exclusive L.A. community with designs of reaching the top of the neighborhood’s social ladder.

Thoughts: Okay, this is a good logline. It’s built around an underdog. And what do we always say here at Scriptshadow? Everybody likes underdogs. Plus it looks like a fun ride – seeing if this person can start as a dog walker and end up being some sort of rich tech titan.

19 votes
A Guy Goes To Therapy by Shane Mack
When an emotionally stunted townie with no direction is left by his longtime girlfriend, he has no choice but to turn to an option he would have never considered: Therapy. As a result, his entire existence is thrown into flux and his life gets a whole lot worse before it can get better.

Thoughts: This one might be okay. There’s a little bit of irony in the concept. Townies aren’t “therapy” types. That tends to be reserved for the upper middle class and above. Liberal elites with rich people problems. So I like that contrast there. Are the stakes high enough here? That would be my question.

19 votes
Madden by Cambron Clark
After being forced into retirement by the Oakland Raiders, fiery former NFL head coach John Madden teams up with a mild-mannered Harvard programmer to rewrite his fading legacy by building the world’s first football video game. Based on a true story.

Thoughts: Wow! Three sports scripts in the top seven! The return of the sports movie!? Credit Adam Sandler and Hustle, I suppose, for opening the town’s mind up to sports film. I know everybody who loves sports and video games holds Madden Football up as the GOAT. I’m just not feeling this one. The creation of a video game? Not to be rude but who cares?

18 votes
Dying for You by Travis Braun
A low-level worker on a spaceship run by a dark god must steal the most powerful weapon in the universe to save his workplace crush.

Thoughts: You had me at spaceship! Our first sci-fi script of the list. I’m down with that. Looks like we’re looking at a sci-fi comedy, though. I’m not as excited about that. Just because comedy is so freaking hard and I can’t remember the last script I read that made me laugh out loud. But I’m willing to give this one a shot. Cause of the spaceship, of course.

18 votes
Sang Froid by Michael Basha
After a botched delivery of fresh blood, a world weary vampire and a pregnant nurse team up to rob a hospital of their supply.

Thoughts: The real question here is… is this as good as Vampire in Silicon Valley? This is a classic example of why the Black List needs to add genres. Cause I don’t know if this is a comedy, action, dark comedy, or drama script. I guess “world weary” implies comedy. But I still need more information to judge this one.

Context: Vampire in Silicon Valley is a logline ChatGLC came up with when I asked it to for a comedy about vampires.  Here’s the logline it gave me – In the high-tech world of Silicon Valley, a young and successful entrepreneur discovers that he is a vampire. As he struggles to maintain his humanity while navigating the cutthroat world of tech startups, he must keep his true identity hidden while dealing with the challenges of being a vampire in the modern age. With the help of his quirky and eccentric team, he must find a way to use his vampire powers to succeed in the competitive world of tech while also staying true to himself.

17 votes
Baby Boom by Jack Waz
When her sister’s gender reveal party triggers the apocalypse, a woman and her husband have to prove to themselves, and the world, that they’re responsible enough to save it.

Thoughts: This one made me giggle. I love the online backlash against gender reveal parties. I think it’s hilarious. If you’ve never seen the viral video of the dad who finds out he’s having a girl instead of a boy during their gender party and he has a fit, you gotta watch it. It’s hilarious. And I love that someone has taken that premise to the extreme and made one of these trigger the apocalypse. This could be really fun.

17 votes
Jambusters by Filipe Coutinho
A mystery about what paper jams can teach us about life. After an inexperienced detective starts investigating a death at the Paper Jam department of a major corporation on the verge of its centennial, she unwittingly embarks on a life-altering spiritual journey that unearths her small town’s dark secrets.

Thoughts: Now this concept I can dig. This reminds of the Black List of old. A weird idea. But still intriguing. A paper jam mystery? I am so in on this one!

17 votes
White Mountains by Becky Leigh & Mario Kyprianou
After an interracial couple in the 1960s has a horrifying encounter with a UFO, they set out to discover if it actually happened, or if it is just a case of folie à deux–madness for two. Based on the true story of Barney and Betty Hill.

Thoughts: You know that if it has to do with UFOs, I’m there. I’m actually really surprised at the list so far. A lot of these ideas are right up my alley. I’m not thrilled that it’s a true story UFO flick. But Betty and Barney Hill is one of the more interesting stories in UFO lore. There were a lot of layers to this one, starting with the fact that they were an interracial couple back at a time when it was really hard to be an interracial couple and, therefore, bringing attention to themselves was a dangerous move and yet they risked it because they believed they saw something extraterrestrial and that the world needed to know about it.

16 votes
Goat by Zack Akers & Skip Bonkie
A promising first-round draft pick is invited to train at the private compound of the team’s legendary but aging quarterback. Over one week, the rising star witnesses the horrific lengths his hero will go to to stay at the top of his game.

Thoughts: What is going on right now!?? Another sports script!? Definitely a trend at this point. I like this concept because it shows you that moving away from the expected setup is usually the better thing to do. Normally, this movie would play out on the team during a season. But it becomes a lot more intimate when it’s just two people all by themselves. It’s almost like the sports version of Ex Machina. Another promising entry!

16 votes
Resurfaced by Alyssa Ross
After Michael Phelps cements his status as the greatest Olympian of all time, he struggles to build a life and identity for himself outside the pool.

Thoughts: Okay, now things are just getting eerie. More sports! Another smart angle from a writer. If you show Michael Phelps winning a bunch of medals, it’s going to be boring. The more interesting story is, what is your life like when your entire childhood and young adulthood was built around a sport, you conquered that sport, and then retired at age 30. What do you do in life after that? I think that’s an interesting question.

15 votes
Oh The Humanity by Gillian Weeks
A dark comedy about the Hindenburg Disaster; or, the mostly true story about one of the biggest f–kups in history, the assholes who tried to cover it up, and the female gossip reporter who made some Nazis very angry.

Thoughts: You gotta love when a logline starts with, “A dark comedy about the Hindenburg Disaster.” We do have some unnecessary capitalization here in this logline. But I’m going to pin that on some assistant to the manager, not the writer. First time I’ve seen the f-word in a Black List logline. The Hindenburg will always be must-see TV so I’m curious about this one.

15 votes
There You Are by Brooke Baker
When a non-confrontational playwright loses her engagement ring, she must travel through Italy to get it back with a man who was supposed to be just a one-night stand, discussing love and lying along the way.

Thoughts: Hmmm… I have mixed thoughts on this one. I like the irony of someone who’s about to get married having to look for her ring with the man she just slept with. Although, unless the writer uses some high-tech writing wizardry, I suspect that this protagonist will be very hard to root for.

15 votes
Viva Mexico by Miguel Flatow
When a washed-up superhero gets betrayed by a Mexican government, he must lead a populist social movement to fight the Narcos, topple the government, and free the people.

Thoughts: Can’t say this is my favorite logline of the bunch. More bluntly, it’s my least favorite. I guess taking down the Narcos is good. But since this logline lacks specificity, it just feels like a generic movie in my head.

14 votes
Colors of Authority by Kevin Sheridan
Escaping his father’s shadow, James Sexton, the son of a Sheriff in Alabama joins the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department with lofty ambitions of one day becoming Sheriff himself. But these dreams quickly sour when he realizes that the department he serves is mired in corruption and a systemic culture of moral depravity. At war with powerful figureheads within the department, threats of death looming from all sides, James betrays the department’s code of silence in order to incriminate his father’s close friend, Sheriff Lee Baca. This is based on a true story.

Thoughts: We officially have the longest logline of the list so far. This is also the most serious sounding script. And it looks like the most ambitious script. There are a lot of things that it looks like the writer is trying to do in this story. Hopefully he can pull it off but I probably won’t read this one unless someone I know tells me it’s great.

14 votes
The Midnight Pool by Jonathan Easley
Burdened by the loss of his wife to a suicide cult, an embittered investigative journalist infiltrates an elite secret society, only to find something far more sinister.

Thoughts: I like elite secret societies. But not so much something “far more sinister.” I’m not a fan of those vague logline endings. There are a lot of scripts like this out there. So I’m going to reserve judgement until I read the script. Hopefully there’s a unique voice or a unique angle to the story that differentiates it from all the imitators.

14 votes
They Came From a Broken World by Vanessa Block
The year is 1955. The small town of Boon Falls has provided a local forest as refuge to aliens fleeing their war-torn planet. When Mia–young woman dealing with the trauma of her mother’s death–stumbles upon an Alien woman who needs her help, a series of haunting revelations in the refugee forest leads her to an unimaginable truth.

Thoughts: I love aliens. This feels, however, like one of those wishy-washy not-really-about-aliens type scripts that’s more about the metaphor than a riveting story. Not saying that dooms the script. But it’s much harder to makes those scripts pop. I’ll read anything with aliens in it, though.

13 votes
Dumb Blonde by Todd Bartels & Lou Howe
The origin story of Dolly Parton, following her rise through the male-dominated music scene of late 1960s Nashville.

Thoughts: And we have a new least favorite logline of the entries so far. I feel like you can cut and paste these loglines and just add a new quasi formerly big celebrity each time. Dolly Parton does have her fans, though.

13 votes
Pikesville Sweep by Brendan McHugh
After a young, newly widowed janitor in a small mining village is unexpectedly elected Mayor, she navigates a new relationship with a mysterious man from the city and tries to determine how to use her new position of power to confront the corruption that has plagued the town for years.

Thoughts: This one doesn’t have that big shiny hook in it anywhere. Which means it’s an execution-dependent screenplay. It used to be that if one of these made the Black List, it was a really good script because it meant it was so good that it overcome its weak logline. But these days, that’s less the case. So I’m lukewarm on this entry.

13 votes
Wild by Michael Burgner
A young woman is determined to protect a thief on the run when he holes up in her small town, even if it means revealing a darker, more violent secret of her own.

Thoughts: Lots of dark secrets in this Black List! I hope everybody can see for themselves how the lack of a special attractor (or a “hook”) hurts a logline. When there are little to no unique elements in a logline, we’re less likely to want to read it. I’d argue this logline doesn’t have a single unique word in it.

12 votes
Clementine by David L. Williams
Set in real time, a Colombian mother barely escapes a pawn shop shootout and goes on the run from her violent ex-husband, a terrifying mob boss, and a bloodthirsty hitwoman sent to collect an overdue debt, all while trying to keep her diabetic daughter safe.

Thoughts: HEY! It’s longtime Scriptshadow reader and contributor, David Williams. So happy to see him on the list this year. The man had to run into a grumpy Carson each and every time he submitted scripts for Amateur Showdown. But regardless of whether he advanced in competitions or not, he was never bitter. He was the opposite. He was always positive. And I have no doubt in my mind that that’s why he’s on the list today. He’s a great example to screenwriters everywhere about what happens when you keep doing the work and you stay positive. Congrats David!

12 votes
Fog of War by Peter Haig
When a retired war journalist returns to the outpost where her son was stationed to investigate the mysterious circumstances surrounding his death, she uncovers unspeakable horrors.

Thoughts: Echoes of In The Valley of Elad here. And that’s why I’m worried about it. These dark super serious movies about investigating death are tough sells, especially in a time like this where everyone is looking for respite from all the darkness. The script will have to be really good to overcome this issue.

12 votes
Jingle Bell Heist by Abby McDonald
At the height of the holiday season, two strangers team up to rob one of New York’s most famous department stores while accidentally falling in love.

Thoughts: I like the irony of doing something bad on the ‘goodest’ holiday of the year. But, personally, as I’ve told you guys here before, I like my holiday movies to be heartwarming and uplifting. My favorite Christmas movie of all time is the ultimate heartwarmer, It’s a Wonderful Life. With that said, I’ll probably review this one before Christmas and, hopefully, it will prove me wrong.

12 votes
Let’s Go Again by Colin Bannon
When her domineering director makes her film the same scene 148 times on the final night of an exhausting shoot, actress Annie Long must fight to keep her own sanity as she tries to decipher what is real, and what is part of his twisted game.

Thoughts: One of the wildest writers out there right now. Definitely a guy who comes up with interesting concepts. This one is no different. It’s got a high concept feel and yet it’s completely original. Nobody’s ever written a movie like this before. That’s always a good sign. My only issue with Bannon is that his third acts get a little too wild for me. And this – “must fight to keep her own sanity” – sounds like it will continue that tradition.

12 votes
The Americano by Nico Bellamy & Chase Pestano
An everyday guy who accidentally starts working as a barista inside the CIA headquarters building gets lured into a spy mission by a beautiful secret agent, known only to him as Caramel Macchiato.

Thoughts: This logline made me chuckle. Again, guys, this is the power of irony in concept creation. When you think of something as big and sophisticated at the CIA, you don’t think about the fact that there’s a coffee shop inside the building. And baristas work there. It’s the perfect contrast. And the idea that one of these baristas gets recruited into a spy mission is really clever.

12 votes
The Boy Houdini by Matthew Tennant
New York, 1889. When young street urchin and aspiring magician Harry Houdini discovers a mysterious puzzle-box, he must use his talent for illusion and escape to unlock the box’s powerful secrets and keep it from the hands of a vengeful occult sorcerer hot on his tail.

Thoughts: Smart move to write a Houdini spec. Back in the 2000s, Houdini was a very popular subject in the spec world. But since none of scripts ever became movies, he fell out of fashion. However, he’s still a known property – an operating IP – and he’s an interesting guy whose life is perfect for movies, since he’s a magician. Color me curious.

11 votes
Match Cut by Will Lowell
While filming on location in Rome, a movie stuntman is mistaken for an infamous assassin, leading to 48 hours of madness as he’s chased through the city by both gangsters and police.

Thoughts: Okay, this is an example of a concept WITHOUT IRONY. Or maybe that’s a strong statement. It doesn’t have enough irony may be a better way of putting it. A movie stuntman is fully capable of running and fighting, shooting guns, and racing cars away from pursuers. So there’s little irony to the fact that he gets mistaken for an assassin. We all know he’s probably going to be okay since he does most of this stuff every day at work anyway. Maybe if they had said, “the world’s worst movie stuntman,” I’d be more interested.

11 votes
Mega Action Hit by Sean Tidwell
After Hollywood’s leading action star hits his head on set and wakes up thinking he’s a real-life action hero, he embarks on an international mission to track down a real stolen nuke before it’s too late.

Thoughts: This concept feels a little dated – like it could’ve conceived in 1998. But it is high concept. And it sounds a little funnier than Match Cut. It’s weird how The Black List always has two of these concepts back to back that are carbon copies of each other. It’s got to be because of some glitch in the voting process.

11 votes
Semper Maternus by Laura Kosann
On a private island off San Francisco, a nanny goes to work for a mother who is one of America’s most powerful tech entrepreneurs. Things slowly begin to devolve as the mother’s hyper-monitoring and surveillance become suffocating.

Thoughts: Another Ex Machina premise! And I’m not mad! I like these premises. They’re one of the most ideal setups for a budget-conscious movie. And I love nanny stories dating back to The Hand That Rocks The Cradle. Grab me a cradle on Amazon cause I’m down for this adventure.

11 votes
Subversion by Andrew Ferguson
When her family is abducted, a disgraced submariner must pilot a narco submarine to its destination in less than eight hours or her husband and daughter will be killed.

Thoughts: Andrew is a trusted member of the Scriptshadow newsletter and it looks like he’s been paying attention to my ramblings! As this script, more than any other script on the list, has the GSU in place! Nice job, Andrew!

11 votes
Total Landscaping by Woody Bess
A day in the life of the employees of Four Seasons Total Landscaping and its neighboring businesses on November 7th, 2020: the day an average, working-class strip mall in East Philadelphia became the focal point of the most divisive presidential election in American History.

Thoughts: I was thinking the other day. What we really need in movies right now? More than anything else? Is more politics. Cause I don’t think there’s enough. For those new to the site who don’t know me, I am emitting extreme amounts of sarcasm right now. I just can’t get pulled down into that depressing hole anymore. Concepts like this literally make me physically ill. With that said, I know many people in the industry can’t get enough of this stuff. So don’t go by my assessment of these concepts.

10 votes
Cheat Day by Emma Dudley
When a young woman in a decade-long heterosexual relationship realizes she needs to explore her bisexuality, she and her boyfriend institute a “Cheat Day:” 24 hours in which they can do whatever–and whomever – before deciding whether to get engaged or break up.

Thoughts: Echoes of Hall Pass, which should’ve been better than it was (million dollar spec that movie, by the way, from the original Project Greenlight winner, Pete Jones). What I loved about that movie was how the guys were so excited to have their hall pass but then they couldn’t get laid if they paid someone. The problem with these concepts is always the same. The guys given the chance to be with someone else never actually do. Someone needs to write a version of this concept where they actually have sex with other people. That’s where you’re going to find a truly compelling movie.

10 votes
Going for Two by Kevin Arnovitz
An openly gay NFL quarterback finds his meticulously-planned life upended on and off the field when he falls for a charming high school teacher during the most important season of his career.

Thoughts: Well I can definitely see why this made the Black List. But I’m not reading it unless it’s the real life story of Bachelor fence-hopper Colton Underwood. That’s a biopic I can get behind. No pun intended.

10 votes
Popular by Marley Schneier
GOP strategist Lee Atwater won the presidency for George H.W. Bush in 1988, and his campaign changed politics forever–and gave him the worst reputation in America. Now, Lee is on his deathbed, and he needs to tell God his side of the story… before it’s too late.

Thoughts: It took waaaaay too long to get to another political script. At most, it should’ve taken 1 slot. The fact that I had to wait this long is a crime. Can’t wait to not read this one.

10 votes
Ravenswood by Evan Enderle
To save her friend, a maid in a decaying manor must unravel the secrets of its inhabitants while confronting spirits, her own terrifying abilities and the very real horrors of Depression-era America lurking outside the door.

Thoughts: If this is a ghost story, it’s one of the most roundabout ways of describing a ghost story that I’ve ever come across. But if it’s got ghosts, I’m in! By the way, note how much better those high ranking concepts were compared to what we’re getting down here in the lower ranks. There’s clearly a difference in quality.

10 votes
The House in the Crooked Forest by Ian Shorr
A mother and her young son fleeing Nazi-occupied Poland are forced to take shelter from a blizzard in an isolated manor, where they discover the Nazis may be the least of their worries.

Thoughts: Ian is a longtime Black List contributor and he tends to have high concept ideas. This one is no exception. My only issue is that he should tell us what’s in the manor. Let us decide if it’s worse than Nazis. We shouldn’t have to take the logline’s word for it.

10 votes
The Pack by Rose Gilroy
A group of documentarians braves the remote wilderness of Alaska in an effort to save a nearly extinct species of wolves. When the crew is brought back together at a prestigious awards ceremony, tensions flare as a deadly truth threatens to unravel their work. The team lived through the harsh elements of the wild but will a secret they share survive the night?

Thoughts: What. Is. THE SECRET!? It’s not a logline unless you tell us what the secret it. The secret is the hook. You can’t deny people that.

10 votes
Vitus by Julian Wayser
In 1518, a Dancing Plague overtook the city of Strasbourg in the Holy Roman Empire. Hundreds of people danced themselves to death over the course of a summer and no one knows why. Encircling medieval medicine, the uncanny, and the origins of mass hysteria, Vitus is a wildly visual exploration of a crucial (but little-known) moment in European history.

Thoughts: Highly curious about this one. I’ve heard of the dancing plague before. I always thought it was really weird. Whenever you have something this bizarre, it opens the door to tell a story about it. So kudos to Wayser for identifying the potential behind this weird historic moment.

10 votes
What We Become by Amy Jo Johnson
A successful author/wife/mother plans a trip to a bucolic island to crack her next book and finds herself in a surprising situation.

Thoughts: The Scriptshadow part of me wants to grumble about how the logline needs to tell us what the surprising situation is. However, I want to share a quick story with you.  When I first moved to LA, I was out one night with a buddy and we stumbled upon a couple playing pool. The girl, shockingly, was Amy Jo Johnson (Power Rangers). The guy, it turned out, was not her boyfriend, but rather, her brother. We played a game of pool together and Amy was the sweetest most fun person you’ve ever met, joking and giving us crap the entire game. To this day, I kick myself for not getting her number but I just figured, what would a Hollywood actress want to do with me? These days, I know that you never know unless you ask! So you know what? This is one logline where I don’t care that the writer didn’t tell us what the hook was. Amy Jo Johnson, you get a pass!  Also, apropos of nothing, are you single?

10 votes
Who Made The Potato Salad? By Kyle Drew
A family’s Christmas dinner goes awry when a xenomorphic demon starts to duplicate and imitate each member of the family. What does it want? To show them their greatest fears.

Thoughts: I read these scripts all the time and while they make pretty good loglines, trying to write them is bit of a demonic task in its own right. They all end up reading the same. So you have to have a very unique voice to make them work.

9 votes
It’s a Wonderful Story by Alexandra Tran
In the aftermath of WWII, a traumatized Frank Capra and Jimmy Stewart use the making of IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE to attempt to find a way back into normalcy.

Thoughts: It’s like the Black List is reading my mind now! I told it my favorite Christmas movie was It’s a Wonderful Life, then 10 loglines later, it’s giving me an It’s A Wonderful Life script. Wait a minute. Does this have something to do with AI? Is this ChatGTP? Has the singularity almost begun? We are all in the Matrix.

9 votes
The Sister by Alexander Thompson
Identical twins Aurora and Gabrielle live in a secluded commune where all twins are raised knowing that in adolescence, one of the two of them will abruptly turn into a terrifying monster. Discovering the full truth of their situation one fateful night, the sisters plot their escape into an outside world they know little about.

Thoughts: Getting some strong young adult novel vibes here. I have issues with concepts where the buy-in is based more on the writer feeling like they’re granted an automatic buy-in rather than the buy-in actually making sense. It feels like the only reason one of the twins turns into a monster is because the writer needs that to happen for their story. I might be wrong. But unless there’s a believable reason for why that happens, this one probably isn’t for me.

8 votes
An Oakland Holiday by Yudho Aditya & Emma Dudley
When a neglected and lonely Southeast Asian Princess goes undercover in an Oakland high school to live out her dream of being a normal teen, she discovers that happy endings come with many hard lessons about life, love, and humility.

Thoughts: I don’t know about you. But many of my dreams start off with the words, “An Oakland Holiday.” This is a tried and true concept. Special Person hides out in normal society. It’s samey. But it usually works. And this one has a slightly different angle with the Asian connection.

8 votes
Better Luck Next Time by Kristen Tepper
Two best friends run a successful underground service taking womens’ toxic exes on humiliating dates, but their friendship is put to the ultimate test when an old mark plots his revenge.

Thoughts: I feel like I’ve heard this one before. Either someone on the site pitched it to me or we’re all drawing ideas from the same popular culture pot and none of us is as original as we think we are.

8 votes
I Love You Now And Forever by Robert Machoian
After exhausting all financial options to save their dying daughter, Frank and Abby are forced into a final act of desperation: rob a local bank.

Thoughts: What would you do to save someone you love? Always an interesting question and, therefore, potent fuel for a movie. However, robbing a bank seems pretty standard. Didn’t John Boyega just make a movie with this exact same setup. Denzel has also made one before. John Q I think it was called? Not original enough for my taste.

8 votes
Jerry! By Greg Roque
One man ran what was declared to be the worst TV show of all-time. Responsible for the degradation of American society. All while topping Oprah in the ratings. This is the over the top, insane true story of how Jerry Springer went from ambitious young attorney, to the Mayor of Cincinnati, to the undisputed King of Trash TV. And along the way, accidentally helping to create the world we live in today.

Thoughts: You know how I feel about biopics. But Jerry Springer was a pretty funny footnote in American TV history. They would literally just let people fight each other on stage, lol. Imagine if they tried to air that show now.

8 votes
Pop by James Morosini
A kid blackmails his favorite pop star into being his best friend.

Thoughts: Shortest logline on the list. It also covers familiar territory. The last few years we’ve had movies about people blackmailing or stalking social media personalities. A pop star feels like a 2003 movie. But, it all comes down to execution. If the script’s good, it will make up for it.

8 votes
The Demolition Expert by Colin Bannon
Blasting out of prison after being double crossed by the Mastermind of a heist, a Demolition Expert uses his genius with explosives to enact revenge on the Caper Crew who set him up while simultaneously picking up the pieces of his personal life.

Thoughts: Why do I get the feeling that Michael Bay is going to take a serious look at this one?

8 votes
The Homestead by Bradley Kaaya Jr.
A troubled bi-racial, inner-city teen is sent to live with his white, conservative grandfather on his ranch for the summer. Things take a turn when the two are forced to overcome their generational and racial differences while defending the ranch from a ruthless, backcountry gang.

Thoughts: I had no idea they were making a real life adaptation of Webster.

8 votes
The Twelve Dancing Princesses by Becca Gleason
A horror thriller spin on the Brothers Grimm fairytale in which 12 female college students fight against a group of dude bros trying to take over their female-only space.

Thoughts: Whoa, these last couple entries are like taking a time machine back to the 2019 Black List! Down with the dude bros! Actually, “Down with the Dude Bros” is a better title.

8 votes
Undo by Will Simmons
A down-on-his-luck former getaway driver comes into possession of a mysterious watch that allows the user to go back in time by one minute. As he starts to uncover its uses and gets pulled into one last heist by his former crew, a dangerous group after the technology gets on his tail and will stop at nothing to get the watch back.

Thoughts: I’ve always been intrigued by mini time travel stories. My worry with them has always been that, not surprisingly, they feel too small. There *is* something to this idea, though. I think he needs to be a race car driver though, not a getaway driver. This is the year of sports scripts, right? It’d be cool if you could keep rewinding on the race course to correct your mistakes.

8 votes
Weary Ride The Belmonts by Josh Corbin
After staging his death many years ago, an aging gunslinger is forced to reunite with his outlaw daughter during the dying days of the west.

Thoughts: I could complain about the lack of a hook here. But Westerns rarely have hooks to them. So it’s one of those delios where you’re going to have to read the script to see if it’s good. Who’s going to take care of that?  Oh yeah, that’s me.  I am literally the only person who reads screenplays in Hollywood.

7 votes
42.6 years by Seth Reiss
After waking up from a failed experimental lifesaving procedure in which he was cryogenically frozen for 42.6 years, a young man realizes he wants his ex-girlfriend back. He’ll have to overcome the fact that while he hasn’t aged a day, she’s lived an entire life without him

Thoughts: Seth Reiss is one half of the writing team who wrote The Menu. And you guys know how much I liked that script. I’m trying to get a grip on the genre here. But “42.6” tells me that it’s probably a comedy. It’s certainly a unique idea, an update on Harold and Maude. Could be good!

7 votes
Break Point by Zachary Joel Johnson
Courted by colleges and sponsors alike, a burnt-out tennis prodigy fights to maintain dominance against her Academy rival as she hurtles toward the existential decision of turning Pro–a choice that will force her to double down on her dream or walk away from the future she’s fought for.

Thoughts: Tennis scripts are everywhere! And yet they still haven’t made a good tennis movie. Go figure. I’m looking for the unique attractor in this one. I’m slightly confused in that the main character seems young but they’re also a burnt out veteran? One thing I’m learning, though, is that women rule when it comes to tennis scripts. Sorry dudes!

7 votes
Caravan by Lindsay Michel
During the Tang Dynasty, a young Persian woman joins a Silk Road caravan to solve the mystery of her father’s disappearance‚ but must fight for survival when her fellow travelers realize there is a shapeshifting demon hiding in their midst.

Thoughts: Tennis and demons are the theme of Black List 2022. A tennis demon script anyone? If you’ve got a good idea, pitch it to me. I like the setting here. I don’t know much about it and that’s one of the things I like when I open a script. I like to learn about new things. Be taken to new places. So I’m willing to give this one a try.

7 votes
Gather the Ashes by Vikash Shankar
Two brothers, Dev and Siddharth, hope to break free of London’s foster care system when they inherit their estranged family’s old farmhouse in India, but they find something sinister lies in the roots of their family tree as they attempt to discover their past.

Thoughts: Another sinister thing hiding in the shadows. Secrets, demons, sinister things, too many double faults, dude-bros. I’m trying to keep up with the madness that is Black List 2022!

7 votes
Himbo by Jason Hellerman
A naive male stripper attempting to start his life over finds himself in the crosshairs of his boss’ increasingly violent divorce.

Thoughts: This one should give all of you hope because the writer doesn’t have a manager, an agent, or a producer. It made the Black List entirely on its own merit. How bout that!

7 votes
It’s Britney, B—ch by Cerina Aragones
A dramatic and musical character study of global pop icon Britney Spears, leading up to her very public unraveling at a Tarzana hair salon, and her recent courtroom victory to win her freedom back.

Thoughts: If someone didn’t write it, ChatGPT was going to. We finally got our Britney Spears biopic everyone. Stab me in the face baby one more time.

7 votes
Life of the Party by Julie Mandel Folly & Hannah Murphy
In this contemporary reimagining of Frankenstein, two teenage feminists struggle to create the perfect boyfriend, only to watch their experiment deteriorate as he succumbs to the ultimate perpetrator of casual high school misogyny: the football team.

Thoughts: This one sounds like it could be fun. A reimagining of Weird Science.

7 votes
Ripple by Max Taxe
When a time traveler starts meddling with the past just as Miles finally meets the love of his life, he must battle ever shifting timelines to find her again.

Thoughts: I’ll read anything with time travel but this logline is confusing. It doesn’t say in the first part of the logline that she disappears. So why does he need to find her again?

7 votes
Wildfire by Chaya Doswell
After accidentally starting a wildfire, 7-year-old Lu, mute and from an abusive home, slyly tricks Merribelle, a hardworking trans woman, into kidnapping her – sparking a beautifully unexpected bond with a devastating expiration date.

Thoughts: This one covers some huge topics. Muteness, abusiveness, a trans woman. And yet the thing I’m most hooked by is the wildfire.

6 votes
Below by Geoff Tock & Greg Weidman
Fresh out of a spell in prison a man attempts to set his life right by working a mysterious job that requires him to seek out life forms hidden amongst us.

Thoughts: Okay, I kinda dig this one. We’ve seen a lot of movies where people come out of prison and get blue collar jobs that they hate because they pay nothing. This throws a twist into that. A guy gets a job looking for hidden life forms. That’s up my alley.

6 votes
Black Dogs by Kieran Turner
Based on the novel by Jason Burhmester. In 1973, Led Zeppelin was robbed of nearly a quarter million dollars in cash while playing a series of concerts in New York City. The case was never solved. We follow four young friends from the streets of Baltimore as they attempt to pull off what is possibly the most brazen heist in Rock & Roll history.

Thoughts: I still think that script a Scriptshadow reader wrote about a heist of Jim Morrison’s grave was the best rock and roll heist script I’ve read. But this sounds pretty cool too. Although I wonder how people are going to sympathize with characters robbing beloved legends.

6 votes
Black Kite by Dan Bulla
After a devastating wildfire wipes out a small California town, a teenage girl is missing and presumed dead. A year later, an obsessive mother and cynical arson investigator begin to suspect that she’s still alive…and in the clutches of a predator.

Thoughts: Lot going on in this idea. I’m not sure if the variables all come together harmoniously. But it does feel like it’s going for it. As long as you’re going for it with your idea, you’re better off than writing something safe and neutral.

6 votes
Chatter by Chris Grillot
Stranded in a small Cajun town, a young mother battling a painkiller relapse must fight to save her daughter from a demonic Tooth Fairy.

Thoughts: I’m noticing with some of these lower ranked scripts, the loglines have buzzwords but they don’t come together nicely. But! “Chatter” does bring us another demon. I think we can safely say, at this point, it’s the year of the demon!

6 votes
Craigshaven by Nicole Ramberg
A troubled teen must confront a local legend when the reappearance of a missing classmate and a fabled ghost ship unravel clues to her own mother’s disappearance.

Thoughts: I would rebuild this logline to focus exclusively around the ghost ship if possible. I don’t think you can bring up a ghost ship casually in a logline (“there’s a missing person…. Oh and then there’s a ghost ship by the way…”)… It’s got to be the central focus.

6 votes
Eternity by Pat Cunnane
After death, everybody gets one week to choose where to spend eternity. For Joan, Larry, and Luke, it’s really a question of who to spend it with.

Thoughts: This choice is easy. Baby Yoda and ChatTPG.

6 votes
Marriage Bracket by Liv Auerbach & Daisygreen Stenhouse
Ten years after a group of girlfriends bet on which of them would be the last to get married, their adult lives and relationships are completely upended when they discover the $80 they drunkenly invested in Bitcoin is now worth $5.2 million.

Thoughts: A fun idea with a couple of problems. Bitcoin is no longer a positive word. But it is a cool way to create a ‘windfall’ storyline. Second problem is, what does a bet about who will be the last to get married have to do with investing money?

6 votes
The Seeker by Camrus Johnson
A childhood folktale comes to life when children of the neighborhood start to go missing after playing hide and seek. A group of friends known as “The Finder Four” set out to get answers, but instead, find themselves sucked into a fantasy fear-factor world with only one way out… Based on Daka Hermon’s Scholastic YA Novel, HIDE & SEEKER.

Thoughts: Concept gets a little too complicated as the logline goes on but kids going missing during hide and seek is a good idea.

6 votes
The Trap by Julie Lipson
Twin-sister trapeze artists wrestle their own inner demons amid the push-pull of career, stardom, and family, all while performing in the most harrowing production of their lives.

Thoughts: We’ve got our second set of twins on the list. This is the first trapeze concept on the Black List in over five years, if my memory serves me correctly. If this story explores the reality of being a trapeze artist, I’ll be into it. But if I read this and I know more about trapeze artists than the writer, we’ve got a problem on our hands. This is something that happens often, by the way. A writer will write about a topic and the reader will end up knowing more about it than they do. This can NEVER happen. You must be the extreme expert on your subject matter.

6 votes
You’re My Best Friend by Mary Beth Barone & Erin Woods
Lily is mature, thoughtful, artistic, and… awkward. Rosie is sweet, caring, and popular with dreams of being a star. When Lily breaks down in tears on her 15th birthday because she has no friends, her Aunt Beth (a hot shot at a big movie studio) devises a plan. Aunt Beth agrees to jump start Rosie’s acting career as long as she can convincingly play the role of a lifetime: Lily’s best friend. Aunt Beth has the scheme and Rosie has the talent. All they have to do is get away with it.

Thoughts: This feels a bit first-scripty. I’m not sure I understand the logline, to be honest. Which is a good lesson, by the way. A lot of people think that the more you write, the more clear your idea will be. When, in actuality, the opposite is true. The more you distill it down, the clearer it will be to the potential reader.

The scripts I’m most looking forward to are Pure, Beachwood, Baby Boom, Jambusters, White Mountains, Goat, Clementine, Let’s Go Again, Vitus, The Americano, Semper Maternus, Subversion, and Undo. I’m too close to Court 17 to be able to judge it objectively. What about you guys? What do you want to read???

If you’re interested in getting a logline consultation from me, they’re $25 and they include a 150-200 word analysis, a 1-10 rating for both concept and logline construction, and a logline rewrite. If you want a full screenplay consult, I offer that as well. E-mail me at carsonreeves1@gmail.com and we’ll get started right away!

Genre: Sci-Fi
Premise: A group of illegal time travelers must perform the, quite literally, heist of the century, in an attempt to steal a special time piece that, when operated, will change the course of history.
About: This script sold to Original Films and Paramount recently in a competitive situation. I didn’t realize it when I read “Relay,” but the writer, Macmillan Hedges, wrote a Black List script from a couple of years ago called Cosmic Sunday. So my entire review of this script was written before I went back and found that out. I only bring that up because, if I had known, I would’ve been better prepared for what I read today.
Writer: MacMillan Hedges
Details: 119 pages

Now today’s script is more my speed.

We’ve got time travel.

We’ve got heists.

We’ve got… well, do we need anything more than time travel and heists?

Let’s find out.

When we meet Jack Ledger, he’s stealing something from the past while being chased by his nemesis, Zoey Beckett, a time travel cop determined to take him down. This chase is special because, although they are in a foot race in the 100 year old Bismark Hotel in San Francisco, they are jumping through pockets of time. It’s 1910, it’s 1953, it’s 1969, it’s 1992. We have no idea what’s going on here and, unless you received a 1600 on your SATs, you’ll probably never find out.

Jack is able to escape to 2025 (our present) but his criminal boss, Whitechapel, betrays him, siding with Beckett and sending Jack to prison. Ten years later, Jack is released. And Jack knows why he’s released. It’s so that Whitechapel can track him to all his other time travel buddies so he can put them in the slammer as well!

Jack doesn’t care. He’s got other things on his mind. He wants to break into “the vault,” the basement of the time travel headquarters. It’s there where all the things that have been stolen from the past are being kept, including his “timepiece,” the special thing that allows you to travel through time (I think – more on that later).

To achieve this feat, Jack will need to construct a crew of people throughout time… and some from the present. Or maybe mostly from the present and a couple from throughout time. It’d be cool if they were all from throughout time but since this script was so confusing, I can’t definitively say where everyone was from. The point is, he needs to construct a “Mission Impossible” crew.

Oh, by the way, we’re told how time travel works here. During the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, a fault line was established that reconstructed time and space. Any structure along that fault line can be used to travel back through time. The older the building, the further back you can travel. Which is why really old buildings in San Francisco are so valuable to time travelers.

Anyway, for reasons that are still confusing to me, you can’t just go steal something and bring it back to the future. It’s better if you use the “relay” technique. This is where you set all your crew members in different years, and then have each heist member in the chain give it to a person who then puts it in a pouch, where it is then picked up many years later by someone else, who then puts it in another pouch and hides it for someone 30 years from then, and so on and so forth. We’re told this is done because it’s harder for the time police to catch you, if I’m to understand the rules correctly.

The ultimate goal seems to be retrieving Jack’s old timepiece. Unfortunately, we won’t know why he needs the time piece until the very end. So hold onto your shorts and get ready for one final wild twist!

Today’s script is a giant reminder that when you write time travel movies, they need to be simple. In a way, Back to the Future ruined time-travel movies because they made it look so effortless. In reality, getting these things right is nearly impossible, which is why you have to rewrite them to death. That’s what Gale and Zemeckis did. They rewrote Back to the Future so many times, their typewriters broke.

Nobody does that anymore. As a result, you get scripts like this, which have all these big ideas, but you need an industrial sized shovel to dig all those ideas up and assemble them into any sort of cohesive narrative.

The number one rule of time travel scripts is: DON’T OVERCOMPLICATE THE TIME TRAVEL PART. It’s clear, here, that the Relay rules only make sense to the writer and no one else. I don’t say that flippantly because it’s a mistake all screenwriters have made at one point or another. They write a script with incredibly complex rules and simply assume that because it makes sense to them, it’ll make sense to the reader as well.

Here’s the information we’re given about time travel in the first act. There’s something called a “timepiece” that you must have in order to time travel. I think. I’d say I’m 80% sure about that. But when you steal things in the past, instead of, you know, just taking them back with you, you for some reason have to put them in “time caches.” Little pouches. And then, in the future, you can conceivably retrieve your pouch and retrieve what’s in it.

Except you can’t just create a time pouch in 1910 and pick it up in 2025. You must have someone pick it up in 1930 and put it somewhere else. And then someone else pick it up in 1960 and move it. And then someone pick it up in 1980 and move it. And so on and so forth until we reach 2025.

Anyway, so our hero, Jack, rescues his buddy, Brigance, in 1910. They then jump to 1951. Keep in mind, I was told that you needed a timepiece to time travel and we were told that Jack got his revoked from the time travel police in the opening scene. So they don’t tell us how he is still able to jump back to 1910. They only tell us, in a side note, that “it will be explained later.” I’m serious. That’s an actual note in the script.

So I’m guessing that they jumped to 1951 because Brigance had a timepiece and he used it for both of them? Maybe. Who knows? But, for some reason, despite Brigance being able to jump them to 1951, he can’t jump them any further. For that, they need Jack’s timepiece, which is in a local church that is acting as the time travel police headquarters. I do not think the police have the timepiece in this year, though. I believe it’s still in 2025. Which is funny, cause we then jump to 2025. Except I thought we couldn’t jump to 2025……..

I think you get the idea of how confusing this is. But in case you don’t, here’s a standard line of exposition from the movie: “First we need to acquire equipment, map out each time period in The Upstart, place TimeCaches for each handoff through time and acclimatize to our designated time periods — find the specific moment for each change to the alt. timeline.” And another: “The VaultMaker never worked in The Upstart. But Whitechapel will keep a descendent nearby. As a security protocol. So we need to find that descendent. That’s how we can get access to the vault.”

Not that anyone who’s producing this will listen to me but I am making a promise to the producers of this movie that if they don’t massively – and I mean MASSIVELY – simplify the time travel in this script, this movie will fail. I know this because I have read every single time travel script of significance from the last 30 years. I know which ones succeed and I know which ones fail. And the ones that fail are the ones that have massively overly complicated rules such as this one.

I was so disappointed by this script, I can’t even tell you. I was thrilled when I saw it in my e-mail, particularly after yesterday’s yawner. Finally, we have a cool new script in a genre I like! But within the first ten pages, I knew the script was toast. Literally nothing made sense. All this crazy stuff was happening with no context for how it was happening. It was like watching a really intense dramatic dialogue scene in a foreign film without subtitles. You see that everyone in the scene is really emotional yet you can’t understand a single word they’re saying.

If I take a step back, I think I can understand the writer’s vision here: Let’s make a big time travel heist movie. In theory, I love that idea. And, if I’m making an argument for the script, the writer *is* doing what I tell everyone who writes high concepts to do. He’s creating a story that can only exist inside his movie and no other. The heist here is extremely unique.

But there are very few movies that can work which are swallowed up by exposition. And here’s something it’s pivotal to remember as a screenwriter: You decide how much exposition your script will need when you decide how many rules your script will have. The more rules you have, the more explaining you will have to do. That’s what doomed this script. There were so many darn rules that the characters spent the whole movie explaining them, and even when you’re doing your best as a writer to get all of the rules into the screenplay, it won’t matter if there’s too much to keep track of. I tell this to writers all the time: readers are not robots. We don’t simply download whatever you write. There is a limit to what we can process. And scripts like this stretch beyond our processing limits.

Everything needs to be massively simplified here for it to have a shot at being a good movie.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Since you will inevitably ask the question, well then how did this sell? It’s the perfect example of the value of coming up with a big exciting concept. If people love your concept enough and want to make your movie, they will overlook weaknesses in your script. And the more they like the concept, the more they’ll overlook. This combined with the fact that The Tomorrow War set off an industry-wide need for big sci-fi ideas, and that’s how we came to this sale.