Genre: Drama-Thriller
Premise: The U.S. attempts to incite a cartel war in Mexico in the hopes of branding Mexico a terrorist state, a label which will give them broader powers in managing the border.
About: You thought Sicario was a one-off. Incorrect, son. The badass drug-trafficking drama has inspired a sequel, whose buzz-meter skyrocketed with that great trailer that debuted a couple of weeks ago. Here we were ready to bury Benicio Del Toro after his turn as “DJ” in “The Last Jedi.” But one look at badass Benicio in Soldado and you can see that he’s been reborn, baby! Newly-minted A-list screenwriter Taylor Sheridan is back for the sequel. However, Denis Villeneuve has been replaced by relatively unknown Italian director, Stefano Sollima. Useless note of the week – Lots of S’s today. Sicario, screenplay, stefano, sequel, sollima, sheridan, soldado.
Writer: Taylor Sheridan
Details: 128 pages1

There were thoughts by some that Emily Blunt’s character in Sicario was too passive. How did they correct this in the sequel? By getting rid of her! Maybe if her name was Sandy Smith it would’ve been different. The choice is curious when you consider it runs counter to the current trend in Hollywood that dictates all lead characters must be female.

Can a testosterone heavy romp into the world of the drug trade compete? I don’t know but the trailer sure looked awesome. Let’s see what the sequel to one of my favorite scripts from 2015 has in store, and if the increasingly busy Taylor Sheridan brought it.

Black Ops agent Matt Graver is used to taking down terrorists in the Middle East. But the government needs him for one of the most complicated missions ever attempted on North American soil. They want Matt to kill the biggest cartel leader in Mexico and make it look like a rival cartel did it.

You see, the government wants to paint the cartels as violent threats to the U.S., which would allow them to designate all of them “terrorists.” Under that label, the government would have ten times the leniency to police the border, which would make their jobs so much easier. All that red tape would blow away in the wind.

So Matt is given a blank check and access to any toys he wants. Soldiers, SEALS, boats, tanks, drones, you name it. “To do this right, I’ve got to … I just want to be clear — Does the resolve exist to see this through?” Matt asks. “Because to achieve this objective I need to get dirty, sir.” His superior leans forward: “Dirty is exactly why you’re here.”

Matt calls his highly sketchy buddy and Mexico expert, Alejandro (Benicio), to be his operations manager. The plan is to kidnap the cartel leader’s teenage daughter, Isabel, and use her to find her elusive father. However, things start going wrong immediately. The group is ambushed by the Mexican police once they cross the border, and have no choice but to turn them into ground beef.

That dustup allows the daughter to escape. Matt has Alejandro go after her while he heads back to the U.S. with his tail between his legs and tries to explain how, even with all the toys he’s been given, he managed to fuck this up. The government becomes convinced that if the daughter gets to the press, she’ll expose details of the mission, and things will get really bad. What they don’t know is that their fate is now in Alejandro’s hands. He catches up to Isabel, and will have to decide what to do with her. All while Matt’s superiors look for a way to salvage the mission.

Wow, this was one hell of an ambitious sequel. The scope of which we’re working from here rivals that of a James Bond flick. We’re jumping to the U.S., to Mexico, to the Middle East. Costcos are getting blown up. Veteran terrorists are getting tortured. Teenage terrorists are getting trained. We’re meeting TONS of characters. We’re introduced to TONS of story threads. I have to admit, it was overwhelming. If you let your mind drift for even a couple of lines, you were out of the loop.

If I’m being 100, the script can’t keep up with itself. By trying to do so much, it loses its focus. And because of that, the events that occur don’t always make sense. I’ll give you an example. Early in the script, an entire Coscto is blown up on American soil. Hundreds of people die. Yet throughout the rest of the script, that moment is only referenced once, in a throwaway line.

Then later in the script, Matt’s team kills all those Mexican police. His boss is furious about this, fearing that the entire country is going to turn on the government if they find out America is responsible. Except the story has already established a rule-set by which an entire Costco can be destroyed and not a single person in America bats on eye. Why would we think those same people would care about a bunch of people killed in another country? Cops or not.

The central plan here is also confusing. They want to kill this cartel leader. Which is fine. But they never introduce us to him, which seems odd. This script has a 40+ character count. But it doesn’t introduce us to the most important enemy in the story?? This makes it harder to care about Isabel, the daughter of the cartel leader, since we don’t establish a physical connection between her and her father. As a result she just seems like some girl.

And then I wasn’t clear what they were trying to do with her. At first I thought it was to draw the father out. But instead we have this convoluted plan where they’re using her to draw out the rival cartel, I suppose to kill her? Or try to kill her? Which would then result in retaliation from her father? A father we’ve never seen? It was WAAAAY too complicated. In my experience, if you’re writing something with this kind of scope, the central goal driving your hero’s actions must be simple. This was not.

Writers need to understand that these “high-difficulty routine” scripts require more time than your average script. You’re not going to be able to bang one of these out in the same amount of time it takes to write Cloverfield Lane. The logistics behind interconnecting so many characters and story threads alone is going to add an untold number of hours. So I’d never say don’t write a script like this. But if you do, be prepared for the extra work. Cause stories like this are a logistical nightmare.

And one of the things that happens when you have to juggle so many balls is that you miss opportunities. You miss potentially great story directions because your eyes are looking in so many places at once.

That happened with Alejandro and Isabel, the daughter. I liked how Sheridan formed a reluctant bond between the two. Their equally tough and selfish demeanors made for an interesting dynamic. As a result, their storyline had the potential to do some great things.

Keep in mind we established Alejandro as a ruthless killer at the beginning of the script. He doesn’t give a shit about anybody and will kill anyone if that’s what the job requires. Imagine, then, after Alejandro retrieves Isabel, he’s given the directive by Matt to kill her. This is actually what the story hints at, since Matt’s boss is telling him that, under no circumstances can that girl get to the press. Here Alejandro is, finally, for the first time in his life, connecting with somebody. Then he’s given the order to kill her. What does he do?

But that’s not the route the story takes. Alejandro simply tells Matt, “I’m going to bring her to you” and we focus more on Alejandro teaching the sheltered Isabel what the “real” world is like (the two have to sneak across the border together). That is a MAJOR missed opportunity as far as I’m concerned. They could’ve gotten so much more out of it. And maybe they would’ve after a few drafts. Hell, maybe they DID after a few more drafts. That’d be a nice surprise.

However, that’s my big beef with Sicario 2. Taylor Sheridan has earned his spot on the A-list. He writes movies that don’t have superheroes, creepy clowns, or The Rock in them – the types of movies that don’t do well theatrically anymore – and he gets people to show up. But a story as ambitious and cool as this needed more development. And as Sheridan’s star rises, I’m not sure he has time for that anymore. He might need to branch out into producing and get writers to flesh these stories out.

Anyway, lots of potential here. But that potential fell short of the border. :(

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

What I learned: I once showed a friend of mine a picture of my dream house. It was this giant southern mansion with this sprawling emerald green yard. I sent it to her and said, “This is my dream home.” She replied back. “But who’s going to mow that lawn?” I laughed but her comment has always stuck with me. The bigger the house, the bigger the lawn you have to mow. And that was the case here. You can be ambitious. You can take on the world. But it’s going to take a lot more time to mow that lawn.

Welcome to the script that makes “The Wolf of Wall Street” look like “We Bought A Zoo.”

Genre: True Story
Premise: A look at one of the craziest rock bands ever to grace the stage – Motley Crue.
About: The adaptation of the Motley Crue biography, “The Dirt,” is a project that people have been trying to push through development for years. In fact, Rich Wilke’s script was on the inaugural Black List! It’s since seen many starts and stops. However, the bottomless money pit known as Netflix finally grabbed the rights and plans to convince Chris Hemsworth to play the lead. The debaucherous world of band pics hasn’t been tested in the current Hollywood climate, so if the movie hits, expect the floodgates to open for Van Halen, Guns and Roses, Def Leppard, and my personal favorite, Poison. Interesting tidbit here. “The Dirt” was written by geek-to-player legend and writer of “The Game,” Neil Strauss.
Writer: Rich Wilkes (based on the book by Tommy Lee, Mick Mars, Vince Neil, Nikki Sixx, and Neil STrauss)
Details: 123 pages

I’m just going to tell you right now. If you’re even the least bit prudish, don’t read this review. There is no way to summarize what happens in this story without getting XXX rated. If you’re okay with that, read on. If not, prepare for a script so scary, no one has the balls to make it.

There’s no easy way to summarize “The Dirt.” Its narrative – if you can all it that – consists of jumping back and forth between each member of the 1980s hair band, Motley Crue, before they were famous, after they were famous, and during their fame, in no particular order, as we watch them go through the highest of “highs,” and eventually the lowest of lows.

First there’s lead singer, Vince Neil. Vince was the ultimate ladies’ man. He was paying child support before he even got out of high school. Vince quickly figured out that the best way to get even more girls was to be in a band.

Next came Nikki Sixx, who played bass. Nikki was a troubled kid from the hood who routinely got beaten by his mother’s many boyfriends and husbands. He finally escaped that life to join Motley Crue, where he quickly became a hardcore heroin addict.

Next was Tommy Lee, the member of the band the average person is most likely familiar with. Tommy grew up a suburban kid and therefore wasn’t as susceptible to debauchery as the other members at the time. Well, unless you count his addiction to having sex with Hollywood celebrities.

Finally there was the most mysterious member of the group, guitarist Mick Mars. Mars was the old man of the group, having attempted to become rock-star famous for a decade before joining Motley Crue. A noted recluse, Mars would later find out he had a rare debilitating bone disorder that would slowly turn his entire skeleton into the equivalent of concrete.

The Dirt opens up on a Motley Crue party where Tommy Lee is performing oral sex on a girl in the middle of the room, which results in her squirting as she orgasms, where Nikki Sixx is waiting to catch the erupting fluid in his mouth. Hey, I told you to turn away from this review, didn’t I?

Oh, don’t worry. It gets worse. There’s a scene where the Crue runs into Ozzy Osbourne at a pool party, who’s desperately looking for a bump of cocaine. The band proclaims they’re out, which isn’t good enough for Ozzy, who grabs a straw, gets down on his knees where a line of ants are walking, and snorts up the line of ants instead.

The most difficult-to-read sections of the script are Vince Neil’s. Neil would go on to kill his best friend during a drunken beer run, while also causing permanent brain damage to the two teens he ran into. Vince somehow gets off with only 30 days in jail, and we later show him at an after-party, having sex with five different girls, lined up one next to the other, while cutting back to a hospital where one of the girls he gave brain damage to is learning how to walk again in physical therapy.

What’s amazing about this script/story is that it covers all the angles in excruciating detail. You get the good, the bad, the weird, and everything in between. There’s a midpoint multi-monologue from all the band members about what it’s really like being a rock star that has to be the most insightful dive into the lives of this profession I’ve ever read. I found it particularly interesting how quickly they got sick of it. That despite all of the perks – and the perks were great – that it was still a job that required you to be “on” every night to a new audience who had just paid a ton of money to see you and who had been looking forward to this all year. And you’re sick, and you’re tired, and you just sang these stupid songs the last 20 nights in a row, and your hearts racing out of your chest to the point where you think you’re going to die because you’ve done SO. MANY. DRUGS. and you still got to be on. You still have to give them the show of their life.

I also loved the visuals that the writers included. One of the main themes of the movie is the “machine,” which is a “rock star machine” that every band must sacrifice themselves to. But instead of only referring to the machine, we see it. It’s big and monstrous with hundreds of different levers and walkways, like a satanic version of something you’d see in a Dr. Seuss film. And we see how, each time a band makes it past a level, they’re placed on a higher, faster, more dangerous level. And the entire machine is dedicated to chewing you up and turning you into meat. It’s a tremendous image and a powerful metaphor.

I don’t know what else to say. This script is fearless. I mean where else are you going to read this line: “We ROCKET IN on Vince’s furiously pumping ass and suddenly… WE’RE INSIDE VINCE NEIL’S TESTICLES.”

I suppose if there’s something to learn from this script it’s: This is how you avoid writing characters who have the potential to be cliche. You write them by subverting the cliche and by adding detail that nobody else in the world would’ve thought of. The newbie writing four rock stars is going to give them very few flaws, if any. They’re going to focus on all the good stuff – the fame, the girls, the drugs. They’re not going to torture their characters like Strauss and Wilkes do. Seeing Vince try to retain his rock star edge after killing his best friend and ruining the lives of two innocent people is both disgusting and heartbreaking. Seeing someone learn they have one of the worst diseases in the world is a detail no newbie is going to think of.

And even the “cliche” stuff, like Nikki Sixx being a heroin-addict, is saved by the level of detail given to the addiction. Sixx goes on drug trips that rival, and in some cases even surpass, those we saw in Trainspotting. DETAIL and SPECIFICITY is the way to make a reader forget all about cliche.

Rarely do I read an adaptation of a book and want to go back and read the book. What’s the point? I just read the streamlined version. But “The Dirt” is one of the few times where I have to now read the source material. You can tell they had to leave a ton out. And I can only imagine what else I’m going to find inside the Motley Crue time capsule. Hell, maybe I’ll even go listen to a few of their songs.

Okay, maybe I won’t go that far.

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

What I learned: This might be the first script I’ve ever read where there’s no narrative – almost the entire script is told in vignettes – and yet I never lost interest. Why? Because these characters were so damn fascinating. This goes to show the power of character creation and how you should always prioritize compelling characters FIRST and plot SECOND.

The Last Jedi is losing this weekend’s box office battle to Insidious 4! When your movie is being taken down by a film that occasionally uses one of those cheesy sequel nicknames (4Sidious!), you know you’re in trouble. Guys, I realize my obsession with The Last Jedi has gone too far. But I still can’t believe Disney allowed a director who doesn’t even like Star Wars to come in and not only undo every single significant story thread from the previous movie, but leave the story nowhere to go for its finale!!!!! Smart people actually ALLOWED THIS TO HAPPEN! And they turned Luke Skywalker into a lame weirdo coward then killed him! lol. People actually sat in an office, nodded, and said, “Yeah, this sounds like a good idea. Let’s go with it.” Even a friend of mine who liked the movie (don’t worry, I’m working on him), admitted, “Oh, yeah, they burned the trilogy to the ground. There’s nowhere to go from here.”

Anyway, enough about Star Wars. Well, until the Solo trailer debuts at least. For now, it’s time to get our hands dirty with some new Amateur Offerings. This is where you, the dedicated readers of this site, read and vote for your favorite script of the weekend. That script will get a site review next Friday. And hopefully we’ll find ourselves the next “Meat.” I know Logan (writer of Meat) signed with Charlie Ferraro at UTA, one of the biggest agents in the business. That could be you by the end of the month! Let’s do it baby. Here are this week’s scripts!

Oh, by the way. If you want to submit for a future Amateur Offerings: Send me a PDF of your script, along with the title, genre, logline, and why you think people should read it (your chance to really pitch your story). All submissions should be sent to Carsonreeves3@gmail.com.

Title: FROM THE CONVALESCENCE OF CHRISTIANNE ZELMAN
Genre: Gothic drama
Logline: A psychiatrist becomes involved with a disturbed young woman, but falls foul of those responsible for her condition — a former Nazi doctor and mysterious Reverend Sister.
Why You Should Read: Played against the rainy altitude of the Austrian Tyrol in 1975, FROM THE CONVALESCENCE OF CHRISTIANNE ZELMAN is both love story and Nazi fairy-tale. The role of Christianne is tailor-made for an Oscar-bound actress while the script itself resurrects an all but forgotten genre — one that allowed me to showcase character and dialogue inside a heightened storyworld. Indeed, I tried to write something that owes as much to golden-age melodrama as it does to the likes of Tennessee Williams and Rainer Fassbinder. In short, I’m convinced this script is like nothing else around at the moment!

Title: BIGFOOT LIVES!
Genre: Comedy
Logline: After coasting off his fortune from the Patterson-Gimlin film, Bigfoot has gone bankrupt. With the help of his new agent, he needs to make another splashy appearance or risk losing everything he has.
Why You Should Read: BIGFOOT LIVES! is funny as hell, unpredictable, and an all-around enjoyable read with a happy ending. Well, that’s my opinion, of course. My goal was to write a movie that makes me laugh, and I’ve succeeded. The question is will everyone else laugh along with me? — I’ve always gotten incredible help from Team ScriptShadow, and it is important for me to continue my development. One of the best ways I’ve found is by receiving the community’s constructive criticism. I’ve proven in my previous appearances on AOW my willingness to put in work to get better and take feedback to heart, and I’m ready to go to war again.

Title: The Promoters
Genre: Drama
Logline: A nightclub bouncer with big dreams and a failing marriage to his paraplegic brother’s ex-girlfriend convinces a successful concert promoter, whose own life is falling apart in the aftermath of a family tragedy, to take him under her wing.
Why You should Read: I’m Antonio Cannady but I go by the pen name Sinsation. I’ve been nominated for best director and best screenplay for my previous works. I currently reside in Orlando, Florida.

Title: Whispers from the Watchtower
Genre: Mystery
Logline: The host of a popular skeptic/debunking radio show works alongside a reluctant psychic in a last ditch attempt to find his missing daughter.
Why You Should Read: I was ecstatic when I found out an earlier draft of this script placed top 10 in the 2017 Launch Pad Feature Competition. From there, the contest organizer sent the script to a producer looking for material and after the producer read it, he sent it to a manager he knew. The manager got back to him within 24 hours to say he loved the story as well and wanted to meet me. Momentum, momentum, momentum! I owe that manager and producer a ton of credit, because together we shaped the story into a project we felt the industry would consider. — My manager had a plan to keep the reads exclusive, targeting select production companies, so why am I making the script public, submitting to AOW in hopes of getting a review? After the screenplay was sent up to the owner of a fairly well known production company and interest expressed, my manager vanished. This was in late July and to this day I have no idea what happened, I hope it wasn’t something catastrophic. In the meantime, it’s back to square one for me and I’m proceeding as though I’m unrepresented. I’d love to know what the Scriptshadow community thinks of the story – and more importantly – if they’d pay to see the actual film. Also, I can’t lie… having struck out in two previous AF attempts, the competitor in me seeks to earn that elusive “worth a read” my first ever submission – The Telemarketer – failed to produce.

Title: Mad For It
Genre: Comedy
Logline: Battling 90s Britpop bands develop a rivalry that makes them famous then ruins their lives in a spiral of one-upmanship and revenge
Why You Should Read: Dear Carson, I am Jack the Stripper, burlesque performer and writer of comedy burlesque routines for ladies in London, UK. I’ve decided to hang up my thong and use my comic talents to write for the screen, drawing on my experiences as a touring musician and music promoter. I’ve also just landed a publishing deal with Three Blend Comics as editor and writer of Tales of Astoundment, a quarterly comedy comic book anthology. You should review my script because my whole life for fifteen years has been a parade of sex and live music and comedy, while listening to the stories of musicians going up and down the industry ladder. The best of all of these experiences is here in a screenplay, waiting to be broadcast into your head, and if a little of your time is the only price to see it, then you, sir, have got a bargain.

This post is for those writers who want to hold themselves more accountable in 2018. List the number of hours and/or pages you wrote this week. The idea here is to be truthful about the amount of work you’re putting in. Plus, by seeing how much other writers are writing, I’m hoping you’ll be inspired to write more yourself. Somewhere between 15-30 hours a week, depending on how busy your life is, is ideal. Also, be supportive and encouraging to others. Writing is a lonely endeavor and it’s nice to know people are rooting for you. Basically, this post is meant as one big bucket of motivation. If you guys find it helpful, I’ll post these regularly. I’m thinking every other week? We’ll see how this one goes. :)

Genre: Holiday/Horror
Premise: After the arrival of a mysterious Christmas present, a troubled young woman finds herself trapped inside her apartment building with three ghastly spirits hell-bent on forcing her to confront the horrors of her past, present and future.
Why You Should Read: Believe it or not, horror fans really love Christmas! Sure, Halloween is our big day, but there’s just something liberating about the holiday season that nicely offsets our darker sensibilities. Unfortunately, there aren’t too many movies out there that successfully bring those disparate aspects of our personalities together. GREMLINS and THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS are kind of the gold standard in this arena, but both of those are family films and don’t exactly qualify as horror. We need more good Christmas horror flicks that we can revisit each year, damn it! — ‘DO NOT OPEN’ started out as a short script. But, thanks to the November writing challenge that a few of us took part in, I’ve expanded that set-up into a modern day, horror re-imagining of a certain Dickens holiday classic. The result is basically ‘A CHRISTMAS CAROL’ meets ‘IT’. — Thanks for taking a look. I can only hope that it’s as much fun to read as it was to write!
Writer: Nick Morris
Details: 84 pages (micro-script! – Nick’s pressing all the buttons today)

Christmas 2017 may be over. But I’m already on to Christmas 2018. Which is why I’m reviewing the WINNER of December 15’s Amateur Offerings, “Do Not Open,” a Christmas-themed el special from perennial Amateur Friday threat, Nick Morris. Gotta get this in shape for the end of the year!

I have to say, before I start, that I admire the layered approach Nick took to titling the screenplay. What’s the first thing anyone does when they see the words, “Do not open?” Yeah, duh. I opened. Here’s what was inside…

24 year-old Holly, who lives in a small one-bedroom apartment, is a heavy proponent of the no-pants rule. That means, once you’re in your apartment, no pants allowed. This made me an immediate fan of Holly.

Unfortunately, Holly’s got issues that go well beyond her pant-dislike, starting with a severe case of agoraphobia. Even simple errands can become a battle. Luckily, Holly finds something outside her door this morning to distract her. A box that has a simple message on it: “Do Not Open.”

Holly kicks the box inside and places it under her Charlie Brown Christmas tree, choosing to abide by the box’s rule. After her girlfriend, Marlene, stops by and forces Holly to open the box, they’re disappointed to find out there’s nothing’s inside.

After Marlene leaves and midnight hits, everything goes to hell, as the building becomes eerily still. Holly checks out the hallway, which is also too quiet. It’s like the world has… turned off. She tries the elevator. Nothing happens. Tries to take the stairs. The door won’t budge.

Eventually, Holly finds her way down to the second floor where she sees her dead sister who perished in a fire as a child standing in the hallway. Seeing dead sister. Always a good sign. We then transport back to that fateful fire, after which Holly’s parents join a cult to deal with the pain.

Holly reemerges from the “dream” on the second floor, where she’s able to find her way down to Floor 1. It’s here where Holly sees herself in the present. A lonely scared girl who stays in her apartment all day. Oh, and every tenant on the floor turns into a demon and she has to blast them into black goo with a bat.

Finally, Holly makes it down to the ground floor – what we now know as Christmas Future – and it’s here where we learn that Future Holly is a drug addict at the end of her rope. And that she’s got to kill more demons, of course. After Holly emerges from her demon-slaying Christmas nightmare, she’s able to acknowledge her metaphorical demons, and finally commit to a life of growth instead of one of stagnation.

It’s been awhile since I read Nick’s last script so I don’t remember it well. But I know I like this one better. It takes a while to get going as its 25 page first act could arguably be condensed into 10 pages. The word “filler” kept flashing through my mind as I was reading it.

For example, there’s a whole 10 page section where we’ve got this box sitting there that says “Do Not Open” and Holly’s not opening it. Technically, this is suspenseful. But there’s a difference between technical suspense and real suspense. I didn’t feel real suspense because the only reason Holly wasn’t opening the box was because the writer didn’t want her to. Any person in their right mind is going to open that box. Or, if they’re not, we have to be convinced why.

Suspense only works when it’s invisible. Not when the writer is clearly pulling the strings.

There also seemed to be too much sitting around. Too many pages going by that were either repeating information or not giving any information at all. Holly lives alone in this apartment that she hates leaving. I understood that by page 5. Why am I still being told that 20 pages later with the only additional information being that she has a girlfriend?


However, once we hit the second act, where our concept emerged, the script became considerably better. I loved the scene where Holly tries to work her way down the trash chute to escape the building and then some freaky ass monster’s arms appears below her. Haven’t seen that scene in a horror movie before!

I also liked the ghost of Christmas Past scene in the church. I was surprisingly affected by how intense the family confrontation was and 100% believed that they’d really lost their daughter. That was the hook moment for me. Before that scene I was like, “Eh, I could go either way here.” Which goes to show, it isn’t the flash (the scares) that pulls the audience in. It’s those human moments. The ones that help us connect with the characters.

The Christmas Present stuff was okay but could’ve been better. It relied too much on gore (this is the section where Holly must beat everyone to a pulp with a bat) as opposed to character development. There was a moment in this section where Holly walks into her apartment and is able to see herself in the 3rd person and it freaked me out. How would you react if you watched yourself all day? What would you think of that person? It got kinda trippy. I wanted more of that. But instead we got more gore and scares.

The Future Stuff needs more development as well. The idea is good. If Holly continues on this path, she’ll die. But that wasn’t set up very well in the first act. And as I pointed out, it’s not like you don’t have plenty of time to explore it. If we could see a hint of her turning to drugs due to not being able to overcome her past or her condition, then the Christmas Future stuff plays out much better.

I also have a suggestion for Nick. Stop using scares from other horror movies. ESPECIALLY generic horror movies. The people with the dark faces and the beaming bright eyes – I’ve seen that a ton. And people turning to our protagonist and screeching with a high-pitched noise. Come on. I can find ten IFC Midnight films right now that do the same thing.

I say this kindly but I’m a little upset about it. Nick reads this site all the time and one of the big things I hit on is that you got to do the hard work and go beyond the obvious choice. If you’ve seen a particular scare in two movies, don’t use it. Or only use it if you’ve honest-to-God spent five hours trying to come up with a new fresh option and you couldn’t think of anything. Because every obvious choice like that makes the reader think “generic.” And it takes fewer generic choices than you think it does before a reader labels your entire script “generic.”

So anyway, I thought this was fun. But due to its repetitive first act and the work it still needs on the Christmas Present and Christmas Future sections, I can’t give it that ‘worth the read’ label. But it was close!

Script link: Do Not Open

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

What I learned: Your first act is going to have the most information in it of all the acts. This is where you’re laying out your characters, your world, your plot, and providing setups that you’ll later pay off (such as the potential addiction to drugs I wanted a better setup of). If your first act is thin and breezy, you probably aren’t utilizing it in the correct way.