Genre: Sci-Fi (TV 1-Hour Drama)
Logline: Within hours of learning from an otherworldly source that his upcoming flight is destined for disaster, a would-be Good Samaritan highjacks Northwest Orient flight 305 in order to prevent it from crashing – so begins the saga of history’s most elusive fugitive, D.B. Cooper.
Why You Should Read: To be entertained. You could simply read to page 2, at which point you’ll hopefully buckle up and enjoy the ride. For those familiar with D.B. Cooper, great. For those who aren’t, a quick review of his wiki page may interest you.
Writer: Scott A. Kovall
Details: 71 pages
Man, this was one of the closest Amateur Showdowns ever.
The three top scripts all had virtually the same vote count. That makes it tough for me because how do I choose?!
In the end, I decided to go with the TV pilot because TV is so important right now with everything that’s going on in the world. We’re all staying home looking for that perfect show to help us through the quarantine. It feels like the right time to review a pilot.
For those wondering which script I’d read and liked from the Sci-Fi Showdown offerings, it was “Nowhere Girl.” One of the most unique premises I’d ever come across and something that should’ve imploded within 20 pages. But Chris Cobb somehow pulls the bizarre execution off. The original draft I read probably would’ve garnered a double-worth-the-read.
So “On This Day In History” has a lot to live up to. I don’t want to feel like I made the wrong choice here so let’s hope Mr. Kovall pulls this off!
[A quick note. I’m going to summarize the plot but I might get some things wrong. I struggled to understand even basic plot points.]
A guy named Sinth who has a tattoo of the name “D.B. Cooper” on his exposed shoulder is sitting on the top floor of a skyscraper in New York in 1974 looking for people to shoot with his scope-rifle. It’s hard to understand if he’s got a specific target in mind or he’s just looking for bad folks.
Cut to three years earlier where Sinth is a high school history teacher. After his class, a strange 25 year old woman with a guitar named Leighton tells him that his on-again-off-again best friend, Tweet, needs his help tonight. Sinth responds to her by writing all his responses on the blackboard.
That evening Sinth takes a ride on his motorcycle only to run into a giant tornado. Luckily, his on-again-off-again buddy Tweet’s house is on his escape route. He runs inside and, by virtue of being there at just the right time, stops the tornado from killing Tweet.
It turns out Leighton is both from the future and invisible to everyone but Sinth. Her job is to tell Sinth to be at certain places at certain times to stop tragic things from happening. For example, she takes Sinth to a hockey game where he stops a puck that goes into the stands. Had he not been there, the puck would’ve hit a young girl in the head and killed her.
What Leighton really needs Sinth for, however, is to go on a certain flight and follow a set of instructions where he will appear to be demanding money. But, in reality, he’s taking the plane off its planned flight path where it would’ve collided with another plane and killed everyone on both flights.
After Sinth, aka D.B. Cooper, does this, he heads back to his high school teaching job where we spend the last ten pages of the pilot, Sinth talking to his class who only want to discuss the now famous story of a guy named D.B. Cooper who jumped off a plane with a bunch of money. The end.
I’m going to share with you some behind-the-curtain details on why I picked this pilot for Sci-Fi Showdown. D.B. Cooper is an infamous mythological figure. Placing him in a science fiction environment sounded fun.
However, if I’m being honest, I was concerned about the logline. It sounded unfocused. And in almost every case where I’ve read an unfocused logline, the script itself has been unfocused. When you think about it, it makes sense. If a writer can’t make one sentence clear, how can they make 70 pages clear?
Unfortunately, that fear was confirmed.
I was lost pretty much from the get-go.
We meet our hero, Sinth Freeman, four pages in, where we’re told he’s America’s Most Elusive Fugitive Ever. We then focus on a tattoo on his arm that says, “D.B. Cooper.”
So many questions.
Is his name Sinth Freeman or D.B. Cooper?
If he’s D.B. Cooper, why would he announce to the world he’s D.B. Cooper by tattooing “D.B. Cooper’s” name on his shoulder?
Or is this after his infamous escape from the plane, in which case maybe he’s using the name “Sinth” to hide his true identify? But wouldn’t showing your real name via tattoo defeat the purpose of that?
Or has he not become a fugitive yet? If so, why have two names?
I’m so confused already and we’re barely four pages in.
But it gets worse.
Why is this guy propping himself down in the middle of New York randomly searching for people to shoot with a rifle? Is he a good samaritan who just happens to be an expert rifleman on the lookout for criminals? Or is he a trained killer who’s been hired for a job?
Aggressively unclear.
But it get worse.
The Blackboard scene.
We cut to three years earlier where Sinth, a.k.a. not yet D.B. Cooper, is a teacher. A guitar playing woman named Leighton shows up in his class. Leighton starts asking Sinth questions and for reasons I have no answers for, Sinth only responds to her through writing answers down on the blackboard.
Is Sinth a mute back in 1971? Has he not learned to talk yet?
All unclear.
At this point I thought I was at least halfway through the pilot. I looked up and nearly had a heart attack. I was only on page 15!!! I still had 57 pages left!
I don’t want to be mean to Scott here. I will say this. He takes a lot of chances with this pilot. He goes for it. And I appreciate that. But if I’m 15 pages in and I’m struggling in every single scene to have even the barest idea of what’s going on, that doesn’t bode well for me wanting to continue reading.
There’s something to be said about the old adage, just tell a good story. Don’t overtell it. Don’t insert yourself into it. Don’t over-stylize it. The ultimate goal is for the reader to forget they’re reading a story. That’s hard to do when you’re trying to show off. When you’re having characters only answer questions on their blackboard when they’re perfectly capable of answering normally.
The biggest problem is that there’s no continuity here. We’re being shaken like a polaroid picture. We’re watching a guy walk a tightrope between the Twin Towers, we’re shooting people from a rooftop, we’re in a history class, we’re in a tornado, we’re at a hockey game, we’re on a plane.
I’m guessing this is what Scott was going for. He didn’t want a smooth ride. And I’m not going to tell you that herky-jerky storytelling doesn’t work. There are cases where it does work. 500 Days of Summer, for example, tells its story in a herky-jerky style.
But the thing with herky-jerky storytelling is that every single other component of the writing has to be perfect. Cause if we’re also confused about OTHER PARTS of the story, now you’re just asking too much of the reader. Readers don’t go into scripts wanting to read every scene three times so that they can understand what’s happening. And that happened constantly here.
For example, halfway into the script you throw out that Leighton is invisible to everyone but Sinth. And sometimes Sinth talks through writing instead of speaking. It’s too much. I always remind writers that one of the quickest ways to lose a reader is lack of clarity. There is nothing that will make a reader check out faster than confusion. Especially if it’s regarding basic story points that shouldn’t require extra thought.
It should be noted that my known preference is simple easy-to-understand concepts and narratives. So, in Scott’s defense, this was going to have to tough time with me even if the execution was great. I applaud him for going after it and trying something different but it just wasn’t my thing.
I’m going to review Nowhere Girl next Friday. I know that script and it deserves a review. So if you want to join in that conversation, read the script here.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Avoid try-hard writing, both in description and dialogue. Seeing a writer try hard to impress is no different than the 12-year-old boy desperately doing skateboarding tricks to get the pretty girl’s attention. The fact that you want to impress her so badly is exactly what pushes her away. Here are a couple of examples from On This Day In History that felt too try-hard…
