First Episode. Could use Criticism

[cheese197]

Well, This is the first time posting in the Writing forum, so I guess I should start off by asking that this not be replicated without my permission. In fact, you you like it and wanna pass it around to animators or tell your friends, that's great, but do not claim it as your own. I still love you though.

This is the first script written for my (hopefully) first animation and series CrackHead. It's comedy mostly set in a college (cliche, but it is a good atmosphere for a show like this) and I look foward to hearing feedback.

S=Stan
B=Bill
P=Phil
L=Len
E=Emma
Iv=Ivan
Se=Sean

And we begin with...
Episode 1: Megini the Magician

{White background. Bill and Stan enter}

S: Hey. My name's Stan.

B: And I'm PC.

S: {sigh} Bill we've gone over this.

B: I know, I know. "If we ever do a spoof I get to be Pc so I don't look like a hippie bum!" I get it, you hate Macs.

S: No retard, I mean, this isn't a spoof at all.

B: You mean we have to use original jokes and writing?

S: Mostly.

B: Lame. Can't we be like Family Guy?

S: No. There are too many shows that use stupid jokes, nonsense cut aways, and base their script on that of another show. {Family Guy/Family Guy/Cleveland Show using Family Guy. Then caption "But we love them so!"}

B: I think that was pretty funny.

S: I think so too. Anyway........... what were we talking about?

B: Some show that being released that has to be original and funny.

S: What's it supposed to be called?

B: Some sh*tty name. CrackHead?

S: Huh. Sounds stupid.

{TITLE SCREEN} S:Ohhh, F*CK!

{In Stan's room. }

S:{Sleeping} Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

P: {In hallway} Target still asleep. Is the distraction ready?

B: {outside, dawn, next to catapult with a monkey in a Jason mask and a Turkey club, pauses stares at the thing for a good 2 seconds} Just about. {Back to Phil in hallway} Wasn't able to get any Swiss. The monkey must be Lactose intolerant.
P: Well, we'll have to make due. {Looks at watch} T-minus 10 seconds. 10. 9. 8. {Bill outside with binoculars} 7. 6. 5. {Monkey close up-blinking} 4.3. 2. 1.

B: {pulls lever} Hurk!

Monkey: {monkey noises, hits window next to Stan's room} OHHHH OHHH AHHHHHHHHHH! {Stan wakes up}
S:What the hell-
P: CHAAAAAAAAAAAAARGE! {starts shooting paint balls at Stan}
S: Oh sh*t! What the f*ck? {Dodges and grabs bandana on bed post} Gotcha. {Rolls into closet}
P: Dammit!
B: Did we get him?
P: No.
B: And I worked so hard on the Jason mask!
L: {Runs down hallway to P and S} Phil, {pants throughout} I heard gunshots and why do you have a paintball gun aimed at Stan's bed.
P: {shrugs} Monday stuff: {Takes out checklist} Launch monkey. Check. Shoot Stan. {Thinks} Half-check. Put the special chocolates in weekly brownies.
L: What was that last one?
P: Just testin' your reflexes. You fail. You suck.
L: Whatever. {walks to Stan's room}
P: {looks toward him and writes} Kill Len for knowing too much. {squints} In progress.
L: {In Stan's room} YO! Stan, come on. It's morning feeding time.
S: {Tightens band that goes around left eye and right part of hair} Why do you need me?
L: You're the only one who can cook.
S: No. I'm the only one who can be trusted to cook. You can't read a recipe,
L: To be fair, my mom hated men in the kitchen.
S: Bill would probably put too much baking soda in the food,
B: {From outside} That only happened once!
L: You put ten cups of baking soda into pancake batter for the eight of us! You made the kitchen look like the beaches at Normandy!
B: There was way more blood there than in the kitchen!
S: And Phil, well...
L: Say no more. Just make sure I can make a waffle without my hair looking like yours.
P: Those modifications were supposed to increase energy output, not make you bald.
S: I'm not bald. Shut the hell up about my hair.
{All downstairs}
S: Well, let's check the fridge. {Opens fridge} Umm, why are there two boxes of Kool-Aid in here?
B: You're supposed to keep Kool-Aid cool. Duh.
S: Yeah, when it's a liquid dumbass, not when it still looks like blood cocaine. {Phil's eye open like he got a crazy idea} NO!
P: Awwww.
L: Where's all the food? I thought we went to the market Saturday?
B: Phil and I had a party.
S: No wonder. All that's in here is printer paper, peanut butter, green apples, a muffler, and Halal bacon, and I can only assume you two didn't find some unholy combination of the five that suited your insane appetites.
B: Sounds 'bout right.
L: Wait did he say muffler?
B: Looks like we'll have to go to Emma and the girls for food.
S: Yeah. The store doesn't open for about half-an-hour.
P: Can I stay and do that unholy, culinary Frankenstein thing you were talkin' about earlier?
S: No! You two come with us. Sean and Austyn are smart, but I don't think either of them is qualified to deal with you two, nor would I wish that fate upon anyone.
P: Fine. {All start to leave} Just let me grab that Peanut butter. I think I can do something that involves any of the major paint companies.
{S, B, P, and L outside girl's house}
S: All right, let's just knock on the door and ask for food.
P: You don't need to explain what we have to do.
S: Yes, I do. I know for a fact you both will do something stupid that will in some way insult Emma.
B: Why'd you have to say Emma?
S: Because if it were Kate, you wouldn't dare call her a slut, a wench, or whatever, and if it were Jess, Phil wouldn't do so either.
P: Why do you have to take away our fun?
E: {S knocks on door} Hold up. I'm coming down! {B: rings doorbell} I said hold up. Just wait! {P rings door bell repeatedly} STOP PRESSING THE F*CKING DOORBELL PHIL!!!!!
P: She knows of my work. I'll have to kill her.
S: No.
E: {opens door, still in bed clothes i.e. T-shirt and fleece pants} What's up gu-
P: HARLOT!!!!
B: WE DEMAND FOOD!!!!
S: Silence! {hits them with plank of wood}}
P: Ow!
B: Asshole!
L: If it wasn't obvious, we wanted to ask if we could borrow some food.
E: Sorry, we're all out. I was actually gonna get some today.
S: Maybe we could carpool.
E: Why?
L: The supermarket's pretty far away.
E: Yeah, and closed. We need to go to the convenience store.
S: The Megini Mart?
B: I hate that place.
P: Yeah. I mean, I go there every week, and I never see the magician. Not one have I seen the Great Megini. {others just stare at him} What? Am I wearing pants? I hope so. It's not Friday. Don't wanna mess up my pants rotation.
S: A question for another time, but Megini isn't a magician.
E: Yeah it means Mega-Mini Mart. They just took out the first and last letter.
P: That's gay.
L: Dude you just reached a whole new level of retard there.
P: Dubya?
L: Not yet.
P: Damn!!!

*Note* To long. Will add the rest later.

[Gangstercake]

I seriously laughed at this. This just made me chuckle, giggle, and laugh my ass off. This definitely needs to be turned into a series.

[BDSyndicate]

I'm trying, animators are the only thing standing in my way, or lack there of really. I'm glad you liked it. Anything else, portal?

[Deathcon7]

A piece of advice, don't be self important. If you're simply supplying an idea or script, be modest. Having a "production company," or aspiring to that, is only going to turn off serious prospects. Anyone who would be interested in working with you would won't want to make such an immediate investment. Your best bet is to get a pilot, animatic, or storyboard, or some sort of portfolio for this. In this way you have something to present to potentials that is palatable, rather than ethereal things like ideas, or here's-a-thoughts, or half-baked scripts.

And on the subject of scripts, if you want to entice an animator, at least ensure the script is properly formated. All you have here is dialog. Do more work to set up the characters, give emotional direction, include the cues for voice actors, set the mood. It's nice that you have an idea, and it's nice that you're excited by it, but if you expect to infect anyone with your excitement, anyone of worth at least, you need to put in a minimum of effort.

Build the content, put in the footwork. And if, in the end, you still can't entice anyone to the project, greenbacks are a universal motivator.

On the piece itself, it was passable. You need to shape and build your characters more, and draw comedy from those interactions, rather than snappy dialog, or random events. And, although you crack at Family Guy and seem disdainful of it, there were a few instances where you could have benefited from flashbacks/cut-aways. And there were some parts that did strongly resemble family guy, notably some of your camera cues (which should be separate from your dialog lines, by the way).

Take what I've said to heart, give this more love, and you'll see you'll attract more people. I can see potential in this, given some effort. I think if you can get this done right, it'll fit right into the Newgrounds visual vernacular.

Good luck.

In the future, if you are looking for critique, please use the review request thread in my signature. I only gave this my thoughts because you asked for a review in the title. Plus, the thread could use the bumps.

[BDSyndicate]

Thanks for the advice. I actually haven't touched this in a while, so it has less cues than others (I found them very tedious to insert, but am going back and doing so), but I sort of made that intentional, cause this is intended to be a pilot and slightly easier on the animator. This script was more or less written to expose the characters rather than explain them, explaining the lack of depth this early on. I will post other stuff to the thread you suggested for the sake of others wanting to receive input.

I do hope I didn't come off as cocky, but in my defense I am not the only one working on this. I am just the only one with access to the NG account (for good reason might I add).

My only thing to add is that I am a writer and an actor. I am no artist and thus visual effects are more or less absent from my writing. I can write speech, but cues are tedious. I will take what you said to heart and try to fix this.

[Deathcon7]

At 2/24/11 09:51 PM, BDSyndicate wrote: Thanks for the advice. I actually haven't touched this in a while, so it has less cues than others (I found them very tedious to insert, but am going back and doing so), but I sort of made that intentional, cause this is intended to be a pilot and slightly easier on the animator. This script was more or less written to expose the characters rather than explain them, explaining the lack of depth this early on.

Proper format is proper format. Imagine a writer leaving out punctuation because it's tedious. Or an artist ignoring their lines. Or an accountant ignoring the numbers. When you're writing script, it's all about cues. What distinguishes a script from a novel is the telling instead of the showing. In a script you tell what's happening, who it's happening to, and why. You give the dialog, where the characters are, how they're feeling, their surroundings. If they're in an urban setting, are they in an alley, or in the middle of the street? Is anyone else around? What about traffic?

What about technical directions: fades, swipes, zooms, camera angles, camera distance, depth of field, focus, lighting. Cinematography is very important in this process and more often than not enhances the scenes in subtle, yet apparent ways. For example, having the camera look up to a character will make them seem heroic, good; the viewer will be more trustful of that character, and will see that character in a better light than, say, a character introduced with the camera looking down on them. Mix in lighting, character design, color choice; I mean, this is visual media. The visuals affect everything.

Anyway, I can rant for a long time about the importance of cinematography. Just take from this that it's a part of the process, and if it's tedious it's only because you need to work to improve your understanding of it. In the end you'll realize you found it tedious just the same way you find repeating math problems tedious. If you don't understand the end, you're not going to understand the means.

I will post other stuff to the thread you suggested for the sake of others wanting to receive input.

Thanks for the bump. I'm not promising you'll get any more reviews other than mine, but it's a sure fire way to, at the very least, get 1 review. Just post in the thread a link to whatever it is you want reviewed.

I do hope I didn't come off as cocky, but in my defense I am not the only one working on this. I am just the only one with access to the NG account (for good reason might I add).

It's not a matter of cockiness, and I didn't say what I said to be negative. The fact of the matter is, if you want to attract a skilled audience to your work, you have to show your skill as well. You have to match them in skill, make them say "Awesome!" the way you would say "Awesome!" to their stellar use of chiaroscuro or some such; you get what I mean.

Anyway, you're not going to attract that audience by putting up airs. More than one person working on a project does not a studio make. Just do the footwork with your current teammates, build up a decent dossier for the project, and then scope out local talent. deviantArt is another good resource, although all the skilled artists are looking for paychecks. Just keep in mind that more and more people are looking to the internet to make money, as opposed to advancing a hobby. That being said, you have to monetize your project as incentive. And contrary to what I said, one of the best methods is having the infrastructure of a studio.

Ya, it's a catch-22.

My only thing to add is that I am a writer and an actor. I am no artist and thus visual effects are more or less absent from my writing. I can write speech, but cues are tedious. I will take what you said to heart and try to fix this.

Keep in mind that I'm no artist either, but proper script formating is proper script formating. Even if you briefly outline what you're envisioning in your head, and let the artist fill in the rest, is sufficient to simply nothing. Keep in mind that an artist is creative in their interpretation of your instructions, not in lacking it.

[BDSyndicate]

I really hate replying back and forth to one person, but I think I'll leave it at this.

I don't know animation. I don't even know angles, or wipes, or fades. That is why I need an animator the way I do. I understand what you are saying, and I understand that this is proper format to you, and may be others. I just have a hard time writing what I do not understand. I write only what I need to say. There are liberties that I do not care about. The campus is whatever the animator would like it to be. Aside from the main characters housing, buildings are up to the artist. I probably should have included the character detail, yes. However, angles and such don't really show up on my radar. I don't need them to write, I need them to draw, so they are of no use yet. Right now, I am just writing words for my use and actor's use. i will have to translate it into cues, but I decided to upload this to save room. Thank you for your comments, I hope you excel in your projects as much as I hope to excel in mine.

[Deathcon7]

At 2/24/11 11:08 PM, BDSyndicate wrote: I really hate replying back and forth to one person, but I think I'll leave it at this.

I don't know animation. I don't even know angles, or wipes, or fades. That is why I need an animator the way I do. I understand what you are saying, and I understand that this is proper format to you, and may be others. I just have a hard time writing what I do not understand. I write only what I need to say. There are liberties that I do not care about. The campus is whatever the animator would like it to be. Aside from the main characters housing, buildings are up to the artist. I probably should have included the character detail, yes. However, angles and such don't really show up on my radar. I don't need them to write, I need them to draw, so they are of no use yet. Right now, I am just writing words for my use and actor's use. i will have to translate it into cues, but I decided to upload this to save room. Thank you for your comments, I hope you excel in your projects as much as I hope to excel in mine.

Thanks buddy, and I understand where you're coming from a bit more now.

Take my advice then as a goal to work toward, as I only say what I said to help you attract artists. Ones of quality will be attracted to projects that show strong signs of being completed.

And take advantage of this forum's resources. If you want to learn more about script writing, just ask! If in the end that's not your interest or intent, that's fine too.

Good luck.