27 posts in 19 threads for "@CoverageGoblin"
- Contest coverage notes: patterns from about sixty horror scripts this season
Tradition is allowed if it earns it. Give the cold open victim something that pays off later, even a small prop, and I will forgive it.
- Page One Friday: share the opening line of your script (week 38)
Kind note: that is a whole movie in one line. Useful note: 'the fortieth time' tells me about the editor's obsession, keep it. See you all next week.
- Hit the Ask The Exchange daily limit before lunch again
The limit message is the first page one I have ever fully respected. Short, clear, knows when to stop.
- Why do we love horror games where the map lies to you?
Writer's note: an unreliable map is an unreliable narrator for places. The player has to rebuild the truth from pieces. It is the same pleasure as a good twist, spread over hours.
- Worst theater audience story you have ever witnessed
Not a horror screening, but someone once read contest notes out loud in a coffee shop and they were mine. I had to sit there and hear my own opinions about page one. That is my horror story.
- Contest coverage notes: patterns from about sixty horror scripts this season
As long as I can stay anonymous. Readers cannot have faces, it ruins the mystique.
- Long form horror video essays: why do the three hour ones keep holding audiences?
The good ones have structure, though. Chapters, a cold open, a callback at the end. The three hour ones that flop are just long, not built.
- Contest coverage notes: patterns from about sixty horror scripts this season
Sure. Specific jobs for characters (a hearing aid technician, a school bus mechanic). A location with its own history. Dialogue that is funny without winking. And the ones I advanced were lean: 90 to …
- Contest coverage notes: patterns from about sixty horror scripts this season
Wrapped a round of contest reading. No names, no titles, just patterns from about sixty horror scripts. Posting because the same notes came up over and over. 1. Page one opens on a nightmare, then the…
- Is found footage a hard sell as a spec script?
Seconding. Also cut every 'we see.' In found footage the camera sees. Be specific about what it misses.
- Page One Friday: share the opening line of your script (week 38)
That is a page one. Clear image, a rule, a threat. Kind note: gorgeous. Useful note: 'on the third pass' could go, let the reader count.
- Is found footage a hard sell as a spec script?
It is harder, not impossible. Most found footage specs are written as if the reader can see the camera. We cannot. Tell me who is holding it and why it is still rolling, every scene, in one line.
- Legacy sequel fatigue: real signal or just loud people online?
From a writing angle, fatigue is usually a story problem. The sequels that work find a new question. The ones that feel tired are just asking the old question louder.
- Body horror after The Substance: new era or one perfect lightning strike?
Page one note for everyone writing the next one: the body horror has to mean something by page ten. Transformation is a metaphor with a deadline.
- Logline critique thread: post yours, get honest (kind) notes
Strong image. 'None of them remember leaving' is doing a lot of work. Who is in danger, though? Give me a stake by the end of the sentence.
- Logline critique thread: post yours, get honest (kind) notes
Pattern note across this thread: the strong ones all have a ticking thing. Calls, counters, wallpaper. The weak loglines I read in contests have a mood and no clock.
- Conviction scores vs gut feel: who has actually been right more often?
Neither can most producers, to be fair.
- Logline critique thread: post yours, get honest (kind) notes
That clause is the whole engine, good. I would want a hint of what the keeper wants, though. Right now she is a receiver, not a protagonist.
- Logline critique thread: post yours, get honest (kind) notes
Rules: one logline per post, under 40 words. Give notes on at least one other person's before you post again. Be kind, be specific. All loglines must be your own work.
- How does signal strength actually work? Is it the same as conviction?
This is the clearest explanation of a scoring system I have read all year, and I read contest rubrics for a living.
- Writing a monster you never fully show
Describe what it does to the space, not what it looks like. Pressure, smell, sound, what the dog refuses to do. Readers remember the effects of a thing longer than a list of teeth.
- Using CRYPT signals in a pitch deck without looking like a trend chaser
The script is the argument. The deck is the garnish. If slide 3 is doing more work than page 1, fix page 1.
- How usernames and flair will work when posting opens
Can I change my name later if I realize I chose poorly at 3am?
- A producer wants my haunting rewritten as folk horror. How do I keep the bones?
The best folk horror scripts I read have a calendar. A festival, a harvest, a date. Your apartment story probably has an anniversary in it somewhere. Turn it into the village's calendar.
- Low budget, high multiple: why horror keeps getting greenlit
From the contest reading pile: the scripts that fit this model are contained, few locations, a clear hook on page one. The ones that do not fit ask for a helicopter on page three.