Writing Contest #76 "The Bechdel Test"

[tudore]

On The Set Of “MacQuarries’ Justice”
In addition to being genuinely funny, this was really interesting. There's a lot of depth implied in Moira and Heather's characters, and I like how much of Heather's personality is shown through the dialogue. I get the impression that Heather is more than just effervescent, but also kind of indifferent/oblivious to other people's lives; though she might just be showing the typical level of empathy people have for mere acquaintances.

[tudore]

TAROT-CON
This feels like a perfect rendition of Bloody Mary. It has the right balance of darkness and playfulness that keep it from being too silly or just failing as horror. Everything feels consistent, and I like the fact that you start off with a typical cold-read to make it seem like story is just going to be about a con job.

[Chris2.0]

Cool stories everyone!

And thanks for the great crits tudore!

Now lemme re-read them all in one sitting and make some notes before I vote!

[Chris2.0]

Evaluation – very good 1st entry! I’m getting a Danger Girl kind of vibe – maybe J. Scot Campbell would be interested in Real Danger Girls?

TAROT-CON – Liked this story the best of all the entries – very good twist at the end! Some minor quibbles would be to do a bit more proof reading, and to shorten or split the dialogue in the last panel into different word balloons, as now it’s reading a bit long… But cool nonetheless…

Blindspot – And this one just steals the show with lean simplicity. Just the right amount of panel descriptions necessary to tell the story… And dialogue is also natural. And who in today’s circumstances wouldn’t like getting back at the 1%?

On The Set Of “MacQuarries’ Justice – I’d want to watch this! And can’t stop making up imaginary backstories for Moira, as it is not mentioned in here? Irish contract killer slash model? Gym instructor slash professional escort? Apart from that, very good panel descriptions & perfect LA actress dialogue! In any case – green van and Irish guilt indeed!

[Chris2.0]

In the end I went with ...

Overall, very good topic chosen by Tudore – and was a great change of pace from the usual writing challenges I’ve been doing elsewhere up till now!

[jwall]

Hello everyone,
Been a little while since I've been in one of these. Sorry to have missed the group challenge. It looked like fun. Also apologize for the double posting. Does that mean you can vote for it twice?

Crits
Evaluation - Characters are strong and the dialogue is solid. It would work very well as a scene from a play. On it's own, it does lack a feeling of completion. Like a scene from a story but not a story in itself. I hope that makes sense.

Blindspot - Lots of questions. So does Eres have powers? Super speed or invisibility? She exhibits them but it's never explained. Though I suppose its not necessary. The characters are well set up and clearly well designed. The dialogue is believable. I like the setup of the robbery (the stealing from lock boxes) is quite clever. The conversation is somewhat one sided, but I liked it.

This is what I Remember- Technically very well written. Everything from the character description (remember the IMDB is your friend when looking up actors) to the sets. I like the setup and the twist. I think you could've built up the world a little more. Your talking about a world where psychics can go inside and change people's memories, but the question lingers as to why she changes the memory. Is another psychic going to read her? Will the coma patient come out and rat on the Govenor? Also if she is free-lance, what's with the boss? Is she part of a larger organization that works on this?
Questions are good. It means you've peaked interest and it's difficult to make the world and story understood in five pages. Well done.

MacQuarries Justice- Always great dialogue and great pokes at our society which is why I always like your stories. Straight conversation with little moving around. I would've liked it if you expanded from talking about the show to actually had them acting in it. There's a lot of humor that could've been had and it would've made for less talking head action. Really love the last line about the dream scene.

Thanks all. Really loved the stories.

[barrytown83]

Hey everyone, thanks for the comments, I appreciate it. I meant to do this much sooner but kind of got sidetracked, sorry for the delay.

Tarot-Con - Definitely an interesting concept, I liked the twist at the end. Could have fleshed out the protagonist's background as a medium a bit more, as well as the ceremony at the end. All in all, though, I liked this one.

Blindspot - I really liked this one, however the ending felt a little rushed. Like it could have used one more page. It felt like their conversation was unfinished. Also, it seemed unclear if Cassandra was aware of Eris's powers before this or not. Otherwise, I really like characters you've created here and the relationship between them.

This is what I Remember - Another really interesting concept, sort of psychic espionage. I thought it was very well done. It felt at some points as though the dialogue and captions were explaining too much, particularly at the end, rather than allowing the images to tell the story. Otherwise I very much liked it.

On the set of "MacQaurries' Justice" - This was possibly my favorite of the bunch. The characters were very well realized, and the situation was very believable. The only issue I can think of is Page 1 panel 4, I don't think the staffer would be want to tell the actor that the director wanted her angry, etc, but that just nit-picky on my part. Otherwise I thought it was very good.


Thanks again everyone, I really enjoyed the stories and appreciate the feedback you guys provided. And sorry again about the late response.

[cbikle]

Evaluation by Barrytown83

Liked this story - nice tense psych/phys evaluation for some clandestine organization with the characters showing different shades of their personalities. Nice job.

[cbikle]

TAROT-CON by JWall

Cool story. First off, I like the idea of a convention for psychics & mediums and you did a great job of describing it (and yes, I did catch the throwback to Edward Johns, that was cool) I don't really have any crits other than to maybe tighten up the dialogue a little ?

In any case, nice job.

[cbikle]

Blindspot by Tudore

I like the descriptions for the 2 characters as it also conveys a lot about their personalities; I'm gathering that they're the actual Greek gods of myth of the same name or witches or something to explain Eris' abilities. Both girls have cute personalities and the story worked for me.