Blame the audience

So Being Human and Outcasts have finished their seasons.

Being Human is a shoe-in for renewal, Outcasts is already cancelled. (Apparently the US version of Being Human is doing well - some of the dialogue is straight out of the UK version.)

I went to a Q&A with the creator of Being Human, Toby Whithouse, last year. I have read an interview with the creator of Outcasts and read a comment or two from the Producer.

Being Human is enthralling, powerful and threaded with its core theme: being human.

Outcasts was boring. I hate to say that because people worked their arses off to produce it and I desperately wanted to like it.

But now I read what the creator and producer are saying - and basically they are blaming the audience for not liking it, not being willing to put up with it being boring. Also, according to the producer as quoted in SFX, us geeks didn't like it because we just want action and shooty guns and aliens. (He didn't use those words, but that's what he said.) 

Hm, that's why we love Being Human so much then. The action and the shooty guns and the aliens. Well, the last scene of Being Human lasted for nearly 15 minutes, almost all talk and it was gripping - because it was all about the core theme of the show.

I mean I could talk about writers who know nothing of science not realising that writing science fiction doesn't mean you can just make stuff up (manipulating DNA with ultrasound at long range - oh puh-lease, there are fundamental Physics reasons why you couldn't do that) but then we'd be here all night. But even that would have been forgivable if the overall story had been character-driven instead of plot-driven (another common error among those who don't understand SF).

So, what's the difference between the two shows really? Theme and expression of theme. Being Human has it, Outcasts squandered its opportunities. And theme is not characters uttering portentous but ultimately meaningless phrases like "This changes everything" when, in fact, nothing's changed. Which is what we got instead.

There is only one reason why people switched off Outcasts, it broke the fundamental rule of writing: It was boring and that is not the fault of the audience.

(Yes, I know some people liked it, of course some people did, everybody's different and has different tastes, this is all my opinion obviously - but, to the majority, it was not appointment TV and that cannot be argued with.)

It has been suggested, with some justification, that perhaps a writer (especially a wannabe such as I) should not denigrate another writer's work - after all, how would I like it if someone did it to me? I expect I wouldn't like it at all, but I do know that if I had a cataclysmic failure like this, I wouldn't be blaming the audience.

We write to entertain the audience, and if they are not entertained the fault is ours not theirs.

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What's on the turntable? "The Rube Thing" by the Esbjorn Svensson Trio from "E.S.T. Live in Hamburg"

What which? Eh?

I have popped my 15 min test script combining Being Human and Torchwood characters on to my Shooting People website for anyone to read - click the link of the left - don't forget it's just for fun.

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What's on the turntable? Nuffink

Evening off

As my reward to myself for finishing Scriptfrenzy successfully I'm having the evening off and just watching some TV. And catching up on my email.

Due to my Internet problems I haven't had any email for 2 days and it all came flooding through this evening once the gates were opened - and, as I stepped delicately through the sea of messages, picking my way through the flotspam and jetspam. I came across the report on my fun Being Human/Torchwood 15-minute crossover script. See this for full details.

I have to admit that, after my little debacle with Unit X, I had suffered a little from self-doubt. Was it possible I only had two good scripts in me? I didn't actually believe it, but those little niggles can be hard to squash (even with the heel of your shoe). Besides you can't let something like that stop you. Pah!

So what was the result? It got what you might call a 6/10 - characterisation and dialogue good for all the Being Human characters (particularly George) and Jack Harkness from Torchwood, but less so for Ianto and Gwen. Lots of nice Wizard of Oz references; and basically a fun read.

BUT, viewed as real script, the plot was more Torchwood style so didn't do the Being Human characters any favours and 15 pages really isn't enough for character depth when you have seven major characters (don't forget the baddie: Mrs Wormwood from The Sarah Jane Adventures).

I've decided to get another opinion on this - not because I disagree, I completely agree - but one viewpoint (even one as good as Philip Shelley) is never enough. Not even for this - because you need to be able to compare and contrast viewpoints to extract the full meat.

However it does answer one really important question: Can I write in the voices of characters from someone else's show? Apparently I can.

This is good.

(I'd be lying if I didn't admit that I have spent some time re-doing my background research on my next project, Tec . Have to put together a nice complex plot.)

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What's on the turntable? "Hunter" by Bjork from "Homogenic"

Fun script done

There you go, Which made it to 13 pages in the end, in the first draft anyway.

Got stuck at one point and realised that it wasn't working with just the two groups because they are both good guys and there was insufficient plot to have them at each other's throats. Instead I brought in a bad guy from the Sarah Jane Adventures to be the cause of the trouble.

I'm pretty pleased with it as it stands, obviously it needs going through a couple of times and smoothing out. I expect there are additional emotions I can bring out. I also need to see if I can fit in "There's no place like home" comfortably - I really want it and there is one character that can say it but it didn't fit the flow at any point.

Joy joy feeling. Be well, citizen.

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What's on the turntable? "I close my eyes and count to ten" by Dusty Springfield

Which witch is which?

As you can see my progress bar is nearly at 50%, I wrote about 5 pages this evening. This section is a bit dialogue heavy and will need some re-writing to trim it and look to see how to clarify the intentions of the various characters within the scene. (Currently it's a bit wishy washy.)

But the two groups have now met. Handling six major characters is quite tricky but we shall see how it goes. This evening on the train I spent some time looking at the different relationships you can have between Gwen, Ianto and Jack on the Torchwood side as opposed to Annie, George and Mitchell from Being Human.

How could the characters interact? What are the similarities and what are the differences? Where will they agree and where disagree?

There's lots of really juicy character stuff you could do, but I'll have to limit it. There's one particular thing I have lined up, poor George he always seems to end up in pain and poor Jack, always winds up dead...

My US Army expert, we'll call him Robert (because that's his name), got back to me today though I haven't read his notes apart from the introduction. Since I'm working on Which I don't want to get side-tracked back to Unit X until I've got the notes from Philip Shelley as well.

Still he was reasonably complimentary "There are many times that you get the military attitude just perfect. What the soldiers would say, how they would act. This adds to the authenticity, believe me."

Which was nice.

But I know there's a bunch of stuff in store for me, that will be less nice. But I want to get it as right as I can within the framework of the story.

It's also interesting, and this has happened with readers on other stories, how on offhand remark about something they don't consider important reveals that you, as the author, have failed to communicate something critically important.

I tore my hair out in Monsters over the fact that every reader assumed that the main character, Chloe, was supernaturally strong - when she was just using one of the simplest Jujitsu moves to immobilise someone, that anybody can be taught in a few minutes. I'm not 100% sure I ever solved it.

And, with Robert, there was a throwaway comment that showed I had got something wrong. It should be relatively easy to fix - much easier than the jujitsu thing. Of course, not being a proper script reader, Robert is offering solutions as well, but I was expecting that so I'm not offended. I asked for his advice and he's giving it, for free.

So. Tomorrow is Friday and I'm not heading home in the afternoon as I usually do because I shall be in work on both Saturday and Sunday. Not a delightful prospect, it can be very lonely here. On the other hand, lots of time for writing in the evenings. Should get Which wrapped up.

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What's on the turntable? "Tubular Bells Part Two" by Mike Oldfield from "Tubular Bells".

All the fun of the fair

Well I finally managed to stop procrastinating about 10:00pm this evening, because I really really had to start writing Which.

And I did.

Oh, what a jolly time I'm having - and I've chopped out one of the TV shows I was going to incorporate.

Just because I'm writing something fun doesn't mean that I'm not applying all the tools at my disposal, because it still needs to be good (hopefully).

The TV programmes I'm combining are Being Human and Torchwood. And I've started the story by echoing the opening of Ep.1 of Being Human (script). Cutting to a brief scene in the Torchwood Hub (Cardiff), then an all-action sequence in Bristol.

But the writing tools? As Lucy mentioned on her blog the other day, consequence is everything - everything in your script must flow logically, and as a dependent action, from the previous event. Aristotle, over 2000 years ago, warned against episodic stories, so this has been known about for a while.

In his book "Writing a Great Movie", Jeff Kitchen expounds a technique which helps you to write consequential plot lines. It involves starting at the end and working backwards. You write down the end you want and say "which is caused directly by...". You do this at a high level for the overall action. Then do the same for each sequence within the story. And then even down to individual scenes.

I applied this technique to Which as I came home on the train today. Obviously it didn't take very long because I'm only aiming for 10-15 pages. But the important thing was that I had planned to include The Sarah Jane Adventures in the story as well but, using this technique, it was found to be surplus to requirements.

So there we go. Fun fun fun.

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What's on the turntable? "Amarok" by Mike Oldfield (58 minutes in)

Questions, questions...

Still preparing for the Toby Whithouse Q&A tomorrow.

I suddenly realised how I could watch the final episode of Being Human. The BBC iPlayer has a download option, I had rejected this previously because the download speed on Rubbish Internet is so bad that, well, here's an example: I'm downloading Patrick Moore's latest Sky at Night, just the 30 minutes version, and it will take over 60 hours to do the last 60%, currently doing 52 bytes/second. (You thought I was joking about my Rubbish Internet.)

But I get much better response at the office during the day - why not download during the day and watch in the evening? Why not indeed. So I did. But even then it took 6 hours!

However it worked and I watched said episode. Phew. Not as totally brilliant as the rest of the series, there'll be questions.

Yes, a lot of questions. Twenty-five (25) in fact, and I've just thought of another one for the list, so 26 questions. I hope no one else has got any. Perhaps I should write them on strips of paper and hand them out.

Still, it means there won't be any awkward silences, I'll always be there to fill the breach with "Hi ... my name is Addy, and ... I'm a screenwriter." No, no awkward silences, just awkward "Has anybody else got a question?"

On my Precautions Just In Case, I have written the URL to my scripts on the back of ten (10) of my business cards - just in case I meet anyone Important. And now I've realised I forgot to mention Monsters is shortlisted for ... some ... writing? ... prize ... I think ... can't quite remember now ... so long ago.

Rubbish Internet is now down to 2 bytes/second. Pathetic. You might wonder why I'm even bothering, well I want to download Heroes tomorrow at work so I'm hoping to get as much done of this as I can so I have time. And, to be fair, it will get better as the evening wears on, plus I can leave it going over night.

Right. Fix website, write some of Running.

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What's on the turntable? "Crime of the Century" by Supertramp from "Crisis, what crisis?" (How ironic.)