this machine will not communicate

Not too many pages today, but I outlined Sequence Four (of which these pages are the beginning), which for me is the hardest sequence.  It's carrying the story to the midpoint, that place where everything tips to a new direction, the hinge; it can kind of be a balancing act to bring the tension up but not overshoot, because you still have plenty to go.  Sequence Four can also be tough from a character standpoint - the act break brought her into a new world and she's slowly becoming acquainted with it.  So on the one hand, S4 sees her more comfortable, figuring things out.  On the other hand, though, she's learning that she's in over her head, that the goal she thought she was achieving with her decision at the act break is actually a false goal (and this will be hammered home at the midpoint).  It's kind of a dichotomy.  My favorite go-to structure model is The Matrix - on the one hand in S4 Neo is learning how to fight, how to operate in the matrix, how to think in a different way, and it's kind of cool.  On the other hand he's realizing that everyone on the ship is depending on him to literally save the entire world - and at the midpoint, he learns that he won't be able to, when the Oracle tells him that he is not the One.  So a lot of the tension in these 10-15 pages is internal, the protagonist warring with herself - she wants to make things work, because this is her new life, but it's getting more and more difficult until it reaches the point where she simply cannot do it.  And then we hit the midpoint and the story heads in a different direction.

Suffice it to say, it's tough.  I think I've got it figured out, but I realized a few days ago that Ilka was in some ways as much a protagonist as Mira, so I'm like having to do two separate character arcs, and interweave them, and I think I kind of fucked up in that the reversal of fortune - that great big X - should have its junction right at the midpoint, and I think they've already switched places.  I'm not sure about the pacing of it. 

Ah well - that's what the process is all about!

( Pages 42-44 )

I really wanted to get the last scene of Act I done tonight, but I'm tired and I don't want to write crap I'll have to rewrite.  So I'll attack it fresh in the morning and go from there.

So remember, I threw out the two previous pages I posted.  This starts after Dominik asks Ilka if they can play a game.

( Pages 22-27 )

Wrote like a boss today.

( Pages 15-22 )

Sometimes I wish I could Ctrl-Z real life.  I was blowing out the candle I had lit and picked up the holder to bring it to me, instead of leaning up to it.  The candle tilted, and I spilled melted wax on my keyboard and desk.  Ctrl-Z!  Undo!  Undo!

So I finished Sequence One today!  I divide a screenplay into eight sequences, each about 10-15 pages long; Act One is S1-2, Act Two is S3-6, and Act Three is S7-8.  It helps me keep track of structure, and it breaks a draft down into more manageable chunks.  So this installment takes us up to the inciting incident, or catalyst.  Whee!
( Pages 7-13 )

Again, mostly just posting for my own benefit - it's a good way to create additional accountability, if nothing else, so feel under no obligation to read.  I only finished outlining the first half, but wanted to go ahead and start drafting, since I had a pretty clear idea of the opening.  The formatting didn't copy over correctly; ah, well.

( Pages 1-3 )

I've decided to do NaNoWriMo! Except that I didn't really have any epic fic ideas ready to go, and if I'm going to do something original, I might as well do a screenplay, since that's more relevant to my interests. Script Frenzy, which is the script equivalent, isn't until April, so I'm just going to kind of freelance this thing. I thought I'd sign up anyway, but after I copy and pasted a 140 page script into Word and learned that it was only 25,000 words...ah well. I don't feel like doing that every day to figure out word counts when it really isn't all that important when it comes to scripts.

But I did think it would be fun to keep track of my progress here. I'm mostly posting this for myself, since I'm a process whore and it's kind of easy to lose track of the early work once you get going - I love seeing how ideas grow and evolve, how things change, etc. So feel under no obligation to read, if you're busy or you're not into it. Of course, criticism is always welcomed, constructive or otherwise; I love workshopping, you know.

( Brainstorming. )