Day 1 Assignment

[Daniel Melin]

Daniel Melin’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is The value of continually distilling one’s ideas into their punchiest and most efficient forms.

1. Present your Concept.

A. A purposeless carpenter learns magic…

B. …to lift the fairy curse he’s under…

C. …tapping into unknown reserves of strength and willpower…

D. …while navigating the magical underworld of his hometown.

2. Tell us the World of this show.

Unique
Sub-World: The city of Athens, Minnesota, and its magical underworld: Everlasting
Summer.
Previously
unexplored: An ostensibly ordinary city with unexplored magical
possibilities.
The
unknown: What is the strange world of Everlasting Summer? Why do the
boundaries between it and Athens seem to be crumbling?
The
unseen: Everlasting Summer’s enchanted citizens, the hidden depths of the
castle, and the depths beneath that that may even lead to hell itself.
Unheard
of Dangers: Werewolves, magical traps, and the things over which Lizzie
has no control.
Reason
to explore it: It is the only way that Tom can lift the curse Lizzie has
placed on him.

[David]

I learned how fun, important, and useful making lists of words and ideas can be. It is a powerful way to craft a thought into a useful tagline. Listing “What ifs” as hooks (why would people want to spend time to watch your world?) was a freeing exercise that helps your mind wander and make interesting discoveries that ultimately help to focus the ideas.

Rebecca – A do-good midlevel UN Secretary witnesses an alien abduction that challenges and changes her understanding of the Universe as she is captivated by the supernatural world.

Unique Subworld – Paranormal and alien abduction experiences and research

Previously Unexplored – Alien Abductions and other paranormal events

The Unkown – Alien species

The Unseen – Government counterintelligence. Alien species methodology and behavior.

Unheard Dangers – Kidnapping, Death, emotional trauma, insanity, loss of identity.

Reason – Understand a larger version of the Universe and how the Human race is part of this vision.

Jakob – An ex-police officer is obsessed with proving that UFOs are visiting Earth while Government agencies prevent him from learning the deeper meaning that only a few people understand and will kill to protect that information.

Unique Subworld – Alien encounters of the 1st-5th kind, Science and religion.

Previously unexplored – Alien behavior and meaning to humans as a species

The Unknown – What aliens may want on Earth

The Unseen – That Humans have special and unique traits.

Reasons to Explore – Examination of human behavior in relation to themselves and the Earth. Saving humanity from a self inflicted destruction and graduating to a more universal being.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 11 months ago by  David Stam. Reason: make a part more defined and less redundant
• This reply was modified 3 years, 11 months ago by  David Stam. Reason: Added another main Character

[Emmanuel Sullivan]

Emmanuel Sullivan’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is the idea and rules for a high concept movie also apply to TV.

Show Concept

A. Two former presidents from opposing parties launch an innovative, bipartisan civic foundation…

B. …senior management (their offspring) and the press constantly derail the venture…

C. …the former leaders of the free world struggle to maintain control…

D. …and use unconventional methods to stay afloat and relevant in politics.

Show World

Unique Sub-World: The inner workings of a nonprofit foundation

Previously unexplored: Daily life for former presidents.

The unknown: How will millennial siblings manage a family foundation?

The unseen: How are foundations funded and who supports them.

Unheard of Dangers: Are the foundation funding sources clean, free of audits and fraud?

Reason to explore it: What is first family life like after leaving the White House.

[Jane Turville]

Jane’s Intriguing Concept and World – What I learned doing this assignment is how difficult it is to condense ideas down into one walloping good concept. Mine certainly isn’t there yet but just getting words on the page helps to make a start. Also, thinking about the world you’re taking the audience into using specific short bullet points helped me understand how I can present this world in the way that I want to – a horrible world coated with a glaze of serenity, peace and innocence.

13 WEEKS

1. Concept

A. The plans of a17-year-old misfit on the verge of kidnapping her younger blind sister to save her from neglect …

B. are blocked when 3 other misfits, each with a connection to a dead human trafficker, involve her in murder.

C. Together with the others, she must discover her own strength and cunning …

D. to save herself from paying the price for murder or being the next murder victim.

2. World

Unique Sub-World: The sordid world of human trafficking

Previously unexplored: Weaknesses in the trafficking ring that leave vulnerability

The unknown: How far into the community does this world seep?

The unseen: Who is actually involved? Who does not want it disrupted?

Unheard of Dangers: Any action could mean death for the ring’s victims as well as those who threaten it.

Reason to explore it: To keep loved ones safe.

[Stuart Voytilla]

Stuart’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is the power of the questions to get deeper into my concept and world. The assignment’s deeper questions allowed me to have a stronger grasp of my show’s bingeworthy potential (especially the world). These have already offered strength and depth of these two important introductory hooks for my show’s evolving Framework and Bible. Great discoveries. Thank you, Hal (and your development team!)

1. My Show’s Concept:

A. A kind-hearted crippled dwarf, enslaved as the court’s fool,

B. …for the tyrannical king who massacred his family and abuses his secret love

C. …transforms into a merciless angel of death

D. …as he deviously exacts vengeance upon the king and his ministers.

2. My Show’s World:

Unique Sub-World: Poe’s nightmarish story landscape; fool manipulates power-hungry king and ministers

Previously unexplored: king’s passion for horrific practical jokes; the disabled and abused as protagonist/hero

The unknown: ruthless king and ministers; fairy tale turned dark nightmare; shadows, deceptions, mistrust, conspiracies and pacts

The unseen: a conspiracy to resurrect the king’s murdered brother and restore him to power

Unheard of Dangers: suspicions of many to reveal Hop-Frog’s deception; question of trust between Hop-Frog and Trippetta

Reason to explore it: the king is played as the fool (the joke is on him); disabled and women claiming power and voice; exploding Poe into an anthology serial horror; current political climate (totalitarian rulers and their sycophants)

[Joseph Eastburn]

Joe’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is… Choosing aspects that we might never have seen on TV makes my show unique.

1. Present your Concept.

A.
Engaging and highly proactive hero…

Ruby Kane, a female detective in small “Gold Rush” town, is haunted by flashbacks of her dead entomologist father who warns her the town has a dark history;

B.
…up against a major conflict…

she catches men who rape older women, who get off through the help of friends, are moved but keep offending,

C.
…goes on unique transformational journey…

so, she follows them, and punishes them herself by injecting them with insect venom,

…Into an intriguing world.

and when she finds out the town was created as a hunting ground, her mission is to stop the ongoing evil.

2. Tell us the World of this show.

Unique
Sub-World:

A town where men prey on and rape older women

Previously
unexplored:

A town created as hunting ground where rapists go

The
unknown:

How it was created, who funded it, why it was able to come into being?

The
unseen:

Ruby’s father spoke of a ghost world underneath the actual world of the town

Unheard
of Dangers:

A tragedy on the order of ‘The Donner Party’ may have struck the early inhabitants

Reason
to explore it:

In a time when every day rape allegation come to light, this is an American town that was created for and by rapists who lure older women so they can hunt them

[Barbara Gilmore]

Module 2 Assignment 1

What I learned from this assignment is that I don’t have all the answers but that I’ll continue to create, to improve, to refine, and to elevate.

Green Lake

Concept

A. A former big city Detective partners with a local County Sheriff to help solve a gruesome murder and disappearance with the same MO as that of her brother’s case

B. After her big city career ambitions are thwarted

C. But first she must learn to live as a local in the same village where she, her parents, and brother used to summer vacation

D. As she aspires to take over the County Sheriff’s small but powerful office

The World

Unique Sub-World: A sleepy vacation town with an abnormally high death rate

Previously unexplored: Where Crime, Paranormal Activity, and threats from the Natural Environment collide

The unknown: Will Jess solve the crimes; Will she be killed first

The unseen: Everyone in the town has committed a crime

Unheard of Dangers: Paranormal Activity; Pollution; Animals and Birds behaving weirdly; The whirlpools under Green Lake

Reason to explore it: To find out what happened to her brother

[Renee Brown]

ASSIGNMENT:M2 Lesson 1 Concept and World

What I learned from this assignment is that every time I re-frame info I have built into my framework, the description morphs just a bit and drops into its intended puzzle hole.

Concept: Renee Brown’s Alien Earth

When a strange planet appears between earth and mars, humanity learns that aliens have inhabited earth for eons. The accepted history of the ancient world is obliterated as humanity and aliens struggle to understand earth’s ancient past and new reality.

Unique Sub-World: Underground caverns of the Longheads, ocean trench cities of the Deepers, high atmosphere cloaked stations of the Skyfliers.

Previously Unexplored: Told mainly from the POV of the alien leaders and the secret agent who mediates for them with humanity.

The unknown: What is this strange planet, where did it come from, and what does it want? What is humanity’s true ancient history?

The unseen: Ancient alien efforts to save humanity, current alien plans to dominate humanity, and humanity’s self-destructive reaction as accepted history crumbles.

Unheard of Dangers: A new alien kid on the block…the Greys – arrive in the 1940’s and have a terrible agreement with elite humans.

Reason to explore it: To save earth, its new interstellar community, and its all but forgotten true ancient history.

[Donna Stockwell]

Donna Stockwell’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is exploring the behaviour of people on a high level is quite revealing, and empowering to see the whole world at once.

Present your concept and world.
1. Present your Concept.
A. Engaging and highly proactive hero… A seemingly stable husband and father
B. …up against a major conflict… is married to a woman who takes (and marries) their daughter’s boyfriend — betrayals of the mother to the family
C. …goes on unique transformational journey… to figure out how to trap love
D. …into an intriguing world. .. by murdering and burying the bodies in the graveyard with his brother (a gravedigger) ’s help.

2. Tell us the World of this show.
Unique Sub-World: wife is controlled emotionally and financially
Previously unexplored: how the emotional excitement of getting married is crushed by the realities of a sociopath
The unknown: how women explore relationships; while a mother is trying to show her daughter how to treat a her boyfriend, she falls in love with him;
The unseen: how the daughter responds to her mother’s teachings, no matter how perverse they turn
Unheard of Dangers: the moral dilemma of crushing a weak mother-daughter bond for love
Reason to explore it: an unspoken respect of women not stealing each other’s boyfriends is taken to the extreme when the two women are mother and daughter.

World 2 of this show.
Unique Sub-World: hiding evidence, namely the bodies
Previously unexplored: grave-diggers, grave-robbers, loyalty to mothers
The unknown: it is dangerous to dig 6’ and 12’ graves, grave-robbing, moving graves closer to living residences as family moves
The unseen: the intricacies of the digging graves and moving bodies, empty graves before a holiday weekend for expectant deaths
Unheard of Dangers: grave walls collapsing while being dug, gravediggers coming out of vaults when coffin is installed
Reason to explore it: it is the working-man’s world of the funeral business

[Cooper James]

What I learned doing this assignment is there are many steps to create a binge-worthy series and having an intriguing concept and world are very important. Tiny steps are good. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither is a great series. Trust the process and the results will reveal themselves at the right time.

Edgemont

Show Concept

A. A single mother becomes a ruthless assassin to save her twin sons and aging father’s home and family fortune…

B. …when they are attacked by dangerous forces…

C. …she discovers her full power…

D. …as she becomes a reluctant leader.

Show World

Unique Sub-World: The desperate and grimy world of a dystopian future.

Previously unexplored: How to gain power and control.

The unknown: How the outside forces/regions will respond.

The unseen: Her father’s betrayal and her son Roman’s run for Senator/Senator Green’s plan to capture Edgemont and turn it into his new headquarters.

Unheard of dangers: The outside forces/regions kill with impunity

Reson to explore it: The only way to say her family and their future.

EDGEMONT WORLD: The dystopian future where the powerful are few but mighty and those who challenge them do so at their peril.

[John Anderson]

John Anderson’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment is… What a pitch bible is and that there really is a template that is pretty straight forward to making a pitch bible

Module 2 – Lesson 1: What Makes a Great TV Pitch Bible?

ASSIGNMENT:

Present your concept and world.

1. Present your Concept.

A. Engaging and highly proactive hero…

B. …up against a major conflict…

C. …goes on unique transformational journey…

D. …Into an intriguing world.

MiG Pilot in soviet Russia during Cold War determines to defect and take his secret plane with him.

2. Tell us the World of this show.

Unique Sub-World: Soviet life during Cold War for a poor person with drive and individualistic spirit.

Previously unexplored: How to climb the rungs into the Soviet system into and through their Airforce

The unknown: Living the life of a MiG pilot is not as rosy as it seems and is full of danger.

The unseen: How the KGB (and CIA) is constantly watching and testing you.

Unheard of Dangers: Corruption is everywhere in every level of the Soviet leadership.

Reason to explore it: His only path to freedom in this repressive system.

Don’t worry if either concept or world are not perfect. You’ll discover other ways to elevate them and make them more intriguing in future lessons. For the moment, just see if you can fill in the blanks and then write a description from there.

[Sherri Coffee]

Sherri D. Coffee Module 2 Assignment 1 Intriguing Concept and World

1. Concept

What if a successful lobbyist is cut off from her dying partner and is threatened by his children, discovers that she must relive her gilded past life to secure her safety.

2. Unique Sub-World – Current backstabbing lobby world; Current NYC financial world and unscrupulous lawyers; Past world 1880’s actress in Theatre company; Past world robber baron rich society.

Previously unexplored: How a woman survives and thrives in the current lobby world and in the past world of an actress in a theatre company.

The unknown: What happened in the past that ignites the current threats to her life?

The unseen: Manipulation and schemes to achieve lobby success; manipulation and schemes women pursue to marry wealthy men in the 1880’s.

Unheard of Dangers: Lobbyist games can send you to prison; An unmarried actress in 1880’s of meager means could end up on the street or an insane asylum.

Reason to explore: What if everything you did in a past life influenced your current life choices?

What I learned is to elevate the environment and the conflict to produce a more intriguing concept.

[Norene Smiley]

NORENE SMILEY – MODULE 2/LESSON 1 – Intriguing Concept & World

What I learned for doing this assignment: I need to continue to hone the backbone of this story. I think I originally had a character in a situation and needed to dig deeper to make it interesting for others and begin to see the big picture journey for myself.

ASSIGNMENT 1 – CONCEPT FOR ‘TROUBLE’

CONCEPT:

• Rebellious orphan

• is violently snatched from safe haven and pursued by megalomaniac and her machines

• realizes she is the ultimate instrument of destruction

• in the final battle between machines and the natural world

2. WORLD OF ‘TROUBLE’

• Unique Sub-World: the steam-punk world of all-powerful machines

• Previously unexplored: endangering last remnants of natural world

• The Unknown: how machines have dominated humankind and reduced them to mindless pleasure-seekers

• The Unseen: what fuels this relentless machine world

• Unheard of dangers: why are the children disappearing

• Reason to explore it: epic struggle for survival of nature

• This reply was modified 3 years, 10 months ago by  Norene Smiley.

[Joseph Eastburn]

(STORY #2)

JOE’S INTRIGUING CONCEPT AND WORLDS

What I learned doing this assignment is… As I started looking at the unique sub-worlds and what
was previously unexplored in TV, I found some interesting aspects of the story
to focus on that haven’t been seen before.

1. A. Engaging and highly
proactive hero… Henry Seymour, a mild-mannered, polite older man, who
was a neighborhood hero when he saved a local kid from drowning.
B. …up against a major
conflict… falls for an online girl who sends him sexy photos and
professes her love to wheedle money out of him.
C. …goes on unique
transformational journey… The only problem is that he doesn’t have money of his
own, so he goes through contortions and lies to get out of the house,
drive or bike to the bank, and steal money from his wife’s and his joint
savings account.
D. …Into an intriguing world…
Falling in love with an online image through photos and
the odd poetry of texting where she always needs more money, and he’s
always trying to get it.

2. Tell us the World of this show.

Unique Sub-World: The slightly alien, cutthroat
world of online sexting when he doesn’t know if she is real, a girl, or
perhaps even a man.
Previously unexplored: The inner world of an older man’s sexual imagination, and how
it upends his life, when all he has to go on are sexy photos and pretty
words. His gullibility.
The unknown: Where is this
experience going to lead him? Will it destroy his 28-year-old marriage,
his relationship with his children, his friends, his neighbors?
The unseen: The strange online
sexting world (who’s really behind these photos and chats?)
Unheard of Dangers: Unseen criminal element
that may use sexting to cheat seniors and hook them into a larger network
of dangers where he or his family could be robbed or killed.
Reason to explore it: It’s going on in the
real world; it’s every older man’s preoccupation; it’s easy to fall prey
to; men and women will be able to relate to this hapless man’s
story.

[Norene Smiley]

Joseph! Love your concept. I haven’t seen anything like it before. Lots of sticky situations for your protagonist to get in, one worse than the other.

[Molly Gagnon]

ASSIGNMENT: Molly McNeal, Carrington Manor’s an underhanded skilled nursing facility who joins forces with Gwenn, an Occupational Therapy Assistant who is in debt to her eyeballs in student loans, to create a codependent relationship with a fraudulent company in order to save her patients from neglect.

What I learned during this assignment is that I just need to keep swimming! My work will not be perfect but it will be worked on.

Present your concept and world.

1. Present your Concept.

A. Engaging and highly proactive hero…

Gwenn is broke and forced to take a job at a corrupt skilled nursing facility.

B. …up against a major conflict…Company forces employees to complete medicare fraud and demented mom won’t sign over her POA to help Gwenn financially.

C. …goes on a unique transformational journey… As Gwenn is asked to bend her moral fibers she becomes more of a risk taker in helping her patients in order to justify her actions.

D. …Into an intriguing world Skilled Nursing Home with patients who never recover, it’s a battle to get the time in with the patients due to poor service, lack of tools, and a corrupt company.

2. Tell us the World of this show.

Unique Sub-World: A unethical and swindling skilled Nursing facility

Previously unexplored: Codependency with the corrupt company

The unknown: What will Gwenn do next to justify her actions?

The unseen: Married Dr, Lesbian boss, Criminal activity in the facility

Unheard of Dangers: Working with wanted criminals, getting investigated by medicare fraud team

Reason to explore it: Only way to pay off huge debt

[Marcus Armstrong]

Marc Armstrong’s Intriguing Concept and World

What I learned doing this assignment was how difficult it is to thoroughly define the World of the show. As I continue developing this, the harder it is to continue until some of my basic premises change.

Concept:

A. Devout Christian and former star athlete…

B. …in a virtually lawless society…

C. …against his own moral compass, seeks vengeance for the murder of his family

D. …but gives his targets one last chance to survive.

World:

Unique Sub-World: A rapidly deteriorating U.S. with minimal police protection

Previously unexplored: Justice is up to the individual

The unknown: Is he outmatched in survival and hunting skills?

The unseen: Alliances are unassured as survival is the primary objective of friend and foe.

Unheard of Dangers: With no due process of law, there is a risk of killing innocent people.

Reason to explore it: Vindication feels good.