Day 2 Assignments

[Lois Wickstrom]

Lois’ Amazing Inciting Incident

what I learned – I already did this in previous lessons.

Intriguing Concept: A boy becomes a were-skunk – he has no choice. If he gets sprayed by a skunk, he will become a skunk. He lives on a skunk farm in a small town where everybody loves skunks. He is a child. He cannot leave his family to get away from skunks, and no matter what he does – no matter where he goes – he might get sprayed. If not by a skunk, then by a can of skunk spray, such as those sold to hunters and pranksters.

Act 1: Meff shows off by walking on his hands when he goes to bat. Coach gets angry with him for not showing team spirit and sentences him to pick up garbage after school. Meff is going to be late to his own 11th birthday party.

Midpoint: When Meff finished picking up garbage and is approaching home, when he gets sprayed by a skunk. He becomes a skunk! The skunk invites him to a skunk party. Before he can get there, an owl attacks and the boy barely escapes. He runs to the hen house where his sister is gathering eggs and his mom is milking a goat. His sister loves skunks and starts petting him. He is of two minds – he’s grossed out and he loves it.

Lock In: Another skunk gives Meff a rotten egg, that smells delicious. Meff eats it and becomes a boy again. The enormity of what has happened to him freaks him out. That night, he learns the family secret. Some of them are were-skunks. “Today you have become a skunk.” The skunk who sprayed him was his Aunt Abigail who has chosen to spend her life as a skunk. Meff thinks he can stay safe if he never gets sprayed again. He decides to work in the shop, rather than outdoors with the skunks. But a customer sprays him with skunk-spray, sold to hunters. And then, his sister sells him to a woman who came looking for a pet skunk.

[Lisa Molenda]

Lisa’s Amazing Inciting Incident

What I learned doing this assignment is that I already have a good inciting incident and lock in for a binge worthy show.

1. What is the “Inciting Incident” of your series that this pilot needs to deliver powerfully?

Jane gets hit by slaughterhouse truck and turned into a vampire

2. Give us the main beats of that Inciting Incident:

Intriguing Concept: Vegan Vampire

Act 1: Jane going to school and taking care of her sick mother, while being stalked by someone

Midpoint: Jane gets turned into a vampire

Lock In: Jane chooses to feed on a human so she can live and continue her research and take care of her mother

[Griffith Lambert]

Module 3 Lesson 2

Griff’s Amazing Inciting Incident

What I learned doing this assignment: In order for the pilot to set up the inciting incident, season one has to be a flashback about how things got so out of control and what’s really behind Stephanie’s disappearance.

THE LAST STRAW

PILOT AS INCITING INCIDENT

· The pilot opens with Stephanie oversleeping and getting the boys to school late. It’s clear that this is a pattern.

· When Stephanie returns home to work on an already past deadline, she is interrupted by Marcey, the party girl across the street, loudly coming home after a night out. There is a lot of tension between the two.

· Then school calls – the boys have got into trouble again. Stephanie is warned that social services may step in if things don’t improve.

· When they get home the boys start fighting with each other, and that sets off a battle royale that spills into the street and involves the neighbors.

· Eventually the cops sort things out and everyone goes home after threatening to run away from home for the umpteenth time. In the morning the boys wake up to find Stephanie gone.

Episode two will begin the flashback/flashforward of Season One as the story of how things got so out of hand is revealed.

· Intriguing Concept: Two teenage brothers awake to find their mother missing, presumably ran away from home.

· Act One: Stephanie can’t get the boys to school on time. The counselor threatens to have Social Services intervene.

· Midpoint: Stephanie doesn’t get her work done due to interruptions including the young woman across the street. The boys get in trouble and have to be picked up from school. A big fight spills into the street and involves neighbors and the police.

· Lock in: In the morning Stephanie is gone and the boys are suddenly on their own.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 2 months ago by  Griffith Lambert. Reason: Changed intriguing concept to focus on the boys

[Brenda Clarke]

Lesson 2 Brenda AMAZING INCITING INCIDENT
After doing this exercise it clearly shows the basics are there but needs to be more focused.

1. What is the “Inciting Incident” of your series that this pilot needs to deliver powerfully?

We discover that Harriet is distraught when her maid doesn’t return from her day off. 2. Give us the main beats of that Inciting Incident:

Intriguing Concept:1830’s setting but LGBTQ characters

Act 1: Harriet is a middle class Englishwoman who trains horses for a living

and lives a quite normal life until one morning she discovers her maid hasn’t

returned from her day off.

Midpoint: We discover that Harriet is secretly a lesbian and in a relationship

with her maid Rosie. Elliot narrowly escapes arrest while his lover is caught

for “crimes of an unnatural act”

Lock In: Harriet must find her lover as she can’t bear to live without her.