Day 2: Forced to Violate Their Own Values – THE WALKING DEAD

[Judith Watson]

Sheriff Grimes is seems to be honest, caring, and brave.

I haven’t seen this show so I don’t know what happened here.

The way the drama is set up looks like the sheriff is here to help at some tragedy and he is searching for victims. He sees bunny slippers and realizes a little girl needs help.

The little girl is set up with bunny slippers, and she picks up a teddy bear. He calls to her in a gentle voice as she walks away from him her back to him. However, when she turns around, he sees that she is out to get him. In order to protect his life, he must shoot her. Thus violating his children value by having to choose life or death.

Sheriff Grimes is the right character because police are suppose to value life. His future is implied because he will have to deal with the Walking Dead continually and violate his value of life, however, are they alive?

Not sure I thought this clip was a good example of values.

[Robert Kerr]

Bob Kerr

Forced To Violate Their Values

First Time Viewing:

How was this value shown?

Sherriff Grimes quickly identifies the feet and small legs of a child from underneath the vehicle. He hurries to the front of the vehicle and calls out to the little girl who is walking away from him.

What caused him to violate this value and what were the consequences?

Once he recognized the little girl was a part of the Walking Dead he was in a life or death situation and pulled his gun and fired. She falls apparently dead.

Second time viewing:

What drama is this scene built around?

There is mass destruction and the sheriff is looking for survivors. He bends down and sees a little girls feet in bunny slippers. There is hope that he has found a survivor. That quickly changes

What Profile items show up in these two characters?

Having never seen this particular show, I have no backstory to based my analysis.

Right Character: Sheriff is the first responder after the disaster. The little girl is the lost child.

Traits: the sheriff is Brave, concerned dedicated and decisive.

Wound: He has lost a rescue before.

Secret: He has never fired his weapon.

Future: The sheriff will now be hunting as killing the walking dead for some time.

What I learned: You can build tensions and drama by giving hints of a character before you actually see their face.

Breakthrough: In my script Fran has a value of always protecting her daughter. She has a scene where she forgets her child at day care and this can be rewritten to create more tension and drama.

[Joan Butler]

Forced to Violate Their Values

How was
this value shown?

There are children’s toys under the car and he appears to be looking under the car in search of lost children. When he sees the girl, he speaks kindly to her.

What
caused him to violate the value and what were the consequences?

He was afraid for his life so he shot the girl. I don’t know the story so I looked up the consequences. He pushes down his feelings and becomes very hard.

What drama
is this scene built around?

The sheriff is trying to protect children from the walking dead. When he sees the girl, he tries to help her until he realizes she is one of the walking dead. Afraid for his life, he shoots her.

What profile items (right character, traits, secret, wound, future) showed up in these two character’s words and actions?

Right character: The girl is a very frightening antagonist. He is the “good guy” protagonist. In a Western, he would wear a white hat.

Traits: good, kind, frightened vs bad, evil, fearless

Future: Just before he shoots her, they both live the same future ie. She will kill him.

The characters are great because it’s unusual to see such a malevolent child who makes a sheriff fear for his life and go against his values to protect himself.

Breakthrough: I had my protagonist accept $75.000 from a pipeline executive who is about to destroy part of the Boreal forest but it took over the plot and was too hard to get her back to being neutral.

[Lynn Vincentnathan]

What makes this character great from a writing perspective?

Rick is a conscience policeman in a devastating scene, trying to save a little girl. But when she turns, he understands she’s a walking dead. He doesn’t do anything at first, but when she starts to growl and come after him, he shoots her in the head, killing her for good.

It’s a double or triple tragedy for him — concern/compassion for people, earlier telling his partner how his wife accused him of not caring (the ultimate put down for a caring man), and that in front of their son, a cruelty he claims he would never do; sense to duty to rescue people, then having to kill a child. Horrible twist.

Range of emotions, upset about what his wife told him and his son hearing it, horror at the death/destruction situation, horror at himself, etc.

[Lynn Vincentnathan]

Just noticed I went beyond that scene. Because I wasn’t familiar with the show, I read the first part of the script…. into the flashback. But that did give me info on who Rick was.