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Day 3 Assignments
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11 Replies
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Lance’s Characters for Horror
What I learned from this assignment is an interesting array of universal characters. I’m used to thinking Protagonist, antagonist, and love interest but this lesson brought a lot more character archetypes to consider.
Tell us your Concept and the Group you have chosen.
A malevolent spirit has taken over Nathan’s body and it threatens to harm and kill Nathan’s wife Hailey and their friends.
Social group – Nathan and Hailey and their friends.
2. Tell us the Dying Pattern of this movie.
Dying Pattern B: Hailey experiences terror and survives. Her husband may die and one or two of their friends will die.
3. Give us an Identity and a sentence for each character that makes up your group.
Rescuer: Hailey tries to save her husband when she understands what is really going on.
Innocent: Nathan’s body has been taken over by a spiteful phantom who takes pleasure in other’s pain.
Moral One: Hailey’s friend Vanessa tries to help her get free of Nathan and when they realize what is happening, she tries to help save Nathan.
Sacrificial Lamb: Rita, a woman Marshal meets while in control of Nathan. Marshall obtains the unrealized desires he had for Hailey on Rita.
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Cameron Martin’s Characters for Horror
What I learned doing this assignment is…a different way of approaching characters. It’s weird coming up with so many characters where most have two purposes, one being to die horribly. It’s almost liberating in a way. I’m usually not nice to my characters to begin with, and have at times killed them off maybe a little too soon depending on whether they’ve fulfilled their story purpose. Never seen THE PURGE, but I’ll be sure to give it a watch and look out for these different character mechanics in other horror movies in the future. Also, in just continuing the brainstorming from the previous lesson, I’m finding the “group” of people is an easy step to overlook. For THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLARS, I knew what I wanted the main character to be, but I didn’t even think about the group until I started having to fill in the blanks. Without the group, it would’ve been closer to noir than a horror with noir elements. In taking this step to figure out the group mechanics and the characters, I found myself going in directions I might not have considered otherwise. The cicada monsters from the previous story were supposed to be part of a genuinely scary story, but brainstorming my way from Family Group, to Family Reunion, to Wedding made for an amazing discovery and potentially hilarious concept. That and the Kaiju storm chasing team (I realize GODZILLA 2000 already did this to a minor degree) were fun ideas that really helped me to flesh out more unique concepts going into this course.
BARE YOUR TEETH (working title)
Concept: In a last ditch effort to secure Stalingrad, Hitler releases the Nazi’s terrifying and untested secret project: Dinosaur hybrids. Now a ragtag group of Nazi and Communist soldiers have to make it out of the death trap that is Stalingrad if they are to succeed in their efforts to defect.
(Side note: What about bear hybrids for the sake of that pun: BEAR YOUR TEETH?)
Group: Team of Professionals
Dying Pattern: A – Put Six to Eight characters together and kill them off one by one
Characters:
Leader – Captain Fritz: Anti-Nazi/Pro German Army man organizes a group of German defectors to abandon Stalingrad
Rescuer – Lieutenant Grumman: Once proud to wave the Nazi flag when providing aid to China during the Japanese invasion, Grumman has since become disillusioned with the party and tries to recover the pride he once had in saving people rather than killing them.
Out of Control – Private Katz: A faithful believer in Nazi propaganda, the Private’s desire to return home to his newly expecting wife exceeds his desire to carry out the Nazi agenda..sometimes
Love Interest – Anastasia: A humble shopkeeper’s daughter turned deadly sniper, who begins to form a bond with Grumman when he saves her after she tried to kill him.
Introvert – L: A person from the steppes that was conscripted to fight for the red army, and struggles to communicate with the others
Complainer – Brutus: A red army captain that talks at length about the bureaucratic process of giving his subordinates orders he knows will fail.
The Carrier: Colonel Reitz: A super Nazi that botches the release of the dinosaur hybrids onto the city.
IT! CRASHED MY WEDDING (working title)
Concept: Every few millennia, ancient cicada-like monsters rise up from deep underground and kill off most life on earth. A wedding is crashed by this event when one of the monsters rises up at the “I do’s.”
Group: Social Event
Dying Pattern: A – Put Six to Eight characters together and kill them off one by one.
Characters:
Leader: The Groom – Apocalypse nerd gets his shot to prove his interests weren’t a complete waste of time, when he’s called to save both his family and his newly wed wife’s family
Love Interest: The Bride – Tries to make the most of her wedding by continuing the festivities wherever she can while family members get eaten
Obnoxious: The Father of the Bride – Seeks any way to separate The Groom and The Bride, disapproving of his daughter’s choice in a nerd.
Rebel: Mother of the Bride – Dotes over The Groom and Bride, and does whatever she can to subvert her husband.
Complainer: Mother of the Groom – Nitpicks every small detail, even in the face of the apocalypse
Sacrificial Lamb: Aunt Gertrude and Uncle Phil – Just…the worst…
THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLARS (working title, and yeah I know it’s probably borderline copyright infringement)
Concept: A detective tries to solve a string of grisly, cannibalistic murders that link up to a famous crime fighting superhero.
Group: Team of Professionals
Dying Pattern: A – Put Six to Eight Characters together and kill them off one by one
Characters:
Leader: Detective Ryker – Leading a task force on finding a serial killer that’s been eating criminals.
Innocent: The Kid – New guy, fresh out of the academy and a big fan of the city’s resident superhero. Eager to make a name for himself and meet his hero.
Red Herring: Detective Barnes – competitor to Ryker and sympathizer to the killer, or at least supports the killing of the criminals.
Rebel: Sergeant O’Donnell – The Muscle of the group, retiring from the SEAL Teams to live a more peaceful life in the homicide division of the police force
Love Interest: Penny Yeager – A reporter and on again, off again flame for Detective Ryker. Her investigative skills rival his.
Monster Bait? (Don’t know fully what this is yet): The Bishop – A crime lord that’s also trying to solve the murders of his men, while staying one step ahead of the cops.
SPINES (working title)
Concept: The real horror is what the monster leaves behind. A Kaiju attack leaves a haze of radiation over a ruined city, and a group of survivors struggle to keep from turning into an image of the monster that attacked their city.
Group: Thrill Seekers (Storm chasers for Kaiju)
Dying Pattern: A – Put 6 to 8 characters together and kill them off one by one (this is getting repetitive, but it kinda makes sense to me. I mean, do you consider becoming a monster “surviving”)
Characters:
Leader: Will – manages the Kaiju chasing team and ensures all safety regulations are taken seriously
Love Interest: Sybil – Monster conservationist and wife to Will. She keeps group informed on behavior patterns of radioactive monsters.
Complainer: Simon – Computers wiz and general grouch. Won’t be in a good mood because optimism jinxes the operation, but is excellent at maintaining equipment and keeping contact with the outside.
Red Herring: Connie – Monster scientist and rival to Sybil. She studies kaiju anatomy and believes it may hold the key to curing many ailments, and replicates the specific radioactive process that occurs in kaiju
Introvert: Dan – Radiation expert and particularly shy around Connie. He helps her in many of her experiments, so that he can be closer to her, while also informing the group on proper radiation safety protocol
The Carrier: Gary – The best damned driver, and don’t you forget it. Ironically, the one who’s the best at keeping the group out of danger winds up being the one to lead them to their doom.
OPEN WIDE
Concept: On a recently colonized planet, a single father and his special needs son must find a way to work together and heal their relationship in order to survive a deadly infestation of alien, parasitic worms that infect and turn everyone in his colony into ravenous monsters.
Group: Social Group
Dying Pattern: Kinda a combination of A and C. I mean, the father and son make it, barely. But a whole lot of other people die.
Characters:
Leader: Sully – goes out of his way to protect and save his son
Innocent: Isaiah – high functioning Aspie who’s obsessed with the alien parasites and studied them in secret
Rescuer: Jude – Spy who rescues Sully and Isaiah as penance for her assisting the interstellar Hegemony cover up their involvement with the recent alien outbreaks.
Moral One: Markus – Holy man that is conscripted to fight aliens and quell any uprising of deserters
Out of Control – Apollo – Draft dodger, like Markus, who tries to start a mutiny to get out of fighting aliens when he’s conscripted.
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Matthew Frendo’s Characters for Horror
What I learned doing this assignment was what elements make up a good horror film and how to start implementing them. This will make future scripts more horror-fiic!
Group: Social Event
Dying Pattern: A. Kill off 6-8 characters one at a time
Characters:
Leader Kelly is the only one with outdoor skills and is nice to everyone, becoming a natural leader in this situation.
Moral One Samid is a stout Muslim…and his father is an oil producer in Saudi Arabia.
Love interest Jimmy is a crypto enthusiast who believes he will change the world through his tech inventions.
Innocent Sam has been homeschooled his whole life…and because of that he comes off as awkward, but has his own way of seeing things.
Rule Breaker Juliet is a leftist anarchist who rebels against anything she can find.
Monster Bait Jessica is the school President, head cheerleader and biggest mean girl ever.
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Alfred’s Characters for Horror.
What I learned: To focus on the characters and that not everyone has to die.
1) Creature stalking and eating minority children. Group is a families in an urban neighborhood.
2) Dying pattern – The characters experience the terror and survive together but one or two will die.
3) Gabriel Freeman – father and science teacher at the nearby high school. He’s the leader.
Sierra Freeman – Gabriel’s wife. She’s the moral center of the group.
Eboni Freeman – Gabriel and Sierra’s 16 year old daughter. She’s the complainer.
Omar Pope – the Red Herring. He actually is working with the monster.
Sara – her son was grabbed by the monster. She’s out of control.
Tavian – Sara’s son. He’s an innocent.
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Eric Humble’s Characters for Horror
What I learned doing this assignment is: that just because you’re adding a list of accepted roles for the cast doesn’t mean they have to be stock characters. This is something I’ve struggled with regarding my horror scripts in the past. I often go into it feeling like I don’t just want two dimension, cliched characters but I end up with a script that doesn’t contain the genre conventions. I’ve had a breakthrough with this lesson that while the roles themselves may be typical, what they do is serve to ensure the genre conventions are met – and I still have the freedom to flesh these characters out with depth and complexity that will make them original and fresh in the script.
Concept: After blacking out at a party, a college student and her friends are stalked on the subway in the predawn hours by a masked man who is only visible when they’re drunk or high.
Group: Social group – classmates and close friends
2. Tell us the Dying Pattern of this movie.
Put 6 to 8 characters together and kill them off one by one.
3. Give us an Identity and a sentence for each character that makes up your group.
Innocent – Introvert / Loner: Rachel is an Amish student who comes from a closed-off, ultraconservative religious society. She’s using her one year away from the community to experience the city and work on a nursing degree… and she’s deathly afraid of alcohol or drugs, not so much because of her religious beliefs but because her father was a raging alcoholic and she doesn’t want that to be her fate as well.
The Carrier – Rebel / Rule Breaker: The one who brings the horror to the group – Mackenzie, Rachel’s free-spirited, hard-partying roommate who insisted everyone go to the party across town in the Industrial District. Likes to take risks and live dangerously.
Red Herring: Bremmer – an older man, not one of the friends, who was at the party and tried to assault Rachel. He’s still around and still dangerous.
Love Interest or lovers: Noah – a med student Rachel has a crush on.
Leader: Bill, Mackenzie’s boyfriend. Tough, military experience.
Out of control / Obnoxious: Roach, slacker student, wealthy background – who, unbeknownst to the others, has brought hard drugs with him and knows how to obtain more from a drug dealer in the area.
Complainer: Veronica, sick with a cold (and brought medicine which will eventually aid them), never wanted to go out tonight to begin with.
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Scott Kaplan’s Characters for Horror
What I learned doing this assignment is that characters can be both good and bad; a gray area. They can evolve and change the outcome of your concept.
1. Concept: Ghost story of a cult utilizing a gateway to summon spirits to kill innocent victims.
Group: Team of Professionals(a sheriff and a priest) / Social Group(5 neighbors that live on Seminole Street). Two groups chosen, who join forces together to stop the cult. It is a direct expression of being diametrically opposed to the concept… stop the antagonists!
2. Dying Pattern: Put seven charcters together. Most will be killed. One of the victims will be a member of the cult who turns against this cult, only to be killed. This sets off a chain of events that lead us into Act III.
3. Characters:
Leader: Max – Fearless leader and Rescuer who takes charge of thr revolt against the cult.
Love interest: Shwin is a co-protagonist. She is also Innocent and scared, but rises up to the challenge with her boyfriend Max… to thwart the cult and sprirts.
Complainer: Jean is a local restauranteur. He complains incessantly, angry that his property that has become a boatyard for two members of the cult.
Rebel: Pat – a handyman, always at odds with neighbors. He breaks a lot of rules.
Moral One: Father Bob. He is the Pastor at the local church. Revered by many, he is brought in to “exorcise” the cult and spirits that they summoned.
Red Herring: Dick Sheriffs. He is the law in this small town. We are unsure which side of the fence he resides on.
Sacraficial Lamb: Stacy starts out as a member of the cult, only to turn against them. He has a “crisis of conscience” which leads to his death. His knowledge enables the revolt to turn the deadly spirits against his former Harbor Rat members.
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ATAUR’S CHARACTERS FOR HORROR
What I learned is: Thanks to the prompts in the Assignment – A great layered sketching of Character. Further, as I explored characters, I backed up into tweaking the concept itself.
CONCEPT
REVENGE OF THE GOOD SHIP ESSEX
A coastal town is revisited by gruesome murders it committed thirty years ago, until it finds out the truth and attempts partial restitution.
GROUP
Sailors, on a cargo ship which ran aground and was marooned on rocks.
DYING PATTERN
Characters guilty in varying degrees, of gruesome killings on the marooned ship, are now getting picked off one by one until the town solves the mystery and makes partial restitution.
CHARACTERS
Leader – obnoxious bully – the mastermind of the atrocities.
Rebel/Rule Breaker – narcissist, putting on a show.
Loser, short, fat, sallow – took particular pleasure in shooting a harpoon into the back of a freed slave attempting to escape.
Assorted losers, joiners, looking for fellow feeling in their new tribe
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Brandon’s Characters for Horror
What I learned: The more realistic the characters, the more the audience will believe in the horror.
1. Concept: High school friends find themselves victims of the Headless Horseman.
The Group: Social Group: A clique of high school drama kids; one of them has an interest in the supernatural and amateur ‘ghost-busting’
2. Dying Pattern:
A. 6 characters will die one by one with 2-3 survivors.
3. Give us an Identity and a sentence for each character that makes up your group.
Moral One— Julian, soft-spoken behind the scenes kid; in love with Sofia; trusts too easily
Rescuer – Sofia, the talented star of her high school plays; always in the spotlight; always positive, with a ‘can-do’ attitude until the end
Leader—Dodge, Sofia’s boyfriend, amateur ghost-buster; set builder; jack-of-all-trades; competent but wild
Complainer/Skeptic – Lacy, stage manager; smart but neurotic; kind of the Scully of the group; thinks too much and gives up too easily
Rebel/Rule Breaker – Owen, former high school wide receiver, quit school to take care of his baby. Always takes the unconventional route. Was even a rebel when he took a role opposite Sofia in a high school play.
Introvert/Loner: Oscar, Julian’s Dad, a janitor, who drags Julian into a Revolutionary War reenactment character/job at the local museum to help with the bills.
Out of Control/The Carrier – Judge Farmer – the rich, eccentric fanatic who wins the head of the Hessian Trooper in an auction, awakening the spirit of the Headless Horseman; kind of a creepy Renfield type.
Red Herring – Ichabod Crane. We think he’s a friendly spirit. At first.
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Mark Veau
What I learned doing this assignment is… it’s a great way to make sure your characters are integrated into the story the correct and most thrilling way possible.
The Concept:
“Attack of the Killer Refrigerator 2”
The high school party of the year is about to get sliced, diced and iced by a maniacal metal appliance – Can a group of survivors overcome its deadly wrath or will they be frozen in ts wall of souls forever?
The Group:
B) Social Event – It’s the high school party of the year. Teens pack a Victorian mansion.
C) Social Group – All of our characters are a big part of this group of partying teens.
The Dying Pattern:
A) Put 6 or 8 characters together and kill them off one by one.
The Characters:
Fred LaVigne – Fifteen – younger brother to one of the most popular girls in school, Molly, the party’s host. Fred is president of the “Attack of the Killer Refrigerator” fan club and a major horror movie buff. He is THE CARRIER because he wins the original Refrigerator movie prop in an online auction and it’s delivered to the house “just in time” for his sister’s party. Fred also exhibits his role as a LEADER/RESCUER/LOVE INTEREST as the mayhem around the survivors becomes more terrifying.
Molly LaVigne – Eighteen – Fred’s older sister – she exhibits both the INNOCENT and THE COMPLAINER traits as her party is ruined with all this death.
Samatha Ryan – Eighteen – Molly’s best friend and THE most popular girl in school. She is in a relationship with Derek, a bully and Fred’s adversary. She plays both the INNOCENT and LOVE INTEREST roles and dabbles in the MONSTER BAIT role as well. She is in an on and off relationship with Derek, but surprisingly, she has feelings for Fred.
Derek Sanders – Eighteen – The class “thug” who is “dating” Samantha is definitely the very definition of the REBEL/RULE BREAKER role. He hates Fred more than anything and the only reason he hasn’t killed him yet, is because he is friends with Molly.
Nick – Seventeen – Another REBEL/RULE BREAKER and Derek’s right hand man.
Patel “Slasher” Slasherelli – Fifteen – Fred’s best friend. Slasher plays the role of RESCUER with a splash of RED HERRING – He also possesses some INTROVERT/LONER qualities… as does Fred.
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This reply was modified 3 years ago by Mark Veau.
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This reply was modified 3 years ago by
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Tina’s Characters for Horror
I found it hard to come up with more character because I envisioned it mainly as a coming of age of a witch – her journey to finding her power and fighting the demon. All the others are mainly under the influence of the demon until they are rescued
1. Tell us your Concept and the Group you have chosen.
A demon keeps patients in a beauty clinic as his livestock to feed on their dormant witch powers, until they are an empty shell and released.
A group of patients in the beauty clinic
2. Tell us the Dying Pattern of this movie.
The characters experience the terror and survive together, but one or two die.
There’s more ‘collateral’ but the meaningful deaths are just 1-2
3. Give us an Identity and a sentence for each character that makes up your group.
The Rescuer/The Chosen One
A 16 year old girl doesn’t know she’s a witch. She has to learn how to unleash her powers to defeat the demon.
The aunt – Leads the clinic / is a puppet for the demon
Appears as the Moral One under influence of the monster / her true self is The Rebel
The female patients of the beauty clinic – Monster Bait
under control of the demon – their true selfs only come out when he doesn’t feed on their powers
The villagers
The Love Interest (for the aunt) – The Mayor
They ignore strange incidents to keep the money from the clinic coming
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Marc KOENIG’s Characters for Horror
What I’ve learned doing this assignment is to start brainstorming about plot and interest techniques through the creation of the characters and their « role » in the deadly journey.
Movie: ELEMENT 119
Group: Team of professionals (scientists)
Dying pattern: 7 characters together, killed one by one.
Carrier: Jennifer – scientist – She behaves as a fierce predator to kill and contaminate any organic being, as a carrier of the initial gem of Element 119.
Leader: Sally – the expert in crystals and chemicals – she’s the most qualified to understand, anticipate and neutralize the monster
Moral one: Jim – the carrier’s husband – he does what he can to keep the whole team alive while trying to find a solution to save his wife. He’ll end up saving her and become the new carrier, releasing the monster outside
Rescuer: John – the maintenance operator – his skills in mechanics and his bravery make him the savior on multiple occasions
Red herring: Scott – the computer expert – isolated in a control room, he communicates with the team in the lab. He can lock or unlock doors, switch power on and off, etc. He turns out to be a mole from the CIA in charge of keeping Sally’s research under survey. His goal is to keep the monster alive and capture it to make it a new weapon
Obnoxious: Julia – scientist, secretly in love with Jim – her only goal is to survive, even if it means sacrificing all others, except for Jim, who would be the last she would consider to let behind her
Rulebreaker: Irina – the team rookie – takes her own decision without any consideration of the leader’s instructions. She turns out to be a spy. Her goal is to destroy the threat and get away from Scott who unmasked her
Monster baits: a few soldiers called in by Scott – heavily armed but very quickly slaughtered by Jennifer
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