Lesson 1

[Brenda Boddy]

Brenda Boddy

What I learned doing this assignment…I expected the pilot to end on a hook, but I also noticed that character building in the new world was important to the script to keep the audience engaged. And there were a number of scenes that built on the changes in the new world, while building curiosity and suspense.

1. I chose ‘The 100’ as the show I would follow. After watching multiple trailers, this seemed to fit the model, AN INNOCENT ON A MISSION IN A STRANGE WORLD, which is the binge pilot I am creating.

a. The START: The female protagonist is in jail.

b. Our attention is caught when she is targeted by the guards. She’s afraid she will be killed. We know they are on a space station and Earth is uninhabited now. We are caught up in her inciting incident. She resists the start of her journey until her mom explains this is a chance for her. We sympathize with her character as we realize she is a good person in a bad situation, made worse by her father being killed unjustly, and her mom being in danger from the authority figure on the space station.

c. She is sent to a new world with other youth. Her journey into a new world begins and we see she is unimpressed with a happy-go-lucky boy. Her character traits at this stage are: rule follower, positive, motivated, and a ‘princess’ (she seems to think she’s more on top of things than the others).

d. She lays out a plan based on her own knowledge and begins a journey to a mountain to get food. Again, the audience’s attention is captured when we see a two headed deer and glowing plants…we know things have changed since the nuclear event on Earth.

e. We begin to see a transformation as she starts to like the happy-go-lucky boy, but now pitfalls are beginning to happen. We see a strange man-eating snake in the water that intrigues the audience while building tension for the young people’s safety. We now know this world could be dangerous. The heroine will need to change how she proceeds in this new world.

f. Meanwhile, a young man who stayed behind is setting himself up to be the leader. We find out he tried to kill the commander on the starship to get himself arrested. Even though he is ‘bad’ we sympathize with him for wanting to go to Earth and be with his sister (another passenger). He is protective of his family and doesn’t want the ‘parents’ to join them, where they might potentially fall under the parents control again. He doesn’t trust the parents to not want to kill or imprison them again. His destroying their bracelets, the link to the starship, changes the status quo on Earth and moves things in his favor, while changing the return situation for the group who went to the mountain.

g. When the heroine and her group attempt to cross the river, one of the team is hit by an arrow. This creates a binge-watching situation when the pilot ends and the audience want to know who threw the spear, who else is alive on this ‘new’ Earth, and how have they evolved (since we previously saw the two headed deer and the man-eating snake).

2. From that, make a list of the 5 Star Points for that show.

1. Big Picture Hooks
   It is serial. Looking at something we haven’t seen, it would be…A group of
   young persons, who have only heard about Earth, are sent there to survive,
   in a post-nuclear world that is different from anything we’ve seen. Hooks
   would be…When the authorities grab the heroine, and she thinks she is
   targeted to be killed. When the group of youth encounter unique glowing
   plants and we realize this is a very different world. When a unique footprint
   is found that shows something has evolved on this world. When the group
   encounters and must survive the giant man-eating snake in the water. When one
   youth is struck and killed by a spear, making us wonder who and what has
   evolved on this Earth. These are action scenes that move the story
   forward.
2. Amazing and Intriguing Character:
   Ask this: What makes these main characters intriguing and interesting? The
   heroine is interesting because we know she has some basic knowledge of
   Earth and will be part of survival here. She has a plan, and the journey begins
   with following her plan. The youth that sets himself up as leader is intriguing
   because we sympathize with why he is on Earth and why he doesn’t want the ‘parents’
   to come down and join them. We don’t like how he’s going about it, but we
   understand why he is doing it.
3. Empathy / Distress
   Ask this: What situation causes us to feel both empathy and distress for
   this character? See previous examples.
4. Layers / Open Loops
   Ask this: What questions are created by this first episode that can only
   be answered by watching the entire season? What other ways has Earth
   changed? Who or what has evolved, that threw the spear, that killed the
   person.
5. Inviting Obsession
   Ask this: How does this pilot create the need to see every single episode?
   Because we all live on Earth, the concept or ideal we haven’t seen (an Earth
   after a nuclear event) draws our curiosity. The character who is trying to
   take over the leadership role, makes us want to see how things evolve when
   the group, that left to scavenge food, returns. We want to see who or what
   evolved over the last hundred years, that killed the youth.

[Leigh Clemons]

ASSIGNMENT: 1.1 Five Star Model
What I learned doing this assignment is how necessary it is for the world of the show to be intricate, active, and compelling. There must always be something happening that leads the audience to keep asking questions and watching the next episode to learn the answers.

Marvel’s Jessica Jones

5 Star Points

Big Picture Hooks
What is the big hook of this show?
This is a superhero show that isn’t about superheroes and their powers, but the consequences of using them, and how having superpowers cannot save a person from every traumatic experience.
Amazing and Intriguing Character
What makes these main characters intriguing and interesting?

Empathy / Distress
What situation causes us to feel both empathy and distress for this character?
Her superpowers aside, Jessica is a smart, beautiful, empathetic woman. She should be strong, but she is broken and vulnerable. Her trauma has crippled her and cut her off from real human connection because it is too painful for her. Her PTSD flashbacks and her attempts to control them are vivid. She is also quite aware that she is barely holding her life together, but is helpless to change it.
Layers / Open Loops
What questions are created by this first episode that can only be answered by watching the entire season?
What will happen to Hope in the aftermath of shooting her parents?
Why is Jessica stalking Luke Cage? Why does she feel emotional around him? What is her connection to the woman in the picture in Cage’s medicine cabinet? Why does it make her cry?
Who is the mysterious Englishman? Is it the same person as Jessica’s mysterious tormentor? What did he do to Jessica that resulted in such severe PTSD?
Now that Jessica has decided to “do something about it” instead of run away, what will she do? Will she help save Hope?

Inviting Obsession
How does this pilot create the need to see every single episode?
A superhuman woman, beautiful and smart to boot, is so terrified of this unknown man that she wants to flee to another continent, but she chooses to stay and fight in order to save another woman from him. How will she defeat him? Can she defeat him, or will her PTSD cripple her and give him the advantage? He controlled her once; will he control her again? What will happen with Luke Cage when Jessica’s connection to him is revealed? Will Hope be exonerated?
3. Watch the same first episode A SECOND TIME while looking at your 5 Star Point analysis. This time, your purpose is to see beyond the obvious answers. Assume there is more to learn and discover it!
Jessica’s relationship with Trish–Trish is the one who is more balanced and comes across as the one in charge.
Cage avoids entanglements–he literally lets nothing get under his skin. Jessica says its better to be alone so that Kilgrave has nobody with whom he can hurt her.

[Leigh Clemons]

Apologies for the formatting snaffu. I cut/pasted from a Google Doc.