Lesson 2

[Rodney Cavin]

Rod’s Big M.I.S.

I learned from this lesson that conventions of the story must be established before the BIG M.I.S. can be established.

I slightly revised the concept as the original was too loose.
Revised Concept: A waitress, puzzled when she receives a micro chip with a tip, soon learns many dangerous people want it forcing her to use every skill she possesses to stay alive and take down the villain.

What are the conventions of your story?
Unwitting but Resourceful Hero: Kellie Stafford, discovering the micro chip she’s been given, seeks someone for help to return it but soon learns just having the chip could cost her life. After going down several dead ends she finally uncovers the true villain and takes them down.

Dangerous Villain: With his company in serious financial trouble, Senator John Sternum borrowed from a questionable source and now has to sell them government secrets in settlement. His ruthless source will kill anyone in the way of their operation — including the Senator.

High Stakes: Kellie’s life, others near her, even the Senator’s is on the line.

Life and Death Situations: Kellie’s customer is killed upon leaving the restaurant; Kellie’s apartment is broken into and thoroughly searched; a near fatal chase; and more I haven’t created yet as Kellie fights back.

This movie is thrilling because while Kellie fights back, her life and others are in constant danger as we slowly learn the underlying motives and relationships leading to an edge-of-the-seat climax.

The Big M.I.S.

Big Mystery: What, or who is behind the micro chip?

Big Intrigue: Who is behind the micro chip and can that knowledge save Kellie’s life?

Big Suspense: Can Kellie stay alive till the villain is discovered and taken down?



[Eileen Montelione]

Subject line: Eileen Montelione’s Big M.I.S.

What I learned doing this assignment is it’s difficult— but essential to simplify the M.I.S.

Logline:
After surviving a terrible attack, Carla wakes up from a coma with retrograde amnesia. Her husband, Derrick Marshall juggles his political career while helping her adjust back into her life at home, and vows to find her attacker.

Unwitting but Resourceful Hero:
Carla Marshall, a victim of a brutal attack that left her with no memory of her past. When her memory is triggered, she soon realizes that the man who claims to be her husband isn’t, and that she isn’t actually Carla Marshall. She’s Morgan Gibson, a small town engineer/wife/mother, who’s been reported missing for nearly a year.

Dangerous Villain:
Derrick Marshall, an ambitious and powerful governor who will stop at nothing to climb the political ladder. He has covered up his wife’s murder by replacing her with an unwitting look-alike, our hero, Carla/Morgan.

High stakes:
Derrick’s dead wife and his other victims, Carla/Morgan’s life, her real family’s lives, unveiling a conspiracy, political power in the wrong hands

Life and death situations:
Carla/Morgan’s initial attack, car chase, (wo)manhunt, her family held hostage

This story is thrilling because?
Carla immediately feels uneasy when Derrick takes her home from the hospital. As she begins to unravel the truth, he becomes suspicious that she knows, and tries to kill her. She narrowly escapes, outsmarting him with traps she engineers along the way back to her real home.

Big Mystery: What is the main mystery of your story that will keep us wondering throughout the story?
Who is Carla, and what happened to her?
Why can’t she remember anything before her attack?
Who attacked her, and why?

Big Intrigue: What is the covert, clandestine, underhanded plot that will live under the surface for most of the movie?
Our main character discovers that she is the center of a murderous political conspiracy, and everything she has been told about herself is a lie.

Big Suspense: What is the main danger to your Hero that will continue to escalate throughout the script?
When her “husband” finds out that she knows the truth, he and his hired hands promise to hunt her and her real family down until they’re dead.

How will she and her real family escape Derrick, and live to tell the truth?

[Kevin Aguilar]

Kevin Aguilar’s Big M.I.S

What did I learn doing this assignment?

– I learned that you have to trust the process. This was difficult because the questions make you ask more and more questions which lead to other questions. All of them are helpful of course because that is the process of ultimately finding your answers to a completed script.

Logline:
Bodies from the small but devout congregation of St. Agnes are found as the new priest, Father Emory Bryant, arrives at his new church. Bryant is quickly suspected of being the likely murderer. Will Father Emory Bryant unravel who is murdering the people of St. Agnes or will he be next?

What are the conventions of your story?

Unwitting but Resourceful Hero: A Priest, Father Emory Bryant, is being framed for murders. His resourcefulness will be his intelligence as he untangles this mystery.

Dangerous Villain: The villain wants to sell the land that the church is on. The priest won’t leave if the congregation is there, so the villain operates through someone from Bryant’s past to arrange the murders.

High Stakes: Members of the church are being murdered, and all signs point to Bryant. The land the church is on is at stake. Law enforcement becomes involved.

Life and Death Situations: The dead victims are all people from Bryant’s congregation. Bryant’s own life is at stake.

This story is thrilling because: Law enforcement and the church community begin to suspect that it is the Priest. The priest needs to figure out who would be framing him and going after him all the while members keep dying. He then uncovers that there is a larger game afoot.

Big Mystery: Who is killing people and why are they framing the Priest?

Big Intrigue: The villain wants to sell the land the church is on for a huge profit.

Big Suspense: Will the priest go to prison for murder or will he be another victim?

[Steven Pickering]

Stephen Pickering’s Big M.I.S.

What I learned doing this assignment is that it helps to strip it back to basic structure before adding the complications.

Logline:

In the bizarre world of a large indoor market, a butcher struggles to help other traders save the market from closure. Battling with market forces can be a deadly affair.

Conventions
Michael Dina, a butcher, but was once a market manager, becomes the ring-leader for the many traders wanting to save the market place from demolition.
Mr Finman, the market owner announces he is closing the historic market building to redevelop the land.
People who fight against the closure seem to be disappearing.
This story is thrilling because we don’t know who is actually making people disappear. Is it the evil landlord, angry traders, or does the historic building itself have something to say…in a supernatural way?

Big M.I.S.
Big Mystery: Can Michael find a way to stop the owner from closing the market?
What is the covert plot? There is an ancient cellar under the market building, once part of a nunnery. Not been accessed for over 100 years, but why is the owner suddenly so keen to get in there?
Big Suspense: Can Michael find out why people are disappearing and avoid being the next victim?

[Jolene Kim]

Subject line: (Jolene’s) Big M.I.S.

Logline: When a couple is ambuscaded into a marriage by the bride’s father/minister after three months of dating, married life reveals the groom’s fatal tendencies.

CONVENTIONS:

Unwitting but resourceful Hero:

• Katarinya – a lonely woman who just wants to be loved, so much so that she ignores red flags and her own instincts.

Dangerous Villain: Shaka, a man who really wants a wife and finds out he is never satisfied when he gets what he wants. He will go to extremes to get everything he wants even if it means getting rid of her.

High stakes: Katarinya’s Safety/Life and Possibly Shaka’s mental state

Life and death situations:

• Shaka blames her for everything and emotionally abuses her so that she is unable to make rational choices.

• Whenever Shaka cooks her food – he spends lots of time and adds things from the poisonous succulent plants

• When Katarinya sleeps- she wakes up to him covering her mouth and says he was trying to stop her from grinding her teeth

• Shaka gets a knife from his brother as a Christmas present

• Shaka sleeps with prostitutes and doesn’t use protection

• Shaka “accidentally” knocks things and breaks them.

• Shaka has different personalities – He is bipolar and you never know who you’re going to get

• Every object in two’s, one disappears… at first cups… Shaka says they broke … even though they were unbreakable.

This movie is thrilling because: Throughout the story, we are constantly worried for Katarinyas life as She tries to understand what is going on in the marriage. Will she figure it out and leave before it’s too late? Each time she uncovers something about Shaka and tries to help him, he becomes vulnerable and no longer can get away with things under that pretense, becoming even more dangerous.

Big Mystery:

• Will Katarinya figure out who she is married to and escape? Or will she end up dead? Will others believe her, that he’s trying to kill her?

Big Intrigue:

Shaka is bipolar, a narcissist and has a savior complex. The little boy in him needs to be loved, but he trusts no one even when he is being loved. He also thinks he’s here to help people, to save them from themselves. He thinks he wants to be married but when he is loved, he doesn’t trust it and when there are normal marital problems, his world falls apart and his self hatred magnifies and is projected onto his wife. He becomes suspicious of everyone. He entertains his fears and brings them to fruition.

Big Suspense:

• Will Shaka kill Katarinya?

[Lisa Vons Cooper]

Subject line: Lisa’s Big M.I.S.
Logline: Secrets are meant to stay buried like the bodies that they hide.
What I learned doing this assignment is that one step builds on another. If you jump from A to Z and miss everything before it makes it tricky to work backwards.
What are the conventions of your story?
• Unwitting but Resourceful Hero:
o Sam is a flight attendant by day and follows in her father’s footsteps at night by taking out bad people for money. Does that make her a bad person?
• Dangerous Villain:
o Who has found out Sam’s secret and killing off people around her?
• High stakes:
o Sam wants out of her father’s business and wants to start a bakery and a family like her Gramma, Mom, and Aunt did. How does she leave her father?
• Life and death situations:
o Sam’s has contracts that she has to complete, or people will come after the family.
o Sam attempts to do a hit in Vegas and learns she was given wrong information.
o Will she be able to walk away without getting her family killed?
• This story is thrilling because?
o We think we know who’s out to destroy Sam and her family but with each rock that is turned over Sam is wrong and can’t trust anyone.
Tell us the Big M.I.S of your story?
• Big Mystery: What is the main mystery of your story that will keep us wondering throughout the story?
o Who’s trying to end the Pilato reign?
• Big Intrigue: What is the covert, clandestine, underhanded plot that will live under the surface for most of the movie?
o Is there anyone Sam can trust, even her family?
o Secrets have a way of getting out and are starting to appear.
• Big Suspense: What is the main danger to your Hero that will continue to escalate throughout the script?
o Will Sam lose her family by death or writing her off for abandoning them?

• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Lisa Vons Cooper.
• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Lisa Vons Cooper.
• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Lisa Vons Cooper.

[Ronald Neustrom]

Ron Neustrom – Big MIS (Day 2 Thriller)

A Danger to Themselves

Big Mystery – Why was Ana Cruz killed?
Big Intrigue – Vivian’s only sister has come out of prison and threatened the life Vivian has built to uncover who killed their mother. This manic, reckless pursuit will probably get both of them killed by the people responsible working to stay hidden.
Big Suspense – Vivian has devoted her life to helping people in crisis by working a suicide hotline and trying to create a local outreach. These situations are routinely life and death and some are connected to a bigger mystery that will threaten and teardown everything in Vivian’s life physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Conventions:

1. Unwitting but Resourceful Hero – Vivian Cruz is a young San Diego woman who has devoted her life to helping people in crisis as a mental health professional attached to working with law enforcement.
2. Dangerous Villain – A team of antagonists are living below the surface masked as law enforcement, coworkers, clients, superiors, and siblings.
3. High Stakes – Vivian’s mother was killed years ago, and her only sister is bent on proving her theory about how their mother died. Helping her sister is putting everything else in her life in jeopardy. However, she is an expert on helping others and walking away from her only sibling will be impossible.
4. Life and Death Situations – By pursuing her goals Vivian enters dangerous situations constantly with law enforcement to try and calm crisis victims. She risks her life and the lives of others as she tries to find resources for these clients in need. Many of these moments come naturally out of the world Vivian has chosen to navigate.
5. This story is thrilling because…I created a throughline where my hero has tried to be a doer of good and a valuable resource to many but the people who inhabit this world are dangerous and unpredictable. They are human bombs that could detonate at any time. So the struggle is between trying to stay on the side of doing what she knows is responsible and right and surviving the level of violence and deception the antagonists are using to stay behind their masks.

What I learned doing this assignment… it is really, really difficult to simplify and find the essence to the BIG MIS in a quality thriller. Sometimes we don’t identify it until the final crisis/climax. Almost always they begin with one mystery that launches us into the world. That sets up another mystery that becomes more and more dangerous to solve for our hero. However, all the elements must grow out of the thriller world naturally and be well-connected

• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Ronald Neustrom.

[Leslie Magee]

Thrillers 33: Lesson 2
Leslie Magee’s Big M.I.S.

What I learned doing this assignment is I’m trying to trust the process and realize that I don’t need everything figured out in the beginning.

Logline: Someone keeps killing people who order food deliveries in New York City.

The conventions of my story

Unwitting but Resourceful Hero: a NYPD detective

Dangerous Villain: the murderer

High Stakes: find the killer before more deaths occur; panic throughout NYC amongst delivery customers, delivery persons, delivery companies, and restaurants

Life and death situations: the murders of the customers, detective’s life threatened

This story is thrilling because food delivery is everywhere, and it would be really scary if this happened in real life.

The Big M.I.S. of my story

Big Mystery: who is doing the killing and why?

Big Intrigue: killer may be using these deaths to cover up a particular murder

Big Suspense: will the detective be able to find the killer and stop them before being killed him/herself?

• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Leslie Magee.
• This reply was modified 5 months, 1 week ago by  Leslie Magee.

[Diane Keranen]

Diane’s Big M.I.S.

What I learned doing this assignment is that the conventions are all essential parts so support the MIS and the MIS are very specific elements and different from each other.

Logline: Assistant DA Nikky Gadsen is preparing her closing arguments for a cut-and-dried capital murder case that will make her career when an anonymous tip reveals the defendants are innocent and about to be murdered themselves.

The conventions of my story:
• Unwitting by resourceful hero: Nikky Gadsen, Assistant DA who fought to get this case to launch her career.
• Dangerous villain: The two actual murderers who want to kill the defendants before the case breaks wide open.
• High stakes: Nikky’s career could be over, innocent defendants could be killed
• Life and death situations: mainly the defendants, but anyone getting in the way when the killers comes for them.
• This story is thrilling because it pits a cunning, African-American Assistant DA who is prosecuting two young African-American boys in a case driven by election politics where the current DA uses her to show the office is not racist in its prosecutions. When Nikky discovers the evidence that her prosecution is unsubstantiated, she must find a way to salvage her career before the real killers murder the defendants and put an end to the case.

The Big M.I.S of the story is:
• Big Mystery: who are the real killers?
• Big Intrigue: can Nikky save her career with the new evidence?
• Big Suspense: can Nikky find the killers in time to save the defendants and her career?

[Diana Black]

Thriller 99_ Diana T. Black_ “What I learned doing this assignment is it’s okay not to have all the answers at this point in time, but I do think one has to have a really strong fascinating core/compelling central idea in order to sustain the narrative – as a base AND that the narrative needs to be highly marketable.

Title:
One-Way Ticket

Logline:
In an effort to control over-population, one-way time machines are now on every street corner with people vanishing even when they don’t choose to “go,” compelling a computer geek to sabotage the system to retrieve his girlfriend.

Conventions:
Unwitting but resourceful Hero – Andrew (26) sweet-natured, and talented computer geek in love with his girlfriend Lucy (24) a graphic designer for Video Games.
Dangerous Villian – Vieslik (54) ambitious, greedy, no empathy for others – reducing the population to lower the societal debt burden and siphon the funds saved from social welfare to line his own pockets
High stakes – When Lucy disappears in front of Andrew’s eyes without using a one-way time machine, he risks his life by hacking into the system (risking being considered by the authorities as a “dissenter”) – to try and rescue her. He has to act fast with a person’s location/destination traceable for only 48 hours before being scrubbed from the archives.
Life and Death situations – Lucy was transported against her will and could be in serious danger – she wasn’t “prepared” via the one-way machine. Andrew risks being “banished” (executed) by the authorities if his hacking the system is detected and when going into the past to find her, risks being trapped forever in the past.
This story is thrilling because – no one knows who’s going to disappear next, who is behind it, whether Andrew will rescue Lucy and both get back to the present, or whether they’ll be caught by the authorities.
The Big M.I.S.
Big Mystery – who ‘s behind the disappearances of those who’ve not volunteered to go into the past? Secondarily, what happens to them when they do go back? Do they actually go back?
Big Intrigue – there’s an underworld where people can pay (very expensive) to get rid of someone they don’t like or have them go in their place with there being an “end-of-life-date” for everyone which is 60 years of age – who is running this clandestine operation – one person, the authorities, A.I.?
Big Suspense – can Andrew successfully travel into the past? If he does go into the past, will he find Lucy? Will she want to return? Will Andrew will get caught for hacking into the system? He if does, can he escape “banishment” i.e. execution? Once he identifies the Villain, is he a match for the Villain i.e. powerful enough to survive his adversary? What sort of future will they face if and when they do come back to the present? Will she want to go back with him? If she doesn’t where do they go? (Things are not great in the past – in some areas, brutal and mean-spirited with only a few places offering sanctuary.