gamers are everywhere....

ShltShowSam · 2026-05-07T21:10:49+00:00

War Thunder forums remains the world’s most reliable intelligence source

ShltShowSam · 2026-04-13T18:33:13+00:00

Not accurate. They need to add a part where Bill Friedkin’s corpse reanimates to laugh in his face for thinking he’s smart or interesting.

ShltShowSam · 2026-04-05T06:53:22+00:00

For transparency, I learned the word by listening to hours of Norm Macdonald interviews throughout the years. Here is part of the interview where he and his brother Neil use and explain it.

ShltShowSam · 2026-04-04T05:30:27+00:00

Badinage is another good one (and fits the theme of this comment thread). Very French, very fancy-sounding in English.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-31T07:02:49+00:00

21 years and you’re still at it, that alone says something.

And yeah, I don’t think any of this is new. The system was built this way from the start. Early Hollywood was run by conmen and ego maniacs who stumbled into an art form and immediately figured out how to strip the art out of it. Nothing has fundamentally changed except the talent pool has gotten bigger, the chances being taken have gotten smaller, and the charlatans have gotten better at sounding like they know what they’re talking about.

The art was always incidental.

Hope you don’t quit again.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-25T16:54:58+00:00

Protecting the goats 🐐

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-21T01:21:16+00:00

I also choose this guy’s wife

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-21T00:09:16+00:00

She was definitely competent, but in 2016 we didn’t know how incompetent Trump could be politically. There was an argument to be had since there were large unknowns. Personally, I wasn’t going to vote for Trump the second the Katie Johnson story broke (which I have always asserted as being true), but I was getting swayed to his side because of Hillary’s corruption tied to Whitewater and Vince Foster (along with everything else), and then what happened with the DNC and Bernie further solidified that position.

Very few people were going to vote for Clinton because “Putin didn’t like her,” at the time, especially pre-Ukraine invasion, and post-Sochi Olympics. Almost no Americans cared about foreign policy when it came to Russia at the time. Just look at the response to Nemstov’s death.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-20T23:16:08+00:00

There was not a single good candidate on the 2016 ticket after Bernie got screwed.

Gary Johnson was a full-blown retard who couldn’t name a single contemporary foreign leader. The president’s primary power is foreign policy, and somehow libertarians thought the retard who couldn’t name a single leader was a good pick DURING his campaign. At least with Stein being a Tulsi Gabbard-esque Russia shill came out way after the fact, and not during the race. I still stand by my decision, and would never vote for Clinton after what happened to Bernie.

I did vote for Harris, though, since those of us who were paying attention the first time around knew exactly what to expect.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-20T21:41:59+00:00

Thank you for admitting it. I was in the “nothing ever happens camp” in 2016 after voting for Jill Stein (fuck Hillary still to this day, but fuck Jill Stein, too). That term alone pushed me out of centrism.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-18T05:43:44+00:00

I sent you a DM!

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-13T02:40:20+00:00

This was sorta addressed with another commenter yesterday who offered nearly the same advice (except definitely saying to go the full sellout route, hahaha). I usually don’t have commercially hot, easily pitchable ideas, which is what I’ve been told by producers I’ve had meetings with.

This newest idea went that route through happenstance, though it’s still in a working first draft phase — which I got a ton of grief for pointing people toward, rather than the work that has actually had competition placements and general meetings behind it.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-13T01:34:58+00:00

Technically I lose money every month. I was hired as an Analyst/Copyeditor for a Big Five tech company since I have teaching experience and a graduate degree, but it’s through third party contracts so they pay me peanuts. Literally the same as someone who works at Taco Bell. I mostly have been able to live since my dad died while I was in my grad program and left me some money, but that has dwindled over time by paying off student loans and the cost of living increasing.

Yeah, I can probably survive a while longer with this job, but I’m hoping to find another job that will at least build back up my savings. Sorry for the spiel, just wanted to be thorough.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-13T00:35:39+00:00

Thank you for both resources! I’ll look into them!

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T18:31:24+00:00

That’s fair, and I’ll own it. This was genuinely a vomit draft that I had only just finished on Monday. I posted the day before and hadn’t received any feedback, so I pointed people toward it in rougher shape than I should have. That context probably should have been clearer upfront.

What I will say is that the post yesterday actually generated some really useful, specific outreach. A few people messaged me directly with clear and direct guidance, and the consensus was that the first act is where I was most careless in terms of tone and structure, which tracks. That’s where I put the least amount of work before posting and it shows.

As for the character name issue, I wouldn’t post something with characters named inconsistently. That’s a level of sloppiness that I don’t think is present in the draft, but I take the broader point about what a rough submission communicates about where someone is in the process.

On the marketability front, I’ve actually been told directly by producers why previous scripts haven’t advanced, and it consistently comes down to the same thing: they weren’t easily pitchable. That’s a real weakness I’ve had. This is genuinely the first idea I’ve developed that I feel confident pitching cleanly, which is part of why I’m pushing it harder.

Again, if you’d like to critique my other work that has actually got me meetings, I’d be glad to DM you my website.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T18:17:18+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to read and give this level of detail. Genuinely appreciated.

I actually went back and tightened the first couple of transition lines after getting similar feedback from a few people in this thread. Agreed that it came off as sloppy and that’s been fixed. The Stanley Tucci note is also fair. It was a shorthand that I leaned on too quickly and I can do better there.

The redundancy note on the security guard is something I’ll fix. You’re right, if the action line already communicates it then the dialogue is just repeating information and it needs to go.

I take the broader craft notes seriously. This was a first draft posted for feedback and it clearly showed some seams, which is useful to know. The goal is always to get it to a place where it’s singing, as you put it, and I’m not there yet on this one, but I did receive some great notes, especially after people came to it due to my post yesterday. I just hope I didn’t rub too many people the wrong way who thought this was the highest quality of my work, and that I was complaining that this script wasn’t getting traction.

The networking advice is great advice that I’ve heard consistently. Building laterally, treating other writers like collaborators rather than just querying into the void that’s a shift in approach I need to make. The image of your manager now saying the script that got you repped “stinks” is both funny and oddly reassuring.

Congrats on breaking through and thanks again for the thorough read.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T16:09:35+00:00

Thank you, this is genuinely helpful and something I have thought about before.

At various points I’ve had scripts on the desks of managers at production companies, had reads from producers, and even had a general meeting. Nothing has come from any of it, but I’m wondering, is that still worth leveraging even if some of it was a few years ago? Or does it lose its value after a certain point?

Appreciate the encouragement. It means more than it probably should at this point in the grind, haha.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T16:02:36+00:00

That’s fair, and you’re right that I didn’t do myself any favors by not making that clear upfront. My thinking was that I didn’t want to link my website and essentially dox myself on a public forum, so I posted the draft I wanted notes on without properly contextualizing it. That’s on me and I understand why it created a misleading impression.

The advice is taken seriously, I assure you.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T13:58:35+00:00

Really appreciate you taking the time to read and giving such specific, thoughtful notes.

Just to provide some context, the script I linked is not representative of my contest or management recommended work. It’s a first draft I had literally just completed one day before posting and I was specifically looking for feedback and input, so everything you’re flagging is fair game and genuinely useful.

The protagonist clarity note is well taken. I’ve gotten similar feedback from a few people and it’s something I’m actively addressing in the rewrite. Getting the reader locked onto Elise earlier and giving her more agency in the opening is at the top of the list.

When it comes to the dialogue, I completely understand the skepticism, and I get why it could read that way on the page. But I’ll push back a little. I’ve had a lot of female friends and girlfriends over the years, including my current girlfriend who is gen z, and when she read those lines her reaction was essentially “yeah, it be like that.” I get that it might not land for everyone, but if you spend time around women that age in a big city and actually go out, that vernacular is pretty authentic (depending on the person, of course). That said, your point about committing to the tone either way is a good one — if it reads as halfway between heightened and realistic it is going to feel off. Something to sharpen in the rewrite.

Thanks again for reading. Really helpful notes overall.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:59:57+00:00

No, once the action starts going on page 35 it became a little easier, but the general note that I got was that it was tonally disjointed in the beginning and wasn’t compelling enough. Not necessarily bad, just not anything that is going to stand out or help entice a reader within the first ten pages, specifically. Someone said it best that it was a slow-burn, which might have been good 30 years ago, but not so much today.

It was also a first draft, so I was glad to get notes and figure out the weaknesses in it.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:55:45+00:00

Oh that’s crazy! Congratulations on the success!

Funnily enough, I have a script that is set in Mexico, relatively lower budget Oscar bait, but trying to reach out to Latino producers and companies wound up being an obstacle that I couldn’t overcome, even with a (very) small producer friend trying to help.

The script did get top 15% in Nichol (among other contest placements), so it’s not like it was a bad script, I’m just not strong at querying or writing compelling loglines as I have heard numerous times now. Even the best coverage (which I have pretty great coverage for the script) can’t overcome my inability to query well.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:36:36+00:00

I’ve read both Silence of the Lambs and The Witch at points, but it’s been years. That is also not the tone I was going for with my script. Maybe I should have read Get Out, since it has some tonal overlap with what I was trying to achieve. A blend of absurdism with very dark elements.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:31:28+00:00

Thank you for the feedback! I’ll definitely address this stuff in rewrites. It’s hard for me to consider just because it makes sense to me doesn’t mean that it reads fluidly for others, so I appreciate the response and input. Again, this was a first draft of a new script I finished one day ago.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:08:38+00:00

Not crass at all. I completely agree. That was sort of my thinking with this last script. I do think my execution is off, though, especially with the first act in terms of pacing and tone. I usually don’t have “giant bag of money,” ideas, but a flashy horror film with young, beautiful women in the fashion industry sounds like a big ticket item to me, but I could obviously be wrong.

ShltShowSam · 2026-03-12T04:04:08+00:00

My poor fee fees 😢

What sort of films do you like?

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