Screenwriting

I think the key isn’t to avoid those elements, but to approach them strategically. You don’t necessarily have to show everything all the time — what matters is choosing the right moments where the visual impact is essential and building tension around it.

A strong concept like yours can still work if the emotional stakes and perspective carry the story, while the big visual moments are used carefully to maximize impact. A lot of effective storytelling comes from what the audience feels and imagines, not just what they see.

At the same time, for beginners, it might help to develop both types of projects — one that’s more producible and another that’s more ambitious. That way, you’re not limiting creativity, but you’re also creating a realistic path into the industry.

Sean Hussey I completely understand the value of contained storytelling, and I actually had similar feedback when I wrote the first version of my screenplay. People told me: “It’s strong, but maybe let go of Dubai and reduce the locations.”

And honestly, I agreed to a certain extent.

But I also think there are stories where visual atmosphere is part of the emotional experience itself. My screenplay is set in the world of EDM, fame, and luxury — and I feel that environment helps communicate the seduction, isolation, and emotional intensity of that world.

For me, the key is finding the balance: being smart and intentional with scale, while still preserving the identity and mood that make the story unique.

There’s another important point that often gets overlooked.

When the Lumière brothers filmed The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat Station, cinema itself was still an experience. The simple act of seeing moving images was enough to astonish audiences.

But that world is gone.

Today’s audience is highly experienced and visually saturated. They don’t just “accept” storytelling anymore — they expect emotion, impact, and scale. They’ve seen everything. They are not easily impressed by dialogue alone or by things being merely described.

Modern viewers want to feel it. They want to see it. They want to experience it on screen in a way that justifies their attention.

So the challenge for writers today is very different: it’s not enough to tell something interesting — you have to design moments that deliver emotion visually, in a way that still surprises an audience that has already seen so much.

That’s a great point — sometimes the setting itself carries a big part of the emotional weight. It’s really about finding that balance where the scale supports the story without losing what makes it unique.

That’s a strong point — audiences today definitely expect a more immersive experience. But I think what still stands out isn’t just scale, it’s specificity. Even in a visually saturated space, moments feel fresh when they are rooted in a unique perspective and emotional truth.

Visual storytelling isn’t only about showing more, but about showing the right things in a way that feels intentional and meaningful.

See you in Cannes, Ashley

Great question Ashley Renée Smith - writing something now where I decided not to think of genre - we'll see if a genre does reveal itself from the particulars of the story, characters, etc. - TBD :) safe trip!

safe travels Ashley. have a wondrous time.

I assigned my characters to break the rules — and they’re doing a fantastic job of it!

Have a good time there, Ashley!

Safe travels and have a great time at Cannes, Ashley Renée Smith.

Here are Google's estimations:

Hard / relatively hard sci-fi 10–20%

Soft / fantasy-leaning sci-fi 80–90%

For every genuinely hard-sci-fi film, there are probably 4–8 fantasy-sci-fi films.

If you include superhero films, space operas, multiverse stories, and “science fantasy,” the imbalance becomes even larger.

Yes, those are true reasons , but I wrote my speculative screenplay to save the world, and whatever it costs will be worth it. 8-)

I refuse to answer that question because proper Sci-Fi is mortally infected by fantasy and I don't want to be kidnapped whilst screaming: "But I do love James Cameron too".

My read is underrepresentation that's being naming may not be a market problem so much as a register problem. Sci-fi has had two well-developed modes for decades: spectacle (the lights in the sky as threat) and whimsy (the lights in the sky as friend). What it's barely touched is a third register — call it moral weight — where the lights aren't the protagonist at all. The protagonist is the human being inside the institutional pressure of having known something for forty years and not being allowed to say so. That register has a long tradition outside the genre (Lives of Others, A Hidden Life, The Quiet American), but ours has mostly skipped it.

My feeling is the frontiers of science have never been so exciting. We are on the cusp of so many world changing discoveries and existential dangers. A more difficult challenge is to present a hopeful, non-dystopian version of the future.

One-hour crime/dark comedy TV series.

Kaylon Langford, you can't anticipate a screenplay as a blockbuster, even if similar to those that were considered blockbusters, as this term comes after the film is released and the sales tell so.

The term "Indie film" refers to those that are produced independently, as opposed to those produced by studios like Universal or Marvel, etc.

Regarding the term big-budget film, you can consider it to be so if that particular script requires a lot of expensive VFX, shooting scenes, and a high-caliber cast.

If you write something similar to an existing movie, there is a copyright problem, unless that movie is so old that copyright has expired.

If you write something moderately similar to a popular movie, you have another problem. The production company will tell you that the viewers have already watched the famous movie which have given you the inspiration to write your script. So the potential audience will be small. Which means that you should write a micro budget script.

You're confusing GENRE and BUDGETS. Sometimes a genre can be big budget, and sometimes it's a small budget. It depends on what the story is about.

It’s about celestial Warriors, fighting in space, shattering realms, dimensions, and worlds. That due to the heat of a dark energy and energy itself colliding in a battle that is so intense it shatters dimensions, worlds, space, and time itself. Everything will be destroyed, but be brought back together again at the end, but the movie will be a continuous on another DVD. Because new enemies of the celestial we’ll come to destroy the main character, but his power gonna destroy everything again and again until he face the darkest enemy. It’s genre is based on Sci-fi.

Anthony Gasca I hope I did address this quite a bit in the webinar in terms of how tight the storytelling is. Every beat is efficient and does multiple things. There is absolutely no filler. That is the big takeaway. In terms of fitting the book into 6 episodes, there are some big sections he has taken out. Notably, the book has at least twice as many sex scenes (probably more) and they are pretty long and detailed. I mean, sorry, but that's kind of the reason people read these books. But on TV it would get to be very repetitive, possibly even slow, and very difficult (therefore expensive) to film. There are actually some really great sex scenes with a lot of relationship talk that are missing, notably the skype scene when Ilya is in Russia, which provides an emotional link between the All Star game and the Cottage, which I do miss. A lot is missing from the end of the book, much of what happens at the cottage and a huge chunk after the drive home, which was cut because the network did not want to set up a second season. And of course Game Changer feels very condensed - a huge section of the book is taken out, leaving a gap between the end of ep. 3 and the end of ep. 5. The fact that 3 years pass there is sort of a "mistake" but I don't see any way to avoid it. Jacob has mentioned that the portion of the story he regretted losing due to budget was Shane's home in Montreal / the hookup building (I mentioned this in the webinar), and I absolutely agree. I wish there would have been money for that and I think it could have fit into the 6 episodes.

I got a chance to see the Zoom chat and thank you all for your comments!

Some of you spot details better than I do! I never noticed the charger on the counter nor the cheetos in the cottage! OMG I've seen this like five times and there are STILL details!!

For the person asking if they had fallen in love in the first scene, read The Long Game! :)

As far as hockey accuracy, people have pointed out many "mistakes." The #1 priority though is to not confuse the audience. So our characters need to be in the same colors all the time, otherwise we'll visually lose track of them and also feel like maybe they play on more than one team or something. Again, when you write, you want to create a rich, detailed world the audience may not have seen before, and then bit by bit reveal info as needed for the audience. But make it as simple as possible - storytelling matters a lot more than accuracy.

The budget was around $2 M per episode which is astonishingly low! A lot of the creative decisions were driven by that, but it actually made for a better show. Which is why people have asked if htey're getting more money for season 2, and the answer is most likely no.

Yes, reportedly we are getting the trophy room scene!! I'm so glad I'm not the only one looking forward to that one. ;)

I just got the chance to watch the webinar. Thank you so much for this fantastic analysis, Anna! I'm a romance fiction editor, so seeing the story adapted to the structure of a television show - which I know very little about (there are five acts?) - has been fascinating.

Jessica Snyder My pleasure! One of the most interesting things is that nearly all of the changes from the book are pretty clearly to fulfill the requirements of pilot structure and setting up a season. Shows how important that is and that the requirements of television are more important than the source material. It's a VERY close adaptation, with much of the dialogue directly taken from the book, yet all the changes that had to be made were made.

Viewership of the first round of the Stanley Cup Finals is up 68%, highest number of total viewers ever.

Congrats y'all!

Way to ROCK, Period Piece Contest finalists! Here's wishing you even more success!

Congrats to the Finalists. I could not be more excited to have Dead Man's Dust included in the Finals. These next two weeks can't go by fast enough. HA!

Congrats to all!! :)

Well done Jaz

Well I tend not to worry about the timing as it seems beyond my control most of the time how hot (or cold) a particular script of mine might be, and I've heard it said that once you identify a trend it's already too late to capitalize on it. I don't worry about the relationship as either I've established one already or I've paid for access. So that leaves concept, and based on the feedback I often get when I pitch, it's concept that seems top of the mind for industry execs at the pitching stage.

An AI script's plot and characterizations are always so generalised, no lived-experience personality infusions. It can best fool someone who is not deeply informed of story and writing basics and know-hows.

I have my originality gifting I infuse in my stories and characterizations. AI lacks that. I appreciate the outer courts editorial work AI can do especially for those who haven't mastered well their writing language but it never does tge inner courts editorial work because that takes the Writer's natural voice and only a fellow human as the final editor can tame that.

Me, my novellas I hope to release have my originality strength over AI.

I agree with Luke Jennings based on my own experiences with AI and my screenplays. The chat boxes are currently fairly decent with analysis, but dreck at creativity. I wonder though whether that will always be true.

Hmm...what makes anything I write unmistakably human?

I try to draw from personal experiences; things people I've researched on the Internet have gone through in their lives; and stuff people I went to school with, worked alongside, and/or attended church (among other places) with encountered in their own time here on Earth.

Great question, Sandra!

great question Sandra Correia :) I actually had extensive 'conversations' with ChatGPT about this - and the irony is that AI admitted its limitations. It confessed that dialogue, for example, can only be written by someone who experiences that moment, since acting is reacting. But is wasn't shy to promote itself as a pretty good mirror to what we're thinking in terms of structure, plot hole checking, and of course, decent research assistant. The question is, will WE be as honest with ourselves on what this working partnership should be ;)

AI systems don't:

* dance

* party

* laugh

* become angry

* ponder

* love

* etc.

They don't love being, because they don't realize they exist.

A calculator doesn't know it exists, yet it can calculate the square root of 31.5, something I cannot do myself.

So an AI system, millions of times more powerful than a calculator, can do millions of times more impressive things than a calculator, and millions of things I could never pull off. That is simply a fact. And it will only get "worse."

But all the movies that ever truly impressed me somehow originated from the love of being. And that remains, at least for now, outside the reach of AI.

As a software engineer, I actually love AI. I'm currently developing an AI-infused screenwriting tool that acts as a lever for my own creativity. I expect it to be great during the structure phase, while remaining mediocre at writing itself, at best.

The last 20% is still my responsibility. And without that 20%, the result is not 80% good. It's 100% crap.

So here's to being a sentient being :-)

And also to AI.