Category: Opinion

John Ostrander on DOCTOR WHO (and the Kids!)

doctorwho-peter-capaldi-the-thick-of-it

by John Ostrander

Doctor Who, the long-running BBC TV series about a humanoid alien transversing through time and space with his companions, has wound up its current season, its tenth since it’s return following a long hiatus. The current actor playing the part, Peter Capaldi, is the fourth actor (or the fifth depending how you number it) since the show returned or the twelfth or thirteenth since the show’s inception. The numbering differential is a wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey thing.

The show has sparked a discussion among the fans lately because, well, that’s what fans do, especially of a cult science-fiction show such as this one. There’s great passion and great heat as usual with these things along with the absolute conviction of one side that they are right and that those on the other side are wrong. It doesn’t matter which side of a debate you’re on, the other guy is wrong. There’s a lot of passion and maybe some thought and that’s what happens with a fan disagreement.

The current issue under debate is that Doctor Who began as a children’s show back in 1963 and it should always be a children’s show. The position of some is that the current monsters are often too scary for children, the continuity has become too complex for children, the relationships are inappropriate for children. read article

Film & TV Writing Contests: Are They Worth the Price of Admission?

wheel of fortune

by Lew Ritter

Every few weeks, my email brings me a breathless announcement for a new or established screenplay competition. It proclaims in bold headlines, ‘Want to Break into Industry?” or “Looking for New Blood.” Can your ticket to fame and fortune be far behind?

There are literally dozens of screenplay competitions out there. Some of the most famous ones are the NICHOL FELLOWSHIP, SCRIPTAPALOOZA, AUSTIN FILM FESTIVAL and of course, the contests run by our fearless leader Larry Brody. He runs two contests yearly, the PEOPLE’S PILOT and SPEC SCRIPTACULAR. Other worthy contest are run by various networks or studios.

There are other lesser known contests that deal exclusively with short films, comedy or horror scripts. The fees are reasonable. The fee is usually around sixty dollars per script. (EDITOR’S NOTE: The PEOPLE’S PILOT and SPEC SCRIPTACULAR are $50.) Sometimes, they offer reduced fees for early bird entries. read article

John Ostrander Ponders Heroes and Their Origins

Nero-Wolfe

by John Ostrander

As I mentioned in a previous column, I’ve been on a Rex Stout/Nero Wolfe reading/re-reading jag as of late and have been enjoying it greatly. As other commentators have noted, the pleasure in the Nero Wolfe novels is not so much the plots, which have been noted as serviceable, but in the characters, especially the rotund and eccentric genius, Nero Wolfe, and his wise cracking legman and assistant, Archie Goodwin.

(Sidenote: when I first met the late and great comic book writer/editor, Also Archie Goodwin, I meant to ask him about Wolfe but decidedly, I think prudently, that he had probably gotten enough of that in his life. End digression.)

Stout had written 33 novels and 39 short stories on the pair between 1934 and his death in 1975. After his death, his estate authorized further Wolfe and Goodwin adventures by Robert Goldsborough who has written ten books, one of which was Archie Meets Nero Wolfe, a prequel to the Nero Wolfe stories telling the tale of how the two first met. read article

LB on Characterization Part 2

Hey, writers, get yourself a Job!
Hey, writers, get yourself a Job!

The TV Writer on TV Writing
by Larry Brody

Once you the writer have given us, the audience, characters with whom we can sympathize, your next job is to give these new people some “tsuris,” which is Yiddish for “Trouble with a Capital T.”

As Aristotle pointed out a couple of years ago, effective writing comes from building up to a climax, which means that once you’ve established the basic situation for your character – the need the character has that must be fulfilled, or the problem she, he, or they must solve – you’ve only brought yourself to the starting point. Often, that point is one relatively small but nevertheless unmanageable stress. Let me repeat that – “relatively small” yet most definitely “unmanageable.”

This is not going to be a permanent situation for your hero or heroes, not by a long shot. Because even then, right at the get-go, while the hero starts working like a house afire to dig out of the crisis at hand, your job is to ratchet up the pressure and make things even tougher. read article

How to Generate a TV Golden Age

Critics keep saying that we’re in a Golden Age of quality TV, and, who knows, maybe we are. But don’t you wonder how we got here? What happened? What changed? As 2015 closes, it’s time for some insight into the year’s biggest media story:

GoldenAge

by Joshua Gans

When we think of Golden Ages it is looking back and realising that things were better during some period of time; we just never realised it at the time. But we are currently living in a Golden Age of Television. It is better than at any point in its history. And what is more, we know it. That is simply a remarkable state of affairs.

When did the Golden Age begin? Many will mark 2008 as a turning point with Breaking Bad (or maybe a year earlier with Mad Men). Others will go back to 2002 and 2003 with The Wire, Battlestar Galactica and Lost. In reality, the Golden Age, as we know it, is really a phenomenon of the last five or six years as knowledge of great alternative programming became widespread. And there is no end in sight. read article