Jack and The Giant [short]

[Sean Z P Harris]

Howdy all!

Here is another short (12 pages) for you to have a lens at and tear apart if needs be.

This was written for a competition in which the participants had to take a fairytale and put a modern twist on it.

It can be found here.

Have at it!

[clayjs]

Sean,

Liked it quite a lot, really. I thought the whole triple betrayal was done very well. Characterization was also strong; dialogue and description were a big step up from 'The Chaser'.

The only real problem I had with 'Jack and the Giant' was the fairy tale tie-in. I understand that was the theme of the contest, but if you plan on moving forward with this script, I'd suggest either eliminating the fairy tale elements or making them a lot stronger. Maybe the bookie is in the penthouse of the Beanstalk Hotel or something. As it is, those elements are just heavyhanded enough to be distracting, but not quite enough to be amusing.

That said, however, I do like the bet standing in for the magic beans.

Thanks for putting your work out there.

Clay

[Sean Z P Harris]

Thanks for that Clay!

This probably isn't something I'll be returning to for a while, but I know where you're coming from re. the fairy tale elements of the story.

I wanted to ground it in the present, so had to substitute everything for modern day equivalents (I did like the betting slip - perhaps the book with all the results, not so much, but it did kinda work in this instance - just!).

Still, glad you liked dialogue and description as these elements of more indicative of my general writing style. I'm nearing the end of the second draft of the feature I'm working on at the moment. I'll pop it up when it's finished.