This is the 3rd time posting about same show…and the 1,000 version I’ve created.
kimberlyPenpusher
A despondent social media planner weighted with a newfound ability to see past lives is forced to confront her karma and that of everyone she knows or remain condemned to repeat their same mistakes for an eternity.
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A despondent social media planner weighted with a newfound ability to see past lives is forced to confront her karma and that of everyone she knows or remain condemned to repeat their same mistakes for an eternity.
INTENTION: ??? * forced to confront her karma and that of everyone she knows * (I think this needs to be more specific – I mean what must she actively do?)
OBSTACLE: ??? what’s standing in her way? What will make it hard to “confront her karma”? I think you need a ticking clock. (Now she genuinely has to help/fix these people.)
STAKES: remain condemned to repeat the same mistakes for eternity. * I dunno. Is it wrong this feels like it should be more intense. I feel because we don’t know how bad the mistakes are – it doesn’t quite hit or feel intense and life-threatening. It feels like she could still walk from this. This is also kind of vague. I mean – how does she precisely know they will live out the same lives/mistakes over and over again. Perhaps she needs to see into the future as well?
Interesting incident – I mean she’s suddenly “weighted”. It just happens?
Attempt 1:
After a car crash, a woman wakes up with the power to see into people’s past lives and futures, and must fix the lives of other survivors of the crash, in order to prevent a deadly premonition.
Notes:
– I’ve made it a car crash so we have a clear incident/reason why she gets powers.
– Also – it seems the ending of this might be buried in the beginning. Perhaps she has to prevent a far worse crash.
– I’m not sure “deadly premonition” works. It might need to be more specific. Like “a premonition of a plane crash” or something.
– She now sees the past lives and futures. I feel we have more intense stakes when we know she has to prevent something far worse. * we now have a ticking clock.
– There’s something a bit like, um, FINAL DESTINATION and THE TERMINATOR about this. Thematically – that feels into your theme of “past lives” and “free will”, etc. I mean – can she stop this thing from happening? Perhaps we’re supposed to live the same lives over and over again. Or like Doc Brown said, “your future is whatever you make it”. (I think he said that.)
Anyways – remember this is still your thing. Take what you need and discard the rest. These are just some ideas for you to agree/disagree with. (Oddly enough – I find disagreeing with someone usually helps me to develop my ideas just by defending them ha.)
Okay – hope this helps.
is this closer?
After a NDE a social media executive weighted with the ability to see past lives and now tasked with healing her “soul family” uses her position to embed herself in the lives of those around her to circumvent karma that foreshadows current life situations that could tragically repeat past life patterns.
thank you, this all helps a great deal.
Also – I never felt the “despondent social media planner” was that relevant to the logline. It’s ornamental. Information that we don’t really need (in the logline that is. It’s fine for the plot.)
I like Mike Pedley’s version.
Being despondent is a state of mind, not a character flaw. The task the logline proposes for the main character should be related to some deeply entrenched character flaw that she needs to overcome to avoid bad karma in her own life as well as enable her to overcome bad karma in others.
“forced to confront” – what does that look like on screen? Film is a visual medium so everything in the logline must be something we can imagine seeing on screen.
If the inciting incident is her developing the ability to see everybody’s past lives, her goal needs to be closely related to that. Problem is, that is something very difficult to visualise on screen. What does a woman seeing everyone’s past lives look like. More importantly, what goal does it set up? I’m guessing, since this is a TV show, that every episode will focus on a specific person she encounters? Then there’ll be an overarching story about her own past lives etc. Is that right?
So, with that in mind, you need to consider a visual goal that this can set up. “Confront her karma” is not a visual goal. That’s more the internal arc, similar to Eleanor in The Good Place – she’s confronted with how horrible she was in life. So your protagonist’s goal, if she’s acting benevolently is going to be to help these people, and this in turn helps herself. Could she become a “past lives therapist” or something? Offer her services to people who come to her for help. Maybe, rather than despondent, she’s selfish. Her offering these services for money starts her off as doing something purely for personal gain, she needs the cash. But over the course of Season 1, she starts changing internally and gets invested in other people’s lives. She wants to help them. Then, maybe have it so all the way through season 1, she only deals with other people’s past lives, but on the last episode she’s faced with her own. She needed to change enough to be able to see it.
“A selfish social media influencer discovers the ability to see people’s past lives and uses her status to set up a “former lives therapy” clinic to monetise her gift but becomes increasingly absorbed in her patients’ past.”
I have no idea if this is the story you want to tell, but I would watch this show!
Hope this helps in some way.
is this any closer?
After a NDE a social media executive weighted with the ability to see past lives and now tasked with healing her “soul family” uses her position to embed herself in the lives of those around her to circumvent karma that foreshadows current life situations that could tragically repeat past life patterns.
very clear help, thank you very much.