Beyond The Zone
Alan SmitheePenpusher
Bitten by a zombie then discarded by her protector, a timid woman struggling to survive learns there's more to the apocalypse and the man she trusted.
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Jaredmacary:
It’s pretty well chiseled in granite now that Zombie bites are immediately fatal. So that’s what people expect to happen. But you can break the rule that once bitten by a zombie the results are immediate and irreversible. It’s a matter of how.
If your story pivots on an exception to the rule, you have to either introduce a dramatic instance of the exception OR at least the possibility of an exception in the first Act.
And in the 2nd Act, you have to have at least 1 more strong beat reminding the audience of the exception, before you pay off the story with the exception.
So it can be done.
>>>>It is the twist at the end and the pay-off that challenges convention.
Then that is the hook that could make our script stand out, make it rise to the top of the reading pile of the 1,001 other scripts about zombies. So I suggest that you don’t bury your twist. Rather, flaunt it.
Also “there’s more to the apocalypse” is cryptic, vague– doesn’t convey any useful information that lures me to your story. A good logline is bait on a hook that lures the reader’s mind to the script.
fwiw.
Jaybird. Great comment. I’m thinking more now how to make the logline more action-oriented and certainly want to avoid trite phrases. I’ll keep working on it.
JanCabal, Yes, absolutely, there must be an action or synthesis because of what the main character has discovered. Truth is not enough for the character or the reader. The dilemma, as DPG has pointed out, is that action appears curtailed due to the nature of the zombie narrative. In this story, there is no “race against time” until one turns into a zombie.
DPG – your comment makes complete narrative sense and is the struggle I face with the logline. It is the twist at the end and the pay-off that challenges convention. I want to allude to the uniqueness of the story without saying too much. I want the logline to be the hook to read and get to the pay-off. Your help is appreciated.
In the alternative universe where zombie’s abide and thrive, isn’t it a biological-medical certainty that after being bitten by a zombie, one immediately becomes one? If so, what chance is there for her to do anything than become a zombie within a minute after the ‘inciting incident’ of being bitten?
All is good, only one thing – the fact that she learns about the dark truth is not enough. She must take an action or something happens. We have a hunch that there is something at stakes, but we don;t want to watch a movie just to learn the truth. Protagonist must take some action: “so now she must …. or this happens.”
Good luck
Interesting premise! One quick note: generally the phrase “more to the…” is followed by “than he ever knew” or something similar. The absence of the latter half throws the reader off. Try changing the phrase (you’ll think of something better than this suggestion): Bitten by a zombie then discarded by her protector, a timid woman struggling to survive learns a dark secret about the apocalypse and the man she trusted.