When ripped off in a car purchase a reckless guy seeks revenge, but must defend himself, his best friend and an attractive receptionist against a psychopathic car salesman.

What if the story is something like this: “A timid research analyst inadvertently creates an ongoing feud with the psychotic car salesman who sold him a lemon.”

Or: “A timid research analyst must contend with a psychotic car salesman stalking him after he returns an overpriced sedan.”

Why research analyst? Just tried to pick a career which doesn’t generally involve dealing with people directly. Could be anything as long as it helps create irony, with a person not used to confrontation having no choice but to confront someone. I actually wanted to use the world “milquetoast” but not enough people know what that means anymore so I went with “timid,” which pretty much means the exact same thing. Shorter is better anyway.

As for putting the inciting incident first: it doesn’t work as well because you may have told me what’s happening but not to whom?I don’t care about what’s happening if I don’t know the person to whom it is. It makes the story sound less interesting. Even in the logline, I need to know right up front whose side I’m on. The events taking place are meaningless if I don’t already know whose perspective I’m witnessing it from. You could always go with something like “When a timid research analyst returns a malfunctioning car, he inadvertently starts a feud with the psycho salesman who sold it to him” — but you really need the comma to make that sentence work properly, and a logline without that pause will always flow better than one with?if it’s written well. It will usually be shorter, too, and as I said, shorter is better.