Young Writers Society

18:00, Thursday @ Shaw Boulevard, Tablado boys decided to have their 'first boys' night out' in Manila. As usual, Jj couldn’t come with them for some excuses, I mean reasons.

Erol was waving at Jem and Jose from the other side of the street.

Jemo: Here he is.
Jose: Yeah, it’s him.

Erol with his big smile was having a hard time crossing the busy street.

Erol: *panting* Jem! You didn’t tell me how hard it is to get here! Hi there, Jose! *smiles*
Jem: Ha-ha, I did tell you, you just forgot it. *burst into laughter*
Jose: (trying not to laugh with Jem...) Am okay, Erol. So, where do you stay here in Manila?
Erol: I stay in my friend’s house in Quezon City.
Jose: Cool, you actually did figure the way to get here that fast.
Erol: Well, thanks, am still familiarizing the routes though. By the way, where’s Nicky?
Jem: Well, knowing that dude, it's just 6:30 pm, so… (counting) he’ll be here at least by 8:30 pm. (said sarcastically)
Erol: Oh really? Yeah, I remember now. *frowns*
Jem: (reading a text message from Nicky) Speaking of him, he just texted me:

Jem: If we only knew he’s just on a train. *laughs*

Erol and Jose laughed with him.

After 2 hours...

Nicky: Hey, guess what, am here guys! So what’s up? Sorry, am late.
Erol and Jose: (smiles)
Jem: No, actually you are just in time for your "two-hour lateness rule".
And we’re used to it don’t worry, except Jose by the way. You owe him now for that!
All boys: (laughs)
Jem: So, where are we going then?
Erol: Anywhere, am cool with anything!
Nicky: Greenbelt!
Jose: (just smiled)

Then, they hired a taxi going to Makati.
Jem, Erol and Nicky: (chatting in a foreign dialect)
The Taxi Driver: (eavesdropping but can hardly understand any of their words)

Jem: Go for a karaoke?
Erol: Let’s go get a drink!
Nicky: Karaoke and cheers!
Jose: (just smiled)

Finally they arrived @ Greenbelt 3. The boys can't decide where to go since there were numbers of bars around. Until they saw a group of four girls, chatting from a corner of one of the coffee shops.

To be continued...

My main advice would be to get straight in with the action. Who are the characters? What are their motivations? What are their relationships with one another? You need to make this clear from the beginning, otherwise the audience is going to be completely lost.

I felt that the characters were not differentiated enough - they should have clear individual personalities and I wasn't really getting that from this. Having said that, of course it's just a small part of the whole and I expect that their characters will come across better on a wider canvas.

Overall, I liked this but thought it could be improved on. Well done and good luck with the rest!

18:00, Thursday @ Shaw Boulevard, Tablado boys decided to have their 'first boys' night out' in Manila. As usual, J.J. couldn’t come with them for some excuses, I mean reasons.

Depending on the medium, I'm left wondering how the audience could possibly know all the information contained in this stage direction. If it's intended as a film, you could have the time stamp and location appear on screen, but the rest of this direction makes no sense as a direction unless you've got a narrator narrating all this, which leads me to ask the question of who the narrator is and what his relation to the story is. Is he one of the characters? Is this a recollection of his past?

Those are some things you should consider.

That said, there are a couple of other issues with this. First, being that the dialogue really felt contrived, and the use of "am" in place of "I'm" really irked me. Secondly, there wasn't much action in this little section. The boys meet up. They wait for a friend. They ride in a taxi. End of episode.

Quite frankly, that's boring. Where's the conflict? The drama? This is likely the first thing your audience will be encountering, so you need to hook them or lose them. Right now, while there's a hint of conflict brewing at the very end (in one of the directions, which makes no sense), there's nothing in this first part to hook your audience.

You might want to fix that.