Yay episode 2
All dressed up he headed to the kitchen to make his favorite breakfast. Two sunny side up eggs with a strip of bacon making a smiley face in his pan. A happy breakfast for a happy clown. As soon as he turn the corner to the kitchen, he stopped. At his kitchen table sat a women with long black hair. Her hands were folded and gently placed on the table as she just sat there. Bogo could feel his heart beating harder afraid to make any noise.
He took two slow steps forward and asked “Who are you? How did you get it?”
This is a pretty good start at setting the scene. It’s riddled with mistakes but I’m looking past that so that I can just get a feel for the story
The part in bold is like two different sentences merged together. Try to let each sentence stick to the same idea instead of doing this.
Also you can remove “as she just sat there”, serves no purpose as we already know she’s seated.
Unsure of if it was a good idea or not, Bogo walked up to the other side of the table and sat down
Here we have some confused characterisation. He goes from not being sure to walking right up and sitting down. I honestly think you should just scrap the “unsure of if it was a good idea or not” and just go with the characterisation that he is naïve/trusting enough to just take a seat, or stick with the characterisation of him not being sure and portray it in his actions, like having him hesitate or something as he is walking. You need to fix either side of this sentence.
“Samantha’s husband worked for a secret military group called GEM. They were working on a machine that could take two people and switch their bodies. They were using it as a way to take captured criminals, switch with them, and go undercover into their gang or organization. Since they were undercover, no one else knew they were agents. They ended up getting killed by police officers or other agents from the FBI or other organizations. GEM was exposed and they were forced to shut down fifteen years ago. Samantha’s husband was chosen to guard the key that could operate this machine. We believe he was killed by someone in search of that key. The men that broke in yesterday must have been looking for it.”
Waaaaaaay too much exposition. Not only is this too much to lay on readers at once, it’s unrealistic that she would give everything up before even knowing if he is on board or not (I see where this is going, she wants to hire him etc).
Think about it. She has seen him take down a few criminals, but that isn’t justification enough to hire a clown, and even if it was, she wouldn’t lay all her cards on the table like this unless she was that bad at her job. Which maybe she is because she is asking a clown for help.
Put yourself in her shoes. You would start off small and tell Bogo something low value to see how he reacts. If he pulls out a clown hammer, hits himself in the face, throws a rubber chicken at you then jumps through a closed window, maybe he isn’t the one. But at least he wouldn’t be on the loose knowing who is guarding a top secret key.
“Bogo, I want you to join us. We need your help in retrieving the key and finding the machine.”
That still doesn’t answer his question. Why him? I liked that you had the instincts to know that it needs justification, but you didn’t really come up with a compelling reason.
Overall:
Here’s what I like. I like Bogo. I like what you are doing with his character, how he is a bit naïve and endearingly innocent, but not totally useless or stupid. That’s quite a good balance so well done there. I also still like the concept. It’s pretty basic and lends itself a lot to your DC/Marvel inspiration, but as long as the story is engaging it won’t matter.
Here’s what I don’t like. Your logic doesn’t make sense. I’ve already explained why above so won’t go into more detail. What I also don’t like is that you have now come up with two set ups to push the storyline forward, but they both happen in the blink of an eye without any real build up or wow factor, and I’m sensing too much of YOUR influence as a writer to make these things happen. 1) You needed him to show off his talents, so two generic people break into a birthday party he was working. 2) You needed a secret organisation to hire him as an agent so they break into his house and hire him at his dining table. It’s just a bit easy and I know you can write better scenes/set ups than that.
Also I’m not adding this to the “Don’t like” list yet, but I wanted to warn you that so far the “conflict” doesn’t really involve Bogo. The organisation wants him to protect some key but it has nothing to do with Bogo’s goal, which, based on what you’ve written so far, is to reach a point where kids don’t fear him/clowns and he can continue his clown work. That goal doesn’t seem connected to working for a secret organisation. Remember that Bogo’s goals and dreams need to be what drive the story forward. If an organisation is deciding to hire him and give him a mission that’s important to them, then it will start to seem like the storyline is simply just happening to Bogo, when it should be Bogo happening to the storyline. He needs to be tied into the storyline in a way nobody else ever could be.
Did you tag me in this btw? I found it anyway but I don’t want to miss this.
-Zoom
Points: 10017
Reviews: 154
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