Scojo's future shock.

[pauljholden]

Okay, without wanting to post the whole thing it boils down to this:

Marines (from the film aliens) attack a planet with aliens who use nest. There is a big battle alien and marine fighting to the death. The last remaining marine decides to detonate a nuclear bomb so he plants a bomb and...

And here I'll quote the text from the future shock:
Page 5
 
1]
Close up of marine placing globe to the glass chamber. It sticks to the glass. On the globe, the words - Nuclear Armament Class D. Next to the globe is a small white card attached to the glass with cellotape.
 
2]
Marine 21 takes hold of the card.
Marine 21 (thinking): What's this?
 
3]
Close up on card. It reads-
From Nest Mother,
Sorry but I had to pop out for a few days. Visit the relatives, you know. Haven't seen them in ages. And you know what they are like.
 
4]
Close up on Marine 21, incredulous.
Marine 21: Eh?
 
5]
Close on letter again. It carries on from previous line.
Oh yes, before I forget...don't forget to feed the cat.
 
6]
Close up on a whimpering white cat rubbing itself against the marine's leg.
Cat: Meeaaaww!
 
===
Scojo asked for my HONEST opinion, and I gave it.

Here's my original response:

> In my honest opinion it was pretty poor.
>
> You've used a section of the aliens story and tried to
> build to some sort of climax but when it came to the
> end it was fairly dull.
>
> A good future shock has an unexpected ending BUT if
> you re-read the future shock you find that the ending
> was telegraphed early on. The end of this story came
> out of nowhere - you may as well have written "And the
> Marine turned into an orange" it makes no sense.
>
> The dialogue is equally duff.
>
> I'm sorry, I had hoped to be pleasently surprised, or
> at least have seen something in this that would have
> pointed to some sort of ability as a writer, but
> really, if this is the best of your future shocks you
> need to seriously rethink your writing abilities.
>
Here was scojo's response:

I think you fail to appreciate the juxtaposition between the cruel fight between alien and human and the fact that all the mother alien wanted was for the human to look after the cat.

It is called irony. Having the marine turn to orange as an example is a ridiculous rebuke of my work.

===========
I then posted:

> I was suggesting that having the alien nip out to see
> it's relatives was such an out of the blue thing it
> would be comparable to any totally random event, like
> the Marine turning into an orange. It's completely
> unexpected and has no logical baring on the what's
> happened in the story.
...
Scojo:

The fact that you do not understand why the mother alien writes what she did, proves you didn't get my future shock.

It is called IRONY.

That was the purpose of the out of the blue ending.
Look up the word in the dictionary if it will help.

I wrote:
> Usage Note: The words ironic, irony, and ironically
> are sometimes used of events and circumstances that
> might better be described as simply "coincidental" or
> "improbable," in that they suggest no particular
> lessons about human vanity or folly.
>
> What you've written would be better described as
> "improbable" NOT ironic. Irony would be if the marines
> had gone to war with the aliens out of the expectation
> that the aliens were hostile but they were in fact
> friendly. But, as your aliens activly fight the
> marines there's no irony involved.
>
> But since your reaction to HONEST criticism that
> YOU'VE asked for is to insult me, then I've no wish to
> continue this conversation in private. If you send ANY
> MORE private emails I WILL POST THEM TO THE NOTICE
> BOARD, along with enough background information so
> that people can understand them in context.

And he wrote:
You fail to understand the term.

According to the definition in my dictionary:
Irony is - " incongruity between what is expected and what actually is,
or a
situation or result showing such an incongruity"
Collins English Dictionary.

That describes my future shock.

So yet again you are wrong.

I have nothing to hide.
Post this email.

======================

So there. Apparently scojo only wants to here people pander to his ego, if you're of an don't agree that he is, indeed, mighty then even if he asks for your opinion, he doesn't want it.

[pauljholden]

So there. Apparently scojo only wants to here people pander to his ego, if you're of an don't agree that he is, indeed, mighty then even if he asks for your opinion, he doesn't want it.

That didn't make ANY sense did it? d'oh.

Here it is again:

Apparently scojo only wants to hear people pander to his ego. If you don't agree that he is, indeed, mighty then, even if he asks for your HONEST opinion, he doesn't want it.

[fraston]

hey i liked the idea! agreed the dialogue was a bit stale, but the ending was sorta funny.

needs a few rewrite tho.

F