DZ-24: Forging story rules in TV pilots

Are your story rules in your pilot strong enough to play out over the life of your show?

Stu and Chas move away from the world of features and dive into the Pilot Episodes of some (New) Golden Age Television: THE SHIELD, THE WIRE, BREAKING BAD, and MAD MEN. And we sneak in some discussion about ANGEL, THE SOPRANOS and GAME OF THRONES.

Our spiritual guide on this tele-vision quest is Wallflower (aka Grant Nebel), writer at The Solute and formerly of The Dissolve and the AV Club.

Together, they examine how the final acts of these pilot episodes – and the Dramatic, Literary and Cinematic rules established therein – will set the scene for the entire life of these seminal shows, right up to their end. Obviously,  abound.

This was one of our favourite episodes to record and – given that both Chas and Stu are casting seductive glances at writing television – hopefully one of our most useful too.

LINKS

• The-Solute.com: Wallflower (Grant Nebel)
  • Grant Nebel: Collected writing on THE SHIELD
  • Soundtracking: Grant’s Podcast on Movie Soundtracks
• THE SHIELD pilot by Shawn Ryan
• THE WIRE – Episode 101 “THE TARGET” teleplay by David Simon, Story by David Simon and Edward Burns
• BREAKING BAD pilot by Vince Gilligan
• MAD MEN – “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes” by Matthew Weiner
  • Vulture.com: Man Men Pilot Predicts the Final Episodes
• Draft Zero: DZ-04: Catharsis and the Post-Coital Cigarette
• Draft Zero: DZ-09: Characterising Introductions
• Draft Zero: DZ-06: Key Scenes and Unlocking the Story
• StyleCaster: ‘Breaking Bad’ and Colors: A Comprehensive Guide to the Theories, Costumes
• The Disenchanted Costumier: Breaking Bad Costumes
• Director’s Guild of America: Elia Kazan – On What Makes a Director (pdf)
• ActionCutPrint: Elia Kazan – On What Makes a Director (excerpted)
• Every Frame A Painting: David Fincher – And the Other Way is Wrong (Vimeo)

BACK MATTER (BACKDRAFT?)

• Bob Saenz: The Mean Old Writer
• Genre Hacks: What is the Most Important Screenwriting Tool: The Rewriting Cycle
• Wired: Harnessing the Power of Feedback Loops
• GoodReader – PDF Reader (PDF Annotation)
• Readdle: Documents & PDF Expert (PDF Annotation)
• Literature & Latte: Scapple (“Flowcharting” for Scrivener)

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