The Trick by Jack B. Nimble - It's all fun and games--until it isn't.  Short, Horror

Minor logic question — Mark is scared from the start, as though they have a plan. But she doesn’t make the plan until they see the house. So why is he agitated at the start? “I don’t like this” - what exactly?

Lots of Mark lines where the subtext is text — not sure if these work as jokes. The penis line and “horror movie hater like me” both feel a bit stiff.

Honestly, a lot of dialogue to get them to the house. All she really needs to say is “Something like that — I’ll make it worth your while.” Get ‘em in the house fast!

Fun turn for the second half. I think you could hit it way harder in the first half with really having Jess tease him and really have him playing cowardly. And I think there could be a bit more in the setup to define the relationship between these two — the twist feels a bit out of left field because it’s not clear whether Mark is luring her here or why she knows this guy who is involved in this nefarious business.

Fun scary house stuff overall and yeah, a good turn.

MARK
Fine. But only because I’m a guy
who makes decisions with my penis.
Great line.  

This took a U-turn I wasn't expecting in a very short space of time. It's a genuinely scary idea someone being not who they appear to be, but I'd use the allowed page count to expand on this, and use the extra pages to build suspense/intrigue before the shock ending.

A nice serial killer horror story, with an evil Dexter-like character; nice one!

My two cents on the matter; you could slide in, somewhere in the first part, that Mark and Jess met recently, to prepare the audience for the final twist. If they had known each other for a long time, as they seem to be right now, it wouldn't be very realistic.

Apart from that, great horror story, and easily producible.

Just curious why you didn’t keep going or use the existing real estate (pages) to build something a little bigger, as is it just happened too fast to get my bearings.

Mark was the one who didn’t want to go into the house, that house in particular, but he telecast the ending up front with “It’s an invitation to a horrible, diabolical murder. Don’t you watch horror movies?” So maybe he knew exactly what was in store for the both of them.

I think, and it’s just opinion, that they go in the house and Mark is genuinely scared shitless, but then some ghostly entity possesses him and he becomes the Maître d' of some ghoulish terror hotel/brothel that only opens its doors on Halloween night, and like in the Shining, the landlord is chosen by the hotel itself to be the ‘deliverance’ of horror from within.

Anyway, with only 3 pages of script it’s hard to build detailed feedback for you to go on, so I’ll leave at that. The writing is good and the cadence of action to dialog flowed well, just wish there was more to the story. Best of luck.

Writer,

Short and to the point. And so is my review. Nice little short you got on your hands here. Nothing groundbreaking, but still fun so nicely done.

Nothing substantial to add.

All the best,

Ghost

So Mark had zero intentions of going to the house, and not just once, he said multiple times.
But yet he was the bad guy who benefitted from Jess going??

He also didn't see the house til later. What if Jess agreed, and they went somewhere else?

Maybe you should have made it more enticing for Mark and have a follow-up from Jess after the penis comment. Perhaps he'll get to use it.

It was a good twist and you followed all the parameters.

The story was well-written and could benefit from a rewrite for clarity.

Good job on entering

Short and sweet, not sure the intro and Mark's reluctance totally work but it doesn't spoil it.

Well written and I can see this getting filmed.

I have an appreciation for the brevity. The story is complete in few words. No fillers. If you have the talent to do this on features, more power to you. This had some excitement and met the requirements.

On the other hand, I personally would have liked more story.

Writer,

Short and sweet, right to the point, but a little too tidy for me. A lot of stars aligning for Mark to know that she would even want to go into that house. That could have used some foreshadowing or a scene showing he literally knows her very well, or a line exposing this near the end. Good effort!

Steve

This one checks the boxes for Halloween and horror - horror for sure.  My first read through, I thought Mark and Jess were two males - gay males maybe after the seduction line LOL - but on my second read through I noticed that Jess was referred to as "she".  Good writing skills on display here - and I liked the twist of Mark ultimately being the killer - not exactly sure how he got Jess to pick the exact house he wanted to trap her in, but it still worked.  Creepy little short here - good work and thanks for sharing on the OWC!

Good effort on this one -- I think I agree with others that maybe Mark should somehow make the suggestion that they go to the house, and she readily agrees, but then he starts to show some hesitation afterwards.  Just something to tie the fact that Mark is the one who's committing the atrocities.  It certainly ramped up once they got in the house.  Some nice visuals and call outs to the haunted house tropes.

Best of luck with it.

Great little tale, you get quite a lot in for three pages.

"It’s an invitation to a horrible, diabolical murder" - Love that precursor.

Just wonder at the end whether Mark could instead repeat the line - "What? Don't you watch horror movies?"

Liked this one a lot, great stuff!

Just read this is two minutes, so I'll be brief. The brevity spoils the build up IMO.
Some of the dialogue was a tad unrealistic. Example: "I think with my penis." Never heard a guy say this about himself, usually that would be said about him.

Also I felt  that I was being led into the conclusion. So no real intrigue there.

It was defo a Halloween yarn but needed more of a build up for me to be fulfilled.

So many comments about rewrites and so on but I would consider this to be one that will gather dust in your files, like so many of these OWC entries, including my own.

This one doesn't make a whole lot of sense, really, but I suppose that is why the twist is so surprising and seems to come out of nowhere.

Some of the dialogue works well, and the story is succinctly told, but it feels more like the script just kind of spins off the rails in the last half-page or so.