What I Learned's blog

Men In Black 3, and how to make a good parody

 

For a parody to be successful, it has to be both good and first.

The official trailer for Men In Black III (shown here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyaFEBI_L24) went online two weeks ago. My animator sent me a link and asked what we could spoof about it. I had a script done in two days. Within two weeks of the trailer being online, my video is online (shown here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zC-x0KkLjS0)

If you search “Men In Black 3 parody” in YouTube, my video is the first to come up. And it's the only one that's really relevant.

What I'm hoping by all this is that by being first to the party, I'll get a head start on views. The script is good, and I especially love the ending. And the video is first, or at least among the first if I missed the others.

So, take a look at it, and let me know if it's successful. Thanks!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zC-x0KkLjS0

 

Sick Joke

My animator had the idea of taking really messed-up jokes and turning them into skits. Here's our first try. It's offensive.

 

Dirtbag and Nun Joke

Submit your music for our movies

I make a video a week. And while most of the movies have the audio taken care of already, there are some that need background music.

Basically, I feel bad using www.Incompetech.com all the time.

This video will detail my basic needs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkLn7pzqAAM

Some of my videos have received thousands of views. Wouldn't it be nice to expand your audience that much? I need free music and you need free promotion, so let's work together.

I need professional-sounding recordings in these formats: .aif, .aifc, .aiff .asf, .au, .mp2, .mp3, .mpa, .snd, .wav, and .wma.

The recordings can't be live. And they have to be something that sounds like it would be the background to a scene in a movie. It has to convey an emotion without being distracting.

In submitting work, you agree to have your work used in a video that will only appear on the Internet. You understand that you will not be compensated for the work.

I can't promise I'll use it, or even contact you, so please don't send any follow-up messages. If I don't respond, I'm too busy with real life stuff. I'll definitely respond if I'm going to use your work.

Keep in mind, most of the time I'm only going to use a shortened version of the work, so viewers wouldn't be getting the whole thing for free.

So leave a comment here, or on my video if you want to share your songs. Leave a link to your work. Also, list your website if you have one. Provide whatever contact information you want to be public. Because other people will be viewing this link or watching my video. So, even if I don't use your work, someone else might.

Abyssinia, Harry Morgan

Doctors and nurses hustle through the surgery tent. The charismatic doctors deliver deadpan one-liners while digging through the young men torn up by battle. A young man walks into this whirlwind of activity.

“Radar, put a mask on,” one of the doctors yells.

“I have a message,” the young man says, faltingly. “Col. Henry Potter's plane...was shot down over the Sea of Japan, it spun and...there were no survivors...”

The doctors all fall quiet. Just the clank of scalpels dropping on metal trays.

 

From the Associated Press: Harry Morgan, who died Dec. 7 at age 96 after having pneumonia, was in the top ranks of actors who could take a small role, or a small scene, and bring it deftly alive. He added richness to any comedy or drama smart enough to call on him.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VY4qSh3UWIU

I always loved M*A*S*H and wanted to give Morgan a send-off that Henry Blake had.

Even as a kid, I liked how that show could go from goofy to serious and then back again. The seriousness made the goofiness that much more important and the goofiness made the serious parts all the more real.

What I Learned: If you want to balance comedy and drama, it starts with the characters. They have to be funny because they are reacting to the sad parts. The two feelings go hand in hand.

 

New publishing companies get swamped with submissions

I always check the publisher of the books my daughter brings home from the library. “When a Dragon Moves In” was published by FlashLight Press. (http://www.flashlightpress.com/index.html) I had never heard of them before. I assumed it was an imprint of a larger, impenetrable publishing company.

I was pleasantly surprised that it was its own company. A little bit of research showed they were owned by a company that published adult books, but it was still small. It was still approachable.

Which means it's approached by EVERYONE.

Their submission guidelines had changed in that they only respond if they really like it. They said it was because they got way too many submissions, and they couldn't respond to them all.

That's the way it is with us writers: Once the door opens a crack, we all rush toward it so the door cracks off its hinges.

There are so few publishing companies out there that actually accept unsolicited submissions that those who do get swamped very quickly. I only hope that my submission stands out from the herd.

What I Learned: There's huge competition even at the little publishers. The same rules apply: Make it your best effort, and make your book stand out. (This is better than the big ones, in which you can't even enter the competition.)

Don't abuse the little publisher that could. They're nice enough to offer you chances to have your work published. The least you can do is buy their books and keep that door open.

“It's OK to steal from the Internet,” they say

I wrote a short story for a client, and it turned out really good. Then, after all was said and done, my client mentioned he stole the idea from the Internet.

If all you need to do is right-click on something, why be original? Creativity isn't rewarded, it's just copied. People who want to copy something because they like it, but don't realize there's a value there.

There's an assumption that if it's online, it should be free. If this was the case, no one would be making any money off their creations and you'd see much less of it online.

Anything can be ripped off. That's why it's even more important to be 100 percent original. Don't fall into the easy trap of generating content mashed up from other people's ideas. You won't stand out. You'll be exactly like everyone else who is doing it.

We don't revere people like Steve Jobs because he copied other people. He got the respect he did because he created something new.

When anything can be copied off the internet the only thing I have is originality. People want original content, not the same old thing. That's why, for instance, Charlie Sheen jokes got old very quickly.

My writing might not be much, but at least it's my own.

 

Here's my YouTube channel. You'll find some bizarre but funny and very nsfw material:

 

YouTube channel

Write about poop? I have a degree, damn it!

An animator I've been working with asked me to come up with some R-rated jokes to animate. He wants to sync into the popularity that comes from Family Guy and especially Seth McFarlane's private channel.

I already created a character who plays movie-based video games and makes fun of them. So, all right. He wants adult humor. Fine. What terrible movie should become a video game?

“2 Girls, 1 Cup.”

Yes, the 4-year-old Internet meme that won't die...it just keeps on going...If you haven't watched it already, don't. Seriously. It's disgusting. This isn't reverse psychology.

So, I came up with a few jokes and wrote it. It took me an hour, probably. I figured the idea was worth an hour. I have a college degree. I've been a professional writer for about 10 years. I didn't want to spend any more time on this than I had to.

Then came the actual production. It takes a lot longer to animate, and the back-and-forth e-mails as we narrowed stuff down took quite a long time. We had to agree on character and background designs, an intro to the series, and I did the voice acting.

End result: NINE hours to create this video. And that's just my half.

So, watch the video. Let me know if it was time well spent.

 

2 Girls, 1 Cup the video game

How to write about Twilight without knowing anything about Twilight

When something as popular as Twilight invades pop culture the way it has, it's not hard to write about it with at least a passing knowledge.

I recently wrote a parody of it for an animated sketch. Here's the video. I hope you like it. But you should be warned there's some disturbing footage in here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncjwZ2CJoTQ

When I wrote this parody, there were certain truths I kept to:

1. It's about the characters. A lot of people rip on Twilight because of the drama. However, the drama is what drew fans to the series. Critics whine that vampires and werewolves should be more visceral, not lingering in love triangles. So I played on that.

My parody is about a Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn video game. So I made the first part of the gameplay about relationships, which I see as the strength (not the weakness) of the books.

2. Take it too far. Parodies work if you take it just far enough outside of the spectrum of what's acceptable in the book's real world. The second act of the video you'll see just how far I pushed it.

3. Prey upon people's preconceived notions. The interaction between Edward Cullen and Jacob at the end is based upon what pretty much every guy thinks Twilight is. It's an easy joke, and I'm not proud.

4. End with a 180 degree change. The problem with some parodies is that they just keep doing the same joke over and over. So, I wanted to make sure the last thing my protagonist says is a surprise.

Character: the most important part of writing, especially if you can make a toy out of it

Megan McCafferty, an of young adult novels, was speaking today to students at Central Regional High School, where she graduated. She said that she came up with what she thought was a great idea for a picture book.

Her agent declined it because there wasn't enough potential for a stuffed animal to come out of it.

“Wow,” said English teacher behind me, sadly.

Christopher Nolan was told by the film studio to make his Batman movies more “Toyetic.” Now, I suppose, books need to be.

This should come as no great shock, really. Everything is merchandised.

But two things make this worse. The first is that here's this New York Times bestselling novelist, and she doesn't have the muscle to get a non-toy book published. Secondly, marketing toys to children when you're trying to get them to read is a downward slope. Reading should open doors to more reading, not to buying commercial products.

My wife and I were in Toys R Us and were surprised to see Fancy Nancy and Pinkalicious dolls. Reading is a very private thing, most of the time. And despite the popularity of these series, we just never thought of the idea that hundreds of thousands of kids read them. Hundreds of thousands of potential customers.

I saw a Splat the Cat at Barnes and Noble. I almost got it, but I didn't because:

1. I'm cheap

2. My daughter has enough stuffed animals already

3. I don't think she'd play with him the way she'd play with her other toys. Maybe I'm wrong about this.

This is depressing. But I guess you have to think of it in terms of children's TV shows. There isn't any children's program on TV right now that isn't trying to sell you something. Except maybe the public broadcasting shows. But if Sesame Street is any indication, with Elmo's face on everything, the other shows will have marketing potential too. A quick Google turned up Word Girl (My favorite PBS show) costumes.

So, I guess we just have to live with it. Books aren't just for education or entertainment anymore. The main thing they teach us is how to be a consumer.

"The Immortals" script

I had the good fortune to interview Vlas and Charley Parlapanides, screenwriters for “The Immortals,” last week in advance of their movie.

They said something that struck me, and I want to share it here. They said that in Hollywood, scriptwriting still has a meritocracy.

“If you have a good script, “ it can get made, Charley Parlapanides said.

“If you do have a big idea, they don't care who you are,” Vlas Parlapanides said.

This is wonderful news to budding screenwriters. It means that if you have a good idea, you can make it work, providing you can get it into the right hands.

More or less.

They also said that you have to work your ass off and that you usually write 5 movies before your sixth one is sold. And then, there's no guarantee it will be made into a movie.

Also, they said you are only as good as your last one. So, if it doesn't make money, no one cares.

What I Learned: It's not as much who you know. Not when it comes to this. Sure, maybe more people will look at your movie if you are famous, or have some kind of connection. But you don't have to be anyone to start.

But you have to make yourself someone to keep going.