What the DEUCE?
Kay, so, here's the low down:
DEUCE
Script: Jason Franks
Art: Nicholas Hunter
FORMAT:
Approx a miniseries or a graphic novel comprised of 6 x 22 page chapters, standard US format (or perhaps 3/4 size). Full bitchin' colour. Note: pagecount is an estimate.
GENRE:
Suspense/ drama/ horror/ crime/ weird shit
AUDIENCE: Mature readers. Coarse language and nasty, nasty violence.
PRODUCTION/ PUBLICATION: I have a particular publisher in mind, but I can see this book at a number of others. We'll pitch once we have 22 pages in hand.
HIGH CONCEPT:
Deconstruct the conventions of a slasher movie without irony.
If you've seen Michael Hanneke's FUNNY GAMES you're on the right track. (The original version, anyway; I didn't see the English language remake but I believe it's shot-for-shot the same)
PLOT
When George Bodenham is murdered on his way to work by a maniac with an Uzi machinegun, there are a lot of questions to be answered. The event took place in broad daylight, on a busy street in the middle of town during rush hour... but nobody saw it happen and nobody remembers the assailant.
George's friends and family don't know how to handle it. What could George have been involved in? Who else is involved? What the fuck? They're ordinary, decent people; young married couples mostly, they have no idea how to deal with this. To make matters worse, the police detective assigned to the case is a borderline retard. They try to deal with the death as best they can and go back to their lives, but it's too late.
The murder, 'Deuce', is amongst them, wandering through their lives unseen and unnoticed-- not really snooping, just hanging around, waiting until it feels like the right time to kill another one. And then another.
Who is this guy? He doesn't hide. He doesn't speak. He just walks around, plain as the day, doing whatever he likes... and he's really lucky. Traffic lights turn green for him. Doors unlock themselves for him. Guns misfire when they're pointed at him. He's just some deuce... excuse me, deus ex machina horror movie villain, right?
But that does that even mean?
OBJECTIVES:
The first objective is to show a realistic view of ordinary people coping with terrible events, without resorting to melodrama. No former green berets, no dark secrets, no soap opera dramas... these people are citizens. They're flawed, they're weak, but they're honest, law abiding types who are just settling into their lives as adults. Some of them are more resourceful than others; some of them seem as if they could be heroes, in the right circumstances... or they think they could be... but those circumstances are the sort that only occur in the movies.
The other objective is to tell a scary fucking story without using any of the standard slasher movie toolkit. No hiding in the shadows, no startle effects, none of that shit where the bad guy moves really fast when he's off camera so he can crop up somewhere unlikely. When Deuce bends the laws of physics it's brazen: we see it happen right in front of us.
Next up: character sheets and a couple of Nic's production sketches.
DEUCE
Script: Jason Franks
Art: Nicholas Hunter
FORMAT:
Approx a miniseries or a graphic novel comprised of 6 x 22 page chapters, standard US format (or perhaps 3/4 size). Full bitchin' colour. Note: pagecount is an estimate.
GENRE:
Suspense/ drama/ horror/ crime/ weird shit
AUDIENCE: Mature readers. Coarse language and nasty, nasty violence.
PRODUCTION/ PUBLICATION: I have a particular publisher in mind, but I can see this book at a number of others. We'll pitch once we have 22 pages in hand.
HIGH CONCEPT:
Deconstruct the conventions of a slasher movie without irony.
If you've seen Michael Hanneke's FUNNY GAMES you're on the right track. (The original version, anyway; I didn't see the English language remake but I believe it's shot-for-shot the same)
PLOT
When George Bodenham is murdered on his way to work by a maniac with an Uzi machinegun, there are a lot of questions to be answered. The event took place in broad daylight, on a busy street in the middle of town during rush hour... but nobody saw it happen and nobody remembers the assailant.
George's friends and family don't know how to handle it. What could George have been involved in? Who else is involved? What the fuck? They're ordinary, decent people; young married couples mostly, they have no idea how to deal with this. To make matters worse, the police detective assigned to the case is a borderline retard. They try to deal with the death as best they can and go back to their lives, but it's too late.
The murder, 'Deuce', is amongst them, wandering through their lives unseen and unnoticed-- not really snooping, just hanging around, waiting until it feels like the right time to kill another one. And then another.
Who is this guy? He doesn't hide. He doesn't speak. He just walks around, plain as the day, doing whatever he likes... and he's really lucky. Traffic lights turn green for him. Doors unlock themselves for him. Guns misfire when they're pointed at him. He's just some deuce... excuse me, deus ex machina horror movie villain, right?
But that does that even mean?
OBJECTIVES:
The first objective is to show a realistic view of ordinary people coping with terrible events, without resorting to melodrama. No former green berets, no dark secrets, no soap opera dramas... these people are citizens. They're flawed, they're weak, but they're honest, law abiding types who are just settling into their lives as adults. Some of them are more resourceful than others; some of them seem as if they could be heroes, in the right circumstances... or they think they could be... but those circumstances are the sort that only occur in the movies.
The other objective is to tell a scary fucking story without using any of the standard slasher movie toolkit. No hiding in the shadows, no startle effects, none of that shit where the bad guy moves really fast when he's off camera so he can crop up somewhere unlikely. When Deuce bends the laws of physics it's brazen: we see it happen right in front of us.
Next up: character sheets and a couple of Nic's production sketches.