The Screenwriter's Wheel

Hollywood and the Film and TV industry is a competitive business. It is tough for a newbie screenwriter to step in and build a career in such a competitive and pen eat pen world environment. 

To add to the stress, there are critics, the good, the bad and the really ugly ones who the producers rely on to figure out whether or not your story makes sense and can be a viable business venture. These critics, also known as the readers, are subjective in most cases and will sometimes apply their own biases when you ask how to better improve your screenplay. However, the ugliest ones in the business, have a reputation for not allowing screenwriters to grow and prosper. Now, granted is the fact that no screenplay is perfect, but these henchmen and women go the distance and will find everything, and I mean everything wrong with your screenplay (and not for entertainment purposes). One sure way to identify a bad critic from a good one is: He or she will barrage the writer with questions that would later be answered by the story in the screenplay itself. They don't look at the story as a whole, but every line or dialogue they find wrong; they scrutinize on that part of screenplay and even after letting you continue, they repeat the process. For the most part, they aren't as knowledgeable as they're perceived to be and are impatient at the same time.

Another major element to add to the competitive nature of the business is this annoying fact: because producers have vested interest in making their investment in a film or any visual medium back with interest, they would most likely want what is trending at that point in time. For example, before the Twilight Saga of films came out, the amount of films and television shows and other content related to vampires and werewolves was low, but since the release of the Twilight Saga of films in gradual succession, the amount of films, television shows and paradies related to werewolves and vampires has exploded. This strategy undermines great filmmakers like Alfred Hitchcock and Woody Allen, who during their earlier filmmaking days, had unique and out of the box ideas. Nowadays, it's all up to the producers, the agents and the critics who determine whether or not your story is a money maker or a breaker.

In response to this challenge, writers have the propensity to take the easy way out thinking: "It's what everyone wants" or "I'll just follow the trend". There is a major problem with either of those self defeating statements:

1. "It's what everybody wants": The simple answer is no. If you're a writer who writes romantic novels and screenplays like writer Nicholas Sparks does, the entire population of a given country is not into the romance genre. You will find a percentage of the population who love Sci-fi, Action, Thriller, Horror, Fantasy and other genres on the list. It is not confined to one specific genre. Here, the 'one size fits all' approach doesn't fit the bill. These days, branching out into other genres is a huge benefit - even if you're the strongest at writing in one genre.
2. "I'll just follow the trend": Agree or disagree with me on this one, but when there is a trend, the competition is not so fiercely competitive because every writer who is interested in a trend is just trying to follow it and not trying to identify their own unique voice by starting their own trend. With a plethora or a pantheon of trends in the market competing for a viewer's eye, it should be difficult for a critic or viewer to criticize or choose sides. Now that is serious competition.

On the plus side, independent producing and filmmaking is on the gradual rise. Despite this natural, progressive step, there are very few investors or independent producers who are willing to fork out the cash needed to finance that high budget, blockbuster film you've just written and hoping to sell.There is also the advice from producing mentors or instructors from film school that tell screenwriters and filmmakers to find a producer that believes in them and or their story, which shouldn't be shunned like it is yesterday's trash.

At the end of the day, you the screenwriter, novelist or anyone who produces any form of literary piece of work, you need to challenge yourself and rise above the familiar jack in the box. For all the screenwriters, write all the fiction you want, but write it in such a way that it will be hard for the most ugliest, and the most nastiest of the critics to fault it. Do not give them a chance. You are the creator so create that new trend no one has ever heard of and everyone is excited about.

"Quantity is something you count, Quality is something you count on" - Patrick, a Boeing employee

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