DARK GENESIS  BY Billy H. Avalos

LOCATIONS(S): Los Angeles; Chicago; San Francisco; Detroit;

     West Virgina; Washington D.C.

CIRCA:2047

LOGLINE: Following the successful invasion of America by a foreign coalition, the resistance movement must not only      out the invaders, but also defeat a nationalistic villain bent on remaking America by killing dissenters.

CONTENT SUMMARY: DARK GENESIS has an intriguing premise, but the execution isn't nearly as strong or focused as it needs to      be, particularly when it comes to providing streamlined narrative and three dimensional characters.

RECOMMENDATION: PASS

EXCELLENT GOOD FAIR NEEDS WORK

PREMISE

STORY LINE

SYNOPSIS:

2045. The United States has been taken over by an invading

coalition of nations that includes Russia, China, and Saudi Arabia. The coalition’s success is due to “R.E.L.A.X.,” an energy wave (based on an orbiting asteroid) that prevents people from committing violent acts. Coalition army helmets make them immune to R.E.L.A.X.. Only a few pockets of resistance to the coalition remain, divided into two factions: those aligned with the deposed President and those with the Legion of Patriots.

Three Legion agents, MIKE DANIELS (20s), NANCY SMITH (30s, British), and STEPHEN DUVALL (50s) break into a San Francisco computer server facility and steal a top secret “G.R.I.P.” computer chip known as Cerebral. Once they have it, Daniels reveals himself to be aligned with the President. He wants Cerebral. But Duvall puts the chip against his skin, thereby absorbing its power and controlling all the world’s computer systems. Duvall then focuses R.E.L.A.X.’s energy onto Daniels as a weapon.

Two years later, scientist RYAN PIERCE (30s) – inventor of both R.E.L.A.X. and G.R.I.P. - visits Los Angeles to reconcile with estranged daughter ASHLEE (teens), an pop singer. But Ashlee wants nothing to do with Ryan. Elsewhere, with the aid of Daniels – who barely survived his encounter with Duvall - rebels attack a coalition convoy and steal a G.R.I.P. As reward for his efforts, Daniels is sent to meet with Ryan in the hopes Ryan can cure the seizures that have plagued Daniels since his encounter with Duvall. Ryan soon meets Daniels and begins to suspect that Daniels’s rage causes his seizures.

Smith takes Ryan to Chicago, where Duvall has just led an invasion of the Jade Tower skyscraper with his Legion of Patriots. Duvall wants Ryan’s help retaking America from the coalition. Ryan reluctantly helps confirm Duvall’s calculations on R.E.L.A.X.’s computer code, which helps Duvall use  R.E.L.A.X.’s energy beam to kills 20 million Americans. Dead are those whose violent acts R.E.L.A.X. had blocked at least three times. Duvall intends on using R.E.L.A.X. to improve the American population. Ryan is horrified. Duvall prepares to kill

Ryan with Cerebral, but Ryan has an G.R.I.P. of his own: TUNDRA,

which makes him invincible. Smith rescues Ryan and takes him to the President. Soon after, Duvall announces on TV his intention to turn off R.E.L.A.X. to free Americans to fight back.      Volunteers flood Chicago as fighting starts between the Legion and the coalition. In Detroit, a rapper feud leads JACKSON KING (seems 20s, black) to attack Z60 (seems 20s, black) on stage. When Z60 blows up Jackson’s house in retaliation, a strange “Soul Release” medallion Jackson recently acquired saves his life. Saudi forces pull Jackson from the rubble. Meanwhile, Smith and Ryan are taken into an underground bunker in West Virginia and meet the PRESIDENT (seems 50s), who wants to take advantage of Duvall’s actions and retake Chicago. The President thinks Ryan’s knowledge of G.R.I.P. and R.E.L.A.X. will prove valuable. But when Ryan learns Ashlee is in Chicago in the

middle of the fighting, he refuses to help until she’s been rescued.

The President sends Ryan to Chicago with CARTIER (seems 30s) as escort. After they’re gone, coalition troops attack the bunker, tracing a signal from Smith, a coalition spy. In Chicago, Jackson is now in the custody Saudi commander MOHAMMED

(seems 40s), who’s gathering as many G.R.I.P.s as he can with the goal of returning to Saudi Arabia as king. Jackson’s Soul Release medallion – a black market variation on G.R.I.P.s - once belonged to Mohammed and reflects the owner’s soul; a white medallion can heal, a black medallion can destroy. Mohammed is alerted that two G.R.I.P.s have been detected: Ryan and Cartier. Mohammed’s forces swarm in and Mohammed challenges Cartier to a duel: his G.R.I.P. against Cartier’s. Cartier accepts and Mohammed kills him, taking Cartier’s G.R.I.P. Mohammed sets his sights on Ashlee. If she loses, she will have to marry him. But then Jackson taps into the “dark powers” of his Soul Release medallion and fights Mohammed. Then Daniels and his soldiers arrive. A fierce fight ensues. Ryan’s separated from Ashlee, but he and Jackson end up in the safe house of gangbanger POTO BANG (seems 20s), who recognizes rapper Jackson.

At the Pentagon, coalition military commander YELTSKOFF (seems 50s) is confronted by Duvall, who now has a number of G.R.I.P.s, making him very powerful. Duvall reveals his  intention to use the coalition’s loyalty oath to kill (using R.E.L.A.X.’s energy) those citizens who acquiesced to the coalition. Only those who resisted are “pure” Americans worthy of survival. Duvall announces these plans on television. The only way he will spare the millions is if Ryan comes to him in Washington, D.C. Ryan hears this and decides to meet with Duvall. By now Ryan’s realized his foolish arrogance in

developing R.E.L.A.X. and G.R.I.P., devices he created for good that have been corrupted by evil. Daniels takes Ryan to  Washington.

Mohammed heads for Washington with Ashlee as his hostage, hoping to claim the G.R.I.P.s of Ryan and Duvall. In Washington, Ryan gives Daniels a new G.R.I.P. that allows a gun to form on his hands. Daniels attacks Duvall, who flees with Ashlee as a hostage. Smith uses her power to turn Mohammed’s men against  him. Jackson and Poto Gang free the President, who decides to destroy America with its own nukes in order to keep the  coalition from having it. When Duvall learns of this, he tells Ryan. Ryan and Smith both helps fuel Duvall’s Cerebral G.R.I.P. so Duvall can stop the nukes. But even after this spirit of cooperation Duvall still plans to start a new era in America with only “pure” Americans, starting by crashing the R.E.L.A.X. asteroid into the earth. It’s only after Ryan convinces Smith that she’s not a part of Duvall’s future America that she turns on Duvall. Together, Ryan and Smith kill Duvall. Ryan then destroys the asteroid before it can hit the earth, but he’s fatally wounded. Meanwhile, Jackson uses Soul Release to defeat the coalition once and for all. In the end, Ashlee’s goodness, combined with Soul Release’s power, heals Ryan.

COMMENTS:

DARK GENESIS offers an interesting premise: what happens

after America is overrun and occupied by a foreign invasion force? How would Americans respond? Who might lead a revolution to oust the invaders? All intriguing questions, particularly in today’s increasingly polarized, partisan world. But while the story has an admirable operatic scope to it, calling to mind the ensemble good versus-evil clash in stories like The Stand, the execution gets too bogged down in convoluted sci-fi/fantasy elements. Most notable is the outlandish conceit that gives many of the characters unique superhuman powers thanks to a computer chip. Aside from this, the story’s also simply too sprawling and unfocused. It’s tedious when it should be gripping, confusing when it should be rousing. A rewrite should seek to streamline the plotting, flesh out the main characters, and explore more clearly the story’s themes. What’s the point to all of this? The premise inherently examines a number of angles, such as the price of freedom, the value of freewill, the evils of  dictatorships, but never really examines them in any detail.

For now, the execution is far too muddy and unsatisfying to merit consideration.

The biggest concern is the dense plot. There’s simply far

too much going on. The structure, packed full of subplots and minor characters, seems needlessly complicated. The characters are constantly coming and going, meeting here, traveling there. Much of these moves seem dictated more by the needs of the writer than by an organic necessity in the story. The script would benefit greatly from a simpler, more unified structure. This means the main characters will need clearer wants, clearer agendas, and clearer alliances. As is, it’s too often hard to divine who’s doing what and why. It all gets very confusing.

Take, for example, the subplot involving Mohammed. While his goal (collecting G.R.I.P.s as a way to get back into power in Saudi Arabia) cleverly explores the way world conflicts can involve strange motivations on the part of its leaders, for now it’s a huge distraction from the main throughline involving the American revolution. Mohammed also is one of the script’s more melodramatic characters, challenging Cartier to a duel and then suddenly deciding he wants Ashlee for his wife. If Mohammed were cut from the story it’s unlikely he would be missed, one of the best tests of any extraneous subplot. Likewise, while it may be realistic to portray two factions opposing the coalition (the Legion and the deposed U.S. government), as it plays out now this fracture resistance seems to muddy the waters needlessly. Why not keep it clean and pit Duvall against the coalition, with Ryan and Daniels taking over Duvall’s misguided army? Again, anything to simplify the action would be well worth consideration.

There’s also something of an over-reliance on gadgets and gizmos in this story. The script presents a number of far-fetched technological advances: the complicated R.E.L.A.X. system (for which the exact mechanics of its operation remain completely unexplained), the confusing G.R.I.P.s (how does a computer chip give someone these kinds of powers?), and the mystical Soul Release medallion (which seems like a powerful, ancient religious artifact out of an Indiana Jones movie even though it’s described as a futuristic invention).

Each device has its own set of rules and backstory that has to be sorted out in confusing, techno-babble dialogue. It’s all very disorienting and distracts from the main action. At times it seems like the story emphasis is mistakenly placed more on these high-tech props than on the characters and plotline. Audiences need to be keying into the characters and their problems, not untangling a knot of exposition about how this future world operates. It all must be streamlined. It might therefore be worthwhile to pick a single gizmo

for the story. The best candidate for elimination is Soul Release. What does this add? For the same reason that Mohammed should perhaps be cut, so, too might Soul Release and Jackson be cut. Plus, as mentioned above, Soul Release seems more like a fantasy element than a science fiction element, what with all the talk about how Soul Release can detect a user’s soul and then create the appropriate powers. This kind of thing simply seems beyond the scope of what’s possible with mere technology. Is that the point? The story tries at times to balance technology on one side and mysticism/religion on the other. But

rather than raise interesting questions about religion and science,these kinds of things are just distracting and may make the audiences roll their eyes in disbelief.

The characters are hopelessly lost in the shuffle, dwarfed by the attention paid to the sci-fi hardware and complicated plotting. But audiences need someone to root for and crave characters with clear goals and transformations. Right now, the characters react more than act. The only character with a clear agenda is Duvall. That’s good, but the heroes also need a plan of action. That way, the audiences can see how Ryan and the others are countering Duvall’s moves and can appreciate whether the heroes are succeeding or failing. Ryan seems to be the story’s protagonist, if only because he’s the only character with any sort of arc. Here, he’s the prototypical

scientist who’s disillusioned with the way his invention has been corrupted by evil. But just how naïve and unsophisticated must Ryan be? On one hand he’s created a device that controls people’s actions, essentially robbing them of freewill. And on the other hand, he’s developed computer chips that when implanted give the user incredible superhuman powers. Worse, those chips can’t be deactivated; one it’s being used, it can’t be taken away. How can Ryan possibly think these kinds of out-rageously powerful devices won’t be perverted by dangerous people? It’s simply impossible to buy. As a result, all of his hand-wringing regret feels phony. Is there any way to tweak his character? Maybe Ryan simply invented the basic computer code from which R.E.L.A.X. and G.R.I.P.s grew? That might remove some of the responsibility for him and give him a more sympathetic arc. In other words, instead of making it a story about a Robert Oppenheimer type (i.e. the person who built the weapon), it’s more about an Albert Einstein type (i.e. the person whose work

led to the bomb).

Perhaps the more interesting angle to Ryan’s character is his lack of involvement. He sees the terror unleashed in America because of his inventions, yet he won’t volunteer to help right the coalition’s wrongs. He instead must be coerced into helping. Why is that? His own daughter could have been killed, it seems, by the coalition’s invasion. Did Ryan take any steps to help her? This might be an avenue worth exploring to show how Ryan evolves from a cold opportunist cashing in to a man of conscience willing to risk his life to destroy his cash cows. How Ryan’s expatriation to France – or his estrangement from Ashlee - factors into all of this is unclear. However it’s handled, though, Ryan needs a clear arc. The current arc (naïve to wise) is good in theory, but it’s hard to buy.

Daniels, Smith, and Duvall need more depth as well. They’re too flat. Maybe Ryan and Duvall have a history. Maybe Duvall was Ryan’s mentor. It’s interesting that the President winds up being more dangerous than Duvall (i.e. Duvall wants to save America in his own warped way while the President is ready to destroy it). Perhaps Duvall senses the President isn’t a “pure” American and is capable of evil. That might provide nice ambiguity to the situation and raise questions about what is a “pure” American. Maybe more should also be done to explore Smith’s opportunism. What if Smith more clearly played all the sides, pretending to be an ally to everyone (Ryan, the President, Duvall, the coalition) so she’s on top no matter who wins.

What doesn’t work right now are Daniels’s seizures. What’s the point to this subplot? It never truly impacts the story. Maybe the key to Daniels isn’t exploring the fallout of his R.E.L.A.X. injuries but instead the impotence of a soldier, a guy sworn to defend his country who failed miserably. There are clearly any number of ways to go with adding edges and facets to the characters. It all depends on the questions the story wants to explore. The choices and questions the characters struggle with point to the overall purpose of the story as a whole.

A few more minor issues:

• Why would this coalition of countries invade the U.S.? It might be understandable if they pool resources to     destroy America, but why go to the expense of invading and occupying it?
• If the Cerebral G.R.I.P. allows Duvall to use 20% of his brain (as opposed to most people’s 1%), why would he need Ryan to help with the math formula?
• How can it be that Ryan’s the only world expert on R.E.L.A.X. and G.R.I.P.? Everyone’s desperate to have him on their side, but aren’t there other scientists with his same knowledge? And if Ryan’s help is so critical, why has everyone waited this long to recruit him?
• If Duvall can use R.E.L.A.X. to kill anyone he chooses at will, why doesn’t he kill the coalition? Why go to all the trouble of manipulating the masses like this? Is it because the coalition is somehow immune to R.E.L.A.X.? This confusion with the “rules” of the story’s technology is a common problem.
• If R.E.L.A.X.’s pacifying influence isn’t total, why don’t the rebels gather in places like urban Detroit to organize, places where R.E.L.A.X. can’t control them? How aware are American citizens of R.E.L.A.X.?
• How did Daniels survive his attack by Duvall in the opening pages? Why didn’t Duvall make sure Daniels was dead?

CONCLUSION: The characters will need to be strengthened considerably for DARK GENESIS to live up to its potential. The story feels undercooked as is, particularly when it comes to creating a clear and cohesive narrative and providing audiences with a clear idea of what the point and purpose to the story is.