tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31350605571277759772024-03-18T17:24:11.846-05:00Kurt Pankau Dot ComBe the strange you want to see in the worldKurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.comBlogger375125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-8893360076176250512024-03-15T07:00:00.286-05:002024-03-17T10:41:51.152-05:00YMMV: Start With a Question, End With a Choice🤷 Question: Tell Me What You Think About Me?...A lot of what's coming up in this series is home-grown and developed by me over the years. But there's a good amount that is adapted from other sources as well, and today's in one of the adaptational posts. Specifically, this comes from a Lessons From the Screenplay video about act structure in films. Using a five-act model, the video goesKurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-55121134680902042562024-03-08T07:00:00.492-06:002024-03-08T07:00:00.154-06:00YMMV: Write More Flash Fiction⚡The Fastest Things on Two Feet...There's a scene in one of the last few episodes of Ted Lasso where the character Nate is visiting his childhood home and picks up his old violin and begins to play it. It is the most honest depiction I've ever seen of what it's like for a musician to return to an instrument that they haven't played in years. He's not playing anything flashy, he's not Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-48271074410175412142024-03-01T07:00:00.372-06:002024-03-01T08:54:28.541-06:00YMMV: Write to a Word Count📈 It's a Competitive World...In the early teens, I started what would become a two-year writing project called Friday Flash Fiction, in which I committed to posting a new original 600-word story every week. It was one of the best things that ever happened to me as a writer; I learned a number of invaluable skills. Most of those I'll get into in more detail in a future post, but the most Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-10676330677269219892024-02-23T07:00:00.545-06:002024-02-23T08:51:07.513-06:00YMMV: Describe With Actions🖼️ Could You Take a Picture, 'Cause I Won't Remember...I think it's time for you to meet Steve. Steve is a CPA in his mid-twenties. He has sunken green eyes and a seemingly permanent 5 o'clock shadow. His sandy brown hair is unkempt. He wears an un-ironed white button-up shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbows and a red tie that sits loose in his collar. He likes fast food and vinyl. He has a Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-52743324591423672702024-02-16T07:00:00.366-06:002024-02-16T08:34:46.058-06:00YMMV: Motivate Your Dialog👄 People Are Talkin', Talkin' 'Bout People...Want to write better dialog? Well, there's no shortage of advice out there to guide you. Avoid maid-and-butler exchanges. Listen to how people speak, perhaps by making recordings in public. Try writing a story that's only dialog. Read They're Made Out of Meat by Terry Bisson for inspiration. Well, I'm here to tell you that you don't need anyKurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-76418694100839616902024-02-09T07:00:00.472-06:002024-02-09T08:23:05.771-06:00YMMV: Plot Holes Don't Matter🕳️ ...In My Heart That Can Only Be Filled By You...There's a fantastic moment in Wonder Woman where Diana first uses her powers. She's surrounded by friends and family and they all react without speaking in a way that conveys that they love her but are also terrified of her. It's a great scene--and I'm a sucker for good "face acting" anyway--and at that moment I knew that I was going to be Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-47495839239250073852024-02-02T07:00:00.641-06:002024-02-02T10:27:42.607-06:00YMMV: Watch Bad Movies🎥 I Can See By Your Eyes You Must Be Lying...I love bad things. For the last few years I've spent New Year's Eve marathoning bad movies. I did an entire year-long blog series about movies, TV shows, books, and more than I don't like. (It was, frankly, a little exhausting.) Why do I do this? For the irony? For the schadenfreude? For the LULZ? No! Well... maybe a little. But, really, what Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-60757705894556576422024-01-30T07:00:00.355-06:002024-01-30T08:10:58.492-06:00First Impressions: Wyrmspan🐉 Stop Draggin' My Heart Around...Developed by Elizabeth Hargrave; Designed by Connie Vogelman; Art by Clementine CampardouI don't want to call this a review, because this is not a review site. This is a blog where I post weird diatribes and years-long writing projects. That said, I do frequently post about board games and I did manage to get my hands on an advanced copy of Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-57267402849470883102024-01-26T07:00:00.555-06:002024-01-26T08:31:32.609-06:00YMMV: Edit As You Go🚶♂️You've Had Too Much To Think, Now You Need a Wife...I was critiquing the first chapter of a friend's novel-in-progress, and one piece of feedback I gave her was that it felt like it had been edited a lot. She acknowledged that it had been, and was curious how I could tell. The short version is that it felt like important bits were elided over, that the prose felt ever-so-slightly out of syncKurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-4964399983237407302024-01-19T07:00:00.352-06:002024-01-19T08:06:01.440-06:00YMMV: Stop Workshopping Your Opening Sentences🏇 Let's Get It Started In Here...It is a truth universally acknowledged that Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, called me Ishmael at the worst of times...Stop Workshopping Your Opening Sentences"Call me Ishmael" is arguably the most famous opening line in English-language literature. But does it really deserve that accolade? I mean... if I were a true iconoclast, I'd be putting Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-971637663128663052024-01-15T07:00:00.006-06:002024-01-15T07:00:00.134-06:00Geekway Mini 2024 Redux🎲 Quit Playin' Games With My Heart...Hey everybody! It's that time of year where I spend an inordinate amount of time playing board games at a convention and then share my feedback with you, the world! This weekend was the "Mini" version of Geekway to the West, and I got to try out lots of cools stuff. There were a number of Play-and-Win titles that I'm skipping over (Apiary, First in Flight, Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-36578473613200942012024-01-12T07:00:00.289-06:002024-01-12T09:44:13.590-06:00YMMV: Manage Your Attention Budget💵 Wanna Get With Me With No Money, Oh No...My first job out of college was as an assistant manager at a retail chain you've heard of. I worked in a few different stores over the course of my 3-and-a-half years there, and at each one I ended up taking over correspondence for the store manager because I was just so much better at writing emails than anyone else. The bar... it was not high. During Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-43693781871375829402024-01-05T07:00:00.409-06:002024-01-11T09:50:04.284-06:00YMMV: Write The Title First🌲Like the Pine Trees Lining the Winding Road...Just a quick bit of housekeeping here at the top. At the last possible minute I've decided to rename this series Your Mileage May Vary. It's one of those things I say a lot in a writing context: "The first rule of writing advice is 'your mileage may vary'." Okay, let's get into it...Write the Title FirstMight as well start this blog series off with Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-38006560075870989672023-12-29T07:00:00.008-06:002023-12-29T07:00:00.134-06:00Announcing: Weird Writing Advice🖊️ I'm a Weirdo, What the Hell am I Doing Here?I have led a local writing discussion group and critique circle since... oh... time immemorial. I give a lot of good advice, apparently. Good enough that more than one person has asked if I have ever written or would ever consider writing a craft book.I have always shied away from the idea. On the one hand, I have a lot of breadth of knowledge,Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-81535185925191857402023-12-22T07:00:00.037-06:002023-12-22T09:59:02.643-06:00Stray Thoughts: An Ironic Die Hard Christmas🎄And I'll Walk as Damn Hard as I Please...It's time once again for the annual debate about whether or not Die Hard constitutes a Christmas movie, and since y'all know how these things works I'm just going to skip to the part where I say: It is for some people and that's fine; it's not for me, but I don't care very strongly about it. I'm just not compelled by the arguments for it.Does it Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-49852787326844250612023-12-15T07:00:00.441-06:002023-12-15T07:00:00.142-06:00Stray Thoughts: Adapting Les Misérables🥖 Well You Know We All Want To Change The World...Victor Hugo's magnum opus Les Misérables is kind of like The Ramones. It's important, it's influential, and it's left an indelible mark on the culture... but is it actually all that good? Oh, there are great moments in it, to be sure. But, like, it's also got long boring stretches and is very much of its time in a way that's impenetrable to Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-87349753380710291612023-12-08T07:00:00.193-06:002023-12-08T07:00:00.135-06:00Consumed With Hate Dishonorable Mentions💩 And I Don't Like Anybody Very Much...Time to mix up the format again. This week we're looking at a bunch of things that I hate... but don't really have anything interesting to say about. Or, at least, not enough to justify their own post. So, in no particular order, here are things that I'm not thrilled about, but on a much smaller scale.Bad Movies I Haven't SeenThe following movies are Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-485190814458667392023-12-01T07:00:00.364-06:002023-12-01T07:00:00.146-06:00Consumed With Hate: Peter Jackson's Hobbit Trilogy💍 Bravest Little Hobbit of Them All...The Crime: The HobbitsesThe Guilty Party: Peter Jackson, et alOverview: Prequels always suckWhy I Hate It...Yes, I was going to do Ridley Scott's Robin Hood, but I've had a last-minute change of heart, so here we are.Peter Jackson's film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings is one of the great cinematic accomplishments of the modern age. A nobody Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-65672573069901341142023-11-24T07:00:00.305-06:002023-11-24T07:00:00.147-06:00Consumed With Hate: Star Trek V: The Final Frontier🌌 What If God Was One Of Us...The Crime: Star Trek V: The Final FrontierThe Guilty Party: William ShatnerOverview: Shatner directs an outing that's long on philosophy and short on anything at all happeningWhy I Hate It...While a lot of fun gets poked at it, Star Trek IV: The One With The Whales is arguably the best (or at least second-best) in the series. It's fun, it leans into the Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-22296932817279919652023-11-17T07:00:00.177-06:002023-11-17T08:09:10.462-06:00Consumed With Hate: Munchkin🧚 We Represent the Lollipop Guild...The Crime: MunchkinThe Guilty Party: Steve JacksonOverview: A low-effort D&D send-up that walks the line between party game and RPG-lite strategy game without really succeeding at either.Why I Hate It...Finding balance in board game design is hard. You don't want there to be a clear winning strategy, or everyone just races for that. You want there to Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-29743749307093613422023-11-10T07:00:00.716-06:002023-11-10T07:00:00.142-06:00Consumed With Hate: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice🤼 No Matter How They Tossed the Dice, It Had To Be...The Crime: Batman v Superman: Dawn of JusticeThe Guilty Party: Warner BrosOverview: Hacked to bits and frankensteined together by a committee of clout-chasing executives desperate to prove they could be just as good at this as Marvel, Batman v Superman is the worst tentpole film I've ever seen.Why I Hate It...I love bad movies. I Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-67795737399652704782023-11-03T07:00:00.306-05:002023-11-03T07:00:00.161-05:00Consumed With Hate: Man of Steel🦸♂️ A Cloudy Day in Metropolis...The Crime: Man of SteelThe Guilty Party: Zack SnyderOverview: Zack Snyder's deconstruction falls flat because he doesn't like superheroes and is real bad at juggling theme, setting the entire DCEU down a path of idiocy.Why I Hate It...Way back in March, I did a write-up of Sucker Punch, a movie that doesn't work, but that I can't help but admire for its Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-54849621300162731592023-10-27T07:00:00.083-05:002023-10-27T07:52:20.120-05:00Consumed With Hate: Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare🛏️ Sweet Dreams are Made of This...The Crime: Freddy's Dead: The Final NightmareThe Guilty Party: Robert Englund, mostlyOverview: Freddy Krueger evolves into his final form, a half-hearted high-camp imitation of himself, for what was supposed to be a final outing.Why I Hate It...It's hard to overstate how big of a deal Freddy Krueger was in the 80s. On the elementary school playground we Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-82205229735134856112023-10-20T07:00:00.200-05:002023-10-20T08:52:07.090-05:00Consumed With Hate? Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before ChristmasI'm Your Boogie Man, That's What I Am...The Crime: Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before ChristmasThe Guilty Party: Honestly, I'm gonna put this one on myselfOverview: I just didn't get itWhy I Don't Completely Hate It...Getting this out of the way up front: this is not a bad movie, it's just one that I happen to not like. It might even be a great movie, but for reasons I'll get to below, Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3135060557127775977.post-33893264664303923922023-10-13T07:00:00.029-05:002023-10-13T07:56:16.250-05:00Consumed With Hate: Ghostbusters (NES)👻 Slip My Hand from Your Hand, Leave You Dancing with a Ghost...The Crime: Ghostbusters (NES)The Guilty Party: ActivisionOverview: Weird mechanics and an unplayable ending make what could have been a good game idea decidedly un-fun.Why I Hate It...It is a truth universally acknowledged that video games based on movies are broken rush jobs trying to cash in on IP and they will only Kurt Pankauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06594378976968497763noreply@blogger.com0