Your Screenplay Sucks!: 100 Ways to Make It Great

by William M. Akers

A lifetime member of the Writer's Guild of America who has had three feature films produced from his screenplays, Akers offers beginning writers the tools they need to get their screenplay noticed.

Genres: Writing, Film, Nonfiction, Reference, Art

287 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[Loni · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abrasive title, but awesome book. If you're interested in writing or selling a screenplay, this book really is a must have. He tells you how to transform and beat your script into shape as well as letting you in on some of the little trade secrets to help you look like you're not a novice. It's also just a fun read, he's very conversational. The only down-side to it is because he is so open, he makes you really understand how difficult it is to break it into the Hollywood industry. So for any aspiring writers out there, good luck and read this book!

[Addy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this book as a package deal with Blake Snyder’s book, Save the Cat. Save the Cat talked a lot about how to develop a screenplay, Your Screenplay Sucks! focuses on the proofreading and rewriting stage. Because so much of writing is rewriting, William M. Akers’ book is an invaluable addition to my collection.
With a sharp sense of humor, Akers gives readers a one hundred item checklist to go through to make sure your screenplay is as flawless as you can make it. So much of breaking into Hollywood is based on your ability to hold the attention of a reader who wants nothing more than to throw your screenplay in the trash. This itemized list is designed to help you, the writer, keep that reader engaged with your story for as long as possible.
Part of the reason I rated this book as highly as I did is because Akers addresses writing issues I’ve been trying to solve for a very long time. For example, every writing class I have been in, I have told the professor “I want to learn how to craft sentences that are powerful and use words economically”. And then this goal is never addressed. Akers gets down to the nitty gritty details; he busts out a microscope and dissects sentences until each one hums with energy. For such a long time, I felt as though my writing had plateaued. Now, equipped with this book, I know what I have to do to continue my journey in becoming a successful writer.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Your Screenplay Sucks - it's true. And here are 100 practical things you can do to fix it. Learn how to brainstorm, take apart, reassemble, and examine each of your characters one by one. There are other books to tell you about formatting and structure - this is the one to read to learn more about voice and great story. Don't be intimidated by the title. It will have you itching to hammer out a rough draft so you have text to play around with.

[Alexis Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you only read one book on screenwriting, this one is perfect. It's easy to understand, and the knowledge of the "don'ts" is far more crucial than the "dos." Like everything else, rules can be bent in certain instances, but this book sets excellent groundwork for writing scripts.

[Carlos Marin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tiene consejos buenos, tiene otros malos, otros horrendos y muchos geniales.

Sea como sea, se convierte automáticamente en libro de consulta.

Eso es bueno.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny and easy to understand. Well organized.

[Jared Woods · Rating 4 out of 5]

A curious hiccup occurred not too long ago. It was an unprecedented event that had never reared its skull throughout my entire creative journey. I found that I had fallen out of love with writing.

This misfortune wasn't a case of writer's block. I am endlessly grateful that I've never experienced this condition in all my years of composing literature. But something else had happened, something... was missing. I still knew which words to use, and I sat them down in a satisfying order, yet the invisible fire running between them had fizzled to smog. There's an energy that lives behind the writing. You cannot fake that, and without it, the content sags tiredly. This overwhelming emotion of uselessness aggravated my depression, and in a crisis of desperation, I tore my bookshelf apart, seeking inspiration. I soon found this book in my hands. I remember purchasing it too. As a professional scriptwriter, I figured it might tighten the finer details of formatting, but now it was to serve a much more profound purpose. I yanked it open and prayed to kick-start the juices that once were.

As the subtitle promises, this book provides 100 ways to make your script great. I'm always suspicious of such well-rounded numbers as they usually indicate stretched advice or removed concepts. However, the point-by-point structure did make for a delightfully digestible trail, and each detail justified its inclusion surprisingly competently. It's always a joy to read books about writing. For if they're not well written, then who does this author think they are? William M. Akers, that's who, boasting a decent list of credentials and the affirmative voice required to assist you through this laborious process. Plus he's quite funny! Except it's more like he's humouring himself, ensuring he's entertained, the reader merely lucky to be invited. I respond well to these types of cocky deliveries.

There are careful distinctions between scriptwriting and novel storytelling, but this publication clicked loudly on many a mutual ground. Hey, are you ready to learn everything you ever needed to know about becoming a good writer? Here it is: USE GOOD WORDS AND USE FEWER OF THEM. Hack it down into small spaces and get clever within those boundaries. Any arrogant keyboardist with a smear of talent can shit out a flow, but strong writing is not a fucking joke. It's a discipline. Like everything in the world, there are people out there willing to do anything to reach perfection, so if you want to compete, you gotta curb your ego and you gotta work. Each minute detail needs to be bulletproof. And if you're not writing purely for the passion of writing, then you've already faceplanted upon the starting line. Pack up your shit and leave.

So, yes, I got a lot from this book, but I am shoving my praise aside for one unforgivably glaring gripe I cannot overlook, and that is the fucking spoilers! I get it, examples are essential, but it's such a presumptuous move to ruin film highlights for your demonstrations as if the whole world has viewed every flick you have. It became so unbearable that I resorted to skimming particular paragraphs, picking at the gist then flicking my eyes sideways before reaching the italicised titles. Painful! I deduct much love for this selfish practice. Shame on you, William!

But if we can ignore that piercing fault above (we can't), then we're left with a flawless checklist which I shall be revisiting every time I tackle a sizeable project. I wish I'd read it earlier, to be fair. Shit man, I wish I'd started writing professionally earlier! Where'd I put my time machine? Anyway, whether this guide prompted the realignment or not is debatable but look at my fingers! They're burning! They're smashing the keyboard with fury, chasing my thoughts and spewing them onto the outside before the ideas drop into the ether of my mind, lost forever. Same as it was! My wobble was but a blip! Let us never blip again! Beneficial book, read it.

[Stephen Arnott · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't know why I bought this one. I have no real interest in writing a screenplay, but I'm interested in movies and the movie business, and the title grabbed me.

This turned out to be an amusing, entertaining books that has great practical advice for anyone interested in writing a script. More than that, although some of the advice is specific to screenwriting (formatting errors, for example) much of the advice would also be valuable to a novelist.

According to the author, most professional script readers are not looking through manuscripts hoping to find a gem (they've read so many bad scripts they've given up hope of that); rather they're looking for the first mistake that will let them throw your script in the trash so they can pick up the next one on the pile and be one step closer to going home.

This book tells you how to avoid the pitfalls.

Good solid advice from a working screenwriter.

[Nic Lishko · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel like I've just been kicked so royally hard in the balls. This book blew me away. The last two chapters left something to be desired as I feel like Akers got on the highest of high horses, but the final 6 pages are literally highlighted from the top to the bottom.
Why do you write? Honestly why?
It's because YOU MUST.
And that's true of me. So fu**ing true it isn't even funny.
Tons of great tips, I would recommend this to any screenwriter who needs to be slapped with a hand that's been sitting in a bucket of ice for two minutes and so when you get slapped it feels more like a punch, but the sting is so unnerving you cry just a little bit knowing that you were in hysterics only a second ago.
Shit. This book will drive me crazy for weeks.
I'll start re-reading it in about a week.

[Clara Mazzi · Rating 3 out of 5]

William Akers says the very same things as Blake Snyder but in a far less nice way. "Your Screenplay Sucks" is a kind of a bad copy of Save The Cat. It's useful and right but Mr Akers likes boasting around his (small) success, loves to mark a clear difference between him and "us, the readers, the amateurs, the non-successful" at such an extent that he finishes his book recommending to consider to drop writing. Thought highly contradictory hence confusing, he keeps insisting on clarity and rigor and analyzes the 5 golden scripts since Hollywood dawning: Ordinary People, Die Hard, Chinatown, Robocop/Rocky/Alien as if Hollywood wouldn't have written anything more interesting ever since nor realizing that these movies are exactly the opposite of what he recommends us: they're slow and boring (for an updated audience).

[Troy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I mistakenly went to Hollywood and pitched my script without reading this book. I thought my script was pretty good until I read this book - no wonder why I never got a call back. As I read through this book, I started to get embarrassed thinking what those Hollywood execs must have thought of my script. I imagined it was passed around as a comedic email chain to all the execs and accomplished screenwriters - at least it found a way to be entertaining.

No seriously. This book was highly insightful and very encouraging. It not only discussed basic screenwriting format, writing, etc., but it also provided tips on how to tell a great story. I highly recommend reading. I will come to rely on this book in the years to come.

[Debbie E. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not just for screenwriters. Writing a fiction novel? Buy this book. Writing a non-fiction novel? Buy this book. The 100 ways checklist shined a light on the holes in my work-in-progress fiction novel. It gave me tons of ideas of (to borrow from the book’s title) “how to make it great”, plus Akers is hysterical so the points will stick with you. I had to keep stoping to jot down ideas it gave me of things to add / change / improve / delete. This book gets an A+ for stirring the creative mind while showing what you need to do for your story to stand out. You think your book or screenplay is ready? Go through the checklist. You will not be disappointed.

[Jesse Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was excellent, except for two caveats. One was the overemphasis on humility; he kept stressing the point that aspiring writers shouldn't be full of themselves. He did this by constantly insulting the reader. I fully agree with his point, but it was tiresome to read over and over. I got it the first time.

The other problem was the formatting ... he used lots of excerpts, which was great, but they were set in the same font as the regular text. So, at times it was hard to tell whether the author was speaking or it was an excerpt. Why not set all excerpts in Courier? Or italicized? Would have made it much clearer. What was more ironic was that several chapters discussed formatting.

[Joohye · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book made me learn a lot of things. This book is about how to write writing that makes the readers interesting. First of all, I wasn't good at writing so I thought that this book will make me feel interesting. As I read the book I thought this book was interesting because even the book was about teaching me how to write, the book was really funny and I got obsessed with the book. Also, I learned how to write a good book so I thought it had only a positive point about this book. I recommend this book to the people that want to be a better author/writer and wants to be interested in writing.

[Jeff Searust · Rating 5 out of 5]

By far the best book on writing a screenplay. It will make you question very specific sections of plot and structure. Even if you think all other books on writing and screenwriting are BS, you should read this one. It's not a beat book or a mythic structure book, it's a book on the basics of the mental and physical aspects of writing.

Would give extra stars for Brautigan reference.

Pull your big boy pants up and take out that crappy screenplay. Get an extra ribbon for the typewriter, and start over.

[Shoma · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book to write a screenplay for a school project. Before I read "Your Screenplay Sucks!", I started typing head first without thinking about the formatting and content. I read this book to see if there were any crucial points I had missed in writing my screenplay, and to my surprise, I had at least one thing to fix or improve on almost every page (from formatting to basic ideas and conflicts). I recommend first just typing out your ideas and once you feel finished, read the book. The book is meant to fix your screenplay and give advice on it, not help write it from scratch.

[Alexa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've heard a lot of similar advice, but this book was organized in a way that resonated with me. While it points out what someone might be doing wrong in the writing of a screenplay, it gives very helpful suggestions.

I recommend any screenwriter trying to launch their career to read this book. Chances are you'll find a tip that will unlock a part of the process of screenwriting that was previously unknown to you. It did for me.

Writers must persevere! And use their spell check!

[Jason Hough · Rating 4 out of 5]

Runs the gamut of screenplay writing tips: from your story and characters all the way to what kind of chads you should use to bind your finished masterpiece.

I probably enjoyed the second half the most, which covered revisions. He includes lots of before-and-after examples, and explains why the changes were made. Many of the examples are his own work.

I will keep this on my shelf next to Denny Flynn's "How NOT to Write a Screenplay".

[Marti Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is full of nuggets of knowledge to stop you from falling into the pitfalls of mistakes that so many other screenwriters find themselves plummeting... When I write my scripts, I keep this and Blake Snyder's SAVE THE CAT by my side for instant reference. And guess what? My movies get made! Aces on the content... Every aspiring screenwriter needs this book, and I tell them so when they send me scripts to provide coverage.

[Mahmood Al-yousif · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a depressing book. But it's an absolutely necessarily text book for experienced and aspiring writers.

Within its covers lie important rules of screenwriting - and writing in general - that must be taken into account if one wants to see their story become successful and produced into a film.

A hard slog of a read, the rewards; however, is that you'll hopefully be a better and more aware writer.

[Mojo Shivers · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good primer on all the mistakes your screenplay may have and suggestions how to resolve. Granted, it’s far from a step-by-step guide to making a pile of crap into gold but it is a comprehensive checklist on areas to look out for and a point in the right direction through, over, under, and around these obstacles. As such, I know where to turn when I’m making that initial pass through my own work.

[Lyn Davis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This laugh out loud funny treatise on the various mistakes made by novice screenwriters is a must for any screenwriter to put all in perspective.

Worthwhile investment in a writer's library. Good checklist for the details to be adhered to by someone who wants to have a screenplay read by someone who might produce it. Or if you want a laugh at the peculiarities of the business.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Akers has lots of good advice for the budding screenwriter, but needs greater structure, overall. He repeats the same points a few too many times. True, repetition is the soul of good pedagogy, but he would have a stronger book with more method to the repetition. Still, overall this is a worthy read, and a must for beginners, since Akers has much industry experience to share.

[Claudia Sorsby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Delightfully pragmatic and practical. I suspect that some of the specific formatting tips will be overtaken by time and technology, but the basic advice is solid. It’s fun to watch movies after reading books like this, to have a better sense of how they’re put together.

Plus, the repeated advice of “don’t get excited, success is almost impossible” can’t be repeated enough.

[Charlotte Tressler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Your Screenplay Sucks! is an informative, entertaining book that makes no bones about the rigors of screenplay formatting, promotion, or getting a foot in the door of the movie industry without making me want to throw my hands up in the air in defeat.
I would recommend this book to anyone who's interested in writing. The suggestions can be applied to any form, not just screenplays.

[P.G. Sundling · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are a dozen items specific to screenplays, but overall, most of the checklist help with novelists and all forms of writing. I wasn't interested in their samples from their Vietnam screenplay. However, the image of refugees dangling from a helicopter was a good example of describing images in the right order.

[Gabi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book full of so many clear guidelines for making your script better. Some things are great reminders and some were eye openers. But I will keep this book next to me and read it during every script I write from now own. It's now one of my go tos, along with Save the Cat.

[Roger Mendoza · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, especially since it gave me some much needed clear advice on writing a great screenplay.

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good read, I learned many new things and gone over stuff I already knew. Worth a read if you are thinking of writing a screenplay.

[Christina Metcalf · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most comprehensive, and enjoyable to read, books on screenplays that I've read. Highly recommend.