An error? No! Poor time management? Never! It is, of course, an object lesson!

And that's what you should tell your editor too, when he's demanding you hand in your latest script. "Having a script might be helpful for you RIGHT NOW," you can explain, "but an object lesson will be helpful for you FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!"

Just... You know... Don't tell 'em that you heard it from me.

*A-hem* Anyway. Today's first lesson is this:

Case in point:
I first came up with the premise that became ArchEnemies in early 2003. Since then it's gone through a few different permutations, finally settling into the current configuration, which will see print from a major publisher--barring calamity--in early to mid-2006.

I say "barring calamity" because a comet could fly down out of the heavens and strike me dead at any moment. But barring celestial events, I honestly think that this is going to happen. There's a great creative team in place. I've already been paid for the first two issues. And I have every reason to believe there'll be a big, splashy announcement just as soon as the publication schedule is finalized.

Early 2003 to early 2006 is three years. And you were complaining when this column was four days late?

What's important is that you get it right in the end.

It's too early to tell you what ArchEnemies is about, but I CAN tell you what it's not about. In fact, a few inches down I'm going to share a whole chunk of script that comes directly from NOT the third issue.

Easy there, imaginary interlocutor. I'll explain: See, it's too early to spill the beans on what will see print in 2006, but I figure there's no harm in showing you something that absolutely, positively WON'T see print in 2006.

Almost every script I write involves plenty of good ideas that just don't make it to the final draft. (Along with a big old helping of truly wretched ones that no one is losing any sleep over.) Sometimes, when I cut a good idea, it's because of space. Sometimes it's because the particular idea doesn't quite fit the story I'm trying to tell.

If I'm very lucky, I can save the idea and use it somewhere else later. More often, the idea is just dead. That was the moment. It was "now or never," and never just beat now to a bloody-pulp.

So it is with this non-excerpt that I'm going to share with you, which is NOT from ArchEnemies #3. Maybe in the alternate future that leads to "Days of Future Past" this exchange would have made it into the final script. Unfortunately, I didn't have the space, and I didn't quite fit the story I was trying to tell.

Take careful notes. There'll be a post-mortem after the excerpt:

[A quick note: This scene involves two of the main characters in ArchEnemies, Vincent and Ethan. Here, Vincent has just swallowed some... alternative medicine.]

First off, this is obviously written in a full script format. Each panel gets it's own description. All dialogue is written before a panel is drawn. I tell the artist to make changes where he thinks he has a better idea, but to let me know before he does anything drastic. And I will ocassionally tweak dialogue after seeing the finished art.

As you probably know, there is no set format for writing full script. Every writer adapts a style that best fits his own peculiar quirks and (hopefully) his artist's quirks as well.

I would guess that most of us start by reading one writer's script and copying that format till we find something better. Over time, our scripts become a hodgepodge of other writers' good ideas. Mine is a little Gaiman, a little Busiek, plus a lot of other little bits stolen from more writers than I can remember.

For instance, I don't remember where I got the idea to number panels the way that I do. In my scripts "P8.4" designates Page 8, Panel 4. I do this so that you can open my script to any random page and always know exactly where you are in the story.

I'm pretty sure that I stole "close on" from Kurt Busiek. "Angle up" and "angle down" are camera directions lifted from my college film classes. "POV" means "point of view." It's basically short hand for "pretend we're standing where X is standing and seeing what s/he is seeing."

"[OP]" means "off-panel." This is a note for the letterer, and it means that the tail of the balloon should point to the panel border. We hear the character's voice, but his/her mouth is not in frame.

As a rule, I try to limit my panel descriptions to what the reader will actually see. In the panels where Vincent looks at Ethan and Ethan looks like he's turned to water, I DON'T say "Ethan looks like he's made of water because Vincent is tripping." I just say, "Ethan is made of water." This economy of language is also a film influence.

A few other notes:

Whew! Okay, that's format. Now content:

Because this is a NOT-excerpt, it hasn't been edited and revised quite as often as the material that made it into the final script. But I like it. Not enough to include it in the issue, but enough to share it with the world, obviously.

Why did I cut it? Well, I mentioned space. The first issue of ArchEnemies weighs in at a meaty 26 pages, but I've worked extremely hard to keep each subsequent issues down to an industry standard 22.

I did this for two reasons:

But issues of space aside, I quickly realized while writing this issue that the story was going in another direction. I wanted Vincent doing something else at this particular moment, instead of having a tripped-out conversation with Ethan. Vincent suddenly had a task to perform, and that left no time for self-medicated, hallucinogenic navel-gazing.

Beyond that, I wasn't quite sure if I had nailed every element that I wanted to nail with this scene. I liked a lot of things about it, but there were still things that bothered me. I never felt like I segued between the "we are all liquid" metaphor and the "who will judge me now?" idea as well as I wanted. I wasn't sure that the poetics of the dialogue fit with Vincent's then-current mental state. Was "pool of man" TOO over-the-top?

And I wasn't sure if I'd nailed the punchline:

I've spent a lot of time talking about the kinds of crap advice that people will give you about writing, but one absolutely NOT crap piece of advice is this:

That's lesson two.

Drew Melbourne writes comics that you will someday read and adore. He also writes comics that will never see the light of day. Some days, apparently, these are the same comics. He has a website: DrewMelbourne.com.