Don't Encourage Us

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Most people watch a movie. Some people can't stop reverse-engineering the decisions inside it. Don't Encourage Us is for the second group. Each episode takes a film, series, or creative property and examines it the way you'd examine any high-stakes decision: what problem was being solved, what trade-offs were made, where the execution landed, and what you'd do with it from here. Not a review show. Not a fan podcast. A forensic examination of creative and strategic choices, by people who can't turn that part of their brain off. If your best conversations about fiction happen after everyone else...

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Don't Encourage Us

Episodes

Story Break: The Billionaire Slayer - One Premise, Four Genres 15.05.2023 57:57

A private jet pilot who flies the ultra-wealthy has a side gig: killing billionaires. That's the pitch. The question is — what kind of story does it become? In this Story Break, the hosts take one provocative concept and run it through four completely different genre frameworks, exposing how the same premise produces radically different stories depending on which creative decisions you make. The f...

Story Break: A Sitcom About a Sitcom — When the Character Outperforms the Person 08.05.2023 46:42

We take a one-line concept and build it into a full series pitch over 45 minutes — characters, backstory, running gags, episode ideas, romance, soundtrack, and the format debate that could take it from web series to HBO. In this episode: The pitch: a sitcom about a sitcom — where the "dad" chases his castmates around set trying to be their actual father How a documentary-style format (think The Of...

Brightburn (2019) Deep Dive: Evil Superman & Why a Great Concept Failed 24.04.2023 1:00:16

In This Deep-Dive Analysis, We Deconstruct the Absurdity: The World's Worst Mother: Why Mom’s Level 10 Delusion was the single most unbelievable and narratively convenient element, and how her character was sacrificed because the script writers couldn't find a logical way to end her arc. Robot vs. Villain: The essential difference between Brandon Breyer (a one-note Terminator who chews forks) and...

Lights Out (2016) Explained: Is the Creature a Manifestation of Depression? 16.04.2023 40:31

Is the creature in Lights Out a ghost that hides in the dark or is it something much more unsettling? Creative professional Steve Franco joins to dig into what makes this 2016 horror film more than a simple monster movie. In this episode: Why a paper-thin concept became a surprisingly layered film The mental illness angle: is the creature a physical manifestation of depression? The vampire ghost t...