Watch Twitter, potentially the greatest writers' room, workshop a concept

The last 24 hours in my twitter feed have been a lot of fun. It started when on a lark I posted a quick pitch that I spitballed earlier in the day to another writer:

"Premise: a retiring Olympian has the greatest sex of his life while at the Olypmic Village. He never gets the name of the other athelete, and doesn't see her before the end of the Games

To find her, he ditches retirement and is determined to compete 4 years later, past his prime."

Premise: a retiring Olympian has the greatest sex of his life while at the Olypmic Village. He never gets the name of the other athelete, and doesn't see her before the end of the Games

To find her, he ditches retirement and is determined to compete 4 years later, past his prime

— Bitter Script Reader (@BittrScrptReadr) February 13, 2018

Sometimes I toss out these quick pitches and they get little reaction. This one seemed to hit a chord with some people. One frequent reaction was to immediately start poking at the premise:

Fixed it - set it in the past, pre-Internet!

— Cathy Trope (@CathyTrope) February 13, 2018

Although, the woman could be from someplace like North Korea, where her access to the world is heavily restricted.

— Probably Wrong (@Broom_Kevin) February 13, 2018

Why this doesn’t work: every Olympic event shows up on broadcast, so all he has to do is watch the footage till he sees her, contact her Olympic committee, and then they can exchange numbers.

— The Beallman (@thebeallman) February 13, 2018

Erm, so he can't find her just by looking at pics of Olympic athletes? It's not like there are a million of them. And they all have pics.

— Kevin Douglas (@KevinSDouglas) February 13, 2018

Basic obstacle is to reconnect with an Olympic athlete? Pretty easy to find them... Unless in the 70”s and on opposite sides of the US/USSR iron curtain.

— Arthur M. Jolly (@jollyarthur) February 13, 2018

Either make it a period piece, or the girl would have be hail from a country sealed off from the world, making her impossible to find in the intervening years.

— Adam Simoneau (@AyJaySimon) February 13, 2018

Don't they have extensive records and videos on everyone who competes in the Olympics? The primary obstacle seems easily resolved. It seems like you would have to include extreme contrivances to negate that.

— Blake X (@BlakeX10) February 13, 2018

Granted, my pitch was less than 280 characters, so it's not like I was delivering a full treatment. I don't blame people for their first reaction being, "Here's why that hook doesn't work." But here's what I found impressive as the tone in my mentions turned from nitpicking to supportive...

Set it in the 70s ;)

— Erik Odeldahl (@erikodeldahl) February 13, 2018

That’s fair. But you’ve gotta at least have the friend who calls out these possibilities to the protagonist. End of the First Act should be a scramble to find her with these methods, only to fail and go for plan B, returning to the Olympics 4 years later.

— The Beallman (@thebeallman) February 13, 2018

That way you resolve both the problem of how he doesn't know her sport (thus why he can't find her) and you can make her close to retirement, too, but establish that he knows she'll be back in 4.

— Ian Gillespie (@IanRGillespie) February 13, 2018

You cld then add other obstacles, like making her sport a demonstration sport in the first cycle to explain how he looked up all ~5K female Olympics athletes & still cldn't find her that way (i.e. he didn't think to check demonstration sports).

— Ian Gillespie (@IanRGillespie) February 13, 2018

Sports that aren't played widely enough to qualify as official Olympic sports, but that the host country and/or IOC include for promotion. Medals are given, but not official. Demonstration sports are upgraded in future games if adopted by enough countries.https://t.co/SWFbKVWAaa

— Ian Gillespie (@IanRGillespie) February 13, 2018

Not necessarily. There are sports that have different effective competitive ages like gymnastics (teens) to marathon runners (late 20s to 30s). Depending on the sport match up they need not be that different in ages

— Endros (@NobleEnd) February 13, 2018

Not necessarily - different events have different peak years. Some you're done by 30, others compete into their 50s. Choose well and they could be the same age or whatever you want.

— William Simpson (@will__simpson) February 13, 2018

And some others liked the potential the story had to subvert familiar tropes:

But I like the whole idea of being over the hill at thirty, which might be the case here.

— Kevin Douglas (@KevinSDouglas) February 13, 2018

My favorite thing about this is retiring Olympian means...what? 28? 32? So you have literally our hottest, young actors doing an Eastwood/Stallone arc and it's amazing.

— Patrick R Young (@JustYoungEnough) February 13, 2018

What's awesome is you can have the "other man/other woman" rival and not have it be competing over a person like a trophy, just a spot on the team.

— Chris Neumann (@blueneumann) February 13, 2018

But best of all were the people who looked at the plot holes in the premise and decided to work the problem. It's easy to poke holes, but it takes more effort and creativity to solve them. This is how you give good notes. Look for story problems and plot holes as opportunities for creativity, not roadblocks to stop you from moving forward.

That was my first thought. Go pre-social media!

— Deirdre Statham (@deirdrestatham) February 13, 2018

I can see an Adam Scott character trying to show the lead Compuserve and suggesting they could find out anything in just a few minutes but no one will listen.

— Chris Neumann (@blueneumann) February 13, 2018

It takes place in the early ‘90’s - when the Olympics switched years. Only two between ‘92 & ‘94. Also, no social media, not as easy to find

— Katie Carroll (@kcarroll9) February 13, 2018

A couple people suggested the same complications...

Complication: it’s 1976 in America, and the next Olympics will be boycotted

— Peter Fries (@Peter_Fries) February 13, 2018

Ok, last thing before I put this out of my head. If we REALLY want to torture the protagonist, make him an American who's in 1976 Summer Games. He learns the new sport, makes the Olympic team, and...the US boycotts. pic.twitter.com/lzxGwzhzYG

— Probably Wrong (@Broom_Kevin) February 13, 2018

What if instead of retiring, his sport or event was being eliminated from the Olympics, so he must master a new sport in 4 years to come back?

— M_Dub (@MWoeppel) February 13, 2018

Additional twist: it turns out to be HER sport

— John Brownlow (@JohnBrownlow) February 13, 2018

And then there were the sillier riffs.

"She says she wants ze D. Vhat is ze D?" "She must be referring to ze secret documents."

— Chris Neumann (@blueneumann) February 13, 2018

Scene: Kicks the door in when they are having sex and whisks them away to be interrogated *pause* Except they got the wrong couple.

— Blake X (@BlakeX10) February 13, 2018

And then a twist on the concept, changing the genre.

Premise inverted: Olympian from North Korea witnesses sexual abuse at Winter Olympics. She never gets the name of the abuser, and doesn't see him again before the Games end. Determined to stop him, she ditches retirement and vows to return four years later to see justice done... https://t.co/XcwImF8vMN

— davidbishop (@davidbishop) February 13, 2018

All in all, I got a big kick out of this "virtual writers room." Sometimes the hive mind can solve problems that one person can't. Seeing how this one idea was workshopped might offer an example of how to receive and contribute to improving both your own ideas and the ideas of others.