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SAN ANDREAS - An adaptation for TV (written by @StirredNotShaken)
StirredNotShaken
Toronto
So, as some of you know, I like to write when I'm not watching Bond or other movies or, most of all, playing music. Well, I've started several projects, none of which I've properly committed to. My novelization of GoldenEye for Dalton came to a halt, as did my concept for an alternate film timeline for Bond, because they're just both things that could never happen so I found them futile.
This project, though? This could happen. I'm writing Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas as a TV series. Writing out full scripts for every single episode, full treatments, everything. I'm going to send it all to Dan Houser or whoever at R* and see what happens once I'm finished. But I'm testing the waters by bringing it up with a couple people now and then, mentioning it here, mentioning it on Reddit and whatnot to see what people think.
It's an ambitious thing I'm writing; storylines are added to the narrative of the game, plot points are added and removed in order to make a better plot. San Andreas is an entertaining game but for all the criticism V's story gets, San Andreas doesn't have the strongest plot or writing either.
I'm using a mix of dialogue lifted straight from the game combined with my own writing. I'd say the ratio is about 65-35 in favour of my own writing. For people familiar with the game, the first season covers the Los Santos missions, the second covers the countryside and San Fierro, the third season covers the desert and Las Venturas, and the truncated fourth season covers the final missions in CJ's return to Los Santos.
Anyway, I hope to share more details with you as this progresses; there's my Reddit posts to read as well if you're interested, but I will be giving little teases here and there.
So... thoughts?
This project, though? This could happen. I'm writing Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas as a TV series. Writing out full scripts for every single episode, full treatments, everything. I'm going to send it all to Dan Houser or whoever at R* and see what happens once I'm finished. But I'm testing the waters by bringing it up with a couple people now and then, mentioning it here, mentioning it on Reddit and whatnot to see what people think.
It's an ambitious thing I'm writing; storylines are added to the narrative of the game, plot points are added and removed in order to make a better plot. San Andreas is an entertaining game but for all the criticism V's story gets, San Andreas doesn't have the strongest plot or writing either.
I'm using a mix of dialogue lifted straight from the game combined with my own writing. I'd say the ratio is about 65-35 in favour of my own writing. For people familiar with the game, the first season covers the Los Santos missions, the second covers the countryside and San Fierro, the third season covers the desert and Las Venturas, and the truncated fourth season covers the final missions in CJ's return to Los Santos.
Anyway, I hope to share more details with you as this progresses; there's my Reddit posts to read as well if you're interested, but I will be giving little teases here and there.
So... thoughts?
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Comments
One question: How many episodes per season?
Thanks for the reply, man, I'm glad you're enthused about it!
The Introduction is dotted throughout the show, actually. I'm not using every single sequence from it, but the vast majority of it will be used, including all sequences involving Grove Street or CRASH (with the exclusion of OG Loc's fifteen seconds).
The majority of these sequences serve as flashbacks in later episodes, though the bulk of them feature during the pilot. I don't want to give too much away, but the following parts of The Introduction make for the cold open of the pilot, or roughly the first ten minutes of the series:
- Sweet and Smoke's conversation about introducing drugs to the Grove Street Families
- CJ stealing a car in Liberty City + his phone call with Joey Leone
- Smoke and Ryder's conversation (though the dialogue is not audible; you just see it in the background - the actual words will be heard in a later flashback near the end of the first season)
- The Green Sabre driving through the streets of Los Santos
- The drive-by on Grove Street and the death of Beverly Johnson
- Sweet's phone call to Carl ("It's momma. She's dead.")
The first season is ten episodes (possibly eleven depending on how many pages it takes to detail one specific thing) and covers the missions from "In the beginning..." to "Badlands".
The second season is 11 episodes and covers the missions from "Body Harvest" to "Yay Ka-Boom-Boom".
The third season is ten episodes and covers the missions from "Highjack" to the first half of "Homecoming".
The fourth season is six episodes and covers the missions from the second half of "Homecoming" to "End of the Line".
On a side note, every episode of the series is named after a mission in the game; that mission - at least partially - takes place within the episode of the same name.
Still looking forward to reading it. I actually wasn't that big on the game, thought it was one of the weaker ones (V is my favourite, followed by Vice City) so I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with it.
Personally I would suggest writing a spec script for a potential episode one/pilot and make sure you absolutely nail it. Then put together a breakdown of how you see the series progressing. Writing an entire series is ambitious, but I would highly recommend putting all your energy into writing a killer pilot to start with.
Also, and this is dependent on how far you have progressed this already, I would suggest creating a bespoke narrative. One that operates within the world of San Andreas and perhaps references incidents and characters who will be familiar to players, but that delivers a new central character/s with their own story. Following the game might feel like an easier task as the groundwork has already been laid, but building your own narrative will be far more rewarding and will ultimately showcase your talent a lot better. You can let your imagination run free, but still have the safety net of the GTA 'world' to keep you in check. You will also avoid your narrative becoming too linear.
As for sending to Houser and co. This is a tricky one, it's unlikely they'll read an unsolicited script unless you have a contact at Rockstar. You'd need an agent and a CV to get anywhere near, but as a screenwriter myself, I would certainly not let this stop you. If you are keen on writing, (is it something you hope to do professionally?) Then use this as an excuse to put together something of a calling card. Just because something has a very slim chance of ever being made, doesn't mean it's worthless and for this reason I would seriously consider the bespoke narrative approach. If you develop a pilot script and it finds its way in to the GTA community and garners some positive attention, you never know what might happen. I can't imagine Houser would be too fussed about a fan fic based on his own work, but I'm pretty sure he'd be impressed with any writers who can deliver good stories that feel like they belong in the world of GTA.
I'm toning the story down quite a bit at parts (for example, "Black Project" and "Green Goo", the latter being considered one of the greatest GTA missions ever, were both scrapped for my outline). I think SA appeals to me because I've played it more than any other video game ever, and it was really the first big, cinematic GTA game if you ask me (III and Vice City accomplished that as well, but they were very short and you couldn't make a multi-season series out of it). I also find the action and plot quite varied and also very sort of an explicit "Act I/II/III" sort of deal where Act I is Santos, Act II is Fierro, and III is Venturas.
I actually have 35 pages of the pilot done and a complete outline - unfinished on paper but completely down in my head - of the entire series. Also, I mean the point of this was to be an adaptation of the game, but there are stories and central characters added to really flesh out the plot and fill in any holes the game makes. The LSPD/CRASH/Tenpenny/police corruption part is actually given its' own storyline and several LSPD characters are added including a Homicide detective named Michaels who really is instrumental in uncovering Tenpenny's crimes over the course of the series.
I really appreciate the input, guys. Here's something for you (the screenplay for the first ~30 minutes of the pilot:
In the beginning...
Fair warning though, it's a hell of a lot of work and writing. My pilot episode is about 15,000 words.
I'd love to see how this goes, chaps. Best of luck.
I only wish that I was as prolific a writer as you are! :)
Well, I've done a 20,000 Masters in Law dissertation in my time but that's it (apart from the longer pieces on my blog).
Interesting - care to provide the links for those?
Tommy is independent of the Forelli Family after the events of Vice City.
...or maybe not.
Tommy, to me, has always been the most "invincible" GTA protagonist (despite his inability to swim...). I like to think that, in the 3D universe, he's still alive.
I never much cared for Tommy. At the beginning, he seemed pretty interesting, then as the story sank more and more into "By the way, this is the plot of Scarface", Tommy himself sank more and more into "I'M TONY MONTANA!" I think it's part of the reason I enjoy playing Scarface: The World is Yours (with the weirdest Wii control scheme known to man) more than Vice City. That, and that stupid mission "The Driver", which makes no sense any way you slice it.