735 - The Flashforward Fallback
Scriptnotes Podcast
John August
4.8 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 12 May 2026
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
John and Craig go back to the beginning to examine the mechanics of the flash-forward opening — or as it's known on this podcast, the "Stuart Special." They look at what makes a strong flash-forward, when to avoid them, and how to pay back the narrative debt they incur.
We also follow up on the Scriptnotes survey and answer a massive grab-bag blitz of listener questions including the potential pitfalls of child protagonists, "unfilmable" elements, and how to end a scene.
In our bonus segment for premium members, how do you socialize at Hollywood parties? We've made all the mistakes so you don't have to.
Links:
- The script for episode one of Chernobyl
- Scriptnotes episode 493: Opening Scenes
- Greta Gerwig's Little Women screenplay
- The Sheep Detectives
- Scriptnotes episode 731: Avoidance and Other Anti-Quests
- Sorkinisms – A Supercut by Kevin T. Porter
- My journey to the microwave alternate timeline by Malmesbury
- Solasta 2
- Get your copy of the Scriptnotes book!
- Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
- Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
- Become a Scriptnotes Premium member, or gift a subscription
- Subscribe to Scriptnotes on YouTube
- Follow Scriptnotes on Instagram and TikTok
- John August on Bluesky and Instagram
- Outro by Nick Moore (send us yours!)
- Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt and edited by Matthew Chilelli.
Email us at ask@johnaugust.com
You can download the episode here.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The reason I don't like this producer is because they're doing this thing that makes me insane, |
| 0:08.6 | which is to elevate their personal issue to an industry-wide rule that does not exist. |
| 0:17.8 | It is an appeal to authority they do not have, or rather, it's an assumption of authority. |
| 0:22.2 | They do not have. And they are inviting people to just throw a wadded up poster of home alone in |
| 0:30.4 | their face. And so I shall do so virtually. |
| 0:35.3 | 30 minutes earlier. Hello and welcome. My name is John August. |
| 0:39.0 | My name is Craig Mason. |
| 0:41.5 | And this is episode 735 of script notes. It's a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. |
| 0:47.8 | What you just experienced was a flash forward, or what we call in this podcast, a Stewart special. |
| 0:53.1 | They are surprisingly common in spec scripts to a degree they can feel cliche. |
| 0:57.3 | Yeah. |
| 0:57.8 | Today on the show, we'll look at what makes an effective flash forward, when to consider them, and when to run away. |
| 1:03.1 | We'll also be answering a bunch of listener questions, including some from our random advice mailbag, and in our bonus segment for premium members, how to go to Hollywood parties. Craig, if there's one thing you and I know about, premium members how to go to Hollywood parties |
| 1:11.2 | Craig if there's one thing you and I know about it's how to go to parties I can't wait to |
| 1:16.4 | learn absolutely so there's some minimums we're going to teach at the minimum we've been to enough |
| 1:21.2 | we've been to enough yeah we can fill people in who have not been to Hollywood parties on what |
| 1:25.1 | they're really like yes absolutely and if you ever do find yourself in one, how to behave. 100%. Yeah, absolutely. One of the last Hollywood parties I think I went to was premiere for second season of The Last of Us. Oh. And I did the things I think you should do at a Hollywood party. So we'll talk through those things. Great. Great. Some follow-up. So last week and the week before, we invite our listeners to participate in a script note survey. |
| 1:46.8 | So we asked them to click a link, go through a form and answer some questions about script notes. Yes. 333 people, Craig, answered that survey. That's a good number. That's a great number. And about half of them were premium members, half of them were our regular listeners. I thought you were to say about half of them enjoy the podcast. |
| 2:02.4 | More than half enjoyed the podcast. |
| 2:03.9 | We'd be terrible. |
| 2:04.5 | If we put the story like, we hate this show, please stop doing it. |
| 2:08.3 | We're running about a 55% right now. |
... |
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