Cold and Steel Episode 5: Snowman on Mars / Discussion

This is the discussion related to the wiki page Cold and Steel Episode 5: Snowman on Mars.

Crit Required

Mr Makor 26 Jan 2023 22:37

Thank you generic3, von-pincier, drpierson, sovereignauthority, doubledenial, and the-son-of-man for your crit.

Forum Post: http://rpcauthority.wikidot.com/forum/t-15558209/cold-and-steel:snow-man-on-mars-draft#post-5864917

Last edited on 26 Jan 2023 22:39 by Mr Makor Show more

DrNog 28 Jan 2023 04:32

I like this article. It's a nice change of pace FROM !VIOLENCIA VIOLENCIA! and something a bit more relaxing and the information they discussed I found interesting. The dialogue to me felt unstitled and natural, I could use some pointers to capture that as it's something I need to work on in my own writing.

Last edited on 28 Jan 2023 04:34 by DrNog Show more

(account deleted) 29 Jan 2023 15:24

Some of the dialogue kinda suffers from Marvel syndrome where it gets interrupted by a lot of quips, most of which you’ve probably seen before. I think it makes the characters feel more like actors and less like human beings, which seems to be the opposite of what you were going for here.

But honestly? This was solid. I thought the scene with 058 was pretty funny so I’ll try to incorporate that into my rewrite without you having to change anything. 4 stars.

SPAG and Dialogue

COOK: You barely sleep as-is.
ALDO: Oh, hush you. [Aldo looked directly into the camera, putting on a forced smile]

This would be so funny if you cut that “Oh, hush you.” there and just started with him looking at the camera with a pained smile. Nobody says “oh hush you” in real life anyways.

is to keep the thing operational 24/7, no wait, 24.4/7.

This would be funnier if you just went “keep thing operational 24.4/7.” By adding that “no wait” it short of weakens the dialogue, makes it sound a little cheesy.

when a lot of clay meets a lot of pressure, like on a planet.

“Like on a planet” implies that Mars is not a planet, right?

Shuush, I'm getting to that. Where was I? Oh yeah.

You're drawing out the joke. The quips wouldn’t bother me so much if they didn’t drag on a little. Go “I’m getting to that” or whatever and then move on. Three sentences dedicated to something that isn’t funny can start to annoy the reader.

When mixed with arsenide, which is a sort of mix of arsenic and other stuff we dig up, you get a suitable semiconductor. Which you can defiantly make many things out of.

…you get a suitable semiconductor, that seems to make up half the stuff around here/seems to be needed by more people than we can handle/etc etc.

“Definitely” is misspelled here. I changed the sentence because you use “which” way too many times here and I think “which you can make many things of” kinda cold cuts the reader if you’re not going to give examples of the things in question.

fellow slave master
apologies, master

Are they fellow masters or is he the ‘slave’?

Last edited on 29 Jan 2023 15:24 by (account deleted) Show more