A "spec script," for those of you not out here in L.A. slaving away to get noticed in television, is an actual sample episode of an existing TV show, which you write on your own, for free. You think it up yourself and write it exactly the same way the TV show does it, same format and everything. Once it's done, you try to get it read by people who do the hiring on TV shows--any TV show you can--simply to show those people how well you write and why they should hire you. To clarify a point that always seems to be confusing to non-showbiz folks, it's not a script you ever expect to sell or get the show to do - it's just a writing sample, that's it and that's all. See, although I have work writing in animation, I'd like to make the jump to prime time. Since I've written bunches of animation scripts I therefore have a million examples of how well I write for animation--if anyone wants to check me out before hiring me, my agents just send one of those scripts off. But since I haven't been hired on a prime-time series just yet, in order to show off my mad skillz to the TV PTB I have to put a spec together.
I hope this makes sense.
Anyway, the other thing about spec scripts is that they have a shelf life--if the show you wrote for is over or just old, the script isn't seen as "hot," so you need to keep writing new ones for shows people are interested in. The following are some spec scripts I've done that aren't particularly "hot" anymore, but I still thought they might be of interest to fandom folk. Everybody always wants to know "are you going to rewrite this as fic?"--like the story doesn't count unless it's in prose form--but...that's a lot of work for a story that's basically done, as far as I'm concerned. A script is its own animal. It's got its own life of the mind, and though it leaves a lot more room for the reader to fill in the blanks--every reaction and moment isn't spelled out for you, like in fic--that could make it even more fun to read. Fill in those blanks with whatever blows your skirt up, you know?
In any case, if you'd like to read a whole new never-shown episode of a show, here they are, in .PDF form. Ratings are the same as for the shows themselves. And as I mention in the prelude to the Buffy spec, these scripts are registered with the Writers Guild of America, west, so if anybody tries to steal them, copy them or otherwise claim them as their own, a great big powerful union will come down on their heads and legally pound the bejeezus out of them. Whee!
Not Just A River
Immediately follows S6 episode "Wrecked"
Buffy's not facing her feelings for Spike. She--and all of Sunnydale--apparently have to pay.
Big
Alternate Season One Hurley backstory
I got this idea during Season One--my challenge to myself was to write Hurley's backstory before the show got to it, to give him something really unexpected, and yet sell the reader on it. My version ponders the question: Hurley is "big" on the island, but how big was he back home? How "big" can anyone make themselves?