John and Craig explore one of the most powerful and versatile tools in episodic television: the cold open. But how does it work? What kind of scenes does it showcase best? How can it play with point of view, perspective and time? What makes it memorable? And how do you make it work for your story?
We also discuss new requirements for loan-out corporations, follow up on streaming ads and AI-generated coverage, and answer listener questions on titles, exposition and disabled representation.
In our bonus segment for premium members, John and Craig check out OpenAI’s flirty new chat capabilities and ask, do they have any love for talking to human-like AI’s?
Links:
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* [John jumps out of a plane](https://www.instagram.com/reel/C66u0u6pbBG/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==) on Instagram
* [Corporate Transparency Act: An Overview of Impending Reporting Obligations](https://www.faegredrinker.com/en/insights/publications/2023/10/corporate-transparency-act-an-overview-of-impending-reporting-obligations)
* [MoviePass, MovieCrash | Official Trailer](https://youtu.be/3G75RASEmUI?si=b5W5zEmpV4r8UzCT) from HBO
* [The Film Fund](https://www.thefilmfund.co/) and [the Reddit thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/Filmmakers/comments/16ftex6/is_the_film_fund_a_reliable_website/)
* [LOST – Desmond in the Hatch](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgsNjTyGsRk)
* [Suwada Nail Clippers](https://www.suwada.co.jp/en/products_en/nailnippers)
* [Song Exploder – Madonna’s “Hung Up”](https://songexploder.net/madonna)
* [The Ladder](https://www.hatchescapes.com/the-ladder) by Hatch Escapes
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* Craig Mazin on [Threads](https://www.threads.net/@clmazin) and [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/clmazin/)
* John August on [Threads](https://www.threads.net/@johnaugust), [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/johnaugust)
* [John on Mastodon](https://mastodon.art/@johnaugust)
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Eric Pearson ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
* Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt and edited by [Matthew Chilelli](https://twitter.com/machelli).
Email us at ask@johnaugust.com
You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/644standard.mp3).
**UPDATE 7-12-24:** The transcript for this episode can be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2024/scriptnotes-episode-644-the-power-of-the-cold-open-transcript).