The Simpsons & Futurama Fanworks Central

[Archonix]

Welcome to the TSSFC Winter Writing Competition!

Once again the voyage of prolonged, drunken ramblings behind a keyboard awaits those brave

This competition focuses on The Simpsons, Futurama and The Venture Brothers in association with our sister site, Venture Industries

Requirements

[*]There are some basic requirements for entry: you must be able to write, and presumably read too

[*]you must pick one show: no cross-overs, fusions or character-inserts.

[*]No self inserts are allowed.

[*]You are allowed to enter as many stories as you are able to write, assuming you can produce them in time.

[*] The story cannot be more than 5000 words long, and ideally should not be less than 100. Drabbles are allowed a long as you tell us that's what your entry is. You may exceed this limit if your story is extremely good - which, of course, it will be since you're the one writing it.
[*] A starts, middles and endings will be posted in this thread. Entrants will pick a start, an end (or several ends) and one or more middles and then try to weave a story through them. Creative use of multiple middles will gain points with the judges but don't, for the love of god, try to cram them all in!

[*] Content must be of a similar level to your chosen show. Suitability of content is left to the discretion of the judges.

[*] Only prose will be accepted. No scripts. Maybe poetry...


Prizes

Due to budgetary constraints the only prizes we can offer are reasonable quality certificates, along with the fuzzy warm feeling that comes with achieving that coveted first place. You can see an example of the certificates here.

The competition starts on the 16th of November and will close on the 14th of December. The judges will announce the winner shortly afterwards.

How to Enter

This is the important bit, so listen very carefully, as I shall type this only once.

In order to enter, you must read through the list of starts, middles and ends that will be in the next post on this thread, and then pick some. You don't need to tell people what you've chosen, but on the other hand nothing is stopping you either. Then you must create a new thread in the [iurl=http://www.simpworks.com/forums/2009-winter-writing-competition/0/]competition board[/iurl] announcing your intention to join. After that it's your thread. You can post anything inside it that's related to your fic - notes, ideas, background material and so on - or indeed nothing at all. When you complete your entry you will also post it in your thread as an attachment. We prefer Open Document format but it's a good idea to post rtf and/or word doc as well. HTML or plain text will only be accepted if you can't produce anything else.

There are to be no other threads than entry threads in the competition forum. This is an absolute rule. If you have any questions or anything else to say, post it in the [iurl=http://www.simpworks.com/forums/2009-winter-writing-competition/09-competition-discussion-and-questions-thread/0/]Competition Discussion and Questions thread[/iurl].

Updates to come.

[Archonix]

Beginnings

The terrible secret of space is revealed
Someone has to face up to reality
A package arrives
The devil comes down to Georgia
Someone changes their appearance
The day starts out so well
Routine maintenance reveals something frightening
Returning from a long journey, they discover everything has changed
Returning from a long journey, they discover nothing has changed in the slightest
A public figure pays a visit
Someone is responsible for that mess
Several people claim they did it

Middles

someone has to leave on a long journey
someone loses something important that the rest of the crew need
someone takes a long holiday with someone else
There is a profound need for booze
A small incident explodes into something world-shaking
Someone gets..... AMNESIA
A battle over a lava pit.
someone dies
An old friend returns
There is a profound, life-changing event
Everyone hides for a while
Nobody wants to own up
There's a leak, and it's all his/her fault!


Ends

someone is left holding the baby
someone returns to work
someone decides to return to the way things were
The world ends.
Everything turns out great.
Nixon hands out the rewards
Lucy Liu becomes the lord and master of the universe
Everyone gets a statue
The women were right after all
Romance blossoms
That unremarkable object in part 1 turns out to be the secret
Things end without resolution
Tragedy strikes out
The president wears pearls
It's thirty years later...