Characters / Screen Rant Pitch Meetings

The Screenwriter

Screenwriter Guy

Played By: Ryan George

A delusional, unhinged screenwriter who pitches scripts that have problematic elements and often expose just how crazy he really is.

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• Allegorical Character: He's a stand-in for how almost any half-baked pitches can be greenlit no matter how flimsy the script or how questionable the content is.
• Ax-Crazy: He cheerfully admits to keeping countless dangerous weapons in his car, and he was apparently banned from going near playgrounds or schools. Aside from that, various pitch meetings (like Coraline for example) acknowledge that something is wrong with him.
• Bestiality Is Depraved: He has several bizarre and disturbing fetishes, which make their way into a lot of his scripts, much of which involves animal sex. When the Producer questions him in this, the Screenwriter invariably offers to send him graphic and detailed drawings on it to show how it would work.
• Big "SHUT UP!": Inverted, he often gives a quick but small "Hey shut up" and continues with his story, without missing a beat, whenever the producer points out some very obvious flaw in his script.
• Brilliant, but Lazy: He's written some genuinely amazing films, however he also won't write more than one draft of a story, so will refuse to correct any plot-holes, continuity errors or any other mistake he makes during the writing process.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: While he's clearly batshit insane, he's also written every TV Show and Movie there is.
• Catchphrase:
  • "Actually it's going to be super easy, barely an inconvenience!"
  • "I'm gonna need you to get all the way off my back..." for when the Producer points out a plot hole that the writer refuses to correct.
  • "Unclear." Often said when The Producer asks him to explain the reasons for a plot hole in the movie.
• Dark and Troubled Past: A few of the pitch meetings hint that he had a terrible childhood.
• Freudian Excuse: It’s hinted several times that his insanity was caused by his bizarre upbringing. For example, the origin for Bruce and Rachel reminiscing about condensed milk in Batman Begins.
  Screenwriter: You remember when you were a kid and you'd say “Mother, could I please have some sweet, sweet condensed milk?”
  Producer: Uh....
  Screenwriter: And then she’d say [in a suddenly disturbed tone of voice and with a Kubrick Stare] “Not until you’ve brushed Mother’s hair. Not until you've brushed it well.”
  Producer: Oh, I think you might have had a weird childhood.
  Screenwriter:[back to his normal cheery tone] Oh, did I? Dang it, that explains some stuff!
• His Name Really Is "Barkeep": His legal name is "Screenwriter Guy".
• Horrifying the Horror: While the Producer Guy is capable of using his anger to make him obey his wishes, there are times when he gets really annoyed by the Producer's (generally sensible) questions and tells him to get "All the way off my back about it". The Producer Guy immediately complies, occasionally noting that the statement sounded vaguely threatening.
• Love at First Sight: It's implied that he and the Producer have romantic feelings for each other.
• Massively Numbered Siblings: In the 200th Bonus Episode, he reveals that he has 17,000 identical brothers and sisters.
• Tame His Anger: Seems that he has already accomplished this, usually having a cheery disposition but admitting that he is profoundly angry all the time.

The Producer

Producer Guy

Played By: Ryan George

A profit-obsessed producer who often points out problematic elements in the Screenwriter’s scripts, but never changes them.

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• Absurd Phobia: He has an intense fear of clouds. A minor Running Gag is the Producer forcing various villains in the Screenwriter's scripts to be clouds because he's sincerely convinced that they're scary.
• Abusive Parents: He apparently has a son named Dum-Dum Johnny that he says breaks out of his cage often. He is also keen on the idea of abandoning him.
• Accidental Murder: It's suggested that he has killed people in bumper cars, and has thus been banned from Six Flags.
• Affably Evil: Much heavier on the "affable" part, to the point of being an Extreme Doormat, but as detailed in the Corrupt Corporate Executive entry, he is up to some seriously sinister stuff.
• Allegorical Character: He represents film execs who will greenlight any project with the potential of easy profits as well as add in more ways to milk even more money from the audience.
• Ambiguously Human: Appa rently he came into this world as a fully grown adult covered in goo.
• Armor-Piercing Question: During the pitch for Mulan (2020), when Screenwriter talks about how anyone who doesn't meet the very strict training standards gets sent home, Producer asks if that doesn't negate the whole premise of the film.
  Producer: So wouldn't Mulan's father just have been sent home if he'd gone?
  Screenwriter: ....Oh my god.
• Awful Wedded Life: The few times he mentions his wife makes it fairly clear that she hates his guts. He seems to be largely oblivious to this.
• Berserk Button: Don't mess with dogs around him.
  • He's quietly furious over John Wick's dog being killed.
  Producer: (Stunned Silence) Okay, some people better die for that.
  • When he hears about Doc Brown repeatedly using dogs in his experiments, he asks if Doc is the villain.
  • He calls it "pretty messed up" that the wizards in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone kept a giant dog locked in a small room all year.
  • When Screenwriter punches a drawing of a puppy in front of him, he gives him a Death Glare and says, completely serious, "I'll Kill You!."
• Captain Obvious: Often reacts to obvious things with childlike wonder. His general reaction to Title Drop is an amazed “That’s the name of the movie/show!” And he reacts similarly to call backs, characters returning from previous instalments etc. Taken to ridiculous levels in the pitch meeting of After Earth where he reacted in a similar manner to the mere mention of Earth and legs exclaiming “That’s where I live!” and “You need those to walk!” respectively.
• Catchphrase: "Fair enough." or "That works." Said whenever the Screenwriter gives him a nonsensical answer to a question about the script.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: Sillier and nicer than most, and mostly he's just really obsessed with profits and allows crazy and possibly offensive pitches. However, some of what we know about Producer paints him as a borderline supervillain including, but not limited to, his intention to buy Canada, willingness to sell off his grandmother, and apparently he worships Satan, complete with the Voice of the Legion and Sdrawkcab Speech. Also his favorite hobby is throwing coins at poor people to see how they react.
  Screenwriter: Taking lives while music plays is going to be a really big part of this film.
  Producer: Death is great. Hail Satan.
  Screenwriter: What?
  Producer: [begins randomly speaking in tongues]
• Everyone Has Standards: He occasionally grows a moral code out of nowhere. He typically loses it just as quickly, especially when the Screenwriter brings up money.
  • As evil as he obviously is, he still has some lines he absolutely won't cross. Besides demanding Screenwriter remove a teenage gangbang scene and calling bullies who hit a crippled kid with their car literal psychopaths.
  • He also reacts in horror when he initially is told the Polar Express starts with the child character "Getting into a strangers vehicle and having his life change forever."
  • When he hears the subplot in Old of two six year olds having sex, getting pregnant, and the baby dying immediately, he goes into a Heroic BSoD and regrets every decision he's made.
  • Twilight: Breaking Dawn's plot point of Jacob/Renesme ending up together after the former imprints on the latter has him drop into a depressed silence, where he shakes his head and finally says:
  Producer: I don't like that.
  • The Pitch Meeting for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has the producer enter Tranquil Fury when the Screenwriter punches a picture of a dog, threatening to end his career (and life) on the spot. As sleazy as the man is, it's clear that harming animals is a bridge too far. This is notably the only moral line he has never been shown tolerating, shrugging off, or outright crossing.
• Extreme Doormat: No matter how much the Screenwriter slacks on his scripts, the Producer seldom does much to improve anything outside of pointing out the flaws.
• Heroes Love Dogs: Hero in the "POV-character equals hero" sense, but he's consistently shown to be horrified whenever bad things happen to dogs in movies. He also owns a dog, which he considers a very good friend.
• Heroic BSoD: The romantic subplot of Old involving two six year olds causes him to just stare silently for a bit before lamenting that he didn't become a doctor instead.
• Hidden Depths: During his Heroic BSoD in the pitch meeting for Old, he mentions getting grades good enough for him to become a doctor.
• Hope Spot: When he hears about making a children's movie, he excitedly calls his daughter to let her know, only to learn more about the plot of Coraline.
• Horrifying the Horror: He scares Screenwriter guy and threatens to kill him after he punched the picture of the dog.
• Idle Rich: Seems to be this way. It's to such an extent that he got plastic surgery to look exactly like the Screenwriter Guy for no other reason other than that he could afford it.
• Ignored Epiphany: In the pitch meeting for "Twilight: Breaking Dawn", he points out with deep concern how messed up the whole Jacob/Renesme imprinting thing is, and doesn't even attempt to hide his utter dissapointment when the epic and exciting final battle that the Writer was describing was revealed to be just a vision shown to the bad guy to dissuade him to not start a war, questioning if the pitch is worth the trouble. Despite these valid concerns, the simple mention of money by the Writer get him back on track instantly.
• Late to the Realization: When Screenwriter is talking about the experiments Rocket and his friends underwent by the High Evolutionary, it takes him a moment to realize what happened to them.
  Producer: Wait, grown up Rocket doesn't have any cute little animal friends!
  Screenwriter: Yeah, so you can see where these flashbacks are headed.
  Producer: (horrified) Oh no!
• Literal-Minded: On occasion. For instance, upon learning that Screenwriter Guy is M. Night Shyamalan's ghostwriter, he immediately asks how he died.
• Love at First Sight: It's implied that he and the screenwriter have romantic feelings for each other.
• Luke, I Am Your Father: Parodied in the Prometheus pitch when he reveals that he is the Screenwriter's 3rd cousin.
• Mad Libs Catchphrase: "X is tight!"
• Misanthrope Supreme: In the pitch meeting for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, he immediately "gets it" that Namor hates everyone, not even wanting to hear why.
• Mood Whiplash: In the Old pitch meeting, he goes from Heroic BSoD to being excited when he hears the movie is based off a graphic novel because now it might make some money.
• Noodle Incident: He's encountered eyes that bleed for no reason before, something he looks very haunted by. The same goes for a time he saw somebody's face removed.
• Oblivious to Love: Perhaps. He thinks that stalking and blowing Cheeto dust in people's faces are romantic.
• Old Shame: invokedHe thinks of Iron Fist (2017) as this, adamantly insisting that Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is the MCU's real first foray into martial arts.
• The Power of Friendship: Shares this with his pet dog, to the point where telling him he was his friend was enough to give him the power to "crash through the wall like the Kool-Aid man".
• Rebuilt Pedestal: Although his father verbally abuses him, he desperately seeks out his respect. Downplayed with the Screenwriter, who he enjoys being around even despite acknowledging how crazy he is.
• Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: He is apparently unable to comprehend why Jaime Reyes can't deal with his financial problems by just borrowing a million dollars from his father. When the Screenwriter explains that they live in poverty, he replies, "I've never heard that word before, and I don't like it."
• Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: Apparently he spent much of his high school laughing at the nerds.
• Stalker without a Crush: According to the pitches for The Incredible Hulk and Sonic The Hedgehog 2, he likes watching people "while they sleep" and "from a distance".
• Tranquil Fury: He very rarely gets mad no matter what the Screenwriter Guy come up with but when does, he shows it in a quiet but dangerous tone. Whenever he shows that side, the Screenwriter Guy always and immediately obeys him.
• The Watson: His role is to point out all of the issues that would come with the films only to ignore them when convinced that the project will sell and he's just as willing to put in his own awful ideas.