Case Studies

Real scripts. Real findings.

Actual coverage findings from features and pilots — what the read surfaced, and why it mattered.

Case Study 09 title card reading ‘Twenty-eight pages out. One note still standing. Revision is a decision.’ Case Study 09

Revision Is a Decision: What a Second Pass Shows About Taking Notes

October 21, 2026

Most writers see their notes once. This case study follows one script through two rounds of coverage: 28 pages cut, a verdict that moved up a full tier, and one note that never moved at all. What a second pass shows about revision.

Read → Case Study 08 title card reading ‘Keep the secret. Keep the audience. You need both.’ Case Study 08

Hidden Protagonist: Can a Film Survive Too Big a Secret?

September 30, 2026

A holiday slasher comedy conceals its protagonist’s identity for most of Act Two — a clever bet that can leave an audience with no one to hold onto. The finding on what a concealed-protagonist design still owes the middle of a story.

Read → Case Study 07 title card reading ‘Up is danger. Down is safety. The reversal is everything.’ Case Study 07

Down Is Safety: Can Direction Alone Carry a Theme?

September 16, 2026

A survival thriller inverts almost every instinct an audience carries in: down is safety, up is danger. No character explains it. The finding on how a spatial device alone carried the entire theme.

Read → Case Study 06 title card reading ‘A reveal that’s assembled. A reveal that’s inevitable. Only one survives the climax.’ Case Study 06

Assembled vs. Inevitable: What’s Your Reveal?

September 2, 2026

Every reveal is either assembled or inevitable: same information, completely different experience. The finding on Wash Will Tell’s Act 3, and the one-lever fix that moved it from one to the other.

Read → Case Study 05 title card reading ‘The right climax. The wrong film. The ideal fix.’ Case Study 05

Your Third Act Is Excellent — And That’s The Problem

August 19, 2026

Sky Crystal's crime-comedy Best Day Ever earned a Final Polish verdict and Strong buyer fit — but its brilliant climax belonged, in register, to a different film. The finding, and the three ways to fix it without touching what makes the ending work.

Read → Case Study 04 title card reading ‘Seven words. One direction. A whole architecture.’ Case Study 04

A Mic Drop In Character Building

August 7, 2026

A TV pilot from writer Angie Wang, put through dev|cut. coverage like any other beta script. The finding: a single seven-word parenthetical on page 7 doing more character work than pages of exposition could — the smallest unit of stage direction a script can offer, carrying the most weight.

Read → Case Study 03 diagram tracing a story’s focus: opens on, transfers to, resolves through. Case Study 03

Who is this story actually about from beginning to end?

July 22, 2026

A feature co-written with Michelle Jubilee Gonzalez — think Hunger Games meets Rollerball — went through dev|cut. coverage like any other beta script. The finding: the opening hands the story to one character, the ending resolves it through someone else entirely.

Read → A close-up of a printed screenplay page from the pilot’s scene 18. Case Study 02

The loaded gun the pilot forgot to fire.

June 30, 2026

A period thriller TV pilot. A housekeeper enters Act One with the calm of someone who has done this before. When she tucks a blanket over a sleeping figure, she tucks it like a coroner on a corpse. The setup was precise. The audience leaned in. And then she disappeared for the rest of the episode.

Read → Case Study 01 title card listing A24, Neon and Searchlight as the prestige-comedy buyer corridor. Case Study 01

The buyer corridor your coverage never gave you.

June 2, 2026

A crime comedy feature — think a modern Grosse Pointe Blank. The craft was there. But the finding that mattered wasn't about craft. It was about the where. dev|cut. coverage identified the buyer corridor: A24. Neon. Searchlight. Not a guess — a read of current slates and recent acquisition patterns.

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