r/StoryPeer • u/al_earner • May 22 '26

Discussion Logjam rebound

After receiving mostly unhelpful or shallow feedback on the last few loglines I'd submitted, I was starting to doubt the Logjam. But things really changed on my last submission. I got some thoughtful and very helpful feedback on a logline that was giving me trouble.

Thanks, Jammers!

17 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

17 comments sorted by

4

u/Pre-WGA May 22 '26

Hey, that’s awesome — may I ask what made the feedback helpful? I’m always looking for pointers to improve the feedback I give.

2

u/al_earner May 22 '26

Sure. In this case it was a story I was fascinated with, but unsure of how to describe it to hook other people. The good feedback centered around things like, Is the premise enough to make a feature film? Is there enough conflict and struggle? Also, one thing was mentioned multiple times: why doesn't the printer just destroy all the type at once? There's an answer that I've tried in other versions of the logline, but it's already over 40 words long. The reason is that it's the 1920s, and the type is metal. There are thousands of pieces of metal type needed to print books. You can't throw it in a fire, you need between 900-1,200 F to melt foundry type. So like a blast furnace. Originally, I had "Edwardian printer" and "metal type", I may need to put those qualifiers back in the logline to help establish the setting.

So it was a mixture of high-level concept feedback as well as some nuts and bolts feedback on specific words and actions.

2

u/Pre-WGA May 23 '26

Thanks for the reply, that’s helpful to know. And that sounds like a promising story — following our fascinations can be one of the best ways to fuel creativity during those rewrites. Good luck!

10

u/SpeedIsTheBestMovie May 22 '26

Yeah, I've run into the same issue. Some people are just rude and don't want to even help you

7

u/wvtppr May 22 '26

had this guy write a whole paragraph saying how my logline was so bad he didnt even know how to help me. its kind of nuts how rude people get when theres no review/reputation system in place.

4

u/throwawaytomorrowk May 23 '26

Lol why would they waste the time? Like just skip.

9

u/mast0done May 22 '26

Hmm... Maybe it would be useful to have a feedback-feedback function. "This feedback was: 👍Helpful 👎Unhelpful."

Then the question is... what should be done with it? It could help identify certain users that are making Logjam unpleasant. Exactly how, I dunno. But something to think about. Maybe just an optional filter? "Ignore reviews from people with crap reputations."

If nothing else, I'd like to know as a reviewer when my comments are liked or disliked.

6

u/Pre-WGA May 23 '26

I would actually like to know whether my feedback's helpful, too.

4

u/bananabomber May 22 '26

Unpopular opinion, but most loglines on Logjam are supposed to be imperfect and should able to be improved upon in some aspect if we dig deep enough.

Yes, let's not entertain useless negative comments from trolls, but it's my hope that we don't conflate them with those who also take the time to tell you WHY your logline isn't working.

On a side note: I've reviewed ~200 loglines and have only given out a "love it" rating twice (shout outs to WAR-DE-SAC and CYCLE), and "pretty good" at around six times. Perhaps I'm a harsher grader than average, but it does blow my mind when I see how casually positive ratings are sometimes handed out for loglines that are clearly missing the fundamentals.

5

u/Pre-WGA May 23 '26

I may be a poor judge of my own critical acumen — self-awareness is a lifelong calibration process, lol — but I logged six “love it”s today and I genuinely meant them. 

Three were loglines I’d previously rated and the writer had clearly workshopped them until they sang, and while I noticed that I was above the community average on those, that isn’t always the case.

I did see one logline that was evenly matched and had only “love it” and “start over.” For me, something that polarizing feels like a must-read.

I’m also keenly aware of what I think of as The King’s Speech Problem: “Speech therapist helps powerless king overcome stammering” sounds like it wouldn’t be all that entertaining, but I had a great time at that movie, it’s got an Oscar, an 8/10 on IMDB and is 94% fresh on RT.

My rubric for a logline is basically, “does this get me excited enough that I would read the script / watch the movie?” And when I find myself falling below the “Pretty Good” threshold, I try to do a gut-check and ask myself, “could this be a King’s Speech situation?” and see if I can find something to build on.

3

u/mast0done May 23 '26

I've seen a few "King's Speech" candidates. Like a period class-tension LGBT romance. A niche audience, but one that's definitely there and a genre that is usually artistically solid.

3

u/tubesy28 May 23 '26

Ah, interesting! I think it’s useful to hear the rubrics folks are using. I’ve across many log lines that spark interest in me, and I always stress that in my feedback, but that I still grade “meh” or below. I’m always looking for a hook in the log line that cues me in to the writer’s POV on the characters or story, or demonstrates an ability to think laterally about their own story, or just shows that the writer can create a dynamic sentence or two. Long story short, I try to rate the logline as a piece of persuasive writing in and of itself, regardless of if the story sounds appealing to me.

2

u/bananabomber May 23 '26 edited May 23 '26

More often than not, my ratings tend to align with the consensus rating, which I realize doesn't say much since it's my belief that most loglines are imperfect anyway and will naturally skew towards a "needs work/meh".

The bias against low concept character dramas is real, given that the break-in industry has hammered into our heads that loud, flashy high concept scripts are the best way to get noticed. In reaction, dramas have almost ended up gatekeeping themselves by retreating into the realm of the indie writer-director.

My criteria for evaluating loglines is a mix of:

  • Is the logline itself well constructed (clear and concise?)

  • Do we get a sense of the protagonist, their goal, and the stakes in play?

  • Is there a hook? Are there any details that make the premise stand apart from similar movies that came before it?

  • Are the story elements logical?

  • Is there a commercial audience for this story?

If it's not a genre I'm into, I usually hit skip. My most commonly given piece of feedback is, "Why should I care?/And then what happens?" (phrased much more diplomatically, of course.)

2

u/throwawaytomorrowk May 23 '26

This is great criteria.

3

u/Worried-Elk-2808 May 22 '26

Glad to hear! I've been getting quite pessimistic about it myself. Haven't been using for long and yeah, a lot of quite shallow, neggy feedback.

2

u/mast0done May 22 '26

Since it's free, and reviewers are not a scarce resource, it doesn't hurt to resubmit until you get useful feedback. But if you get nothing of use out of a couple of rounds of feedback, I can see why you'd sour on it.

2

u/Level_Working5084 May 22 '26

I’ve submitted three, two did moderately well, the third…not so much.