The Critic

You’re sitting alone in your house, reading a book. You just recently released your short film, entitled “Scute,” to the internet. It’s a simple story about a turtle that goes on a quest of self-discovery. You’re rather proud of your work; you enjoyed making it and think your efforts paid off.
You’re about to turn to the next page of your novel when you hear a shuffling outside your window. You apprehensively glance out but see nothing.
“Must be a mouse,” you mutter to yourself. You refocus on your book, but soon are interrupted by the sound once again, this time from outside your garage. Come to think of it, you don't recall ever seeing a mouse in the neighborhood. Yet again you dismiss your suspicions. Perhaps it’s a raccoon.
You continue reading, but you’re having difficulty concentrating on the story. Paranoia is beginning to creep into your psyche. You gently put a bookmark in your novel and shut it, placing it on the nearby table. You get up and put the kettle on; a cup of tea might calm your nerves.
As you wait for the water to boil, you hear the shuffling again.
But it’s coming from somewhere else this time: your basement.
Something, or someone, has broken in.
You, panicked, instinctually grab a dirty butter knife, the closest thing to a weapon in the immediate vicinity, to defend yourself with. The disturbing noises continue in the form of footsteps, coming closer with each iteration.
You hear a door creak open. Your hands are shaking.
You hear someone walk upstairs. You can feel the adrenaline coursing through your veins.
And then your tormenter makes his appearance.
He is a man at least a foot taller than you. He sports a smug grin on his bony, pale face, and is wearing an overcoat with a turtleneck underneath. Your grip on the butter knife tightens at the sight of him.
“Hello,” he says in a voice that grates your eardrums with its raspy British accent. “I’m the Critic. Today, I shall dissect the two-dimensional animated short film, ‘Scute.’”
You panic and stab at this man with your butter knife. He swiftly grabs it before it even makes contact with him. He looks you directly in the eyes as his grin widens ever so slightly. He reams the butter knife out of your hands and twirls it around once before tossing it far from your reach.
“Not a fan of criticism?” he remarks. “Unsurprising. Not many people are.”
The Critic somehow retrieves a laptop from his coat and places it on your kitchen counter. He spins you around to face it and stands to your left, holding your head in place with his right hand, his long, unfiled nails digging into your scalp. You’re too scared to move; you have no idea what this man might do.
The laptop automatically powers on, instantly revealing a windows media player tab with what seems to be a copy of your film loaded up on it, likely abbreviated judging by the timestamp at the bottom. The Critic presses the start button.
Your film’s intro credit scene plays. You quickly notice that a zero, in Times New Roman font, is superimposed onto the video in the upper right corner.
“Five seconds of useless intro. That’s a demerit,” the Critic scolds.
The Critic pulls a sharp object out from his overcoat. It’s a small, needlelike tool resembling an ice pick. He stabs it deep into your shoulder. Instantly, it feels as if your entire arm burst into flame; it must be tipped with some sort of chemical. You yell in pain. The Critic chuckles ever so slightly at your reaction.
You notice that the number superimposed on the screen changes to a one.
The film cuts to the scene of the turtle protagonist in the city, confirming your suspicions that you are watching an abridged copy.
The Critic chimes in once again. “Hmm. That turtle is clearly of the species Chrysemys picta yet is depicted as living in what seems to be coastal Oregon, where it does not naturally reside. Another demerit.”
The Critic takes out another needle and stabs it into your leg. Pain shoots upward. The number onscreen changes to two.
“Speaking of the painted turtle, that tone of orange on the bottom of the shell is a shade too light. Demerit!”
The Critic stabs another needle right next to the last one, amplifying the pain further. The number changes to three.
The scene shifts again to one of your personal favorites due to the effort it took to animate: the bar. The protagonist orders a martini.
“Ah, notice that in the corner, the shadow on the wall is about two degrees off from what it realistically should be, based on the lighting. That is certainly worth a demerit.” The Critic stabs another needle into your wrist, careful to just barely miss your arteries. Your hand might as well have been lowered into acid. The number onscreen ticks up to four.
“And why a martini? Why not a slightly less cliched drink, such as my personal favorite, a Negroni.” The Critic stabs yet another needle into your lower abdomen. The pain, at this point, is near unbearable and quickly increasing. And it’s not just the physical suffering, it’s the mental agony of your beloved creation being used to mock you.
The kettle you set on earlier emanates its earsplitting wail. The Critic pauses the video, turns off the stove, removes the kettle, takes the cup you had prepared, and pours the boiling water in. While he’s distracted, you try to make a break for it, but the Critic swiftly grabs you by the same shoulder he embedded a needle in with a bone-crushing grip, irritating your already burning nerves. He drags you back over to the laptop and takes a sip of the scalding hot tea without even flinching.
“It’s not Lipton, I’ll give you that,” he says. “I’ll negate your demerit for fleeing.” You swear that the accursed Times New Roman number on the laptop screen flicks to five before returning to four.
The film resumes playing, and the Critic keeps complaining about all sorts of little details and stabbing another ice pick into you for each one. Some of these are legitimate criticisms, albeit minor, [such as the way you animated the movement of water in one scene] but just as many are nonsensical complaints about things such as the turtle “lacking taste” and that “he’d never make a good soup.”
Finally, the Critic concludes his callous commentary, with one final grievance about how the film should have ended with the entire cast being killed off in a fiery blaze. The video fades to black.
You’re twitching in agony, fourteen needles embedded in your flesh. The Critic smirks at you. He’s done insulting your work, he’ll leave you alone, right?
The laptop’s screen displays the Times New Roman font once again, this time in white.
RUNTIME: 15 MINUTES TOTAL [5 spent critiquing]
DEMERIT TOTAL: 14
RATE: APPROXIMATELY .933 DEMERITS PER MINUTE
The screen goes completely black once again. The Critic gently shuts the laptop.
“How unfortunate,” the critic says. “Yet another disgrace to cinema. However, perhaps with a little editing, a few modifications, something can be salvaged from the wreckage.”
“Editing?” you ask, “Uh, s…sure! I have some extra unused scenes saved somewhere, maybe I could splice in some, make some tweaks, whatever you think would work.” You hope that if you give the Critic what he wants, he’ll leave. Maybe then you’d have a chance to call the police and get this psychopath arrested.
“Oh, the film? No, that’s unsalvageable. Complete dreck.” The Critic turns to you and smirks malignly. “I was thinking something more long-term.”
The Critic draws out a scalpel from his overcoat. It gleams forebodingly in the dim light. Your eyes widen as he stares directly at you.
“What we need here, you see, are a few changes to the director themselves.”
Category:PotM
Category:Weird