John and Craig look at another set of incredible news stories and ask, How Would This Be a Movie? Stories include an AI love service, an inventor with good intentions who doomed our planet, a fake Aretha Franklin, and a multi-million dollar nut heist.

We also follow up on heroic names and answer listener questions about researching your story.

In our bonus segment for premium members, John and Craig lie awake and wonder — what happens to our work after we die?

Links:

• The Man of Your Dreams by Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz for The Cut
• The Brilliant Inventor Who Made Two of History’s Biggest Mistakes by Steven Johnson for The New York Times Magazine
• Pennsylvania Woman Who Disappeared in 1992 Is Found Alive in Puerto Rico by Eduardo Medina for the New York Times
• The Counterfeit Queen of Soul by Jeff Maysh for Smithsonian
• The Curious Case of the Disappearing Nuts by Peter Vigneron for Outside
• A History Professor Takes On Hollywood by Katherine Rosman for the New York Times
• This Isn’t Going to End Well: The True Story of a Man I Thought I Knew by Daniel Wallace
• Posthumously by Daniel Wallace
• The Last of Us: Soundtrack From the Series by David Fleming & Gustavo Santaolalla
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• Craig Mazin on Instagram
• John August on Twitter
• John on Instagram
• John on Mastodon
• Outro by Orpheus (send us yours!)
• Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt and edited by Matthew Chilelli.

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You can download the episode here.