Dog Park Outline

Premise: You have to let go before you can move on

Logline: An experimental procedure that resurrects a beloved pet goes horribly wrong,
forcing the dog’s owner to put an end to his mistake before it ends him.

Synopsis: A widower loses his dog, his only lifeline, to dog-fighting and gang violence.
When an ex-military scientist offers him a chance to bring his pet back from the dead,
desperation pushes him to accept. The process appears to work perfectly at first, but soon
the dog reveals that it is loyal only to itself and has an appetite for bloody revenge. The
brutal deaths force the man to confront his mistake before the monstrous animal can harm
anyone else.

1. Opening Image: A man and his dog are playing in a dog park in the early evening.
The man leaves the dog unattended to use the restroom. When he’s out of sight,
two men grab his dog, put it in a bag and jump into a van. The man runs out after
them but is too late, and the van races away. In a large, undistinguished building,
the thieves duct-tape the stolen dog’s mouth shut, then toss it in a room with a large
black dog named Titan. Titan promptly attacks and kills the defenseless dog.
2. Theme Stated: Connor sits in an otherwise empty bar in the middle of the day,
drinking. A news report on the TV talks about the one-year anniversary of a plane
crash, but he asks the bartender to change the channel. Finishing his drink, he goes
outside to get his dog, Duke. Connor and Duke go back to their new apartment in
San Francisco, where Connor unpacks boxes from the suburban home he shared
with his family. He places a framed photo of his wife and daughter on the dresser
and hangs some of his family’s clothes in the closet, clearly showing that he hasn’t
moved on with his life.
3. Set-Up: Connor goes to the park and meets Beatrix, an elderly woman who knows
everyone in the area. Beatrix tells Connor about the local dog park, and when the
man from the opening walks past, tells Connor about the rash of animal
disappearances recently.
4. Catalyst: Connor and Duke go to the dog park. Gabriel, a dog trainer for a local
gang, approaches with his dog Titan and two friends.
5. Debate: Gabriel offers to buy Duke, but Connor refuses and leaves.
6. Break Into Two: Connor and Duke return home, but Connor is attacked from
behind and knocked out. When he wakes up, Duke is gone. He calls the police, but
they are unable to help him. Searching frantically, he runs into Beatrix, who tells
him where to find the dog-fighting arena. Meanwhile, the gang tapes Duke up and
Titan attacks. Connor, hearing the fight in the distance, finds to the arena in a
warehouse by the docks and encounters Gabriel and his gang. They give him
Duke’s dead body and threaten to kill him if he comes back or tells the police
anything.
7. B Story: Distraught, Connor leaves and prepares to bury Duke. Before he can, a
scientist named Amanda drives up and talks him out of it, saying she can bring
 Duke back to life. In desperation, Connor agrees, and the two go to Amanda’s lab.
Connor notices that Amanda has a number of specially reinforced cages, but she
reassures him by saying that they were for her earlier, less successful experiments.
She successfully clones Duke, restoring his age and memories. Elated, Amanda
propositions Connor, and the two spend the night together.
8. Fun And Games: Everything seems normal with Duke at first, though Connor
notices that his dog is eating more than usual. Dukes attentively watches Connor
use the toilet at one point. Duke sneaks out one night and goes to the dog-fighting
arena. Before a match between Titan and another dog begins, Duke attacks and
kills Titan, ruining the match and publicly humiliating Gabriel.
9. Midpoint: Gabriel confronts Connor the next morning at the dog park, but Connor
has no idea what he’s talking about. When a gang member tries to grab Duke, the
dog bites off one of his fingers. Connor calls Amanda and tries to figure out where
they stand, but she blows him off, saying they just used each other for sex. That
night, two of Gabriel’s friends break into Connor’s apartment to steal Duke,
thinking he’s a valuable fighting animal, but Duke kills one and frightens off the
other.
10. Bad Guys Close In: Duke sneaks into Gabriel’s apartment the next night and kills
his son while Gabriel is gone. Gabriel returns and, devastated and enraged, grabs a
gun and goes to Connor’s apartment.
11. All Is Lost: Connor hears a noise in the middle of the night and catches Duke
cleaning blood off his muzzle in the toilet. He tries to restrain the dog, but Duke
intimidates him. The dog hears Gabriel pulling up and runs outside to attack him.
Gabriel loses his gun during the fight and flees with Duke in hot pursuit. Connor
chases after them, but quickly loses them.
12. Dark Night Of Soul: Connor returns to Amanda’s lab and presses her until she
admits that she was paying the gang for dead animals from the dog-fighting ring.
She reveals that she had expected these changes in Duke, and kept his body for
further research instead of disposing of it like she promised. Connor takes Duke’s
body outside and buries it while Amanda watches.
13. Break Into Three: Duke corners Gabriel at the dog-fighting arena and the two fight,
a fire accidentally starting in the process. Connor sees the smoke and flames and
heads to the warehouse. He enters and finds Duke, who has killed Gabriel but was
wounded in the process. He lures the dog into another room and locks the door,
then quickly flees the burning building.
14. Finale: Before Connor can leave the area, Duke leaps out of the burning warehouse
and savages his former master. Mortally wounded, he manages to impale Duke on
a jagged pipe, killing the monstrous animal. He embraces his dying pet as his
vision fades to black.
15. Final Image: Connor wakes up inside a tube in Amanda’s lab. Amanda cheerfully
explains that her research has finally reached the human testing phase and that
Connor is her first test subject. She pulls a sheet off a nearby table, revealing his
dead body. A covered dog-shaped body rests on another table. He screams in
horror as she explains that her experiments may hurt a little…