H8: A drama series

 

“Taut… compelling… A strong premise that evokes the procedural fluency and mystical atmosphere of the first season of True Detective. A project that could find a home with Premium Cable or Streaming Networks.” -The Black List

Logline

When minority children start going missing in a small Southern town, two exceptional FBI agents—one Black, one Pakistani-American—with colliding worldviews are called in to investigate. What they uncover reveals the heart of hatred in America and a vast, sinister conspiracy.

Synopsis

H8 captures the zeitgeist and brings something completely fresh to TV: New heroes and an unflinching examination of polarizing realities—from race and religion to the psychology of hate. Ostensibly a mystery, the larger subject of the show is the intolerance and bigotry simmering beneath the surface in America, a veritable powder-keg on the verge of exploding in the age of Trump. At a time when partisan social media debates, fake news and the mainstreaming of extremism threaten to tear us apart, H8 will give us something bigger than another cop show or crime to solve. It is an exploration of the human condition at this complicated historical moment, when the national culture at large is in the throes of an existential crisis.

Series Overview

H8 is an hour-long dramatic serial narrative that captures the zeitgeist and brings something completely fresh to television: New heroes and an unflinching examination of polarizing realities—from race and religion to the psychology of hate.

The first season is a complex mystery about a series of child abductions in rural Georgia and the relationship of the two FBIagents who investigate the crimes. However, the larger subject of the show is the intolerance and bigotry simmering beneath the surface in America, a veritable powder-keg on the verge of exploding in the age of Donald Trump and Black Lives Matter.

At a time when partisan social media debates, fake news and the mainstreaming of extremism threaten to tear us apart, H8 will give us something bigger than another cop show or crime to solve. It is an exploration of the human condition at this complicated historical moment, when the national culture at large is in the throes of an existential crisis.

Foraying into this volatile territory—afflicted by institutional racism, Islamophobia, and rampant corruption—are two exceptional men: Elijah Winters, a black Renaissance man with ESP and powerhouse marital arts moves; and Imran Mirza, a sharpshooting, cyber-security wiz who hunts down terrorists and happens to have a Muslim background.

The driving engine of H8 is their odd-couple dynamic: one older, the other younger; one intuitive, the other rational; one spiritual, the other an atheist; one cool, the other hot-headed; one steeped in traditional investigative techniques, the other a tech-savvy millennial.

Through these rich characters, their different points of view and “buddy” dynamic, and the genre elements of the police procedural, H8 aims to explore the idea of prejudice in multiple dimensions, unravelling the assumptions we all make about one another—and the lead characters are not exempt. Like real people, their biases will be challenged and broken down over the course of the series.

As the investigation grows darker, each turn more menacing than the last, a relationship that begins with friction matures into a synergistic partnership in which the leads come to respect each other’s differences, realizing they’re stronger as a team because of them.

In light of our current climate, where we appear to be more divided than ever before, increasingly insulated from one another, and caught in our own echo chambers, H8 will seek to articulate dominant ideological strains through its characters, be the crucible in which they clash, and, finally, the vehicle through which each crime, each conversation and each act of heroism helps the viewer recognize that the truth is not always simple, the “good guys” aren’t always who you think they are and the “enemy” is sometimes your ally.

Awards and Industry Recognition

H8 has garnered the following industry recognition:

• Second Place Winner, WeScreenplay Television Pilot Screenwriting Contest (2018)
• Finalist, Sundance Episodic Lab (2018)
• Finalist, Atlanta Film Festival Screenplay Competition (2018)
• Finalist, WeScreenplay Diverse Voices Screenwriting Lab (2018 – still active)
• Finalist, The Film Empire’s Diversity Screenwriting Contest (2018)
• Semifinalist, MACRO Episodic Lab (2018 – still active)
• Semifinalist, Louisville Int’l Film Festival Screenplay Competition (2018)
• Quarterfinalist, CineStory Fellowship Competition (2018)
• Consistently ranked among the top 10 scripts on Coverfly’s The Red List (since Nov. 2017)
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• Semifinalist, ScreenCraft Pilot Launch TV Script Contest (2017)
• Quarterfinalist, Final Draft Big Break Screenwriting Contest (2017)
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•Finalist, Industry Insider TV Pilot Contest (2016)