News Cycle

In the war for ratings, it's handy for news media organisations to know what tomorrow's sensational headline will be before it happens. How do they do that? They make the news. And award-winning investigative reporter Jim Cowbell knows that nothing captures the public's interest like a juicy bloody murder.

Investigative reporter Jim Cowbell, and his trusty social media/publicity guru set out to commit the perfect murder. Perfect in the sense that it will be a media sensation.

A “Mike Atkins” FILM
WRITTEN BY Mike Atkins

Investigative reporter Jim Cowbell is at his peak. His award-winning current affairs show, Cowbell @ Seven has just won a Golden Circle Media Award for the work that the show did bringing the killer of young Gemma Mortenson to justice. Many in the industry believe that the killer would still be on the street if Cowbell @ Seven hadn’t been there to cover every grisly step of the investigation.

Unfortunately Gemma was killed during the so-called “summer slump,” those long hot months when the sought-after 18-35 demographic has better things to do than watching TV. The next violent murder will be a winter one, Jim’s gonna make sure of it.

Also, Gemma was brunette. Blondes play better on screen. That’s another thing he’ll do differently next time.

With that in mind, Jim begins drafting an email to the boys at Volition Media Solutions. What a world we live in, Jim thought; the same people who come up with his Twitter updates can also orchestrate a murder by design.