Write more like yourself.

A screenwriting tool that thinks with you.

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Free to write. Pro for $15/month.

Koto reads your work
and thinks with you.

It never writes for you.

Most AI tools generate text and call it help. Koto does something different. It reads your pages, learns how you write, and helps you think through the hard parts—structure, character, tone, intent.

The words on the page are always yours.
Koto just helps you find them faster.

Your story, structured for thinking.

When you start a project, Koto has a conversation with you about your story. This becomes a set of living, editable documents that drive every brainstorm session. Koto isn’t guessing—it’s read the bible.

Story — Joy Glock Club

A subversive action comedy half hour TV show set in San Gabriel Valley. When ICE agents terrorize the Chinese community, there is only one team that can stop them: a gang of militant, vigilante crime fighting grannies known as the Joy Glock Club. The comedy lives in the gap between extreme violence and extreme domesticity. Leone meets Shaw Brothers meets grandma comedy.

The central question: Can four grandmothers save a neighborhood that will never know it needed saving — or who saved it?

Characters — Joy Glock Club

HELEN.

72. Retired seamstress. Still makes her own clothes. Speaks four languages, claims two. Her kung fu is classical — economical, invisible until it isn’t. The kind of woman who has already solved the problem before you’ve finished explaining it. Authority comes from being right so often she stopped needing to say so. Has protected this community for thirty years under the cover of being harmless. Finds it mildly insulting that it keeps working.

GRACE.

68. Former restaurant owner. Sold the restaurant. Did not stop being angry. Hits first, asks nothing. The others consider her a liability; she considers herself a time-saver. Surprisingly gentle with children and dogs. Everyone else should watch themselves.

PEGGY.

74. Offers food before, during, and after violence. It is unclear if this is hospitality or psychological warfare. Possibly unclear to Peggy too. Deadpan so complete it reads as cognitive — it is not. The most dangerous person in any room, including rooms Helen is in. Helen knows this.

JANET.

49. The young one. Came in as ICE. Didn’t leave that way. Spent six months running surveillance on the group and developed what she describes as professional respect and what the others describe as getting got. Still carries the badge Helen made. Hasn’t decided if that’s embarrassing or clarifying.

Genre — Joy Glock Club

Spaghetti western comedy. The visual grammar borrows from Leone — wide establishing shots, slow push-ins, eyes in close-up before violence. The pacing borrows from Shaw Brothers — sudden tonal shifts from comedy to action with no transition.

References: Kill Bill (tonal whiplash), Barry (the mundane and ordinary are lethally competent), Nobody (competence mistaken for invisbility).

World — Joy Glock Club

San Gabriel Valley, present day. Pearl River Bakery -- a non descript bakery serving fresh egg tarts at 530am for the past 30 years -- is the ladies main lair. Think Bond hideout with immaculate feng shui. Here they gather to monitor ICE movements, discover new ways to use cleavers, and play mahjong.

Other key locations: 99 Ranch parking lot, the church kitchen, San Gabriel courthouse.

Writing Notes — Joy Glock Club

Comedy and danger are inseparable. One always lives inside the other.

The grandmas never acknowledge how extraordinary they are.

Treat violence as mundane, snacks as urgent.

Think in zoom punches, smash cuts, Leone geometry.

Dialogue should feel clipped and naturalistic. Characters talk past each other. No one says what they mean — subtext carries the weight.

Violence is stylized but consequences are real. A fight scene should feel choreographed. A funeral scene should feel earned.

Voice Profile — Joy Glock Club

Structure

Episodes are 25-30 pages with an act break every 10 pages.

Act and episode endings must create forward pull – unresolved tension, a revelation, or a question the audience can’t sit with.

Dialogue

Consistently short — 1–3 lines per speech. Parentheticals almost never used. Characters deflect rather than confront. Humor is dry, punchlines land through understatement. High confidence.

Action Lines

Sparse and visual. Describes what the camera sees, not internal states. Short paragraphs, active verbs. High confidence.

Preferences

- Avoids flashbacks as a structural device
- No characters stating emotions directly in dialogue
- Rejects tidy resolutions — prefers ambiguity

The more you write,
the better Koto knows your voice.

It distills what makes you, you.

As you write, Koto builds your voice profile—observations about your patterns, your tendencies, your style. Offbeat protagonists or conventional heroes? Sparse action lines or dense? Hard cuts or slow dissolves?

It’s yours to read, edit, and override.

VOICE.md
Scenes tend to end abruptly, often mid-dialogue.
Action lines are visual and sparse — describes
what the camera sees, not internal states.
Dialogue runs short. Characters deflect rather
than confront directly. Tone balances dry humor
with genuine vulnerability.

It learns what you don’t want.

When a suggestion doesn’t fit your project, Koto notices. Over time it stops reaching for the obvious and pushes toward the specific—the choices only you would make.

The scene ends too neatly. Maybe Grace just walks out — no explanation.
Grace could pull Helen aside after the fight — tell her she's proud of her. A quiet moment between them.
Got it. I'll keep Grace's sentiment underneath, not on the surface.

A writers’ room that’s always open.

Every writer gets stuck. You know the feeling—staring at a scene that isn’t working, knowing something’s off but not what. Koto can help.

/stuck The Pearl River Bakery scene isn’t landing. Helen has just figured out ICE is planning something but the scene ends flat.

Koto

She’s Already Late

Helen pieces it together and realizes the plan has already started. Something she dismissed a week ago — a car, a face at the wrong window — was the beginning. She’s not ahead of this. She’s catching up.

There’s a Leak

The plan is too specific. ICE knows too much about the bakery, the schedule, the women. Helen looks around the table at the people she's protected for thirty years and, for the first time, isn't sure.

...

/stuck — 5 directions. You pick one, none, or something in between.

You

Give me 15 specific external goals for Grace in episode one.

Koto

1. Get the egg tarts out of the oven before Peggy notices she used the wrong flour 

2. Find out which ICE vehicle has been parked on Las Tunas for three days 

3. Return the cleaver she borrowed from the church kitchen 

4. Avoid Helen until after the mahjong game 

5. Make sure Danny doesn’t see her at the 99 Ranch 

...

Specific, not generic. Koto knows your world.

You

/notes

Koto

The episodes move well on the surface, but the central engine is still unclear: what does Helen stand to lose? She’s competent, unflappable, always right — which means there’s no cost to any of it yet. The comedy lands, but the stakes don’t. Until we understand what failure would actually take from her, the threat driving the series won’t fully register.

———

— Ep. 1, pp. 4–7 The ICE threat is established visually but the community’s specific vulnerability isn’t. What exactly are they protecting, and who would be taken first?
— Ep. 2, p. 12 Grace’s decision to act alone contradicts what we’ve been shown about how the group operates. Needs a beat that earns it.
— Throughout Janet’s interiority is thin. We understand her function before we understand her.

/notes — A dramaturgical read. Macro first, then specific.

You

In the mahjong scene, what are some ways that Helen could realize that Janet is actually an imposter?

Koto

A few directions, depending on what you want the scene to do:

— Janet’s tiles are arranged perfectly — sorted by suit, by value, facing the same direction. Real Janet never organizes her tiles.
— Janet uses a phrase that’s technically right but generational — something a woman her age wouldn’t say.
— Peggy offers the orange slices. The real Janet always refuses fruit. This Janet takes one without thinking.

No command needed. Just ask.

Commands for the thinking writers do most.

/stuck 5 pitches when you don’t know what comes next.
/notes A dramaturgical read — macro story problems and specific observations.
/character Who is this person — what they want, what they need, what they haven’t admitted yet.
/what-if Explore what changes if your story takes a different turn.

Everything else, just ask.

A professional tool, not a toy.

Fountain formatting

Write in plain text. Scene headings, dialogue, transitions—formatted as you type. What you see is what you export.

PDF export

Industry-standard screenplay PDF. Courier 12pt, proper margins, correct page breaks. The script your agent expects.

Local files

Your scripts live in folders on your machine. No cloud, no databases, no lock-in. Your project is a directory.

Dark mode

The Sumi palette was designed for long writing sessions. Warm paper tones on dark backgrounds. Low eye strain, high focus.

Git-native

Plain text files. Version control, branching, diffs—they all just work. Never lose a draft.

Koto editor interface showing Joy Glock Club screenplay with outline, editor, and chat panel

Your words, your work.

We know the conversation around AI and writing. We’re writers too, and we take it seriously.

Your scripts stay on your machine.

Koto is local-first. Your files live in folders you control. There is no cloud sync, no server holding your work.

Your writing is never used to train AI.

Not ours. Not anyone else’s. Your scripts are yours.

Your voice profile is a file you can read and edit.

Everything Koto learns about your writing is stored as a readable and editable markdown file in your project folder. No black box. No hidden data. Open it in any text editor.

Joy Glock Club

Joy Glock Club

Four kung fu grandmothers run an underground railroad out of a mahjong parlor — and ICE just knocked on the wrong door.

We wrote this with Koto. Every word.

Start writing today.

Free

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  • Fountain formatting.
  • Local file management.
  • PDF export (with watermark).
  • A few brainstorm sessions to try the AI.
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Pro — $15/month

  • Everything in Free, plus:
  • Brainstorm sessions with generous monthly usage.
  • Voice learning that gets sharper as you write.
  • Clean PDF export (no watermark).
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What format are my scripts in?

Fountain—an open, plain-text screenplay format. Your scripts are .fountain files you can open in any text editor. No lock-in, no proprietary formats.

Does Koto work offline?

Yes. Everything except the chat works without an internet connection. Your scripts live on your machine—you can write anywhere.

Does the AI write my script?

No. Koto is a thinking tool. It helps you work through story problems, explore characters, and find your way into a scene. The writing is yours.

Is my work used to train AI models?

Never. Your scripts stay on your machine. They are never sent to any server for training purposes.

What about Final Draft / Highland / Fade In?

Koto is a different approach. If you love your current tool, keep using it. Koto is for writers who want a fast screenwriting editor with a brainstorming chat built in—and who care about owning their files as plain text.

Can I cancel anytime?

Yes. Your scripts are local files—they don’t disappear if you cancel. You can always use the free tier to edit and export.

What about Windows / Linux?

Mac-only at launch. Other platforms are on the roadmap.

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