So would you say that Turner's history helped him secure that credit? Considering everything we hear and read, writing something on spec without first acquiring the rights is a very stupid move. Does Turner get that credit if he doesn't also have "The Longest Yard" and "Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning" under his name?

I'm actually curious to hear your thoughts on that. It sounds like I'm being condescending, but I'm really not.

Carlos, I covered some of the background of UITA here. While Turner has a number of credits beginning in 2005 and has a very active writing career nowadays (he sold at least 3 pitches in the last year or so that I know of), back when he found Kirn's book around 2001, he had yet to really establish himself in the industry (the first project I can find he was involved in was an uncredited production polish of Aeon Flux in 2005). That probably explained why he wrote it on spec.

The credit determination is made by the WGA and has nothing to do with subsequent credits on any other projects. The credits on any project are determined on the merits of the written material on that project. Period. Since I have served as a credit arbiter many times, I have a pretty good grasp on that process. The reason Turner received credit is probably quite simple: The arbiters found that what he contributed in adapting Kirn's book in the way of plot, characterizations, scenes and scene sequences, dialogue, and so forth met the threshold of what was in the final script to merit shared credit.

The key there is that anything Reitman wrote that had any seeming reliance on Turner's script is presumed to have been used by Reitman, even if he claims otherwise. Even those choices Turner made of what material to include in the script from Kirn's novel would be credited to Turner, not Reitman.

Thank you for that explanation, Scott.