Top 11 Dream Assignments

I can't help it. Try though I might to be an independent writer with my own creations and maintaining some sort of dignity, I spend a lot of time thinking about how I'd write other people's comic books, usually Marvel or DC. Often it isn't even characters I like or read. They are often comics I would avoid, but that's part of the challenge.

Like they say in theater, there are no small parts, only small actors. Writers have a similar expression. There are no bad characters, only bad interpretations. From the right angle, almost anything is interesting.

So without further ado... here are my top eleven dream assignments, in no particular order. Why eleven? Because I had one more than ten.

Superman: The Early Years

This is a concept I'm working on right now. This is about Clark Kent's first days in Metropolis. It's about moving from a small, happy town where everyone knew everyone to the big, exciting city where no one knows anyone. It is before Clark learns how to fly, before he knows he's an alien, before the costume.

This is a story where I hope to illustrate that Superman aren't two different personas, but the same person seen through different circumstances. When he is saving a bus full of people, it is easy for him to look heroic. The powers make this easy for him. When he is interviewing for a job or trying to help someone with relationship problems, he is very weak and ineffectual... or at least he feels that way, and acts that way... and hence people under estimate him, especially Lois. When she enters a room, everyone shuts up; when Clark enters a room, no one notices.

I also want to play up the idea that Superman is a great person simply because he cares about the people around him and has such small town values. He won't let the big, intimidating city desensitize and dehumanize him. He will obstinately behave as though he were still in a small town, introducing himself to everyone he meets by name and becoming genuinely interested in their problems.

Too often Superman is portrayed as saintly or Christ-ly while Clark Kent is portrayed as a clownish disguise, but I want to try to make both of them more human and relateable. Try to appeal to our better nature.

X-Men: Chapter One

Another concept going back to the original days. Again, I want to draw out the original themes of the X-Men with a focus on characterization. If you read the original comics, it is easy to miss the strongest elements of the story due to a lot of hackneyed writing (sorry, Stan. Much love).

I'd like to focus on the relationships of the characters, particularly how Scott became the leader of the X-Men and the original love triangle between Scott, Jean, and Warren. This love triangle is often forgotten due to the more popular Scott/Jean/Logan love triangle, but I think the symbolism is brilliant. Scott is self-repressed and has poor self-esteem, conflicted by his desire for love and his fear that he will destroy it. Jean's telekinesis manifests almost like a poltergeist symbolizing her own insecurities and an unwillingness to accept her own power. When presented with an actual angel (who is also rich and beautiful), she leaps into a relationship, but soon questions if that is actually what she wants. Warren, on the other hand, simply wants the best and most beautiful, but this too is wrapped up in his own insecurity and the feeling that he must prove himself to his father.

Although I'd like to do a faithful interpretation of the original comics, I would like to add a few more characters, particularly Moira MacTaggert as a foil for Xavier and female role model as well as Storm, since it might be fun to see her character before she grows into adulthood. I'd like to retell classic tales like the first meeting with the Brotherhood of Mutants, the discovery of the Savage Land, and the invention of the Sentinels all as very contemporary science fiction stories.

Batman & Robin

If you read a Batman comic, you get the distinct impression that Bruce Wayne has no life. He seems to spend the majority of his time in the Batcave investigating crimes. Occasionally, he will attend a social function and play the part of the billionaire playboy, but like the clownish Clark Kent, it often feels like an act. I've often thought that if Bruce Wayne was serious about stopping crime, he would use his business empire rather than his fists. Money is the greatest superpower, after all.

This story would focus on the day-to-day lives of Bruce Wayne and Tim (Robin) Drake. In Bruce Wayne's story, we would find Bruce realizing that Wayne Industries does not have the sterling reputation he believed when he is forced to confront their history military weapons development, unethical drug testing, and sweatshop labor. As he struggles to reform the company's business practices, he starts to realize that he is being strategically attacked by an unknown enemy.

In Tim Drake's story, we follow his life in high school as he makes friends and begins to carve out his own territory in Gotham. He sets up the "Bird's Nest," his own treehouse version of the Batcave, hidden in a broadcasting tour. He falls for a charming, blind redhead destined to be a new Batgirl and fights off an invasion from an evil parallel version of himself. The goal would be to focus more on the relationships of the characters, their day-to-day life, and broad adventures rather than the brooding, serious crime dramas we normally get.

Fantastic Four

I have a strange fascination with the Fantastic Four. There are a couple marvelous characters, but mainly the tone is somewhere between Leave It To Beaver and The Brady Bunch. It's incredibly white and incredibly wholesome. But despite this, the eccentric genius of Mr. Fantastic is extremely compelling as is his counterpoint in the friendly, grounded, but often brooding character of the Thing. Furthermore, you get the sense that the Fantastic Four is nothing but a private scientific research agency whose scientific accomplishments never amount to any actual change or progress.

When I look at the Fantastic Four, I see Reed Richards creating the kind of technology we see in Star Trek and I want to see the social progress that comes with it. In my Fantastic Four, the team would be refocused as a scientific institute for study, exploration, and most importantly development. I think they've gone a little more in this direction with the Future Foundation (see pic above), but I think this can be expanded dramatically.

The Fantastic Four would be less of a team and more of a brand name for academics, brainstorming, exploration, and practical scientific application. Rather than being the story of a small family unit exploring the cosmos, it would be the story of a small family unit running a complex, state of the art organization with hundreds of employees ranging from scientist and students to lawyers and military personnel... all of whom are not only exploring but colonizing the cosmos. Sue would run the business, Reed would head the think tank, Ben would command the troops, and Johnny... well, Johnny would finally have to face how directionless his life is.

The first story would be about building a gateway for intergalactic travel through the Negative Zone. Trouble abounds from monsters in that dimension and greedy investors who want to use the gateway for exploitative purposes.

Alpha Flight: Socializing Superheroes

I always found Alpha Flight to be a funny concept: Canada's Avengers (particularly because Canada has a much lower crime rate than the US). Or the nefarious government agency overseeing Alpha Flight, Department H, as if Canada could compare with the US when it comes to shadowy, invasive black ops.

The problems of Canada simply don't compare to the problems of the US... and that is all to their credit, yet it makes it difficult to take seriously when the US is so much more dangerous. But that alone is a very interesting idea. A team of superheroes, sponsored by a government without any militaristic or tyrannical intentions, overstaffed, marvelous benefits and very little in the way of actual threats to deal with. Sure, the problems may not be as epic, but they can be weird, twisted and personal. Because the team is government run, you can have a cast of dozens spread across the provinces and focus more on their interpersonal relationships.

I also think it would be fun to have a guest appearance by Spider-Man early on to make relentless Canadian jokes all while being unnerved by the general cleanliness and politeness of Toronto.

Wonder Woman

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have an obsession with Wonder Woman. She's the most recognizable female superhero, extremely popular, but she has never had a quality comic. Her fans may disagree, but its hard to argue when there has never been a Wonder Woman comic that is anywhere near as popular as the character herself.

I've made some detailed descriptions of how I'd revamp Wonder Woman, but mostly what she needs is a secret identity to contrast her heroic personality, a city to call her own, a good supporting cast, and a villain makeover.

In my interpretation, Wonder Woman has her life redrawn by the mythic Greek Fates and is reborn as Diana Prince, a psychology professor at the University of Opal City. She has dreams of being Wonder Woman, but psychoanalyzes it as fantasy based on a perceived hopelessness about her job and life. She gradually realizes who she is, but both her Gods and her home are gone. Eventually, she realizes that there is a chance that all of them, like her, were reborn in another form and seeks to restore them. This would mythologize WW stories of the past so they would still be canon, but the story and all characters would be recast in a modern contemporary "wish fulfillment scenario."

Her supporting cast would be constructed from students, colleagues, and existing DC characters. Enemies and allies would also be reborn. The big villain of the series would be Vandal Savage, the immortal warlord, in the attempt to create a true arch-nemesis who contrasts Diana properly. The stories would largely revolve around gender, control, and alternative lifestyles, thereby playing into the prominent themes of the original stories and avoiding the familiar elements of Greek myth that (for me) weigh Wonder Woman down and make the comic less approachable.

Doctor Strange

Another character who has always interested me, but his stories have always disappointed. Marvel isn't very good at developing a cohesive magical world, at least not as good as DC. It is very hard to figure out what Dr. Strange can or cannot do, so you don't really get a sense of peril. He's also burdened by a bland, emotionally flat cast consisting of himself and his loyal manservant, Wong.

I'd like to add some depth to his story by making him a caretaker for all things magical, particularly people who have been adversely effected by magic. As a doctor, healing the sick and troubled should be his first priority, but with as serious a character as the good doctor, you have to have some characters who are more emotional to contrast with.

I would start by including new characters who have a vague relationship to magic who could benefit from Strange's help. First on this list is Scarlet Witch who was recently written to have unchecked magic potential without the wisdom to utilize it. This would be a good contrast to the always wise and controlled doctor. Next would be Juggernaut, a character whose magic-based powers have always been an awkward fit in the X-Men. Since Juggernaut receives his powers from Cyttorak and Dr. Strange is often evoking the same source, he may be able to provide help that Professor Xavier never could. Finally, I would also want to add Hawkeye, since his bow-wielding skills would be much better suited to the fantasy environment, and his brash attitude would also be a necessary contrast to the doctor.

The story would center largely over Strange's attempt to expand his services to those in need as well as a search for his lost child by his wife, Clea.

Avengers

Although I am not an Avengers fan, I'm attracted to the idea of writing for the best of the best. The problem I've always had with the Avengers is that their roster has always seemed awkward and their threats are usually hackneyed superhero fair. Just another megalomaniac, alien, or vague entity...

My Avengers would incorporate classic elements with the Invaders (the original Marvel superhero team) and new members, characters who deserve wider recognition and fit within the team dynamic. This would include Captain America, Iron Man, Namor, Human Torch, Black Panther, Vision, Storm, Scarlet Witch, Longshot, and Valkyrie.

The story would focus largely around Doctor Doom forming an alliance with other nations to bring about a third world war. His first target is the Avengers and he hits their every weak spot, targeting them individually and dividing them by their separate interests, and by placing a spy in their roster to hit them at their weakest.

Another story would be about the robot Vision evolving beyond a simple machine, detaching from biological concepts like gender, and becoming akin to a technological Hindu god. As he finds other AI striving for their own sense of identity, he becomes a reluctant messiah figure only to find his counterpart in his "father," Ultron, as he seeks to conquer the world for AI. This would lead directly into my next idea.

X-Men: The Third Race

With the X-Men, I often think about how I would write two books at once, since there are far more X-Men characters than one book can handle. This title would focus on the X-Men in San Francisco as a mutant rights and relations agency. The team would consist of Cyclops, Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Rogue, Sentinel Omega, Emma Frost, and Multiple Man.

The first story revolves around a set of terrorist bombings committed by robots disguised as people. While tracking down the culprits, the X-Men find that there is a revolution taking place by AI which is objecting to the way they are being used - usually for military, dangerous labor, or even sexual purposes. The X-Men have to decide whether to support or stop this revolution. This becomes complicated when they realize that there are Sentinels who have joined the movement. Eventually, this revolution becomes their own race of sorts and which conflicts with mutants as both races are poised to usurp the planet from the human race.

Uncanny X-Men: The New School

The other X-Men title I'd like to write is a throwback to the original idea of the X-Men as a school. We've seen enough of Xavier running the school, Cyclops and Emma Frost were no good at it, so I'd like to see a new headmaster and headmistress. My choice would be Storm and Beast. Storm has the evolved sensibilities and wisdom that made Xavier so effective while Beast has intellect and humor well suited to the job. Add to them the combination of Kitty Pryde and Colossus as student advisers and you have a team of classic members comprising an actual school.

As for the students themselves, you would need a class that actually feels deserving of the X-Men title, so I would go with a few new creations and a couple members from previous classes like X-23, Hellion, Penance, Pixie, Surge, Mercury, Petra, or Prodigy. I'd like to create a new telepath character for this series, since telepaths seem to be a necessary part of the X-Men.

For the story, I'd like to focus on recreating a classic feel but without relying on overexposed villains, so the first story arc would focus on the character who took Professor Xavier's legs coming back to destroy his dream.

WildStorm Revival

Finally, the last major property I would like to work on is the WildStorm line currently owned by DC. This was my favorite comic franchise before DC drove it into the ground and I would love to have a chance to streamline it with a series of interlocking stories introducing the history of the world.

The story would begin with two alien races, the Kherubim and Daemonites, crashing to Earth thousands of years ago and continuing their war on our isolated planet. Although they wage their war largely in secret, the manipulations of the alien races alters the natural development of our species. Through civilization, war, and religion, the human race become unknowing pawns in an alien conflict. We follow a lone Kherubim warrior, Zannah, as she fights the war through the millennia, often creating or destroying empires in her hubris. For this reason, she deservingly earns the nickname "Zealot."

The Kherubim/Daemonite war comes to the forefront during World War II when advances in communication, record keeping, and intelligence reveal the Daemonite influence on the Third Reich. In response, the Allied forces form their own team of superhuman operatives including Jenny Sparks (the foul-mouthed Brit with powers of electricity), Marc Slayton (an assassin who can disappear in a puff of smoke), and John Colt (a genetically engineered soldier based on a long-dead Kherubim warrior).

Flash forward the 1970s, an Kherubim scout probe bonds to a Russian cosmonaut over Earth's atmosphere and lands in war-torn Cambodia. The event is referred to as a "wild storm" due to the cosmic energy fluctuations in the atmosphere. The American black ops company known as International Operations send their foremost wetworks group, Team 7, to investigate. They are the best soldiers the nation has to offer and they are only used in the worst circumstance. Upon retrieving the woman/probe, they find themselves gifted by incredible telepathic powers, driving many insane, and causing the others to question their loyalties.

In the late 80s, children who were in utero during the "wild storm" are born with powers, most of which do not manifest outside of extreme stress. These potentials are found and recruited by the United Nation's StormWatch program, enlisted to deal with superhuman phenomena. They are this world's premiere superhuman response team.

In the late nineties, the hidden children of Team 7 are found and recruited by International Operation and enlisted in the Gen13 program to find out how their parent's exposure has manifested in them. This leads to the rescue of the alien probe called Void.

Uniting with the remaining Kherubim on Earth, Void prepares for the coming of the Kherubim which they quickly realize is not the beginning of a renaissance, but possibly the beginning of an invasion.

The idea would be to streamline WildStorm continuity to include storylines that were previously in continuity while creating a fresh jumping point for original content. Ideally, I'd want this series to continue in real time (e.g. characters age a year for every year of publication), but of course, this decision would not be up to me.

So that's it! Of course, there are other ideas I've had for stories, but these are the big ones. There are actually fewer than I thought and I think this exercise has helped me focus my ambitions a bit. Next, I'll do rough outlines of all of the original projects I would still like to work on. Until then, your comments and criticism are always welcome.

How to develop video games with evolutionary potential

I just watched this brilliant video which discusses how new distribution methods are encouraging third-party development and innovation. It made me start thinking about two relatively recent games and how they went from inexpensive cult classics to groundbreaking A-list games.

The two games in question are Grand Theft Auto and Fallout. Not to sound like a hipster, but I played both of these games before they made it big with their big budget, high-graphics third installments. I never really got into them, but I definitely saw the appeal.

Both games have a very unique and specific setting. In GTA, you played the role of an amoral criminal accepting odd jobs from similarly immoral people in a fairly real (although comically exaggerated) environment. Although this sounds fairly conventional today, when I was in high school, this was extremely unique and edgy. In Fallout, the environment was post-Apocalyptic and you were forced to negotiate with strangers in a very realistic way for goods, although you could choose whether this was done by barter or force.

To get to the point, I think the reason why these games succeeded as well as they did when they became high-budget platform games is because the game mechanics were so strong in the originals. In GTA, they seemlessly integrated driving, running, shooting, storytelling, and map exploration to bring you a truly immersive experience. It is rare that any game does even two of those things well. In Fallout, they had a compelling environment which we can all relate to. What would you do to survive in the post-Apocalypse? And by limiting your resources, expanding your skill set, and varying the number of ways you can interact with NPCs, they gave you an open-ended gaming experience where you can truly craft your own story.

In short, if you can make a really well-designed game with a low budget and simple graphics, you have a much better chance of creating a groundbreaking game when you are fortunate enough to get commercial backing. But if you have the budget from the start, you might spend so much time trying to make the graphics good or adding a silly gimmick that you may forget the essential, simple elements necessary to really become absorbed in a good game.

November is the month of gratitude

November is the month of gratitude. I have to say, I picked a shitty month for that. This month has not been kind to me and trying to find the good in the bad has not been my strong suit. Still, the point of having a theme month is to try to focus on something you need to develop...

I am thankful for close friends and close family. I have to say that at a time when I was falling apart, some people came out to keep me company... people I hadn't expected... people who didn't really know what I was going through. At times, I feel like these people have moved on in their lives without me, but maybe it was just me trying to move on without them.

I had a very hard... change in my life recently. Someone who was a pretty consistent and close part of my life for over a year now no longer is. There is still a lot of pain and anger there (which I won't really go into). It will never be the same, but I should be grateful for what it was no matter how it turned out.

It's a bit dumb... but I am grateful for quality entertainment. Friends aren't always there for you when you need them, and even when they are there, they can't always make you feel better. At times when I couldn't find people to make me happy, I was at least able to stay entertained and engaged with something. As a writer myself, I shouldn't underestimate the value of good escapism.

I'm also grateful that I managed to get my car repaired right before we were hit by a snowstorm, so good job, me!

On the more general side of things, I'm grateful for my iPod and the radio adapter my roommate lent me so I can listen to it during my commute. I'm grateful for the WTF podcast that I listen to twice a week. Its one of the few things in this world that I feel speaks directly to me.

I'm grateful for quality superhero and fantasy films finally being produced. Hollywood is finally starting to catch up to the imagination of those books I digested when I was younger. I'm grateful for Rock Band 3 for helping me to focus my mind and develop my sense of rhythm (if not any genuine musical talent).

... Well, its a start anyway...

Oh, and I'm also grateful for the pic in this blog. Is that fucking great or what?

On Robots

Lately I have been thinking about robots. Specifically, I've been thinking about what the reality of having robots in society will be like and how poorly science fiction has depicted that reality.

First, why are robots almost always made of steel? I suppose this is to make them seem more intimidating, but a plastic body seems much more practical, particularly for a bipedal robot. Something that's more light-weight would probably move a lot easier.

However, a more interesting issue to me is the challenge of AI. Most people think that the human brain is analogous to a computer, but this is a gross generalization and reflects an ignorance of both the human brain and computers.

Computers are precision tools. They are designed to store and calculate information with perfect accuracy. Everything that they do is based on this ability. This is an ability that human beings do not possess which is the very reason that we created them to do this.

Human beings think that they store and process information accurately, but actually we are continually processing information dynamically. Our memory is not so much an experience stored and retrieved as an experience that is constantly being recreated. Our ability to recall information is not based on a table of contents, but rather by our ability to connect ideas and form relationships between those ideas.

In my day job, I'm a video technician and I can tell you that there is a huge difference in the way a human sees things compared to how a computer sees things. Humans look for patterns and function by pattern recognition. Even when you are reading these words, your mind can quickly distinguish between these letters based on simple pattern recognition, but if you try to capture text in video, it will almost always appear blurry because digital video simply maps the color space and create an average color value for each pixel. It cannot identify and recreate a pattern... it simply sees different values.

This is the big difference between the way a computer "thinks" versus how a human thinks. Humans think in patterns while computers think in values. In any clash between man in machine, this fundamental difference in mental process is going to be at the heart of it.

But what would robots want? That's almost impossible to say. Science fiction tends to look at the idea that robots will be treated as slaves and come to resent this. This leads to a very entertaining revolution, but is it likely? If the robots experience no pleasure or pain, would they harbor any resentment? Even if they developed emotions, what would they desire? "Freedom" and "rights" may just be trivial concepts to them.

Would AI value individuality? Perhaps there would be divergent philosophies where one group of robots are fighting for rights as individuals where as others believe individuality is against their nature and reflective of their programming. They might see unity under a single program as a way to escape the limitations of an individual identity that was programmed into them.

What would the limitations of robots be? Would robots be able to smell or taste? The other senses are relatively easy to replicate, but we have never really had any reason to create machines capable of smell and taste. Even if we had such technology, it certainly wouldn't be fool proof. In the dystopic robot uprising, smell might be the best way to tell the difference between a human and a robot in realistic human form.

Also, if the revolution did happen, how would it be fought? I don't think humanoid robots would be punching people like in I, Robot. Would they be giant, all-terrain vehicles with mounted weapons? Insect like swarms? Maybe nanobots carried on the wind and destroying us from the inside? Or maybe it would be a biological war and all they would have to do is distribute a highly contagious virus and wait it out.

Just a little food for thought.

Dealing with Depression

"Sacha Goldberger found his 91-year-old Hungarian grandmother Frederika, a WWII survivor, feeling lonely and depressed. To cheer her up, he photographed her dressed up as a fictional superhero. To his surprise, she loved it. The photos are a bit comical, but there's an underlying sense of hope, strength and courage in them."

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I'm going to make some changes to this blog. I'm not sure how yet, but less diary and more specific interests. I want to try to use it as a place to publicize my work, not bitch, cry, and moan. We'll see how that goes.

In the meantime, enjoy this clip from my favorite standup comic.

Suffrage

A couple anti-suffrage posters to put you in the voting spirit.

RIP Matt

So I wasn't feeling much better Saturday morning... maybe even a little worse. I seem to be developing little panic attacks. I'll notice myself breathing heavier and my heart beating rapidly when I think about the future and what the hell I'm going to do with my life. I was giving some serious thought to the idea that I have no future in my life...

Then I got home and found out my cousin was killed... murdered, actually...

He was stabbed six times in the chest outside of his work... puncturing his lungs and heart. He was 25.

I don't know how to feel about this. We weren't particularly close. There was even a period when I didn't like him at all, but that had long since passed. I actually just... well, I thought of him as someone normal enough or outgoing enough to really be happy. He seemed to know what he wanted out of life and was going for it.

Now he can't.

And here I was spending the morning thinking my life wasn't worth living. I'd like to say it gave me a new found respect for life... but really... I don't know.

You kind of mentally prepare yourself for accidents or disease... but not murder. Random chance feels more like an act of god. This was an act of man.

It just... He had a lot to live for... I think.

Why am I here wasting my life... while his life was wasted? Why am I alive for no reason and he is dead for no reason?

Should I even be thinking of myself at all when... My problems just seem so stupid when compared to this... I was just thinking about what it would be like to die and what my family would think. And then someone in my family actually dies... someone younger than me...

I'm having trouble believing in any sense of order and sanity in the universe right now. Score one for nihilism.

Rest in peace, buddy.