Lull

I'd like to continue - I think that, well, back when we were on a lot more we considered an approach which was effectively....let's just establish all the characters we want/need and worry about other writers later because...at that point it was just the three of us, and you MRP, doing out of continuity stuff.

I think we've lost our Justice Society writer - give that he/she has deleted all their posts.

My main problem is time - I am at a major loss, and I keep going back to my issues, but time has passed and I am forgetful these days. I have to re-read through where I am, and then there is this genuine concern that I'll put out complete crap. Of course, crap is activity and activity is good for sites like this. We need new blood, I suppose?

So, just as a random thought, is it the DC Limit of the site that might be causing an issue? I don't want to throw it out there and confuse everything but...would it be fun/interesting to do a DC/Marvel Merger.

So, for example, MRP if you wanted to do a Canary thing in the 1950's, you can tie it to Invaders and Captain America and what not.

Chris could do Challengers of the Unknown mixed with Fantastic Four/Champions, etc?

I don't want to throw ideas out and around just because it seems like a "good idea" I just thought it might be a good revitalisation point? Who knows. I need to extract my finger and get on with Wonder Woman or Sentinels.

Another possibility is that we just do our own universes - and we all collaborate on a Multiversal Justice League or something?

Could I ask...What would stop you porting/retelling the Batman/Wildstorm stories over here?

You'd be free of the "issues" we all faced during the UltimateDC go-around last time. No DoB/Adrini to fuck about with everything, so, perhaps they might fit better into this world? A world where, actually, we don't need Batman/Flash/Green Lantern/Superman because we've got a different Trinity and a different setup. Perhaps we could just discuss ideas here and now? Like, if DC came to you and said "Hey, man, we've got a big stable of books and no continuity reference points at the moment...what would you want to do?" I mean...you could do Superman, if you wanted?

I've often thought about that sort of world - Personally, I'm a conceptual writer, and I think we all know that. Magic has always been something I am drawn to, but the other thing is Time. I'd love LOVE to write a time travel series or a heavily alien based series. Initially, I thought I might head down the road (before WW) of doing a kind of Time Travel story involving Superman, perhaps the Flash, to investigate what was happening in time. I'd pull in all our favourite characters, Rip Hunter, Booster, and the heroes would be based from an Island of Time, which was two hours, and the Time Waves were slowly eroding the Island, slowly and carefully reducing the amount of time they had to solve the issue of Time Travel and time Degradation; partially solved, they'd be released into the Time Stream and pop up randomly. Superman would no longer be the premier hero of the world, it would be Martian Manhunter, who lead a modern day legion made of aliens and Omega Men; the Legion itself would follow that time-honored tradition of dystopian future, and Rip Hunter would be working with the time masters to try and work out why time was so very, very wonky.

So...what would you do if DC asked you "What do you want to do, MRP?"

Fair enough - Always happy to discuss with you, mate.

buck C_Miller What do you guys think?

That's right, I am summoning you!

As far as Buck and Miller goes....OK? I've not spoken or heard from Chris in a while, so, I guess his Girlfriend is going well?

Oh, Tangent and Just Imagine are two of my favourite Elseworlds, because of that version reason. Taking a name and then turning it on its head is great fun! I think there's a lot of mileage to be had there - The Tangent Superman was a perfect example of what to do with that world, as was the Atom and the Metal Men, with a kind of "Team 7" approach.

(I was less enthused with the JISL Batman and Superman, but Aquaman, the Wonder Woman and the Green Lantern were fantastic)

I think we both know that I like the Ultimisation approach - not necessarily what DC has done with Nu52, but some elements of it. The modernisation (not necessarily Superman in Jeans and Boots, or Wonder Womans HORRENDOUS new costume) of certain characters is done well. Aquaman was made relevant again, Azzerello's Wonder Woman and Modern pantheon - those are things that appeal to me.

To be honest, we're at a position where you could almost do that. All that's established thus far is Sentinels, and Disaster - You could do any number of things with any number of characters. Our Trinity Could be Traci 13, Major Disaster A another, it could be anyone you wanted to do. Perhaps it's something that could be used and thought about in the structure of this site, or you know, not?

The holiday season has always been a bad time to try to get stuff done and posted for everyone on these things, and 2015 has been a bit of a wash, so my working mantra right now is:

New Year New Content.

That's what I am going to be working towards.

-M

I think it might be cool to do a Gardner Fox style JLA story but not limit it to just JLA characters-a typical Fox JLA story set up the conflict in chapter 1, then had a bunch of smaller chapters where one or two heroes teamed up to face part of the conflict,then the team reunited for the final chapter and resolution.

It might be fin to set that up, an intro chapter, then each of us taking one of the short chapters building toward the conclusion featuring a character of our choosing, then bringing them all together for a final chapter and resolution. Doesn't have to follow that exact model either, and it could even be a multi-time story where each chapter is in a different era withthe threat that persists or re-emerges.

Off the top of my head say something that first appears in the 40s with the Canary discovering/encountering it, and finishes in the contemporary world with Traci 13 facing it or some thing like that. Logistics could be a nightmare, new characters could or could not be allowed depending on how folks feel and people not coming through with chapters would kill the whole thing, so there it's a bit of a gambit to try the way things are. With the whole time travel/multi-dimensional stuff though it wouldn't need to affect long term story plans of writers if they chose not to.

My caveat though, is these special projects are tough to coordinate and agree on, especially when people are not producing stuff on a regular basis. They can take a while and get frustrating too, which would have the opposite effects that we are shooting for. And it cannot devolve into 1 person's stories and everyone else being delegated to their writer monkeys or it will drive people away rather than build up momentum for the site.

-M

I am typing very slowly one handed for a couple of days as I cut up a couple of fingers at work last night, nothing serious, just cuts in annoying places that make using the fingers difficult until they heal up in a day or two. I have some thought, but will save them until it doesn't take forever to type them out.

-M

Ok fingers have healed enough that it doesn't hurt to hit the keys on the keyboard with them.

A few things-Continuity. As I get older the more I think continuity is a bit of a fan wank. It should not be a goal. Tell the stories, figure out how they fit together (if they do afterwards). Continuity and shared universes were late developments in the Super-hero game and they actually never fit the DC universe all that well, because for the longest time DC publishing was a series of editorial fiefdoms each run by a different person with different visions of what makes a good story or how things should work. Marvel was slightly different in that it started much smaller and wall all under the editorial supervision of Stan, but even then the shared universe wasn't something rigid or the goal of stories, it was more of a happenstance until the second generation of writers who grew up as fans came in and started to impose stricter continuity on things (people like Roy Thomas for instance).

The only way a multi-author shared universe works is if you put someone in the role of gatekeeper-a and you have an agreed upon world Bible in place before word one of a story is written that everyone adheres to. Put the wrong person in the role as gatekeeper, and you get a nightmare environment to try to work in. The gatekeeper ideally is someone who is not writing themselves and not pursuing their own agenda, but one who is there to serve the needs of the other writers and make everything work. Essentially they are the line editor but not a writer. That doesn't happen on sites like this. There's no capable gatekeeper, there's no agreed upon universe Bible, and so chasing continuity is really a fool's errand in that situation. If you are having writers set the continuity without those in pace, it becomes disastrous as people's vision's contradict each other, conflicts emerge and there is no process to smooth it out and resolve them, so people get frustrated and leave, or one person's vision dominates and drives out everyone who is not like minded, and if that vision is too narrow or exclusive, there is no room for anyone to do anything really, and anyone new simply becomes a writer monkey to someone else's vision. If there is a predetermined Bible, at least someone coming in can make the knowledgeable decision of if they want to work in that environment and carve out a space within that. If you have a good group, it can work for a short time without the Bible/gatekeeper combo, but only so long as that good group remains intact and no one comes in and disrupts the groove, which, on a site like this, never really happens.

When Jack started his original fiction site, I thought we were making strides towards creating that universe Bible and setting a foundation for things to move forward, but then things fizzled, so even that is no guarantee.

All of which is my way of saying that I think continuity at the outset is an albatross for sites like these.

Content, not continuity is the key to launching and surviving. Content will bring people in, content will get people to come back and content will interest people in contributing. Once you have content, then you can start building something, but without it, it's just dead space and hopeless aspirations.

And I will be the first to admit, I have been terrible with getting content out there, so I am not pointing fingers at anyone but myself here.

The second thing is that content is not just story content. Community content is just as important. People can find content many places, they can post content many places, but if they find a place where they feel they are a part of something, then you have something. The shared universe concept I think is a symptom of that. People want to belong to something bigger, so by making the story content part of something bigger it fills that need, but creates all the other problems I mentioned before, sort of unintended consequences. There are other ways to build that community.

Some of that can come form a common interest-in our case comics, though to be honest I think a lot of folks at these sites we have done are less fans of comics and more fans of the super-hero genre itself in whatever format (comics, video games, movies, tv etc.). However, you need a larger pool of folks to build community this way, so it is not something that will happen at first, but can start small and grow.

One common interest though is the desire to wrte/create, and perhaps even to collaborate. I was always a proponent of having some kind of writer's room thread or forum where people can talk through the writing challenges, collaborate, troubleshoot, etc. and a lot of the conversations I have had with site members outside the boards themselves often consisted of those things. Helping break ideas down into story, working on beats, figuring out what is working or not working etc. The feedback forum for stories works that way at times, however the challenge here is to find people who are willing to hear criticism and work at the craft. Some people simple cannot accept criticism. I always find it interesting when I read interviews with working writers how they interact with each other and lean on each other when they are creating things. Kelly Sue DeConnick talks to Warren Ellis, Bendis talks to Oeming, Fraction checks in with Brubaker, Brubaker calls someone else, etc. all of them with the common goal of producing the best stories possible, and not being thin-skinned or letting ego get in the way of craft. They are consummate professionals who know their way around a story and are skilled storytellers, yet they are always seeking to get better. It's refreshing and inspiring to someone who aspires to be a storyteller and that kind of creator interaction is something I really look for when I participate in sites like this, and I have found a few folks who are like-minded, but far too often I find folks who think they know it all and their stories cannot be improved and that no ones else has anything insightful to offer to them, and so they offer nothing to the writer community through their participation. I have some strengths as a writer, I have many, many more weaknesses and I am trying to challenge myself to make those better, but I cannot get better if I am not honest with myself about what I am putting out there. Sometimes I find a lot of people who want to write aren't honest with themselves about what they are putting out there, and aren't truly confident enough in their ability to withstand honest appraisals and input-the defense mechanism is to shut out or shout down any criticism. If you can build the kind of craft dialogue and writer's room collaboration-you can fill that sense of belonging that a community needs.

So, I haven't said anything here I haven't said in various places before, but I wanted to get it all together in one place and in one coherent statement.

So what does it all mean-if we are to move forward we need three things
1) more content
2) more conversation
3) more collaboration

all of which will hopefully lead to a start on a community that we all hoped for when we came to the place.

So I think hawksmoor and I are both working on content for the new year-which is cool.

I am open to collaboration or at least kibitzing on stories or ideas to help both myself and other writers if they are interested.

We are having conversations, but ultimately there is a limit to how much can be accomplished by 2-3 people, so we will need to get more on board at some point, but we need to set something in motion for people to get on board with.

Let's see what we can do I guess. Not everyone may be in a position to create content, but hopefully they can collaborate/kibitz or at least participate in the conversations. We have to start somewhere though, so it might as well be here.

If you have something to write, write it, don't worry about claims, deadlines, or continuity for now. Just do it.


-M

I think continuity should be a happy circumstance. If we find points to build from cool, if not cool too. Let's start with, there's a multiverse out there with some touchstones between them. If people want to collaborate on one particular world right now, go for it. I am just going to tell the stories I want to tell for now. If something comes up I want to jump in on, great, if not, well, at least there will be interesting stuff to read.

As for criticism, I think a lot of people don't understand the process of writing and mistake a first draft for a final product. There's drafts and revisions and leaving stuff on the cutting room floor and smoothing out rough spots and all sorts of things that have to happen before that initial ejaculation of words onto the page is made into something to be put out there for consumption. You're not done when you first write the final word, that's when the work actually just begins. Again, it goes back to the comment I got form an editor-a lot of people want to have written, few want to actually do the work of writing. And writing is work, make no mistake about it. It can be pleasurable of course, but it's still work.

-M

Captain Comet, nice choice. if I remember correctly, and you may very well be going your own route, he was like a Rocketeer type character in Tangent?


Are you thinking that your Shadow Cabinet/Canary/Men of War stuff would follow the Tangent route, or a kind of amalgamation of all of it?

You have a lot of different thoughts, themes, and titles ramming and rattling around in your head there, with Hub City and Weird Worlds occupying mental real-estate as well. I'd say, and this is hilariously hypocritical considering it's coming from me, maybe pick an easier one and work with a solo?

Wow, you write when you drive? I'm all for being prepared, but I'm not sure I can condone that behaviour!

Yeah, I do love Ellis and I do really enjoy his newsletter. It makes the Monday 5.37am train a little bit more bearable when I have that little package to read. I think a discussion relating to how we write, and how we do things might be good, and it might make it easier for me to actually write as well.

I think, once I get a moment, I'm going to write a few short stories just to get myself properly into the mental space for writing, and then back into WW and Sentinels. Perhaps something set in that world with characters I already have. Really, the challenge I set myself normally is "how can I modernise said character". It doesn't always work - Like, I enjoyed the concept that DC employed with say, Klarion, but the writing and execution was terrible. How do I learn from that?

Similarly, with Katana. The idea was solid, the execution was terrible. There are things I can learn from that - I also have an active Ultimate DC file, where I add in information/ideas for Ultimising characters. Sometimes it is a concept, other times a storyline idea, or a background. I have got concepts for my version of an Ultimate Universe that I keep toying with putting up, but not sure if I should...