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Post by buck on Jul 16, 2015 22:01:27 GMT -5
Sorry everybody been buried since I started a new job last week not sure when I will be able to get an update done. I will keep everyone updated though.
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Post by The MRP! on Aug 11, 2015 2:53:07 GMT -5
I am stuck in a position where I feel a desire/need to write something, but I can't figure out what, and none of what I had in mind for Weird Worlds is working for me currently, so I am stuck in neutral. Nothing DC is resonating with me currently (the only thing that is even remotely pulling me DC way is to go totally Just Imagine Stan Lee Creating the DCU or the Tangent projects where I just use a name and totally reimagine what the character is) but I am not sure I want to go that route and if I did I would likely just create something new altogether. Gah, been banging my head (figuratively) for a few weeks now getting nowhere at all. So I am not sure what to do or how to proceed. I have been in a creative nowhereland for most of 2015, but the past few weeks is the first time all year I have really felt a pull to be writing something and not trying to force myself to write. The way 2014 ended left me in a deep creative funk and I still haven't really clawed my way out of it yet. I am hoping the inkling to write the last few weeks is the start of my emerging from it, but I don't really know where it's going to go, if it's going to go anywhere.
-M
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Post by hawksmoor on Aug 15, 2015 23:13:52 GMT -5
Not wanting to throw fuel into the fire here but have you ever thought that perhaps you're more of a Marvel guy, in the writing stakes, than you are a DC chap? Just curious. Also,forgive my absence, I'm on Holiday in Chicago (can't sleep tonight) but will be back in the UK Wednesday
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Post by The MRP! on Aug 15, 2015 23:48:14 GMT -5
Not wanting to throw fuel into the fire here but have you ever thought that perhaps you're more of a Marvel guy, in the writing stakes, than you are a DC chap? Just curious. Also,forgive my absence, I'm on Holiday in Chicago (can't sleep tonight) but will be back in the UK Wednesday The longest runs I have ever done on a fan fic were for the original UDC, writing the Marvel fan fic stuff never clicked for me much either (I'm more attached to the history of Marvel as I was a Marvel Zombie growing up, so I am much more reluctant to vary too far from it. I also think the DC heroes are more iconic and better able to withstand variant interpretations-Batman is Batman and Bruce Wayne can be many things and you still have Batman, but stray too far from what Peter Parker is and you lose Spider-Man kind of thing, making much harder in my view to do fan fic that isn't at least in the mode of what Marvel already is). So I don't think the funk is a DC vs. Marvel thing. Marvel is not interesting me much in terms of writing now either. I have been in an overall creative funk since December as this winter was one gut punch after another irl and it took me out of the loop and sapped any motivation to write or draw at all. I tried to force myself back into it to get Weird Worlds going, but nothing I did there was catching me enough to drag me out of the funk I have been in. Like I said, recently the feeling of wanting to write something is the first time I have felt that in about 9 months but nothing is calling me enough to commit to it on anything more than a spare thought or two as to how I might approach something or what I might like to tackle. A lot of it is overcoming inertia and just plain being out of practice now, having to break bad habits and get back to a writing routine, but while the stray desire is there, the commitment needed to do it hasn't manifested itself yet. Part of it was that I always felt I was working towards something, each thing I wrote was one more step towards the overall goal, but lately I have just been feeling too old to keep playing the young man's game of working toward's that goal. The feeling set in that I was never going to get there. That's part of the funk, and one I still haven't been fully able to shake. Working towards it was always the thing that drove me, that keep me motivated to write no matter what I was writing. It hasn't been there of late, and nothing Marvel or DC has really motivated me to pursue just for fun's sake, so I am not sure. I am at a bit of a crossroads really with the writing, and I am just not sure which road I will take, not just about what to write, but if to write. I think the desire to write recently is part of my not wanting to give up the ghost just yet, but I the lack of actual follow through may be a sign I may already have despite that desire. It's been a few weks of soul searching and I haven't really reached any conclusions yet. -M |
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Post by hawksmoor on Aug 23, 2015 15:17:45 GMT -5
Fair enough, for whatever reason I always viewed you as more of a Marvel guy.
I don't really think that storytelling is a young man's game, or whatever. Understandably, if you're putting out monthly sections, that might be a bit tough, but...nobody here is doing that. I'm in a bit of a funk as well, and I want to claw my way out of it so that I can get back to Wonder Woman and Sentinels. I think I might just try and write something out of "Continuity" as it were, just to get myself back into the frame.
I'm sure we can pull ourselves out of our mutual funks,
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Post by hawksmoor on Aug 30, 2015 2:03:09 GMT -5
Sorry to double post,
I've been faffing around something rotten, so I am going to return to writing immediately (this second) and try and get a second issue of Wonder Woman out.
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Post by The MRP! on Aug 31, 2015 15:53:37 GMT -5
Kicking the tires on an idea for something. Not sure yet. It's a step away from Weird Worlds if I do it, but might do is an Elseworlds because it doesn't lend itself well to claims list.
My wife is on vacation this week and we are rearranging everything in the house (joy) so time to think things over as I move furniture, letting things stew and ferment to see if it is something I can do or not.
-M
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Post by hawksmoor on Sept 16, 2015 14:49:57 GMT -5
Be interested to hear your idea, MRP. Whatever that is...if you want to discuss it through with someone? More than happy to do so.
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 17, 2015 22:03:24 GMT -5
Be interested to hear your idea, MRP. Whatever that is...if you want to discuss it through with someone? More than happy to do so. I just finished getting the revamp of the office/studio space done and still have some finalizing on things on the rest of the house, but I actually have a usable work space again, so hopefully I can start actually getting some work done on things. We'll see. Everything has pretty much been on back burner as I have done a bunch of house projects over the last few weeks to get to this point. I am hoping to get some ass in chair time to start committing those floating ideas to paper and start working on turning them into something that I can talk about and start seeing what kind of structure I can give to things, whether they would be shared sandbox or free floating Elseworlds type stuff. Part of what I need to do is get caught up reading on what is in the sandbox to see if the ideas I have can or should fit into that. We'll see. Right now everything is broad strokes and not even detailed enough to get into characters or plot. Mostly just thoughts about genre and theme with possibilities of plot and characters hinted at. So not at a point where I am ready to articulate the ideas to anyone else just yet, but I appreciate the offer and will keep it in mind iof/when I get to that point. -M |
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 18, 2015 2:06:26 GMT -5
Ok so I sat down and just typed up the various thoughts running around in my head to give you a glimpse of what is going on...the thing I was kicking the tires on when I posted before was Men of War (see below) but the time to think broadened the scope of the idea, but also made it wildly unmanageable, so I present to you the ramblings of a madman....
The Shadow Cabinet in broad strokes...
-M
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Post by hawksmoor on Sept 19, 2015 10:19:52 GMT -5
I like it, I really do. The idea of secret histories is something you've always been interested in and worked into your stories (through Authority, Planetary, and your aborted Allstar Marvel stuff). Fringes of DC with Milestone and Wildstorm combined are perfect. There are elements of Wildstorm I always thought would benefit from being a larger part of the Nu52 world, but, in the sense of "don't mess with it, but port some suitable characters from DCU to Wildstorm, not the other way around".
The sort of "Cold War" era feel is great as well, and there are some fun characters in there. I like Tao as the Unseen Hand, personally. I think that fits his MO more than Vandal. He always struck me as, despite being a great manipulator, the sort of chap who's in there and involved in the fight, regardless of his position in the army - but it's your story. You do what you like!
Seriously, I'd love to see this, and read it, and if you want...discuss it?
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 20, 2015 10:00:10 GMT -5
I am still playing with the ideas, and if I do move on it, it will be sometime before I would post it, as I would want a handful of issues/stories in the can before I posted the first and would want to actually be a bit meticulous in doing drafts, edits and revisions before I post anything. So, while I am leaning towards doing something with this, I am not sure what just yet and even if I decide to move forward, it's going to be a slow process, going for something I am satisfied with in terms of quality rather than just getting something out there to have something out there, which (along with some other factors) probably means this needs to be an Elseworlds rather than sandbox thing-but then Weird Worlds worked out so well I am not sure I want to go that route either. There's a balance I need to find that has been elusive this past year or more.
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 22, 2015 4:30:56 GMT -5
To not clutter up this thread, I started a new thread to discuss ideas for the Shadow Cabinet.... here-M |
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 27, 2015 17:39:35 GMT -5
From Warren Ellis' weekly newsletter Orbital Operations...
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Sept 30, 2015 14:39:19 GMT -5
SO I finished taking the old comic script I was using to springboard Canary from and finished doing a beat breakdown to turn it into a prose work. Now I am working on fleshing out the dynamics of the scenes to make it work as a prose piece, figuring out what needs to be present in the script that was handled by visuals before so I can have a working story skeleton to start fleshing out as an actual script soon. Plus doing some research on the time period and setting to give the period piece the necessary verisimilitude it needs to function effectively.
-M
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Post by hawksmoor on Oct 2, 2015 15:17:10 GMT -5
Cool MRP! Glad to see you're getting stuck in an planned out. (I personally hate writing Period stuff, because I don't really like it. I'm much more of a speculative fiction chap)
I too have been writing and planning today. Wonder Woman #2 is partially written and #3 is planned, a bit. I need to mess about with something because I think I've boxed myself in, so I may need to claim additional characters or something, but I think I'll be alright. I just need a realm where peoples mental states are altered...
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Post by The MRP! on Oct 12, 2015 18:37:31 GMT -5
The ms for the Spooktacular is approaching 2000 words (which covers the original 3 pages of the 8 page comic script it started out as). My guess is the first draft will clock in about 5-6K words before edits and rewrites, but we'll see. About 1000 of what's done was done today, but I had to stop mid scene to take care of some things, but I had been doing one scene/sequence at a time up to that point. SO we will see how it goes when I try to pick up the threads I had going.
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Oct 24, 2015 1:05:21 GMT -5
Have hit a little snag-domestic issues requiring my attention and time(many house projects and our refrigerator may have gasped its last breath tonight so there may go the weekend too), so Spooktacular has stalled a bit. Getting it done and up by Halloween is going to be tight, but I'm going to try my damnedest to do so.
As of right now, the plan is to post it as part of the Weird Worlds forum/threads.
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Oct 28, 2015 2:19:58 GMT -5
Chugging along on the opening Canary story i.e. the Spooktacular, clocking in at about 3500 words so far (which covers about 3/12 of the original 8 pages of story) so still looking at maybe 5-6K overall when all said and done. Not sure I can make it for Halloween, but there's a chance I can get it posted by the end of the weekend.
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Oct 29, 2015 20:18:42 GMT -5
In adapting the 8 page comic story into a prose short, I realized it needed an additional scene to make it work. It was something I mostly cut to keep the page count at 8 to fit the slot in the anthology it was ticketed to appear in, but without that page restriction it's something that really needs to be fleshed out to make the story work better-so I started work on it tonight. It removes a plot contrivance I inserted to make it work as an 8 page short, allowing for a better bridge between the set up and climax, so actually serves the narrative better. The off-shoot is it's at least a thousand word scene so it's going to add to the length of the installment and the time to needed to finish this. However, I think the extra day or two it takes will be worth it to make this a better piece overall. So still hoping for Sunday, but more likely Tuesday to get this up finally (I work Monday so may not get a chance to do much for it that day).
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Nov 6, 2015 16:00:51 GMT -5
Week from hell, missed holiday no issue and no time this week to work on it. It's still coming but won't be called Halloween Spooktacular I guess.
-M
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Post by The MRP! on Jan 15, 2016 3:07:47 GMT -5
Halfway through January, anyone got anything in the pipeline?
I've reworked the Canary story with a better structure, but I am not happy with the pacing or prose itself yet, so am On a third rewrite of the approximately 6K work manuscript, and there are two sequences I need to actually draft yet that are only done as beat breakdowns filling in the gaps. Nothing is coming easy and I don't want to post anything until everything is in the can on it, so its still in progress, but crawling along. I may yet have to take the edit knife to it and trim a bunch and leave it on the editing room floor so to speak, but not until I have everything done in draft at least, so those 2 skeleton scenes need to be finished before I look to trim.
So plugging along slowly, but haven't given up the ghost yet.
-M
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