Continued writing speedbumps

A few days ago, I sat down to write, only to realize I haven't named any of the towns. Which will get confusing for me if I don't fix that. 

And as I mentioned recently, I need to include fictional books. I have some good ideas, but now those books need names. And some of the main book heroes need names. So far, I've come up with 2/3 place names, and none of the others. 

Another unexpected delay came from a character who I'm becoming surprisingly attached to. Since this is a take off Beauty and the Beast, I have another guy as something of an echo to Gaston. But unlike Gaston, Corvin is actually a good guy. I had the random idea that he would quite poetry. Which ended up being really helpful, because Maya is pretty mean to him. Not for any good reason, but mostly because he reminds her of someone else. (It's like how Kiki is irrationally angry at Tombo for much of the movie. Except Maya is an adult so she doesn't have much excuse for her behavior). 

And Corvin does look like one of those handsome jerks. But he's secretly a big nerd, and very kind. When he quotes poetry, Maya is too confused to be mean anymore. Heh. He picks up on that pretty fast, as a way to kind of defuse her. 

Anyway, all of this is to say that if Corvin quotes poetry, I need to find poetry. They're in another world, so I shouldn't really use poetry from our world. Which means I'm stuck with my own poetry. I spent most of an evening skimming through my weird collection of poetry. I needed to find something relevant to their conversation, which wasn't easy. Most of my poems are about nature. It was strange, because I haven't looked at some of those poems in a long time. There were a couple that I had no memory of. If I'd read them in a book, I would have had no idea that I wrote them. Those were the ones that felt the most like professional poetry. At least in my limited education of it. 

Time Travel Consultant

I just rewatched Back to the Future. In the end credits, I noticed someone who was credited as the "DeLorean time travel consultant." That is awesome. How do you become a time travel consultant? 

For some reason, this time I got a real kick when Doc reads his own letter (written by his future self) and starts tearing up. I never really paid much attention to that scene before. 

I also noticed an awesome parallel. Marty and Doc's friendship is a lot like that of Ben and Fern's friendship with Dr. Octavius. Teenagers that are friends with quirky inventors (or mad scientists).  No wonder that fanfic is so fun to write. Back to the Future was right. 

Marty ended up as Doc's friend because he was told not to go near that crazy scientist. I figured that was the case, and it turns out that's what the filmmakers intended as well. Though I feel like Marty and Doc's relationship best comes out in the third movie. Maybe because that's when "present Doc" gets the most screen time. In the first movie, it was mostly "past Doc," who didn't know Marty yet. And in the second movie, Doc was mostly backup. It was the third movie where Doc really got his own story. 

The ending makes no sense. One of the main points of the trilogy is that time travel is too dangerous, and the time machine has to to be destroyed. It's ridiculous for Doc to rebuild it just to get his dog, especially when he'd already asked Marty to take care of Einstein. He wanted Marty to know that he was ok, but he could have left another message like he did before. 

But still, it's damn cool to see the time machine train fly off. Which is probably the reason they ended that way. 

Manga Update

Time for some comments on the manga and anime I've been looking at this past year. 

For a long time, I've been trying to find an English translation of From up on Poppy Hill. And I finally found it. I knew it wouldn't be as good as the movie. but it was pretty flat. It was all the same shoujo manga I've seen before. 

I watched the Basara anime many years ago, and I don't really remember it. But I've been enjoying the manga. I liked the concept of someone pretending to be the chosen one, to protect her people. I was a little disappointed (spoilers) that she really was the actual chosen one, but I'm invested enough now to want to continue reading. I may go back and try the anime again. 

My Hero Academia is finally over. Honestly, the only reason I finished the manga is because it's one of the only popular ones I was following, and I wanted to recognize references when I go to Fanime, or something. I stopped being excited about it a while ago. Part of that is because they do something that's really disgusting - making a pervert character who's supposed to be funny. 

I watched the first couple seasons of Spy x Family. I'm not sure what to make of it yet. It's supposed to be funny, but I can't help thinking of how traumatized this little girl will be from her childhood. 

I finished Barefoot Gen. Wow, that was probably the heaviest manga I've ever read. It's definitely worth reading, because it is based on real events. The author survived the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. Other parts of the manga are from other survivors. 

I kept reading Shaman King, though I'm not sure why. It stopped very abruptly, in the middle of the ending arc. I think it has since been completed, but I don't care enough to find it. It was interesting at first, but ended up baffling. Like when one character nearly killed another, just so he could cut him open and examine his insides. And then the others tell the character that survived to suck it up and deal with it, so the almost-murderer can be on their team. Yeesh. There were a lot of things that made me go "why?" 

I read Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card. It was nostalgic. But the story style no longer interests me. I think nostalgia is why I appreciate the first two Cardcaptor series. There were some cool new card designs though. 

And I've been watching the new Kenshin anime! I'm so glad they're redoing it without all the useless filler. 

There are a few manga I tried, but gave up on after a few chapters. I won't bother to mention them. 

Fictional Fiction

After I read Carry On, I realized that it was a fanfiction. But not what your'e thinking. Rowell, the author, wrote a novel about a college girl. In that novel, the protagonist has a book series that she loves, and she writes fanfiction about it. Rowell liked these fictional books so much that she ended up turning them into real novels. Three of them! So it's almost like the author created fanfiction of her own work. 

Right now, I need to find some books for my characters to read. I think I may end up doing the reverse of what Rowell did - taking story ideas I have, and making them into books that my characters read. 

Long ago, I even made notes on some classic literature that might exist in their world. So I could tap into that. 

And one of the characters likes manga. I had a random idea for a comic strip, but only a couple vague ideas. And a title. So maybe I'll have that be the manga that he reads. It's not like I'm ever gonna draw a proper manga. 

I'm kinda tempted to wait to figure out these books. But if I figure them out now, I can possibly work their themes into the rest of the plot. 

Childhood Fantasia

It's time to ramble some about Fantasia. I loved it growing up. Or, I should say, I loved parts of it. 

The opening number was always strange to me. When I watch it now, I think, "so, this is what an animator imagines when they listen to classical music." 

I still love the part with the fairies. Decorating spiderwebs with dewdrops, painting fall colors on the leaves, tracing frost patterns on the water. I loved the mushrooms. Especially the smallest one. I had no concept stereotypical portrayals back then, but it's amazing how many of them there were in kids movies. More on that later. 

Now when I think of The Sorcerer's Apprentice, I think of the live-action movie. The ending used to scare me as the kid. But only the part where the Sorcerer whacks Mickey with his broom. Not the part with the axe. I guess I was a weird kid. I also just learned that the Sorcerer's design was based on Walt Disney! 

I loved the dinosaurs too. Though not the violent parts so much. The Rite of Spring, the accompanaying music by Stravinski, actually caused riots when it was first performed. The music and visuals were too intense for the audience of the time. Stravinski was alive when Fantasia was animated. He liked it at first, but apparently changed his mind part-way through. I wonder what happened. 

I thought the Soundtrack was cute. Now I just watch it and am interested to see how someone visualized the sound of a flute. 

I suppose the Greek mythology must have been my favorite. Cute colorful unicorns and winged horses, pretty centaurs, and the idea that you could drink a rainbow. Now it's somewhat tainted by the zebra centaurs. I love the idea of zebra centaurs. But gee, what a coincidence that the only dark-skinned characters are servants. My cousin told me that her copy of Fantasia had edited the zebra cantaurs out. But it was on the version I grew up with, and on the DVD I later got. 

The DVD has more footage of the musicians and narrator. But due to an issue with the audio, the narrator's voice is different. That still confuses the heck out of me. I haven't been able to find a DVD with the narrator I grew up with. So if I watch it, I watch my old copy. 

And Dionysus is another example of Disney drunkenness. There was quite a lot of that in early Disney Movies. Everything from Dumbo to Robin Hood. 

Also, did they purposefully have cross-dressing ostriches? Because all of those ostriches are boys. Girl ostriches are brown. Heheh. 

Usually as a kid, I stopped the movie at this point. Bald Mountain was too intense for me to enjoy. And Ave Maria wasn't interesting enough. 

Fantasia wasn't successful when it came out. It was too experimental. But it had a big impact on a lot of people. Enough so that they made a sequel. I also love Fantasia 2000. My favorites as a kid were Pines of Rome, and especially Firebird Suite. Which is still true. 

But now I'm super impressed with the way they plotted Rhapsody in Blue. There are a ton of cameos in that piece, from the Disney staff to George Gershwin himself. 

Fantasia was the first time I'd heard many of these songs. I still can't listen to them without picturing the animations. Even now that I've performed some of those songs.  

Changing Roles

Sometimes it's fun to notice when two actors star in multiple, unrelated movies together. 

I've seen a couple times where two unrelated movies have the same hero, and the same villain. Like Wolverine and Magneto, who are then the hero and villain in Flushed Away (by the creators of Wallace and Gromit). 

Then there was a boyfriend and girlfriend in one movie, who played a brother and sister in another movie. 

A little weirder is when actors play a parent and child in one movie, and in the next one, they're a married couple. Which I can't help as seeing as another common Hollywood example of men having much younger wives. 

Actually, in my favorite season of Doctor Who, Jenny is the Doctor's daughter. And the two actors ended up getting married in real life. But the Doctor's age isn't easy to tell from his appearance. 

I found a very sweet example in Once Upon a Time. Snow White and Prince Charming are actually married in real life! 

When you're trying to be accurate

I want my stories to feel real when it comes to forests and mountains and animals. 

I was looking for something that one character could point out to another, to help them realize how beautiful the forest is. I landed on a display that hummingbirds do, which involves a high-speed dive out of the sky. I started writing it, and it felt perfect. Then I realized that male hummingbirds do that to show off to the females. They wouldn't be doing that in autumn, well after the nesting season....

So, back to square one. It would help if I'd ever actually gotten to walk through those forests. Hopefully soon. During the right season...