The writeup thread

Sharky wrote:

It's where Matt Groening got the name Homer Simpson from

I'd say it's where he got the same "Simpson" from. Every member of the Simpson family is named after Matt Groening's family (Homer is his father's name), with two exceptions - Bart instead of Matt and Grampa instead of Abraham. Although Grampa's name is Abraham, he was named by the writers who were unaware that Groening's grandfather was named Abraham. Groening himself refers to Grampa as Grampa.

Okay, here's a idea for an update of DR NO, based on the werid symbols in the deserts of China.

MI6 is very curious when large symbols start appearing across the face of the earth. They are designed for satellite calibration, but it is a method that has not been used since the 1960s. Bond's investigation leads him to Dr. Julius No, who has acquired the access codes to decommissioned Soviet spy satellites. No is attempting to bring them back on-line, and intends to re-direct them into the paths of other satellites to create an ablation cascade. When two satellites collide, they create a cloud of debris. Inertia carries this debris outwards, which can take out other satellites. This has happened before, though it only took out two satellites. No is going to use the ablation cascade to create a blind spot in US and UK spy satellite coverage, allowing him (or his employers) to move something of value undetected (I just don't know what that might be ... yet).

Harmsway wrote:

I need to see DAY OF THE LOCUST.

Indeed you do. I saw it about twenty years ago and although I remember very little about it I do recall that I absolutely loved it. Been meaning to revisit it.

Loomis wrote:

Harmsway wrote:

I need to see DAY OF THE LOCUST.

Indeed you do. I saw it about twenty years ago and although I remember very little about it I do recall that I absolutely loved it. Been meaning to revisit it.

Well, it's added to my to-see list. Sadly, Netflix doesn't have it, so it looks like I'll have to purchase it.

I've been sitting on an idea for a while now, and I was hoping I could get some feedback on it, because I think it will either be very good, or very poor:

In the late 1960s, Charles Manson formed "The Family", and carried out the notorious Tate-LaBianca killings. Central to Manson's philosophy was "Helter Skelter". Manson believed that The Beatles' White Album contained clues that foreshadowed the coming apocalypse, and that he and the Family was at the centre of this. "Helter Skelter" suggested that a racial war was coming because the Family would lure white youth away from San Francisco. Black men, suddenly deprived of the white women whom the political changes of the 1960s had made sexually available to them, would be without an outlet for their frustrations and would lash out in violent crimes against whites. The resulting murderous rampage against blacks by frightened whites would then be exploited by militant blacks to provoke a savage war between racist and non-racist whites over the treatment of African-Amrricans. The scenario ended with almost all white people dead, and the African-American population leaderless and unable to take care of themselves. The Family, who had survived the war by hiding in a bunker out in the desert, would emerge as the rulers of the remaining population.

Now, here's the idea for the story: a band of neo-Nazis - or possibly a group of right-wing, ultra-fundamentalist Christians - decide to put Helter Skelter into action. Rather than triggering a racial war between blacks and whites, they intend to set African-Americans and Hispanic people against one another so that they kill one another off and make for an all-white state. It's partially inspired by this report about hate crimes in Germany, with people in the police forces sharing ultranationalist ideologies. And also the ultranationalist gangs in Russia, who attack ethnic minorities on a regular basis.

I think this could make for a good story ... or a very bad one.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

I've been sitting on an idea for a while now, and I was hoping I could get some feedback on it, because I think it will either be very good, or very poor:

In the late 1960s, Charles Manson formed "The Family", and carried out the notorious Tate-LaBianca killings. Central to Manson's philosophy was "Helter Skelter". Manson believed that The Beatles' White Album contained clues that foreshadowed the coming apocalypse, and that he and the Family was at the centre of this. "Helter Skelter" suggested that a racial war was coming because the Family would lure white youth away from San Francisco. Black men, suddenly deprived of the white women whom the political changes of the 1960s had made sexually available to them, would be without an outlet for their frustrations and would lash out in violent crimes against whites. The resulting murderous rampage against blacks by frightened whites would then be exploited by militant blacks to provoke a savage war between racist and non-racist whites over the treatment of African-Amrricans. The scenario ended with almost all white people dead, and the African-American population leaderless and unable to take care of themselves. The Family, who had survived the war by hiding in a bunker out in the desert, would emerge as the rulers of the remaining population.

Now, here's the idea for the story: a band of neo-Nazis - or possibly a group of right-wing, ultra-fundamentalist Christians - decide to put Helter Skelter into action. Rather than triggering a racial war between blacks and whites, they intend to set African-Americans and Hispanic people against one another so that they kill one another off and make for an all-white state. It's partially inspired by this report about hate crimes in Germany, with people in the police forces sharing ultranationalist ideologies. And also the ultranationalist gangs in Russia, who attack ethnic minorities on a regular basis.

I think this could make for a good story ... or a very bad one.

Looks good.

Terminus at CBn wrote a screenplay a few years back entitled "SILVERKNIGHT" that involved a similar premise and included Neo-Nazis and such. I believe the plot centered around a man-made virus that specifically targeted the DNA of African-Americans. Your idea is a bit more realistic, though, whereas his was a bit more 'Bondian' (at least, Brosnan-era Bondian).

That kind of reminds me of Matthew Reilly's Area 7 - a band of powerful South Africans who were sympathetic to aparthied attempted to steal a genetically-engineered virus from a US Air Force base in Utah that targeted people based on the proteins that dictated skin pigment, with the intention of using it to hold Africa hostage and turn the continent into their own private empire with a slave workforce. It was actually pretty clever in how it was done.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

I've been sitting on an idea for a while now, and I was hoping I could get some feedback on it, because I think it will either be very good, or very poor:

In the late 1960s, Charles Manson formed "The Family", and carried out the notorious Tate-LaBianca killings. Central to Manson's philosophy was "Helter Skelter". Manson believed that The Beatles' White Album contained clues that foreshadowed the coming apocalypse, and that he and the Family was at the centre of this. "Helter Skelter" suggested that a racial war was coming because the Family would lure white youth away from San Francisco. Black men, suddenly deprived of the white women whom the political changes of the 1960s had made sexually available to them, would be without an outlet for their frustrations and would lash out in violent crimes against whites. The resulting murderous rampage against blacks by frightened whites would then be exploited by militant blacks to provoke a savage war between racist and non-racist whites over the treatment of African-Amrricans. The scenario ended with almost all white people dead, and the African-American population leaderless and unable to take care of themselves. The Family, who had survived the war by hiding in a bunker out in the desert, would emerge as the rulers of the remaining population.

Now, here's the idea for the story: a band of neo-Nazis - or possibly a group of right-wing, ultra-fundamentalist Christians - decide to put Helter Skelter into action. Rather than triggering a racial war between blacks and whites, they intend to set African-Americans and Hispanic people against one another so that they kill one another off and make for an all-white state. It's partially inspired by this report about hate crimes in Germany, with people in the police forces sharing ultranationalist ideologies. And also the ultranationalist gangs in Russia, who attack ethnic minorities on a regular basis.

I think this could make for a good story ... or a very bad one.

I like it, but it's far too political for Bond. That said, it could work as a standalone thriller.

Yeah, a lot of these plots are rather dense. Good for thrillers, not necessarily great for Bond. Bond works best when the core story and set-up is rather simple, allowing for a lot of the color to come in through the details. That was the Fleming way, at any rate.

Exactly. It's like if you take Herrmann or Barry's orchestral compositions to the piano, they lose a hell of a lot. A lot of their genius is in the orchestration. The devil in the detail.

Harmsway wrote:

Yeah, a lot of these plots are rather dense. Good for thrillers, not necessarily great for Bond. Bond works best when the core story and set-up is rather simple, allowing for a lot of the color to come in through the details. That was the Fleming way, at any rate.

Okay, here's the story in its simplest form: a group of Neo-Nazis try to create a "new Europe" by starting a race war to "cleanse" the continent of everyone they despise.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

Harmsway wrote:

Yeah, a lot of these plots are rather dense. Good for thrillers, not necessarily great for Bond. Bond works best when the core story and set-up is rather simple, allowing for a lot of the color to come in through the details. That was the Fleming way, at any rate.

Okay, here's the story in its simplest form: a group of Neo-Nazis try to create a "new Europe" by starting a race war to "cleanse" the continent of everyone they despise.

You know what I've always wanted to see from you, Cap?

I'd like to see you concoct the most outlandish, over the top original Bond story you can possibly conceive. Throw all your inhibitions out the window, go against your usual grain and give us Craig's "TSWLM", "MR" or "DAD". People (myself excluded) have criticized you before for your stories being too political or "dull"; I'd like to see you try your hand at coming up with something that will surprise us all and prove the doubters wrong.

Challenge accepted?

Okay: the villain wants to bring about a localised ice age in the Asia-Pacific region. He intends to do this by detonating a series of nuclear devices along the sea floor, resulting in a shift in the earth's mass. This will cause the earth's magnetic field to change, disrupting the natural flow of the gulf stream and the jet stream. Temperatuers will plunge, and the Asia-Pacific will freeze over. The villain himself is an American who is upset that China and Japan and the rest of Asia no longer need the United States to survive. He believes that they experienced their economic growth because America allowed them to, and that because America gave them that power, America has the right to take it away.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

Okay: the villain wants to bring about a localised ice age in the Asia-Pacific region. He intends to do this by detonating a series of nuclear devices along the sea floor, resulting in a shift in the earth's mass. This will cause the earth's magnetic field to change, disrupting the natural flow of the gulf stream and the jet stream. Temperatuers will plunge, and the Asia-Pacific will freeze over. The villain himself is an American who is upset that China and Japan and the rest of Asia no longer need the United States to survive. He believes that they experienced their economic growth because America allowed them to, and that because America gave them that power, America has the right to take it away.

Good start. Now can you put it in treatment form? It's one thing to have a plot idea, it's another to implement it in a story with all the classic Bond trimmings. I know you've said in the past that a Bond film doesn't need those trimmings to be a Bond film, but I'd like to see you try to work them in anyhow.

This is my process - the idea comes first, then the details.

I recently read an article about a parasitic fungus in the Thai forests that creates "zombie" ants. It takes control of their bodies, then steers them to a place where it can propogate, killing the ant in the process. The villain of this story could extract an enzyme from the fungus that does not control the minds of people, but lowers their inhibitions and makes them more susceptible to suggestion. This is how he plans to carry out his scheme - by using others to do his dirty work.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

This is my process - the idea comes first, then the details.

I recently read an article about a parasitic fungus in the Thai forests that creates "zombie" ants. It takes control of their bodies, then steers them to a place where it can propogate, killing the ant in the process. The villain of this story could extract an enzyme from the fungus that does not control the minds of people, but lowers their inhibitions and makes them more susceptible to suggestion. This is how he plans to carry out his scheme - by using others to do his dirty work.

Another good idea.

And regarding your process, I was just stating that I hope you can develop it into a full-on treatment rather than just leaving it as a plot idea.

That Ice Age plot sounds pretty wild. As long as there's plenty of sex, alcoholic beverages, gourmet meals, and no Al Gore-style propaganda, I'm happy.

Sharky wrote:

That Ice Age plot sounds pretty wild. As long as there's plenty of sex, alcoholic beverages, gourmet meals, and no Al Gore-style propaganda, I'm happy.

And this is what I'm challenging Captain to do. Put together a treatment that possesses all those classic Bondian qualities, married with an over the top and out of this world plot (which he already has down).

Okay, here's a pretty rough idea:

Minsk, Belarus -- Bond must thwart the sale of an SS-18 "Satan", a Soviet-era ICBM armed with ten MIRVs, or multiple indepenent re-entry vehicles. In short, it is one missile that comes armed with ten warheads, which are independelty targeted and fired from the missle while it is in flight. Bond is able to prevent the missle from being sold, but in the middle of a firefight, some of his allies turn on him, and he is forced to kill them. Bond also retrieves an aerosol grenade from the body of a fallen enemy, which he takes back to London for Q to analyse.

Adrar, Algeria -- With the episode in Belarus over, M sends Bond to southern Algeria. Satellite photos have revealed a series of large structures in the Sahara desert, and MI6 want to know more. With the help of a local Bedouin tribe, Bond is able to get close enough to examine the symbols. He comes to the conclusion that that they are a system of calibrating spy satellites that has not been used since the 1960s. However, there is no indication as to who might have built them or which satellite they are trying to calibrate. This sequence ends with a decommissioned Soviet satellite being brought back on-line and colliding with another satellite over eastern Russia. The debris cloud expands outwards, taking out several other satellites. The end result is that nobody has eyes on eastern Russia and northern China. This is what the symbols in the Sahara were for - taking control of the Soviet satellite and steering it into the path of other spy satellites.

Bangkok, Thailand -- Bond wants to go to Russia, but M had other ideas. Q's analysis of the aerosol grenade has come up with a modified version of an enzyme indigenous to a certain fungus in Thailand. This fungus is known for being able to infect ants, take control of them and steer them to a place where the fungus can propogate, repeating the process. The enzyme does not work on humans the way it does ants (unsurprising, given the physiologicla differences between ants and humans), but the modified version lowers the inhibitons of people, and makes them more susceptible to suggestion. It is effectively a mind-control grenade.

Deep in the Thai jungles, Bond encounters the villain, an American who is finding new species of animals deep in the forests. He created the enzyme dispersal device, which he uses to manipulate people into doing his bidding. Bond discovers that the rogue satellite was controlled from his base, establishing a connection between Minsk, Algeria and Thailand. After escaping a death-trap set by the villain, Bond goes off in pursuit.

Magadan, Russia -- The villain has set himself up in eastern Russia, which is key to his plans. Believing that China, Japan and most of Asia have only experienced prosperity because America allows them to, he is upset that these countries feel they no longer need the US. Since he believes America gave them their economic power, he feels that America has the right to take it away. His plan is to set off a string of nuclear warheads placed strategically across eastern Russia (though he only has half the number he originally intended, thanks to Bond's intervention in Belarus). Each of these has been set up to destroy a massive vein of magnetised iron ores in the earth's crust. At the same time, he will destroy a series of precarious Soviet-era dams across the region. The sudden loss of magnetised ores and the abrupt mass shift as the water is released with briefly interrupt the earth's rotation. This will cause a movement in the earth's magnetic field as it moves to compensate, and this movement will affect ocean currents and wind patterns in the Asia-Pacific. The net effect is a localised ice age, with China, Japan and Korea all freezing over. Bond ultimately kills the villain by sabotaging the detonator on one of his warheads and setting it off early in a bunker near a dam the villain plans to destroy. This causes a non-nuclear explosion that irradiates the area. The villain is exposed to lethal levels of radiation, before Bond seals him inside the bunker, leaving him to variously freeze and starve to death while he is poisoned by the radiation.

Looks pretty good. Could use some refining, but a good start nonetheless.

Okay, new idea: the Occupy movement gets violently out of hand - where protestors were once protesting, not they are attacking the people they hold responsible for corporate greed. But closer examination reveals that the killings are not random at all: rather, someone is using the protests and the ensuing chaos to kill off people involved in some kind of worldwide conspiracy.