McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

The Secret History Spectrum

<< < (2/3) > >>

svb1972:
Another thought.  How much of the paranormal is no longer secret.

In Otherworlds, we start off focused on a Pack of Werewolves.  They're werewolves, they turn into wolves, they're humans.  And they don't believe in any other kind of supernatural beings at all.

Which paranormal is common.
People accept that Witches, Warlocks, Oogans, Necromancers are real.  They even accept that Zombies happen.  But Vampires?  That's just rediculous.  Fairies?  I don't believe in fairies.

How deep is the rabbit hole, and how far down into it has humanity jumped.

the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
The thing that the whole "secret history" genre convention is about, IMO, is providing a (semi-)plausible means for all this stuff to exist alongside history without affecting it in ways that lead to a world totally different from our own. 

One way around banging your head on this is to have the supernatural only have been real for a relatively short span of time; that something happened to make it real, or to make it visible when previously it was much less connected to our world, and, whether the supernaturals or the supernaturally aware mortals are intentionally coming out of the closet or not, there's been a paradigm shift in how hard it is to stay secret.

belial.1980:

--- Quote from: Lanodantheon on February 15, 2010, 05:49:09 AM ---

This leads to the idea of a place where all this fantasy stuff is normal.

However, this also begs the question for a world where the paranormal isn't, "What goes bump in their night?"


--- End quote ---

I don't think that everybody would necessarily be familiar with every aspect of the supernatural. There could always be something out there that people don't know about or that's not widely publicized.

I'd recommend reading some books that deal with legendary/mythological beings and creatures. Right now the fantasy genre is saturated with vampires, werevolves, and zombies. There're so many rich and interesting things out there that you can take ideas from.

Hmmm...an idea just hit me. Along the lines of zombie drills...once I came across an old Atomic Bomb survival pamphlet in my grandma's attic. Published ca. 1951. It was a school child's illustrated guide for suriviving an atomic blast--basically things like "don't look at the explosion" and "hide under your desk."

That might be something fun to play with--a tongue in cheek depiction of a school kid's survival guide that includes information for dealing with zombies, cleaning werewolf bites, etc. Government issued and cheesy.

Aludra:
"When confronted by a zombie in your classroom, get under your desk and cover your brain."

Lanodantheon:

--- Quote from: Aludra on February 15, 2010, 07:01:38 PM ---"When confronted by a zombie in your classroom, get under your desk and cover your brain."

--- End quote ---


--- Quote from: belial.1980 on February 15, 2010, 06:27:48 PM ---I don't think that everybody would necessarily be familiar with every aspect of the supernatural. There could always be something out there that people don't know about or that's not widely publicized.

I'd recommend reading some books that deal with legendary/mythological beings and creatures. Right now the fantasy genre is saturated with vampires, werevolves, and zombies. There're so many rich and interesting things out there that you can take ideas from.

Hmmm...an idea just hit me. Along the lines of zombie drills...once I came across an old Atomic Bomb survival pamphlet in my grandma's attic. Published ca. 1951. It was a school child's illustrated guide for suriviving an atomic blast--basically things like "don't look at the explosion" and "hide under your desk."

That might be something fun to play with--a tongue in cheek depiction of a school kid's survival guide that includes information for dealing with zombies, cleaning werewolf bites, etc. Government issued and cheesy.

--- End quote ---

Having almost completed my degree in film I am quite familiar with "Duck and Cover" :)

I will share one position I am taking for this project that is my take on things: supernatural stuff exists(I'm making a list), but that all the popular culture is the same.

Watch Dracula, 30 Days of Night or Twilight with the thought of this coming out of a world where Vampires are an accepted reality. Do the same with Night of The Living Dead under the auspice that that movie is actually based on/or compiled from found footage, a real life Blair Witch Project. This approach has been informing me a lot more about my world than any other research, though I will do some into the classics. Especially because I have been taught in Computer Science classes that "There's always more than one way to do things."  ;D

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page