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OC-tober But I Have No Prompts And Just Do Whatever I Want: Day 6
VERY LONG POST (if you're just here for the art you don't have to read below the cut)
Magikos plot and lore! I didn't get very far in the original production because it was made to be a cartoon series and all that remains outside of that lost footage (I repeat: I DO NOT have it) and my fuzzy memory is the script for episode one and a handful of notes so enjoy my inconsistent rambling until we get to my ideas for the eventual rewrite.
[Insert Picture of Ravellois 1&2]
Original:
We open up on a meeting in a dark room where each of the attendees' faces is covered in shadow. The man in the military uniform at the head of the long table begins to monologue about the injustices those with inhuman adaptations face, shadow puppet/storybook style animations illustrate the narration. The man declares that "From now on, we will not call ourselves humans. We'll call ourselves..." followed by the title logo appearing onscreen (Magikos).
When the title screen fades away we're back in the meeting room, now with just military man (whose name is apparently Jedrek) and a gender ambiguous individual in a lab coat who questions Jedrek on his resolve. When he reaffirms his decision, they leave and lab coat gives the order to the guard at the door to "Prepare the misters. It's time."
The background music swells as we transition to the wordless sequence where the kill-humans-gas descends on various cities around the world, cutting to close-up scenes of people collapsing in the street, gas leaking under doors and wafting through broken windows, a woman washing dishes goes limp and her head bobs up and down in soapy water as her husband and child follow suit in the background. Two magikos in coveralls and face masks bust down the door and drag their bodies onto a pile of other corpses which they set on fire.
Zooming out, Jedrek watches the pyre on a screen from back in the base. Lab coat walks in and informs him that all the humans are dead.
Roll theme.
From there we join Ravellois as she wakes up and realizes that her city is a lot quieter than usual. Also, her parents are gone. Flashback to the night before when her parents grill her on her superiority as a demon and their expectations for her. Happily, Ravellois transforms into her human form and goes about her day. She's found by members of the magikos government, they're all "mysterious unattended child needs supervision" so one of them volunteers his family to foster her until they find her parents.
The rest of the episodes follow their adventures in going to school, practicing/learning to take advantage of their inhuman adaptations (with Ravellois vehemently denying hers), and interning(?) at the magikos government to put their skills to use until Ravellois's parents return in the season finale and she has to defeat them.
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Magikos was originally a story about finding your people and becoming who you want to be regardless of others' expectations or what they made of you (hence the demon symbolism). Killing all the humans was framed as a good thing in the same way that cutting out toxic relationships or removing yourself from a bad situation is. Ravellois had to separate herself from those things so that she could start seeing being a demon as good and not shameful or painful. When she insists to everyone she meets that she's human and refuses to use her powers, they don't believe her but they also don't press her. She's allowed to take her time in opening up as the cast goes on episodic adventures that culminate into her parents returning at the end of the season and trying to take over the new magikos society. She fights them and wins thanks to her character growth and self-acceptance, earning her happy ending where her parents change their minds seeing how their daughter grew in their absence and they... just live? I guess? I was twelve, actually decent storytelling was a skill I had yet to build and unlike [Valerie's Story], I've left it the way it was all these years only occasionally thinking about it or drawing Ravellois for fun because I like her design.
Rewrite:
First off, Hidnight already deals with most of the themes of the original Magikos so we're not exactly scrapping it, but we are changing it significantly. Starting with the genocide. Yeah, that's no longer a "good" thing. Although, the injustice angle is quite interesting; especially when you consider the ranking system.
It wasn't a major point in gen 1 until the end when the cast needed to fight the two evil demons and nobody but Ravellois could (for both overpowered MC and symbolism reasons). There were five ranks known as stars.
Taken directly from my notes:
"One star magikos are the most common and/or the weakest. Cat, bear, and other animal hybrids are most often found here. Magikos with weak and/or useless abilities are also categorized here. Ex: color-changing eyes or uncannily able to find coins on the ground
"Two star magikos aren't found everywhere but they're still not rare by any means. They're also still pretty weak and basic in terms of abilities. Avians, butterflies, other animalistic physical differences, and abilities like walking on walls or healing minor cuts. Any physicalities that show you're a magikos are almost always low tier because they aren't that powerful.
"Three stars are the middle of the known scale. Usually referred to as rare. This includes classic "superhero" abilities like super strength and speed, laser eyes, and telekinesis. Plus mythical creatures like mermaids, unicorns, and dragons. This is also the common starting point for those who climb the ranks as they hone their skills.
"Four stars is the forces of nature tier. Elemental powers controlling fire, water, ice, the earth, lightning, etc. are very rare and powerful. Controlling the weather is even more rare.
"Fives stars is the highest tier on the known scale. VERY powerful. Like, few-hits-to-kill powerful. Hardly anyone has reached this rank by working and it is EXTREMELY rare to be born here. (AN: Lab coat was born here because they could essentially "hulk out" into a giant bat/wolf monster)
"Six and seven stars were added at the end of the series when everyone saw the awesome power of demons. Six was made specifically for Ravellois because she broke all their scales and seven was for her parents. Another reason why she was the only one who could defeat them. Impossible to be born in these tiers."
I'm thinking we keep the rankings mostly the same, but now seven doesn't exist and humans are included as zero stars. The secret society saw zero stars as a stain on their species and coined the term "magikos" as a way of separating themselves from the weakling humans. Zero stars, who make up 50% of the population, are wiped out and life is pretty good for a while. But who becomes the next target in the Hidden Renaissance's quest for a perfect world now that they've successfully gotten rid of the humans? Who's at the bottom now? The one stars. It isn't noticeable at first, but one stars begin being targeted by propaganda and dog whistles. Even the ones who helped in the human extermination and subsequent government takeover. They're not "magikos enough" anymore.
Ravellois is still a demon. She still hides that she is a demon and gives her human-sona a different name to avoid being found out: Nimeni. When she wakes up in the post-humans world, she is herded along with the other magikos to the broadcast explaining the new world order and afterwords is placed with a foster family of mainly four stars (same as before) who don't seem to care about the whole quiet genocide.
As she and the foster brother her age (13) attend school, she meets magikos of all types. When the anti-one star stuff gets heated, Ravellois joins in the fight against it to protect her friends. Somehow, they find out that she's a demon. And they're kinda upset about it. "You pretending to be human isn't helping anyone. You have the power to turn this around, so use it!" And in the end, she is a support for the one stars instead of their hero. We're also giving Ravellois anxiety. A shier personality will help set her apart from my other protagonists and she can learn about coping with stress and releasing herself from the unhealthy expectations that the society, even though it favors her, presses onto her.
I'm also thinking that this story could be specifically geared towards a younger audience. Despite Valerie starting her story at ten years old, that book isn't meant for ten year olds. It gets really dark in some places. Same goes for Hidnight. I don't know exactly the age demographic either of those are for so I'd like to experiment with a target audience that isn't just Me, Winvyre/Winvyre's unnamed civilian persona. Of course, it'll be a long time yet until I start any sort of serious work on Magikos G2, I just wanted to share some of my work beyond my two main WIPs!
A picture of Bunty taken by them in the movie: "Flushed Away"
"Flushed Away" 2006
Plot (I told it myself): One day, all the pets in Buckingham Palace. Bunty is a young chicken with a light green jade necklace and an orange mane. When they took pictures of the animals, Bunty felt bored while they were taking pictures. After taking pictures, Bunty suddenly saw that their barn key had been dropped and they hadn't noticed. Bunty then hid the key. In the evening, everyone was gone to attend the ceremony tomorrow, Bunty successfully unlocked the iron cage and Bunty escaped into the ventilation duct so that they wouldn't bring her in for the ceremony. When Bunty escaped, suddenly Mrs. Tweedy was buying many new chickens and Mr. Tweedy was waiting outside. Bunty was trying to escape when Mrs. Tweedy discovered and caught Bunty in a cage and then, the couple go to Yorkshire. Bunty feels very sad that the two captured Bunty because the first time when Bunty only escaped the palace once. But at this time, Bunty met chickens like: Ginger, Babs, Mac, Fowler,… They felt happy because there was a new character and Ginger just wanted a plan to escape the farm. And Babs gives Bunty her new navy blue necklace and fixes her old mane, originally they were doing a mane makeover. Mac is confiding in Bunty but now she becomes brave. Fowler is just telling stories which makes Bunty a bit bored and they are becoming a team to get the escape plan from Tweedy Farm.
Spanish/Portuguese:
Enredo (eu mesmo contei): Um dia, todos os animais de estimação do Palácio de Buckingham. Bunty é uma galinha jovem com um colar de jade verde claro e uma crina laranja. Quando tiraram fotos dos animais, Bunty ficou entediado enquanto eles tiravam fotos. Depois de tirar fotos, Bunty de repente viu que a chave do celeiro havia caído e eles não perceberam. Bunty então escondeu a chave. À noite, todos foram assistir à cerimónia de amanhã, Bunty destrancou com sucesso a gaiola de ferro e Bunty escapou para a conduta de ventilação para que não a trouxessem para a cerimónia. Quando Bunty escapou, de repente a Sra. Tweedy estava comprando muitas galinhas novas e o Sr. Tweedy estava esperando do lado de fora. Bunty estava tentando escapar quando a Sra. Tweedy descobriu e pegou Bunty em uma gaiola e então o casal foi para Yorkshire. Bunty fica muito triste porque os dois capturaram Bunty porque foi a primeira vez que Bunty escapou do palácio apenas uma vez. Mas nessa época, Bunty conheceu galinhas como: Ginger, Babs, Mac, Fowler,… Eles ficaram felizes porque havia um novo personagem e Ginger só queria um plano para escapar da fazenda. E Babs dá a Bunty seu novo colar azul marinho e conserta sua antiga crina, originalmente eles estavam fazendo uma reforma na crina. Mac está confiando em Bunty, mas agora ela se torna corajosa. Fowler está apenas contando histórias que deixam Bunty um pouco entediado e eles estão se formando em uma equipe para conseguir o plano de fuga da Fazenda Tweedy.