Not NaNoWriMo: Superheroes World-Building
Nov. 1st, 2022 08:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tuftearsI've poked around at a variety of projects and one I would *like* to get back to, but is on the backburner because I just don't "get" it enough, has been the concept of superheroes in space. That is, not 'low Earth orbit' or 'villain has a secret base on the moon' or anything like that, but a story about superheroes out there in the galaxy, visiting different places.
But I really do enjoy superheroes as a literature.
So, a couple of things that need to go together:
One. Superheroes. I can come up with individual heroes, but I'm not sure I adequately understand how to fit them together, or make them work. What are your favorite heroes, what do you like most about them? What do you think your heroes would do, given access to a starship and a map to Local Space?
Two. Galactic science fiction. Once you have cheap and convenient space travel, you usually also have abundant power, resources, and space. The individual power level of your average police-person, soldier, or armed warship goes up correspondingly, to a point where some fellow running around in tights punching people out from the shadows might seem more like a dangerous vigilante than an actual hero.
It feels to me like superheroes and villains might turn into... celebrities, consultants, or maybe they might confine their superpowered deeds to the frontiers where the general power levels are a lot lower.
Is the solution here, make the superpowered people more powerful, lower the generally available 'power level', maybe by way of some kind of apocalypse that forces people to turn to superheroes for help, while supervillains try to provide order "their own way"? Or go with the idea of celebrities, people famous for their own sake, and having powers simply enrolls one into a system where the question is how they use that power? What would *you* want to see?
Distance is also an issue, but one that can be solved with discreet application of technology. Star systems are, relatively speaking, entire states, so one can travel between "cities" -- planets, space stations, asteroid mining bases, that sort of thing, relatively quickly -- but going between systems without a convenient hyperspace gateway in the middle is going to Take Time (tm), in which the hero won't be available to solve crime in their normal beat. Contrariwise, villains probably rely on that same factor to elude pursuit-- things getting too hot in one system? Time to take a long trip!
Three. Superhero stories. This is possibly the biggest stumbling block. I like *reading* them, but I'm way less confident about writing one, especially one that involves multiple superheroes in a given sector of space. Maybe tell me about some of your favorite superhero stories, or things you *do* want to see, and things you *don't* want to see.
The most obvious story is, of course, some grave threat to all existence within a sector, but that's way too heavy-handed to me. I want to write stories that explore life in a galaxy that has some finite number of superheroes and villains, so they need to interact with one another, and existence can't be on the line every time, that just gets old fast. Stopping crime is the next obvious thing, I guess, followed by assisting in the wake of natural disasters. But what else do superheroes get up to?
Anyway, this isn't for a NaNoWriMo *this* year, but it could be for something next year!
But I really do enjoy superheroes as a literature.
So, a couple of things that need to go together:
One. Superheroes. I can come up with individual heroes, but I'm not sure I adequately understand how to fit them together, or make them work. What are your favorite heroes, what do you like most about them? What do you think your heroes would do, given access to a starship and a map to Local Space?
Two. Galactic science fiction. Once you have cheap and convenient space travel, you usually also have abundant power, resources, and space. The individual power level of your average police-person, soldier, or armed warship goes up correspondingly, to a point where some fellow running around in tights punching people out from the shadows might seem more like a dangerous vigilante than an actual hero.
It feels to me like superheroes and villains might turn into... celebrities, consultants, or maybe they might confine their superpowered deeds to the frontiers where the general power levels are a lot lower.
Is the solution here, make the superpowered people more powerful, lower the generally available 'power level', maybe by way of some kind of apocalypse that forces people to turn to superheroes for help, while supervillains try to provide order "their own way"? Or go with the idea of celebrities, people famous for their own sake, and having powers simply enrolls one into a system where the question is how they use that power? What would *you* want to see?
Distance is also an issue, but one that can be solved with discreet application of technology. Star systems are, relatively speaking, entire states, so one can travel between "cities" -- planets, space stations, asteroid mining bases, that sort of thing, relatively quickly -- but going between systems without a convenient hyperspace gateway in the middle is going to Take Time (tm), in which the hero won't be available to solve crime in their normal beat. Contrariwise, villains probably rely on that same factor to elude pursuit-- things getting too hot in one system? Time to take a long trip!
Three. Superhero stories. This is possibly the biggest stumbling block. I like *reading* them, but I'm way less confident about writing one, especially one that involves multiple superheroes in a given sector of space. Maybe tell me about some of your favorite superhero stories, or things you *do* want to see, and things you *don't* want to see.
The most obvious story is, of course, some grave threat to all existence within a sector, but that's way too heavy-handed to me. I want to write stories that explore life in a galaxy that has some finite number of superheroes and villains, so they need to interact with one another, and existence can't be on the line every time, that just gets old fast. Stopping crime is the next obvious thing, I guess, followed by assisting in the wake of natural disasters. But what else do superheroes get up to?
Anyway, this isn't for a NaNoWriMo *this* year, but it could be for something next year!
no subject
Date: 2023-01-02 02:13 am (UTC)I feel like the big question is "what are the things that you like about superheroes?"
One of my favorite things about superhero stories is the shared-world element. Standalone superheroes can be fun (I actually liked the film Hancock, for example). But I think it's the sense of continuity and overlapping stories that has always fascinated me most about superheroes. The way characters change and grow, gaining and losing powers, interacting with characters from other parts of the setting -- sometimes ones who are completely different in tone and power level.
Superhero stories are always a lot more about the character than the plot, for me. There's an authorized DC Comics Webtoon about Batman & co that's 90% superheroes interacting with each other in ordinary ways and it's perfect: https://www.webtoons.com/en/slice-of-life/batman-wayne-family-adventures/list?title_no=3180
Like it helps a lot that I'm familiar with the backstories of all of these characters, because it's an important backdrop. But the emotional beats and interactions are what fascinates me.
no subject
Date: 2023-01-02 03:14 am (UTC)I do agree that nailing down things I like best would be important. I'll list off superheroes and villains that I enjoy:
Batman (as the Greatest Detective, not so much the grim, humorless purger of criminals)
Catwoman (as the Greatest Thief and a foil to the otherwise imperturbable Batman)
Iron Man (it's a juvenile fantasy, having the coolest toys, but Tom Swift and his Numerous Improbable Inventions was a thing back when too)
Doctor Doom (pre-magic phase, the man just has a ton of gravitas)
The whole Astro City series was amazing but more for the aspect of 'behind the stages on superhero comics' and the respectful way it treated the subject, too. I liked selected arcs of Doctor Strange, Green Lantern, a bunch of others, but I can't say they would be my first choices:
Doctor Strange is cool but magic is hard to work around without running into the 'Deus Ex Machina' problem-- why can't, for example, the Doc just use magic to solve any given problem right away? You wind up with too much handwaving for my tastes, versus a hero with more clearly delineated rules and boundaries.
Superman is another example of the 'cool but...' problem. If I had a Superman-alike in my universe, I'd be forever keeping him just off camera, dealing with the actual universe-ending threats, and checking in at home now and then, and the harried heroes just doing their best to reassure him that they're fine, so they don't add to the already colossal burden on his (or her) shoulders.
Green Lantern... I liked it back when but coming back to it many years later, I found myself agreeing with Sinestro that Hal Jordan and his ilk were a singularly unimaginative lot. Also the 'cool but...' problem.
I dabbled in the X-men cinematic universe but I don't like the way it always seems to devolve into humans vs mutants.
I watched a fair chunk of the Flash superhero TV series! Flash isn't bad but I'd want a more 'thinking Flash' than the impulsive one. Really, that describes how I'd want my superheroes to act in general. Take a little time to think about how best to use your powers, folks! Maybe being a costumed vigilante isn't always the most optimal use of your talents? We're looking at you, Tony Stark.
So what I'd probably do, if and when I ever get around to writing this 'for reals', would be to set up different neighborhoods, each one with its own mood and 'style' of superheroics. The MC would have various reasons for travelling from one neighborhood to another, and establishing themselves with the denizens of those areas. A Gotham-like mining colony, for example, or an industrial zone built around the rings of a gas giant for the powered armor types.