Chapter Six and Pre-Writing

You all know the old saying, "If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans." I had a plan to post an eighteen-chapter graphic novel without missing updates to catch up on writing. See, I had written the entire script to Draconis Wicked two years before the first pages were ever drawn. I write Urban Underbrush one chapter at a time (with a few grand plans and threads secretly tying things together) but since Draconis Wicked is one story with a definite ending, it just made more sense to write the whole thing first and draw it second. This way, I could weave certain themes through the story, drop hints at what's ahead, and, of course, I'd never need to stop making new pages due to writer's block. 

As you may have noticed, I somehow managed to miss two updates in spite of all this prewriting. Shortly before I started drawing Chapter Five, I realized that I wanted to change the ending to Chapter Six. I won't give anything away, but the end of Chapter Six used a device that was interesting, but perfectly unremarkable in the Draconis world. I wanted to use this device in another story instead, where it would be a major turning point and an irreplaceable piece of the plot (more on that some other day). 

No big deal. I'd just swap the parts I wanted to save for later with similar devices and adjust the story that led up to it. Well, as soon as I took out the ending I realized that the rest of the chapter didn't work. I don't mean it didn't work without the original ending. I mean it never worked. But that big finish was distracting and interesting enough to keep me from noticing. Now that I was forced to revisit Chapter SIx without the same finale, I could see that the plot was hollow, the character personalities weren't quite right, and the whole thing seemed out of sync with the other chapters.

Members of the audience, you will never get to read Chapter Six in its original form. Never. Don't go getting curious. Reading it will only make you sad.

Rewriting Chapter Six proved difficult. I wasn't free to write whatever I felt like. Chapter Six had to accomplish certain goals, the most important one being that the end for the new Chapter Six still had to match up with the beginning of the old Chapter Seven. I found myself mentally pulling Chapter Six apart into it's basic components. I put the parts I liked in one pile and threw the rest away. It took a few passes to put the pieces back together into a unified story. Gradually, I recognized exactly which moments were holding me back and which themes I should have been exploring all along.

Now that I've finished the new script for Chapter Six, I feel like it was well worth the time and even the delays. The new Chapter Six isn't just "better than the old one," "good for a repair job," or "successfully patched all the holes." It's actually a good story. And if I've done my job, not only will you enjoy it, you won't even know that it wasn't a part of the original script.

Except I just told you.

Forget all that you read.

Marj

www.lepusstudios.com

Draconis Wicked - Chapter Five Retrospective

Today brought a close to Draconis Wicked Chapter Five: The Journal of Dr. Yapix.

SPOILER ALERT: Obviously, This blog will contain many references to Chapter Five and the previous chapters. If you don't want them to be spoiled, I suggest you read the comics first, then come back to the blog.

Chapter Five is one of my favorite chapters. In many ways, it sets the tone for the rest of the story. Chapter Five also gives us the last big piece of establishing information: the final destination of Draconis's journey.

If you're not sure what that means, then we should review everything that's happened so far:

Chapter One: Malcorona sends Draconis to investigate a lost treasure. Draconis learns about the Aurora Crystal and the magic barrier. He decides take the crystal for himself.

Chapter Two: Draconis goes to Phoenix Village, looking for someone he can trick into crossing the barrier for him.

Chapter Three: Draconis, Flight, and Snakey learn that no one can carry the Aurora Crystal across the barrier without absorbing its magic. They also learn about the secret passage to the treasury. Draconis decides to go out into the world and look for the passage entrance.

Chapter Four: Draconis and his crew have no idea where the entrance may be, but Chisel Town seems like a good place to start looking. They cross the Forest of Mists to get there.

Chapter Five: The mines of Chisel Town are a dead end. Instead the team finds Doctor Yapix, who figures out that the passage entrance is on the top of Mount Kyros.

As you can see, all of these early chapters are not exactly about Draconis going on his quest. They are about Draconis figuring out how to start his quest. It's sort of similar to Legend of Zelda games like A Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time. In these games, Link starts his adventure with a small quest (collecting spirit stones). When the small quest is complete (when Link gets the Master Sword), Link's real quest (the longer, tougher quest) is revealed to him. Draconis has finished his smaller quest and is now at the start of his real quest. Everything from now on will be about Draconis and his team finding a way to the top of Mount Kyros.

"Wait, how can the chapters ahead be the biggest part of the story? Can't Draconis just turn around and just walk up that Mountain?" Well, obviously, things are going to complicate this trip and Draconis won't be able to take the straightest path (even if he would like to.) If you need an estimate of how much longer this will take, I'd say the story is about 25% complete.

"Hey, you spent the first fourth of the story just getting to the starting point?" Well, I'm not in a hurry to finish Draconis Wicked. After all, it's a series of episodes, not a movie that needs to be told in two hours or less. But I also don't want this tale to linger on until everyone's bored with it. When I outlined the plot, I felt really comfortable with the length of each section and the length of the story as a whole. Spending this much time getting started won't seem strange by th time the stroy is through.

Besides, I may have dragged out some of the early chapters because they were my only chance to take advantage of different roles and character dynamics. Since a big part of the story is about building a team, it was important to enjoy each character combo while I had it. I can't go back to a point when it's just Draconis by himself, or just Draconis and Flight, so I had limited opportunities to play with those situations. I wanted to make sure I used these moments to their fullest before moving on to the next point.

"So, what's next?" One part of the story ends while another one begins. Some of the next chapters may feel a little different now that we have a larger team and a clearer goal. But much the mood will stay the same - Draconis still has the same attitude and the same relationship with his other party members. Speaking of which, Draconis has a real solid team now, but it's not quite complete yet. There are still plenty of reasons to keep reading. I hope you'll stick with us into the new frontier.

-Marj

www.lepusstudios.com