Need some help with a backstory

[Brickhouse]

So I decided to come here for a little help creating the backstory for a sci-fi epic feature film trilogy.

So far, the story takes place 500 years after the Axis won world war 2. The Japanese control all of North America, Australia, and all of the Pacific. The German Reich controls all of Asia, Europe and Africa. In control of the Reich is Adolf Hitler the 8th, and Emperor Meiji controls the Japanese occupied territory.

The Germans and Japanese have started to run out of livable space, and begin attempts at colonizing the Deneb system where multiple habitable planets exist. However, things become difficult since the whole Deneb system is already occupied by another humanoid race as well as many primitive native tribes and creatures.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, a large group of Ukrainian rebels start a revolution and take over the city of Kiev.


Thats all I have so far. As I said, it's intended to be an epic trilogy, and it requires a lot more work. There are a couple major conflicts going on, which is what I need ideas for. Once I have a good backbone, then I can create characters and character conflicts.

And of course, most importantly is the action. I'm hoping to have at least one epic space battle, an epic native vs axis battle, as well as others. Things you probably need to know: The main story will follow one of the Ukrainian rebels but of course, there will be lots of characters.

The reason I come here for help, is because I feel that this forum is comprised of the most talented, devoted sci fi creators/fans. I feel like your imput would be the most helpful.

Thanks

[emotepix]

Hey Brick

Okay, I'll jump in.

Couple of comments for you...

a) I know that you fully intend to be the next Lucas. However, start with making your first scipt/story the best it can be. i.e. ditch the "epic feature film trilogy" part unless your family is beyond extremely rich, owns Intel, or similar. Sounds a little, well, short of practical, let's say;

b) there were three nations involved in the Axis Powers, not two;

c) you have your work cut out for you just researching and making believable the premise behind your first conceit - how in the heck did the Axis Powers win World War Two? Are we in a parallel universe? What happened? As I said, you'd better be very convincing, because there are people out here who a) read and b) read history;

d) who is AH the 8th? who is His Serene Highness the Emperor Meiji? Not just their names, but who are they? fill out their histories and you'll fill your own research reserves;

e) what the heck is the Deneb system? And how did AH the 8th and EM get there? A ton of research implied here. Is this hard sci fi, where you have to justify facts with real physics? Things like FTL travel, string theory and time dilation? Or is this superhero stuff where people can beam to the next galaxy without losing a second of their lives?

f) And then of course the most important thing is character, not action. And the one character you've ignored completely so far is your hero - the Ukranian rebel. Find out where he came from, what made him, how he changed from a boy into a man (or a girl into a woman), and that will actually dictate the action s/he has to take, which in turn dictates the action of the story.

And no, you only have here the Hero and his gang, the Axis powers and their gang, and the Deneb characters and their gang. If you reduce the Axis and the Deneb gangs to their leadership, then you actually only have three main characters to live with. The rest arise from those main three.

Story is structure. There is a book that I consider to be the definitive one on the topic called, co-incidentally, "Story", by Robert McKee. Run, do not walk, to your book supplier and get a copy and keep it by your side until you can recite the core of each and every chapter and verse. Then set it aside and get to it!

Finally, set your original intentions aside and just work on the story.

Get the story right.

This, in my world, means telling the story, out loud, to real people.

Each story beat. Many times. In real life.

Each time you tell it, you'll be a) learning it yourself, b) watching your audience (the person you're telling) for reactions and c) fine tuning your story and its delivery as you go.

Eventually, aafter around a dozen or so tellings, you'll have sped up the slow bits, cut out the uninteresting bits, clarified the bits that got frowns or deer-in-the-headlight looks from your audience, and streamlined the story so you can tell it in a few well-chosen and "developed" paragraphs.

Congrats.

You've just developed your pitch.

Your story will have "settled" (i.e. no more major changes, you'll be telling 99% the same story every time now, with only minor tweaks to allow for other people now, not for your own story), it will have legs (people will love it and start talking about it, which is how every single story teller since the beginning of time got respect for their craft) and, most importantly, you'll start to get one feeling above all -

you'll start to get a good feel about why you're telling this particular story, centered around these particular people, at this particular time.

In other words, you'll have defined what, in current Hollywood terms, the "take-away" or the "take home" is - what's in it for the audience? How are you, through this story, enriching their lives and their life experience by giving your their time and attention and listening to your story?

Once you have your story structured, this is your game plan. It can be, as you say, a three part movie. Or a 52 part movie. Or one movie. Who cares about the parts. Make the story good first. The parts will take care of themselves, become self-evident, further down the road.

Worry about making your characters believable. Do we understand what you're talking about when you say Deneb? (we certainly understand when someone says "Klingon", for instance.)
And - what's our take home? Why should we care about your people? What's to love, even in your bad guys? (don't forget, even Al Capone thought he was a good guy - in particular, for you, read "Mein Kampf" or a translation thereof. Get into the mind of a disgruntled and persecuted young clerk called Adolf Schickelgruber and see what moved him enough to get off his backside and change the world).

And, by the way, if your story fails at any of the above, then you'll know to move on to the next uber-Lucas idea before you commit the next year to writing it out in a room on your own, or to give it a real rework until that your story sings to all souls, yours and ours both. Think about the lines around the block for Lucas and you know I'm right.

Last thought: if you are writing for Hollywood, forget about owning your project after you've made the sale.

The reason they buy it is so they can take it and change it *and make it theirs*.

If they change it more than 50% at the end, guess what? You lose writing credit. That's a WGA rule. So yes, it's possible that, in theory, after 10 sets of total rewrites, nobody actually gets legal WGA credit for the movie, if none of the writers contribute more than 50% of the film's final script.

If you want to retain creative control to some degree, either

a) win 10 lotteries,

b) discover how to really take us to the Deneb system and make all the natives there friendly, helpful and lots of fun, then contact Virgin Galactic at once;

c) learn all about 3D animation or similar means of making the entire opus yourself, or

d) write a novel first, not a screenplay.

You can always move on to the film rights and screenplays later.

HTH
JM2c, YMMV
Cheers
C

[Pagrin]

Wow. Excellent advice emotepix.
Seriously Brickhouse, read and understand the advice. I've seen a lot of people with grand ideas (myself included) who haven't done jack with them, because they thought they could jump right in and do it all themselves.
Which brings me to the only other advice I can come up with. When you write something, put your heart and soul into it, and then show it to someone who couldn't give a fig either way and get them to read it and sit back and wait for the pain. Because if they come back and say it was crap, you have a lot of work to do. If they say it was so so, you have a lot of work to do. If they say it was great, then and only then do you look at actually producing it.

[johnfields]

ditto the above advice - really consider what would have happened- What about the Soviet Union? Hitler considered America to be an aryan nation so I doubt he would have allowed the japanese to keep it - consider how long the germans and Japanese would have remained allies - Germany with it's rigid racial laws and the heavily shinto Japan - there's a fight just waitng to happen.