It has been a loooong time since I made a post here and it's about time I got around to it. Luckily, I just finished Descendants #45 'The Gremlin and the Game', (link) so it does give me something to write about. And, as it turns out, there are a bunch of interesting things that came out of this seemingly standalone issue.
So let's get to it. The full lowdown under the cut.
The core idea behind this story has been around since around the time I did the arcade scene in 'The Beach Episode'. The idea, as it started out, was that it would be the first 'on screen' introduction of the villain, 'Jack'. He would ransom players in the immersion pods and the Descendants would have to link into the game to save the day.
What kept this from coming into being, was my lack of interest in Jack as a character. Plain and simple, he's just a technopath, much like the one shown in 'All Girls Want Bad Boys'. And while I contend that any power can be made interesting with proper characterization, Jack, who was created as a one-off joke about the low-grade villains Life Savers, Inc had been fighting off screen, just wasn't worth building up in my opinion.
So the idea was shelved, only to come back to me in year three, when the plan was for Duvall to hire a hacker to lock a specific target (one Tome wanted to kidnap and the Descendants wanted to recruit to the school) in the virtual world of Deathgate in order to observe their reactions.
This too fell by the wayside as I decided I preferred a slow burn on the Seven Daughters of Duvall plot, establishing Joy and Charity in particular as lasting characters before laying out their father's plans. Be ready for this to take the stage in Year 5!
Eventually though, there came a time in Year 4, where I looked back and noticed that a) the supporting cast that weren't Tink hadn't gotten any love lately, and b) the magical world had been similarly ignored as I focused on the whole Confluence arc.
Therefore, when it turned out that I needed an issue to fit between the marriage arc and 'The Juniper Chronicles', I linked this old plot to Faerie, which in turn brought Lisa into the story.
In doing so, I earned a reason to flesh out the popular culture of the Descendants Universe, creating thirty new companies, shows, comics, and characters on display at the convention. Some made it into the story (like Iron Woobie, a nod to the trope of the same name and to the first HARDAC episode of Batman: the Animated Series (woobie is Barbara Gordon's teddy bear).
I also got the chance to expand on Faerie. As said before, what was seen in Rise of Morganna was a setting only about the size of Europe, whereas Faerie is actually the size of a planet. The expansion here though was a bit more subtle; we establish that gremlins are not fairies, but a 'native' species, implying that the trolls, ogres and demons aren't native. Their origins will be dealt with likely in Year 6, which isn't to say that we won't see more of Faerie and soon.
The characters of Ron and Jaime were originally going to be just standard, scared innocents for the heroes to save. In writing them though, and the action at the convention, I couldn't help but think about how, in most stories, geeks are always shown freaking out when the 'game turns real', while the cool, jockish action hero just mans up and punches evil in the face.
I decided that I wanted to go in a different direction. For the convention goers, I decided that once people learned that they weren't in physical danger, this emergency would turn into a fun game. But for Ron and Jamie, after the initial shock is worn off, they would be capable of being inspired to heroism alongside Our Heroes. I'm not entirely sure how well that worked, but here's hoping it did.
Ron and Jamie's future isn't set in stone yet, but I would like to add them to the supporting cast in the future.
All in all, this issue was fun to write, especially getting to go geek with all of the convention trappings and the adorable fear on the gremlin's part. I hope that it was even half as much fun to read.
Until next time!
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