How Something Or Other Should Have Ended

Copperfox

Copperfox

Well-known member
YouTube runs humorous videos about what might be a better ending for a given story; they call this "How It Should Have Ended." Like, say, Tonto tells the Lone Ranger, "Go find a sidekick who won't get tired of you running things. I'm going to find a sidekick from the Osage, the Shawnee, the Apache or the Iriquois. I'll call myself The Lone Indian, so THERE."

Mere days ago, on a thread I called "How THAT Should Have Ended," I imagined an epilogue to the Paul Mantee space movie "Robinson Crusoe on Mars." Mantee's film had a satisfying conclusion; nothing needed to be corrected. I just considered what people back on Earth might do with the information.

God knows why, but I'm having difficulty accessing "THAT should have." Thus this FURTHER thread. Watch this space.
 
In order to produce the full impact of this example, I need to hold back the payoff until the NEXT post. So don't look at the NEXT post until you've perused what I offer here.

All right, imagine you're a comicbook author born before World War Two. In your present time, stories can logically have protagonists who are war veterans. You imagine three separate situations which traumatize your leading characters. One, a dive-bomber pilot in the Pacific Theater, is the only survivor of his squadron, and inevitably feels survivor's guilt. Secondly, a female servicemember is adrift on wreckage with an injured man; he purposely lets himself sink so she can live on. Thirdly, just AFTER the war, two men following up on atomic- energy research learn that co-workers have suffered fatal radiation poisoning, a la Chernobyl. These two are now duty-bound to help develop safer uses of nuclear energy. (Don't even try saying "But there aren't any safe uses!" Reactor safety has been hugely improved since Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.)

The four survivors resolve to carry forward in good causes, honoring the departed friends who passed the torch.

Snare drum roll......

More snare drums join the roll......

Bass drum adds to the suspense.....

But the cymbals won't clash until you're prepared to be surprised.


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Last chance NOT to look........



We live in an era when ridiculing goodness is fashionable.

Remember that the already-mentioned heroes are willing to perish doing brave deeds beyond the call of duty. <<

The already- mentioned heroes would never even consider mocking heroism.

CYMBALS CLOSE TO CLASHING......

The already-mentioned heroes didn't have to be recruited out of prison, motivated by the promise of reduced sentences if they play along. They didn't choose to believe that heroism is a joke.



The altruistic WW2-era heroes share NOTHING BUT a group name with Amanda Waller's operation.


That's right........ the group name is THE SUICIDE SQUAD!!!!! .
 
2001: A Space Odyssey -- Star Child turns to look at the camera and says, "T-T-Th-That's ALL, Folks!!"
 
ShastaoftheNineRealms said:
Whether we've met or not, I think I like you.
Click to expand...
Thanks, Shasta. I'm a 66 year old youth minister and chaplain whose major publications are about youth development. I also owe a great debt in my spiritual journey to C. S. Lewis. Maybe we'll meet someday in that great somewhere.
 
Talk about something or other! My own "Spacebullies Two" epic (begun long before Mel Brooks ACTUALLY accumulated enough money to produce a "Space-BALLS Two" for real) offered plural corrections:

I had my version of Yoda tell my Luke-plus-Han character WHAT place he's a prince OF. Once reaching Arrakis (which I renamed "Srirachiss"), GROAN Starr and "Puke" learn that, although Muad'dib ("Muddy-Drip") died, he died WITHOUT ever becoming a destructive warmonger. Princess Trala-lalia never becomes an abomination; and Paul's son DOESN'T turn into a huge evil blobby monster who loves ruining an entire galaxy just because.

There, I've shown that there are LOTS of things whose endings require correction.
 
Yes, it HAS formed a new sub-genre. Going all the way back, I thought of "Spacebullies Two" because (1) in "Spaceballs," Mel Brooks as Master Yogurt told Lone Star to expect a sequel, "Spaceballs Two, the Search for More Money;" and (2) I was sick and tired of the militant atheist Frank Herbert actively imposing hopeless disasters on the honorable House Atreides. So I depicted GROAN Starr, Princess VIXEN and more besides as looking for a chance to relieve OTHER characters from arbitrarily- imposed calamities.

Around this time, the CW streaming network was subjecting Green Arrow, The Flash and other DC heroes to gratuitous humiliation. It came naturally for my "ragtag band" (yawn, everybody always uses the expression "ragtag band") of good guys to get ahead of this hope -crushing influence (hence my expression "Hopecrusher Central") before it could spread a contagion of existential pessimism. Since the first Earth-variant my posse visited was the one with streaming television trampling on the hope of goodness getting the upper hand, I labelled it "SEEDUBB Earth."

In a snowballing effect, like Frodo Baggins collecting new comrades on his way east, Groan Starr and company moved along to "Urth," where there was a version of the Justice League. Continuing from there, some traveled over to "Terra," where a version of the Winter Soldier lived, and where my version of a Stargate was available.

What makes "Spacebullies Two" its own sub-genre is the notion that multiple iterations of the Earth could exist simultaneously within ONE three-dimensional reality, while NOT requiring the Spock-has-a-beard plot device of parallel worlds. I have "Janitors of the Universe" functioning like an airport control tower, arranging for assorted hero-teams to commute hither and thither. With a few exceptions, none of these teams are compelled to wait their turn for an available wormhole. For example, I've had a version of Thor meet She-Ra from the Masters of the Universe franchise, made characters derived from Starship Troopers encounter a Babylon Five spinoff, brought anime characters into the Star Wars universe, shown a version of Indiana Jones flying to a faraway planet, caused a version of Doctor Manhattan from "Watchmen" to be interrogated by Perry Mason, let a version of "Blake's Seven" overlap Star Trek, shown TWO separate Harley Quinns joining the side of good, and let a version of Batman marry a version of Britney Spears.

Evening Star himself lately asked me to split up my Spacebullies characters into separate posses, in order that the management of the new YouTube channel would notice us having more THREADS active, not merely many VIEWS on existing threads.

If you're interested in adding characters of your own, please assume that they belong OUTSIDE of my "Spacebullies Two" sub-reality. For instance, Evening Star is creating threads which expand the Narnian universe, such as his Byron-on-Wells series.

Or, of course, make up original stories (fantasy OR non-fantasy) which don't interact with ANY other thread.
 
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