[This is for anyone who's been following or knows where to go to catch up on my graphic novel "Emily's Child"]So I've been trying to figure out what are these hard questions that needed to be answered before I started writing and creating this comic, long before it was stolen from me. Now the questions have gotten impossible! Oakland just seems to be a no-furries-land in the sense that no anthro work could survive if it based it's settings on Oakland or the rest of the Bay Area...I've been going back and forth over and over again about the psycology, evolution, and culture of the demographics in my city as well as the nature and biology of the animals, specifically wolves (seeing as the main characters are kit foxes but I'm appling the same canine behaviors of wolves into the rest of the family) and for some reason they just won't work either for the main character (Raquel) or the rest of the other major populations in my city.What won't work? That was my first question. Turning the social behaviors of wolves into mental conditions and then considering a anthro-canine with a "omega wolf" mentality as a "disabled" opens up a pleathora of trouble in any city even at the first stage in this sentence! No such 'person' could live to see adulthood at least with out recieving even more severe physical and/or mental impairments! One out of every...two persons would take advantage of him/her even if it's just short-changing at a supermarket, and that applies to everyone here. If they new about their disorder, that statistic changes from "take advantage" to "exploit" or "physically/verbally abuse." Emily's Child seems to be a very kindergarden slang to what nicknames the gangs here could really give them.Now back to the syndrome itsself. Raquel for the longest part had always this fantastic, if not miraculous way of always acting as a pure altruist whenever her "disorder" reared (or should I say lowered) it's ugly head in front of others. However the function of a "Omega Wolf" within it's pack was not to just be an altruist. I've had the hardest time reading up on their "ritualized" behaviors and personal/interpersonal attitudes, but there are a lot of aspects to this mental state where this compleately altruistic character does not coencide with the disorder I made for her (and the rest of the canine population) placing all this scientefic data into consideration.It is also a difficult problem converting these behaviors into the interactions with modern society of the human world, especially in Oakland. For example would wolves view each of their social systems e.g school, work, family, transportation, shopping/restraunt centers, as "packs?" Canines in general (not the domestic kind as much, although I'm not considering the evolutionary aspects of having both interacting as 'equals' in my anthro world just yet; seeing as I may have pets like "Author" has) would have trouble interacting with people in every way at this point because of the issue of which "pack" are they loyal to. They would all have to develop external hierarchies for these "packs" in order to adjust and a lot of help learning to tolerate dealing with "rivals" or "competitors" outside of their main "pack." I had even considering applying this into certain state/government structures such as Raquel's school district making it law that canines with siblings must all go to the same school to create a structural bridge from the parents 'pack' to the schools 'pack...'However with all this in consideration, does Raquels disability even apply anymore, seeing as all of the natural-born canines would have some mental/psycological difficulty with the world around them; or does it give her a more special or severe disorder? If there was a fight within Raquels own family, would she try to get in the middle of it to take the tensions onto herself? Would she do the same thing at school or in the general public, where people outside her family would all the more be ok with, even greatful to take out any anger or stress onto her? Seeing as she comes from a Latino/Mexican background, how does their traditional, modern, and subculture affect/interact with the the social behaviors of canines and how does that affect Raquel?So the first ultimate question that you've asked me thousands of times (though not this way) wich I'm finally getting to from all this is: What do I want to say? I have expirienced the tip of the iceburg with my regions rap, 'ghteeo' and 'n****/gangsta' pride culture at it's very worst or best depending on how you take it, and I can't see a way Raquel could help these people the way she is. That really was the origional idea was that Raquel changed or even redemeed all of this subculture, but even if I narrow the number of people down that Raquel touches, I don't know how she could reach one of these persons unless that had some hint of aristrocracy or elitism within their or their families persona (ie they aren't dependant of social security or welfare; or they don't use public transportation; or they have a more 'refined taste,' etc). This may be because I haven't developed Raquels enough and I'm only treating her as if she experienced the same things I did or had the same qualities that I had. I know that I'm far too obscure to be projected in any way as Raquel, and besides I don't react at all for the most part to the tragedies and evils I see in Oakland, while Raquel does in an all too perfect manner in a Christian's world-viewpoint!Just to keep track the two main questions on the plate now are:What do I want to say-before I even take on a premise and summary for the story-because not eveyone can come up with a raving success like Alfred Hitchkock; who could just visit a city and come up with a blockbuster right after considering how great it would be to have a muder in that town.How can Raquel change anyone, or even survive the way she is? Is it all conscidence, or does she have a talent for developing this wisdom?One thing I did notice I'm telling you all here is that this area has a overpowering/predominant mindset that pervades in every social hierarchy (as humans) of my city and the cities surrounding it extending to hundereds of miles around! Could it be that I wish to address or take on this attitude with my graphic novel? It could be that Raquel does see this attitude so strongly that it convinces her to assioate everyone to be of the same "pack" she was raised in as well as interpets this attitude as the instruction to how she must behave within this pack ie. submissive, nonviolent, and altrustic; (whereas the origional concept to the disorder was that "Omega Wolf" anthros lost their sese of aggression to the point that their entire region of the brain for it was turned off, disconnected, or miswired). This still brings up two conflicts to that because I can't see how she can get that interpetation when this predominant attitude is the exact opposite-so it would seem her self-proclaimed "role" within the city is to be "at war" with it through her humble, altrustic ways. There is also the probelem of the origional conflict with Raquels personal desire; to become a basketball playet in with WNBA like her older sister desires; implying that Raquel sees her eldest sister as the main dominant figure in her "family"/"pack" as well as the two having the closest relationships compared to anyone else plus a lack of any impression/relationship onto both of them from their parents.Loads to think about. Is this comic impossible to start/finish at this state? Seeing as I lost nearly all the story notes both old and new due to the robbery (I got a lot of the schoolwork and other notepads recovered thanks to some of the papers having contact information and the lady who's yard they were dumped in was kind enough to have them returned to me); is that a sign that I should just give this-and my wishes/prayers/desired_actions for this city up; permanately even? Or do you see a light to any of this that could could offer to me to help me get this project up in running with the fullest sucess? I really need to know soon, I can't focus on anything else (regarding school and other work that is-I'm still trying to pray,fast,etc) at the moment...Thanks for reading at least; and peace to all the rest of you bretheren,Michael TuttleP.S.EDIT: Some extra questions came into me head yesterday about the whole "predominant mentality" issue...Am I saying it's wrong/evil? Am I just exposing it to the ret of the world? What do I want Raquel to fell about it? Am I just exposing our culture in the eyes of the last person who whould be living there to my audience who would already feel that way if they did move over here? What if I addressed "us" directly through the comic, even though it's physically, much less culturally impossible to get comics into their hands? Do I want my world to be changed; what aspects; and how? On the other hand, I don't want to just 'copy and paste' my settings/enviornment onto Raquels, but if it had the same ideals, what would Raquel herself want to change, considering her disability, and how can she? Should Raquel herself change rather than change those around her, or vice versa? Does the story really have to revolve around "change"? It's an amazing comic if it's just about Raquel "surviving" if not even "succeeding" in this obscure world. Though it would still be hard to write and both ideas seem too much like a soap opera, drama, or reality tv show...and I want this comic to fall into a genre both the critics are craving and praising or engrossing themselves with...or do I?
I guess I must also be telling you that I needed to start over anyway...Image the time I have trying to think this if not more in-depth with all my other stories or story-ideas...but I'm just feeling silly right now for some reason...I'm sure it's just a temporary spell...try to be serious as much as possible when responding to this please.
Comments