Story Scribbles

What type of structure do I want for this?

I think I’m gonna go with Episodic. Just cause I like episodes.

Each episode will have a goal, a mission, that leads closer to the bigger goal of the series. However the season goes.

What’s the goal of the season?

- Stop the main villain from getting the second half of the weapon used to summon the monster. They need to find the second half of the Signet before the villain does. In order to do that, they need to solve a bunch of puzzles, go on adventures. Each adventure brings them closer to the Signet and to uncovering the truth. Each episode they face off with one of Professor Chaos’ henchmen. The final adventure they face off with Professor Chaos himself.

Who’s the main villain?

- Professor Chaos

Who is Professor Chaos?

- Arch-typical villain who wants to rule Strongland.

- He has one half of the signet and is looking for the second one.

- He believes that true freedom can only come through Chaos. And Chaos can only come by destroying the status quo. And to destroy the status quo he needs power. And to get power he needs the monster. But what he doesn’t realize is that the monster will have power over him.

Notes

- Establish that Danny is the one that stuck his neck out for Eliza. So that when she betrays him it hurts that much more.

- Establish Danny and Eliza’s relationship. Maybe he’s the guy whom Eliza trusts. He likes her, but she doesn’t

- At the beginning when their father is telling them the story. It should be done in his study. Maybe they come in and ask him to tell them a story. We should establish he’s a widower.

- Establish a relationship between John and Eliza from when they were young to justify him not hurting her when he becomes a monster.

- Eliza has been working for a while when we meet her. Establish an existing tumultuous relationship with Danny. Establish how Eliza still lives with her parents. Her parents don’t know what she does. And she keeps it away from them. Plot C: But at some point the parents realize what their daughter does, maybe when she saves their life.

- What is Eliza’s and Danny’s relationship like?

- Eliza and Danny should already be chasing Chaos. Let’s try to introduce some of Eliza’s memory there somehow

Scribbles:

How to best establish John and Eliza?

-> We need to show how they are when they are young. I’m thinking we need to show that Eliza always protected her younger brother

-> They were always inseparable.

Episode 01

We need to introduce the villain and the mission right away

Old Man Storm tells the story of the monster to his little kids. They enquire about whether it’s true. He tells them that’s a story for another night. He puts them to sleep. John and Eliza wake up on the sound of aggressive dialogue. John tells Eliza to wait and he goes down and watches his dad in his study talking to a man his dad refers to as Professor Chaos John can’t see the man clearly. The man orders his henchman to take Old Man Storm prisoner. Storm tells him he has kids. Professor Chaos tells him he should’ve thought about that before stealing his money and that he’ll find him the signet. Storm vows never to help him. They storm out of the office and when John tries to interject he is subdued easily. Eliza watches from the stairs.

John wakes up to find that there are a couple of adults talking about adoption. He escapes out of the window after promising he’ll come back for Eliza. But he never does. We know from the voice over.

Episode 02

It’s 10 years later. Eliza now 22 walks out of her house. Her adoptive mother comes running to her to give her her lunch. Eliza complains that the first day of her job as a private investigator and her mom still makes her lunch. Her mother walks her out of the house and she gets into an expensive car and instructs the driver to wait for her until she gets into the office. Eliza: “Mom”. Mom: “Good bye honey, I’ll miss you.” Eliza: “Bye mom.”

Eliza hides the lunchbox her mom gave her in the car as the driver opens up for her and she walks out.

Eliza walks into the office and a couple of co-workers make fun of her driver escort. She hears one of them say that she only got it because her parents are rich. Another one says that they aren’t really her parents. They adopted her. The first responds, lucky her. They should’ve adopted me.

Eliza sits at her desk and takes out a picture of her and her father and her brother and puts it on the desk, “I’ll find you guys. I will.”

Eliza gets called into her boss’ office and he’s not happy that he’s been forced to hire her. Tells her that she got a freebie because of her dad’s connections. Wanting to prove herself she looks at a map and says that she knows they’ve been following this thief. The map has a bunch of marks on the different places that were robbed. Eliza impresses the boss by deducing several facts about the thief (TBD). She’s also able to deduce when the next robbery will be. He’s looking for very specific things. The boss is impressed and he calls in the lead investigator, Danny, to assign Eliza to work with him. He’s not happy. That’s when they get a call about a robbery in progress, proving that Eliza is right and they go after him.

Episode 03

They arrive to the place being robbed. Danny tells her to stay in the car while he goes in. She doesn’t listen and she goes after him. They realize that what has been stolen will cost the insurance company a lot of money. Eliza realizes that the thief is still there. They surprise him. The thief escapes. They chase him, but Eliza is faster than Danny, who’s an older man. She’s able to tackle the thief. It is John her brother, but he doesn’t seem to know her. Danny arrives and he tazes him, thinking that he’s the the thief. They don’t find he artifact he stole.

Episode 04

John is held in a police precinct. Eliza sneaks in and confronts him about what’s going on. He tells her that it’s not what it seems. He doesn’t know who she is. She accuses him of turning her life upside down, because she thought he left and never came back for her intentionally. “Lady, I don’t know who you are and who this John guy is, my name is Bond, James Bond. (TBD: figure out alias name). He tells her that he’s trying to keep the second piece of the signet away from Professor Chaos. John says that Professor Chaos has this man who’s trying to figure out the second piece of the signet. Once Professor Chaos has the full signet he’ll be able to summon the monster. Eliza doesn’t believe these fairy tails. John appears to believe it. Eliza decides to help John escape, after he promises to show her where that man Professor Chaos is working with is, thinking that it is her father.

She helps John escape from the police department.

He betrays her and escapes.

Episode 05

Eliza catches up with John as he is retrieving the artifact. She wants to take it back.

John begs her not to do that, since Professor Chaos doesn’t look kindly on failure. He reveals that his father needs help because he’s sick and he needs the money professor chaos gives him to buy his father the medicine he needs

Eliza meets John’s father and he doesn’t look anything like John. But John seems blinded to that.

There is a tender moment between John and his father. The father clearly doesn’t know anything about John’s life. He thinks that he’s taking care of his fishing business. Eliza doesn’t let on.

Professor Chaos pays them a visit. He taunts John’s father telling John that he is a thief.

Eliza takes the artifact and escapes.

A chase sequence where Professor Chaos chases Eliza captures her, John intervenes and tries to help. But they both end up in Professor’s Chaos dungeon.

The Villain takes the second half of the signet. “At last.”

Episode 06

John and Eliza are in a dungeon. John blames Eliza for getting captured. But she tells him she put her life in line for him, not like him who ran and left her. He tells her that she should get off the story that they are siblings.

That’s when they notice another person in the dungeon. It’s Storm, Eliza and John’s father.

A character building moment as Storm apologizes and admits that it’s all his fault.

Professor Chaos comes in throws the second piece of the signet saying that it’s useless.

“You lied to me. This will be the last time.” He speaks to Storm. He approaches him and shoves Eliza out of the way. John runs to her aid. Chaos drags the man out.

Storm motions to Eliza not to intervene.

When Chaos tortures Storm, he says something which triggers a memory for Eliza (TBD - something from ep 1), by which she knows how to get the Signet. Eliza reveals that she’s his daughter and she knows how to get the signet.

Storm begs her not to do that, but she says its the only way to save his life.

Eliza says that she’ll need her brother’s help. John says that he’s not her brother and he’d like to get out of there, but Chaos forces him to help.

Eliza promises that she can take care of his father, because of her rich parents.

Chaos agrees to send them and tell them if they don’t come back he will kill Eliza’s father

Before they depart John tells Chaos that Eliza isn’t planning to get him the signet, but he will as long as he forgets about his father’s debt.

Episode 07

At her father’s old place, they go in and Eliza uses her memory to find a mapj, her father’s notes and a small device with rotating rings. The map tells them where to go (TBD - establish earlier). It’s a city in the middle of the mountain desert of Strongland, “The Forbidden City”.

When they look up the map, they don’t see any island over there.

Danny gets a call that Eliza has been spotted.

A character building moment as they go through the stuff and Eliza shows John pictures of them as a family, John seems to soften up to the idea, but then he rejects it saying that all he remember is his real father rescuing from the ocean. That man in dungeon is a man who chose his passion over his family. That’s the first thing he remembers. He doesn’t remember anything else.

That’s when Danny comes knocking in and trapping Eliza with a sizable police force, after all she has helped John escape.

Danny tells her that there is still a chance for her to reclaim her position. She’s giving up her dream by going down this path.

John decides to give himself up to give Eliza a chance to go find the signet

But before John leaves Eliza discovers an underground escape tunnel (TBD - need to establish this earlier on)

They go through the tunnel and exit behind the cops.

Danny notices and gives chase. There is a car chase and they end up by the sea at a dockyard.

They have a chance to get on a boat, but John doesn’t do the sea any more.

As the police force gets closer Chaos comes to the rescue in his helicopter.

John and Eliza climb in. Danny catches up with them and hangs on the base of the helicopter.

Chaos tries to get rid of him, but Eliza says that if he does that she won’t help him.

Eliza pulls Danny up into the helicopter as they head into the horizon

Episode 08

John approaches the area where the Forbidden City should be, but there is nothing there. He says, “I told you there is nothing,”

That’s when they notice a weird reflection that makes them realize there is an invisible dome.

Chaos pulls up just in time

Eliza takes out the device and says, what if this is the key.

She tries a couple of different permutations and when she finally gets it right, the device shines and suddenly the helicopter goes into a tales spin, when a huge storm emanating from the dome engulfs it.

John wakes up as an animal licks his face. He scrambles away from it.

He looks around at an the ruins of a city

He goes and finds Danny checking Eliza. “Well thanks for checking up on me.”

After a bit of “It’s your fault for getting us here” conversation, Danny sides with Eliza. John: “Weren’t you going to arrest her, now your suddenly on her side?”

John tries to leave but finds that there is some sort of force preventing him from getting out.

They discover that Chaos has taken the map, but the notes are still with Eliza. Eliza says that we have to find that signet before Chaos does or no one is safe. John says that he thought she didn’t believe in these fables. She says that recent events have given her a change of mind. The notes have a cryptic poem translated from an old writing her father has discovered.

The poem talks about the location where the sun sets, but also about having to pass multiple obstacles. They track the sun and they head there.

(TBD: come up with a few obstacles they must overcome together. We can build the relationship between John and Eliza more in there as both of them take turns helping each other. Reflecting how they were when they were younger)

They enter a temple that shows images of the war that took place between the monster and the people of Strongland.

They end up at a puzzle on the ground which the poem talks about.

Chaos surprises them and forces Eliza to solve it.

Episode 09

They are able to get the signet

John tricks Chaos and steels the signet and he’s the one who puts it together.

John turns into the monster, as if the monster forms around him in a whirl of wind.

They run away from him.

“I am death”

Danny tries to protect Eliza, but the monster flings him easily.

The monster tries to kill Danny, but when Eliza gets in the way he doesn’t harm her.

The monster heads to the edge of the city and he brings down the force field around the city

Episode 10

Eliza and Danny free Old Man Storm.

As they go into the city it has turned into chaos.

There are people who are looting, buildings burning.

Someone tries to attack them and steal their money, but Eliza and Danny subdue him.

How the hell does the monster cause all this. The monster, the great deciever, makes people think that they can be happy by hurting each other in all sorts of way. And then he feeds off the misery. He gets more powerful the more evil is carried out. The more people obey him the more he becomes a ruler over them.

Storm says that he must be destroyed. Eliza reveals that John is the monster. The monster must feed off his pain.

Storm tells her that only John can break the spell. The monster feeds off his pain an loneliness. (TBD - his pain/powerlessness/envy has to come out in scenes in previous episodes)

Eliza: How can we reach him.

Danny: You remember he didn’t harm you. Even though he’s like that. He’s still not going to harm you.

Eliza decides to face off with the monster against her fathers wishes.

Episode 11

Eliza and Danny go to where the monster is wrecking havoc.

There is a military contingency trying to subdue him to no effect.

Eliza convinces the commander to let her approach him. “It’s your life.”

Danny tries to stop her. She apologizes for treating him badly. And admits that she’s always looked up to him.

Eliza goes and faces off with her brother the monster.

They have a heart to heart and at that moment he weakens and she can actually see her brother through the monster’s body. She reaches for him and they touch hands.

Eliza: I love you no matter what. You’re my brother; my flesh and my blood. Monster: Are you going to love me after I kill your parents.

The monster goes to Eliza’s parents.

Episode 12

Danny had noticed how the armour around him weekend when talking with Eliza. He suggests that they should use that to their advantage.

It’s her brother she says. But he counters and says, “He’s not your brother anymore.”

Eliza rejects the idea.

Danny talks to the general and he justifies the move is to save Strongland.

Eliza catches up with the monster as he’s about to destroy her parent’s house and again she gets in front of him.

She reminds him of memories of how they were when they were a child.

He rejects that and says all he remembers is being abandoned and having to survive on his own.

She shows him a video of them playing.

The armor around him starts to melt away.

The sniper readies himself to shoot.

Eliza jumps to snatch the signet hanging around John’s neck.

The sniper fires and Eliza is the one that gets hit.

Eliza is able to break the signet off the necklace.

John’s monster completely dissipates.

The signet glows in Eliza’s hands before she completely dissappears in a burst of light.

2 years later John works in a secluded place in Strongland doing something (TBD), when he sees his sister. He rushes to her but she’s no longer there… TADA… to be continued.