S1E16 - We Accidentally a Whole Episode of this Podcast

Okay, so here's the deal. Jack and I were recording for my other podcast, let's Get Weird about. And we are. We were, like, three hours deep into a conversation about Starship Troopers and both the book and the movie, and we've been staying mostly on topic. We've been good, but we didn't just hit, like, the three hour mark. We just accidentally did an episode of behind the Locked Doors where we just, like, talked about it takes a wolf and a problem I've been having for, like, 20 solid minutes. And I. I can't put it in the other podcast. So it is an episode of behind the Locked Doors. It's just weird. So I'm just dumping it here. So enjoy. Whatever. This is.

Off the chain spoilers in here about future projects the way we are in Lockheedaurus, or is this a separate situation?

We're putting the warning now.

Okay.

We've been talking for three hours about Starship Troopers and you. I mean, like, we've. I think we've covered. I'm not gonna say I've covered everything because I will probably. We will probably stop recording. And then I'll be like, oh, shit, we didn't talk about.

Yeah, we'll talk for 20 more minutes.

Yeah. But, like.

Okay, but I want to flag right now spoilers for Scott's horny werewolf project because the stuff that you were putting in the channel the other day about, like, Mouse and his old squad of five guys who you're like, okay. In one single episode. We have to care so much about these guys. Yeah. Was so Starship Troopers flavored to me. Like, the boot camp segments of that, where it's like, you have so little time to get, like, really invested in these guys who are gonna go die in a minute.

Yeah.

And, like, being able to build those relationships quickly and have those, like, tender little details between them that, like, get you invested immediately and, like, make it so that when they die, you're like, fuck, I'm so upset.

Yeah. I think I've mostly broken down to I'm gonna. I don't know. I don't. I don't think I have the time to do all. To do all of that in, like, 5,000 words.

You had a lot of beats you wanted to hit.

Yeah. Well, the thing is, I have time. I could do it if I didn't also have to explain why they all get killed, because that's part of the relevant plot. And so I have to, like, be setting up the big thing. They're not just gonna die randomly in a fight. It's a whole reason for the, for the. For a revenge plot and setting that up is non trivial. So I need to. I need to dedicate time to that. And I don't have that just like that cross purposes at that point.

I know that it's sort of like its own little contained story within this larger narrative, but I'm almost thinking, damn, is there any way to fit that setup into the previous episode or two so that by the time you hit the mouse? Flashbacks, you don't have to deal with all that shit and it just fall. It clicks into place at the end like, oh, my God, this is why this happened.

So the thing that I've been. The way to give myself more time that I've been thinking about is it's possible that I could break that episode into chunks and put it over the course of other episodes as like, oh.

Just like have the little flashbacks inserted along the way.

Yeah. And do it sort of like, I don't think I want to insert that in the middle of a different scene because the episodes flow so well together. But like, maybe at the beginning or the end of every episode you start seeing some of this other thing, you know, and then it's. At some point you figure out what's going on. Right. Like you're going to be like, oh, okay, this is 10 years in the past or something. I don't know. I don't totally love that idea, but it's the best thing I can come up with.

Okay, so have you read the Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson? The original. Okay, yeah.

Do you know the original one? Not any of. Because he keeps reading.

Yeah, I haven't read all the stuff.

I read the first three.

The first three are the ones that I'm talking about. I don't. I can't keep track of all the other shit that's going on. But do you know how there are those journal entries from the. Like, this is just guy you don't know anything about.

Oh, yeah.

At the beginning of every chapter. I don't remember which one it. Maybe it's the first book that like you find out later it was the journals of the guy who became the God emperor or whatever.

Yes.

And you don't know that at the beginning it's like he's just some guy who is like, going on this journey and chronicling the journey. And by the end you find out like, oh my God, I've realized we were getting the point of view of the like, arc villain of this whole, like, previous age. And by then it really hits because you've seen the fallout of all of his choices by the point you find out who he was, and you've also seen the very human side of him from his journals. So it can work. I've seen it done.

That's fascinating, because what you've presented to me, my instinct is to say, well, I've got this character, 21, who's, like the leader of the group. This is their lieutenant, who's in charge of this group. And if I use his journals, that solves a couple of problems because I don't have to worry about people clocking a voice that he can be talking about people. And if he's talking about Mouse, there's no reason for us to believe that's the protagonist.

Yeah, because you don't have Mouse actually speaking.

Right. And it's a different name, and we wouldn't know. So we can talk about this character, and we can then. And then we have more. We probably have more time because I can be somewhat more efficient by talking about his, like, reports and stuff like that and, like. And talking about his own moments with those people. And then we have the. Okay, so then I'd have to. I'd have to conclude that after about. I'd have about six episodes worth of needing to do that before we have the reveal of who Mows is. But we get.

Did you drop one of these even before the first. The very first episode?

Yeah, probably. Because I could also. Because then I could use that as world building. You could talk about, like, the war and stuff as a sort of entry, introduction to what's going on. But then, like. And create confusion because then, like, well, the actual story proper doesn't involve, like, all that stuff's in the past. Right. Like the war's ended and all that stuff. So that creates confusion, which I think is useful in keeping people a little bit off. Off balance. So then what you have. So you have the full story of 21 over the course of these diary entries or journal or first person. First person stuff. And we. And then the Mouse episode itself is part of that same story because he comes in sort of late to this group is how I've imagined it. But the last episode is him. And now you realize what's going. Like we could even do. I could even drop the whole, like, the. Trying to be circumspect about who Mouse is in that episode. We could start with. Yeah, we're using the same narrator and voice actor, and we're doing the same thing that we normally do where we're we're talking, you know, like, where it's just. It's very obvious, like, oh, this is Mouse. And it's been this character that we've been following this whole time, and now we don't. We understand, like, oh, crap, this is him. And I just have to. Yeah. And then that might. That really might work. I'm gonna have to chew on this idea because that solves several of my problems. It gives me more time to work on the misfits. It gives us a lot of time with 21, and it gives us an opportunity to. We still get the reveal, which I kind of like, I've been. It's one of those things where I.

Know you were struggling with the reveal aspect of it.

It's one of those concepts that I like it, and I don't know why I like it. I keep coming at it from different angles and being like, is this in service of the story, or does this just make me feel like a smart writer guy? Because that moment of, like, oh, my God, that's who he is.

Oh, yeah, right.

And, like, that's a thing that is good, and that makes you feel good as a writer when you can pull that off. But is that actually in service of the story, or is that sort of like me just trying to be. Trying to show off or trying to be better than it really needs to be? Is this a darling that needs to be killed? This whole idea of the reveal. But I can't fully divorce myself from it. It feels somehow part of this whole thing, and it makes me. That makes me think, because I can't fully dismiss it. Even when I think to myself, like, I don't know if this is working. I think this may just be my own ego doing this, because I still can't dismiss it. It makes me wonder if I'm missing something about what purpose it actually does. Like, maybe it does serve a purpose, and I just haven't figured out what that is. It could be that. Because the first six episodes are structured like a mystery. Five, six episodes of the series are structured like a mystery. The mystery is who is killing all of the Blackwoods. Like, who's the murderer? The reveal of that is that it's our protagonist. That's the big reveal. So if I can make who the protagonist is. The protagonist is Mouse. If I can make that reveal coincide with the reveal of, oh, now these. That's also the same moment that these two plots intersect. And now we understand the full. Like, you don't even need to explain what happens after this point, like, now I get why. Why our protagonist is doing all the things he's doing.

Yeah. It all, like, clicks into place simultaneously.

Yeah. And that. If I can get that moment, we don't have to, like, drag a reveal over the course of two episodes with multiple things and, like, people. No, it's like, there. If I could get that one crystalline moment of, oh, now this all makes sense. Yeah. I guess that that may be what I'm trying to go for. So maybe I should be thinking about it in terms of that. And if that's the case. Well, go ahead.

You could do this. What Sucker Punch said it was doing and didn't. Where you're going, oh, this was the main character the whole time.

I mean. Yeah. I mean, like, he is the character. I mean, he is the main character.

Right.

But. Yeah, yeah, the. But, like, yeah, the. The reveal. Because if we. And that also makes the production quality of. Because I'm not. I'm not immune to having to, like, worry about how many actors I'm hiring. But if I have one person who does all of 21 stuff and he also does everybody else, then that means I just need one person to do all of that for me.

And rather than five people.

Yeah. Rather than a whole bunch of people and worrying about sound design, it's just like. It's just a straightforward. I work with one person and he gets it done. The one thing that is that I will have to solve if I go that route. The problem I have to solve is telling the story of why the Misfits get. Maybe. Okay, let me run this by you, because maybe. Maybe this is just. We've just fully devolved into. This is now an episode of behind.

The Doors might get, like, cut and put somewhere else or something.

I'm. I might just put it on the behind the Locked Doors feed and be like, hey, by the way, this start. This is after three hours of talking about Starship Troopers. Jack.

Hi, everyone.

Yeah, okay.

So.

Okay, no, I did. I did talk this through with somebody who's not me, because it's one of those things that I don't know if it ever fully fits. So the plot that I have for the Misfits is that they are all of the people who don't like the Ne'er Do Wells and the Runts and the people who have things wrong with them that they don't fit in with the rest of the werewolf organization. So they're the odd men out everywhere.

The Misfits.

Yeah, the Misfits. So they get the idea Is that the General says, okay, I need to. These guys are troublemakers. And so the answer is we'll put them all in a single unit and we'll send that unit on a suicide mission and then just get them all.

Out of the way.

Get them all out of the way. And then they. So they do that. They put them in there. Except it turns out that when you take all of these special people and put them in a single unit and you have a good enough commander who understands what their value is, that actually turns out they're super useful and good and they're actually able to pull off things that nobody else could. And so we keep sending them in superside missions and they keep coming back successful instead.

Yeah, having like completed the mission successfully.

And this is maybe where I still haven't figured out the answer, because in my head, the version is like, well, the general who's like, still unhappy about these fact these guys haven't died, finally just pulls the trigger and sends somebody deliberately to kill them. But if you do that explanation for stuff, I have to bring the general into the story. I have to explain that because it seems counterintuitive because these guys are being super successful. Like, they're doing all of the things that we said we couldn't do. And like, But I need there to be a betrayal. I need there to. I need a betrayal from somewhere. So that there's a reason for the protagonist to go after the General and try to kill all his family members. But I'm not sure that that sells.

So is there any way that 21 could have like an inkling that there's an ulterior motive behind the missions that he's receiving for his team? Because if he's getting orders from the, they're like, hey, go do this mission. And they come back successful. And the general's like, great job. Like, is there any way he could read intent ulterior motive into the types of missions they're being sent on?

He could.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, he could.

Maybe you could at least imply from 21's perspective, hey, I don't know that this guy's on the up and up. Like he. He always congratulates us and says, we did a good job and we completed his mission and blah, blah, blah, but like, his vibes are off. I don't know.

Yeah, maybe, for sure. But I think maybe what's actually missing there is that the misfits need to do something that triggers the General and it needs to be something like, okay.

I have to Just take these guys out.

Yeah. There needs to be an action that we as the audience recognize as being good and within their rights, which is like, I don't know, maybe they figure out they're being sent on suicide missions and they're going to defect or something, or they're going to desert or. I don't know what that action is, but they have been, because of the situation they're in, they're put into a position where they have to make a decision. They have to go against the general and that's why they get all killed, get caught.

I mean, could it be that they are like, hey, we have successfully completed every mission we've been assigned, but we have it on good authority that we were not meant to survive these missions. If they have figured that piece out, can they try to go to someone else higher up in the command to be like, hey, this general has it out for us and is trying to get us killed. But we're useful. Like, we're a useful unit and we know what the fuck we're doing. We're getting results. And then they don't even make it to that point because they all get killed or whatever.

Yeah, the pro. The only problem I have is if they're like. If the whole thing is that they're gonna, like, go to the, like the press or something is that I'm not sure I've laid the ground worth sufficiently that anybody would care that, like, oh, sure.

Because if it's like, these really are just the guys that everyone doesn't give a shit about. Yeah, nobody would give a fuck.

And I'm like, werewolves aren't super well thought of in the. In the writer world, so it better be kind of like, I don't care. Maybe it's. I wonder if there's a way to have, like, if. If they could be. If the thing is that they're going to turn the rest of the. Of the werewolves on, like, so that they are the. They're the troublemakers, right? So, like, you've. You've taken all the guys who might be like, union organizers or, like, you know. Oh, yeah, who would, like, who would, like, who could be help?

My werewolf army has unionized, right?

So, like, you put them off in its own group. And if they're responsible, they've been sent off on these missions, they're actually super successful. And then it's like, I need. If I could come up with a way for them to have an argument, like, some. Some way that they have something in their pocket that makes them A threat that they could turn all of the rest of the werewolf packs against the army and make. And make problems for them. Then that, that would be a super sufficient reason. Like, okay, now this is. These guys are now super fucking dangerous and we need to, we need to choke them off. Maybe I might have to make up lore for something like that. Like, I don't know, like, like maybe. Or like, or maybe they're, they're aware of some knowledge or something. Like maybe they, maybe everybody find out.

On one of these suicide missions that's like a really sensitive piece of information that they're not supposed to have.

Yeah.

And they weren't supposed to get it because they weren't supposed to succeed.

Yeah, maybe. Maybe it's something, it could be something like, like everybody's under the impression that werewolves were created specifically for this task. Like, this was in a new invention. And maybe it turns out that's a preexisting idea that comes from elsewhere that was stolen by the main group and that actually there's a. Oh, oh, oh, okay. Well, I mean, if I want to tie into themes, right?

Yeah, we love themes.

So the main idea of, I mean, if you're gonna be. I don't know how much, how much I'm actually doing this in text, but things that I've been thinking about while writing about it is the idea that like, the werewolves are standing for a certain kind of masculinity and so. And it's a starship trooper's masculinity. Right. It's a, it's a, you know, like, you are made for war. You are made for, you know, only defense. You're not meant for something else. And if they had proof that there was another way out there, there's a, like, literally, if I can. I don't know what the specifics of it would be, but if it's like literally like, oh, no, like werewolves, I don't know, exist in the wild and they don't act like the. We aren't really like this.

There's basically like, there's a third path and they don't want us to know about it.

If I can make it somehow tie into that theme that, like, there's another way and that we can. We could be peaceful, you know, that we could be in fact, caring and nurturing. Things that, like, are often thought of as very. Not masculine, but that could be very. Okay, wait, maybe do you think it could tie into. Because I've been thinking about the super horny idea that werewolf saliva is regenerative. So, like, which I like, it's very.

So if you're kissing your homies on the mouth, you can heal them, their wounds, right?

So, like, if there was a. A very direct way of like using, using that. Like, okay, so this is a common knowledge thing that people kind of know about, but, like, that's actually indicative of a larger thing, which is that, like, they are, I don't know, somehow able to do that, you know, cure disease or like, they could be, like, they have this other place in society beyond just being killing machines, using that as like one. Like there's something that we. That's being hidden and denied about werewolves to the werewolves themselves. So they'll stay useful in the war and turns out, no, actually we could be something else. Maybe it's got something to do with that biology of regeneration or.

Yeah, that'd be a nice justification for the horny reason of using the werewolf saliva as a healing agent.

Yeah, it makes me think about. So I haven't yet talked to. Also in this season of let's Get Weird about. I'm gonna talk to my wife about these wolf books written by Rick McIntyre. And they're super interesting. And I only bring them up now because there is a reading for those books that is super about gender, which I think is really cool. He's not doing it. He's just trying to write some books about wolves.

He's not doing it.

He's not doing it on purpose. But because you use the alpha beta, omega or the alpha beta terminology, I could not listen to these books without thinking all the time about all the guys who are like, well, I'm an Alpha male. Right. But, like, the truth of what an Alpha male wolf actually does is not the same as what people think of Alpha male humans as being, like. Like, they, they do do some amount of, like, protecting their family from other wolf packs most, because that's mostly the dangerous thing. But they're also providers of like, food nurturers. Yeah, but then also, yeah, like, also he makes a very good argument that the most important thing a male alpha wolf does is play with his kids.

Like, literally, like, aw, that's so cute. What the hell.

Yeah, because, like, that's how you teach them how to be wolves. And it's not just like, about play fighting, it's about, like, play hunting and, you know, like, finding voles in the ground and, like, how to. And like, it also builds a really strong community because if you play with your kids, they love they, you know, like you more basically. And those are people who are part of your wolf pack later. So you build these really strong connections in a way that a distant father.

Really wouldn't imagine if Heinlein had gone that way instead of. You should just beat the hell out of your children.

Yes. Oh, 100%. Yeah. So, okay, so if there's a. I gotta. So I'm thinking about, like, that version of masculinity which is rooted in some actual science, which is like, this is what wolves actually do. This is how wolves actually be. Like, I'm trying to think about if I can integrate some of that to. To create that alternate path or something like that. I do like the idea of a reveal of, like, wolves, of the werewolves being like, everybody thinks they were created for this, but it turns out that maybe we just rediscovered something that already existed and that.

And repaired them.

Yeah, they've repurposed a version of this creature for modern times to win a war, when in fact that was not their primary function in previous times. Maybe the previous times is that this was a. I don't know, it was about providing or healing or nurturing or something like that that you can, you know, in a mask. You know, again, like playing with children, teaching people how to do stuff. Like, there's. There's got to be something in there. I'm going to. I'm going to have to chew on this because I can't do it while we're on the phone here.

I guess this is going to be like, you need to take a whole walk around your block and take a long shower and like, lie in bed awake at night and think about it.

Honestly, you'll probably. I'm going to chew on this all day and then like, probably like 10:00 tonight. The. It takes a little 10:00 is usually.

When we start seeing the lore hit in the chat.

That's because what happens is that I try to actually write for a few hours and then if I don't have. I haven't done it properly enough. But I just need to work through some. Like. That's usually the point where I'm like, well, I guess I'm not getting real writing done. And then I just go fucking off the wall in this one. In behind the scenes, in the behind the scenes channel. Okay.

I love it. It's like a fun little snack for me at 10pm like clockwork basically every day.

Yeah, it's. It's actually been super helpful because there's an observer effect when you're thinking about things where if I just wrote that out in a Notepad. I wouldn't necessarily feel. It wouldn't necessarily be as useful. But knowing that there are little people who can pop up in the emojis with eyes and they know eyes emoji.

I'm looking.

Yeah, I don't know. Something about that changes the creative process where I know I am presenting something that's going to be observed by somebody else, which makes me think about the thoughts more and present them in a way that is understandable to other people. It's like rubber duck programming. You know what this is?

No.

Rubber duck programming is a fascinating idea that you are stuck on. You're a programmer, you're stuck on a trial. You're like, I can't understand why this isn't working. So you bring out something that you then explain the problem to. And in this example, it would be a rubber duck. So you take a literal rubber duck and you start trying to explain the problem to it as if it is a person. And in the process of doing that, you often figure out what the solution was because you are having to reformat it in a way that somebody else can understand it. And that's.

You hear yourself say it out loud and you're like, oh, wait a minute. Yeah, figure out the issue.

And part of the problem is like you, if you're just thinking about it or you're talking to yourself about it, you know all of the things that you know. And you're not having to readdress your base assumptions, but if you explain to somebody else, you then have to also explain your basic assumptions. And that helps you fully formulate the idea in a more reasonable way. And the. And writing things out in that channel is super. The same way where I'm like, okay, I need to formulate this in a way that somebody else is going to be able to follow what I'm saying. Okay, I need to lay it out as here is my goal is that doing what I wanted to do, what happens if I do this? And then trying to explain it in a way. And that is very different than just talking aloud and then having all the mush inside of my brain jamming up against each other.

Well, and then I've seen it happen in real time where halfway through explaining something, you're like, oh, wait, I've solved my problem.

Yeah, that's. I mean, exactly like you're trying to like, you know, or like the thing where you're like, I'm going to spitball some ideas. And then you're like, ah, I can't do that. Well, what If I did do that and you, like, start to explore it.

Why can't I do that?

Like, well, like, you know, would that be good? Would it work? It's kind of the idea kind of slaps. I'm going to explore it for a while. And then it becomes so, like the. Even when you're like. You're like, soliciting the void for impact, you're like, okay, any of these ideas sound good. But then you like, in. Just by thinking about what other people might think about it, you also are reevaluating. It is also super interesting.

And then getting the little tiny emoji feedback is like, okay, somebody thought this was cool. That's not worth nothing for sure.

Just posting things that you're probably going to cut from a script and just be like, here's the thing. I don't know if it's going to stay or not. But now somebody else has seen it also makes it easier to be like, well, I wrote this badass line, but now it's gone. But now that's not all gone.

Yeah, it's immortalized in this channel.

Okay. And that's about where we tailed off and then got back into the podcast we were actually trying to record. So I'm sure that you all are missing a lot of context. There's some stuff that we've been discussing behind the scenes that if you're listening us on the public feed, maybe you don't have the full context for. You can always ask me if you. Hey, Scott, what the fuck's here? Because I will explain it to you. And that's actually usefully helpful sometimes. So. But anyway, this has been a thing. And we'll be back with a real episode, like, later when you hear about the other project and all that stuff. So bye.