LSGL BRAINSTORM
T 03.11.08

Premise:  Explore Act II as dream sequence.  Focus on using the Òquestion streamingÓ method.

1.  Breaking up Act II
What if act II isnÕt uninterrupted -- what if itÕs interspersed with real shots from outside the cave?

2.  Act II sound - solid tone?
What if act II, instead of having more music, essentially comes to a halt...  A musical stand-still where we have one long, droning tone -- which increases the contrast with act III, when things get chaotic, perhaps with drums?

3.  Floating blob tableaux
What if when we enter into the dream sequence, thereÕs the sense of walking from shadows into a lit area in an enormously large room.  We see an elder standing there doing something...  The camera is at human eye-level, and moves at a human pace.  The scene is set up so that there is an implied floor that weÕre moving across...  Perhaps thereÕs even a CG floor...  With black tiles.

I keep imagining this scene where thereÕs an elder standing in the void, and thereÕs a giant shoggoth floating in mid-air in front of it...  And blood is dripping from the elder to the shoggoth...  Perhaps creating the opportunity for an interesting pose for the elder.  The elder couldnÕt be frozen motionless, though -- it would need to be breathing...  What if the huge shoggoth in front of it were my ÒboilingÓ texture wrapped around a CG spheroid -- but the texture was somewhat translucent, so we could see the weird textures moving around as if inside?  Along with some floating eyeballs?

What if -- same scenario -- the entire dream sequence is just this one tableaux...  Just ONE tableaux!  ...And the camera swoops in from afar, as if without gravity -- a disembodied consciousness...  And we get some really close-up shots of droplets of blood, and the sound of dripping, and seeing the droplets merge with the giant orb?

Same scenario:  What if then, after seeing the elder in tableaux with the shoggoth, we have some sort of cracking, or the sound of lightning, and the giant floating orb breaks and everything starts to flood?

If this is the climax of act II, then perhaps we see the elder with a very small shoggoth first -- then in a few disconcerting cuts, the shoggoth gets precipitously larger.  Perhaps we see the elder even start the scene by cutting itself, starting the flow of blood?

Maybe time is discontinuous and we first see the shoggoth floating there mid-air, medium sized...  Then we see the cutting and the shoggoth begin to form...  Then we see the shoggoth in its massive state.

Cut to a shot of the elderÕs eye as the crisis strikes, so we donÕt see the shoggoth actually break surface tension...  Then we see lots of impressions of water splashing and flooding, perhaps superimposed over the elder?

Maybe as we see the shoggoth getting huge, itÕs no longer merely a sphere, but instead has tentacle-like pseudopods extending from it threateningly...  Maybe dangling down from above, maybe whipping around.

As we see the shoggoth get bigger, the key size cue is the scale of the elder.  Perhaps also the light in the room, if I decided to go with volumetric lighting.

4.  Single tableux:  The subterranean city succumbs to shoggoth tidal wave
The floating blob tableaux is one idea thatÕs been gestating in my mind...  What other single tableaux might I use?  If I had to pick just one key image that told the whole story -- what would it be?  (IÕm thinking of the illustrations that Ray Harryhausen would do to illustrate the key scenes in his films, and of how George Lucas hired Ralph McQuarrie to do impressive concept drawings that would sell Star Wars to the funders.)

What if the key illustration was of elders in a city in a huge cave, a massive subterranean lake in the midground...  There are elders in the foreground, on a walkway at the edge of the lake -- and far off in the distance we can see the city on the other shore...  And the elders turn in surprise, because at that far shore, we can see a massive flood of shoggoth suddenly pouring in through holes in the cave wall...  Whole city blocks are devastated by the initial impact...  The tidal wave comes flooding across the lake at unimaginable speed toward this shore -- which is not safe.  Panic.

5.  Eyes in the sky
What if I returned to the idea I had in my original video concept clip:  eyes in the sky.  ItÕs reminiscent of Salvador Dali -- whose image was in turn used in an Alfred Hitchcock film.  The eyes are like those of the shoggoths, and convey some sort of sense that the elders feel like theyÕre being watched.

6.  Abstract textures
What if the dream sequence were nothing but colors and wet textures?  Sort of like the overture to ÒDancer In The DarkÓ?  What could that possibly communicate?  What if I had elders viewed through the distortion?  Sort of like viewing someone through the textured glass of a shower stall?  It seems like a surface treatment without substance.

7.  Regret for abandoning oneÕs people
What are the elders dreaming about?  Is it the history of their people?  Or just the last moments that they saw on Earth before leaving for another planet?  If theyÕre thinking about the last moments they saw on Earth, then are they really preoccupied with the shoggoths -- or is it the genocide and all of the elders lost that theyÕre thinking about?

Does the beacon appear in their dream?  What if I had an elder step into the beacon and leave the Earth?  What if A whole other planet appeared, floating above the beacon...  As if that was where the elder was about to go to when they stepped into the beacon?

Do the elders feel regret about abandoning the rest of their species?  If I showed lots of dead bodies laying in an endless bloody carpet, that would convey horror.  What if the elders who left for another world saw lines of elders standing still...  Like ghosts staring accusingly?  And then perhaps as the elders look at the lines, a tidal wave floods over the army standing there...  Compelling the elders to go into the beacon.  That would make the dream a little more centered on the eldersÕ POV, rather than the explorersÕ outsidersÕ view of whatÕs going on.

Imagine standing in front of an army of statues, and then a tidal wave comes directly at you, cresting far over the heads of the others.

8.  First person account explored - going past Òend dayÓ
That seemed to be a useful tool...  Imagining what the elders are *feeling* and then extrapolating dream images off of that.  So, what are all the flavors of emotion that the sleeping elders are feeling?

For this experiment, letÕs switch to the first person:  ÒI feel.Ó  ...IÕm an elder.  IÕm among the most powerful telepaths of my species.  I can walk in time one level of reality removed from actuality.  So IÕve crossed this moment in the astral realm before.  IÕve felt that suddenly my species was gone.  When IÕm in the astral plane, the presence of the minds is like a dull warmth, very indistinct...  But then when theyÕre gone, thereÕs this sudden naked cold, feeling that I have lost my connection to the mass of blood and meat that makes up the body of my native species.

9.  The experience of entering another speciesÕ minds
What does it feel like to get into the body of an alien species?  ThereÕs maybe a disgust at first.  Perhaps itÕs a body dysphoria -- like transsexuality, a profound sense of wrongness about the flesh oneÕs encapsulated in.  At first one would presumably be physically uncoordinated...  Like walking on stilts for the first time -- while wearing a gorilla costume.  But over time, as neural connections are made, control of the body would become more intuitive, and sensations would feel less like they were coming to oneÕs mind from far away.  It would take time, but eventually being in the body would become naturalistic and the focus of attention would be occurrences in the environment around oneself...  On the habitat, rather than the Òspacesuit.Ó

This hive of elders, everyone in it has probably practiced entering the minds of various species -- ones which were not suitable for permanent colonization.  For some of them, there would be a sense of exhilaration...  Amazed at one can do, seeing new planets.  Remember:  Almost everyone in the hive was born on earth, and has never left the planet.  To get to pop into the minds of different species as if one were simply popping on a space suit and setting foot on another planet -- it would be an incomparable experience.

10.  Maintaining a link with Earth
So, when the elders minds are still on earth, they already have a pretty clear idea about where theyÕre going and what theyÕre going to do...  Perhaps I ought to limit this experience -- maybe thereÕs just one small planet with bugs on it that the elders train with...  But the leap to a planet far in the future and far away in space...  It involves greater risk.

Maybe thereÕs a conflict between the leader and some of the senior acolytes in the hive.  The leader insists on leaping without keeping a connection to earth -- but others feel it would only be prudent to maintain some sort of tie to earth, as a back up plan.  And then that ÒprudenceÓ is what makes the elders vulnerable to being snapped back here when the human explorers link into the hive mind.

When the elders make the leap to the other planet, perhaps they can feel that they are stretching their silver cords.  Do the cords feel taught while they are on the other planet?  Perhaps at first...  So the creatures that are being invaded have some time to feel mentally unnerved as the elders struggle to get inside their minds...  But then, once the elders have been in the other minds for a while, then the link to the astral plane seems almost absent.

If one transferred oneÕs entire consciousness to the other place, then presumably one could leave from there to yet another place.  However, only a great mind could do that -- because thereÕs no psionic amplifier there in the future.  The leader could explore even farther into the future, but the others would be Òat the end of their rope.Ó  The leader might criticize them for the extent to which they are still attached to Earth...  Literally still hanging on to what is past.  He/she might berate them for not letting go and moving on.

11.  GenocideÕs shock to the collective consciousness
If you know youÕre going to shoot into the future, how much of your mind is going to be focused on what is to come -- versus what has transpired?  Are the minds of the elders frozen in the moment at which they left earth?

Given that the elders are a telepathic species, how does the death of their species affect their minds?  Is there a lasting trauma?  What happens telepathically when an elder dies?  Others of the species will feel a hole where they used to be...  But will there also be some sort of ripples that leave their bodies and affect the entire noosphere?

Hm.  Let me try to say that in a different way.  Supposing that at some level a species has collective consciousness.  When a creature dies, if they are conscious of their own death, then that pain and horror is experienced by the survivors.  It would presumably be a powerful shock to the system...  Perhaps enough to put a being into catatonia.

12.  Mad jailors
What if the portions of the eldersÕ brains that stayed behind to act as prison guards for the alien minds theyÕre displacing got hit by this echoing death cry, and went mad...  So the alien minds arenÕt just prisoners being kept inside the eldersÕ bodies -- theyÕre being held captive by captors who have gone utterly mad.

I have to say, this is an interesting riff on LovecraftÕs own themes...  Humans often go mad, having seen the true nature of the universe...  How intriguing for a ÒmonsterÓ to come up against a truth that is so appalling and incomprehensible that it goes mad too!

13.  A schism between leader and disciples?
Perhaps the leader was adamant about the acolytes of the hive not staying behind to see what happened on end day because he suspected the trauma would be too much to bear.  But the disciples are too curious, and decide amongst themselves to wait.

If I go with that idea, then weÕve got a ÒLotÕs WifeÓ story...  Or OrpheusÕ wife Eurydice looking back at Hades and being lost.  (Wow -- I hadnÕt quite realized the extent to which those two stories are identical.)

The acolytes might feel that their leader is brilliant -- but also a bit mad...  So they rebel, deciding to keep life-lines to Earth and to stay long enough to witness the catastrophe.  However, if I go with this schism between the disciples and the leader, then the leader must miss out on seeing the catastrophe...  Maybe he doesnÕt want to see everyone heÕs ever cared about die...  Curiosity doesnÕt kill his cat...

But, on the other hand, heÕs been the engineer of the entire ÒArkÓ project.  Some part of him must be just dying to see what the great mystery of end day is.  And if he is indeed the worldÕs oldest elder, then there are going to be friends that he wants to check in at the last moment...

Yet, in order to create this project, heÕs already cut himself off from his people.  Surely he must have tried to convince them to work with him, and been rebuffed?  Is there maybe some anger at his people?  Some sense that they have damned themselves?  If so, then maybe he even feels some sense of vengeance when they die?

14.  The hive as a bomb shelter behind a two-way mirror
It neednÕt go that way, though.  HeÕs had the strange experience of meeting himself on the astral plane, coming back and forth through time...  So his motivation may be destiny -- he doesnÕt try to convince his peers of anything, but instead suddenly disappears, telling no one where heÕs going to.

If thatÕs the case, then when end day comes, heÕd want to watch his friends -- but he couldnÕt necessarily talk to them and say goodbye...  It would be more like watching the apocalypse through a crystal ball...  I guess IÕm thinking of the Wicked WitchÕs crystal ball in ÒThe Wizard of Oz,Ó how Dorothy could see Auntie Em calling for her -- but there was no sound.  ThereÕs a sense of powerlessness -- wanting to reach out and connect with those who are being lost, but also knowing that if you allow yourself to reach outside of the psychic bubble, it might betray your location?

Is being inside the hive sort of like being behind a two-way mirror, telepathically speaking?  Is that deliberate -- or is it a side effect of the amplifierÕs ongoing tampering with time?

15.  How do the human explorers disrupt the eldersÕ psychic tether?
Maybe the reason why the shoggoths didnÕt see the beaconÕs beam the first time it sent the elders to another world is because it was Òpure.Ó  Maybe human mental energy, when amplified and mixed into the eldersÕ consciousness creates an ÒimpureÓ energy stream.

Oh!  What if just momentarily the human explorers get transported to the far future and get sent into the bodies of the creatures that the elders have invaded?  It would be a good Lovecraftian moment of horror to have the humans suddenly find themselves in another beingÕs body.

Maybe by connecting to the psychic amplifier, the humans get catapulted into the future -- and they switch places with elders who are already there...  Who get sent back to Earth.  I dunno...  That makes the device a little too much like a Òbody switching device,Ó which seems overly simple.  I donÕt want some sort of ÒFreaky FridayÓ scenario, were people can just pop between each othersÕ bodies for a lark...  No, the device is an amplifier of sorts; you need to have psionic talent to use it.

IÕve been imagining that the lightning bolts we see shooting out of the top of the beacon are a visible manifestation of the silver cords of the astral travelers.  This means that the silver ÒropeÓ is still coming out the top of the amplifier at all times...  ItÕs just invisible, existing on the astral plane...

But if we traced it back down from the stars, then it seems that there must be lines drawn from the amplifier outward to all of the individual elders in the hive.  Radiating rays from the beacon make for a potentially useful visual:  strings that the amplifier makes glow brighter, which it weaves together into a mighty rope.  IÕve been envisioning the individual eldersÕ mental contributions as radio waves pulsing from their heads -- and thatÕs probably still the way to go.  But to understand that whatÕs happening could also be visualized as straight lines from them to the machine -- thatÕs useful.

So, when the humans touch the screen, they tap into the collective consciousness of the elders who are attached to the machine.  Humans are not telepathic per se in this universe; but they have galvanic skin response...  A sort of electrical field that could act as interference in a very fragile and precise psionic activity.

Perhaps when the humans briefly connect, itÕs like they add weight to the rope, and the tug causes the silver rubber band to snap back.

I could imagine the mechanics of the amplifier depending upon a precise geometry of the elders involved...  So adding humans throws off the shape.  The trouble with this idea is that the hive doesnÕt seem to be arranged in a geometrical way.

Perhaps the silver rope is less like a tether between the eldersÕ spirits and their bodies...  Perhaps itÕs more like a tube which they travel through...  Tunneling through space?  Perhaps the elders off in another place and time can hear the whispers of humans in the system?

Perhaps the trance that the elders use to time travel is like the one that Christopher Reeve used in the film, ÒSomewhere In TimeÓ...  ThereÕs an intense sort of hypnosis going on, which allows travel -- distract a person, and the belief in what theyÕre doing falls apart...  In ÒSomewhere In Time,Ó thereÕs the accident of having a penny in oneÕs pocket with the wrong date on it, which destroys the illusion.

I guess where IÕm trying to go with this is suggesting that maybe itÕs not that the human explorers have actually disturbed the machine or yanked back the elders who are in another time...  Perhaps what they have done is somehow upset the 1/5 minds of the elders that remain in the cave, and so technically speaking itÕs the elders themselves who yank the rest of their selves back to this time and place on earth.

16.  How are the cave elders connected to the future elders?

Yes, IÕm on the right track now...  But thereÕs still some difficulties to work out.  It makes sense to me that the explorersÕ simply walking through the cave passes below the notice of the elders.  ...The elders, whom, I should point out, are not in suspended animation per se -- theyÕre dreaming, and theyÕre doing some sort of telepathic work that maintains the link to their other selves.  The elders in the cave are linked to the amplifier...  So humans messing with the amplifier would indeed draw the eldersÕ attention.

Maybe it is not the humansÕ mental energy that ÒtaintsÓ the amplifiersÕ stream -- maybe itÕs the fact that the prison guards on earth have gone mad.  [Note that talking about the amplifierÕs lightning as both a ÒstreamÓ and as a ÒropeÓ is a conflict of metaphors.]

Does the amplifier do its job using a single burst -- or is it constantly mediating an astral relationship between the different parts of the elders?

If the cave elders have gone mad, what can they be doing that maintains the psionic connection to the future elders?

Is the only point of having the cave elders go mad that it would allow me to have more interesting dream sequences...  Explain why theyÕre thinking about the shoggoths still 50,000 years later?

When the elders in the cave sense that someone is in the psychic network with them, how do they respond?  Do they summon the greater parts of themselves back from the future in a panic?  Do the elders in the future ÒfallÓ back to Earth because concentration was broken -- an accident?

How active the mind on earth has to be is an open question...  ItÕs clear that the earth *body* has to be in some sort of physical state of hibernation, though.

Does the part of the mind that stays on Earth know whatÕs going on in the future?  It seems like that canÕt be the case, because when the Yith took our protagonist elder to their time, there may have been a part of the elder left behind -- but it did not know what was going on wherever the Yith are.  So thatÕs established:  the cave elders and the future elders do not share consciousnesses -- thereÕs a wall of non-communication between them.

The part of the eldersÕ brain which is left on earth has to keep the body alive.  It deals with basic metabolic functions...  So, in that respect, itÕs rather like the reptile part of our own brain.  But itÕs a bit more evolved than that.  It can dream.  It acts as prison guard for the alien minds that the future elders have switched places with.  But perhaps the role of Òprison guardÓ is strictly metaphorical -- all it actually does is keep the body turned off.  It may be that the prisoners donÕt have the skill to manipulate the eldersÕ bodies, or cannot overcome the 1/5 elder brain, which is stronger than the whole of their mental powers.

Does the part of the elder that hibernates project a silver cord to the future elders -- or do the elders in the future leave a trail behind them?  Perhaps the crucial relationship here is figuring out how the elderÕs Òreptile brainÓ relates to and interacts with the other four lobes.

17.  How do the different lobes of the elderÕs brain interact?
ThereÕs a Òwall of timeÓ between the fifth of the elder that stays on Earth and the four-fifths that travel in time.  The earth fifth takes care of the body.  ItÕs been left alone.  To an extent, the dreams that we see in the mental web are the dreams of partial beings.

Note, though, that the elders in the cave do not simply have straight lines of mental energy going from themselves to the beacon...  ThereÕs a mental web.  So, even though these are only partial brains, together there are many lobes interacting.  The sum is greater than the parts.

The dreaming occurs at a collective level.  Perhaps, then, the astral projection also takes place at the collective level.  I do have this sense that the elders all mentally linked hands when they traveled into the future...  So there was a sort of mental ark that got catapulted by the amplifier into the future.  Then, when the elders arrived at where they were going, they sort of disembarked and were able to go their separate ways in order to enter individual bodies.

Perhaps in the future, each elder contributes a lobe of their brain to a future collectivity...  Imagine a rope with ends that fray into individual threads.  At either end of the rope thereÕs a sort of metal ring that keeps the main length of the rope from fraying.  The metal ring on one end is the amplifier.  The ring on the other end is created by an act of will.

Perhaps another useful metaphor:  The rope to the future is not something that one climbs up -- the rope is lowered down into a dark abyss.

Ah ha!  HereÕs the thing...  The elders in the cave may not be aware of the elders in the future -- but perhaps the elders in the future are somehow aware of their minds in the past.

How much time has elapsed in the future?  Do the future and past exist on parallel time lines?  Does that mean that the elders in the future have lived there 50,000 years?  Perhaps thereÕs a Brigadoon effect...  No, wrong comparison...  IÕm thinking of how in the Chinese story of Monkey King, a day in heaven is a year on earth.  So, maybe the elders in the future have only been where they are for five years or a hundred years, due to this peculiar difference.

This could help explain why the leader has an easier time traveling back into the past to recruit disciples...  He could spend years in the past and have it be moments in the present.  But if he goes into the future, many years pass in real time -- at least if he comes out of the astral plane and actually lives in a time period a while.  That might help establish that the disciples arenÕt really all that prepared for the future...  TheyÕre allowed to spend a day or two in the bodies of insects on a nearby planet -- but back home it takes a year.

Plot hole.  Why not do the training period on planets in the past?  I can explain why the elders have to go so far into the future -- the need to get past the recorded history of the Yith, into a section of time that the Yith donÕt have knowledge of, so free will can be active again.  This would also help explain why they have to go far out into space...  Perhaps to another galaxy?

How is traveling through time different from traveling in space, astrally?

Ugh.  Anyway, where IÕm going with this is that perhaps the elders in the future feel something occurring in the past -- and so they snap themselves back to the cave...  But due to the difference in time scales, they canÕt tell what it is.  ItÕs just an instant of panic that they must respond to instantaneously.

I guess IÕm sort of answering my own question...  If the elders can travel from the future back to the present instantaneously, then travel on the astral plane takes no time at all.  It is actually dipping your toes into normal space that engages time.

If youÕre in the future, what does it feel like to have a part of yourself in the past?  Perhaps when youÕre in the astral plane (the unfrayed length of the rope), you have a fairly clear sense of your physical body?  No...  I think as soon as you detach part of yourself from your body, it becomes far from you.

IÕm trying to visualize the sensory homunculus of an elder in hyperspace.  I sort of have this picture of a human with an arm thatÕs a mile long.  Prick the finger with a pin, and the elder feels something instantly -- but itÕs like a distant whisper.

From the distant, collective future mindÕs perspective, humans entering the mental web back in the hive would seem sort of like an infection.  I have this mental image of lots of green dots -- and a red dot moving among them.

I suppose the future elders would have no idea what the intruder in the mental net back home could be.  Perhaps their first thought would be that itÕs the Yith again...  If the Yith were to take over the eldersÕ prone bodies, what might happen then?  Maybe the elders in the future would lose their connection to their bodies entirely -- and their spirits would plummet into the future, toward the end of time.

OK...  This is all a bit complicated and confusing...  But I think IÕve got enough now to go back to the dreamers in the cave.

18.  Recap of how the amplifier works.
So the eldersÕ reptile minds are dreaming.  The humans enter the mental net and voyeuristically see what the elders are dreaming about.

The reptile minds went into hibernation after the future minds left, and thereÕs a wall of time between them, so the reptile minds are preoccupied with the last things they saw:  the genocide of their species.

Keeping prisoners trapped is mainly a matter of keeping the bodies in a state of hibernation -- so the reptile minds donÕt worry to much about their captives.

Time in the present and time in the future progress concurrently -- but on different scales.  Traveling through the astral plane, however, is instantaneous.

When the hiveÕs collective mind senses that there are invaders in the psychic net, the first assumption is that itÕs the Yith.  ThereÕs an instant of panic.

Due to the difference in time scales, the elders in the future cannot risk hesitation.  They hurtle back from the future to find out whatÕs gone wrong.

When we see the lightning beam ignite, it is the astral rope of the elderÕs mental arc coming back.  ItÕs like a landing beacon that has been activated to help draw the elders back into themselves.

Plot hole:  The elders in their bomb shelter have been able to witness the end of elder life on earth...  And in the astral plane theyÕve felt the shockwave of their species ceasing to exist...  To the extent that Òend dayÓ has been identified...  But how come they canÕt sense the day of their own deaths?  TheyÕve traveled into the future...  How can they not have passed the moment of their own personal extinction and not noticed it?

Perhaps it has something to do with the two-way mirror that theyÕve created there...  There are weird reflections of the past and future shimmering in the air...  Most of elder society has attributed it to the presence of the primal gods in the mountains of madness...  But IÕm suggesting itÕs a result of the amplifier and experiments in time travel.  So, perhaps the elders believe that what theyÕre feeling is simply a shockwave from the end day?

Maybe the future is opaque to them in this one null spot -- and the reason why it has been an unfathomable tract of land is because it is the location of their own deaths in the future.