A place for those who "Trust the Fungus"

All right, so I have a question and a request for you guys.

Recently, I re-watched the movie, and I started to notice and wonder about various little things; from how the characters came to be the way they are, to the history of the alternate world, to why some of the reptile-people are much more... well, reptilian than the others, to why they look like humans and have humanlike emotions (one of the defining differences between reptiles and mammals is the presence of the limbic brain, and with it the capacity for emotion and attachment), to how their world got the way it is and whether it can be fixed, to whether people made into goombas can be saved, to whatever happened to that one pizza that Koopa ordered.

Well, a primordial soup of tiny, fragmented thoughts, observations, questions, and ideas have finally started to coalesce into a story following the first year of Daisy's rule over Dinohattan. It focuses mainly on Daisy and a few other characters who would be more or less her management team (Iggy, Spike, Toad, the ailing King, etc.), although a range of other characters and aspects of alternate-world life would be focused on, and I'm really excited about it. My problem is, however, that trying to write the story in the form it currently has in my mind would have a great deal of emphasis on some things, and a sad lack in others. Therefore, every time I've tried to write my story, it's sputtered and died. What I need are suggestions and questions to put my mind to. What are things that have stuck out to you that need explaining? Which minor characters interested you? What aspects of Dinohattan would you be interested in seeing more of? What interesting thoughts and theories have occurred to you?

This, dear Archivers, is my question and my request: would you be interested in reading this story, and will you help me?

...Anyway, I'll try to have the first chapter or two or three up on this thread by the end of the week for you to peruse and get a feel for the story with. See you around!

~Carnie~

First of all, I really love the title for this story. It really says so much towards what you're trying to say thematically. The first year is always the hardest with the founding of a new government out of the ashes of its predecessor always being a risky proposition. I can certainly see some parallels between Dinohattan's return to democracy and the recent Arab Spring in the Middle East.

I would be very interested in reading such a fan fiction, especially as your posts have been quite articulate and sophisticated thus far; I imagine you would tackle this premise well. As I have personally read each of the early scripts and interviewed much of the cast/crew I can also offer my thoughts on all of the questions you have posed as well as any others. They did quite a bit of world-building when it came to this project, so things that may seem vague or unanswered in the film itself really do have explanations.

I'll be here to work with you if you so desire my contribution.

Sounds really interesting!

Hmm, the First Year. Yeah, that doesn't sound like a certain fan fic now does it?

But all kidding aside, I'm pretty sure this could be a pretty good fic I could read. I'm honestly not too interested in a fic that's set AFTER the movie, I feel it's much more interesting to explore BEFORE especially since the movie set out a lot of questions for fan fic authors to answer.

But I'll help out if you need any. It's just great knowing this movie is FINALLY getting some fan fiction like it deserves! Now all we need to do is prevent bad Fanm Fic writers from getting their hands on it!

My apologies for taking so long to post; I've only just managed to pull myself, for the time being, out of the swirling vortex that is PSAT Study, Running Errands, and Generally Not Dying.

Thank you guys so much! It means a lot to me to see that people are not only interested, but willing to help, and that I'm not wasting my time and energy on hammering out the details of this story. I promise I'll try to update often and make it one you can enjoy!

Thanks, Redstar! Most of the time I'm awful at coming up with names and story titles, and I was bouncing around a few (rather lame) ideas for the title of this one, but the one that I ended up using seemed to fit it the best.

Oh damn, I did it again. I keep coming up with these ideas and being like 'OMAHGAWD DIS IS GON' BE AWSUM' and then finding out later that someone else used it first. -headdesk- Thank you for pointing that out, though, Mushroom; if one finds oneself in this predicament, it's much better to know one's enemy so that one can change any other accidental resemblances. I'm not sure which fanfic you're talking about, but are there any other resemblances you can see between it and this one?

I do understand what you mean about prequels vs. sequels, although I guess for me it depends on how thoroughly a story's been wrapped up. Personally, I'm quite interested in both the past and future of Dinohattan; mostly it'll focus on the latter, with flashbacks, discoveries, and revelations as to the former. I'm mainly going to build off of the worldbuilding that the creators have already done, although depending on how compatible they are with the canon world there may be a few twists added. -shiftyeyes-

This is one of the main parts where you guys' help, especially Redstar's, will be absolutely invaluable. I'll spoiler-tag any questions and such that might be spoilers for the story, so you can highlight them or avoid them as you wish. Let me see... the first few questions I have are thus.

Did the Doorstop Baby incident at the beginning of the movie happen during the presumable overthrow at the beginning of Koopa's reign, slightly before, or some time afterward? At first I assumed that they both happened at the same time, but looking at the Queen's style of clothes I've started to wonder whether Koopa-style clothing was already in place (or whether that's just how the dino-humans' clothes tend to look). Which leads to my next question:

What was the alternate world like before Koopa took over? I know that the design was specifically inspired (in-universe) by Manhattan, and that they apparently had a monarchy beforehand, but how different was it?

I know that Daisy's ancestors were directly affected by and connected to the meteorite, turning them into Portal Keepers, but would the explanation that (the meteorite is actually the home/host/prison of an Eldritch Abomination that knows what it wants people to be like and is responsible for humans and dino-humans evolving parallel to one another, and that some of the dino-humans seem more reptilian than others because they're supposed to be evolving on a completely different path and some of them have lesser/different connections to the magic field that makes them seem 'human') manage to fit into the worldbuilding that's already been done?

Well the story I'm referring to is called The First Rebel. And like your story it tries to explain things like why Daisy was orphaned in the first place and such.

Oh man, I'm sorry! I just looked through the threads in Fanstuff and realized it was your fic that your were talking about. I really wasn't trying to rip it off or anything, I promise. It does sound cool; I'll do my best to keep First Year developing in a different direction. I swear, it's a friggin' curse; one time I came up with a character who, as a plot twist, is later revealed to be an incubus, and less than an hour later I saw a page on TV Tropes mentioning a webcomic with the exact same twist. D:

Also, I just realized you're a fellow troper. High five!

Let's see... I'm trying to think of some mistakes that might be made by an idealistic college student, who may or may not know much at all about running a government, and who has been suddenly placed in a position of power, with a dying father who's been a fungus for twenty years and a motley crew, the sanest of which is the mute mini-dinosaur, as her only advisors. Suggestions? Whee, run-on sentences!

(I think I might go ahead and make this into First Year's discussion thread, and then make a different thread for the actual story. Would that be okay? If not, what with the one-thread-per-fic rule, I can post it on this thread;it's just that having a different thread with one post per chapter might make it a bit easier to read and keep track of.)

1upmushroom wrote:I'm honestly not too interested in a fic that's set AFTER the movie, I feel it's much more interesting to explore BEFORE especially since the movie set out a lot of questions for fan fic authors to answer.

I'd have to agree only when the sequel does not continue the themes or story of the original work or examines completely irrelevant events from the past. Carnie seems to be approaching a sequel to Super Mario Bros. in the way that truly successful sequels always are: a look at how the world and characters came to be as they are and where this will ultimately lead them.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Did the Doorstop Baby incident at the beginning of the movie happen during the presumable overthrow at the beginning of Koopa's reign, slightly before, or some time afterward?

Koopa slaughtered the Portal-Keeper society during the coup before realizing that only one of their blood could withstand the power of the dimensions. He would have attempted to merge our worlds not long after stabilizing the city, so Daisy's 'Moses in the bulrushes' incident couldn't have been more than a few days, if not hours, afterwards.

Carnivorous M. wrote:What was the alternate world like before Koopa took over? I know that the design was specifically inspired (in-universe) by Manhattan, and that they apparently had a monarchy beforehand, but how different was it?

Their world had been dying long before Koopa took over; his corrupt rule only exacerbated the situation. The monarchy would at that point have been working with the Portal-Keeper society to preserve what little vegetation/water was left while attempting to maintain order against constants riots. Food shortages would have been a constant issue.

Carnivorous M. wrote:I know that Daisy's ancestors were directly affected by and connected to the meteorite, turning them into Portal Keepers, but would the explanation that (the meteorite is actually the home/host/prison of an Eldritch Abomination that knows what it wants people to be like and is responsible for humans and dino-humans evolving parallel to one another, and that some of the dino-humans seem more reptilian than others because they're supposed to be evolving on a completely different path and some of them have lesser/different connections to the magic field that makes them seem 'human'[/color]) manage to fit into the worldbuilding that's already been done?
No explanation on this was given in either the early scripts or our private discussions with writer Parker Bennett, so you're free to develop the Portal-Keeper society however you feel best suits your intentions for the story.

Carnivorous M. wrote:(I think I might go ahead and make this into First Year's discussion thread, and then make a different thread for the actual story. Would that be okay?

Yes, that would certainly be acceptable. I can see that developing the story will be an intense process, so it'd be better to post chapters as they're completed in a different topic to avoid spoilers, etc.

I can't wait to read this! It sounds really interesting. I'm thinking of doing my fanfic on Daisy when she was growing up, inside of the Catholic church. Haha, maybe after we all do our fanfics, we can make a book out of them!

Alright, so far so good, you got the starter developed greatly, the only real thing I have to say is to change it to a prologue. This is what I love to do in stories like these, basically whenever you start a story if the first chapter doesn't really have anything to do with the rest of the story but it starts out it should be the prologue.

Let me explain, in my story The First Rebel, it starts out in a mental Aslyum where the main characters break out and head to the city. However, not only will they never go back there but also, the rest of the story takes place in the city, no where else so what do I do? Make that begining a prologue of course!

@ Redstar: Thanks a ton! That's really helped me a lot with getting the outline for the story done so far. Another couple questions: about how large is Dinohattan, in both dimensions and population, and are there any people trying to eke out a living in the desert?

@ LyanRai: Thank you! I hope it turns out to be fairly interesting; knowing me, there's a real chance it'll putter off and turn into a random events plot. You guys be sure and let me know if I start derailing the characters too much or if the story starts to get too off-track, 'kay?

@ 1upmushroom: Ooh, thanks for pointing that out; I knew there was something a bit wrong with the chapter formatting.

(Also, yus! We'd call it the Big Book of Dinohattan, and people would have to go through a suitably silly initiation ceremony into the Brotherhood of Funny Hats to get a copy. -shiftyeyes-)

The first chapter is done! Sorry it's kind of short and practically nothing happens in it; I just thought that it needed a good start to set the tone before the plot gets going. Feel free to point out unintentionally odd phrasing, story/world/character mistakes, grammar slip-ups, things like that. I thrive off of constructive crit. ^^

...Oops, almost forgot to link it. May I present: Ze prologue! Enjoy, and tell me what you think!

1upmushroom wrote:Alright, so far so good, you got the starter developed greatly, the only real thing I have to say is to change it to a prologue. This is what I love to do in stories like these, basically whenever you start a story if the first chapter doesn't really have anything to do with the rest of the story but it starts out it should be the prologue.

I disagree entirely. A prologue, more often than not, is a sign of poor writing an an inability to world-build. Developing a story means also developing its characters and history. You must engage the reader through a steady flow of information that expands on what was learned previously.

Let me put it this way: how many movies with a prologue lasting longer than a few seconds of voice-over are actually good? The Lord of the Rings, sure, but you also have Lynch's Dune and, of course, Super Mario Bros.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Thanks a ton! That's really helped me a lot with getting the outline for the story done so far. Another couple questions: about how large is Dinohattan, in both dimensions and population, and are there any people trying to eke out a living in the desert?

No problem! It's nice being able to share what I know about the movie, especially towards something so creative.

I really can't speak on how large Dinohattan is in either regard, though I can tell you that the city is in severe decay because of both Koopa's incompetence/corruption in ruling and the Fungus impeding any construction efforts. The outskirts of the city are largely abandoned while food shortages have led to a decline in birth rate.

According to early scripts, Toad (variably alone or with companions) lived out in the desert, so its certainly habitable if you know what you're doing. I can't suggest that there's civilization, but hermits, shantytowns or underground villages wouldn't be completely out of the question.

Thanks! Those pieces of information in particular are pretty important to the plot, so it's good to know them before I go any further with world and plot construction. Another couple of questions: what was Koopa's position of power before the takeover? From his outfit in the beginning, he seems to have been a high-ranking military officer, possibly a general of some sort, but I'm not sure.

Also, where do they get and how do they handle food and water? They don't appear to be handling food/water distribution very well, and I imagine that the poorer population gets most of its food from the desert, but do they have a stockpile of good food and water that Koopa and the other select few can use? Do they get water from the occasional reservoir, or do they have a slowly decreasing amount in the filtration system that will leave them doomed once it's gone?

As to the proper handling of prologues, I suppose it depends on the writer, the story, and the medium through which it's being portrayed. For example, it's very rare for a movie to need or make good use of a prologue, but in a book they can work very well. Each of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books, for example, has a short, strange prologue that seems entirely disconnected from the story; by the end, however, one can see that it ties in beautifully with the themes of the particular (and very nearly always excellent) book. For another (sort-of) example, the quite amazing book Ash: A Secret History uses several chapters as a prologue to introduce the main character and show how rough life is in a mercenary company, as well as to showcase a few important events and themes from her childhood. A prologue can be a good way to set up a theme and show that it was already there, so to speak, before the real beginning of the story.

A prologue can be misused a number of ways, however. It could throw away the suspenseful reveal of an important and potentially impactful event later in the story, spoiling it. If the reader has already seen the villain kill the hero's parents when he was a wee child, then later on while he's busy being shocked over finding out his parents are dead the reader will be rolling their eyes and motioning for him to get on with it. It could be attempting to set up a theme, but be so disjointed and disconnected from the story that the reader will be left wondering what on earth it's supposed to mean. It could be that the author doesn't really know how to do a proper beginning with the characters they've chosen, so they simply start with another group of characters that may or may not ever be seen again.

It really depends. I'm honestly not sure how to classify the first part of First Year, because it seems a bit too small and a bit too different from the way the other chapters are narrated to call it a chapter, but it's too closely connected to the story to really be called a prologue. Hmmm. Thoughts?

Also, I forgot to mention this, but I think for the purposes of this fic it might be best if I pretended that the stinger and the very last scene before the credits didn't happen. I hate to be one of those authors who cherrypicks and ignores things to suit their own purpose, but I've tried everything I can think of and I can't find any reasonable scenario where those two scenes won't completely dismantle the plot. Would it bother you guys terribly if I omitted them from the story?

Carnivorous M. wrote:Another couple of questions: what was Koopa's position of power before the takeover? From his outfit in the beginning, he seems to have been a high-ranking military officer, possibly a general of some sort, but I'm not sure.

Koopa certainly was a high-ranking military official who often dealt directly with the King, arguing that they should merge the dimensions and invade our world to deal with the crisis. It seems like he was more an adviser and blue blood officer rather than an actual soldier.

Early scripts mention several other men who helped run the government alongside Koopa who were presumably others in the military that instigated the coup. They are: Kyle Davenport, Koopa's "Energy Ax;" Otto Krem; Koopa's chief henchman and head of the Goomba forces (with implication of a possible coup on his own part) and propaganda commissar Hark Breland.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Also, where do they get and how do they handle food and water? They don't appear to be handling food/water distribution very well, and I imagine that the poorer population gets most of its food from the desert, but do they have a stockpile of good food and water that Koopa and the other select few can use? Do they get water from the occasional reservoir, or do they have a slowly decreasing amount in the filtration system that will leave them doomed once it's gone?

Much of the population is carnivorous, so it's literally a dino-eat-dino world. The shortage of vegetation has led to a decrease in herbivore citizens, which has forced carnivores to feed off of each other. It's chaos.

However, food isn't so much a concern as is water, which is rationed out from underground reservoirs deep in the desert.

Carnivorous M. wrote:It really depends. I'm honestly not sure how to classify the first part of First Year, because it seems a bit too small and a bit too different from the way the other chapters are narrated to call it a chapter, but it's too closely connected to the story to really be called a prologue. Hmmm. Thoughts?

Simply make it the opening to the first chapter, with a break denoted by three lines beginning the story itself.

I think you should add in something about the sky of the Mushroom Kingdom looking like "tomato soup" or however it's described in the one script, like, there's not really any sun, but more of a thick fog full of light.

Phew! It's been a while, but I'm back and ready to get cracking again. Unfortunately my copy of the movie is missing, so I'm going to have to get another one, but that shouldn't take too terribly long.

In the meantime, I've come across some more questions that need answering before I can proceed any further in the story. Thanks again, Redstar, for all of your help. ^^

What are some major biological and/or psychological differences between humans and dinofolk? I mean, obviously there are biological differences, but what are some ones that would largely affect day-to-day life? For example, are there any major 'species' of dinofolk which can be easily traced through ancestry, or is any one dino person pretty much just kind of a dino-mutt?* Would, say, a dino person look at another dino person and think 'Hmm, they look mostly T-Rex, maybe a little bit plesiosaur,' or would they think 'big guy, sharp teeth, moist skin, gills, mean-looking, stay away'? How sharply-drawn are the lines between 'animal' and 'person'? Do any of them have any functional mutations, like breathing underwater or flying, or are they mostly just aesthetic differences like scales? About how long is their lifespan, gestation period, etc.?

On the psychological side, I've noticed that the residents of Dino World seem to have a sort of whimsical, passive, childlike mentality (if maybe that of a rather disturbed and decidedly non-innocent child). Are there any notable social norms that it would be good to know? For example, what are the attitudes toward killing and eating sentient beings? Is it just a fact of life, or a thing that people have to numb themselves to over time even though they know it's horrible? Do the herbivores mostly accept that they're probably going to end up someone's dinner? From what we've seen of Dinohattan, I'm imagining an 'as long as it's not me or someone I care about, well, a person's gotta eat' mindset.

Also, how aware is the general population of the situation with the human world? Do they know about the planned invasion, or even much about the human world at all? Was the presence of M'n'L a shock to them in a 'Oh hey, the tunnel to the human world is finally open and now there's these weird gross mammal things running around the city' way, or a 'Woah, the human world actually exists? And there's humans? Here?' way? Toad seemed to know a lot about the dimensions and whatnot, and he doesn't seem unduly shocked to see M'n'L, but then again he kind of strikes me as Dinohattan's equivalent of a stoner who believes in Bigfoot.

Also also, does anyone know some good sources I might use to research what was known about dinosaurs and biology and the like back in the 90s, and how that's changed? I want to do my best to make sure that Daisy doesn't magically know things from twenty years later on the calendar of scientific progress.

Also also also, do any of Koopa's named government-runner underlings have any established personalities I need to keep in mind, or can I pretty much start from scratch with them?

Finally for now-- and this one is pretty important-- is Dino World literally an alternate earth, or a different planet entirely? Are there any major differences between it and Earth, like the lengths of seasons and years or what stars are visible or where continents are (past the smog, that is)? Do they use a similar calendar to Earth?

Sorry for the millions of questions; these are some of my favorite parts of world-building, and even if they aren't already figured out to that level of detail, I need to know how many liberties I can take.

I think you should add in something about the sky of the Mushroom Kingdom looking like "tomato soup" or however it's described in the one script, like, there's not really any sun, but more of a thick fog full of light.

Good idea, and good eye! Things like that are great for the atmosphere of a story and its locale.

Glad to be back!

*must resist urge to make a Darkwing Duck refere-- oh dammit, there it is

Also, when I think of "the first year" in terms of the Mario Bros. movie timeline, I would think of the first year following the moment the meteorite struck the planet... Sixty five million years ago.

Carnivorous M. wrote:What are some major biological and/or psychological differences between humans and dinofolk? [...] How sharply-drawn are the lines between 'animal' and 'person'? Do any of them have any functional mutations, like breathing underwater or flying, or are they mostly just aesthetic differences like scales?

According to early scripts, some dino-humans can spit acid. Toad himself gained the ability to blend into backgrounds like a chameleon once he was de-evolved. There are definitely "functional mutations," but they depend on the species and level of evolution.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Would, say, a dino person look at another dino person and think 'Hmm, they look mostly T-Rex, maybe a little bit plesiosaur,' or would they think 'big guy, sharp teeth, moist skin, gills, mean-looking, stay away'?

I think species could be identified by scent, although there are surely some visible identifiers. Koopa is obviously a T. rex while Lena is a pterodactyl. The production actually fashioned a scale prosthetic that would run along her spine, imitating ridges.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Also, how aware is the general population of the situation with the human world? Do they know about the planned invasion, or even much about the human world at all?

The human world is largely considered a myth or urban legend. People know about it because it's what they've heard whispers of or being taught in school, but very few have actually been there. At least before Koopa's reign there was a sort of underground market for Earth goods, which is why you see so many Earth brands on T-shirts in the background.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Also also also, do any of Koopa's named government-runner underlings have any established personalities I need to keep in mind, or can I pretty much start from scratch with them?

The only government aid with a somewhat definable personality is Hark Breland, who is noted in the script to be a "ladies' man" and a better dresser than Koopa.

Carnivorous M. wrote:Finally for now-- and this one is pretty important-- is Dino World literally an alternate earth, or a different planet entirely? Are there any major differences between it and Earth, like the lengths of seasons and years or what stars are visible or where continents are (past the smog, that is)? Do they use a similar calendar to Earth?

The Dino World occupies the same universe as ours, but within a different dimension. This is opposed to true alternate universes and why the two worlds can be merged. As a shadow/pocket universe, the Dino World does not have a moon or stars. There's just nothingness beyond the planet. Without a moon or sun there really aren't any seasons or even days.

Continents are roughly the same as on our Earth, but without a normal core continental drift happens much more slowly.