I think a lot of us have dreams of growing up and changing the world. Impacting it in some great way. Or if you’re villain type, maybe in a bad way.
Anyway, now that I got your attention with changing the world.
I’m not talking about changing “our” world. I’m talking about changing our world that is inside of the stories, so like… y’know, the real world but in the comic world. :D
I’m a huge fan of The Witcher (the games/books, not the show) – The Witcher heavily impacted me and the way I view my world, with shades of grey, who is or isn’t a monster, what are truly monsters? And that was a subject I really wanted to get into which I did with my own comic. The Witcher influenced me and inspired me to look into folklore, mythologies, everything I could think of and try to make my own out of it.
However, one thing I am bad at is coming up with an “original world” and what do I mean by that? I mean creating a brand new world where… the countries have different names, or rules and laws. It’s very hard to create this all on your own. So what did I do? I used the world as we know it now but I tried to change it here and there. There was actually a wonderful article which once again, was by the wonderful Tantz and it talked about urban fantasy and how tricky it is to write but also the easy ways to write it and how if magic played a part in the day to day life of everyone, how a lot of things could have been different.
My idea of how to go about this, using the real world but still using my magical world was to actually use our world as a base, but build my own rules on top of it. Slavery? Didn’t happen. Why? Because witches ain’t about that life. If there were slavery, it was about status and not skin color, which is actually something that we used to do too, the Old North men did it, they didn’t care about what you looked like, but if they felt like they were stronger and better and overall, just… greater than you, you would have probably become their slave. Or they would have sold you into slavery. Also, slavery used to have a different term or meaning for them too, where it could have been that you just owed them something so you worked for them until you could pay off that favor or that debt was paid in full. So, take that however you will. Christopher Columbus? Never existed in my comic. World War II? Never happened. Why? Because after The Great War, the supernatural groups stepped in and decided they had to have some sort of political influence. Ireland? It’s just Ireland, there is no “Ireland” and then “Northern Ireland” – please don’t @ me fellow Irish folk. It’s just easier for me.
How do I hide the supernatural world from the regular people and why do I do this?
The how:I applied the Men in Black situation to my comic. If there is ever a situation, that is more of a major scale, such as a giant worm ripping through the NYC subways, there would be magic users who can alter the mind and memory of people. I actually already displayed this in my comic in pretty much the beginning to show you that, yes, the supernatural are a secret and they have means on keeping it a secret. Things that are done on a smaller scale, such as someone saw a werewolf running across a road, that could just be chalked up to “you were tired” or “it was probably a dude in a furry outfit” etc.
The why: Honestly, it really is all about writing, I am not a professional writer, obviously, and I don’t quite understand how to combine the two where it would all work out okay without some sort of major chaos or clashing, especially since I don't want that to be the focal point or even have any influence in the story. Actually, I think a story that did that wonderfully was actually done by my friend, hchano, her comic, dream*scar – wonderfully drawn and wonderfully written, their supernatural groups coexisted with humans but there was a situation of the occasional racism some would face, and then obviously there was a more major plot point which unfortunately we only saw a glimpse of because of the indefinite hiatus that d*s is on, but still, it’s really worth the read.
Continuing onto MY WHY about the situation, like I said, it’s tricky combining the two, my current world, the alternate universe of our own world (I guess) is on a huge peaceful scale, no countries are trying to bite each other and the most you see is maybe some disagreements here and there but because of the magical/supernatural influence, there is never a war or a threat of one. However, I was recently reading and watching articles on aliens because I’m into aliens, and one of the reasons states about why the government kept aliens a secret or tried to for so long is because us, humans, are prone to mass panic, if one person freaks out, another one will and then three more and then seven more and so on goes the numbers. And this is a big reason why the supernatural stay hidden in my comic. If they pop out of hiding there will be this new wave of “people” coming out into the world, something that has mainly been myths and just tales, is now confirmed as all real and that will create a mass panic, start riots, hate campaigns, VAMPIRES WILL BE GETTING CANCELED ON TWITTER. You get it.
Now, why not do it where they were always part of society? Because that creates a very big branch between a human and a supernatural being. There is a big divide in power and they know this. There will be a power push from one or the other, and given our history, it’s probably going to be the humans pushing to control the supernatural. The best way to explain this is that, at the end of the day, we are all humans and we all have the potential of being dicks to each other, we’re not truly different from one another besides morally and obvious physical appearance but we are still human and we all look human. But you put a human and a vampire face to face, there are differences, one is much stronger, one is more dangerous and only one will survive this encounter, and we know which one that is. Therefor, vampires, are now seen as a threat by humans, and this is how we are, this is how every creature is, when we see an obvious threat, we will either stand ready or rally with our pitchforks. Because we’re dicks.
Originally, that’s how SCORNED was going to be, magic was known, supernatural beings were rare BUT very much present. But then the whole superhero thing comes into play: “great power comes with great responsibility” and actually THE BOYS, does that very well and showcases how so many “heroes” are actually super destructive and realistically, I think a lot of people would hate them for it, to the point of wanting to take them down, but then you have a ton of people who are enamored with this image they have and they put their blind faith into them, oblivious either by nature or just forcing themselves to be ignore the destruction that their beloved “hero” caused.
Now this goes further on into why I keep it a secret, my comic has a plot, and that plot just doesn’t involve humans being dicks to the supernatural. As stated before, I don’t want to focus on that, in fact, a lot of the lore I have already written out for my story probably won’t really be explained or seen in-comic. It really is more of an “extra” bit of information for you to look into on your own time if you’re curious about the world.
If I ever manage to work on the prequels for SCORNED like I would love to, that’s where the comic lore is way more heavily used because that’s when the world is being shaped to fit the current world we see now in my comic.
Also, a part of me for keeping it a secret is because I’m kind of bad at writing and I don’t want to have to go into the whole discussion how humans can coexist with the supernatural when they’re having too hard of a time coexisting with other humans. shrug Despite the fact that humanity is currently in a state of peace in my comic, people are still dicks. It really is just much easier for me to hide it MiB style.
Anyway, thanks for reading this article. Do you have any favorite stories that either merge the two worlds or keeps them separate? Do you work on a comic with either of the scenarios? How are you going about it? Let me know! ALSO, you know what else has supernatural content in it??? THE DUCK HORROR ANTHOLOGY: THE DUCK: REANIMATED WHICH IS AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE SO GOOOOO BUYYYY ITTTTTT!!!!!!!
Changing the World
damehelsing at 12:00AM, Aug. 8, 2021
6 likes!
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bravo1102 at 7:14PM, Aug. 8, 2021
What if it's not a secret just that no one believes in it anymore? All the supernatural comes from stories in our world. It all comes from what were at one point eyewitness stories (and still many being cataloged) Just that outside of conspiracy theories and fringe magazines no one really takes it seriously. But it is all quite real. The supernatural is beyond belief and so it literally remains. No one believes the stories except those who deal with it. Who listens to Coast to Coast AM? Who reads Fortean Times, Atlantis Rising, UFO monthly and believes all the reports? There are tons and tons all the time but the great majority go on with their lives because it hasn't directly affected them.
Matt Comics at 8:44AM, Aug. 8, 2021
I've always followed the Fictional Earth approach. I can take inspiration from any part of our world, but then I twist it into a cartoon equivalent, or use things that don't exist anymore like prehistoric topography, legendary locations and all that stuff. My Earth and our Earth have different countries/geography/history because it's way easier than dealing with the headaches caused by realism. Most of my non-human species were around a long time before humans. They not only coexist with humans (who have seen weirder things by now), but effectively rule most of the planet.
Banes at 7:33AM, Aug. 8, 2021
Gotta say it - the idea of Vampires being cancelled on Twitter is really funny and suggests many other possibilities. But it would change the world of the story...and maybe even the genre. Figuring out all the ins and outs of why the supernatural remains hidden is a tough one. I've wrestled with it while developing series. Even the popular and long running Dresden Files and Supernatural, as far as I know, never explain why the secret is maintained by the few in the know. You mention Men In Black, who explained it great by just saying "it would cause a panic."
Andreas_Helixfinger at 1:16AM, Aug. 8, 2021
The supernatural world is one of my fairy/nature spirit species called the Imsies and is the source of Psionics, this world's term for magic, psychic powers and anything supernatural, and it exists in the realm of dreams, the imagination and the unciounsess mind. Imsies occupy both this realm and the natural realm and are therefore mostly invicible to the world of Amsies, which are low-psionic beings (Imsies being high-psionic beings) in which the human species is included (the exception being humans who are born as Psions meaning they're high-psionic Amsies), for which they are only half-recogniced as anything more then creatures of myth and superstition. Some communities and organizations recognice them as real, but most people don't--until they get to know them of course. Iddlings being the most recogniced because unlike other Imsy subraces, who mostly dwell deep in the wilderness, they live close to humans and their urban settings--for reasons you'll find out reading Idfestation^^
Andreas_Helixfinger at 1:12AM, Aug. 8, 2021
Well, the retro-futuristic alternative earth that my comics takes place in does have both a natural world and a supernatural world. The natural world being one of advanced bio-science and an environment that is mutating and terraforming due to the so called Orbital Flux, which was unexplainably caused by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Human civilization is split up and spread out across little islands as most of the land is sinking under the rising oceans, forcing every civilized society to work together to stay afloat and to work towards the preservation of human DNA that is rapidly mutating out of recognition, introducing the Morph-class system among other things, for which Molly Lusc belongs to the Anthrope-class being half-human, half-seal. Also Rock n' Roll never happened in the history of this alternative version of our world, which is why people live like the 1920's never entirely ended and jazz music and sea shanties is still cool^^