KlarVyvern Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 Most people who aspire to write works of fiction care somewhat for originality, though true originality is somewhat dead. It's almost impossible to write a fantasy book without borrowing from Tolkien, and science fiction writers have to contend with Star Wars, Star Trek, Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, Dr Who etc (Science fiction is REALLY DIVERSE 0.0). I want to eventually write and illustrate graphic novels and I spend my free time drawing concept art or coming up with stories. Most of the fun is coming up with ideas that are never used or really uncommon, but sometimes something really specific gets used in the weirdest of places, as I will show in the example that inspired me to make this thread. SPOILERS FOR THE MANGA "BLACK BUTLER" BELOW! For those who won't see the spoiler, it's basically me and a famous manga coming up with the exact same plot element. One of the possible stories I wanted to make is supposed to be about a young man becoming the apprentice of a Grim Reaper after taking his own life, in fact, this is how they're supposed to be made. The novel is then supposed to be about mortality, morality and other "deep things", but that is somewhat irrelevant for now. The latest issue of Black Butler revealed that Shinigami (basically Grim Reapers/minor death gods for you who don't know about Japanese mythology) are people who took their own mortal lives and have to spend part of their afterlife reaping souls. This astounded me and made me question the viability of my own creation. I mean, if I ever published it people would think I stole/borrowed the idea from BB, especially since it's so specific. So, has anyone here had this happen to them? If so, how did it affect you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bab8s Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 Not something I made, but the Hunger Games got crap from vaguely resembling an obscure Japanese cult movie called Battle Royale. The author of the Hunger Games had never heard of the other book/movie, but that didn't stop some people from complaining. To sum up my thoughts on the subject: Everyone thinks in unique ways, but there are only a limited number of things to think about. I wouldn't worry about accidentally "copying" some other work, because the people who will accuse you of doing so don't tend to be experts in anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DiosGX Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 (edited) I was in the middle of writing a five-book-long odyssey about ten years ago. A friend of mine was telling me to watch Gurren Lagann (LOLANIMOO) because it was amazing. I said I'd watch it eventually, and never did for about three years, once the books were finally done. I looked back on it, and thought, "huh. I was writing a story about a ragtag motley crew of Judeo-Christian mythos-inspired supernatural demon slayers, traveling the earth on a small moon-sized, blood red world ship. Right about the same time Gurren Lagann aired the episode where the moon transforms into a blood red world ship powered by HOT BLOODED SPIRIT." To wit, the living ship in my books was fueled by the ecosphere "barnacles" on its hull and by the bio dome at the ship's core—which was more or less a forest (inside a ship (I THOUGHT IT WAS COOL)). But that all of its "mysterious ancient technology" starts to malfunction when there's a large enough congregation of negativity in the ship's city. But that was just a plot device I created to kind of explore the inner world of a flying utopia and how all of its crazy S#&$ actually works. The answer was just HOT BLOODED SPIRIT F*** YEAH. Now here's the kicker. This type of thing may be rare, but it does happen. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, nor have I put much actual time into researching it... and most people outright deny it even being a thing because it's so completely insane. Maybe it's just the (legal) weed I smoke (frequently), but I do believe in some type of Universal Mind that we are all, consciously or unconsciously, connected to. A visual novel game that came out recently called "999," is actually quite plot focused around Morphogenetic Fields, which is in essence the same thing as the "global human mind," as some refer to it. http://www.cracked.com/article_18788_the-5-most-mind-blowing-coincidences-all-time.html Check out this here cracked article, down at the bottom. #3 about Dennis the Menace. This is back in the 50s. There was no internet. People didn't communicate overseas unless you were a politician or a celebrity. Much less two no-name comic artists living in dirty city apartments. So, their comics strips had the same exact name, and for some bizarre reason were published on the same exact day. That means the guy in the UK just ripped off his American counterpart, right? Or vice versa?Nope. By all accounts, neither man knew, or had any way of knowing, that there was an equivalent comic being developed an ocean away Just as a final (long) thought, I have been given, and have given, much advice as directly regards writing in my life. One of the most critical was "throw away 75% of what you write." An answer given in response to the query of; "why is it that major paperback authors always seem to write pure gold?" The answer is that they do not. They write a lot, and get rid of most of it, retaining only the best parts. It's like making a cake, frosting it, decorating it, and then removing the cake such that only the frosting and candy and s'mores and beef jerky and nachos... ... remain. Um, sorry, little munchie fit came on. But the point is, you don't want to keep EVERYTHING you write. With that in mind, feel free to go nuts. Be as wild and creative as you want to be in any way you want, because odds on favor is that it won't stay in the end. Though it may give you another idea all together. Perhaps it's just me, but no matter how much pre-writing and preparation I do, in the heat of actually writing it out, new ideas always spring to mind and it's just like, "oh man, THAT'S GREAT!, how did I never think of this before?" The other bit of advice is... to put it in layman's terms, to steal from other people. I don't mean RIP THEM OFF entirely, goodness, no. The key here is to take a story you like. The common example in workshops is Star Wars just because (almost) everyone knows it. So it's like, you take Star Wars and then remove anything that is unique to Star Wars itself. What do you have left? You can still use space ships. You can still use interplanetary travel. You can take its premise and the general idea of its plot, but you can use characters in any way you want. Your main guy doesn't have to be Luke Skywalker. Your main man can be a trading merchant making a living. It could be a literal rockstar touring planets and playing music. It could be anything you want, once you strip away the unique elements and are left with a setting that is familiar to you already, ergo comfortable for your own creative expressions. I honestly feel it's important to pay tribute/homage to that which has inspired you, or touched you, or provoked some manner of thought or feeling. It is those essences, to me, that separate Art from Modern Art. I could keep going, and going, but I'm going to cut it off in a second here. To answer your final question, as I've had a few instances of "how did we both do this SAME thing at the SAME TIME?" Well, it just made me believe that the Global Human Mind is very much a real thing. And that's pretty rad. o 3o! Edited May 23, 2015 by DiosGX Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KlarVyvern Posted May 23, 2015 Author Share Posted May 23, 2015 Not something I made, but the Hunger Games got crap from vaguely resembling an obscure Japanese cult movie called Battle Royale. The author of the Hunger Games had never heard of the other book/movie, but that didn't stop some people from complaining. To sum up my thoughts on the subject: Everyone thinks in unique ways, but there are only a limited number of things to think about. I wouldn't worry about accidentally "copying" some other work, because the people who will accuse you of doing so don't tend to be experts in anything. Yeah, the whole hate-train is kind of stupid, since "putting young people in an arena and make them fight" is kind off non-specific and vague, and the circumstances were different the the two works. Kind off like saying Zorro copied LOTR because both features prominent sword-play. Yeah, I try not to care so much, but the thing is still fresh in mind so I'll have to sleep on it or something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DiosGX Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 As for the "kids locked down and forced to fight," another rad visual novel, also by Spike Chunsoft... Danganronpa. If you are interested in story telling whatsoever, you absolutely must check those games out. I can suggest a pretty rad british girl who did a Let's Play of both games. Unlike most Let's Players on youtube, she actually knows how to be quiet and let the game speak for itself most of the time. A trait that is rather endearing to her channel, I must say. It's a shame though cuz damn her accent is super sexy. Stay away from tumblr as far as that game is concerned though. All those people are just awful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KlarVyvern Posted May 23, 2015 Author Share Posted May 23, 2015 (edited) -snip- Yeah, I 'm aware of the "throwing away 75%" idea before and I actually implement it, since I'm aware of how works can be bloated and spiral out of control if you don't streamline it *cough*Sonichu*cough*. Most of the ideas I've entertained has been thrown out the window and the example I gave is the result of much streamlining and to the point that it barely resembles its original concept (celestial conflict between heaven and hell). But yeah, really solid advice, and it's nice that we share some ideas. Thanks for the post. Also, your project was pretty cool O3O. Edited May 23, 2015 by KlarVyvern Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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