by Maya Mills » Sat Oct 25, 2014 2:13 pm
For the Final Round, I did some write-ups about what my plans are for each character. They're both small, character driven plots and they might be subject to some change (I like to keep things flexible), but these are my ideas for where both characters should go. Since these will determine how they fit into XU, feel free to ask questions, pitch ideas, or make comments before you decide to vote.
Nina Madaraki
The Pitch:
After a year-long undercover assignment at AIM, Nina has left SHIELD and returned to Xavier’s. She seems disillusioned with her original ideas about working for any sort of government agency and nostalgic for her old goals of exploring the boundaries of the biological sciences once again. She presents herself as returning to Xavier’s in order to continue her education and pursue her own research.
However, her old superiors at SHIELD are suspicious about her exit from the organization. They worry that her time at AIM may have warped her perspective of the world and that she might be vulnerable to leaking classified information about SHIELD operations to their enemies.
And when some high level biological materials go missing from a SHIELD base, the University is placed in the awkward position of having to decide whether they trust Nina enough to protect her…
The Sell:
I want to keep what’s happened to Nina in continuity, grow her as a character, but at the same time return her to some of the moral ambiguity and mad scientist vibe that made her fun. Nina’s turn away from SHIELD is designed to be suspicious and while we may not believe that she’s joined AIM, it’ll be clear that her time spent undercover with them has influenced her quite a bit. She has a new trust in science to save the world and is willing to go to great lengths to see that her experiments succeed. She’s also much more ambitious than before and we’re going to see her start to take action on a much larger scale than she has in the past.
Many of the older characters will probably be torn between recognizing Nina is much more like she used to be in the past (happy, idealistic, honest, and outgoing) but also disturbingly close to a darker future that they once had to help Nina overcome. Younger characters will get a chance to be experimented on or become henchmen. Nina is going to need some good henchmen.
The major point though is not to make Nina a villain, but something closer to what I identified as her core concept: a person that wants to do good but doesn’t understand what good is. She wants to heal the sick, help the downtrodden, and fight for your right to party, but she needs guidance and help to realize that a super-virus isn’t necessarily the best answer to her problems.
Hannah Murphy
The Pitch:
After returning to XU with her little sister in tow, Murphy seems content to settle down and finish her studies in the Library Sciences. Unfortunately, she seems to be losing control of her ability to shift at will, involuntarily changing whenever she’s exposed to moonlight of any kind.
A consultation with some of the more magically inclined determines that the weakened werewolf curse that infected Murphy is steadily getting stronger and eventually Murphy will lose the ability to control her shifting altogether unless she does something.
Unfortunately, before they can do anything, they have to figure out exactly where her curse came from and why it has begun to increase in strength. And the answer might only known to a grinning god of mischief that will be happy to tell them. For a price....
The Sell:
Murphy is one of my all-time favorites. Which is amazing when you consider how little plot she’s been involved in. She’s become a werewolf and dated Janice. That’s really it. I love her based simply on the strength of her character and that speaks volumes about how fun she is to play, in my opinion.
With my ideas for her, I wanted to fix the one perceived weakness that Trav pointed out: Giving her story focus so that she can really shine. And the best way to do that is to have things go wrong. Murphy has always been comfortable in her skin as a werewolf, but now for the first time she’ll be torn between what part of her is the “real” Murphy: the girl or the wolf.
In order to answer that question, I’m going to explore the origins of the poorly fleshed out curse that turned her into a werewolf. Murphy is going to return to the forest where she and her original pack first came into being. She’s going to discover why she was cursed and how it might not have been such a random attack after all.
This is a character arc heavily tied into some of the magical elements of the game, so I hope that both new and old characters involved in those bits might be attracted to helping Murphy solve the mystery of her existence. Murphy is also going to be leaning heavily on her fellow shifters for morale support and guidance.
As for some of the younger characters, Murphy is very protective of her sister. Watch out for that.
The main point is to really explore who Murphy is and how she fits into the larger scheme of things. She’s been waiting for a story of her own and I really hope this one is it. However, I would also like to stress that this story is meant to be kept smaller and personal. It isn’t an issue or even a major sub-plot, but the story of a character discovering that they are part of something larger than themselves and having to decide what that means for themselves.
The voting will be open until Monday.
On your mark, get Seth, ROGEN!
. For Riot I think the problem is she is a little too exaggerated (A trend I see in many of Ten's characters). I think a Riot toned down to more reasonable levels while still being an asocial pervert could work well, though I don't know if Ten would want to go that way. I do find old Riot amusing at times which is more that I can say for Murphy so I will go with Riot.
. I just would want to make sure it's a little more reigned in with Nina.
