✩Getting Some Advice

It’s been a little over a week since I was given this project, and with my research into many different uses of time travel in media, I think I have a pretty decent idea of where I want the plot of my film to be. Let’s recap where my head is currently...

• Fantasy genre
• Target audience: teens-young adults
• Set in the real world
• Include magical elements, but nothing too flashy, costly, or challenging
• No ensemble cast, focus on 2-3 main characters
• The plot centered around characters living on opposite traveling timelines
• To spare confusion, don’t explain how the time-traveling phenomenon works

Armed with these concepts and my wild imagination, I decided to call my brother, Jake. I often turn to him when I am creating stories because he is an avid film/story loves like myself. We have watched many TV shows together such as Steven Universe, WandaVision, Cobra Kai, Voltron, and the Dream SMP. The two of us have spent countless hours discussing lore, characterization, motives, and symbolism in the media we indulge in. Not to mention, he took AICE Media when he was in high school and is currently taking courses in filming at UF, so I highly value his opinion. Thankfully, he had some time to chat about my film opening ideas.


I shared with Jake all my thoughts regarding my project, and he really liked the ideas I had come up with. He thought the time travel idea was a super neat plotline to work with. He proposed an interesting way that I could open my film: the character who is traveling backward visits numerous locations that would be later seen in the film. (Side note, we dubbed the character traveling forwards as “One” and the character traveling backward “Two” to aid in conversation). I think this idea is super cool and definitely something I can work with; however, this implies that One and Two live in the same world, which I had not thought of. I had initially thought that it might make more sense to have the characters live in two different worlds. This would make it simpler for the audience to comprehend how One and Two can communicate. But Jakes’s idea made me rethink.


Wouldn’t it be interesting to have both characters live in the same world? The characters could talk about places the other knows about, and even attempt to find one another. It could make for a more compelling story than my original idea in my opinion. I believe there is more for me to play with if One and Two lived in the same world.


I had mentioned in a previous blog post that a theme I might want to work with is how “magic is everywhere” or something along those lines. Using Jake’s inspiration, perhaps I could make my story follow One, but they somehow stumble upon a method to communicate with Two. Though I haven’t decided what this is yet, it is perhaps something I can foreshadow in my film opening. From there, One is confused as to why Two contacted One and who Two is. Two, however, is bidding their farewell to One. This could be because Two has other places to be, and only visited One’s world to take care of something, most likely magical. From there, One tries desperately to find out who Two is and how to find them for reasons I have yet to develop. But, when One finally reaches Two's first conversation with One, One finally learns Two’s backstory, but by then there is nothing One can do to bring back their friend. One would have to continue on with their normal life, leaving the audience to wonder if the story was all made up or not.


Jake’s idea ultimately spiraled a major brainstorming session on my part, and this idea is super unique and exciting to me. He also recommended that I check out the musical “The Last 5 Years,” for it also utilizes a reverse timeline structure to tell its story, which I will discuss in my next blog post.


Shoutout to Jake for helping me out, your advice has made me super hyped to start filming!!


Well, that's all for today, thanks for reading!