Idea List #4

 

Sure, I’m no Jack Kirby/Stan Lee, but who knows what you can be when you take an idea and make it your own?  Mouse down and see what you like!  As always, these ideas are in the “What if…” format – that is, add the phrase “what if” in front of every idea.  Enjoy!

 

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(In SW) Boba Fett turned out to really be a clone of Anakin Skywalker?  Wouldn=t that starch your bloomers?

 

A college guy and a college girl decided to move in together as roommates, nothing else.  What problems could come up because of this?  This could be very funny.

 

A comics group began doing a monthly Ashowcase@ of one-shot stories involving new characters or old, from different artists in the organization (and free-lancers)?

 

A kid from the late nineties was transported to a school in the early fifties?  Image the culture shock!  Like ABack to the Future,@ but with more attitude, but at the same time more light-hearted than (re: not as cynical as) AA Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur=s Court@.

 

A low light photographer found that he had captured a murder on film?

 

A small town lawyer finds himself defending the biggest case of the year?  What if he is prosecuting?

 

A teddy bear, sold during a huge sale, contained a bomb?

 

A writer used his fiction to solve problems in his real life, sort of using his characters as alter egos to work out his life?  What happens when he tries to live life that way?  What if he is using his characters to feed his life, and his life to feed his characters in a feedback loop?  What if this gets out of hand, and he starts committing crimes?

 

All the things you imagined would come to pass, unless you kept a tight restraint upon yourself?  What would happen if your control slipped?

 

An unknown man unknowingly held the future of the planet in his hands?  Who is he, and how would you find him?

 

Arthur, alive after the final battle with Modred, gives up his kingdom for his one love, Guinevere.  However, he is tempted to take up the banner again, and must make the choice again - the throne or love.

 

Coca-cola was reformulated to be an aphrodisiac?

 

Earth became an alien POW camp?

 

Everybody else in your workplace was involved in some type of conspiracy or shady dealing, but you weren=t in on the deal?

 

In a cartoon weird-land, like the Far Side, all the cartoons were about Anormal@ life?

 

Jelly-fish controlled the world?

 

Ms. Marple met Nero Wolfe?  It could start with her visiting New York, and wanting to see the orchids....

 

Santa Claus was stuck in L.A. (or New York, or anywhere), and couldn=t get back to the North Pole?

 

Some island became a new state?  Imagine the political and social intrigue that could be generated from that.  Base it on Puerto Rico, of course.

 

Someone developed a virus that affected both humans and computers?

 

Someone gave you the ultimate computer chip, the most high-tech piece imaginable, able to revolutionize the market, and on that chip was encoded instructions to make a light-speed computer?  What would you do with it?  Who would be trying to take it from you?

 

Terrorists took over a military installation?

 

The Aaliens@ conspiring on our planet (UFO=s, etc.) were actually humans from the future?

 

The director of the CIA was actually a foreign agent?  How would he be found out, and how would he be caught?

 

The most important book (or piece of paper) in the world was given to a man who couldn=t read?

 

The same hitchhiker kept appearing as you traveled across country?

 

The Subway sandwich people were trying to take over the world?

 

The whole world turned vegetarian?

 

There was an end to rainbows?  Would you find a pot of gold there?

 

There was another sentient life-form on earth, and you had to quickly find it?

 

Things died around you?  The longer you stayed around something, the quicker it would die?  Obviously you would be an outcast, but you could make a fortune as a hitman.  How would that affect you, as you cannot be with anyone you love, or really anyone at all.  All the time, you can feel yourself, stealing seconds of life away from the people around you.  Depressing.

 

What if America's best spy was a James Bond-esque woman?  What would she be like, and what sorts of missions would she perform?

 

You believed you were from Saturn?

 

You bought a state?  How would the government deal with that?

 

You cloned someone, and the clone met the real one after the clone had grown up?  What would the clone think about it all?  Would he question his own reality?  What would the Atechnical@ and real relationship between the two be?

 

You could bring someone back to life for five minutes (or 2 hours)?

 

You could hold your breath for abnormally long periods of time?  How could you use that talent?

 

You could make time go backwards?

 

You could make time stop?  What would you do as you could move around and no one else could?  What problems would you encounter as you were in this state?  What if you found that there were Athings@ in this state?  If you wanted to be realistic, how would light react in this situation?  As you moved, would you displace all the frozen light particles, leaving a Awake@ behind you?

 

You could not fly, in a society of those who could?

 

You could see into the spiritual world?

 

You could spend one day in the past, without changing the time line?

 

You could stop time?

 

You could tell time without looking at a clock, and were never wrong (the idea is of an internal clock)?

 

You couldn=t tell time?

 

You designed a machine that would take anything and break it down to its constituent elements?

 

You discovered your recently dead sister lead a double life that caused her death?  What would you do?  What if it was either (or both) or your parents instead?

 

You found a trove?  What if there was no historically plausible reason for that trove to be where you found it?  What would you do?  What if you didn=t tell?

 

You found all the missing pennies?

 

You found out that human beings were really alien to the planet, and that our ancestors had subjugated another, native race before falling into barbarism?  What if the descendants of our ancestors now came looking for us?

 

You found out your phone was bugged, but you didn=t know by whom or for what reason?  What if everything you did was being monitored?

 

You had a cure for baldness, selling to the highest bidder?

 

You had a handicapped detective?  Blind, or deaf, or in a wheelchair, or maybe a group of them together.  I can see how each might have advantages.  However, the idea would receive a lot of bad press if handled badly.

 

You had been (virtually?) alone for years, and were suddenly cast in with a lot of people (like a castaway suddenly rescued, perhaps, or a voluntary withdrawal that is shattered, or just the course of events)?

 

You had one chance to go back and change something in your past, and see how that change would affect your entire life?  What would you change, and what would happen?

 

You had the ability to make someone fall asleep?

 

You linked a powerful computer (or Athe web@) to an android=s body?  What type of personality would it have?  What would it do?

 

You performed a successful brain transplant?

 

You selectively bred four-leaf clovers?

 

You used to read, but an accident damaged the brain centers that let you recognize written words?

 

You were a comic-book villain, and you didn=t want to be such anymore?  How would convince others of this change?  What would you do with yourself?  Why would you change?

 

You were a master ventriloquist?  What manner of mischief could you get into?  How could somebody force you to use that talent?  How could you use it to get away?

 

You were a ocean scientist and you were living alone on a research platform in the middle of the Pacific?

 

You were a policeman who worked at night?  What if you were a police detective in the same situation?

 

You were abducted by yourself?

 

You were allergic to every kind of known fabric?

 

You were allergic to green?

 

You were attacked by a rampaging ice cream truck?

 

You were attracted to women=s skin?  That you liked to see their skin, touch it, inhale it?  What kind of person would that make you, in other respects?

 

You were changed into some animal?  What if it kept changing, every day, into something else, somewhere else?

 

You were forced to participate in a giant scavenger hunt, with you life (or perhaps someone else=s) depending on your success?  A hackneyed idea, but it could be used again.

 

You were genetically (or artificially) altered to be a methane breather to further exploration of a new planet?

 

You were kidnaped and forced to bear children by artificial insemination?

 

You were to write about a detective that could remember everything, a perfect eidetic memory?  Of course, you would have to give him (or her) a sidekick to tell the story.  What if the person had the memory and the logical mind, but not much else going for them?

 

You wrote a book about the Union general who went to Italy to get a Lincoln conspirator?

 

You wrote a novel based in the Sioux Indian uprising during 1862?  What happened, and what were the thoughts of the soldiers fighting here instead of on the Civil War front lines?  How would they react to Pope's arrival in disgrace?

 

You wrote a story depending on the fact that the international airport system is a defacto country unto itself?

 

You wrote an updated Charlie Chan novel?

 

You wrote books based on old movies, Casablanca, say, or something of the kind?

 

Your computer began to talk to you?

 

Your dog was possessed?

 

Your hair grew an inch a day?

 

Your scarf tried to kill you?

 

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The Idea Lounge website and related links created by Brian S. Miller.  Last update: June 31, 2004.