You ever have that moment when you realize "Hey, I might be onto something here"? You know, that moment when you've been doing something for a long time, not sure where it might be going, and then suddenly someone turns around and tells you that it's amazing, keep doing it? Yeah, I had one of those moments earlier today.

So, I've been taking this Scriptwriting class for the Fall term and part of the class was that we had to present a 10-15 page script for the class to read and comment on. Deciding that I needed to see how it would stand up to scrutiny, I converted Episode 1 of DMC: Renegades into script format and submitted it (obviously, with the DMC part of the title omitted; the idea behind the class is to prepare our work for presentation to producers, and if Renegades is ever made into an actual non-Capcom-supported production, it'll have all the specifically DMC parts taken out and replaced with original analogs). It was supposed to be discussed last Thursday, but had to get pushed back due to time constraints so today, that's what we started the class off with. And HOT DAMN did it get a much better reception than I expected. O_O

Practically the unanimous decision, professor included, was that nearly EVERYTHING I had done was excellent and only needed a few minor tweaks here and there (my professor even started discussing possible television networks I could submit it to! Holy shit!). Of course, I've enjoyed the praise you guys have given me (for which I am very grateful), but it was another thing entirely to be praised by my fellow writers, particularly fellow writers that are trying to go professional themselves. (As a side note, I hadn't yet been given tangible confirmation that my professor really was a professional himself; sure, he'd given out really good advice and had occasionally mentioned shows he had written, but nothing really impressive. Then today he mentioned that he could tell I'd spent a long time working on the story by myself JUST BY READING IT, and I started to get the feeling that this guy juuuust might be the real deal.) Probably the biggest confidence boost was that a few of my classmates made a point of mentioning that it wasn't the kind of story they typically liked and even THEY enjoyed it!

Of course, I didn't simply make this journal to brag, there's actually some feedback I'm looking for from you guys, my fellow DAers. One thing that my professor said is that, should Renegades really be made into a TV show (which is partially my intention with it, hence the Episodes and not Chapters), it couldn't be called Renegades; there was already a cop show in the 80s named Renegades. (I also got a very nasty feeling of deja vu; a few years ago I was working on a script for a fantasy adventure game and dubbed it Twilight due to the central conflict between a god of the day and a god of the night with the "Twilight" referring to the humans caught in the middle of the conflict. Then Stephanie Meyer came out with her crap-tastic vampire romance. T_T) So I've been thinking about some possible alternative titles and figured I'd shoot them by you guys and see what you thought:

The Grey Area
Living in the Grey
End of the Tunnel (also partially a reference to the Metallica song "No Leaf Clover" and the line "Then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel Is just a freight train coming your way")
Crossroads
Chosen Paths

The main suggestion my professor made was to look at the themes I had in mind for my story and choose a title that referenced that, and the three main themes are:

-the fact that Fenrir and Hantu live in the neutral ("grey") area between the good and evil and are willing to use aspects of either in order to survive. They don't fight for the Angels and they don't fight for the other Demons, they fight for themselves and those close to them, that's all.
-choices; several of the characters will go through sub-plots that deal with the fallout of the paths they've chosen for themselves.
-independent identities; the idea that who you're born as, who you are on a genetic level, does not determine who you are as an individual, that it's up to you to decide who you are and no one else. This is probably the stronger of the themes, as it incorporates parts of the others, but I think it's a bit vague and isn't as easy to find a suitable title for

Any ideas? Suggestions? Favor one of the titles mentioned above? I WISH TO KNOOOOW.


Also: I've been listening to this damn song repeatedly for the past few days and I CAN'T GET THE DAMN THING OUT OF MY HEAD AUGGGGGH [link]