Planning "Sokka's Eleven" - Part 1

So, I was reading Star Wars: Scoundrels this weekend, a story that could have been retitled "Han Solo's Eleven" and it wouldn't be any less apt. I personally recommend the book to people who like Star Wars, Han Solo, or complicated capers, but that's not what this post is about. I enjoyed the book so much that it revived my enthusiasm for an old fanfic idea that I shelved in favor of other projects:

Sokka's Eleven.

One of the reasons I put it on the back burner was the announcement of The Promise, because my vision of Sokka's Eleven would deal with how the various characters adapt to adult life in the post-war world, and I didn't want the comic stepping on my toes. (It already ruined Last Stand of the Freedom Fighters forever. No need to repeat it.) However, since the comics have turned out to be a blight on everything that was ever good about ATLA, I'm thinking maybe I don't care about writing a story that one-ups the comics. After all, I can't do any worse than Gene Yang. Besides, Legend of Korra gives end-points for the main cast's lives that go far beyond the circumstances of the comics, so I can use work based off that information and perhaps accidentally wind up more or less compatible with what gets filled in later as "canon."

However, I'm writing Retroactive now. (Hey, maybe one or two of you haven't heard yet. Doesn't hurt to get that fact established.) I'm too dedicated to that to shelve it in favor of another novel-sized project, but I figured out the next best thing...

I'll just plan out Sokka's Eleven in public, via a series of blog posts, and see how people respond to my ideas and process.

So, first up, I flesh out the premise and major characters.( Read more... )