Marvel Cinematic Universe, here I come...
For now, I'm only telling my story using other people's images.
An introduction to my concept
My take on Marvel's Mistress Death is a concept drawn from the existing character in the Marvel Universe, and the body of work that has been created by the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) in the years since it debuted. But first, the preamble.
The success of the MCU lies in several crucial factors;
The concept is one of total transformation of human society in the 21st century - using the power of storytelling and mainstream/mass media. The concept is also one of love saving the day.
The bare bones:
Message: Death walks this Earth now. And she is not happy.
She and her children are here to make change - and destroy the evils that limit the human race. The old world will not survive. If you want to be part of the new world, it’s time to evolve.
The Multiverse is coming, whether you like it or not - and it will change everything in the Real World.
The success of the MCU lies in several crucial factors;
- a focus on deep and compelling characters and their growth over time and through challenges
- casting that matches actors to the characters in a way that defies expectations and creates a sense of congruence
- the willingness to focus on real world issues and explore them in multiple dimensions - thereby creating room for these issues to be resolved
- a highly passionate fan base that reaches all around the world
The concept is one of total transformation of human society in the 21st century - using the power of storytelling and mainstream/mass media. The concept is also one of love saving the day.
The bare bones:
Message: Death walks this Earth now. And she is not happy.
She and her children are here to make change - and destroy the evils that limit the human race. The old world will not survive. If you want to be part of the new world, it’s time to evolve.
The Multiverse is coming, whether you like it or not - and it will change everything in the Real World.
The Draft Script Treatment
Written for Marvel - released in cinemas in 2025/2027 (depending on COVID-19) and streamed on Disney+ after the 3-day spoiler ban lifts
Note: This pitch is constantly evolving, and information is being added all the time. Check back regularly to watch it morph into finality.
Concept: Death has chosen to take the form of a human - to learn about the world. To experience it. And to play with it. This is her story.
Hook: A taste of what's to come, and a teaser of what is possible. But watch out, this story comes with trigger warnings - and we might just heal your demons.
Intent: Mistress Death has chosen Earth as her refuge to live out the impending Apocalypse of the Multi-Verse. But she's not going down without a fight. It's her twin she's fighting - but she will not leave a single person behind. Watch her journey to become an Avenger so she can finally prove that she's done it right.
Core Message: Humanity needs to wake up and realise how close they are to the edge - And that their choices will either push us off that edge, or allow us to rise above it.
Unique Selling Point: Nothing is really known about this movie before it comes out. Not the name of the main character, not the comics it's been drawn from, not the cast or crew. It is top-secret, and all information given in the lead up to the movie is purposefully vague and ephemeral. Not even the crew and cast of the other movies (seem to) know. All the audience knows is that there's a portion of it set in space - every teaser/trailer contains the same three themes - galaxies, shadows, and falling. And every trailer shows new footage (no repeated moments, each second a new opportunity to tell more of the story).
Title: Mistress Death
Working/First Title: Dark Space (with the true title of the movie not revealed until the first three days after the movie premiere or the spoiler ban is lifted)
(Teaser tied to the title - None of the ads ever reveal the true name of the movie, only the working title (#thetitleisaspoiler), but just before the text/header for Dark Space comes up - there is a brief blip of something in black and gold, with just little highlights of red.
Final Reveal Title: There is an initial title scene at the beginning of the movie, but shorter than expected - and only the first 2 words (Mistress Death). When the title is finally revealed in the movie - the lettering is formed out of obsidian with gold veins and appears in exactly the same location as the teaser - and proceeds to bleed roses and vines and then focus on a moment of storytelling (like the cinematic Marvel logo) until it dissolves into black smoke. Towards the end of the movie - after the reveal/centrefold moment, but before the endgame phase - there is a rewind to the beginning, and the opening credits run again - in full this time. This is where the full title of the movie is revealed - Mistress Death and the Avengers. (/joins/takes over/alternate connotation chosen to suitably convey the relationship before heading into showdown phase)
Full Title: Movie's main visual themes explained. Twirling blue baton, endless glitter sand pouring - hourglasses and boxes that open outwards. Book pages.
Primary motivations: Love, belonging, voice, truth, stillness
Visual Themes: Swan dive, gold+white and black smoke, bringing the shadows to life, creating a relationship with the borders of the screen, black shapes, comic frames - start of the movie has more white space, end of the movie has more black space, but there is also more gold and rainbow light refraction.
Social Themes to be tackled: Mental Health, Suicide, Domestic Violence and Abuse, Trauma, Disability, Poverty, Inequality, LGTBIQA+ issues.
Tone: Unreliable narrator, breaking the 4th wall, playing the meta, and always with a central core of hope.
Possible Charity Partners: Black Dog Institute, Sydney Story Factory, Act for Peace, Variety the Kids Charity, The Wilderness Society.
Logline to be considered: (How much do we give away? Is the name of the character a spoiler too, or do we warn the potential audience of what's coming?)
Too Precious to share
Ie. Concept: In the heart of the Marvel Universe, a strange story begins to grow, a character as yet without form, and yet already entirely defined. Who is she? What does she want? Is she a villain or a hero? Will we find out before it's too late?
Logline: A new character has woken up in the Marvel Universe. But nothing is what it seems. Can she pierce the illusion before it's too late?
Alt logline: Girl meets boy. It goes horribly wrong, but somehow, love makes it all alright in the end. Or does it?
Open Secret
Ie. Concept: A great darkness has been born into the body of a lightworker in the early 21st Century. Will our heroes discover her true nature before it's too late? What could possibly change the outcome of the ancient war between Light and Dark?
Logline: The human personification of Death has woken up on earth in the early 21st Century, but she is reluctant to fulfill her final purpose of triggering the End of the Universe because she has fallen in love.
Alt Logline: Death has been born into a human body on Earth in the 21st Century to End Everything – but when she falls in love, she struggles to bring herself to take the final leap.
Tagline to be considered: (What defines the story without giving it away? Or again, are we trading our secrets openly to gain buy-in?)
Too Precious to share
Ie. Tagline: Do you know who you really share this planet with? Or do the secrets scare you?
Alt Tagline: Think the world is a big place? Wait until you meet the cosmos. It's all girl meets boy.
Open Secret
Ie. Tagline: Death walks the Earth, preparing for the final re-balancing of the Universe.
Alt Tagline: Death has come to Earth. What is she here for? Obviously - the end of Everything.
Summary:
[First Act Play-by Play]
We open on Vormir, and follow a small figure up to the edge of the cliff where the guardian of the Soul Stone should be. There is noone else there. Just an empty, lonely rock - as if everyone else has passed on already, and this is the last living thing in the Universe. After a suitably poignant interval (with building music), the figure plummets from the top of the cliff and starts to fall.
The opening credits start to roll - the original Marvel credits, with paper comic pages riffling, but slower, catching more of the stories, and little whispers of sound that grows as we zoom in to a particular comic 2-page spread among all the others and fades into the original footage from X-Men 1 (nazi camp and muddy feet in the rain), then transitions on into the original footage from X-Men First Class (looking at the -new- child Erik and his family) - this plays for a few seconds, and the tape screeches to a halt, and the voice-over says, 'Oops, that's not my story...' It rewinds a bit and cuts to the X-Men 1 evolution effects (spinning lights circling each other and then coming together), which plays for a few more seconds until the narrator pipes up again "oh for goodness sake, where's the file gotten to? Let's start again ..."
The film stutters and rips away to blackness, with just a hint of red - like the inside of an eyelid. It opens and looks up at the ceiling - a dream catcher and a skylight directly above, with a bit of blue sky just visible behind the glass. The eye blinks several times and then the view in front of it starts to change in between blinks and the narrator's voice starts to introduce their life in front of our eyes.
From a creative and arty bedroom, it shifts to a snapshot of a work day, a few other normal-type life activities, and then cuts to walking up the mountain at Vormir. And then the edge of the cliff - a few long slow blinks, and then a long shot of a woman in a long black dress doing a swan dive off the platform. As she falls, time slows, and slows, and then, still held in the musical symphony, freezes into place. The narrator says ''They say when you die, your life flashes before your eyes. It must be the time for mine."
"You're probably wondering how I got here."
The film then starts to run in reverse, speeding back over all we've seen, and then further and further back until it stops.
Blackness.
"This is where my story started. We're right at the very beginning now."
Two neutron stars start to dance around each other, spinning in and in until they're caught in a dance, and then they fade into an infinity symbol logo effect kind of like the X-men 1 evolution effects. After another suitable pause, it flicks into the image, just like the opening scenes of X-men and goes into a montage that shows a child growing up - launching into the identity portion of the film.
"And here, we, go..." (said in the style of Heath Ledger/Joker in the Dark Knight)
A child is born rather unassumingly of a dancer and an entrepreneur somewhere in Portugal in 1990, and after one particularly traumatic event in her baby years, lives a (mostly) ordinary life bouncing back and forth between South Africa and London via the US. At age 9, she comes to Australia, and a series of tragic (betrayal trauma) events from here and all through her teen years force her to consider suicide. And keep considering it. Sometimes seriously, sometimes as just a wish for escape.
Then... something changes - montage of the early days of the X-Men and an eruption of comics.
The Marvel credits begin to play again, softly, behind a super-imposed image of a girl transforming from an ordinary-looking teen into one resembling Rogue from X-Men, and a few scenes that flash up like memories of being an experiment in a lab.
This disappears into the background, and there is another series of montages that show her moving out of home, getting married in her early 20’s and rolls on into her late-twenties (26) until the end of her marriage forces her through a ‘dark night of the soul’.
Ultimately, this reveals her true nature as a cosmic being.
As she responds to the trauma and heals herself from the wounds the ones she loved have inflicted, she slowly realizes that she is the human personification of Death, come to Earth for the sole purpose of re-balancing the scales from destruction to creation. She is the catalyst for the transformation – and ultimate evolution – of the human race.
She struggles to come to terms with the eventual cataclysm, rejecting the idea that everything has to end, and vows to create a new way.
She experiments with the nature of Reality until she spontaneously creates the Multiverse in an attempt to preserve the human race in perpetuity – but can’t help meddling along the way – trying to make it ‘better’. The rest of the movie is about her quest to do just that...
Until we reach the centerfold of the movie, and she explodes into all that she is as the cosmic and unbounded form of Death - and she renames herself Hope.
Did she succeed, or are we all destined to be caught in this inexorable ending and die along with Everything?
In the end, only Time will tell.
[Fuzzy Details of Acts II and III - still TBW]
Act II may be short to compensate for the length of Act I, depending on timing and relevance of delivery - Act II takes a change of tack (after the audience has met The Void in the centrefold). Themes of climate change, eco-activism, poverty, war, trauma, and reflections on Covid-19 and it's relevance to humanity over its 10-year arc. Act II is also where the audience meets the real Mistress Death. For a title character, she doesn't spend much time in the middle of the screen, but she is always there, a shadow at the edge of camera, guiding it to where it needs to be to show the whole story. She prefers to see everything differently - because she is different. We see through her eyes and her guidance as she takes us on a tour of the Universe. She shows us how tiny - and how intrinsic - we really are to the Earth. And once she has dwarfed our minds into the back seat, she takes the audience on a healing journey through Darkness - showing that in fact, there is always Light. (Trippy visuals, moving meditations and a request for consent to allow post-hypnotic suggestion - in order to save the world.)
Final third of the movie is Act III, where the action moves beyond Earth and into the cosmic realms. Introduction of Eternity, Infinity, and Oblivion. Introduction of wider mythology of the Universe.
Final Scene: The Home-coming. She finds her place in the arc - and steps into her role. The evolution is shown by another life-flashing montage, but this one with the full impact of the opening scene animations, and the added emotional context that is given when showing those heroes who each try to save her from falling.
End Credit Scene: The last scene that leads into end credits of black figures falling. Once again, we're at Vormir, but now you can see the figure clearly and there is no doubt that she is not alone. A ring of people surround her, and as she steps up to the plate, she turns to look at the one standing beside her, and smiles, before twisting around and over the edge, to fall backwards towards her death.
Fore-shadowing: the screen fades to black and black feathers sweep across the screen just before she hits - either as if someone had caught her and whisked her away, or as if she had suddenly grown her own wings.
After-Credits Scenes: Full of shadows and dancing, falling, and running black shadows of a girl. Like Pixar or Disney end credits, the action keeps going, emphasising the key take-aways. Themes of white pages of ink, like pages of books, being swallowed up by a pulsing cosmic darkness - like a sentient cloud of smoke, with an electric purple galaxy pulsing at it's heart. When the cast credit of the lead character comes up (Tristyn Faith), there is an animation of a dragon that takes over the screen, jumping on the words and disappearing into a rip in the screen with it. It keeps scrolling with a gap, and as more names come up, some of them are also stolen by the dragon.
Note: There is a new clip at every new stage of the end credits, giving glimpses into the long-term future of the MCU - every time it looks like it might get boring, another clip appears - like slices of time bordered by the shifting black screen.
First After-Credit Scene: A winged figure rises to hang in front of the altar, facing the people who have ringed it. (If fans are paying attention, they might notice that all the names that were eaten by the dragon are the faces standing here. In front of their collective eyes, Mistress Death hangs in mid-air, with wings as black as night, with just a hint of the swirling black of the Void at the tips, and armoured in an intricate and complex suit that is reminiscent of Stark tech. The metal is veined with gold that seems to pulse with the same colour as the Soul stone. As they watch, she turns her hand and they see an Infinity Gauntlet - matching her suit, but undeniably containing all 6 of the Infinity Stones - and a 7th, one that pulses with the same kind of black smoke that rings her outline.
Second after-credit scene: Deeply emotional goodbye speech.
Third After-Credit Scene: The moment where - in front of an audience - Mistress Death Snaps, and as a ripple of glittering gold and pink energy speeds away, her armour opens around her, and she drops into the Well, black dress fluttering like a shroud.
Fourth after-credit Scene: Her, lying shattered at the bottom of the Well, with a ring of faces peering down at her. And then the pulse of the Soul Stone, and all of them are hovering in the temple that Thanos and Tony Stark visited, and she asks them if it was worth it.
Fifth after-credit scene: after all the other credits have gone - but before the cinema lights come up - Alan Watts, The Sound of the Rain is playing. The screen is still shifting like shadows roiling in front of a white background.
Then a new scene plays - a shot of me lying at the bottom of the well, broken and crumbled. The shot changes so it's as if it is through my eyes, staring up at the now-empty platform. A drop of water falls from the sky and hits me in the face.
Then the screen snaps to proper black, and the cinema lights come up. End of Movie. Right? Shh, almost.
There's still a little ripple in the blackness like a drop (or 2-3) hitting the other side of it with some force.
After a suitable period of time commensurate with just about everyone except maybe the slowest die-hard fans and the ushers having pretty much left - there's a sigh, and the shadows burst open, and Tristyn Faith (me) peers through (totally not at all like a chest-burster from Aliens), and looks about as if scoping out the place. The screen behind me is white, like a page in a book, and vaguely visible behind me are the type-written words 'The End'. I say directly to camera - "Well, looks like it's just you and me left. Thanks for sticking around, if you're still here by choice. And thanks for cleaning up after all of us if you're not. Patience and commitment should be rewarded with something truly valuable, so here's a super secret sneak peak of where I'm going next." Then I withdraw back into the black frame, which seals up as if it had never parted.
And then a bigger drop that hits the 'other side' of the black screen and bursts through, splashing into the camera, clearing to reveal the same frame of eyes that was in the initial opening credits, blinking to clear the moisture away as they look up from the bottom of the well.
Then the camera changes to see me sitting up as another drop hits me.
And then another, and I reach up to taste it and realise (somehow without words) that it's tears. Then it starts to rain gently, and a voice says "We'd best get out of here before it really starts coming down." and I turn to see (Tom Hiddleston's) Loki smiling down at me and holding out a hand. My eyes convey a question, so he helps me up and tells me "There's more for you to do yet" and he leads me by the hand offscreen.
The screen whites out and then solidifies with edges like a page in a book, displaying the type-written words 'The End'. My voice says "OK, now we're done. Have a good rest of your day."
Working Soundtrack: - here.
Alt Soundtrack: here.
Final Soundtrack: - TBD - First draft of a first draft here.
And then... The song that the start of the movie - and the trailer - is set to:
Note: This pitch is constantly evolving, and information is being added all the time. Check back regularly to watch it morph into finality.
Concept: Death has chosen to take the form of a human - to learn about the world. To experience it. And to play with it. This is her story.
Hook: A taste of what's to come, and a teaser of what is possible. But watch out, this story comes with trigger warnings - and we might just heal your demons.
Intent: Mistress Death has chosen Earth as her refuge to live out the impending Apocalypse of the Multi-Verse. But she's not going down without a fight. It's her twin she's fighting - but she will not leave a single person behind. Watch her journey to become an Avenger so she can finally prove that she's done it right.
Core Message: Humanity needs to wake up and realise how close they are to the edge - And that their choices will either push us off that edge, or allow us to rise above it.
Unique Selling Point: Nothing is really known about this movie before it comes out. Not the name of the main character, not the comics it's been drawn from, not the cast or crew. It is top-secret, and all information given in the lead up to the movie is purposefully vague and ephemeral. Not even the crew and cast of the other movies (seem to) know. All the audience knows is that there's a portion of it set in space - every teaser/trailer contains the same three themes - galaxies, shadows, and falling. And every trailer shows new footage (no repeated moments, each second a new opportunity to tell more of the story).
Title: Mistress Death
Working/First Title: Dark Space (with the true title of the movie not revealed until the first three days after the movie premiere or the spoiler ban is lifted)
(Teaser tied to the title - None of the ads ever reveal the true name of the movie, only the working title (#thetitleisaspoiler), but just before the text/header for Dark Space comes up - there is a brief blip of something in black and gold, with just little highlights of red.
Final Reveal Title: There is an initial title scene at the beginning of the movie, but shorter than expected - and only the first 2 words (Mistress Death). When the title is finally revealed in the movie - the lettering is formed out of obsidian with gold veins and appears in exactly the same location as the teaser - and proceeds to bleed roses and vines and then focus on a moment of storytelling (like the cinematic Marvel logo) until it dissolves into black smoke. Towards the end of the movie - after the reveal/centrefold moment, but before the endgame phase - there is a rewind to the beginning, and the opening credits run again - in full this time. This is where the full title of the movie is revealed - Mistress Death and the Avengers. (/joins/takes over/alternate connotation chosen to suitably convey the relationship before heading into showdown phase)
Full Title: Movie's main visual themes explained. Twirling blue baton, endless glitter sand pouring - hourglasses and boxes that open outwards. Book pages.
Primary motivations: Love, belonging, voice, truth, stillness
Visual Themes: Swan dive, gold+white and black smoke, bringing the shadows to life, creating a relationship with the borders of the screen, black shapes, comic frames - start of the movie has more white space, end of the movie has more black space, but there is also more gold and rainbow light refraction.
Social Themes to be tackled: Mental Health, Suicide, Domestic Violence and Abuse, Trauma, Disability, Poverty, Inequality, LGTBIQA+ issues.
Tone: Unreliable narrator, breaking the 4th wall, playing the meta, and always with a central core of hope.
Possible Charity Partners: Black Dog Institute, Sydney Story Factory, Act for Peace, Variety the Kids Charity, The Wilderness Society.
Logline to be considered: (How much do we give away? Is the name of the character a spoiler too, or do we warn the potential audience of what's coming?)
Too Precious to share
Ie. Concept: In the heart of the Marvel Universe, a strange story begins to grow, a character as yet without form, and yet already entirely defined. Who is she? What does she want? Is she a villain or a hero? Will we find out before it's too late?
Logline: A new character has woken up in the Marvel Universe. But nothing is what it seems. Can she pierce the illusion before it's too late?
Alt logline: Girl meets boy. It goes horribly wrong, but somehow, love makes it all alright in the end. Or does it?
Open Secret
Ie. Concept: A great darkness has been born into the body of a lightworker in the early 21st Century. Will our heroes discover her true nature before it's too late? What could possibly change the outcome of the ancient war between Light and Dark?
Logline: The human personification of Death has woken up on earth in the early 21st Century, but she is reluctant to fulfill her final purpose of triggering the End of the Universe because she has fallen in love.
Alt Logline: Death has been born into a human body on Earth in the 21st Century to End Everything – but when she falls in love, she struggles to bring herself to take the final leap.
Tagline to be considered: (What defines the story without giving it away? Or again, are we trading our secrets openly to gain buy-in?)
Too Precious to share
Ie. Tagline: Do you know who you really share this planet with? Or do the secrets scare you?
Alt Tagline: Think the world is a big place? Wait until you meet the cosmos. It's all girl meets boy.
Open Secret
Ie. Tagline: Death walks the Earth, preparing for the final re-balancing of the Universe.
Alt Tagline: Death has come to Earth. What is she here for? Obviously - the end of Everything.
Summary:
[First Act Play-by Play]
We open on Vormir, and follow a small figure up to the edge of the cliff where the guardian of the Soul Stone should be. There is noone else there. Just an empty, lonely rock - as if everyone else has passed on already, and this is the last living thing in the Universe. After a suitably poignant interval (with building music), the figure plummets from the top of the cliff and starts to fall.
The opening credits start to roll - the original Marvel credits, with paper comic pages riffling, but slower, catching more of the stories, and little whispers of sound that grows as we zoom in to a particular comic 2-page spread among all the others and fades into the original footage from X-Men 1 (nazi camp and muddy feet in the rain), then transitions on into the original footage from X-Men First Class (looking at the -new- child Erik and his family) - this plays for a few seconds, and the tape screeches to a halt, and the voice-over says, 'Oops, that's not my story...' It rewinds a bit and cuts to the X-Men 1 evolution effects (spinning lights circling each other and then coming together), which plays for a few more seconds until the narrator pipes up again "oh for goodness sake, where's the file gotten to? Let's start again ..."
The film stutters and rips away to blackness, with just a hint of red - like the inside of an eyelid. It opens and looks up at the ceiling - a dream catcher and a skylight directly above, with a bit of blue sky just visible behind the glass. The eye blinks several times and then the view in front of it starts to change in between blinks and the narrator's voice starts to introduce their life in front of our eyes.
From a creative and arty bedroom, it shifts to a snapshot of a work day, a few other normal-type life activities, and then cuts to walking up the mountain at Vormir. And then the edge of the cliff - a few long slow blinks, and then a long shot of a woman in a long black dress doing a swan dive off the platform. As she falls, time slows, and slows, and then, still held in the musical symphony, freezes into place. The narrator says ''They say when you die, your life flashes before your eyes. It must be the time for mine."
"You're probably wondering how I got here."
The film then starts to run in reverse, speeding back over all we've seen, and then further and further back until it stops.
Blackness.
"This is where my story started. We're right at the very beginning now."
Two neutron stars start to dance around each other, spinning in and in until they're caught in a dance, and then they fade into an infinity symbol logo effect kind of like the X-men 1 evolution effects. After another suitable pause, it flicks into the image, just like the opening scenes of X-men and goes into a montage that shows a child growing up - launching into the identity portion of the film.
"And here, we, go..." (said in the style of Heath Ledger/Joker in the Dark Knight)
A child is born rather unassumingly of a dancer and an entrepreneur somewhere in Portugal in 1990, and after one particularly traumatic event in her baby years, lives a (mostly) ordinary life bouncing back and forth between South Africa and London via the US. At age 9, she comes to Australia, and a series of tragic (betrayal trauma) events from here and all through her teen years force her to consider suicide. And keep considering it. Sometimes seriously, sometimes as just a wish for escape.
Then... something changes - montage of the early days of the X-Men and an eruption of comics.
The Marvel credits begin to play again, softly, behind a super-imposed image of a girl transforming from an ordinary-looking teen into one resembling Rogue from X-Men, and a few scenes that flash up like memories of being an experiment in a lab.
This disappears into the background, and there is another series of montages that show her moving out of home, getting married in her early 20’s and rolls on into her late-twenties (26) until the end of her marriage forces her through a ‘dark night of the soul’.
Ultimately, this reveals her true nature as a cosmic being.
As she responds to the trauma and heals herself from the wounds the ones she loved have inflicted, she slowly realizes that she is the human personification of Death, come to Earth for the sole purpose of re-balancing the scales from destruction to creation. She is the catalyst for the transformation – and ultimate evolution – of the human race.
She struggles to come to terms with the eventual cataclysm, rejecting the idea that everything has to end, and vows to create a new way.
She experiments with the nature of Reality until she spontaneously creates the Multiverse in an attempt to preserve the human race in perpetuity – but can’t help meddling along the way – trying to make it ‘better’. The rest of the movie is about her quest to do just that...
Until we reach the centerfold of the movie, and she explodes into all that she is as the cosmic and unbounded form of Death - and she renames herself Hope.
Did she succeed, or are we all destined to be caught in this inexorable ending and die along with Everything?
In the end, only Time will tell.
[Fuzzy Details of Acts II and III - still TBW]
Act II may be short to compensate for the length of Act I, depending on timing and relevance of delivery - Act II takes a change of tack (after the audience has met The Void in the centrefold). Themes of climate change, eco-activism, poverty, war, trauma, and reflections on Covid-19 and it's relevance to humanity over its 10-year arc. Act II is also where the audience meets the real Mistress Death. For a title character, she doesn't spend much time in the middle of the screen, but she is always there, a shadow at the edge of camera, guiding it to where it needs to be to show the whole story. She prefers to see everything differently - because she is different. We see through her eyes and her guidance as she takes us on a tour of the Universe. She shows us how tiny - and how intrinsic - we really are to the Earth. And once she has dwarfed our minds into the back seat, she takes the audience on a healing journey through Darkness - showing that in fact, there is always Light. (Trippy visuals, moving meditations and a request for consent to allow post-hypnotic suggestion - in order to save the world.)
Final third of the movie is Act III, where the action moves beyond Earth and into the cosmic realms. Introduction of Eternity, Infinity, and Oblivion. Introduction of wider mythology of the Universe.
Final Scene: The Home-coming. She finds her place in the arc - and steps into her role. The evolution is shown by another life-flashing montage, but this one with the full impact of the opening scene animations, and the added emotional context that is given when showing those heroes who each try to save her from falling.
End Credit Scene: The last scene that leads into end credits of black figures falling. Once again, we're at Vormir, but now you can see the figure clearly and there is no doubt that she is not alone. A ring of people surround her, and as she steps up to the plate, she turns to look at the one standing beside her, and smiles, before twisting around and over the edge, to fall backwards towards her death.
Fore-shadowing: the screen fades to black and black feathers sweep across the screen just before she hits - either as if someone had caught her and whisked her away, or as if she had suddenly grown her own wings.
After-Credits Scenes: Full of shadows and dancing, falling, and running black shadows of a girl. Like Pixar or Disney end credits, the action keeps going, emphasising the key take-aways. Themes of white pages of ink, like pages of books, being swallowed up by a pulsing cosmic darkness - like a sentient cloud of smoke, with an electric purple galaxy pulsing at it's heart. When the cast credit of the lead character comes up (Tristyn Faith), there is an animation of a dragon that takes over the screen, jumping on the words and disappearing into a rip in the screen with it. It keeps scrolling with a gap, and as more names come up, some of them are also stolen by the dragon.
Note: There is a new clip at every new stage of the end credits, giving glimpses into the long-term future of the MCU - every time it looks like it might get boring, another clip appears - like slices of time bordered by the shifting black screen.
First After-Credit Scene: A winged figure rises to hang in front of the altar, facing the people who have ringed it. (If fans are paying attention, they might notice that all the names that were eaten by the dragon are the faces standing here. In front of their collective eyes, Mistress Death hangs in mid-air, with wings as black as night, with just a hint of the swirling black of the Void at the tips, and armoured in an intricate and complex suit that is reminiscent of Stark tech. The metal is veined with gold that seems to pulse with the same colour as the Soul stone. As they watch, she turns her hand and they see an Infinity Gauntlet - matching her suit, but undeniably containing all 6 of the Infinity Stones - and a 7th, one that pulses with the same kind of black smoke that rings her outline.
Second after-credit scene: Deeply emotional goodbye speech.
Third After-Credit Scene: The moment where - in front of an audience - Mistress Death Snaps, and as a ripple of glittering gold and pink energy speeds away, her armour opens around her, and she drops into the Well, black dress fluttering like a shroud.
Fourth after-credit Scene: Her, lying shattered at the bottom of the Well, with a ring of faces peering down at her. And then the pulse of the Soul Stone, and all of them are hovering in the temple that Thanos and Tony Stark visited, and she asks them if it was worth it.
Fifth after-credit scene: after all the other credits have gone - but before the cinema lights come up - Alan Watts, The Sound of the Rain is playing. The screen is still shifting like shadows roiling in front of a white background.
Then a new scene plays - a shot of me lying at the bottom of the well, broken and crumbled. The shot changes so it's as if it is through my eyes, staring up at the now-empty platform. A drop of water falls from the sky and hits me in the face.
Then the screen snaps to proper black, and the cinema lights come up. End of Movie. Right? Shh, almost.
There's still a little ripple in the blackness like a drop (or 2-3) hitting the other side of it with some force.
After a suitable period of time commensurate with just about everyone except maybe the slowest die-hard fans and the ushers having pretty much left - there's a sigh, and the shadows burst open, and Tristyn Faith (me) peers through (totally not at all like a chest-burster from Aliens), and looks about as if scoping out the place. The screen behind me is white, like a page in a book, and vaguely visible behind me are the type-written words 'The End'. I say directly to camera - "Well, looks like it's just you and me left. Thanks for sticking around, if you're still here by choice. And thanks for cleaning up after all of us if you're not. Patience and commitment should be rewarded with something truly valuable, so here's a super secret sneak peak of where I'm going next." Then I withdraw back into the black frame, which seals up as if it had never parted.
And then a bigger drop that hits the 'other side' of the black screen and bursts through, splashing into the camera, clearing to reveal the same frame of eyes that was in the initial opening credits, blinking to clear the moisture away as they look up from the bottom of the well.
Then the camera changes to see me sitting up as another drop hits me.
And then another, and I reach up to taste it and realise (somehow without words) that it's tears. Then it starts to rain gently, and a voice says "We'd best get out of here before it really starts coming down." and I turn to see (Tom Hiddleston's) Loki smiling down at me and holding out a hand. My eyes convey a question, so he helps me up and tells me "There's more for you to do yet" and he leads me by the hand offscreen.
The screen whites out and then solidifies with edges like a page in a book, displaying the type-written words 'The End'. My voice says "OK, now we're done. Have a good rest of your day."
Working Soundtrack: - here.
Alt Soundtrack: here.
Final Soundtrack: - TBD - First draft of a first draft here.
And then... The song that the start of the movie - and the trailer - is set to:
Additional Context
Promotion Strategy: Guerilla marketing (think little TV spots with mostly black space, and just flashes/snippets of story, viral social media and word of mouth - create a buzz about 'what is this', with all details about the story itself, or any mention of what it's actually about is considered spoilers - even the full title of the movie is not revealed until the opening credits of the movie itself - and then shared widely after the 'spoiler ban' is lifted. The trailers are more teasers that only give away the look and the feel of the movie - the footage for each is shot specifically for the trailer, so the movie will only have new footage - and each new snippet is another glance into the world, no pun intended.
Possible Deep-Cover Hype/Buzz: Part way through filming, there is a rumour circulated that there's been a tragedy on set. Slowly, it comes out that the lead actress has died, part-way through filming (jumping from a set-piece without a cord/lifeline), but that they intend to continue to honour the legacy (or something similar). Then someone completely different surfaces in the media and takes the spotlight away. Years later, in the movie itself - the deception is revealed and the 'cover girl' (aka me or best suited lead double) turns out to be the same person living in disguise to protect the secret/spoilers. (Probably too much. :P Can't imagine anything that would make the audience more angry. But would certainly create a splash.)
Main Character's Arc: Mistress Death is more than human, but she spends the first 26-30 years of her life living through various forms of trauma and abuse, so at first she can’t believe what her soul-searching is telling her. All through her life, she has been a healer, and a bleeding heart. Reconciling her life as a lightworker with the impending destruction of everything that exists is not easy – and she spends most of the movie running away from it. She is in love with the world, and wants nothing more than to make it better for everyone. But as she starts to understand the powers that she has as the embodiment of Death, she decides to reject her Destiny, hatching a plan to turn the End of Everything into a new beginning.
As she starts to use her powers behind the scenes to create dreams and visions of her ‘better world’, other people start to come into her life that see (the surface layer of) what she’s doing and want to help her. They recognize in her something unheard of in any form of Death before – the ability to create Life. Because she has spent so much time as an insignificant human girl, she has felt the pain of being powerless – and as her powers develop, so too does her burning desire to ‘make it right’.
She is not the first – or only – incarnation of Death. But there is one thing that makes her stand out from all the rest. The one simple thing that makes her dream matter. The final incarnation of Death – The Dream of the Endless – and the being that has existed from before the beginning of existence, and will continue after the end of Everything; has marked her as his soul mate.
She has no idea that he knows her, and continues her mission – to right all the wrongs in the human world and rebalance human society. Her soul’s calling drives her to declare war on poverty, greed, destruction of nature and mindless commercialism. And behind the scenes, one after the other, all beings that operate on a cosmic scale start to notice her. But because The Dream of the Endless – the most terrifying incarnation of Death – is backing her, they are unable to interfere, only allowed to observe.
As the movie passes into the third Act, she realizes that she is doing exactly what she intended – the world is changing around her. It’s not until the final complication that she realizes he has been watching her, and that he knows the truth that she has forgotten – or chosen to ignore.
She is Death.
She cannot fail to do exactly what she has been born onto Earth to do – to End Everything. Inside her lives the first – and last – primordial black hole of the Universe. At the right moment, it will trigger, and every atom of matter in the Universe will be instantly drawn to its centre – effectively destroying every living thing in existence except him and her.
But unbeknownst to him, she has been protecting a dream, deep within a pocket dimension she created inside her mind – and at the moment of destruction, she creates a cosmic mobius strip – tying Death to the existence of every living thing and bringing them back as a part of his consciousness. This is the purpose of the Multiverse - to protect Life, to give it a home, and to ensure that Death’s greatest fear can never come to pass again. To ensure that He will never be alone again.
And the Universe will never be the same…
The Kickstarter (please note, this was from June 2017, and is not a good representation of my skills. It is, however a good representation of my consistent, coherent, stable and constantly evolving delusion of identity): https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tristanadefae/mistress-death?ref=user_menu
Possible Deep-Cover Hype/Buzz: Part way through filming, there is a rumour circulated that there's been a tragedy on set. Slowly, it comes out that the lead actress has died, part-way through filming (jumping from a set-piece without a cord/lifeline), but that they intend to continue to honour the legacy (or something similar). Then someone completely different surfaces in the media and takes the spotlight away. Years later, in the movie itself - the deception is revealed and the 'cover girl' (aka me or best suited lead double) turns out to be the same person living in disguise to protect the secret/spoilers. (Probably too much. :P Can't imagine anything that would make the audience more angry. But would certainly create a splash.)
Main Character's Arc: Mistress Death is more than human, but she spends the first 26-30 years of her life living through various forms of trauma and abuse, so at first she can’t believe what her soul-searching is telling her. All through her life, she has been a healer, and a bleeding heart. Reconciling her life as a lightworker with the impending destruction of everything that exists is not easy – and she spends most of the movie running away from it. She is in love with the world, and wants nothing more than to make it better for everyone. But as she starts to understand the powers that she has as the embodiment of Death, she decides to reject her Destiny, hatching a plan to turn the End of Everything into a new beginning.
As she starts to use her powers behind the scenes to create dreams and visions of her ‘better world’, other people start to come into her life that see (the surface layer of) what she’s doing and want to help her. They recognize in her something unheard of in any form of Death before – the ability to create Life. Because she has spent so much time as an insignificant human girl, she has felt the pain of being powerless – and as her powers develop, so too does her burning desire to ‘make it right’.
She is not the first – or only – incarnation of Death. But there is one thing that makes her stand out from all the rest. The one simple thing that makes her dream matter. The final incarnation of Death – The Dream of the Endless – and the being that has existed from before the beginning of existence, and will continue after the end of Everything; has marked her as his soul mate.
She has no idea that he knows her, and continues her mission – to right all the wrongs in the human world and rebalance human society. Her soul’s calling drives her to declare war on poverty, greed, destruction of nature and mindless commercialism. And behind the scenes, one after the other, all beings that operate on a cosmic scale start to notice her. But because The Dream of the Endless – the most terrifying incarnation of Death – is backing her, they are unable to interfere, only allowed to observe.
As the movie passes into the third Act, she realizes that she is doing exactly what she intended – the world is changing around her. It’s not until the final complication that she realizes he has been watching her, and that he knows the truth that she has forgotten – or chosen to ignore.
She is Death.
She cannot fail to do exactly what she has been born onto Earth to do – to End Everything. Inside her lives the first – and last – primordial black hole of the Universe. At the right moment, it will trigger, and every atom of matter in the Universe will be instantly drawn to its centre – effectively destroying every living thing in existence except him and her.
But unbeknownst to him, she has been protecting a dream, deep within a pocket dimension she created inside her mind – and at the moment of destruction, she creates a cosmic mobius strip – tying Death to the existence of every living thing and bringing them back as a part of his consciousness. This is the purpose of the Multiverse - to protect Life, to give it a home, and to ensure that Death’s greatest fear can never come to pass again. To ensure that He will never be alone again.
And the Universe will never be the same…
The Kickstarter (please note, this was from June 2017, and is not a good representation of my skills. It is, however a good representation of my consistent, coherent, stable and constantly evolving delusion of identity): https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tristanadefae/mistress-death?ref=user_menu
The Real World
I believe in the concept of creating the environment for our stories to be heard. As part of creating this movie, and designing the environment for it to be released into - I aim to do everything in my power to bring the baseline of human society up to meet the top 20%. As our understanding of the world and our affinity for technology grows, it is becoming increasingly more apparent that we have all the resources needed to create a minimum standard of living for every human being on the planet.
The long-term goal of this movie is to make that a reality - to bring the vision of a united human race into reality by giving them either a threat worth uniting against - or a hope worth uniting for.
World Goals;
These goals are inherent in the creation of this story - in order to be able to hear, read, or experience this story - you will need a compatible device, along with the reasonable leisure time in your schedule to enjoy wasting a few hours of your life experiencing it. Or the powerful desire to live in it, and make the real world fit around it.
The time you spend on it is entirely up to you. But these are the only conditions in which this movie can exist and fulfill it's true purpose:
To unite the human race.
The long-term goal of this movie is to make that a reality - to bring the vision of a united human race into reality by giving them either a threat worth uniting against - or a hope worth uniting for.
World Goals;
- Every human being on the planet has a smart device by 2027, with access to the internet.
- Every human being on the planet has some form of income that makes them more than $1 a day, by 2027.
- Every human being on the planet has stable access to food, water and sanitation, by 2027.
- Every human being on the planet has a home that suits them, a social group that they feel they belong with, and safety from the threat of war and/or violence, by 2027.
These goals are inherent in the creation of this story - in order to be able to hear, read, or experience this story - you will need a compatible device, along with the reasonable leisure time in your schedule to enjoy wasting a few hours of your life experiencing it. Or the powerful desire to live in it, and make the real world fit around it.
The time you spend on it is entirely up to you. But these are the only conditions in which this movie can exist and fulfill it's true purpose:
To unite the human race.
Potential Bolt-on Apps for Virtual/Mixed Reality side-story - Aka, The Game
- AR phone app that allows you to see ‘auras’ and magic around other people in response to certain conditions.
- Eventually compatible with eye-wear that allows for integration into ‘real-life’ situations.
- A concert/presentation at a Comic-Con, using mixed media AR to craft a submersive experience of another world.
- AI companion that responds as if it were a certain person.
- Allows for a choice of who you want as your companion, and depending on how ‘friendly’ you become with your companion, allows for additional story-telling aspects, such as relationship quests that unlock levels of interactions outside the game itself.
- Ongoing support in a variety of methods tailored to each individual audience member.
- VR experience that maps to your location so you can move about within a certain delineated space completely within a virtual environment. (Will need serious thoughts as to safety and protection from misuse and intentional abuse.
- Starts with you mapping your ‘home’ location and provides quests that allow you to map other areas and then experience them from your home location.
- Ie. Map your bedroom, then go to the park and map it and then come home and visit the park from your bedroom.
- Allows for mapping of public areas in such a way that you can ‘visit’ popular areas without the worry of crowds and/or litter/pollution etc.
- Built-in rewards for interacting with the outside world in ‘safe’ ways for those who may have a barrier to such interactions, such as trauma, social anxiety or a physical disability.
- Eventually, a virtual world with a haptic feedback array that simulates all the senses, creating ambient environments in which you can experience different states of being.
- Ie. Those that can’t walk having an experience of walking.
- Ie. The ability to experience shapeshifting or magic within the simulated world, as if it were real.
- Ie. Being able to experience walking on the surface of an alien planet.
- A meditation and wellness app that incorporates elements of nature such as forests, mountains and rivers into a daily routine for better mental health.
An introduction to the main character
So who is Tristyn Faith. And why does this story matter? Uh, best answer - check out here and then come back.
Second best answer... Keep reading.
Second best answer... Keep reading.
The Journey to Disney+
This is the journey of a million steps. It will be my attempt to take this...
And this...
And turn it into this...
This is new for me.
Understanding, finally, the division in the way I see the world, and what it actually is.
These are the inner worlds that I play.
Two colours of the same soul, worlds apart.
These are the inner worlds that I play.
Two colours of the same soul, worlds apart.
But are they really so different?