Sci-Fi plot suggestions
With many thanks to - and I really enjoyed reading these web pages:
http://www.jokeindex.com/joke.asp?Joke=2009
http://www.jokeindex.com/cat.asp?Cat=15
http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/Handbooks/WWWPlots/genre.html
http://www.scifime.com/scifime/
http://scifi.about.com/bltvschedule.htm
http://eversion.com/~randomtrek/randomtrek.story.0011.html
http://thesmudge.com/shapeshifter/Roswell/all/rbi2b.htm
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COMPUTERS
A virtual reality program is activated, and the distinction between reality
and the programme becomes confused or indistinguishable - People connect
their brains directly to computers and get dependent on them. - A complex
computer system spontaneously becomes self-aware.
TOTAL CONTROL GLOBAL GOVERNMENT
A couple files an application to the government for permission to conceive
a baby.
ROBOTS
A human falls in love with a robot - A robot falls in love with a human
- An android discovers emotions and goes berserk -
ALIENS
An alien: Is stranded on earth - Befriends a human child or falls in love
with an earth gal - Is pursued by shadowy malevolent Pentagon officials
under the pretence of national security - Uses alien powers to defeat the
shadowy malevolent Pentagon officials, making them look foolish without
really harming them - Makes teary farewell and returns to home planet -
Aliens travel a far distance to loot the earth of resources which exist
in far greater and much more easily recoverable quantities on the many
uninhabited bodies they pass on the way to earth - UFO abductions - Brain-controlling
parasites attempt to wrest control of human race - Aliens put someone on
trial for the sins of humanity - Aliens with completely incomprehensible
motivations make war on the human race/invade earth.
Aliens invade earth in order to eat humans.
An AI turns on its creators.
A human discovers that the human race is being controlled by aliens.
The alien invasion that flounders because their technological advantage
is perfectly neutralized by their lack of resources, compared to the humans.
"Single female monster ISO single human male. Object: Mating."
Aliens as Vampires
TOTAL DISASTER IS THREATENED
meteor storm - asteroid - climate change - virus - computer virus
UFO abductions - Brain-controlling parasites attempt to wrest control of
human race - Aliens with completely incomprehensible motivations make war
on the human race/invade earth - Death from old age turns out to be due
to some simple, single cause, leading to an easy immortality treatment,
with consequent catastrophic social implications -
A sexually selective plague kills off or sterilizes almost all of the men,
or almost all of the women.
A human discovers that the human race is being controlled by aliens.
Humans are seen as a menace to galactic society, having developed technology
over a few short centuries compared with the thousands it took the other
races.
Earth is threatened by an asteroid, and a space mission is mounted to save
the planet.
An entire society is run by a computer.
Mating is controlled by a fascist dating and selection system - and a hero
or heroine breaks through and falls in love.
A technological innovation prompts a large portion of society to violently
suppress it.
Death ray or brain destruction or brain control is spread by a ray from
the planet, or by radio waves, or by a computer virus or by television
or something else.
DISASTER: Famine, storms, floods, planets being demolished to make way
for galactic bypasses. The GOOD GUY is a firefighter, or a rescue pilot,
or even a super hero.
Vampires attack
THE BAD GUY - THE TOTAL GLOBAL DOMINATION MOGUL - THE 'JAMES BOND' TYPE
EVIL VILLAIN SEEKING GLOBAL DOMINATION - THE BAD GANG
A great hunter decides that humans are the most entertaining prey of all,
and visits Earth to bag a few.
The Bad Guy travels through time to kill the Hero in his childhood, or
prevent him from ever being born.
Post-cataclysmic rag-tag armies struggle to survive against gangs of bandits,
mutants, cyberpunks, bikers, etc.
Two hostile factions colonize a planet within walking distance of each
other.
The BAD GUY'S motives are: quest - adventure - pursuit - rescue - escape
- revenge - The Riddle - rivalry - Crime Pursued by Vengeance - family
member or partner - madness - jealousy - abduction - Enigma (temptation
or a riddle)
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THE HERO - HEROINE WHO IS GOOD - TRAVELS IN TIME - A RESEARCHER - A
COMPUTER WHIZZ-KID - SOME SPECIAL SKILL
The bureaucratic/reactionary mindset stands in the way of scientific progress,
but is overcome by the researcher through ability, purity of heart, and
use of the scientific method.
Scientists work feverishly to develop a cure for the Supervirus or a weapon
to stop the Invincible Bad Guys.
The Good Guys travel through time to stop a historical Bad Guy, usually
Hitler.
The Chronocops travel in time to catch a Bad Guy who escaped into some
other era.
A young researcher: Gets a job at a Mega-huge Corporation or Ultra-secret
Government Agency - Learns that the employer's latest discovery has a Nasty
Side Effect or involves some obvious human rights abuses, but the employer
is moving ahead with it anyway - Confronts the employer, who casually dismisses
the researcher's concerns and chides her/him for not being a "team
player" - Tries to blow the whistle to avert disaster - Gets hounded
by Shadowy Malevolent Goons - Goes to meet with inside sources, and finds
them either dead or with just enough life left to utter a cryptic clue
- Watches the disaster overtake the CEO - Testifies before Congress and
enters the Witness Protection Program.
The Whizz Kid travels from today and uses his skills of today to improvise
and solve disasters of the sci-fi scenarios.
Mating is controlled by a fascist dating and selection system - and a hero
or heroine breaks through and falls in love.
The GOOD GUY'S motives are: quest - adventure - pursuit - rescue - escape
- revenge - The Riddle - rivalry - Underdog - temptation - transformation
- growing up - love - Forbidden Love - sacrifice - discovery - Wretched
Excess - political revolt
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TRANSFORMED INTO A HERO
A crass sexist male becomes pregnant.
The fearful ordinary guy is transformed into a hero.
A human discovers that the human race is being controlled by aliens.
A person from the past goes into suspended animation and wakes up in modern
times, or a person from modern times goes into suspended animation and
wakes up in the future.
The government bans music, painting, dancing, or some other art form, or
education, reading, writing, computers; only the hero seems to care enough
to do anything about it.
THE GOOD GANG
Post-cataclysmic rag-tag armies struggle to kick the EVIL ARMY out.
The rag-tag rebel army/fleet struggles valiantly to overthrow the Evil
Empire.
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DIFFERENT LOCATIONS AND PLOTS
A high-tech amusement park goes lethally berserk.
The government ships criminals off to other planets.
The rightful monarch or long-lost heir is restored to the throne.
The Princess is about to be crowned (coronation) and she is kidnapped but
then rescued and the coronation finally takes place.
abduction - kidnapping
Enigma (temptation or a riddle)
Involuntary Crimes of Love (example: discovery that one has married one's
mother, sister, etc.)
Recovery of a lost something - solution to the Riddle
Court Case - A persecutor and a supplicant take a grievance before a power
in authority. A case goes wrong - leading to vengeance.
DELIVERANCE: An unfortunate or group of unfortunates is held in a location
and delivered from a threatener by a Rescuer. The unfortunates - family,
friends, a distraught village, the population of an entire world,or world,
or universe. The threatener can be animate or inanimate. A force of nature
is sometimes more threatening than a sinister villain - 'Jaws', a dragon,
an army, a robot, an earthquake, a volcano, a hurricane, a flood or a breakdown
in the laws of nature, an accident at work (down a mine, left on a planet
alone, communications go down).
Revenge: An avenger and a GOOD GUY struggle for victory.
Vengeance: by family upon family, gang on gang, BAD GUY against GOOD GUY.
Pursuit: Fugitive from punishment is pursued by a pursuer. (The Running
Man)
DISASTER: Famine, storms, floods, planets being demolished to make way
for galactic bypasses. The GOOD GUY is a firefighter, or a rescue pilot,
or even a super hero.
REVOLT: Tyrant and some conspirators - peasants, evil guards - bureaucratic
government - GOOD GUY - cop protecting the system that he doesn't even
believe in anymore?
DARING ENTERPRISE : captain of a colonizing ship bound for Mars with a
traitor on board, and a meteor storm ahead
ABDUCTION - KIDNAPPING
THE ENIGMA - RIDDLE
INTERROGATION
HACKING - DETECTIVE - ARCHAEOLOGIST - PHYSICIST - BOTANIST - COOK
AMNESIA
QUEST - finding the ring - the gizmo - the rescue formula - the villain's
weapon - the code
TIME TRAVEL
RELIC
SHIPWRECK
HEALING
REVOLT - ruler overthrown - conspiracy
ALIEN CRAFT CRASH-LANDS
The packet has been kept alive by the good fortune of battery backup and
the bustling market for antique electronics.
ECLIPSE
Protect the Ambassador - celebrity
Slavery
Raids
Survival
POISON
Dangerous One Night Stand
TRANSPORT OF PRECIOUS ORE (GOLD) OR MEDICINE OR VIRUS ANTIDOTE
TREASURE MAP - QUEST - ARCHAEOLOGY?
HOMETOWN DESTRUCTION
INSANE DRAGON
Bankrupt Alchemist
SWORD
JEWELS
SHIP OF UNDEAD
MARIE CELESTE
DRAGON AND THE GATE
PORTAL TO 'GAMMA WORLD'
HIRING THE GANG
SPACE METAL MISSING
BOTTLE IN THE SEA
THE FALSE VAMPIRE
GANG - PICK POCKET GANG SAVES THE UNIVERSE - rescued from retirement or
from being on the streets
HAUNTING - by power or spirit - castle haunted - time travel
WEIRD REPETITION OF PAST CRIME - HAUNTING? - getting the clues through
spotting this and research
To WELCOME PAGE
Radio Soap (serial drama) - HOW TO MAKE IT
Five-minute episodes - or short episodes
Step by step instruction from Alan Beck.
Learn about radio drama on this site along with my book - Beck, Alan, Radio Acting, London: A & C Black (1997) ISBN 0-7136-4631-4
This is how to make a short-form soap - entertaining (above all) and you can include issues (issues that could influence the listeners' behaviour).
Further: production, scripting, web site, marketing, focus group meetings, drop-in script, copyright material logging, trails, soap launch.
LINKS WITH OTHER SITE
Radio Drama - directing, acting, technical, learning & teaching, researching, styles, genres
This is a complete curriculum of scripts, techniques, advice, sound files - effects and atmoses (with no copyright and so free to use), detailed script commentaries, etc. -
Contact: [email protected]
This site's address: http://www.savoyhill.co.uk/soap/index.html