Getting back to working on those Persona 5 transcripts. I'm almost done with the prologue, and I feel like for my final script, and thus the comic, I might do something with the framing device that people are either going to really love or really hate. Similarly to what I'm going to do with the presentation of Ren's backstory, prior to the events of the main story.
SPOILERS for the aspects of Persona 5 under the "Keep Reading" , though since most of this is in the opening, and the rest is in the first arc, it may not be considered a spoiler.
So, my thinking is, I **might** eliminate the casino escape, and just start with Ren being beat up by the pigs and Sae starting her interrogation of him. I havent decided for sure yet, but I like the idea of the reader or player or whatever not fully grasping yet whats going on, who this guy is, what he's really like, or how he was caught, etc. We only find out about the Metaverse and the Phantom Thieves naturally as the main story presents them.
There would still be a framing device of course, and sparse Sae interjections (way less than in the game of course, and less spoilery in certain spots as to whats going to happen next), but we don't get any inkling of whats to come in the MAIN story, besides the fact that this guy is considered a criminal, was arrested, looks young, and was beaten up by the cops, before this lady comes in to interrogate him.
That said...... obviously anyone who has started this game knows just how damn iconic the casino escape is. It really is a fantastic in media res type of opening that grips you from the very beginning, and shows how cool everything is. Its such a great "dropping you straight into the action" type of opening thats only rivaled in my eyes by the "The Hostage" first chapter/ Demo of Detroit Become Human.
(With Detroit both earning points because it not being a framing device means there is no spoiling things to come, and the fact that of course its a choice game and that aspect really enthrals me in a way that is hard to be beat by a non-choice game, but also losing a bunch of points, by having extra material such as the Kamski interview that I think should not only be in the actual game, but should come before "The Hostage" chapter as the actual beginning.)
But, coming back to Persona 5, you could also argue either for or against showing the combat in the opening too, with the Shadows, etc. Giving away the fact that its not a normal Casino, and thus A. spoiling an aspect of this game, that most people going in blind would be less aware of, or thinking about, and B. Slightly tempering the cool heist vibes (only slightly) by immediate knowledge that its some sort of fantastic world.
And on the other hand, its also really thrilling in a specific kind of way, when you see the same scene again but in a different context. Though how much of that is impacted by it originally being a video game, and you are controlling all this, I'm unsure. Would it be as effective in a comic?
As always I dont want to read any of the mangas for these games before making my own comics, because A. I dont want to cheat. I want these comics to be MY comics, and just taking something from someone else, even if its an official source, or using it to make decisions is going to lead to me compromising what I want to do. Especially since my adaptation is already going to be very unusual with the 1970s setting. and B. I might even subconsciously add something to my own version if I have knowledge of it in the back of my mind. Inevitably, being based on the same source material, some things are going to be the same, but still, I want to make my own version.
But not reading the official Persona 5 manga means not knowing how they chose to start the story, or, if it does start the same way as the game, if it hits as hard in comic form.
But anyways, that opening is still damn cool, and it makes it really hard for me to decide. Just wanted to get my feelings about all this out there, really.
I love it when a story exists as its own text in universe.
Primarily as a framing device but not always.
Like the Atanatarion (and MANY others) in middle earth. (Like the Red Book in which Bilbo Baggins wrote of his adventure)
Or the Bornstellar Relation in Halo, along with the Rubicon testimony and the records of Catalog Triad #879 (scattered on Onyx and Earth).
All serving as framing narratives for the Forerunner Trilogy.
Another example would be Adjutant Revendicate’s 20-year documentation of almost the entirety of Halo lore, which they relayed to Invariant Bias at the Absolute Record as a contingency, also serving in turn as a framing device for the 2022 Halo Encyclopedia.
I had an idea for a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles show. It takes place in the future, and has our now grown-up series mainstays telling stories about their past adventures to Shadow, Casey Jones' daughter.
You know what trope I live for? When the first episode of a TV show begins with a book being opened, and years later the finale ends with the camera zooming out as the book closes. That’s the good stuff. 10/10
House of Leaves has so many fucking layers of framing going on its like inception the (so far) main story's in a fake but true found footage horror movie described by an academic paped written by an old blind dead guy that has another storyline going on in the footnotes by the guy who found the dead guy's stuff and is trying to edit it and get it published
