#traction cities

[amirzand]

It was a blast to be part of “The Illustrated World of Mortal Engines” back in 2018... here are some of the illustrations from the book...

[theblvckvenus]

“roll up that tender air and the plant dies, the colour fades. the earth we walk on is a parched cinder. it is marl we tread and fiery cobbles scorch our feet. by the truth we are undone.”

- Virginia Woolf, Orlando

[thisnorthernboy]

Mortal Engines

My illustrations that appear in The Illustrated World of Mortal Engines are now available to buy. Go to my blog for details.

I drew over 50 illustrations for this book which explores Philip Reeve’s Mortal Engines world. There are also amazing illustrations and maps from Ian McQue, David Wyatt, Amir Zand, Philip Varbanov, and Maxime Plasse.

[cptablovegood]

Anyone else just dumbstruck by how Hester looked in the trailer?

I fell in love with a complex, mentally unstable, selfish, ruthless girl who life had fucked over because of how scarred she was. We get pretty all the time. I don’t want pretty!

[cptablovegood]

If anyone who is also obsessed with the mortal engines wants to add each other so we can start a bit chat/discussion that would be amazing 😄

[definitely-not-karen]

I have watched that one good clip from the Mortal Engines movie and I know the book is better and I’m not a writer and this isn’t a recommendation since that movie series is very dead but it’d like to randomly make a story very loosely based off of mortal engines because I haven’t read the books.

Ok so:

The protagonist would be like the mayor of a small town. Small enough to not have to hunt other traction cities but large enough to be desirable to run down. The movie could start with a big chase with the town running away from a predator city and getting away and it stirs up more discourse over if they should make their town a predator city. The mayor would be against it wanting to stay a small close knit community thinking working together with other smaller traction cities a better way to survive the wastes rather than municipal darwinism.

The city chasing them could be London still with some scenes focusing on a character there that helps explore the interesting concept of a giant predator city but has grown tired of municipal darwinism as well. The movie could have both perspectives of the argument with neither being essentially evil.

I have two other ideas past this.

The town may have to be constantly on the move with London trying to find them and having the pressure to become a predator grow due to not being able to stop and gather resources. It could end in a climax with getting a bunch of other small traction towns to work together to either take down London somehow or at least make London get off their backs with finding the towns more trouble than they’re worth. There could be radio transmissions between the town and city where they negotiate, threaten or taunt. The citizen of the city could be on the side of the mayor and while they never meet face to face, they secretly broadcast their location to the town helping them evade and create plans to fight back.

Or

The town gets caught due to the disagreements and becomes a part of London where the ex-mayor meets the London citizen also tired of giant traction cities destroying communities. The citizen brings the ex-mayor to a meeting area with other ex-mayors whose towns were also devoured by London. These mayors could work together, protesting for their want of independence from London. Eventually a decently large abandoned traction town could be caught and the ex-mayor either leads a revolution to gain control of the town before it’s scrapped and drive it out and away from London or negotiate independence and take control of the town that is large enough to fit those that want to leave London.

Some ideas that I just have and may or may not be good hehe:

The mayor and the citizen could have an implied romance. Long chats on the radio in the one version and passionate cooperation in the other version.

Maybe the earth is starting to show signs of healing making municipal darwinism sort of redundant as new technologies and resources are found making traction cities more of a, move away from natural disasters and unstable environments rather than needing to hunt others for resources.

There isn’t necessarily anything wrong with cities being able to move, it’s the idea that they have to hunt each other that is being challenged.

Obviously I’m not a story writer I just like to have fun. Also I have never read Mortal Engines I just really like the idea of cities moving around. Also I love fanart of traction cities, it really is amazing and shows the imagined geographies of certain cities with how people draw them.

[cptablovegood]

Im only 5 minutes in to the mortal engines film and I already have so many issues 😒

I might just have to stop watching film adaptions of my fave books. Like the disappointment is too much 😪

[caughtinbetweenworlds]

Peter Jackson wants to make a film out of the Mortal Engines series... Please let it be so!