One of my story files that I've had for a while was titled Grandpa Anarchy The Musical. When I first created it I had no idea what I actually intended to do with it, I just thought it was a funny title so I made a file with hat title and saved it.
Later, sometime last year, I decided that a musical should have songs -- that if I could come up with some hero-themed songs based on well known musical numbers (so that the melody was obvious), I could have a lot of fun with the idea. I sketched out the start of "If I Was A Villain" and "My Favorite Things" and left it at that. I didn't really know where I was going with the idea yet.
This past week I had decided to assemble a new music playlist starting with two songs that have an awful lot in common: Let It Go, from Disney's Frozen, and Defying Gravity from the musical Wicked. Both songs are about breaking away from authority and taking control of our own life, and exploring what you can really do with your power. And both hold the promise of possibly crossing that line from good to evil. In Frozen, the older sister Elsa ultimately does not really turn evil -- but in the original version of the movie she did (which is how the original fairy tale goes I believe). In Wicked, Elphaba has good reasons for her actions, but essentially becomes the Wicked Witch of the West (at least, is portrayed that way).
One other thing both songs have in common -- they're both sung by Idina Menzel.
(In fact, you can find several Let It Go/Defying Gravity mashups on Youtube, so quite a few people see the connections.)
So with all of this in my head, I turned today to Grandpa Anarchy The Musical. It seemed like an obvious choice to do a song based on either Let It Go or Defying Gravity, and once I had thought about it, I settled on a story about how Kid Calculus goes from Grandpa Anarchy's sidekick, to his nemesis, to a truly evil villain (which he's in the process of becoming in a couple of the stories I've recently written -- Villain of the Weak and Disorientation.) Thus this is a musical in three acts -- one where Kid Calculus is a young and innocent sidekick, one where he's abandoned by Grandpa Anarchy and becomes his bitter rival, and one where he makes the leap to full villain and is defeated.
Which allows me to make the centerpiece of my second act a song called Defying Anarchy. ^_^
But today was Act One. Since this is a big project, I decided to break each act up into a separate story for the purposes of finishing a story a day. Act One ends up being 1,232 words long, so it's about the length of a typical Grandpa Anarchy story. I'm expecting each act to contain two songs -- this one has both My Favorite Things and If I Were A Villain.
Unpossible Man looked about the smoke-filled, rubble-strewn lair. He grinned like a kid in a candy store."You know," he said, "I really love my job. I mean really love it."Nina grinned. "Beating up Nazis does put me in a good mood," she agreed."I know exactly what you mean," said Grandpa Anarchy. "Nothing makes me happier than punching a bad guy." He paused a moment, then said, "In fact, I think I'd put it this way." He began to sing:"Face punches, fist fights and smashing of villains,"Last-second rescues that stops men from killin',"Bad guys entrapped in a wiretap sting,"These are a few of my favorite things."Deep Fat Fryer nodded enthusiastically. "That's right!" he said. He sang:"Zombies on fire and flame balls exploding,"Lightning that gives you a sense of foreboding,"Taking down Totengräber fall or spring,"These are a few of my favorite things."Unpossible Man grinned. He did a little pirouette and sang:"Costumes of spandex, and muscular heroes,"Lairs being blown up by spies with two zeros,"Breaking an underground slave traffic ring,"These are a few of my favorite things."Then all three sang:"When the death ray"Gets in my way,"When the world is doomed,"I simply remember my favorite things,"And then death is not presumed."
Ah ha ha! I love it!
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