Seeking closure · 5:06am Sep 25th, 2016
Until a few months ago I tried to maintain a cadaence of releasing one story per month. My decision to refocus on To Serve In Hell, and the arrival of Baby Wubs, kinda changed that (for now). But for a long time there, I managed to do it.
But, not every story I worked on in that time survived, despite some of them seeming so promising at the outset. A few lost steam before I could finish them, leaving me with this pile of isolated "chapter 1"s that seem unlikely to ever get "the end"s. And being fairly OCD (probably not in the clinical sense, but certainly in the pain-in-the-arse sense), of course I wouldn't want to show them to anyone unless they were actually done.
...Right?
Look for these chapters and more, coming soon to a FimFiction near you!
Well, what else am I supposed to do with a year-and-a-half's worth of unfinished stories? 
Not everything's going on the chopping block just yet; the Power Ponies thing I teased a few weeks ago, and the Limestone x Flash Sentry thing that I've mentioned before, are still (God willing) going to get finished. To Serve In Hell is going to get finished, too. But a lot of the rest of it's going to get posted.
If I haven't lost you already, you might ask, "Why?"
Simple: I still have it in my head that I'm going to finish and release these damn things. If you're familiar with David Allen's productivity book Getting Things Done, this is a classic case of open loops, where the mind refuses to let go of something until it's filed-away in its "proper" place. Part of the GTD method is to control and address these open loops in a healthy way, and I've tried to do so as best as I can figure. But, to be honest, I begin to suspect I won't find peace with these stories until I get them out there, because I still really like the ideas. Though as I hinted at in my recent blog about writer's block, I think some of these might need more specialized tools (or at least a great deal more time) than I can throw at them in the foreseeable future.
My goal in offering them isn't to burden people with crap. There's more than enough crappy stories out there. Honestly, I don't think these are crap, despite being unfinished. No, it's to get them off my mind, and to free up energy for projects that haven't stalled-out. It's to draw a mental line in the (mental) sand, and to tell myself: "Okay fine, self; you released what you could write of it. Move on!"
"First the dubious metaphors, then talking to himself..."
I also want to start brainstorming new stuff again, without worrying about whether there's some old story that I should be working on instead. I've tended not to do that as much since we had Wubs, likely because my brain hasn't been storming much in general, given the lack of sleep and free time that a baby brings. But I managed to just sit and do that for a bit today, and the feeling was phenomenal. While I've thought of doing this before, I think it was that feeling that made me decide that now (or as soon as I can pull things together) is the time.
Have you guys ever had a story stall on you? I mean, beyond just writer's block--like stalled enough that you know it isn't coming back? I'd be curious to hear more!
Glad to hear your not giving up on them. And yes I've had a story stalled on me before.
4227000 I kind of am, otherwise I'd develop them into full standalone stories.
It's funny though, I was cleaning-up one of them last night, and the ideas started flowing again, and pretty soon it turned into a fully-baked story! So who knows, maybe this'll be a way to finally get some of these finished up.
Stories, scripts for shows and movies, comics, cars, etc. All sorts of stuff have stalled out on me. Most of the time it was because they were half thought out ideas that, at the time, were just kind of like a one line joke. In those cases they weren't anything more than what they were.
Sometimes I've had things stall out because who I was working with lost interest and went on to something else. Or in some cases, wasn't interested at all but didn't want to say anything.
Some may look at my unfinished stories (especially the first one) and say that they've stalled out. It's not true though. I do have every intention of going back to them and doing them. I wanna make Hail Sombra's additional chapters, Finish up Ponyville vol 2 and Passing Notes. I also want to get the work I promised to get done done as well so that I can just focus on them too.
I think as far as the two things that stalled out that disappointed me the most, were this one detective comic I was doing years ago and the slasher movie script I was putting together. In the case of the detective comic what was most disappointing about that was I'd finished my end and the artist who, promised the moon and that he'd told other people and they were gonna help and it was going to get done and blah blah blah just totally bailed and went on to do his own things and the people who he'd said were gonna help had no idea what I was talking about.
The slasher movie script was honestly just some high school early college idea. I ended up stopping after a diner scene where the main characters are just chatting about their plans for the weekend and that the initial two victims were found murdered. The thing is if I finished it... I'd have to make it and the question remains... would anyone ACTUALLY want to see it.
Unfinished ideas can feel pretty bad, especially when you thought it was so awesome to start with. For me what's even worse is when you put a ton of effort into something. You're really proud of it. You've (in your mind) crossed all the t's and dotted all the I's and when it's out there nobody pays it any attention. That right there can be a real motivation killer. It can feel like you wasted your time and that's something you can't get back.
4227125
Well that is good news afterall
4227200 That sucks about the comic, man. I bet it would've been good. I totally agree with this though:
And that's part of why I pulled the plug on some of these that didn't boil down to a quick one-shot. I feel bad wasting your time with Tequila Sunrise when that's how it ended up, but going back and editing it some more, I just got to the point where I didn't think it was going to grow beyond that initial scene. At least not with a lot more time than I could throw at it right now.
Sometimes it's hard to see if an idea is going to take off until you spend a bit of time developing it. Of course it's easy to write things off prematurely when you really just need to spend that time. I guess I don't feel as comfortable sitting there with an unfinished story; I want that sucker done. But then there's a question of how much free time you have in general. Maybe I'd have gotten all these done if I had a lot more, but for the moment, I'd rather just have them out there than wonder if I'll ever get back to them.
4228146 Well, the good thing about a site like this is that you can save them here and retool them later. I mean, Tequila Sunrise if you took out the mlp angle (slight as it is) frankly is a novel. How long of one I don't know but it's a novel. I also agree I want those other stories done or progressing as well. But, like you I have other commitments that came up. Some important others eh... not so much but they came up and things got pushed back.
As far as my little bit on Tequila Sunrise don't worry about it. It was a good experience overall and I was glad to help out how I could at the time.