HO SHIT I'M A TELEVISION PRODUCER, WHAT?
1. Comment to this post with "I surrender!" and I'll assign you the basis of some tv show idea. (Science fiction show, medical drama, criminal procedure, etc...)
2. Create a cast of characters, including the actors who'd play them
3. Add in any actor photos, character bios and show synopsis that you want.
4. Post to your own journal.
erethesunrises gave me this prompt:AND YOUR TV SHOW? GREEK GODS IN WORLD WAR II. WHICH GODS/GODDESSES WOULD ALIGN WITH THE ALLIES AND VICE VERSA? ANYTHING YOU WANT! Also, the format of this is shamelessly stolen from her, since my imagination was drained with the rest of this.
It’s 1943 and for the second time in thirty years the entire world finds itself at war with each other. Germany, Italy, and Japan lead the Axis Powers against the Allies, who include Great Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States in a hard fought war which would cause more destruction than had ever been seen in such a short amount of time. But little does the world know that high on Mount Olympus, the gods have finally re-entered the game and are exacting their revenge for the thousands of years Man has forgotten them in favor of the monotheistic faiths. This war is like a game of chess to these deities, whose existence is now a closely guarded secret to those who don’t believe. It’s a secret that our hero Aeneas, the son of the goddess Venus, must keep as he travels across Europe in an effort to fulfill his destiny and return his displaced family to their roots in Axis-controlled Italy. Told with an ensemble cast in the same style as Heroes, with disparate storylines that are all somehow connected, Keep Calm And Carry On combines the Second World War with elements of The Aeneid to make it a little bit historical drama, a little bit fantasy and a little bit Roman mythology.
AENEAS (Bradley James) Previously a family man who avoided the draft because he was flat footed, Aeneas stayed at home with his ailing father Anchises, his wife Creusa and their son Iulus until their entire street was obliterated during a German air raid. Per his mother’s prompting, Aeneas has set off on an expedition to return to his ancestral home in Italy and find a place for his current family, who are waiting for him in London, to rebuild their lives and a community of believers in the gods. The problem is that to do that, he needs to get through Nazi-occupied France and into Mussolini-ruled Italy without detection. Meanwhile, he carries on his shoulders the secret of the gods and how none of what he sees around him is truly Man’s doing. Aeneas is restless and tries as hard as he can to rebel against the gods who control his life, which causes him to fall in with Dido, a beautiful and mysterious woman who could blow the whole thing. Aeneas is traveling with his sidekick Pallas, who he considers his best friend. Aeneas is prone to long bouts of self doubt and generally emo angsting.
DIDO (Carey Mulligan) The daughter of a powerful French diplomat, Dido is beautiful and wiley young woman who holds an unusual amount of personal power for a woman of her time. She takes Aeneas and Pallas into her care when they stumble into her hometown of Cassel, in the north of France, and quickly falls in love with the dashing Aeneas and then proceeds to do everything within her power to keep him with him instead of leaving to fulfill his destiny because she cannot face the prospect of living without him. This puts him in conflict with Pallas.
PALLAS (Nicholas Hoult) Pallas is the younger best friend and confidant of Aeneas. He knows about and believes in Aeneas’ destiny and his future among the gods and tries to push him to get there. He looks up to Aeneas to an extreme and is therefore frustrated by his continued affair with Dido, who he sees not only as a rival to Creusa but also a block in the road to destiny.
TURNUS (Matthew Goode) Turnus is a German soldier who is posted in Cassel who discovers Aeneas’ true mission. A true believer in Christianity, he finds Aeneas to be a blasphemer and makes it his personal mission to stop him. But because straight up killing Aeneas would give him more trouble than its worth, Turnus must find alternte ways to stop him from fulfilling his destiny and creating a community of true believers, and so he encourages Aeneas’ relationship with Dido, until his real aim is uncovered by Aeneas.
CREUSA (Allison Mack) The wife of Aeneas, who has been left at home to care for Anchises and Iulus in a homeless shelter in London. She is a very strong woman, with the thankless job of being the thing (or in this case, one of the many things) standing in the way of the show’s main couple (ie Aeneas/Dido) but she is still likable enough thanks to the fire with which she fights for the continued protection of Anchises and Iulus. She wants nothing more than to keep her family together and to hear from her husband with news that they can follow him to their new life in Italy, but she has no hopes for the posative outcome of the war and thinks that sooner or later, the whole world will be speaking German. She’s also missing the big picture because no one has bothered to tell her that her husband is the son of a goddess and is essentially the Olympians’ pawn.
ANCHISES (Michael Gambon) An old man, and a vetern of the Great War, Anchises hates being stuck in London while there is a war raging outside that he can do nothing about. He loves his family but he hates that he has the secret behind his son’s birth on his shoulders. But he does truly love Venus, even if she has largely forgotten him now that he’s aged, and looks forward to her periodic visits.
IULUS (Asa Butterfield) The son of Creusa and Aeneas, Iulus is a young boy who doesn’t completely understand what is happening around him and why they can’t go back to their house and where his father has gone. Largely self reliant, Iulus spends most of his time reading well above his grade level and beating his grandfather, Anchises, at chess.
JUPITER (Anthony Hopkins) The King of the Gods, Jupiter is pissed at having been forgotten by Man. This war was his idea, as a sort of sport for the other gods. He himself is neutral, but he’s very invested in the community of believers and if that means needing to dupe the Axis Powers to let an Englishman through their territory, he’s more than willing to make that happen. He has a short fuse with his wife Juno, who is going against him at every turn. It is Jupiter’s job to make sure that the secret of the Olympians’ existence remain a secret, at least for now.
JUNO (Helen Mirren) Juno, quite simply, is a bitch. She has never forgiven Venus for her victory at the Judgment of Paris and that hatred carries over to Venus’ son, Aeneas. Therefore, she tries to thwart his attempts at founding a community of believers, saying that she’d rather have Man worship a monotheistic god than have the community of believers be started by the son of Venus. This, of course, gets her in trouble with many of the other gods, especially those who support the Allies, and Jupiter, who really wants that community. She supports the Axis Powers in the war.
VENUS (Michelle Williams) Venus is the mother of Aeneas and takes that before anything else. It was she who appeared before Aeneas to tell him of his true paternity and heritage and charged him with his mission toward Italy. As the goddess of love and beauty, she is of course extremely glamorous and uses that to her advantage whenever possible. Because her son is an Englishman, she is a staunch supporter of the Allies’ cause and sees the war as interfering more with the lives of real people more than many of the other gods do, because of her more intimate connection to Man.
MERCURY (Colin Morgan) Mercury, the messenger god, is the spunky assistant to Jupiter. It’s his job to ferry the official messages from Jupiter to Aeneas and Aeneas’ answers to Jupiter, along with the rest of the divine to mortal correspondence that is not done in person. Like his boss, Mercury is a neutral party in the war but as it is also his job to ferry the souls of the dead to the Underworld, he sees first hand the destruction the war is causing and wants more than any of the other gods for it to all just be over.
MINERVA (Julie Andrews) As the goddess of wisdom, Minerva is drawn to the personalities of Roosevelt and Churchill, who she sees as geniuses, rather than the insanity of Hilter, Mussolini and Hirohito. For that reason she has aligned herself with the Allied Powers. Minerva carries herself with a dignity and grace unsurpassed by any of the Olympians and is looked up to by many of them. People often seek her approval in their actions.
MARS (Kenneth Branagh) As the god of war, Mars thrives on this kind of world at war environment. He’s one of the few but powerful supporters of the Axis Powers amoung the Olympians; he feels that people like Hitler and Mussolini will keep the fighting going on longer and that is Mars’ main objective. Mars is very belligerent and will fly off the hook at little things, so people tend to tred carefully around him.
NEPTUNE (Christopher Lee) Neptune joins Mars and Juno as the third of the three main supporters of the Axis Powers. Like Mars, he feels that he has the most power at a time when naval battles are happening on a daily basis, as they are in the Pacific, and he thinks that the Axis leaders are the men who are going to preserve that. Neptune is wise and usually kind, but he has a bit of a nasty streak in him that Juno frequently uses to her advantage.
APOLLO (Neil Patrick Harris) Apollo is the god of music as well as the god of the moon. He is musical and charming and funny and liked by basically everyone. He’s aligned himself with the Allies, mostly because that is who Minerva is siding with, but does not feel particularly strongly either way. Out of all the gods, he is especially close with his twin Diana.
DIANA (Billie Piper) As the goddess of the hunt, Diana is interested in the war as a journey, not as a destiny. She thrives on the fighting the same way Mars does but isn’t too concerned about keeping it going, she’d rather just enjoy it while it lasts. Like her twin, Apollo, Diana mostly sided with the Allies because Minerva did, but she’s happy to put all her energy into helping them if it makes it more fun for her.
BACCHUS (Robert Downey Jr.) As the god of wine and general revelry, Bacchus is basically just here to have a party. Anywhere he goes tends to turn into a good time to be had by all and because of that he’s one of the most popular of the gods. People like him. He’s sided with the Allied Powers, but mostly just because that’s what seems like a safe bet since most of the other powerful gods are on that side.
CERES (Elizabeth Mitchell) As the goddess of agriculture, Ceres has become despondent since Man turned away from the farm as being the focus of all life to pay more attention to machinery, making the winters on Earth harsher than they had been before the Industrial Revolution. Combine this with her constant worry for her daughter Proserpine, the wife by force of Pluto, Ceres is a shadow of her former carefree self and is the source of worry on the part of many of the other gods on Olympus. Despite her down times, though, she is still an ethereal beauty.
PLUTO (Alan Rickman) As the god of the Underworld, Pluto finds himself overworked during this time when so many people are dying. Lucky for him, he quite likes having a lot to do and for that reason he supports the Axis Powers, since he’s grateful to Hitler for the influx of work the dictator is sending his way. As a person, Pluto is intimidating, but finds himself largely isolated since he rarely visits Olympus and his fellow gods rarely visit him. He’s happy that way, though. His one companion is his wife Proserpine, who spends the winter months with him.
PROSERPINE (Kristin Kreuk) Proserpine enjoys the title of queen of the underworld, which she has begrudgingly embraced. Although she has come to love her husband, Pluto, there are still wounds there since she was forced to marry him and leave her happy life with her mother, Ceres, on Olympus in the first place. She is quiet and ethereal like her mother, but very isolated. She does not have a particular opinion on what the outcome of the war should be, but if pressed she’ll say that she’d like it to be over so the influx of souls will stop coming into the Underworld.
2. Create a cast of characters, including the actors who'd play them
3. Add in any actor photos, character bios and show synopsis that you want.
4. Post to your own journal.
erethesunrises gave me this prompt:AND YOUR TV SHOW? GREEK GODS IN WORLD WAR II. WHICH GODS/GODDESSES WOULD ALIGN WITH THE ALLIES AND VICE VERSA? ANYTHING YOU WANT! Also, the format of this is shamelessly stolen from her, since my imagination was drained with the rest of this.
It’s 1943 and for the second time in thirty years the entire world finds itself at war with each other. Germany, Italy, and Japan lead the Axis Powers against the Allies, who include Great Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States in a hard fought war which would cause more destruction than had ever been seen in such a short amount of time. But little does the world know that high on Mount Olympus, the gods have finally re-entered the game and are exacting their revenge for the thousands of years Man has forgotten them in favor of the monotheistic faiths. This war is like a game of chess to these deities, whose existence is now a closely guarded secret to those who don’t believe. It’s a secret that our hero Aeneas, the son of the goddess Venus, must keep as he travels across Europe in an effort to fulfill his destiny and return his displaced family to their roots in Axis-controlled Italy. Told with an ensemble cast in the same style as Heroes, with disparate storylines that are all somehow connected, Keep Calm And Carry On combines the Second World War with elements of The Aeneid to make it a little bit historical drama, a little bit fantasy and a little bit Roman mythology.
AENEAS (Bradley James) Previously a family man who avoided the draft because he was flat footed, Aeneas stayed at home with his ailing father Anchises, his wife Creusa and their son Iulus until their entire street was obliterated during a German air raid. Per his mother’s prompting, Aeneas has set off on an expedition to return to his ancestral home in Italy and find a place for his current family, who are waiting for him in London, to rebuild their lives and a community of believers in the gods. The problem is that to do that, he needs to get through Nazi-occupied France and into Mussolini-ruled Italy without detection. Meanwhile, he carries on his shoulders the secret of the gods and how none of what he sees around him is truly Man’s doing. Aeneas is restless and tries as hard as he can to rebel against the gods who control his life, which causes him to fall in with Dido, a beautiful and mysterious woman who could blow the whole thing. Aeneas is traveling with his sidekick Pallas, who he considers his best friend. Aeneas is prone to long bouts of self doubt and generally emo angsting.
DIDO (Carey Mulligan) The daughter of a powerful French diplomat, Dido is beautiful and wiley young woman who holds an unusual amount of personal power for a woman of her time. She takes Aeneas and Pallas into her care when they stumble into her hometown of Cassel, in the north of France, and quickly falls in love with the dashing Aeneas and then proceeds to do everything within her power to keep him with him instead of leaving to fulfill his destiny because she cannot face the prospect of living without him. This puts him in conflict with Pallas.
PALLAS (Nicholas Hoult) Pallas is the younger best friend and confidant of Aeneas. He knows about and believes in Aeneas’ destiny and his future among the gods and tries to push him to get there. He looks up to Aeneas to an extreme and is therefore frustrated by his continued affair with Dido, who he sees not only as a rival to Creusa but also a block in the road to destiny.
TURNUS (Matthew Goode) Turnus is a German soldier who is posted in Cassel who discovers Aeneas’ true mission. A true believer in Christianity, he finds Aeneas to be a blasphemer and makes it his personal mission to stop him. But because straight up killing Aeneas would give him more trouble than its worth, Turnus must find alternte ways to stop him from fulfilling his destiny and creating a community of true believers, and so he encourages Aeneas’ relationship with Dido, until his real aim is uncovered by Aeneas.
CREUSA (Allison Mack) The wife of Aeneas, who has been left at home to care for Anchises and Iulus in a homeless shelter in London. She is a very strong woman, with the thankless job of being the thing (or in this case, one of the many things) standing in the way of the show’s main couple (ie Aeneas/Dido) but she is still likable enough thanks to the fire with which she fights for the continued protection of Anchises and Iulus. She wants nothing more than to keep her family together and to hear from her husband with news that they can follow him to their new life in Italy, but she has no hopes for the posative outcome of the war and thinks that sooner or later, the whole world will be speaking German. She’s also missing the big picture because no one has bothered to tell her that her husband is the son of a goddess and is essentially the Olympians’ pawn.
ANCHISES (Michael Gambon) An old man, and a vetern of the Great War, Anchises hates being stuck in London while there is a war raging outside that he can do nothing about. He loves his family but he hates that he has the secret behind his son’s birth on his shoulders. But he does truly love Venus, even if she has largely forgotten him now that he’s aged, and looks forward to her periodic visits.
IULUS (Asa Butterfield) The son of Creusa and Aeneas, Iulus is a young boy who doesn’t completely understand what is happening around him and why they can’t go back to their house and where his father has gone. Largely self reliant, Iulus spends most of his time reading well above his grade level and beating his grandfather, Anchises, at chess.
JUPITER (Anthony Hopkins) The King of the Gods, Jupiter is pissed at having been forgotten by Man. This war was his idea, as a sort of sport for the other gods. He himself is neutral, but he’s very invested in the community of believers and if that means needing to dupe the Axis Powers to let an Englishman through their territory, he’s more than willing to make that happen. He has a short fuse with his wife Juno, who is going against him at every turn. It is Jupiter’s job to make sure that the secret of the Olympians’ existence remain a secret, at least for now.
JUNO (Helen Mirren) Juno, quite simply, is a bitch. She has never forgiven Venus for her victory at the Judgment of Paris and that hatred carries over to Venus’ son, Aeneas. Therefore, she tries to thwart his attempts at founding a community of believers, saying that she’d rather have Man worship a monotheistic god than have the community of believers be started by the son of Venus. This, of course, gets her in trouble with many of the other gods, especially those who support the Allies, and Jupiter, who really wants that community. She supports the Axis Powers in the war.
VENUS (Michelle Williams) Venus is the mother of Aeneas and takes that before anything else. It was she who appeared before Aeneas to tell him of his true paternity and heritage and charged him with his mission toward Italy. As the goddess of love and beauty, she is of course extremely glamorous and uses that to her advantage whenever possible. Because her son is an Englishman, she is a staunch supporter of the Allies’ cause and sees the war as interfering more with the lives of real people more than many of the other gods do, because of her more intimate connection to Man.
MERCURY (Colin Morgan) Mercury, the messenger god, is the spunky assistant to Jupiter. It’s his job to ferry the official messages from Jupiter to Aeneas and Aeneas’ answers to Jupiter, along with the rest of the divine to mortal correspondence that is not done in person. Like his boss, Mercury is a neutral party in the war but as it is also his job to ferry the souls of the dead to the Underworld, he sees first hand the destruction the war is causing and wants more than any of the other gods for it to all just be over.
MINERVA (Julie Andrews) As the goddess of wisdom, Minerva is drawn to the personalities of Roosevelt and Churchill, who she sees as geniuses, rather than the insanity of Hilter, Mussolini and Hirohito. For that reason she has aligned herself with the Allied Powers. Minerva carries herself with a dignity and grace unsurpassed by any of the Olympians and is looked up to by many of them. People often seek her approval in their actions.
MARS (Kenneth Branagh) As the god of war, Mars thrives on this kind of world at war environment. He’s one of the few but powerful supporters of the Axis Powers amoung the Olympians; he feels that people like Hitler and Mussolini will keep the fighting going on longer and that is Mars’ main objective. Mars is very belligerent and will fly off the hook at little things, so people tend to tred carefully around him.
NEPTUNE (Christopher Lee) Neptune joins Mars and Juno as the third of the three main supporters of the Axis Powers. Like Mars, he feels that he has the most power at a time when naval battles are happening on a daily basis, as they are in the Pacific, and he thinks that the Axis leaders are the men who are going to preserve that. Neptune is wise and usually kind, but he has a bit of a nasty streak in him that Juno frequently uses to her advantage.
APOLLO (Neil Patrick Harris) Apollo is the god of music as well as the god of the moon. He is musical and charming and funny and liked by basically everyone. He’s aligned himself with the Allies, mostly because that is who Minerva is siding with, but does not feel particularly strongly either way. Out of all the gods, he is especially close with his twin Diana.
DIANA (Billie Piper) As the goddess of the hunt, Diana is interested in the war as a journey, not as a destiny. She thrives on the fighting the same way Mars does but isn’t too concerned about keeping it going, she’d rather just enjoy it while it lasts. Like her twin, Apollo, Diana mostly sided with the Allies because Minerva did, but she’s happy to put all her energy into helping them if it makes it more fun for her.
BACCHUS (Robert Downey Jr.) As the god of wine and general revelry, Bacchus is basically just here to have a party. Anywhere he goes tends to turn into a good time to be had by all and because of that he’s one of the most popular of the gods. People like him. He’s sided with the Allied Powers, but mostly just because that’s what seems like a safe bet since most of the other powerful gods are on that side.
CERES (Elizabeth Mitchell) As the goddess of agriculture, Ceres has become despondent since Man turned away from the farm as being the focus of all life to pay more attention to machinery, making the winters on Earth harsher than they had been before the Industrial Revolution. Combine this with her constant worry for her daughter Proserpine, the wife by force of Pluto, Ceres is a shadow of her former carefree self and is the source of worry on the part of many of the other gods on Olympus. Despite her down times, though, she is still an ethereal beauty.
PLUTO (Alan Rickman) As the god of the Underworld, Pluto finds himself overworked during this time when so many people are dying. Lucky for him, he quite likes having a lot to do and for that reason he supports the Axis Powers, since he’s grateful to Hitler for the influx of work the dictator is sending his way. As a person, Pluto is intimidating, but finds himself largely isolated since he rarely visits Olympus and his fellow gods rarely visit him. He’s happy that way, though. His one companion is his wife Proserpine, who spends the winter months with him.
PROSERPINE (Kristin Kreuk) Proserpine enjoys the title of queen of the underworld, which she has begrudgingly embraced. Although she has come to love her husband, Pluto, there are still wounds there since she was forced to marry him and leave her happy life with her mother, Ceres, on Olympus in the first place. She is quiet and ethereal like her mother, but very isolated. She does not have a particular opinion on what the outcome of the war should be, but if pressed she’ll say that she’d like it to be over so the influx of souls will stop coming into the Underworld.