Human Reznya and my stance on back stories (Patreon)

I designed this backstory version of Reznya, of a time when she was still human. Seeing as how she is one of the more major characters of Shrapnel, I figured she would benefit from one. I not revealing this design until I have some more solidified story elements, but this is what I have for her so far.

Ever since I made Peppa and the Murder Machine and Kill Contract: Minions, people have constantly asked to know what the back stories were for the mascots and to know of their origins. While I do appreciate the  interest people show in my characters, it's not something I want to reveal right away, especially now, when the actual Shrapnel series hasn't even started (and knowing me there are tons of things subject to change).

I love to write in-depth stories and backgrounds for my characters, not so I can back an origin story, but for it to be basis for my character's personality and actions. It also helps me to keep their characteristics consistent.

We live in a generation where things have to make sense and all manners of information is readily available or spoon fed to us. Take the horror film industry for example, just about every film you watch has some segment where they try to "explain" whatever entity is driving the plot along in the film. As the audience learns more about it, their fear weakens and eventually it will dissipate.

I've seen this in a personal example in my stikbot series, Off the Grid. When Cecilia first showed up in the show, the audience foudn her to be terrifying and creepy. She had no clear motives and no one could figure out just exactly what she was, and there was a lovely little charm to it, but as the company dragged on the show longer than they should have, she started to develop more of a screen presence and now she's nothing but a comic relief character. They went as far as to develop some corny sappy back story for her that was completely not canon with Cecilia's original lore.

I hate seeing what Cecilia has been reduced to and ever since, my reluctance to create backstory works have gotten even stronger.

Remember when Ridley Scott's Alien first came out? No one knew what the Xenomorph, hell it wasn't even called the Xenomorph, it was the ALIEN, and it was exactly that, ALIEN. It was terrifying, it was unusual, and we knew just about nothing about it. I loved the feeling of understanding so little and being afraid of this terrifying thing.

While I don't plan to keep the audience mystified or baffled forever, I want to convey to them the fear of not knowing, not understanding and wanting more. Especially when Juka shows up, people are definitely going to be horrified and interested. But as my work continues I'll reveal bits and piece probably through flashbacks, photos, logs and various other forms of story telling, and maybe the audience will be able to piece it together.

Sorry for the long rant~ Felt like taking my creative garbage angst out somewhere~