Cutting Room Floor 2023 (part 2)

 Cancelled Plot: The Shadow of Evil

• This was a secondary plot to be run alongside and complementary to One World, One Ocean. It would have served as a final wrapup for Ultraman Trigger's story and been an alternative end for Cleve Sharpe as a villain.
• The idea was, instead of Rahab, the merfolk would have worshipped Ghatanothoa, the final boss monster and true villain of Ultraman Tiga. Ghatanothoa was the insane spawn of Cthulhu and the dark god that the Giants of Darkness, with Trigger's unwitting help, reawakened to destroy the original Ultra civilization of Agama and claim dominion. They were foiled by Tiga, Trigger's father, who destroyed Ghatanothoa's physical form at the cost of his own life, but a Shadow, the disembodied intelligence of the monster, remained in the spot where he was killed - the oceans off the coast of Whalestrand.
• As One World, One Ocean progressed, signs that all was not well would make themselves apparent. Giant monsters would rise out of the ocean and into the city, neccesitating the Kobbers pull out their big guns to drive them away or kill them. Dark visions would afflict many of the populace - Valério and Trigger most of all. The merfolk would, in fact, be praying to Ghatanothoa - either the captive merfolk or the outsider pod would be responsible.
• It would also transpire that the pearl of Sharpe's collection was an artefact he'd ignoranrly dubbed the Eternity Core. It was, in fact, Ghatanothoa's heart, sundered from his body when Tiga sacrificed himself to destroy the evil god. Through the Eternity Core, Ghatanothoa would influence many monsters and villains through the Whalestrand season.
• By the climax of the story, Sharpe would attempt to escape by boat, taking the Eternity Core with him. Passing over the Shadow as he sailed, Sharpe's body would be hijacked by the Eternity Core, with the Shadow taking control of this new form. This humanoid form of Ghatanothoa, dubbed Megalothoa, would turn its insane wrath upon Whalestrand, seeking to restart its dark conquest of Earth, but would be destroyed for good by Ultraman Trigger and the Kobbers.
• In truth, the more I thought about this, the less enthused I was for it. In my mind, Trigger's story was done. He'd already faced his demons several times in the Agama years and there wasn't really any more I could drag out from him. Having him face the original monster that bested him and killed his father might have been an interesting angle to attack his character, recalling Agony's words about how futile the Ultranian species' battle against evil seemed to be on the surface. But I didn't really fancy going through what I felt was the same motions over and over from those years. Trigger had been through enough trauma, in my mind. It was time to let the boy rest and enjoy his hard-won peace.

Cancelled Storyline: The Other Vent

• This one's... weird. It came about shortly after I decided to have Sharpe send an assassn after Vent. I'd been musing on Vilfred's attraction to Vent at the time, because while I was fully aware that it could only end badly, I didn't really... want it to end badly, per se? The way Aqualand plot was shaping up at the time, I felt that the inevitable conclusion was that poor Vilf would be out of a job due to Sharpe firing him - which technically did happen, if you count a Stand punch to the jaw as a firing notice. So I wanted to give the poor guy some form of happy ending.
• The general idea was that Vent would end up having his own Easter, of sorts. But while Easter's development was due to convoluted multiverse stuff I still don't understand, Vent's was... a different matter. The plan was, following the assassination attempt, Vent would begin constructing a backup body in case something like that happened again. While he's normally against making backups of himself, as he sees it as making light of the experience of living, he would soon realize that, on a practical level, it would be a neccesary evil.
• Unfortunately, something would happen to the backup body. That was all I had down in my mind - something would happen. Either it would be stolen, or something would go wrong when Vent tried to download himself into it. The end result was that the body would go walkabout in some fashion. The Kobbers would have to track it down and recover it. Beyond these steps, I didn't really have any idea for what would come in the middle, although thinking about it now some ideas begin to take shape.
• Whatever the intervening steps, the end result was the creation of a 'second' Vent, seperate from the original. Bearing some of Vent's memories, but having a personality closer to the canon Mega Man ZX version of the character. He would use the MEGA system from that game as well, and would eventually hook up with Vilfred as a sort of apology for the original Vent putting him through all the trouble of facing up against Sharpe.
• This new Vent would have also needed a new name to differentiate himself. I was thinking either 'Thomas', meaning 'twin', or Valentine. Because Easter.
  
  ...actually, 'Valentine Twain Cosine' does sound like a JoJo name.
• If you noticed that this looks like me trying to have my cake and eat it, then congratulations, you've figured out why I dropped this! I ruminated on this idea for a month, including up to and after Vent's actual assassination and the battle with Tomas 'Smoke' Vrbada. But at that point I was starting to get turned off by the whole 'Vilfred's hot for Vent' thing, which I suspected was starting to raise eybrows. and I knew that me trying to pull this off would definitely raise some eyebrows. So I quietly shelved the idea and never made any hints or steps towards it.
• On a side note, I considered Kamen Rider Shinobi instead of Smoke as Vent's assassin. But then Mortal Kombat 1 was announced, and... well, there it is!

Cancelled Plot: Tall Tales

• This one actually came about during the second Agama season. I hung onto it for the entire year to see how I felt when the Whalestrand season came around, but decided to drop it in the end as I'd completely lost interest and it didn't really seem fitting for the setting.
• The plot would revolve around characters who were descendants of figures from American folklore and tall tales, banding together as a sort of motely crew united by their shared heritage. The crew would consist of:
• Captain Jennifer Stormalong. A talented sailor and able to communicate with sea life. She was the leader of the group and spoke in a sterotypical Boston patois.
• Peter Bunyan. A quiet and mild-mannered young man, only seven or eight feet tall compared to his giant of an ancestor. Very strong and good with an axe.
• Jolyne Magarac. Able to turn her skin into solid iron and heat up her body. Loud and scrappy.
• Ronnie Appleseed. Lover of nature, but not in a spaced-out granola guy way. Could control plants. Was probably in a relationship with Peter.
• 'Eagle-Eye' William The direct descendant of Pecos Bill and Slue-Foot Sue. Owned a magic lasso which could tame anything. The only sane member of the group.
• The entire conceit of their story was Jennifer assembling her crew in a bid to try and find adventures comparable to their ancestors and write their name in the history books. But in the modern world, even with the kind of strange things that Kobbers face, there just simply isn't enough untamed wilderness and fearsome critters for the kind of impossible feats that Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill etc. But Jennifer would keep dragging her crew into more and more dangerous adventures in a bid to make a name for herself.
• Eventually, the other members of the crew would turn on Jennifer and tell her to stop living in the past and that the world has no more room for big folkloric heroes like themselves. Crushed and full of injured pride, Jennifer would steal Eagle-Eye's lasso and try to prove them wrong by fighting a dangerous monster on her own, eventually becoming the villain through her bllody-minded determination to become a legend. 

Cancelled Plot: The Ocean Hunter

•  I don't want to give too much away about this one. Basically, if you ever heard me talk about that old light gun game The Ocean Hunter, the general premise was similar to that. The Kobbers would help the main characters of that game protect Whalestrand from the Six Great Monsters attacking ships and shore:
• Kraken, a giant octopus
• Leviathan, a megalodon
• Charybdis, a giant anglerfish
• Karkinos, a giant and highly agressive crab,
• Ahuizotl, an elamosaurus
• Midgardsorm, a huge worm. This thing's boss battle would involve it swallowing the Kobbers, nd you'd have to journey through its body cavity and fight its sentient heart.
• There would be character development between the lead characters, of course. Chris, the Player 2 character, would grow resentful of Torel, the Player 1 character, for hogging all the spotlight and treating ocean hunting like a game. Perhaps Chris would have been the one becoming Kamen Rider Poseidon...
• Mini bosses from the game would have made appearances, too. Naga, Vlitra and Kaliyah the oarfish would have shown up, as would the shark triplets Kerberos, the giant jellyfish Medusa and Umi-Bozu the octopus.
• I don't wanna spoil too much, but... I didn't pick the name Rahab out of a hat. You'll just have to sit and wait for 2024 to find out more on that account.