An interesting night full of stolen kisses, political intrigue and Ryan dry-heaving in Adrian’s bathroom. One of those nights not easily forgotten.

It’s been almost a year now since Adrian and I started taking the first steps toward an adaptation of Ti’ana to a feature film - and almost three months since we started focusing on the storyboarding process. We always knew it was coming, and now, we find ourselves here - getting to those real sketchy boards - the ones indicative of all we plan to change. Seeing these coming to life is frightening us while also enhancing our excitement. These elements are not only our chance to write in fixes that massage the story away from words and into the screen, but also put a personal stamp on all things Myst - usually, because it’s necessary, always with us wondering whether we have the right.

Early on, and almost for all time, the majority of discussion has been dedicated to Veovis - our tragic hero. When the name Myst has gotten dropped from time to time - even with our collaborators in Hollywood - the first thing we’ve heard is “I can’t wait to see more about Atrus and his sons.” This is what we’ve found people are coming to expect from us. It couldn’t be further from the truth.

Veovis has been crowned emperor of Ti’ana. He’s shadowed Aitrus and the namesake herself. He’s been invented and reinvented. He’s been orphaned, driven insane, and written in kind with not only Judas but Jesus Christ. He’s been stabbed, and torched and left for dead. He’s been redeemed, destroyed, and redeemed again. He’s been our compass through this story - leading everything and everyone except his father - his unforgiving, unloving, always-belittling Lord Rakeri.

The relationship between Veovis and Rakeri has always been strained - there are some that will even argue that it’s present in the subtext of the novel. Whether it is or not, we’ve taken it and ran with it - and it’s the basis of the many pains that Veovis holds so close. In our version, after the council edict is passed canceling the plans to break through to the surface, Veovis and Aitrus find themselves spending many a night in the lower city nursing their remaining wounds from the accident by sampling a number of fine D’ni taverns. One night specifically, Veovis’ birthday - plans are made to have Aitrus join him, his father and others for evening meal. After getting well lubricated, the pair launches from a jetty at the shore of City Proper toward K’veer and without need, Veovis begins to assure Aitrus that he will be well-liked by Rakeri, if for nothing else than saving his son’s life. Internally, however, he struggles with his own prejudices, knowing that in many ways he’s bringing the next of kin of the lower scraps of D’ni government to dine with the aristocracy. In his mind, Aitrus only has his place for being a savior to royal lines.

That evening, a relationship is established between Rakeri and Aitrus that goes miles beyond what’s in the book. Rakeri, being forever ashamed of the finely featured, emotionally volatile, spoiled son of a senator that Veovis has become - is struck with the confidence, stoicism and base masculine traits that his son’s friend holds as natural assets. When greeting Aitrus before dinner, Rakeri takes his arm in the proper D’ni way and warmly welcomes him to the estate - noting that it is often that his son needs saving. He makes notes to himself of Aitrus’s features: the scars on his hands from years of working with the rock - a man’s hands - and finds it curious that such a man would ever consider his son worthy of friendship.

Rakeri’s appraisal of Aitrus becomes one of the many glimpses in defining why Veovis is the way that he is. Even as an invented kinship in Rakeri’s own mind, the faux role of father/son that blossoms between him and Aitrus proves to be far richer than any love Veovis has ever received himself, even in youth. An eventually-fatal jealously begins to erupt inside the young Lord as he continues to watch so many things he desires be granted to others, regardless of his painstaking attempts at garnering them for himself. And after Anna arrives in D’ni and the bonds begin to form between her and Aitrus, Veovis starts to silently blame himself for being a failure as a brother and allowing the attention he once held from Aitrus to so easily shift away to a surface dweller. As time passes, this notion evolves into a twisted obsession in Veovis - and he begins to desire young Anna for himself - especially after she begins to capture the imagination of D’ni, and, in his mind, becomes a quality sample of the feminine that should be reserved only for the finest of D’ni royalty.

In a blatant attempt at trying to capture the truest sense of Anna for himself, Veovis lunges at her for a kiss late in the story. Adrian spent the evening trying to get the pose right for the moment and Ryan, unfortunately, had to stand in for young Anna. After many finger-obscured protected guy-guy kisses, Adrian finally surprised Ryan and I captured the perfect resistance to serve as Phil’s reference. Ryan immediately ran to the bathroom to clean off the nastiness. And I immediately began to wonder if someday there will be McInVanderisms, much like there are Wingrovisms today.

11:46 pm

tags: aitrus, animatic, anna, changes, d'ni, images, McInVanderism, myst, rakeri, Ryan, storyboarding, ti'ana, veovis, wingrovism