Opinion Poll

I've been mulling over a story idea for several years and today in play-writing class I tried to vocalize it for the first time and when I was done I was met by a room full of blank stares, a cough in the background and then the class moved on.. Now I'll admit it's an off-beat story, a little out-there I guess. But I think it has some potential to be interesting, entertaining even.

So I've decided to have a little opinion poll here. Yea or nay on this story.

It's kind of a cross between "At the Mountains of Madness" by HP Lovecraft, "Kingdom of the Blind" by HG Wells, "Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now", "Man Who Would Be King" by Kipling and the Island of Misfit Toys from those animated Rudolph Christmas specials.

Told in a gritty, "I survived" narration style, the story would follow a group of arctic explorers whose expedition gets horribly lost. Frost-bite, maybe some cannibalism. But the group trudges on. They eventually stumble upon an island of ice which is home to a magical city. This is the Island of Misfit Toys from the Rudolph movie, only when they enter the city, things are obviously going wrong. The city is being lorded over by a dictator toy (still haven't decided on which malfunctioning toy it should be) who uses semi-melted green plastic-army men to enforce his rule. The explorers band together with a Misfit Toy underground to overthrow the dictator toy. Through a bizarre and horrifying turn of events, their guerrilla war leaves the explorers the masters of the Island.

The story would escalate from this point ultimately resulting in all of the explorers, except our narrator, meeting awful deaths at the hands of the toys. Possibly a war with Santa's camp - I don't know. The possibilities at this point are endless.

Originally posted on September 9, 2005 on Myspace.