Mad Genius, Part 2

11/2/2018 8:05:34 PM

The Real Day After.

6

Rainy.

So, I find it interesting, and I meant to comment on this yesterday, but I find it interesting that in all of the years of WTML no one has ever commented on , nor asked about, the telling of ‘Time.’ It curiouses me that no one has ever questioned it. But, I wonder if it curiouses me that everyone has so readily accepted it.

It does tend to serve purpose. It is an interesting way to mark time. Sometimes it is enigmatic even to myself. Sometimes it is telling of what is to come. Sometimes, like Mad Genius it is descriptive.

“Time…Directed.”

And, it was. Mad Genius was a very scripted episode. It contained much more dialogue and interaction than any previous episode, or even those to follow. It was not an easy task for me. It drags a little in places, and it doesn’t flow quite as smoothly as I would have liked, but the point is there.

The thing about the whole interaction between the trio in Part 2 is that I had no way to just ‘make it happen.’ In order to do that scene, I had to read the script that was in front of me, below the camera, silently and to myself. I had to hear the other two characters naturally. I had to hear their delivery and their timing. I had to hear it in my head as if it were happening and at the same time try to react as naturally as I could.

I don’t think that I have ever put so much effort and concentration into any one thing in my life. It took every fiber of it that I had available. It is not perfect by any means, but overall – Goal Achieved. There are two places in that run where you can see that I edited the video. The overall goal was to not have to clip anything. I really wanted to do it straight through. The reason was that I had no cut-aways. I had nothing to go away to in order to come back different.

I thought about this a lot last night. If there had been footage of Walt doing his lines and an image to show Johnny and I could jump around between the three it wouldn’t have felt quite so stagnant. It needed that kind of ‘life.’ At the time, I couldn’t have done it, even if I had conceived it. I was so used to just doing lil quips between me and Walt that the absence of Walt himself never really phased me. In this case it really did.

But, overall, Mission Accomplished. It set the tone. It opened the door to more. It developed relationship and demonstrated characters.

So, another thing about the WTML videos is the use of all the “stuff in between.” The Clips. The randomness of my day, my week…my life. Because they are not part of the main body, they must be distinguishable. I have tried something different in every video I have done.

Sometimes it is as simple as title boards. Other times it gets a lil more ‘creative’ as with the Comic Book Motif from one of the episodes. With Mad Genius it was all a lil deeper.

You’ll notice that these ‘in-betweens’ happen atop, or within, a series of squares. They appear, and reverberate, at different levels. This was meant to represent the three levels of being – The Consciousness, The Sub-Consciousness, and The Super-Consciousness; The Outer, The Inner, and The Real.

I like the use of the repeating ‘W’ pattern. It makes the ending of the full episode a little more amusing to me.

WTML, in its original days, included an Artist of the Week. This became more challenging as things evolved. And, of course, I must always be wary of licensing. It’s a fine line for me. Music is just such a part of my being and my doing that it is inevitably going to be playing.

In this case, we do not have an Artist of the Week, but more of an Album of the Week. I describe it as one of my Compilation CDs. I do so like the groove it sets.

I like the level and the usage of the music ‘in the background.’ I think it is at an almost perfect place.

I use Walt to make reference to things in the works. I remember what I wanted to do. I remember setting out on that path. I do not remember what stopped me.

‘Introducing…’, of course, refers to Johnny. It is indicated that we have met him once before. But, still, this is our real introduction to dear old Johnny on the Job.

What can I say? The Demon has been for a long time.

And finally, ‘Stay in School Kiddies.’ I am not necessarily proud of my hijinx in life. But, I own them. They were what they were…and I survived them. I survived them and here I am. My life is far from perfect. I am no role model and I am nothing you strive to be…but…I’m pretty damn blessed. [Despite anything I have done or been in my life.]