Alternative Ending to V for Vendetta

(Or, I Can't Be The First Person To Think Of This)

We enter the scene with Finch, the detective assigned to track down V, staggering into Victoria Station. He's heavily under the influence of LSD, a drug he took to try to understand the enigmatic killer, and although it's exacted a heavy mental toll, it's done its work well. He's finally close to V's lair...and its secrets.

He heads down into the abandoned Underground. At last, he spots V himself. He pulls out his gun...prepares to fire...

And suddenly a vast dog leaps past him, spoiling his aim! The dog, some sort of breed of Great Dane, lets out a strange and poignant howl. In Finch's drugged state, it almost seems as if it's calling out, "Roverrr here!"

V turns. He spots Finch, but seemingly just as importantly, he spots the massive dog. He moves towards the pair with a swift, gliding motion, and Finch knows they're both doomed...

When suddenly, a giant net drops from the ceiling onto V, entangling him! Finch stares in utter confusion as four people step from the shadows, four civilians who've managed to do what the entire British government could not--capture the terrorist known as V.

"Good work, Scooby!" they chorus, as one of them, a young man dressed in green, scratches the dog's head. Another, dressed in white, steps forward to V, who's only managed to free his head from the weighted net. "And now, let's see who V really is!" With a flourish, they remove the mask.

Everyone, even Finch, gasps. "Old Man McAllister!" they shout. The girl with spectacles nods knowingly. "Of course. He was using the V costume to frighten people away from organized governmental authority...and the old mill!"

"That's right," snarles V. "And I would have gotten away with it, too, if not for you meddling kids...and that dog!"

Getting an Idea Out of My Head

As is usual when I have what I think is a really great idea that I have no way to convey to the people who could do something about it, I'm just going to blog the idea and hope that someone who has some power to do something about it sees it. It's sort of like setting a bottle adrift at sea, except that that a bottle adrift at sea has less chance of being found by a person who was really just looking for porn sites.

So, with that in mind, and hoping that Joss Whedon Googles his own name just to see what people are saying about him (I can't be the only person who does this), I suggest:

A Firefly line of novels.

Seriously, the movie apparently didn't do enough business to bring out another $25 million film, and that seems to be the end of it...but unless I've been lied to repeatedly by a variety of different publishers, authors of TV tie-in books don't get paid 25 million dollars. I think that there's definitely a devoted following of the series that's willing to shell out regular dough for a series of decently written books, and that it could be sustained as a profitable line. And one of the advantages of writing a book based on a TV series is that TV series are designed as "story machines"--ie, the setting and characters are meant to generate a large number of story ideas, just because they need to have a large number of stories over the lifespan of the series.

So. Let the word-of-mouth campaign spread from this tiny little blog, read by a bare minimum of people (and probably fewer since I post so infrequently now.) Let it become a vast tide of public opinion which will reach the ears of publishing houses everywhere. Firefly: The Novels! Or Serenity Joss Whedon Nathan Fillion Universal ...let's see, what other keywords would get me hits?

Right. Hot Asian shaved.

Jazz Textures

Something I was wondering tonight at work, when someone tuned to the "smooth jazz" station...

Are there other textures of jazz? Like rough, abrasive jazz, which you can put on in the background, but it'll eventually wear away at your nerves and make you tense, irritable, and in the mood to fight.

Or sharp jazz. You'll be listening to it, it doesn't really register much, then BAM! You suddenly get a big jagged chunk of jazz straight in your ear. (Presumably necessitating a tetanus shot.)

Or perhaps, moving in the opposite direction, soft downy jazz. Jazz so inconsequential it puts you to sleep.

Liquid jazz, which presumably conforms itself to any listener's contours...

Gaseous jazz, jazz so inconsequential you don't actually notice you're listening to it. (This last jazz is, of course, a purely theoretical jazz texture, as by definition, it's impossible to notice the existence of true gaseous jazz. In fact, I could be listening to it right now.)

All of the above is, of course, "free jazz" when heard over the radio, and only becomes "expensive jazz" when heard in concert.