In December’s issue of The Goreletter, I posted the following list of story starters for “Scary Politics.” As the primary season is heating up to the boiling point of hellfire, I thought I’d copy it here to the blog, as a reminder that there’s no better place for reimagining the world — and for doing so in horrific ways — than in the real world of American politics.
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SCARY POLITICS
Discover the weirdest story you can by simply freewriting (without stopping to edit) in response to one the following prompts and seeing where it takes you.
- Murder by voting booth.
- Script an over-the-top smear campaign or ludicrously accusatory TV commercial.
- From the point of view of an assistant or intern, dramatize a politician’s appeal for help in covering up a heinous crime.
- Describe a deathmatch between an elephant and a donkey (or other political animal symbol) with as much gritty realism as possible. Give this battle a function.
- Write a “Bill of Rights” for the citizens of Hell. Or invent a “Bill of Wrongs.”
- Choose your favorite monster or imaginary creature. Now create a political party for others of its kind, or have it run for office on behalf of all monsters.
- Zombify an assassinated politician.
- Deliver a non-human character’s speech before the UN General Assembly.
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Related reading for further inspiration:
+ Read “The H Word: The Politics of Horror” by Paul Tremblay (Nightmare Magazine)
+ See “If Horror Movie Villains Were Running for President” from Donte Neal at Mashable (Neal created the great Pennywise the Clown (from King’s IT) poster on this blog entry).
+ Speaking of Stephen King, now might be a really good time to re-read The Dead Zone!
+ Do a google or youtube search for “American Horror Story” + your favorite candidate’s name. 🙂
+ Of course, vote Cthulhu! Here’s his I Have a Dream speech.