#I keep fucking almost tagging things 'Julie Strand' and 'Joey Harmin' because I keep forgetting they don't have cannon last names

[ziracona]

I think you've said the your first plan for Frank's fate was a lot different than what happened in fic? Do you mind sharing what your original idea was?

Sure!

So, originally, when I added Legion to In Living Memory--which was by far the biggest rewrite I did to my outline--I planned out Susie’s arc and Joey’s more or less as they appear in-fic. However, almost none of what happened with Frank was planned. So, when I write, characters often do stuff I don’t understand at the time or only partially understand, or figure out the reasons behind later, which can be a little bit of a hassle but isn’t too bad. Unfortunately, they also not just incredibly infrequently will decide to do shit I had no idea they would do ahead of time, and like, I can’t stop them, because like it or not, if I did, I’d be writing them OOC, so I just kind of have to go with it. When I got to The Lost, the section with Frank was supposed to be very different. He was supposed to show up, and Jeff was going to be low-key nice to him. I think in the original outline draft, he was a little more fucked up still than he is in-fic, so in the outline, Jeff bumps into him upstairs while looking for the tape, easily incapacitates him when Frank attacks him, and is super surprised by winning the fight in like 0.8 seconds, and realizes how fucked up he is. Frank is kind of freaked out, because he’s super weak and at someone who he would expect hates him’s mercy, but Jeff just is kind of silently like “it’s okay--don’t worry” and doesn’t tell anyone else he’s there so that he won’t be in trouble, and they leave with the tape. When I actually wrote the chapter, that changed to Frank being more healed at this point, and them actually fighting him, and some of what ended up in chapter, but Jeff was mostly just expected to be like “Okay, but we’re not going to kill him. We’re going to show mercy even if he wouldn’t, and let him go.” because Jeff is, well, Jeff. And instead he was like “Hey uh can I do a thing?” and I was like “Uh yeah I guess” and he just went off and was unreasonably nice and compassionate to Frank Morrison for like 40 pages and I was like...This is going to butterfly effect update everything. Shit.

And it did. Thanks Jeff. (Sincerely though, it’s much better the way the cards fell and the way I ended up writing/developing Frank and Julie and also Jeff and Joey and Susie too).  Originally, Frank was going to be slightly conflicted (as Jeff would still have been unexpectedly merciful to him), but to a much, much lesser extent. He was never a monster--he’s kind of a shitty person, but not without redeeming qualities, and he’s still in his early 20s. [To be fair, though, in ILM, Frank gets away with a lot. Like, going back and reading Tenacity, Adrenaline, and Grit alone, he does some sincerely fucked up stuff to Meg that he is allowed by the compassion of the rest of the cast to come back from. Meg doesn’t get enough credit for how nice she is to Frank by the end of the fic. Which I mean, everyone nice to the Legion is going to be automatically juxtaposed with Jeff, who is the most compassionate and selfless man ever, but credit where it’s due, Meg is a super, super kind person. Lets Frank go in Vs. because he helped Susie and because it would make Susie sad, doesn’t try to get revenge on him even though he’s caused her lasting PTSD and some pretty big trauma for petty reasons, is willing to believe he and Julie could/have actually changed, and while at fic-end she’s still kind of at “I am sincerely glad for you that you’re not who you used to be, but also, being close to you is traumatic for me because of what you did to me in the past, so I do not want to be around you,” (which is already a both valid and incredibly generous place to be at towards him), she feels further compassion for him because at this point he really does sincerely regret and feel guilt and shame for the things he’s done and wish he could change them, and extends the possibility that maybe in the future she will heal enough that that’s not the case anymore and there might be a future where they could be okay with each other, or oven become friends. And I know that next to Jeff people don’t all be looking as amazing as they would otherwise haha, but that’s like, that’s such a kind and strong and compassionate choice to make towards someone who has hurt you. Forgiveness is such, such a valuable thing, because it just is never merited, it’s always an act of compassion, and I really love her for that. I know I’m totally derailing the actual question so I’ll get back to it now though--sorry--I just have a lot of love for Meg Thomas.]

But uh yes, back on topic. Frank was never a monster. Legion is super interesting and I love them because they’re in a class all their own, which I know I’ve said before. But like, “teens who murdered one guy once spur of the moment because one of the group was in trouble” is such a different mental/psychological/ethical/emotional place to be coming from than any of the other killers. Frank is kind of a shithead, but he does genuinely love and care for his friends, and would be willing to suffer for them. He’s definitely got Reactive Attachment Disorder too, which is part of why he has such a hard time getting to trust Jeff eventually. 

So, as aggressive and kind of shitty but not wholly without redeeming qualities, his original story would have seen him usually an aggressor (tries hard to stop Susie, hurts Meg, gets on Joey’s case for anything kind he does, kills survivors pretty brutally & threatens people to try and keep them in line, etc), but also having moments of sympathy and humanity (letting Quentin go in Distortion/Iron Maiden, conflicted about Jeff helping him, being willing to get incredibly hurt by the Entity to protect Joey, fighting Ghostface to save Susie even though their relationship is not good right now, etc), and getting kind of mixed results in his ending. He would still have saved Susie in Vs. and been helped by Meg, who would still have offered him temporary Clemency because he saved her girlfriend and she’s got some honor, and would have escaped with Julie and the rest of the survivors and allies and made it back to the world. However, instead of sticking around to help patch up Jeff etc, Frank and Julie would have booked almost immediately in 600 Seconds (I doubt he would have stopped to help the truck driver either), and ended up with an uncertain fate. In the original outline, they kind of go off Bonnie & Clyde style and live together on the run. They send Susie and Joey postcards and such sometimes, but are kind of just MIA at the end, and it is unclear/up in the air if they will escalate into violence again, or be convinced by their old friends to come meet up and maybe try living a different life. I am not sure of details beyond that, because that outline kind of burned to death with the first actual paper draft of The Lost, as at that point I was pretty sure what Jeff was choosing to do would drastically change Frank’s future and decisions. I was kind of unsure how to feel about that at first. 

I’ve never like, hated Frank, but when Darkness Among Us released, I did not like him. Didn’t hate, but like, he was kind of vaguely portrayed as an angry, violent white boy who thinks his sad backstory gives him the right to commit murder, and despite that was wildly not just like, liked, but like, stan-style liked and pretty frequently really woobified too in big chunks of the fandom right after release, while the much more canonically sympathetic Joey got super sidelined (probably for race reasons) and so did Julie. So, I certainly didn’t like, plan to give him as big even a role as he had? I wanted him to be complex because he just was, but uh, it was surreal for me that I ended up having a deep emotional attachment to Frank hecking Morrison, but like, I guess here we are lol. And I’m not sorry. It was a good way for the story to go, and improved the plot. My frustration with the initial portrayals I saw were p valid, but I just didn’t end up writing Frank that way, or seeing him that way when I got to know him, and the person he was in ILM is someone who I am happy got and chose to take a shot at redemption and a good life with people who loved him. I care about him a lot. I think after The Lost, and certainly by the first draft of The Cat I was fully on board with how I knew then that Frank’s story was going to go, and it’s a kinder, softer story than I had planned, but I’m glad it was. I’m glad the stupid rat boy got a redemption arc. It’s so fkn hard to actually choose to change if you do bad stuff in real life, and it’s pretty damn valuable if someone can face the guilt and responsibility of what they did, accept it, and try to find some way to make right. He had a stacked deck in life, and got pretty lost out there for a while, but he beat the world, in the end. Frank let himself get pretty hardened and chose to throw out a lot of humanity before he decided to stop, but he did, and he earned a little bit of hope in the end. I don’t know if his ending is fair or not, considering all the bad shit he did, but I also don’t think it has to be. I don’t remember the exact line, but Jeff’s right when he says that life has always been unfair to them, but never in ways that were good, and that unfair can be a good thing too. Life is so rarely unfair to human beings in a way that is merciful or kind, and it’s really kind of amazing the rare times it is. I’m happy things ended up how they did. : )

[Also: fun stupid fact as a last note here. When I decided to expand Frank’s role, I was like “Okay, I can definitely see the value of this character arc and story change, and I like it and am on board, but you absolutely cannot sideline Joey to give Frank room,” like--I was not going to end up like

nuh-uh, so I literally invented a rule for myself that any time Frank got new content that wasn’t in the outline, I had to give Joey new content too so he wouldn’t get bypassed/sidelined and his arc and narrative would get the value and consideration and time it deserved alongside Frank’s and not accidentally, good intentions or not, end up getting overshadowed, and I really did stick to that. Like it got kind of funny to me. But I’m also glad I did because now Frank has a cool and well developed, hard-earned redemption arc, Julie gets one too, and I get *EveN MOooREe* Joey being a wonderful character screen time. Just good for everything all around. <3 ]