#I want different departments and pseudo-office politics and possibly internal back-stabbing

[yzafre]

The thing about TMNT 2012 is that while I like Rise more on an as-is basis, '12 gives me more creative inspiration.

Part of that is the "they dropped all these interesting, weird character beats then refused to do anything more than surface-level writing with them, if that", which makes me want to pull them apart and put them back together and write out what I was wanting from the character writing the whole time. That instinct to say "okay but what if they did this. focused on this. developed this. did this better." Which... is a thing I might eventually write out. It does exist rent free in my head, like... minimum 20% of the time lately. ((a problem when I need that space to finish my kh fic I've only got 5 chapters left to draft I'm so close))

But also it's like. I tell my self stories with a little enemy-to-ally OC guy in my head while driving or trying to sleep (as one does) and the next thing I know I'm thinking about like. The internal operations of the Foot clan. Shredder's branch in Japan vs Bradford's US branch. Like I think Shredder's was referred to as a crime family at some point, but was Bradford's? He wasn't just recruiting soldiers then making train and stay in waiting, was he?

And like, I assume he was recruiting through his martial arts classes, and I got the feeling his dojos were like a chain thing? Were they all across the country? What happened if he recruited from somewhere in California? Did he make them move to New York? Did he have, like... HR people to help him get situated?

What about Xever and Bradford's rivalry that supposedly pre-dates the show. Was Bradford just recruitment while Xever was doing jobs? Was Bradford also doing, like... missions or jobs? Were they usually tapped for different types of jobs? Were they, like, trying to improve their reputation and putting in bids so Shredder would send them more jobs over the other guy?

Bradford also had a TV show. So he had, like... businesses? With departments, maybe? Were those kept separate, or were they part of the whole crime family.... thing. Were anyone used for money laundering? Did the people working for them know what Bradford was up to? Were they staffed with Foot clan recruits? Who was in charge of Finances?

And like if they were doing actual crime things... what were they? Do I need to look up how crime families work to see how all they earn money? Was it really mundane or were they doing more complicated ninja stuff? ((I bet you could do crazy insider training if you could break into any company in the world. Also if you could sabotage companies to control the market. I don't know, the most I know about crime is what you see in Leverage.))

Also, like... equipment. The uniforms, and the weapons, and the gear, for all those recruits, that's gotta come from somewhere. How is that.. handled? Do they have free rein? Get a certain amount per year but have to pay if they lose it? Always have to buy it themselves? Where does it come from? Do they own the manufacturers through, like, shell companies? Do they have an R&D department that doesn't do combat? Information and logistics?

And suddenly I'm so many layers deep in it and I turn around and I don't just have one guy living in my head, I've got like - 6 at minimum.