#TSS The Secret Scientists

[ohmygillygoshoppler]

Let's hear them secret scientist headcannons, Ma. Pretty please 🙏🥺

huehuheuheuhwlhbsjhbclah~ y’all know what it is, mostly rambling I wrote most of this waiting for the dentist lol

Drew (Audrey do not call her that omg Saturday)

Mama’s albino. Isee it with my eyes and just feel it in my bones. She’s pale, her hair is pale, I she even had baby blues in TGIS so, yeah. 

Drew isn’t a huge fan of chocolate, opposites since Mom Monday had a thing for cocoa. Maybe she doesn’t have a thing for sweets in general? Like I can see Drew as more of a FoodSnack person rather than SweetSnack person. She’ll be like, “I want a snack,” And spend like 2 hours prepping the stuff for a food item that will be gone in 20 minutes and somehow, she’ll find a way to convince Doc to “help” with the cleanup after.

She always wanted a big family, But only managed to have Zak. She loves her family regardless, it's just not the way she thought they'd be. I mean, come on; Her and Doc are so romantic all the time, like there’s no way they woulda stopped at just one. If she could have given Zak a sibling, she would have, but it wasn’t in the cards. So, adoption, lmao.

My girl is a mystic through and through but she is not mystically inclined. She could tear out her hair and make a deal with the devil, and still not be able to conjure her own magic at all, but she is so well versed in it, you’d think she was a sorcerer or something. (Maybe she could, oh I dunno, help her magical buddies out with that know-how, huh?)

Doc “Solomon” Saturday

My guy has some serious PTSD and OCD issues that he hasn’t quite sorted out, and I’ll bet he’s scared to go into it given all the times he’s started talking about it, only to immediately shut himself up about it.

Like, seriously, my man needs a therapist.

I’m laughing and wringing my hands together like Argost himself thinking about all the fun times we’re gonna have with mr. Magic Doesn’t Exist now that he’s gotta help his new Angel Daughter find her friends. Sorry Solomon, but you’re gonna have an aneurysm.

Doyle Blackwell  **Professional Uncle

Such a cool dude, he can’t drink alcohol because he’s too cool to get buzzed (he's allergic to alcohol and will turn beet red after one drink help this poor man)

I get a lot of, “I dont deserve an apartment,” vibes from this guy so I say he needs more “Chillin at home with the fam,” And less “Shitty hostels wherever the cheapest.” Also man needs a gf (or bf, ffs nobody want him fr!!11!)

He's bi, and I know cuz he told me lmao

Paul Cheechoo (Uncle Bear!👏🏼 Uncle Bear! 👏🏼Uncle Bear!👏🏼)

Okokokokok, so I am super super projecting here because Cheechoo deadass reminds me of an uncle who is A.) also native af, we’re not Inuit but were fuckin n8v; and B.) also a fuckin geologist lesgoooooo

So guys got a big family, huge actually. Lots of cousins and nieces and nephews and aunties and uncles and such- making it a bit hard and a bit sad keeping the whole Secret Scientist thing away from his family. Especially after the Weird world incident when he became withdrawn from them, fearing Argost might do something horrible to his kin. So, he kept mostly to himself, confiding only in his fellow scientists.

I feel like his sarcasm and friendly demeanor is so sweet and endearing, especially for someone so friggin big, I mean good god- Look at this man. The friendly giant trope always gets me, so what? BUT! That being said, I’d like to think that sometimes my guy forgets how big he is… Like, we’ve seen how this guy gets tossed around like a ragdoll, maybe he also forgets he’s a brick shithouse, given all the times he’s gotten his ass whooped.

Man is Golden Retriever coded, and I wanna eat him alive for it./pos

Arthur Fuckin Beeman

My man! *kills him again and again and again and again an-*

Also, I love how we all saw this man, we all looked at each other, and we all said, “Yeah, he's autistic af.” Like, it's very clear that this man’s brain works… differently from others.

My brother once said, Liaos from Dungeon Meshi if he didn’t want to eat the aliens he just wanted to hang out and honestly…. Werk.

Does this man deserve an arc? Not really, but do I wanna put him in a few fucked up situations? Hang him upside down and shake him till all his tokens fall out? Maybe. Maybe Zak’ll help me, too. Shit…

Miranda Grey (Big Grey)

Ooooooohohohohohohohohoooo~ We hardly got anything with you, Doctor. Which means I can do whatever, and I both hate and love that-

I know you love your sister~ I know you’re sad about her betrayal~~ I know you’re hurting, girly, I know your devastated inside and you can’t do anything about it because so much shit is falling apart around you and now your sister fucked over the only people you can call friends, fuck you Miranda! Eat shit and die! ILY!!

I reeeeeeaaaaly think she’s guilty about what she’s done to the Saturdays, especially Zak, so maybe she might try and say or do something to try and make amends, but how? Thats a good question… I wanna know too, lmao.

Abbey Grey (Little Grey)

Ooooooooooooooooh~~~

I have plans for you, stupid bitch……

Agent Ex husband

The scariest mfer in all existence, most stifled man in all existence, omg. If War were ever made a fucking human, Epsilon would be his fate, and holy fuck- Yeah. Stoic? Check. Bound by a strict code of ethics/honor? Check. Big As Shit? Check. Scary????? Umm, yeah. My mans a Horseman.

Wants to be loved. Wants to rest. Wants to have a cigarette for the first time in years. Wants some coffee with extra cream and sugar. Does he deserve it? No,not really. But he does need it. His soul needs a good kneading, like dough.

However, he is fucked up for the way he raised Francis and how he’s always shutting hom down and telling him how his thoughts don’t matter like, damn, just tell the boy he aint shit why dont you-

I feel like, if I give Francis an arc, Epsilon should have one too. I wanna know more about him- surprise surprise- and what makes him tick. We see in the show that there is some care for Francis, we see as much when he gets so mad at Francis for not quickly following his instructions, but that begs the question; does he actually care, or is he protecting his interests, so to speak? Lots to learn, lots to pick apart.

[dood1e-bug]

Don't care

Explosion + Unstable Formula

[secretsaturdayshitposting]

I feel sorta cheated out knowing they could have made another season to go into more depth about the other characters back stories, ie: Francis, Epsilon, other secret scientists, etc, but they didn’t and like now there’s a giant gap. Like why did they already know epsilon? Why’d he “retire”? Was it recovering from the cloning then taking care of Francis? Why’d they hate him? How did the other SS get into the SS? How did they grow to be a team of people that trusted each other as much as they did? Like ahh. What’s the deal with drew and van rook???? Was that in college? how’d Doyle go from the avalanche to van rook?? Why’s he the guy he is? (Bc obv he was young enough to be more emotionally and rationally stable if he had a supportive family? Did he not? What happened?)

Now all I’ll have is fanfics and I do not want to read TSS fanfics 🥲. ESP how drew and van Rook dated but like I want to know.

[qianqiancandyjar]

Ghost Hunter Family Masterpost

Danny Phantom_The Secret Saturdays AU

Title: Ghost Hunter Family

Status: Aported

Introduction/Story summary:

The Fentons are supernatural investigators, ghost hunters as well as ecto-energy scientists. Danny and Jazz have been traveling all over the world with their parents to study all kinds of ghosts since they were born. Their goal was to keep the existence of ghosts in secret and protect humans from supernatural forces.

At the year Danny was born, Jack, Maddie and Vlad found an asteroid on the countryside of Amity Park, with a message about how the Ghost King would come back. To prevent the balance being broken, the Fentons decided to start looking for clues about the Ghost King. Of course, someone else was thinking about the same thing...

Forewarning:

1)I made tons of adjustments to let the settings of Danny Phantom fit into The Secret Saturdays AU here. Don't be surprised if it doesn't go like what you think. (Also because many stories are based on dreams)

2)Most of the ghosts in the canon won't show up here. I mean, as DP fans, we already know and see so much about them. Let's just assume the Fentons had met them because I won't make a story out of it. That will be too easy to guess.

3)Oh, for those who don't know anything about TSS, this is just another type of Ghost King AU. :D

List of comics:

Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Crossover shorts:

#1 Christmas Reunion

#2 Another Family

#3 Warrior Scientist Moms

Something about this AU:

If Danny and Jazz's life was like Zak's, if Jack and Maddie were better and more rational parents like Doc and Drew, what will happen? Yep, that's what I thought when I made this AU.

If you have watched both shows, you can probably see the settings are basically the same, but slightly different.

Of course the family had encountered almost every typical ghosts in the canon, such as Technus, Ember or Desiree, so the real specialty I want about this AU is to let the family travel around the world to see other types of ghosts.

I am definitely bad at this kind of story. Because unlike my other two AUs, I most likely will make each chapter a single story and slightly related to the main plot. Each chapter may not have direct connection to the last one. I had read many supernatural fictions for this yet still have no faith in my own original stories. This is why I kinda started a weird way to make this comic: based on some creepy dreams I had.

Abandoning note and more headcanons

[msnihilist]

Yet ANOTHER reason why I adore TSS: love isn't the answer.

The problems that the characters in this show face are physical and very, very real — they cannot be vanquished with the power of love.

Friendship didn't stop the Secret Scientists from turning against Doc and Drew. Doyle loving Abbey didn't stop her from choosing her job over him. Zak's parents loving him unconditionally doesn't stop him from turning to his arch enemy for help.

Love is never enough. Even Van Rook's last words in the finale, which are silly on the surface, are, "You were the only thing I liked almost as much as money." He's saying that Drew's love wasn't enough.

In this show, love never keeps anyone alive, it never keeps them around, it never scares off the monsters lurking in the dark. Love alone isn't enough.

Word of God is dead and all that, sure, but even Jay Stephens said that Zak's powers would have eventually turned him evil. All the love in the world couldn't change that.

The ending was decided from the start. Nothing could have changed fate. The only way to win is to not play.

[thenewnio]

MORE TSS OCS

Near the semi-rural Japanese village of Kainomachi, there is a mountain known as the Yokai's Mountain (妖怪の山), home to many varied yokai and Japanese cryptids. The locals could spend all day telling the many stories of the mountain, but the most famous one is the legend of "Ohachirō-Sama", the resident daitengu queen, and her extensive family of which she is the matriarch.

Here are two notable family members of Clan Hachibō:

Natsuki

A Lemurian girl raised by Clan Hachibō.

Somewhere around Fisk's age

Can speak clear, coherent English and Japanese, but not the Lemurian language (She was only a baby when found and adopted by the clan)

Tends to annoy the other yokai and cryptids with her chatting

Disguises herself in a tengu costume before meeting the Secret Scientists and the Saturday family

Uses a giant magical tengu fan to fly with her adoptive family

Initially assumed to be an unknown type of satori due to her mysterious powers of telekinesis, which only manifests with strong emotions

As an infant, Natsuki was found by one of the tengu next to her dying mother (fatally injured by the naga), who begged for her daughter's protection with her dying breath. The child was taken in and named after the summer, the season in which she was found. As Natsuki grew up, the tengu taught her their ways, from Onmyōdō magic to how to speak in their tongues. She soon grew curious about the human world, and would annoy her stepsiblings by constantly talking about its wonders. Still, her older foster sister, Daiko, made her wear a tengu costume so that whoever killed her biological mother wouldn't recognize her. One day, during an outing, Natsuki snuck off to spy on the humans. At the same time, the Saturdays were in the area researching the local cryptids. Watching them from afar, she saw Fiskerton, recognizing him as the same species as her. She tried to reveal her true species to them, only for the other tengu to arrive and return her to their mountain home. After an argument with Daiko, Natsuki went out again, this time without her disguise, to meet with Fisk. However, she got lost, and was caught in a trap by Abbey Grey, but was rescued by Professor Mizuki/Hibagon, who upon recognizing her species, brought her to the Secret Scientists for confirmation. This done, they next informed the Saturdays, who were astounded that there was another Lemurian. Fisk, especially, was excited, and he and Natsuki began to bond.

Daiko

The eldest daughter of Ohachirō-Sama.

Her natural-born leadership earned her the position of her mother's second-in-command

Actually genuinely cares about Natsuki

A bit strict and serious

Like all daitengu, she towers over humans at 10 feet.

Really despises Piecemeal since he tried to eat Natsuki

Secretly wishes that Natsuki would stay with their family forever

After tracking Natsuki to the Saturdays, she ambushed them under the initial assumption that they had kidnapped her adoptive sister. Upon seeing Fisk, she "abducted" him, forcibly taking him and Natsuki back to the mountain. While the Saturdays set out to rescue Fisk, Natsuki helped him escape, and they began their descent down the mountain. Unbeknownst to them, Daiko discovered their absence and followed them with some other daitengu. Making things more complicated was the fact that Piecemeal was nearby, seeing a two-course meal. He tried to capture the two Lemurians, but Daiko, seeing this, flew to their rescue, keeping him occupied long enough for the Saturdays and the other tengu to arrive. After the tengu dealt with Piecemeal, Clan Hachibō and the Saturdays agreed to work together to protect Natsuki from the naga, whom they now knew was responsible for killing her birth mother. Meanwhile, Fisk began undergoing training under Daiko in order to fully unlock his Lemurian powers.

[brasletygtz]

Doyle x Dustin Doodles

Hello, here I will leave more sketches of Doyle x Dustin (my oc) and in summary, the story that I am working on about them is that Doyle did not trust Dustin at all since it seems suspicious that he has resigned from his job as an assistant to work as a zak's babysitter

Buenas aqui dejare mas bocetos de Doyle x Dustin(mi oc) y en resúmen en la historia que estoy trabajando de ellos es que doyle con confíaba para nada en Dustin ya que se le hace sospechoso que haya renunciado en su trabajo de asistente para trabajar como niñero de zak.

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Extra:

Sparks es la razón por la que Dustin renuncio a los científicos secretos o mas bien a Arthur Beeman

Sparks is the reason Dustin quit the secret scientists or rather Arthur Beeman

The character with sparks is an oc that has nothing to do with TSS but is a fresh drawing from sparks

[drewsaturday]

I wish I could find more substantial art of her, but this was my OC Florence. She was a post-series antagonist Youtuber (or whatever they'd call it for trademark issue avoidance) who got kind of obsessed with cryptid sightings after the events of the finale, as did a lot of other people! That's how she got so many eyes on her coverage, plus people wanted something to replace Weird World.

She is antithetical to the secret scientists where she thinks the world should know about cryptids and so on, so the Saturdays have to tread murky water of figuring out what they can do to shut her down without suspicion, ignore her, or... maybe let her and others like her be a stepping stone to a more mixed world--that is, until her coverage starts to result in harm.

I think there is a lot to be said about the post-finale world of TSS and how there is still value in secrecy for safety. None of this would've happened had they not been involved in such a widescale threat. But it did happen and, while I guess you could apply some superhero logic of "well the story needs people to believe certain things so they just do", the amount of people who WON'T believe it's a hoax has gotta be mounting.

So how does the world move forward after so much did become more known after the events of the series, from cherufe news coverage to Paris melting to this? Is it better to maintain the status quo to prevent harm, or is some of the world ready to embrace change? Etc.

[rhythmantics]

Wow, see your thought process is so interesting! How did you end up coming up with the details surround Francis and his people, we don’t get many details in the show due to their very nature 

@skiboop​

First, I started with what the original writers had in mind. We could piece together a few things based on what Jay Stephens has said on the Toonzone forums and what we’ve seen in the show

Keeping with the theme of “all myths are real” in TSS, it appears that the People are a reference to a couple things in real life:

The Men in Black. These are a supposed group of people (or perhaps aliens? O: ) who are seen in connection with UFO sightings or other such paranormal phenomena, for the purpose of covering them up. Some believe they’re a governmental organization full of secret agents, some believe they’re aliens themselves, taking on a human guise, etc. etc. This connection is the most evident one - Epsilon outright says “my People have experience with... coverups” at the end of Paris is Melting, and every member we see dresses in a uniform color, with eyewear that hides their eyes. We only ever seem to see “agents,” and have yet to see any civilians.

The Illuminati, or secret societies in general. The general vibe of these kinds of mythos is that there’s some shadowy cabal of rich assholes who secretly control the world, and have access to advanced technology and/or supernatural powers. Epsilon’s people are clearly a society of some sort, given they have the resources to build a whole-ass space station that no one else knows about, and they’ve been explicitly stated by Jay Stephens on the Toonzone forums that they’re kind of their own thing - not actually members of the Scientists, not exactly government agents. Plus, they had the ability to take something out of Doyle’s Swiss safety deposit box without alerting anyone, meaning they’re either really, really good thieves, or they have enough political and economic sway to get an incredibly secure organization to do whatever they want.

Now, as for how they function internally, our main hint is just that Francis is a clone, they’ve been cloning for a hundred years or so at least, and they don’t really treat him well! This reveals a few things:

They’re very traditional. You could say conservative. They value stability, conformity, uniformity, and consistency. The very idea that a “perfect agent” exists is flawed, even ignoring that 50% of how a person turns out is the environment they’re raised in - the same agent will not be the best fit for every situation. Epsilon can’t squeeze into small areas, and while he’s good at keeping cool under fire, he’s not exactly going to win someone over with his charming smile and gregarious personality. But they’re so steadfast on this idea of achieving consistent and predictable results that they’ve clung onto this flawed system for at least 100 years.

They care more about group identity than individual identity. Adding to this is how much pride Francis takes in his People in his first episode, despite what we find out about how they treat him later. They brainwashed taught this kid that their organization is great, fantastic, he should be happy to be there, while regularly stamping out his individual thoughts or feelings. Plus, you know... the fact that Francis's name isn't even his name.

They value personal gain over morality or ethics. Francis outright says this (”good guys, bad guys, you always know their next move. Victory goes to the gray men in the middle, because you never know how we'll surprise you.”), and it’s pretty clear from their actions - they want Zak not for the good of the world, but because he’d make a valuable asset if they manage to control him.

They’re pretty cruel! They’re willing to force a child (!!!) to go through extremely harsh training - given that out in the field, Epsilon is already berating him for having thoughts of his own, one wonders how much worse it gets behind closed doors. They were also totally willing to kidnap an 11-12 year old boy and subject him to the same abuse training as Francis for their own gain.

If you start combining some of the later implications with what the People are based on, you start to get this picture of a small, secluded group  who split from regular society more than 100 years ago, developed hyperadvanced technology within their own circles, and came into this idea that they’re separate from and better than the outside world. They potentially see themselves as peacekeepers or guardians for when regular society goes south, “only intervening when necessary,” but the reality is that they’re more like parasites, manipulating the outside world for shortsighted personal gain. Power is likely incredibly stratified even within their ranks - Epsilon and Francis, who are mere agents, can’t do anything about their fates. Francis’s reaction to Zak feeling bad for him is “I don’t need your pity,” because he’s resigned himself to his place in his Peoples’ system. Since some people in this society have absolutely 0 power, it’s very likely that some others have absolute or nearly absolute power.

Then if you know how these kinds of systems develop and evolve in real life (sociology FTW) you can infer several possible origins - maybe a leisure club for rich assholes who already had a lot of power, which is what most modern-day “secret societies” actually are.

But more importantly - what I write is there because it’s good for the story I’m trying to tell! What I prefer is the idea that they actually started out idealistically - maybe even as the Secret Scientists of their own time, in the late 1700s/early 1800s - a group that gathered up humanity’s best and brightest, possibly under the banner of “providing a safe haven for visionaries” etc., who made leaps and bounds in technological development. Over time, they grew arrogant and prideful, believing too much that their increasingly amoral actions were for the greater good... like what happened with the actual Secret Scientists in season 2.

So first of all, I did not know you had a tumblr??? Second It Will Not Obey You SLAPS. And third my question: How in god's name did you do so much research for your fic??? What is your secret. How do you go about organizing or even knowing where to start for that matter. I struggle with research cause I never know where to start or stop and often I'm really uncertain if the info I'm gathering is even needed or if it's extraneous. I am both stupid and a perfectionist HELP ME

Hi Anon, thank you so much! I always appreciate viewer support and I hope you're enjoying all the art on this blog that isn't in the fic. In any case, I don't know if this method will work for you, or if it's how other authors do research, but here's my process. It's pretty long, so I'll put it under a cut for you:

First, I start with a story. When I say story, I don't really mean a beginning-middle-end, this happens and then that happens; it's a little more vague than that. For me, a story is more like a feeling, some truth or impulse, and all the writing or plot structure or everything else is built around it. I don't generally bother with things like plot structures (which I think should be descriptive and not prescriptive anyway), and I do make outlines, but you'd be surprised by how barren they are. Here's the original from 2016, with some spoilers blacked out:

And as you can see, I threw about half of it away during the writing process, haha. A surprising amount remains, though!

Something that comes about from approaching the story as a single entity is that oftentimes, things just fall into place. A big fight taking place in the congo where most of the cryptids from the Kur flash-forwards get called up, or the gang getting shot down over the Amazon like in the first two episodes of the show - little coincidences like this happen all the time. I think it's because, while writing, my brain starts making connections that I'm not consciously aware of - I often go by what "feels correct," and I've rewritten whole chapters multiple times before to chase that feeling of "correct."

How that ties into research is twofold: first, I'm a naturally curious person, and I'm constantly reading about stuff like mythology or ancient history or science etc. on my own. I like to have an approximate knowledge of many things - that way, there's more for my brain to make connections to. For example, I already knew about the chinese five-element system (wuxing), and remembered mystic hotspots from the show, and Excalibur, and video games, so when I decided on a plot device to keep Zak and Francis together during the main story, it was fairly easy to land on the idea of a quest to power up a special weapon only Francis can wield by hitting up mystical hotspots, each one themed after one of the wuxing.

The second part of the process is this: I have the general vibe or concept of the story in my head, and now I've settled on something concrete plot-wise - the magic weapon wuxing powerup quest. That makes it really easy to start researching specific details. I know I need a magic weapon, and I know this magic weapon has to be tied to Sumerian mythology, so I start digging around in Sumerian mythology for magic weapons, and find Sharur, the talking mace wielded by the Sumerian god Ninurta. Then I do some more research into the wuxing and see that each element is attached to a color, so those are the colors Sharur changes into. Now, a big part of the original show was its globetrotting nature, so obviously, I need to make each of these hotspots a different part of the globe. (And incidentally, "mythic hotspot" doesn't really roll off the tongue, so I rooted around myths for power spots etc. and found the Quechuan word "huaca," which has a meaning very similar to what I'm trying to make each huaca out to be).

So I scatter the huacas out so they're all roughly equidistant to each other, and none are too similar in geography or concept, and we go back to existing connections: I want to have one in China, because 1) I'm Chinese, 2) there's plot reasons (Sharur uses the wuxing because it was enchanted by a Chinese guy), 3) China has a long history comparable to India, the latter of which already featured extensively in the show. So I root around for the "secret science" parts of Chinese history and stumble across this semi-mythical Xia dynasty with its emperor who may or may not exist. That feels very Secret Saturdays to me, so Yu the Great and his tomb are now the second huaca. Now, we know so little about Yu the Great that there's not too much to draw from for how his tomb looks, but I already know about the tomb of Qin Shi Huang - his tomb's excavation was put on pause because ancient records spoke of him having a scale mercury replica of China complete with flowing mercury rivers, and while these claims were initially considered massive exaggerations if not outright lies, they DID find a TON of mercury in the tomb, making them go "unless..."

Mercury obviously fits right in with this huaca being "metal"-themed, so it's a perfect reference. The idea of a scale replica of China was blown up into the idea of a magically-powered VR simulation of ancient China. Now I need a cryptid for this arc, and hey, howdy, turns out Yu the Great has a serpent-slaying myth, Xiangliu! And what's this? Xiangliu's blood was so virulently poisonous that after it was slain, when the floodwaters came, the land became barren! There is such a strong pro-environement and pro-taking care of animals even when they seem monstrous vibe in TSS that if this story is seen through the lens of TSS, it looks a lot like a cautionary tale for why you don't just murder rampaging animals - they're natural parts of their natural environments, and there are repercussions for messing too much with the food chain.

And hey, doesn't that sound like a lesson Francis should learn? The last huaca, we got as far as Francis going from "I don't want to be here" to "I guess I'm stuck here." This huaca, we need to highlight how different he and Zak are, and how shortsighted - and human - Francis's ideals are, where he repeats Yu the Great's mistake, and humanity's mistakes as a whole.

Again, a lot of these connections aren't necessarily being made consciously. In the moment, they just sort of "feel right," which I know is unhelpful, but I can't really explain it any other way.

For an arc that had more secondary research than already knowing things ahead of time, the arc in the Congo took the longest to write (there was a two-year hiatus between it and the previous arc), in large part because I had so little to go off of. Myths from the Congo area are fairly sparse on the ground (for many reasons), and the ones I did find didn't really feel very TSS or IWNOY. I knew that this was the arc where everything went to shit - that we'd been building to that for a while - but I didn't have in my notes exactly how things went to shit, or even what the huaca was going to be. I knew it would be wood-themed, but this being the Congo Rainforest, pretty much anything I did would count. I knew I wanted to do something with the origin of humanity and/or the lemurians, because Africa was where humans first evolved.

So, actually, I wound up doing research into pretty much everything - all the cryptids from the area, all the myths from the area I could find. Previously, in my research on lemurians when working out what their Deal would be, I found out that a lot of writings on lemurians came from occultists in the 1900s, who also had many (racist and misogynistic) writings about where THEY think the first humans come from, about mystical ancient societies that were hyper advanced, etc. etc., which fit with the way that the lemurians seemed to have a veritable magical paradise in Shangri-La before the nagas massacred them. I could at least use the names from these hippies, because I couldn't find comparable mythology from the actual area, but I stripped out the... less savory parts.

I wanted to use the eloko/biloko when I found them, because their myths give them magic bells that compel people who hear it to do what they want - much like how the lemurian's charisma was set up (this being one of those interesting little coincidences that happen when the story "feels right.") Doubly so when I found out that eloko/biloko sleep in trees, which - wood-themed huaca. But I still wasn't really... piecing anything together.

So I switched tracks and started looking into Gilgamesh, the man, the myth, the legend, at the center of this all. Read the Epic of Gilgamesh (or, re-read, rather), and found the myth regarding Utnapishtim and Gilgamesh's quest for eternal life. An old man gifted by immortality from the gods? Given that I already had in my notes that the lemurians struck a deal with the devil with Kur and became what they are, and the eloko/biloko were a failure as a result of the lemurians going "wait, not like this" halfway through, Utnapishtim sounded like he could fit in as a lemurian from this original hullabaloo. And in the original Gilgamesh myth, the plant Utnapishtim points Gilgamesh to, which would grant him all his youth and vitality back, gets stolen from him by a serpent. Hey, nagas!

Okay, so now I had the origin of the lemurians, Utnapishtim's character being involved, even a hook for the nagas, and thus Argost, but it still wasn't coming together. SO...

... I gave up and started looking at biblical stuff. I'm a sellout hack. BUT, at least you can argue that biblical stuff is always potentially relevant, because the Saturday line has biblical names (Zakariya/Zechariah, Solomon, Elijah, Samuel) and Zak is set up with a minor Jesus reference (sacrifices himself for the good of mankind, is dead for 3 (minutes) and is resurrected). Specifically, I started looking into the "secret science" part of biblical stuff - apocrypha, or non-canonical texts. There's tons of interesting stuff in there, but it turned out to be mostly useless, aside from the chapter titles, but it did help to form this idea of making deals and regretting them - and I'm realizing now as I'm writing this that this was another one of those unconscious connections - ch12 is literally named after the part in Goethe's Faust where Faust makes his deal with Mephistopheles ("Die Wette biet ich" - "the bet I offer").

So now that I'd been freed to do biblical stuff (which, hey, also fits in with the wood theme, because Garden of Eden, get it?), I had access to the imagery of the snake tempting eve with fruit. And suddenly, everything started to come together. Themes of trying to defy what you are by nature, the nagas as betrayers, Kur and its entourage as demons, getting what you wished for but at what cost, a fall into darkness as the major players fail to defy their natures (and the consequences that result) - once I started, I couldn't stop.

So it's a bit hard to answer your question because it's all so intuitive, but I guess if I really had to say, the real answer to where to start and where to end is to just pick a topic you like so much that you wouldn't mind doing tons of research on it, even if most of it winds up being unusable. I LOVE ancient history and mythology, so even if nothing I read is useful, I don't mind reading. And not minding the reading means I have so much already floating around in my head for when I need to write something new. If you forced me to write, say, a crime drama or sci-fi story - two fields I have much less interest and much less knowledge on - I would also be pretty lost! At that point, I'd have two options - either I write something by the numbers just to get it done, or I do enough reading on the topic that I find something about it to love and care about, and then write based on that.

I think more is always better. Anything you don't immediately use becomes a potential connection for something else down the line. I'd say a good 30% of weird little factoids featured in IWNOY are things I knew before I did research for it, and now, for other projects I'm doing, the stuff I learned for IWNOY sometimes becomes relevant.

And I would always try not to worry too much about overstuffing or making your first draft bad. The secret is, most of the actually good writing happens in the editing. Your first draft exists for the purpose of existing. It's fine if it's riddled with holes, if the dialogue sucks, if there's way too much exposition and "essay-style writing" (what I like to call it when you randomly infodump all the research you've done - I've done this sooooo many times), or if it's so bad you have to delete the whole thing and start over (this is a regular part of my writing process!). The point of draft 1 is to throw the damn spaghetti against the damn wall. Edits and revisions are where you tastefully arrange it so that it's good and an art piece, haha.

[triysn]

the only reason I want a celebrity trio crossover is so they can all play alien, cryptid or evo for the rest of time and the inter-organisational admin is a MESS

[obsxdiannn]

Doc and Drew: Please don’t kill our son. We know he’s the reincarnation of an ancient god that could end the world but he’s also just a kid. He’s only 12.

The Secret Scientists: Lol we’re not gonna *kill* him, we’re just gonna permanently cryofreeze his body until we figure out what to do with him!

[droidmom]

oh my god i used to have an alien oc who i shipped with beeman and apparently i'd planned for her to just. vanish. come back and drop her kid off with him that she apparently had. and then vanish again and probably die. but he would've been back with miranda by that point. and so ?? ??? theyre just. raising an alien baby that wasn't even beeman's bc my dumb 12 yr old ass was like "this is a kids show so no sex without marriage :(" and hONESTLY........ i'm tempted to revamp this idea with a nonbinary alien whose species doesnt need sex to reproduce theyre just like hmm. that person's cool. im going to generate a baby using their essence and my own. and then stick that baby with miranda and beeman. and then go die in a war or something.

[labrat8899]

ok y’all it’s time for me to compile all the headcannons for my favorite Canadian rock licker, cause there’s a lot:

He has a older brother! His name is Leo, and he’s an orthopedic surgeon and has training as a trauma surgeon. Has definitely had to patch Paul up a few times (usually not cool for family to treat other members, but it was emergencies). Leo helped out when zak was born, and is the saturdays go to when someone gets really banged up

Loves hockey, favorite team is the Vancouver Canucks. Also played growing up, and was really good (that’s why he survived weird world he was used to getting the shit beat out of him)

He got his doctorate at a young age? Or younger than usual (I envision at about 27-30 years old, most get it at 33 or older)

Joined the secret scientists because he helped the saturdays with some project and they were like, “want to join this secret organization that don’t take rules from no one?” and he was like “yes”

When zak turned 18, Paul took him up to Canada and bought him a beer and told him, “if your tell your parents I did this for you I’ll throw you to the damn wolf thing that almost killed me”

He has a doggo, cause someone needs to keep him company while he works in the frozen tundra. It’s a Siberian husky (can’t think of a name but it’s a girl)

He hates to be called “cheech” or “pauley”. Also nicknamed captain canuck by beeman which he also hates

His parents died right before he joined the secret scientists and he had a really hard time getting over it and grieved for a really hard time. Doc and Drew helped him (and his brother) through, so he considers them his second family (that’s why I think he’s seems so close to them)

Was definitely a grunge guy in the 90s and still listens to it

[thenixkat]

i have a theory that the Secret Scientists convinced the Plumbers that cryptids aren't real. Mostly going off stuff from OS and TSS.

ok so disregarding TGIS b/c I hate it and it just... doesn't work in regards to everything TSS.

But we do know via word of god that Max and the Saturdays worked together on a mission in Bellwood at one point. We also know that in OS the Plumbers were not an intergalactic police force and more an international organization of alien hunters who just... threw fuckers into the Null Void if the caught them (and even if we go with the later UAF retcon of it being an intergalactic police force they still just throw fuckers into the Null Void or prison without like trials and shit)

Max believes that all 'cryptid' stuff is either aliens or hoaxes. He even states that 'Bigfoot was just a guy in a suit' in the Benwolf ep I believe.

the Saturday family primarily both protects humans from hostile cryptids and protect cryptids from humanity by hiding evidence of their existence

I don't believe Max came across as the kinda person who they'd let in on the cryptid secret. I feel its very likely that while working together that one time in Bellwood, they both fixed whatever cryptid issue was happening AND convinced Max that cryptids were either fake or aliens

and its not like the Secret Scientists need the Plumbers for anything, they've got their own alien expert (and likely had more b4 the Weird World Raid killed over 40 of their number)

[thesecretsaturdaysvault]

TSS Anniversary Survey Results!

Hello everybody! Thank you to everyone who participated in this year’s anniversary event, this was fun and exciting to run! Here are the results for the survey

ZAK SATURDAY: Favorite Saturday family member

FISKERTON: Favorite Saturday sibling

PAUL CHEECHOO AND ARTHUR BEEMAN: Tie for favorite Secret Secientist

AGENT EPSILON: Least favorite Secret Scientist

FISKERTON: Favorite cryptid in the show

V.V. ARGOST: Favorite Villain/Antagonist

PIECEMEAL: Least favorite Villain/Antagonist

ZAK SATURDAY: Favorite character overall

ARTHUR BEEMAN: Least favorite character overall (by one vote)

SEASON 1: Prefered season overall

THE UNBLINKING EYE: Favorite episode (by one vote)

CURSE OF THE STOLEN TIGER: Least favorite episode

FANDOM OPINION: Favorite quote

FANDOM OPINION: Favorite meme

DREW/DOC: Favorite ship

FANDOM OPINION: Things to change about TSS

FANDOM OPINION: Fan Theory

There we are! I hope you enjoyed seeing how the fandom feels about TSS.

If you enjoyed this, let me know! I might try something similar later

[msnihilist]

I love that TSS doesn't do redemption/damnation arcs. When characters switch "sides," they more or less stay exactly the same, they just now have different motivation. Doyle is still very much a mercenary, and Van Rook even more so — he's only helping out our heroes because Doyle is paying him to, haha. Even the Secret Scientists don't change. They care about Doc and Drew as colleagues/friends, it's just that their goals no longer align, putting them on opposing sides.