Sovereign is coming soon!

Hi Tim, and the Not Tim readers,

 Despite my best efforts, I am still not posting as often as I'd like to be, and somehow find myself fabricating weapons for the upcoming production of "Sovereign" (Part III of Mac Rogers' Honeycomb Trilogy) without ever finishing posting about "Blast Radius" - which closed a couple months ago. 

What? Fabricating weapons you say?

 As noted in previous blogs, the characters in the post apocalyptic, alien occupied, farming society of "Blast Radius" were forced to improvise weapons to fight off their 15 foot tall insectoid oppressors - using "reapers". Essentially 5 foot pole axes for chopping swamp veggies in place of anything else. They are the few limited pieces of technology allowed. In the course of the play, the characters discover a far more potent and costly weapon that allows them to wage a deadly war on the bugs. "Blast Radius" ended with this war beginning, and "Sovereign" will begin some years after it's completion and a victorious human race is trying to pick up the pieces.

 Some few bugs survive though - and a dedicated team of hunters uses their instincts, rage and talents to find them and kill them. A few of the Bug Hunters appear during the course of the play - and I noted that in rehearsals the actors were using the "reapers" I made for the previous play. I didn't like that. The war is over. Any quasi-militia unit would not be using improvised weapons at this point. They may not have good gear, or even very effective gear due to the continuing lack of high technology, but the tools they use would not be re-purposed farm implements. They would have made weapons specific to the task. Longer. Double edged. Stronger. "Reaper 2.0" I'm calling them. 

And I'm making them now. But... no spoilers.

 I wanted to talk Blast Radius, specifically one of the most fun weaponized fights I've had the pleasure of choreographing, using some of the most game actors I've had the privilege of working with as a fight director. If you saw Blast Radius, you know the fight I'm talking about - Becky Byers and Cotton Wright as very pregnant ladies Ronnie and Willa battling it out to the death with 5 foot polearms. I promised earlier to map out the fight here, and so I shall.

 I'm writing it out below in the most basic language possible, so as not to get caught up in the terminology of the style of fighting I used. It is also important to note that one of the stage directions Mac Rogers wrote in was "The fight is simultaneously clumsy and vicious." To me that says a lot. These aren't skilled warriors doing highly acrobatic moves. This is a human woman carrying a late term baby and an alien mind trapped in another human woman carrying a late term baby, and they mean to kill each other. Not look cool, or badass, or anything. They want each other dead. There was no room for fancy stuff. So... next post please!