Here in Los Angeles there is an unspoken (and spoken) thought that you should never openly discuss ideas. The reasoning behind it is pretty simple… someone will steal it. Fortunately I’ve never blatantly had an idea stolen from me (that I knew of) and I secretly really hope it’s not because all of my ideas were terrible.

This thought process really says a lot about the type of people here in Los Angeles. When people typically steal things it means they’re desperate, right? I guess that can be debated. One argument could be made that everyone is stealing or “duplicating” a previous idea at some point. The bottom line is that when it comes 95 percent of films we’re all copying or stealing themes, stories, thoughts, and ideas. Seriously. But lets not walk down that road because it leaves too much to be debated, we need to back track a little and specify the ideas we’re dealing with.

I’m talking about me talking to John Doe and I tell him that I’m going to write a film and here’s the idea… And then John Doe turns it and uses it for himself – That’s the type of idea stealing I’m currently talking about. But I’ve been doing a lot of thinking on this subject and I’d like to take a moment and say fuck that train of thought.

The reality is, is that your idea is your idea and nobody can ever really duplicate your vision. Lets take Jurassic Park for a moment – Nobody could have done what Michael Crichton did and weave one of the top 10 coolest stories of all time, but people can try. The beauty of art is that nobody can ever put your stamp on it - that’s what makes something great.

When dealing with stories and the entertainment industry I think it’s a great idea to openly discuss your ideas. It allows you to fine tune your vision and get instant feedback on what you’re doing. Not to mention - if someone is desperate enough to turn and steal your idea then have pity (or just say fuck them), they’re desperate and they’re not going to sustain in whatever they’re doing.

This is all up for debate and maybe I’d feel a bit different if I was screwed over by some idea thief. I just think it’s great to talk out new ideas and challenge yourself, who knows maybe someone will challenge you.

****

Roughly 30 minutes later.

I just got a call from my friend and told him what I was writing and my thoughts on ideas. He told me I was crazy and wrong and proceeded to bring up some valid points and why it’s a stupid idea to talk ideas out with people. We then met at a middle ground and I agreed it should *maybe just be kept in a trusted circle.

Maybe… But F that, I just wrote all the above and feel good about it.

There are a few rules that I think should and can be implemented into society… at least in my perfect world. I should probably note that I don’t think this will ever happen, it’s just what I want.

Rule #1: There must be elevator entertainment. Human has never been so uncomfortable than when we’re standing in an elevator. I hate the long-standing awkward silence, and the elevator is a test of how you deal with these moments. Do you look down at the ground? Stare at the elevator’s numbers changing? Stare at the doors? I have long thought that every elevator has a camera and it’s just some big science experiment.

If we can somehow get something that everyone can do while in there, like a quick puzzle or trivia I think the world would be a happier place.

Rule #2: Root Beer at all meals. When you go out to eat and a server asks if you’d like water I think the question should be: “Would you like water and a Root Beer?” Or “Would you just like Root Beer?” I don’t think I can properly explain the underrated value of Root Beet. Sometimes I wonder if it’s so great because it’s not as main-stream as Pepsi or Coke.

Rule #3: No walking slow in a parking garage. “YO! Slow fing walker, get out of my way because you’re in the middle of the driving area!” Not sure if it’s a LA thing or what, but people who take their sweet time and hold up traffic in a parking garage should be banned from parking. The only possible solve (without running someone over) is to implement a power walk rule in every and all garage. Move fast or get arrested… okay not arrested… but something.

Rule #4: When you say your age you say it in days and not years. Doesn’t it just sound cooler and as though you live longer to place a bigger number here? “How old are you?”

“I’m 25.”

Or –

“I’m 9,125.”

Sure, it will eventually sound common day and lose its appeal over time but at least you can feel like Yoda for just a moment. I want to feel that I’m so old I actually forget the days.

Rule #5: Notes on poorly parked cars. Imagine if you see that car that’s parked on an angle occupying 2 spots for no reason. Now imagine if you had a note that said “I messed with your car and you’ll never know what I did” even though you did nothing. I think that note alone would scare someone into submission and start a trend of properly parked cars. Even if you’re not parked like a complete idiot but are doing something that messes with the flow, you should still get a note on your car.

I even think that new cars should come with a set of notes just out of courtesy. I don’t think people realize what bad parkers do to the common man’s psyche. Or is it just me?

I’ll stop at 5 … it’s just a start, but it’s something.

Five totally ridiculously random thoughts have been stewing in my head today.

5 - The TV show AWAKE was cancelled. Damn! It was a very good show. I’ve talked about it to many times because the creator behind it, Kyle Killen, is insanely talented and has had some kind of horrible string of luck. For the record, his previous show Lone Star was also very good.

4 – I really want to see Battleship and I don’t care who knows it… but unfortunately it comes out next week. After my taste of Avengers I’ve become an insta action junkie - this happens every summer when the first blockbuster comes out. Sort of hoping Dark Shadows has Johnny Depp blowing something up.

3 – I like Kevin Hart. I’ve been giving this dude the short end of the stick for far to long, but I have to admit… he’s pretty funny. Random prediction: Kevin Hart will win an Academy Award at some point.

Just blacked out for a second. I thought I just wrote… Oh… yeah I did just write that. I’m sticking to it.

2 – I just spent the last 10 minutes watching Manny Pacquiao highlights and (I hate to say this) I think Floyd Mayweather would win the dream match. I should note that I never watch boxing and almost know nothing about it. Just saying.

1 – What’s the deal with paying extra to sit in the emergency exit row? I purchased a ticket on Frontier Airlines and they advertised the emergency exit row as an upgrade with more legroom. Seriously?

I’ve gone on the emergency exit row rant before so I won’t completely jump into this but their needs to be some rule changes. Specifically, I think to sit there you should have to be 18 years old; I do not trust a kid who is 13 to open that door.

People pay extra to sit there!?

Let me lay out a little scenario for you:

Worst-case scenario happens and someone has to use that emergency exit. Lets say you F up when trying to open that door. You’re suddenly the person who actually paid extra to be a hero but you screwed up and now all eyes are on you… And you’re out extra cash.

This whole concept of the emergency exit row is baffling. You’d think that the emergency exit row would be cheaper due to the potential responsibility behind it.

I think it’s time we change the name of the emergency exit row, lets be honest, nobody actually thinks of it as an emergency exit row, it’s for more leg room – and obviously the airlines know that the consumer thinks it’s a crock. While we’re at it, we can avoid the whole thing about how to put on a seatbelt before take off…

At some point in the last few years I’ve adopted and stuck to the belief that when it comes to decisions there is nothing bigger than the small ones, and there is nothing more impactful than any decision you make. I’ve been trying to grasp how important they are, and for whatever reason a few years ago when I read “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho something clicked. There was a line that stated, “Whenever you make a decision you’re thrust in a different flow of life” (hope I didn’t fuck that up too much). What Paulo was saying is that the decision you make puts you in a stream that takes you somewhere, who knows where, but it’s somewhere. Paulo is right – when you decide something, you are then going to a new area of life.

I should stop now and mention that this kind of writing is typically saved for my personal journal but the truth is I don’t feel like writing by hand, I feel like typing, and this is my blog so screw it… I’m running forward with a little more of an expressive blog. Be prepared for a random stream of consciousness, I’m 197 words in and I don’t know where I’m going with this…

I’m experiencing some sort of creative block and I’m having a problem holding a thought… I’m having a problem making a decision. I’m always told, “writers, write.” So, I’m writing. I’m trying to figure out why I’m so scrambled and wondering if anyone else gets like this and I’m also curious if there really is a thing as “writers block” or a “creative block.”

Logic tells me that you can push through these things, I kind of feel that only the weak minded should settle for anything that’s associated with a “block” and I feel like there are ways around it – change of scenery, music, food, sleep, etc… But is that true, and why am I calling myself weak minded? I feel that writing this is somehow going to help me out and help me focus a bit, I just need a kick-start to my brain.

Getting back to decisions for a minute: Why are they so important? When dealing with myself, my issue at this moment in time is that I cannot make a decision. I cannot settle on exactly what I want to work on and there are many variables going into these lack of decisions. I haven’t really made a proactive decision in 2 days and in turn I ended up doing basically nothing, and I think that’s important because it’s clearly a mirror to something much bigger.

I always think about the small decisions in life and at times I’m obsessed with the origin of situations. When talking to my friends I’m always curious as to how someone got to the point they’re currently at because it’s always interesting to pinpoint those few decisions that made someone enter their specific world. Sometimes it’s scary to think about what would have been had you chose X over Z, but that’s life, and it’s something that I think is a tad bit underrated.

(If you’re still reading - congratulations… I’m almost done… I know this is all confusing but I hope it’s going somewhere… *hope)

The key to decisions is your confidence and if you truly made it. Did you get bullied or peer pressured into deciding something? Are you making a decision based off of social standards? Do you feel unsure of your decision? Someone should never feel unsure of his or her decision… right?

The more I digest all of this, aside from health, I think that decision and direction are the two most important things for anyone. Direction = What you want. Decision = How you’ll get it. Just be specific and confident and the rest will fall in place.

A wise man once said “I shall seek and I shall find” I find this to be incredibly important, those 7 words sum up everything that (I think) people should be about. Seeking and finding what they want… just make the right decisions getting there.

That’s it, no mas, now that I just attempted to ramble myself into working and making a decision I need to concentrate. I hope that somehow I related to at least one person, I would hate to think I’m in this sort of creative blocked journey on my own.

Enjoy whatever the next small decision is that you make… it may be the biggest thing of your life.

I think I have finally figured it out! After years of tough and long mental thought I have figured out how to move forward and reboot the Back To The Future trilogy… and it came to me in a dream… No, seriously. I’ll hold off on the dream talk for now because we need to get a few things clear.

When I’m talking about Back To The Future I’m bundling all 3 films together because it’s that complete. I’m well aware that the 1st film is the best, the 2nd is arguably as good as the 1st, and the 3rd isn’t nearly as good as either but somehow gets better when you catch it on TV.

Here’s why it’s a brilliant trilogy:

Aside from the obvious things like amazing characters, fun storylines, great writing, great directing, and continuous new imaginative visuals it created a fail safe for itself. When Back To The Future literally went to the future in Part 2 it went to the year 2015, forever sealing its fate in that desired time and location. We currently cannot make a sequel to the film because our modern day (2012) doesn’t look like the conception when it was released in 1989, ie: hover boards, flying cars, and fashion. It’s brilliant, right?

Also, in Part 2 we learned that Marty had kids, was married to Jennifer, and Biffs grandson Griff went to jail (to name a few) - another fail safe. Initial thought is there is no way to make a sequel, say Back To The Future Part 4 because it would look hokey and out of touch. Of course this couldn’t have been the intent of the team behind Back To The Future when they created it but it happened, and it’s awesome.

Here’s what my thoughts have always been about trying to flip this trilogy:

- In order to keep this series going with the same title and characters someone would have to conceivably start from scratch and remake the film with a new Marty, Doc Brown, George McFly, Biff, etc… The problem with this idea is everyone knows it’s to soon to do this and that the original films are still better than almost everything in the world.

- The movie could take place in 1985 picking up from where Part 3 left off but the main issue is that a train murdered the DeLorean and Doc Brown is stuck in the old west. OH, and lets not forget the obvious… Michael J Fox and Doc Brown are older and cannot be in these films.

- Speaking of Doc Brown; maybe Part 4 could start in the Wild West and he could send some cowboys into the future for whatever reason. But, who really wants to start a film in the Wild West?

- At the end of Part 3 when Jennifer’s fax disappears stating “you’re fired” she asks Doc what the deal is and Doc says: “the future has not been written yet” – Oh shit! Does that one sentence negate everything above? Did Zemeckis know what he was doing when that line was spoken? What does that mean!?

Quick Side Note: I feel like this is a good random stopping point to point out that I don’t know why everything needs to be rebooted or remade. Honestly, I don’t know why I can’t leave this alone, well, yes I do. I loved this series and deep down I want to pay homage to it. I know that someone is going to redo this movie and trilogy and I want it to be me. Moving on…

Back to my dream and my Back To The Future solve. Remember in Part 1 when Doc Brown was shot by the Libyans at the Twin Pines mall and was talking about plutonium? Also, remember that Marty was recording him? In fact, Marty brought the videotape with him to 1955 to show doc he knew about the flux compacitor. Well, that footage is key to keeping everything moving forward.

In my dream a group of current day kids found the footage from Doc Brown and Marty (along with footage we’ve never seen in the films) and learned how to build a time machine, and not just from a DeLorean but from anything because they know what makes time travel possible… The Flux Compacitor.

The beauty of Doc filming himself in the first film opens up the idea completely and it’s totally logical he was in YouTube mode filming himself stating what he needs to do to time travel. Doc was essentially making a running diary of his work, thus throwing all of his knowledge to future time travelers.

The kids would then reference the footage, create a time machine, and proceed to go on their own adventure, and on this adventure they could maintain the integrity of the series and also reference things like Hill Dale, the clock tower, Marty and Jennifer, Biff, hover board… basically everything from the original that’s cool.

Major issue: The flying fucking cars in the future that we don’t have in current day. The solve: Doc Brown was the catalyst behind the flying and much of the technology that we saw in Part 2 but he just didn’t know it (this would also explain how he created a flying train in Part 3). But since Doc isn’t around because he went back to the Wild West the flying car hasn’t hit the scene… yet (but could be referenced in the video tapes).

Also, lets not forget Doc’s crazy ass “the future has not been written yet” line and plug that in when we need to. Is this line a cop out? Yes. But my entire plot hinges on that line and the videotape footage.

And BOOM, we have a reboot and a semi sequel to the films! But wait, just like Back To The Future there’s one more option -

My dream also consisted of a low budget version of Back To The Future – seriously. That low budget modern day version is a found footage approach, which still revolves around Doc’s videotapes but takes place in 1985. This version takes place during the time that Marty heads back to the past in Part 1 when the Libyans shot Doc.

The major flaw to this is that Marty took the video camera with him, but I’m sure there is some kind of work around to that. How cool is a found footage time travel movie?

What this all boils down to is that in order to reboot this franchise and not fuck things up we need Doc’s footage, it’s the spine to everything, its like the flux compacitor. In my dream it seemed perfect. With this footage we can move forward to open a new adventure for a new group of kids and integrate the old crew.

Does this sound crazy?

In my perfect world this franchise would go untouched, but that’s not reality. We’re in that zone where it’s easier to just retool and reboot everything under the sun due to the built in audience and financial return. Also, we’re getting to a point where the people that are taking over and can make these decisions were fan boys of the original series and if someone has the opportunity to redo this thing, it’s going to happen.

Truthfully, I want to make this movie and when I pitched the idea to someone they thought I was crazy and couldn’t be done. Screw crazy, Doc Brown was crazy and he made a time machine out of a DeLorean. If someone reads this and has the immediate power to get a reboot in motion don’t F things up.