Hi Rene,

Good post. I'll come back to your other suggestions in a bit. First I want to discuss the Madman. I think we're largely on the same page, just one slight difference:

The way the story seems to be developing, we're following a group in a small, suburban town (which makes sense in a lot of ways...not just story/Production wise, but also in the Demographics of the people who listen to Podcasts, I imagine).


It make sense that our "madman" lives in that area. So he's a part of the community, in the sense that a small town is a "Local Community". He's not necessarily playing an active role, or plays cards with other characters.

I actually think Libby might have stumbled on the Madman:

I like the idea of a shut-in character, perhaps an INFJ - a creative, smart but introverted character previously able to live and work from home, obtain everything online for their prior existence, now forced to join the human race.


Super intelligent, but socially isolated. He records his own journal everyday.

He's our POV for seeing the psychological effects of the Fog. He gives us an insight into what people are experiencing, probably just at the extremes.

This journal will give the Podcast a very unusual feel, underlying the events taking place. He's very smart, so he thinks about thinks on a deep level, but we see how those thoughts, while intelligent, are slowly twisting into something dangerous and creepy.

So, he lives in our Local Community...a few streets from our Main Characters, perhaps. But he's also apart from the community, socially.


I also think we've stumbled perfectly onto his Character Arc:

He's in his house when the Starving Diaspora from the City descends on the town.

Following his journal, we've already witnessed him descending into an unusual, and dark place.

He has come to see the Fog as an agent of change. Maybe nothing sent it or maybe The Nothing has sent it....but it's here, it's Absolutely Real, and it will do one thing, it will kill people. It will cleanse the Earth (similar to what you mentioned about the weak being killed off).

So it's not based on religious ideas, but simply something that's palpably true...there is an undeniable force at work that is here to eradicate and change.

Anyway, the invasion into his home, and his private world, is the moment where there's a definitive break made.

At first he's brushed aside by the invaders and suffers a minor head injury, but then something changes in him, a revelatory moment that the old world is dead (perhaps represented by his computer/work being knocked off a table by the invaders) and he clinically dispatches them in some way....maybe with something nasty like a Meat Hammer from the kitchen.

One of them, though gravely wounded, is still alive.

Here's where it gets nasty.

He drags him out into the garden, douses him in lighter fluid from his barbecue, then sets him on fire...and describes the process in his journal.

In his mind he has become a "Servant of the Fog" (that doesn't need to be explicit). By burning the man, he is sending his essence, through the smoke, into the Fog itself.

He can also notice, casually, that the man is little more than "Noisy Meat"...foreshadowing the onset of Cannibalism and showing how he's mentally distancing himself from his fellow man.


After the Invasion has ended. The surviving members of the local community do door to door checks. Paramedics etc

They find our man, bleeding from his minor injury, and seemingly in a state of shock due to his psychological state. They take him to the Hospital where are main characters are talking to the Doctor and the Nurses.

He overhears a conversation about how the Hospitals and Prisons have been abandoned. He takes it as a 'Sign' and leaves the Hospital and the Local Community, to set off on his Mission.

At the Prison itself, he will simply have to tell the Prisoners the truth..that they've been abandoned by the same State that imprisoned them like Rats in a cage has betrayed them and left them to die, and that together they can find food, and get their revenge.

He can deliver this message over the Prison Tannoy system if we like. A disturbing, unsettling address that is nevertheless completely true.

That way they already have self interest to essentially follow him...Hunger and Revenge. So it's fairly plausible and he doesn't need to be some super leader, there's just self interest at play, and a certain level of gratitude for releasing them.

That seems pretty perfect to me. The journal allows us to slowly and naturally develop and experience the Fog Mania first hand, and the antagonists Arc...and it all fits in perfectly with the other story-lines.

Our sufferer has no real way of knowing whether what they're seeing is real or a result of their visual or auditory hallucinations...and neither does the audience.

But yes...we'll have to keep an eye on it.

There's an easy trap to fall into here. We already withhold so much from the audience, and it's going to be hard enough describing everything without resorting to exposition upon exposition. If those descriptions become unreliable, it might turn the audience off. They won't like the wool being pulled so deliberately over their eyes.

There's an easy trap to fall into here. We already withhold so much from the audience, and it's going to be hard enough describing everything without resorting to exposition upon exposition. If those descriptions become unreliable, it might turn the audience off. They won't like the wool being pulled so deliberately over their eyes.

It'd only be the subjective POV of one minor character. You'd know he was schizophrenic, and you'd know that he can't trust his own perception, so I don't think it would be too much of a problem. I do understand your concerns though.

It's something I'm willing to let someone try as an experiment.

Was it Frank that suggested it? Perhaps we should let him present a small character arc for the character to see how, and where we could fit it in.

Part of me feels that despite the relative dangers, in a world like this where the whole environment is affecting mental health, it seems fitting that someone with mental health issues should be present in some small way.

It'd only be the subjective POV of one minor character. You'd know he was schizophrenic, and you'd know that he can't trust his own perception, so I don't think it would be too much of a problem. I do understand your concerns though.

It's something I'm willing to let someone try as an experiment.

Was it Frank that suggested it? Perhaps we should let him present a small character arc for the character to see how, and where we could fit it in.

Part of me feels that despite the relative dangers, in a world like this where the whole environment is affecting mental health, it seems fitting that someone with mental health issues should be present in some small way.

Fair point.

I had another thought. The fog presents some interesting opportunities for fear. Fear of heights? If the fog is thick, can't see how high you are. Agoraphobia? Fog feels like home. Claustrophobia? You're in for it when the fog closes in.

The deaf are in real trouble.

A seeing eye dog would be an excellent addition to the story, not necessarily for a blind person but as a supporting character, used to working with people and with better senses than us. And since it's a podcast it would be easy to add in. Imagine the dog barking at the fog and nobody knows why, or turning people away at the last second from a bad mis-step.

Depression is already going to be a major mental health issue for many, many people. There will be suicides. There will be breakdowns. Mental health is going to be represented, if there's a chronic issue added it has to be something important and relevant enough for a compelling arc that has some bearing on the story and isn't just there for the sake of it.

Fair point.

I had another thought. The fog presents some interesting opportunities for fear. Fear of heights? If the fog is thick, can't see how high you are. Agoraphobia? Fog feels like home. Claustrophobia? You're in for it when the fog closes in.

The deaf are in real trouble.

A seeing eye dog would be an excellent addition to the story, not necessarily for a blind person but as a supporting character, used to working with people and with better senses than us. And since it's a podcast it would be easy to add in. Imagine the dog barking at the fog and nobody knows why, or turning people away at the last second from a bad mis-step.

Depression is already going to be a major mental health issue for many, many people. There will be suicides. There will be breakdowns. Mental health is going to be represented, if there's a chronic issue added it has to be something important and relevant enough for a compelling arc that has some bearing on the story and isn't just there for the sake of it.

The suicide idea made me think that on their travels our main characters could hear some music, but (obviously) they can't see much. They travel towards it, the visibility clears a bit... And there's a field of hundreds of people who have killed themselves.  They put on a CD to die to, then took poison or something.

They would hear the sound of crows, too.
Crows... Or other carrion birds.

They would hear the sound of crows, too.
Crows... Or other carrion birds.