Jabberwocky Song, a sci-fi Hero's Journey
Channel: Paul Spooner
Date: 2023-09-02

Around the turn of the millennia my high-school buddies and I had the idea to make the poem Jabberwocky from Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll into a short film. It was going to be live-action, with a CG jabberwock. Part of the appeal was that one of my buddies had a dad who was a script doctor, and he encouraged us to develop a more elaborate story-line. We were trying to do a death-of-the-author reading of the poem, where the jabberwock is the father of the "beamish boy" or something like that. Like most high-school brainstorms, it never came to fruition, but the idea has been stuck in my head ever since.

Then some time around 2018 my brother shared an EDM track with me. It was Explorers by Hinkik, and after listening to it a couple times, I began to hear the story of Jabberwocky in the music. My sister and I sang some vocals, and I put together a few storyboards, culminating in this timing blocking:
https://youtu.be/cr5faLe5DS8
I was also introduced to @JordanBPeterson around this time, and began to see the archetypal Hero's Journey structure underlying all narrative, even poems as on-the-face silly as Jabberwocky. However, I was never confident enough in my vision for the project to complete it.

Then Midjourney, the AI Image Generation app came along. After doing a couple of other AMV style videos, I felt confident enough to tackle the dream of telling this story. It's based on a Heroic Transformational Journey reading of the poem, set in a science-fiction far future, where the "nonsense" words are proper nouns of the alien world flora and fauna. A young man goes on a simultaneous physical and psychological quest to reconcile with his father, save his parent's marriage, defeat the cyber-dragon terrorizing his space colony, and marry the girl of his dreams. I'd still like to do a from-scratch 3D animated version, but this is good enough for now.

Music: Explorers by Hinkik (re-cut by me)
Vocals: Suzanne Spooner (and me)
Visuals: Midjourney (prompts by me)
Software credit: Audacity @audacity and Blender @BlenderOfficial

Lyrics are Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll:
Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
  The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
  The frumious Bandersnatch!"
  
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
  Long time the manxome foe he sought
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
  And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
  The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
  And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
  The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
  He went galumphing back.
  
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
  Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
  He chortled in his joy."

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.