#bob botsford

As much as I've made comments about how long this took me to produce....it actually took even longer. There was an original script, a few years earlier, that I wrote just for fun and without yet ever intending on publishing this story in any way. At the time, this was just a fun thing for myself to think about. That script file, I'm sure is long gone, I wrote it on the only family computer before I got my first laptop, and my brother later turned that computer into his own gaming computer and wiped everything on it (I'm sure there's a backup somewhere, there's absolutely no way we just erased everything without backing everything up, but I have no intention of hunting that back up down lol). I do remember some important differences in that script that I thought would be fun to share!

Firstly, some differences to Word Up as a whole. Since this story was inspired while having WordGirl as a current hyperfixation and watching Meet the Robinsons and The Incredibles way too close together, originally I was going to steal the The Incredibles idea of super hero being illegal, and that been the reason why no one in the family was a super hero, or at least the surface level reason. I later decided I didn't want to steal my ideas from a movie just because it's a good movie with a similar genre, and changed it to be a conscious choice Becky made. However, I mentioned that the "illegal to be a super hero" concept was only the surface level reason for no one in the family being super heroes, the deeper reasons were to do with Becky's relationship with having been WordGirl, and that part remains true in this current version of Word Up. In every version of this, Becky always had complicated feelings about WordGirl, and in every version, it was those feelings that were driving her decisions, whether it be that she didn't push back on a law against super heroes, or it being what drove her choice to leave, or it being the reason that she personally doesn't want her kids to be super heroes (Tobey has his own reasons for not wanting them to super heroes, dealing with his own past as a villain). Some of these complicated feelings will be shown in New Beginnings, but the story after, Everything Changes, will have a pretty heavy focus on it.

Much more minor change to Word Up as a whole: Becky was originally supposed to be a librarian instead of a bookstore owner. Was changed mainly because, realistically, there is no way Tobey and Becky would able to afford the house they live in with Tobey being a teacher and Becky being a librarian. They probably still can't, but changes I made to make this slightly more believable were to have Becky run her own business that's doing pretty well, Tobey being a private school teacher so theoretically he's making more money, and Tobey's previous job being at a very high end tech company, and because the star couple are very good with their finances, the insane amount of Tobey made at his last job as been invested and is continuing to help them. Even after all those changes though, you're probably still going to have to suspend your disbelief in this regard. This was such a minor change, why the hell did I give an entire paragraph to explain the change????

Next regarding the actual lost script, originally Becky was supposed to be on a business trip and Tobey was supposed to find Bob just kinda...wandering the street looking for Becky. Tobey was going to give Bob the essential updates regarding the family and that Becky was out of town. Tobey was then going to be the one to being Bob home, introduce him to the kids, and of course call Becky and update her. The point of this was so that Bob could get some time to get to know Becky's family without her there (because of course, every moment these two are together is dedicated to reconnecting with each other). This was changed partially because she was originally a librarian and I'm not sure librarians go on business trips??? Idk, maybe they do... but moreso because I wanted Tobey and Bob to have conflict and forcing Tobey to be a good host because the actual good host was absent made that more difficult. I couldn't find a way to approach the story this way without it making one of them seem like a jerk. Either Tobey had to be a jerk that kicks Bob to the curb (which wasn't even a thought in my head in this version, for reasons I'll state below) or Bob had to be the jerk who's rude to the man that graciously took him in and was nothing but a good host to him. (Not to mention, as stated earlier, originally the story was about super heroes being illegal, and Bob was originally wandering around as Huggy, so Tobey actually saved his ass in the original story).

As mentioned above, having Tobey kick Bob to the curb wasn't even a fathomable option originally, because originally, if you can believe it, Tobey really didn't give two shits that Bob had left voluntarily. In this final version, Bob said "war" and Becky forgave him immediately, and in the original, Tobey was the same way. I think Theo might have a small problem with it, but I can't remember for sure. I think Theo was still a bit of an ass in that story, but it was more like "he's a just a teenager" vibes, whereas here, I hope you can see the loving instinct that is driving his behavior. Anyway, Tobey's perspective was changed because I realized he absolutely should 10000% have a problem with how Bob left. It made zero sense for Tobey to just be completely chill with Bob did.

Also Bob didn't have his translator yet in this version, it was originally meant to be something Tobey invented later. For the originl of this story, Bob was using a text to speech app on Tobey's phone to communitate with the family.