User blog:FrenchTouch/The State of Crossroads

Holler y'all, FrenchTouch here to present you with, I think, a quite necessary update on how Crossroads is doing, possibly important questions that deserve an explanative answer and overall what it all means. Firstly, a complete listing of you folk's involvement in the universe; before that I would like to thank you for having participated and developed interest in the development of the project both within and out of it&mdash;so here goes: Also much thanks to Andrew, Jacky, Jacques, Arty and DS3 for their support, which is also very helpful on its own right.
 * Draft; overall creative consultation, conceptualization (Rapunkel,) and direct collaboration (Crossroads Pilot)
 * Carlos; creative consultation (Crossroads series,) conceptualization and direct collaboration (Crossroads Season 1 and own character)
 * Blue; creative consultation and conceptualization (own character and lore)
 * R&#333;nin; creative consultation and conceptualization (own character)

As can be seen quite easily, my work has been quite tremendously influenced by you guys in the best of ways, actually&mdash;I can already think of a couple of ideas that I never would've thought of and yet were so good to I can't not include them anymore. Thanks aside though, let's get in the middle of things: A recurring problem when brainstorming for Crossroads, either alone or in collaboration, is the cast, we don't really know&mdash;and when we do, we forget&mdash;who each character is and what they do, so as to clear this issue once and for all, allow me to introduce the cheatsheet for the main cast of Crossroads, the series. Spoilers ahead!  The Cast of Crossroads 

Hacktivist motivated by seeking untold truths about the world; joins a group sharing similar interests in order to be remunerated for taking such risks (season 1) from which he is put in relation with the team by Nick Rixon and becomes an informant. Seeing his group become stained by political affiliation and profit-seeking, he severs ties from it, at which point he is put in closer relation with the team, which starts considering his membership. (season 2) Adventurous and mysterious member whose sudden disappearance fueled rumors and a mild controversy among the team (at the time it was only an association,) leading to its unpopularity among the people and former/honorary members. (pre-series) Visiting professor in social sciences and one of the oldest members of the team, per shock in view of the political events that led to its existence, but also in reason of interest towards the behaviour of such an organism. (pre-series) Surprised with the evolution of the association into a vigilante task force, he makes the choice to officially desolidarize himself from the team yet in reality tries to observe it as close as possible while still avoiding any criminal endeavours, in order to document its story. (season 1) Founding member of the team and officer of the New York Police Department, affected to the Midtown South Precinct, joined in support of his colleague, Jacques Worther's idea. (pre-series) Was against the “vigilantization” of the team but later accepted it, using his resources as a police officer to lead the team on new cases. Japanese economist of the World Bank, bearer of news for the team through Kinard's improvised information web, (season 2) in favour of a decentralization/reform of international organizations. Immortal polymath, joined the team soon after its founding, most notably pushed the marginalization of team forward and set to develop the abilities of his colleagues. Takes the lead of risky maneuvers, setting the responsibilities and potential consequences upon himself in order to protect the integrity of the team. (all seasons) Dutch investigator, joins the team for a short amount of a time. Sidenote: The lack of details is voluntary because the spoilers are too strong on that one. Founding member of the team, spearheaded the association project in support of the New York Police Department with his former colleague, officer Drake Gibson, before controversy arose on the evergrowing Internet which turned people away from it and led to numerous personal attacks ranging from his age to homosexuality&mdash;cornered, to evade the blowback, he was demoted and colleagues who had supported him (except for Gibson) were in the obligation to distance themselves. (pre-series) Now a private investigator, saw in the new direction of the team a way to render his activities more productive and conjoint, he also manages the resources at hand during the entire lifespan of the team. Federal agent for the Defense Intelligence Agency, investigates on the same basis as the team. (season 2) Ostracized from the frame of society, joined the team seeking for a refuge in order to exorcise the demons of her past life. Part-time founding member of the team, didn't support the criminalization of the team but chose to help nonetheless; soon left because of the pressure weighing him down as to live a better family life. (season 1) Informant of the team, not a member, gains interest for the endeavours he is involved and disappears soon after putting profit above integrity. (season 1) Patron of his own vigilante group over the states and contacted on numerous occasions by the team for difficult operations needing special tactics. Part of Kinard's web. Trucker, handles money for the team so as to not engage suspicion. Superhuman helping with the more physical tasks of the team, advocates in favour working conjointly with governmental structures, which he ends up doing alone. Retired agent bent on destroying malevolent organizations by all means, cybernetically enhanced and trained fighter for the team. Honestly I have no fucking idea. Ex-gangster, personal friend of Iosepp. Conducts covert operations and retrieves information for the team in exchange for help with his own social endeavours. Homeless wanderer, stuck near the team for a while before disappearing as well. Solo vigilante, joined the team briefly in the context of shared interests in a conflict against certain criminals. Ex-freedom fighter in identity crisis, motivated by the need to change the world for the better to join the team, using the gained knowledge to advance further in his self-understanding.
 * Carlos Kinard
 * Dante Winsor
 * David Miranda
 * Drake Gibson
 * Eiji Watanabe
 * Iosepp
 * Jack Aaij
 * Jacques Worther
 * Jasmine Rosejoy
 * Mandy Waller
 * Mario Barrios
 * Nick Rixon
 * Oliver Barnes
 * Rafael Belinda
 * Ronnie Allen
 * Sergi Maya
 * Simon Mason
 * Tadarius Terrence
 * Ted Sala
 * Wiliam Lawton
 * Yan Galán

That's about all that I had in mind, but, of course, it is not immutable and can be changed, if you have any ideas I'd be glad to hear them but for the time being those are the barest descriptions for the cast. With that cleared out of the way though, I'd like to move on to something that might be a little more relevant:  The Progression of Crossroads  As of the upload time of this blog post, the series' pilot is not really out yet, Iosepp's page is far from rewritten and the rest of the Crossroads Universe is pretty much on standby. And I would like to address that, as more than meets the eye is going on about it&mdash;Concerning Iosepp, the advancement of his story is in no way a slowdown to the rest of the universe, as nothing of importance yet depends on it, which is also why it is slow. You will also note that I have started working on his fighting style, which, again is not a problem either, but like all things it does take time to work on, but in the end I think it should be for the better.

That said, the priority really is the series in itself, which, due to my inconvenient focus on detail, advances very slowly but still does quite a bit; as its subject, it needs to ripen and mature a bit before I can make use of it the way I intend to. All in all it was a much more complicated task than I expected but it will be coming.

On that note, I'd like to say that if you have any ideas, or just expectations, details you would like to see met in Crossroads, the series or the universe, be sure to inform me of it however you like so that I may think about it, it means a lot for me to include what you guys want to see so don't be shy about it if you feel like it.

As I've noticed, too, it would seem more Rapunkel would be welcome, so I will take some time to focus on her a bit in order to present you with quality content. Note that, having found a bit more of an equilibrium, I will now mostly be able to do multiple things at the same time, notably Earth-2702 and Earth-5888, semi-active projects that I do take very seriously as well.  TL;DR  I just noticed that every single thing I said was mostly rambling with no conclusion whatsoever, so excuse me for that, if you want a condensed version of what I said, here goes: Thanks to Draft, Carlos, Blue and R&#333;nin for their participation and to Andrew, Arty, Jacky, Jacques and DS3 for their support; because character roles are a problem in the Crossroads series, I have made a cheatsheet of bare descriptions for the entire main cast, which you can change if you have any ideas concerning it&mdash;Aside from that, all is going rather well and in spite of my writer's block, nothing else is really slowing down the progress of all my projects, so if you have any inquiry you'd like to make I am still relatively free and I'll do that as much as possible.

Stay tuned for a real, more in-depth update on my content, with new ideas. Have a good one, folk.