I remember when I was still living in the Phillipines. Clark Air Force Base, MacArthur Elementary School. A nice school, far better then the base housing around it at the time. I remembered it as a nice schoo. Where you can walk for hours and not fear about getting mugged or being lost. Behind it, at least an acre of playground and equipment meant for us kids. Slides that were at least twenty feet high (Now, they're much closer to the ground; must be a governement-reg thing....) A nice wooden bridge and "forts" that often reminded me of a child-giant's Lincoln Logs. The bridge was about ten feet wide and well over twenty-feet long. I could be wrong in those measurements; admitingly, I was very short as a child. *LOL*
Remembering that bridge right now, I wonder if the designers used the "military brat" thing as insperation. It would answer a lot of questions when I now think about it.
I had a lot of fun back then, the ususal games of Tag and "Capture the Flag" (Online games cannot compare, IMO) and the inevitibile games of "War". Just forming your own "Platoons" (Which almost always consist of guys (and a few girls) in the same classes. Picking the right goals and setting and taking it from there. Considering that all toy guns, even the obvious day-glo colored junk, were banned from the school, it was like group Tag. Consider that lives that our parents lived at the time, the transition was somewhat easier, I guess.
For a time, I always considered this story idea of this
"mock war" in the playground, based on my own personal
experiences. A certain satire of current and past war movies
without the actual guns and explosions. Seeing 3rd graders on
"patrol" packing Super Soakers. for example. A heavily
guarded "Ammo depot" being the nearest water spout.
Kids hiding in some playground equipment, looking over maps and
battle plans sketched in crayons and colored pencils.
"Humvees" replaced with go-carts with a nice-sized
Super Soaker mounted over the roll cage, right next to the
spotlight. <G>.
Sometimes, I would try to picture such an idea into other movies.
The "Future Battle" intro in "Terminator 2",
for example. With just those water guns and maybe a fire hose
*LOL* Or "Saving Private Ryan", where they're storming
this fort/playground eqiupment in this huge sandbox. And people
get "out" when they get hit with the streams of water.
And maybe a few "refs" keeping watch and score.
Or maybe a "crack team" that consists of a small
group, out to undermine the "regime" of the oppressive
PTA. (Which, IMO, are opressive. Most of the PTA's ideals on
censorship reminds me of the usual Facist propaganda that you'd
find in 1940's Europe.) Set and run like the "crime
thriller/bank heist" movies. Kids in plain clothes and large
backpacks with hands-off microphones crotched over equipment and
in the back of their bikes. Surveillance teams in thick jackets,
watching over people from a distance with
"Ghelli-covered" telescopes.
It's kinda funny when I think about that idea. Because of how
much technology is in schools right now, bought and used
by the students there. PDAs, beepers, cell phones, et al. You got
these devices that allows instant messaging across the room, and
you find out ten year-olds are getting them. You got MP3 players
and other such high-tech goodies that kids seem to master almost
instantly and, to me, seeing them working as some sort of
surveillance team actually fits.
Personally, it makes me feel kinda old, because I always made due
with the usual pasing notes in class. Using friends as courtiers.
And maybe the occasional coded message written in the inside door
of a bathroom stall. Ten years from now, such practices would be
considered "quaint"
Or maybe just a plain, old Resistance story. I always love them <G>. For some reason, the romantic fight for some sort of "Independance" and corrupted powers always make me feel somewhat happy, within reasons. I mean, I got the idea when I was still a Senior in high school. Walking down some hallway, trying to get to class on time. And I started to notice these students, just clustering together in their own little groups. Most of the conversations were short, but sometimes, you can also see them making hand guestures as the group parts. Some are subtle, and others are broad. Seeing that, I guess that's where the root of the idea came from. But then, seeing all these people in their own clustered groups kinda disgusted me as well. Seeing them staying with "their own" and almost never intermingling unless forced to. It'd often reminded me of the Hindu caste system, for certain reasons.
But the ideas are there. And maybe one day, I might actually sit down and write some of them down into something legitimate enough to sell <G>. But knowing my luck, Nicklodean might be the only ones buying them, and I *hate* those guys!