User blog:Strannik01/Behind the Scenes of the PDH Universe

What the heck was it all about, anyway?
Back in December of last year, I started posting short stories involving characters on this wiki. I never really explained anything or gave it any background, mostly because I was curious to see how people would react if I showed them my stories cold, without any preconceptions. But I figured that now would be as good of a time as any to give a little background.

PDH Universe actually started all the way back in 2005-2006, when I first discovered that some Golden Age characters were in public domain. It started out as a modern-day story involving revamped versions of the original characters. After toying around with it for a while, I realized that I didn't really like it. The world I created was the world where legacies of decades-old heroes endured for decades at the expense of everything else. It felt... stifling. Limiting. So I put the idea aside and moved on to other create endeavors.

A few years later, I came up with an idea for a story that was, to put it frankly and honestly, superheroes meets Disney teen stars. The plot would involve superheroes and supervillains of old continuing their fight in secret under the guise of corporate struggles. One of those companies was Trenton Enterprises, led by the well-meaning but ruthless Axel Trenton. That idea didn't really go anywhere, but I filed the concepts and characters away for future use.

Then, a couple of months ago, I got an idea for a story involving characters that were based on the early 90s cartoons I grew up on and how they were trying to adjust to civilian life. Along the way, I couldn't help but slip in references to Golden Age characters. And then, it hit me - I could use some of my PDH universe ideas to fill in the backstory. I had to tweak the history quite a bit to make it fit. I am not sure where I started using Axel Trenton and other characters from the whole secret corporate war story idea, but once I did, they became important parts of both the history and the present (though, again, they had to tweaked to make them fit). As I downloaded more and more public domain comics, I added more Golden Age stuff in the background and linked some of the previously unrelated plot threads together. It's still very much a work in progress, and I constantly find myself going back and tweaking details to make everything work better.

Right now, I am working on a novel set in the modern section of PHD universe. But when I need a background idea I want to develop, some tangent I can't cover in the main novel, I write a story and put it here, because, hey, I might as well share.

So that's PDH Universe in the nutshell - an evolving pile of tangents.

Oh, and for the record, PDH stands for Public Domain Heroes. It's not particularly clever, I know, but I used it for so long that it pretty much stuck.