I been thinking about this for a while. First with a the significant other of a hero without powers or a helping role, where we see their day to day life and how they feel insignificant next to the hero and all the action that take place away from them for the most. See different relations, ones where the hero over compensates for short-comings, one where they are toxic or even abuse panther in their. Mentors for heroes, who start the story with as mentors, mother/parents of heroes. Also when i mean full story, i don’t mean a single episode in a series or a poltline in a book, but a fully completed story centered around them alone.
some archs i thought of:
-the comedic relief -the powerhouse(usually written as dumb) -the villain(that is not just a serial killer) -the future seer/oracle
Feel free to add media/stories use the arch for the full stories
More (anti) war films from the “wrong” side’s perspective. Flags of our Fathers and All Quiet on the Western Front are compelling as they tell stories that we all know but from a fresh point of view making you compare and contrast the experiences from both sides.
Something that fleshed out the lives and motivations of VC or NVA troops during the Vietnam War would be interesting as they’re only ever portrayed as screaming fanatics who’s only existence is to shoot at Americans in most films.
Or the story of a conscripted German teenager sent to Normandy on the eve of the allied invasion and the all-encompassing dread that must overwhelmed them as ships and planes fill the sea and sky.
Or what life must have been like on board a Japanese aircraft carrier before Midway, that unshakeable belief in your own destiny as a people filled with propaganda about your own superiority and stories of your endless victories to be so utterly shattered in a cataclysmic defeat. The ultimate story of hubris.
Band of Brothers has that one scene where they’re walking past a bunch of German POWs and Malarkey jokingly asks them where they’re from, only for one of them to respond with “Eugene, Oregon”.
Supposedly based on a real encounter, the guy’s family was part of “The Aryan Call” wave of propaganda that happened early in the war, which had some native German families in the US return to fight for Germany. Poor guy just got swept up in his family’s decision. It was an incredibly humanizing moment when you realize everyone there, on both sides, is just some scared kid, far from home, whose only there because circumstances in their lives beyond their control brought them.
Of course, shortly after, the guy gets executed with the rest of the POWs.