Lorax - Blog Posts

The Lorax Novelization

Do you ever kinda wish something would exist, so you just decide to make it yourself?

Read here. I release new chapters every week.

Lorax Novelization Excerpt

Nobody ever really writes about Once-ler's life on the farm. I imagined he had to help support his family and fight for the chance to study by making a space in the barn or something. I think that would've been more relatable. Excerpt below.

Only one evening did Once-ler's Ma visit the barn out of curiosity to ask what he was doing.

"Wow," she said, when she saw what he'd done to the place.

It was practically an office now, with books stuffed into barrels and crates, one of the stalls made entirely into a library with shelves and a file cabinet. Blue prints and charts were taped to the walls and ceiling, with even more piles stacked around the floor. The big drafting table took up the wall facing the door, with magnificent designs pinned to the drawing board. In the corner Once-ler's well-loved guitar rested in a safe spot underneath the hayloft. This had been transformed into a comfortable out-of-the-way bedroom and changing area with a mattress, a neat basket of folded clothes and a curtain.

"Wow, you really have it good, Oncie," she told him. "And we don't even make you pay rent. You got this whole place to yourself while we're all crammed together in that little cottage. Brett and Chet sure don't get anythin' like this!"

She didn't mention that Brett and Chet never took the initiative to work for anything like it.

"And taking all my yarn!" she said, noticing what he'd swiped from her supply and turned into a mass of unidentifiable shapes. She tapped her foot. “Have you ever considered moving out?"

"Actually… I would love to now that hard times have come to an end." Once-ler spun around, and twirled one of the pink blobs of yarn around on his finger. "In fact, I'm almost ready to go and sell my invention. I just need to find something better than this cheap yarn to make it with."

(Read the whole story on Ao3)

Chapter Five is up!

Preview:

It’s rare that a fantasy comes true just as you’re fantasizing about it, but that’s just what happened when Once-ler’s wagon rolled over the next hill. Not only did the scene happen to be extraordinary, but it came at such a coincidental time of desperate wishfulness that Once-ler was ripped straight from his daydreams and his eyes filled with tears immediately.

PEACE! FREEDOM! INSPIRATION! it screamed all at once.

Such a heavy feeling of serenity and joy descended upon his soul that he knew immediately he was where he was meant to be. It took less than a second to decide this was home, and he would never change his mind for the rest of his days. A smile spread across his face, the kind that was so big it hurt.

The valley he overlooked was a forest, but not like the forest at home. He’d never dreamed a forest could be so different. Where the one behind his farm was small, dry, and gray, the one below stretched beyond the horizon, filled with the brightest green grass and dark blue water full of lily pads, duckweed, and cattails.

Wispy trees and bushes bloomed with pink, yellow, and orange silken foliage that filled his nose with sugary sweetness. Instead of being empty and boring, as if animals would rather be anywhere less desolate, it buzzed with bees, butterflies, frogs, and fish he could see even from his vantage atop the highest hill. A sense of adventure and endless discovery pierced his heart as Once-ler's wagon rolled deeper down into Heaven.

So this was how forests were supposed to be. Every choice he’d made up to that point had been right after all, if it had led him to this. When the wagon reached the bottom of the hill, the yodels died on his lips, and he threw his guitar in the back. “Come on, Melvin,” he said, leading the mule along. The forest only became more interesting from there.

Ho-li-ah Ho-le-rah-hi-hi-ah Ho-le-rah-cuckoo Fol-de-rol, laddie right Toor-a-lie-addy

“Wait, who’s singing? Oh, wow!” Once-ler stood in awe as he watched a trio of fat yellow and orange fish dancing atop a rock, using their fins as legs. They held hands, spinning with their eyes closed, occasionally kicking out their fins or breaking away to do an Irish jig.

“Bizarre,” he said, checking over his shoulder just in case it was some kind of trick. “Does anyone else even know this exists?”

A yellow butterfly soared past with wings the size of book pages. The dark spots on its wings looked like a cow's. It landed on a flower where a frog strolled by on its hind legs and started milking it into an acorn cap.

"Oh my goodness!" Once-ler hopped up and down. "I think I just stumbled upon a completely undiscovered habitat!" After his life at home, he'd begun to think there was no such thing as anything new or exciting.

"Magnificent," he said, tears filling his eyes as a swarm of orange swans flew over his head under sun-tinted clouds. They soared, then dipped, taking a dive alongside a waterfall that roared ominously.

~*~

Follow me for the rest of the rewrite! (I'm going to post new chapters every week).

I can't wait to get to the part about the Lorax. I'm going to write him so much differently than the movie that made him a useless smart aleck. I always thought he should be more mysterious and fae-like. Gonna try to make it like something Tolkien or Holly Black would write. This story is really fun to write!

Super quick Lorax concept, if he was a fae creature

original description:

"He was shortish. And oldish. And brownish. And mossy. And he spoke with a voice that was sharpish and bossy."

I'm gonna make him more mysterious than the movie in my fanfiction.

"Your presence here has run its course. Now heed my words, depart this place perforce. Ere sunset paints the valley's hue, begone, or nature's wrath you'll rue. Forces unleashed, a primal might, will curse you through eternal night. Beware, the warning's clear and grim. Your fate awaits if you stay within!"

The Great Lorax Rewrite (beginning)

Hey guys, here's the beginning of the fanfiction I'm writing on Ao3. The aim is to tell Once-ler's whole story from beginning to end without Ted interrupting. There are four chapters up so far, and a lot more to come:

"Where is it? Where did you put my guitar?"

Once-ler smacked his head as he looked under the triple bunk bed he was forced to share with his brothers in their small house.

"Reckon if ya don't get out there n' chop some trees, I'll let Brett n' Chet smash that dang guitar for good!" his Ma's voice called from the kitchen.

His younger twin brothers and sister laughed from the dinner table.

"Hurry up n' get more money from yer wood," Brett complained. "We only got three potatoes in our stew today, n' they're smaller n' ping pong balls."

"Yeah, an' none for you, Oncie," said Gizette. "I get the last one!"

"Why can't I ever have any of the stew if I'm always the one earnin' the money?" Once-ler tripped out of their closet-like bedroom, and squeezed around the table through the equally cramped dining area. This was made even harder by his abnormal height; he always had bruises on his knees and elbows from being such a tall person in such a small house.

Before him sat his shorter, but equally ungainly family, squished around the table: his mother with her teased up hair balanced by a bow, in her patched polka-dot sweater while serving brown stew water, the twins Brett and Chet with ripped up overalls and squashed hats who were staring eagerly at two tiny potatoes on their plates, and the youngest "baby" Gizette with ratty hair, buck teeth, and the biggest serving of stew of all (which was still not very big).

In the corner Once-ler's father was asleep in the rocking chair by the fire, using his old gray coat as a blanket. His gray hat was pulled over his stubbled face, and his ax laid on the floor beside him after his long day of woodcutting. Once-ler had to avoid the blade as he tiptoed to the only corner of the room with enough space.

"Because, sweetie," said his Ma, "You're the oldest child, and we have to think of the youngins. It's time for you to be an adult. Anyway, we've all got to make sacrifices when times are hard." The fancy unidentifiable dead animal she always wore around her neck bobbed its nose as she scooped the last tiny part of the stew into her own bowl.

This was always the excuse whenever Once-ler said he needed anything: "We have to think of the youngins." He understood the sentiment, really. It just seemed like he couldn't recall anyone ever using that argument during the short time he'd gotten to be the youngest. The youngest kids were also older than he'd been when they'd first started using this excuse. In fact, it seemed his family had decided Once-ler was an adult the second he'd been born, and that the others could never grow up.

Movie Rant

One thing that bothered me about the 2012 Lorax is what a psychotic jerk the Lorax was. He literally tried to kill the Once-ler ("I was just trying to calmly float you away." Yeah sure!) and only bopped in occasionally to insult and bicker with him.

This is one of the main reasons I chose to rewrite the story and make him a better character. I imagine the Lorax as more of a mysterious fae-like creature who can be mischievous but capable of more compelling arguments, rather than just being a bumbling smart aleck.

(Illustration by Tony DiTerlizzi)

What other movies do you think they made the good guy seem like a villain or vice versa? I'm hoping this will be the first in a series of rewrites in the form of full novelizations on Ao3. (I'm looking at you Wish movie).

New chapter is up!

Preview:

The first place Once-ler tried his luck was the city of North Nitch where the biggest businesses were. It was a city of rainbow, sleek buildings twisted into swirly shapes and blinking lights, filled with the latest technology, including traffic lights with seven colors instead of three. He lost track of how many times he almost got run over in traffic trying to understand what they were supposed to mean.

O'Hare's Business and Innovation Center was the biggest, sleekest, twistiest building where he made an appointment to pitch his product. He rode an elevator up to the hundredth floor at the top of the building where helicopters flew so close to the window it looked like he could touch them. The O'Hares were a famous line of CEOs who ran all the major companies in every country.

Once-ler pulled his guitar from his back, mentally going over the pitch he'd carefully prepared for the team of salesmen. He took a deep breath, and began:

"The great is Thneed… I mean, the Thneed is good," he missed a note, completely forgetting how to sing in anapestic tetrameter.

READ THE REST ON AO3!

Join me as I post an actually finished rewrite of this entire movie! Extra plot twists, foreshadowing, and embellishments, since I did multiple drafts! Nobody ever finished a full rewrite before, so I did it myself.

I was only going to release one chapter every Wednesday, but felt like posting more for fun. Comments/likes/kudos are REALLY appreciated, so I can get an audience. Please share this novelization with anyone you think would enjoy it.

I've been working on it for an abnormally long time, and got really carried away doing multiple drafts, especially for the later parts. The aim was to make it better than one of those professional Disney movie novelizations. Hopefully it feels like a full satisfying book with a lot of little things that connect and foreshadow.

The Lorax Rewritten/Full Novelization

Rest assured, the whole fanfiction exists and is finished. It is now being posted on a schedule. It seems like nobody ever actually seriously finishes these rewrites, so we finally did. Follow for new chapters, and to get the whole story of how the Lorax 2012 should've been.

Also let us know what other fandoms need high quality finished fanfictions, so we can make them finally exist too!

We are thinking of rewriting the Wish movie next. Obviously Magnifico was the good guy.

Because the original had a lot of plot holes and wasn't satisfying.

What to expect:

1. Actually tells the Once-ler's whole story from beginning to end (no Ted)

2. Gives Once-ler more agency and develops his motives beyond "my family made me do it."

3. Includes "You're all going to jail!" scene

4. Animals die/the stakes are raised

5. Logical explanations for why they couldn't just plant more trees or use a ladder, why Once-ler didn't just plant the seed himself, etc.

6. The Lorax is actually significant

7. Characters like Once-ler's dad, Norma, and O'Hare are woven in, but don't steal the spotlight. (Example: Norma isn't an annoying girlfriend who steals the role of the Lorax).

8. NO ANNOYING OCS, MARY SUES, OR STUPID ROMANCES!!!!!!!!!! Just a straightforward, comprehensive narrative of what the movie should've been like.

This entire novel is complete and has been through multiple drafts. If you follow it, you can be sure that it does have an ending and the author knows where it's going with foreshadowing and extra plot twists. Chapters will be released each week.

IM EXFOLIATING THIS IS THE FUNNIEST THING I’VE SEEN ALL DAY 😭

somebody said to draw basil as the lorax now so uhm yeah.. this is very uhm i have no words

HELP HELP HELP IM AT WORK AND I SEE THIS IM CRYING LMAOOOOOOOOO