Hops & HavocA Bellwether story
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World & Canon · Proposals

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Future Ideas Backlog#

Status: Proposal, not canon
Promotion rule: An idea becomes canon only when incorporated into an approved core document or released project.

Tags: STORY, COMIC, GAME, WEB, ART, MERCH, WORLD, CHARACTER

001-020: Bellwether Stories#

  1. IDEA-001 - The Permit from Beyond [STORY] Priya discovers the Collective filed its first Earth claim through a county mineral-rights form in 1987.
  1. IDEA-002 - Doug Teaches Shop [COMIC] Doug runs a repair workshop for teenagers while hiding an active alien device among ordinary broken lawn equipment.
  1. IDEA-003 - The Randy's Chili Sanction [STORY] A Collective diplomat interprets Randy's annual chili contest as a binding trial of planetary sovereignty.
  1. IDEA-004 - Jerry's Open House [COMIC] Jerry must host a neighborhood open house while his signal shed contains a captured Curator.
  1. IDEA-005 - Municipal Logo Crisis [WEB] Bellwether debates whether the Resistance symbol violates the town branding guide during an active siege.
  1. IDEA-006 - The Last Video Store [STORY] Doug protects the region's final video store because analog tapes contain images the Collective cannot alter remotely.
  1. IDEA-007 - Foam Day Parade [COMIC] The Collective stages a compulsory celebration that the Resistance hijacks using parade-float hydraulics.
  1. IDEA-008 - The Haunted Taproom [STORY] Apparent ghosts in a closed brewery are memory fragments stored in dormant yeast.
  1. IDEA-009 - Blue Ribbon Invasion [GAME] County fair minigames become defensive training and resource gathering before a major attack.
  1. IDEA-010 - The Bellwether Bigfoot Committee [STORY] Local cryptid hunters possess excellent trail cameras and terrible conclusions about alien scouts.
  1. IDEA-011 - Randy Runs for Mayor [COMIC] Randy becomes a protest candidate and accidentally develops a viable platform centered on parking and extraterrestrial disclosure.
  1. IDEA-012 - The Brewery Ghost Kitchen [STORY] A delivery-only restaurant distributes spore cultures through comfort food selected by predictive software.
  1. IDEA-013 - Doug's Lost Skate Tape [CHARACTER] Footage from 1989 shows the Gleaming Cube in the background of Doug's teenage downhill run. (Promoted to canon as STORY-11.)
  1. IDEA-014 - The Public Comment Offensive [COMIC] Heather organizes residents to delay annexation through a meeting that the Collective is legally required to hear in full.
  1. IDEA-015 - Battle of the Christmas Tree Lot [STORY] Alien heat signatures animate unsold trees into a defensive grove.
  1. IDEA-016 - The Laundromat Node [GAME] A tiny satellite node uses dryer resonance and missing socks to distribute cultures.
  1. IDEA-017 - Bellwether After Dark [WEB] An in-universe late-night call-in show archives rumors, witness accounts, and increasingly accurate conspiracy maps.
  1. IDEA-018 - The HOA Collaborators [STORY] A gated community accepts Collective protection in exchange for perfect lawns and strict microbial covenants.
  1. IDEA-019 - Randy's First Dollar [CHARACTER] A story about the tavern's earliest years reveals why Randy protects a building he constantly claims to hate.
  1. IDEA-020 - The Great Tap Handle Heist [GAME] The Resistance steals symbolic tap handles from occupied breweries to recover access codes hidden in their grain.

021-040: Character and Relationship Stories#

  1. IDEA-021 - Barry's Performance Review [COMIC] Barry demands formal recognition as a Resistance officer, then rejects every evaluation category.
  1. IDEA-022 - Marlene's Impossible Drill [STORY] Marlene conducts an evacuation exercise while Doug creates the emergency she was planning to simulate.
  1. IDEA-023 - Heather Takes a Night Off [CHARACTER] The entire intelligence network malfunctions because everyone assumed Heather would quietly fix their problems.
  1. IDEA-024 - Jerry Was Wrong [STORY] Jerry's certainty about an infiltrator damages an innocent person, forcing him to rebuild trust without hiding behind the alien threat.
  1. IDEA-025 - Doug's Daughter [CHARACTER] Introduce an adult daughter who loves Doug but refuses to participate in his myth of himself.
  1. IDEA-026 - The Other Barry [STORY] A discarded early Barry copy has built a peaceful life running a motel and does not want reintegration.
  1. IDEA-027 - Peaches Explains the Nickname [COMIC] Four witnesses tell mutually exclusive stories, each visually presented as fact.
  1. IDEA-028 - Tucker's Apology Tour [STORY] Tucker visits towns harmed by Heritage's distribution and discovers that public remorse can become another brand.
  1. IDEA-029 - Calvin's Rulebook [MERCH] An illustrated pocket manual mixing genuine preparedness with notes about Doug-specific hazards.
  1. IDEA-030 - Vellum Tries Fast Food [COMIC] Vellum studies human hospitality at a drive-through and reaches dangerous conclusions about menus and consent.
  1. IDEA-031 - Kayla's Missing Hour [STORY] One hour of invasion footage contradicts her memory and contains a message from a future Barry.
  1. IDEA-032 - Randy and the Grand Culture [CHARACTER] Randy negotiates with a planetary intelligence as though settling a vendor invoice.
  1. IDEA-033 - Kip Without a Team [STORY] A disgraced Kip must navigate town on foot and decide whether identity survives loss of status.
  1. IDEA-034 - Mother Scoby's Childhood [WORLD] Conflicting accounts imply Mother Scoby began as a human wellness entrepreneur, an alien exile, or both.
  1. IDEA-035 - Jerry and Barry Fix a Furnace [COMIC] A contained bottle episode where two technical experts turn a basic repair into an argument about consciousness.
  1. IDEA-036 - Doug Learns Restraint [STORY] Doug must win a confrontation without striking, breaking, jumping, or quoting anything he saw on VHS.
  1. IDEA-037 - Heather's Black Book [WORLD] A contact ledger becomes more strategically valuable than the Cube for one night.
  1. IDEA-038 - Marlene for Governor [STORY] Post-invasion politics pressure Marlene to turn emergency competence into a campaign identity.
  1. IDEA-039 - Barry Gets Religion [CHARACTER] Barry explores belief after encountering a system his models cannot reduce, then becomes insufferable in a new direction.
  1. IDEA-040 - Doug and Jerry, 1992 [COMIC] A flashback shows the friendship beginning during a failed attempt to repair a stolen arcade cabinet.

041-060: Alien Worlds and Expansion#

  1. IDEA-041 - The Dry Planet [WORLD] A world rejected fermentation and built a culture the Collective cannot classify.
  1. IDEA-042 - Lager Moon Prison [GAME] A low-gravity prison stores dissidents in individual flavorless cells.
  1. IDEA-043 - The Cultivated Dead [STORY] The Collective reconstructs extinct species as products without restoring their cultures.
  1. IDEA-044 - Interstellar Health Inspection [COMIC] Randy's Two receives an alien sanitation inspector with standards that classify humans as an open fermentation hazard.
  1. IDEA-045 - The World That Chose Annexation [STORY] The heroes visit a prosperous planet that knowingly joined the Collective and resents Earth for destabilizing it.
  1. IDEA-046 - Foamgate Road Trip [GAME] A route-based game mode jumps between occupied worlds with changing environmental rules.
  1. IDEA-047 - The Unmarketable Species [WORLD] An alien culture is immune to branding because it cannot perceive status.
  1. IDEA-048 - Vellum's Home Culture [STORY] Vellum returns home as a traitor and confronts relatives distributed across several bodies.
  1. IDEA-049 - Grand Cellar Travel Guide [WEB] An in-universe tourism guide gradually reveals coercive social systems beneath beautiful destinations.
  1. IDEA-050 - The Original Brewery [WORLD] The first Collective fermentation site is sacred, abandoned, and built around a fragment resembling the Cube.
  1. IDEA-051 - The Planet of Perfect Reviews [STORY] A civilization eliminated dissatisfaction by making criticism biologically impossible.
  1. IDEA-052 - Galactic Dive Bar Crawl [COMIC] Heather maps independent gathering places across alien cultures.
  1. IDEA-053 - The Macro Alliance Goes Interstellar [STORY] Human corporations export franchising to worlds newly freed from the Collective.
  1. IDEA-054 - Barry's Moon [CHARACTER] A machine settlement asks Barry to become its founding operating system.
  1. IDEA-055 - The Flat Beer Nebula [ART] A dead region of space where fermentation signals vanish and ships drift into unshared memories.
  1. IDEA-056 - Bract's Trial [STORY] Marshal Bract is tried under a legal system that assumes collective responsibility rather than individual guilt.
  1. IDEA-057 - The Tap at the End of Time [STORY] A Foamgate malfunction sends the trio to the last open establishment in the universe.
  1. IDEA-058 - Cultivar Civil War [GAME] Collective factions compete to define voluntary federation after the Grand Culture fractures.
  1. IDEA-059 - Randy's Two Franchise Dispute [COMIC] Unauthorized Randy's locations spread across space with wildly inaccurate menus.
  1. IDEA-060 - The Species That Invented Corn Dogs [WORLD] Peaches discovers an alien civilization with a suspiciously familiar fair food and declares first contact a success.

061-080: Game, Web, Art, and Merchandise#

  1. IDEA-061 - Barry Device Companion [WEB] A website mode lets Barry critique visitors' tactical choices and browser settings.
  1. IDEA-062 - Bellwether Interactive Map [WEB] Locations unlock timeline entries, evidence, menus, and hidden alien infrastructure.
  1. IDEA-063 - Resistance Field Patches [MERCH] Skill-based patches for repair, logistics, hospitality, radio, and municipal procedure.
  1. IDEA-064 - Gleaming Cube Desk Light [MERCH] A deliberately mysterious light with Barry's objections printed in the manual.
  1. IDEA-065 - Randy's Menu Zine [MERCH] Recipes, stories, stains, and handwritten continuity clues.
  1. IDEA-066 - D.A.G.G.E.R.S. Cycling Jersey [MERCH] Premium-looking faction gear whose acronym differs subtly across labels.
  1. IDEA-067 - VHS Character Trailers [WEB] Short degraded training tapes hosted by Doug, contradicted by Barry.
  1. IDEA-068 - Build Barry a Body [GAME] Players assemble chassis modules that alter mobility, weapons, and insult delivery.
  1. IDEA-069 - Tavern Defense Board Game [GAME] Cooperative placement game balancing customers, repairs, intelligence, and escalating alien inspections.
  1. IDEA-070 - Foamgate Pinball [GAME] A physical or digital table moving the ball between Bellwether and the Grand Cellar.
  1. IDEA-071 - Enemy Can Labels [ART] Fictional beverage labels encode enemy lore without promoting real alcohol consumption.
  1. IDEA-072 - Resistance Radio Podcast [WEB] In-universe broadcasts deliver fiction, updates, music, and unreliable reports.
  1. IDEA-073 - Choose Your Own Zoning Hearing [WEB] An interactive story where every procedural choice affects invasion readiness.
  1. IDEA-074 - Doug's Improvised Arsenal Cards [MERCH] Collectible cards show components, failure modes, and Jerry's safety notes.
  1. IDEA-075 - The Barry Insult Generator [WEB] Curated, character-accurate technical criticism with strict writing rules.
  1. IDEA-076 - Randy's Two Neon Sign [MERCH] A sign whose "Two" intermittently shuts off, preserving Randy's complaint.
  1. IDEA-077 - Bellwether Newspaper Archive [WEB] Fake local reporting tracks the invasion from civic boosterism to resistance journalism.
  1. IDEA-078 - Analog Survival Kit [MERCH] Notebook, map, pencils, cards, and fictional field guide packaged as resistance equipment.
  1. IDEA-079 - Culture Ship Cutaway [ART] Technical poster showing biological systems with Jerry and Barry arguing in annotations.
  1. IDEA-080 - Randy's Tavern Pop-Up [MERCH] An event installation focused on set design, food, actors, and story clues.

081-103: Long-Horizon Franchise Ideas#

  1. IDEA-081 - Children of the Pour [STORY] A generation raised after the invasion considers alien technology ordinary and the original Resistance embarrassingly mythologized.
  1. IDEA-082 - The Cube Chooses Someone Else [STORY] Doug must accept that the artifact responds more strongly to a person he distrusts.
  1. IDEA-083 - Death of a Barry [STORY] One legitimate Barry instance chooses permanent shutdown to protect the others.
  1. IDEA-084 - The Second Bellwether [WORLD] A Collective world copied Bellwether from harvested memories and populated it with inaccurate recreations.
  1. IDEA-085 - Randy's Museum Problem [STORY] Historians want to preserve the rebuilt tavern, preventing it from functioning as a living bar.
  1. IDEA-086 - Doug Walker Action Figure Lawsuit [COMIC] Doug approves an unsafe toy prototype while Marlene fights unauthorized use of the Resistance image.
  1. IDEA-087 - The Peace Conference Cookout [STORY] BBQ procedure becomes the neutral protocol for negotiations among species with incompatible dining biology.
  1. IDEA-088 - Jerry's Final Conspiracy [STORY] Jerry suspects the peaceful postwar network is quietly rebuilding the same control under friendlier language.
  1. IDEA-089 - The Cube Is Afraid [WORLD] Evidence suggests its unpredictable behavior is defensive rather than mystical.
  1. IDEA-090 - Return of Mother Scoby [STORY] A voluntary symbiosis movement asks whether her ideas were wrong or merely imposed.
  1. IDEA-091 - The Unfermented War [NOVEL] A civilization from beyond Collective space sees all symbiotic life as contamination.
  1. IDEA-092 - Barry for President [COMIC] A machine-rights campaign uses Barry's image without obtaining his consent.
  1. IDEA-093 - The Last Macro Lager [STORY] A supposedly ordinary can becomes culturally priceless after galactic collectors misunderstand its rarity.
  1. IDEA-094 - Doug Opens a Dojo [COMIC] Doug combines skateboarding, repair, and action philosophy into a training system that works despite lacking theoretical coherence.
  1. IDEA-095 - The Quicksand I Was Promised [GAME] A brewery's spent-grain lagoon turns into a real rescue hazard, briefly vindicating Doug's lifelong belief that quicksand deserved more respect.
  1. IDEA-096 - Antidote Run [GAME] The Resistance must compound and deliver district-specific spore cures before a conformity yeast turns the town's favorite memories into brand preferences.
  1. IDEA-097 - Three Minutes to Last Call [STORY] A countdown crisis forces Doug, Jerry, Barry, and Randy to solve different parts of the same impossible tavern emergency without a clean command structure.
  1. IDEA-098 - Heather Writes the History [NOVEL] Competing memoirs force Heather to document who actually made the Resistance function.
  1. IDEA-099 - The Grand Culture's Child [CHARACTER] A new distributed intelligence asks Barry to serve as parent, mentor, or warning.
  1. IDEA-100 - Bellwether Secedes from Earth [STORY] Treaty language accidentally gives the town independent interstellar standing.
  1. IDEA-101 - Randy's at the Beginning [STORY] Time displacement places the tavern crew at the origin of Collective fermentation, where intervention could erase their own history.
  1. IDEA-102 - The Thing That Made the Cube [NOVEL] The creator finally approaches, but its explanation contradicts every recorded Cube event.
  1. IDEA-103 - Last Call [STORY] Far in the future, an older Doug closes Randy's for the night while a new crew argues about a minor problem that is obviously the next invasion.

Parked: The Off-World Arc#

Status: Parked proposals, not canon (decision 2026-07: the franchise stays local to Bellwether)

The original twenty-story timeline escalated past Bellwether into a regional, planetary, and interstellar war. That escalation was cut when the Master Timeline was rescoped to fifteen Bellwether-local stories. The beats are preserved here in case the franchise ever earns them. Several supporting entries elsewhere in canon (Foamgates, the Culture Ship, the Grand Cellar, Randy's Two, Grand Culture Avatars) are parked alongside this arc.

Former Act III, The Appalachian Pour:

  • The Blue Ridge Tapline. A convoy campaign through mountain towns, disabling nodes. The Collective counter-offers real economic rescue. Ends with the first stable Foamgate.
  • Macro Aggression. The Macro Alliance buys into the war with supplies and unacceptable conditions. Mother Scoby captures a Foamgate and redirects it beyond Earth.
  • Foamgate 89. All factions converge on an unstable gate at Mile Marker
  1. A Collective scout ship crashes at Blue Cinder Ridge and the Resistance gains a ship.
  • The Worst Astronauts. Doug, Jerry, Heather, Barry, Peaches, and Vellum train for space and launch while still attached to part of the repair shop.
  • Effervescence Without End. The crew infiltrates the regional command ship and learns Earth is one of thousands of cultivated worlds.

Former Act IV, Planetary Pour:

  • Open Bar at the End of the World. Worldwide node activation presented as a service upgrade. Annexation offered through a consumption-weighted vote.
  • One Person, One Pour. The Resistance defeats the fraudulent vote. Barry is trapped inside the Grand Culture.
  • The Barry Problem. Competing Barry instances across Earth. The Cube extracts one continuity at an unexplained cost.

Former Act V, Taking Their Planet:

  • They Took Our Bar. The Collective destroys Randy's. Thousands of venues rename themselves Randy's for one night. (Localized and promoted to canon as STORY-14.)
  • We're Taking Their Planet. The crew reaches the Grand Cellar and forces a civilization-wide confrontation with consent. The Grand Culture fractures into voluntary networks. (The disconnect beat was localized into STORY-15.)

Backlog Review Questions#

Before promoting an idea, answer:

  1. What core character truth does it test?
  2. What changes after the story?
  3. Why can this happen only in Hops & Havoc?
  4. Does it preserve sincerity?
  5. Which canon documents require updates?
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