ITT: Original Story Ideas

[Doktor Howl]

humanity spends 1,000 years colonizing space with gigantic cryo-sleeper ships and trade routes that take 100 years to cross, and people can upload their conscious minds to computers to overcome the vast time scales everything takes now, and everything in human culture revolves around waiting 50 years for the Amazon package to arrive. Then, some asshole finally invents dependable faster-than-light engines, and everything will fall apart if the technology isn't immediately suppressed.

Here's one:  A generation ship arrives to find their target planet fully colonized by people who left Earth 50 years after they did, because that's when FTL travel was invented.  And it turns out that the skills needed to colonize a near-Earth planet aren't really all THAT useful on a fully urbanized planet, so they all wind up working in the equivalent of McDonalds/WalMarts, and die in abject poverty some years later.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

humanity spends 1,000 years colonizing space with gigantic cryo-sleeper ships and trade routes that take 100 years to cross, and people can upload their conscious minds to computers to overcome the vast time scales everything takes now, and everything in human culture revolves around waiting 50 years for the Amazon package to arrive. Then, some asshole finally invents dependable faster-than-light engines, and everything will fall apart if the technology isn't immediately suppressed.

Here's one:  A generation ship arrives to find their target planet fully colonized by people who left Earth 50 years after they did, because that's when FTL travel was invented.  And it turns out that the skills needed to colonize a near-Earth planet aren't really all THAT useful on a fully urbanized planet, so they all wind up working in the equivalent of McDonalds/WalMarts, and die in abject poverty some years later.

No no no, thet're relieved. They were only doing this because that's what their parents wanted. It is a generation ship after all.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

Something similar to the "Who's on First" skit by abbot and costello, but in place of strange nicknames instead revolving around ambiguous use of the phrase "foot fetish" in a store that sells both pornography and lucky rabbit's foot talismans

EDIT:
More ideas:

*The trademark dispute between the World Wildlife Fund and the World Wrestlig Federation is depicted as having been settled by having Hulk Hogam wrestle a bear

*The inner circle of the Republican Party consists of a cult of followers of the religion of the ancient Aztecs. This is why the Republican Party believes that war brings prosperity

[LuciferX]

humanity spends 1,000 years colonizing space with gigantic cryo-sleeper ships and trade routes that take 100 years to cross, and people can upload their conscious minds to computers to overcome the vast time scales everything takes now, and everything in human culture revolves around waiting 50 years for the Amazon package to arrive. Then, some asshole finally invents dependable faster-than-light engines, and everything will fall apart if the technology isn't immediately suppressed.

Here's one:  A generation ship arrives to find their target planet fully colonized by people who left Earth 50 years after they did, because that's when FTL travel was invented.  And it turns out that the skills needed to colonize a near-Earth planet aren't really all THAT useful on a fully urbanized planet, so they all wind up working in the equivalent of McDonalds/WalMarts, and die in abject poverty some years later.

No no no, thet're relieved. They were only doing this because that's what their parents wanted. It is a generation ship after all.

Subtitle: /Overcoming Technology/
Cover illustration: Tesla Roadster in space with mannequin "driver"

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[addendum, 2/10]

We open on protagonist entering a travel agency reminiscent of the original Total Recall film.
Glossy brochures of different travel options are presented by a campy future-retro mannequin service android.
Flipping through them one last time, "I see the free consciousness upload is included with all packages,"
the protagonist remarks in a casual way. A fake bead of sweat forms on the android's forehead as
it responds, "B-because we figured that way there would be less reasons for complaint," after a long
beat, "Consider it like a nescesary backup, something required for our peace of mind, like destination insurance."
"I'm not sure I follow."
"Well, since you're actually the last client I'll ever have, suppose I told you, would you still buy the ticket?"
"What's it to you?"
"Heh," the robot seems to smile, "I suppose it's probably not news to you that otherwise you won't make it?"

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

A shock rocker, under studio pressure to produce a follow up to his extremely successful second album, moves into a murder house associated with occult experiments in order to inspire him, at the same time as trying to kick a drug habit he doesn't quite admit he has. However, the house is haunted (or possibly he just has delirium tremens). He finishes the album & his friends are surprised by how stable he's acting, & it's hinted that he is possessed by the killer magus.

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

A priest decides that the world's sorry state is because the communion is not literally human flesh and blood, and starts a movement that becomes unexpectedly popular, in part because this ritual causes the memories & vitality of the deceased to be spread among the congregation, who now share a weak psychic link strengthened weekly.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

One of those insufferable end of innocence stories where some snot-nosed little puke has to come to terms with the untimely death of a friend, except that it gradually transmutes into a knockoff of The Final Destination and as the main character starts to come to grips with the fact that death comes for everybody that's when Death comes for everybody

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

Ok I just reread my last suggestion and it's kind of stupid as is. Here's how I decided it should go:

The protagonist's friend or dog or father figure almost dies and forces them to comr=e to grips with death. But though they don't die Death is now after them in a Final Destination-esque fashion

alternately

Someone poignantly dies but then they come back from the dead as a ghost or vampire or something and it turns into a supernatural teen romance

alternately

dog/friend/father figure dies and protagonist spends most of the story on a quest for for a magical artifact capable of restoring life, such as the elixir of life, the necronomicon, or the holy grail. The quest succeeds. Alternately they might spend their life developing a Re-Animator-esque serum

EDIT:

A fake bead of sweat forms on the android's forehead

I like this. I've got the image in my head here of a cut to a closeup on a nozzle specifically designed to extrude fake beads of sweat.

[ReverendJesus]

A fake bead of sweat forms on the android's forehead

I like this. I've got the image in my head here of a cut to a closeup on a nozzle specifically designed to extrude fake beads of sweat.

As a matter of fact, Ouestionable Content's alternate universe has specifically addressed this issue. They have a little nozzle, and a "thick whitish fluid" comes out.

[axod]

A fake bead of sweat forms on the android's forehead

I like this. I've got the image in my head here of a cut to a closeup on a nozzle specifically designed to extrude fake beads of sweat.

As a matter of fact, Ouestionable Content's alternate universe has specifically addressed this issue. They have a little nozzle, and a "thick whitish fluid" comes out.

Yeah, I have this actuator / potentiometer to simulate parasympathetic SLUDGE response with a dedented rotary, but it doesn't do anything kinky.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

An overweight demon tries several fad diets to try and lose weight including eating only people's souls and eating only pain and sorrow

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

Skit: The Hamburgler's healthfood nut cousin, The Broccoli Raaber

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

An "Blair Withc"-style amatuer film crew making a film about civics discovers that the real reason why the Republicans talk about Jesus so much is to draw attention away from the fact that they actually worship Mammon, and that this is also the reason why so many black people are executed, because they are Mammon's favorite sacrifice. The crew films several party meetings in secrecy but is eventually discovered and shot down by submachinegun wielding party members as they try to run away. The camera falls down a storm drain after it is dropped. The final expository text at the end explains that no one was charged with their murder due to some bs about stand your ground laws and their film equipment being a "hoax bomb".

I just finished playing the game Night in the Woods and the last act is basically this. Or at any rate the villains spout republican-like rhetoric and sacrifice people to demons, which is ultimately the core gist of this idea.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

Hellraiser sequel: Donald Trump is the newest cenobite. Because he's into that too. His body mod is that his toupee has been sewn into his scalp. EDIT: Also, possibly, tubes implanted into his bladder constantly empty into his throat

[LuciferX]

Tongue in check mockumentary about the origins of Alexa and the marketing exodus that occurred over branding concerns because the product name was changed from iAlexa, which supposedly was too close to Alexia, a condition they pretended to avoid.