Plagiarism of the SavageMen (short story)

After the destruction of Morningstar 1, its Cupids have returned to the Cupid Homeworld. They are given new occupations, such as Dactylopius-177 joining the Department of Linguistics; with the Department of Art having been in self-imposed seclusion for twenty years as they furiously debate the meaning of Mona Lisa's grin, painter Paintbrush-122 is offered a position as a creature designer with the Department of Entertainment for their upcoming animated series The Rainbow Adventures, concerning kids who travel through dreams using a magic rainbow. Among the nightmares he is tasked with designing are the SavageMen, horned, brutish robots conceived of as the descendants of a small group of Clockwork Cherubs who became stranded in a pocket dimension and dared to modify themselves.

However, due to a misunderstanding, the same basic story outline is also sent to a different team, headed by Sketchbook-430, who deliver their own rendition of it, with a subtly altered origin story for the robots. To resolve the apparent contradiction, a line is hastily dubbed in the Sketchbook cut, referencing a prior encounter between the Rainbow Kids and the SavageMen “in the 14th Cosmos” (which does not actually match the events of the Paintbrush version). When the two cartoons are screened at the Cupid Theatre as consecutive episodes respectively entitled The Death? Planned It! and The Moonbeams, however, it becomes apparent that the designs created by the two teams are in fact virtually identical. After the credits roll, a fight breaks out between Paintbrush and Sketchbook, who were attending the premiere incognito, with each accusing the other of having stolen the design.

The fight is broken up by Larrikin-1029, who'd stayed late in the hope of there being an exciting post-credits stringer, and who captures the two in a burlap sack and brings them before Judicator-337 of the Department of Discipline. What beings as an informal trial soon devolves back into name-calling, only for events to come to an unlikely conclusion when a Rift opens right above Judicator's desk, allowing a group of actual, live SavageMen through into the Cupid Homeworld. Threatening the Cupids with annihilation if they don't comply, they assert that they are the rightful owners to the copyright of their own design, as decreed by the Supreme Court of the Fourteenth Cosmos. Though this is where the transcript of the trial ends due to the Secretary Cupid having legged it, it later becomes apparent that an agreement was indeed worked out, as all further episodes of The Rainbow Adventures featuring the SavageMen now credit the SavageMen with the ownership of their own concept and design.

While the event goes on to be recorded in “Incident Report C248A”, with a note from the Department of Discipline that it is of historical interest only and should not be construed as any kind of legal precedent, Sketchbook-430 and Paintbrush-122, “now better-educated as to the dangers of being an artist and a multiversal traveller” decide to to give up on monster design and resolve to “exclusively paint still lives, preferably of potted begonias”.

Worldbuilding

Universes

The story takes place in the Cupid Homeworld.
The 97th Cosmos is referenced.
The SavageMen originated in the 14th Cosmos which apparently has well-known “anomalous properties” previously discussed in a Cupid Fact File.

Other

Although the Supreme Quaestor wouldn't allow it to be made until the creators included a secondary Cupid character, The Rainbow Adventures principally stars a cast of human characters, a first for media produced by the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids for the Cupids' own consumption.
The Cupids in attendance at the first screening of The Death? Planned It! and The Moonbeams are described as relishing the escapism because they're “so tired by their work of traveling the multiverse and thwarting green gorillas”.
When a fight first broke out between Paintbrush-122 and Sketchbook-430, Valerius-1497 commented that “one of them was probably lying about the other being the plagiarist — unless he wasn’t, in which case it was out of his hands and the Department of Paradoxes should be notified”. The Department of Boxing & Fistfighting was also notified but “wanted nothing to do with it” because both combatants were fighting dirty instead of following any proper rules of boxing.
Valerius-1497 is described as a member of the Department of Problem-Solving, and Larrikin-1029 as “a representative of the infamous Blue Feather”.

Continuity

This story was the second after PROSE: Of Romeos and Juliets to take the form of an Incident Report of the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids.
The story positions itself as a sequel to PROSE: The Resurrection of the Wellsians, primarily depicting Paintbrush-122's fate after Mandragora's Great Experiment. His former job painting portraits of the Governor of Morningstar 1 is mentioned.
The Department of Linguistics was previously mentioned in PROSE: The Szaclowk & the Halfworld.
The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids' taboo against Clockwork Cherubs reengineering themselves, as established in PROSE: The Labors of Juliet, is referenced in the form of the SavageMen's backstory as given in The Death? Planned It!, a comically blunt cautionary tale against the same.
The burlap sack running gag makes its reappearance, having been last seen in PROSE: The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids in Oz. Larrikin-1029's casual possession of one on an evening out at the Theatre is consistent with his statement in PROSE: Acquaintanceship-982 and the Missing Mail Mystery that he always carried one with him. The gag would return in PROSE: Peace and Quiet.
Judicator-337 would later reappear in PROSE: The Case Against Conspiracy.

Behind the scenes

Background

The story was created as a topical satire of a then-ongoing controversy in the Doctor Who surrounding the perceived resemblance between a piece of 2016 armchair concept art by artist Matthew Savage for a new design of Cybermen, and the design used for the helmet of Ashad as seen in the 2019 trailer for Series 12 of the TV series, which did not credit Savage. The dispute would eventually be settled amicably between the artist and the BBC along terms not disclosed to the public.

As such, despite obviously having a very different storyline and main characters, The Rainbow Adventures is presented as a sort of spoof of Doctor Who. Not only do the conspicuously-named SavageMen correspond to the Cybermen, with the pivotal cranial light-bulb matching the head-lamp which was one of the main smoking guns between the Savage and Series 12 Cybermen designs, but The Death? Planned It! references the title of The Tenth Planet, the first TV Cyberman story, while The Moonbeams references The Moonbase, the second such story. In The Moonbase, the Cybermen confusingly claimed to have previously met the Doctor on "Planet 14" rather than the previous "Tenth Planet" in an apparent retcon of the Cybermen's origin which caused considerable tangles in later continuity; this is referenced in Plagiarism of the SavageMen with the SavageMen being retconned in The Moonbeams to have originated in the 14th Cosmos.

The references extend beyond Cyberman-related elements: the retconned invention of “a ranting mad scientist who was eventually destroyed by his own creations” as the SavageMen's inventor recalls Davros, the retconned creator of the Daleks, and The Walkies appears to be a counterpart to the original 1963 The Daleks serial, with “Little Billy” being named in reference to William Hartnell who portraied the Doctor; the cliffhanger throwing a rising thermometre evoking the Who cliffhanger of a rising radiation counter at the end of the previous serial; and “Mr Raymond” being named in reference to Dalek designer Raymond Cusick.

Read online

The story can be read for free on the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids website.

Contents

Plot