Dream Theatre: 'Road God'

     Earlier this morning I got a pretty decent pitch for a 3 issue miniseries. Here's the skinny.

    You know those deities from Ancient Mythology where we have a name and a general idea of their purview, but not a hell of a lot else is known about them? This is about what happens to them. It's called 'Road God'. 

    The story begins with a number of largely amnesiac divinities (in my dream, it was three, but thematically, four is probably better*) who manifest on Earth having dipped below the number of worshippers necessary to maintain their godhood. Beyond this, they recall very little else. 

    Fortunately, the place where they manifest is the temple of the God of Forgotten Things, who is a kind of officious bureaucrat, who can get them caught up on procedure. I'm imagining him as kind of the worst stereotype of the Ellis Island bureaucrat who just wants to tick off all the things he's required to do to the minimum standard required of him. He presents each of the deities with a kind of hieroglyphic lanyard to identify them ("This is what we know about you") and tells them what they need to do.

    Each 'lanyard' (I'm imagining a small stone tablet) has a series of hieroglyphs written on it which spell out something like "My name is X, I do this" (e.g. "My Name is Horkos, I represent the fate of all oathbreakers" or "My Name is Limos, I am the Goddess of Famine and Starvation"). 
    Our hero's lanyard says, "My name is (TBD), I'm in the Band". 

    Our hero hits on the idea of everyone becoming musicians. They can write songs all about their own glory and, when the songs get popular enough and have enough people humming them or singing along, they'll have regained enough of their godhood to be able to reascend. Lacking any other suggestions, the series turns into VH-1's behind the music where the Garage Band comes together and they try and overcome their minor troubles. One of these troubles is that our hero, who's kind of okay at exhorting everyone to give it their best, is kind of shit at everything musical and laments that his lanyard wasn't cleared about what his role was in the band. If it had said, "I'm second electric triangle in the band, I'd at least know that I need to go out and get myself an electric triangle!"

    Eventually, they (or just he) returns to the temple of the God of Forgotten Things (who's not there. He's on break) and starts rummaging around trying to find some clue as to his purpose. Eventually, he discovers that he's mistranslated his lanyard. It doesn't read "I'm in the band", it reads "I'm with the band". He's the God of Roadies.

    BOOM: Cue Title. 'ROAD GOD' End of issue one.

    This is the point at which the dream ended.

    The rest of the story then becomes the tale of the other gods reclaiming their divinity by repurposing or reinventing themselves within the role outline on the lanyard. The band stuff can fall to the wayside here, but I'd still like to keep the overall thematic structure of something like 'Behind the Music' which traces the rise and fall of a band.

    (* This is kind of where the number comes in. In my dream, it was three gods, but if we're going for a 'rockumentary' vibe, four members reflects not only the Beatles, but also the things which I consider the story's spiritual inspiration, the song 'The Mesopotamians' by They Might Be Giants.)

    In each case, our hero is indispensable, using his roadie powers to deal with all the drudge stuff that they need to overcome to achieve their purpose and regain their godhood, but doesn't achieve it himself.

    The story ends with our hero dying, an old mortal man with nothing left of himself after he's spent his lifetime helping people out (but only ever with the sort of forgettable drudge work that doesn't make for much of a legacy). He still tells everyone, of course, of the days of his youth where he hung out with legendary deities, being instrumental in their success and performing amazing feats for them.

    "Like what, grandad? Carrying their bags?"
    "Yeah, exactly that. Like carrying a god's bags is nothing. Gods carry a lot of heavy shit, and you think they'd be able to regulate the tides or preside over the administration of human affairs while carrying their own bags!
    "Whaddya think of when you think of Zeus, eh? Thunderbolts. Or Hephaestus? Bloody great anvil. Where would they be without them? Nowhere that's where. And you think they're gonna carry 'em themselves? Are they fuck! That's a job for fuckin' muggins 'ere. And that's because gods are fuckin' soft! " etc...

    And then he dies...

    Epilogue: ...only to awaken in the Temple he was in at the outset. The God of Forgotten Things still hasn't returned from break, and a backlog is starting to build up. It's okay, though, he likes helping people with menial drudgework. He's going to be good at this.