“What if” posts are not simple writing prompts but supercharged explorations into the many directions a simple prompt can take you. Here you will find conventional questions and “what if” questions surrounding a prompt to help get the creative juices flowing.
Prompt comes from watching Romantic Comedies.
What if the “Wedding Planner” secretly hates those getting married?
A lot of contradiction there. The first obvious question is why does he/she hate those getting married and why is he/she in the business of wedding planning?
I’ll use He for now on for simplicity.
The career choice could have already been established when some event turned from pleasure to disdain. What if that event was of their own failed marriage? Or what if he was left at the altar? Or his own marriage is a disappointment?
What if he plans the weddings and they go off without a hitch and he is in high demand but he sets something up that would cause strife between the couple sometime after the honeymoon? To do this he would really have to know the couples to figure out what wedge to bring to bear.
Those wedges could be secrets the couple tells him in confidence that are subtly revealed in a way as not to point back at him.
Those wedges could be lies or even truths that he learns along the way as he plans their special day. Maybe one has been unfaithful during the time they were engaged. Maybe it’s about money. Money is always a huge issue in marriages and here some extremes can be explored. Past embezzlements that finally catch up to them.
Instead of just wedges into the marriage, what if it was more sinister. What if the wedding planner was a serial killer?
Access to their home, place of business, and daily routines can all be gathered by this wedding/death planner as he would want intimate knowledge for the couple so he could plan the best wedding ever for them.
What if this serial killer not only just kills his prey but likes to play mind games with them? He knows a lot already but he could employ some of those wedges above to create a hostile environment, thus clouding the investigation that follows. Detectives are more likely to suspect a husband or wife before outside forces.
But what if we tone it down a little, what if this wedding planner idea helps explore the thoughts of jealousy and its effects on people? What if it is about arranged marriages, the history and culture of?
How about a possible built-in conflict where the idea could explore planning of a gay marriage by a planner who opposed to the idea or maybe a planner with no understanding?
Now go plan your own story.
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