The cannibalism twist is a nice touch! Question, the feral things seem to be very strong and clearly don’t mind eating trolls for their survival, I’m wondering then why did they Branch become leader if he is generally “weaker” then them? Did he do something specific to earn the respect of the ferals? Also what happened to the past leader?
sorry if anything’s unclear!
There have been past leaders in the feral village. There was a leader when Branch was brought to the village they weren’t to….fond of Branch…(everyone saw Branch as just Things pet for a while ) They only allowed Branch to stay because Thing didn’t kill him and they know Thing would kill anything they come across, if Thing thought Branch was deserving to be spared then so be it.
Everyone looked down on Branch because he was “weaker” (mostly from being a grey malnourished 7 year old troll) After like a week of Thing treating Branch as a fragile pet Branch had enough and decided to try and prove himself to the ferals…
He earned their respect throughout the years. After living in the village for a couple weeks he started creating traps that started catching more and more critters in the more dangerous regions(which was very helpful for the ferals as it saved them time and resources) When he started getting his “health issues” handled (the baby’s no longer borderline starving 🤩 YAY!!) He proved to be a good fighter. After the village started gaining more and more trolls (since Branch did a lot for the village they decided to keep letting trolls come to see if they could help as much as Branch did) Branch was able to prove he was the better hunter than almost all of the grey trolls (mostly because he’s been fighting more then singing and dancing for years at this point unlike the other grey trolls) Eventually he was well respected in the village thanks to how much he improved the village, he was no longer looked down on instead he was seen as an equal to the feral trolls.
Eventually the old feral leader died after going missing (as much as the feral trolls have their “we’ll never die” complex they aren’t the strongest when they’re completely alone, it’s why they hunt in packs/squads) and someone else needed to be in charge (usually they make the strongest the leader) but they decided to go with Branch since he’s done so much for the village and all its inhabitants. Soon Branch made Thing his second in command and they’ve been in charge ever since.
Lily Gladstone in her high school yearbook named most likely to win an Oscar (2003/2004). Twenty years later she stars in Martin Scorsese’s KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON