Behind the Scenes

Behind the Scenes of Witness Protection

Completed March 14, 2022

I love 80s cinema. That obsession led me to a movie called Witness, and thus gave me the idea to write "Witness Protection". It took me months to complete and it ended up being the longest one shot I've ever written thus far with 6691 words.

Witness is the 1985 crime/romance film starring Harrison Ford. Ford plays the captain of a police precinct named John Book. After the death of his father, Samuel Lapp and his mother Rachel are waiting for their train when Samuel uses the bathroom and witnesses a brutal murder. The victim was another cop and Samuel IDs the murderer as also a cop. Unsure who to trust, John Book is forced to be a one man army and returns Samuel and Rachel to their Amish community. Book ends up staying due to an gunshot wound and he and Rachel develop a forbidden romance. Eventually, the traitor cop attacks with his buddies and John Book fights them all off. He returns to his old life and parts ways with Rachel.

I personally like the movie and Harrison Ford's role, but I started to lose interest halfway when it became clear to me that it was more of a romance than an action cop film. However, it left enough of an impression to write a similar story with STRIKE Team: Delta.

The baseline idea was for Clint Barton and Natasha Romanoff to protect a kid, who is the sole witness in a murder investigation. To be honest, nothing was planned after that.

Now knowing that Harrison Ford is the star of Witness, you may have guessed that my made up dead agent is named after him. The name John came from the character he plays.

At first, it went smoothly. Then I got stuck for weeks because I didn't know what I wanted to name the boy. I didn't want to name him Samuel Lapp because I didn't want to write a crossover or a Witness parody. Briefly, I considered the idea of making the boy Peter Parker, but decided against it. Finally, I decided on the name Jason after one of my favorite Bat kids: Jason Todd. The last name came up much later. I chose Davis because it was a very common last name and as a reference to Jefferson Davis aka Miles Morales' father for no reason in particular. Jason's looks I purposely modeled after Cooper Barton, but I also left it vague enough for people to choose Jason's ethnicity to their liking.

The murderer being Agent Jack Rollins didn't even cross my mind until I got stuck again. Initially, I planned to make up another character with similar appearances to Barton except taller. This character would have also been a HYDRA sleeper agent infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D., but Clint and Natasha would have been left oblivious to how vast the HYDRA infiltration really is, keeping the consistency of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. After describing the murderer, I thought it would be cool to throw in a familiar face. At first, I was going to use Brock Rumlow, but he didn't look enough like Clint and I didn't think the STRIKE Commander would do his own dirty work or be so sloppy. Agent Jack Rollins fit the description perfectly. Unfortunately, this no longer became canon compliant.

After rewatching Agent Carter, Daniel Sousa slipped into the story. His suspicions of HYDRA and his mysterious death fit into the plot like the correct puzzle piece.

I don't know why I always write Natasha as eating raspberry filled pastries. I guess I have a random headcanon that she likes raspberry pastries.

Jeremy Renner can build houses. Ergo, Clint Barton can build safe houses.

I was going to switch between Clint and Natasha's perspectives, but I ended up sticking with Clint's p.o.v. because of his emotional connection to Jason as a father. By the way, you may have noticed that Jason's father is not in the picture. So Clint fills in that role for him.

I envisioned this epic fight scene between Natasha and the HYDRA agents where she fights them inside the cabin while Clint protects Jason from an approaching Jack Rollins, who intends to kill his witness. This didn't work for two reasons: (a) Natasha needed to be injured. Even though we all know she is a complete badass even when wounded, Clint would not let her fight while he is still able-bodied and healthy. And (b) it's illogical to let the fight come to you by breaking down your last line of defense (the house) while protecting someone inside. To keep the fight on their terms, Clint needed to go out to them and keep Jason fully protected inside. If Clint died, Natasha would be their next line of defense.

I don't know why I mentioned coffee so much in this one shot. I hate coffee. Adults seem to live off of it though.

I mentioned 2009 because I wanted this story to take place late in their partnership. It's before The Avengers and probably happens after Clint's mission in New Mexico and Natasha's missions with Stark and Banner.

I finished this story while on spring break in Hawaii. As much as I love the plot, writing this story gave me so much grief, I was eager to finish it in order to write other stories. That's why the ending may feel a bit rushed, though it's slightly better since I edited it.

According to the Wattpad website, it takes about 40 minutes to read "Witness Protection". I apologize for that. I didn't want to split it into two parts because I wanted it to feel like one movie. I hope you guys thought the 40 minutes I stole from your life was worth it.

I hope you guys enjoyed "Witness Protection"! More to come soon.