Twist idea

Since Phil said we should be trying to add our own twist to the story we've been given, I've been thinking...

First, the basic story of "Journey to the Center of the Earth" is basically

• hear tale of lost treasure under earth
• travel to far off place
• go down big hole in ground
• discover underground world of living fossils
• travel through perilous underground world
• return to civilisation and tell tale

(incidentally, this is also pretty much the story of King Solomon's Mine, but with scientific treasures substituting for diamonds)

Therefore, it seems to me that it would be possible to do a sci-fi version of the story while sticking to the spirit of the original story simply by substituting "earth" for "planet X"; now the protagonists merely travel to local equivalent of iceland, and discover plants and animals from planet X's prehistory

Basically, this is just an opportunity to design some freaky alien mushrooms and funky coloured rocks ^^;