A few people emailed me after the last time I had an open call for post requests asking me to “rip into” George R.R. Martin for taking such a long-ass time finishing the A Song of Ice and Fire books, which… no. I mean, just no. Even if we could get around the amazing hypocrisy of me calling someone out for taking a long time to finish a creative work, it’s something I just wouldn’t do regardless, because writers work at their own speed and it’s not a uniform process that’s the same for everybody so expecting Martin to crank out books on a yearly basis like Terry Pratchett does is silly and also Neil Gaiman said stuff I agree with. And so forth.
But I will say this: by getting HBO to sign on to a Game of Thrones series, Martin has – intentionally or not – set himself a deadline. And he’s set himself this deadline for one reason: he’s written a series which features young characters which is now being converted into an ongoing telefilmic series. In order for that series to work, it needs to film itself as quickly as possible. (It can be released on whatever schedule HBO likes, but that’s a different thing entirely.)
Think about it for a second. People complain quite frequently that the young actors in the Harry Potter movies have aged too quickly to portray the characters effectively. Now, granted, this is a pretty stupid complaint given that the first movie started production in 2000, when Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint were all eleven (just like in the book), and thanks to a fanatical devotion to cranking the movies out on a schedule that would probably be considered near-slavery if it weren’t for the enormous salaries involved for everybody working on it, they’re just about finished shooting the double-film adaptation of Deathly Hallows now, ten years later. Filming seven years’ worth of progression in ten years is honestly pretty amazing – and people still complain that Radcliffe, Watson and Grint have aged too much.
But the Harry Potter experience is nothing compared to what awaits production on A Game of Thrones and so forth, because the latter is a series of novels where young protagonists go through much more in an even shorter timespan: as of the end of the fourth book, they’ve covered in between two and a half and three years. Assuming that the rest of the series follows this pace, that’s seven novels covering about five years and change. Given that some major characters – Bran and Arya Stark, for example, as well as lesser characters like Thomen Baratheon – are out-and-out little kids (not even tweens), these series are going to have to film relatively close to one another, even faster than release times in order to keep from aging the younger characters too fast onscreen. (Especially considering that it’s been made clear that the show plans to produce one season per novel.) If they don’t, the show has the danger of pulling a Walt-from-Lost, where they have a young character clearly aging faster than the timeline of the show he’s on can handle.
Now, this isn’t impossible to film. Difficult, yes, but certainly not impossible – especially given HBO’s production budgets and the likely enormous return on investment. But all of this difficulty puts Martin’s back up against a wall, because up until now it was just his ass on the line if he got further delayed in finishing the books. Now it’s not just him: it’s everybody working on these shows. Previously the only other people affected by Martin’s slow writing speed were maybe a few people at a publishing company and some fans with an enormous sense of entitlement. Now, though, it’s a horde of people who are completely dependent on him finishing the books so they can produce the TV shows.
I don’t know if Martin can handle that pressure or not. I hope he can. I just know that I wouldn’t want it.
“Good morning, sir. I have prepared a breakfast of scrambled egg, kippers and bacon, as per your request.”
“Fantastic, Jeeves! I tell you truly, I’ve worked up a massive appetite and that’s no mistake.”
“Am I to assume that tonight’s excursion went well, sir?”
“Well, it started off a bit sticky. My cape got all tangled when I went to punch this one hooligan in the face.”
“Ah, yes. The cape.”
“Jeeves, we’ve had this discussion twice now. The cape is part of the ensemble.”
“We have had this discussion twice, sir, because your cape has gotten tangled up in your legs twice.”
“Ah ha, Jeeves. I didn’t say it got tangled in my legs this time, merely that it had gotten tangled.”
“In what did it get tangled?”
“Well, around my right arm.”
“Is that not your good arm for fisticuffs, sir?”
“Don’t be coy. You know it is. And the cape stays.”
“I confess, I fail to understand the appeal of the cape.”
“It’s dramatic, Jeeves. Like a bat’s wings. Criminals fear it, I reckon.”
“Do criminals fear gentlemen in opera cloaks?”
“Ah, but this is cut differently from an opera cloak. It rupples.”
“Rupples, sir?”
“Yes. It ruffles and it ripples. Therefore, it rupples.”
“This ruppling of which you speak seems to have a great deal in common with tangling.”
“Enough talk about that, Jeeves. I think I’ve made it quite clear that the cape represents my bat-wings, for I am a child of the night, and so forth.”
“Could not some other form of abstraction suffice, sir?”
“Well, without the wings, I’m hardly a bat, am I? I’m sort of a black badger.”
“I understand badgers can be quite nasty in a pinch.”
“Yes, but it’s not like a great roaring badger came smashing through my window at Brinkley, is it? It was a bat. That’s an omen, Jeeves. Can’t mess about with omens, that’s bad luck.”
“Sir, a bat did not crash through your window either. You dreamt it.”
“Dream omens are still omens.”
“I concede the point.”
“Thank you, Jeeves. By the way, this is really cracking nosh.”
“I do my best, sir. So what happened after your encounter with the criminal class?”
“Oh, that wasn’t the only one.”
“Indeed?”
“You see, after I dropped off those thugs at the local constabulary -”
“Speaking of which, sir, that Detective Gordon fellow has been around again, asking after you. I do believe he suspects.”
“Drat. Are you sure?”
“Quite sure, sir.”
“I wonder how he caught on. I’ve been doing the growly voice, you know. Doesn’t sound a thing like me at all.”
“Yes, sir, but you also did the growly voice when you did your impersonation of a bear for the Policemen’s Charitable Association last month.”
“Do you think that tipped anybody off, then?”
“I would consider it possible.”
“Oh, by the way, Jeeves, while we’re on the topic, did you pick up lozenges for me?”
“Yes, sir. Blackcurrant, as you requested.”
“Brilliant. Where was I?”
“You had just dropped off some criminals with the police.”
“Exactly. I had some time left in the night, you see, so I wandered down to the dockyards, hoping to catch some criminals doing criminalish things.”
“And did you, sir?”
“Did I ever! This was the astounding thing, Jeeves – there was this band of bravos robbing a freighter!”
“Is that really so surprising, sir? Freighters are frequently the target of the unlawful.”
“I wouldn’t call this normal.”
“Why not?”
“Didn’t I mention the fellow in the makeup?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, there was one.”
“What sort of makeup, sir? Was he dressed for a pantomime?”
“Not quite so much that, Jeeves, as he was garbed like a clown.”
“What sort of clown, sir? Traditional whiteface, auguste, or are we speaking more of the comedia dell’arte variety of Italian clown?”
“…which one is the one that wears purple pants?”
“That would most likely be auguste.”
“Anyway. This clown was in charge of the other criminals.”
“That seems most improper. An auguste clown is known for being subservient to the whiteface. It appears, sir, that your adversary has no formal training in clowning.”
“I suspected as much when he started hitting me on the head with his brolly.”
“Did you apprehend him in the end?”
“No, no, that’s the rub. I got his underlings, you can bet on that, but the big cheese, as they say, ran away with the milk and the spoon.”
“So he escaped.”
“Shame, too. I suspect this clown will make up a good deal more work for me. Oh, did you catch that? “Make up.” Totally by accident.”
“Your wit remains sharp, sir.”
“Thanks, Jeeves. Anyway, it’s been a long night, so it’s to bed for Bertie, I think. Wake me up around two, would you?”
“Certainly, sir.”
“Oh, and did you ask about -”
“Yes, I did inquire with the owner of the building as you requested. It seems that he is not keen on the idea of tenants putting in major construction projects in his apartments.”
“So that means no secret passage to the cellar, then?”
“Sadly not.”
“Drat. A secret base in the cellar would have been extremely thematic.”
“Bats do not often dwell in cellars, I believe.”
“It was a metaphor, Jeeves. A bat must have his cave, you know.”
“Or a badger his hole?”
“Do stop going on about badgers, Jeeves.”
“Certainly, sir.”
Some some of you may have heard that story about the venerable Canadian history magazine The Beaver changing its name because of the confusion it caused over exactly what kind of magazine it was, and apparently also because a lot of school Internet filters blocked it.
It was a funny enough story that even the New York Times ran it, but it got me wondering: now that pubic waxing is apparently de rigueur among young women, are female genitals even called beavers anymore? I mean, when the hair is gone, the resemblance pretty well disappears.
So will “beaver” wind up being one of those funny little linguistic artifacts, like calling a remote control a “clicker” decades after they switched from sonics to infrared, or should the magazine just have held out until we start calling women’s privates “chinchillas”?
Bonus: Apparently the term “beaver” in this sense was popularized by Kurt Vonnegut in Breakfast of Champions. I couldn’t find Vonnegut’s drawing of a beaver anywhere online, so here is his rendition of an asshole.
When I was a kid, there was this awesome picture book I read, one of the sort where the writer/artist had put in all sorts of diagrams and little details and so on, and it was about this race of tiny, fuzzy hippopotamus-like people divided into two kingdoms which were at war. But I can’t remember the name of it.
Is this ringing a bell with anybody?
UPDATE: In comments MIB correctly identifies it as Trouble For Trumpets, which now checking eBay I discover is stupidly expensive. And what’s worse is that at some point I’ll buy it, because that’s the sort of book I wanna read with my kids if and when I have any.
My friend Gemma Files recently finished her novel A Book of Tongues, which I am not sure what it is about offhand, but I know the following things:
1.) It has cowboys shootin’ people in violent bloody gunfights
2.) It has mean badass magic in violent bloody ways
3.) It has gay sex, which may or may not be violent and bloody
If these elements seem like they might appeal to you, then I highly recommend that you purchase a copy, because Gemma is a hell of a writer. It is not un-pricey, but it is a special Limited Edition. (I promise I will ask Gemma if she will write an additional gay cowboy fight scene in the inside of the cover for you if you get one.)
Harry Connolly actually took me up on the long-dormant “I will review your shit if you send me a copy” clause on this website and sent me a copy of Child of Fire, his first novel. So, knowing that I got it for free, is it worth what I paid for it?
The long and short of it is that this is a pretty good book. There are a couple of missteps early on: I kind of get the feeling that Harry was enjoying writing something that clearly had a bit of a pulp-horror feel to it, and I like that general tone, but there are one or two similes that just kind of made me groan a little at the purpleness of the prose. That having been said, these are few and far between and none come at the book’s crucial sequences.
And dare I say the crucial sequences are excellent. Connolly is a very strong action writer right out of the gate: his fight scenes are clear and concise without losing any of the excellent small bits that make up a good fight scene. Given that his fight scenes in this book involve a fairly complex magical doohickey, more than one type of monster and magic spells, he could have really gotten snagged here. But he didn’t, and that is definitely to his credit.
Characterwise, the book feels very “first of a series-ish.” This is not a complaint per se; Connolly doesn’t pull a Harry Potter and spend god knows how long setting up the actual book, but instead drops his characters right into a mystical war-gasm pretty much right off the bat. But there’s tension between the lead character and the sidekick (whom he is actually sidekick to, but in story exposure terms, she’s the sidekick for now), and we get hints of why that is and that the lead character has a Dark Past ™, but we never get the full explanation. Again, there is nothing wrong with this: it’s a perfectly valid storytelling choice to draw it out over books. It’s just not my preference.
But these are quibbles. Child of Fire is a strong first novel and Harry Connolly is a strong writer with a good modern-pulp feel to his work, and I like that. So if you’re inclined towards books where the good guy has magic death-paper, I’d recommend giving it a chance.
A pretty strong effort from Terry Pratchett this go-around, in part because he’s mostly left his usual formula behind in a way. Which is appropriate for what’s an interesting combination of sports novel and nontraditional hero’s journey, while still part of Pratchett’s overall continuing Discworld metastory of a fantasy-world Industrial Revolution.
Unseen Academicals has no obvious villain – sure, there’s a thuggish football goon, but he’s barely a factor for most of the story. What it is instead is philosophical – of course, all of Pratchett’s books have their philosophical moments, but Academicals is very much a meditation on what creates the mentality of crowds – what’s attractive and good about it as well as what’s repellent and bad. In this book, Vetinari is doing nothing less than attempting to change crowd psychology, if only a little bit, and what’s really clever on both his part and Pratchett’s is that he acknowledges, for the first time in the entire series, that’s he’s really taking a risk. (The book also delivers, for a brief, tantalizing moment, a small insight into what actually drives Vetinari. If that alone doesn’t make you go out and get it, then you don’t read Pratchett yet.)
On a simpler level, Pratchett’s delivering a welcome mix of known quantities and new faces. Mustrum Ridcully and Ponder Stibbons are significant POV characters for a good chunk of the book (although they’re not the main characters); Ridcully in particular comes off really well, because he’s still funny good old Ridcully who gets peeved due to a rival university popping up – but Pratchett really makes it clear in this book that Ridcully is the Boss Wizard for a number of very good reasons, both external and internal, and it’s really just cool to see Ridcully get a couple of totally badass character moments.
The new faces this go-around would be, I expect, more of the William De Worde “one novel and then into background” sort rather than a continuing protagonist like Vimes or Moist von Lipwig. To give any details about Nutt and Glenda would spoil the read, so I won’t bother: I’ll just say that the former introduces a notably missing element to the Discworld’s fantasy panoply and the latter is another of Pratchett’s favored (and entirely deserving to be so) big tough girl heroes.
And, of course, this is a book about football. Because here Pratchett is having the characters of the Discworld explicitly invent football (rather than the traditional organic formation he usually goes with), it allows him to speak through his characters about why football is great, why the rules are the rules and why it’s more than just a game but a visceral experience. And he does it with good gags.
Highly recommended. It’s not as good as Nation is, but it’s a very good Discworld novel indeed. Solid A.
What do Citizen Kane, The Matrix, and Meet the Spartans have in common?
What do War & Peace, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, and The Destroyer Volume 11: Kill or CURE have in common?
What do Persepolis, Jack Staff, and Tyrese Gibson’s MAYHEM! have in common?
I imagine the answer to the first two questions is obvious to pretty much anyone who’s familiar with films and novels.1 Unfortunately, I don’t need to imagine getting into an argument over what I believe is the obvious answer to the third.
I understand why Will Eisner came up with2 the term/format of the “graphic novel.” He wanted a “real” book publisher to publish his comics3. Comics at the time carried the stigma of being throw-away entertainment for kids. Getting a traditional novel publisher interested meant convincing one or more of them that the comics being offered up for publication were, in fact, something other than comics.
Fair enough. I’d call my feet tits if I thought it’d convince someone to give me money to touch them. I’m not proud.4 But I’d like to think that when I got out of the long, scalding hot shower I’d take after having whatever’s at the ends of my legs fondled, I’d be able to recognize that my feet aren’t breasts.
It’s frustrating to me to see writers and artists I respect giving more than the minimum lip service required to the notion that their work in the medium of comics is something other than comics work.
In his (Revised) Graphic Novel Manifesto, Eddie Campbell states: “The goal of the graphic novelist is to take the form of the comic book, which has become an embarrassment, and raise it to a more ambitious and meaningful level.”
(EDITED TO ADD: I’ve since been informed by someone who’d know that the Manifesto in question is intended as a work of comedy–a context I’m embarrassed to admit I missed due to clearly insufficient research on my part. I thank Mr. Campbell for clarifying the matter in the comments {which anyone who can be bothered to read my blathering should definitely check out}, and apologize for inadvertently misrepresenting his position.)
I’m all for more ambitious and meaningful comics. And I can even see how someone of Campbell’s stature could perceive a medium that includes the work of Alex Toth, Jack Kirby, and Bernie Krigstein, among many, many others, an embarrassment, irrevocably connected in the public’s mind with the stereotypical “Biff! Bam! Pow!” Adam West Batman image as it seemingly is, even to this day. The still widespread perception that comics are for kids is problematic (most North American comics not being for kids is also problematic for entirely different reasons, but that’s another post.)
I submit to you that the solution to the problem isn’t to create a new term for comic books,5 but to create more and better work in the comic medium–while making sure as many people as possible know that’s the medium the work is in.
As a comic book, From Hell elevates the comic book medium. As a graphic novel, it diminishes the comic book medium, in the same way Margaret Atwood insisting A Handmaid’s Tale isn’t science fiction diminishes science fiction. Both situations encourage those who don’t know what a comic/sci-fi is to believe the comics/sci-fi they’re consuming is something else. They are given no incentive to seek out good comics or sci-fi, because they aren’t interested in comics and sci-fi. The fact that they just enjoyed those very things is immaterial to their future reading choices, because they don’t understand what they just read was the very thing they’re predisposed to believe they’ve no interest in reading.
That’s not entirely an apples to apples comparison, as comics are a medium and science fiction is a genre6. But the point is that some comics will be embarrassing to people who want their comic work taken seriously for its literary or artistic merit for as long as there are comics. And whatever necessarily arbitrary distinction one tries to make between comics and graphic novels won’t change the fact that there will be some graphic novels that will embarrass creators who want their graphic novel work taken seriously for its artistic or literary merit, too. Because the distinction is arbitrary, and it’s an arbitrary distinction I suspect many would be unwilling, unable, or simply unprepared to make, even if there were widespread agreement on what the distinction should be7.
A year or two back, I was contacted about editing a series of graphic novels for a corporate client. Each of the graphic novels was to contain a central theme educating the reader about the client’s product; each was to reveal that theme in a humourous way; and each graphic novel was to consist of a row of three to four panels.
I tried to explain to the client that what they were describing would more accurately be called a comic strip. The client was quite insistent that they didn’t want comics, strips or otherwise. They wanted graphic novels. Four panel graphic novels.
That’s what those who’ve tried to elevate comics to the level of serious literature by creating a new and, from an artistic standpoint, unnecessary term have gotten from the public for their effort: a complete lack of any recognition of a qualitative (or even quantitative) difference between a graphic novel, a comic book, a trade paperback, and/or a comic strip.8
At the end of his Manifesto, Campbell returns the idea of the graphic novel to its original context, that of a marketing tool–a context in which the term had, and continues to have, a positive value for the comics creator. Says Mr. Campbell: “The graphic novelist reserves the right to deny any or all of the above if it means a quick sale.”
The use of the term graphic novel to describe comics has enabled a huge number of sales, to publishers, potential readers, and the Hollywood moneyhandlers who arguably keep the North American comics industry solvent (or at least inspire people to continue creating and publishing work inside it, if only for the worst reasons.) But at the end of the day, a graphic novel’s just another word for a comic book.9
There are more and better comics being made today than ever before. Instead of being embarrassed by those examples of the medium that display modest (or no) ambition, I’d prefer comics creators acknowledge what’s gone before, celebrate what’s been accomplished in the medium so far, and embrace the possibilities of what’s yet to come.
Unless, of course, doing so would interfere with a quick sale. In that case, here’s your four panel graphic novel; where’s my cheque?
For those who aren’t familiar with those things, the answers are “They’re all films” and “They’re all novels” respectively; “They’re all stories told in the same medium” is a perfectly reasonable answer to both. [↩]
or co-opted, depending on whose version of events you believe [↩]
Considering the way comics creators were treated by the major comics companies of the time, you really can’t blame him. [↩]
Well, that and a shelf at the local chain bookstore, a topic I may revisit in a future post if some politician fails to say something suitably moronic in the next few weeks. [↩]
At least in Canada and the United States. Over in his blog, Campbell has suggested the term “comic book” may carry substantially more baggage in a European context than it does in the one I tend to experience it in. [↩]
”Co-writer” of the “graphic novel” Cowboys & Aliens. Which we still don’t talk about. [↩]
- Someone in the requests post asked for a general investigation into what I like and don’t like in music, and that’s coming later this week, but for the meantime? I really got into listening to Orishas this week. I really like hip-hop combined with traditional musical forms and Orishas do it very well, mixing Spanish rhyming (which admittedly I can’t follow, but their flow and performance is excellent even without understanding the words) with Cuban rumba- and salsa-style beats. “El Kilo” is probably my favorite single of theirs so far, but “Bruja” isn’t far behind.
- I’m really enjoying Then We Came To The End by Joshua Ferris. It’s funny and clever and hard to put down, and that’s what I want out of a light novel.
- I’ve always had an inherent fondness for poker-dice type games, and Lock N’ Roll is one of the best I’ve seen in quite some time. Current high score is 7622, for those interested in beating me.
MEH
- I got Britannia this week at a discount, which is great, and of course the new Fantasy Flight edition of the game is gorgeous in most respects. My complaint, however, is that this is a game with eleventy billion tokens, and the plastic insert which is supposed to store the pieces is entirely random and doesn’t actually have anything to do with the various types of pieces, so you end up kind of mixing things together in untidy clumps. This isn’t a small deal, because Britannia is a looooong-ass game, and anything that can reduce its playtime – like, say, simplifying the storage of it – is welcome.
- I finally got around to reading all of Jack Staff this week and… it’s not bad, I suppose, but I don’t see why this comic gets so many raves. It’s a perfectly average, okayish superhero comic. If it was a Marvel or DC book it would be completely unmemorable. Paul Grist’s art gives it an additional sort of original character, sure, but I was expecting an A-plus book and got maybe a B-minus. Is this like Walt Simonson’s Thor – is it one of those comics everybody else jerks over and I just read it and think, “eh, whatever?” (Other than Beta Ray Bill, of course.)
DIDN’T LIKE
- Whenever I see one of the old Big Books that Paradox Press used to print (The Big Book of Death, The Big Book of Hoaxes, The Big Book of the Weird Wild West, et cetera) in a used bookstore, I make a point to pick it up because they’re out of print and they’re always awesome: clever stories about real, obscure things, people and happenings. However, The Big Book of Urban Legends is just terrible, because it is full of boring stories about fake things that never happened that you have already heard half a dozen times. It’s like reading a book of knock-knock jokes when you’re older than eight; you know them all already, so it’s not fun or cool. It’s just bad.
- Bloody Confused! by Chuck Culpepper is a great little piece of sportswriting – a journey alongside Culpepper during his time in England as he lives there for a few years and, being a sports fan generally, settles in and picks a football team to cheer for (in his case, Portsmouth), and in the process discovers why he likes sports. It’s engaging and intelligent and is readable both for the fan (for whom it will illuminate many of the reasons non-soccer fans have trouble understanding or appreciating the game, and how to get past those issues), and the nonfan (for whom it will illuminate both the joy of being a fan generally and the joy of being a soccer fan particularly).
- Punisher #6 is actually the execution of a pretty good idea: namely, bringing back everybody Scourge ever killed from the dead, and siccing them on somebody. That it is the Hood siccing them on the Punisher just makes it even better, because the motivations all make sense (the Hood wants a no-cost plan to kill or at least inconvenience the Punisher, the villains want to not go back to being dead once the spell runs out, and the Punisher wants what he always wants). All this, plus the return of Death Adder (probably one of the coolest minor Marvel villains ever), and hopefully the promise of getting, however briefly, into the mind of Turner D. Century.
- Caught up (finally) on the back end of Friday Night Lights‘ third season, and oh man does this show ever get bad? Other than last season’s “Tyra and Landry kill a guy” plot (which was dealt with in a mature enough fashion that its sensationalism was forgiveable), this show just doesn’t make missteps, not ever. Plus this is the first season where they’ve actually had enough stability to set up the fourth season, with a brilliant hook (forcing Coach to take over the just-reopened decrepit poor high school’s football team and letting the uber-successful Dillon Panthers now be the nemesis rather than the scrappy underdog). With the show’s cast set to change drastically next season (only Matt and Julie of the kids set to stick around, and one hopes that Matt Saracen will finally for once in his damn life catch a fucking break and pull a Smash by the fourth episode or something) the show needed exactly this sort of tactic to remain the powerhouse that it is.
DIDN’T LIKE
- Dance of the Dead turns out to be a real disappointment, a movie that can’t decide if it’s a zombie comedy movie or a zombie parody movie and by extension mostly fails at both. It’s not funny. It’s not clever. It’s not even internally consistent. (This is a movie that seemingly can’t decide between “slow zombies” and “fast zombies,” instead going with the truly retarded decision of “both.”) Large chunks of it are really stupid. Large chunks of it are really predictable. Practically none of it is entertaining. And the obvious societal commentary that could be done with zombies plus prom is almost completely ignored. I know this was a low-budget movie, but you don’t need a high budget to make a good zombie movie – that’s one of the plusses of the genre, for crissake.
- You know, I’ve often said that Padma Lakshmi, the host of Top Chef, is a wooden self-important she-jackal. And this is true. But Kelly Choi, host of Top Chef Masters, makes Padma Lakshmi look like Julia fucking Child.
- Maksim instead of Kupono? Really, Nigel? (And you know this comes down to Nigel.) Are you trying to utterly invalidate the entire concept of dancing for your life? Because when Kupono A) dances like shit in his competitive dance and then B) pulls out a crappy, distracted solo, while Max A) dances well in his competitive dance and then B) nails his solo, your preferences become obvious. Yes, Max looks like a Russian mobster, but that’s not his fault. He is Russian, after all. (And now, lay odds on the new Kupono/Kayla pairing to get a contemporary routine next week so Kayla, obviously one of Nigel’s favorites, can make top ten.) Also, Ashley danced better than Kaitlyn did and similarly should not have gone, but they were both chaff anyway so it’s more forgivable.
- Pixar films, at this point, are either an A+ (Wall-E), an A (Ratatouille) or an A- (Cars). On this scale, Up is a solid A – not quite reaching the peaks of Pixar but definitely not one of their “lesser” efforts (where “lesser” is something just about any other filmmakers would kill for). Ed Asner’s voicework fits his character perfectly (and if you don’t at least sniffle in that first ten minutes, what are you made of?) and the little kid character steals just about every scene without feeling forced. The second great summer film of a thus-mostly-starved 2009.
- Panic Breakout is really only fun the first one or two times, but what a one or two times!
- Finally got around to reading Jennifer 8. Lee’s The Fortune Cookie Chronicles and really enjoyed how a treatise on the history of modern Chinese food could serve as commentary on globalism, cultural mutation, immigration, racial attitudes, appropriation and reconcilation. Fascinating, and also brings with it a number of “oh, must try that” food ideas.
DIDN’T LIKE
- Mental is a terrible case of medical-procedural-by-the-numbers, pretending to be daring because it’s dealing with mental illness, but come on – using special effects to make schizophrenia more exciting is both overdone and tasteless. Chris Vance, in the lead, is particularly ill-equipped to handle his role; of course, even if he were a great actor, he’d still have a boring “look I’m kooky and nontraditional for no explicable reason” character to deal with, but he’s not a great actor; half of his work feels like a weak Hugh-Laurie-as-House impersonation minus the balls that makes House so interesting.
- “The Princess and the Dragon” expansion for Carcassonne? Oh my god, is it bad. Mutates one of the best board games of all time into an unrecognizable, not very-fun mess. Avoid. Do not get this expansion.
- Man, what a terrible set of audition episodes for So You Think You Can Dance this year. I went back and speed-rewatched the most recent set of Australian audition episodes for a comparison, and then last year’s Canadian and American auditions, and it’s not just me; this year’s American auditions focused more on jokey bad auditions that were supposedly funny much, much more than average, and the American show is the only one that still even bothers to show many bad auditions at all; in the Aussie and Canuck versions you can literally count the number of joke auditions on one hand, which ironically makes them funnier because they stand out in sharp relief to all the really great dancing. I’m honestly a bit nervous about this season now because I can’t help but wonder: did they not have enough good dancing to showcase?
My good friend (and occasional commenter) Charlotte has started a fine and interesting blog devoted to books here, which I highly recommend to any bibliophile, because girl can write about books.
FLAPJACKS: So first you did those Fighting Fantasy gamebooks. ME: Yes. FLAPJACKS:And then you did all that nerd-lit from years gone by. ME: Yes. FLAPJACKS: You realize there remains only one true realm of nerd-bookery left to you. ME: Unfortunately. FLAPJACKS: A final frontier, if you will. ME: Yes, very clever.
“Pork and Beans” by Weezer and “So What” by Pink. 2008 was a really great year for “fuck you” songs, as the general frustration of the world with stupid bullshit finally hit its boiling point, and these were two of the best. Weezer’s song was “Fuck you, I’m a nerd” and Pink’s was “Fuck you, my marriage didn’t work out and who are you to comment.” They both had fantastic hooks (Pink’s “na-na-na-na” in particular will burn itself into your brain) and great musicality, and while Weezer’s video might have been a love letter to internet geeks, Pink’s video had Pink dancing naked and chainsawing down a tree, so at best the “best video” contest between these two is a wash.
The Incredible Hercules. Let’s face facts: 2008 was a remarkably shitty year for Big Two superhero comics. Other than the tail end of All-Star Superman’s glorious twelve-issue run, what was there? “Event” comics repeatedly failed to impress (something which, at this point, should surprise absolutely nobody) and most superhero comics held up as this year’s exemplars of the form (Jason Aaron’s Ghost Rider, say, or Geoff Johns’ work on Green Lantern, or Abnett and Lanning’s writing on Nova and Guardians of the Galaxy) are barely more than what should be expected out of the form – competent, entertaining storytelling that isn’t particularly revolutionary. The one bright light in all of this was Incredible Hercules, a comic which takes the mythological scope of Walt Simonson’s Thor and marries it to a humourous style not unlike that of Giffen and DeMatteis’ Justice League International (with the same core of pathos that that latter title had). Constantly wonderful and only getting better with time.
WALL-E. The single best film Pixar Studios have ever made – and considering this is the studio with Toy Story 2, Finding Nemo, Monsters Inc. and The Incredibles under its belt, that says something. Confident enough to wed most of its storytelling to physical comedy – and physical comedy created by a junky little robot no less – the scope and ambition of WALL-E is only more breathtaking. Yes, Andrew Stanton and company walked it back in public, claiming that it wasn’t “about” consumerism and the ecological destruction of the planet. The rest of us knew ass-covering bullshit when we heard it.
Nation by Terry Pratchett. Nobody knows how many swings at the plate Pratchett has left in him at this point, so that makes this home run of a book all the more glorious; a book which manages to be horrifying without being gory, romantic without being crass, sad without being melodramatic, spiritual without being moralistic, and praiseworthy of science without being annoyingly self-satisfied. As it is a Pratchett book, it is of course also very, very funny and clever throughout, and its message – of the possible comingling and even necessary interdependence of science and religion – is timely and welcome.
Leverage. God, how did John Rogers pitch this and ever have any trouble? “It’s Ocean’s Eleven versus evil corporations who screw over the little guy.” Why did it take so long for someone in Hollywood to throw money at him to get it made? But finally it happened, and this show is a glorious triumph – funny, exciting and most of all you never, ever have to watch it in Idiot Mode because the characters are doing stupid things for stupid reasons. Leverage is a show where the characters, at their worst, do smart things for stupid reasons. Or stupid things for smart reasons. And that makes all the difference.
Furr by Blitzen Trapper. I like music with energetic beats and operatic ambition, so the fact that I’m putting simple, folky, gentle Blitzen Trapper on my “best” list should serve as notice to how brilliant this record was. The title track is a love song about a werewolf, for crissake – just saying that should prepare you for some of the shittiest filk imaginable, but instead Blitzen Trapper makes it work, avoiding cute jokes and writing pure, eloquent poetry, and sounding all the while like a young version of Bob Dylan backed up by The Band. Just fantastic.
Berlin: City of Smoke. Jason Lutes’ epic continues to be absolutely fucking staggering. You should read this comic. Enough said.
In Bruges. Tanked at the box office, as people expected from the shitty advertising campaign that it would be another Lock, Stock-lite English gangster caper film, but instead this was by turns a funny and solemn story about two gangsters (in Bruges) taking cover after a crime gone horribly wrong, a crime that left scars. The comedy comes from razor-sharp dialogue; the pathos from absolutely brilliant work by Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes, and a story that inverts the usual heh-heh-we’re-gangsters tropes and unabashedly, without moralizing, points out that the criminal life really, really sucks at your soul. The best directorial debut of the year, by a country mile.
Northlanders. Brutal, vicious, and utterly fantastic Viking stories that only served to once again remind comics fans of why Vertigo still matters if you’re not interested in medium-dark fantasy (along with the equally fantastic Scalped). Totally hard-ass and uncompromising about both the virtues and flaws of the Viking world, and the lack of an overarching supernarrative means that Brian Wood can do what he does best – stories more connected by theme than by plot. (With Vikings in them.)
Fallout 3. Everybody else has already said everything that could be said about this game, so I’ll just throw in a backhanded compliment: the game is so crazily chock-full of content that I maxed out at level 20 when I was less than a third of the way through the main plot. Dear Bethesda: please to patch game to give more levels please.
Bob on Survivor. You have to love it when a 57-year-old physics teacher (and clearly still a very fit one) dominates the competition challenges over people half his age and invents multiple realistic-looking fake immunity idols to keep himself in play. Bob was the runaway fan-favorite of Survivor: Gabon and easily one of the most dominant players in years, his only failing being an early willingness to trust the wrong people (which merely made him all the more sympathetic).
The Boys. The next time somebody tells me that Garth Ennis just likes to take the piss out of superhero comics and that’s the only reason he’s writing The Boys, I will make them read #15, wherein Annie, undergoing a severe crisis of faith, demands that God give her a sign He exists, and leaves the church disappointed and on the brink of collapse when nothing happens – and then promptly runs into Hughie, who of course is exactly the sign she asked for. Then I will beat them to death with a lead pipe because I am sick to fucking death of people whining about shit that isn’t true. Be forewarned.
The Battlestar Galactica board game. An ingeniously designed board game, featuring the standard cooperative-survival mechanics one would expect given the setting, but with a brilliant twist: some of the players are actually Cylons and they are secretly trying to destroy humanity. The game’s system is designed to make hiding and striking against humanity a thing of subtlety and play-skill; if you’re really good you can even set up other players to take the fall for you, framing them as Cylons using nothing more than your own ability to lie. Similarly, it takes true observational skill to ferret out a really good Cylon player, as well as time your incarceration of them properly. Yes, it’s kind of a shame that Boomer sucks compared to most of the other characters, but other than that this game is seriously just about perfect in its execution.
Chuck. With a promising mini-season start last year, Chuck was already a solidly entertaining little show, but now? Far and away the most improved show on television; the plots are more clever, the dialogue snappier, the action higher quality and the unrealized romance between Chuck and Sarah satisfyingly boiling away behind a thousand actually-good reasons for them to not be together. Also good: the elevation of the Buy-More supporting cast to credits-level importance. Last season I was worried Chuck might waste them in favour of the annoying guy who plays Morgan. This season – well, less Morgan! That’s a start.
Metropolis by Janelle Monáe.
I trust that was self-explanatory, but if it wasn’t – that blend of nu-funk, futuristic soul and utter batshit craziness (it’s a concept album! Set in 2719!) is like what I think Legion of Super-Heroes should be if it were transposed into musical form. And she’s an obvious music nerd. Any other P.Diddy “discovery” diva-lite would want to be all pretty and sexified in their debut video. She wants to be Robot James Brown. How awesome is that?
