The Major Problems with the new Ghost in the Shell

As a quick preamble, I became aware of the new Ghost in the Shell series via Women Write About Comics, where they are doing a great multi-part series on The Major, Motoko Kusanagi, the female lead of all the GITS incarnations. You should go check it out.

And in a likely vain and futile attempt to fend off whatever comments might come about not appreciating the origins of the characters, I am well aware of Shirow's original GITS work, and many of his other works, in which there is ample display of, to put it mildly, sex. That, however, is a whole other set of issues, and I'm not up for tackling tentacles and the issue of consent in anime/manga today.

Now, on with the main post...

Normally I'd save this kind of post for a Saturday, as it is partially a review. But there were so, so many issues with what I saw in the first episode of Ghost in the Shell: Arise, that it really warranted it's own discussion. Heck, it warrants a lot more than I can discuss in a single post, which is why I intend to also live tweet my rewatch of it. Which would be a terrible sacrifice of my time and sanity, were it not also a tremendous opportunity for snark.

I have to believe Arise was meant to be snarked at. The only other explanation is that the animators were all a bunch of teenage fanboys who can't get dates of their own and wouldn't know a real interaction with a woman if she came and yanked them out of their dark, underground cubicles. Lest you think I'm exaggerating or being cynical, I could have titled this post "The Major's Boobs" and it would have conveyed one of the primary motifs of the first episode. ... And calling it a motif is being generous. 

There are good points to Arise, which is clearly meant as a prequel to any of the original GITS material and, more specifically, to the last GITS on television (as far as I know), GITS: Stand Alone Complex. It's even being produced by the same studio, though I can only surmise there have been some changes in executive decision making in the intervening years.

There are callbacks to GITS: SAC right from the opening credits, and it's a promising sign that they even go so far as to replicate the skyline. As in a standard prequel, there's the introduction of characters, the bringing together of the team, and there are hints of some of the complex plots that made SAC such an enjoyable series to watch.

Even the clear decision to represent the Major in a younger body is in keeping with her backstory from both the original manga and SAC, and present opportunities for some interesting character development and psychological discussions. After all, in a truly cybernetic body, what governs the decision to "age?" What are the decisions the Major makes to upgrade from where we see her here to where we know she's going.

Only I get the distinct impression that with Arise, it will mostly be the opportunity for TNA. In fact, there was so much gratuitous nudity, partially nudity, and blouse-popping cleavage, I feel the acronym for Arise ought to be GITS: TNA.

Maybe the whole point of the title is meant to be innuendo?  Though that would imply a certain meta-level of cleverness that I don't think we're going to see from the rest of the series.

Which is a shame, because there are moments of some smart storytelling, and some glimpses of what could be some great explorations of the issues raised by the very premise of the show. There's a potential here for some real imagination in the storytelling.

But I think mostly what, or rather who, we're going to get glimpses of are the women, in outfits - or the lack thereof - that will leave little to the imagination.

Some exhibits for the prosecution:

The shower scene. Ignoring the thinly-veiled attempt to portray this new Major as vulnerable by resorting to the cliche tactic of having her naked, there is absolutely no reason for the behind-the-frosted-glass-door strip that occurs before it.

Commander Busty, or alternatively, the Breasts With No Name. The Major's commanding officer is not, so near as I can tell, even given a name. Instead, she's given cleavage, and a shirt that apparently cannot be buttoned above her navel. Or maybe the army just doesn't have shirts that fit her.  Granted, my own experiences with the military are limited to four years of JROTC and a year on scholarship, but I seem to recall more staid uniforms being regulation. Again, she is not named. She is just the BWNN who commands the Major's unit.

Motoko's bra. This should almost be it's own character, it's on screen so often. When she's not naked in cyberspace - which she is in every single such scene, knees clasped to chest, probably again meant to invoke "vulnerability" - she apparently has no clothes to wear aside from her uniform. (Wait, maybe this also explains the BWNN's own outfit issues. Future Japan's military doesn't know how to provide clothes to it's female soldiers.) So when she's not in uniform, she's in her underwear. This leads to a number of fan-service scenes. 

I might object less if it was at least a sport bra, but it's clearly some strappy black thing. Okay, again, the animators are teenage boys who know nothing about breasts or bras, but still, a quick Google search... actually, come to think of it, that's probably what caused this problem in the first place.

Also, and it may just be me, but I swear the Major's breasts are bigger when she's just in a bra. Maybe her uniform is really binding? Hard to say.

The Lolita landmines, or rather the mobile, robotic landmines, that from a military purpose seem absolutely useless for the battlefield unless you're fighting a war at a lollicon convention.

And those are just the things that stand out on the first viewing...

Admittedly, Stand Alone Complex had it's own issues with the Major and sexuality, to say nothing of the original manga, and in the first season of GITS: SAC she was dressed in that same ludicrous outfit you'll see if you bother to Google-search her. And there were the highly sexual overtones of that episode with the nurse, just to name a particular incident. But by the second season, they'd dressed her in a more practical outfit, and by and large it did not seem a series devoted to fanwank.

Arise, on the other hand...

It's sloppy storytelling, needless hyper-sexualizing, and unfortunately symptomatic of larger cultural problems within a number of communities, from comics to games to movies and television. (Star Trek: Into Darkness, I'm looking at you.) Maybe I'm just more aware of the gratuitous placement of women in skimpy outfits now that my daughter is nearly at her teen years, or maybe it's just that it's become such an overwhelming tide that it's impossible not to notice it anymore.

Anime and manga are probably the wrong places to look to start stemming that tide, but as this version came out of the same studio that, in the last incarnation, had the audacity to (in the second season, anyway) clothe the Major in not the thigh-high boots and garters but an actual functional outfit and an overcoat, of all things, there was at least a precedent to hope for here.

While it may not be fair to hold Arise to higher expectations than the culture, as a whole, and anime in particular seems incapable of lately, it has to start somewhere. And maybe starting in an arena that has a bad reputation for how it handles (or more accurately manhandles) women, might send the message that this is something that has to change.

Kat & Mouse: The Interview

Time for something a little different. I generally don't do guests - because, let's face it, this is basically the local cable channel equivalent of the internet - but this one made an exception for me. I'm not sure why, though I'm guessing his stylish fedora was on a bit too tight. 

Anyway... Abner Senires is the author of the Kat & Mouse books, which aside from satisfying this writer's own personal sci-fi craving, also reinvents/pays homage to some "classic" ideas, some more classic than others.

S: Welcome, Abner.

A: Thank you, Sean, for having me on the show today.

I see you have questions for me. Have at them, sir.

S: Indeed I do. So, first of all, where did the name come from? And if you say Tom & Jerry, know I'm going to be torn between disappointment and geekish applause.

A: It came from, you guessed it, Tom and Jerry.

(waits for disappointed applause)

S: I think we all knew that was coming. But, seriously...

A: Real answer: I had other names I was playing with. In one version of my notes, Kat was originally called Blackwolfe and she went solo. In another version, they were a duo, Kat was still called Blackwolfe and Mouse went by the name Boomer. All handles, of course, just as they are now.

And then one day the phrase "playing a game a cat and mouse" popped into my head. I think I might've been watching something or maybe read it somewhere. And it stuck. I thought, "Why not call them 'Kat' and 'Mouse,' to play off that phrase?"

Hence the name.

S: And has to be easier to type than Blackwolfe & Boomer, I imagine. Kat & Mouse are serialized fiction, a form that hasn't been done much since the days of Dickens, at least for literature. What led you to write Kat & Mouse in that manner?

A: When I decided to write Kat & Mouse, I had the notion the stories would be told in a specific sequence. I could have just written the stories, submitted them for publication, and had them appear that way. But the possibility arose that I would, say, write and submit stories 1, 2, 3, and 4 but have them end up being released as 4, 1, 3, and 2.

Which would defeat the purpose of the sequence, especially if I had a connecting storyline running through and connecting one story to the next.

So I decided I'd do it as a serialized story. This way, I could control the sequence of the stories and, in terms of the overarching storyline of each season, control when and where I'd drop clues and hints and foreshadowing.

S: Speaking of old-fashioned forms, Kat & Mouse seem very much a throwback to the cyberpunk days of the late 80's and early 90's. Which, as much as I adore it, is a sub-genre that seems to have already had its heyday. So why resurrect it? What about that setting appealed to you and made you say, "Hey, I want to set stories here?"

A: The appeal for me was the intersection of the modern and the near-future. The fact that cyberpunk was rooted in a very recognizable world – today's world – but had bits of slightly advanced tech that wasn't too far removed from the now. It wasn't Star Trek or Star Wars tech. No transporters or warp engines. But people had robotic prostheses and self-driving cars and the ability to insert a program chip into a slot in your head and instantly know, say, Conversational Italian or Japanese or the equivalent knowledge of a graduate in Corporate Law.

And since I wanted to feature modern weapons in my stories, writing cyberpunk was the best way to do that. I already had experience in weapon use and I'm familiar with some of the typical techniques of our military special warfare operators. And these were the types of skills that Kat and Mouse use in their adventures.

Another thing about weapon use--at one point I wanted write sword and sorcery. But I'm not well-versed on fighting with swords, particularly techniques of that era. I didn't want to portray a swordfight between my mightily-thewed hero and the evil sorcerer's henchman and have those in the know say "Bullsh*t! You're doing it wrong." There's a part of me that wants to depict those kinds of things realistically. Or at least as realistically as you can get in a dramatic portrayal. Yes, there are creative licenses a writer could take but I really wanted to keep things firmly rooted in some kind of verisimilitude. I'm kind of a stickler for that sort of thing. Writing cyberpunk made more sense in that department. I could use modern weapons and not worry that my descriptions of their use would offend those in the know.

I suppose you could say "Why not write a techno-thriller instead?" But much of techno-thriller writing is rooted in today's world and dealing with the geopolitics of the day. I wasn't interested in that sort of thing. What I was interested in was the stuff I saw from Robocop and Terminator and Terminator 2 and Demolition Man.

Cyberpunk. That was the field I wanted to play in.

S: I can't believe you just cited Demolition Man as an influence. Though, admittedly, it was a fun film.

Again, I've not quite worked my way through the first volume, but there were to my mind definite echoes in this of not only William Gibson, but also various Japanese anime, and maybe even a little – minus the fantasy elements – Shadowrun RPG. Any of those influence you, and if so, how much? Or were there other influences elsewhere?

A: All of it. Gibson. Anime, specifically Gunsmith Cats, Dirty Pair, Bubblegum Crisis, Appleseed, and Ghost in the Shell. And, yes, Shadowrun minus the fantasy elements, as well as another RPG from the early 90's called, appropriately enough, Cyberpunk 2020.

And the influence was huge.

My template for the visual aesthetic of the serial was Blade Runner. Of course. Classic film cyberpunk. Hopefully I've captured some of that in what descriptions I've written in the stories.

S: I think you have, yes.

A: From Shadowrun and Cyberpunk 2020 I essentially borrowed world-building details, particularly when I wrote out the timeline of the world of Kat and Mouse.

From Gibson, specifically the short story "Johnny Mnemonic", I borrowed the voice. That minimalistic style. I also cribbed a little of that from Raymond Chandler and Robert B. Parker and from James Cameron's screenplays.

The influence from anime resulted more in the desire to write about kick-ass female leads. And you get a lot of that in anime, especially in the titles I mentioned.

S: Would you rather see a live action movie, a television series, or a Japanese anime (or even comic book/manga) adaptation?

A: Yes. To all.

While I did write a Kat and Mouse screenplay (which I then adapted as the Season 1 episode "Easy Money") I would love to see a television series.

S: If I had the money to be a producer, I would see this happen. ... Dream cast for the above?

A: I don't watch too much current TV (I'm a few seasons behind and only get my fix via Netflix and Hulu), but from actors I've seen so far I would realistically cast the TV series as follows:

• KAT: Meghan Ory (Ruby/Little Red Riding Hood from Once Upon A Time)
• MOUSE: Allison Scagliotti (from Warehouse 13)
• REVELL: Anthony Stewart Head (Giles from Buffy)
• FAST EDDIE: Dominic Monaghan (from Lost and Merry from Lord of the Rings)
• SPECS: Lee Arenberg (Leroy/Grumpy from Once Upon A Time)
• JAKE STEELE: Sam Witwer (Aidan from Being Human)
• CONNOR MURPHY: Josh Holloway (Sawyer from Lost)
• JADE: Emily VanCamp (from Revenge)
• SAKURA: Kelly Hu (from Warehouse 13 and Lady Deathstrike from X2)
• ABSINTHE: Amy Acker (Fred from Angel)
• VALKYRIE: Felicia Day (from The Guild)

S: I'm sad to say I only recognized about half those names. Clearly, I too, am behind in my TV watching. Because I read a lot, he says. Moving on...

Last but not least, aside from serialized fiction, you also do your bit for radio drama, another arguably archaic art form (say that 10 times fast) that has made something of a comeback in podcasts and the like. What got you into that?

A: Several years ago I had it in mind to get into voice-acting. You know, for video games, cartoons, animated films, that sort of thing. I took classes for about a year or so and started looking into possible work. Somewhere in my Internet searches I ran across an open audition call for voice actors. Someone was producing an audio drama as a podcast, it happened to be unpaid, totally volunteer, and they were looking for people. I decided "Why not? It might be unpaid but I'd get some experience performing on the mic. And the credit wouldn't hurt." So I auditioned and got the part. Small supporting one but a part nonetheless.

And it was a fun experience.

So I went looking for other opportunities and found this niche of folks writing, directing, producing, and acting in audio drama podcasts. Tons of people. So for about two or three years, I was auditioning and getting cast in a whole bunch of audio dramas. At last count, I think it was about forty-something appearances. Some were one-time roles. The majority were as a recurring character over several episodes.

It's been a while since I last did audio drama, though. Other things cropped up. Plus, I wanted to put focus back into writing in general and Kat and Mouse in particular.

S: Any projects we can look forward to, either of your own or someone else you want to give a shout out to?

A: There are more Kat and Mouse stories on the way. I've sketched out the overall arc for Season 3, sketched out the episodes, am revising the first 2 episodes and have outlined and started episode 3. I'm hoping to start "airing" them at the serial site by mid- to late-November, depending on how things work out over the next several weeks.

S: Excellent. I won't hold you to that calendar, though. And other things?

A: There are a couple of other writing projects in the hopper. One is a space opera piece. The other is a story that actually takes place in the world of Kat and Mouse, about the members of a cyborg SWAT team. Both of them are still in the pre-writing phase. No idea yet when they'll get to being written. Right now the focus is on the Ladies.

As for shout-outs, there's some great comics I recently ran across that I think everybody should be reading. RACHEL RISING by Terry Moore, RAT QUEENS by Kurtis J. Wiebe and Roc Upchurch, and LAZARUS by Greg Rucka and Michael Lark. Excellent stuff. I believe RAT QUEENS and LAZARUS have two trade collections out at this time and RACHEL RISING is on trade collection number four. So go and get them. Now.

S: You heard the man, folks. And if you haven't read Kat & Mouse yet, you need to do that, too.

AUTHOR BIO

Abner Senires writes sci-fi pulp adventure and probably drinks far too much coffee. He lives just outside Seattle, WA with his wife and a pair of rambunctious cats. WEBSITE: www.AbnerSenires.com

BLOG: blog.AbnerSenires.com TWITTER: @abnersenires KAT AND MOUSE, GUNS FOR HIRE: PAYBACK Things are heating up for near-future female mercenaries Kat and Mouse as they tackle even more hair-raising jobs for shadowy clients and run afoul of terrorists, freedom fighters, hired assassins, a Japanese crime syndicate, and warring punkergangs. And smack in the middle of this, an enemy from the past is back and wants revenge on the duo. Now these two sassy sisters-in-arms must fight back and survive...and still get their jobs done. Available from:

Kindle

Smashwords

The Saturday Review: Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone

You know which Mission Impossible movie is my favorite? (Trust me, this is relevant.) The first one. Before they got too action-oriented and just plain ridiculous (though the 4th one was enjoyable), there was the first one, that, if you were paying attention, dropped little bread crumbs along the way. Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone is like that, only without the part where Tom Cruise rips off his face.

(This book has zero face-ripping, in case you were looking for that sort of thing.)

This is the first book in what is now part of a trilogy, and as the third one is out - or due soon - it seemed like a good time to write the first one up. Gladstone's created a brand new world here, with it's own mythology and blend of fantasy and science fiction and even a little steampunk, and though there isn't a lot of the usual world-building that would go into a more traditional sci-fi treatment of the piece, there's enough there so the reader doesn't get lost wandering in and out of both the alleyways and the politics of this new world. Part of me wishes there had been a little more, as there's clearly a class divide at work in this world, and an even greater divide between the cities that run on magic and the outer areas that don't, and that's mostly left unexplored other than the bits the reader is introduced to as character development. Perhaps that's what the sequels will help do.

As for this one, there's a murder mystery of sorts at the heart of this story. Civilization is built around various gods, each one providing the life-force - or just the utilities - that keep their individual cities going. One of those gods has been killed, and it's up to a young lawyer/witch to help her boss figure out who and why. The novel does a great job of blending the legal aspects of having a city and a world that runs a lot on magic with the more down to earth practicalities off it. A great deal of thought went into how it all works, and though a legal drama might not sound like the best thing to blend magic and science with, it works very well. Even when the scene shifts into a courtroom, in a scenario that, minus the trappings, would be at home in a John Grisham novel, it never loses it's sense of action.

There's also some philosophical/theological explorations here, which is fitting when the other main character is a priest whose job it was to watch over the god, and who therefore has a vested interest in solving the mystery. Again, like the courtroom material, what could have been a heavy-handed or even boring exploration of these weightier issues is deftly woven within the action of the main story, and never feels out of place or makes the story slow down.

The characters were well-thought out, the machinations of all involved sufficiently complex without being overwhelming, and the world just gritty enough to feel lived-in yet still retaining its sense of being something new. A blend of Grisham and perhaps Mieville, with just a dash of Gaiman around the edges, this is a world well worth taking the time to explore.

As for that Mission Impossible thing? If you're paying attention, Gladstone drops clues as to the ultimate reveal, like any good mystery writer does. Some of them you may not catch until the end, but they are they throughout and they make for a satisfying puzzle. While you can't solve everything from the clues, there's a big part of the mystery that's waiting for you to figure it out.

Only without the face-ripping.

The Saturday Review: Deeply Odd

I think this is the second book of Koontz's I've reviewed here this year. (Well, maybe this year. I know it's been ... a while... since I've been regular here. ... Do they make an equivalent of writerly prune juice to keep the ideas flowing? Only that leads to an easy and uncomfortable metaphor, doesn't it? Never mind on that one.) This one is going to go much the way of that last one, and if you'd rather not sort through the rest of this, here's the final verdict up front: meh.

That's an official "meh" as in: I didn't quit half-way through but seriously, seriously thought about it and only really finished it because I was sufficiently mildly interested in how the train wreck would resolve itself. I gave it three stars on Goodreads only because they don't have a half-star system, and two seemed a little too harsh.

This is a "read if you've got nothing else better on your TBR list or there's nothing better in the library. Or on TV." I mean that. There's better storytelling on television. Even on the networks.

As for the details...

When I started thinking about how to best summarize my feelings on this, I was going to devise a "Deeply Odd Drinking Game." Only I realized it would more likely be the "Deeply Odd Sure-fire Path to Alcohol Poisoning" which doesn't really sound like anybody's idea of a game. Least no one I want to go drinking with, at any rate. So, instead, I've devised a game we'll call "Spot the Plot." Here's how you play. Open the book, anywhere, at random. Read a paragraph. Does it have anything to do with the plot?

Odds are, no. (Pun not intentional.)

Try again.

Odds are, the next one won't, either.

As you could be at this a while, let me tell you what you will find, in no particular order:

Odd reminisces about his dead girlfriend

Odd tells someone to call him "Odd" - and the they don't. Or vice versa as in someone tells Odd to call them "X" and he insists on saying "Mr X" or "Mrs X" or some such.

Odd ruminates on the nature of evil and evil people, which, frankly, he does so often I figure he's got more stomachs than a cow.

Someone tells Odd how special he is, how much he's going to do. Bonus points for it being random characters who more or less exist in the book solely to tell Odd how special he is.

Odd then goes "gee aw shucks." (This is a separate point because he does this a bit.)

While I normally write spoiler-free (as much as possible) reviews of the things I read, please be aware I have now spoiled half the book for you.

Yes, half. I wish I was making that up.

Koontz is one of those authors who is largely hit or miss for me. Either I really like the book, or I don't, and the reasons why I don't have become somewhat predictable over his long and very prolific career. I have thought, in the past, that some of his prolificness may be what hurts certain books, and why, in more recent years, he's become a bit more miss for me than hit. I've learned to read the book jackets, anticipate the plot, and know beforehand whether I want to give it a go. Occasionally I'm wrong - his "Shadow Street" book fell flat for me despite my hopes - and so far the Odd series had avoided Koontz's more problematic pitfalls.

This one, by contrast, was a study in them. (The only thing it was missing was a dog. I mean, there was a dog, of course there was, but it was a much less precious and precocious pooch than the usual canines that show up in Koontz's books. Oh, and the precocious "special" child was missing from this one. Sort of.) I figure there was only about enough plot in this, as written, to sustain half the total pages. This could have been a novella, and a much more satisfying one than it was as a novel. Moreover, although the series is clearly building on things, you could easily skip this one, as now doubt all the things you really need to know will be gone over in great depth and far too much detail in the next installment. Or, better yet, they won't be, and this little escapade in Odd's tales will be written off as a bad dream.

I'm really hoping this doesn't mark a turning point for the series, though I have reasons to fear it does. I started off liking Koontz's Frankenstein series, though that series went off the rails much, much faster. The first book held so much great promise, and the second one mostly spent its time breaking that promise by partially or wholly abandoning most of the premises that made the first one so good. (And by slipping into the standard Koontz cliches. Though I think it avoided the dog, there was the child.) By the end of the Frankenstein books I was so thoroughly unimpressed that I read them mostly for completion's sake.

If the Odd series keeps going the way of this book, I may not be able to even muster that much effort.

The Saturday Review: X-Files, Season 1

First of all, to those of you asking why I'm "reviewing" a series that is now 20 years old (yes, you read that right) here's the thing: I had money last year, and like any good American, I splurged some. Including buying the complete series of the X-Files. (Amazon had it on sale, okay, so don't judge me.) As I started to watch it I was curious to see whether it would hold up, being 20 years old, or whether it would, like many cherished things from my childhood, fall flat. And by "childhood" I mean college years, because let's face it, most of us aren't really adults those first few years in college. And by "fall flat," I mean turn out to be much, much more horrible than I ever realized it was, like Flash Gordon, which, let's face it, could not be saved even by the combined powers of Queen, Brian Blessed, and a future James Bond.

The X-Files did not have a catchy theme tune by a popular, possibly even god-like, rock band. If it features a role starring a future James Bond, it was not in Season 1. And nowhere did anyone even begin to approach the levels of scenery consumption that Brian Blessed achieves solely by walking on set. It was, however, just as good as I remembered it being.

Some things do not hold up, of course. It was a product of the 90s, and the first on-screen appearance by a boxy-nosed car was a little jarring, mostly because I associate those with a much earlier and more primitive era. (The 80s.) In certain respects you have to regard the X-Files as something of a period piece, harkening back to a time when women still wore shoulder pads to rival NFL linebackers and you could use a portable phone to bludgeon someone to death. Any scene featuring a computer is almost comedic.

There are also certain actors whose immediate presence automatically screams early 90s - such as Amanda Pays, who I had a huge crush on ever since her roles in The Flash and Max Headroom, both of which I would also buy if Amazon put them sufficiently on sale because I am weak like that, as well as some who are still around, like Mark Sheppard of BSG and Supernatural fame. (Who has also freakishly not aged in the intervening 20 years. Made me wonder whether his role as Crowley is really an act.)

That said, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that everything I loved about the early years of the X-Files still held up. Although there is a distinct low-budget quality to the first half of Season 1, probably due to concerns about whether the series would survive past mid-season, it's clear that Fox knew they had a hit on their hands and started shoveling more money toward the show in the second half. Starting with the death of Scully's father, there's a decided upswing in the effects and the locations that is rather noticeable. Yet this change in resources doesn't mean that the first half of the season is, from a story standpoint, weaker than the first. Indeed, the first half of Season 1 features one of the more memorable villains from X-Files lore.

I was also surprised to see that many episodes I thought were in the first season are, instead, in the second season, with the exception of one of my all-time favorite episodes, "Darkness Falls," which still managed to creep me out some. Indeed, many of what would become staples of the later seasons were conspicuously absent here: there is no black oil, Skinner is only introduced late in the season, and the Cigarette Smoking Man is less adversary and more just nameless face of the conspiracy.

There is obvious chemistry between Mulder and Scully from the start, and it was interesting to watch as their roles of believer and skeptic solidified some. I can see why I kept watching the show, and why I still maintain that the show was often strongest when it wasn't dealing with its core mythos of aliens and UFOs and abductions. Most of the stand-out episodes of the first season are the ones that have nothing at all to do with extra-terrestrials.

That said, the first season did manage to set the stage for things to come. The conspiracy hinted at in the first episode was slowly expanded on, and a sense of menace imbued to the key players.  There is the appearance of the "establishment" trying to shut down the X-Files (which of course they manage to do by the end of the season, as would happen a couple of times throughout the series run).  There were the supporting players like the Lone Gunmen, who remind the audience that as far out there as Fox Mulder might seem, he wasn't the craziest one out there.

There were also things that, if memory serves, got lost a little bit in later seasons. Certainly when aliens became more the focus there was less "weirdness of the week," but almost all long-running shows with similar themes have to eventually outgrow that if they are to survive (see Supernatural, for instance). And I think there was less made of the fact that Fox was, in fact, quite the brilliant agent at the FBI who chose to dedicate his career to weirdness, and as such respected for his talents if mocked for his beliefs.

All in all, I enjoyed re-watching the first season, and am looking forward to watching Season 2 now, which has some more of the episodes and themes I more clearly remember (like the one with the submarine and the fluke man). Although parts of Season 1 did feel dated, I did mange to recapture the things that got me hooked on the X-Files way back in my freshman year of college, and that alone was worth the cost.

The Saturday Review: Windup Girl

I am a big fan of William Gibson. The novels of The Sprawl were my first introduction to "modern" science fiction (for as valid a term as that is), and over the intervening decades since I first stumbled across them, I have eagerly awaited each of Gibson's new novels. Which, as anyone who is a fan of Gibson knows, is a usually a pretty long wait. And while they are always worth the wait, I am not very patient. Fortunately, there is The Windup Girl.

If I called this book Gibsonian, that would probably sum up it's basic premise better than anything else. TWG is not cyberpunk in any traditional sense (a quick look at blurbs describes it as "biopunk," but that seems too easy a label), but the nature of the world the characters lives in has that same streetwise neo-noir future. Only where Gibson and others delved into the realm of the computer and the technological, Bacigalupi's future is more organic, and one that seems a much more impending future. The set-up is simple: this is a post carbon-crash world, one where fossil fuels have either run out or run sufficiently short to amount to the same thing. Bioengineering is a way of life and has been for a while, with the consequence that there are genetically modified foods in the market, strange new artificially created life forms, and frightening new viruses and plagues.

At one part steampunk in it's approach to getting around the problems created by a lack of combustion engines (there are airships, of course), unlike stories in that genre this is no alternate future or reworked past. This is a serious look at what such a new world would mean not only for the world economy and the great nations, but smaller nations as well. And if it is one part steampunk, it is also one part dystopian disaster fiction. Climate change is a harsh reality in this world, all the more so for nations that live close to sea level, including Thailand, where the story is set. The sea is kept just barely at bay, and at great expense. Just as real are the results of bioengineered crops and animals more keenly felt in smaller, less powerful nations. Eating the wrong food from the market can expose yourself to all sorts of unpleasant consequences, and people are always on the lookout for past food stores and genetics that offer purer alternatives.

We meet several characters, each of them compelling in their own way if not all equally likeable. One is a company man, a "Calorie Man" working for what seem to be the big movers and shakers in this new world: biotech companies. Here, too, the author draws on a familiar theme, that of the mega company of the future that is the ultimate mover and shaker in a world where old political and economic boundaries have fallen. But, again, TWG does something a little different with it, and gives us the perspective of the smaller nation having to compete and defend itself against companies that would have felt right at home in a William Gibson novel. 

Another character is the titular Windup Girl, a creation straight out of Philip K Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (though perhaps owing more to Bladerunner than the novel itself), an artificial woman struggling with the nature of who and what she is. Then there are government rebels, and self-serving refugees, and a host of smaller characters, all at once both familiar and new. All as equally plausible, as equally believable as the setting itself.

This is a novel that draws heavily on past materials, then interweaves them with new ideas and points them in new directions, all masterfully written with a style that was as compelling as it was innovative. Once started it was hard to put down, as I kept wanting to spend more time in this world the author has created, even if parts of that world aren't very pleasant.

In fact, if I had one complaint about this novel, it is that it is so far the only novel set in this world. Bacigalupi has written two short stories set in this universe, but The Windup Girl is the first full-length novel. (Which was a bit surprising. I expected "Calorie Man" to be another novel, given how fully formed this world he's created is, and it took me a bit of searching to discover it was in a book and not a book itself.) Just so long as it's not the last, I'll be a very, very happy reader.

The Saturday Review: Helix

Details matter. Details can make or break a story, because if the writer can't pay attention to details, you have to wonder about the rest of it. Now, I know some things get overlooked. Mistakes happen, and I'm okay with that. There's also a certain amount of suspension of disbelief required in almost any story, no matter how "realistic" it is. The less grounded in reality, the greater the suspension, but details can be key to holding that suspension in place.

It's in the details where Helix fell apart for me. I'm disappointed by this, because I wanted to like the show. There's certainly a lot to like about it, including the cast, but I couldn't help feeling they overlooked too many things. Maybe this is nitpicking, but when it gets to a certain level the nits start unraveling the whole.

(A couple of spoilers in this, so just be forewarned.)

I'm going to break these down into a couple of categories, starting with

Location

Point #1: Okay, did anyone in charge of this show remember that the Arctic, unlike it's southern cousin, is an ocean. I know one person did: whoever did that gorgeous matte that was under the helicopter on approach to the facility. Did you see those cracks? They were great. They were there because, again, the Arctic is an ocean, and the ice there does very different things than ice on solid land. There's a reason there aren't the kind of bases in the Arctic that there are in the Antarctic, and one of those is that sea ice isn't anywhere near as stable.

Even when it isn't melting. Which brings me to

Point #2. Now, they did a nice job on the map situating it in a place where there is still not open water in the summer in the Arctic, but whoever sank the probably millions if not billions of dollars into this thing (I mean, did you see that head office? Wood floors, spacious enough to park a couple of cars in, and that massive window? In the Arctic?), I hope they designed it to float in the long term.

Now, judging by the day/night cycles it's somewhere between summer and winter (because they are, according to what they said, above the Arctic circle), so we can't expect it to be at the height of summer,  and we're not yet to open water in the entire Arctic in the summer, but if I were building something like that, I'd be worried about it.

Point #3: Speaking of temperature, what idiot walks out into that kind of cold without a face covering? Idiots who spend their lives in LA and don't actually have any appreciation for cold weather, that's who. This one should have been a matter of common sense. Again, even allowing that it's not the dead of winter, there was serious blowing snow and cold. Enough cold to freeze the monkeys solid, and rather quickly by the looks of it.  And yet, the army guy, and the scientist trying to escape, are out there dressed no more warmly than if they're trying to build a snow fort on a Saturday afternoon.

Contagion Protocol

If these are really the people working at the CDC, I'm suddenly a lot more frightened. I am not a doctor. I am not a scientist. And even I know that those suits they wear are not just about airborne pathogens. Even I know that you don't take off the thing that protects your face when you have infected rats right in front of you. For something that they know is so deadly, they are awfully cavalier about it in certain scenes.

Beyond that, it looks as though new people will be showing up. I'm sorry, but what part of "quarantine" were they unfamiliar with? New people cannot come in, just as the old people cannot come out. That's what it means to be quarantined.

Even before the outbreak, why are there such big air vents? Why aren't there more filters that would make it harder for the bad guy to move around in the vents in the first place? This is a lab dealing with various pathogens, some of which had to be potentially airborne, and yet there seem to have been zero precautions in place. Maybe this will be explained as part of some nefarious scheme, but still...

Common Sense

This to me is the most damning part. Okay, they're playing fast and loose with the CDC stuff. Not like it hasn't been done before. Okay, it was clearly written by people who only see snow in snow globes. Not the first time there, either. But then there were these things:

You have a dangerous, contagious man on the loose. And yet, near as I can tell, the job of head of security is to stand around behind the others. Everyone seems to forget to look for the biggest threat.  What else does security have to do at this point other than conduct a manhunt for the number one threat to them all? Because clearly security isn't doing other things they should be.

Then the bad guy takes the hand of one of his victims. We know the chip in the hand allows access to the locks. Why not immediately rescind the dead guy's access? If I could figure out that's what he wanted a hand for, the guy who's job it is to keep everyone secure should have. Heck, even if it wasn't what the bad guy wanted the hand for, this does not seem an unreasonable precaution. Yet no one even suggests it, even after it's been demonstrated that access can, in fact, be restricted.

Also, what's the number one rule of any horror film? DO NOT GO ANYWHERE ALONE. This is not just a question of the characters being less genre-savvy than the audience, this is common sense. You have a bad guy who is traveling through the air vents, vents that lead everywhere and cannot be sealed off. (I'll grant them that one, seeing as the bad guy demonstrates serious strength.) Why is anyone, ANYONE, traveling through the facility or working alone at this point? I don't care if you're taking a shower, you don't go alone.

Speaking of which, tracking a person through a metal air vent should not be hard. It makes an awful lot of noise. Although in this case it only seemed to do so when necessary to build suspense. Though I suppose that falls under the convention of having big enough vents to move around in anyway. Look, I bought it for Die Hard - which they had the good grace to name drop - but, in the intervening decades, I thought we'd all become savvy enough to know that in real life, these vents aren't big enough for that.

I'd like to nitpick having to manually search for the guy in the vents in the first place, but it's not entirely implausible that there isn't so much as a Roomba in the entire facility. Though, really, someone or something has to be keeping that gorgeous hardwood floor clean and shiny.

So, where does that leave me with the show?

When all is said and done, I really, really wanted this to be good. And parts of it are. Parts of it - and some of these are narrative things that I did not address here - are not. The lack of attention to detail worries me, from the small details to the big ones that seem to be driving the story.

I may tune in next week, but I really think they've lost me just by not paying enough attention.

Too Far vs Not Far Enough

I put down two books in a row last week. Both books looked promising; yes, I judge a book by its cover. And the book flap. So do you, so let's not quibble over this. One book was even by an author I have heard of, who has a good reputation.

That said, I got no more than three and a half chapters into the first book, and about ten pages into the second. Which in both cases turned out to be more than enough. The books were plagued by different problems on opposite ends of the storytelling spectrum, but both were deeply flawed enough for me to put them down.

Well, let me rephrase that. "Deeply" flawed makes them sound like the offspring of someone's high school project and a vanity press. These were not. Under different expectations, they might have been good, and I'll say honestly that had I picked up the second book when it was published in the late 80's, teen me would have probably loved it.

Teen me also liked hot pockets. Tastes change.

Both books were science fiction, which is the extent of what they have in common. The plot of either isn't really important to this post, save that, again, both looked interesting. The first book collapsed under the weight of it's own characters. Specifically, the first three chapters dealt with three separate characters, and sadly only one of them was interesting. There was also head-hopping, wherein the POV changed character mid-scene as two of the characters interacted. That's a particular pet peeve in my case, but it happens, and I've kept reading despite it before. (Michael Crichton was guilty of this at least once.) Only the first chapter, the one with the interesting character, dealt with the science fiction premise of the book. The other two could have been at home in books of any genre. They were stock, they were cliche, and because of it they were boring.

I got the impression the book was the first author's foray into science fiction, and that the author is primarily a writer of literary-esque fiction. There's probably an argument in there about sticking to what you're good at, but as the late Iain Banks demonstrated, you can be good at both. (The entire argument about genre vs literary could actually be buried under the weight of Banks alone, but I'm sure it'll pop up again zombie-like sometime soon.) That said, I think the author needed more practice. Or at least more time spent brainstorming a character sheet.

The second book had the opposite problem. There was too much science fiction all crammed into a small space. What I mean by this is that there was not a single piece of equipment used in the first set piece that the author hadn't renamed. The gun, the plane, the outfit, the ammunition. A few had been confusingly renamed, as it took me a bit to figure out he was referring to some sort of vision enhancement thing. I know there's a fine line in science fiction about these things. You are going to have to create terms, at least beyond "thing," which as I've just demonstrated only gets you so far. But there's a limit. You don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you design a car, after all.

Some of this I think is more a product of the book's time than anything else. I seem to recall a lot of science fiction doing this in the 80's, and perhaps if I went back and reread some of the books I loved then, they wouldn't make the cut, either. Yet I have a strong suspicion the really good ones would make it. (I am tempted to re-read Neuromancer just to see.)

Neither of these two problems, on opposite ends of the genre spectrum as they are, would be inherently fatal to the books for everyone, I am sure. It was for me, though, and I have enough other books waiting to be read without spending time on a bad book no matter how strong the premise.

Omelette du Homage

So, if you're in the mood for a very dangerous drinking game (or you want to play an alcoholic version of Russian Roulette), I have a proposal for you: one shot per sci-fi reference in Fox's new Almost Human.

Now, normally I don't comment too much on current things in pop culture. This is because, rather than being on the cutting edge of pop culture, I'm more akin to being on the dull, rusty garden implement left out on the lawn over the winter edge of things. (Thankfully my shots are current. I think.)

But there were just so. many. things. Leaving aside that the entire premise was done before in the short-lived (but thoroughly enjoyable and not just because of Yancey Butler) Mann and Machine, in about the first 20 minutes, this is what I noticed. This list is entirely spoiler-free, I promise. Nothing here is plot relevant. More on that - the non-plot relevance - in a moment. Anyway, in random order:

• There was the memory machine from Total Recall
• The neighborhoods from Blade Runner.
• The noodle shop from Blade Runner, complete with the people with umbrellas in the background.* 
• The emotional robots going nuts. Heck, I was waiting for someone to say "More human than human."
• The robot doing the statistical analysis on who to save from I, Robot.
• Heck, the interior of the police station looked very similar to I, Robot.
• The bad guys stole their black leather get up from Clarence J Boddicker in Robocop. (With maybe a dash of Roy Batty thrown in.)

And that was about when I just stopped keeping track.

Don't get me wrong, it was enjoyable enough, despite the veritable plethora of cliches - including every single character profile - and I'll tune in to see where it goes. But as the similarities started to pile up, I had to wonder if they were doing this on purpose. By the end of the episode, I was convinced they were. My only question is, were they doing it as homage, or because they couldn't think of anything original?

If I'm giving the benefit of the doubt to the writers, I'd have to say homage, if only because there were just. so. many. On the other hand, this is from the same guy that crafted the last two Star Trek films, including the one that was largely cobbled together from Wrath of Khan and various sundry pieces. So it may be a little from column A, a little from column B.

[Seeing as how J.J. Abrams' next big thing is the Star Wars films, I have decided that in a stunning bit of prognostication I shall herein reveal the script for those: it's going to be entirely bits and pieces from the prior movies. In random order. With lens flares.** As long as those bits and pieces are mostly from the original trilogy, I'm actually good with that. Maybe a couple of the lightsaber battles from the prequels, because let's face it, those were the only good things in the prequels.]

I'd also like to believe that the massive amount of references were mostly homage because otherwise there's a staggering lack of originality that's just depressing. The media powers that be ought to be able to come up with better without having to shamelessly steal from other things. Or else they just figured not enough people would notice, which is just a cynical thing to be thinking, even for me.

And I'll admit, if it's homage, it's just clever enough to get me to tune back in. But there had better be more than just retread. As much as I adored all the sci-fi goodness that they're drawing on, nostalgia only carries so far.

Besides, I have most of those films on DVD anyway.

Oh, and if you're puzzled over the title, it was my own homage to an episode of Dexter's Lab. By which I mean I blatantly stole it.

*I'd have to check, but if that wasn't just about shot perfect - same angle and everything - from that opening scene with Deckard, I'll eat a spinner. (That's one of those flying cars.)

** Okay, that was low-hanging fruit, and to be honest I didn't notice any in Almost Human. There was, however, a decidedly shiny quality to some aspects, though it was balanced out by the non-shiny underbelly stuff.

Review: The Fall

This is the second "part two of three" book I've read in the past couple of months, and, sadly, it fell into the well-established category where the follow-up book is not quite as spectacular as the first. I finished The Strain all in a rush, because it was that good. Sadly, The Fall, DelToro and Hogan's follow-up, was only finished quickly because it was short, and because I checked two books out at once and so needed to get through it to move onto the other one.

After the phenomenal pace and plot of The Strain, this one felt kind of rushed. There were scenes where it took me a bit to understand what was going on, and that kills any edge-of-your-seat momentum that might be building. I won't spoil any plot points, but there was a needless macguffin introduced early on - one that wasn't even hinted at in the first book. It felt too much like a "let's throw this in to move the plot along" kind of thing, and while done right that might have worked, here it was just cliche and rather ham-fisted. Not to mention that it put up not one but two major plot holes that weren't addressed by much more than a hand-wave.

It was also short, too short really for me to understand why this is a trilogy instead of just one big book (unless I want to be cynical). If this second volume had been fleshed out better, then perhaps having three separate books would make more sense. And if the authors had taken the time to flesh things out, it might have made for a better book.

Bottom line, while I liked The Fall, and liked it well enough to both finish this book and move on to the last one in the trilogy, it's raised the stakes a lot for that third book. I'm hoping that one will be more like the first, so I don't find myself wishing they'd just stuck to one book only.

Review: The Strain

Let me first say that I don't read "end of the world" books. Prior to this first book in Guillermo DelToro and Chuck Hogan's trilogy, that category was largely comprised of The Stand and The Road. Actually, come to think of it, that might be the entirety of the category. Nor do I watch a whole lot of movies in that genre. I could count those using my fingers, and still have some left over. I might even get away with just one hand if I exclude movies based on books, because that would eliminate the television and film versions, respectively, of both books. Nor am I really sure the Mad Max trilogy counts in that genre. And while I do have two end of the world books on my "want to read" list, one of them is mostly on that list for the novelty of it. The other is on the list because I know the author - a little - and it is, by all accounts, really, really good. (That would be Alex Adams' White Horse.)

But I haven't read those yet.

I have read The Strain.

Technically, the book took me weeks to finish. I even had to renew it from the library. Ignore that. The sad truth is, I cracked it open, and then other things got in my way, and the book sat on my kitchen table for weeks through no fault of it's own. I take the blame for those first weeks. Whereas all credit is due to the book itself for the last four days. Because that's how long it took me to go through three quarters of the book. If there hadn't been pesky things like my having to work during the day, I probably would have finished it in half that time. It's that good.

I immediately went to the library and picked up books two and three of the trilogy.

It's that good.

To steal from a professional review blurbed on the inside cover: it's like crossing King with Stoker with Crichton. Two of whom are authors I like, and the other one wrote Dracula which pretty much set the tone for the entire vampire genre. Although you should know that already. Come to think on it, seeing as King wrote his own vampire book, I could probably take Stoker off the list. And it owes more to King and Crichton anyway in terms of it's scope and characters and pacing.

"Owes to" is not the same as "steals from," however, as this is it's own work and not simply a cut and paste from other books. Del Toro and Hogan make the genre - or genres, as it is end of the world by vampires - their own. There's just enough science in it to ground it in modern times. There's just enough supernatural to make you turn on all the lights. And while the book isn't perfect - the description of the vampires will seem very familiar to anyone who saw Del Toro's Blade II - it was enough of a ride to overlook the occasional jostle.

I won't give away any plot points, other than to say it ends on the kind of cliffhanger that makes me glad I can get books two and three from the library. It also sets things up so that if the series doesn't end happily for all involved, I'm not going to be surprised.

All involved excluding the reader, of course, as I have already started The Fall, and so far it is living up to the expectations set by The Strain.

Why I Will Survive the Apocalypse

I am apparently well equipped to survive the Apocalypse. I say this not because I have a storm cellar stocked with dry goods and water (though I do know a guy who has such supplies) nor because I possess some unique skills such as the ability to grow crops, hunt game, fashion my own clothes or fly a rocket ship. No, apparently, I possess these skills because I am a writer. Or at least, so Hollywood tells me.

Mind you, I've not seen this latest parable, but according to the plot summaries I've read, in 2012 John Cusack's leading character is a writer. This follows a long line of rather ludicrous and unlikely heroes in Hollywood. I remember one reviewer commenting on Will Smith's lawyer in Enemy of the State. But that was Will Smith, so a certain leeway applies. As much as I like John Cusack, however, I have trouble believing any of the writers I know are equipped to survive the end of the world.

(With the possible exception of Stephanie Meyer who has clearly made some sort of deal with demonic powers. There's no other explanation for it. Then again, maybe that just guarantees she'll be among the first collected.)

This is not to say I haven't learned things that might not be useful in my writing career in the event of the impending end of the world. But there's a wide gap between researching something to write about it, and actually doing it. I wrote a couple of short articles on edible plants, but without the guides I used as a reference in my backpack, I'm as lost as the next guy. Maybe a little less lost, having been a Boy Scout, but even then there's a limit to my abilities.

The bulk of the things I have written on I just can't see being any help should an asteroid strike, or a supervolcano explode, or nuclear war break out, or any other number of doomsday scenarios occur. Though I might possibly survive the invasion by a large lizard type critter that breathes radioactive fire, based solely on Orson Wells surviving Godzilla. But as I don't live in Tokyo - or for that matter within five hundred miles of the nearest oceanic coast - somehow I foresee my having plenty of time to get out of the way should something come ashore. (Nothing ever comes ashore in the Great Lakes, not even in Hollywood. ... Okay, there was one exception, but I challenge anyone to name it.)

None of which matters to Hollywood. I'm not sure there's a reason why the main character in the latest disaster flick is a writer. Part of me suspects there's a jar someplace where Hollywood writers reach in and draw out a random career for the hero. How else do you explain Arnold as a kindergarten teacher?

Or maybe it's just wishful thinking on the part of the screenwriters, attempting to get themselves on that doomsday list in the event of the end of the world.

Either way, should we reach that point in my lifetime, I will cling to the hope there's a reason for it, and that whatever reason it is will be made manifest when the time comes. Which beats cowering under my desk, which is most likely where I'd really be.

Twenty Minutes Into the Future - in 10 Seconds

The tri-corder has arrived. For those who have no idea what I just said, the tri-corder was this little hand-held doohickey (yes, that's a technical term) the doctors in Star Trek could use to scan someone, anytime, anywhere, to figure out what was wrong with them. Think of it like a portable x-ray/MRI/"other medical things I can't even begin to identify" device. Pure science fiction.

Back in the 1960's, that is. Turns out, modern technology has caught up with Star Trek, more or less, and it's no longer a fantasy. The portable medical scanner is, in fact, a reality. It may not be the complete diagnostic tool the tri-corder was supposed to be, but it's darn close.

Then, too, consider the modern cell phone. Which does just about a million and one things besides make calls. It is, for all intents and purposes, a portable computer. I remember back when the best thing to do with a computer was to turn the cursor colors and make pretty patterns on the screen. (I was in grade school, and it was one of those Tandy machines.) Now, if I could afford one, I could have something in my pocket that does most of what I rely on my laptop for. Not perfectly, and frankly, I prefer my laptop, but it's the possibility that blows my mind.

It's the unexpected pace at which the "future" arrives that provides something of a perilous pitfall for those of us in the science fiction genre. You've got a limited number of options when it comes to "when" in the setting - either it's the near future, or it's the far off future. There's kind of a middle ground, something like Star Trek, for example, which is only a few hundred years away, but that kind of falls into the latter category with the space ships and the aliens.

I say "future" as a stand-in for futuristic. After all, my favorite bit of science fantasy takes place a long time ago. And my second favorite turned out to... well, let me stop there before I give away any spoilers. (Hint for those who want to know: Toasters)

Near future stuff is most often the domain of cyberpunk and a few other things like it. "Max Headroom," which gave the particular sub-genre the setting device I appropriated for this entry's title, was something which was clearly in the future without being all that far away. Like most such near future efforts, in some ways it came up a little short. In others... well, sometimes as a writer you get lucky.

Some things kind of fall in between. 2001 looks, on the surface, like a far off future. with spaceships and AI and the like. And considering it was some 40 years away, that seemed like a bit of distance. Now, of course, we've been and gone. Bladerunner is set in a scant 9 years from now, and while I want my flying car I seriously hope the rest of it doesn't come true. And it looks unlikely to.

As a writer who dabbles in science fiction, I tend to set things rather nebulously in the future when I do. I am well aware that whatever I write, even without narrowing down a date for it, will very likely either seem silly or hopelessly outdated just within my lifetime. For example, I wrote an internet-based bit of fiction - as in the internet figured into the central plot - back in the early 1990's. When I blew the dust off it here a year ago, I had to laugh at most of what I'd written then. The reality of the internet had turned out to be far different than the predictions and what all the sci-fi of the time was envisioning. I reworked it, and made it more in keeping with what we know now... and also toned it down a bit so I don't laugh at it in another ten years.

I think if you're serious about it - like William Gibson or Philip K Dick - that near future can actually be a bit more challenging, because you can't make those great leaps that writers like Heinlein and Herbert did. I'm not serious about it, at least not at their level, so I freely admit my own stuff is either a blatant pastiche or a carefully crafted homage, depending on how generous my reader is inclined to be. And you have to write it with the knowledge that no matter what you might predict, the future could catch up with you a lot sooner than you think.

All that said, now that the tri-corder is here, where's my phaser?

Shadowrun

The only role-playing game I ever seriously thought about playing has turned 20. I never did actually play the game, but if there was something that was going to get me to buy multi-sided dice and huddle around somebody's card table in their basement or rec room, Shadowrun would have been it. I actually owned the guidebook up until my last move, and it provided a fair amount of inspiration for me. (I've never thought of it before now, but it occurs to me the blend of the supernatural/paranormal and sci-fi that is the hallmark of the game may well have been in part the inspiration for my main body of work.)

For those not familiar with this particular RPG - back in the days when that meant dice and well-worn books and card tables and not fancy CGI effects - the premise was a simple one: in a "Twenty Minutes Into The Future" type device, sometime in the near future magic returns to the world in all its forms. Dragons, wizards, orcs, trolls, etc... in short, take your standard Dungeons and Dragons motifs, all the sci-fi trappings of a cyberpunk convention, mix them all together with a mercenary-based system of gaming, and you have the basic gist. The actual setting of the game as played was a bit farther into the future, I think, about mid-point or so in the 20th Century, but the turning event in their particular history had already occurred some time back, so trolls carrying lasers was commonplace for the inhabitants.

Of course, some of the technology that was supposed to be in the future now looks kind of... quaint. Which is also an issue if you're trying to do near-future sci-fi. (The topic of a forth-coming post.) Very few people foresaw the revolution in cell phones and those little hand-held computers so many of us carry now. (Better known as iPhones, Blackberries, and the like.) On the other hand, I don't think anyone who played the game ever expected the future to be like that anyway.

At least I hope not, as it was all rather dystopian. In that regard somewhat unoriginally so, as it was all big corporations ruling the future, but I'm guilty of that particular trope myself. I say trope rather than cliche in a hopeful tone, there, but certain aspects of it carried a somewhat dismal tone. Which makes sense in an RPG, because after all if it's all sunshine and rainbows, what is there for characters to do?

I also have to wonder how many of the guys writing urban fantasy - and possibly some of the women - were in some part influenced by the game. It occurs to me that the whole "magic and tech don't mix" motif was one of the rules of the game: magic users in the game didn't get any of the nifty cybernetic enhancements the non-magic characters could get. Of course it was all set in a more futuristic time than the majority of urban fantasy, but there's some of it out there. I think. .... If not there will be when I publish. So there.

Anyway, as I said at the outset it provided some inspiration for me, and used to sit on my bookshelf. I think I may have to go out and purchase the anniversary guidebook, just to put it back on my shelf again so that, when the mood strikes, I can mine it for ideas.

.... Still not buying the dice, though.

Steampunk Music

A quick definition, for those not in the know, borrowed from the Wiki gods:

Steampunk is a sub-genre of fantasy and speculative fiction that [...] denotes works set in an era or world where steam power is still widely used [...] but with prominent elements of either science fiction or fantasy [...]. Other examples of steampunk contain alternate-history-style presentations of "the path not taken" of such technology as dirigibles, analog computers, or digital mechanical computers [...] with a presumption of functionality. (original article here)

This is one of the concepts that may be best understood with a visual, so take a moment to look here and then again here, and you'll get the idea.

Now, the concept appeals to me for a number of reasons, not least because the first bit of adult fiction I ever really got into was Sherlock Holmes. (Tolkien and Herbert were in there, too, but their worlds had more limited entries.) Steampunk seems perpetually stuck in a semi-Victorian era level of society. A bit more advanced, as I think dirigibles came slightly later, but with about the same feel. So it appeals to me for that reason alone, as there is just something about that era that I find fascinating.

Also, I find dirigibles incredibly cool, and think that even though it would be slower, modern air travel would be so much more enjoyable if we'd stuck with blimps. Which, yes, is wholly impractical given the number of travelers and the speeds with which they must travel, but really, can anyone argue that a slower pace would really be a bad thing in today's world? And besides... blimps! Blimps!!

Ok, that bit of personal geeky self-indulgence aside, one of the other reasons the genre appeals to me is it has such a visual element to it. Which was pretty much where I thought it began and ended - as a visual medium.

I was wrong. (Probably not for the last time, certainly not for the first.)

There is musical steampunk.

I'm not sure if it expands beyond the band that was introduced on the radio the other day, via one of the NPR programs, but it does exist. The group, whose name eludes me - and we all know how I feel about research on this blog - is primarily a jazz-oriented outfit. Now for whatever reason, they decided to attempt to do modern era music on more traditional instruments. In other words, rock and roll without the standard rock and roll set of instruments. Big band meets Led Zeppelin. Sort of. (Yes, blimps again.)

It was not muzak by any means, which might be the first comparison that springs to mind. They managed to retain the edginess that defines steampunk, and convey that on a musical level. I won't claim it was music I'd run out and buy, but it was decidedly different, and I thought it added another dimension to this particular genre. It reminded me that if you're going to get into world-building, which is sometimes an integral part of both fantasy, sci-fi, and spec-fic (with all the over-lapping those genres do lately), there are always multiple layers of elements to consider.

Which, if it didn't look so cool might be enough to get me to eschew the unfamiliar future for the known element of the present.

Only... there are those blimps to consider.

Defending the Litte Guy

Everyone hates the Ewoks. This seems to be the universal consensus among legions of Star Wars fans, and one of the reasons why Return of the Jedi was thought to be the weakest of the three films. Then, of course, Lucas made three more films, thereby elevating ROTJ from the bottom of the pile and dropping the Ewoks from "most hated" status. I expect they're at least a distant third now.

I have to admit, I'm not everyone, and I think some of that is rooted in my academic background. One of the chief complaints I've heard about the Ewoks is how they managed to overcome the obviously technologically superior Imperial Forces. (Speaking of which, why is it "Imperial" with an "I" when it's "Empire" with an "E"? Have to find that out one of these days.) This, more than any other argument I've heard, seems to be the main source of ire. I suspect some of it may also be that it was Ewoks, not Wookies, but given the FX constraints of the day I've heard that was largely budgetary more so than anything else.

There might also be some lingering resentment that, for the longest time, the only post Star Wars offerings were a couple of television movies featuring, of all things, just the Ewoks. No mention of any of the rest of the Star Wars universe. Other than the Ewoks, it could have been set anywhere else. But I think a lot of it is that the Ewoks manage to overcome the Stormtroopers.

If we were talking a long, protracted campaign, then I think the critics would be right. There's no way the Ewok would be able to withstand a coordinated campaign. The Empire isn't the Americans in Vietnam, after all. Assuming the planet was worth the effort, they'd wipe out the Ewoks in a heartbeat. Superior numbers, superior technology. If all else failed, they'd just vaporize the planet. (Which I suspect would have happened the moment the Death Star was finished anyway.)

But that's not what happens in the film. It isn't an entire war. It's one battle. Against an indigenous, obviously prepared guerrilla force. Yes, it's a force of three foot tall natives who look suspiciously like a marketing ploy. (It is George Lucas, after all, a marketing mastermind... to a certain extent... and it is Star Wars, which changed the movie marketing game forever.) Yet they know the terrain, they've put together various defensive/offensive efforts that are clearly aimed at the occupying forces - unless there's some T-rex sized predator roaming around that requires the smashing logs suspended from trees - and they aren't entirely alone. They have the Rebel squad assisting them, too.

As someone who's studied military history, I know this isn't the first time a smaller, less-armed force has managed to defeat a large, more technologically proficient force. Little Big Horn comes to mind, among other instances. Guerrilla warfare works for precisely the reasons the Ewoks manage to put a dent in those shiny white uniforms. Smaller, more mobile force, that knows how to use the local terrain to their advantage. In the long term, against a more ruthless force willing to use all the means at their disposal (which most opposing forces aren't - hence the reason we didn't firebomb North Vietnam into a wasteland) those advantages can be countered and overcome.

So, again, in the long term the Ewoks would be toast. Fuzzy toast, likely with the smell of burnt hair which, if you've ever smelled it, is highly unpleasant. But for one, short, pitched battle, with the element of surprise and advanced planning, there's no reason why it couldn't have gone their way. They might have even won a few battles before the Empire razed the forest and hunted the little pseudo teddy bears into extinction.

Hate the Ewoks if you must, but don't begrudge them their victory.

Although if Lucas ever comes up with a Jedi Ewok, then I, too, may be on the anti-Ewok bandwagon. Or would that metaphor work better with a Sand Crawler?