April 2014

SF/F Commentary

Movie Review: The Lego Movie (2014)

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I can’t remember when I saw the first footage for The Lego Movie (2014), but I do remember thinking to myself that it would be the geekiest, most reference-laden work of 2014.  Indeed, if any film tops this one in its insistence on crossing genres and referencing geek cultures from comics, films, books, and, hell, even Legos, then that would be a feat unto itself.  As it stands, The Lego Movie is sort of like that friend who beats everyone at Trivial Pursuit every single time because he spends too much time on the Internet or with his nose buried in Netflix or the library stacks (or her, for that matter).  And I mean that in a good way.  What makes this such a lovable film is the fact that it shows so much love to the communities from which it borrows, not just in terms of the Lego work, where franchised media properties are well represented, but in terms of the worlds from which those properties originate.  This is, in point of fact, a film for geeks, and it is a film I think everyone should see, if only to count off all the jokes based on DC characters or pirates or Star Wars or a number of other geeky things.  Expect a drinking game upon the DVD release. The Lego Movie follows Emmet, a regular construction worker in a regular town with a regular job and a deep desire to be like everyone else.  Indeed, in this ordinary city, everyone is like everyone else.  Everyone sings the same happy song (“Everything is Awesome“), enjoys the same television, and goes through life with the same hopes and dreams:  to be part of the team that is the city.  But when he stumbles upon a mysterious woman searching the ruins of a building, Emmet discovers the Piece of Resistance and learns that he is the Special, tasked with preventing Lord Business from freezing the entire world just as it is with the Cragle (crazy glue with some of the letters missing).  With his world thrown into chaos, Emmet must discover who he really is and how to put the world back to rights. If it’s not already clear, I loved The Lego Movie.  For the most part, there aren’t a lot of good geeky movies that reference things that I actually know, and so to sit there in the theater laughing at jokes that were funny on their own to everyone else, but also funny to me on a different level was a treat.  Much as Pixar’s films frequently engage their audiences on multiple levels (jokes for kids that work for adults and vice versa), this is a comedy film with multiple levels of engagement.  That’s not an easy thing to do, and so I have to give this film major props for keeping me, and my less-geeky friend, utterly entertained from start to finish.  The geek-minded, I’m sure, will find so much to love about this film based solely on its referential nature; indeed, this is the kind of film built just for us, and it knows it.  There’s an almost charming awareness in the film — surely translated from the geek love of the writers and cast — as if it were subconsciously crashing down the 4th wall to share with us its own in-jokes. All of this referential humor is supported by a stunning cast of voice actors (and equally stunning and hilarious characters or caricatures).  Batman (Will Arnett) is the caricature we’ve all known and loved, but with a side of emo-EDM artist and frat-douche; it’s hard not to find him hilarious, even as we recognize the qualities that make him a horrible person.  The clueless Emmet (Chris Pratt) gives solid grounding to the film, as he is the closest character to us — not a ninja fighter, not a wizard, just a guy lost in a world of craziness (maybe not as much like us after all).  Even his boneheaded ideas — the bunkbed couch — are fodder for hilarity; they also happen to be important to the plot, which gives depth to the comedic elements.  It’s too easy to make jokes for the sake of the joke, but to make that joke central to the development of the plot requires some degree of writing skill.  Additionally, Morgan Freeman’s turn as Vesuvius, a Gandalf-esque figure, adds a certain gravitas to the cast, if only because it’s Morgan Freeman playing a silly wizard with crazy light eyes, and Elizabeth Banks’ rendition of Wyldstyle, the “love interest” and biggest ass kicker of the film, adds some much needed sass to main cast (the Lego fight scenes are hilarious, by the way).  There are even brief appearances from Green Lantern (Jonah Hill), Superman (Channing Tatum — oddly enough, not dancing without a shirt on), Wonder Woman (Colbie Smulders), and more.  Throw in Liam Neeson as Bad Cop/Good Cop, a two-faced (literally) caricature of the classic cliche, and Will Farrell as Lord Business, the high-style, crazed villain, and you have an exceptional comedy cast. It’s here that I’d like to talk a little more about one character in specific.  A lot of people have talked about the treatment of Wyldstyle throughout this film.  Some have suggested that she is unfairly shafted here, that it should have been her that got to be “the Special” or perhaps that she simply fell into the trap so many female characters do:  the love interest/object.  Much of this is true, in a sense; Wyldstyle is coded as “love interest” from the second Emmet sees her — the camera shows her in slow motion, waving her Lego hair in the wind for an inordinate amount of time — but I must admit that I found this less a reflection of the film’s adherence to the tropes of Hollywood than a deliberate play on the absurdity of the trope itself.  I also always viewed her as a major supporting character, as Emmet seemed central from the start.

SF/F Commentary

A Cereal Metaphor for the SFF Community

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Imagine you have a bowl of cereal, and there are a bunch of other people with bowls of cereal, too.  Person A really likes Lucky Charms, which you think are OK, but you’re much more into Cocoa Puffs.  Person B likes neither, but prefers Mini Wheats, while Person C enjoys Lucky Charms, but discovered Trix and hasn’t turned back.  Along comes Person D.  They like Grape Nuts.  There’s nothing necessarily wrong with Grape Nuts.  Sometime’s it’s OK.  Heck, sometimes it’s even good if you’re in the mood for it.  Other times, it’s the thing you avoid in the morning because it’s like chewing on rodent food.  But Person D likes Grape Nuts, not because it’s good for them or tasty, per se, but because Grape Nuts is what their friends eat, and they like their friends a lot. None of this would be a problem, of course, as one can like whatever they want.  Indeed, one should eat whatever they want in this metaphor because, well, it’s a free country (or a mostly free world or something; this metaphor isn’t perfect).  But unlike Person A or B or C or yourself, Person D believes you’re all ignoring Grape Nuts because you hate people who eat them.  There might be some truth to that.  You’re not overly fond of Grape Nuts eaters.  They make far too much noise when they chew and they’re constantly going on about how good Grape Nuts are for you…if you’d only stop being stupid by eating all those Cocoa Puffs and Lucky Charms and Mini Wheats and Trix, you’d see the light.  So you may not eat Grape Nuts for that reason, or perhaps because you just really hate Grape Nuts (it’s an acquired taste, after all).  So Person D says, “Fine.  I’m going to piss in your cereal so you can’t enjoy any of it.” You’re understandably shocked by this.  Why would someone piss in your cereal just to make a point?  Isn’t that petty?  Isn’t that rude?  Isn’t that kind of the opposite of the purpose of eating cereal?  Isn’t all this supposed to be about getting some breakfast?  More importantly, while you can understand some dislike the love you share for Cocoa Puffs, you at least poured it into your bowl solely because you liked it; indeed, the inventor of Cocoa Puffs shared their own favorite cereals so you could maybe enjoy some Pops or Cinnamon Toast Crunch or Froot Loops, and so on and so forth, because that’s what we do in a community:  share cereals.  But Person D decided to piss in your cereal. The question is this:  How do you get the piss out of your cereal?  Maybe you just pour another bowl.  Or try to ignore the piss taste in your mouth.  Or find a way to siphon out the piss and save your cereal before it’s too late.  Either way, someone has pissed in your cereal.  How you react is up to you.

SF/F Commentary

Speculative Fiction 2014: Announcement and Call for Submissions!

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Update:  Submissions will close at 12 PM EST on January 2nd, 2015.  Get those submissions in ASAP! Update 2:  A previous version of this article did not include a notice about payment for selected works.  That has been corrected below. Speculative Fiction: The Best Online Reviews, Essays and Commentary is an anthology that celebrates online science fiction and fantasy non-fiction and its influence on the community. Each year, a collection of the anthology will be curated by rotating editors. Last year, Ana and Thea from The Book Smugglers created Speculative Fiction 2013. This year, we’re pleased to say that we — me and Renay from Lady Business — will be editors of Speculative Fiction 2014. The first volume of Speculative Fiction, released in 2012, collected 52 pieces from authors, bloggers, and critics. The second volume, Speculative Fiction 2013, collects 53 pieces and will be released in April 2014 (details coming soon). All profits from the sales of Speculative Fiction will be donated to Room to Read. Each edition is published by Jurassic London, a small press run by Jared Shurin. The 2013 edition contains an afterword written by us, which explains what we will be looking for as the conversation surrounding sf/f continues throughout 2014. As we edit, we will follow those stated guidelines: We will continue the work of previous editors in finding symmetry between long term, ongoing debates and original discussions spurred by new developments in genre culture, both in creative content and fan response. We will embrace the rich diversity of voices both from within SF fandom and beyond, with the recognition that important genre conversations are happening outside standard literary SF community culture and its platforms. We will do our best to strive for parity in gender, sexuality, race, and nationality in recognition that as a fandom, SF is stronger when it includes the perspectives that may lie outside U.S. and U.K. cultural narratives.  With our goals in mind, we’re happy to announce that we’re open for submissions! Send us the best reviews, commentaries, and other non-fiction works using this form. What we’re looking for in 2014: We’re looking for non-fiction reviews, essays, and criticism (“works”) with speculative fiction at their core. This can include science fiction, fantasy, horror, and topics that fall under or align with those topics. We welcome works about all forms of media, including but not limited to: books; film; television; all forms of games from tabletop to games next-gen consoles; and comics and manga. The work must have a publication date between January 1, 2014 and December 31, 2014. Anyone is eligible for inclusion: authors, fans, bloggers, critics who blog, bloggers who are authors, etc.), and all identifications are welcome, from full legal names to fannish pseudonyms. Everyone is welcome to submit any link they find interesting even if they are not the author. There is no limit on nominations. If you see five relevant posts, we’ll take them! If you see 50, we’ll take those, too. We’re aiming for pieces between 800 – 1500 words, but longer pieces are absolutely welcome.  Payment is $0.01 a word (up to $10) for non-exclusive reprint rights. Submitted works can be from anywhere in the world, although we do need an English translation for consideration. SPECIAL NOTE: we are very interested in receiving commentary on speculative fiction from the young adult community, media fandom (mainstream film/television), academia, and nonwestern fandoms, such as anime/manga, as well as content on a wide array of platforms, including tumblr and other nontraditional writing spaces. And there you have it.  Submit away!

SF/F Commentary

I’m a Hugo Award Nominee — Holy Moly on a Stick!

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If you didn’t know already, then you’re probably living in a hole, don’t know what a Hugo Award is, or don’t care.  Or maybe you’re secretly plotting to keep me forever in obscurity.  *glare* In any case, my podcast, The Skiffy and Fanty Show, is a finalist for the 2014 Hugo Awards in the Best Fancast category.  We’re up there with a bunch of other amazing podcasts, too; there’s something really cool about being in a category with Galactic Suburbia, The Writer and the Critic, and The Coode Street Podcast.  Heck, even SF Signal, who is the big boy (or girl) in town, is worthy of admiration for being a powerhouse in the sf/f podcast field.  Plus, there’s Verity Podcast (Doctor Who FTW!) and Emma Newman’s adorable Tea & Jeopardy.  If this isn’t a varied list of cool podcasts, I don’t know what is! So my name is among a sea of wonderful names.  My crew is among a sea of wonderful crews.  My podcast is among a sea of wonderful podcasts.  It’s a good day. And, indeed, that’s all this post is about:  celebrating the awesomeness that is this whole ordeal.  I don’t know if I’ll win, and in a lot of ways, I kind of don’t care.  Obviously, I want to win, but I never thought I’d sit here and write this sentence and think “yeah, I really do feel deeply honored that I got nominated and get to see this thing I’ve spent so much time on among a host of amazing shows that have worked hard to be where they are too…and even if I don’t win, I’m still going to feel great.”  But I really feel that way right now.  It feels amazing.  I’ve never been nominated for anything important.  Hell, when I played baseball in my youth, I was the kid you’d give that silly participation trophy to because I couldn’t play worth a damn (though I had the lowest strikeout record in my last season because I was so short and hardly anyone could pitch within my strike zone — I wear that with pride). But now I’m a Hugo nominee!  That’s not a participation award.  That’s a “people like what you do and voted for you” plaque.  I may not win, but I’ll get to wear my little Hugo pin like a badge of friggin honor.  And you better believe I’m going to wear that thing everywhere. Cue transition to new thing…. And that brings me to the very important fact that I’m still trying to raise funds to attend Worldcon.  Now, I have a new reason:  to attend the Hugo ceremonies!  Right now, I need to make enough to pay for the plane ticket this month.  The food and (now new) hotel expenses can come later.  But it does mean I really really really need help.  As of this post, I’m about $600 short of the amount I need for the plane ticket.* If you’ve got $10 to spare, please consider donating.  It would help me out a lot, but it would also help The Skiffy and Fanty Show do a lot of wonderful things at Worldcon, including attending the Hugo Award ceremonies.** And on that note, I’m going to go for a walk and grin like a fool all day! ——————————- *Pretty sure I can get a ticket for between $1250 and $1400 right now, but that will change after April, I imagine. **Also on the docket:  lots of interviews with international authors and a few walk-by sessions! P.S.:  I’ll have another post about the awards later.  Right now, I’m riding the happy.

World in the Satin Bag

Film Remakes and the Necessity for Critical Distance

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Hollywood is hopelessly obsessed with remakes.  We all know this.  And if we don’t, it’s really not that difficult to figure out how obsessed Hollywood really is.  But I’ll make it easy for you here:  here’s a list of 57 remakes which were marked as “in development“ as of July 2013.  Some of those may have been dropped, but the fact of the matter is that there were 57 remakes in various stages of development last year. There’s nothing inherently wrong with remakes, of course.  After all, many remakes tackles films that are now 30+ years old, which means the primary viewing audience — let’s say 15 to 40 — probably hasn’t seen them anyway.  Some remakes are attempts to update concepts which haven’t aged well, or which really are pretty darn cool and would benefit from newer film technologies and bigger budgets (technically, this year’s Robocop fits into this category, but that film is terrible).  It makes sense, too, why Hollywood studios would choose to remake a film:  it’s safer to reboot something that was already a success — or which has a following or concept that would work well in today’s market — since the discussion surrounding the remake will naturally include buzz about the previous version; obviously, this can sometimes backfire, as in the case of Total Recall or Robocop (or perhaps it’s more often than not), as it’s difficult to find remakes which are absolutely better than their predecessors.  There’s almost always something “missing.” I tend to think of remakes in two ways: They are indicative of Hollywood’s inability to imagine new things and, in a sense, its refusal to take chances; and They are only a good idea if there is sufficient critical distance from the original source material. It’s the latter of these two modes that I want to discuss here. Part of the problem with remakes and reboots, as I see it, is the obsession with doing so before the original material has time to breathe.  Amazing Spider-Man may be a decent superhero film, but it comes on the heels of an existing “canon” of Spider-Man films — the Sam Raimi lot.  Setting aside what we think about Raimi’s take on Spidey, the films were financially successful and were generally well-received.  The latest batch is half a decade removed from the original; rather than continue the story with a new cast, this new Spidey flick completely re-tells Spidey’s origins.  If the intended audience for remakes are a “new” batch of viewers, which is, admittedly, my argument, then it makes little sense to re-tell an existing narrative when the audience is hardly “new.”  One can point to many other examples of this, such as the Battlestar Galactica movie-reboot-remake-monstrosity that will hit theaters at some point in the next year or so.  Would it not make more sense to continue an existing narrative? What I want to suggest about all this is a kind of “too soon”-ness.  It’s not that these reboots and remakes of 30-years-or-less-old flicks are bad in and of themselves; in fact, many of them might be perfectly fine movies on their own or improvements over their predecessors (given the absence of emo-hipster jazz dances in the new Spidey films, I suspect this is a point most of you will understand).  Rather, the problem these films pose is two-fold: Their “too soon”-ness courts comparison, largely unfavorable, and creates the conditions for viewer fatigue, and They remind us that Hollywood is largely a business, and so any means by which they can procure profit from licensed properties will be taken, including rebooting and remaking things well before they’ve fallen away from public consciousness, perhaps under the false assumption that doing so will naturally draw new and old fans alike. To the first, I think comparison is both beneficial and detrimental.  If a film succeeds in remaking something that wasn’t all that great to begin with, but is fondly remembered in a kind of “cult” sense (i.e., Red Dawn), then the comparison to the original is largely positive.  If Red Dawn (the remake) were actually better than Red Dawn (the 1980s cult classic), our conversation surrounding it would be about what it does right, how it succeeds where its predecessor did not and where it succeeds on its own merits.  But Red Dawn did not have that reception.  It is right for us to compare it to the original and laugh at the fact that the remake is an obviously lesser film, suffering from poor pacing, bad acting, and so on.  It is also right for us to recognize the absurdity of its altered premise.  The original Red Dawn took place right at the tail end of the Cold War, nestling itself right into pre-existing American fears and cultural narratives.  In 1984, the Soviet Union was a real threat in America’s public discourse.  But North Korea, the primary villain of the remake, is only a threat in the most limited sense.  While the U.S. currently considers NK a dangerous nation, it is not one which we actively discuss as having the capacity to invade the United States — if anything, we should recognize that North Korea’s only staying power is a nuclear deterrent.  The remake’s politics, as such, are conspicuously nonsensical in comparison to its predecessor and remind us of the specificity of the cultural context in which the original Red Dawn arose:  it is simply untranslatable to the cultural context of 2012.[1] Much of the problem with Red Dawn rests in the fact that its conceptual origins are a) not detached from the present era due to chronological proximity, and b) coupled with a narrative which always reminds us that this is a remake.  In other words, it is difficult for the studios, let alone the public at large — except, perhaps, a limited portion of the present viewership (teens) — to disentangle the narrative of Red Dawn (2012) from the history and narrative of Red Dawn (1984).  And that disentanglement is necessary, I would argue, to avoid the

SF/F Commentary

Fundraiser Updatery: 18 Days and Counting…

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There are 18 days left in my Worldcon fundraiser for The Skiffy and Fanty Show.  And I’m $1552 short.  That’s a lot to make up in less than a month, but it’s still doable.  $87 a day will do it!  But that means I really need everyone’s help on this.  A *lot* of help. And on that subject, I want to thank all the folks who have helped out thus far: Fred Kiesche Scott Pohlenz Matthew Sheahan Louise Lowenspets (there are two dots on the last “o,” but I can’t figure out how to put it in there on my tablet — sorry 🙁 ) Andrew Liptak Stina Leicht Maureen Kincaid Speller John Pitts Linda Nagata Mike Martinez Fabio Fernandes Rachael Acks David Annandale Sue Armitage Joe Monti Catherine Hill Amy Fredericks Note:  I have only listed donations that were made public.  I would also like to thank all the folks who didn’t want to be named.  You are equally as awesome for every little bit you’ve given me for this. Note 2:  I also want to say an enormous thank you to Myke Cole, who offered to share his hotel room at Worldcon with me free of charge.  It’s people like Myke and the folks above (and the unlisted folks) who make this community so wonderful:  giving up money or things or whatever to help someone out.  And that’s not just for me.  This community has helped all kinds of people.  It’s a great thing. As of right now, I’m holding off on scheduling interviews and the like, but if it starts to look that the fundraiser will get close to the goal, I’ll get all of that started.  My hope is to host walk-by sessions and interview as many international authors, editors, and so on I possibly can.  Likewise, it’s possible I’ll be on programming this year, which is pretty darn awesome! In any case, this month, we’re recording a Torture Cinema review of Highlander II at the end of the month with special guest Mike Martinez (who donated and was selected to pick the movie for the 3rd Milestone).  Other perks are already available and listed on the page. And that’s all the updates I’ve got at the moment.  If you can spare some cash, please help out.  Even $5 helps. Anywhoodles.

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