The Hugos in “Turmoil” and the Glee Crowd
There seems to be a contingent of fandom that takes pleasure in any perceived disorder in the Hugo Awards. They themselves love sf/f, often because they write in the genre themselves, but when it comes to one of the most important awards, it’s almost as if they are excited for its fall from grace, perceived or otherwise. In some cases, they declare their hope that the award simply dies; in other cases, their public displays of laughter are all the indicators one needs to determine how they feel about the Hugos. I don’t know why they take pleasure in Hugo controversies. At first, I thought it might be due to jealousy, since many of these same folks don’t get nominated in any of the categories or rarely see their own nominees appear,[1] but that would make their opinions petty and pathetic rather than detrimental. I think it goes much deeper than that; they are to the Hugos what the Joker is to Batman: they just want to see the world burn. This attitude should bother any of us who care about this genre for a number of reasons. First, while the Hugos may not be the arbiter of quality they are traditionally thought to be — indeed, they never were, being a semi-populist award from the start — they do remain an important feature of the sf/f genre. They are not, as some Hugo-lovers might suggest, the end-all-be-all of sf/f awards, in no small part because there are so many other awards which are equally important, though not necessarily as visible; the Hugos also fall short due to their very nature, which will by necessity critically alienate anyone who doesn’t value semi-populist views of what’s “best” in this genre. But they are important, even in a limited, fandom-bloc-oriented sense. The idea that these awards should die is, as such, like asking the genre to amputate its arm. Second, these awards are important to a lot of people, not just the SMoFs, but other authors, Worldcon attendees, and readers.[2] You may not agree with their views, as I often do not, but to take pleasure in the idea that something of importance to a bunch of individuals might go away or lose all significance is the worst sort of schadenfreude. The Hugos have been part of sf/f fandom for decades and were a way for sf/f fans to recognize the works they loved when nobody else would. These days, the Hugos serve a different purpose, but they remain important to a lot of people. I may not agree with the way the awards are run or how people vote for them, but I won’t begrudge the WSFS committee members or the voters for their passion for the award (if, indeed, it is passion for the award[3]). Those who enjoy seeing the Hugos mired in controversy seem to care little about the people who love what the Hugos represent in principle. This kind of sniping, fragmentary nature of fandom likewise seems counterproductive, as it necessitates the disconnection between fandom groups rather than their interaction. This, in turn, reinforces the bubble attitudes and makes change difficult. How can one expect the Hugos to change if the communities who participate in it or don’t aren’t actually talking about with one another. Fragmentation is not necessarily a good thing. It creates bubbles. Those bubbles become echo chambers. Nobody adds anything new to an echo chamber, and if you’re not adding anything new, you can’t adapt. I don’t particularly want to see the Hugos become an echo chamber. It needs to adapt with the times; to do that, people need to criticize it and participate for the love (however you want to code it).[4] If you don’t care about the awards, the reasonable response would be to simply ignore them. But the response I keep seeing is one of passive destruction. Some people want the Hugos to die, not because there is anything inherently wrong with the awards in and of themselves, but because they dislike the award for one reason or another. It’s about destruction, not construction. It’s about burning down the house for the laughs, not rebuilding the foundations. It would be one thing if the conversation were about putting more attention on other awards in an effort to add credibility to the genre; it’s entirely another to hope for the demise of any individual award simply because one disagrees with how they function, what they represent, and so on. The former is a constructive attitude; the latter is world burning. I’m one of the many who criticize the awards. While I can’t speak for all the others, I can say that my criticism comes from a position of love. I want the Hugos to be better. So do a lot of other people, especially those who have criticized the awards’ diversity, bloc voting practices, and so on. These are legitimate issues, and they should be addressed. And the best way to correct what you think are the flaws in the Hugos is to become a voting member.[5] But burning the award or taking pleasure in its demise is the kind of thing that makes fandom intolerable. This field deserves better. ————————————- [1]: In my honest opinion, some of them really deserve Hugo recognition. [2]: Not all readers, mind you. As has become clear in the discussions about the Hugos on Twitter, even readers who know about the Hugos don’t necessarily care if a book or author has won one. For me, this is a bit of a sticky area. Having involved myself in the Worldcon/Hugo universe over the last few years has reminded me that the award does not necessarily represent what I consider to be good, even though I am also a nominee on this year’s ballot — granted, I’m nominated in a very different category from literature (fancasts). [3]: As we have seen this year, there are some who vote with the intention of disrupting the process, often for political gain.
5 Annoying Author Habits on Twitter
I spend far too much time on Twitter, which means I read a lot of tweets from a lot of authors. Some authors are great at interacting, carving out their little niche and creating a kind of Twitter persona to represent them. Others, however, are kind of like social media bacterial infections who must do everything they possibly can to sell their own work; they basically turn into walking spam monkeys. And still others present themselves as bitter, rage-infested monsters fit for the Mos Eisley Cantina in Star Wars. Neither of these latter two groups are particularly fun to engage, which might explain why the five things I’ve listed here haven’t actually helped many of these individuals develop a steady writing career. Here goes: Constantly Complaining About Your Career There are two kinds of career complaints: Legitimate grievances which occasionally happen and need to be addressed in a public forum (or privately in a different context) Unsubstantiated complaints about why your work isn’t doing as well as you’d like Whether or not it is actually true that there’s a conspiracy to keep you from being successful, constantly harping about such things makes you look less like a victim and more like a bitter failure. I have seen authors rant and rant about how their careers aren’t going the way they want, but it’s not their fault; someone else is responsible for the fact that their books don’t sell. It’s certainly possible that you’re being sabotaged by individuals or an -ism, but it is more likely your work isn’t selling for reasons within and beyond your control: your writing isn’t good enough, you don’t know how to market your work, you are writing X when the market is tired of it, nobody actually knows who you are because you’re published by a nobody, the previous book sold better than the second because it got into more bookstores, many of which are now closed, and so on an so forth. A lot of the times, the first two are the most likely culprits. Not everyone is a great writer. Some authors have pushed ahead too soon, expecting that their writing will meet the demands of the market. There’s no easy way to tell these folks that they need to spend more time developing their writing style and learning the craft. If you say anything, they’ll go back to the conspiracy theories about how you’re out to ruin their career or whatever. I’ve yet to see one of these conversations go well on Twitter, which I suppose is to be expected. Regardless, this perspective on the world of publishing is an annoying one, as the individual who believes it tends to become engrossed in the conspiracy against themselves, turning bitter, angry, and sometimes rude. Inserting Yourself Into Every Vaguely “Relevant” Hashtag Hashtags are a great Twitter tool. They’re useful for spreading opinions about a topic among a wider range of users. I’ve started running a hashtag called #monthlyreads, which is designed for a once-a-month sharing of the things you read. I expect this hashtag to get abused. Most people are pretty good about hashtags. They understand that they are for having a conversation or sharing information, and so they use it for that single purpose. But then there is that minority of people who believe every hashtag that is vaguely related to their work is a perfect place to insert said work. This happens most often in hashtags for sharing works of literature that fit within a category (diversity, for example). Everyone else shares their favorite books while some random author pops up to suggest their own work. There’s nothing inherently wrong with mentioning your own work on Twitter, but there is something tacky and downright annoying about constantly inserting said work into these hashtag conversations. Hashtags are not exclusively promotional in attitude, and so it is blatantly obvious that an author is trying to hawk their work when they join these conversations. Authors who do this are also rarely good writers. There’s something off about their work, either because it is substandard and has been self-published on the cheap or it is released through questionable means or the author is simply desperate and doesn’t know how to properly advertise. Hashtags are not about you. They are communal. Using them incorrectly is, frankly, irritating. It doesn’t bode well for you as an author if a portion of your potential readers identify you and your work with negative emotions. Constantly Being Angry About Stuff It doesn’t matter what you’re angry about: local politicians, racism, bad food, the fact that monkeys stole your wallet, sexism, liberals, how much you hate Country X, conservatives, gerbils, people who tweet about their cats…doesn’t matter. If your Twitter account is a long stream of angry tweets about anything in particular, it gives me the impression that you are an insanely angry person and, therefore, unapproachable. In my mind, that’s a bad thing. I’m an aspiring author and a podcaster. If I have little interest in interviewing you because you seem bitter and angry all the time, then I can assume other podcasters, interviewers, and so on might feel the same way. This isn’t to suggest that you shouldn’t complain about things that bug you. Twitter is a social network, after all, and that means you should use it to, well, be social. Anger is part of our social culture. But it should be clear that you also like things. Movies, hamburgers, recycling, the smell of new books…whatever. If the entire world pisses you off all the time, maybe you need to re-evaluate your entire life. There are good things on this planet, and your social network presence should show more than just the things that drive you up the wall. There’s also a separate issue here: people who are bitter and angry all the time (or most of the time) are also more likely to fall into the confirmation bias bubble. This can lead to a kind of
Movie Review: Jodorowsky’s Dune (2013)
Last night, I saw Jodorowsky’s Dune, a documentary about a film which was never made but has nonetheless had a remarkable impact on science fiction film since its development in the 1970s. In all honesty, I had never heard of this ill-fated “adaptation” of Frank Herbert’s classic novel, and so it was with great pleasure that I saw the poster at my local theater and realized I’d have the chance to watch a documentary about something science fictional. Jodorowsky’s Dune (JD from now on) is an insane journey into what may have been the most experimental science fiction epic ever devised. Alejandro Jodorowsky was a noted surrealistic filmmaker in the 60s and 70s, producing such works as El Topo and The Holy Mountain, and so anyone familiar with his work might understand just how ambitious, and, indeed, insane, Jodorowsky could be. The documentary, however, provides enough context about Jodorowsky’s career — namely, through short excerpts from the aforementioned works — to convey the wildly imaginative vision that led to Dune. Throughout the documentary, Jodorowsky passionately lays out the spiritual and ideological agenda that guided the film from start to finish and his view of film as a medium for producing art and capturing the human spirit. From his perspective, Dune was always meant to be a spiritual journey created by spiritual “warriors” (his term), and so the eccentric and seemingly counter-intuitive choices made throughout the initial development has a certain kind of logic to it. The documentary lays these elements out primarily through Jodorowsky himself, whose passion and yearning for the promise of Dune almost flows out of the screen like a river of dreams. Insofar as a documentary can present beauty, JD does so by giving room to its primary subject. Part of the documentary’s charm, as such, rests in Jodorowsky’s character: an enigmatic, uncompromising filmmaker who appears to honestly believe in the liberative potential in film as an art form. It’s that uncompromising nature which might explain why Dune was never made, though JD never explicitly says as much. Whatever one might think of his filmography, JD’s character study reveals a visionary whose passion and spirituality guide his artistic process. This isn’t just a film about Dune; it is a film about Jodorowsky and his methods, about the processes of making art as opposed to entertainment. From the often humorous tales about cast selections and negotiations (Salvador Dali being one of the more amusing examples) to Jodorowsky’s amusing style of telling these tales, there is much to love about the framing of JD as a kind of surrealist documentary adventure. Jodorowsky himself acknowledges that he imagined Dune as taking the audience on an LSD trip without them ever actually taking drugs and that this process should alter their perceptions: of film, of the human subject, of reality. JD explores this vision with an unmeasured hand, giving Jodorowsky space to expound upon his visions, desires, and dreams rather than remaining focused on the objective truth one might receive with a history. Unlike, for example, a Star Wars documentary (which I happen to be watching at this moment — Empire of Dreams), JD is a deeply personal exploration. That subjective perspective gave me a deeper connection to the material, as it is only through the personal element, I would argue, that we can understand what Dune was meant to be. In that respect, the remaining elements are all funneled through Jodorowsky’s spiritual agenda, such that all of the production crew and cast choices are identified with the spiritual “warriors” about which the audience is repeatedly reminded. H.R. Giger (Alien), Michel Seydoux (Cyrano de Bergerac), Dan O’Bannon (Alien, Total Recall, etc.), and others each have their moment in the spotlight, each reinforcing Jodorowsky’s narrative, which JD frames by beginning with Jodorowsky and ending with a brief discussion of the influence Dune has had on sf film since — the actual conclusion tells us that Seydoux and Jodorowsky have teamed up to make another film (The Dance of Reality). I do take issue with the conclusions drawn from this influence, though, as it seems specious to assume similarities in future films are always necessarily influenced by a single predecessor. True, Giger and O’Bannon worked together on Alien, but JD tries to support this claim by placing images side-by-side, as if suggesting that two similarly-shaped items are necessarily connected on the same line rather than, perhaps, the product of an individual’s visions (Giger’s, for example). There are also moments where JD tries to argue that other films were influenced by Dune without having any direct connection to its creative talents — at least, no connection that is made apparent to the audience. This seems to undercut Jodorowsky’s claim that Dune was meant to inspire, even if the final moments of the film are, indeed, rather inspiring. Perhaps I expect such claims to be more firmly grounded in objective truth, which JD seems averse to doing precisely because of its primary subject. For me, part of what made this documentary so fascinating was the feeling that I too was being taken on a journey of sorts. I didn’t know about Jodorowsky’s Dune, and so every stage of documentary revealed details which breathed life into a project I had no personal connection to. By the end, I felt the same yearning for Dune that Jodorowsky relived as he explored his memories of the film that was never born. There is something unique about this version of Dune that I now feel deserves to be on the screen, even if it will never be so. The worst case scenario would be the release of the rare production book Jodorowsky and Seydoux used to entice the studios to fund them; this would give all of us access to a vision that has remained hidden, and it just might open new pathways to the imagination in a manner consistent with Jodorowsky’s spiritual agenda. Whether that will ever happen is up to speculation, but it should happen. It must happen. I’d
Top 10 Posts for April 2014
Here they are: Movie Review: Riddick (2013) (or, I’m Going to Mega Rant Now) A Cereal Metaphor for the SFF Community Speculative Fiction 2014: Announcement and Call for Submissions! Top 10 Overused Fantasy Cliches Top 10 Science Fiction and Fantasy Movies Since 2010 (Thus Far) Kim Stanley Robinson and Exposition (or, No More James Patterson, Please) Movie Review Rant : Catching Fire (2013) Adventures in Teaching Literature: David Henry Hwang and the Ethnic Debate Top 10 Cats in Science Fiction and Fantasy 2014 Hugo Nominee Ballot: The Full List + 1939 Retro-Hugo Nominees An interesting mix, don’t you think?
Movie Review: The Lego Movie (2014)
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.
A Cereal Metaphor for the SFF Community
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.