Alphas is the first superhero show in the last couple years that I've managed to get into. The Cape was … eh. No Ordinary Family had too many poor reviews and I didn't like what I saw in the trailers. But the concept of Alphas intrigued me, and the characters and writing kept me, and the new season cannot start fast enough.
Alphas is a blend of superhero and crime dramas. There's a team of people, each with an 'alpha' ability, who are assembled by a psychologist and work for the Department of Defense, tracking down other alphas who are (usually) a threat to society. The show's wonderfully morally grey—there are secret and terrible prisons, nobody really knows what the DoD's long term plan for alphas is, and not every alpha-of-the-week is actually a bad guy in the end. The main ensemble knows they're getting progressively more in over their heads and being asked to do things that they're not trained for, especially when it comes to the Big Bad, alpha terrorist group Red Flag.
Alphas is as much about the characters as the crime-of-the-week, though. Everyone's believably flawed and played straight and realistic, not for laughs or as archetypes. They screw up. They have emotional baggage. They get on each others' nerves for the smallest things, and sometimes they lose trust in each other, but at the end of day they're friends. Occasionally the "end of the day" is a couple episodes later, though. This is not a show that wraps up everyone's problems neatly at the end of the hour.
As for the superhero aspects of the show: everyone in the ensemble has powers except for Dr. Rosen, the psychologist and alpha expert. There's a bit of stereotyping going on with who gets what power—the black guy's really strong, the beautiful woman has mind control, the nerd can hack anything with his mind—and the "synethesia" one woman has is not actually synethesia. The powers don't feel over-the-top, just a little beyond what's normal, and there's yet to be a big hero-vs-villain sort of fight that doesn't involve a) teamwork or b) conventional weapons. We're also jumping into these people's lives after they've figured out what they can do, so we see acceptance, not angst. Family members know, characters use powers for everyday things like getting a can of coke out of a machine or avoiding a speeding ticket, and nobody, not even the alphas-of-the-week are defined by their powers.
As you can probably guess, the believability and understated everything is a large part what attracts me to the show. It's a cop show, not a soap opera like Heroes or an homage to comics like The Cape was looking to be, before I stopped watching. (I also like cop shows about as much as I like superheroes. That probably helps.) I'm also caught by the writing, which seems a cut above regular TV fare, and like that the writers aren't afraid to explore the morally grey thing. I've been looking forward to Season Two since it was announced, and no, that cliffhanger in the finale really didn't help.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
History and Convergent Books
2011 was an interestingly synchronicitous year for me, reading-wise. As a general rule, I read a handful of historical sci-fi and fantasy books each year, and when I read non-fiction, there's a pretty good chance it'll be historical in nature too*. Normally the books I pick up don't coincide as much as 2011's did, though, and they usually don't get me thinking on a meta-level afterwards.
What started me off was watching Anonymous almost immediately after reading Ink and Steel by Elizabeth Bear. They both deal with the conspiracies and politics around the throne of Elizabeth I, and both place Shakespeare's plays at the center of the story—with reinterpretations of what that role really was. Anonymous states that Shakespeare's plays were written by the Earl of Oxford as a statement against the party line, and that Shakespeare was the front for the operation. Ink and Steel, on the other hand, has Shakespeare writing his own plays, with the help of a couple nobles versed in magic, and Kit Marlowe, who's living in Faerie instead of being dead. The plays are written in support of the party line (or at least the "good" politics), and the Earl of Oxford is part of the faction intent on bringing James I to power in England. Both stories state the Earl is Elizabeth's bastard.
I admit to knowing nothing about Elizabethan court politics prior to Ink and Steel, so don't know if Bear's portrayal is accurate or not—or even if we know enough about the people involved to have a good picture of what sides they were on. Having read it first, though, I accepted the factions as historical fact, which made seeing Anonymous, which had largely the same cast of characters but in different political roles, a little jarring. Why would so-and-so be saying that? Isn't he for Elizabeth? After a while, though, I gave up trying to make sense of it all and assumed the politics in Anonymous were as made up as the supposed Shakespeare conspiracy. After all, the screenwriters couldn't even be bothered to place the plays in the right order.**
I had a related experience with The Hammer and the Cross, a history of the Vikings from the first historical records to the point at which everyone seems to have settled down, become Christian, and stopped raiding other countries. In this case, I'd read an article earlier in the year about how some of those Viking men who'd been buried with swords and armor and gold were actually women. Unfortunately, The Hammer and the Cross was written before we knew that, so while part of me took the facts at face value and wanted to believe them all, because if it's in a book it must be true, part of me knew there were facts missing and kept adding "and also women" during the battle accounts.
I'm writing this post as an educated adult who's fairly up on her (Western) history and so tends to pick up historical fiction and non-fiction already knowing the general facts. This means that I'll notice basic errors, like epic fantasy hay bales, but when writers make more obscure mistakes, I'm with the majority in assuming there was no mistake at all. That in itself is an argument for accuracy of research, no? I read to learn, and I don't want to learn the wrong things. It distorts my perception of the world. That doesn't mean I'm not for taking creative liberties with facts if that's what the story demands, but I'd like the writer to be upfront about it in a foreword, afterword, or in the way they present the information in-text. The writers of Anonymous, I feel, were not upfront about their changes at all. I'd be less critical of the film if they had been.
I've talked before about how we approach history. Our past defines us and guides our actions whether we want it to or not, and I think understanding how history interacts with the present and how different cultures worked and were interconnected strengthens our view of the world. Not to get too self-helpy on you. But it's one of the reasons I think historical fiction, SFF or otherwise, is important, because it takes historical fact and makes it come alive. And *points to previous paragraph* why I think historical accuracy is important too.
That brings me to the last coincidental pair of books from last year. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis, is a time travel story about a historian stranded in the 1300s valiantly recording her experiences and getting caught up in the lives around her. It's about people and crises and life. Eifelheim, by Michael Flynn, is a first-contact story, about an alien ship that crashes in the medieval Black Forest, and the locals who help them survive and who initiate cultural exchange. It has a lot of interesting things to say about the intersection of science and religion, as well as what makes a "person", and the Black Forest setting feels as real as Willis's Oxford.
I find it interesting that two books set during the same time period, both well-researched, well-written, and critically acclaimed, can have such vastly different feels. Willis' Middle Ages are raw where Flynn's are a little idealized, because that's their stories require.The same goes for Anonymous and Ink and Steel, or any group of books set during whatever time period. History's surprisingly fluid, not just because the archeological record can be interpreted multiple ways or because established facts are sometimes not established at all, but because we impose biases on it, rework it to make a point, and promote some facts over others to influence reality. I love that about it, especially when it results in historical fiction, and especially because comparing different takes on the same history is fun for me.
A good writer will make the reader believe that they're truly taking part in the Middle Ages, or Elizabethan England, or eighteenth-century China, or wherever, and that's important and good, but it's also no substitute for primary documents and historical non-fiction. Fiction is lies, after all, even if it's one lie couched in a lot of fact. I get a lot of my history from novels and movies, and from comparing different fictions, but I keep a saltshaker handy, read informed reviews, and look stuff up if it tickles my interest. It's a good way to read, I think. And a pretty decent way to travel through time.
* Or neuroscience.
** I read Marvel: 1602 after seeing Anonymous and was pleased to see the politics were still there, but that Marvel characters had replaced the courtiers. I liked that--although I would've liked Shakespeare to cameo.
*** Neither is Marvel: 1602 but I hope that's obvious.
What started me off was watching Anonymous almost immediately after reading Ink and Steel by Elizabeth Bear. They both deal with the conspiracies and politics around the throne of Elizabeth I, and both place Shakespeare's plays at the center of the story—with reinterpretations of what that role really was. Anonymous states that Shakespeare's plays were written by the Earl of Oxford as a statement against the party line, and that Shakespeare was the front for the operation. Ink and Steel, on the other hand, has Shakespeare writing his own plays, with the help of a couple nobles versed in magic, and Kit Marlowe, who's living in Faerie instead of being dead. The plays are written in support of the party line (or at least the "good" politics), and the Earl of Oxford is part of the faction intent on bringing James I to power in England. Both stories state the Earl is Elizabeth's bastard.
I admit to knowing nothing about Elizabethan court politics prior to Ink and Steel, so don't know if Bear's portrayal is accurate or not—or even if we know enough about the people involved to have a good picture of what sides they were on. Having read it first, though, I accepted the factions as historical fact, which made seeing Anonymous, which had largely the same cast of characters but in different political roles, a little jarring. Why would so-and-so be saying that? Isn't he for Elizabeth? After a while, though, I gave up trying to make sense of it all and assumed the politics in Anonymous were as made up as the supposed Shakespeare conspiracy. After all, the screenwriters couldn't even be bothered to place the plays in the right order.**
I had a related experience with The Hammer and the Cross, a history of the Vikings from the first historical records to the point at which everyone seems to have settled down, become Christian, and stopped raiding other countries. In this case, I'd read an article earlier in the year about how some of those Viking men who'd been buried with swords and armor and gold were actually women. Unfortunately, The Hammer and the Cross was written before we knew that, so while part of me took the facts at face value and wanted to believe them all, because if it's in a book it must be true, part of me knew there were facts missing and kept adding "and also women" during the battle accounts.
I'm writing this post as an educated adult who's fairly up on her (Western) history and so tends to pick up historical fiction and non-fiction already knowing the general facts. This means that I'll notice basic errors, like epic fantasy hay bales, but when writers make more obscure mistakes, I'm with the majority in assuming there was no mistake at all. That in itself is an argument for accuracy of research, no? I read to learn, and I don't want to learn the wrong things. It distorts my perception of the world. That doesn't mean I'm not for taking creative liberties with facts if that's what the story demands, but I'd like the writer to be upfront about it in a foreword, afterword, or in the way they present the information in-text. The writers of Anonymous, I feel, were not upfront about their changes at all. I'd be less critical of the film if they had been.
I've talked before about how we approach history. Our past defines us and guides our actions whether we want it to or not, and I think understanding how history interacts with the present and how different cultures worked and were interconnected strengthens our view of the world. Not to get too self-helpy on you. But it's one of the reasons I think historical fiction, SFF or otherwise, is important, because it takes historical fact and makes it come alive. And *points to previous paragraph* why I think historical accuracy is important too.
That brings me to the last coincidental pair of books from last year. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis, is a time travel story about a historian stranded in the 1300s valiantly recording her experiences and getting caught up in the lives around her. It's about people and crises and life. Eifelheim, by Michael Flynn, is a first-contact story, about an alien ship that crashes in the medieval Black Forest, and the locals who help them survive and who initiate cultural exchange. It has a lot of interesting things to say about the intersection of science and religion, as well as what makes a "person", and the Black Forest setting feels as real as Willis's Oxford.
I find it interesting that two books set during the same time period, both well-researched, well-written, and critically acclaimed, can have such vastly different feels. Willis' Middle Ages are raw where Flynn's are a little idealized, because that's their stories require.The same goes for Anonymous and Ink and Steel, or any group of books set during whatever time period. History's surprisingly fluid, not just because the archeological record can be interpreted multiple ways or because established facts are sometimes not established at all, but because we impose biases on it, rework it to make a point, and promote some facts over others to influence reality. I love that about it, especially when it results in historical fiction, and especially because comparing different takes on the same history is fun for me.
A good writer will make the reader believe that they're truly taking part in the Middle Ages, or Elizabethan England, or eighteenth-century China, or wherever, and that's important and good, but it's also no substitute for primary documents and historical non-fiction. Fiction is lies, after all, even if it's one lie couched in a lot of fact. I get a lot of my history from novels and movies, and from comparing different fictions, but I keep a saltshaker handy, read informed reviews, and look stuff up if it tickles my interest. It's a good way to read, I think. And a pretty decent way to travel through time.
* Or neuroscience.
** I read Marvel: 1602 after seeing Anonymous and was pleased to see the politics were still there, but that Marvel characters had replaced the courtiers. I liked that--although I would've liked Shakespeare to cameo.
*** Neither is Marvel: 1602 but I hope that's obvious.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Great Superhero Read - Marvel: 1602
As always, here be spoilers.
I asked for Marvel: 1602 for my birthday last year, knowing only the hook: Marvel-verse heroes in Elizabethan England, instead of the present day. Also Neil Gaiman. Knowing Gaiman, I expected the layered, beautiful, intelligent story, but I didn't expect it to be integrated into the modern-day Marvel canon. I thought it would be much more of a fanfic/what-if situation.
The story starts by establishing characters, setting, and the threat that must be stopped, and as the book goes on we meet more characters and get further twists. It's a great all-round read, with requisite superhero power usage and intrigue that kept me flipping pages, but one of the things I liked best was turning a page and going, "Hey, it's that guy! I know that guy!" followed by either "Of course that's what he'd be doing" or "That was an interesting career switch. Huh. Wonder why?"* I really liked how Gaiman wove so many of the Marvel standbys into the story and made it seem right, and how well he made the characters fit into the time period. How well some of the characters fit without needing to be changed.
If you've been following this superhero project of mine, you probably know that I mainly know the Marvel-verse from the movies and internet-fed geek osmosis. This still means that I know the basic situations the characters find themselves in, I know some of the relationships the characters have to each other, I know how the characters relate to their world. (I think. Hopefully.) So it was interesting to see all that being rewritten and how Gaiman handles all the origin stories in a world where technological explanations won't fly. Of course he'd use magic and/or the arcane and instead, because what are superpowers but magic anyway? Plus Elizabethans had a healthy belief in magic already, or some of them did if John Dee is anything to go by. Using magic grounds the characters in their new world.
Gaiman handles the impact of superpowers on seventeenth-century Europe very well all round, but I'd expect nothing less. I'm thinking mostly about the Inquisition going after the witchbreed here, and the fear James I instills in just about everyone with powers. It felt very believable to me while I was reading and, I'll admit, generated more of a sense of wonder than the Spider-Man omnibus did. That was straight-up action. This is shiny, with an open-ended feel not only because not all the Marvel characters appeared in 1602 but also because in the end, the characters have the whole future ahead of them. Anything could happen!
When I said the superpowers in 1602 were caused by magic, I actually lied. The characters approach the powers as having magical origins and the way the powers are described reinforces the idea, but they actually result from the universe trying to reset the Earth after one Steve Rogers is thrown back in time. Therefore, the superpowers are caused by quantum, as Terry Pratchett would say. Which is essentially magic anyway, due to Clarke's Third Law and most people not understanding higher physics. And of course, the introduction of future!Captain America means that Marvel: 1602 isn't just a rewriting, it's a parallel universe.
To sum up: Marvel: 1602 is pitch-perfect on characterization, setting, and story, and hits every note I didn't know I wanted from a reworking of the Marvel canon. There are hidden levels you can peal the story apart to find, and more going on than you actually get to see on the page. And I desperately want a sequel, or prequel, or something to I can see more of everyone's adventures. (Alas, I will probably not get it, even if I somehow manage to buy/inherit Marvel.) I could probably reread the book and pick up on things I didn't catch the first time round, and that's always a sign of quality fiction for me. I wholeheartedly recommend you read this, if you're anywhere near the "target audience" of comic fans, alternate history fans, and Gaiman nerds.
* There were also "oh!" moments pertaining to people's powers, people's relationships, and what America means.
Monday, January 9, 2012
Computing, Holographs, and Medicine - A Science Round-Up
It's been a long time since I've done a science round-up, which means there's an awful lot of links in this post. Hopefully you're all nerdy enough about science to think that's a bonus.
Most of the cool scientific advances since my last post have been technological. We can produce microscopically thin circuit boards out of graphene, which means smaller computers and hopefully greater processing power. Those computerized glasses might become a reality—not that it matters, because there are LED contact lenses in the works. There's also conductive ink now, which promises to do some very cool things.
There are robots swimming across the Pacific and self-assembling 3D objects that come in a number of shapes, not just one at a time. Holographic TV and movies might become a reality soon too, which would be awesome. We've seen it in enough science fiction, it's time it actually happens. Plus it'll get rid of that 3D headache problem!
A group of scientists has recently managed to create an invisibility cloak that also hides objects from time. Granted, it's not even close to being a piece of fabric yet, and probably never will be, but the potential for hiding things in plain sight like that … wow. It's even cooler than macroscopic quantum entanglement or self-cleaning fabric, though that's pretty cool as well.
I think I'll end today on an anthropological note. There's now evidence that humans left Africa over 100,000 years ago, Which is about 30,000 years before anyone thought they had. This means rethinking ancient human cultures and migration patterns, and possibly other artifacts that don't quite fit where they've been placed at the moment. Me? I'll leave that to the scientists and get on with thinking of the hows and whys of that migration, and any human dramas that might make a good tale.
Most of the cool scientific advances since my last post have been technological. We can produce microscopically thin circuit boards out of graphene, which means smaller computers and hopefully greater processing power. Those computerized glasses might become a reality—not that it matters, because there are LED contact lenses in the works. There's also conductive ink now, which promises to do some very cool things.
A group of scientists has recently managed to create an invisibility cloak that also hides objects from time. Granted, it's not even close to being a piece of fabric yet, and probably never will be, but the potential for hiding things in plain sight like that … wow. It's even cooler than macroscopic quantum entanglement or self-cleaning fabric, though that's pretty cool as well.
What else have I come across? The fact that memory comes in packets is intriguing, and makes me wonder how that knowledge is going to impact psychology. I don't know enough about neuropsych and neuroscience to be able to hazard a guess at what that might be, though, but I feel like I should use it in a story at some point. The idea has potential.
And speaking of human biology, we may actually have a functional antiviral now! And io9 has a list of modern medical technologies that we're going to think are barbaric in the future. I'd like to see stories about people looking back at modern medicine with horror, or time travellers doing the same, or, better yet, people proposing technologies that'll surpass what's on that list. In fiction or reality, I don't care.
I think I'll end today on an anthropological note. There's now evidence that humans left Africa over 100,000 years ago, Which is about 30,000 years before anyone thought they had. This means rethinking ancient human cultures and migration patterns, and possibly other artifacts that don't quite fit where they've been placed at the moment. Me? I'll leave that to the scientists and get on with thinking of the hows and whys of that migration, and any human dramas that might make a good tale.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
New Year and Sundry
So it's 2012 and I feel like I should probably start blogging again. Or at least update this thing and let everyone know I'm still alive.* 2011 was a year. Some good, some bad, all kind of merging into normality. I suspect 2012 will be the same, and I've learned my lesson about hoping to finish writing projects. It never happens, and whenever I think I'm done, I manage to set myself back a good couple years. It's like I'm Sisyphus or one of those math problem snails (A snail is climbing a window. Every day it climbs three inches, and every night it slides back two inches. If the window is three feet tall, how long until the snail reaches the top of the glass?). In other words, if you ask about my novel, I will probably hit you.
Anyway, last year I listed my favourite books of the year—as in "what I read", not "what came out" like most lists seem to be. Pleasingly, I pretty much matched my "new to me" numbers, with 55 books read in 2010 and 54 in 2011, re-read two books each year, and finished two previously started books. I figure I'm pretty close, especially since I'm pretty sure 2011's books were thicker on average. And I did slightly better at getting non-genre fiction into my diet! One book in 2010 vs. three in 2011**. Also eight non-fiction books in 2011 vs. six in 2010.
Here's my best of the year, for what they're worth:
Best Urban Fantasy: Midnight Riot tied with Of Blood and Honey
Best Non-Urban Fantasy: The Girl with Glass Feet
Best Superhero Novel: Wild Cards I
Best Science Fiction: The Passage, closely followed by book #54, Eifelheim
Best Non-Genre Adult Fiction: Cloud Atlas
Best YA: The Clockwork Giant
Best Non-Fiction: The Hammer and the Cross
If you're curious about why I picked those particular books, ask in the comments. If I give each of them a mini-review right now, this post will never end. If you want to know what else I read, the list is here.
As for blogging plans for the new year, I don't really have any except that I'm going to do my best to get a post up every week. I want to continue talking about and reviewing superhero fiction of varying types, since I've read more superhero novels, acquired more graphic novels, and had a backlog of superhero film media to begin with. Plus, y'know, superheroes are awesome. I've also been archiving interesting science, so expect a post on that in the near future. Beyond that … I don't really want to talk about my process and progress with my writing, because that just gets me bummed, but other than that, I'm pretty open to suggestions. Note that I do not and will probably never have a Life to discuss here.
* I am.
** Yes, it's still pathetic. SFF is too distracting.
Anyway, last year I listed my favourite books of the year—as in "what I read", not "what came out" like most lists seem to be. Pleasingly, I pretty much matched my "new to me" numbers, with 55 books read in 2010 and 54 in 2011, re-read two books each year, and finished two previously started books. I figure I'm pretty close, especially since I'm pretty sure 2011's books were thicker on average. And I did slightly better at getting non-genre fiction into my diet! One book in 2010 vs. three in 2011**. Also eight non-fiction books in 2011 vs. six in 2010.
Here's my best of the year, for what they're worth:
Best Urban Fantasy: Midnight Riot tied with Of Blood and Honey
Best Non-Urban Fantasy: The Girl with Glass Feet
Best Superhero Novel: Wild Cards I
Best Science Fiction: The Passage, closely followed by book #54, Eifelheim
Best Non-Genre Adult Fiction: Cloud Atlas
Best YA: The Clockwork Giant
Best Non-Fiction: The Hammer and the Cross
If you're curious about why I picked those particular books, ask in the comments. If I give each of them a mini-review right now, this post will never end. If you want to know what else I read, the list is here.
As for blogging plans for the new year, I don't really have any except that I'm going to do my best to get a post up every week. I want to continue talking about and reviewing superhero fiction of varying types, since I've read more superhero novels, acquired more graphic novels, and had a backlog of superhero film media to begin with. Plus, y'know, superheroes are awesome. I've also been archiving interesting science, so expect a post on that in the near future. Beyond that … I don't really want to talk about my process and progress with my writing, because that just gets me bummed, but other than that, I'm pretty open to suggestions. Note that I do not and will probably never have a Life to discuss here.
* I am.
** Yes, it's still pathetic. SFF is too distracting.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
On Not Blogging
Some of you may have noticed that I haven't been blogging lately. To be honest, I've fallen out of interest with it, at least for the moment. It helps that I don't have much to say. I'm not experienced enough as a writer to really have anything new or interesting or helpful to say about the writing process. I'm not up to or interested in reviewing all the books I read, not even when they're superhero-related. I don't even have the sort of life that makes for good blog memoir. I wake up, I mess around on the web, I write, I go to work, I come home, I sleep. I see friends outside of work maybe once a fortnight, if I'm lucky.
I'm also having a hard time finding my place within the writing community. Part of me knows that I'm making progress as a writer and that I have enough knowledge of or instinct for the writing basics to be beyond the general advice that most people disseminate. She knows I can do this. But another part of me second-guesses everything, takes note of all the writing advice and points out all the places in my manuscript where I'm not following the rules, says that I work too slowly, that I'll never stand a chance if I can't push out a quality finished book every year. She also says that wanting to break rules out of confidence you're beyond them is the first sign of an overly ambitious, ultimately failed writer. A third part of me insists that I have to be aware of all the industry workings Right Now even though I don't have a finished manuscript and so don't need to know how to query agents, select a publishing house, read a contract, manage a career, or conduct myself appropriately during reading. She's working with Part Two, and Part One is desperately trying to get them to shut up already.
It's not going so well. Two and Three aren't really interested in rational arguments.
So yes, I'm distancing myself from the internet. I'd love to pay more than cursory attention to the writing blogs I follow, and comment, add to the discussion, and play the part of the Writer that's expected of me. (Who expects that? Part Three.) But I can't, and I'm sorry if dropping off the radar looks like I'm ignoring you. I'm not. I'm just trying to deprive Two and Three of ammunition, and not say anything I'll regret later. I may have said too much already.
The thing is, not blogging is oddly liberating. I stopped posting to a schedule to free myself, and not posting at all frees me further. I don't have to worry about whether my ideas are good enough for a blog post, or articulated properly, and I have more time and more space just to be myself and to focus on what I want to do. Yes, blogging is/was largely a Part Three thing.
To the people who I know are going to say, "Don't give up!", I'm not. I'm still planning to be a writer, to be traditionally published, and, if I'm lucky, write a Hugo-winning NYT bestseller*. I just can't do everything that I feel the industry wants me to do and be happy while doing it. To anyone wanting to say, "But you need to blog and network and attend conventions!", no, I don't. I am so not ready as a writer to do that. To do so is hubris. Feel free to say other positive things at me, though, like "You're awesome!" and "Here are blog ideas!" Part One needs those pretty badly right now.
*might as well dream big
I'm also having a hard time finding my place within the writing community. Part of me knows that I'm making progress as a writer and that I have enough knowledge of or instinct for the writing basics to be beyond the general advice that most people disseminate. She knows I can do this. But another part of me second-guesses everything, takes note of all the writing advice and points out all the places in my manuscript where I'm not following the rules, says that I work too slowly, that I'll never stand a chance if I can't push out a quality finished book every year. She also says that wanting to break rules out of confidence you're beyond them is the first sign of an overly ambitious, ultimately failed writer. A third part of me insists that I have to be aware of all the industry workings Right Now even though I don't have a finished manuscript and so don't need to know how to query agents, select a publishing house, read a contract, manage a career, or conduct myself appropriately during reading. She's working with Part Two, and Part One is desperately trying to get them to shut up already.
It's not going so well. Two and Three aren't really interested in rational arguments.
So yes, I'm distancing myself from the internet. I'd love to pay more than cursory attention to the writing blogs I follow, and comment, add to the discussion, and play the part of the Writer that's expected of me. (Who expects that? Part Three.) But I can't, and I'm sorry if dropping off the radar looks like I'm ignoring you. I'm not. I'm just trying to deprive Two and Three of ammunition, and not say anything I'll regret later. I may have said too much already.
The thing is, not blogging is oddly liberating. I stopped posting to a schedule to free myself, and not posting at all frees me further. I don't have to worry about whether my ideas are good enough for a blog post, or articulated properly, and I have more time and more space just to be myself and to focus on what I want to do. Yes, blogging is/was largely a Part Three thing.
To the people who I know are going to say, "Don't give up!", I'm not. I'm still planning to be a writer, to be traditionally published, and, if I'm lucky, write a Hugo-winning NYT bestseller*. I just can't do everything that I feel the industry wants me to do and be happy while doing it. To anyone wanting to say, "But you need to blog and network and attend conventions!", no, I don't. I am so not ready as a writer to do that. To do so is hubris. Feel free to say other positive things at me, though, like "You're awesome!" and "Here are blog ideas!" Part One needs those pretty badly right now.
*might as well dream big
Friday, October 14, 2011
Changing Forms
I was up at my parents' last week, doing general visitery things and being a good daughter. And as happens when I'm home, I got to talking writing with Dad. He's about the only person I feel able to talk over my frustrations with, both about my own writing and about the industry in general. (After all, if you talk about frustrations on the internet, the internet will jump on your head and maybe tell prospective agents on you.) One of the things that came out of our discussions was that my frustrations over my novel not being the novel I want it to be, no matter how hard I try, could be because the novel was in the wrong form and/or not playing to my strengths.
This appears to actually have been the case, because I've shifted the form slightly and am writing again, finally. More on that at the end. I realized something else, though—I see a lot of writing blogs talk about style and structure, about how to write what sells, and about how to fix problems with the plot, with characters, with description, with mechanics. I see blogs talking about how to get out of writer's block by starting something new, having zombies attack the main character, or about how writer's block doesn't really exist and have you seen their post about fixing plot problems? I don't see many, if any, posts about solving problems by stepping back and asking yourself if the story's being told the right way, if it has the right narrative form or point-of-view. Those sorts of problems probably happen less than the other reasons for block, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
I'm not going to talk about that process of stepping back. Hopefully you already know how to do that. Nor am I going to talk about point-of-view (POV) shifts, because there are plenty of other people talking about those. So that leaves me to list narrative forms, in the hopes that they'll spark a revelation in at least one blocked writer. This is probably not a complete list. Feel free to add to it.
This appears to actually have been the case, because I've shifted the form slightly and am writing again, finally. More on that at the end. I realized something else, though—I see a lot of writing blogs talk about style and structure, about how to write what sells, and about how to fix problems with the plot, with characters, with description, with mechanics. I see blogs talking about how to get out of writer's block by starting something new, having zombies attack the main character, or about how writer's block doesn't really exist and have you seen their post about fixing plot problems? I don't see many, if any, posts about solving problems by stepping back and asking yourself if the story's being told the right way, if it has the right narrative form or point-of-view. Those sorts of problems probably happen less than the other reasons for block, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
I'm not going to talk about that process of stepping back. Hopefully you already know how to do that. Nor am I going to talk about point-of-view (POV) shifts, because there are plenty of other people talking about those. So that leaves me to list narrative forms, in the hopes that they'll spark a revelation in at least one blocked writer. This is probably not a complete list. Feel free to add to it.
- traditional narrative - a single narrator in any POV, telling a story; may focus on a character, a group of characters, a society, an age, a civilization…. The possibilities are, as with any of these forms, unlimited.
- reflective narrative - technically falls under "traditional narrative", but enough of a shift that I'm giving it its own bullet; the narrator speaks from a point after the book ends, shedding wisdom and insight on events in their past.
- multiple narrative - any story with two or more narrators, describing events from multiple points of view or telling interweaving/parallel stories; often gives the story a broader scope.
- nonlinear narrative - a story that jumps between different points in time.
- frame story - a story that's given a context for being told—a series of discovered letters, an interview, a person editing a manuscript, etc.; will most likely have two narrators, one with much less prominence than the other.
- epistolary novel/diary - a story told through letters, diary entries, email, etc.; can be told by one or more people.
- script - a story told through dialogue and physical actions, rather than prose.
- visual narrative - a story told through pictures (photos, film, drawings, etc.), rather than or alongside prose.
- verse novel - a story told through poetry, rather than prose.
Of course, these forms can be combined. I'd say graphic novels and comics are a blend of script and visual narrative, for instance. Reflective narratives can easily show up in any of the other forms. Scripts can be frame stories or nonlinear. You don't need to stick to just one, either, if mixing them up works better.
I can't tell you if you're blocked because you've using the wrong narrative form or if you're blocked because of something else. Obviously. You need to step back from the thick of the story and work that out yourself. But don't think, like I did, that the first form you choose is the only form the story can take. Be flexible. Try out other forms, if they strike your interest.
For the record, I'm switching my novel from a dual narrative to a frame story that drops one of the narrators and adds in another as the "framer". It'll require a whole lot more new writing, but I think it'll be a better book for it, in the end. It's so good to have the words flowing again.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Year of the Superhero - After the Golden Age
After the Golden Age is … I'm still trying to decide as I write this, unfortunately. I think the cover copy did it a disservice, in that it seemed to promise me one book when I got another. The plot summary is neat—accountant daughter of famous superheroes must help take down supervillain—but it got me expecting a cutthroat story about assembling evidence and a lot of time in the courtroom, when the story itself is more about personal journey, family, and acceptance of one's lot in life. Which is not a bad story, at all. It just wasn't what I was expecting.
After the Golden Age is set in a fairly typical superhero world. Commerce City could stand in for just about anywhere. It has superheroes—the four members of the Olympiad, as well as a handful of teamless heroes. The Olympiad works out of a command centre at the top of a skyscraper, mounts patrols, checks the police scanner, and responds to supervillain-type threats, which annoys the police. There's also a supervillain, the Destructor, who's been a thorn in everyone's side for a generation and has crazy, mad scientist schemes that are "bound to work this time!" even if he works in an escape plan anyway. There do not appear to be superheroes elsewhere, and the reasons for powers existing in Commerce City isn't explained until near the end of the book.
But that's all background. Celia West, main character, accountant, and daughter of half the Olympiad, is more interesting. She has issues centering around how disappointed her parents were that she didn't inherit powers, and she's trying to make up for a mistake in her past. It's not going so well, and when she starts helping with Destructor's trial, it only gets worse. She also gets kidnapped enough that she reads hostage video scripts sarcastically and is pretty good at sizing up bad guys. As the story progresses, she starts taking a more active role in her life and the mystery (because there's always a mystery, we'll get back to that), and learns that heroism isn't just about powers and costumes. All the same, I can't help feeling that she could've been better realized, that we could've seen more of her personality outside of her reactions to events.
Like I said, I'd expected a cutthroat trial story, with Celia tracking down evidence in death-defying ways, and that wasn't what I got. The trial takes up maybe half the novel, at most, and we don't see very much of it, or of people putting together evidence. (They're trying to get the Destructor for tax fraud, not property destruction, murder, and the other things he's guilty of.) The story's about Celia coming to terms with herself, and the central mystery involves who's behind the current crime spree, since the Destructor's under way too much security to mastermind it himself. Or is he? As Celia's tracking down evidence against the Destructor, she starts uncovering hints that there's maybe more to the kidnappings, the Destructor, and superpowers than everyone suspects. As mysteries go, it's a fairly predictable one. I caught a lot of the clues before I think I was meant to, and anticipated a lot of, but not all, the twists. It also has an urban fantasy vibe, which isn't surprising considering that's where Vaughn got her start.
There are some moments surrounding superpowers and superheroes that I found interesting. The Olympiad and Destructor are still effective in their hero/villain roles once their identities are revealed, for instance, and welcome the publicity even. There are some sweet moments in which Spark, Celia's mother, cooks food with her bare hands and such-like. There are some not-so-sweet flashbacks where Celia's dad tries to test her for powers. There's mention of the consequences of telepathy. And, so far uniquely in my quest for superhero knowledge, the accident that caused the powers is also responsible for the protectiveness the heroes feel for the city. When they say they "have to" do their job, they mean it.
Ultimately, this isn't a particularly memorable story. Sure, I enjoyed reading it, but I didn't take anyway anything new from it. Everything superhero-wise (which is why I read the book) appears elsewhere—the nature of heroism, the growing-up narrative, the realistic examination of heroes and their powers—and I don't think After the Golden Age does those any better than the other stories. It was definitely an enjoyable read and a good story, but it kind of pales in comparison to some of the other books I've read this year. Oh well, on to the next book…
Monday, September 26, 2011
Thoughts about History
I was thinking about stories and history and life the other day, about the sorts of books I read and how I feel when I read them, and about the local history I know and share, and I realized something. For me, there are two types of history. Maybe this is normal, but it's not, but I think it's interesting enough to merit a blog post all the same.
The main type of history is, of course, world history, all the facts and stories we've gathered about the span of human existence. It's epic and complicated, fantastic and scary, repeating and fascinating. It's sometimes hard to separate facts from fictions or synthesize what actually happened from all the varying reports. Most importantly, the people who populate this kind of history don't feel like people. I can read about Sumerians, Romans, Ming Chinese, Elizabethans, 19th-Century Americans, and men in WWII trenches, and unless I'm reading firsthand accounts, nobody feels real even though I know they were. There's an aura of fiction to this kind of history, and one I'd imagine historians and historical novelists have to push past at every turn.
And then there's the history of the places I know intimately, the stories about specific events and people who shaped the parts of my province I know best. While there's still a slight sense that the events aren't real, it's still a lot more grounded. I can point to landmarks or stand on hillsides and say, "This is where such-and-such happened" or "So-and-so could've been here then". I took a walking tour of historic Vancouver a couple weeks ago and had a strong feeling of "yes, this happened" because I could see the streets, knew the buildings, and, importantly, knew that the people being talked about were the same rough-and-ready types who had first colonized the area I grew up in. When I think about this type of history, I have a sense of ownership, that this is my history and something to be proud of.
This divide between world history and local history parallels my reasons for reading histories and historical novels. Most historical fiction I read or want to read, I choose because I want to know what life was like in a certain place at a certain time. The biographies and histories I choose are picked for the same sorts of reasons. I want to expand my knowledge base and find things out. But the novels, bios, and histories I've read about British Columbia—the gold rush, the ranchers, the loggers, and so on—I read because I know the basic stories and want to see how they're realized on the page. I use those books more like a time machine than an archive, and when I'm reading them, there's a deeper sense of "this could have happened" than I get with other historical fiction. I also get the time machine effect through firsthand accounts, as I alluded earlier.
I imagine this is probably a pretty common thing. History's always more immediate when you can see where it happened, or when you can see artifacts. The sense I got of European history, and the ancient world, while I was touring Europe so many years ago was incredible. And of course, local history often has a folklore quality to it. We tend to mythologize important people and events, and tell our children about them at a young age. The biggest hero of the area I grew up was a guy named Billy Barker, who found a motherlode that spurred a gold rush that built a city and drew ranchers into the area. Without him, the town I grew up wouldn't have been founded. There were other rushes, and other miners in the area first, but he's the guy everyone's heard about. I also learned the mythology of the fur trade, the Northwest Passage, and Canada's explorers.
At what point does local history become the more global "characters-not-people" history? How long does it have to be before the cultural memories fade? How much area can be called local? (My schoolbooks mythologized the colonization and exploration of the whole country, but the only bits at felt real are the bits that happened to BC.) Is this mythologizing of history what created the world's myths? I don't know. I don't even know if there's a single answer. But it's something interesting to think about, isn't it?
The main type of history is, of course, world history, all the facts and stories we've gathered about the span of human existence. It's epic and complicated, fantastic and scary, repeating and fascinating. It's sometimes hard to separate facts from fictions or synthesize what actually happened from all the varying reports. Most importantly, the people who populate this kind of history don't feel like people. I can read about Sumerians, Romans, Ming Chinese, Elizabethans, 19th-Century Americans, and men in WWII trenches, and unless I'm reading firsthand accounts, nobody feels real even though I know they were. There's an aura of fiction to this kind of history, and one I'd imagine historians and historical novelists have to push past at every turn.
And then there's the history of the places I know intimately, the stories about specific events and people who shaped the parts of my province I know best. While there's still a slight sense that the events aren't real, it's still a lot more grounded. I can point to landmarks or stand on hillsides and say, "This is where such-and-such happened" or "So-and-so could've been here then". I took a walking tour of historic Vancouver a couple weeks ago and had a strong feeling of "yes, this happened" because I could see the streets, knew the buildings, and, importantly, knew that the people being talked about were the same rough-and-ready types who had first colonized the area I grew up in. When I think about this type of history, I have a sense of ownership, that this is my history and something to be proud of.
This divide between world history and local history parallels my reasons for reading histories and historical novels. Most historical fiction I read or want to read, I choose because I want to know what life was like in a certain place at a certain time. The biographies and histories I choose are picked for the same sorts of reasons. I want to expand my knowledge base and find things out. But the novels, bios, and histories I've read about British Columbia—the gold rush, the ranchers, the loggers, and so on—I read because I know the basic stories and want to see how they're realized on the page. I use those books more like a time machine than an archive, and when I'm reading them, there's a deeper sense of "this could have happened" than I get with other historical fiction. I also get the time machine effect through firsthand accounts, as I alluded earlier.
I imagine this is probably a pretty common thing. History's always more immediate when you can see where it happened, or when you can see artifacts. The sense I got of European history, and the ancient world, while I was touring Europe so many years ago was incredible. And of course, local history often has a folklore quality to it. We tend to mythologize important people and events, and tell our children about them at a young age. The biggest hero of the area I grew up was a guy named Billy Barker, who found a motherlode that spurred a gold rush that built a city and drew ranchers into the area. Without him, the town I grew up wouldn't have been founded. There were other rushes, and other miners in the area first, but he's the guy everyone's heard about. I also learned the mythology of the fur trade, the Northwest Passage, and Canada's explorers.
At what point does local history become the more global "characters-not-people" history? How long does it have to be before the cultural memories fade? How much area can be called local? (My schoolbooks mythologized the colonization and exploration of the whole country, but the only bits at felt real are the bits that happened to BC.) Is this mythologizing of history what created the world's myths? I don't know. I don't even know if there's a single answer. But it's something interesting to think about, isn't it?
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Year of the Superhero - Captain America
If you've been following this series, you'll know that Marvel movies make me grin like an idiot. Captain America was no exception. It was fun and exciting and a little bit cheeky, and I barely have any quibbles at all.
(Yes, I know Captain America came out weeks ago and I watched it opening week. I just didn't feel a blog post about it till now. On the upside, this means I don't have to worry as much about spoilers as usual.*)
I went into the film knowing the basics of the character through fandom osmosis and the theatrical trailers. Captain America is a whole-hearted boy scout type named Steve Rogers, who gets enhanced through "scientific" means to become a super-soldier. He has a sidekick named Bucky, and together they fight Nazis. Then Cap, as he's affectionately known, gets frozen, then thawed out later to lead to the Avengers. The trailers also told me there'd be a British love interest and Hugo Weaving delightfully chewing the scenery. I expected Hollywood gun fights and superhero quips, and I got that—but the film was more serious than I'd expected too, and there were some twists and turns in the origin story that I hadn't anticipated.
The film starts with a modern-day scene in the arctic, the discovery of a downed plane, and a suspiciously familiar shield (if you've seen Iron Man 2 and the Captain America trailers). We skip back to 1941 and go through Cap's entire origin story until he crashes the plane. The movie ends with Steve Rogers waking up in a hospital bed and discovering that he's not inKansas the 1940s anymore. Normally I don't have much patience with frame stories like this, because I feel the frame is generally unnecessary, but in this case I like it. That first scene sets up a mystery and a sense of anticipation that lurks in the background for the rest of the film, and the final scene establishes more or less where the Marvel movie-verse is going to go next. Take those scenes out, and you're left with a run-of-the-mill origin story with a definite conclusion that necessitates a lot of explanation when The Avengers comes out. I'd have less patience with a "yeah, so we found him and unthawed him" scene in Avengers than I generally do with frame stories.
The origin story itself is pretty standard. Steve Rogers tries and fails multiple times to enlist, is taken under the wing of a scientist and brought into a super-soldier program, and proves himself and is rewarded with enhancement. He metaphorically stumbles around a while trying to find something useful to do, then becomes a badass hero who destroys Nazi facilities with a crack team of soldiers. He finally ends up in a one-to-one fight with his nemesis, the Red Skull.
With the WWII setting, the story could've gone a couple ways I'm glad it didn't. It could've been a really gritty war movie, full of dirt and blood and bodies, and make a statement about how awful war is and how comrades become family, etc. Or it could've been a goofy action film à la Indiana Jones, with campy Nazis who never seem to come close to committing actual atrocities and are basically a tame threat.
What we got instead was a war movie that pays tribute to how hard and gritty and bleak the war was at times without really getting into it, and a bunch of Nazis that, while kind of goofy looking and ineffectual in the Hollywood way of not hitting targets, did pose a fairly big threat to our protagonists. Their retro-futuristic energy weapons were a large part of that. If they'd just been guys in weird outfits…
I really liked the retro-futuristic look of the technology. I know that a lot of what I saw in terms of transformation chambers, secret labs, planes, and energy cannons didn't actually exist back then, but it all looked like it could have. I had a bit harder time accepting that with the level of technology displayed in 1941, we haven't come further than the technology seen in Iron Man, though. I mean, there's a proto-type flying car in Captain America! Even if it failed in the film, if Howard Stark could do that then, why does his son only have cars on the market in our universe? Or should I accept that the holograms and AI in Iron Man are in some way the outcome of things Stark Sr. was dreaming up back in the day? I think I'll take that option…
I nearly bounced in my seat and squeed when the cosmic cube showed up near the beginning. I didn't because I was with people who hadn't seen Thor** and didn't want to spoil them. Or scare them. I get the impression that the cube wasn't initially linked to Thor and Asgard in the comics, that maybe it still isn't, but I think it's a stroke of genius that it is in the films. It ties the continuity together, and has implications for The Avengers. I enjoyed the demonstrations of just what the cube's power could do, and I thought everything the Nazis did with it was twice as terrible because they were perverting a holy/alien artifact. Which ties into the Nazi-occult thing, too.
Individual character time… I liked Cap. I was a little worried going in because I thought he'd be either really naive or too much like a boy scout, but my fears were unfounded. He was a solid, nice, likable guy, but he didn't come off as a caricature. He was a person, a person with his head on straight, and a person who grew up over the course of the film.
The supporting cast all delivered good performances as well. I'm a little in love with Howard Stark, who has incredible flair and does crazy things like his son does. I'm definitely in the faction who wants him to get his own film. Peggy Carter, the love interest, was good as well. I was glad to see that she got to be active and badass, but wanted to see more of that. It felt like she was sidelined by the men a lot, and yes, I know that's realistic to the era, but … *sigh* I also thought the romance aspects were a little heavy-handed at times, but believable 90% of the time.
I liked Hugo Weaving as the Red Skull too. He played up the sinister, creepy madness of the character, ending up slightly on the Indiana Jones side of the war movie equation, which is where a villain like him needed to be, I think. This is a comic book movie. The baddies are allowed to be a little unbelievable and cartoonish at times. But damn, he was creepy, and he pulled off the infodump scenes pretty well to boot. My only quibble with Weaving is that he had the worst German accent of any of the German characters. It wobbled. It occasionally went a bit Aussie. The vowels were slightly off most of the time. You'd think an actor of his caliber could do better, especially since he must've had a vocal coach.
But apart from the Peggy and Red Skull quibbles, this was a solid, enjoyable film. I think my favourite Marvel characters are still Iron Man and Spider-man, but Cap is fun and I'm looking forward to seeing him again in The Avengers next summer. I've got a good sense of his character and background now, and see some possibilities for how he'll interact with the rest of the team.
* Not that I ever avoid spoilers, really, but I worry whenever I put them in.
** Yes, I know. I plan to fix this soon.
(Yes, I know Captain America came out weeks ago and I watched it opening week. I just didn't feel a blog post about it till now. On the upside, this means I don't have to worry as much about spoilers as usual.*)
I went into the film knowing the basics of the character through fandom osmosis and the theatrical trailers. Captain America is a whole-hearted boy scout type named Steve Rogers, who gets enhanced through "scientific" means to become a super-soldier. He has a sidekick named Bucky, and together they fight Nazis. Then Cap, as he's affectionately known, gets frozen, then thawed out later to lead to the Avengers. The trailers also told me there'd be a British love interest and Hugo Weaving delightfully chewing the scenery. I expected Hollywood gun fights and superhero quips, and I got that—but the film was more serious than I'd expected too, and there were some twists and turns in the origin story that I hadn't anticipated.
The film starts with a modern-day scene in the arctic, the discovery of a downed plane, and a suspiciously familiar shield (if you've seen Iron Man 2 and the Captain America trailers). We skip back to 1941 and go through Cap's entire origin story until he crashes the plane. The movie ends with Steve Rogers waking up in a hospital bed and discovering that he's not in
The origin story itself is pretty standard. Steve Rogers tries and fails multiple times to enlist, is taken under the wing of a scientist and brought into a super-soldier program, and proves himself and is rewarded with enhancement. He metaphorically stumbles around a while trying to find something useful to do, then becomes a badass hero who destroys Nazi facilities with a crack team of soldiers. He finally ends up in a one-to-one fight with his nemesis, the Red Skull.
With the WWII setting, the story could've gone a couple ways I'm glad it didn't. It could've been a really gritty war movie, full of dirt and blood and bodies, and make a statement about how awful war is and how comrades become family, etc. Or it could've been a goofy action film à la Indiana Jones, with campy Nazis who never seem to come close to committing actual atrocities and are basically a tame threat.
What we got instead was a war movie that pays tribute to how hard and gritty and bleak the war was at times without really getting into it, and a bunch of Nazis that, while kind of goofy looking and ineffectual in the Hollywood way of not hitting targets, did pose a fairly big threat to our protagonists. Their retro-futuristic energy weapons were a large part of that. If they'd just been guys in weird outfits…
I really liked the retro-futuristic look of the technology. I know that a lot of what I saw in terms of transformation chambers, secret labs, planes, and energy cannons didn't actually exist back then, but it all looked like it could have. I had a bit harder time accepting that with the level of technology displayed in 1941, we haven't come further than the technology seen in Iron Man, though. I mean, there's a proto-type flying car in Captain America! Even if it failed in the film, if Howard Stark could do that then, why does his son only have cars on the market in our universe? Or should I accept that the holograms and AI in Iron Man are in some way the outcome of things Stark Sr. was dreaming up back in the day? I think I'll take that option…
I nearly bounced in my seat and squeed when the cosmic cube showed up near the beginning. I didn't because I was with people who hadn't seen Thor** and didn't want to spoil them. Or scare them. I get the impression that the cube wasn't initially linked to Thor and Asgard in the comics, that maybe it still isn't, but I think it's a stroke of genius that it is in the films. It ties the continuity together, and has implications for The Avengers. I enjoyed the demonstrations of just what the cube's power could do, and I thought everything the Nazis did with it was twice as terrible because they were perverting a holy/alien artifact. Which ties into the Nazi-occult thing, too.
Individual character time… I liked Cap. I was a little worried going in because I thought he'd be either really naive or too much like a boy scout, but my fears were unfounded. He was a solid, nice, likable guy, but he didn't come off as a caricature. He was a person, a person with his head on straight, and a person who grew up over the course of the film.
The supporting cast all delivered good performances as well. I'm a little in love with Howard Stark, who has incredible flair and does crazy things like his son does. I'm definitely in the faction who wants him to get his own film. Peggy Carter, the love interest, was good as well. I was glad to see that she got to be active and badass, but wanted to see more of that. It felt like she was sidelined by the men a lot, and yes, I know that's realistic to the era, but … *sigh* I also thought the romance aspects were a little heavy-handed at times, but believable 90% of the time.
I liked Hugo Weaving as the Red Skull too. He played up the sinister, creepy madness of the character, ending up slightly on the Indiana Jones side of the war movie equation, which is where a villain like him needed to be, I think. This is a comic book movie. The baddies are allowed to be a little unbelievable and cartoonish at times. But damn, he was creepy, and he pulled off the infodump scenes pretty well to boot. My only quibble with Weaving is that he had the worst German accent of any of the German characters. It wobbled. It occasionally went a bit Aussie. The vowels were slightly off most of the time. You'd think an actor of his caliber could do better, especially since he must've had a vocal coach.
But apart from the Peggy and Red Skull quibbles, this was a solid, enjoyable film. I think my favourite Marvel characters are still Iron Man and Spider-man, but Cap is fun and I'm looking forward to seeing him again in The Avengers next summer. I've got a good sense of his character and background now, and see some possibilities for how he'll interact with the rest of the team.
* Not that I ever avoid spoilers, really, but I worry whenever I put them in.
** Yes, I know. I plan to fix this soon.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)