Well, I have now completed the first three Barsoom novels, just finishing Warlord of Mars.
I will say, of the three, Warlord is, perhaps, the silliest of three fairly ridiculous novels. Now, when I say the books are ridiculous, these novels are hyperbolic, escapist adventure fantasy. Its the predecessor to Flash Gordon and Conan by several years, each, and helped launch both genres. While interesting themes and ideas present themselves in the three books, you'd be hard pressed to say that Edgar Rice Burroughs was pushing an agenda beneath the layers of the Barsoom novels, or that he was seeking to impart a subversive message or pat himself on the back for writing a very important book. But that doesn't mean they aren't pretty wild fun, and don't work surprisingly well in the context of the modern action enthusiast.
But it can get silly. Warlord features at least two instance where our hero goes undercover in iffy disguises, knocks himself out more than once, and routinely has to explain that maybe he isn't much of a thinker as he apologizes to the reader for not having a particularly good reason why he has once again pitched himself into a fight that maybe didn't need to happen (while suggesting he thinks to think too hard about these things is sort of for jerks, anyway). In some ways, John Carter is the Jack Burton of his time and place. He's a reasonable man caught up in unreasonable circumstances.
I dunno. My back hurts because I did crunches wrong. I had a pretty nice dinner out with pals this evening, and think I'll be having another nice dinner out with pals on Thursday.
I'm almost done with Warlord of Mars, and think I'll finish that instead of blogging.
The weekend seemed to just shoot by in a way that the past several weeks really have not done.
If you're following us on social media, you may have seen a cryptic allusion to PaulT (aka: PlacesLost) and I joining forces with our respective extra-curricular interests and making a day of it. Spoiler alert: Paul was looking to do something fun for himself in the world of video, and so he interviewed me about my Superman hobby for a while, and then he shot my my collection of stuff. Also: we ate pizza.
I think its still a bit up in the air what Paul will do with the footage, but we had fun, and I think I talked either as an interviewee or just running my mouth from 10 in the morning until about five PM or whenever Paul departed.
This promises to upstage Nixon/ Frost, I am sure. Yes, that is me in my office. We're a bit out of focus here, so consider it a teaser and get off Paul's case.
Of late, Jamie and I are running out of shows to watch. Frankly, we've lost our enthusiasm for some of the shows we'd been watching as time seems to have taken its toll on whatever early creative explosions were occurring, giving way to predictable, redundant comedy or plotting turning the show into a 30-60 minute exercise in remembering better days.
Yes, I'm looking at you 30 Rock. I've turned you off halfway through the episode the past two weeks.
But it reminds me that at least 30 Rock got a chance, again and again from NBC. Other shows have either been cut down in their prime, or ended due to what I have to assume were business reasons before the show has finished really exploring the possibilities of the characters.
editor's note: for clarification, from here to the end, its probably worth checking the calendar.
We mostly talk genre around here, so surely I am not alone in my despair amongst my friends here as I wonder aloud why Lexx ever went off the air. A clear vision of man's future, at least as inspiring as Andromeda, or the oft mentioned Earth: Final Conflict. All had something compelling to say about us as people, something that needed to go on for much longer than the limited schedules fate bestowed them.
But if I can indulge in Example Prime: According to Jim.
I am aware that many shows are lucky to see a single season, but with the complex plotting, nuanced characterization and fascinating growth of the characters in multiple modes from a sort of Sirkian exploration of family and class to a sort of pathos worthy of Von Trier, this slice of Americana received only 8 seasons in which to explore the lives of Jim, Cheryl, they're family and friends. What more could we have learned by seeing Jim's eventual transition to retirement? How would he and Cheryl have coped in Season 25 with the overdose death of Dana?
There are so many lingering questions that only time and the room to let the characters really breathe in their space could have really bring the show to maturity and let longstanding trends with the characters bear fruit.
It seems impossible that 2009 saw the final (official) episode of the program, and I admit I'm a bit behind in my fan-fiction both prose and the skits and full episodes on my website http://geocities.accordingtoryan/\\3456#, but I think its worth keeping the vision of the show alive. If Arrested Development can see a revival after its shaky ratings and confusing messaging, I'm fairly certain that the millions who watched According to Jim during its official run will be able to see this program see the light of day once more.
In the run up to this summer's Avengers movie, Jamie and I are going to be watching the individual superhero movies that will take us right up to the big team-up picture. Its a lot of flicks. The Alamo will be running a marathon, but I just can't see myself sitting through what has to be roughly 12 hours of Marvel action of movies I've seen already multiple times.
Iron Man
The Incredible Hulk
Iron Man 2
Thor
Captain America
That doesn't mean I don't actually quite like most of the movies, but... I dunno. The Planet of the Apes marathon was just truly something Ahab-like that I felt I had to do once in my life. Now, if they screened all the Superman movies... now we're talking.
Iron Man (2008) still holds up remarkably well, even if this was the first time I wondered why the 10 Rings terrorist association wanted Tony Stark to build the missile rather than kill him as Obadbiah Stane had requested to garner goodwill and maybe get those Jericho missiles off a truck.
Looking at Iron Man and comparing it to DC's attempt to launch a hydra-headed franchise like Avengers with Green Lantern, its a reminder that WB and DCE are really, really bad at all this, and there's no reason to think that they won't really mess up the upcoming Superman film, Man of Steel. DC's answer to a cocksure hero like Tony Stark didn't work with the Ryan Reynold's "I'm a loveable goof" take on Hal Jordan, a terrible costume and pretty much no motivation for our hero or the audience to embrace.
Iron Man was actually such a trick and gave such a clear arc to Tony Stark as a character that trying to repeat the narrative success in the sequel didn't really take. I recall not being exactly bored during Iron Man 2, but also knowing that they were going to learn a lot about what was missing for when they wrote the third installment.
May I also add: I really like Gwyneth Paltrow in this movie. I can genuinely say I never thought I'd give a damn about Pepper Potts, but I like her understated performance. She isn't given that much to do in this boy's own adventure, but she manages to do a lot with what's on the page and feel like a bit more than the girlfriend-in-trouble that Kirsten Dunst got stuck playing over three Spidey movies. Her scenes with Robert Downey Jr.'s force of nature Tony Stark feel terribly natural in the work-wife sort of vibe, and the dialog just works (see: the scene where she has to swap out Tony's batteries). It goes a long way.
And, of course, Jeff Bridges as a super-villain? This movie is just terribly well cast all the way down the line, including Clark Gregg as Agent Coulson, everyone's favorite G-Man.
Its a fun movie, even if it boils down to mad-scientist antics and two dudes slugging it out on a rooftop and goofing on a bit of BS for the conclusion to their spat (I am sure one can read all sorts of symbolism into the Arc Generator killing Stane, but I doubt 1 in 20 filmgoers found themselves weeping at all the lovely irony).
Song of the Thin Man (1947) is neck deep in the (white) New York jazz scene of the post WWII era, and catches us up with Nick and Nora now well settled into the role of parents of a 10 year old Nick Jr. Tonally, the movie is the final conversion of Nick and Nora as sober, semi-responsible society folk and unlike the first appearance of the couple, plays off their "square-ness". While they joke about booze, I'm not sure I saw them imbibe more than once in the course of the film.
An odd comparison to how they first appeared in 1934, but an interesting reflection of the move from the screwball movies of the pre WWII era to the movies meant for mass consumption as we rolled towards 1950's and TV's incessantly pleasant view of the world.
I've now re-read Princess of Mars and finished Gods of Mars. I am now heading into Warlord of Mars. Because, you know: Mars.
I am also going to spoil the end of the book because its not a spoiler. Its so that you know something I wish I'd known - the book ends on an amazing cliffhanger. DO NOT EXPECT NARRATIVE CLOSURE. The last forty pages of the book, I just kept thinking "wow, this is really not seeming like its wrapping up here. The first book had that whole epilogue sort of ending. Not this one." Nope. It ends with a very Two Towers sort of insistence that you will read/buy book 3, and you will like it.
And I will. Well, I have a collection with the first three books in it, so...
its pretty much this for over 200 pages
Nobody is going to accuse Edgar Rice Burroughs of writing deep literature with the Barsoom novels. His character, John Carter, is not here to give lit majors reasons to write papers. Sure, you could spend a lot of time exploring ideas of religion, class, race, masculinity and femininity in his work, and it might not be wrong to do so as you grapple with 20th Century genre-fiction's long and shaky history with all of these issues. But these are books for crazy, escapist high adventure and if you find something else in there, well, there you are.
In the past few weeks I've had three separate conversations with three separate people from very, very different backgrounds, all of whom were describing their individual situations and then wound up throwing their hands in the air and saying "this isn't how it is in the movies!" They were not being hyperbolic or kidding.
I don't know if its any different from how CNN's favorite line from witnesses since 9/11 has been "it was like something out of a movie". On the news, it seems, it's the only way to describe the fact that you're in one of those make-or-break/ life-or-death situations that comes along but once in a blue moon. Unless you're in movies and your name is John McClane.
Have we found ourselves in a place where we speak more often about the construction of fictional character's lives than our own that our only model for how things go in life is in the condensed and scripted world of television and movies? Are we learning more from watching Harry and Sally falling in love than we are from watching our parents or talking to friends?
As you know, I watch Mad Men, a program I feel manages to do what good fiction can do, and that's tell us something about the universal "us" or about ourselves as flawed, hypocritical, deceitful, kind, odd people who want to do the right thing, or the thing that we hope is right for us. The program gets a lot of press coverage, and is well rewarded for its efforts by people who give out statuettes. By taking place in the 1960's rather than today, we get some comforting distance, all while having a limited omniscience as viewers as we know where the world in which these characters are living is headed while they're just along for the ride. Its meant everything from the shock of a Muhammad Ali win to the death of John F. Kennedy stopping everyone in their tracks for an episode.
On the season opener, which aired Sunday, apparently the opening sequence in which young advertising executives (not at Don's advertising agency, but another) were throwing bags of water down at African Americans from their Manhattan skyscraper offices while on the sidewalks a group of black protesters asked for equal treatment - was apparently pulled line for line from a newspaper story from the period in which the episode occurs.
Over the past few days I've received a few links from you guys, and I guess its appropriate to comment.
Cap Homecoming
If you haven't seen the video of the little boy receiving a visit from Captain America for his birthday, and then learning that the unmasked Cap is the dad he thought was in Afghanistan where he's serving, then you really need to watch it.
An amazing and poignant moment, and a reminder that the US military is a volunteer military of men and women who are also fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters. Here's to all of our Captain Americas coming home.
Yes, I saw the Gawker article and cartoon. Yes, that's The Daily Texan.
I have literally no idea what the cartoonist was thinking, but contextually, just the use of the word "colored", which is only used in Texas in a weird, gallows humor sort of way to suggest backwards thinking, tells me that this cartoonist was trying to make a point which never quite made it into the strip, and instead just made UT's daily student paper look backward and racist.
If the cartoonist was trying to make a point about how the matronly and condescending media is telling the story by framing the story to a child-like audience to scare them, then... okay. I guess I get it even if I don't buy necessarily buy that interpretation. You'd pretty much need to be handed a few sign posts to get you there.
From looking at the rest of the cartoonist's work on the Texan website, all of her strips (if you want to call them that) are terribly inept and seem to fail to actually convey anything other than a general sense of "I watched CNN last night" and a bit of anger at someone running for student government*. Frankly, political cartooning is hard. The skill to create icons and symbolism to convey your opinion or some greater truth with a 2 second glance is hard to come by. Even among comic nerds, political cartooning gets a certain level of respect for the difficult task it represents. This student gets an F in cartooning.
But, pulling Eisner's work would mean The Daily Texan would then need to either fill that space with another cartoon (and lord knows how hard that would be to find), or run an ad for Forbidden Fruit or Tom's Tabooley or something. I just wish the editor or faculty advisor had been able to make a better decision before letting this see print.
Several comics sites talked about the guy, and who can blame them? A dude who owns a completely amazing black Lamborghini dressed himself up as Batman and drove around in the car (with the top down), pretty much doing what every single person in the world has always wanted to do.
Some were saying this guy does this for kids or a charity or something. Really, I don't know why he does it, but he's okay in my book.
And how can you go wrong hiring Andy Devine to play Santa? I will tell you: You cannot.
My Personal Bug-a-Boo of the Day
Mixing historical figures with genre tropes is getting played out. Especially when you can tell that neither the artist nor the person writing the article (a) realizes this, or (b) realizes that this one in particular was done a long time ago and better as "Tales from the Bully Pulpit".
No, I don't care about the Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter movie.
Thanks to everyone for thinking of me and sending me links! Keep them coming.
*dear students: these elections will never matter anywhere, to anyone but to sad people reading grad school applications in basements
