Monthly Archives: October 2020

Novel Nordic Noirs

For some time my sweetie-wife and I have been enjoying murder shows from the far north of Europe. Recently we have added two more programs to our rotation of after dinner entertainment.

Arctic Circle is a show set in the Lapland region of Finland. This is the part of the world where you get reindeer and lots and lots of snow. It is also the area of Finland that seems to analogous to American’s relationship with Appalachia, rustic and suspicious of outsiders and with a dose of religious fundamentalism. The show follows Nina a local cop who usually is dealing with drunks and poachers now entangled in a case involving cross border human trafficking, the Russian Mafia, and a novel and deadly virus while dealing with the issues of a single mother  with a special needs daughter and a growing affair with a foreign scientist.

The show is well produced, well acted, and is thoroughly engaging.

The second program is Jordskott a police thriller with horror overtones. Produced and set in Sweden, though it features the lead from the Finnish serries Bordertown now playing a heavy, this show centers on Eva a police detective who has returned home after the death of her father and the unresolved disappearance of her young daughter seven years earlier. Atmospheric and moody Jordskott, which translates roughly in Soil Shot, unfolds at tits own pace with just enough mystery and strange reveals the keep the viewer engaged.

Arctic Circle is currently streaming on the Roku Channel Topic and Jordskott is a Shudder exclusive.

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But 2020 is 2020

Yesterday I gave you a number of reasons why the election in 2020 is not a repeat of 2016 with plenty of nuggets to raise your spirits and cool your fears. Today we are going in the other direction and I’m going to go over a few possibilities how this election could go wrong. And by go wrong I mean yield an illegitimate result. Trump is very unpopular and has a practically non-existent chance to win the popular vote and very slim chance, 13% as of today at 538, but we have more to fear this go around than another electoral misfire.

1) Who decides on the electors?

In our system we do not actually vote for president we vote for a slate of elector to represent our state at the electoral college who had promised to vote for our choice in the presidential contest. In some states it is not force of law that selects the electors and there is nothing legally from preventing a legislature from voting to send a slate of electors of their choosing. So, if Florida goes by a bare margin to trump thee governor and thee state legislature could simply choose to ignore the results and send a GOP slate delivering the state’s electoral college votes to Trump. If Trump is defeated soundly in a number of states this avenue of election rigging is closed off but if it comes down to a single state and the GOP control the state it is a possibility.

2) A Delay in Certifying the Electors.

If the election and the electors are not certified in time, then a state may not send their electors to the college to vote on the president. Such an outcome could make it impossible for any candidate to cross the 270 line in which case the selection of president would be made by the House of Representatives with each state having one vote. There has been reporting that the Trump campaign have been readying a large number of lawyers to contest elections and slate of electors in a number of states with the intention of not winning these legal challenges but consuming so much time that the electors cannot be certified and throwing the election to the house.

The Congress that would vote in the new president is the incoming class and there have also been reports that the Democrats under the leadership of their Speaker have been targeting particular House Seats with an eye focused on gaining control of a majority of state delegation in addition to their current majority in total members.

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Why 2020 is Not 2016

There are at the time of this writing 20 days until the United States Official Election day though people are voting now by mail and in person by way of early voting and the possibility remains that closer than expected contest may delay results by days or weeks.

As we approach the critical time for our republic and for the world many people are having tense fearful reactions to Biden lead in the polls recalling Clinton’s lead that evaporated and left the nation dealing with a narcissistic corrupt man-child at the head of our government. While the only poll that reallymatters is the actual vote tally here are a few reasons to keep in mind as to why 2020’s election is not the same as 2016’s.

1) Joe Biden is not as a reviled figure as Hillary Clinton.

Rightly or wrongly Clinton carried 30 years of negative political baggage creating a contest between two despised candidates. That dynamic is missing entirely.

2) Joe Biden is consistently breaking the 50% barrier in polling.

Hillary Clinton while often outpolling Trump rarely if ever managed to score above 50% in the polls and in the final weeks of the campaign remained below that critical measure.

3) There are no major third-party candidates.

In an election as tight as 2016 with the outcome turning on less than a few hundred thousand votes nationally the presence of third-party vote drainers such as Jill Stein proved critical.

4) 2016’s ‘unthinkable’ is our reality.

In 2016 is was commonly accepted wisdom that the electorate simply would not elect Trump as President. Despite 538’s giving Trump a 1 in 3 chance of emerging victorious people simply assumed it would not happen but in 2020 we have sadly been forced to accept that it can and that it did happen. Now no one dismisses Trump’s chances as ‘unthinkable.’

5) The polling has been unusually stable.

Look at the charts from 2016 and you’ll see wild gyrations in support for the two candidates but in 2020 the difference between Trump and Biden has been fluctuating over just a few points and never enough to cause the two to swap places. Biden’s lead has remained at 6-8 points for months.

6) Trump is no longer an unknown.

While Trump in 2016 possessed in some people’s mind at almost unknown potential as President in 2020 his qualities are well known. It is now plain to all but his core support that the erratic, ignorant, insulting, and racist style reflects who he truly is and now merely a ‘show.’

7) The Electorate is motivated.

Voter turnout in 2016 was depressed and Trump winning the election received a lower percentage of votes than Romney’s losing campaign in 2012 but in 2020 early voting, mail-in voting, and fund raising all indicated a high energized voting population on track to shatter all voter turnout records.

8) 207,557 dead Americans.

2016 did not provide the stark and undeniable reality of with candidates’ failure to manage a crisis such as COVID-19 has done for the Trump administration. From the face that Trump was aware of the deadly nature early and tried to ignore it, to the reports that the administration’s considers death’s in ‘Blue States’ unimportant Trump’s handling of the pandemic has demonstrated clearly, plainly, and lethally he is utterly unfit for the office and the price we will all pay if he remains in it.

All that said the most important thing is to VOTE. In person, early, or by mail, no poll matters but that one.

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Pandemic Programming: Staged

The Global COVID-19 pandemic in addition to killing more than a million people with over 210,00 of them here in the dysfunctional United States of America, has also wreaked havoc on the entertainment industry. Beyond the shuttering of exhibition houses and live theater around the globe production has foundered on the rocks of this disease. Film and television sets are cramped, crowded affairs with buffet style craft services to keep everyone fed and little ability to engage in social distancing with the results being that making new programing a risky enterprise.

However, a few creatives are finding ways to still give us the entertainment and joyful diversion we desperately need in the dark days and the one I am enjoying best is Staged.

Starring fan favorites David Tennant and Michael Sheen Staged centers on the two actors playing fictionalized and exaggerated versions of themselves as they are trapped in their homes by the pandemic and via Zoom calls attempt to salvage a theatrical production being helmed by a novice and weak first time director played by the program’s creator, director, and writer, Simon Evans.

In addition to Tennent and Sheen their real-life spouses, Georgia and Anna are supporting and engaging characters along with a few guest stars also contributing to the socially distanced project.

Selected scenes are available on YouTube and work quite well on their own but the full half-hour episodes laying on Hulu are the real joy. If you are in need of laughter fueled escape, I couldn’t recommend Staged any higher.

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Voting is Done

Here in California Voting by mail while not universal has been gaining greater and greater acceptance as the nominal method for participating in each election and during a deadly pandemic it makes even more sense. For several election cycles my sweetie-wife and I have been voting by mail simply for the convivence.

One of the advantages of mailing your ballot is the comfort of doing the research at home, making all your notes at home, and then completing the ballot without notes or other aids. It was also a bit of a hassle to carry into the polling location some sort of written guide for all the down ballot offices, judges, schoolboards and the like as well as the lesser known initiatives but statewide and local. Yes the state provides a sample ballot that you can mark ahead of time and that does work, but while standing at the plastic stations where you fill out the ballot I have always felt a time pressure to fill out and submit my ballot and at home no one is waiting to use my desk after me.

So, election 2020 is now in my personal rear-view mirror. I have voted against Trump, Trumpism, and all so have lent it even the barest of support. It is now in the hands of everyone else.

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Activation Energy, Momentum, and the Milliped’s Problem

It seems to me that my writing requires an activation energy that must be met every single time I sit at the keyboard. I want to write, I sit with the intention of writing, but there is always a resistance and it takes an effort of will to overcome that resistance. However, once that has been overcome the writing moves forward without much resistance. It’s the barrier that I have to force myself over but knowing that it is just a momentary barrier makes it one that can be surmounted but never ignored.

In addition to the activation energy to begin writing for the day each project also seems to have their own elements of momentum. At the start of any new project, short story or novel, it is tough getting the story going. The characters kind of mill about in scenes and the scenes feel pointless generating doubt about the entire project. Again, if I push on there comes a moment when the story moves by itself. It is as if I needed to get up to a certain speed and crest a hill but once I do it slides on its own all the way to the end.

On my newest novel I have discovered a new trap, a new hazard to avoid. With the publication Vulcan’s Forge, I received some very nice praise, praise that was unknown by this reader directed at a particular aspect of the SF story that I had worked quite hard at. It was quite a moment of pride to have someone tell me that the elements that really wanted to work had been one of their selling points.

Now I am working a new SF novel and this element again needs careful attention but like the milliped after being asked how it manages to move so many feet perfectly coordinated, I find myself frozen and worried that I’m messing up what I had once done so well.

There’s no cure for this but to work through it and trust myself and my eventual beta readers.

With writing, and all the arts, there are always new barriers to overcome.

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Second Act Troubles

A dissatisfaction with the current progress of Lovecraft Country has me thinking about second act issues. Of course, when I speak of second acts, I am referring to the traditional three act structure that many films and television shows employ even though I myself utilize a five-act structure when building out a novel.

In the three act model the first act is establishment of the characters, the world, and the central conflict of the story. The third act is after all the major revelations and the characters hurtle towards their final conflicts and resolution leaving the second act, which is the same size in term of word or page counts as the other two combines, as a vast middle where advancement and reversal take place as the characters chart the course of the plot. It is not unusual for second acts to become muddled and messy as their purpose doesn’t seem as well defined as acts one or three. This is in part why I like the five-act system instead of one massive poorly defined act there are two with better laid out purposes.

What’s important is that the characters have goal that they have identified and chase that directly immediately impact the story. The second act of Star Wars (A New Hope for you youngsters.) Is the Flacon’s capture, the discovery and rescue of the princess and the escape from the Death Star. At each of the turns we understand exactly what it is the characters need to achieve, the cost of the fail to do that, and the escalation as obtaining the immediate goal brings further problems and troubles.

While things that happen here do affect the third act and the story’s eventual conclusion the characters are not looking off to that distant end but rather dealing with objective that if they do not meet them now there will be terrible consequences.

Keep your second act moving, as the writer keep your eye on the final prize the conclusion, but remember that the characters have to have immediate goals that matter to them now.

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Stop It with The Pan and Scan

Last night my Sweetie-Wife and I decided to watch a streaming film. The first couple of movies she selected from Amazon’s steaming library, we were going to Amazon because their catalog of foreign specialty films seems the best, were unsuitable because they were not available via our Prime memberships and in addition to a rental fee were sourced from 16mm prints. I am never going to pay a rental fee for a low-quality dupe from 16mm.

She advanced that she wanted to see a spaghetti western preferably one with Klaus Kinski a quick search turned up I am Sartana … Your Angel of Death. Okay we gave that one a try.

It didn’t look right.

The original aspect ratio was 2.35 to 1 but that was not the presentation Amazon offered up. In addition, the director or director of photography adored shooting through along zoom lens which magnified camera shake which was additionally magnified by the Pan and Scan alteration. On top of that fast camera movement and frequent transitions to ‘Dutch Angles’ made the experience not simply unappealing but actually headache inducing.

We switched over to Django Defies Sartana which is presented in its original aspect ratio, 1.85 to 1, and taken from a much better source.

In these days of high definition wide screen televisions there is no call for Pan and Scan at all and it should be eliminated.

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Playing Politics with Our Lives

It’s not new or shocking to state that Trump cares for no one but Trump. Those who expect or hope that his brush with COVID-19 and his mortality will somehow implant the barest empathy for another human being are deluding themselves. A person in the mid-70s is set in who that are and in Trump’s case that is an immoral, narcissistic, sociopath interested only in his own well-being and wealth.

In addition to this the pressures of the election and his immunity towards state and federal crimes along with civil threats including $400 million dollars in personal debts coming due in the next four years provide incentive, beyond his inherent selfish needs, for Trump to do whatever it takes to retain the office of President of the United States.

Which of course means interfering in the process the approve the vital vaccine we need for COVID-19.

The FDA wants to publish guidelines that any vaccine before approval must first have its participant monitored for two months following their last does, waiting to see in adverse events develop or if the vaccine’s protections show signs of being only a short duration. This reasonable, if still highly rushed, guideline is quite acceptable unless your eye is on election day in which case this is terrible. No vaccine can meet this guideline and be approved before November 3rd 2020. Of course, interference from the White House undermines confidence in the vaccine and damages intake of this vital measure to protect our health, our lives, and our economy.

Trump doesn’t care if the vaccine works.

Trump doesn’t care if you die.

Trump only cares for Trump.

Trump only wants to win and your corpse is an acceptable price for that victory.

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Lovecraft Country Impressions After 7 Episodes

Lovecraft Country is an HBO limited series adapted from the novel of the same name written by Matt Ruff and centers on a group of Black characters dealing with magic, monsters, and racism during Jim Crow America. Mild spoilers ahead.

The story’s protagonist is Atticus ‘Tic’ Freeman, a Korean War veteran, genre fiction enthusiast, and a descendant of the founding member of cult order.

I have now watched seven episode of Lovecraft Country and my feelings are hopeful but with a dash of apprehension.

The characters are well drawn with complex backstories and vibrant inner lives that all the actors of the series portray beautifully. The drama and dynamics are grounded in a realistic approach with the various character struggling with lingering abuse, trauma, and trust issues while still possessing aspirational motivations that speak to a high nature within them. In the face of a racist, unjust, and oppressive system that surrounds them they maintain, for the most part, their own dignity.

The fantastical elements, monsters and magic, are handled quite adeptly with fresh shocks and turns that has prevented the genre elements from becoming stale even seven hours into the story.

My apprehensions arise from concerns of the course of the narrative and the coming conclusion and break down into two major categories.

First; The lack of direct objectives for the protagonists. Tic, for most of the series now, has been searching for and attempting to decipher pages from a magical text with the goal of protecting his family. But it is not clear exactly what he is protecting them from. While there are evil supernatural forces, and one such force attempted to use Tic as part of a dangerous ritual, the surviving members of the cults do not appear to offer a direct and specific threat to Tic. It is not clear what will happen if Tic fails in obtaining ‘protection’ or what will happen if the surviving cultists are unopposed. This would be fine if we were only 1/3 of the way into the story but at 2/3 we need to have a clear appreciation of the stakes.

While the character drama is proceeding nicely, and the characters are being tested on their inner natures and being forced to change and grow that is sufficient for dramatic fiction but lacking for genre stories. Genre is more plot dependent; we need more than Luke Skywalker gaining maturity we need the defeat of the Death Star as well.

My Second apprehension centers on the thematic elements of the story and specifically with the racism of Jim Crow America. It is good to tell this story set in the Jim Crow period. It is a dark disgusting chapter of American History too often swept aside in popular entertainment. My issues do not arise from setting here and being direct in depicting the overt racism, but I fear the series is setting itself up for an unsatisfactory conclusion.

We know that Jim Crow will not end until the middle of the next decade and that systemic racism will persist after its legal abolition. making it a central thematic conflict in the show without a fictionalized character to stand in for it means that the characters no matter their eventually outcome with the cultists will lose in the greater cultural conflict. This is where having a character stand in for the wider culture is a useful device. A white racist character that comes to see the evil and ignorance of their racism can be used to suggest that cultural change and growth is possible and hinting that victory of those evil forces is possible even if your story ends within racist times but Lovecraft Country has no recurring major racist characters to suggest such a growth is possible. Because the racist characters come and go as part of the universal background the background becomes unchanging and unchangeable.

Perhaps that is the thematic intent of the show’s creators but it is very difficult to make failure and futility into satisfying ends for stories.

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