Category Archives: SF

The Good News Post

So, there are several bits of new news to share this chilly December morning.

First off: Because I have a minor surgery scheduled this week and then a week off from my day job for recovery that mean I will not be working any more overtime. The money is nice, and I love chipping in and helping out my team at Kaiser Permanente but it’s really nice to get back to a normal schedule that allows for writing.

Second, pivoting of the subject of writing, our favorite local bookstore Mysterious Galaxy is saved! They have new owners and a new location so the store will not have to shutter depriving San Diego book readers, un-employing its staff, or leaving its various book, gaming, and writing groups homeless. Truly this had made this season festive.

And HBO’s Watchmen reached the season one finale and for once I am not disappointed by a project associate with showrunner Damon Lindelof. Quite the contrary, this series was fantastic. Every element plays perfectly in tune with the themes that grounded this version of the story and all the major points and developments were well established. The characters both as written and as performed simply captivated and for those that are the older versions of ones from the sources material managed to be true to their natures while exploring logical and consistent change from the thirty years that had passed. While Angela Abar (Regina Hill) may have been the protagonist of the story Laurie Blake (Jean Smart) took home favorite character prize from this viewer. Where the original graphic novel Watchmen centered thematically on the Cold War and the ever-present threat of nuclear annihilation with those ideas and terrors informing not just the plot but the look and feel of the story this Watchmen explored the lingering horror, hate, and trauma of racial injustice and bigotry. Starting off with the slaughter and destruction of ‘Black Wall Street’ in Tulsa Oklahoma in 1921 and ending with crisis from Tulsa that threatens the world, Watchmen 2019 explores justice and the thorny issues confusing that concept with its petty cousin vengeance. Best off the season did not end with a plot cliffhanger. While the final shots left a terribly large question unanswered it did not fail to resolve the essential conflict or theme of the series. If there is never a season two the show is still full resolved and satisfying. Thank you, Mr. Lindelof, I do so hate cliffhangers.

 

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Television Review: The Mandalorian

November 12th Disney Plus went live and since I could get that and the streaming service HULU for the same price I pay for HULU I went ahead and signed up giving me access to the Star Wars  inspired series The Mandalorian.

Set during the chaos after the fall of the Galactic Empire in Return of the Jedi, the series follows the adventures of the titular and unnamed Mandalorian bounty hunter. Returning to the original Star Wars  aesthetic of a dirty, grimy and lived in universe the show is not about Jedi and the quarrels of feuding noble house but, at least at first, about the scramble for survival by less legendary characters.

The pilot episode sets up several aspect of the central character’s situation: money is tight, his people are dispossessed, and he suffered a traumatic childhood.  Given a missions that appears to be ‘off book’ by a mysterious employer, played by veteran eclectic filmmaker Werner Herzog, the Mandalorian is soon swept up into what appears to a deep conspiracy that may test his off practiced detachment from he fellow beings.

While short on characterization The Mandalorian  shows promises that we hope the grand arc will live up to.

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HBO’s Watchmen

So with my expectations appropriately low I have begun watching HBO new series Watchmen. In this review I will fullyspoil both the comic and 2009 adaptation of Watchmen.

Why am I setting expectation low for this alternate history super hero series? The answer is one name, Damon Lindelof. Lindelof has been a writer if television and feature for a number of years and his name is attached to some major projects, Star Trek: Into Darkness, Prometheus, World War Z, Cowboys and Aliens, and the recently delayer and/or canceled feature film The Hunt. With the exception of that final entry which I have not viewed, all of these projects not only left me cold but I felt assaulted by intelligence with gaps in logic that no suspension bridge of disbelief could span. Given that history as a writer I expect very little from a Damon Lindelof project.

However I am a fan of Watchmen  both the original comic and the Snyder feature adaptation and I heard enough about this set up and premise of this series to genuinely intrigue me.

Watchmen  is in an alternate time line where costumed heroes began appearing in the streets sometime in the 1940s. For both the comic and the 2009 feature this leads to a radically different 1980s, Nixon is never forced out of office by Watergate, a god-like being Doctor Manhattan transforms science, technology, and world events by being a patriotic ‘superman,’ figure, and the US Constitution is amended to allow unlimited terms for a president. One of the more revered heroes, Ozymandias, convinced only he can save the world from impending nuclear annihilation fakes a catastrophic event to create species wide unity. In the comic he stages an inter-dimensional attack on Earth from giant squids, and in the 2009 feature he frames Dr. Manhattan for the attack. In both cases half of metropolitan New York is killed. The remaining, having failed to stop the attack, commit to keeping the secret giving Ozymandias’ plan a chance of success except for the manically committed Rorschach. In order to maintain their conspiracy Dr. Manhattan murders Rorschach but a by Rorschach journal detailing his investigation into the plot is published and the world continues to teeter on the brink of global nuclear war.

The series Watchmen  take place 30 years later in a parallel 2019 but it is not clear if it has followed the comic’s reality with monstrous being from another dimension having ‘attacked’ the Earth in the 1980s or the 2009’s Dr. Manhattan hoax timeline. Given Manhattan’s known presence on Mars and a rain of tiny squid in episode one I am inclined to believe that Lindelof is extrapolating from the comic’s history.

Episode one opens with a heinous event that tragically is not part of some dark alternate timeline but rather a part shameful American History, The Tulsa Race Massacre, when rioting white slaughter the residents of the Midwest’s ‘Black Wall Street.’  We follow the survival of one young boy as the rioting and murders exterminate the town around him. The story picks up some ninety-odd years later with our lead character Angela Abar. Angela is a police detective but following an earlier terrorists campaign police are masked adopting like super heroes secret identities. The terrorists that waged their war on the police were the Kavalry, a virulent racist organization that idolizes the murdered Rorschach. When the Kavalry resurfaces Angela’s world is turned upside down and she quickly becomes entwined in a new conspiracy with roots stretching back to the 1921 massacre. Simultaneously on a distant English estate Ozymandias lives in retired seclusion pursuing his own unrevealed plots that involve genetic engineering and artificial people.

There is a very strong moral ambiguity to the show. The Kavalry are presented in a no redeeming method but the police, our protagonists employee torture to achieve their means and that is never good.

Watchmen  the series in its first two episodes presents a number of interesting and compelling character but also displays a few typical Hollywoodisms that usually mar action sequences with events that simply defy any understanding of how the physics of the world actually work but so far nothing that has dissuaded me from watching further episodes.  All in all Lindelof’s show is interesting, complex and may still prove that more than The Fonz can jump a shark.

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It! The Terror From Beyond Space

Continuing my run of films best suited for the month of October last night, after a very frustrating day dealing with AT&T technical support, I watched 1958’s It! The Terror From Beyond Space. This movie along with Planet of the Vampires,  in which no vampires appear, is one of the direct predecessors to 1979’s amazing and classic film Alien. Written by Jerome Bixby It! Pits the crew of a spaceship against a deadly and unstoppable monstrous alien that has stowed away aboard their rocket.

The first Mars expedition has ended in disaster with all communication lost after the ship reached Mars. The film opens with a voice over explaining that the second expedition has rescued the narrator, the sole survivor of the doomed first, and is taking him back to Earth to face trial for the murder of he fellow crew in a bid to survive the harsh and unforgiving Martian environment. It’s not long before the alien stow away make itself known and the crew begin their retreat deck by deck from its lethal assaults. This exploration/rescue mission is stocked with cases of grenades, endless 45 semi-automatic pistols, home made gas bombs, and even a bazooka that is fired off in the cramp confines of the bridge but nothing stops or even hampers the creature’s attacks.  Two of the ten cast members are women but even for 1958 this movie is out right sexist with the ladies forced to serve dinner and coffee while providing only the barest of plot of character motivations, and with the younger, of course, thrust into a needless love triangle because that’s why females characters exist in movies.

Despite its cheesiness It! Manages to score what might be a few important moments in cinema history. Between stolen model designs and sequences the climax of the film may very well represent the first cinematic explosive decompression. The basic set up was one of the films that inspired Dan O’Bannon when he started out crafting the script to Alien and that lineage is stark and clear. Without this mostly forgettable film we would have never been introduced to Ellen Ripley.

 

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New Achievement Unlocked

The road to publication of my first novel has been long, twisty, and full of detours that sent back to square one but the destination has finally come into sight.

It has been an interesting experience as I proceed into new and unknown territory with phase of the publication. Submitted books and stories is something I have become quite familiar with but when the contract arrive for the novel that was new, particularly since I was navigating those waters sans agent. Then there was working with my editor. I must say that Don has been great, between his comments and the insights from Imogene the copyeditor I not only improved Vulcan’s Forge  I also learned things about my own writing style and hopefully have improved.

For the last two weeks I have been carefully reviewing the galleys for Vulcan’s Forge, scouring the PDFs for mistakes, typos, and the like. (And I must report that there have been very few. I adore the layout and look of the text. This is one of the principal reasons I sought traditional publishing there are far too many critical skills that are best performed by others.)

This morning I popped over the Flame tree Press’ website and saw that their Spring 2020 catalog was posted and there on page 28 was my book.

I was not ready for the emotional experience. There is a vast gulf between thinking about a thing and seeing that actual thing come into reality. It’s an excitement I have looked forward to and now it makes my fingers tremble and my heart flutter.

There can only be one ‘first time’ and I am so happy to share mine with Flame Tree.

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Does Gemini Man Herald the End of Acting?

In a recent article over at VOX an author expressed the fear that the near perfect digital recreation of an actor’s younger version is merely the camel’s nose in the tent that will lead to the replacement of actors with entirely digital creations. This is not a new concern and formed the one central question in Connie Willis’ novel Remake and then as now I do not foresee that as a concern for the near future.

Acting is not just walking from mark to mark and parroting the words from the script. If it were there would be a far large number of great actors entertaining us and it would not b so plainly evident when a talented actor was simply ‘phoning in’ their performance. Acting is an art and like all art is requires a conscious creative act. There are numerous choices an actor makes in their performance that go far beyond simply repeating the words.  There will not fully digital actors entire there are self-aware computers capable of making those emotional choices.

A second often expressed fear is that there will be endless films using recreations of stars that have passed and while there will the occasional use of a dead actor to recreate a famous role, for example Peter Cushing’s double in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story  it will never become a vehicle for a star powered film. Firstly there is still the creative aspect that will fail to double the original actor’s unique vision but more importantly is that younger generations will never simply adopt their parent’s stars. Even an eternally young John Wayne would not have continued to be the massive star of his earlier days as the country and culture changed around him.

Change is coming but actors are not about be wholly replaced by bits and bytes.

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Movie Review: Ad Astra

In Ad Astra  Brad Pitt plays Roy McBride an astronaut whose father, Clifford McBride also a revered astronaut, vanished on a mission beyond Neptune in the outer solar system to survey extra-solar planets for signs of intelligent life. Sudden intense burst of gamma radiation from outer solar system now threaten human on Earth, the Moon, and Mars, burst of radiation that appear to be coming from Clifford’s list mission. Roy is dispatched to send a message to his father and hopefully end the threat the humanity.

Sharing some thematic elements with Conrad’s Heart of Darkness  this film is a slow mediation on the shadows they live within the human spirit and the dangerous of isolation and disconnection that can happen even when we are surrounded by people. However while those are the themes of the screenplay, and the film is filled with talented veteran actors Ad Astra  fails to fully engage on a character level leaving the audience to experience repeated long sequences of Brad Pitt stealing Ryan Gosling’s thunder of staring expressionless in the middle distance.

Now, I love good slow cinema. The Remains of the Day  a film about one man’s repressed emotions set in the sedate world of less English nobility is one of my favorites but Ad Astra  fails to find the character at the center of the story and never forces the character to engage in a meaningful choice. A much better science-fiction film on these same themes and also with a careful slow pacing is the US version of Solaris. These films are possible but ad Astra  simply isn’t it.

The science in Ad Astra  is bad, but I have come to expect that from Hollywood science-fiction but without a good character story to catch the viewer that allows the bad science to become that much more noticeable.

The film is tonally inconsistent. It tries to balance quiet character contemplation with scenes of intense action and fails at both. There are two major set pieces of action that simply have no story reason for existing: a sequence with lunar pirates and an unmotivated attack on Roy McBride as he transits between lunar locales and a rescue mission to space station that apparently orbits between Earth and Mars solely for animal research.

All in all Ad Astra  was a dull plodding affair that thought is had much more profound things to say than it really did.

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Secret Morgue 2: Alien Autopsy Edition

This past Saturday was the second Secret Morgue a marathon of horror film presented at the theater in the ComicCon Museum by Film Geeks San Diego. Last year the theme of the marathon was VHS horror, films of the 70s and 80s that you may have discovered at your local video rental store back when that was a thing. This year’s theme was SF horror with an emphasis on aliens. As has become the tradition the selection is film presented is kept secret with the schedule providing a chronology that gives the starts and stop films of each film and the breaks for snacks but no titles. (The running times did allow me to eliminate the possibility that one of the films would be Mario Bava’s Planet of the Vampires.)

In order of presentation here are the films that were screened.

 

The Space Children

The Hidden

XTRO

Night of the Comet

Without Warning

I Come in Peace

Galaxy of Terror

 

There was a bonus feature but I simply could not muster the energy for that and left after the end of the seven-feature run. Of the films in the marathon I had previously seen two of them, The Space Children  and Galaxy of Terror  and the rest were known to me but for various reason had remained outside of my personal viewing history. This is a departure from last year’s run when I had seen none of the films screened. Of the film I think Night of the Comet  was likely the best made and the most entertaining while Without Warning  proved to be a chore to endure and I could not recommend it to anyone at all.

The food/snacks this year included a buffet of Indian Food, Pizza, and bakery bread with some green sauce that I did not try.

I adore Film geeks San Diego and everything they do to expand interesting cinema experiences in my town and I am looking forward to next year’s Secret morgue with its theme of ‘The Undead.’

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Foreign Movie Review: Salyut-7

Inspired by the Soviet Mission to save their crippled space station the film Salyut 7is a fictionalized drama in low Earth orbit.

Vladimir Fyodorov is a Soviet Cosmonaut grounded after reporting having seen ‘angels’ in orbit during a life-threatening emergency. His wife and daughter are relieved that Vladimir will no longer be risking his life in dangerous space missions. Everything is upturned when the space station Salyut 7 that was un-crewed and flying on automatic suddenly loses all power and is rendered dead in orbit. Fearful that either the Americans may steal the station by way of a shuttle mission or that the station in an uncontrolled re-entry posses a hazard the Soviet’s decide to launch a mission to repair the station. After all other cosmonauts fail to dock with tumbling station in simulation it is decided to reactive Vladimir and along with an engineer is sent to Salyut 7. Once there they face numerous challenges both technical and personal as they struggle to rescue the station, Soviet prestige, and their very lives in a desperate bid to save the station.

With only a few technical errors, Salyut 7 is a gorgeous film utilizing the very best special effects to recreate the sensation of flying 200 miles above the Earth at 17,000 miles per hour.  In the interests of narrative and drama, the story deviates significantly from the historical record and should be best viewed as a work of fiction rather than a view of actual events. The acting is very good, the drama is tight and the characters believable and relatable. Currently available on Amazon Prime in Russian with English subtitles Salyut 7 is worth the time for anyone who enjoys a heavy dose of technical realism in their space films/

 

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One Year Without an Agent

It was a little more than a year ago when my literary agency made it official and dropped me from their list.

I won’t lie, that hurt.

I won’t lie, I saw it coming. Emails went unanswered manuscripts went unread and in general I seemed to be more and more of an afterthought so the eventual move was hardly surprising. I am not naming names and I am not here to trash talk anyone or make a big public angry rant. The Author/Agent relations is a relation and now all of them work out, people have the be compatible just as with romantic entanglements there comes a time when it is better to walk away than to stay in one that is unhealthy and counter-productive. For those who are still with that agent and that agency I wish you all the best.

So, what has happened to me in the intervening twelve months?

I mentioned that ‘manuscripts went unread’ well that referred to a strange little novel I wrote where I combined Science-Fiction with Film Noir. I am certainly not the first person to that, there a plenty of novels exploring that blending of genres but what is different in mine are the exact sub-genres I braided together. Noir has two major branches, the ‘Hard Boiled’ school of police and private detectives and the ‘dark underbelly’ of society. That second branch is represented by works such as ‘Double Indemnity’ and ‘The Postman Always Rings Twice’ and it is the flavor I wanted to work with, merging it with colonial science-fiction about humanity as it struggles to survive on alien worlds.

I took that SF/Noir manuscript that had languished unread and found a publisher that produced books of both SF and crime narrative and submitted it. The book sold. First time, first publisher I submitted it to. I just completed the edits to the manuscript and my editor has submitted to the house’s production department. Vulcan’s Forge is expected to hit the shelves next March.

The manuscript that started the relationship with my former agent is showing promise as well. A major house that specializes in military SF, which is what that manuscript is, just alerted me that the work had been pulled of ‘closer examination.’ Of course they may still pass on the book but it’s more activity that it had been getting.

On the short story front I made it to ‘Finalist’ for the Writers of the Future Contest. That’s in the top eight slots out of thousands that had entered. I did not win, but it felt good that my odd little AI/Ghost story made it so far.

The point of all this?

If you’re queries are bouncing off agencies, do not despair. There are more paths in that just that one. Keep writing, keep plugging, and remember never ever self-reject

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