newnumber6

Starting as usual with PoG links.

Advice: Advice from SF/Comic Creators to people starting out in the field... (April 16, 1992)
Part One: Nancy Kress (read as much as you can, and persist, and don't write only when you're in the mood), Candas Jane Dorsey (what makes bad SF, the "Rod and Don Dialogue"), Lewis Shiner (don't start, it's a tremendously discouraging business, and if you're going to, get a day job), Kathy Gale (UK Editor, always submit in a professional way),
Part Two: Kim Stanley Robinson (responding on OSC's advice of "Primacy of Event over Character" and Card not following his own advice, kind of rips on Card a bit too), Tanya Huff (on the pros and cons on writer's groups), Ed Bryant (on Writer's Workshops like Clarion), Dan Simmons (on how the Milford Writer's Workshop helped him), Neil Gaiman (on his experience at a Milford and learning nothing about writing but learning about reading), shift in focus to comics. Frank Miller (know what you want)
Part Three: Fabian Nicieza (take writing courses, plan to have another career, work through independents/small press), M.W. Kaluta (on how he got his first full professional gig on The Shadow, and his advice), Gene Colan (you have to love it, don't do it for the fame), Sergio Aragones (practice, and think ahead at how the world may change). Summary from the host, and a closing clip from Dan Piraro (stay away, I don't want the comptetition)

Farewell (Season 1 finale)
Assorted promotions, Dick Tracy (movie and the then-recent comics), TMNT (in advance of the first live action movie), Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue, Archie news, Incredible Hulk comic, 1990 Earth Day, interviews with Max Collins, Rob Salem, artist Dale Keown... very disjointed and none of it terribly interesting so I won't do the full clip-by-clip summary. Part One: Part Two: Part Three:

Memory (December 8, 1993)

How we're defined by our memories, in SF and Fantasy and comics
Part One: Lynda Barry (on what bring childhood memories for her, a trick for remembering things in a different way that you wouldn't normally, triggering other people's memories in writing), Neil Gaiman (on converting his memories into a comic and being replaced by it), Dave McKean (on using collages to represent memory), Neil Gaiman (on suddenly realizing something about your childhood memories as an adult because as child you don't know what's significant), Michael Moorcock (on his childhood memories of WWII shaping the landscapes of his fiction)
Part Two: Harlan Ellison (on what triggers memories for him, and exorcising hurtful memories with writing, and gives a couple of his favorite quotes about memories), Howard Hendrix (on the memory of his brother shaping one of his stories, and the difference of how memory in fiction compared to real life), Harry Harrison (on how memory works, short term vs long term memory, and the disadvantages to a linear memory of computers)
Part Three: William Gibson (on Agrippa, and Cyberspace as a metaphor for memory), Iain M. Banks (on his fascination with memory and the links between identity and memory), Brian Aldiss (on writing his own autobiography, and a story of a memory he'd written when he was 16), Edward Bryant (on how our memory shapes us and lack of memory also influences us)

Medicine and Nanotechnology (December 1, 1993)
Part One: Frederick Pohl (on people selling off organs to finance their trip to Gateway, and the real black market for organs), Nancy Kress (on writing "The Mountain to Mohammed", and her growing concern about health insurance, and the tough choices involved in controlling medical costs, and worries about gene scanning to mark people as uninsurable), Joel Davis (on the Human Genome Project changing the way medicine is practiced)
Part Two: Joel Davis again (on who owns the rights to the drugs created by using human DNA), Nancy Kress (on relaxing the controls of testing drugs on the dying), John Clute (on nanotechnology as a trend in SF), William Gibson (on including nanotech in Virtual Light, and finding it creepy), Tony Daniel (on Nano as the 'new magic' of SF), Stven Barnes (on linking Nanotech and Dinosaurs in The Barsoom Project, and where he researched it), Ian McDonald (on including nanotech in Necroville and his ideas of what resurrecting the dead might mean)
Part Three: Michael Skeet (on his story Relics, and whether writers get carried away with nanotech), Dave Smeds (on the practical obstacles to reaching nanotech), Greg Bear (on writing Blood Music before nanotechnology really became well-known, and why he use it, and his own sins of treating nanotech as 'magic', and the legacy of the Frankenstein image, and his own feeling that we need to know as much as possible)

Next Week, Writer's Workshops, Games, and Awards, the last set of PoG links until the person posting them posts some more, I guess.

In other TV news, what's been new... Heroes, meh. I think it's the last year anyway, so its not really worth getting worked up about, but the developments in the latest ep do not particularly interest me. Flashforward is still entertaining in terms of its normal plot and it's done a good job of keeping me interested with some of the twists they've introduced, although some sloppiness with how the visions work still annoys me.

Glee's still okay, but I'm finding the main characters less and less likable with each ep, with a few exceptions (I liked the Quinn/Rachel scene in this week's episodes) and they really need to start focusing on the minor characters.

Supernatural had a solid MOTW episode.

The big TV story for me was that Stargate Universe had the third part of its premiere, and again, not bad. There's a couple spoilery elements I want to talk about behind the cut (including a possible "I CALLED IT" moment), and some speculation/wonderings for the future: ( Read more... )


I think that's it for this week. It's Thanksgiving Weekend here in Canada, so to all the Canucks on my list, Happy Thanksgiving. Except, not for me. Apparently most of my immediate family is working this weekend, including tomorrow, so we won't be doing anything until sometime a little later. So no big meal for me, alas. Oh well.

First, Happy Birthday soleta_nf!

Second, meh. Sleep was not great. I kept semi-waking up convinced that I was moving tomorrow/today and my mind was frantically racing trying to organize everything. Even though part of me was aware and tried to remind myself that uh, no, I'm not moving, the racing-mind part wouldn't listen. On the other hand, then I had a dream that I went to see a taping of the Daily Show, and hung out with Jon Stewart afterwards, which was kinda fun.

Did I mention how on Monday at about 5:30 am I helped a homeless woman steal back her bag of clothes from another homeless person who was using it as a pillow? No? Well, maybe after work.

Finally, Stargate Universe castings! They finally announced the rest of the main cast. And there are some recognizable (to me, at least) names there, although nothing super-exciting, some are at least mildly cool. (cut just in case you don't want to know) ( Read more... )

Gateworld has an interview with Ben Browder, mostly general history and a little on the series he's working on developing (as a writer), a bit on Farscape and Stargate and his semi-acting rivalry with Nathan Fillion.

Also of interest, to Stargate Altantis fans, one of the producers gave a breakdown of what episodes the 6th season might have had, if it had gotten one. Apparently they were far enough along that they had ideas, even if many were ideas that couldn't fit in the previous year. Some potential spoilers, in that any of the elements there might be reused, and they say some might be factors in the SG:A DVD movie. Most interesting is, to me, (spoilers just for Atlantis finale, not for the future) ( Read more... )

Also related: Joseph Mallozzi's "Best 4 SG:A Episodes I never got to write". Somewhat more detailed.

A couple of the (collective) episodes sound kinda cool and I'm a little disappointed we'll never get to see them. Also they had some ideas I've had, too, proving once again, I should TOTALLY write for Stargate! ;) Anyway, I wish I could tap into parallel worlds sometimes just so I could see all these 'what might have beens!'. Or Nathan Fillion as John Crichton in Farscape!)

Speaking of Fillion, remember Doctor Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog? Well, Whedon has said that it will continue in some form, but he's not sure what the form is. It may not be an internet series anymore. I dunno, I'm in as long as it's not a "I'll continue it as a comic book!", because it has to stay a musical! ;)

Anyway, talking with locker_monster the other day, I mentioned off-handedly that they should get Summer Glau in the sequel, and make use of her trained ballerina skills. The idea was good for a few seconds of amusement, but it also stuck with me and came to me this morning before I left for work. And I have a longish (45 minute or so) walk to work, in which it's generally too dark to read, so my mind tends to latch on any old thing and work on it. I came up with the idea of having all of Doctor Horrible's major enemies being Firefly actors. Yes, I know it's unlikely and impractical he'd ever do anything like it, but amusing (to me, which is all that counts).

So, the product of my thinking on the way to work (and a little bit after), behind the cut. It's just silly fluff, but might be worth a chuckle. I present to you: the heroic counterparts to the Evil League of Evil!

( Read more... )

Edit: Oh yeah, and Doc Horrible fans in Canada, apparently the glitches with Canadian distribution are over and you should be able to reorder from amazon.ca.

Edit2: Although technically my Doctor Horrible ideas isn't a "What I'd Do With..." entry, I'm adding the tag anyway because it's related and it'll make it easier to find it again when I want to reread it. Yes, I like rereading my own ideas, I'm lame.

First Stargate Universe casting is in... veteran actor Robert Carlyle will be playing... a role that wasn't in the initial manifest released during casting, possibly because they were keeping it secret. In the story that reveals him, they've also released a bit more information on the initial plot (that gets the people in the situation for the series). Anyway, I haven't seen much he's been in personally, but he might be good.

Terminator winter finale was only okay.

Heroes finale was mostly craptastic, with a few decent moments. I think this year I might do a MIDSEASON REVIEW of all the TV I've been watching, in the next few weeks, so I'll expand more on it later.

Personally? I seem to be having another cat day. I had an 8 hour sleep last night, and then two separate naps during the day. I dunno why. Nothing to do and I was sleepy, I guess. Been having a few unsettling dreams lately. You know, the kind where I'm happy, or have a hope of becoming such. Meh. My winter's depression typically isn't supposed to start until after New Years, damnit. Meh I said. An emphatic meh to all the world. Having a lot of 'last survivor of a plague' type fantasies lately, in part triggered by Survivors, in part by general depression and loneliness.

Other than the great mehness, feeling just slightly off healthwise. Like I'm mostly recovered from a cold but still have a risk of slipping back in now and then. Isolated spots of coughing, days apart, or random dizziness. *shrug*

Still have the bad half of my Xmas shopping to do. That is, the half that it's not appropriate to give a gift card. I'll see what I can find tomorrow at the mall on the way to work. Speaking of work, very low-level stressing about whether next week's going to be screwed up schedulewise, but not enough to be worth mentioning. And yet I did. So that should give you an idea of how little is going on in my life right now. :P

And to close off, GIANT UNDERSEA STARFISH FOUND OFF ANTARCTICA. Those aren't starfish... those are Elder Thing pets! (Okay, so it's old, but I was just linked it again).

It's Canadian thanksgiving this weekend, but we'll be postponing ours till next week because of evil gnomes. Or scheduling problems. But evil gnomes sound better.

So instead I'll talk about TV.

Atlantis was good this week. I have to admit I didn't see the big revelation coming, and I was rather pleased with it because (spoilers start now) ( Read more... )

Also, I've been dipping into Nostalgia this week as through... magic, I found an old TV show I enjoyed when I was a kid. It's called The Girl from Tomorrow, and it was Australian-made, about a girl from the Utopian year 3000 who during a time travel experiemnt is taken hostage by a criminal from 2500 and brought to the year 1990, and has to fit in with the world and try to find the missing time capsule. Okay, so it's a kid's show, and although it's reasonably well done for all that, it's probably not worth watching much unless you were a kid or enjoy kid's shows, or are on a nostalgia kick. But I'm 2 of the above 3, so I'm rewatching it - mostly because when it aired here I only caught something like 10 of the 24 episodes and never saw either how it began or how it ended. I really liked it at the time (helped in no small fact as a young teenage boy, I thought the girls in it were cute), and it's enjoyable enough to watch now, despite the cheesy 90s CGI effects. I wonder if anybody else on my flist remembers it.

Wolverine and The X-Men was pretty good this week, although I've never been a fan of ( Read more... )

Not much else been on that I recall. Terminator was enjoyable this week, for a stand-alone. Heroes was laughable but I already posted on that. Supernatural was okay. I think that's about all there was.

Still haven't finished Avatar, maybe I'll make that my next weekend project (at the almost midpoint for S3 now).

Great. Woke up this morning with no net. And since the network hub is in my roommates room, that means it can't get fixed until they wake up, which due to their work schedule is past noon. Bah. Anyway, I'm writing this offline and posting later. (Edit: Okay, it didn't last as long as I thought, they woke early I guess)

So, Book Foo:

Finished: Sun of Suns, by Karl Schroeder (Book One of Virga)
Started: Revelation Space, by Alastair Reynolds

Thoughts on SoS behind the cut. General concept spoilers only. Short version: liked it more than I expected to. ( Read more... )

Finished: Firestarter, by Stephen King (reread)
Started: A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge (reread)

Since Firestarter's a reread I won't go too long. Still enjoyed it. I think King's at his best when the 'threat' isn't supernatural. My favorite works of his are usually ones where there's some supernatural element or weird world setup (Long Walk/Running Man), but most of the danger driving the story is coming from just people. He usually seems to fall down on endings when the threat is supernatural, because he builds the horror up so big that any resolution's kind of a cheat.

Anyway, since I'm running low on new books I figured I'd do a reread, and AFUtD's been beckoning me for a while.

Oh, and in other news, looks like Stargate Atlantis is cancelled, but they'll be doing movies. Bit of a shame, but I never liked Atlantis as much as SG1 and if they're doing movies it's not that big a disappointment. And I assume that means they're going on with the third series. Hope that goes well.

Because I'm holding off the one comic I was going to get (newuniversal: 1959 one shot) until next week.

So instead, I'll talk about Stargate: Continuum, now that it's officially released. (Spoilers behind cuts)

Overall, it was okay, but felt too much like "just another episode" syndrome. No 'big'ness. In fact, it felt just like an episode that had already been done.

( Read more... )

There was one element I really really liked, and actually dovetailed into a little plot seed I'd sorta been playing with (in my frequent "I SHOULD TOTALLY WRITE FOR STARGATE" phases), although they didn't give it enough time or play, IMHO. ( Read more... )

So, what's been going on in my life? Not a whole lot. Same job, same thing day after day, in a rut and can't even see any end to it. Meh. No, I haven't seen any of the latest movies because I'm lame and don't really go to them. So, random stuff.

We may be getting a kitten (by we, I mean more the roommates who will be taking care of it mostly, I'll just be giving it occasional scritches). We already have an older cat.

Been writing some, of course, and actually more than I've been before... even on my 'off' weeks I've usually been writing a fair bit. Right now still working on a novel-length work on my on weeks and a comic project on my off.

What else. TV I guess. Since it's summer, I've resumed my watching of Old School Doctor Who. On Terror of the Zygons, which features the Brigadier in a kilt!

Doctor Horrible concluded. Spoilery thoughts behind cut. ( Read more... )

Watched Stargate Atlantis, but it was the kind of forgettable, 'we sort of have to do this set of character beats to get where we need to go next' type episode, and wasn't really memorable at all.

More annoying commercials. Wendy's is the offender again, with more tortured logic. Previously, we examined their analogy about cows coming from Antarctica, which really suggests that they believe they should serve their burgers raw. This time, though, they say "If chicken is good, and salad is good, then doesn't that make our chicken salad... good good?" No. I will demonstrate. "Gravy is good. Ice cream is good. So, logically, ICE CREAM COVERED WITH GRAVY, IS GOOD GOOD!". This all assumes 'good good' is a term at all.

Speaking of commercials, am I the only one disturbed that the Lucky Charms Leprechaun can now apparently CONTROL TIME? KILL IT NOW, BEFORE IT'S UNSTOPPABLE. Anyway, also disturbing, but for a different reason, here's a knife that will freeze your internal organs and make you explode when you get stabbed with it.

I had a dream where I was a time traveller back in the old West (specifically, Deadwood), and somebody said "Cool!" and so I suspected they were another time traveller, so I said something was "awesome" (explaining for the others involved that I merely meant literally inspiring of awe), to get his attention, and we later got together and confirmed that we were both time travellers. He was a historian, trying to find out what happened. *shrugs*.

And finally, the latest LJdickery... they announce "We're bringing back Basic Accounts", and make everybody happy, but you have to go to another community to see the truth - they're 'bringing them back', but they're going back on their word furthur by putting ads on them. Which means they're not actually bringing them back at all, they're removing them, and giving the name to something else. It's like "Due to popular demand, we're bringing back our vegetarian burger!" And then hiding somewhere, "Our vegetarian burgers will now all be made from beef". If you really, absolutely had to do crap like breaking the original promise and adding ads to basic accounts to survive as a business, you could earn a lot more of my respect by doing it honestly instead of constantly pulling bait and switch crap like this.

This week I got three books:

New Warriors #13 (meh, okay)
Runaways #30 (My pick of the week, some interesting tweaks to the status quo)
Secret Invasion Runaways/Young Avengers #1 (reasonably fun)

Full reviews as usual at my comic reviews site for anyone interested.

I also noticed the bookstore I got my giftcards at for my birthday/xmas was having a 'buy 3 books, get the 4th free'... not _that_ great a deal, but still, better than nothing. So I used up one of them and got:
Queen of Mazes, by Karl Schroeder
A Meeting at Corvallis by S.M. Stirling
Iron Sunrise, by Charles Stross
and
Camouflage, by Joe Haldeman (Nebula Award Winner).

Work was okay, but a bit later than usual and so got home later than I'd like, both hot, tired (from the long walk), and hungry (I wanted to stop at a Taco Bell and see if I could take advantage of Phillip Ontakos, but alas, none is ever in my path when I need one. :P). However, on the way home I did pass a strip club with "Hulk was filmed here" on the marquee (outside). You can see the one in the trailer, when the two monsters are rushing each other in the streets and you see a big Zanzibar sign in the background. I just found it was amusing that they were advertising that.

In other news, I'm reasonably pleased with myself writing wise this month. Not only have I met my writing quotas for on-weeks, but I've also _edited_ a significant amount on my off-weeks. Pretty much every day this month that would have been a writing day on an on-week has become an editing day on an off-week. Okay, sure, I may not have done as much as I would have liked on each day, but I've done a chunk that I can at least be mildly pleased with. So yay me. I think I'm also getting a little better at identifying exactly what about particular passages that doesn't sound right - before it was usually sort of a vague unease, that the words didn't flow as I wanted them to, but wasn't sure exactly what to fix. So I think I'm getting a little better at it. Yay me x2.

In TV news, well, there's Doctor Who, and... well, unlike a lot of people on my flist, I didn't much care for the latest episode. Like a lot of RTD's work, it was only okay. Well-acted, certainly. A few good moments, undoubtably. But on the whole it didn't do much for me - the basic plot has been used many times in SF (and even non SF) and, really, not done terribly innovatively here. The reason why it happened (both the sci-fi reason and the more human reason behind the title) didn't reall work well for me, nor did I see why certain elements of the resolution should work (which seemed to boil down to 'just because we need that'). There's also a lot in the episode that, because it's a tease for big events that the finale will handle, I have to hold in abeyance before I decide whether they were handled well or terribly in this episode. Midnight was much better.

Also watched the S5 premiere of Stargate Atlantis, which I watched early by... let's say 'magic'. It was also okay, but a little more on the enjoyable side. Kind of a lot there that I expected to happen, but Stargate's the kind of show that it's fun to follow along even with that. Still, one thing really bugged me (fairly minor spoiler, but cut anyway) ( Read more... )

Oh, and a teaser from Doctor Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog (the Joss Whedon mini-musical with Nathan Fillion and Neil Patrick Harris), if you haven't seen it yet.

So, I watched Stargate: Ark of Truth. Thoughts behind cut, some spoilers.
( Read more... )

That wraps up most of what I watch for the next little while, until BSG starts and Doctor Who shortly after that. Lost's still ongoing for a couple more weeks. It's been better than last year, since they've decided on a course to actually finish up the series. Up and down. The Desmond ep was the best so far this year I think.

Watching Serenity on Space now.

Book Foo:
Finished: Excession, by Iain M. Banks
Started: Use of Weapons, by Iain M. Banks

Thoughts on Excession (and a quote from it) behind the cut, non-spoilery. Generally liked it.
( Read more... )

Finished: Reflex, by Steven Gould (sequel to Jumper) (reread)
Still reading: Otherland, Vol 2: River of Blue Fire by Tad Williams

Brief thoughts on Reflex behind the cut. Not really spoilery.
( Read more... )

Haven't been writing very much, have been trying to do some editing, but have been in a real funk lately and haven't felt much like doing _anything_. Oddly enough I've had some decent ideas for writing, just when it comes right down to it I have trouble forcing myself to. Still hoping my depression tapers off before the end of March like it often does. Oh well, keep trying, the only way to go.