Eoghann Irving's Blog, page 19
March 12, 2015
Book Review: Foundation and Chaos by Greg Bear
Foundation and Chaos is book two of the Second Foundation Trilogy is rather different to book one. For a start Bear sticks more faithfully to the Foundation universe as described by Asimov. How important that is will vary depending on the reader. More importantly, the plot of this book feels more cohesive, resulting in a more entertaining read.
The Second Foundation Trilogy covers the life of Hari Seldon, his invention of psychohistory and his setting up of the two Foundations. This particular book concentrates on the period of his life when he was put on trial by the crumbling Empire. Although Hari Seldon is the main character of the trilogy (and thus this particular book) large parts of it are witnessed through the eyes of other characters. This is both interesting and frustrating at the same time.
On the one hand we get to explore Trantor from various perspectives. On the other, I found Seldon to be one of the most interesting characters and wanted to spend more time in his head. There is an overarching plot to this trilogy, the exact nature of which is not clear yet. In the first book, there were sections which seemed totally irrelevant to the main thrust of the book. During this book, the various strands become rather more entwined. Even so the significance is not at all clear. Plotwise, perhaps the most significant change from book one to book two is the portrayal of R Daneel Olivaw. In this book he seems less human. A not unnatural condition for a robot as old as he is by this point. His obsession with “protecting” the human race while still genuine goodwill on his part, seems less healthy now and maybe counterproductive. He also seems a little too free at manipulating people.
As I mentioned this book is more faithful to the Foundation Universe. No more wormholes, we’re back to hyperships again. This book reads and feels more like an Asimov Foundation story. The themes are very much those which Asimov used throughout his Foundation writing too. Unfortunately there is still something missing. The book is well written, the characters interesting and the setting well developed. Its good, its just not quite Foundation.
Foundation and Chaos: The Second Foundation Trilogy
by Greg Bear [Harper Voyager]
Price:
$6.11
£0.01
CDN$ 9.92
EUR 7,53
EUR 7,50
March 11, 2015
Doctor Who Review: The Moonbase
The second outing for perennial Doctor Who villains the Cybermen and Patrick Troughton's first meeting with them is a less than thrilling affair. Even allowing for the much slower pace of a all the 60s Doctor Who there's still something particularly stagey about this adventure.
Moonbase uses the base-in-peril format that was the template for this period of Doctor Who, but unfortunately the slow pace really undermines the tension that they are trying to build. An awful lot of time is spent talking to each other and explaining things that are mostly fairly obvious anyway.
Slow, Very Slow
At this point in Doctor Who's history they are still paying at least lip service to the educational aspects of the show and in a few places the plot sort of grinds to a halt so they can supply us with science facts. That doesn't help the tension very much either.
Of course the stagey aspect of Doctor Who is fairly common this early on in the series and is partly a result of limited budgets, small sets and bulky cameras that aren't very mobile. But the slow pace is usually an issue with longer stories while The Moonbase is only a four parter. Which probably suggests to you that the plot is a very slim thing indeed, and that is the case.
Basically two things happen. The Cybermen first try to poison the Moonbase crew and infiltrate the base, then when that fails they try a mass invasion.
Impressive and not so Impressive Moments
There are some very impressive moments in The Moonbase. For example the moment where that Cyber Army gathers and sets foot across the moon has some real power to it. Certainly these days we're more used to massive cyber invasions, but this was only the second Cyberman story.
Also quite effective was the Cybermen floating away as the Gravitron took effect on them. Much less so however was the Cybermen's spaceships which were not only designed to look like a standard flying saucer, but also looked cardboard flying saucers.
Another disappointing moment was when the rescue craft from Earth was deflected off towards the sun. This had the potential to be a gripping moment, but the total lack of any visuals to support what was happening and the surprisingly muted reaction from most of the characters as they recited what was happening, really dulled the effect.
On the other hand the powerful drum beats of the incidental music, swelling in volume at crucial moments, were remarkably effective in wringing drama from several scenes that might otherwise just have been silver clad men ponderously walking.
A Crowded TARDIS
Early seasons of Doctor Who often featured three companions for the Doctor and that's how many we have here with Polly, Ben and Jamie all accompanying the Second Doctor. The problem with this particular combination is that there's too much overlap between Ben and Jamie so neither one really has enough to do.
In the end Jamie spends a large amount of time in the sick bay. But he still gets a better deal of it than Polly. While she gets a brief moment to shine, mixing up a weapon to attack the Cybermen with, later on she can be seen handing out coffee to the men while they work. Oh the Sixties, they're so quaint!
Patrick Troughton gives it his all of course and he's easily the highlight of the story. Even when forced to do silly things like trying to take a shoe off someone while they are wearing it, he somehow makes it semi-plausible to watch.
Missing Episodes
The Moonbase is one of the stories where episodes are missing, specifically episodes 1 and 4. The version I watched had animation replacing them (similar to Tenth Planet) and it was very effective, capturing the color scheme, likenesses and movements of all the actors.
So Did You Like It?
Not that much really. I mean, it's Doctor Who, so I rarely dislike it. But I found myself barely paying attention at times in most of the episodes. I actually enjoyed the animated one the most. If you want to show people a 2nd Doctor story, there are much better ones than this.
Doctor Who: The Moonbase (Story 33)
by Morris Barry [BBC Home Entertainment]
Price:
$16.26
£12.89
CDN$ 22.97
EUR 18,51
EUR 18,72
March 10, 2015
Book Review: Voyage by Stephen Baxter
It seems particularly appropriate this week during the 30th Anniversary of the moon landing that I’m reviewing this particular book. Voyage is an alternative history exploring what might have happened if, following the moon landings, instead of developing the Space Shuttle, NASA had concentrated its resources to landing a man on Mars.
The book starts when Neil Armstrong stands on the moon and finishes in the 80s when NASA sends a mission to Mars.
The result is a fascinating but flawed look into what might have been. Baxter has obviously done a prodigious amount of research into NASA. Reading this book you learn a lot about the culture, language and details of space exploration.
Unfortunately it is these very details which work against the book as a story. You probably won’t be surprised to discover that astronauts use a lot of acronyms. In keeping with the realistic tone of the book, so does Baxter. Which means he has to explain them all to us.
All the description and explanation slows the actual story down to a crawl. While I found the details of the space flights and training very interesting, I didn’t really connect with any of the characters in the book till around the half way mark.
This is a shame since once I had made that connection (created by a specific traumatic event) I found that the story picked up pace and became much more gripping to read.
A second problem is the sheer number of characters in this book. Covering 2 decades as it does, it flits between many viewpoints never giving you very long to learn about any individual character, apart from the one central character who I found to be intensely whiney and annoying.
Despite these flaws I still think this is an amazing book and well worth reading. It does an excellent job of showing the sheer scale of difficulty that is involved in putting man on any other planet. Baxter also debates the wisdom of such stunt missions or indeed space travel at all, letting each side put forward their arguments without heavy bias.
by Stephen Baxter [Harper Voyager]
Price:
$21.92
£0.29
CDN$ 21.98
EUR 48,86
EUR 48,80
March 9, 2015
Book Review: Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie
Joe Abercrombie's First Law Trilogy is a remarkable work that brings epic fantasy down into the gutter. The writing is sophisticated and compelling and yet I feel the need to have a shower after I finish reading.
In the third book Last Argument of Kings all the plots so carefully put into place are brought together in a series of thrilling set pieces and the answers to several puzzles are revealed.
Characters and Voice
One of the areas where Abercrombie excels is in giving his characters such a distinct voice and attitude. Whether it's Logen (got to be realistic, say one thing for Logen Ninefingers say he's) or Sand dan Glokta (body found floating at the docks) he provides easy ticks and behavior to distinguish the characters while at the same time giving them complex, and sometimes inconsistent motivations.
It might seem odd to praise inconsistent motivations, but people generally tend to be highly inconsistent and portraying that in fiction while still having them come across as credible characters is an impressive feat.
Almost to a man, or woman, these are people who believe that they are the heroes of the story. They think they're doing the right thing and they're doing it for the right reasons. Of course then we switch to another viewpoint and Abercrombie takes great delight in showing us exactly how wrong that belief is.
We also get credible villains. People who are equally motivated and whose arguments when we here them sound just as credible as those of the supposed heroes. The result is compellingly complex.
Does it Have to Be So Miserable?
The previous two books weren't exactly a boy scout camp out but the pessimism on display by the end of this book was quite hard for me to take. If the author has a message at all it would seem to be some combination of the fact that people don't change and that blood breeds more blood.
In the end almost everyone pays for their sins and the only exception is a person who arguably was already paying for them. There are no heroes here and there's really no evidence that the characters changed or grew. They think they did, but in the end when put to the test, they revert to what they were before.
It's probably a realistic view of humanity, we don't really change very much, but I sort of like reading about people who are better than me rather whereas in this world the people are universally dark and twisted. When the most honorable character is a murderer who also attacked a woman in a fit of rage, it's hard to cheer for anyone.
A Brutal Game of Chess
Abercrombie holds back the reveal for very near the end, but it had become pretty obvious even in the previous books that what is really going on here isn't some titanic struggle of good versus evil. Rather it is a ruthless game played by two powerful men who manipulate, use and discard any and all who come within their grasp.
And in the end, much like the characters don't change, neither does the power balance between the two of them. The character of Bayaz plays off readers expectations for kindly old mages. But look at his actions from the first book onwards and you will see something entirely different at work.
This is an incredibly violent and brutal world that's being described. It's not just the wars and battles. There's rape, torture, beatings, betrayals. It's as though the author took the expression "no good dead goes unpunished" and built a story around it. And in the end, most of that violence is fundamentally pointless because these are all puppets whose strings are pulled without them even realising it.
Why Won't It End?
While I think the writing in general is extremely good there is a stage in the last hundred pages or so where things really seem to drag. It's as though the author felt the need to spell out a dozen little details for his readers.
Some of it felt obvious and some redundant. There was also a just a bit too much glorying in how screwed over everyone had been. When things are turning out that spectacularly miserably for everyone I don't really need it drawn out.
And yet the actual ending, with it's call back to the very beginning of the first book is pretty much note perfect.
Who is This For?
Do you like epic fantasy?
Do you prefer a gritty realism?
Is Grimdark a good thing?
This one is for you.
Did You Like It?
Yes I did like it, almost despite itself. The plot is compelling and the characters are so well written it's hard not to care, regardless of the darkness of the events. That said, I'm not sure if or when I'll read the sequel stories. There's only so much darkness I can take.
Buy, Borrow or Skip?
The skill displayed in the writing makes this one a must buy if you can tolerate the brutality and cynicism on display.
Last Argument of Kings (First Law: Book Three)
by Joe Abercrombie [Pyr]
Price:
$12.94
£4.51
CDN$ 15.58
EUR 16,05
EUR 16,01
March 7, 2015
Dragon Hoard Part 4: Enter the Dragon (1st Draft)
This is post #4 of 5 in the series “Dragon Hoard”
My jog turned into a frantic dash as I raced to pull Jim off the aged guest he was currently assaulting. Jim was a big man, in all meanings of the word, and how he hadn't crushed the skinny old woman already was a happy mystery. I grabbed hold of him and tried to pull him away from the woman who was snarling and hissing as she fought back.
To my surprise he stepped back quite willingly, but the old woman did not, instead grabbing onto him so hard I saw her nails draw blood. My half day of training when I joined Blue Ridge Casino had not covered this scenario! I tried to prise the woman loose with very little success and short of breaking her wrist, which I didn't think the manager would appreciate, I really wasn't sure what to do.
Fortunately for me backup arrived in the form of several more members of security, presumably alerted by the woman's screamed profanities and the ever growing crowd around us. We finally managed to separate Jim and the old woman by sheer body mass, hustling them apart until someone could figure out what the hell was going on.
The old woman continued to screech and curse, trying to push her way past the human wall that had now formed at which point the manager arrived.
Now I actually like Wayne, he's a fair boss, but, faced with this, anger won out.
"What the hell is going on?" He bellowed in a voice that really shouldn't come out of such a thin frame. I seriously considered just fading into the background but someone was bound to notice my absence eventually, so I manned up and attempted to explain.
I wouldn't have believed it myself, I mean Jim must have outweighed that old woman two hundred pounds, but her continued screaming, not to mention impressive vocabulary were fairly convincing. Jim, meanwhile, had calmed down enough to be scared, also, he was bleeding.
"You, and you, with me." Wayne said stabbing his finger in the direction of Jim and myself. Why do I always get caught up in this stuff?
"Um… what about… her." I gestured with my head towards the grandmother from hell. Wayne gave me a sour look.
"She will be escorted from the building." He said, sounding like he'd rather be eating ashes right now.
Leaving the rest of security to take care of crowd control, we followed Wayne through to the back rooms and away from the curious onlookers. Rather than going to his office, Wayne headed for the security room.
Once we had all trooped inside, Wayne shut the door with a solid and rather ominous sounding, clunk then turned to face us both.
"What in the hell just happened out there?" He demanded.
Jim shuffled his feet and looked down, strangely reluctant to defend himself. I opened my mouth to answer, then hastily shut it again realizing anything I said might mean throwing Jim under the bus.
"Well?" Wayne shouted. His face was taking on an alarmingly red shade. I don't think I'd ever seem him quite that angry before.
"I wasn't doing anything." Jim finally spoke up. "She just attacked me." Wayne stared at him, an incredulous expression on his face.
"She just attacked me." Jim's voice must have gone up half an octave. "I was minding my own business, she calls me a thief and attacks me!"
Wayne shook his head, the story was just about the most ridiculous thing I had heard in a month or more. So ridiculous I wanted to believe it.
"Why don't we check the video?" I suggested. Jim nodded eagerly, apparently convinced that the tapes would support his crazy tale.
Wayne scowled, but that alarming red coloring was receding from his face.
"Do it." He said, looking at me.
I wasn't sure what to expect. It took me a few minutes to find the right camera and time code, during which time Jim fidgeted silently and Wayne paced up and down the small room. I noted absently that he seemed much more uptight than usual, but this wasn't the time to ask about it.
Finally I found the footage and sure enough things happened just as Jim had described. He was walking from one side of the room to the other, when all of a sudden the old woman stood up from the slot machine and launched herself at him. Obviously we couldn't tell what was being said, her actions were clear.
"Fine. Get back out there the pair of you. And keep your heads down!" Wayne snapped. "Mr. Drago is arriving today, I can't afford any more mess ups."
"Who is Drago?" Jim murmured to me as we walked out of the security room. I glanced at him in surprise, but then Jim wasn't one to worry about anything beyond the immediate problem.
"Sante Drago owns Blue Ridge Casino and a dozen other Casinos around the country." I said, keeping my voice low enough that Wayne wouldn't hear. "If you believe the rumors he's got quite the temper. Get on the wrong side of him and you lose your job. Online they call him the 'silver dragon'."
"Well I don't plan on attracting his attention." Jim muttered. "I need this job."
"Don't we all." I agreed as we returned to the noise of the slots and the crowds of people.
Keeping a low profile seemed like an excellent plan after all the excitement so I worked my way back over to my section of the hall and then wandered over to Lee Anne for a chat.
She was in her usual spot sitting in front of one of the cheaper slot machines. Lee Anne was a traditionalist and had a big cup full of change to feed into the machines.
"Hey there darlin'!" She greeted me warmly as usual. "Lots of odd stuff going on this evening."
"Tell me about it." I muttered, thinking about Jim and his attacker. Pausing only to take a puff of her ever present cigarette, Lee Anne did exactly that.
"Well me and the ladies was having a chat earlier, just a little gossip you know." Lee Anne paused and brushed a lock of greying hair away from her eyes. "But I swear I saw Barbara. You remember Barbara right? All tits and ass and blonde hair. I swear I saw Barbara taking something from Marie's purse when she stepped away to the ladies room."
"I thought Barbara was the one who's husband died and left her a small fortune."
"He did, and she's never short of gentleman friends either." The disapproval was clear in Lee Anne's voice.
"Was this here? Did you say anything?" The casino had cameras everywhere, if someone was stealing from purses it would be on the video.
But I didn't hear Lee Anne's answer. My attention was suddenly diverted elsewhere. A small platoon of immaculately besuited men and women were walking by, flanking a grey haired older man.
I knew without being told or having to ask that Sante Drago had arrived. More unnerving however was the discovery that Sante Drago actually was a Silver Dragon.
Next: Part 5 — Coffee Break
Dragon Hoard is a weekly serial sequel to The Wolves of West Virginia, which is available on Kindle.
by Eoghann Irving [-]
Price:
-
-
-
-
-
Greed is Good Part 4: Enter the Dragon (1st Draft)
This is post #4 of 4 in the series “Greed is Good”
My jog turned into a frantic dash as I raced to pull Jim off the aged guest he was currently assaulting. Jim was a big man, in all meanings of the word, and how he hadn't crushed the skinny old woman already was a happy mystery. I grabbed hold of him and tried to pull him away from the woman who was snarling and hissing as she fought back.
To my surprise he stepped back quite willingly, but the old woman did not, instead grabbing onto him so hard I saw her nails draw blood. My half day of training when I joined Blue Ridge Casino had not covered this scenario! I tried to prise the woman loose with very little success and short of breaking her wrist, which I didn't think the manager would appreciate, I really wasn't sure what to do.
Fortunately for me backup arrived in the form of several more members of security, presumably alerted by the woman's screamed profanities and the ever growing crowd around us. We finally managed to separate Jim and the old woman by sheer body mass, hustling them apart until someone could figure out what the hell was going on.
The old woman continued to screech and curse, trying to push her way past the human wall that had now formed at which point the manager arrived.
Now I actually like Wayne, he's a fair boss, but, faced with this, anger won out.
"What the hell is going on?" He bellowed in a voice that really shouldn't come out of such a thin frame. I seriously considered just fading into the background but someone was bound to notice my absence eventually, so I manned up and attempted to explain.
I wouldn't have believed it myself, I mean Jim must have outweighed that old woman two hundred pounds, but her continued screaming, not to mention impressive vocabulary were fairly convincing. Jim, meanwhile, had calmed down enough to be scared, also, he was bleeding.
"You, and you, with me." Wayne said stabbing his finger in the direction of Jim and myself. Why do I always get caught up in this stuff?
"Um… what about… her." I gestured with my head towards the grandmother from hell. Wayne gave me a sour look.
"She will be escorted from the building." He said, sounding like he'd rather be eating ashes right now.
Leaving the rest of security to take care of crowd control, we followed Wayne through to the back rooms and away from the curious onlookers. Rather than going to his office, Wayne headed for the security room.
Once we had all trooped inside, Wayne shut the door with a solid and rather ominous sounding, clunk then turned to face us both.
"What in the hell just happened out there?" He demanded.
Jim shuffled his feet and looked down, strangely reluctant to defend himself. I opened my mouth to answer, then hastily shut it again realizing anything I said might mean throwing Jim under the bus.
"Well?" Wayne shouted. His face was taking on an alarmingly red shade. I don't think I'd ever seem him quite that angry before.
"I wasn't doing anything." Jim finally spoke up. "She just attacked me." Wayne stared at him, an incredulous expression on his face.
"She just attacked me." Jim's voice must have gone up half an octave. "I was minding my own business, she calls me a thief and attacks me!"
Wayne shook his head, the story was just about the most ridiculous thing I had heard in a month or more. So ridiculous I wanted to believe it.
"Why don't we check the video?" I suggested. Jim nodded eagerly, apparently convinced that the tapes would support his crazy tale.
Wayne scowled, but that alarming red coloring was receding from his face.
"Do it." He said, looking at me.
I wasn't sure what to expect. It took me a few minutes to find the right camera and time code, during which time Jim fidgeted silently and Wayne paced up and down the small room. I noted absently that he seemed much more uptight than usual, but this wasn't the time to ask about it.
Finally I found the footage and sure enough things happened just as Jim had described. He was walking from one side of the room to the other, when all of a sudden the old woman stood up from the slot machine and launched herself at him. Obviously we couldn't tell what was being said, her actions were clear.
"Fine. Get back out there the pair of you. And keep your heads down!" Wayne snapped. "Mr. Drago is arriving today, I can't afford any more mess ups."
"Who is Drago?" Jim murmured to me as we walked out of the security room. I glanced at him in surprise, but then Jim wasn't one to worry about anything beyond the immediate problem.
"Sante Drago owns Blue Ridge Casino and a dozen other Casinos around the country." I said, keeping my voice low enough that Wayne wouldn't hear. "If you believe the rumors he's got quite the temper. Get on the wrong side of him and you lose your job. Online they call him the 'silver dragon'."
"Well I don't plan on attracting his attention." Jim muttered. "I need this job."
"Don't we all." I agreed as we returned to the noise of the slots and the crowds of people.
Keeping a low profile seemed like an excellent plan after all the excitement so I worked my way back over to my section of the hall and then wandered over to Lee Anne for a chat.
She was in her usual spot sitting in front of one of the cheaper slot machines. Lee Anne was a traditionalist and had a big cup full of change to feed into the machines.
"Hey there darlin'!" She greeted me warmly as usual. "Lots of odd stuff going on this evening."
"Tell me about it." I muttered, thinking about Jim and his attacker. Pausing only to take a puff of her ever present cigarette, Lee Anne did exactly that.
"Well me and the ladies was having a chat earlier, just a little gossip you know." Lee Anne paused and brushed a lock of greying hair away from her eyes. "But I swear I saw Barbara. You remember Barbara right? All tits and ass and blonde hair. I swear I saw Barbara taking something from Marie's purse when she stepped away to the ladies room."
"I thought Barbara was the one who's husband died and left her a small fortune."
"He did, and she's never short of gentleman friends either." The disapproval was clear in Lee Anne's voice.
"Was this here? Did you say anything?" The casino had cameras everywhere, if someone was stealing from purses it would be on the video.
But I didn't hear Lee Anne's answer. My attention was suddenly diverted elsewhere. A small platoon of immaculately besuited men and women were walking by, flanking a grey haired older man.
I knew without being told or having to ask that Sante Drago had arrived. More unnerving however was the discovery that Sante Drago actually was a Silver Dragon.
Next: Part 5 — Coffee Break
Zombiemart is weekly serial sequel to The Wolves of West Virginia, which is available on Kindle.
by Eoghann Irving [-]
Price:
-
-
-
-
-
March 2, 2015
TV Review: Constantine
Thirteen episodes and that is likely all you get for Constantine. Officially it hasn't been cancelled yet, but the odds are piled up so high against it, you'd be better to assume it was and avoid disappointment. So what went wrong?
John Constantine is a DC Comics character perhaps best known for the long running Hellblazer comic and that's certainly where the tv show took most of its tonal inputs from. Which is slightly odd since Hellblazer was actually cancelled two years ago and replaced by a more mainstream version of the title, tied into the DC superhero universe. And it's that more recent version that informs the setting of the TV version.
You Can't Take The British Out of Constantine
This is where we hit the first problem. It's not just that John Constantine is English, because they kept that detail, nor that the stories were set in England, which they got rid of, it's that the stories were rooted in the culture of Britain at the time they were published.
Hellblazer was unusual in that Constantine aged in real time over the course of the 20 years the comic was published and the stories were invested with social commentary. All that was lost in the tv adaptation.
Constantine and Hellblazer is British at its core and stripping away the setting and the supporting characters to place him in a generic American background removed a lot of what made it distinctive in the first place.
What Does it Want to Be?
Constantine's lack of unique identity showed in the inconsistency of the episodes. This did get a bit better as the series progressed, but in order to win an audience it needed that uniqueness at the beginning, otherwise it just came across as a Supernatural ripoff.
A lot of the time it really didn't seem to know what it wanted to be. Was it simply a monster of the week horror show? Was it Southern Gothic? Perhaps Catholic inspired horror like the Exorcist?
There was too much monster of the week and too little connective tissue. Yes I know, they kept talking about the rising darkness but with the exception of a couple of episodes that wasn't an active plot element, more of a poor explanation for the supernatural to behave out of character.
This is all stuff that could have, and likely would have, been addressed over time but they're not going to get a shot at that now. And even if they had, I don't get the feeling they would have been prepared to go to the dark places the comic did.
A Bland Supporting Cast
When it was announced that Lucy Griffiths who had played Liv Aberdine in the pilot episode was being replaced by Angelica Celaya as Zed Martin I was hopeful because there just wasn't that much chemistry between Griffiths and Matt Ryan's Constantine.
Unfortunately the new actor and character really didn't change anything. It didn't help that they couldn't seem to decide what sort of relationship they wanted the two to have. Early on they seemed to be going for flirtatious banter and one-upmanship but then all of a sudden it became some sort of protegé/mentor relationship.
And then there was Charles Halford as Chas. There is a character Chas in Hellblazer, but this is the name only. And having established a mystery to this character in the pilot episode, Constantine promptly answered that mystery in the dullest way possible and then turned him into a sort of human pincushion. Chas appeared in 10 of the thirteen episodes and I still couldn't tell you what his character actually was.
Trying Too Hard
To the producer's credit they did try quite hard to give us a real Constantine, by the end they even had him smoking like a chimney. When was the last time you saw that on tv?
There were lots of references to other supernatural DC Comics characters like Dr. Fate and the Spectre as well. They really wanted comics fans to buy into this adaptation. In the end though that need for acceptance may have done more harm than good.
Matt Ryan's Constantine was perpetually pushed up to eleven, like a caricature of the character he was supposed to be playing. All snarls and cynicism and witty one liners, but with nothing deeper behind it. Perhaps if they had actually gone past having characters tell us how dark and destructive he was and actually shown it, he would have felt more real? Unfortunately they didn't and much like his costume he came across as two dimensional.
Yes the costume was relatively faithful to the comic book sources, but it didn't feel real or lived in. The collar of the jacket was perpetually up and the tie hung loose in a way that made it feel like it was fixed in place (it probably was, wasn't it?). In the end this was a cosplay Constantine, not a real person.
Did You Like It?
Well yeah sort of. I mean in a sort of Agents of SHIELD Season 1 before it gets good way. Constantine isn't actually bad you see and even its most clichéd episode is at least watchable, but it's also not actually good. Of its short run of 13 episodes there are probably only about 3 that even somewhat stand out.
In truth it really didn't earn an extension or a second season.
February 28, 2015
Dragon Hoard Part 3: News From The Old World (1st Draft)
This is post #3 of 5 in the series “Dragon Hoard”
I fought the sudden urge to hang up the phone and leave the house before The Ceannard got on the phone. It's a bit like being summoned before the school Principal, you know it's not going to be good, you know you can't avoid it, but oh boy do you want to.
'Mr. Brodie." An elderly voice said. Too late!
"Ceannard." I responded, "You're up late." Actually given the time difference, it was probably more a case that he was up early.
"Yes, well, some of us have a work ethic Mr. Brodie."
"And some of us are trying to go to work." I couldn't keep the irritation out of my voice. Living this far away from the Ceannard and the rest of the dinosaurs had left me used to a certain freedom of action.
"Well, I certainly wouldn't want to get in the way of your career as a stock boy." The Ceannard's voice bit off his response with equal testiness and I belatedly remembered that his temper had been legendary. Didn't seem like he'd mellowed with age.
"Security guard." I muttered, knowing as I said it just how defiantly juvenile it must sound.
"Reports of your activities have come to our attention." The Ceannard continued. "Disturbing reports." I braced myself for the inevitable censure. "We have seen similar activity in various locations around the world."
Okay, that I wasn't expecting. I had arrogantly assumed that this activity was all centered on me. Apparently I was not so important after all.
"These activities represent an alarming increase in hostile magical events across all continents."
"What's causing it?"
"We don't know. We're investigating of course, but naturally no one wants to talk. I've always said secrets will bring us all down in the end." I could picture the Ceannard shaking his head as he spoke.
"But, it's coordinated?" I pressed. The Ceannard laughed bitterly.
"You're not a fool boy, despite that unfortunate business. Hostile magical activity on multiple continents, this is entirely deliberate. We are reaching out to all our contacts and asking them to report anything unusual as well as warning them to be careful. You are isolated and vulnerable."
"I appreciate the concern sir, but I seem to have done okay so far."
"You can't blow up a building every time you get in a bit of trouble boy." The Ceannard snapped. "For god's sake learn some subtlety. There's more to wizardry than explosions."
"Yes sir." I said as the line went dead. Damn but he was a grumpy old man. He didn't have to reach out to me personally though, particularly not given how I had left Edinburgh. That was more than a mere courtesy call. Whatever was stirring out in the world, the Parliament was worried about it, and here I sat on my own with no one to cover my back and a bloody great geas dragging mystical attention from miles around. I had a feeling my status as unwanted and unacknowledged black sheep was about to come to an end.
Business was booming at the Blue Ridge Casino, which was just as well for me considering my job at Supermart 13 was on perpetual hold. There isn't a lot of call for people to stock the shelves in a pile of smoldering rubble after all.
The casino wasn't dependent on locals for revenue, though it would happily take, but pulled the suckers in for a hundred miles in all directions. It had been expanding year on year for most of a decade and now looked every bit the gaudy, tawdry, temple to greed that it aspired to be.
Every evening when I walked into the place I was met by a wave of stale air and smoke. The casino was probably one of the few public places left in Charles Town where smoking occurred in open areas. In theory those areas were separated from the rest of the casino, in practice it turns out that smoke travels.
The other thing that greeted me every evening was noise. Ringing, beeping, clanging all accompanied by the background roar of a thousand people talking. It's all rather overwhelming the first five or ten times you experience it. But I'd built up a resistance. I enter an almost zen like state of calm as I walk into the building. The noises and smells just wash over me without penetrating. Most of the time.
I'm not sure how many slot machines exactly the casino had, but I figure it must be enough to seat the entire population of Charles Town. The slots you see are the bread and butter of the casino. Yes, it has horse racing and table games and those attract the higher end clientele, but all those slots just soak up quarters and dollars. In fact these days they happily give you a special card so you don't have to get up to refill, just let your bank account drain directly into the machines.
Lee Anne was exactly the sort of gambler that the casino loved. She was in here every weekend sitting in front of the machine with a cigarette in one hand and the other pressing the buttons. She sat there for hours barely moving her hand just stabbing at the buttons again and again.
I waved to Lee Anne as I walked past and she waved back without letting her concentration slip. I made a mental note to stop back later and see how she was doing, she always had some gossip to share. Right now though I need to get to my spot and relieve Jim.
Jim wasn't where he was supposed to be though. For a moment I was left wondering how to locate him in this sprawling building without alerting management, but then my geas solved the problem for me.
I heard a yell, followed by a thump and then a bellow of rage that could only have come from a man the size of Jim. Following that noise I jogged along a row of slots and made a sharp right. Sure enough, there he was engaged in a bizarre wrestling match with a woman who couldn't have been less than 80 years old.
Next: Part 4 — Enter the Dragon
Dragon Hoard is weekly serial sequel to The Wolves of West Virginia, which is available on Kindle.
by Eoghann Irving [-]
Price:
-
-
-
-
-
Greed is Good Part 3: News From The Old World (1st Draft)
This is post #3 of 3 in the series “Greed is Good”
I fought the sudden urge to hang up the phone and leave the house before The Ceannard got on the phone. It's a bit like being summoned before the school Principal, you know it's not going to be good, you know you can't avoid it, but oh boy do you want to.
'Mr. Brodie." An elderly voice said. Too late!
"Ceannard." I responded, "You're up late." Actually given the time difference, it was probably more a case that he was up early.
"Yes, well, some of us have a work ethic Mr. Brodie."
"And some of us are trying to go to work." I couldn't keep the irritation out of my voice. Living this far away from the Ceannard and the rest of the dinosaurs had left me used to a certain freedom of action.
"Well, I certainly wouldn't want to get in the way of your career as a stock boy." The Ceannard's voice bit off his response with equal testiness and I belatedly remembered that his temper had been legendary. Didn't seem like he'd mellowed with age.
"Security guard." I muttered, knowing as I said it just how defiantly juvenile it must sound.
"Reports of your activities have come to our attention." The Ceannard continued. "Disturbing reports." I braced myself for the inevitable censure. "We have seen similar activity in various locations around the world."
Okay, that I wasn't expecting. I had arrogantly assumed that this activity was all centered on me. Apparently I was not so important after all.
"These activities represent an alarming increase in hostile magical events across all continents."
"What's causing it?"
"We don't know. We're investigating of course, but naturally no one wants to talk. I've always said secrets will bring us all down in the end." I could picture the Ceannard shaking his head as he spoke.
"But, it's coordinated?" I pressed. The Ceannard laughed bitterly.
"You're not a fool boy, despite that unfortunate business. Hostile magical activity on multiple continents, this is entirely deliberate. We are reaching out to all our contacts and asking them to report anything unusual as well as warning them to be careful. You are isolated and vulnerable."
"I appreciate the concern sir, but I seem to have done okay so far."
"You can't blow up a building every time you get in a bit of trouble boy." The Ceannard snapped. "For god's sake learn some subtlety. There's more to wizardry than explosions."
"Yes sir." I said as the line went dead. Damn but he was a grumpy old man. He didn't have to reach out to me personally though, particularly not given how I had left Edinburgh. That was more than a mere courtesy call. Whatever was stirring out in the world, the Parliament was worried about it, and here I sat on my own with no one to cover my back and a bloody great geas dragging mystical attention from miles around. I had a feeling my status as unwanted and unacknowledged black sheep was about to come to an end.
Business was booming at the Blue Ridge Casino, which was just as well for me considering my job at Supermart 13 was on perpetual hold. There isn't a lot of call for people to stock the shelves in a pile of smoldering rubble after all.
The casino wasn't dependent on locals for revenue, though it would happily take, but pulled the suckers in for a hundred miles in all directions. It had been expanding year on year for most of a decade and now looked every bit the gaudy, tawdry, temple to greed that it aspired to be.
Every evening when I walked into the place I was met by a wave of stale air and smoke. The casino was probably one of the few public places left in Charles Town where smoking occurred in open areas. In theory those areas were separated from the rest of the casino, in practice it turns out that smoke travels.
The other thing that greeted me every evening was noise. Ringing, beeping, clanging all accompanied by the background roar of a thousand people talking. It's all rather overwhelming the first five or ten times you experience it. But I'd built up a resistance. I enter an almost zen like state of calm as I walk into the building. The noises and smells just wash over me without penetrating. Most of the time.
I'm not sure how many slot machines exactly the casino had, but I figure it must be enough to seat the entire population of Charles Town. The slots you see are the bread and butter of the casino. Yes, it has horse racing and table games and those attract the higher end clientele, but all those slots just soak up quarters and dollars. In fact these days they happily give you a special card so you don't have to get up to refill, just let your bank account drain directly into the machines.
Lee Anne was exactly the sort of gambler that the casino loved. She was in here every weekend sitting in front of the machine with a cigarette in one hand and the other pressing the buttons. She sat there for hours barely moving her hand just stabbing at the buttons again and again.
I waved to Lee Anne as I walked past and she waved back without letting her concentration slip. I made a mental note to stop back later and see how she was doing, she always had some gossip to share. Right now though I need to get to my spot and relieve Jim.
Jim wasn't where he was supposed to be though. For a moment I was left wondering how to locate him in this sprawling building without alerting management, but then my geas solved the problem for me.
I heard a yell, followed by a thump and then a bellow of rage that could only have come from a man the size of Jim. Following that noise I jogged along a row of slots and made a sharp right. Sure enough, there he was engaged in a bizarre wrestling match with a woman who couldn't have been less than 80 years old.
Next: Part 4
Zombiemart is weekly serial sequel to The Wolves of West Virginia, which is available on Kindle.
by Eoghann Irving [-]
Price:
-
-
-
-
-
February 25, 2015
Book Review: Kill School by Gregory Lynn
This is the fourth book review in my #GreatIndieReviewProject and once again it's a solid read that would hold up against many traditionally published work.
Have you ever read a book and thought, "that was good, but it was so close to being very good"? Because that pretty much sums up my reaction to Kill School. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with the story as it stands but I think it actually has the potential to be much better.
One of its strengths is certainly the goblin Hobbes himself who is just inherently likable (usually of benefit for a viewpoint character) but there are a couple of points where the events seemed a bit unclear to me and I also think it misses a trick on emotional development.
What's It All About Then?
Hobbes is a goblin of unusual size. He's good natured, but not particularly quick witted and when a fight between him and another rather bullying goblin ends in death, he quickly finds himself manipulated into attending a school for goblin assassins.
Which, when written like that seems a bit of a stretch but the story does a good job of making it seem quite plausible as you read along. The novella basically covers Hobbes time at this "Kill School" through to his graduation.
A Little Light Reading
At its heart this is a light hearted fantasy story with the sort of humor that brings a wry smile to my bitter and twisted countenance. I couldn't call it laugh out loud funny, but I can't actually remember the last book I read that was and I'm not sure that's even what it is trying to be.
The most obvious comparison here is Terry Pratchett, but Kill School is less inclined to directly parody other works and more interested in just telling its own story. The pace, rather like the protagonist, feels unhurried telling the story in it's own time and while that probably reduces the tension the reader feels it also makes for pleasantly non-stressful reading.
There's an interesting dichotomy at work here in that the pacing and the telling of the story is quite gentle, but the actions are at time brutal. We are talking about a school for goblin assassins after all.
Shouldn't He Care?
Humor is an effective way to reduce tension in a novel, but it also tends to undercut the emotional impact of scenes and that is something that presents a problem here.
After his first kill Hobbes reaction feels very real. He goes into a state of denial and afterwards seems rather like he's suffering from some sort of PTSD. But, at no point during the rest of the story does he really seem to feel the emotional consequences of his actions.
This is true later on as well when he has to perform additional assassinations. While those assassinations may or may not be real I couldn't help but feel he should be reacting to them in some way. Instead Hobbes remains largely even tempered (until pushed too hard) and placid.
There is a plot journey here, but there isn't an emotional one and I think that is what stops this from being a really good story in my eyes because it keeps me as a reader slightly detached from what is happening.
But What About The Larger World
This is the first of several novellas and there are hints at a larger story or at least significant future events, but we don't get too much insight into what is going on. For the purposes of this story we are entirely confined to the goblin caverns.
We do learn a little about the hierarchy of goblins with the regular goblins essentially slaves for the hobgoblins. There's also the open question of why it's been decided that goblin assassins are needed. Presumably that is for future stories.
The other noticeable thing about this particular fantasy world is how modern it feels. The cavern where assassinations are practiced is essentially a Danger Room/Holodeck and a lot of other references like the ever present spork play on modern concepts.
I don't know that I have a good picture of this world as a living entity. While each of the individual scenes work well, they feel a little like they are stitched together more than naturally growing out of each other, but that is something that exposure to further stories might take care of.
Who Is This For?
Do you like fantasy?
Do you like Terry Pratchett?
Are assassins cool?
Give it a shot.
Did You Like It?
Yes I did like it, my criticisms aren't intended to point out what was bad about Kill School so much as what could have raised it up to a higher level. As it stands, it does exactly what it says on the tin and the result is some pleasant and relaxing reading.
Buy, Borrow or Skip?
It's $2.99 if it sounds remotely interesting to you, buy it. What have you got to lose?
Kill School: The First HemoGoblins Novella
by Gregory Lynn [TFTMM Publishing]
Price:
-
-
-
-
-
