Peter David's Blog, page 49

X-Factor

This isn’t a secret because I announced it back at Dragon*Con, but Bleeding Cool seems compelled to announce it incorrectly by stating that X-Factor is cancelled with #19.

Which is not true. It’s cancelled with #20.

Also for some reason Bleeding Cool is associating it with the fact that Quicksilver will be returning to the Avengers and that’s why the book is going away. No, it’s because not enough people are buying it. Which is exactly the reason they cancelled “Gambit” as well, so it’ll probably be a long time before he gets to star in another book.

All I did was write a book that got tons of positive write-ups. Which I guess is enough to encourage people to buy it when it comes out in trades, oblivious to the fact that books get cancelled when you do that. Whatever.

Me, I remember when Rich Johnston used to write to me for confirmation before running stuff. Apparently that’s no longer the case.

PAD

Assorted Thoughts: Tomb Raider, Sir Apropos, & more

Originally published July 20, 2001, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1444

Assorted stuff…

Indiana Jones was conceived because his creators said, “Let’s create a character who is evocative of the types of heroes that we thrilled to in those old movie serials.” And it worked.

Lara Croft, to the best of my knowledge, was conceived because someone said, “Let’s do Indiana Jones with big hooters and make a fortune.” And it worked. But creatively it was a copy of a copy.

Which is why the film, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, plays the same way. Everything seems to be copied from other films, and as a result everything seems vague, undefined, or just plain reminiscent. But not pleasant reminiscent; more like “ho hum” reminiscent.

Raiders of the Lost Ark had a slam bang opening action sequence with its hero trying to obtain a relic? So does Tomb Raider… except where Lost Ark’s sequence featured genuine jeopardy, set up the main villain, and established Indy’s fear of snakes, Tomb Raider’s opening is a big fakeout with no real plot consequences.

Raiders hadbad guys seeking some major archeological artifact which our hero is racing to obtain? So does Tomb Raider… except in the former, the bad guys were knowable (Hitler and his Nazis) and the goal understandable: Hitler wants to use the powerful energies of the ark—whatever those may be—to mow down his enemies and rule the world. In Tomb Raider, the bad guys are unknowable (the Illuminati) and the goal vague: they want to obtain a gadget that will allow them to control time. And do… what with it? Shout “Duck!” to Abe Lincoln or JFK? Derail research on the atomic bomb? Pull Jesus off the cross? Save the dinosaurs? No clue. Lara’s direct opponent offers her some options that he can provide her if he gets his own hands on it, but he didn’t want the thing just so he could make Lara Croft happy. Near as we can tell, he wants it so he can “be God.” That’s nice. Then what? I dunno.

Indy had issues with his father? Lara has issues with hers, except the only reason it has any emotional resonance is the real life split between star Angelina Jolie and her actor father, Jon Voight, who appears as Lara’s dad.

Also, Indy has more flexibility. He can go looking for stuff pretty much anywhere. With Lara, the major goal has to be a tomb. Otherwise you can’t call it Tomb Raider.

A copy of a copy. That’s ultimately all the film is, and in the end it leaves you pretty much feeling as if—despite the fact that the entirety of reality supposedly hung in the balance—that nothing much was at stake. Me, I took pleasure in watching Red Dwarf’s Chris Barrie as her butler, and marveling at Jolie’s physical stamina (she reportedly went home bleeding every night from injuries sustained during an extended bungee jumping sequence. I can believe it.)

Me, I keep wanting to see a take-off with Jessica Rabbit or even Betty Boop in the Lara role, and call it Toon Raider.

* * *

Attention DVD fans: Kathleen brought home Blackadder: The Complete Collector’s Set, and it absolutely lives up to its name. In addition to the four entire series, it also contains Blackadder Back & Forth, Blackadder: The Cavalier Years, Blackadder’s Christmas Carol (which, frankly, I would recommend you watch first, since it gives you a great overview of the series and is what got me hooked on it), plus a “Who’s Who,” a Guide to Historical Figures and Events, an interview with series creator Richard Curtis, and a sing-along. It’s pricey but definitely worth it.

* * *

I hear Charlton Heston will have a cameo—as an ape—in the Tim Burton Planet of the Apes film. In my humble opinion, it will be a waste of an opportunity if Heston does not say one or both of the following lines: “They’ll get my gun when they pry it out of my cold, dead paws,” or “Get your stinking hands off me, you damn dirty human!”

* * *

I don’t often use this column to push projects of mine, but I’m excited about this, so I thought I’d share it with you. The June 18 issue of Publishers Weekly carried a very positive review for my new novel, Sir Apropos of Nothing. The thing I was most pleased to learn was that the reviewer had never heard of me, or read anything that I’d written, so she wasn’t predisposed to like it. She came into it cold and simply loved the book. Here’s the review:

Sir Apropos of Nothing *(starred review)

An antihero for the 21st Century, Apropos springs from his mother’s womb with a full set of teeth, ready to bite anyone who gets in the way of his survival in this fast, fun, heroic fantasy satire. Serious issues are bound to concern a child born of a gang rape conducted by knights who wouldn’t know the Holy Grail even if it was filled with mead and emptied over their heads. David, author of more than 40 novels, primarily Star Trek or Babylon 5 related, knows how to spin a story, entertaining the reader with pathos, bathos, mythos, and psychos. When Apropos sets off to rescue a bratty, Hecate-worshipping princess named Entipy, he’s an angry young man lame of leg and spirit. As a reluctant hero he must endure a wicked phoenix, the Outer Lawless Regions, and the Screaming Gorge of Eternal madness, not to mention the annoyingly brave Tacit, who claims to have been raised by unicorns. In the course of his quest he also discovers his father and learns how to turn lemons into high-octane lemonade. At times repugnant, at others delightful, but never boring, Sir Apropos wants to “break out of the little box that I had been placed in, first by society, then by the knights and now by destiny itself.” Of course he blows the box into smithereens, as does David, who appears to be planning still more adventures (and hopefully, misadventures) for his cranky knight.

So go buy copies and read it. If you hurry out to Borders right now, I’m told that they will actually sell you a copy at the cover price. And if you buy two, you can get the second one for the same price as the first one. What a deal!

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705).

 

 

I Don’t Understand Some People Reviewing “ARTFUL”

I’ve been reading the Amazon reviews of ARTFUL and overall I’m averaging four stars out of five. So I figure that’s good.

But there seem to be a spate of One-star reviews that read almost uniformly the same:

“Didn’t keep reading it.”

“Couldn’t read it.”

“Don’t read books about vampires.”

“Read one chapter, stopped.”

Maybe I’m being oversensitive, but how can anyone claim to have an informed opinion about a book that they didn’t complete? Or that they didn’t even start? One person even gave it a one-star review because they never received it? The hell?

I don’t mind if someone reads a book of mine and declares they didn’t like it, but I don’t see why they feel the need to slam it without having actually bothered to read it.

PAD

I’ve been thinking about Mr. Shaw a lot lately.

I have no idea why. I just am.

Mr. Lance Shaw was my eighth grade history teacher when I was living in Verona, NJ. But before I had him in eighth grade, I heard about him in seventh grade. All the eighth graders would tell us how awful he was. That he was relentlessly brutal, demanding. That he worked them ragged. The horror stories about Mr. Shaw were legendary and if you wound up getting him, then God help you.

When I got my eighth grade schedule and found I had Mr. Shaw as a teacher, my heart sank. I cannot tell you how much I dreaded the class.

On the first day, we filed in, and every student was nervous. We’d all heard the horror stories. Once the bell rang, Shaw surveyed us a moment.

Then he said the following:

“I have two rules. The first is that you will address me as King Shaw or Your Highness.”

We all exchanged confused looks.

“And the second rule is that you will spend from now until the end of the school year telling all the seventh graders what a terrible and terrifying teacher I am. I want you to petrify them.”

That’s when we realized. It was a joke. A massive school-wide joke. Shaw was, in fact, a perfectly nice guy, a great teacher, and had a snarky sense of humor. He had been using his students to spread awful rumors about him so that new students would be terrified of him at first and then love the notion that, No, Shaw’s not a bad guy, we’re just hosing everyone else in the school.

And naturally when we got out of the class and went to lunch, the first thing we did was terrorize the seventh graders about Mr. Shaw.

I’ve no idea whatever happened to him after that, of course, but I hope he stuck with teaching. He was great.

PAD

On the Death Penalty

Originally published July 13, 2001, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1443

“You know the good part about the death penalty in Texas? Fewer Texans.”

–George Carlin

Some years ago, I wrote an issue of The Incredible Hulk which featured a character named Crazy Eight. She was a supervillain or hero, depending upon which side of the law you were on. And she was on death row for having committed a series of cold-blooded murders. She was the Punisher with a string of luck that had run out, and the story involved her final hours and her interaction with Doc Samson. In the last pages, she was strapped to a chair and electrocuted, on panel. She was pronounced dead. Aside from an emotional final page with Doc, that was the end of the story.

When the issue came out, I was flooded… deluged, I tell you, inundated (all right, I got a few letters) from readers who were extremely bothered by the story. Why? Because I’d shown someone being executed.

“This kind of thing is extremely upsetting,” I was told. “A comic is no place for this story.” “I don’t want to see this kind of thing happening.” “You shouldn’t have killed her; she was too good a character.” And my favorite, “What a disregard for long-standing characters Marvel has, to dispatch them in so heartless and pointless a fashion,” which was pretty interesting considering Crazy Eight had never existed before that issue.

This response amazed me. Here were all these people, getting well and truly worked up over the death of a comic book character. What upset them wasn’t that she died, but the manner in which she had gone. She didn’t get laser-beamed, or demolecularized, or anything satisfactorily comic booky. She was executed by the state.

Except, as we know, these things really happen. In Texas, fried felons is rivaling drilling for oil as the major pastime. And I couldn’t help but wonder whether these letter writers got quite as worked up about real people dying. I suspected they didn’t. Why? Because if they were genuinely in opposition to the death penalty, they would have been pleased to see a story portraying it in all its cold-blooded brutality.

But this was a comic book character. She wasn’t real. No one had actually died. The only real thing in the whole comic was the method of her death, and that was what got people worked up: The reality. Which makes you wonder why, if people are so exorcised by the reality of capital punishment, so many people think it’s a nifty idea.

I think I know why.

We haven’t gone far enough.

It’s a true hoot to hear Europeans going on about how barbaric this country is because we have capital punishment. They sniff about how any truly mature country has left it behind. This, of course, ignores the fact that America is anything but a mature country. We’ve only been around a little over 225 years. Compared to European countries, that’s an eyeblink. As a society we’re obsessed with youth, and we have the same love/hate relationship with the government that many teens have with their parents: We resent its intrusion into our lives, and want it to go away so we can do what we want when we want, and keep its hands off our stuff (like money and guns)… but we also squawk if the government isn’t there when we need it. This is indeed an adolescent country at best, a country of brats. As such, we embrace the death penalty because of the most juvenile of exclamations: “I hate you! I hope you die!” And with the First Fratboy in the White House, we can rest assured that that mind set is going to be in place for at least the next three and a half years (which, I assure you, is going to seem like a lot longer during the current presidency.)

See, here’s the problem. As noted, European countries have one hell of a lot of nerve crabbing at us about capital punishment, considering that when they were at a parallel time in their development—and even older, really—they not only embraced execution, they made it into a fine art. Anyone who’s seen Braveheart can attest to that… and, in point of fact, the movie wasn’t historically accurate since the Brits were in fact a lot more vicious with William Wallace than the film showed us. Execution, particularly in Europe, was a public sport, a means of mass entertainment.

You know why?

No TV.

So now, y’know, Europeans have TV—lots of our programs, for that matter—so they can afford to get all snooty, because they have other stuff to watch now.

In the meantime, somewhere along the way, American executions became very private matters. We didn’t publicly hang them or burn them or press them beneath rocks, like in the good old days. Executions became very private, quiet matters. Well, if the reaction to the Hulk issue is any indication, the only reason we still have them is because people don’t actually see what’s going on.

Remember Vietnam? Remember what turned the tide of public opinion? That’s right. TV. Americans sitting around the dinner table saw footage on the six o’clock news showing our boys dying, and it wasn’t pretty, and wasn’t noble, and John Wayne and Randolph Scott weren’t making it look heroic. It looked, in fact, pretty godawful. And within a relatively short time, we were pulling out of there.

So here we had the Tim McVeigh execution, and the courts ruled that it could not be televised. See, that’s what upsets me. If the Europeans have any legitimate reason to complain about us, it’s that. At least they truly knew how to turn slaughter into an art form, a festivity. A true entertainment for young and old, for the killer in all of us. If there’s any example we should follow, it’s that one.

Do I think the McVeigh execution should have been televised? Absolutely. I mean, we know that capital punishment isn’t a deterrent. Why should it be? It’s neatly tucked away behind brick walls. But if would-be killers, murderers, terrorists, actually see the act right before their eyes, they might be inclined to give genuine second thought to their actions. Kind of like the kids in “Scared Straight.” And if Americans watch it and are appalled by what they see, then maybe this “barbaric” form of state-sanction retribution will finally go the way of the dodo. In the meantime, let’s have fun with it.

In fact, I’ll take it a step further, because if we’re gonna do this, let’s do it right. I think it should have been on Pay Per View. That’s right. Pay Per View. In fact, I think all executions should be on Pay Per View. It’d generate a mint. You know it, I know it. And half of all the proceeds of each execution would go into a fund to benefit the survivors of the killers’ victims. How can you argue with that?

And you know what else? Let’s have executions carry some poetic justice with them. Executing Tim McVeigh with a lethal injection was of no relevance to the nature of his crime. It didn’t really give him a feel for what his victims experienced. Instead, they should have taken him out the way Alan Moore had Rorschach take out that guy who butchered the girl. They should have found a building (preferably in Oklahoma) scheduled for demolition anyway. Take McVeigh, put him in the middle of it, surrounded by explosives. Handcuff him to a pipe, put the key a distance away, and give him a surgical saw that he can’t use to cut through the pipe, but would be able to hack through his wrist. Give him a sporting chance. But not too sporting: Tell him he’s got ten minutes to get out, and really only give him one. Then blow the monster to kingdom come.

Cruel and unusual? Hell no. It’s less cruel than lethal injection; he would have died in one quick, blinding flash. Unusual? People die every day and blow up buildings every day. So what’s unusual by just combining the two?

But at the very least—if you can’t make the blowing up part work for you—then keep the lethal injection, but have an interesting person host the event. I have just the candidate: Anne Robinson, the British game show host. What could be more appropriate? After all, cold blooded terrorist sociopaths are part of what keep mankind from advancing to a higher state of decency and morality. So who better to dispatch them? Witnesses spoke of McVeigh’s icy, contemptuous stare in his final moments. But I submit that he would have had considerably less sang froid if, while breathing his last, he’d had to look at Robinson’s glacial gaze and have, as the last words he’d ever hear on this planet, the contemptuous dismissal of, “You are the weakest link. Goodbye.”

I’d pay money to see that. I bet Europeans would, too.

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.)

 

Happy Birthday Peter David

Kath here.

If you haven’t wished Peter Happy Birthday on Facebook or Twitter, feel free to do it here or even if you have wished him a happy Birthday on Facebook and/or the Twitter.

I wanted to post a Happy Birthday to my husband, my best friend, and an all around sweet guy.

I love you Peter David and wish nothing but happiness for you in the coming year.

Kath ‘the wife’ David

On the set of Spider-Man (2002)

Originally published July 6, 2001, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1442

Spider-Man, having just saved Mary Jane from the clutches of a super-villain, lands with her on the rooftop of a Manhattan building. He exchanges a few words with her, then quickly bolts, vaulting off the roof with a mid-air somersault thrown in for good measure.

From a comic book point of view, this is fairly routine stuff. Except it wasn’t a comic book.

“Let’s go again!” called Sam Raimi from his director’s chair, as Spider-Man and Mary Jane moved back to their starting positions. The dark clouds which had been amassing from an incoming storm front—bearing with them precipitation that would have sent actors, crew and cameramen scurrying for cover and effectively ending the day of shooting—miraculously stalled offshore. The air remained brisk and snappingly cool (a sharp contrast to the several days of warm weather preceding it), but the rain that the weathermen had been forecasting for the previous two days never came. Even God, apparently, didn’t want to get in the way of the shoot.

Yes, Spider-Man, the long-awaited, hotly-debated live-action version of everyone’s favorite web-slinger, was shooting in New York City for a few days. Naturally most of what you’ll be seeing in the 2002 release is being produced on sound stages (and, against a ton of green screens, most likely). But there’s nothing like genuine New York City backgrounds to provide the kind of authentic ambiance that one wants for a film like this one. So one day late in April, the film crew had set up on a 7th floor terrace rooftop at 50th Street and 5th Avenue, to film the aftermath of a Spidey-style rescue.

Why the heck was I there? Because as of this writing (I provide that qualifier because the final publishing and licensing contracts haven’t been signed yet, so it’s merely 99% certain instead of a done deal) Ballantine/Del Rey books will be publishing the novelization tie-in of the film, and I’m slated to be writing it.

I’d sworn off writing novelizations a few years ago after the on-going script changes and incessant rewrites on Batman Forever nearly drove me insane. But I’d later stepped away from that “never-again” policy and several subsequent novelizations had gone without incident. Furthermore, Del Rey was working far enough in advance that shooting of Spider-Man would be wrapped before I started writing, which meant that I would be able to work off a final, locked script rather than something that was constantly in a state of flux.

Plus, c’mon… it’s Spider-Man. X-Men had snapped the decades-long curse of Marvel movies first begun with Howard the Duck (a film that, if first released today and with Howard done entirely with CGI, would probably have been a hit), the casting for Spider-Man didn’t have a clunker in the bunch, Raimi seemed a good choice as director, and the picture of the costume in Entertainment Weekly looked absolutely dead-on. The whole thing sounded like a quality hit to me. Consequently, I did a full court press for the project with editor Steve Saffel of Del Rey. I just kept reminding him of the working relationship we had going back to our days in sales and promotion at Marvel, my track record of novelizations, my experience writing Spider-Man (including Spider-Man 2099, which featured organic webshooters years before they became a controversial aspect of the film), and ultimately, I reminded him about the incriminating photographs I had of him. This landed me the gig.

One day Steve called me and said, “Wanna go see them filming Spider-Man?” Apparently a mini-junket had been arranged in conjunction with Sony Pictures. It was on the day that I was just returning via red-eye from Los Angeles, but I just couldn’t pass it up. Which was how I came to find myself on a Manhattan rooftop, trying desperately to keep out of the way of cameramen, prop men, sound men, etc., all passing through narrow walkways not designed with a thirty-man film operation in mind. First rule of being on movie set: No matter where you stand, sooner or later, you’ll block someone.

Dressed in leather jacket, with sunglasses on, the eye of a storm of activity (as directors so often are) was Sam Raimi. I could see the familial resemblance to his actor brother, Ted (the late, lamented Joxur of Xena, Warrior Princess), although his face was a bit more square and his voice deeper. I was introduced to him and he looked me up and down and said, in regards to my duster, “Nice coat.”

“You want it?” I said immediately. Fortunately he didn’t take me up on it, considering it was a gift from Kathleen and I don’t think she would have been too jazzed.

And thirty feet away from me was—well—Spider-Man.

In a low voice I asked one crew woman, “Is that a stuntman, or is that Tobey Maguire?”

“That’s Tobey,” she said.

They’d certainly come a long way from the Michael Keaton Batman. Rather than a rubber suit on the outside, they had constructed a form-fitting muscle suit for Maguire to wear under the costume itself, and a chin-piece within the mask, so that there would be visual consistency between Maguire and the stuntmen. The weblines had been carefully sculpted, and the blue was dark—not quite as black as in the early Ditko days, but darker and moodier than the bright blue of later years. The entire costume had a sort of “mesh” look to it. I was told that they started with over twenty costumes (including some that were “distressed” to varying degrees, making it sound like our hero is going to be taking something of a pounding during the film). Four of them, however, vanished early in the production, stolen, and there is a sizable monetary reward for information leading to their return.

At one point, Maguire—fooling around between takes—started dancing around and shaking his sculpted (literally) backside like a Chippendales dancer. The women surrounding me seemed to appreciate it. Also the reflective eye pieces in the mask were removable, so when the camera wasn’t on him, Toby Maguire’s eyes were peering out from under the mask, which was certainly a bizarre sight.

Kirsten Dunst was Mary Jane, her hair dyed the appropriate red, and wearing one of those slit-skirted, high-collared Chinese dresses for plot reasons I won’t go into. The scene began with the actors running into frame, Spidey with one arm around Mary Jane’s waist and the other inexplicably straight up in the air. For a moment I had no idea why our hero was posed like the Statue of Liberty, but then of course I realized: He was swinging in on a webline which would probably be added later. The magic of movies.

While this was going on, a stuntman was practicing what I assumed to be Spider-Man’s eventual exit from the scene: An impressive forward leap (off a springboard, I think; I couldn’t quite see since my view was impeded) capped by a mid-air somersault and perfect landing. He made it look incredibly effortless, so when you see Spidey performing amazing (naturally) aerial acrobatics, don’t automatically assume that he’s on strings. You might be watching this guy.

I was turning around at one point to step out of someone’s way. The trailing end of my duster spun out, brushing near a free-standing heater, and a voice from my immediate right said, “Don’t let your coat touch the heater.” I turned the other direction; Kirsten Dunst was sitting about eight inches from me, perched in a chair with her name on it.

“Thanks,” I said. I introduced myself and commented that I was pleased they’d made her hair red. “What other color would it be?” she asked, as if it was a given. Now you and I know that Hollywood is perfectly capable of saying, “Can’t Mary Jane be a blonde?” and poof, she’s a blonde. This is the town that gave us Don Blake standing side-by-side with biker-thug Thor, and Daredevil with a wrestling costume, no horns on his head, and a blindfold. But she may not have even been born yet when those travesties hit the airwaves.

A crew woman asked Dunst if she wanted to retire to the inside and the room serving as her dressing room, but the young trouper chose to remain out on the chilly rooftop, part of the group, wrapped in a jacket and next to the heater for additional warmth. A chat with her revealed that she’d been faithfully reading up on her character, and yes, fan boys, she even knew the classic “Face it, tiger, you just hit the jackpot” intro of our favorite red head. She, along with other key people on the shoot, is very aware of the history of, and anticipation for, the film. (Yes, the movie makers do indeed aggressively monitor the internet, aware of such fan controversies as the organic webshooters debate.)

All in all, we visited about forty-five minutes. And naturally, because there’s no situation that I can’t screw up to some degree, as I was exiting I was so pumped up on what I’d seen (not to mention a bit light-headed because I was still jet-lagged) that—as we passed down the narrow hallway out—I came within an inch of knocking Sam Raimi out of a chair he’d taken refuge in while the next shot was being set up. Very slick. Great way to leave a final lasting impression: Nearly cripple the director.

Wallopin’ websnappers indeed.

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY, 11705. Say, if Marvel is currently publishing The Ultimate Spider-Man, does that mean the other Spidey titles should be renamed The Penultimate Spider-Man?)

 

Guest column: Gwen! David

Originally published June 22, 2001, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1440

April 27, 1994

Teacher: So class, today we’re going to discuss where you went on Take Your Daughter to Work Day!

Jessica: My Daddy’s a caterer, and he works in a restaurant!

Lindsay: I went to the gym, ’cause my Mommy’s an aerobics instructor.

Courtney: My Dad’s a doctor. He helps people feel better.

Gwen! (age 9): My Daddy has a very important job. He sits around all day and plays on his computer in the basement. I went with him to the Central Offices. It had a bunch of video games and toys and a Batmobile. Everybody there’s real nice and some of them even spend the whole day coloring! It’s so much fun.

Teacher: Gwen!, what exactly does your father do?

Gwen! (still age 9): He writes comic books!

Yep, a day in the early life of being Peter David’s middle daughter Gwen! Let me introduce myself. My name is Gwen! David. I live in a house with my dad, Peter David, his newly married, Kathleen O’Shea David, my little sister, Ariel, five kitties (Pandora, Stalin, Treat Williams, Milli, and Vanilli) and a bunny (Lazy Pancake). I am in 11th grade and only have 14 more days of school left. Then I will be in 12th grade. Wahoo! I like to do computer art and photography at my school. This summer I’m stage-managing Guys and Dolls at the Bald Hill Amphitheater, so come and see it! Umm… Oh, I just took my SATs. I got an 1,190. (That’s good.) I love the Powerpuff Girls, John Wayne, and Treat Willams (the actor and the cat). They’re so cool. Well, anyway, at this point, you may be asking, “Hey, where’s Peter?” Well, he’s kinda been a little crazy lately, due to his wedding and all—so crazy, in fact, that he let me write this week’s column. Here, I will tell you what it’s like being Peter David’s daughter. I will make up a list of pros and cons:

Pros

1. I can go up to just about any dealer at a comic-book convention and say, “My dad’s Peter David. Can I get a discount?” To which the reply is generally a yes.

2. In my English class last year, my teacher, Ms. Dinkel, told me that all “great writers” use the Harvard outline when writing, and to be a “great writer” we had to use the Harvard outline. Well, I thought that was a big waste of time, so I went home and asked my dad if he used a Harvard outline when writing. “Not if I don’t have to,” he said (or something like that). So I went back to my teacher, and informed her that my dad was a “great writer,” and he did not use the Harvard outline. I was excused from having to write an outline for the rest of the year (so cool).

3. Last November I went to Portugal! It was lots of fun. People asked me, “Hey, Gwen!, why are you going to Portugal?” to which I would reply, “For a comic-book convention.”

“Don’t you think Portugal’s a little far to travel for a comic-book convention?” they would say.

“Not if it’s for free!” I would reply. I actually get to go to a boatload of cool places: Portugal, Maryland, Texas, Florida, Wisconsin…

4. My best friend Cayley has come with me to Star Trek conventions called Shoreleave and Farpoint in Maryland every year for the past three or four years. We have lots of fun there. They’re the greatest conventions, ’cause there’s a Pizza Hut and a pool in the hotel. How cool is that?

5. My house is filled with books. Lots of them. Tons and tons of them. A lot of them are my dad’s and his friends’, but most of them are other people’s (who are not nearly as good writers as my dad, of course, but we have their books there, anyway). If I ever get bored, and somebody’s using the computer, I can find lots of different books on subjects ranging from Star Trek to Shakespeare.

6. I, along with my sisters (Ariel and Shana), am the only person in the whole world who can call Harlan Ellison “Uncy Harlan” and still live to tell about it.

7. Number seven is going to be more of a “Why it’s great to be Gwen! David’s father,” but, anyway, I won two tickets to go see a sneak preview of Pearl Harbor from a radio station (94.3, ’80s rock. Oh, yeah.), and my Dad said that he’d go with me. Isn’t that neat?

8. People come up to me in the hallways all the time and say, “Your dad was in Wizard this issue.”

“Again?”

9. My dad likes to act in shows at community theaters. Two summers ago, we did L’il Abner together. He was Marryin’ Sam, and I was Scarlett. It was lots of fun, despite all the driving. He’s made lots of friends doing community theater, which is good, ’cause social interaction is always a plus for him. He was also in a production of 1776. Not everybody can say that their dad wore tights on a regular basis for a month and a half.

10. People come from far and wide on Halloween to our house, ’cause my dad gives out comic books, instead of candy. Why? Well, there’s a few reasons. First of all, we get a bunch of free ones every month from random people and they just sit around and collect dust. Also, there’s the philosophy of, “Why rot your teeth when you can rot your brain?”

Cons

Those are the pros to being Peter David’s daughter. However, whenever there’s a pro, there’s a con. (Oh, wait, that reminds me of this great joke: Since pro is the opposite of con, what is the opposite of progress?)

1. I was traumatized as a young child. My dad thought he was being funny when he taught kindergartener Gwen! the rhyme, “In fourteen hundred and ninety-three, Columbus sailed the deep blue sea!” Yes, well, little Gwen! quickly became the laughingstock of her class when she eagerly volunteered that information. I was traumatized, I tell you…

2. There’ve been reports of a teenage boy going around saying with utter glee and delight (unfortunately, truthfully so), “I went out with Peter David’s daughter!” If you see him, punch him. Punch him right in the head. Hard.

I can’t really think of any other cons—so that’s good! ’Cause my dad’s really cool. I think so, and you should think so, too. So send him a congratulatory letter for getting married and not stressing out so much as to cause a heart attack, which would be bad.

Gwen! David, student of… stuff? can be written to at Second Age, Inc., P.O. Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.

 

What the Hell is Wrong with Fans?

I’m afraid that I’m going to come across like a cranky fan sitting in my rocking chair complaining about the kids running around on my lawn. Nevertheless, recent instances of fan entitlement are starting to get on my nerves.

I’m not talking about previously discussed situations such as fans coming up with all sorts of excuses for stealing material and claiming that it’s okay to do so. Those are entertaining as always, but not really big on my mind at the moment.

No, I’m thinking about the current fans of “Once Upon a Time” who are not only convinced that their views are not being represented on the series, but are going after such blameless targets as the actors, targeting them with hostile tweets and such. And you thought it was bad when a villainess in a soap opera couldn’t go food shopping without being harassed by customers.

I know this is nothing new. Back in the days of original STAR TREK, there were–hell, still are–fans of slash fiction. Kirk and Spock together as a couple. It wasn’t relevant to them that that wasn’t remotely based in the reality of either character, any more than modern SUPERNATURAL fans are deterred in coming up with Wincest stories.

But the difference between now and then is that slash fans were a subset of Trek fandom and that’s all they were. No one ever expected for half a second that stories in which Kirk and Spock romantically hooked up would be manifested on the TV series or in any of the subsequent films.

Now we’re in a different mindset, though. Now fans seem to believe that not only should their views be reflected in the series, but if they aren’t, then the producers are doing something wrong. That they are overlooking or neglecting the needs of the fans and, in doing so, are displaying the fact that they are uncaring about particular aspects of fannish priorities.

For instance: while fans get worked up over the relationships of Belle and Rumple or Emma and Hook, there are some fans who stridently believe that Emma and the Queen should be an item. It doesn’t matter to them that both characters are straight or that the two characters have a history of personal antipathy. They want Emma and the Queen as an item. Which is fine if they want to restrict that view to fanzine stories. But instead they go on binges where they launch attacks on writers or, for that matter, actress Jennifer Morrison (who plays Emma) because they believe that not only are their views not being represented (which is true) but that they are being a disservice because their views are not being represented (which is false.)

And the problem is that if writers say they understand where the fans are coming from but aren’t going to write what the fans want to see, then the fans are quick to condemn the writers and call them hypocrites. Sure, the writers or producers may SAY they support gay rights, but they don’t really. The proof of that is that they won’t write what the fans want to see.

I’m not sure where or when this fandom mentality developed. I’m not sure why this sense of entitlement has swelled to such proportions that fans feel the need to write entire essays about how various programs or writers or whomever are letting them down by failing to represent their views. It may well be because of the rise of the Internet because once upon a time, fans would simply rage in a vacuum. But now writers and producers not only see what they’re saying but respond to it, sometimes in self-defense. And it’s a shame that that sort of fan mentality has brought matters to this situation.

I just wish that the fractional number of fans who were obsessed about unworkable offshoot stories would be happy with sharing their stories and beliefs of what characters should be doing with each other and keep it to themselves.

PAD

Those summertime comics memories…

Originally published June 15, 2001, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1439

Assorted stuff…

* * *

 Oh yes… summertime memories of comics…

There I was, six years old, relaxing on a playground, hearing the sounds of childish laughter from all around. I was leaning against a tree, enjoy a cool breeze wafting from the east. I was reading a Harvey Comic, the adventures of Casper.

I heard a low chuckle and looked up. Several boys towered over me. They appeared to be behemoths, gargantuan in stature. In retrospect, they were probably about nine years old.

“Look at the baby reading baby comics!” they hooted, grabbed it out of my hand and ripped it to shreds, leaving me fighting back tears.

Ah, summer memories…

Let us now applaud Marvel Comics.

Marvel has recently announced that it will be dispensing with the seal of the Comics Code Authority, to be replaced by an in-house-generated means of labeling. Now I’ve never been a big fan of labeling on principle, but I’ve always supported the right of individual publishers to make that decision. And in any event, it’s certainly preferable to the CCA label, a mark not dissimilar to the mark of Cain considering that—no matter how much time passes—it still carries with it the stain of an organization developed (in part) specifically to drive EC Comics out of business.

On top of that, publishers have always had their own in-house guidelines, formal or informal, and have adhered to those. In some cases those guidelines are even stricter than the CCA. So why not follow the preferences of those who are actually putting out the books, rather than a reviewing organization whose only option when they disapprove of a book—as Bill Jemas pointed out—is to withhold its seal, thereby not warning parents at all if there’s something in the comic that they feel is inappropriate. I mean, you could argue that the absence of the label should theoretically be enough, but c’mon: Who looks to be guided by something that isn’t there? Besides, there’s enough comics coming out which don’t bear the seal as a matter of course to make its absence not particularly noticeable.

The decision has caused a stir in some quarters that Marvel is going to start putting in all manner of material that would make its titles inappropriate for younger readers. I don’t know that that’s going to happen. Will Marvel start up a line of “Mature” comics? Possibly. It wouldn’t be unprecedented in its history: Remember Epic Comics? And DC has Vertigo, after all. But I seriously doubt that the dropping of the CCA is going to prompt explicit sex scenes for Peter Parker, or cause Ben Grimm or Wolverine to start cussing up a blue streak (and what is a blue streak, actually? I’ve never understood that. Why should the color blue be associated with dirty words? Blue is a very unfilthy color. The sky on a gorgeous day, is blue. Noble lineage is referred to as blue bloods. Blue is the field on the stars and stripes. Blues is the soul music of an entire people. A bride is supposed to having something blue on her. So if you’re using dirty words, why a blue streak? A blue streak, by association, should be clean and pure and soulful. Brown streak. That makes more sense. Anyone who’s ever had to launder a kid’s underwear will tell you about how unpleasant a brown streak can be. Tough to come out, not real pleasant to deal with. Yeah. Curse up a brown streak. I like it. But I digress…)

What Marvel has really done is taken personal responsibility for its line. There’ll be no hiding behind the CCA if a storm rolls in over content; then again, the CCA was always a tattered umbrella at best, unknown to most parents as any sort of guide and rather irrelevant in terms of protection.

* * *

Oh, yes, summertime memories of comics…

There I was, fourteen years old, lying on a towel near the community pool. I was reading a copy of Spider-Man.

“Hi,” I heard a musical voice say, and couldn’t believe it. It was Debbie Foster, whom I’d had a crush on for two years. I couldn’t believe she was noticing me. She was wearing a two-piece blue-and-white checked bathing suit, and was toweling dry her hair. I’d never seen anything as sensuous in my young life. “I didn’t know you came here.”

“Sometimes,” I said, trying to keep my voice from cracking.

She glanced at the comic. “Are you holding that for your little brother?” she inquired.

“No,” I said, and the moment I saw the reaction in her eyes, I knew I’d blown it. I read comics. To her, that meant I was an idiot.

“Oh. Well… see you around,” she said, and walked quickly away.

Ah, summer memories…

* * *

Now that Marvel’s taking responsibility for its line, it might want to start taking responsibility for making life bearable for its writers.

Every month, DC sends out bundles of comics to the various folks who produce the titles. To some degree it’s a courtesy, a perk. But it serves an even more valuable purpose: It enables writers to stay apprised of what the heck is going on in other titles. Marvel, for what I can only presume is cost-cutting purposes, doesn’t send out comps anymore. Or if it does, it’s only to a handful of folks.

Do you have any idea what a pain in the butt it is to plan stories in a shared universe wherein no one shares. Any given month there may be developments with villains I was thinking of using, heroes I was thinking of guest-starring, or even my own character, showing up in another title without my knowing the developments therein. Nor is there any clear, consistent means of always knowing who’s going to be available in the coming months, or if there are going to be any major changes in the character’s status. Yeah, yeah, I know, we could always read Diamond Previews. But saying “The Absorbing Man guest stars in Thor!” isn’t good enough. It would help to know if, by the end of that issue, the Absorbing Man is going to be in one piece… literally.

For that matter, it also helps to know the types of stories other writers are doing, just so you don’t wind up producing a storyline that is too similar. Fans just love to claim rip-offs.

Theoretically editors should be monitoring this stuff, but that still guarantees that writers’ access to info is going to be catch-as-catch-can. What Marvel desperately needs is a monthly update synopsizing everything that happened in every Marvel title, which would then be circulated to all writers. Furthermore, it also needs a regularly published “directory” (call it “Who’s Where”) of Marvel heroes and villains, detailing current status and availability (so we don’t have Venom showing up in four titles simultaneously.) Especially if Marvel now has effectively two sets of universes (regular and Ultimate) to keep track of.

This wouldn’t be that hard to do if you get the right person. Peter Sanderson certainly comes to mind: Sanderson used to be Marvel’s continuity maven, and then he was let go in one of the purges some years ago. He knows this stuff better than anyone. Bring him back to help facilitate some sort of organized checklist. Hell, you don’t even have to mail it; these days just about every writer is online, so it can be emailed.

If Marvel doesn’t feel it owes writers the courtesy of free comics, at the very least it owes writers the courtesy of enabling us to do our jobs as efficiently and error-free as possible.

* * *

Oh, yes, summertime memories of comics…

I was sitting on the subway, sweltering in the broken air conditioning. I was two days shy of my thirtieth birthday. Suddenly a gorgeous, exotic red-haired woman sat down next to me, looking around as if concerned she was being followed. “Don’t ask any questions,” she said quickly, grabbed my face and kissed me. Her lips were thick and tasted of the pine barrens. My eyes were startled, wide-open, and at that moment I saw a swarthy man walk past, glancing right and left, obviously searching for someone. Quickly I closed my eyes, giving in to the moment.

The moment he was gone, we broke contact. I blinked, an owl in broad daylight, and she quickly thrust a copy of Shazam #1 into my hands. “Get out here,” she said quickly as the train rolled into the station.

“But this isn’t my stop,” I said. “It’s 23rd Street. I was—”

“Get out here, drop the comic in the mailbox at the corner of 23rd and 7th, if you value your country’s freedom.” Quickly she got up, walked in the opposite direction that the swarthy man had gone, and out of my life.

I did as she said. I got out, went to the mailbox, which was right where she said it was. I dropped the comic in the box, jiggling the door to make sure it went in. I couldn’t help but note that the comic made a faintly metallic “thunk” when it went in. I turned, walked away quickly. When I was half a block away, the mailbox blew up. I still have a scar where a flying piece of metal nicked my right arm.

Ah, summer memories…

* * *

I’m still getting mail about DVD coding. All the things I talk about every week, all the stands I take, and that’s what gets me a record flow of mail? I mean, geez, when I defended Harlan Ellison’s lawsuit against AOL et al, I was prepared for hate letters from people who didn’t want their free downloading copyright-violation fun interfered with. But this war of techno-words regarding DVDs is driving me to distraction. And everyone keeps accusing me of spreading “misinformation” whenever I print someone else’s letter, as if I should “know better” somehow. As for me, I’ve still got 12:00 blinking on my VCR; I don’t understand what you guys are talking about, and at this point, I don’t care. For the love of God, just send them to “Oh So” and leave me the hell alone, okay?

* * *

Oh, yes, summertime memories of comics…

I’m 44 years old, the summer right around the corner, and I get email from CBG telling me this issue must, absolutely must, feature summertime recollections of comics. I don’t have any. I’m sure sometime, somewhere, something happened during a summer that was comics related, but it didn’t make an impression, and I wasn’t paying attention because I didn’t know there was gonna be a freakin’ quiz. The only thing I remember comics-related about summers, other than that summer is convention season, is that when I was a kid the mom-and-pop store where I bought comics had no air conditioning, and one large ceiling fan that hadn’t worked since the Eisenhower administration. So the place always smelled bad. Go try and make a column out of that.

So I made stuff up. I’m a writer. That’s what I do. Deal with it.

Have a nice summer.

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.)