Keith R.A. DeCandido's Blog, page 3

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “Into the Fire”

The Shadow War comes to an end and it’s kind of an anticlimactic disappointment. The Morden-Mollari pas de deux comes to an end, also, and it’s way more satisfying. The Babylon 5 Rewatch goes “Into the Fire.”

An excerpt:

In every prior scene with Mollari and Morden going back to the latter’s first appearance in “Signs and Portents,” Morden is playing the ambassador like a two-dollar banjo. Morden always has the upper hand, always is in charge of everything that’s happening. When the prime minister brings the Shadows’ proxy to him in “Into the Fire,” however, for the first time, the positions are reversed. Peter Jurasik cranks up Mollari’s tropism for theatricality up to eleven, repeatedly and bombastically showing that he has the upper hand no matter how many times Morden tries to counter it. Then the crowning moment of the scene, which is also the simplest: removing a small remote from his pocket and pushing the button, with Morden having very generously provided a rhetorical opening. After that, Morden is carried off, the character showing true emotion for the first time ever, and Mollari very quietly promises far worse to be done to him.

book launch party for Supernatural Crimes Unit: NYPD on 10/28 in the Bronx!

Two years ago today, I started writing Supernatural Crimes Unit: NYPD Book 1: The Thin Blue Ley-Line.

Two weeks from now, that book will be published, and I’m havin’ a party!

Come one, come all to the Tea Room, adjacent to the Burren Public House in the Bronx, on Tuesday the 28th of October — the official pub date for SCU — and celebrate this new series with me!

I’ll have copies of the book for sale, and there will be food and drink for sale at the venue as well.

Some more details on the Facebook event page I created.

Hope to see folks there! YAY BOOK!

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “The Long Night”

Two characters reach the end of the line, one inevitable and welcome, the other sad and tragic. The Babylon 5 Rewatch stays up through “The Long Night.”

An excerpt:

One of the things I particularly admire about this episode is that J. Michael Straczynski recognized that the standard pacing of an episode wasn’t going to work here. So rather than intercut between the tragic setup of the Vorlon-Shadow showdown with the sacrifice of White Star 14 and the cathartic conclusion of Emperor Cartagia’s reign over the Centauri Republic, each part stands more or less on its own, with the latter taking up most of the first half of the episode, and the former taking up most of the rest.

And it works beautifully. We’ve spent the last four episodes being given ample evidence of how absolutely awful Cartagia is, aided by a magnificently sneering performance by Wortham Krimmer. And in case, we’ve forgotten, we see plenty of the epically mercurial emperor here, from his murder of the jester to his turning on Mollari right before Vir stabs him.

I won’t be at New York Comic Con, but my book will be!

GOOD NEWS! The Blackstone booth at New York Comic Con (booth 3544) will have exclusive autographed copies of the hardcover of Supernatural Crimes Unit: NYPD Book 1: The Thin Blue Ley-Line for sale!

BAD NEWS! I won’t be there to personalize those autographs, as dojo business is going to keep me away from NYCC this year, alas. (We’ve got a ton of people coming in from our Italian branch for a couple weeks.)

But if you’re gonna be at the con and don’t want to wait until the 28th to get the hardcover, now’s your chance to get it, complete with autograph!

Archon 48 over and out

My first Archon was the 48th Archon, and I have to say that — after hearing about how nifty this convention was from many people, most notably fellow authors (who are local to the con) Elizabeth Donald and Van Allen Plexico — I’m really glad I finally made it here as their Toastmaster. Thanks to last year’s Toastmaster, Dana Fredsti, for recommending me.

Flying out on Thursday had a slight hiccup, but only a slight one. I forgot to pack my passport, and my drivers license isn’t yet a Real ID. However, in practical terms this just meant I had to carry a bright red piece of paper that said “NO REAL ID” through security like I was wearing a scarlet letter, and also be walked through it by a TSA representative. (On the way back this morning, it was even less of a big deal, with my being handed a less obtrusive white piece of paper, could go through the metal detector on my own, and then had to have my hands swabbed to prove I hadn’t handled a bomb recently or something.)

On the flight out I wrote a foreword for an anthology, and then worked in the hotel restaurant on my opening ceremonies skit. (Basically, I spent it making fun of Chat GPT and AI in general, which I thought was a worthy target. I wrote screwed-up bios for the guests of honor as I introduced them, then went to the web site to find the right ones. Everybody laughed.)

My panels were all excellent, but I want to single out the Friday-at-noon world building panel, which was to a packed room despite being Friday at noon. I also want to thank the four people who came to my reading, and Caitlin and Ashley who not only came to my autographing, but hung out with me for a while.

One of the best things about the con was being able to hang out and chat with folks I don’t get to see/talk to that often, including the aforementioned Van and Elizabeth, as well as Elizabeth’s husband Jimmy Gillentine, the various Literary Underworld folk (Diana, Cole, and all the others whose names I’m forgetting because I’m a dumbass), Donna Munro, Mark Tiedemann, Steven H. Silver (however briefly), Richard C. White, and fellow guest of honor Melinda M. Snodgrass, as well as various fans most notably Kerri, who’s a huge Supernatural fan, and was very happy to get her copies of Nevermore and Bone Key signed.

My friend Anastasia Klimchynskaya came down for the con also, and made sure I got to see other things, taking me to Left Bank Books (I bought a Keith Haring book I didn’t know about, as well as a button) and to the Arch (see picture with this blog post). She also took me to a movie theatre to see the “launch party” for Taylor Swift’s latest album, The Life of a Showgirl. Swift is someone I’ve admired for some time — mostly because all the right people hate her — but I haven’t yet tried to seriously get into her music. This 90-minute film presented all the songs on the new album, as well as the making of the video of the first single, “The Fate of Ophelia.” The video hooked me instantly, as it opens with a re-creation of the pre-Raphaelite painting Ophelia by John Everett Millais. Unfortunately, while she is an excellent singer, and her lyrics are superb, the actual music behind the words left me completely cold. It felt soulless to me. Anastasia assured me that not all her music is like that, which is encouraging, but alas the movie failed in making me want to buy the album.

And then we had an adventure on the way back as Anastasia hit something on the road that shredded the front passenger tire, and we had to change it in the dark. Luckily, her car had everything you needed to change the tire, and our cell phones have flash lights…..

We got back to the hotel and went immediately to the Literary Underworld party because there’s booze there…..

Anyhow, despite the bits of lunacy, the con was most excellent, full of wonderful people, entertaining panels, and folks who thought enough of my presence to seek out my work, whether buying copies of my books that Sally Kobee had for sale or preordering Supernatural Crimes Unit: NYPD Book 1. My favorite moment on a panel was during the “Ideas are Easy, Writing is Hard” panel, when Kurt Pankau turned to me and good-naturedly complained, “Usually, I’m the one with the big energy on a panel, you’re messing with my mojo.”

As I write this I’m sitting in the airport waiting to board my flight home. I had a great time, and I want to extend major thanks to the entire concom, but especially to co-chairs Tricia and Scott and guest liaison Zo and chauffeur Alan.

Still and all, I’ll be happy to return to the wife and the kitty-cats, not to mention my own bed…..

new on Patreon: The Thursday Murder Club

I’m trying to catch up on my reviews and vignettes for my Patreon, and it starts today! For all patrons (and for $3 for non-patrons): a review of The Thursday Murder Club, the delightful Netflix movie based on the Richard Osman novel. Here’s an excerpt:

The storyline beautifully and subtly plays with several different themes, particularly the mistreatment of marginalized people—primarily women and immigrants. The TMC was started by Penelope, a former policewoman, now in hospice care and in a non-responsive coma. The 1973 murder was one of her cases, but it was never one she wanted the club to solve. She always thought the boyfriend did it, but he claimed that a masked intruder did it, and the male detectives believed him. The boyfriend went missing after that, and the case went cold. There’s also De Freitas, who, as a PC and as a woman of color, isn’t taken at all seriously by her colleagues until the TMC manipulates things so that she’s transferred to CID. Bogdan’s sick mother turns out to be a very important plot point, one that shows the appalling treatment of immigrants in the post-Brexit UK.

Most impressively is Kingsley’s Ibrahim. The character talks often (particularly during a eulogy) about how much he loves the accepting community of Cooper’s Chase, and also is subtly queer-coded throughout—notably, referring to himself as a “confirmed bachelor” when the TMC are asked about their marital status, which was code for “gay” during the mid-to-late twentieth century—and it’s confirmed in the end when we see him and Joyce comparing pictures. Joyce has a whole album of pictures with her late husband. Ibrahim then removes a picture from a hidden compartment in his wallet of him as a young man with another pretty young man. At no point does Ibrahim identify who the man was to him, but it’s obvious from the way the scene is set that that was the love of his life, and the single buried picture contrasts with Joyce’s photo album to show how unacceptable Ibrahim’s sexual orientation was in his youth.

Check it out!

my Archon 48 schedule

I will be the Toastmaster at Archon 48 this coming weekend in Collinsville, Illinois (a suburb of St. Louis). Here’s my schedule:

Friday

12-1pm: “The Art of World Building,” w/Donna J.W. Munro, Debbie Manber Kupfer, Ray Tabler, and David Von Allmen (Marquette A)

6-6.30pm: opening ceremonies, w/Tim Griffin, Tony Mast, Carrie Savage, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Alyssa Winans, Erin McFadden, and Scott Corwin (Lasalle)

9-10pm: “Trope Survivor: Fantasy Edition,” w/Kathryn Sullivan, Brian Katcher, and Claire Ashgrove (Salon 4)

Saturday

10-11am: “Building Believable Worlds,” w/Cole Lanahan, Angie Fox, Richard C. White, and Christine Amsden (Marquette A)

11am-12pm: reading (Fishbowl)

3-4pm: “Ideas are Easy, Writing is Hard,” w/Cole Lanahan, John Hornor Jacobs, Ray Tabler, and Kurt Pankau (Marquette A)

4-5pm: autographing (Fishbowl)

Sunday

3-4pm: closing ceremonies, w/Tim Griffin, Tony Mast, Carrie Savage, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Alyssa Winans, Erin McFadden, and Scott Corwin (Lasalle)

Sally Kobee of Larry Smith Books will be at the show with several of my books in stock. Looking forward to seeing folks!

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “Falling Toward Apotheosis”

It’s a very hifalutin title for a generally transitional episode, though it does have a major development with the Vorlon ambassador, and we finally find out how Sheridan survived Z’ha’dum. The Babylon 5 Rewatch starts “Falling Toward Apotheosis.”

An excerpt:

And we finally find out how Sheridan survived Z’ha’dum, and it boils down to “a wizard did it,” and holy crap is it arbitrary and silly. This show’s commitment to “life force” as a real thing is bad enough, but the notion that Lorien can only give Sheridan twenty years’ worth of hit points is just ridiculous. Twenty years is less than an eyeblink to someone who has allegedly been around for billions of years—I can’t even imagine it as a span of time he can even think in terms of, anymore than I ever think in terms of picoseconds. It’s pretty much performative writing to the finale, and it’s never good when you can see the strings…

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds third season overview

A look back at a season that had one serious low point (“Four-and-a-Half Vulcans”) and not really any high points. My overview of a very disappointing third season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.

An excerpt:

Part of the problem is that there’s a line between genuinely setting up the show for which you’re a prequel and engaging in self-indulgent nonsense that goes for the nostalgia hit over story sense and/or continuity maintenance. And season three of SNW dances back and forth over that line, um, a lot.

The thing is, when it’s on the pure setting-up side, we get some absolutely great stuff. “The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail” does a magnificent job of showing the embryonic forms of the relationships that Spock, Uhura, Chapel, and Scotty will have with Jim Kirk and each other on the TV show that aired six decades ago (and its followup movies). For all that the episode is generally horrible, “Four-and-a-Half Vulcans” does do fine work in deepening the specific friendship between Kirk and Scotty, as does “New Life and New Civilizations” for Kirk and Spock. And several episodes this season lay the groundwork for the Chapel-Roger Korby romance that was the backstory of “What Are Little Girls Made Of?”

On the other hand, there’s some self-indulgent nonsense, bits that are done as fannish references that hinder the storyline, some of which works better than others.

coming in 2026: The Inflictors!

I’ve signed a contract with Spare Oom Press to do a new novel about a team of superheroes in 1977 New York City, The Inflictors. We’re planning to release Book 1, tentatively titled Come Together, in the spring of 2026 with the official launch at JordanCon.

Anybody who’s read my Buffy the Vampire Slayer novel Blackout or my Limbus Inc. novelette “Right On, Sister!” or my story “Order Up” in the most recent issue of Weird Tales knows how much I love writing fiction that takes place in the decade in which I was a child, and I’m very much looking forward to once again going back in time to write about the swingin’ seventies with this new title.

Oh, and speaking of “Order Up,” that story takes place in the same setting as The Inflictors.

More soon……………