Tansy Rayner Roberts's Blog, page 135

Batgirl #1, Stormwatch #1, JLI #1 [DC Reboot Reviews]

I have to learn that holidays or no holidays, Fridays are a write-off for me. I get nothing but the smallest tasks done, and while it's a good day for catching up on all the stuff I don't manage to finish while I'm writing novels through the week, I shouldn't get my hopes up.

So today I child-wrangled, and I got up my Friday links post, and that was pretty much it. But in amongst the visitors & child-wrangling, I managed to make this a comics day. I listened to the latest episode of Panel2Panel, featuring a great discussion on the (temporary) deaths of superheroes – I especially loved what Grant had to say about the importance of legacy heroes and how this gets sabotaged every time they bring back some old guy from the grave. And it's nice to hear Kitty's POV because I know so little about Marvel – I had no idea that Marvel don't have the same legacy tradition with newbies taking over the suits and hero names of their seniors!

I also listened to How I Got My Boyfriend Into Comics who also had an excellent main topic, this one being Supergirl vs. Superboy. I got all nostalgic for the Superboy comics I read when they first came out in the mid-90′s, with his leather jacket and stupid hair and Hawaii. Awwww, Superboy with no name, I did rather love you.

Raeli joined my comics party by discovering the Tiny Titans comics I got her on the iPad, and devouring them. It was a little scary. Tiny Titans are brilliant – the concept is pretty much Muppet Babies or Torchwood Babieez done with the Teen Titans characters and a few other guest stars like Batgirl. Each issue has a bunch of stories featuring various characters, some only a page long and others 6-8 pages. It's cute and smart and unscary, and perfect for my six year old. She even read one of them to Jem as a bedtime story. I gained some cool Mum points for being able to identify Terra and Raven, and I remain kind of glad she hasn't asked me why there are two Wonder Girls. I kind of love that their approach to DC canon is to just include everyone and am looking forward to the all Batgirls issue next month!

My favourite story of the Tiny Titans is in issue #1 (which is either 99 cents or free on the iPad) and features Cassie Wonder Girl deciding her new superhero costume is jeans and a t-shirt. This leads to some of the other kids wondering, how would Wonder Woman look if her costume was jeans and a t-shirt? (answer: kind of awesome) That's basically the level it's at, but did I mention adorable?

Now on to the grown up stuff! SPOILERS for Issue #1 of Batgirl, Stormwatch and Justice League International below.

Batgirl #1

Written by: Gail Simone

Pencils by: Ardian Syaf

I was in two minds about this one. I love Gail Simone's work, mostly through Birds of Prey, but then there was that whole issue with taking Barbara Gordon's powerful story arc as Oracle away from her, and removing the only disabled superhero from the DC Universe. On the other hand, as Godiyeva said very firmly to me on more than one occasion, putting Barbara Gordon *in* the wheelchair in the first place, and not letting the character recover like every other character in comics, was just as problematic.

I did very much like how Simone handled the transition, showing clearly that this is an alternative version of the DCverse in which Babs was shot by the Joker in exactly the same way, and confined to a wheelchair for three years before regaining the use of her legs. This event has had a deep impact on her, and changed the way she looks at the world – whether it be wincing at the casual ableism of her new roommate, or freezing in a fight against someone who points a gun at her. It's no Oracle, but I liked the fact that the storyline hasn't erased all of her complex history, and it remains as part of her personal baggage.

Everything else about this comic is pretty great. We see the warm relationship between Babs and her father, a new friendship forming with her activist roommate (who I'm guessing is anti-establishment and thus anti-police, so that could be interesting) and we get to see an awful lot of art of Babs swinging on a line, riding her cool motorbike, etc.

It's well written, the art is easy on the eye, it's very gung ho girlpower and yeah, I love my Babs.

VERDICT: Almost certainly a keeper.

STORMWATCH

written by: Paul Cornell

pencils by: Miguel Sepulveda

This is a far better introduction to a team book than poor old Justice League #1, and that's with me still hardly knowing who anyone is. The whole thing is coming across as a bit of a Torchwood of the superhero world (I mean this is a good way!) in that it's all a little darker and grittier, there are lots of panels drawn in sinister alleys and so on. I'm intrigued. I love me some Martian Manhunter and I very much like how he's written and drawn here, plus bonus points for remembering he's a shapechanger (amazing how many stories forgot this).

All I know about the previous iterations of this comic is that it's come in from some other comics company that's a lot less straightlaced than DC, and that it features a gay couple who get married someday. Which is kind of awesome. I do like what I've seen of Apollo and the Midnighter, even if that isn't very much.

Basically I suspect this is one of those I'll be going back and re-reading once I have half a dozen or so issues, and enjoying even more. I'm not there yet, but the introductions so far have encouraged me to keep going.



VERDICT: So far so good.

Justice League International #1

written by Dan Jurgens

pencils by Aaron Lopreski

This is where I have to admit what a Justice League International tragic I really am. Give me an international team of superheroes almost no one has heard of and some random adventure and a bit of inter-team bitching, and I'm there. Having said that, this issue was a bit more lukewarm than I was hoping for, as I have a bit of a soft spot for the Justice League Dan Jurgens wrote back in the day, and for the Death of Superman comics which remain the only substantial Superman run I've ever read properly.

The actual team itself excites me. Short of bringing Ted Kord back from the dead as Blue Beetle, I couldn't really ask for more. And I don't require full on bwa-ha-ha humour for it to feel like my Justice League, I'm happy for characters like Booster Gold, Guy Gardner, Fire, Ice, etc. to be taken seriously. But…

The set up worked for me, the adventure worked for me, and the art is exactly the kind of art I associate with this kind of Justice League. Having Booster Gold as the leader is bizarre to me but it fits with everything that's gone before, and Guy Gardner refusing to accept that was just as believable. Even a bit of Batman coming along for the ride was cool. I appreciate a nod to the past with a new Rocket Red, and the banter between him and the new Chinese hero August General in Iron was fun.

The scene in which the international council run through the potential superheroes and rule out a whole bunch of them delighted me (Plastic Man who I hate with a fiery vengeance – no; Blue Beetle who is adorable but would make me sad with the not being Ted Kord – no rookies; Batman – didn't you say you wanted heroes we could control?). It brings me back to the old JLI days and the old Justice League Europe days, and aww. Nostalgia.

But where were Fire and Ice? They are drawn brilliantly, but Ice only had a single line that actually sounded like it came from her (talking with Booster about how to handle Guy) and one that was generic banter and most definitely not Tora-like at all. I'm pretty sure Fire got no lines at all, and no hint as to her personality. And yes sure, it's problematic that the Brazilian superheroine's personality usually consists of a) being sexy b) being kind of a bitch and c) having a hotblooded temper, but COME ON. I love to her to bits, and I'm delighted to see her and Ice in the same team because frankly I never entirely got over Ice's death back in the 90′s, and where is my girl friendship? Where is the teasing Booster?

Where, in short, are Fire and Ice, because I did not see them participate in this comic.

I wouldn't have minded if the reason they were being sidelined was so as to give more attention to the new female characters, Vixen (not that new as she was in your Mama's Justice League, post-Crisis, late 80′s style) and Godiva (who I remember from the Global Guardians – she has big hair. And fights with it.) but there wasn't really a lot of that. Godiva is the most prominent female character in this particular issue, when it comes to actual dialogue, and we learn that she is British (honestly I never knew this about her before), she's a bit bitchy and a bit flirty (THAT IS FIRE'S JOB OMG) and a bit bolshy. Vixen is suspiciously quiet.

So yes there is a lot of potential here for it to be a fun, great comic, and I love that the diversity is so much better than the "real" Justice League, as is only appropriate for a comic with 'International' in the title, but it doesn't matter if you have four women on the team instead of one if you never let them do anything or show off their personalities. Or have personalities.

All having different coloured hair is not enough. I expect better!

VERDICT: Who am I kidding? Justice League International tragic. Damn it, damn it. Short of them actually killing both Fire and Ice off, I'm here forever.

I'm starting to remember why it took me so long to quit comics last time. Damn it.

Friday Links is interested in Novels now

Jem demands extra Amy Pond content in all of Mummy's blog posts

The big news in indie press is that Alisa Krasnostein of Twelfth Planet Press, publisher of my own Love & Romanpunk and Siren Beat, is opening her doors to novels in January 2012. Exciting times!

Meanwhile, Narrelle M Harris, self-reprinter, discusses that other kind of indie press, and whether self-publishing is actually all about vanity.

Jason Nahrung has been on fire lately with some brilliant posts about our changing industry, and I particularly liked this one: Putting the eeeeee in e-books.

Meanwhile the Stella Prize for women was officially launched. Is it too much to hope that a spec fic writer wins it in the early years? Alisa, get publishing!

Aliette de Bodard wrote a marvellous rant which examines the way that US storytelling tropes are so ingrained in global culture that they basically dictate what is considered good and bad writing. I think this is a very important topic and one that bears further discussion.

Ellen Datlow is angry about the portrayal of older women in fiction, and challenged writers to do better.

Juliet McKenna has a challenge of her own, for us all to promote equality in genre writing and reviewing. Kudos to SFX for publishing this piece which criticises their own practices as well as those of the industry as a whole.

Elizabeth Bear has written a fascinating essay on Charlie Stross' blog, about the role of the singularity in the science fiction community, and the issues she had with it as a concept. She talks about gender and diversity in this "rainbow age" of SF, and it's well worth a read.

Meanwhile, there's a new blog about science fiction in YA, something I know is on a lot of our minds at the moment! (not looking at Cat Sparks or Simon Haynes in particular) And if you missed it, here's my blog post on the Locus Roundtable about our family's favourite science fiction books for kids.

There's a great positive news story about Jennifer Yeh Nelson, a successful female director in Hollywood.

Glenda Larke has been writing a series of posts on her transition to using Dragon Dictate software to write her novels, and she talks eloquently here about the writing-related technological changes she has seen in her lifetime, and how writers with RSI or other medical issues that limit their typing abilities shouldn't be afraid to embrace the new.

Jim C Hines is once again showing off his chops as a good ally: in this case discussing what subtle (and in some cases not so subtle) differences he would face in his career if he had been born Jane.

Stirring stuff, but I also wanted to quote a tweet from Ekaterina Sedia which is certainly relevant, even if this wasn't one of the posts she had in mind:

@esedia Ultimate irony: male bloggers writing about the difficulties of female bloggers get gazillions positive comments!

Podcast of the week is the Outer Alliance/Writer and the Critic crossover, in which Julia, Kirstyn & Mondy discuss a range of queer fiction (including Horn & Bleed by Peter M Ball) and many of the issues that emerge from writing and reviewing work with queer characters. And stuff. It's brilliant, so listen to it! Also, the show notes are a work of art.

Big Guns and Banter: What is the point of Justice League #1? [DC Reboot Reviews]

So DC has this big reboot thing going on, and apparently it's a good time to hop on board. I've been a recovering DC Comics fangirl for a while now, and only dipping my toe back into the water through graphic novels. But the iPad has got me a tiny bit excited about comics again, and the relaunch includes day and date digital releases, so I decided to pick out the titles that most interested me (let's face it, mostly the ones with women on the cover wearing all their clothes) and review a huge bunch of #1 issues, whittling them away in the hopes of finding some regular comics to read and (hope hope hope) enjoy.

Despite being a woman, and a feminist. Yeah, I'm a bit trepidatious too.



Justice League #1

Written by: Geoff Johns

Penciled by: Jim Lee

I wasn't going to buy this comic. It certainly wasn't in my top 10 of 'comics of interest' in the DC Reboot, for several reasons:

1) I generally hate and resent any 'big guns' version of the Justice League apart from the original, thanks largely to Grant bloody Morrison's revamp of the comic in 1997 which destroyed the last vestiges of my love for the franchise by getting rid of all my favouite beloved beta-hero characters,

2) 'Big guns' generally means 'all the big name male heroes, and Wonder Woman cos you can only have one girl, hitting stuff'. I like most of the individual 'big guns' classic Justice League characters individually (if written well, obviously), but the fastest way to make them uninteresting to me is to smack them all together in the same comic. To me, Superman, Batman, Green Lantern (Hal) etc. work best as mentor figures rather than teammates, because the plots just turn into enormous slugfests and writers struggle to create threats or storyline that honestly couldn't just be handled by Superman OR Batman OR Green Lantern, etc.

3) Also I think it hurts a group book when almost every single character has their own comic title (or several) because it means little in the way of character development or personalised story is going to happen in the group title. Plus it means insane over-wrought multi title arc stories, which never show off characters or books to best effect.

4) I also, frankly, hate all modern reboots of the Justice League origin story of the post-Crisis era, because all the history and baggage of a group is what makes it interesting to me, and I resent very much the constant youthening of Wonder Woman (let's face it, she doesn't have to physically age, so why not let her keep her BRAINS), who for at least a decade was replaced in the origin story by Black Canary (because you gotta have a girl, but only one), and so on. If you're gonna completely reboot the damn title, then do something different with it, not a watered down version of what they did back in the 1960′s. The original origin story is retro cool, in a 'how the gang came together' kind of way, and all others have provided diminishing returns.

5) There was no Starro the Conqueror on the cover, so what is the POINT OF YOU, JLA #1???

6) to my shock and delight, they are actually doing a second Justice League title which appears (I hope, I hope) to have many of my old favourite characters, some humour, and basically allowing the beta superheroes to screw up in new and interesting ways. This is my Justice League. So the Big Guns can go stand in the corner with the popular crowd.

7) where is my Martian Manhunter? Oh, another comic. Bah.

Ahem, yeah, I wasn't going to bother with JLA #1, but then the first day of September rolled around and it was the ONLY DC Reboot comic released that day. What a cheap trick. Then I heard on Nerdzilla about how it was the top selling comic of the year even though it hadn't been released yet, and I figured it would be an easy way to get the hang of how this whole hard-soft-weird reboot is coming together, so I thought I'd give it a go.

[spoilers]

I didn't like it.

For a start we only get four characters from the total line up, and only three of them talk to each other. Mostly this is Batman and Green Lantern measuring each other's pectorals and finding them wanting. This has to be the most irritating version of Hal Jordan I have ever read (though to be fair I haven't seen the film so don't know if Ryan Reynolds gives him a run for his money), and the least attractive version of Batman I've ever seen (and quite frankly if Batman isn't hot then JLA what is the point of you?). There's hitting things and banter, and by the way no women at all, even the one that's on the cover. We get a hint as to Cyborg/Vic Stone's backstory, which is of interest to me because he's the only character who I don't associate with the Justice League history, but I read a lot of Teen Titans back in the day.

And really, when I look back on the issue, I'm pretty sure the plot (to be continuuuuued) is that Superman doesn't wear red undies over his blue tights any more. Argue with me if you can!

So no, not a success, and now I think I have to read another bloody issue to see if Wonder Woman gets to turn up in the next one. Or maybe I'll just check out what Nerdzilla & Panel2Panel have to say about JLA in future and devote my attention to the comics I actually think I will like.

Tansy's shopping list for this week was:

Batgirl #1

Action Comics #1

Detective Comics #1

Justice League International #1

Hawk and Dove #1 (Dawn is back! woot! I have a soft spot for Hawk & Dove when one of them is a girl)

Stormwatch #1 (this is for you, Paul Cornell)

and a bunch of back issues of Tiny Titans for 99 cents each!

The DC Reboot comics released this week that I didn't pick up were:

Swamp Thing #1 (no appeal)

Green Arrow #1 (no beard, Oliver Queen, what is the point of you??)

Batwing #1 (kind of intrigued by Batman of Africa concept but how can it possibly be done well?)

Animal Man #1 (I recall much dread and sadness from what little I read in 90′s plus the cover is hideous)

Men of War #1 (so not for me)

OMAC #1 (don't even know what this is)

Static Shock #1 (hmm actually I think I did mean to check this one out but I have already blown my budget. Maybe next week)

So stay tuned, more (probably shorter… heh, maybe) DC Reboot reviews to come!

Tansy Reads Agrippina: Republic Reading 2 October 2011

Tasmanians all take note! I'm reading at the Republic Bar on Sunday 2 October, along with first time novelist Cameron Hindrum. The event goes from 3-5 PM.

My plan is to read from Love and Romanpunk, probably the opening Agrippina story, because seriously that story was made to be read aloud. I'm really looking forward to it. If you haven't been to a Republic Reading before, they are very fun and relaxed, you can have a drink or something to eat, hang out and listen to stuff. They also have an open reading towards the end of the session – I think they used to put it in the middle but then everyone used to leave straight away and not stick around for the featured readers. Heh.

The event is about as family friendly as stuff in pubs is – which is a whole lot friendlier than it used to be thanks to the glorious smoking ban – and I'm pretty sure my kids will be there. Hmm. Not sure how family friendly what I *read* will be, so if you have smart old-enough-to-get-smutty-references kids you might want to take that into account. Or bring headphones for them. But you can rest assured I will not be reading anything that I couldn't in front of my six year old.

Oh dear. Maybe I have to re-think the story. Eh, I'll just let her play with my iPhone, she won't hear a word I'm reading.

TANSY REPUBLIC READING

DATE: Sunday 2 October

TIME: 3-5 PM

PLACE: Republic Bar, North Hobart, TAS

RSVP: Nope, just turn up.

COST: Free!

WILL COPIES OF LOVE & ROMANPUNK AND SIREN BEAT BE AVAILABLE FOR SALE: Hell yes! Not officially or anything, but I'll have a stack of both books propped precariously beside my cute children.

Writing Fantasy: Finding the Words

I had an amazing visit to the local Maritime Museum today, under the guidance of the most excellent Liz. Raeli and Jem had a brilliant time exploring the museum itself, which combined display and video material with some fabulous tactile exhibits such as wheels to spin, enormous brass bells to ring, and the hull of a ship for small people to hide inside (possibly this was not actually there for that purpose).

After stocking up on loot from the shop (an activity book and pirate craft project for Raeli, a pirate slinky for Jem, a book about female crewed ships for me) we were taken upstairs to view the sekrit stuff, namely the archive and private library, plus the many staff. I have to say this is the first time I have used writer credentials to get behind the red velvet curtain of anywhere! The girls were well behaved for a good 10-15 minutes as Liz showed me some of their digitised images and shared some gems about the history of the Derwent river. I already have extra Nancy ideas bubbling away, and plan to go back for more visits when not encumbered with two children with a patience time limit (well, the toddler, anyway. Raeli was a jewel the whole time, and charmingly fascinated with the place).

I'm almost at the end of the draft of the first Nancy novel, and while I'm very pleased with the writing and most importantly the scene-by-scene structure, it's not ready yet. Now that I know which time periods are going to be relevant to the story, I need to do a lot more research on what Hobart was like in those specific times, and figure out for myself what Nancy and Sylvie Napoleon were doing during those specific years.

But there's the other thing I need to do as well, which sadly no amount of historical books and visits to museums are going to help me with (unless of course they do). I need to find my words.

Language is one of those elements of fantasy worldbuilding that I rarely hear anyone talk about, but it's hugely important to me. Names have a power to them, and I can't get started writing until I know what my main characters are called – I'm still dealing with the emotional fallout of having to change a name in Fury, thanks to not realising until one particular scene that I had four characters whose names all began with the letter 'N' – but it's not just the names which help to form the story in my head.

Margo Lanagan once called me the 'queen of nouns,' which is one of my favourite quotes ever about my writing. I replied I think that she totally had to become the most famous of all our writing group because she writes the more inspired cover blurbs, and she replied to that by winning a bunch World Fantasy Awards and becoming super famous. What a show off.

But it's true that when it comes to fantasy, it's the nouns that pull it all together for me. Words have a power, and I love finding exactly the right ones to convey a world of significance in a single moment. I also look out for this in other works, the use of alien/fantasy words used carefully in context so you understand exactly what they mean, the use of created swear words, and my very favourite, the redefinition of a known word to mean something new and wondrous.

With Mocklore, glimmer and glint took on a very specific meaning, to the point that I can't read anyone else using the phrase 'a glint in the eye' without feeling sympathetic explodey stabbing pains. There are probably others, though those books are a galaxy far far away – I know that I worked to redefine what the word 'outback' meant, in Mocklore, in a Delta Void short story, and then there was Daggar with his Profithood and Profitscoundrel ways…

With the Creature Court trilogy, I made a lot of choices to do with words. There were the words that defined my magic system and the otherworld my characters inhabited: animor, courtesi, sentinels, creature court. I don't remember why I chose to erase the word 'night' from that world and replace it with the Latin 'nox,' but it worked I think to show the importance of the night, because the absence of the word shone out like a beacon. Also, I find, in fiction generally and in fantasy in particular, there are some words that are used so often they cease to make any resonance or sense. It was pretty clear that 'night' was going to be one of those words.

(the catch, of course, was how many times night is used as a compound with other words, which meant I had to decide what to do with nightgowns, midnight and nightmares.)

Likewise, while I love a good Duchess, I wanted my daylight folk to have a language of aristocracy that was almost but not quite familiar. I was throwing around hints of other languages to try to de-Anglicise my work, simply because so many very English terms are used incredibly commonly in fantasy. (not that there's anything wrong with them as words – but I like to keep myself interested with new things) So Ashiol's family are all about Duchessas, Ducomtes, Baronilles, and the like.

While 'princessa' is a term known to the daylight people, there are no 'kings.' King is a term reserved for the nox, and for the Creature Court. One of the choices I made was that, as culturally this was a role only men held, there was no female equivalent. So when Velody defies tradition to reach that rank, she's not a queen, she's a damn king. There's no denying that 'queen' and 'king' have different weights to them in our culture – why else would the man who marries a queen not be allowed to be named 'king' because then he would obviously out rank her? So I thoroughly de-gendered 'king' and very much enjoyed doing so.

The other gender choice I made was to write the whole trilogy without using the world 'girl.' I do use woman, as there are times when referring to women generally without an age reference is necessary, but the people of Aufleur themselves used 'dame' and 'demoiselle' as titles and descriptions for women. And maybe there isn't much difference between saying 'demoiselle' (meaning young unmarried woman) and saying 'girl' but it felt good, damn it, to erase that particular word and its cultural baggage from three books in the universe.

Thank goodness for search/replace functions, that's all I can say.

Having been playing in the Aufleur-Tierce-Bazeppe sandpit for so long, jumping back into Nancy's world was a bit of a shock to the system, not least because I don't have my words yet. I talked a little while back about not having my magic system nailed down. Mostly what I meant by that is that I don't have the words yet to convey what magic in that universe is like.

I still don't. It's rare for me to be this far along with a book and not have the words – but for once, the story is unfolding first. If I'd got horribly stuck, I would have gone away with a dictionary and thesaurus and nutted the whole thing out, but somehow, so far, I've got away with it. It's a tricky business. I am now a bit more firmly attached to the magic system, and I know there are two kinds of magic in this world – that which humans are allowed to use, and that which comes from the gods. I know it all ties in to the Pandora myth, though I'm not sure how. I want to use 'curse' quite liberally, though I also want to be careful not to use it in the same way that, for instance, Holly Black does.

And of course I need to pore over "Siren Beat," the original novelette, for clues as to how the world works. Sometimes my subconscious is good like that.

The tricky part for me is that while the story is set in modern Tasmania, and is predominantly about magic and magical creatures from European myth, it's also set in a world in which all the myths, basically, are true, and being slap bang in the particular ocean we are means Asian influences as well, and acknowledging the existence of monsters and magical wonders from as many pantheons and story cycles as possible.

Which makes it hard, of course, to settle on a vocabulary which encompasses all of those influences. [Love and Romanpunk's "Agrippinaverse" was so much easier by comparison, by only using Roman mythology & Greek by way of Roman, I had a vocab ready made for me - Latin all the way, baby!] I copped out on it in Siren Beat with the use of 'guardian,' and I'm still a little angry at saddling myself with that, one of the most generic fantasy labels of all time. But then part of me is wanting to use 'witch,' too, and that's even worse. Also, there are enchantresses knocking at the story door, wanting to come in. Damn it all.

As soon as the battle is over and the draft is done, I'm rolling up my sleeves and hunting down every single bloody one of the words I need to make the story AWESOME, rather than merely finished. I will conquer Nancy Napoleon's vocabulary if it's the last thing I do.

Then of course, once the magical part is nailed down, I need to use my rusty research skills to find the vocab so that my scenes dipping back into particular historical periods feels real. That's the good thing about fantasy – having used vocabulary to convey completely made up times and places, I'm well trained in introducing readers to new worlds. Now I have to do it with time periods too, which means actually locating real words, rather than letting my linguistic imagination take over. I've been having great fun picking up Victorian Australian slang, and need to do the same with some 1930′s lingo.

The other day, over a conversation on Twitter with Tania Walker about the way Tasmanians (especially older Tasmanians) use the extremely retro 'cobber' sometimes instead of 'mate,' it occurred to me that this word, which has huge resonance with me because it reminds me of my Poppy, who died when I was ten years old, was perfect for Nancy Napoleon. How better to demonstrate that she's a tough talking thug who's been living in the same city for over a century than to have her casually use a term like 'cobber' which is traditionally masculine, and belongs very much to another age?

One of my recent purchases was a book of Gothic Australian fiction. I often find that reading fiction that was written in a particular era is a great way to pick up on linguistic gems that the history books simply don't mention. There's a reason I went through my Evelyn-Waugh-and-Nancy-Mitford phase back when the Creature Court was unfolding in my head!

Also, possibly, when I'm applying all the exciting new vocabulary to my second draft, I will have to do something about the fact that Nancy Napoleon says 'fuck' in every second sentence. But that's a problem for another day.

Spaceships for Growing Girls

The new Locus Round Table topic is Fantastic literature for kids, with a particular focus on SF. Karen Burnham, currently at home with her brand new baby, outlines the beginning of the series here.

And the first post is BY ME! I made the science fictional personal by talking about some of the SF I read when I was young, but particularly what robots and spaceships are on my daughters' bookshelves. Including our favourite Play School modern classic, Jemima To The Rescue:

"A great feminist moment. She rescues the honey. The day is saved because Jemima is a big damn hero who is also good at her job. In space."

I don't know who else will be participating, but I'm excited to see their posts this month.

Elsewhere, Sherwood Smith talks about the perception that kids don't want to read science fiction. I was surprised at the premise as I have seen quite a bit of SF for middle grade around, and from what I hear, publishers are very keen for YA SF to take off as the next big thing. But the discussion & the comments so far are an interesting read.

Galactic Suburbia Spoilerific Book Club: The Hunger Games

It's the trilogy that put dystopia into YA and not only kicked Harry Potter and Twilight off the bestseller charts, but also shot them between the eyes with a crossbow. While they were stung by wasps.

Tansy and Alisa are spoiling the hell out of The Hunger Games, Catching Fire and Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins. Listener beware, the first rule about the Spoilerific Book Club is… WE SPOIL STUFF.

Please only listen to the podcast if you have read the books in question, plan never to read the books in question, or really truly don't mind spoilers. Also, towards the end, we get pretty spoilery about Harry Potter too. It's relevant! Mostly.

You can find the podcast on iTunes, by direct download or stream it on the site.

Daleks in Technicolour!

It was officially the first day of the school holidays today, and Jem was in daycare, so Raeli and I walked up the hill to Godiyeva's place to share a double matinee of Daleks with her three boys. I haven't really watched the Peter Cushing movies since I was a kid, but it was less than $10 for both of them together on Fishpond (billed just as Dr Who and the Daleks if you're looking, and yes they actually spelled Dr that way).

I was hoping the movies would appeal to the kids, as I don't have any hope of getting Raeli to pay attention to any black and white Who any time soon (though she loves Jon Pertwee). It worked far better than I expected! The kids were riveted to Dr Who and the Daleks – and I don't blame them. Damn, but that movie holds up. Once you get over the fact that it's set in a parallel universe where a human professor who calls himself Dr Who has two granddaughters named Barbara and Susan, etc (and the kids adored picking the differences between TV Who and Movie Who, listening to them analyse the whole thing was pure gold) it is a splendid way to spend lazy day.

I remember hating little girl Susan (Roberta Tovey) when I was younger, but I liked her a lot viewing the movie as an adult, and a mother of a six-year-old. Susan is plucky and cool, she uses her brain constantly, and her Grandfather treats her as a peer in science rather than a child, which is very sweet. The scene in which she is sent from the city to return to "TARDIS" herself through the petrified jungle is very compelling, and we all liked how brave she was. Barbara isn't too bad either, despite the trailer describing her as 'Dr Who's frightened granddaughter', her pink slacks and her astoundingly high hair. Sure, she has a boyfriend and isn't quite as heroic as her much younger sister, her role mostly being to kiss Roy Castle and look scared, but she is also spotted reading a science book early on, and has several semi-hero moments throughout the story.

Roy Castle as Ian was brilliant – he's very likeable, and the kids adored his bumbling slapstick acting, all the bumping into things and causing disasters, while the adults sipped their tea and noted the various times that Ian is blamed for some calamity that wasn't actually his fault. His transition from nervous boyfriend dragged into the family shed and whisked off for an adventure by accident all the way through to jungle adventurer and soldier is quite entertaining, and even if he and Jennie Linden have a fraction of the chemistry of the real Ian and Barbara, they still make a good team.

There's a domesticity to this TARDIS team which is completely different to their TV selves, but I'm okay with that – this works well for a film, and certainly made it very appealing to the kids. Family friendly indeed! If you're going to replace the actors, as was necessary for many reasons, much better to overhaul the characters from scratch rather than create some pale versions of the originals. Peter Cushing's Doctor is sweet and bumbling, and the whole adventure is about as scary as Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (in fact, Wonka might be a bit scarier in places) but I was quite okay with that.

The TARDIS design is fabulous, and you can see why the modern production team have stolen so many elements of Cushing's TARDIS – namely the size, the feeling of it being a scientist's shed, the outline of the windows in the door being visible from inside (the white inner doors comes from the second movie) and the put-together-by-a-crazy-person artistry of the console and surrounding giant computers.

I love the giant computers in this movie. They should mate withe Graeme Garden's computer from The Goodies and have babies. Laptop babies.

The absolute star of the film is the Daleks – not just their gloriously colourful selves, but the fact that they have so much more personality than in the TV show, and their world makes more sense. I was amazed by the design of the Dalek city, and the thought that had gone into Dalek architecture (though Godiyeva and I amused ourselves for sometime imagining what the Dalek version of Grand Designs would be like). Eyestalks on the walls as cc-tv were particularly brilliant, as were the spiky sculptures, the lifts without doors, and of course the smooth surfaces which end suddenly on cliff faces all around.

While I've always been attached to the Dalek design, etc., I've never been particularly interested in them as characters – the comic strips that were all Daleks, no people, for instance, bored me senseless. I was surprised at how strongly I enjoyed watching them in this story, possibly because it is the beginning of the history, when they're at their most intriguing, but I have to say I think it was largely because they looked so cool.

The colour also makes a difference – the kids loved the fact that they could tell the Daleks apart, and the scenes which are just Dalek talking to each other were surprisingly animated. We were also fascinated to see how the designs had changed – there were no sink plungers here, but elongated claw arms. The scene in which a Dalek actually frisks Peter Cushing was highly amusing! The guns were also interesting – mostly using 'gas' ie smoke machines, because of course it was a cheap but effective special effect to use, but the gas ranged from something that paralysed humans to something that was capable of blowing things up. Then there was the Welding Dalek with his flamethrower gun, capable of cutting through walls. Did they pitch that one as merchandise?

Speaking of merchandising, we came up with all kinds of merchandise concepts while watching this. I wondered aloud why no one has ever done graphic novels of Classic Who – it would be a great way of making those stories accessible to a new generation in a way that audios and even the existing filmed episodes can't quite manage it. We also want security cameras attached to eyestalks, please.

Oh, and the Dalek control room? Had lava lamps. Yes, really.

I don't know if the film would have been quite so enjoyable if not for the four children (aged between three and eight) loving the hell out of it, but I was quite buoyed by the whole experience, not least because they spent the lunch break afterwards all pretending to be Daleks, in a highly entertaining fashion.

Because yeah, there's the other thing. They sympathised deeply with the Daleks, especially towards the end where the humans turned on them. They were disappointed when their favourites got killed, and very mournful when the whole lot of them were wiped out.

We'll always have Skaro.

The second movie, Dalek Invasion of Earth 2150 (sponsored by Sugar Puffs! with gratuitous product placement in post-apocalyptic England) was not quite as well received by the kids, which goes to show that they are indistinguishable from 1960′s cinema audiences. I can see why, for many reasons. The story is grittier, and just plain less fun. Susan and the Dr are as good as ever, though separated for most of the film. Susan is again allowed to be very clever, while her Grandfather bumbles around on dumb luck. "Niece" Louise, the Barbara substitute, is given absolutely nothing to do (I suspect casting her was similar to the logic behind casting the underwear model in the recent Transformers film – Jill Curzon's primary role seems to have been to take lots of bikini pics with Daleks to promote the movie) though she does wear an intriguing jacket that's very steampunk by way of Mary Quant. That's basically it.

Bernard Cribbins, playing PC Tom Campbell (though we mostly called him Bernard, and Wilf) is by far the most appealing character in the movie. Like Roy Castle, his physical humour was much appreciated by the kids, and is pretty much an oasis in an otherwise humourless film. The scene in which he is pretending to be a Roboman (twelve years between 'a little short for a stormtrooper,' please note!) by eating with them but constantly falling out of sync was hilarious. I also really enjoyed the early scene which was basically him and Peter Cushing exploring a warehouse – it's a shame that the plot structure, taken as it it straight from the TV story, meant that he was mostly separated from the rest of the regular cast, without actually getting a chance to forge a relationship with any of them. The set up from the first movie with its pre-set relationship dynamic worked better in this regard.

If the Dalek architecture was the star of the first film, the star of 2150 AD was the gorgeous model work, especially the spaceship/flying saucer which is regularly seen soaring over London. It's just beautiful, and the final scenes in which it was destroyed put almost as much of a lump in my throat as the destruction of the original Enterprise. I wish they still used real model work in TV these days. CGI is amazing, but there's something about good models that feels more real.

The whole film in fact looks great, including the spaceship interiors, the grim remains of a post-invasion London, and the mine at Bedfordshire, even if it's stretching credibility that this film is set twenty years in the future of the 1960′s, let alone two hundred years.

And basically the whole thing is entirely worth it for the scene in which Philip Madoc in his trenchcoat is set upon by a horde of lavender Daleks. With a shed.

So yes, if you're prepared to click your heels and say "I don't care about canon, I don't care about canon," these movies make the perfect popcorn matinees for family viewing – and are a good introduction for small fans into the wonderful world of "look what they did there."

We struggled to get through the Dalekmania documentary that came with the movies – largely because the kids were so over the DVD by this point and busily setting off every remote control Doctor Who creature in the house (quite a lot, as it happens), staging an epic battle between K9 and a Gold Dalek, and generally creating a lot of noise. My favourite bit though was the interview with the actors who played Alydon and Dioni, the gilded and heavily mascara'd Thals from the first movie. Their sense of humour and memories of that time were great fun, and the anecdote about all the manly muscle men getting paid extra to shave their chests and arms (damages!) is worth listening to in the actor's own highly amused voice.

There's bonus footage of Terry Nation, too, with a gratuitous bookshelf of goodies behind him (whoa Terry, you had a LOT of copies of that book about Avon) and while I'm a little cynical about him at times, I did like hearing how hard he worked to protect the image of the Daleks from being figures of fun. Not sure how successful he was, but the fact that it meant so much to him was very sweet.

Watching New Who: Father's Day

Watching New Who – in conversation with David McDonald, Tansy Rayner Roberts and Tehani Wessely

David is coming to New Who for the first time, having loved Classic Who as a kid. Tehani is a recent convert, and ploughed through Seasons 1 to 6 (so far) in just a few weeks after becoming addicted thanks to Matt Smith – she's rewatching to keep up with David! Tansy is the expert in the team, with a history in Doctor Who fandom that goes WAY back, and a passion for Doctor Who that inspires us all (plus a six-year-old daughter who is finding her own Doctors for the first time). We're going to work our way through New Who, using season openers and closers, and Hugo shortlisted episodes, as our blogging points. Just for fun! We have already talked about:



"Rose", S01E01

"Dalek", S01E06

FATHER'S DAY – Season one, episode eight

The Doctor – Christopher Eccleston

Rose Tyler – Billie Piper

DAVID:

Perhaps I should have waited a little bit before writing this, because I am actually a little teary. That would have to be one of the most well crafted Doctor Who story lines I can remember, and it had everything that made me fall in love with Doctor Who to begin with. What a crunchy story, we get so many layers! Rose's relationship with the Doctor, the paradoxes and dangers of time travel (but no mention of the Blinovitch Limitation Effect!), and of course the foundation of it all, Rose's relationship with her father. Episodes like this can fall in the trap of laying on the emotion too thick, but they got it just right here.

TEHANI:

It shocked me a bit, seeing Rose and the Doctor being nasty to each other early in the episode. I mean, the Doctor is clearly very angry with Rose for saving her father, but the way they really aim at each other's weak points, with Rose throwing the Doctor's loneliness in his face – eep.

DAVID:

It's sadly accurate, the better we know someone, the more effectively we can hurt them. But, this gives us an interesting insight, I don't remember the Doctor ever being quite as vulnerable with one of his companions. Sure, there have been some (in)famous dummy spits (my favourite probably being Tegan's great line "Call yourself a Time Lord? A broken clock keeps better time than you do, at least it is right twice a day!") but there has always been a sense of the Doctor being a little bit above letting himself really get hurt by the things his companions have said. But, here the Doctor does have that air of loneliness, we really do get the impression that he is adrift and alone and that he needs Rose in his life, maybe even more than she needs him.

TANSY:

I like the fact that we see the Doctor and Rose's relationship develop. On the surface they have looked all along like the usual 'hooray we're travelling' pair, but there have been fractures and niggly bits all along to show that actually, they don't completely trust or love each other yet. This story is almost the row they had to have, to become a more united team. The Doctor's suspicion that Rose only changed her mind because of time travel, and she might have been using him for that all along, was really interesting, and I don't think we ever really know if that was true. It's also important because of what happened with the Adam storyline back in The Long Game where we learned that some people aren't cut out to be companions, and the Doctor won't forgive anyone who tries to use his gift selfishly.

TEHANI:

The Doctor seems so sad in this episode. When he lashes out at Rose, calling her a "another stupid ape", it feels like a lot of pent up sadness flows out, and stays out throughout the episode. He marvels at the ordinary people, and it feels like he wishes he was one.

TANSY:

That speech to the bride and groom about how they met, and how a story like that is wondrous to the Doctor because that's not the kind of life he has, is just lovely. I think there's a theme threading through this whole season about the Doctor's changing relationship with the human race. He's so angry at the start, I think because they're still here and his old world has gone. And Rose is slowly teaching him to respect humans again, to appreciate them as he used to (though he always had a love-hate relationship with the apes, especially the ones in uniform!). Ultimately of course we are going to end up with a Doctor who is ridiculously in love with the human race, but we're not there yet.

Humanity, however, is providing the Doctor with regular opportunities to save people, which is pretty much his therapy right now. Father's Day shows us how important that is to him.

DAVID:

There is a powerful line in that speech, which is brilliant, where the Doctor says "Who said you're not important?" To me, growing up, one of the defining characteristics of the Doctor was that he valued people on an individual level, not just as causes, and that he considered everyone important. He didn't really deal in the idea that the end justified the means, or that it was okay to sacrifice a smaller number of people to save a greater number. I think towards the end of the original series, as they sought to create a darker, grittier tone that they might have lost sight of that a little – the Doctor could be quite ruthless. In this episode we really see a return to the idea of the Doctor as not willing to compromise this ideal. At no point does the Doctor even seem to suggest that sacrificing Pete would be a neat solution, and not only save the people in the church, but the whole world. I think that is very important.

TANSY:

Yes, I agree with this very much – there's a theory in fandom that has come across very clearly in the narratives written for the Doctor by Big Finish Audio that the Doctor, either consciously or sub-consciously, shapes the identity of his next incarnation by compensating (and, usually, over-compensating) for perceived flaws in the current model. The Seventh Doctor is very much someone who looked at the big picture of the universe, and would be more likely to sacrifice an individual to save many more. The Eighth Doctor, in the various stories explored through the audio plays, will absolutely risk the whole of time, space and the cosmos to protect one person, at the beginning of his run, but it's implied they might be pushing him towards different choices later on, and he's certainly suffered enough that you can see the beginnings of the Ninth Doctor in him. There are some moments in the series they did with Sheridan Smith's Lucie Miller where he is actually called on his priorities by another companion, who can't understand why on earth he wouldn't sacrifice one person to save, for instance, a whole world.

TEHANI:

Your insights into the changes in the Doctors themselves is great to have Tansy. I've only got three Doctors to consider in this aspect (I loved Tom Baker, but have next to no recollection of his actual character in the show!) and they are all distinct within themselves – those changes in what is in essence the same person is part of what keeps the story alive, yeah?

TANSY:

And of course the Time War itself, which we will never see, has birthed this new, angry, lonely version of the man we thought we knew. He basically had to make that choice, to sacrifice his own people to save the universe, or so it is implied, and now is determined never to be that person again. I love that we get character progression still in a protagonist who is over 900 years old!

TEHANI:

The portrayal of Jackie here was interesting. We talked earlier about her, and Rose has this image of her dad from Jackie that paints him as a saint, but the actuality is pretty different. Which leads into another episode later on I guess, of what would have happened between Jackie and Pete had he not died. Having said that, it was pretty funny to see the Doctor rouse on Jackie and her say "Yes sir."

TANSY:

This story is hugely sympathetic towards Jackie, and humanises her rather more. She has officially stopped being a caricature, and we can see exactly where she comes from, and why Rose's Most Exciting Adventure is actually something of a tragedy for her mother.

TEHANI:

It demonstrates somewhat the self-centredness of the young – Rose is really only thinking of herself. I don't suppose it ever occurred to her to think how Jackie was affected by the loss of her husband.

DAVID:

The scenes with her and young Rose completely changed my perception of Jackie.

Another one of the themes running through the episode that I thought was handled well was how it examined the way that we tend to sugar coat the past, and look back at people and events in an often unrealistic way. It's fascinating to watch Rose come to the realisation that her parents' relationship, and her father, were not exactly how Jackie had portrayed hem, you can almost see Rose's whole world view shifting. And, of course, that discovery that our parents are people too, with their own "story", is something that we all go through as some point.

I realise I may have gotten a bit philosophical in this post, but that is why this such a powerful episode, it tackles some pretty deep themes, and does it so very well.

TANSY:

it is a very deep episode, absolutely. It's rare to see the idea of an unreliable narrator played with so effectively in television, and it's done very well here. It reminds us too, I think, how young Rose is, and how uncynical she is, compared to the Doctor or even Jackie, for all her tough talk at times. And (looking ahead) I am very happy that she and Jackie have a conversation later on this season which addresses this episode, and what Rose learned about her Dad.

TEHANI:

In the end, I think Pete proved himself to be the Pete of Jackie's memories, rather than of her present. He sacrificed himself, not just for Jackie and Rose, but for everyone. He was pretty smart too, not wasting time flustering but figuring it out for himself, mostly.

And I should have noted too, that Pete isn't the only one who sacrifices himself – the Doctor does it too, putting everyone behind him and stepping forward in a last ditch attempt to save them.

TANSY:

I love Pete as a character. You can see how he and Jackie fit together as a couple, for all their flaws, and you can see parts of him in Rose. He feels very real – the storyline of the heroine's dead father sacrificing himself again to save everyone could have been completely naff, but it's amazingly touching because he feels like an ordinary bloke caught up in utter weirdness.

Also, I've got to say, Rose was raised without a Dad? Gee, I wonder what the appeal of the DOCTOR could be? Oh damn, I just squicked myself out.

DAVID:

Tansy, I don't think it gets to a squicky level, but there is definitely a hint that the Doctor is filling a void in Rose's life that her father's absence left.

TEHANI:

Just wait, David!

TANSY:

It's squickier if you've seen season 2, hehehe. But how awesome to have actual character motivations for a companion choosing to run into the TARDIS rather than just "oh, I just lost a female one, but here's this convenient Trojan handmaiden, let's take her." Which is, by the way, Tehani, a real thing that happened.

TEHANI:

Classic Who reference! I really must get to them

DAVID:

Pete is easily the strongest"supporting" character of the season so far, and there are two reasons. Firstly, Paul Cornell has written him brilliantly, creating a truly convincing character who feels "real", because he has all the flaws and strengths of a real person. We see this ordinary guy who has drifted through life trying to make something of himself, and frankly hasn't really done a good job of it, and who just wants to be a good dad. He is not some "hero", but in the end he does something truly noble and heroic, and we believe it.

Secondly, Shaun Dingwall deserves a huge amount of praise for his performance in this episode, I thought he was simply magnificent. It gives a lie to the idea that genre TV is some how a lesser art form than other types, I challenge anyone to find much better than his acting here. He walks the line between serious and humour perfectly. Billie Piper also impressed me, I have to admit I thought she was just another teen idol type pseudo celeb but she was brilliant in this, I owe her an apology! I thought all the main actors walked away with a lot to be proud of, really.

TANSY:

This is only the beginning! The work done in this season and the success of it meant a huge array of really good actors coming into the show. There will be many great supporting roles to come. But I agree that Shaun Dingwall and Pete are something special and (spoilers spoilers!) so glad that this isn't the last that we see of him. Which is of course the best thing about Doctor Who – you can always find a timey wimey way to bring back beloved characters.

TEHANI:

And we really should mention that in the intervening episode between "Dalek" and "Father's Day", we had Simon Pegg! I can't help but wonder if some of the great actors they get come on the show at reduced rates, just because they're fans!

DAVID:

The dialogue in this episode is sparkling as well, there are lots of times it could have been cliched or clunky, but Cornell has done a great job. There were two lines of dialogue that stood out for me in particular in this episode because of their context (one is the Doctor's I have already mentioned), the other is when Pete says "No, love. I'm your dad. It's my job for it to be my fault." I am not ashamed to admit that I found a lot of this episode really powerful emotionally, to the point of having to blink very rapidly more than once!

TEHANI:

You would have to be made of stone to not have the ending affect you. I'll say it again, not a Rose fan, but this episode really gave her a good showing.

TANSY:

Pete is a gorgeous Dad, he really is. And even though some aspects of his personality and life were an initial disappointment to Rose, when Jackie's fictional version of Pete conflicted with the real bloke, it's very cool to see that he would have been excellent at the actual Dad stuff. Though of course that makes it more sad – being an awesome Dad might well have been the making of Pete, and they never got the chance to find that out about him, in the original timeline.

Sniff. I think I have something in my eye.

Friday Links Learns that Meep-Meep-Meep is a colour.

Let's just stop and bask in the glory that is Muppet nail polish. Muppet nail polish, people!

Also, a TARDIS corset. Doctor Who cosplay is one of those things that has made my internet a better place over the last few years. I love these crafty, creative geekpeople!

Check out the Strange Horizons Fundraising Drive – and as an example of some of the great work they do, try this wonderful essay about Pat Cadigan.

 

John Scalzi has written an important post acknowledging the difference between being a prominent male blogger and a prominent female blogger, when it comes to the abuse and hate mail they receive.

I was deeply sad to read this post by Cheryl Morgan, who is feeling beaten down by the mudslinging she has been experiencing for years, and decided to withdraw her connection to many fan, volunteer and professional projects. Cheryl's commitment to our community and the science fiction field as a whole has always been inspiring to me, and it's devastating to realise what the personal cost of that has been for her.

Tehani is running a blog series on the relationship between pro writers and indie press over at The Booknut. I particularly liked this guest post by Trent Jamieson.

For my own reference, here's the schedule for the upcoming month of DC rebootiness. Even more exciting is this head's up I got from the Hathor Legacy about upcoming DC comics for kids. The special Batgirl issue of Tiny Titans looks fantastic, and as I'd never even heard of Tiny Titans before (hmm, though actually, it's sounding familiar now, Isabel did you mention this to me?) I immediately went to order some for Raeli.

I'm loving the Bitch blog right now – their 'we're all mad here' blog series is looking at some very interesting issues. I particularly liked the posts on the portrayal of crazy ladies in the animated Batverse, and Whedon's exploration of the use of institutionalisation to control women across his various shows.

Which is good timing to make another recommendation for