Podcast at the End of the Universe Episode 8!

[Kim]

We are here once again to finish our discussion of The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson and Sphere by Michael Crichton.


You can listen on Soundcloud, iTunes, or your favourite podcast app!

[Sarah]

I loved it again, guys! My favorite moment was when Milly said "How do you fall under a couch?" I was laughing so hard I had to stop what I was doing.

And I'm pretty sure that was Milly, but if it was Way then I apologize. Thank you for continuing to introduce yourselves, ladies. I do have some trouble telling your voices apart. You have mildly different pronunciations but I'm not used to it yet. Somehow using Woman 1 and Woman 2 seems insulting, with the even more appalling Girl 1 and Girl 2 not an option.

I can't wait to see what you guys have to say about next month's books!

[Trike]

I agree with Sarah Anne that both of the women's voices sound so similar that at times it's hard to tell who's speaking. In one of the earlier podcasts I actually thought only one of you were there.

When you guys were talking about whether these books pass this test or that test, the only one I was familiar with was the Bechdel Test. I have no idea what the other ones were. You did explain the lamp test, which I probably would have figured out from context, but it's possible there's someone out there named Lamp. One sounded like "monkey Morey" which is probably not it. ("This book approved by a monkey name Morey!") The closest thing I could figure was a reference to Mako Mori, the character from Pacific Rim. If that's the case, you should probably explain the reference, since almost no one saw that movie and I doubt many people who did see it remember her name.

I think dipping into the discussion threads would be beneficial, too, because a lot of people had some astute observations about these books. I think it was Silvio and Peggy who had some interesting one-off comments about Sphere that were also humorous.

[Trike]

Ah, the Mako Mori Test. I did not know this was a thing, and I'm a liberal male feminist who A) reads sci-fi and B) owns Pacific Rim on disc.

http://www.dailydot.com/fandom/mako-m...

[Sarah]

I was also wondering about that particular one. Thanks for the link, Trike.

[Kim]

I had no idea either, thanks Trike.

[Kim]

And good idea on the discussions thread. Might spend a little time before each podcast going through and pulling things out.

[Paige]

Trike wrote: "I agree with Sarah Anne that both of the women's voices sound so similar that at times it's hard to tell who's speaking. In one of the earlier podcasts I actually thought only one of you were there..."

Hey Trike, Milly here! It's the Mako Mori test, which was inspired by Pacific Rim, it states that there has to be one Prominent Female Character, The character must have her own narrative Arc, and that the aforementioned Arc, must not be in support of a man's story.

[Paige]

Sarah Anne wrote: "I loved it again, guys! My favorite moment was when Milly said "How do you fall under a couch?" I was laughing so hard I had to stop what I was doing.

And I'm pretty sure that was Milly, but if it..."

Hey Sarah! It was me, Milly that is! Glad you enjoyed it. I was so perplexed when I read that!

[Sarah]

Yay, I got it right! I didn't reread Sphere so I was surprised by that utterly absurd image. Thanks for mentioning it. :)

[Silvio]

I don't remember Jurassic Park or The Andromeda Strain having terribly memorable characters either, but the difference was in the ideas. In The Andromeda Strain weird stuff happened, and then you found out why it happened. In Jurassic Park someone told you bad stuff would happen, and then it happened. In both cases the explanation made sense with only small suspensions of disbelief. Here plenty of weird bad stuff happened, but then the explanation of it was even weirder than what it was supposed to explain. Also, because it was a psychological explanation, the racism/sexism problems got built directly into it instead of being more peripheral.

[Melanie, the neutral party]

@Silvio That's a good observation.