The Last Witch Hunter + other movie news

Posted on October 24, 2015 by Eric

I had the chance to go and see The Last Witch Hunter on opening day, so I took it. Headed to the theater early, got a great seat and started munching pop corn. IF you want to munch pop corn and have some cool visual stuff up on screen, this movie is good for that. Very visual – and I’m a visual person so it really worked for me. This movie is not deep, nor does it pretend to be anything other than what you’d expect. Vin Diesel really seems to be enjoying this role and all of the other things attached to the movie by extension. I liked it and I will likely grab the DVD when it comes out just to be able to go back over the scenes at the witch’s bar. Very, very cool stuff in there. I won’t spoil anything here – but there is a small twist. It didn’t have much set up and wasn’t particularly meaningful because it lacked set up, but it still gave a gratifying result. I’m forced to agree with Charlie Jane Anders – this will be a guilty pleasure film. Check out her review here.

One thing this movie did negatively impact for me was how I felt about a heavily produced role playing session that Vin filmed (along with others) – vaguely related to the film. Shocker, he plays a witch hunter character. I initially passed it along to friends, but the longer I go the less I like it. The “production value” is what really puts me off to it. It’s way too produced to make me think it’s anything other than a half hour movie commercial and I hate that because I know Vin is a role player and has noted many times in many places that he has a soft spot for Dungeons and Dragons. It’s a commercial. There, I said it. Why did they cut the scenes where there was out of character conversation? That’s where the real joy of playing can be found.

Now – IF Vin were to take his love for role playing and the seriousness and visual style of Last Witch Hunter and combine that into a Dungeons and Dragons movie I’d go see it. There are rumblings of another D&D movie out there, but those rumors do nothing but worry me. I want it to be done as seriously as Witch Hunter and not put comedians in key roles.

Continuing with the “other movie” stuff, I saw a report that said Johnny Depp is in talks to produce and star in a movie version of “Fortunately The Milk”. All I can say to that is PLEASE DON’T. Don’t get me wrong – I like Mr. Gaiman’s work. I love that story and have read it to my daughter a bunch of times. She loves it and reads it on her own these days. The problem I have here is that it’s a very short story. IF they had said they were making a half hour animated special then I would be thrilled. It’s just the right length for something like that. Put it on every year in September or something (the same way we get the Great Pumpkin around this time of year) and it would undoubtedly live forever. It’s just not enough for a feature length film. Doing that ventures into “Grinch” land and that mess with Jim Carrey still makes me mad.

Get some pop corn. Go see Last Witch Hunter!

Surprise!

Posted on October 11, 2015 by Eric

I was genuinely surprised. I got an e-mail with an invitation to be a participant at Philcon.

I was surprised on multiple levels – not the least of them being that I have no new work out this year. Not that it’s a requirement or anything like that, just that it was a thought stuck in my head. I wasn’t looking for or expecting this invitation and it’s a really good feeling to have gotten it.

Sadly, I have also been lacking in my promotion of local conventions.

YOU SHOULD GO TO PHILCON! Head on over to their page and check them out!

I know there are some folks who are hesitant to attend conventions for whatever reason. I can say you will meet some excellent people there. I always look forward to these things. I almost always have an amazing time. This is a place where stories are born. Don’t believe me? Read this from last year: Defend The Pizza!

100 From Amazon

Posted on October 9, 2015 by Eric

Amazon posted a list titled “100 Science Fiction & Fantasy Books to Read in a Lifetime”.

I know why people put lists out there. I often find them lazy attempts to fill blog space that would otherwise have nothing to say, but from time to time the infamous ‘they’ find one that resonates with me – and that’s why they do it. They want you to react. The more you react the more people you know go there to see what all the hubbub is about (and the more traffic they get the better the odds of making money).

I couldn’t resist this one. I went there and checked the list out.

I can certainly say I hope when the list is complete you’re not expected to be done with your lifetime. The editors based these choices on personal favorites, vision, character creation and other traits. I looked over the list and broke it down because I really wanted to know. Here’s how the numbers went:

I’ve read 50 of the list. Going back to my fear, that would make me halfway to ‘finished’ and I don’t think I feel good about that. I was a little surprised it was that many, but also a little surprised it wasn’t more. Of the 50 I’ve read there were only 3 that I really hated. I can’t say they shouldn’t be on the list, just that I hated them. That’s around 6% that just didn’t work for me and that’s not bad. The rest were stories I was OK with, liked or really loved.

I expected to see The Hobbit on there, and it was. I didn’t see anything by Morcock (Elric stuff) and was surprised by that. I wouldn’t have liked it particularly, but I expected it. I saw the Thomas Covenant stuff on there and I despised that first book. Still do, but I understand why it’s on the list. It was nice to see such a variety of good stuff.

Of the other half – I’d already had 14 of those titles on my “to read” list. I added 17 more based on this list. That puts me at 31 ‘to read” and that will be 81 of the 100. Not shabby. What about the rest?

In among those titles were a dozen where I’ve seen the movie adaptation. There’s a fair argument to be made that I should read those books – and I might. The problem is that while I know intellectually the books are likely far better than the film adaptations, I can’t bring myself to put those up on the list of “to read” until I’ve plowed through all the rest of the ones that I don’t know anything about yet. Should I rush to read Dune? I’ve seen a movie version and part of a television version and I know what those showed me. Do I want to dive into that series? I’m not sure. I’ve liked the other stuff by Herbert that I’ve read (yes, there are other things) but I’m not rushing. Will I ever get there? Maybe.

If you’re like a lot of my friends, you’re thinking to yourself – that still only gets us to 93. What about the other seven books?

OH – those seven. Those are the books that I’m just not interested in. There are various reasons for this and I won’t go into them all but I will give you an example or two. Handmaid’s Tale by Atwood – not interested. She’s had negative things to say about science fiction as a genre in the past and it turned me off to her and her work. Not going there – don’t care how good you think it is. Game of Thrones books – not interested. Yes I tried them. Yes I tried the show too. Martin chucks a child out of a tower in the first chapter. Yeah, I know he lives. Those people suck and I don’t want to read about them. I like people I can root for and I haven’t found a character in there I like. I know how stupid popular it all is. Still not going there. Are there other things by Martin I would read? Maybe. I’ve heard his new book is set in the same world but earlier. I’ve also heard that his Wild Cards stuff is really good.

There is it – the full 100. You should go and check out the list. I’d like to hear where you land in the count and if you shared a similar breakdown.

OH – and I still recommend this one as a fantastic start to a great series:

Storytelling

Posted on October 4, 2015 by Eric

I really like this little film. It’s only about 6 minutes long but somehow I’m drawn in and interested. There are no words and it’s all in black and white. It’s not as deep or I’m not as connected as I was with Wall-e, but it’s the same idea. Story telling that is at the core something that will draw you in. What do you think?

The Last Goodbye

I will also check out more of the music from Pilotpriest.

Nobody

Posted on October 3, 2015 by Eric

Nobody Gets the Girl by James Maxey
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I don’t know that I would have picked this book up if it were not for WTS. I have stalled on a couple of things I’ve been reading lately but this book certainly didn’t have that issue. I bought it Thursday afternoon and had it finished by Friday afternoon. It was fast.

It actually felt like I wanted to see it as a graphic novel, not a novel. There were parts that felt like they were full page panels.

I came away from the story wondering if I liked the hero or not. I think he’s got a lot going for him, but he’s also got a lot going against him. He starts as a regular guy and ends up working with comic book style characters to “save the world” but he’s also a murderer. I look forward to a discussion about this one.

View all my reviews

Guest Spot for Banned Books Week!

Posted on September 29, 2015 by Eric

I was very excited to be invited to write a blog post over at Books Are My Thing this week. That blog post is up there today. Head on over and check it out – and be sure to join in the discussion!

Books Are My Thing

Still Writing

Posted on September 21, 2015 by Eric

I know it’s been awfully quiet here lately. I’m working my way back to getting more stuff up here I really am. I’ve got a couple of things lined up. I’ve also received TWO invitations to anthologies! I’m very excited about this and have started cranking away on those ideas already.

More soon!

Work Swallowed August

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Eric

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything. That’s one of those traps with blogs – you have these gaps at odd times for various lengths and if people catch your blog at just the wrong moment then you’ve lost them. They think you never update or that you’ve blog faded or whatever. Well, I haven’t blog faded. I’m as inconsistent as I have ever been. Work (the day job supporting all this cool stuff) swallowed the month of August. The ravening beast of overtime licked his chops, bit down and shook me like a rag toy. I got flung to the side at some point and I crashed pretty hard. It’s hard to work up the desire to sit at the computer and type after you’ve done that for 10 or 12 or 14 hours at a pop for the day job. My wrists hurt, my elbows were inflamed enough for my wife to feel the heat radiating off them and my back was… painful. In short, that sucked and I’d like to avoid doing it again. I made it through – how well is yet to be seen.

In the middle of that mess I was able to attend Intervention 6. I had the pleasure of helping out with the children’s programming track again this year. I think it says something that staffing at a convention was a welcome relief from my work schedule. There weren’t a ton of kids there this year. I’m not sure why. Some of the kids have grown past the “little kids” program level. Some have made the return trip year after year, but it’s difficult to gauge the program not knowing who we’re going to get. I haven’t quite figured out how to make that work better. I’d normally give a review of the rest of the convention, but I really didn’t see it. I was there, I walked past it, I even chatted with some of the other folks there. Missed all the other program stuff. I can tell you there are some crazy talented folks working out there that deserve your attention. I can tell you that I’ve found a couple of folks that I may recruit to help with children’s programming next year – they were spectacular with the kids. In the end, the kids seemed happy and that was really the whole point. I call that a win.

I’m getting my writing geared up again too. All the submissions I had out there came back (rejected) during the month that was eaten so it’s time to get out there and keep trying. There are things on the way though – I’m hoping to have a guest blog appearance during banned books week! I’m sure there are other things I’m forgetting, but I’ll keep everyone posted as I remember them…

Mars

Posted on August 1, 2015 by Eric

The Martian by Andy Weir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A friend of mine said she started this book one evening and couldn’t put it down. I should have listened.

I started and finished this book this morning. I’m actually giving it 4.5 stars. It was a super fast read. There was a lot of “science” in there, but I put it in quotations because I can’t confirm any of it. You know what? I’m OK with that. It all sounded reasonably plausible to me (even the parts that I figure aren’t could work, right?). In the end this I think the science could be substituted out for any inhospitable landscape and particular level of ingenuity. Don’t get me wrong, placing the story on Mars makes this what it is but that’s just the backdrop. The really wonderful part here is the characters. They’re all people. There’s no trouble at all believing all of them as real. I totally believe this story could happen in our near future.

You know what else? I hope this and other stories of people overcoming great odds to accomplish things that move us toward outer space exploration (ahem, Apollo 13) become the sort of thing that inspires people to push for more exploration. This book was a heck of a ride. I can’t wait to see the movie.