There has been some recent (well, relatively recent but I’ve been slow to post) buzz around a television series based on Dungeons & Dragons.
In theory, this makes me happy. The issue is that being too excited to see something like this frequently leads to a big let down or massive disappointment. I’ve been burned in that department before (looking at you D&D movie from 2000). Sure, the latest film Honor Among Thieves did really well and was a lot of fun to watch. It had some great moments and an enjoyable story. There were big name actors involved who actually took on the story, rather than taking on the roll as a… diversion or escape from some other engagement they didn’t want to deal with. I liked it and I’ve watched it more than once. I went and bought a DVD (yes, hard copies personally owned are still a thing) to support the idea that they should make more.
So, why am I not more excited about this?
Fantasy is a very easy genre to do badly. It’s also super easy to mock when it all goes wrong. It’s also maddening when the ‘fantasy’ aspect is wrecked in order to shoe horn in some standard Hollyweird bullshit that some executive who’s never liked that “geeky stuff” anyway thinks it needs. “Where’s the lovers triangle and who’s playing the handsome but misunderstood hero”? Insert vomit noises here.
The good – D&D is now socially mainstream enough that shows and movies are not immediately shelved. There’s hope that this new TV show (streaming show likely) will actually show D&D related things. Real actors, quality effects and a decent story. One article I read (like here) also gives some “geek cred” to the creators behind the process.
The bad – It’s a series, so there’s likely less in the effects budget and that’s kind of a big deal when it comes to magic spells and mythical creatures. It’s being set in the Forgotten Realms, but nothing more specific than that. That’s kind of like saying I’m making a TV show about the police and it’s being set in America. Thanks. Way to narrow it down. There’s an absolute mountain of material there, but that’s where the trouble always begins. The mountain of material falls into the trap of trying to mention it all. We even saw a peek of that in the movie. How many little ‘nod to the fans’ things were spliced between the scenes that moved the story? Can we use any of the things they used in the movie if this show isn’t attached to it? IF we can’t, does that mean we’ll never see anything else from the Red Wizards of Thay?
The worrisome – It’s being set up on Netflix as of right now. I like them as a streaming service generally. They are, however, notorious for giving a show five to eight episodes, letting it start to generate some buzz, then just killing it altogether. That would just make me more mad if all of the stuff above was actually navigated successfully and I was actually a fan of a good show and they axed it.
It’s a lot of unanswered questions. I’ll keep watching for more, but my hope is… guarded.
I’m happy to say that I’ve been invited to be a panelist at the annual convention of the Baltimore Science Fiction Society again this year. I’m very excited for it!
Fandom in general and conventions in particular have had a lot of hard times lately. Things that might have been easier to deal with in different social environments have become bigger and noticeably more damaging. Sometimes for the better – exposing less than wonderful people and removing them from the processes. Sometimes for the worse – bending to inappropriate social pressures and attacking people without just cause. All of these things have made what was once a shining thing for me a lot more tarnished.
I have been attending or speaking at this particular con for somewhere in the realm of 30 years. I’ve been through a number of things with them, a number of locations and a bunch of changes. I know a number of people who’ve decided to go other directions and can’t or won’t forgive the people running this convention enough to support them. I understand that – I have made that choice with a number of other conventions myself. I’ve decided to keep going here, and I’m glad they’ll have me.
I got my draft schedule the other day and I started digging into panels and descriptions.
I’ve shifted away from a lot of the author things. I haven’t had anything published in so long I almost don’t remember the process. I am still connected to fandom and gaming, so I’ve been added to a bunch of those panels. My draft list is:
What Makes a Good Player?
So you want to be a Game Master?
Coming out of the Dungeon
Being a bad guy without being a Bad Guy
Your Player Said What??
and – Making a Book Club Work
I spent a fair portion of my afternoon writing up a bunch of notes for these descriptions and doing some homework on my fellow panelists (not going to get caught off guard again if I can help it). I can’t wait to see what everyone else has to say… and I am really looking forward to coming back and giving a full report on it here. Stay tuned!
I have volunteered as tribute… I mean, I volunteered to be on panels at the Baltimore science fiction society’s convention again this year. I made that choice back around the first of the year (or maybe earlier?) when they sent out invitations. I haven’t heard anything yet, but that’s typical for any convention – many details, including schedules, run close to the last minute. I expect the schedule won’t be final until close to Memorial Day weekend (when the convention happens).
I understand there are any number of folks out there who are very down on Balticon and the people running it. I’ve witnessed some people getting rotten treatment and half ass apologies or no apologies. I know a large number of authors and vendors who are specifically not going this year, and likely never will again. There have been struggles.
Part of me very much wants to support my friends. I know first hand how behind the scenes stuff spirals out of control and becomes ‘news’. I’ve stopped all support for any worldcon and Philcon specifically for personal reasons much like theirs. I’ve posted about that before, both here and other places. Treating people shabbily is not excusable.
Balticon was the first convention I ever attended back in 1993. They were the first convention to invite me as an author guest. They were the first convention I displayed art at. They’ve been my ‘home con’ where I’ve participated for more than 3 decades. I’m going again this year. I am hopeful for improvements, but mindful of what has gone before.
Let me tell you something that isn’t a secret: people like good stories.
Somehow, people that create entertainment media tend to forget that. Sometimes the reviewers do too. A couple of years ago I wrote up a post about what you should be watching. The show in question is called “Love, Death & Robots”. It burst onto the scene with stunning visuals and garnered a massive response. New, short animations with crazy good stories from a list of authors known for their stories. I watched them all, then I re-watched them all, then I spent some writing time reacting to them and telling others about it. There are fantastic stories and mind blowing art in there. I still recommend watching them.
Last month Amazon dropped a series called “Secret Level”. It seems to me that this series is a direct reaction to, or perhaps decedent of Love, Death and Robots. I watched them all, despite Amazon being the terrible corporation that it is (I despise that we paid for no commercials and then they basically said, yes but pay more of live with them). As I watched them I could clearly and easily see how this series followed (mimicked?) the other. Thing is, it felt hollow. There was something missing. OH, that’s right. Story. All the episodes were meant to showcase a video game and the star studded voice actor line up. The episodes did that with gusto. The artwork and animation were amazing… but honestly, I expect that from companies that literally create the computer renders for the games they’re using as the basis for the episodes. OF COURSE they’re going to look good. I’d actually bet the people behind the scenes were able to save some amount of work by getting already created computer models from the game companies and/or using the same model software to create the shots for the series. Genuinely screen capture worthy shots. Fantastic looking, mesmerizing color. Very shiny… and kind of boring. If you’re not completely invested in the video games already, there’s almost nothing there beyond that.
To be entirely fair, I haven’t played video games in a very long time. I started in 8-bit land and never really progressed much further. Perhaps there are gamers out there who think this series is the quintessential embodiment of their favorite intellectual property. I don’t know. I clearly don’t get it. Some of the voices were recognizable. Some of the shows moved faster than others, some had more pull than others, but they all felt incomplete. The story just lacked. One in particular – the one with Arnold as the main voice actor – was absolutely unwatchable. I shut that one off and skipped to the next one.
I was going back through the site I use to track websites I want to read but can’t keep up with every day and found two old posts about this show. One touted the A-list cast and moving imagery. The other was about the series getting green lit for a second season before the entire first season was finished airing. Both of those short articles said the very same thing. Great voice talent. Great video game franchises that you will recognize. Neither one said anything about story. Not a word about it.
Before anyone tries to say I’m just a video game hater, that is not true. I understand there is, in fact, a great deal of story built into these game franchises. Stories in these games have fascinating ideas and can have massive, ever changing worlds involved with them. It’s a constantly changing field that offers up an immersive form of entertainment for all sorts of folks. It’s also a massive industry. I understand why show runners would try to take a video game property and create a show or movie from that.
Not every show can be a hit. Not every story moves you on a deep and meaningful level. A show really does need a story! There’s no two ways about it, this secret level can remain locked in my opinion. If you want to make it better, get an actual story to fit into these short episodes.
I spent my evening at the monthly meeting of my local science fiction (and fantasy) fan/reading group tonight. We’re about to wrap up our 26th? year. We’ve been at it a long time. One of the things we’ve been doing during that time is creating a monthly fanzine.
There was a time when I was very bitter that we were clearly eligible for winning a Hugo award in the fanzine category and could never gain any traction, even with our own members. That eventually slid into disappointment more than bitterness, and then into happiness that we weren’t tied to scandals and terrible nonsense.
These days, we keep creating the fanzine because it’s a small thing that brings us joy. A few dozen ‘subscribers’ and a way to get some relatable content out to our friends. Yes, we’re still eligible to win a Hugo but I’m no longer certain it’s a thing we would want.
Jeff dug up some physical copies of old covers. For many years we had an actual, printed paper copy to hand out live and in person to anyone showing up for the meeting. These old pages showed me a variety of the kind of artwork I’ve done over the years. A lot of what I saw here was cringeworthy. Some of them I like to this day.
I don’t post as much about my art here these days in part because there’s less of it than there used to be. I just don’t have the same amount of time I did before. There are so many things to do in this world that sometimes I lose track and don’t create as much art as I’d like. Even the cringey stuff. Gotta break some eggs and all that.
I suggest doing art. Create something. Save it if you like OR give it to somebody. Someday it might come back to you so you can see how far you have come.
This is one of those posts where I put it here, on my site so that when anyone questions it I can say definitively that I own it.
The weekend before Thanksgiving I headed to Cherry Hill (yes, the Philadelphia con is in NJ) for the annual science fiction convention put on by the Philadelphia Science Fiction Society. I’ve gone to Philcon for many years, and have been invited to be on panels for many years as well. This convention is the home of a couple of the most legendary convention stories, including defend the pizza, and Yes – I realize that was 9 years ago.
Blame to me. I glanced at the convention requirements, but I did NOT read them as thoroughly as I should have. I see this now, I saw it then. It still didn’t make me at all happy. You see, the convention, as a private organization, can make any requirements it sees fit for entry into their event. They did. They required a Covid vaccination update that fell within certain parameters. IF you were just vaccinated back in ’22, that wasn’t good enough. You’d need a PCR negative test if you didn’t have a booster dated this year (basically).
They’re not wrong. *I* am the danger vector. Since the CDC declared an end to the public health emergency back in May, and even before then, I have been traveling for work. I’ve been from Georgia to Oregon. In 0 of the places I’ve been since May has anyone asked for proof of vaccination, let alone very specific versions of the vaccine. I haven’t even seen a mask in months. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not out there trying to catch anything, I just haven’t given things much more thought than basic precautions. I even still keep my CDC card with me. Proof of vax, even if I don’t really need it anymore. Except now I did, and it wasn’t good enough.
Imagine my shock when the convention staff told me I wasn’t allowed in.
I’d booked a hotel, I’d made the drive, I’d set up things for the panels I was going to speak on and even ordered (and pre-paid for) a t-shirt for the first time in years. Nope, you’ll have to go away.
Once I got past my initial shock, I was actually angry at this rule. Again, not their fault I didn’t know, and I know that. I was as much stunned they made the rule more than anything. It was excessive, at least to my way of thinking. I shared my opinion with a friend and he suggested I just go to the local pharmacy and get tested. Excellent plan.
I drove to a local Walgreens and headed to the pharmacy counter. The worker there kindly explained that a PCR test required lab work and there was no way I was getting that at this hour on a Friday night. I looked around, trying to figure out what to do with my rapidly building level of frustration. As I looked around, I realized there was almost nobody in the store. I looked back at the girl behind the desk and said, “What are you doing right now?” She was taken aback so I added, “You’ve got boosters, right? I want one.”
So, 15 minutes later I had a shot in the arm and a newly signed and dated entry on my CDC vaccination card. I drove back to the hotel, parked the car and headed back to the check in desk. I plunked the card down on the desk and asked for my entry badge. The very same person who refused me before glanced at the card, saw the date that ended with ’23, smiled and welcomed me.
That’s the part that really bothered me later. It was the same person that felt it was so important to turn me away previously. It looked like I met their rules, so they were happy and welcoming. The part I’m glad she missed was that I had literally been gone for about a half an hour and still didn’t meet the requirements for entry. You see, those shots technically require a 2 week time period to become effective… and the rules said that too. A shot in the arm that day didn’t actually help anyone in the immediate time frame. They could have just as easily turned me away again…
I’m glad they didn’t. Laying out the money for the trip was a doable thing, but not for absolutely no return and no access to what I came there for. What it did was cement in my mind that this convention wants to never change, and if that means dying then so be it. In my personal experience over the past decade the attendance, the panel variety, the guest list and many other aspects have been dwindling. This year I was shocked at the lack of people. I’ve said the crowd was thinning before, but I saw so few people there I didn’t believe the attendance was more than about 200. It was dismal. The panel list was smaller, the guest list was smaller and the principle speaker wasn’t able to attend (last minute illness). Part of me can’t help but wonder if the policy had a bigger hand in that dip in attendees than just the rumors I heard. Yes, I know of at least 2 guests that said they weren’t coming back based on the rule. If I know of two, how many more were there? How many attendees just didn’t bother? What was there to draw them in?
The hotel hasn’t changed in all that time either. Admittedly, they’re working on remodeling the place, but I think this photo was symbolic of my weekend.
Worn, broken and barely hanging on. That’s it. That’s what I got from the weekend and even after waiting a week to get past the immediacy of my feelings, the impression has not improved. If anything, it’s gotten worse.
My panels, and my fellow panelists, were good. There were never more than ten people in any panel I was on (or that I attended), but the people that were there still held some enthusiasm. I was able to connect with a couple of con attendees, so that was great. I got to see my friends and may have even weaseled my way into a couple of short story anthologies for next year.
Still owning the fact that it was my screw up in not practicing what I preach and failing to read the fine print, this year just left a bad aftertaste. This wasn’t a good con. I had witnessed struggles in an indirect way with this con before, but I went with the benefit of the doubt. I wasn’t there in person to witness the challenges, so I could just try to keep things going. Not so much anymore. I’m glad I made the connections I did. I’m glad I saw my friends again, but I’m going to have to wait until next year rolls around to decide if I’m actually going to attend Philcon again. Ever.
We’re closing in on the end of the 23rd year of the fan group Watch The Skies. It’s been an amazing run and I genuinely hope it rolls at least another 23 years or more.
We still publish a fanzine each month and I still get the opportunity to make cover art for the various issues. The August book we were discussing was called Paradox Hotel. I liked the visual concept of various versions of the hotel being slightly out of focus with each other. A blurry filter over the camera lens. I pulled together some images and set to work. Here’s the cover for the August issue:
Doing this a little differently than I have in the past. Much more a “as it happens” thing ~ or as close to that as I get. I’m writing this while in the middle of day 2 at the con. We’ll see how it all shakes out (and if I actually get back to this before I have to go all the way home).
Getting to the con from home was a challenge. There are 0 things the con can do about travel distance or traffic challenges, but it was certainly part of my experience. the 3.5 hour drive that was supposed to get me here took about 5 when I finally got here and got checked in. That was… not ideal. It was a difficult way to start.
Once I was actually here, at the venue, I discovered their wayfinding / signage to be lacking. Getting around here is not an easy thing when you’ve never been here before. There are actually 3 buildings containing various aspects of the convention and NONE of that is clear from the entry drive or signage from the parking area(s). I realize that wayfinding signs are part of my day job / professional life, but it makes such a huge difference to a persons experience. Bad signs meant it was hard to find the hotel registration. Then it was hard to figure out the right parking area / path to my room in the building next door. THEN I had to go and figure out con registration in the third building.
I figured it out, but by the time I got through all that I was just beat. I was done, I just didn’t know it yet.
I grabbed the person I’m rooming with and grabbed a bite to eat at a local sub shop, then came back to find 0 parking spaces available at the hotel lot near my room. Very frustrating.
I headed off to a panel that said it was about role playing informing your writing. What I got from the panel was a lengthy discussion about story telling informing your gaming. NOT the sort of panel that overwhelmed me and filled me with a desire to go and do more.
In the end, I decided that I was well and truly exhausted from the combination of a long work week and a miserable drive. I turned in early… missing out on the kind of fun you find at cons, like light up ice cubes for your party drinks!
Hopefully day 02 will bring more and better things…
This was originally published in Watch The Skies April 2023 edition.
In another dystopian future entry, the Korean film Jung_e presents some very real questions about what developing A.I. means and presents a picture of how that can effect the people most closely related to any project connected to that development.
The earth has warmed, the waters have risen. Humans have moved off the earth to various space platforms. Three of these platforms band together and declare war on the other platforms. In an attempt to create a winning edge, the allied forces take an elite soldier and attempt to clone her brain. This cloning is intended to create a soldier with all the skills, subtlety and loyalty of the original soldier in an easily replicated way. These clones will turn the tide and win the war for the allies. The experiments continue to run into an unknown obstacle, frustrating their attempts to complete this new A.I. soldier.
There are a number of pieces that are drawn into the film. I see a little bit of Robocop in there. I see a little bit of Ex Machina. There’s a touch of Ghost In The Shell. These are the things I see mixing and swirling around the story of the soldier and the doctor working on creating this new brand of soldier. It brings up a number of questions, but doesn’t necessarily answer them. This is a movie worth watching for the discussions it will give you after watching, along with a couple of very exciting action sequences. You should be watching Jung_E.
This was originally published in Watch The Skies March 2023 edition.
The main character
I didn’t go looking for this show, but then when I found it I was in. I don’t find shows about deadly plagues nearly as interesting these days, but this show managed to bring me in.
Hot Skull is a dystopian story involving a new, terrifying pandemic called ‘Jabber’. It’s called this because the first symptom is the victim speaking gibberish. This pandemic has caused panic and an authoritarian agency has taken control, herding people into various locked communities and using armed troops to enforce curfews and quarantines. The antagonist is a man named Murat who struggles against this agency, as he seems to be immune to the effects of the disease. Everyone wears noise canceling headphones and eye each other with suspicion while out in public.
The story is dark. The characters are very real. There aren’t Hollywood stereotypes at play here… this is a Turkish language series. Yes, subtitles but worth it. Looking at a pandemic from a non-American point of view is just one aspect of this show that makes it worth the effort.
