Bleeding Fiction

I went out tonight and saw Serenity. I know I haven't gushed about it on the blog, but I'm a pretty big fan of Firefly, or at least as big a fan as I get for things that aren't the Three Kingdoms or Adventure! or have been part of my life since childhood. It's good. Really good. As I said coming out of the theater, "this movie is twelve, seventeen, no! A hundred and ten different kinds of awesome!"

That's a lot of different kinds of awesome.

It was funny, hard-edged, touching and visually keen. It has bits that make you think they're doing something familiar, some trope you've seen a dozen times in movies or tv, but they twist it and surprise you. In other words, it really was like the show, Firefly, brought to the big screen.

I was a bit concerned, before seeing the movie, that it was going to go in one of two bad directions. The first would be in treading over too much familiar ground; in essence making it a rehash of one or two episodes of Firefly with a more cinematic and final ending tacked onto the end. The second would be in not covering enough of the old ground and leaving people who hadn't seen Firefly floating out in space and wondering who these people were.

I feel that there were several elements in common with the way Firefly worked, a few of the standard plot tropes, but the story itself was different enough that it didn't feel done before. I think, too, that they did a good job of introducing us to all the little character bits that were essential to the relationships; that the relationships may have mattered more to me, as a viewer of Firefly who already had more than ten hours of familiarity with these characters, but that non-Firefly fans would understand them, as well.

The only problem is that I don't know for certain; no one I went to the movie with hadn't already seen and enjoyed Firefly.

Not that the movie was all sweetness and light. I'm not, for example, as huge a fan of "kung fu uber-River" as everyone else in the theater seemed to be. I'll also mention that there was something I disliked about the movie, something that honestly came very close to ruining it for me, a specific ten seconds or so. However, I won't mention what it was here, because it's a spoiler and I don't want to give away spoilers. I remain too conscious of my long-ago FFVII snaffu for that.

Let me say, though, that it's the sort of thing that will really only bother me and one or two other people - the vast majority of people reading this probably won't care. I mention it solely for posterity.

So, in summary: excellent movie, for both fans of Firefly and those who've never seen it before (I think - if you haven't seen Firefly and do see Serenity I am especially curious to hear your opinion), with but one moment that made the movie very, very hard for me personally to take.

I'm going to see it again with Lukas on Monday.

I seem to have pinched a nerve or something in my left knee. My entire lower leg hurts mightily every night starting around 9 or so and doesn't stop until I wake up the next morning. Too heavy and impact on the ball of my left foot during this time makes me howl.

I'm vaguely considering seeing someone about this.

But I probably won't.

And A Game Of Shut The Fuck Up

I kicked out and saw the tremendously awesome Erin McKeown tonight. As always, she pulled off a splendiferous show. Erin's set list ran: White City, Beautiful (I Guess), Cinematic, To The Stars, The Taste of You, Aspera, Life On The Moon, We Are More, Float and Le Petit Mort. That might be a little bit out of order, but not hugely so. Erin put a little bit of a slow reggae or samba take on Taste of You; this girl needs to release a live album but now!

The crowd was a little small, but she was an opening act and the Showbox is pretty sizeable. The folks on the floor, though, were pretty into it. And why not? Erin can pack a huge amount of music, and a grand passion for it, into a very puny frame. Truly, the girl is small. Tiny. That this is true is a source of continuous wonder to me.

After Erin's set I picked up a t-shirt (the brown one - I now have 3 out of 4 colors. This is maybe a little sad) and got Erin to sign my copy of ...Birds. Since this wasn't an Erin show, per se, the girl wasn't swamped with fans, so I had a moment to talk to her, socially. I always feel a little weird about that; what do I have to say to Erin? I mean, I don't know much about her aside from the "public persona" (i.e. the music) and she knows nothing about me, so once the "I'm a big fan" is out of the way, where do you go? Nowhere, as it turns out - just to how she's not in Seattle enough, but hopes to come back in January.

Maybe I'll think of something witty to say by then...

* * *

Erin, as I said, was the opening act tonight. She opened for a guy named Mike Doughty, who has the world's worst band website. I say this because the "samples" of his songs contained thereon are each only 3 seconds long. That's just stupid. So, I was left, for a while leading up to tonight, wondering whether or not he'd be worth sticking around for after Erin was done playing.

Then, out of nowhere on Saturday, The Delightful Jeni Garber sent me an email to tell me that Mr. Doughty, who is the former front-man for Soul Coughing, was playing with Erin and, since I was likely going to the show anyway, I should make sure to check him out. "I really like his sound," says Jeni. "It's worth seeing."

Serendipity!

Mike came out to much applause and said "The name of my band is the name of my name. We are the Mike Doughty Band." And then he started playing. The Delightful Jeni Garber is no liar; his sound is worth seeing. It's really good, too. Sort of a small-scale rock jam-band, with keyboards and bass (as in standing bass, not bass guitar) backing the guitar and drums. Dude had me hooked from the first.

In contrast to Erin, who, for all that she clearly enjoys what she does, has a strong touch of grace about her, Mike has a sense of disbelief about him, as if his every smile says "Can you believe that I get paid to do this shit?" Not that he doesn't take what he does seriously; when the ambient noise from the crowd got to be too much for him he stopped playing in the middle of one song and said "how about we play a quick game of 'shut the fuck up?' I'll say 'shut the fuck up' and you all say 'shhh.'" Fans, as fans often do, tossed out the names of songs they wanted him to play. "Mmm... no," he said, and "Probably not. Maybe. Sure, but later. No. No. What else? No, not that." In other words, he's a funny guy.

I wanted his CD but, sadly, from purchasing Erin's T-shirt, I'd run out of the cash to buy either of his albums. I'll order them online, though, sometime soonish if I can spare the money. I wonder, too, if Soul Coughing is any good. I'm only passingly familiar with them, which is to say I know the name and not much more.

I stole that title from somewhere. Just not sure where.

I saw Neil Gaiman speak tonight, to a crowd of some 800 or so, in a church next to the UW bookstore. There's a comment to be made about seeing Neil speak from the veritable pulpit and religious experiences, but I'll leave that for other people.

Me, I'll just say that it was pretty cool. Neil continues to be funny and witty and kind. Neil continues, too, to have a totally awesome voice, though it was a little ill-served by the accoustics of the church and the nature of what he was reading; the characters in that particular section of Anansi Boys have accents that stray a bit far from Neil's normal English one. Stray almost to the Carribean, in fact.

Neil looked a bit haggard, though. Not a surprise, I guess, given that he's been on a signing tour for a few weeks now. That's the sort of thing that'll run a person down; cramped fingers, bags under the eyes, a general diassociation with where you currently are. I've been there (only minus the being famous and the name-dropping and the having people want my signature, of course). It's not much a situation I envy (and the way I've been sleeping lately, it's not a situation I'm far from), but the Neil I saw tonight certainly cut a different picture from the, let's face it, dead sexy shot on the dust jacket of the new book.

Also, I noticed something a little funny tonight. I couldn't help but feeling, as Neil was talking, that I'd heard it all before. What he read from the book, yes, of course, but his questions in the Q&A session, too. I'd read them on his blog. It's the strange and almost awkward power of the internet; I don't need to hear him speak, because I already know what he's going to say. His own words have become a digital oracle, and now he's only echoing himself. Signal edges dangerously close to noise, and the signing itself, the sheer size of which makes more meaningful connection impossible, becomes almost redundant.

The beginning of that last paragraph is true. The first 4 sentences, say. Where I get by the end of that paragraph, though, I'm not sure that I agree with what I wrote. But I don't take any of it back.

"Music so good, you'll crap your pants."

Obvious, really.

I'm vaguely put out by the way Firefly fans refer to themselves as "Browncoats."

It always (and unavoidably) makes me think, and not pleasantly, of "brownshirts."

Fraggle Rock's just great. I love almost everything about it. I wish there were a Fraggle Rock soundtrack, because I could listen to a lot of those songs for a good long while, too.

I'm noticing one or two things that I hadn't noticed before, too. For example, Gobo, the leader of the Fraggle gang, is Canadian. At least if if we're judging by his accent.

Also, the Fraggles exist in the same universe as some iteration of the Muppet Show cast; at one point, Doc gets a letter from Kermit.

It's a bit kiddy, maybe, but I kind of want a plush Gobo now.

Someone please explain to me how it's possible for me to stand in front of 200 people for 2 hours and give a speech in English and not feel the least bit put out, to feel, in fact, calm, in control, witty and engaging, and yet stand in front of 20 people for 2 minutes and give a speech in Japanese and be shaking like a leaf.

I knew the material, too. I knew it cold.

So, so frustrating.

I'm bored with my current site design.

Someone send me a new one, please.

Preferably before the end of this month, when my blog hits it's second year anniversary.

New Scientist continues to provide me with articles that make me happy. Stem cells. Extract 1 cell from an 8-celled bit and the thing can still survive. Overcome ethical objections. As previously stated: yay.

A dude at the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Bioethics feels the need to bring me down: "It is politically naive to talk about alternatives, and this terminology undermines the moral stance of scientists pursuing the other techniques," he says. "If you hint that it might solve the moral dispute, you're providing ammunition for opponents, so it’s essential to back the original stance."

He has a point, of course. I don't much like the idea of a bunch of scientists throwing up their hands and saying "okay, okay, sure, traditional stem-cell research is unethical." Because that's giving in; it's not helpful. It's important to hold to your convictions, important to keep up the argument.

But at the same time, what happens when these scientists hold their ground in the current climate? Well, considering how much research funding isn't going to the traditional lines of stem-cell research right now, they're sure as hell not doing research. So, they more or less stop being scientists and become politicians and lobbyists instead.

We already have enough of those. Better, I figure, to do the research you can do while the political climate shifts along its merry way back into something more normal.

Has anyone besides me been watching the Colbert Report over the past two nights? Colbert's intensity and arrogance is a pretty fun contrast to John Stewart's depreciation and incomprehension, which has been true since his days on the Daily Show. I'm not entirely sure how long that'll stay interesting in full half hour blocks, but so far, so good.

Monday night's "gravitas face-off" against Stone Phillips alone made the entire half hour worthwhile. "In the interest of full disclosure," said Phillips, "this reporter should admit that he also has a piercing there." Tonight, I was a big fan of the opening segments - The Word and All You Need To Know.

As with the Daily Show, the interviews come in two types: the live-to-tape studio interviews and the edited location interviews with people who just don't get it. The live-to-tape are coming off a little flat right now - Colbert's using them as a platform for being intense and not much more - but that might level out in time. The location interviews are very much like the ones on the Daily Show. No surprise there. I like them well enough, but I think they've always been the weakest part of the Daily Show, so seeing more of those isn't exactly my first choice. I'd like to see something replace them; maybe a second guest segment like they did with Stone Phillips. Though I guess that wouldn't work well with every guest...

Finally, I've got to admit that I'm not a huge fan of the plugs for Colbert at the end of the Daily Show. It makes the Daily Show seem shorter and more rushed, which is not a good thing. I figure that's to grab viewers early and should go away by the end of next week.

(Speaking of the Daily Show, though - John went really easy on O'Reilly tonight, no? Sort of a let down, I think. Anyone have a take on this?)

If you haven't seen either show recently, you can check out a few clips at their respective web sites. The clips I'm talking about specifically aren't up as of this posting, but they most likely will be by Wednesday evening.

(PS - Can anyone tell me what A. Whitney Brown's been doing lately? Even more than Stephen he was my favorite Daily Show commentator, but I can't remember seeing him in anything in something like half a decade...)

I've let a few things fall by the wayside in the past few weeks, vis a vis blogging, at least. Let me see if I can sum it up quickly:

Dar Williams: I skipped the Dar show on Wednesday. Some of you will now undoubtedly be wondering if I'm feeling alright, and I assure you that I am. It's just that I had a test in Japanese on Thursday and decided that getting my master's degree was more important than seeing Dar. This one time, at least. Plus, by staying home, I got to talk on the phone with Sarah Who Is Awesome. The conversation, as you might expect, was awesome.

November: Speaking of awesome things, my invitation to Aaron and Jen's wedding came in the mail this week. Plus their wedding's just before Thanksgiving, which means I get to be home for that, too.

Smallville: Same problem with Aquaman here as in Super Friends: they had to invent a water-based problem for him to have a reason to be around. Also, sufer style was never cool. Not even in the 80's, when people thought it was. Also also, while I'm not a huge fan of Tom Welling's pecs, it probably wasn't the smartest move on the producers' part to film the episode where he goes topless after he'd stopped working out.

Kamikaze Girls: A Japanese biker girl head-butting a Japanese Loli is a universally funny image. When it shows up repeatedly in a movie that's cute, funny, bizarre and, at turns, heart-warming, you're pretty much set. See this if you can.

Arkham Asylum: One of the classic Batman stories, re-released in a normal-sized trade, includes a copy of the script. It has one of the best lines from Batman ever. The rogues have Batman trapped and at their mercy. They're debating what to do with him. "We should take his mask off and get a look at his face," says one. "Don't be obvious," says the Joker as he looks at Batman's grim mask. "That is his face."

Mirrormask: Lukas accurately quotes me as saying that "I have never seen a movie that so fully reflected the tastes of its director." Neil Gaiman, Dave McKean and the Jim Henson's company were locked in a room. This is the movie they made. It's of the "unhappy girl gets sucked into wonderous yet crappy other world" genre. Some reviewers regard this as a bad thing. They are stupid, for this movie is excellent.

I think that pretty much covers the highlights. I need to get better about keeping a schedule, I think. But, then, that's usually the case these days. Pardon, I'm off to give being productive a whirl. Or possibly to watch the Princess Bride. I haven't decided.

I just saw Mirrormask for the second time. It continues to be cool as hell, though occasionally colored too sepia-tone for my eyes to be happy with.

There are a few scenes that have some wonderful drawings (pronounced "drawerings") by Dave McKean plastered over a wall - beautifully covering floor to ceiling. The drawings are quickly torn from the wall and crumbled up, some even burnt, by one of the main characters. It occurred to me that this is a great pity, if it's not a bit of camera trickery, that is, because the drawings are, as I said, wonderful and beautiful, and in fact so plentiful that if someone were to, say, sell them on e-bay or some such I could concievably buy one. And it'd be cool to own an original bit of Dave McKean scribbled ink work.

The theater in which I just saw Mirrormask is also the theater in which I saw Kamikaze Girls (do check out that site - it's exhaustive!). Sadly, while the theater's still showing the first, the later was but a limited, one-week run, which means I'll have to wait to see it again until it comes out on video. This makes me sad.

I love spam email. I really do:

Think you know why people traffic in drugs? Money? Power? Greed?

Welcome to the world of The Hallucinogenic Conspiracy. The conspiracy

theory believed by many underworld figures for many decades. Also one of the

underworlds best kept secrets. Until now!

You are about to journey into the minds of some of the worlds most notorious

and deadly criminals.

You will learn why these criminals keep operating in their illegal

trade even after they have made millions or even billions.

It is The Hallucinogenic Conspiracy that keeps them there.

It's sad, but it's become as much of a tradition for me to miss the Great Pumpkin as it is for Linus. It was on last night, of course. And I didn't even know until today. One day I'll just but the thing on DVD, but in a lot of ways that seems like it would be missing the point.

Aaaarggh!

Gimme some sugar baby.

Which B-Movie Badass Are You?
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With the exception of the 12 hours from noon to midnight on Friday, when I was host to the briefly-visiting Delightful Jeni Garber and helped a friend celebrate his birthday through the judicious consumption of sushi, this past week has been singularly bad.

Bad as in "I am, in no uncertain terms, failing my Japanese language class and will likely need to spend an extra year in school if I'm to get my degree."

This left me with the urge to commit random acts with violins. Seeing as I can't play the catgut, though, I figured I should write, instead. I worked through the second half of a short story called "The Gun Saint" today. I was pretty happy with the structure of the original, so this was mostly a change in details. I think it's much improved, but I'm still a bit too close to the work to say.

If anyone would like to read it, please let me know; the usual rules on such things apply.