Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

No Justins, No Peace

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Consistently wrong since 2002

The words do not have to be perfect.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

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Sunday Evening Open Thread: The Road…

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Worth a click, even if the film-in-production sounds more like The Wind Rises than My Neighbor Totoro: Hayao Miyazaki Prepares to Cast One Last Spell

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156Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    Jim Henson had once considered adapting The Lord of the Rings (using human like puppets instead of the Muppets)

    I would totally watch a Muppets based LotR.

  3. 3.

    guachi

    My Neighbor Totoro is a film that’s basically impossible to dislike. It and Spirited Away are my two favorite animated films. The scene on the train in Spirited Away is one of my single most favorite scenes in any movie.

  4. 4.

    UncleEbeneezer

    If you loved the scenery of LOTR, check out Power Of The Dog on Netflix and Top Of The Lake on Amazon Prime.  Both are Jane Campion projects shot with stunning vistas of NZ.  And both are very good.

  7. 7.

    trnc

    The Beatles should have done what Zep did – not ask permission. But I appreciate that the fab four respected JRR enough to ask.

  11. 11.

    Nelle

    @karen marie: For the scenery alone, yes (I’m not big on the story line, but others in my family loved it).  Matamata was just up the road from where we lived so we took visitors to Hobbiton as part of the New Zealand experience.  It’s lovely there.  My sister, an LOTR fan, was in quiet heaven.

  12. 12.

    Chetan Murthy

    @trnc: I would say at least try one movie (obvs. the first, which might be Fellowship of the Ring, but might be The Hobbit).  Enough other people have watched these films, that even though they were not to my taste, it seems a lot, lot, lot of people, not just Tolkien fans, find them to be wonderful films.

    I read Hobbit, LotR and Silmarillion multiple times, starting in middle school and going all the way thru college.  And a ton of other fantasy novels, of course.  A. ton.  So it’s not that I dislike fantasy.  Just disliked Fellowship, really, and never got past that.

  13. 13.

    Brachiator

    Hayao Miyazaki will return to direct one final film for Studio Ghibli — a “fantasy on a grand scale.”

    Yes, please.

    Love all his work, especially Kiki’s Delivery Service.

     

    ETA: RIP Anne Rice, queen of the vampire novels

  15. 15.

    Dan B

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Well aren’t you special!

    Friends who’ve been to New Zealand say it’s the most beautiful country, except a good friend of mine whose Canadian boyfriend was from there.  They lived 8n Sydney fora year, visited Bobby’s family in a very windy spot at the north of South Island. (I’ve been waiting to type that, woot!)  The food on the train was beyond English – pasty white bread, crust trimmed, choice of canned corn or canned peas for topping.  This was the early 80’s and I hear it’s improved a lot.

    I’d love to go but a high quality virtual (no bungees please) would be terrific.

    BTW did you visit the Hogwarts set, or is that a different country?

  19. 19.

    PJ

    @karen marie: Don’t watch the extended versions, and start with The Fellowship (contra to Chetan’s advice, The Hobbit movies are terrible, all of Jackson’s worst impulses taken to extremes.). If you don’t like the Fellowship, don’t keep watching.

  20. 20.

    SpaceUnit

    Never read the books, didn’t care for the Peter Jackson films, but a LOTR with Fozzie Bear as Frodo would pretty much be my cup of tea.

    As for the Beatles . . .  well, humanity dodged a bullet there.

  23. 23.

    Kalakal

    Miss Piggy doubling  as Arwen & Galadriel would add a certain something to it. Not neccessarialy a good something…

  24. 24.

    JoyceH

    Have you folks heard about the US Postal Service ‘temporarily suspending’ mail service to Australia and New Zealand? HUH? Supposed to be COVID related somehow…

  25. 25.

    Brachiator

    @PJ:

    @karen marie: Don’t watch the extended versions, and start with The Fellowship (contra to Chetan’s advice, The Hobbit movies are terrible, all of Jackson’s worst impulses taken to extremes.).

    Totally agree. The standard version of the LoTR films is just fine for the average viewer.

  26. 26.

    Chetan Murthy

    @PJ:

    The Hobbit movies are terrible, all of Jackson’s worst impulses taken to extremes.

    Oh wow.  I hadn’t heard that [since not paying attention, since never gonna watch ’em]  100% believe you, and I retract my advice about which movie to watch first.

  29. 29.

    Chetan Murthy

    @NotMax: You have no idea what kind of SF&F reader I was.  I mean …. just *devoured* the stuff.  I was 13, and, y’know, for a 13yo boy who’s having a lot of trouble fitting in, SF&F can be a certain kind of escape.  Just ground thru those novels like there was no tomorrow.

    Then for decades, I wouldn’t touch the stuff: stuck to “literature”, which I must say is almost always superior.  Lately (like: last 5yr) I’ve been re-reading some of the old stuff, and bit-by-bit the new stuff.  B/c now it’s not for escape, so I don’t search for books that are written from the (ahem) sex-starved pubescent male POV.

  30. 30.

    Brachiator

    @JoyceH:

    From the USPS site:

    The Postal Service™ is temporarily suspending international mail acceptance for certain destinations due to impacts related to the COVID-19 pandemic and other unrelated service disruptions. Customers: please refrain from mailing items addressed to the countries listed here, until further notice.

    New Zealand is listed.

  31. 31.

    sab

    @karen marie: I loved the books and reread them repeatedly from age twelve to my mid-twenties. Walked out early in the first movie. Hobbits were fine, but not what Jackson did with the Elves. Everyone told me I should have started with the second movie.

  32. 32.

    lowtechcyclist

    I’m holding out for a film adaptation of Bored of the Rings.  When they were in their pre-teens, my two youngest cousins would have been perfect as Moxie and Pepsi.

  33. 33.

    lowtechcyclist

    @sab: Everyone told me I should have started with the second movie.

    The second movie is what really did it in, AFAIAC. How do you make a movie of The Two Towers, and leave out all the Isengard stuff?

  34. 34.

    Robert Sneddon

    How many times does this make for Miyazaki-dono’s “last movie?” He’s retired and un-retired quite a few times now.

    Sadly his son hasn’t inherited the master’s touch but that’s possibly nurture rather than nature. Miyazaki Hayao grew up when Japan was changing in a very strange way, when the old was being forcibly wrenched away from the new and genius can’t really be taught or handed down to the next generation.

    There are other Japanese animators and directors not in the Ghibli circle who are carving their own way in the world, people like Shinkai Makoto (The Place Promised To Us In Our Early Days, 5 Centimeters Per Second) and Mamoru Hosoda (Wolf Children: Ame and Yuki)  who are also worth your time if you are fond of the Master’s work as well as studios other than Ghibli — I am a particular fan of Shaft and its idiosyncratic art style as demonstrated in the Orouboros-like entangled Monogatari series, directed by Shinbo.

  35. 35.

    NotMax

    @Chetan Murthy

    As the saying goes, the Golden Age of science fiction is 13.

    Full disclosure: Was an avid devourer of same myself. Other genres too, but shan’t get into that.

    ;)

  36. 36.

    Brachiator

    @sab:

    Walked out early in the first movie. Hobbits were fine, but not what Jackson did with the Elves.

    Are you talking about the Lord of the Rings films or the Hobbit?

    I could never finish any of the novels. I did, however, love the Bored of the Rings parody novel. But I really enjoyed the LOTR trilogy.

    Everyone told me I should have started with the second movie.

    Everyone? Were these people also big fans of the novels?

  37. 37.

    sab

    @lowtechcyclist: Glad I bailed then, although sorry to have missed Sean Bean reviving his career. Twelve year old girl me always hated Boromir as just an annoying self-absorbed male jock. I was too young to understand the difficulties of his position. I just thought yuck! high school football player.

  38. 38.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Dan B: New Zealand is stunning. I posit anywhere there are more sheep than people makes a fine place to live or visit.

    Wind and earthquakes seem to be its biggest drawbacks but I have longed to live there (temporarily or permanently) since I visited 15 years ago. I should’ve worked harder at it.

  39. 39.

    dmsilev

    I very much enjoyed the LOTR films, but couldn’t finish the Hobbit trilogy. There are all sorts of post-mortems about what went wrong with the latter; the short answer is ‘almost everything’.

    I haven’t yet had a chance to visit the new Academy museum and see the Ghibli exhibit, but I really need to carve out the time to do so. Maybe during the holiday break, assuming I don’t get snowed under with deadline-sensitive work.

  40. 40.

    sab

    @Brachiator: How the fuck do yous turn that sweet not very long  children’s book into three movies full of battles. I never saw any of the Hobbit movies.

    I walked out in the Council of Elrond at the first LOTR movie. Didn’t like what they did with Elrond. Not the actor. The script. Snipey backbiting guy. I had always seen him as sort of special and calm and thoughtful. He just came across to me as bitchy.

  41. 41.

    Kalakal

    I would love to see some films based on Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd & the Grey Mouser Lankhmar books. I remember liking those far more than LOTR and I did like LOTR

  42. 42.

    NotMax

    Well, the status of the package with the last of the few small items ordered via Amazon on Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals has now officially been changed there to Lost. The others have all been dribbling in, up to and including this past week.

    By far nothing crucial, only something minor of which it’s nice to have a good amount in stock at home.

  43. 43.

    schrodingers_cat

    In my ongoing artistic adventure, I bought several sketch books, a black one, one to draw and a mixed media one that takes wet media as well as dry, white pens and some blending tools. Charcoal kit coming next week. Plus a book called drawing class. I am thinking of reviving my blog and blogging about it

    First blog post, how to start coloring and/or drawing without spending a dime. Use what you have.

  45. 45.

    schrodingers_cat

    @dmsilev: I couldn’t even get through the Hobbit books. IMHO LOTR is overrated. I feel the same about Harry Potter too. I have only seen the first 3 movies. I thought they were okayish not great.

    *ducks

    BTW any Peaky blinders fans here? Or BSG? I like my fiction to be dark and morally ambiguous. Simplistic morality tales bore me.

  46. 46.

    zhena gogolia

    Richard Armitage is brilliant as Thorin. But there’s a lot of other stuff in the movie, unfortunately.

    OT, Bill Penzey is on fire today:

    And new customer T.B. finds it “extremely disappointing that a company like yours gets involved in politics.” And adds: “If you must continue at least include the deaths of all the aborted babies and how important it is to stop the murder Mills throughout the world.”

    Absolutely, and with the recent Supreme Court ruling, now is the time for all of us to remind everyone we know that the “pro-life” movement intentionally causes 80% of abortions by blocking Sex Ed in schools and accessible, affordable birth control. People honestly trying to prevent automotive fatalities don’t start out by banning Drivers Ed and outlawing airbags.

    The “pro-life” movement has never been about preventing abortions. All they have ever been about is reducing the number of babies being born into homes where two people love each other very much and are ready and excited to welcome a child into the world, and instead have that same baby be born to an unwed, impoverished, teen mom who will as likely as not be broken by the process. To get enough votes to prevent the ultra-rich from ever paying taxes you need a whole lot of broken voters. This is how they create them.

    Cooking heals broken lives. Please do all you can to add love to the lives of parents going it alone and to anyone else facing extra hurdles in life. Together we can counter the Republican message of cruelty, racism, and hurt. Maybe we can even heal a few Republicans and Republican-leaning “Independents” along the way. You have more strength than you might imagine.

  48. 48.

    sab

    OT: I just lit  my Advent wreath. Week three: Joy (the one with the pink instead of the more somber purple or lavender candles.)

    I love all the winter holidays based around lights.

    My dog and cats think I am trying to burn the house down.

  51. 51.

    Anne Laurie

    @Kalakal: I would love to see some films based on Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd & the Grey Mouser Lankhmar books.

    Oh, that would be fun! — at least as animated versions.

    Marketing problem, though:  These days, it’d be hard for people *not* to assume Fafhrd & the Mouser were a couple.  (Even back in the less enlightened 1980s, there were  parodies:  Bring your mighty weapon over here, Faf — and your sword, also!)  This would make some of the (teenage) audience so excited as to invite, shall we say, over-policing using only the most *correct* of modern standards… which would kinda kill most of the tongue-in-check joy of the originals.

    And, of course, the Sad Puppies would probably write long screeds threatening to bomb the studios, the director’s home, any theatres showing the eventual…

  52. 52.

    NotMax

    @schrodingers_cat

    Tune in to tomorrow’s morning thread (presuming I’m awake while it’s fresh). Got a capsule review of a little something waiting in the wings which might just fit your bill.

    /teaser

  57. 57.

    Mary G

    I’m 65 and still reading SF/F. I can’t read the old stuff with all the leching after the well-endowed ensign who doesn’t even get a line.

  60. 60.

    Nelle

    We were going to go back to New Zealand in Feb of 2020 but I was sick, so we were going to postpone until March.  We haven’t tried since then.  I don’t know if we could get a place in the lottery for the quarantine hotel and we figured that people returning to see family have priority.  And I refuse to be on a plane for 12-13 hours to get there.  It is sobering to wonder if, at our age, we will get back at all.  I know that aging means letting go, but that one will sting.  2020 was our 40th anniversary and we planned to go back to the two most epic places that we’ve lived – late summer in New Zealand and summer solstice on the Arctic Coast of Alaska (Kaktovik).  It wasn’t to be.  Will it ever be?

  63. 63.

    sab

    @schrodingers_cat: I took a drawing class a couple of years ago and it was really helpful. I think a book could be as helpful as a live instructor.

    I was a very very good draftsman all through k-12 and college, but I lacked creativity.

    My sister the soon to be retired successful art historiam was a terrible draftsman but her weird contorted drawings always were very interesting and artistically appealing. “That chair doesn’t even look like a chair but the drawing is mezmerizing.” Good design sense. Her good eye was part of her success in art history although she really couldn’t draw at all.

    So I stopped doing it and moved on to other stuff.

    My husband came across my youthful portfolio and said I should do more of that. But skills not used are skills lost. Trying to claw my way back to drawing competently.

    I like what you are doing. I hope you keep at it.

  64. 64.

    dmsilev

    @schrodingers_cat: The Hobbit is a pretty short book (not surprising, since it was written as a children’s story). That was one of the big problems with the film version; there just wasn’t all that much source material in the main text to support three overstuffed films.

    As for quality of the books, well they’re certainly not perfect.  The author had his issues, foibles, blind spots, hobbyhorses, etc. If nothing else, however, they were enormously influential in how fantasy writing developed over the latter half of the twentieth century. If it’s a genre you enjoy, LOTR is worth reading just for that.

  65. 65.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Nelle:

     I don’t know if we could get a place in the lottery for the quarantine hotel

    I checked last night, and there are only a few countries from which they’re accepting visitors (and the US isn’t one of them).  If you’re in AU, I would guess you can go, but from your description, you’re not.

    I’m hoping to go in April or May (which will be end-of-summer there).  Of course, “best-laid plans” and all …. who knows what the world will be like in April.

    P.S. from what I understand, NZ expects to be able to reopen to visitors in April 2022.  But again, who really knows?

  66. 66.

    sab

    @schrodingers_cat: There used to be other amazimg stuff (Ursula LeGuin, e.g) but publishers thought adolescent males were their only market and began to ignore the others.

    ETA I am a huge NK Jemisen fan.

  68. 68.

    Chetan Murthy

    @sab: LeGuin.  Joanna Russ. James Tiptree, Jr. Alice Sheldon.  There are a few others.  And these days …. so many female SF&F writers writing not-in-the-male-POV.

    ETA; Oh, and Octavia Butler!

  69. 69.

    Feathers

    @Robert Sneddon: Watching the Miyazaki documentaries on HBOMax, there is a very sad moment where he says that he made a huge mistake in not training someone to replace him and take over the studio after he is gone. They show the son and he does not seem enthusiastic about having to step into his father’s shoes. The whole studio is set up to fulfill his desires, it basically shuts down when he is not working on something. Of course talented people moved on in order to be able to work on their own projects.

    A company keeping going once the founder can’t run things is never a given. It has to be seriously planned for and set up, at least a decade before the transition is anticipated. The founder has to also be willing to not win every argument as the changeover happens.

    I’m not happy that Ghibli will probably end with Miyazaki, but blame the father, not the son.

    And the documentaries are excellent, not just for Ghibli fans but for seeing how creative work at the highest level happens.

  71. 71.

    dmsilev

    @sab:

    ETA I am a huge NK Jemisen fan.

    The Broken Earth trilogy is really good. I enjoyed The City We Became, but I suspect you have to be (or were) a New York resident to fully appreciate it.

  74. 74.

    Kent

    @sab: The Lord of the Rings took 3 books and made them into 3 movies, which resulted in some condensing and re-writing but was more or less faithful to the source.

    The Hobbit took one shorter book, and expanded it into three long movies, which was just too much and resulted in all manner of overblown mistakes.

    Not to mention the fact that the Lord of the Rings is just a better and more coherent story all around than the Hobbit.

  75. 75.

    sab

    @Chetan Murthy: There are a lot of wonderful books out there. Wander into any big box bookstore to SF&F and they are not there. That is a big change over the last 20 years. They disappeaared completely from big bookstores, but there they are online if you know where to look.

  76. 76.

    NotMax

    @sab

    The pressure to make everything a trilogy or tetralogy really did throw the proverbial monkey wrench into the business of SF&F.

  77. 77.

    Kalakal

    @sab: I think the big shift was it went from sf & f to f. What sf remained was nearly all movie tie ins eg Star Wars. You’re right you do have to look, there is good stuff still. I have a special loathing for ‘military’ SF.

  78. 78.

    Chetan Murthy

    @sab:

    There are a lot of wonderful books out there.

    100% agree.  That there is a sizable female audience for SF&F has completely changed the game.  B/c before that, aside from a few writers, it was all aimed at teenage boys.  Or at least, that’s how I remember it.

  79. 79.

    Dan B

    @WaterGirl: Also an Armitage fan here as much because he seemed to be dating Lee Pace, another fine and charismatic actor and chameleon.  Lee Pace seems to have married his long term boyfriend recently.  Lee and Richard may have been too alike to keep the excitement of being in a relationship going.

  80. 80.

    germy

    "I also read Flash Gordon when I was 6, but if I were still reading it when I was 16, I'd have been an imbecile." — Lina Wertmuller, on the unfortunate tendencies of the American cinema

    — TravSD (@TravSD) December 11, 2021

  81. 81.

    sab

    @Kalakal: Last time I went to a bookstore for SF it was all Star Trek. My reaction was “Excuse me. I am old. This was a thing when I was fourteen,  Don’t you have anything more recent”?

  84. 84.

    Brachiator

    @sab:

    How the fuck do you turn that sweet not very long  children’s book into three movies full of battles.

    A lot of people are still puzzling over this. Peter Jackson was too much in love with the material. Unfortunately he forgot to make a good movie.

    I walked out in the Council of Elrond at the first LOTR movie. Didn’t like what they did with Elrond. Not the actor. The script. Snipey backbiting guy. I had always seen him as sort of special and calm and thoughtful. He just came across to me as bitchy.

    Since I didn’t know the novels well or even care about them, I didn’t come to the films with any deep expectations of particular characters. But I deeply admired and enjoyed the films.

    I also think I compared the Jackson films to the Star Wars prequels, which I found to be empty and joyless.

    Maybe another director will attempt a reboot years from now. There certainly seems to be room for other approaches.

  85. 85.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Feathers: I rather get the impression from many sources that Miyazaki-dono was almost impossible to work with as a collaborator and only tolerable to work for as a subordinate. He could be wonderful to interact with — I was slightly acquainted with Diana Wynn Jones who wrote the book “Howl’s Moving Castle”, one of the very few movies Ghibli ever made from someone else’s existing work. The finished movie was being considered for an animation award at Cannes, the jury invited the reclusive Miyazaki to be at the awards. He refused, of course since, well Miyazaki but he suggested they invite Diana instead. The jury said in effect, “A mere writer? Pshaw.” and there was no invite to Cannes for Diana.

    Shortly thereafter Miyazaki airfreighted a specially subtitled 35mm print of the as-yet-unreleased film to Wales and hired a movie theatre in Diana’s home town for a single evening’s showing of the movie to her and her friends. Class.

  97. 97.

    mrmoshpotato

    Henson would finally release his fantasy epic with The Dark Crystal in 1982

    Mmmmmmmmmmmm
    Mmmmmmmmmmmm
    Mmmmmmmmmmmm

  99. 99.

    Cameron

    A number of years ago I read a book called The Natural History of Make Believe, which I found fascinating.  Author loathed LOTR (which I didn’t and don’t have an opinion on, never having read) and Narnia (which, based on the little reading I did, I agreed with).  It’s probably out of print now.

  102. 102.

    sab

    @Brachiator: I am glad to see your different perspective. Book to movie is always difficult and book people are often disappointed. Maybe I just didn’t like the color of the scenery.

    In Jackson’s defense, I went to see it with my new boyfriend who I have since married and has been my spouse of twenty years. He did not and does not like fantasy, especially anything that reeks of Britain (his folks are Irish.) He was too annoyed to fall asleep. Maybe with a better companion I would have been more tolerant, but I doubt it.

  104. 104.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, …

    (Sound on, and wait for it…)

    Boris Johnson's statement to the nation this evening #ToryPartyGames #ToryPartyParties #BorisMustGo pic.twitter.com/OGkM69RDUa

    — HappyToast ★ (@IamHappyToast) December 12, 2021

    Context from DW.com:

    The photo throws up fresh questions about the conduct of Johnson and his government, days after it emerged last week that his staff held an illegal Christmas party on December 18, 2020.

    The British prime minister has faced a barrage of criticism and calls to quit, amid plummeting public support for his administration.

    An Opinium poll published Saturday for the Observer newspaper, showed 57% of Brits think Johnson should now resign.

    The same poll found support for his ruling Conservatives has fallen four points to 32%.

    Backing for the opposition Labour Party has risen to 41%, its biggest lead since 2014.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  105. 105.

    RSA

    @Chetan Murthy:

    You have no idea what kind of SF&F reader I was.  I mean …. just *devoured* the stuff.  I was 13, and, y’know, for a 13yo boy who’s having a lot of trouble fitting in, SF&F can be a certain kind of escape.  Just ground thru those novels like there was no tomorrow. Then for decades, I wouldn’t touch the stuff: stuck to “literature”, which I must say is almost always superior.

    This is so much my own trajectory in reading. I’ve gone back now and then to SF over the years, but only lightly, to catch up on some modern space opera and adventurous-but-literary SF (Banks, Reynolds, SImmons, etc.)

    All along, though, I had my favorites that I’d be happy to tell anyone about: Ray Bradbury, Ursula K. Le Guin, Stanislaw Lem, and Jack Vance.

  106. 106.

    sab

    @karen marie: You’re not twelve. An unfortunate side of my personality is that I tend to obsess about stuff until I move on to the next obsession. My current one is Dorothy Dunnett. She is amazing, but the obsession is all me. Historical fiction not Sci Fy.

  110. 110.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @zhena gogolia:

    Still very sore, but the pain is now in the “bad normal” zone as opposed to the “extreme medical bad” zone, if that makes sense.

    Swelling is still huge.

  112. 112.

    debbie

    I don’t remember if I’ve seen all three of the movies or just two. Everything in it was too long for me. The animated version from around the 1970s is still my favorite version.

  113. 113.

    Dan B

    @WaterGirl: I caught the teasing.  I’m glad to hear from someone who appreciates these actors who are incredibly handsome but gravitate towards roles that are interesting and challenging.

  116. 116.

    Cameron

    Anyone else here a Gene Wolfe fan?  I like all his stuff, but The Book of the New Sun completely blew me away – science fiction written as fantasy.

  119. 119.

    oatler

    @Cameron:

    I used to eat Wolfe for breakfast lunch and dinner, but he sort of lost me with the Book of the Long Sun. Almost as if he was trying to be convoluted for convolution’s sake.

    Recommend his short story collections though, as well as all his other works, especially Peace.

  120. 120.

    Tehanu

    @schrodingers_cat: Most SF is written with teenage boys in mind, it seems.

     

    Are you kidding? That may have been true back in the 1950’s. Don’t try to tell me that “The Broken Earth” trilogy or Ancillary Justice or Station 11 or “The Long Price Quartet” or A Memory Called Empire are mind candy for pimply adolescents.

  121. 121.

    Cameron

    @NotMax:

    @oatler:

    Also a big fan of “James Tiptree Jr.”  It’s unfortunate that people who would otherwise have enjoyed scifi got turned of by the Giant-Engineering-Problems-of-the-Future shit.  Shoot, there’s always been great stuff out there, just a lot of it had a hard time finding a home.

  124. 124.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @zhena gogolia:

    Thanks! It’s just a matter of time now. And I can do most stuff normally now (if gingerly).

    Checking myself out of Sighthound Hall tomorrow and returning to my modest but comfy rooms in Threadkill Lane.

  125. 125.

    Ruckus

    @Dan B:

    I did a 3 week motorcycle tour of NZ, both islands, Aukland to the south end of the south island. And back, but north on the opposite side of the country. A most beautiful place. The people were better than the place. I met amazing people and truly enjoyed my far, far too short stay. I would have emigrated there if I had not been right at the age that ended that possibility. I recommend it, and hope to get back for another visit some day. Reasonably soon would be best.

  127. 127.

    Gin & Tonic

    Speaking of surgery, I learned a new word the other day: capsulorrhaphy. It is a surgical procedure to correct shoulder instability. Not for me, for my son. This will be his second surgery on the same shoulder.

  128. 128.

    Gin & Tonic

    Was in NZ about 10-12 years ago, early spring for them. Got some skiing in, and did this, which is not quite as insane as bungee jumping. If not for the whole family and job (at the time) thing, I’d have moved there in a heartbeat.

  129. 129.

    El-Man

    Should I post my pics from Hobbiton? Toured back in 2016, and have a few without any family members in…

  130. 130.

    different-church-lady

    Paul was going to be Frodo, Ringo Sam, George Gandalf, and John Gollum

    That is just far too on-the-nose to be believable.

  132. 132.

    RSA

    @Tehanu: Are you kidding? That may have been true back in the 1950’s.

    It’s possible you’re both right. When I was immersed in the field, I think that the most popular material appealed mostly to young male readers, but the best work was much more universal.

    (Interestingly, when I do a Google search for the most “popular” SF series, all the hits are for the “best” SF series. But they’re not the same thing at all.)

  134. 134.

    CarolPW

    @oatler: ​
      The New Sun and Long Sun stuff was obscure enough to be pretty tedious, but his other books, like Pandora by Holly Hollander, Castleview, the Soldier in the Mist set and The Knight books were fantastic. Tim Powers is also not to be forgotten.

  137. 137.

    Lyrebird

    @Tehanu: I don’t know how to define “most” but I want to say that I get a smile seeing your nym.  Haven’t read any LeGuin in a while, but she and CJ Cherryh and Patricia McKillip (ever read Fool’s Run?) had a huge impact on me back in the day.

  141. 141.

    Fair Economist

    For most of my middle age I lost interest in fantasy and sci-fi, but lately I have picked it up again and find there’s a lot of good SF & F by female authors today. Some recently that I particularly liked are The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by VE Schwab, the Broken Earth trilogy by NK Jemison, The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers, and The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri.

    I really liked Jackson’s Fellowship. I recall from the book that Elrond was a foot dragger, and I thought it fine he was a bit petty. In particular, the scene of Galadriel refusing the Ring was just incredible. I thought the movies declined as the series went on – Two Towers was mostly good but dropping the Siege of Isengard was a huge mistake and the Helm’s Deep fight went on WAY too long. The first half of RotK was fine but the second half of about 5 sequential happy endings filmed through vaselined lenses was just awful. It really made me understand how important the Cleansing of the Shire was to keep the ending from being too sappy.

  142. 142.

    CarolPW

    @Lyrebird: Patricia McKillip, Robin McKinley and Vonda McIntyre made it easy to shop books in a bricks-and-mortar store without walking very far.

  148. 148.

    dnfree

    @Chetan Murthy: The Lord of the Rings movies are great.  Three books, three movies.  Making the much lighter book The Hobbit into three movies was a ludicrous expansion, requiring a lot of padding and added drama.  The entire style of the book was destroyed.  I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.

  151. 151.

    cain

    I’m hoping for Wheel of Time or some other thing I am not quite sure of because I can’t remember.

  152. 152.

    cain

    @Fair Economist: ​
     
    I’ve been a fantasy lover since the 80s and used to even interact with a number of fantasy writers through BBS. Great people – love hanging out with them when they were drunk. (I get around :-)
    But there are plenty of great fantasy books that I enjoy over the years.

  153. 153.

    Richard

    @karen marie:

    You should probably give it a try. It has a great soundtrack. Some of the themes are beginning to be outdated, but it still has a lot of impact on popular culture. People still refer to LOTR everyday.

  155. 155.

    LiminalOwl

    @Mary G: Preach!  (But there were good authors, even then.)

    @schrodingers_cat:  Yes, in the so-called Golden Age.  Not currently, at least not the stuff that wins awards, or in the major magazines. And that’s what a small group of malcontents are ranting about.

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