Skiffy -- Science Fiction & Fantasy essays
Legend of Earthsea
A Review
Monday, December 13, 2004, Sci-Fi channel premiered Legend of Earthsea.
Directed by Robert Lieberman, Garvin Scott's teleplay was based upon the award-
winning trilogy by Ursula K. Le Guin: The Wizard of Earthsea (Boston Globe Horn
Award for Excellence), The Tombs of Atuan (Newberry Award), and The Farthest
Shore (National Book Award). She has added a fourth book, Tehanu, and an
anthology, Tales of Earthsea: Short Stories. The author, herself, has had little
to do with the cable television four-hour epic. On her website Le Guin states,
"When I tried to suggest the unwisdom of making radical changes to characters,
events, and relationships which have been familiar to hundreds of thousands of
readers all over the world for over thirty years, I was sent a copy of the
script and informed that production was already under way." (Earthsea Miniseries i)
She went on to object to the show's conflict between Believers and Unbelievers and the eventual
union of their disparate belief systems.
Le Guin has expressed further displeasure with the adaptation, most
strikingly the fact that racial ethnicity in the miniseries had been altered.
(A Whitewashed Earthsea ii) Obviously,
this Earthsea is not Le Guin's Earthsea, it's Sci-Fi's. Both are set in a
mystical world of islands, wizards, priestesses, and dragons. So, the question
is how is Sci-Fi's version?
Staring Shawn Ashmore, Kristin Kreuk, Danny Glover, and Isabella
Rossellini, Legend of Earthsea is the story of the young wizard Ged who is
destined to unite an ancient magical artifact and bring peace to his island
world. In his quest, he rights a wrong he has committed, makes unlikely friends,
and confronts foes both human and monstrous.
The tale unfolded slowly with much of the action taking place off camera.
In fact I felt that it moved laboriously in the first hour as the world of
Earthsea was shown to the viewers. Fortunately, things improved when Ged arrived
on Roke, Isle of the Wise. The acting varied greatly. Shawn Ashmore did a fairly
good job as the young Ged. He's slightly arrogant and impatient; he is not as
effective playing the older, supposedly wiser wizard. Kristin Kreuk's Tenar was
nearly a nonentity for the first third of the movie, but after Kossil moved
against her, she showed strength and character when she was given meaty
dialogue, and opposed the villainous Tygath. Christopher Gauthier was affable
and funny as Ged's friend Vetch. I liked his sardonic wit and reluctant heroism.
The Kargide barbarian King Tygath, portrayed by Sebastian Roche, was more
annoying than fearsome. Danny Glover and Isabella Rossellini stole every scene
in which the Wizard Ogion or High Priestess Thar appeared. Tim Storvick's
special effects were low key, but adequate with Ged's shape-shifting and the
dragon Orm Embar being the best.
For many this miniseries may be a problematic adaptation, but for me it
was an enjoyable, if flawed, fantasy adventure.
gcd
17 December 2004
i. Le Guin, U. "Earthsea Miniseries" http://ursulakleguin.com/Earthsea.html 13 November 2004
ii. Le Guin, U. "A Whitewashed Earthsea How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my
books.", Slate Magazine culturebox. slate.msn.com 16 December 2004
Battlestar Galactica
Thoughts on the Eve of the New Series - A Reminiscence
I feel almost guilty for liking Sci-Fi Channel's Legend of Earthsea. I've read Ursala K. Le Guin's essays "A Whitewashed Earthsea" i and "Frankenstein's Earthsea" ii, detailing the foibles and follies of Earthsea's television adaptation. I knew from the first promotional hype that it could not be a faithful version of the written word and did not expect it to be. I judged what was broadcast: was it better than Darklight, was it as good as Stargate: Atlantis? Le Guin has noted that the Legend of Eatrthsea teleplay was a jumbled confusion of scenes from her books. Like Legend, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Conan the Barbarian seemed to be created as if the Cimmerian god Crom had taken characters, settings, and action from Robert E. Howard's pulp tales, shaken them in his fierce fist and cast them like dice in a Shadizar chancery. The screenplay by John Milius and Oliver Stone for the first Conan movie was true to the vision and spirit of REH; however Legend was not true to Le Guin's. Will Sci-Fi's new series Battlestar Galactica be true to the 1978 ABC show?
I feel differently about Battlestar Galactica than any other science fiction movie or television show of my youth. For me, BG equals nostalgia. It's like the ratty old teddy bear you never wanted to part with, even the short time it took your mother to wash it. I recall the premiere being interrupted by Jimmy Carter, Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin for the signing of the Camp David Peace Accords. I remember slogging through the horrendous novelizations by Glen A. Larson and Robert Thurston and the slightly surreal memory of Canadian-born Lorne Greene comparing the thirteen colonies of Kobol to the founding thirteen United States of America. I even have squirreled away the Sonic Fazor raygun that doubled as a laser pistol like Apollo's or Starbuck's. And like that stuffed ursine friend, when you pull out Galactica today, it appears a little moth-eaten, disheveled, and dated. But don't you still look on it fondly?
After the December 2003 miniseries, I spoke with an old friend about the show. This new Battlestar Galactica was a fresh interpretation, altering heroes, technology, and villains. My friend Adam did not want a retelling as much as an updating of the series. He would have preferred something akin to what Gene Roddenberry did with Star Trek: The Next Generation. He wanted to know what happened to the "rag tag fugitive fleet in its lonely quest for a shining planet known as Earth".
I enjoyed the miniseries more than he. I liked some of the new elements, such as the humanoid Cylons and a female Starbuck. I didn't think Boomer also needed a sex change. The Raptor pilot could have been a non-Adama family Athena, or, even better, Sheba. I opposed the morphing of Colonel Tigh into a disagreeable drunk -- that bordered on character assassination.
Many of the changes could make for some interesting storytelling. The Galactica is no longer the flagship of the Colonial fleet. It's an aging ship ready for decommissioning. Its technology is retrograde by design to protect it from Cylon computer viruses. Commander Adama is estranged from Captain Apollo over the death of his youngest son. Zac and the reaction to his demise by the Cylons' attacking swarm had pointed to a close and loving family in the original series. The surviving civilian government is strong and does not resemble the effete, ineffectual Council of the Twelve. Baltar is more of a Cylon dupe than a traitorous Quisling. As the enemy now looks like humans, they can be anyone - there may already be an infiltrator aboard. And the most intriguing twist for me was that Adama was not the faithful believer guiding his flock to a planet of refuge, but a leader who just used a myth to unite the surviving people behind him.
Tonight the series begins in earnest with a two-hour opening. The question I posed will start to be answered. Will Battlestar Galactica be true to my memory, will it be another Earthsea or another Conan? I'm looking forward to discovering the answer.
gcd
14 January 2005
i. Le Guin, U. "A Whitewashed Earthsea How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books." Slate Magazine culturebox. slate.msn.com 16 December 2004
ii. Le Guin, U. "Frankenstein's Earthsea" Locus Online. locusmag.com 5 January 2005
Medium vs. Point Pleasant
There are two new mid-season network offerings this year with a supernatural aspect to them.
Point Pleasant comes with an impressive pedigree for the sci-fi fan. Marti Noxon of Buffy the Vampire
Slayer is its co-creator, and it stars Richard Burgi of The Sentinel, Starship Troopers 2 and Darklight, Dina
Mayer of Starship Troopers, Star Trek: Nemesis and Birds of Prey, and James Morrison of Space: Above
and Beyond. Even one of the show's executive producer is Dawn Parouse of Tru Calling.
When the mysterious Christina Nickson, a child of Darkness, comes to Point Pleasant to seek
out information on her mortal mother, the final conflict between Light and Darkness begins on the Jersey
shore. [Didn’t Aleister Crowley place Armageddon in California?] Unfortunately this show is not very
scary, it misstated the dogma of Immaculate Conception, and its demonic mark, a commingling of 666, the
Book of Revelation’s Sign of the Beast, looks more like the meteorological symbol for a hurricane.
Based upon a true-life psychic detective, Medium chronicles the story of Allison Dubois who works with
prosecutors to bring murders to justice. This show has three things going for it that Point Pleasant lacks.
Four, if you count Patricia Arquette, the most talented of the Arquette clan.
First, there is humor. The pillow talk between Dubois and her husband is caring, playful and intelligent.
Second, there are characters the audience can care about. It is not only those on the side of Darkness that
are unlikable in Point Pleasant. Only the daughter, Judy Kramer, is even marginally affable. Medium’s best
character is the husband who is simultaneously skeptical and believing. Although a scientifically trained
engineer, he is supportive of his wife’s psychic gifts.
Last, Medium is able to surprise. This was most evident when Dubois’s husband attempted to hide his
plans for her birthday or her preternatural dreams showed her another man’s face for the killer she was
persuing. Point Pleasant telegraphs its victims and their horrible fates like Samuel Morse.
NBC has a winner in its Monday night lineup, while Fox should have brought back Tru Calling instead.
gcd
21 January 2005
NUMB3RS: A Non-science-fiction Show for the SF Fan
With Star Trek: Enterprise coming to an end, where can a SF fan look for a scientifically minded network program?
NUMB3RS is one place. Airing Friday nights at 10 p.m. on CBS, this new series uses science, mathematical disciplines like statistics, and computer models to aid the two Eppes brothers in solving crimes and catching crooks. This show isn't all formulas, sums, and proofs. Rob Morrow's [Northern Exposure] Don Eppes and his team of FBI agents played by Alimi Ballard [Dark Angel] and Sabrina Lloyd [Sliders] perform flatfoot criminal investigating. They are also ready to do the dangerous work, putting on the bulletproof vests, drawing their pistols, and pursuing the criminals when necessary.
Two other characters bring a human touch to the left-brainy show. Judd Hirsch [Taxi] is endearing as the brothers' widowed father, Alan. Peter MacNichol [Ally McBeal] portrays Larry Fleinhardt, a theoretical physicist and mentor to David Krumholtz's [Serenity] math inclined Charlie Eppes. While a classic absent-minded professor, he is hardly a cliché. The Ph.D.s' conversations about life and the role of science in it are fascinating and illustrate the close friendship between the two intelligent, but different, individuals. Their disparate worldviews are demonstrated by two scenes. In one episode, the professor of applied mathematics tests his calculations by barreling down a hill in a go-cart, and in another, the physics professor has lunch while discussing what the universe would 'look like' from inside a black hole.
This television program is worth your look.
gcd
16 February 2005
Yesterday's Classics
With the republication of E.E. "Doc" Smith's Triplanetary and Tom Cruise's War of the Worlds blockbuster being promoted in movie trailers, I am posing a question: "how do yesterday's classics hold up with today's audience?" When I saw that Smith's book had been reprinted, I sought out my copy. I remember trying it, and finding the writing pretty bad, especially the cardboard dialogue. I found the battered paperback at the bottom of a box of books, tucked away in the inky shadows of a dark closet. When I pulled it out, intending to scan it and see if my memory of its literary mistakes was accurate, I found a bookmark two-thirds through the book. I hadn't even finished it!
Late last year, I saw George Pal's War of the Worlds on cable. I feel this movie held up. And Steven Spielberg is working on his own version of the story, filmed in small part in Naugatuck, CT, twenty minutes from where my keyboard rests. (Shameless plug for my home state) Every work of art, even a timeless one, is a product of its age. Pal's 1953 version demonstrated both a faith in science and an even greater faith in God common in the fifties with its nascent rocket flights and the adding of "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance. H.G. Wells's curate presented a radically different take on religion. Orson Welles's 1938 broadcast benefited from WWII hysteria and the fact that many listeners channel surfed to CBS from the "Edgar Bergen/ Charlie McCarthy Show" and missed that the Martian attack was all a radioplay.
I recently read Robert A. Heinlein's novel Sixth Column. I am questioning how much I liked it. It had an exciting story of an America under foreign occupation. There was a virtually magical new discovery in science and technology that enabled some stalwart Heinlein characters to win back the freedom of the USA. But, as with Smith's book, I had problems with the text.
In many ways the world of the early 1940's was as alien as any science fiction landscape. The anti-Japanese political cartoons of that period by Theodor Dr. Seuss Geisel look racist today. Yes, I know that there were Italians and Germans in internment camps as well as Japanese. And that there was known sabotage by Japanese immigrants in Brazil, as well as a fear of the presence of the pro-Imperial Kokuryu-kai (the Black Dragon Society, progenitor of the modern criminal syndicate Yakuza), but the internment is a sad chapter in the history of American freedom and civil rights.
I remember reading and enjoying Jack London's SF tales of the "Yellow Peril" on the West Coast, which included bio-warfare from dirigibles. I cringe and force myself to skim over some phrases when I read Robert E. Howard's word choices when writing about the blacks of the Hyborian Age. I heard noted H.P. Lovecraft biographer and scholar J.T. Joshi speak at a Boskone panel on prejudice in the Providence writer's works. Joshi's view was that, although the bigotry was in line with the mainstream popular thought of that time, Lovecraft was, based upon his known reading and his intellectual contacts, someone who should have known better. I guess when I read the racial intolerance present in Sixth Column, I feel the same way about the author of Stranger in a Strange Land.
Published in Astounding Science Fiction in 1941 and in novel form in 1949, Sixth Column is the story of an invasion and occupation of the United States by PanAsiatics. An ex-marketing executive, a hobo, and a group of egghead scientists develop the weapons and the elaborate plans for a counter-attack on the oppressive usurpers. Heinlein makes a point of establishing that the PanAsians are a polyglot mixture of cultures and does not represent any particular Asian ethnicity. This makes sense because his PanAsiatics do not conform to any group of sixty-four years ago or today with which I am familiar. The writing contains many "yellow" epithets. "Face saving" suicide seems to claim more causalities than the fantastic weapons of the resistance. There is some interesting character development concerning peaceful men embroiled in brutal war. However, there are some missed opportunities for exploration of collaborators, the mindset of megalomaniac mad scientists, and most striking of all, the heroic role of an Asian-American who meets prejudice from both the Occidentals and the Orientals in the story. And -- this may be just nit-picking -- the divine Prince of the invaders is a fanatic about Chess (yes, I am aware that Chess originated in 6th or 7th century Common Era India and is pretty much international these days) and not, say, Shogi or Go. Though that fact does make for a clever plot twist.
The University of North Carolina at Wilmington's Barbara Brannon has written about the revolution enabled by desktop and Internet publishing.
These students {children of the digital age} inhabit a paradigm shift, half a millennium after Gutenberg, every bit as radical as that from manuscript to print.
"The Laser Printer As an Agent of Change"
I am adding these comments to the forum of the Quantum Muse web site where a story is composed of an ISO characterset today and an illegible sequence of ones and zeroes tomorrow. I've gotten a bit rambling here and perhaps drifting off-topic. So let me return to my original question. In the fecund fluidity of (Al Gore's) Internet, how do yesterday's classics hold up with today's audience?
For me, Sixth Column falls short.
gcd
17 March 2005
FOX Fails Fans
Be careful what you wish for. Like the return of Tru Calling.
Staring Eliza Dushku [Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, True Lies], Tru Calling was the story a young woman with the ability to go back in time to rescue people from dying. Although similar to Groundhog Day, The X-Files episode “Monday” or Lola rennt [Run Lola Run], Tru Calling had a few twists that made the series more interesting. Tru Davies’s temporal mulligans only took place when she was asked for help. Her murdered mother had the same talent. And she acquired a nemesis whose role is to ensure destiny runs its course and those who are meant to die meet their fated demise.
This FOX show started out only okay, but with the introduction midway through the first season of Jason Priestly as Jack Harper, the anti-Tru and kismet’s ally, it truly rocked. By the end of the season, we learned not only of her mother’s do-over knack, but that her father had been her mom’s opponent, as Harper is now Tru’s.
Tru Calling, more than any other show, is the true successor to Buffy Scooby Gang heroism. On a Yahoo! Star Trek list, a trekkie wrote that the only program she watched on UPN besides Enterprise was Veronica Mars, and it was the closest thing to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Alyson Hannigan did a cameo the very next week; all of which enticed me to try out the program. Well, close only counts in bocce ball and curling. Though I could see why it could be called Buffylike. It has an affable and attractive blonde lead. Her dad is a P.I. and when he's not being Her Father, he makes a mildly Giles-ish mentor. She also has a group of friends who help her solve mysteries. There is a young policeman whom she has mesmerized with pretty persuasion, the street-wise Hispanic classmate, the hip and funny African-American buddy, even a female computer geek (who even resembles a first season Willow). But Veronica has not welded them into a real Scooby Gang. It would be a better show if she did.
Tru has her own crew to aid her on her repeated days – from the shy and resourceful Davis to her brother Harrison, a slick, but recovering scoundrel. This program has a bit of everything for a careful viewer. There is the soap opera like fun of Tru’s relationships and romances, as well as the exciting conflict between the better and lesser angels of our nature. One episode had a debate attempting to codify rules to the inexplicable concept of reliving time. This even included Davis questioning one of Tru’s death reversals. The villain of the piece is a complex character: this fact was demonstrated when Jack was asked for help and he related that he hated his job as he did it faithfully. This season Jack has surrounded himself with a team of allies too.
The broadcast history of this program sounds like a Re-wind day of the series itself. FOX at first renewed the series but for only a limited six episodes. It was then cancelled in favor of the apocalyptic Point Pleasant, and then brought back for its shortened run. Finally FOX pulled up short and has not shown the last episode – preferring instead to inflict more of Paris Hilton’s unreality show The Simple Life on their viewing audience. I’ve read Ms Dushku has moved on to other projects.
Guess I’ll just have to wait for the DVD. Just like Wonderfalls. Maybe that was the plan.
gcd
30 April 2005
New Series Reviews for 2005
It is quite the television season for the Science fiction/Fantasy
fan. From returning shows like Medium; new series like Supernatural,
Invasion, Surface or Threshold; to the remake of
a classic like Night Stalker.
I liked Supernatural more than I expected to. I think that
was in
part because I was so pumped up about the return of Night Stalker
that I wasn’t prepared to give it the proper due. After seeing a
Kolchak:The Night Stalker mini-marathon on Sci-Fi Channel, I
wonder if
that was generated more by nostalgic kitsch than the quality of the
1970’s program (excepting, of course, the performances of Darren
McGavin, Simon Oakland and the supporting cast).
Centered on the younger of two ghost-busting brothers (Jared
Padalecki as Sam Winchester and Jensen Ackles as Dean), Supernatural
is
the story of a family who has been touched by the supernatural and now
strives to combat it. Sam is the more troubled of the two. He wants a
normal life. Dean accepts his itinerant and grifter existence better.
He has a tongue-in-check sense of humor, at one point calling FBI
agents Mulder and Scully. The show hints at how day to day life would
for be someone living a life of battling monsters, like how do you buy
gas without a “real” job, the intricacies of fake IDs and credit card
fraud.
The premiere episode spent the screen time to show the back-story of
its supernatural characters. Special effects were good, with a bit of
The Ring touch to some. A noticeable flaw was its predictability. It
dealt with the well-known Urban Myth of the Disappearing Hitchhiker,
such as Chicago’s Resurrection Mary,,
though it did add some interesting
and (unfortunate) in-the-news twists. The epilogue was extremely
predictable as Sam is propelled from a life as graduate student, boy
friend, and “ordinary guy” to join his brother in their quest to find
their father (Joseph Campbell anyone?) and the supernatural
creature
that has killed his love ones.
The second episode continued the search, added depth to the
brother’s relationship, and presented an exciting hunt for/from a
Wendigo. Supernatural looks to be a series to follow this
season.
Supernatural airs Tuesday on the WB.
gcd 2005
V for Vendetta
Review
I highly recommend the film V for Vendetta. Owen Weaving creates a
mysterious, complex portrayal for V, the terrorist/freedom fighter and
popular personage. Natalie Portman is beautiful as a character both
fearful and brave, victim and hero. A command performance by her.
Stephen Rea is wonderfully hangdogged as the plodding cop. John Hurt,
once ‘Winston Smith’, is frightening as the High Chancellor.
The storytelling method is ingeniously and fluidly done.
Movie/play/book references, flashbacks and story within story techniques are used to
advance the tale without being confusing or extraneous. It is a tad
violent, but also thought provoking. Or maybe I just have a feeling.
This movie, based upon the 1980s (1982-1985 & 1988) graphic novel
series by David Lloyd and Alan Moore (who took his name off this project),
convincingly presents a totalitarian English government which rose to
power through fear. A superhero opposes this iron heel in the guise of
a Guy Fawkes mask (the film was originally set for a Fifth of November release, but postponed possibly due to the London Tube bombings) and with a flashing set of daggers and bombastic music
and fireworks of mass destruction. He involves a young woman Evey in
his flashy introduction to the world. You’ll have to see the rest for yourself.
The Wachowski Brothers have done it again. They wrote the screenplay
and James McTeigue, an alumnus of theirs, directs.
gcd
18 March 2006
Shorter versions of several of these essays may be found as Letters to the Editor at Scifidimensions.com
Or as forum comments at Quantum Muse under the nom de plume [nom-de-ordinateur?] of Cuchulain
Or were published in Trap One Report newsletter of UNIT-USA
Fun sci-fi quiz links
My results:
 | You scored as Moya (Farscape). You are surrounded by muppets. But that is okay because they are your friends and have shown many times that they can be trusted. Now if only you could stop being bothered about wormholes.
Moya (Farscape) | | 94% | Millennium Falcon (Star Wars) | | 88% | Babylon 5 (Babylon 5) | | 81% | Nebuchadnezzar (The Matrix) | | 75% | Andromeda Ascendant (Andromeda) | | 75% | Serenity (Firefly) | | 63% | SG-1 (Stargate) | | 56% | FBI's X-Files Division (The X-Files) | | 56% | Deep Space Nine (Star Trek) | | 56% | |
| |
| Enterprise D (Star Trek) | | 56% |
|
| | Bebop (Cowboy Bebop) | | 50% |
|
| | Galactica (Battlestar Galactica) | | 44% |
|
Email: cuchulian@snet.net
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