Ray Harryhausen passed away last week. This has been noted by people more qualified than I to discuss the master of stop-motion magic—Rick Baker, Adam Savage, Todd Masters, George Lucas, Peter Jackson, and more. The superhuman talent and perseverance evident in a Harryhausen effects sequence can easily be seen in countless visual effects artists since he first brought his creations to frame-by-frame life on the big screen. That makes sense. So how can I really say anything of worth when I say that I was also profoundly influenced by the artistry of Ray Harryhausen? With modesty, and a story about Clash of the Titans. Continue reading…
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Recent Features
Ray Harryhausen and Me: A Life of High Adventure and Escapism
Things That Change You Forever
I have a ghost story of my own. At least, I have a ghost-cat story.
My final year as an undergraduate was spent in relative splendor. My friends and I lucked into tenancy in the house of a professor on sabbatical. Twelve foot ceilings! Built in bookshelves! Three cats! Real, grown-up furniture! Wait… let’s get back to the cats. The professorial family had three cats and a dog, though the dog was sent to a friend with a farm (later, they told us later that we clinched the lease when they told us that cat care was part of the deal and our response was, “Aw, we don’t get the dog?”).
So. Three housemates, three cats. One morning around the (solid oak!) table, we were chatting about the cats’ sleeping habits. Two of the cats routinely slept in my room, the third with one of the others. Feeling a little left out, the third roommate said, “That’s okay, because Ghost Cat slept on my bed last night.” Continue reading…
Secret Agent, Detective, Genius, Jerk: Modernizing Sherlock Holmes
A man with dark wavy hair wakes up in an iron-framed bed in the middle of a windowless room. He leaps out from under the white sheets and stares intently at a corner of the white ceiling. Suddenly, gracefully, he spins to defeat an invisible opponent in four swift motions, finally falling to his knees in front of an empty chair, hands outstretched.
There’s something about the way Benedict Cumberbatch plays the lead role in the BBC series Sherlock that seems like it could be Holmes’ fantasy version of how a brilliant detective behaves. Continue reading…
My New Weapon of Choice
In April, the Guttersnipes like to mix it up a little. This month, Comics Editor Carol Borden writes about romance.
“You hit him with a frying pan,” he said to her. “How come you didn’t grab a knife?”
“The frying pan was closer.” Her eyes slid away. “It’s not like I had time to pick a weapon. It’s not like the frying pan is my weapon of choice.” –Agnes And The Hitman (27)
Growing up in a town where Elvis was sighted post mortem, I despised and mocked The King. Now, I have held wakes in his honor. I used to only like punk. Then I used to say I liked everything but country. Now I don’t even bother arguing that I’m listening to “Americana,” not country. It is a truth universally acknowledged that something I once despised I will come to appreciate and, often, love. So when both Chris and alex recommended Jennifer Crusie, the author of many romance novels, and in particular her collaboration with Bob Mayer, Agnes And The Hitman, I knew I needed to read it. Continue reading…
Interview with Nalo Hopkinson
TVOntario interviews writer Nalo Hopkinson about utopian literature, the ancestral experience of slavery, “noticing race” and the ideals of Toronto’s Caribana festival.
“The Pagan Pilgrim”
Ronnie Pontiac writes a fascinating essay on Thomas Morton, inciter of Puritans and founder of the Enlightenment Utopian experiment Ma-re Mount, “the American melting pot boiling hot” in the New World: “In May 1627 Tom decided to celebrate May Day with the locals. There would be food, drink, a maypole, music, dancing, and hopefully wenching; [...]
“Anxiety and Optimism in Frank Hampton’s Dan Dare”
“In the very first Dan Dare adventure, which began to be serialised weekly in the Christian boy’s comic Eagle in 1950, we were introduced to the ‘ … Inter Planet Space Fleet some years in the future.’ It’s an odd organisation, in that it’s clearly meant to be Earth’s ‘Space Fleet,’ but it’s clearly really [...]
Discussing The Dispossessed with Ursula K. Le Guin
ReadMOre’s Mark Tiedemann has an in depth conversation with writer Ursula K. Le Guin about The Dispossessed.
Red Skies: Soviet Science Fiction
A thorough and well-illustrated look at Soviet science fiction, from the 1920s through the 1980s. (via SF Signal)
Bioshock and Operation Atlantis
Keith from Teleport City writes about William Stiefel’s Libertarian seasteading dream, Operation Atlantis, and BioShock: “BioShock imagines a society built on very similar principals a those of Atlantis I, II, and III, but instead of geodesic domes floating on the surface of the ocean, Ryan’s libertarian utopia is a city at the bottom of the [...]
RIP, Joanna Russ
Science fiction author and feminist and queer critic, Joanna Russ has died. She was probably best know for her novel, The Female Man and her critical text, How To Suppress Women’s Writing. Feminist Science Fiction, Fantasy & Utopia has more about Russ and her work.
Cartographic Curiosities
Step right up for your glimpse of Slate Magazine’s slideshow collection of cartographic curiosities!
Of Note Elsewhere
“It’s easier to tell the same stories everyone else does. There’s no particular shame in it.
It’s just that it’s lazy, which is just about the worst possible thing a spec fic writer can be.
Oh, and it’s not true.”
Kameron Hurley writes about lazy writing, cannibal llamas, female soldiers, and women here. (Thanks, James!)
Patton Oswalt’s multi-franchise super-movie described in his Star Wars filibuster from Parks and Recreation, animated.
Corrigan Vaughan writes an open letter to “Fans of Geek Things“: “I appreciate that you think I have a nice rack and that some of you even find my friends and I to be pretty. That’s very kind. I’m not, however, super in love with the fact that having a rack at all seems to preclude me from being considered a ‘real’ fan.”
The Hollywood Reporter interviews director Takashi Miike about his new film, Shield of Straw: ” In Japan now, films are very safe. When I was young and went to old cinemas, they had a distinctive feel, an adult smell about them. As you got in your seat and the lights went down, there was a feeling of excitement: What if the film is scarier than I thought it’s going to be? You’re taken into that world. Nowadays, you can sit in the theater and know it’s going to be safe. That’s good for business, but not for filmmaking.”
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