Vol. 1 Issue 3 - 2.28.09

Articles

* Mark Henry - Author Interview by Megan MacGregor
* Jeri Smith-Ready - Author Interview by J. Lee Moffatt
* Road Trip of the Damned - Book Review by Megan MacGregor
* Red by Jordan Summers - Book Review by Naomi Clark
* Revamped by J.F. Lewis - Book Review by J. Lee Moffatt
* Wicked Game by Jeri Smith-Ready - Book Review by J. Lee Moffatt

Fiction:
* Death Storm by Kenneth Mark Hoover
* The Girl With White Hair by Lee Bailes
* He Brings Spring by Jennzah Elisabeth House
* Lament by Alice Godwin
* Land of the Rising Sun by Jim Stratton
* Last Dance by Lisa Kessler
* Show Down at the Vampire Truck Stop by Sharon Fisher
* Soolie's Poultice by Lawrence Buentello
* Starlight and Tea by Reece Notley
* Violet Twilight by J. Lee Moffatt

Featured Artist
* Dawnii by Andi Lee

I used to be a movie junkie. Several times a month I’d head down the street to the nearest multiplex, buy my ticket and shut off the logical parts of my brain to just drink in the entertainment for a few hours. I was so into going to the movies that I’d see the same movie twice in the same day – Batman Begins and Serenity come to mind. I amassed Movie Watcher points like they were going out of business earning a free pass every other month. It was heaven on earth.

Then something happened.

I don’t think it was the price hike. In San Diego it costs over $10 to see a non-matinee showing, and matinees are over $8. It was pricey, but I didn’t mind. I was at the movies. I was escaping. It was fun. Even when the movie was bad…well almost… We won’t talk about Legally Blonde 2 and a few others that I’d like the hours of my life back that I wasted.

I think the big switch for me was the incredible rudeness of the other movie goers. When you’ve paid $10 to watch a movie, you expect a certain amount of decorum by the members of the audience. But as technology has improved, new phones, being able to text, being able to be on line anywhere, anytime, it has ruined going to the movies for me. Because while I’m sitting there with my phone shut off (hell usually I forget to turn it on again too), there is some dipshit with their phone on, texting away and chattering while I’m trying to pretend the real world doesn’t exist.

In California they’ve made it against the law to talk on the phone/text while you drive. Wouldn’t it be nice if they made it legal to toss some moron out of the movie theatre for doing it too?

If they did that, they’d get me back to the multiplex.

I miss going to the movies, but I sure as hell don’t miss the rude people who still do go.

It would be nice to watch the Academy Awards again because I’d seen the films nominated. (Not that my kind of movies ever are, but we won’t go into that). Instead of watching the Red Carpet shows to snark about who’s wearing what or not.

***

And an addendum to last week’s tirade about Dollhouse, I watched the second episode. It was terrific. It was so much better. It was like watching a different show entirely. Now I’ll be watching for the show, not just because it’s a Whedon show.

Like many of my fellow Whedonesque members I was waiting expectantly for the premiere of Dollhouse, Joss’ new television series. Now I’m not jumping in with both feet giving my heart to the show. I can’t. It is on FOX, and they’ve hurt me too many times in the past for me to get suckered in again. I forgave them for Profit. I grudgingly let what they did to Firefly pass (mostly because I didn’t really watch it before DVD). But after what they did to Drive, I will never become emotionally involved with a program on the network again.

I skipped past most of the doom and gloom reviews across the nets. I hate spoilers, so avoided pretty much everything. I do know that FOX made Joss redo the pilot for Dollhouse, just like the did with Firefly. I honestly think that FOX picks up these other shows to use as tax write-offs to balance out the success of American Idiot Idol.

(I hate reality television – in case you were wondering.)

But last Friday night, I sat down to watch Dollhouse live with all the commercials going. Eliza Dusku is a better actress than I expected. I loved Faith, she was my favorite of the Slayers, and I still wish we had the Faith redemption series. Tru Calling was a great show – but wait for it – it was on FOX and they abused the hell out of it. They gave Tru a full season, but then they killed the second season just as the mythology was fleshing out.

I don’t know what it is with FOX or maybe I do. They think we’re stupid. They insist on dumbing down and blanding out all the most interesting characters. FOX didn’t like Malcolm Reynolds. They thought he was too mean, so Joss had to fluffy Mal up in the second pilot. Apparently FOX’s programming directors are as stupid as they think their audience is.

I was disappointed in Dollhouse. Sure Eliza could act. Sure she looked pretty. Amy Acker was creepy in her little part. But all in all the premise has been so butchered by the Powers That Be that I was mostly meh about it all.



But I can’t blame that all on FOX. Part of the blame has to go with my expectations. You see this past summer a little miracle happened. That miracle was Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog. For forty minutes Joss Whedon got to do whatever the fuck he wanted. It was brilliant from beginning to end. The characters were tight. The music was splendid and the story was compelling. It was near perfection. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watched it.

I bought it on iTunes (and I HATE iTunes). I bought it on Amazon unbox. I bought the soundtrack on iTunes and again on Amazon MP3. I bought the DVD for myself and friends for Christmas. It’s on my MP3 player.

And no I don’t just love it because I have a serious stalker like crush on Nathan Fillion. I love it because it’s good.

I wish Dollhouse could have been better, but Joss’ hammer is caught in a vice.

Thanks FOX – way to go – again.

My name is J. Lee Moffatt, I’m a writer, and I also write fanfic. Hell like a lot of you out there I started writing fanfic long before I ever wrote for an original character or world. I was writing Star Trek – classic Trek – fic when I was in High School in a spiral notebook during my English class. It was tons of fun back then experimenting with the dreaded Mary Sue character joining the crew of the Enterprise. Thank all the gods I don’t remember any of the details of that period in my life, but it was fun. And being on paper with bright pink Flair pen ink, I don’t have to worry about anyone else seeing them either.

These days I still take a break when my brain gets full to write some fic. Most are small ficlets, but once every few months I get in the mood to go for a big story. I blame those big stories on Joss Whedon’s ‘Verse and Supernatural in most cases. There’s just something so tempting to fiddle in those worlds with those characters. I don’t bring in many OC (original characters) anymore. That way leads to Suedome, and I will go out of my way to avoid that at all costs.

Some people think that writing fanfic is a waste of a writers’ time. How can you say that you’re serious about writing if you’re screwing around in someone else’s sandbox playing with their action figures?

And to that I say – bullshit.

Writing is like playing a musical instrument or creating art. The more you do, the better you get. It doesn’t matter if you’re writing about Sam and Dean or your own creation. It’s all part of the learning process. I can’t begin to tell you how much I learned from playing in those other sandboxes. I had a journalism degree to wipe away. I had to relearn how to write more than who, what, where, when and how, and how to make all of it interesting.

In the end it’s all about getting your hands dirty. You’re not going to get better if you don’t practice, and there isn’t anything wrong with practicing with someone else’s instrument. Just make sure you don’t take credit for their creation and it’ll all be shiny.

Practice with fanfic if you feel the need. If you’re inspired to write a story about the Colonial Fleet finding the Firefly ‘Verse, then do it. Screw around. Experiment. Try things you would never try in your own worlds. Learn from it. Grow from it. Share it with other people to get feedback. You need feedback to learn what works and what doesn’t.

Then take those lessons you’ve learned and apply it to your worlds and your characters. Tell your stories and share those too.

The only words wasted are the ones that aren’t set down in pixels or ink.

BTW - If you'd like to read my fanfic go to fanficbylee, I post there probably more than I should.

Second seasons.

As jleemoffatt noted on Monday (it was an ideological Monday) second seasons are notoriously, traditionally bad. As a fan it is frustrating, no matter how understanding you try to be. For an entire season you were blown away by this show! Every detail was noted in case it was important later and every action taken by a character was dissected to see what it meant in the wider scheme of things. You were dreading the curse of cancellation and were delighted when the second season was commissioned. You had INVESTED, and then the makers disappointed you. Character development was rewound or evolved in strange, or frankly bizarre, directions, the new plots are clumsy and unloved and sprang from nowhere.

You looked to the sky, shook your fist and shouted, "Why, TV Gods, Why?"

Why?

Because the people making the show didn't know that they were going to have a second season, or even make it through the first season intact in some cases. That means that a good writer creates the first season as a stand-alone, telling a self-contained story. Every episode is crafted until it shines because the makers are hoping to impress the Network Execs and the audience enough so that they get a second series.

What that means is that when they get the second season, they have to pick this beautiful, carefully woven tapestry of characterisation and plot-threads apart in order to use it as fuel for the new episodes. Sometimes that means that characters seem to forget lessons learnt in the previous season because they work better narratively without that self-knowledge. Sometimes it means that they rewrite or tweak the world's mythology in order to provide more fodder for plots.

It's exasperating sometimes - a lot of the time - but it's necessary for the story and by the third season the world will be set-up to generate its own new plot threads and characters.

So sit back, be patient (although I think everyone has a right to criticise and should do so) and be thankful that they aren't comic-book based. Every decade or so (although it seems to happening every other year recently) they have to throw a big Event in order to either reboot things or to toss the status quo on its head. Although, Marvel Fangirl that I am, I liked Secret Invasion and love the idea of Dark Reign, even if I still mutter darkly about what the buggers did to poor Iron Man and Spiderman. I tell you this now, if I am ever commissioned to write a comic book MJ will have her own comic! And she'll date Bobby, who doesn't get enough love from girls that aren't trying to kill him.



</lj>

A day later than I’d planned on writing and posting this, she says ignoring that it’s actually months past when Monday’s Penguin wanted to get Penguin Pop going…

I’m going to talk about Heroes which is one of my must watch TV shows. The others in case you’re wondering on network TV, not cable, are LOST, Supernatural and Bones. I love Heroes, and unlike so many other fans I have not turned my back on the show while it fought its way through its second season.

But wait, you say, Heroes is in season three. Villains was Volume Three, wasn’t it?

While chronologically that’s true thanks to the Writers’ Strike Villains was delayed until what should have been season 3. Confused? Think of it this way, if the Strike hadn’t happened all those Villains episodes that you’ve been bitching about or confused by, or in my case drooled over, were supposed to air last year in the Spring of 2008.

Season Two Heroes – Generations AND Villains – were both different than season one. New characters were brought in that people HATED. Existing characters were tweaked and twisted in ways you didn’t like. It made you mad. It made you write mean things on the internet. It made you give up watching one of the best shows on television.

Different doesn’t mean bad. It just means different. Heroes is an experimental program. It’s not like formula procedural dramas. I adore Bones, but you know how each episode is going to play out. 1 – gross body, 2 – Booth and Brennan bicker and share smoldering chemistry that I pray is never realized on the small screen which will be the kiss of death for the show, 3 – the Squints look at the squicky corpse and figure out whodunit. Swap out CSI (and I only count Vegas baby), and you’ve got another hour of regular television.

Fans of LOST were livid when the Tailies, Ana Lucia and Libby were brought into the show in Season Two. It upset their plans for fanfic for years on end, and when they brought Nicky and Paulo into Season Three, they were crying for JJ Abram’s head on a pike.

Doesn’t that sound familiar too? How many of these fans are calling for Tim Kring’s balls on a silver platter? How many of them are jumping through hoops that Bryan Fuller is coming back after ABC killed Pushing Daisies?

And can any of you ever remember a second season of a Star Trek series that didn't suck ass (other than the original series)?

People get over yourselves. Give these creative men who brought us the incredible, flexible changing world of Heroes a chance. Yes things are different than they were in Season One. Anyone who reads comic books knows how a retcon works. If you don’t read them, check out on Wikipedia or someplace else on how the origin of Supergirl was butchered by DC Comics over the years, and dear god don’t get me started on what they did to Huntress and Wonder Woman.

Press the “I believe” button and just have fun. Stop being so critical and give the gang on Heroes a chance to right the barrel they’re riding in down the rapids. Let’s face it if Generations and Villains had been just like Genesis you’d have been wondering why they weren’t changing things up and bringing in new characters to spice up the story line.

Now don’t get me wrong. I would rather have a root canal without drugs before I had to look at Maya again. And what they did to my boy Sylar in Generations and Villains was above and beyond weird, but I didn’t stop watching. I couldn’t. It may have been occasionally frustrating, but it was still the best place for me to be on Monday night at 9pm. Heroes, LOST and Supernatural are the only shows I watch live, while my DVR records them to watch again with friends. Would you rather be watching the Bachelor? Or how about whatever comedy they are running on CBS with the rest of their dinosaur demographic. (I’d mention whatever FOX has on at the time, but by the time you read this it might just be more reruns of House which they air more than they do commercials.)

I cannot wait for February 2nd. Bring on Fugitives. Just being able to watch Adrian Pasdar play an evil prick makes it all worth it. I’ve been waiting for the return of Jim Profit for a very long time. And to watch the Devil turn out to be Sylar’s daddy….oh yes baby…I cannot fucking wait for that.

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