Ancient Logic

As it turns out, I have a bit more to say about the second Guardians of the Galaxy film. After a rewatch I'd rate the movie a notch or two higher than what I wrote in my previous post, mostly because its craft and attention to detail became more apparent the second time around.  CAUTION SPOILERS AHEAD! First of all, the use of "Brandy" in the film approaches genius and just that little bit of foreshadowing really helps sell the way Ego manipulates his son. Later in the film Ego tells Quill that he is a 'sailor,' and that while he loved his mother, he also knew that Meredith Quill would 'steal him from the sea.' In his first discussion, Ego suggests that the 'sea' is simply a metaphor for his need to travel, his urge to explore. The idea of a planet-sized celestial seizing upon the ethos of ramble-rock makes a twisted sort of sense but that metaphor as simply a step up to Ego's true intention. What Ego thinks is that the 'sea'...

While there are worse ways to spend your money, Alien: Covenant is far from must-see movie-making. The earlier of these Alien reboot movies, Alien: Prometheus, was a hot mess - throwing half a dozen half-baked, super-ambitious ideas into the air and trying to catch them on the same saucer. It didn't work and mostly serves as a good example of why story must be the first, last, and everything in a movie. Covenant is bit more coherent, if for no other reason than it really only has one idea in mind: getting us to a fully-formed xenomorph engaged in quality chest-ripping and murder-dicing. Which it does with reasonable competence. Did I want more out of this movie? There are some moments that hint at a much more interesting and epic movie behind this one - the visit of the android David to the home planet (?) of the Engineers is one example. The idea of the evolution of the Xenomorph being a kind of machine directed domestication is intriguing. But really this movie is the...

Weird Fiction, I think by definition, is a hard genre to describe. Still, I think it's possible to point to a couple of major strains - Classic and New.  Cover Image for "Speaking to Skull Kings and Other Stories" by Emily B. Cataneo On one hand you have the heritage of Machen, Blackwood, Gilman, Ligotti, and of course the decrepit and dark idol of HP himself. These are tales almost like ghost stories, where protagonists brush up against the uncanny and either survives or succumbs to bleak fates. These tales tend towards a morose and gothic atmosphere and describe worlds I'd definitely avoid in real life. Then you have the bizarre stuff like Ann and Jeff VanderMeer, Michael Shea, and China Meiville where weirdness is something plastic and garish. Often referred to as the "New Weird," these are works where the universe keeps warping chromosomes and shoving disparate genres into weird hybrids. I'm not sure if I'm that keen to visit B...

If find myself pressed for time this month and absolutely overwhelmed by the various media I'd like to tell you about.  Pretty much my reaction throughout this film. First up. I watched Guardians of The Galaxy Volume 2, okay? So you can get off my back. And? I loved it. About as much as the first one, honestly, give or take a joke or two. What it misses in novelty and sheer comedy (this is a percentage thing: there are more jokes and fewer of them completely land) it more than makes up for resonance and, you know, feelings. It's actually damn impressive that the first movie 1) got made in the first place 2) worked as well as it did. There are five characters I doubt many had any reason to care about and by the end of the first flick, you loved them. Total surprise. So that's the first film. The second film surprises by taking all of this very, very seriously and finding ways of making you care about such diverse topics as the attempt of a green and purple siste...

I have a few short speculative stories to recommend from the past month. Particularly this year I find myself drawn to stories that promise one of two things: gloomy, restless undead or enormous 16-wheel tractor trailers, flames painted down the side, horns blaring, riding down the venal and corrupt and flattening them into road-kill on the side of the road. I have three of the former listed and one of the latter. Parallax by Morgan Crooks (2017) Her Hands Like Ice by KT Bryski. ( Bracken ) This was very good. The central of the mystery of the story - what haunts the narrator - is spun out convincingly, mesmerizingly until the final line. The reader's ache to UNDERSTAND this mystery echoes the cold need of the narrator to keep ahold of her dead sister. Not so much a revision or reaction to the classic vampire set-up as a clever misdirection.  Infinite Love Engine by Joseph Allen Hill ( Lightspeed ). A great rollicking funny-as-hell, deranged, explosion of Afrofutris...