Book. Film. TV.
How come I’d never heard of ‘The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet’ by Becky Chambers? I only came across it by picking it up off a shelf in a bricks and mortar bookshop because of the title. (Oldschool.) Consider yourself informed if you like female-centric science fiction that takes place in the great expanse that is space, love crews that become families, made up of multi-faceted beings (‘sapients’ to use the novel’s term) working out what it means to be them, be they Human or not, around others.
Wayfarer is a ‘tunneler’ with the ability to bore ‘tunnels’ ‘in between space’ to speed up travel in a future that doesn’t believe in faster than light travel because of the ramifications. Rosemary, a wet-behind-the-ears clerk from Mars, joins the small crew at the start of the story, but she has a huge secret (it’s not that she busted out her brilliant, damaged sister from an assassin-making facility, though there are Firefly parallels if you look) just as Captain Ashby gets a transformational job offer.
It will mean a long flight for the crew, (as per the title) and an opportunity for Rosemary to gain practical knowledge of what she’s diligently studied and learn things she never thought of. The crew is chiefly Human - Ashby, brilliant techs Kizzy and Jenks and the not very approachable algaeist Corbin (it helps keep the ship functioning). They all have different backgrounds that inform who they are, and then there are Sissix the reptilian pilot is Aandrisk, with some very different cultural norms to Dr Chef’s (a nickname as nobody can utter his given Grum name) and Ohan’s, who can do the complex calculations that allow the Wayfarer to do its thing, although at a huge personal cost, not to mention the ship’s AI Lovey. These aliens have all come together through the Galactic Commons, and the Humans are considered a inferior race, and some of our cultural norms are looked at from a very different perspective.
Rosemary isn’t the only one with a secret - and some are secrets about themselves that were hitherto unknown to them. She gets to know the crew, forming friendships and more (the novel features cross-species het and f/f, an alien from a bisexual culture, and an organic/inorganic ‘ship). Most of all, this crew of people who are good at what they do come to understand what it means to be a ‘feather family’ - quite a few are estranged from their birth family by death, criminality or at least the physical distance caused by their job.
I grew to really care about them as they approach their destination. I particularly enjoyed the time and space devoted to feelings, relationships and perspectives. There’s inventive world0building, but the writer then takes the step of having the characters deal with the ramifications, philosophical and emotional - and it looks like she’s going to be writing the continuing adventures of the Wayfarer.
I went to see Suicide Squad last week (life has been a little busy since). My hopes/expectations were that it would be less dull than Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice. It passes on that score, but that doesn’t mean it was ‘good’, though. There were plot holes, there were too many characters and too many flashbacks. What was Amanda Waller thinking? Serve her right for failing to control Enchantress - spectacularly, because only Diablo’s power seemed like it might compete with her and her brother. The team were underprepared and a bit underpowered for that level of power (although ‘a machine’ to destroy the world/make the world kneel to you - how CGItastic, and how fortunate/stupid that Enchantress then decided to power down from being a Scary Galadriel type to a human size figure the Squad could beat). (Other plotholes here via The AV Club and Jenny Nicholson.)
I also found Deadshot a bit dull. I don’t know if it’s how the character is written in the comics or ifit was Smith’s unwillingness to make the character embrace his darkness, but the whole ‘oh he’s an anti-hero because he loves his daughter and won’t kill women and children’ but he's not really evil except in ways we won't admit schtick, let alone his can’t-miss-anything-power was snoozeworthy. For me, Harley and her Mr J and their baroque, dysfunctional, abusive romance stole the movie - to the point that I would go and see Batffleck versus them. Leto’s Joker was distinctive enough and she was great (apart from a few accent wobbles that made me presume they missed Harleen Quinzel's year out in Australia flashback) in her spectacular messed-upness. I liked Kinnaman, didn’t like Courtney, thought the film was literally too dark and I’m not sure of what to think of the way all the young women were coupled off, but it had its moments.
I forgot to wait for scenes in the middle of the credits.
Parks and Rec 7.4 Leslie and Ron (this was the only episode available to catch up on, so I hope the next will be 7.5 and Dave won’t skip it).
Oh yes, if the show was going to have, essentially, a two-hander, it should be between these two as Leslie tried to work out how their friendship had come to that point. She was relentless, he was just as stubborn and Swanson-y. I started getting worried that the reason why he’d quit was really bad, although Ron running his own business makes total sense, especially if Tom and Donna were, too.
Apart from the absurdity of their attempts to escape, talk/not talk and eventual drunken shenanigans, it filled in the gaps since the jump-ahead quite nicely. Everyone left Ron! And the loss of April, particularly, would hit him hard, even if he’s always known she was going places, like Leslie. (Did Ben not, at one point, notice Ron’s misery, though?) And Leslie overreacting because Morningstar meant getting rid of ‘Ann’s House’ was predictable, but her hurt that he hadn’t come to tell her to her face was understandable, even if the riposte was that she’d stood him up in her busy busy busy phase. And for Ron to give Leslie the perfect gift! Aww.
Really good episode.
This entry was originally posted at http://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/248251.html.
Wayfarer is a ‘tunneler’ with the ability to bore ‘tunnels’ ‘in between space’ to speed up travel in a future that doesn’t believe in faster than light travel because of the ramifications. Rosemary, a wet-behind-the-ears clerk from Mars, joins the small crew at the start of the story, but she has a huge secret (it’s not that she busted out her brilliant, damaged sister from an assassin-making facility, though there are Firefly parallels if you look) just as Captain Ashby gets a transformational job offer.
It will mean a long flight for the crew, (as per the title) and an opportunity for Rosemary to gain practical knowledge of what she’s diligently studied and learn things she never thought of. The crew is chiefly Human - Ashby, brilliant techs Kizzy and Jenks and the not very approachable algaeist Corbin (it helps keep the ship functioning). They all have different backgrounds that inform who they are, and then there are Sissix the reptilian pilot is Aandrisk, with some very different cultural norms to Dr Chef’s (a nickname as nobody can utter his given Grum name) and Ohan’s, who can do the complex calculations that allow the Wayfarer to do its thing, although at a huge personal cost, not to mention the ship’s AI Lovey. These aliens have all come together through the Galactic Commons, and the Humans are considered a inferior race, and some of our cultural norms are looked at from a very different perspective.
Rosemary isn’t the only one with a secret - and some are secrets about themselves that were hitherto unknown to them. She gets to know the crew, forming friendships and more (the novel features cross-species het and f/f, an alien from a bisexual culture, and an organic/inorganic ‘ship). Most of all, this crew of people who are good at what they do come to understand what it means to be a ‘feather family’ - quite a few are estranged from their birth family by death, criminality or at least the physical distance caused by their job.
I grew to really care about them as they approach their destination. I particularly enjoyed the time and space devoted to feelings, relationships and perspectives. There’s inventive world0building, but the writer then takes the step of having the characters deal with the ramifications, philosophical and emotional - and it looks like she’s going to be writing the continuing adventures of the Wayfarer.
I went to see Suicide Squad last week (life has been a little busy since). My hopes/expectations were that it would be less dull than Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice. It passes on that score, but that doesn’t mean it was ‘good’, though. There were plot holes, there were too many characters and too many flashbacks. What was Amanda Waller thinking? Serve her right for failing to control Enchantress - spectacularly, because only Diablo’s power seemed like it might compete with her and her brother. The team were underprepared and a bit underpowered for that level of power (although ‘a machine’ to destroy the world/make the world kneel to you - how CGItastic, and how fortunate/stupid that Enchantress then decided to power down from being a Scary Galadriel type to a human size figure the Squad could beat). (Other plotholes here via The AV Club and Jenny Nicholson.)
I also found Deadshot a bit dull. I don’t know if it’s how the character is written in the comics or ifit was Smith’s unwillingness to make the character embrace his darkness, but the whole ‘oh he’s an anti-hero because he loves his daughter and won’t kill women and children’ but he's not really evil except in ways we won't admit schtick, let alone his can’t-miss-anything-power was snoozeworthy. For me, Harley and her Mr J and their baroque, dysfunctional, abusive romance stole the movie - to the point that I would go and see Batffleck versus them. Leto’s Joker was distinctive enough and she was great (apart from a few accent wobbles that made me presume they missed Harleen Quinzel's year out in Australia flashback) in her spectacular messed-upness. I liked Kinnaman, didn’t like Courtney, thought the film was literally too dark and I’m not sure of what to think of the way all the young women were coupled off, but it had its moments.
I forgot to wait for scenes in the middle of the credits.
Parks and Rec 7.4 Leslie and Ron (this was the only episode available to catch up on, so I hope the next will be 7.5 and Dave won’t skip it).
Oh yes, if the show was going to have, essentially, a two-hander, it should be between these two as Leslie tried to work out how their friendship had come to that point. She was relentless, he was just as stubborn and Swanson-y. I started getting worried that the reason why he’d quit was really bad, although Ron running his own business makes total sense, especially if Tom and Donna were, too.
Apart from the absurdity of their attempts to escape, talk/not talk and eventual drunken shenanigans, it filled in the gaps since the jump-ahead quite nicely. Everyone left Ron! And the loss of April, particularly, would hit him hard, even if he’s always known she was going places, like Leslie. (Did Ben not, at one point, notice Ron’s misery, though?) And Leslie overreacting because Morningstar meant getting rid of ‘Ann’s House’ was predictable, but her hurt that he hadn’t come to tell her to her face was understandable, even if the riposte was that she’d stood him up in her busy busy busy phase. And for Ron to give Leslie the perfect gift! Aww.
Really good episode.
This entry was originally posted at http://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/248251.html.