REV: End of Month Reviews #75 - March 2010 [spoilers]
Saxon Brenton
[REVIEW] End of Month Reviews #75 - March 2010 [spoilers]
Reviewed This Issue:
Journey Into... #10 [8Fold] {high concept 7}
Looniverse Chronicles #1 [LNH] {high concept 7}
Patrick Harrison and the Canadians: the Hockey Stick Thief [MISC]
SW10: January 2010 #4: The Ministry of Speed [SW10] {high concept 7}
Also posted:
Academy of Super-Heroes #103 [ASH]
SW10: January 2010 #3: Return of the She-Ra Fight Club [SW10]
Seventy-five issues? Where the does the time go?
Spoilers below...
====
Journey Into... #10
'Cover Story'
An Eightfold [8Fold] series {high concept 7 contest}
by Tom Russell
A big problem with writing these recaps each month is that all too
often I overanalyse things.
Throughout this particular narrative I kept wondering 'What sort of
leverage does she hold with the authorities that lets her get away with
that sort of extraordinary behaviour?' Or the media, for that matter?
That question is never answered, and to be fair that's probably
because it's not important to the presentation. In a longer format,
probably attempting to dot all the 'i's and cross all the 't's, this
might at least be alluded to. However, the short story format that the
fixed time limit of the High Concept Challenge favours means that this
is passed over. Assuming that it exists as anything other that a
phantasm in my head, of course.
In summary, this is a story based on the HCC7 notion of 'Olympics'.
It's a character piece that relates the circumstances of, and some of
the backstory behind, an interview with Heidi Schenck, an East German
Olympian turned four colour hero turned lesbian rights representative who
is now dying. The strongest possible /implication/ is that Ms Schenck's
long term health has been damaged because of the steroids that the East
German regime used for its athletes, although significantly she never
directly confirms this. This latter aspect makes up a major focus of
the story: her extraordinary habit (and okay, ability to get away with
it) of acknowledging a controversial idea without acknowledging it.
This does not take the form of a political style talking past the issue
to obfuscate, and certainly not a military style 'neither confirm nor
deny' stonewalling. Instead, her responses are typically (perhaps
stereotypically by this late stage of her career) presented along the
lines that such and such a controversial notion could affect her image
in such and such a way. Sometimes literally in that format.
The first example of this - "'Without the skirt, I look more
feminine.'" - is in a context that it could be just an interesting
personality quirk. The second - "'It wouldn't be very patriotic of me
to say that I hated my mother and father for sending me away.'" - brought
me up short in wonderment. How did she get away with that in communist
East Germany?
And at the risk of repeating myself, we aren't told. Possibly that
aspect isn't important at all, and may even have been a detail which was
never considered. Whatever the case, Tom pulls a clever sleight of hand
and focuses instead on the personality reasons for doing so rather than
the mechanics of how it is handled:
| "There are people who can lie and everyone loves them and there are
| people who can lie and everyone can see it, and with me, they can see it.
| I can't put on an act. I have to be honest and risk it not working
| very well or else it won't work at all."
Which is fascinating and in one way very brave while simultaneously being
very cowardly. The brave outweighs the cowardly by a large amount, of
course, simply because in her situation it would be/would have been simple
to use the minders and publicity agents as a shield to not make any comment
at all.
Looniverse Chronicles #1
'264 BC: Extend The Olive Branch... of DOOM!'
A Legion of Net.Heroes [LNH] series {high concept 7 contest}
by Andrew Perron
Right, administrivia first. Another HHC7 entry for the theme of
'Olympics'. Also, Andrew has created a new anthology series to showcase
stories that take place in other than the present day LNH setting.
In this case, at one of the Olympic games in ancient Greece.
Bilistiche of Macedonia is a horse trainer with entrants in the games,
but she is also a superhuman who secretly fights for justice as Aphrodite
Bilistiche. While travelling to the games she sees a rock falling from
the sky and contaminate with its glow the sacred olive trees that produce
the victory laurels at the games. Her account of how dangerous these
particular olive branches have become is dismissed because of her gender,
so she sets out trying to protect the participants in the games by use
of her abilities. Those participants whom she frequently associates in
her mortal identity she can quickly and easily protect by directly
infusing with protective power, so she therefore sets about to sabotage
the other contestants so that only her associates can win and come into
contact with the laurels.
Now, on a meta level this works fine, because it provides Aphrodite
Bilistiche the opportunity to showcase her powers to the reader. But
within story it leads to accusations of... Bilistiche-dickery! Yes,
just like in the Golden Age Superman stories when Superman would use his
powers in contrived and outlandish ways to fool and humiliate Lois Lane
and Lana Lang (because in those days the demographic for comic books was
young boys, who were always in favour of seeing girls (and their cooties)
humiliated and kept in their place), Aphrodite Bilistiche goes about
using her superhuman powers in a sequence of complicated manoeuvres.
All this instead of using those powers to distract the judges who have
possession of the deadly olive branches while she either decontaminates
them or replaces them entirely.
Now, lest the reader of this article miss the nuance that I am
ranting in mock indignation, I will conclude with the recommendation
that this is a perfectly readable story, done as a Golden Age style
pastiche with lots of appropriate little touches, such as calling in
her living statue friend Galatea to masquerade as her while she is busy.
Patrick Harrison and the Canadians: the Hockey Stick Thief
A Miscellaneous [Misc] posting
by Martin Phipps
So. Martin's love of superheroes and action movies, and his
penchant for topical satire combine in this story, where the illegitimate
children of sports stars (who "can't keep their pants on") are hidden
away in the safety of Camp Limbo. And told, futilely, not to go running
around killing people and stealing cars. Because you see, in the world
that this story inhabits, having an irresponsible sporting star as a
parent is something like having a supervillain as a parent: you inherit
their abilities and bad reputation.
In this instance Manhattan teenager Patrick is accused of having
possession of Jacques Levesques' hockey stick, and as a result discovers
that he's the son of National Hockey League commissioner Patrick Trembley.
He teams up with some new friends at Camp Limbo to solve the mystery of
the missing hockey stick, stealing cars and murdering their way across
the country. All ends well with the motto "See kids, you too can murder
and steal as long as you have rich, powerful parents to make it alright."
This comes across as high speed fun. Everything that is not a joke
is either background information, characterisation, and most of the time
these set up for jokes as well.
SW10: January 2010 #4: The Ministry of Speed
A Superhuman World [SW10] post {high concept 7 contest}
by Scott Eiler
I don't think I've made this observation before, but the obvious
advantage of having so many of the Superhuman World stories presented
as journalist reports is that Scott has a valid reason to present
information dumps in a concise form. In this case the speedster The
Hurrier has been invited to write a comment for the Superhuman World
website on new super-runners who are appearing.
The resulting write up is dense with all sorts of interesting
titbits of information. The Hurrier outlines his worldview on the
difference between super-speed (where the person can do everything
quickly) and its subset super-running (where the person can move fast)
and how the former can lead to an addiction for constant speed; and
this segues into the nominal main story concept of a religious
ministry to those suffering from an addiction to speed. There is
also a classification scheme of various sources where an individual's
super speed may derive from - which includes an obvious take-off of
the Speed Force used in the DC Universe setting. In fact, the middle
of the article has a number of direct swipes from outside the SW
setting: simply because of the nature of the topic of discussion I
was expecting the throwaway references to the speedsters naming
themselves DCU style with words like 'quick' and 'zoom'. I was
grinning in bemusement when the Peanuts references, including
Linus van Pelt as a super-mage.
----------
Saxon Brenton University of Technology, city library, Sydney Australia
saxon....@uts.edu.au
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Tom Russell
> � � �The first example of this - "'Without the skirt, I look more
> feminine.'" - is in a context that it could be just an interesting
> personality quirk. �The second - "'It wouldn't be very patriotic of me
> to say that I hated my mother and father for sending me away.'" - brought
> me up short in wonderment. �How did she get away with that in communist
> East Germany?
Um... er...
Well, there's a reason why I said I wasn't one hundred percent happy
with this one. :-/
==Tom
Martin Phipps
> Patrick Harrison and the Canadians: the Hockey Stick Thief
> A Miscellaneous [Misc] posting
> by Martin Phipps
>
> � � �So. �Martin's love of superheroes and action movies, and his �
> penchant for topical satire combine in this story, where the illegitimate �
> children of sports stars (who "can't keep their pants on") are hidden �
> away in the safety of Camp Limbo. �And told, futilely, not to go running �
> around killing people and stealing cars. �Because you see, in the world �
> that this story inhabits, having an irresponsible sporting star as a �
> parent is something like having a supervillain as a parent: you inherit �
> their abilities and bad reputation.
> � � �In this instance Manhattan teenager Patrick is accused of having �
> possession of Jacques Levesques' hockey stick, and as a result discovers �
> that he's the son of National Hockey League commissioner Patrick Trembley. �
> He teams up with some new friends at Camp Limbo to solve the mystery of �
> the missing hockey stick, stealing cars and murdering their way across �
> the country. �All ends well with the motto "See kids, you too can murder �
> and steal as long as you have rich, powerful parents to make it alright."
> � � �This comes across as high speed fun. �Everything that is not a joke �
> is either background information, characterisation, and most of the time �
> these set up for jokes as well.
Just my luck: the sets of people who read Patrick Harrison and the
Canadians: the Hockey Stick Thief and saw the movie Percy Jackson and
the Olympians: the Lightning Thief would appear to have zero
intersect. :)
Martin
Andrew Perron
Honestly, I liked it - her ambiguity was very interesting. And the fact
that she's not directly making a statement would provide some leeway for
the authorities - *if* they wanted to avoid doing her in.
Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, seems they did~
Scott Eiler
I'm with Andrew on this one. This statement makes good sense, when
coming from an East German who's being interviewed after the fall of
East Germany. Maybe the proper phrase in English would be, "It
wouldn't have been very patriotic if..." - but hey, there might be
language issues.
Scott Eiler
> SW10: January 2010 #4: The Ministry of Speed
> A Superhuman World [SW10] post {high concept 7 contest}
> by Scott Eiler
>
> I don't think I've made this observation before, but the obvious
> advantage of having so many of the Superhuman World stories presented
> as journalist reports is that Scott has a valid reason to present
> information dumps in a concise form.
... My Master Plan is proceeding according to my Master Plan!
(I got that phrase from a Marvel comic, though admittedly one of the
silly ones.)
> In fact, the middle
> of the article has a number of direct swipes from outside the SW
> setting: simply because of the nature of the topic of discussion I
> was expecting the throwaway references to the speedsters naming
> themselves DCU style with words like 'quick' and 'zoom'.
Ah, the joys of commentary fiction.
I'll admit, "The Ministry of Speed" is not a story so much as a plot
seed. There was a conflict and a resolution, but I'll admit it was
kind of wimpy. I had much more fun with "Return of the She-Ra Fight
Club", which for once resolved existing plot seeds (while leaving room
for more).
> I was
> grinning in bemusement when the Peanuts references, including
> Linus van Pelt as a super-mage.
Yeah, well, I put in plot seeds for reasons that aren't obvious
sometimes, not even to me.
The Peanuts characters are making an increasing inroads into my
universe. Lucy actually tried to influence the 2008 U.S. Presidential
elections. (http://www.eilertech.com/stories/2008/
reticent.htm#reticent) It would be wrong for me to deny Charlie his
chance in my world.
...
Saxon, I try to take these opportunities to review what you've
written. Feel free to let me know if I've missed something. (My
newsreader does not give credit to original authors, only to latest
responder. And I don't see anything "LNH" for this time period.)
Andrew Perron
> I'm with Andrew on this one. This statement makes good sense, when
> coming from an East German who's being interviewed after the fall of
> East Germany. Maybe the proper phrase in English would be, "It
> wouldn't have been very patriotic if..." - but hey, there might be
> language issues.
Well, some of the statements took place back in the day, if you look.
'70s, '80s.
Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, zam pow whiz go!
Saxon Brenton
Andrew Perron wrote:
> Tom Russell wrote:
>> Um... er...
>>
>> Well, there's a reason why I said I wasn't one hundred percent happy
>> with this one. :-/
>
> Honestly, I liked it - her ambiguity was very interesting. And the fact
> that she's not directly making a statement would provide some leeway for
> the authorities - *if* they wanted to avoid doing her in.
Once I realised there would be no explanantion and applied the Mystery
Science Theatre 3000 mantra to it (remember that it's just a show, you
really should relax...), wel, I can appreciate it as a character piece
on its own merits. I suppose the thing to remember is that this is a story
nominally in the four colour superhero gere, so it's not a question of
'should I apply willing suspension of disbelief?' but rather 'how much
willing suspension of disbelief, and where?'
---
Saxon Brenton
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Saxon Brenton
Martin Phipps lamented:
> Just my luck: the sets of people who read Patrick Harrison and the
> Canadians: the Hockey Stick Thief and saw the movie Percy Jackson and
> the Olympians: the Lightning Thief would appear to have zero
> intersect. :) Martin
Oh, wait, you mean there was a *movie* of it? :-)
---
Saxon Brenton (oblivious)
Saxon Brenton
Scott Eiler asked:
> Saxon, I try to take these opportunities to review what you've
> written. Feel free to let me know if I've missed something. (My
> newsreader does not give credit to original authors, only to latest
> responder. And I don't see anything "LNH" for this time period.)
I didn't write any stories in that period. I was *planning* an
olympics story, but that fell through :-(
For what it's worth, the url links I place at the bottom of every
EoMR should be useful in identifying who wrote what; in particlur
this link: http://lists.eyrie.org/pipermail/racc/ gives the
monthly accumuklations, and they're searchable by author, title
and date.
---
Saxon Brenton
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Andrew Perron
> Looniverse Chronicles #1
> '264 BC: Extend The Olive Branch... of DOOM!'
> A Legion of Net.Heroes [LNH] series {high concept 7 contest}
> by Andrew Perron
> Right, administrivia first. Another HHC7 entry for the theme of
> 'Olympics'. Also, Andrew has created a new anthology series to showcase
> stories that take place in other than the present day LNH setting.
Yes! Note to everyone: this is the perfect opportunity to write Murder She
Wrote parodies.
> Now, on a meta level this works fine, because it provides Aphrodite
> Bilistiche the opportunity to showcase her powers to the reader. But
> within story it leads to accusations of... Bilistiche-dickery!
Woo! Yay for goofy story elements. <3
> All this instead of using those powers to distract the judges who have
> possession of the deadly olive branches while she either decontaminates
> them or replaces them entirely.
...you know, the thing is, I didn't even think of that option. It was
dickery from the word go!
> Now, lest the reader of this article miss the nuance that I am
> ranting in mock indignation, I will conclude with the recommendation
> that this is a perfectly readable story, done as a Golden Age style
> pastiche with lots of appropriate little touches, such as calling in
> her living statue friend Galatea to masquerade as her while she is busy.
Thanks! Though I think I aimed for Golden Age but hit Silver instead.
Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, reading The Death of Cheesecake-Eater
Lad. You are insane.