So what should JMS do next?
mpvork...@hotmail.com
to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
So I've been thinking. What should he consider as a next project? And
I came up with three possibles. Neither of them are beyond his powers,
and should either or both be fun. And I know that in two of the three
cases no script has been done yet.
One. Thor. My pompous jerk cousin, Ken Branagh, has been tapped to
direct. I think they have a script, but I'm not sure. Joe could do a
great job.
Two. Spider-Man 4. Sam's talking about doing it in 2010. I know he
doesn't have a script. Right now he's got Kirsten, and maybe Dylan
Baker. No word on Tobey. Joe could make that one sing.
Three. Ghostbusters 3. Apart from the first movie, who was the best
damn writer to ever tackle those characters?
So it's simple. We can even add a fourth. Joe could write The
Avengers. He could even make the Fantastic Four franchise rock on the
big screen.
It's his call.
Mike
Jan
mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>
>Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
>to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
>
>So I've been thinking. What should he consider as a next project? And
>I came up with three possibles.
While any one of those might be interesting, I'd prefer to see what JMS comes up
with using his own characters and situations.
What I'd really love to see is a situation similar to what he's done in the
comics, though where he could write a story of whatever length works and then
make it a TV show of whatever number of episodes he decides is right. It could
even be an anthology format with other writers doing the same thing and perhaps
have a couple of stories running concurrently.
I'd pay to see whatever cable channel that show was on.
Jan
--
I try never to get involved in my own life. Too much trouble.
Brian Harvey
>One. Thor.
>Two. Spider-Man 4.
>Three. Ghostbusters 3.
I vote no on all of these, especially the last two, since I make it a rule
never to see movies with numbers in their names. (Yeah, okay, I was lucky
that they didn't call Aliens "Alien 2.")
These would be more of the same for JMS, not what I'd call a stretch.
What's the current status of making a film out of Ursula LeGuin's
_The Dispossessed_? I remember there have been a few false starts. That's
something that needs doing.
Getting away from science fiction, Peter Dickinson is a great neglected
author whose mysteries would be great as movies. He's also written a lot
of young-adult books that would make great films. My favorites are
_Hindsight_ in the adult category and _The Seventh Raven_ for kids.
In a whole different direction, it'd be great to see the movies help out in
the battle against high-stakes testing in education. This is a /real/
stretch, since it's not a novel with a plot, but could JMS write a movie
based on James Herndon's _How to Survive in Your Native Land_? Or any of
Jonathan Kozol's books?
Or, maybe he could just surprise us. :-)
John W. Kennedy
a singular ability and love
for words in action, spoken fearlessly.
Where else is he to find them -- syndicated
television reduced to nearly nil,
as now it is -- but in the living theatre?
"Snow White" 's all very well, (a "Cinderella"
done in the style of Kálmán haunts my past
and future, too), but we know he has more
than /Schneewitchen/ in him, a tragedy,
a comedy, romance, or history,
or better yet (to my mind) pastoral
whose cast includes a bear, quite unexplained,
that speaks the most complex verse of the play
(as bears in pastorals are wont to do).
So come on, Joe, visit your native East
where Suits are only morons, thrice as wise,
therefore, as idiot Angeleno Suits,
and work your craft upon the master's anvil
the breathing, three-dimensioned, lusty Stage.
Dan Dassow
wrote:
> So come on, Joe, visit your native East
> where Suits are only morons, thrice as wise,
> therefore, as idiot Angeleno Suits,
> and work your craft upon the master's anvil
> the breathing, three-dimensioned, lusty Stage.
It would be great to see a serious Straczynski stage play. Joe's first
one act play should not be an issue.
Dan Dassow
Duggy
his new watch.
===
= DUG.
===
Stile4aly
Going to disagree on all 3 counts. I think that the comic book movies
have hit their zenith with Dark Knight, Iron Man, and the upcoming
Watchmen. I fear that the genre is quickly becoming so over-filled
that even if Thor is done well it could be subject to consumer
malaise.
Spiderman 4 should be stopped. 3 was nothing short of an abortion,
and it burned any good will I might have had for Sam Raimi with the
franchise. It's a real pity too because 1 and 2 were well handled,
but 3 went the Batman and Robin route - too many villains and
characters acting as if they had no intelligence whatsoever.
Ghostbusters 3 is being written by a pair of writers for The Office,
who I think would be a good match for the mix of dry wit and slapstick
that Ghostbusters successfully achieved.
If Changeling is any indication, I think Joe should stick with non-
fiction and or realistic fiction (though I'm dead curious to see what
he does with World War Z).
Baff
There are so few good writers in the sci-fi genre that I shed a tear
every time I hear about another non-sci-fi project that Joe is working
on (though I think it is very cool that he is getting to do big stuff
and being recognized for it.)
I've been waiting 20 years for Ender's Game to get made. Dunno how Joe
would feel about writing for kids though. It would be the opposite of a
lot of his early work when he wrote for adults on kids shows.
--
Vince
"Good and evil aren't always." Weis & Hickman (I think)
Stefan
> Our Joe, above all else, has shown he has
> a singular ability and love
> for words in action, spoken fearlessly.
> Where else is he to find them -- syndicated
> television reduced to nearly nil,
> as now it is -- but in the living theatre?
> "Snow White" 's all very well, (a "Cinderella"
> done in the style of Kálmán haunts my past
> and future, too), but we know he has more
> than /Schneewitchen/ in him, a tragedy,
> a comedy, romance, or history,
> or better yet (to my mind) pastoral
> whose cast includes a bear, quite unexplained,
> that speaks the most complex verse of the play
> (as bears in pastorals are wont to do).
Great idea: bear on stage.
(Since JMS _loves_ bears)
What about this famous bear-verse for a Beginning:
"I lay on my chest
And I thought it best
To pretend I was having a evening rest;
I lay on my tum
And I tried to hum
But nothing particular seemed to come"(*)
Ste <slghtly evil grin> fan
(*) A.A.Milne
--
The very best TV-SF-Series ever:
Babylon5, Firefly, Stargate, Startrek
Pure alphabetically order ;-)
mpvork...@hotmail.com
He's prolly gonna do just that.
I agree, none of what I've thrown out there would a stretch for Joe.
But he could do a far better job than 99.999 percent of the others out
there. For me, Joe's in the same league as Bill Goldman and Paddy
Chayevsky. He's at the peak of his powers, and can write anything he
wants. He's tackling Doc Smith's Lensman series now, something that a
lot of people have said could never be filmed. Hell, Joe could knock
out a dynamite script for Alfie Bester's The Demolished Man, and
that's a story that was deliberately written to be unfilmable. Alfie
said so himself.
Something I'd like to see him do just for funzies is an adaptation of
Don Westlake's novel High Adventure. It's one of the funniest things
ever put to paper. The hero's an outlaw. He smuggles weed into the US,
with bogus pre-Columbian antiques hidden in the bales of dope. The
Belizean government doesn't care about him smuggling dope, but they'd
get a little upset about the art. The Americans get cranky about the
weed, but the antiques, feh. And our hero works both ends of this scam
for what reason? To recover the money he was screwed out of on a land
deal by a Belizean bureaucrat named...
get this...
Innocent St. Michael.
I swear. Westlake had me in tears the first time I read it. I had to
stop because I laughed so hard I strained my ribs.
Mike
Brian Harvey
>I've been waiting 20 years for Ender's Game to get made. Dunno how Joe
>would feel about writing for kids though. It would be the opposite of a
>lot of his early work when he wrote for adults on kids shows.
Ender's Game isn't a kids' book, even though a lot of kids like it. It's a
fierce anti-war polemic for adults, imho.
The trouble about filming it is that once you've read the book, you can never
again experience the wrenching shock when you learn in the next-to-last
chapter what kind of book it actually is. So the movie would have to appeal
to non-sf fans who haven't read it!
Alan Dicey
> I would vote for anything sci-fi, movie, mini-series or tv show.
>
> There are so few good writers in the sci-fi genre that I shed a tear
> every time I hear about another non-sci-fi project that Joe is working
> on (though I think it is very cool that he is getting to do big stuff
> and being recognized for it.)
>
> I've been waiting 20 years for Ender's Game to get made. Dunno how Joe
> would feel about writing for kids though. It would be the opposite of a
> lot of his early work when he wrote for adults on kids shows.
>
Ender's Game would be a good subject, but I don't see that it is
"written for kids". The characters are mostly children, but that
doesn't mean that adults can't be interested - most of them are parents,
after all. It's a powerful and gripping story which would fully repay
sensitive treatment and produce a great movie. The one difficulty is
that much of the power comes from the surprise ending.
Steampunk seems to be gaining ground, perhaps its time for a good
steampunk movie (a feeling tapped into by Joss Whedon with Dr.
Horrible). China Mieville's "Perdido Street Station", or some of the
Philip Reeve stories (admittedly those are for younger readers)
On a different tack, I've always thought that short stories make better
movies than full novels, as there is less to edit out. Of the authors I
read when first getting into SF, I still remember Sam Delaney and Roger
Zelazny's short stories as outstanding (and they have many Hugo and
Nebula awards between them). They had a thing for elaborate titles,
too: things like "We, in Some Strange Power’s Employ, Move on a Rigorous
Line", "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones",
"Driftglass", "High Weir" (Delaney) "The Doors Of His Face, The Lamps Of
His Mouth", "A Rose For Ecclesiates", (Zelazny).
Joseph DeMartino
> Ender's Game isn't a kids' book, even though a lot of kids like it. It's a
> fierce anti-war polemic for adults, imho.
Vince didn't mean that JMS would be writing a *story* for kids, which
Ender's Game clearly *isn't*, but that he would be writing a script
for child *actors* - who would necessarily make up most of the cast.
Regards,
Joe.
Stefan
> Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
> to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
[snip]
> One. Thor. My pompous jerk cousin, Ken Branagh, has been tapped to
> direct. I think they have a script, but I'm not sure. Joe could do a
> great job.
> Two. Spider-Man 4. Sam's talking about doing it in 2010. I know he
> doesn't have a script. Right now he's got Kirsten, and maybe Dylan
> Baker. No word on Tobey. Joe could make that one sing.
> Three. Ghostbusters 3. Apart from the first movie, who was the best
> damn writer to ever tackle those characters?
Going a bit more serious compared to my previous
posting in this thread...
Please NO MORE Superheroes!
I never liked them much.
(The only "Superman" I watch with fun is
Lois&Clark because it's Screwball-Comedy at
its best.)
And Ghostbusters were neat.
But do we really need a third one?
But what I'm longtime waiting for, are some
really precious written and directed movies
based on novels from Isaac Asimov.
For instance some of the early ones:
"Pebble in the Sky" (1950)
"The Stars, Like Dust" (1951)
"The Currents of Space" (1952)
Pure fun also could be a (TV-)Series based on
the Lucky Starr novels.
I'm certainly thinking about much more desirable
future JMS projects than noticed above. ;-)
Stefan
Brian Harvey
>Vince didn't mean that JMS would be writing a *story* for kids, which
>Ender's Game clearly *isn't*, but that he would be writing a script
>for child *actors* - who would necessarily make up most of the cast.
Oh, yeah, sorry. And, JMS said in one of the script books that he doesn't
like children in his stories -- or at least not in the B5 context -- so
that /would/ be a challenge for him! :-) But at least the characters aren't
supposed to be cute and cuddly, not like that B5 sick kid.
Dan Dassow
When I first heard about Changeling, this came to minde.
Dan Dassow
Duggy
Bigger changes have been made than making them teenagers and casting
with twenty-somethings.
===
= DUG.
===
Wes Struebing
Frankly, while I *did* enjoy "Ender's Game" (and it got the praise,
imho, it deserved) I much preferred "Speaker for the Dead"
I'm not sure whether it is even possible to do a decent cinematic job
on it, but it would certainly provide that stretch that JMS has been
telling us about recently, in particular.
(though, Ender's... would probably have to be made first to provide
the background...)
--
Wes Struebing
Jan. 20, 2009 - the end of an error
Amy Guskin
<2f216ef8-2327-4a56...@p59g2000hsd.googlegroups.com>):
Nicely turned. Bravo.
Amy
--
"In my line of work you gotta keep repeating things over and over and over
again for the truth to sink in, to kinda catapult the propaganda." - George
W. Bush, May 24, 2005
Amy Guskin
<0d739b0d-fd3a-43d4...@u29g2000pro.googlegroups.com>):
> He should get bracelet with WWTNGWMTD? on it. It would go great with
> his new watch. <<
What would the n______ great w______ maker t_______ do? Huh?
John W. Kennedy
> Nicely turned. Bravo.
Thanks. Horrifically uneven, of course, as all my efforts are in that
direction, but I had spent all day at Fairleigh Dickenson U's annual
Shakespeare conference, and then at following reception, so I really
couldn't /not/ try it, especially since I quite meant it. After 24
hours to cool off, a few lines are worth having written, I think (even
if I should be the only person here to have read "Descent into Hell").
--
John "Exit, pursued by a bear" Kennedy
Amy Guskin
<a52d0e9e-d19f-4886...@u75g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>):
>
>
> John "Exit, pursued by a bear" Kennedy <<
Probably safer than being pursued by the NBS...
Matt Ion
>>> On Sun, 19 Oct 2008 22:33:48 -0400, thus spake John W. Kennedy (in article
> <a52d0e9e-d19f-4886...@u75g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>):
>>
>> John "Exit, pursued by a bear" Kennedy <<
>
> Probably safer than being pursued by the NBS...
The Narn Bear Squad??
Matt Ion
Yeah, wasn't it something about "kids and cute robots"? Or "robots and
cute kids"? I think that was probably a direct reference to the
original Battlestar Galactica's Boxey and Muffett. In any case, I don't
see him discounting the idea of kids in his work just for the sake of
them being kids... I think the idea was avoiding "cuteness" just for the
sake of embedding "cuteness".
Duggy
> >> On Sun, 19 Oct 2008 00:36:48 -0400, thus spake Duggy (in article
> > his new watch. <<
> What would the n______ great w______ maker t_______ do? Huh?
What Would The News Group Want Me To Do?
===
= DUG.
===
Duggy
> Yeah, wasn't it something about "kids and cute robots"? Or "robots and
> cute kids"? I think that was probably a direct reference to the
> original Battlestar Galactica's Boxey and Muffett.
And TNG's Wesley, SeaQuest's Lucas, RoboCop's Nikko (RC3), Gadget (TV
series), Adric in Doctor Who... Boxey is certainly a major one, but I
think that it's something that he saw wrong in a lot of SF.
As for Robot's R2, VINCent & Old BOB in The Black Hole, Explorers,
Twikky in Buck Rogers... One again, Muffet was important, but if he
was the only one then Joe probably wouldn't have made a rule.
> In any case, I don't see him discounting the idea of kids in his work just for the sake of
> them being kids... I think the idea was avoiding "cuteness" just for the
> sake of embedding "cuteness".
I think it's a feature of the SF-is-for-kids attitude that pops up a
lot (In Australia Farscape was often edited to remove adult content)
and I don't think that he wanted to "dumb" down Babylon 5 in that way.
===
= DUG.
===
Matt Ion
> And TNG's Wesley,
Ah, but without Wesley, we wouldn't get comedy gold like this from Wil
Wheaton himself:
http://www.tvsquad.com/bloggers/wil-wheaton/
> SeaQuest's Lucas,
Didn't mind him quite so much.
Duggy
> Duggy wrote:
> > And TNG's Wesley,
> Ah, but without Wesley, we wouldn't get comedy gold like this from Wil
> Wheaton himself:http://www.tvsquad.com/bloggers/wil-wheaton/
I think Wil himself existed before Wesley.
> > SeaQuest's Lucas,
> Didn't mind him quite so much.
He started off a Wesley clone, but I think they got over using him
pretty quick.
===
= DUG.
===
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Also, Scott Card has a script he's already done for Ender's, but there
are problems with it; he's not satisfied with how it's come out, and
has been doing periodic rewrites and script doctoring. But he seems to
have a final draft at last. And I don't think he's been satisfied
with the possible directors he's been presented with. He's in pre-
production now, but we all know how that can go. I've seen projects
make it into post and still go up in flames.
Mike
Fel
[ Your display is set for the "ISO-8859-1" character set. ]
[ Some characters may be displayed incorrectly. ]
On 19 Okt., 18:28, Alan Dicey <a...@diceyhome.free-online.co.uk>
wrote:
> On a different tack, I've always thought that short stories make better
> movies than full novels, as there is less to edit out. Of the authors I
> read when first getting into SF, I still remember Sam Delaney and Roger
> Zelazny's short stories as outstanding (and they have many Hugo and
> Nebula awards between them). They had a thing for elaborate titles,
> too: things like "We, in Some Strange Power?s Employ, Move on a Rigorous
> Line", "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones",
> "Driftglass", "High Weir" (Delaney) "The Doors Of His Face, The Lamps Of
> His Mouth", "A Rose For Ecclesiates", (Zelazny).
Speaking of Zelazny, what I'm waiting for for decades now is an Amber
TV Series ;) (or 5-10 movies *bg*) and JMS would be the perfect fit to
write it!
So long,
Mark
Matt Ion
> On Oct 20, 6:00 pm, Matt Ion <soundy...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Duggy wrote:
>>> And TNG's Wesley,
>> Ah, but without Wesley, we wouldn't get comedy gold like this from Wil
>> Wheaton himself:http://www.tvsquad.com/bloggers/wil-wheaton/
>
> I think Wil himself existed before Wesley.
Yes, but if it hadn't been for his Wesley role, we wouldn't have that
brilliant and hilarious blog. Get it now?
Duggy
I think that a lot of people who haven't played Wesley have brillant
and/or hilarious blogs.
===
= DUG.
===
Duggy
> I think that a lot of people who haven't played Wesley have brillant
> and/or hilarious blogs.
Having now read it, I don't really think it's that brillant or
hilarious.
It's a little like Family Guy: Blue Harvest... a whole lot of jokes
and comments that I'd already thought myself or read in a newsgroup
discussion somewhere. And, frankly, apart from a couple of comments,
it's nothing many other episode reviewers couldn't write.
Humour is, of course, subjective, but this blog doesn't do anything
for me... so I'm not accepting the Wil Wheaton blog as making up for
the character (in my world.)
===
= DUG.
===
Giovanni Wassen
> Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
> to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
Peter F. Hamilton's Commonwealth saga would be a nice story to adapt :)
But I'll settle for anything JMS came up with himself, Babylon 5 related or
not.
--
Gio
http://blog.watkijkikoptv.info
http://myanimelist.net/profile/extatix
Doug Freyburger
>
> Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
> to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
>
Consider asking this question while he was working on
Babylon 5 - What would I have answered then? More B5
of course. And that's what Joe did. Push through renewal
for the 5th season, complete the arc, make TV movies, do
Crusade. The outcome compared to nearly any other
series was so good it's off the scale in quality.
Now Joe's working on Lensmen. I think Lensmen has as
much franchise potential as Star Wars or Star Trek. What
do I think he should work on next? Building the franchise!
I think he can push the limits of his abilities building a
franchise as good as the social commentary of Star Trek
as profitable as Star Wars, and do it within the Lensmen
universe. Consider that Star Wars has some small amount
of social commentary about the temptation of any large
government to become oppresive, yet Star Trek has a lot
of social commentary that starts with humanity bringing
out its best in response to alien contact. Lensmen is
also about bringing out everyone's best in response to
alien contact but it also has terrorism, piracy, tyranny,
a focus on individual personal excellence, plenty of fleet
actions for the folks more interested in special effects than
plot and on and on and on.
I hope Joe goes after Lensmen with the single minded
genius of the Fenachrome. Oh right, that's the next space
opera franchise to turn to philosophical gold ...
<*>
mpvork...@hotmail.com
What I'd dearly love to see, and have been fiddling with myself just
for funzies, is Lois Bujold's Vorkosigan series. Miles is a
fascinating character, and her universe is well-structured and
populated by a very interesting and diverse humanity. No nonhumans,
although the genengineering of the Quaddies and Cetagandans damn near
gives us aliens...
Mike
Professor
> So I've been thinking. What should he consider as a next project? And
> I came up with three possibles.
> Mike
I suspect new projects will meet the following criteria
a) It pays well and is worth his time
b) It is fun and interesting, suggesting it is worth doing
c) Is something that is new and challenging
If he could write the project in his sleep, why do it? He has done
that, been there. Time is the most limited commodity we have since we
all die, so do fund, interesting and new things before this clock
expires. That is called living and experiencing. I believe the
universe likes that.
David
wrrlykam
> On Oct 18, 2:02 pm, b...@cs.berkeley.edu (Brian Harvey) wrote:
> Hell, Joe could knock
> out a dynamite script for Alfie Bester's The Demolished Man, and
> that's a story that was deliberately written to be unfilmable. Alfie
> said so himself.
I'm with you on this one Brian, either The Demolished Man or Tiger
Tiger (The Stars My Desitination) would be adaption heaven. I'm not
sure TDM is unfilmable given modern technology and some imagination.
I've often tried to imagine how the word patterns could be visualised.
We have the writer (what a wonderful way to payback Bester for the
inspiration that TDM gave to B5), all we need is a suitable director.
Dave
Jerry Heyman
wrote:
> mpvork...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
>> Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
>> to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
>
> Peter F. Hamilton's Commonwealth saga would be a nice story to adapt :)
>
> But I'll settle for anything JMS came up with himself, Babylon 5 related
> or not.
Personally, I'd like to see someone of JMS' caliber attempt to
do Larry Niven's Ringworld trilogy (didn't like the last one).
Traveling the ringworld itself could be a never ending story...
jerry
--
// Jerry Heyman | "Software is the difference between
// Amiga Forever :-) | hardware and reality"
\\ // hey...@acm.org |
\X/ http://www.hobbeshollow.com
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> on Tuesday 21 October 2008 6:20 am, exta...@gmail.com (Giovanni Wassen)
> wrote:
>
> > mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> >> Our fearless leader has a lot of irons in the fire. He says he wants
> >> to do stuff that pushes the limits of his abilities.
>
> > Peter F. Hamilton's Commonwealth saga would be a nice story to adapt :)
>
> > But I'll settle for anything JMS came up with himself, Babylon 5 related
> > or not.
>
> Personally, I'd like to see someone of JMS' caliber attempt to
> do Larry Niven's Ringworld trilogy (didn't like the last one).
> Traveling the ringworld itself could be a never ending story...
>
> jerry
> --
> // Jerry Heyman | "Software is the difference between
> // Amiga Forever :-) | hardware and reality"
> \X/ http://www.hobbeshollow.com
As of a few years back, Phil Tippett was working on a live-action
version of Ringworld. I think it died in Development Hell. As to a
Bester adaptation, if anybody
could do it, Joe could. There is a script floating around that Oliver
Stone tried to get on film back in the mid-Eighties... but he took
quite a few liberties with it, turning "Dishonest Abe" Lincoln Powell
into a woman, among other changes... in the mid-90's, I ran across an
article about the ten best unproduced scripts in Hollywood, and
Stone's "Demolished Man" was on the list, along with the then-unfilmed
"Romeo Is Bleeding" and the Leigh Brackett "Princess of Mars". And, as
I remember, the original script for "Total Recall", by Dan O'Bannon
and Ron Shusett, was on there. You know, the one that starred Richard
Dreyfuss that David Cronenberg was gonna direct,,,?
They don't call it development hell for nothin'.
Mike
Brian Harvey
>I'm with you on this one Brian
Much as I'd love to see the Bester novels on film, I can't take credit for
the suggestion -- you're miscounting greater-than characters. :-)
PS I'd also love to see the Cordwainer Smith stories on film!
Since we seem to be in the SF rut. :-)
Brian Harvey
> the Leigh Brackett "Princess of Mars".
Which reminds me, how have we avoided seeing _Stranger in a Strange Land_
on film all these decades? For a while it was up there with _On the Road_
as an iconic everyone's-read-it book of the '60s.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
I think I heard that the rights got tied up. Rumour had it at one
point that Virginia Heinlein refused to release the rights. Another
rumor was that Tom Hanks optioned it along with Ron Howard, but they
couldn't secure the backing. Nobody really knows for sure. I heard
from a writer friend that a lot of classic sf was put on long-term
option by some unnamed producer and tied up for a ridiculous period
like thirty years or so, or put into a open-ended option so nobody but
this one guy could ever do these classic sf novels. Mind you, this in
an urban legend story that Caldwell told me, so it may be just so much
hot air.
Hollywood is perpetually about twenty years behind the curve on sf.
Always has been. And a lot of pro sf writers want nothing to do with
the movie biz; they seem to think it's beneath them to write good
fiction for film. There are really only a handful of good sf writers
who've made the transition to Hollywood; Joe, Mike Cassutt, Melinda
Snodgrass, Hank Slesar, Harlan, Dave Gerrold. A few others. John
Varley worked as a script doctor for years. And Harlan wrote a classic
rant when he retired from the SFWA in the late Seventies, telling the
whole gaggle that their narrow-minded idiocy was keeping them from
some serious bucks. Fools.
I even had one writer tell me that the reason she didn't try to market
screenplays was because she didn't like having to chase work. She'll
write Star Wars novels for a pittance, but she won't write a script
that could make her half a million dollars for a month's work.
Morons.
Mike
Brian Harvey
> And a lot of pro sf writers want nothing to do with
>the movie biz; they seem to think it's beneath them to write good
>fiction for film.
Well, to be fair, back in the time we're talking about (the "Golden Age"),
there was an awful lot of very bad pseudo-SF in movies, and not much good.
(It used to be the official policy of the MIT Science Fiction Society that
the only good SF movie was "Forbidden Planet." :-) (This was before 2001
came out; I think that changed their mind.) So the SF writers had reason
to worry.
But it doesn't matter now -- nobody is suggesting that we have get Heinlein,
Bester, etc. to rise up from the grave and write their own screenplays. Joe
can do all that. :-) And probably also many other good screenwriters who
aren't even especially SF people. The main thing is to find a director who
won't let the special effects be the star of the show (e.g., not Lucas or
Speilberg :-).
That was one of the things that first attracted me to B5 -- most of the time,
I didn't have my nose rubbed in the fact that it was SF. It was only after I
started reading the secondary fan literature (I came late to B5) that I found
out there was something special about the CGI.
Amy Guskin
article <52a3963d-8f84-4fc5...@q35g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>):
> On Oct 21, 10:01 pm, b...@cs.berkeley.edu (Brian Harvey) wrote:
>> mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com writes:
>>> the Leigh Brackett "Princess of Mars".
>>
>> Which reminds me, how have we avoided seeing _Stranger in a Strange Land_
>> on film all these decades? For a while it was up there with _On the Road_
>> as an iconic everyone's-read-it book of the '60s.
>
> I think I heard that the rights got tied up. Rumour had it at one
> point that Virginia Heinlein refused to release the rights. Another
> rumor was that Tom Hanks optioned it along with Ron Howard, but they
> couldn't secure the backing. Nobody really knows for sure. <<
Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration. The rights holders (in these cases,
usually the book publishers) know who has those rights. Some properties do
cycle through options and attached talent on a seasonal sort of basis
("Evita" was a great example of this before it finally got made), but often
it's just that the rights are sitting there, waiting to be bought, but no one
in Hollywood is interested in the property. Alas.
Andrew Swallow
great stories there.
I am surprised that a TV station aiming for a mixed audience has not
recreated some of the anti-slavery fights between the banning of
the slave trade and the US Civil War; this would provide an epic
like 'Rome'. There is everything in there - politics, war, rape, lots of
technological change (including sailing ships being replaced by steam
ships), heroism and double dealing. Whites and blacks on both sides.
Points of interest:
The Washer Woman War.
The campaigns of the Jamaican Regiment.
Andrew Swallow
Duggy
> Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration. The rights holders (in these cases,
> usually the book publishers) know who has those rights. Some properties do
> cycle through options and attached talent on a seasonal sort of basis
> ("Evita" was a great example of this before it finally got made), but often
> it's just that the rights are sitting there, waiting to be bought, but no one
> in Hollywood is interested in the property. Alas.
And then you have people sitting on the rights not doing anything with
them... and waiting to screw someone when they think they do have the
rights...
Watchmen, anyone?
===
= DUG.
===
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com writes:
> > And a lot of pro sf writers want nothing to do with
> >the movie biz; they seem to think it's beneath them to write good
> >fiction for film.
>
> Well, to be fair, back in the time we're talking about (the "Golden Age"),
> there was an awful lot of very bad pseudo-SF in movies, and not much good.
> (It used to be the official policy of the MIT Science Fiction Society that
> the only good SF movie was "Forbidden Planet." :-) (This was before 2001
> came out; I think that changed their mind.) So the SF writers had reason
> to worry.
Brian, when JMS was lobbying for a reinstatement of the Nebula for
Dramatic Presentation, he got hate mail from a lot of sf pros. One of
the mildest was from somebody who said "I work my ass off for pennies
a word while you and your Hollywood hack buddies rake in a fortune
writing crap. You'll never see that award as long as I'm alive."
George RR Martin actually had the nerve to ask Joe how may awards he
needed. It pissed Joe off so bad that he resigned from SFFWA and
hasn't gone back. These are people who wanted parity with the WGA; you
recognize SF, we recognize screenplays. It's apples and oranges. One
is genre, one is form. And while I'll warrant you that there's a lot
of really awful sf movies, the reason is because the people who really
know the material won't write it for Hollywood. If you hate the
butchery that's been done to Phil Dick's books by the folks who've
movieized 'em, and think you can improve on them, do so. Screenplays
are a different form, is all. Learn to write that way and you can make
better sf movies.
> But it doesn't matter now -- nobody is suggesting that we have get Heinlein,
> Bester, etc. to rise up from the grave and write their own screenplays. Joe
> can do all that. :-) And probably also many other good screenwriters who
> aren't even especially SF people. The main thing is to find a director who
> won't let the special effects be the star of the show (e.g., not Lucas or
> Speilberg :-).
Agreed. George lost his way some time ago, and Steve will sometimes
let his goshwow get away from him. There are quite a few writers out
there who are old fans, and want to write stuff that's true to the
spirit of the originals. Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, Alex Kurtzman and
Roberto Orci, Whedon, Brad Bird all come to mind. Veterans of the
business like Mike Cassutt and Melinda Snodgrass come to mind as well.
(In fact, I'd love to see Melinda's novels about the Fifteenth Circuit
Court translated to film. That's some good stuff; think Law & Order or
any other good courtroom show on a space station.) Right now the best
director for comics and sf is probably Favreau, just because he keeps
the story first and like the nuts and bolts approach to fx work. By
all means we should keep Brett Ratner and Joe McG Nichol away from
good sf.
> That was one of the things that first attracted me to B5 -- most of the time,
> I didn't have my nose rubbed in the fact that it was SF. It was only after I
> started reading the secondary fan literature (I came late to B5) that I found
> out there was something special about the CGI.
See, that's my thing as well. Keep the effects as seamless and
unobtrusive as possible. Make them serve the story. Iron Man made the
effects serve the story, not the other way around. With Transformers,
the story served the effects, in those odd moments when there was
story. B5 didn't try to explain the universe; it was just there, and
you found out what the backstory was as you went. Characters grew and
got more complex. Londo's a good example; a morose but likeable drunk
winds up becoming a major player in the galactic scene, and
illustrates the old axiom about gaining the whole world and losing
your soul. G'kar starts off as a villainous warmongering pervert and
winds up becoming a heroic peaceloving pervert... You did notice that,
didn't you? G'kar has a lech for human women. Preferably in bunches.
But, as you state, we aren't beaten over the head with it. Like Larry
Niven, Joe just threw it out there and figured we'd catch it. And we
did. Usually.
Mike
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> >> On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 23:38:56 -0400, thus spake mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com (in
>
> article <52a3963d-8f84-4fc5-b0e0-dffa6fb69...@q35g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>):
The estates of the writers sometimes have control of those properties
as well. I know that when the anime version of Lensman came out
without the permission of the Smith estate, Vera Smith Trestrail
pitched a monster fit, and justifiably so. But in Heinlein's case, the
publishers have control of the rights, and Hollywood won't pursue
making a new Heinlein film until they have the right people to do it.
Considering that so far all we have is Destination Moon, Starship
Troopers and The Puppet Masters, none of which were quite what Robert
had in mind, the odds are that there won't be another movie based on
his stuff until somebody like Ridley Scott or Jim Cameron tackles it.
And Stranger would work best as a miniseries; too complex for a two-
hour movie.
I did tell you that the explanation I got fron Dan Caldwell was summat
of an urban legend, right? :-)
I'd trade my gay uncle's left testicle for someone to do Piper's Space
Viking, or Anderson's Corridors Of Time, as a movie. Or some loon to
adapt Laumer's Retief stories as a series. (Why my gay uncle's left
testicle? He's not using it... )
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Exactly, Andrew. Lots of good story there. But it has to be done
fairly and with balance. There were good and bad people on both sides
of all that, and if you let a Spike Lee get hold of it, it would be
seen as an anti-white rant. Put it in the hands of Craig Brewer or
Tyler Perry, and see what you get.
Mike
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Haw! Boy, do you have that nailed... Remember back in the Eighties,
when Cannon had the rights to all the Marvel heroes and cranked out
some awful low budget crap? Remember Superman 4?
I've been going on about this for years, and all I'm doing is
parroting what I've heard from Orson Welles, John Huston, Chuck Jones,
Don Westlake and gobs of others. You have to respect the single
element, be it a word, frame of film or note of music. A lot of people
don't. A week ago there was a story about doing a fifth Lethal Weapon
movie where Riggs is gonna retire and has one more case to wrap up, so
he goes and drags Murtaugh out of retirement. Mel heard about it and
said NO. Because he knows that the last movie sucked, and it was
because they didn't respect the source material. The best adaptations
of books into film are ones where the writers, producers and director
respected the source material. A good example of this not being done
is Bob Shaye's godawful The Last Mimsy. Read Henry Kuttner's original
story and then try to suffer through that mess.
In the early Nineties, a studio had the rights to a Fantastic Four
movie and was about to lose them if they didn't do something. They
hurriedly cranked out an FF flick with a B-movie cast and weak story,
and oddly enough some okay effects from Optic Nerve. I was never
released, but I saw it on a bootleg tape. Even with a quick and dirty
production, you could tell they respected the material even if they
didn't quite get it. They still lost the rights afterward, but they
made an effort.
Honestly, I'm surprised Watchmen got made at all. What I've seen looks
really good, so I have high hopes. But for me, it was one of those
they'll-never-be-able-to-do-it-right projects, like Heinlein's Glory
Road or Zelazny's Amber or Varley's Titan. Glad to see it finished.
Need more coffee.
Mike
Brian Harvey
> and if you let a Spike Lee get hold of it, it would be
>seen as an anti-white rant.
I don't think this is fair. _Malcolm X_ shows fairly (and with approval)
his growth from the sort of anti-white position you're worried about into
an advocate of racial harmony. Lee makes /anti-white-privilege/ rants,
and /anti-white-racist/ rants, but _School Daze_ was arguably an anti-black
rant.
Josh Hill
wrote:
Oh, I don't know. It isn't all about money. If it were, they would
have become investment bankers or plumbers or something. Some people
just don't like to lose creative control and see their material
dumbified, or see others take credit for their work.
--
Josh
"What is it exactly that the V.P. does every day?" - Sarah Palin
John W. Kennedy
> ..., but no one
> in Hollywood is interested in the property. Alas.
Frankly, I'm not sure that much golden-age SF /should/ interest
Hollywood. Apart from often being highly episodic and idea-driven,
with characters that are -- well, not one-dimensional, but frequently
rather vague -- it often has scenes that are completely unfilmable as
written.
How do you put Second Foundationers on screen, for example? We are
told that they do not need to speak with one another, and we are also
told that they do /not/ use telepathy, but simply use their knowledge
of psychology to read each other's body language. It's an intriguing
idea -- but if you actually put it into a script, you're asking actors
to do the impossible. Do you substitute something else -- i.e., one of
the usual devices used to represent telepathy? If you do, you face the
wrath of the fans.
How do you handle, say, "Time Enough for Love"? Never mind the parts
that some would describe as "kinky" (or "disgusting"). What is the /
plot/ of "Time Enough for Love"? What is the actual story that is
being told?
How do you actually put on screen the last page of "Stranger in a
Strange Land" without looking like the most sick-making parts of the
movie of "Carousel"?
And, as I say above, classic SF tends to be episodic. (In some cases,
the original publishing circumstances are a factor.) Television, in
the manner of "Masterpiece" (or "Babylon 5"), would be far more suited
to the task.
I'm not even sure how well JMS is going to do with the Lensmen. It has
some great moments for film, but -- how do you do the spider scene?
Andrew Swallow
[snip]
>
> How do you put Second Foundationers on screen, for example? We are
> told that they do not need to speak with one another, and we are also
> told that they do /not/ use telepathy, but simply use their knowledge
> of psychology to read each other's body language. It's an intriguing
> idea -- but if you actually put it into a script, you're asking actors
> to do the impossible. Do you substitute something else -- i.e., one of
> the usual devices used to represent telepathy? If you do, you face the
> wrath of the fans.
>
Use the same cheat as the book, you pretend the chacacters spoke the words.
Andrew Swallow
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Spike comes across to me as a racist little pig. Malcolm X was well
done, but I think a lot of that was because he had a major studio
standing over him to make sure he didn't fuck it up. I didn't see
School Daze, so I can't judge there,but from what I've been given to
understand it was more of a rant against black complacency, something
I agree with on a broader scale. My feeling is that no one should
allow themselves to get complacent; always strive to be better than
you are. Spike's recent bitchery at Clint annoyed me, though, and he's
gonna be hard to live with since this most recent movie flopped.
He can do some really good work. Do The Right Thing was great, so was
Inside Man. Spike just needs to take his ego and predjudices out of
the equation.
Mike
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:38:56 -0700 (PDT), mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com
>
> - Show quoted text -
Trust me, I know some of these folks. I know moviemaking is a
collaborative process, but when you send in a book to your publisher,
nine times outta ten it's gonna come back with some suggestions for
editing or rewrites. Same is true with scripts.
The writer I mentioned who hates chasing work is Barbara Hambly. I
like her personally, but she has that blind spot that a lot of prose
writers have when it comes to movies. She'd have to learn a new form,
and do the dance with the studios, and she doesn't like that. She's
not alone.
When I first met JMS in '87, he was in a foul mood because he'd just
come off a panel with Larry Niven, who badmouthed him loudly and
publicly about being just a tv writer who didn't need to be on a panel
with professional prose novelists. I found out about this years after
the fact, and my good opinion of Larry went right out the window,
never to return. I admire Larry's work, but he himself is a rude and
detestable bastard that I will never speak to again. His actions were
totally unprofessional.
Joe's worth a thousand of him.
No, it's not all about money. Some of it's about ego.
Mike
mpvork...@hotmail.com
wrote:
Agreed, a lot of classic sf is unfilmable. Second Foundation would
take a lot of work to adapt, but a good writer who knows the books
could do it and well. Time Enough For Love is episodic, and would have
to be done as a twenty-episode miniseries. Unless you wanted to go for
a expansion, in which you could get a good three seasons out of it,
five if you really puffed it up. Stranger could be adapted, but would
take some work.
Expand on this. I'm doing scripts of Lois McMaster Bujold's Memory and
A Civil Campaign for my own amusement, and focusing on dialogue and
character interplay; so far they're boliing down nicely, and Memory
looks like it's gonna cook down to 130 pages. Civil Campaign should be
a few pages more. A lot of what you get in novels is expository; I've
cut a good ten pages of Memory just by ditching some of Miles' inner
dialogue and some descriptive passages. My job is dialogue, not
scenery. Scenery is property and set design; I give them the direction
I want to go in, and they do the rest. My job is to make the dialogue
and action work. No more.
Joe's got Lensman cooking nicely. He'll make the spider scene work.
The big focus will be on Kimball Kinnison, and the backstory will come
in during the course of the script.
Mike
Duggy
wrote:
> How do you put Second Foundationers on screen, for example? We are
> told that they do not need to speak with one another, and we are also
> told that they do /not/ use telepathy, but simply use their knowledge
> of psychology to read each other's body language. It's an intriguing
> idea -- but if you actually put it into a script, you're asking actors
> to do the impossible.
Not impossible. I've seen it done before, but only for small scenes,
obviously.
> Do you substitute something else -- i.e., one of
> the usual devices used to represent telepathy? If you do, you face the
> wrath of the fans.
Easy, the internal monologue or a subtitle.
Subtitles are obvious, of course.
"If she turns around, it means she likes me."
> How do you handle, say, "Time Enough for Love"? Never mind the parts
> that some would describe as "kinky" (or "disgusting"). What is the /
> plot/ of "Time Enough for Love"? What is the actual story that is
> being told?
Does it matter?
> And, as I say above, classic SF tends to be episodic. (In some cases,
> the original publishing circumstances are a factor.) Television, in
> the manner of "Masterpiece" (or "Babylon 5"), would be far more suited
> to the task.
Lots of films are episodic and based on episodic material.
MASH the film. Any anthology film.
Some episodic nature can be iron out. Some doesn't need to be.
> I'm not even sure how well JMS is going to do with the Lensmen. It has
> some great moments for film, but -- how do you do the spider scene?
I don't know, how do you do the spider scene?
===
= DUG.
===
Matt Ion
> On Oct 21, 7:07 pm, Duggy <P.Allan.Dug...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> I think that a lot of people who haven't played Wesley have brillant
>> and/or hilarious blogs.
>
> Having now read it, I don't really think it's that brillant or
> hilarious.
>
> It's a little like Family Guy: Blue Harvest... a whole lot of jokes
> and comments that I'd already thought myself or read in a newsgroup
> discussion somewhere. And, frankly, apart from a couple of comments,
> it's nothing many other episode reviewers couldn't write.
Perhaps... except none of them could have written from an "inside"
perspective. You'll note that on many occasions, Wheaton himself is
pretty annoyed by his alter-ego on the screen.
> Humour is, of course, subjective, but this blog doesn't do anything
> for me... so I'm not accepting the Wil Wheaton blog as making up for
> the character (in my world.)
It doesn't have to, since he didn't create the character.
Brian Harvey
>never to return. I admire Larry's work, but he himself is a rude and
>detestable bastard that I will never speak to again. His actions were
>totally unprofessional.
Must come from all that time spent with Jerry Pournelle.
wrrlykam
> They don't call it development hell for nothin'.
>
They live there alongside with Rama and Childhood's End. Although Rama
has popped up recently with connections to Morgan Freeman. but has
sunk back in a week or so ago due to lack of funding.
It has been a long time since I read Childhood's End (about 30 years),
but there are connecting themes to B5 if I remember correctly - the
Jason Ironheart episode 'Mind War' and guy at the end of 'The
Deconstruction of Falling Stars' and again touched with the Soul
Hunter storyline in 'River of Souls'.
Dave
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Morgan was in a car wreck awhile back, and is recovering a bit less
quickly than he'd like. That may have scared off the studio moneymen
who were talking about Rama.
I'd still like to see it done, but I think Ed Harris would be a better
choice. They're going with Morgan on account of his box-office draw; a
movie's got his name on it, it's got a guaranteed audience.
Mike
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Prolly. At least Jerry saves his rudeness and bastardy for when he's
drunk.
Mike
Josh Hill
wrote:
>Trust me, I know some of these folks. I know moviemaking is a
>collaborative process, but when you send in a book to your publisher,
>nine times outta ten it's gonna come back with some suggestions for
>editing or rewrites. Same is true with scripts.
>
>The writer I mentioned who hates chasing work is Barbara Hambly. I
>like her personally, but she has that blind spot that a lot of prose
>writers have when it comes to movies. She'd have to learn a new form,
>and do the dance with the studios, and she doesn't like that. She's
>not alone.
>
>When I first met JMS in '87, he was in a foul mood because he'd just
>come off a panel with Larry Niven, who badmouthed him loudly and
>publicly about being just a tv writer who didn't need to be on a panel
>with professional prose novelists. I found out about this years after
>the fact, and my good opinion of Larry went right out the window,
>never to return. I admire Larry's work, but he himself is a rude and
>detestable bastard that I will never speak to again. His actions were
>totally unprofessional.
>
>Joe's worth a thousand of him.
>
>No, it's not all about money. Some of it's about ego.
You aren't the only person who's told me that about Larry Niven.
I've never believed myself in the sort of snobbery that says that
being a TV writer requires less talent and skill than being a
novelist. If anything, it seems to me that it takes more talent to
become a successful TV writer than it does to become an entry level
genre writer, and of course there's never a cap on talent. Besides
which, I've read some of JMS's stories, and it's apparent that he can
bring the same magic to the printed page that he brings to the screen.
On the other hand, JMS himself referred a few days ago to the creative
limitations of television writing, and we all know of the legendary
battles that JMS, Harlan Ellison, and others have fought with the
Hollywood system -- "ancient Egyptians," "I am not your pimp," and so
forth. It's not that publishers don't make demands and changes, but in
publishing, it's essentially the writer's show. Lolita may have been
rejected by 22 publishing houses, but when it was published, it was
published intact and according to the writer's intentions, whereas we
all know what happened to Crusade, which involved no controversy,
merely JMS's battle to maintain basic creative standards. Clint
Eastwood's decision to film Changeling unaltered is I think a
once-in-a-liftime experience for writers in the Hollywood system.
So if I were a writer, and after creative freedom, I think I'd prefer
short stories and novels; if after a living income, television. I can
see how the difference might lead to resentment.
Also, as you pointed out, screenplays are a different craft, a new
form to be learned with its own special language and requirements.
Novelists, playwrights, and to a lesser extent poets tend to
specialize in their own areas, so it doesn't really surprise me that
screenwriting is a specialized area as well. Hell, even Hollywood is
compartmentalized between screen and teleplays, though I'm not sure
how much that has to do with the writers. And while many writers,
including some great ones, have made the transition from print to
Hollywood and vice versa, not every successful novelist is *good* at
screenwriting -- Heinlein's screenplay, for example, was terrible, and
he himself acknowledges somewhere that he had no gift for
screenwriting.
Mike Ross
>On Oct 18, 2:02 pm, b...@cs.berkeley.edu (Brian Harvey) wrote:
>> Or, maybe he could just surprise us. :-)
>
>He's prolly gonna do just that.
>
>I agree, none of what I've thrown out there would a stretch for Joe.
>But he could do a far better job than 99.999 percent of the others out
>there. For me, Joe's in the same league as Bill Goldman and Paddy
>Chayevsky. He's at the peak of his powers, and can write anything he
>wants. He's tackling Doc Smith's Lensman series now, something that a
>lot of people have said could never be filmed.
Hmmmm now you've got me thinking. I've never heard it said that Donaldson
fancies himself a screenwriter. I wonder what Joe could do with the Gap, or even
(whisper it) Covenant?
Mike
--
http://www.corestore.org
'As I walk along these shores
I am the history within'
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> On Sat, 18 Oct 2008 14:12:54 -0700 (PDT), mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >On Oct 18, 2:02 pm, b...@cs.berkeley.edu (Brian Harvey) wrote:
> >> Or, maybe he could just surprise us. :-)
>
> >He's prolly gonna do just that.
>
> >I agree, none of what I've thrown out there would a stretch for Joe.
> >But he could do a far better job than 99.999 percent of the others out
> >there. For me, Joe's in the same league as Bill Goldman and Paddy
> >Chayevsky. He's at the peak of his powers, and can write anything he
> >wants. He's tackling Doc Smith's Lensman series now, something that a
> >lot of people have said could never be filmed.
>
> Hmmmm now you've got me thinking. I've never heard it said that Donaldson
> fancies himself a screenwriter. I wonder what Joe could do with the Gap, or even
> (whisper it) Covenant?
>
> Mike
> 'As I walk along these shores
> I am the history within'
Hopefully, nothing. I can't stand Donaldson's work. Far better fantasy
out there. I'd like to see Joe tackle Chalker's Dancing Gods series.
Or Emma Bull's War For The Oaks. Anything but Covenant.
Although, I will admit, it's not because Donaldson's a bad writer. The
Covenant stuff just got so gray and grim and depressing, and my then-
girlfriend thought those books were the cat's ass and went on and on
and on about them all the fuckin' time...
Mike
Dave Hayslett
....
> Although, I will admit, it's not because Donaldson's a bad writer. The
> Covenant stuff just got so gray and grim and depressing, and my then-
> girlfriend thought those books were the cat's ass and went on and on
> and on about them all the fuckin' time...
That's because they're great stuff. Though they admittedly are not
everyone's cup of tea, as has been discussed 'round here from time to time.
:-) (And if you thought Covenant was gray, you must not have read The
Gap.)
--
Dave (10/24/2008 12:34:13 PM)
Dying is easy; it's living
that scares me to death.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Look, Dave, my life sucks enough already. I don't need to be reading
depressing shit like that. And no, I didn't read the Gap. I won't shop
there, either.
Until we get a new President and I get a new job, I need stuff to make
me laugh. Not stuff that makes me want to stick my head in a howitzer.
Mike
Alan Dicey
>
> Hmmmm now you've got me thinking. I've never heard it said that Donaldson
> fancies himself a screenwriter. I wonder what Joe could do with the Gap, or even
> (whisper it) Covenant?
Donaldson is not ordinarily bad. Donaldson falls into the small but
important class of "actively unreadable".
Most bad writing is just dull, does not engage the reader, and raises
its CBA score to the point where it gets put down and forgotten. Like,
say, most Golden Age pulp fiction or almost any 3-volume fantasy novel
published after the sleeper success of the 1-volume Lord Of The Rings
paperback.
Donaldson, on the other hand, engages the reader, but then inspires
revulsion. It becomes harder and harder to approach the book, even
lying face-down, until eventually it is flung across the room and only
touched once more, to put it in the rubbish bin. It has become Actively
Unreadable, generating a repulsion field that is almost tangible, a bit
like the unappreciated library books in Neil Gaiman's Mirrormask.
I struggled through Book 1 of Thomas Covenant, eventually finishing it.
After a while I approached book 2. Surely he had improved: No.
After about 50 pages the book got flying lessons, and both it and book 1
were binned.
They had become Actively Unreadable.
This is extreme treatment: I was bought up to treat books with great
care, not to crease the pages, not to fold over corners.
But Donaldson = bin.
It should not be filmed, not even see the light of day again. Unless,
perhaps, suitably labelled and hung about with warnings as a horror movie.
The kindest thing for the rest of the human race would be if Donaldson
suddenly discovered an interest in extreme sports and disappeared up the
Orinoco for the next fify years.
[CBA=Can't Be Arsed. Shall I carry on reading that Robert Rankin book?
Naaa, can't be arsed . . .]
Josh Hill
I liked them.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
wrote:
I feel exactly the same way. Donaldson isn't bad, just unreadable
after a bit. And I slogged my way through the whole thing, up through
The Power That Preserves, partly because I wanted to give the guy the
benefit of the doubt, and partly (okay, mostly) because I wanted to
shut Bobbi up. She just kept on... and I figured that if I made the
effort, he'd have to get better.
But he didn't.
And a lot of other writers had the same opinion I did. Even Chalker,
in the first Dancing Gods novel, made reference to Donaldson. "There's
a place called The Land that's so unpleasant that even the residents
don't believe in it." Not a direct quote, but close.
"Actively unreadable". Donaldson falls into that area of Niven's Laws
that says it's a sin to waste the reader's time, something Larry has
done himself on occasion. "Ringworld Throne" being a good example...
I'm trying to think of other books that fit the profile. Mostly big-
name mainstream best-sellers where nothing really happens, there's no
real plot, nothing of importance happens to anybody, and folks trudge
along reacting to things rather than trying to do something... hell, I
can't think of any books that fit, mostly because I don't read that
fei-oo.
I'm starting to realize that my literary tastes are somewhat limited.
SF, some fantasy, mysteries, and funny shit. And even that is limited.
Right now I'm rereading Zelazny's complete Amber novels, and
remembering that parts of the books are overly convoluted, and some
parts are literary masturbation, and all of is readable but not in a
single sitting, you have to put it down and take a breath sometimes.
When I finish with it, I'll grab something light like Pratchett's
"Hogfather" and blast through it. Discworld is always fun. Watching
Susan Sto Helit beat the shit out of monsters with a fireplace poker
is funny as hell.
Hey, that's what Joe can do next!
Mike
Methuselah Jones
Ross of rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated make plain:
I've been thinking along the same lines recently. Of course, that could
have something to do with the fact that I'm reading "Fatal Revenant"
right now. :)
I really should have re-read "The Runes of the Earth" first, though;
after three years a lot of the details are fuzzy. If it's that long
again before "Against All Things Ending" is published, I think I'll have
to re-read both of them before tackling it. The first two trilogies, on
the other hand, are pretty thoroughly ingrained, as I've read them at
least three times.
Yes, the stories are grim. But as the Giants -- lovers of stories, good
and bad -- say, "Joy is in the ear that hears, not the mouth that
speaks." The Covenant stories represent the ultimate in optimism. The
heroes and heroines are terribly flawed, but manage to resist despair in
spite of every reason to give in to it, and overcome both the outer and
inner Despiser.
--
Methuselah
"Am reserving two tickets for you for my premiere. Come and bring a
friend, if you have one."
-- George Bernard Shaw, to Winston Churchill
"Impossible to be present for the first performance. Will attend second,
if there is one."
-- Churchill's reply
Doug Freyburger
> important class of "actively unreadable".
> Donaldson, on the other hand, engages the reader, but then inspires
So comparing with movies then, a bit like "The Killing Fields"
and "Saving Private Ryan"? I have to admit those movies
stirred the same feelings as reading the Thomas Covenant
books. I do NOT regret watching/reading them. I have no
plans on doing a repeat watching/reading.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Or "The Aviator"? Very well done, great acting, but it's like watching
a huge flaming fireball of a wreck at Indy. Seeing it once is enough.
The Covenant novels may be optimistic at heart, in that he manages to
slog his way to salvation, but Jesus Harold Christ on a pogo stick,
what a hellishly miserable trip getting there!
I could never bring myself to watch "Killing Fields", even though I've
seen clips of Haing Ngor's performance, and it'll wring tears from
you. "Saving Private Ryan" I did watch, and it's a 2 and a 1/2 hour
episode of Combat. It's a big-budget remake of "The Big Red One". If
Sam Fuller'd had that kinda dough twenty years ago, BR1 would have
been considered the greatest war movie ever made.
Anybody who hasn't seen the reconstructed BR1, go get it. Richard
Schickel and the restorers put back close to an hour of lost footage
that makes the whole movie work better. One guy whose entire role
wound up on the cutting room floor finally gets his screen time. It's
Lee Marvin's finest hour, and the supporting cast of Robert Carradine,
Mark Hamill, Bobby DiCicco and Kelly Johnson ain't too bad, either. As
with any good war movie, at its heart it's anti-war.
Mike
Dave Hayslett
> Mike Ross wrote:
>>
>> Hmmmm now you've got me thinking. I've never heard it said that Donaldson
>> fancies himself a screenwriter. I wonder what Joe could do with the Gap, or even
>> (whisper it) Covenant?
>
>
> Donaldson is not ordinarily bad. Donaldson falls into the small but
> important class of "actively unreadable".
<snip>
Opinions vary considerably.
--
Dave (10/28/2008 4:21:52 PM)
Self-realization. I was thinking of the immortal words of Socrates, when he
said, "I drank what?"
mpvork...@hotmail.com
Spoken like a Donaldson fan, David. He's a guy you either love or
hate. Personally, my choice of humonguous fantasy epics starts with
Tolkien and end with Tad Williams.
Mike
Dave Hayslett
> On Oct 28, 3:21 pm, Dave Hayslett <haysl...@sc.rr.com> wrote:
>> On Sat, 25 Oct 2008 10:39:16 +0100, Alan Dicey wrote:
>>> Mike Ross wrote:
>>
>>>> Hmmmm now you've got me thinking. I've never heard it said that Donaldson
>>>> fancies himself a screenwriter. I wonder what Joe could do with the Gap, or even
>>>> (whisper it) Covenant?
>>
>>> Donaldson is not ordinarily bad. Donaldson falls into the small but
>>> important class of "actively unreadable".
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>> Opinions vary considerably.
....
> Spoken like a Donaldson fan, David. He's a guy you either love or
> hate.
Thank you for your support of my point. :-)
--
Dave (10/29/2008 10:58:54 AM)
Class dismissed. Time to die.
Mike Ross
<snip>
>Although, I will admit, it's not because Donaldson's a bad writer. The
>Covenant stuff just got so gray and grim and depressing, and my then-
>girlfriend thought those books were the cat's ass and went on and on
>and on about them all the fuckin' time...
Ah.
I had one of those. I married her.
Donaldson has his moments. In the Gap, there's a character called 'The Bill',
who has (allegedly) been surgically provided with a double phallus, in order to
penetrate women in both nether orifices simultaneously - typical Donaldson
description, with all the delicacy of a ton of wet cement.
Ever since reading it, I've referred to a certain Mr. Gates as 'The Bill'...
Mike
--
Duggy
> Donaldson has his moments. In the Gap, there's a character called 'The Bill',
> who has (allegedly) been surgically provided with a double phallus, in order to
> penetrate women in both nether orifices simultaneously - typical Donaldson
> description, with all the delicacy of a ton of wet cement.
> Ever since reading it, I've referred to a certain Mr. Gates as 'The Bill'...
Well, I'm a little glad I'm going to a part on the weekend and will
miss this weeks episodes of a certain British Police Drama.
===
= DUG.
===
Jon Schild
Man's War."
--
Wanted dead and/or alive: Shroedinger's cat.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
IMDb has three projects listed that Joe's done or is doing: Ninja
Assassin, for the Wachowskis, is in post. They Marched Into Sunlight,
for Tom Hanks and Paul Greengrass, is in pre-production. He's either
doing or done scripts for Silver Surfer, World War Z, Lensman, and a
Biblical epic about David. And that's the merest tip of the iceberg.
Joe is turning into the Bill Goldman of the 21st century.
I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
Mike
Jan
mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>
>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>
>Mike
>
From the Hollywood Reporter:
>"Forbidden Planet"
>
>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c70c6678ca082f85346929
Jan
--
I try never to get involved in my own life. Too much trouble.
Giovanni Wassen
>>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>>
>>Mike
>>
>
> From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
>>"Forbidden Planet"
>>
>>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed
>>"Changeling," is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic
>>"Forbidden Planet" for Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via
>>>Silver Pictures.
>
>
> http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c
> 70c6678ca082f85346929
Oh wow! I saw that movie not too long ago and loved every bit of it.
--
Gio
http://blog.watkijkikoptv.info
http://myanimelist.net/profile/extatix
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9-9bb8-326c76092...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
> mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com says...
>
>
>
> >I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>
> >Mike
>
> From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
> >"Forbidden Planet"
>
> >J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
> >is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
> >Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
> Jan
>
> --
> I try never to get involved in my own life. Too much trouble.
"Long in the works" is putting it mildly. I read about an effort in
'93 to do a remake; Stan Winston was involved with that. I was dancing
all around the room when I heard of it, and followed it in the trades
for nearly a year. Then one day it was gone. It became another one of
those would-be movie, up there with Mike Minor's Strat and Phil
Tippet's Ringworld.
I hope it's true this time.
Mike
Blair Leatherwood
> In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
> mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>
>>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>>
>>Mike
>>
>
>
> From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
>
>>"Forbidden Planet"
>>
>>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
>>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
>>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
>
> http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c70c6678ca082f85346929
>
> Jan
>
>
of one set...
Blair
Jon Schild
Jan wrote:
> In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
> mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>
>>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>>
>>Mike
>
>
> From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
>>"Forbidden Planet"
>>
>>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
>>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
>>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
> http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c70c6678ca082f85346929
>
> Jan
Cheer! Whistle! Clap! Jump up and down!
When I heard of this latest redo of Forbidden Planet, I was afraid they
would give it to some clueless hack who would destroy it (as usual). I
am so happy to be wrong.
mpvork...@hotmail.com
>
> >>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>
> >>Mike
>
> > From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
> >>"Forbidden Planet"
>
> >>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
> >>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
> >>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
> > Jan
>
> Cheer! Whistle! Clap! Jump up and down!
>
> When I heard of this latest redo of Forbidden Planet, I was afraid they
> would give it to some clueless hack who would destroy it (as usual). I
> am so happy to be wrong.
>
> --
>
> - Show quoted text -
This is why I keep on about Joe and sf films. He's like me, a lifelong
fanboy. He knows sf like no one else in Hollywood, and probably has
more love and respect for sf and fantasy than any other writer out
there.
And he's been in the business so long that he's pretty much ego-free.
Ask Angela Lansbury about that.
Miles
Craig
I don't know what to say about this. One one hand I hate the idea of
remaking classic movies. Forbidden Planet is IMO another movie that does
not need a remake (along with The Day the Earth Stood Still and countless
others). It is one of my favorite movies and when the Special Box DVD came
out a few years ago I picked it the day it came out.
On the other hand I can't wait to see Joe's take on this. Esp. after his
unintentional homage to it in B5. I mean who better to reimagine the idea
of the sheer size of the Krell machinary. Ionly wish Tim Chote was alive so
we could see him in an out take wandering around the set as Zathras....
On the Gripping hand It can only help to elevate JMS in the Hollywood
status machine and that is a good thing. Now if WB would get off their
keisters and give a big screen B5 a shot.....
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> On 31 Oct 2008 03:06:05 -0700, Jan wrote:
>
> I don't know what to say about this. One one hand I hate the idea of
> remaking classic movies. Forbidden Planet is IMO another movie that does
> not need a remake (along with The Day the Earth Stood Still and countless
> others). It is one of my favorite movies and when the Special Box DVD came
> out a few years ago I picked it the day it came out.
>
> On the other hand I can't wait to see Joe's take on this. Esp. after his
> unintentional homage to it in B5. I mean who better to reimagine the idea
> of the sheer size of the Krell machinary. Ionly wish Tim Chote was alive so
> we could see him in an out take wandering around the set as Zathras....
>
> On the Gripping hand It can only help to elevate JMS in the Hollywood
> status machine and that is a good thing. Now if WB would get off their
> keisters and give a big screen B5 a shot.....
>
>
>
> > mpvorkosi...@hotmail.com says...
>
> >>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>
> >>Mike
>
> > From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
> >>"Forbidden Planet"
>
> >>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
> >>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
> >>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
> > Jan- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
I don't think there'll ever be a B5 bigscreen movie. Andreas is dead,
Rick's dead... you can write around them, but it won't be the same.
And Joe said that unless he gets a huge budget to work with, there
won't be any more B5. And I can't blame him. Warner has gotten as bad
as Disney was always accused of being, pinching pennies so hard that
it's abuse of former presidents. Screaming Abes.
Jeffrey Kaplan
> On the Gripping hand It can only help to elevate JMS in the Hollywood
Finally, someone else who uses that expression! :)
--
Jeffrey Kaplan www.gordol.org
The from userid is killfiled Send personal mail to gordol
"I suppose there'll be a war now, hmm? All that running around and
shooting one another. You would have thought sooner or later it would
go out of fashion." (Amb. Mollari, B5 "The Gathering")
Charlie E.
>In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
>mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>>
>>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>>
>>Mike
>>
>
>From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
>>"Forbidden Planet"
>>
>>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
>>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
>>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
>http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c70c6678ca082f85346929
>
>Jan
Ok, Joe doing Shakepeare! (Tempest in Space!) The mind boggles... 8-)
Charlie
Craig
> Previously on rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated, Craig said:
>
>> On the Gripping hand It can only help to elevate JMS in the Hollywood
>
> Finally, someone else who uses that expression! :)
I can only use it in a forum like this where there is bound to be others
that understand it.
Which reminds me, I'm long overdue on re-reading Mote.
Chris
Craig <CBob...@SBCGlobal.net> wrote:
> I don't know what to say about this. One one hand I hate the idea of
> remaking classic movies. Forbidden Planet is IMO another movie that does
> not need a remake (along with The Day the Earth Stood Still and countless
> others). It is one of my favorite movies and when the Special Box DVD came
> out a few years ago I picked it the day it came out.
i would just like to make the argument for the other side for one moment
here.
when there is a remake of a film it does a lot of good things, it opens
up a budget and advertising that makes the original film easier to find
and get ahold of. this may not seem that important to those of us here
that are connected and can get pretty much anything via the web, but for
the vast majority of people, when they see these remakes coming out,
they will wander into the video store and see "the day the earth stood
still"(or whatever) for the first time on the shelf, when 6 months ago
they would not have looked twice at it. sure, they still may not watch
it and may only watch the new version, but there WILL be SOME people who
choose to rent/buy both to see and compare(i loved the 1965 "flight of
the phoenix" but didn't bother buying it until the new version came out
a couple years ago and i got both for the price of one). now, i don't
really plan on buying many moves or tv shows at all unless i can get
them on Blu-Ray, hopefully the budget from the remake will provide some
leftovers to convert some of these classics to Blu(if the original FILM
still exists for any of these, it CAN be re-mastered in hi-def, though
some FX may "show the strings" so to speak)
second, it's new material. if you dislike it, simply do not buy it, it
is not as though the original is being destroyed by the presence of a
new version, in fact, the above statement contradicts that, and usually
more of the original is created. and no, it doesn't "rape my childhood"*
or "destroy my memories"* because my memories are much stronger than can
be destroyed by a simple hollywood creation. and usually, if a remake
suck, it makes my memories of the original STRONGER, and if it's so good
that i forget the original, maybe the original wasn't that good to begin
with. (and "rape" is just a word that should not be mis-used for such
things as entertainment media)
George Lucasing a film, on the other hand, is evil, because it DOES
destroy the original(or at least makes it very hard to find), at least
when it's a Full-Lucasing, not a Half-Lucasing. A Full-Lucas is when the
movie has scenes changed, a half lucas is just a cleanup where the image
looks the same but is simply cleaner and clearer.
basically, i don't see how the undestructive creation of material could
be worthy of HATE, dislike, sure, but hate? hardly.
*those 2 terms are commonly heard phrases, not implying anyone here has
stated them.
....Chris
Wes Struebing
>In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
>mpvork...@hotmail.com says...
>>
>>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>>
>>Mike
>>
>
>From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
>>"Forbidden Planet"
>>
>>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
>>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
>>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
>http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib356467890c70c6678ca082f85346929
>
Kudos to you, Joe!
Not to be a naysayer - I can't think of anyone I would rather have
doing a remake of one of the best SF classics ever than JMS - but -
What I don't understand is why remake a film that is already
excellent? On a pare with "The Day the Earth Stood Still" (which is
still so far resisting a remake)
(that said - I'd go see it...)
--
Wes Struebing
Jan. 20, 2009 - the end of an error
Wes Struebing
wrote:
>Previously on rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated, Craig said:
>
>> On the Gripping hand It can only help to elevate JMS in the Hollywood
>
>Finally, someone else who uses that expression! :)
Gee; doesn't everyone, in the appropriate circumstances?
;-)
Wes Struebing
wrote:
Agreed (at least the original). I still like, though, the review that
Algis Budrys wrote, in which he called it "The Goat in Maude's
Eye"...<G>
mpvork...@hotmail.com
> On 31 Oct 2008 03:06:05 -0700, Jan <janmschroe...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> >In article <a7b49242-f197-45e9-9bb8-326c76092...@v30g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
>
> >>I think I shouldn't have started this thread.
>
> >>Mike
>
> >From the Hollywood Reporter:
>
> >>"Forbidden Planet"
>
> >>J. Michael Straczynski, the writer of the Clint Eastwood->directed "Changeling,"
> >>is penning a long-in-the-works update of sci-fi >classic "Forbidden Planet" for
> >>Warner Bros. Joel Silver is producing via >Silver Pictures.
>
>
> Kudos to you, Joe!
>
> Not to be a naysayer - I can't think of anyone I would rather have
> doing a remake of one of the best SF classics ever than JMS - but -
>
> What I don't understand is why remake a film that is already
> excellent? On a pare with "The Day the Earth Stood Still" (which is
> still so far resisting a remake)
>
> (that said - I'd go see it...)
> --
>
> Wes Struebing
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
Uh, Wes? They've done a remake of The Day The Earth Stood Still. With
Keanu. And Jenny Connelly. They did do Gort, just slightly different.
The trailer looks really cool, but you know as well as I that no
director, no matter who or how good he is, will ever be able to better
the original. Robert Wise made cinematic perfection. He had few peers,
and the original Day has none.
I'm not including Forbidden Planet, as it's a case of apples vs.
oranges.
Mike
Jeffrey Kaplan
> What I don't understand is why remake a film that is already
> excellent? On a pare with "The Day the Earth Stood Still" (which is
> still so far resisting a remake)
That remake is done and in the can. It's to be released on December
12.
--
Jeffrey Kaplan www.gordol.org
The from userid is killfiled Send personal mail to gordol
"Narns, Humans, Centauri...we all do what we do for the same reason:
because it seems like a good idea at the time." (Amb. G'Kar, B5 "Mind
War")
David E. Bath
Jon Schild <j...@xmission.com> writes:
> I would like to see him do a big-screen adaptation of John Scalzi's "Old
> Man's War."
I just read that one recently and I enjoyed it immensely! His
descriptions of the various alien races that are encountered were very
well done and quite inventive.