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Ramblings
Sunday, April 25, 2004. 04:41 p.m.What Now? I haven't written anything in months (or, if I'm honest with myself and discount my fan fiction, in years). I've been aware of this for some time now, but I've mostly been indifferent towards it, insisting in my foolishly and stubbornly optimistic way that when I'm ready to write, the words will just spill right out of me and onto the word processor. Well, we all have moments of sheer stupidity at one point or another in our lives, so I won't beat myself up over it. My mom oh-so casually mentioned over lunch that a fifteen year old girl had made a bestseller list. She also brought up Christopher Paolini, who wrote Eragon, the book I'm currently reading. Paolini was also fifteen when he started work on his book. And then, with the unmitigated gall only a mother can possess when talking to her favorite (or only) child, she adds, "No pressure or anything, but..." *sigh* Even my mom, who has been Patience itself when it comes to my, er, amusing little foibles, thinks I should get my lazy ass moving and write, write, write. And I would --- really, truly --- if it weren't for the unfortunate fact that I can't. And at the risk of sounding melodramatic, maybe I've never been able to. Let's face reality for a little while, shall we? I'm barely educated, I've never had any training in creative writing and am therefore unfamiliar with its techniques, my vocabulary has stagnated, I've had little to no life experience and most terrible of all, I don't have any stories to tell that are just my own. *kicks a figurative stone* So now what? Your Mission, Should You Choose to Accept It... My friends and I celebrated Martin's 21st birthday (woo-hoo!) last Friday night with a sleepover at Nina's. We stayed up until 6-ish Saturday morning playing CatchPhrase, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Star Wars Life, pusoy dos, poker and a ridiculous but fun game involving tiny plastic cups (don't ask). Aren't we just an incredibly wild group of mostly 20-somethings? *clears throat* Anyway, when we were at the mall, the subject of Harry Potter came up and somehow that led to us bitching about the total lack of good Harry Potter fan fic. It makes sense, of course, because the majority of HP fan fiction writers are teeny bopper types who don't know enough not to write Mary Sues and poorly explained 'shipper stories. HP male / male slash is particularly painful to read (on the few occasions I've dared them, at least), because they're mostly written by thirteen year old girls who don't know what goes where but still insist on making their (ugh) stories graphic. So Ranina challenged Martin to write a good Harry Potter fan fic. The conditions of the challenge as we set them down are: Now some of those conditions may seem pretty basic for any passable story, but believe me, it's nothing short of a miracle to meet them when writing Harry Potter fan fiction. Best of luck to Martin. I'll be posting his story in Nytie's Den if and when he's done with it. Before I go, I'm giving a special shout-out to Anna Lyn, who's one of the few people who actually read my rubbish. Don't I feel special? Retrogression - Another Disillusioned Rambling about Comic Books Bleargh. I knew the X-Men Reload event was bringing back the colorful spandex costumes and old school X-Men creators, but I had no idea things would look so cheesy. Check out the June covers for Uncanny X-Men and X-Men. There's also the cringe-worthy preview of Joss Whedon's script and John Cassaday's interior art for Astonishing X-Men. I'm disliking this Reload business more and more everyday. It smacks of regression. It's almost as though they're erasing everything Grant Morrison accomplished in his run. Whether or not fans liked what he did (I personally loved it to itsy bitsy pieces), going back to the state the X-Men were in before he came on can hardly be the right thing to do. What happened to forward thinking? Progression? Change, which is supposed to be the status quo for the merry mutants? Just because it worked in the 80s and 90s doesn't necessarily mean it'll work in this century. And even if it does, are the X-Men always going to stay this way? Are they never going to evolve? Ever? What I'd like is a real reload. Retire all the old X-Men. Bring in a new generation of X-Men. Have Beak lead them (seriously). Bring in new stories and new environments. Up the stakes (dead means dead, man). Hire new writers. Heck, hire new artists as well, up and coming talents who haven't had a shot at a book as big as X-Men. Prove that it's the story and the concept that really sells, not old-timey characters that fans refuse to let go of. All right, it's probably never going to happen. As Garth Algar said: We fear change. Well, Marvel does. And many fans do. But not this one. This one is moving on. Yup. I'm sad to announce that I'm giving them up, all my old heroes: Storm, Nightcrawler, Beast, Iceman and (more recently) Emma Frost. Unless the ranch of X-Men creators and editors show me that they're really moving forward, I'm done and not coming back. Which, really, frees my money up for other, better titles. I'm still sticking with Daredevil and Y: The Last Man, naturally. Neither Brian Michael Bendis nor Brian K. Vaughan have yet failed to impress me. I'll keep reading Ultimate X-Men, at least until I find out what Bryan Singer has planned for the book. If it involves putting Wolverine in the spotlight any more than necessary, I'll be dropping it like a hot potato. And I'll continue to pick up X-Statix, just to see if Peter Milligan and Mike Allred can conjure up some of the magic they had in their early X-Force issues. The cover for X-Statix #24 is very promising.  I'll also be trying out more Vertigo titles: Fables, Lucifer, Hellblazer, etc. For some reason, I seem to click more easily with Vertigo than Marvel these days. That's the good (or bad) thing about being a comic book fan: there's no shortage of great stories you can blow your money on.
Anyway, I guess this is the end of my love affair with the X-Men. It was good while it lasted (for the most part). Oh, yeah, and if Ranina is still a fan, I offer her my sympathies. Come Reload, Rogue will be written by Chuck Austen. I hate the character with a passion, but even she doesn't deserve such a lamentable fate. ¡Adiós! I'm in Heaven (Or Pretty Close to It) I went to the comic book store today (whoopie  ) after being unable to drop by at all last month. The pile of comic books waiting for me was pretty big (one of the biggest since I decided to stop buying every X-Men and X-related title and minseries Marvel was churning out). And because I'm feeling the need to share the cause of my happiness, I will list down my thoughts on each of the comics I bought (in alphabetical order, of course).
1602 #6 - Maybe Neil Gaiman just isn't my cuppa joe. I liked this issue, as I liked all the previous issues, but it didn't strike an emotional chord with me. And Andy Kubert's art seemed sloppy in some places. Ah, well, win some, lose some. If I ever get a hankering for Gaiman again, I suppose I could just pick up old Sandman trades. Daredevil #56 - Squeee! People can say what they want about the decline of Brian Michael Bendis' work in, say, Ultimate X-Men (and regarding the fill-in "Blockbuster" arc, they wouldn't be totally wrong), but where Daredevil is concerned he has yet to disappoint. I find myself falling more and more in love with the man's writing everyday. Sure, this was just a setup issue for the rest of the story arc, but it's a strong, character-driven one, and those are the best kind. Half of the panels were obscured by speech bubbles, but I didn't care. Bendis may be a bit wordy for some, but his dialogue is just perfect for me. And then there is Alex Maleev's art. *sighs contentedly* Aside from the wonderful texture and perspective of it, I don't believe I've ever seen a cuter Peter Parker drawn anywhere. And that's saying something, considering the fact that his face was obscured in shadows for the better part of his appearance. Um, Larroca who? Elektra #s 31 & 32 - These two issues were kind of a disappointment after the hard core-ness (is there such a word?) of Rodi's first few issues. The art doesn't help, either. Besides being inconsistent and unsuitable for the dark nature of Elektra's life (#32), in some panels it was just plain ugly. I'll still be collecting the rest of the issues until its cancellation with #35, though, for completeness' sake. Also, Rodi might still surprise me with his last story. New X-Men #s 151 & 152 - "Kkrrr... Destroy..." Hee! I love Rover, the ancient Sentinel, and his cute, cute, cute master Tom Skylark. And if I swung both ways, I'd say E.V.A. was a babe, too. The Planet X story arc was a bit disappointing to me (the highlight was Beak coming at Magneto with his trusty bat), but Here Comes Tomorrow is shaping up to be an enjoyable one. I love the the badass-ness (or is it the badass-ity?) of Beak's descendant, Tito Bohusk. I like the evil crawlers, the Three-in-One (I'm even prepared to overlook the fact that they ought to be dead 150 years into the future), good Cassandra Nova (though she's still a creepy old biddy) and evil Beast. I don't even mind that the story had Wolverine in it and featured the Phoenix again. Marc Silvestri's art was good. I still don't get what all the fuss with his returning to draw X-Men is about, but the art is very, very good. The only bad thing about this arc is that it's Grant Morrison's last. Oh, I know, some people are turning cartwheels over his departure, but I really liked his storytelling style. I even liked his more mediocre stories. And to think, Chuck Austen will be filling in for him when he's gone. Oh, the humanity! Ultimate X-Men #41 - Back to you, Bendis. David Finch is a demi-god (I can't say god, because that would be, you know, blasphemy). His art could have told the story even without Bendis' dialogue (which was surprisingly spare this time around). It's heartbreaking. Also, this is the first time I've seen any real humanity in Ultimate Wolverine. It made me like him a whole lot more. I don't usually cry over movies, and I never cry over comics, but I came pretty close to it with this issue. X-Statix #18 - Compared to the earlier issues of X-Force and X-Statix, this last arc was blah. Allred's art was great, as usual, but even that couldn't cover up for what was obviously a hasty rewrite on Milligan's part. I blame editorial Marvel. The only good thing about this issue was the very last page, which conjured up some unpleasant memories of watching The Ring. Jesus, that face was scary. X-Treme X-Men #39 - I wasn't planning on buying the Storm: The Arena arc of XXM, but my friends gave me the first two issues for Christmas, so I had to know how it turned out. Now I wish I hadn't (no offense to Nina and TinTin, who are just the sweetest people ever). I've heard that Igor Kordey's art had improved vastly since his fill-ins in New X-Men, but this... ugh. And the story itself... double ugh. I didn't like it one bit. We know Storm can kick major booty, but she'd only ever done it as a last resort. Otherwise, it had always been a peaceful and diplomatic recourse for my beloved(?) Windrider. I am so sick of seeing this robotic, infallible superwoman walking around wearing Ororo's skin. Where's the compassion? The vulnerability, damn it? I... never mind. No, I won't talk about it anymore. I'm just glad I dropped X-Treme X-Men a while back. Not only did I save money, I also avoided severe upchuckings caused by sappy Rogue / Remy moments. Blick and double blick. Y: The Last Man: Unmanned TPB - I've been interested in this title for some time now, but couldn't buy it because of, erm, financial restraints. Since I've dropped Uncanny and X-Treme X-Men and Elektra's been cancelled, and since I'll most likely be dropping New X-Men after Grant Morrison leaves, I decided I could afford to pick up another title. And boy, am I glad I picked Y: The Last Man! The posters at ComiX-Fan raved about it, but I figured that was just adoring fanboy talk. Nope. Y is every bit as fantastic as they said it would be. Brian K. Vaughan has now earned himself yet another worshipful fangirl (whether he likes it or not). And I really like Pia Guerra's art --- the expressions on the characters’ faces are spot on. I don't remember being this affected by a comic book since Grant Morrison's "E is for Extinction" arc on New X-Men. Three cheers for Yorick Brown! *swoons in an undignified manner* My mouth is now watering for the next few Y: The Last Man trades (and my mother's wallet is groaning in despair). I also want to pick up the trades of Brian Michael Bendis' Powers and earlier Daredevil arcs and Grant Morrison's The Invisibles. That awful, evil man got me hooked on his writing with New X-Men, and now that he's leaving, I need to get my Morrison fix. Supposedly, The Invisibles is a good place to start, though the trades might be hard to come by. I also want to try out Fables, by Bill Willingham. Y: The Last Man has gotten me interested in DC / Vertigo titles (and sadly, less interested in X-Men titles). I'd try Hellblazer, too, except it's been running for a long time now, and I'm not sure where a good jumping point would be. Between (or among?) Brian Michael Bendis, Brian K. Vaughan and Grant Morrison's writing and David Finch, Alex Maleev and Pia Guerra's art, I'm walking on Cloud Nine. Just call me a happy and willing sucker. Grievance I'm supposed to be getting ready for my cousin Jeff's 21st birthday party (woo-hoo!), but I just had to get this off my chest. It seems that FanFiction.Net has stopped posting R-rated stories in their Just In section. It basically means that R-rated fics still get uploaded to the website, but people won't be able to view them unless they go the specific categories and select the "All" option on the rating menu. This seriously pisses me off. I can understand the staff's need to protect the prepubescent twerps who come around posting their little Harry Potter fics from the bad, bad influences of R-rated fan fiction, but this is bordering on censorship, or hypocrisy at the very least. R-rated fiction is still there for any determined nine year old to find, but, hey, if it's not in the more obvious places they can think to look, why, we're absolved of any responsibility, right? Bullshit. If FanFiction.Net doesn't allow R-rated fiction to be presented to the public in exactly the same way as PG and G fics, then they shouldn't allow R-rated fics to be uploaded at all! What they're doing seems a bit cowardly to me. I think the stand-up thing to do would be to risk the little kids reading fiction with adult content or else wipe these stories off the site entirely. It won't stop people from looking for adult fics elsewhere, but at least FanFiction.Net would have done the right thing. Ugh. It's enough to make me want to write and post some NC-17 smut just to piss them off! I won't, of course, because the godawful truth is I can't write smut (can't as in incapable, not prohibited). In the meantime, here's some good, old-fashioned R-rated fan fiction for X-Men fans to peruse (if they wish): Of Chickens and Men Category: X-Men Genre: Drama / Angst / Character Study Pairing: Beak / Angel Summary: Featuring Beak, during the Planet X arc. Rated R for adult language and sexual references, though the story itself is PG. Criminal Category: Ultimate X-Men Genre: Angst / Character Study Pairings: None Summary: In support of the background guys: Forge on Forge, how he joined Magneto's Brotherhood and what happened afterwards. Rated R for adult language. Take that, FanFiction.Net!
Nytie's Den My FanFiction.Net account has been really slow lately. Possessed by some insane, not too bright but wholly determined demon, I built my own site, Nytie's Den, to house an archive of my fan fiction. It looks like shit, but I'm a virgin when it comes to making websites (among other things), so allowances have to be made. The drop down ads (it's a Geocities site) don't help matters much either. Even so, I can't help but be proud of it. I made this thing on my own! With my bare fingers! *pats self on the back* Not bad for a person who flunked Computer Science. |
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