Bonfire of the Genres: Critical Looks Sci-Fi and Fantasy

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Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Re-reading "Herbert West, Re-Animator" as an adult and realizing the most luridly horrified prose is reserved not for the various zombie disasters or for the vats of undead lizard-monster flesh, but for describing a black guy, was a loving trip.

# ¿ Jun 14, 2018 18:22

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 03:36

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Man, the dialogue in that first excerpt is just awful. It's only a few steps up from some Eye of Argon crap, and Abercrombie (presumably) doesn't even have the excuse of being a teenager in the Ozarks when he was writing it.

Also, writing a Muslim-bogeyman evil empire in your gritty fantasy novel is bad enough, but naming it the "Gurkish Empire" is a loving crime. Seriously?

Antivehicular fucked around with this message at 05:18 on Aug 17, 2018

# ¿ Aug 17, 2018 05:13

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

Spoilers, turdass!!

# ¿ Nov 1, 2018 05:56

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Strom Cuzewon posted:

synthetic spreadable eggs

the incredible spreadable egg

# ¿ Nov 20, 2018 18:55

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Drool Rockworm obviously pledged the same frat as Brooks Cracktackle and Crunch Buttsteak

# ¿ Jan 6, 2019 14:02

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

avshalemon posted:

yeah donaldson was a great choice for this thread, the books are woeful but apparently they were a big deal back when they were first published (which i think was late 70s, early 80s?) and are one of the sff things that pretty much everyone i've spoken to over the age of 30 has read or is at least familiar with. obviously i am in australia which is a peri-apocalyptic hellscape populated by criminal slimes, but donaldson's always been held on the same tier as lotr and dune by the ageing nerds i talked to, which he does not deserve at all

This will date me in a very specific way, but I remember seeing the Thomas Covenant books recommended by Inquest (InQuest? whatever) magazine as important fantasy novels to read, alongside LotR and Wheel of Time (and Dune on the SF side), back when I was a kid reading CCG magazines. These things were definitely mainstream American nerd lore as late as the '90s.

# ¿ Jan 8, 2019 00:17

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I have a copy of Elemental Masters and it's loving mesmerizing. It's true outsider art in the sense of "someone who perceives the world at a 45-degree angle from mainstream human perception, earnestly trying to communicate artistically in their own idiom" and is only questionably readable, but it's a hell of an experience nonetheless.

# ¿ Jan 10, 2019 02:42

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

Social movements come and go, but The Lord of the Rings will always be there for you to rewrite.

If you want a vision of the future, imagine Horick the Elf eating a luscious mealbread -- forever.

# ¿ Jan 24, 2019 13:58

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Avs would never create a character this boring

# ¿ Jan 28, 2019 01:07

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Is there really a character in the Thomas Covenant books named "Kevin Landwaster?" Honest to loving God?

# ¿ Jan 29, 2019 03:39

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I read it, and it includes the sentence "the giants are eternal wanderers, and left without a permanent home; they then lose their home away from home when they are all killed," which makes me nostalgic for bad middle-school book reports.

# ¿ Jan 29, 2019 04:13

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Strom Cuzewon posted:

(god imagine trying to write a similar list for mistborn, you'd be scraping the bottom of the barrel by the third bulletpoint)

The more I hear about how empty these books are, the more I kind of want to read one, just to see if they're honestly the black holes that they sound like.

Then I remember I own good books and have no excuse to track down bad ones, so, y'know, it all evens out

# ¿ Jan 29, 2019 22:40

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

TheGreatEvilKing posted:

I'm confused how you get LGBT anything out of a story where there's no actual sex and the only relationships are straight, chaste marriages?

Intense emotional relationships between characters of the same sex in homosocial environments. I wouldn't say it's a correct reading, at least not if you go by authorial intent, but it's pretty straightforward.

# ¿ Jan 31, 2019 15:29

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

yeah I probably shouldn't have thrown a rock at that hornet's nest

(I have seen people argue on the Internet that LGBT content in LotR was totally intentional because Tolkien had definitely seen his fellow soldiers fall in love with each other during WWI, which is amazing)

# ¿ Jan 31, 2019 16:28

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

pikachode posted:

i think a lot of us have a pokepocalypse somewhere in our past

Back in high school, some Internet friends of mine and I found and mocked a very long, overwrought post-apoc Pokemon fanfic. I had the "brilliant" idea to write a parody of it using Homestar Runner characters instead. Luckily, this urge passed, but recently I found an old notebook from that era with a detailed drawing of cyborg Homsar and felt this amazing flood of retroactive shame. kind of ashamed of even writing this post TBH

# ¿ Feb 3, 2019 01:38

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

Trying to visualize how detailed a drawing of Homsar, even cyborg Homsar, could be.

"Detailed" is an extremely relative term here

# ¿ Feb 3, 2019 02:04

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

uberkeyzer posted:

It's incredible. There's are several characters who are supposed to deliver burns so sick that the targets are left gasping for breath and everyone around bursts into applause at his cleverness. Only...Brandon Sanderson really, really can't write comedy, so you're left with large chunks of the movie reading like the on-air segments of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Here's an example I found via googling:

Only a Mormon would write a witty burn where the burn-deliverer apparently believes oral sex feels bad

# ¿ Feb 3, 2019 03:05

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Foot-long eyebrows? Are Thaylen actually Mothmen?

# ¿ Feb 3, 2019 06:10

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Bonfire of the Genres: we then skip forward 4500 years to the assassination of a king by some guy

# ¿ Feb 3, 2019 10:39

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Strom Cuzewon posted:

Parshmen are a form of Parshendi that lack Spren, rending them dullwitted

So... literally a magical version of the Chris Rock "black people and n-words" bit? Jesus screaming poo poo

# ¿ Feb 4, 2019 00:05

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I just want to point out the profoundly inane phrase "parts of his own soul shaped like swords," which I guess is what shardblades are? I can just hear the whiny nerd voice trying to explain why this is great worldbuilding. THEY'RE NOT "MAGIC SWORDS," THEY'RE PARTS OF A SOUL AND THEY'RE JUST SHAPED LIKE SWORDS, GEEZ MOM

# ¿ Feb 5, 2019 19:03

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

What mind-blowing revelations was that guy expecting to come from listening to a Spider-Man Christmas album? Your heart expanding three sizes like the goddamn Grinch, because only the terminally joyless could fail to appreciate a comic-book movie, I guess?

# ¿ Feb 5, 2019 19:53

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I have a hard time feeling sympathetic to "it's fun for the writer" arguments. Entertainment for the reader is a fine goal, sure, as is creative play just for the sake of fun, but as a reader considering whether something is worth my time, why should I care if the writer had fun? It doesn't make bad writing not bad, or masturbatory writing appropriate for an audience.

# ¿ Feb 6, 2019 19:18

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

Death Comes for the Archbishop

Just going to interrupt to say that everyone should read this book. It's not very long, the prose is fairly simple, and it's just unspeakably beautiful.

# ¿ Feb 7, 2019 14:28

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Bozo being laughed at is the triumph of his art, though? People laughed at Bozo because he was a successful clown.

I am so goddamn lost. Can we get back to talking about shardblades and gemhearts and mealbreads?

# ¿ Feb 7, 2019 15:41

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

chernobyl kinsman posted:

im making the executive decision to put Bear on the TBB canon and all of you losers need to read it this month

I got my copy yesterday. Will begin tonight. Got a reissue with a "classy" cover, but will live through this disappointment.

# ¿ Feb 7, 2019 19:40

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I really need to read Henry Darger. Are there any decent versions of his work available, or is it all going to be other people's analysis?

EDIT: beaten by a relentlessly terrible quoted post, holy poo poo

# ¿ Feb 8, 2019 15:56

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

CountFosco posted:

Also, Susan wasn't "kicked out of Narnia." When the time came for her to be brought back into Narnia, she didn't come because she had convinced herself that it was a childhood delusion/fantasy. The lipstick and boys stuff is, I believe, meant to be reflective of this deeper shift in attitude, rather than the big error itself.

Even if it's not an intentional choice by Lewis, it's very telling that the descent into materialism/loss of spiritual self is signified by Susan, as an older adolescent girl, developing the interests of an adult woman. It's an extremely common sexist attitude, in both fiction and real life, to treat feminine material interests as inherently more shallow, crassly "worldly," and bankrupt of deeper value than equivalent masculine interests. (Said feminine material interests are pushed onto women by the same society, and women who don't take interest in them chastised just as badly, but that's a whole different discussion.) Adolescent male characters in male-written/targeted genre fiction are allowed to be infatuated with girls and have gender-stereotypical interests without it implying anything about their overall spiritual character, but similar female characters who exhibit any gender-stereotypical interests or take interest in boys beyond a single token love interest are practically always considered to be dumb, silly, and frivolous. It's particularly galling in Narnia because, as mentioned, she ends up loving locked out of Heaven for it.

# ¿ Feb 9, 2019 02:07

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

Lewis himself spent the '20s as a demon after rejecting Christianity as a teenager.

please don't spoil my Inklings Real Person Fanfiction

# ¿ Feb 9, 2019 07:34

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

a redtext-giver who leaves garbage characters in his redtext
a shameful redtext-giver

# ¿ Feb 11, 2019 05:16

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I'm just picturing the saddest guard-shark in its own tank, disconsolately bumping its nose on the glass as its competing urges to fulfill its duty and eat its charges war within it

It's a stupid mental image but it's still better than Sexy Scary Succubus up there

# ¿ Feb 13, 2019 21:56

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

To be fair, "this novel has a prologue about emotionless elves murdering their children for displaying signs of mortality, and this has nothing to do with the premise or eventual plot of the novel" is pretty egregious.

# ¿ Feb 15, 2019 14:38

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I'm trying to figure out how a decapitated goat can still look alive until you're right on top of it. Lack of head not visible? Extremely specialized fantasy goats?

Edit: what a godawful snipe this is

# ¿ Feb 17, 2019 06:58

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I read "A Spell For Chameleon" at 12 and most of the grodiness sailed over my head (I may have been a dim child). I'd hope a 5-year-old would be even more oblivious.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2019 17:03

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

He wrote with the predatory efficiency of a lifelong bachelor

Apropos of nothing, but where's your new avatar from? It's really cute.

# ¿ Feb 23, 2019 07:59

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

The tedious exposition is the point of the exercise, but the authentic vintage sexism really makes it

# ¿ Feb 23, 2019 10:25

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Pacho posted:

I don't mind The Silmarillion and the later published appendices and notes but they are kinda guilty of making some folk believe that "worldbuilding" is the purpose of fantasy and not a tool. I think GRRM is at least honest (and smart) in putting all of that in actual enciclopaedias

Yeah, I feel like Tolkien's great crime was inadvertently convincing writers that the intricate worldbuilding of LotR was how fantasy should be written, instead of just an insane passion project by a literal dotty old professor. Tolkien did it well, and generally knew when it mattered to the story and when it didn't (and never intended to publish most of this stuff), but most of the people who followed him don't. It's the same way that E. E. Cummings wrote brilliantly but inspired reams of completely awful grammar-free poetry.

Antivehicular fucked around with this message at 20:37 on Feb 23, 2019

# ¿ Feb 23, 2019 20:11

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Sham bam bamina! posted:

E. E. Cummings didn't write his name like that; that was a gimmick pushed by his publisher.

Oh, hey, thanks for the heads-up. I didn't know that. (Also, wow, that publisher has a lot to answer for.)

# ¿ Feb 23, 2019 20:38

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I will stand up for the Mother series as good video-game writing, but almost all its successors have taken the wrong message ("be wacky and also sad / explicitly reference the player") from it instead of the actual reason it's any good ("get a writer who has chops in non-video-game writing, make sure he actually has guiding ideas in mind").

# ¿ Feb 25, 2019 00:58

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 03:36

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

my bony fealty posted:

"vomit zombies."

This phrase bodes ill.

# ¿ Mar 1, 2019 16:31

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > The Goodmine > Bonfire of the Genres: Critical Looks Sci-Fi and Fantasy

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