The Bloor & Queen Street Saturday. Again.

Yet another Saturday descends, and we have now officially turned Queen Street West and Bloor Street into our weekend haunts as we made our way out of the Annex to venture down into the bowels of downtown once more. One of the things I’m quickly beginning to appreciate about these downtown jaunts is just how much easier it is to actually endure them; a typical weekend in Singapore was an ordeal for me because I would be sweating buckets about 2 minutes after stepping outside into that tropical heat and humidity. So while I was fine as soon as we got into the air conditioned protection of a shopping mall, getting from once place to another was not actually that pleasant an afternoon walk down the streets with all that equatorial heat. Here, I no longer fear the sun, I actually look forward to it as it warms up the air somewhat.

But first, the stuff.

Just before we left, I found this sitting in the mail today. This is another one of those DVDs I’ve been meaning to get for-freakin’-ever but never did, simply because even though it was perfectly legal in Singapore, there was simply not enough demand for it.

Then again, a director talking about Hollywood in as caustic a manner as possible is not exactly the Singaporean idea of entertainment, so I can see why the retailers there would wisely decide that this wouldn’t sell like hotcakes and never bother to order it. Thanks to the miracle of “gently used copies” on eBay, It’s now mine. I’ve already watched one of the highlights of this DVD on the internet (namely, Smith’s gutbustingly funny recollection of his work on the next Superman movie) so I’m really looking forward to hearing what he has to say on various other topics. He is, after all, the poster boy for the Geek Gone Good.

Queen Street West basically belongs to the Wife. That’s really more her town, because there are three art stores there, all of which she frequents for very, very specific things. One store is her canvas store, the other is her pencil and equipment store, and another is her paper store. The only thing Queen Street West really holds for me is the Silver Snail, but then my geek concerns are highly focused. Still it was a good run, especially since one art store in particular has a game geek and the Wife had to patiently endure me sidelining the geek in question while we discussed the merits of the Playstation 3 versus the Nintendo Wii. After that, it was a street car ride back up to Bloor, and a quick visit to Suspect Video for more odd films, and final run into Korea Town for more of them whacky Asian grocery products you can’t get in normal stores here, but find in abundance at the typical Cold Storage grocery store in Singapore. On the other hand, I can finally buy Hickory Sticks and Corn Chips here again, something I was deprived of for over 10 years in Singapore.

On a totally unrelated note, I continue to bang my head against the brick wall of sonic insanity that is Psychobilly Freakout by Reverend Horton Heat on the Expert level of Guitar Hero 2. My inconsistency with this song is really starting to annoy me, and remind me greatly of my struggle to beat Cowboys From Hell by Pantera on the original Guitar Hero. Mostly this is simply because I’m not practicing enough and still insist on jumping straight into the song and trying to just play the damn thing. I find myself going through bizarre cycles of getting shut out, 30 seconds into the songs UTTERLY MAD intro, and then suddenly fluking it out and getting 80+% into the song before finally flunking out. This is EXACTLY what happened to me in Cowboys From Hell, so I suspect that it’ll take a lot less time to actually pass this damn song if I’d just buckle down and use that practice mode since That’s What It’s There For. Although I’m a bit confused as to how Harmonix arranged these songs, because as far as I can tell, I can actually pass the encore song, YYZ by Rush with relative ease.

Oh well, I should get back to writing more of that darn novel.

And at some point over the week, you can look forward to not one, but two, count ‘em TWO commentaries on a Japanese Giant Monster Movie featuring the creature to the left.

Yep, it’s a giant turtle. With rocket legs.

But we’ll get to that when we get to it…

And On A Comic Book Related Note

The Wife’s rendition of Psylocke, she of the Psi-Blade, the focused totality of her psychic power. As usual, you can click on the picture to enlarge it.

Also, there’s this…

The first of the AAA titles for the next generation of consoles finally has a trailer. It’s also the first of the big league franchises to have a locked down release date of October 16, but that’s only if you’ve got an Xbox 360 or a Playstation 3. Still, it’s looking pretty sweet, and they’ve finally stopped messing around with fictional cities and just dropped you in the middle of New York, so you can bet the anti-game proponents are going to have a field day with how this will be a simulator for terrorists to conduct practice runs on their next 9/11 tragedy…

Also, Lost In Loveless finally has some good momentum going behind it, as I’m now moving into the juicy stuff that motivated me to write this book in the first place. It’s always fun when you finally get to the moments that inspired you, and I’ve already had a couple of surprise moments on the way that have shed more light on the story. Whoo.

Lazy Thursday

Did a little bit of writing, a little bit o’ banking and a whole lot of playing Prince of Persia: The Warrior Within. So far it falls far, far BELOW the quality established by its predecessor. It’s unbalanced, frustrating and very cheap in the way it artificially lengthens the game’s lifespan by simply making you navigate the same areas over and over again. Most critics gave the game an average of 80%, but the New York Times actually reviewed the game and gave it 40%. It’s harsh, and I wouldn’t go quite that low, but the game is certainly a disappointment so far.

I’d probably be more generous with my feelings towards it if I hadn’t just played God of War II. But then, to be fair, nothing on the PS2 is gonna’ top that.

Another Day Of Work

Aside from writing more of Lost In Loveless the only thing of note that I did today was explore the northern part of the Annex to check out that crazy Casa Loma and some of the surrounding parks, now that the weather is no longer sub-zero. It’s nice walking around these old neighborhoods and seeing houses all over the place. Especially since seeing a house doesn’t automatically mean the person living in it is a millionaire.

Feeling Bad For Chris

I FINALLY got around to picking this up and reading it today when I saw the trade on sale at a Bloor street book store for $11.

It was hilarious. It was touching. And yes, true to its title, Astonishing X-Men, it was, indeed, astonishing.

And yet, at the same time, despite the fact that I was overjoyed at one of the most entertaining renditions of the X-Men I have ever seen, despite my enthusiasm at getting my hands on even more and being blown away by the sheer entertainment value of it all, when I closed the book and put it down, there was one feeling that was predominant over all.

I felt really, really, really bad for Chris Claremont, the man who wrote the X-Men comics for 16 years.

As I understand it, Claremont’s not doing much these days, not for lack of demand for his talent, so much as a heart illness which has forced him to slow down considerably. But I can’t help thinking of my reaction to this new work written by Joss Whedon, he of Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Firefly fame. When I first started reading comics as a kid, most of them were, to be honest, terribly written when measured by any standard of literary quality. Shallow characterization, simple plots and a tendency to ignore character (not to mention physical) logic in order to resolve plot lines were the order of the day. Claremont was a step above that, providing more consistency, drama and imagination for his readers. He was hampered by the “Marvel rules” however. During his years, Marvel was still firmly of the opinion that the comics were read by children and that the stories should never make the assumption that people reading a particular issue were familiar with the ongoing plot–or indeed the characters of the series. As a result of that, Claremont was forced to work with rules such as the characters often reiterating who they were and what they did. Of particular irritation to me was Psylocke and her constant refrain, “This is my psi-blade! A psychic knife that is the focused totality of my psychic powers!”

And she would say this EVERY. SINGLE. TIME she drew that blade out, and people would just stand there and let her say that spiel before she plunged it into their foreheads and disrupted their neurons.

But Claremont also gave young comic readers of the 80′s what is undoubtedly the First Great Comic Tale of the 20th century. In 1980, he wrote The Dark Phoenix saga, the first story in the history of comics that really made the industry grow up a little. It was a story of how one superhero actually becomes corrupted by her power, does terrible things and then makes the ultimate sacrifice, giving up her life so that the absolute power she wields doesn’t corrupt her absolutely and endanger the life of everything and everyone around her.

While this might be the kind of thing that is fairly de rigeur for Japanese anime, in the comics industry of 1980, it was a bold, paradigm shattering move that laid to waste the idea that comics would forever have a “reset button” where at the end of a storyline, the characters reverted to status quo, unchanged and unaffected by the events they’d lived through.

That particular story was a cathartic moment for the industry, and if it hadn’t happened, we might never have seen the likes of Frank Miller attempt The Dark Knight Returns or Alan Moore try his hand at The Watchmen, because it was Claremont that finally taught the comics industry that the stories of comics could be “real” stories in the literary sense of pushing things forward to a conclusion with real and definite change.

I am, in particular, always brought back to that place where I was eight years old and read this final panel in the comic, almost a recalling of classic Greek narrative devices with a chorus closing the tale. You can click on it to magnify it:

When you’re a kid, particularly when you’ve been digesting “normal” children’s fare like Pippi Longstocking, or other DC or Marvel titles, this is pretty mindblowing stuff. I’d already read this kind of thing in the Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov that I was reading, but had already relegated comics to a place where they couldn’t do this.

But then a funny thing happened. I outgrew Claremont. I outgrew comics.

The rise in particular of Image comics, with its shallow, vacuous titles that really lived up to their name (with no substance at all) was the final nail in the coffin for me, and it would take Neil-O and the work he did with Sandman to make me rethink my previous assumptions that comics were juvenile and immature writing compared to the stuff I was reading in university.

Claremont, as progressive as he was, was a product of his time. Having spent so much time writing for a younger audience, having spent so many years Writing The Marvel Way, as I grew older, the limitations in his writing–at least to me–began to show. The X-Men had angst, yes, but after doing such an amazing job on the Dark Phoenix Saga, bringing Jean Grey back (though this wasn’t actually his idea and he was opposed to it) took its toll, and over the years, his writing seemed stuck in a constant cycle of angst, loss, resurrection, false hope, angst and loss again. Thought balloons w
ere already starting to seem like a cheap tactic to me by this point, the years, and years and years of writing the same characters had rendered them inert.

Which is why I was so amazed at my reaction to Astonishing X-Men. Not only was it apparent that Joss Whedon knew how to tell a story, he really knew these characters. He’d grown up reading them as well, but now he infused them with that same flirtatious dramatic/comedic sensibility he’d sharpened to a razor’s edge on with Buffy and Firefly. He took the history and familiar elements of these characters, but he breathed life into them. He gave them a friction that was far more entertaining and believable. He even poked fun at the inherent outrageousness of the Marvel universe, as when one character says “Jean Grey is dead,” and the rapid reply is, “Yeah, that’ll last…”

I couldn’t help wondering what that would feel like. To know that these where characters that you defined for a generation of readers, and then some punk comes along and blows you out of the water like that. Not that I’m insinuating Whedon is insulting Claremont’s legacy, it’s obvious he has MUCH respect for the material Claremont crafted. But there is such a dramatic difference in the quality between Whedon’s and Claremont’s writing that it’s positively night and day. There is a life and lightness and flow to Whedon’s story that Claremont could never accomplish. I don’t know if part of that agility comes from being trained to write episodic scripts that had to move really fast, or whether it’s simply a result of natural talent, but Whedon has a greater understanding of character and nuance that makes the X-Men not just real, but far more likeable and relatable than they have been in years. And not once does Whedon ever have his character reiterate their abilities for the umpteenth time. He even manages the rare feat of not abusing Wolverine by having him appear too much, something most writers who have tackled the X-Men have always fallen victim to.

Man, I’m just REALLY impressed with this. I found Ultimate X-Men to be fun. But what Whedon has done has actually reminded me, in an updated, more assured, mature, slick, glossy, post-millenial sort of way, why I liked these characters so much when I was kid.

Whedon’s just let me like them again as an adult. Not an easy trick.

Shift In Status

This was one of those good days where the novel finally switched over from something that felt like work to something that felt like a story again.

It’s something that I think all writers have to come to terms with when it comes to creating something as large as a novel. I think artists have to deal with the same problem when it comes to creating a comic, or directors when crafting a full scale motion picture. Whenever you do anything that’s longer in form, it’s impossible for it to always be riding the muse, firing on all cylinders, in a frenzy of creative joy. At some point that inspiration (or at least the manic, hyper-accelerated version of it that creative types live for) will die, and you’re left with what separates real artists from wannabes; the ability to forge on ahead and keep working the craft even when you’re not basking in the light of the muses. Which means also that you’re more likely to actually finish the damn thing, as opposed to referring to it as a work in progress for the rest of your dilettante life.

I think that working when you’re inspired is a grand thing, but I also believe that when it comes to something bigger, like the long form pieces of art mentioned above, you’re going to experience a massive attack of inefficiency if you ONLY work under the condition that inspiration is burning with nova-like intensity. Writing is part art and part craft, and one of the things about any craft is having the discipline to stick with it and see it finished (or at least worked on) even when you’re not feeling particularly peachy about the whole thing.

That’s what’s been happening with Lost In Loveless lately where it was… well, saying it was a torturous process would be too much of an exaggeration, but it was pretty slow going, getting those words out and even though it didn’t feel like writer’s block, it was still a bit discouraging to watch the words come out one by one, veeeeery slowwwlyyyy and think “Well, it’s not bad.”

The dam finally broke again today though and I got some decent momentum with about three pages cranked out, compared to the paragraph or two that I’d previously been working with. Speaking of which, back to work…

Yup, It’s Quiet

Stay at home Sunday, wrote a bit of novel, played a bit of Ace Combat 5 and finished up watching Robot Chicken.

You know the drill…

Surprise Bargains

What was supposed to be just a normal trip out to the burbs to shop at a mall called Yorkdale Shopping Centre turned into an orgy of game purchasing for Games-I-Like-But-Don’t-Love that I’ve been Kind’a-Sort’a-Meaning-To-Pick-Up-At-Some-Point.

Thanks to EB Games and a “March Madness” sale that I just didn’t see coming, they had huge bins full of used/rental copies of games. One bin was 2 games for $20 and the other was 2 games for $30. Here’s what I ended up with.

Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War

I’ve been playing the Ace Combat series since it first debuted on the Playstation 1, but had gotten slack in keeping up with the series on the PS2, thanks to the explosion of other games that kept me busy. This will be a good chance for me to once again enjoy my favorite feature of the game; the radar summary at the end that charts your flight path and shows you just how much you suck when you hopelessly pursue enemy planes. Who knew all those turns would end up as a pretty corkscrew when viewed from thousands of feet away?


Drakengard 2

I got the original Drakengard primarily because the concept was so out there; a combination of Army Fighter (where you as a lone soldier take on an entire army, usually simultaneously) combined with Panzer Dragoon (think arcade fighter flight simulation, but with dragons) mechanics… And it was made by Square-Enix, the Final Fantasy guys. While it wasn’t a classic, the game still offered a warped and disturbing plot, as well as some adequate game play. I’m curious to see how the follow up goes.

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within

Had to get it, man. Had to. The first Prince of Persia: Sands of Time was one of the best action/platformers made in the PS2/Xbox generation. And even though the critics came down pretty harshly on the sequel for abandoning everything good about the first in favor of a “dark, gritty” Frank Miller-esque take, I still want to find out what happens next. And hey, it was 10 bucks…

Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones

And finally, the conclusion to the Prince of Persia trilogy which came out just last year. This one I have much higher hopes for, if only because the critics were more generous in their praise. The game is supposedly a return to the form of the first, with more emphasis on the platforming, acrobatic, environmental puzzle aspects that were so unique in the first place. As you can see, there’s also a chariot race, and the game incorporates some of the same Dragon’s Lair-esque mechanics of the God of War series with special moves being executed to timed button presses.

Speaking of which, God of War II is now finished, and that was practically a religious experience if you’re any kind of action gamer. Anyone that has a PS2 MUST get this game, though it can be a bit demanding during certain points even at the normal difficulty level. Still, this is without a doubt the single finest action game experience you’re ever going to have on the Playstation 2, so if you’re a fan of the genre, do yourself a favor and DO NOT MISS THIS TITLE.

Walking Without Cold Or Sweat

It’s just another dull Friday for the Most Boring Couple In The World, but that’s just fine with me. Today was the first time we actually ventured out into the big bad world when the temperature was in the double digits, a SCORCHIN’ 11 degrees outside. It was one of those days that reminds that I still have a lot to get used to about being back home again.

Just like my trip to Los Angeles last year, it was a bizarre experience to be out on the streets of Toronto (although in this case, it was just a couple of blocks down to the grocer) without breaking into the kind of sweat that saps your will to live. It was also nice to be outside and not be freezing to the bone, and I think it’ll be another couple of months yet before I finally accept the fact that This Is The Way It Is From Now On. Not that I’m complaining. It’s the same thing with the days. My body clock is now undergoing a mild sense of confusion as the days get longer, since sunset (especially thanks to daylight savings time) has already surpassed the usual sunset time of Singapore, where it was normally pitch black before 7:30 pm.

It’s also time to watch the last of the films we rented from Suspect Video before returning them tomorrow. We’ve actually already seen some of this, but mean to complete it tonight. Jiri Barta is a Czech film maker that plays around with various kinds of animation, and Labyrinth of Darkness is a collection of his shorts (though one of them actually runs nearly an hour) compiled into a very weird melange of ingenious and some times disturbing film anthology. In particular is one stop-motion story that acts as the cover of the DVD, called The Club of the Laid Off which chronicles the lives of a bunch of cast off mannequins as they live boring, repetitive, pointless lives, not unlike the people they are built to mimic. All of that changes when more stylish, urbane mannequins get dumped in their abandoned building, but I won’t go any further than that.

It’s not the laugh-fest that Robot Chicken is, but it makes a great case for animation being more than just entertainment or “feel good” films.

Oh yeah, shouldn’t I be writing a book?

Bock, Bock, Bock, Ba-CAW! And More God of War II

This arrived in the mail today and I am a giddy little geek. There’s just something deliciously evil about taking beloved toys and using stop-motion animation to make them do horrible things to each other. It kind of reminds me of summer days as a kid when instead of going out and playing in the streets like normal, well adjusted children, I’d be using our ancient VHS camcorder to make live-action movies, or primitive stop motion features using Justice League and He-Man action figures.

Except of course that what you find in Robot Chicken is hilariously brilliant. As opposed to my spare, Hemingway-esque, incredibly poignant dialog that went along the lines of “PAY IN SPADES, KALIBAK! WHA-POW!!”

If you don’t know, Robot Chicken is a series of stop-motion animated shorts by Seth Green (aka Oz of Buffy the Vampire Slayter fame and Scott Evil, Dr. Evil’s son in the Austin Power films) and Matthew Senreich, editor of Toyfare magazine. Basically the show is no-holds barred insanity that goes above and beyond the clay-mation hijinks of Celebrity Deathmatch to go into strange, perverse areas of pop and geek culture. Only in Robot Chicken will you find a parody of Final Fantasy VII where the characters are now working in a fast food restaurant, and only here will you find out exactly how deep Ted Turner’s psychosis and love for Captain Planet goes. But don’t take my word for it. Witness for yourself…

I’d seen various Robot Chicken shorts over the last couple of years, without knowing that’s what it was, until that particular Captain Planet sketch compelled me to find exactly who the hell these lunatics were. Now that I have it for my very own, I feel all giddy inside.

God of War II continues to be played and it is a marvel of a game. The further I get into it, the more and more impressed I am by the brilliance of the actual design. Too often these days, a game will make me go “Wow” for reasons other than the actual game itself, such as the graphics, or the quality of the story or cutscenes shown. While God of War II undoubtedly has the best graphics that the PS2 will ever see, what amazes me the most about this game is how much it feels like watching Raiders of the Lost Ark for the very first time. You’re left with your mouth hanging open at some of the setpiece action/game sequences, and when you see them, you think “That did NOT just happen! HOW COOL IS THAT?!” and you just can’t wait to see what happens in deeper in the game, which usually tops whatever it is you’ve just seen anyway. I can’t remember the last time I had this much fun with an action game. It’s just BRILLIANT. It’s not done yet, since the Wife insists that not a minute of gaming goes by at which she’s not present, so I play it in chunks when she’s not working, and we’re both unbelievably impressed. After this, the upcoming Tomb Raider: Anniversary in June is going to be somewhat anti-climatic. Especially considering I’ll probably still be screaming “YEEEEEEEEE!” over Guitar Hero: 80′s Edition which will arrive a few days later.

Also things with IGN are moving, albeit slowly. A few more contractual formalities have been worked out (translation, they lost the signed contracts I sent and needed them again), and we’re now just about ready to start. Of course, I can’t actually talk about what I’m going to be doing. But I will say my first article involves dealing with someone I already know and have a lot of respect for, so this will be fun and easy.

And yes, Lost In Loveless continues to be written, but… really what can you say about that? “I wrote more book.” Whoo. How exciting….