Category: Books

Posted on

Is Ready Player One Filmable?

Ready_Player_One

I recently finished Ernest Cline’s geeky pop culture video game novel Ready Player One, and now I am not so sure that I want Steven Spielberg to attempt to make it in to a movie.  I mean there is so much going on, and just about every major geek property is included in this book from Star Wars to Marvel to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.  Maybe if the Disney was doing this movie and not Warner Brothers they could figure out a way to make most of the licensing work, but even if they get all the licensing (or enough of it anyway), they will still have to make it in to a movie that non-geeks are going to want to watch. Spielberg’s name will help bring in audiences, but even for the father of the modern blockbuster hits are not guaranteed.

The problem is people escaping real life and living in a video game might be to high concept for audiences to wrap their minds around, and even if they do, will they be able to keep up with the non-stop 80’s video game, TV, and movie references?  Some of them were even lost on me as I read the book.  This is going to be a hard movie to get right, and if it goes wrong it will go really wrong.  I guess I am just worried that a very fun book will turn in to middling movie that no one will watch.  We will find out in a little over two years how Mr. Spielberg captures the adventures of Parzival and his 80’s loving virtual pals.  I just wish I felt better about it all.  If nothing else the book is still great, and you should add to your reading list if you haven’t read it already.

Posted on

Where There Is Milk There Is Hope!

fortunately_the_milk

Neil Gaiman has done it again.  He has make me super envious of his whimsical brilliance.  “Fortunately, the Milk…” is a short children’s book about one father’s adventure to save his children from a breakfast without milk.  Dry cereal is a horror which no child should be forced to endure.  The father in question will travel though time and space to insure his children have the milk they need, and no of number of green aliens, pirates, volcano gods, or wumpires will stop him.  He will need a little help from a stegosaurus, but milk must be served!

While “Fortunately, the Milk…” is most certainly aimed at kids, there are a couple of jokes in there for adults, and the story is so well done that it will entertain readers of all ages.  Well I guess I can only guarantee that one man in his 30’s will be entertained by it, but still, I am fairly sure everyone else will like it too.  There aren’t enough lighthearted time travel adventures being written, so I am glad that Gaiman took it on himself to try and rectify that.

There are two different versions of “Fortunately, the Milk…”, one illustrated by Chis Riddell which I read, and the other by Skottie Young.  Riddell’s pictures were wonderful, and they captured the story’s charm perfectly.  I loved that the father in question looked an awful lot like Neil Gaiman.  It made the book feel like Gaiman himself was telling me the story, which was great.  I looked at Young’s work on Amazon, and it looked very good as well.  I may have to buy his version too.

If you have kids or you just want to read a fun short story, you should pick up “Fortunately, the Milk…”  I thought it was a lot of fun to read.  While the whole book took me less than an hour to read, it was an hour well spent.  Just remember, “Where there is milk, there is hope!”

Posted on

AMC Is Getting Ready To Launch Preacher!

https://twitter.com/Sethrogen/status/641693712796545024/photo/1

So executive producer Seth Rogen released the first poster for his new comic book based show Preacher.  I have to admit when I first heard about this project I was excited about it.  I fondly remember reading some of the comics at a friend’s house.  Now thanks to the Hoopla app I was able to read the first two collections of the books, and I have to say Preacher does not hold up.  It is very 90’s, but not in a retro way, in a going all out trying offend you kind of way.  Which it then makes sense why I liked it when I was younger, but not so much now.  Oh to be thirteen again!

I will probably still give this show a shot when it debut’s next summer, but my excitement level has dropped.  Who knows, since they will have to tone down the comics quite a bit (as in I am not sure if they can use much of the source material) to get it on TV, Preacher may be better for it.  If nothing else the look of the comic is good, so if they copy the art style we may at least be in for a visual treat if nothing else.

Posted on

Shmee Doesn’t Fear The Walking Dead! So Far…

Fear-the-Walking-Dead

The wife and I got around to watching the first episode of Fear the Walking Dead last night, and while it was okay, so far the show has prequel problems.  These aren’t problems that can’t be fixed or resolved as the show goes on, but they left the debut hour and half episode feeling a little flat.

Fear the Walking Dead starts off before the events of the Walking Dead proper, so the world has not yet plunged in to zombie chaos.  Instead it is on the verge.  A young heroin addict (Frank Dillane) sees his former friend eat some of the other residents of a drug den.  When he gets in an accident soon after and is questioned by the cops obviously no one believes him.

Therein lies the problem: we trust the drug addict because we know what is happening and going to happen.  Like all prequels, we have more knowledge of events then the characters on screen, so it kills some of the suspense, or at least it doesn’t let us disbelieve along with the cast.  We know.  Which is unfortunate because this is a long episode, so they really want this slow burn story to build that nonexistent suspense, but instead you are just waiting for them to get on with it.

The writers are also using the audiences’ knowledge to be a little lazy.  There is a scene where the addict’s parents (Kim Dickens and Cliff Curtis) go and investigate the place where the son saw the events take place, and there is evidence of some brutal happening, so what to do they do?  Call and tell the police of an apparent homicide?  Nope.  They go home.  Why you ask?  Because the writers know that you know the end of the world is happening post haste, so lets not waste time on getting the cops involved.  The problem is that the characters don’t know the end of the world is coming, so of course they would have called.  Like I said, prequel problems.

Now judging by next week’s preview a lot of these problems will go away since the end is nigh.  Then we will pretty much just have a Walking Dead: LA.  Which is a little disappointing because I was hoping for a more of a how/why things fell apart story, not just another location for the show.  Who knows maybe I will still get what I want.  There are five episodes left, so I will watch and see.