(1) BACK TO NARNIA? According to Evangelical Focus, a fourth Narnia movie – The Silver Chair — could be ready in 2016
The story happens decades later. In Narnia, King Caspian is now an old man. Eustace and Jill will be asked to find Caspian’s son, Prince Rilian, with the help of Aslan.
Scriptwriter David Magee (“Life of Pi”, “Finding Neverland”) is writing the film adaptation, which will be released five years after the previous movie, “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.”
Collider says the next film will be the start of a new franchise entirely – one where The Walden group, makers of the earlier movies, will not be involved.
The rebooted angle doesn’t come as a total surprise. The Mark Gordon Company and The C.S. Lewis Company took over the rights from The Walden Group back in 2013, when they first announced plans for a Silver Chair adaptation, so it’s not surprising that the production companies would want to build something new instead of relying on the foundation of a franchise that was ultimately always a bit of an underperformer.
Collider also asked about casting.
Given the plot of The Silver Chair, the fourth book in the series, which takes places decades in future from where we last saw our heroes in 2010’s Voyage of the Dawn Treader, I also asked if we would see any of the original cast reprising their roles in the new film. The answer is a hard no.
[Mark Gordon] No, it’s all going to be a brand new franchise. All original. All original characters, different directors, and an entire new team that this is coming from.
If the phrase “original characters” causes your hair to bristle, don’t worry, I asked him to clarify if these were entirely new character creations or existing characters in the Narnia mythology that have yet to get the movie treatment, and he confirmed the later. The new characters will come “from the world” of Narnia.
The IMDB FAQ has more information about what characters will be included:
Will we see characters from earlier Narnia films?
Not necessarily. We should see Eustace Scrubb as a main character, along with Aslan. But Silver Chair, the novel, does not include his Pevensie cousins, Lucy, Edmund, Susan and Peter. Other returning characters who may or may not be included are Trumpkin (PC), King Caspian (PC, VDT), Ramandu’s Daughter (VDT), and Lord Drinian (VDT).
(2) IDEA TO HONOR GERRY ANDERSON. Some of his admirers have launched a “Campaign for blue plaques in honour of Kilburn creator of Thunderbirds”. (via Ansible Links.)
Gerry Anderson, who attended Kingsgate Primary School, is most famous for the cult 1960s series Thunderbirds, which featured iconic characters including Scott Tracey, Lady Penelope and Parker.
The Historic Kilburn Plaque Scheme (HKPS) is looking to raise £2,500 to mark his contribution with two plaques: one on his old school in Kingsgate Road, and one on the Sidney Boyd Court estate, on the corner of West End Lane and Woodchurch Road, where he used to live.
Mr Anderson lived with his parents in a large detached house on the site of the estate from 1929 to 1935 before the area was bombed in the war.
(3) AND WE’RE STILL MAD. “Seven TV Finales That Went Out of Their Way to Anger Fans” at Cracked. Number six is Quantum Leap.
In the last episode, Sam somehow leaps into his own body in some kind of odd purgatory-like dimension that looks like a bar — which, as far as purgatory dimensions go, ain’t half-bad. Also, a guy who is implied to be God is there, working as a bartender. If the fact that even God had to have a part-time job in the early ’90s doesn’t disprove Reaganomics, what will?
(4) IS THIS CHARACTER THAT POPULAR? Suvudu’s Matt Staggs reports “Poe Dameron to Have Monthly Comic Book”.
He was only on screen for a few minutes, but Star Wars: The Force Awakens Resistance pilot Poe Dameron turned out to be one of the film’s biggest breakout characters. (Well, maybe next to TR-8R.) This week, Lucasfilm Ltd. and Marvel Entertainment announced that he’ll be the star of his own comic book: Star Wars: Poe Dameron. The new ongoing series will be written by Charles Soule (Lando, Obi-Wan and Anakin) and illustrated by Phil Noto (Chewbacca).
(5) UNDER-REMEMBERED AUTHORS. David Brin, in a post that begins with a tribute to the late David Hartwell, also names some forgotten authors – who should not be.
A fun little conversation-starter? On Quora I was asked to name “forgotten” sci fiauthors. Other respondents were citing Roger Zelazny, L. Sprague de Camp, Ursuala Le Guin, Lester del Rey, A.E. VanVogt, Fritz Lieber, Clifford Simak, Harlan Ellison and Theodore Sturgeon. Well, of course Zelazny and Farmer and Ursula and those others should never be forgotten. But would any reasonably well-read person say they are? Or Walter Miller or Iain Banks? No, not yet on any such list! And I hope never.
For my own answer I dug deeper. From Robert Sheckley and Alice Sheldon (James Tiptree Jr.) and William Tenn, the greatest of all short story writers to lamented classics like John Boyd’s “The Last Starship From Earth.”
(6) CALL FOR PAPERS. The MLA 2017 session “Dangerous Visions: Science Fiction’s Countercultures” seeks papers that probe the following topic –
In the introduction to the chapter on “Countercultures” in his edited volume The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction (2014), Rob Latham asserts that “Science fiction has always had a close relationship with countercultural movements” (383). The alternative worldmaking capacities of SF&F, in other words, has long had resonances in the sub- and countercultural movements of the past few centuries, “especially,” as Latham qualifies and expands, “if the allied genre of the literary utopia [and, we might add, the dystopia] is included within” the orbit of SF.
The convention will be held in January 2017 in Philadelphia. Papers proposed to the panel … might address the countercultural forces of the following topics, broadly conceived, or take their own unique direction:
- pulp magazines
- SF and the Literary Left
- the New Wave (American or British)
- cyberpunk
- British Boom
- contemporary/world SF
- postcolonial SF
- (critical) utopias/dystopias
- SF as counterculture
- SF beyond “science fiction”
- SF comics, films, television
(7) TODAY IN HISTORY
- January 23, 1957 – Machines at the Wham-O toy company roll out the first batch of their aerodynamic plastic discs–now known to millions of fans all over the world as Frisbees.
(8) SOME GOOD OLD DAYS. The Traveler at Galactic Journey in “20,000 Leagues Over The Air!” is among the very first in 1961 to review Vincent Price’s performance in Master of the World.
Every once in a while, my faith is restored in Hollywood, and I remember why I sit through the schlock to get to the gold.
My daughter and I sat through 90 minutes of the execrable, so bad it’s bad Konga because we had been lured in by the exciting posters for Master of the World. It promised to be a sumptuous Jules Verne classic a la Journey to the Center of the Earth, and it starred the inimitable Vincent Price to boot.
It was worth the wait–the movie is an absolute delight….
(9) TIME TRAVELING IN STONE. On Book View Café, Steven Popkes tells about a road trip that combined “Fossils and Atomic Testing in Nevada”.
It was also a different perspective to see how people in Nevada viewed such things. I was living in California most of that time. We ducked and covered in the classrooms in case war came. But, in Las Vegas, people saw the flash. There were hundreds of tests in Nevada, many above ground. Every time an above ground test happened, it was seen across much of the state. In California, we were scared of something amorphous. In Nevada, they saw it every few months.
Then, back to the hills and looking for rocks and fossils.
We ended up with about 100 pounds of rock holding down every counter in the hotel room. Fifty pounds were our addition to the adjacent rock garden but the remaining 50 pounds needed to be shipped. We ended up purchasing a sturdy suitcase in Walmart and paying $25 for a check on. We heard, “what do you have in here? Rocks?” more than once. We just smiled and gave them our credit card.
(10) TROUBLE MAGNET. Lela E. Buis shares her ideas about “The dangers of Internet activism”.
However, some of these activists have run afoul of public opinion and suffered for it. Jenny Trout was dropped by her publisher after the Fionna Man episode. Ann Rice, Kevin Weinberg and Marvin Kaye suffered from their efforts to counter some of these attacks. Sarah Wendell received a lot of negative attention after Vox Day featured her comments on his conservative blog. And Day is a prime example himself. Everyone in the SFF community should know his name after last year’s Hugo debacle, but most of the press is so negative that it leads people to discount his viewpoints.
(11) TERMS WITHOUT ENDEARMENT. Did Steve Davidson just refuse John C. Wright’s surrender?
[Davidson] Response: “Publicly repudiate slates and campaigning. Don’t participate; let your readers know that you don’t endorse slates and have requested that your works not be included on them.”
[Writer left unnamed in article] “Done! I accept your offer, I have posted a notice on my blog eschewing slate voting, and you must now perform your part of the deal, and forswear putting my works, should any be nominated, below ‘No Award.’”
[Davidson continues] And now for the analysis.
First, note that in the first quote from PP we have this “assuming it wins the nomination”.
This whole thing is about the nominating process and the final voting, not just the final vote. PP has very carefully tried to thread a needle here by entirely ignoring the fact that slates and campaigning are pretty much a done deal by the time we get to the final ballot.
So, PP. No. Your assumption about what you’ve agreed to do is meaningless because the assumption is wrong – and I think deliberately so.
Moving on: We’ve been through this in detail for over two years now. You may have made a statement on your blog – but I see no requests you’ve made to have your works removed from slates.
[Thanks to Andrew Porter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]
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I do feel Davidson is excessively hard line. What JCW needs to do to go above No Award is to write something that deserves to be rated above No Award. Nothing I have so far read of his fulfils that basic criterion. If something is gamed onto the ballot again, and it is good then I might well vote for it.
That he regards me and all my friends as the scum of the earth ensures that I won’t ever seek his works out.
(11) TERMS WITHOUT ENDEARMENT Steve Davison says in his article
I can’t help but wonder if “Published Author” appears on this gentleman’s business card.
And later Steve tries to invoke (10) TROUBLE MAGNET, by mentioning Gamer Gate, but he will fail since they only harrass women.
Ms Buis might have a point. I’ve not the fairest idea who any of these people are, they’ve been brushed from history. Assuming they ever were people I might have heard of.
(4) Maybe the character isn’t popular enough and they need a boost to sell all those not-Rey toys.
(1): BACK TO NARNIA?
I’m happy to learn that the Narnia movies are continuing, since there are so many interesting visuals to adapt at the very least, and with today’s CG so much can be done. It’s sort of disappointing to hear that there will not be a bridge with the Walden films, though. I thought that Will Poulter did a fine job as Eustace in Dawn Treader (though he probably aged out of the part for the later books) and I’ve become used to the Liam Neeson Aslan.
(4): IS THIS CHARACTER THAT POPULAR?
Yes. Don’t ask Tumblr that! Poe/Finn bromance/romance is huge.
Fifth?
ETA: Nope. It’s Sith & ::ticky::
Aha, I am the first true fifth! 😀 But as we all know, there can be as many fifths as desired. Fifths for everyfive!
(3) AND WE’RE STILL MAD. – Good list. I note they mentioned Lost separately earlier, but that so needs to be there. I’d also throw in Space: Above and Beyond, but that may be due more to early cancellation.
(11) TERMS WITHOUT ENDEARMENT. ::rolls eyes::
But John, ignoring your rather flexible practice of truthfulness when it come to yourself, what if I just found your works to be just crap? Please sir, could I then vote you under No Award?
Arse.
(5) Diana Wynne Jones, of course. she should be considered THE great YA fantasist.
nickpheas: Ms Buis might have a point. I’ve not the fairest idea who any of these people are, they’ve been brushed from history. Assuming they ever were people I might have heard of.
Ms Buis has been trawling for blog traffic. She’s been writing low-content posts like this, and then posting links to the same posts again and again on Twitter. Frex, one of these posts has 7 tweets promoting it within a 48-hour span in the last couple of days. She uses various combinations of hashtags designed to attract attention: #worldcon #sfwa #scifi #bullying #censorship #childrape #blackface #racism #sexism #Nazi #diversity #politicallycorrect
I happened to figure out this is what is going on, because I have a Twitter RSS set up for certain hashtags, and she keeps showing up in it for posts only tangentially related to those hashtags.
I’ve given up commenting on her posts even when Mike links to them, because they are so error-ridden — and like this one, frequently lacking in context. I’m not going to send her blog traffic unless she starts posting accurate, meaningful content.
(4) Two things to remember. Marvel seem to be spinning mini series off for pretty much every character. I don’t think Poe is any less significant than Lando.
As a relatively minor character, he’s a damn sight easier to spin stories about. X-Wing pilot who does covert missions? No probs. A story for Rey that’s not going to spoil or be retconned by the next film? Much trickier.
@nickpheas
I’d also add that Poe is probably the only character from tFA that could easily be written without too many spoilers. Rey has too many mysteries beforehand (maybe it’s about her scavenging adventures), and after tFA….well, that’s what SW:VIII is for. Finn has similar issues too. I would hope that there may be something planned further down the road for them, but it’s a small chance.
But Poe? Kickass X-Wing fighter pilot. Dark Horse ran with that for several years, so it’s pretty easily done.
Would like to see Maz Kanata be given more to do, but she’s currently too much a bit character.
(4) IS THIS CHARACTER THAT POPULAR?
Is there, like, another movie out there than the one I’ve seen? Did the movie change considerably late in the production process, and the people making tie-in products base their decisions on scenes that ended up on the cutting room floor?
But I suppose in this particular instance, Poe Dameron is the right character to go with: It should be easy to tell stories of his adventures in the years before the events of the movie, without directly touching upon the plot of the movie. (ETA: Or, what Snowcrash said.)
(11) TERMS WITHOUT ENDEARMENT
A puppy not getting it? How … unsurprising. It’s sort of sad to see how the puppy in question does not seem to understand the difference between giving his works a fair judgment, and not placing his works below No Award.
Iphinome: (4) Maybe the character isn’t popular enough and they need a boost to sell all those not-Rey toys.
*snort* I can just hear the backroom discussions:
(11): Steve Davidson: “Which brings up another smarmy game: We’ve never agreed on our definitions of slate. All you’ve got to do is decide that something isn’t a slate, or campaigning, and you’re free and clear.”
As a former policy debate nerd, I think of this as the Topicality Gambit. It’s irritating enough when introduced as an argument over and over in policy debates, but at least in that arena there’s a judge or two who will eventually chew out the negative side if they keep playing the “does it fit the definition” game ad nauseum.
Clicky.
(5) Huzzah! I’m not the only one remembering William Tenn.
(4) @ nickphease and JJ, I can totally see your reasoning, and I’m sure that played a role in the media tie in. But bottom line is, I’m not sure I want to see Poe without his heterosexual lifemate (apologies to Dogma). I mean, more than half of the fun of Poe is how he plays off of Finn.
Rose Embolism: I’m not sure I want to see Poe without his heterosexual lifemate (apologies to Dogma). I mean, more than half of the fun of Poe is how he plays off of Finn.
Well, of course! I mean, it’s obvious that they are the Han and Chewie of the new generation.
Holy moly, Barsk didn’t get released until 29 December — but now that it’s out and people have read it, it’s rocketed to the top of SFWA’s Novel Recommendation List!
But Han and Chewie weren’t boyfriends, whereas Poe and Finn totally are.
On a different note, I see that The Gracekeepers is currently $2 at Amazon. ISTR it receiving some praise around here (and elsewhere).
(1) BACK TO NARNIA?
I can recall The Silver Chair being the first Narnia book I was seriously disappointed with.
The first three books (I read them in published order) at least seemed adventurous, with some interesting characters and situations.
The Silver Chair starred the irritating sockpuppet-redeemed-liberal child from an earlier book and a friend from school, neither of whom could spot a clue if it walked up to them, hit them in the face and told them it was a clue. The villain was a pale, soapy imitation of the White Witch, herself only just adequate as a villain, and the prince who needed rescuing was an annoying pale nonentity. The religious subtext was thumpingly in the way, and all the interesting characters and situations set up inthe earlier books were dead and gone and untold backstory before we ever got to see them.
Worst of all, the final event in the book was magical knights from a magical world with the approval and blessings of Lewis’ god magically coming to the real world … to physically beat and terrorize some children who had been playground bullies.
The book’s clear satisfaction and approval of this action shocked and disturbed me, even as a small child.
I actually think that Poe’s popularity is evidence that good casting can really impact and improve on a film. As written, Poe is mildly interesting, but Oscar Isaac’s charm, charisma, and performance really elevated the character into something rather compelling. It felt like he had a real life and history and relationships, even though we never saw any of it(except for his [bro]romance with Finn). I think all the new main characters actually benefited from this. Boyega and Ridley’s performances also created more character than I think was written on the page.
@Wildcat
there can be as many fifths as desired
Call me a traditionalist but:
There can be only two…
https://youtu.be/zZ1WyBGG_Vw
(5) UNDER-REMEMBERED AUTHORS. John Boyd’s “The Last Starship From Earth.” I thought the title rang a bell. A quick rummage around my bookcase shows I own the 1972 Pan edition. Can’t remember a thing about the plot, but if David Brin thinks it’s a lost classic and the blurb on the back, from none other than Robert A. Heinlein himself, says it’s “terrific… belongs up at the top along with Brave New World and 1984,” I may well have to give it a re-read.
Rose Embolism on January 24, 2016 at 1:30 am said:
I heartily endorse this. The Merlin Conspiracy is my favorite. Deep Secrets is a zany look at the early British SF convention scene (with guest appearance by a Neil Gaimanish person). Dark Lord of Derkholm is just plain LOL fun, even more fun in conjunction with the Rough Guide to Fantasy Land. Hexwood is disturbing in a good way. The list goes on and on.
Also under appreciated: Zenna Henderson. Her stories are wonderful. How I wish they were available in e-books. She’d be the third author whose work I would own in both paper and pixels.
@JJ I enjoyed Barsk a lot.
I wonder if there is something analogous to the Academy awards…a novel like Barsk, released in December, has advantages for an award nomination over, say, Elizabeth Bear’s Karen Memory, released early in 2015 (I in fact read a review copy in late 2014).
RE: Barsk
Huh. I think it’s been high on the list for quite some time – I assumed it was because SFWA members get ARCs (similar to how Academy Awards members get screeners).
Today’s read — Babylon Steel, by Gaie Sebold
Good book. Well-written, fast-paced, and fun (which isn’t to say it doesn’t have some dark parts, because it absolutely does.) I feel like the impulse here was the author saying, “I want to write a fantasy book about a bad-ass empowered prostitute”, and then proceeding to do so very well. It’s a book where the occasional odd structural element (a major plot thread resolves in the middle of the story) or potentially cliché trope (the brothel-owning main character has a Thing with the chief of police) somehow doesn’t detract from the overall charm, and may even add to it. The plot is the main character investigating three loosely intertwined mysteries in a city at the junction of many planes. I’ll be picking up the sequel at some point.
@kyra I read that one, too, because I am a sucker for interdimensional/multidimensional stories. I haven’t picked up the sequel as yet, though. Sometimes I read way too broadly.
I’ve been reading a fair amount of non fiction, lately. Grounding myself a bit into history. Currently reading Barry Cunliffe’s latest.
The first shall be fifth, and the fifth shall be fifth. The tenth shall be second fifth, and the third can be fifth if you’re King Arthur. It’s the circle of fifths!
I don’t know who “John C. Wright” is, but Steve Davidson sounds mad.
I have been looking at Barsk with interest but so far it is quite expensive, so I have been waiting to hear a bit more about it/excavate a little of Mount TBR before spending the money. I would love to hear what Filers thought of it.
@ Paul Weimer
I have seen speculation that both early release and late release may hurt a book’s chances of a Hugo nomination. In fact someone (Chaos Horizon, it turns out when I got less lazy and googled) looked at date of publication of Hugo Nominees/Winners from 2001 to 2014 and showed that 75% of nominations and 85% of wins in that time period have a May-Oct publication date. I estimated from Chaos Horizon’s plot of Locus Magazine’s list of SFF books released each month–admittedly a very rough guess from limited data–and this time period seems to account for 55% of releases.
So in fact, to a first approximation both Karen Memory and Barsk may be at a disadvantage for a Hugo nomination compared to something like Uprooted or Seveneves.
I’d have thought that a character played by an actor called Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada getting a bigger role in the expanded universe could only be seen as a good thing.
Also not bad for a character that jnf fhccbfrq gb qvr va gur svefg erry.
I think Poe is getting his own comic book because, like the rest of the new power trio, he’s massively popular, largely due to genius casting. It’s also a mark of the great diversity of modern fandom. A huge number of people either actively write romantic fiction, or at least appreciate some recreational shipping. When you have two characters that were as well cast as Finn and Poe, and the chemistry gods smile on their on-scene interactions, that’s a market. It’s still a market even if it’s not “your” kind of fandom.
Add to that Snowcrash’s analysis that Poe can be spin-offed without huge plot spoilers. Added to the fact that the arc of Poe was changed because Oscar Issacs was simply too charming not to use. And ad to the fact that charisma, plus hot shot pilot, make it easy to make hime a Barrowman/Harkness type of character, and yeah, spin-offs galore.
@Jim Henley – yes, I am angry.
Steve Davidson makes one very good point: simply being honestly (no slating) nominated to the final ballot does not make a work worthy of going above No Award on everyone’s ballots.
In other words, if I think the work is awful I will put it below No Award, as I have done previously with honest nominees I thought were awful.
He also misses a point, in my opinion: I, at least, am going to penalize authors for a while for having participated in slating in the past. YMMV–one of the things spokesPuppies *still* patently don’t understand is that nonPuppies don’t have leaders we take marching orders from: I can’t speak for anyone but myself, and haven’t been given orders by anyone, much less anyone multiple nonPuppies will follow.
But for me, the fact that someone slated or organized slating is a black mark against them that means I may choose to place their work below No Award for some time no matter how good it is. I’m an old lady and the years pass faster for me, so a requiring decade of good behavior from them doesn’t seem unreasonable to me.
And of course, “good behavior” means that someone didn’t slate or participate in what I think is slating. I don’t care if they think it is slating.
I’m naturally going to be more suspicious of groups that have slated in the past. One of the natural consequences of behaving badly is that it is harder to convince people that this year is different. So if Puppies could use something as a slate (a so-called “Recomendation List” nudge-nudge-wink-wink for a non-random example) I’m going to assume they are using it as a slate.
And that’s one more year before their decade of good behavior begins.
And even *after* that decade of good behavior there is still the problem that if I have read a bunch of their stuff and it was, in my opinion, bad, I’m likely to assume anything else they write is in the same style and quality. And appreciation of anything is not enhanced by that kind of starting position.
I speak only for myself. But this is all pretty standard human reaction stuff.
An example of how little impact on me was made by the characterization in the new Star Wars movie: Which one is Poe? and which one is Finn? I think Rey is the young woman, but mostly that’s because I think I remember that being the name associated with the missing-Monopoly-piece mini-kerfuffle (kerfufflet?).
@Morris Keesan: Poe is the one who keeps saying extreme things that you can’t tell are in jest or not. Finn is the one who records solo albums whenever the fights with his brother get too bad. Rey is a drop of golden sun. In the movie she destroys five rebel planets.
@MaxL:
I beg to differ on Han and Chewie. I just rewatched all the Star Wars (my review of the Holiday Special is a baffled “why?” for 90 minutes) and I got a very strong life mate vibe from Han and Chewie. There were several instances of stroking that I noticed.
I liked Poe from the moment he sassed Kylo Ren.
‘Forgotten’ authors that is an interesting list to think about – some of my favorites Janet Kagen, Zenna Henderson, John M Ford to name a few
If John M Ford’s literary executors didn’t hate his work so much, it wouldn’t be forgotten.
Creators, make a proper will!
Robert Stallman? Tom Reamy? And to judge by recent Guardian articles “every woman who wrote fantasy or science fiction prior to JK Rowling.”
Poe made absolutely no impression on me at all; his role could have been cut with no loss to the film.
Kylo Ren, quite frankly, sucked as a baddie (snope or whatever the hologram’s name was equally so); walking around with your fists balled and your arms held straight works once to display your fury; after that it’s just bad acting.
Finn – was ok, but I didn’t buy the sudden conversion (although his confusion and seemingly out-of-place presentation would explain what the Storm Troopers were such terrible soldiers in the earlier films, if all of them were as equally clueless as Finn was in the beginning)
Left me flat, the whole thing did. Star fighter fights – same old same old; light saber fights – same old. Ridiculous plot holes – same old. It’s almost as if the guiding principal for the film was “let’s do a remake of Star Wars, but not exactly”
steve davidson on January 24, 2016 at 8:58 am said:
*Snookums*!
Shouldn’t all this “Star Wars” talk be in the Spoilers thread?
Poe, Rey, and Finn also got some backstory in the “Before the Awakening” tie-in novel/series of novellas released basically concurrent with the movie, and Poe had a pre-existing tie-in with fan-favorite badass pilot Shara Bey (who is his late mother, and whom he obviously takes after hard), from the Shattered Empire comics. And, as others have observed, it is not possible to overstate how much the on-screen chemistry between Finn and Poe has sent fandom swooning and flat-out hoping for a canon gay character in the movies — there are already several in the new canonical novels/comics.
…..And this is where hyping up the aforementioned book would have helped because Finn’s story is by far the best when it comes to explicating background: namely, that Jakku was not a sudden conversion, the cracks in his conditioning started appearing months earlier, were noticed by his superiors, and the field action on Jakku was his last chance to prove himself before he was sent for reorientation.
Thank you for posting a cover image proving – contrary to occasional claims – that the Narnia books were once published with the correct original numbering, and not the latter-day incorrect numbering (by which Silver Chair is 6th). The movies at least proceeded in the right order, making this one case where the movies are truer to the books than the books’ (current) covers are.
@Nate Harada
One of the reasons I’m looking forward to Episode XIII is because the new three are so very much “not your parent’s Star Wars” and I’m eager to see a movie by a more innovative director that is mostly driven by them and not the necessity to secure a solid landing for a new franchise.
It will be good to see the source material in a way that is bound by the necessity to shoe-horn in the older characters, more than necessary.
@jj
I found Barsk a page turner, but annoying even while I was reading it, and as soon as I finished I found myself getting even more annoyed. The particle physics and linguistics both hit the bogosometer so hard the needle bent against the pin, the * ex machina explanation at the end was lame, and the universe was unbelievably empty.
The story kept making excuses for the viewpoint characters not interacting with other people to a point where in a dramatic presentation I would expect a crippling lack of budget for walk-ons and supporting characters. In a text, it was a spectacular failure of show, don’t tell. On a gut deep level I felt the story was lying about being set on a populated planet and in a crowded universe, and I don’t think that was the author’s intent.