Michael Lauck's Words Without Wisdom

Stray thoughts on science fiction, fantasy, writing and life in general from unknown author Michael Lauck SwordsAndRayguns.com

[swordsandrayguns]

Science Fiction And Fantasy Fans Should Write Reviews

Writers, especially indie authors like yours truly, always ask for reviews. Why? Is it just to be annoying? Truth is, on ebook retailers, reviews = increased visibility. Even Google has indicated reviews affect search engine returns. So that is honestly a big part of why authors ask. Some of us also ask because we really want the feedback. I know I do, but I can’t pretend like that is why all authors ask. Because of that, I always feel kind of sleazy asking for them. It is like a waiter not so subtly reminding you to tip as they present the bill. However, I think there is a good reason we (all of us) should write reviews for books we read. I believe it helps the overall science fiction and fantasy community.

Hear me out; I know this sounds like me trying to justify asking for reviews but I really mean it is for the good of us all. See, I am old enough to remember the fan organized science fiction newsletters and fanzines, although I was too young to actually participate in that culture. I do, though, distinctly remember when conventions and other fan gatherings were the only time you could see obscure science fiction and fantasy shows/movies and find certain books, magazines, etc. Back when “anime” was “Japanimation,” for example, the 24 hour viewing room at the local convention was your best, maybe only, chance to see stuff like Vampire Hunter D, Fist of the North Star, Macross or Dirty Pair. If you were lucky, there was a club in your area that gathered monthly and crowded around a TV to watch untranslated VHS tapes traded with other clubs or laserdiscs purchased through friends in Tokyo. I was in one that met monthly at the Pantera’s in Webster Groves. Pizza and Captain Harlock in Japanese makes for a great Saturday afternoon!

Today, there are thousands of anime options out there… you don’t even have to buy them. They are on YouTube, Hulu, Netflix, etc… How do you decide? How do you cut through the madness? Same thing with books. Actually, it is even worse with books because you have all the independent authors and small presses available, too. Back in the day, if you were a science fiction and fantasy fan, you were a “science fiction and fantasy fan;” there were no distinctions and Lloyd Alexander’s Chronicles of Prydain books sat to Isaac Asimov’s Foundation titles and nobody even thought about putting them in separate sections! You read what was at the library or on the paperback rack at the bookseller of your choice because that was all there was! Hardback science fiction was pretty much just from the Science Fiction Book Club (if you had that kind of money/were old enough to enter a mail order contract). I don’t even remember if there was a dedicated fantasy book of the month club; you probably just had to hope the Science Fiction Book Club would throw you the odd bone. If you were lucky, you had maybe a dozen titles in that spinning paperback rack (because science fiction and fantasy probably shared the real estate with Louis L’Amour westerns, spy and detective thrillers and romance novels) and whatever you hadn’t already read at the library. That was it! That was all you could get unless you had spare cash for expensive mail order or could swap books with friends. If you were really lucky some selfless fan would donate a paper grocery sack of their paperback cast-offs to your library and keep you going for weeks! 

But in 2021 Amazon alone dumps about 18 bajillion-million books in your lap (bajillion-million is really a word; they had to invent just to describe Amazon’s book catalog). There are physical books, ebooks, web only stuff and audiobooks. At the same time, the science fiction and fantasy meta-community is now fragmented into at least a thousand distinct fandoms. You do not have to be a science fiction and fantasy fan anymore; you can get very, very specific about your tastes. You only like martial arts stories framed with video game conventions? It’s a thing. Prefer historical novels told from an extraterrestrial point of view? It’s a thing. Female driven tales of magic set in the modern day as a metaphor for larger social problems? It’s a thing. Robots versus dinosaurs? Stories of Elvish warriors with a well defined and unique culture? Belgian post-apocalyptic comic books set in America? They already made that into a TV show. 

How do you cut through the noise and find what you really want? How do you figure it all out? You only have so much time you can read and you have to budget it as carefully as your money… maybe even more carefully. After all, even if you are not buying, most libraries participate in e-book lending systems that still dump thousands of titles in your lap for free. How do you choose between the 400 books with spaceships, lasers and/or dragons on the cover published since you started reading this article? Reviews are your answer. Scratch that; good reviews, written by other fans, are your answer! 

I used to shy away from writing reviews for two reasons: one, I always felt like I should write a dissertation on a book and two, I kind of didn’t want to admit to how many Star Trek books I end up reading because Simon and Schuster sells a new group of Star Trek ebooks every month for 99¢*! And even as I started to adjust my attitude and realize why book reviews are good for the science fiction and fantasy reader communities, it isn’t like anyone needs a review to discover Star Trek, right?

Let’s be real, that is probably fair. It is really, really hard to imagine someone stumbling across Star Trek, Star Wars or Game of Thrones in book form without any previous knowledge of the franchise… and I imagine things for a living! If you are pressed for time or nervous about writing reviews, it seems reasonable to not worry about the big franchises so much. On the flip side, if you are a serious Star Trek or Star Wars reader, for example, you could post reviews mentioning if a story felt true to the series, where the book would fall in the chronology of the overall series, which characters from the shows/movies appeared and the like. Some readers want to know these things and that is really what I think reader reviews should address!

Some of you are nervous about posting a review because you are nervous about sharing your thoughts and writing. I get that (for me it is that I feel obligated to write a dissertation as a matter of respect to the author and the work they put in). I suggest you just write a review as if you were telling a friend about the book. That is essentially what you are doing anyway; true, you probably haven’t met a single person who will read that review but just the fact they are considering reading that book with spaceships and lasers and dragons on the cover makes them part of the big science fiction and fantasy community, so they certainly could be a friend!

When it comes to writing a review, the only rule is no spoilers! You are not trying to re-tell the story, just help potential readers figure out if it is what they want in a story. I honestly suggest answering any questions you wanted answered when you were choosing the book. I think it is fair to mention other, possibly better known, properties the story brought to mind. Not necessarily compare, but more in terms of categorization. “The title suggests this book would be something like Doctor Who, but it made me think more of Blake’s 7 with a dash of Space: 1999,” or “This story reminded me of Fritz Leiber’s Lankhmar stories and Greek mythology.” Would you read either of those books? Would you not? That is what I am suggesting we try to do with reviews. 

I think it also might be a good idea to mention any content concerns. “This seemed kind of R-rated for the Star Wars universe,” “The author does not shy away from violence,” and a simple “Contains adult language” could all be tremendously helpful to other readers. This is the only time you might bend (not break) the no spoilers rule... If there is something in the story you believe could truly upset a reader (a racist character, sexual assault, the bad guy kills dogs), mention it if you must. Just try to respect the no spoilers rule to the best of your ability. 

Some people might not want to speak negatively of a book. Maybe you realize just because it was not your cup of tea this does not keep it from being the story that will change someone else’s life or maybe you just believe if you don’t have anything nice to say, be quiet. That is 100% okay. You could only review books you truly like. That is still going to help the community of readers. Or, you can stick to reviews that do not pass judgement. I am advocating reviewing books as a kind of crowd sourced categorization method for the overall and heavily segmented science fiction and fantasy community. With that in mind, I do not believe a “review” has to offer an opinion or judgement about a book, only information to help other readers decide if it is something that may be of interest to them. 

This leaves one big question: where do you post a review? That is a good question and I believe the answer is wherever you would look for information about what to read next. The logical place to start is wherever you got the book. Pretty much every book retailer, be they online or brick and mortar, has a web presence that will let readers post reviews. Some will even automatically ask you for one. That seems a perfectly logical place to post a review, but if you are reading library books there may not be an opportunity to review titles (although my library system does post reader reviews, yours might not). There are social media options, Goodreads springs to mind, but there is no reason you could not post your thoughts on books to Facebook, Twitter, whatever. There are also websites and blogs which take reader reviews. You can post on as many or as few as you want (but please post a review somewhere!)… Personally, I guess I would think about the level of privacy and anonymity I want. As a reader, I did not really think that way but as a writer I do. I will admit I am afraid some Goodreads members, for example, may permanently discount my own writing because I read comic books or assume because I posted reviews of the 1950s Tom Corbett, Space Cadet novels my books are going to be of that shiny silver rocket ship brand of science fiction. I have actually kind of abandoned Goodreads for review platforms were I am anonymous. I do not use my name on Amazon, for example, so I post reviews there. In setting up profiles in other platforms I am careful now to stay generic. Goodreads requires a name, so if that bothers you find another place to post reviews. 

I mentioned the fanzines and conventions earlier in this article. Sometimes I hear people kind of mourning those days, when the science fiction and fantasy community felt like more of a community because it was so much harder to get access to materials and merchandise. Maybe this is the complaining that all generations start as they decide the next generation has it so much easier, but I can say as someone in on the tail end of things, back in the day the science fiction and fantasy community did kind of feel more like a community. Whether you went all in and organized a club, convention or fanzine or just participated by attending or subscribing, fans had to go out of their way to participate and find the things they loved. Nobody was accidentally a science fiction and fantasy fan. Writing reviews, making that little commitment, means you are participating and contributing.

I hope I have convinced you to start reviewing books (or podcasts or movies or whatever part of science fiction and fantasy you love) because it is going to help us all find the next things we love. And also, despite our thousand fandoms today, I personally would love to see the science fiction and fantasy meta-community become a little more of a community again. 

Thanks for reading. It really does mean a great deal to me just to get some other people thinking about this… if you have enjoyed this little article, if you find yourself agreeing with me please take a couple minutes out of your day and review the next book you read. Let me thank you in advance for the person you are going to end up helping to find their next read!

* If you are unaware of Simon and Schuster’s monthly selection of 99¢ Star Trek ebooks, you can find them here, I don’t get a piece of this or anything, just sharing: https://www.simonandschuster.com/startrekbooks

[swordsandrayguns]

QuaranTV 6: Battle Beyond The Stars

Two weeks in, still sick and still watching TV. At some point in the past week or so the broadcast science fiction network Comet ran the awesome Roger Corman produced 1980 epic science fiction adventure Battle Beyond The Stars. It is important to note by “epic science fiction adventure” I mean Star Wars meets Magnificent Seven hybrid. And by hybrid I mean rip off. And by awesome I actually mean awesome.

Roger Corman has a reputation for turning out low budget and low quality features. I imagine that is a pretty fair assessment of his career but he has turned out a few gems, too. Or maybe he is just an acquired taste. Probably the best way to describe Roger Corman is to say he is a prolific producer with quite a few cult hits, such as Little Shop Of Horrors, Dementia 13, and Deathrace 2000, to his credit. He was the executive producer of Rock’n’Roll High School and helped bring the anime film Galaxy Express 999 to America back in 1979 but also turned out things like the Deathstalker and Barbarian Queen movies. So, yeah, maybe Corman is an acquired taste.

And he is a taste I have definitely acquired over the years. I have named pets after Deathrace 2000 characters and I can’t count how many times I have sat through the Bloodfist movies! So I imagine I am pre-disposed to like Battle Beyond The Stars... it certainly does not hurt that it was a fixture on cable back when I was 9 or 10 years old, either. It is safe to be there is more than a little nostalgia factoring into my opinion, too.

Battle Beyond The Stars, for a relatively low budget Star Wars rip off (it is thought to have been made for about two million dollars), has a pretty healthy cast of recognizable actors (especially for the time). The evil warlord threatening the peaceful planet Akir is played by John Saxon and I will pretty much always give a movie with John Saxon a chance. I mean, he was Roper in Enter The Dragon! The young idealist heading out from the peaceful planet of Akir to enlist a group of mercenaries to fight the warlord is Richard Thomas, best known for his portrayal of John Boy in The Waltons. Among the mercenaries he gathers are 1980s sex goddess Sybil Danning, Robert Vaughn (The Man From U.N.C.L.E.) and George Peppard (after Banacek but before The A-Team). The film is also full of people who you kind of recognize from ‘80s television like character actor Earl Boen and a pre-Newhart Julia Duffy.

Surprisingly, for a relatively low budget Star Wars rip off, Battle Beyond The Stars has fairly good special effects. The sets are cheap looking and the make up is uneven. The reptilian alien who signs on to fight the evil warlord is actually not that bad while the one-eyed, surgically scarred, mutant crew of the evil warlord’s battleship crew are nothing short of laughable. The spaceship models are a real surprise; the spaceship exterior scenes are all better than the interiors! Sure some of the ship designs (okay, most of the designs), are just plain ugly but the space battles and other model sequences are better than much of what you might see in Battlestar Galactica or Buck Rogers, both of which were being made at about the same time. it is probably worth mentioning a young James Cameron (yeah, the Titanic and Avatar, James Cameron) was responsible for many of the effects. He was apparently introduced to Corman by his assistant Gale Anne Hurd (who eventually married Cameron and later produced The Walking Dead). It is a good thing the space effects were decent; Corman re-used them in Space Raiders, Vampirella, his version of Fantastic Four and one or two other movies.

The real star, surprise and delight to Battle Beyond The Stars, though, is the soundtrack. As soon as the film starts the score just grabs you. It does not sound like a low budget film at all... because the young composer tasked with creating the epic soundtrack was James Horner, who would go on to compose the scores for Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, Titanic and Avatar, winning two Oscars for Titanic. His work alone make the film seem much more rich and full bodied than its budget would suggest. The score to Battle Beyond The Stars seems to me to be an obvious ancestor to Horner’s scores for both Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan and Star Trek III: The Search For Spock.

The bottom line is Battle Beyond The Stars is a low budget Star Wars inspired version of Magnificent Seven (itself a version of Seven Samurai) that is hardly the worst knock off of Seven Samurai (or Magnificent Seven) which manages to exceed it humble origins at times to create one of the best of the post-Star Wars low budget attempts to cash in on the Star Wars money train. 

[swordsandrayguns]

QuaranTV 5: Yo- Yo Girl Cop (At Last)

A couple of weeks ago I knew only a few things about Sukeban Deka: there were three movies, two were from the ‘80s and one from circa 2006, Sukeban Deka was originally a manga, it is about a teenage schoolgirl/secret government agent who uses a yo-yo as a weapon and, because they were cheap, I owned all three movies. Well, as y’all probably know since I have been sick and quarantining at home I have been watching stuff and somehow my stack of Sukeban Deka movies made it to the pile next to the living room television.

Yo-Yo Girl Cop is the 2006 reboot/continuation of the Sukeban Deka story. The first two films were directly related to a television series running in Japan at the time with each season telling the story of a new delinquent girl turned special agent assigned the name Sukeban Deka and given a weaponized yo-yo. Although Yo-Yo Girl Cop is related to those TV series and films (the stories from them are referenced as the past and the same actor plays the head of the secret organization behind the Sukeban Deka agents) I do not believe there was a television series airing when this film was released so it is a stand alone project.

Point blank: Yo-Yo Girl Cop is my least favorite of the Sukeban Deka films. It is the most ambitious of the movies, both in terms of story and action. Unfortunately, it fails to live up to its ambitions in both regards. 

The plot is ultimately as far fetched as any of the movies in the series, with unknown evil types using an influential website to encourage high school kids, particularly kids who feel bullied and rejected, to act as suicide bombers for reasons that never really are revealed (at least in the subtitled version and I doubt the dub is any clearer on that). A new troubled girl is chosen to be the Sukeban Deka to investigate the website and the mysterious three day countdown it has begun to display. Bullying, and attempted cover ups of bullying incidents, are central to the movie but they are really just plot points to move things along not themes which are explored in any meaningful way.

The action replaces the kind of inexpensive TV-level special effects and choreography of the first two movies with cheap CGI explosions, blood and bad wire work. Like the other films in the series, this movie stars a pop singer turned actress without any real fighting prowess. To make things even worse, though, given the countdown the Sukeban Deka faces she has no real chance to train so her miraculous and sudden ability to wield her deadly yo-yo at the climax of the movie just makes no damn sense at all.

Although there is more blood in the first few minutes of Yo-Yo Girl Cop features more blood than seen in the entirety of the first two movies (and probably the television seasons they were attached to as well) it is not a gory film at all. It does not seem to have an official MPAA rating but I would guess it would have hit PG-13... and even that is due to language as much as violence.

Because of the time it was released and the cover of the DVD, I was expecting Yo-Yo Girl Cop to fall into the sexploitation seen in plenty of Japanese films and manga. Although the sukeban deka in this film rocks a much shorter skirt than her predecessors, that really might reflect current Japanese school uniforms. The only real gratuitous exploitation bit with new sukeban deka outfit is the death garter belt holster rig for the deadly yo-yo, but even that is not done nearly as tastelessly as it could have been! She also seems to magically acquire an all leather battle suit for the final battle (along with sudden weapon skills) but that seems to be more “badass mode” than an attempt to make the heroine sexy.

Honestly, at the end of the day if Yo-Yo Girl Cop went exploitive at least it would have a draw for some viewers. As it stands, though, it is not much of an action movie, it is not much of a thriller, cop movie or teen drama either. There is an appearance of Tak Sakaguchi (The Prisoner from Ryuhei Kitamura’s brilliant Versus) and that is about the most exciting thing about this movie. If you are intrigued by the Sukeban Deka movies, seek out either of the others. In fact, Sukeban Deka 2 is the best of the bunch and since they are all more or less stand alone stories you should start there. If you love it, find the first movie and then finally catch Yo-Yo Girl Cop if you are one of those people who simply has to complete any series you start!

And if you are the kind of person that simply has to finish any series you start (WARNING: THIS IS BLATANT COMMERCIALISM ON MY PART) then maybe you should check out my Black Sky Rangers series of ebooks about first responders in space (Amazon only) or my Pride Of Tigers novels about caravan guards in a wuxi-inspired fantasy world. Those are a little more widely available and there is a free story set in that world available to all my email list subscribers!

[swordsandrayguns]

(QuaranTV 4) Animaniacs: Reboot, Revival or Ruined?

If you are like me (and heaven help you if you are), one of the few bright spots on the news in 2020 was the announcement Animaniacs would be returning with new episodes on Hulu. Being a college student in the early ‘90s (and studying art to boot), those were prime cartoon years for me. And there were great shows being tossed out in the after-school hours, too! Tiny Toon Adventures, Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series and, of course, Animaniacs. In recent years it has completely baffled me how, despite the influx of kids related networks spread across cable/satellite providers and the post-HD boom of low powered digital sub channels chocked full of retro programming, there is no longer a real after school or Saturday morning power block of cartoons anymore. So when I heard Animaniacs was returning I was hit with a wave of hope, nostalgia and even a little fear they would screw it up or it would turn into a one off deal that ultimately disappoints (Teen Titans, I am looking at you).

Before I get into Animaniacs, let me mention one of the bigger retro-programming centered low power digital sub channel networks, METV, has announced they are bringing back Saturday morning cartoons starting January 2, 2021 so check your local listings. 

Let me start by mentioning I have not watched all of the new Animaniacs yet; I’m about half a dozen episodes in and kind of avoiding binge watching the whole series. You know, trying to savor it. All in all, I am really enjoying the Animaniacs revival. It is a revival, by the way, as the Warners are the same Warners and the new series is basically a continuation of the original. It is worth watching, and it will make you laugh. Remember that while I commence to bitch about it!

One of my big disappointments with the new series is so far it is basically the Warners and Pinky and the Brain show. The new opening sequence mentions there are new characters (which played well to the focus groups) but with the exception of the new, female, studio president none have surfaced and she has not been much of a presence on the show. None of the other old characters have popped up either, with the exception of Ralph the security guard. Don’t get me wrong, I like Pinky and the Brain but they could have just revived either Pinky and The Brain or Pinky and The Brain and Elmyra (‘member that?). 

The fifth episode, which features Pinky and Brain being chased by “every Yakuza and their mothers” and meeting Edward Snowden, kind of addresses the lack of supporting characters but really does not introduce anyone new to replace Slappy Squirrel, the Hip Hippoes, Slappy Squirrel, Dr. Scratchansniff or any of my other old favorites. Perhaps that will change in episode six. I hope so! Animaniacs needs more than just the Warners and a couple of gene-spliced rodents to keep the show moving.

So speaking of the Warners... there is my other big disappointment. Don’t get me wrong, they are still funny and I still laugh at the show. But the new <i>Animaniacs</i> is different and the Warners are at the heart of it because they are the core of the show and, honestly, Pinky and the Brain are pretty much exactly the same as they have been in every show featuring them. I first noticed it in the new opening song, which has understandably been updated. With most of the old cast gone it does not makes sense to mention Goodfeathers, Buttons and Mindy or Slappy Squirrel in the lyrics. With the passage of time it makes sense Wakko no longer packs away the snacks while Bill Clinton plays the sax; the show needs to be timely to keep its edge. What I noticed, though, was that it used to be “Dot is cute and Yakko yacks” but that has been changed to “Dot has wit and Yakko yacks.” The lyrics also take a swipe at modern political correctness by pointing out the new (as of yet unseen) cast is “gender balanced, pronoun neutral and ethnically diverse.” So what to make of the change in Dot’s line?

The Warners are more politically correct now... “Helloooooo, nurse!” was basically their catchphrase. Hell, I think I still have an Animaniacs paperweight somewhere (with my Animaniacs snow globe) that says “Helloooooo, nurse!” and a few other phrases when you move it. But they have yet to udder those words in the new series and Dr. Scratchansniff’s nurse is among the casualties of the cast change. There has also barely been a reference to the fact nobody seems to know what the Warners are (I believe the good doctor referred to them as “puppy-children”). Also gone seems to be the original show’s taking old fashioned cartoon formats and tropes and applying them to today’s pop culture (like a trip to the Hollywood Canteen or Brown Derby as an excuse to introduce a bunch of parody versions of contemporary movie stars). Animaniacs was a new cartoon back in 1993 but it broke away form the Scooby Doo 30 minute single story mold and went back to the Merry Melodies and Looney Toons style plots and formats even more than its cousin Tiny Toon Adventures did.

The problem I see with the new Animaniacs is they are modernizing a ‘90s cartoon so the Warners can provide commentary and satire on today’s issues, pop culture and society but missing some important character traits of their main cast. What seems to be forgotten is the fact the Warner Brothers (and the Warner Sister) might have been actually created in the early ‘90s but they were not supposed to be from the 1990s... they were supposed to be uncontrollable characters from 1930s black and white cartoons. Although they were good sorts deep down, they were not politically correct and they were not grown ups. I am afraid the new Animaniacs, despite the fact it has jumped from after school broadcast TV aimed at kids to streaming media aimed at adults, has actually become in some ways more restrained and self censored. A rather weak segment on gun control using multiplying bunnies instead of guns (or “buns,” which kind of illustrates how thin the writing was on that) which missed plenty of opportunities for non-political humor (the multiplying rabbits screamed for a Star Trek Tribble reference and an irreverent portrayal of William Shatner) and chose to be preachy instead kind of bolsters my fears.

So is Animaniacs worth watching? Yes, for sure if you were a fan of the original or even want a cartoon you can watch with your kids. Just be warned: they seem to be streamlining the  cast to cash in of the best remembered characters and the show has lost a little of the wit, charm and edge that made the original so damn good. If you missed Animaniacs the first time around and want to figure out what made it so special and beloved, you ain’t going to find it here. The old show had a fearlessness to it, something that in a really weird way I can only liken to almost a kid’s version of the fearlessness found in Chappelle’s Show. Unfortunately that fearlessness seems to be gone now.

[swordsandrayguns]

QuaranTV 3: Sukeban Deka 2

Okay, you might want to grab a pencil and a sticky note to keep up with this one! This is the latest in a series of blogs title QuaranTV 3 and in this one I am talking the 1988 Japanese movie Sukeban Deka 2 which actually features the main character whose title/code name is Sukeban Deka 3 because Sukeban Deka 2 was the star of the the movie Sukeban Deka 1... got it? Now that we are all caught up, Sukeban Deka 2 is, obviously, the sequel to Sukeban Deka 1 and, despite being a theatrically released feature film, also serves as a cap to a season of the Sukeban Deka TV series.

In this film Sukeban Deka 3 (aka Yui) works with her sisters, who wield metal origami cranes and knitting needles instead of her yo-yo, to fight for justice but the program Yui works under has been taken over by a new student police force tasked with stopping underage crime. After Yui objects to the new group’s overly violent methods (you know, compared to the tame methodology of a secret undercover group that sends school girls with explosive yo-you out to fight crime) and quits, her old boss and friends are targeted by the student police group because, as I think we all saw coming, they are going to take over Tokyo. Yui teams up with a group of outcast kids living in a squat to fight back and... then it basically turns into an episode of the A-Team.

I quite liked Sukeban Deka 2, possibly more than the first. Yui Asaka, aka Yui the Sukeban Deka 3, is just as likable as Yoko Minamino was in the first and has shed the weird red leather pseudo ninja gear she rocked during her appearance in Sukeban Deka 1. This movie starts with a summary of the series and explains the three agents who have borne the Sukeban Deka mantle over the series. This is incredibly helpful, not that it was entirely necessary to follow the first movie, and explains that the main character from the first movie spent 17 years of her life locked in an iron mask. I don’t think that was even mentioned in the first movie!

Where Sukeban Deka 1 turned into a weird Enter The Dragon homage this movie, as mentioned above, really felt like an episode of the A-Team. I first thought this when I was subjected to some of the worst fight choreography I have ever seen in a feature film but the final battle, complete with homemade weapons and traps employing clothes line to defeat masses of attacking baddies just cemented the comparison. Although there is just the briefest allusion to possible romance blooming between Sukeban Deka 3 and the leader of the homeless kids, Sukeban Deka 2 retains the surprising innocence of Sukeban Deka 1. I continue to find that refreshing. I have literally seen more violence and innuendo in Japanese sentai shows. I am very interested to see if the 2006 third installment (Yo Yo Girl Cop) keeps up the PG rating or goes the route of most of the other Tokyo Shock/media Blasters DVDs I have seen and goes off the rails with either violence or sexploitation.

So let me sum up both Sukeban Deka films I have seen so far this way: these are the Japanese action films you can watch with you girlfriend/boyfriend/parole officer/parents or whoever else thinks you only watch this stuff because you are a pervert. In fact, the only reason why I would not suggest viewing them with some young Power Ranger fans in your life you are looking to get into something beyond the mighty morphin’ shows is because the movies are subtitled, not dubbed, and that is sure to turn off most younger viewers!

Okay, real quick before I sign off let me mention I have a new martial arts fantasy novel out called White Tiger, Black Leopard which is available at your favorite ebook retailer. If you are not sure if a martial arts fantasy novel is your cup of tea, I get it... visit my website SwordsandRayguns.com and sign up for my email newsletter (which is going to be mainly stuff about books, TV, comics and movies I am watching and reading) and you’ll get a free story in the genre to help you figure it out. You can also check out my science fiction novels.

Keep an eye out... probably watching Yo Yo Girl Cop soon.

[swordsandrayguns]

QuaranTV 2: Sukeban Deka

I have a new book to launch (White Tiger, Black Leopard comes out tomorrow, Wednesday November 25 on your favorite ebook retailer...) but I also have had a fever for a week and am locked at home waiting for the results of a Covid test. So instead of worrying about book promotions and things like that (I did not even mention that White Tiger, Black Leopard is a new martial arts fantasy inspired by Chinese wuxia literature and old fashioned pulp adventures)  I am watching lots of TV and laying around. Something about flu-like symptoms and low grade fevers makes the couch incredibly tempting. And since, for once, I am not doing 15 other things while I watch TV this seems like a good time to catch up on all those Japanese movies and TV shows I have been meaning to watch when I have the time to sit still and pay attention. Time I have, sitting still is about all I have the energy for and paying attention... well, as long as it is nothing too serious. That means that four hour version of the 47 Ronin is too much but something like Sukeban Deka, which translates roughly to delinquent girl undercover agent or something along those lines, is perfect.

A couple of years ago one of the overstock book and DVD sites I frequent had dirt cheap copies of Sukeban Deka 1&2 and the later remake Yo-Yo Girl Cop. I picked up all three DVDs and placed them on my over growing stack of stuff to watch eventually. I knew the films were based on a manga, but I have never read it and honestly I am not even sure it has ever been translated and released in the US. I was just in the right mood and they were cheap... I think I also bought a box set of Delinquent Girl Boss movies on the same order.

So flash forward to the era of Covid, a fever I would normally ignore forcing me to stay home and boredom pushing me to look for something other than the tokusatsu shows I have been watching lately... Sukeban Deka seemed the perfect choice. And I have to say: it surprised the hell out of me!

What I did not realize going into the film was that it was based more on the Sukeban Deka television series than the original manga. Starring Yoko Minamino (who is the second delinquent turned undercover high school agent code named Sukeban Deka in the series) the 1987 film serves as a bridge between the second season starring Minamino and the third, starring Yui Asaka as the third agent Sukeban Deka. In fact, I did not really know any of this until after I finished watching and looked the movie up on Wikipedia. Not knowing the background did not really keep me from enjoying the movie and I did enjoy it.

High school students dealing with extreme circumstances of the real world (like being secret government agents) is a fairly common theme in manga and Sukeban Deka falls firmly into the genre. Basically, it is a typical action film with the stars wearing school uniforms. Actually, it is pretty heavily drawn from Enter The Dragon with plucky teenage girls wielding explosive/electrified yo-yos and flinging marbles instead of Bruce Lee. Right there, that exact sentence tells you if you should watch the movie or not. If you did not read that and immediately say “That sounds like the dumbest damn thing ever” and you have a soft spot for cute pop stars turned action heroes then go find a copy of Sukeban Deka! At least the first one; I have not gotten around to watching the sequel or remake yet.

One thing really did surprise me, though. The filmmakers were very respectful of the characters and actresses. With the exception of a pink jogging suit, the uniform the team chose when attacking the enemy stronghold, I think Yoko Minamino wore an ankle length skirt the entire movie (either with a fluffy pink sweater or as part of her sailor outfit school uniform). That kind of reads like a complaint, but it is not. It was nice watching a piece of Japanese action fluff that did not feature gratuitous nudity or exploitation of the young stars. I don’t know if this is because the movie was actually made for TV (although everything I have found seems to indicate it was a feature film) or just restrained, but Sukeban Deka was more chaste than I would expect from any Japanese program... something more like I would expect from late ‘80s Hong King cinema. If you have read this far and have a chance to grab a copy (or stream it from somewhere) I would say watch Sukeban Deka. It should be of interest to many Asian cinema fans.

[swordsandrayguns]

QuaranTV: Amazon Riders

So the good news is I have a new martial arts fantasy book coming out Wednesday, November 25 (you can pre-order on your favorite ebook retailer, unless that is Barnes and Noble, here). White Tiger, Black Leopard is technically a sequel to The Grand Tournament, but you can reader in any order. There are no rules.

And the bad news is I am under house lockdown awaiting the results of a Covid-19 test. I feel semi-crappy but not terrible. In the old world, you know, back in the day, I would consider this a minor annoyance and probably have gone to work. In this modern world, though... I am stuck at home. Luckily, though, the freezer is full and I have pretty much every streaming service known to man (except Disney+, which I recently cancelled, but that is a different story).

So what to watch while laying on the couch when you are cut off from the world with the 850,000 TV shows and movies on various streaming services your only source of entertainment? For me it was Amazon Riders on Amazon Prime. Why? I have been meaning to watch it. I had knocked out the first few episodes on plane flights but the problem with Japanese language stuff for me is that I need to read the subtitles (dubs blow) so that means I can’t type up or read or play with Lego sets while I watch. So this little Covid scare fever thing is the perfect time for me to watch this little slice of tokusatasu.

Amazon Riders is an installment of the Kamen Rider meta-series set in its own alternate universe. From what I understand it was produced to stream on Japanese Amazon Prime hence the working in of the term Amazon. One of the great things Amazon Riders has going for it (besides being easy to stream if you have Prime) is the alternate universe thing means you don’t have to be super familiar with other Kamen Rider series. I have seen a handful of episodes over the years and vaguely remember the American version (Masked Rider) in the post-Power Ranger boom of US tokusatsu kid programming but I am really not down with my Kamen Rider mythos.

The quick review: I am not really sure how Amazon Riders ranks among the rest of Kamen Rider but all in all I liked it. It is dark, violent and it does not always feature the tightest story telling. But it is interesting, violent and feels like grown up tokusatsu, especially compared to the Ultraman I grew up with and the various Sentai series I have been catching on Tubi.

Set more or less in the modern time, Japan is plagued by 4000 test subjects loose who eventually turn into cannibalistic armored bug people (after all, insects are kind of the Kamen Rider motif). The big, bad company behind all this has a group of mercenaries to hunt’em down with electrified knives, machine guns and a friendly (possibly mentally impaired) Amazon. When times get tough and the team is outclassed a mysterious Amazon shows up and kicks the crap out of everyone. Will the team survive? What the hell is the story with these cannibals? Who is the mysterious Amazon? Why is the big, bag company exec so over-protective of her children? That is basically what is going on with Amazon Riders and every episode brings everyone one step closer to an answer after beating the baddie of the week to death. And not a there is a fight and then the bad guys explodes kind of beating, either.

If you like your tokusatsu light, Amazon Riders is not for you. It is excessively violent with lots of CGI enhanced splatter. I am not sure how other incarnation of Kamen Rider get through their battles but in Amazon Riders you get a pretty healthy amount of severed limbs and removed organs. The good guys have giant forearm spines that cut their opponents to shreds (and have moves with names like Violent Punish) and the bad guys literally eat their victims in grand zombie movie style.

I am not sure if it is sloppy storytelling or poor translation but there is not a whole lot of subtlety in Amazon Riders. The mercenaries, who are a pretty major focus of the story, barely have backstories. How the test subjects got out into the population at large is kind of nebulous and where the trademark Kamen Rider motorcycle came from is not exactly fully defined. The second season, which is set five years after the first, actually has a little more going for it in terms of plot and story... it just takes you like 13 episodes to get there. I am not saying that all your season one questions will be answered in season two, but the important ones will be!

Bloody tokusatsu action pretty much sums up Amazon Riders. And I am getting a bit worn out. Check in again soon... I have been watching plenty of television lately so maybe I’ll check in with my thoughts on Sukeban Deka the movie or Ninja Sentai Kakuranger. 

[swordsandrayguns]

Demi-Gods And Semi-Devils (2003 CCTV) Review

Let me start this review by stating I have never had the opportunity to read the Louis Cha (aka Jin Yong) novel Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils. There is no English translation. My ability to read Chinese is simply not good enough to tackle a novel. To be honest, it never has been and I have let my skills slide to the point where I doubt I could get through a newspaper article. I know there are probably “fan translations” out there but I avoid these things. Arguments about “popularizing the genre by making classics available to more audiences” versus “it is not your intellectual property” aside, translating a novel, let alone a complicated wuxia novel, is not something to be crowdsourced by amateurs. One of my teachers translated English language books into Chinese for a living and I know how much effort went into his work. He concentrated on one popular, mainstream American writer and was the official Chinese translator for all the author’s work. He was very concerned with keeping the author’s original style and rhythms as intact as possible even while moving from American English into written Chinese. As a reader, I want to experience a single translator’s attempt to recreate the original text.

Since so many classic wuxia novels are unavailable to me, television series based on the novels are the best way for me to enjoy the stories. I have seen many movies based on wuxia novels and I know they are cutting out a great deal. For example, my translated copy of The Deer and The Cauldron is over 1500 pages. The story is split into two Royal Tramp films that total just over three hours of running time. Don’t get me wrong, they are great movies but that ends up being about 8 seconds of screen time for every page so you know something is getting cut out!

There have been at least three films based on Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils, the most famous in American probably being the 1977 Shaw Brothers movie The Battle Wizard. Proving my point about film adaptations, it pretty much concentrates on one of the story’s triad of main characters. It has been a while since I have seen it, but I am pretty sure it runs short of an hour and a half! On the television side there have been a few versions of Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils with another production announced. I decided to watch the 2003 series originally produced for Mainland China’s CCTV because it was available on Amazon Prime in Mandarin with English subtitles. 

Before I jump into the show, let me talk about the Amazon Prime presentation. By and large it is pretty good and seems to be taken from the DVD release. Although the show often gets beyond my current ear for Mandarin, what I could follow seemed to be reflected correctly in the subtitles (which is not always the case) although signs, book titles and other writings are generally not translated. None of the credits are translated, either, but you can figure out the cast with the help of Wikipedia and IMDB if that is important to you. Somewhere about the halfway point of the 40 episode series the closing theme disappears from the show’s end titles. It does not affect the story, but it is a little strange. 

The one issue with the Amazon Prime presentation, and it is a big one, is Episode 31 is unavailable. There does not seem to be a reason for it. You can not even purchase or rent the episode from Amazon Prime; it is simply missing. Worse yet, even though the story is spread out over 40 episodes, every episode propels the plot forward. You can find the missing episode on the Internet. I hate to admit it, but I went to YouTube for the missing episode. I feel guilty about it because I hate intellectual property theft, but I gave in to the temptation after I could not find a DVD copy of the series on Amazon or Yes Asia, my usually Chinese language TV hook up. And, yes, that is a spoiler alert: I was and am interested in owning the series. One other thing about finding Episode 31 on YouTube: it was a different translation so characters had different names, which added annoyance to my guilt!

The show itself is really well done. I am not sure if it follows the same storytelling paths as the book, but it presents the stories of naive prince Duan Yu, kung fu master Qiao Feng of the Beggars Sect and Shaolin monk Xuzhu in an engaging and compelling manner as they unravel the mysteries of their lives, search for love and eventually find a common foe. If I have any complaint it would be Xuzhu seems to be short-changed by the series, although this may simply well reflect the narrative presented in the book. Either way, the story is engaging, compelling and (like any good Louis Cha story) complicated! It is, at its core, a martial arts adventure with a good deal of soap opera romance thrown in. Not enough to convince my wife to watch it, but she does not like subtitles!

Like most, if not all, of Louis Cha’s other books Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils was serialized first in newspapers and later released as a novel. In a bit of fan service, the novel actually has a different ending for Duan You than the original newspaper serialization. I will not reveal which ending the producers chose for this television series!

The series is almost 20 years old, but all in all I think the production values hold up rather well. My guess is this was a pretty expensive series for the time, especially compared to the typical Mainland television (or even film) production. The CGI does not compare to something like The CW’s DC superhero shows but it is also from 2003. It is not seamless, but it is serviceable. They actually make good use of CGI to create various internal energy attacks and are not shy about using physical effects for many of the wounds and gore. There are two heavily scarred characters in the series and the make up effects for one of them (he is on crutches) are actually pretty good. A character with a burned face has less effective make up, but I have seen worse. The fight choreography (and let’s face it: that is the important thing) is well done but leans heavily towards powerful masters blasting each other with esoteric qi attacks. Do not expect the physicality of a Liu Kar-Leung (Liu Chia-Liang) style of choreography but it does not quite get to the wire excesses from a ‘90s Tsui Hark film, either.

I know I have never seen this series before, I am 100% sure of that, but parts of it did seem strangely familiar. A sub-plot involving a corrupt Tibetan monk struck me as something I had seen, and I recognized the monk as his costuming as something I had seen. I am wondering if episodes of it were not reedited and packaged as direct to video “movies” offered up for rental in DVD shops aimed at the Chinese-American community a few years back. If so, I did not find any mention of it on the Internet but it really would not surprise me. 

Before I wrap this up, let me take just a minute or two to talk about the cast. Taiwanese born Mandopop star Jimmy Lin portrays Duan Yu, who I would argue is the anchor of the story. He brings a wide eyed, boyish charm to the character that keeps him believably naive without be annoyingly cartoonish. Veteran mainland actor Hu Jun takes the role of Qiao Feng and does an admirable job carrying the quiet anger of the character throughout the series. The triumvirate of heroes is rounded out by Gao Hu as monk Xuzhu. I have no complaint with his performance other than, as I mentioned earlier, I felt as if Xuzhu did not get equal time with the other two and felt a bit flat in comparison. Ji Chunhua fills the role of the leader of the Four Evils and will be a familiar “bad guy” to many martial art movie fans as he as appeared in Shaolin Temple, Fong Sai Yuk II and many other films. You know that bald, scary poison soaked bad guy in New Legend of Shaolin? That’s him. Christy Chung, from Love On Delivery and God of Cookery with Stephen Chow and The Bodyguard From Beijing and Twin Warriors with Jet Li, makes an appearance in several episodes as well. This series also includes a large part for Liu Yifei, one of her fist big roles, who is currently starring in Disney’s live action Mulan.

To summarize it all, I can not promise you the 2003 CCTV production of Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils is a faithful representation of the original novel. I can tell you it stands a head and shoulders above any film based on the novel that I have seen. If you need a new series to binge watch and have a love of the complicated, martial arts fueled plots of wuxia novels you will not go wrong giving this series a try.

[swordsandrayguns]

Riker’s Beard And Family Time: Looking Back At Star Trek: TNG

I write science fiction and fantasy novels… so I am no stranger to things dubbed “nerdy.” The last few months, though, I have been doing something that pushes the boundaries of nerdy even for me. I’m watching all the Star Trek properties in the order of their release. Yup, an epic binge watch covering over five decades of television series, cartoons and motion pictures. Look, I can try to explain and rationalize this a couple ways. Truth is, I travel a great deal and have to fill the time I spent in airports and on planes (preferably with things I can download as oppose to stream). I am also, as an author, studying some of the great examples of “universe building” and epic story arcs. Still nerdy, though; I admit it.

Obviously, I started with the original series and jumped into the animated series. I timed this all so my viewing of Star Trek: The Motion Picture coincided with the the special 40th anniversary showings in theaters. I followed through the next couple of movies into The Next Generation, alternating in movies and even the original series pilot The Cage (which was originally made available to the public as a pay per view offering between the first and second seasons of The Next Generation) as they fell in the original release timeline. I am getting to the end of the fifth season of Next Generation now and very much looking forward to alternating between episodes of The Next Generation, Deep Space 9 and even the occasional film in the near future.

Just in case you are wondering, I am pretty dedicated to sticking to the timeline but I am not strictly adhering to it. As I find myself, for example, in a hotel with channels such as BBC America or the Heroes and Icons channel I will only turn on episodes that have already showed up in my series overview… so no DS9, Voyager or Enterprise (yet) but the adventures of Kirk and company are fair game, as are Next Generation episodes up to season five. On the other hand, I am still watching Discovery’s Short Treks as they come out and I am definitely watching Picard as soon as I get a chance (meaning on my big screen at home instead of streaming it on my laptop over shaky hotel wifi). 

Even though I have not finished the complete rewatch, I find that I already have some new thoughts and ideas about I have seen so far starting with Riker’s beard.

Star Trek The Next Generation has generated a basketful of memes from “Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.” to “I am not a merry man” but undeniably the greatest is “Riker’s beard.” Just as the Internet has given us “jumping the shark,” the phrase to mark when a show is never quite as good again named for a really stupid moment when Fonzie was in Hawaii, it gave us “Riker’s beard” to mark the opposite. To this day, I know people that will immediately turn off an episode of The Next Generation if Jonathan Frakes turns up clean shaven (or if Wesley is in it, but that is a whole different story and, honestly, my harsh view of Wesley softened a bit with this re-watch). My first revelation from my Next Generation binge is that while season two, when the beard shows up, is better than season one, it is not when Next Generation really hits its stride.

First of all, let me defend season one of Star Trek The Next Generation. Twenty one years after the premiere of Star Trek, after three seasons of a pioneering science fiction drama, a year of the animated series and four feature films, Star Trek The Next Generation had to take up the incredibly difficult challenge of continuing one of the world’s beloved stories without a single character from the original series. Even more difficult, the real world had changed. Where the original Star Trek was making a statement by having a Russian, an Asian and an African woman on the bridge The Next Generation would not have made any statements with this type of casting. After all, when Picard met his crew and first face Q at Farpoint the biggest show on television focused on the an upper middle class African American family, something that was absolutely unthinkable when Kirk boldly set forth with his crew. 

The first season of Star Trek The Next Generation not only introduced Q, the Ferengi and Data’s not so lovable android brother Lore it killed a main character. Star Trek The Next Generation took a major step that not only the original series never tackled but most shows avoid. Sure, other shows tease it and even then it was usually on a season ending cliffhanger. Even the original series backed away from the only death of a major character they ever portrayed with an entire movie dedicated to reversing it. Star Trek The Next Generation killed Tasha Yar completely out of the blue with three episodes left in the first season. This incredibly bold move cast a shadow on the entire series, adding a real threat to future episodes. 

Is season one perfect? Oh, no. Not at all. Not even close, but like I already mentioned it had an amazingly difficult challenge facing it. The fans were expecting… well, everything. Next Generation was trying to stay true to the essence of Star Trek while making itself something new. They put families on the Enterprise to emphasize it was a vehicle of exploration, not a military ship. They made sure there was not a Vulcan to be found and put the odd man in a kilt wandering the hallways. They put a Klingon on the bridge! But then they had to deal with it all.

Season two was better. For one thing, the anticipation and the expectations were gone. The show made it through the first season and when it came back with its second season it was coming back as Star Trek The Next Generation not “the new Star Trek.” Ironically, due to a writers’ strike, season two actually started off with a script recycled from the ill-fated Star Trek: Phase II series. In addition to the first officer’s facial hair, the second season brought Whoopi Goldberg on board as the ship’s bartender and saw Diana Muldaur (in her third Star Trek universe role as Dr. Pulaski) taking over the sick bay from Dr. Crusher. Geordi La Forge also migrated from the bridge to take over engineering. It was always a bit odd, somehow, in season one to not have the chief engineer as a major character, if only because the chief engineer would seem to play as an important of a role in the operations of the ship as, say, the ship’s counselor or a teenager doing his after school work study program as an acting ensign.

While season two was an improvement, it had its issues. Dr. Pulaski, playing a role meant, no doubt, to help humanize Data, came across as abrasive and (in my opinion) mean spirited. Gates McFadden had been fired, apparently because the head writer did not like her, but Gene Roddenberry resisted killing her character so Dr. Beverly Crusher merely transferred off the ship. When the head writer left the popular character of Dr. Crusher returned in season three. Whoopi Goldberg, although an interesting character, was the ship’s civilian bartender which is just kind of weird. Did the ship have a food court, too? The season was also shortened, because of the aforementioned writers’ strike, and it actually ended with (of all things) a clip show. A clip show!

As a final defense of season two, it did introduce the Borg, one of greatest science fiction villain races of all times. But was it really that much better than season one? Well, season two saw five episodes get a total of six Emmy nominations and won two (both technical Emmy awards related to the sound department). Season one’s premiere was the first television episode to be nominated for a Hugo Award in 15 years. Another season one episode was the first syndicated television episode to win a Peabody Award and six episodes gathered a total of seven Emmy nominations, winning three (for makeup, costume design and sound editing). If you place your faith in the numbers, it seems season one might have actually been better (at least if you go by its awards).

So by now, if I may be so bold as to make a prediction, you are probably thinking “This guy has put way too much thought into Star Trek The Next Generation” and “Okay, so if season two is not when The Next Generation gets great, when is it?” First, I said as an author I am studying Star Trek so cut me some slack. Second, I am glad you asked.

Star Trek The Next Generation, in my opinion, really hit its stride is the fourth season. Season four swept onto screens with the second part of season finale cliffhanger The Best Of Both Worlds. The Federation was facing the awesome might of the Borg and the crew of the Enterprise was desperately trying to save Picard, who had been taken and turned into Borg mouthpiece Locutus, so the season started with big action and drama. This quickly led to a series of episodes focusing on character relationships, particularly family relationships. 

After he is rescued, Picard is left a broken man and returns to his family’s vineyard in France. Although there had been several stories about Picard’s history, this was the first to address his family and his entry into Star Fleet. Data’s Day not only explored how the android navigated through his duties and relationships, it introduced Chief O’Brien’s new wife Keiko. The O’Briens are the focus in the very next episode, showing not only the natural difficulties they were having adjusting to their new life as a married couple but also O’Brien’s past Star Fleet career and the psychological wounds left by his service in the war with Cardassia. To me, Riker’s beard does not signify when Star Trek The Next Generation really gets good, it is when Keiko O’Brien appears.

Family was a major theme of the fourth season, as Worf discovered he was a father and worked to regain his family’s honor in the eyes of fellow Klingons. Luxanna Troi re-appeared as did the ghost of Tasha Yar when the crew encountered her sister. Data’s brother also made another appearance, as did Data’s creator. Data also grew a great deal, even being shown to try out a romantic relationship with another crew member. The true strength of Star Trek The Next Generation, as of season four, was that it was well established enough as a series to feature stories based on human relationships instead of action or the “alien of the week.”

It should also be noted that season four also brought more episodes which were a part of longer storylines, such as Worf’s dishonor and the political intrigues of the Klingon Empire. There were also many returning minor characters and new characters being set up for multiple appearances. It is only after three seasons Star Trek The Next Generation finally had established enough of its own universe for this to happen. Also, though, by season four plans were in motion for a second live action Star Trek series, one to run concurrently with Next Generation. It could have been that the introduction of multi-episode storylines were a result of the producers consciously attempting to expand the Star Trek universe while starting to differentiate Next Generation from the upcoming Deep Space Nine.

Ironically, season four also marks Star Trek The Next Generation outlasting its predecessor in terms of seasons on the air. While this did not actually influence the formation of my opinion season four is when Next Generation really gets good, it does really make me wonder what Star Trek may have become if it had a season four.

[swordsandrayguns]

Retro Science Fiction At Its Best

Lately I have been obsessed with Tom Corbett, Space Cadet. One of the few television shows to spawn a radio show (as opposed to the other way around), the adventures of Tom Corbett ran on TV for 5 years and spent time on every national network. Unfortunately, few of the TV episodes seem to exist any more. The radio series, which featured the same cast as the television show, ran twice a week for six months in 1952. Luckily, about 40 of the radio episodes still exist and can downloaded for free on the Internet. Tom Corbett’s adventures also spread to newspaper comic strips, comic books and eight novels.

Teaming up with classmates Roger Manning and Astro to crew the Space Academy rocket ship Polaris under the command of instructor Captain Strong, the boys blast through the solar system training to become members of the Solar Guard. Their adventures are not hard edged science fiction; they are more akin to the Saturday morning matinee science fiction of the 1950s such as Destination Moon or Crash Of Moons (which is actually edited from another early science fiction TV show, Rocky Jones, Space Ranger).

If you want to jump into the rocket powered adventures of Tom Corbett, YouTube is a great place to find the few surviving television episodes. The radio show, sponsored by Kellogg’s cereals (such as Pep, the “build up wheat cereal” which also sponsored the radio adventures of Superman), can be found on old time radio show sites and on Archive.org. Digital copies of the Tom Corbett, Space Cadet novels can be found (for free) on Amazon, Archive.org and other sites carrying Project Gutenberg public domain downloads. I’ve reviewed the first two books, Stand By For Mars and Danger In Deep Space, over on Goodreads (find those here and here).

[swordsandrayguns]

Star Trek Discovery And Starship Trooper Thoughts...

Okay, two things went down this week in my world of science fiction. One, I drove a whole bunch and ended up listening to audiobooks of Heinlein’s Orphans of the Sky and Starship Troopers. I have a couple thoughts on Starship Troopers, observations really. I have read both before (more than once) but not in a while. Also, the new trailer for season three of Star Trek Discovery hit. Let’s tackle that first: so season three of Star Trek Discovery is Gene Rodenberry’s Andromeda? Please, please, please Universal Lords of Irony: let Kevin Sorbo make a guest appearance. At least give me a character named Dylan Hunt (how many Roddenberry projects had characters named Dylan Hunt? At least one of’em... maybe two.)

So, Starship Troopers. It is a great book with lots of debate over just what the Hell point Heinlein was trying to make. I am not going to pretend to know his motives or even give you my interpretation of the “point” of the book. Read it your damn self and make up your mind. READ IT; don’t rely on the movie. The movie is fun, but there are many, many key differences. Like the Mobile Infantry is NOT integrated in the book, although the Navy is. Dizzy Flores is a man (and a minor character) in the book. The bugs are smaller with more technology in the book, too. And are the Skinnies even in the movie? I don’t think so.

When you read the book (or listen to the unabridged audiobook) there a few things I want you to think about, though. Here they are:

The main character, Juan “Johnny” Rico, is a South American spoiled rich kid who, by the way, remains a trust fund baby at the end of the book. 

Many, many characters die and not just in combat.

Despite the fact this future utopia scoffs at the rampant crime of the 20th century Johnny Rico has experience with two violent crimes on Earth. One he is the victim of and another, a horrific crime in any age, is committed by a member of his training camp. This does not count the crimes under the military code of justice that occur during the course of the novel.

Although there is much discussion about how one acquires a franchise, citizenship and the right to vote, there is actually very little discussed about how the government operates and vote matters are the subject of elections. It is not even explained who authorized the forces of Earth to actually go to war (although why Earth goes to war seems to be made clear) even though there is discussion of the fact there is conflict even before there is officially war declared.

Johnny Rico speaks of the Mobile Infantry, and throws facts around about the independence of the Mobile Infantry such as they have the lowest percentage of officers in any army in history. He also speaks as if they are the only military force of his time other than the Navy. This is demonstrably not true, though. It is mentioned, or at least implied, the Navy has some sort of ground forces (when he speaks of how the Navy thinks it could win wars on their own and the Mobile Infantry is not necessary). There are also the K9 units and Combat Engineers, neither part of the Mobile Infantry, specifically mentioned in action. Also, a huge amount of the support roles for the Mobile Infantry (as illustrated on the planet Sanctuary) are filled by civilians. 

Johnny Rico is extremely proud of how elite the Mobile Infantry are... after all, less than 10% of his boot camp graduate to become Mobile Infantry and the rest are drummed out or quit. However, it must be remembered of the approximately two dozen military service options he was given the Mobile Infantry was his last option yet the only thing he was qualified to do. He did not, for example, qualify for a single Navy job. 

Finally, many people point out (and make a big deal about the fact) in this book only veterans can become voting citizens. This is technically true, but it is mentioned multiple times there are many, many ways a volunteer can serve because nobody is turned down. A job is found for every volunteer, which argues against that whole Mobile Infantry do it all themselves attitude Rico has. It also means most voting citizens are not combat veterans are even necessarily  “military men.” This is even specifically discussed at one point in one of Rico’s political science classes.

Just a few things to think about...

[swordsandrayguns]

Classic Chinese Fantasy Finally Gets US Translation

The classic wuxia novel series The Legend of the Condor Heroes by Jin Yong is finally getting a US translation! The first volume, titled A Hero Born, will be released by St. Martin’s Press this Tuesday. I have read excerpts of the various Condor Hero stories in traditional Chinese but, alas, my skills are not good enough to tackle reading any of the novels. I have been a huge have of the television shows and films based on these books (and other wuxia novels... think Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) and my frustration over finding decent translations of then was part of the motivation for me to write my first novel The Grand Tournament.

I just want to spread the word about Anna Holmwood’s new translation (you can find more information on the St Martins Press website). If you have read my novels or have enjoyed films such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon then I urge you to check out A Hero Born. However, I want to encourage others to take on this novel as well... If you are a fan of more traditional fantasy, ranging from Tolkien to Howard to Game of Thrones, check out A Hero Born and discover the rich world of Chinese fantasy novels!

[swordsandrayguns]

Upcoming Radio Appearance

Yours truly, science fiction and fantasy author Michael Lauck, will be appearing on the radio show Podcast UFO Tuesday, March 6 with witness to the Pascagoula Incident Calvin Parker, thanks to an article on the UFO sighting I wrote for the show a few years back. You can read the original article here and listen to the show live at 6PM Eastern time a few ways... check out the Podcast UFO website for details.

[swordsandrayguns]

A Review Of Murray Leinster’s Men Into Space

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON GOODREADS

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First of all, it is important to remember that Men Into Space is actually a television tie-in book. It is entirely possible, in fact, that it is the first adult science fiction television tie-in book. Sure, Tom Corbett, Space Cadet had a series of novels but Tom Corbett was really aimed at a younger audience. The television show Men Into Space ran from 1959 to 1960 and followed Major Ed McCauley (portrayed by William Lundigan), the most experienced astronaut in the space program, as he commands dangerous missions or helps troubleshoot problems. He is the only consistent character from episode to episode. There are no aliens or space fights in the show, either. Men Into Space episodes concentrate on the problems and perils inherent in space travel.

The TV show is important because Murray Leinster's book follows the television show's format. Each of the six chapters is its own stand-alone episode with McCauley as the only constant. The book is not a retelling of Men Into Space episodes, though. Instead it serves as a prequel to the show, highlighting key missions in McCauley's career (and the problems and perils he faces). You don't have to be familiar with Men Into Space the series to follow the book or read the book to follow the series, for that matter.

In a way, Leinster's Men Into Space reads almost like an alternative history book. The methods and technology presented (multi-stage rockets, sliderules, analog radio) were what we really did use to get to the moon. It all seems very familiar. In this book, though, we did not stop there. We built a space station, a moon base and headed to Mars with Apollo-style equipment. This is not the swashbuckling adventures of space opera or even the social commentary (mixed with swashbuckling space opera) of a Star Trek. 

I am a fan of the television show Men Into Space, I am a fan of Murray Leinster and guess what? I enjoyed this book. I deducted one star because it was not as good as many of his other stories, partially because one of Leinster's strengths is his ability to conceive of unknown technologies. It is, at times, a bit of a dry read but it is a very accurate approximation of the show's mood. I deducted another star because the story in the sixth and final chapter was a serious disappointment. The set up was good, the main point of conflict interesting but the resolution depended on a completely ridiculous plot twist (the only one in the entire book). Had it occurred somewhere in the middle chapters I might have been a bit more charitable but instead it ended the book on a sour note. View all my Goodreads reviews

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A 58 year old paperback I picked up on the Internet kicks off a discussion of classic science fiction author Murray Leinster, the pioneering TV show Men Into Space and golden age science fiction stories on old time radio!

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DC Comic's Star Trek Discovery Problem

Why Star Trek: Discovery is creating a problem for DC Comics... even though DC has nothing to do with Star Trek! Also, leave Anna Diop alone and a goodbye to...

Science fiction and fantasy author Michael Lauck explains how Star Trek: Discovery has created a big problem for DC Comics... even though DC doesn’t even do Star Trek comics anymore! Also, goodbyes to Harry Anderson and Art Bell. Please take a second to join the mailing list on Michael’s website SwordsAndRayguns.com, all future free content from the site will be available for mail list members first!

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Author Michael Lauck rambles on about Judge Dredd a bit, zeroing in on the book Jduge Dredd: Year One Omnibus (which collections three print stories covering Dredd’s early days on the streets.