WHAT IT IS, week ending 3.2.2019

Week four of recommitting to this weekly check-in on what I've been reading, what I've been watching, what I've been writing, and how it all interweaves into a seamless whole of creativity and inspiration.  (see, when you're the one in charge of the writing, you can make anything sound good, even if the truth is a bit more . . . messy).  That's enough for a preamble, let get to it:

VISUAL MEDIA:


Columbo: Murder by the Book --
I introduced my 11-year-old son to Columbo this past week, and it was glorious.  (possibly more glorious for me than for him).  This is the classic episode directed by Stephen Spielberg and written by Steven Bochco.  Ken Franklin (played by Jack Cassidy, who starred in several Columbo episodes) is one-half of a writing team, famous for the series of mysteries starring Mrs. Melville.  His partner, Jim Ferris, has decided to end their partnership.  So, Franklin kills him, while carefully laying the groundwork for it to look like a mob hit.  It's an intricate plan involving luring his soon to be former partner away from the office, to come to his cabin a couple hours south, while convincing Ferris to call and tell his wife that he's working late, without letting on he's with Franklin.  It's a masterful plan.
But Columbo knows, right from the jump, that Franklin is the one who did it, and tiny inconsistencies pop up as he hangs around and drops in, uninvited, on Franklin, using his aloof manner to play the part of a doofus, while putting together the puzzle laid out for him.  In the end, Columbo enlists Ferris's wife, imploring her to talk extemporaneously about her husband's writing and his partnership with Franklin, hoping that some minor detail will clue him in to how he can catch the killer.
And it works, because it always does, because he's Columbo.
This is a different Columbo, though, not quite the character he became, that we know and love so much.  Falk is still shifting from the initial pilot's characterization, which had him berating and admonishing the murderer.  It's closer to the unassuming, quiet detective he becomes, but there's still a bit of assertiveness and forthrightness, particularly in the scene with Ferris's widow, toward the end, that feels like a bit of a hangover from those first, slightly faulty steps.  It's not a bad thing, and not even anything that would be unwelcome in the character; it's just a characteristic to which fans of Columbo might be unaccustomed.
I love this series, and this episode, in particular, is certainly a high point for the series.  The smartness of the plot, the timing from Columbo -- with his "gotchas" after setting up the murderer to incriminate himself by answering a previous, seemingly innocuous, question -- is priceless.  There's a ton I can take away from this episode and this show, to improve my writing.
Oh, and though I'm certain my son would tell you, now, that watching this episode was "boring," he was totally into every turn of the screw, while we watched.  So, there's that, too.

Babylon 5: Chrysalis (season 1, episode 22) --
I finished up season one of Babylon 5.  It, too, was great.  I'd forgotten about the subplot around Garibaldi being shot while pursuing a tip that someone was out to kill the Earth Alliance President, which leads to the successful assassination of President Santiago.
This episode is where everything changes.  Delenn performs a ritual that puts her into a chrysalis and will change her physical appearance, going forward, which will come with a renewed outlook on her race's role in the universe and how they relate to humans, specifically, and other races, in general.  Garibaldi is shot by one of his own, which will make him even more paranoid.  Londo unwittingly enlists the Shadows to destroy a Narn military base in a disputed area between the Narns and Centauri.  G'Kar will leave the station to look into this.  And with the Earth Alliance President dead, his VP, Morgan Clark, steps in and immediately announces a retrenchment and refocus on Earth and its priorities (not unlike the current U.S. regime under Trump, as well as other right-wing, nationalist political figures ascending across the globe).  As Kosh states, toward the end of the episode, "And so it begins."  Indeed it does.
One thing I've always kept at the back of my mind, in reference to this episode and to my own writing, is a statement from the commentary track by J. Michael Straczynski.  The bits surrounding Commander Sinclair in this episode are, for the most part, quiet, at least in the opening half of the show.  He and his on-again, off-again lover, Catherine Sakai, are getting a chance to spend time together, and Sinclair decides to pop the question.  She says yes.  This is followed by a nice dinner (for a quick moment, anyway) with Ivanova and Garibaldi, announcing their plans and asking these two to be their Maid of Honor and Best Man, respectively. 
As JMS points out, this was intentional.  The best way, he said, to lay the foundation for a big shake-up, as happens in the latter half of this episode, is to start with some quiet moments, to allow for a stark contrast between the quiet and the loud, allowing the impact of the dramatic events to be heightened by this contrast.  It's something I try to have in my "bag of tricks," but after watching this episode again, I realize it's something I need to be more aware of, when I'm writing dramatic scenes like this.



WRITTEN MATERIAL:

Anna Akhmatova: My Half Century --My reading of Anna Akhmatova's prose continues.  I've moved into a section where she writes about Pushkin, for which she became quite well known.  It has me intrigued to read his work now.
Akhmatova's prose continues to be engaging, whether writing matter-of-factly or poetically, and her incisive intellect is very appealing.  I have shared a few more quotes from my reading, on the site.  Links below:

Quotes part Two

Quotes part Three

I was particularly taken with the second link above, where Akhmatova talks of the village where she spent some of her early life, Slepnyovo.  She likened it to an arch in architecture, where it seems small at first, but it gets bigger and bigger until you find complete freedom, once you walk through.  It's a wonderful metaphor for life, living in a small village or a small town, as I did, but it also works with the mechanics of the words:  arch being the first, smaller section of architecture, a much larger word and idea.


INSPIRATION(s):

Moebius, always inspirational.

MUSIC:

Went back to a musician Warren Ellis introduced me to, through one of his e-newsletters, Kemper Norton.  Part ambient, part electronica, the music can be soothing one second and then become completely overwhelming, with harmonies vying for dominance and failing, while the collective pieces merge into a whole that is almost otherworldly.  His work is wholly distinct and great for writing.  Here's a sample:





WRITING:

I've mentioned before that I track my writing.  Used to be, I logged the number of words written per day, shooting for 1000 words a day.  Now, I log whether I have written or not, and right now I'm in the middle of what I am certain is my second longest streak of unbroken days of writing - 28.  Not bad.  6 more and I match my personal best of 34. 

This week I completed final revisions on a short story "Tommy & Marc," which acts as a prelude to the novel I need to do a heavy rewrite on, which is next in the queue.  The short story was a way for me to get a better feel for the main characters of my novel.  At the time, I'd already written up roughly 25,000 words of background material on them, as well as the setting and plot and such, but I still didn't really know how they might talk or act -- specifically, I needed to better understand what made the two of them different, and writing a story set during their first year of high school seemed a good way to do that. 

It was something I'd not done before, but which I had read about, from other writers, as a good way to delve into characters before embarking on a longer story with them.  It helped.  Though, obviously, writing 4000 words didn't give me a full picture of these characters, but it did help get things started and propelled me into the novel, which, at its first draft length, runs to about 120,000 words, and that experience, in turn, hopefully helped inform the rewrites for this story. 

I know these short stories aren't always written, by others, with the idea of publication in mind.  They're more an exercise, something to fill out the backstory while remaining in the crevices between paragraphs.  But I like what I wrote, and it stands well on its own.  So, now, I need to start looking for places where it might be a good fit.  But not until I fix the ending, which I realized, after getting it written, didn't work.  Or, didn't work as well as I would have liked.  I tried to be overly flowery and profound, when I all I need to be is direct with the writing, especially since I already know exactly how the story ends up.  This is something I struggle with -- though I find myself better able to recognize it, now -- attempting to overreach with my prose when all that's needed is a blunt directness.  So, I'll polish that up, start looking for journals to submit it to, and begin the task of whittling down 120,000 words to around 90K.  Oh, and I need to rework my query letter again for the first novel. 
That seems like enough to get me through another week of writing, without a break.  If so, I'll be back here next week, touting my new personal best streak of consecutive days of writing. 

-chris

Why Before Watchmen is a bad idea

Besides the horrible title.

Over at Newsarama, Graeme McMillan wrote a blog post commenting that Before Watchmen may indeed be the project that rips the internet in half, as Brian Michael Bendis predicted "House of M" would.  McMillan points to the recent interview with Moore at Seraphemera and J. Michael Straczynski's interview at Aint' It Cool News. 

One point JMS, who is a creator I've admired for a long time (note: I haven't read any of his Spider-Man comics past those drawn by JRJr; I haven't read his recent Superman or Wonder Woman comics; and I've not read much, if any, of the work that has earned him such a bad reputation with fans and bloggers/critics), makes in his interview sits particularly poorly with me:

... neither Alan nor the detractors have the legal or the moral high ground here.

JMS argues a number of points leading up to this statement.  But, in signing on to this endeavor and in making the above statement, he - like a lot of other people - seems to completely miss the point at the heart of this argument.  Below is what I said in the comments section to McMillan's blog post:

I find it laughable and disappointing that JMS states Moore and his backers have no moral ground upon which to claim Watchmen 2 is a bad idea. I’ve been a fan of JMS ever since Babylon 5 ... but he, like so many others, seem to miss the point with this entire argument.

Neil Gaiman directly attributes his good working relationship vis-a-vis Sandman for DC/Vertigo with the way Alan Moore was treated and his vocal and strident response to that. Moore’s stance comes off as selfish to some, but at the heart of it, Moore is asking for these corporations to respect the creators, respect the work they do, and allow them the opportunity to work in an industry where writers and artists own that which they create like “real publishers” do. By signing the petition started by Frank Miller against labeling in the 80s along with the Creators’ Bill of Rights and being one of the handful of creators, if not the only one, who did not go back on his word, Moore has been at the forefront of creators’ rights in mainstream comic publishing.

By taking on Watchmen 2, despite all of his arguments, JMS is only propagating the status quo wherein Marvel and DC can leech off the writers and artists who work for them (will Marvel provide a bountiful pension to Bendis when his books no longer sell for them? it seems highly unlikely).

DC was smart to get high-profile creators to work on this. But, by agreeing, these “big names” have legitimized the outdated work practices at the Big Two. That is the moral issue at hand. and I find it depressing to think these people don’t see the problem here.

Ah, well. I’ll just go try to track down Saga, or get caught up on Wasteland, or pick up the new Fantagraphics or Top Shelf book. That, for me, is the good stuff anyway.

So, I won't be picking up any of these books.  Regardless of the moral stance I take in my response above, I found, when the story broke officially, that I was not interested in any of these books in the least.  I like many of the creators involved. But new stories with these characters just didn't excite me.  I got everything I needed in the original.

And - plug, plug - I'm blogging about that at my other site - ReadingWatchmen.com.  Check it out.  If you enjoyed the graphic novel, I think you might like what I'm doing there.

chris

FROM THE LONGBOXES: Amazing Spider-Man #30-35 by JMS & JRJr – Part III

Forgot to post this on Wednesday, so here's a Sunday bonus. The final installment in my short series on J. Michael Straczynski's & John Romita, Jr.'s run on Amazing Spider-Man that originally ran at the In the Mouth of Dorkness blog.

Enjoy.

SOME FINAL THOUGHTS

One of the best things about J. Michael Straczynski’s run on Amazing Spider-Man (at least up to the point I stopped reading, which was when JRJr left the book and Mike Deodato came on as artist) was his characterization of Peter Parker. JMS had a firm hold on what makes this character tick. Despite being older, Peter is still a person who takes very seriously his responsibility to his family (Aunt May and, though she is gone at this point, Mary Jane) as well as his responsibility, as Spider-Man, to the populace at large. This does not mean his exploits as Spider-Man are not nerve-wracking. This is why Spidey has always been a wise-cracker, spewing ridiculous jokes to cover up the fear he feels. It’s a common defense mechanism and one that has been a part of this character from the start. And JMS’s dialogue smoothly fits into this aspect of the character.

JMS also has Peter moving forward in his civilian life, having him become a science teacher at his old high school, as another way for him to give back to the community. This is a natural extension of the Spider-Man template set forth by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko back in the early sixties where they had him graduate high school, move on to college, and have evolving relationships with the likes of Betty Brant and Gwen Stacy. Again, it fits the character and is a nice way of “showing” readers who Peter Parker/Spider-Man is rather than telling us through some dull expository caption boxes. It’s a subtle bit of storytelling that too few writers in comics miss out on, even today.

The pacing of this story is also excellent. There’s an ebb and flow to the narrative that allows readers to enjoy the story and experience the emotional crescendos when they arrive. One of the best bits of writing advice I’ve gotten came from the DVD commentary by JMS for the final episode of season one of Babylon 5. He discussed how one should have a quiet moment prior to a major disruption in the narrative – whether it be an emotional disruption or an alien attack or whatever – in order to make that emotional instance resonate with the audience. And JMS deftly weaves the quiet moments with the “big” ones in this storyline.

Straczynski also sets things up nicely. He doesn’t have any resolutions come out of left field. The way Spider-Man defeats Morlun is reached through a natural progression of events, none of which feels forced or hackneyed. The way Morlun goes on about feeding on a pure totemistic host, and Ezekiel’s surprise arrival that catches the villain off-guard and bloodies his nose – offering Peter an opportunity to study what manner of creature Morlun is – all make sense and feel like the events they are (the villain monologuing, Ezekiel helping Peter) before you realize that they have secondary consequences (the opportunity for Peter to survive this primal force). It’s wonderful storytelling.

And that brings me to another aspect JMS brought to his initial storyline. He incorporated Peter’s scientific background when he had Peter take Morlun’s blood and analyze it for a possible way of defeating him. This is something I have rarely seen utilized in Spider-Man comics. It was refreshing. This has always been a cornerstone of the character, and yet it is hardly used within the stories. Peter’s webs were originally created by him, a scientific breakthrough that he tried to sell to some scientists way back in issue # 18 – a deal that fell through when they discovered the webs dissolved in minutes.

Yeah, editors have made his webs organic – actually an extension of Peter and emanating from his wrists – and I can’t say where the “continuity” stands on this aspect right now, and I’d rather not think about that. Ugh.

Bringing this aspect back into the book, accentuated by Peter’s decision to become a science teacher at his former high school, was something I greatly appreciated.

And John Romita, Jr’s artwork has never looked as good, in my opinion. He draws a lithe, ballet-like Spider-Man who is wiry and able to contort his body in a manner reminiscent of a spider and, again, a body type that hearkens back to Steve Ditko’s seminal work.

AN HISTORICAL NOTE: Initially, Jack Kirby was tapped to draw Spider-Man and he finished five pages of an initial story. But Stan Lee discarded that and chose to have Ditko draw the book. He obviously made the right choice. I don’t know the reasoning, but it seems to me that Kirby’s blocky style really would not fit with the character of Peter Parker – a teenage bookworm with a slight physical frame – whereas Ditko’s lithe artwork was a perfect match for the young hero.

JRJr knows how to draw comics, especially action-packed ones like Spider-Man. And he does not disappoint here. When Spidey first faces Morlun, the double-page spread we get from JRJr is fantastic, a whirlwind of these two larger-than-life characters pummeling each other. It’s a collage of images without panel borders that gets across the frenetic pace of the battle. It really is a masterfully drawn spread that showcases the unique properties of comics storytelling.

But, though this may not be his strong suit, JRJr can also evoke emotion from the quieter moments of the story. It’s these moments that help punctuate the action and give it the emotional tenor necessary in a story like this. Thankfully, JRJr is not afraid to let these softer moments breathe within the larger narrative. He understands, better than a lot of artists, how to tell a comic story effectively and give readers a full and satisfying experience. Having a veteran of his stature, who can also hit deadlines, on this book with JMS was a good move on Marvel’s part. It really elevated the first half of Straczynski’s tenure as writer on Amazing Spider-Man and is a major reason why this first storyline won the 2002 Eisner award for best serialized story.

And finally – JMS went there. He finally had Aunt May discover that her nephew is Spider-Man. And the way JMS handled that was brilliant.

But that’s best saved for another time.

-chris

FROM THE LONGBOXES: Amazing Spider-Man by JMS & JRJr part 1

It's new comics Wednesday, so here's another piece from my writings over at the In the Mouth of Dorkness blog.

Enjoy,

In 2001, Marvel decided to make a big splash with their books and re-energize a number of titles. These included New X-Men from Grant Morrison & Frank Quitely, Daredevil from Brian Michael Bendis & Alex Maleev, and Amazing Spider-Man from J. Michael Straczynski & John Romita, Jr. It was a great time to be reading comics, and, for me, this was the first time since John Byrne was working regularly for them that I took any notice of Marvel comics. I mean, come on – Grant Morrison did Animal Man and Bendis did Torso, and I loved those books. How could I not pay attention?

But, for me, the biggest news was that JMS was going to be writing Amazing Spider-Man. This was huge. I love Babylon 5, and, for my money, it is the best science fiction television show ever to hit the airwaves. The evolution of characters, the laying down of story seeds in the first season that payoff two or three or four seasons later, the big ideas coupled with fully realized alien races and political intrigue – JMS kept me excited and wanting more throughout the entire five seasons of this seminal science fiction show.

So when he was hired for Spidey, I was all in.

And the first storyline, encompassing issues 30-35 and entitled “Coming Home,” did not disappoint and ended up winning the Eisner award for best serialized story that year.

In interviews, I remember JMS stating he wanted to stay away from the typical Spider-Man villains and create new characters for his run. And he dropped everyone into the deep end of the pool with the first issue when he introduced Ezekiel.

A successful businessman – something we don’t discover until shortly after we first meet him – Ezekiel knows an awful lot about Spider-Man, including his origin, his powers, and who it is beneath the mask. Ezekiel also has very similar powers to those of Spidery. And, to top it all off, he tells Pete that maybe everything he believed about his life as Spider-Man is wrong.

Ezekiel claims that Peter’s transition into Spider-Man isn’t merely a random occurrence. He asks Peter, as the two of them stand atop the Empire State Building:

“Did the radiation enable the spider to give you these powers?

Or was the spider trying to give you those powers before the radiation killed it?”

And Peter’s mind is blown. This puts everything he’s believed since that fateful day into question, and Peter doesn’t know what to think. And then, Ezekiel is gone.

A few days later, Ezekiel finds Peter at his new job, science teacher at his old high school. He invites Peter for pizza to discuss what he thinks he knows about his powers. Ezekiel tells Peter about these totemistic forces that used to walk the earth, race memories that still haunt our DNA. These forces were ones that could bridge the gap between humans and other species. Ezekiel claims that Spider-Man is one of these totemistic forces. As he explains, you can judge a hero (or man) by his enemies. One type of hero attracts the same type of enemy, and in the case of Spidey, he’s attracted a lot of totemistic pretenders – Doctor Octopus, the Vulture, the Rhino, the Lizard, and the Scorpion, to name a few of his rogues.

After their pizza, Ezekiel invites Peter to his office building where he offers Peter sanctuary in a specially built panic room where he can hide from the evil that is coming to hunt him down. Peter declines, worried that whoever may be after him would put innocents in danger in order to draw him out. And, having battled numerous enemies through the years as Spider-Man, he feels no need to run and hide. He’s done this before. He will do it again. And he always comes out on top.

AN ASIDE:

I loved this new perspective JMS took with regard to Spider-Man’s powers and origin. There was an outcry from loyal Spidey fans who denigrated such a reworking of Peter Parker’s story – and many posited a strong argument that this new idea took away the strength of the character, i.e. a forlorn teenager accidentally endowed with great power who must come to terms with his new reality and realize that with such power comes great responsibility. The randomness of the spider bite plays into this depiction of the character very strongly, and I can understand how some might perceive this as undermining the character. But, for me, I always took Ezekiel’s story with a heavy grain of salt, intrigued by this notion but content to believe it was only a possibility and nothing more.

But I digress

The evil coming to hunt down and feed on Spider-Man is the other major character JMS introduces in this first story arc, Morlun. A vampiric creature who feeds on the life-force of those who have totemistic powers, Morlun believes, as Ezekiel does, that Spider-Man is one of these totemistic forces. It has been a long time, possibly centuries, since Morlun fed on a pure totemistic force. So he is determined to capture Spider-Man. And he is a badass. With inhuman strength on a level that allows him to effortlessly shake off Spider-Man’s strongest punches, unyielding stamina, and the ability to track his prey anywhere once he’s come in to contact with them, Morlun does not stop for anything. This is something Spidey learns very quickly, when Morlun uses Spider-Man as a rag doll in their initial confrontation.

Worn down and fearing for his life, Peter goes back to Ezekiel. He is ready to take the sanctuary now. But it is too late. Morlun has touched Peter. He can track him anywhere now, sensing him even within a full-proof hideaway such as Ezekiel constructed. Sanctuary is no longer an option.

It is at this point, that things look bleakest for our hero.

To be continued …

-chris