The Matrix

Caught a bit of The Matrix:Reloaded on telly the other night and it reminded me about this article I wrote a few years back about the Matrix series. Originally published in Prism, The British Fantasy newsletter way back in 2003.

(SPOILER ALERT! Don’t read this if you haven’t seen the entire Matrix trilogy. And don’t read this if you’ve got housework to do. The carpet won’t hoover itself you know …)

I’m confused.

The Matrix was a near-perfect action blockbuster: stylish action set-pieces, a tightly constructed plot, there’s even an attempt at depth by moulding philosophical concepts to the action. (Okay, so certain aspects of the plot don’t really stand up to close inspection and some elements of the film are highly derivative but any film that can persuade Keanu Reeves to increase his dramatic range to the point where he has two facial expressions has to be commended.)

Then came Matrix: Reloaded. The explosions were bigger but unfortunately so were the philosophical discussions. These conflicting elements sat awkwardly beside each other. And the ‘To Be Continued … ’ ending was so ineptly handled that it even used a “dramatic” musical sting of the sort outlawed in 1937 for being too corny. But although disappointed the fans remained loyal, ignoring the film’s obvious flaws whilst secretly hoping that the next instalment would see a return to former glories. (The technical name for this kind of blind loyalty on the part of SF fans is known as ‘The Phantom Menace syndrome’.)

Finally came Matrix: Revolutions. Presumably the revolutions of the title are a reference to the 180° turns in allegiance performed by most of the Matrix’s fans after watching this incredibly tedious film. Action scenes are almost entirely jettisoned for impenetrable philosophical discussions, main characters such as Morpheus are reduced to simpering sidekicks, and Keanu Reeves has by now totally misplaced his second facial expression. The film even denies the audience the consolation that this is the final instalment in The Matrix story; with the Oracle and the Architect musing on a future disruption of the newfound peace.

But is the Matrix trilogy really that bad? Perhaps it’s too soon to fully assess the films’ merits. Maybe they will repay multiple viewings. Have the Wachowski brothers produced a set of SF classics that are too sophisticated for the current audience but which will in years to come be treated with the same awed reverence as films such as Blade Runner?

Frankly, I don’t care.

The Matrix films were marketed as action blockbusters and that’s what I want damn it! The first film showed that the philosophy could be worked into the story without slowing the action scenes down so why did they mess around with things on the sequels? I’m guessing because they wanted to show off their knowledge of Baudrillard and Barthes in an attempt to silence the intellectuals who sneered that they had just copied the names from their old notes from Philosophy 101.

And they had to work in all the pompous religious and mythological symbolism. Most of the characters have Biblical names! Neo gets blinded just like Oedipus! He dies and is resurrected just like Jesus!

But all the clever intellectual games are pointless without a decent plot to go with them. The Wachowskis’ sense of pacing gradually deserted them over the course of the series, the balance between action and dialogue becoming increasingly uneven. So The Matrix opens with a kick-ass fight scene! Reloaded opens with explosions! And Revolutions opens with Neo sitting at a train station …

Meanwhile the scenes in Zion are deathly dull, turning the entire trilogy into a holo-deck episode from Star Trek. Characters like the Trainman, the Albino Twins, and the Indian family that turn up whilst Neo’s trapped in the train station, appear and then disappear as The Wachowskis realise they don’t really know what to do with them. Even The Architect, who is a pivotal character, only appears after they’ve scoured the dictionary for enough multi-syllable words with which to pepper his dialogue. In fact by Revolutions even the trilogy’s three main characters -- Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus -- are relegated to the sidelines for large chunks of the film. Instead we’re supposed to care about the geeky kid (imaginatively named Kid) and the gruff Captain Mifune. But these aren’t characters; they’re extras who have somehow managed to blag a few lines of dialogue.

The fact that elements of the plot are explained in tie-ins like The Animatrix series and the Enter the Matrix computer game doesn’t help. When I watch a film I want all the relevant information to be included in the film itself not in some spin-off product that I’ve got absolutely no interest in. (Okay, so I’ve read The Matrix graphic novel but that’s because I like comics, not because I’ve been brainwashed into buying any old rubbish that carries the Matrix brand name.) No doubt the Wachowskis think of these tie-ins as ways of allowing the fans to enjoy the Matrix in a more intense interactive manner but that only applies to the hardcore Matrix fanboy. The term that comes more readily to mind for the average filmgoer is total rip-off.

Even the lauded special effects aren’t that special. The Burly Brawl in Reloaded loses all credibility once the CGI goes into overload. Up until then it had been an exciting slice of chop socky with the only major effects being used to create the illusion of multiple Agent Smiths. But as soon as Neo goes into his kickboxing poledancer routine the fight just becomes laughable. And yet still the scene plods on, proudly displaying its blocky sub-Pacman graphics.

The attack on Zion in Revolutions also suffers from being too long. Long after the audience has figured out exactly which clichés the humans are going to use to save the day the Wachowskis feel the need to drag the scene out for a seemingly interminable length of time. For some reason they think it will make the supposedly unstoppable Sentinels scarier if they reinforce the machines’ total inability to kill unarmed and unprotected people despite the humans being weighed down by heavily laden wheelbarrows.

The fact that the Wachowskis expect people to dissect the films, searching for all the clever references they’ve made, also means that people start to find all the bits of the story that don’t seem to make sense. Like, how comes Neo can use his computer-generated powers in the real world? If the computers can’t create a perfect version of the Matrix because human minds reject it why don’t they just clone braindead humans who wouldn’t be able to reject the perfect Matrix? If Neo and Agent Smith are supposed to be so radically different from all the other computer programs in The Matrix, blessing them with unpredictability, then how comes The Oracle can always predict what they’re going to do?

Maybe all this stuff makes sense and maybe it doesn’t. But if it does the Wachowskis haven’t done themselves any favours by making it such a tangled mess. They should’ve stuck to the formula of producing a slick action movie that touches upon the metaphysical stuff just enough that the audience could delve deeper into the references if they were interested. By keeping everything moving quickly they could gloss over the story’s inconsistencies.

Because even in some of the smaller details the films fall apart. One of the great things about the first film was that the Agents were so unstoppable that even the super-cool Morpheus and Trinity legged it as soon as they appeared on the scene. Yet in Reloaded despite the Agents having upgrades that allow them to go toe-to-toe with Neo suddenly Morpheus and Trinity start duking it out with anyone they can find who’s wearing a black suit and shades. Worse, if the upgrades mean that a mere handful of Agents can hold their own (albeit briefly) against Neo then how come he isn’t totally overwhelmed when battling a hundred or so copies of Agent Smith? And why does Neo keep forgetting he has superpowers whenever the Wachowskis want to prolong an action scene? I just wanted to scream at him, “You can fly, you moron! You can halt bullets in mid-flight! You can enter into Agents and unravel their very being! Why are you standing there letting them punch you?”

Although for me the biggest problem of the films is the way that the heroes quite happily blast away at innocent people. It’s clearly stated that if you die in The Matrix you also die in the real world. Therefore when Neo and Co. shoot at the Agents, causing them to vacate the bodies they’d hijacked, leaving them as bullet-ridden corpses, the good guys have effectively just killed innocent people. Now, fair enough, when faced with certain death at the hands of an implacable killer who makes the original Terminator look cuddly you’re not going to be too bothered about how you stop him so long as it works. In that sort of situation self-preservation rules. But there’s not even the slightest hint of remorse following these regrettable slayings. The only time I recall this dilemma even being mentioned in the films is in the training sequence with the woman in the red dress where Morpheus tells Neo, “If you are not one of us, you are one of them.”

Well, that’s all right then. Why bother displaying genuine human emotion over a truly horrible situation when you can just hide behind rhetoric and a pair of shades?
Not that I’m condoning “The Matrix Defence” that has sprung up in America where teenagers claim to have been driven to kill people because of the messages of violence in the Matrix films. No doubt these kids have also seen Disney films, with blatant messages of love and tolerance, but did that make them go out and start acting like saints? No. The teenagers’ violence came from mental problems and sociological strife. If these issues had been dealt with then the question of whether the Matrix films could ever have driven them to commit murder would never even have arisen.

And yeah, I know there’s a whole looking glass reflection aspect to the human/machine relationship in the Matrix films. We can’t live without the machines and they can’t live without us so we’re locked in an endless cycle of mutual dependency and hatred. So showing the heroes as being capable of an icy ruthlessness that matches that of the machines may well have been intentional. Maybe it’s to remind the audience that okay, humans are the good guys but we can still act like right bastards when the occasion demands. Although if this was the Wachowskis’ purpose I think they fumbled the ball badly.

This lack of compassion is something that I feel mars the series as a whole. The first two films are, on one level, love stories, with Trinity’s love bringing Neo back from the dead in The Matrix and then him returning the favour in Reloaded. And Revolutions has them both so filled with love for humanity that they sacrifice their lives so that their comrades might have a better future. Yet frankly I found these scenes didn’t touch me at all on an emotional level. In fact Trinity’s death scene was so badly handled, with the camera panning down ever so solemnly to reveal that she had been skewered by umpteen sharp objects (but she hadn’t told Neo this because she didn’t want to upset the poor dear), that it totally avoids pathos and instead jumps straight into black comedy.

Even the other romantic elements that were brought in after someone noticed that Neo and Trinity had absolutely zilch chemistry together fail to elicit audience sympathy. Link and Zee’s romance is never given enough screentime to engage the viewer whilst the romantic triangle between Morpheus, Niobe, and Commander Lock that started in Reloaded is conveniently forgotten in Revolutions when the Wachowskis realise they don’t actually know what to do with the subplot.

With no emotion at the heart of the story the trilogy becomes empty, soulless.

The kind of story that might have been written by a machine.

The Mask Behind the Face WHC edition

Just had it confirmed that there will be a special limited edition of my British Fantasy Award winning novella, The Mask Behind the Face, on sale at the World Horror Convention 2010.

This edition comes with a new cover quote from legendary horror author T.E.D Klein. "Wow, what an impressive story ... ambitious, in fact downright audacious"

This goes along with the previous quotes from bestselling novelists Mark Chadbourn and Brian Keene so I'm a litle bit chuffed right now.

Robert B Parker RIP

Robert B Parker passed away on Monday. He made a huge impact on the crime scene in the '70s and published over 60 novels, most famously the Spenser series. His work was tough, funny, intelligent and romantic. From all accounts so was he.

One of my favourite writers. I'm sorry that he's gone.

2009 reading

I'm probably forgetting a bunch of stuff but here's a rough list of what I read last year. Probably would've helped if I hadn't waited until halfway through the year to start listing my reading. And if I hadn't then lost the list.

* = not finished by the end of 2009
** = reread
*** = not quite a reread but heavy skimming of books that have been read previously

Novels:
GENTLEMEN OF THE ROAD -- Michael Chabon*
THE MASTER SNIPER -- Stephen Hunter
THE CODE OF THE WOOSTERS -- PG Wodehouse
THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE -- James M Cain
THEY SHOOT HORSES DON'T THEY? -- Horace McCoy
SOME OF YOUR BLOOD -- Theodore Sturgeon
TAMING A SEAHORSE -- Robert B Parker
THE DRIVE-IN: THE BUS TOUR -- Joe R Lansdale
THE LOVERS -- John Connolly
ALTERED CARBON -- Richard Morgan
ECHO BURNING -- Lee Child
THE ROAD -- Cormac McCarthy
THE TURNAROUND -- George Pelecanos
THE GATES -- John Connolly
TOMATO RED -- Daniel Woodrell
MARATHON MAN -- William Goldman
STARSHIP TROOPERS -- Robert Heinlein*
BATMAN BEGINS -- Dennis O'Neil*
THE GODWULF MANUSCRIPT -- Robert B Parker***
GOD SAVE THE CHILD -- Robert B Parker***
MORTAL STAKES -- Robert B Parker***
PROMISED LAND -- Robert B Parker***

Collections:
VERY GOOD, JEEVES! -- PG Wodehouse
E PLURIBUS UNICORN -- Theodore Sturgeon*
WAKING NIGHTMARES -- Ramsey Campbell*
BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S -- Truman Capote*
EARTHMAN GO HOME -- Harlan Ellison*
DARK VISONS -- Stephen King, Dan Simmons, George RR Martin*
NIGHT VISIONS 3 -- Ramsey Campbell, Lisa Tuttle, Clive Barker*

Short stories:
A bunch of Thomas Ligotti stories
Desperate Hours -- Jonathan Marshall
Guy Walks into a Bar ... -- Lee Child
The Sticky Wicket -- James Herriot
The Ant and the Grasshopper -- W Somerset Maugham
The Man From Glasgow -- W Somerset Maugham
The Pitch -- Dennis Etchison
The Accountant -- Robert Sheckley
Miss Marple Tells a Story -- Agatha Christie
The Last Seance -- Agatha Christie
The Snail-Watcher -- Patricia Highsmith
The Day of Reckoning -- Patricia Highsmith
The Baby Spoon -- Patricia Highsmith
A Curious Suicide -- Patricia Highsmith
A Rose for Emily -- William Faulkner
The Man Who Didn't Ask Why -- CS Forester
Examination Day -- Henry Slesar
The Seed from the Sepulchre -- Clark Ashton Smith
Home Away from Home -- Robert Bloch
You've Got to Have Brains -- Robert Bloch
The Mannikin -- Robert Bloch
The Graveyard Rats -- Henry Kuttner
The Wonderful story of Henry Sugar -- Roald Dahl
The Willows -- Algernon Blackwood
Oh Whistle and I'll Come to you my Lad -- MR James
Lost Hearts -- MR James
Canon Alberic's Scrap-book -- MR James
The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral -- MR James
Number 13 -- MR James
The Girls in Their Summer Dresses -- Irwin Shaw
The Heart of a Goof -- PG Wodehouse
High Stakes -- PG Wodehouse
Buried Treasure -- PG Wodehouse
The Letter of the Law -- PG Wodehouse
The Monster -- Joe Haldeman
Two Minutes Forty-Five Seconds -- Dan Simmons
A Way Home -- Theodore Sturgeon
Talent -- Theodore Sturgeon
The Man Born Blind -- CS Lewis
Forms of Things Unknown -- CS Lewis
Apples -- Ramsey Campbell
The Open Window -- Saki
Denton's Death -- Martin Amis
Activity Time -- Monica Dickens
Eyes -- Charles L Grant

Scriptbooks:
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: ONCE MORE WITH FEELING -- Joss Whedon
DR WHO: THE TALONS OF WENG-CHIANG -- Robert Holmes*

Non-Fiction:
CREATORS ON THE FANTASTIC FOUR -- Tom Defalco
WILL STORR vs THE SUPERNATURAL -- Will Storr*
A PATH WITH HEART -- Jack Kornfield*
ZANSHIN -- Vince Morris**
THE ELEMENTS OF ZEN -- David Scott and Tony Doubleday
AT HELL'S GATE -- Claude Anshin Thomas
BUDDHISM WITHOUT BELIEFS -- Stephen Batchelor
HARDCORE ZEN -- Brad Warner
SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP -- Brad Warner
ZEN WRAPPED IN KARMA DIPPED IN CHOCOLATE -- Brad Warner
THE COMICS JOURNAL LIBRARY 6: THE WRITERS -- Tom Spurgeon**
MEDITATIONS ON VIOLENCE -- Rory Miller
LITTLE BLACK BOOK OF VIOLENCE -- Lawrence A Kane and Kris Wilder*
WORKING WITH WARRIORS -- Dennis Martin*
IMPOSSIBLE TERRITORIES: AN UNOFFICIAL COMPANION TO THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN BLACK DOSSIER -- Jess Nevins
GRANT MORRISON: THE EARLY YEARS -- Timothy Callahan*
TARANTINO -- Jim Smith
NORMAN ROCKWELL -- Kara Ann Marling
THE PRE-RAPHAELITES -- Christopher Wood*
WONDER WOMAN: THE COMPLETE HISTORY -- Les Daniels*
ZEN FOR BEGINNERS -- Judith Blackstone and Zoran Josipovic
THE ESSENTIAL BATMAN ENCYCLOPEDIA -- Robert Greenberger*
THE NAKED ARTIST -- Bryan Talbot*

Poetry:
The Charge of the Light Brigade -- Alfred, Lord Tennyson
The Lady of Shallot -- Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening -- Robert Frost
Fire and Ice -- Robert Frost**
To Lucasta, On Going to the Wars -- Richard Lovelace
The Love Song of Alfred J Prufrock -- TS Eliot
Macavity: The Mystery Cat -- TS Eliot
The Second Coming -- WB Yeats
Dolor -- Theodore Roethke
The Tiger -- William Blake**
The Sick Rose -- William Blake**
A Poison Tree -- William Blake
On Art and Artists -- William Blake
The Clod and the Pebble -- William Blake
A Tragedy -- E Nesbit
To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time -- Robert Herrick
How Pleasant to Know Mr Lear -- Edward Lear
Jenny Kiss'd Me -- Leigh Hunt
The Lazy Writer -- Bert Leston Taylor
La Belle Dame sans Merci -- John Keats
I Tracked a Dead Man Down a Trench -- Walter Lyon
The Raven -- Edgar Allen Poe**

Comics:
JLA: NEW WORLD ORDER -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: AMERICAN DREAMS -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: ROCK OF AGES -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: STRENGTH IN NUMBERS -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: JUSTIC FOR ALL -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: WORLD WAR III -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: EARTH 2 -- Grant Morrison**
JLA/WILDCATS -- Grant Morrison**
JLA: YEAR ONE -- Mark Waid and Brian Augustyn**
JUSTICE LEAGUE: A MIDSUMMER'S NIGHTMARE -- Mark Waid and Fabian Nicezia
FANTASTIC FOUR: IMAGINAUTS -- Mark Waid
FANTASTIC FOUR: UNTHINKABLE -- Mark Waid
FANTASTIC FOUR: AUTHORIATIVE ACTION -- Mark Waid**
FANTASTIC FOUR: DISASSEMBLED -- Mark Waid**
FANTASTIC FOUR: RISING STORM -- Mark Waid**
DAN DARE -- Garth Ennis
THE UNCANNY X-MEN: BEYOND THE FURTHEST STAR -- Chris Claremont
STREETS OF GLORY -- Garth Ennis
FALLEN ANGEL -- Peter David
THE QUESTION: ZEN AND VIOLENCE -- Dennis O'Neil
THE QUESTION: POISONED GROUND -- Dennis O'Neil
THE QUESTION: EPITAPH FOR A HERO -- Dennis O'Neil
THE QUESTION: WELCOME TO OZ -- Dennis O'Neil
THE QUESTION: RIDDLES -- Dennis O'Neil
THE NEW FRONTIER -- Darwyn Cooke
ANIMAL MAN -- Grant Morrison**
ANIMAL MAN: ORIGIN OF THE SPECIES -- Grant Morrison**
ANIMAL MAN: DEUS EX MACHINA -- Grant Morrison**
BATTLEFIELDS -- Garth Ennis
WAR STORIES -- Garth Ennis**
SCARLET IN GASLIGHT -- Mike Powell
THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS -- Frank Miller**
BLAZING COMBAT -- Archie Goodwin and various artists
RUNAWAYS: DEADEND KIDS -- Joss Whedon
SPYBOY: -- Peter David
BATMAN BEGINS -- Scott Beatty
EDUARDO RISSO'S TALES OF TERROR -- Carlo Trillos
CRIMINAL: LAWLESS -- Ed Brubaker**
MURDER ME DEAD -- David Lapham
TWO GUNS -- Steven Grant
Y- THE LAST MAN: WHYS AND WHEREFORES: Brian K Vaughan
CAPTAIN AMERICA: OPERATION REBIRTH -- Mark Waid
CAPTAIN AMERICA: PROTECT AND SERVE -- Mark Waid
CAPTAIN AMERICA/ CAPTAIN AMERICA: SENTINEL OF LIBERTY -- as many of the non-collected Mark Waid issues as I could find.
IRREDEEMABLE -- Mark Waid
FIGHT TO THE DEATH: BATTLE OF GUADALCANAL -- Larry Hama
SIN CITY: BOOZE, BROADS AND BULLETS -- Frank Miller**
DARK BLUE -- Warren Ellis**
CONAN AND THE SONGS OF THE DEAD -- Joe R Lansdale
ALLSTAR SUPERMAN VOL 2 -- Grant Morrison
THE FLASH: THE RETURN OF BARRY ALLEN -- Mark Waid
THE FLASH: TERMINAL VELOCITY -- Mark Waid
THE FLASH: RACE AGAINST TIME -- Mark Waid
THE LIFE STORY OF THE FLASH -- Mark Waid and Brian Augustyn**
GREEN LANTERN/SUPERMAN: LEGEND OF THE GREEN FLAME -- Neil Gaiman**
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: TIME OF YOUR LIFE -- Joss Whedon, Jeph Loeb
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: PREDATORS AND PREY -- Jane Espenson, Steven S. DeKnight and Drew Z. Greenberg
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: DEATH AND DATING -- Mark Waid, Dan Slott, Roger Stern
THE LONE RANGER -- Brett Matthews
HITMAN -- Garth Ennis***
THE COMPLETE NEW STATESMEN -- John Smith
CAPTAIN AMERICA: WAR AND REMEMBRANCE -- Roger Stern

Avatar

Just got back from seeing a press screening of Avatar. Good fun. Gets a bit silly in places and the running time meant that I ended up with deep vein thrombosis but if you just go along for the ride it's great.

Eat Your Heart Out, Wordsworth

Here's a few poems I've been fiddling with:

The Great Old One Cthulhu,
Whilst holidaying in Honolulu,
Was disturbed by a dirge,
And could not resist the urge,
To rip the head off of Lulu.

No? Okay, how about this one?

A chef became a ghost,
After arguing with a dinner party host,
He had stood by the oven,
And said, "Hey, stop shoving!"
But still ended up next to the roast.

No, no, take that gun from your head, there's only one more.

Barry was mad of course,
Lacking sanity or even remorse,
He used blowtorch and knife,
To create a new form of life,
Out of two pigs, a duck and a horse.

So do you think I'll become Poet Laureate anytime soon?

TV or not TV

"We Have Books About TV" -- Sign outside Springfield Library, The Simpsons

Televison gets a bad rep for encouraging illiteracy and turning anyone who watches a programme for more than thirty seconds into a braindead, dribbling moron but I'm not sure that's entirely deserved. Yeah, there's lot of rubbish programmes that people watch when they could be reading but there's lots of TV adaptations of books and also lots of TV programmes that get novelised.

Personally a lot of my early reading came from finding out about books and characters from TV. Paddington Bear, Just William, Swallows and Amazons, Sherlock Holmes, Dr Who and The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Not to mention Jackonary which led to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Wind in the Willows and The Otterbury Incident (written by a future Poet Laureate no less). While you could argue the literary merit of some of these stories they helped develop my love of reading.

Even as an adult I find myself sampling authors due to the influence of TV adaptations. Books such as Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe novels, P.G. Wodehouse, Agatha Christie's Miss Marple. Even the Simon Nye novel which he later developed into his hit sitcom Men Behaving Badly (fortunately when he adapted it for TV he decided it might be an idea to include some jokes.)

And it's not just me. One of my friends happily admits that he's not a big reader but thanks to TV he's had a crack at C.S. Forester's Hornblower novels, Jeff Lindsay's Dexter novels and P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster stories.

Now I appreciate it's not just the influence of television that brought me to read some of these books. Stacy Keach's Mike Hammer isn't really a factor in me wanting to try Mickey Spillane and I don't remember Spenser: For Hire well enough for it to sway me one way or another when it comes to reading Robert B Parker. And I'll admit that even when I thoroughly enjoy a TV adaptation it won't necessarily spur me on to read the source material. At least not straight away. Decades passed between my seeing Joan Hickson portraying Miss Marple and my deciding that perhaps I should give the books a go. And although I tried a P.G. Wodehouse novel at the time of Fry and Laurie's Jeeves and Wooster it took many years and several nudges from various quarters (including repeats of the TV series) to remind me that it was high time to read some more of his stuff.

Sometimes the TV connection can be quite unexpected. A while back Garth Ennis mentioned that he enjoyed the novels of Derek Robinson, an author with whom I was totally unfamiliar. Recently I stumbled upon one of Mr Robinson's books only to discover it was the basis for a TV series I saw as a child.

UK TV has a long history of adapting books to screen and otherwise appropriating literary characters. Rumpole of the Bailey, The Darling Buds of May, Bodies, Tales of the Unexpected, A Bit of a Do. Crime novels seem to be particularly popular TV fodder -- Wire in the Blood, A Touch of Frost, Dalziel and Pascoe, Inspector Morse, Sharman, Jemima Shore Investigates, An Unsuitable Job For A Woman. Not to mention period dramas. British TV does like to dress up actors in frockcoats and breeches and actresses in bonnets and corsets. Although to be fair quite a few of these programmes seem equally keen to get the actors and actresses out of these costumes at the earliest opportunity.

Judging by the imports we get over here US TV isn't quite so keen on adapting books but in the last few years there seems to have been an upswing -- Homicide: Life on the Street, True Blood, The Wire, Generation Kill, Dexter and FlashForward.

So it's not all bad news as far as TV is concerned. It can actually inspire people to read more than just those annoying messages that flash up on the screen to tell you what the next programme will be, totally ruining the ending of the programme that you're currently watching. Occasionally, just occasionally, television can inspire viewers to seek out the wonders of literature.

Now excuse me, I'm off to watch I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here.

Mash-up

Just to annoy the musical purists out there here's one of my favourite mash-ups:

FantasyCon Bebop

Went to FantasyCon over the weekend. Caught up with friends, went for a curry, visited Nottingham Castle and its excellent art gallery. Jolly good fun.

And in a totally unrelated matter here's the Cowboy Bebop theme 'cos I'm in the mood for some anime-inspired Japanese jazz. Trust me, it's actually pretty good.

Monster Magnet

'Cos sometimes you just need some psychedelic rock in your life.

Catastrophia

Just heard that I've had a story accepted for Catastrophia, PS Publishing's anthology of post-apocalyptic fiction featuring stories from heavyweights in the fields of science fiction and horror such as Brian Aldiss, Adam Roberts and Simon Clark. (Presumably after getting those three PS ran out of money and had to settle for what they could get.)

Redbelt

Trying to decide if I like David Mamet's Redbelt or not. It's well-acted (even Tim Allen puts in a decent performance) but the plot makes less and less sense as it goes along. Plus, the film's about Brazilian ju-jitsu but half the hero's moves that so impress the media types in the film are stick and knife techniques from the Filipino martial arts.

Still, it was fun to play spot the famous martial artist with the cast -- "Look, it's John Machado. And Randy Couture. And there's Dan Inosanto -- so that's where all the Filipino stuff came from."

No Comic Book Role Shall Escape My Sight

Okay, so Ryan Reynolds is going to play Hal Jordan in the upcoming Green Lantern film. This after already playing Hannibal King and Deadpool. Meanwhile his missus Scarlett Johannson is due to play the Black Widow after already playing Silken Floss in The Spirit and Rebecca in Ghost World. Are they in a tie for the actor who's played the most comic book characters on the big screen or has someone else got them beat?

Lemon Jelly

Ah, I haven't listened to The Staunton Lick in ages.

Fifteen Minutes of Game

Little exercise in timewasting that I stole from Michael Kelly. List 15 books that will always stick with you. But they have to be the first 15 books you think of in 15 minutes. Cue much cursing when you only start thinking of really impressive books after 16 minutes.

Anyway, here's my list:

Black Light -- Stephen Hunter
Axiomatic -- Greg Egan
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- Douglas Adams
The Drive-in -- Joe R Lansdale
The Unquiet -- John Connolly
The Hound of the Baskervilles -- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Wind in the Willows -- Kenneth Grahame
Dune -- Frank Herbert
Dirty White Boys -- Stephen Hunter
Mucho Mojo -- Joe R Lansdale
L.A. Confidential -- James Ellroy
Mortal Stakes -- Robert B Parker
Dr Who and the Planet of the Spiders -- Terrance Dicks
Biggles Hits the Trail -- Captain W.E. Johns
The History of the Runestaff -- Michael Moorcock

Yakety Yak

There's a quick interview with me up on the Thomas Ligotti message
boards if you have absolutely nothing better to do.

http://www.ligotti.net/showthread.php?p=20889#post20889

The Reflecting Eye

A while back I was one of a bunch of authors asked to write some quick comments on their favourite novellas. My choice was 'The Reflecting Eye' by John Connolly. See the final feature at http://ttapress.com/611/their-favourite-novellas/0/5/

My bit's tucked away right at the bottom but I'm sure that's because they listed the contributors in alphabetical order and not just because no one's ever heard of me.

Tales of Mild Uneasiness

Recently read Eduardo Risso's Tales of Terror. Collection of black and white comic strips from the Argentinian artist. Nice artwork (even if I think the visuals don't always flow that well from panel to panel) but the scripts by Carlos Trillos fall pretty flat. There's a couple of okay stories but nothing special and definitely nothing scary. Probably doesn't help that originally they weren't written in English.

Anyway, samples of Risso's artwork and a more positive review of the book over at http://warren-peace.blogspot.com/2007/10/eduardo-rissos-tales-of-terror-i-didnt.html

Everybody Knows Everything

Bit disappointed with The South Bank Show profile of William Goldman. Yeah, they showed great clips from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ("Guns or knives, Butch?") and some of his other films but they skipped A Bridge Too Far and The Princess Bride.

Not to mention the fact that any Goldman fan will have heard all the anecdotes he trotted out about a million times before. I was sitting there guessing which bit of gossip he was going to supply about each clip before he even opened his mouth.

Still an enjoyable programme of course. I just wish it hadn't been so predictable.

Wire We Waiting?

So I've finally bought the last two seasons of The Wire after finding them discounted to a price that I can actually afford. I was absolutely ecstactic ... until I discovered that the series is finally coming to British TV so I didn't need to buy them after all.

Typical.