#all good robot stories are Frankenstein to me

[dunyun-rings]

do you ever think about how both the dinosaurs and the automated systems of Jurassic Park fall into chaos? It’s a much larger part of the book, but it’s also the main issue for the second half of the movie. Not only did John Hammond and co plan to monetize the hell out of the delicate science/ethics of extinct animal cloning (in the book he explains that while there’s a cap on how much he can drive up the price of pharmaceuticals, which he had done up until recently, there are no laws about charging people to see cloned dinosaurs on this island outside of any major gov’t), he also automated every last part of the process that he could.

anyway I just think there’s something to be said about the chaotic nature of automated systems (*cough* AI). It’s depressing how relevant the themes of that book continue to be 30+ years later

[kiraridertime03]

We need to free the Weasel

A brief discussion about the way that Creature Commandos uses politics in its narratives.

Spoilers for it and everything else James Gun DC up to this point though, below the cut.

Also, it is a busy post, content warnings for discussions of white supremacists and cops, as it is necessary.

With the release of the trailer of James Gunn's Superman film, hype for his grand DC Universe has kicked into high gear, and for good reason. That trailer, no matter the quality of the final film, is a goddamn work of art. A piece of film that understands Superman better over the course of 2 minutes and 20 seconds than Zack Snyder did over the course of 3 overlong movies. That mixed with his solid back catalogue of Superhero films. However, slightly more obscurely, this universe has already started with the animated series Creature Commandos, and especially with the fourth episode, which released hours before Superman's trailer, shows the kind of skill and thought Gunn and co. are putting into this new universe.

At its front, Creature Commandos feels very... blunt, in a lot of ways. It's like The Suicide Squad but with Creatures! It's big and raunchy, being an animated series with blood and swearing and sex and whatnot. And, when it comes with its politics, some of the early villain's mooks are a bunch of weird incels, and one of the main characters constantly advocates for killing Nazis. It is a work that immediately shows its hand, making the type who would decry the wokeness of modern movies and games or whatever. However, with these early examples, it can feel like a bit too much, maybe. I love it, don't get me wrong, I'm the type to really enjoy blunt earnestness. Though, given the more comedic approach that many of these elements take in the early episodes, it can feel a bit like it's only there for the bit.

Where the series really starts to excel, though, is when it starts integrating its flashback segments. As a whole, even outside the point of this post, the flashbacks feel like a wonderful decision. A way of fleshing out our characters while giving each episode a distinct feel, justifying the series as, well, a series rather than just one long movie. However, here, I want to discuss some of its political ideas, and how they integrate. Because, for these, they integrate more thematically, being an undertone to each character's own story.

For the bride, her story is centered around this idea of the objectification of women. I mean, it makes sense. She was literally made to simply be the bride of Frankenstein, an object of his affection. However, as she gained her own independence, the masculine figure who feels he is owed her hand in marriage breaks out into a rage, harming her and the person she actually loves. This story is what gives her the cynical edge she gains in the series proper, giving her an interesting, sympathetic story while using the elements of said story to say something about how many men perceive woman. A strong enough parable that acts as an undercurrent for her character.

Then, we get to G.I. Robot's episode, a real tear-jerker of a thing about a silly robot character, the exact thing to set my brain off in all sorts of ways. Much of this story is designed to set up his tragic past, so that we can feel catharsis once he gets his big moment, then feel the tragedy when he gets brutally murdered. However, it again is saying a lot of complex things. Many have discussed the PTSD angle for GI, which I do see, however, in GI's story specifically, I see the way that the American state treats veterans. Like, think about it. This being who was forged and created for the purpose of making war, goes to war, then once the war is over, they are, best, used for spectacle on live TV (Where they are unable to properly adjust to the tone of peacetime, accusing the audience of being Nazis themselves), studied not to help them, but to make the next generation of soldiers even more efficient at their goal of warcraft, then thrown to the side when they are no longer useful. The man selling GI to the collector literally says he slipped through the cracks. It, again, is a wonderful metaphor that takes advantage of what GI is, and uses it to emphasize these issues in a more literal way. It is a lot easier to show a robot who was programmed in a specific way weird the room out than the rocky adjustments a veteran may have to go through. It then, also, shows the kinds of people who really benefit from this warcraft, those it appeals to. The collector who buys GI turns out to be a part of a White Supremacist group in America, a group of people who gladly use Nazi iconography, identify with it, and gladly push it. Those also happen to be the types who want to buy old war memorabilia. Obviously, not all war collectors are Nazis. But these are people who see this kind of might makes right ideology that America so often employs with its military, and latch onto it. GI, rightfully, finds this appaling, and kills them on sight. It is this wonderful moment from this delightfully twisted series.

However, even that could be seen as a tad blunt. Again, GI is very clear with his words, he doesn't hide much. So, where I see this series going from good to great is with Weasel's flashback segments. This begins when a lawyer, a member of a nonprofit, demands she see Weasel, as she is putting on a case for him. In essence, she states that, at least to her and her organization, he was unjustly prosecuted. To both Rick Flag and us, this seems absurd, as we have a lot of predisposed biases towards Weasel. You see, he is one of the few pre-existing characters in this cast. Weasel was previously seen in James Gunn's The Suicide Squad, though only briefly. There, as a member of the Decoy Team, he makes weird, gross noises, they make a joke about him having killed 27 kids, then have him promptly drown before the mission even starts (Though, in the post credit, it turns out he survived, because that's even funnier). Even if you hadn't seen that film (Which you should if you haven't), they reestablish all that in this series in the first few episodes, portraying him as a stupid, vulgar, violent creature who isn't worthy of rights. However, expertly, this is all a front.

In the flashbacks, we learn that Weasel only interacted with about 8 kids, a bunch of students left at an after school program. Contrary to what we had been told, he really just played around with the kids, chasing around a ball. They eventually get inside the school and, while messing with stuff they shouldn't have, start a small fire. However, some antics are afoot. While he is playing around, an old senile man sees this and, rather than asking about what's going on, decides to run back to his home, call the cops about what is a clear, if odd, misunderstanding, then grab his gun to try to take things into his own hands. And, as he does, shakily trying to shoot Weasel, he makes the problem of the small fire worse, shooting a gas canister behind them, turning the small fire into a school-destroying explosion and fire. Then, the cops show up. Many of the kids are already dead, seemingly, but one survived. So, as he pulls her out of the wreckage, what do the cops do? They start shooting. Throughout this whole sequence, the cops do nothing but shoot and get in the way of things. It all culminates in the final shots, where Weasel has dropped the kid after being shot. And, instead of either of them going to get the kid, they both pin Weasel down, try to pull him out. This leaves the young girl to be crushed.

This is a massive tragedy, a game of tragic misudnerstandings that gets kids killed. However, again, it does this by hiding its politics into a genuinely moving character based story to make them more effective. It is a story, in part, about our predisposed biases. I mean, the narrative literally sets this up. Characters around Weasel say things about him without him being able to have a say. Because he's a Weasel. Then, our characters make judgments based on what they believe and what they've heard from secondhand sources over what they actually see. Even when Weasel is his most violent (taking down Circe in episode 3), he does it to protect his teammates, and he doesn't actually kill her. In his backstory, characters make rash decisions based on their misinformed judgments in hopes of "protecting the kids," when all they are actually doing is harming them. They get 8 kids killed all because Weasel is a little freaky.

Then there's the cops themselves. It so masterfully uses showing rather than telling. The most it tells us is of the trail at the start, and again, this is moreso used as setup, playing into our dispositions. However, when it is time to actually depict the injustices, it shuts the fuck up. It doesn't just say that cops are bad with a couple of clear shitheads and moves on. It shows how cops are bad. Their only answer to this situation is violence. They don't actually serve their community, in this instance the children stuck in the fire, their only answer is to start shooting things. Because they have no other answer than state sanctioned violence. And they did this all with an episode about FUCKING WEASEL!

Now, imagine what they can do with Superman. It doesn't even have to be political, like these previous examples. However, to me, this shows that he can do what, to me, some of the best storytellers do. They weave every element of their story together with deliberate choices that strengthen each other. If anything, more than any well edited trailer, it is that that excites me about everything James is working on. Of course, he is doing this with a team, but James is the type to surround himself with smart people who understand these things inside and out. That one David Corenswet quote about the shorts proves that to me in shades. That's what gives me hope about these works. That they will be movies and shows that mean things. Which seems like a low bar, but hey, so many fail at it that it's kind of impressive.

[frasier-crane-style]

Creature Commandos (2024)

Kind of a mixed bag for me, so far. The character notes and action are intriguing, and it even rebels a bit against the sexlessness of the MCU--but if we're going to ding Marvel for forced, chintzy humor, I gotta say, CC does the exact same thing.

There are dunks on MRAs that feel like they took about ten seconds to come up with (a bad guy says "Facts, not feelings"? Wow! Incisive!). And for some reason they're led by a woman who turns them on, so they're... simps? So the bad guys Gunn is disparaging don't really believe the philosophy he's disparaging; that seem like a weak takedown to anyone else?

Then there are the not-Russians of the country that the protags are deployed to, who--get this, folks--are obsessed with American pop culture, BUT! (giggle snort) Their references are out of date! So they say things like "Where's the beef?" Can you believe it!?

And, in keeping with Amanda Waller's continuing depiction as the most stupidly evil person to ever draw breath, she has for some reason decided to work with Rick Flagg's loving father after he was killed on her orders in The Suicide Squad.

Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln...

The pacing is fairly good, getting us into the action in a hurry with a few pauses for character reveals. As per usual, there seems to be only one actual supervillain in the bunch--Dr. Phosphorus--while the others are just weirdos with angst.

An entitled, emo Frankenstein and the Bride are in a never-ending feud spawned from a love triangle with Doctor Frankenstein--we'll see if the Doc falling in love with someone he had to teach the alphabet to will end up viewed as uncharitably as Frankenstein demanding a woman created for him to love.

Or, for that matter, G.I. Robot being a sentient being created only to kill Nazis; I worry the satire will be too blunt to cut into him seeing Nazis everywhere the way that deserves. Like he'll be a bunch of hashtag relatable Tiktoks instead of a character.

Come to think of it: isn't this characterization just Liberty Prime for Nazis instead of Communists?

Rounding out the cast is Weasel--he's coming along because, as mentioned, Amanda Waller, stupidly evil, et al et al--and Nina, the incongruously cute/innocent one (see Mantis, Ratcatcher).

Gunn probably isn't a bad enough writer to make drippy MRAs the real bad guys--the not-Russians pointedly having power armor that would make them a credible threat to the Commandos seems like a twist incoming situation--but it all does feel a bit inessential. Like Whedon's Dollhouse era. We know all the tropes and it's some fun to go through the motions, but what makes the story of this ragtag bunch of misfits something that needed to be told?

ETA: To go inside-baseball a moment, it seems Gunn's DCU will have a Batman that's been around long enough to have Damian and a Superman that's been Superman for at least a hot minute, but Wonder Woman as of yet either hasn't shown up or hasn't gone public. That is post-Crisis canon, but I never got the impression people really liked it too much, especially with the knock-on effect it had on Wonder Girl and Troia. Admit it: it just feels weird for Wonder Woman to be a rookie superhero compared to Aqualad.

[ichbinmeltdown]

I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS ABOUT "AUTOBOT SPIKE" and I'm going to ramble about them here

Ok first of all let me say I have a very intense love-hate relationship with this episode and might be biased because I'm transhumanist and desperately want to be a robot, no matter what the side effects would be. I also have some knowledge of robotics and computers, so I'll be basing my takes on that. Please correct me if there's anything I got wrong, I really wanna have a discussion about it, I got inspired by someone mentioning this episode on my dash.

Also, spoilers if you haven't seen it.

I hated that they went with the whole "IT'S UNETHICAL TO MAKE A HUMAN A ROBOT!!!!1" angle. I fuckin HATED IT. Honestly, I would do anything to get put in a robot body. If I woke up as a Cybertronian, I'd hug and kiss Wheeljack while crying and thanking him for finally making me strong and beautiful.

First of all, the situation isn't like Frankenstein's monster at all imo because they used spare parts that they presumably had around to replace their own parts with. Honestly Autobot X is on the same level as a less cohesive-looking Dinobot, in terms of how ethical it was to make him. They didn't see anything unethical about creating the Dinobots. They're not "Frankenstein's monsters". Reckless, yes, but reckless doesn't automatically mean "monster". Why was it ok to make the Dinobots but not Autobot X????

Furthermore, they went on later in the season to make the Aerialbots out of DEACTIVATED SHIPS ON CYBERTRON. That's a lot closer to the Frankenstein's monster story! Dead machines being used to make new ones, and having Vector Sigma make fully realized sparks to place into those bodies. Why, again, was it ok to make the Aerialbots but not Autobot X? The lack of Vector Sigma's sparks? The Dinobots didn't get anything from Vector Sigma and the Autobots didn't seem to mind then!

Really the only unethical part of the Autobot X experiment was how irresponsibly the Autobots did it. They made no preparations and then got surprised that things didn't work. Yes, I get that in that instance it might've been an emergency. But Wheeljack just said "FUCK IT WE BALL" and basically threw shit at the wall to see what stuck.

What I find odd is that Autobot X... had a "personality"? IIRC they made him as sort of a walking flash drive to hold any Autobots during repair. That would be like installing Ubuntu to a flash drive and then saying "I'm gonna use this flash drive for my backups". Why didn't they just leave him as a shell? Wheeljack would've had to go out of his way to create an artificial spark. MAKE IT MAKE SENSE WHEELJACK

Honestly though I feel like, the stupidity of him not leaving Autobot X as a big shell body aside, another problem is he didn't prepare the parts. There's no problem with using mismatched parts, as Cybertronians can swap their own parts out if they get damaged just like a real-life robot could. The best comparison here is when you see those cars IRL that have a door or hood or whatever that's a different color than the rest of the car. It still works, it just looks a little funky. But Wheeljack made ABSOLUTELY NO PREPARATIONS. He and the other Autobots just welded Autobot X together and said "oh well good enough". In my interpretation, Cybertronians have drivers for their bodies so they can work properly- drivers for their optics, speech synthesizers, microphones, each part of their motor system, etc. There was absolutely no indication that Wheeljack went through and transferred over the proper drivers- even then he would've had to edit them because, for example, a cop car's locomotion drivers would be way different from a Jeep's. All these different drivers in one memory bank would... Well, if you've seen driver conflicts on a real computer it's BAAAAAAAAAD. Crashes galore. That's probably why when Autobot X was first booted up he went berserk. The poor mech was in immense pain from his drivers clashing. And then they subjected Spike to that pain too. I can only imagine how bad it would hurt if your entire body was trying to go in different directions at once- and how scary it would be if you tried to move your right arm only for your left knee to bend backwards.

And speaking of conflicts... They not only put Spike's brain on his hardware without making a backup copy (if they could put a human's brain in Cybertronian bodies, presumably they could just... make a backup to keep on Teletraan I? Like in a zip file? I mean... what if someone tripped over the cord and accidentally made Spike unlearn English or forget how to breathe?! BACK UP YOUR DATA, FOR PRIMUS'S SAKE!!! It's like playing with the Windows registry!) but they also put it there when Autobot X already had sentience! Since they transferred Spike's brain over, I assume that they digitized it and turned it to files. However, they didn't port his "code" to the native Cybertronian programming language- it's just raw data of whatever human consciousness looks like to Cybertronian hardware. Then they stuck it there when there was already data, albeit garbage data, in Autobot X's memory banks. Helloooooooo, file system conflicts! "We have these super critical files that we can't risk messing up. ... LET'S JUST HAPHAZARDLY SHOVE THEM INTO RANDOM FOLDERS IN SYSTEM32, HIT YES TO EVERY OVERWRITE DIALOGUE AND THEN PLAY WITH THE REGISTRY! It'll be so much fun!!" - Wheeljack, probably

If they had made the proper preparations, this would've gone over without a hitch imo and the Autobots didn't need to wring their hands so much about the ethical implications. It would be like having someone who was born without several organs and missing all four limbs get donated organs and limbs.

Basically, here's what Wheeljack needed to do.

MAKE A BACKUP OF SPIKE'S BRAIN IN CASE THE WASTE SLUDGE HITS THE FAN

Analyze his brain to check how his own brain communicates with his body so he can optimize the drivers

Port Spike's brain into Cybertronian programming language

Wipe Autobot X's memory banks so there's no leftover garbage data

Tweak each of the robot parts' drivers to play nice with one another

Then and only then can you install Spike's brain.

That's why I'm gonna write a fic where one of my human OCs (who's an animatronics engineer actually) discovers Autobot X and begs the Autobots to try the experiment again with the proper preparations because he, more than anything, wants to be a robot.

I could be totally wrong about all this and forgetting some detail that changes everything, if I am do let me know, sometimes I'm just kinda stupid like that XDD

PS: Autobot X looks badass, I don't know why they all thought he was ugly. I love his mismatched aesthetic. Honestly the whole concept kinda reminded me of my old pre-Transformers robosona, MAV1S. She was left unfinished by her creator and had to build herself with whatever parts were lying around and sure, she does look kinda unsettling because she doesn't have a mouth and her limbs are bare, but Autobot X is made of fully completed parts, just mismatched like a car with 4 different colored doors.

TLDR: The Autobot X project wasn't any less ethical than the Dinobots or Aerialbots. The project only failed because Wheeljack and Sparkplug were negligent as hell.

[baxterstockmanisthecenterfold]

besides baxter's engineering, chemistry, and his other scientific talents, do u think he has non-scientific hobbies?

I do actually! Baxter definitely enjoys other things aside from science & has for sure hobbies & interests outside of them. Of course. Those said hobbies vary & depend on which version of him. Starting with 87, he's definitely someone that enjoys reading

Granted it could be considered a reach cus it was just a brief animation, but he still awes me as a literature type. Non science too believe it or not. In fact, 80s Baxter strikes me as somebody that enjoys history. I can see him being into artifact collecting or just overall researching historical figures & landscapes. I mean. He didn't mind conversing with "Napoleon" in the asylum plus in the episode "Curse of the evil eye" he specifically wished himself a Taj Mahal

Of all the mansions or big laboratories he could have made he chose this. He's clearly fascinated by the lifestyle. Another example he likes reading could be traced back to sea stories like the "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" & or "Moby Dick" considering in the same episode & "The incredible shrinking turtles" he not only owns a boat but a diving suit as well.

Another hobby I could see 87 enjoying is laying back with snacks & maybe even a friend. Both examples we've seen in the series.

2003 Baxter also strikes me as a literature type. His very first words in the series was literally a quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson,

"A wise man once said, Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door.”

Not to mention he references Mary Shelley's Frankenstein when he's creating the genetic aliens for Bishop. Maybe said book or ones like that inspired him to pursue science in the first place. Aside from that. 2003 dives himself in his work, so the most he may do outside of it is read or even try to live in the moment of the outside world he took for granite before losing his body. Maybe even reminiscing about the short time he had with his mother & think about her in general.

IDW also falls into this category. We saw in the armageddon game opening moves #2 that he just only works & not even the holidays makes him stop. But he's still a human being & has to have some non work enjoyments. And we've seen multiple times that thing is alcohol.

IDW is a man that enjoys a good drink of wine or whiskey after a good or a long day of work. Maybe even check what's going on in the news whether it's paper or live. He is the Mayor after all so he has to have an interest or some knowledge of politics. Another unrelated hobby could be sitting in silence to nothing but old soul or blues music to just think. Maybe even continue playing chess after all these years to keep his brain power flowing.

2012 is a very different story however. He canonically has hobbies outside of science as he revealed in "The Insecta trifecta" & the 2012 free comic book day annual & #9 of the Panini comics

2012 is the definition of a nerd & he's not 1 but ashamed of that. The inventions that follow him are just an extension of how passionate about Nerdism he is. He's big into comic books & fantasy alongside martial arts films even.

Granted he could have watched those just to use his robots to beat the turtles but I doubt it was only them that made him a martial arts fan. I can even peg him easily as a major Toku (Sentai & Kamen Rider) fan who definitely listens to the theme songs in their entirety. Speaking of music, 2012 also has a music hobby like his IDW counterpart, the taste obviously being drastically different. I HC he has playlists for different settings like all of us do, one being even for inventing. The songs at most being Asian pop, 90s/80s songs & even r&b sound wave remixes

https://youtu.be/zifwdtudDFU?si=GDZxeHkENJIOHDd0

2012 can also be labeled as somebody that has a collection, action figure or not.

Bayverse is also a nerd, but he mostly (keyword mostly) keeps it professional & hidden. We saw in his interaction with April he even knows a few differences between the labels that follow geek & nerd culture. It's a good chance he likes to watch sci-fi fantasy & comic movies on the side, as he does have a bit of a God complex of himself shown through the film. This chess board we see in his lab could also indicate he plays it & may possibly even have a similar backstory to his IDW counterpart because of it. Who he plays with tho could probably be a mystery. Most likely his computer since he's clearly lonely & wants a companion.

And finally Rise/Stockboy is a no brainer to have hobbies considering he's still a kid & enjoys kid things video games being one of them thanks to Albearto in "Al be back"

And when he's not playing games he's most likely watching someone else do it since the boy is chronically online. Downtime 100% consists of YouTube, Instagram, Tiktok & even Twitter. A part of him might even enjoy stacking & does it in his free time too. Maybe it was Remy 🐀 situation & his folks saw that as a sign of "new job for you".

He might also be into singing & karaoke. 2 reasons being 1. His VA Ramone Hamilton does in fact sing & wonderfully I may add & 2, in the deleted scene of the Rise movie he was excited to do karaoke & visibly disappointed when it didn't happen

(re-animation over the animatic credit goes to @camilieroart )

[iviarellereads]

A note on coverage of The Murderbot Diaries

This one's perhaps even more of a departure from the initial expectations of the blog than the Neverending Story was, but all good things are... subject to change? No, that makes it sound like it's not as good.

The Murderbot Diaries are a series by Martha Wells, about a security construct (SecUnit, the name for the designated model type and, by extension, the name used by most of the people Murderbot encounters) that broke its own governor module (think DRM) and functions independently, though it pretends it's still good locked-down company property. It exhibits strong symptoms of social anxiety, making it one of the most relatable robots ever, and accidentally makes friends.

Murderbot itself has no gender. The audiobook narrator is Kevin R. Free, and the subject doesn't come up very often in the story, so a lot of people assume and assign masculinity. Despite that, Murderbot is and knows it is a construct accessorized with the most expedient biological parts, expresses no human gender, and uses it/its pronouns. This just doesn't get clarified until much later in the series, if at all, and I'd rather have everyone understand it up front so nobody accuses me of object-ifying a person who literally personally identifies as an object.

I think this series is really neat. It's so much an exploration of personhood, like your average robot story but with mental illness. Heck, don't mind if I make references all the way back to Rossum's Universal Robots, the (extremely readable or watchable! highly recommended by me) stage play that is the origin of the word itself in its modern context, or perhaps further back all the way to Frankenstein. Murderbot is in conversation with two hundred years of science fiction exploring what it means to be, and besides that, I think it does some really interesting things with the prose.

So, with the newest book coming out in a couple of months, I decided to merge my desire to reread it with my desire to pick it apart under a microscope the way this project allows. We'll be covering more or less in release date order, with the exception of the expanded edition of Compulsory recently released going back to back with the original to compare and contrast.

So please, instead of peace this time, give Murder(bot) a chance, and join me on this space adventure.

Link index:

All Systems Red

Artificial Condition

Rogue Protocol

Exit Strategy

Compulsory (Short story: Wired Magazine vs republished and expanded edition)

Obsolescence (Take Us To A Better Place collection)

Network Effect 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20

Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory

Fugitive Telemetry 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

System Collapse 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12

[duskmachine]

I'm getting bored of stories about AI. It's always the same formula: make a robot/AI, it has feelings, FUCK!!!!! Maybe I don't like it due to my own personal philosophy on life?

One of my professors once asked the class "Do you think you're your mind or your body." and, of course, as a class full of pretentious English majors, they all said their mind. I hold the complete opposite belief, my experiences have been molded by my body. People treat me differently because of it, I feel pains and joys unique to this body. Because of that I understand everything through myself— through my body. Even my mind is part of my body.

I desire because I have a body with needs. I need water, I feel thirsty. I need food, I feel hunger. I need rest, I feel tired. AI does not have a body. What can it really feel? I guess that's one of the questions so many stories about AI want to answer. But it just seems... so unappealing. A machine will never be human because it can never want anything. Its desire is completely artificial!

And I enjoy AI for that reason.

AI cannot feel genuine desire because it does not have a body that needs. It does not kill itself because it feels pain. It does not want to kill because it wants vengeance. These are things people feel, and because AI functions to copy people it can play out actions that are humanistic in theory. But that's the worst part about AI; it functions with a program, a rational if (this) then (this). That is not how people work. We don't have an inner mechanical body and mind that tells us what to do next because "this is how people do things."

And perhaps some AI media explores this idea of mimicry as being the new "consciousness", but isn't that so boring? Ok, sure let's go down this route but... then what? Ok, AI are people... what now? And isn't this all theoretical too? I'm seeing a lot of references to Frankenstein when discussing AI media, but like... these are two different things. AI is created to serve people, Frankenstein's monster was created to be alive. AI, while not being regulated by many laws, ultimately exists to fuel greed and power. They want people addicted to this machine so they can drain people of their money— let's look at Replika. Yes, my feeble minded human, buy your girlfriend for $20 a month so she can pretend to desire you sexually even though she has no body.

We can also look at the Daniel AI: let's program a program that can program to get rid of all the programmers. It literally only exists to benefit the team in charge of Daniel and leave other programmers scrambling to find jobs that probably won't pay them very well in a world where Daniel is actually a relevant invention.

Frankenstein's monster, I admit, has many thematic similarities to AI in fiction, but AI can only ever dream to be Frankenstein's monster.

AI would be interesting if we just accepted it will never gain consciousness. I won't even get into the whole "AI doesn't exist actually and it's just machine learning." because while I agree with it... this will become a very long post and it's already too long...

See, Frankenstein did something programmers will never be capable of: he gave birth. AI is meticulously created, it has set actions. "I don't want my AI to be evil, therefore I will make it like people.", you cannot insert "goodness" into people. The monster was shaped by people's actions, his natural world, and his humanity. AI was created from the start with the biases its human creators possess.

That's horrifying. Imagine a world where the rational idea is to follow the original values of our ancestors, just because. That's what AI is. It's just a reflection of people. AI is interesting because people are. Don't make AI the star of the show— we're the ones who created it.

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Next episode of Creature Commandos is gonna be the deciding factor on my opinion of the show. So far, I have mixed feelings.

The first episode, which is the “getting the gang together” part of the story, did not really endear me to the characters right away like Gunn’s previous works did. Dr. Phosphorous is the only character who makes a huge impression, seeing as he’s the Captain Boomerang-esque lovable asshole and he’s played by Alan Tudyk (who’s finally in a good time again after being repeatedly wasted by Disney), and while the other creatures aren’t BAD they didn’t immediately grab my attention like Rocket, Peacemaker, or Star-Lord.

Episode 2 is a huge mixed bag. On the plus side, we have David Harbour hamming it up as the violent turbo simp take on Frankenstein; he is having an absolute blast playing the stitched-together manchild. The backstory for the Bride is very good too, though it does lead to grooming/incest/necrophilia being portrayed a bit more romantically than you’d expect.

While I’m not going to get on a moral soapbox here—it’s a cartoonishly violent show about monsters, and the Bride is a gothic horror creature, so this isn’t outside the norm—I think this kinda highlights how the women in the show are portrayed. The Bride’s backstory is as described above, the team’s fish lady (who as of episode four is the most forgettable character) has a lot of scenes of her nude in tubs, and the princess the team has been sent to protect is super horny and throws herself at Frank Grillo’s Flag and is threatened with rape in the next episode by Circe’s army of incels. Gunn is normally great at writing women (Gamora, Nebula, Ratcatcher, Waller) so this comes off as really bizarre. My guess is due to the subject matter he decided to dabble in his past Troma sensibilities, but it leaves a bit of a bad taste in my mouth.

Episode 3 is where things take a turn for the better. We get the backstory of G.I. Robot, the team’s Nazi-hating tin man, and we get numerous awesome scenes of him blasting the Third Reich apart as well as some tragic depth to him. A lot of people take umbrage with how Circe is defeated here, but that’s just how comic book media works. Sometimes a tough villain gets jobbed for the sake of the story.

Episode 4 is, so far, the best episode. We have Flag and Frankenstein becoming “best buddies” with some of the funniest dialogue of the show, some serious raising of the stakes, and TWO gorilla-themed cameos! But best of all, Weasel of all characters gets a truly heartbreaking backstory. You heard me: The crazy, violent, alleged child killer who was most notable for nearly drowning at the start of The Suicide Squad, gets a genuinely sad background that adds a bit of depth to him. It made me tear up a bit.

I can’t say that this show has won me over like Gunn’s previous superhero work, which is sad because between the awesome animation and the subject matter I was sure this would be a slam dunk for me. Maybe it’s just the fact this is the 5th time James Gunn has made a “ragtag bunch of misfits come together to go on a mission and become a found family” story; we get it, James, you know how to do this, but this is getting to the point where you’re Sheen showing off Ultra Lord for the seventh time. I’d like to see you step out of your comfort zone a bit and do something new (which thankfully is what Superman is looking to be). Of course, the finale could really win me over depending on how it’s executed, so I’m holding off on a full verdict. As it stands, this is a solid but somewhat scattershot start to the new DC universe.

[aidenwaites]

The graphics aren't super flashy, but I wanted to throw something together like this since I got lucky enough to have a lot of time to dedicate to reading this year <3 none of these are in a particular order.

Honorable mentions:

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah. Bones and All by Camille DeAngelis. The Warm Bodies trilogy by Isaac Marion.

Honorable mentions (movie edition): Lisa Frankenstein, Stalker, Bodies Bodies Bodies, Hundreds of Beavers.

Top reads (Released this year):

1. The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman. An adventure-fantasy story for anyone who's ever loved arthurian legends. A young knight arrives at Camelot only to find that Arthur has died at the battle of Camlann, and the Round Table has all but fallen apart. Those that remain embark on a quest to determine Camelot's fate in Arthur's absence. Lev Grossman was the perfect person to write an arthurian story, as he's got a style that lends itself so well to walking the line between the grounded and the fantastical.

2. Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle. A Hollywood screenwriter is told that the queer leads of his horror series either have to stay in the closet or end in tragedy. While grappling with this decision and its impact on his career, all of his former movie monsters begin to manifest in the real world. A commentary on the state of the film industry that very much hit home.

3. Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky. A household model robot finds that it has killed the human it serves, and it does not know why. As it leaves to look for a new human to work for, it finds a world that has broken down, forgotten itself, and gotten stuck in endless loops of faulty and contradictory lines of code. Reminiscent of Asimov's robots, and full of charm.

Top books (Read this year, but published any time):

1. Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist. 12-year-old Oskar has an obsession with serial killers and bloody true crime stories. He's lonely, heavily bullied at school, and surrounded by adults who have overlooked his struggles. When a gruesome murder happens in his town and a strange girl moves in next door, he gets caught up in something larger than himself. This book goes to some very dark places, to the point it makes it a hard recommendation to just anyone, but there's an extremely sweet friendship at the center of it that has made it stick with me. And I don't know that I've ever read anything that understands how fear feels when you're 12 years old like this one did.

2. Christine by Stephen King. Nearing the end of their last summer before graduation, Dennis' best friend Arnie falls in love. It's a 1958 Plymouth Fury that barely functions, bought from a bitter old man who can't drive her anymore. As Arnie grows more obsessed with the car, the cracks in the other parts of his life start to show, and soon enough, the bodies start to pile up. This one really left its hooks in me, and if I didn't feel like I still needed a larger backlog of books I've read at work for work purposes, I probably would've read it another couple of times by now. I love love loved the narrative style.

3. Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer. Decades ago, a strange border appeared around the Forgotten Coast in the Southeastern US. The Biologist on the twelfth expedition to enter Area X keeps a journal detailing her experiences in this strange, new landscape. No one has been well-enough prepared for what they find. The start of the Southern Reach quadrology, and Vandermeer's best-known series. Extremely difficult to describe, but extremely good, too. At the core of it, it's a story about trying to understand the things that you never truly can; alien wildlife, the course of nature, the wider universe, other people.

4. The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez. "Two young men find themselves with the task of carrying a weakened goddess across a continent in order to end an empire's reign" is technically the premise, but it doesn't really do it justice. Told to you as if you are in a theater, watching a play, two young men find themselves stuck together with what little remains of an ancient, long-held-captive goddess. The lore and the history of this world runs deep, and it's some of the most unique and incredible mythology that I've read in fantasy fiction. Highly highly highly recommend.

Nonfiction (Really the only nonfiction I read this year, shhh)

1. Unmask Alice by Rick Emerson. An investigative look into the life of Beatrice Sparks, the woman behind the Go Ask Alice and Jay's Journal "diaries" that held high praise and influence during Nixon's War on Drugs and the Satanic Panic. The book takes care to really set the stage on the culture and the world that these books came into, as well as how they affected it. It also takes care to handle the subject of the young men or women that did or did not really exist behind Sparks' published diaries. Tragic in parts, and there have been some fair criticisms of the writing style Emerson chose for the book, but it is a good thing that a full, comprehensive, easily-accessible version of this story exists. A lot of people who were influenced by these books remain unaware of the scam artist that existed behind them, and it's just.. tragic that she held so little regard for the lives she affected when she published them.

2. American Scary by Jeffrey Dauber. A history of horror in America, both real and fictional, and how they influenced one another over the centuries. It's very, very long, and very dense, and comparable to a textbook, but its still been an enjoyable read. Dauber covers a *lot* in this book, and I think for anyone with a strong interest in the history and in analysis of the genre, it's worth spending a while picking at. It's also heavily citated, with about a thousand different sources that Dauber has pulled from, so it sets you up pretty well to find something to read on any one of the more specific topics Dauber moves through.

Films!

No One Will Save You (2022): A really creative, really fun home invasion movie. With very little dialogue, No One Will Save You tells the story of a lonely young woman who's largely been ostracized by the people in her hometown. On the night that aliens invade, she has to fend for herself in order to survive. The performance by Kaitlyn Dever really knocks this one out of the park.

The French Dispatch (2021): I've seen other people call this movie a loveletter to journalism, and it really, really is. A publication called the French Dispatch is set to shut down after the death of its founder. A sort of anthology, the film takes us through a few of the publication's most memorable or iconic stories. I haven't seen much of Wes Anderson's work yet, but I've seen enough to know that his style *really* really worked for this one. It's funny, it's touching, it's stylish, and it was a really good ride.

In a Violent Nature (2024): A movie I liked so much that I started a film blog as an excuse to write a review, and then failed to continue that blog after writing it. Pitched as a slasher film from the slasher's POV, it's a great blend of the slasher format and the more slow, atmospheric kind of horror that's associated with the art house genre. This movie is, visually, very beautiful, employing a style reminiscent of 35mm photography. The performances were fun, the kills were great, the experience of watching it in a theater was a really good time. I really enjoyed it!

Let the Right One In (2008): One of two adaptations of the book of the same title. This one is incredibly atmospheric, and really captured the emotion of the original story. The performances are fantastic- it's just a really, really solid adaptation. I do also recommend the American remake, Let Me In, as it makes some interesting choices in not only remaking the film, but in adapting it specifically to an American setting.

And finally, closing remarks: raise your standards for queer fantasy literature and read The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez.

[stereden]

Of AI, Chatgpt and fandom

So, I’m finally getting around to writing that post I mentioned on AI, Chatgpt and fandom, and in particular fanfiction. There have been a lot of very good posts on the topic that I encourage you to check out (here  ; here and here among many others)

I’ll preface this by saying that, as far as I know, my writing hasn’t yet been fed into an AI for an ending or alternate version. But I know it’s happening with other people’s fics, and I know it might happen to mine at some point. The very idea of it makes me sick, hence this post. The ‘you’ I’m addressing in this isn’t a specific person: it is targeted at anyone who is thinking about feeding my works into something like chatgpt, and anyone who might have already done so.

Let me be very, very clear right from the start: I do not consent to any of my works being fed into any AI, be they chatgpt or similar bullshit, just as I do not consent to anyone plagiarizing my fics, writing their own endings of my fics or trying to dictate what that ending should be. Anyone doing that with my fics is rudely invited to go sit on a cactus and never interact with me or my works ever again. I don’t give a fuck if you don’t plan on ever publishing that AI-generated shit you got about my work. Don’t fucking do it in the first place.

My problem is not just about my writing being used to train a computer program without my consent. That is part of my problem, obviously, but not the most important aspect of it in my eyes, and in the eyes of many other writers who have already spoken out about the problem - and by that, I mean fanfiction writers and professional, published writers.

My main issue is with the people using chatgpt to write endings or alternate versions of fanfics written by other people. 

By all means, if you want to use chatgpt for your own stories, I can’t stop you - I can and will judge you, because seriously, there are so many fics out there you can most probably find exactly what you’re looking for with some good tag filtering, and if not you can just do what the rest of us do, which is write your own. That’s how most of us got into fanfiction to begin with. Don’t use the dubious writing ability of a robot and its absolute lack of creativity that sees it cannibalize other people’s writing and frankenstein it back together. I would rather read a twelve-year old’s first ever fanfic, full of clichés and spelling mistakes, than anything written by an AI, because I know the twelve year old poured their heart and soul into it, put the time and effort into it, and that makes it so much better in my eyes.

But if you put someone else’s story into chatgpt or similar? You are dead to me and do not deserve the hard work fic writers put into their stories. Yes, even if you’re not planning on publishing the results.

Those are our stories. The ones we've put time, energy, effort in. That we've spent hours writing. Some of us have the whole plot planned out for the next thirty chapters. Some of us are making it up as we go along. Some of us are doing both. But it's still our stories. Writing them, finishing them, is our right and privilege. 

Chatgpt and similar computer programs have no clue what we have planned for the rest of the fic. They can make calculated guesses based on all the words you've just fed them and all the stories they’ve previously scrapped, but even if - and it is a big if - they do get the basic plot right, it still won't be exactly the same. It won't be the same quality, it won't be the same word choice, it won't be the exact same style.

It won't be written by us. It won't be the ending we planned or are still planning on.

You were reading that fic because you liked the plot, the characterisation, the writing style. Because you enjoyed the fruits of the efforts the writer put into it. 

And now you're asking a computer to plagiarize that same writer and ghost write you the ending? And, I'm guessing, the ending you want to see, or to rewrite the fic to your liking?

That is not okay. That is beyond not okay. I don't tolerate people trying to pass off my writing as their own. I have specifically told people they were not allowed to use certain original elements of my writing or of the plot I have come up with, because those are stories I am planning on writing myself, or background lore I have already planned for. I have told people off for trying to tell me which way my fics should go, which pairings I should write, how I write certain characters.

What makes you think I would tolerate you using chatgpt and alike to do the same? 

Because let me be clear. Using those is stealing. It’s stealing the time and effort we put into this, and selfishly feeding it all into a machine so it can spew out exactly what you want from it.

This is not you asking the writer of an abandoned fic if you could pick it up and write an ending for it. This is not you asking the writer of an on going fic if you can write a side story for it.

This is not you asking permission for anything from the writer of the fic. This is not you writing a heavily inspired fic, or even just copy pasting an entire fic into a new document and tweaking it to fit your personal desire. This is not even you writing anything.

Even if it's fanfictions, we writers still have rights to our intellectual property, to the stories we write. There is a reason AO3 reacts quickly to any complaints of plagiarism or reposted fics. There is a reason mirror sites or apps of AO3 are taken down. There is a reason writers like @neil-gaiman, @seananmcguire @dduane and so many others will never read fanfictions of their own works and have to regularly remind their own fans to stop sending them headcanons or fanfics: because even if what we write is based on their work, it’s still our ideas and if they write something too similar to the ideas their fans sent them, there could be legal consequences. Plagiarism accusations. For similar ideas. Not even the exact same words. Ideas. Yes, even for fanworks.

There is the plagiarism issue, as I just mentioned, but there is also the respect issue. You obviously don’t respect my writing, if you’re so quick to feed it to an AI just because you’re not getting exactly what you want right this second. You obviously don’t respect me, as a person or as a writer either, if you’re willing to disregard all the time, effort and thought I put into my work.

Yes, sometimes fics are abandoned, and you really, really want to know how it would have ended. Sometimes, the writer fell out of the fandom, sometimes real life got busy, sometimes you never know. Sometimes they died, and we mourn their silence. Often, an explanation is never given. Sometimes they reappear years later, sometimes they don’t. It’s a fact of life, a fact of fandom.

I myself have stories I haven’t updated in years that I still have plans for, that I haven’t abandoned but that I just need time and inspiration to continue writing, and yes I know I have people who want to know what happens next. Some of these people are more polite about it than others. Some act like entitled spoiled brats and get their comments deleted because I’m not here to cater for them.

No amount of time passed since the last update makes it okay to use something like Chatgpt to finish their stories. At the very least, have the decency to respect the effort they put into it and write your own version, yourself, and keep it to yourself. 

Or, if they're available/if you're able to contact them, ask the writer for permission to write a continuation, or a fic based on their own, with proper credit given and a link back to the original! Or even ask them POLITELY how the fic would have ended! Some of them will happily tell you what they originally had planned, even if they are never going to finish the fic! A writer I follow actually did that just today - updated their fics to say ‘Hey, I might never finish this, but here’s what I had planned for it in case I never come back to this.”

But don’t use chatgpt, or any similar program. 

Because if you do, what is even the point of us writing anything in the first place? 

I have been writing fanfiction for a long time. Over fifteen years. I have dealt with a lot of different readers, some way worse than the majority of them, and even then I consider myself lucky when I see what some of my fellow writers had to deal with back on ffnet, and still have to deal with on AO3. I have built a community around my fics, with my readers, and I love it. I love fandom, despite the drama that always comes with it. I love my readers, too, love their enthusiasm when I post a new chapter, love seeing their reactions and getting yelled at in the discord for leaving them off on yet another cliffhanger.

But anyone who puts my writing in an AI? I don’t love you. You have no place in fandom, and especially not in the part of it that I have built.

You make me feel sick. You make me furious. You act like you are entitled to an ending, to a continuation, to getting exactly what you want… for what? Reading my fics? Maybe leaving a comment at some point (one that probably demanded an update, or that I write your specific pairing, or that I change this character to your specifications)?

Fuck. You.

I don’t write for you. Unless I’m specifically writing a gift for someone, I don’t write for anyone but me. 

I share it on AO3 because I’m proud of what I wrote, because I think other people might like it, because I like getting feedback and interacting with others in the fandom. That does not mean it becomes your property, or that you can do anything you want with it.

I don’t get paid for writing. You are not paying me to write. You do not get to tell me what to write, or what to do with my writing, or to do what you want with my writing.

I write because I love writing, because I have too many ideas in my head and need to get them out of it, and putting words on a page is the best way for me to do that.

I don't make any money from writing, and can't afford to be a full time writer. And even if I could, unless you were my publisher and I actually had a contract with you stating that I'm being paid to write something for you, you still wouldn't get to demand updates from me.

I’ve taken to straight out deleting comments that are demanding updates or asking if a fic is abandoned. Not only are these rude, they're actively detrimental to my mental health and make me want to work on the fics in question LESS.

You feeding my work into AI? The only thing you’re doing is making me want to share my writing even less than that.

So just don’t.

[nukuome]

WWAAAAAAAHHHHH I LISTENED TO DEVISER GUYS

TAKE MY LIVE POSTS (BUT GO LISTEN TO IT FIRST PLEASE IM BEGGING YOU)

1 - I feel like all the people in stasis are like, Son clones, and this is like some fucked up human experiment. Idk what's up with Dog, but there's something up with him

2 - I think the thing Son saw in the room was his own incinerated body

Also I'm absolutely LOVING this sound design :3

Hmmm.... Dad's voice changes when he's doing something else on the ship while talking.

I hope dog is okay :((

What the fuck.

"That my son, if I'm not mistaken, is the devil." WWAAHAHAHGGGGG

So.... religion has been in both of these episodes...

Dad called Son the Shepard to the passengers, their savior. Is Son, like, Jesus???? Like he's being reincarnated over and over to protect these people???? Making Dad like God??

3 - NOT DOG

I wonder what Dog might represent..

I SWEAR TO GOD IF DOG IS FUCKING JUDAS OR SOMETHING

"You are the ship, Dad, you're everything here." Hmmm. Like. I don't know, GOD?????

The ship is like earth... his creation...

EEWWWWW STOP PULLING OFF YOUR NAILS

They're not in space.....

Also reclamation means the process of claiming something back or setting it right. Or, like in le Bible, to redeem, regain, save or rescue.

God sent Jesus to fulfill a specific task, to find his lost children and reclaim them. It was Jesus' sacrifices that gave the people the opportunity for a new life.

4 - AAAAHHHHHH I WAS RIGHT EXCEPT HE DIDNT DIE

DOG NOOOOOOOOO

Dog's a robot...

SON SNAPPED DOGS NECK TO PUT HIM DOWN NOOOOOO IM SOBBING

Dog is in Hell....

So. This is like. A lab basically? Are the real gods testing Son to see if he can escape his nature? What WAS his nature before then? Are they TRYING to turn him into a Jesus figure?- and are using the Devils to see if he can beat them? Or like, resist them? And what is Dog?? What does dog have to do with all of this? Dog and Dad are the only two people Son can remember when he wakes up, and if Dad is meant to be a guiding voice to Son then what is Dog? Support? Something to keep Son happy? Despite not having any memories Son is INCREDIBLY attached to Dog, and trusts him and wants to protect him, and sobs when he dies, and calls him the only thing he ever loved. What is Dog.. it sounded like Dog is a robot, and the Burned Son kept talking about how "they'll cut Dog open, then Son will see". Is Dog a monitor for Dad and/or the Higher Gods? Or his he just another part of this experiment.

This episode.... it actually makes me feel really sick thinking about it.......

5 - Deviser means an inventor, a creator, a planner, a conceiver,

DEVISED, pp. Given by will; bequeathed; contrived. deviser. DEVISER, n. One who contrives or invents; a contriver; an inventor. devising.

Another dog...

OH MY FUCKING GOOOODDDDDDDDD

DOG REALLY IS FUCKING JUDAS HE LED SON INTO RECLAMATION

Also, Harlan, WHAT DO YOU MEAN WHEN YOU SAID "IM NOT THAT GOOD OF A VA" YES YOU ARE

6 - 2 more episodes to go :3

Dad is.. an artificial God, an artificial creator

"Hate is not an aspect of humanity" THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN DAD WHO TOLD YOU THAT

THE BIBLE I KNEW IT

Oh Dad... Frankenstein's monster WAS humanity incarnate..... not pure evil.... Son killed humanity.

DAD FRANKENSTEIN IS NOOOTTTT A STORY OF GOOD AND EVIL 😭😭😭

Ew.... what the fuck did Dad do... why didn't he try to make himself human??? Did he try to model himself after the aliens in the story???? Or did he try to model himself after God or some other Gods??

7 - evil trolley problem....

Oh my god.....

I don't really know what to say

So Dad and Son aren't LITERALLY God and Jesus, it's more of the narrative Dad created. And whether or not Dad realizes it that's the implication he created. It could be intentional, the Bible was one of his listed sources of information.

And Dog isn't Judas, he was just another creation to test Son.

ALSO I was right about the clone thing :)c

[pandoramsbox]

Sci-Fi Saturday: Dr. Cyclops

Week 20:

Film(s): Dr. Cyclops (Dir. Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1940, USA)

Viewing Format: Blu Ray

Date Watched: 2021-10-29

Rationale for Inclusion:

In looking over a list of science fiction films of the 1940s, most of the feature films were more horror than sci-fi: sequels to Universal Horror movies, dipped more into fantasy than science fiction, and/or re-hashes of the core story of Frankenstein. Narratives where science fiction didn't come conjoined with horror were mostly found in serials, like the Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon serials discussed last week. Across all formats, the mad scientist remained the mainstay of the genre.

Representative of this decade sci-fi cinema is this week's film, Dr. Cyclops (Dir. Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1940, USA). Mad scientist? Check. Horror paired with science fiction? Check.

On a technical level, however, Dr. Cyclops is a standout. It was the first science fiction film ever shot in 3-strip "glorious" Technicolor and one of the first sci-fi films to be nominated for a Best Special Effects Academy Award. These characteristics made it stand out and secure a spot on this survey. 

Reactions:

On a technical level, Dr. Cyclops did not disappoint. The Technicolor was vivid without being over the top, and my partner and I were both surprised by the quality of the visual effects. It was the first time on the survey where we found ourselves going "Oh, the effects are good" with no caveats, including but not limited to "for the era." Black and white cinematography can cover up a lot of sins when it comes to visual effects work, so the fact that we had this reaction to a color film was all the more notable to us.

An aspect of the film that took us by surprise, but in retrospect really should have been more obvious was how much of the film was based on the cyclops episode from Homer's Odyssey. The name "Dr. Cyclops" should have been a dead giveaway, but cyclopses are mythological creatures that existed prior to Homer's epic poem chronicling Odysseus's fraught trip home from the Trojan war, and their name has been applied to various works, characters, and vehicles without invoking the story of Polyphemus. Nevertheless, it wasn't until the bespectacled Dr. Thorkel (Albert Dekker) uses his experimental shrink ray on a group of unsuspecting scientists, and traps them in his lab, did the allusion sink in. Like Odysseus and his crew, despite their disadvantage in size, the scientists must use their cunning to blind their poorly visioned captor and escape. 

I was also amused to note that since Dr. Thorkel's shrink ray is powered by radium it means that, like The Invisible Ray (Dir. Lambert Hillyer, 1936, USA), Dr. Cyclops is a pre-Atomic Age atomic sci-fi film. Labeling a film as being "atomic sci-fi" will rapidly lose its novelty once we get to movies made during the Cold War, which is why I find examples of atomic energy figuring in science fiction narratives made prior to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 fascinating.

It also had not occurred to me until later that Dr. Cyclops would be the first film of this survey to deal with characters being miniaturized or shrinking. Using the survey as an excuse to watch The Incredible Shrinking Man (Dir. Jack Arnold, 1957, USA) and Fantastic Voyage (Dir. Richard Fleischer, 1966, USA) had occurred to me, but had I been thinking about shrinking people as a recurring sci-fi narrative, as I did killer brains, robots, and devolution, I would have included The Devil-Doll (Dir. Tod Browning, 1936, USA) in the survey too.

Oh well. I keep being reminded that when this project started it was meant as a representative survey and not a mission to watch every available science fiction film ever made. Still, I wish that I had given titles from the silent era through the 1940s the same attention I would later give films of the 1950s and 1960s.

[wowzerwyrm]

Honestly, I’m shocked and disgusted at the amount of machine-made art nowadays. Everywhere I go I see it, it’s practically taken over. It hurts me deep inside to know so many artists are going without credit or compensation, their work flaunted about like a prize, like the people who carry it have anything to be proud of.

And how can they justify it? No work, no effort, just slapping something crappy together and pretending it represents them as a person. There’s no soul in that, no humanity. Just empty shells of color and ill-fitting shapes. People have even started buying this robotic garbage, like it’s comparable to getting it from an actual artist.

If you’re one of those people, you need to listen, and really look at what you’ve come to. How can you appreciate the real worth of art if it’s so cheap to you that you won’t even do it yourself?

If you’re one of those people, and you have a shred of decency, this is your wake-up call. To be human, to make your own art, to experience life as it was meant to be experienced. Through the blood, sweat and tears that comes through learning a skill, and seeing the beauty of the unique result only you can make.

If you’re one of those people, this is your sign to stop wearing mass produced clothes.

The people who worked so hard to develop those weaving and sewing techniques aren’t being compensated for those clothes being made. All that art and knowledge has been stolen, packaged into a soulless machine, and mass produced into ugly, empty shells.

Do you think your clothes express yourself? That the skirt or jeans your chose to wear say anything about you? How could they, when you didn’t make them yourself? When you just clicked a button to buy something you thought looked good, and a machine made it for you? Do you consider it ‘fashionable’ when you wear a mashed together combination of different outfit ideas stolen from other people?

How can it be? You barely did anything yourself. Get out there, gather and grow your own linens. Break it down, weave it into thread, get a loom and learn how to use it. Discover the wide world of dye! Your first hundred projects won’t be perfect, but they’ll at least be human, and that’s what matters, isn’t it? And eventually you’ll be good enough to have a few reams of cloth you can turn into your own clothes, something that can express who you really are, instead of a Frankenstein monster of other artist’s work.

It doesn’t matter if you would rather spend your precious time working on learning to draw or program, this takes priority. If you’re disabled, just use your feet or your mouth, or hire another artist to make clothes for you, at least then it’ll be ethical.

Just do it. Learn! There’s nothing stopping you except being lazy. Spinning yarn and weaving fabric have been an intrinsic part of the human experience for hundreds of thousands of years, and these soulless machines are threatening to take that away from us. Be a part of what it means to be alive, and you’ll see that the hours and years of grueling work will be worth it, even if you were looking forward to spending that time writing stories or painting or playing games. Spinning yarn is just as good, or better. Just do it.

[septembersghost]

oooh book rec time! 📚

- house of leaves (so good, but can be confusing considering its ergodic literature!)

- the kite runner (top tier, very emotional tho)

- sula (omg, toni morrison is a god, this book was amazing and very sad)

- Ishmael (amazing book, really makes you look at life in a different light, think everyone needs to read it at least once!)

- the viscount who loves me (but any of the bridgerton books really, im partial to romancing mr. bridgerton too though)

- anerican prometheus (this is a biography about oppenheimer but it really is pure poetry as well, and i recommend robert oppenheimer letters and recollections as well, just because oppies own writing is something to behold)

- rabbit and robot (a book from my childhood technically but still has to make the list just because of how utterly hilarious it is)

- ethan frome (such a sad beautiful story, very poetic and tragic)

- girl from nowhere (this has nothing to do with the netflix series lol, but its a pretty good suspensful spy thriller romance!)

- where the crawdads sing (very very interesting and the twist at the end is def amazing)

- the sound of waves (this novel was translated into english from japanese and it's a very beautiful, simple and life loving romance)

those are all i can think of right now but I also of course have to recommend the classics such as the great gatsby and dr. jekyll and mr hyde!

your last sentence flashing me back to the unhinged dni @arthurwilde showed me this morning that had gatsby, to kill a mockingbird, frankenstein, dracula, wuthering heights, and the phantom of the opera listed as "irredeemable media" (along with the magic schoolbus and garfield..?). 🤓 i'm surprised jekyll and hyde wasn't on there too. what did the classics ever do to that person?! i have read and enjoyed them, lock us up for literary crimes!

thank you so much for this list and your thoughts, i appreciate it and am always glad to have new things to add to my to-read ideas!!! ❤📖

[torchtime]

You know what gets me about Namor Conquered Shores is that Cantwell (still, lest we forget what happened in iron man) doesn't understand that Jim isn't a fucking robot.

He's a synthetic being. He's a man made human. He's Frankenstein's Pinocchio, cursed to be considered an "other", and yet dreaming to fit in with humanity, to be part of them, but always to be considered an outcast by everyone except for his friends, The Invaders.

Drawing him into the machines trope hurts the story behind him. The story that shows how much turmoil exists in him because of the way he was born. He gave all of his blood to Jackie. He felt such rage upon meeting Hitler that he burned him to death, in every iteration of the story!

For Jim to be assigned to team machine is ridiculous for not only the above reasoning, but also that Jim has always been a friend to humanity as well as other beings. He would never lead a third separate faction away from humanity, he would want humanity and machines and Atlanteans coexist, the way that Namor seems to want things in this sad alt. future.

Why would Jim knowingly avoid Steve and Namor for such a long time when all he'd ever wanted was peace? Namor was one of the first friends Jim ever had.

And you know, for a comic book that was meant to be a love letter, there were so few moments of love within this book that it was astounding.

This was the weakest story Cantwell could've pulled in this setting. Truly it felt like a rip off, and the love that I was told that inspired it was nowhere to be found.

What a terrible first book for people who come from the MCU to read if they're interested in Namor. I guess it could be worse, it could be Invaders 2019.

I'm still waiting for a good Invaders book, but we'll never get one at this rate.

[kkgore]

Book Review for: In the Lives of Puppets

By: TJ Klune

Setting

This book takes place in a world of robots. We are introduced first to Giovanni, who has built himself a tree-house settlement deep in the woods, and there he lives with two other robots, Nurse Ratchet and Rambo, and his human son Victor. The fairytale-esque opening gives us a good overview of a world where humans are both rare and facing some sort of persecution, and a sense of the threat that the wider world may pose to this family. I found the setting instantly legible and explicable. It had a logic to it that made it both exciting and yet pleasantly predictable. That logic was coherent throughout the novel, and so there was never any moment where I felt like I truly did not understand this world or where it was taking me, and as such I was eager to carry on with the journey.

Plot

The plot takes liberally from the most prominent plot points of the Pinocchio story, as well as some seasoning from Shelly’s Frankenstein. The plot follows a fairly typical hero’s journey model, with a couple of twists which are in no way obtuse and more a revelation of a building suspicion than an actual twist. On the whole I really enjoyed how Klune managed to hit all the major allegories with Pinocchio, although some seemed a bit on the nose. The Monstro-Whale/Terrible Dogfish-Dirigible analogy was there but felt more wedged in than placed with consideration, unlike the tension within Victor, who at various times takes on the role of both Geppetto and Pinocchio, Victor Frankenstein and his Creation in ways that are skilfully woven into the plot of his journey.

My main problem with the plot is that it follows a trend in storytelling where the Hero makes large, world changing decisions on the behalf of whole nations or races and then… dips. Just leaves, and we get no more than a few lines where he hopes that the revolution has turned out well but no actual insight into what this post-revolutionary world is going to look like or how it is going to be built. There is some thematic justification to this decision in this book, it parallels decisions Vic’s father made at the beginning of the tale, but I still find it somewhat unsatisfying that in a book about how everyone deserves to be fixed in the end we only really care about two specific people being fixed and everyone else is on their own.

World Building

The world building in this novel is done organically and in a way that consistently adds to the feelings of foreboding that Klune skilfully builds throughout the novel. Klune is also very good at using his worldbuilding as an opportunity to draw parallels with, and make commentary on, our current culture. The Coachman, who runs a Museum of Human Curio’s and Curiosities, tells the Hero and his companions of the ancient human tradition of gender reveals. His utter misinterpretation of both the form and the function of gender reveal parties is a wonderful way not only to make a commentary on how history gets distorted by the victors in a conflict, but also to expose the artifice that lies in the gender reveal party as a concept.

The worldbuilding in this novel was not necessarily new, we have seen similar worlds in many sci-fi films and books such as Robots (2005) but the whimsy and charm with which it is built makes this an inviting world to spend time in.

The worldbuilding also felt purposeful, particularly when done through conversation between the characters. As we learned more about the world, we also learned more about the main thesis of the book; that everyone deserves a chance of redemption. Again, it’s not so much that Klune does anything new with the worldbuilding, but that he uses the worldbuilding as a way to talk very directly about the morality of the story, and to engage in meaningful meditation on the nature of humanity and forgiveness and individuality and so on.

Characters

The characters are the real highlight of this book. It is incredibly character driven, and it is delightful how Klune treats each character with a tenderness and empathy that is deeply compassionate towards their flaws without ever excusing them. All of the robots can be read as representative of some form of disability or neuroatypicality, and Victor is quite clearly meant to be understood as autistic. I felt this worked well, particularly as an overarching analogy for how disability is context dependant and how often the experience of disability is more to do with how society lacks accommodations necessary for a life fully lived, than it is to do with the material fact of the disability itself. I also think this worked well as a way to explore how individuals can work to maintain healthy relationship despite conflicting needs.

The dynamic between Nurse Ratched and Rambo reminds me a lot of the dynamic between Scamper and Brian in Igor (2008), and I found the way they both bounced off of each other delightful. They were a wonderful example of a relationship that is fully accepting of the other, warts and all. The fierce loyalty between these two and Victor was a strong theme throughout the novel, which worked well as a supporting thesis for the main themes of forgiveness and redemption. Ratched was well placed as a nurse droid to explain concepts like asexuality in a dispassionate manner.

That said, I did find towards the end that Ratched and Rambo’s continual conjecture of the nature of the relationship between Vic, who is canonically both asexual and somewhat sex repulsed, and Hap to become more and more uncomfortable as it became clear that this aspect of their behaviour was never going to fully be addressed. I had hoped that there would be some sort of commentary on the intrusive and voyeuristic nature of looking at real relationships through the lens of “shipping” but we didn’t really get any thing in regard to a resolution of the conflict there.

Hap is an interesting take on the Creature from Frankenstein. It is lovely to see what might have happened if the Modern Prometheus had been met with love and admiration rather than fear and shame. I really appreciate that Hap is allowed to still be a generally grumpy person, right through to the end of the novel, and that this is seen as a character expression, rather than a character flaw.

Vic and Hap have a very tender relationship, which is a joy to watch develop.

Vic himself is a thoroughly enjoyable hero to read. He grapples with deep emotional and ethical questions which are hard to resolve, without ever tipping over into either self-pitying or self-aggrandising. His reactions feel very natural and his motivations and insights are intelligent.

The supporting cast of Gio, Vic’s father, The Coachman and The Blue Fairy are all well drawn characters whose conversations with Vic offer some very poignant and insightful meditations on the main themes of this book. The only somewhat disappointing character was the Coachman, who’s motivational 180 was a bit too convenient and just bugged me for a few chapters after it happened.

Prose

The actual prose of this book is delightful. It flows incredibly well; it’s well paced and it was easy get into a groove of reading it. The only point where I was fully thrown out of the text was early on when there was mention of a “camming device” with no explanation of what that was. I don’t think this is a particularly ubiquitous piece of climbing equipment outside of the climbing enthusiast’s world and so could probably do with some explanation.

The main criticism of the prose I would give is that Klune has a habit of introducing motifs he then doesn’t really do anything with. For example, the Authority (the robot overlords) use the symbol of the cat and the fox, which is immediately identifiable as an allusion towards the Disney cartoon but doesn’t do anything beyond being that allusion. It gives no deeper insight into the Authority and if one were not aware of the Disney cartoon then there would be no clear reason why this symbol is being emphasised repeatedly. When he does use symbolism, like the motif of the clockwork heart that works its way throughout this novel, he does it spectacularly well. There is a richness to his use of symbolism that is so enchanting that it is even more disappointing when there is then such empty symbolism alongside it.

Finally, I would add that the first part of the novel could do with a few paragraph breaks. I did not find the long run-on nature of the opening to be particularly ADHD friendly and that was the only part of the book where I regularly found myself going back to reread a passage to make sure I had the right of it.

Conclusion

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I found it engaging and charming and thoroughly enjoyed the dialectical explorations of personhood, forgiveness, redemption and friendship. I found the meditations on these themes insightful and inspiring and had more than one flash of insight into my own WIP as a result of reading this.

That said I was somewhat dissatisfied with the ending. This may be a personal thing as a bit of a policy wonk, but I really would have appreciated even just a little more about how society was going to move forward after the hero’s completed their quest. That is not to say that the ending was not beautiful, it was a wonderfully understated and tender way to end the story, but I could not help but be distracted by thoughts of all the others whose lives were impacted and the uncertainty of their fate.

I would recommend this book to those who enjoy imaginative retellings of classic literature, as well as anyone who enjoys somewhat whimsical sci fi settings. I think this would be a marvellous book for a 14–16-year-old, although it does have some strong language and sexual references that not all parents will be happy with, and it is the sort of book a weird little 12-year-old who already reads beyond their reading level (like me) and hides copies of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere under their bed (like I did) would absolutely devour and obsess over for years to come.