Revenge of the Sith
We actually did watch this a couple of days after Episode 1 and Episode 2, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to write about it at the time.
Movie whose name I couldn’t initially remember: things that weren’t too bad:
- The opening fight scene is quite nice.
- Christopher Lee. Again.
- Anakin’s robotic arm is nicely styled.
- Samuel L. Jackson
- Samuel L Jackson fighting with a light sabre.
- Ewan McGregor is way better in this film.
- You gave General Grievous four light sabres. That was a stroke of genius.
- Ian McDiarmaid is scenery-chewing good, for most of the film.
- Yoda’s suffering as the Jedi are killed. True pathos – and in a puppet. Very nice.
- A Wookie army!
- Jimmy Smits!
- Your classics is showing, George, moving from republic to empire.
- I finally realised that Anakin’s costume journey parallels Luke’s (ooh, spoilers). That’s quite a nice touch.
- Anakin and Obi-wan fighting is really pretty cool.
- The parallel of the twins being born with Vader being born is obvious, but still kinda cool.
- James Earl Jones.
- Jimmy Smits.
What were you thinking, George?
- In the opening credits you say there are heroes on both sides. Why are you confusing the young people with this even-handed post-modern crap?
- Your droid general sounds like he has emphysema. Or possibly TB. If he was in an 19th-century dress and sounded like that, you’d know there was a death scene coming up. DROIDS DON’T COUGH, GEORGE.
- ETA: Thanks to Grant I’ve discovered that Grievous is actually a cyborg, who coughs because Windu shot him. In the Clone Wars cartoon. Which just transfers my annoyance: nice little plot point for those in the know, but for the rest of us it’s just confuses. Bad, George; bad.
Why wouldn’t a queen let a female senator continue to act in a role she’s clearly been good at just because she has a baby? No, seriously George, why is this a problem?- Tell me, George, how exactly is destroying the Sith going to bring balance to the Force? Balance implies, well, balance – stuff on both sides. Without the Sith doesn’t that mean it’s going to be all one-sided? I’m not saying I like the Dark Side, but balance is not the word you’re looking for here.
- Anakin’s petulance moves his well-founded angst and concern for his mother away from Macbeth or Hamlet and more towards many ten-year-olds I know (and, let’s be honest, Luke in Episode 4).
- Ian McDiarmaid’s make-up after being beaten up is really, really bad.
- Anakin goes Total Evil way too quickly.
- You reduced Padme to weeping and fretting. From elected queen to senator to weeping and wailing. This is not an adequate plot arc, GEORGE. Very disappointing.
- Also Anakin treats Padme as property. I understand he’s evil but that’s still not cool.
- “Only a Sith deals in absolutes.” Do you even see what you did there, George?
- I wrote “No respect for traffic patterns” in my notes. I don’t remember what I meant, but still, TRAFFIC PATTERNS, George.
But finally, my biggest gripe, George, is that you did not include Han Solo anywhere in these prequels. You included Boba Fett for heaven’s sake, and Chewbacca, and ANTILLES, but no Han. No moment in a bar where a grizzled man claps a hand to a young boy’s shoulder and says “this is my nephew, I’m teaching him about smuggling”? Why, George? Why?
Ancillary Mercy
This book was provided to me by the publisher at no cost.
Spoilers ahead for Ancillary Justice (reviews here and here – yes I loved it enough to review it the second time around) and Ancillary Sword.
Sooo… first thing to admit: it took me reading someone else’s review to realise that Justices, Swords and Mercies are all the sorts of ships that Breq is in charge of. How embarrassing that I did not realise that.
Secondly: yes, I love this series, I love Leckie’s work, I love Breq and the world she inhabits. My love is true and remains unshaken.
Further note: I’m just going with ‘she’ to refer to everyone, when I have to. I think there’s one person whose gender is actually confirmed (… maybe…insofar as that ever can be in these books) and it just does violence to my brain to go with he/she when Leckie herself (ahaha) goes with SHE. So nyer.
As with Justice to Sword, Mercy starts almost immediately Sword finishes off. I quite like this, since it means there doesn’t need to be any tedious filling in of blanks. It also means I’d like to see an omnibus edition where you can just read the whole lot, start to finish. It wouldn’t even be that much bigger than a complete edition of The Lord of the Rings. Breq continues to have issues with Anaander Mianaai, ruler of the Radch and therefore of civilisation as the Radch defines it… Continue reading →
Domnall and the Borrowed Child
This book was provided to me by the publisher at no cost.
I did not love this book.
It’s perfectly adequate as a re-hashing of the ideas about Faerie stealing children and possible consequences and so on, but I don’t think it’s as clever as it thinks it is.
I think the idea of only the old and somewhat pathetic faeries still being around is meant to be – amusing? challenging? – but instead it just comes off as a bit confusing, because the reason for that isn’t really explored; sometimes an info dump can be useful. Additionally I think what happens with the mortal woman is meant to, I dunno, challenge expectations or something. Didn’t really work.
Domnall comes across as a bit boring, rather than the somewhat sly, hard-working and long-suffering fae that I think was the intention. And if he wasn’t meant to be that, and was instead meant to be the lazy good-for-nothing whose butt is kicked to get more done – well, that didn’t really work either. The sidekick that he accidentally ended up with didn’t have enough character to be a funny, ambitious, or appropriately sidekick-y sidekick, and there were a couple of uncomfortable moments between them too (of a sexual nature – nothing too squick, don’t worry).
The plot itself is serviceable, and if that sounds like damning with faint praise… that’s probably about right.
Galactic Suburbia 130
In Which We Have High Expectations Of What Lies Beyond Equality, but in the meantime there’s Party Down. Get us from iTunes or at Galactic Suburbia.
We apologise for the sound quality of this episode, which had a few glitches that even the Silent Producer could not magic away, notably Alisa’s emergency phone call which the mike occasionally picks up. (Everything’s fine now.)
What’s New on the Internet
7 Jewish Authors Get Personal About Anti-Semitism (Alisa finds 7 new authors to read)
SF Editors Picks – Recommendations on great new SF/F/H stories by top editors.
Twitter @SFEditorsPicks
Facebook SFEditorsPicks
Mind Meld w/ Tansy & Tehani – Books That Made Me Love SFF
What Culture Have we Consumed?
Alisa: Scandal S1 and S2; Party Down S1 and S2; Coode St Podcast Ep 251: Kristine Kathryn Rusch and women in SF; The Serial Dynasty podcast
Tansy: House of Shattered Wings, by Aliette de Bodard; Alias by Brian Michael Bendis (Tor.com reread leading up to the show on Nov 20), SHIELD 50th Anniversary comics – Mockingbird [woo since we recorded this they announced it was going to series with the same writer!], [Don’t call her] The Cavalry, Agent Carter, Fury, Quake
Alex: Aurora: Beyond Equality; Up the Walls of the World, James Tiptree Jr; Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, Samuel Delany
Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook, support us at Patreon and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!
Witches of Lychford
This book was provided to me by the publisher at no cost.
In Witches of Lychford, Paul Cornell takes the idea of witches being people (and particularly women) who are tasked in some way to protect the humdrum population from things they don’t understand. Here, the place is a bog-standard (on the outside) English village, which is facing a very real and common threat: a giant supermarket chain wanting to move into the village and Change Things. On the face of it those things are alarming enough for those who are traditionalist, or who moved to the country to get away from big business and the corporate nature of the modern world. Underneath, though, is a far more alarming truth – that changing things in Lychford, such as boundary markers and the like, could have devastating results for the way the ‘real’ world interacts with the world of Faery and other, more malignant dimensions.
Cornell’s focus is on the three women who might have a chance to do something about this. By far my favourite is Judith Mawson: at 71, she has “a list of what she didn’t like, and almost everything – and everybody – in Lychford was on it.” There’s a point late in the story where she grudgingly tells someone they are not on that list. Cranky old women for the win, I say. Judith is competent but not a superhero; she gets things done and grumbles about it – and sometimes she fails. Also, her tragedy is absolutely and completely appalling.
The other two women were less convincing to me. Having read a few of these Tor novellas it’s striking to see some of the similarities – I don’t know whether it’s deliberate or if it’s just fallen out that way in my reading. But there are some similarities in theme between this and Angela Slatter’s Of Sorrow and Such, and in one of the young women there’s a link to Seanan McGuire’s Every Heart a Doorway because she spent time in the land of Faery and has been damaged by it. Her friend is the newly-arrived pastor, whose faith has been challenged by events in her past and who is really not feeling like she fits into the parish, where she herself grew up. Lizzie, the pastor, and Autumn both felt rather flat to me – especially coming off the back of McGuire and Slatter. Their issues were less emotionally gripping than I would have liked and they did not especially appeal to me as people, either (or perhaps concurrently). Nor did their role in solving the problems feel like it was fundamental.
Despite this problem of characterisation, I did still enjoy the book. It’s not a significant addition to the fiction on witches, or the real/faery divide, but it’s an interesting story and there are some lovely moments.
Attack of the Clones
Our idea initially was that we would watch one episode a week, which would get us about up to episode 7. But Phantom Menace left such a bad taste in our mouths that we decided we had to watch the second: it’s not a great film, but at least it’s not as bad as the first. Right?
So:
Attack of the Clones: things that weren’t too bad:
- Jay Laga’aia.
- Ewan McGregor’s hair is definitely better in this film.
- Obi-wan in general is better in this film. He’s better when he’s stern.
- Female assassin.
- Female Jedi!!
- Yoda in a city.
- Yoda taking part in politics.
- YODA FIGHTING.
- Jedi younglings are super cute.
- Jango Fett.
- Boba Fett.
- Christopher Lee!
- Christopher Lee in a speed racer!
- Christopher Lee with a light sabre!
- Christopher Lee fighting Yoda!!
- James: at least they got John Williams back.
- And the use of CG isn’t quite as bad as Episode 1.
What were you thinking, George?
- Not enough Jay Laga’aia.
- You kept Jar Jar, George. You kept Jar Jar.
- Amidala + Anakin: everything about every scene they are in together.
- Amidala’s clothing choices. I’m not presuming to speak for every woman here, George, but I think it would have been more realistic for a woman who is being forced to be alone with a man whose romantic interest makes her uncomfortable not to wear provocative clothing. YES she has a choice in what she chooses to wear, NO I am not blaming her for Anakin’s infatuation, but nonetheless it’s a dubious choice for your costuming.
- Anakin in general.
- So petulant
- So creepy towards Amidala
- His rebelliousness towards Obi-wan is just embarrassing.
- You have NO RESPECT FOR PHYSICS, George. Super leaps between struts is one thing. But the level of timing required to jump from the speeder onto the assassin’s speeder, not to mention the leap itself, is truly ludicrous. NO RESPECT, George.
- Amidala always getting pushed around by the menfolks. Boring, George.
- You fridged Shmi Skywalker, George. Couldn’t you at least have given her a bit more of a story for herself? Shown her with Jack and the kids?
- You made Christopher Lee say some really bad dialogue, George. That’s nearly unforgivable.
- James: the CG is still pretty bad.
The Phantom Menace
In honour of The Force Awakens coming out… whenever that is, we’ve decided to rewatch Star Wars. All six. In in-universe chronology.
Yes, today we watched The Phantom Menace.
The Phantom Menace: things that weren’t too bad:
- The references to the original trilogy were mostly kinda cute, and not all of them were over the top. The “I have a bad feeling about this” is meant to immediately make someone like me feel at home, and I liked that. Also going through a ventilation shaft was pretty funny.
The meet-cute of C3PO and R2-D2 is, indeed, quite cute.- The cameo from Warwick Davis: weird! But cool.
- Samuel L. Jackson.
- A nod to diversity: at least two noticeable black humans and two female pilots! Amazing.
- Liam Neeson’s hair.
The fight between Qui-Gon and Darth Maul is fantastic.
- Double-ended light sabre!!
- James: the music. At least they got John Williams back.
What were you thinking, George?
- It’s a film about trade negotiations going wrong. I mean really.
- TOO MUCH CGI GEORGE. This is why we can’t have nice things.
- Qui-Gon’s use of mind tricks as soon as things are slightly difficult is just repulsive.
- Darth Maul. Not his existence, his lack of one. What a wasted character, man.
- He has basically no dialogue!
- He has no motivation!
- His fight with Qui-Gon is too short.
- The pod race. I did not need to see all three laps, George.
- The Gungans. I am all in favour of ignored/oppressed people showing they have something to contribute, but did it have to be in such a racist and boring way?
- Jar Jar Binks. Everything about him.
- I do mean everything.
- Anakin.
- Ani? Really? For the boy who grows up to be Darth Vader? Seriously.
- Why did you make him so young?
- Why did you make him so petulant?
- Didn’t your casting call throw up any other options?
- Ewan McGregor’s hair.
- Qui-Gon is a master Jedi and he’s fooled by some make-up as to who actually has the power in the entourage of women? Really?
- George, you made Anakin the product of a virgin birth and only spent ten seconds thinking about it. I mean, seriously, man, what the hell?
- James: the visuals reminded of Bedknobs and Broomsticks. It just looked plastic.
Galactic Suburbia 129
In which we explain the metaphorically violent nature of Australian politics, celebrate the return of Feminist Frequency and our faces are on the internet.
And I am late in posting this! Holidays will do that, when you don’t take a laptop camping… you can get us from iTunes or Galactic Suburbia, anyway.
What’s New on the Internet
Malcolm Turnbull is not Tony Abbott: the Australian Spill Story
Our national sport
The onion thing, no we don’t get it either.
New Feminist Frequency Tropes v Women in Video Games – Women as Reward & Special DLC Mini Episode.
The Three Hoarsemen Podcast Episode 25 featuring Alisa
Galactic Suburbia on Books and Pieces
What Culture Have we Consumed?
Alisa: Mad Max Fury Road; Undisclosed: The State vs Adnan Syed Podcast
Alex: Slaughterhouse 5, Kurt Vonnegut; Archer’s Goon, Diana Wynne Jones; I finished Stranger in a Strange Land!! Also Of Sorrow and Such, Angela Slatter
Tansy: Dawn, Octavia E. Butler; Bombshells #1, Marguerite Sauvage & Marguerite Bennett; The Cornell Collective; Supernatural
Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook, support us at Patreon and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!
Rampant
By Diana Peterfreund
Sadly I did not love this book as much as I had hoped. Partly this is me, partly it is the book.
I had read the novella, Errant, so I thought I kinda knew what the story was going to be about. But Errant is set… I forget when, some time in the past. Rampant is not; it’s about a girl in modern America learning about unicorns. Which is fine, it was just a bit of a surprise. I had t read the blurb, deliberately; I didn’t want any spoilers since I figured it was going to be the sort of book I’d like anyway.
Killer unicorns? How can that not be awesome? That’s what it’s about, by the way. Unicorns are real and they hunt animals and people. Only certain people can hunt them in return. This is the learning-about-your-abilities book. If that’s your thing, feel free to ignore my whinging! Just go read it; it’s certainly enjoyable enough that I wouldn’t dissuade potential readers automatically.
Anyway, what I really had not expected was how much the book would be focussed in sex. Not having it, how people feel about you if you do or don’t, etc (do American teens really feel pressured to have sex before they leave high school??). It does make sense, given that Peterfreund has kept the virginity aspect for her unicorn hunters, but… it felt like it got in the way of what I was expecting, which was learning about unicorn hunting and dealing with that aspect of your nature. Which, yes, virginity is part of that. But there was a lot of going on dates and agonising which I guess just isn’t what I was interested in reading.
So I’m willing to agree that in that aspect, definitely a problem of my expectations. And I did like the discussion around rape, attitudes towards and reactions to, although the victim seemed to deal with it faster than I would expect. (Not that I want intense victiming either, necessarily.)
On the book’s side, I felt that the plot went a bit too fast sometimes; fast enough that things got a bit improbable (yes yes, around the killer unicorns bits) and too convenient. In the characters I especially found Astrid’s mother a bit much; a bit ridiculous.
For all its faults I will definitely read the sequel, Ascendant, at some point.
Up the Walls of the World
This book is absolutely bonkers. Mad. And completely wonderful.
This was Tiptree’s first novel, but naturally enough many of the concerns and interests of his short stories are present here as well. I am so sad that he did not write more novels; this made me so happy, as did Brightness Falls from the Air, that I do wonder what else could have come from that amazing brain.
Let’s start by talking about the authorial situation and get that out of the way. This was published in 1978. Tiptree had been revealed as Alice Sheldon at the end of 1976. I was surprised therefore to discover that the brief bio in the end flap (oh hard backs I really do love you) makes no mention of him being her, although it does acknowledge Tiptree as a pseudonym. But I guess that pre internet, how are people going to know about the identity? Via Locus maybe, and fanzines, and word of mouth. Tiptree was not such a big deal that the New York Times was going to run an expose. Presumably therefor with this publication your more casual, less crazy SF fans aren’t going to know who Tiptree ‘really’ is – and Tiptree is enough of a name (… and male…?) to make it worth keeping the pseudonym. But THEN I turned to the back and the back cover image is Sheldon! Now I’ve seen the pic before and it’s quite obvious to me who this is; but others have suggested that this could, actually, be an ambiguously gendered person. I’m not entirely convinced. But anyway, there’s that.
Now, to plot. I’m going to be entirely spoilery because I really want to think about what Tiptree is doing here.
Randomly Yours, Alex 