Welcome to Fantasy Friday! Every week, you are invited to write and post anything having to do with fantasy, science fiction, etc., right here in the comments: a crazy idea for a new subgenre, a bit of a story you’re trying to write, your unbridled opinion of the last novel you read or the last SF convention you attended. At 5 p.m. PST today, if we’ve got at least ten participants, we’ll choose the day’s most entertaining writer and PayPal them $10 on the spot. Go start your weekend off with a cold one on us! (Minors, make that a couple of hot chocolates.)
1 • Clint Harris said:
April 4th, 2008 at 11:12 am, permalink
I’ve been seriously missing out for the last four years. In 2003, NBC played a miniseries that would serve as the jumping off point of a resurrection of a campy 1970’s TV show. That’s right, folks. I’m talking Battlestar Galactica.
Due to the marvels of miniseries technology, I missed most of that miniseries. I recognized that Starbuck was no longer the guy from the A-Team, much less a guy, but she could still have easily kicked Dirk Benedict’s ass. The rest of the series was moved around and lost in the regular cruddy programming.
Four years later, I finally got the SciFi Channel, started watching the series, and realized I had missed a lot. That, of course, is an understatement. Yet, oddly enough, SciFi only played the same episode over and over again. The Election episode. Which I still can’t get all the way through without falling asleep. And for whatever reason, they stopped playing ANY reruns (except that episode) and OnDemand won’t play it either. I gave up.
Now the network has decided to forego playing their crappy, low-budget movies and try to catch up people like me with the first three seasons. Thing is that I work (right), so I catch only a few moments here and there. I’ve seen something about a missing eye, a dog bowl, a planet full of “Boomers”. It’s like I’m drunk and doing a connect-the-dots or something. My wife has been watching them at home. She’s hooked. And mostly caught up. @#$%^%$%#$!
We rented the miniseries. We watched it in its entirety in one sitting. Around 8:00 last night, I looked at the clock and thought “Crap, I’m missing LOST. Oh well.”
I’m hooked. Now we’re looking all over town for season one on DVD, since SciFi has already gone back to playing the new season and the Battlestar Marathon has switched back to Jeremy London and Stephen Baldwin natural disaster movies which involve the heroes fighting CGI monsters, boneheaded army guys, and career obscurity. “Mangator III: Run Silent, Run Deep.” “Pyranhas: Fish of Fire!” And yes, I’ve mentioned these titles before, but I plan to get a lot of mileage out of them.
Before, I could appreciate the production quality of Battlestar Galactica. I was just in over my head without backstory and it came off as boring and confusing. It didn’t hurt to watch the shameless celebrity shilling at the hands of Joss Whedon, Seth Green, and Joel McHale. Joel McHale! That guy hates everything! He’s like Life Cereal’s Mikey for the Television world!
I’m catching up now. And though I might not be as cool as the rest of you who have stuck through writer’s strikes, split seasons, and episodes pre-empted by marathons of “W.A.S.P.P!” for the SciFi movie of the week. I’m there now.
Frakin’ score! My wife just called and bought season one on DVD! Yes, I am a geek. And now, I’m a little bit closer to being complete.
2 • Chris (The Book Swede) said:
April 4th, 2008 at 2:46 pm, permalink
OK, I’ve never posted here before. I’m going to do one of those story bits
The bit below is about halfway through, a nice, fun, torture scene… I’ve called one character, “Mister”, for no reason I now remember…
–
“I do believe, Mr. O’Hearney, that you are arousing my knife.” Mister demonstrated just what a knife erection looked like, trailing his knife from the bottom of Patrick’s neck, between his collar-bones, up to below his chin, and Patrick bled some more, a lot more, of his getting-more-precious-by-the-moment blood.
Mister looked down on him curiously. “My my. If I were you, Mr. O’Hearney, I’d be rather offended by now. That red stuff of yours is leaving your body with a willingness that borders on the impolite.”
Mister smiled as Patrick gasped. Leaning forward he raised an eyebrow as Patrick tried to speak. “That was a rising inflection, Mr. O’Hearney, and I do believe you weren’t screaming. Do my ears deceive me? There is a question you want to ask?”
“Why? All this. The talk. The ‘Mr. O’Hearney’. The…” A tear rolled down Patrick’s face, stinging. “The knives. Why?”
“Why have I gone to such lengths to make you comfortable, you mean?” Part of Patrick wanted to point out that no, that wasn’t what he’d meant, but the other part, the part that preferred his internal organs to remain internal, wouldn’t allow his lips to move.
“Because it’s what I do. I can no more stop hurting people than this knife can.” He smiled, “And this knife can hurt people [i]a lot[/i]. But you know that, Mr. O’Hearney, and, from the way your eyes are wandering this room, I can tell that you’re looking for a way out of this situation.” He frowned and looked at his hands, “Either that, or your eyes are going to fall out. That did happen once. Well twice, since both eyes went, but that’s neither here nor there.”
Patrick groaned again; he was good at groaning, but, in the circumstances, he rather felt he was being unappreciated. “Very well, boy. You are looking for a way out. I shall offer one. And, before you roll your eyes again, it doesn’t involve dying. Oh. Wait, it does, and large quantities of it, too. But not on your part, so don’t worry your pretty little head about it.” He grinned, “Or I’ll cut it off.”
“Look, you’ve been torturing me for bloody hours, now. Shut up with the pointless ultimatums, and offer me the bloody way out! Yes, I’ll kill somebody’s grandmother, yes, I’ll poke somebody’s eyes out with a red hot poker, just tell me what to do!”
Mister looked at him and then laughed, quietly and softly. “Very well…”
–
Anyway, that’s it
Thought I’d get it out there since that particular story is doing my head in at the moment; can’t finish it. (As you can tell, it’s very much in draft form, and I expect bits will be moved around a lot — including out of existence)!
3 • Chris (The Book Swede) said:
April 4th, 2008 at 2:49 pm, permalink
Why is it only after you’ve clicked submit that you notice so many problems
~Chris
4 • Michael Gordon said:
April 4th, 2008 at 3:13 pm, permalink
I’m in the mood to post a little poetry (translation: I’m too lazy/busy to write a new flash fiction).
In Dreams I Start
When I was young and all my dreams were new,
I did not know the ways of love and pain.
I lived and fought with heroes brave and true
And lines ‘twixt white and black were clear and plain.
A hero’s world is simpler than our own–
Where Right is clear and evil can be fought,
And gods and monsters there are plainly known,
And magic made from nothing but a thought.
Where purpose guides and every choice is clear,
And no ill falls by chance, without it intent,
These worlds are sung by bards to eager ears,
Whose tastes these tales did bid them to invent.
And to this day in story-worlds I thrive
For ’tis in dreams I start to feel alive.