Kyle Brady: Blog » SciFi

“The SciFi Future of Corporate Supremacy” [Self]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 19:09:13 +0000

New column at Technotainment Revelations on True/Slant:

In a world of corporate supremacy, where governments are controlled by corporations, life will be very different from the future many of us imagine. Thanks to a recent Supreme Court ruling that allows organizations to have direct influence on politics, at least in America, our bright future will no longer be so bright, and it will not be full of the technological wonders that science fiction and our imaginations have taught us to expect.

Go check it out.

Gridlinked [Nerdly Book Review]

Kyle Brady — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:05:54 +0000

"Gridlinked" by Neal Asher (2001) - 5/5 stars

Neal Asher is on numerous lists for awards in 2009, but when I picked this up, I had no idea - the cover intrigued me and the description drew me in. Little did I know I was going to read one of the best and most genre-innovative novels that I've seen since the eras of Tolkien, Herbert, and the other greats...

"Gridlinked" is a novel that sits at the intersection of cyberpunk, classic scifi, and action thrillers, with a slight touch of space opera - all to great effect. Technology is described, and is an integral part of the plot, but is not overdone as so often seen in many cyberpunk novels. Similarly, new terms are used without definitions, in the cyberpunk fashion, but not in as confusing a manner as typical. The space opera and scifi elements make appearances throughout with the use of spaceships, some awesome technology, and many of the plot points.

The most important genre of this blend, however, is the action thriller: the novel's pace is fast, but not frantic; clever but not annoying; coy but not opaque. Since the most central character (there are four) is the equivalent of a highly secret service agent, this occasionally feels like a James Bond plot set in both space and the future, but never to its detriment.

It is hard to explain why this novel is so great without reading it, because descriptions of characters, plot, style, tone, and any other characteristics do not do it Neal Asher justice. For any reader that enjoys any part of science fiction, "Gridlinked" is a must-read.

A War of Gifts [Nerdly Book Review]

Kyle Brady — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 08:05:36 +0000

"A War of Gifts" by Orson Scott Card (2007) - 2/5 stars

This novella lives inside the Enderverse, but is a bit weird by those same standards - the writing is quick and terse, without any of the feel of the Ender-series books, and the story is very plain and mostly uninteresting.

But knowing a significant portion of Orson Scott Card's personal history, political stance, and religious beliefs is what made this story partially interesting. The opening is inside a church that is very fundamentalist in a shockingly drawn out scene, and the theme of religion carries through the book as one of the central characters brings his worrisome religious beliefs to Battle School.

At its heart, this novella seems to be a battle within Orson Scott Card that plays out in public and on paper as a short musing on religion and national customs. While the overall theme seems to be that Christian religion is acceptable so long as it's the correct one and acted out properly, there are shockingly see-through sneers at other religions (Islam especially), atheism, and secular customs.

I like OSC's work within the Enderverse, and some outside of it, but he needs to learn to keep his religion and political beliefs out of his otherwise masterful writing of novels. He made this mistake before, with the Homceoming Saga - I just hope he doesn't repeat this again within the beloved Ender canon.

“An Open Letter to the SyFy Network” [Self]

Kyle Brady — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 07:25:07 +0000

New guest post at the Inquisitr:

Not many people will publicly admit this, but I will: there’s a soft spot in my heart for the SyFy Network (formerly “SciFi”), and always has been. But just because I’m sympathetic to the cause doesn’t mean I unilaterally support your decisions, which is why this is being written.

Go check it out.

Why I Won’t Be Seeing the New “Star Trek” Movie(s) [Old Content]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:49:45 +0000

First, let me say this: I am a Trekkie. I was born in '87, and grew up with TNG... between it and the original Star Wars movies, my nerddom was cemented for life.

Voyager was fun, and so were the bits of DS-9 that I watched on occasion, but neither matched the greatness of TNG. Until a few months ago, if someone were to say "ship's captain", I would automatically respond "Jean-Luc Picard". Nowadays, I might hesitate between Admiral Adama (the "captain" of Battlestar Galactica... a show I've recently fallen in love with) and Picard, but the point is that Picard was amazing in ways Kirk never will be. Not even Janeway (Voyager) could compete, and she was pretty cool in her own right.

Ok. Can we move forward now that I've verified my pedigree? Great.

JJ Abrams

If you watched the first two seasons of Lost, loved it, and then hated it as it slowly devolved into "how can we make this show more randomly complex for no real reason, since we make it up as we go", you know why I don't like Abrams. He's also responsibile for Alias (the crappy "OMG SHE CHANGED HER HAIRCOLOR!" spy show), Fringe (the "fake science so fake it's annoying" show), and Cloverfield (the overly hyped monster movie made for $3 and a candybar).

Oh, and Mission:Impossible III. Do I need to continue? The man's work is just plain annoying.

Casting

This should be a quick and easy point. We're really supposed to believe a psycho superhuman serial killer (Sylar) is now an intelligent, peaceful Vulcan (Spock)? That's really difficult since Zachary Quinto really only has one claim to fame prior to Star Trek. Also, Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) is a Zac Effron wannabe? Not to mention that porky British guy who only plays in bad comedies, or the guy from the "Whitecastle" movies.

Please.

Edit: I'm not saying we should judge the cast based on prior work, but that alot of them are already stereotyped in the minds of the viewers at the moment, for one reason or another... that makes for difficult believability.

Captain Kirk

Like I said before, I'm a Picard guy. Always have been, always will be. It's often been said that in the minds of many fans, Kirk has long since been dead... Why revive him?

I have no interest in his storyline, and I know I'm not alone.

Timeline

If you're going to do a "reboot" of Star Trek, why would you revisit one that already exists? There is a rich tradition of extending the universe with entirely new characters and plots, and it would have been better to create an entirely new branch than to wedge in some crappy prequel story.

They're talking about starting another TV show... which would make more sense if a new branch had been created, but as of now that's pretty dumb. Also keep in mind these are Trekkie fans you're dealing with - anything that changes the continuity/canon will piss off the people that root for you.

Which means a true "reboot" is impossible.

Edit: Abrams himself has called this a reboot, and has expressed his intentions for a sequel to this, and beyond. Look it up, it's a fact.

The Movie

I've read reviews, talked to people who saw it, and watched all the trailers, trying to decide if I was being too harsh. But no matter how much you may or may not have loved the movie, there is one inescapable fact: this is not a true Star Trek entity.

Star Trek is about social commentary, intergalactic politics, interspecies tensions, morality, humanity's future, imperialism, and a whole bunch of other concepts/values that tend to be rather high-brained. Every version of the show, and the movies, had this fact at its core, regardless of who they were trying to appeal to.

Abrams, on the other hand, took an action movie and wrapped it in Star Trek lore. Yes, all the characters are there, and there's "spaceships and stuff"... but what is the movie really about? Skydiving, rebellious teenagers, nonsense military decisions ("let's give teenagers a ship!"), Cloverfield monsters (more on this below), getting laid, and random in-fighting.

Does that sound similar? At all? I didn't think so. Because those are the makings of a generic action movie.

You can update many aspects of Star Trek without changing it at the core: updating for modern times ("the Cold War is over!"), better special effects, more space battles, less cheesy acting, newer technology, less "all white people, all the time", etc. But you need to follow the basic, intrinsic values of the franchise.

I imagine Abrams (and the studios) said "let's do a Star Trek movie, but make huge amounts of money!", to which the obvious solution was to not actually make a Star Trek movie, and just pretend enough for the fanboys to drool.

The Cloverfield Monster

Let's compare...

Click for larger

It's a pretty obvious case of monster reuse, but in case you were still skeptical, they were "designed" by the same person - Neville Page.

More and More

There's probably a few more points I could get into, but these are the major ones. I wish this weren't the case, because I love Star Trek as much as the next guy, but what a crappy way to introduce the franchise to a new generation. A semi-popular-cancelled-after-a-few-seasons-because-it's-on-FOX TV show would have been a better choice, even if Abrams was involved and they named it Star Trek: The New Lost Alias of Khan's Felicitious Leather Fringe Jacket.

What we, as devoted fans, need is someone who actually cares about the franchise. If they want to actually do a TV show again, I'm all for it, as long as it's a branch that extends into the future (aka post-Voyager and post-DS-9 in the timeline), and they stick to the principles that make Star Trek, you know, Star Trek.

Make it so.

p.s. Lens flares.

--- --- ---

Update (5/18/2009 10:50am PST): Added clarification to the chasting and reboot remarks. Marked as edited.

Musings on SciFi Book Length [Self]

Kyle Brady — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 00:34:17 +0000

There's been some discussion recently about the length of books in SciFi, both past and present... along with the details of who/what/why/when/how/where, and whether or not having longer books is a good idea.

I posted a lengthy response on an io9 overview of the "debate", and thought it was re-post worthy:

Who said that longer books are bad?

I prefer the well planned, thought out, and complex lengthy SciFi novels of today to alot of the shorter "wham, bam, thank you mam" stuff that was seen previously.

If you're a good author, then you write until your story is done. As much as people pretend it isn't true, the originators of SciFi were not very good authors- they had good ideas and great imagination, but had trouble with plot, dialogue, and the idea of a character as an individual. If you need examples of this, just thumb through any of the "original greats".

People like Stross, McDevitt, etc. are good examples of great and far-fetched SciFi ideas that are turned into not only great novels, but novels of epic proportions. Some of the greatest novels of modern times has the same "feel" of scope that is found in Tolkein's "Lord of the Rings" series, with all the best parts of SciFi.

And this is supposed to be a bad thing? Please.

I'm not even going to get into the current state of Fantasy's book length. Completely different... story.