touched by his noodly appendage
Jul. 18th, 2011 02:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadydaveWow, last week was busy. I had three goals: 1) finish two stories to submit to Machine of Death 2; 2) finish Diana's Slytherin scarf for HP 7.2; 3) finish Basara so I could give all 27 volumes back to Courtney. Naturally, I only accomplished one of these things (1). And then, on Thursday when I had a million things to do, I came down with bizarre chest congestion and general blah and have felt like a woeful Dickensian orphan all weekend.
But I did see HP 7.2 on opening night! I'm not the biggest fan of the movies, but I enjoy seeing them (and then analyzing how badly they fail at adapting stuff afterwards), and normally I think they do a serviceable job transferring the books to screen. This one, though, was pretty disappointing: not because it was actively BAD, but because I feel like the second half of Deathly Hallows is jam-packed with exciting stuff, and yet, somehow, the movie kinda failed at making any of it actually exciting onscreen.
Also, they cut the best part of the epilogue:
SOME KID: Why are they staring at us?
RON: It's me. I'm extremely famous.
WHY DO YOU HATE THE BOOKS' FINAL SCENES, STEVEN KLOVES. THEY ARE SO MUCH BETTER THAN YOURS.
In conclusion: WHOLE HEAP OF MEH is not a good concept for a conclusion to a series.
And then I drove up to Boston to see Courtney! On Saturday, we went to the MFA:
ME: ...Does that say "Cthulu"?
COURTNEY: I think it's the Chihuly exhibit.
TURNS OUT WE WERE BOTH RIGHT. Little did we know that for all appearances the world of glass-blowing is merely a cover for the Elder Gods to break through to our universe. I don't really know what else would explain the theme of extra-dimensional tentacles...
Ikebana Boat
Mille Fiori
Persian Ceiling
What's this?
CEILING SQUID IS WATCHING YOU.
The Chandelier room
Neodymium Reeds on Logs
On a similar note, adherents of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are now permitted to wear pasta strainers as religious headgear for driver's license photos in Austria.
Thirty Days of Genre
Day 3: A genre novel that is underrated.
(Look, they don't say thirty CONSECUTIVE days.)
I can't think of a specific book, but I can think of a specific author: Patricia McKillip. It seems that no one has anything bad to say against her, but she rarely gets brought up in discussions about classic fantasy novels, and I think she's one of the most consistently good authors in the genre. She's awesome at riffing on some of fantasy's most compelling themes -- the power of nature, music, and story-telling -- and using its most familiar tropes in new and interesting ways while never really repeating herself. She also has a beautiful dream-like style of writing AND a knack for creating likable characters. What's not to like?
Here, have some reviews of her stuff:
The Sorceress and the Cygnet/The Bell at Sealey Head
The Cygnet and the Firebird
But I did see HP 7.2 on opening night! I'm not the biggest fan of the movies, but I enjoy seeing them (and then analyzing how badly they fail at adapting stuff afterwards), and normally I think they do a serviceable job transferring the books to screen. This one, though, was pretty disappointing: not because it was actively BAD, but because I feel like the second half of Deathly Hallows is jam-packed with exciting stuff, and yet, somehow, the movie kinda failed at making any of it actually exciting onscreen.
Also, they cut the best part of the epilogue:
SOME KID: Why are they staring at us?
RON: It's me. I'm extremely famous.
WHY DO YOU HATE THE BOOKS' FINAL SCENES, STEVEN KLOVES. THEY ARE SO MUCH BETTER THAN YOURS.
In conclusion: WHOLE HEAP OF MEH is not a good concept for a conclusion to a series.
And then I drove up to Boston to see Courtney! On Saturday, we went to the MFA:
ME: ...Does that say "Cthulu"?
COURTNEY: I think it's the Chihuly exhibit.
TURNS OUT WE WERE BOTH RIGHT. Little did we know that for all appearances the world of glass-blowing is merely a cover for the Elder Gods to break through to our universe. I don't really know what else would explain the theme of extra-dimensional tentacles...
Ikebana Boat
Mille Fiori
Persian Ceiling
What's this?
CEILING SQUID IS WATCHING YOU.
The Chandelier room
Neodymium Reeds on Logs
On a similar note, adherents of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are now permitted to wear pasta strainers as religious headgear for driver's license photos in Austria.
Thirty Days of Genre
Day 3: A genre novel that is underrated.
(Look, they don't say thirty CONSECUTIVE days.)
I can't think of a specific book, but I can think of a specific author: Patricia McKillip. It seems that no one has anything bad to say against her, but she rarely gets brought up in discussions about classic fantasy novels, and I think she's one of the most consistently good authors in the genre. She's awesome at riffing on some of fantasy's most compelling themes -- the power of nature, music, and story-telling -- and using its most familiar tropes in new and interesting ways while never really repeating herself. She also has a beautiful dream-like style of writing AND a knack for creating likable characters. What's not to like?
Here, have some reviews of her stuff:
The Sorceress and the Cygnet/The Bell at Sealey Head
The Cygnet and the Firebird