The blog is moving

I'm going to close up my Blogger blogs and switch over to LiveJournal. Check em out at jeffsoesbe.livejournal.com. See ya there!

Upcoming "Bionic Woman" tidbit

David Eick (one of BSG producers) is going to be heading up a "revival" ("reimagination") of the old "Bionic Woman" series. One specific detail that came out recently (see appended article) is that Katie Sackoff (Starbuck from BSG) will play an evil bionic woman in the pilot.

I do wonder why, when you have a technological marvel, there is always an evil analog. Back in the 70s/80s, you could attribute it to the Soviet Union doing parallel secret research in the same area. I think there was even an episode or two of "Six Million Dollar Man" about this. This time around, I wonder how they'll explain the existence of an evil bionic woman. The Chinese? Aliens? Secret branch of US Government?

Article from SciFi News from TV MegaSite yahoo group (http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/ group/scifi-news/).

Sackhoff Guests On Bionic Woman

Katee Sackhoff, who plays Starbuck in SCI FI Channel's original series
Battlestar Galactica, will guest-star in The Bionic Woman, the SF NBC
pilot from Battlestar executive producer David Eick, according to The
Hollywood Reporter.

Sackhoff will appear in the pilot for the series, a reimagining of the
1970s show, which again centers on Jamie Sommers (Michelle Ryan), a
woman who is turned into a walking technological miracle after a car
crash.

Sackhoff will play Sarah, an evil bionic woman and nemesis to Sommers.
The casting comes on the heels of the recent apparent demise of
Starbuck on Battlestar.

Battlestar Galactica Season Finale

I'm steadfastly avoiding spoilers for the BSG Season 3 Finale that just showed yesterday. I really want to watch this one clean, even though I do know bits and pieces already (some of the final five Cylons) and I have a good sense of the verdict of the trial (i'm betting "not guilty", though I can't yet see how they get there).

BSG has been interesting this season - they took a lot of twists at the end of the Season 2 and the start of Season 3 and I'm not sure how well all the twists worked. But I still think it's a very good show and one of the best on TV.

Asimov's - February 2007

An interesting month for Asimov's. I thought several of the stories had very strong starts and intriguing plots and characters, but then took a major turn in style and/or plot turn right near the end of the story and didn't live up to their promise. I would put "Outgoing" by Alex Wilson, "The Chimera Transit" by Jack Skillingstead and "Close" by William Preston in this category.

My favorite story in this issue was "Recovering Apollo 8", a deep character study of a man driven by a love of space and respect for those who explored it. (It's my guess that the character was modeled on Richard Branson, owner of Virgin Enterprises.) The story had some alternate history aspects to it that I felt weren't really necessary except to allow for certain plot elements to occur, and a bit of a coincidence at the end (to resolve a final plot thread). Those were the only things that kept it from being a top-notch story for me.

I'd also give credit to "A Portrait of the Artist" by Charles Midwinter, an interesting look at an artist, his sometimes girlfriend, and an interesting turn of events in his life and his art. I don't think it knitted together as nicely as I would like - again, a few too-convenient events at the end - but I still enjoyed the style and (minimal) scope of the story.

Analog - Jan/Feb 2007

I read an entire Analog for the first time in a very long time, perhaps ever, and I now understand what people mean when they call something "an Analog story". I found these stories ... well ... obvious, blatant, or some adjective similar to those. The stories usually seem to contain a quite intriguing premise, but then the story is advanced almost completely through narrative exposition or expository dialogue.

I thought that the "world exploration" was, at times, quite clumsy and handled in a manner similar to what people often (negatively) attribute to "old time" science fiction or modern Star Trek (a la, "As you know, Doctor, the prothalium drive is a simple extension of the hypertrophic Quanset Field").

To me the best stories were less obvious and (somewhat) more subtle in their presentation. They also had in common that they were simpler in scope and character. For this issue, my favorites were "Super Gyro" by Grey Rollins (in a world of meta-humans, a fast food worker tries to handle a robbery gone sour) and "If Only We Knew" by Jerry Orton (a man in for a simple insurance exam discovers that he is more special than he could have imagined).

But even these stories, in my opinion, suffered from being too "surface" and not going deep enough into the characters and the implication of their setup. Even these stories also tended to have a "pithy one-liner" ending that went for a small chuckle (usually sexual in nature) that, for me, undercut the potential depth of the story.

Asimov's - January 2007

None of the stories in the January 2007 Asimov's received top grades from me. Most stories were at about the same level (B/B-), except for "Cafe Culture" by Jack Dann, which I found rather unenjoyable (and almost distasteful) no matter how I tried to interpret it.

The two I enjoyed the most were "The Hikikomori's Cartoon Kimono" by A.R. Morlan, for its different subject matter and post-cyberpunk feel, and "Poison" by Bruce McAllister, a story of a witch, a boy and some lizards that doesn't end like you'd expect and had a nice "fairy tale" style.

Forced to choose a favorite from this issue, I would choose "The Hikikomori's Cartoon Kimono".

Catching Up: March/April/May 2006

This is a short review of magazines from back in March/April/May of 2006 (I'm a little behind).

F&SF, March 2006: None of the stories received top grades (A-/A/A+) from me. My favorite was "Czesko" by Ef Deal, because of its storytelling style and somewhat different subject and plot.

F&SF, April 2006: None of the stories received top grades from me, but several got strong B/B+ grades: "Gardening at Night" by Daryl Gregory, "IKlawa" by Donald Mead, "The Moment of Joy Before" by Claudia O'Keefe, and "Starbuck" by Robert Reed. My favorite was "IKlawa" because I enjoyed the alternate history and the look at a subject that is rarely treated in science fiction (Africa in the 19th century).

Asimov's, April/May 2006: This was a marvelous issue, as several stories received top grades and the overall quality of stories was very high.

"Inclination" by William Shunn was an intriguing and touching coming-of-age tale of life on a spaceship; "The Final Flight of the Blue Bee" by James Maxey was a very enjoyable "real-world" superhero tale focused on the characters behind the legends; "The Osteomancer's Son" by Greg van Eekhout a very moving yet hard-boiled story of the son of a magician; and "The Walls of the Universe" was a fun yarn about a farmboy and multiple universes. My favorites (tie) were "The Osteomancer's Son" and "Inclination".

TV: “Doctor Who” (Introduction)

I’m going to start out with a painful confession: I have never watched “Doctor Who” before starting on in the new series.

I’m sure this marks me as some of deprived child, and people are now wondering about what other hideous things my parents did to me, or in what cultural backwater I spent my misguided youth (Texas).

As I understand it, the various incarnations of “Doctor Who” all have the following characteristics: a charismatic, mysterious and somewhat prickly main character; time travel; obsessed robots with metallic voices; fanciful aliens; overarching plotlines; and “sidechicks”. Quite frankly, I should have been tracking this show down and watching it every chance I could get!

But I didn’t. I have vague recollections of it occasionally being on late at night on my local public television station, but it was very inconsistent and not something to which you could get attached. This was before there were things like a bazillion cable channels, including some devoted to science fiction. This was also before you could find old videotapes at the local video store.

However, things have changed. Now there’s Sci-Fi channel and Netflix and conventions and downloadable videos and website and flash-based previews and wikipedia episode guides and if you want to know anything about a show you can find it out in a second and have episodes at your door in a day.

So, it’s time for me to experience “Doctor Who”. What better way to start than with the latest series, especially since multiple episodes were nominated for the Hugo for best Short Form Dramatic Presentation. I’ve started in on the series, and am about five or six episodes into it. More thoughts later.

TV: “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”

What’s this, you say? A review of a television show about the backstage goings-on at a television show? In a blog reviewing speculative fiction?

OK, you’re right. But I must ask the question: what could be more speculative than a television show where people are smart, funny, quick-witted, talk very fast and believe passionately that what they are doing is Terribly Important and they need to devote themselves fully to it?

I enjoy watching this show, as I’ve enjoyed watching virtually everything that Aaron Sorkin has created or had a major hand in. I read a review on salon.com by Heather Havrilesky (http://www.salon.com/ent/tv/iltw/2006/09/24/studio_60/) with which I agree tremendously. She talks about how all the Aaron Sorkin ventures have a strong sense of self-importance, and while it works in a show about politics and the president, it probably doesn’t work as well in a show about a late-night comedy show (or about a third-ranked sports network, see “Sports Night”).

But you know what, I still like it and I’ll definitely watch it until it ends up diminishing in the ratings and it gets taken off the air and ends up consigned to DVD box sets. While watching it, I’ll dream of a world where people are smart, funny, quick-witted, talk very fast and believe that what they are doing is Terribly Important and they should devote all their passion and energy to it. It will also be a world where late-night comedy skit shows are topical, pointed and marvelously funny. What could be more speculative than that?

As a last note, there are environments (beyond politics) where I think the self-important, fast talking, quick-witted style of drama can work. I'm betting there multiple science fiction premises where it would make sense, and I think it woud also make sense in the world of high-tech startups. Many years ago, when I lived in Silicon Valley, I had ideas for a television show set in the world of a startup. Now I realize it would be in the style of an Aaron Sorkin show. I've still got the concept, plotline and episode ideas sitting around - Aaron, why don't your people call my people (read: me) and we can do lunch?

Reboot

We're going to take a little reboot here. I've been bad about keeping up with my posting, and I've gotten behind on my magazine reading, so I'm going to restart with the recent magazines, television shows, movies, etc. I might catch up to the past work, I might not. We'll just see how it goes.