Brand X

Quick plug for someone else's comic, the upcoming Five Fists of Science. Read the preview at the link, then buy the comic.

Seriously, if you don't think that Nikola Tesla teaming up with Mark Twain to fight Thomas Edison and J.P. Morgan is cool, I'm not sure we can be friends any more. That's the kind of concept that everyone's pretending SNAKES ON A PLANE is. That's cooler than Batman fighting Captain America on a pirate ship. Hell, I'll come right out and say it, it's cooler than zeppelins. And nothing's cooler than zeppelins.

Speaking of which, here's a line I need to get off my chest and will never be able to use:

Villain: "What do you mean 'gone too far'? I'm hardly the first person to interrogate my enemies by dipping parts of them in liquid nitrogen and then smashing them into chunks!"

Henchman: "I know, master, but using the chunks in margaritas..."

Good email from Mr. Producer today, regarding some questions about the first section of the screenplay and how things are going to develop. The best thing about intelligent questions is how answering them makes you clarify things in your head, make explicit the vague notions you've been kicking around, and often develop them better in the process.

One of his questions, however, was "How did you come up with this specific bit?" This is the kind of question that makes writers nervous. The truth is that no matter how much we analyze, structure and understand what we do, and screenwriters do this more than most just due to the nature of the medium, there's always a certain irreducible edge of the mystical about it.

I don't know where I got that bit. Some bits I steal from real life, some I steal from other writers, some I force into existence by simple brute effort, some I assemble out of whatever sense of craft I've managed to develop, but a surprising, and a worrying, amount of what I create just kind of appears. I've heard this from other writers, that a lot of what we make just materializes in our heads from nothing. It's doubly worrying because that's often the best stuff.

This worries us, or at least worries me, because if we don't know how it works, we don't know if it's going to keep working. Think of writers you've enjoyed; I bet there's at least one on your list who, at some point in their career, lost their mojo. Maybe all at once, maybe slowly, maybe even temporarily. Obviously, one doesn't want to name names, but I think we're all mature enough to acknowledge that the later works of Shakespeare are, by and large, nowhere near as good as his earlier stuff. That could happen to any of us. It could happen tomorrow. Man, do I ever not want that to happen.

That's why questions like "Where did this bit come from?" give me mild heebie-jeebies, because they try to pin down the mystical, and experience teaches us that the mystical doesn't respond well to being pinned down. Magic does not survive lab testing. If you wait up all night to see Santa, he doesn't come. And yes, we can quantify and practice our craft, we can establish the underlying principles we're using and strengthen them thereby, we can understand a lot of what we do. But not all of it. For all the skill and finesse and workmanship we can develop, there's still that weird supernatural aspect, and like the educated cavemen that we are, we're always a little scared of what we don't understand.

Writers are a superstitous and cowardly lot. Who can blame us?

Labels: writing

I feel like a jerk doing two political posts in a row, I just couldn't resist talking about this. It reminds me why I love this loony-assed country so much.

Some South Dakota Sioux have remembered that their dumbass state legislature can't tell them what to do on their land.

The United States has always wrestled with questions of sovereignty; it's one of the reasons we're cool, and several of the reasons we're crazy. We have three coequal branches of government, a layer cake of local, state, and federal laws, and of course the very weird and tricky issue of Indian sovereignty, which is morally linked with that little genocide thing nobody likes to talk about.

Drive across the border from Utah into Nevada at any point, and the first two businesses you'll see will be a casino and a liquor store. Their customer base is not Nevadans, I'm guessing. The massive rise in gambling in this country has proven to be quite a windfall for areas that permit it, including reservations. I myself like to duck across my local state line around July 2nd or so and stock up on the really GOOD fireworks. I sometimes wonder if this doesn't give Americans a somewhat different view of the law than citizens in other countries. The law may be the absolute guide of behavior laid down by the people's representatives in government, but it's also observably inconsistent and circumnavigable. Maybe we take the law a little less seriously than most other places. Maybe that's even a good thing.

Also, call it knee-jerk liberalism, but I'm always tickled pink to see Indians telling the government to cram it.

Anyway, let's all raise a glass to standing up to The Man. Here's how to send a few bucks to this effort. Tell your friends.

Labels: politics

This is the best animated GIF that ever there was.

This has sweet FA to do with screenwriting. You don't like it, get your own blog. Which you probably already have. You'll have to excuse me, I've just watched the Star Wars Holiday Special from 1977. Harvey Korman in blackface alien drag, and that's not the worst part. I'm a bit punchy, but this image has just renewed my faith in humanity.

Seems that this nice fellow went through Bush's approval rating state by state in the months since the 2004 election, color-coding states based on their relative approval vs. disapproval of Bush's competence, and showing the month-to-month progress.

You remember that feeling in November 2004? That sick, betrayed, punched-in-the-gut sensation that comes with the horrible impression that your fellow Americans are gullible, stupid, bigoted bastards?

Turns out they're not. We're a little slow on the uptake, maybe, but it turns out you can still only fool all of the people some of the time.

EDIT: Turns out that doesn't look so good in my Blogger layout, so if you missed the link at the beginning, the image under discussion is here.

Labels: politics

I've been perpetrating a very mild fraud on readers of this blog, which I wish to come clean about now that it's entirely moot. My legal name was not Noah Brand until today. I spent this morning at the courthouse taking care of my name change hearing and the last paperwork, and I am now honest-to-gosh named Noah Brand. Really. I mean it this time.

Visiting courtrooms is always interesting for me. They carry such a weight of tradition, ritual, and seriousness, especially for a huge constitutional democracy fan like myself, but at the same time so much that's trivial and stupid goes on in them. This morning was an interesting example. There were about 20 of us there for name changes, which were scheduled at 8:45. Restraining order hearings were scheduled at 9:00, so things went briskly. The judge was perfectly nice, but I couldn't help contrasting my respect for the judicial system with the utterly perfunctory nature of the proceedings.

I was one of the last ones called, and I passed the time looking at the other people there and trying to guess why they wanted their names changed. Some, I figured, were getting married or divorced, mostly the women. Often, the name the judge called was the clue, as it was the old name. Several Asian people clearly were moving to something easier for Americans to pronounce, including one young lady I was seated next to, who was switching from Xin to Kriston. I didn't have the heart to tell her that was a very weird spelling of it.

My favorite was one slightly pudgy young fellow with his indie-issue hoodie, purple hair and a somewhat thin and scraggly beard. I was hoping he wasn't one of those neopagans who insist on being called Starchild Ravenwing, when the judge called him by the name he was changing, which turned out to be Elizabeth. I couldn't resist checking his posted form when I went to put mine up; he'd decided to go with Anthony, which I felt was a good choice.

It's interesting; I always find transsexuals tremendously life-affirming, the embodiment of negotiated committment values, people willing to risk a great deal and give up even more in the name of making their identity their own. On the other hand, I find otherkin annoying and faintly creepy, which makes me question why I'm totally down with gender dysphoria, but not with species dysphoria.

Enough rambling. Back to practicing my new signature work.

Posting tonight from the Rose and Raindrop a lovely Portland restaurant with a bar that allows pipe smoking and has a beer list to make brave men weep. I’ve been here the last couple hours with Adam, my producer/brother who longtime readers of this blog (Hi, mom!) will remember. He’s in town for a few days to work on the script with me. Instead we’re working on developing the best possible pitch version of the story, so he can go impress his director and investor friends with how cool the idea is and how they ought to drop everything else in their lives and commit to working with Gray Area on this instead.

Incidentally, turns out the only thing better than the beer at the Rose and Raindrop is the burgers, and the only thing better than the burgers is the cornmeal-breaded catfish.

Why, yes, I’ve had a few beers. Why do you ask?

Labels: writing

Boy, nothing motivates productivity like looking at your contract and noting the discrepancy between where one is supposed to be and where one actually is. The other problem with one's dream job, it turns out, is remembering that it's a job. No problem, I'm not all that behind, I just won't be leaving my room for a couple days.

And, speaking of things other than writing I've been doing today, rewatched SINGIN' IN THE RAIN and noted that Gene Kelly's skeleton is made entirely of Slinkies, and Donald O'Connor has no skeleton; he is composed of Silly Putty and elf magic.

Why yes, since you ask, I am heterosexual. Someone email me or something; I'm going to be in this room for a while.

Labels: writing

Last week, I mentioned that I was looking for a better title for a romantic comedy spec about a guy's adventures with two women, and ensuing complications. Today, after a caffiene-fueled brainstorming session with Sylvia, including such suggestions as THE ATTRACTIVE YOUNG PEOPLE WHO HAVE SEX WITH EACH OTHER, and the somewhat punchier BIG GIANT SEX PILE, we've got it down to three contenders. I'd like to solicit the opinion of the internet, specifically the tiny corner of it that reads this blog, as to which one we ought to go with.

The three finalists are:

IT'S COMPLICATED

BEST LAID PLANS

TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING

I am aware that BEST LAID PLANS has already been a movie, but I figure if that didn't stop Crash, why let it stop us?

Labels: writing

Because it seemed like a good idea at the time, the Pentagon's begun working on cyborg sharks, presumably to replace the commando dolphins they lost last year.

First off, how do you work on a cyborg shark project without looking around and going "Crap, I'm a supervillain. How'd that happen?"

Secondly, you know that the cyborg sharks are going to go rogue and turn evil, and quite naturally the only force on earth that can oppose them will be the long-lost commando dolphins, ironically fighting to save the very society that tormented them and made them freaks. That's just what's going to happen, and we all know it.

I see this as a Pixar animated feature, kind of TERMINATOR meets FINDING NEMO. Crossover audience, loads of toys, probably several direct-to-video sequels.

In other words, while I'm busting my ass trying to write good movies, reality blithely continues to write terrible ones.

As you were.