Behold–I return from the wilderness.  Nope, no holy tablets though.  No souvenirs either.

For those who weren’t in the loop, I took an extended leave from cyberspace to chase a writing gig at Mongoose Publishing, the publishers of several role-playings including Babylon 5, Conan (which is fantastic), and the new edition of Paranoia.

The final verdict?  I just couldn’t meet the deadline.  I’ve been getting some nasty leg cramps for the last week or so, and even got a prescription of quinine for it.  Quinine…the stuff they used to use for malaria?!  Yup, the same.  One dose really messed up too.  My legs felt great, but the rest of me felt like I’d just had a nasty visit from Torquemada.  By mid-afternoon I couldn’t even type.  There were other things, the new kittens and some of the health problems they were having.  Minor ones, thank God.  Earlier in August, we also had a long humid heatwave run through here.  It sounds like a lot of excuses, but I was genuinely off my game these last few weeks.

I didn’t just leave it at that, though.  Jamie’s been a real trooper, pulling for me and backing me up on whatever I had to do.  And I really wanted the gig.  Writing for B5, Lone Wolf, Conan or whatever and getting paid?  I was sleeping a few hours a night for the last two weeks.  Last night I stayed up till 4am, throwing ice water into my face, on the hour, every hour. Then I went back to the keyboard and typed like crazy, crunching d20 stats and data as I went.

I wanted it bad, but I had to be realistic.  I  wasn’t going to make the deadline no matter how good I was.  Exhausted, in constant pain.  50 pages in just a couple hours?  Nah.  I learned a while back I had to forgive myself for having limits.  I send a short e-mail to Mongoose.  I figured I’d be lucky if they asked to see what I had so far, but there’s no reason to.

I didn’t get the job, but Jamie and I ended up achieving something more important.  We proved to each other that, despite all our missteps and nightmarish failures, we’re still a good team.  In sports, people would call it a character-building defeat.  You can have a good team, a good driver, the best technology, the best skills…and still have a bad day.  I think that’s what we’re having now.

Okay, so we get to live and fight another day.  The next battlefield will probably be more Afterhell, maybe a novel.  So we lost a battle.  We’ll win the war.

Just thought I’d try out the new settings.  It’s a good excuse anyway.

My submission for Mongoose Publishing is really behind.  I’m guesstimating that I need to do at least 12,000 words today to make up for lost ground.  I was getting some nasty, nasty leg cramps last night which put me completely off my game.  My doctor has written up a ‘script for quinine, of all things.  The stuff they used for malaria?  Sheesh.

Not sure why this has flared up.  The RNCC, a veritable goulash of hypocrisy and meanspiritedness, has been going on all week.  The news media has given up its roll-over-and-play-dead routine and gone straight to lovin’ on the legs of neocons.  Here in the real world, Jamie and I are trying to keep fleas off the new litter of kittens.  Most of the last five weeks have been hot and muggy, especially at night.  It seems I have so many reasons to choose from.  [shrug]  Well, I thought it was worth a laugh.

A few quick tidbits for folks, if it ever comes up in their own lives.

• At the RNCC last night, Ahnod the Governator was lying up his carefully crafted backside.  Apparently honesty isn’t counted among the rarely codified and loudly touted family virtues.  Don’t let anyone get away with stuff like that.  Pin them down.
• This has been bugging me for some time.  I’m one of several people monitoring right-wing media for Media Matters for America.   The neocon screaming head I’m tracking is a shrill, detestable  little gnome by the name of Mark Levin.  If you ever hear someone sing his praises, get that person to a professional cult deprogrammer immediately.  Those of you who follow the ISA Phoenix Babylon 5 PBEM might have witnessed a caricature of him just recently.  Sorry, I had to get it out of my system.

Anyway, I wanted to get all that out.  I don’t want to bog folks down in a rant.  It’s a time-honored cyberpunk tradition, but I’m not sure if I have the energy for a good old-fashioned Johnny Storm moment anyway.

In case people haven’t heard already, the object of King Kong’s affections has gone to the Mann’s Chinese Theater in the sky.   Here are a few links:

I saw the original 1933 King Kong just a few weeks ago, and inadvertently renewed my childhood crush on her all over again.  I’d forgotten what a good actress she was, the way she expressed an ongoing struggle between tenacity and vulnerability.  For many years after, she had to reconcile herself to the shadow that King Kong cast over her career, and finally did so with charm and aplomb.  In fact she’d even become friends with director Peter Jackson when he took the reins of the King Kong remake.  She might not be here, but she’s radiant somewhere.

A quick postscript:  I prefer to keep Afterhell as non-partisan as possible, but I had to throw this bit of synchronicity in.  While I was writing up this entry, the second hour of the Al Franken Show started with a horror-oriented intro complete with John Carpenter’s theme for Halloween.  Oh man, I hope they do that again when October 31 comes around!

I just heard that Jackson Beck has died at the age of 92. He lent his voice to many characters, probably numbering up into the thousands if you count commercials, of which he did many, for everything from Chesterfield cigarettes to Little Caesar’s pizza. You know that “Pizza Pizza” snip? That was Beck.

He was the voice of Bluto in Popeye cartoons, Philo Vance in a rather well done detective drama in the late forties, and did dozens of narrator roles in radio, film and television. They ranged from “Faster than a speeding bullet!” for the Superman radio and TV shows, to “On November 13th, Felix Unger was asked to remove himself from his place of residence …” for The Odd Couple TV show, to the narrator of Woody Allen’s “Take the Money and Run.”

Beck’s work has become a part of our popular culture to the point where we probably don’t even notice it, and I thought it appropriate to make note of his passing here.

Hi, folks, I thought I’d make an appearance here before the record-breaking summer heat conspired with my Pentium Northwood system to force me into the nearest garage.

I’m polishing up a couple of scripts for the perusal of our resident artist and webmistress, Alida Saxon.  She’s asked to see them so she can percolate some album art ideas for Volume 2…not to mention threatened just out of sheer curiosity.  It’s only to be expected.

I keep talking about new eps, dropping titles like “Sleepless Days” and “Damning Praise,” so someone’s bound to call my bluff eventually.  Anyway, a couple thoughts on matters loosely related to Afterhell…..

Jamie recently pointed me to an article on the SFGate about a news story I’d been following for a while.  A kid in San Jose was in serious hot water for a poem he’d written in school.  It was a primitive, edgy piece of work that evoked the fears of any reasonable person after the events at Columbine High School a few years back.

Students and faculty were panicking.  Was it a poem or a threat?  A threatening poem?  What was it?!

The case was before the California State Supreme Court.  Fortunately, sanity reigned and the kid was cleared of any charges.

Now Jamie brought this to my attention for two reasons.  The kid lives in San Jose, California.  My hometown.  And one of several writers who came to this kid’s defense is one of my favorites, none other than Harlan Ellison.

And this does strike a personal chord for me, for reasons other than the obvious.  My brother once got into trouble for somthing similar.  A counselor at his school saw a picture he drew and called our parents in.  He was only copying some art from a post-apocalyptic RPG, an early edition of Gamma World.  A line drawing of a humanoid rabbit packing a rifle was enough to make her, a normally reasonable and sympathetic woman, panic.  And they had to show the counselor the book and prove my brother hadn’t gone postal.

I’ve always agreed with Ellison’s take on art, that its function is to disturb as well as inspire.   Complaceny, not fear, is the enemy.  With enough time and mental adjustment, you can get used to anything.  Complaceny is comfortable, reassuring and unchanging.  Once you’re hooked on the junk, you’ll do anything to keep it going.  Even comfort has its dangers.

I wanted to put in a world for Jerry Goldsmith, noted composer for fillms and television, who died in his sleep Wednesday night.  Everyone has been touched by his innovative music at least once in their lives, from Patton to Logan’s Run, from The Omen to the Star Trek films, from The Man from UNCLE to The Waltons.  I’ve loved film music for a long time.  His work at there for me at the very beginning.  The second film I ever saw was bits from Planet of the Apes, and the music I heard then has stuck to me all this time.  I’d like to think an exciting new sound has been added to Heaven’s mix.

Just got back from ‘Salem’s Lot.  Man, does my neck hurt.

Tons of fans, of the horror genre or of Stephen King in particular, have been chomping at the bit about TNT’s remake of ‘Salem’s Lot.  I’m not trying to be punny, honestly.  Controversy has been buzzing around this thing for some time, ever since Tobe Hooper directed the original mini-series in 1979.

“It wasn’t like the book.”  “The opening was stupid.”  “They did Barlow wrong!”  “David Soul sucks!”  “I wanna blankie!” “Waaaaah!”

Yeah, kinda cold of me.  Sorry.  My sympathy for fundamentalists or literalists is a little low.

Here’s why.  Books ain’t movies, movies ain’t books, and parts ain’t parts, no matter what people tell you.  Literature and cinema are fundamentally different media, each putting their own special demands on artist and audience alike.  They each have their own merits.  You can’t just dump filet mignon into a blender and call it the perfect milkshake.  When a book is adapted to film or vice versa, you have to cut the results some slack.  Expect change.  Otherwise you get junk.

I subjected you to that  li’l lecture, true believers, only to make clear where I’m coming from.  I’m familiar with the book and the ‘79 mini-series, but not loyal.  I didn’t go in with a lot of expectations.  Just one.  I wanted it to be good.

Folks have asked what I think of the TNT remake.  Here I am telling you.

The first half was fantastic.  It boiled down the best qualities of the original book, right down to the opening narration.  Scriptwriter Peter Ficardi should be commended.  The teaser is the only major deviation from the source—and a good one—establishing crisis and drawing us in from the start.  When we hit the titular town, taking in quick character sketches of the people and the place, it’s like a funeral pall laid out before us.  We’re told at the opening, “This town knows darkness.”  And it’s easy to believe.

My hopes were up. It was promising good things.  There was some atmosphere, a few genuine efforts to hit a little too close to home.  This wasn’t a safe, orderly little world where a great eeeevil colors outside the lines.

It was really cooking until the second half.  It kept falling short of greatness.  Suddenly we’re stiffed with Hollywoodisms:  token Scully moments, the undead on the march, out-of-character one-liners, sudden orchestra hits and high-speed smash-edits.  Cheap shocks.  Carnival tricks.  And just when we’re handed a perfect ending for this horror flick, a lame-ass heavy metal cover of “Paint It Black” intrudes on it.

Don’t ruin the tone, idiots!   Consistency may be the hobgoblin of little minds, but it’s not wishy-washy either.

Stupid.  Keep it simple, stupid.

I hate to say it, but I honestly don’t think director Mikael Salomon knew how to tackle horror at all.  I mean, look at this!  When asked what makes a movie scary, the one element he doesn’t mention is the story itself.

I’m sure someone will eventually try to hang me with my own words, but that’s what at the heart of every horror flick.  We need nightmares, not pranks.  We can get that stupid snake-in-the-candy-jar trick anywhere.  It doesn’t take a lot of skill to walk up behind someone and shout “Boo!”

And this version of ‘Salem’s Lot has been hamstrung by that very mistake, which was made repeatedly.  If it wasn’t for that, it’d have left us with chills long after the incredible shrinking end credits were done.

Sure, it’s fun.  No question.  Both adaptations have their moments.  But it could’ve been more.  It could’ve been memorable.

I’m just ducking in real quick to touch base.  I mentioned some comments on the ‘Salem’s Lot remake earlier.  I posted them in my own LJ blog for those who are curious.

Also, Fahrenheit 9/11 is a work of genius.  It’s more than a political commentary.  Michael Moore pulled all the stops and used every single part of the medium to the full.  Here is a movie film students will be picking apart for decades to come.  And yeah, it’s frightening at times.  Gory in places, too.  There’s some on-the-spot war footage, right down to the wounds.  Caveats a la mode.

Godzilla looms ahead.  I’ll let you know how it goes.  But first, my wrist is getting cranky….

Just a quick little something before I disappear for the weekend.  This is an entry I wrote in another blog for Halloween 2003.

http://www.ujournal.org/users/darkkarma0/2066.html

I was trying to do a major rundown of horror film highlights throughout the month, capping it off with (what I considered) recommendations for a personal Halloween movie marathon.  We were still in the thick of post-production, so the blog idea didn’t work out.

If folks are curious, I can offer a review of the TNT remake of ‘Salem’s Lot.  I’m going to try to catch the whole thing this weekend.  But I’ve got two other movies ahead of it in the queue:  Fahrenheit 9/11 and the original 1954 Japanese version of Godzilla.  Is it a different movie without Raymond Burr butting in?  We shall see.

Or maybe just me and Jamie.  I wasn’t going to speak for anyone….

A quick update for all and sundry:  Afterhell:  “Dark Descent” is now on sale at CD Baby.

It’s an online store run by and for independent musicians yet to be discovered (or resented) by the recording industry.  Its base of operations is right here in the Portland Tri-Met area, and the CD Baby crew are a lot of fun to work with.  Special thanks to CD Baby’s daddy Derek Sivers, Peter Wright (aka Detective Moore), and actor/composer Curt Siffert!

Local folks make good?  We’ll see.

Last night, Jamie and I had dinner with up-and-coming voice actor DJ Chiles.  Loads of fun.  Sometimes we got intimidated by the sheer number of voices, dialects, accents, and gags DJ could do on the fly!  We talked about all sorts of things, everything from cats to his work of late.  He’s part of an improv group and had recently done some voiceovers for a local PBS station.  What he can do is just amazing.

We met him and many more voice actors at a Halloween party put on by a lady in the Afterhell cast.  At the party, we passed around copies of “Damning Praise” and “Sleepless Days”, two scripts Jamie and I had written for the series.  Everyone decided to do an impromptu reader’s theater with “Sleepless Days” where DJ read for a vampire.  He gave the role that perfect hint of a Hungarian accent, expertly avoiding camp.  Every now and then ever since, he’s sent us an occasional note about doing more.

And of course that came up again over dinner last night.  We gave the usual status report and crossing of fingers.  Blah, blah, CD sales, seed money, blah, blah, blah, hopehopehope. 

We discussed ways to promote the show.  Banner exchanges, bugging Fangoria Magazine for a review (I’d link to www.fangoria.com, but the pic on this week’s front page might be too grisly for some–fair warning), online ad space.

Producing new eps, which came into the discussion as well, should be a more streamlined process than before.  Having gone through the process once, I know what we can do better and where.  We should be able to produce two or three eps for the time and cost it took for the pilot.

All this becomes more pressing as time passes.  Any actor involved in the project for a protracted period of time has asked more than once, “When can we make another one?”

Hearing that again last night from DJ has got us wondering.  I think we’ve been bitten by the audio bug again.  The only question now is what to do about it.