Hello
NOTE: This chapter has been ready for a while, but I'm only getting around to posting now because...
BORN January 22 at 4:11 am
My new daughter Zoey! (10 lbs 5.5 oz)
On with the show...
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I'm Trying to Pass the Bechdel Test (as a good example for my kids).
(How appropriate to broach this topic near the birth of my daughter.)
When I first created Metropolis I erroneously thought that I could make the characters genderless. I consider myself a feminist and I thought (erroneously) that I could avoid gender issues in my story. Within the first few chapters it was obvious that it was all too easy to impose the male gender on the characters. Eg's top hat is a dead giveaway.
Frankly, I don't know of any good science-fiction that adequately conveys a true genderless society. I know a few stories about genderless societies, but they are always in relation to or told by a gendered main character. The only examples I can think of right now are that episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation called "The Outcast" and a book called "The Breeds of Man" by F.M. Busby. Are we even capable of envisioning what a genderless society might be like? If anyone can give me a better example of a story involving a true genderless society, please let me know.
So once I accepted that the characters in Metropolis had a gender, I was suddenly faced with the problem that my comic strip was a world of men. I didn't want that. I want to set a good example for my son and my daughter. I also didn't want my strip to fail the Bechdel Test. I immediately created the character of Tepper in Chapter 7.
Since then I have struggled to involve more female characters into the overall arch of the Metropolis storyline. It's been tough. I only get 8 pages a chapter, so there's not a lot of room. Regardless, I publicly apologize for not passing the Bechdel Test sooner.
The second female character to appear in Metropolis is the White Queen of Sarnia in Chapter 30. Bechdel Test requirement #1 is met.
A third female character is introduced in Chapter 34. Ms. Teschmacher, the executive assistant to the city of Metropolis. However, to date she has not spoken a word. That will be rectified. She's going to be a really fun character.
Chapter 39 introduces our fourth female; whom you will discover is named Tuck E. Rogers.
Four women, 39 chapters and so far they've never spoken a single word to each other. I'm happy to say that Chapter 40 will meet the second and third requirement of the Bechdel Test and officially passing it.
I hope you're enjoying the story.
Have a great day.
PS: A Note about the Bechdel Test.
I don't consider the Bechdel Test to be the "be-all and end-all" of literary analysis. However, I do consider it a good rule of thumb for the type of stories I would like to create. You can't apply the Bechdel Test fairly to a significant amount of literature from the past. But shouldn't it be the base line minimum for most of the stories we're creating today?
PSS: On a similar topic, please enjoy this video of Joss Whedon.
Hiya
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The Sad tale of one of the reasons I stopped collecting comics as a kid.
I used to collect comics in the 80's. Comics were pretty big back then (in numbers if not in dollars). I didn't have a lot of money as a kid but I scraped enough to get two titles a month. The first was G.I. Joe by Marvel Comics. The second title was the "The New Mutants".
In retrospect, it was very weird for a kid who collected G.I. Joe to start collecting a comic like "The New Mutants". Especially considering the style of art that it had. The artist was Bill Sienkiewicz. It was... weird. Check out a few of his covers here (#17 to 31). I have nothing but fondness for his issues of "The New Mutants". I look at comic books today and I wonder where have all the Bill Sienkiewiczes gone?
At any rate... Reading "The New Mutants" introduced me to "The Uncanny X-Men". I really wanted to collect it, but my young mind couldn't rationalize collecting something if I couldn't get back issues. I was hung up on completion. I didn't know too much about comics, but I knew that trying to get all issues of a comic that was up to #196 was going to be hard and very, very expensive.
My first X-Men Issue was #196, a crossover from Secret Wars II which was a limited series I decided to collect. I continued to collect "The Uncanny X-Men" until #258; an "Acts of Vengeance" crossover.
Sigh.
The crossover killed my love of comics. It seemed like everything was a crossover. If I didn't want to feel like I was missing something then I had to buy a seemingly endless list of crossover titles. Add to that the numerous related titles that suddenly sprang up: X-Factor, Excalibur, Wolverine! Three more titles to the three that I was already collecting.
It all became too much. Too much time. Too much money. Too many titles. I hung in for a while but my comic book buying fizzled out completely by early 1990s.
I missed it terribly. I didn't buy a comic again for almost 20 years.
Hiya
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Christmas Music... I started early this year.
I can't help myself. I want diverge from my usual topics of comics and sci-fi to write about Christmas music.
Most people assume that my favourite Christmas album is "A Charlie Brown Christmas" by the Vince Guaraldi Trio. Some of you know that I am a dedicated Peanuts and Charles Monroe Schulz fan. However, that album is only my second favourite for this time of year. I want to tell you about the third and first on my list for the season.
At number three we have "Count Your Blessings". This was an amazing live concert with Jane Siberry, Holly Cole, Rebecca Jenkins, Mary Margaret O'Hara and Victoria Williams (I'll let you google them). I was already a fan of Jane Siberry and Holly Cole when CBC announced this concert in 1994. I was pleasantly introduced to the voices of the remaining three. As you can tell by the Amazon.ca listing I've linked for the CD it is now rare and in high demand. I had a tape copy of the original broadcast from CBC. The banter between these ladies between the songs was hilarious. You don't get that on the CD release.
My number one Christmas album might come as a surprise, Clint Black's "Looking for Christmas"! Certainly not as rare and sought after as the previous album. My wife introduced me to this album. And it has become something that has to be played ever Christmas along with "It's a Wonderful Life". This is a very strong album. Nowadays (here comes my inner codger) it seems that singers spend more time on singles and forget about the album as a whole. I can't help but feel like a happy kid at Christmas when this album plays.
You don't have to be a country music fan to enjoy it. In fact, Clint's country twang gives a lot of playfulness and joy to the songs. Oh, by the way, don't let the album cover put you off.
Other Christmas albums I enjoy:
Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton's "Once Upon a Christmas"
- A Christmas time classic
Los Straightjackets - "Tis the Season for Los Straightjackets"
- Instrumental versions of Christmas songs with a surfer rock twist. Thanks to my brother-in-law Mark for introducing me to this one.
The Rankins - "Do You Hear... : Christmas with Heather, Cookie and Raylene Rankin"
- Good East Coast Canadians girls singing really nicely.
PS: I am not an employee of Amazon.ca. I'm not trying to boost their sales. I just put in the links so you can read what others thought of the albums in the reviews. After a quick search I found most of these albums are available on itunes.ca if not itunes.com. Surprisingly, I could not find Clint's though.
Have a great day.
Hiya
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Download the F.Y.O.C version here.
The Pre-History of my Comic Collecting.
Here's a story that may sound familiar to some of you.
It occurred to me recently that I collected comic strips way before I ever discovered comic books. I must have been under 10 year old; so sometime around the late 70's.
When I was growing up we did not get the local paper (then called the Kitchener-Waterloo Record). Whenever I did come across a newspaper, I would clip the comic strip page. I didn't clip the individual strips, I left the page whole. I don't remember how many I had but I remember a number of them had turned quite yellow.
The best part of this memory is how I stored them. I don't remember when (1978 maybe) but I got the Star Wars Death Star for Christmas. I kept the box. It become a piece of decorative furniture that stood beside my bed. I kept the comic strips in that box.
I have fond memories now of opening that humungous box and reading the pages over and over again.
I can't remember when I got rid of the box and all the strips inside. Knowing myself; I probably was a little trepid about it.
Since that time, my only exposure to comics was borrowing Asterix, Tin Tin and Peanuts (by Charles M. Schulz) books from my local library; which I did repeatedly.
Later on in August 1984, I bought my very first comic book with the intention of collecting. It was G.I. Joe #26 from Marvel comics and written by the great Larry Hama. (I didn't have to look that up. I know it by heart.) It didn't dawn on at the time, but my little twelve year old brain was already primed to read comics years before.
PS: I still have the Death Star and Issue #26.
Have a great day.
.
Hi
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I used to collect comics back in the 80's and 90's. I don't want to sound like a codger but I remember when the cover price of a comic was 0.99 cents. I remember when comics were printed on newsprint. And I also remember the comic "spinner rack".
There was a lot of reasons I left comic books for the aughts (2000's), but I think that one of the main reasons a lot of people did the same was the death of the corner store spinner rack.
In the late 90's and all through the aughts, comic books became something that could only be purchased at specialty shops. That's not where I bought my first comic book. Frankly, that's not where I bought my last comic book either.
Comics books had fabulous market penetration with the corner store spinner rack. I would go there every day in the hopes that a new batch of comics would be there. Any kid at any time was at risk of suddenly discovering the incredible world of comics. Nowadays a kid needs to drive downtown and have generous financial backing to collect comics. Sad to say, but it seems that comic book collecting is now an adult activity.
I don't know if the spinner rack will ever make a return, but I think it would be good for comics if it did. In the meantime, there is a gleam of hope.
1) You can still find Archie comics at your corner store. They are usually sorely neglected on the hidden on the bottom shelf.
2) Chapters book store still seems to have spinner racks. Yahoo.
My sense of nostalgia really affects my opinion on all this.
If there was a petition to sign, I would.
Have a great day.
