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lestatslestits · 4 years

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Phantom of the Opera/Sherlock Holmes Crossover Masterpost

@wheel-of-fish and @jennyfair7 requested a master post of all of the Sherlock Holmes and Phantom of the Opera crossovers that I know of, so after a few days of compiling, here it is! These books range from the (fairly) well known to the rather obsessively obscure, and include any books I know of where the Holmes and Phantom universes overlap. I’ve taken this as a chance to review the ones I’ve read, and I’ll hopefully be able to update this post with more info on the others once I finish them. All opinions expressed in this post are my own.

Note: this is only a list of crossovers published and available for purchase, and of which I am aware. If anyone else knows of more, please let me know!

The Angel of the Opera by Sam Siciliano

This is the first Phantom/Sherlock crossover I ever read. For me it’s a bit hit or miss. The author decided to forgo including Watson, and instead included a character named Doctor Henry Vernier, a cousin of Holmes’, as the narrator. I believe that Henry Vernier is most likely a reference to Doctor Verner, Holmes’ cousin who ended up buying Watson’s medical practice after the death of Mary Watson. Which is to say, it’s a book written by a person who seemingly remembered a single line from a single Sherlock Holmes story about Holmes having a physician cousin named Verner (presumably made into Vernier for the purposes of the book’s French setting, and to reflect Holmes’ French heritage), but still managed to confuse the Grasshopper and the Scorpion, and occasionally spell Erik as “Eric.” It makes some sense, though, as Siciliano is mostly a Sherlockian, with several other pastiches under his belt. For my money, he’s not my favorite interpreter of Holmes as a character, although it could be that his choice of narrators impacts how Holmes is portrayed. Although it does tend to fall into some Phantom-centric tropes that I don’t care for, overall The Angel of the Opera is long enough to flesh out the story more fully than some Holmes/Phantom crossovers manage, and in general the style feels consistent with what you would expect from a Holmes story. It absolutely pulled me in when I read it at a young age, and I’m hoping to have the chance to revisit it soon.

The Canary Trainer by Nicholas Meyer

The Canary Trainer is the second book (chronologically) in a trio of Holmes novels that take place during The Great Hiatus, the years between “The Final Problem” and “The Empty House,” during which time Holmes is assumed dead. The first book, The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, involves Holmes meeting Sigmund Freud and undergoing psychotherapy to cope with his drug addiction. The Canary Trainer finds Holmes in France, taking a violinist position at the Opera House and coming face to face (so to speak) with Erik. Nicholas Meyer is perhaps best known for directing Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The Seven-Per-Cent Solution is a well-known Holmes pastiche (which I will admit I’ve never read). The Canary Trainer is a bit more obscure.

The Canary Trainer takes on a lot of cool concepts (a story that takes place during The Great Hiatus, perspective on Erik’s time as an architect and builder, etc.), but it also makes a lot of baffling choices, such as having Gaston Leroux show up as a character, and including Irene Adler only to under-utilize her as little more than a love interest for Holmes (her lukewarm friendship with Christine is one of the most disappointing parts of the book, in my opinion). It also barely allows Erik and Holmes to interact. Erik is such a profoundly sympathetic antagonist and Holmes is capable of such extreme empathy that it’s a shame to not let them engage with each other.

Rendezvous at the Populaire and I Will Find the Answer by Kate Workman

While most Holmes/Phantom crossovers focus on Leroux’s novel, Rendezvous at the Populaire, as its name suggests, pulls heavily from the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. So heavily, in fact, that a major chunk of the dialogue and descriptions comes directly from lyrics, which can be distracting. Stylistically, Rendezvous at the Populaire reads differently than your typical Holmes pastiche, drawing from multiple points of view instead of one narrator. It can feel rather rough around the edges, but I ultimately found it a fun read. It’s nice to read a crossover that features Watson, and Holmes and Erik have a nice dynamic. This book prompted a sequel, I Will Find the Answer, in which Holmes, Watson, and Erik join forces to solve the Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde. In the same way that Rendezvous at the Populaire draws primarily from the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, I Will Find the Answer draws more heavily from Jekyll and Hyde than from Robert Louis Stevenson’s book. Workman’s style progresses nicely between books, making I Will Find the Answer a bit easier of a read, less reliant on song lyrics for its text. If she ever decides to publish her proposed third book featuring Holmes and Erik solving the Jack the Ripper murders, I’ll be interested to read it.

Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Opera Ghost by Steven Philip Jones and Aldin Baroza

This is two part comic is part of a series pitting Holmes against various gothic literary icons and monsters. It draws heavily from Leroux and Kay. The comic takes place after The Great Hiatus and the death of Mary Watson. The story had to be pretty heavily condensed to fit the two issue format, but it accomplishes a lot in a short space, hitting high points in the story. There is a subplot that heavily focuses on Watson mourning Mary’s death, which leads to a unique twist on the end of the story. The art style is cool and has a nice vintage black and white look. I would love to see this concept extended into a longer series, but as it stands it’s a nice, quick read. Due to its brevity it does get a little confusing at times, including a point where Mary appears to call Watson “James” instead of John (although it’s hard to fault the comics for a mistake Doyle himself occasionally made), but it’s a lot of fun and definitely worth checking out.

Angels of Music by Kim Newman

This is a crossover that breaks the mold! Instead of pitting Holmes against Erik, this book features Irene Adler (among other fictional woman, including Christine Daaé and some of Newman’s own characters from other books) working with Erik as a sort of spy. It’s Charlie’s Angels by way of The Phantom of the Opera, and I’m only a few pages into it, but I’m certainly excited to read more. In some ways Irene Adler is a more natural fit into Phantom than Holmes himself is, so I’m always interested to find crossovers that include her. I’ll likely update this post once I’ve finished the book.

The Phantom of the Opera Carmen by Regina Goncalves

I had to do a lot of digging to find any information about this book and I’m still not entirely sure what it’s about, but I wanted to include it for the sake of thoroughness. Hopefully I’ll be able to read it and provide an update later.

The Phantom of the Opera Carmen is one story in a series of educational books for young readers. The stories focus on a time traveler named Caius Zip who travels and learns about the connection between art and science. This story features Caius teaming up with Sherlock Holmes and H.G. Wells to solve the mystery of our favorite ghost while the opera house attempts to mount a production of Carmen. There also seems to be a story about Caius and Sherlock meeting some of the masters of Impressionism and learning about their art. How, if at all, this ties in with the Phantom plot isn’t clear. This book is on my list once I finish Angels of Music, so I hope to be able to report back later.

Sherlock Holmes contro il Fantasma dell’Opera by Antonella Mecenero

Sherlock Holmes contro il Fantasma dell’Opera is an e-book short story/novella in which Sherlock Holmes once again takes a position as a violinist at the opera house in order to solve the mystery of the Phantom. I know very little about this book as it exclusively available in Italian, which I don’t read or speak. Special thanks to @letyourfantasiesunwind1981 for pointing out this story to me!

#the phantom of the opera #poto #sherlock holmes #irene adler #jekyll and hyde #arthur conan doyle #gaston leroux #phandom #phantom history #long post

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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Power Rangers: The Version of In Space We Never Got

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Power Rangers in Space was a revolutionary entry in the Power Rangers franchise. The show had certainly evolved over the previous five seasons but In Space was a quantum leap forward. Airing in 1998 on Fox Kids, the series featured serialized plots, character arcs with depth, and gifts for longtime fans in the form of returning Rangers and villains. Nearly 25 years later, the series remains highly regarded, many elements of it even making their way into the current Power Rangers comics.

But it all could have been so very different. Imagine a version of In Space where Astronema wasn’t the big bad, Red Ranger Andros didn’t exist, and Power Rangers Turbo’s Justin is a a main character! At one point in time these were real possibilities.

To discuss all this we need to go back to May 1997, back around the time the second half of Turbo was beginning to be written. As production continued on the current season, preliminary plans for the next season were already in motion. The producers had access to half of the source footage they’d be working with, Denji Sentai Megaranger, and memos were going back and forth on how to utilize it for Power Rangers.

Amongst these was a pitch for a season concept by executive producer Shuki Levy, a proto version of In Space. The pitch was in part intended for the production team so work could begin on designing sets and those designs could later be sent off to toymaker Bandai to start work on playsets. This pitch and accompanying materials were acquired by a fan from a production staff member at Power Morphicon in 2010. This is what we’ll be taking a deep dive into.

The Turbo Set-Up

In the show as aired, In Space was set up in Turbo’s finale where the Rangers’ base was blown to smithereens. Discovering their old mentor, Zordon, had been taken captive by the forces of evil, Rangers T.J., Cassie, Carlos, and Ashley all blast off into space without their powers, with Justin staying behind. In Space’s premiere has the four Rangers join up with Andros, the In Space Red Ranger, and gain new powers to fight against the evil Astronema (replacing Turbo’s main villain, Divatox.)

The proto version of In Space would have set up events for the season across the final four episodes of Turbo. A running subplot would have featured the Phantom Ranger (a mysterious ally to the Turbo team) investigating a meeting called by the evil Dark Specter. The Phantom Ranger would have discovered that a group of past villains, including Divatox, Rita Repulsa, Lord Zedd, and more were being ordered by Dark Spector to kidnap Zordon.

Movies

The Power Rangers Turbo Deleted Scenes That Could Have Saved the Movie

By Shamus Kelley

Dark Specter’s plan is to drain Zordon of his good energy and turn his powers evil, in the process making Zordon cease to exist. The Phantom Ranger is discovered and just manages to get a signal to the Rangers before he’s captured. The villains combine their powers and use the energy to capture Zordon in front of the terrified Alpha-5. With Zordon gone, the Rangers are faced with their toughest challenge yet. Traveling into deep space.

Fans of In Space will recognize that this plot was dramatically condensed and used as the opening scenes of the first episode of that season, “From Out of Nowhere.” That episode gave us the big meeting of evil and introduced Dark Specter to the audience, but instead of the Phantom Ranger it was the new Red Ranger Andros that observed the meeting. Unlike the Phantom Ranger, Andros was able to escape.

It’s a shame more of this didn’t make it into the show, especially the sequence of Zordon getting captured. This never made it to screen in the final version of either Turbo or In Space, relegated to an off-screen event the characters simply talked about.

The Lost Arc of Power Rangers in Space

The proto In Space begins with the entire Turbo team intact, Justin included. At night the team meets Dimitria, still the team’s mentor, “upon a flat mountain top” called The Power Dome. This would be the team’s base of operations for the season, the dome floating in space not too far from Earth. Within it was “a giant pyramid made of silky material” that would be the entire set. The Rangers would also be given a space station that would be “floating further in the dark deep of space.” In the show that aired that space station would be called the Astro Megaship.

In what seemed to be a set up for a typical episode, the Rangers would use their “Power Gliders” (an early name for the Galaxy Gliders) to travel from Earth to the Power Dome to the space station. The Rangers would also pilot “flying machines” across space but they have a major drawback. They have limited power and can only be “re-energized” by “the Command Center on Earth.” This probably meant the Power Dome or the space station, since later documents state the set for the command center would be repurposed as sets for the space station.

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Each Ranger would need to watch the energy level of their vehicle closely as they searched for Zordon. They’d discover clues along the way but the journey wouldn’t be a straight line, since they’d continually have to be racing back to Earth to re-energize not only the flying machines but their weapons as well. Occasionally they’d have to stay and defend Earth all while “the clock is ticking on Zordon’s destiny.”

It’s unclear what the “flying machines” were intended to be. Perhaps they were supposed to be the Galaxy Gliders but considering the documents alternatively refer to them as vehicles? Maybe the plan was to create all-new machines that weren’t from Megaranger. While these machines never made it into the series, an echo of the idea lives on in the subsequent season, Power Rangers Lost Galaxy, where the Rangers piloted the American exclusive Jet Jammers.

As the Rangers are off in space the Earth would be unprotected… except for Bulk and Skull, the loveable bumbling duo. They announce to everyone in Angel Grove that they’ll lead a group of volunteers and form a “Citizen Force Group” to protect the city. Eventually this was whittled down to just Bulk, Skull, and new character Professor Phenomenus investigating aliens.

While In Space eventually had episodes where the Rangers searchedfor Zordon, this early take on the arc features it far more prominently. The season also would have had more of its episodes set in outer space. In Space as aired did feature the team traveling to different worlds but the team ended up on Earth far more than what the proto version planned.

This probably came down to budget; it was simply more effective to shoot scenes set on Earth than to stage locations as various alien planets or try to explain away the Earth-bound Sentai footage. It also makes more practical sense to just have the Megaship and scrap the Power Dome. Why have two bases?

A lot of Turbo’s core cast remains in place, including Dimitria as their mentor and Justin as the Blue Ranger with T.J. continuing on as Red Ranger. In the series Justin left and T.J. went from being the Red Turbo Ranger to the Blue In Space Ranger.

This marks one of the bigger changes from the aired season. There’s no mention of Andros. In Space was largely defined by the new Red Ranger, an alien from KO-35 whose back-story formed the core arc of the season. Without that, would In Space have featured as strong a character arc for say, T.J.? He is the best Red Ranger of all time, at least according to us, so the thought of him getting even more screen time would have been welcome.

On the other hand, having a season set in space but none of the Rangers are aliens feels like a missed opportunity. Sure Andros was human (remember, not all humans are from earth in the Power Rangers universe) but functionally he was an alien. His presence not only broadened the scope of the Power Rangers universe but gave the team a guide through the galaxy. Justin gets a lot of overblown flack from fans, being a kid Ranger, but we have to admit that Andros was a far better character than Justin ever was.

Perhaps the Silver Ranger could have been an alien, just like Zhane was in the finished season, but curiously the production team wasn’t even sure they’d use the Silver Ranger! In response to the question of whether the Mega Delta Zord (an early name for the Delta Megazord) “belonged to” to the Silver Ranger, it was stated, “we should also discuss whether to bring the Silver Ranger in at all.”

Not bring in the sixth Ranger? How could they even consider that? To understand this line of thinking, at the time this proto concept was being written, the Power Rangers production team only had access to 27 episodes of Megaranger, a little over half the season. Mega Silver was introduced in episode 24 with the handicap of a short morphed time limit. With this in mind, it’s easy to see why the producers considered not including him. We can assume that once the producers saw more of Megaranger they realized they had enough footage to make him a worthwhile inclusion.

Villains

Justin and Dimitria weren’t the only carry overs from Turbo. In the bio for Ecliptor, a major In Space villain, he’s described as “Divatox’s new second-in-command.” Divatox would have carried over as the main villain of In Space! In the series as aired Divatox made a few guest appearances but was quickly phased out in favor of a new villain, Astronema.

This, like T.J. being the Red Ranger instead of Andros, removes a core element of the series. Spoiler for a nearly 25-year-old show, but part way through the season Astronema was revealed to be Andros’ sister! With Divatox in place, In Space would have lost a major part of what made it so memorable to fans.

How would Divatox have fit into things? We know she would have been working for Dark Specter but her over the top personality might have clashed with the more powerful leader of evil. Maybe the character would have gotten a new lease on life, especially if her supporting cast of villains were jettisoned. Ecliptor being called Divatox’s new second-in-command seems to imply that Elgar, a general in Turbo and Divatox’s nephew, would have been jettisoned from the show. At the very least, he would have played a minor supporting role as he did in the final version of In Space. Without a wacky supporting cast, Divatox might have lost some of her comedy and played a bit more serious. As interesting as that would have been, Divatox’s humor is what made her so memorable so it’s for the best that Astronema was brought in.

The documents also lay out a new group of henchmen that would have joined the season, “purple putties.” These were undoubtedly a temp name for the “Kunekune” foot soldiers from Megaranger. At this point it looks like the production had planned on utilizing them more extensively than In Space eventually did, where they were mostly dropped in favor of the US original Quantrons.

The biggest big bad of the season though is Dark Specter. While the outline for the episodes makes him appear similar to his final version, he would have featured a very different appearance. The character as aired reused the Maligore villain suit from Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie with a quick lampshade by Divatox to explain away the similarity. The proto version of the season lays out that the suit they planned to use was that of the lead villain from Carranger, the previous Sentai season. Exhaus.

The documents describe Dark Specter as, “the Monarch of Evil is an enormous floating head. It is bigger than the platform, bigger than the whole mountain. His breath alone causes a strong wind to blow over the surface of the platform.” This is a fairly accurate description of Exhaus, further supported by a mention from production that, “his image is available on the Turbo footage (cars).” Ultimately the Exhaus monster suit would get used as Goldgoyle, the final villain that wiped out the Turbo Rangers’ megazords. More than likely the Maligore suit was used in its place because it looked more menacing.

An Unseen Megazord

This isn’t just an unseen part of In Space, it was unseen in Megaranger as well! Alongside designs for the other Megazords of the season, including the Cosmotron Megazord, an early name for the Mega Voyager, is a design for a Megazord that never made it past the development stage. The Stratoforce Megazord. A Megazord made of only one component Zord, this may have been an early idea that was most likely scrapped in favor of the Mega Winger, the Silver Ranger’s Megazord. The name was later reused for one of the Zords in Lost Galaxy.

Was All This Better Than What We Got?

No. As interesting as some of these ideas are, seeing Zordon get captured is the only major change that would have benefited the season. Divatox is incredible and Justin isn’t as bad as fans make him out to be, but their inclusion wouldn’t have made the season better. Andros and Astronema alone are two of the better characters Power Rangers has ever had. It would have been awful to lose them.

The best thing about this proto version is the peak it gives us into the production of Power Rangers. It lets us see just how far ahead they had to start planning a season and how only having a chunk of the Sentai footage impacted it. We get insight into how the demands of production and limits of budget forced these big ideas to get scaled down.

More than anything it makes you appreciate what we ended up getting all the more. Power Rangers In Space arguably helped foster the dedicated fan base the franchise still has today. It took everything that had come before and made it matter. It gave the series stakes and a broader canvas of stories to work with. It excited the imagination.

Maybe a giant silky pyramid could have done the same but somehow I doubt it.

Thanks to Project Hexagon: The Power Rangers Script Archive for providing the pitch and scans included here.

The post Power Rangers: The Version of In Space We Never Got appeared first on Den of Geek.

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olmopress · 5 years

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Farticipatory culture!

week 7: Harry Jenkins, Convergence culture: Where old and new media collide, Introduction and Chapter 4

Shiiiit was reading Henry Jenkins boring. Oh my God. All those useless stories and that endless circumnavigation of issues. Man I understand you had to reach a certain wordcount to get someone to publish you but maaaaaaaaan I got so bored.

You are more than welcome to imagine that the stuff I liked about Mr. Jenkins is very little

BUT

I have to say we share a common interest in Star Wars. To honor that, I am unleashing the first FRANCHISE-THEMED post on this blog.

Yes kids! The visual content of this blog post will feature exclusively material from Star Wars!

If you like my idea you can contact me in private for donations. I would love to raise a little profit out of George Lucas’ copyrighted material because

SCREW HIM

So hit me up with your money, we shall use it to fund modern heroes fighting against the horrendous kebab imperialism of the Turkish fils de pute president.

OK here we go. Jerkin’ Mr. Jenkins has three concepts for us and

INCREDIBLY ENOUGH

none of them is particularly original. At times I fell almost like this guy is just a great affabulatore who probably got great grades in his college papers because he could babble for 2000 words without saying much of particular relevance.

BUT THIS IS JUST ME BEING NASTY

Sure.

Jenkins’ first and most important concept is that of convergence. We dumbasses who had to go through COM 220 in this university are already familiar with this word and associate it either with technological convergence or media ownership convergence. But just like that time in which the Buddha taught for 40 years straight just wake up one day and be

HOLD UP BRO IT WAS ALL A BIG EXPEDIENT TO PREPARE YOU FOR THE TRUTH OF THE

LOTUS SUTRA

Jenkins surprises us silly undergraduate with a sort of ULTIMATE MEANING of convergence. To him, convergence is neither solely about technology, nor solely about ownership. By convergence, he means

“the flow of content across ultiple media platforms, the cooperation between multiple media industries, and the migratory behavior of media audiences who will go almost anywhere in search of the kinds of entertainment experiences they want” (2)

Just the kind of definition I need the weekend before a midterm. Thanks Harry. So what I gather from this is that the converge he is talking about is essentially about content, or I mean comunque about themes and instances orbiting around a certain kind of content. Right? I guess. And so Jenkins focuses on how these kinds of contents are reproduced by and sought on different media.

Much of the rest of his introduction is Jenkins bustling with his own confused concepts to gain a degree of clarity of this stuff on convergence. Which in a way is fun to watch in itself. Because first he traces the supposedly linear history of the development of the idea – by the way quoting (and fortunately criticizing that JERK of Negroponte who believed that “monolithic empires of mass media are dissolving into an array of cottage industries” – and then he embarks on a frankly boring and useless story about this New Orleans Media Experience of 2003 about which honestly nobody gives a shit and even which even more honestly is just boring. Did I say that already? Oh sorry.

BUT IT’S TRUE

This story is infused (as frankly the rest of the stuff I have read) with a disgusting romantic notion of corporate behavior and aims, as if big media companies just couldn’t go on without including their audiences because they LOVE THEM.

FUCK NO HARRY THEY JUST WANT THEIR MONEY AND THEY’LL DO EVERYTHING IT TAKES TO SQUEEZE AS MUCH OF IT AS POSSIBLE FROM THEIR OUR POCKETS AND YOU FUCKING KNOW IT GODDAMNIT YOU TEACH AT USC IT’S NOT LIKE YOU WERE BORN YESTERDAY

I’m sorry. You may have noticed I have slight tendency in losing my temper at

MANAGERIAL CAPITALIST PIGS

No I mean with people who see things differently from me. But let us go on. By the way there is a moment in which Jenkins, talking about the way in which corporations were dealing with the emergence of convergence (I rhymed!), writes:

“The old paradigms were breaking down faster than the new ones were emerging, producing panic among those most invested in the status quo and curiosity in those who saw change as an opportunity” (7)

You what this reminds me? Look it up here. This guy first wrote it. See that part about the monsters? Does it remind you of anything? Am I implying that media giants especially of the internet are giving us a new fascism? Did you know that Charlemagne most probably didn’t want to be crowned emperor by Pope Leo III?

Unless you’re a historian of the Middle Ages, one of the answers for those last two questions is “Yes.”

Btw you should know that I decided I was heterosexual when I was 3 and went to see Phantom Menace and got acquainted with the looks of this lady up here.

Anyway. Back to convergence. Jenkins goes on and on and on and on about this talking about the different lifespans of delivery technologies and media, about his self-defined Black Box Fallacy (because to him, and he honestly has a point, while hardware diverges, content converges), about the fact that convergence is a process and not an endpoint, and about all sorts of things

UNTIL

He basically says that convergence is a top-down process as much as it is a bottom-up one. And at this point, Harry, you kinda lost me. You have used so many different and contrasting ways of defining what is it that you’re trying to define that I do not know anymore if I am reading you or fucking Spinoza. And I AM SORRY, you ain’t as cool as my lad Baruch.

So yeah I was left pretty much like this:

I think we should stick to the explanation I gave in the beginning. let us move to a second concept, which will be hopefully easier to define.

I wanna talk about collective intelligence because Jerkings only suggests it. So let me do the explanation know.

Collective intelligence was at work fo instance on the Game of Thrones’ subreddit who higitus figidus cracked the secret behind Jon Snow’s lineage YEARS before the thing was revealed in the series. Like in those beautiful communist revolutions we don’t do anymore, commoners pooled their wits and skills to fuck over the greedy and ugly masters who enslaved them. This is collective intelligence: to unionize cognitive processes and screw capital ownership.

OK maybe this was a little bit too political but you get the point right? It’s about people pooling resources and working together to solve problems or propose stuff. It’s actually quite cool. And it happens all the time on the internet. Because it’s easier to pool those cognitive resources over there.

DONE!

Let’s move to the last one.

The third point in Jenkins’ reading was participatory culture. His endless spiel about Star Wars fandom was at times interesting and times suicide-inducing. Potentially cool as a case study, but we don’t really need it for the purposes of this post. So.

The stuff we need to know is contained in the first few pages of the chapter. First of all, Jenkins rightly notes that while fandom as always existed, the internet has tipped the scales because it makes fan culture more visible. Which is in itself quite OK.

youtube

aaaaand here’s a beautiful example of Star Wars’ participatory culture.

He then distinguishes between interactivity and participation. To him, interactivity refers only to the fact that people get more feedback when they consume cultural products. Participation, he says, is deeper because it is basically in the consumer’s (I hate this word) hands: it is “open-ended” and not constrained by the decision of the designers of the original/official products. The rest of the chapter deals in ways in which companies address fan-generated content. Funnily enough, he distinguishes between prohibitionists (tight-ass douchebags who don’t want you to mess with their precious product) and collaborationists (other douchebags who instead see the staff you do as yet one more opportunity to steal time and labor from you). Nice, huh?

The funniest thing is that he chooses COLLABORATIONISTS: I mean really? You really wanna make me do that association between capitalism and fascism again? It was your choice huh.

A good example that Jenkins makes is that of game modders, who manipulate the code of videogames to construct personalized fantasies that might expand the universe of the original game, or maybe even take it to a completely new direction. Here’s an example De’Noantri:

I guess I broke my rule about Star Wars. Too bad. But I am the one who calls te shots here. I’m your lider maximo here. This is a READ ONLY blog. You shut up and read, comrade!

To reach a conclusion, the whole story of how LucasArt deals with fandom content is surely fascinating, but Jenkins repeatedly fails to look at a very important issue. When George Lucas in ANY way makes use of content created by fans, most of the times directly appropriating the copyright for it, he is

EXPLOITING

those silly fans. Instance: when the devs of Star Wars Galaxies sought fan advice for developing the game, did these fans got paid? Where are their rights? Where is the compensation for the time and labor they offered? Nowhere. And so they have been exploited, allowing George Lucas to save money on people he would have had to pay for the same services. But he had the fans he wanted to iNcLuDe…

I mean you really thought I was not going to use this?

So the conclusion is:

FANS OF ALL NATIONS, UNIONIZE!

CLAIM YOUR SHARE OF PROFIT!

DEMAND COLLECTIVIZATION OF FRANCHISES!

DEMAND LIBERALIZATION OF FAN FICTION!

DEMAND THE FUTURE!

Here you can see a visual depiction of the fandom working class rising up against bourgeoise privilege.

Since I already broke the rule, culture time will be free this week too. This is a great Russian composer who certainly influenced Williams when composing Star Wars’ music. It is one of my favorites pieces of music ever so ENJOY!

youtube

Here instead you can see Caravaggio depicting me making it barely alive out of this week’s readings:

It happens every now and then. Let’s hope next it’ll be better.

auf Wiedersehen!

Image Sources: GIPHY.com, squillace.org, wikiart.org

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spynotebook · 7 years

Link

Image: CW.

Greeting, my Global Express Guaranteed packages of fun. Sorry “Postal Apocalypse” is a day late, but this time I did an extra extra-long version to make up for it—you get a free 50 percent more of my shenanigans! This week: The future of Batfleck! The future of Ghostbusters! The future of the Star Wars prequels! And I’m finally back to answering questions about where superheroes go to the bathroom.

Broken Arrowverse

Mike W.:

Greetings Postman! I had originally started watching the CW’s Arrow a few years ago when the first season debuted on Netflix, and continued with the second season when it was released (I prefer most shows in binge-watching form).

Friends who had watched the Arrow and Flash when they originally aired suggested that I start alternating episodes, because there were several crossover episodes throughout the season. I think that was good advice because some pieces of those crossovers may not have made sense taken out of the context of where both shows were at.

Now alternating between episodes of two shows wasn’t terrible. Occasionally I would forget to switch over and just hit “play next” and not realize my mistake until something regarding Flash happened on Arrow that hadn’t been mentioned yet in Flash, or vice versa. These spoilers, or even information that made no sense out of context bugged me every time!

The next set of seasons were released on Netflix, only this time the CW threw the Legends of Tomorrow in the mix as well! Alternating between three series at the same time seemed like a lot of work so I kept putting it off... only to have Supergirl get tossed into the crossover blender the season after that!

Is it worth watching all four shows concurrently for the crossover episodes? Bouncing back and forth seems like a lot of work, and I’m not sure if the order is consistent or if some shows missed episodes here and there , and if the ties between crossovers are important to each show then it seems like it might be frustrating if they were out of order. What do you suggest?

Honestly, as long as you account for the crossovers—and not even all of those—it can be reasonably uncomplicated for you to catch up. Sure, there’ll be a few references or asides to things that have happened in the other shows, but they’re few and far between, and never that important. Look, if they bug you they bug you, but trying to watch every episode of four TV series in the order they aired sounds like it would be infinitely more irritating. So I suggest trying this instead:

Arrow seasons one and two

Arrow season three, episodes 1-7

Flash season one, episodes 1-8 (episode 8 begins the first Arrow crossover)

Arrow season three, episodes 8-23 (episode 8 concludes it)

Flash season one, episodes 9-23

Arrow season four, episodes 1-7

Flash season two, episodes 1-8

Arrow season four, episodes 8-23 (same deal as Arrow s3 and Flash s1)

Flash season two, episodes 9-23

Legends of Tomorrow season one

Supergirl season one

Here’s where it gets a bit wackier, thanks to the “Invasion” crossover, and the Flash/Supergirl musical episode.

Arrow season five, episodes 1-7

Flash season three, episodes 1-7

Legends of Tomorrow season two, episode 1-6

Supergirl season two, episodes 1-8 (ep. 8 verrrrrry technically starts “Invasion”)

Flash season three, episode 8 (“Invasion” part two)

Arrow season five, episode 8 (“Invasion” part three)

Legends of Tomorrow season two, episode 7 (“Invasion” part four)

Arrow season five, episodes 9-23

Flash season three, episodes 8-16

Supergirl season two, episodes 8-16

Flash season three, episodes 17-23 (ep. 17 is the Flash/Supergirl musical)

Supergirl season two, episodes 17-22 (there’s no ep. 23)

Legends of Tomorrow season two, episodes 8-17

Since Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow are stand-alone after “Invasion,” it really doesn’t matter when you watch the rest of their seasons.

And yes, I recognize there’s technically a Flash/Supergirl crossover in seasons two and one, respectively, but it’s actually more of a cameo. Basically, the Flash shows up for an entire Supergirl episode; in the corresponding Flash episode, the Flash disappears for a couple of minutes while running around the multiverse; when he gets back to Earth-One he says, “Boy, that was weird!” or something. You 100 percent do not need to rearrange your viewing order to accommodate it, or anything else, in my opinion.

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Let the Hate Flow Through You

Andrew M.:

Dear Mr. Postman, I have a habit of forming complicated non-binary opinions after reading a book or watching a movie. Instead of just loving or hating something and then either gushing or complaining for the next hour, I more often declare frankly whether I enjoyed it or not, and then want to talk about everything both positive and negative. This has led to me having a reputation among my friends as someone who “hates everything.” Anytime I see a movie, if I don’t totally love it, I’m attacked.

And if it sounds like I’m just a buzzkill, I’m not certain that’s the case, either. I’m often very positive, I just like full discussions where we can talk about what did and didn’t work. Sure, I can be negative (I didn’t enjoy Rogue One and actually fell asleep during it, while Flash throws me into a weekly blind rage), but not everything’s going to win you over.

This has even ruined some of my nerd interests. Despite being a huge fan, I fell completely out of Doctor Who and stopped watching years ago because any fans I met would get offended if the discussion got even a little gray. And it’s no fun to be in a fandom and not talk to anyone.

Am I too harsh on my media? Should I lie and pretend I love everything? Should I stop discussion altogether?

Andrew, this is a question close to my heart, as I too look at things with a critical eye and am frequently accused of being a hater (as are my coworkers, as is io9 as a whole). To be fair, I do hate many things, and I have often hated things professionally; however, anyone who reads io9 regularly and has object permanence should be able to see that all of us here love a lot more than we hate.

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But once someone is convinced you’re a hater, it’s hard to shake the preconception. Say you and your friends watch Wonder Woman, and you find it flawless. Just perfect in every way. Your friends may be surprised at your opinion, but in a few weeks when you all watch Transformers: The Last Knight and point out it is senseless garbage, they’ll immediately call you a full-time hater again.

There’s not much you can do about this, unfortunately. Some people don’t understand thinking critically about art is really about understanding it fully, and gaining a deeper appreciation of it overall. They also don’t understand that even if you feel something has flaws, that doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t like it. The two aren’t mutually exclusive! (And since my opinions are broadcast to a wide audience, some of those people just want to have their own opinions validated, and feel attacked if I disagree, as if I’m calling them dumb. Then they attack me to make themselves feel better. I’m assuming your friends aren’t this bad.)

You just need to find friends who actually enjoy discussing the movie’s merits and flaws with you, and are secure enough that they can disagree with you without freaking out. They exist somewhere. At the very least, I feel totally confident in telling you that most io9 commenters on James Whitbrook’s Doctor Who coverage will agree with you that modern Doctor Who is not wholly without fault.

Image: Disney.

The Phantom Menace Pain

John H.:

Dear Mr Postman, how and when will Disney get around to fixing the Prequels? From a certain point of view, this has to happen. Those three movies are the dogs of the film franchise and they need to make a return on Disney’s investment. There’s no way The Mouse just lets them hang out, sucking in substantially less money than the other six.

First is the how – do they re-edit and make minimal reshoots? Hire one of the fan editors to use their ideas? Maybe fuse I and II together? Or maybe they declare the first three non-canon and start over?

Second is the when – wait until after George Lucas is one with the force? Until they run out of ideas for stand-alone movies? Wait a decade to build up nostalgia and demand?

Screwing around with Star Wars films is a time-honored tradition that Lucas himself started, so there’s really no reason not to. What’s your take?

Alas, you’ve begun with a false premise. While the prequels may make nominally less than the original trilogy—although nine times out of 10 you’re forced to buy all six Lucas movies at once, so it’s not actually much less—what they make is almost totally profit. Sure, there’s manufacturing costs and residuals to the cast and crew, but that’s built into the cost. Disney doesn’t have to touch a thing, and the prequels will continue to make a decent profit for them.

And there’s no reason to do anything to them when those resources would be better spent on churning out new Star Wars movies, each of which will probably make around a billion dollars. That’s a significantly better use of time and talent, with much higher returns. Basically, the prequels are profitable enough to keep, but not profitable enough to bother messing around with.

I also have a feeling that Lucas included a few legally-binding demands when he sold Star Wars to Disney, one of which could be “You can’t make any alterations to my Star Wars films,” which would be understandable if somewhat ironic. I also worry that he demanded Disney never release the non-Special Editions of the original trilogy, in revenge for all of us bitching so much about the prequels. I can’t know this for sure, but I am 100 percent certain that if Lucas had demanded these conditions before he sold them the franchise, Disney would have absolutely agreed to them.

Intentional Cowl

David O.:

Following on from the question about casting an old Batman at the start of a DC cinematic universe, do you think if the whole shebang went on long enough that we’d see a new non-Bruce Wayne Batman on the big screen?

Supposing he just gets too old or has one too many “Sad Affleck” moments to want to stick around, do you think WB would give us Damien, Terry, or even Dick under the cowl? Or do you think they’d sooner recast the part?

Affleck is totally gonna bolt long before WB is ready to reboot the DCEU. Since they’re trying to establish a continuity—and because trying to find someone to replace Affleck a la Kilmer and Clooney is a losing proposition—I’m betting that Affleck passes the cowl. Now, whether there’s actually a full Batman movie where this happens, or whether it happens in the first five minutes of the movie, or it happens offscreen before the film because Affleck is just so sick of this superhero bullshit depends on so many factors—Affleck, his contract, how fast WB manages to actually make these film—that it’s impossible to predict.

As for who he passes the cowl to, I’m calling it now: Damian Wayne. First of all, WB is planning on making a Nightwing movie; assuming this actually happens, they’ll want both Batman and Nightwing movie franchises. Meanwhile, Damian’s been Robin in the comics since 2009, and has been regularly showing up in DC’s animated movies and the very popular Injustice video games. He’s even in the recent animated Judas Contract movie, despite that being an adaptation of a Teen Titans tale from the ‘80s.

Basically, Damian has taken over the role of Robin in pop culture, and is more associated with the character than Dick Grayson or Jason Todd or Tim Drake at this point, and the DC live-action movies are much more interested in modern takes on these characters than any kind of legacy anyway. Also, tell me that “Batman has a kid he doesn’t know about who is raised by a league of assassins” isn’t the most DCEU thing you can think of. Ya can’t.

Image: Satellite of Love/Netflix.

Movie Sign of the Times

James M.:

With the return of MST3K to Netflix it would seem that a lot of opportunities could arise for the series that were not possible before. Netflix has the rights to a host of movies and I would enjoy seeing Jonah and the bots’ take on Michael Bay’s TMNT or Prometheus.

Is this likely or should the Satellite of Love crew focus on older, more obscure pieces?

As an uber-fan, I want—nay, need—MST3K to stick to older, cheesy movies. To me, it’s intrinsic to the show’s DNA, and watching the ‘Bots riff a big budget modern movie, no matter how terrible, would feel wrong. I know full well that Rifftrax does this for many big movies, including some genuine hits, and I love when they do it, and I love them, but I don’t think something like Prometheus would fit with MST3K’s low-fi, garage-built sensibilities.

Besides, the reason Rifftrax can do this is because they’re literally offering their own commentary track for the films. There’s absolutely no way Paramount or any major studio would consider licensing out their big films to MST3K for mocking.

A film would have to be so old and so terrible that giving it to Jonah and the ‘Bots would provide the maximum revenue stream, and it would still have to outweigh the shame of making a movie so bad it deserves to be put in the same league as Manos: The Hands of Fate, Monster A-Go-Go, the Coleman Francis trilogie, and the rest.

All that said, as time marches on, the revenue streams and hubris regarding these films will dwindle. Maybe in 2040, Crow and Tom Servo will be making fun of Transformers: Dark of the Moon, because it’ll feel as old and terrible as Starcrash seems now. But I imagine—and hope—that they won’t be running out of pre-1990 targets anytime soon.

Image: Sony.

Giving Up the Ghostbuster

Joe C.:

I think we can all agree that Ghostbusters 2016 was not a success. It did not make its money back, eliminating a sequel with this cast and crew. However, it wasn’t bad enough to kill the franchise. So I ask, where does Ghostbusters go from here?

Do they do another reboot with new characters again? A reboot with the original characters but recast? An animated movie is in the works, but word has been mum on that.

In my world of imaginary optimal outcomes, I would love to see a new GB cartoon. You get the original GBs back, add some new ones, make it take place after the video game (or GB2 for simplicity) and add adult humor. Some of the funniest moments in the original movie are the jokes that go over kids’ heads. Unfortunately an adult oriented GB cartoon won’t sell action figures, so that option’s probably off the table.

Right now this franchise is like a bunch of tangled Christmas lights; nobody knows how to untangle it, so fuck, why not just go out and buy a new set?

Well, that “new set of Christmas lights” is essentially what the movie reboot tried to be, and it didn’t work out. Rights holders Ivan Reitman and Dan Aykroyd may be eager to try again, but studios like Sony won’t be. You can hope for any incarnation of the team you want, but unless Bill Murray agrees to star—which he absolutely won’t, as the last 30 years have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt—studios aren’t going to take a chance on a new movie for years, probably more than a decade.

A cartoon is more likely, but not by much. Cartoon Network and Disney XD are way more interested in making shows based on their own properties (e.g. Adventure Time and that Gumball show, and DuckTales and Marvel’s stuff respectively) because if they own it then they get the profits if it’s popular enough to sell DVDs and merchandise. Toys aren’t as much of a factor as they used to be, because basically only the biggest, most popular franchises sell action figures nowadays—which is the same reason why Pokémon and Transformers are cartoons owned by other companies that CN and Disney XD are willing to air.

But if Reitman and Aykroyd license out Ghostbusters as a kid’s cartoon, that’s going to kill the chance of a new movie, because studios will feel it can only be a cartoon. I know this isn’t logical, but I’m not pretending it is; studios want PG-13 movies, so Hollywood execs will instantly decide if Ghostbusters is right for kids’ cartoons, it can’t possibly right to make a $150 million movie about (and the last movie didn’t help).

Reitman and Aykroyd know this, and the movie is recent enough that I’m sure they still have hope of getting a new live-action film. Even if a network wanted it, I doubt they’d be willing to do a Ghostbusters cartoon for the foreseeable future.

Image: Lucasfilm.

I Only Meant to Stay a While

Spessartine:

Dear Postman of the Future,

Although national anthems probably died in the societal collapse that you miraculously survived, I’m sure you vaguely remember some kind of patriotic ditty associated with sporting events and the like.

Here’s my question: suppose that Nerdom/Geekdom decided to declare itself an official something-or-other, and as part of the package, we had to choose one anthem for all us, to be played before every con, cruise, and filk concert for the rest of this century.

What would that anthem be? Is it a classical piece? Is it an instrumental mash-up of themes? Is it “I Ship It” ? What, in your notably nerdy opinion, could possible do the job?

Well, if nerd-dom declared its anthem it would either Luke’s theme from Star Wars, or “The Imperial March.” Just like when I called Star Wars the most quoted movie of all time, it also has the most instantly iconic and beloved music, and these are the two songs that the largest majority of nerds in the world would actually agree upon as a song to represent them as an entity. There’s no other music that comes close to be as universally accepted among our kind.

However, when I’m finally elected King of Nerds, I will be declaring “Twilight” by E.L.O. as the national nerd anthem, because it’s nerdy as hell, it’s catchy as shit, and has this amazing scifi music video:

That’s not an official music video, as you might suspect; it was the animated intro for the opening ceremony of a Japanese scifi n’ anime convention called Daicon IV, held back in 1983, which totally didn’t properly license the music but I assume were forgiven because it’s so amazing. Fun fact: The guys who made this went on to form Studio Gainax, including Evangelion creator/director Hideaki Anno.

Image: DC Comics.

Flash in the Bed Pan

Jason W.:

Dear postman,

You seem like a man who knows a thing or two about fictional characters’ bathroom habits. So does Iron Man pee in his suit or what? Similar question: Does Batman use the rooftops of Gotham as his own personal outhouse?

I am dead certain that Iron Man’s suit takes care of all his waste, and drops it surreptitiously when he flies around so no one notices. I am merely very confident Batman’s suit also accommodates his number ones and number twos, probably—and more than a little disgustingly—containing them until he gets back to the Batcave. However, it’s worth remembering that Bruce almost never eats or drinks, and probably takes some ultra-efficient vitamin of his own devising that gives him the energy he needs with producing little to no waste, so such a thing would very rarely need to be utilized.

If you doubt me, please remember that Kevin Smith did once retcon Batman’s origin—in continuity at the time, amazingly—that Batman pissed his pants at one point during his Year One. If the legendarily prepared Batman was too young to have thought about this potential problem then, he certainly addressed it afterward.

Guys! Thanks for all the great questions! You keep emailing the postman, I’ll keep trying to answer more, So send your questions, concerns, arguments that need settling, pleas for advice, and whatever else the heck you want to [email protected]!

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