A Treasure Trove of Pathetic Riches
I’ve recently discovered a whole new world of absolutely stupid fantasy films on Netflix, and I’m loving every minute of it. People who know me will know that I’m no stranger to low-quality entertainment, which holds an inexplicable appeal for me that serves to counterbalance my admittedly snobby side. It’s not that I can’t tell that these things are bad, far from it. Rather, the badness itself forms a sort of magnetic draw, which I’ve only just begun to understand. The fact is that even though watching a terrible film is obviously not a match for watching a great film, it beats watching a mediocre one each and every time.
It’s their uniqueness that makes all the difference (I know it’s strange to call these invariably derivative movies “unique,” but bear with me here). Great films take risks, and average films treat risks the same way you or I would treat rabid weasels, but bad films, the truly awful ones, are capable of entering extremely insane territory at the blink of an eye. These movies have nothing to lose and they’ll do anything for a little bit of attention, like that one girl in college. You’re far less likely to be bored watching one of these than Under the Tuscan Sun, anyway.
Don't ask me why I remember this movie.
And though this probably means that there’s something wrong with me, I also love the experience of ingesting a story written by a true idiot. Most people being of average intelligence, these are harder to find than you might think, so it’s kind of a treat to run across one. As a fantasy writer, I find it oddly inspiring to listen to dialog that sounds as though it was written by a ten-year-old Dungeon Master. It serves to remind us all of what we’re capable of.
*actual villainous line
So, yes, I want to make a case for watching horrid garbage. I don’t count it as a waste of time, because it’s honestly ten times more entertaining than watching something that garnered warm reviews, but will be forgotten in five years. I’m going to continue to dredge the depths of Netflix in search of movies that by all rights shouldn’t exist, and probably make comics about them. All who wish to join me in my depravity are welcome.
Fantasy: A Glossary
Attempting to categorize anything within the genre of fantasy can get pretty hairy, but since I keep running into trouble by using the wrong terms, I decided to do something about it. I made it my mission to learn the various distinctions between fantasy subgenres, or anything that could even be confused with a fantasy subgenre. It turns out that I had no idea what I was getting into.
I’ve since discovered that fantasy storytelling is similar to heavy metal music, in that it’s split into way too many diverse groups and most of them are so specific as to be unnecessary. I thought about making a Venn diagram, but that proved to be impossible, especially since all these genres freely mix and match with each other. But what kind of nerd would I be if I didn’t make my best attempt to sort it all out?
So follows my glossary of fantasy subgenres and associate genres, after hours of research. I’ve tried to give some indication of how much each relies on magical elements, but as with practically everything I’m presenting here, nothing is a hard and fast rule.
Alternate History
Features a sort of “what if” scenario regarding real-world history, in which the writer changes certain events and then speculates on the outcome. Strictly speaking, there’s no magic involved, making this subgenre more likely to overlap with sci-fi than fantasy. Of course, some people mix them anyway, and we end up with a sort of low-magic Historical Fantasy piece.
Magic Level: Nonexistent to Low
Bangsian Fantasy
When it comes to official fantasy subgenres, you don’t get more specific than this one. In Bangsian Fantasy, dead famous people (fictional or real-life) all get together and have delightful conversations and/or adventures, whether it be in the afterlife, as ghosts, or having been reanimated somehow. One of them is almost always Sherlock Holmes.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Children’s Fantasy
Right there in the name. This one is special because many of genre fiction’s earliest works fall into this category, as the authors felt that this was the only way they could get away with it. Times have changed, but saying “It’s for the kiddies!” is still a far more acceptable and widespread way to write about fantasy elements. I would say it’s a shame, but I don’t begrudge the existence of all the wonderful fantasy stories for children out there.
Magic Level: High
Comic Fantasy
Fantasy that’s humorous in some way, whether it’s making fun of itself, other works of fantasy, society in general, or all of the above. Obviously, this can really be any kind of fantasy at all, as long as it makes you laugh (excluding movies like She, where you’re laughing for the wrong reasons).
Magic Level: Any
Contemporary/Modern/Urban Fantasy
Set in a version of the modern world that is pervaded with fantasy elements, rather than an alternate universe. “Urban Fantasy” is a popular term for such stories set specifically inside a city. “Mythic Fiction” is similar, but all fantastical elements must reflect mythological or folkloric sources. Can be either High or Low fantasy (see below).
Magic Level: Any
Dark/Gothic/Horror Fantasy
This one is fairly self-explanatory, simply representing a mixing of the fantasy and horror genres. Often includes infernal representations like demons or somesuch, or unspeakable supernatural beings like Cthulhu.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Dying Earth Fantasy
Another super-specific subgenre, named after the seminal work by Jack Vance, which was later expanded on by numerous authors. The term has come to encompass any fantasy or science fiction story taking place just before the end of the human world.
Magic Level: Any
Elfpunk/Mythpunk/Etherpunk
Yes, biker elves, folkloric beat poets, and computer scientist wizards do get their own subgenres. This is all just a smattering of really, really specific areas of Urban Fantasy (see Contemporary, above). Use these terms in conversation only if it’s really important to you that nobody understand what you’re talking about.
Magic Level: Medium
Fairy Tale Fantasy
Basically, people writing their own fairy tales. Fairy tales themselves aren’t considered “fantasy” in the literary sense, although officially they encapsulate several stories written by known authors rather than derived from folklore (Hans Christian Andersen, anyone?). I think that this distinction is flawed; to my mind, “fairy tale” should refer only to collectively created folk tales, and “fairy tale fantasy” to works by single authors that show a strong fairy tale influence.
Magic Level: Medium to High
Fantastique
A mostly French genre that’s sort of like Magical Realism in that it portrays supernatural effects as simply existing in the modern world, but unlike it in that the characters themselves are rather disturbed by all this strangeness. Kind of a good stepping stone between Magical Realism and “classic” fantasy.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Fantasy of Manners
A twisting of the term “comedy of manners,” meaning that it’s a fantasy in which everyone wittily snipes at each other like they’re in a Jane Austen novel. So closely related to Romantic Fantasy and Historical Fantasy that it’s sort of pointless to separate it from them, except for the fact that it’s sure not to be as serious.
Magic Level: Low
Gaslamp Fantasy
Fantasy that takes place specifically in a Victorian or Gothic universe. Differs from Steampunk, a sci-fi genre, in that it de-emphasizes technology a bit and will often have more supernatural goings-on. But most people will probably still think of them as the same thing.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Hard Fantasy
Named after “hard” science fiction, in which no fanciful deviations from the realm of plausibility are allowed. It’s harder for pure fantasy to pull this off, so it probably has sci-fi elements intertwined. Notably, typing the name of this genre into a Google image search does not turn up the types of pictures you want to see.
Magic Level: Nonexistent to Low
Heroic Fantasy
An ill-defined genre, it’s an awful lot like Sword and Sorcery (in fact, it’s pretty much just the same genre in disguise so that it won’t have to own up to that Red Sonja movie). Perhaps it has a little more emphasis on good vs. evil and saving the world, but isn’t that what High Fantasy is for?
Magic Level: High
High/Epic Fantasy
What most people are thinking of when they hear the word “fantasy.” Describes an intricate alternate universe of some sort, usually separate from our own, always with internally consistent rules. Legendary heroes, prophecies, and Campbellian themes abound. The fate of the world is frequently at stake. One of the two “umbrella” fantasy genres, along with Low Fantasy.
Magic Level: High to Staggering
Historical Fantasy
Almost always set in a pre-industrial time in real-world history, although also applicable to a made-up world that simply takes all of its cues from a specific historical period or culture of Earth. Usually has pretty strong magical elements.
Magic Level: Medium to High
Lost World
This genre can be fantasy, science fiction, or both. It revolves around the discovery of a long-lost continent or civilization (such as the city of Atlantis) by “modern” explorers. Lost World stories often have a vintage feel to them, as their golden age was between the late 19th and early 20th centuries and modern writers in this genre still like to evoke the mood of those decades.
Magic Level: Low
Low Fantasy
The other “umbrella” genre (opposite High Fantasy), it has more of a tendency to blur the lines between the real world and the fantasy world. Favors fictionalized versions of our reality (historical or present) rather than entirely made-up universes, although this isn’t always the case. Instead of the salvation of humanity, the story focuses on the hero’s personal struggles. Somewhat more likely to be gritty and dark than romantic or whimsical, yet by other definitions it is said to take itself far less seriously.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Magical Realism
Commonly referring to works made in Spanish, this describes a genre wherein there are fantastical elements that people in a real-life setting calmly accept without question. It might be controversial including this here, as people can’t seem to decide whether this is actually “fantasy” or not (here are some opinions). I personally can’t see any reason why this isn’t widely considered to be a fantasy genre, other than the fact that we still need to feel comfortable assigning these books as required reading in schools.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Medieval Fantasy
Ale and wenches, kings and castles, dragons and knights, ho! Usually considered a subgenre of High Fantasy, this is by far the most common type of fantasy setting that exists. It basically includes anything with strong resemblances to what its creators must have thought medieval Europe looked like. Really fun, but it can sometimes get old after a while.
Magic Level: High
Mythology/Folk/Fairy Tales
Everyone knows what these are, and they’ve served to inspire many (if not all) works of fantasy fiction over the centuries. However, I believe they should not be considered “fantasy” as such, since these stories are not really works of fiction so much as cultural constructs. They are created collectively and evolve over time, more like a language than a genre.
Magic Level: Staggering
Paranormal Romance
A more catch-all term for Romantic Fantasy (see below) that can also encompass sci-fi and horror. Probably more likely to be used in the context of Urban Fantasy rather than a fantasy that takes place in the past or in another world.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Romantic Fantasy
Exactly what it sounds like. If you want to get even more specific over what’s already a pretty specific genre, Wikipedia’s got you covered: “Some publishers distinguish between ‘romantic fantasy’ where the romance is most important and ‘fantasy romance’ where the fantasy elements are most important.” Okay, whatever.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Science Fantasy
The Wikipedia article on this one really sort of doubles as a thought-provoking essay about what constitutes fantasy vs. sci-fi elements all on its own, so be sure to check it out for further elaboration. In short, I think that “Science Fantasy” can be used as a catch-all term for works that subjectively seem as though they can’t be exclusive to either genre, such as the notable example of Star Wars.
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Superhero/Martial Arts Fantasy
I understand that superhero stories and martial arts stories are very distinct from one another, but their relationship to the overall genre of “fantasy” is the same, so I’ve lumped them together here. Basically, whether or not they are technically fantasy genres is something people can’t seem to decide on. The point may be moot anyway, as both these genres are so large that they cultivate their own followings and have huge sets of tropes and conventions that are unique to them. Hence, they should usually be considered on their own terms.
Magic Level: Any
Sword and Sorcery
Wikipedia describes this genre as “swashbuckling,” yet we all know that the primary example of it is Conan the Barbarian. I suppose the literary Conan is somewhat swashbuckling (although his image isn’t what immediately pops into my mind whenever I hear that term), but the cinematic Conan is hardly a glib, roguish hero. This genre is oriented around action and adventure, focused on the personal struggles of a single character who is probably an anti-hero. Looked down on nowadays due to lots of derivative elements and Conan copycats, but still one of my favorites because of its overall grittiness and lack of elves. Sometimes called “Sword and Sandal” if it has a Greco-Roman flavor to it.
Magic Level: High
Supernatural Fiction
Apparently, stories containing supernatural creatures usually count as “fantasy,” unless, of course, they are about ghosts. I mean, that would just be silly!
Magic Level: Low to Medium
Surrealism
Oh boy, here we go. Trying to decide if Surrealism counts as “fantasy” or not is like trying to get a mammoth to have sex with a blue whale–they’re both way too large and nobody can figure out how they’re supposed to fit together. Ultimately, this is something that everyone has to decide for themselves, because there will never be an answer.
Magic Level: What’s Magic? What’s Reality? I forgot who I am!
Weird/New Weird Fiction
Unique in that it applies to works created before the many types of speculative fiction fell into place (or in the case of New Weird, it mimics the aforementioned stories in style). Doesn’t care one whit about the various genre distinctions, mixing them freely. Its motto: anything goes.
Magic Level: Any
What If/Plot Convenience Fantasy
When a story (usually a movie) seems set entirely in the real world except for a single magical occurrence, which almost always goes unexplained and is mostly there to put the characters in a strange situation. Primary examples would be Liar, Liar and Freaky Friday, but the best by far is Groundhog Day. “So put your little hand in mine…”
Magic Level: Extremely Low
And there you go. I tried to be as comprehensive as I could, though it wouldn’t surprise me if I left out a genre or two dedicated solely to surfing unicorns or something like that. Hopefully, this glossary will save others as much time as I used up making it.
The Intense Beauty that Surrounds the Human Struggle
To me, historical fantasy isn’t about swords and wizards. And though it’s nice to have these things, it isn’t really about taverns and dungeons either. It certainly isn’t about elves and dwarves, despite what video game makers seem to think. So what is it that sets it apart from science fiction as an imaginative genre?
No, sci-fi has these too.
I can only speak my own thoughts on the matter. A true historical fantasy should depict the contrast and commingling of good and bad. We should see the ugliness of mankind’s deeds and the nobility of human emotions, the savagery of nature as well as its indescribable beauty, set side-by-side. For this is our world.
Neither fantasy nor sci-fi mean anything unless they somehow evoke the reality we live in. And while sci-fi (generally) explores mankind’s relationship to technology and discovery, it’s fantasy’s place to explore our links to our past and to the natural world around us. The best of both these genres also explore our connections to one another. A story without relatable characters leaves us bored pretty darn quick.
And unfortunately, fantasy isn’t willing to step up to the plate the way sci-fi does.
Okay, okay, that was a highly generalized statement. Sci-fi has plenty of cookie-cutter or just plain badly-thought-out premises. But at least most sci-fi is built around an original idea of some kind. Or an idea that’s a pastiche of other people’s original ideas. Or maybe they’ll have the courtesy to come up with an alien race or monster that looks kind of different from other people’s aliens and monsters. Just not motherloving elves and dwarves and wizards again and again and again.
Screw elves. I want a fantasy about humans. I want them to wear burlap and huddle in the dark afraid of predators. Let them dig out the earth with hand tools made of wood, and build their houses and barns and castles with years of toil. I want to see humans loving and talking and betraying one another while they shape what they can of the world around them, even as its unfathomable vastness holds them in awe. That’s what I’d really like to see more of.
Ah, well. Better get back to writing. The only way any of us can experience our perfect stories is to create them ourselves.
A Fantasy Movie I Liked For A Change
I spend a lot of time complaining about fantasy on this blog, and it probably looks like I hate the stuff. Of course, I love the fantasy genre, I just hate most of what’s in it (because I love the fantasy genre). Recently I sat down and watched a fantasy movie that did a lot of things right, so I figured I’d better yak about it here, just to add some balance. Oh, and this post has plenty of spoilers, so consider yourself warned.
The film I watched? Dragonslayer. Sure, it takes a few too many cues from Star Wars, but what do you expect? It was the eighties, and those movies had just finished blowing everyone’s mind. And sure, the subject matter is inherently cheesy, but the story is well-told and even the dialogue, often bad in this sort of film, is generally cleverer than you would expect. Okay, maybe the hero is a weenie-bitch whose gains in confidence only make him into more and more of an annoying jerk, but…well, I’m not really going to defend him. He’s the worst thing about this movie.
There he is on the right.
Despite everything I’ve said, I still like this movie, goddammit. There are just so many perfect little fantasy touches that make it all worthwhile. The setting is, to me, what every fantasy setting should be: stunning natural beauty plus acute human misery. The peasants work their asses off in their fields and shops, while their King, wearing gold-embroidered robes, sits in a drafty castle next to a dwarf dressed as a jester and a freaking wolfhound. This isn’t a world of kind, just rulers and gaily singing serfs. This world is one where the common folk live in fear of terrible wild beasts on one side and tyrannical bureaucratic governments on the other. A world in which people are cold, hungry and dirty, a world of greasy fires and woolen clothing and crumbling stone towers. A proper fantasy world without a Calvin Klein model in sight. This is how you do medieval fantasy, kids.
There are so many things about this movie where they just had the right idea. The plot is a cross between the “Saint George and the Dragon” and “Sorcerer’s Apprentice” legends, a naturally awesome mix. There’s a sacrificial virgin who actually tries really hard to get away before getting made into barbecue, and a princess who is noble, pure, and beautiful, but gets her feet gnawed off by baby dragons anyway. The hero’s dragon-slaying weapon is not a sword, but a supremely bad-ass lance forged by the local blacksmith. It’s really nice to see a fantasy avoid the whole “speshikal magical god-sword” trope for something that’s more down to earth, but is all the cooler for it.
Not to mention that his dragon-slaying weapon actually fails to slay the dragon. What does work is to turn his dead mentor into a freaking wizard-bomb and blow the dragon apart in mid-flight. Then, while its bloody, smoking corpse is laying on the ground, the jerk of a King shows up and takes credit for all of it while the heroes say “fuck this shit” and ride off in a random direction, letting him have his petty empire with his fascist monarchial propaganda. This definitely qualifies as one of my favorite endings to any fantasy film, ever. Not everyone is saved. The dragon is dead, but that isn’t the end to all problems. People are just going to have to do the best they can in this unfair world–an unfair world with awesome pulley-based technology and stunning vistas.
It almost makes all this social oppression and backbreaking labor worthwhile.
So while Dragonslayer may be only vaguely remembered as a minor fantasy classic that people enjoyed for the cool visuals and little else, I would like to give it props for its gritty, troubled world. If adopted, that trope alone would be a vast improvement to so many of the bland and whiny fantasies of today. I wish I’d seen this movie a long time ago.
Why Fantasy Keeps Going Nowhere
I would kill for a good fantasy TV show. I have often argued, and I still maintain, that fantasy as a genre has as much potential for creativity as science fiction. The people who make it are just much, much lazier. The history of fantasy on television reflects this, as all fantasy television shows are bad. Even the good ones are bad (forgive me, Xena). The thing is, fantasy has what sci-fi doesn’t: a collection of tropes so well-known, so recognizable, so easy to plug and play that they tempt the slothfulness of any writer, whether that writer is talented or not. Everybody who writes fantasy knows at the back of their minds that if they throw together a Dark Lord, a Beautiful Maiden, a Simple Farm Lad and a Prophecy involving a Magic Sword, they can just call it a day and no one will think twice about it. We just expect it at this point.
Something got me on this kick, of course. I checked out Legend of the Seeker, a relatively new show with a very impressive budget, considering its genre.1 Lots of hope to be had here, although I didn’t let my hopes get that high. There wasn’t much of a chance for that to happen, though, as the pilot consisted of the exact plot of A New Hope run through some sort of medieval fantasy translator. We’re talking a show where a person can literally watch the scenes go by, say in their head “I bet Simple Farm Lad here will find his parents dead and his cottage on fire in exactly five minutes,” and be right on the money. There was literally not a single thing in the pilot that could not have been randomly generated by a mildly retarded AI after it finished absorbing every paperback in the world to feature a sword, rose, castle or dragon on the cover.
Chronicles of Moronia, Book One.
Our hero, the Simple Farm Lad, is brash but stupid (of course). He runs into a Beautiful Maiden with the personality of a grapefruit who is annoyed by yet intrigued with him (naturally). He’s the long-lost object of some kind of Prophecy even though he’s a complete dunce, she’s far more skilled than he is but somehow can’t just go defeat the bad guy herself, the maguffins multiply and we all drown in seas of explanatory dialogue. The show’s best characters by far are the Wise Old Mage, who is at his heart also a cliché but played by a delightfully competent actor, and the main villain, who doesn’t have much to him beyond “dark and brooding” but looks a lot like the Prince of Persia. These two guys I enjoy watching, when the story centers on them.
As for the other characters on the show, I have a theory. A bus of Calvin Klein models, on its way to an underwear exhibition or something, overturned and crashed. The survivors, having gone feral, were discovered months later by a traveling Renaissance Faire, which clothed and fed them (well, clothed them anyway) and returned them to humanity. This not only explains why the characters spend most of their time standing around looking equally bored and confused, but also why they must constantly narrate their own lives through a stream of simplistic dialogue as though they would otherwise forget what they were doing mid-action. They wear quasi-medieval clothing and jaw about poor peasant’s tasks, but their body language suggests that they were never taught how to do anything but lean half-naked against things and glare intensely. At least Lucy Lawless always seemed at home plunging weapons into people’s vital organs.
It might seem like I’m being too harsh, but it’s hard to understate how much efforts like this disappoint me. This one has a budget, for god’s sake–-there are great sets and props and special effects that don’t look like someone drew on a filmstrip with a crayon. But none of this saves the tired, tired story and the Keanu Reeves-esque characters. Here’s the big secret seemingly kept from TV producers: great characters are what make or break a show. Programs like Star Trek and my still-beloved Xena had silly costumes, crappy props and often ludicrous storylines, but the characters were what made us want to watch. Their feelings, and the actions that resulted from them, seemed real to us. It’s on these kinds of connections that true fandoms are built. I know fantasy could do more of this if it wanted to. Just stop taking the easy way out.
- I know it’s based on a series of books by Terry Goodkind, but fantasy writers of both prose and live action share the same originality problems, so my complaints still apply. Besides, I didn’t want to read the damn books. [↩]
I Get to Rant About Avatar, Too
I didn’t want to watch Avatar. I knew I wasn’t going to like it. But too many people insisted I should, and I can’t properly criticize something I haven’t seen, anyway. And I must admit, there were aspects about it that I greatly enjoyed. Very rarely these days can visual effects be truthfully referred to as “groundbreaking,” but Avatar earns that compliment and then some. This film is the future of computer animation in cinema. It’s majestic to watch.
Visually, I mean. The story pisses me off.
This has already been pointed out more than once, but I have to say it in my own voice. Anyone who thinks this movie is a credit to Native American cultural portrayals is failing to grasp what it’s really about. I have no tolerance for Noble Savage bullshit, and neither should anyone else. In this day and age, the person who creates it usually means well by it, and so everyone joins in the cheering and people don’t realize that it’s just another form of dehumanization. But Avatar isn’t just a story about perfect people with a perfect culture, who sing with all the voices of the mountain and paint with all the colors of the wind, oh no. Enter the Essential White Hero, who will of course become their greatest warrior and wed the Chief’s Daughter and BLAH BLAH BLAH, even though he’s presumably never heard the wolf cry to the blue corn moon or anything. This guy is a device to assuage the guilt of white people, and absolutely nothing more than that.
Have no fear, woodland creatures!
My problems with the script aren’t all ideological. Simply speaking to strength of narrative, this film had sucky characters (“sucky” being the professional term describing characters whose personalities consist only of a single trait, if that). Our hero appears to have no connection to humanity whatsoever, even though he’s, like, 26 and has presumably kissed someone and shared a candy bar with someone and played Mario Kart with someone and otherwise been privy to the nicer bits of the human race. This isn’t a Last of the Mohicans scenario, where the man has been raised by the natives and sees them as his family. He just literally stumbles into their world and is not only able to sever his previous identity without any difficulty, but will later become the perfect embodiment of their cultural ideal. Yeah, right.
The other characters are even worse. The Na’vi are a collection of various stereotypes, even down to the Young Brave who is already betrothed to the Chief’s Daughter, hates our white protagonist at first, finally recognizes him as his brother and leader, then dies valiantly in battle. You know, the guy who was probably supposed to be the actual hero of his people, but gets shunted aside to make room for a clumsy, clueless outsider, because we’re really more comfortable if the white guy does it. Then there’s Sigourney Weaver’s character, whose motivations are all over the map and whose sole purpose is to die, a collection of human buddies who are also only dimly defined, and a smattering of bad guys (pictured below) who I actually have no complaints about. Subtlety is the watchword here.
The script was obviously afraid that we’d have no idea what the movie was trying to tell us unless it held our hand the entire way, which is annoying in and of itself. But what got to me the most was that precisely zero of the human characters acted like humans. I’ve already mentioned how the hero appeared to have been raised in a sensory deprivation chamber judging by the emotional bonds he displayed towards the civilization that birthed him, bonds that, if possessed, might have actually created some tension for his character. The rest of the cast does no better–-the character played by Michelle Rodriguez, who understandably chokes when asked to commit genocide, later turns on the humans and kills dozens of them before going down. She’s a hardened marine, and many of these people were presumably her friends, whom she was willing to die beside the previous day. I just can’t buy her conflict-free turnaround. Finally, the part that really had me groaning was the very end, in which most of the remaining humans were herded onto their ships to return to Earth, never to be seen again. They will never, ever return to bother the Na’vi or bombard their planet with nuclear weapons against which they would have no defense, because it’s not like persistence is a major part of human nature or anything. We are, in fact, known galaxy-wide for our gracious acceptance of defeat.
I'm going home now.
All sarcasm aside, it’s true that there should only be one possible outcome to this plot: the flaming death of all the Na’vi. In many ways, that would actually be fitting. After all, the thing that makes white people’s history with Native Americans tragic, poignant and emotionally distressing is the fact that we succeeded in destroying them. That this movie insists on depicting a highly contrived victory, all made possible by a converted white dude no less, is just insult heaped upon insult. Avatar is not an homage to the beauty of Native American culture, but a white boy fantasy of living without guilt. Nobody should be inspired by this.
Look, I understand the desire to make the white guilt go away forever. I struggle with it myself. But indulging in daydreams about pure absolution, assimilation and acceptance into ethnic culture that is more than just acceptance, but complete and utter vindication: all this is a lie. The world isn’t fair, and if Native Americans have to watch their own culture slowly fade to nothing after centuries of abuse, then we can handle a little white guilt. We certainly aren’t going to redeem ourselves through pretending that we can just cast it off like an old, hole-ridden shirt because hey, we’re the best! We’ve got to accept this part of ourselves, because it will always be there. Life goes on, guys.
I Review Dragon Age: Origins
Actually, I won’t. Because someone with exactly my opinion has already done so. This person is, of course, as big of a Baldur’s Gate fan as I am, was as excited about Dragon Age for the same reasons I am, and liked the new game just as much as I do. We even have more or less the same caveats about it, as well as the guilty reasoning that most of the issues we have regarding it are more related to our nostalgic obsession with Bioware’s first games than DA:O’s actual flaws.
But we can’t help it, you see. I, for one, have never played a game where the developers endeavored to inject as much atmospheric, entertaining content into every corner of their work as much as BG2. Here is one of my favorite examples. In most fantasy games, if there is an inn mechanic, the PC walks up to the innkeeper and initiates dialogue. The Standard Fantasy Innkeeper is invariably fat, bored, and boring. He asks for a few coppers and sends you up to bed, with nary a second glance. If you’re lucky, you can squeeze a rumor or two out of him. Whereas in BG2, this happens:
Vincenzo the Innkeep: ’Allo to you an’ a good day! I am Vincenzo and I offer you all the services of me humble l’il inn!
Willet the Stableboy: There’re a lot o’ things t’ be said about yer inn, Vince … but “humble” ain’t the one I would be pickin’, aye?
Vincenzo the Innkeep: Hush, boy! An’ keep callin’ me “Vince” an’ I’ll have ye strapped o’er a log! The name’s “Vincenzo!”
Willet the Stableboy: ‘At’s a lotta rot. Ye hears that name from a Sembian trader an’ suddenly yer puttin’ on airs. Pfeh!
Vincenzo the Innkeep: Never mind the boy. He’s an ignorant lout I took in out of pity. A simpleton who doesn’t know his place. Is there aught I can do for you, my good Lady?
This is what I mean. These NPCs, who continue to argue with one another every time the player interacts with them, serve no further use later in the plot. There is no purpose to their conversation other than to delight me, and the game is chock full of this stuff. And some people think a good RPG is about damage per second and item harvesting.
Do I think Dragon Age lives up to this game in sheer richness of detail? It doesn’t, but frankly, no modern game could. Nowadays developers have too much other stuff to worry about, like creating character models that don’t resemble Polly Pocket dolls. Making each and every NPC into a quirky character and creating fantasy cities that seem alive with real individuals would take time and energy that they simply don’t have.
Sexy.
And really, DA:O is still damn atmospheric, more than any RPG I’ve played for a long time. I still love you, Bioware. Call me.
I Can’t Believe It’s She-Ra.
I found it. Deep in the primordial ooze of my infant memories, right next to Land Before Time, The Last Unicorn and The Brave Little Toaster, I always knew there was a cartoon blonde woman who rode a pegasus and wielded a sparkling, identity-switching greatsword. And like them, she was stamped indelibly in my subconscious. That’s right, there’s no telling how much influence She-Ra: Princess of Power has had over the person who is now me. We’re not talking about something I obsessed over when I was nine. This is no Power Rangers or Captain Planet. I must have been four or five when I encountered this thing.
I don’t know how I ended up watching it on the internet. But from the first few scenes, I was convinced I’d found her. I didn’t remember the name of the character or even much about the cartoon itself, but I’ve always remembered how it made me feel. Even from the time I was very little, I noticed how unfair gender roles seemed in the entertainment I consumed. Women just never seemed to be doing anything. My favorite genre, fantasy, sparked my imagination and transported me to other worlds, but the main character was invariably a man who I didn’t identify with. This meant that the few times I did encounter an animated fantasy centered around a woman, I’d latch onto it and never let go. I’ve always carried a memory of that brightly colored VHS tape sitting on the lower level of a wooden rack in the tiny video rental store in Navajoland–we were still living on the Rez, which is how I know I must’ve been really young–and that I begged my mother to take it out for me again.
Now, I know it was She-Ra.
After watching a few episodes, I also know why I remember my mother rolling her eyes and sighing when I went up to her, clutching the video. It’s literally the most unsubtle thing I’ve ever watched, and I watch Walker, Texas Ranger.
Later he'll stare down a bear.
There are some things from our foggy childhood memory-ooze that deserve to be enjoyed again as we grow up (the three films I mentioned in the second sentence of this post are excellent examples), but even as I watch this cartoon and torment my poor husband with the horrible voice acting, I know that the thrill I’m getting from it is entirely related to my memories and not the show itself. It’s just an animated advertisement for some toys, after all, with utterly ridiculous characters1 and cludgy moral messages. But I can take comfort in the fact that what it helped me to believe when I was very young, that it’s possible for female characters to ride around on horses swinging swords and being the main focus of a story, is worthwhile. Sometimes, something doesn’t have to be good in order to matter.
It’s also very gratifying whenever I discover that a piece of media I remember from long ago actually exists and isn’t just a figment of my imagination. I’m still holding out hope that that weird Alice in Wonderland ripoff that has mind control in it and a villain who lives in a bowling ball house wasn’t just a dream I had once. I mean, the kangaroo ninjas turned out to be from a real movie, and they were a much stupider idea! If anybody ever watches something that has a guy who lives in a bowling ball, they need to let me know.
- My favorite character description from the Wikipedia page is this: “Sweet Bee is a bee-woman from an intergalactic bee colony who came to Etheria seeking Bees and a new home when her race of Bee’s homeworld is destroyed by Wasps.” [↩]
Barbarians Once More
So it looks like they cast the new Conan. I find it interesting that they found someone who’s also an Austrian bodybuilder, and hopefully this is a demonstration that they’ll be faithful to the spirit of the original. I’m looking forward to this new low fantasy reboot (Conan and also Red Sonja), even though it’s simply another notch on Hollywood’s remake bedpost. The way I think of it, we’ve got nothing to lose–the genre’s been practically dead since the 1980s anyway, and it would be nice to see it redone from a modern perspective. I would also be nice to see some fantasy movies to counter the dominance of high fantasy propagated by Lord of the Rings.
The genre shall be ours forever! Forth Eorlingas!
I should probably clarify what I mean by “high” and “low” fantasy. Generally speaking, high fantasy stories are like LotR and Star Wars, featuring an epic scope, black-and-white moral dichotomies, and lots of magic or the equivalent of magic, like the Force. Low fantasy stories like that of Conan the Barbarian tend to have more constrained proportions (such as being centered on one man’s quest for revenge instead of the salvation of the entire world), ambiguous morality, and very limited use of magic. It’s a great use of fantasy, and I’m glad to see it resurrected even if it’s all being done for money. Hopefully it will be worthwhile, as the Batman and Star Trek reboots have been.
