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Finally got around to reading another John Scalzi book, this one being The Human Division. I had heard about this book some time ago – it was published originally online as a series of stories set in the Old Man’s War universe, then consolidated into a book with some extras when it came out in hardcover.

I liked it – it presents effectively the other perspective after the ending of the Old Man’s War trilogy – that of the Colonial Union trying to get Earth back in the fold. And it doesn’t present a straight narrative – kind of jumps around to follow the main characters through different situations – sometimes the transitions are rather abrupt but it still all holds together pretty well.

I also liked that true to form, he tries to inject direct and subtle humor in many places along the way. These days, while I like the crazy, over the top ‘serious’ sci-fi like anyone else, I also appreciate when humor is used – it just softens the tone of a given book and humanizes the characters so much more, IMHO.

One other interesting angle is how he veers around the backstories between the main characters – most usually start out fairly sarcastic or intense – but then he takes the time to make them more three-dimensional – even in very small ways. Nice touch.

While I was disappointed that the ending is rather open-ended, I guess that’s life (not a ‘hollywood ending’) and, it potentially means he’ll revisit stories in this ‘universe’ again in the not-too-distant future.

Now, to read some of his other back catalog of books….

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Annoying – I find yet ANOTHER great animated series, only to determine that it’s already been CANCELLED – argh! So just finished watching the last episode of Sym-Bionic Titan, made by one of my fave animators – Genndy Tartakovsky, you may know him for Samurai Jack, Dexter’s Laboratory or even one of the early Clone Wars animated series.

So apparently this series came out a few years ago but was ultimately cancelled after its first year of 20 episodes in part because there were no TOYS associated with it? Sometimes I really think Cartoon Network has its head up its collective TV set on this stuff?!?

This series is really well-done – it has the always incredible art and design by Scott Wills (also of Samurai Jack fame among others); it has engaging stories that while in some cases a wee bit repetitive (they do generally fight one monster a show) still move a multistory plot along in the background and have the characters actually *develop* along the way. Astute viewers will notice sly visual pop culture references hidden in most episodes or in some cases, dialogue, but ths show doesn’t go out of its way to be ‘hip’ in that respect, which is nice.

One thing that’s very different about this show vs. say, Samurai Jack, is that the violence is definitely more pronounced, definitely more anime-inspired. While in watching some extras about Samurai Jack, they talked about how they could never actually kill a ‘person’ onscreen in that show – so they slice and dice robots and robot kaiju all over the place instead – here, they definitely left that rule behind, sometimes in a big way (the large battles of the ‘Escape from Galaluna’ episode especially).

But like happened to TRON:Uprising – I guess hollywood can’t appreciate (and RENEW for another season!) quality when they see it. Hopefully Mr. Tartakovsky will keep up the great work and using the same animators and art team – amazing stuff, this was…..

Other voices:
Metacritic

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great article. Although truth be told, I haven’t ever seen much of this show. But I should…..! And a possible reboot?

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Definitive Oral History of a TV Masterpiece

Joel Hodgson Wants To Resurrect Mystery Science Theater 3000 In 2014

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Scarecrow Video raising $100K on Kickstarter to preserve world’s largest archive of movies

for those of you who don’t know who/what Scarecrow Video is, you need to get INFORMED. 🙂

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It doesn’t get much nerdier than this….but I think I spotted an actual mistake! On the front of the suit at the end when they are talking, it says ‘Dallas’ on the front plate. But he says at the start of the video he was building the suit that Kane wore (John Hurt) – Kane was the character that has the alien burst out of his chest after getting back from the alien wreck. But Dallas was Tom Skerritt, the captain of the ship? Zing!

Anyway, pretty incredible work by any measure….

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HR Giger has passed away as of this past May, just found out about it tonight.

‘Alien’ artist H.R. Giger dead at 74

Love him or hate him, he was certainly one-of-a-kind and one wonders where the ‘goth industry’ would have been without him – much of its art can certainly be considered a Giger ripoff at some point or another.

Definitely not art for the timid or faint of heart, most well known for the xenomorph alien, movie artwork and set design in Alien (reused in the sequels), the ELP and Debbie Harry album covers, and a bit more obscure, one of the original attempts to make a movie out of Dune. I actually have copies of both Dark Seed videogames on my shelf, need to break those out sometime…..

In whatever eerie, disturbing bio-mechanoid resting place you now inhabit, rest in peace, Herr Giger.

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