2026年8月1日 星期六

"The Warlock in Spite of Himself" by Christopher Stasheff (1969)


"'A totalitarian movement, beyond question,' the robot replied, 'A rabble-rouser, no doubt power hungry, who will lead the people to make demands on the government, demands which cannot be met.  The crown's refusals will be used to incite the mob to violence, and you have your revolution made.'

"'Couldn't be just an ambitious nobleman trying to usurp the crown?'

"'Usurpation derives its support from the upper classes, Rod.  No, this is a proletarian revolution - a prelude to a totalitarian government.'"

Christopher Stasheff was a Midwestern author known for blending science fiction and fantasy.  This novel, The Warlock in Spite of Himself, is probably his best known work.  It's also the first book in Stasheff's Warlock of Gramarye series, which consists of 12 books published between the late 60s and early 2000s.  Stasheff passed away in 2018.

In the novel a star traveler representing a galaxy-spanning democracy visits the world of Gramarye, where a group of colonists have established a society modeled on the Middle Ages.  This feudal community is ruled by the capricious Queen Catherine, a young woman new to the throne and her responsibilities as queen.  Our star traveler, seeing in Catherine's troubled monarchy an opportunity to push Gramarye towards democracy, decides to intervene in local politics.

Given its date of publication, many of The Warlock in Spite of Himself's earliest readers drew parallels between the novel and American exploits in Vietnam.  These parallels are, I think, a bit of a stretch.  Yes, the novel's political underpinnings do invite some comparisons to American adventurism in Indochina, but The Warlock in Spite of Himself is a far from politically astute work.  The politics at play in the book are more cosmetic, and concepts such as totalitarianism and democracy are treated in the most cursory fashion.

On balance I don't think this novel is any more timely than Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, a tale The Warlock in Spite of Himself much resembles.  Both books involve a more "enlightened" protagonist transported into medieval times, both books involve this protagonist posing as a magician, and both books involve characters attempting to modernize medieval institutions.  The main difference being that Twain's book is a work of satire, while The Warlock in Spite of Himself is offered with more of a straight face.

Then there's the misogyny, of which The Warlock in Spite of Himself has plenty.  Sure, the protagonist overcomes some of his misogyny in the course of the novel, but there are still several troubling depictions of women and their ability to change (or even influence) events in this narrative, and this aspect of the novel will likely cause most readers to question the author's attitudes toward the female sex.

I wouldn't recommend this book.  I found it hard to get through and less than convincing.  It's not terrible, mind you, but I've read much better science fiction (and fantasy) from the same time period.

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2026年7月8日 星期三

"Illuminations: Stories" by Alan Moore (2022)


"One major problem seemed to be that nearly everyone working in the business - artists, writers, editors and publishers - was a promoted comic fan who though they might know everything about King Bee, had no original or viable ideas of their own that might conceivably alleviate the comic world's near-terminal condition."

Alan Moore is a noted writer of comic books who began writing fiction in the late 90s.  He first came to widespread attention through his work at DC Comics, where he wrote a celebrated run on Swamp Thing, and where he then created the groundbreaking limited series Watchmen with artist Dave Gibbons.  Since his heyday in the 80s he's bounced around quite a bit, penning a number of comic book titles for a number of different publishers.

My personal (?) relationship with Moore goes back to that run on Swamp Thing in the early 80s.  I liked that character prior to Moore taking on writing duties, but it was Moore's innovations on that title that made me a genuine fan.  From Swamp Thing it was an easy leap to Watchmen, another series I loved, but after that seminal work I largely lost track of Moore, only reading a handful of the comics he wrote for Image later on.

This said, I have made jokes at his expense.  A few years ago I came across a quote by Moore, something to the effect of people becoming the thing they dread.  As part of this quote Moore explained that he'd become a wizard, and for years now I've been warning people of the perils of going to bed and waking up as a wizard, encouraging them to guard against such transformations.  This joke only ever lands with one friend who's also familiar with the same quote, but I still insist on repeating it from time to time, as if its repetition will make the reference any less obscure.  "I went to pay for my latte at Starbucks," I'll say, "And damned if I didn't become a wizard once the change hit the counter."

Alan Moore, to put it another way, takes himself incredibly seriously, and he probably thinks that you and I should too.  While briefly researching this short story collection, for example, I ran across an interview with him in which he explains the literary devices he uses in the writing of his stories - in case, you know, the rest of us are too slow on the uptake.  In the interview he seems nice enough about it, but yeah, he is in this respect far from unsassuming.

Anyway, on to the stories.

1. Hypothetical Lizard

This story starts off promising but goes nowhere fast.  I really liked the bit about the "whore of sorcerers" and the procedure employed in the creation of such a being, but the overall narrative is an extremely pedestrian tale of sexual jealousy which fails to utilize an excellent opening.

2. Not Even Legend

One of the better stories here.  A group investigating the paranormal meets and runs afoul of all the spirits which normally exist outside of their investigations.  It's a little like The Curious Case of Benjamin Button meets a detective story.  It works well.

3. Location, Location, Location

A pointlessly sexual story involving a real estate transaction and the end of the world.  I'm really not sure where Moore was trying to go with this one, and I don't think he's entirely sure either.

4. Cold Reading

A psychic gets on the wrong side of the supernatural.  It's a solid story that would have worked well as a horror comic.  Anything more than that would have involved a deeper dive into the characters.

5. The Improbably Complex High-Energy State

One of the most pretentious things I've ever read, and keep in mind that I've struggled through books like Gravity's Rainbow and Finnegan's Wake.  This story is best described as a kind of fantasia (or phantasmagoria) involving entities existing in a quantum substrate.  It tries to be amusing, occasionally succeeds, but I found reading it to be a real chore.

6. Illuminations

An older man pays a heavy price for nostalgia.  This is far and away the best story in this collection, and I assume it leans heavily on the author's memories of younger years.  The ending isn't altogether unexpected, but the various plot elements click together nicely in the end.

7. What We Can Know About Thunderman

This novella is the centerpiece of this short story collection, and serves as Moore's grand statement on the (American) comic book industry.  By turns pointless and confusing, this sprawling... thing really puts the "T" in "turgid."

In case, as Moore is likely to suspect, you're too slow to catch the symbolism, "Thunderman" is a stand-in for Superman, "American" is a stand-in for DC, and "Massive" is a stand-in for Marvel.  Having endured Moore's dismissing vignettes of various figures within the comic book industry, I can understand why more current creators are often so cryptic in their descriptions of interactions with him.  He's probably not a pleasant individual to deal with.

8. American Light: An Appreciation

What's more pretentious than a Beat poem which places various Egyptian deities in the context of San Franciscan history?  Its author supplying footnotes to this same Beat poem for the edification of his less literate readership!  Hey, at least it's short!

9. And, at the Last, Just to be Done with Silence

Don't ask me, I don't know.  Maybe it's about the devil?

Whatever it's about, it's the last story in this collection, and I felt like I'd just completed a marathon after finishing it.  Getting through Illuminations wasn't easy, and I have no desire to repeat the experience through any of Moore's other books.  Alan Moore has certainly written some excellent comic books, but I doubt the rest of his fiction is worth locating.

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2026年7月3日 星期五

Absolute Batman Vols. 1 and 2 by Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta (2025 and 2026)


This Batman, described as a "genius of violence" by none other than this comic book universe's Alfred Pennyworth, is a lot more badass than the Batman you're probably used to.

Is he rich?  No, he was born poor, in Crime Alley, where he developed several lasting friendships with people who were, in "normal" DC continuity, his adversaries.

Does he have a chip on his shoulder?  Yes, he does, but for different reasons.  In the Absolute universe his father, a teacher, was killed during a school field trip, and his mother is still living.

Are bats relevant to his becoming a masked vigilante?  Yes, but not in the same way.  Instead of falling into a cave full of bats on his parents' estate, he gets pushed into the bat house during a shooting which leads to his father's death, and he never develops the same fixation on that animal.

Is he an unassuming, normal-looking guy outside of his costumed adventures?  In a way yes, in another way no.  He does work a regular job, but he's also a HUGE individual - hulking even - with an interest in things like poker and boxing.

Is he the world's greatest detective?  Not in the conventional sense, no.  This Batman is more of a strategist ready to get his hands dirty.  What he wages against Gotham's criminal element is more of a war with serious casualties, and he has zero qualms about taking lives in the process.

Does he have a Robin?  Lord I hope not.  The Wikipedia entry detailing his exploits in volume 3 (which I have yet to read) mentions that the Absolute Deathstroke makes an appearance with "an army of Robins" later on.  I sincerely hope Robin isn't introduced as part of a lame attempt to tone this character down and/or make him more "relatable."

How about his rogue's gallery?  Scott Snyder has, I think, made them all better.  Gone are the more cartoonish adversaries of yesteryear, to be replaced by truly terrifying individuals acting out nearly unimaginable levels of trauma.  The Bane of this series is SCARY, and even relatively minor villains such as Black Mask are very sinister.

By this point Absolute Batman represents over a third of the Absolute Universe's total revenue.  I totally get this.  I've read bits of Absolute Superman, Absolute Martian Manhunter and Absolute Flash, and Absolute Batman outshines them all in terms of consistency, attention to detail and sheer badassery.  

It should also be said that volume 2 far outshines volume 1 in terms of awesomeness.  If you've only read volume 1 and wondered what the big deal was, I highly encourage going back and reading volume 2 immediately.  Volume 2 is METAL, upping the ante considerably on all the weirdness hinted at in volume 1.

I plan on reading volume 3 later this summer.  For that matter I'd like to take another pass at Absolute Martian Manhunter (which I enjoyed) and track down Absolute Wonder Woman, which I haven't read yet.  At this point in time DC is BURYING Marvel in terms of comic book sales, and for evidence one need look no farther than the two trade paperbacks discussed here.

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Thoughts on 1966-1967's Ultraman TV Show 3


Almost done with the original series!  I think I might watch some vintage anime after this entry - there seems to be a lot of it on YouTube.

If you've enjoyed these entries I'm glad.  Writing them has certainly been an eye-opening experience for me, and at some point in the future I'll probably continue on to Ultraseven, the next Ultraman series after the original run.



Space creatures invade a cosmic ray research center, miniaturize various scientists, and cause general distress.

This episode's monster's name, "Dada," is, by the way, a reference to the avant-garde art movement which developed around World War I.  Dadaism came after the cubist movement, and often involves cutting and pasting words or images.  David Bowie used the Dada approach to writing poetry to craft the lyrics to many of his early songs.



"Golden Monster Goldon."  Try saying that five times fast.

As monsters go Goldon is bad news.  He eats up gold and hides inside the earth, and he likes to stomp mountain villages.  Cap and Ide take a new vehicle, the Vellucidar into the subterranean depths to catch him, but that goes badly and Ultraman has to save the day again.



Things get mythological when a hunter angers the monster Woo by pursuing a "snow girl" into the mountains.  Said Woo is NOT COOL with hunters bothering its lady friends.



One of my favorite episodes.  It makes almost no sense from beginning to end.

The Science Patrol gets a new member, or at least a transfer from the Science Patrol's South American branch, and this transfer isn't all that he first appears to be.

Yes, Random Scientist Guy, any civilization founded by blood-drinking sentient plants is doomed to failure!



Zumbolar is one of the cuter monsters.  It must have been really hot to stomp around in those flames wearing that suit.

In this episode "Patty," visiting from the Science Patrol's India branch (!), fails to help the Science Patrol deal with Zumbolar's stompiness and general disregard for both public and private property.

No idea why they suddenly feel sorry for Zumbolar at the end of this episode.  It's not like he was any more or less sympathetic than the other kaiju.



This Mefilas is a real tool.  I bet he hangs out with Alien Baltan when he's not attempting to seize other species' planets.

But for whatever reason Mefilas needs a particular (human) boy to verbally cede the Earth to him, and what follows are some weird "torture" sequences involving the boy and his sister, Akiko.  In the course of this "torture" Mefilas (as you would expect?) turns the lovely Akiko into a kaiju, and the Science Patrol has to pull its punches when it comes to fighting the city-wide destruction which results.

At the end Ultraman just kind of says "Fuck it," and lets Mefilas fly off.  Mefilas vows to return, hoping for some future human who will say "The Earth is yours!" so he can take over.

In case Mefilas is reading this, I recommend journeying to Las Vegas or some similar city next time.  After people have gone through the last few dollars in their bank accounts THAT'S the time to swoop in and ask: "Hey, would you mind handing over the entire planet to me?"



Cap has Hayata fly the VTOL over just to deliver an umbrella?  That's not a waste of public or private resources... at all!

Kinda weird including a suicide in the first five minutes of a kid's show, but then again they did the same thing in the Spider-Man series.  Japan is... Japan.

You can tell the actors involved had more fun making this one.  There are fun little improvised (?) scenes of them waking up in the middle of the night, drinking beer and (I'm not making this up) shooting a rocket up a kaiju's ass.  Japan is - again - Japan.



Satisfyingly ridiculous.  In this episode the Science Patrol decides to have a Buddhist funeral for all the monsters Ultraman's thrown into space.

Seabozu is a sad, skeletal-type monster who just wants to leave the Earth's atmosphere.  Why be dicks about it, Science Patrol?  Why attack him when he just needs a hug?  Why not just help him leave?

Anyway, don't ask me to explain it, but after a lot of weird empathizing with the kaiju the Science Patrol dresses up a rocket to look like Ultraman, and uses this rocket to shoot Seabozu back into space.



The Science Patrol fights a Doomsday-like monster that gets stronger every time they attack it.  Arashi ("the Spider Shot guy") goes rogue for a bit and helps Ultraman take the monster down in the end.



It's time to get meta.  Pigmon shows up in a Tokyo department store and looks over some choice Ultraman toys.  After that Ide invents a machine to translate Monster Language into human speech (no thanks to the professor!) and they find out that a MONSTER APOCALPYSE is about to happen if they don't defeat Geronimon, a kaiju that has resurrected all of Ultraman's defeated foes.

....the end result being Ide's realization that Ultraman helps those that help themselves... even if poor Pigmon does get squished in the process.



Our Heroes journey to Planet Q to retrieve something called a "BM Fuse" for a damaged space station.



What a weird end to the series.  Aliens decide to invade the Earth and Ultraman loses - for the second time in the entire series - to an alien adversary.  The difference in this instance being that he really does die - or something - and then decides to "sacrifice himself" for the sake of Hayata, his human host.  At this point Zoffy, an emissary sent from the Land of Light, takes Ultraman back there in a big red globe.

BUT... what about the undefeated kaiju?  What about the alien invasion?  Is the world still doomed?  The Science Patrol, busy saying goodbye to Ultraman, is completely oblivious to such matters!

After watching this episode I'm no longer sure that the series is set in the distant future.  The scientist guy mentions that the aliens have been making contact since the 1930s, and that the alien invasion is the result of forty years of planning.  So, at the latest, this series takes place in the 1970s, a little after the episode's broadcast date.  An earlier episode described the Cold War as an event occurring in the distant past.  Who knows?

Anyway, that's it for Ultraman for now.  I'll be watching other things for a while, and, as said above, I may work my way (back) to Ultraseven in the fall.

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2026年6月14日 星期日

"The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus" by Emma Knight (2025)


"A large part of her wished she could stop caring about whatever it was that had come between her dad and Lennox.  Why this fixation on a past that wasn't even hers?  But she knew why.  She could see how easy it would be to relive her parents' lives without quite choosing to, the way a toboggan finds its way into the pre-compressed path of whoever went before.  She wanted to better understand the route they had taken, so she didn't fall into it by mistake."

Emma Knight is a Canadian author with only this novel to her credit.  Before turning to the writing of fiction she was a journalist and co-writer of cookbooks.  There's talk of The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus being adapted into a television series by MGM Television, but that series is far from being realized at the time of writing.

In the book Pen (short of "Penelope") ventures to Scotland to study abroad.  After doing so she forges a relationship with the Lennox family, a group of erstwhile aristocrats living in a restored castle.  She is immediately attracted to the Lennox's young son, Sasha, but her and Sasha's feelings for one another are undermined by both Pen's father's past dealings with the Lennoxes and family secrets on both sides.

What's a young, sexually inexperienced Canadian girl to do?  Well, if you've read as many of these "chick lit"-type books as I have, you'll know that yes, Pen and Sasha eventually hook up, and yes, all of the family secrets are brought to light in the concluding chapters of this novel.

Just don't ask me what the octopus present in the title is supposed to symbolize.  I'm still not entirely sure.  The Margot character attempts to explain that during her and Pen's outing at the aquarium, but it seems a feeble metaphor, and one not entirely connected to the narrative.

The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus is a clumsily written book by a first time author.  As such I'd give it a passing grade, but only passing.  It resembles any number of similar books now on the market, and the author needs to either increase her output or start taking serious chances if she wants to avoid drowning in a sea of literary mediocrity.

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2026年6月7日 星期日

(Japanese) Spider-Man (1978-1979) 2


"Spider Strings!"

"Spider Machine GP7!"

"Marveller!"

"Change Leopardon!"

Yes, it's time for another round of the Japanese Spider-man TV show, my lowkey sexual obsession with "Amazoness" continuing unabated.

This entry brings me up to 28 episodes out of 41.  That's all I could find on YouTube.  I'd love to watch the remaining 13 episodes, but alas, I couldn't find them online.  

(I even tried searching by スパイダーマン! )



Spider-man helps a boy with a heart condition.  Not much happens in this episode, even if Spider-man FINALLY figures out Amazoness' secret identity as the editor of his girlfriend's newspaper.



Professor Monster and his Iron Cross Army try to blow up a dam AND flood the city of Tokyo with gas that they plan on igniting afterward.  The Iron Cross Army be gangsta like that.

And that's one tough dog.  Not only does it walk off two bullets, but it later falls off the side of a damn and fights off several henchmen.

Not sure what the boy was doing in the mountains in the first place.  Maybe looking for his dad?  But how would he know where his dad was?



A pro wrestler wants to become "the strongest one there is," and ends up getting turned into a "machine bem" that resembles the Thing.



Spider-man helps a boy bullied by classmates while the Iron Cross Army, for inexplicable reasons, commits a series of extremely low level crimes across the Tokyo area.  Can't help but feel sorry for the mom accused of stealing 5 million yen.  That was a low blow, Amazoness, even for you!

And how many boys had fathers killed in car accidents in late 70s Japan?  Judging by this show it was A LOT.



Definitely one of the weirder ones.  I'd put this alongside the cat demon episode.  Spider-man meets an alien boy with mind powers who takes him to a secret village in the mountains where the locals (who can all fly) are planning to sacrifice the boy's sister to a monster in a lake.  Amazoness gets a new outfit in this one, and I'm not a fan of the new look.  Maybe they thought she was too drab in earlier episodes?



Funny how you bad guys keep running into Takuya, isn't it?  It's almost as if he's... Spider-man?

In this one the Iron Cross Army kidnaps a girl (so much kidnapping!) who might have the power of precognition. 



This is one of the more random ones.  An Interpol guy gets caught spying on the Iron Cross Army, and Spider-man helps him escape their clutches.  But why not carry the guy once he's injured?  Isn't Spider-man strong enough?  And why bother to commandeer the helicopter if they weren't going to escape in it?  And why not take the guy directly to the hospital, so he could see his son another day?



One of Professor Monster's more skeletal henchmen goes around stealing people's blood for his boss.  In the midst of that Spider-man rescues a blind little girl.  Can you guess who the little girl's father is?



Watch your back, Takuya, some dude's buying your girlfriend presents behind your back!

Shortly thereafter Takuya stumbles upon - I kid you not - a private club where people gamble on rabbit races, chick races and spider fights.  Go figure.  Was that really a thing in Japan at the time?  I kind of doubt it.

It should be noted that at this point in the series Spider-man not only has a spider sense but also X-ray vision and the completely inexplicable ability to know when someone's trying to contact him.  By this point his powers are pretty much all over the place.

And naturally the "sorceress" running the club turns out to be one of Professor Monster's Machine Bem.  She resembles a lower grade Mysterio.



Spider-man meets A BOY WHO THROWS COCKROACHES ON PEOPLE and who at one point PUTS A COCKROACH IN ANOTHER BOY'S MOUTH.  Yeah, if you enjoy that kind of weirdness this show is for you!

And as you'd expect the machine bem at the end is a cockroach.  Why wouldn't it be a cockroach?  Of course it's a cockroach!!



A former jewel thief is tortured to death by the Iron Cross Army, and they create clone (?) to trick the thief's son into divulging the location of a hidden gem.  But as you'd expect Spider-man shows up, and so much for the missing gem, the Iron Cross Army and their giant crab monster.

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