Legends Never Die: The Last Command

1993 capped off Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy with The Last Command. Grand Admiral Thrawn has acquired most of the Katana Fleet Dreadnaughts and thanks to the Imperial storehouse he found in Heir to the Empire, has an army of rapidly-grown clone soldiers to bolster his forces. While he prepares for a grand offensive against the New Republic.

Luke Skywalker investigates the nature of the clones and encounters the now-allied Noghri. Leia gives birth to twins: Jaina and Jacen Solo. Talon Karrde tries to form a Smuggler's Alliance for mutual protection among freelancers from the Empire. Niles Ferrier bites off more than he can chew. Joruus C'Baoth finally goes off the deep end. Disgraced senator Borsk Fey'lya finally does something productive. Garm Bel Iblis and Mon Mothma put their grudge aside. Leia, her assistant Winter and Talon Karrde's ace slicer (hacker) Ghent uncover the information leak on Coruscant. Mara Jade takes several hard looks at where her life has gone and where she wants it to go.

There's much that could be said about the book, but that would ruin the experience of reading it, and read it you should. Thrawn's cleverness is on display with some of his most creative tricks, and Bel Iblish shows just how capable he is of keeping up with the Grand Admiral.

Not to sound like a broken record, but the action, the character interactions, the traveling, the big crazy ideas that populate the galaxy, EVERYTHING oozes Star Wars in the best possible ways and the final showdown with C'Baoth is supremely satisfying in a variety of ways.

So, since that was a fairly short review of the book itself (by necessity, since otherwise it would involve spoilers) let's talk about strong female characters in the Expanded Universe.

There were a hell of a lot of them.

Zahn's trilogy in particular sets a very high bar since essentially every female he introduces is a supremely competent badass in multiple ways. Mara Jade is the biggest example: a wanderer coasting along the fringe after her life as the Emperor's Hand (A spy and assassin trained in the Force) abruptly ended, she gets drawn back into conflict and the echoing last command of Emperor Palpatine ordering her to KILL LUKE SKYWALKER. Through it all she undergoes significant character development, reconnecting with the Force and rethinking her hatred of Skywalker. She's her own woman, with her own goals and motivations, but makes an exceptionally good adventuring partner with Luke as the more cynical of the two. Mara was so popular among fans that Lucafilm eventually actually went and hired a real model to dress as the character and official art would use her face/appearance as reference material. As far as heroes that the Expanded Universe added to the Star Wars franchise, the woman named Mara Jade sits uncontested at the top. 

Leia Organa Solo's aide, best friend, and long time rebel intelligence agent Winter is another strong addition. A fellow Alderaanian with stark white hair and a perfect memory, she appears here as a side character helping Leia out with intelligence gathering and data sorting, but the character would end up appearing quite a lot in other materials and grow into her own (especially in the X-Wing series).

Even Garm Bel Iblis' two most trusted subordinates are women: Sena and Irenez (who feature most prominently in Dark Force Rising). Then there's Shada D'ukal, a very small role who's introduced as a space pirate's arm candy, but ends up being a deadly hired bodyguard in a firefight. Let's not forget Leia herself, negotiating the defection of a race hell-bent on honoring their debt to the Empire while she's heavily pregnant with twins.

While they're all some flavor of “badass warrior lady” each one's different and has different areas of skill and different flaws. Its great stuff, and the vast number of clickbait thinkpieces out there saying that “Star Wars FINALLY has a Strong Female Character in a lead role!” are, frankly, insulting to anyone who's ever dipped even a toe into Star Wars past the movies. These are good characters. Strong characters. Strong female characters, and they're being completely erased by a new continuity and a “Narrative” that can only assert itself by dumping what came before into the Memory Hole.

But yeah, read the Thrawn Trilogy. Its good Star Wars. 

Why Han Shooting First Matters

I wrote this a year ago and never did anything with it, but real life got crazy this week and I didn't have time to do much else. So this is one of those "in case of emergency break glass" moments.

The Star Wars Hype Machine is on full blast and we're getting all sorts of dumb clickbait clinging to the franchise like remoras. (Still true a year later) Normally I'd ignore it, but the most recent one involves an interview with George Lucas on stuff and it mentions him defending the idea of making Han shoot Greedo first in the cantina, because in a post-Return of the Jedi world, Han and Leia were an item and Han's supposed to be a John Wayne figure and John Wayne always lets the bad guys shoot first (Can't find the article now).

Yes, that's a reason, but one that short-changes Han Solo's character.

Let's say its 1977 and station wagons ruled the Earth. I wasn't there, so I'm just assuming all of the 70s were the same color and texture as a tartan couch. Not important.

Star Wars is out and it features a Hero (Luke), his Mentor (Ben), and two comic relief sidekicks in possession of a plot device (Artoo and Threepio). They're hunted by the bad guys and need to get out of town in a hurry with no questions asked. They go to a shady bar and hire a shady rogue (Han) to get them off world.

We then learn that Han owes Jabba the Hutt a lot of money and feels like this job can clear his debts. He's then confronted by one of Jabba's lackeys who's come to collect the money. Han doesn't have it yet and tries to get Greedo to back off. Greedo doesn't, and Han shoots him dead before Greedo has a chance to do the same.

This tells us several things.

1. Han is decisive and crafty. He outwits Greedo by keeping him talking while getting his own blaster ready.
2. Self-preservation is Han's first priority. He murders Greedo to save his own skin. At this point he's an unknown factor in Luke's story, and he's desperate for money to pay off Jabba. Who's to say he won't turn on Luke and Ben at the first opportunity to save his own neck? (We know NOW that he doesn't, but that's with the benefit of hindsight.)

This creates added tension to their escape from Tatooine, because Luke and Ben are putting their trust into a selfish rogue and criminal. During the course of the movie, Han is continuously grumpy and uncooperative, with Luke continuously appealing to his better nature. Its telling that he only agrees to help Luke rescue the Princess after Luke mentions that she's rich, not beautiful.

After escaping the Death Star, Han gets his money and as Luke prepares for what is basically a suicide mission, Han ducks out, citing his considerable debt and not wanting to risk his neck for some dumb idealists.

At this point, Han is out of the picture. He fulfilled his contract and got what he wanted. He could've paid off his debt and gone on his way and the ending of the movie could've been tweaked to make it work.

Instead, Han returns at a critical point to give Luke a chance to save the day. Luke's (and Chewie's) constant pestering finally had an effect on Han's conscience, and he finally did something selfless.

By the Empire Strikes Back, Han has been upgraded to a main character. He still complains about the bounty on his head and the need to get money, but at least this time he's sticking around the Rebels and even risks his neck for Luke in a blizzard. He's also developing feelings for the Princess, but he's still a rogue. He still doesn't have much attachment to the Rebellion outside of his personal loyalty to Luke and Leia (and Chewie guilting him into staying). From the start of the movie he's making preparations to leave, but its more non-committal and he keeps finding reasons to stick around this time.

That personal level of loyalty shows itself in the stoicism with which he accepts his Carbonite fate. He can go to his possible death knowing that his friends at least won't face the same fate.

That loyalty is rewarded in Return of the Jedi, when he's rescued by those same friends and made a General in the Rebellion. By now he's been tortured, frozen in a block of Carbonite, and handed over to a ruthless crimelord by the same guy. He's been screwed hard by the Empire, and has a very personal stake in fighting it. He even hands the keys of the Millennium Falcon over to the same guy who handed him over to the Empire in the first place, something unthinkable for the selfish jerk from the first movie. By this point, he's a full-fledged hero, using his marksmanship and cunning for the noble cause of overthrowing tyranny instead of just getting paid and completes a redemption arc that you didn't even know existed the first time you saw Han in the Cantina.

This is called character development and is the reason why Han shooting first is a good thing.  

Legends Never Die: Dark Force Rising

1992 brought us Dark Force Rising, the second book of Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy. Slightly generic title aside, it expands on the previous entry and further expands the lore and setting of the nascent Expanded Universe by dipping into relics from the Old Republic.

At this point, both the New Republic and Grand Admiral Thrawn's Imperial remnant are bloodied and looking for an edge in their fight. The NR is aware that there is an information leak, and Han Solo suspects the shifty Bothan senator Borsk Fey'lya and his Spynet connections and Lando goes along for the ride.

Meanwhile, Luke Skywalker is drawn to a planet where the mad clone Jedi Joruus C'Baoth is waiting for him, claiming to want to teach him. Luke soon realizes that C'Baoth is incredibly powerful and also a budding tyrant and wants to help heal his damaged mind. C'Baoth's goal at the moment is to train Luke, Leia and her unborn twins as Jedi molded by his fractured mind.

Meanwhiler, smuggler baron Talon Karrde is on the run after Thrawn learned of his duplicitousness. Karrde is eventually captured and imprisoned by the Admiral because he knows where a large supply of valuable warships are hidden. Mara Jade tracks down Luke and helps him shake off C'Baoth's mind tricks. Like it or not, she needs his help rescuing Karrde.

Meanwhiler-er, a very, very pregnant Leia travels with Chewie & Threepio to Honoghr, the planet of the Noghri that have been trying to capture her to try and win them over to the New Republic.

Meanwhilest, Han & Lando stumble upon a ghost: a Corellian Senator who's long been thought dead named Garm Bel Iblis. Not only is Garm alive and well, he's been running his own splinter Rebellion against the Empire after splitting off from Mon Mothma over ideological differences. Bel Iblis is a tactical genius and has a line on some long-lost warships, but he's not one to rejoin the New Republic without some serious convincing.

It all ends in a race to find the location of a fleet of fabled Dreadnaught-class heavy cruisers called the Katana Fleet.

This is going to be a broken record, but Book 2 continues to do what Heir to the Empire did so very well: Grand space opera in the vein of the original Trilogy. World-hopping, action, tactical genius, new technologies, and adventure.

Of the two major new characters, Garm Bel Iblis fits into a kind of character archetype that Zahn is fond of: the highly intelligent master planner. Talon Karrde & Thrawn are both extensions of that. This is fine, since Zahn does them very well and differentiates their personalities and areas of expertise, but there are a lot of clever bastards populating this book.

This is balanced out by the other new character: Lowbrow ship thief Niles Ferrier. Ferrier is a scumbag who's only really good at one thing: stealing starships, and Thrawn wants him to find ships for the Empire. Unfortunately Ferrier thinks he can hang with the big boys, and fancies himself a master schemer. Amusingly enough, he's not.

Before I say “Its a good book, read it if you like Star Wars” I think there's room to discuss a few established characters.

Leia goes behind enemy lines to do what she does best: diplomacy. She's able to go into hostile territory protected by secrecy and her heritage as Darth Vader's daughter. Spoiler: she succeeds, without firing a shot and while heavily pregnant. Its remarkably well handled and shows just how powerful and essential to the New Republic Leia is.

Next, is Luke. Being a Jedi, Luke fights a lot, but this trilogy really hammers home the idea that its only ever as a last resort. Knowledge and Defense, never Attack, that sort of thing. Even when he learns that C'Baoth is completely mad, he doesn't want to kill him. He wants to help him, not kill him. Luke is a capital-G Good Guy, and has the skill and wisdom to pull it off exceptionally.

Dark Force Rising is a good book, read it if you like Star Wars. It continues the top tier entertainment of the Thrawn Trilogy.

#PulpWillNotDivideUs

I should be writing a book review, but some heated discussions in the Pulp Revolution Twitter crowd over the last 24 hours or so have me wanting to put some random thoughts down. These aren't in any particular order or organization.

The topic of discussion is tone and how Pulp Revolutionaries are presenting themselves. There are some Pulp supporters who don't think its necessary to tear down non-Pulp establishment authors like Asimov in order to build up the Pulps. I'm mostly on this side because I think the quality of the Pulps is obvious when people are exposed to them and I think readers are smart enough to decide for themselves. Right now I'm reading The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard anthology and its phenomenal stuff. Seriously, go read it.

The other side is crashing the gates of establishment Fantasy/Sci-Fi screaming for vengeance after seventy-odd years of very serious Literary people shitting on the Pulps with lies and scrubbing all of the fun out of speculative fiction. Jeffro Johnson, arguably the torchbearer of the Pulp Revolution, is strongly in this camp, and makes a number of good points at the Castalia House blog about allthis. 

Now the random points:

1: The fact that people are civilly disagreeing in public discussions about the nascent Pulp Revolution is good. Healthy, even, since it shows there's a lot of passion going around, and passion is what drives TWO-FISTED TALES OF ADVENTURE!

2: Emphasis on public discourse, insofar as that's possible, considering Twitter and G+ and other outlets increasingly tightening the screws on Wrongthinkers. As far as I'm aware, there isn't a secret cabal of Pulpists conspiring to behead those who insult the name of Burroughs. If there is, I haven't been invited to it.

3: After the conversation last night, Cirsova Magazine's editor put up a post about how he got called a misogynist fascist for daring to go to another forum and offer to talk about the kind of stories he prints. He reached out an olive branch and was called a fascist. That's bullshit, and that behavior isn't even uncommon among Establishment/Pink/Post-Campbellian Sci-Fi fans. Just look at how Jon Del Arroz was treated by his local scene. Hell, look at what happened to the Sad Puppies campaigns every single year of their existence. At least the Pulp side of the fence enjoys the concept of being an ideological fistfight instead of chanting something like “Pulp Will Not Divide Us” during the next Hugo Awards to a half-empty auditorium. (Calling it now.)

4: It is impossible to coexist with something that wants you driven out from its presence or converted to its narrow worldview. Which is what Establishment Sci-Fi is nakedly trying to do to Pulp. We have evidence. See the above point. Pulp and the Superversives are a very real threat to the ivory tower of modern Science Fiction & Fantasy. They have the enthusiasm, very soon they're going to have the writers (and a lot of young, up and coming writers at that, with long careers ahead of them), and then they'll have the audience.

5: Off topic, but I've noticed a very large number of Catholics in the Pulp and Superversive movements. Makes sense, since the Subversive movement has little for them/us to care about.

6: Twitter is garbage for nuanced discussion. Its a weird kind of arguing but agreeing at the same time. The “Barnstormers” aren't saying all post-Pulp Golden Age stories are worthless and the “Diplomats” aren't saying that the Barnstormers shouldn't be criticizing the sacred cows of Establishment sci-fi when justified. At least I hope not.

7: If you catch me tone policing, tell me to dial it back.

8: That was a joke.

9: And yes, I'm starting to change my stance from Diplomat to Barnstormer. 

10: And N

Pulp Regression: Regress Harder

Much has been said in Pulp Revolution circles about readers/authors hitting a wall with contemporary Fantasy & Sci-Fi and looking to older, forgotten masters for inspiration and entertainment. Going back to Heinlein & Asimov, and then going back even further to Howard & Burroughs.

Having spent the last sixteen years or so writing in a vacuum broken up with occasional screams into the wilderness, I ended up doing something similar, but different, when I hit my dissatisfaction point with the state of modern speculative fiction.

It was around 1999-2000 and Vector Prime hit the Star Wars Expanded Universe with grimdark the size of a moon. After a couple disappointing reads, I drifted away from the series that had consumed my existence in the 1990s and looked for high adventure and daring deeds elsewhere, only to find Science Fiction was obsessed with philosophical navel-gazing and Fantasy in the early 2000s was a mix of clunky Tolkien ripoffs and Harry Potter (I tried reading And the Sorcerer's/Philosopher's Stone but found it boring and didn't get far). If I hadn't found Discworld, I would've abandoned reading speculative fiction altogether after I finished The Lord of the Rings and then The Silmarillion.

So I went back further. College provided me with a broad scope of reading material, but just about anything from the 20^th Century studied at the academic level is painfully boring or trying to beat you over the head with its message. You have to look at the popular authors that most professors deem beneath them to find the fun stuff.

Fortunately I landed in the Medieval/Renaissance/Classics camp, where you could pursue a degree and actually enjoy what you were reading. Grand epics, titanic struggles, supernatural events, the horrors and heroics of war, love, loss, tragedy, human triumph, philosophy and even comedy.

By virtue of there being fewer extant sources of literature from the pre-Gutenberg era, what was preserved was a wider spread of academic study than more modern time periods.

That's because what was preserved was what these people wanted to read over and over. They felt these stories had value worth preserving. Homer, Chaucer, Malory, Shakespeare, Marlowe, Spenser, Kidd, More, Erasmus, Dante; any one of these provided a more satisfying and educating experience about human nature than anything I read in class from the “Moderns.” Plus, once you got past the archaic language, it was downright fun and scratched a massive pulpy itch that I didn't even know I had. You don't need to learn Old English to enjoy Beowulf when perfectly good translations exist.

Unconsciously, I had regressed to Tolkien, and then deciding to follow his example, I decided to look at what he drew inspiration from and regressed further to the age of Myth.

Where am I going with this?

If the ballads and epics of history inspired Tolkien, they also inspired the writers of the pulps. Robert E. Howard pulled “Cimmeria” out of Herodotus and turned it into something different for Conan. I think there's real value for the Pulp Revolution to look at what the Golden Age authors were themselves stealing from.  

Besides, Beowulf's great. Everyone should read it. 

Pulp Revolution Review: Nethereal

Nethereal is the 2015 debut novel by Brian Niemeier, and it is one hell of a page turner.

First, some ethical disclosure: the author and I follow each other on Twitter, I am a frequent listener to a podcast that he co-hosts, and we are both part of the current Superversive and Pulp Revolution movements taking place within Sci-Fi/Fantasy. So there is absolutely a level of personal bias to this review that I want you to be aware of.

Now to business. Nethereal is the first book of the Soul Cycle, which is a Weird Space Opera/Horror setting. Now, by Weird, I mean WEIRD. Traditional physics have no place here and a combination of super science and magic are what propel space travel, which is under the monopolistic control of the Guild. Thrown into this is the pirate frigate Shibboleth, captained by Jaren Peregrine, the halfbreed last survivor of the Gen race (effectively Space Elves) hell-bent on revenge for the Guild's genocide of his people. He has two steersmen (magician/pilots): Nakvin, a beautiful, half-human woman with mysterious origins and Deim, a devoutly religious young man who's family has been helping Peregrine's for several generations. And there is Teg Cross, mercenary sociopath and Jeren's combat enforcer.

Misfortune leads them to a revolutionary group building a massive and unnerving exploration ship called the Exodus, which further misfortune causes it to travel to Hell during its maiden voyage.

Yes, actual Hell (at least Hell as described by Gen theology).

Then it gets weirder.

That's all I want to say about the plot, because a) I want to avoid spoilers and b) I could be here all day trying to explain what happens, there's so much of it.

I simply trying to explain what the book is is less effective than explaining what it is like. It is like Dune meets Firefly meets Outlaw Star meets Lovecraft meets Spelljammer meets Moby Dick meets the Inferno. It draws from a tremendous variety of influences and in doing so defies genre classification, though “Space Opera Horror” might be the closest you can get.

Despite the disparate influences (or maybe because of them), the setting is one of the strongest selling points for the book, and its is incredibly thought-out. The action escalates to grandiosity, and the villains rise to match the scale.

Its not a perfect book, though a lot of my criticisms are nitpicks and entirely subjective. Scene transitions sometimes feel rushed or lacking in cohesion. The prose is straightforward but feels like it lacks a little something to make it quotable. The same is true for the dialogue. They get the job done, but its not on the level of a master like Bradbury's narration or Herbert's quotability.

That doesn't mean that Neimeier can't get there. Nethereal is a very strong, imaginative debut propelled by a confident enthusiasm for its subject matter. Absolutely recommended, though the intentional weirdness won't be for everybody. Amazon's your best place to find it. 

Legends Never Die: Heir to the Empire

A survey of the Expanded Universe really ought to start with Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy. Published in 1991 by Bantam Spectra, the first book, Heir to the Empire, ushered in the Expanded Universe proper after a long period of dormancy where the only new Star Wars material being released was for the roleplaying game by West End Games.

Zahn was an established Sci-Fi author by this point, having won a Hugo Award (back when that still meant something) and created a Space Opera series of his own with the Cobra trilogy. In the course of writing this trilogy, he worked closely with West End Games, and incorporated a lot of supplemental material into the books, establishing a cross-pollination between different products. It would take more new stories to start forming the true EU, but this was the keystone, and it was a huge success.

The setup is this: Five years after Return of the Jedi, the fledgling New Republic is struggling against a sudden surge of Imperial resistance. Said resistance comes from Grand Admiral Thrawn, an imposing blue-skinned, red-eyed near-human alien who has returned from the Unknown Regions to find the Empire in tatters and he is determined to right that ship.

Thrawn has limited resources and manpower, so he resorts to brilliant tactics and intel from a deep cover spy known only as “Delta Source” to attack against “the Rebels,” until he discovers the planet Wayland and one of the Emperor's hidden vaults guarded by a powerful, but insane cloned Jedi.

Meanwhile, Luke Skywalker has a final visit from Obi-Wan Kenobi's spirit urging him stay vigilant against the Dark Side and promises that he will find new allies. Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa Solo, now pregnant with twins, are busy flying around the galaxy doing diplomatic work when strange gray aliens repeatedly attack them, intent on capturing Leia specifically. Leia also has to deal with intrigue in the government as the stalwart Admiral Ackbar butts heads with the slippery Bothan senator, Borsk Fey'lya. Han is trying to make inroads into the smuggler scene to set up freelance supply lines that the New Republic badly needs, which leads him to smuggler baron Talon Karrde, a man who's risen to prominence in the wake of Jabba's death.

After a disastrous encounter with an Interdictor cruiser, Luke comes into an uneasy alliance with Karrde. Intelligent and urbane, Karrde's real stock in trade is information, and he knows more about Thrawn than he's willing to let the New Republic have for free. Karrde also has a mysterious lieutenant, Mara Jade, who wants nothing more in the world than to kill Luke Skywalker. Mara was the Emperor's Hand, a Force sensitive assassin and spy that answered only to Palpatine. The Emperor's death effectively destroyed her life. Naturally, she and Luke have to survive a hostile forest together.

Meanwhile, Lando Calrissian has a new business venture that is promptly raided by Thrawn, and the mole miners stolen from Lando are used in a climactic space battle where the Empire cleverly attempts to use the miners to board and capture New Republic capital ships to steal them. The New Republic repels them, but at significant cost to their own drydocked fleet.

Meanwhile, Leia and Chewie capture one of her would-be kidnappers and learn he's a Noghri, a species of lethal hunters who were sworn to serve their “savior” Darth Vader. Moreover, Khabarakh, the captured Noghri, calls Leia the Mal'ary'ush, the Lady Vader, and agrees to the dangerous prospect of negotiations with his race.

Heir to the Empire is amazing. It captures the grand space opera themes and the world-hopping pulp that the Star Wars Trilogy was built on. The pace is rocket fast and never lingers too long on mundane drudgery. The heroes are in character and growing as people. Luke is maturing as a Jedi. Leia is swamped by matters of state and imminent motherhood. Han is chafing with respectability but growing into it. Lando is up to his old entrepreneurial tricks.

The new characters are fine additions. Thrawn is the obvious standout, since he's a deliberate contrast to Vader's rage and Palpatine's gleeful tyranny. Thrawn isn't so much a “villain” as he is an antagonist. He wants order in the galaxy and sees the Rebellion (he refuses to acknowledge the New Republic by title) as rampant, violent chaos that must be quelled. His effectiveness is based on an analytical mind that would make Mycroft Holmes jealous, and he has weaponized art history as a means of studying species to find their weaknesses. Thrawn is, however, still an antagonist, and while reasonable and intelligent, he is unbending and cold with regards to his enemies. He has no interest in negotiating with the New Republic. He wants them beaten down.

The viewpoint character for Thrawn is his second-in-command, Captain Pellaeon. Pellaeon is an old veteran who served back in the late Republic and into the Empire. A competent commander, but lacking in innovation, he was the one who took command at Endor after the Emperor's death and sounded the retreat to cut the Navy's losses. Pellaeon doesn't really get what Thrawn's doing all the time, but he trusts him implicitly, and is another believer in re-establishing law and order in the galaxy.

Joruus C'Baoth, the mad Jedi clone, isn't evil in the direct sense, nor is he related to the Sith in any way. He's clearly powerful and possesses wild mood swings, but wishes to impose order as well, though with him at the top deciding what that means. He's something of a Jedi supremacist, where he sees those with the ability to use the Force as the top of the food chain. He and Thrawn butt heads frequently, but Thrawn has access to ysalmiri, little lizards that create bubbles where the Force can't work, that can keep C'Baoth in check.

Talon Karrde is something of a combination of Han and Lando. Hands-on, but with a very strong organization sense that makes his smuggler group one of the most reputable out there. He's smart and has contingency plans, and he doesn't like being caught between the Empire and the New Republic, so he tries to play off both sides. Mara too, doesn't like being caught between the two factions and simply wanted to find a peaceful place for herself when Luke Skywalker comes walking into her life and the romantic tension that follows.

The characters are great. The action sequences are good, and the grand sweeping scope is everything you could want in a Star Wars story that builds on where Return of the Jedi ended. There's a reason why people clamored for years to turn this into a sequel movie trilogy.

Its damn good, and an essential read for anyone looking at getting into the Expanded Universe.

Legends Never Die

After Revenge of the Sith, I was pretty much done with Star Wars. The prequel trilogy was a massive disappointment for me, and the quality of secondary materials dropped considerably after 1999. I'd occasionally peek back in to see what was happening or buy the occasional video game, but Star Wars as a whole wasn't the all-encompassing obsession that I had grown up with.

Then Disney bought the entirety of the property in 2012 and in 2014 the new owners decided to wipe the slate, as it were, and deleted the Expanded Universe continuity in one stroke. 37 years' worth of officially licensed material, be it books, shows, comics, games, made-for-tv movies, whatever, was thrown out the window to make room for a new “Canon” continuity where everything from that point was now officially official and the only survivors of the previous continuity were the six theatrical movies and the animated Clone Wars TV show that was airing at the time.

From a business standpoint, I get it. Disney spent a fat wad of cash getting Star Wars, they were damn sure going to milk it for what it was worth, and that meant new movies, new books, new games, and new everything.

Everything else? Right into the memory hole, except for whatever characters and items that the powers that be deemed worthy of being elevated to Canon, like Grand Admiral Thrawn. Oh sure, they're still reprinting the old continuity, now branded as “Legends” but that's because Disney loves money and its a move to placate old fans bitter about the Wipe.

If I sound bitter three years after the Wipe, that's because I am. George Lucas didn't rape my childhood with the Prequels like so many people joked about in the early 2000s for the simple reason that all those stories and games that I consumed with my parents' hard-earned money as a boy still counted. I could still point people to them and say “the Prequels suck, sure, but Wraith Squadron is amazing” and not get too many funny looks.

Now though? Like tears in the rain. The Expanded Universe is gone and only the grognards are left to bear witness to its passing. The new generation of Star Wars fans, both the casuals that only watch the movies and the diehards that consume the books and comics, are now being told that this is fine. This is good. The Expanded Universe was a convoluted mess that was difficult to follow and was nothing but glorified fan fiction anyway and it never mattered. There were no strong female characters. There was no diversity. It belongs dead and forgotten.

Lies.

The hell with that. It mattered to me. It mattered to enough people that a constant barrage of New York Times Bestseller novels and a growing video game empire in the early 90s provided the raw financial capital and an audience hungry for more that emboldened Lucas to release the Special Editions and then new movies to huge (financial, if not critical) success.

Without the Expanded Universe, I doubt that would have happened.

So with that said, and since I have a tendency to rage against the dying of the light, I am going to go through the Expanded Universe as a literary body and give them a fair shake. Because while there certainly were bizarre missteps and insane oddities in that patchwork continuity, there were some truly amazing stories that NuCanon hasn't surpassed. 

Shelf Stagnation, Part 2

So part 1 of an informal survey of thestate of Science-Fiction and Fantasy at retail was a downer. By comparison, I decided to go to a Half Price Books over the weekend for a comparison.

Now, Half Price Books and Barnes & Noble are two different creatures. The former is primarily a used book store while B&N is a full retail store. Both sell books, music, movies board games and, for lack of a better category, “pop culture trinkets” like Dr. Who mugs and Harley Quinn statuettes and whatnot.

The general atmosphere in the SF/F aisle couldn't be more different despite a roughly equivalent shelf space. Since there were millions of cheap Sci-Fi and Fantasy paperbacks published over the years, HPB ends up having a much richer selection available at any given time, with a large number of these books being printed in the 70s and 80s.

The first thing that stuck out was that Jules Verne and H.G. Wells were firmly entrenched within the shelf, as they should be. A whole bunch of Roger Zelazny paperbacks stood out at the end of the alphabet. Margaret Weis and Tracey Hickman existed in four places: Their Dragonlance output, their fantasy collaborations, and their individual works. The rest is going to be me rattling off names of fantasy authors: C.J. Cherryh, Andre Norton, Anne McCaffrey, Alan Dean Foster, Tanith Lee, Robert Asprin, Craig Shaw Gardner, Michael Moorcock, Fritz Leiber, Orson Scott Card's. There was only one Pratchett book at the time, but it was an early North American edition of The Colour of Magic from the 80s. Piers Anthony's Xanth series took up a whole row by itself, so if you're looking for Comic Fantasy like Anthony and Asprin's Myth books, that's where they're hiding.

This is all in addition to authors on the shelf at Barnes & Noble and the differences are remarkable. The history, the weird cover art, the oddball books standing alongside giants of the genre. There's a sense of discovery there that's missing from the other chain. One time, I picked up the entirety of the Thieves' World series for ten dollars.

So the question is why? Why is HPB better at handling Fantasy than B&N? Is it because B&N is beholden to traditional publishing and HPB is fueled by the masses bringing in their own books?

Maybe.

While Barnes & Noble may be among the last of its kind struggling against extinction, I don't think physical bookstores should be written off completely yet.  

Shelf Stagnation

Today I went to one of my area Barnes & Noble stores because I still have a fondness for the last of the Big Box Bookstores, and because I wanted to look closely at the Science-Fiction/Fantasy aisle, particularly in regards to Fantasy, since that is what I predominantly write.

I've heard horror stories of the SF/F aisles in other areas, where they're nothing more than a tiny shelf in a remote corner of the store, hidden by the shadows of an ever-increasing Manga section. That's not the case in my area, fortunately, and the two stores nearest me have a healthy selection, at least as far of square footage of dead trees is concerned.

The variety on offer, though, is lacking. As far as Fantasy is concerned, you have: the essential Tolkien section, Tolkien followers like the Robert Jordan and Terry Brooks, then the new epic fantasy stars like Joe Abercrombie, Brandon Sanderson and Patrick Rothfuss, as well as noted female authors like Mercedes Lackey and Ursula K. Le Guin. Neil Gaiman and the late, great Terry Pratchett both have respectable shelf space as well. Jim Butcher has a very large presence as well, with most of the Dresden Files on offer, along with his other series. George R.R. Martin is strongly represented too, of course.

After that, it gets murkier. The list of instantly recognizable names diminishes. Ray Bradbury's modest section occupies an uncomfortable spot next to an even smaller (fortunately) Marion Zimmer Bradley section. Thanks to the game series, the Witcher books are off to the side by the RPG and video game art books. Two omnibus editions of Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber stand defiant near the end of the alphabet before the Warhammer 40k and Star Wars books begin. The rest is a sea of quite respectable-looking books filling two genres: urban fantasy and high fantasy in varying states of cynical deconstruction. And that is it.

It is this mob of lower-tier books that stands out to me. I have no idea of their relative merits, nor their flaws. The urban fantasy novels tend to feature a single person, usually a woman, dressed in a way some artist might call “badass” looking intently into the distance while surrounded by glowy bits. The high fantasy books tend to focus on a sword, or someone holding a sword in a generic ready stance. Others look even more generic. A crown. An axe. The face of some warrior in a helmet. A close-up of a dragon's eye. Or they might just be a landscape. Some are just a design and some text. There's very little action.

Taken individually, these are not ugly design choices for covers. Taken individually, they might draw the eye on a table with a “New in Paperback!” sign accompanied by whatever public talking heads have a ghostwritten memoir out this month.

Lumped together, though, they turn into a sea of sameyness. They get lost trying to muscle their way through the crowd but all belie a similar school of graphic design that makes them look boring.

Stagnant.

The poor cover selection is not the authors' fault. That lies with the publishers/marketers/designers. If every book cover looked like it came from the psychedelic paperpacks of the 60s they would start to blend together in a riot of color reflective of the time they were printed in.

The keyword that stuck about that humble SF/F aisle was “stagnant” and the covers hit that home.

Science Fiction and Fantasy have long occupied an awkward place where they sit at the kids' table in the other room away from “Serious Literature.” Serious Literature is for serious readers who are serious about being taken seriously by serious academics. That attitude was what turned me off of most of my 20^th Century Literature courses (my focus was on Medieval and Renaissance anyway). SF/F was wild, frivolous, frequently comedic, imaginative and frowned upon by Serious Literature. Its supposed to tickle the imagination with its possibilities. Its supposed to titillate you with stories that Serious Literature doesn't want you to read because, God forbid, they might be FUN.

I didn't see any of that in the SF/F aisle. I saw the literary equivalent of Dad Rock: something that was once incredibly energetic but now trying to be responsible and respectable and trying to make sure you go to bed by 11 so you have enough energy for tomorrow.

I don't think that's the authors' fault. Nor Barnes & Noble's. Nor anyone in particular's. I think that at some point in time there was a desire for SF/F to be taken seriously by an audience that was never going to give it the time of day anyway. Only a few authors are ever lifted out of SF/F into Serious Literature, notably H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Bram Stoker and Mary Shelley. Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard are lucky to get occasional reprint collections. God help you if you're trying to find Moorcock or Leiber or Moore or Brackett.

In chasing respectability, it forfeited adventure, danger and even its own history. The great advantage of SF/F is that literally and literarily, anything goes. Instead, the Fantasy selection at your local big box store is Urban Fantasy and some flavor of Gritty Medieval Fantasy.

“Fun” got inherited by a growing Young Adult market because “eh, they're just kids books.” Nevermind that the Harry Potter books have a gigantic adult reader base and that Deathly Hallows is a doorstopper that would make Tolstoy's nose bleed with envy.

Again, I don't think its anyone's specific fault that the current state of mainstream Sci-Fi and Fantasy except the growing need for traditional publishers and retailers to make safe bets to turn a profit. So the covers are safe. The titles are safe. The author selection is safe.

Its all quite boring unless you are looking for a specific author or their work.

There was exactly one book on the shelves that stood out completely with unique and eye-catching art: A new edition of Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys.

Just look at that cover. Its magnificent. Its evocative. Its even a little outrageous. It was unlike anything else taking up shelf space next to it, but it stood alone next to its much more serious looking previous editions.

I think this is a root of the problem facing mainstream SF/F at the moment. Stagnation in presentation.

Thank god that there's a growing indie scene grumbling at the fringes, because if anyone can safe SF/F from the Sisyphean hell of trying to be Serious Literature, its going to be the ragtag group of misfits slapped together at the last minute.   

REEEEEE Vult, a Response to The Economist's "Medieval Memes" Article

Yesterday I became aware of an article published by The Economist on January 2^nd titled “Medieval Memes: The far right's new fascination with the Middle Ages.” It is an irritating piece of clickbait, that I normally would ignore, but this time its in my wheelhouse. Here it is.

Here is the Archive link if you don't feel like giving the Economist clicks for it (or in case it is somehow edited or removed)

I recommend reading along, because otherwise my ramblings won't make any sense.

Some credentials. I have a Master's Degree in Humanities, which is a small department at my alma mater that focused on a more Classical fusion of philosophy, literature, history and so on pertaining to a historical area. It was very niche, and allowed the student and department to work together to develop a focused curriculum suitable to their field of study. Mine was the 14^th-15^th centuries and more specifically the Northern Crusades. So while I am not currently employed as a Medievalist (it is a very small field and good luck getting your foot in the door unless you want to take a Marxist or Feminist approach to the subject, then you can be swimming in grant money. Sadly not a joke), nor am I by any means an expert in the field, I still am a historian thanks to my academic training, and I will be viewing this article though that lens.

First, the byline. The initials “S.N.” which tell me nothing. I have no idea who or what the author of the piece is, nor their credentials, if they even have them. A quick search of the initials in connection to The Economist bring up several “The Economist Explains” articles. One about Dutch people working part time, another about some economists wanting to get rid of cash and so on. A dead end, then. Next to it is “Claremont, California,” which a quick search shows is a primarily residential town at the Eastern edge of Los Angeles County that is home to a collection of seven colleges, both undergrad and graduate. So its a college town, and a large one at that. So the author of the piece is more likely to be a professor, or staffer, or student than, say, a pipe fitter.

Below that is a photograph from Game of Thrones featuring horsemen in armor that is clearly more fantastical than real. (Seriously, Lamellar? In a Wars of the Roses ripoff?) I suppose that's to be expected, since GoT is visually synonymous with “standard fantasy” in the eyes of modern pop culture. Ten years ago, it would've been a picture from Lord of the Rings. Yet it has nothing to do with actual Medieval scholarship outside of the visual cue of armored men on horseback.

The text begins with a contradiction. The first sentence asserts that until recently “it was rare to find Americans who were passionate about both medieval history and contemporary politics.” First, this is an anecdotal assumption without evidence provided (which is most of the article). Second, it mentions “the odd Christian conservative,” “a Marxist grad student” and “an environmental activist” in a list of hypothetical examples of your average medievalist. Each of these hypothetical people is identified as someone deeply rooted in contemporary politics. It is a Christian conservative, a Marxist grad student, and an Environmental activist.

None of these is a prerequisite for studying the past. Moreover, one need not have a modern political agenda to be fascinated by land ownership patterns or vegetable dyes. The Society for Creative Anachronism in particular is deeply interested in rediscovering how authentic Medieval clothing was constructed for the purposes of recreating it.

Moreover still, the odd “Christian Conservative” is less odd than one would think. I went to a Jesuit university. One of my grad school mentors was a Jesuit, and another was a devout layman who headed up the Catholic Studies department. I shared several classes with a few seminarians. The encompassed a broad spectrum of political alignment. In my experience, you could not throw a copy of Summa Theologiæ without hitting a fellow Catholic. Which is not a surprise, considering that Europe during the time period in question was dominated by the Roman Catholic Church.

“Since the September 11^th attacks." The current year is 2017. 9/11 happened sixteen years ago. There are people who were born after the event who are now learning how to drive. “Fairly recently” is a stretch at this point. “The American far right has developed a fascination with the Middle Ages and the Renaissance—in particular, with the idea of the West as a united civilisation that was fending off a challenge from the East.” The idea of a unified Western European civilization (interestingly, the spelling of “civilization” uses the British variant, a possible clue to our mystery author) is one that the Medieval Europeans themselves held. It was called Christendom, and referred generally to the lands where Christianity was the dominant religion as opposed to neighboring Islam or paganism. The notion of “whiteness” was much less important than being Christian to the Medieval mind. This is part of the reason why Europeans were so enamored with the legend of Prestor John's distant, but very Christian, kingdom providing assistance to greater Christendom in a time of need.

In function "Christendom" was more of a cultural identity than an established geopolitical unit, since Christian kings and nobles were constantly fighting each other over worldly disputes well before the Reformation fractured the religion in Western Europe. There's also the constant friction between the Papal States and the Holy Roman Empire over who should lead the general Christian community, the Popes or the Imperial heirs of Charlemagne, that frequently led to wars and excommunications of Emperors. The idea of “Christendom” is by no means new. It is also no surprise that when Islamic extremists refer to their own attacks as literal holy jihads, that there are people who would take to the idea that “Christendom” is under attack again. In many ways, it is, or are we ignoring the criticisms of the “decadent West” and the rhetoric of how America is “The Great Satan” which was used by the Ayatollah of Iran in the 1970s? The far-right of the West are not the only ones dredging this imagery up.

“The embrace of the medieval extends from the alt-right online forum culture that has exploded in the last few years to stodgier old-school racists.” Oh boy, here we go. Deus Vult memes from Reddit and Twitter are very, very, very rarely to be taken seriously, as are photoshops of Donald Trump in crusader armor shouting “Deus Vult!” as a reference to his saber rattling against ISIS. Internet “shitposting” as its called (if you'll pardon my French) is mostly to be taken ironically or deliberately contrarian to get a rise out of people. A quick look at Know Your Meme would provide plenty of stupid jokes that display this.

“Anti-Islam journals and websites name themselves after the Frankish king Charles Martel, who fought Muslim armies in the 8th century.” I have never heard of a website named after Charles Martel, but I know for a fact that he was the father of the man who would establish the Carolingian Dynasty (Pepin the Short) and while Charles himself would functionally rule as Mayor of the Palace and Duke and Prince of the Franks, he never, EVER became king and deliberately left the throne vacant during his time as regent.

This is not some nobody. This is the grandfather of Charlemagne and a major early Medieval figure in his own right. He is well documented, and a MEDIEVALIST, even one not focusing on the Carolingian period, could verify this information with even a quick glance at any online encyclopedia. This is an insultingly amateurish error in basic research.

Curiously, the article mentions that modern Jihadists use their own memes and images to promote the idea that they are in a cultural war against a reincarnated Byzantium. Sounds like an interesting counterpoint, but is not addressed again.

We continue. “For Americans who are indifferent to the Middle Ages, or think of it as an unpleasant plague-ridden prelude to the present, this might be of little consequence. But millions of others with mainstream or left-leaning beliefs are attracted to the medieval era—witness the popularity of Renaissance reenactments, or medieval-inspired fantasies like "Game of Thrones".” I will meet anecdote with anecdote: Most of the people I know who view the Medieval period as “a plague-ridden prelude to the present” are left-leaning or Progressive in some form or another.

Why is there an automatic assumption that it is only millions of left-leaning or “mainstream” people that are attracted to the time period? For a theologically minded conservative Christian, the works of Aquinas, Augustine, More, Erasmus, and Dante are THE bedrock of academic scholarship. And “mainstream” is as vague a category as can be imagined. Besides, aren't the masses of average people the ones who don't care about the Medieval period that much anyway? I'm getting deeply mixed signals here.

Then it mentions conservative firebrand Milo Yiannapoulis for some reason (probably clickbait algorithms). He's irrelevant to the article, but regardless of what one thinks of Milo, he's such a self-promoter who puts his name out as much and as far as possible that it should be easy to copy and paste his last name into an article so that it can be spelled properly. “Yiannopoulos.” There. I just did it myself. Also, “including a preference for a preference for “homogeneity over diversity.” is a sentence where a big red circle from a professor would go to mark the error. Proofreading is essential to presenting a academically professional argument.

The following paragraph quotes an essay by Sierra Lomuto (I had to look up her credentials because the article did not provide them: she is a doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania with a background in women's studies and English) at “In the Middle” a left-wing academic blog that I have never heard of but has 2,895,500 page views. Here's the essay in full, if you are of a mind to read it since the author of the piece did not provide a link.

It is left-wing and intersectional, which is a topic of social justice controversy (and beyond the scope of this already too-long response), but the crux of its argument is that it is a moral imperative for Medievalists as a whole to resist white nationalism from pointing to the Middle Ages to justify their own viewpoints. Fair enough, I suppose, but could it not also be argued by a Medievalist who does not subscribe to intersectional feminism that they too must be resisted from pointing to the Middle Ages to justify their own viewpoints if they are counterfactual? The end goal of historical study should be historical accuracy, regardless of agenda.

“Art historians document the appearances of dark-skinned migrants in northern Europe to show that medieval populations, if not quite as mobile as today, were still pretty mobile.” The “art historians” mentioned is one person, the person who runs the People of Color in European Art History page (medievalpoc.tumblr.com), which received considerable attention from left-wing outlets in 2014 (including NPR), has apparently received harrassment (which is never acceptable) but has also been rightly criticized for presenting factually incorrect information (the criticism of which is entirely acceptable for someone purporting to be historically accurate). Here's an example. (yes, its somebody roleplaying a Dalek, because Tumblr is a bizarre place, but at least they show their work and sources). Interestingly, the “In The Middle” essay also links to the Medieval POC Tumblr page.

The paragraph ends with: “Progressives and reactionaries may both be drawn to the Middle Ages out of an affinity for “tradition,” says Shirin Khanmohamadi, a professor of literature at San Francisco State University who teaches a course called the Multicultural Middle Ages. But progressives would find it most interesting to explore "the premodern contribution to 'multiculturalism' and to other modes taken for granted as modern."” Khanmohamadi has published one book, “In Light of Another's Word European Ethnography in the Middle Ages” in 2013 through the University of Pennsylvania Press. The description of which seems to explore Medieval European travel accounts, like those of “John Mandeville”, Gerald of Wales, and William of Rubruck. Fair enough, that's an interesting subject. What is much more controversial is her name attached to a list of 465 members of the MLA Members for Justice in Palestine resolution. The Modern Language Association is a huge body of academics who study modern languages and literature and have created the MLA Style Manual, which dictates the proper format for academic writing (in the Liberal Arts, at least). I say controversial because the resolution would call on the MLA to boycott Israeli academic institutions until political criteria are met by the state of Israel. That's uncomfortable territory for both sides of the Israel-Palestine dispute.

Then there is a small dig at people who enjoy movies and video games because that's somehow a sign of intellectual inferiority somehow? The very existence of Crusader Kings II, which is a very, very deep Medieval Spreadsheet Simulator, points to the opposite, that these mediums, while at times very flawed (such as Braveheart's Battle of Stamford Bridge Without the Bridge or the blatant Soviet propaganda of the 1938 film Aleksandr Nevskiy), they can be a valuable tool in promoting the study of the time period. Yet while absorbing medieval information primarily through movies is implied to be wrong, Game of Thrones is somehow fine, despite being a show many people watch for “titties and dragons.” If it is because George R.R. Martin has the “correct” political opinions, then this is, to appropriate a phrase, deeply problematic.

On the surface, it is a poorly-written article by an anonymous author with multiple proofreading errors, one glaring factual error, nonexistent citations, and a decidedly one-sided political slant that requires research on the part of the reader to discover.

The article's true argument seems to be that the Medieval period is one of deep historical complexity and nuance (I agree) and that it is a moral imperative that the gatekeepers of that academic knowledge must resist political stances that they deem to be wrong by teaching the benighted populist masses the error of their ways. On this I vehemently disagree. An “Ivory Tower” approach to teaching about the Medieval and Renaissance periods that presupposes the moral authority of a particular modern political philosophy is a dangerous slippery slope that discourages debate, encourages intellectual stagnation, and ultimately drives people interested in the subject matter away if they do not have the "correct" identity politics. No matter how well-intentioned it may be, that kind of mindset is identical to justifying every action with cries of “Deus Vult!”

Closing the academic gates against the supposed intellectual barbarians is not the answer. Those hungry for knowledge will seek it elsewhere, and the increasingly available translations of primary source documents, living history groups like the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) or several Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) schools or the slowly growing number of very knowledgeable Youtubers will be happy to quench that thirst for knowledge.

"I am Torgo. I take care of the place while the Master is away."

So yes, Manos: The Hands of Fate is an infamous little movie from 1966 that is often mentioned in conversations about the "Worst Movie Ever Made." While I don't think its the actual worst movie ever made (that's a matter of personal taste), it is a colossal turkey that earns its reputation.

Written, produced, directed and starring Harold P. Warren, an insurance and fertilizer salesman from El Paso, Texas, the movie was famously made on a bet with a Hollywood location scout named Stirling Silliphant, who would himself go on to great acclaim as the screenwriter of such classics as In the Heat of the Night, The Towering Inferno, The Poseidon Adventure, and, uh, Over the Top. The bet was that Warren could complete a low budget horror film on his own.

After a tumultuous production and failing miserably in the Southwest, the film languished in obscurity until the famous MST3K episode aired in 1993. After that, it turned into a Z-movie icon, eventually spawning a mobile game, a blu ray digital remaster, and a successful crowdfunded project for Manos Returns, which is due some time this year if IMDB is correct. Much like Troll 2, its not exactly obscure anymore, but that doesn't change the fact that its still awful.

What's it about? 

After eight minutes of driving around the El Paso countryside, a family on vacation get lost looking for Valley Lodge. The father, Mike, is played by Hal P. Warren himself. The mom is Margaret, played by Diane Mahree, who would later find success in fashion modeling, and their daughter, Debbie, played by Jackey Neyman, but dubbed into incomprehensibility. They stop at a house that “wasn't there before” first to ask for directions, then for lodging as night approaches. The caretaker is a twitchy and awkward man with strange knees (whether he was supposed to be a satyr or “like a hunchback, only hunchknees” seems a bit ambiguous, since I've seen both reported. Doesn't really matter, anyway.) He's named Torgo, and played by John Reynolds, a troubled young man who was apparently on LSD during filming and committed suicide at the age of 25 a month before the movie was released to theaters. 

So that's depressing.

Torgo's weird as hell, speaking in halting sentences and stumbling around with his own theme song. He takes care of the place while the Master is away, and while reluctant to allow the family to stay, he lusts for Margaret.

The Master is played by Tom Neyman, and is the leader of a mysterious and vague cult of possibly immortal, possibly undead people. He worships an abyssal being of primordial darkness named Manos that has a hand motif, and his cult centers their worship around a macabre bonfire where they sit, talk, argue, and eventually get into a catfight around. Essentially the Dark Souls of movies.

I'm only half joking. The similarities might be purely coincidental, but they are striking.

Tom Neyman is essentially the unsung hero of this movie. In addition to being the villain, his daughter played Debbie, his dog played the devil dog, he helped make Torgo's knees, built some of the props and his wife designed most of the costumes. He also gives the best performance of the movie, for what its worth.

I've noticed that in the best worst movies made, there's always some person with talent that is applying genuine effort to elevate the movie above its massive failings. Here, its clearly Neyman who gave it his best effort.

So what doesn't work? Saying “Everything” is a cop out, and also untrue. The editing is bad, with long and short cuts jumping around the place and long stretches of boredom that help drag its run time over 60 minutes. The cinematography is bad, with mostly dull scene composition, flat interior lighting and absolutely horrible exterior night lighting. There's the occasional flash of an interesting shot, but it passes just as quickly as it arrived. The acting is bad, with flat deliveries of dull dialogue. The female characters have it worse, with weird delays in their reactions and awkward expressions and just generally weird timing issues with their delivery. The audio itself was bad, and every sound, including dialogue, was added in post production, with voice recording occasionally being drowned out by sound effects. The smooth jazz soundtrack also doesn't fit the tone of a legitimate horror movie at all, with its flutes and saxophones and pianos.

So what's good about it? Or at least “good” with air quotes?

Torgo has become such an iconic character because he's so damn weird. He's a filthy creepy pervert that peeps through windows, yet he's the most sympathetic character because its obvious he's an unwilling servant of the Master who's fed up with being treated like dirt for a very long time.

The Master himself chews the scenery and glowers like a madman. There's even a kernel of a moody, mysterious horror film buried at the core (brigadoon house, strange cult, creepy caretaker, supernatural goings-on, etc), but the execution is so un-salvageable that it adds to the boredom and, oddly, its bizarro charm.

Like so many of its Z-level kin, Manos: The Hands of Fate ends up being a trainwreck that is simultaneously boring and utterly surreal.

Do I recommend it? As a movie that fulfills the basic requirements of entertainment, no, HELL NO. For the certain masochistic subset that has conditioned itself to find joy in weird cinematic failures this is absolutely essential, like a rite of passage.