Darcy Casselman's weblog. Just like old times.
Finished season 1 of Sense8. It is not a good show. It’s self-indulgent and nonsensical, brimming with melodrama and an
unearned sense of its own importance.
I loved it anyway.
I think because I really just like the characters. You spend a lot of time with them. They all lead improbably
complicated and dangerous lives. You’ve got a Chicago cop, kick-ass Korean MMA fighter lady, Kenyan bus driver (which,
it turns out, is more complicated and dangerous than it sounds), Icelandic DJ in London, trans-woman computer hacker in
San Francisco, Indian research doctor and bride-to-be, German jewel thief and Mexican telenovella star. And they can
each channel each others abilities. It’s a 90s or 2000s graphic novel quasi-superhero story.
And the fact that one of them is a telenovella star is the subtle hint that tells you how to frame this thing. It’s
_supposed_to be a crazy fantasy story. So just go with it.
I do wish it spent more time digging into the science fictional premise. But that’s my taste.
So much of this show is utterly ridiculous. Bits of it are pointlessly gratuitous (in various senses). I can’t justify
liking it as much as I do. But I do.
I’m enjoying reading George R R Martin’s take on the drama that is the 2015
Hugo awards. I’ll link to the boingboing summary as
a launching page not because I think Cory has a clear-eyed, unbiased view of the situation (he doesn’t, even though I
agree with him), but because it also links to an interesting set of blog posts by Bruce Schneier’s posts on voting
systems, and I kinda love that stuff.
I’m a one-time Worldcon member who didn’t vote for the Hugos. I’m occasionally tempted to join as a voting member
because you get free ebooks of all the nominees, but then I remember I never bother to read the pile of books I already
own.
The Hugos are a clique. The clique is Worldcon. People who are popular regulars at Worldcon by and large get the
nominations and win the trophies. But the Hugos are Worldcon’s. It’s their award. It’s weird to be in the room where
they’re handing them out, because you kinda feel like you’ve crashed somebody else’s prom when they’re handing out prom
king and queen awards. If you don’t go to prom or even to that school, I don’t really see how you’d expect to win those
particular popularity contests.
I mean, they nominate stuff like video tapings of the previous year’s Hugo awards ceremony. Everything except for the
fiction awards is kind of a joke. A good-natured joke, generally, but I’m not going to be looking to the Hugos to tell
me what’s a good comic to read or movie to watch.
Now, you could argue whether the “most prestigious science fiction literature awards” should go to the prom kings and
queens of Worldcon, but Worldcon is the hub of science fiction book fandom. Very good writers go there. If you’re a
serious science fiction writer and you’re not going there, one has some justification to question your dedication to the
field. And they do care about the quality of the work. And the Worldcon people do actually take the fiction awards very
seriously. So I feel a bit sad that they’ve had this happen to them. Because the people rushing in to vote don’t care
about the Worldcon community or history or whatever. They’re doing it for the lulz.
With minimal ado, this blog endorses the following candidates in the municipal races I get a say in:
I’d love to endorse some school board candidates, but I have to admit I’m not well-enough informed to publicly commit to
endorsements. School board is really important and I wish I had time to dig into it. Good, critical evaluation of
candidates would also be really valuable because it’s so hard to come by. But I don’t have it. I suck, basically.
As if to contradict myself, I have some less well-informed opinions of other races around the region. If you’re
interested in them, check out
my Sticking My Oar In section.
more...
