Movie Review: Skyfall

Hello dear readers, I am here today to happily proclaim over fifty years of James Bond. To do so I will be giving a brief and spoiler free review of Skyfall the latest film in this wonderful series.

As readers ought to know Skyfall is the third film done with the first blonde Bond actor Daniel Craig. This film, unlike the previous Quantum of Solace, is not a direct sequel and instead is a stand alone film with an original story line following the escapades of M and of course 007 himself.

This film revolves around the mysterious and authorative M as she has her command questioned and an adversary from the past comes back to haunt her. As well 007 questions his loyalty and commitment to the organization he has so faithfully served for many years.

Now on with the show er review!

The Good:

Well what can I say readers? This film has once again given us reasons for why James Bond is a classic hero and such a suave character. From dynamic one liners to amazing action scenes we get a well put together movie with a stellar cast of characters and a wonderful set of villains as well.

Daniel Craig of course returns in his third showing as the eponymous 007 James Bond that lovable MI6 agent. We start of with him fighting valiently in the line of duty and being the good agent he always has been. During the opening moments of the films actions he has intense action sequences and is thrust into the line of duty while questioning his superiors orders and trying to do his duty.

Judi Dench returns as the grand old lady M and the leader of MI6 where we find she is being questioned in her role as a leader and we see her past has come home to haunt her putting some of her current and past decisions in the spotlight.

Then we have a cast of new (or old however you want to look at them) characters returning, with Naomi Harris as Bond's supporting agent, Ben Whishaw as the new Q, Rory Kinnear as Bill Tanner, and Javier Bardem as the villain of this installment.

Put together these characters create a fabulous story of intrigue, betrayal, unorthodox tactics, plotting, and politics. It also delves more deeply into incidents in Bond's past which are interesting to see played out on screen and discover some interesting facts about our great hero.

Then of course we have the hilarious one liners and situational comedy that are so familiar to a 007 film with lovely lines along with my favorite "Seems like a waste of perfectly good Scotch" and I'll leave readers guessing as to the incident which prompts that ;)

The action sequences are amazing and impressively fantastic, what more could you expect from a Bond film? Strung together by an excellent plot we see an army of mooks being demolished by Bond in increasingly unique and unorthodox ways. The final showdown between Bond and our villain is impressive for the number of ways you can kill people with the contents of an old English house and 'the old ways' of killing.

To top it all off the music in the film is a call back to the original Bond soundtracks and we have the opening title song written and sung by none other than Adele. It's probably one of the best Bond openings to date.

For more astute viewers we also have dozens of callbacks to the original Bond films themselves, and much to my pleasant surprise a number of original gadgets. You'll be shocked to see some of the inventive ways they play these in to the film, and it also increases the re-watch value as you try to find all the shout outs to older films.

The Bad:

I honestly can't find to much to criticize about this film. Mind you, there are some things.

For those hoping to see the events of Quantum of Solace and Casino Royale wrapped up, better explained and expanded on I'm afraid you'll be disapointed. Unless later films write this in the film is purely stand alone with no connection to the events of the previous film whatsoever and little effort is made building upon Bond's character or how he's reacted to the previous events from the films. This is one thing that disapointed me but that's alright considering the film we are left with.

There is also the fact that some elements of the plot seem strung together on a shoestring and could have been better explained. For instance the villain could have used just a bit more foreshadowing and given a bit more depth. Otherwise his plans seem kind of out there.

We've also got the issues with other events being left vague or unmentioned which left me confused, not critically so, but still wondering about events characters were referencing in the plot.

Verdict:

All in all though, Skyfall is definately an excellent addition to the James Bond series and filmography as a whole. I found that I was on the edge of my seat most of the film and I was laughing along with the fun events and gnawing my finger nails in suspense for later on.

I would seriously reccomend that people go see this movie and enjoy fifty years of James Bond!

4 out of 5 stars for this great film!

Arnageddon??? And the Salvation War

Well dear readers I'm pleased to say that here comes another interesting (and very unique) review for you today. I recently finished the story Armageddon??? by author Stuart Slade. To say it is unique would be an understatement of earth shaking proportions. The story has quite a simple premise (one apparently set off by a comment on a discussion board) and one which readers of any stripe will find intriguing. Stuart simply asks; what would happen if the forces of Hell were unleashed on Earth? All Earth would be unleashed on Hell he says. This is made rather startlingly apparent in a number of amusing and fascinating ways.

Though to start out I will say this, the series has recieved both praise and hate for a number of reasons, many being unfounded, and much of the arguments and various counter arguments can be had out on the stories tvtropes page so it's worth a look. Armageddon??? and it's sequel Patheocide can be found here in rough form as they will sadly probably never be published to an indicent regarding internet piracy. Though they are in rough form they are still well written and prosed with only minor spelling and language mistakes so easy to read and well worth it too.

As a minor note there will be spoilers in this review, not major ones mind you, but if you read anything on the tvtropes page you'll see rather quickly what it's all about.

The Good:

Armageddom??? starts off nice and briskly sometime right after a mysterious event know as The Message in which it has been decreed that all mankind must lay down and die and surrender themselves to Satan by the order of Heavan. Many do simply lay down and die, but not all. In fact most of huamnity decides to stand up and fight.

That is exactly what we see happening when the novel starts off as a demonic herald is flying through the sky and is shot down (and much to the relief of everyone watching) killed by modern weaponry. This scene is pivotal as it proves demons can be killed and gives humanity hope and eggs us on to fight back.

From here the story progresses into a number of believable and insanely well written battle scenes. The author shows how the world would have to pick up the slack in order to fight the armies of Hell. Massive mobilizations are called on levels not seen since World War Two, entire sectors of the economy are turned around or changed towards weapons production, and more importantly, that of spare parts for the existing military equipment. They also institute the draft again, and form a militia, which clearly shows just how dire (and life changing) the situation is.

Then we have scenes where mothballed equipment is pulled out the hanger (or in a humorous example 'liberated' from a museum) and made ready for battle again.

The portrayal of the humans as being incredibly badass is also a nice touch, though the jury really is out on whether parts of this story about David Petraeus are fan wank or hero-worship. The author also does not skimp in his writing about real life people and their situations and nearly every big name shows up in varying degrees, George Bush, David Cameron, Vladimir Putin, and Queen Elizabeth all get some good screen time along with a bevy of memorable fictional characrers as well. Some such as kitten (a person not a cat) are very interesting and show the authors willingness to be unconventional in how he makes his heroes, while others like Tucker Elroy and other military men are the usual hoo-rah but lovable military. Then we have some zany scientists and researchers that are quite fun (get into the parts about DIMO(N) I gaurentee you will love them, so no spoilers there).

Then we have the portrayal of the denizens of Hell, and ooh boy is it awesome! The author constructs a well thought out, reasonable, and excitingly fresh look at how Hell is run, structured and inhabited. He mostly used classical sources to get an idea of the head honchoes, the looks, and their powers. I have to say this was probably one of the most well done parts of the novel. For literary reasons of course he couldn't have them simply as all powerful and amazing monsters, instead he gives them a distinct series of strengths and weaknesses. For instance demons are huge, big, scary monsters and most stand at around six feet tall, the Greater Demons and rulers of hell are simply giant! There are also many forms of demons, the regualr demons who can shoot lightning from their tridents (and like all demons regenrate wounds, a full clip from an M-16 barely slows them down much to the infantries dismay early on) harpies who fly and shoot fire, succubus who...well take a guess, naga who can shoot more powerful bolts of lightning and generate portals to and from Hell, and gorgons who are basically Medusa's but with portal generating powers of their own. Then of course there are a variety of hell beasts like rhinolobsters and wyverns.

Hell itself is run as a kingdom lorded over by Satan who has his lesser dukes beneath him jockying for position, and then beneath that are the warrior class who are basically the dukes muscle men, and beyond that are lesser demons who are the demonic equivalent of serfs. It's an amalgamation of a medieval society with bronze age technology. The torture of the damned and Hell's running of that system is well explored and I will not elaborate just so I can pique the readers curiosity.

It's also got a bronze age outlook on war, and when that meets up with 21st century technology, firepower, and doctrine...well you can guess how that goes.

To be fair though the demons are no slouches and many are intelligent and have wonderful initiative and ingenuity, but they are simply outclassed in many ways in the open field. On their home turf... well that's another story. They do manage to get a number of truly horrifying strikes at Earth as well, proving they aren't completely harmless.

To Stuart's credit he also does an excellent job describing the sheer terrifying power of modern weaponry. One actually feels sorry for demons on the recieving end of artillery strikes or for harpies torn apart by dog-fights with F-16s. The aftermath of an artillery barrage and seeing what happens when a HEAT round goes off in tightly packed ranks is truly gruesome.

Modern military for the win ya'll.

The story also contains some wonderful humour and wit which I just can't bring myself to spoil for the potential reader. Needless to say it is good!

The Bad:

Now the story gets a bad rap from many who say that humans are to overpowered in the story and Stuart made the demons to underpowered. I have to angrily disagree with this criticism, barring sheer supernatural intervention (like instant healing or outright invicibility) Stuart did an excellent job of taking real life stories and legends about what we percieve as a demon and how it would look, tweaked it a bit to conform to the laws of physics and set them loose. What happens is predictable. Stuarts excercise really shows that modern firepower really can overpower anything the demons can muster. It's an excellent take on what human weapons as we have right now could do to nearly any supernatural force!

Though I myself do have some criticisms of the story.

The author is clearly what we would call a gear head, and he does take lengthy breaks in the narrative to lovingly describe the inner workings and effects of each weapon he puts in the pages. While in principle there is nothing wrong with this, I have to object to how often it was used. It did slow the narrative down unnecessarily at points and it sometimes seemed like I was slogging through technical jargon that didn't serve any real purpose in the story other than to prove how much the author knew. I applaud the author's indepth knowlegde, but felt it would have been far better to skip much of the excessive detail and 'dumbed down' certain points merely for the sake of brevity.

Another point is that while the badass humans is pretty awesome, they did some things too right, too early. For instance the massive mobilization of the economy takes a number of weeks and somehow derelict factories are up and running practically overnight with the American juggernaught starting up again. It looks good, but realistically it would take at the bare minimum a year to get our modern industry to even close the World War Two levels that the author describes. So too does the science community react far to quickly to the sudden changes in the laws of physics and reality (our human ingrained skepticism is still a factor and 'seeing is believing' still applies). The speed and ease with which the scientific community reacts to these massive changes (and begins studying very specific aspects of demons) is much too fast to be realistic. I found that one of the demon's main strengths (the ability to possess peoples minds) was discovered and defeated with unbelievable ease. The scientists literally had nothing to go on before the Hellgate opened and the demonic legions were let loose, but yet they can counter this ability and study demons with little or no imperical data to go on? Give me a break! It also served as a big suspense killer and robbed the demons of what could have been a big game changer for the opening stages of the story! That was a personal let down for me and one that really stretched my suspension of disbelief to the breaking point.

The other is the authors bias, which while not intolerable, it still seeps through. For one thing he makes a number of personal jabs. One particularly irritating and worthy of Micheal Crichton type pettiness, is at another internet figure whom advocated M113 as the armies main fighting vehicle. That character is prompty drafted and shipped to Alaska to dig latrines.One must also remember that this is a story where the most religious people on Earth do simply lay down and die. He also takes some digs at countries (particularly the Israeli Armed Forces) he doesn't like as well as ideas and practices and people he finds irritating, which while not entirely bad is somewhat off putting to potential readers.

The other big UGH for me regarding his writing is his handling of many real life characters. For instance he has George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice survive The Message, now both of these people in real life are extremely religious and did allow their faith and beliefs to influence their politics in both overt and minor ways. That they lived through The Message was something extremely unlikely to me, and that's not just my politics talking. Though to make a point for my politics, this was an administration marred with dozens of unhealthy economic choices, incredibly bad military decisions, and was one which had advisors who were very questionable in their actions and were constantly jockying for position and influence on affairs. The smooth sailing, well reasoned and nearly infalliable way the government reacts is at huge odds with the lackluster and screw up prone administration in real life.

One point where I had to laugh in bitter irony is where there is a suggestion that people who are Nephillim or refuse to wear anti-demon headgear be rounded up and detained. Bush immediately vetoes this idea and speaks about infringing on liberties and chastises the person who suggests it. I was sorely reminded of things like the Patriot Act in this scene and couldn't help but find the whole exchange ridiculous.

Another unceccessary and poorly done plot point is when Richard Dawkins is rescued from Hell. This is because he is a friend of a government scientist who is angry about it, unusual care is taken to extract him and then put him in the hands of people who are willing to look after him. This after they have been portalling into Hell talking to soldiers and others who had been killed by demons or in the fighting, and it had occured to no one to pull any of them out!? They also don't discover a crucial plot point about people in Hell until this time which is also rather remarkably stupid (I mean come on if you were killed in battle and in Hell would the first thing you wanted to do was be supplied with weapons and told to start an insurgency rather than, y'know, GET OUT OF HELL!?). It was one part in the story which I immensely disliked and found to be more than ridiculous. Though I suppose it can be forgiven as Dawkins is still portrayed as somewhat of an egotistical knob. Still really, really ridiculous from a rational and practical perspective though.

The Verdict:

Despite some claims, Stuart did give the demons a fighting chance, and despite others he really has his military stuff down to a T. Stuart is an excellent writer who has crafted an intriguing world full of war, violence, heroism, and has unleased Earth on Hell.

It reads well, has its own excellent brand of wit, and is a masterpiece of war fiction.

Despite some plot flaws and issues of skepticism I have to say that the story reads very well and I will certainly be reading it again.

I give it a four out of five stars.

I am currently reading the sequel title Pantheocide and will be reviewing it later on.

World War Z: First Full Trailer

See it here http://zombieresearchsociety.com/archives/12933

Ok so many people have probably seen the first 23 second long mini trailer for World War Z the movie. Needless to say it was a horrible trailer which should have never been done.

That being said however, this full length trailer gives us a good look at this upcoming movie which seems to have a somewhat solid plot behind it, decent cinematic effects, and good action. This actually has caused me to give the film a second thought.

When I first heard about Brad Pitt's association with the film I was rather dismayed, as I couldn't think of anyone less suited to the task at hand. Now though, it seems like a fairly decent plot has been put together which can use Pitt to his full extent, and it looks as though their actually borrowing a number of ideas from the book. This brings it up in my estimation and means that it warrants a wary first glance.

So now I'm holding my breath and hoping that when this film comes out I'll be treated to something that blows away my low expectations.

Give the trailer a watch. It may change your opinion too.

The Monsanto Menace

While usually I don't have much to say about companies and corporations I recently found a video from an unlikely source. Alt-Market.com is a website that revolves around the establishing of alternate market opportunities in preparation for an economic downturn or collapse. It is also a part of the so-called liberty movement and makes its political views very clear. While it does have some decent articles from time to time it spends an unhealthy ammount of time peddling various conspiracy theories and decrying the American system. So it should be understandable that the author and I rarely see eye-to-eye on anything.

So imagine my surprise when the authour posted this artcile. It features a link to youtube video featuring the documentary 'David vs. Monsanto' which revolves around a Canadian farmer who is doing his best to fight back against the insidious influence of Monsanto and their attempts to enforce their ridiculous patent of GMO foods. For those unfamiliar a brief bit of background; Monsanto is a major player in the agribusiness of genetically modified organisms. As such they have put a patent on the particular content of their food and if that genetic pattern or seed shows up on another person's property Monsanto will sue you, sieze your product and milk you for every dollar you are worth.



Sueing people for impractical reasons is their trademark

Now I believe that Monsanto is probably one of the most evil corporations since the United Fruit Company and they have a number of unethical and immoral business practices which they like to use. As such I would encourage people to boycott their product and vote with your dollars by shopping at alternative food stores and buying from local vendors and deprive the mega-corps of their greens.

That however, is a topic for another time. I encourage people to watch this documentary and see just what it is all about and I want to raise awareness of what this company is doing and how it can effect all of us, even if you own just a small backyard garden plot.

So please watch and enjoy!

Atlas Shrugged Part II

Well considering the monumental failure of the first installment of the Atlas Shrugged film series which was in part due to it's terrible acting, poor adaptation, and even worse source material, imagine my surpirse when I found out they were doing part two.

Now I think anyone who followed the films has probably known about this for some time, but courtesy of Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature (an excellent blog dedicated to demolishing all of Ayn Rand's silly ideas) I've seen the most recent trailer for part two. Well let me just say that other than being dramatically large hams (but hey, given the subject material...) and still peddling tha nonsense ideology they managed to actually make this movie look interesting. Now that's quite a feat.

The trailer is actually pretty well and competently strung together, the actors all seem more human (or at least doing their best to take the subject matter semi-seriously and not verge on self-parody) and capable of putting on a brave face. I for one would be delighted if they portrayed this film as a subtle parody of Rand's works, still interesting to watch but the actors very aware of just how dumb everything being spoken and preached to the audience, is. For a great example see Micheal Ironsides preformance in Starship Troopers.

Now this of course is probably not going to happen (sigh) but a man can hope. Rather than totally skip out on even viewing this film, like part one, I may actually pirate it after it's DVD release.

Having read the book (four months of agony) I remember that I liked part three the best as at least things happened without hundreds of pages worth of useless build up. Part two in comparison was only marginally interesting. Still slow and ranting but its conclusion was worthwhile at least.

I'm certainly looking forward how they can pull of some of the 'heroes' blatant near terrorist attacks in a positive light for a modern audience (I only say near because of their intention to not kill people but deny resources, but considering where many of these attacks take place and that many were for essential items the chances of not doing so is nill). Not that I predict to many normal people seeing this film. Hell I'd see it, mostly to criticize of course but that's because I so passionately loathe the material behind it. Though seeing how they manage to pull off some of Rand's more questionable moral points would be interesting in the least. If, as it looks, they put everything in a straight, pulled right off the page way, then I can see this film getting even more hate from potential audience members. It might not even be a bad film if they dumbed down the author rant message and presented it as more right-wing mantra with the parable of bad government put up to eleven. Sadly though since it's coming straight from the heart of Objectivist theory that is all but improbable.

Well that's all for this post folks. Hopefully you won't go see this movie do what I do (and many of its other 'fans' did) and pirate it off the internet!

Here's the trailer for your viewing 'pleasure'. Enjoy!!

Freedom from religion? Or freedom from opposing ideas?

Hello my fair readers. I begin today's article by saying that I am unashamedly Christian and that I don't mind if that turns some readers away. Frankly it's my blog and I will occasionally post things that others find opposite to their ideoligcal or personal views. That being said I continue on with today's topic.

I often get into debates with agnostics or atheists regarding Christianity, why I do so is still somewhat of a mystery to me as it is rarely productive. True I make no secret of my religious beliefs, which has made me a target of anger and criticism in the past, but I should hopefully know better at this point than to engage in pointless debates with people who just sincerely don't want to hear my point of view on the matter. Which of course brings me to today's subject.

In a recent, more friendly chat I had with an atheist acquaintance he told me he supported both the seperation of church and state, and the campaign for a freedom from religion. This is a term I had heard of before, but wasn't quite sure of what it meant so I asked him to clarify. He explained the term meant that he supported the view that the discussion of religion and faith should be removed from the public sphere and regulated into the private one and into a person's household.

This of course shocked me to no end. I asked whether that he meant for atheism to disappear from the public forum as well, and to his credit he answered 'No I'd just rather all religious debate disappeared so we wouldn't have to hear about it anymore, but I'd still insist there's no God."

Now none of what he'd said there is bad at all, but the very idea of simply removing a point of topic from the public sphere is one that strikes me as totalitarian in nature.

I of course should clarify something here. I am a rabid opponent of racism, hate speech, revisionist history, and the greatest sin of all, Holocaust denial. Any of those items are hateful, usually carry violent undertones, and are meant only to provoke hostility in a crowd. These things are in my opinion not defended under free speech, just like inciting violence or panic isn't. None of these things are appropriate or acceptable in civil discourse, just as copious name calling or profanity is considered impolite and obscene to public debate.

The idea that religion can be used to incite similar hate speech or intolerance is not false, but that goes against the thousands of other religious or faith based initiatives to do exactly the opposite such as promoting peace, justice, care for the poor, and forgiveness in society. So to be clear, attempting to ban religious discourse in public based on that category falls flat.

Now to return to the matter at hand, the term 'freedom from religion' implies that a person who is not a believer would be able to go about their daily life and never have to encounter a religious message or slogan (presumably unless they pass a church or mosque ect). That implies I would hope that a religious person could go about their daily life and never have to encounter an atheist banner or slogan.

I somehow though doubt that is the sincere wish of the atheist who promotes the idea.

Consider this, an atheist does not regard himself as religious, nor would his own banner or slogan be considered religious under the law. So I must presume that 'freedom from religion' does not include 'freedom from atheism'.

Now I can understand some out there asking 'Yeah, so what?' well in rebuttal let me put it this way. If society is 'free from religion' but not free from atheism then a religious or faithful person will most likely have to endure slogans, banners, chants and other atheist items without complaint while being unable to mount a rebuttal in the public forum themselves. I regard this as totalitarian in nature. It merely silences an idea that an atheist finds disqueting, is this idea hateful, bigoted, aiming to incite violence, or provoke people? No, the simple belief in God does not do that. While it will of course sometimes spark heated debate it is not meant to be used as a message to spread hate, bigotry, and ignorance (anyone who claims otherwise is deluded or no true servant of the Lord and merely a self-centered bigot).

So for someone to claim they want 'freedom from religion' I hear echoes of 'I want to silence the opposing view point'. While this may not be forefront on the minds of many who adhere to this idea, I am quite certain that most of its ardent defenders clearly want a society where they are free to preach their own spiritually dead message, while using the power of the state to silence any view point which would contest them and regulate the worshippers to their homes and churches rendering any response they might have mute.

Not only is that abhorent and un-democratic, but it flies in the very face of what most atheists would believe. They believe they have reason and logic on their side, well silencing the other end of the debate is not reason or logic. It is naked brutality masked as concern for society. I don't agree with anyone who supports this idea and I would encourage others to chastise the holders of it. It is not an idea which people who live in a democratic society should hold to, nor is it one which anyone who believes in logic and reason should want to see undertaken.

I am sometimes criticized for my belief in 'censoring' holocaust denial, or hate speech. Well what does someone who wants 'freedom from religion' preach? Civil discourse? No. They preach no discourse at all and merely wish to dictate to us what we can and cannot hear. That is the exact opposite of what I stand for in society.

I like to believe that we live in a free and open society which doesn't allow for bigotry and hate speech to run rampant. If we close one door of civil public discourse, how many more can be closed to satisfy people?

I finish with this, 'freedom from religion' is no freedom at all, but merely totalitarian urges masked behind lofty idealism. If you don't agree with a view debate it, if you don't wish to participate in said debate ignore it. What one cannot do is silence any opposing view point in a debate! If one cannot speak their mind than how can civil disocourse in society exist at all?

The Grim Dark (In Writing)

Recently dear readers something has been on my mind which I just can't shake. Something that has both bothered and annoyed me. It's something which has been slowly creeping into our papers, our video games, our movies, and our novels! This slow seeping and gloomy menace is what we can call Grimdark (or Grim Dark). Now this is a phenominon which is not entirely new, it has been going on since the 90s after all, and is one which is fairly well established. In the fantasy genre though, it is beginning to show. Since A Song of Ice and Fire and its attendent TV series Game of Thrones became such sensational hits, we have been seeing an upsurge in popularizing dark fantasy. Dark fantasy has also been around for some time (Diablo anyone?) and has had a genre of its own. However, it is one which is becoming incredibly popularized in all forms of fantasy writing recently, pushing it to mainstream. This of course has shifted me from being mildly opposed to it, to becoming outright annoyed.

Now here's the thing, I don't mind dark fantasy (or any dark item in particular) but the massive push of depressing black, bleak, and nihilistic fiction is starting to become almost cliche to me. I enjoy a good morally gray story from time to time yes, but recently its less from time to time, and more 'all the damn time'.

To use one great example we have George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series. A deconstruction of the heroic fantasy genre (which is wonderful in itself) it started as a rich and interesting world with some dark and morally gray tones, but has since shifted to bleak, hopeless, and has multiple characters carrying the idiot ball. For instance in the most recent book A Dance with Dragons we had a series of inreasingly dark, twisted, and disturbing scenes played out before us and everything that the main characters did seemed to serve no purpose or else went incredibly wrong. Now I hadn't minded this before, but by this point many of the actions the characters took cried out idiot ball rather than 'decision gone wrong' and many of the more grotesque elements of the story were completely uncessecary.

Here's the thing, I love Martin's work and all he does in it, but when the series is so dark that I can instantly predict how badly something is going to go wrong without even thinking about it there is something wrong. I found myself simply guessing who would be the one to be screwed over in the next chapter, and was never really surprised at who it was.

For some non-literature examples I merely need point to video-games like The Witcher or the Dragon Age series. Each of them are good games, but the unnecessary ammount of angst, grimness, and depressing overtones makes it irritating for me to keep playing them. And the modern swearing (I mean honestly, like in all this dark literature everyone has to say f*ck at some point or another! There was no point in history until very recently that f*ck was being used as a swear word! I just can't stand that writers need to use it to somehow make the setting 'darker and edgier'! That word doesn't make it darker or edgier!!!) in these series just sets my teeth on edge. The games tell a dark, racist, and depressing story about a fantasy world where fantastic racism abounds and even kings and nobles aren't safe from the machinations of evil and inherent corrupt decay. They also seem quite content to play in petty power struggles as the powers of hell stand almost literally on their doorstep. Grimdark indeed.

The deonsrtuction of the heroic fantasy genre is something that I can appreciate from an artistic perspective, but when we are flooded by so many cheap grimdark fantasy knock offs that have no depth I begin to get sincerely tired of the whole charade. Why should I care that there are so many rape scenes, or that in this version it's just so morally gray? Unless the author is setting out with a specific goal in mind I really can't stand the cheap novelty of it.

A recent series that set off my irritation was the Prince of Thorns series which is loosely set in a post-global warming earth, but has so many elements of grimdark (the cover art alone should tell you).

Now while I have nothing against the authors writing, he just latches to hard onto this grimdark aspect for me to be able to truly enjoy the read (indeed the opening scene is a group of swearing soldiers happily ransacking some dead peasants bodies and describing all the blood and gore) which is a let down. If it even had a slightly lighter tone I would be more sympathetic, but sadly now I cannot be.

The biggest problem is when these stories get so dark its to the point of self-parody. Dance with Dragons comes oh so very close to this. Every chapter with the Martell prince was painful to read with all the grimdark I was experiencing. It nearly got as bad as a Warhammer 40k novel (and those are grimdark by design, but thankfully not all take themselves seriously). Hopefully though future installments will leave me guessing at the plot again and finding it a page turner rather than glumly turning from one page to the next as everyone screws up in one fantastic way or another.

Now with this out of my system I can return to writing my own, somewhat light hearted, science fiction.