Lacking creativity? Can’t seem to come up with something other than a rehash of The Thing or Pocahontas? Try genre-mixing. A genre is nothing but a set of tropes and expectations. Some of the best arts in the world were created by taking standards from one set and applying them to another. Horror is an excellent mixer. It’s the onion of the cinematic world. All the settings have been taken? Put it in space (Good example: Alien. Bad example: Leprechaun 4: in Space). But no, let’s make it a comedy (Good example: Shaun of the Dead. Bad example: Killjoy). Dean Koontz is known for hybridizing, some to success and some…
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Postmodern Mainstream Literary Realism (for Adults)
Let’s talk about ‘postmodern mainstream literary realism’ for a second. What does ‘postmodern mainstream literary realism’ mean? Basically, anything that’s not genre fiction (Sci-Fi, Westerns, romances, fantasy, etc.). They’re all terms for the same thing, I just lumped them together. If you see it on the NYT best sellers list, it’s PMLR. And I hate it. I can’t stomach it. I can rarely read such stuff. It’s pretentious, it’s wordy, it’s nonsensical, it’s dull, it’s repetitive, it’s boring. I’ve made numerous attempts to read The Great Gatsby that ended up in failure. Then there’s The Almost Moon, Heart of Darkness, The Catcher in the Rye, East of Eden. These are…
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White Mage Story Update & “You Got Your Reality in my Fantasy!”
I have two questions for the audience today. I find myself in conflict with White Mage Story. The first is the ending – I’m finding it difficult to reconcile the message that I wanted to send, with the message that everyone received. It’s like playing telephone. I was trying to say something about “it doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do it to the best of your ability”. Instead, people got “learn the value of what you do, rather than trying to change it”. I think a lot of people misinterpreted White Mage Story, which is my own fault. The trick now is whether to go with…
