Like when the planets align, there are a few times each year when geeks can fly their freak flags high and proud, in vast numbers, and at the same time in different parts of the universe.
This coming Labor Day is one of those weekends.
On the west coast, we have Pax, in Seattle, a three-day game festival for tabletop, videogame, and PC gamers and a general celebration of gamer-geek culture. (And in the other corner, Atlanta, we have Dragon*Con. But more on that another time.)
There’s a curious phenomenon happening out there in LiteraryLand: The territory of genre fiction is being invaded by the literary camp.
Take Justin Cronin, writer of respectable stories, who recently leaped the chasm to the dystopian, undead-ridden realm of Twilight. With The Passage, his post-apocalyptic, doorstopper of a saga, the author enters a new universe, seemingly snubbing his former life writing “serious books” like Mary and O’Neil and The Summer Guest, which won prizes like Pen/Hemingway Award, the Whiting Writer’s Award and the Stephen Crane Prize. Both books of fiction situate themselves solidly in the camp of literary fiction. They’re set on the planet Earth we know and love. Not so with The Passage, in which mutant vampire-like creatures ravage a post-apocalyptic U.S. of A. Think Cormac McCarthy’s The Road crossed with the movie The Road Warrior, with the psychological tonnage of John Fowles’ The Magus and the “huh?” of The Matrix.
Do we really need another Robin Hood?
That’s the question begged by Ridley Scott’s new version.
Starring action-lunk-with-acting-gravitas Russell Crowe in the title role, and an A-list supporting cast of Cate Blanchett, William Hurt, and Max von Sydow, the new Robin Hood also features a budget and production values on an epic scale. Men in Tights, Mel Brooks’ 1993 send-up, this is not.
Scott’s Robin Hood is the latest of some 50 movie and television adaptations chronicling the life and exploits of our favorite do-gooder thief—an impressive run that begins with the silent Robin Hood and His Merry Men in 1908.
You’d think viewers would be weary of another retelling of this gallant, often green-clothed folk hero who selflessly stands up for the common man. But few other stories have enjoyed such a continuous reworking as good old RH, who began appearing orally in legends, ballads, and outlaw stories around the reign of King John (1199-1216) and, in print, in Piers Plowman (circa 1377).
Geeks have hearts of gold.
I wrote some time ago about an effort to aid Haiti relief, spearheaded by an organization called the Harry Potter Alliance, which has long inspired Harry Potter fans to take action on real-world social issues like global warming and Darfur. Recently, it launched its largest fandom action, called Help Haiti Heal, to raise money for the victims of the Haiti earthquake.
Of course, the point was to raise a bunch of money in a time of need. But, on the sly, I think the effort helped show that so-called escapist pursuits like reading fantasy novels like Harry Potter, watching fantasy movies like Lord of the Rings, or participating in role-playing games can actually connect to the real world, too.
Fantasy and gaming is often accused of being frivolous, pointless, escapist or lost in it own world.
But not anymore.
An organization called the Harry Potter Alliance, which has long inspired Harry Potter fans to take action on real-world social issues like global warming and Darfur, has now launched perhaps its largest fandom action with an organization called Help Haiti Heal.
Saturday, January 23 at 2pm ET is when the awareness-raising and fundraising effort kicks off. On that day, fans of all kinds will be coming together to raise money for the victims of the Haiti earthquake. Rooted in the Harry Potter community, the Helping Haiti Heal live fundraising webcast will take place via Livestream (http://www.thehpalliance.org/haiti), and bring together Harry Potter fans and fans of other blockbuster books, movies, and TV series such as Heroes, True Blood, Mad Men, The Wire, and Firefly for this effort. The four-hour event includes entertainment, performance, interviews, news and more.
Here’s the truth: No matter how hard you try to suppress some jagged part of your past, it invariably comes screaming back. Especially when you label that subterranean aspect of your previous life “unfinished business” and sweep it under the rug.
Such was the case with my Dungeons and Dragons obsession. The last time I played was senior year in high school, 25 years ago. I thought I had put my gamer days behind me. But what I had simply done was quit playing. My desire to inhabit some fantasy world remained, haunted me throughout my adulthood, and kept beckoning me with its crooked, wiggling finger.
I had played D&D, that oft-maligned fantasy role-playing game, for six hours every Friday night (not to mention the hours I spent scheming and dreaming my next D&D adventure), from the summer before my eighth-grade year until my last year of high school. Week after week, for five years straight, I sat at a table of pimply-faced boys, surrounded by bags of cheese doodles, bottles of Mountain Dew, and mounds of polyhedral dice. In and around those mundane trappings of 20th-century rural New Hampshire life, my D&D gang and I conjured a more fantastic reality, one filled with magic swords, blistering fireballs, and heroic leaps from castle parapets onto the backs of giant rats, goblins, and umber hulks.
[Read below for how to win a free, autographed copy of the author's book Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks]
Like many action-adventure, science fiction and fantasy movies of recent years—Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Batman, Transformers, to name only a few—James Cameron’s Avatar taps into our primal selves. That pick-up-your-battle-ax and kill mentality, long suppressed by so-called society, still courses in our veins. Movies let us “just do it.” We travel to richly-imagined parallel worlds and watch a hero like Aragorn kick major orc butt. We cheer, and secretly wish that we were him.
What distinguishes Avatar from its vicarious derring-do ilk is that the plot touches directly on this craving for transformation.
The Gathering Storm ebook cover by Todd Lockwood by Irene Gallo
Out of Print For Decades, The Dune Encyclopedia Surfaces Online by Stubby the Rocket
Announcing the 2010 Hugo Award Winners! by Management Services
