Welcome back to the Terry Pratchett Book Club! Today seems like a good day to put on your favorite tunes, knit a hat, do a mundane chore that doesn’t depress you, and pick up books that you like!
With that in mind, let’s push on to the next section of our reading party, “The Lure of the Wyrm”.
People love an unsolved mystery—especially one far enough in the past as to allow wild speculation. Has there been a case that’s invited more outlandish theories than Jack the Ripper’s? The combination of grotesque details, gaslit setting, creaky conspiracy theories, and the eerie suddenness of the murders onset and ending have all lead to hundreds of retellings. Some of the most interesting have been stories that careened straight into the uncanny, giving us Jacks who can travel through time, haunt bridges, and possess wax figures.
Perhaps the writers of the tales below couldn’t bring themselves to believe that such a monstrous man was entirely human? Whatever the root of the fascination, we’ve stalked the Ripper straight out of the alleys of Whitechapel and into these eight SFF tales.
The Wheel of Time television series is back again with more casting news! Which, given their current production pause, is exciting for all of us because it gives us more information to chew over. This time, we’ve got Whitecloaks on the brain…
(Note: The comments section for this piece will most likely contain spoilers for the Wheel of Time series.)
Welcome back to the Terry Pratchett Book Club! Did you drink water today? Do you have a fluffy pillow nearby (for screaming into)? Have you spent your allotted five minutes staring into the great abyss and contemplating the universe?
Then you should be all set to move on, and think a bit about “The Sending of Eight”.
Welcome to Terry Pratchett Book Club! Are we all sitting comfortably? Preferably with a warm beverage of choice? Excellent, because it’s time to dive right in on the first Discworld novel: The Colour of Magic. We are plowing right through the opening segment, so let’s get to it!
It feels like the right time to be reading (or rereading) Terry Pratchett, doesn’t it?
A lot of us are exhausted, the truth often seems to pass people right by, and we could all use something comforting, I think. So here’s a little corner of the internet where we can perhaps spend some time together and enjoy some very good books.
There are plenty of cute, if forgettable, children’s fantasy films that offer just enough intrigue, action, and oddness to keep the entire family occupied for about two hours. Sometimes those films even get relegated to family film pile that you can trot out semi-frequently for everyone’s enjoyment. Sometimes those films even make it into a beloved category of Family Staple, the sort of movie you watch together on holidays and reminisce over.
And then there are children’s fantasy films like Artemis Fowl.
[Some spoilers for Artemis Fowl.]
We often talk about the value science fiction and fantasy can offer us in the form of allegory. This literary device gives us the ability to talk about real world problems through a filter: the story condemns fascism, but the fascists are elves; the story takes on racism, but the bigotry we see is leveled at a tentacled alien rather than a human; the story wants to show you the indignities perpetrated by sexism, but it offers up a society where men are the oppressed gender. We view events through this filter and ostensibly learn something about our own world, our own failings and shortcomings, and hopefully emerge with greater empathy and a desire to do better.
But the trouble is, allegory can always be ignored by the people who need to internalize it the most.
Space Force has the kind of pedigree that should make for truly entertaining television. Brought to you by Parks and Rec co-creator Greg Daniels, and The Office’s resident micromanager, Steve Carell, Space Force is part office comedy (if you think of the military being run like a giant office with a ridiculous budget), part satire of our current political era. It has an impressive stable of actors and writers, and a lot of money to back up the exercise.
But satire is notorious for being the most difficult type of comedy to write effectively, and there’s a reason for that—you can’t create effective satire without knowing precisely who you are offering critique of, and why they deserve that critique. And while you would think that Space Force had the easiest job of all on that front, it turns out that no one was quite prepared to give us the scathing irony its subject matter required. And that’s a problem.
As human beings, we all have our types. This holds true in fiction as well as life, the traits that resonate with us and help us form friendships and deeper attachments. The attributes that we recognize in ourselves that help us to better understand our own feelings and foibles. Types are useful for helping us organize the bits and pieces of being alive that don’t always make sense to us.
When I started watching She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, I instantly recognized Catra as one of my types.
[Spoilers for the series finale of She-Ra below.]
If you watched the first season of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, and reached the episode “Princess Prom”, you may have felt that the show was making a promise—a fictional universe in which seemingly everyone was queer and characters were free to romance, befriend, and stand by the people they chose without concern for what our world might think of it. You may also have wondered if the show would be permitted to fulfill that promise.
Oh, my friends. The team behind this show wasn’t about to step away before giving us what we deserved.
[Spoilers for the final season of She-Ra.]
She-Ra and the Princesses of Power is about to come to an end. While this is a sad time for fans of the show, we also must prepare for the final season! If you don’t have time to do the full rewatch right now, don’t worry. We’ve got you covered.
It was recently announced that Temuera Morrison has a part in season two of The Mandalorian.
Boba Fett is finally coming back to the Star Wars universe.
This is a big deal, considering the fact that there are some fans who typically question his emergence from the Sarlacc Pit post-Return of the Jedi (not me, I’ve been holding out hope on this one for years), and the fact that Boba Fett story lines have been thin on the ground since the prequels. Needless to say, the comeback of any Fett prompts a lot of questions for The Mandalorian. Here are just a few…
Sometimes you’re watching a lot of Clone Wars, and sometimes your brain points out little innocuous things to you… like the fact that Jedi never seem to have luggage.
