The Blood Solution: Progress Report 4

Approaching Infinity: Book Three
Word Count: 41,400
The Goal: 75,000

My initial goal was 30,000 words by year's end. Needless to say, I'm glad to have exceeded that. Hopefully, I will be able to continue at the pace I've been keeping in spite of my full-time job.

Thanks to everyone who's supported me this and previous years with these books, to Robert, Jean, Elizabeth, and Josh in particular. Thank you Ai for your patience, understanding, and all the second chances. Thanks also--and most of all--for Faye.

Happy New Year!

My Favorite Book

1969 : Roger Zelazny : Creatures of Light and Darkness

I've talked about this book here before. It's still worth mentioning again, though, that no one seems to get the connection to Monkey (Journey to the West). Zelazny was brilliant.

My Favorite Movie

1985 : To Live and Die in L.A.

My Favorite Song

1977 : Pink Floyd : Animals : Dogs

Aura Battler Dunbine

聖戦士ダンバイン (1983)

I just finished watching this series for the first time. While it may not be for everyone, especially if you're not particularly interested in Japanese animation, it was startlingly engaging for being almost 30 years old. My interest in Japan started with animation and I'm still a fan, but I find, like most stodgy old people, that I prefer the stuff of my own generation. That being said and biases aside, I strongly believe that anime of the 80's up through the early 90's is far superior to that being produced today with regard to pacing and basic story-telling ability.

I was having a conversation with a friend, thinking about Dunbine and other things—movies, in particular—that came out of the 80's. I won't call it a Golden Age, but I do feel that, in general, the pacing for movies was better then, that they were better punctuated, and you came away with a clear sense of progression and development. These days a lot of what we see seems to meander and we suddenly find ourselves at the end, not sure how we got there or how we're supposed to feel. I will say that many cable TV series in the last few years do not appear to suffer this.

My humble opinion, anyway. And perhaps all due to my poor choices, but here's a meaningless exercise: think about the last movie or TV show or whatever you saw—something you'd been looking forward to—and ask yourself about how the story unfolded, how the pacing was, and how successful or unsuccessful the piece was overall in light of those things.

(Oh, and Lor Kalkin's color scheme was actually NOT influenced by the Dunbine. Just a coincidence.)

Lor Kalkin: The Contamination Pump

by Jason Orr

Lor Kalkin: The Contamination Pump

by Jason Orr. Thanks again, Jason!