If you think Eddings is good, try reading *anything* written by Guy Gavriel Kay. Especially "Tigana", "The Lions of Al-Rassan", or "Sailing to Sarantium" and its sequel "Lord of Emperors."
Utterly fantasic writing. GGKay was the one author selected to help Christopher Tolkien edit the Sillmarion (sp). His Tolkien influence really shows in his first work (The Fionavar Tapestry) but he really develops his own strong voice starting with Tigana.
I have tons of memories from before I was five. When I was four my family and I moved from Richmond, VA to OBX, NC. I can remember all sorts of things from our home in Richmond: building a dam of rocks in a stream with my brothers and sister, at least two winters, the swimming pool, playing with the cassette recorder with my younger brother, playing with the Richard Scarry toys, etc etc.
I also can remember my crib, which contained a ton of great things to play with. There was this hanging toy that had a bright red air button that, when you pushed it hard enough, a little plastic piece shot up and rang a bell. At first I wasn't strong enough to push it in and had to ask my parents or siblings to ring it for me. I used to wake up every day and start off trying to ring the bell, eventually I could.
I had a checkered yellow and white blanket, lots of stuffed animals. My crib time was filled with jobs, I felt that I should play with every animal so none would feel neglected.
I remember my dad singing me to sleep to Harry Chapin. Years later, if I hear any Chapin song -- even if it isn't familiar to me -- I find that I already know the words.
I don't remember my first steps. I do remember the move from VA to NC (though I have stronger memories of the yard sale that came before -- a lot of my toys were included!).
None -- well most -- of these events were related to me, in fact when I was probing the extent of my memory I told these stories to my parents who were a bit surprised that I could remember so far back.
Ow! My arm! Sorry for the quick writing, but I gotta get to work.
It's not 4 billion, more like a few points over 1 billion.
You state that you are of pure Chinese descent...and then use a TIME magazine article to prove your point? Don't you have any relatives that can provide us with personal insight? Hm, well anyway.
Though this idea is ancient, the Communist government began to encourage the use of this virtue in times of famine and hardship.
The CCP strongly denied the past in an attempt to create the future, Mao's entire focus was iconoclastic. Everything traditional was viewed as a chain keeping the Chinese from advancing. This is why thousands of temples were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Confucianism represented all that Mao, the CCP, and the masses were turning away from.
The grumbles about upstarts' arrogance and the government officials' corruption turned into general disapproval. People began to look favorably at the ancient Chinese maxim which praises abstinence in consumption....
You first say the Chinese government promoted this ideal, but this statement seems to indicate that the people turned to it out of disapproval.
What the CCP did was encourage certain ideals that were similar, but not identical to those of Confucius. Filial Piety, being the basis of Confucianism, was still denied. Officially people were supposed to look up to Mao and CCP officals. Of course in practice most still observed the traditional values.
Considering the 30 million destitute Chinese struggling in remote mountainous areas and those laid-off work who are living a hard life, traditional virtues like fighting one's way up and building the country through hardship and thrift are still highly encouraged by the Chinese government.
Sure that's true, when the CCP removed the "iron rice bowl" (no time to explain, try google) they caused massive unemployment. Most of the figures I've seen point to something around 50% of the original workforce.
Gah! I'm out of time. Moderators, don't even bother modding up this quick diatribe of mine. It's far too rushed to be considered coherent.
Um, he meant that the director's cut *for LOTR* is running in the theaters. Peter Jackson made a big deal about explaining that the new 4 hour release is not a "director's cut" because that implies that he was unhappy with something in the theater release, which he wasn't. He prefers people call it the "extended edition."
So when the previous poster was referring to buying a director's cut, Phil made an attempt towards a joke that no one is getting.
Ha! If you do that you'll end up with the smelly geeks living on your property and eating dinner at your house whenever they feel like it. I.e. how Thoreau's deal with Emerson worked out.
Thoreau, "Yeah, umm, dude. I wanna like, crash on your lawn and build a house...get back to nature kinda thing. No big deal, I'll build all my own stuff and eat off the land...hey, you gonna eat all that bacon?"
It's not just you, quiddich is a sport that was clearly designed to be a sport that appears to be a team sport, similar to European Football, but in actuality is a convient way for Harry to demonstrate his HEROness.
Quiddich could be a truly exciting and awesome game, IF catching the snitch simply ended the game (none of this 150 points nonesense). That way, each team member would MATTER because if one team is behind and the snitch appears, the losing team has to pull together and gain points while their seeker tries to delay their opposite's catching of the seeker.
That rule modification would make for some really exciting, nailbiter scenes in which, say, Harry's team is down by 20 points. The snitch appears. Harry knows that he can't catch the snitch UNTIL his team pulls up those 20 points, so he tries to stay inbetween the snitch and the other team's seeker. His team knows that he can't keep the other seeker from the snitch forever, so they rally and try to score those 30 points. The other team knows that it is only a matter of time until their seeker can grab the snitch, so they play hard defense to keep Harry's team down until their seeker is able to do so.
There. Exciting, TEAM sport. Harry's role would still be important, and the book/movie scenes would be much more exciting because the entire team would be involved.
No, the original poster was correct. Quiddich is *clearly* a sport that Rowling designed to *look* like a team sport but in reality be a convenient facade that enables Harry to be a Hero(tm).
In the fourth book, she just changed the standard variation for the game for variety's sake.
Quiddich would be a MUCH more exciting game if catching the snitch simply ended the game, rather than ending it and adding 150 points. That way there would be a certain amount of strategy involved in catching the snitch (i.e. you wouldn't want to catch it while your team was behind, but they would realize this and would have to work hard to make sure that they were ahead when the snitch appears).
That would be truly cool.
Re:Wow. How disgusting. [OT]
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I guess we just disagree. To me, looking at either of those scenes -- detached from the movie -- would still be pretty cool.
The same goes for scenes like any of the space scenes in Starship Troopers, the view of the space ship at the beginning of Pitch Black, watching the T-1000 walk through the jail bars in Terminator 2, et cetera.
If what you say is true, why are graphic demos and concept art from upcoming movies (that one may or may not know any of the story to) so popular?
My friends and I will choose to watch some movies, *solely* on the basis that there will be cool special effects.
Memento or Frailty are good examples of how a movie doesn't need technical wizardry to tell a great story. Star Wars: The Phantom Menace is a great example of how the plot of the movie can be terrible, but the movie still be watchable due to the spectacular nature of its special effects.
True, things are best when the special effects blend together with the story (The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings) but it isn't required for great special effects.
Are you telling me that you couldn't just look at any scene from Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, separated from what little characterization and plot there is, and enjoy it for being kick-ass CGI?
Of course it wouldn't. That's an example of the "not having a story" and "depending on special effects" type of movie.
"Lost In Space" horrible movie, great special effects. I still don't see how a movie needs an emotional connection to make the special effects worthwhile.
I'd really like to meet these animation friends.;-)
4, 5, and 6 may have had primitive effects, but the story telling was much better.
The effects in the recent movies may be ahead technologically, but the lack of good storytelling with those effects ruined the movie's ability to make good use of those shots.
Check again, that was what the person you are disagreeing with said.
Sorry, the VFX was better in the 4, 5, and 6 simply because the audience reacted to them.
Um...what? Is their a correlational relationship between the technical wizardry of special effects and the art of storytelling? A movie with a bad story (The Haunting, The Fifth Element, Final Fantasy) can still have incredibly great special effects. They aren't "Storytelling Effects", they are "Visual Effects."
"Oh lord," said William Shatner in a resigned voice. -- Futurama "Where No Fan Has Gone Before"
If a child (or anyone for that matter) plays a video game, then goes on a murderous rampage, there has to be something wrong with him other than the fact that he plays games, ie he already has some serious issues.... if you know (or even are mildly suspicious) that your child has violent tendencies, you shouldn't let them play video games that are violent.
Oookay. There are two problems with your argument.
You assume that children who have "violent tendencies" will have those tendencies augmented by playing a video game that plays on those tendencies. (i.e. harm the child)
You assume that not playing those games (i.e. their prohibition by an authority figure) will help to ameliorate those tendencies. (i.e. help the child)
There is no causal correlation between playing violent video games and becoming violent. There is no evidence to show that if a violent child plays violent video games that child will demonstrate an increased tendency towards violence. In fact, a recent study by MIT, The University of California at LA, and the University of London showed that violent video games are potentially helpful to children. By allowing them to act out their fantasies in a setting designed for that purpose those fantasies are relagated to the fantasy world and farther removed from the real world.
Futhermore, there is strong evidence showing that the stronger something is prohibited by authority figures, the more attractive it becomes to children (and not just rebellious children). Especially if it is something that is banned for no readily apparent reason.
Kevin Smith rules, but there must have been conscripted workers or slaves hammering away at that second death star. Most likely they were still a few on the first one as well. Someone's gotta do the grunt work that requires a brain:-)
Beloved?? Yoda? Sorry but I have to agree with Brin on this one. Yoda easily rivals the emperor in underhanded manipulation of those around him to get what he wants. Why didn't he tell Luke, oh by the way, Vader's your pop? He wanted to manipulate Luke into killing his own father, without him even realizing it.
Even the very first time I watched ESB and ROTJ I didn't understand Yoda's stretch of an excuse for his deviousness. The Phantom Menace and especially the Attack of the Clones have only deepened my misgivings about Yoda. He seems so much more... dark, than in the original trilogy. If nothing is going on behind the scenes with Yoda then GL is doing a terrible job of portraying Yoda as a wise and benevolent master.
"I'll take the style of the Old Republic any day."
But where's the substance?
"You seem to be forgetting that it is your precious Empire that slaughtered millions in the destruction of Alderaan."
How many people were onboard the first Death Star, the second? C'mon man, you know the second had conscripted construction crews working full time even as the rebels attacked. Remember that they were having trouble getting the regular construction crews to work hard enough, and that they were going to redouble their efforts? How, exactly, do you think he was figuring that he would do that? Call a conference and just tell the crews to step on it?
Ah, yes. But that is another writer's interpretation of the rebel alliance. Sure it was approved by Lucasarts, perhaps even by Lucas himself, but it's still not part of the official movie canon.
I've actually just finished re-reading Zhan's series and I noticed a *lot* of similarities to the action scenes in Zhan's books and those in Attack of the Clones. Still, reading those books makes me all nostalgic for the span of time preceding The Phantom Menace. What Zhan and other SW writers came up with for the SW future is far, far better than Lucas' mangling of the SW past.
Another explanation could be a sketch from the old "I Love Lucy" show in which Lucy and Ethel were selling mayonaisse at 40 cents per quart. When Ricky discovered their scheme he added up the costs and figured that each quart cost them 80 cents to make.
Lucy's response was: "Well we'll make up for it in volume!"
Of course that could have been satirizing some issue that was current at the time of the show. *shrug*
Slashdot Mirror
If you think Eddings is good, try reading *anything* written by Guy Gavriel Kay. Especially "Tigana", "The Lions of Al-Rassan", or "Sailing to Sarantium" and its sequel "Lord of Emperors."
Utterly fantasic writing. GGKay was the one author selected to help Christopher Tolkien edit the Sillmarion (sp). His Tolkien influence really shows in his first work (The Fionavar Tapestry) but he really develops his own strong voice starting with Tigana.
I have tons of memories from before I was five. When I was four my family and I moved from Richmond, VA to OBX, NC. I can remember all sorts of things from our home in Richmond: building a dam of rocks in a stream with my brothers and sister, at least two winters, the swimming pool, playing with the cassette recorder with my younger brother, playing with the Richard Scarry toys, etc etc.
I also can remember my crib, which contained a ton of great things to play with. There was this hanging toy that had a bright red air button that, when you pushed it hard enough, a little plastic piece shot up and rang a bell. At first I wasn't strong enough to push it in and had to ask my parents or siblings to ring it for me. I used to wake up every day and start off trying to ring the bell, eventually I could.
I had a checkered yellow and white blanket, lots of stuffed animals. My crib time was filled with jobs, I felt that I should play with every animal so none would feel neglected.
I remember my dad singing me to sleep to Harry Chapin. Years later, if I hear any Chapin song -- even if it isn't familiar to me -- I find that I already know the words.
I don't remember my first steps. I do remember the move from VA to NC (though I have stronger memories of the yard sale that came before -- a lot of my toys were included!).
None -- well most -- of these events were related to me, in fact when I was probing the extent of my memory I told these stories to my parents who were a bit surprised that I could remember so far back.
Ow! My arm! Sorry for the quick writing, but I gotta get to work.
It's not 4 billion, more like a few points over 1 billion.
You state that you are of pure Chinese descent...and then use a TIME magazine article to prove your point? Don't you have any relatives that can provide us with personal insight? Hm, well anyway.
Though this idea is ancient, the Communist government began to encourage the use of this virtue in times of famine and hardship.
The CCP strongly denied the past in an attempt to create the future, Mao's entire focus was iconoclastic. Everything traditional was viewed as a chain keeping the Chinese from advancing. This is why thousands of temples were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Confucianism represented all that Mao, the CCP, and the masses were turning away from.
The grumbles about upstarts' arrogance and the government officials' corruption turned into general disapproval. People began to look favorably at the ancient Chinese maxim which praises abstinence in consumption....
You first say the Chinese government promoted this ideal, but this statement seems to indicate that the people turned to it out of disapproval.
What the CCP did was encourage certain ideals that were similar, but not identical to those of Confucius. Filial Piety, being the basis of Confucianism, was still denied. Officially people were supposed to look up to Mao and CCP officals. Of course in practice most still observed the traditional values.
Considering the 30 million destitute Chinese struggling in remote mountainous areas and those laid-off work who are living a hard life, traditional virtues like fighting one's way up and building the country through hardship and thrift are still highly encouraged by the Chinese government.
Sure that's true, when the CCP removed the "iron rice bowl" (no time to explain, try google) they caused massive unemployment. Most of the figures I've seen point to something around 50% of the original workforce.
Gah! I'm out of time. Moderators, don't even bother modding up this quick diatribe of mine. It's far too rushed to be considered coherent.
Um, he meant that the director's cut *for LOTR* is running in the theaters. Peter Jackson made a big deal about explaining that the new 4 hour release is not a "director's cut" because that implies that he was unhappy with something in the theater release, which he wasn't. He prefers people call it the "extended edition."
So when the previous poster was referring to buying a director's cut, Phil made an attempt towards a joke that no one is getting.
Exactly. The show is clearly a ripoff of Cowboy Bebop.
Ha! If you do that you'll end up with the smelly geeks living on your property and eating dinner at your house whenever they feel like it. I.e. how Thoreau's deal with Emerson worked out.
Thoreau, "Yeah, umm, dude. I wanna like, crash on your lawn and build a house...get back to nature kinda thing. No big deal, I'll build all my own stuff and eat off the land...hey, you gonna eat all that bacon?"
It's not just you, quiddich is a sport that was clearly designed to be a sport that appears to be a team sport, similar to European Football, but in actuality is a convient way for Harry to demonstrate his HEROness.
Quiddich could be a truly exciting and awesome game, IF catching the snitch simply ended the game (none of this 150 points nonesense). That way, each team member would MATTER because if one team is behind and the snitch appears, the losing team has to pull together and gain points while their seeker tries to delay their opposite's catching of the seeker.
That rule modification would make for some really exciting, nailbiter scenes in which, say, Harry's team is down by 20 points. The snitch appears. Harry knows that he can't catch the snitch UNTIL his team pulls up those 20 points, so he tries to stay inbetween the snitch and the other team's seeker. His team knows that he can't keep the other seeker from the snitch forever, so they rally and try to score those 30 points. The other team knows that it is only a matter of time until their seeker can grab the snitch, so they play hard defense to keep Harry's team down until their seeker is able to do so.
There. Exciting, TEAM sport. Harry's role would still be important, and the book/movie scenes would be much more exciting because the entire team would be involved.
No, the original poster was correct. Quiddich is *clearly* a sport that Rowling designed to *look* like a team sport but in reality be a convenient facade that enables Harry to be a Hero(tm).
In the fourth book, she just changed the standard variation for the game for variety's sake.
Quiddich would be a MUCH more exciting game if catching the snitch simply ended the game, rather than ending it and adding 150 points. That way there would be a certain amount of strategy involved in catching the snitch (i.e. you wouldn't want to catch it while your team was behind, but they would realize this and would have to work hard to make sure that they were ahead when the snitch appears).
That would be truly cool.
Great post, I agree completely.
However, I'm not sure that people with those types of interests are a very high percentage of ticket sales for a movie like Star Wars or even Titanic.
That I readily agree with.
I guess we just disagree. To me, looking at either of those scenes -- detached from the movie -- would still be pretty cool.
The same goes for scenes like any of the space scenes in Starship Troopers, the view of the space ship at the beginning of Pitch Black, watching the T-1000 walk through the jail bars in Terminator 2, et cetera.
If what you say is true, why are graphic demos and concept art from upcoming movies (that one may or may not know any of the story to) so popular?
My friends and I will choose to watch some movies, *solely* on the basis that there will be cool special effects.
Memento or Frailty are good examples of how a movie doesn't need technical wizardry to tell a great story. Star Wars: The Phantom Menace is a great example of how the plot of the movie can be terrible, but the movie still be watchable due to the spectacular nature of its special effects.
True, things are best when the special effects blend together with the story (The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings) but it isn't required for great special effects.
Are you telling me that you couldn't just look at any scene from Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, separated from what little characterization and plot there is, and enjoy it for being kick-ass CGI?
Of course it wouldn't. That's an example of the "not having a story" and "depending on special effects" type of movie.
;-)
"Lost In Space" horrible movie, great special effects. I still don't see how a movie needs an emotional connection to make the special effects worthwhile.
I'd really like to meet these animation friends.
4, 5, and 6 may have had primitive effects, but the story telling was much better.
The effects in the recent movies may be ahead technologically, but the lack of good storytelling with those effects ruined the movie's ability to make good use of those shots.
Check again, that was what the person you are disagreeing with said.
Sorry, the VFX was better in the 4, 5, and 6 simply because the audience reacted to them.
Um...what? Is their a correlational relationship between the technical wizardry of special effects and the art of storytelling? A movie with a bad story (The Haunting, The Fifth Element, Final Fantasy) can still have incredibly great special effects. They aren't "Storytelling Effects", they are "Visual Effects."
-- Futurama "Where No Fan Has Gone Before"
If a child (or anyone for that matter) plays a video game, then goes on a murderous rampage, there has to be something wrong with him other than the fact that he plays games, ie he already has some serious issues.
Oookay. There are two problems with your argument.
will have those tendencies augmented by playing a video game that plays on those tendencies. (i.e. harm the child)
There is no causal correlation between playing violent video games and becoming violent. There is no evidence to show that if a violent child plays violent video games that child will demonstrate an increased tendency towards violence. In fact, a recent study by MIT, The University of California at LA, and the University of London showed that violent video games are potentially helpful to children. By allowing them to act out their fantasies in a setting designed for that purpose those fantasies are relagated to the fantasy world and farther removed from the real world.
Futhermore, there is strong evidence showing that the stronger something is prohibited by authority figures, the more attractive it becomes to children (and not just rebellious children). Especially if it is something that is banned for no readily apparent reason.
Kevin Smith rules, but there must have been conscripted workers or slaves hammering away at that second death star. Most likely they were still a few on the first one as well. Someone's gotta do the grunt work that requires a brain :-)
Not when there are civilians involved, or in the case of my argument conscripted (i.e. forced) workers.
I was just saying that most of the people I know don't view Yoda as a very good character and would be happy to see this plot twist put into play.
But I do believe your are correct, it just wouldn't fly with most of the fans.
Beloved?? Yoda? Sorry but I have to agree with Brin on this one. Yoda easily rivals the emperor in underhanded manipulation of those around him to get what he wants. Why didn't he tell Luke, oh by the way, Vader's your pop? He wanted to manipulate Luke into killing his own father, without him even realizing it.
... dark, than in the original trilogy. If nothing is going on behind the scenes with Yoda then GL is doing a terrible job of portraying Yoda as a wise and benevolent master.
Even the very first time I watched ESB and ROTJ I didn't understand Yoda's stretch of an excuse for his deviousness. The Phantom Menace and especially the Attack of the Clones have only deepened my misgivings about Yoda. He seems so much more
Good lord!
"I'll take the style of the Old Republic any day."
But where's the substance?
"You seem to be forgetting that it is your precious Empire that slaughtered millions in the destruction of Alderaan."
How many people were onboard the first Death Star, the second? C'mon man, you know the second had conscripted construction crews working full time even as the rebels attacked. Remember that they were having trouble getting the regular construction crews to work hard enough, and that they were going to redouble their efforts? How, exactly, do you think he was figuring that he would do that? Call a conference and just tell the crews to step on it?
Ah, yes. But that is another writer's interpretation of the rebel alliance. Sure it was approved by Lucasarts, perhaps even by Lucas himself, but it's still not part of the official movie canon.
I've actually just finished re-reading Zhan's series and I noticed a *lot* of similarities to the action scenes in Zhan's books and those in Attack of the Clones. Still, reading those books makes me all nostalgic for the span of time preceding The Phantom Menace. What Zhan and other SW writers came up with for the SW future is far, far better than Lucas' mangling of the SW past.
It should be working again now.
Check out the class thesis I did on the history of United States copyright. Pages 10+ are at least somewhat relevant.
"New balance sucks. Ecco rules the universe! Then again, I'm biased: I value my knees too much to be a runner. ;)"
Or you can have it both ways. I have a pair of Ecco boots for utilitarian purposes, and a pair of NB's for athletics.
Man, I always pictured R2D2 as a foul-mouthed repair droid. Some of his beeps even sound like angry versions of the "censor" beeps.
Another explanation could be a sketch from the old "I Love Lucy" show in which Lucy and Ethel were selling mayonaisse at 40 cents per quart. When Ricky discovered their scheme he added up the costs and figured that each quart cost them 80 cents to make.
Lucy's response was: "Well we'll make up for it in volume!"
Of course that could have been satirizing some issue that was current at the time of the show. *shrug*