The Letters to the Editor department is intended to be a forum for our readers to express their own opinions and ideas. While we appreciate the many complimentary letters we receive each day, you won't find them on this page. Instead, you will find letters that go beyond or even contradict what we have written, letters that offer a different perspective and provide a different view of science fiction. If you would like to submit a letter, please use our feedback form or send a message to scifiweekly@scifi.com.
-- Scott Edelman, Editor-in-Chief
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TV Execs Aren't Always the Problem
udos for the Algis Budrys interview! I found his comment, "science fiction isn't really science fiction. It's technology fiction," particularly thought-provoking. After reading the interview I can better appreciate why he's at least as famous for his criticism as he is for his writing. I think this is your best interview yet. Hope to see more of this caliber in the future.
Something bothered me about Noel Duffy's letter ("Quality SF Always Gets Slaughtered"), and it took me a while to pin it down. "It seems that truly artistic and creative ideas are the bane of existence for the almighty television network executives. Every time a writer comes up with something original, the brass are never secure until it has been chopped up, watered down and reconstituted into a format they can easily plug into their programming periodic table of formula entertainment." One gets this vivid mental picture of the valiant Neo and his companions trying to get their new TV show past the watchful eyes of the Agents. ... There are certainly cases where shows have been tampered with, much to their detriment, but is this always the case? I think that blaming the Soulless-Executives-Who-Don't-Understand-Art for canceling and/or altering our favorite programs is just a little too glib to be true in every instance. For instance, if a show is a critical success, but watched only by one person out of every hundred thousand, is the network obligated to keep it on the air? And since SF programming tends to require a slightly higher budget than your average soap opera, I can't say that I'm too surprised that the network would want to keep a closer eye on things.
And since people want to know in advance that they're backing a winner, there tends to be some unfortunate second-guessing at times. Still, given human nature, I'd be willing to bet that, for every executive who's ruined/cancelled a series through meddling, there is one who has actively helped a series by doing the same thing--and probably eight more who haven't felt the need to mess with things at all. Most studio executives are probably more intelligent and tasteful than we tend to give them credit for. Unfortunately it's the bad ones who make the biggest impression and color our perceptions.
While I'm sort of on the subject, I've just finished reading Adventures in the Screen Trade by William Goldman, and I heartily recommend it to anyone looking for some sort of insight as to what sorts of people and events can affect the quality of a motion picture. For one thing, the director's influence is not normally as strong as most people believe.
Also, regarding Justin Graham's comment ("Imported Anime is Getting Worse"), "The influx of anime on American television must stop!": Good luck, Justin. You might try going down to the shore to prevent the tide from coming in while you're at it. Anime is becoming more popular with each passing week, and everyone wants to get in on the next Pokemon. True, Card Captor Sakura and Escaflowne should serve as examples of How-Not-to-do-Anime-on-American-TV, but these are the exceptions rather than the rule. And it's a relatively simple matter to pick up uncut versions of both series on DVD. The popularity of anime has made it much easier to obtain, and I can't help but think that that's a good thing. I mean, there are TV commercials for Cardcaptors merchandise, for crying out loud! It used to be that you could only buy Clow cards at a Japanese import shop, and now they're advertising them on TV. There are Gundam kits at Toys 'R' Us! You can't find anime videos at Kmart yet, but give them time. I can remember when the only place you could find anime fans and merchandise was at comic book and science fiction conventions. True, the new fans don't understand the hobby, have no respect for the classics, are only into the superficial aspects, yadda yadda yadda. But the popularity of the form as a whole has made it easier for me to get my hands on the stuff that I personally think is good. Here's hoping the trend continues!
Justin also mentions the dubbing on Outlaw Star and Gundam Wing (and Vision of Escaflowne.) I don't know. I pretty much take bad dubbing in stride. Not everyone can afford to hire Neil Gaiman to do their dub script after all. I rather enjoyed Outlaw Star and had no problems with the dub (if you want bad dubs, check out some of the anime fare that airs on the Encore Action channel. Blue Seed is fairly good but it seems to be the exception.) I prefer subtitles when I can get them, but since not everyone can read them (some anime fans are dyslexic; others have trouble reading fast enough to keep up with the subs) I don't regard dubbing as the Sin Against Nature that some anime fans seem to. The quality of voice-acting on the anime dubs that I've seen on TV hasn't really been appreciably worse than some of the voice-acting on the regular American cartoons. I'm willing to overlook a bad dub if there's a decent story and/or characters to reward me.
Stewart Tame
sbt@ans.net
Kirk is Still the Best Captain
s a long time sci-fi and Star Trek fan, I wanted to add my thoughts to the Kirk question. I for one was extremely disappointed in the way he died. While the death of Spock was gut-wrenching, Kirk's real death--his death on Enterprise B saving lives the way he and Gene Roddenberry always said he would go out--was ripped away from the fans without proper actor reaction on screen just to promote Picard and his gang. Kirk's death with Picard just wasn't a memorable heroic death. It was half-hearted. Unlike Spock's death, after Kirk died no one on screen talked about him--and yet we were told for years that Kirk was Riker's hero and role model!
I think this lack of respect for a beloved character is the reason some fans want to give the screen Kirk (the only one who is real according to the rules set by the Great Bird of the Galaxy) another try. But we fans must accept reality. The actor who plays our beloved Kirk is older, the owners of the screen rights do not want him and his castmates to make an on-screen return and thus we have the stories--not the return-to-life horrible dribble--but those pages that tell untold stories from Kirk's time with his original Enterprise and crew. No one tells these tales better than Diane Carey.
As for Picard being killed off, I vote yes! He was never a great captain. Be honest, if you were trapped in a horrible situation, stranded somewhere, would you want to place your life in the hands of Kirk--who never gave a moment's thought to risking everything to save the life of a man under his command, or Picard--who sat on the bridge as Riker agonized over lost love and said "Is it time to go?" or when Worf's brother's planet was being destroyed said, "It's hard to watch these things?" Picard is thoughtless middle-management--even non-Starfleet people made these comments during the Borg attack when he simply ripped parts from his former officers now turned Borg--or when he killed them as they called to him to help. Too bad this was not Riker's response to Picard when he became a Borg! Kirk was on screen with his TV crew for three years and was closer to them than Picard after
seven years--seven years and he barely can come to a poker game as a friend!
My advice: make Picard the paper-pushing admiral he always wanted to be and give Riker the helm. And a married Riker would be a nice change--officers can have families! Just a thought. I look forward to hearing my fellow fans' opinions.
Gloria Hoffner
gloriah@phillynews.com
Patrick Stewart Can't Be Replaced
just read the letter by Virgil Yancy ("Picard Must Be Replaced, Not Killed"). I agree that Patrick Stewart cannot be replaced by another actor portraying Capt. Picard. He is Picard, no other actor would do justice to the character. Greed may play a role in larger salaries, but the knowledge of the character and the sense of being the character also legitimizes a larger salary than someone just starting a new character would get (unless we are talking a "big ticket actor").
However, Virgil got a couple of facts wrong in his letter. The original pilot "The Cage" was never seen by the general TV audience until a few years ago. Parts of the pilot were used in the two-part "The Menagerie," because they had the film and could use it to save money on an episode of Star Trek, a show that had trouble getting production money out of the network. The original actor who played Pike, Jeffrey Hunter, was not used for that episode because he was not available at the time and the producers figured that since he was disfigured anyway, that any actor could portray Pike. It was actually the "suits" at NBC that did not like the original pilot the way it was, they thought it was too "cerebral" and wanted a little more action. They decided on William Shatner who could give a little more flair to the captain of the Enterprise.
No one could replace William Shatner or Patrick Stewart in their respective parts. They could, however, have new actors portray them as younger versions of themselves, after all this was done with Patrick Stewart in the season six Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Tapestry."
As we all know, in science fiction, almost anything is possible.
Gary Magid
SCIFIREAD@AOL.com
Two Actors Shouldn't Play Picard
hile I agree that Picard should not be played by another actor ("Picard Must Be Replaced, Not Killed"), phasing him out and finally forcing a promotion on Wil Riker would be a better option than getting another Picard.
M.A.S.H. replaced Col. Blake with Col. Potter. Bewitched replaced Dick York with Dick Sargent (a virtual wash because they looked so much alike) and Alice Ghostly with the other Gladys Cravitz. It's been done both ways. I vote for promoting Riker and having Patrick Stewart do a cameo as Picard. Money or not, he defines the role for most fans.
I also would like to point out a flaw in Virgil Yancey's reasoning regarding the original Star Trek series and Captain Pike. The viewers never saw Capt. Christopher Pike until the original pilot for Star Trek, "The Cage," was reworked into the two-part episode "The Menagerie." It was not the viewers who did not like Capt. Pike, it was the network execs who did not like the story line ... "Too cerebral."
Diane Catanzaro
catanz1@mail.com
Fans Should Have Lemon Protection
n response to Dave Adams' letter ("Tribes 2 May Bug the Unwary") about bugs in Tribes 2, I found it amusing that he cites the auto-patch feature. You see, mine was one of the systems on which the auto-patcher would not work. I had to manually hunt down a patch so I could get the game to even start.
I wish more companies would make some sort of promise like the Mac software company did when the promised that if any of their software shipped with bugs, their head of QA would eat a plate of bugs.
Just so you know, he did.
Instead of new laws protecting the software manufacturers, I would like to see some sort of mandate making them accountable for poor products. If I can buy a dysfunctional car and get "lemon" protection, why can't I do the same with software?
Sean P. Tomlinson
steelrat@slip.net
Writers Rarely Create Real Kids
ever do I ever ... ever say that kids in general are stupid ("Lexx Puts Star Trek to Shame"). Past the age of 6 they usually have fully-developed brains and the only reason they may seem stupid is because we keep them in a sea of ignorance. In reality, kids do not behave at all like those seen in most sci-fi. I don't blame the children, instead I blame the inbred, ignoramus writers that create "loveable," "happy" and airheaded little morons that they think are somehow cute. It only serves to infuriate me and make me turn off the television when I'm watching some perfectly good sci-fi and some poorly-written kid does something incredibly stupid and the entire show revolves around saving the idiot child (note: children are never blamed for their foolishness, they are told that they just don't know any better!) or repairing the damage done.
Using children to facilitate a plot such as that is sheer laziness and is really overused and boring. For example, an episode of Star Trek: Voyager, Tuvok is stranded on a planet where he encounters some simpleton children. They are slowly killed during the entire episode. But the true gut-wrenching, blowing stomach acid out my mouth scene was when a little girl was hanging around Tuvok, then she goes back to her sleeping bag near the other children. Suddenly, they all get up and go over to Tuvok. "We can't sleep" she explains. "I think the fire is dying out! tell us a story!!" they all say in the sappiest voices possible! Then he sings to them! I only wish I had had a knife with me that I might hang myself by my intestines. An example of good writing for kids was in Dune. Though it wasn't the greatest sci-fi ever, Muad'ib's sister rules! And what about that kid from The Sixth Sense?? He was pretty cool.
So why is it that in reality when a little kid does something that gets them into significant life threatening danger (doesn't happen nearly as often as Star Trek/Aliens would have you think), they usually die/get badly injured? It's because nothing original/realistic could ever be dreamed of
by the writers of Star Trek.
Andrew Pfleiderer
apfleiderer@home.com
Puppeteering Has a Long Tradition
aving read all the backlash against the so-called "Muppets" of Farscape ("Muppets, Robots and Kids Must Go"), I would like to point out that puppeteering as a craft goes back thousands of years and is a time-honored and ancient tradition. Not too long ago, especially in Eastern societies, puppet theater was the art form of royalty, as cherished and revered as Shakespeare.
How have we, in the 21st century, forgotten the value of this wonderful theatrical tool? Long live the "Muppets," and let's get rid of all the Bumpy Forehead pseudo-aliens that rule much of SF today. It is almost certain that the real "aliens" out there, somewhere, look nothing at all like humans. Which means if we want to do SF that tries to be "realistic," we must depart from the Homo Sapiens body plan and go for the gusto, on scales both large and small. Farscape is defying the Star Trek norm with characters like Rygel, Pilot, and others. Why should the fact that these characters are puppets on the set detract from the fact that they "live" nicely on screen?
It's impressive enough when a film or TV series avoids the easy cop-out of humanized aliens who speak perfect English, and instead uses bizarre or otherwise technically challenging life forms. Must we be such clods that we can't appreciate the fact that this marvelous craft lives on in some of our
most cherished modern SF epics? After all, Yoda was a "Muppet" more than any of Farscape's aliens. And do the same people that ridicule Farscape go after Yoda and all the other Star Wars puppetry, too?
Brad R. Torgersen
subodeon@qwest.net
Muppets Have a Place in Media
egarding the responses to "Muppets" ("Muppets, Robots and Kids Must Go") in Science Fiction (or other media), one simply has to look at the stunning work of art called The Dark Crystal to realize that puppets have their place in the genre. This may be the pinnacle example of puppets used perfectly in a film.
While Rygel from Farscape isn't the finest example, Pilot certain works well as a believable alien. Better than a man dressed in a costume would look.
If viewing The Dark Crystal isn't enough, go watch Labyrinth, in which the puppets are some of the star players. Yes, it's more of a children's movie, but there was no compromising on the puppetry.
The tradition of puppetry in genre media goes back quite a ways, and while many strides have been made, not the least significant belong to Gerry and Sylvia Anderson for their magnificent work in the 1960s with puppets and miniatures in such classic TV series' as Supercar, Stingray, Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet.
Anyone thinking puppets have no place in genre media hasn't seen enough of the media.
Sean Huxter
sean@turbinegames.com
Puppets Help the Alien Seem Alien
'm feeling particularly loquacious today, so I'm going to jump into the "Muppets, Robots, and Kids" fray ("Muppets, Robots and Kids Must Go").
I'm going to put this simply enough. I'm tired of the "anthropomorphic alien with the headpiece of the week" perpetrated on us by a long line of shows better left unnamed (to avoid a jihad). I fondly remember creatures like the insectoid alien in Babylon 5, for example.
Unfortunately, CGI tends to be a little too expensive to use for a major character, and, even if a show can use it, generally it's not at a convincing quality level. So, it seems to leave us at an impasse: Either we have a two-armed, two-legged critter running around with silly headware to represent the diversity of life in the universe, or something like Henson's done.
Now, the only reason anyone's bandied about the term "Muppet" is due to Brian Henson's family name. As much as I respect (and miss) his father's work, I find Brian's work at least a generation ahead. In my (less than humble) opinion, Farscape has offered its devotees, of which I happily count myself one, a superlative and coherent visual style not often seen in mainstream science fiction. I find characters like Rygel and Pilot to offer a certain visual solidity that makes the illusion that much more convincing, and I challenge the critics to find a cost-effective solution to Henson's puppeteering that works as nicely as his current work in Farscape does. I'm tired of hearing people critique without offering solutions.
Oh, and if anyone badmouths Pilot again? They can just go frell off ...
Sean P. Tomlinson
steelrat@slip.net
Puppets Often More Real Than Kids
arscape has a great blend of puppets and actors ("Muppets, Robots and Kids Must Go"). I agree with the people that have said not all species should look alike. There are many different forms. Pilot and Rygel are wonderful characters that have many different personality traits that can be used to better the show. I don't think about them being puppets while I'm watching Farscape; they are controlled and written so well that there is no reason to. Children playing roles however, I think is getting old. Most movies I've seen with a child has had similar plot lines. Our society has similar views on how children should act. Cute, educated, silly, whatever it may be, it is usually done in excess. From what I've seen, Farscape has been mildly successful in showing kids with a little more intelligence and maturation than usual. I encourage writers to come up with ground-breaking children/teen performances.
Robots were also discussed, and I agree with the person who said that it was logical that we would use robots for menial tasks in the future where people could be hurt or would spend more time. Robots could be very functional and are, to me, just advanced machines. We have machines now clearly and later on they will advance.
As the series has progressed, I have loved watching the characters evolve and explore their universe. The plots have been very creative, especially the ones dealing with time portals, the ongoing worm holes, and death. I heard someone say that the political side of that side of universe will be discussed and I can't wait to see where they go with that.
Brixton Hokkiado
soundandvision@davidbowie.com
Humans as Energy is Inefficient
he trouble with humans as energy source [in The Matrix] isn't that it would be inefficient ("Thermodynamics Law is Not Broken"). It's that they aren't a source, they're a sink. Comparing them with other "inefficient" energy sources such as fossil fuels misses the point. In the case of fossil fuels, we are looking at an open system (from the perspective of the well drillers). It doesn't matter how inefficiently fossil fuels produce energy, nor how inefficiently that energy was stored; we don't have to put that energy in. What matters is how much more energy you get out of them than it took to extract the fuel from the ground--which is a lot.
Similarly, you could use humans as an energy source by kidnapping them from somewhere and eating them, burning them, or running them on a treadmill until they starved. It's inefficient, but you didn't have to put in the energy to grow them to adulthood and keep them alive, so it doesn't matter. The moment you start feeding them and keeping them warm etc. as the machines did in The Matrix, you've closed the system. At that point you fall victim to the fact that you can't get more out than you put in. Period. Even serious recycling doesn't get around the fact that you burn food inside yourself, and getting it ready to burn again requires lots of energy (which we get free from the sun via solar batteries called "plants").
Now if someone says, well what the machines use is some kind of mystical "life energy," well that's mysticism and science has nothing to say. Short of that, and it certainly seemed in the movie as if they were simply claiming humans as electrical batteries, the science is a dead loss. Still a fun movie mind you--I really wasn't expecting a plausible premise when I went in. I was expecting them to "need guns. Lots of guns."
Rufus Polson
dpolson@sfu.ca
Don't Compare Buffy and Prisoner
have to agree with Greg Crider's letter ("Disney Delays Anime Releases"): Disney does seem to be taking their time releasing Hayao Miyazaki's movies in the U.S. I like to imagine that they've assigned the entire project to one person working in a forgotten closet in a subbasement somewhere. I suppose that we fans could always try a petition. Such tactics worked in persuading them to include a
Japanese language track on the Princess Mononoke DVD release after all. I suppose they have their reasons for all of the delay. Apparently projects like remaking Escape to Witch Mountain (or more precisely, remaking it again. Anyone else remember the 1995 TV movie version?) take precedence...
And I'm sure that Brian Robinson ("Buffy and Prisoner Share Silence") meant well when he wrote, apparently with a straight face, "Buffy is one of the few shows that has aired that can match the intelligence and depth of The Prisoner." My reaction to this was
probably somewhat like that of a college literary professor hearing a student say of Moby Dick, "So it's kind of like Jaws, right?" I admit to having seen only about three or four episodes of Buffy, but it seems that comparing it to The Prisoner is question of apples and oranges. The two series are just so different in terms of intent and storytelling techniques that comparisons between the two are only likely to annoy fans of both series, perhaps more so the Prisoner fans.
Although now I've got the image in my head. Buffy wakes up in a strange room in a Welsh resort town ... "Where am I?" "In the village ... " Argh!
Stewart Tame
sbt@ans.net
Authors Are Admired Over Actors
always enjoy Scott Edelman's editorials. I especially enjoyed his comments about "Longing to Live in Ray Bradbury's Toy Store". I admire authors much more than actors or athletes. Most people here in Portland, OR are excited about a movie filming here, but I'm much more thrilled that I had jury duty with Ursula K. Le Guin a couple of weeks ago. And I will always hold it a badge
of honor that Harlan Ellison once called me a bad name (in jest) at a book signing. In 20 years everyone may say "Who?" when you mention Tom Cruise, but for most of the writers named in the editorial, their careers have already outlasted the pop stars of today.
Rachel Sinclair
bluegirl@teleport.com
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