Goodkind XXXVIII: The Great Tomato Showdown

[Myshkin]

[quote name='The Road To Awe' post='1455695' date='Jul 24 2008, 23.05']Terry Goodkind meets Alan Moore.[/quote]

That was beautiful.

[The Wolf Maid]

[quote name='Wyatt' post='1455675' date='Jul 25 2008, 13.22']Speaking of which...Wyatt/TRTA slash...I guess I'd be the uke. Shudder, shudder, shudder.[/quote]
But consider! TRTA would have to do all the work, if yaoi conventions are to be followed.

[quote name='The Road To Awe' post='1455695' date='Jul 25 2008, 14.05']Terry Goodkind meets Alan Moore.

Wyatt, coincidentally, is bishounen (and uke, as he says, but I was working on this post before he posted) the like of which you have never seen, while I am a total bara (and seme). Just so you get it right when you're slashing.[/quote]
I concur with Myshkin: Beautiful. I feel...honored I got mentioned there.

As for you and Wyatt, let the :smileysex: commence.

[The Anti-Targ]

[quote name='The Wolf Maid' post='1455474' date='Jul 25 2008, 13.19']Shh. Don't say that out loud. Might ruin my rep. :P

Thanks for the link.

And oh, the [url="http://www.legendoftheseeker.com/"]SoT trailer[/url] is out. It actually looks...somewhat OK.[/quote]

Nooooooooooo!!! How can they despoil Middle Earth by turning into the Realms of the SoT!!!!!

Now I know they won't use these beautiful lands for ASOIAF.

If the series comes here I don't know whether I'll be able to bring myself to watch it. Lots of our local actors getting work out of it though.

[Ecchi-Oni]

Commie death choosers who can't even live in the correct hemisphere doing Tairies masterpiece of truthiness? Blasphemy.

[Muttering Bill]

[quote name='TheKassi' post='1455691' date='Jul 25 2008, 01.57']I figure this is honestly a bit of PR. If they wanted a title more fitting of the whole series they could have gone with the name of the series. Its got a lot of advantages.[/quote]
Except that [i]Sword of Truth [/i]is an extrememly generic fantasy title (which is exactly the sort of impressions that Tairy wants to avoid giving to potential viewers). Wait, so is [i]Legend of the Seeker[/i]... :dunno:

And that trailor looks disappointingly... decent. But that doesn't mean anything; they can make anything look alright in a trailer. I'm still optimistic that this show is going to be terrible.

[Foreverlad]

[quote name='Muttering Bill' post='1456458' date='Jul 25 2008, 14.42']Except that [i]Sword of Truth [/i]is an extrememly generic fantasy title (which is exactly the sort of impressions that Tairy wants to avoid giving to potential viewers). Wait, so is [i]Legend of the Seeker[/i]... :dunno:

And that trailor looks disappointingly... decent. But that doesn't mean anything; they can make anything look alright in a trailer. I'm still optimistic that this show is going to be terrible.[/quote]

I don't know. The entire trailer seems a little flat, looks more like a sequel to a Narnia flick than Goodkind's Wizard's First Rule. I also can't understand going with Legend of the Seeker as the series title either. I understand that "Wizard's First Rule" doesn't work, and "Sword of Truth" focuses more on an object than the wielder of the object, but to remove all outward signs of Goodkind's brand name is either silly or utterly brilliant. It's silly in that it SHOULDN'T help book sales, but it's brilliant if someone else thinks the Goodkind name tarnishes a product. Since tairy chose the title himself, I'll go with silly.

I'm not a fan of the environment either. If it's cheaper to film in NZ, so be it, but up until you're deep in the tale, it all felt like a story taking place in the northeast U.S. to me.

[Werthead]

You're shitting me? Bruce Spence is Zedd? That's kind of awesome (he was the thoroughly twisted Train Man in the [b]Matrix[/b] sequels and the even more twisted Mouth of Sauron in [i]Return of the King[/i]; he was also in [i]Road Warrior[/i]).

Also, when I posted news of the trailer on [url="http://malazanworld.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1118&page=108"]Malazanempire[/url] it kind of broke the brains of the people posting there, and they had a freeform poetry-off in honour of the trailer (as you obviously would).

Frankly disturbing :stunned:

[Joanna vander Poele]

[quote name='Wyatt' post='1455675' date='Jul 24 2008, 22.22']Speaking of which...Wyatt/TRTA slash...I guess I'd be the uke. Shudder, shudder, shudder.[/quote]
Let's see some action :whip:

The trailer looks... all right. Dude playing Richard's kind of cute :P Might as well check it out for a laugh. The sad thing mainly is that this craphole series got picked up while much better, higher-quality fantasy are left in the dust, insofar as adaptions go.

Also, for the longest time I was unaware that John Galt was an Ayn Rand character and kept thinking, "Man, what did an Independent Canadian politican from my textbooks do to [i]you[/i] guys?"

[Nerdanel]

Re: [url="http://ofblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/fantasy-version-of-godwins-law.html"]This OF Blog of the Fallen link[/url] which I consider fair game since it got referred from the thread, which is how I found it

So, it appears that some people now think there is a law to the effect that "When the length of an Internet discussion about fantasy approaches infinity, the probability of an author getting compared to Goodkind approaches one." (I don't think there's enough evidence for a new law, myself.)

I probably sound bitter at Moorcock. It's because I'm an ex-fan and so have a lot of emotion invested in him. I really liked - no, adored - those early Elric stories. The Dreaming City was my favorite short story ever when I was 12. (Nowadays that probably would be Tolkien's Akallabêth or something by Clark Ashton Smith.) I just reread The Dreaming City and see the flaws in it I didn't when I was younger but I can also see what I liked so very much. That what I liked is largely missing in newer Moorcock.

This is not a unique situation. I loved the first three Earthsea books and HATED Tehanu, although I must say that the trend towards Tehanu was already visible in the earlier books. I've also read a couple of late Earthsea short stories and hated them too. LeGuin's writing about Earthsea changed in ways very alike to Moorcock. Goodkind similarly changed as his series progressed. I actually liked Wizard's First Rule, although by the time I tried rereading it my English skills (as a second language, which should explain my lateness) had developed enough that I noticed how badly it was written.

Being the analytical person that I am, I have in the past formulated the idea that there are two basic ways of being bad at world-building. I call these ways the Eddings way (meticulous, yet utterly mechanical and unrealistic planning: countries that have existed practically unchanging for thousands of years, cookie-cutter national personalities, no cultural exchange...) and the Goodkind way (making things up as one goes along, throwing in cool stuff with little justification) after the authors who best exemplify them. Moorcock might call them the Law style and the Chaos style. However, I think it uncontroversial that Moorcock himself uses the Goodkindian Chaos style.

I've already said that Moorcock and Goodkind hold opposite opinions, so any complaint about the loathsomeness of Objectivism (loathsomeness about which I agree, by the way) is completely misplaced here. The problem is how they have more and more moved into propagandizing in their fiction, which I think is a bad thing. Both of them have even admitted in interviews that they have written novels in order to convey a philosophical point. (Do I need to dig up the Moorcock quote for you?)

Fans of Goodkind have written that he's really a nice person. However, he is known for saying obnoxious stuff in interviews, including denigrating the entire genre of fantasy (which he claims not to have read). Moorcock denigrates entire wide subsets of fantasy on grounds that do not hold water on a closer look (and are too long to discuss here, so that I'm thinking of starting a topic just for debunking them) while also claiming not to have more than skimmed a major target of his hatred, the failings of which he dissects in great and misguided detail. If Goodkind's comments on fantasy are obnoxious, why aren't Moorcock's on Tolkien?

I wasn't talking about anyone's clothes. I have no idea how Moorcock dresses.

[Myshkin]

[quote name='Nerdanel' post='1456837' date='Jul 25 2008, 16.43']If Goodkind's comments on fantasy are obnoxious, why aren't Moorcock's on Tolkien?[/quote]
I think they are. Moorcock's comments on Tolkien have always seemed like sour grapes to me (and I have never really been a Tolkien fan).

[The Road To Awe]

[quote name='Joanna Nox' post='1456824' date='Jul 25 2008, 16.23']Let's see some action :whip:[/quote]

Wyatt's very shy. He wouldn't like all those people looking at him, especially since I make him wear seifuku and buruma a few sizes too small. The skirt on the seifuku is delightfully short.

Can't you just hear his soft words, "oh, Andrew-sama, so embarassed! All of these people looking at Wyatt-chan!" and his soft cheeks turning beet red.

[Myshkin]

[quote name='The Road To Awe' post='1456905' date='Jul 25 2008, 17.58']Wyatt's very shy. He wouldn't like all those people looking at him, especially since I make him wear seifuku and buruma a few sizes too small. The skirt on the seifuku is delightfully short.

Can't you just hear his soft words, "oh, Andrew-sama, so embarassed! All of these people looking at Wyatt-chan!" and his soft cheeks turning beet red.[/quote]
This is fast becoming a very engrossing subplot in the epic story that is the Tairy Threads.

[Wyatt]

So I guess this is the part of the franchise were we try to be all hip with the cool anime kids? Like Marvel Mangaverse?

[The Road To Awe]

Marvel Mangaverse . . . Good Lord, Wyatt. What's next? Chick Tracts? F.A.T.A.L. (as an aside, does F.A.T.A.L. have rules for almost rape, or just full-on rape)?

Maybe. I'm fixing to try my hand at recasting the scene from Kingdom Come where Wonder Woman confronts Superman in the Fortress of Solitude over abandoning humanity. It takes a lot of work because recasting the Man of Tommorow as anything resembling Richard Rahl is . . . difficult.

[Larry.]

[quote name='Nerdanel' post='1456837' date='Jul 25 2008, 18.43']Re: [url="http://ofblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/fantasy-version-of-godwins-law.html"]This OF Blog of the Fallen link[/url] which I consider fair game since it got referred from the thread, which is how I found it

So, it appears that some people now think there is a law to the effect that "When the length of an Internet discussion about fantasy approaches infinity, the probability of an author getting compared to Goodkind approaches one." (I don't think there's enough evidence for a new law, myself.)

I probably sound bitter at Moorcock. It's because I'm an ex-fan and so have a lot of emotion invested in him. I really liked - no, adored - those early Elric stories. The Dreaming City was my favorite short story ever when I was 12. (Nowadays that probably would be Tolkien's Akallabêth or something by Clark Ashton Smith.) I just reread The Dreaming City and see the flaws in it I didn't when I was younger but I can also see what I liked so very much. That what I liked is largely missing in newer Moorcock.

This is not a unique situation. I loved the first three Earthsea books and HATED Tehanu, although I must say that the trend towards Tehanu was already visible in the earlier books. I've also read a couple of late Earthsea short stories and hated them too. LeGuin's writing about Earthsea changed in ways very alike to Moorcock. Goodkind similarly changed as his series progressed. I actually liked Wizard's First Rule, although by the time I tried rereading it my English skills (as a second language, which should explain my lateness) had developed enough that I noticed how badly it was written.

Being the analytical person that I am, I have in the past formulated the idea that there are two basic ways of being bad at world-building. I call these ways the Eddings way (meticulous, yet utterly mechanical and unrealistic planning: countries that have existed practically unchanging for thousands of years, cookie-cutter national personalities, no cultural exchange...) and the Goodkind way (making things up as one goes along, throwing in cool stuff with little justification) after the authors who best exemplify them. Moorcock might call them the Law style and the Chaos style. However, I think it uncontroversial that Moorcock himself uses the Goodkindian Chaos style.

I've already said that Moorcock and Goodkind hold opposite opinions, so any complaint about the loathsomeness of Objectivism (loathsomeness about which I agree, by the way) is completely misplaced here. The problem is how they have more and more moved into propagandizing in their fiction, which I think is a bad thing. Both of them have even admitted in interviews that they have written novels in order to convey a philosophical point. (Do I need to dig up the Moorcock quote for you?)

Fans of Goodkind have written that he's really a nice person. However, he is known for saying obnoxious stuff in interviews, including denigrating the entire genre of fantasy (which he claims not to have read). Moorcock denigrates entire wide subsets of fantasy on grounds that do not hold water on a closer look (and are too long to discuss here, so that I'm thinking of starting a topic just for debunking them) while also claiming not to have more than skimmed a major target of his hatred, the failings of which he dissects in great and misguided detail. If Goodkind's comments on fantasy are obnoxious, why aren't Moorcock's on Tolkien?

I wasn't talking about anyone's clothes. I have no idea how Moorcock dresses.[/quote]

I think something got lost in translation, since my post was a satire there making fun of making facile arguments that connect another author to Goodkind. So, needless to say, I disagree with that first bit of yours. Now onto the rest:

Knowing that you are an ex-fan of Moorcock and Le Guin helps, as now I can work against my first reaction of the jilted lover/ex-fan. What you basically describe is what didn't work for [i]you[/i], but for a great many others, Moorcock and Le Guin's further developments as writers worked. Second, there is no effective counter provided to a near-consensus among those who are well-read; generalizations are provided supported only by personal anecdotes. Fine, I'll just disagree and dismiss your opinions on this as being but personal opinions, since tastes vary.

Third, the "propaganda" bit hasn't been proven or disproven, so I'll have to leave that out, leaving me only with the conclusion that you just don't like the authors now and that's that. Again, nothing really substantive in the way of justifying connections to Goodkind, since he doesn't have the support of SFWA, since there aren't legions of writers citing him as an influence, since nothing he has produced has been cited as a "literary" piece or influence, unlike the iconic Elric (flaws or not in the writing, in the storytelling he has influenced quite a few, including Steven Erikson, it seems) or the myriad feminist SF/fantasy writers who cite Le Guin as a seminal influence. And as for your notion that Moorcock's ideas "don't hold water," having read the latest revision of his [i]Wizardry & Wild Romance[/i], I'd have to conclude that he was quite restrained with his criticisms, which in many cases could and perhaps should have been taken much further. I can only conclude that you have a disliking for wide swaths of fantasy fiction and that is your prerogative. I just don't agree with it.

[Myshkin]

DF, it sounds as if you're arguing that being a good writer excuses you from ever being wrong. Moorcock is an SFWA Grandmaster so he can say whatever he wants without ever being wrong. Tairy is not, and so can not.

[Larry.]

No, what I'm arguing is that Moorcock has more "authority" to make comments on the field considering his background. He too can be incorrect. But I'd be more apt to place more weight on his words than on certain others because of his experience and skills. To put it in a way that ironically comes close to Godwin territories, my expertise is in the late Weimar/Nazi era on cultural/religious issues, with some of that straying into parts on the Holocaust. I happen to be a Functionalist in regards to that debate and while there are Intentionalists who could shoot things down, I would hope people would be more willing to consider the opinions of a Ph.D. in his/her area over those of a MA in the same field (me) because of the greater proven track record and experience. Same would hold true in this sort of debate. Moorcock has a background that is wide-ranging and deep. Not all are going to agree with his opinions, but due to said background and reputation, I'd argue that he'd be better worth paying attention to than to an opponent who is relatively unversed in the field.

[The Wolf Maid]

[quote name='Chriskele' post='1456657' date='Jul 26 2008, 04.56']I mean this question sincerely:

Do you think the girl who is playing Klan had her agent say something to the effect of "If this series is a hit and lasts, you will be depicted as having almost been raped roughly 10 times. Are you OK with that?"[/quote]
No.

[quote name='Werthead' post='1456795' date='Jul 26 2008, 06.52']Also, when I posted news of the trailer on [url="http://malazanworld.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1118&page=108"]Malazanempire[/url] it kind of broke the brains of the people posting there, and they had a freeform poetry-off in honour of the trailer (as you obviously would).

Frankly disturbing :stunned:[/quote]
...Well, at least they're creative.

[quote]Can't you just hear his soft words, "oh, Andrew-sama, so embarassed! All of these people looking at Wyatt-chan!" and his soft cheeks turning beet red.[/quote]
I find it a little disturbing that I can actually hear that voice. I must be reading to much yaoi manga.

I can also imagine what's going to happen next. :stunned:

[Larry.]

Sounds like you need to be reading [i]Letters to Penthouse[/i] as a cure for your yaoi-mania ;)

[The Wolf Maid]

Can't get Penthouse over here. Just [i]FHM[/i] and apparently, [i]Playboy[/i].