Category: TV

No Bones To Pick With Hannibal

On By Lou W. SytsmaIn 2013 TV, LifeLeave a comment

There are many things our family loves about living out in Western Canada – the open spaces, the mountains etc but the weather can be a bit trying at times.  The last week of April saw spring like conditions finally arise only to have it all undone by snow the last two days.  It is very deflating to wake up to see snow falling at this time of the year.


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Hannibal  – really enjoying this atmospheric and intelligent take on Thomas Harris‘s characters.  Especially the show’s serialization of story – not killers! – carrying the impact of Graham’s shooting of serial killer Hobbes in the third episode.  The show has done a great job of avoiding the case of the week syndrome that the CSI clones do.

The sub-textual handling of Bella Crawford’s – so nice to see Gina Torres again –  cancer and Graham’s  realization of it during the questioning of a suspect was wonderfully played. Both actors gave very controlled but amazingly poignant portrayals.  Highlight of the episode.

And a wonderful example that what is NOT being said or is only being intimated, can be just as powerful, even not more so, that what is being shown or told.

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Prophet of Bones by Ted Kosmatka  – literally a real page turner.  I knocked off over a 100 pages in my first sitting.  This is a Michael Crichtonesque style thriller.  The prose is lean and clean – complex emotional beats and ideas reduced to tight single lines of writing.  It all revolves around a unique find of ancient human bones and the book is filled with much scientific jargon around genetics but never becomes dull or boring.  The book dwells in the same conspiracy theater that books such as The DaVinci Code do.

The interesting thing about the author is that he works as a writer for the videogame company Valve – maker of the classic Half Life series and Portal games.  He writes the same brisk pace and economy of words employed with video games.  Not my normal cup of tea but I enjoyed.

The major caveat with the book – as with most books of this type or TV shows – Hello Lost & X-Files – the buildup surpasses the payoff.

Slow Spring

On By Lou W. SytsmaIn 2013 TV, 2013 WritingLeave a comment

Spring continues to snooze.  Third week of April and finally the snow has begun to recede.  Most of it was lost due to overnight/early morning rain late in the week.

Now the outdoors look like a great sandstorm has blown through.  Gritty streets and sidewalks bear witness to the amount of sand that is used during the winter months.  Soon the street and sidewalk cleaners will be out gathering it all up for reuse next year.

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Not much new on the TV front. Still processing the conclusion of Spartacus.  It’s been a while that a show has engaged that emotionally and just been pure entertaining from start to finish.  What a great cast of memorable characters.

Been watching the latest superhero show – Arrow – in big gulps.  The show moves quickly and is not afraid to shake things up.  The cast is uniformly good.

I don’t feel the show has adequately explained Oliver Queen’s modus operandi with him dispatching the bad guys with arrows.  If the focus was kept squarely on the names in his book hit list – after giving the victim of the week a chance first to turn themselves in – it would be more palatable.

The problem is the bulk of his dispatching occurs with the hired hands.  Yeah they are bad guys but Queen never gives these red shirts the same consideration that he gives to the named offenders.  A bit of a conundrum the show just skates around.

The real delight has been in the guest casting the show has pulled off.  Actors such as Seth Gabel from Fringe, Manu Bennett as Craxus from Spartacus, James Callis and Rekha Sharma from Battlestar Galactica, and Ben Browder from Farscape.  None of them get a real chance to develop their characters as its usually a one and done deal. The exception has been Manu who has had a recurring role playing an Australian Secret Service Agent – Slade Wilson in flashbacks from Queen’s time on the island where he was shipwrecked for 5 years.

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Been reading self published author Hugh Howey’s Wool which hit a chord with readers where it was available as an e-book in the Amazon store.  From there it has been picked up by a traditional publisher and sold in paperback.  Howey is on the vanguard of a new publishing path that is now possible with the continuing rise of eBooks which bypass traditional methods.

It’s still takes a lot of luck to get a book published and noticed that way and you have to have the skills to back it all up.  So far from the reading I have done of Wool,  Howey has proven himself to be able to let his work speak for himself.  The book is well written, technically and artistically.  It’s a page turner peopled with engaging characters all taking part in a bigger story that has interesting twists.  Some characters, especially the bad guys, are a little two dimensional but there have been traditionally published books with far worse examples.

Wool is an enjoyable and entertaining read which I highly recommend if you like dystopian/mystery/thriller types of stories.

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Went to my second meeting of the Edmonton Writer’s Group and have been enjoying myself.  It is very interesting to listen to other people’s feedback from the same story.  Opinions vary widely and I am constantly amazed at the differing reactions to story points that I either had no problem with or even considered.

It’s also evident that there is a great support structure here as the group keeps each other apprised of upcoming writer/book events.  It is also been helpful from a motivational perspective too.  Glad I checked it and I will continue to attend.  One more meeting and I will be considered a full time member.

Does that mean I earn my first letter?

Double Feature Victory

On By Lou W. SytsmaIn 2013 TVLeave a comment

My, my.  Where does the time fly?

It’s been over a week since my last blog entry and the time gap is due to how busy I have been keeping.  Finished reading Owen King’s wonderful novel – Double Feature, saw the last two episodes of Spartacus – wonderful end to an emotionally engaging series, and have been nursing a sore back back to health.  The back injury was perplexing – was out walking the dog, felt something shift in my spine which caused the muscles in my lower back to seize up and then leave me with intermittent spasms over the rest of the week.  Each day the muscles relaxed more.  It has taken over a week for the spasms to cease.

It’s looking like Mother Nature didn’t make the mailing list for this year’s calendar. Mid-April  and we are still getting snow. Not just here but all over the country. Climate change is a much more apropos term than the more popular global warming tag bandied about these days.  Anyhow, time for a bit deeper dive into…

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Double Feature is a true delight! Congrats to Owen King. I am left with the conclusion that he is a man wiser than his years.
DF is a book filled with great characters, great life insights. It covers the spectrum of emotions and several set pieces that made me laugh outright at several passages.  There are some great ruminations on the nature of life as well.
What more can one ask for in a book?

Did anyone figure out who Bea’s boyfriend is?  I inclined to think it’s – GASP! – Tom.
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To die a free man is a noble thing.

Spartacus: War Of The Damned – Series Finale – Victory

To all involved with Spartacus I only have one word – GRATITUDE! 

A tip of the hat to the creative team behind this series – Steven DeKnight ignored the naysayers and took this bloody, bawdy, no holds barred approach to the series – including same sex partnerships; all done in an operatic style that conveyed the immediacy of those times in contrast to the largely sheltered life most of us live today to dramatize the cost and pursuit of freedom.  This was done on the macro scale thematically throughout the series and in parallel the character arcs of the major players mirrored that struggle.  Spartacus, whose real name is lost, the Roman name given to a Thracian slave became more than a name.  The name became legend and a symbol for freedom.   At the start of the rebellion Spartacus driven by revenge for the death of his wife at Roman whim. At the end he had grown beyond his own concerns and forfeited his life so that the woman, children, and the less fortunate unable to protect themselves could find freedom.  In this way he honored his wife’s memory.

Contrast that with Gannicus, a fellow gladiator who had won his freedom as a slave and had reluctantly joined the rebellion out of guilt at having slept with his comrade’s – Oenomaus wife.  While he pledged his sword to the cause, he kept a distance too, constantly refusing Spartacus’s entreaties to accept a leadership role until the very end when he became touched by the plights of the lessor.  He and Spartacus ended up at the same place but by widely divergent paths.

The finale played with expectations by constantly providing moments of hope where even though the outcome is known in history books.  So when Spartacus finally fell after several close battles with Crassus and Gannicus had the expected return engagement rematch with Caesar; gaining the upper hand only to be thwarted in delivering the killing blow when overcome by other Roman soldiers,  their outcomes were more difficult to take while feeling even more worthy because of those tantalizing moments of possible victory.  Gannicus being crucified and seeing Oenomaus and the cheering crowds of the arena once more were a fitting end for him.  Just as Spartacus lay dying waiting to see his wife once again.  And to hear her speak his real name.

It was a thematically interesting approach for the show to take where the major characters were often defeated by unseen attacks from the back.  Crixus, Spartacus, Tiberius, and much later, and more famously – Julius Caesar.  The irony of Caesar’s derivise jibe to Gannicus after he has been hoisted up on the cross – ‘Such an ignoble ending.’ – is replete with irony.
What a great end to an outstanding series.  A series that was criminally under watched.  The nod to the original Spartacus – Andy Whitfield – at the end was well done too.
I shed a few tears as this one played out.  This series entertained with the best of them.

Separate Paths

On By Lou W. SytsmaIn 2013 TVLeave a comment

Spartacus S03E08 – Separate Paths:

Wow!  Is this the Tiberius that James T. Kirk was named after? What a despicable little shit he is!

Crassus asking why Caesar was not a horse was priceless.

Brilliant and bloody battle scenes.  In the picture above we see Crixus, who has broken off from Spartacus, exulting his cohorts to defeat the Roman force below before heading to Rome itself.  Which can be seen on the horizon.

Alas it is his last victory for a fatal battle looms right after this one.

8 episodes in.  Only 2 left.  Characters are starting to fall now.  Two(?) of the bigger ones were taken down.  Time runs out for the remainder.

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Twenty-First Century King by Bev Vincent:

Many out there review King’s works and Bev’s voice is one of the most clear and perceptive.  I really enjoyed reading his takes on King’s works since 2000 and on.  Bev’s insights, at the least, crystallize concepts and themes King tackles; while often providing food for thought and new ways to view King’s writing.

I treated this book like candy, reading one review a day and was really sad when I reached the end.

Congrats to Bev on a job well done and another welcome addition to my King library.

PS – WebTV indeed!

Spartacus – Bloody Chess Match & Fiction Frission

On By Lou W. SytsmaIn Spartacus Season 3, WritingLeave a comment

Spartacus S03E05 – Blood Brothers: much like last season’s 5th episode – was brilliance.  Spartacus and the Roman Military Leader Crassus have been engaged in a mental chess game match all season.  In this one Spartacus made all the right moves and yet was still out manuveured by Crassus. On the action front this show continues to set the high bar on action sequences with swordtacular battle scenes. Again and again.



And like last season’s show shifting 5th episode which saw the gladiators leave the arena and their slavery behind forever, Spartacus has lost the city.  Just as he was poised to draw out and divide Crassus’s forces.  To the hills they must flee! 

Crassus has gained the upper hand in battle while at the same time the rift between he and his son, Tiberius, has now become permanently irrepairable.

The foreshadowing irony of Caesar stabbing Spartacus in the back was most delicious indeed.

Brilliant, brilliant writing.

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I’ve taken stabs at fiction writing here and there but never have I experienced that AHA! moment when unrelated items have coalesced into a new and unique idea that other writers talk about.  Part of my problem is that I have read so many takes on how to write the process has become overwhelming plus my own unintentionally created roadblock of wanting to write something big and epic so that it will move people.  A bittersweet story much like Frodo sailing off to the Grey Havens after saving Middle Earth.


That’s a tall order for any writer.  Especially one starting out.  

So I’ve refocused my direction and am now directing my energies to smaller pieces.  I mentioned in a previous post that I had sent off a piece for a 200 word micro-fiction contest. That’s about as small as one can get!

Genre fiction is where I wish to write in be it SF, Fantasy, or Horror.  I have seen it said countless times that genre fiction is about the characters.  Take a character and put them in unusual circumstances.  Such circumstances arise when you take two previously unrelated ideas and put them together in a brand new way to push your characters.

Well I have achieved that AHA! epiphany.  The catalyst for my moment of insight was a lovely piece of writing over at Flash Fiction Online – “Beholder” by Sarah Grey.  This is a small story about technology versus man that elicits, for me, a big emotional response.

That’s the kind of story I want to write and Beholder gave me the spark to put two disparate ideas together. So I am working a piece that takes something I do often – walk our dog and a concept from a TV show.  I have it all mapped out in my head.  I know the whole story and how it will end.  

How well putting those two ideas together works is throttled only by my skill as a writer to tell it.  Exciting!  And scary.