Michael G. Munz

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Archives for September 2013

Farscape Rewatch: “The Way We Weren’t” (spoilers)

September 30, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

Season 2, Episode 5: “The Way We Weren’t”
****1/2  out of *****

“Oh, it’s perfectly fine to cut off one of his arms, then, is it Zhaan?!”

A recording is found that reveals Aeryn to not only have been aboard Moya before but to have taken part in the execution of her first pilot. It’s angst, regret, and anger all around, and a really fantastic character episode. As usual, Claudia Black does a fantastic job, and Pilot himself is as real and alive as any of the non-puppet characters.

This is another episode that contributed to my never, ever trusting Crais. Yes, Aeryn killed a pilot under orders, but Crais is the one who gave those orders—with apparent malice and zero remorse. He was an “insane military commander” even before his brother was killed. Yes, his brother’s death screwed him up, but we see here that ruthlessness lurked in him even during his regular duties. Am I judging Crais more harshly than Aeryn? I suppose that’s open to debate.

This episode also gives a deeper understanding of Pilot; how desperate he was to be bonded to a leviathan and the guilt he’s been hiding since that bonding. His anger at Aeryn is at least partially transferred self-loathing for his part in the first pilot’s death and the torture Moya underwent so she would accept him[1]. He’d never mentioned the pain, and likely accepted it previously as penance for his own crimes.

It’s interesting that, in the entire course of the series, no one ever brings up the question of whether or not Pilot has an actual name, or if he’d even like one. It would have been nice if someone had asked him, and this would have been one of the best opportunities for it.

Last line:
“And you say you think you love this man?”

Other Comments:
Pilot says he’ll have less control for a while. I don’t remember if that ever had any actual effect.

I felt bad for Pilot being wrapped up in the cargo bay like that.
——
[1] “Chop off an arm and all he can muster is a few snotty remarks…”

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Filed Under: Farscape Tagged With: Geek Interest, Rewatch, Science Fiction

Evil genius reviews A Shadow in the Flames

September 25, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

An evil genius bent on world domination legitimate businessman on Goodreads has given A Shadow in the Flames a 5-star review!

“There truly is a difference between writing and storytelling, and [Munz] knows both. He teases us with scenes that we know, KNOW must be related, but can’t quite put together. The entire time, we watch a certain ticking time bomb of a character, waiting for the moment when the countdown hits zero.”

Read more on Goodreads…

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Filed Under: A Shadow in the Flames, Books Tagged With: Science Fiction

Working on A Dragon at the Gate

September 24, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

So I’m continuing to chip away at the pre-writing phase of book 3 of the New Aeneid Cycle (working title, A Dragon at the Gate). At this point, I’ve managed to lay down the skeleton of the book in the sense that I now have a rough outline of how I expect things to go. (Granted, once I actually start writing, this is likely to change, but it’s a good road map to start with.) It’s a good feeling; the difference between trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle with or without the box top to tell you what it’s going to look like, really.

Some things I’m still not sure of. There are characters who don’t really have much to do yet. One I’ve already decided to kill off for that reason. Other characters I know exactly what I want to do with, but not quite how to plug them in. I suppose one solution is going to be simply tossing them into the mix and seeing what they do. I bet at least one of them is going to mess up my whole plan… [Read more…]

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Filed Under: A Dragon at the Gate, Books, Writing Tagged With: New Aeneid Cycle, Science Fiction, Writer

Reblogging: Revolution! A Manifesto for Readers

September 18, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

A fantastic call to action for book-lovers everywhere, from J.M. Guillen…

Revolution! A Manifesto for Readers

Imagine having the power to change the stories of a generation.

You could define what their ideas of “heroism” were. You could shape what they found funny, or noble, or tragic. People who you would never meet or touch would share deep, inherent concepts with you, and carry them forward to a time beyond your death.

If you could shape the stories of a generation…

(read more)

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Filed Under: Books Tagged With: Reading

Farscape Rewatch: “Crackers Don’t Matter” (spoilers)

September 17, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

Season 2, Episode 4: “Crackers Don’t Matter”
****1/2 out of *****

“What the hell is this?”
“Heat-deflecting paste. You’ll burn up in there without it.”
“Smells like puke.”
“I pre-digested it to increase it’s potency.”
“It’s PUKE?!”

And here we have quite possibly the weirdest, most fun, most disturbing Farscape episode so far. It’s never a good sign when people are crawling across the ceiling.

A blind-ish fly-man thing by the name of T’raltixx comes aboard promising to make modifications that will help Moya hide from the Peacekeepers and winds up driving everyone insane as part of a plan to…get a bunch of light. (I confess, I never quite bought the whole “my species needs light!” thing. What, he can’t just go out and buy a whole crapload of floodlights?)

As I said, this is a fun episode. Clearly the actors were having a ball getting to explore their characters going crazy. John and Aeryn arguing with pulse pistols, Pilot getting anti-social and twitchy[1], Harvey making his debut before he even officially existed[2], and, well, that disturbing scene between John and Chiana in the passageway. And in what other episode do we get to see John dressed up in a cape with a sword and shield and covered in puke?


Last line:
“Hey Zhaan. How do we take it all back?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yeah.”

Other Comments:
I’m still hating Zhaan’s outfit.

Aren’t pulsars supposed to, ya know, pulse? I could be wrong about this, but…

——
[1] Creepy, really. Kudos to the puppeteers.

[2] “Kill her! Then we’ll have pizza! And margarita shooters!”

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Filed Under: Farscape Tagged With: Geek Interest, Rewatch, Science Fiction

Working on Book 3 (aka Book 5)

September 15, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

It feels strange to be picking up with a series I’d more or less stopped writing years ago. I’m officially working on book 3 of the New Aeneid Cycle. There, I said it.

I hadn’t expected to be doing so, quite honestly. As you can see from the left column over there (to the left, as you can probably imagine), the series consists thus far of A Shadow in the Flames and A Memory in the Black. I first published ASITF in late 2007 in paperback, mostly just to be able to get it out of my mind so I could move on to writing other books. Yet in the time since, people would often ask, upon hearing I’d published a novel, “Can I get it on Kindle?” I’d gotten tired of telling them no, so last June saw the release of the revised version for Kindle.

It’s a different publishing world than it was in 2007. (Strange how only half a decade can bring so much change!) My experience with getting ASITF to Kindle went so smoothly that I decided to finally release A Memory in the Black. After all, it was mostly finished already. I’d simply not bothered to release it for logistical reasons which, these days, are moot. With a bit of final polishing and a cover design by Amalia Chitulescu, it came to Kindle on August 20th. To date, there have been over 2,000 downloads and the average Amazon review is 4.5 stars!

And so, with what appears to be a growing audience for the series (and some plans of mine to further widen that audience) coupled with some troubles at getting a different manuscript project past the outlining stage, I decided that, hey, I should write book #3! So far, it’s a bit of a challenge picking up where I left off. The act of getting AMITB ready for publication did help me re-acquaint myself with the characters, and I do know where I want things to end up by the end of book 3 (this is a trilogy, by the way), but I don’t yet know quite how to get there, each character’s part, or how to put it all together. I’m having to re-evaluate some long-held ideas for book 3, but I’m also finding new and more interesting options.

But it’s still in the early stages. For those of you who’ve finished book 2, however, I can tell you: I DO know what’s going to happen with the, um… Well, you’ve read it. You can probably guess to what I’m referring. The working title for book 3? Here Be Dragons.

So why do I call it book 5 in the title? After writing AMITB, I wrote two other manuscripts: a comedic contemporary fantasy titled Murdering Zeus for Fun and Prophet and a more serious contemporary fantasy titled A Memory of Dragons. (Okay, so I have a thing for memory and dragons.) I’ve not forgotten about these! But that’s all I’ll say about them in this entry…

Incidentally, watch this blog and my Twitter feed for more news about A Shadow in the Flames in a little while…

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Filed Under: A Memory in the Black, A Shadow in the Flames, Books, Writing Tagged With: Science Fiction, Writer

Farscape Rewatch: “Taking the Stone” (spoilers)

September 11, 2013 By Michael G. Munz Leave a Comment

Season 2, Episode 3: “Taking the Stone”
**  out of *****

“Lately, do I seem…a little crazy to you?”
“What do you mean, ‘lately’?”

Chiana learns that her brother Nerri has died and, to deal with her grief, hooks up with a bunch of irritating constantly-baked teenagers with terrible hair who live on a graveyard planet. Also, Rygel’s new look haunts him (literally), and it would’ve gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for those meddling kids and their Luxan.

While I like Chiana, this episode is one of my least favorite of the season. It’s just…boring. The Rygel subplot is a bit incidental and doesn’t really go anywhere, even when it tries to give D’Argo and Zhaan something to do on the side. The drama on the planet is dull. The little bit with Chiana’s suicidal tendencies and Aeryn’s understanding is occasionally interesting[1], but there’s too much story gristle around that meat for it to redeem the episode.

It’s a shame that Crichton didn’t turn around at the start when Chiana told him she needed to talk. Edgley plays Chiana’s pain really well, and Crichton being too absorbed in his own task to see that makes me feel for her all the more. Plus, if he’d just seen that something was wrong at that point, this whole episode might have been avoided.

Crichton continues to be very protective of his crewmates. Heck, he’s willing to play Mushroom Roulette[2] just to get some information that MIGHT help Chiana. He’s a more extreme personality than he used to be, and is beginning to notice his own instabilities…

Last line:
“Let’s get out of this dead place.”

Other Comments:
So where are the pre-teens? These kids are obviously procreating.

——
[1] Aeryn clearly has more experience with people dealing with grief than Crichton does.

[2] With a one-in-four chance of dying, no less.

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Filed Under: Farscape Tagged With: Geek Interest, Rewatch, Science Fiction

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