Reading: the New Yorker
Music: John Hartford
TV/Movie: Lost Season 2
Link o' the Day: Argentus

So does Battle Royale kick ass or what? I can't believe I once tried to compare the storylines with The Condemned. They should be so lucky. It just shows to go ya that if you can't get a dozen bulked out steroid monsters to be in your "kill or be killed" movie, you'd be better off with Japanese high school students. I will admit that The Condemned had tighter action choreography, but Battle Royale makes up for that in gruesome realism. That's not to say it's a very bloody movie. Sure, a bit bloody, but it's not a nonstop gore-fest. There's a lot of character going on here.

Oh, and it features one of my favorite Japanese actors--Beat Takeshi.


And while I'm going on about stuff I should have seen, like, years ago. Lost continues to amaze me. We're now up to the middle of Season 2 and it's still successfully keeping our attention. The only thing that really bothers me about the story so far is the black smoke. Everything else I can come up with an explanation for--but the black smoke? What the hell? I can explain (for myself at least) the mysterious roars, the exploding trees, the visions, Them--practically eerything.

But not the black smoke.

Some of you are probably snickering at me. You know about the black smoke. You know all about it. You can't believe I haven't figured it out by now.

Please keep it to yourself. If I don't know by Season 4 well...the writers' names are available on IMDB and I'm pretty good at finding people online.

I'm just sayin'


-=-=-=-=-

Workwise I'm gearing up to get the next issue of the SFWA Bulletin underway. I have a couple of things to do with the Hardcastle & McCormick book, as well as ginning up a new cover layout. A decent amount of writing, some phonecalls, arranging some scanning, and some webpaging.

Busy, busy!

-=-=-=-=-

Today's link goes to the most recently yearly edition of Steven Silver's fanzine Argentus. I have a small appearance in this issue in the "Mock Review" section where Steve asked a few of his readers to choose a book at random and write a review based solely on the information printed on the back cover. Other features include Chris Garcia's TAFF Report, a report on the 2007 Worldcon in Japan, pieces by Fred Lerner and Alma Alexander, and more. It's a quick download (PDF format) and well worth the read.

Argentus and many other fine fanzines are kindly archived at Efanzines.com by Bill Burns.