THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
07/02/04 -- Vol. 22, No. 1
El Presidente: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
The Power Behind El Pres: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
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Topics:
A Filk Song (lyrics by Mark R. Leeper)
I, ROBOT (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This Week's Reading (Retro Hugo-nominated novellas)
(book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: A Filk Song (lyrics by Mark R. Leeper)
One of the activities at science fiction conventions is to sing
science fiction and fantasy songs. There is a whole subculture at
science fiction conventions that "filks." I am not usually part
of that subculture, but what the heck. Recently I saw THE WOLF
MAN again and I stared writing down lines. Anyway the following
is sung to the tune of "I'm a Believer" by the Monkees.
I thought werewolves were only real in fairy tales.
And then my gypsy son, my Bela died,
And I had to worry.
He had turned all furry.
And he'd bitten Talbot on the side.
And I saw his face
Or I'm not Maleva.
That's a werewolf's face.
No doubt in my mind.
He's a wolf. Har-rooooo
The wolfbane's bloomin'
He's lost his groomin'
Like Edward Hyde.
The Talbot family lies under a curse tonight.
And Larry doesn't know just what to do.
He looks really scary,
Tall and dark and hairy,
And he smells like something from the zoo.
He's a werewolf now
Or I'm not Maleva.
That's a werewolf's face.
No doubt in my mind.
He's a wolf. Har-rooooo
Though Talbot's yelpin'
I couldn't help him
If I tried.
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: I, ROBOT (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This summer we will get a film production of I, ROBOT, starring
Will Smith and based somewhat on a collection of nine magazine
stories by Isaac Asimov. I say "somewhat" since at this writing I
have seen only a trailer for the film and that just does not
capture the spirit of Isaac Asimov's writing. It looks like a
typical summer action film with lots of chase scenes. Supposedly
the film is set in a time before Asimov's stories take place,
though it is claimed that it uses plot elements from Asimov's
stories. I am afraid all too frequently filmmakers choose to use a
bankable title for a film without having much desire to consider
the implications of that title. A case in point is MISSION
IMPOSSIBLE. The public is probably aware that that is the title
of an intelligent spy series from 1960s television. The
filmmakers want to give the public the impression that their film
will be an intelligent spy story. And that seems to be almost as
far as the loyalty to the original series goes. Oh, they will try
to get some of the characters' names correct. That is about all.
The thing is that there is a fixed format for a "Mission
Impossible" story. Every episode starts with the Impossible
Mission Force being giving some task difficult to accomplish.
Typically it might be something like to topple a dictator. Then
the head of the project (initially Steven Hill, later Peter Graves)
chooses a team to accomplish this task. Then the team members go
in separate directions doing mysterious things. The viewer has to
wonder what these odd actions have to do with the mission. Then
five minutes before the end of the program the trap is sprung and
all the individual mysterious actions we have seen work together
perfectly like the pieces of a well-oiled machine. Suddenly
everything falls into place and makes sense. Every episode comes
with a free A-ha!-experience packed inside. The film OCEAN'S
ELEVEN worked somewhat that way. MISSION IMPOSSIBLE did not.
Literally speaking, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE was not a "Mission
Impossible" story. I don't expect that I, ROBOT will be an "I,
Robot" story.
Doing an Asimov robot story is an odd choice, since robots are not
in vogue. Robots were of some science fiction interest in the 1950s
and 1960s with Robbie and Gort and the robot from "Lost in Space"
capturing public attention. Public interest value peaked with the
production of STAR WARS in which robots were major characters.
After that, bad sci-fi films started putting in cute little
robots. SILENT RUNNING had done a reasonable job with its Huey,
Dewey, and Louie, but after Lucas's success the robots started
getting pretty ridiculous with the cutesy V.I.N.C.E.N.T. in THE
BLACK HOLE and Twiki in television's "Buck Rogers". We have not
seen a lot of robots in films of late because some of those silly
ones sort of killed the interest value. We did see David in A.I.:
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE to counterbalance the "Buffybot" on
television. Even the recent multi-story film ROBOT STORIES had
only one story in which the robots were real characters, the way
they are in an Asimov story. Robots may become more serious-
seeming in the public's minds now that people are buying little
robots to vacuum their living rooms. So if they do a decent job,
the time might be ripe to bring back robots to science fiction
films.
Asimov's story collection is one of the classics of science
fiction which until recently has seemed nearly impossible to adapt
very well into a film. However, now that some New Zealander has
taken the Mount Everest of unfilmable classic books, THE LORD OF
THE RINGS, and brought it to the screen, it looks like other
challenging fiction works may be produced. And this summer we
will get some kind of screen version of the Asimov classic.
Asimov initially took a good deal of his inspiration apparently
from a collection of stories by Eando Binder about a robot called
"Adam Link" collected in novel form in ADAM LINK, ROBOT. Binder
started with a short story "I, Robot" that was essentially a
rewrite of the James Whale Frankenstein movies. It is set in the
United States, but it is essentially pieces borrowed from the two
movies. Binder wrote more stories about his Adam Link character.
A lot of the ideas Asimov wrote were comments on the Binder. The
borrowing of the title was not Asimov's idea but the idea of his
publisher.
The stories in the Asimov collection I, ROBOT made famous Asimov's
famous Three Laws of Robotics. I don't know about these days, but
a few years ago any science fiction fan worth his metal (pun
intended) could rattle them off from memory.
1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction,
allow a human being to come to harm.
2) A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where
such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such
protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
Writer Isaac Asimov and legendary editor John W. Campbell each
credited the other with having authored the three laws. In a
discussion Asimov talked about what priorities it would make sense
to put into the programming of a robot. Campbell codified
Asimov's ideas by formally stating the priorities. Actually a
bigger deal has been made of the laws than they seem to actually
deserve. Their profundity has, in my humble opinion, been
overrated. Referring to each of the previous laws make them seem
more complex than they actually are. What they say is that a
robot's first priority is protecting humans. The second priority
is obedience. Third is self-preservation. Put that way they say
exactly the same thing but they seem a lot less dramatic.
I will have more to say about robot stories next week. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
Last week I discussed the current Hugo-nominated novellas. This
week I'll talk about the Retro Hugo-nominated ones (from 1953).
My first choice is the novella "A Case of Conscience" by James
Blish, which forms the first part of the novel A CASE OF
CONSCIENCE. I will admit a predilection for theological science
fiction. I realize this seems to contradict my complaint about
Connie Willis's Christmas fantasies last week, but theological
discussion is not the same as religious content. And Blish leaves
his readers to draw their own conclusions, rather than dictating a
set explanation. Certainly the question of whether one can have a
completely moral society without religion (or more specifically,
at least in the story, without God) is still a topic of
discussion.
Second for me was "...And My Fear Is Great" by Theodore Sturgeon.
The topic--individuals with special powers that become stronger
when they join together--shows up in many of Sturgeon's works.
For some reason it worked better for me here than elsewhere.
"Three Hearts and Three Lions" by Poul Anderson is the original
version of the novel of the same name. (This was expanded
throughout, rather than forming intact a segment of the novel, so
the only place to read this novella is in its original magazine
publication. I suspect, however, that it will be voted on by a
lot people who have read only the expanded version. However, my
reaction applies to both.) The story of a twentieth-century man
finding himself transported not only back in time, but into a
magical version of our world, is a classic, and Anderson knows his
stuff here. For example, you might think that the use of tobacco
here was anachronistic. But I discovered that the first literary
mention of tobacco was in Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queen" in
the late 16th century, so I guess Anderson is allowed to include
it on the basis of established usage. (And just as Sturgeon did,
Anderson revisits his themes in other works as well, particularly
A MIDSUMMER TEMPEST.)
The two other nominees just didn't make it for me. "Un-Man" by
Poul Anderson seemed a fairly basic story about a secret group of
a special type of human (an "un-man", which is also a pun on
"U.N.-man" [as in United Nations]) whose job is to enforce world
peace. I suspect even in 1953 it wasn't particularly original,
but I also think I find Anderson's overtly political works much
less appealing and more strident than his non-political ones. And
"The Rose" by Charles L. Harness is about a confrontation between
science and art, but frankly it struck me as a lot of mumbo-jumbo.
[-ecl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Oh, if only I did nothing simply as
a result of laziness.
--Feodor Dostoyevski
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