Tragic blowjob is tragic in this moody expansion of the National Lampoon's Vacation Extended Cinematic Universe.
Showing posts with label 2003. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2003. Show all posts
Thursday, May 4, 2023
Saturday, January 13, 2018
COMICS REVIEW: ORBITER (2003)
Writer: Warren Ellis
Artist: Colleen Doran
Colorist: Dave Stewart
Letterer: Clem Robins
Review by William D. Tucker
In the not-too-distant-future, a NASA space shuttle disappears not long after launch. No one knows exactly what happened, but this loss deals a deathblow to the program of manned spaceflight. The government is no longer willing to invest in any mission which could get people killed, and only robotic space exploration missions are funded. This shift in policy works alongside a drift towards militarism and growing economic inequality inside the United States, and within a decade of the space shuttle's vanishing, Kennedy Space Center has become a shantytown squat for growing populations of the permanently unemployed, climate change refugees from the flooding coastal regions, and masses of sick junkies, the untreated mentally ill, and those disenfranchised by jingoistic nationalism and white supremacy.
And then one day, the vanished space shuttle returns, crashing into the shantytown, and killing scores of innocent people. The military government of the United States moves quickly to investigate the returned shuttle, and try to crack the mystery of its disappearance. The military supervised scientists discover rather quickly that the shuttle is not what it once was: it is covered in a mysterious skin. Only one member of the original crew has survived. And they may no longer be human . . .
Orbiter is a science fiction allegory about the death and rebirth of manned space exploration in the United States of America. I describe it specifically as an allegory because the emphasis here is on themes, ideas, and an overall message about the necessity of interdisciplinary collaboration among the "hard" and "soft" sciences of physics, biology, psychology, and engineering in order to overcome the vast challenges of intergalactic exploration, as opposed to a focus on characters and interpersonal drama. The characters are important, and well-sketched for the most part, but like many science fiction tales, the ideas are what matter most. This results in a cast of characters who mostly exist as spokespeople for different values and philosophical points of view, with a few devolving into stock stereotypes of geekdom and hardline military authoritarianism. I was able to forgive the weaknesses of some of the characterizations because the overall thematic development was so compelling.
The art is seamless and cinematic, foregoing sound effects text and thought bubbles, and emphasizing shadows, earth tones, faces, and the magnificent returned space shuttle which has undergone a startling biomechanical transformation. Scenes of crushing poverty and cataclysmic mass death set a very dark tone early on with an abundance of detail depicting piles of corpses and heaps of trash side by side. Human life has lost much of its meaning and value. But as the human investigators probe deeper into the mystery of the returned spacecraft, the people-with their questions and memories and theories-take center stage lifting the story into a higher plane both visually and textually.
At one hundred brisk pages, Orbiter cuts all the bullshit, and gives you everything you need between two covers.
This comic was originally published as a single volume hardback "graphic novel" way back in 2003, the year the US embarked on its disastrous Iraq adventure, and it seems even more relevant now as the United States struggles to keep its shit together under the shameful administration of Fake President trump and his government of white supremacists, hyper-nationalists, and climate change denying anti-intellectuals. Orbiter, for all its gruesome dystopian world-building, actually depicts a path forward by dramatizing interdisciplinary cooperation in the face of nihilistic inertia and despair. Sometimes dystopia clarifies one's thinking, and makes you realize you need not be bound to the failed institutions and ideologies of the past. This, too, is what I see as the primary lesson of the ordeal of the Fake President trump White House as it implodes in real time: what kind of country do we want marching forward into the future? One that is inclusive of all people regardless of skin color, sexuality, and gender identity? Or a corrupt shithole of jingoism and white supremacy?
Orbiter offered transcendent hope in the dark days of the lying, warmongering Bush/Cheney regime in 2003, and it holds up in this present moment as well.
Artist: Colleen Doran
Colorist: Dave Stewart
Letterer: Clem Robins
Review by William D. Tucker
In the not-too-distant-future, a NASA space shuttle disappears not long after launch. No one knows exactly what happened, but this loss deals a deathblow to the program of manned spaceflight. The government is no longer willing to invest in any mission which could get people killed, and only robotic space exploration missions are funded. This shift in policy works alongside a drift towards militarism and growing economic inequality inside the United States, and within a decade of the space shuttle's vanishing, Kennedy Space Center has become a shantytown squat for growing populations of the permanently unemployed, climate change refugees from the flooding coastal regions, and masses of sick junkies, the untreated mentally ill, and those disenfranchised by jingoistic nationalism and white supremacy.
And then one day, the vanished space shuttle returns, crashing into the shantytown, and killing scores of innocent people. The military government of the United States moves quickly to investigate the returned shuttle, and try to crack the mystery of its disappearance. The military supervised scientists discover rather quickly that the shuttle is not what it once was: it is covered in a mysterious skin. Only one member of the original crew has survived. And they may no longer be human . . .
Orbiter is a science fiction allegory about the death and rebirth of manned space exploration in the United States of America. I describe it specifically as an allegory because the emphasis here is on themes, ideas, and an overall message about the necessity of interdisciplinary collaboration among the "hard" and "soft" sciences of physics, biology, psychology, and engineering in order to overcome the vast challenges of intergalactic exploration, as opposed to a focus on characters and interpersonal drama. The characters are important, and well-sketched for the most part, but like many science fiction tales, the ideas are what matter most. This results in a cast of characters who mostly exist as spokespeople for different values and philosophical points of view, with a few devolving into stock stereotypes of geekdom and hardline military authoritarianism. I was able to forgive the weaknesses of some of the characterizations because the overall thematic development was so compelling.
The art is seamless and cinematic, foregoing sound effects text and thought bubbles, and emphasizing shadows, earth tones, faces, and the magnificent returned space shuttle which has undergone a startling biomechanical transformation. Scenes of crushing poverty and cataclysmic mass death set a very dark tone early on with an abundance of detail depicting piles of corpses and heaps of trash side by side. Human life has lost much of its meaning and value. But as the human investigators probe deeper into the mystery of the returned spacecraft, the people-with their questions and memories and theories-take center stage lifting the story into a higher plane both visually and textually.
At one hundred brisk pages, Orbiter cuts all the bullshit, and gives you everything you need between two covers.
This comic was originally published as a single volume hardback "graphic novel" way back in 2003, the year the US embarked on its disastrous Iraq adventure, and it seems even more relevant now as the United States struggles to keep its shit together under the shameful administration of Fake President trump and his government of white supremacists, hyper-nationalists, and climate change denying anti-intellectuals. Orbiter, for all its gruesome dystopian world-building, actually depicts a path forward by dramatizing interdisciplinary cooperation in the face of nihilistic inertia and despair. Sometimes dystopia clarifies one's thinking, and makes you realize you need not be bound to the failed institutions and ideologies of the past. This, too, is what I see as the primary lesson of the ordeal of the Fake President trump White House as it implodes in real time: what kind of country do we want marching forward into the future? One that is inclusive of all people regardless of skin color, sexuality, and gender identity? Or a corrupt shithole of jingoism and white supremacy?
Orbiter offered transcendent hope in the dark days of the lying, warmongering Bush/Cheney regime in 2003, and it holds up in this present moment as well.
Friday, June 23, 2017
Hopper
Hopper
by William D. Tucker
1.
White light against a plaster wall
Looking with my back turned.
Window is the vacancy of intersection.
A perspective on one aspect of the jagged upper texture
There is pointing and then there are jabs from the buildings.
You sit there, white light on your back.
The room is so suffused with cold, clear light.
Nothing is hidden yet nothing is revealed in the cold, clear light.
We speak of matters with a speech that the Observer does not render exactly
In the rendering, we become a pantomime.
Nowhere above and beyond this room,
So filled with light,
Can we ever speak truly of the vacant point of intersection.
Who has ever spoken before the cold, clear light suffused this room,
How was it even possible?
It isn't blinding, it isn't sudden, in fact it lacks all flourish or sensationalism.
The cold, clear light simply is, and it is in a most unavoidable way.
Nothing hidden, nothing revealed.
Looking with my back turned.
2.
Drink. Purchase. Sitting. Another drink/purchase.
Routine of the room of the cold, clear light.
Papers. Organize. Read. Papers. Sort. Prioritize.
This is the work of the room of the cold clear light.
Pillows. Laughing. Porch. Train car. Outdoors. Indoors.
This is the room of the cold, clear light.
Green, beige, red, blue, yellow, purple:
These stand out in strange new ways beneath the cold, clear light.
3.
He wished to communicate sunlight on the side of a building.
Many received his communication.
Others received many other things besides.
Drink. Routine. Cold. Clear. Light.
"More real than real" as one person put it.
Critical response: good, suffused with the cold, clear light.
He did not try to explain, except for elaborate designs and plans.
Many view. Experience an array of emotions.
There is a look of awareness at the science and rigor of construction.
Science/rigor/effort is reduced to "emotional response."
Cold, clear light becomes invisible.
"I get a sense of loneliness," one person says.
"This makes me feel a certain way," says another.
Rigor, effort, construction, science subsumed by "emotion."
Opinion. Subjective. I like. I think. I feel.
Drink. Routine. Cold. Clear. Light.
Looking with my back turned, I see them turning away having observed,
felt, thought, and processed very briefly the offering before them.
4.
Plans. Construction. Intersecting lines of purpose.
The science and the rigor necessary to achieve that specific effect.
"I want to communicate sunlight on the side of a building."
Result: opinions.
I think. I feel. Maybe. I like. I did not like.
I am approached for moments, perhaps, having extensively researched, practiced, and calculated myself.
Moments.
The rigor disappears. Lines of intersecting purpose are softly, gently smudged into pleasant, distinct blurs of opinion.
Invisible. Cold. Clear. Light.
5.
Opinion passed.
Return of routine.
Beyond initial foray into understanding.
Drink. Office. Papers. Organize. Dance. Sunbathe.
Analysis:
Cold, clear light becomes visible perceptible
Intersecting lines of purpose rise to the surface.
"I can see the wires."
Repetition of analysis.
Rigor and science unearthed
Notebooks are thumbed through
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
Cold, clear light hides nothing and reveals nothing.
Analysis:
"In this place there are fewer, wealthier people. No one has any memory of the past. Everyone is prosperous, satisfied, happy, and no one quite wants to remember how it got that way."
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
"He is expressing a deeply ambivalent attitude towards his subject matter. The elements of the voyeuristic collide with an overwhelming sense of the privacy of each person's universe. Ultimately, the voyeuristic wins out, because, alas, the end result is the work itself. He could not resist looking into the realms of privacy and then sharing what he saw with others."
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
"It is the portrayal of man's environment as supremely indifferent that wins out over everything else. His settings are neither threatening nor comforting, destructive nor supportive, good nor evil. His humans, likewise, have learned to dwell in this environment with all harmony by becoming creatures of supreme indifference themselves."
Analysis. Results ad infinitum. Each analysis different.
Return of opinion.
Opinion refined.
Opinion/analysis synthesis.
Still opinion.
Cold, clear light hides nothing and reveals nothing.
-February-April 2003
Copyright 2003 by William D. Tucker. All rights reserved. Used with permission.
by William D. Tucker
1.
White light against a plaster wall
Looking with my back turned.
Window is the vacancy of intersection.
A perspective on one aspect of the jagged upper texture
There is pointing and then there are jabs from the buildings.
You sit there, white light on your back.
The room is so suffused with cold, clear light.
Nothing is hidden yet nothing is revealed in the cold, clear light.
We speak of matters with a speech that the Observer does not render exactly
In the rendering, we become a pantomime.
Nowhere above and beyond this room,
So filled with light,
Can we ever speak truly of the vacant point of intersection.
Who has ever spoken before the cold, clear light suffused this room,
How was it even possible?
It isn't blinding, it isn't sudden, in fact it lacks all flourish or sensationalism.
The cold, clear light simply is, and it is in a most unavoidable way.
Nothing hidden, nothing revealed.
Looking with my back turned.
2.
Drink. Purchase. Sitting. Another drink/purchase.
Routine of the room of the cold, clear light.
Papers. Organize. Read. Papers. Sort. Prioritize.
This is the work of the room of the cold clear light.
Pillows. Laughing. Porch. Train car. Outdoors. Indoors.
This is the room of the cold, clear light.
Green, beige, red, blue, yellow, purple:
These stand out in strange new ways beneath the cold, clear light.
3.
He wished to communicate sunlight on the side of a building.
Many received his communication.
Others received many other things besides.
Drink. Routine. Cold. Clear. Light.
"More real than real" as one person put it.
Critical response: good, suffused with the cold, clear light.
He did not try to explain, except for elaborate designs and plans.
Many view. Experience an array of emotions.
There is a look of awareness at the science and rigor of construction.
Science/rigor/effort is reduced to "emotional response."
Cold, clear light becomes invisible.
"I get a sense of loneliness," one person says.
"This makes me feel a certain way," says another.
Rigor, effort, construction, science subsumed by "emotion."
Opinion. Subjective. I like. I think. I feel.
Drink. Routine. Cold. Clear. Light.
Looking with my back turned, I see them turning away having observed,
felt, thought, and processed very briefly the offering before them.
4.
Plans. Construction. Intersecting lines of purpose.
The science and the rigor necessary to achieve that specific effect.
"I want to communicate sunlight on the side of a building."
Result: opinions.
I think. I feel. Maybe. I like. I did not like.
I am approached for moments, perhaps, having extensively researched, practiced, and calculated myself.
Moments.
The rigor disappears. Lines of intersecting purpose are softly, gently smudged into pleasant, distinct blurs of opinion.
Invisible. Cold. Clear. Light.
5.
Opinion passed.
Return of routine.
Beyond initial foray into understanding.
Drink. Office. Papers. Organize. Dance. Sunbathe.
Analysis:
Cold, clear light becomes visible perceptible
Intersecting lines of purpose rise to the surface.
"I can see the wires."
Repetition of analysis.
Rigor and science unearthed
Notebooks are thumbed through
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
Cold, clear light hides nothing and reveals nothing.
Analysis:
"In this place there are fewer, wealthier people. No one has any memory of the past. Everyone is prosperous, satisfied, happy, and no one quite wants to remember how it got that way."
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
"He is expressing a deeply ambivalent attitude towards his subject matter. The elements of the voyeuristic collide with an overwhelming sense of the privacy of each person's universe. Ultimately, the voyeuristic wins out, because, alas, the end result is the work itself. He could not resist looking into the realms of privacy and then sharing what he saw with others."
Paradigm shift/analysis again:
"It is the portrayal of man's environment as supremely indifferent that wins out over everything else. His settings are neither threatening nor comforting, destructive nor supportive, good nor evil. His humans, likewise, have learned to dwell in this environment with all harmony by becoming creatures of supreme indifference themselves."
Analysis. Results ad infinitum. Each analysis different.
Return of opinion.
Opinion refined.
Opinion/analysis synthesis.
Still opinion.
Cold, clear light hides nothing and reveals nothing.
-February-April 2003
Copyright 2003 by William D. Tucker. All rights reserved. Used with permission.
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