First, a political thing.  Sort of.  Not that you should come to me for political opinion, but hey, if you’re here, why not?  If you’re a diehard Sarah Palin fan, skip this.  It’s okay.  I don’t mind.  I’m not really going to criticize her politics, but I know that some things are hot buttons.  So no need to offend you.

SO JUST SKIP THIS AND GO TO THE NEXT BOLD LINE IF YOU’RE GOING TO BE BOTHERED BY ANY POSSIBLE IMPLICATION THAT SARAH PALIN IS NOT JESUS AND OPTIMUS PRIME COMBINED.

The thing that bugs me about Palin isn’t her politics.  Sure, I don’t agree with them, but I don’t agree with most politicians.  And disagreement isn’t a bad thing.  It means were talking about stuff, and I am all about talking about stuff.  The more discussion, the more shared ideas, the better off we are.  That’s my opinion, and maybe you disagree.  And that just makes me smile.

The thing that bugs me about Palin (and about people like her) is that they embody nothing less than the sin of hubris, of arrogance, of absolute certainty.  She lives in a world where she can do no wrong, even unintentionally.  She is master of fate, queen of circumstances, always right.  And if you disagree or criticize her than you are clearly an enemy and not worth listening to.

Seriously, Palin fans.  Has she ever admitted to making a mistake?  Has she ever admitted to a lapse in judgment?  Even the smallest moment of humanity where she screwed up or misspoke?  No, because she’s perfect.  Because nothing bad is ever her fault, but certainly everything good in her life is because of how awesome she is.  Heck, even when confronted with the very messy world and its unpredictability despite the best of our intentions (like a pregnant daughter while preaching the value of abstinence only education) she refuses to admit that sometimes, oftentimes, life is muddled and difficult and the answers aren’t always easy.  When confronted with such complex dilemmas, Sarah just smiles and winks and spouts some well-worn catch phrase.  Which is fine.  She’s a politician (sort of), and that’s partof her job.  But what’s annoying about Palin is that there’s no indication that she’s playing for the camera, acting certain while understanding the screwed up mess that is our world.  No Palin believes this, wholeheartedly.  She lives in a world of absolutes, and when you dare to suggest that there might be a shade of gray or two in this reality, she merely shakes her head, covers her ears, and wraps herself in a forcefield of smug idealism.

To be fair to Palin, this isn’t about her political affiliation.  There are those like her in all spectrums of society.  They’re the people who make life harder than it has to be because they’re smarter than you, because they blind certainty for confidence, and flat dismissal as debate.

I don’t blame Palin for the recent shooting.  That’d be silly.  Crazy people do crazy stuff, and we who are not crazy are usually obsessed with trying to understand it when it’s usually impossible to do so.  But I do dislike Palin for refusing to even consider that it didn’t help to put crosshairs on a map and that phrases like “Don’t retreat.  Reload” might have some accidental unpleasant implications behind them.  To blame Palin for the actions of a lunatic is ridiculous.  To expect her to use it, as so many of us have, to consider our actions and how they might effect the world, is not.

But that’s not Sarah.  She’s blameless.  She’s perfect.  And the sooner the rest of us figure that out, the happier she’ll be.

ENOUGH OF THAT.

The other thing that’s on my mind is pretty big too.  It’s the changing of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to make it more palatable for our time.

I’m just going to call bullshit on this.

I get where this desire comes from.  Let’s remove an unpleasant word because it is unpleasant, because it carries a terrible history that we would all rather forget.  But that’s exactly why it should stay there.  Because once you alter a piece of history, you destroy its relevance forever.

Let’s face it.  Humans have lousy memories.  It’s why politicians can say they don’t remember integration being hard, or why, after two months with a new piece of technology, we immediately start to complain about its limitations.  We forget.  Not because we want to forget, but because it’s so easy to do.  Our brains are not recording devices.  They are imagination devices, and that’s all our memories are.  Bits of imagination cobbled together from half-formed bits of the past.  That’s why you can convince someone they saw a Bugs Bunny costume at Disneyland.  All it takes is a doctored photo, a few people they trust reinforcing the idea, and they’ll remember.

This is why we have to write things down, preserve art, and carry the actual recollections of the past with us.  Because if we just trust we’ll remember, we’re sure to forget.

For Huckleberry Finn, inserting Slave might seem like a good idea.  But if you do it, then what happens in fifteen years when the word Slave might be deemed offensive?  Do you change that too?  Perhaps to Servant.  And, heck, while we’re at it, let’s take out any references to smoking.  Kids shouldn’t smoke.  And why have any reference to skin color at all?  Why not leave it undescribed so that everyone can enjoy Huck and Jim’s adventure without feeling left out? And does he have to run away?  Can’t Huck and Servant Jim just go and have a little adventure before returning home for dinner?

Ridiculous?  Maybe.  But why not?  Why not change everything, one step at a time?  If a book is only a thing meant to reflect our current attitudes and beliefs, then who really cares?  Let’s rewrite the whole damn thing and just ignore it.

The problem is one of memory.  We need to remember our imperfections, our faults.  We need to remember that not so long ago, as civilizations measure things, black people were slaves, women couldn’t vote, and even if you were a white guy, life still wasn’t perfect.  It’s all too easy to pine for a glorious golden yesterday that never existed, which is why we occasionally need a hard slap in the face to remind us that it didn’t.

It’s watching A Day at the Races and seeing the Marx Brothers in blackface.  It’s unsettling, but it’s also necessary.  It’s reading the Constitution.  ALL of the Constitution.  Even the bad parts.  Especially the bad parts because the bad parts show us how far we’ve come and how far we have to go.  They remind us that even the most sacred document was created by flawed human beings who were just doing the best they could.  And perhaps it’s wrong to judge them for their failings, but to acknowledge those failings is a good thing.

The second reason I hate the idea of changing a classic novel (a book I haven’t even read by the way) is that it renders all art vulnerable, transitory, meaningless.  Once we decide to rewrite history itself, then we are guilty of denying the flaws in ourselves.  We become obsessed with covering them up and then, you might as well call it a day as a civlization.  Because it takes a lot of effort to continually rework the past into something you aren’t embarrassed by.

Take Star Wars.  I really don’t care if Lucas wants to play with his creation until the end of time.  Special Edition, Extended Edition, Edition with More Sound FX.  It’s his thing.  Let him do what he wants with it.  But that’s not enough for Lucas, who, if he had his way, would erase the originals from existence in favor of his new versions.  I’m not going to argue that the originals are better than the new versions (though, let’s be honest, they are), but I am going to argue that a cultural event such as the original Star Wars deserves to be preserved, warts and all.  Lucas isn’t just indulging in creative masturbation, but that he’s guilty of something much worse.  He’s destroying a sacred artifact, one re-release at a time.

And that’s why we can’t allow anyone, not even artists, to go back and change things in their work.  Once anyone starts down that road, once they start seeing history as optional, they will begin erasing it.  Because it’s not human nature to reconcile different versions of the same thing.  We like things neat and tidy.  We want one version of Star Wars, one version of Huck Finn.  And if you give many of us the option of taking the original or the new version that edits out unpleasantness or is just more readily available, we’ll go for it.  We’ll erase the past. 

And the ultimate irony is we won’t even remember doing it.

On that pleasant note, I bid you happy A. LEE MARTINEZ APPRECIATION DAY!!

I couldn’t do any of this without you, gang.  There’d be no A. Lee Martinez to appreciate without all your support.  And I think we can all agree that would be a terrible thing.  Thank The Mighty Robot King we don’t live in that universe.

Fighting the good fight, Writing the good write,

Lee

It’s probably why I haven’t written sequels yet and why my books tend to be short.  I might have a long story in me, but I haven’t found it yet.  And the tendency of fantasy now is to write long novels with overarching plots means I don’t read much of it either.  I’m more of a too-the-point kind of guy, and that can be a good or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it.

There are exceptions, one or two long stories that I’ve enjoyed.  Justice League Unlimited: Season One is The Greatest Thing That Has Ever Been On Television.  Ever.  And a big part of that is the fact that it has an overarching plot executed masterfully.  The execution is what matters though.  The thing I love about JLU: S1 is that you don’t really know it’s an overarching story until near the middle of the season.  Until then, you mostly get to enjoy a few standalone episodes with a few recurring plot threads.  Even when the arc gets going, you still can enjoy nearly all of the episodes on their own.  Seeing how they connect adds a whole new level to the season, but even on an episode by episode basis, the show really fires on all cylinders.

I’ll admit that maybe this is some failing on my part.  Maybe I’m just not “mature” or “patient” enough to wait around for the payoff.  But, hey, I’m an important guy.  I have a lot of stuff to do.

Things get cancelled.  Great things.  We all know this.  So why is it that some things evoke a fan-based delirium and some don’t?  Beats the hell out of me.

I know, Whedon fans, how you adore him.  How Firefly was apparently the greatest show ever created (although it really wasn’t on long enough to prove it), but really, I wish you’d just get over it.

Maybe this is just my perspective, but I’m used to things I like getting cancelled.  I regret it, but I move on with my life.  But, hey, if I gotta hear about Dollhouse & Firefly, then at least do me a favor and listen to theis list of awesome things that never got their fair shot.

KOLCHACK THE NIGHTSTALKER:  Yes, this show was on and off the air before I was even watching television, but it’s a damned fun show.  I love Kolchack.  He didn’t disappear entirely.  Moonstone Comics occasionally tells a Kolchack story.  They had a solid mini series a few years ago.  And they tried to revive the series a few years ago, but they completely missed the point of the original.  They ditched the monsters and went X-Files, which robbed the idea of all its charm and just turned it generic.

MANIMAL:  Our hero can turn into any animal.  Although for budget reasons, he tends to just transform into the same two.  But Manimal was still awesome.

AUTOMAN:  A police detective discovers a way to bring a video game character to life.  Together, they fight crime.  Every bit as beautiful as it sounds.

ELEVENTH HOUR:  Imagine this.  A show about a science guy who solves crimes that is damn good.  Nobody really noticed Eleventh Hour when it was on, but it was a good show.

CENTURY CITY:  Lawyers in the future!  This one was doomed from the start.  I knew that.  It didn’t last long, but I enjoyed ever episode I saw.  It was an original concept and a unique take on lawyer & sci fi shows.  Of course, it never had a chance, and I don’t know if it would’ve kept entertaining me.  But it was at least original enough that it deserved a shot in my humble opinion.

THE THING:  This isn’t a TV show, but a comic book.  A few years ago, the Ever-Lovin’ Blue-Eyed Thing got his own solo series.  It was terrific.  Great writing.  Great fun.  Great art.  It lasted all of 9 issues before Marvel realized they were producing a comic that didn’t have Wolverine or Spider-Man in it.  Couldn’t let that last, could they?

This one really bugs me because I didn’t expect the Thing’s series to last, but it would’ve been nice to at least make it to issue 12.  Would one year have been too much to ask, Marvel?  Guess so.

WAR OF THE MONSTERS:  A video game.  The best monster-based fighting game ever, bar none.  While the game is great, it didn’t do well enough to warrent a sequel.  Which stinks because if the developers had gotten a chance to develop it further, I think they would’ve ditched its flaws and improved it considerably.

If Halo fans can act like their generic space marine FPS obsession is a gift direct from The Mighty Robot King himself, then I think I’m entitled to at least one decent kaiju-fightin’ video game.