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Mad About Uwe.

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And now for something completely different.

Here’s German director Uwe Boll cursing out the moviegoing public for its failure to crowdfund his “important movie,” “Rampage 3.”

In case Boll’s antipathy here is lost on the viewer, he has thoughtfully entitled his youtube video, “fuck you all.”   I have several friends undertaking Indiegogo campaigns.  If they raise less money than they hope to, I doubt they would communicate their disappointment so candidly.

Maybe I’m as nuts as Boll himself for saying this, but … part of me actually has a pathological, grudging respect for this guy …  The original “Rampage” was an effective movie, even if Boll’s other films (including “Rampage 2”) were not.  And … talk about an independent creator who isn’t afraid to offend, and who apparently cares little about what others think of him.

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Dang it, people are talking about “Watership Down” and now I want to go watch it again.

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Thanks, ANNA MARTIN.

“Come back you fools!!  DOGS AREN’T DANGEROUS!!”

And it’s past midnight!!

I remember the film adaptation’s voiceover saying near the end that “General Woundwort’s body was never found.”  I’m not scared.  I have a certain rapport with the truly most terrifying fictional “rabbit” of all time, Donnie Darko’s “Frank.”  (He appears in my mirror from time to time.)  That tall prognosticating hare would PWN Woundwort and his entire Owsla.

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Pictured:  BROMANCE.

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Mary Washington College Professor Emile Lester quoted about controversial new Texas history textbooks.

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Click here for Michael Stone’s article over at “Progressive Secular Humanist” about the controversial new textbooks approved by the Texas State Board of Education:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/progressivesecularhumanist/2014/11/texas-approves-textbooks-with-moses-as-founding-father/

[EDIT: I see now that the article is dated from November?  Once again I arrive late to the party …]

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Aphelion Webzine features “Iphigenia’s Womb.”

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I’m quite happy to say that the good folks over at Aphelion Webzine today featured my poem, “Iphigenia’s Womb,” in their wonderful free online magazine for fantasy and science fiction fans. The poem can be found here:

http://www.aphelion-webzine.com/poetry/2015/06/IphigeniasWomb.html

“Iphigenia’s Womb” was first published over in Dead Snakes in January 2014.  I am grateful to Poetry and Filk Editor Iain Muir for allowing me to share it today in Aphelion, as it might now be enjoyed greater numbers of fans of Greek mythology.

The piece is an allegory to the death by burning of Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon.  He sacrificed her to the Gods to appease them after an offense, as the deities had sent strong winds to beach the Greek warships ready to set sail against Troy.  (Of course, the poem is also about other things.)

If the imagery of the burning girl bothers you, then consider this — there are various versions of the story.  In one, a giant bird appears from the heavens to dive down and rescue young Iphigenia clean away.  It’s the kind of deus ex machina we occasionally see from winged saviors in fantasy; think of both the eagles in J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings,” as well as the wayward seagull in Richard Adams’ “Watership Down.”  (“WHERE’S YOUR WHITE BIRD, *NOW*, BIGWIG?!?!”)

Thanks again to Mr. Muir and the Aphelion community!  🙂

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“Are You There?” by W. H. Auden

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Are You There?

Each lover has some theory of his own
About the difference between the ache
Of being with his love, and being alone:Why what, when dreaming, is dear flesh and bone
That really stirs the senses, when awake,
Appears a simulacrum of his own.

Narcissus disbelieves in the unknown;
He cannot join his image in the lake
So long as he assumes he is alone.

The child, the waterfall, the fire, the stone,
Are always up to mischief, though, and take
The universe for granted as their own.

The elderly, like Proust, are always prone
To think of love as a subjective fake;
The more they love, the more they feel alone.

Whatever view we hold, it must be shown
Why every lover has a wish to make
Some kind of otherness his own:
Perhaps, in fact, we never are alone.

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— Thanks to blogger Ashok Karra for sharing this poem on his own blog.  Read his analysis here:
http://www.ashokkarra.com/2007/05/the-distance-of-love-on-audens-are-you-there/
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Sorry I am posting this a little late …

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“U.S. Government hacked; feds think China is the culprit” (CNN.Com)

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I cracked a thoughtless joke online about this last night — I apologize. I’m only now realizing the breadth and seriousness of China’s penetration of federal employees’ information.

Many friends of mine are federal employees. I hope they are (and will remain) unaffected.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/04/politics/federal-agency-hacked-personnel-management/index.html

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Sooooo, “The Following” actually will kinda continue …

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… because the talented Michael Ealy is apparently playing his character from the newly cancelled show in the upcoming “The Perfect Guy.”

I’ll see it.  I’m a fan of this guy.  I’d love to see him play a calculating KGB agent in a Clancy-esque thriller — someone in the tradition of Felix Cortez from “Clear and Present Danger.”  Or, if Hollywood is remaking everything, why not give us another iteration of “The Jackal?”

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“You must be master and win …”

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“You must be master and win, or serve and lose; grieve or triumph; be the anvil or the hammer.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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“SARAH CONNOR???” “Yes?”

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So this is a little strange …

A woman who I do not know on Google + is “adding” and following every single man she can find with any variation of the name “Eric Robert.”  (Google + remains the poor man’s Facebook, despite its designers’ ambitions.  “Adding” is a lot like following someone on Twitter.)

So I am being monitored along with no fewer than 31 other guys named “Eric Robert,” “Eric Roberts” or “Eric Robert” with a following surname.  I won’t state her name here … for all I know there is a perfectly logical reason for somebody monitoring every Eric Robert on the Internet.  (Is there such a thing as an Eric-fetish?  Or is this maybe an online “bot” programmed to locate a lost sibling?)

All I can think of is the Terminator finding every “Sarah Connor” in the phone book, and then acting like the most inconvenient door-to-door salesman ever.  (If the gender reversal for this analogy is consistent, does that mean that Summer Glau will knock on my door, and Lena Headey must then barge in and fight to save me?  Because I am more or less on board with that.)