Knock on wood

[cleolinda]

Ah, October: the second awesomest month of the year for the holiday-minded. I got tons of work today, and even sorted out a major plot point that had been giving me frickin' hives. This is what happens when you take a relatively simple story and then expand it with a ton of new scenes while also keeping three subsequent installments in mind, people. I don't know how JK Rowling did it, except that she deserves every penny she got for it.

As for the linkspam, I think I'm just going to move on past the week or so I missed, because the thought of trying to sort through it makes me want to cry. There may be a reduced amount of 'spam for a while, because I'm pretty much going to have to read for research at nights while it's quiet and try to write during the day--I have the borrowed laptop for the entire month of October, huzzah!

Meanwhile, Sister Girl came down with some kind of 24-Hour Hell Flu over the weekend--not a stomach flu, but rather something so bad that she got "freezing cold, except that my head was on fire, and I started crying and Mom didn't know what to do"--and I promptly came down with it twelve hours later, except that I popped two Advil and some Tylenol Sinus, felt like hell for about four hours, and then was mostly fine by midnight. I'm still kind of snurfly today, but again: work getting done, so that was good.

P.S. It's Banned Books Week. You can read some banned books at ManyBooks.net. Also: Most Challenged Books of 21st Century (2000–2005).

Meanwhile, foresthouse is helping to develop a Discworld convention at nadwcon2009; you can read about her having dinner with Terry Pratchett this weekend here.


Anubis, god of dead, floats down Thames.

Photojournalist Kenji Nagai was killed by a Burmese soldier during anti-government protests. Warning: photographic proof. I mean, it's not graphic, but it may still be upsetting: "The 'stray bullet' explanation was proposed by the government of Myanmar as an explanation for Nagai's death. However video footage obtained by Japanese television appears to show a Burmese soldier shoving Nagai to the ground and shooting him at point-blank range."

Stallone says he saw 'horrific' atrocities in Myanmar.

In sex life of jumping spiders, size matters; 6 die from brain-eating amoeba in lakes; Why Women Worry So Much. I like to think that these three stories are related.

Two men fight for custody of amputated leg.

My Little Cthulhu!

Hey, look, it's my childhood!

Lost Season-Four Spoilers Leaked. I didn't read it, so DON'T SPOIL ME I can't really tell you what it says.

From Dachelle: A detailed list of changes to The Dark Is Rising The Seeker. Very first sentence: "Arthurian legend does not play a part." Uh. I genuinely want to slap someone on Susan Cooper's behalf, and I haven't even read the series yet.

Rose McGowan is 'Barbarella.' Isn't she actually with Robert Rodriguez? So I'm not really surprised.

James Purefoy Signs as 'Solomon Kane.'

Dakota Blue Richards Nabs Her Second Big Role.

Pullman: ‘Real’ Oxford is Disappearing. "Continuing his campaign to save the Jericho boatyard in the city, Pullman attended a ceremony to rename a protestor’s boat Lyra’s Defiance." Meanwhile, Eva Green and Nicole Kidman in Costume and at Yahoo: Daemon Featurette (aww! Freddie Highmore! HESTER!).

Writer Peter Morgan Working on a Sequel to 'The Queen.' "The film 'will focus on Blair's reaction to the handover of power between Clinton, a natural liberal ally, and Bush, who came from the other end of the political spectrum.' The project will actually be the third in Morgan's series of films about Blair, which began with the Channel 4 telepic The Deal."

Freeman and Banderas to Star in The Code.

Is Tim Burton Directing Remake of 'Frankenweenie' for Disney?

David Lynch Sells Out, Peddles Gucci. "That and I never like seeing something from David Lynch that makes sense on the initial viewing."

Akerman's Watchmen Update.

Biel is NOT Wonder Woman.

Urban Eyes Star Trek?

First Poster for 'The Other Boleyn Girl'... still looks like the book cover from a while back. Which was kind of lame.

Is the World Ready for Lesbian Teenage Werewolves? Lesbian Werewolf Film Not as Exciting as Concept Implies.

Actor David Thewlis to JKR [back in the day]: Put more Lupin in Harry Potter Books.

Report: Bond films' original 'Moneypenny' dies. Aww.

Spielberg Furious After Indiana Jones Plot Is Leaked.

Bono Expects Spider-Man Musical To Set New Standards. There are way too many things going on in that sentence for me to even start.

Comments

[apey1013.livejournal.com]

A giant Anubis, god of the dead, floating down the Thames is cool but not as cool as my Anubis and Thoth finger puppets I got at that exhibit when it was in the U.S.!

[emisi.livejournal.com]

Every time I read something else about the shambling horror that is The Seeker I just get angrier. It's like they took the Cliff-Notes version of the book and left the rewriting to a 13-year-old boy so that it would be "cooler."

[emisi.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I just noticed that they changed the father's name to Roger. I think I figured out why he would be emotionally unavailable in England. Poor guy must never hear the end of it.

[evilbearhunter.livejournal.com]

It makes me so very angry and I never even read the books. I may have issues. Also, icon twins!

[elendiari22.livejournal.com]

The brain-eating amoeba story? That is why I only swim in the ocean.

[neveth.livejournal.com]

But what about sharks and jellyfishes?

Thus why I only swim in pools. And people mock me for not swimming in lakes.

[miladygrey.livejournal.com]

Sweet merciful gods, I am going to hunt down the producers and directors of "The Seeker" and kill them DEAD. I read that book when I was ten, and I understood it, loved it, and still own the entire series. Why must they completely and utterly ruin it? WHY?

And Ian McShane and Chris Eccleston? Really, I thought better of you both. Go read the book, it won't kill you.

[honorh.livejournal.com]

I know! I want to see Eccles being all badass in leather armor on a horse, *pauses to wipe drool* but why'd they have to vivisect a perfectly good book to get him there?

[greenwitch.livejournal.com]

From Dachelle: A detailed list of changes to The Dark Is Rising The Seeker. Very first sentence: "Arthurian legend does not play a part." Uh. I genuinely want to slap someone on Susan Cooper's behalf, and I haven't even read the series yet.

*reads*

OH. EM. GEE. WHAT.

I'm just thankful this movie will suck so bad that the likelihood of them making Greenwitch (or any of the other books) is almost nonexistent.

[riverchild.livejournal.com]

Writer Peter Morgan Working on a Sequel to 'The Queen.'

Sweet, that should keep Michael Sheen in bread and butter for another couple of years.

[wearejustducky.livejournal.com]

I actualy just got done reading the Dark is Rising books, and when I happened to catch the trailer for the movie, I finally realized exactly HOW MUCH of an ABOMINATION UNTO THE LORD this travesty is.

It made me feel like picking up a pitchfork and a burning torch and marching somewhere.

And it could have been so good. I mean, McShane and Eccleston! In the same movie!

I weep.

[marginaliana]

*reads post on The Seeker*

*cries*

God, what utter shit. :(

[laughingacademy.livejournal.com]

While ranting about the cinematic abomination that is The Seeker to a friend who (a) has not read the Dark Is Rising series but (b) is, like me, a pervy Brit fancier, the following exchange occurred:

Me: [Rantapalooza]...so I’m re-reading the books to savor the good memories before the movie sullies them.

Her: You know, you don’t have to see it.

Me: The only reason I might go is that the lead villain is played by Christopher Eccleston.

Her: Oh, shit.

Me: Exactly.

God, this movie is entirely made of FAIL. Even a poster the other day made my angry with its depiction of the Six Signs—quartered circles? BOOOORRRRRRRING! They need knobs and wings and go-faster stripes!

*SEETHES*

[evilbearhunter.livejournal.com]

Maybe you could wait until it's out on DVD, and then just fast forward to the Eccelston parts? Unless you're enjoying the seething rage, which I would totally understand.

[ciara-belle.livejournal.com]

That poster for Other Boleyn Girl looks kind of wonky. Like some terrible Photoshopping and an unfortunate wig for Scarlett.

Also, why are women never wearing hoods in these movies? They could at least put their hair up. *grumps*

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

They are wearing hoods in the stills I saw, at least. Cheap-ass looking hoods, but there you are.

[falco-conlon.livejournal.com]

LITTLE CTHULHU!?

AAAWWWWWWW!

[trede.livejournal.com]

That Lost article isn't very spoilery. The headline is a bit of an exaggeration. It's not so much "spoilers leaked" as "the writers themselves giving several vague hints".

Looking forward to The Queen sequel... although the whole point of that film was Helen Mirren as the Queen, not whatsisname as Tony Blair (no matter how good a job he did). So calling it a sequel is a bit much.

[glass-radical.livejournal.com]

mostly things like "writers confirm existence of male puberty"

[glass-radical.livejournal.com]

ZOMG FRANKENWEENIE. THAT is a golden moment of my childhood that led to my love of the horror genre.

[gannet-guts.livejournal.com]

OMG, HESTER. That voice is like, PERFECT. PERFECT.

[ninepointfivemm.livejournal.com]

I have not even READ the book, and I already like a drawly Texan woman as a jackrabbit. It so fits.

*appropriately uses the Bono facepalm icon*

[sapphires13.livejournal.com]

I love Bono, I love Julie Taymor, I even liked the Spiderman movies. But I cringe everytime I hear about that damn Spiderman musical. It's just so WRONG.

Re: *appropriately uses the Bono facepalm icon*

[lotusbiosm.livejournal.com]

As I told my best friend, who is a huge Spider-Man fanboy as well as a U2 fanboy- it will either be tremendously awesome or tremendously awful.

[queenofattolia.livejournal.com]

Re The Dark is Rising: those people had absolutely no shame, did they? Talk about hubris - to take a beloved YA classic and "improve" it. What balls. What stupidity. Hey guys - no one is going to think this is a viable alternative to Harry Potter! NO ONE. Oh - and YOU. SUCK.

Re Rose McGowan as Barbarella: it's official - Rodrigues is thinking with his johnson. This is going to blow chunks, and I hope Jane Fonda is chortling somewhere.

[sonneta.livejournal.com]

...Am I the only one giggling at the fact that the scientist-guy in the brain-eating amoeba article's name is Beaches? ...Yes, I'm very tired.

[foresthouse.livejournal.com]

"Little Victims." HEEHEEHEE.

Kenji Nagai's death is very disturbing to me. Possibly because I have a good friend who's an international photojournalist, and, while he's not anywhere hear Burma at the moment...well, you never know where he'll go next. Yikes.

The whole business with The Seeker makes me want to fly to Hollywood, somehow find out everyone involved in this travesty, and lock them in a dark room with nothing to read but back-issues of Cosmo, because honestly that is all they deserve after this.

I think this one's my favorite WTF moment:

Will goes to the mall and is accused of shoplifting by security guards, who take him to their office, demand the signs, then turn into rooks and chase him around the mall.

What? WHY? Why is this better than the original??

Also, why is the Rider's horse white? Will has a twin? Merriman has a mace? OK, I've stopped reading. My soul is crying.

This actually came up at the author dinner, and all of us were appalled at the mess they've made, and wondered what happened to poor Susan Cooper (i.e. did she desperately need money for lung transplant? a new heart? What? Holly noted that you don't have as much choice as one would thing when getting a book turned into a movie, and I guess she would know, but it's not usually this bad!

Susan Cooper is actually still alive, right?

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

She is--I want to say that the entry with the list itself mentioned that she's even written screenplays, and that they're in contact with her, and that they KNOW that she's not happy (although the quotes from the filmmakers seem to phrase it more as her being "conflicted" or "knowing what has to happen when a book becomes a movie"). I'm sorry, NO ONE deserves this. Just from what I'm reading, it's like the movie is maybe 45% what she actually wrote. It's like, why are you even bothering with this property? Do you actually LIKE it at all? Were you just afraid she'd sue you if you made your tangentially similar original movie? I am actually considering some kind of Boycott This Movie campaign, if only because I'm terrified this movie making any kind of money will encourage studios to butcher other properties. Up until now, LOTR and HP set excellent precedents for faithful movies making shitloads of money, and most subsequent productions have followed in their footsteps. Like, the Lemony Snicket movie changed a few things, including more of a wrap-up at the end, but they all worked, and the rest of the movie was so obviously trying to capture the books. The Narnia movie was fantastic, the Dark Materials people are obviously trying to be as faithful as possible despite the religion issue, Stardust made some majorish changes but was still a lovely adaptation--the only other really, really horrible travesty I can think of off the top of my head was the Earthsea miniseries, and it bombed, so, you know, faithful = money was still being upheld. Seriously, maybe this is just The Week I Get Unnecessarily Worked Up, but the Dark Is Rising situation terrifies me as a writer AND a reader/viewer. This shit cannot be allowed to stand.

[wirrrn.livejournal.com]

Hey,

I like to think that Anubis floating down the Thames is related to the awful changes being wrought on Harry Potter and the Rising Dark The Seeker...

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

Bono Expects Spider-Man Musical To Set New Standards.

I'm not even clicking on that link, I'm too busy trying to wrap my head around that sentence. o_O

[ironclad1609.livejournal.com]

The Lost spoilers hardly deserved that title, don't worry. *is too curious for own good*

Dear idiot actor from Indiana Jones: good luck finding a new job.

[stareyednight.livejournal.com]

Not sure if you saw this: http://www.imdb.com/news/wenn/2007-10-01/celeb/12

Britney loses custody of her kids tomorrow at noon. My boyfriend has morbidly announced that he thinks she won't see out the weekend.

Sometimes there just aren't enough bitchcakes in the world...

[maetang.livejournal.com]

Re: Dark is Rising travesty, this is starting to remind me of the time Disney wanted to overhaul Winnie the Pooh by replacing Christopher Robin with a gurrrrl, and Neil Gaiman posted his hilarious "bitchcakes" (http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2005/12/skippy-show.asp) post.

That's all that goes through my head now, when I read about the horrible, horrible things they're doing to The Dark is Rising. Bitchcakes!

Re: Sometimes there just aren't enough bitchcakes in the world...

[foresthouse.livejournal.com]

HEE. I am glad you linked to that, because I'd forgotten about it.

...They never actually went through with that, did they? I hope not!