Luke would be more buff if he weren’t such a tauntaun riding wuss.
It’s beach season! In the frozen north where I live, we’re currently shedding our polar bear and Sasquatch skins to show off our tummies once again! Except, after six months of trudging through snowdrifts and blizzards, our thighs may be tree trunks of victory, but our abs have lost that chainmail bikini flattering glory.
Fear not, there is hope. Here are some tips for fighting off that winter bulge!
Chase Down a Pack of Wild Wolves
Nothing will get you sweating faster than chasing down wild canines, especially when they turn on you and you have to fight them off with nothing but your wit and might. Make sure to pack your wit or, failing that, lots of sharp steeled might.
Modern adaptation that manages to keep the poofy hair = adaptation done right.
Jem and the Holograms, that quintessential 80s animated rock band, is back!
First, it returned in a monthly IDW comic book, written by Kelly Thompson and illustrated by Sophie Campbell, which is totally awesome. Then, this week, a trailer was released for the forthcoming live action movie. To say it wasn’t well received by fans is a bit like saying that the sun exploding would be bad for the Earth.
BUT, as self-help gurus would say: Try and capture the positive in your day-to-day. And slay goats. (I’m pretty sure they say that.) And so, in my continuous pursuit to see the positive in things that are easy to hate, I looked at the trailer three times (!) to pull out some positive traits.
1 – Ambition Is Tough (And Unattractive!)
Ambition is a crap shoot. You might succeed, you might not. It’s good that the trailer clearly showcases that Jerrica had absolutely no ambition and had to be convinced to pursue stardom. The lesson here is simple: Don’t pursue stuff. Be pursued! It’s a real life fairy tale! Plus, as often showcased, ambition is unattractive in girls. Who the hell wants to be unattractive???
As a performing storyteller (think bard), I’ve had the chance to participate in some epic tellings. And I mean EPIC! Up to three days of multiple tellers from across various countries telling a long and ancient story, one chapter at a time. It’s, well, it’s epic.
“I could string his bow, too, but everyone would just say the Hulk could have done it faster… It’s not easy being me.”
I’ve had the chance to tell The Odyssey twice, once in my hometown of Ottawa, the other time on the West Coast in Nanaimo, BC. The last telling was two weekends ago, and it struck me that you could take Odysseus out of his story and plop him into a sword and sorcery adventure and voilà! You have a perfect barbarian hero. Let me, in fact, count the ways:
He Has Super Strength
He’s so badass that he’s the only one who can string his ash bow. The only one! People try, fail and then go drink wine while mumbling.
He Knows How to Keep a Story Going
Okay, so we encounter him in The Iliad (bloody fun stuff). That war lasted ten years. Ten years! Then he takes another nine years to get home, while partaking of multiple adventures. Kind of makes you understand why Epic Fantasy is so, well, Epic.
Hear ye! Hear ye! This week, the InterWebs exploded with posts on bookselling and all their various don’ts and dos. They may speak of their crazed magical ways of InterWebs, but it is we of Black Gate who will provide you with the DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO SELLING MORE BOOKS!
“Razzle Dazzle, InterWeb razzle…”
Gather round, Authors of Yore, Authors of Now and Authors of Soon, and learn the true ways of book selling success.
1. MAKE IT PERSONAL!
Like any good conquest, the personal touch makes the difference. Let them see the blood lust in your eyes first-hand. Remember, the closer you are to them, the more blood lust they’ll see, the more books you’ll sell.
2. FEAR IS YOUR FRIEND
That’s their fear. Not yours. Make them fear that not purchasing your book will lead their villages to be burned and their crops to be destroyed! Speak fondly of past blood baths! Showcase them in a spiffy pop-up banner behind your sales table and REMEMBER TO FOLLOW THROUGH! If you don’t want to waste too much writing time destroying your non-purchasing enemies, at least steal their goat.
I started planning this post by thinking: Hey, Good Friday, awesome time for a post on sword and sorcery crucifixion. That evolved into: okay, that might be in poor taste (that’s personal growth, that right there). How about just on hero sacrifice, then? They bring us lessons by sacrificing stuff, right?
I am He-Mullet!
Yes, right. And the stuff (or people, whatever) they sacrifice is often forgotten by the time we’re screaming cheers and profanities during the final battle. We feel that something good has been accomplished and we forget everything that was left behind. Well, no more. Today, let us take a moment to ponder these sacrifices.
Hair Let’s just start this with an important one, with a view to the 80s movies boom of S&S (sounds kind of Fifty Shade-ish when it’s put like that. Ha.) A mullet covered in lice is just not an easy look to pull off. Sadly much hair was sacrificed in the name of victory.
Weapons
So many weapons are cast aside. They’re special for one scene, then they get stuck in a rib cage and game over. Just abandoned like it never mattered. Let us remind the swords that yes, they did matter.
Rib Cages
On the same line, with the sword stuck in them and all. Perhaps if it had been protected by more than a bikini, the story could have ended differently .
Reboots are awesome. There you go. I’ve said it. Call blasphemy all you want, but I’m a fan of (some) adaptations, and 80s cartoons are high on my list of “Yes, please adapt.” It’s not just that modern companies are making the storylines better; they’re quite frankly making some of them make sense. Not in all cases, but in a heck of a lot of them.
I’m a child of the 80s. I grew up on these cartoons, and enjoyed their adaptations. I followed their various incarnations, too, but now is a golden age for storylines, with plenty flourishing.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Knee pads are a ninja’s BFF.
I’ve always been a fan of witty repartee, martial arts and turtles. Combine all three and you’ve sold me. Easily.
TMNT started as a rather dark comic book, grew into a 10-year long cartoon show in the 80s, then a 6-year run starting in 2003. Nickelodeon bought the rights in 2012, and BOOM, started everything up again.
IDW has two new comics lines, one based on the new cartoon show and one more based on the old comics (and much darker. I love it). I struck that out because they just repeated one of my least favorite storylines ever (spoiler link). No conclusion on that yet, so I’m no longer including it (take that, IDW!) Let’s also ignore anything live action, because there is absolutely no winning there.
Anyway, back to the new cartoon. What makes the new turtles unique? Their personalities are more defined.
Michelangelo, the party one, is now more funny than annoying. Donatello gets more chances to shine (he’s my fave). Leonardo, the poor always responsible lead turtle, is now a geek and gets excited about Space Heroes (a riff off Star Trek: The Animated Series). Raphael is still angry and one of the most loyal and, although he pretends to be a hard-ass, he’s one of the more sensitive.
You too could look this morally superior as you plant your garden.
Are you in charge of a Barbarian horde? Did your family lay siege to a neighboring kingdom over the winter? Do you enjoy feasting on the thawed entrails of your enemy (remember to cook the meat well, first! Who knows where your enemy has been!)
Well, my heroic homemakers, spring will soon be in the air. The ground will thaw and so will the bodies of your enemies. Birds will sing and battle cries will echo. Grass will sprout and warrior tummies will demand feeding.
The time to plan your Garden of Victory is now! Here are some easy to follow tips and tricks to make it even easier than before, all while using existing resources.
Burn, Burn, Burn!
First, you MUST BURN THE WINTER SCARS FROM YOUR LAND! (I’m told this isn’t really a planting thing, but trust me, it’ll look cool.) Make sure your land is covered with combustible materials, like oil, dry hay or failed batches of barbarian moonshine.
TIP: Make sure you don’t set the fire too close to your home. If you didn’t destroy all neighboring tribes during the winter, add some coloring agents to keep the smoke interesting. You don’t want to start being predictable. Remember: predictable neighbors are invadable neighbors.
This is possibly the most brilliant way to think about writing ever. I can’t believe I’m just thinking about it now, and certainly won’t have to beat the metaphor into shape. Well, maybe a bit. But, who the heck cares. You can now view your writing as a freaking barbarian invasion! Like I said: brilliant.
Barbarians don’t post plans on the Internet, so I interviewed one and drew this. You’re welcome.
PLANNING THE BATTLE
Like any good invading army, you must first plan which of your troops are going where. It’s known as “plotting” in the writing world. It doesn’t need to be super detailed, but you should know the attack plan of your knights (aka hero) and archers (aka secondary characters. Sorry, Hawkeye). Plus, you should know a bit about your enemy’s defenses (aka villain).
Build up enthusiasm in your barbarian army with awesome speeches (aka writing down cool scenes).
FIRST WAVE OF ATTACK!
This is where you plunge in and WRITE! KILL! DESTROY! Your armies are in place. Your knights are totally rocking it! Your archers are shooting those little wooden arrows like they can’t run out AND THEY DON’T BECAUSE IT’S YOUR BOOK!
Growing up, my brother was a huge gamer, and I loved watching him play. He used to rent a Nintendo at the library every weekend, as well as the Final Fantasy cartridge. He would practically turn blue holding his breath all week, hoping no one else would rent it and save over that one precious on-cartridge spot.
Then, when the Super Nintendo was announced, he saved allll of his monies and my dad drove us to the States (it was coming out only months later in Canada!) He bought it, and we stared at those “high-res” graphics on the box all the way back home.
I bought him Final Fantasy 2 (I know, I know, it’s IV, but back in the day, Google didn’t alert us of all these things. Wait, am I old? I’m going to ignore that.) I had to get Dad to drive me to the States to get it again, and it ate up all of my hard earned paper route proceeds. Totally worth it to see him jump up and down.
BUT, on top of the games teaching me things through their acquisitions (saving, planning, emotional manipulation/whining), I think it’s safe to say that we’ve all learned many other fine lessons from playing pixelated heroes.
The barbarian plight against snakes is a rarely celebrated, often retold story. From Conan’s eternal plight against snake cults to He-Man’s hissy conquerors of Eternia, there seems to be an infestation of snakes. This mostly highlights how incompetent our brawny brethren are at dealing with scaly slithering psychopaths.
To get the best advice, I called Gary from the Extermination Team in my hometown and then John from Etermin-yay! after Gary hung up on me for the third time. I condensed the conversation with Gary since we chatted for well over an hour, but John’s is pretty much as-is. **
See? This is a problem. A recurring problem, to boot
