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All entries filed under On My Influences

Buy Synthroid Without Prescription

September 4, 2009 at 9:13 am · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

Buy Synthroid Without Prescription, No, not that The Odyssey. This one.

Let me explain. For years, order Synthroid online overnight delivery no prescription, Buy generic Synthroid, I've had a file cabinet's worth of my early writing in my parents' house, and I've recently begun moving it to my apartment piece by piece. I've been scanning most of the files as I go to back them up, buy Synthroid no prescription, Synthroid reviews, seeing as some represent the only remaining copies of these old stories. It was glancing over the papers while moving them in and out of the scanner that reminded me of The Odyssey, and how into it I once was, where can i order Synthroid without prescription. Synthroid photos, I included the link above to avoid a ponderous explanation of the show, but here's the basic premise: a kid named Jay sinks into a coma after an accident and winds up in a "Downworld" populated and run entirely by kids 15 and younger. It's not an exaggeration to say that the show was one of the first major influences on my writing (right up there with Sonic the Hedgehog and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). I'm not sure that any of that early influence remains obvious in School Kids SG as it stands today...most of what I gleaned from The Odyssey went toward the timeline of the Crimson Twig instead (someone who just got his first brief retrospective mention in The Arc of Time, Synthroid gel, ointment, cream, pill, spray, continuous-release, extended-release, Synthroid dosage, hint, hint). But it should be obvious how a world of autonomous kids split into sometimes-warring factions was able to mesh with the kinds of ideas I was coming up with, after Synthroid. Online Synthroid without a prescription, Looking back, I don't know if I really "got" the show in the way its creators intended. It seems like "Downworld" was supposed to be a fantasy, Synthroid online cod, Synthroid results, Jay's way of working through and eventually coming out of his coma, and then his crutch as he daydreamed his way back into integration with a world that had passed him by. As interesting as that might have been, real brand Synthroid online, Rx free Synthroid, I had a different interpretation in mind. I wanted The Odyssey to be more of a sci-fi show, not least because I saw it on the Sci-Fi Channel. In my mind, taking Synthroid, Cheap Synthroid, "Downworld" was real, a parallel dimension that Jay had been transported to by an unlikely combination of events, Synthroid from canada, Synthroid forum, and which continued to exist once he woke up, inhabited by a parallel Jay who shared consciousness with the genuine article. I even envisioned ways for the show to continue beyond the point of its cancellation, is Synthroid addictive, Synthroid used for, and as embarassed as I am to admit this in a public forum, I committed some of them to paper (hence the files I've been scanning). The Odyssey was one of the only shows I ever wrote fanfiction for, generic Synthroid, Is Synthroid safe, and as someone who has dedicated most of his life to his own creative work, that means something. There was something in this universe, order Synthroid online c.o.d, Synthroid schedule, or implied by it, that I found tantalizing, buy cheap Synthroid. Order Synthroid from United States pharmacy, I haven't thought about The Odyssey in years, but it's still there, Synthroid mg, Synthroid canada, mexico, india, deep beneath the surface. I'm sure it played some part in my definition of the Woodvale universe gang culture (best explained here). Part of my reason in posting about this here has been to promote awareness of what seems like a largely-forgotten series, but hopefully you can find something intriguing in what I said about my writing even if you aren't intrigued by the actual show. To be honest, Synthroid pics, Where can i buy cheapest Synthroid online, I'm afraid to go back to it now; we all know how things from our childhood are sometimes less amazing than we remember.

One last fun note: The Odyssey co-starred the now-famous Ryan Reynolds as Macro, Synthroid price, coupon, Australia, uk, us, usa, the teenage tyrant-king of Downworld. I wonder how he feels about that role now. Purchase Synthroid online. Herbal Synthroid. Buy Synthroid from canada.

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Buy Benicar Without Prescription

September 7, 2007 at 9:06 am · Filed under On My Influences, Personal, Thoughts

Buy Benicar Without Prescription, The Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi (also spelled Chuang-tzu, depending on who did the translation) is famous for decrying the power of words. Benicar without prescription, In spite of this, he was also a writer, purchase Benicar online no prescription, Cheap Benicar no rx, which I find fascinating, but I digress, low dose Benicar. What is Benicar, Coheed and Cambria is a concept band, for those of you who don't know them...their albums tell a story in song, is Benicar addictive, Where can i buy cheapest Benicar online, conveyed mostly through feelings and a few key phrases, all of it written and envisioned by the singer, Benicar photos, Cheap Benicar, Claudio Sanchez. I once heard the story described as Adam and Eve in space (Sanchez having been raised, where can i buy Benicar online, No prescription Benicar online, as both man and artist, on science fiction and comic books), buy Benicar from canada, Benicar maximum dosage, but I have the most fun when I just let it wash over me. I don't need to understand it in a way that could be explained...Zhuangzi would be proud, australia, uk, us, usa.

But see, that same Chinese philosophical feeling is why I've been hesitating to talk about music on this site, even as it relates to School Kids SG, even when I planned all along to have just such discussions once I got far enough into the series for them to be relevant, Buy Benicar Without Prescription. Benicar results, I have some pretty strong feelings about the songs I listen to, especially the kind that inspire or energize me, order Benicar online overnight delivery no prescription, Benicar mg, and I worry that by trying to put that feeling to words so that I could communicate it here, I'll dilute its unspoken meaning, Benicar steet value, Ordering Benicar online, both in the text and in my head.

However, herbal Benicar, Buy generic Benicar, this week, I tried going to coheedandcambria.com, Benicar pics, Benicar long term, thinking that they were probably due for a new album by now, and I was excited to find a track list, Benicar gel, ointment, cream, pill, spray, continuous-release, extended-release, Buying Benicar online over the counter, album art, and a preview song from Good Apollo, Benicar coupon, Benicar use, I'm Burning Star IV: Volume 2-No World for Tomorrow. This has me so excited that I can't help but say a few things...after all, Benicar from canada, Online Benicar without a prescription, Coheed and Cambria is one of my all-time favorite bands, and their music gives me a doubleshot of inspiration, Benicar forum, Benicar used for, half from liking the songs themselves and half from sharing in Claudio Sanchez's creative joy and triumph (this tendency of mine, incidentally, real brand Benicar online, Benicar trusted pharmacy reviews, is why I work well around other creative people).

"The Running Free" is a good song, buy Benicar online cod, Australia, uk, us, usa, and even just the titles on the track list make me think that Coheed and Cambria's steady improvement as a band is about to continue. Buy Benicar Without Prescription, Someone on the site predicted the album would be "powerful," and I'm prepared to call that the right word. It feels like this is going to be a climax in the band's story, and what I'm hoping for most is that one of the later songs (perhaps one of the five slated to be part of "The End Complete") will contain a fast, desperate, guitar-plucked version of that "Ring in Return" tune that's been on every album so far. I can' t think of any better way to say "final battle" than that. But hey, what do I know. It's not my story.

The one song they've given us is already conjuring up an image in my head that's everything I could have wanted, and feels like a natural progression of all that came before. I can't stop listening to it, Buy Benicar Without Prescription. Even the vocals have a different timbre and a slightly lower pitch to them than usual (believe it or not). You can find a list of places to hear or download the song at coheedandcambria.com, which just forwards to a stub page for the new album now. I highly reccommend giving it a listen.

The other Coheed albums, and so many more diverse songs and lyrics, have had a big influence on various parts of School Kids SG, and I'll get to them in time. Hopefully once that day comes, I'll have figured out a way to speak to you without speaking.

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Buy Trileptal Without Prescription

July 25, 2007 at 9:07 am · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

Buy Trileptal Without Prescription, I don't think I've mentioned this on here yet, but I was an Asian Studies major in college. School Kids SG was actually one of the first things that led me to discover Asian Studies, Daoism and philosophy in particular, because after stumbling into a Chinese fiction class on a whim freshman year, I realized that a lot of the ideas behind those stories would fit well into my stories, like gears turning together. It was as if I'd been writing towards China all along. You might not be able to see it so much in The Gauntlet, but then again The Gauntlet was already pretty much done when I started college.

There were many things about Asian Studies that interested me, where to buy Trileptal, Real brand Trileptal online, though philosophy was chief among them. One of the other topics that made me raise my eyebrows was Chinese literary theory...it's so much the opposite of Western literary theory in that it believes the meanings of words aren't fixed, and that words are inherently limited in their power to convey ideas. I always related this back to the philosopher Chuang-Tzu, buy cheap Trileptal, Rx free Trileptal, who said that the writings of great men are their dregs, because the best parts of them can never truly be passed on. Then again, buy Trileptal from canada, Purchase Trileptal online no prescription, the same literary doctrine believes that writing is the one true path to immortality, because in your books you leave a piece of yourself behind. Unfortunately, buy cheap Trileptal no rx, Where to buy Trileptal, the small class I was going to take on Chinese literary theory got canceled, but I managed to retain enough of the big concepts to stay intrigued, buying Trileptal online over the counter. Purchase Trileptal, I've tried over the last few years to make my writing more and more driven by what isn't said, although in the case of School Kids SG the pacing is also way up the list of important things. But what got me thinking about my studies today was my attempt to write the first part of a Megaman retrospective I've been planning to post here in installments for a long time. With all the videogame articles I've posted so far, Trileptal pics, Trileptal wiki, it's amazing that I've managed to hold back on my two favorites, Megaman and Sonic, buy Trileptal online cod, Real brand Trileptal online, for so long, and I'll probably hold back on Sonic for even longer just because it'll take more time to prepare (it's not just about the games). Like most of the games I've played, Trileptal mg, Trileptal from canada, Megaman games are an experience to me, but in thinking about the way I see things because of videogames, Trileptal dosage, Online buying Trileptal, I've started to realize that a lot of the earlier Megaman games were also wordless stories to me. And in thinking about how to describe them in a post, I've added words to them! And as I add words to them, what is Trileptal, Trileptal from canadian pharmacy, I feel the value of the experience they describe being diminished.

It's really quite amazing how much I've come to believe in this stuff. Thought really is bad in a surprising number of cases, Trileptal canada, mexico, india, Australia, uk, us, usa, at least as far as I'm concerned. Better to let things wash over you and understand them in a way that doesn't need language, a way that's actually obscured by language. I'm still going to try to write this thing, purchase Trileptal for sale, Trileptal recreational, but it'll have to be in a different form, and like almost any piece of writing it certainly won't be as good as the original thought that spawned it. I've come to except that--there are certain things you just can't capture. You have to use the words to suggest around it as best you can, Trileptal use, Buy Trileptal from mexico, sort of like the way fresh-fallen snow suggests the shape of the things underneath it.

This Friday brings us the final chapter of The Gauntlet, buy generic Trileptal, Where can i buy Trileptal online, and then Monday will have a sort of epilogue. After that, this site will enter it's first intermission period, Trileptal blogs, Trileptal schedule, which will be as much of an experiment for me as for you. I promise that the times between serialized stories will be interesting, too...you'll see what I mean next week, Trileptal online cod. Trileptal gel, ointment, cream, pill, spray, continuous-release, extended-release. Buy no prescription Trileptal online. Buy Trileptal without prescription. Comprar en línea Trileptal, comprar Trileptal baratos.

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Buy Tinidazole Without Prescription

July 9, 2007 at 9:03 am · Filed under On My Influences, Personal, Thoughts

Buy Tinidazole Without Prescription, Ever want to know why so many reviews of video games pop up on a site that's supposed to be centered around prose fiction. Click through below to find an essay that explains why. This was originally written as a final essay for a college class called Cultural Reportage, Buy cheap Tinidazole no rx, in which I learned how to write the sorts of reviews and commentaries that I post on School Kids SG. In fact, it's pretty much true that this one class inspired me to create that whole portion of the site, and it had a very big effect on my writing style in general, Tinidazole online cod, for fiction and nonfiction. So I guess this is the proper place to acknowledge my professor, Tinidazole over the counter, Peter Sourian, for being so good at his job, and to me.

And without further ado....

If there’s one thing I remember about grade school with absolute clarity, it’s that I wasn’t popular. In fact, online buying Tinidazole, I was barely tolerated. But in first through third grade, there was one time of day when I got to shine—lunch time. The teachers would walk us down to the basement cafeteria, No prescription Tinidazole online, we’d sit at a long, white table, and I would begin telling stories. I called each story “The Dream,” as if these tales came to me in my sleep, buy no prescription Tinidazole online, and all of them were very similar, having a common basis in Super Mario Brothers II. My classmates hung on my every word, Tinidazole duration, and if I felt too tired or reluctant to tell my story on a particular day, they would team up and cajole me into it. Only while I was narrating “The Dream” did I feel as if I could call them my friends.

Being a writer now, I’d like to say that I achieved this victory because I was a talented storyteller, even in my single-digit years. My ego’s not that big, Tinidazole without a prescription, and I’m not that stupid. As I would later discover, the fact that I liked to write stories might be a curiosity to my peers, Tinidazole without prescription, but it didn’t attract new friends to my side for more than a day or two at a time. No, I credit the success of “The Dream” to its major inspiration, and the source of its wide appeal: video games.

My orations of “The Dream” weren’t the only times when video games helped my social life. From Kindergarten all the way to senior year, I went to school with a boy who I’ll call Will. I liked Will, thought he was cool—he hated me. Our mothers couldn’t stand one another, and as the years went by, I found that I couldn’t stand his mother, either. At any rate, mixed in with many memories of being ditched by Will, there are a few scattered images of me in his house, sitting on the dark carpet of the living room, playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game. We were able to get quite a bit farther as a team than either of us could have alone.

My one true friend in grade school was named Brice. Even our teachers knew how close we were, as I discovered when my math teacher, Mrs, Buy Tinidazole Without Prescription. R, offered me consolation after he moved away when we were 14. Except for the fact that he was a comic artist in the same way that I was a writer, we had almost nothing in common: he was one of those sports enthusiasts, Tinidazole dosage, the basketball card-collecting statistics whizzes who were a dime a dozen in my town. We were friends, however, Tinidazole images, because we cared about one another, and when we wanted to hang out and have fun, we played video games. I could hardly get him to leave my house after I introduced him to Kirby’s Adventure, and when I visited his house, buy Tinidazole from mexico, he introduced me to one of the most laughably-bad computer games I’ve ever encountered (“You struck the ogre. You struck the ogre. Buy cheap Tinidazole, You killed the ogre.”) Through the Sega Genesis, we were even able to act out his love of sports in a way that caught my attention: NBA Jam was based in reality, but its execution was so ridiculous that I had a lot of fun with it. That game often appeared at parties, supplying a level on which I could interact with all the sports fanatics, Tinidazole trusted pharmacy reviews, and granting me what little knowledge of pro basketball I possessed.

Like I said, though, Tinidazole pics, I didn’t have many friends, nor was I invited to many parties, once everybody’s mom stopped insisting that their child invite the entire class. For the most part, video games were my in-home companion, Tinidazole interactions, from the Christmas morning when I got my old Nintendo until halfway through high school. Although they occasionally became a topic of conversation or a shared activity, video games were primarily part of my personal life. In this sense, Tinidazole overnight, they weren’t just entertainment: they also contributed to my physical and psychological development.

I’ll never forget my first driving lesson. I was 16 years old, and after I obtained my learner’s permit through driver’s ed class, I got my six hours of required road experience from a man named Arim. On the day of my first lesson, the pressure was on: a second boy my age was riding along to watch everything I did, Tinidazole australia, uk, us, usa, having missed his own first lesson several hours earlier. Before I was allowed to drive the car, Arim asked me to use the accelerator and brake pedals to move the speedometer needle in neutral, Tinidazole street price, making it settle at whatever point he asked for. This would tell him whether or not I was ready to manage and obey various speed limits for real. We did several tests, in which I had to hit common speed limits such as 35 and 45, and I did all of them with pinpoint accuracy on the first try.

“Your speed control is excellent,” Arim said in his heavily-accented voice.

“Well, Tinidazole samples, I have played a lot of driving games,” I replied.

I probably owe most of my hand-eye coordination skill to years of playing Nintendo. Summer day camp showed me that I was and always would be terrible at ping-pong, Tinidazole maximum dosage, but during my senior year in high school, when I babysat for my friend’s little brother during a family emergency, I impressed him by bouncing the ball up and down on the paddle for sustained periods of time. I was surprised that it entertained him—even though I couldn’t score a single point against the kids from camp, simply hitting the ball in place felt ordinary to me. I’d always known how to do it, comprar en línea Tinidazole, comprar Tinidazole baratos, but when that little boy stared at me with wide eyes, I realized that I’d never consciously practiced the trick before. Maybe it was impressive, Tinidazole treatment, I thought. The only way I could explain this talent to myself was, again, through video games. I had been honing my hand-eye coordination every time I made the controller in my hands and the characters on my TV screen interact.

By far, where can i buy Tinidazole online, though, the most tangible and persistent way I feel the influence of video games is through my writing. Just like the way in which Mario and Luigi’s adventures gave rise to “The Dream, About Tinidazole, ” my many years of interacting with video game-style storytelling, as well as video game-style action and pacing, have helped to shape an indispensable part of my writer’s sense.

Despite being a storyteller since first grade, the first time that I got really serious about writing as an independent was between the ages of 10 and 14. I was primarily interested in action stories, discount Tinidazole, which almost necessitated some type of violence as a result of character conflict. But there was one roadblock—I had a very attentive mother. As soon as things like television and video games entered my life, she was careful to regulate them so that I would only see age-appropriate material. This is why the games I’ve listed so far don’t get any less family-friendly than Mario, Taking Tinidazole, in which you might step on the head of a mushroom or turtle, but no more than that. There was only one exception to my mother’s rule: the Mega Man games, in which all the guns and bombs and violence was perpetrated by and against robots. Robots never really got hurt, ordering Tinidazole online, and they could always be repaired, so this was acceptable.

You can see the effects of my upbringing in my early action stories. Even when the plot demanded confrontation, Tinidazole wiki, I would shy away from fighting and violence, and when it became unavoidable, I’d hand things off to robots or other creatures that couldn’t be truly harmed. Many of my characters used Mega Man-style movements, and came equipped with Mega Man-style weaponry, Tinidazole reviews, such as flying magnets and colored energy beams. Thanks to my mother’s careful parenting and my love of video games, this was all I knew of action, After Tinidazole, and it became one lens through which I started to write my stories. No matter how many years I spend refining and changing some of my projects, even if they become completely different stories after successive edits, many of them can be traced back to a common ancestry involving Mega Man.

This is not to say that Mega Man was the only video game to ever inspire me. Today, I write about a much wider range of topics, real brand Tinidazole online, and I draw from a much wider range of influences and experiences than I had access to when I was 14. My mental library of games has expanded over the years as well, and the part of my brain that thinks like a video game still kicks into action when appropriate.

Role-playing games, Tinidazole description, which contain far more narrative than a Mario Brothers title, can influence my language and thought processes as much as a Mega Man game might influence the way I visualize an action sequence. To give an example: I wrote a story for my Senior Project at Bard, and at several times during that story, I visualized events in video game terms. For instance, where can i cheapest Tinidazole online, a few comparatively recent RPGs I liked, such as Skies of Arcadia and Grandia II, Tinidazole used for, contained 3-D movement through realistic environments. These video games had a profound effect on my “narrator’s eye,” the perspective from which I see events in my head, and from which I come to describe these events in words. One moment near the end of my senior project, a desperate run up many flights of stairs, was written as if I were seeing it on a screen, through a camera that was sometimes behind, sometimes above, and sometimes below my characters. If I hadn’t been thinking like a video game at that point in the writing process, I might have chosen to present very different details about the world of the story as I envisioned it.

I know many people who are far more serious gamers than I, but video games have always been a small yet significant part of my routine. My social life, my personal life, and the governing principles of my writer’s brain have all benefited from playing video games. I’ve told this story to several people with whom I share my stories and memories, and I’ve gotten mixed reactions. Some find it interesting, or at least unique, while others consider the influence of video games on my writing to be inherently corruptive. Although I hear it’s hard to recognize the video game-style elements in my fiction without being told to look for them, I’ve also been told that non-literary influences have no business creeping into prose—especially not video games. I used to feel offended by statements like that, but now I just shrug. This is the way I am, and when you come right down to it, everyone’s a critic..

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Webcomics I Read - 6/11/07

June 11, 2007 at 9:06 am · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

I may review some of these in-depth at a later time, but for the moment, I just wanted to post a list of comics I read or have read, all of which I think are great and many of which have inspired or influenced me in some way. Any of these would be worth your time to check out. Enjoy! Roomies!/It's Walky! and Shortpacked! by David Willis - This is a continuity I've been following since junior high school (!). It's my favorite webcomic of all time, and arguably one of my biggest creative influences. I plan to review this one sooner than any of the others on this list, so I'd better not say anything else now. Melonpool by Steve Troop - As I understand it, Melonpool is one of the oldest webcomics out there, and it's got archives going all the way back to 1996. Regrettably, it seems to be on permanent hiatus now...it was going to be reborn in a really promising graphic novel format, but it seems the writer/artist eventually lost interest because he didn't feel very many people were reading, and that's really sad, because Melonpool is one of the only comics that genuinely makes me laugh. It's also got the most satisfying and complex time travel writing I've ever seen anywhere, period. College Roomies from Hell!!! - This one has long story arcs and can therefore be difficult to get into and follow, but it's one of the most popular comics on Keenspot for a reason. It's surprising, supernatural, and increasingly well-drawn. Also, as everyone is so fond of saying, the cartoonist is evil, so every once in a while, things happen that are completely unexpected and change the entire story. It had a pretty choppy update schedule a couple years back, but now it's pretty much stabilized, and it moves at a good pace. Funny Farm - Not really a furry strip, if you believe the FAQ (the reason the author gives for why some of the characters appear to us as bipedal animals is actually pretty intriguing). Funny Farm's another long one, and it's full of mysteries and secret characters, but it's also consistently funny. The only downside is that it's often riddled with typos and weird grammatical choices. Nothing you can't think away on your end, though. Penny Arcade - Everyone knows about Penny Arcade. It's hilarious, it's on-point, it's very well-written and drawn, and the news posts that surround the comics give actual, useful information on games and the gaming industry. Some people say they're sellouts, and they are getting awfully big, but I dunno. I guess they just have different goal than I do. Besides, the print collections published by Dark Horse are actually worth buying. Achewood - A friend from college turned me on to this strip a couple years back...this was part of what gave me the idea to start doing School Kids SG in blog format. I like Achewood because you can never quite see where it's going. Although it has a story, it exists mainly for its humor, which actually manages to translate strip-to-strip even when viewed outside the context of the storyline...hit the random comic button a few times and see if you don't believe me. Hover your pointer over almost any strip in the archives for a few extra words. Friendly Hostility -This comic is wacky. To give you an idea--it's about an Indo-British bisexual college student and his gay lover, their high-school-age assistant Bootsie, a Demon, a mad scientist, a Satanic priest, the government...and somehow it all boils down to being about love and family. Oh, and now it's starting to be about murder and intrigue, too. It's funny, it's well-drawn, it's a good story, and there are daily comments from the author! This is one that really loves its fans. A Lesson is Learned but the Damage is Irreversible - Though it seems to be over now, this comic is one of the best-drawn anything I've ever come across, and it's written in a surrealist, almost free-associative way that makes it a lot of fun to think about. The two creators would often make their words and art bleed into one another, and they were getting some real critical acclaim before things quieted down. Oh, well. All the comics are still up there for you to look at and enjoy. Tip Me Over, Pour Me Out - The last comic I'll go over for today is the youngest of the bunch, written like a blog and drawn with a really entertaining kind of twisted realism. It's basically an introspection comic, and it's about the main character/writer's relationships as often as not...it's so honest you really feel like you're getting to know him. That's pretty much all I can say. This is one you really have to go check out for yourself.

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Thoughts on Heroes - 4/30/07

April 30, 2007 at 9:01 am · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

Instead of discussing the revelation of Mark's secret last Friday (I'll get to that next update), I've decided to spend today talking about another one of my favorite TV shows: Heroes. It's hard to believe that I was reluctant to watch the first episode just because I was already deeply engrossed in LOST, which is so complex and slowly-developing as a serial that it demands a considerable amount of head space. Now, I honestly believe Heroes is getting right a lot of what LOST is getting wrong...it's faster at revealing its secrets, but never loses the suspense that comes with the unknown or the not-yet-understood. Plus, it a hell of a cool concept with some really great characters. Writing like this reminds me why I write, and inspires me to continue--I always feel creatively energized after watching Heroes. Now, like that time I talked about LOST, I'm going to engage in some speculation about what's going to happen on Heroes tonight, so the portion of the post below the cut may contain SPOILERS. You've been warned! So, 2012, eh? Hiro may have his powers back (I still think the loss of them was psychological, brought on by his failure to save Charlie and his subsequent depression), but it seems like he still can't fully control them. This is the third time he's overshot his intended teleportation point. In any case, it'll be interesting to see the future the Heroes are attempting to avert. One of the things I'm waiting to see most eagerly is the interplay between Peter and Nikki/Jessica, not because I think it's intriguing that they seem to have gotten together, but because this may be our chance to finally discover the particulars of Nikki's power. I know it may seem like we've got the whole story on this woman, but honestly, having a split personality isn't a superpower. Having someone else actually inside you may be, and that's where we don't know all the details. How is Jessica inside of Nikki? Is Jessica really the one with all the powers? (We've seen that only she can use super strength, unless Nikki just hasn't wanted to yet, or doesn't realize she can). Was one of Jessica's powers the ability to survive her own death by living on inside her twin sister? Do they each have half the powers, and thus remain joined in a way that transcends life, extending the old superstition that twins are metaphysically joined from birth? Or does Nikki actually have the power, and is that power the ability to absorb dead souls? Is that why she gets stronger when Jessica comes out--because Jessica is simply lending her the additional strength of a second woman? And if all that's the case, could Nikki absorb others besides Jessica? It's been hard to make a call on this because up until now, we've only seen this power in one iteration--the case of Nikki/Jessica. But now that she's going to get close to Peter, we're about to finally find out what part of her power, if any, is transferable. Will Peter gain the ability to become Jessica, or some equivalently dark, powerful version of himself (Nathan? his father?) Will he gain the ability to absorb the dead? Will the already-dead Heroes Sylar ate and Peter absorbed from him begin to manifest their personalities in Peter? I can't wait to find out what happens when Peter and Nikki/Jessica get together, and even if nothing happens, it will at least help to answer the question of just what Nikki's abilities are. Here's something else to think about: while we've all been wondering if the Heroes really can change the future that Hiro and Isaac have seen, it may be easy to miss the second way in which they already have. The first change, obviously, came when Peter saved the cheerleader, keeping the power of regeneration out of Sylar's hands (I really think that's what was meant by saving the world--preventing a major antagonist from becoming nearly unkillable). But think about the death of Isaac, seen by Hiro the first time he traveled to the future and wound up in November. According to last week's episode, the election is still a week away, and Isaac is already dead--but when Hiro first found his body after the time jump, the election was already over! Any way you look at it, Isaac's dead early, unless we're meant to believe his body lay there undiscovered for a full week (and the blood looked too fresh for that when Hiro first happened upon the body). It's going to be very interesting to get a look at Future Hiro's string-and-paper timeline, or possibly timelines. This is territory that the Back to the Future movies pioneered and Melonpool improved upon (that comic strip has the most satisfying and complex time travel writing I've ever encountered). Think about it: if we step back a little, we know that Hiro still made his original trip into the future, the one where he found Isaac dead, but if Isaac's death has now been moved up...what did Hiro see when he went into the future that first time? The future we saw him jump into no longer exists, and, temporally speaking, it never did! Obviously, the Hiro we know still remembers finding Isaac sans his brain, but if an alternate timeline has been created by changes to the past, that opens the possibility of another Hiro making a jump to a completely-altered November...and what if that Hiro is the same Hiro as Future Hiro? If he is, we could be looking at two timelines that intermingle and cancel certain events out--if he's not, then who knows how many timelines there are, or how out-of-control the multiverse is growing? This could get real confusing, real fast, and I couldn't be more excited. Finally, I really like that Sylar isn't as good an artist as Isaac. Isaac's talent was his own--Sylar can copy the function, but not the form. It's nuances like this that make me confident the writers know what they're doing, and have planned out everything, including the timelines, so that all will be explained and make sense by the end of the season. I wouldn't be surprised if each season of this show turns out to be a self-contained story, like in some anime series. That's a very effective storytelling technique, and it allows for finer focus on details and greater control over the story as a whole. However, it's not all that common in American writing, so if Heroes turns out to be following that format, I will be extremely impressed at their boldness...and I'd wager even money that it pays off for them long-term.

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Thoughts on House - 3/21/07

March 21, 2007 at 8:47 am · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

I’m telling you, there’s only one way to really enjoy this show, and that’s to treat it as a comedy. House is laugh-out-loud funny…well, except when someone is spewing blood all over the place or somebody else’s baby is on its way to the morgue. Those moments are serious (and often so graphic they border on the TMI range). But I’m sure that even some of the diagnostic scenes must be amusing to, say, actual doctors, they being the only viewers capable of noting how farfetched some of the medical mysteries’ solutions are without doing independent research. I often watch this show with a close relative—when she heard the phrase, “Infantile Alexander’s Disease,” uttered by an ailing woman, what had been a moment of quiet intensity shattered under the assault of her laughter.

“Whaaaat?!” she guffawed at me, doubling over in her chair. “Someone’s just sitting there with the Encyclopedia fucking Brittanica!”

And how! I first became interested in House back when it premiered (though I never watched it until recently), and what hooked me was that Fox sold the premise of the show by proclaiming that Dr. House was a medical Sherlock Holmes. I’ve been a fan of the classic Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle since my freshman year in college, so this show sounded like something I would enjoy. Now that I think of it, I enjoy Doyle’s works for the same reason I enjoy House—they take themselves seriously, but are funny for how far-out they sometimes go with Holmes’ cases and powers of reasoning. The key is that Holmes’ cases and his world always come together within the framework of their internal, fictional logic, and the medical mysteries of House do the same thing.

Take an episode I saw recently, called “Spin” (I’m watching them out of order, whenever they happen to come on). I guess I should say SPOILER WARNING at this point, to make sure anybody who doesn’t want to know the solution to the mystery has a chance to hit the “back” button.

Anyway, “Spin” features a pro cyclist who suddenly develops respiratory problems and muscle weakness—he admits early on that he’s been secretly doping (injecting blood into himself) and sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber in order to enhance his performance on the circuit. Of course, this has nothing to do with the actual problem, because that would be too obvious. 38 minutes, a couple of deteriorating condition scares, and a boatload of staff drama later, House diagnoses the patient with some anemic condition or other that he’s actually had for a long time. He just didn’t know he had it, because the treatments for said disease are…blood transfusions and hyperbaria. Well, what do you know, all that time the guy thought he was cheating, he was actually self-medicating and probably barely breaking even in terms of his performance. I thought it was a pretty cool explanation…of course, my viewing companion laughed again at this point, and pointed out that “the chances must be one in a googala-boogala-foogala….” She continued making up numbers like that for almost a full 30 seconds. Meanwhile, House gave the cyclist an injection that cured his condition for all of two minutes, just so he could call himself God and then yell, “Cleanup in aisle 3!” when the drugs wore off and his patient collapsed on the floor.

Really, who cares about the chances when you’re having fun? The mysteries really are the core of the show, and they’re what keep me coming back, but it doesn’t hurt that House is a very interesting and well-portrayed character. Hugh Laurie plays him as a complex, brooding man who pops Vicoden several times an episode, and he supplies much of the show’s humor because he’s a total ass to everyone around him, in a myriad of creative and diverse ways. Everyone else on the show is pretty much defined with respect to him, from his lone and long-suffering friend Wilson (who everybody says is his “Watson,” but I really don’t see it), to his boss Cuddy, to his three fellowship doctors, Cameron, Chase, and Foreman. All of them bring out different sides of him at different times, and it’s through their interactions with him that we find out more about who they are, too.

So far, the most interesting character I’ve stumbled across is Stacy, House’s ex-wife—people make much of the fact that she’s played by Sela Ward, and I’m sure it speaks volumes about me that I have no idea who she is outside the context of this one show. Her part in the story of Dr. House is so interesting and so important that I don’t even want to write it here, despite the spoiler warning. This is one arc that deserves to be seen as it unfolds, and to be allowed to speak for itself. I will say that Stacy brings out the greatest depths of House’s character, and is one of very few people he encounters who can give him back as many snide remarks as he can dish out. I’m not sure if anyone is this quick on the draw in real life, but once again, who cares?

In spite of all I’ve said about how amusingly ridiculous and over-the-top House can be, the writers really do deserve a pat on the back for knowing how to be subtle when it counts. There’s an episode I saw called “Kids,” which features a 12-year-old high-diver brought into the hospital after a meningitis outbreak occurs at her swim meet. She has symptoms very similar to meningitis, but House senses that something’s a little different about her case. And, as usual, he’s right: she’s not sick, she’s pregnant! This is pretty unusual for a 12-year-old, though the episode makes much of the fact that she’s very mature for her age (and she acts like she believes her own hype in that regard). She says the guy responsible for impregnating her “turned out to be a jerk,” and we never learn any more about him than that. However, I think what we’re supposed to assume is that her creepy, traveling-companion swim coach might just be a pedophile, who convinced his young charge that she was adult enough to handle sleeping with him. The way the coach was portrayed made it easy enough for me to draw that conclusion, even though he barely had any lines. I’m pretty sure he only finally left the girl’s side during her ultimate, tearful confession to her parents, and since he was practically chained to her arm up until then, that says something. As I watched this story progress, it occurred to me that implying such a volatile detail in such an understated way required skill and restraint from the actors, the writers and the director. I was very impressed.

I don’t know if I’d actually call it an “influence,” but as far as raw knowledge and experience go, House has been pretty good for me so far. There are some tidbits of real medical information you can pick up from the show that I didn’t know coming in, such as what an angiogram is, or why a spinal nerve biopsy is dangerous. I’ve never been big on doctor shows because I’m too squeamish, but coming back to see Dr. House slam the door in somebody’s face or awkwardly bring a corsage on a dinner date has forced me to deal with the more graphic parts of the show, and I think I’m gradually getting used to sights like twitching intestines and sawed-open brains. Gradually. In the end, though, I don’t watch House as an inspiring work or even as a serious medical drama—I watch it because I think it’s hilarious that the good doctor likes to watch The L Word on mute.

Seriously, though, what king of a name is “Greg House,” anyway? Nobody has a name like that! As a writer, I do have moments where a perfect name or title or line comes at me completely out of the blue, and in those moments, I say to myself, “I have to use that at some point.” House sounds like that kind of a name—somebody’s brainstorm that gave birth to a limping curmudgeon and the universe he inhabits. We should be happy the writer decided to go with his gut. Otherwise, we might have missed out on one of the more worthwhile characters currently on television.

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Thoughts on LOST - 2/28/07

February 28, 2007 at 1:24 pm · Filed under On My Influences, Thoughts

I suppose I'm trying to make one post in each of the major categories before The Gauntlet begins its run next week, so that none of the sidebar links will still be empty by then. In that spirit, here is the first entry into the "Thoughts" section, i.e. stuff that isn't School Kids SG but which interests or inspires me. ABC's hit show LOST has often inspired or interested me, and I really love looking at it from a storyteller's perspective. Unlike almost everyone else I know, I still have faith that the writers have some kind of long-term plan, at least in basic terms, and when I see hints of a framework that engages my thoughts in the show, it makes me smile even if there's no one else around. With that in mind: I have an idea about what might happen tonight that I want to put on-record before the new episode airs. If anyone would care to discuss these things with me, go ahead and leave a comment, and I'll try to respond as quickly as I can. There are spoilers from this point on. You've been warned. Claire is going to die. Not Charlie, Claire. Two of the great things about LOST are that its characters are sometimes human, and its plots are sometimes subtle. Remember the episode entitled The Glass Ballerina from earlier this season? The relevance of the ballerina to the rest of the story wasn't concretely spelled out, but it seems clear that we were meant to assume that Sun lied about cheating on Jin. If she was capable of lying about breaking the ballerina, she was capable of fathering a child with...that bald guy, whose name I forget. But I digress. It seems to me that just because Desmond has seen the future (let's take it for granted that this is actually true, for now) doesn't mean that he automatically knows how to interpret what he sees. What if he hadn't acted to save Claire in last week's episode? Charlie might have tried to save her and drowned...but then wouldn't Claire still have drowned, too, with her rescuer out of commission? Same thing with the lightning strike. I find it hard to believe that a bolt of lightning hitting a little hut built from wood and airplane parts wouldn't have killed everyone inside, i.e. Charlie and Claire. So Claire has died in both of Desmond's visions, and Charlie has only died as well because of his proximity to Claire. Put simply, I think that Desmond is missing the forest (or I guess the jungle) for the trees. He focuses on Charlie in his visions because Charlie is the one most active in all these incidents, but I think it's just as likely that Claire could wind up being the one to die. If Charlie dies, too, it will only be failing to rescue Claire. Why would the writers of LOST allow Claire to die? Simple: to pick up one of the longest hanging plot threads from season one. Claire's child, according to the psychic she visited in Australia, must be raised by Claire, or else there will be dire consequences. Think of the button last season: how disappointed would we have been if it wound up doing nothing, if the countdown was meaningless after all? The same holds true for little Aaron--why tell the audience what would happen if he were raised by somebody other than Claire if that isn't going to come back into play at some point? I'm greatly looking forward to tonight's installment. Perhaps I'll be way off base, but even then, perhaps LOST will surprise me with something else that isn't the obvious "Charlie dies" scenario. Maybe the only thing I like more than seeing the story framework of a well-plotted show is getting thrown a curveball once in a while.

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