ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY MY ONLY POST ABOUT 50 SHADES OF GREY

Odds are by now you’ve come across the book 50 Shades Of Grey in yr local bookstore – or, failing that, you’ve come across some TV news stories or Facebook posts or something about the book. In which case you probably know three things about it:

(1) It’s got lotsa BDSM sex in it

(2) It’s poorly written

(3) It’s insanely popular, despite (1).

Much has been written about it primarily because of points (1) and (3), and most of it because an awful lot of people can’t get their heads around the idea that women not only like porn (OMG!), but BDSM porn (ZOMFG!).

Also, because of its apparent popularity with a particular female demo, they’re calling it “mommy porn” (which is both sensationalistic and a bit creepy-sounding).

I’m writing about it partly because it’s been popping up on bookshelves in Asia (I can personally confirm that the whole series is available in major bookstores in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur) and partly because of all the dithering it’s inspired.

Newsweek did a cover story on it (with a poorly conceived feminism spin)! 

Libraries are refusing to carry it!

Actual BDSM practitioners are concerned over inaccuracies!

Gilbert Gottfried is reading it out loud on the Internet!

The library angle is the most interesting to me – it’s not often you see libraries refusing to stock certain books before uppity parents and Christian groups get a chance to demand they remove them. Of course, the difference is that librarians aren’t obliged to carry something just because there’s demand for it. Also, anti-censorship people can point to Lolita and Lady Chatterly’s Lover all they want – comparing E.L. James to Nabokov or Lawrence is like comparing Dan Brown to Grahame Greene.

However, it’s a fair bet that some libraries are probably more worried about the sexy bits than the writing quality. Which raises the broader question of where does one draw the line between erotica and porn, whether there should be a line at all, and whether libraries should have a section for it.

Personally, I think they should. I think erotica is as valid a genre and a cultural signpost as techno-thrillers and urban fantasy. And as Annie Sprinkles once said (I think – or possibly it was Suzie Bright), the difference between “erotica” and “porn” is the difference between whether you order wine or beer with your meal in a fancy restaurant.

So why not carry 50SoG? Some have argued that “if it gets more people to go to the library and/or read books, do it”. To which I would add: If gets more people to read erotica/porn, go for it.

DISCLAIMER: I haven’t read 50SoG, no. And I don’t plan to. From what I’ve read, it sounds like an overhyped romance novel with a BDSM angle.

More to the point, my experience with erotica is that even when it’s by someone who knows how to write, it falls short of my expectations in terms of both sexiness and narrative.

Which is why I started writing my own, of course.

Everything went grey,

This is dF

TELEPORTATION WARS!

Yr Fuck-Yeah-21st-Century lede of the day:



I could elaborate, but it would only ruin it.

I do recommend reading the article if you want to know more.

Beam me up,

This is dF

EARTH’S MIGHTIEST HEROES b/w THAT 70S SHOW

I watch Hollywood blockbusters. I have opinions. That makes me movie critic, yes?

Dark Shadows

Having never watched the TV show, my only preconception going in was the worry that Tim Burton would turn the gothic soap into an OTT camp-goth Addams Family pastiche (which the movie poster certainly suggested). Luckily, he didn’t. Not entirely, anyway.

The story runs with one of the basic storylines of the TV show – Barnabas Collins, cursed by a spurned lover (who also happens to be a witch) and imprisoned for 200 years, is accidentally freed in 1972 to discover his family survives but is still cursed, while the witch still lives and has taken over the town the Collins family originally founded. Barnabas vows to restore the family name, and in the process many dark secrets are revealed.

A lot of fans of the original TV show (and critics in general) are not happy with the Burton/Depp version, which is more comedy than horror. But I think that’s unfair – partly because Burton’s never really made a horror movie in his life (or at least not a scary one) and partly because from the few YouTube clips I’ve seen, the original Dark Shadows wasn’t scary by 1960s standards, let alone the 21st Century.

For the most part, Burton and scriptwriter Seth Grahame-Smith (author of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter!) avoid the usual pitfalls of the man-out-of-time gimmick, and maintain the right dosage of soap-opera tropes and supernatural camp without going overboard, except for the overblown and somewhat rushed CG ending ("Oh and BTW, this character has been a werewolf all this time!"). But thanks to a top-notch cast having fun with it, Dark Shadows is mighty entertaining, and the best live-action film Burton has done since Sleepy Hollow.

The Avengers

First things first: I was never a big fan of either the Avengers comic or most of the individual titles of the characters involved. Indeed, of the bunch, the Hulk was the only title I read regularly. Also, I never saw the recent films featuring Thor or Captain America.

So, with all that out of the way, I can tell you from the POV of a casual viewer that The Avengers is one of the better comic-book movies I’ve seen, thanks to Joss Whedon knowing better than most people in Hollywood what a comic-book movie ought to be like as an experience – i.e. lotsa epic, well-choreographed fight scenes, a brisk but comprehensible pace and snappy banter, but never taking itself seriously.

It helps that Robert Downey Jr’s take on Iron Man arguably set the gold standard for everyone else in the film. Jeremy Renner makes even Hawkeye look cool, and Mark Ruffalo’s take on David Banner was an unexpected treat – and I say that as someone who liked Eric Bana’s take (and I should add I never saw Ed Norton’s version). Anyway, it’s a hell of a lot more fun than I was expecting. Still don't care for Captain America and Thor, mind you.

Smash hits,

This is dF