Conspicuous Acts of Cultural Consumption

Comics writer Kieron Gillen sent out his latest newsletter yesterday, which featured a line-up of his top music tracks of 2019. Gillen’s got a background as a DJ, and writes some pretty awesome music-inspired works, and his newsletter has introduced me to a bunch of music I would have overlooked.

He introduced The Comet Is Coming thusly:

People occasionally ask me about whether there’s going to be a Doctor Aphra show or not (answer: no idea) but no-one’s actually asked what I’d like to see in a Doctor Aphra show. My answer: I would like to see them back a cart of money up to The Comet Is Coming and get them to record the complete score. Listen to this. You want to watch the show this is the theme tune for. This is an explosion, a promise, all propulsion and sex. I walk, it soars, the world is better.

Newsletter 144: momentarily Manichean, Kieron Gillen

I loved his Doctor Aphra run, so…yeah. Sold. Just on the description. But then I went and tracked them down on youtube, and seriously, OH. MY. GOD.

I may have ordered CDs already. Because I am terrifyingly behind the times in that regard.

You should subscribe to Gillen’s newsletter, BTW. Even if you’re not a comics fan. I followed him this way for a year or so, before I started engaging with his work, and he’s invariably introduced me to interesting things every week.

This has been your Friday Morning community service announcement.

I’m reading Dreamsongs at the moment, George R.R. Martin’s big retrospective collection of short stories, and the introductions where Martin gets salty are among my favourite things.

Particularly this one, from Doing the Wild Card Shuffle, where he talks about a failed attempt to get a job at Marvel and how his love of comics led to Wild Cards:

I have no doubt that in some alternate universe Marvel Comics did hire me when I applied in 1971, and right now in that world I am sitting at home muttering and gnawing at my wrists as I watch blockbuster movies based on my characters and stories rake in hundreds of millions of dollars while I receive exactly nothing.

In this world I was spared that fate. In this world I wrote short stories and novellas and novels instead of funny books, and later on screenplays and teleplays as well.

Martin, George R.R.. Dreamsongs: A RRetrospective (p. 229).

A useful reminder that sometimes the opportunities that don’t pan out wouldn’t necessarily have led you to a more successful life.

We finished watching the third season of Riverdale last night, and my mouth dropped at the sheer and wondrous audacity of a twist in the penultimate episode where a secret was revealed. It was a moment that delivered what I’d loved in Riverdale’s first season–a well-honed twist that changed the direction of a story, and showed you a big, whopping clue that had been there all season and became sinister by the addition of new information.

It renewed my love for the franchise in the space of two episodes, and got me interested in really sitting down and investigating the craft of each season.

On the other hand, there was a looooong gap between the point where we started the season and the point we ended it. At one point, well into the heart of the season, we simply stopped watching for about twelve months because we didn’t have the energy.

After a relatively sublime first season, it’s a show that’s struggled to maintain its footing, but I continue to admire its energy. Whether it succeeds or fails on any given episode–Riverdale goes big.