SFL Archives Vol 17a readthrough update 01

 148 bookmarks, 100% completion

-Movies & tv-series mentioned: THE LAWNMOWER MAN, RONNIE ROCKET, MANN & MACHINE, ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW, ALIEN 3, GODZILLA, QUANTUM LEAP, COOL WORLD, YOUNG INDIANA JONES CHRONICLES, SWAMP THING (TV), GREATEST AMERICAN HERO, SEARCH, QUEST FOR LOVE, IT HAPPENED HERE, PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT, THE LAWNMOWER MAN, IN LIVING COLOR, RADIOACTIVE DREAMS, FREEJACK, RED DWARF, GOLDEN YEARS, MOTHER GOOSE AND GRIMM, BIG BLUE, SLIPSTREAM, HARDWARE, OMEGA MAN, SOYLENT GREEN, THE FLASH (TV), THE JERK (play), TIME TRAX, HIGHLANDER 2, UNTIL THE END OF THE WORLD, NIGHTMARE CAFE, FROG BASEBALL, BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES, CHEERS, DANGER ISLAND, KNIGHTRIDER 2010, THE DOORS, RUNNING DELILAH, TWILIGHT OF THE COCKROACHES, KINVIG, FOREVER KNIGHT, VOYAGERS, SPACEBALLS, PIRATES OF DARK WATERS, DARKWING DUCK, SPACE CATS, ROC,

-Book mentions: NIGHTTHREADS, NIGHT LIFE OF THE GODS, PHULES PARADISE, ASH OCK, HE SHE IT, SUGAR RAIN, ILLEGAL ALIENS, BUREAU 13, CHONG KO, MUTANT STAR, JACK THE BODILESS, PROSPEROS BOOKS,LEGAL DAISY SPACING, RANSOM OF BLACK STEALTH ONE, THE SANDMAN (comic), TOO MANY MAGICIANS, ORBITAL RESONANCE, THE QUICK, BEANWORLD (comic), DARK TOWER, FIRE SEA, DUNCTION CHRONICLES, CANTORS DILEMMA, WANDERING STARS: AN ANTHOLOGY OF JEWISH SF&F, A FIRE UPON THE DEEP, ALIEN SEX, CYBERNETIC JUNGLE, LOMOKOME PAPERS, THE HUMANOIDS, THE BLACK SUN, JURASSIC PARK,

-Pop Culture references: teenage Valley slang, Xgopher (early internet searching tool), Powells Books (Portland OR), Werner Ehardt's EST training, PUNCH magazine, magic debunker James Zwinge aka the Amazing Randi, E Entertainment, Arsenio Hall show, "Samantha Fox (the pornstar, not the singer)", Michael Jackson music videos, Captain America 1990, 1988 Copyright Designs and Patent Act,

-SF-LOVERS mailing list moves to new server hardware GANDALF.RUTGERS.EDU, a Sun 670MP server.

-Oddly specific requests:

>scifi stories "that are actually about the social process of doing science, as opposed to engineering or psuedo-scientific magic/mysticism"

>incredibly BAD SF books 

>Fairy tales

>SF radio shows

>Nordic Mythos

>reproductive biology and social systems

>stories dealing in and with Shamanism

>fantasy stories based on Irish/Celtic myth

>movies and tv-series that Industrial Light & Magic worked on

>Best virtual reality stories

>SF authors in SF novels

-SFL Death notices: Author Isaac Asimov, SF&F convention organizer Terry Biffel, actor John-Eric Hexum.

-COOL WORLD movie & comic series discussion.

-SFAN: Space, Fantasy & Adventure Network tries to drum up support as an alternative to the upcoming SciFi Channel cable network...only the SFAN slate of offerings is very Star Trek/Star Trek actor focused and does not have any else to offer outside of Star Trek.

-Dan O'Bannon having a really hard time remembering to attribute other authors/influences in his work, especially if it's AE Van Vogt.

-A list of the the 5 largest Cable Multisystem Operators

(2021 note: This is of archival interest for pop-culture historians).

-How Joseph Green, a SF&F super-fan leveraged an author-facetime interview with Frederick Pohl for tips on how to get published in SF&F magazines. Frederick Pohl used Joseph Green's story to kick off the IF First Story series in IF Magazine.

(2021 note: One of the biggest benefactors of the IF First Story series was Larry Niven.)

-1991 SFL Archives April Fool joke: A database, available cia CD-ROM, able to procedurally generate SF&F stories based on 10000 hard coded plot elements & SF&F author writing sample. 

-A FIRE UPON THE DEEP comes out and SFLer's like the Futuristic USENET in it, along with the callback/call-forward to the Vinge short story THE BLABBER.

-More details of Raymond Feist and David Brin contributing to the same group D&D sessions/using material from their shared D&D sessions.

-SFLer's recall Ridley Scott's pre-movie director career/

-First appearance of Mike Judge in the SFL Archives thanks to FROG BASEBALL.

(2021 note: FROG BASEBALL was the premiere appearance of BEAVIS & BUTTHEAD).

-As of 1991, Glen Cook's last DREAD EMPIRE book selling only 6000 copies, dooming the chances of any sequels for that series.

-CMU pimps out their Science Fiction & Fantasy collection library.

-Someone mentions the Robert Silverberg mashup novella involving hell, HP Lovecraft & Robert Howard which Harry Harrison parodied in a BILL THE GALACTIC HERO sequel.

-The weirdness of Thomas Disch's lost off-broadway play about Ben-Hur and the US Civil War General Lew Wallace.

-Mail order book publisher Dime Books being investigated for mail fraud and ponzi schemes in at least 4 states.

-The first teaser information for the animated DC Comics tv series that would become BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES comes out. SFLer reaction is muted, the art design is unlike anything previously seen.

-Someone digs up an old Robert Heinlein quote about never rewriting any of his work. The Heinlein Defense Squad tries to deny this until other SFLer's pull up exact quotes/interviews of Robert Heinlein saying exactly that.

-SF radio shows discussion brings up the ZBS Foundation which specialized in unique SF style radio dramas involving cyborgs, cyberpunk, etc.

-SFLers want other SFLers to know that Elizabeth Moon is a ex-marine and knows how to write military stuff.

-More David Eddings Mallorean discussion, and one SFLer wonders why the same author bio text is never updated in any of Eddings 12+ published books.

-A few SFLer's try making the case that Corwin in the AMBER series is a Nazi...because he hazily remembered marching towards Moscow.

The "incredibly BAD SF books" discussion brings up the AYES OF TEXAS series along with with more even worse than the Ayes of Texas SF gems.

-Lots of skeptical discussion of upcoming 1992 tv series MANN & MACHINE that changes to vast investment in the series once it airs.

(2021 note: The setting and plot elements of MANN & MACHINE heavily remind me of the 2013 tv series ALMOST HUMAN beat for beat.)

-Church of the SUB GENIUS novels, and callouts to the Church of Sub Genius in various SF&F stories

-GODZILLA movie discussion. Lists of Godzilla films, lists of Godzilla enemies, lists of actors in Godzilla films, little known facts about the Godzilla films/behind the scenes production details/trivia about how some actors were hired just for their cars, etc.

-Commentary on Mark Hamill's acting career and acting abilities. Some like Hamill's acting choices, others absolutely loathe Hamill.

-One SFLer makes the argument about too much carnography aka torture-porn being the trend in current SF&F stories.

-Babylon 5 officially announced, and discussion of the series setting kicks off.

-SFLer's start discussing the many many many SF&F series based on Irish/Celtic mythos, after someone clues into Julian May re-using Derry Air aka Londonberry Air aka Danny Boy in her SF&F books.

-The ethics of buying used books.

-WHEEL OF TIME series discussion kicks off. A few SFLers are confused/angry that the WoT series is suddenly getting extended past 3 books into 7 books. Lots of interesting WoT character/plot discussion happens that I'm not going to bother recapping here.

-Even the most hardcore WILD CARD series fans can't deny the past few Wild Cards books have sucked, and tripled down on sex, bdsm and tortureporn elements.

-QUANTUM LEAP hits season 4 in the USA & season 2 in the UK causing a confusing medley of Quantum Leap posts that makes a reader from 2021 (me) extremely confused just like Sam Beckett.

-MANN & MAN has lots of male SFLer's commenting on Yancy Butler's looks. A certain segment of  SFLer's equate any female supporting actress presence in a tv-series or movie = bimbo wearing revealing clothing...This behavior hits a new low when SFLer Tom O'Connell calls Vasquez from ALIENS 1986  "the plump bimbo"

tomo@kpc.com (Tom O'Connell) writes:

>When the plump bimbo in Aliens grits her teeth and presses the button on

>the grenade with the other weak character (not just weak in the movie) do

>I care? No, it's just another Rambo character with a hormone problem

>giving the special effects people a chance to blow something up.

-Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk novel SNOW CRASH comes out and longtime fans of cyberpunk fiction find it gibberish try-hard trash.

-Terrible fan conduct at SF&F conventions 1992 edition. Plus tons of "Shit that didn't Happen" aka "and then everyone clapped" style stories of SF&F fandom owning normal people at SF&F conventions.

-First mention of mil-scifi author David Weber in the SFL Archives, and mild discussion of David Weber's writing & stories.

(2021 note: tldr version is that Weber's writing style had the strengths and weaknesses at the very beginning of his professional writing career to the latest published David Weber novel as 2019/2021.) 

-Extremely heaving ALIEN 3 discussion. Most SFLers did not like Alien 3 and are confused by Bishop 2, IRL actors aging out of roles, why the Xenomorph has 4 legs, and most importantly, how/why/when/where did Ripley get implanted with that Queen Xenomorph embryo.

-Cornbread being the true link between ALIEN 1979,  ALIENS 1986, & ALIEN 3.