Geek Confessional Thread 2024

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Sometimes he comes across as being a bit too much into the authoritarian, sometimes he's very strongly anti-authoritarian.

My own suspicion is that he thought some authoritarian approaches were the only practical ones for some problems while simultaneously not being at all happy with where he knew that seemed to always end up.

Authoritarianism is great so long as there's a benevolent authoritarian.

The problem is that when there isn't -- and that always happens eventually -- you don't then have a peaceful mechanism to remove them from power.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I guess I don't see "clever" as purely a positive thing.

I think it helps that in the UK, being called "clever" can be an insult, whereas it's never used that way by Americans, unless they're trying to do a whole anglophenia thing.

 

[Mannahnin]

Oh, I think there are great things in Moon, Stranger in a Strange Land (although it was wildly over-hyped by the hippies) and even Starship Troopers. But in all three, you can see his politics and "old men should be having sex with lots of young women" thing getting more and more intense, presumably as his fame was growing.

By the time the 1970s and early 1980s rolled around, he was still doing good stuff -- Friday, which has an ick factor but is still pretty good, and Job, in particular -- but you also have indulgent stuff about Lazarus Long getting laid and various hard body women popping through time and space in service (in every sense) of old dudes.

He's less gross than Lieber was at the end, but he was going down the same path.

Ironically, I think the best Heinlein books are by John Varley, who gets 99% of the ick out and puts out mostly pure goodness as a result. (Mammoth is pretty weak, but his Eight Worlds novels are fantastic.)

Good post. I'll have to try out Varley.

Point of order, though, I don't think ST has any of the weird sex stuff. Which makes sense, given that it's from '59.

I think Heinlein getting into his own neuroses and kinks later is a big part of why a lot of folks say his most lasting work is in the "juveniles". Though some of those still have some gross sexism, like Orphans of the Sky. :/ Tunnel in the Sky is still a great book, for example.

 

[trappedslider]

Good post. I'll have to try out Varley.

Red Thunder and it's sequels are good imo, there's a bit where one of the characters does a rant on how the space race should have gone but it's in character since he's a former astronaut and talking about full speed ahead vs slow and steady.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Red Thunder and it's sequels are good imo, there's a bit where one of the characters does a rant on how the space race should have gone but it's in character since he's a former astronaut and talking about full speed ahead vs slow and steady.

The Red Thunder series is very Heinlein juvenile, in all the best ways. I really like how lived-in his Earth-bound parts of those books are. The Florida stuff is especially vivid to me.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Authoritarianism is great so long as there's a benevolent authoritarian.

The problem is that when there isn't -- and that always happens eventually -- you don't then have a peaceful mechanism to remove them from power.

Yup. I mean, I think there's some intractable problems that I don't see any solution for other than authoritarian power. Problem is, after you've solved those, you can't count on having a Cincinnatus. In fact you'd be awfully lucky if you got one.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I won't tell anyone what they should think of either. I like both. But I would say don't rely on my opinions or the opinions and synopsis of posters. Watch and read for yourself and make your own determination. I know I was surprised when I read the book. There are definitely sentiments in the book I disagree with. I tend to be more on the side of the film. But I was not expecting to like the book as much as I did and be as entertained by and engaged with the arguments he was making.

Oddly enough, there are elements of the movie I quite like (the bugs are great for example, even if they're vastly different from the ones in the book) and the overt parody I can modestly appreciate. On the other hand, there are individual scenes that make my want to punch the scriptwriters, so I can't be but conflicted about it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Cut that person out of your life.

To refresh your memory/tear open old wounds, in Memnoch, Lestat travels through time and drinks Jesus' blood as he's carrying the cross to his crucifiction.

Completely incredible. I never got that far, but now I kind of wish I had just so I could have rolled my eyes at that.

 

[Scribe]

Completely incredible. I never got that far, but now I kind of wish I had just so I could have rolled my eyes at that.

Oh it was something. Pretty sure the end of that one scarred me.

 

[Moonmover]

I'm replaying the Mass Effect games at the moment.

Mass Effect 2 is the one that holds up the least.

The original has some janky gameplay elements (why do I always have to have a pistol, sniper rifle, assault rifle, and shotgun equipped? Especially when I chose a character class that only uses pistols?), but the story, characters, and worldbuilding more than make up for it.

ME3 is maybe the best example of the now-defunct cover-shooter genre. And, I Iove the story and presentation of it. Yeah, the ending was disappointing, but everything leading up to it is compelling.

Andromeda is a whole different kind of game from the first three, and the writing is weak, but the gameplay is fun. Hopping around with your jetpack in gunfights is delightful, and the degree of customization you have over your gear and loadout boggles the mind.

ME2, though....

I hate that the game forces you to work for Cerberus. The first game portrayed them as nothing more than racist mad scientists. ME2 makes it clear that they aren't all racists....but they are still mad scientists doing horrible evil things on the reg. The game railroads you into doing everything TIM tells you to do; you have some dialogue options that let you whine about it, but you never get a chance to undermine their stupid agenda.

What's the point of killing Shepard and destroying the Normandy, only to resurrect Shepard and rebuild the Normandy by the end of the first mission? It feels like just an incredibly convoluted way to explain why the ship has a different floor plan than it did in the first game.

The combat is...fine. It works. It isn't particularly fun or interesting. Some weapons and powers work better or worse against different defense types. It's basically Pokémon but with only four "elements" (health, armor, shields, barriers).

And then there's scanning for minerals. Ugh.