OLD MAN’S WAR: A SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL BY JOHN SCALZI

I haven’t used GUARDIANS OF THE GENRE! to review the books I read, because most of the books I read either didn’t  motivate me enough to spend my time reviewing; or I didn’t think enough of the followers of this blog would be interested in reading them.

As I mentioned in my SHELFARI IS DA SHIZNIT! post April 18, 2010, I joined this social networking website devoted to books earlier that month. I have been using Shelfari’s features – which include creating your own custom profile, building a virtual bookshelf , rating and discuss books and discovering new books – for the past nineteen months and have surprised myself by posting thirty-one (mostly short) reviews of the forty-five books I’ve posted there as having read in the past two years.

Anyone interesting in reading some of my book reviews, or just some of the books that I’ve read, can click on the Shelfari widget in the right column of this blog (right below the “Labels for lookin’”) or click on this link: http://www.shelfari.com/?kmi=2369330.

I was sufficiently excited by Old Man’s War by John Scalzi to share with you this brief review.

Vincent Chong's artwork for the Subterranean Press limited edition of Old Man’s War

John Scalzi’s “Old Man’s War” is definitely in the tradition of Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" and Haldeman's "Forever War”. However, Mr. Scalzi’s take on future war is more concerned with how technology affects man, than in the actual combat itself.

The point-of –view character of “Old Man’s War”, John Perry, is very much an everyman. But unlike the characters from the previously mentioned classics (both of which I’ve read and liked), Perry is an elderly man who volunteers to join the Colonial Defense Forces, [MINOR SPOILER] so that he will be put into the body of a young man and given a second chance at life – provided he survives his ten years of service. This gives his character a different outlook on advanced technologies, alien conflict and general human philosophy. Scalzi examines all these topics and more, while advancing the plot of Perry’s training in the CDF and his eventual trail-by-combat.

I greatly enjoyed “Old Man’s War” and its humanistic approach to the problems of future war. I will definitely be reading the sequel “The Ghost Brigades”!

For science fiction fans who have been dissatisfied with the recent depictions of human and alien conflict in both film and Television, you may find reading Old Man’s War will satiate your need for a more in-depth  depiction of the subject.

Director Wolfgang Petersen

If you need any more motivation to read this book: Paramount Pictures has acquired screen rights to the John Scalzi novel Old Man’s War, with Wolfgang Petersen attached to direct and David Self adapting the tale into a large-scale science fiction project. Scott Stuber will produce through his Stuber Pictures banner, with Petersen also producing.

Read the book now, so that when you see the movie you can groan along with me and say, “The book was better!”

CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER – 2011 – A FIRST RATE ADVENTURE!

My first exposure to Captain America was in the form of those wonderfully limited animated cartoons from 1966. The cartoons, which were actually photocopied images taken directly from the comics, were terrible animation, but they were my first exposure to the Mighty Marvel Superheroes: Captain America, The Incredible Hulk, The Invincible Iron Man, The Mighty Thor and Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner. In 1967, Spiderman and the Fantastic Four would get their own Saturday morning cartoons and that would eventually lead me to buying my first issues of Spiderman and The Fantastic Four. It would be a few years before I could afford to buy more Marvel comics with my limited allowance money, but I definitely bought the characters that I remembered from those early cartoons: The Incredible Hulk, The Invincible Iron Man, The Mighty Thor and of course Captain America!

Captain America has had a rough time of it in cinema. Cap’s first cinematic incarnation was the 1944 Republic serial and dealt with Captain America trying to thwart the plans of The Scarab in his attempts to acquire the "Dynamic Vibrator" and "Electronic Firebolt" which were devices that could be used as super-weapons. Other than the previously mentioned cartoons, Captain America wouldn’t appear on-screen again until he emerged in two TV movies on CBS: Captain America, which aired January 19, 1979, and Captain America II: Death Too Soon, which aired November 23, 1979.  Both starred Reb Brown in the title role and placed Steve Rogers in then contemporary times with a completely different origin and modus operandi.

Captain America was to make his feature film debut in 1990 starring Matt Salinger as Captain America and Scott Paulin as The Red Skull with direction by Albert Pyun. This film featured Steve Rogers becoming Captain America during World War II to battle the Red Skull and being frozen in ice, to be subsequently revived in 1990 to save the President of the United States from a crime family that dislikes his environmentalist polices. The film was planned for release in the summer of 1990, but after several release dates were announced between fall 1990 and winter 1991 the film still went unreleased for two years before debuting direct to video and on cable television in the United States in the summer of 1992. Of all the screen versions of Captain America, this was the most loyal to the source material, but its limited budget didn’t make it look much better than the 1970’s TV movies.

Finally, this summer saw the release of two of Marvel’s superheroes Thor and Captain America. Marvel Studios has been building up to the upcoming release of The Avengers next year since the first Iron Man film was released in 2008. The Avengers will feature not only Captain America and Thor, but Iron Man and the Hulk as well. I loved the two Iron Man films and enjoyed Thor as well, so my expectations for Captain America: The First Avenger were fairly high. I was not disappointed.

Captain America: The First Avenger is set in 1942, just as America is entering World War II. Steve Rogers is a skinny kid who is determined to enlist in the military. Unfortunately, he is listed as 4F until a mysterious Dr. Erksine sees the kid and ensures that Steve passes his exam, so that he can enter his Project Rebirth program. Proving his intelligence, guts and sheer determination, Dr. Erksine chooses Steve to be subjected to the massive injections of the super soldier serum he created. Steve is transformed into a perfect physical specimen, but just as he is emerging from the lab, Dr. Erksine is murdered by a HYDRA agent and Steve becomes the only super soldier. The government doesn’t want to risk Steve in combat, so he is relegated to performing as “Captain America” in USO shows stateside to sell war bonds. While on a tour overseas, Steve finds out that his old friend James “Bucky” Barnes has been captured by HDYRA during a secret mission to find the headquarters of the Red Skull. The leader of HYDRA, the Red Skull had worked for Hitler as a scientific research division, but on gaining enough military strength on his own, decides to use the war as a means to establishing himself as the absolute ruler of the world! Donning an altered version of his Captain America costume, Steve Rogers races off to face the Red Skull and stop him before it too late!

Joe Johnson was the perfect director for Captain America, as he had also directed one of my favorite comic book film adaptations: The Rocketeer. Captain America takes its time to establish the wartime setting, getting all the visual details of New York circa 1942 just right. Chris Evans as the spindly Steve Rogers (done with some fine digital trickery) is just as convincing as when he eventually becomes Captain America. I think because so much effort is put into the pre super-heroic Steve Rogers, that when he eventually dons the Red-white-and-blue uniform, we are really pulling for him on several levels. Hugo Weaving does a fine job of playing the Red Skull with just enough panache that his evil plans seem almost justified. The whole supporting cast, from Haley Atwell as Peggy Carter, Tommy Lee Jones as Colonel Chester Philips, to Sebastian Stan as ‘Bucky’ Barnes, get the most out of their minimal screen time. There are also some cool moments in the film that only a Marvel Comics fan or a comic book historian would notice. When Captain America is doing his USO tour, he is given a badge-shaped shield, instead of the circular shield that the character is most identified with. The "badge" shield is the shield that Captain America only used for the very first issue of the Captain America comic that was published in March of 1941. Among a group of soldiers that Captain America attacks the Red Skull's fortress with are Timothy "Dum Dum" Dugan and Gabe Jones. These are two of the soldiers that appeared in the WWII comic first published by Marvel in 1963 entitled Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos.

Once the battle between Captain America and the Red Skull starts, the action is almost nonstop! I particularly liked the retro-high tech weapons used by the Red Skull and his HYDRA minions. From ray-cannon tanks to underwater jets, there is enough gadgetry to keep any super-science geek happy. Captain America, despite his super strength and agility, is still quite believable on screen, as it seems most of the stunts were done live action whenever possible. As good as modern CGI is it is no substitute to for real actors and stunt people doing their thing.

As with all the other recent Marvel films, if you stay to the end of the credits you are treated to a sneak peek of The Avengers film that is being released next summer. This is being directed by Joss Whedon, who also wrote the script and I for one can’t wait for it!

Any fan of the superhero genre, or period action films, should enjoy Captain America: The First Avenger. As a first adventure of Captain America it is indeed first rate!

BATTLE: LOS ANGELES - 2011 - SCIENCE FICTION AT WAR!

I want to start off this review of Battle: Los Angles by stating that I am a genre fan! I watch movies outside of my three favorites genres – read the blog description under the blog title if you don’t know what those are – but I will always watch any theatrical release of my three favorite genres, at the very least, when they become available for rent on blu-ay. I am not a professional film critic, so I have limited time and financial resources that force me to choose the genre films that I see at the theater carefully. For the past decade or so, there seems to be a dearth of true science fiction films and a plethora of fantasy and horror films, so I tend to favor going to a science fiction film over the other two genres.

I went into Battle: Los Angeles knowing only two things about the plot: It was about an alien invasion of Earth and it was from the point of view of a platoon of Marines who are at the frontline of the defense of Los Angeles. The only film by director Jonathan Liebesman that I had seen was the mediocre horror film Darkness Falls (2003), so I didn’t have that as incentive to feel positive about the film. The star Aaron Eckhart I had seen in a few films like The Dark Knight (2007) and Paycheck (2003), but he never really stood out to me as a leading man type. The supporting male cast is made up of mostly unfamiliar names, but the two female co-stars were somewhat familiar to me as a genre fan: Michelle Rodriguez I liked from Resident Evil (2002) and Avatar (2009) and Bridget Moynahan I felt neutral about from I, Robot (2004). I always try to temper my expectations for any film, but the more positive the foreknowledge I have before shelling out my six bucks for the matinee showing at my local theater the more likely I will enjoy a film. Conversely, the more negative information I have before viewing a film makes it more challenging to view a film positively. With the plethora of information that is available now on the Internet before a film is even released, it takes a certain amount of restraint to gather enough background on a film to make a decision on whether to see it or not, but not so much as to take away from the surprises that the film may have in store. When the quantity of information is minimal prior to its release, as was the case with Battle: Los Angeles, it sometimes indicates a lack of confidence in a film from the production company. Still, I tried to keep an open mind.

Battle: Los Angeles starts off with a flash forward to the initial destruction of L. A., as a way of jolting the audience with the anticipated violence. The movie quickly reverts to twenty-four hours prior to that and sets up our cast of characters that we’ll be following for the rest of the film. We’re introduced to Staff Sargent Michael Nantz, who is resigning after 20 years in the Marines because of a tragedy that befell him on his last mission. Before his retirement is finalized, alien machines fall to Earth into the ocean along the coastline of several major cities including Los Angeles and Nantz is assigned to a new platoon of Marines to help hold the line. Nantz must not only deal with an unknown enemy, but a young Lieutenant William Martinez, who has been given this assignment as his first command. Nantz’s platoon is ordered to a local police station, where a group of civilians have been reported to be hiding out from the initial invasion of the alien troops. The aliens have formed a beach head and are deploying groups of armed and armored troops, who are killing both military and civilians alike. The military have decided to form a line of defense just behind the beach head, but for only as long as it takes them to commit an air strike that they hope will cause them to retreat. This only gives Nantz’ platoon twelve hours to find the civilians and get them to safety.

All of the above action takes place in the first twenty minutes of Battle: Los Angeles, so you have some idea of the pacing of the film. There are almost no “time outs” in the course of the action, as most of the film is concerned with the Marines fighting through increasingly more hostile alien forces, all while protecting their civilian charges. I can honestly say that I found the brisk pace consistent with combat situational sequences and didn’t have a problem with the minimalist approach to characterization. The characters for the most part serve as drivers of the plot, which in turn fulfills the film’s ultimate goal: which is to demonstrate humanity’s ability to rise above even the most impossible of circumstances and through perseverance and cooperation accomplish a smaller task that leads to a greater good. Battle: Los Angeles is foremost a war movie and a pro-military one at that. This film is less about the aliens and their advanced technology and more about human beings and their tenacity, inner-strength and a duty to a greater good.

Technically Battle: Los Angeles is amazing! From the opening sequences of the comet-like ships hurtling into the ocean, to the individual alien soldiers with their armored shells and advanced projectile weapons; it all looks sufficiently futuristic, yet still realistic. I liked the way the film slowly revealed the various types of weapons and vehicles and how their revelation became crucial to the plot. The only complaint that I have with the aliens, is the one that I always have and that is why do aliens always seem to be humanoid? In a film with a major motion picture budget, the aliens could have looked like anything, yet they have one head, two arms and two legs. One thing that I did like was that the aliens were not furnished with a “force field”, which allowed the human weapons a chance to at least cause the aliens some damage. This created the more combat type of action that I’m sure the filmmakers were aiming for.

Is Battle: Los Angeles a good science fiction film? Maybe, because they use the aliens more as an symbol for an enormous catastrophe that humanity must overcome: such as depleted energy and resources and the declining world economy. But its main focus is on the human element, despite all the external visual devices and it still comes off as more of a contemporary war story. Let me say that Battle: Los Angeles is a mash-up of the SF and War genres and it does a good job of representing both. Best of all, this film doesn’t have the feel of a “tent-pole” movie in that it actually comes to a satisfying conclusion, while still allowing for the possibility of a sequel. I recommend Battle: Los Angeles to fans of war films first, science fiction films second and I don’t recommend it to anyone who objects to a militant perspective. I personally liked Battle: Los Angeles despite my favoring a more pacifist lifestyle, because it did a decent job of justifying the difficult decisions that are made in the heat of combat, while still demonstrating the atrocities of war. See Battle: Los Angeles and decide for yourself.