Didn’t realise the Walking Dead TV show differed so much from the comics…

See, I came to the Walking Dead bandwagon late as it is, having only seen it when they had some marathon going on AMC when the sun was out (so summer sometime or something). Due to a serious case of TV ennui. 500 channels and nothing on and all that.

So I saw this bit lingering about on Afrofuturist Affair’s Twitter feed. Started reading it to see what they had to say.

Ended up getting a major shock.

I’m having the same thoughts about the show as I did when having to be conscious about my being a fan of Mad Men…

Just one of the points to seriously consider in this post:-

Merle knew where Glenn stood on the pyramid of power simply by the fact that he was allowed to remain at the prison and therefore had no problems challenging him.

As is rightly pointed out, no one asked Rick to live with Shane…

And if, like me, you had no idea about Tyrese’s de-… de-everything-ing in the TV version, you’ll be amazed, like the authors were, that the same people who wrote the comics are writing the TV series. Lemme just quote again to show what happened:-

The sad thing is the contrast between the bowing and scraping Tyrese of the TV series and the powerful, capable co-leader from the comics is glaring.

Thats right. Read it again. You read that correctly. I’ll quote yet again:-

He used to join in the decision making, being consulted by Rick; he was actually one of the few characters who did and would check him.

Yup.

Succinctly, as they said:-

In the comic series Tyreese is a co-leader with Rick. He’s one of the main fighters of the group, he’s one of the people the rest of the group look up to. He is respected, he is honoured, he is a valued and highly contributing member of the group. In many ways he fulfills the role that Shane fulfills in the television series – only without the arseholery that makes us wish for Shane to become a chew toy every episode. Most importantly, Tyreese could be counted upon to share the burden of leadership with Rick, matching him walker kill for walker kill. Tyreese is so skilled that upon being locked in a gym with walkers, her emerges unscathed with scores of kills to his name.

WHAT?! How could they de-… de-everything him so…

So far we have not seen a lot of Tyrese, which, as we said before, is already a big deviation from the comics where he was an integral member of the group since before the survivors even reached the prison or Hershel’s farm…

(WHAT?!…)

This delay means Tyrese didn’t join the group when Rick was still accepting of outsiders, willing to share leadership roles and welcome of help; instead he arrives when Rick is paranoid, suspicious and violently hostile. In a desperate attempt to fit in and be accepted, Tyrese goes beyond accommodating and is positively servile. Whatever they need, whatever they want, he bows, he crawls, he begs – desperate and subservient.

Yeah, that’s right. The two-bit POC player in the TV show that you see here, was a Shane, with all the bad parts out.

I dunno how to end this post.

The general deconstruction aside… see what they say about Michonne’s difference as well, not to mention the commentary on T-Dog… that’s enough to make me… reconsider.

I’m crestfallen.

They don’t even really hold out the hope that they’re planning on building him to be a leader like Rick. As they said:- “There can be only one silent Black token!”

Me, I’m still getting over the shock that I had something to be disappointed in.

I could see on my own what they’re saying about about Darryl already, that in comparison to his brother’s “classic” depiction, his subtle racism looks as if it doesn’t exist at all. People can say “Well, lookit Merle, I ain’t racist” and all that tripe.

But, yeah.

I can’t even. I can’t even.

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When gaming scrapes too much off of real life…

Watching the Residence tutorial, (http://residencebukkitmod.wikispaces.com) just to protect a house I built, when on another server all I had to do was either get certain ores as placemarkers, or join a faction, with that screen of pure code that showed up at the start, reminded me of my UNIX and Microsoft Server courses.

I mean, really?  Oh, come on, man!

Even the client -side part was looking almost as un-usuer friendly.

“It’s complicated but powerful.”

Yeah, but that’s why I don’t play strat. I ain’t employing that part of my brain I use to do that to game.

Nooo, sireee….

I fainted. I liked playing house, and playing 3D lego with blocks I just dig, destroy and put together.

I’ll go over that another day. Right now, I’m a go thwap stuff somewhere on another game…

Where’s that Tribalman’s Shiv I tossed onto this blog somewhere…

Words I write, and words I aspire to

Writing is coming today, and am happy with words.

I think I’ll be able to look back on them and not um, like, yanno, cringe.

Also, I found Denise’s (a character in the piece I am working on) couch. And will add a rug.

I live to write like this:- http://www.strangehorizons.com/2012/20121217/wing-f.shtml

A poem, a story, succinct, beautiful. All at once.

Another piece of note:- http://www.strangehorizons.com/2013/20130114/inventory-f.shtml

Snippet

At 7 o’ clock in the morning, the air is stirring. The air will  obligingly mist over if you open your mouth and breathe out. Mist emanates, too, from the exhaust pipes of cars, people driving along to work. Students are stumbling along to school. Mothers are berating their little ones to pay attention and take their eyes off their portable playing sets.

And if you’re me, vampires are now resting – and it’s your turn to watch over them. As I have to do with Deepon.

She’s forcing me to make a choice. She’s making me make a decision. And she knows it.

Cavediving near lava

After losing my second diamond Silk Touch pickaxe, regular diamond pickaxe, and diamond sword someone gave me, and at least three regular diamond pickaxes I crafted afterwards, from falling into lava and discovering hitting /back don’t get you your stuff when you get back to your dying spot after I lost obsidian and coal from lava while mining obsidian, I decided not to armour up and go with stone EVERYTHING. But I had to get a diamond pick to mine the copious amounts of redstone, lapis, gold and coal I was finding near this lava flow…

Here’s how it went.

This was me after grinding at a monster pit trap:-

Iron armour regotten after mob pit trap grinding, since the Iron set @greatlight9181 gave me was lost due to the unfortunate Falling Off the End Map incident that shall not  be mentioned (lagged while ender thwapped, fell off, lost first Silk Touch diamond pick, tons of glass, armour, etc…). Someone gave me Iron Leggings gratis afterwards.

But guess what? While mining Obsidian and some Redstone I found lear lava, I fell in. Cue my distress over losing most of the Obsidian, redstone, coal I had found up to that point.

But my deaths weren’t to end there. Whilst carefully crafting my way across the lava, something had to just come up from behind and explode me off into it.

Sigh.

I started using my junk pickaxes, swords and bows from my mob pit trap grinding.

Made it across the lava after leaving a gap in the stone I was crafting  behind me. But they met me at the other side, and, while thwapping, fell in an open square someone left with lava.

But. There was coal. And Iron. And Redstone. And Diamond Ore.

I caved and crafted another after spotting so many ores. This was the first of many.

I caved and remade my first of three? plain Diamond pickaxes. After destroying 2 Redstone ores using a iron pickaxe. Had 10 diamonds after that, and lapis. And Redstone.

Then.

After making sure the path behind me was blocked off, I proceeded CAREFULLY towards the ore. The coal I found on the way was already home safely in a chest.

I started spamming the /home home and /back commands to make sure the ores I got were not gonna be lost by some (often occurring?) freak accident. Or a monster surprise.

My perseverance was rewarded. Lookee.

Carefully, carefully, I made my way to it. And started digging around it. That’s when I learned to start digging indiscriminately around me, lava or no. Ores galore. Because. Lookee.

I added stones to make sure NOTHING fell into that lava. And. Lookee again.

On the bottom right of my path, to the right of what I had  already found, I was to find Redstone as well, but I thought I had taken a screenshot. Take my word for it.

See that block near me on the left of the pic? I had looked up and saw coal. So I built up to it.

I was being extremely careful, and digging to find blocks to make floor, so I wasn’t porting home as much.  Or at all at this point, I think? Here’s what this section netted me.

Note. No clothes.

Of course I lost the pick after this (fu game, I wasn’t TRYING “to swim in the lava”!) , but everything I mined was home.

If things explode you on land, all you do is lose experience. You can hit /back.

Guess why I’m mentioning it here.

So, that’s my first REAL cavediving experience. And it netted me a ton. Have two stacks and then some of Redstone, Coal(almost three stacks of it), and I was able to remake my Iron Armour set.

What ya thinkee?

Online writing

If only. I wish.

This story, at Strange Horizons

On misogyny in gaming, and the like.

To elaborate on my tweet, here :-

(NSFW words to follow, mind you…)

Guys will have names, sprays, and joke about, balls, dicks, dick cheese, masturbation, ejaculate, smegma, the ass and anal sex, not to mention the denigration of homosexuality, and of course, porn. Yet if you ask them to kindly make a tea of your tampon and drink, they run screaming like… bitches. “That’s fucking gross”. Etc. What is UP with that? To that I say: kindly refer to the edited screenshot of my Strange Tribalman’s Shiv.

Ahem.

Feminist? I… dunno. Knee-jerk? Oh yeah.

Dafuq.

That feeling you get when you’re busy belting out Esthero’s “Heaven Sent” on the way to your apartment building, only to have a paramedic with a defibrilator show up in the lobby and join you on the elevator…

(Don’t get it? Search for the song’s lyrics…)

Minecrafting

I think it has retro appeal. But I play with friends.

So buddy tells me “go find a sheep and shear it for wool”. I walk around a lot one way, and find a… dog? Wolf? I tried shearing it, then I tries using the shears another way, and ended up hitting it. It won’t stop following, so I had to kill the thang. Next time I go out to find wool, I go the other way, and find people’s houses with animals outside; I check the shears to see if it works,  but I can’t pick up the wool…  So then, I go past a house with fire on the roof (as ambience?). I fell down a hole, and heard, “Baaaa”. Looked up and saw a sheep stranded on a pixelated square above me. So I build about 3 ways out with dirt, and plopped  torches all over the place, then stalked it with shears. All through the night. Killed an 8-bit spider monster. When it resets its wool the pixelated grass underneath it disappears. Eh?

I’m a stalk you for wool… again and again and…

Broke my axe digging the sheep out, but buddy was gone for the night IRL, so no repairs. Plus, it flew away somewhere. Couldn’t find it. Then I come back to the house I’m sharing. The silly chicken that flew out of the egg my buddy threw (I thought he tossed out a chicken from nowhere… had no clue what he was doing, I’m new after all… looked hilarious) popped out 2 more eggs while running around all over the place. But the dog won’t follow you. Barks a lot.

If you don’t watch it, apparently you can create a waterfall in a house when u upend a bucket.

I couldn’t really toggle his lift right, so I’d upend the water I was carrying…

Looks interesting, but a pain to undo.

Let’s see, what else.

Hard to make rain look bad, even in 8- bit.

I have some slimeballs, and bones. And rotten flesh. Oh yeah, he took me to the nether. WHY DO THE PIG ZOMBIES sound like children?! “Don’t hit the pigs.” “Why?” ” ‘Cause they’ll own you…” “What about the ghasts? “Kill them.”

Buddy has a monster pit trap in his basement next to a monster spawn. Interesting, thwapping away without the consequences.

…aaand I enchanted a sword. It’s extra sharp now, cause I have a sharpness enchant.

Not bad for a first day. Buddy’s staff at the server, so he can fly. In an 8-bit suit. Dunno why he chose a suit; he’s not a suit IRL…

I saw a funny U toob minecraft vid, so I was really enthusiastic. I… really wanted to dig…

That’s it for my first day minecrafting. Better go check and see if that wacky 8-bit chicken plopped out any more eggs…

😛

On the variety of voices to be heard from the Caribbean

From Wadadli pen:-

One telling thing in Ann’s responses is that she found no formula to Caribbean fiction. Thematically, stylistically, tonally, they were as diverse as the countries and writers, themselves, as diverse as we who live here know we are.

“There is certainly no lack of stories to tell,” Ann said, “and publishers looking for fresh voices will find plenty of them in the region.” Hear that, publishers?

 

Also of note:-

“It calls to mind Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie’s TED talk on the danger of a single story, in which she chastised those who make generalizations about the character of a country from a read of a single book, or even a single type of book about that place. Where that place has fewer writers, or fewer opportunities for its writers to enter the mainstream, that danger is more acute; the Caribbean, where, as I know firsthand, opportunities to publish are limited, falls into that category.

 

Word(s) to the wise..