A visually stunning retelling of the final chapters of Odysseus' return home to Ithaca that is brutal, quiet, and an exploration of the traumas of war—but it's missing the supernatural

When I heard Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche were going to be in a new retelling of the Odyssey (focusing on just the final chapters following our hero's return back to Ithaca), I was stoked. This marks these two fantastic actors' first film together since 1996's The English Patient.

I'm also a long-time Odyssey stan, having fallen in love with the story upon my first read way back in 10th grade. Since then, I've revisited it over the years, especially the Emily Wilson translation that came out in 2018. And honestly, there hasn't been a good depiction of the story in quite a while. In the '90s, we had Armand Assante playing Odysseus in a TV movie (with a perfectly cast Isabella Rossellini playing the grey-eyed goddess Athena), which while entertaining wasn't quite classic cinema. You could also count 2000's O Brother, Where Art Thou?, though that's more of a loose adaptation updated to the 20th century.

With The Return, we pick up on the story nearly 20 years after Odysseus left his home to take up arms and join his fellow Greeks to fight against the Trojans across the sea. The war itself lasted for a decade, before our wily hero thought up the Trojan horse, which would turn the tide of the battle and end in Troy's destruction. While everyone else headed home, Odysseus spent another 10 years wandering the Greek isles, cursed by the sea god Poseidon.

When he finally makes it to the shore of Ithaca, he's battered, bruised, naked, distraught, and not even sure of where is until Eumaeus, a slave, tells him. This version of Odysseus, however, isn't the resilient hero (at least not yet)—he's a broken man filled with the horrors of war and PTSD.

His family, for whom he has so long fought to make it back to see, has their own issues too. Penelope is cornered by rapacious suitors that demand her hand in marriage while also ruining the island. Telemachus, their son, is man-child angry at both his mother and long-vanished father. Only Penelope, it seems, holds out hope.

For those familiar with the Odyssey (and I can't imagine someone seeing this movie who's not at least a little familiar with the age-old epic), you know the beats and the tropes, but the film takes its time with delivering some of them. With others, you get them ad nauseam. At times, I felt acutely Penelope's frustration as we watched her each evening unravel her shroud work on the loom, the bright red twine coiling away her progress. The camera lingers on many scenes on the island, and it feels at times like you're right there living on the craggy shores of Ithaca.

What this movie is missing, however, is the magic and the gods of the original source. Without Athena's constant guiding hand (and often appearing in disguise), Poseidon's unearthly rage, or Zeus' kingly machinations, the story misses something.

I know that the director chose to do this on purpose, to create a tale about humans and human destruction, but it doesn't exactly work for me. There's a majesty and grandeur to the Greek gods, and dare I say it a level of pettiness and fun that makes the story less about trauma and more about adventure.

Trauma is an important part of the human experience, and to be fair, one that's been overlooked in storytelling for much of history. The rise of A24 has given us many films that expertly explore trauma, and The Return follows the same sort of path. For me, though, it was a bit of a slog to watch, and as I left the theater, I was in a kind of numb place for a few hours. I don't think I saw Odysseus smile once in the entire movie, and the only time he expresses he gratitude for finally making it home, he literally stuffs his mouth with soil.

I'm glad I saw it—Fiennes' portrayal is excellent, and the production design is immaculate—but this one's for only hardcore Homer fans, I'm afraid.

Nerd Coefficient: 6/10.

POSTED BY: Haley Zapal, new NoaF contributor and lawyer-turned-copywriter living in Atlanta, Georgia. A co-host of Hugo Award-winning podcast Hugo, Girl!, she posts on Instagram as @cestlahaley. She loves nautical fiction, growing corn and giving them pun names like Timothee Chalamaize, and thinking about fried chicken.

For a massively revered classic, a faithful rendering may not suffice

As nation states go, these we have here in Latin America are rather young. The Westernized portion of our history only covers a few centuries, and the much longer Native portion barely survives in mutilated fragments. Unlike the Greek or Chinese or Icelandic peoples, who long ago developed a solid sense of who they are, we're still in the middle of figuring ourselves out. It would seem pointless to attempt to write a national epic about us when "us" still has many blank spaces awaiting definition.

And yet, the multigenerational saga One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez succeeds at both transmitting and creating a portrait of the Colombian nation. Like Don Quixote, it narrates the chaos that follows men when possessed by an idea. Like the Iliad, it laments the escalating destruction that can result from an unyielding sense of honor. Like War and Peace, it traces the ways individual lives intersect with big history. Like the Divine Comedy, it creates its own cosmology and makes the reader take it as true. Like Macbeth, it dissects the forces that lure men toward excessive ambition. Like the Old Testament, it bridges the passage from mythic origins to known history. It's an ostentatious book, the kind that requires a writer to err on the side of overconfidence. Such a bet is risky, but that's the price of admission in this game: you simply can't pull off something of the monumental scope of One Hundred Years of Solitude if you have any humility left in you. You must think yourself worthy of it.

The Netflix adaptation of One Hundred Years of Solitude, released just this month in a first batch of eight episodes out of a planned total of sixteen, faced a comparable challenge. And on the technical level, the challenge is met with the highest excellence: period-accurate costumes, meticulously researched set design, authentic 19th-century furniture, handcrafted props, true-sounding accents, and multiple full-sized versions of the entire town of Macondo. The production's stratospheric budget is noticeable in every scene: in exquisite cinematography, in pitch-perfect casting, in brutally honest war scenes, in taking every opportunity to boast Colombia's gorgeous geography. If the series can be said to commit any fault at all, it's only in its absolute reverence for the source text, precisely the kind of humility with which it couldn't have been composed in the first place.

This degree of allegiance to the source text is understandable given the impossibly high expectations placed on the project. One Hundred Years of Solitude is a sacred cow of our literary canon, so there would have been a loud backlash had the scriptwriters and directors hired by Netflix dared introduce a more personal touch into the story. So what we get is an almost word-for-word translation of the novel, to the point that a voiceover narrator is used (in fact, overused) to explain the plot to the audience.

Now, before someone accuses me of being inconsistent: I'm aware that I praised the film adaptation of Pedro Páramo for staying strictly faithful to the book. So why do I see the same choice as a defect this time? The difference is that, despite being much shorter, Pedro Páramo is a far more experimental book than One Hundred Years of Solitude. The disorienting effect of hearing so many voices at the same time already gave Pedro Páramo (the book) some of the qualities of the audiovisual medium, which made the task easier for Pedro Páramo (the movie). With One Hundred Years of Solitude there's a bigger maneuvering margin to build upon the book, but the directors don't take advantage of it. To rely heavily on a voiceover narrator isn't as jarring in Pedro Páramo (the movie) because Pedro Páramo (the book) is composed as a continuous conversation: the protagonist is being told his father's story in the voices of the dead. So it makes sense for the movie to also be composed as a conversation. One Hundred Years of Solitude uses a more traditional formula (omniscient third-person narrator who is not part of the plot). Giving the narrator such a prominent position in the adaptation feels like an intrusion, almost an admission that the directors didn't trust the images' ability to tell the story. Watching a dramatized adaptation of a book shouldn't feel like a read-along of the book.

This deferential attitude toward our canon has already been defied in literature; audiovisual media shouldn't have to recapitulate the whole progression that went from the generation of writers who prayed at the altar of García Márquez to the generation of writers who spat in the face of García Márquez to today's generation of writers who are neither for nor against García Márquez and are just focused on doing their own thing. For example, in the Anglo world, iconoclastic reinterpretations of Shakespeare are a long-established and respected tradition. García Márquez himself was no stranger to that kind of transformative creation: he wrote the screenplay of a retelling of Oedipus Rex set in the violent 1990s of rural Colombia. It shouldn't be seen as blasphemy to do a less than faithful adaptation of One Hundred Years of Solitude, as long as the core theme is treated with respect.

And what is that core theme? The same as in every national epic: This Is What It Feels Like To Be Us. However, García Márquez wasn't merely reporting on an already existing sense of nationhood; he was codifying it. The earliest Colombian novels were meant to serve as almost ethnographic descriptions of social customs, but the generation of writers to which García Márquez belonged had a much clearer idea of that task. By reading him, we learn to be Colombian. We learn to pay attention to what is at stake in our embarrassing saga of repeated errors. Particularly in One Hundred Years of Solitude, we learn about the folly of putting abstract allegiances above universal human needs, about the dangers of forgetting basic truths, about the poisonous consequences of imposing artificial obstacles to love. Above all, we learn that the one thing you should never be afraid of is love.

One isn't required to 100% agree with the guy's ideas about love, though. His oeuvre was uniformly influenced by outdated and sometimes very harmful views on gender dynamics. In his interviews he blamed women for the problems of sexism. The last book he published before his death is a romanticized account of child prostitution. When approaching his writings, one must keep in mind both his exceptional talents and his abhorrent opinions. Even One Hundred Years of Solitude, the book that got him the Nobel Prize, is replete with instances of unchallenged, as in authorially endorsed, sexual misconduct that can't be easily removed in an adaptation without unraveling the rest of the plot.

So what can be salvaged from One Hundred Years of Solitude? What justifies its continued place of honor in world literature and the undeniably beautiful adaptation Netflix threw bucketfuls of money at? I've already mentioned how it conveys the general feeling of what it's like to be Colombian. Let me give a more concrete example: a few years ago, when I reviewed Encanto, I briefly considered mentioning a factoid that existed in parallel with the announcement of the movie but was completely unrelated. What happened was that, on the same day that the first trailer for Encanto was released, it was reported in the news that the murderers of Haitian president Jovenel Moïse were Colombian ex-army mercenaries. I didn't include that bit of news in the review because it was already long enough, but it's relevant here: Encanto was offering me a rare occasion to feel good about my country, but it was instantly ruined by the revelation about the murderers. That whiplash of incompatible emotions, that corrosive question in my head (Why did I bother getting excited?), that millionth refusal by history to let us feel proud of anything, that abrupt cold shower of pointlessness—that is what it feels like, every day, to be Colombian. And the biggest artistic merit of One Hundred Years of Solitude lies in capturing that infernally complicated feeling and exploring how we live with it and through it, and how we stubbornly keep looking for a way to someday live past it.

Nerd Coefficient: 8/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.

A fun and high-octane dieselpunk adventure set in a world where life is precariously clinging to high mountains... because the lowlands are dominated by giant insects

Zham Sa-Yool has a problem. Several problems, actually. He is a reprobate, a cad, a rake and an excellent pilot. He also really can’t pay his bar bills, which means when he goes to town on behalf of his sister, he often winds up in one bad situation or another. His latest visit to a bar winds up with a potential recruit for his sister’s mercenary company, and a whole lot of trouble. And, it seems, a lead to a job that will take the Last Stop and its air wing to the lowlands for a payday that could make their money problems go away... if the competition, and the giant insects, don’t get them first.

This is the world, and the story of Django Wexler’s Last Stop.

Zham’s world is not quite our own, or it is not recognizably our own, although it feels like a dieselpunk 1930s-era level of technology. Airplanes, tommy guns, sky pirates, two-fisted action and adventure, a lot of the trappings one might find in, say, an Indiana Jones movie, or the Phantom movie from the 1990s, or TV series such as Bring 'Em Back Alive and Tales of the Golden Monkey. The emphasis is on high-octane action and adventure, narrow escapes, daredevil escapes, twists and turns of the plot, and of course deadly enemies.

Wexler takes this well-worn chassis, freshens it up, and makes it his own with a couple of innovations. First off, the novel has a modern sensibility and representation as far as gender and queerness. The stock characters often found in this sort of fiction are here, somewhat, but even in the names such as Zham’s (and his physical description), Wexler reaches for more and broader models of characters. Also, the novel is unapologetic in having queer characters, and women who break, and are far more diverse than, the stereotypes they are often relegated to in works of this type. So we get a modern, diverse cast of characters for Wexler’s setup.

Next, the world. Human civilization has retreated to mountaintops and high places because of the bugs below “The layer”. What has happened to cause this is not clear (it is not clear whether an event happened to do this; reading between the lines, I get the sense that it did), but below a certain altitude, giant insects (defying laws of physics) dominate the landscape. These bugs are mindless and deadly. But they are also useful, since certain species of bug can be harvested for fuel to provide a magical lift for airplanes. Humans have to stay high and stay flying in order for civilization to continue, and occasionally delve down to get more bug blood. But no one can LIVE down there, surely.

Or can they? The Last Stop team (led by Quendra, Zham’s sister and apparently once a military hero), who are deep in debt and on their last legs, take a commission to transport a scientist to what appears to be a base below the layer, in a hidden valley. If such a place exists, a place the bugs can’t get to, it would be a boon and a treasure beyond price. What the crew of the Last Stop find, however, is a nest of intrigue and conflict, instead... and of course, as you might expect, bugs.

As interesting as the hints of culture and society that we get are, the real focus, again, is on fun action and adventure in a world constructed by Wexler to allow dogfighting, raucous action against hordes of insects, intrigue, adventure, twists and turns, and a dieselpunk aesthetic without much of the baggage that books set in the actual era on Earth would suffer. The substitution of the bugs for some of the usual tropes of the era (which often involve some rather unpleasant colonial and third-world settings, opponents and situations) also helps remove some of the sting out of such works. The bugs are, to all appearances and effects, a faceless and inhuman menace, but they are an environmental opponent. The real conflict is between factions of people seeking power and control, with the Last Stop crew caught in the middle of it.

Last Stop ends with the end of a mission, and with the crew in a place where they can have more adventures, continue to untangle the mystery, and deal with the fallout of what they found underneath the layer. I listened to this book in audio, and the production is top notch. What’s more, this sort of action adventure in an audiobook format harkens a bit back to old radio serials. It’s not written explicitly in that format and style, but it feels adjacent to it.

To be clear, look again at the cover. Airplanes and giant insects. This IS a novel where you get exactly what it says on the tin. If that cover interests you, then you want to read or listen to this book.

Besides the pulp adventures mentioned above, Last Stop puts me in mind of a number of works where traveling the skies is the only way to get around. The RPG Swashbucklers of the Seven Skies, for instance, relies on islands floating in the sky, where going too low can be absolutely deadly. Curtis Craddock’s Risen Kingdoms series, starting with An Alchemy of Masques and Mirrors, focuses on a similar science fantasy, with more emphasis on the fantasy approach, with islands in an endless sky. Jeff Carlson’s Plague Year is a straight near-future SF novel where the surviving human population has to live on mountains because a deadly nanotech plague exists at elevations below ten thousand feet. And of course, the ultimate pulp RPG world of Crimson Skies. There is a lot that has been done in this space, but I do think that Last Stop shows how to go forward with this aesthetic and chassis of a world in a new, inclusive way that keeps up the fun, pulse-pounding adventure. In a world and time where a brief sojourn from reality is on the menu, a trip to the world of Last Stop, be it in ebook or audio, seems to me perfectly suited to that.

Highlights:

• Diverse and rich cast of characters
• Fun and fresh Dieselpunk adventure without the baggage
• You get exactly what the cover promises

Turns out you can give yourself an epiphany without being quite sure how you did it

Dreams aren't stories in the strict sense: they don't proceed from an authorial choice, don't follow an ordered causal progression, and don't express a deliberate stance on their theme. Only the most surreal category of stories would include the semi-random free association carnival our unconscious minds are capable of spitting out. But dreams do have some sort of secret logic, a symbolic language that is unique to each of us. Because they're generated from our own thoughts, they can never tell us something we don't already know. It's just that sometimes we need to be reminded of an obvious truth.

The world of Inside Out is the perfect venue for that kind of exploration. In the limited TV series Dream Productions, a school dance approaches, and our girl Riley is going through the messy balancing act between her childish whimsy and her drive toward maturity. Unsurprisingly, the forces inside her head are working full-time to process those complicated feelings. The surprising part is how neatly the dreams-as-stories metaphor corresponds to the inner conflict.

In the abstract mindspace of Inside Out, dreams are made in a movie studio with a limited repertoire of plots and an unlimited VFX budget. We meet scripwriters, actors, directors, stunt performers, camera operators—but let's not forget these homunculi are actually fragments of Riley's mind. The cutthroat rivalries and artistic disagreements that drive this series are meant to represent unconscious urges that are channeled into dream imagery. The question troubling Riley is whether she has enough social competence for teenage activities; she loves fun, but she's terrified of being perceived as uncool. Her mother's less-than-ideal choice of dress for the upcoming occasion triggers a whole week of disturbing nightmares she needs to sort out on her own.

What adds a level of meta awesomeness to this premise is that it lets us witness (albeit very indirectly) the creative process at Pixar. Since its foundation, the studio has been praised by its strong grasp of emotional stakes; when you go to the movies for a Pixar production, you know you're going to end up crying, and you're looking forward to it. You love how Pixar makes you cry. You love how it seems to understand you so well. That is the degree of insight that Riley's inner movie studio has about her.

The use of dreams as a catalyst for self-knowledge and growth will be immediately recognizable to viewers familiar with The Cell, Paprika or Inception. Where Dream Productions sets itself apart is in the argument that we can learn from our dreams even if we don't remember them. And here the connection between dreams and stories is especially relevant. Maybe you grew up watching Pixar movies, but do you remember everything that happens in them? What Pixar seems to be telling us in Dream Productions is that what matters in their stories isn't their plot, but the emotional imprint they leave upon us. What stories do for us is something deeper than provide models to follow or cautionary tales. They suggest ways of feeling we hadn't considered. They test our stated values. They teach us to be human.

As if that weren't enough substance, Dream Productions adds yet another meta level: the series is told as a mockumentary where Riley's homunculi talk to the camera. Who is supposed to be filming this and interviewing Riley's unconscious? Who are these characters addressing? Go figure. Like in Diego Velásquez's painting Las Meninas, you're invited to put yourself at the center of this piece of art. You're meant to participate as a character in the story, but the world of the story is a slice of you. You're watching yourself watch yourself.

And here Dream Productions finally reveals the ace up its sleeve. I won't spoil how this plays out, but if you connect the idea of dreams as an improvisational form of storytelling with the idea of deliberate introspection turning its gaze on itself, you'll probably guess what I'm talking about. As I've said a thousand times on this blog, the best stories are those about stories. And Dream Productions draws you into an infinite page of potential plot, the text of which comes from a pen your hand is holding.

That is the hidden lesson of every story about dreams: you need to become aware that you are their only author, and you have always been.

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.

This is the rude shakeup that today's pathologically risk-averse studios need

It's often been said that superhero comics are this generation's mythology, to which it's often been replied that classical mythology wasn't constrained by copyright law and didn't have to obey corporate mandates. To fulfill the cultural function of myths, superhero comics would have to be freely usable by anyone. That's the approach that comedian Vera Drew has followed with the building blocks of the Batman mythos: to borrow a well-worn phrase, she's seized the means of narration, making them her own, resignifying them as milestones in her personal coming-of-age story and creating the first interesting live-action portrayal of the Joker since 2008.

Take note, Zaslav. You might learn something.

Drew's artistically and legally adventurous exploration of her life's journey, The People's Joker, is a nonstop riot of queer joy transmuted into queer pride sublimated into queer wrath. Via multiple formats (cartoon animation, action figures, glitch art, superposition of live actors onto handdrawn backgrounds, the occasional callback to actual DC movies), The People's Joker breathes new life into the plot of 2019's insufferably pretentious Joker movie.

In this version of Gotham City, Batman is a closeted child predator, the Daily Planet is a far-right conspiracist podcast, Arkham Asylum provides conversion therapy, and the deadly laughing gas that has for decades been the Joker's signature weapon is a common medication prescribed to suppress bad feelings. Our protagonist, an aspiring comedian who moves to Gotham City to escape her transphobic and outrageously narcissistic mother, founds a clandestine "anti-comedy" club with fellow members of Batman's rogue gallery to oppose the city's violent monopoly on comedy. While she strives to bring the power of laughter back to the people, she also has to navigate toxic romance, the surveillance state, institutional discrimination, overmedicalization, transgenerational trauma, and her own issues with self-acceptance.

It's hard to do justice to the explosion of art styles with which this movie is put together. Outdoor and action scenes feature material from dozens of artists, each with their unique take on character design, palette, and degree of detail. Yet somehow the incompatible parts build a harmonious pastiche where any search for uniformity matters less than playfulness, experimentation, and sincerity. Underneath the neverending mockery of Batman lore, a very personal truth can be perceived. This isn't the type of art that results from executive producers trimming the rough edges off a piece of soulless cashgrab. This is a scream from the depths of a generous heart that has been wounded and betrayed but still holds on to the promise of human goodness that can be found in comic book tales. Where official DC productions such as Aquaman 2 or Shazam 2 or Flash 1 flailed about in futile search of something genuine to say, The People's Joker lolsobs openly, with a vulnerable earnestness that authorized house style would never risk. Sure, there are tons of irony here, but the movie never wields it as a cushion against its own feelings.

The People's Joker looks at societal cruelty in the eyes and responds by baring its soul, making the incisive statements 2019's Joker wishes it had the audacity to attempt. Joker's facile edginess is left looking like the juvenile posturing it truly is next to Drew's carefree irreverence and raw intensity. In a year that has already given us pleasant surprises from independent queer SFF filmmakers, The People's Joker takes a wry look at a corporate media ecosystem saturated by too much content carrying too little meaning, and loudly, fearlessly, effortlessly gets the last laugh.

Nerd Coefficient: 9/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.

“This doesn’t bring back the ones who were lost. This doesn’t make things *right*. But it makes things better than they’ve been, and maybe that can be enough to let us move forward, you know? Maybe this is where some of the broken bits get fixed.” - Marcia

“I know you don’t have a choice about this. I’m still grateful. I’m glad to know you, October.” - the Luidaeg

“No,” said Marcia. She met the Luidaeg’s eyes and didn’t flinch. “I have other paths to walk, and other roads to run.”

“Your name is Marcia, and you travled with the Count of Goldengreen. They *said* all that. But I don’t know you. Something about you isn’t right. Who are you?” -Captain Pete

“I’m nobody,” said Marcia, taking a half-step backwards, like she was getting ready to run.

A mindtrip to the Moon and back

You've seen this movie before: a moderately successful family man with a big house in a placid suburb realizes he's unhappy with his life, so he takes a sudden detour for a seemingly immature but actually deeply important self-exploration. His wife, a career woman hyperfocused on being taken seriously, finds his antics increasingly irritating, while their teenage daughter has begun an unusual friendship with the new neighbor, a sensitive boy with an authoritarian father. This situation will not end well.

You've seen this movie before. It's called American Beauty and it premiered in 1999. At first it was highly praised for its critique of hollow bourgeois aspirations, but over the years it has been reevaluated and criticized for its simplistic melodrama and its uncritical centering of the male perspective. And when Kevin Spacey's history of sexual misconduct was exposed, the movie turned radioactive. No one dares touch it. Which is a pity, because American Beauty, underneath all its creepiness and its self-serious attempts at edginess, did have a few valuable things to say about the search for happiness.

Enter the 2022 movie Linoleum. It was never advertised as a remake, but it so cleverly deconstructs the plot of American Beauty that it might as well have openly acknowledged the extent of its debt. Similarly set in the late 1990s, it proposes a more empathetic alternative to the earlier movie's cynicism. And from this point on I'm going to need to spoil the secrets of Linoleum.

Imagine if the plot of American Beauty were told by the protagonist of the 2005 movie Stay, and you'll get the gist of what Linoleum is doing behind the curtain. And that's the last warning before full spoilers.

The ending of Linoleum reveals that the husband, the husband's father, and the neighbor's son are symbolic incarnations of one single person, an old man with dementia whose memories are chaotically remixing themselves in his last moments. He's been telling himself a story where the events of his youth, his adulthood and his old age are reenacted by different characters at the same time. At the core of his jumbled memories is the night his real father tried to kill him and instead died in a crash.

What this does for Linoleum's intertextual relationship with American Beauty is expand the perspective we're being asked to consider. American Beauty is a very selfish story, one in which the husband's worldview provides the dominating voice that defines the terms in which the plot is meant to be understood. In Linoleum, the fact that the core characters are the same person means that their separate perspectives are equally significant. This is not only the story of a middle-aged man seeking to reignite his enjoyment of life, but also the story of a boy struggling to find his own path beyond his father's shadow, and the story of an old man who is losing the sense of who he is. These parallel looks at three stages of the same life story complete the theme that American Beauty could only portray at one moment: the chain of circumstances that feed our satisfactions and our regrets.

While the husband's chosen method of correcting the course of his life in American Beauty is to become a jerk and a sexual predator, in Linoleum the unhappy husband embarks on a more wholesome pursuit: he's going to build a rocket in his garage. He has always wanted to be an astronaut, and he can't let his better years go by without achieving that dream. Now, let's remember that this plot point is part of the deathbed hallucination, so it should be interpreted as a stand-in for whichever aspirations the actual protagonist may have had. Being an astronaut is the stereotypical dream of every child, and in the movie's narrative it's used to represent the yearning for personal self-realization. So the literal text of the story shows us a man building a rocket in his garage, but the meaning of the story is about daring to dream big, about aiming for the stars.

Another way Linoleum improves upon American Beauty is in the character of the wife. In the first movie, she's an obstacle in the husband's quest for meaning. We're meant to agree that he's right to despise her, because everything about her personality and her goals is fake. Clearly, this is a very male-centric way of writing a marriage in trouble. Linoleum opts for a more nuanced look. This husband (again, inside the badly remembered story) genuinely loves his wife, but they've gradually lost the capacity to respect each other's wants. There was a time when they dared to dream big, but the big things that were supposed to come to their lives never did, and now they feel stuck. The epiphany that begins the reparation of their relationship is the wife's refusal to live by someone else's expectations. The fact that she also turns out to be a multiple character in the hallucination gives her equal rank of thematic importance as the husband.

Live enough years and you'll become intimately familiar with regret, with the longing for the road not taken. The ending of American Beauty resolves this problem by offering its protagonist a terrible choice that he ultimately rejects. And at that moment his life is ready to end. Linoleum refrains from pretending that we're ever ready to end; it doesn't even try to resolve the problem of regret. What it does propose is that, from a broad perspective, regret is a matter of how we remember our lives. And if we end up remembering differently, we may find unexpected forms of contentment.

Nerd Coefficient: 8/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.

Another SF heist novel that follows on the fallout and consequences of the series' first novel, in a more planetbound setting.

Things looked like they were going so well. Sean, Tamara and Indigo had obtained the Philosopher’s Stone Data and came to their compromise to try and bring peace to the ministers, republic and everyone else. They had a hold on a powerful political figure in the republic to help make this happen. But the secret message from his thought-to-be-dead sister upends their plans, and everything else in the bargain. But can his new friends trust him when Sean must deal Brigid, the titular Unkillable Princess?

Hunt keeps a lot of the chassis from The Immortality Thief in this her second novel. Sean remains our single point of view, and he is snarky, observant, clever, well connected and as crap in physical conflicts as ever. The novel keeps using its flashback format from the first novel, and sometimes it does this explicitly for terms of the heist-like portions the plot sometimes takes us to. And sometimes, it is character building, as we learn even more about the Sean-Brigid relationship through seeing flashbacks scenes before they were ripped apart (and Sean thought Brigid dead). We get a complex and rich story that is built up for Sean and Brigid, far beyond what had been given in the first novel, showing an interesting and very complicated pair of siblings with a relationship that is never, ever easy. 

This book is significantly shorter than its predecessor, and feels less of a “pressure cooker” than the first novel, showing that even by keeping the chassis of the first book, Hunt wants to and does experiment with some new things. Sean proves to be well connected, and those connections and his social skills give him some new options and ideas that were not in the first book. Now, given that Sean is dealing with his thought-to-be-dead sister, and some of the fallout from the first book, this gives the book a much more social feel to the conflicts in the narrative than the first. Sure, there are plenty of action sequences like the first novel, although our field of play is generally set in locations within a city, and there are no monsters this time other than the human ones (and yes, some of those are bad enough). So Sean really shines in this book in a way he didn’t in the first book. In the first book, he was a translator guy who was useless in a lot of the combat-oriented situations in the book. Here, he has more to do (translation actually plays a role here with a fun little bit between the siblings) and going in guys blazing as Tamara and Indigo can do, is a less effective strategy.

One other thing that this book does keep up, is the fact that “anyone can die”. Well, perhaps not our three main protagonists, like the first book, but this is a violent and deadly world, perhaps not to the level of the spacecraft in the first book, but with multiple espionage and government factions running around, to say nothing of the Unkillable Princess Brigid herself, there is definitely a shakedown of characters like in the first book, if not quite to the same severe levels. Hunt does a great job, thus, in presenting the opportunity for drama and heartbreak, especially when she expands Tamara’s backstory by introducing her own sister into the mix. There is a real sense of tension that is analogous to the first book, but in this new wider scenery and canvas.

As far as Indigo, he gets significantly less to do in this book than the first one. He is an alien on a strange planet (to him) that he is not supposed to be, and he spends a fair amount of the action offscreen and unable to intervene (until he has to, and dramatically). Given the nature and setup of the book, I am not surprised (Indigo wandering around openly would contradict the worldbuilding and setup) but it does mean that this book focuses far more on Sean-Brigid (and Tamara) and leaves Indigo a little out in the cold, narratively speaking. I enjoyed Indigo's presence for what we got of it, and his somewhat limited pages on the screen as it were are impactful.

This second book is the middle of a trilogy (?) and so does not have an easy endpoint or offramp like the first book does. I am willing to let that slide, because if you are reading a second book in a series, an offramp is less immediately desirable for me as a reader and reviewer, it means I have already committed to a universe and don’t particularly have to have an “out” after the second book. Given the pattern of the books, I predicted about three quarters in the shape of what and where and the why of the third book and I was not disappointed, although it should be said that Hunt surprised me in the denouement. It’s not quite the strange endgame of The Immortality Thief, but I do appreciate and like an author who works in good and clean lines...and is willing to surprise and color outside of them.

I wouldn’t start here, this is a book for people who read The Immortality Thief and want to continue with the series. A lot of the worldbuilding of that first novel is taken for granted here and not really recapitulated. It’s accepted and the consequences and downstream effects of that worldbuilding, including the “what now” from the ending of the first, are what Hunt is concerned about here. I am here to tell you that if you enjoyed the first book, you will likely enjoy this second with its different focus, but with much of the same or allied elements from the first.

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Highlights:

• Excellent development and use of Sean as main character, especially in contrast and reflected with his sister Brigid

• Excellent continued and elaborated worldbuilding from the first novel. 

• A shorter, brisker work than the first novel, showing the author’s ability to shift gears

Reference: Hunt, Taran, The Unkillable Princess [Rebellion Publishing, 2025].

POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I’m just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.

Robert Eggers delivers a terrifying, graphic, and atmospheric take on the classic vampire tale, managing to inject fresh horror back into story that has spent decades being sanitized by sedutive pop culture bloodsuckers.

Remaking a film that is the progenitor of modern vampire cinema is an interesting undertaking; it's also been done before (Herzog's 1979 Nosferatu). So why did Robert Eggers — director of The Witch and The Lighthouse— feel compelled to put his own spin on the story?

Because he loves it. Like, really loves it. As a kid, he saw an image of Max Shreck's Orlok and became infatuated. As a teenager, he directed a stage version of it, and has been consumed by the tale ever since. If there was anyone going to develop a new (and different enough) film version of Nosferatu, it could have only been Eggers. His production design, especially, as well as immaculate choice in casting are two primary reasons why this film works, and they're superb. Seeing a Depp in a desaturated and gothic town hasn't been this fun since 1999's Sleepy Hollow, which is a master class in horror vibes (Eggers is the heir apparent to Tim Burton, all of the atmospheric darkness without the tweeness). 

I won't recount the plot bit by bit as literally everyone knows the story, but I do want to focus this review on what's different and great about this new version.

Depicting Orlok as a gruff, disgusting, and aggressive Transylvanian folk vampire

Placing all of the agency in Ellen's story and giving her a powerful physical presence

Showcasing the plague narrative in a way that shows the utter devastation Orlok brings

My issue with the prior two Nosferatus (Nosferati?) is that they feel so claustrophobically self-contained. The first, of course, because it's more than 100 years old and the technology simply wasn't there to tell an expansive, wide-ranging story. When Orlok boards the ship and brings forth the plague — both to the ship's crew and the people of Wisberg — you really see how horrible the disease is and the effects on society. The oozing and infected rat bites, the hysterically screaming patients in the hospital hallways, and the frightened populace hiding behind shuttered doors paint a picture of depravity and emergency that build to the climax. Ellen must put an end to this plague (both the literal one killing people and the figurative one stalking her) and only she can do it. 

The Math

Baseline Score: 8

Bonuses: Bill Skarsgard as Orlok is novel take on Dracula and terrifying; Lily-Rose Depp's physical acting is captivating; the cinematography stuns you shot after shot.

POSTED BY: Haley Zapal, new NoaF contributor and lawyer-turned-copywriter living in Atlanta, Georgia. A co-host of Hugo Award-winning podcast Hugo, Girl!, she posts on Instagram as @cestlahaley. She loves nautical fiction, growing corn and giving them pun names like Timothee Chalamaize, and thinking about fried chicken.

A roundup of three British novels that play with genre and form to create something a little bit special

Private Rites by Julia Armfield

Julie Armfield is a pioneer in the microgenre of "melancholy lesbians," and has followed up her last sad banger Our Wives Under the Seawith another tragic hit, this time a climate-fiction/horror-adjacent reimagining of King Lear, in which three queer sisters navigate their lives and relationships, especially with one another, in the aftermath of the death of their famous architect father, all against the backdrop of a world being steadily drowned by unending rain.

The main focus of the text throughout remains on the three sisters, using each of them as viewpoint characters, interspersed with some others, including the city itself (predominantly washes of beautiful descriptions of place and vignettes of the various inhabitants trying to live their lives in this damp, changing, drowning world). But the rain is constant—its fact and effects a touchstone throughout the story, never the focus but constantly noticeable just out of the corner of your eye. And so, by the time we reach the end, it is a looming horror that overwhelms the true plot of the story, the disintegrating psychodrama of betrayal and inheritance.

What I found most interesting, and something I think Armfield manages very well, is how the climate-fictional aspects of the story do not read as SFnal in tone, sharing more with litfic and horror respectively in how they are presented—this is a story that rejects explanations, whose climate change takes on a hint of the arcane before the end—and uses it instead as a setting, a psychological spectre and an act of god, not something to be reckoned with or solved, or even survived, but merely endured. Or perhaps weathered (ha). It loses no power from being treated this way, and perhaps even gains some—there is a weight to treating the climate disaster aspect as something unstoppable, unsolvable, that lingers long after the book is done, and felt more impactful on me at least than any number of stories that tackle the issue more head on.

Like all of Armfield's books, Private Rites is chock full of beautiful prose work, lush descriptions of place that unite the profound and the mundane, and sad, queer women in whose interiority we are allowed to revel, finding almost uncomfortable levels of sympathy with their most personal thoughts. It is gripping in all its aspects, and in my opinion may be her best work yet.

Nerd Coefficient: 10/10.

Reference: Armfield, Julia. Private Rites [HarperCollins, 2024].

Orbital by Samantha Harvey

If we count Orbital as genre, the Booker has been on a three winner SFF streak, with 2022's The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, 2023's Prophet Song and now Orbital. But that's a big if. The events of the story—such as there even are events—may not have strictly happened as yet, but they fall so closely into the realm of the possible that it feels an enormous stretch to call this speculative work, unless you consider all fiction that contains space travel to be that by default. In any case, whether or not it comes in under a technicality, its mode is far from the usual for genre fiction, and therein lie both its strength and its weakness. We follow six astro/cosmonauts on the ISS through one day—sixteen passes over the surface of the Earth—as they muse on their place in the universe, their relationship with Earth, each other and their loved ones, and the new manned mission to the moon they witness launching. They don't do much, and what they do isn't the focus anyway—instead it's a book of pondering, a rolling set of banger one-liners and intensely evocative descriptive passages, lush and wallowing in its use of language. All of which it does stunningly.

The problem comes with the unrelenting sameness of that—Harvey does a great job of evoking wonder at the view from the window of a tin can in space, and at the marvel of space travel at all, genuinely working to craft that emotional response where other books might rest on the assumption that the feeling comes pre-packaged in the reader (which it does not in me). But that feeling—that awe at everything—persists regardless of the variation in content, even when dealing with the cramped mundanities of astronaut life, and the lack of tonal variation rather wears the wonder thin by the end of its (quite short) duration.

However, what it does it does do remarkably well, and only begins to overstay its welcome towards the end. If, unlike me, you are truly dazzled simply by the reality of space travel, it may well continue to land all the way through.

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10.

Reference: Harvey, Samantha. Orbital [Vintage Publishing, 2023].

Three Eight One by Aliya Whiteley

A story of two texts. The first, a fantastical, quest-like, quasi-mythological narrative of a girl who must leave her home village to go on a ritualised journey. The second, in the margins of this, the footnotes of a far-future archivist, reckoning with her life via her connection to this text from a time far outside her ability to fully contextualise.

Three Eight One uses the interrelation of these two stories, their contrast in tone, in voice and in formatting on the page, to examine our relationship with the past and the present, with the nature of humanity and what might be lost to make a utopia, with the things that remain constant no matter how much humanity changes, and with the power of stories.

In the quest narrative, Fairly has to leave her village to follow the Horned Road, as is traditional for young people. This begins by pressing a button on a chain device, switching the narrative from third into first person, and far from the last time format will be played with in such a manner. Her progression through the quest—neatly parcelled out into sections, each of precisely 381 words—becomes increasingly stranger, leading us through a world that feels both modern and alien, both using and defying the tropes of fantasy as we know it. Even alone, Fairly's story, with its interrogation of the motivations of quests, of power structures and community, with its ambiguous and thought-provoking ending, would be worthwhile.

But it is not alone, and it is the annotation from the future author which, for me, really makes this book. We slowly learn through the story that she writes from a time so far ahead of ours as to render some of the context of the story beyond her grasp—the way that she talks about details of narrative and place make it clear through subtle repetitions the extent of her ignorance, despite her profession that she lives in an age of knowledge. We see glimpses into her world, a utopia she considers hard-earned but worthwhile, a world without conflict but where much has been lost to secure that safety. But we also see simple glimpses into her life, into her emotional relationship with a text from a long-dead civilisation. The connection that she herself can barely explain to a text she doesn't fully understand is one of the most compelling things in the story, and watching it develop over the pages, intertwining with that story itself, is incredibly rewarding.

Add to that her development in the later half of the book, where we meet her older, wiser self, and learn how her life has been shaped beyond the boundaries of the text she's annotating, and it becomes even more special.

Above all, it's a book of subtlety, refusing to spell things out for the reader but instead trusting them to make their own connections, while making sure all the tools are available to do so if they're willing. It's a book full of thoughtfulness, and one to sit with, digest and discuss, and one of the most fascinating things I've read this year.

Nerd Coefficient: 9/10.

Reference: Whiteley, Aliya. Three Eight One [Rebellion Publishing, 2024].

POSTED BY: Roseanna Pendlebury, the humble servant of a very loud cat. @chloroformtea.bsky.social

We travel back in time 10,000 years before the Kwisatz Haderach to learn about the origins of what would become the Bene Gesserit—and get Game of Thrones-level chicanery and angling. (Spoiler-free)

In both Denis Villeneuve's and David Lynch's film versions of Dune, we get fleeting glimpses of the witchlike Bene Gesserit. We can see that these dark-clad, mysterious women are controlling the puppet strings of emperors and the great houses, but we don't real insight into their machinations.

An origin story focusing on why, and how, they came to be is the focus of Max's new series Dune Prophecy, which is set about a century after the Butlerian Jihad in which humans defeated thinking machines and banned AI technology. The planet Wallach IX is home to the Sisterhood's school, where women are trained in truthsayers to serve the great houses of the Imperium.

The show centers on Valya Harkonnen, the Reverend Mother of the Sisterhood. Played immaculately by Emily Wilson, she is ambitious, conniving, and Machiavellian in her approach to not only extending the influence of the Sisterhood but also in taking personal revenge against House Atreides, whom she blames for her family's fall from grace and exile.

When a Sisterhood-arranged marriage between the emperor and a great house falls apart due to treachery, chaos threatens the order, resulting in a series of plots, subplots, and flashbacks concerning Valya and Tula. It all gets very confusing—not unlike watching Game of Thrones for the first time—and Max very clearly is trying to launch this as the next Game of Thrones (despite already having one in the form of House of the Dragon).

What I love most about this show is how the Sisterhood is portrayed like the Jedi Order in the prequel Star Wars movies, and it's made me think more critically about both. This description, for example, can literally apply to either: "A quasi-religious organization with no external oversight that puts members of its order in positions of great power throughout the galaxy."

To be clear, I still think that the both the Jedi and Bene Gesserit are awesome, but it'd be naive to think that they're unproblematic. Modern storytelling has gotten really good about morally gray characters—the days of Pure Good Guy (Batman) vs. Pure Bad Guy (Joker) are long gone, and in their stead are the Jamie Lannisters, Walter Whites, and Omar Littles of the world.

As we learn more about the Sisterhood, we see that they are engaged in galaxy-ranging eugenics (I'm calling it as I see with their breeding program), covert political manipulation, and, sometimes even murder. This, of course, doesn't mean I won't root for these space witches, but it is something to think about. Truly good characters are boring, as we have learned from prestige TV over the years.

In terms of look and feel, it's no Villeneuve Dune—but the sets and product design feel futuristic enough that it's not a distraction. There's a scene in episode 6 where we finally see space folding around a heighliner for the first time and it's absolutely incredible. The only scenes where I'm taken out of the universe are the ones set in the bar/nightclub. It feels chintzy and like something out a Syfy original movie from the '90s.

The pacing is a bit hit-or-miss (I had to rewatch the first episode twice to really get into it because it's so exposition-heavy), but each successive episode picks up steam and gets you more invested. Overall, though, it's an enjoyable watch and a different take on Dune for those who, like me, have read one Dune book and really enjoyed the movies, but aren't as well versed in all the lore from Frank Herbert's other books. Hell, I'm now inspired to pick up Dune Messiah.

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10.

POSTED BY: Haley Zapal, NoaF contributor and lawyer-turned-copywriter living in Atlanta, Georgia. A co-host of Hugo Award-winning podcast Hugo, Girl!, she posts on Instagram as @cestlahaley. She loves nautical fiction, growing corn and giving them pun names like Timothee Chalamaize, and thinking about fried chicken.

A near-future quasi-urban fantasy where the titular Coyote takes on fascists in a nearby state

Reference: Saintcrow, Lilith. Coyote Run [Horned Lark Press, 2025].

POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I'm just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.

The quirky inventor and his trusty four-legged pal are dragged into a rematch

After a brief scare that apparently threatened the end of the business of Aardman Animation, the claymation studio is back with a bang: the treacherous penguin who tormented the adorkable duo Wallace and Gromit in the 1993 episode The Wrong Trousers is now the main villain of his own feature-length film, Vengeance Most Fowl, streaming now on Netflix. (Hmm, a forgotten enemy from an old episode returns in a film? And it happens to be the second film in the franchise? Yes, the pattern is clear. Vengeance Most Fowl is the Wrath of Khan of the Wallace & Gromit universe.)

The setting where our clay heroes live appears to remain frozen in its vaguely mid-20th-century state, but as an embodiment of the eccentric inventor archetype, Wallace got a big update for the 2020s. The central joke about Wallace, the recurring flaw that reveals his character, has always been that he expends more effort in building an absurdly complicated machine that washes, dresses and feeds him than he'd expend in actually washing, dressing and feeding himself. So he presents a useful case scenario for our ongoing discussion about the tasks that people ought to be doing but prefer to delegate to machines.

This time, long-suffering Gromit's cause for consternation du jour is Wallace's invention of programmable garden gnomes. Whereas Gromit keeps a colorful garden that vibrates with life, the robotic gnome turns it into a geometrically perfect nightmare of topiary sameness. The message isn't subtle or original, but our era needs to be reminded of it: automation and standardization are extremely useful for saving time, but they cannot replace the pleasure of deliberate creative choices. As you may recall, one of Gromit's hobbies is knitting. He may take a whole day to finish one sock, while the robotic gnome spits out an entire suit in seconds, which is the opposite of what making your own clothes is about. Results-oriented methods are a bad fit for tasks where having to do an effort is the whole point. (At the meta level, this is an effective argument for the worth of claymation in a world of digital magic.) To stress the same point, the plot has Wallace introduce still another redundant machine: one that pets his dog for him. One would think people don't need to be reminded that interpersonal connection cannot be replaced with machines, but... alas. Such are the times allotted to us.

However, the film doesn't just tell us what we already know. There are more sides to the issue of dangerous machines. When the evil penguin once again hijacks Wallace's invention to turn it against him, the way Wallace wins is by making another machine. That's who he is; that's how he solves all his problems. Even Gromit learns to love the garden gnomes when they help save the day. What's going on?

To understand what Vengeance Most Fowl seems to be saying, it's worthwhile to look more closely at the subplot with the police officers who are trying to recapture the escaped penguin. In a nutshell, we have an experienced senior who has accumulated a vast repertoire of time-tested heuristics (which he calls trusting one's gut) and an enthusiastic rookie who has the textbook fresh in her head and prefers to solve cases by sticking to procedure. Their disagreement mirrors the film's core conflict between spontaneity and algorithm. And yet, it's the rookie cop who figures out the truth by insisting on following the logical rules of evidence (despite her superior believing she listened to her gut). Once again: what's going on?

What I suspect is going on is that the opposition between spontaneity and algorithm doesn't need to be resolved, but dissolved. It was never a real opposition. The two need not be enemies. You can pet your dog by yourself while a robotic gnome assists you with the form of gardening you prefer.

This embrace between passion and technique is visible in the very fact that this film exists. Aardman is known for its very high standards of animation quality with immensely complicated materials. One could use computers to animate Wallace & Gromit in a fraction of the time, but the studio's choice to go for the painstaking effort it takes to make inert clay come alive, and make it look no less eye-catching than today's ubiquitous digital creations, is a beautiful demonstration that the medium is the message. Vengeance Most Fowl excels in overcoming unthinkable technical challenges: a dozen tiny gnomes walking in perfect synchrony to carry a van; a boat chase on a navigable aqueduct; an arsenal of boomeranging boots (it makes sense in context).

And then there is, of course, the brilliant choice to give the villain a malleable face that nonetheless stays expressionless no matter what. It's terrifying how we can always tell when he's angry, when he's content, when he's disappointed, when he's defiant, even though his face doesn't move even once. This is a welcome comeback for one of the best characters ever created by Aardman Animation.

Nerd Coefficient: 8/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.

 A whimsical romp combining familiar tropes with inventive charm.

Tropes are not rules, and they are not poison. They are tools, shortcuts to simplify some elements of plot construction by using familiar component parts. They are pieces of mating plumage, which signal to the reader that the author is engaging with a particular set of expectations. Maiga Doocy has a deft hand at deploying tropes to advantage in Sorcery and Small Magics, so that the story felt comfortable without being stale, full of familiar bits of structure that guided my expectations along familiar paths, while allowing me to be surprised by inventive bits of character or world-building that filled out the details.

We open with a Magic School™ setting, in which Leovander Lovage and Sebastian Grimm are Rivals™, nearly Enemies™, who have been snarking at each other their entire time at school. In full fairness, this is on Leo, because Leo is kind of a jerk who can’t resist picking on straight-laced and reserved Grimm; and indeed his juvenile shenanigans have put him on the edge of expulsion if he doesn't shape up. Now they are in their last year of studies, preparing for the Trials™ which will determine their magical futures. Leo, with an aristocratic and respected magical lineage, is skilled at small magics (charms and cantrips), but useless at Grandmagic, as larger spells are called. They always go wrong, someone gets hurt, and so he’s sworn off them, which means his career options are limited. Nevertheless, he’s rich and privileged, so that’s not really going to be a real problem for him. Meanwhile, Grimm is serious, highly skilled, and fully invested in making a name for himself – which is important, since he comes from a much less privileged background.

Through a reasonably plausible but also entertainingly contrived accident, Grimm inadvertently casts a spell on Leo that renders Leo subject to every one of his commands. Whatever he orders, Leo must obey, and if Grimm gets too far away, Leo suffers increasingly agonising discomfort that becomes life-threatening. Such spells are highly, highly illegal, so rather than go ask for help, our boys decide to keep it secret while trying to work out how to undo this curse on their own.

This premise could absolutely be a paint-by-numbers enemies-to-lovers forced-proximity magic-school romantasy. But because Doocy uses the tropes as tools, rather than crutches, instead it’s something a bit more inventive. For example, the Quest™ to undo the spell takes Leo and Grimm out of school, so really only the opening scenes make use of the familiar Magic School trappings. Further, every element of the world-building is constructed to reinforce their character arcs, which lends a really pleasing coherence to the story. This is most obvious in the magic system. In this world, magic requires two types of people to cooperate in order to cast a spell: scrivers, who write the spells, and casters, who actually cast them. Leo is a scriver, and Grimm is a caster, so in addition to the Forced Proximity™ of the curse, their complementary skills also add a structural component of Working Together™.

This magic system is itself deeply intertwined with the best bit of the setting: the Unquiet Wood, a wild forest whose dangers are walled off from the domain of humans by a boundary that is constantly refreshed by governmental magician teams. But the boundary is not perfect, and when magical influences slip through, the results can be deadly: blights that destroy crops and ruin whole towns, poisonous flowers that will kill a person in hours. Yet the magic can also be wondrous, and a whole economy of Unquiet Wood foragers makes its living by venturing past the boundary and collecting magical artifacts. A single wing feather of a griffin can be a vitally important magical tool in spell casting.

So naturally – naturally– Leo and Grimm find that the only path to undoing their curse takes them into the Unquiet Wood, where various eventualities cast light upon their magical capacity, their relationship, and the true nature of the Unquiet Wood.

One thing I quite liked about this book was the absence of any real antagonist. Leo and Grimm get into their current situation through a genuinely innocent misunderstanding, and the solution that they seek is accomplished by acting in good faith with everyone they meet. Sometimes they are collaboratively working together to solve mutual problems, but sometimes people just help out out for the sake of helping.  The baseline assumption of this book is that most people are Good, Actually. It's not quite the same as Cozy Fantasy, which tends to focus more on importing rituals of self-care into fantasy land (coffee, baking, books, cushions, cats, hygge, etc.), but it's still a comfortable worldview to spend a few hundred pages with.

And it's worth noting that this theme — that people are Good and Cooperative, Actually — serves as a structural glue to many elements of the plot and setting. It underlies the duality of the magic system; it shows up in the actions Leo and Grimm take, and the bargains they strike with other people they meet during their quest; and I would bet folding cash that it will also turn out to be the solution to the current deadliness of the Unquiet Wood. This world is built on combining unlike things to build something larger, not walling them off from each other. So despite the crossbow bolts that start flying in the climax, no one is really operating out of malice here. It’s a kind book, peopled with basically good folks — yes, even the ones that need to get fed to monsters have Reasons. It is entertainingly written, tightly plotted, and not (quite) as predictable as you’d expect from its component parts. I expect to read the next books in the series with great pleasure.

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Nerd coefficient: 7/10, an enjoyable experience, but not without its flaws

Highlights:

• Slow-burn stormcloud/sunshine order/chaos romance
• Whimsical, charming setting and magic
• Effectively deployed tropes
  

Reference: Doocy, Maiga, Sorcery and Small Magics [Orbit 2024].

CLARA COHEN lives in Scotland in a creaky old building with pipes for gas lighting still lurking under her floorboards. She is an experimental linguist by profession, and calligrapher and Islamic geometric artist by vocation. During figure skating season she does blather on a bit about figure skating. She is on Mastodon at wandering.shop/@ergative, and on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/ergative-abs.bsky.social

Missed opportunities for love, with POISON to fill the gaps

Cover illustration by John Howe

I’ve been thinking back on it fondly recently, especially after Book 2 in the series got me through a particularly bad night in early November last year. So, in a flurry of skilled Ebay searches I managed to collect the whole lot – and in mass market paperback, which is the Superior Book Format, don’t @ me, I will not be taking questions at this time. Instead, I will be doing the talking here, the first Wednesday of every month (except today, which is the second Wednesday, but starting a new endeavour on New Year’s Day is a recipe for failure, so this is absolutely a planned scheduling event and in no way a consequence of my decision to take on a 16-month reviewing project in a haze of jet-lagged ambition on January 2nd, 2025.)

My approach will be as follows: I want to remind people how great these books are as I revisit them myself. I will not be entirely blind to their faults as they emerge, but my attitude is going to highlight all the things these books do well. These books got me through a rough time, I’m going to be leaning on them as rough times continue, and only a fool picks nits when the lice are load-bearing. Or something. Look, at least it's not as bad out here (yet) as it is going to get in there. Hobb has never built a sandcastle she doesn't crush under her merciless feet.

So, how does the saga begin? 

It begins with a boy, unloved and inconvenient to his family, so unloved and inconvenient that he does not even have a name. What he does have, though, is lineage: He is the bastard son of Chivalry Farseer, the oldest son of the king of the Six Duchies. His maternal family, lacking capacity for another mouth to feed, drop him off with Chivalry’s men when they swing back through town six years after the boy’s conception. Chivalry, being off on an errand somewhere, is not around, so the boy is given to Chivalry’s stable man, Burrich, to look after. Burrich, not terribly imaginative, calls the boy Fitz, short for FitzChivalry (‘Chivalry’s Bastard’), and thus is FitzChivalry Farseer named.

And ok, yes, FitzChivalry Farseer is a silly name. In fact, all of the names in the Six Duchies are pretty silly. Virtue naming is very in vogue, you understand, especially for royalty, and so we’ve got King Shrewd, with three sons: Chivalry, Verity, and Regal, borne of ancestors with names like Victory, Graciousness, Desire, all the way back to King Taker, the first settler to claim power in the land that became the Six Duchies. By the time you’ve spent several hundred pages in this world, these naming conventions make such perfect sense that you have difficulty seeing what it is that makes your best friend raise a dubious eyebrows at 'King Shrewd??' when she reads the synopsis of the book as you plan your buddy-read with her.

The plot of the book is one of the most coherent and self-contained of any of the ROTE books: political intrigue, magic, supernaturally baffling attacks from a previously unknown enemy, last-ditch political alliances, assassination, treason, betrayal, quite a lot of poison, etc, wrapped up with a reasonable bow at the end, which leaves the reader feeling like they've gotten a full story, with a conclusion and a path to resolution, but no need to keep reading if they're happy with what they've had already. (This is, as I recall, the last time it happens. The rest of the ROTE sub-series are much more like one tale split into three volumes.) All very good – but also, rather typical fantasy plot stuff. No, what makes this book brilliant is characterization and relationships – all of which are built upon a foundation of betrayals and missed opportunities for love. Remember, the book opens with a boy so unwanted that he does not even have a name. Hobb began as she meant to continue. Not for nothing is her work described as ‘misery porn’ on r/fantasy. But it’s so good! It’s such well-constructed misery porn! Again and again and again, Fitz is presented with people whom he could love, and again and again, something comes in to prevent it, to interfere with it, to make it weaker and less comforting than it might otherwise be.

You’d think, would you not, that Burrich, who does most of the work raising Fitz, would become a foster father sort, no? No. At first, Burrich treats Fitz like one of his dogs – which is to say, he keeps him fed and safe and teaches obedience. But the relationship between them is strained, because Burritch knows how to deal with dogs, and with men, and 6-year-old Fitz is neither. Also, Fitz has a magical ability to bond with animals, which Burrich regards as unnatural and obscene. When Burritch learns that Fitz has bonded with a puppy named Nosey, he rips that puppy away from Fitz, severing their bond in a single act of pain and shocking cruelty. (Yes, yes, I know, but that’s hundreds of pages later, and I didn’t know about it my first time through!) 

Well, then, what about this titular assassin, whom Fitz is recruited to serve in the role of titular apprentice? Chade Fallstar, a scarred, reclusive man, teaches Fitz secretly about poison and manipulation and politics, and could be another possible mentor, another source of possible affection. But his mentorship is also conditional. He tests Fitz’s loyalty to King Shrewd, and he abandons Fitz during a truly harrowing sequence when Fitz is sent to be trained in the use of his ancestral magical ability, called Skill. 

But Fitz has family, has he not? Yes, and they suck too. His father, Prince Chivalry Farseer, abdicates almost immediately and Fitz never meets him. His younger uncle, Prince Regal, sees him entirely as an obstacle to Regal’s own political machinations. Prince Verity, next in line after Chivalry’s abdication, could become a mentor, a teacher, could undo the damage caused by his disastrous Skill training – but by then the kingdom is under attack and Verity cannot be spared.  King Shrewd manages to win Fitz’s loyalty by the simplest possible means: a transactional bargain. Shrewd will give Fitz a home and protection, and in return Fitz must serve him. This is not a great deal, but it is the best Fitz is offered, and his loyalty to Shrewd is ever after unshakeable. 

There is only one friend whose affection is not conditional: the court jester, the Fool. A strange person, childlike and inscrutable, albino-like in appearance, prone to odd statements and insights, and incapable of articulating his meaning in anything other than riddles. But he does not betray Fitz the way Burritch does in taking Nosey away; the way Chade does in deserting him during his Skill training; the way Shrewd does in using him as a tool rather than providing for his well-being; the way his father does in deserting him. And the relationship between Fitz and the Fool will structure every other book in the series, to a greater or lesser extent.

Oh, it’s so good, NOAFers! I’m so glad to be reading these books again! Thank you for listening to my ravings as they unfold over the next 16 months!

--

References:

Hobb, Robin. Assassin's Apprentice. [Harper Collins, 1995].

CLARA COHEN lives in Scotland in a creaky old building with pipes for gas lighting still lurking under her floorboards. She is an experimental linguist by profession, and calligrapher and Islamic geometric artist by vocation. During figure skating season she does blather on a bit about figure skating. She is on Mastodon at wandering.shop/@ergative, and on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/ergative-abs.bsky.social

Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai is a legend for a reason — here are some influences and thoughts on a 4K rewatch on the big screen.

For those that aren't familiar with the plot, the story centers around a medieval farming village that's been beset by bandits who come to steal their crops — as it's not ripe for harvest yet, the bad guys vow to return when it is. The farmers set out to convince samurai to come to their aid, offering unlimited food as payment. Fortunately, a starving ronin (samurai without masters and thus jobs), takes them up on their quest, and manages to gather a crew of like-minded warriors to commit to the cause. 

Discussion-wise, I don't think that there's much I can bring to the table that hasn't been the subject of countless textbooks, documentaries, and college seminars, so I thought instead I'd focus on 5 things that brought me joy or that I hadn't noticed until this viewing.

1. Oh George Lucas, I'd recognize that flower field anywhere

It's no secret that George Lucas was heavily influenced by Kurosawa's filmmaking techniques, from screen wipes to dramatic musical accompaniment. He even acknowledged that Hidden Fortress inspired him to tell the story of A New Hope through the eyes of lowly droids, stand-ins for the lowly peasants that anchor Hidden Fortress. (Here's a quick primer on exactly all those similarities.)

But in the middle of Seven Samurai, there's a scene of beauty and respite for the youngest samurai, Katsushirō and Shino, a local village girl. They meet secretly in field of flowers, laughing and flirting while trying to ignore the fact that bandits are about to besiege their town. Even though Seven Samurai is shot in black and white, this scene stands out with the sheer number of small delicate flowers, and they contrast well against the dark and scrubby brush behind them. It's very clear that Lucas had this scene in mind while filming Attack of the Clones, as Anakin and Padme similarly share a moment of joy in the flower field on Naboo. (Another fun reference? Darth Vader's helmet is 100% influenced by samurai helmets. The list goes on and on when it comes to Lucas' love for Kurosawa.)

2. Kambei's easy smile makes me want to be a better person

The first time we meet Kambei, he's shaving his ceremonial chonmage, or top knot, so he can disguise himself as a monk to go undercover and rescue a kidnapped child. This isn't something that's taken lightly, as a samurai's haircut was not only practical (it helped to keep his helmet securely on his head in battle) but also symbolic, identifying him to all the world as a warrior. He is, as we'll see throughout the movie, a total good guy. His decision to help the struggling villagers is the only reason the others join him, as he's a natural leader. But what I love most about him is how kind he is — his smile is contagious and very pure. He doesn't raise his voice, he doesn't get impatient, and he's always, always cool, calm, and collected. I aspire to take his approach to life, and smile more to the world. 

3. The villager choreography definitely had an influence on Mad Max: Fury Road

To understand Seven Samurai, you have to know a little about the life of a farmer in this era. It's the 1580s, in rural Japan, and life is hard. Like, really hard. Farmers are the lifeblood of the empire, but they're also vulnerable to droughts, famine, and pillaging attacks from bandits. Daily life is full of toil and hard work, and their bodies are rough for the wear. Kurosawa depicts his villagers in an interesting way in this movie, and the "villager choreography" as I call it always sees them moving together en masse, whether they're planting, harvesting, mourning, fighting, or celebrating. I think this is a nod to the communal nature of their existence, as it you can't do literally anything by yourself when you're a farmer. 

4. The sheer likability of the samurai is just mind-blowing

The world loves a "we're putting together a team for a job" movie and I am certainly no exception. From The Dirty Dozen and The Magnificent Seven to Ocean's 11 and The Italian Job, these kinds of movies are just incredibly watchable. Why? I think it's because you get a super diverse array of characters (all with unique skillsets that are fun), witty banter, and a sense of camaraderie that's extremely FOMO-inducing.

Kambeo assembles a crew to protect the villagers that's got everything: a skilled and stoic sword master, a woodchopper that can help them through dark times, an old friend, a hot head, a youngster eager to prove his worth, and a skilled archer. And the best part is, when these guys are on screen, the actually seem like they like hanging out with each other. Some are in it for the glory, some for the rice, and some for revenge, but they're all also in it for the sense of belonging they get — even the blustery and crass Kikuchiyo, who starts the movie out as an annoying hanger-on but who comes full circle as a hero. No joke, I would kill to have lunch with these guys.

5. This time around, Kikuchiyo's story choked me up a little

Comic relief in Seven Samurai comes in the form of Kikuchiyo, a peasant-born street fighter that longs to be a samurai. He is loud, crude, almost always nearly naked, and constantly scratching himself. He only makes it on to the team thanks to his sheer persistence as he trails along beside the heroes on the way to the village, refusing to take no for an answer. It isn't until well into the movie that we learn about his origin story, and it helps us understand why he's choosing to fight for these trod upon people. It's his past.

In the final battle scene, he rushes towards burning buildings to help those trapped inside, and a dying mother hands him her child before collapsing. He grabs the baby and then absolutely just falls apart, confessing "This child was me!" It is at this point that we learn about his trauma-filled past. He too was an orphan, the victim of violence against his small community. In a movie this old, and about samurai warriors, you wouldn't expect this level of emotionality, and it's refreshing to see with modern eyes. Kikuchiyo goes on to fight bravely and sacrifice himself for this village, and in the process helps to break the cycle of trauma for many others and giving them a chance to escape a fate like his.

Overall

Seven Samurai is three and half hours long, but there's not a wasted minute or any filler. I even found myself waiting until the brief intermission to run to the bathroom so I wouldn't miss a single scene, and this despite the fact that I'd seen it before. The film is a somewhat shocking 70 years old, yet it still looks incredible and is compulsively watchable. I think it's because it's the classic battle of good versus evil, filled with universal archetypes that all know and love, from the one-eyed bandit to the clear-eyed hero who can make it all right. It's long run time is thus a feature and not a bug, as it can freely spend time letting the audience get to know the characters and their struggles. Somehow, it's still relatable for modern audiences, too — from the jaw-dropping action scenes and forbidden romance to the potty humor jokes.

Everyone should see Seven Samurai, I fully believe this. I'm still riding the high of seeing it on the big screen. Be right back, going to look into ordering a T-shirt with the samurai flag on it...

POSTED BY: Haley Zapal, NoaF contributor and lawyer-turned-copywriter living in Atlanta, Georgia. A co-host of Hugo Award-winning podcast Hugo, Girl!, she posts on Instagram as @cestlahaley. She loves nautical fiction, growing corn and giving them pun names like Timothee Chalamaize, and thinking about fried chicken.

Hidden away in Netflix’s YA fantasy section, Dead Boy Detectives is a feel-good horror comedy that has already been cancelled. Fortunately, the sole existing season is enormously satisfying and the plot wraps up nicely in its quick but entertaining eight episodes. The show follows the adventures of two dead teen boys (Edwin, who was killed at the turn of the century, and Charles, who was murdered in the 1980s) who form an investigative agency to solve mysteries for other ghosts. Things change when they cross paths with Crystal, a psychic teen girl with amnesia and a stalker demon boyfriend. Later they ally with Niko, a spiritually sensitive but lighthearted student grieving the death of her father. Although it exists in the same universe as the broody Sandman television show, Dead Boy Detectives takes a much lighter tone. It has intensely likeable leads, refreshingly diverse casting, and a clever mix of the tragic and the very funny, with twisty plots to keep viewers engaged. I haven’t enjoyed a dark comedy this much since season one of Russian Doll. Like Russian Doll, Dead Boy Detectives has emotionally wounded main characters caught in outlandish situations that ultimately lead them to inner growth and leave viewers with a satisfying story arc.

In the early 1900s, Edwin (George Rexstrew) is attacked by his classmates in an occult ritual at his British private school. The prank summons a real demon who (apologetically) traps Edwin in hell until he finds a way to escape years later. The deceased Edwin returns to Earth as a ghost and meets Charles (Jayden Revri), a 1980s high school boy who has just been murdered by his classmates after he protected another student from bullying. Instead of moving on to the afterlife, Edwin and Charles hide from Death (Kirby Howell-Baptiste) when she comes for them, and decide to start a detective agency to help other ghosts resolve mysteries or other injustices related to their deaths.

In the first episode, they are approached by a young Victorian-era ghost girl who asks them to help her psychic human friend Crystal (Kassius Nelson). Crystal has started behaving erratically and seems to be possessed but, as the ghost girl notes by way of another explanation, she is also “American.” In the process of helping Crystal regain control of herself, the three become involved in the mystery of a missing child and travel to an isolated New England town, Port Townsend, to investigate. While there, they connect with Niko (Yuyu Kitamura), a Japanese exchange student who becomes infested with hilariously foul-mouthed dandelion sprites (Max Jenkins, Caitlin Reilly). Edwin and Charles have to adapt to their new living allies while dealing with new threats in Port Townsend from the tricky and seductive Cat King (Lukas Gage) and from Esther (Jenn Lyon), a sarcastic and beauty-obsessed witch.

Throughout the story, Edwin is brilliant and sophisticated, but also uptight and hesitant to trust any newcomers. After decades with just Charles as a companion, he is not open to the two new women in their lives. In contrast, Charles is cheerful, upbeat, and friendly, and develops an attachment to Crystal, leading to one of two unexpected love triangles in the show.

In addition to strong leads, the show has an excellent cast of memorable side characters, including Tragic Mick (Michael Beach), a cursed walrus forced to live in the form of a middle-aged man who runs a magic shop that helps the teens; Monty (Joshua Colley), the witch’s handsome and seductive bird turned boy who becomes attracted to Edwin; the Night Nurse (Ruth Connell), a hilariously bossy official in the afterlife agency whose job it is to locate missing ghost children like Charles and Edwin; and Jenny (Briana Cuoco), the sole mundane human and a cynical goth butcher shop owner.

Each of the characters is laugh-out-loud funny, but also fiercely brutal or intensely tragic. The dichotomy works well, though, creating intensity without bleakness and softening terrifying moments with unexpected bursts of sarcasm or irony. There are also scenes where the show leans into the sadness of Edwin’s and Charles’s backstories without an undercurrent of humor, and that contrast of seriousness makes the overall story even more powerful. Towards the end of the series, the tale of Esther’s origins gets a little complicated and devolves into a rushed montage-style summary, which is not as helpful. The same thing happens with Crystal’s backstory when she starts to uncover who she really is. But, for the most part, Dead Boy Detectives delivers a near-flawless acting ensemble which draws you in from the first moment and leaves you cheering at the end.

Nerd Coefficient: 8/10.

Highlights:

A raunchy, visceral, uncompromising statement of intention

The new iteration of DC-derived stories has a curious choice of opening chapter. With narrative threads vaguely connecting to The Suicide Squad (the good one) and its spinoff series Peacemaker, the HBO Max series Creature Commandos reanimates a discussion that should have been declared resolved decades ago, but that the current era of superheroes seems to have forgotten: What if you could fix the world with just one little murder? Never mind that the first half of the series is about trying to prevent that murder; if you've met self-appointed protector of humankind Amanda Waller, you know that her extensive skill set doesn't include moral consistency. So throwing away money and lives to defend the princess-heiress of Pokolistan from sorceress Circe and her army of easily duped incels, only to change her mind and throw away more money and lives to have said princess-heiress murdered anyway, is exactly on brand for her.

Writer/producer/director James Gunn surely knew that starting this new DC saga with a team story would prompt parallels with the Justice League. Namely, how is this team different from its more heroic counterpart? What is it that makes the Commandos a dark mirror of the League? That kind of comparison isn't new. If you want answers about why Superman doesn't kill (and, therefore, why Zack Snyder doesn't have the faintest idea how to handle the Justice League), all you need to read is the 2001 story What's So Funny About Truth, Justice & the American Way? by Joe Kelly. Much like the Snyderverse drew from the gray worldview of The Dark Knight Returns and The Death of Superman, it seems the... Gunnverse? is drawing from the genre's own reaction to that excess of cynicism.

So let's return to our initial question, which can be rephrased like this: Can the value of one life be purely instrumental? In such Kantian terms, the question touches the core of why Amanda Waller operates the way she does. Her extreme brand of pragmatism bypasses any consideration of principle, and the same logic that makes her stage a clandestine operation to protect a foreign head of state can as easily move her to favor the opposite strategic objective. How does this make sense to her? Easy: a high-profile political assassination with unknown cascading repercussions isn't any more problematic to her than forcing inmates to risk ther necks for uncertain gain. The life of a princess-heiress or the life of an unjustly incarcerated metahuman are just assets to her, usable or disposable according to whatever arcane moral calculation is going on in her head.

And this is why Gunn chose Creature Commandos as the first entry in the new DC-verse: to establish a clear demarcation over against the messy position the Snyderverse started with. The version of Superman that Snyder presented in his 2013 film Man of Steel is a semidivine figure whom puny mortals should look at in awe, but not look up to; one with no ties of loyalty to humankind beyond his personal attachments: he fights to defend his adoptive mother, but he couldn't care less about innocent bystanders. That's how he was raised: Jonathan Kent taught him that he should let people die if helping them would expose his secret. Martha Kent taught him that his immeasurable power came with no responsibility. With the worst role models in the history of the character, the result couldn't be other than what we got: a Superman who is no hero. The absurdly contrived scene where we're expected to agree he had no other choice available but to kill General Zod set a dour tone that persisted for the rest of the Snyderverse. A Superman who kills was joined by a Batman who tortures and brands people and a Wonder Woman who has lost her faith in humans. That is not how you build a team of heroes.

Creature Commandos exposes what happens when your idea of saving the world doesn't contain an iron clause on the absolute value of every life: you lose sight of what you were trying to fight for. Waller's ill-fated adventure in Pokolistan ends with the death of the victim she was supposed to protect, as well as the deaths of members of her own team who shouldn't even have been in prison. The reason why they were available for her to exploit in the first place is the same broken logic that ranks lives in order of importance. You can't call yourself a defender of the world if you don't equally care for every single life in it. The numerous flashbacks that reveal the origin of each member of the Commandos go back to the same theme of according life an instrumental as opposed to absolute value. Waller believes she's using a team of monsters, creatures whose past misdeeds render them only worthy of being used, but the truth is they're all innocent. She's the real monster, and the unstated implication of the show's message is that Snyder's Superman is a monster on the same scale as Waller. Gunn needed to make that clear before introducing his own take on Superman.

There's nothing naïve about a Superman who doesn't kill. Via reductio ab absurdum, Creature Commandos shows the natural result of abandoning that basic principle, and helps set the tone for a renewed view of superheroism that doesn't fetishize power for its own sake or treat conflict as a utilitarian calculation. The superhero genre is in crisis because it's embarrassed of itself, averse to sincerity, willingly corrupted by cynicism. However tonally voluble and structurally disjointed, Creature Commandos was a necessary laxative for all the rotten beliefs that have clogged up the genre. With the slate clear, it's time for Superman to once again show the way.

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10.

POSTED BY: Arturo Serrano, multiclass Trekkie/Whovian/Moonie/Miraculer, accumulating experience points for still more obsessions.