Brent Hartinger's Blog, page 15

I’ve written before how I sometimes classify books and movies in one of two ways: as “broccoli” (it’s good for you) or “dessert” (it’s fun to consume). The very best writing, I think, is both broccoli and dessert.

There’s also a way that I sometimes classify authors of books: as either a “broadcast network” or a “cable channel.”

Does the writer’s work have widespread, “mass” appeal — just like the broadcast networks? Or does it have a quirkier, more challenging sensibility for a “niche” audience, like the cable channels?

Basically, is it 2 Broke Girls or Girls? Two and a Half Men or Mad Men.

Please note: this isn’t really a question of quality. The broadcast networks air plenty of crap, but they also air some of the best stuff on television (like The Good Wife and Modern Family, two of the best shows ever, IMHO).

And let’s face it: the cable channels air lots of crap too.

The point is, an author can be excellent and still have mass appeal. J.K. Rowling, Stephen King, and John Grisham are all “broadcast networks,” and they’re (often) damn good at what they do.

Meanwhile, being a “cable channel” doesn’t mean something can’t be popular. Neil Gaiman, Tananarive Due, and Margaret Atwood, all very successful writers, are cable channels: a little weird or challenging, idiosyncratic, more of an acquired taste.

So if you’re a writer, which are you? Are you a mainstream broadcast network or a quirky, niche cable channel? This is important information to know about yourself. But it’s not necessarily as easy to see as you might think.

Like most writers, when I was a novice, I saw myself as a “broadcast network”: I simply assumed that “everyone” would love my work.

Twenty years, and dozens of would-be movie and book projects later, I now know that I am a cable channel into the deepest marrow of my bones.

Broadcast networks try to appeal to every major marketing demographic with their programming. The “four quadrant” demographics are: men under the age of 25, women under the age of 25, men over the age of 25, and women over the age of 25.

If you’re a “broadcast network” author, your books would appeal to most or all of these quadrants. Or if you write YA, your books would appeal to “everyone” in a typical high school: say, sixty percent of the whole school. And probably a lot of college-age students and adults too.

And I don’t just mean “they’d like ‘em if they read ‘em!” The question to be asked is: would your books inspire massive numbers of people to seek them out, to buy them in hardcover?

If not, you’re probably a cable channel.

Sadly, if you’re writing gay fiction, African American fiction, or, say, teen fiction in verse, you’re probably a cable channel whether you like it or not. Most of us wish for a time when this won’t be true, but as a society we’re really not there yet; there are too many people who simply won’t read these sub-genres, no matter what.

For what it’s worth, just being a genre writer doesn’t necessarily make you a cable channel: romance, mystery, and fantasy are three specific genres — but they’re also the most popular genres in publishing today, with widespread, mainstream appeal.

Anyway, what does all this mean for you as a writer? Truthfully, in terms of money, you’re probably better off being a broadcast network. These are (mostly) the books that make the best-seller lists and get optioned for the movies.

By contrast, if you want to win awards, you’re probably better off being a cable channel (better still, a cable channel that writes literary fiction. Ha!).

If you’re a cable channel, that doesn’t mean you’ll never hit the bestseller lists or have your book turned into a movie (I’m proof of that). But frankly, your projects might be a harder sell.

Both types of writers have strengths and weaknesses, pros and cons. And I’m not trying to put writers in boxes, and I would never tell any writer not to reach for the stars and hope for the widest possible audience.

But the mainstream world worships authors who are broadcast networks (by definition, right? Something is mainstream for a reason). And it probably always will.

Which brings me to an important lesson I’ve learned: it’s okay to be a cable channel.

In my opinion, the whole point of being a writer isn’t to win awards or get rich and famous: it’s to write books.

Whether you’re a broadcast network or a cable channel, if you’re lucky enough to be able to support yourself doing what you love, well, that’s not a means to an end — it is the end.

You reach that point, my friend, and you’ve already won the game.

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The post Advice for Writers: Are You a Cable Channel or a Broadcast Network? appeared first on Brent's Brain.

Now this is what I call a dedicated fan. Check out this incredibly cool clothing from Russel Middlebrook fan Sierra. (I like it all, but I I think I like the soul-sucking brain zombies shoes the best!)

The post Russel Middlebrook Fan Art! appeared first on Brent's Brain.

The first movie trailer for Geography Club (the movie) is out! It’s not yet embeddable, so check it out here.

The first movie poster is below.

 

 

The post Check Out the Trailer and Poster for GEOGRAPHY CLUB (the Movie)! appeared first on Brent's Brain.

Curious who’s playing Russel in the upcoming movie version of Geography Club? His name is Cameron Deane Stewart, and he actually had a small role in last fall’s Pitch Perfect. In the trailer, you can see him at about the :45 mark. He’s playing — seriously — the naked guy in the shower:

The post Who’s Playing Russel in the GEOGRAPHY CLUB Movie? The Naked Guy in the Shower (Video) appeared first on Brent's Brain.

Here it is! The jacket to the next Russel Middlebrook book, coming in March, 2013!

Geography Club’s Russel Middlebrook and his friends Min and Gunnar are back, and they’re laughing about something they call the Elephant of Surprise—the tendency for life to never turn out the way you expect. Sure enough, Russel soon happens upon a hot, but mysterious guy named Wade—even as he’s also drawn back to an old flame named Kevin. Meanwhile, Min learns her girlfriend Leah is keeping secrets, and Gunnar just wants to be left alone to pursue his latest obsession.

But the elephant is definitely on the move in all three of their lives. Just who is Wade and what are he and his friends planning? What is Leah hiding? And why is Gunnar taking naked pictures of Kevin in the shower?

The Elephant of Surprise, the latest entry in Brent Hartinger’s groundbreaking gay teen Russel Middlebrook Series, is a story of humor, danger, and romance. Before it’s over, Russel and his friends will learn that the Elephant of Surprise really does appear when you least expect him—and that when he stomps on you, it really, really hurts.

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So this is kinda cool.

Geography Club, my first novel, has been in print in paperback ever since it was first published. But the two existing sequels in the Russel Middlebrook Series, The Order of the Poison Oak (book #2) and Double Feature: Attack of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies/Bride of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies (book #3, also known as Split Screen), eventually went out of print in both paperback and hardcover.

Basically, the only way you could read em is if you got a used copy or the e-version, which sucked, because these books are always the favorites of anyone who’s read the whole series.

Well, the good news is that, with the release of the Geography Club feature film in 2013, and the release of The Elephant of Surprise in March (book #4 in the series), both those earlier books are now back out in paperback.

Check em out here:

The Order of the Poison Oak.

Double Feature: Attack of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies/Bride of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies.

 

 

 

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Writers of fiction are crazy.

If you’re a writer yourself, I’m sure you’ve read the depressing statistics:

Well over 95% of all completed novels are never published by a traditional publisher.
Well over 99% of all screenplays registered with the Writers Guild are never produced or even optioned. In fact, you have a much greater chance of winning the California lottery than you do of selling your screenplay to a studio.
Most playwrights are lucky to ever get a reading of their play, much less an actual production, even at a crappy amateur theater.

And if you do manage to beat the odds and get your book published or your screenplay or play  produced, that’s still no guarantee of success. Most entertainment projects ultimately “fail” — 90% of books don’t earn out their advances, many completed movies don’t even get a DVD release, and plenty of plays run to nearly-empty theaters.

This is simply the reality of a life writing fiction. Anyone who believes otherwise is either (a) lucky enough to have stumbled into early success (and naive enough not to know that that kind of success never lasts forever), or (b) deliberately lying to themselves.

The fact is: most of the time, writers fail. We fail artistically — in that, if we’re really honest with ourselves, we never really successfully achieve what we set out to do. Or we fail commercially — in that, even if we did succeed artistically, we picked a project or idea that didn’t really have any kind of a “mass” audience.

Or maybe we just never got a break, or the timing wasn’t right. Who knows?

I’ve worked on a number of different projects in the last twelve months: two movies, three novels, and one play.

That’s six projects in all (some of which, it must be said, were started in earlier years: I’m a prolific writer, but even I’m not that prolific!).

I know for a fact one of the movies is going to happen (it’s the movie version of Geography Club, and it’s long since wrapped for a 2013 release). The other movie (based on a screenplay and play of mine) now looks very likely too (for a 2013 shoot and a 2014 release).

One of the novels, The Elephant of Surprise (the latest in the Russel Middlebrook Series) will be out in 2013.

That’s a pretty good track record: three of six projects will almost certainly be seen by the general public in one form or another.

Meanwhile, the other three projects — two novels and one play — are just beginning their submission processes. Hopefully, they’ll all sell somewhere too.

So that’s not a bad track record, is it? At least a 50% success rate and counting?

But here’s the thing: this is my output at the end of twenty years of writing and developing some actual skills, not to mention something of a track record.

Before I sold my first novel (in 2000), I wrote eight novels that never went anywhere (at the time, I thought they were golden, but now I see that they weren’t anywhere near professional quality).

Before I had my first screenplay optioned, I wrote ten that didn’t go anywhere. And I’ve written plenty since then that didn’t go anywhere either — I’ve written more than twenty screenplays, and only four have ever been optioned.

Before I had my first play produced, I wrote six that never left the computer hard drive.

The point is, the odds of having a book published or a play or screenplay produced are incredibly long.

But it’s not entirely random. Talent, quality of the project, and perseverance count for something too. There is a correlation between “talent” and “success” in the arts. (It’s sometimes a loose correlation, but it’s there!)

So is that why we writers of fiction keep forging ahead? Because the odds aren’t that long if you have some idea what you’re doing?

Not really. I just finished telling you that just because a project is produced or published doesn’t mean it’s going to be a success. All of these projects of mine, even the ones that get released, could totally tank. The odds are they’ll be middling successes, at best.

So why do it?

Because I — all writers of fiction — hope against hope that maybe, somehow, we’ll be the exception to the rule. This time it’ll be different.

Basically, we’re professional dreamers — not just dreamers in creating our works of fictions, but dreamers about our lives, our chosen career. We want the impossible. We reach for the stars, knowing full well that we’re never going to touch them — and will, in fact, probably fall flat on our faces.

And this, in a nutshell, is why I love writers, and why I’m so incredibly proud to be one of them. We are so not practical.

Every project of fiction is a complete leap of faith, an amazingly stupid jump into darkness.

High risk, but high rewards.

What if all these projects of mine failed? Sure, I’d be devastated — oh, would I be devastated! — but I would carry on regardless. For one thing, even if they all basically flop, I’d at least have eked out enough money to keep clawing my way forward, standing up, brushing myself off, and starting the whole process all over again.

Because when all is said and done, writing fiction isn’t really about the result. It’s about that process.

It’s about that stupid, crazy leap of faith. Failure and rejection feel horrible (I really can’t emphasize this enough!). Since all good art is personal, it’s impossible not to take the rejection of your art very, very personally.

But that crazy stupid leap before the failure? It feels so good! It’s one of those few times in life when I know for a fact that I am alive. You only live once, and failure in the arts doesn’t ever kill you. So why not risk everything short of that for a chance at glory, for that little fleeting glimpse of immortality?

If you win, you win. And if you don’t, at least you go down with guns blazing.

Like I said, we writers of fiction are crazy. But they say you’re only truly crazy if you don’t know you’re crazy. I know exactly what I’m doing, how incredibly stupid it is — and I plan to keep on doing it anyway.

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I just finished a mini-workshop of my latest play, Bleeding Hearts, a full-length play about four frustrated liberals who plot to kill a Rush Limbaugh-like demagogue (the reading went well!). I thought folks might be interested in reading the first two scenes.

Warning: it’s a very black comedy! (And yes, I realize we’re all very sick of politics right now…)

 

BLEEDING HEARTS

A Comedy by Brent Hartinger

CAST OF CHARACTERS

(3M/3F with doubling)

MARK: male, late twenties, a Sensitive New Age Guy, earnest with a tendency toward hothead.

SIOBHAN: female, late twenties, Flower Child 2.0, a little ditsy with a daisy in her hair.

ROSA: female, late twenties, a blunt African American earth-mother-of-sorts with a keen bullshit detector.

GIDEON: male, late twenties, a geeky gay guy, an observer of life, frequently the witty sidekick.

MRS. RYAN: female, forties, no-nonsense salt of the earth type with a permanent scowl and thick boots.

BEN: male, late twenties, cocky and boorish.

BURKE BRADLEY: male, forties, a right-wing radio talk show host, a cross between Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. Doubled by the actor who plays Ben.

ACT 1

Scene 1

SETTING:  (It is afternoon at a rustic lake-side cabin. Essential set elements include a screen door, a radio, a kitchen area, and a mounted horned animal head on the wall near the front door. That door, upstage, looks out onto a front porch. Other doors lead to the various bedrooms.)

AT RISE:  (Mrs. Ryan leads Mark, Siobhan, and Rosa inside, each of them

loaded with backpacks and duffel bagsand groceries in cloth bags, which

they set on the floor and on the kitchen counters. As they assess the cabin, Mrs. Ryan assesses them: she clearly disapproves of what she sees.)

MRS. RYAN: And here you go.

SIOBHAN (exuberant): Ohhh, I love it up here! It’s like you can actually feel the trees growing up all around you! Can’t you just feel it? (to Mrs. Ryan) What’s it like to live here all year round? Does it ever stop being magical?

(Mrs. Ryan just stares.)

(Beat.)

MRS. RYAN (to the others): There’s no maid service, but we’ll replace the sheets and towels Friday morning. Just leave the old ones in the bin on the porch.

ROSA: We’ve actually stayed here before. Lots of times.

MRS. RYAN: Is that right? You’d think I’d remember you.

ROSA: Why is that?

(Beat.)

MRS. RYAN: Anyway, so you know all this.

(Gideon enters, carrying more bags.)

GIDEON: You know, there’s a real breeze off that lake. (to Mrs. Ryan) You ever consider installing wind turbines? You could power this whole resort, I bet.

(Mrs. Ryan just stares at him too.)

(Beat.)

MRS. RYAN (to the others): There’s firewood out back for the fireplaces, and we set wood in the firepits on the beach every afternoon.

MARK:Yes, we remember.

MRS. RYAN: That’s right, you’ve stayed here before.

(Mrs. Ryan turns for the door, but stops.)

MRS. RYAN: So. You’ll be staying the full two weeks?

ROSA: Why wouldn’t we be?

MRS. RYAN: Okay, then. I’ll let you get unpacked.

(But as she exits, Siobhan notices that she’s about to step on a bug.)

SIOBHAN: Careful! Don’t step on the beetle.

(Siobhan gently shoos it outside.)

SIOBHAN: There we go. Careful, little guy.

(Mrs. Ryan stares one more time.)

(Beat.)

MRS. RYAN (to the group): There are coffee filters in the cupboard.

(With that, shaking her head, Mrs. Ryan exits.)

MARK (re: Mrs. Ryan): What’s with the attitude?

ROSA: You really have to ask?

SIOBHAN: She wasn’t that bad. I like her boots.

ROSA: She treated us like we’re freaks. But we’re not freaks.

(Siobhan begins digging through her bag. She finds what she’s looking for.)

SIOBHAN: Thank God! I thought I forgot my menstrual sea sponge. And you remembered the hemp dental floss!

MARK: Rosa’s right. She was totally rude to us. Just based on this image of who she thinks we are.

GIDEON: If we’re going to come out here on vacation, we have to deal with the people who actually own this land.

ROSA: “The people who actually own this land”?

GIDEON: Wait. You’re right. The people who own this land now.

ROSA: Because they stole it from the people who were here before.

MARK: Or at least their ancestors did.

ROSA: They’re all still profiting from it.

SIOBHAN (unpacking): Are you saying we shouldn’t have stopped at that fruit stand?

ROSA: Well, no. That was better than a corporate-owned supermarket.

MARK: Besides, the people who live here now are victims too. They’re just trying to make a living.

ROSA: But at what point does it become their fault? How much squawking about native rights and environmental regulation do these yokels have to do before they shoulder some of the responsibility?

MARK: Right. It’s patronizing to say that the oppressed can’t also be oppressors.

ROSA: Keeping in mind that it’s all ultimately about power, and when power’s not apportioned equally –

MARK: — then blame can’t be distributed equally either. Exactly.

(Beat.)

GIDEON: Can I just say? Being a liberal is exhausting.

MARK: To hell with all of ‘em! For the next two weeks, it’s just us. The rest of the world doesn’t even exist. No Fox News, no mainstream media that’s almost as bad.

SIOBHAN: Except for Rachel Maddow!

MARK: For the next two weeks, I don’t want to hear about a single Tweet from Sarah fucking Palin.

(From the window, Rosa spots something outside.)

ROSA: Speak of the Devil.

MARK: Sarah Palin?

ROSA: Worse. It’s Ben.

GIDEON: Wait. What?

MARK: Who invited him? I thought we all agreed we didn’t want him coming up here with us ever again.

ROSA: We did!

GIDEON: Someone must’ve cc-ed him by mistake.

MARK: How did the four of us ever end up being friends with him anyway?

ROSA: It was college. You do things you regret.

(Ben enters, carrying his luggage.)

BEN: Hey, guys! What’s up?

MARK (unenthusiastically): Ben.

GIDEON (unenthusiastically): Ben.

ROSA (unenthusiastically): Ben.

SIOBHAN (enthusiastically, as if to compensate for the others): Ben!

BEN (to Mark): So how’s life, man?

MARK: Good. Life is good.

BEN (re: Mark and Siobhan): I keep expecting to hear that you guys are getting married!

MARKL Uh … well …

BEN (with a smirk): Oh, that’s right. You’re not getting married until everyone can get married.

GIDEON: What’s so crazy about that?

BEN: Huh?

GIDEON: What’s so crazy about Mark and Siobhan not getting married until everyone can get married?

BEN: Nothing at all! Hey, Gideon, if you wanted to marry a goat, who am I to judge?

(Everyone falls silent. Ben looks out the window.)

BEN: Who’s driving the go-cart?

MARK: It’s an electric car. Siobhan and me.

BEN: Seriously? I’ve never seen one up close.

MARK: Well, now you have.

BEN: Gotta do your part on that whole global warming thing, right?

MARK: Climate change. Yeah.

BEN: You guys still believe, huh? Even after all the new evidence?

MARK: There hasn’t been any new evidence, at least not for your side.

SIOBHAN (brightly): Hey, we should make lunch! I brought some broccoli that’s so organic they don’t even let the farmers who grow it wear cologne.

BEN(to Mark): I know, I know. There’s a “scientific consensus.” That’s what you guys think, right?

MARK: It’s not what we “think.” It’s what there is.

BEN: Right. Just like there was a scientific consensus back in the 70s that we’re about to enter another Ice Age?

MARK: There was never a scientific consensus that we were entering another Ice Age! That’s a complete lie!

SIOBHAN: And I have a dozen eggs taken only from hens who’ve decided they’re not quite ready to become mothers.

BEN (ignoring Siobhan): If you guys are so sure of yourselves, why are you so scared of the debate? Let’s have it out!

MARK: Because there isn’t a debate! The only “debate” that exists is in the minds of people who have no idea what they’re talking about!

SIOBHAN: Seriously. How about some lunch?

BEN: Teach the controversy — that’s what I always say. What is it with you liberals — everything always has to be so black-and-white!

(BLACKOUT)

(END OF SCENE 1)

ACT 1

Scene 2

SETTING: (It’s the cabin by the lake, later that night after dinner.)

AT RISE: (The five friends have gathered on the front porch. Through an open window, we hear the murmur of voices, but every now and then, Ben’s voice comes through loud and clear.)

BEN (O.S.) (from the porch): This country absolutely hates rich people. I just don’t understand why we have to punish people for being successful!

(Mark bursts into the cabin, totally exasperated. Outside, the voices fall back to a murmur.)

MARK: Kill me now!

(He paces around the room a bit, breathing deeply, trying to calm himself down. Just when he might finally be ready to face Ben again, Mark hears his voice again.)

BEN (O.S.) (from the porch): Racism is mostly dead in America. The real racists these days are black people.

(Suddenly, Rosa emerges from out of the porch, similarly furious.)

ROSA: Kill me now!

MARK: I know!

ROSA: I’ve so had it with him! We’ve been listening to his right-wing bullshit ever since college.

MARK: The whole point of this vacation was to get away from assholes like him!

ROSA: Why is he even here? He knows we all disagree with him! I think he just says all those things to piss us off.

BEN (O.S.) (from the porch): In Europe they throw Christians into prison just for talking about gay people in church.

(Gideon bursts into the cabin, horrified.)

GIDEON: Kill me now!

MARK: I know!

ROSA: He didn’t used to be this bad. I can deal with people who have different opinions. But how do you deal with someone who has a completely different set of facts?

MARK: It’s the whole Republican Party. They’ve gone completely Lord of the Flies.

ROSA: Even the last election didn’t stop them. Every time it seems like they’re finally dead and gone, they always pop back up, as strong as ever, like –

MARK: Cockroaches.

ROSA: I was going to say herpes, but yeah.

GIDEON: But what do we do about Ben?

ROSA: What do liberals always do? We sit here and take it. Or we’ll calmly and patiently work out some grand compromise, and our side will live up to our part of the bargain  — and he’ll be the exact same asshole he always is!

MARK: It’s true. Republicans always win because they’re willing to blow everything up if they don’t get their way.

ROSA: And we liberals always put up with it. We never fight back. We have to be “adult” about everything, the mature ones. We never fight fire with fire.

BEN (O.S.): Sarah Palin proved once and for all that all feminists are complete hypocrites.

(Siobhan enters the cabin, appalled. But before she can anything, the others respond:)

MARK, ROSA, AND SIOBHAN: We know!

GIDEON: He’s an absolute idiot! How can any one person be so completely wrong about everything?

ROSA: What are you talking about? Didn’t you hear him say earlier that he’s willing to let you marry a goat?

MARK: Hold on. If we’re all in here, who’s out there with Ben?

(The door opens again. Ben steps inside.)

BEN: Hey, what’s everyone doing in here?

(Beat.)

SIOBHAN: I was going to wash the dishes.

MARK, GIDEON, AND ROSA (simultaneously): I’ll dry!

(They start to leave, but Ben stops them.)

BEN: Look, I’m just trying to cut through all the bullshit. Sometimes things just aren’t that complicated.

(No one responds.)

BEN: What did I say?

ROSA: You sound exactly like that talk radio asshole, Burke Bradley.

BEN: Burke Bradley’s not an asshole. I listen to him sometimes. He’s not what you think. Sometimes he says what needs to be said.

ROSA: That women who use birth control are sluts?

SIOBHAN (changing the subject): Oh, we forgot dessert! I made muffins. I’m using a new brand of honey that’s given voluntarily by the bees.

BEN (to Rosa): Burke Bradley’s just saying what a lot of people are thinking. Wouldn’t you rather he say it on the radio where people like you can respond to it?

ROSA: That health care is death panels? That Obama sympathizes with terrorists? No, I actually think those are opinions this country can live without.

BEN: See, it’s exactly that kind of attitude that makes people like Burke Bradley so popular.

ROSA: Yes, it’s my fault that racist, sexist, homophobic idiots like Burke Bradley exist.

SIOBHAN (helplessly): I also have cruelty-free caramel corn. Most people have no idea how much cruelty there is in caramel corn.

(In the sullen silence that follows, Ben crosses to his bag, takes out a gun, sits, and starts to clean it.)

ROSA: Now what are you doing?

BEN: What does it look like? I’m cleaning my gun.

ROSA: Well, would you mind doing that later?

BEN: Why?

ROSA: It makes me nervous. Especially since I now know you think it’s important to give voice to all those poor, oppressed Neo-Nazis.

(Ben laughs derisively.)

ROSA: What?

BEN: You guys just always claim to be so tolerant, but you know what? You’re not. Gideon, you’re gay. I accept that — I don’t judge you. Well, I like my gun. But you guys can’t accept that. You have to judge me. And I just think that’s kinda ironic, because I’m not the one going around making this big huge deal about how important it is to be tolerant. Did you ever think about that? That maybe you guys are being pretty hypocrit–

(As he’s cleaning it, Ben’s gun suddenly goes off, hitting him in the head. He slumps over, dead. They all sit in stunned silence. Finally:)

MARK: Okay, what just happened is bad, but at least it finally shut him the fuck up!

(BLACKOUT)

(END OF SCENE 2)

Want to read the whole script? Email me for a complete copy.

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First, in honor of Halloween, Double Feature: Attack of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies/Bride of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies (book 3 in the Russel Middlebrook Series and a Lambda Award winner!) is on sale for $2.99!

And since it is the Halloween season, and since Min Wei (a character of mine from the Russel Middlebrook Series) is revealed to be a monster movie fanatic in that book, I thought I’d list her favorite monster movies of all time and let her give her reasons why:

The Ring (2002): “Okay, the story’s pretty ridiculous: you watch a video tape and seven days later, the phone rings and you die? But the movie plays it totally straight — no ironic asides or meta-references a la Scream. And because the writers and characters take it all so seriously, you do too. Plus, the videotape itself? Genuinely creepy.”

House of Wax (2005): “A very under-rated little thriller starring Supernatural‘s Jared Padalecki and Happy Ending’s Elisha Cuthbert. Movies about waxworks are required to do three things: confuse the audience about who is wax and who is real, kill people using wax in creepy ways, and ultimately show lots of things melting. This movie does all of these things extremely well.”

Jeepers Creepers (2001) “The amazing thing about Jeepers Creepers is that you genuinely have no idea where it’s going. Is it a serial killer movie … or something else? And when the ‘something else’ is finally revealed, it’s totally satisfying and original — and really, really disturbing. Why won’t it die? The movie also has the guts to end the right way.”

Alien/Aliens (1979/1986): “Two movies in the same franchise, but they’re completely different genres: one is horror, one is action-adventure. How interesting is that? If I had to choose, I’d say Aliens is the slightly better film. Aliens isn’t just an action movie with a woman in the lead, a woman who acts exactly like a man: it’s an action movie about women, about a deep-seated conflict between two kick-ass females (Ripley and the Alien queen), both motivated by something even more primal that survival — the desire to protect one’s offspring. Also, check out how Ripley, Hicks, and Newt slowly turn into a family.”

Pitch Black (2000) “A completely under-rated sci-fi masterpiece with a great set-up: a planet with three suns that has perpetual daylight … until it doesn’t. But what makes this movie truly terrific is the fact that none of characters end up being exactly what you think. The guy you think is the hero of the movie? Maybe not so much. The guy you think is the villain? Well, maybe that’s not right either. One of the characters even switches genders! It just goes to show that when it comes to people, nothing is ever black and white.”

Starship Troopers (1997): “A smart movie that confuses stupid viewers. The film pretends to glorify war, violence, and American kick-ass superiority. But in truth, it makes a much more interesting point about the pointlessness of war. Who exactly are the heroes here? You definitely have to read between the lines, but it’s probably not humanity. And check out all the similarities between ‘soldier’ bugs and expendable human grunts. This movie, a precursor to District 9, gets my vote for the most subversive studio film ever made.”

Monsters (2010): “Alien life forms have crashed into Mexico, and the U.S. has built a huge wall quarantining the country (no subtext there, right?). Two Americans are stranded inside the alien district and somehow have to find their way back to the U.S. This indie movie, made on a shoestring budget and sort of ‘quiet’, should have driven me crazy because it was filmed without a script and mostly improvised (all the extras were “real” people going about their business). But the effects, done on home computers, are amazing, and the movie has a real heart.”

The Descent (2005): “Six women go caving, but somewhere along the way, ‘girl power’ turns into ‘girl horror.’ Suddenly, it’s every woman for herself! Another movie set in the dark that also has a very, very dark theme: look how quickly ‘civilized’ humans can be reduced to barbarism. And this is another movie with the guts to end exactly the right way (at least in the U.K. version).”

The Mist (2007): “A lot of people criticize this movie for the bad acting and shoddy special effects. I’m not saying they were intentional, but I see this movie as an homage to the great, but cheap B-movies of the past. Yes, it’s very broad with not much subtext or greater “meaning,” but it’s not a stupid film: the whole thing is clearly building to that deliberately shocking ending, which I just loved.”

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956): “Ever felt like the world has gone completely mad, and fewer and fewer people can see it? I’ll feel that way next week if Mitt Romney is elected president. But that’s also the theme of  this movie, which is another one that doesn’t make much sense if you think about it too much: how exactly are those pods recreating human beings? But it doesn’t matter, because the actors and writer take it seriously, so you do too.”

Poltergeist (1982): “Yes, yes, I know, it’s an obvious choice, but it’s still possibly the best ghost story ever filmed — and I say that as not a real big fan of writer, producer, and rumored co-director Steven Spielberg.”

Honorable Mention: “These monster movies all have their flaws, but there’s a lot to love in them too: Cabin in the Woods (2012), Splice (2009), and Deep Blue Sea (1999).”

P.S. Wow, Min has great taste in movies! Her choices are surprisingly similar to my own….

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Do the main characters in a book or movie or TV show need to be sympathetic?

Of course not.

But I think it is important that all your characters be interesting. The main characters on Breaking Bad or Girls or Game of Thrones aren’t necessarily sympathetic — they’re mostly all horrible to each other — but they’re usually pretty interesting, right?

I’ve been thinking about this because I’ve been seeing a whole lot of gay characters lately that I don’t find sympathetic or interesting.

Take the new TV shows The New Normal and Partners.

It turns out that the trend this year is gay couples where one half is uptight and fussy, and the other is “flamboyant.” I don’t know any actual couples like this, and maybe they’re just ripping off Modern Family (which at least frequently subverts both these hackneyed gay stereotypes). Anyway, I can see how this dynamic could make for good comedy.

What I don’t get is how incredibly annoying the “flamboyant” half of the gay couples on Partners and The New Normal are. Both guys are played by appealing actors (Michael Urie and Andrew Rannells), but the characters are written as completely superficial, frequently bitchy, and almost pathologically self-centered.

Since when is behavior like this charming, even on a sitcom?

Or maybe it’s just that the writing is sub-par. Will & Grace included a couple of incredibly self-absorbed characters, Jack and Karen, that were hilarious (at least until they got all warm and fuzzy in later seasons). I think the difference is we weren’t supposed to actually like Jack and Karen as people. They were objects of satire  — pretty vicious satire at that.

We were laughing at them, not with them (at least I was). But it sure seems to me like we’re supposed to think the gay characters on Partners and The New Normal are somehow adorable.

It’s not that these characters are effeminate that makes them annoying to me. In fact, if I were effeminate, I’d actually be annoyed the way this type of character is portrayed on so many shows. (Don’t get me started on reality shows like The A-List, which seem to push people to be as bitchy as possible because it supposedly “makes good TV.”)

And sure enough, there are plenty of non-effeminate gay characters that seem just as pathologically self-centered these days. The “selling point” of the new Logo web series The Hunting Season is that the characters get naked and have sex a lot, so it’s probably review-proof. (They sell an “uncensored” version of each episode, which I admit is a pretty brilliant marketing gimmick.)

But despite the eye candy, the show depresses me every time I watch it with how incredibly superficial and self-centered the main gay characters all are — even the main character, who is only slightly less jerky than the others. (Truth is, I never really warmed to Queer as Folk either, for all the same reasons. I’m told the characters all mellowed in later seasons, but I never got that far.)

This all takes me back to The Russel Middlebrook Series and the reason I wrote Geography Club in the first place.

I was a book reviewer back then, in the 1990s, and I was being sent all these gay literary novels that had basically the same story: sensitive, young misfit is tormented as a kid and teen, and then moves to the big city to be openly gay, but rather than finding peace and happiness, he instead turns into a selfish, jaded, self-centered jerk who shits all over all his friends. Basically, the main character ends up treating the whole world the way he was treated, but he doesn’t have enough self-insight to ever realize that.

My partner and I used to call the whole genre “asshole gay fiction,” because the gay characters all seemed like assholes.

In fairness, this was a very trendy literary style at the time — in literary fiction in general, not just gay books. It had been very trendy ever since the 1960s and the rise of the master of uber-asshole fiction, John Updike. I think the idea was that for fiction to be truthful, it had to include even the main characters’ most negative traits and behaviors.

And I get it, I really do. And on some level, I even agree with the “warts and all” idea of writing.

The thing is, these gay characters didn’t seem like anyone I knew. My friends weren’t perfect, but they weren’t that wounded. They were mostly nice guys and girls generally trying to do the right thing. The few people who were negative and bitchy and self-centered? I chose not to be friends with them.

So all these books I was reading actually didn’t seem truthful to me: they seemed like writing exercises, designed to push the envelope and shock the reader.

Needless to say, these characters also weren’t very interesting to me. This is part of the reason why I am so drawn to YA literature (and I think so many readers are drawn to YA): sympathetic characters are still encouraged. Literary fiction is supposedly more “important,” but it’s not very fun to read.

Anyway, I wrote Russel Middlebrook and his friends: gay, bi, and straight. They’re definitely all flawed, but it was really, really important to me that when they make mistakes, they feel bad about it. And when they screw up, they try to make things right.

You know: they’re not assholes.

I didn’t think that was anything very radical. But maybe it is.

P.S. For an outstanding gay web series, try The Outs, which I think manages to pull off the difficult balancing act of gay characters who are really flawed, but are still not completely self-centered jerks.

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