Byron 'Giggsy'’s Comments (group member since Aug 31, 2009)

Byron 'Giggsy'’s comments from the Philip K Dick group.

JUNE 27th 2014 = Radio Free Albemuth will open in theaters in at least ten cities across the United States. Also the same day that Radio Free Albemuth will be available across a wide array of Video on Demand platforms in the U.S. To be followed by the DVD release and an exclusive subscription streaming window also to be announced shortly.

filmmakers believe this good news of US distribution will create the momentum needed to further release around the world.

Simon wrote: "The best introduction to PKD in my book, for the record, is either "Ubik" or "Flow my Tears the Policeman Said"."

I have to agree. 2 of his best, both award winners, they are better written than some of his earlier works that were forced to be written/published in a fast timeframe in order to get paycheck. The two combined seem to hit almost all of his common themes (except if memory is correct there are no android/clone/simulacra/robot in either one as many of his works do)

The best work to recommend to a reader you are familiar with of course depends on what you know of their tastes/personality. I can see Electric Sheep, 3 Stigmata, or Scanner Darkly good first reads as well.

I wouldn't say BRANDED was bad, but it failed to impress me or be very memorable.

It's at least good enough I'd recommend you try to catch an airing or find a cheap rental and decide for yourself, I'm sure somebody else here may like it much more than me, but the movie wasn't as interesting as it had potential to be.

Richard wrote: "Has anyone seen the "Free Radio Albemuth" film with Alanis Morissette yet? That was a straight to DVD thing but it received good reviews.. Hard to find..for free anyhow. :p "

The writer/director/producer of the film is a member here, so if you do find a free copy you might not want to post it here :P

Actually, I believe the release keeps getting delayed, there is still hope for a multi-platform release of theater, on demand, dvd, streaming rental, etc...

There is a Q&A with John Alan Simon concerning the movie in this group you may want to check out

good point. When we see the innards of David from Prometheus and Bishop from Aliens its revealing them as 'less than human' and Dick always preferred the 'more human than human' which is infinitely more interesting in my mind

no one ever refers to the book as a comedy, but some of the scenes with Barris playing off of Luckman is the best comedy I've ever found. The discussion of missing gears on the bike and whether or not Barris left Arctor's front door unlocked with a note on it saying come on in would make me laugh the 1000th time I read them

Le Guin's "The Lathe of Heaven" has been mentioned twice already, I just finished it a week ago, but it's definitely Dickian and a good book

I also just finished Delany's "Babel-17", which is discussed in posts 45 thru 48 here. I found myself thinking of PKD while reading. It's definitely a good peer to compare to PKD's book of the same era. I had trouble deciding if it's fair to call it Dickian or not. It think it may be a stretch to make strong comparisons, but the fact that PKD came to mind must mean something. I'd certainly call it a great book and recommend it to PKD fans

Ubik is an expansion of PKD's novella "What the Dead Men Say". It's not completely the same, but it was the starting point and Ubik reuses his concept of half-life and communicating with the almost aka 'partial' dead.

You may want to read the novella first if you like to analyze works in order and see how the novel developed from the novella, but its certainly not required to understand or enjoy Ubik

When I read it, I feel like it's Runciter only in half-life, but when I think about it, I feel Dick is making it possible for either one or even both to be in half-life at the same time. I don't think he cares which you put, but cares that he got you thinking about it

I read all of them. Here is how I would rank them in order, but many are so close I'd come up with a different ranking on another day I'm sure.


War Game
Pay for the Printer
What the Dead Men Say
We Can Remember It for You Wholesale
Upon The Dull Earth


Retreat Syndrome
Oh, to be a Blobel!
War Veteran
Captive Market
Beyond Lies the Wub


Top Stand-By Job
The Crawlers
If There Were No Benny Cemoli
Preserving Machine
Roog

John wrote: "'Upon The Dull Earth' is one of the most disturbing examples of "came back wrong"."

Just read this one and like it quite a bit. I found it reminded me of the style of many modern horror short stories. When a typically sci-fi writer creates this, we call it a sci-fi story, but if a typically horror writer had created it, I'm sure we'd all call it a great horror story - and I don't think people would be arguing it was really science fiction. They are just labels, but I found that interesting as I completed reading.

"The Preserving Machine" - first published in 1953 in the magazine F&SF
"War Game" - first published in the magazine Galaxy Science Fiction, in 1959
"Upon the Dull Earth" - first published in November 1954 in Beyond Fantasy Fiction.
"Roog" "Roog" - first sale but not his first published story, written in November 1951 and appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction November 1953
"War Veteran" - first published in If magazine in March 1955.
"Beyond Lies the Wub" - first published story, originally appearing in Planet Stories in July, 1952
"We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" - first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in April 1966, and is the basis for the two TOTAL RECALL movies
"If There Were No Benny Cemoli" - first published in the December, 1963 issue of Galaxy magazine
"Retreat Syndrome" - first published in Worlds of Tomorrow Science Fiction in 1965
"The Crawlers" - first published in Imagination magazine, July 1954 under the title "Foundling Home"
"Oh, to be a Blobel!" - first published in Galaxy magazine, February 1964
"What the Dead Men Say" - first published in Worlds of Tomorrow magazine in June 1964, PKD expanded on this story in the novel UBIK
"Pay for the Printer" - first published in Satellite Science Fiction, October 1956

Beyond Lies The Wub may be downloaded for free as an audiobook, PDF, Text, Html, or all the popular ebook formats here: http://manybooks.net/titles/dickp2855...

Here are the stories, and other short story collections they are available in:

"The Preserving Machine" Collected Volume I, aka Beyond Lies the Wub A Handful of Darkness // Robots, Androids, and Mechanical Oddities // Beyond Lies the Wub

"War Game" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat // Robots, Androids, and Mechanical Oddities // The Days of Perky Pat // Minority Report

"Upon the Dull Earth" Collected Volume III, aka The Father-Thing // A Handful of Darkness // The Father-Thing // The Philip K. Dick Reader // Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick

"Roog" Collected Volume I aka Beyond Lies the Wub // Beyond Lies the Wub // Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick

"War Veteran" Collected Volume III, aka The Father-Thing // The Father-Thing // The Philip K. Dick Reader

"Top Stand-By Job" aka "Stand By" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat

"Beyond Lies the Wub" Collected Volume I aka Beyond Lies the Wub // The Best of Philip K. Dick // Beyond Lies the Wub // Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick

"We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" (Collected Volume II, aka We Can Remember It for You Wholesale -OR- Collected Volume V, aka The Little Black Box
[depending on which published version] ) // The Little Black Box // The Philip K. Dick Reader // Minority Report // Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick

"Captive Market" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat // The Days of Perky Pat

"If There Were No Benny Cemoli" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat // The Best of Philip K. Dick // The Days of Perky Pat

"Retreat Syndrome" Collected Volume V, aka The Little Black Box // The Little Black Box

"The Crawlers" Collected Volume III, aka The Father-Thing // The Father-Thing // The Philip K. Dick Reader

"Oh, to be a Blobel!" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat // The Best of Philip K. Dick // The Days of Perky Pat // Minority Report

"What the Dead Men Say" Collected Volume IV, aka The Days of Perky Pat // The Days of Perky Pat // Minority Report

"Pay for the Printer" Collected Volume III, aka The Father-Thing // The Father-Thing // The Philip K. Dick Reader

The group read will be the short stories in . These stories are available in many other story collections.

Congrats to John Alan Simon and Elizabeth Karr. RFA's Kickstarter fundraising target has been achieved.

This should get Radio Free Albemuth in some theatres, as well as release on DVD, Cable, VOD, and on digital outlets like Netflix, iTunes, and Hulu.

John wrote: I like all the PKD adaptations to varying degrees. Though I often say that the two best "PKD movies" are Terry Gilliam's Brazil and 12 Monkeys - neither of which are actually from PKD stories, but really capture the essence of the writing.

Yes, it's interesting how the most Dickian movies aren't based directly on his works. I always consider Natali's Cypher very good film example of what PKD's books are like. I just re-watched Dark City - that too has the memory implants like We Can Remember it for You Wholesale and the cityscape shifting like Ubik.

Congrats on the complement from David Hartwell.

It's obvious you are PKD fan. Is he your favorite author? What do you think of the other Dick stories that have made it to the big screen?

Interesting... I assumed it was filmed in Canada since it's often cheaper to film there.

3 hours from now, John and Katherine will do a live interview you can call into or tweet questions to.

blogtalkradio.com radio-free-albemuth-indie-filmmakers


Not sure if the interview gets posted later on, hopefully so since this is short notice.

not much in terms of recognizable names, a largely Canadian cast, but experienced in terms of number of acting credits

Jonathan Scarfe ... Nicholas Brady
Shea Whigham ... Phil
Katheryn Winnick ... Rachel Brady
Alanis Morissette ... Sylvia
Hanna Hall ... Vivian Kaplan