Day 2 of hangouts:

[mistressofmuses]

Day two complete!
Today Taylor and I:
- Watched episodes 3 and 4 of Shadow and Bone
- Read a good bit more of That Ain't Witchcraft
- Finished playing Transistor (which was very good and very pretty and still had an interesting setting/worldbuilding. Cyberpunk-but-make-it-art-nouveau is My Aesthetic, thanks.)
- Listened to more of The Magnus Archives. Got to a meme line, ha
- Started playing Hades
- Made spaghetti
- Went out to the garden every couple hours to pick Japanese beetles off my mom's plants. I love bugs and hate killing them, but invasive species are different, and they're just so destructive.

And now it's late, so I'm going to try to power through my writing (though speedwriting isn't generally my thing) and call it a night.

Comments

[galadhir]

What did you think of Shadow and Bone? I thought it was very pretty to look at, but not exactly innovative or interesting - something I felt that, apart from the trappings, I'd seen many times before.

[mistressofmuses]

I'm enjoying it! We got through four of the eight episodes, so the rest we'll probably finish next time we hang out.

I do think it's a wee bit generic in terms of "prophesized chosen one" fantasy plotline, but as long as I find the characters themselves interesting, that's often what matters more to me. I like the characters (and think the casting was excellent.) And it is very pretty to look at, which is enjoyable in and of itself for me.
Though if they *hadn't* worked the Crows characters in, I feel like I may not have been as engaged? And I'm coming at it already liking those characters from their books, and they're definitely still the part I care about the most, heh.

The Six of Crows duology, in my opinion, felt much less generic, because those books focused solely on the Crows, and had next to nothing to do with Alina's story. The events of her story feature in the broader socio-political world the duology is set in, and she shows up as a side character late, but by that point her big chosen one arc is over.
The books themselves have a much more narrow focus on the characters in question, and a more personal revenge quest. (And a really fun heist in the first book that they've stolen a few bits from for the show so far.) Despite the narrower, more personal focus, I actually find that more interesting than the big good-vs-evil, save-the-world prophecy type story, lol.

[galadhir]

Oh, I didn't realize it was an adaptation of a book series. It felt a little like the adventures of the crows had been stuck into a different story, and their parts were the most interesting of the whole thing. It would have been better if the series had concentrated more on them. In fact I've often thought of writing a book about a bunch of people who were doing interesting things living their lives while a traditional hero quest went on in the background, so I'm delighted to learn that that was initially what was happening here :) The traditional hero quests have been done so much, it sadly doesn't really make enough of a difference if you're only going to change it by making the traditional hero a woman.

[mistressofmuses]

Yeah! There's a trilogy I think just called "The Grisha Trilogy" and a duology called the "Six of Crows" duology. I have not read the trilogy that focuses on Alina... and to be honest, haven't heard a lot that makes me want to? But I really enjoyed the duology: Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom.

While the Crows wind up brushing up against some big world-level stuff, their stories and motivations remain very personal. Kaz's long-con revenge plot is catnip to me, because I love morally-grey masterminds who grudgingly start caring about their crew. ;P

I enjoy the trappings of fantasy, so even if I've seen the same rough plot before, I can often still enjoy it, which is so far the case for me with Shadow and Bone. If I care enough about the characters and the execution is decent, I'll still have a good time and be invested in how it all comes about. But it's true - it's not markedly DIFFERENT from things that have been done before.

[galadhir]

Oh, that sounds like something I should look up. I do find that I've now read so much fantasy that re-covers the same old ground again and again, that I have a much harder time finding new fantasy that I enjoy. One of the problems of having spent about 40 years reading all the fantasy I can lay my hands on, unfortunately. That's partly why I'm having so much difficulty writing atm, I think - I don't want to tell a story that's already been told before, but I can't think of anything new that might be exciting. We really need new things, though, I think.

[mistressofmuses]

I'd certainly recommend them! I had fun reading them, at least.

That's fair. I understand how frequently you can boil down a story into a few basic plot structures, so often I'm more interested in the execution or the quality of the writing/characters/etc. than I am how original the basic plot beats are. And to an extent, without SOME familiar plot beats or tropes, it ceases to be part of the genre... but it can be a fine line between "utilizing requirements of the genre" and "derivative as hell" lol.

Having read as much of it as you have, I'm sure it gets that much harder to be excited about seeing what boils down to the same story told in just a slightly new way. I haven't read quite that extensively in the genre, but I've still noped out of things when they seem too much like an inferior version of something else I've read.

And I feel the same way about a lot of my original writing. :/ There are characters or ideas I have that I really like... but I don't think that any of it would really stand out as truly original. And even if I couldn't think of a truly *new* story to tell, I wouldn't be telling it any better than other people already have, heh.
Or, frustratingly, I've had an idea for years... and then learn about something that uses a similar plot device or element that I'm then terrified to keep in my story for fear people would think I was copying, lol.

[galadhir]

I think my problem is that I've always been a fan of the setting first. My taste were formed by Tolkien, where 75% of the fun is just traveling through the world and looking at the ruins and being awed by how wondrous the First Age must have been if this is what's left of it. So I'm always looking for that feeling of 'this is a whole new world with its own history, and it's not the same as ours, and there might be something wondrous around every corner.'

I know from my own storytelling experience that too much of that stuff actually gets in the way of the plot, but I do wish sometimes that the iron grip of the plot could be relaxed a bit so there was time to just enjoy being in the world.

I do agree that we shouldn't try too hard to be original, because we probably are original just by virtue of being the only one of us in the world. Too much thinking about making art gets in the way of actually making it. I think you should absolutely tell your stories, because why else were you put on earth with the desire to tell them?

I think it's probably TV, with its inability to do nuance, and its writing by committee, that strips a lot of the meat out of the stories that it adapts.

[mistressofmuses]

I just rewatched the LotR trilogy and was remembering that sense of absolute wonder at the history that's hinted at as characters move through the world. (Which I think the movies captured wonderfully, though there's so much more to the books.) It's absolutely the case that there isn't a lot that captures the depth of awe at the ruins and cultures on display in Tolkien's works.

Settings and worldbuilding are something so tricky to do well without just rehashing stuff done before. So many of the fantasy standards now ARE just built on other works, almost all of which are just Tolkien-but-not-as-good. And I still can find enjoyment in some of those works, but it's hard to find something that feels truly *new*.

(You also run into the fact that it seems out of fashion these days. More works seem to want to be fantasy-but-gritty-realism rather than that sort of magical sense. Or take very STRONG cues from real-world cultures. Which isn't all bad! I'd like there to be a lot more fantasy that isn't just magical Western Europe, but when it's done shallowly, it doesn't add much.)

The most interesting worldbuilding I feel like I've read recently was The Broken Earth trilogy, though it's certainly a darker story (and continually treads the fantasy/sci-fi cusp.)

No one will tell your story the same way you will tell it. :) I hope to eventually figure out how to tell the stories I want to in ways that satisfy me with the outcome!

But definitely agreed: TV and film are excellent mediums, but they're DIFFERENT from long-form novels. They do make it far more difficult to capture any sense of nuance, and there's also only so much that can be fit into the runtime. The visuals can convey a lot quickly, but can also lose a lot.