Ah, the long dark of January. I hope you are making it through OK. I always struggle with this time of year; the lack of sunlight and the cold, grey weather always leave me a listless couch potato.
MOVIES & TV
1917
1917 is a fairly simple war story - two WWI soldiers have a limited amount of time to get a message from point A to point B - but what makes it interesting is the way the story is told. By making the film appear to be take place over two long, unedited shots, the action feels like it is happening in real-time and the simple narrative is given a sense of immediacy and tension that I don’t think would have been there otherwise. 1917 also includes some incredible cinematography and lighting design that is worth seeing on a big screen.
CHERNOBYL
This month I finally made time to watch HBO’s stressful and engrossing mini-series about the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. I heard that the show was intense so I had planned on spacing out my viewings, but ended up binging the whole thing in two nights. The first two episodes in particular are really incredible. Chernobyl depicts the truly horrifying events during and after the explosion and is sometimes very hard to watch (I viewed a large portion of episode 4 through my fingers), but I definitely recommend this mini-series if you feel up to it.
In my late 20s I went through a period of time where I was obsessed with the surreal sadness and beauty of the nearby abandoned city of Pripyat (so much so that I included it in some art) but as I watched Chernobyl I quickly realized how little I knew about the actual disaster. While there are a number of large fictional liberties taken to help the narrative structure and arc of the show, most of the key moments seem to have been recreated as honestly as possible. There is also an accompanying podcast that I highly recommend which has host Peter Sagal discussing the fact and fiction of each episode with the show’s screenwriter.
THE GOOD PLACE
In keeping with my bingy January, I also watched three seasons of The Good Place over a single weekend so I could be up-to-date for the finale. And said finale had me doing some intense, ugly crying, to the extent that my dog kept coming over to lick tears off my face and check if I was OK. Like every sitcom there are definitely some forgettable filler episodes in The Good Place, but overall it tells a funny, kind, and surprisingly optimistic story about humanity and death. I’m glad I watched it.
BOOKS
I had fairly bad luck with books this month, with most of my selections ranging from “meh” to “ugh”. Luckily I did end up with at least one to recommend and another to partially recommend, both of which involved necromancers weirdly.
LORD OF SECRETS (Breanna Teintze)
Lord of Secrets is a fun magic/fantasy adventure about Gray, a rogue wizard trying to rescue his grandfather who has been abducted by the nefarious leader of the Mages’ Guild. Over the course of his journey, Gray manages to inadvertently collect a group of companions including an escaped slave, a grouchy inn keeper, and an 900-year-old undying necromancer god. While the book was a little sparse on worldbuilding, I still enjoyed the story and characters and found the magic system to be quite creative.
GIDEON THE NINTH (Tamsyn Muir)
There were a couple of big things that kept me from truly enjoying this book, but I wanted to mention it here because it has a lot going for it and maybe I just wasn’t the right reader. The setting and story are really interesting: a gothic/sci-fi mashup about a society of necromancers who make up nine different “houses”, each with a different specialization. The orphan Gideon, our protagonist, was raised in the Ninth House under constant duress and harassment, particularly from the royal daughter and current head of the house Harrowhark Nonagesimus. When the god-like emperor summons representatives from each house for a special challenge, Harrowhark enlists (forces) Gideon to be her “Cavalier” and the two arrive at a crumbling ancient compound full of mysteries, secrets, and all sorts of bad things.
My first problem with the book stems from the large cast of characters that I absolutely could not keep straight. I ended up having to create a cheat-sheet to keep next to the book so I could remember who was who. My other problem involves the toxic, abusive relationship between Gideon and Harrowhark that suddenly changes near the end of the book in a way that did not feel earned AT ALL and really bothered me. But books are different for every reader and my issues might not be your issues. So if it sounds interesting maybe give it a read and see if you like it?
ART
I finished two new collages this month, both of which will be part of a red-themed group show at Gallery 9. PLUS, I filmed a start-to-finish video for “Year of the Rat” that I will be posting soon to my Patreon page.
“Dragon Fish”
“Year of the Rat”