Duned

Yesterday we hit the treadmill and did a nice easy hour in which we didn't check the time till the 59th minute. As we suspected running through the soreness cleared out the knee. Some residual soreness remains. We did some good book thinkin' too. Things are coming together, mentally speaking, for the Australian scene. 

We haven't talked about our QAnon contacts lately because they've demanded silence from this blog. However, Qbi Wan has given us permission to break our  silence. He says the parents vs school board conflict was partially stoked by QAnon assets and observers should expect to see more direct actions. Qbi Wan also claims that the Justice Department is designating parents as domestic terrorists so they can redirect Federal resources against Q. Qbi Wan says, 'The plan unfolds'.

Reviews  of Dune are coming in. The Critical Drinker says Dune is (mostly) brilliant. The Critical Drinker is mostly right. Ben Shapiro reviews Dune here and agrees with Will. Ben's 'biggest issue' is the musical score. The brilliant Steve Sailer notices something we noticed: 'Spaniard Javier Bardem (best known as Anton Chigurh) is amusing as Fremen chieftain Stilgar, doing a grumpy riff on Mexican Anthony Quinn’s wonderful Auda Abu Tayi in Lawrence of Arabia.' Does this mean we are also brilliant? It does.

We've been unable to watch Dune, and we've watched it twice now, without thinking of the previous two versions. We just know all the rhythms and beats. It's like we're listening to another version of a song we love. Shapiro says one hasn't seen Dune till one has seen Dune in the theatre. That's our plan. 

A lot of people talk about author Frank Herbert's amazing world building. But is the world really all that amazing? The Dune universe is eerily familiar to those of us who lived in the 20th century. Herbert wrote about a great-power conflict over a must have natural resource found only in the desert. The Atriedes are the west. The Harkonnen are the Ruskis. The Fremin are the Arabs from Lawrence of Arabia. This template also works for Medieval and Renaissance Europe. That said, Herbert's work on Fremin culture is impressive.

Monday Meadowlands

Driving to the Meadowlands yesterday we had a bit of Juju. In The Final Storm, some or all of the Australian attack will be described via Samurakami, Martinez and the Underlings listening in on the squadron radio net. Yes, we think that's it. Yes. Reminder: we are among the best there is at what we do.

[Why were you going to the Meadowlands?-Ed] 

Did we ever sellout yesterday:

It was Mrs. Stroock's corporate gig. Skybox suite with lots of side talk about REDACTED and the REDACTED industry. The Giants won, 25-3. 

My friend William Katz reports on Barry Soetoro's campaigning for Clinton bagman Terry McAuliffe in Virginia. Bill makes some apt observations with which this blog agrees. We'll believe challenger Glenn Youngkin will win the gubernatorial race in Virginia when we see it. But Barry campaigning for McAuliffe is not only a bad sign, it's a bad idea. The Dems lost over a thousand seats nationwide when Barry occupied the White House. The man has no coattails. What about 2008 you ask? Please. Hillary would have dragged all those candidates into office with her too. Hell, so would Joe.

Bill writes that he believes Barry has 'decisive influence' in the White House. This blog agrees. Joe's White House is staffed with Obama holdovers and nitwits like Pete Buttigieg. It shows the exact same inability to learn from mistakes and adapt as Barry did for eight years.  

On to Dune Week, Day-2.

Let's talk about some of the characters in Denis Villeneuve's Dune. First off, Oscar Issacs gives a wonderful performance as Duke Ledo Atreides. He's the good guy dedicated to service with honor. In no other version of Dune (we'll try to avoid comparisons but in some cases it will be impossible) is Duke Ledo's relationship with his dead father, gored by a bull, so fully realized. Ledo's scenes with Paul are inspiring and touching. 

We had our doubts about Jason Momoa as Duncan, but here he impresses. He's Paul's mentor, played more like an older brother than a distant teacher (see Patrick Stewart in the 1984 version). When Duncan kneels before Paul as Duke for the first time, well, let's just say we had that damn emotional reaction. 

Javier Bardem's Stilgar reminded us of Anthony Quinn in Lawrence of Arabia tinged with weariness and caution. Which is fine, actually. 

Watching Zendaya as Chaney, let's be thankful for the limited screen time. This is not a Disney show. Hopefully she improves in the second film.

Below, Monday Metal redux. Turns out Travelling Riverside Blues is a lot easier to play than we thought. A song at once about sex, the Mississippi and guitars. When one says one is going to Rosedale with one's Rider, one is talking about guitars.:

Will's Good Idea for the Week of 10/24/21

Alec Baldwin picked up a gun and shot a woman. It's not this blog's job to mock Alec Baldwin in this, his darkest moment. It will fall to other blogs to point out Baldwin was petty, vindictive and mean. That he used other's personal tragedy to make political points. This blog would never point out that Baldwin's an gun grabbing anti-2A fascist. Even if Baldwin would, has, and will kick a man down with personal tragedy, this blog won't do it. 

Besides, apt Amazon reviewers have noted that we know little about firearms. Maybe it's appropriate to point un-checked guns at unsuspecting women. We shrug. Whether or not Alec Baldwin is a murderer is not for this blog to say. That's up to a jury. We'll respect their verdict.

At all times a man of the right must play by gentlemen's rules. Always. 

We finished Dune and will  be reviewing it all week. First off, we want to talk about influences. Here's director Denis Villeneuve talking about his influences which unsurprisingly are David Lean and Lawrence of Arabia.  

We start with David Lynch's 1984 disaster. We've seen the film many times. And while Lynch does some visually interesting things, his work is a confusing disaster. In college we read Frank Herbert's novel, which we liked well enough. We've never felt the need to read any more in the series. I 2000 we watched the Sci-Fi Channel's miniseries version of Dune. We re-watched it last year.  It's very British and feels like a lavishly produced episode of Star Trek TNG. This version is easy and sensual. The miniseries is well done within its limitations, about a $20 million budget. Denis  Villeneuve's version is better, of course. Not bad for a Q. 

Sometime yesterday we realized that we have four rough drafts in varying states of rough draftidness. That is, we have four novels written. Four books will be released next year. Remarkable.

The beta readers gave us a chapter of The Great Nuclear War of 1975 last night. It was appropriately marked with red pen. The more red, the better. To show reader(s) the nature of the business, we found a mistake they missed. That's it. That's the gig. 'Sefl publishing'; get fucked. We've found typos in history books put out by big fancy publishing houses. 

We may need to spend November going over 75 one last time. We thought of two small changes we can make. We'll see. Remember, 75 and 76 will come out nearly simultaneous. A six week interval? Maybe eight. There will be a third novel. Maybe that's the summer sneak in? Maybe we should write a chapter during the Christmas break?

Saturday Updates

We went back to the doctor yesterday. He took a look at our sore knee and said and we quote, 'I don't know.' The doctor said stay off it for another week or 10 days. Damnit. 

Our youngest turned nine yesterday. You know, when she was a year old, we told Mrs. Stroock we wanted another. We were already up to our neck in diapers. Pro-tip for you young fellas. The jump from one to two kids is huge. The jump from two to three kids is small. Three to four? There's a reason lots of couples just keep going. Mrs. Stroock said no, which was fair enough. 

We made an impulse buy this week, a Fender guitar. We're back. 

We are almost done watching Denis Villenueve's Dune and will write about the film all next week. First thought: Magnificent. Which doesn't surprise us. We're not a film guy. In fact we're film a neophyte. We stop for Return of the Jedi. But we love Villenueve's work, Arrival, Blade Runner, Sicario.

[Didn't you love The Phantom Menace when you first saw it and see Rogue-One twice in 18 hours?-Ed]

What are you getting at, love?

[You're not necessarily the most level headed film critic-Ed]

Anyway, on to the things.

We did plenty of good work on The Final Storm this week. We wrote the Australian air strike set up. We'll write the strike next week. There will be plenty of Japanese aircraft up and Commander Samurakami is back as well. After that we must needs write the Italians with the Israelis on the side. We'll probably have those Italian F-104s intercepting Soviet bombers.  Readers will see something out of Task Force 60. And don't forget about 22 SAS Regiment. Seriously, you don't know what their story arc has been leading too? Damn right I stole the idea. Can reader(s) name from whom I stole it? Hey, if a West German teenager can, why not the SAS? Overall The Final Storm is 55,000 words.

We're 2/3rds of the way done with The Great Salvation of 1976. We finished the Korean War readthrough and will be going back over it this week. The beta readers, or beta couple, have 75. The wife is marking the MS up real good. Writer pro-tip. It is an industry secret that women make the best editors. We're not talking about your 24 year old 'editorial assistant'*. We mean your 50ish office manager type. Mrs. Stroock once worked with a woman known around the office as the 'QC Nazi'. Remember, women will go to four different stores to find the right garbage can to match the tope curtain in the guest bedroom shower.** You better believe they can edit the fuck out of your MS.

*Thank you Robert Stacy McCain (Stars and Bars be upon you, sir). 

**True story.

Duned

So they're going to make Dune again:

Via The Playlist, Villeneuve recently told a crowd gathered for a Montreal film event that his adaptation of the 1965 novel “will probably take two years to make,” with a goal of making “two films; maybe more.” That bomb drop reaffirms Villeneuve’s long-haul commitment to what’s long been a passion project.

Denis Villenueve  made three of our favorite recent movies: Sicario, Arrival and Blade Runner 2049. 

Do click over and watch the video about the 1984 version of Dune. The presenter is exactly right. The movie is both awesome and awkward. Visually Dune is a stunning triumph. However the film is a confusing mess and one must watch it multiple times to understand what the hell is happening. We saw the trailer when we went to The Last Starfighter in 1984 and it scared the hell out of us. At times one feels as if director David Lynch is trying to make one sick.

We've always preferred SyFy's 2000 version of Dune. They gave the film a desert sensibility and sensuality and it worked. We liked the funny accents and the very unique costumes. There's just nothing like them. SyFy also wisely made the book into a 6 hour miniseries, thereby not cramming 800 pages into two and a half hours.

Also, the babes are hot.