Yesterday the Oscar nomination were announced; to no surprise, Heath Ledger has a spot on the list of Best Supporting Actors (and will certainly win) for his performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight; to much outcry, The Dark Knight failed to recieve any other major nominations, such as Best Director or even Best [...]
Archive for the ‘Theory’ Category
Defending Gotham in Hockey Pads: The Lie of the Hero
Posted in Analyses, Movies, Theory, tagged Batman on January 23, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Thesis (WIP)
Posted in Theory on January 2, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Free (decentralized, node-based) global networking means that small-scale (individualized) groups can harness both the intrinsic mobility and speed of innovation of small-scale groups and the intrinsic efficiency of action of large-scale (heirarchal) structures. Large-scale structures, however, are not similarly benefited. Therefore, as long as free global networking exists, the paradigm will continue to shift towards [...]
Merlin’s Principle
Posted in Theory on December 9, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
A short note today. This isn’t anything new for those who know me, but it’s an important foundation of what I believe, so I figured it should be up here, especially for some pieces I want to write in the future.
Major Premise: All rational/logical structures/systems can be fundamentally represented mathematically.
Minor Premise: Gödel’s incompleteness theorems, which [...]
The Football Frenzy: Arbitrary specialization & the handicap principle
Posted in Theory, tagged handicap principle, Heinlein, sports on November 28, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook [...]
Narrative space
Posted in D&D, Movies, Theory, Video games on August 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I’m a storyteller. I see the world in stories. That’s not saying much, because this is true of everyone. What is a story, after all? It’s an organization of reality, an illusionary order imposed by our brains to make sense of the fundamentally nonsensical universe. So why say I’m a storyteller? Because it means something [...]
“The tragedy of verisimilitude”
Posted in Analyses, Politic, Television, Theory, tagged Battlestar Galactica, Bush, Generation Kill, The Wire on August 5, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
This post is something of a sequel to this one.
I’m halfway through season two of The Wire (just finished “All Prologue”) and I’ve got some more thoughts on it and David Simon’s other HBO production, Generation Kill (thoughts which of course apply to television and to some extent narratives in general as well).
What strikes me [...]
“It’s about the characters, stupid”
Posted in Analyses, Television, Theory, tagged Doctor Who, The Wire on July 30, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Having finished the first season of The Wire (and the first episode of season two), I think I’ve figured out what my problem with it is: I’m not engaged by the characters. I don’t mean to say that I don’t like The Wire; I think it is brilliant, and great, and powerful, but so far [...]
Episodic and Seasonal Pacing on Television
Posted in Analyses, Television, Theory, tagged Battlestar Galactica, Mad Men, The Wire, Veronica Mars on July 28, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
If you somehow weren’t aware, season two of Mad Men premiered last night. The episode was everything I expected and hoped for and more, with a couple of surprises along with the general thoughtful evolution of characters that have aged more than a year since we last saw them. (Season two begins in February 1962; [...]
A meditation on The Wire, Battlestar Galactica, and Firefly, plus the relationship between comedy and drama
Posted in Analyses, Television, Theory, tagged Battlestar Galactica, Firefly, The Wire on July 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
For years there have been (at least to my perhaps biased perceptions) two shows that have dominated television critics’ articles as the “best shows on TV”: Battlestar Galactica and The Wire. I’ve watched Battlestar since the beginning (and fallen completely in love with it, and become known as something of an evangelist for it), but [...]
