Belated Review: "The Expanse" (TV series)

A ridiculously-horrible head cold, likely derived from a sinus infection coming from my hellish week of allergies had me laid up most of yesterday and all of today.

So what to do?

Well, I have a DVD set of the SyFy Channel's "The Expanse" series, so that takes care of that question.

I'll be honest with you: after the train wreck that was the last season and a half of "Battlestar Galactica" and the ridiculous downward spiral of SciFi Channel turned SyFy Channel (what a stupid name), I was loathe to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I read the first four books of the series by James S.A. Corey and loved it. I wasn't super-interested in letting the TV series poison what I enjoyed.

Then I watched the first episode on YouTube.

I ate my words a bit and eventually got the series on DVD to gorge on at my leisure.

When your head is pounding from sinuses, you pretty much don't want to move, and kind of want to die, there's nothing better than some space opera.

And I have to admit, the TV series delivers.

I'm pretty happy with the casting and the continuity tweaks, overall.

Steven Strait is a solid James Holden. I have to say that Thomas Jane does a pretty good job as Miller. Dominique Tipper is pretty much dead-on as how I envisioned Naomi Nagata. Cas Anvar is an excellent Alex and Wes Chatham is growing on me as Amos. Shohreh Aghdashloo is a little warm-and-fuzzy for how I picture Chrisjen Avasarala (who doesn't even appear in the books until "Caliban's War"), but I get there are certain realities of having profanity-using characters on television.

There were surprisingly-mild changes to the story of "Leviathan Wakes", but I can't say they damaged the overall story at all.

And I love the Rocinante. I just love it with an unhealthy passion.

I can't wait for season two. Assuming these goddamn allergies don't kill me first.

An outrage

Did you know that the United States, home to the founding of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (aka Pastafarianism) does not officially recognize our creed as a true religion?

According to Atlas Obscura, a U.S. judge ruled our faith to not qualify for Constitutional protection.

Given some of the bullshit out there that's managed to get protections in this country, I consider this to be an unforgivable outrage.

Seriously. What do we have to do to overcome this persecution and lack of recognition? I ask for your guidance, oh Great FSM! May we be touched by Your Noodly Appendage. RAmen!

Huh

My stats say, as of writing this post, this blog has had 109,109 page views since it started back when the whim struck me.

What an odd number.

Review: "The Far Stars" trilogy by Jay Allan

I saw a review on io9 recommending a space opera series by Jay Allan. The series consists of three books: Enemy in the Dark, Shadow of Empire, and Funeral Games.

Starving for reading material amidst the shit-storm that has been the first three months of 2016, I rolled the dice and got all three books from Amazon.

Good lord.

So the review (linked above) does this series justice. The hero's name is "Arkarin Blackhawk". In the first chapter, he's wearing a loincloth on an alien planet and fighting a guy in a dinosaur. Blackhawk, a genetically-engineered superman who - the author will repeatedly tell you - is haunted by a dark past. Blackhawk is pretty much what you'd get if you took Doc Savage, Han Solo, and Aragorn, then put them in a blender and poured the result into a spaceship.

Blackhawk's crew are all similar cliches: the loud-mouthed second-in-command, the beautiful assassin, the lumbering ass-kickers, the hyper-skilled mechanic, the hyper-skilled pilot, etc. etc.

These misfits are united only in their love for Blackhawk and vice-versa as they blow up everything and everyone they come across. Blackhawk has a love interest in the form of Astra Lucerne, who is beautiful, spunky, stubborn, blah-blah-blah and loves Blackhawk despite his terrible darkness.

Seriously. This is repeated nearly every chapter in all three books.

So, I'm snarking on this series a bit, but I have to say it's a fun read. It's classic, trashy pulp story with evil, scheming villains, an evil empire, and tropes galore. Jay Allan does a great job writing up cheese while making it engaging and fun.

It's been a welcome distraction on BART and good, clean fun.

If you're looking for a "Battlestar Galactica"-meets-Star Wars story, I'd suggest giving the series a try.