Latest / Mixed Perspectives Podcast / Stop Calling Fantasy "Just Dragons" | Ep 2
Transcript
- speaker-0: If you don't know those genres, you may think of science fiction as just spaceships or you may think of fantasy as magic. speaker-1: dragons. Being a fantasy writer or a reader almost had like a stigma to it where it's like you know it wasn't as appreciated. speaker-0: This human has to work with AI agents. That's the only people in his office is him and his AI agents. speaker-1: Like he like looks at me and he's like I I never cried during a movie before speaker-0: Like that's why I would also say if you don't think you like science fiction and fantasy, I would recommend trying to find speaker-1: Welcome everybody, fellow book nerds and movies and story lovers. Appreciate you guys coming back and listening and or watching us. ⁓ my name is Aaron. And we are amazing awesome bros. And both phys physically, literally, spiritually, ethically, all the above. speaker-0: My name is Emmanuel. We're also incredibly humble, obviously. speaker-1: I'm writing a book to call ⁓ being humble and like me and proud of it. So that's that's my book title. ⁓ it's a self help book, really. It's it's showing people how to be as cool as you are. ⁓ I've been selling it ⁓ just like hotcakes. I don't even know what a hotcake is, but that's what I'm doing. speaker-0: It's a version of a pan of a pancake. speaker-1: I think it is. It's more probably Southern. Yeah, so this this one we're gonna talk about ⁓ genres and maybe more writing, ⁓ kind of like what genre means and ⁓ get into the nitty-gritty of maybe what's ⁓ why is it sometimes? Maybe not so much recently since like Marvel took off and everything, but it used to have like a being a fantasy writer or a reader almost had like a stigma to it where it's like, you know, it wasn't as appreciated. I remember Brandon Sanderson even talking about how like I mean he was he was already like a big thing and he had a guy talking about was like, You write fantasy? And he's like, Yeah, you know what, that's good and he like like scoffed and like left. And he was one of those like and he was a professor writer and it was one of those like it's almost looked down upon, which is kinda funny to hear about 'cause I mean like but I mean we think about it, I mean like pretty much before Tolkien, modern day at least, like, it wasn't really taken even seriously, and even then it wasn't taken seriously until I would say like eighties or nineties. And then they came into the zeitgeist of like popular being popular, I think more in the two thousand. ⁓ so what do you think about that? speaker-0: Well, ⁓ hmm, that's a good question. I mean, so I think historically genre I mean, genre is just a little story itself. I mean the Odyssey is a fantasy. ⁓ and it's yeah. I do think from a pop culture standpoint, that I mean, nerd culture is culture right now. Like that's and I think I think so much of that is because millennials like myself who grew up on Ninja Turtles and Star Wars, etc. are now in positions of power and we can create things and so and our kids like the things that we you know, like and we make. So I do think that is a part re Part of the reasons why genre is popular as a culture thing now, or at least sci-fi fantasy. And I think there's there isn't, yeah, there is an interesting thing though with science fiction fantasy, genre. I mean, I'm using those terms very broadly. ⁓ basically anything that's fantastical that isn't, you know, set in hard hardcore reality, I guess. ⁓ I think part of it is probably has to do with lots of things. One of those could be I was listening to a podcast, I don't know, a few months ago, and it was these two academics who were both literature academics talking about whether the Lord of the Rings was literature or not. And you could tell on the call they had they had a low esteem for genre. Like it was almost like in academia it's not considered ⁓ Yeah, true or legitimate. And I think part of that's just a misconception of what especially Science fiction, fantasy, what they are. So they are not I think if you don't know those genres, you may think of science fiction as just spaceships, or you may think of fantasy as magic and the dragons. And I think there's there's this thing with those specific genres where they're almost like a lens into telling any other type of genre, those core genres, any type of way you want. So by that I mean like if you could look at Aristotle's Poetics, you've got basically dramas, you have Comedies and tragedies. Those are the two story types. And that's still the case. Like you have comedies and tragedies. ⁓ comedies being something that ends happy and tragedies something that ends sad. Within that, you get kind of things start to split off where you have what we can make consider a drama. You might s you know, where it's people talking about serious things seriously. And you have comedies, what we a modern day would call a comedy, which is people laughing. But then then you get a dramedy where you start to combine those Comedy and dramas to a dramedy. So it's kind of like a thing where you might be like Ted Lasso, for example, it's a great dramedy. Like the first season was more comedic, and then the more seasons gone becomes more drum dramedy. ⁓ the same is true when it comes to applying so in the late eighteen hundreds, H. G. Wells, for example, ⁓ famously he did I should fact check this 'cause I think he's a time machine guy, right? He's the one who did the com time machine think. speaker-1: So I'll I'll edit it and if it's it's right I'll I'll put it right. speaker-0: Yeah. Sorry, no, so H. G. Wells did ⁓ War of the Worlds. And then there is Jules Verne who did Around the World in Eighty Days. Then you had the John Carter of Mars guy who also did Tarzan. Those types of writers cr started creating this subgenre, almost this fantastical type of storytelling where it was very fantastical, very over the top. And I think there's probably an element of this is me just riffing, but I think there's probably element of at the time academics were like, What is this nonsense? They almost thought of it like popcorn writing. ⁓ and some of that writing is phenomenal writing. Like if you go back and read some like Jules Verne, for example, like the way they wrote then you just it's mm, it's beautiful. ⁓ but I think at the time for the especially for academia It was probably like, ⁓ that's not very good. And that's just how the culture is. If academia says something that kinda can trickle down into, well, this isn't serious. And then that trickles down into why are you letting, you know, don't let your kids read this because it's nonsense. But I think one of the things I love about genre is it lets you frame a comedy, it lets you frame a drama, it lets you frame a romance with a certain lens that just I in my mind amplifies the storytelling and it amplifies it can amplify the stakes. I mean, so For example, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I didn't really, before reading that book, I didn't really think it was possible to write like a comedy science fiction. And I read that book. Yeah. And I was like, this is I literally laughed out loud. It's probably the first time I've ever laughed out loud while reading. ⁓ it's absolute brilliant. Yeah. And it's it's a science fiction, but it's a comedy, and it the comedy works so well because it's science fiction. speaker-1: Even speaker-0: I mean, romance, you know, what what do you call it? Romanticy. I mean, that's a huge subgenre. And I think one of the things that I love about genre, and probably you would re would would would identify with this, is the world itself. Like I think that's there's something about the world that science fiction and fantasy, as very broad terms, when you can create a world within that and then set stories within that, ⁓ I don't know, it just really speaks to me. Like that's when I think about stories. If I'm trying to come up with a story, it's like for example, I always had this idea of a scene ⁓ for a I I think it could be a a movie, probably, but it was like a conversation of these two people who were married, and it would be set during a dinner and they're talking about basically what what went wrong with a marriage. And it's just a drama. I mean, but I it it didn't really excite me until I'm like, what if I set this during the apocalypse? What if I set this conversation after some kind of alien invasion or zombie, whatever? and they're about to die because they're they've they've walled themselves into this, you know, closet or something and the things are trying to break in and they're having this last conversation as married people before speaker-1: They could talk about in-laws that are literally trying to eat them. It's like I never liked your mother anyways. Now she's trying to eat. speaker-0: The moment I did that mental exercise of putting it in a type of some type of a genre, it just g got me really excited, like all the possibilities I could do with that story type of storytelling. So I think for me that's why genre I love it. And I think there's a that's why I would also say if you don't think you like science fiction and fantasy, I would recommend trying to find something within those genres that, you know, if you really like romance, let's find a romanticy. Or if you like ⁓ Like heist stories. Like there's a lot of really great heist stories set within those genres. Yeah, I mean I could talk about genre for forever, but yeah. speaker-1: Yeah. I mean and and it's interesting too where it's like there's a weird dichotomy of like kinda going back to what we were talking about how like I remember like when it came to reading, even when I was younger, like in high school or middle school and stuff, like if you had I don't know, if you had like I don't know, like ⁓ Lonesome Dove for instance, if you had one of those books, like, you know, a Western, you're reading it, but then you had like the book of like Aragon or something. And reading it. I feel like people would be like judge you like, ⁓ he's a nerd and he's like, ⁓ it's just being smart. It's kinda like when people like criticize or not criticize, look down them on like playing video games, but then like they're fine with playing chess. Or like, you know, if you're if you sit down and watch sports, you're like, ⁓ you're bad. But if you watch people making a home, you're like, ⁓ that's good. It's like it's the same thing. You you're you know, it's just one person once an another niche and stuff. And so I I th I find that kind of interesting. Where now again, like I think it's really broken down where it's not as bad. But even when I say like I write, if I tell people I'm writing and stuff, I don't necessarily even tell ⁓ what I write. I just say I'm like I write. And then if they ask, then I'll tell ⁓ Not because like I think it's my old habit of like not protecting myself, or just like I don't feel like like, ⁓ you know, not taken seriously or whatever. And again, like I I think it's not as bad as it used to be. But it is kind of funny of that double standard of like, you know, someone can be sitting and reading a historical fiction. It's just as fantastical as fiction, like it's not even real. But then like again, like you'd be sitting reading the Odyssey and they'd be like, ⁓ that's really cool and stuff. And then you're reading like an amazing Wheel of Time book that has like depth stuff, and you're like, that's a nerd. And it's like it's a frickin' sane thing. You know? So it's one of those things. But ⁓ another thing with the genre is like I feel like when when like a lot of reasons why I go the only like in world stuff that I enjoy well, like when I say in the world, I mean like true like earth and stuff, is like I mean some sci fi. ⁓ like one of my favorite sci fi series is Expeditionary Force, which is like if you haven't read it, it's it's one of the only books that I read on a regular basis or listen to that like I laugh out loud because he's it's so the characters, ⁓ it's like quick quick ⁓ elevator pitch of it. It's like the very first book, aliens come, they land on the ⁓ like on Earth, they look like hamster people. ⁓ the main character is all written in the first person. The main character like helps to fight 'cause he's a military guy. ⁓ and then like these lizard people come. And they destroy the hamster people. And then they're like, all right, well now we're there's a whole war going on. So they recruit it and then they get to another planet. And then they realize like maybe they're on the wrong side, because these lizard people are not good people. ⁓ and then they find like the equivalent of like finding a dragon, but it's finding an AI guy, and his name's Skippy, and he's like so fantastic. And the and the audiobook is ⁓ read and it's it's amazing. And he's he's hilarious. And so like That stuff is like one of the ones I like when it comes to real world stuff where it's like, you know, some of that. But like I don't really enjoy too much urban fantasy because it's one of those like I live in our world and I'm already bored, like I I wanna escape kind of thing. ⁓ so like I like the the escapism of reading with fantasy and stuff and writing it. I've I've only written like one or two books where it's like actually in our world and then even then I never finished it 'cause it's like I already live this you know, like I don't really you know. So but like like right now I'm writing a ⁓ a Western a Western steampunk fantasy is like a big mashup and it's like really fun. I I I'm having a lot of fun with it. But like it's one of those things where it's like if I tell that to some people, they'll be like judging me because they're like, ⁓ that's not real. I was like, well neither is your, you know, whatever book. And so I mean a lot of historical books is like that didn't happen. You know, when it comes to like, you know, the historical fantasy and stuff. ⁓ but you know it's one of those like genre is is one of those things that I feel that like people get tripped up on. Like a lot of people like even our uncle, for instance, let's give like him example. He again, he reads his logic, because I remember asking him, his logic of reading only historical books. He's like, well, I'm gonna I only have X amount of time on my life, you know, on Earth. And so I'm gonna read it to be like productive and do the historical stuff. Which is nothing's wrong with that. I mean that's that's fine. He has a lot of knows a lot of history stuff. ⁓ but at the same time I do feel like he's missing out. Like I do feel like he would enjoy other books that have the same like stuff but just in word like for instance like ⁓ the ⁓ Red Rising series. I mean it has I don't you we read the first one ⁓ but the rest of the ones go in space the first one's very like Hunger Games esque ⁓ and then the second one is totally space opera totally different. But it's like it it it goes with themes of like kind of with like a dictorship and like dictatorship I'm sorry. And like what people what happens like with when they have power does it corrupt them and making poor choices. And it's all stuff that like real people in real life Like Alexander the Great and all these other people who are amazing, ⁓ are amazing, but like, you know, famous, they did, but they just set him in space. And then like and that reaches a whole nother people. And I feel like if you only limit to yourself to like the real stuff, you miss out. Like you miss out on the amazing friendship of Frodo and Sam. You know, like I I remember our our cousin Zach, he ⁓ he's originally from Texas and he moved up here a while back. And ⁓ I remember he didn't watch a whole lot of movies and I remember watching Lord of Rings with him. He got to the point where Frodo tells Sam to leave. And like he like looks at me and he's like, I I never cried during a movie before And I'm like, Right. That's so like sweet. And and it's like it's that it's that thing 'cause it's like it's that friendship, a like a broken friendship and the trust and it's one of those like that that's true to everybody. And then just because little hobbits who are like as big as your five year old are saying it doesn't make it any less true human, you know? Yeah. speaker-0: And it isn't I mean, I think there is an element and I can't necessarily relate to it at all, but ⁓ some people just don't like escape not even escapism, because I don't think of fa I don't think of it as escapism, but there is it's almost like their their minds or their imaginations have a difficult time do going to a world that doesn't exist. I don't know why that is, but that just seems to be and I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, I but I do think It just seems probably seems to be but I think so I think there's like these these spectrums where there's people who can't come to get their mind to go to these imaginary worlds, whether it's sci-fi, fantasy, whatever. And then there are those who just want to live in this all the time. And then there's kind of like this middle ground where some people who may not like genre because of whatever reason, they just haven't necessarily given it a chance. ⁓ so give it a chance if you're watching this or listening to this, you know, just give it a chance. Yeah, I you know, I I love it. It's I think even when it comes to so for for my work, for my for my job, I mostly do work. it's I'm a cre I'm a director who does a lot of commercial work and it's mostly doc style or if it's commercial, it's doesn't have any type of genre or anything to it. ⁓ it's more, you know, lifestyle something or whatever. But once in a while we get to do something that's more imaginative. So For example, this weekend, which by the time somebody's listening to this will have been weeks ago, but ⁓ we're filming a short film just because we wanted to. I had this idea for a satire AI in the workplace thing that's set in the nine it's it's set in the near future, but it looks like the nineties because I just think there's something comedic about that. And this guy, this human has to work with AI agents. That's the only people in his office is him. And he's AI agents, but they're not people. They're AI agents and they can't be reasoned with. And his whole job is to babysit them to get this job done. And it's very, it's genre. It's very it's super dumb. I'm super excited about it. ⁓ I'm very excited about it. We're filming all actors, ⁓ and we're going to film them in a room, and we're actually recording them on a camera and then transcribing their face visually to ASCII text that is animated on a old CRT monitor that the actor will be acting against in real time. So we're doing everything in real time. But it's the reason we're doing it is 'cause I it's it's I would consider that genre. That's kind of like a sci fi parody thing. ⁓ but because it has that genre fantastical element, it just makes me really excited, like creatively. Like I just I just love it. I would be less excited if it was just people talking. Like it just I mean it'd be fun if 'cause it's comedy and I like comedy, but There's something about adding that slight element of like, hey, how can I make this a little more fantastical? That for me just lights me up and just from a creative standpoint, like gives me all these ideas. Like what would it look like if we did this? Or what if we looked like this do this? ⁓ sci fi and fantasy is also the most difficult thing to execute visually, so that's a thing. ⁓ but I think part of the challenge is why it's such a joy. speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah. I mean anything worth having is has to be difficult. I mean, if everyone could be shredded and it's super easy. Like, you know, back in the sixties when they had the bet bake mugshaker workout things. Like if that was all it took, everyone would be like the rock, you know, it'd be super but you know. That's the same thing with writing. I mean writing writing on paper sounds really easy and then when you actually just put the like actually your fingers to the the keyboard, it's like really hard. So when it comes to like like structure and like passive voice, man. I always forget it's a thing. And then ⁓ and then people will say like, ⁓ this is passive I'm like, ⁓ that's right, I gotta do that stupid thing. ⁓ and I have to Google what passive voice is 'cause I always forget I always forget. speaker-0: ⁓ Aaron is talking about the difference between the active voice and the passive voice. And if you need an example of a great active voice, read Hemingway. He is the best. The best. The best active voice. ⁓ Hemingway. Just as an example. So Hemingway, I wouldn't consider genre. ⁓ but you could some people have taken some of Hemingway's stories like The Old Man and the Sea and set it in a science fiction setting, which is really fascinating. speaker-1: I don't think I've actually read it. speaker-0: And it's like a retelling of that story, but yeah, we can talk about voice at some point. But Yeah. And we'll have to talk about the classics. Because there is there is, especially as writers, especially coming up where we're kind of self taught. And there's no like formal education for writers. I feel like people, at least in our country, in our era, like there's not really like you don't go to writing school really to be a writer. You just have to figure it out. ⁓ we need it right. speaker-1: I was gonna say, I would say like Brandon Sanderson's online class is great. ⁓ he has two of them. He wrote one, he wrote one. He did one in like I want to say early 2000s or maybe the teens. And then he did one again recently. Because he teaches the same class, but sometimes it changes. And I've listened to that, I listen to like at least once a year. His stuff is really good. If you never look down it, just go on YouTube. It's it's all free. ⁓ his classes are are are phenomenal. Because he he takes it as like for this class, I'm gonna pretend that you want to do writing as a business. And like and actually be this. And because that's one reason, like, cause you took a writing class in high school and I did not. Because there was like a creative writing class. But it was one of those things where like you were saying last episode, it's like if you tell me what to do, I don't want to do it when it comes to that, like writing. Like I hated writing papers, but then like I would procrastinate and write my own story for hours. So it's one of those like don't tell me what to do. And like and some of that's just attitude, and some of that's just like, you know, your own mental thing. And I'm sure like I would have learned things. ⁓ but like yeah, it's very It's one of those things writing is one of those like you can take a lot of classes, you can do a lot of how tos, you can listen to, you know, structure. By the end of the day, like if you don't do the reps, you're you're not gonna get the muscles, you know? Like you have to you have to put like the ink to the paper as it were. And I mean like I've been writing for shoot, since what, ninety nine, so it's almost been thirty years or something, or longer. Anywho, but like Yeah, something like that. ⁓ I still can't spell to save my life. So so it like like the word immediately, I literally would have to have that copied and pasted on my document to find it because I can never spell it. This is before like voice to text. Because now if I can't like spell a word, I'll just say it in my phone and then they'll like sometimes. English isn't my best language, which is the only language I speak, but it's not my best one. And ⁓ I like I'll even say like the pronunciation, like I know it's this word, but my pronunciation's wrong. So then I'm just like I don't I don't even know what to do. Or like my wife who is Filipina She ⁓ English is her second language, although she has a pretty like barely noticeable accent. She spells way better than I do. So like I literally will ask her like a word like ⁓ I don't know. Like niche, for instance. I'll say like how do you spell niche? And she'll probably know how to spell it. I'm like, Do you know what that means? And she's like, No. So so that's what I thought it's funny where it's like, I I know I know the knowledge and then communicate it on my fingertip piece is just there's a there's a disconnect. ⁓ but yeah, that's that's it. speaker-0: Yeah, spelling spelling yeah, I think sp spelling is its own its own thing. Spelling especially in English, 'cause there's no nothing makes sense. There's no you just have to literally memorize it. There's no rules. They say there's rules, but they're not. They're lying. speaker-1: Well and I always think of the stupid I before E that we learned and like the word weird. What where's the I and the E and them? So I would spell weird I before E and it's like it's wrong. I'm like, that's what the song said I before E. You will lie. Yeah. And I was actually I was side tangent. I was actually thinking of like, it's a good thing I live in this day and age. Because like if you know, like in the Civil War era when everyone like wrote letters or even World War II and stuff, and I'm like, if if they like wrote read my stuff, one, my handwriting's terrible. And then they're like, Are you like are you like a crazy person? Like, because all my stuff would be spelled wrong, like and it'd be so sloppy. And I'm like, it's a good thing I live in this day and age. Otherwise it's like, I would just not be able to function as a writer. It's just like like send them a manuscript and try to print it and they're like, What is what is this picture? Or they would like he's so deep that he just makes up his own things, you know. Like Shakespeare, he made up he's he made up like languages that we like elbow grease, like that was a Shakespeare term. That wasn't a thing. speaker-0: He's had he create he's created like dozens of terms. ⁓ there was a poster I saw once in a I don't remember where it was, it was an English class. We were filming something for a college or something, but that she she had the professor had on her board, like a big poster in the in the room, just like this huge list of terms, idioms, ⁓ expressions that Shakespeare created. I had no idea. There was so many. Like, ⁓ my gosh, she basically invented English. At least the way that we think about English. But it's yeah. Pretty pretty wild. But that's the power of writing. That's the power of writing, people. speaker-1: That is the power of writing and reading and listening and arithmetic. But yeah, so I mean like I think here's a challenge for you, li dear listeners and watchers, is if you have only read a specific genre or you haven't read another genre in a while, you should you should try to ⁓ find a book that maybe like for instance, let's just go with romanticy. Like if you love romance ⁓ and you haven't only you've only did it like, you know, the western or the, you know, whatever. Find find a story that is fantasy that has romance in it or or something like that. Just just get a little bit out of your comfort zone. ⁓ like for instance, I never really read a whole lot of historical fiction until I got into a series that was talking about like Genghis Khan. And it's like a it's like a five book series and it's awesome. And it got me a lot of historical fiction 'cause I'm like, ⁓ because I thought historical fiction was boring. Like, you know, like I do I listen to, you know, or read some, you know, memoirs of World War Two or something. But like I never read one that really hooked me. And then I was like, ⁓ it's just like the same thing. It's just, you know, in a different setting, a different genre. So challenge you guys. Look look, if you never read a sci fi, you never read a fantasy, we never read a historical fiction or a western or whatever, ⁓ find one and then try to read it and then tell us tell us what you read and ⁓ put it in the comments and stuff. I'd love to love to listen to it and hear it. And ⁓ we can discuss it later too, if you want. So again, thank you for listening to our awesome podcast. We appreciate it. Again, we'll have a cool jingle at some point, but we really don't really know what we're naming this thing. ⁓ and thank you for our journey and you guys keep reading and writing and again find a new genre that you haven't tried and dip your feet in it. Maybe you'll love it, maybe you'll like it, but regardless, you'll have a good story to tell that I wrote that I read this and I loved it or hated it. And no matter what, I'm sure your relatives at Thanksgiving will appreciate it. So have a good one. Peace. speaker-0: Peace.