American Gods, Supernatural, and Jesus

Recently I have been reading American Gods by Neil Gaiman, as well as watching the TV show Supernatural, which has been on for pretty close to 15 years now. I am finding both of them quite enjoyable. They have strong similarities, specifically they both take place in America (Trump's America?) where behind the scenes of ordinary life (a pretty dreary ordinary life mostly in the country or very small towns) biblical or pagan gods, culture heroes, and etc. pursue their own agendas, generally with bad effects on human beings who stumble across them.
American Gods has a high reputation and it is very entertaining and well-written. The specific plot of the story is that many of the ancient gods of European or Middle Eastern origin are trying desperately to make a living, generally by running some kind of scam. They are old and weak because nobody much believes in them anymore more and sacrifices are hard to come by.
There is one very noticeable weak point in American Gods, and that is the complete absence of Jesus in the storyline. When the human hero of the story comes across these gods and goddesses, many of them talk about how things are not nearly as good as they were back in the old days. They are upset about the current condition and talk about it in some detail. But Jesus never comes up. Churches, priests, ministers, huge suburban ministries with a strong television presence likewise. Jesus should be there in that landscape, but he isn't, not even as a figure on whom to blame the sad plight of the old gods. It is fully in line with the tone and logic of American Gods that the old guys should take a new human ear as an opportunity to pour out their troubles.
Supernatural is a bit different. A lot of biblical and semi-biblical mythology is strongly present in the main plot line. You can kind of understand how the makers of the TV series might back off from including any commentary whatsoever on Jesus.
But it is very odd that a novelist who likes think of himself as innovative, would censor himself in this way. Or is there some other explanation for his strong desire to ignore the most important American God?

Not a horned helmet among them

A couple or three weeks ago I had a look at the Last Kingdom, a TV series depicting the period of Alfred the Great and his wars with the Danes. I was referred by friends to a critique of the authenticity of this film put on YouTube by a man named Lindy Beige. Mr. Beige is repeatedly offended by the fact that ninth century warriors wore soft leather armo and all sorts of inexplicable fur and leather accessories. And even the kings are dirty. One of them wears the same clothes for 10 years!

Fair enough – but I have to say that I found the series inexplicably good. When was the last time you saw a commercial video depiction of the Vikings that has nobody wearing horned helmets? In my case I think I can say "never!"

It's also surprising to me that the treatment of Alfred the Great, a man who was very eccentric in terms of his own time, is reasonably believable.

Mr. Beige says sense somewhere in his critique that he has no trouble with the plot or the acting of the last kingdom. Indeed? And you want more?

Summon back the fire-witch to the court of the Crimson King

<\p>Did the young George R.R. Martin listen to King Crimson A LOT?

Ripper Street and steampunk

I talked recently about the Canadian show Murdoch's Mysteries as an entertaining exploration of late Victorian Toronto, which is not exactly steam punk but close enough.

I am now watching Ripper Street, which like the Canadian series is about the late 19th century and is not exactly steampunk but shares Murdoch mysteries fascination with new technology and science.

The fascination of a variety of creative people with the modernity of the late 19th century and the early 20th is fascinating to me!

Murdoch's Mysteries: we live in a new and incredible age

For about a decade, CBC has been broadcasting an interesting murder mystery series set in Edwardian Canada, or rather, Edwardian Toronto. I have been watching reruns of the show over the last two or three weeks and like most series television, it is much more enjoyable when seen that way.

It would be easy enough to call the show "steampunk" except that the technology that sets the pace in the show is electricity. Murdoch, the lead character, is a Toronto detective who is enthusiastic about modern technology -- x-ray machines, electrical automobiles, movie cameras -- and uses it very effectively to solve crimes. In the course of his adventures he also runs into many leading figures of the time – Alexander Graham Bell, Henry Ford, Tesla, Marconi, Andrew Carnegie, Winston Churchill. He does not run into Sherlock Holmes, but he does run across somebody who thinks he is Sherlock Holmes.

I am also impressed by the depiction of the city of Toronto. Toronto circa 1899 is shown as being multi-cultural and multi-ethnic, wrestling with a variety of political, racial, and social conflicts, which are reasonably realistically portrayed. One of the main characters, for instance, gets in trouble for promoting contraception, which is illegal at the time. Other characters are properly shocked by this and there is a bit of a riot.

I think there may be more in-jokes in the series than I'm picking up. Two days ago I saw an episode where I was pretty sure two characters were modelled after Toronto's Ford brothers. The characters were not politicians, but they looked like the Fords and their personal interactions with each other matched what I know of the Fords.

All too often we think that people in the past were old-fashioned fuddy-duddies. In some places in some areas that is undoubtably true. But in other times people -- or many of them – are seized by an awareness of modernity. One of the great virtues of Murdoch's Mysteries is that it reminds us of that fact. "We live in a new and incredible age," says one character, and she is quite right.

"The gleaming cities of Earth...

...Where peace reigns, and hatred has no home."

These are the last lines of the episode "Muse" from the series "Star Trek: Voyager." The episode is characteristic of the series as a whole.


Voyager is not the most popular series in the Star Trek franchise. Like some of the other series – maybe all of them – it started out rather weak, and with characters that were not particularly well developed. But I have seen the series twice now and I think that once the series got rid of the character Kes and brought Seven of Nine into the story, about halfway through, it got a lot better. Sure, there are some fairly dumb and typically dumb stories, but there is some very good science fiction as well.


The episode "Muse" is an example of how serious television, if the creators take it seriously themselves,  can give writers and directors and actors space do all sorts of interesting stuff. The existence of Netflix shows us how some series work very well as they build on previous strengths.
 The characters of Voyager are very good examples of this. They aren't brilliantly done, but they are increasingly good as things progress. The character of the doctor by Robert Picardo and Seven of Nine by Jeri Ryan come to mind. In both cases, incomplete human beings turn into something else as they mature, and as is repeatedly emphasized by the development of the series as a whole, they have to be accepted by the flesh and blood human beings as equals. I think Ryan, whom many people think got the job sheerly on the basis of astonishing physical beauty, had a very tough assignment here and did it very well.

In the case of "Muse" we see an alien culture that seems to have developed to an era similar to archaic Greece. A local poet rescues one of the members of the Starfleet expedition and uses her story to create a drama far away better than anything that has existed in his culture before. It's not really a very believable story when it comes down to it  but it does make you think about how astonishing the effect of early Greek drama must've been. Classicists know this, but how often has this been explored on TV or in any other popular genre of fiction?

The quote I used for a title for this post indicates a final characteristic worth noting. It is spoken by the poet of the alien culture who has visualized Earth as the home of peace and perfection. According to the series, he's absolutely right. The 24th century according to the writers of the series is a time when the most optimistic dreams we have for our future have come true. Sometimes that optimism seems a bit overdone, but I would say that the whole dramatic interest of the series is that it argues that even when peace and concord have come to Earth, there will still be plenty of problems in applying all our best ideas to real-life situations.

Does Star Trek: the Original Series belong on this blog?

Alas, that's what I'm thinking about these days.

This year I am teaching much the same courses as I've been teaching for the last four years. My teaching, thinking about basic facts and concepts that should be presented to my students, is a major source for much of my blogging. Then there are current events. Right now I find little to inspire original thought in the news. I don't have such respect for my own opinions as to think that my readers will be interested in hearing me go on about American politics, Canadian politics, or even Middle Eastern politics. I find all these developing stories to be stalled in patterns that I have either talked about before or are just as obvious to interested readers as they are to me. I am not interested in being another political ranter, not unless I have a really good rant to trot out.

Similarly, I don't have much new to say about chivalry or deeds of arms right now. I should have a book out this spring on Charny's Men at Arms, and I continue to work on the Chronicle of the Good Duke Louis of Bourbon, but I'm at the stage where I really can't offer up new material from either  source.

I am working away on various projects but I am not reading really interesting material of the right size and complexity to be described in a blog entry. My thoughts recently tend to be suitable for a Facebook post. Namely, a couple of sentences of reaction linked to an article that has something to do with current events.

Which leaves me with my TV watching habits, especially my use of Netflix to look over and reevaluate some of the more interesting popular phenomena of my lifetime. One of these, one of the most important really given its great popularity, is Star Trek. What does Star Trek tell us about the last half-century?

I have put a little bit of this material in the blog already, in part because I was pleasantly surprised by how good average and above average television series are when seen through Netflix, without commercial interruption, and at a pace set by the viewer – who if he or she is really interested will not wait a week to see the next episode of the series that really appeals.

So what about Star Trek? As I expected Star Trek: the Next Generation was really entertaining when seen through Netflix. I was rather surprised to see that Deep Space 9 was far better when viewed rapidly than it was in its original presentation, which caused me to give up on it early in its second season. I was very impressed by most of what I saw on my recent viewing.

So what about the original series? My memory of the original series is that it was not really very good. I was only about 15 when it came on, but I'd already read a lot of high-quality science fiction in print, and I thought that the TV show was not really giving the best selection of science-fiction ideas available. The series was better than most of what was on TV, but most of what was on TV was pretty lame.

Part of me wondered why the series had such a tremendous impact. I knew plenty of people who really loved it.

Well, re-watching the first season of the original series has confirmed me in these opinions:

It was pretty lame.

At least, the first half of the first season was really leaden. The characters are poorly drawn and poorly presented.

A good half of that season focused on exactly one idea, which is not really much of a science fictional idea as much as a horror genre idea. That idea is that universe is filled with things that look like human beings that are actually monsters; or alternatively things that started out as human beings have turned into monsters, sometimes only moral monsters. There's a lot of betrayal and menace in those early episodes, and they're not really very good episodes otherwise.

But about halfway through that first season, what people have loved about this series begins to emerge. By that I mean the characters and the interactions between the characters on the ship and particularly on the bridge of the ship start making you really care about what goes on with them.

What really surprised me was that I liked the first season James T Kirk. I have always been someone who put James T Kirk down as a borderline maniac whose prominence in Starfleet reveals a weakness in their whole system, especially the recruiting efforts.. My image of Kirk is a rather smug character who relies on his physical charisma (which did not really speak to me) to get his way. But the first season Kirk is not really like that. He's trimmer, fitter, handsomer and – can't believe I'm saying this – more intelligent and more philosophical than he was later on in the series or in the movies. He says a lot of things are actually smart. He looks smarter than Spock!

Is there any historical point to be made from this material? Well, I do now have a more sympathetic view of the popular influence of the series. And if any of you are watching the old Star Trek, you might keep an eye out for the awe and discomfort that the characters have for anything to do with computerization.

"Oh, Sherlock, neither of us was the first."

I am astonished by the achievement that is the recent remake of the Sherlock Holmes stories set in 21st century London.

Arthur Conan Doyle's stories always were more than a simple recounting of the accomplishments of the scientific detective who is also, because of his great gifts, a complete social misfit. I am pretty sure that Doyle did not invent that figure. The stories gave almost equal prominence to John Watson, the normal and cheerful friend – normal and cheerful, that is, if you ignore his rather odd devotion to his apparently indifferent friend (?).

The current re-envisioning gives much more prominence to the theme of intimacy and the difficulties of achieving it – not just between Holmes and Watson, but between others as well. 21st century London is ostensibly much freer or at least more freewheeling than Victorian London. But despite social and sexual liberation, the characters in the series struggle to reach out to each other without exposing themselves too much. They are terrified of rejection, and this keeps them just as much on edge as we imagine their 19th century counterparts were.

There must be Holmes fans out there who are raging at this series and its betrayal of some aspect of the canon. But though I'm not entirely satisfied with the stories as told, my basic attitude is one of astonishment at the chances taken by the creators and their rather amazing degree of success. In the last quarter hour of the Sign of Three episode, I sat with my mouth hanging open and my breath bated waiting to see what would come next. And it was the emotional and social struggles of the characters that surprised and yes, ensorcelled me.

Wit and wisdom from Deep Space 9

Quark, a merchant and a predatory capitalist criticizes the chivalry of his time:

Do you know what I like about Klingon stories?… Nothing! Lots of people die and nobody makes any profit!

George RR Martin, master storyteller

This blog post is dedicated to the proposition that George RR Martin is objectively a major figure in the literature of the early third millennium.

I speak as someone who has read the Ice and Fire books, some of them more than once, but has not been following the TV series week by week. I like many others have criticized Martin in the past for brutalizing his readers and for letting his story grow uncontrollably as he follows many many characters at greater length. I like others have before me the terrible example of Robert Jordan, another author wrote a huge fantasy series but died before he finished it. Pictures of George RR Martin made me think he doesn't follow the healthiest of lifestyles.

Nevertheless, George RR Martin has become a major force in contemporary storytelling. Four times now he has made thousands, indeed millions, scream.

Some years ago, the book version of the death of Ned Stark shocked thousands of fans, many of whom rushed to log on to fan forums and express their passionate response.

Some years later, readers had a similar reaction to the Red Wedding in its original written form.

The TV version of these events have motivated millions to express themselves, to the point that some people said that last night the reaction to the video version of the Red Wedding "broke the Internet."

Anyone who can do that is a master storyteller.

(This may seem to undervalue the contribution of screenwriters, directors and others in the TV version of Game of Thrones, but my reading of interviews with the actors convinces me that they see themselves as following Martin's vision.)

Now this may all be a flash in the pan. There are other TV series that are making a big impact, getting serious discussion in other media, being lauded as cultural touchstones of our era. But I feel it necessary to admit, publicly, that Martin is really something.

Visiting a future via Star Trek: The Next Generation

It's heresy around my house to say it, but I doubt I could watch the original Star Trek  series all the way through.  It was just not good  enough science fiction even the first time around.  Furthermore I have a very limited tolerance for James T. Kirk/William Shatner.  The fact that Kirk was given the Federation's best starship and allowed to keep its command says something rather alarming about the Federation.

ST:TNG, on the other hand, though it started out rather weak, was good enough in my memory to give a second chance. I have now been through TNG a second time, and I quite enjoyed it.

It still was not great science fiction.  The superscience explanations of the technologies, of the threats to the Enterprise or other good guys, of the solutions to those threats were either gruesomely bad or laughable, depending on my mood.  Another ST series, I forget which, wore out the phrase "reverse[d] polarity."  In TNG, "interference," which prevented rescues or self-defense or timely reaction to some threat, explained everything.

 Action/adventure plots were usually just as lame. So many preventable  disasters so easily avoided if only the command staff had used common sense or had sensible security protocols!  Here comes a mysterious alien ship that refuses to open communication! PUT THOSE DAMNED SHIELDS UP! (Blam! Too late!)

Then there are some of the odd unexplained features of the largely unseen future society of the  Federation.  Real ST fans have thoroughly explored the question of whether the Federation uses money (the evidence is contradictory).  But it is certainly noteworthy that commerce is shown as a marginal and unworthy activity, indulged in by lowlifes.  One wonders about how non-Starfleet Federation citizens get from planet to planet.  Are there passenger ships (we see none)?  If there are, can you buy a ticket?  How much would a passage cost? Or do only people with Starfleet connections travel the stars, hitchhiking on Starfleet ships (we see that a lot) or use shuttlecraft size transport?

Is Starfleet a vastly privileged aristocracy resting on a subject population?  Is it the 18th -century in space, minus the slave trade and distant plantations? (A dish of tea, captain?   Earl Grey, hot?)

On the other hand, there were some really good aspects to the series.

When the show tackled ethical questions that sprang from real science fiction premises,  it often, maybe more often than not, did a really good job.  The episode where the Enterprise crew decides not to weaponize a Borg drone but to treat him like an individual rather than a walking computer virus -- thus giving up an opportunity to destroy the hostile and very dangerous Borg -- was one of the best ST episodes ever. Whether anyone could be that ethical is another matter, but they sure did not duck the issues.

Another thing that the real fans have debated is the mixed record TNG had on gender issues.  Certainly the complete lack of gay people makes the future society look kind of old-fashioned.  But what does one expect  from an American prime-time show from the 80s and 90s?  It is quite remarkable, however, that in most societies depicted, women and men were treated as equals in intellectual and institutional authority. I remarked to my wife as we watched that ST:TNG must have had more good parts for middle-aged women than any other show of the time.  And that is no small thing, indicative  of a real commitment to incorporating male/female equality as a basic feature of that fictional society.

More wisdom from Babylon 5

Londo, the Centauri ambassador, is editing a report on potential enemies to make them seem more menacing.
Naïve assistant: "But they are a very spiritual people!"
Londo: "Leave that in. That always scares them!"

It's too late for the pebbles to vote

Words of wisdom from Babylon 5 (which I never saw the first time around):

 "The avalanche has already begun, it's too late for the pebbles to vote."

An Irishman can't help himself -- scorn for Game of Thrones

John Doyle in the Globe and Mail:

A second reason is an aversion to medieval-fantasy material that is ludicrously inauthentic when compared with real history and genuine mythology and legend. I’ve no problem with the Arthurian legends because they arise from a bona fide cultural impulse. As an Irishman of a certain age, I could talk to you till your eyes fell out about the magic of An Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle Raid at Cooley), the central story of the Ulster cycle of legends. It’s about an attempt to steal a particularity fertile bull. But it teems with warriors and magicians, dominated by the god-like warrior Cú Chulainn. There are even ravens swirling in the mist. It shares much with Game of Thrones in surface detail but there’s a powerful, authentic poignancy to An Táin, and a rawness to the action, the work of many hands and storytellers, generation after generation. In comparison, Game of Thrones is slick and contrived.

Astonishingly good

Law and Order SVU is in its 13th season and I have to say, that although  in the normal course of events the series should be as stale as thirteen-year-old bread, in some ways it is better than ever.

The most recent episode was classic SVU.  It could easily have been in season one -- heck, it would have been a good pilot, introducing the whole series.  But somehow it pulled me in, really pulled me in.  Was it the acting?  The direction?  Who knows? 

But what  really started this train of thought was the previous episode, about a young loser couple whose infant dies mysteriously.  It was heartbreaking, and though the case was only marginally an SUV matter, it  may have been the best episode ever.  Here I have to say that the people who played the young couple were astonishingly good, and the writers should be proud.

Yoga on TV

Last night while watching one hour-long crime show, I saw three different ads where yoga was used to stand for a healthy lifestyle. Two of them I'd never seen before.

It's everywhere.

And if you want a truly hypnotic yoga TV experience, try Namaste Yoga. An amazing piece of cinematographical design and quite inspiring yoga. And of course the yogis are something else.

Nipissing history students find the fun in academia

Some readers may disapprove, but seeing as this grew out of a seminar situation, this tickled me:

Yesterday, Matt and I went to Sudbury (Laurentian University) for a conference called "Social Science on the Final Frontier." Essentially, the conference was about the intersection of the social sciences and the science fiction genre. We presented about the conceptualization of the state of nature in the TV series LOST.

Here's our abstract if you were actually interested in what we were presenting about:

Nasty, Brutish and LOST: the State of Nature in the hit TV series LOST
By: Holly Ann Garnett and Matthew Morris

The state of nature has generally been described as life outside of society, the state, or government. Indeed, many political philosophers have envisaged the human being prior to, or exterior to, these social constructs in order to ascertain the true nature of humanity. Although a primarily hypothetical situation, the closest observations of the state of nature today could be in post-disaster areas, a hijacking situation or perhaps even the archetypal deserted island scenario, like in ABC’s hit science fiction saga of LOST.

Our discussion paper ponders the question: can the situations of ABC’s hit science fiction saga truly be considered the philosophical state of nature? We explore this question through an examination the theoretical underpinnings of this political concept through the writings of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau.We find that many of the characteristics of the state of nature that Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau describe exist in the characters and scenarios of LOST, even if these diverse thinkers describes quite varied situations.


Now, if you were wondering why the heck we did this, it's really borne out of our honours seminar class, in which we ended up making references (and sometimes just talking about) the TV series LOST since we, and our professor, are such big fans of the show. So over the past few months (since April at least) Matt and I have been researching and reading about LOST and political philosophy (yes, academics is THAT fun!)

More fun, perhaps, than reading Thomas More's creepy Utopia (at least, that's how I remember Utopia). More useful? Argue your opinion!

Image: The brooding, mysterious master of a far-away island.