Hellbound
A while ago I had the opportunity to see the stage show Hadestown, a jazzy operatic retelling of the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice. We had to drive a while to get there and I wasn’t sure how much down-time…
Tag Fiction
Lying’s Pride
We will believe any words said with conviction. Not all of us, not all of the time – sometimes people can tell the difference between flattery and observation, between pleasant lies and harsh truths. Still, as much as you may…
Trouble in Paradise
As the world careens towards apocalyptic dystopia, it is only natural that the dedicated escapists of gaming might crave the inverse – a world that at least functions, that isn’t on fire or ridden with disease or rapidly shuffling malicious…
Designed Character
In art, characters are designed and presented – every aspect of the character’s design was considered at some point along the way, and most have some sort of significance. Even in live-action films and theater, people are cast to embody…
Symbolic
We operate by symbols. Everything we think we see is, by the time we perceive it, converted from the light that enters our eyes into a collection of ideas, into symbols for objects and creatures we know – or, for…
Ashes
“How am I so confident?” She rubbed her lips, I think imagining another version of herself taking a cool film noir drag on a cigarette. “Am I? No, no I’m just good at not acting, uh, unconfident? Nervous. Whatever. I’m…
Other Lives
Isn’t it strange how complex and overwhelming our feelings about fictional people can become? There is a conflict of impulses: The sympathetic and the dramatic. We want characters to be happy for the same reason we want our friends and…