This post not titled

…”It’s a small world,” because then you’d have one of the top-ten “Get out of my brain!” songs circling horribly around in there, and it would be my fault. It’s probably already happening. I’m sorry. I could also have called the post “It’s all connected,” because I’m thinking of how once you have spent a lot of time with a book, an author, a TV show, or anything, many other things either remind you of that original “fandom,” or really are connected to it, sometimes in unexpected ways.

For example, earlier this week, my British Lit survey classes were reading book 4 of Paradise Lost, in which Satan faces the flipside of his boast in bk. 1 that “The mind is its own place, and in itself / Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n” (1.254-5), when he leaves Hell for Earth, only to realize “Which way I fly is Hell, myself am Hell” (4.75). This morning in chapel, the speaker gave a modern example: a criminal in solitary confinement is not alone; he is only confronted with himself and his crime(s).

A less dire example: ABC’s revised sci-fi show V (reviews by Todd Hertz, Nik at Nite, Nikki Faith) has cast actors from a number of previous sci-fi shows that fans should recognize, including Morena Baccarin (“Inara” of Firefly) and Alan Tudyk (“Wash” from Firefly and “Alpha” from Dollhouse). Executive producer Jeffrey Bell used to work with Joss Whedon on Angel, and in an interview with Todd Hertz, referred to Buffy:

What does sci-fi allow you do in terms of storytelling that maybe other genres don’t?

What I love about genre storytelling is it allows you to tell stories as metaphor. When they first started Buffy the Vampire Slayer, they’d talk about each episode’s “themons” as opposed to demons. For instance, you had the girl in high school who turned invisible as a metaphor for being the shy, wallflower girl who feels like she doesn’t exist. And then, the very idea of a hellhole being under the high school? That’s one of the great metaphors in television. With these genres, you can tell really rich stories that don’t feel literal. You can talk about areas that people may not want to sit and watch a show about—but mask it in action, fantasy or science fiction and make it more palpable. I love that.

So do I! And “themons”?! Has anyone connected to Mutant Enemy mentioned that before? How great is that? I’m totally using it (properly attributed, of course!) in my next essay on BtVS.

WILLOW: It’s all connected. The root systems, the molecules…the energy. Everything’s connected.(Buffy 7.1 “Lessons”)

Happy Hallowe’en, or How did I miss this?

Let this be a lesson to us all (especially me)—this is what happens when you don’t blog for a month or more & people stop checking. I missed “Chaucer”’s enthusiastic post on the Middle English version of Twilight, or rather Vespers:

Sure, the prose kynd of maketh Dives et Pauper look lyk George Orwelle, but the storie pulleth me yn….

In this fyne book of sparklie vampyres, Bella Cygne moveth from Essex to Yorkshyre to lyve with her fathir, who ys a sheriff and escheator. At a scole ful of recentlie coyned stereotypes, she witnesseth the fayre skyn and fashion-sprede slow-mocioun hotenesse of the Cu Chulainn clan, the which have all eaten long ago of the magical Irisshe Salmon of Really Good Hair (oon byte of this magical salmon and ye shal have good hair for evir). Aftir Bella doth see the hottest of the clan, Edward, stop a wagon wyth hys bare handes, fight off twentie churles, and brood so much he did make Angel look lyk Mister Rogeres, she doth realise that the Cu Chulainns are vampyres. But they are good vampyres, who drinke wyne. Ther is considerablie moore sexual tensioun than in Piers Plowman.

We are amused. Also amusing: Castle’s many Whedon-allusions in the Hallowe’en episode. (For some reason WP is not allowing me to embed video today.)

My resolution for November: to post more frequently. Much more frequently. You’ll see.

Academic Buffyness now and future

David Lavery posted the program of the first (as far as I know) French conference on Buffy Tueuse de Vampires, set for this Friday. BtVS DVDs include dubbed French & Spanish soundtracks, so can be useful for language study. I note one paper title refers to “Mort et tuerie…”—would that be translated back as “Death and slayage”? One of the most difficult things about dubbing/translating Buffy must be getting Joss Whedon’s unique linguistic style. Perhaps they generally don’t even try?

And a belated announcement that dates have been announced for next year’s Slayage Conference on the Whedonverses: June 3-6, 2010. Location still TBD. I hope some of the French Buffyologists will be there (at least two are from Johns Hopkins, so why not?) Plenty of time to work up papers on the “Season 8″ and “Angel: After the Fall” continuation comic series, as well as Dollhouse and things still to be said about Buffy, Angel, and Firefly/Serenity.

Joss Whedon wins Bradbury Award

While bloggers and critics are bravoing and/or booing over last Friday’s premiere of Joss Whedon’s new TV series Dollhouse, Locus online announces that the SFWA* Bradbury Award for excellence in screenwriting goes to Joss Whedon. To be presented April 24-26, 2009.

I’ll be explicating some of the many, many reasons this award is deserved at my “Watch and Learn” workshop on Monday, Feb. 23, “What’s so great about Buffy?” –6:30 p.m. in D.Rich 117.

*Science Fiction Writers of America

at SC3: Slayage Conference on the Whedonverses

We’ve just concluded the second day of the third Slayage Conference on the works of Joss Whedon, which include TV shows Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, the film Serenity, scripts for other movies, and comics. This year, it’s in Arkadelphia, Arkansas, and the group was too large for the room designated for the first keynote session, so this morning’s presentation was moved to a larger auditorium.

Why are academic types from all over the USA, Canada, Britain, and elsewhere still talking about Buffy, a show that’s been in reruns since 2003?

“It has staying power,” [conference organizer] Durand said. “It’s like I tell my students in philosophy a lot of times: We’re not so much about necessarily finding all the answers as wanting to ask better questions. `Buffy,’ I think, does that. `Buffy’ never really leaves you with nice, pat answers. You have even more questions than when you started.”

So far, almost all of the papers I’ve heard have been thought-provoking and often entertaining as well. It’s also been great to meet friends from past conferences again. Several of us had the pleasure this evening of dining with guest of honor Jeanine Basinger, who is perfectly charming, and reminds me of my favorite author, the late Dorothy Dunnett. (I got into “Buffy studies” when I presented a paper on Dunnett’s historical fiction at PCA, where I discovered other academics taking BtVS seriously.)

The last event tonight was a workshop analyzing one of the key episodes, season 4’s dream finale, “Restless,” led by Rhonda Wilcox. I’ve seen it three or four times, at least, and I still found new insights.

More tomorrow. Conference website.

What we did last Thursday

I’ve been meaning to post about the fun night-out with my husband Jim. You could call it “dinner-and-a-movie,” but since it was dinner at the Raleighwood Cinema Grill, where dinner is served in the theater itself, followed by a special charity screening of one of our favorite movies, Serenity, it was so much more. In fact, we attended the Can’t Stop the Serenity event in Raleigh, NC, complete with giveaways, costume contests, and a sold-out, very enthusiastic audience. The costume contest winner wore a scale model of the space-ship “Serenity,” complete with blinking running-lights, light-up tail, removable shuttle, and a photo of the crew visible in the open cargo bay. Awesome. And a little scary. The only question was who would win 2nd and 3rd place!

Thanks to the CU student who reminded me of this event in time for us to get tickets. We waved at each other across the aisle. None of us were in costume, I might add. We had a blast, though, and really enjoyed seeing the film again on the big screen with a fabulous sound-system.