September 11, 2002

12:48 PM

Some sort of insanity must have possessed this guy, making him think he could write a prequel trilogy to Roger Zelazny's classic Amber series (ahem, not this one). Most reviewers agree--and you can read for yourself--that it's not very good. All this, and the fact that the Sci-Fi Channel also has sinister plans for the property means that there are only one or two nails left to be driven into the coffin of my childhood. Hooray!
posted by Hildago (15 comments total)

Man, the skiffy channel's planning on fucking with "the forever war", too. Bad enough that they got their hands on "Riverworld"....
posted by interrobang at 12:52 PM on September 11, 2002

well, we all know there is nothing original being done on the damn idiot box.
posted by kileregreen at 12:56 PM on September 11, 2002

...or at least nothing they won't CANCEL.
posted by Kikkoman at 1:14 PM on September 11, 2002

You forgot to mention the other Sci-Fi offerings - in the works are a Firestarter followup, a Battlestar Galactica 4 hour miniseries, and the long-awaited adaptation of MYST.

Compare that to the other network's tepid fare for the 2002-03 season, and one could assume that Jamie Tarses was onto something...
posted by Smart Dalek at 1:20 PM on September 11, 2002

And no, I'm not saying that approvingly.
posted by Smart Dalek at 1:29 PM on September 11, 2002

*has sudden attack of warm fuzzy nostalgia*

*wanders off to bookstore*

If scifi tries it, I'll probably feel compelled to watch the first 30 minutes. 99% of everything is crap. I live in (the rosy myst of) hope.
posted by frykitty at 1:35 PM on September 11, 2002

Ugh. The first two sentences were enough for me. And the whole concept of a prequel fails anyway, since so much of the wonder of Amber was the way it interacted with Zelazny's Earth:
"My son was dating a demon?"
"Face it, he could have done a lot worse his freshman year."
Brilliant.
posted by sodalinda at 1:36 PM on September 11, 2002

Of course, they also cancelled Farscape, so who knows what they're thinking...
posted by UnReality at 1:36 PM on September 11, 2002

Meanwhile, in another part of the office...
The first Dune prequel, House Atreides, was a steaming pile. I kept reading thinking, "It'll get better. This is Dune, man, it'll be fine." Nope. And QC didn't keep the authors and publishers from releasing House Harkonnen, House Corrino, and the new The Butlerian Jihad (links not provided since I wouldn't push this 'David Drake' style writing on anyone.) Props to Brian Herbert and whoever the other co-author was for ruining my favorite universe.

Does anyone like Foundation Prequels? If memory serves either Brin or Bear wrote one of them...
posted by Tacodog at 1:37 PM on September 11, 2002

Wait...you liked the Dune sequels?
posted by sodalinda at 1:44 PM on September 11, 2002

No one but Zelazny could do Amber justice. This saddens me. Not sure why, though -- I don't have to read the prequel, and there's no chance I will.
posted by Shane at 2:14 PM on September 11, 2002

sodalinda: no, not at all. I loved Dune and re-read it every few years, but the prequels are complete trash to the sequels which I simply found feh.
posted by Tacodog at 2:25 PM on September 11, 2002

All scifi on TV sucks. There's something about the medium which just won't embrace Sci-Fi.
posted by signal at 4:40 PM on September 11, 2002

Well, now they've cancelled Farscape, another nail goes in my cable subscription's coffin.... 80+ channels means it just takes longer for me to find out there's nothing on...
posted by Samizdata at 12:10 AM on September 12, 2002

I first encountered Amber in the old skool interactive fiction from Trillium/Telarium... that and their version of Fahrenheit 451 are great memories.

If I remember correctly, the Telarium text adventure game series was developed in coordination with the real authors.
posted by i blame your mother at 4:19 AM on September 12, 2002