Beasts of the Southern Reach
September 27, 2017 12:30 PM Subscribe
Annihilation (slyt) - trailer for the forthcoming movie by Alex Garland (Ex Machina, Dredd), based on the Southern Reach Trilogy books by Jeff VanderMeer.
Not familiar with the book, but WOW
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 12:33 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 12:33 PM on September 27, 2017
I was very pleasantly surprised by this trailer. It captures the weirdness and sense of beautiful body horror that you find in Vandermeer's work. As a fan of the books, making a film primarily from the first novel makes a lot of sense.
Also, as a long time reader of Vandermeer's writing... I'm very excited for him and also this is super strange. I never thought there would be a visual rendition of his work like this.
posted by selfnoise at 12:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [10 favorites]
Also, as a long time reader of Vandermeer's writing... I'm very excited for him and also this is super strange. I never thought there would be a visual rendition of his work like this.
posted by selfnoise at 12:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [10 favorites]
I would imagine that I am like many others here who are hoping so so hard that they get this right but can't imagine how. I will try to remain optimistic! The trailer looks great though.
posted by conifer at 12:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by conifer at 12:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
omg omg omg omg, please be as weird and unsettling as the book(s), please please please
posted by palomar at 12:37 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
posted by palomar at 12:37 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
I want them to get this right, too, but I read the book and I'm not sure how I'd judge whether or not they got it right.
posted by entropone at 12:38 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
posted by entropone at 12:38 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
I thought they already made a movie out of this called Stalker in 1979
/snark
posted by lorddimwit at 12:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [11 favorites]
/snark
posted by lorddimwit at 12:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [11 favorites]
Invasion of the Solarises.
posted by Artw at 12:42 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
posted by Artw at 12:42 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
I would be up for a "You stepped into a Soft Place" book club with Annihilation, Roadside Picnic, Dhalgren... Add your own books here.
posted by selfnoise at 12:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [25 favorites]
posted by selfnoise at 12:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [25 favorites]
I never finished the triology because I didn't like the second book nearly as much as the first. This makes me want to get back to it. God, I hated "Control" as a character name.
posted by gladly at 12:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
posted by gladly at 12:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
Can't say I remember much about these books, as I read them 3 years ago or so, but apparently it was un-enjoyable enough for me to write a review on goodreads, which I rarely do **possible spoiler?**:
"UGH. Really wishing I had stopped after the first book now. No conclusions, no explanations, nothing worth finishing the book for. What is Area X? Who knows. Who even fucking cares. Not me."
I think I'd been on a kick of books that turned into trilogies unexpectedly at the time, so the review was maybe harsher than necessary. It didn't stop me from reading Borne, though, which I rather enjoyed.
posted by Grither at 12:47 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
"UGH. Really wishing I had stopped after the first book now. No conclusions, no explanations, nothing worth finishing the book for. What is Area X? Who knows. Who even fucking cares. Not me."
I think I'd been on a kick of books that turned into trilogies unexpectedly at the time, so the review was maybe harsher than necessary. It didn't stop me from reading Borne, though, which I rather enjoyed.
posted by Grither at 12:47 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
Really excited for this, and kinda surprised to see people saying they don't think it will translate to the screen. The writing seemed very cinematic to me.
I originally read Annihilation, the 1st in the series, with no idea what it was about and never having read Vandermeer before. I liked it, in a 'that was different' sort of way, but had no interest in finishing the series. Then I just couldn't get it out of my head, for almost a year, and had to read the rest. It was the imagery that I couldn't forget.
posted by mannequito at 12:47 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
I originally read Annihilation, the 1st in the series, with no idea what it was about and never having read Vandermeer before. I liked it, in a 'that was different' sort of way, but had no interest in finishing the series. Then I just couldn't get it out of my head, for almost a year, and had to read the rest. It was the imagery that I couldn't forget.
posted by mannequito at 12:47 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
Needs moar Thor.
posted by sammyo at 12:48 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by sammyo at 12:48 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
So not having read the book, is it more Solaris or Three Body Problem or what? Is there a comparable vibe to another book?
posted by GuyZero at 12:50 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by GuyZero at 12:50 PM on September 27, 2017
I found it VERY Stalker/Roadside Picnic, and quite Solaris also, though IIRC he said at a reading he'd not watched/read either.
(An odd omission if so)
posted by Artw at 12:52 PM on September 27, 2017
(An odd omission if so)
posted by Artw at 12:52 PM on September 27, 2017
I would be up for a "You stepped into a Soft Place" book club with Annihilation, Roadside Picnic, Dhalgren... Add your own books here.
Mythago Wood, maybe?
posted by Artw at 12:53 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
Mythago Wood, maybe?
posted by Artw at 12:53 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
I enjoyed the books a great deal, I hope they do not mess this up. I'm very afraid they'll have to be more explicitly expository, because Hollywood.
posted by sandettie light vessel automatic at 12:54 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by sandettie light vessel automatic at 12:54 PM on September 27, 2017
Its DNA Films, so stealth a British film. Paramount are distributing though and there's probably some Hollywood money.
posted by Artw at 12:58 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Artw at 12:58 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Acceptance actually does answer everything. There's a short sequence, possibly just a single paragraph but no more than three, that tells you exactly what Area X is and how it came to be.
It doesn't matter, though, because that's not really the point.
Anyway, I'm definitely excited for this movie. At first, I was a little bothered about the border being visible in the trailer, but somebody on Reddit reminded me that the entrance to Area X is described in the book as being a shimmering wall of light. So that's fine.
Overall, this isn't quite how I pictured Area X looking, but I'm fine with that. It's kind of nice, actually, to get a totally fresh perspective on the story. Otherwise, what's even the point of adaptation?
So not having read the book, is it more Solaris or Three Body Problem or what? Is there a comparable vibe to another book?
I haven't read it, but Roadside Picnic is probably a good point of orientation. (Hence the Stalker snark above. Stalker was based on Roadside Picnic.)
And, yes, you can make a very good argument for Solaris as well.
(VanderMeer denying familiarity with various inspirations people want to ascribe to this book is sort of an amusing theme. It often gets called "Lovecraftian" as well, which he denies with particular vehemence, as he doesn't care for Lovecraft. I think the only writer I've seen him claim as direct inspiration for anything is Nabokov. There's a short story in City of Saints and Madmen where the viewpoint character literally receives an invitation to a beheading.)
posted by tobascodagama at 12:59 PM on September 27, 2017 [11 favorites]
It doesn't matter, though, because that's not really the point.
Anyway, I'm definitely excited for this movie. At first, I was a little bothered about the border being visible in the trailer, but somebody on Reddit reminded me that the entrance to Area X is described in the book as being a shimmering wall of light. So that's fine.
Overall, this isn't quite how I pictured Area X looking, but I'm fine with that. It's kind of nice, actually, to get a totally fresh perspective on the story. Otherwise, what's even the point of adaptation?
So not having read the book, is it more Solaris or Three Body Problem or what? Is there a comparable vibe to another book?
I haven't read it, but Roadside Picnic is probably a good point of orientation. (Hence the Stalker snark above. Stalker was based on Roadside Picnic.)
And, yes, you can make a very good argument for Solaris as well.
(VanderMeer denying familiarity with various inspirations people want to ascribe to this book is sort of an amusing theme. It often gets called "Lovecraftian" as well, which he denies with particular vehemence, as he doesn't care for Lovecraft. I think the only writer I've seen him claim as direct inspiration for anything is Nabokov. There's a short story in City of Saints and Madmen where the viewpoint character literally receives an invitation to a beheading.)
posted by tobascodagama at 12:59 PM on September 27, 2017 [11 favorites]
I didn't care much for the book, but the trailer has me at least a bit interested in seeing the movie.
posted by ClingClang at 1:02 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by ClingClang at 1:02 PM on September 27, 2017
I would be up for a "You stepped into a Soft Place" book club with Annihilation, Roadside Picnic, Dhalgren... Add your own books here.
I thought of Annihilation as a "bad landscape" book and mentally group it with Roadside Picnic, M John Harrison's Storm of Wings and those of the Viriconium stories that focus on the toxic landscape more than with Delany. The city in Dhalgren is weird but it's not poisonous or invasive, and I feel like the concerns about history and identity are very specifically human concerns rather than big-N Nature or alien concerns. Dhalgren is downright cozy compared to Annihilation.
I will probably read the other two books - I found the first one gripping in a novella sort of way. Not slight exactly but quick.
Honestly, I wonder how they'll manage to make it misogynist and sex it up for the movie version. I wasn't absolutely overwhelmed with how Vandermeer wrote the women characters - as so often with male writers, I felt like his women characters didn't really seem to think about or experience typical gendered stuff, and were a bit more like male characters with the pronouns swapped out than anything else - but it was a perfectly cromulent Adventure In A Bad Landscape With Women Naturally Accepted As Protagonists story, to the point where there's pretty much nothing titillating, erotic, violent-in-a-sexualized-way or whatever for the moviemakers to work with. Are we really ready for an SFnal movie which doesn't center sex or romance in a way that entices male viewers?
posted by Frowner at 1:03 PM on September 27, 2017 [10 favorites]
Are we really ready for an SFnal movie which doesn't center sex or romance in a way that entices male viewers?
Yeah, I am nervous about what they had to do to get this funded.
posted by sandettie light vessel automatic at 1:09 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
Yeah, I am nervous about what they had to do to get this funded.
posted by sandettie light vessel automatic at 1:09 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
Acceptance actually does answer everything. There's a short sequence, possibly just a single paragraph but no more than three, that tells you exactly what Area X is and how it came to be.
As I recall this explanation was narrated by someone heavily traumatised and totally out of his depth from a diary handed to him by a woman who's entire life revolves around lying and written by someone who is in the midst of a decades long process to become a sparkly blue whale.
The word unreliable may not be sufficient.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 1:09 PM on September 27, 2017 [20 favorites]
As I recall this explanation was narrated by someone heavily traumatised and totally out of his depth from a diary handed to him by a woman who's entire life revolves around lying and written by someone who is in the midst of a decades long process to become a sparkly blue whale.
The word unreliable may not be sufficient.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 1:09 PM on September 27, 2017 [20 favorites]
There's already a absent relationship partner with flashbacks in the book so I'm not sure they'll have to do much of anything. (Sorry I'm trying to be vague here)
posted by selfnoise at 1:11 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by selfnoise at 1:11 PM on September 27, 2017
Grither: "What is Area X? Who knows. Who even fucking cares. Not me.""
This what I liked best about the books. And this is what the movie will inevitably fuck up.
The movie will not make me look in new ways at the mold growing under my toilet seat, or on that old pot of yogurt I forgot in the back of my fridge. It might still be good fun, but it won't have the same addling, dizzying effect as the books.
posted by chavenet at 1:11 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
This what I liked best about the books. And this is what the movie will inevitably fuck up.
The movie will not make me look in new ways at the mold growing under my toilet seat, or on that old pot of yogurt I forgot in the back of my fridge. It might still be good fun, but it won't have the same addling, dizzying effect as the books.
posted by chavenet at 1:11 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
The word unreliable may not be sufficient.
See above, re: Nabokov. Everything is unreliable and subjective. But the explanation given fits all available data. If you absolutely need an answer, it's there for you. It also really doesn't matter.
I will probably read the other two books - I found the first one gripping in a novella sort of way. Not slight exactly but quick.
Authority seems to lose a lot of people because it's definitely not slight or quick. I enjoyed it, personally, but I don't blame any readers who liked the first book but bounced off the second.
posted by tobascodagama at 1:16 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
See above, re: Nabokov. Everything is unreliable and subjective. But the explanation given fits all available data. If you absolutely need an answer, it's there for you. It also really doesn't matter.
I will probably read the other two books - I found the first one gripping in a novella sort of way. Not slight exactly but quick.
Authority seems to lose a lot of people because it's definitely not slight or quick. I enjoyed it, personally, but I don't blame any readers who liked the first book but bounced off the second.
posted by tobascodagama at 1:16 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
Metafilter: A decades long process to become a sparkly blue whale.
posted by CynicalKnight at 1:28 PM on September 27, 2017 [13 favorites]
posted by CynicalKnight at 1:28 PM on September 27, 2017 [13 favorites]
I really didn't like the Ambergris stories that Vandermeer published in the early 2000s - they seemed too willfully wacky somehow, like a lot of New Weird stuff. Mieville seemed willfully wacky at the time too, but (at the time, at least - I read the Ambergris books then and never re-read) the politics of the Mieville books combined with the wackiness and together were more satisfying than the sort of vague political gestures of the other New Weird stuff. And Annihilation has some political content, but that's not really its thing - just very general skepticism-of-power stuff...but it's so eerie, vivid and immediate. The [central being] in the [central location] at its [central task] is as visible to me as anything I can think of in literature. Not to mention the [location of the conflict] between [various characters] and the repository of [important things] and evidence of [past events]. Extremely unsettling and discombobulating.
If you like to read for landscape, the eerie and the estranging, Annihilation is an excellent book.
posted by Frowner at 1:31 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
If you like to read for landscape, the eerie and the estranging, Annihilation is an excellent book.
posted by Frowner at 1:31 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
There's already a absent relationship partner with flashbacks in the book so I'm not sure they'll have to do much of anything.
WILL OSCAR ISAAC BE DANCING?
posted by Artw at 1:32 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
WILL OSCAR ISAAC BE DANCING?
posted by Artw at 1:32 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
I read the first book and part of the second, but had no desire to continue. The trilogy is very much "New Weird," and full explanations are almost always beside the point, and usually a mistake if actually provided. I think the first book taken as a stand-alone object -- fragmentary, unexplained, truncated -- is actually the best way to experience New Weird, and so I wasn't unhappy to find myself bored with book 2 and ready to put it all down.
That said, if you do read lots of New Weird stuff, all of its weird tricks do feel a bit familiar from earlier artists -- Mieville, Link, Park, Harrison, Murakami, Ballard, the Strugatskys, much of the New Wave SF/Fantasy of the 70s, etc. VanderMeer's New Weird and broader The Weird anthologies are pretty decent recaps, but the result is that he himself doesn't feel to me to be breaking much new ground, so much as putting it together into new combinations and narratives. In the end, I worry that "weird," like the gothic from which it (partially) emerged, is more an emotional state than something genuinely novel, and once you are familiar with its gambits it loses much of its power of awe, wonder, or disturbance. But I still very much look forward to someone making a serious attempt to capture this on film, especially as FX have progressed so much beyond the moldy drips of Solaris.
posted by chortly at 1:35 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
That said, if you do read lots of New Weird stuff, all of its weird tricks do feel a bit familiar from earlier artists -- Mieville, Link, Park, Harrison, Murakami, Ballard, the Strugatskys, much of the New Wave SF/Fantasy of the 70s, etc. VanderMeer's New Weird and broader The Weird anthologies are pretty decent recaps, but the result is that he himself doesn't feel to me to be breaking much new ground, so much as putting it together into new combinations and narratives. In the end, I worry that "weird," like the gothic from which it (partially) emerged, is more an emotional state than something genuinely novel, and once you are familiar with its gambits it loses much of its power of awe, wonder, or disturbance. But I still very much look forward to someone making a serious attempt to capture this on film, especially as FX have progressed so much beyond the moldy drips of Solaris.
posted by chortly at 1:35 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
My biggest take on the applicable Vandermeer tomes was largely -
Yup. Those were books.
Made of words.
posted by Samizdata at 1:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
Yup. Those were books.
Made of words.
posted by Samizdata at 1:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee the lighthouse eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
posted by radicalawyer at 1:42 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
posted by radicalawyer at 1:42 PM on September 27, 2017 [7 favorites]
I'm a big fan of Natalie, from Leon the Professional to Black Swan. Is this going to be a sci-fi trilogy though? Because she has never done that before. Ever. Not once. Shut up.
Also it said from the writer of Ex Machina and it wasn't Charlie Brooker. Just admit it's an OK fanfic of Black Mirror. And it used Falling Water as a set, which was pretty cool.
If you haven't seen Dredd before, it has Lena Headey playing a ruthless gang leader defending her turf. It's sci-fi Cersei.
posted by adept256 at 1:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Also it said from the writer of Ex Machina and it wasn't Charlie Brooker. Just admit it's an OK fanfic of Black Mirror. And it used Falling Water as a set, which was pretty cool.
If you haven't seen Dredd before, it has Lena Headey playing a ruthless gang leader defending her turf. It's sci-fi Cersei.
posted by adept256 at 1:45 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
And it used Falling Water as a set, which was pretty cool.
It's actually the Juvet Landscape Hotel .
posted by Artw at 1:57 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
It's actually the Juvet Landscape Hotel .
posted by Artw at 1:57 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
Vandermeer does a really amazing thing -- when mundane things are discussed, he describes what they look like, and then when the fantasy elements show up, he describes how they feel, which makes them terrifying. There are these moments where you know how something feels but not what it looks like, and it's like that thing is creeping up behind you and you can't turn around. It makes these books, even the slower ones, really stick with you and propel you through the story.
So it's weird to see all the rainbow CGI imagery of the trailer, because yeah, I guess that's what it is described as looking like, eventually, but it lacks a kind of unknowable-terror feeling that made the books memorable.
posted by Rinku at 2:26 PM on September 27, 2017 [13 favorites]
So it's weird to see all the rainbow CGI imagery of the trailer, because yeah, I guess that's what it is described as looking like, eventually, but it lacks a kind of unknowable-terror feeling that made the books memorable.
posted by Rinku at 2:26 PM on September 27, 2017 [13 favorites]
I loooooovvvved these books and am feeling quietly confident that this film will be a decent stab at an adaptation.
posted by misterbee at 3:07 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by misterbee at 3:07 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Like many of you I bogged down art the second book and have had the third on my nightstand seemingly forever while I justify reading Dune one more time instead.
I think this film will do well in the wake of Arrival. I do wonder if they'll have to show us more than they should.
posted by Kafkaesque at 3:19 PM on September 27, 2017
I think this film will do well in the wake of Arrival. I do wonder if they'll have to show us more than they should.
posted by Kafkaesque at 3:19 PM on September 27, 2017
I'm not familiar with the books and the trailer doesn't really do much for me but I've liked most of Garland's work so far so I'll probably go see it.
posted by octothorpe at 3:36 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by octothorpe at 3:36 PM on September 27, 2017
I devoured this series, and the farther in I got the more I hated it.
posted by wotsac at 3:41 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by wotsac at 3:41 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
I devoured this series, and the farther in I got the more I hated it.
Ah, like the Thomas Covenant books!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:51 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
Ah, like the Thomas Covenant books!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:51 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
I'm on my third viewing of this trailer and I know I'm going to watch it another five times in the next twenty four hours
I'm more excited about this than I am about the new Blade Runner, and I am very, very excited about the new Blade Runner.
posted by thecaddy at 3:55 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
I'm more excited about this than I am about the new Blade Runner, and I am very, very excited about the new Blade Runner.
posted by thecaddy at 3:55 PM on September 27, 2017 [5 favorites]
Wow, they show the lighthouse as a lighthouse? Will it be both a real structure and inverted? How will I know if it's become a threatening vagina-like space that will kill you/warp your reality???
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:56 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:56 PM on September 27, 2017 [3 favorites]
I thought the latter books were fine, but they were tantalizingly close to something incredible and just didn't quite reach it, which was frustrating... I can't really even explain the missing element, but the tone and imagery was great, maybe just the pacing was really off? I can think of a lot of scenes from the latter books that I really, really love, they just didn't gel into a whole better than those parts. I still really liked the whole trilogy, though.
posted by jason_steakums at 4:04 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by jason_steakums at 4:04 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
For folks who want a different bent on New Weird and bounced off Vandermeer, I basically never hear KJ Bishop's The Etched City discussed but it is spectacular. Like Gabriel Garcia Marquez did 60 years of acid.
posted by WidgetAlley at 4:15 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
posted by WidgetAlley at 4:15 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
I thought the latter books were fine, but they were tantalizingly close to something incredible and just didn't quite reach it, which was frustrating... I can't really even explain the missing element
This may be a New Weird thing, because Mieville does this all the time too: As the narrative heads toward climax, the thing that has been providing the tension sort of deflates and is cast aside without resolution. That question that kept you turning pages is ultimately unimportant and/or unknowable, which has a certain ring of truth to it, but man does that ever deny you catharsis. And it makes sense, because in the case of the Southern Reach the main point is how unknowable a truly alien intelligence would be to us, so it would have been disappointing to have the aliens pop up and explain everything like the end of AI, but it still subverts our expectations of fiction.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 4:43 PM on September 27, 2017 [9 favorites]
This may be a New Weird thing, because Mieville does this all the time too: As the narrative heads toward climax, the thing that has been providing the tension sort of deflates and is cast aside without resolution. That question that kept you turning pages is ultimately unimportant and/or unknowable, which has a certain ring of truth to it, but man does that ever deny you catharsis. And it makes sense, because in the case of the Southern Reach the main point is how unknowable a truly alien intelligence would be to us, so it would have been disappointing to have the aliens pop up and explain everything like the end of AI, but it still subverts our expectations of fiction.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 4:43 PM on September 27, 2017 [9 favorites]
Honestly, I wonder how they'll manage to make it misogynist and sex it up for the movie version. I wasn't absolutely overwhelmed with how Vandermeer wrote the women characters - as so often with male writers, I felt like his women characters didn't really seem to think about or experience typical gendered stuff, and were a bit more like male characters with the pronouns swapped out than anything else
One thing I liked about the book is that the protagonist, though female, copes maladaptively by being kind of remote and shut off, emotionally, which is a way that women sometimes are IRL but rarely in books or movies. IIRC in the trilogy that way of coping has repercussions for her -- in her marriage, with her colleagues -- that I remember understanding to be partly gendered, though its possible that was a subtextual reading.
Anyway, I think Natalie Portman is miscast. Judging by the trailer and her previous performances, she's going to play the character as fragile/vulnerable, which is boring and stereotypical for a female character, and not true to the book. There's a moment in the trailer where her husband physically pulls away from her and she looks hurt, which is the opposite of their dynamic in the books.
I'm not sure who I would cast instead but maybe a Michelle Rodriguez or Rosario Dawson or Daisy Ridley or Francis McDormand, though I guess McDormand is a little old now. Just someone who can do steely, who can do remote.
I'm a bit concerned about this aspect of the movie, tbh, because while I enjoyed Ex Machina believing that the robots were the heroes, I recently re-read The Beach (which director Alex Garland wrote) and there are two main female characters: smart but amoral leader, who is described as being overweight every time she appears, and beautiful object of desire who has a boyfriend but encourages the protagonist's crush on her and throws a fit in the middle of a crisis because he's not paying enough attention to her. It's enough of a thing in the book that it made me think back on that subplot of Ex Machina differently like -- yikes, does Alex Garland unironically believe in The Injustice Of The Friend Zone? It seems to be a theme with him.
posted by mrmurbles at 5:15 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
One thing I liked about the book is that the protagonist, though female, copes maladaptively by being kind of remote and shut off, emotionally, which is a way that women sometimes are IRL but rarely in books or movies. IIRC in the trilogy that way of coping has repercussions for her -- in her marriage, with her colleagues -- that I remember understanding to be partly gendered, though its possible that was a subtextual reading.
Anyway, I think Natalie Portman is miscast. Judging by the trailer and her previous performances, she's going to play the character as fragile/vulnerable, which is boring and stereotypical for a female character, and not true to the book. There's a moment in the trailer where her husband physically pulls away from her and she looks hurt, which is the opposite of their dynamic in the books.
I'm not sure who I would cast instead but maybe a Michelle Rodriguez or Rosario Dawson or Daisy Ridley or Francis McDormand, though I guess McDormand is a little old now. Just someone who can do steely, who can do remote.
I'm a bit concerned about this aspect of the movie, tbh, because while I enjoyed Ex Machina believing that the robots were the heroes, I recently re-read The Beach (which director Alex Garland wrote) and there are two main female characters: smart but amoral leader, who is described as being overweight every time she appears, and beautiful object of desire who has a boyfriend but encourages the protagonist's crush on her and throws a fit in the middle of a crisis because he's not paying enough attention to her. It's enough of a thing in the book that it made me think back on that subplot of Ex Machina differently like -- yikes, does Alex Garland unironically believe in The Injustice Of The Friend Zone? It seems to be a theme with him.
posted by mrmurbles at 5:15 PM on September 27, 2017 [8 favorites]
So, is Natalie Portman doing this because she saw how well Amy Adams did in Arrival? Because I really thought NP was done and done with sci-fi/fantasy. I mean, if she wouldn't return to dip her ladle in the Marvel money pool as Jane Foster (although there were reportedly other factors at work as well), I'm surprised she's back to genre work. And I say that as a fan.
posted by the sobsister at 5:21 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by the sobsister at 5:21 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
I devoured this series, and the farther in I got the more I hated it.
Ah, like the Thomas Covenant books!
I loathed that series by the end of the first book, never read another. I remember nothing about it except a sense of outrage over the shameless derivativeness, nay outright plagiarism.
Eh? This post isn’t about that series? Sorry, I just get worked up.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 5:32 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
Ah, like the Thomas Covenant books!
I loathed that series by the end of the first book, never read another. I remember nothing about it except a sense of outrage over the shameless derivativeness, nay outright plagiarism.
Eh? This post isn’t about that series? Sorry, I just get worked up.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 5:32 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
You've hit on a good point, mrmurbles, one which I really enjoyed about the book: the protagonist's introversion. The books did a good job showing how her self-contained intellectual way of approaching the world is continually misinterpreted by those around her--with disastrous results for some. I felt this was pretty realistic, as women with this level of inwardness that are content to be alone in their own minds are not represented often in popular culture as heroines. I'll have to reserve judgement until I see the movie, but I can see how a more stoic actress would have reflected the book character better.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 5:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [9 favorites]
posted by Kitty Stardust at 5:36 PM on September 27, 2017 [9 favorites]
the main point is how unknowable a truly alien intelligence would be to us
What’s annoying is that Annihilation is redolent of stories that handled this in interesting and satisfying ways. But it in Vandemere’s hands it’s just... a mess?
posted by wotsac at 5:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
What’s annoying is that Annihilation is redolent of stories that handled this in interesting and satisfying ways. But it in Vandemere’s hands it’s just... a mess?
posted by wotsac at 5:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
Anyway, I think Natalie Portman is miscast.
Among other things, The Biologist is supposed to be at least part Asian, though which specific ethnicity is not specified.
And Jennifer Jason Leigh's character is supposed to be half Native American, presumably Seminole.
The novels don't really do anything with those facts, but I'm just saying.
posted by tobascodagama at 5:57 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
Among other things, The Biologist is supposed to be at least part Asian, though which specific ethnicity is not specified.
And Jennifer Jason Leigh's character is supposed to be half Native American, presumably Seminole.
The novels don't really do anything with those facts, but I'm just saying.
posted by tobascodagama at 5:57 PM on September 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
I also don't blame anyone for bouncing off the second book. But I loved it. I think I've got a thing for storylines where government bureacracy encounters the unknowable, but tries to impose order and rules anyways.
My favorite part of the second was the part of it that felt like this ghost story where the ghost is haunting the bureaucracy like it's a house, haunting the org chart and the morale and the operating procedures and the work/life balance of the staff, but ALSO maybe haunting the physical lives of everyone as an imminent unknowable danger. That worked so well, but I feel like that alone could be separated out into its own story where it can breathe, where it isn't competing with everything else in the book. Like it needs to be in some real slow Weird le Carré type story, like a Tim Powers Declare kind of thing.
Also, speaking of Powers, where's my Fault Lines premium cable show, Hollywood? I want that so bad as like the first series to start liberally cribbing from the exciting new television ideas Twin Peaks season 3 created.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:18 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
My favorite part of the second was the part of it that felt like this ghost story where the ghost is haunting the bureaucracy like it's a house, haunting the org chart and the morale and the operating procedures and the work/life balance of the staff, but ALSO maybe haunting the physical lives of everyone as an imminent unknowable danger. That worked so well, but I feel like that alone could be separated out into its own story where it can breathe, where it isn't competing with everything else in the book. Like it needs to be in some real slow Weird le Carré type story, like a Tim Powers Declare kind of thing.
Also, speaking of Powers, where's my Fault Lines premium cable show, Hollywood? I want that so bad as like the first series to start liberally cribbing from the exciting new television ideas Twin Peaks season 3 created.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:18 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
the main point is how unknowable a truly alien intelligence would be to us, so it would have been disappointing to have the aliens pop up and explain everything like the end of AI, but it still subverts our expectations of fiction.
The problem is that this is the same subversion much New Weird engages in. On the upside, Frowner's comment above caused me to pull down my copy of Perdido Street Station and crack it open at random, to see how well it's stood up, and how unfair may be to compare Annihilation disfavorably against it. And wow, it's got its problems, but its really not just the politics that makes Mieville different. That prose -- the riotous mix of grubby physicality, multicultural cacophony, hard-boiled melodrama, and metaphysical grandiosity -- is really quite fun, and much as I enjoy a repressed introvert confronting the unknowable in SF (which is also the mode in many of the folks I list above, like Harrison, Murakami, Ballard, Lem, the Strugatskys, etc), it's also quite a relief when something like Perdido breaks so raucously from the mold.
posted by chortly at 6:31 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
The problem is that this is the same subversion much New Weird engages in. On the upside, Frowner's comment above caused me to pull down my copy of Perdido Street Station and crack it open at random, to see how well it's stood up, and how unfair may be to compare Annihilation disfavorably against it. And wow, it's got its problems, but its really not just the politics that makes Mieville different. That prose -- the riotous mix of grubby physicality, multicultural cacophony, hard-boiled melodrama, and metaphysical grandiosity -- is really quite fun, and much as I enjoy a repressed introvert confronting the unknowable in SF (which is also the mode in many of the folks I list above, like Harrison, Murakami, Ballard, Lem, the Strugatskys, etc), it's also quite a relief when something like Perdido breaks so raucously from the mold.
posted by chortly at 6:31 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
I read the books last spring, and they hit me pretty hard on multiple levels of who I am and what I was going through at the time: the New Weird, which I found I really enjoyed; the exact descriptions of how the biologist felt about the habitats she studied and became connected to, which I related heavily to; and the underlying story of grief and loss, which I was contending mightily with at the time. So many moments I had to just put the book down to either reflect or sob. The combination may unduly color my perception of the overall quality of the books, but oof. Probably no getting around that for me.
I hope I enjoy the movie too, but man. I guess I hope it's not TOO much like the books, actually. They were impactful and cathartic but I'm not sure I can handle that shit again, not quite yet.
(also though, I don't really know who I would have cast, but like, it wouldn't have been Natalie Portman?? maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.)
posted by Ornate Rocksnail at 7:22 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
I hope I enjoy the movie too, but man. I guess I hope it's not TOO much like the books, actually. They were impactful and cathartic but I'm not sure I can handle that shit again, not quite yet.
(also though, I don't really know who I would have cast, but like, it wouldn't have been Natalie Portman?? maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.)
posted by Ornate Rocksnail at 7:22 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Ok, this has officially piqued my interest and enthusiasm. The first book was pretty good (shame the second one wasn't, no idea about the third).
posted by turbid dahlia at 8:18 PM on September 27, 2017
posted by turbid dahlia at 8:18 PM on September 27, 2017
One thing I liked about the book is that the protagonist, though female, copes maladaptively by being kind of remote and shut off, emotionally
Hey, she's just doing it the best she can.
posted by dephlogisticated at 8:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Hey, she's just doing it the best she can.
posted by dephlogisticated at 8:40 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Hoping they adapt the second and third books, if only for a
(SPOILER) ----
---- kaiju-sized Natalie Portman smashing the fuck out of some tanks
posted by misterbee at 8:41 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
(SPOILER) ----
---- kaiju-sized Natalie Portman smashing the fuck out of some tanks
posted by misterbee at 8:41 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
I discovered Annihilation by virtue of an AskMe about books that would give you the same feeling as the first time you played Myst, and I still think that suggestion fuckin' nailed. it.
I'm refusing to get excited about the movie, because every movie I've gotten excited about in the last year or so has sucked terribly, and I really don't want this to suck.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:04 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
I'm refusing to get excited about the movie, because every movie I've gotten excited about in the last year or so has sucked terribly, and I really don't want this to suck.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:04 PM on September 27, 2017 [4 favorites]
In defence of "Authority", it's one of only two written books made out of words on pages to have managed to give me a physical jump-scare, at least since I became an adult and Doctor Who novelisations stopped giving me nightmares. (The other was "The Road". Both scares related to surprises in confined spaces.)
posted by chappell, ambrose at 10:56 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
posted by chappell, ambrose at 10:56 PM on September 27, 2017 [6 favorites]
And actually in defence of Book 2 more generally, I really liked it, although it wasn't at all where I was expecting the series to go.
I did get stuck on the island in Book 3, though, and it's probably too late to pick it up again.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 11:00 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
I did get stuck on the island in Book 3, though, and it's probably too late to pick it up again.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 11:00 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
It's a movie, not a book. Continuing to compare movies to books has only given and will forever give you grief.
posted by Brocktoon at 11:58 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Brocktoon at 11:58 PM on September 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
*spoilers*
I loved Annihilation - I took it as a powerful story of love and loss, about the complex relationship the biologist had with her husband - the way they both completed and failed each other, drifting apart when she finds out he selfishly volunteered for the 11th Expedition, and then regret at not making things right when he did not return. She eventually finds his lost journal in Area X, and upon reading it, discovers all the entries are addressed to her, as a gift to her upon his return, proving to her that even though they parted on bad terms she was still foremost on his mind. His expedition ended in disaster, like her own, with everyone else dead. In his last entry he says he is going deeper into Area X, to see for himself what lies beyond.
Annihilation turns out to be written as the biologist's journal, which she adds to the pile of journals written by prior expeditions, all lost and never to be retrieved. In the last page she writes a final message to the reader, which completes the novel so well, capturing her rediscovered love and longing for her husband, and total emptiness within her...
---
I plan to continue on into Area X, to go as far as I can before it is too late. I will follow my husband up the coast, up past the island, even. I don't believe I'll find him - I don't need to find him - but I want to see what he saw. I want to feel him close, as if he is in the room. And, if I'm honest, I can't shake the sense that he is still here, somewhere, even if utterly transformed - in the eye of a dolphin, in the touch of an uprising of moss, anywhere and everywhere. Perhaps I'll even find a boat abandoned on a deserted beach, if I'm lucky, and some sign of what happened next. I could be content with just that, even knowing what I know.
This part I will do alone, leaving you behind. Don't follow. I'm well beyond you now, and traveling very fast.
Has there always been someone like me to bury the bodies, to have regrets, to carry on after everyone else was dead?
I am the last casualty of both the eleventh and the twelfth expeditions.
I am not returning home.
---
In some sense, it doesn't matter what Area X is at all, or that nothing was really explained. It's a story of feelings and emotions, not facts and plotting. If I was the director I'd write the movie this way, and have Natalie Portman narrate the last words as a haunting close over the spectacular beauty of the coast.
posted by xdvesper at 3:44 AM on September 28, 2017 [10 favorites]
I loved Annihilation - I took it as a powerful story of love and loss, about the complex relationship the biologist had with her husband - the way they both completed and failed each other, drifting apart when she finds out he selfishly volunteered for the 11th Expedition, and then regret at not making things right when he did not return. She eventually finds his lost journal in Area X, and upon reading it, discovers all the entries are addressed to her, as a gift to her upon his return, proving to her that even though they parted on bad terms she was still foremost on his mind. His expedition ended in disaster, like her own, with everyone else dead. In his last entry he says he is going deeper into Area X, to see for himself what lies beyond.
Annihilation turns out to be written as the biologist's journal, which she adds to the pile of journals written by prior expeditions, all lost and never to be retrieved. In the last page she writes a final message to the reader, which completes the novel so well, capturing her rediscovered love and longing for her husband, and total emptiness within her...
---
I plan to continue on into Area X, to go as far as I can before it is too late. I will follow my husband up the coast, up past the island, even. I don't believe I'll find him - I don't need to find him - but I want to see what he saw. I want to feel him close, as if he is in the room. And, if I'm honest, I can't shake the sense that he is still here, somewhere, even if utterly transformed - in the eye of a dolphin, in the touch of an uprising of moss, anywhere and everywhere. Perhaps I'll even find a boat abandoned on a deserted beach, if I'm lucky, and some sign of what happened next. I could be content with just that, even knowing what I know.
This part I will do alone, leaving you behind. Don't follow. I'm well beyond you now, and traveling very fast.
Has there always been someone like me to bury the bodies, to have regrets, to carry on after everyone else was dead?
I am the last casualty of both the eleventh and the twelfth expeditions.
I am not returning home.
---
In some sense, it doesn't matter what Area X is at all, or that nothing was really explained. It's a story of feelings and emotions, not facts and plotting. If I was the director I'd write the movie this way, and have Natalie Portman narrate the last words as a haunting close over the spectacular beauty of the coast.
posted by xdvesper at 3:44 AM on September 28, 2017 [10 favorites]
I'm not sure what I think of the trailer but I wanted to check in on the side of liking the second book.
It had a vibe of claustrophobic bureaucracy that I appreciated.
posted by jclarkin at 5:59 AM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]
It had a vibe of claustrophobic bureaucracy that I appreciated.
posted by jclarkin at 5:59 AM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]
tobascodagama: "Acceptance actually does answer everything. There's a short sequence, possibly just a single paragraph but no more than three, that tells you exactly what Area X is and how it came to be."
Oooh really?? I'm not having any luck finding this, what does it say or can you give me the gist of it? Feel free to mefi mail me if you're trying to avoid spoilers in thread.
posted by Grither at 7:51 AM on September 28, 2017
Oooh really?? I'm not having any luck finding this, what does it say or can you give me the gist of it? Feel free to mefi mail me if you're trying to avoid spoilers in thread.
posted by Grither at 7:51 AM on September 28, 2017
I read the Area X trilogy while spending afternoons on the porch with my big old white rabbit while she slowly faded away, so good or bad, it's always going to occupy a strange place in my mind.
posted by lagomorphius at 9:47 AM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by lagomorphius at 9:47 AM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]
I'm not having any luck finding this, what does it say or can you give me the gist of it?
I don't think I could do a better job than this Goodreads thread. Anybody else who wants spoilers for Acceptance can click through as well.
posted by tobascodagama at 10:19 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
I don't think I could do a better job than this Goodreads thread. Anybody else who wants spoilers for Acceptance can click through as well.
posted by tobascodagama at 10:19 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
(I think it's probably taking certain things too literally, but it's an accurate summary of all the clues that are found in the story nonetheless.)
posted by tobascodagama at 10:22 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by tobascodagama at 10:22 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
(VanderMeer denying familiarity with various inspirations people want to ascribe to this book is sort of an amusing theme. It often gets called "Lovecraftian" as well, which he denies with particular vehemence, as he doesn't care for Lovecraft. I think the only writer I've seen him claim as direct inspiration for anything is Nabokov. There's a short story in City of Saints and Madmen where the viewpoint character literally receives an invitation to a beheading.)
That is really strange to me because I haven't read up too much on VanderMeer and just presumed all along that Lovecraft was a huge influence as he seems to be lurking everywhere in Area X. He also includes Lovecraft in his weird fiction anthology.
posted by lagomorphius at 11:23 AM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]
That is really strange to me because I haven't read up too much on VanderMeer and just presumed all along that Lovecraft was a huge influence as he seems to be lurking everywhere in Area X. He also includes Lovecraft in his weird fiction anthology.
posted by lagomorphius at 11:23 AM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]
God, I hated "Control" as a character name.
Not denying your right to hate the name as a stylistic choice, but in fairness it's explicitly linked to the character of Control in the Le Carré novels; and the character is completely out of control, ignorant of what's really going out, outwitted and frustrated at every turn by the (absent) Director, the Deputy Director (who really runs the organisation, despite Control's attempts to take charge) and his own mother. All three characters are female, and much stronger and more competent than Control. And he doesn't end up "winning" against any of them.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 11:44 AM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]
Not denying your right to hate the name as a stylistic choice, but in fairness it's explicitly linked to the character of Control in the Le Carré novels; and the character is completely out of control, ignorant of what's really going out, outwitted and frustrated at every turn by the (absent) Director, the Deputy Director (who really runs the organisation, despite Control's attempts to take charge) and his own mother. All three characters are female, and much stronger and more competent than Control. And he doesn't end up "winning" against any of them.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 11:44 AM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]
Are you sure it's not a reference to this Control instead?
posted by tobascodagama at 11:51 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by tobascodagama at 11:51 AM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]
Stopped lurking and finally joined JUST to say
- selfnoise, I'm in. Which book is up first?
- WidgetAlley, 100% agree on Etched City
- It seems like the only movies I look forward to anymore weave together mycology, rabbits, lighthouses, and absent space/time. Convenient that this meets all the criteria.
I love these books so much,* but am properly cautious about this. Portman is miscast, for one.
The books sort of revolve around the written word as records (the text in the Tower; the diaries left behind; assessments and experiments and recordings and moldering files) and about internalities becoming (forcibly) external--and that'll got lost if characters can't muse about internal thoughts.
Also, one of the things that really struck me in the first book was the feeling of complete unreliability. The tower is a tower; it is a hole; it is a presence; it is an absence. It will be very hard to represent that visually or in a way that doesn't seem heavy handed.
*The Creature's scrawlings actually inspired an insane D&D cleric I had...
posted by flibbertigibbet at 12:21 PM on September 29, 2017 [3 favorites]
The books sort of revolve around the written word as records (the text in the Tower; the diaries left behind; assessments and experiments and recordings and moldering files) and about internalities becoming (forcibly) external--and that'll got lost if characters can't muse about internal thoughts.
Also, one of the things that really struck me in the first book was the feeling of complete unreliability. The tower is a tower; it is a hole; it is a presence; it is an absence. It will be very hard to represent that visually or in a way that doesn't seem heavy handed.
*The Creature's scrawlings actually inspired an insane D&D cleric I had...
posted by flibbertigibbet at 12:21 PM on September 29, 2017 [3 favorites]
It's got the interviews back at the base, so if it's handled as a frame story of her describing the trip, they can get at some of that weird unreliability there.
I liked the Annihilation okay, and I think I finished Authority but it was enough of a slog that I didn't continue on to Acceptance. I loved the Ambergris books though, especially Shriek. That's a book where a lot of imagery stayed with me for a long time: the war's exotic weapons, the description of the mass disappearance. I can't remember if the exploration of the caves was in Shriek or Finch, but that was great too. I didn't think as highly of Finch as a whole, which had a very different tone from the earlier Ambergris stuff, but that city is such a rich setting.
I see his newest book has also already had the film rights optioned. I didn't even know there was a newest book!
posted by vibratory manner of working at 2:12 PM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]
I liked the Annihilation okay, and I think I finished Authority but it was enough of a slog that I didn't continue on to Acceptance. I loved the Ambergris books though, especially Shriek. That's a book where a lot of imagery stayed with me for a long time: the war's exotic weapons, the description of the mass disappearance. I can't remember if the exploration of the caves was in Shriek or Finch, but that was great too. I didn't think as highly of Finch as a whole, which had a very different tone from the earlier Ambergris stuff, but that city is such a rich setting.
I see his newest book has also already had the film rights optioned. I didn't even know there was a newest book!
posted by vibratory manner of working at 2:12 PM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]
> It's got the interviews back at the base, so if it's handled as a frame story of her describing the trip, they can get at some of that weird unreliability there.
Yes! That could work very well! What you see happening on screen in Area X gradually diverges from the narratives you're getting in the debriefings, at first just a little, then a lot, and then what's happening on screen keeps going after those narratives stop. That could sneak up on the audience and spook them very effectively. Not in exactly the same way as the internal clues of unreliability of the book's narrator, but pretty similar. The story about biologist and the owl from book three could make nice ending to the movie.
Like a lot of you, I really didn't like book two, but I was interested enough to keep going. Book three, I my opinion, was a lot better, still not as good as the first book, but I enjoyed it. It's back in Area X again, and, among other things, there's a section that continues the biologist's narrative from book one and is really nice.
posted by nangar at 8:41 AM on September 30, 2017 [2 favorites]
Yes! That could work very well! What you see happening on screen in Area X gradually diverges from the narratives you're getting in the debriefings, at first just a little, then a lot, and then what's happening on screen keeps going after those narratives stop. That could sneak up on the audience and spook them very effectively. Not in exactly the same way as the internal clues of unreliability of the book's narrator, but pretty similar. The story about biologist and the owl from book three could make nice ending to the movie.
Like a lot of you, I really didn't like book two, but I was interested enough to keep going. Book three, I my opinion, was a lot better, still not as good as the first book, but I enjoyed it. It's back in Area X again, and, among other things, there's a section that continues the biologist's narrative from book one and is really nice.
posted by nangar at 8:41 AM on September 30, 2017 [2 favorites]
Literally just finished Annihilation and was sort of meh, though that's totally on me; I'm too sloppy a reader for atmosphere to really work a lot of the time, and it is an atmosphere-heavy book. Not sure I would've read through if the trailer hadn't given me supplementary images* for my dumb brain. I'll probably give the other books a shot, though I'm more jazzed about the movie.
*Especially those deer! I love the Uncanny Mimicry of the Mundane thing, like DeForge's Spotting Deer or the ant colony in Jon Lewis' True Swamp.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:17 PM on October 7, 2017
*Especially those deer! I love the Uncanny Mimicry of the Mundane thing, like DeForge's Spotting Deer or the ant colony in Jon Lewis' True Swamp.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:17 PM on October 7, 2017
« Older 🚶 | Zuzana Růžičková (1927-2017) Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 12:32 PM on September 27, 2017 [12 favorites]