Buffini's Blog

It should be noted before I go off on my rant that I am a bit of a Superman fanatic – There is no other superhero that can ever come close to bettering him in my eyes. It always  surprises me a little though, the attitudes to the different heros and their various personas.

Take for example Batman – a hero certainly, but a dark and moody, broody type of a chap. Most people I know consider Batman to be cooler than Superman, and this tends to follow through for most of the mainline heros out there – The darker, cooler, crankier, etc… that they are, the more popular they tend to be. It seems to be a case of we want our heros, much like our celebrities and so on, to misbehave and be “bad boys” in order to be worthy of our adulation.

But why? What is it about the bad boy mystique that attracts us over the simple messages espoused by others like good old Clark? Its something thats fascinated me for a long time, and has (it seems to me anyway..) strong ties into people’s morbid fascination with fame and celebrity, the need to believe in the supernatural, and all of that other jazz.

A related topic is the way that Superman, being damn near omnipotent, omnisicient, and pretty much omnipresent, is frequently portrayed as a Messiah figure. Think about it – people worship him, pray to him for salvation, curse him when things go wrong; he is the effective manifest saviour of the world, and because of his nature he can never back down from that mile high pedestal which the masses have placed him on. This in itself is a massive research topic, and one deserving of a post all of it’s own. A nice little weekend project I feel

Has finally, oh so finally, shipped from Amazon. But, genius that I am, I manged to send it back home to the mammy’s address instead of my work address, or even my own home address. After waiting since last May for it to be published in November, and the since February for it to ship, you’d think that I might, just maybe, have had the cop-on to send it to the right place…

But oh no.

Anyway, for those who dont know, its the final collected volume of the 4 Volume collected Sandman series. The series as a whole is beautifully and expertly written by one Mr. Neil Gaiman (yes I would have his babies), and I’m busting to read the goddamn thing at this stage…

This is a placeholder until I find time later on to write a whopping big post on exactly what I thought of the film, analysis and blah de blah blah. And make no mistake – it was beautiful and a great monster of a post is the only thing that will do this beast justice.

Image by kwc via FlickrWent to the launch of Mr. Gaiman’s newest, The Graveyard Book, last night. Great experience. Was initially worried I wouldn’t get in because it was a ticket event, but turned out I needn’t have worried (or turned up quite so early…) as tickets were just to get a seat for the reading.

Listened to the Master read from his new piece (unfortunately I’d already read the book while in the que, got bored waiting), and he then did a Q&A. Some other git got my question in – Neil spent a month recently in China on a research trip, and wanted to ask was this for his latest work and what type of effort would it be – and he stated that it will be a non-fiction book revolving around mtyh, 7th (I think) century Chinese legend, and various such things. He has a very distinctive sense of humour, warm and dry at the same time, almost giving the impression of being a big kid who’s delighted that people came to see his latest fun and games. ( The picture here is not mine, but was similar enough that I thought it added to the post, thanks to original photographer linked at photo)

He told several funny stories, my favourite of which revolved around the two versions of the book, one illustrated by Dave McKean, long time collaborator, and one by Chris Riddell. Story goes like so (as far as my caffeine addled wits can recall):
Neil and Dave standing talking at the official launch of The Grveyard Book when Dave’s young son comes barrelling up: “Daddy Daddy!! Guess what!! Look, the book was illustrated by Chris Riddell, he’s like my favourite illustrator ever!!”. Silence from Dave, the kind of silence that can only be produced when horribly embarassed by a well meaning loved one. “Can we go and get him to sign my book daddy, please please please??”. “um, yeah, sure..” says Dave , and allows him to tugged away by his wide-eyed little boy, presumably glowing beetroot red. If I was Neil at this point I would have been rolling on the floor, struggling to breathe as the tears of laughter course down my face…

Someone also asked will he ever go back to comics, to which he replied that he was currently extremely behind schedule working on 2 part Batman story, apparently on page 25 of 32. Of part 1. Something to look forward to….

Neil very generously agreed to sign anything bought in store last night, plus 2 other items people had brought along, which suited me perfectly as I had bought the book, plus brough my copy of Absolute Sandman Vol. 1, and my copy of 1602. Signed all 3, and did little sketches in Sandman and Graveyard Book, see pictures below.

A very fun event, and massive thank you to Neil for taking the time out to talk to everyone, and spend so much time signing and personalising sketches/messages for everyone.

I am a happy fan-boy.

Image via Wikipedia Its getting frightening now. More so because I’m starting the course in November and still think I can pull off the 50,000 word book. On the bright side the plot is starting to flesh out a little bit, which, on the down side, only gives me a deeper insight into how much more work there is to be done.

Thought I’d start off the day with a little comic talk. Recently bought (had bought for me ) a copy of V for Vendetta, and it was the first time I’d read it. Shameful, I know. I saw the movie when it came out a few years ago, and was a big fan, but couldn’t understand why people kept telling me it wasn’t as good as the book, and why the inestimable Mr. Moore wanted nothing to do with it. I finally get it.

While the film could well have been a decent stand up piece on its own, when compared to the book it was a poor shadow. It lacked the depth and insight into the characters that were the heart of the book, for example, there was next to nothing about the Leader in the film, and Evey’s character wasn’t correctly interpreted as the terrified child-woman that is depicted through the dialogue and images. All through the book you get a real feel for her character, from the first clumsy frightened attempts to make money selling her body, which dives into not only her despair at her life and all thats been taken away from her, but also the state of the society as a whole. Its the ultimate dog eat dog, survival of the fittest world with the just the faintest veneer of order and civilization thrown over it.

Coming back to finish this post after a few days of hiatus and hangovers. Its amazing the extra insights into someone’s work you can gain given extra time and re-reading. One thing that struck me this morning is the relationship between Cain and Abel in Sandman. Cain is the elder domineering, generally assholey dude who murders his brother on a regular basis. But wha tyo’ve got to consider there is the vicious cycle that he finds himself in. Back in the dawn days he killed his brother in a fit of rage and so became branded for all time as the first murderer. This then plays out over and over again in the dream. But, and this is the important bit, you get occasional flashes of insight into the character that speak of an unholy amount of pain caused by this recurring action, and the odd flash of tenderness towards his half-wit fluffiness and light brother, who basically just wants them to be friends. At times it seems like he wants to break out of it but, knowing that he can’t, it just serves to make him all the more bitter and enraged. I’ve re-read it a couple of time and, as I say, this just came to me this morning. Amazing what careful thought can give you.

Recently subscribed to Neil Gaiman’s blog, and reading some of the comments on it and what people have to say on other sites it got me thinking.

I’m a big fan of the Gaimanator’s work, so much so that I’ve just ordered over €100 worth of his work off Amazon, including Vols 1 and 2 of The Sandman. Never read it but I hear its fantastic work. I already have several of his other works, including 1602, a fantastic piece set in 1602 in the Marvel Universe.

Frequently people write into him asking, How can I become a good writer, What are your secrets, blah blah blah, and to do him credit he doesn’t just tell them to fup off, he does give a reasonable answer to people. But a separate question still stands of what actually makes a good story?

For me personally, its got to have characters with real depth, or at least the possibility of depth. Characters that are blatantly two dimensional are, to put it bluntly, crap. Similarly the universe it’s set in needs to provide a convincing backdrop to the story, so it can’t be hard sci-fi set in pinky pony land. You’ve got to have some real meat to the story, something that will draw you in and hold your attention, something that will physically stop you from putting that beast down until you’ve milked every last drop of literary goodness from it.

The more I write and think about this, the harder it actually appears to be to quantify… Obviously there are always different criteria for different people. Some of my favourites would include the almighty HitchHikers Guide to the Galaxy, the Discworld series, a short story called Flowers for Algernon, I am Legend, and sweet Jeebus too many to write down. But its an interesting subject, one of those things that drags you off on a tangent and wont let you go.

Maybe that means that the question itself qualifies as a story