Darkwing Duck

Duckwing Duck premiered on September 8, 1991. I can't believe it's been twenty years. However, and my mom had this same reaction, that means I was already EIGHT! To me, it felt like Darkwing Duck had always been around but I guess it's just all of Disney Afternoon being lumped together.

Abarat on Sale!

Remember how I tried to tell you about the wonderful series, Abarat?

The publisher is offering a special deal through November 9th or while supplies last where all three are on sale!

You can purchase all three books for just $24.99 and that includes shipping. Amazon is charging $33 for them.

http://www.bookperk.com/abarat-trilogy?utm_source=nl_n110&utm_medium=eml&utm_content=offer&utm_campaign=/abarat-trilogy&hc_guid=2aa75f4e-1783-474f-9163-6a1adc36eec8

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom

I had heard mixed reviews about Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom but it has Beckett, I loved author A.C. Crispin's Han Solo prequel series and I basically read everything about POTC anyway...

So, I loved it and to illustrate one of the points why I love it, I'm going to use the Bechdel test. It's still not a litmus test for me but I think it'll be useful here.

1. It has to have at least two women in it Yep
2. Who talk to each other Yep
3. About something besides a man Yep

Try doing that with the actual films! Actually, the Young Jack Sparrow series and Legends of the Brethren Court also have better multiple female characters but they don't always interact with each other. However, this book had female characters interacting and talking with each other on MULTIPLE occasions!

Some had concerns about Jack's "voice" but I felt like this is a much younger Jack Sparrow before Barbossa's betrayal and really growing into a man. Really, how many 25 year olds act the same at 38? People change.

I was once again struck by how similar Jack Sparrow is to Han Solo. Obviously, I knew this before which is why I thought Crispin would be such a great choice but it's still interesting to compare the two rogues with troubled childhoods and a hatred of slavery along with a distrust of religion.

However, then that makes me even more curious that we fully support Han settling down with Leia but a majority of POTC fans seem to hate the idea of Jack settling with anyone but his ship. So, what makes the difference there? Is it just because of their acting or because Han/Leia are canon or because they were supposed to be for kids? If you notice, Han's the rogue but we never actually see him kiss anyone but Leia...
On the other hand, we hear all about Jack's exploits but we only see him kiss Elizabeth which wasn't his idea and Angelica.
I suppose Jack is just too damaged, compared to Han, to maintain a meaningful relationship other than Gibbs (NOT slash, platonic) or the Pearl especially since he's often apart from both.

One of the main females in the book, Esmeralda, is similar to Angelica but I felt she was done better. She chose to leave her convent education to become a pirate since that was the family business and not because of Jack Sparrow. Esmeralda didn't have any secret agendas or contradict herself.

If they wanted to make a film out of this, I'd be very happy...

Beckett was awesome. We learned a lot of his backstory and I was very pleased with the details. I felt there was even enough ambiguity that I could still ship Beckett/Jack if I wanted.

My only real quibble with the novel, and it is just a quibble, is that the chapters are really long. I feel so bad for complaining but when you're used to chapters that are 8-20 pages, then a book with 40 page chapters just seems so very different and daunting...

Oh, Poochie! POOCHIE!
I love Poochie and he's in this book. ( SPOILERS )

I started to write a story about Poochie being immortal in 2006, but never finished. Here's the beginning.

( Poochie )

Puss in Boots

Have you ever noticed how Guillermo del Toro shows up in the weirdest places?

He's an executive producer on Puss in Boots and does a couple of voices.

The ads tried to say stuff like, "Best animated film of the Year" which I found hard to believe. I'm not sure anything could top KungFu Panda 2 which was astounding in both story and animation.

I was right, but it was still a lot of fun. In fact, I found myself wishing that Pirates of the Caribbean had a Reel_Fanfiction challenge so I could suggest this or that we could remake On Stranger Tides...

The story was a lot more concise and easy to follow without sacrificing the excitement. We could understand the motivation behind characters and I really liked Kitty Softpaws who also is a great example of why declawing is awful. I was very surprised and pleased that a children's movie would tackle such a topic.

Also adding to the POTC comparison was guitar provided by Rodrigo Y Gabriela.