Westerns dominated Hollywood fare for a very long time after WW2. Then there was a brief moment in time, right before the age of the summer blockbuster, when “good” movies were popular. The question is, are we leaving superhero movies behind?
And if we are, is it all just a lulz until AI generated movies wash over the audience and nothing matters anymore?
There is a chance that rather than some new, exciting genre taking over Hollywood that the very notion of “mass media” will become rather quaint. We’ll all have a hyper personalized AI — like in the movie “Her” — that will scan our face and give us a movie that it so personalized that there will no longer be any “shared reality” at all anymore.
Hollywood exist of two types of people: plutocrat suits and programmers.
And programmers may be eliminated if we reach AGI sooner rather than later. Or, put another way, Hollywood is ripe for a severe disruption very, very soon. All the technological pieces are falling into place. It’s just a matter of time before AI is a commodity to the point that the entire knowledge / creative economy implodes into a Singularity based around it.
After way, way, way, way longer than I imagined, I may — may — have stabilized the beginning of the third draft of my first novel. It’s been tough going. Really tough.
There have been a number of structural problems that have caused everything to collapse repeatedly, to the point that I’ve felt like I was spinning my wheels and not really getting anything done.
But I’ve managed to come up with a sequence of events that pleases me. The true test will be if I can read through what I have done so far and me not realize it’s so bad that I can’t use it. I’m hopeful. I think there’s a decent chance that may, just maybe, things will move at quite a nice clip.
As always, of course, I continue to worry that Something Will Happen that will throw everything out of whack. I’ve been living in a very idyllic situation for way too long and it just can’t last.
And that doesn’t even begin to address the longer term issue of the fucking Fourth Turning that may break out just as I’m beginning to query this novel seriously in about a year. Ugh. I want to become a traditionally published novelist, not spend all my time dodging ICE agents or bombs.
I’m fascinated by this Website’s Webstats to an absurd, surreal degree. So any little twitch in hits that I get that is out of the ordinary causes me no end of reflection. Twice now someone has randomly pinged some link from the very beginning of this Website.
This makes me think two things.
One, a lot goes on with this Website that my software doesn’t pick up for some reason and two, I am uneasy that I may have caught the attention of people who actually like, uhhhh, matter and and shit.
There are two types of people I imagine would care about me on the high end — political people and creative Hollywood types. I rant about much I fucking hate MAGA on this blog when I’m not mentally masturbating about the novel I’ve been working on for years and years and years.
At the moment, I think it’s my political ranting that are piquing people’s interests. I think. I think as it grows more and more clear that my “hysterical doom shit” may not be totally off base, people want to learn more about what I’ve blathered on about over the years.
That, at least, is one theory.
If it’s Hollywood types, then, lulz, I have no idea. I’m still a solid year away from querying the novel. Regardless, all are welcome, as long as you’re not a deranged stalker.
Lulz. This is just mental masturbation. I am so far away from finishing this novel, much less having to worry about shit like this. But I’m drinking 90 proof moonshine at the moment so humor me.
From what I can tell of Hollywood actresses, they love, love, love the opportunity to use the guise of “acting” to do freaky shit. I think this is great for me as an audience member and it does hearten me as an aspiring novelist. I say this because in this third draft of the novel sex work — specifically stripping — plays a pretty significant role.
I am well aware that because of human nature and the needs of marketing that the only thing anyone will want to talk about is the stripper angle of the story. Ok, I get it. But for me, I just think it’s an interesting way to add dimension to some of my female characters.
And I could totally see a number of ambitious women in Hollywood really digging the situations I throw my characters in because of how important stripping is to the progression of the plot. But, as I said, people will be so hung up on the sex worker angle of the story that they may not even realize what the point of the story is in the first place.
But I can see the appeal of my female characters to Hollywood actresses. If I do my job right, I will craft a number of really interesting women who just happen to strip on occasion. At the moment, the stripper angle is nothing more than an excuse to flesh out characters in the first act.
The rest of the novel is a homage to Stieg Larsson’s work in a way that the average read should see it as an old brown shoe. If I am a good enough writer, that is.
Anyway. What do I know. I’m a smelly CIS white male.
The fact that the below is a hang up in the current SAG strike negotiations is an indication of how serious Hollywood Suits are taking the potential of zombie actors populating future movies.
It makes a lot of sense that the Hollywood Suits would really want this ability. It is clear to anyone clued in with a pulse that the very idea of what we consider “entertainment” is about to be revolutionized in near term.
It could be that by around 2030, everyone will be given a very personalized movie that was generated by AI after it did a scan of their face to see what mood they were in.
It seems clear that we’re on the cusp of a major upheaval in Hollywood. The only question now is a matter of timing. In the end, having living actors in a movie may be seen as “quaint” and “artisanal.”
Being old, I know what I don’t know. And among the things I just don’t know at this point is — how much will my lack of any acting experience hinder my ability to write a good screenplay? I think it’s one of those things where it’s hard to quantify.
While it definitely HELPS to have training as an actor, it’s not like it’s totally impossible to write a decent screenplay if you’re just a regular old doofus like me. And, truth be told, it’s not like I’m opposed to taking acting lessons at some point in the future if that will help me write a better screenplay.
Now, this is where I pause and reflect on how fucking old I am. Age, like race, is just not something you can change. I just can’t help the life I’ve led. And, as such, I’m far more likely to get somewhere with a novel than I am a screenplay. But, having said that, I will note that I’m a really good talker — I love to schmooze, especially when intoxicated and I’m 100% extroverted.
…But I’m 50. I’m 50, poor and short.
And, yet, time and again in my life, I’ve managed to shock the haters by pulling a rabbit out of a hat. It happened in my 20s and it happened when I was in Seoul. When I was in Seoul, I not only was one of the best rock DJs in town for a few months, I also had the lone English-language expat magazine.
This it all went to shit.
Angst for the memories, and all that.
But I’m not dead yet. Though, if I somehow manage to blow up with my DJ money in my 50s and 60s, it will be a very bittersweet experience. On one hand, I will at last have the success I feel I deserve, but on the other I will be so fucking old that I can’t, like, go clubbing all night with twentysomethings without coming across as a freaky weirdo — or worse yet, a dirty old man.
Ugh. I’m old. And I’m about 30 years too late when it comes to what I’m suddenly interested in doing — getting into screenwriting. And, yet, being old — and delusional — is rather freeing. I’m old enough that I’m quite aware of how delusional I’m being to begin the process of learning how to write screenplays.
And, of course, there are the other obvious obstacles of my background and where I live. But, like I said, I’m really delusional and it would be nice to have three solid screenplays finished if I ever find myself with a little extra scratch so I can physically go to LA and see what fate might bring me.
But, like I said — I’m delusional. Very, very delusional.
And, yet, sometimes these screenplay ideas I have rolling around in my mind can be very, very potent. They jump out of the depths of my mind and demand to be told.
The reason why I like screenwriting as opposed to novel writing — at least when it comes to these stories — is all I have to do is know the proper structure and formatting. I can just tell some prospective director what should be on the screen and it’s up to them to make it a reality.
Novel writing, meanwhile, requires I actually show the reader in their minds what is going on. This is very stressful and and wear one out if you spend all your time thinking about storytelling — which, of course, I happen to do these days.
Anyway. This, just like the novel I’m working on — is a long term project. I continue to just drift, in fits and starts, towards some general goal. I need to be a lot more clear with myself that I have a very, very window of opportunity to knock something, anything out that I can point to and say, “Look, I’m not all talk and blog posts.”
I continue to drift towards my goal of finishing a novel so I can query it in the fall of 2024 — just as the so-called “Fourth Turning” is going to happen. Ugh. Anyway, I also want to have a fall back “second creative track.” As such, I’ve decided that screenwriting is going to be it.
Just as I have used Stieg Larsson’s “The Girl Who Played With Fire” as my “textbook” for the novel I’m writing, so, too, do I plan to use Charlie Kaufman’s “The Enteral Sunshine of The Spotless Mind” as my “textbook” for screenwriting. I think I’m probably going to do something similar with the Star Wars screenplay at some point soon.
I need to understand how to properly read a screenplay. I’ve already found bouncing back and forth between novel writing and screenwriting has helped my writing a lot. Something about thinking about how to structure a screenplay aids in helping me see things in a different way with the novel.
Anyway, something about the fall / winter season coming (along with a lot of more darkness) has caused me to feel a little unnerved. I’m still faraway, so close with the novel. It’s fun to just totally switch gears on a creative level and read about something completely different and new, while staying within the general writing skillset.
I hate the fact that I don’t have enough structure in my life. I have a rather idyllic situation going on at the moment and I spend way too much of my time just daydreaming and drifting towards my goal.
What’s more, I know damn well that this unusual — a great — situation that I find myself in can last for only so long. Something is going to throw everything out of whack soon enough and I’ll be smarting that I didn’t squeeze out every once of creativity I could when I had the opportunity.
I wonder what it will be. Maybe it will be The Fourth Turning, maybe it will be having to go underground when weaponized ICE agents start to hunt me down for thinking ding-dong Tyrant Trump is a fucking cocksucker.
Another day, another few thousand words written on the very beginning of the third draft of my first novel. I feel like I’ve been spinning my wheels for months and months and months to the point that I’m growing rather alarmed. I’m so alarmed that I definitely feel in put-up-or-shut up mode.
My dream title for my first novel.
Having said all that, I’m beginning to feel more confident that I may — may — be just about to zoom through the story because I’ve finally established re-imagined relationships between the major characters. I’ve fleshed out some characters that were just meant to be minor characters. I’ve also leaned into the duality of my heroine’s professional life.
Which, I think, makes it a far more interesting read, even if for marketing purposes all anyone will want to talk about is how my heroine owns a strip club. But, I go where the muse takes me and that’s where I want to go. I’m willing to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, if need be.
One key reform I think I’m going to do with this latest version of the third draft is I’m not going to be so quick to re-read what I’ve written. While doing that has really helped make the story a lot better, it has also led to significant drift in the story simply because I keep seeing ways to make the story better.
There is a reason why they say all novels are “abandoned” rather than “finished.”
The story is never going to be “perfect,” it just has to be “done” and “good enough” that I can query it to a literary agent without being embarrassed at how bad it is.
The whole issue of querying is beginning to loom large in my mind. It’s very much uncharted territory. I really need to finish this third draft no later than, say, about March. That will give me time to figure out how to properly query and to find “comp” books, etc, etc.
It will be a whole new era in this project.
Having said that, I continue to be interested in learning about screenwriting. I have even gone so far as to print out the screenplay of “The Enteral Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” to use as my “textbook.” I probably will do the same thing soon with Star Wars.
I have a number of REALLY GOOD screenplay concepts rolling around in my mind. But, just as with the novel, I apparently seem determined to just drift towards my goal without any structure.
All this as I worry that just as I’m trying to query my first novel in late 2024, the whole world will implode / explode and I’ll be kicking myself for not learning how to use Ham Radio.
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