Just a Geek by Wil Wheaton


[rating=4] ‘Just a Geek’ promises “Unflinchingly honest tales of the search for life, love, and fulfillment beyond the Starship Enterprise”.
I’m very happy to say, it delivers on that promise.

In 1991, I was 13 years old and Wil Wheaton was about to retire from Star Trek at the ripe old age of 18. My friend Alyssa and I went to a convention in Toronto to hear Wil speak.

I was floored by the difference between the character I’d seen on TV – clean shaven, immaculate spandex attire, smiling, polite and dripping with 1950s ‘Leave It To Beaver’ purity – and the brash young man standing on the stage, decked out in a Canadian tuxedo (head to toe denim), black leather jacket and backwards baseball cap, affecting a slacker drawl.

Who WAS this man? This wasn’t Wesley! He was wearing LEATHER!!!


(Please note: I am not the lady with the silver ponytail photobombing Wil)

Wil Wheaton was the first celebrity I ever met in person. The experience caused me to wonder about the huge divide between the media I consumed in theaters and on TV and the people who worked to create them. He woke me up to the Industry side of magic, fame and alternate reality. It was a key moment for me, and kept me from wetting my pants later in life when I got to meet Richard Dean Anderson (MacGyver!) and Kevin Smith.

These days, you can follow celebrities on Twitter, watch interviews on YouTube, read about an actor’s life history on Wikipedia, or connect with him on his mad popular blog, WWdN. Information was far more limited in my teens, so it was a unique revelation to have this insider peek into what was happening to Wil back in the 90s.

Wil Wheaton had debt issues? He had stepsons? He fought court battles with his wife’s ex? WHAT? You mean, he wasn’t regularly enjoying tea and crumpets with Patrick Stewart, in a band with Jonathan Frakes, attending Levar Burton’s friends-only bookclub? Damn. Life is cruel.

At points, the tone of this autobiographical work became a bit too sentimental, too whiny, waxed political, waned wistful, grew sassy, felt self-important. But I forgive those wee faults because they are human and true, and they live up to the title: Wil Wheaton is really just a geek, looking for love and acceptance and some money to pay his bills.

The happy ending comes in real life, knowing that he’s now doing well, showing up as Evil Wil Wheaton on TV in ‘Big Bang Theory‘ episodes and on the web in ‘The Guild’ with Felicia Day.

Four solid stars: not big on fancy style, but clean, honest and intimate.
Read the FAQs at the end, some of his best writing is in the ultra-short answers IMHO.

4 of 5 stars / bookshelves: read, 269 pages, Publisher: O’Reilly Media, Inc (2004)
Read from February 16 to 20, 2012

Whiteout by Greg Rucka, Steve Lieber


[rating=4] Why read ‘Whiteout’, you ask?

Well… maybe you’re thinking: it’s winter, it’s cold, I’m miserable.

Maybe you want to read a comic set in a place where the weather’s even WORSE than where you are. Make yourself feel better. Good idea.

You have options. You could truck across the futuristic Siberia of Enrico Marini & Thierry Smolderen’s ‘Gipsy’. You could fight off Alaskan vampires in Steve Niles & Ben Templesmith’s ’30 Days of Night’. You could explore shipwrecks in the icy Arctic waters of Jacques Tardi’s ‘The Arctic Marauder’.
Or… you could solve murders in Antarctica with Greg Rucka’s troubled U.S. Marshal Carrie Stetko in Whiteout. I recommend that you do.

Rucka is known for his strong female characters, and after reading this I bought the whole Queen & Country series — great spy thrillers.

Steve Lieber’s art is solid work: from parkas, guns and airplanes to sexy yet believable women who can kick ass. And of course, snow & ice.

Bought at the Silver Snail back in 2003, it was already a few years old then (published 1999). Reading it in 2012, I still enjoy the story; it’s aged really well.

Apparently, a movie version of this was made in 2009. The bloody Casting Director chose Kate Beckinsale to be Carrie(!) and replaced Lily Sharpe, the other female lead, with a guy. WTF? Awful, terrible, no-good idea. Part of the fun was the sexual tension between Carrie & Lily, their isolation in a place where men vastly outnumber women. Bah.

I love Kate B, but her face and body are all wrong for this role, and she’s English. Ms. Stetko is 100% pure U.S. Marshal. Personally, I’d have chosen Jorja Fox of CSI fame. She’s perfect – the right freckles, the badass / troubled history thing, the right hair and eyebrows, the right body type, knows how to play law enforcement. She’d also probably have been easier on the budget.

4 of 5 stars / bookshelves: graphic-novel. 128 pages, Publisher: Oni Press (Apr 15 2001) Read from February 07 to 17, 2012

Observe:
Carrie StetkoJorja Fox