I feel like I'm swimming upstream in polluted water when I read other works out there for purposes of trying to see how something I would want to write might fit in.

It's bad.

A lot of what I skimmed over were Mass Effect clones, but somehow further right wing than Mass Effect already was, with the names changed and the numbers filed off.

A lot of what's left involves "humanity fuck yeah" space imperialism, grizzled tough guys with cold piercing stares and powerlifter physiques well into old age and their adventures with brilliant and hot scientist women that are defined more about who their father is/was and less by their actual job, that try to prove they are Independent Strong Willed Women but of course swoon for the timeless grizzled ego insert's blandly stoic charms. Also, a space bureaucracy usually interferes with the grizzled tough guy's very important imperialistic mission and his only chance to save humanity is to go rogue with a ragtag bunch of renegades and kill those filthy aliens before they threaten colonial interests. Or something.

I got some pretty harsh negative feedback for my inclusion of ideas in my own work. The idea that billionaires wanting to colonize Mars aren't actually going to save humanity by doing that and it would be an insatiable resource sink that would further accelerate Earth's decay was especially incendiary. Maybe I should have already become a rich and influential writer first before trying something like that, but that seems like it might have involved writing one of the above reactionary works instead and hoping another off-brand Mass Effect got more traction instead.

I'm demoralized, but I'm also nearly done with the third book in my self-published trilogy. It's a weird place to be.

EDIT: I may as well post a link to the website my wife and my friend helped set up. It has the first five chapters available for free and some other stuff.

https://www.tulpatrilogy.com/

  • WranglesGammon [comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Yeah it's awesome that the message gets better as the series progresses, but the initial framing of "here, this one is the good empire" is still pretty cringe (to me, though I haven't read the books so this opinion is purely based on the film)

    • TreadOnMe [none/use name]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Well, yeah, Hollywood is still Hollywood, we'll see if they get the message across in this series.

      • WranglesGammon [comrade/them]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Yeah, I imagine the writers room will be sweating buckets at the mere prospect of using the word jihad so I'm really interested to see how closely they stick to the (from what I've heard and intend to read soon) religious complexity, especially given how propagandised western audiences are toward Islam

        • camaron28 [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          I don't want to hate on idiot leftists but i'm already dreading the "oh, so these muslim-coded people are doing a jihad? How problematic" discourse.

          I've seen them complain about how none of the main fremen actors were arab but i honestly think it's for the best given what will happen later in the series.

          You need to see several steps ahead when engaging in discourse. Just like Leto II, the most powerful poster.

      • GalaxyBrain [they/them]
        ·
        3 years ago

        If they're following the books then it mostly depends on how many movies they get. Since this one is basic the first half of a five hour movie and they just didn't make the second half yet, I'm okay with waiting and seeing on it.

    • Leon_Grotsky [comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Yeah it’s awesome that the message gets better as the series progresses

      That was kind of the point. The message doesn't "get better," the message of the series was always "Oh, but what if you really aren't helping as much as you think you are?"

      but the initial framing of “here, this one is the good empire” is still pretty cringe

      This is not the case, the Empire is never "good" at any point in the series, at it's best point it could be described as "the least-bad version of the future as interpreted by the subjective analysis of a demi-god." This premise exists to be subverted within the story; but you just have to read all the books and analyze it as one work to reach this point.

      Also fuck Brian Herbert.

      • WranglesGammon [comrade/them]
        ·
        3 years ago

        That was kind of the point. The message doesn’t “get better,” the message of the series was always “Oh, but what if you really aren’t helping as much as you think you are?”

        This is not the case, the Empire is never “good” at any point in the series, at it’s best point it could be described as “the least-bad version of the future as interpreted by the subjective analysis of a demi-god.” This premise exists to be subverted within the story; but you just have to read all the books and analyze it as one work to reach this point.

        Mate very good points, you're absolutely right. I guess I'm just overly excited for the message about all empires being evil, and wanted more of that payoff ahead of its time! As I said in another comment I'm more worried about the book-less watcher's interpretation becoming that house atreides are the good guys since most of them are killed off whilst still highly sympathetic characters. Btw you've convinced me even more that I can't wait to read the books!

        Sorry if what I said doesn't make sense btw I just got home and I'm quite drunk :bird-screm1: