Fandom Unleashed In The Capital

As I have just started a series in my photoblog on our Tulip Festival, I'm posting today here. Last weekend Ottawa saw its annual Comiccon, a three day event at the EY Centre for fans of comics, movies, television, sci fi, and much more. Celebrity guests and artists were on hand for meet and greet sessions and events over the weekend. Merchandise was on sale from exhibitors and craftspeople. And there were no shortage of those in costume, walking about. As for me, well, put me in a suit and I could get away with posing as Lex Luthor.

This Darth Vader was walking about with R2-D2. There was no sign of an annoying and worrisome protocol droid.

Among the exhibitors was a business called Sparx and Mace, which specializes in period cosplay clothing for women and men- corsets, lace, scarves, and items that might be considered a bit racy.

One of the cosplayers, with a zombie look. We'll see more of her in our final shot.

This sort of merchandise appealed to me. Among my purchases were comic book t-shirts and some prints from artist Geof Isherwood (an Avengers group shot, a solo Thor in stormy weather, and a dramatic Wonder Woman). I chatted with Mr. Isherwood, as well as Nick Bradshaw, another well established artist nearby.

I liked this formidable armour, though I have no idea who the character is supposed to be.

I took some perspective shots. The place was exceptionally busy, with people coming through. The EY Centre, located near the airport, is larger than our convention centre downtown, and someone I chatted with during the day noted that it's easier for exhibitors to load and unload here than it would be downtown. 

This vendor included some pillows in their wares. One guess as to why this drew my eye.

Among the cosplayers were plenty of Negans (including a woman) wielding barbed wire bats, a good many Deadpools and Spider-Men, more than a few Harley Quinns, and plenty of Star Wars related people. Ottawa has a local chapter of Star Wars cosplayers, the 501st Legion, and they had a specified area in the building.

I believe this is a Doctor Who villain, but the whole franchise gets me a bit dazed and confused, so perhaps someone can verify that.

I stopped by this booth, for Wasteland Artisan, which specializes in handcrafted masks and accessories.

This trio caught my eye during my wanderings. Here we have Colossus with the silver skin, Professor Xavier in the wheelchair, and a young woman playing the part of Negasonic Teenage Warhead, all from the X-Men franchise.

This wall caught my eye too. It was for a business specializing in makeup effects.

Two of our national museums here in the capital region had a shared booth, which makes sense as they are run together by the same organizational leadership. The Canadian Museum of History and the Canadian War Museum are presenting a pair of related exhibits beginning in June. Medieval Europe will be shown at the former, while the latter hosts an exhibit on Armour- from knights to superheroes. While the suit of armour in the background was stationary, the soldier and Iron Man were in fact cosplayers who were part of the booth. I'm looking forward to both of these exhibits and will be documenting them in the photoblog.

One of my favourite cosplayers of the event- this fellow was in costume as Groot, walking about on stilts, and when I caught him here, he had a t-shirt from the nearby shirt vendor with the only three words the character ever says in the Guardians of the Galaxy films.

More cosplayers. I find it fascinating how much attention to detail these people pay to their costumes, and the enthusiasm is infectious.

Out in the entry corridor, I photographed some more. The Dark Knight certainly fits the part. His companion... a bit of looking about suggests she was taking the part of She-Ra.

This robot costume really caught my eye. I had a chance to speak with the person in the costume a few minutes later and complimented her on the costume.

A zombie bride had quite a few onlookers gathered around.

I liked the costume of this woman, playing Cruella De Vil. Aside from the smile (unthinkable in the original character), she definitely looks the part. She graciously held a pose for me.

I finish off with this set of three women in different costumes posing for photographers. The last one includes our zombie from earlier in this post. If you get a chance to go to one of these conventions, take it. These are a whole lot of fun.

Stopping The End Of The World, Canadian Style

With that Independence Day sequel turning up in theatres soon, I got to thinking of how, in all these end of the world disaster films, with perhaps the exception of The Day After Tomorrow, there's never really a mention of what might be going on in Canada. This is my response, set a couple of centuries and a half down the line.

Alien Invaders Wreck Havoc On Planet Before Being Throttled By Red Serged Hellion

February 5^th, 2267 (CP). The world is struggling to put itself back together after an invasion of alien beings across the globe destroyed cities and landmarks, laid waste to entire nations, and wiped out millions of lives. In what has been designated the biggest cataclysm to ever come across the planet since the Trump Temper Tantrum of November 9^th, 2016, scores of cities were destroyed by the space faring Tawrae race of reptilian extra terrestrials, bent on destruction just for the sake of destruction.

“My great-great-great-great grandfather Giorgio told you people it was aliens,” Dimitri Tsoukalos told reporters after the great cataclysm had been turned back. Referring to an early twenty first century ancestor who appeared on programs on ancient aliens and who had strange hair, the young Tsoukalos was busy trying to figure out where his Athens area home had gone to after the Tawrae had wrecked havoc in Greece.

The British Royal Family, who took refuge in Scotland at Balmoral while London was being demolished, are reportedly all accounted for. Queen Kylie III has issued a statement, declaring that “the people of Great Britain will carry on, will always rise up, and will never miss afternoon tea again. Now where are my corgis? I didn’t leave them at the Palace, did I?”

The French military, which in the last century had risen up to new heights of might (a curious thing, given their historical track record until ninety years ago of regular surrenders and half hearted fights in warfare), were decimated during the alien invasion. The Tawrae made a special point of demolishing Paris and the city of New Marseilles, leaving the Eiffel Tower upside down and piercing through the Louvre. “We have lost so much of our precious art,” Louvre director Gustav LeFou told reporters, weeping. “Even the Mona Lisa, our precious lady, she is shredded beyond repair. I know, millions of lives lost should matter more, but I can’t muster myself to feel that way right now. I just feel like getting myself good and drunk, but even my favourite restaurant got wiped out of existence.”

In Russia, Tsar Vladimir the 19^th, clone of the first Tsar of the modern era dynasty, Vladimir Putin, was killed after the Tawrae attacked Moscow, destroying the full reserve of Putin clones. “Our beloved tyrant is gone,” Russian prime minister Tatiana Orlov told reporters, weeping before the wreckage of what had once the Kremlin. “All we have known for two and a half centuries has been the benevolent iron fist of the Putins. How can we carry on without him? Well, I don’t know about you, but I think vodka is in order right about now. Unfortunately we lost all the vodka in stock too, and it may take weeks to replenish the supplies."

The attacks ranged across the world, decimating large countries and small. China saw the destruction of the Forbidden City and the Great Wall (not to mention millions of lives). Cape Town in South Africa was smashed and shattered. Australia saw massive carnage in its major cities, and officials there fear there might be serious consequences. With gangs of marauding anarchic bikers already taking to the roads, the nation is developing what some are calling Mad Max syndrome. Speaking on condition of anonymity, an aide to the Prime Minister admitted, “We can’t even blame this one on the dingos.”

In America, still holding onto military power centuries after its founding, former president Josiah Bush shook his head while at the family ranch in Texas. “You know, I knew them there alien critters musta been comin’, and if I’d been re-elected, we wouldn’t have seen San Francisco and Los Diego slide into the sea. We wouldn’t have seen all that destruction wipe out New York City 2.0, just like they always showed in the old time movies. I mean, did you see how the Statue of Liberty ended up falling to earth in Ohio? We wouldn’t have seen New Miami flattened like a pancake. The Bushes always knew how to get things done, yes sir. Mission Accomplished, like old Dubya used to say. But no, you people all had to vote for that Federalist Isolationist Party brat. Don’t y’all go on sayin’ I didn’t tell you so.”

The President herself, Kiara Kardashian, was evacuated from Washington shortly before its destruction with her cabinet, having to leave behind the cryogenically preserved remains of her ancestor Khloe, and was deeply unhappy. “What happens when we finally find a cure for the terminal narcissism disease?” she was heard to ask, seemingly ignoring the reality that millions of her citizens were dead, the country was shattered, its largest cities blasted into oblivion, and its survivors were looking for answers. “Granny Khloe’s going to be pissed, people, pissed!”

Queen Sarah VII, the self titled Empress of the 500 acre Duchy Of Wasilla, a walled off independent enclave in the heart of the state of Alaska, issued a statement. “Those aliens, by golly, they didn’t even try comin’ out this way, you betcha. They know we got ourselves lots of guns and phasers and gosh golly thermal grenades, and we ain’t afraid to use ‘em, you betcha. Like the first Queen Sarah said, I can see Russia from my house!”

And yet humanity has survived. The alien invasion has been halted and defeated. Not by a rag tag army of misfits, as might have been the case in old disaster films of the 20^th and 21^st centuries. But by one person. As it turns out, the one person the world needed to get the job done.

After laying waste to much of the world, the Tawrae turned their attention north of the American border, to Canada. Scientists and military officers had been perplexed as to why the country had been spared up to that point. Dr. Millicent Stanhope, a physicist with North America Space Command, told reporters, “The working theory we had was that the enemy perceived the country as far too cold for their liking. I mean, they left Alaska alone too, so our military bases up there were unaffected. A bit of a shame they didn’t at least blast that irritating Duchy Of Wasilla. Wait, did I say that out loud?”

Some of the fleet attacked Toronto, interrupting a rally by fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs, who had been desperately deluding themselves into the hope that this year would be the year their team won the Stanley Cup, despite not having had won it for three hundred years now. Most of the alien fleet landed in southern Alberta- a curious break with their procedures up to that point- their ships had laid waste to regions from altitude.

Thousands of heavily armed reptilian shock troopers poured out and took up position. So did their Grand Emperor, Tavx Mrothmar, eight feet of pure ugly, drool, and crankiness. Waiting there was a lone figure in red serge. It was a Mountie, and she looked annoyed.  It was the legendary Inspector Wynonna Ulrich, one in a long line of cranky Mounties, going back to the beginnings of the police force in the 19^th century with Zane Ulrich and including the esteemed but cranky Lars Ulrich. All of them cops, all of them thoroughly dangerous, all of them seriously grouchy.

“I’m Wynonna Ulrich. Lay down your arms and surrender,” Ulrich told the aliens, witnessed at a distance by onlookers, too scared out of their minds to run from the sight of alien ships, and too baffled by the one woman standing up to them.

The Tawrae laughed and laughed. Ulrich shrugged. “Last chance, you ugly mother****ers.”

Grand Emperor Mrothmar stepped forward, staring at her. “Wynonna Ulrich? Don’t you play keyboards for that Poptallica band?”

Ulrich sneered. “I am not that Wynonna Ulrich.”

What followed, according to witnesses, was a brawl her distant ancestor Lars would have been proud of. The Inspector smashed through the lines of Tawrae shock troopers, carving a path of destruction and broken bones, kicking alien butt and leaving them crying. In the end, with the fleet ships blown to oblivion from within, and the broken bodies and agonized moans of Tawrae troopers all around her, she had Mrothmar by the throat, most of the bones of his body broken. “I don’t suppose it’s too late to ask for your holo-autograph, is it?” Mrothmar managed to ask.

Ulrich finished him with one last punch, dropping the deceased emperor’s remains before her. Canadian police and military have taken the surviving aliens, heavily wounded and perhaps a mere twentieth of the force that landed, into custody pending decisions on what to do about them. The remainder of the fleet fled at top speed, leaving behind pleas of clemency in holo-messages, apologizing for “that whole destroying most of your planet thing, and by the way, please don’t send that angry woman after us, we’re really, really, really sorry.”

As for Ulrich herself? She returned to her home, for a change in uniforms and a shower, what with all the orange blood she ended up getting on her during the epic brawl. Then she came back to her detachment, where the press was waiting.  She wasn’t in much of a mood to talk to reporters, particularly after one entertainment reporter spoke up. “Skip Jones, New Hollywood Tonight. Wynonna, what will the rest of Poptallica think of you moonlighting as an alien killer?”

Ulrich’s eyes narrowed. “You have five seconds to run.”

Jones looked confused. “Run? Run where? For what?”

Ulrich sighed. “To hell with the five seconds.” She closed the distance, and only in that last moment did Jones seem to understand he was in danger.  He turned and started running, the Inspector close on his heels. At last word, Jones had fallen- or been thrown- into Tombstone Canyon. He won’t be missed. 

Sprinting Through Time: Unexpected

“There are a number of safeguards that have been in place for thousands of years to prevent our people’s existence from becoming common knowledge. You will learn more about these as time goes by.”

A warning early on in Unexpected, the first in a series of time travel science fiction novels by the author Erin Lausten. I recently read the book, and came away from it thoroughly enjoying the final product. Time travel as a theme allows for many possibilities, whether the medium be a novel, television show, or movie. In the genre, there are usually rules to be followed… sometimes bent, but not to be broken. And typically the means of accessing time is through some form of technology. Unexpected offers a different means of travelling through time, giving the reader a sub-species of humanity who can shift themselves through time at will. They are the viators.

The book introduces us to Hailey McIntyre, an office worker in the contemporary world who has a run-in while on her way to work with a drug addict. The situation goes from bad to worse when he opens fire on her and her friend… and then she comes to somewhere else. And somewhen else, to be precise. She finds herself in the past, on a pirate ship at sea, and in a world of trouble.

The other main character, Derian , is introduced in short order, and the world he inhabits is quickly shown to the reader. Hundreds of years old, Derian is still in the prime of his life, a legend among viators, the time traveler humans who are a distinct subspecies, slow to age, hard to kill. They’ve been having troubles of their own, with disappearances and hints at rogue operations among viators. Derian is dispatched after an anomaly being picked up in the time stream by his colleagues. The anomaly is Hailey herself, an unregistered time traveler, and Derian goes in pursuit. He quickly learns that Hailey is capable of doing things that most new viators, let alone some experienced ones, can’t do. Hailey seems to be something entirely new of herself.

The novel follows the story of these two characters and a handful of others, on opposing sides in a growing conflict between viators and rogues. Among the first of that set are Derian’s friends and colleagues, particularly Lucius, Magister of the viators, and Roderic, an amusing Scot viator. The latter include a pair of sadistic villains, Nikanuur and Carlo, both of whom are memorably cruel, and one of whom has a personal stake in the matter. A wild card thrown into the mix is Poppi; she’s something of a solo act, rather off kilter at first, but ultimately one of my favourite characters in the novel.

The chemistry and storyline between Hailey and Derian is the foundation of the novel. Hailey is a firecracker, a real spitfire. She has attitude and sass, and real courage. She comes across in the novel as someone with a very distinct, genuine voice and a feisty personality. I liked her tremendously. Derian, the experienced operative, has something of a brooding Darcy-ish feel to him, and I liked his sheer determination and drive. The chemistry they share is obvious from the start; there’s a mutual attraction, and Lausten wisely gives that its proper pace.

The novel takes its characters across the seas of time, into multiple eras. Information is given out gradually at just the right time, and the pacing of the novel is spot on. There are action sequences and quiet moments interspersed throughout, and the narrative does a fine job tweaking the conventions of the time travel genre. I enjoyed Unexpected tremendously, and I look forward to future books, seeing where these characters travel to next.

Unexpected can be found among other places at Erin's Amazon.com page, where you'll also see some of her other work. She's busy continuing the Viator series, and you can follow her at her own blog, Erin Lausten.

Time Is Running Out Before We Blow Up Again, And I Haven't Had My Morning Coffee Yet

"What would you do if you knew you had less then a minute to live?"


One of the many questions in and about the film Source Code, which arrived in theatres earlier this year. And today, in the first of two reviews for films, I'm kicking myself for missing it in the theatres. I recently had a chance to see it, and I came away impressed. The science fiction film stars Jake Gyllenhall, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga, and Jeffrey Wright, and is directed by Duncan Jones. It deals with themes like time travel, fate, destiny, and family, and it requires repeated viewing. In fact, you'll like picking up on things you missed the first time.

The film opens on a commuter train on its way into Chicago, where a soldier named Colter Stevens (Gyllenhall) wakes up in confusion. He was last aware of being on a mission in Afghanistan, and has no idea how he came to be there. His seatmate Christina (Monaghan) sees him as someone else, a teacher named Sean who she's dating. While he tries to understand what's happening to him, a bomb goes off, killing everyone on board.

Stevens comes to in a strange capsule, where a military officer, Captain Goodwin (Farmiga), seen on a computer screen, informs him he's in an experimental system called the Source Code, allowing him access to the final minutes of a dead mans' life in an alternate reality. A bomb has indeed gone off earlier that day on a train, and the bomber intends to detonate a much larger one later in the day. He's told that he can't change the past, but through Source Code, there's a chance that the bomber can be identified in the prime reality and the bombing prevented. The project leader (Wright) lurks in the background, rather less sympathetic then Goodwin. He's more interested in ensuring that his program is viable.

Stevens is re-inserted several times into alternate realities, checking off potential suspects and gathering information. He tries to change fate, to save lives, even though he's been told it won't change the past in his own reality. And he comes to understand the full nature of what brought him into the program, something that he has to piece together on his own.

The premise is preposterous, of course, but ingenious and exhilirating at the same time. I was reminded of Quantum Leap, which had the premise of inserting a time travellers' soul into another body (in fact, there's a bit of an Easter egg linked to that television show in the cast). And then there's also Groundhog Day, the comedy that featured Bill Murray experiencing the same day over and over again. Memento also came to mind through the film, since that movie played around with the concept of fractured time. Lastly, I was reminded of Vantage Point, which, while not science fiction, dealt with the idea of examining the same few minutes of time from several points of view. One of the pleasures of a film like this is watching out for small details, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. The audience is drawn right in there with Stevens, wondering who the bomber is, trying to piece together what's happening before the clock runs out.

Duncan Jones has only directed one previous feature, Moon, which I haven't seen, but this film certainly impresses. With much of the action through the film contained to a train and a peculiar capsule, and some of that action deliberately repetitive, Jones does a good job telling the story, ratcheting up the tension, drawing the audience along in this trip down the proverbial rabbit hole. His production and special effects crews really do their work well; the destruction of the train is seen several times in different ways, and feels harrowing. The effects used drawing Stevens into and out of the timeline have a suitably disorienting effect. And the music score is tense and haunting. 

The casting works well. Gyllenhall is a sympathetic lead, conveying initial confusion when he first finds himself where he doesn't expect to be. As the film progresses, we see his desperation, determination, his wish to save lives, and his choice to try to subvert fate. And he has personal things to come to terms with. Gyllenhall does a fine job making us empathize with Stevens, and brings a sincerity and likeability to the role. Michelle Monaghan, whose work includes Mission Impossible III (rumor has it Cruise had to stand on a ladder to come eye to eye with her) and Gone Baby Gone, is a likeable leading lady, even while her character finds herself confused by the behaviour of a man she thinks she knows. Jeffrey Wright, a character actor who's been around for years in many roles and has, of late, been appearing in James Bond films, is suitably grumpy as the Source Code project director Rutledge.

The standout of the cast, however, is Vera Farmiga. She really came to prominence in Up In The Air (if you haven't seen it, remedy that anon!), and she continues to shine here. As Goodwin, she's the friendly face each time Stevens comes out of figuratively being blown up again. She's sympathetic to him, wants to give him the answers he's looking for, and ultimately helps him in a way you might not expect. As an actress, she brings warmth, empathy, compassion, and professionalism to the role, and it's what she doesn't say that intrigues me. Her eyes convey so much that she doesn't need to say, and that's a credit to her skills as an actress. Someone else in the role would have been far less intriguing.

The film isn't perfect, of course. I have some issues with the ending, which I won't go into, since that would be spoilerish. Regardless, I admired the technical aspects of the film, the pacing, the cast, and the very premise of playing around with time. As preposterous as the concept at its heart, the film is compelling, clever, and ultimately very human. Like good sci-fi is supposed to do, it makes you ask questions, and it makes you think. Which, let's face it, you're not going to get from a movie with lots of explosions and robots that turn into machines and a dimwitted mouthbreathing troglodyte named Shia.

Get your hands on this film. You'll enjoy it.