Hey friends!
It’s your first-ever D&D character that is a halfling for some reason you can’t explain, Sam Cote, back with entry 12 of Weekly Favories! Happy Hobbit Day to everyone who is celebrating! I’ll be making all seven meals today to honor our stout heroes: Bilbo, Frodo, Samwise, Merry, and Pippin.
What I’m Reading: I finally finished The Titan’s Curse, thanks to the help of the audiobook. Overall, I think it’s been my second favorite Percy Jackson book so far (after The Lightning Thief). Since then, I’ve been reading The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin. At around 160 pages, its a pretty short one to fit in before I move on with the mega-series. I’m enjoying it so far!
What I’m Listening To: I finished the audiobook of Ring Shout by P. Djeli Clark! I thought it was really well-written and impactful, and I can see why it won so many awards. I think the short length was a good choice plot-wise, but left something to be desired character-wise. It was able to fully explore the events presented without biting off more than it could chew, but the ability to explore the charaters’ past and relationships was more condensed than I typically prefer. When I’m asking for more from a book, it’s a sign that I enjoyed what was given!
What I’m Watching: This week I watched both the 1984 and 2021 adaptations of Dune for my Sci-fi class. It was really interesting to see them both side-by-side. I think the 2021 adaptation is much stronger in its character work, and the characters feel much more real than the 1984 version. The 1984 adaptation leans into parts of the book that I consider to be its worst features: namely, the conflation of homosexuality and fatness with evil, as seen in the characterization of Baron Harkonnen, and the overall odd pacing. The homophobia and fatphobia exists in a few key lines of the book, and is exaggerated further in the 1984 film. It also does nothing to address the weird pacing by shoving the whole book into one film. The 2021 adaptation omits (at least in this first film) the homophobia communicated in the Baron’s character, but the fatphobia is not so easily addressed– a major aspect of the character is that he is supposed to be physically reviling, which the 2021 film downplays but still contains. In my opinion, the villain should be primarily reviling for his morals and actions, not his appearance. At first, I was skeptical about the new Dune adaptaition being split into 2 films– the book itself is split into three sections, so why not three films? However, this choice is making more sense to me on the basis that it disrupts the odd structure of the book in favor of a new approach. I’m curious to see how it plays out!
What I’m Making: I made my first book review reaction video this week! It was pretty fun to make, and a bit different from my usual content. With the help of my girlfried, Hailey, we made a game out of it, and I tried to guess which books the reviews were talking about.
How I Slow Down & Unplug: I’ve had COVID since last Thursday, so naps have been key!
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