Our mashup for the first of December (did you remember to say “rabbit” three times?) is Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air. It’s all about man versus nature, with themes of ecological awareness and man competing with man as side dishes. Great book, even if there’s controversy (original) about what exactly happened up there.
In honor of that New Zealand flick I’ve been reading about in all the popular newsmagazines, we’ll mashup The Hobbit today. It’ll be kind of a relief to do a story that has something that more or less resembles the typical adventuring party for once. It’s one of those big adventuring parties I remember from massive sprawling college AD&D games, but it’s still an adventuring party.
The Monday Mashup returns with Hitchcock’s Psycho. This is another one that almost has to be a one-shot, unless you wanted to make Norman Bates an ongoing master villain — which is an interesting idea, now that I think about it. But I’m going to be thinking one-shot. There’s an insane villain, obsessed by someone who doesn’t exist anymore, and there’s a lonely location. Now, do you cast the PCs as Marion Crane and helpless prey, or do you cast ‘em as the post-death investigators? I’m inclined to think the latter, although that turns it into a police procedural… which is in and of itself interesting. My approach follows.
It’s an early morning Monday Mashup today, since I’m going to be non-bloggy most of the day. This week’s source material is the Oscar-winning Silence of the Lambs. Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, what’s not to love? Other than the rumors about a prequel focusing on Lecter, of course.
I’m feeling musical again today, but this time we’ll go for a specific song rather than an entire musical oeuvre. Our mashup of the week is “Stairway to Heaven” (original) by Led Zeppelin. Now, I’m no Led Zeppelin expert, but I read that song as describing some significantly transformative events. I’m pretty sure the lady in question is making bad, materialistic choices. And I think we have a few Tolkien references. Seems like that ought to be enough to work with. Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines.
I’m going to miss Monday Mashup this week (and be light on general on blogging). A family member is in the hospital with something fairly serious and I a) can’t focus on blogging and b) don’t have as much free time anyhow.
Since there are a few regular game writing memes out there these days — my Monday Mashup and Ginger’s Game WISH come to mind — I thought it might be nice to have an announcement list for people who want to keep up with them. Thus, I set up a list at Yahoo for precisely that purpose. Right now, every time I post a new Monday Mashup, it’ll send a message to the list. Ginger is setting Game WISH up the same way. The list is moderated, and there shouldn’t ever be any other traffic on it, so it’s just a few posts a week. ...
For Mashup number fifteen, we’ll return to the classics of science fiction. Our subject today is the Foundation Trilogy, Asimov’s soft-SF series of psychohistory, galactic empire, and barbarianism. I’m more interested in the original three books than the multitude of sequels, but suit yourself for your mashups. The core concept of the trilogy is Hari Seldon’s psychohistory, with which Seldon predicted the fall of the Galactic Empire and manipulated events so as to minimize the time before another Empire would rise. Add in the backstop that was the Second Foundation — and don’t forget the psionics — and you have a lot of material to work with. Oh, and this is your sporadic reminder that there’s a game meme announcement mailing list. The only traffic on the list is announcements of new game meme posts; right now it’s just me and Ginger’s WISH. Now, on to my Mashup.
The fourteenth Monday Mashup revolves around the Boston Red Sox. (Yeah, you can take a week off if you’re staring at your screen in horror.) They’re generally a talented team of players but are always struck down before they reach the peak of their profession by a dire curse — which always leaves them strong enough to come back and make another try next year. In my book, professional sports is a popular form of entertainment, so let’s mash those Dirt Dogs up.
Today’s Monday Mashup concept was contributed by Eric McErlain, who runs the excellent Off Wing Opinion (original). He suggested Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend some time ago, but I put off using it for a while because I thought it was a little close to Body Snatchers. But time has passed and here we are. If you haven’t read I Am Legend, allow me to strongly recommend it. It’s the story of the last man on earth, beseiged by a horde of vampires. He defends himself, despite the fact that he has nothing to live for. In the end, he realizes that to the new society of vampires, he’s the legendary monster. My brief summary doesn’t do it justice, but it’s a start. Mash!