TSR Worlds Annual 1 (Chapter 4)

This chapter continues the storyline of both the annual itself and of Forgotten Realms Issue 14.  As you may recall, Jasmine had been captured by “Bluebeard” the lich and his sassy demilich sidekick.  The Realms’ Master crew is preparing to assault the lich in his lair, but the lich wants a little private time his new bride.

Luckily, the appearance of the mini-me Spelljammer gives him an idea.  Having read comics himself in his youth, the lich realizes that when two groups of heroes meet for the first time, they must have a misunderstanding that leads to a fight.

The demilich leaves to put the plan into action while the lich plays out his bondage fantasies with Jasmine.

Eww…

Anyway, the demilich teleports to the mini-me Spelljammer and uses an Alter Self spell to take on Jasmine’s appearance.  More properly, he tales on the appearance of Jasmine’s ghost.

When “Jasmine” appears to the crew and relates her tale of murder and betrayal, Meredith is understandably skeptical of this convenient haunting.  The demilich is an accomplished liar though, and with the help of an ESP spell manages to win over the crew.

 

(As an aside, look at how Rags Morales uses body language to sell this scene.  This is what separates good art from mediocre art)

Back to the story, Captain Omen and Minder are discussing how to begin their assault on the lich’s lair when the mini-me Spelljammer swoops down from on high and demands they prepare to be boarded.

Just to ensure there is no chance of cooler heads prevailing, Tember immediately sprints from the ship to shout accusations of murder at the first person he sees.  Luckily for us, this turns out to be Vartan.  Vartan then opens up a can of whup-ass and does what we have all wanted to do since Tember first appeared.

 

Thank you Vartan, I feel better now.

The two crews fight it out in pretty stereotypical comic book fashion.  First one crew has the advantage, then vice-versa. Notably though, Agrivar shows some of that paladin wisdom by ignoring the fracas below and ambushing the demilich lurking above.

Despite Agrivar and Ishi’s best efforts, the demilich recovers before they can strike a killing blow.  Deciding he is having too much fun watching the battle below to be distracted by a couple of fighter types, the demilich gates them to his master’s castle.  After all, he figures his master can dispatch them without much trouble.

Ah, hubris.

While the demilich was distracted, the fight below has cooled down from a all-out brawl to a shouting match between Captain Omen and Meredith.  Meredith continues to accuse Captain Omen of murdering Jasmine while Captain Omen protests his innocence.  Minder notices the demilich lurking and the combined group decides to deal with him once and for all.

Inside the castle, Agrivar and Ishi pick themselves up of the ground after being unceremoniously teleported there.  Ishi sees a light ahead and they attempt to sneak their way into the liches chamber.  Before they get to the door though, the lich tells them they can stop whispering because he heard them when they landed in the hallway.

Got to love a snarky lich.

Agrivar demands the lich release Jasmine while striking a heroic pose.  Not surprisingly, the lich decides to respond with a lightning bolt.  He is kind enough to thank them for standing so close together before doing so though.

Ishi recovers first and kicks the lich in the face.  The only effect this seems to have is to turn the lich on (eww… again).  The lich starts to talk about how when he is done with Jasmine that Ishi might be next in line.

This enrages Ishi who screams that he would have to kill her before she would submit. 

Unfortunately, the lich decides this is a sound suggestion and summons a fiend from one of the “nastier lower planes” to drag Ishi and Jasmine off.  The lich promises that the fiend will “return with your corpses when he is finished showing you his home”.

Man that lich is one twisted guy.

By this time Agrivar has recovered, but realizes he only has time to save one of his companions from the beast before it retreats through the gate.  Acting on instinct he leaps forward and saves Ishi.

And thus Jasmine is cosigned to a fate worse than death.  Well, she would be if not for the combined Realms’ Master and Spelljammer crews arriving just in the nick of time to save her.

Facing the combined crew alone, the lich decides discretion is the better part of valor and runs down the hallway (after conjuring a Wall of Fog to cover his escape).  He ultimately decides to hide in the ice cavern where he keeps his dead wives, but ends up getting a bit of a surprise.

After the lich buries himself under several tons of rubble, it is revealed that Captain Omen created an illusion that the lich’s wives had come to life in order to unnerve him. 

With Jasmine rescued and the lich situation resolved, the two crews say their farewells and prepare to part ways.  Jasmine reveals that Meredith offered her a spot on her crew and that she plans to take it.  She also congratulates Ishi on winning the “Duel of Hearts”, leaving the swordswoman with a satisfied smile on her face.

Goodbye Jasmine, you are already missed.

Well, tune in next time for the final chapter of the TSR Worlds Annual 1, or as I like to call it “the horror continues”.

Thoughts

• This seventeen page story is the only reason I am reviewing this 70 page comic book annual.  As always, Rags Morales delivers on the art.  Jim Lowder is the writer of this segment and he does an a admirable job.
• I enjoyed both the demilich and the lich a whole lot.  The demilich was both intelligent and had a sardonic wit, while the lich was believably creepy and insane.  I really enjoyed how the two played off one another.
• I grabbed a lot more scans than I normally do for this kind of post.  I was just so grateful that there was decent art in this book that I just couldn’t help myself.
• I will admit that the conclusion of the “duel of hearts” seems both rushed and a little contrived.  I am glad they tied up that plot thread though.
• I was very sad to see Jasmine go.  I feel she really added something to the Realms’ Master crew.  I did pick up a few issues of Spelljammer after she crossed over, but I was pretty unhappy with her portrayal in that book.

TSR Worlds Annual 1 (Chapter 3)

When we left off, Meredith had flown the mini-me Spelljammer into Toril’s crystal sphere.  Meredith is originally from the Forgotten Realms, and is looking to pick up some items she left with her old friends Rose and Michael.  This time, she (smartly) decides to leave Mullet Boy with Pax and seek out her friends by herself.

Meredith makes her way to Selune’s Smile, the bar where the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons comic takes place.  Talking with the bartender Luna, she finds out that her friends died five years ago.  They continue to talk about the fate of Meredith’s friends and their daughter, even though the entire cast of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons comic comes by one by one to interrupt the conversation.

When she learns Jasmine is still alive, Meredith quite bluntly asks if Jasmine inherited all of her parents possessions.   Luna realizes Meredith is fishing for information about her magic key and simply tells her that Jasmine still possesses it.

So now Meredith just has to hunt down Jasmine.  As a powerful wizard, perhaps she should cast a simple divination spell to locate the girl?  Maybe a Locate Object on her magic key?

Nah, lets follow some out of date information that she left town with an adventurer named “Chaos Carter”. 

The Advanced Dungeons & Dragons crew decides, in typical adventuring party fashion, to assist Meredith in locating Jasmine.  Onyx the dwarf notes that this won’t be easy, since Chaos Carter is the type of guy who topples empires through treachery and keeps his identity secret.

The scene abruptly shifts to Conan Blacker and assorted other caravan guards fighting off a griffon attack.  After they repel the attack, Blacker argues over tactics with the Gold Grain’s caravan master Gorm about the attack. Gorm is not the type of guy to be interested in listening to a mere hirelings suggestions though.

The importance of this scene becomes obvious when the half-elven wizard Kyriani reveals to Meredith that some guy she blew her contacts told her that Chaos Carter is currently targeting the Golden Grain Caravan and is disguised as one of the guards.  The group decides the best way to locate Chaos Carter is to infiltrate the caravan.

Meredith uses her illusions to fake a dragon attack on the party.  They then send Kyriani running in the direction of the caravan crying for help.  Despite Gorm’s initial reluctance to get involved, Kyriani’s “assets” prove to be to be sufficient incentive for Gorm to invite Kyriani and her “guards” to join the caravan.

As the party integrates with the remaining guards, they hear some griping from a somewhat skinny blonde guard named Raymond about how poorly the guards are treated by the merchants.  He insinuates that the merchants withhold healing potions from their guards.

Isn’t that always the way?  Big Business feels the crunch so the first thing they do is cut back on benefits for the little guy. 

Meanwhile, Gorm expresses his concern that Blacker, who we saw fighting griffons earlier, is actually the infamous Chaos Carter.  Apparently the griffons had some kind of extortion gig going on.  Rather than pay the griffons their “reasonable tribute”, Blacker insisted on fighting them instead.  This is enough to convince Gorm that Blacker is out to ruin him.

Wait a second, the griffons were running an extortion gig?

OK, I know griffons are smarter than mere animals, but does a group of griffons running an extortion gig make any sense?  Aren’t there a ton of monsters that this kind of activity would be a more natural fit for?  Since Griffons can’t speak common, how do they make their demands?  Do they hold up a sign saying “I can has ur Gold Peezes” or just hope someone in the group they are shaking down has a Tongues spell handy?

In any case, while Gorm is talking, the caravan is attacked again, this time by giant bats!  Things aren’t going well for the guards until Meredith casts a sleep spell to take them down.

Gorm then disappears, never to appear in the story again.

Speaking of sleep, the next scene you see has Meredith waking up Vajra to tell her all the guards have gone.  Vajra wonders if they have pulled a Wisp (quit without warning). Meredith overheard them discussing it.  Apparently Blacker is arguing that they do, but Raymond is arguing that they don’t.  Their musings are interrupted by a purple worm attack.

OK, this is starting to get ridiculous.  I know the Forgotten Realms are a dangerous place, but when you are attacked by greedy griffons, giant bats, and purple worms in the space of 24 hours, I assume you must be wearing monster attracting perfume.

The guards return in time to help defeat the purple worm, but Blacker is now suspicious that the newcomers are a bunch of company spies.  Meredith blithely admits to this, much to Kyriani’s utter confusion.  Blacker and his men quit in disgust over the company’s double-dealing ways.

Kyriani rubs her two brain cells together and realizes they never asked Blacker where Jasmine is.  Meredith tells her to go find out, so she marches after the mercenary.

Of course the reason Meredith let Blacker go is because he isn’t Chaos Carter.  Who could it be?  Maybe Raymond, the only other guard with a name?  Meredith asks him where Jasmine is, and he gives the incredibly vague, “I left her last month in the city of Saerloon” before leaving.

 

Back at Selune’s Smile, Kyriani expresses surprise that Blacker isn’t Chaos Carter, especially since he admitted it during pillow talk.  Onyx simply notes that “Girl, once you get a man worked up, He’d admit to being Elminster if you asked him to”.

Wow.

Anyway, now that they know Jasmine is in Saerloon, Luna was able to scry her and saw her boarding a ship that then teleported away.  This somehow gives her the information she needs to find Jasmine, so Meredith then decides to head back to the mini-me Spelljammer.

What happens next?  Well, you will just have to return for TSR Worlds Annual 1 (Chapter 4).  This time with decent art!

Thoughts

• This plot was extremely contrived.  Especially when you consider that the group had multiple powerful wizards who should have been able to clear this up rather quickly.
• I am amazed by how badly mischaracterized Kyriani is in this one.  As I recall, in the AD&D comic she was portrayed as sexy but smart (she is a wizard after all).  In this comic she is simply a vapid bimbo.
• You would think that when Luna saw Jasmine boarding the ship, she would say something like “Oh good, she is with Agrivar.  You can trust him, he is Kyriani’s brother and a paladin”.  Of course, then they couldn’t have a misunderstanding and get into a fight.

TSR Worlds Annual 1 (Chapter 1 & 2)

Regular readers are aware that I have been recapping the Forgotten Realms comic book put out by DC and TSR in the late 80’s and early 90’s.  The last issue I recapped was Forgotten Realms Issue 14, which ended with Jasmine being captured by a lich version of Bluebeard.

The story is continued in the truly atrocious TSR Annual 1.  The annual was an attempt to cross-pollinate readers of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Dragonlance, and Forgotten Realms comics, as well as launch the Spelljammer comic book.  At the time, all it did was convince me that the other books were not worth reading.

The comic begins on Unipaxala, the peace asteroid (no, seriously).  Several of the Unipaxalain priests are attempting to negotiate with Meredith, the captain of a spelljamming vessel, to rescue a priest named Pax Ahlmuhn from the neogi.  She is reluctant until they throw in a Crown of Stars spacefaring helm.  They also convince her to take Pax Ahlmuhn’s nephew Tember with her so that Pax will know they sent her.

If you understood any of the above paragraph, you obviously played Spelljammer in the 80’s. 

Meredith, Tember, and her disposable crew take off in one of those neat dragonfly ships and mount a rescue attempt.  Much like Han Solo in the Empire Strikes Back, Meredith avoids their “sensors” by floating in a debris field until they are close, then following one of the larger neogi spider ships into the base.

Once there, Meredith sends her commando crew to find the priest while Tember and her guard the ship.  Things seem to be going well until Tember basically waves at some umber hulks, which causes them to destroy the ship.  The two rendezvous with her crew and Pax Ahlmuhn.  With their own transport destroyed, they set out looking for a new one.

Luckily for them, they stumble upon the legendary Spelljammer almost immediately.  More accurately, they stumble upon a mini-me version of the Spelljammer.  They make their way towards it when the neogi and their umber hulk slaves arrive and try to stop their departure.  The three characters who have been given names make it aboard the ship while the rest of the crew dies “heroically”.

Realizing they can’t outrun the neogi spider ships pursuing them, Meredith uses a phase door spell to duck into the nearest crystal sphere.  At this point the neogi conveniently disappear, never to be seen in the story again. 

Still, they need supplies so they land mini-me Spelljammer on nearby Krynn.  Meredith claims to be familiar with Krynn, so she inexplicably decides to stay behind and send young Tember out with a pocket full of jewels to buy provisions from town. 

While walking in a random direction through the jungle, Tember sees a bunch of goblins who have apparently run down a gazelle and killed it with their axes.  Seeing as he is supposed to buy provisions, Tember decides to hail the goblins. 

No, seriously. 

 

This goes about as well as you would expect, especially when he trips over his own feet and spills jewels everywhere.  Luckily for him, a bunch of elves with a furry fetish ambush the goblins.  Unfortunately, these elves don’t seem too keen on humans either, until an underdressed elf sorceress named Sulia shows up to stay the hand of the furries.

Apparently Sulia’s blind brother received a vision from the great pumpkin tiger spirit that they would find a stranger in the belly of “a great winged beast”.  Tember realizes they are talking about the mini-me Spelljammer and immediately agrees to take the heavily armed savages back to the ship.

Tember is obviously an idiot.

Along the way, the furry elves ambush a trio of goblins on a cart.  Luckily, the cart contains exactly the type of supplies Tember is looking for, so he exchanges the jewels for the contents.  Honestly, I wish that the furry elves had simply traded Tember some “magic beans” for the jewels, as that would make more sense and be in keeping with the characterizations so far.

On the trip to the ship, Sulia reveals the reason she wants to see the ship is to prove that her brother’s visions are true prophesy.  Once this is proven, her brother Maraghiz will be able to take over as the shaman of the clan.  Well, at least according to her.  The furry elves seem to support the incumbent shaman.

Arriving at the ship, the natives are suitably impressed.  Even the furry elves have to admit that Maraghiz is the real deal.  Unfortunately, the furry elves decide they have to kill Sulia and Maraghiz in order to keep the incumbent shaman in office.

Ah, just like Chicago politics.

Before the battle can get interesting, Meredith surrounds the furry warriors with a wall of flame.  They then disappear from the story, never to be seen again.  Meredith does take some time to talk with Sulia and Maraghiz though.  Although Sulia and Maraghiz realize they can never return home, Maraghiz conveniently states he has had other visions of people who can help him.  The brother and sister team then wander into the woods, practically begging the reader to follow their further adventures in the Dragonlance comic book.

The group then decides to go to leave Krynn and travel to the Forgotten Realms.  If you want to know why, you will have to return for Chapter 3.

Thoughts

• Reading this makes me appreciate Jeff Grubb and Rags Morales’ work on Forgotten Realms even more.
• This pacifist light religion is boring in the way only a made up religion can be.
• Tember is really, really annoying.  With apologies to Will Wheaton, Tember combines all the worst attributes of Wesley Crusher with the added bonus of being an idiot.  At least Wesley was smart enough to save the Enterprise when he needed to.
• Is there some crossover between furries and Dungeons & Dragons fans that TSR felt was being underserved in the 80’s?  Because that is the only excuse for this story I can think of.

New Decade, New Spider-Man

I am a fan of the Spider-Man film franchise. A lifelong fan of the character, I felt that Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire managed to bring Spider-Man to life on the big screen with a care rarely seen in superhero movies. When it was announced they were both on board for Spider-Man 4, I was truly looking forward to more films with the two of them.

Apparently, it is not meant to be. Sony has recently announced that Spider-Man 4 will no longer include Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire and that they are going to reboot the franchise. They are looking for a younger cast and are planning on making the franchise “grittier”. It also sounds like they are hoping to focus more on Spider-Man’s high school years, which were rushed through the first time around.

So as an avowed fan of the franchise so far, what do I think?

Recasting Peter Parker

The recasting of Peter Parker has both pros and cons. Tobey Maguire was a great Peter Parker. He gave us a Peter who was thoughtful, emotional, and believably nerdy. Tobey Maguire’s performance as Peter Parker emphasized that Peter is an everyman, which is what made Peter’s actions as Spider-Man all the more heroic.

On the other hand, I was much less of a fan of Tobey Maguire’s performance when he was behind the mask. His quips as Spider-Man always seemed a bit hollow. Tobey also specializes in conveying his emotions via his facial expressions, which was impossible when his face was hidden behind a full-face mask.

So maybe it is time for a new Spider-Man. Regardless, whoever gets the role should realize that they have pretty big shoes to fill.

A new director

I will miss Sam Raimi. He was a fan of the character and it showed. People often complain when novels are brought to the big screen about how much is left out. How much more complex is this when you have a character with a forty year publication history behind him? Sam Raimi did such an amazing job because as a fan he had a personal vision of Spider-Man to guide him.

This doesn’t mean that the new director won’t be up to the task. It does point to what factors Sony should look to when hiring the new guy. Once again, whoever comes in as director will be judged against the high standard Sam Raimi set.

Rebooting the franchise

I am a worried that it is too soon to reboot the franchise, but continuing the existing series with a brand new cast and new director seems like an equally dubious prospect. Personally, I would rather that they put the franchise on hiatus for a few years.

Of course that will never happen. Spider-Man is a major cash cow for Sony Pictures, and they want to milk it as much as they can while they still have the rights. I used to speculate that Sony would simply buy Marvel rather than let the rights revert back. Now that Disney owns Marvel, that option is off the table. So assuming that the rights will eventually revert to Marvel, it seems more logical to continue with Tobey Maguire and Sam Raimi during the time they have left.

According to all reports that was the plan. After Spider-Man 3, Tobey Maguire and Sam Raimi seemed ambivalent about doing a fourth installment. Sony went to great lengths to get onboard for Spider-Man 4. So it is a bit of a shock when Sony announced their intention to reboot the franchise instead.

We will probably never know what happen behind closed doors. Regardless, it seems obvious that rebooting the franchise wasn’t Sony’s first choice.

It wouldn’t be my first choice either.

A younger cast

I don’t have a problem with this. Frankly, Tobey Maguire was always a bit old for the part of Peter Parker. While he managed to pull it off pretty well, this is something that became harder to overlook with each successive movie. I think a younger actor playing the part would help underscore how extraordinary it is that Peter chooses to be a hero at an age when most of us were still trying to figure out how to score booze.

A focus on the high school years might also give face time to more of Peter’s supporting cast. While there were a few cameos, only Mary Jane and Harry Osborn had any significant roles in the movies. I would love to see characters like Flash Thompson, Liz Allen, or even Ultimate Spider-Man cast members like Kong get a chance to shine.

A grittier Spider-Man

I hope this is just marketing talking. While I have enjoyed the occasional gritty Spider-Man story (i.e., The Death of Jean DeWolf), it isn’t really where the character belongs. While Peter Parker is often burdened by his own sense of responsibility, being Spider-Man is also a release for him. This sense of fun is as important to Spider-Man as his ability to stick to walls or spin webs!

Final Thoughts

Spider-Man 4 has the deck stacked against it. The first franchise was spectacular, but it seems unlikely that lightning will strike twice. I wouldn’t count Spidey out yet though… he does his best work when the odds are against him!

Why The Guild Season Three is like Buffy Season Six

I enjoyed Buffy: The Vampire Slayer Season Six a lot.  It had the musical episode, the near-marriage of Xander and Anya, and even Xander saving the day. 

Season Six is also the darkest season of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer.  Buffy has a death wish for most of the season and only finds relief through brutal sex with someone she hates.  Willow battles with addiction to dark magic and ends up turning evil when her girlfriend is killed.  Anya becomes a demon again after Xander leaves her at the altar.  All of these were compelling storylines by themselves, but together they cast a pall over the season.

The Guild: Season Three shares a similar dark streak.  What makes Season Three especially dark is that Season Two left the Knights of Good on the edge of ruin.  Rather than pulling the Knights of Good back from the brink, Season Three chronicles their continuing disintegration. 

Not only do the Knights of Good have to deal with their own demons, but they also face an external threat in the form of the Axis of Anarchy.  I have to admit I like the addition of a rival guild to the series.  None of the characters in the Axis of Anarchy are especially deep, but they do serve as great dramatic foils for the Knights of Good. 

Frankly, the Knights of Good would have enough problems without the Axis of Anarchy breathing down their necks.

Vork is still reeling from the revelation that it was Clara who was continually killing his character last season.  This leads him on a self-proclaimed journey of enlightenment.  In the end, the only enlightenment he find is that he seems to elicit feelings of disgust and dislike in everyone he meets.

Codex is given leadership of the Knights of Good by Vork.  Unfortunately, she only manages to preside over the guilds disintegration.  The experience is crushing to Codex, although in all fairness the forces tearing the Knights of Good apart may have been too much for even the best guild leader to overcome.  Codex regains some of her pride back in the season finale, although high on her victory she rushes into a sexual encounter she seems sure to regret.

Last season I said I lost all sympathy for Clara.  Season Three does little to change my opinion.  Clara seems to have little understanding as to why her husband is upset at her kissing other men or how her gaming addiction hurts her family.  While she does make some half-hearted attempts to patch up her marriage this season, it all seems to be motivated by an attempt to avoid suffering any consequences for her actions rather than actual concern.  I have to admit I found the revelation that Clara was pregnant again at the end to be horrifying rather than funny.

Zaboo finds himself in a poisonous relationship with Riley.  Riley has a controlling personality, and she has no problem using sex, or paintball guns, to keep Zaboo under her thumb.  Interestingly, Zaboo is probably the character who grows the most this season, as he ultimately manages to break off his self-destructive relationship with Riley by himself.

Tinkerballa is still pissed that Bladezz deleted her character.  She actually joins the Axis of Anarchy, but it is obvious she is not happy there.  She is obviously used to being the “Queen Bitch” of the group, and is put off by being just one of a crowd of ill-tempered gamers.  It is also pretty obvious that she regrets setting the Axis of Anarchy on Bladezz when she sees how far they are willing to go.  I was glad to see Tinkerballa come to the realization that there are worse things than a deleted character.

Bladezz comes off more sympathetic in this season than in any of the previous ones.  As the Axis of Anarchy begins to torment him in real life, you really begin to feel for the poor kid.  After all, no man deserves a website like this dedicated to him!

So what did I think of Season Three as a whole?  This was probably the best season of The Guild yet.  I wouldn’t be surprised to find some people turned off by the darker storyline, but like the aforementioned Buffy:The Vampire Slayer Season Six it provides a deeper look into what makes the main characters tick.

5 out of 5 purple drops

And they burned the (Doll)house down

Dollhouse has been officially cancelled and I can’t say that this is a big surprise.  While I have felt the show substantially improved as it went on, the ratings continue to be abominably low.  Not to mention, when a network puts a show on hiatus during November sweeps, it is an obvious presage of things to come.

I am sad to see Dollhouse go.  The show had a rocky start, but then so did Buffy: The Vampire Slayer.  I will admit that I enjoyed Dollhouse less for what it was than for what it had the potential to become.  We saw some of this potential in the episode "Epitaph One".  I really believe that if Dollhouse had been given the full five season run that Joss Whedon envisioned that it could have become a truly outstanding show.

Still, my feelings about the cancellation are a lot more complex then mine were when Fox cancelled Firefly back in 2002.  At the time it seemed like Fox had deliberately sabotaged its own show.  Fox chose not to air the pilot episode, forcing Joss Whedon to rework the second episode into a new pilot.  They continuously preempted the show when it was just starting out, making it almost impossible for it to find an audience.  They even cancelled it unceremoniously after eleven episodes, with three completed episodes left unaired in the United States.

What made this treatment inconceivable to me is that unlike Dollhouse or even Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, Firefly hit the ground running and caught my interest in the very first episode.

You could argue that Dollhouse had some of the same issues with Fox.  Like Firefly, it was stranded in the TV wastelands of Friday night.  Dollhouse also had an unaired, and in my opinion superior, pilot episode (although in this case Joss Whedon took the blame for pulling it). So there are some similarities.

There are also differences.  Fox gave Dollhouse a full season to find an audience.  They also put a marketing push behind Dollhouse at the start of season two, something they never did for Firefly.  They have even stated that they will air the full thirteen episodes they ordered for this season, another courtesy they never gave Firefly.

So I am sad to see Dollhouse go, but not outraged like I was when Fox cancelled Firefly.  It does make me long for a time when TV shows were given a greater opportunity to grow before the threat of cancellation loomed.  After all, by today’s standards a low-rated show like Seinfeld would have been pulled by the second season, long before it hit its stride and became a ratings juggernaut.  Nevertheless, I am not sure I can lay my ire at the feet of Fox since these changes are occurring industry wide.

I am curious to see what Joss Whedon’s next project will be.  He has stated that if Dollhouse was cancelled that he would begin work in earnest on a second Dr. Horrible series, which I am definitely looking forward to.  I am curious if he will make another attempt at creating a network TV show after the fate of Dollhouse though.  After all, Joss Whedon has great name recognition, a loyal fanbase, and has already had great success on the Internet with Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog.  

Maybe he needs the television networks less than they need him!

Is it wrong that I don’t want to create my own campaign world?

Many Dungeon Masters (DMs) aspire to be world creators.  They create intricate campaign worlds with fully realized politics, cultures, and geography.  They design unique races, monsters, and classes to compliment the vision of Dungeons & Dragons that they have in their head. 

In my current gaming group, my friend Brian spent years developing the World of Tyr.  While not all of our games have been set in that world, the passion Brian showed for it caused us to brand ourselves as the Lords of Tyr when we decided to create an online presence.  In the RPG Bloggers Network, Wyatt shares the development of his game world with his readers on the Spirits of Eden.  The time and energy he spends developing his world is evident on the (virtual) page.

In the shadow of such evident passion, I have to admit, perhaps a little sheepishly, that game world design never appealed much to me.  My first game worlds lacked coherence, having a lot in common with the “throw everything in” nature of the implied setting in Dungeons & Dragons 4e.  When I bought the original “old grey box” Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, I pretty much abandoned world building entirely.

Don’t get me wrong: I love to tell stories.  I can spend hours working on plots, coming up with motivations for my villains, and finding ways to bring the player character backstories into play.  I work very hard to engage my players in the plots of my stories and ensure everyone has a personal stake in the adventure.

Which I suppose is the point.  I tend to focus on character drama rather than on sweeping epic storytelling.  This is probably why I prefer to work in established campaign settings.  It allows me to “sub-contract” the work of world creation to someone else, allowing me to focus on the character drama that is my bread and butter.

I suppose this is true for most other roleplaying games I have ran as well.  In Sci-Fi games, I tend to go for established settings like Star Wars.  When it comes to superhero games, I prefer to run in the Marvel Universe (although this may be more of a result of my encyclopedic knowledge of that universe than anything else).

Still, I sometimes look at world builders with a little bit of envy.  When a good world building dungeon master is on a roll they can create truly amazing campaign setting which put even the best published campaign settings to shame. 

I suppose it is just a different skill set.  Some DM’s are like George Lucas, capable creating vivid worlds and writing vast epics but stumbling over character motivation and dialogue.  Some are like Joss Whedon, giving you great character interaction and willing to tweak the world for the sake of the story.  Rarest of all are those DM’s like J.R.R. Tolkien, capable of telling personal stories while building a world  of epic scope.

So what kind of a DM are you?