Ask Steve Perry

Started by Corporal Hicks, May 06, 2007, 09:22:14 PM

Author
Ask Steve Perry (Read 187,749 times)

steveperry

steveperry

#495
Boys, boys, settle down ...

I have no problem with people expressing opinions opposing my own. If you read back over this thread from the first, you'll see that happened more than once. It is what makes a horse race, that people disagree about whose critter runs the fastest. I don't think because I've written a bunch of stuff in these universes that it makes me automatically right -- it doesn't.

Then again, I came by my view of things honestly, having seen the movies in the theaters, read the graphic novels, and having been allowed to join the creative teams, first by novelizing the comics, and then coming up with my own story. I have some experience in the A, P, AvP universe and I've brought it to bear on what I've written.

I'm happy to admit I'm not the world's greatest expert on this.

I don't have to be. But I am willing to mount a vigorous defense of what I think, and have done so. And will continue to do so. I can take care of myself.

In the end, I am one of the guys sitting in front of a word processor writing the stories. I am constrained by many things -- my skills as a writer, the stories as they were shown and told, the dictates of the folks who own and run things. I do  the best I can with what I got. Sometimes I can push back a bit, which is why the whole yautja storyline exists at all. My daughter and I did it despite being told that we should not. They let it slide because we convinced them. The powers-that-be had since put their foot down and made it known they absolutely weren't going there any more. (Of course, that was then, and they might change their minds down the line, you never know.)

The notion that I can't pronounce a word that I made up any way that I want is, not to put too fine a point on it, silly.

Because I'm the guy in the chair telling the story, I do have some control, and so I use it as best I can.
Turnabout was one of half a dozen ideas I offered to DH -- actually, it's a combination of two of them -- and that's what they picked. 

They passed on the one from the Predator's VP.

For me to try and write material that is at odds with what I believe  wouldn't work very well. The German Shepherd Dog comparison pissed a lot of people off because they don't agree, and I can understand that, but since that's what I believe, and I'm the guy putting the words through my fingers for people who believe the same thing, what would you have me do? Jettison my opinion and adopt yours?

Uh, no. My opinion might not be any more valid, but it is mine, and since nobody has put forth any convincing reason why I should dump it and take up theirs, why would I? You think I'm wrong? Fine, no problem. I think I'm right, and I'm the guy who gets to say it in print. If you really have a case you think is watertight, take it to Fox and change their minds.

Good luck with that.

Fox owns it all. Dark Horse rents space in their building. None it belongs to me, nor to any of the fans, unless they happen to work at Fox. I work for Dark Horse. Everything I offer has to be approved by them, and then by Fox. It's their ball and bat, and if I want to play, I have to do it by their rules. That's how it works in the real world -- as opposed to the theoretical one where laissez-faire capitalism says that the fans pay my salary, so I must pay heed to what they want. Nope. You have to take that argument to DH and Fox -- I'm just one of the proletariat workers here.

If you can do better, you have my blessing to try.

Xenomrph

Xenomrph

#496
Well said, Mr. Perry. Glad to see that us fanboys didn't scare you off.

That said, I would like to see an answer to the earlier question: do fans influence your work in any way? I guess I mean in terms of fan/hate mail, or what you see tossed around on messageboards like this one, or in the "reviews" section of Amazon.com or something like that, does it influence your work at all?

I mean "influence" in terms of what you get from fan feedback, and also perhaps what FOX or Dark Horse says to you based on what they're seeing, as well.

War Wager

War Wager

#497
Quote from: War Wager on Sep 10, 2008, 08:35:55 PM
So what exactly did you think of AvPR Mr Perry?

Was it really that bad? :)

steveperry

steveperry

#498
Quote from: Xenomrph on Sep 11, 2008, 06:35:31 PM
Well said, Mr. Perry. Glad to see that us fanboys didn't scare you off.

That said, I would like to see an answer to the earlier question: do fans influence your work in any way? I guess I mean in terms of fan/hate mail, or what you see tossed around on messageboards like this one, or in the "reviews" section of Amazon.com or something like that, does it influence your work at all?

I mean "influence" in terms of what you get from fan feedback, and also perhaps what FOX or Dark Horse says to you based on what they're seeing, as well.

Fanboys don't scare me. I was a fanboy, I expect, before most of the people who show up here were born. Still am.

And as to their input, the asnwer is: yes and no. With the graphic novelizations, not so much, for two reasons. First, it has been a while since I did those, and the internet was not so ubiquitous as it is now -- there weren't any fan groups in this universe that I noticed. (I did hear some stuff from Star Wars fans that I took into account when I got into that universe, but remember that the first Aliens novelization came out more than fifteen years ago, and the web was a bit sketchier then.)

Second reason is that I had the comics as a template, and what DH leased was the right to novelize those, so we had to stick close to what had already been approved. There were some name changes we had to do to keep things legal, and eventually, those got changed back to what we wanted to do in the first place. But the comics were the basis of what my daughter and I did.

For the most recent novel, which my daughter also helped on, the story was fairly straight-forward, and I knew pretty much how I wanted to play it. The main characters came into focus from the start, and I just ran with them. It was their story, not that of the Predators so much, and that's how I wrote it.
I didn't really need a whole lot of input into that, and since the Preds were not VP characters, nor really the focus, I figured I had enough to go with.

Another book, maybe I'd get some thoughts from the fan base I could use. But -- to he honest here -- probably not so much from folks who get horsey and call me names. One doesn't reward bad behavior, that will only encourage it.

The problem with fan input is that the really hardcore fans tend to not like a whole bunch of stuff that casual fans and readers enjoy, and the level of detail necessary to please the heavy duty fanboys is too much for most readers -- they don't care for it. Microscopic details can bog down the story, and spending any real amount of time getting something perfect for the three guys who might get it is not the way to go, if you have a deadline. (From the time Turnabout's outline was approved until it was due to be delivered was less than four months. My daughter was going to write most of it, but ran into some scheduling problems that made that impossible -- she was doing an Aliens novel, a Star Trek novel, and she had two small children at home, so I wound up doing most of it, and by the time I got to it, had only six weeks or so.)

If you have a hundred readers, and the choice is to please eighty of them by doing it one way, or three of them by doing it the other, which way would you go? (Keeping in mind that if the book tanks big-time, you might not get invited back, and a certain percentage of the readers aren't going to like it no matter which choice you make ...)

Two hardcore fans will argue to the death over what color lint was in the Predator's pocket last Tuesday. I can't go there -- it doesn't entertain enough readers, and whatever I might say if I did go there would piss off one of the guy arguing anyhow.

As to AvPR, I believe I have said it a time or two here and elsewhere -- yeah, it was that bad. I don't know what they were thinking. They might not have killed the franchise, but they didn't help it any.

In my opinion.



Xenomrph

Xenomrph

#499
As a side note, I actually read 'Turnabout' recently. While I did like it and I thought the characters were cool and interesting, for some reason it didn't quite feel like a Predator novel.

To explain what I mean, it was sort of that the Predators took a total back seat to what the other characters were doing. Like, sure, the Predators were running around doing their thing, but the only time we really saw the Predators doing anything was when the other characters spotted them (or were killed by them), but beyond that it sort of read like the Predators could have been excised from the novel entirely and just had a plot about the Park Ranger/sniper dealing with asshole poachers (and maybe change it up so Mary's brother had merely been killed by a bear, rather than a Predator) and it would have been just as interesting and most of the events would have played out the same way.

I know you said that you weren't trying to have the Predator viewpoint, but I think a "happy medium" might have been showing the Predators doing things on their own without the human interaction, and perhaps implying their moods and whatnot from their body language without really getting inside their head like you did in AvP: Prey. An example would be the 'Predator' movies themselves (and the novelizations of those movies, moreso the second than the first). There's all kinds of scenes that show the Predator doing something on his own without any meaningful input from the human characters, but it doesn't go into "Predator POV" and show you what the Predator is thinking.
Does that make sense? It was just something I was thinking about after I finished reading the book.

steveperry

steveperry

#500
Sure. As I said, it wasn't the Predators' story. But if you use viewpoint characters and not omnipotent or camera-view, the only way to show the Predators doing anything has to come from a viewpoint character watching them do it. And since nobody but Sloane knows for sure they are here -- Mary and Regal don't see them until the end of the book, then everything we see them doing has to come from him.

Which it does. He doesn't' know jack about them save that they are killing his bears on his watch, and that they don't mind taking human trophies.

More than that would require more interaction between them, and since this was a sniper's duel, it is by its nature going to take place at a far remove.

That's the story I wanted to tell. If I had had Sloane captured by the Preds, and in their camp, I could have done more, but they don't generally capture a lot of humans and let them hang around, so I'd have to come up with a good reason for them to do that, and how would I explain it? That would be pure speculation on Sloane's part -- unless they laid it out for him.

Nothing wrong with the notion, it's just not the one I wanted to play with. It was all about Sloane's ability to deal with the threat using skills that were as good as theirs, and weaponry that wasn't so inferior that it mattered. That's what the title means.  I wanted the hunters to come up against somebody who could make them the hunted.

That was the story I wanted to tell. That's the one I told. The rest is coulda-shoulda-woulda, but I didn't go there.

Kimarhi

Kimarhi

#501
I liked Turnabout because it was slightly different.  The Preds were hunted for once.




The next one needs more wristblade action! 

Xenomrph

Xenomrph

#502
Quote from: Kimarhi on Sep 12, 2008, 12:21:02 AM
I liked Turnabout because it was slightly different.  The Preds were hunted for once.




The next one needs more wristblade action! 
Agreed, I did like the book, and it certainly was unique as Predator novel, and I can understand where you (Mr. Perry) are coming from with your justification on using no Predator POV. Just saying that that degree of "uniqueness" which we haven't seen in other Predator novels/comics/movies might be a bit of a turn-off for some Predator fans, or might not be what they're expecting.

I am just very glad it didn't "not feel like a Predator novel" the way John Shirley's 'Forever Midnight' did - his book did get inside the Predators' heads... but also fundamentally changed them as a species from the ground up to the point where it felt like I was reading a science fiction book about some other race of violent killers that had had the word "Predator" shoehorned into it. It wasn't just that his Predators differed widely from the Predators you'd made for 'AvP: Prey', but that they differed widely from what we'd seen in the original source films themselves. At least the ones in 'Turnabout' acted like Predators when, as you said, Sloane was observing them (even if he didn't always know what he was looking at).

On the whole, though, I'm pretty easy to please when it comes to Aliens and Predator stuff. I gobble AvP stuff up, and I was actually entertained by both AvP movies. Part of the fun for me as a fan is finding ways to make all the continuity stuff "fit"... and when it can't, I just sort of say "oops" and continue having a good time reading the comics or playing the video games or whatever.

Alienseseses

Alienseseses

#503
I am going to ask Steve Perry a question. If, you know, it's OK.


What would you have added or subtracted in regards to AVP-R specifically? And don't say 'Character development.' I want to know exactly what could make it work.


Also, if it OK if I send you part of that plot I've been writing so I can know if I'm doing a good job? Or would that be bad for your creative process?

steveperry

steveperry

#504
Quote from: Alienseseses on Sep 14, 2008, 04:22:36 AM
I am going to ask Steve Perry a question. If, you know, it's OK.


What would you have added or subtracted in regards to AVP-R specifically? And don't say 'Character development.' I want to know exactly what could make it work.


Also, if it OK if I send you part of that plot I've been writing so I can know if I'm doing a good job? Or would that be bad for your creative process?

I didn't care for the movie as a whole. I did like the homeworld stuff a little, but all the booga-booga on Earth was just a gore fest and over the top. It was murky, mindlessly violent, and I don't think the script as it stood could have been made to work -- for me -- without major surgery, enough so that it would have been another story entirely.

Exactly? Throw it out and come up with a better story.

I think like a lot of folks who really don't understand science fiction and fantasy, they went for the look and the action, and they dropped the ball where it counts.

In Alien, the set-up laid out the truck-drivers-in-space. You got to know who they were, at least a little, so when they started get et, you cared.

Stories that work are about people you care about. The reason I got nice fan mail on the yautja was because we fleshed out the VP Predator enough so that readers could identify with him. It wasn't just that he had a broken tusk, it was that he was a person in his own right. You could understand why he did what he did. People respected him.

Character development is what makes a movie hold my interest. If they are all cardboard, who cares what happens to them? Ripley, you remember. Everybody remembers Ripley.

Who are you going to remember from AvPR? Anybody? There's no there there ...

My lawyer won't let me look at unread mss by anybody I don't know well enough to trust. We don't want to find ourselves in court someday with an irate writer who claims we swiped his idea. Not that it's likely in a universe where the writer doesn't own any of the rights, but stranger things have happened.

Sorry. Nature of the biz.

War Wager

War Wager

#505
Would you say the first AvP was better story-wise and do you like that movie better overall?

steveperry

steveperry

#506
Quote from: War Wager on Sep 15, 2008, 12:09:37 AM
Would you say the first AvP was better story-wise and do you like that movie better overall?

"Better" is a relative term. I'd say the first one wasn't as bad, but I wasn't impressed with it.

I didn't like either of them.

What they should have done was the movie version of AvP the graphic novel/novelization. The comic book writers told a better story. My daughter and I added a little bit that -- we think -- made it better. Fans seemed to like it -- it's gone through twenty-some odd printings, last time I looked, and has just gone back to press again.

Lot of folks liked Dachande and Noguchi. I think a movie with them would have been better and more popular. The producers had the material right there, all they had to do was get a writer could turn it into a script and they'd have had a winner.

Doesn't surprise me that they didn't. They spend a lot of time shooting themselves in the feet down in La-La-Land.

My opinion.

War Wager

War Wager

#507
The pyramid setting was at least new and different. The most dangerous and alien enviroment on Earth and a lot more scarier than some hick town in the middle of God's nowhere. I felt the characters, while they had poor lines too, were more memorable and likable than in AvPR.

This leads to another question; do you think there is still hope for this franchise or is it dead?

Xenomrph

Xenomrph

#508
Over the years, have you read any of the other Aliens/Predator/AvP materials, such as books, comics, videogames, etc? I don't just mean for "research" or whatnot for books you were going to write, but also just for curiosity or leisure reading, etc.
If so, what did you think of what you read? Any personal favorites?

steveperry

steveperry

#509
Quote from: War Wager on Sep 15, 2008, 04:15:31 PM
The pyramid setting was at least new and different. The most dangerous and alien enviroment on Earth and a lot more scarier than some hick town in the middle of God's nowhere. I felt the characters, while they had poor lines too, were more memorable and likable than in AvPR.

This leads to another question; do you think there is still hope for this franchise or is it dead?

As long as the movies make a profit, the franchise isn't dead. If you can shoot it fairly cheap, get a halfway decent summer audience in the theater seats, and good video sales? You can always pitch another one. Lot of bad movies make enough money to keep churning out sequels. Chuckie, anyone? How many Friday the 13th have there been?

What made the Dark Knight Batman movie work? Sure the EFX were cool, that flipping truck and all, but it was the scenery-chewing by Ledger as the Joker, and the low-key Batman and Bruce Wayne Bale gave the audience -- the fact that (spoiler here) they killed the girlfriend -- lot of folks didn't see that coming.
Alfred. Jim Gordon. Characters you remember.

Character-driven stuff puts 'em in the seats, and Bats was a great comic book movie.

That's what they need in AvP.

Mostly, I confine my reading in the A, P, AvP universe to stuff I need to read; or to  stuff my daughter writes, and now and then, one by somebody I know. I have a stack of books by my bed, and I never catch up entirely. So many books, so little time ...

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