Thursday, January 21, 2010

For the love of sci-fi


In the very early eighties, along with every other sci-fi loving kid, I ran home from school to watch Star Blazers. They had an awesome evil comet ship, evil blue alien guys and Derek Wildstar. Really, how can a guy with a name like that not be just the coolest guy ever?

It was fitting then that I blessed my first human--I had a thing for writing about animals as a kid--character with the last name of Wildstar. This instantly made her cool, and she could do no wrong in my eyes.

The story, however, could be very wrong. Horribly cheesy wrong.

It did have some redeeming bits. Very tiny bits. Those bits slowly morphed into an entirely different story. Ms. Wildstar grew older and far less cheesy.

She looked in the mirror one day and turned back at me with a glare and the knife I'd written into the story for her in her hands. "You bettter change this stupid name, or you'll be sorry."

I took out my editing knife and waved it around. "Voila! All better."

She pointed at the typewriter and shook her head. "The first name too. It sucks."

"Right. Sorry." I waved my knife around a little more.

Anastassia Delyn looked in the mirror and smiled. "Much better. Now, get back to work."

"Yes, ma'am."

There are days I miss that young, cheesy Ms. Wildstar who dances around amidst the milling Barthromians. She was much easier to please.

"You're not watching those worn out VHS tapes of that stupid cartoon again are you?"

"Um... no, ma'am."

"Good, get writing."

6 comments:

  1. Hehe This was great. I more than get the agony over names. I like the name Anastassia. It's pretty. :)

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  2. Ohhhhh interesting. So this is where Delyn came from. Thanks for this, Gypsy. ;)

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  3. Hmm, let's see my old names for my very old story. James Pendower (seems pendower is a beach in England). Misty Peppermill (a morphing of two random words). Mitchell Buller (from the nearby Mt. Buller).

    That was for my unfinished, 10,000 word unintentional Harry Potter parody.

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  4. Sadly, I can still remember most of the words to the opening Star Blazers song and find myself singing it when vacccuming. Something about the tone of the vaccum brings it to mind every darn time.

    Ryan - at least your borrowed names were from places and not cartoon characters. :D

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