The Ravens Nest

The Return of The Written Page

So, full disclosure, I just don’t care.

When I found out about the Writer’s Strike, I didn’t care.

I cared even less about the Screen Actor’s Guild strike.

I know how that may sound but I want you to read this full article before you start throwing vitriol or cheering in the comments. If I’ve asked nothing else, I’m only asking this.

I led this article with just a sampling of the books in my library. I haven’t shown you the sagas, the eddas, the multitude of books by writers like Hunter S. Thompson and I’ve got plenty more. I just chose the ones that, if I had to grab and run and never return, these are the books that would come along for the ride because these books matter more than anything to me.

I know some of you may think that fairy tales, Conan and horror may seem a bit immature for my level, but I assure you, they’re anything but.

Think about this for a moment. The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen ends with Ariel unable to express her love for the prince and she dissolves into nothing more than sea foam at the end. Cinderella’s stepmother, instructs both of her daughters to mutilate their own feet to get them into the golden slipper (not glass) that the prince was using as a qualifier. Crows ratted them out. They served as bridesmaids for Cinderella and, after her wedding, the crows pecked their eyes out. Cinderella has a happy ending, her stepsisters and stepmother, not so much. I could go on and on and on but those are just two examples of how absolutely brutal some fairy tales could be. They were no joke.

Howard’s Conan is even better than the movies, though I did enjoy all of the movies to some degree or another. Lovecraft’s work uses dense language but truly conveys the parlance of the times while subjecting all of us to nightmarish horrors beyond human comprehension, all built around a central mythos. In The Norse Sagas, the truly heroic some times die ignoble deaths…and they lose. The Celtic and Irish folklore regale us with tales of the Tuatha De Danann, a beast named Balor who’s eye, when opened, burns the very air that you and I breathe. Greek tales of Perseus killing Medusa to later save Andromeda, Zeus, Heracles, etc are all part of a tapestry of tales that take our imaginations and give us something to which to aspire. It appeals to the best in us and gives us all a collection of archetypes by which we can simply take our pick of which ones we prefer to look at and possibly even have one to resonate with. The kicker is that you don’t even have to be of the nationality or ancestry to enjoy them. They’re there for everyone to read and enjoy.

Lately, though, Hollywood wants to “reimagine” these tales and present them to us. They want to shoehorn in the latest and greatest of outrages and they honestly still believe (looking at you, Snow…white?…and no dwarves…ummm…okay?) somehow, if presented, we will now be forced to resonate with it and, should you not, then you’re a bad person.

We just went through the same thing with The Little Mermaid and that “reimagining.” How did that go, by the way? It struggled to turn a profit, and was called a “disappointment” by one of it’s financiers, according to The Direct. That has to hurt. It needed 560 million to break even and it did 568 million, give or take a million or two. Ouch. Three months after it’s theatrical release, it’s going straight to Disney+.

Don’t worry about it though, I’m sure Snow White…ish will do just fine, I mean there’s already the controversy of putting actors who are little people (Dwarf Actors) completely out of work by using outrage to kick them off the project, calling the prince a “stalker” and of course, just about anything from the original is going to be straight-up thrown out of the “reimagining” altogether.

It’s why I don’t roll back to the original animated movies by Disney. I just don’t care. I didn’t care about them then, I sure as hell don’t care about them now.

Why? Because I have the originals. Not everyone gets a happy ending and there are points that are being missed by not reading the original stories. Beauty And The Beast never had Gaston or a group of mad villagers. Beauty was visited in a dream by the young man beneath the Beast. She was in a race against time to accept and love him and, if she didn’t, he would fade and only The Beast would remain.

Don’t misunderstand me, I get it. Writers are worried about being replaced by A.I.

Hey, I understand. I wouldn’t want my job being replaced by nothing more than a machine as well. I’d like to be in the loop but, if not, I may need to make a pivot somewhere. Another point I’d like to make is that, Studios are a business and they’re always gambling. If I give you money to make a movie, it’s an investment and you are not legally obligated to make money, hopefully sooner rather than later. If you don’t, well then I will never fund you again. See how that works? Writing to a niche audience, that’s what you’ll get. Not everyone is going to be jumping up and suddenly celebrating your cause. When you pander, that’s what you get. When you lecture and people decide not to show up for it, guess what? That is a message. We might be silent at times but our wallets are not. Studios are now looking at writers and thinking “Well they’re not making money. Let’s see if we can get better out of A.I. and ChatGPT to give us better ideas. We, the audience have been telling you for years, “Stop it! Just write a good flick or TV show and we’ll turn out to see it” and still, somehow, even given source material where 85% of the work is done for you, you still manage to use it as a pulpit to pound and a soapbox upon which to stand.

Actors have only enabled this behavior. Flying friends across the country on private planes, shuttling them to the red carpet in limos, having afterparties in large mansions that use more power than I will in a decade while lecturing us about how awful I am. Well, buddy, you can hate me for free, I really don’t care.

Meanwhile, when your movies fail, you blame anyone, everyone and anything…but never once take responsibility for your lackluster performance. You gloat, you condescend, you’re snide and arrogant and you pretend to tell us what we “need” to or “should” do, what we must accept and what we must not tolerate while you have literally zero idea what it’s like to struggle to make your bills this month or the next.

No, I don’t. No I shouldn’t. No, I won’t. Blame me. Yes, it’s true, I’m not spending money at the theater. I buy my movies secondhand these days and stream them from my own computer. I have movies and TV shows but the most important thing that every one of you have overlooked, I have those books right up there in that picture. They will provide me with hours upon hours of entertainment. They will never be “updated for modern audiences” because I have my copy already. They won’t have your new covers that will proudly display the absolute hot garbage of an excuse that passes for a TV show “based on that work.” I don’t care what you call me for it, the point is, Hollywood, you will absolutely hate my guts for free and, if you wish to know how I sleep at night, it’s without underwear so you can kiss my ass. It’s that simple.

I do feel badly for the people who construct sets (that you’ve replaced with cruddy green screen and CGI tech) and the makeup artists (you’re replacing them with the same) and the costume designers, seamstresses and tailors (you’re replacing with the same) and somehow, I’m supposed to be supporting you?

Remember the Keystone XL Pipeline? How did you feel about them? The authors I picture above never lectured them, most of them can’t because they’re no longer with us but damned if they didn’t write stories that resonated with those people working on that project. I’ve lost jobs and you didn’t seem to care about that either. I guess as long as you got yours, it all works out in the end right? Right.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not writing this to gloat or to engage in any schadenfruede but to merely convey the message that I’ve needed certain people in my life but Hollywood has really never been among those groups. I still remember people getting antsy with me when they asked me about my thoughts on Octomom when “reality” TV was at it’s peak and I said “I don’t care.”

Fact is, I didn’t. I still don’t. None of these people ever paid my bills, sat down with me to talk about things that might be going wrong in my life, cooked any of my meals, provided relief efforts when I was in a natural disaster zone during one of the hurricanes, nothing. In fact, according to some of these people, I’m such a terrible person. Nevermind that I’ve helped pay their bills, buy their houses, helped send their kids to school in nice places, or aided in giving them a better life than I’ve ever had. It’s pretty shameful.

I love movies and TV. Always have. I just won’t pay to consume much more because, what else is there when what’s on the written page is so much better than anything coming from the studios? I can crack open any of the books in my TTPRG library and instantly write something better than what’s on those screens.

Now they want YouTube. Pardon me while I get sick as I know what will happen. New rules (those are already happening) and the claims that they’re trying to push spam bots off the site altogether. Sure, gotta make a warm welcome for that celebutard clientele, right? Then the rules will be leveraged against channels like yours and mine to be pushed off. YouTube will become the next Hollywood and YouTube will be farmed for non-union actors, writers, etc and best believe, some will chomp at the bit to get that cash. Meanwhile, many of us will be pushed to invisibility.

This is why I say. I don’t care and can’t be compelled to care. I never will care. Let Hollywood burn to the ground, as far as I’m concerned because the roles will soon be reversed and we will be burned completely out of what we built as well.

…and you’ll still be a terrible person for having a problem with it.

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