Philippine Speculative Fiction (or Phabulism)

I've been thinking about the nature of local fiction, especially concerning the possibility of a Philippine Science Fiction or Fantasy genre of books. One of the questions is - does anything in it necessarily have to be Pinoy in nature?

Is a Philippine writer obliged to insert aspects of the culture, language, or history into fiction? Is it really, as my friend Dean says, a bit of guilt that spurs us to do so as Philippine writers?

I can't speak for everyone, but I do feel that guilt. I feel that there are few representations of Filipinos in international media, so if I'm writing something that has a chance of hitting the international stage, I'd like some remnant some small sliver of pinoyness to make it as well.

Yes, I am one of those people who was tickled to discover that Johnny Rico, the main character in the Starship Troopers novel, was actually Filipino (we find this out in the last few pages). I love seeing Filipino comic artists sneak in the Philippine flag on a shirt or a Jollibee store in the background of a comic.

On the other hand, if writers from the U.S. can write about far away places and about us in particular, why can't we do the same? Why can't we write about strange alien races located beyond the reach of our solar systems? Why can't we write about magical realms with little basis in our world or history? Why can't we write about world-sweeping disasters that affect everyone on the planet?

We can.

It's just that we tend to stop ourselves from doing so.

Dragonlance - The Movie!

Well, check out the list of alleged cast members of the Dragonlance animated movie and see if their actors match your imagined voices for each of these characters:

Tanis Half-Elven
Michael Rosenbaum

Raistlin Majere
Kiefer Sutherland

Goldmoon
Lucy Lawless

Flint Fireforge / Fewmaster Toede
Fred Tatasciore

Tika Waylen
Michelle Trachtenberg

Greetings All!

Sorry I've been away for so long!

Renewed interest in blogging? Perhaps. It's more of getting back into the discipline of typing and putting ideas down into words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs.

The subject matter of this blog will probably shift a wee bit. I'll be focused on my hobbies and other interests, less on the details of my personal life. I'll be shifting those stories and opinions elsewhere.

The promotion of Speculative Fiction (I'd argue for Phabulism! The Ph is for the Philippines, and the Fabulism is for the genre of writing!) is one of the primary goals of my friend Dean Alfar, and so I'll be talking a bit about my readings in that genre and perhaps some of the difficulties I'm encountering in making my own contributions to that body of work.

Comic books are another interest of mine, though I've begun focusing on collecting the TPBs rather than on the one-off issues so this may be rather rare.

Movies may be reviewed here as well, Role-playing games (settings & systems) along with musings on the industries that surround each one of these hobbies of mine will appear in this blog in the future.

Stay tuned, fearless readers!