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| Logo by Dave Lee |
Our first livecast with Mickey Knox is up and the outtakes of Dave Lee interview were uploaded today. We intend to make more orginal and helpfull content for people new to Steampunk or Cosplay in the future.
Friday 11 March 2016
Radio Retrofuture is in the AIr!
Finally after much delay, we have launched our video channel on youtube!
Saturday 5 March 2016
Is Firefly something- or something-punk? Please give Retrofuturism some credit.
So, today I read a thread in which somebody asked. 'Is Firefly Dieselpunk?'
This happens to be a subject I wanted to talk about a long time. There are alot of common misconceptions about Steampunkesque visuals and stories. But before we start, what is Firefly?
Firefly(2002) is a short lived sciencefiction series written and produced by Geek God Joss Whedon; who also wrote Buffy the Vampire Slayer and The Avengers movie. Firefly was his favorite project, for which he had to jump a lot of hoops just to get the Pilot made. But after one season it got canceled anyway. But the show became a big hit when it got released on DVD. It's cultfollowing helped Whedon to finance a movie, Firefly: Serenity and to publish a comic-series that tied Firefly, the series, and Firefly, the movie, together. Still a lot of fans, including me, are very disappointed no new seasons were made.
The series is set in the year 2517, were humanity has settled a new Star System, and follows the adventures of the crew of Serenity, a "Firefly-class" spaceship. Each of these nine individuals have there own reasons to be on this ship, and have different views on their predicaments that make it a very interesting, and entertaining show. But Firefly is probably best known for it's visuals. This universe is portrayed as a Wild Wild West setting in space, with religious colonies, prospector towns and it fair share of vigilantes and robberbarons. It is one of the reasons why Firefly looked the why it did. And also why some people are so confused about its genre.
This is were the important rule of, 'Show don't tell' comes in children. The first Scene of Firefly is the last battle of the Unification War between the Alliance and the 'Browncoats' in Serenity-Valley. The Browncoats look like a bunch of Space Cowboys but the Alliance Forces look similar to the Union forces of the American Civil War. Do I need to to tell you, who will win this battle? ... Don't think so.
Firefly blends Space Opera with Western genres, depicting humanity's future as a multi-cultural society that is basically a fusion of Western and East Asian cultures. That's because the creators reasoned these would be the most dominant ones in this future. As a result Mandarin Chinese is the second language of the Sino-American Alliance.
Furthermore the show depicts this multi-cultural aspects is the visual design, that made Firefly look so unique. The sets and fashion in the show is a blend of Old Western-styles with Traditional Chinese dress. This a good example of using 'Retrofuturism' as a storytelling device to bring the world to life without wasting time on dialogues to explain this.
We know who the badguys are in this series. We recognize the Robberbarons, the ranchers and the farmers because we have already seen them in Westerns movies before. We know just enough about the American frontiertowns to understand what is going on in the colonies. The same goes for the use of horses in the series. When you settle a new land, with no infrastructure or industry and expertise is scares. Do you want complex vehicles or rather use horses?
And when you compare these frontiertowsn with the sterile chrome and blue spaceships of the Alliance. Who do you think are the ones in control?
Firefly applies a very interesting bland of history and popular culture to visualize it's setting, what gives the show it's retrofuturistic appearance. Sure, it's creators could have been inspired by Steam/dieselpunk. But that is not the reason why these elements appear in the show. Firefly is not unique in using Retrofuturism as a storytelling device either. We see it in Anime all the time, like Gundam, Battleship Yamamoto, and my favorite Last Exile. But unfortunately the first instincts of (Steampunk-)fans seems to be to label these as Steampunkesque or something-punk. I've never seen anyone ask, is this Retrofuturistic?
To conclude, Firefly is future prediction, and not an alternate history. The parallels drawn between the American Old-West and space colonisation give the show it's Retrofuturistic look.
These discussions also reveal that the subject of Retrofuturism more credit than it does. A matter a fact, I become more and more convinced that more people are a fan of Retrofuturism than any of the so called punk-genres. But Steampunk is it's flagship, and little can be done about that at this point.
This happens to be a subject I wanted to talk about a long time. There are alot of common misconceptions about Steampunkesque visuals and stories. But before we start, what is Firefly?
Firefly(2002) is a short lived sciencefiction series written and produced by Geek God Joss Whedon; who also wrote Buffy the Vampire Slayer and The Avengers movie. Firefly was his favorite project, for which he had to jump a lot of hoops just to get the Pilot made. But after one season it got canceled anyway. But the show became a big hit when it got released on DVD. It's cultfollowing helped Whedon to finance a movie, Firefly: Serenity and to publish a comic-series that tied Firefly, the series, and Firefly, the movie, together. Still a lot of fans, including me, are very disappointed no new seasons were made.
The series is set in the year 2517, were humanity has settled a new Star System, and follows the adventures of the crew of Serenity, a "Firefly-class" spaceship. Each of these nine individuals have there own reasons to be on this ship, and have different views on their predicaments that make it a very interesting, and entertaining show. But Firefly is probably best known for it's visuals. This universe is portrayed as a Wild Wild West setting in space, with religious colonies, prospector towns and it fair share of vigilantes and robberbarons. It is one of the reasons why Firefly looked the why it did. And also why some people are so confused about its genre.This is were the important rule of, 'Show don't tell' comes in children. The first Scene of Firefly is the last battle of the Unification War between the Alliance and the 'Browncoats' in Serenity-Valley. The Browncoats look like a bunch of Space Cowboys but the Alliance Forces look similar to the Union forces of the American Civil War. Do I need to to tell you, who will win this battle? ... Don't think so.
Firefly blends Space Opera with Western genres, depicting humanity's future as a multi-cultural society that is basically a fusion of Western and East Asian cultures. That's because the creators reasoned these would be the most dominant ones in this future. As a result Mandarin Chinese is the second language of the Sino-American Alliance.
Furthermore the show depicts this multi-cultural aspects is the visual design, that made Firefly look so unique. The sets and fashion in the show is a blend of Old Western-styles with Traditional Chinese dress. This a good example of using 'Retrofuturism' as a storytelling device to bring the world to life without wasting time on dialogues to explain this.
We know who the badguys are in this series. We recognize the Robberbarons, the ranchers and the farmers because we have already seen them in Westerns movies before. We know just enough about the American frontiertowns to understand what is going on in the colonies. The same goes for the use of horses in the series. When you settle a new land, with no infrastructure or industry and expertise is scares. Do you want complex vehicles or rather use horses?
And when you compare these frontiertowsn with the sterile chrome and blue spaceships of the Alliance. Who do you think are the ones in control?
Firefly applies a very interesting bland of history and popular culture to visualize it's setting, what gives the show it's retrofuturistic appearance. Sure, it's creators could have been inspired by Steam/dieselpunk. But that is not the reason why these elements appear in the show. Firefly is not unique in using Retrofuturism as a storytelling device either. We see it in Anime all the time, like Gundam, Battleship Yamamoto, and my favorite Last Exile. But unfortunately the first instincts of (Steampunk-)fans seems to be to label these as Steampunkesque or something-punk. I've never seen anyone ask, is this Retrofuturistic?
To conclude, Firefly is future prediction, and not an alternate history. The parallels drawn between the American Old-West and space colonisation give the show it's Retrofuturistic look.
These discussions also reveal that the subject of Retrofuturism more credit than it does. A matter a fact, I become more and more convinced that more people are a fan of Retrofuturism than any of the so called punk-genres. But Steampunk is it's flagship, and little can be done about that at this point.
Thursday 3 March 2016
Webcast: Making Steam with Dave Lee
Had a wonderfull livestream with Dave Lee, A humble Geek who will soon move back to the USA. I happy to catch him before he moved back.
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