Escape Artists

PseudoPod => Episode Comments => Topic started by: Bdoomed on June 29, 2019, 06:36:15 PM

Title: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: Bdoomed on June 29, 2019, 06:36:15 PM
PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance (http://pseudopod.org/2019/06/28/pseudopod-654-fotb-xlviii-parts-maintenance/)

Author: Kurt Hunt (http://pseudopod.org/people/kurt-hunt/), Bo Balder (http://pseudopod.org/people/bo-balder/) and Michael Uhall (http://pseudopod.org/people/michael-uhall/)
Narrator: Graeme Dunlop (http://pseudopod.org/people/graeme-dunlop/), Dan Rabarts (http://pseudopod.org/people/dan-rabarts/) and Kris Straub (http://pseudopod.org/people/kris-straub/)
Host: Alasdair Stuart (http://pseudopod.org/people/alasdair-stuart/)

PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance is a PseudoPod original.



Content Warning:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)



Show Notes
“A Real Death” is a PseudoPod Original

“Kintsugi” is a PseudoPod Original — Kintsugi: “I wrote the story for a contest on Codex Writers forum. So much fun to join with more than a hundred people in getting a story done each week for a month!”“

How to Construct a Gun from Your Own Flesh” was first published in the Spring 2018 issue of Vastarien.



this isn’t meant to last
this is for right now




“Find a real death. But there is no real death any longer. There are bodies that break down the way the cars do.”

–Antoine de Saint Exupery, Flight to Arras



Bad luck. Voice went first. Hard enough to communicate with it, but without? Gesticulation. Exasperation.

The woman at the repair shop snaps her gum and raises an eyebrow at me. I signal again for something to write with. “Vocal cords,” I want to say. “Mute now. Graft? Transplant? Help a guy out?” But of course I say nothing.

She sighs and flips her visor down to block her eyes. Some vid, or maybe chatting with a boyfriend. Whatever. No help here. I’m invisible. Scansorted when I walked in:  warranties expired;  credit unsatisfactory;  accounts canceled;  nothing to barter.

As people used to say: “broke.”

I leave.

Fuck.

Bad, bad luck.



Listen to this week's Pseudopod. (http://traffic.libsyn.com/pseudopod/Pseudo654_FOTB-XLVIII_PartsAndMaintenance.mp3)
Follow us on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtLeMuTcFDtF2C3MiF6GPfQ) and Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7ahtswbjEhqKQifCwMX8o1?si=GMgBgLFHRsCzJ8xlvf9nOw)!
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: Scuba Man on July 12, 2019, 07:39:44 PM
I’m noticing more frequent, specific warnings at the beginning of episodes.  ???  ??? Or, instead of a blanket-warning, Pseudopod is giving warnings-within-the-spoilers that urge the listener to look at the key-word-warnings.
I’m finding it an odd (and unnecessary) development. I don’t want to know WHAT gruesomeness is in an episode. If I can’t handle it, it’s up to ME to stop the episode. I like (?!) the feeling of ... oh f##k... I gotta skip this nightmare fuel. I’m taking ownership of my squeamishness.
Meh... my 2 cents.
 ;D
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: adrianh on July 13, 2019, 02:18:45 PM
FWIW I love and appreciate the more explicit warnings, don't find the spoilerish (unless you go read the explicit descriptions on the website — which you don't have to.)
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: Scuba Man on July 16, 2019, 09:14:56 AM
10-4, adrianh. Makes sense to me, eh.
Re: episodes. How To Make A Handgun Out Of Human Flesh was glorious body & handgun horror. I’m looking at chicken bones in a whole new light! Gruesome!  ;D
Re: 1st story. That was horror. I felt the author handled the UNAMUSING topic (prostitution & human [cybernetic] trafficking) responsibly. Alisdar, your musings about the episode were thoughtful.   :-\ It makes me rethink the replicants in the movie, Blade Runner.
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: harrietpodder on August 12, 2019, 09:38:05 PM
Hi Scubaman, I like the explicit warnings because my body/mind are disabled, and ppl fear disability as it is, so the one person's "body horror" might be another's "oh yuck, here comes disabled=bad=trash=automatic horror, YET AGAIN"

Being disabled, the horror of the cyberprostitution was overshadowed that once you broke eg became disabled, you were worthless; my body doesn't work so well, but my brain and my voice do, so when MC lost his voice; it hit me hard.
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: Scuba Man on August 19, 2019, 09:33:50 PM
Hi Scubaman, I like the explicit warnings because my body/mind are disabled, and ppl fear disability as it is, so the one person's "body horror" might be another's "oh yuck, here comes disabled=bad=trash=automatic horror, YET AGAIN"

Being disabled, the horror of the cyberprostitution was overshadowed that once you broke eg became disabled, you were worthless; my body doesn't work so well, but my brain and my voice do, so when MC lost his voice; it hit me hard.
I appreciated your response, harrietpodder . As long as pseudopod doesn't start doing YouTube, click-baity titles (like this channel, called Mr Creeps [...mind you, I love the narration... and the creepy pastas are REALLY odd]), I'm cool with the explicit warnings.
https://youtu.be/gZbO0Uhq7Fc (https://youtu.be/gZbO0Uhq7Fc)
Title: Re: PseudoPod 654: Flash on the Borderlands XLVIII: Parts & Maintenance
Post by: Scattercat on August 26, 2019, 05:32:05 AM
I was iffy on "A Real Death" for most of the reasons mentioned above, and while I appreciate Alasdair's explanation afterward, it still landed on the wrong side of exploitative for me.

"Kintsugi" was pretty solid, though I feel like Ttai would be judged pretty harshly by any sensible moral code.  Imagine a human artist who made sculptures by dipping live animals into an electroplating tank or something.  "He doesn't understand that they can feel" only goes so far, even for an alien.

"How to Construct a Gun from Your Own Flesh" was highly amusing, cynical and darkly comic.  A+ horror all round on that one.  I particularly liked the throwaway line at the end about the gun's "office" and how that rewrote the entire story's perspective in a flash.