Author Topic: EP160: Kallakak’s Cousins  (Read 25807 times)

Russell Nash

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Reply #25 on: June 03, 2008, 05:11:18 PM
Given that I'm definately not the only person who is just sick and %&/&)% tired of the is it SF or not argument. I have split that off here.



Rain

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Reply #26 on: June 03, 2008, 05:17:17 PM
I liked this story, it was fun and sweet and had a lot of cool SF elements. After a big bunch of letdown episodes this was just what i needed



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Reply #27 on: June 03, 2008, 05:45:44 PM
Anyway, that's not the fault of the story, or the author.  I thought it was an amusing story, mostly.  But one thing I didn't like was the reveal at the very end -- when we find out Kallakak's wife isn't dead but she had simply left.  It really threw me, and not in a way I particularly enjoyed. 

I have to agree that gone not dead thing kind of threw me as well.  I thought there were several hints about this through the story, but I was never quite sure.  Now for the sappy part, that kind of colored the whole story for me.  It was alright and light hearted as Steve said, but then they tossed that out there and I thought, wow a devoice in a culture when that is still actually a taboo thing, how very sad.  Taboo might be the wrong word here, but...  My two cents.

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deflective

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Reply #28 on: June 03, 2008, 07:13:32 PM
I'm a little surprised at the majority response being positive on this one. I definitely don't mind a little light fare at all, but I prefer for it to be interesting or funny as opposed a very tiny smattering of both and be predominantly boring.

i don't usually post a 'me too' but i don't have the interest for much more than that. so, me too.

an odd story like this is ok, one every one hundred and sixty seems about right. tv is already available if i want a sitcom.



OsamaBinLondon

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Reply #29 on: June 03, 2008, 11:08:07 PM
Blithe, trite, unfettered, entertaining.  :)



lieffeil

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Reply #30 on: June 04, 2008, 06:53:04 AM
Why were the humans called Jellidoos?  Or were those not humans?  It was unclear (at least to me). 

Kalakkak's people likewise were very interesting, but I seem to have missed what they look like beyond ear frills and two pairs of arms and that they are all born as (apparently sexless until maturity) twins.  A good start, but I needed more.

This felt like a piece of a larger work.  I was left unsatisfied.

I believe they were referred to as "humanoid". Humanesque?
I agree with your last statement, however. It occurred to me as I was listening, and I think it has something to do with the fact that over the course of the story the characters become easier to understand and empathize with. Often in short stories the author will have character development that is truncated, so that we get the idea that there is something that we can relate to in them, but it's not given to us outright. This sort of "look, they're people too" thing happens a lot more in novels, when the author wants or needs you to empathize with the main characters right off the bat, so that you'll keep turning the pages.
It was refreshing, and soothing. I especially loved the description of tea at Bo's. I had to brew a pot for myself before I could resume listening. What can I say? Easily influenced.
And I found the idea of the manipulative robot who everyone assumes is straight to be quite hilarious.
As for the romantic aspect of it, maybe the real reason why the main character didn't contradict the cousins is that either way, he lost his wife. That's probably just the hopeless idealist in me, but I like to think there's something to it.

Last comment: Steve Eley's voice has grown on me. It has the sort of sarcastic straight-forward quality of a good friend, the type who will tell you the truth whether you want to hear it or not.

...you've got three metric seconds.


stePH

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Reply #31 on: June 04, 2008, 01:40:58 PM
It was refreshing, and soothing. I especially loved the description of tea at Bo's. I had to brew a pot for myself before I could resume listening. What can I say? Easily influenced.
And I found the idea of the manipulative robot who everyone assumes is straight to be quite hilarious.


I missed that until you mentioned it, but it sounds a bit like P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves.

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ChiliFan

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Reply #32 on: June 05, 2008, 11:32:53 PM
I think the story is definitely in a Star Trek: Deep Space Nine vein, due to it being set on a space station with shops, like on the promenade in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and especially having different species interacting with each other. I think there was at least one dispute over ownership of a shop in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, but I can't remember which episode it was in. I hadn't read or heard any of Cat Rambo's stuff before, so it would be interesting to find out if any of it is in a similar vein.




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Reply #33 on: June 05, 2008, 11:49:30 PM
I think the story is definitely in a Star Trek: Deep Space Nine vein, due to it being set on a space station with shops, like on the promenade in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and especially having different species interacting with each other. I think there was at least one dispute over ownership of a shop in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, but I can't remember which episode it was in. I hadn't read or heard any of Cat Rambo's stuff before, so it would be interesting to find out if any of it is in a similar vein.



I read a killer story of hers in the latest Weird Tales.  It was excellent, and tonewise could not have been any different from this story.


JoeFitz

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Reply #34 on: June 06, 2008, 01:07:20 AM
I kept waiting for something significant to happen and was totally turned off by the sitcom ending. I was pleased with the world-building and the scant description of all species - I really thought the story had legs, if you'll pardon the pun. I would be interested in other stories set in this universe.



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Reply #35 on: June 06, 2008, 05:13:51 AM
Light-hearted, fun, enjoyable. If it were food it would be a snack.

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Reply #36 on: June 08, 2008, 04:21:11 PM
It's called Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, after a 1970's German terrorist organisation.

Hey cool!  I just heard about that the other day.

;)

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qwints

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Reply #37 on: June 10, 2008, 08:07:17 AM
I felt like it would have worked better as a TV show. It felt like it was filled with sight gags, and some of the drags in the action could be corrected by fantastic scenery.

The lamp flared and crackled . . .
And Nevyrazimov felt better.


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Reply #38 on: June 10, 2008, 10:14:30 PM
I felt like it would have worked better as a TV show. It felt like it was filled with sight gags, and some of the drags in the action could be corrected by fantastic scenery.

*announcer voice*

  "Coming this fall to the CW; Kallakak's Cousins! kallakak thought he had everything he could want, his own shop and a beautiful wife to share it with, but when his wife leaves him to go find herself, her three wacky cousins move in and hilarity ensues. Catch it this fall!"

  This story would make a great pilot.  ;D

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Reply #39 on: June 10, 2008, 11:07:09 PM
  "Coming this fall to the CW; Kallakak's Cousins! kallakak thought he had everything he could want, his own shop and a beautiful wife to share it with, but when his wife leaves him to go find herself, her three wacky cousins move in and hilarity ensues. Catch it this fall!"

  This story would make a great pilot.  ;D


 :D That totally sounds like a pitch.

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goatkeeper

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Reply #40 on: June 11, 2008, 08:29:50 PM
I felt like it would have worked better as a TV show. It felt like it was filled with sight gags, and some of the drags in the action could be corrected by fantastic scenery.

I agree- this did seem like an episode out of a sitcom.  I enjoyed this story very much and great read.



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Reply #41 on: June 20, 2008, 12:41:24 PM
Sorry but I thought this was terrible. Dull, pointless and such an obvious ending it was painful. I would have turned it off half way through except I had a vague amount of curiousity over whether he got to keep his shop or not.

Dire.



csrster

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Reply #42 on: June 24, 2008, 01:04:50 PM
I found this one thoroughly and enjoyably old-fashioned - from back in the days before SF became "genre literature".
It read like the kind of thing that used to crop up in those crumbling old 1970s paperback sf anthologies I used to
borrow from the local library when I was a kid.



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Reply #43 on: July 01, 2008, 03:15:09 PM
Was anyone else picturing ST: Deep Space 9 and Kallakak & his cousins as a furry & webbed version of a Ferengi?

Maybe I should've had a 2nd cup of coffee before plugging it in during my commute...



Russell Nash

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Reply #44 on: July 01, 2008, 06:25:24 PM
Was anyone else picturing ST: Deep Space 9 and Kallakak & his cousins as a furry & webbed version of a Ferengi?

Maybe I should've had a 2nd cup of coffee before plugging it in during my commute...

Several differnet space stations went through my head.  All of the ones that were portrayed as being a bit run down were mashed together in my head.  A little DS9, a little B5, even a little Crescent.



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Reply #45 on: August 02, 2008, 03:47:01 PM
This was one of the episodes we saved up for our cross-country road trip, and we enjoyed it. Yes, it was fluffy, but it was an enjoyable fluffy.

Although, after the story, we speculated a bit over the physiological characteristics of the alien species, because we're nerds like that.



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Reply #46 on: August 04, 2008, 08:06:24 PM
Cute. I liked it. Not the best Escape Pod of all time, but certainly entertaining - like an episode of "Welcome Back Kotter" -- the students get him into various embarrassing situations and then accidentally get him out of trouble in the end.

Pretty stock stuff, but it's stock because it works.
Was anyone else picturing ST: Deep Space 9 and Kallakak & his cousins as a furry & webbed version of a Ferengi?

Maybe I should've had a 2nd cup of coffee before plugging it in during my commute...
More of a B5 in my mind, but yeah.

Actually, I thought that kind of helped with the story.

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Reply #47 on: July 02, 2010, 05:55:02 PM
I didn't finish this one. It sounds like those who liked it thought it was light and funny, but I must've missed something because it didn't make me laugh and I didn't find it at all light--it was about an oppressive government with constantly shifting laws so that no one can ever be aware whether they're breaking the law or not to the point that business owners can have their shop stolen right from under them without the slightest warning.  That's depressing.  The idea of the constantly shifting laws was interesting by itself, but the story wasn't compelling enough to make me want to hear the rest.