FYI - I have been using the term "slow boil" before you "introduced" me to it here. There might even be some older posts that I've made which reference the term. I recall first hearing it with regards to the movie "The Village" back in 2004.
Yup, you're right, my mistake - it seems to have cropped up a lot since I used it as a model distinction for "Eyes of the Crowd" (more on which below) but, mea culpa.
Hmmmm. You might want to be just a little less presumptuous. You'd be surprised what my opinion of "pulp" is.
Well, this was just poor phrasing on my part. Your assumption that my use of "pulpy" - as a model distinction (for the "front-loading" you enjoy) in the "Eyes Of The Crowd" discussion - was meant by me as derogatory (from the comment in Pseudopod 173: Bophuthatswana "Some people call that "pulpy" but c'est la vie"), when I meant no such thing. "Pulpy" is good, fun and the best way to tell some stories -"pulpy", just like "slow boil", is another flavor of genre approach, nothing more, nothing less. As opposed to the derogatory modifier "faddish".
Beyond the fact that most lit classes these days encourage slow characterization rather than a "pedal to the metal" approach, I was specifically referring to the school of "all-about-me" critics, writers, directors, producers (and sometimes *shudder* writer-directors) etc. etc. who promote this approach. Formost amongst them is M. Night Shyamalan. You might not find this trend a fad, but I think there is a case to be made.
For the first part - although it's been at least 10/15 years since I checked, they'd already seemed to have made a distinction between lit classes and genre classes in most writing curriculum. And even in those Lit classes, Raymond Carver is still taught as an exemplar of compression. As to the second, I don't know what a discussion about approaches to writing short genre fiction has to do with modern critics, directors, producers and writer/directors of film. So, I guess I still don't see the supposed faddishness. Blackwood's "The Willows" (1907) starts with long, descriptive scene setting of The Rhine and character detail, many pages before anything of note happens, and it still works a treat (and we all know who's favorite story that was). So, no, still don't see it as anything distinctly "new" (I mean, I get that you don't like it but nothing beyond that), sorry.