A writer's interpretation of the modern world.

-Lex

Little known fact - Some might say I have dark sensibilities.

Thinking seriously about it, I’ve been that way since childhood. When I was five or six, my parents bought me the Childcraft Encyclopedia set. By the time I was seven I had read the entire set, some volumes more than once. But one segment in particular stuck with me. It stuck with me so significantly that I had an aggressive impulse to share it with my kindergarten class for show and tell. Most adults would find this amusing, had my shared subject not been about the death of our sun and the end of life as we knew it.

I began by explaining that our solar system’s sun was a medium star and depending on the size of the star, its inevitable death would come about accordingly. Small or dwarf stars, as I had recently learned, would just fizzle out and collapse. Large stars would explode into super novas, destroying everything in their wake. Our sun, a medium star, would swell so large that it would engulf Mercury and Venus before shrinking into nothing. As for our Earth — it would survive, but life on this planet surely would not.

I then went into detail explaining how the sun’s incredible growth would scorch the planet until every living thing ceased to exist. And if, by chance, anything on Earth did survive the heat wave (understatement), it would then be subject to an unyielding winter. Once the sun dies, there’s no more heat. No more energy. No more anything.

Now — as a kid, my sense of time was a bit distorted and I was under the impression that this was all going to happen very, very soon. My concept of 3 billion years could easily have been confused with end of the week. So naturally, I was alarmed and I made it a point to make sure everyone I knew shared my extreme panic.

“And this is all going to happen…tomorrow!”

Needless to say, none of my Catholic school teachers were very impressed. I had basically read the Book of Revelations to a class full of six year olds. And ever since then, I’ve always been “that guy”.

-Lex

I don’t know how this gem slipped by me, but whoa nelly.

-Lex

I won’t pretend that I’ve been an avid comic reader since I was 6. Heck — I barely read 2 comics a month. And to dig myself into a deeper hole – I only started re-reading them about a year ago. As a kid I tried reading The Uncanny X-Men, some Amazing Spider Man and a bit of Dazzler but my parents (ie; my mother) never let it become a bona fide hobby. As an adult nearly two decades later, I can see why. It’s a very expensive hobby.

But I have come across a bit of a gold-mine within the art of comic book reading. A few months ago I stumbled upon The Astonishing X-Men which was — in part — written by Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I read the first few issues 1-32 and couldn’t stop, so leapt to the Hope Trilogy: “Messiah Complex”, “Messiah War” and “The Second Coming” (not yet released). As I read through them all, I only played two albums: “The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place” & “The Rescue” by Explosions In the Sky.

Call it cheesy, but adding an instrumental soundtrack like that to an already epic, heart-wrenching apocalyptic storyline changes the entire experience. I’m not as big on music as I am on story, but the two combined –astonishingly– force each other to translate so much more clearly. Seeing Kitty Pryde ripped away from Peter (twice), just makes more emotional sense with “First Breath After Coma” or “Day Six” in the background. I can’t listen to any song on those albums — even without a comic in my hands –without feeling a sense of love and doom all at the same time.

Giving context to music with a great story or giving context to a great story with good music makes all the difference in the world. It is also incredibly therapeutic and could save you a trip to your psychologist.

Just my $.02
-Lex

P.S. …
The Astonishing X-Men

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astonishing_X-Men

Explosions In the Sky

http://www.explosionsinthesky.com

I have never been good friends with 6AM. But as fate would have it, we’ve been seeing a lot of each other lately.

I work 10 hours a day at a fierce, fast-paced start-up company. By the time I get home my brain’s bandwidth is pretty much exhausted. Ads, development, testing, meetings, battles — It really takes a lot out of me. Still having scripts at home waiting for me to write when I’m done with work, a full day for me is no walk in the park. That said, more often than not I’ll find myself crashing into bed before even opening Final Draft to type a single slugline. I’ve got a deadline now, so something had to give. (ie; my sleep between 6AM-8AM Mon-Fri)

In theory, it’s perfect. I wake up early with a fresh brain, undisturbed and just out of my dreamscape. In practice, I have sensitive eyes that hurt when I turn on my laptop, a cat that whines the moment I wake up and an undiagnosed allergy to 6AM and the sound of my alarm. But I suppose this is discipline and I have to do it.

Still, two hours isn’t a lot of time. But it’s more than zero and I can at least feel assured that I’m getting two hours in as a daily minimum. I still try to write more if I have the capacity to do so when I return home, hence the lack of my social life in 2010. Pages are getting written, so I’m doing something right — I suppose.

Even so, 6AM is only a temporary ally. I’m much more fond of its counterpart, 9:30. AM? PM? I’ll take what I can get.

-Lex

This year for Christmas I thought I’d do something a bit more fun. So naturally, I decided to write a dark children’s story to show the other side of this cheerful holiday. It revolves around a peculiar little boy named Zilo. And so I present to you my first ever Christmas story…

Little Zilo’s Dark Christmas

Happy Holidays!
-Lex

I’ve never been a traditional fan of Christmas. Holiday cheer, (or cheer in general), is not quite my cup of tea. I don’t go home for the holidays, drink eggnog by the fireplace or wrap presents with gingerbread cookies. I don’t wear red sweaters, shovel snow or sing Christmas carols. Christmas time, however, is the perfect time to knock out some Final Fantasy or Modern Warfare hours without feeling guilty for losing yourself in front of a television screen for 12 consecutive hours.

And I can always find time for humor. So if you share my same dark sensibilities toward Christmas… -queue Jack Skellington- I think you’ll enjoy Adult Swim’s top 10 Christmas picks as much as I do.

Click to view Adult Swim’s Top 10

# 6

Merry Christmas. (And don’t say I never got you anything.)

-Lex

I’ve got a few posts pending in my queue, but a co-worker sent something kind of fun my way and I thought I’d share it. This could make an excellent stocking stuffer.

Just don’t get me one.

Twitter Literature

-Lex

“The only problem with living like there’s no tomorrow is that when tomorrow comes, it hurts.”