Why am I not hearing more talk about this? Is anyone else going to be there this year? I promise I don't bite.

Hey, do you know where it's gonna be now?

Henderson State University, Arkadelphia, AR

http://slayageonline.com/SC3/SC3_Program.pdf





Mrs. Haunt and I will be staying at the Hampton Inn, and will have our vehicle so if anyone is staying nearby we might be able to play ferry to and from (as long as you're willing to suffer our schedule... which will probably mean dawn till dusk or beyond.)

I feel so. Incredibly. Stupid. Before for thinking that Arkadelphia was not a real place. Wow.

*blushes*

ETA: Gahh. That's the weekend right before my Raconteurs concert (June 9), so that wouldn't very well either financially or logistically (it would require some very strategically coordinated traveling for me to be able to do both comfortably). So, sadly, I cannot go.

I would say I could go next year, but that's when I'm off to shoot movies...

I guess only the Haunts and I attended, but I believe a good time was had by all. The highlight, IMHO, was Jeanine Basinger's talk on Sunday AM--she is a delightful person, and told us SO much about Joss.

Start planning now for 2010!

I'm baaaaaaaaaack!


So, another Slayage goes in the books. It was great fun, just as all the others have been. There's something very cool about the madness of tribal fan academic gatherings. Despite being pretty darned introverted and antisocial myself, every time I go to one of these I just love getting to meet and talk with fellow fans... particularly with the "intellectual" ones. Granted they're all much smarter than I am, but I put on a good show, and by and large they're willing to let me pretend.

Also every time I do this I walk out swearing that I'm going to write my own paper to present at the next one. Two years between conferences ought to be enough time for even a poser like myself to cobble together something interesting. But nope... every time I go empty handed. Mrs. Haunt actually HAS written a paper, but insists that it's not ready for public consumption yet, so maybe in 2010.

At any rate, since I'm old and my memory is spotty at best I won't even attempt to give a play-by-play of the entire conference. Sadly the nature of a beast like this is that you are inevitably called upon to choose between more than one amazing reading, so I'm sure that I missed as much treasure as I found. Still, a few have stayed with me well enough to deserve mention.

Our very own (possessive much?) Mockingbird, aka K. Dale Koontz was on hand to present her paper "The One That Almost Got Away: Doyle and the Fish Story", which was fascinating and cast long-overdue attention to the subtext of our favorite half-Lister demon. This is the second conference that Mrs. Haunt and I have had the pleasure of sharing with Dale and we're both grateful that we got the chance to speak with her at more length this time around. She's what is commonly referred to as "good people" and we very much look forward to meeting with her again in the future.

Oh, and there was also the small matter of her recently published book, Faith and Choice in the Works of Joss Whedon . Bloody brilliant.

Cynthia Masson presented "What the Hell? - Angel's 'The Girl in Question'", which managed to pull off two miracles. First, it earned her the coveted Mr. Pointy 2008 Award... no small feat considering the incredible competition this year. And secondly, and much more impressive, it managed to convince Mrs. Haunt and I both that the much-loathed ante-penultimate Angel episode might actually NOT suck as much as we remembered. In fact it may even be worthy of rewatching and closer inspection. Not sure if I should thank Ms. Masson for that or curse her.

J. Bowers from the University of Missouri, Columbia gave her very first academic conference paper, "Vampire Noir: How Angel Subverts the Detective Genre". I confess that I wasn't actually interested in hearing this paper simply because I thought that the study of Angel's noir tropes was a pretty well-worn path already, and only got to see this because it was part of the Angel I session. Honestly, it ended up on the list my wife and I had to choose from when it came time to nominate the Mr. Pointy Award. In point of fact it was the one we actually voted for. Not because it was absolutely THE best paper out of everything we saw, but because it had the most unexpected emotional impact on us. Leaving aside all the thorough research, rich detail and compelling analysis in the paper itself, it managed to make me realize one of the reasons I've been so dissatisfied with After the Fall so far. (Something about the complete and utter genre shift that's too complicated for me to waste my time trying to explain here.)

Janet Halfyard blew us all away with her powerful and poetic study "Hero's Journey, Heroine's Return: Buffy, Eurydice and the Orpheus Myth". In essence it looked at various ways in which Buffy was portrayed as both Eurydice AND Orpheus at various points in the series' narrative. Great stuff.

"Television Intertextuality After Buffy" by Jeffrey Bussolini was one of the most fun presentations. The paper itself was pretty good, discussing multiple series that have clearly drawn inspiration from the works of Joss (not just Buffy, despite the title)... though I think some of the examples he cited were less about direct influence or inspiration and just a little more about general pop culture and "collective unconscious". Anyways, what made the panel so fun was seeing all the clips from the different shows, such as Eureka, Supernatural and even Deadwood. And best of all, perhaps one of my favorite moments from the entire conference, was seeing the reaction of everyone in the audience who apparently had never seen Moonlight. It was unanimously agreed that that one goes beyond mere "inspiration" or intertextuality. But that's old news to most of us by this point.

I was apparently one of the very few people in the audience at the Firefly/Serenity panel that actually enjoyed Josef Velazquez's "Dappled Things" paper. I'm the furthest thing from an academic (cue Forrest Gump impression, "I'm not a smart man..."), but for some reason had not one iota of difficulty following the discussion of multiple personality values combining to create additional values and what those values mean/how they are interpretted. I was truly enraptured by it... so much so that after the awkward silence during the post-presentation Q&A session I felt obligated to track down Mr. Velazquez and thank him for his work. Honestly I think he was a little confused that I tracked him down like that, but I thought it was important that he know someone appreciated it.

And finally, there was the pro-Angel contingent, the ladies I affectionately refer to as Angel's Angels. Bronwen Calvert gave the genius essay "'Great, she's super-strong and she can alter time': Illyria and Visual Pleasure", which among its other heavenly graces gave us the opportunity to watch some Illyria clips, such as her battle with Angel, Wes and Spike in "Shells".

Lorna Jowett (who really should need no introduction) gave us "Self-Made Man: Lindsey McDonald, 'the Cain to Angel's Abel'". Given his popularity it's always kind of surprised me that Lindsey hasn't gotten more critical academic attention that he does. Jowett clearly loves and understands the character and is doing her part to show how complex his role in the series truly was.

And of course my own personal hero thanks to what sometimes seems to be her one-woman crusade to guarantee Angel: The Series not be forgotten in rush to discuss Joss' other works (and her passionate love for the character of Wesley), Stacey Abbott. Not only is there her published work including Reading Angel  and Celluloid Vampires , as well as her many contributions to the Slayage Online Journal of Buffy Studies , but every conference she presents at least one new paper or essay on the subject. This time around it was "'I don't know what kind of man I am anymore': The Damaged Man in Angel and post-Angel Cult Television". It was absolutely, intimidatingly brilliant... and also the most emotional, tear-jerking, depressing presentation of the entire conference (and I mean that in a good way.)

I could go on (despite my previous claim of poor memory), but I'll wrap it up here. Just a few more things I think I have to mention...

* The banquet and sing-along were great, as usual. After participating (by which I mean attending) these conferences for six years now it's really satisfying to be on such good and friendly terms with folks like Rhonda Wilcox and David Lavery. And though I can't sing to save my life and would rather gouge out my own spleen than perform in public, every time I get to sing Whedon songs with these folks is golden. Also I think Rhonda may actually take my suggestion to add Barry Manilow's "Mandy" to the song roster next time seriously.

* Getting to meet our own .com member suzie was a highlight. My wife and I both had a blast. Getting to know her and talk with her about all those controversial fan opinions we don't normally get to talk about (at least not without getting into trouble) was a real joy. Hopefully she tracks down her password for .org here and posts her own thoughts on the conference. Also my somewhat shocking introduction to Maeve will certainly be a memory to cherish.

* Because I promised those in attendance that I wouldn't, I simply cannot resist pointing out that Rhonda Wilcox's chastisement for self linking was a comedic high point of at least one session. We laughed and laughed... and Rhonda has a great sense of humor about it.

* One of the greatest memories of the entire shebang would have to be the keynote speech "Joss Whedon, Film Major: A+ All the Way" by none other than Jeanine Basinger, Corwin-Fuller Professor of Film Studies and Founder and Curator of the Cinema Archives at Wesleyan University, who also just so happens to be Joss Whedon's film studies professor and surrogate mother. She spent over an hour telling stories about Joss as a student and friend. I've never wished I had a micro-cassette recorder (or at least a better memory) than I did during this talk. Hopefully someone out there somewhere will be able to post a more detailed account of exactly what Prof. Basinger talked about.

Lastly, a very special thank you to Kevin Durand for organizing the whole affair on a local level. These things always have the potential for horrible chaos and he managed to work it all out so we didn't leave his town a smoking hole in the ground when we left. Thanks for all your extremely hard work, Mr. Durand.

Can't wait for 2010!!!

Thanks for the report, Haunt. It sounds like a great time.

Excellent report, Haunt - thanks so much.

FAR better report than mine...I'm still so exhausted that I even forgot to mention Mockingbird, whose paper was indeed fine (and her book, too--everybody buy it!).

Since it seems that the sessions Haunt and I attended didn't overlap that much, I'll report on some of the other papers:
David Lavery talked about Whedon's work on films, starting with his script-doctoring and on through Serenity. Compared Joss as a writer/director with fellow Wesleyan grad Michael Bay. This is part of his forthcoming book on Joss http://davidlavery.net/Whedon/ 

The 2nd session on "Genre, Narrative, Performance" included an interesting paper by Kelsie Acton on western tropes in BtVS--interesting, because usually the Slotkin "regeneration through violence" stuff is applied to Firefly. Also, Leigh Clemons explained how the shift to graphic-novel/comicbook genre has been changing "character/story" in "Season 8"--which was great for a comics newbie like me.
James Francis: "Reaver Madness: Joss Whedon's Undead Evolution from Ubervamp to Cannibalistic Terror"--hard to boil this one down, but among other things, he said that the Reavers (that would be the "cannibalistic terror") represent the ultimate in moral decay, destroying "flesh and blood without consequence," but "they are us"--so that's the scary. And I've oversimplified ridiculously.

In the only session on Willow, Jane Martin talked about the tradition of the "uncontrollable redhead" in literature, film, and comics to lead into a detailed comparison of Willow/Dark Willow and Jean Gray/Dark Phoenix. That session also included one of the best papers by an undergrad, which examined Willow's discovery of magic as her metaphorical queer coming out experience. This approach was much more effective than another one, which shall remain unnamed, that critiqued the literal portrayal of Willow as a lesbian for not being lesbian enough.

Rumor has it that 2010 will be in Sacramento, CA (did I say that already?), so start planning now.

Something conflicted with the session that had the comics discussion or I absolutely would have been there. However I'm not sure I could have resisted pointing out that comics are a medium, not a genre.