Daily Archives: December 18, 2025

Top Tens – Fantasy & SF: Top 10 SF Books (Special Mention: Cult & Pulp) (2) Paranoia

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Rulebook cover art

 

 

(2) PARANOIA (1984 – PRESENT)

Commie mutant traitor!

“The Computer is your friend. The Computer wants you to be happy. Happiness is mandatory. Failure to be happy is treason. Treason is punishable by summary execution. Are you happy, citizen? Have a nice daycycle”

Welcome to Alpha Complex in the SF role-playing game of Paranoia – “a world designed by Kafka, Stalin, Orwell, Huxley, Sartre, the Marx Brothers and that crazy old man at the airport bar at 2 am”. A dystopian fusion to the point where everything would be monstrously overwhelming but for its own dysfunctionality and the game’s absurdist dark humor.

It’s also a post-apocalyptic dystopia – although what apocalypse (if any?) forced the last survivors (or are they?) of humanity into the last underground or domed city (or is it?) run by the supercomputer known simply as the Computer or Friend Computer is now mysterious, as no one is sure what happened any more, if anyone ever did. Not even the Computer, when it tried to figure out what went wrong – “unfortunately, the Computer’s databases had been corrupted, and after finding some old Cold War propaganda, it concluded that the Communists did it”.

And now, the Computer is the equivalent of a barely functional paranoid schizophrenic – that probably would have wiped out Alpha Complex but for its inefficiency, its ability to simultaneously pursue wildly inconsistent goals at odds with each other, and its genuine but abstract benevolence towards Alpha Complex (or whatever remains of either that benevolence or Alpha Complex).

It may be teetering on complete breakdown (or outright psychosis) after decades of subversion or reprogramming by conflicting groups, but the Computer still rules Alpha Complex – “its dystopian society organized in a hierarchy of “security clearances based on the electromagnetic spectrum (specifically Isaac Newton’s version), from lowly Infrared worker drones, through Red grunts and Yellow managers, all the way up the rainbow to the Violet and Ultraviolet elite”, the High Programmers.

This society is supported by “swarms of robots” – which if anything, tend to be crazier and more dangerous to humans than the Computer – as well as “spies, omnipresent surveillance, and a bureaucracy so huge and convoluted no one’s quite sure who’s in charge of what any more”.

“Problems in Alpha Complex are solved by teams of Troubleshooters, whose job is to find trouble and shoot it”. (Stay alert. Trust nobody! Keep your laser handy!).

Those problems including traitors – where virtually everything is treason, and even the knowledge of what is or isn’t treason is usually above your security clearance – as well as Communists or other secret societies, and mutants. Or a combination of all of these – the trifecta of “commie mutant traitor”, which is what players yell as they shoot each other in the back. Indeed, I’m known to be fond of using that phrase in real life.

Of course, “thanks to years of clone breeding” (everyone is a clone in Alpha Complex), “overexposure to radiation, and other snafus”, everyone is a mutant. Everyone is also a member of one or more secret societies, mostly plotting to overthrow the order of Alpha Complex. Ironically, the secret societies were started by the Computer, as an outlet to the natural human impulse to conspire together, but as usual in Alpha Complex, got out of control.

(You seem a little too informed of matters above your security clearance, citizen – please report for termination! Have a nice daycycle!)

The players “are (usually) Red-level Troubleshooters working for Friend Computer, grudgingly assigned useless, backfiring equipment and weapons, and dispatched on (often impossible) Suicide Missions, all while navigating the endless deathtrap which is Alpha Complex, keeping their mutant powers a secret, advancing the cause of their secret society, and trying to earn promotion to higher color grades”. Not to mention in-fighting among players – if you’re not shooting each other in the back, it’s because you’re shooting each other in the face.

You’ll go through a few clones, if not all of them, by the end, if you make it to the end – which is the truly dangerous part, the mission de-briefing, when you accuse each of treason. If you’re lucky, your fabricated accusations of treason might just overlap with their genuine treason.

RATING: 5 STARS*****
S-TIER (GOD-TIER)

Top Tens – Heroes & Villains: Top 10 Villains of Mythology (Special Mention) (2) Demons & Devils

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Detail of a 16th-century painting The Last Judgement by Jacob de Backer in the National Museum in Warsaw in WIkipedia “Devil” (public domain image)

 

 

(2) DEMONS & DEVILS

 

Demons and devils – even archdemons, daemons, fallen angels or legions of hell, fiends, imps, incubi or succubi.

Demons and devils came very close to their own special mention entry for my Top 10 Mythologies, given how pervasive demons or demonic beings are in myth and folklore. Ultimately however I deferred that special mention entry to here as I was not prepared to tempt fate from the forces of hell if I ranked them anywhere else. Also, demons and devils in popular culture or imagination have largely been assimilated into those of Biblical mythology, albeit that in turn took many of its cues from Middle Eastern mythology.

Demons or devils tend to be depicted as chthonic beings but also as more villainous than the other chthonic or underworld beings of mythology in general, albeit with substantial overlap between them. While chthonic deities can be depicted as neutral or even benevolent, there is usually no such ambiguity for demons or devils – chaotic, destructive or evil to the core. Bad to the bone as it were, although there is occasionally sympathy for the devil.

Indeed, they tend to be the benchmark for evil beings, such that demonic is an adjective for evil, literally or metaphorically (or metaphysically). The wider or “most generic definition” of demon would be “any evil or injurious spirit or supernatural being” – which could be very wide indeed, including things such as vampires or even dragons.

A good or noble demon is something of an oxymoron – even relying on one to not lie or cheat on a deal is fraught with peril. At best, a demon might be depicted as capable of redemption, in which case it becomes something else or is no longer a demon, but almost universally they are depicted as irredeemably evil in nature. Even when they purport to do something good, it turns out to be for the greater evil.

The archetypes of demons or devils – essentially synonymous, albeit occasionally distinguished in such things as Dungeons and Dragons where demons are chaotic evil and devils are lawful evil – are those from the Bible or Biblical mythology. The latter can get convoluted, on occasion distinguishing demons native to Hell or other eldritch beings as opposed to damned souls or fallen angels from Heaven, although they all tend to be conflated under the label of demon or devil. Also, as noted before, the demons and devils of the Bible or Biblical mythology in turn are influence by those of Middle Eastern mythologies, notably Mesopotamian and Persian.

However, there are similar beings or eldritch abominations in other mythologies that are translated as demons or devils – Buddhist and Shinto mythology are particularly notable in this respect. The televised version of Su Wukong or Monkey is forever etched into my mind with his declaration of demonic opponents – “Ah, DE-MON!”.

One reason that they are so pervasive in mythology or folklore is that they often stand in for the chaotic or destructive forces of nature – or humanity. There is a large overlap between demons or devils and other supernatural beings – with witches, fairies, dragons, ghosts and vampires perhaps as foremost for similar elements, tropes or types.

Devils are perhaps at their worst doing their deals (or Faustian pacts) for souls, while demons are at their worst corrupting or possessing good or innocent beings – demonic possession is arguably the most villainous weapon in their arsenal and comes in various forms, such that it could be the subject of its own top ten, particularly as it extends to animals or objects other than humans, ending up much like fairies or ghosts with various demon or demonic animals or objects.

For that matter, demons or devils in myth or folklore could well be the subject of their own top ten list, whether for named individuals or broader classifications, including their various elements, tropes and types – not to mention the elements, tropes and types of those most important human interaction with them, demon-slayers or exorcists.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****

S-TIER (DEVIL TIER)

Top Tens – Comics: Top 10 Comics (Special Mention: 2000 AD) (2) Alan Moore – D.R. & Quinch

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2000 AD poster art of the titular delinquent duo

 

 

(2) ALAN MOORE – D.R. & QUINCH (1983 – 1987)

 

“Even had I suspected then the truly horrifying suffering and amazing loss of life that would be caused by our well-meaning enterprise… I’d have done it anyway. Only more so.”

 

One of my hot takes in comics is that I find Alan Moore’s work overrated. I’m not saying I don’t like it. But for me, his finest work was his series D.R. & Quinch, when he started as a writer for 2000 AD and before taking himself too seriously. After all, how seriously can you take yourself when you pronounce the Roman snake god Glycon as your deity? (In Moore’s case, very).

You see, Alan Moore used to be fun – and never more so in this semi-regular but sadly brief series about the eponymous alien adolescent delinquent duo. It started with a one-off comic “D.R. & Quinch Have Fun on Earth” as part of the recurring Future Shock and Time Twister stories, in which the duo steal a time machine to wreak havoc on an insignificant planet in the cosmic boondocks no one cares about (i.e. Earth) as a prank on their college dean. However, they proved so popular they got five longer stories – “D.R. and Quinch Go Straight”, “D.R. and Quinch Go Girl Crazy”, “D.R. and Quinch Get Drafted”, “D.R. and Quinch Go to Hollywood” and “D.R. and Quinch Go Back to Nature”.

You know you’re in for a wild ride when your protagonist’s initials stand for diminished responsibility.

TV Tropes sums it up best:

In what can best be described as “Rule of Funny meets For the Evulz,” D.R. & Quinch tells the totally amazing story of one Waldo “D.R.” Dobbs (the “D.R.” stands for “Diminished Responsibility”), a skinny, lanky, teenage delinquent who boasts a genius IQ, enjoys acts of extreme violence and destruction, and looks like a cross between a gremlin and a skrull with a pompadour, and Dobbs’ best friend Ernest Erroll Quinch, a large, purple-skinned brute who is much, much quieter than Dobbs as he prefers writing to talking. Together, these two deeply sociopathic, evilly affable, omnicidal maniacs do as they please, and what pleases them usually involves death and destruction on a tremendous scale; it helps that, in their part of the Milky Way, nuclear warheads are as easily obtainable as a handgun in the Deep South.

 

“S’right”

 

RATING:

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

Top Tens – Fantasy & SF: Top 10 SF Books (Special Mention: Classic) (2) Arthur C. Clarke – Childhood’s End & Space Odyssey

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Screenshot of the weird alien black monolith from the iconic opening Dawn of Man sequence from the 2001: A Space Odyssey film

 

 

(2) ARTHUR C. CLARKE –

CHILDHOOD’S END & SPACE ODYSSEY (1953 & 1968-1997)

 

“I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”.

 

The iconic line of 2001: A Space Odyssey, both in the 1968 film by Stanley Kubrick – from a screenplay co-written by Kubrick and Clarke – and in the subsequent novel, or more precisely novelization, written by them but for which Clarke ended up as the official author.

Yes, that’s right – the film 2001: A Space Odyssey wasn’t adapted from a book, the book was adapted from the screenplay written by Kubrick and Clarke for the film, albeit that screenplay was inspired by various short stories by Clarke.

Also, while some people may be familiar with the film’s sequel, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, people may not be as aware that sequel was adapted from the book sequel 2010: Odyssey Two – or that there were two more sequel books, yet adapted in film and yet to be missed in real life chronology, 2061: Odyssey Three, and 3001: The Final Odyssey.

Anyway, you all know the two iconic scenes from the film – they’re pretty much what everyone remembers from the film to the exclusion of everything else, except maybe the space baby or star child thing at the end.

The first is the opening scene, subsequently imitated and parodied, of that weird black alien monolith seeding our hominin ancestors with intelligence, all to the orchestral music of Thus Spake Zaruthusa.

The second is of course the scene of my featured quote, of the sentient but paranoid supercomputer HAL (from the letters before IBM) not opening those damn pod bay doors on a space mission to Jupiter to check out more alien monoliths because those things get around.

Clarke’s novel Childhood’s End is also probably an influence for the film, particularly as Kubrick initially sought to adapt that novel and it has a similar theme of transcendent evolution guided by aliens. The aliens in the novel are much more intrusive than the monoliths in Space Odyssey, ruling Earth as benevolent but unseen Overlords (literally using that title).

The Overlords are unseen because in the novel’s first big twist, their appearance resembles that of depictions of the Christian Devil – something which is initially attributed to some sort of racial memory of previous visitation but that, in another big twist, is revealed to be not a racial memory but a racial premonition of this visitation. As for the source of that premonition, in the final twists of the novel it turns out that it originates from the latent psychic potential of humanity which sees humanity merge with the Overmind, essentially a psychic star child – or star adult since that’s’ the point of the title with humanity ending its pre-psychic “childhood”. The final kicker – while the Overlords serve the Overmind, they can never join it as they lack any latent psychic nature and hence have to go around the galaxy baby-sitting other species that have it.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****

S-TIER (GOD-TIER – OR IS THAT MONOLITH OR OVERLORD TIER?)