Shooting War

Shooting War is a comic set in the near future. It is told from the perspective of Jimmy Burns who runs a liberal video blog. He unexpectedly captures a terrorist attack of a Starbucks on video. This marks the second attack on U.S. Soil. A news company called Global News recruits him on the spot and sends him to Iraq to cover the situation over there. His helicopter is shot down on his way over to Iraq, and Jimmy is captured. His captors force him to film and upload their proclamation to the network. Throughout the comic, Jimmy is continually coerced into filming several different videos. Eventually he is embedded with a unit of soldiers lead by a man named Crash. While being embedded in the unit, Jimmy experiences an ambush and is captured again by the same person as before. He is forced once again to film another one of this terrorist’s videos, but midway through the filming, Crash’s unit breaks into the compound and takes out the terrorist and frees Jimmy.

Shooting War is an amazing comic. Probably one of the aspects which I enjoy most is that it is so believable. The equipment is the equivalent to that which is being used today. This realistic aspect is most likely a result of it only taking place a few years in the future. I find it interesting how the tactics that the insurgents are using do not differ from those that the current insurgents are using now. This story is more driven by the happening truth than the story truth. I think that most adults should read this comic, because it gives a fresh perspective on what the situation in Iraq will become if nothing changes.

The Things They Carried

The Things They Carried is one to of the most interesting collection of short stories that I have ever read. Each story is different, though they all share one common theme. They all take place in Vietnam. In the short story “The Things They carried”, the narrator describes the things that different soldiers carried in Vietnam. Odd objects carried by one soldier were bars of soap stolen from a hotel. “Spin” talks about the positive moments in this horrible war. One of the soldiers finds an orphan puppy and raises it himself, feeding it with a plastic spoon and keeping it in a ruck sack. Only to have a fellow soldier strap the small animal to a land mine and detonate the device. “How to Tell a True War Story” gives several examples of the tall tales that soldiers tell to one another in their fox holes. “The Man I Killed” and “Ambushed” are both told from the point of view of a remorseful soldier. In both of these stories the soldier has killed a man and afterward has not been able to deal with the reality of what he has done. The personal accounts of the soldiers lend the book a sort of authenticity that news coverage cannot provide.

I find my self deeply interested by these stories, for I only just began to learn about the Vietnam War during my freshman year of high school. I found it hard to hear about the war from the point of view of the soldiers, for many of them do not want to have to remember what happened then. I think that if the rest of this book is not assigned, then I will finish the book for my own leisure.

Survivor#2

Tender Barnson’s life changes drastically. His caseworker dies, when she mixes two different types of cleaning solutions together, and they produce chlorine gas as a byproduct which causes her to suffocate. When the FBI investigates, they do not consider Barnson a subject of interest, because he is creedish. Later, a talent agent scouts Tender Barnson. In the blink of an eye Tender becomes a celebrity. He lands on the cover of Time Magazine and has his own book, ghost written by another. But his fame is short lived, and as it wanes, he makes appearances at two different Super Bowls. At his first appearance, he predicts a future disaster, as foretold to him by Fertility. His revelation effectively averts the casualties that would have been caused by this calamity. Between the two bowl games, Barnson has his own T.V. talk show, where he gives advice to callers. Also, the land that used to belong to the creedish church is turned into a landfill for old porn by Barnson’s agent. At the second Super Bowl, his agent commits suicide, and Tender is charged with the murder. His brother Adam with help from Fertility saves Tender from the police, and they hitch hike back to the creedish property. For some reason I cannot understand, they drive head long into a concrete wall. Then Adam tricks Tender into delivering him to heaven. Finally Tender meets Fertility, and they get on an airplane to Sydney, Australia. This is the same plane that Tender hijacks at the beginning of the book.

I find that this book has the most obscene and perverse content, that I have ever read. At the same time I think that this book is a good representation of the United States’ darker side. The description of bizarre sexual practices such as “glory holes” and the fascination with disaster that occurs when Barnson foretells of the impending calamity; these both show the sadistic nature of our society. Chuck Palahniuk is an interesting author, and I enjoy his work, even if it is extremely racy.

Survivor #1

Tender Barnson is a man who throughly disturbs me. In the beginning of the book, he hijacks an airplane, so that he can tell his life story to the black box. He was raised in a cult where he had no rights, because he was born three minutes later than his brother. This creedish death cult, to which Barnson belongs, has several bizarre restrictions, such as not eating refined sugar and not listening to radios. Being second born, he is forced to leave the community and work in the outside world. His phone number is mistakenly advertised as a suicide-help hot line, and he tells the people that call him, that they should kill themselves. While Barnson is in the outside world, the rest of his creedish comrades deliver themselves to heaven by killing themselves. As a result, he is given a disturbing caseworker, because he is deemed a suicide risk. After awhile, she begins to encourage Barnson to kill himself, because she is tired of dealing with him. At the same time Barnson is infatuated with a girl named Fertility. Her brother is one of the people who committed suicide with his help. Tender Barnson additionally works as a servant for two bankers and uses fake flowers stolen from a mausoleum to decorate his employer’s garden.

Chuck Palahnick’s book Survivor is very hard to understand for two reasons. First, it is written backwards and secondly, he likes to use very annoying word loops like, “the megaphone said”, to repeatedly start sentences. I do not understand what this confusing book has to do with the class topic games.