ANTICONTENT

Last Christmas, Gearbox Software, makers of the Borderlands games, gave members of their team cast iron skillets with the company logo on them. It was picked up by the gaming press in early January, and it’s been on my mind, on and off, ever since.

I’m quite interested in the business of how companies make themselves better employers. Gifts are a complicated thing because they can be a nice touch when things are going well, but a bit tone deaf when they aren’t — it can smack of papering over the cracks.

But that’s not it. Although the Borderlands film suffered critical and commercial immolation earlier in the year, let’s assume the team was happy with the progress being made on the upcoming Borderlands 4, which there is no reason to think won’t be quite a good game. Indeed, a senior writer alluded to the team’s work on Borderlands 4 when revealing the skillet on X over Christmas.

The thing is, we have a cast iron skillet with a custom design, and I know how lovely they can be. Ours has a beautiful Day of the Dead-inspired sugar skull design by Lourdes Villagomez — thank you, Lodge, which is never not joyful to look at. Their Dolly Parton collection is a hoot too.

What bothers me about the Gearbox skillet is that it’s a missed opportunity to do something beautiful. The logo is perfectly serviceable as logos go — a bit route 1, perhaps (it’s, like, a gear? in a box?) — but this was a moment when the logo, though better than nothing, wasn’t really enough.

Every time I look at our pan, I think of the many brilliant artists and designers who surely work at the studio, any one of whom could have been brought into the circle of trust and given the brief “design something beautiful and Gearbox-y or Borderlands-y for the underside of a 10-inch skillet”.

It might have been an ornate variation on the logo or a depiction of one of the game’s vibrant, unhinged characters (team Claptrap, anyone?) Or, very likely, something better. Although I’m sure it was well received — and it was a nice thing to do, of course — there is a slight whiff of corporate hubris about it. It was an idea without the all-important creative follow-up meeting with the right people in the room to figure out what would really make people happy. Something of the managerial “we know best”. Never mind, eh?

Lately I’ve completed a re-watch of The Wire, and oddly it makes me want to talk about The West Wing as well. Although The Wire is slightly more recent, I consider them to be in the same era of TV. The 20 or so years since have been much kinder to The Wire, especially compared to The West Wing’s Sorkin years.

I think it’s probably down to The Wire’s almost documentary-level realism, whereas The West Wing is set in a hyperreal parallel universe where everyone is a genius — and talks like it.

When Sorkin is on form he is a brilliant writer, but a largely-unspoken problem with Sorkin is that when he’s bad, he’s terrible. And in some moments, and occasionally whole episodes, The West Wing is now nigh unwatchable.

Issues include:

• Outright sexist storylines and dialogue
• Cringe-worthy dialogue
• Interchangeable characters
• Groaning exposition
• Extremely poor musical choices (which I don’t know for a fact but am absolutely certain are down to Sorkin)

The West Wing is brilliant more often than it’s terrible — and its best episodes fall into the Sorkin years: particularly the double episode that kicks off season 2. But I like the post-Sorkin seasons nearly as much for their more realistic dialogue and story choices. Here the worst episodes are merely dull, and not embarrassing.

I think Sorkin shares a problem with George Lucas in that, too often, they’re surrounded by subordinates who only say yes. Sorkin’s best writing since The West Wing has been for film, not TV. And in film he has had the likes of Danny Boyle and David Fincher to exact high demands and rein in the worst excesses.

Meanwhile, the worst criticisms I can level at The Wire are that every season takes too long to get going. I am not a believer in “watch a few episodes — give it a chance” and instead buy into the Sorkin quote:

Our responsibility [as storytellers] is to captivate you for however long we've asked for your attention.

I do tell people The Wire is worth sticking with, because it’s genuinely worth it. Things that are brilliant:

• The writing
• The acting
• The storytelling
• The dialogue
• The locations
• The music choices (almost always heard in the background, in scene)

What else is there after those?

But I don’t have the patience to stick out the early boring episodes of a new show any more. This may be a learned behaviour in the streaming era when the whole TV business model is to drag out stories for as long as possible to keep the subscriptions ticking along. (That wasn’t a problem created by streaming, of course — looking at you Heroes and Lost). Thank goodness for series like The Bear — the best TV since The Wire (and yes, I rate Breaking Bad extremely highly) — which buck the trend.

To the limited extent that I understood early-20th Century Baltimore (which is not at all), The Wire strikes me as a brilliant portrayal where the city is the star, albeit with a flawless supporting cast. I can’t think of one dud performance, or one over-egged line of dialogue.

I should probably write a post in praise of what The West Wing did well, as it will always be some of my favourite TV. But it doesn’t hold up as one of the very best any more — at least not in sum.

Reverting my Tumblr to something a bit more scrapbooky. I miss early Tumblr — as fun as blogging’s ever been.

Meanwhile, writing is happening, but mainly on paper and random notes files. Haven’t figured out where to put it, if anywhere. But the important thing is I’m doing it.

Also in mental health world:

• For now, stripping back personal social presences to just Instagram (unless you count Tumblr)
• Getting back into cryptic crosswords. Another thing that is good for my brain.
• Running again, as of Jan 1. 5K plan done, and half way into a 10K. It’s gotten back to the point that it’s fun. I hope I never stop.

I’ve been a professional writer for, ooh, quite a while now. It’s gone pretty OK. It’s paid the bills. In that time, my main creative outlet has been taking photographs.

If I’m being the honest, I think the reason I haven’t written much (and shared even less) creative stuff outside of work is a fear of failure. That failure could take many forms, but the most likely is falling into a silent void. Thing is, I know that doesn’t matter.

I’m getting on a bit more now, and I need to put worries like this behind me. Writing is good for me: more so than photography. It makes my brain calm. And I have a few, extremely modest, writing aspirations. Nothing to do with any conventional measure of success — just a few things I’d like to write at some point.

So I’m going to have a really good go at writing and publishing some things: probably here, and also on socials if they’re short enough. And I’m going to try really hard not to second-guess them, or feel self-conscious about them, and then delete them.

I don’t fully know what this will look like yet. To start with, probably a few more daft jokes on Bluesky. After that, maybe some stupid poems and weird short stories. That sounds like plenty for now. Just a bit of routine and confidence-building.

I like taking photos, though. I’m going to keep doing that. It gets me out of the house. But I’m going to put way less thought and time into it. I can get quite over-thinky about it.

stationery.

toronto 2017.

homecoming.

19.

ravn v2.

flöyen, bergen.