Episode 67: The Strange Affair Of The Skull At The Window by Joshua Reynolds
In a sequel to November’s “The Strange Affair of the Artisan’s Heart,” Popoca and the Countess are back, this time they are on the trail of a thief that has stolen a rare moth from the London Zoo…a rare, four foot moth. Sword fights, dirigibles, and electric velocipedes ensue. bloopers
Also, Big and Rish talk about the recent Oscars, Ameriquetzlan vocabulary, Monday Morning Quarterbacking, John Hughes, Pixar haters, and then Rish drones on and on about the Spider-man films. In fact, if you listen closely on a night just like this, you can still hear him out there, talking about Spider-man. Spooky.
Right click HERE to download the episode, select Save Link As, and save the file to your hard drive.
http://media.libsyn.com/media/dunesteef/Dunesteef_67_The_Strange_Affair_Of_The_Skull_At_The_Window_by_Joshua_Reynolds.mp3%20Related Links:
Joshua Reynolds’ Site
The Strange Affair Of The Martian Engine at Cosmass Infinities
Some sound effects were provided by freesound.org.
Music in today’s episode was La Traversée by Ehma.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
The Dunesteef Audio Fiction Magazine 
March 15, 2010 at 7:49 am
STORY: I liked the interplay between the characters, and the velocipede scene was quite funny, but this story felt much slower than the last one. Especially the big explanatory scene when the Countess and Popoca are each trying to pull facts out of the other even though both pretty clearly know what’s happening. I also think we needed some sort of audio cue — Popoca heard a click, and then the Countess said “I have to let go”, and they end up swinging back toward the hour hand by a grapnel or something — for the “letting go” scene.
PRODUCTION: As I said, there was that part of the story that felt VERY slow, but there wasn’t much that could be done about it, I guess. The velocipede ride was done very well, and overall I think steampunk/gearpunk stories really lend themselves well to full-cast audio with effects because there are so many cool effects, especially those that can be repurposed from other items — like the dremel effect that was used in the clock tower.
Thanks for using the music I used when I did “Artisan’s Heart”. Can we get Ehma to subtitle it “Popoca’s Theme”? Like how there was “Ilia’s Theme” in ST:TMP? (Sorry, I just watched that this weekend.)
COMMENTARY:
1. OSCARS — I’ve never watched them and never cared to. Televised awards shows in general are a major waste of time IMO. As for Kristen “I have one emotion in my range” Stewart… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkYDyPicm50 — so far the only thing I’ve really liked her in is “Adventureland” because the movie was good enough to compensate for her. She was SOOOOO BAAAAAD in Twilight (which I saw because I had to know what everyone was talking about).
2. SEGUES — see also “Travis Stork on ‘The Doctors'”.
3. SPIDERMAN:
a. You don’t like recasting. I get that. But what about when an actor dies, as Richard Harris did after Harry Potter 2? Or would you rather sequels bring in a new character to go with the new actor?
b. I didn’t see Spiderman 3. I didn’t like Dr Octopus in SM2 — I thought the role could’ve been written better, though I have no problem with Molina’s acting.
c. I LOVED Keaton as Batman, and I thought he was fine as the slightly-eccentric Bruce Wayne. Though Batman was my first real introduction to the character other than the Adam West TV show, so I didn’t know Wayne was supposed to be played the way Bale played him. I also think Clooney SHOULD have been good. All signs pointed to him being a great Batman. But it wasn’t to be. Oh well.
A good episode all around.
March 15, 2010 at 11:29 am
Holy Beelzebub, the sound design was amazing on this episode! It reminded me of when I was a boy and would sneak a tape recorder into the movies, then listen to it in my room, imagining images to match what I was hearing.
Is there an Academy Awards for podcasts?
March 16, 2010 at 10:14 am
1. It’s all about that Jerry Seinfeld impression. The grand pivot about which this episode revolved (in my humble opinion).
2. [Heresy alert] : I really enjoyed Up, but I got the chance to see The Fantastic Mr. Fox on a long plane flight 2 weeks ago, and in my opinion it’s the better movie. It’s basically the difference between a movie made by committee and one which follows a more individual creative vision. I guess I’m partial to the latter. Big-budget blockbusters tend to have that committee feel. They’re less of a commercial gamble for the studios, as such movies have an understandably broader appeal. But they also lack the unique, idiosyncratic flavor and creative coherence that can only come from following one person’s personal expression.
I’d say that Up was like a creative and wonderfully realized version of something I’ve seen before. Whereas Fantastic Mr. Fox felt more like something new.
March 16, 2010 at 1:02 pm
ps. I’m way overdue for a contribution here. Just waiting on my check to arrive. Thanks as always for a great podcast!
March 16, 2010 at 1:28 pm
Loved this story (and it’s prequel). The characters are delightful and engaging, and the world is broad and quirky and full of surprises. Mr Reynolds, you rock. More, pleeze.
March 16, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Edit: I was trying to figure out how I would describe the lead characters. I finally came up with: The Countessa plays James Bond to Popoca’s Sherlock Holmes. That is a great – and jarring – mix. Their communication fails and succeeds in the ways you’d expect those two tropes to behave to each other. Very nice.
March 18, 2010 at 9:27 am
Abbie, that’s a pretty good description. Wish I’d thought of it. That may be why I liked this and the other story, so well.
March 19, 2010 at 3:24 pm
Nice production guys.
November 7, 2014 at 4:00 am
Not sure the author will ever read this, but if he keeps writing this series set in London, fyi a countess would never say “Bloke”, or “nicked”. Throwing in a smattering of English slang is fine but if you don’t use it properly it’s jarring.