#Bleeding edge characters movie

He employs a lot of uptalk, especially with the women. In terms of dialogue, Pynchon does a few interesting (but not necessarily good) things. A cast list or dramatis personae at the front (or even the back) might have helped throughout the nearly-500 pages of this book I kept finding myself going “Uh, did we meet this character before? The dialogue and narration seem to imply we have, but I have no memory of this person.” The revolving door and seemingly random comings-and-goings of characters is a problem for this book, or at least for me and the level of attention I was willing to pay it. It would be an understatement to call the cast of Bleeding Edge numerous. In what I can only describe as pretentious satire Pynchon channels that Gibson flavour of social commentary on technology while populating this New York with strange, if not memorable, people.

He draws up a constellation of conspirators who seem to have involvement in September 11, which might have been a government plot, or a Middle Eastern plot, or both. I say alternative because while this isn’t really alternative history, the lens through which Pynchon examines events in New York surrounding Septemis an esoteric one. Whereas Gibson writes books in “alternative near-futures,” Pynchon seems to be writing about alternative near-pasts. Pynchon here reminds me a little of William Gibson.

#Bleeding edge characters movie

Obviously I don’t know if the movie is much like the book, but it has a similar stylistic feeling to Bleeding Edge: an overwhelming cast of characters connected in bizarre and coincidental ways stumbling in a stupour through a miasmic plot that sputters and jolts towards its conclusion. Coincidentally, I watched the adaptation of Inherent Vice just after I started reading this.

Thomas Pynchon, of course, is a literary juggernaut. The three Goodreads friends who have rated Bleeding Edge all gave it 5 stars, so that’s impressive.