Quick Observation on Guns in Fiction
I just read The Executioner #20, New Orleans Knockout, in about 24 hours. Very fast read and pretty entertaining novel. Bolan's "Attack Winnebago" was especially hilarious.
The observation I wanted to bring up, however, is this: while there is a modicum of what I like to call "gun talk" in the book, as there is in most of the Pendleton Executioners, it is not overdone. Yes, we know what sorts of guns Mack Bolan totes around; .44 Automag, Beretta 9mm automatic with silencer, Uzi, etc., but Pendleton is careful to never let the "gun talk" stray into the realm of "gun porn".
Just like the shift in movie "vibe" from the 70's to the 80's moves from "thriller" or "crime drama" to "action movie", the Post-Modern Pulp of the 70's moves from discussing weapons and action in a modicum of detail to, in the 80's, being in many respects simple vehicles for showing off the size of the author's firearms reference works collection.
I will freely admit to being a bit of a gun nut. I like guns, I like shooting guns, I like talking about guns and reading about guns and in general I think that while what they do is regrettable, the firearm is a fascinating technological and socio-political story for the last five hundred years or so.
On the other hand, reading through some of these early Executioners, you can see that Pendleton wasn't writing the saga of Mack Bolan just to talk about the .44 Automag any more than the Dirty Harry movies were about the Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 magnum.
And that's perfectly fine with me.
The observation I wanted to bring up, however, is this: while there is a modicum of what I like to call "gun talk" in the book, as there is in most of the Pendleton Executioners, it is not overdone. Yes, we know what sorts of guns Mack Bolan totes around; .44 Automag, Beretta 9mm automatic with silencer, Uzi, etc., but Pendleton is careful to never let the "gun talk" stray into the realm of "gun porn".
Just like the shift in movie "vibe" from the 70's to the 80's moves from "thriller" or "crime drama" to "action movie", the Post-Modern Pulp of the 70's moves from discussing weapons and action in a modicum of detail to, in the 80's, being in many respects simple vehicles for showing off the size of the author's firearms reference works collection.
I will freely admit to being a bit of a gun nut. I like guns, I like shooting guns, I like talking about guns and reading about guns and in general I think that while what they do is regrettable, the firearm is a fascinating technological and socio-political story for the last five hundred years or so.
On the other hand, reading through some of these early Executioners, you can see that Pendleton wasn't writing the saga of Mack Bolan just to talk about the .44 Automag any more than the Dirty Harry movies were about the Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 magnum.
And that's perfectly fine with me.
