Tag Archives: the human division

Tales From the Clarke, the fifth episode of The Human Division gives a fresh look at a known character

Tales From the Clarke continues Scalzi wonderful episodic The Human Division. This time we see a familiar face from the first episode, Captain Coloma. Scalzi chooses a great protagonist by following a character with whom we’re already familiar but who was not a major character.

She’s tasked with showing off an old ship to delegates from Earth. The Colonial Union wants to rebuild Earth’s trust, so this is a critical mission. However, everything isn’t as it seems. By the end we see some resolution but with more tantalizing questions to propel us into the remaining episodes of The Human Division.

Episode 4 of Scalzi’s The Human Division gives us a glimpse of Earth

A Voice in the Wilderness is another side-story to the overall arc of The Human Division (and a great one at that). For the first time, Scalzi shows us what everyday life is like on Earth. Episode 4 follows a political commentator on Earth and shows us some of the conversations surrounding Earth’s relationships with the Colonial Union and the Conclave. It’s extremely fascinating and something we haven’t seen in the Old Man’s War universe previously.

This episode provides great content for the current state of humanity in the universe. As might be expected by an episode still early in the total work, however, it also leaves us with questions. I’m anxious to find the answers to those questions in future episodes. A Voice in the Wilderness is easily worth the $0.99, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the episodic format of The Human Division!

Reposted from my Goodreads.

We Only Need the Heads gets Scalzi’s The Human Division back on track

Just a few minutes into We Only Need the Heads, John Scalzi’s third episode of The Human Division, and I not only knew it was entertaining, but I also immediately realized the context of the second episode, Walk the Plank. Walk the Plank wasn’t quite as strong as a stand alone episode, but We Only Need the Heads quickly relates back to both of the first episodes.

As one CDF officer is loaned for a CDF mission to remove an unauthorized colony, a Colonial Union ambassador is tasked with completing the final negotiations with an alien race. Of course, these two separate goals are intertwined in ways that neither know at first.

We Only Need the Heads is very engaging, and Scalzi expertly jumps between action with the CDF and dialogue with the ambassadors. I believe we also see some hints of where the story is going in The Human Division, but it might be too early for me to know.

Walk the Plank continues Scalzi’s The Human Division

Walk the Plank is the second episode in John Scalzi’s The Human Division. It’s very different than The B-Team, the first episode, which I presume Scalzi did on purpose to set expectations. Walk the Plank is written as a transcript rather than in a traditional form. In addition, it’s much shorter, and the story doesn’t seem as satisfying.

While the first episode was a great story by itself, Walk the Plank is self-contained but but only decent. If it didn’t exist as part of a larger series, it would be rather boring. On the other hand, it’s more than enough for a chapter in an average novel.

As part of a larger whole, it seems to help set up things to come. There are some troubling problems that will likely reappear in later episodes. To be clear, I wouldn’t complain at all if it was simply a chapter in a novel, which is what it is in a way. However, if the The Human Division was compared to a TV series with The B-Team being the double-length pilot, Walk the Plank would would be one of the more out-of-place episodes with its weird format and subpar plot.

It was entertaining and served the greater story but just didn’t stand alone as amazingly well as The B-Team. Of course, Scalzi’s set such a high bar far himself that it’s to be expected that some episodes would miss by a little. I’d guess that Scalzi knew this to be one of the weaker episodes that’s more of a side story providing additional information, and that’s why it was placed second. Now we know that some episodes will be very different, and this helps give us an idea of what to expect. I can’t wait until next week for the next episode!

Scalzi’s episodic The Human Division kicks off with The B-Team

The B-Team marks John Scalzi’s return to his Old Man’s War universe, the series for which he’s most known. Set after the events of The Last Colony and Zoe’s Tale, it tells of a Colonial Union team sent to repair a diplomatic mission gone wrong. While it seems enjoyable without knowledge of the previous books in the series, it would also spoil them. I highly recommend reading the rest of the series first. Readers familiar with the series should enjoy seeing the ramifications of Perry and Sagan’s actions and those of the Conclave.

The B-Team is the first episode of The Human Division, which will be released as one collected book shortly. It’s comprised of thirteen short stories considered episodes of a whole. The B-Team was released on Tuesday, January 15, and a new episode will be releasing every Tuesday until the entire story is published. This reminds me of serialized novels in the past; however, those only worked as a while novel. The Human Division actually consists of stand-alone episodes. It’s a short story collection with an over-arching (presumably) story. This seems like an evolution of Scalzi’s last novel, Redshirts, which he considered a novel with three codas.

The B-Team follows all new characters in the Old Man’s War universe but was still very exciting. The political landscape of the universe was changed significantly at the end of the last Old Man’s War novel, and it’s nice to see those changes. I’m looking forward to the remaining episodes!