Harlan Ellison was an acid-tongued, verbal bruiser of a reviewer and critic who used to flense his opponents before he defenestrated them. He was not a fighter who liked the taste of his own blood in his mouth; he liked the taste of other people’s blood in his mouth, and was happy to indulge himself in getting some whenever possible. There are a lot of people out there who will be happy to give their true, unvarnished opinion of Harlan Ellison — but only because he’s now safely deceased, and thus won’t show up at their front doors with a broken-off stop sign and the unnatural grin of the Undead.
None of this should be taken as a criticism, because absolutely none of it is. I might not have watched the classic Doctor Who if it wasn’t for this man. Rest in Peace, Harlan Ellison.
Moe Lane
Not only a critic, but a darned fine SF writer. He wrote “The City on the Edge of Forever”, one of the greatest Star Trek Original Series episodes. Among his short stories was “Repent, Harlequin”, Said the Ticktock Man” which won the Hugo and the Nebula award.
A sad day for Science Fiction.
He also wrote “A Boy and His Dog”, which was turned into one of Don Johnson’s best movies…
JMS has a great story that is a perfect picture of who he was https://www.facebook.com/officialjmspage/posts/1999083533459833
Harlan Ellison was a consultant for Babylon 5, and there was a scene where Ivanova is reading Harlan Ellison’s autobiography– which he hadn’t written at that point, so it was just a book with blank pages. After the scene he snagged the prop and took to carrying it around with him, just to make people curious.