Saluting Maestro Williams

John Williams is 80 today. May he live and compose for a long time to come!











One of film music's finest voices, and one of the musical voices that has moved me the most over the years. Thank you, Maestro Williams.

A quiz-thing

I haven't done one of these in quite some time! Roger did this one, and I think I will, too.

1. One of my favorite TV shows recently changed the actors who played two characters. Have you ever been bothered by a TV show or movie series changing actors who play a character you love?

At first glance, I didn't think I really had very many good examples of this, but thinking about it more, it's obvious that I have a bunch. First we have the James Bond movies; you can't be a long-time Bond fan and not have some strong opinions as to which one's the best. (Mine is that I really, truly, honestly like every single Bond actor, and that the one most generally viewed as the worst -- George Lazenby -- was not only pretty good, but starred in the best Bond film ever made. How do you like that!)

Then we have things like the ongoing reboot of Star Trek, with younger actors cast as Captain Kirk and company, and there's the new version of Spider Man coming out soon. I'm fine with Trek, although I'm not as thrilled with the resulting movie as some and I think the goofy "But it's just a new timeline!" excuses are pretty weak; I'm not fine with Spider-Man, though, because it's unnecessary when a perfectly acceptable (even if most folks didn't like III all that much) series of films could have been continued, and the only reason this one's happening at all is because Sony has to make a movie or they lose the Spider-Man rights.

I also remember things like the year that Donna Reed played Miss Ellie on Dallas, because they didn't want to write out Miss Ellie but Barbara Bel Geddes needed time off. I was OK with that; by that point, Miss Ellie was mainly a supporting character, anyway.

So basically, I go with a case-by-case basis on this kind of thing.

2. A coworker recently shared a link to a blog listing the "five things you should know before dating a journalist." As a journalist, I can honestly say the writer was spot-on. What are some things people should know before spending time with you?

I'm kind of confoozled by this question...if they want to spend time with me then they gotta know something about me to begin with, right? But anyway, I guess people should know that I tend to value honest conversation and laughter, and that I find racism and paranoia a major turnoff. Singing the praises of the New England Patriots is right out.

3. What is something you often do without realizing that you're doing it?


Knuckle-cracking. Humming. Muttering to myself. Staring off into space because I'm thinking about something.

4. Who has the capacity to make you angrier than anyone else in your life, and what in particular does he or she do to make you so angry?

Yeesh, I don't know...various Republicans, maybe? I can feel anger pretty intensely, but it burns itself out pretty quickly. The whole Tea Party thing makes me pretty mad, though. So do young people who bleat about Ron Paul and how awesome it would be if we hitched our 21st-century economy to 19th-century economic theory; what irritates me is how intensely clueless these folks are, and yet they'll tell me, "Educate yourself!" And climate-change deniers strikes me as not just angering, but downright dangerous.

5. If a fairy waved a magic wand and gave you the house of your dreams, where would it be and what features would it have?


A large kitchen with really great ventilation, large bedrooms, a room big enough for the books (and with enough shelves), and it should be on a nice-sized lot bounded by a bunch of trees, for cooling and privacy. Oh, and a woodstove, and an outbuilding of some sort -- maybe an old, ramshackle garage -- where I could set up some kind of workshop so I could finally start exploring woodworking on a real basis and not just piecemeal via the projects I get at The Store.

6. What’s a belief that you hold with which many people disagree?

Obviously, that the Star Wars prequels don't suck! And also, that Super Bowl commercials are generally lame and not interesting enough to bother watching. I pay so little attention that there could be an ad during a Super Bowl featuring Kat Dennings wearing overalls while engaging in a pie fight, and I wouldn't know until the next day. (And maybe a good thing...that scenario might well make my head explode.)

7. I used to talk in my sleep. In fact, I could carry on a conversation with someone when I was fully asleep, and my mom used this fact when I was a teenager to find out if I did anything wrong and was hiding it from my parents. If you were talking your sleep tonight, what do you think you would say?

"Cersei, you lying whore." (I'm reading A Clash of Kings right now.)

8. The fourth installment of the "Twilight" movie series ("Breaking Dawn Part I") will be released in theaters soon. Movie theaters started selling advance tickets for midnight showings months ago. Have you ever attended a midnight premiere showing of a movie?

Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. Those are the only midnight movies I've done. I've seen a host of others on opening day, though.

9. On Tuesday, tigers, lions and bears were let loose in Zanesville, Ohio, by their owner before he committed suicide, leading to a hunt in which 49 of the animals, including 18 endangered Bengal tigers, were killed. How would you react if you saw "Caution exotic animals. Stay in your vehicle" being displayed on a road sign?

OK, this quiz is officially dated now. If I'm in the car with a person I don't like, maybe I distract them so they don't see the sign and then trick them into getting outside? No, that's mean. I guess I just drive away until I figure I'm safe and then call someone to find out what's going on.

10. If a company opened a theme park aimed at adults, what would you name one of the rides?


The Princess Leia Organa Slave Girl Revue. This would take place at the Star Wars theme park. Which needs to exist.

11. Imagine you just moved onto Sesame Street. Which puppet would you want as your new roommate?


Since Kermit exists on both Sesame Street and The Muppet Show, I will assume that Sesame Street is somewhat close to whatever street the Muppet Theater is on. This, therefore, gives me access to all the Muppets, and not just the ones on Sesame Street. For a roommate? I'd take Scooter. I think he'd be fairly quiet and conscientious. (I'll bet Animal throws some wild parties....)

12. Have you ever had a weird crush on a famous person that didn't make sense to you?


Nah, they all make sense to me. Some of them may not make sense to you, but I can't help that!

13. If you get ten minutes to interview any celebrity of your choice, who would you like it to be?


George Lucas. Or Barack Obama. Or Joss Whedon. Or...I'll just stop there, I guess.

14. You've just won the complete DVD collection of all the movies starring one actor or actress. Which actor/actress would you pick?


Ooooh, tough one. I think I'd go with Humphrey Bogart. Or Meryl Streep. Or Marilyn Monroe. Or...yeah, I'll stop there.

15. Actor George Clooney recently told People Magazine that he doesn't use Twitter "because I will drink in the evening and I don't want anything that I could possibly write at midnight to actually end my career." What is something you've said through social media and then regretted it?


A Facebook friend posted that he was going off to work as a polling place volunteer on either Election Day or Primary Day, and I posted something like "Good luck, and make sure you demand ID and do whatever you need to do to keep those pesky brown people from voting!" He's pretty liberal, so I figured he and his friends would recognize that I was mocking the GOP's jihad against 'voter fraud', none of which actually exists and which really gives rise to policies that just happen to also heavily discourage minority voters, who tend to vote for Democrats. My phrasing, though was not well-considered or well-received, so I apologized and deleted the comment. Not my finest moment online.

16. VH1 has re-introduced its hit show "Pop-Up Video," which gives behind-the-scenes facts for popular music videos. What musician would you be most interested in learning behind-the-scenes facts about?


John Williams. Or the Beatles.

17. If you stumbled across someone's personal written journal that was accidentally left in a public place, would you read any of the content?


That's tough...I think I'd thumb through it, in the hopes of seeing if I could find any identifying marks within it, so that I might try to contact the owner and return it to them. If it was completely anonymous, though...maybe I'd read it. I'm honestly not sure.

18. What is the title of a self-help book that you'd never want to see on a store bookshelf?

Finding the Super Model In Your Life, by Tom Brady.

19. Many media outlets have been asking this question a lot this week... Which Halloween costume do you think will be overdone this year?

Well, obviously this quiz has been knocking around for a few months. Right now I have no idea...but the idea of a bunch of kids dressed up as Mitt Romney is pretty unsettling.

20. Should a marriage license have a renewal date or expiration date, like a driver’s license?

Ye Gods, why would we want to do this? Is someone seriously suggesting this? As in, you have to renew by a certain date or your marriage simply ends? Is this an actual idea out there somewhere? It seems to me that this, far more than allowing gays to marry, would fundamentally alter the notion of what marriage is about.

And there, the quiz ends. Huzzah!

A Random Wednesday Conversation Starter

Questions go here! So far I'm not getting as many as usual...let's close up that gap, shall we?

200 Years of Dickens

Happy birthday to Charles Dickens!

"This just might be my masterpiece."

Pulp Fiction has been a favorite film of mine ever since it came out...which is why it strikes me as odd that until quite recently, it was the only Quentin Tarantino film I've seen since I first heard of him. All I've seen of Tarantino's work was Pulp Fiction and episodes of ER and CSI that he directed (both of which, very well, in my view). I did start to watch Kill Bill Volume One a few years ago but never finished it, for no real reason. And there I stopped, until I finally got around to watching Inglourious Basterds a month or so ago.

I loved this movie. Absolutely loved it. I loved it for what it is: a big, violent, gory, profane cartoon parody of jingoistic war movies.

Tarantino is not everyone's cup of tea. He tends to construct long scenes consisting of conversational duels that are punctuated by violence, and that's certainly on display here, several times, in sequences whose tension increases as Tarantino delays the violent payoff, and delays it again, and delays it still again. The very first scene does this, when a Gestapo commander drops in to visit a French farmer. His visit seems dull and routine; our Gestapo fellow at first doesn't seem terribly invested in what he's doing: searching for hiding Jews. He initially gives off an air of a man just going through the bureaucratic motions, and the farmer seems to be just answering his questions until he buggers off. But at some point it becomes clear that he's not going to bugger off, and that this dull Gestapo bureaucrat is anything but. As I thought back over this scene, I kept trying to pinpoint exactly when it is that this man, Colonel Landa, takes on an air of quiet malice, but he does. It's the most unsettling kind of malice, the smiling malice of a man who knows that his job is to mete out death and that he will do his job and then go home and go to bed at night.

This 'delaying of the payoff' recurs over and over again throughout the film, such as an extremely tense scene set in an basement tavern in France that never seems to end, or in a moment in a restaurant when a girl who is hiding the fact that she is a Jew finds herself at a table with Hermann Goering. In fact, this payoff-delaying tactic of Tarantino's shows up in the very first shot, as our French farmer watches the Nazis driving up his road. Watch this scene and realize, several times, that the Nazis should be there by now.

The seriousness of this scene contrasts with the sheer absurdity of the storyline that has a drawling American, Aldo Raine, recruiting a special team of assassins – out of Jewish-Americans – whose job will be nothing more than to operate in Europe and kill as many Nazis as possible, in as violent a way as possible, so that their reputation – the 'Basterds' – will reach back to Berlin and strike fear into the heart of the highest command, including Hitler himself. Raine's team and their casual acceptance of torture and execution is a bit unsettling, but there's also something weirdly exhilarating about it all. Maybe it's because it's the Nazis and we know that we can hate on them just fine, but Tarantino allows the 'rank and file' Nazis to have just enough personality that it's a bit unsettling when Raine uses his bowie knife to carve a swastika into the forehead of one of them ("I'm gonna give you something you can't take off"). But only a little.

And as usual, in a Tarantino film, so much of the weight is carried by the dialogue, such as when Raine realizes that a captive Nazi has decided to be defiant, so he shouts to one of his men: "We got a German here who wants to die for his country! Oblige him!"

This parody material exists alongside a revenge story, as an escapee from the film's first scene later encounters Colonel Landa again (in a scene that made me realize that never has whipped cream looked creepier). She hatches a plan to do nothing more than kill Hitler himself. How? Well, he's coming to see a movie. In the theater she owns. She's going to get everyone in there, bar the doors, and set the theater on fire. I can only assume that this is an allusion to the infamous events at Oradour-sur-Glane.

Why is Hitler coming to France to see a movie? The film explains that, too, but I'd just as soon not get into it. The whole film is awash in odd coincidences, broad strokes, and scenes stitched together with narration by Samuel L. Jackson.

Since it's Tarantino, it's not unexpected that his knowledge of film history is going to come into play at some point. The key location of the second half of the film is a movie theater, a key plot point hinges on the flammability of film stock used in the 1940s, the timing of the plot hinges on a reel change, and so on. Tarantino's visual sense is as keen as ever; Inglourious Basterds includes one of the most striking visuals I've ever seen, as the movie keeps projecting onto clouds of smoke, creating swirling images of film in a film.

Ultimately the movie seems by turns serious and silly, which I think is rather the point; it's not unlike that old Captain America cover that has Cap punching Hitler's lights out. And it all helps that the film is acted almost perfectly. There isn't a single weak spot in the cast, so far as I can recall, and it's all grounded by Brad Pitt as Aldo Raine and Christoph Waltz (who won an Academy Award) as Colonel Landa. Even so, I think the best performance belongs to Melanie Laurent as Shoshanna, the escaped Jew who later gets her chance for revenge. She perfectly captures the tension of someone walking a tightrope as trying to maintain a secret identity, carry off a revenge plot, and fend off the advances of a smitten Nazi.

This film has a certain unsettling effect, because I found myself laughing at a lot of very violent death being meted out in large quantities against Nazis. But it's so over-the-top, so cartoonish, that ultimately I think that the film works best as gonzo comedy that is a blending of genres than anything else.

(Poster above via)

Stuff you can't make up if you try

I swear:

Broncos running back Knowshon Moreno was arrested for DUI in Denver while behind the wheel of a Bentley convertible with personalized license plates that read "SAUCED," KDVR-31 reported Monday.

Nothing I can add here.

Super Thoughts: Giants 21, Patriots 17

I'm thrilled to get to use this again:

Ahhhh, how sweet it is! Watching the Patriots lose just doesn't get old, folks. Nosiree Bob. Without further ado, some random thoughts on the game:

::  He's been retired and broadcasting for three or four years now, but I still want someone to take Rodney Harrison's knee out. What a goon he was as a player.

::  1st quarter tweet: "Mental errors by the Pats? But...but...I thought they were Gods of Football!!!"

Seriously, the Patriots looked sloppy early and they looked sloppy late. St. Tom giving up a safety on a panic throw to avoid a sack? Twelve men on the field? The Pats have a reputation for not playing that sloppily. I'm not sure the rep is as earned as it should be, but there it is. They put it back together, though, and played well for the second and third quarters, before getting sloppy again in the fourth, with Brady throwing the game's only interception (and only turnover, period) on an ill-advised, dumbass play and his receivers getting a bad case of the Drops.

:: I think that the best quarterbacks in football right now, in high-pressure situations, are most definitely Eli Manning and Ben Roethlisberger (last year's flat performance in the Super Bowl notwithstanding, and the Steelers were actually very competitive in that game after digging a surprising early hole). St. Tom's pressure-QB reputation is, for my money, not well-earned. He lost Super Bowl XLVI, Super Bowl XLII, and the 2006 AFC Championship games, despite having the ball for the last minute of each of those games (and in one of those, he only needed a field goal). And even going back to his "big winning drives" in Super Bowls XXXVI and XXXVIII, well...those were drives in which he took over with the score tied, so unless he turns the ball over, the worst thing that happens is the game goes to overtime. I think that the Myth of St. Tom took a big hit last night.

:: Put it another way: Joe Montana never lost a single Super Bowl, much less two Super Bowls. Joe Montana drove his team ninety-two yards for the winning touchdown in Super Bowl XXIII (yes, he had two minutes and change to do it in, but so what? He got the job done), and he also produced two Super Bowl blowouts in games in which he was supposed to produce Super Bowl blowouts. St. Tom is a great quarterback and will be a well-deserved Hall of Fame player. But the discussion of St. Tom as the 'best ever quarterback' is, for me, over.

:: Continuing a theme: I don't think that the Patriots are going to fall apart as a team, but I do think that this year is probably St. Tom's last, best chance to win a Super Bowl. He's going to be another year older, and like I've said before, physical decline comes to everyone, and it's going to come to him -- especially now that he's going into his twelfth year as a starter, who has also played more than twenty post-season games. That's literally packing an extra season-and-one-third into his career. It takes its toll, and I think we'll start seeing that toll before long. Brady likes to talk about playing until he's 40, but I'd bet that if he does, he's playing someplace else, because the physical decline will have become undeniable to the point that Belichick either trades or cuts him after drafting his heir-apparent.

:: Interesting article along those same lines:

Dynasties always believe they can last forever, until they begin to crumble. And their greatest men and fiercest warriors — their Tom Bradys — always believe in their own excellence and its nearly immutable power to make things work out as they’re supposed to.

Until they are bested enough times to know better.

“We just didn’t make enough plays,” Brady said. “We all wish we could have done a little bit more. It comes down to one play at the end. If we make it, we’re world champions; if we don’t, we wish we were.”

Yes, but the fact is the Patriots had to have it come down to one miracle play. And the Giants, in not getting beaten by the long-shot throw, may have shown Sunday that the Patriots’ time is over. Super Bowls are incredibly difficult to get to, even for teams that have made five of the past 11.

:: No one will mention it much because they've got three titles to their credit, but this Super Bowl loss means that the Bills, Vikings, and Broncos have new company in the "four-time Super Bowl loser" club. Huzzah!!

:: Cris Collinsworth wasn't as annoying as I thought he might be. But I did find it odd that at the end of the Giants' last drive, when the Giants were trying to put up the go-ahead points without leaving too much time on the clock, they mentioned that they might want to get a first-down at the 1 without scoring and then just run the clock all the way down until they have to kick the field goal...Al Michaels and Collinsworth kept discussing this whole series without mentioning that the Pats lost to the Bills back in Week Three on an identical situation.

:: Random goofy fact: Only six teams have lost to the Bills during the regular season and still gone on to win the Super Bowl. (This year's Giants are not one of those.)

:: Another random goofy fact: the AFC East is 2-9 in Super Bowls against NFC East teams. Ouch.

:: On the commercials: As usual, I don't care and pay little attention. I use commercials for their intended purpose: going to the bathroom, getting food, writing, checking Facebook, et cetera. The only ones I watched were a few of the movie trailers (none of which looked all that good, except for The Avengers), a pretty sappy Toyota Camry commercial, and a Clint Eastwood commercial for Chrysler that ratcheted up the "America, YAY!" to 11 and seemed to also be saying, "Hey, remember that Camry commercial from before? F*** those people." (But here's a thought: the fact that such a grittily optimistic ad could be aired this year might say something about the mood of the country that might, in turn, be good news for a certain sitting President.)

:: On the halftime show: I liked it a lot. It was actually a show, and featured an artist who is still producing new material and who wasn't content to just do a quick "greatest hits" thing. I loved the goofy Egyptian panoply, and I started Tweeting a bunch of Egyptian and Roman-related pop culture quotes, such as "Give my regards to King Tut, asshole!" (from Stargate) and "If you wanna find all the cops, they're hangin' out in the donut shops" (by the Bangles). Still, it was a really good show by Madonna. Color me impressed!

That's about all...except for these, because really, I could look at scenes like this all day:

Ahhhh! Thanks, 2011 NFL! Next up, free agency and the Draft. Football never stops! It just slows down a bit.

Sentential Links

Time for linkage...but first, Plinko!



OK, the links:

:: Not wanting to look at this girl directly (lest I be turned to stone) I quickly grabbed a shirt and walked fast to the counter. The T-shirt Girl running the till had heard what I did and we both smiled at each other with our shared secret. For a brief second, we were both in on the same joke.

:: Either way, Komen has stained their charity and it's going to stay stained when they inevitably cave in to right wing ideological demands again. (I, for one, will never support any Komen-based drive or program again. I will go out of my way to buy stuff without the pink ribbon on it, and I will not donate any money to them. They've proven what they're about. In all honesty, I was already down on Komen with their habit of sending teams of lawyers to enforce their trademark on the phrase "For the Cure", so that any mom-and-pop selling cupcakes in hopes of raising a few hundred bucks for some disease's respective research facility had to shut down or change their name. Along these lines, John Scalzi is doing some limited-time fundraising for Planned Parenthood.)

:: There is just something wonderful when Hubble points to nearby spiral galaxies. Sprawling and detailed, we get both great resolution on smaller features as well as a jaw-dropping overview of a grand spiral… like, say, NGC 1073: (Oh, wow....)

:: There were only two shots fired from Greg Stratton's .22 Magnum rifle. (If you've ever wondered what slaughtering a farm animal for meat looks like, this is the post for you. If not...then don't click.)

:: So I kind of grew up immersed in poetry (some of my older relatives used to recite poetry as well, having learned it in school). I recognize that some people did not. And yet, at the same time, I think the fact that I know it and like it isn't anything I should have to apologize for or be ashamed for.

:: I’m not a climber and I never will be. I love mountains, but I love the feeling of being in them, surrounded by them. I don’t feel the need to stand on top, to measure myself against them because, well, the mountain wins. Every time. I have no desire to climb Everest or anything else. My fascination is akin to the one I have for polar exploration–the extremes are just so mind-boggling, the bizarre things that this planet can throw up in the face of humans poking their heads into remote and untouched places.

:: I'm not gonna lie, folks: I had high hopes for this storyline after Rose got in her auto accident, and I can't help but feel a little disappointed by the way it all played out. Don't get me wrong, I don't particularly want to see Rose careen off the highway and carve a swath of destruction through the playground at the Toledo School For Adorable But Tragically Blinded Orphans, I'm just saying that in this strip, that's actually a pretty likely outcome.

:: It was my favorite type of career. Long-lasting, diverse, a little bit chaotic, not overly managed, with moments of brilliance, moments of just good workmanship … and you can tell, you can just tell, that his career has been about acting, yes, but it was about forming relationships. (I hope that when I die, Sheila writes a tribute. Of course, this assumes that when the time comes, I have something to my name to form the meat of a Sheila O'Malley tribute....)

More next week.

Sunday Burst of Weird and Awesome

Oddities and Awesome abound!

:: The Fifteen Most Embarrassing Tom Brady Photos. Because mocking St. Tom never gets old! GO GIANTS!!!

:: In the unlikely event that I ever own a bookstore of my own, it will have a cat.

:: Here is the newest leader in my ongoing quest for the Greatest Thing Ever:

More next week!

Saturday Centus

Just a normal prompt this week! (Although I shouldn't say 'just' a normal prompt, as a lot of times it's been the seemingly simplest prompts that have tripped me up and made me take hours just to mull them over to come up with something.)

"And these are--?" asked the lady in the floppy hat.

"Peas," said Farmer Jimmy, behind his stall at the market. "Two peas in every pod."

"Two?"

"Two. Two peas in a pod."

"Only two?"

"Yessum...but these peas are three inches in diameter."

"These peas are genetically modified, aren't they?"

"Don't think so. Just good old SuperMegaTechnoCorp seed."

"OK, thanks." And the lady moved on to the next stall, not even looking at Farmer Jimmy's football apples. The exact size and shape, naturally, of a regulation football.

"Hippie farmers with their organic food," Jimmy growsed. "Probably wear tie-dye under their overalls, too."

And hey, Centusians, feel free to participate in my twice-annual Ask Me Anything! festival, in which you get to...well, you know.

Oh, Tom, Tom, Tom.... (Answers the first!)

So usually I wait until the second half of the month to start giving answers to "Ask Me Anything!" questions, but Roger has a couple that are time sensitive, pertaining as they do to the impending Super Bowl. So here they are:

Why do you hate Tom Brady so much?

Hoo boy. You know, I was all prepared with this answer. I was going to write about how I don't hate Tom Brady personally, because it's not like I know him or anything, and that more than anything else, my hatred for Brady is the "sports fan's hatred of the other guy". You know, it's how sports fans feel about that one guy who always seems to have your team's number, no matter what. It's like how Boston sports fans likely felt for years about Bucky Dent or Mookie Wilson.

But then, St. Tommy had to go and open his mouth at a Super Bowl press thing the other day, in the context of talking about how his father has made all kinds of sacrifices to follow his son's football career:

"He's been there every step of the way," Brady said of his dad. "Then I went to school a long ways from home, and he and my mom were there at every home football game that they could possibly be at and a lot of road games, too. And even when I started my pro career, he traveled to Buffalo. I don't know if you guys have ever been to the hotels in Buffalo -- they're not the nicest places in the world -- but he would travel to those."

Wow. Thanks for that, Tom.

Now, most of the folks I follow online – few of whom blog anymore, and most of whom are on Twitter, which makes me sad – are of the "Who cares what some football player thinks" camp, or the "Hey, he's just telling the truth, because Buffalo kind of sucks" camp, or a combination of both camps. This goes along with "Geez, Buffalo, do you gotta get so upset any time somebody says something mean about your city?" And those folks are right.

But still...yeah. I hear you, folks. I really do. But still: f*** Tom Brady.

Here's why: There was really no reason for it. He didn't need to say it. Buffalo wasn't part of the conversation in any way, until he cited it as an example of awful hardships his father has had to endure in the purpose of following his son's career. "Hey, he's come to Buffalo. That's a commitment!" And he said it on an enormous media stage.

Look, I am well aware that Buffalo isn't the nicest city in the world, or even the country, or even the state. I'm well aware that this city's warts are openly displayed for all to see. I'm well aware that this city continues to rust and crumble while we continually shoot ourselves in the foot, development-wise. But that doesn't mean that I should be happy to hear continued use of my city, my home, as a national short-hand for "crappy cesspool of a city" to which no one in their right mind would want to go unless it's for business and you're only going to be there for the shortest time possible.

Here's the bottom line: We get to say these things. Brady doesn't. At least, not for me. The "Brady is right and it shouldn't matter" crowd will have to bear with me if I'm not willing to say "Thank you, Mr Brady, may I have another?" on this one. Harumph!

There's also some rhetoric going around that this kind of thing – the impression our city makes on visiting athletes who are in town for a game – is part of what keeps star players from entertaining Buffalo as a possible spot for when they are free agents. To this I say, simply, nonsense. Look, I know that the view from the Kensington Expressway into downtown from the airport isn't terribly inspiring. But in my experience there's not a city in the world that doesn't have such a route, somewhere. I read things like this – "Buffalo's hotels aren't super nice and the town's nightlife isn't terribly exciting" – and I think, "Huh. Does Green Bay hear things like this?"

Probably not...and the reason why is glaringly obvious. Why don't star players avoid Green Bay like the plague and refuse to entertain the possibility of signing there? Because Green Bay has a team that wins. Buffalo does not. I guarantee that as long as the Bills are here, it won't matter how the city looks: if the team gets good again, players will be more willing to sign here.

So: Why do I hate Tom Brady? Because he's great and he kicks my team's ass constantly. Because he lives a ridiculously charmed life. Because as great as he clearly is, I still think he's overrated; he's never really produced a signature win and a huge moment that will live in sports lore forever, there's nothing he's ever done that makes me think, "Wow, I remember when Tom Brady did ____"; I tire of the man-crushes that many sports commentators have on the guy.

Here's a true story: I've always thought that NBC's Cris Collinsworth has been overly obsessive about Brady, and that he brings Brady into conversations entirely too often, whether the discussion involves the Patriots or not. I mentioned this once on Facebook, and another friend disagreed, saying that Collinsworth simply has a lot of respect for one of the game's best players. Fine. Except that during last year's Winter Olympics, Collinsworth at one point presented a profile piece he'd done on short-track speed skater Apollo Anton Ohno, after which he said to Bob Costas and those of us at home, "Apollo Anton Ohno really reminds me of Tom Brady."

GAHHH!!!

So there's why I hate Tom Brady. (Kinda sorta. I mean, I'm sure he loves his mother.)

Oh, and a prediction? I really don't like offering predictions, but I'll offer a hope: Giants 30, Patriots 16. Not only do I want Brady to lose, but I want him to lose fairly convincingly. I want his defeat to be large enough that no one can whitewash this game for him if he does lose. I don't think a blow-out is likely, but if Brady loses by 10-14 points and only puts up pedestrian numbers – say, 200 yards, 1 TD, 2 picks – it'll make me feel all kinds of warm and fuzzy inside. But I guess it's OK if he wins his fourth, tying him with Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw. After all, neither one of those guys ever lost a Super Bowl.

And hey, folks, questions aren't exactly flying in the door yet, so Ask Me Anything!

Something for Thursday

One of the people with whom I graduated high school was a guy named Dave Donavon. Dave was never particularly a friend of mine, but he wasn't someone I disliked, either; for whatever reason, I just never got to know him all that well. We weren't in a whole lot of classes together, and I wasn't much of a social animal back then anyway, preferring to spend Friday nights hanging out at home. Dave was a good guy whom I didn't know all that well. Come to that, virtually my entire high school graduating class was good people I didn't know all that well. I'm not sure, now, how I feel about that. I don't really regret hanging out at home, reading and watching movies and writing, but I do wonder if I missed out on some awfully cool stuff when I read people on FB saying things like, "Hey, remember when...."

Dave, sadly, suffered a heart attack and died earlier this week. Naturally, in this age we're in, I learned about this via Twitter and Facebook, and a lot of the folks I'm friends with on FB from that era are posting their memories of Dave. I honestly don't have any, but it still saddens me...Dave was 40 years old, the same age as me. Judging by photos, he had roughly the same body type as me right about now. And he is, to my knowledge, the first of our graduating class to die. I suppose we're lucky in that regard, but it's also a function of being a fairly small school where the graduating class numbered around 100.

I remember that Dave was into hard rock quite a bit back in the day, and really, hard rock's a bug you don't tend to get over, even as you discover other music later in life. According to my friend Andy -- also from high school, and a guy who knew everybody -- Dave's favorite band was Van Halen, which means that Dave and I would have had some stuff to talk about right there, had any conversations happened. So, in memory of Dave Donavon, here is Van Halen with "Dreams".

Fixing the Prequels: Revenge of the Sith (part two)

part one

When last we left our intrepid Jedi – months and months ago – they they had just made their way through an immense space battle to land on General Grievous's ship, through which they must now make their way to find the captive Chancellor Palpatine. This is pretty standard "infiltrate the enemy ship" stuff, but it's all pretty fun to watch anyway, because Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen actually have pretty good chemistry together. In this whole sequence, I like how Christensen portrays Anakin as more self-assured, more confident, but less obviously-arrogant than he had been in Attack of the Clones. The effect goes a long way to highlight the tragedy of Anakin's later fall from grace.

(Before I go on, I should note the very long stall in this series of posts, with an apology for those who actually enjoy reading this stuff. My reasons are the usual whiny "Nobody knows I'm doing this, but that Red Letter Media turd gets all kinds of love whenever he speaks!" stuff. So let's just stipulate all that and move on, shall we? OK!)

R2-D2 is another part of the puzzle here, and he has his own problems. He is trying to lie low when a couple of battle droids enter the landing bay, but his efforts are stymied by the fact that Obi Wan keeps talking to him, very loudly, via the commlink. Thus R2 is distracted at several points where Obi Wan and Anakin would find having a droid plugged into the computer system fairly convenient.

All of this is pretty standard Star Wars derring-do as Obi Wan and Anakin make their way to the observation deck where they suspect Palpatine is being helped. I find it all a lot of fun to watch, and it could have been even longer, what with some deleted scenes from this sequence that are available on the DVD. In one scene, our two Jedi heroes wind up in the ship's giant fuel pipes; in another, they are surrounded by droids and communicate with one another with baseball-coach type hand signals. These scenes are fun to watch, and I'm glad they're on the DVD, but I don't think they would have added much to the proceedings except for some fun action material. This entire sequence of the film takes an impressive bit of time, though, which is probably a good chunk of why it needed trimming.

Here again, by the way, we see R2 using his rockets that AOTC revealed, and yet another new gizmo: R2 has a supply of oil which he's able to squirt on the battle droids and all over the ground before setting it on fire. As usual, a lot of Star Wars fans complained about this, but also as usual, I'm fine with it. For one thing, I rather like what is now something of a gag, which is that each time there's a new Star Wars movie, we see something else that R2 can do. And what's also nice is that really, none of these particular abilities is particularly outlandish given what an R2 unit essentially is: a robotic space mechanic. You know how, within reason and given the right set of attachments, you can do pretty much anything with a Dremel rotary tool or Multi-Max? Well, that's what R2 is: a big, intelligent, Dremel tool. (Hmmmm...Dremel's colors are blue and silver, not unlike a certain droid...hmmmm....)

The other thing that stands out in this entire sequence, once we land on the ship, is that there's no music at all. We have music and all manner of sound effects when Obi Wan and Anakin are flying their ships through the space battle, but once we're on General Grievous's cruiser itself, there is no music at all: just ambient sounds of machines and distant explosions and wind in the elevator shafts and so on.

Our two Jedi reach the observation deck and find Palpatine there, restrained to a chair that looks a lot like the throne he will later use in Return of the Jedi. The room is bounded on all sides by giant windows that are overlooking the space battle. Now Dooku enters, and after a bit of preliminary boasting, the lightsaber battle begins:

OBI-WAN: (bows) Chancellor.

ANAKIN: Are you all right?

PALPATINE: (quietly) Count Dooku.

PALPATINE makes a small gesture with his hand. OBI-WAN and ANAKIN turn around. The elevator DOORS CAN BE HEARD OPENING AND CLOSING as COUNT DOOKU strides into the room. He is above the Jedi, standing on a balcony, with two SUPER BATTLE DROIDS. The Jedi turn to see him. He looks down on the Jedi. 

OBI-WAN: (quietly to Anakin) This time we will do it together.

ANAKIN: I was about to say that.

COUNT DOOKU jumps down to the main level. 

PALPATINE: Get help! You're no match for him. He's a Sith Lord.

OBI-WAN: Chancellor Palpatine, Sith Lords are our specialty.

OBI-WAN and ANAKIN throw off their cloaks and ignite their lightsabers. 

COUNT DOOKU: Your swords, please, Master Jedi. We don't want to make a mess of things in front of the Chancellor.

OBI-WAN and ANAKIN move toward DOOKU.

OBI-WAN: You won't get away this time, Dooku.

OBI-WAN and ANAKIN charge COUNT DOOKU. A great sword fight ensues.

COUNT DOOKU: I've been looking forward to this.

ANAKIN: My powers have doubled since the last time we met, Count.

COUNT DOOKU: Good. Twice the pride, double the fall. 

I really like this scene...all of it. Especially the little reference to their last confrontation with Dooku, at the end of AOTC, when Anakin decided to charge in by himself and got tossed aside for his trouble. They lost that duel because they didn't work together; this time, Anakin is willing to wait. But he hasn't grown up too much; he is still willing to boast about the growth of his powers.

What happens next is something of a pitched duel in which it still seems that Dooku is their better; he again manages to toss Anakin aside, and then he again incapacitates Obi Wan. But this time, Anakin is much stronger and holds his own...only merely that, until Dooku says something else:

COUNT DOOKU: (continuing) I sense great fear in you, Skywalker. You have hate, you have anger, but you don’t use them.

This goading of Anakin proves ill-advised for Dooku, as he immediately uses his hate and his anger. A minute later, he cuts off Dooku's hands and takes his saber, now holding two blades at the neck of the helpless Count. He knows that a Jedi is probably supposed to be merciful in such a situation, but Palpatine, laughing, tells Anakin: "Kill him. Kill him now."

This is a deeply chilling moment. Palpatine's warmth – feigned though we know it was in the previous two films – disappears instantly as Palpatine says "Kill him." And when Anakin hesitates, Palpatine allows his coldest, harshest tone to come forth: "Do it."

And Anakin does. Right there, with Palpatine looking on and with Dooku's eyes wide as he realizes he's just been betrayed, Anakin beheads the helpless Count.

Now this dialogue:

PALPATINE: You did well, Anakin. He was too dangerous to be kept alive.

ANAKIN drops COUNT DOOKU's lightsaber, moving to PALPATINE. 

ANAKIN: Yes, but he was an unarmed prisoner.

ANAKIN raises his hands toward PALPATINE, who is strapped in the Admiral's Chair. The Chancellor's restraints pop loose. 

ANAKIN: (continuing) I shouldn't have done that, Chancellor. It's not the Jedi way.

PALPATINE stands up, rubbing his wrists. 

PALPATINE: It is only natural. He cut off your arm, and you wanted revenge. It wasn't the first time, Anakin. Remember what you told me about your mother and the Sand People. Now, we must leave before more security droids arrive. 

Something interesting happens here, something easy to miss. As noted, this scene takes place in an enormous observation room with giant windows on all sides, so that during the entire lightsaber duel, we can see the space battle raging in the sky beyond; and occasionally, we hear the sounds of ships as they fly by very close to the windows. At the moment that Palpatine refers to Anakin's mother's fate at the hands of the Sandpeople, there is a sound that could very well be a ship in space outside*, or it could be the cry of one of the Sandpeople. It's a little aural reminder of what has gone before...and Palpatine is already starting to lay the groundwork for Anakin's temptation to the Dark Side of the Force.

But what's really interesting is that Palpatine allows Dooku to start that particular ball rolling, with his line about Anakin having hate, anger, but not using them. I always wonder...has Palpatine already decided to start working on Anakin's conversion? Or has he just now realized the potential of what he has in Anakin?

In AOTC, Palpatine manipulated the Jedi Council to assign Obi Wan and Anakin to the protection of Padme following the assassination attempt. Was he doing that with the intent of pushing Anakin's emotions to the fore, with temptation in mind, or was he simply working to sow seeds of dissent and distrust within the Jedi order? I might lean to the latter, except that we know that Palpatine has made good on his word to young Anakin from the end of TPM ("We will watch your career with great interest."). It's significant that Anakin has shared the dark secret of what happened to his mother – and what he did after that – with Palpatine.

As this scene ends, Anakin picks up the incapacitated Obi Wan and slings him over his shoulder, over Palpatine's objections that they don't have time to dally over him. "His fate will be our own," says Anakin, and they start making their way back down to the landing bay.

Of course, this is a Star Wars film, so they don't get there. They encounter some more trouble with elevators, this time when the cruiser they are on takes heavy fire and starts to aim straight down toward the planet, throwing off the perspective. Anakin and Palpatine enter an elevator shaft and start running down the walls, which are now the floors, since the ship is dropping straight down. But then the bridge crew gets things under control again, causing the ship to level back out again...which means that the walls of the elevator shaft are now walls again. Needless to say, they get out of this predicament, just as Obi Wan wakes back up; then they are back in a deserted corridor and trying to get back to the landing bay when they are imprisoned by something called "ray shields". After Obi Wan protests "How did this happen? We're smarter than this!", Anakin suggests that they just patiently wait for R2D2 to come along and release them. Obi Wan is surprised that Anakin is suggesting patience, but the plan goes awry when R2 does, in fact, arrive...with a whole bunch of warrior droids with him. "Do you have a plan B?" Obi Wan asks...and that's where I'll stop for this time.

If it seems like I haven't done much 'fixing' in a series called 'Fixing the Prequels', well, it's generally because I think that the entire opening sequence of RotS is as masterfully done as anything in the entire Star Wars saga. There's just nothing to fix here, but a lot to admire. Don't worry, though; we'll start fixing stuff next time out. In that installment we will deal with General Grievous, reunite two young lovers, and start to get hints of Darth Sidious's plan to lower the shroud of the Dark Side over everything. Tune in! (And it won't take the better part of a year to get there, either.)

* I know, I know, "Sound can't travel in space". For the purposes of Star Wars...actually, for most filmed SF in general...I just don't care.

Ask Me Anything!

Yup, folks, it's February, which means that it's time once again for Ask Me Anything!, wherein I throw open the doors to all comers who may wish to pose questions of goofy sort, or serious sort, or any kind of sort you can imagine. All questions and queries are welcome, so bring 'em on! This is your chance, folks!

Questions may be left in comments to this post, or if you prefer, you can certainly e-mail me (jaquandor AT gmail DOT com). Or send 'em via Facebook. Or Tweet 'em at me (make sure to put the '@jaquandor' thing in there, or I'll never see it). Or even in comments on Flickr, if you like. Lots of options here to make things easy.

I'll have more to say about it later in the month, but February 2012 marks ten years I've been blogging, so let's make this iteration of Ask Me Anything! a real hootenanny! (Or a lollapalooza. Or a shindig. Whichever.)

So...Ask Me Anything!

A Random Wednesday Conversation Starter

I can't believe I'm going to do this, but I just can't resist it. I'm going to steal an entire post from someone else. And not just the idea for the post, but the entire actual post. I hope you don't mind, Cal! (And if you want to comment over there rather than here, I'll completely respect that.)

Anyway, here are some burgers. Assuming that (a) you eat meat, (b) you like burgers, and (c) you see these on the menu somewhere, which one do you order?

Page One: A Game of Thrones

Page One: A Game of Thrones, originally uploaded by Jaquandor.

This ought to be my final word on A Game of Thrones for a bit, but it certainly warrants inclusion in my "Page One" series. So here it is: page one of A Game of Thrones.

The best way to comment on a book...

...is not actually a long and thought-out blog post, but rather, a series of Internet meme-photos with the captions altered. So here are some Y U No... pics in honor of A Game of Thrones.

"You still stammered on the 'W'."

I've seen British period dramas referred to as "Bigscreen episodes of Masterpiece Theater", which I suppose is kind of an apt description. But it's something of a dismissive description, isn't it? It seems designed to put off the kind of people who think that watching stuffy Brits on Masterpiece Theater is the stuff of torture. And it can be, if what's on Masterpiece Theater isn't all that good. But when it is good, what's wrong with that?

This is what I kept thinking of while recently watching The King's Speech: "This reminds me of Masterpiece Theater." And not in a bad way, mind you, because I've always liked the good things on Masterpiece Theater. But it's the air of the story: very little by way of visual invention; instead, it's very solidly produced drama, with a good script, acted out by a great cast. Aside from a few stylistic things along the way, there's no real feel of a particular "director's hand" in The King's Speech.

The story follows a particular Prince of Wales who is destined – although, being second in line, he doesn't know it – to be King George V of England. This particular Prince has a deep problem that seemingly makes any public life nearly impossible: he has a terrible stutter. The King's Speech would probably be the best movie I've ever seen about a stutterer, if not for A Fish Called Wanda. As it is, this movie runs a nice second.

Colin Firth plays the future king, Prince Albert, the Duke of York, who in the first part of the film is frustrated by his stutter when he needs to speak in public but is also thankful that as second in line, he isn't called that often to perform acts of oratory. He seeks out some treatments, but none of them work; it is his wife (Elizabeth, the Duchess of York, played by Helena Bonham Carter) who visits yet another 'expert' on the treatment of stuttering, one Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). Over the course of the film Logue provides Albert with treatments, most of which Logue has developed on an ad hoc basis over his life. And over the course of the film the two men develop a deep friendship, despite Albert's insistence that they cannot (because of his station) and Lionel's insistence that when the door closes in his office, and it's just the Prince and Lionel, then it's Lionel's rules that must be obeyed.

Of course, we know – without even needing to consult the history books – that Prince Albert will, in fact, become King; we also know that he will be called to address his entire nation via the relatively new medium of radio, and that this speech will be either his big triumph or the hill on which he dies. How it goes really isn't a surprise at all, and it shouldn't be; for all the historical drama, Masterpiece Theater production full of Brits thing that this movie has going on, it's pretty clear early on that The King's Speech is simply a new version of one of storytelling's most classic tropes, the student who must learn from an enigmatic and idiosyncratic teacher if he/she is to triumph over his/her foes. The only difference is that here, the foe that must be triumphed over is a part of Prince Albert's own character. It's an inner struggle, and it's only in that that The King's Speech differs much in structure at all from, say, The Karate Kid.

A problem is established for which a person needs help. The person has a tentative, untrusting meeting with a teacher who promises to help. The lessons begin, and they're a bit confusing at first, both to the student and to us, watching it. But over time, as the connections begin to form, the lessons make more sense, and the story builds to the inevitable conflict, whether it be against a particular boxer, the rich blond black-belt karate dude, or against the expectations that the King will fail to deliver a stirring speech to his nation in a time of war.

Ultimately, what makes The King's Speech compelling is pretty much what makes all movies compelling that tell familiar stories: the characters and the relationships amongst them. Albert and Lionel form a friendship based in deep respect for one another and, even, need, without ever really coming out and saying it. Albert, obviously, needs help with his stutter, but Lionel needs some kind of acceptance. Lionel, it seems, is an amateur actor who wishes to play the lead in something, anything, but who seems eternally relegated to secondary roles. In helping the future King, he finally – in some way – achieves his wish. I also like how the film makes a gentle feint in the direction of having the King turn away from his teacher, but this well-worn and frankly unsurprising turn is avoided by the two men having a frank conversation.

Tom Hooper's direction is fairly understated; he seems content for the most part to let his actors do most of the heavy lifting after he decides where to put the camera or how to light the room. In fairness, there are a lot of interesting choices to be made there, and Hooper makes them. He rarely puts his actors in the center of the frame, for instance; they are always slightly off to the left, or close to the bottom. The lighting is generally bright and washed out; this is not your standard English drama with long walks in gorgeous gardens while everyone talks about God Save the King. After watching a bit of the film, I started to wonder why Hooper just didn't go all-in and shoot The King's Speech in black-and-white.

The King's Speech won the Best Picture Oscar for its year. I've seen some evidence out there, amongst the various pop-culture and film-oriented sites that I frequent, that the general opinion is starting to settle that The King's Speech was unworthy of that award, and that it should have gone to The Social Network instead. Speaking for myself, I personally found The King's Speech far more engaging and interesting, particularly in its human interactions, than The Social Network, which largely left me cold. Obviously your mileage may vary...but The King's Speech lingers in my memory much longer than The Social Network did.

(Apparently Tom Hooper is now helming the filmed adaptation, long-awaited, of the Les Miserables musical. Well, he's got his work cut out for him. I've made that movie in my head to the point where I can read the credits over the final montage.)

Sentential Links

Linkage...but first, Slinky-age!



Wow, those fellows need to get out more. Which is my way of saying, yes, I'm sad that I didn't think of this myself. (And at the very end, I can't help thinking, "Dude, watch out! You'll lose your fingers that way!")

Anyway, the linkage!

:: I realize this morning that what I have learned from the Curandera, the dream and Brian, is that I’m not a crazy dog lady. I just happen to love my dog. And anyone who is a true animal lover can understand that dogs really are members of one’s family. Yoda and I are a package deal. He’s not in my mate space, but he definitely has a huge chunk of my heart. And I’m never again going to hide that fact from a man.

:: Before I went on Lexapro, I said to the doctor that I felt like I was living on a thin precipice beneath a giant, sucking whirlpool that I couldn't get past. I don't feel like that now, haven't in years, and maybe the drug helped me get past it and I need instead to focus on controlling my anger for myself, by myself, instead of just letting the drug numb me to it. (For various reasons, SamuraiFrog is abandoning his antidepressants, and he's blogging frankly and honestly about the experience. I hope it all works out for him, and for his wife.)

:: I know I’ve mentioned before in these pages that I think Chuck Norris sucks and the people who like him kind of suck, but just to remind you: Chuck Norris sucks and the people who like him kind of suck. (Yes, SamuraiFrog again, but it's from a different blog he writes for, so we're all good.)

:: It’s been well established established that Dagwood and Herb use aggressive, angry breakdancing as a way to express extreme negative emotion. (Note to self: learn to spin around on your head like that! It would be awesome!)

:: On Wednesday, January 25th, Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich spoke to a crowd of supporters in Florida. In a short speech guaranteed to create a buzz—online, as well as among space enthusiasts—he declared that if elected president, “… by the end of my second term we will have the first permanent base on the moon and it will be American.”

That’s a pretty bold statement. Unfortunately, it’s also impossible.

:: To put it another way, when a competent writer tells you a story, you know what happened. When a good writer tells you a story, you feel it happen to you.

More next week!

Saturday Centus (Sunday edition)

This week's prompt is straight-forward, if a bit macabre. I'm going back to my science fiction roots here:

Two robots looked down on the fires of Earth from their orbital platform. They were there to monitor the climate, but with no one left to report it to, what now?

"Do you think anyone will remember humans?" asked the younger robot, with a quivering synth-voice. Its emotion chip was state-of-the-art.

"We will," replied the older, robot. His emotion chip was first-gen, so he wasn't given to sentiment. "We know where the bodies are buried, anyway." He pointed to a screen. "Cold front in North America," he said.

"Snow in the Caucasus," said the first bot.

I wonder what did us all in. I hope it wasn't us.