True Blood – the best worst thing ever.
Way back in the far away year 2008 Alan Ball worked to adapt Charlene Harris’ Southern Vampire Mystery series of books into a TV show. That sort of thing happens all the time. What doesn’t happen all the time is the start of one of the most interesting (for certain special values) and best (for other certain special values) TV shows ever created. So let us discuss the magic that is True Blood. The first season of True Blood floundered like many shows do. They had a premise, and some good ideas taken from the novels along with their own takes on character and plot and they charged fully ahead. But it didn’t gel yet. It was just sort of there. Blood, gore, boobs and vampires. That was what it had. But what it would have was much stranger indeed….
Why we do not need to renumber Doctors
All right look. Hurt isn’t playing the Valeyard but this comes into play. Spoiler for the mini-episode “The Night Doctor” so watch that first I suppose. …still here…? All right… And… go! The Valeyard comes between the 12th and 13th regeneration of the Doctor but is not considered the 12th or 13th regeneration. Just like the War!Doctor is not considered the Ninth. He comes between. Not in place of. Because it isn’t about the number of raw regenerations. IT never was. See regeneration numbers are imposed limits by the Time Lords because, they claimed, too many and you go mad/fade away slowly/etc. Like, to be too referential here, wearing/keeping the One Ring too long. Butter spread across too much time vortex, as it were. What it is about is how many of them are The Doctor. Eleven so far. Soon…
The new face of war…
The times are changing. G.I. Joe and Cobra have both sufgfered huge losses in funding and recruitment. And now they have… new plans… ——————————— “Hello! You used to know me as Cobra Commander! Yes! I plotted to take over your stupid countries with might and power. Of course I did! Wouldn’t you, if faced with the sort of sniveling weakness you yourselves display? “Sadly there has been a downturn in recruits for my Cobra soldiers. As such I have been forced to reconsider our methods. So I am here today to announce that Cobra will no longer exist. Instead I shall use my army, my weapons and my masterful plans to help you get into the best shape of your life. Organically. Safely. Artistically! “From here on out we are…. YOGA! Yes, so please address me as the Yoga Commander….
New Girl – The first true Sitcom Voltron
I was talking to a friend the other day (my The Glory, The Glory podcast co-host Aidan) and realized that New Girl is really something special on modern television. To really dig into why, though, we need to glance back at Sitcom Eras Past. In the 50s and 60s (and please remember that decades and their trends don’t generally start until partway through. The 80s didn’t really start until 83/84) sitcoms often featured a lot of physical humor and exaggerated scenarios. I Love Lucy and Bewitched, I Dream of Genie and The Flying Nun. The sort of exaggerated event that made for broader comedy while still being nominally relatable – though at a remove because these were often blown out of proportion for comedy. In the 70s the sitcom turned and we had shows like Taxi and Cheers who found…
Game of Heathers
I just realized that Heathers, yes the movie, fits really well into Game of Thrones. Yes, really. Think of it like this: You have Heather Lannister, Heather Baratheon, and Heather Greyjoy and then poor Veronica Stark. Meanwhile everyone is afraid of the new kid Slater Targaryen. Now, I haven’t read ahead or anything but I really hope Veronica blows up King’s Landing. Also I want to reshoot Heathers with Heather Lannister’s brother Tyrion involved. But anyway! Yeah. Heather Stark moves to King’s Landing, and she hates it. It’s run by this clique of Heathers. Well, you know how this story goes. Slater is feared, he’s known as Dragon Boy, and hooks up with Ronnie. They manage to accidently kill Heather Baratheon (well Ronnie thinks it’s an accident at first) and now the wheels start to come off. Also – late…
Jem! I’m gonna hologram forever…
Shameful realization – I’ve never actually dug into the Jem cartoon here. I mean I’ve created a Scale of One to Jem. I’ve talked about the show some but I’ve never really given it the full on me it deserves. That changes now! Synergy, hit it! Jem was one of those shows that makes much more sense when you’re watching it as a kid than it ever will trying to think about it as an adult. But basically there’s this woman, Jerrica Benton. Why isn’t Jerrica a more popular name? It’s the female form of Jericho, like the “Walls Of” which were torn down by sound – come on that’s clever! Anyway her dad built this hologram thing to be ultra-cool and left it to her and so… Get this – Jerrica runs a music company and uses Synergy, the…
The Dark Shadows Dare
Welcome to a new round of Dare the Internet to Make Me Do Stupid Things this time with guest-stupid-person Laszlo Xalieri! You see, right now at Amazon the complete Dark Shadows is on sale. When I say “on sale” I mean $250 off reducing the price to a cheap $350 dollars. That’s $350 for, get this, 1225 thirty minute episodes. One thousand, two-hundred and twenty-five episodes. Holy crap. This set weighs like 15 lbs. and comes with 131 DVDs. It has 470 hours of TV. All of it is Dark Shadows. Look at this set: This is where the stupid comes in. No one really wants to commit to watching that much Dark Shadows. Or owning it. Imagine the tears rolling down a cheek as another DVD case is lifted out, as Season Umpteenbillion rolls onward. No one should do…
S.H.I.E.L.D. – the theme
So with Joss Whedon poised to do a S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show I figgered one good cost saving measure would be to reuse the Firefly theme and just change around the words some. Well, then I thought I’d be helpful, see, and do it for them. So, below, is the new S.H.I.E.L.D. theme: Take my Cube, remake the land Take me where only A.I.M. can stand I don’t care, I’m still free You can’t take Helicarriers from me. Kill me off, try that tack Tell them I ain’t comin’ back Replace me with an LMD You can’t take Helicarriers from me. Leave my flyin’ car where it lay It won’t never see another day Lost clearance, blew the scheme You can’t take Helicarriers from me. I feel Hydra reaching out And Zodiac’s song without a doubt I still hear and I…