Bone Headed Movie

Just saw "Ghost Rider".

Wow.

Curiously, it's not Nic Cage who is going to drive you nuts. I think Nic Cage must have held both the director and the script in contempt and chose to just sort of do his own thing. And that's the only brilliance you'll see in "Ghost Rider".

After the movie spends somewhere near twenty minutes putting together the set-up, the rest of the action is just sorta obvious. Sorta. They pretty much say "Here's Ghost Rider, here's what he does. He has to keep X from happening." But this is also one of those movies where things were either lost in script versions, on the editing room floor, or because the director didn't know what he was doing. This is the same director as Daredevil, so who knows. Not me. There's just some action that seems to occur just to occur and not because it makes much sense. Like Wes Bentley's wardrobe.

It's not really clear why Satan's son is in a fight with daddy, or what his master plan is. Or why he...

Oh, heck. At least the movie moves along really, really fast. And Eva Mendes is very good looking, even if she has the least believable presence as a news reporter in recent memory. But, again, she's very good looking, and so we can forgive her.

Sam Elliot plays the old Ghost Rider, who actually DOES have precedent from the comics, if my West Coast Avengers memory serves.

I dunno. It's a dumb movie. But the FX are decent, Cage was funny, and Eva Mendes is, I repeat, very good looking.

I've not read a lot of Ghost Rider comics. Frankly, I thought the character was sort of one note. But that can work okay in a movie. It just doesn't sustain over an ongoing comic series.

What up

I think at this point I've more or less explained what that post from the other day was all about to the folks who asked. Let us all put that behind us now, shall we?

I learned an important lesson this week regarding my expectations of my own life, and, I think, in keeping my ears and eyes open when it comes to the big decisions.

In less exciting life lessons, I also learned that the comic store is going to do everything their power not to give you any money for your comics when you go to resell back issues. The good news on this is that I held onto a lot of my Spider-Man comics, so those didn't just disappear on me. I also still have my runs on X-Men and Uncanny X-Men. And more closet space. But I will never, ever try to resell comics at the comic shop. I guess I don't mind too much that I practically gave away the comics I gave away, as I had no plans for reading them ever again, and was pretty certain nobody was going to be that interested in reading them, either.

But, yeah, the whole thing left a sort of bad taste in my mouth. I can't say my tastes are really that much more refined today than they were when I bought a lot of those comics in the last twelve years or so, but I was given some good tips by my Comic Shop owner/manager in PHX. His advice: Pick one thing you're going to collect, focus on that, and if you manage to collect all of those, great. Then you can move on. Now, this applies for purchase of back-issues and less for purchase of current titles. Obviously if I buy Extreme Combat Rats #1, it doesn't mean I should buy every issue of Extreme Combat Rats. But it does mean that if I am to "build" a collection, it's best to have long runs ona title. There is, basically, no advice for what to do with your copies of Extreme Combat Rats numbers 1 -4 that you purchased, but gave up on, and then saw was cancelled with issue 13. It's unlikely anyone will ever really want those.

(Although there will be someone out there who will set up an Extreme Combat Rats fan site, possibly with their own fan art and fan fiction.)

What I did get was some store credit to Austin Books, with which I picked up the Invincible Ultimate Collection Vol. 1, as per JimD's recommendation. And JimD was right. Invincible doesn't necessarily bring a lot new to the superhero genre, nor even really the Teen Superhero genre. Instead, the series takes the concept and simply chooses to execute on some fairly well worn ideas extremely well. In fact, a forward thinking movie producer would find a way to turn the first 13 issues into a very popular 2-2.5 hour movie.

Saturday jason auditioned me for our new, non-existent band. Jamie played key boards, I played the bass and Jason played drums. Sigmund showed up for the end and played the trombone, and thus was born: Sigmund and the Steans Monster (and Andy). Look for us to be filling stadiums next summer, as people rock out to our hit "If I was a Fish".

Last night we headed to Jeff and Keora's place over on Enfield. Apparently Jeff and Keora live in a quad-apartmenet building tucked amongst some obscenely expensive homes in one of Austin's older, monied neighborhoods. I do not know why, but their rent is insanely reasonable. A while back I kept asking Jeff why he didn't move, but I will never ask him that question again.

Anyway, Jason just called and I think we're headed for food, coffee and maybe the dog park.

Best Movie... Ever?

Could the upcoming live action adaptation of Underdog be the greatest movie ever?

We'll see...

The Era Resumes

Sometimes (when you're single) you meet a really nice girl. She's pretty, and she's funny, and she even agrees with you that Trompe Le Monde by The Pixies is a pretty good album, when everyone else in the world thinks it wasn't a great effort. You have a good first date, and you think "Wow, this is it!"

At he beginning she mentioned she liked mountain biking, and while you weren't that into mountain biking, you thought "That's fine! I can go mountain biking every once in a while. We love The Pixies!" But then when you go out the next time, all she talks about is how you're going to go mountain biking. She talks about tire types, changing tires, handle grips and certain kinds of dirt on certain kinds of paths.

So, you bring up The Pixies, and you realize the only Pixies album she actually owns is Trompe Le Monde.

Figuring it's a fluke, you try again and she insists on actually going mountain biking. So you figure, "Ah, that's okay. I can try this."

So you go mountain biking. And while you've ridden a bike before, you aren't keeping up because, honestly, who takes a two-wheeled vehicle under your own power into rocky terrain?

You go out again, and it's more mountain biking. More talk of mountain biking. More trails and rocks. Anyway, she's being sort of encouraging.

But you realize, "She doesn't just like her mountain biking, she NEEDS to go mountain biking." So as pretty and funny as she is, and even though she also likes Trompe Le Monde (in her own way) you realize that maybe this isn't such a good idea.

And so, anyway, you call it off sort of abruptly. No doubt she's pissed. After all, you liked biking, didn't you?

So you're single again, and you sort of talked her up to everyone, so what does that make you?

Tired

The new job continues apace. I'm still trying to adapt to a new environment, names, people, ideas, alphabet soup and cube life.

Mostly I spent the first two days completely exhausted and jittery on caffeine. I also feel completely out of touch with the world as personal e-mail is still something I'm not sure is okay, no "web surfing" in the office (even during lunch, I guess...), and I'm not really picking up the phone. Still the new guy. Gotta look crazy busy, and I am.

Poor Jamie. I took her out to dinner last night, and I know I was a million miles away the entire time. We went to Austin-fave-spot Castle Hill in our attempt to do something nice for a change. I just didn't think i was very good company.

Today, at least, I am not totally exhausted. I remember this from starting the job in PHX. I was tired for most of the first month, and then one day my body adjusted to the lack of sleep, I settled in, and got used to things in general. It'll happen again. It's just going to take time.

Poor Lucy is very upset by my return to work. Mel is, too, but he seems to understand what is going on, while Lucy has spent 1/5th of her life with me at home for her amusement. Her clock is off as she's waking up when I get up. And today Mel actually came and got me out of bed as I tried to squeeze in five more minutes of sleep. Apparently he wanted to be fed and would not be denied.


I saw an article that mentioned a ton of bands are going back out on tour, including Van Halen and The Police. There's an odd generational thing that happens every decade where the folks who were kids or teenagers during a certain decade is able to somehow relive their past, now that they've got an income and will pay out the nose to see their bands. In the 70's, 50's music was big. In the 80's, the Summer of Love generations pilt no small amount of ink telling us how great it had been and making sure the "oldies" and classic rock stations played 60's faves. In teh 90's we all uffered through a revival of the Village People and Disco nostaglia. And now we're getting the Police and Van halen (I'm sorry you Hagar fans, Van Halen is an 80's band).

There was some commentary about the "sad" state of music that we have to pull from a catalog that's 20 years old to build concensus, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Those bands didn't just pay their dues, they're still selling records twenty years after they broke up. Where's the NKOTB reunion tour? Weren't we once told they were bigger tan the Beatles?


Hop everyone is having a good Valentine's Day.

Weekend/ First Day of Work

Friday Night Jamie and I headed North by Northwest to sup with JAL and his lovely wife, Tania. JAL and I go back almost as far as The League and Peabo. Curiously, JAL lives in N. Austin, but works very close to League HQ, in fact between The Hopalong Lounge and the House of Peabo. I shall begin working to convince him to join us in the 78745/04 area with all due speed.

The JAL's are a fun couple, and we had a lovely evening, even if we got a little droopy early in the evening and had to call the night just prior to JAL's knife tricks.

Saturday was relatively uneventful, but Cassidy joined us for some fun. I had planned to organize my comics for sale to Austin Books (no, not all of them), but then I realized I had to make a list of the stuff I was getting rid of so my database would be accurate, so I did that instead of anything productive. Plus, FedEx delivered a box of meat to our house, but the meat was for some other guy. Jamie called FedEx and explained to them our meat situation. So now we have this random box of meat sitting in the fridge as FedEx is tasked with tracking down the true owner of the meat.

Hit Threadgill's for catfish and okra. Then to Jason's where we watched Ghost Ship, a fairly awful haunted house movie with a terribly misused Julianna Marguiles and Gabriel Byrne. What fascinated me (and JackBart should take note) was that you could almost see the half-way decent movie that might have existed had Joel Silver not been attached to the project. Instead, you sort of get "movie in a can". Five characters explain their two-dimensional motivations in pointless explosition, enter haunted house, pretty girl survives. Just as in the 90's remake of "The Haunting", nobody on this picture understood the concept of "less is more".

Sunday I bought a cowboy hat. It's true. I bought a straw Stetson at Cavender's Boot City. Jason does not like my hat. But I do. I think it looks sharp. He also decried my plan to buy silver-toed cowboy boots with fancy bluebonnets stitched into the leather.

Dinner at Hunan, where I am becoming BFF with the waitress, Sue. Me and Sue are becoming big pals, and to prove it, Sue hooked Jamie up with some extra rice last night. It's nice that I like their food, but when I feel like a regular somewhere, I'm ten times likelier to hit that place up when we go out. I expected to be a regular by now at Casa G's, but I think the place is so full of frequent flyers that everyone is a regular.

I could not sleep last night, and so I stayed up far too late finishing my weekly comic reviews and working on my HR paperwork for the new job. Then, I just lay awake. After keeping a nocturnal schedule for the past few months, getting up at 6:15 for work hit me like a sledgehammer. I have some apologizing to do tomorrow. I was so @#$%ing tired, I was ready to fall asleep all day.

So far so good. It's my first job where my office isn't sort of in the thick of town, so I will have to get used to being out on 360. I may also have a window in my cube (sort of like some of the cubes at my office in AZ, OH). I will miss having an office, and apparently there's a strict "no surfing" policy which is fairly well policed, which is kind of creepy. I found myself wondering today if my Google searches were being monitored as I looked up some information on some B2B systems.

All in all, the job looks very promising, and the folks in the surrounding cubes seem like some decent joes and janes. Plus, forty minutes in to work today in fog and rain, and 30+ minutes home in sunshine. I used to have an hour home for my five mile drive from Briar Street to UT. This is a commute I can handle.

I'm off to bed.

You kids be good.

Previous to Hollywoodland

The feature film "Hollywoodland" was originally entitled "Truth, Justice and the American Way". Warner Bros. money was tied up in the film, and with Superman Returns expected to become a cultural phenomenon (along the lines of "Spider-Man" or "Pirates of the Carribbean"), the Super-Friendly title was changed. That said, "Hollywoodland" rolls off the tongue a bit better, anyway, unless you're making goo-goo eyes at spunky reporters.

In the next few days, Hollywoodland will be arriving in my mailbox via Netflix, and I'll watch the movie.

Here's the deal: In the past year or so, I've become quite a fan of George Reeves' Superman/ Clark Kent. As genuine as I continue to find Christopher Reeve's performance as a Man of Steel with a heart of glass, and as much as I think Brandon Routh was the right guy for the emotionally battered Superman of "Superman Returns"...

George Reeves Superman is the Superman that I watch and think "That's a Superman I can relate to!" Looking kind of paunchy in a fairly home-made looking suit, bemused by the guys shooting at me, making lots of comments regarding my dual identity at my co-worker's expense, and, of course, winking at the camera... I dare you to watch those episodes and NOT like Reeves (or, really, the whole cast).

The official story is that George Reeves killed himself, but ever since Reeves died, there have been suggestions that perhaps it wasn't Reeves who put the gun to his own head. And, I guess, that's more or less what the movie explores.

But I recently read an interview with Noel Neill in which she expresses her disappointment regarding the film. I highly recommend reading the interview here.

As infrequently as the newspapers or television seem to get a story right as it's breaking, what chance do filmmakers have of digging up much of the truth fifty years later?

So I'll watch the film. But I'll watch it with a certain eye of skepticism. Reeves' early death was tragic, no matter how it truly occured. I suppose it's somehow easier to think of the smiling Superman coming to an end not of his own doing than to think, as the movie posits, that the show and the character were what eventually led to his death.

Those are two very different stories, if there's a lesson to be garnered from all this. And it seems that there's not agreement even among those who knew Reeves during his final years, as to what may have happened.


More to follow when I've actually seen the movie...