The Origin of Species - Darwin/Kirk Cameron

As some of you may be aware, November 24th 2009 marks the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin. This truly monumental work is deservedly being celebrated around the world in a manner similar to the celebration that took place in 2005 for the 100th anniversary of Einstein's mind-boggling achievements in 1905 (the year he published papers on Special Relativity, Brownian Motion [his least famous but most cited work] and the Photoelectric Effect). Also as some of you know, Kirk Cameron has taken this time of celebration to be a complete dick.

Walking through campus last week around lunchtime, as I am prone to do, I noticed hordes of students carrying what seemed to be a copy of On the Origin of Species. At first I thought they must have all just been from the same class, but as I saw more and more of these copies I excitedly figured that someone on campus must be handing them out for free in celebration of the anniversary. On my way back from the student center, I spotted some people handing out these books and snagged one. However I got a weird vibe from the man who handed me one and asked 'is this a trick?' to which the man just replied 'no, the whole book is there'. I instantly know that yes, this was indeed a trick.

Because Georgia Tech is a state school, anyone can come and distribute free information on the campus. However what this really results in is religious fanatics handing out pamphlets, showing pictures of aborted children, or yelling about fire and brimstone through a megaphone as students rush off to class. It's taken much of my self-control not to confront or thwart these people in the past.

What I realized after picking up my copy of The Origin of Species (yes I left out the 'On', see below) is that this was no different than the above cases. Yes it does have the entirety of Darwin's text, but the front 50 pages of the book is creationist propaganda. After getting back to my computer and chatting up some informed friends, I discovered this was a well known ploy spearheaded by infamous nutjob (thanks for the word, Pat) Kirk Cameron.

He calls his this is 'Origin into Schools' project, which intends to 'inform' students about the 'truth' involving evolution. Because public schools like Georgia Tech are public domain, he intends to freely distribute roughly 100,000 copies of this monstrosity on campuses around the country, hoping to change the minds of countless 'lost souls'.

Now I don't really want to sit here and point out all the fallacies found in the introduction to the book (and boy are there many) but it's the whole idea behind this stunt that I find despicable. First let me point out that they got the title wrong of Darwin's book (having left out the 'On'). Yes something as simple as the freaking title Cameron, Ray Comfort and their cronies were unable to get right. Secondly it is true that they seem to have included the entire text from On the Origin of Species, they have however made it completely unreadable. Using a text at least 4 points smaller than the intro, they have also eliminated any line breaks and formatting whatsoever, leaving it as a large impenetrable block of text. They obviously never intended anyone to read the majority of this book, which makes their motives loud and clear.

What I have a big problem with, is the 'Trojan Horse' method used here. I can't imagine anyone picking up this copy intending to read Darwin, and being convinced by the shoddy and infantile introduction. As much criticism as atheists often take for 'using hostile methods to force their beliefs on others' I don't think anything Richard Dawkins or others have done anything as disrespectful as this. The only proportionate response would be for Dawkins to publish his own edition of the bible including footnotes whenever the text says something factually incorrect or impossible. And before anyone claims that this is an illegitimate comparison, yes I do believe that On The Origin of Species is equivalent to the bible for evolutionists (just as I also believe that going into space is as close as someone like myself has to reaching heaven).

I don't think this attempt by Kirk Cameron and introduction author Ray Comfort will really have any impact on this intellectual war whatsoever. It is generally agreed that they are pretty crazy and very few (although more than you would like to think) people listen to them. My only hope is that for anyone on the fence with respect to this issue sees through the vile tactics used here to realize how crazy these people really are. I leave you with Darwin's final words, found even in this copy.

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

(Interesting side note: as Dawkins points out in The Greatest Show on Earth after the first edition the line 'having been originally breathed' was modified by ending with 'by the creator' due to pressure from religious forces. The fact that this line does not occur in Cameron's edition shows that really, they have put hardly any thought into this section of the book and have no idea what they're talking about.)

Mad Men v. Friday Night Lights

While watching the first season of Friday Night Lights I was struck by how similar it was to Mad Men and felt the need to do a comparison piece between them. For those who are unaware, Friday Night Lights is a show based on a movie which is based on a book which is turn based on a fictional high school football team in west Texas. The show focuses on the everyday lives of those closely associated with the team, which turns out to be pretty much everyone in the small football crazed town.

The first season starts out with one of the best pilots that I have ever seen, it has a pretty spoilerific incident at it's conclusion that I won't ruin, but really it's not necessarily that plot line that makes it fantastic. The pacing and energy of the pilot really capture the excitement leading up to the first game of an especially promising season for the Dillon Panthers, and the camerawork (as it is throughout the whole show) is especially beautiful. The show is shot in the familiar cinema verite (the shaky hand held camera technique used in Blair Witch, The Office and Battlestar Galactica) and although I guess it's true of any film or show that use this technique, it really ads a sense of voyeurism making it feel like you're watching real people experience real events.

As I pointed out in a previous post, it is often told that Mad Men is really just a well written period soap opera. I'm not the first person to come up with this description, pretty much every casual viewer and critic has pointed this out. However when I described Mad Men as such at the time I was unaware that this would become somewhat of a criticism of the show. People who have not watched it and are skeptical of its greatness just end up quoting what they've heard by asking 'isn't it just like a soap opera?' Fairly or not, because 'soap operas' are often portrayed as trashy low brow entertainment, this ends up turning some people off to Mad Men who may otherwise find the show completely engrossing.

I much prefer the way Mad Men is described by Chuck Klosterman in his new book Eating the Dinosaur.

As a piece of entertainment, Mad Men has done everything right. It's perfectly cast and brilliantly paced, and it uses symmetrical symbolism in a way rarely attempted on television-every plot point is mirrored by a minor, less overt story line in the same allegorical vein. No Character is drawn without flaws.By Placing it in the 'secret' 1960s that everyone now accepts as normative (i.e. the subversive and damaged masquerading as suburban bliss), its white-collar characters are able to get away with living archaic, un-PC lives that (a) feel completely authentic but (b) would be impossible to depict in the present.

Here he points out all the things that are great about Mad Men without having to resort to talking about their sex lives. But this begs the question, what is wrong exactly with having plot lines driven by characters' personal lives? Almost every serial requires this sort of plotting, and what is special about Mad Men that makes people describe it in this way? Really what makes this show anymore of a soap opera than Battlestar Galactica? I don't think it is (actually I think BSG is much 'worse' in this way), and just because Mad Men smartly focuses its slow moving stories around peoples jobs and important incidents in their realistic lives rather than focusing on explosions and robots, doesn't make it any more melodramatic.

The reason I thought of Mad Men while watching FNL is that the later is pretty much the best nighttime soap opera that I have ever watched. Whereas Mad Men parcels out its events and well thought out plot lines, FNL tries to introduce as many different threads as possible. Put it this way: the writers of Mad Men could have used the plot lines from 2 FNL episodes to fill an entire season, and there were 22 episodes in the first season of FNL. This is great whenever the show introduced a lame plot (did Tyra having a one night stand with the oil speculator from LA do anything for anyone?) seeing that the audience was pretty sure that it would go away as fast as it came. However this also results in plot lines that have enough promise to be strung out over the majority of the season getting dropped just as quickly as they came (the introduction of Voodoo Taylor or Smash's steroid problems). FNL isn't as good as it could be because of this (the subsequent seasons are only 12 episodes so it's possible that they fix this problem) but boy is it watchable and entertaining.

Besides both being 'nighttime soap operas' both Mad Men and FNL rely on a strong sense of 'place' to ground the show. Now when I was doing literary analysis for novels in high school, I was one to kind of ignore issues such as place or setting and focus more on character analysis. Although I think sometimes the importance of 'place' is a little overstated, it is wildly essential to both Mad Men and FNL. Whereas Mad Men tries to place its characters in the context of the changing 60s, FNL attempts to chronicle the inter workings of the aforementioned football obsessed town. Although most people are familiar with the important events of the 60s, I have a suspicion that most people who might watch FNL know very little about these type of towns, or really even Texas in general. FNL attempts to show why those who grow up in towns like Dillon are so obsessed with high school football, and to show that they are not all just 'dumb jocks'. I think people who are still bitter from being picked on by the football players in high school might have some problems with this show (the AV Club message board tells me so) but the portrayal of the athletes is especially important and even handed, and might make some people rethink the 'jerky dumb jock' stereotype.

If forced to choose which show I liked more, I think I would still be pressed to find a show currently airing better than Mad Men. I loved watching the first season of FNL, and the first couple of episodes were some of the most emotionally affecting hours of television I have ever seen (really, me and Lindsay were almost to the point of tears for each of the first 6 or so episodes).The show also portrays sports in the way you wish they were, every game coming down to the final play and almost always in the favor of your rooting interest. However because of the way the show constantly brings up and drops new plot lines the show gets a little shaggy towards the end of the first season. Through thee seasons Mad Men has been absolutely superlative. The way the show is rooted in its well developed characters makes viewers more invested the more they watch it. The seasons are not distinct as they are in a show like The Wire, but I think there is something to be said for being consistently spectacular.

The Book of Basketball - Bill Simmons

Bill Simmons tends to be one of those writers that elicits pretty strong opinions by those who encounter his writing. As you may or may not be aware, Simmons is famous for writing on ESPN's Page 2 and more recently for starring in one of the most popular sports podcasts. His schtick is that rather than writing from the perspective of a sports journalist he writes from the perspective of an everyday fan. This results in him being able to take strong, and often biased opinions and he hardly ever tries to be politically correct. Unlike pretty much every ESPN personality he rarely appears on the network, and even actively tries to separate himself from the company. This 'fan friendly' approach is often the source of the bad parts in his writing, but I think it's also what really separates himself from his contemporaries.

In Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs Chuck Klosterman points out that it appears that all sports reporters and writers actually hate sports. This is, he claims, because they get so close to the athletes and day to day operation of sports that they can't help to be disillusioned with what they see. Many athletes are indeed terrible people (as are people in any occupation) and becoming too close to those same people you need to idolize in their reporting eventually breaks down pretty much every sports journalist. Simmons avoids this by staying at arms length from the athletes, owners and coaches involved in professional sports. Although this creates some pretty strong biases in his writing (he's a HUGE Boston fan, which has become insufferable due to all their winning this decade) it actually leaves him less biased than most writers or talking heads when it comes to sports as a whole. He's allowed to call athletes out when they act like knuckleheads, and he's allowed to attack the owners when they act like rich, cheap assholes. By being able to voice his real opinions he fills a much needed gap in sports reporting which too often degenerates into a huge circlejerk between the writers, athletes and everyone else involved.

Although this is technically not his first book (he published one a few years ago about the Red Sox winning the World Series), this is Simmons' first book of almost completely new material. In The Book of Basketball he sets out to redesign the basketball hall of fame (which he finds inadequate) with a tier system and by ranking every player to make it into the hall of fame. His reasoning for doing this is something along the lines of 'why should Micheal Jordon (the best player ever) and Vince Carter (a malcontent and infamous ball hog) both be recognized to the same level'? It's a valid question, and one that should be considered for other sports as well. If the hall of fame is to recognize not only the accomplishments of those who contributed to a particular sport, but also to act as a history museum, shouldn't the levels of those accomplishments be acknowledged?

The Book of Basketball also attempts to answer many questions which Simmons thinks are important to the sport as a whole. There is a whole section dedicated to 'what-ifs' that considers how the league might be different if small (and sometimes huge) things happened differently. But really at the core of this book is something that Simmons calls The Secret. He wants to find out what really is the trick to winning basketball games and championships and what is the 'it' that some players seem to have while others are completely clueless. As he is first told by Isiah Thomas, The Secret is that 'basketball is not really about basketball'.

What Isiah, and pretty much every other great player, understands is that winning basketball games to some degree is not just about who has better players. More than baseball, and possibly rivaling football, basketball is a team sport. It doesn't matter who has the better players as much as you might think, what really matters is having a team that plays well together and having players that can fit certain roles. While this may seem obvious to some people, just watch any NBA game of the past 10 years and you'll see that hardly any players gets The Secret (which I guess is where the name comes from).

Simmons frames the focal point of this argument as whether or not you think Bill Russel or Wilt Chamberlain was the better basketball in the NBA's early years. Do you go with the defensive team minded Russell or the unstoppable scoring machine Wilt (who famously scored 100 points in one game)? As Simmons points out, this is a ridiculous argument seeing that Russel won 11 championships in 13 years, often beating Wilt's teams, while Wilt only won 2 championships his entire career. Why was it that Russell routinely beat Wilt even though Wilt arguably had more skills? According to Simmons, this argument is at the heart of understanding basketball as a whole, and where individual players rank against each other.

Other than these topics, Simmons also attempts to lay out a brief history of the league and the important events that shaped the NBA as we know it today. If this seems like a lot to go over for one book it is. There is a reason the book is 700 pages besides the fact that Simmons feels bad making his readers pay for his writing.

Although he has obviously done his research for the book (and likes to remind you of this fact over and over) the best parts of The Book of Basketball are anecdotes either from Simmons personally or from those he reads/interviews. The beginning sections of the book where Simmons describes going to Celtics games during Larry Bird's prime are absolute gold. You really get a feel of what it felt like to attend those historic games, and makes you yearn for the days before jumbotrons and around the clock sports coverage. Even if the Celtic love can get a little old at times, it's hard not to see how growing up watching that particular team would create an NBA fanatic.

Being only moderately knowledgeable about basketball I found The Book of Basketball to be at the perfect level of depth. However, if you know hardly anything about basketball, or more specifically basketball greats of the past, you might glaze over when Simmons starts his countdown to the greatest players ever. Especially in the lower numbers (he lists the 96 greatest players ever leaving room for current players that don't yet make the cut) I too often found myself in sections of 5 or so players who I had never heard of before. Simmons tries to break this up with humor and funny anecdotes, but many of the older less known players blended together. This is not to say this is his fault, I'm sure someone with more knowledge of basketball history would be much more interested in these sections than I was.

The thing that really keeps this book going is Simmons' patented humor and stories. He fills this book with footnotes (almost 2 a page) and while this makes this book a 'long' 700 pages, they are mostly used to break up the basketball talk. I know it might make me somewhat of a 'dude', but I often find Simmons really, really funny. However it's in this 'dude' quality that I think that the book's weakest moments lie. Seeing that normally he has to listen to ESPNs censors, he really lets himself go with lots of dick and sex jokes. He occasionally makes comments that could be deemed sexist, and while I appreciate him trying to challenge the overly politically correctness of out times, it did occasionally make me cringe. Also a little over the top are his pop culture jokes. He likes to think he's a king of pop culture references, but it's really just Karate Kid, Teen Wolf, and Boogie Nights jokes over and over. I also think he'll regret making references and comparisons to things like The Bachelor, seeing that I don't think these references will age particularly well.

As much as I wish Simmons held back at times, what really makes The Book of Basketball great is his ability to point out which players and teams mattered, and which people had worthwhile personal stories to tell. Simmons turned me own to players who I knew about but never fully appreciated, Bill Walton and Julius Erving to name a few (seriously, who was cooler than Dr. J? See below), and made me realize how much of a team sport basketball really is. I also liked the sections where he would trash players (i.e. Patrick Ewing, Vince Carter, Pete Maravich, all for different reasons) who are often (mistakenly) thought of as all-time greats, especially given that his talents for humor lend themselves to negative criticism. Reading this book has already made me appreciate understand basketball when I watch it much more than I previously have.






















On the personal stories front, his discussions on race relations in the early days of the NBA are particularly great, especially given that this too often gets ignored when discussing sports history. His treatment of lives of Elgin Baylor and Oscar Robinson gave me chills, and I'm not the kind of person who throws that term around. If anyone ever wonders why sports matter, I would encourage them to read about the lives of these and other players.

If you're a fan of Simmons, basketball, or sports in general I would say this is a solid 'must read'. He structures it such that if you get bored with a certain section, you can easily skip around and still enjoy the book. Only want to read about players or teams you know? Go ahead, he encourages it. The 'R-rated' humor will cause a few eye rolls, as well as some audible guffaws, but you will finish the book having a much better feeling about why basketball is a great sport, and which players were truly transcendent.

Eating the Dinosaur - Chuck Klosterman

On the back cover of Chuck Klosterman's newest book there is a fake question and answer with the writer. Besides containing some of the typical smartassness found in Klosterman's writing there is the following section discussing the book's theme:

Q: Is there a larger theme?

A: Oh, something about reality. "What is reality," maybe? No, that's not it. Not exactly. I get the sense that most of the core questions dwell on the way media perception constructs a fake reality that ends up becoming more meaningful that whatever actually happened.

Although Klosterman often hides though humor or snarkiness, this is some of the best self analysis that he's written, and it perfectly explains what Eating the Dinosaur is about.

Compared to the other books of his that I have read (Killing Yourself to Live and Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs) Eating the Dinosaur has a much stronger central theme and seems to have had more thought put into it. Although Killing Yourself to Live has a 'strong theme' in theory, it too often gets dragged down by his various musings and distractions. In Dinosaur he stays much more on topic, and almost never gets distracted from his central idea (he barely brings up his personal life, which is a welcome change from his previous efforts). Although I haven't read all of Klosterman's other work, I think it's safe to say that Eating the Dinosaur is is best work to date.

As stated above, Dinosaur has a central theme of "reality versus perceived reality as it is affected by culture". Although like Cocoa Puffs it is a collection of essays on various subjects, unlike Cocoa Puffs all these essays seem to be connected on a deeper level. Whether it's talking about the failure of Chris Gaines, the fall and perception of Ralph Sampson, laughtracks, the sincerity of Rivers Cuomo, Ralph Nader and Warner Herzog or the things the Unabomber got right (more on this in a bit) Dinosaur attempts to analyze ways in which our world experience is mediated and affected through the culture in which we live.

One of my favorite essays was Klosterman explaining why he loves football (which can be read here on ESPN, to which Klosterman is an occasional contributor), and why it's such a fantastic sport. He ends the chapter with his best thoughts about the subject:

Football allows the intellectual part of my brain to evolve, but it allows the emotional part to remain unchanged. It has a liberal cerebellum and a reactionary heart. And this is all I want from everything, all the time, always.

Klosterman is here discussing how when it comes to the way football develops tactically, coaches are willing to try anything, constantly challenging the intellect. There is no 'right' way to play (unlike in other sports, say Baseball) and teams are constantly coming up with unique formations and plays to challenge what we thought was possible. However in a way football does support 'old school values' and this results in Klosterman calling it a kind of reverse libertarian. This section explains many of the reasons I myself love football, and I would point to it for anyone who doesn't understand America's fascination with this sport.

As much as I liked the chapter on football, objectively Klosterman's best section is the one in which he tackles the Unabomber. He begins the section with the usual caveats when discussing a possibly sensitive subject, and compares discussing the Unabombers manifesto to discussing O.J. Simpson as a football player. Regardless of the 'appropriateness' of the discussion, he makes some good points. Klosterman writes:

Like so many modern people, my relationship with technology makes no sense whatsoever: It's the most important aspect of my life that I hate. The more central it becomes to how I live, the worse it seems for the world at large. I believe all technology has a positive short-term effect and a negative long-term impact, and-on balance-the exponential of upsurge of technology's social import has been detrimental to the human experience.

Being a little young when the Unabomber was fully active, I was somewhat unaware of what he was all about. I knew he was a crazy guy who lived in the woods of Montana and who sent bombs in the mail to random people in order to have his manifesto published. After reading this section I went online to read though parts of the manifesto, and it ended up making me really depressed. Really, I was upset that I shared to many of the same ideas about society and technology that the Unabomber posits (and Klosterman agrees with here) that it was hard for me to reconcile how I could not come to the same conclusions as Ted Kaczynski.

Kaczynski's main thesis is that as we have become more reliant on technology, and thus don't have to work to fulfill our basic needs as an organism, we have become unhappy and depressed as a species. Almost every activity we associate with 'being human' from art to science to even charity, he ascribes as a 'surrogate activity' that is really taking the place of living and surviving. I don't necessarily agree with him here, but it's hard not to follow his logic to some of these conclusions. After thinking about this a while I came to the conclusion that yes our species seems to be having some issues with the acceleration of society and technology, but I don't think we can go back at this point. Not everyone in the world can live in a cabin in Montana, and many of the people that I love would not be alive if it were not for advanced technology. It's true that human's weren't 'made' to sit and look at screens all day, but sometimes you have to make sacrifices.

It's in this last section that many of the ideas that Klosterman has batted around for a while in various books and articles come together. The modern human is fully immersed in his society, and many of our ideas or thoughts that we would think originate from ourselves are actually a manifestation of the society we inhabit. Is our own reality different than the reality we experience through media such as television, movies or the internet? How much of our own mind is distinct to us and not shared with the rest of our society? These are some serious questions that Klosterman hints at in Dinosaur while discussing his usual assortment of 'irrelevant' topics. Like his other books Eating the Dinosaur is entertaining and a fast read, but I think it does dig a little deeper. Instead of finding myself rereading sections from confused by what Klosterman is saying because of his complicated wordplay, while reading Dinosaur I found myself rereading sections in order to understand what sophisticated philosophical idea he was trying to connect to ABB, or whatever other piece of irrelevant pop culture he choses to disect.

Ender's Shadow - Orson Scott Card

After a college friend revealed Orson Scott Card's feelings towards homosexuals to me it was hard not to let his personal feelings affect my opinion of Ender's Game. This brought up the common question of 'does an artist's personal opinions affect the enjoyment of his art or ideas in such a way that it completely ruins them?' Nietzsche was a well known sexist, and there are even many passages in his books that tout these ignorant opinions, but does that mean his other, more enlightened views are thus negated? Some (okay, 99 percent) rappers have hateful or sexist lines in their songs, but does that mean we can't look past it or enjoy their other songs? Or with the case of Card, can we enjoy his books even though he actively supports the mistreatment of an entire section of people in our society?

Card's situation is a little different that the other examples above because his personal opinions are a little less obvious from his work. There is no way to tell that he is a homophobe from the text of Ender's Game. In fact all the scenes of little boys running around naked and talking about their love for each other is more than a little homoerotic. However, Ender's Game was written before Card became more outspoken about his beliefs so it's possible that he just didn't feel as strongly at the time. After talking to some friends, and reading about his other work on the internet, I decided I had no interest in reading the rest of the Ender series. However, I was interested in Ender's Shadow on the strength of a couple of recommendations, and was also interested to see if Card's homophobic beliefs would rear their ugly head in this later written piece.

On the later of these accounts, I found Ender's Shadow to be no more homophobic than Ender's Game. Frankly it was possibly even more homoerotic than his seminal work. Now I'm not the kind of person that thinks every homophobe is possibly just a closeted self-loathing gay, but the thought did cross my mind more than once when it comes to Card.

Ender's Shadow is as the subtitle says, 'a parrallel novel to Ender's Game'. It takes (mostly) the same story and tells it from the character of Bean, Ender's right hand man and another small but intelligent child. Additionally to telling Bean's point of view, Shadow is used to give us more background and explanation for the events that happened in Game either through Bean's interaction with the teachers and commanders or through blunt bits of exposition through other characters.

I found Bean's own development to be interesting, if not a little more than reminiscent of the story we are told about Ender. They are both younger than the typical members of battle school, and furthermore they are small for their age. They both are singled out for their size and intelligence by their instructor during their lunch to the school in order to ostrisize them from their fellow students. Although this makes sense later on when we learn that Bean is really the 'back up' to Ender in case he should fail, it still feels a little too repetitive. Further making Ender's Shadow repetitive is the fact that the sections with Ender are exactly like they are in the previous book, with us getting the running monologue of Bean's head instead of Enders. Also, Card still has no idea how to write children (I don't care how smart they are, children don't speak like that!).

In addition to using many of the same sections for the plat, Card also doesn't have the best of writing styles. It is often said that the best films 'show and not tell', and even though this is a book I think the same basic principle applies to all storytelling. It is best to tell a story while leaving the audience to fill in some gaps themselves. The best storytellers will leave enough gaps to keep the audience stimulated and thinking, while giving them enough information so everyone can follow along and come to (mostly) the same conclusions. There are way too many sections of unnecessary explanation in Card's books, and it makes him only a mediocre writer. There is no need ot have a character explain what happened and why in a two page monologue after the reader themselves have also read the event in question. Card is either spoon feeding the reader, or trying to make his characters seem 'analytical', but it really just comes off as both patronizing and boring.

I didn't hate Ender's Shadow, and found much of it entertaining as I did with Ender's Game. Card does reuse a lot of the same tricks, and clumsily connects events and characters while over-explaining everything, but the story is still interesting. After reading Shadow, and reading about the other books in both the Ender and Bean series, I can see why people think Card is a one trick pony. Shadow did feel a little like Card realized he had used up his one good idea, and that he missed the boat and underdeveloped many of the characters in that book. Shadow is really for Ender's Game fanatics who can't get enough of that universe, but for everyone else I'd say it's a solid skip.

So how did I come out of this feeling about Card the person? Well from Shadow and Game I gather that Card feels two things about himself, or at least about himself at a young age. 1) That he was small and unfairly picked upon as a child. And 2) that he was beyond his age in intelligence and was able to use this to trick the older and bigger kids. Furthermore, it's obvious from his online commentaries that he is just another conservative religious man who recently decided to make gay-bashing his personal quest. So can we disconnect his art from the person? In this case I think you can, even though he only has 1 great book (that is poorly written like many sci-fi greats) and I don't think he's really worth the energy getting that upset about in the first place.

The Greatest Show on Earth - Richard Dawkins

Evolution is a fact. Beyond reasonable doubt, beyond serious doubt, beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt, beyond doubt evolution is a fact... [It] didn't have to be true. It is not self-evidently, tautologically, obviously true, and there was a time when most people, even
educated people, thought it wasn't. It didn't have to be true, but it is.

In my previous post discussing one of Dawkins' other books I wrote that I didn't really want to get into another debate about evolution vs. creationism. In reviewing his most recent book, it would be impossible and irresponsible for me to ignore this ongoing and often spiteful dialog.

The goal of this book, as the subtitle lets on, is for Dawkins to produce the 'Evidence for Evolution'. Although examples of and evidence for evolution is found throughout his other writing, he doesn't have a book that states 'these are the facts, and this is why evolution is true'. In this way The Greatest Show on Earth is a much needed book. Although another book (which Dawkins fully reccomends) that tackles this subject was released earlier this year in Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True, I think it's neccesary for someone who is widely known (as much in our society that a scientist can be) to also tackle this subject. Too many people either believe or contradict evoluution without really knowing the facts. As Dawkins often points out, General scientific knowledge in our world is at an extremely depressing level given how much knowledge we as a species have. The purpose of this book is both to convince those on the fence that evolution is indeed true, and to arm those who believe in it against those who Dawkins calls 'history deniers'.

The first thing that Dawkins tackles in this book, and the one thing that I think is sorely needed in the current discussion about evolution, is the idea that it is 'only a theory'. He frames the argument so well in the book it would be hard for me to recapitulate his ideas. Basically, he points out that the only thing that can be proven are mathematical theorems. You often hear Darwinists sarcastically say 'well gravity is only a theory', and really it's true. You can prove that the square root of 2 is an irrational number, but you cannot prove that evolution is true. This does not mean that beyond any doubt it is true.

Dawkins uses the risky move of pointing out that many people in the world no longer believe the Holocaust occurred. He compares this case of 'ignoring' the facts to those who ignore the truth of evolution. It's a risky move because any time you use Hitler or the Holocaust in an argument, one typically losses all credibility. But here I think he makes a valid point. Even with the eye witnesses (which are becoming fewer and fewer these days) he claims that the evidence for evolution is just as strong as the evidence for the occurrence of the Holocaust. The point here is for him to point out what we consider to be 'evidence' and how we as humans make decisions about what happened in the past.

This brings up the next set of arguments that Dawkins tackles. He spends a fair amount of time on the fossil record, and whether or not it is 'incomplete'. Many people (not just creationists) believe that the fossil record is the biggest, and perhaps only, evidence for evolution. Thus they are taught to say 'the record is incomplete' thinking that if they point out areas where we don't have fossils of intermediate species evolution will be blown to shreds. There are two main points here that Dawkins points out. First, our record is more complete than we have any right ot expect. We have so many 'intermediates' and examples of not only human ancestors, but ancestors of many species that it is more than enough to conclude evolution's truth. Second, any time we find a new fossil, creationists then can say 'where is the intermediate between that and the one before'. As I've pointed out in my reivew for The Ancestor's tale, there are an infinate number of 'intermediates' between species. Placing everything in a neat and tidy box is a human way of thinking, and nature does not work this way.

Furthermore, Dawkins makes the argument that our evidence for evolution is so convincing that even if we did not have one fossil we would be just as confident in the truth of evolution by natural selection. Comparing scientists to detectives who have to figure out what happened inthe aftermath of a crime, Dawkins writes:

The fossil record, like the spy camera in the murder story, is a bonus, something that we had no right ot expect as a matter of entitlement.

There is something else that creationists, and those who don't take the time to learn the subject often miss. They think that evolution is 'in the past' and something that has to be proven like a fact of history. The thing they miss is that evolution is happening all around us every day. Furthermore, as Dawkins writes:

there is more than enough evidence for the fact of evolution in the comparative study of modern species and their geographical distribution. We don't need fossils - the case for evolution is watertight without them; so it is paradoxical to use gaps in the fossil record as though they were evidence against evolution. We are, as I say, lucky to have fossils at all.

It is theses other pieces of evidence that I think make this book required reading for enlightened adults. Everyone knows what fossils are and how they work. But hardly anyone really understands the other pieces of evidence that are produced throughout this book. I won't really go into them here, because I think one really needs to sit down and read this book (or a book like it like Coyne's) to understand the evidence. The domestication of animals, our relationships to other creatures, geological features and countless other examples are used to show how everything in biology and life is driven by evolution and natural selection.

One of the main arguments that is often used against 'Darwinists' is that they're just replacing one ideology with another. This argument is used by both those who are religous and obviously at odds with Darwinism, and by those who think that any kind of ideology is ridiculous and harmful. Furthermore, this argument is even extended to all of science, where they believe 'Religion' is just being replaced with 'Science' with those who believe acting just as blind and indoctrinated. I find this argument utterly ridiculous. Science is a way of thinking, not a set of beliefs. As Dawkins points out above, evolution didn't have to be true but all of our evidence points out that it is. If there were some, any, evidence that Darwinian Evolution wasn't true those of us who believe in it would have to abandon this idea and try to figure out how things really work. Those who believe in 'creationism' or any other religious belief will never change their indivdual beliefs. They are set in stone for all time, unable to be changed by even the most convincing mounds of evidence.

Dollhouse - Joss Whedon

In my previous post, I tried to make a case for Fringe being one of the better shows on television that no one watches. I think that this discussion could easily be shifted to Dollhouse, a show that absolutely no one watches and one that is in dire straights. On a week-to-week basis I don't think Dollhouse is as strong as Fringe, it occasionally has a few groan inducing episodes here and there which takes the show down a level. However at its peak Dollhouse is easily the best show on television when LOST isn't airing, which feels like 95% of the year. (I'm not including Mad Men here, which is a different kind of good.)

Because so few people watch this show, likely you included, I think I need to give a little background on what the show is about. The dollhouse in Dollhouse is a place where people can go to get any desire or wish fulfilled. The dollhouse is populated with people who have had their memory wiped, a blank slate if you will, and can hence be programmed with any set of memories or skills that could be imagined. The 'dolls', or 'actives', are people who have volunteered to go through with this for 5 years, at which time they will be released carrying a boatload of money under their arms and their original memories intact.

If all of this sounds sinister, it should. Although not every person comes to the dollhouse for sexual purposes, a fair amount do. In less creepy jobs the dolls take on jobs such as being bodyguards, helping to solve kidnapping cases and being a proxy mother for a motherless child. Although this process is an extremely powerful tool, the company is seemingly only interested in making money and gaining power by helping those at high places.

Dollhouse is a different show, because we have very few 'good guys' to root for. Most of the characters are people who work in the dollhouse, an admittedly morally questionable place. We also get a fair amount of exposure to the dolls, but because they are just empty vessels who are filled with a different personality every week it's hard for the audience to feel a connection with them. The show does have Paul Ballard (played BSG's Tahmoh Penikett) an FBI agent obsessed with shutting down the dollhouse. But he's pretty inept as an agent, and turns out to be not the most upstanding person himself. I think having almost all of the characters able to be considered 'villains' is one of the problems with the show, more of which I will go into below.

Of the original 12 episode season run last year, a little over half involve the main doll, Echo (Eliza Dushku), getting an assignment, which usually turns out to be more difficult than originally intended, and having her clean up the pieces and save the day. Most of these are pretty weak, and after the first 5 episodes, I was not sure if this show lived up to Whedon's previous work. However starting with the 6th episode 'Man on the Street' the show turned from a pleasant but spotty weekly diversion to a fantastic show that delves into deep philosophical questions.

As the dolls start malfunctioning, the question of 'what makes a person who they are' starts to be addressed. Is a person the whole package, body and soul, or are they just a collection of memories that could conceivably be placed in another body? As Echo starts to remember more than she should (none of the dolls should remember anything about their engagements) she starts wondering who she is. Even without her original identity, she has fragments of memories from multiple sources and this is obviously confounding. Then as agent Ballard gets closer to the dollhouse, and a ex-doll who had an infamous and bloody escape a few months prior makes his presence felt the show really kicks into high gear. The last few episodes of the first season are truly spectacular, and the season finale (which was left off the air and only available on DVD) is one of the riskiest, and best, season finales I have ever seen.

As great as Dollhouse is, and the heights do really compare with the best of anything Whedon has ever done, it does have flaws that prevent it from becoming one of the great shows in recent memory. First is to again bring up the weakness in the 'doll-of-the-week' episodes. The second season, which is only 3 episodes young, has had a couple of these kinds of episodes and they have fallen far below the peaks the show can reach. The second problem is the obvious flaw of having Eliza Dushku play the lead. As decent as she is in other roles, she really doesn't have the chops to carry this show. The show's format requires her to be a different person every week, and this would be difficult for even the best actors. Many of the actors on the show blow Dushku out of the water, and all the Echo based episodes are a little weak.

Another problem with the show is that because of the purpose of the dollhouse, everything feels a little dirty and wrong. I have already discussed the fact that the show is chock full of 'bad guys', but I haven't brought up the inherent misogyny and sexism found in much of the show. Many of the episodes at least start out with Echo or one of the other female dolls being in some ridiculous overly sexed up outfit ready to go out and please one of the male clients. Furthermore in many episodes where the doll's 'programming' goes awry, we're stuck with innocent women who are completely helpless and often at the mercy of some big strong man who has less than honorable intentions. I give Whedon a little extra slack here because he did create the great feminist figure of Buffy, but sometimes the sexism still gets a little oppressive in Dollhouse. This is not to say the writers are inherently sexist, it's just that the basis of the show inherently explores the sexism found in our society and the writers just need to try a little harder to make sure that they don't get carried away exploring these themes.

I'm not sure if it's these problems inherent to the show that are causing it to get such terrible ratings, or if it's more on Fox's hands being that the show is aired on Fridays and with terrible shows leading up to it. Fox also doesn't advertise the show very well, and really seems to care less whether or not Dollhouse succeeds. I know that much of the suits at Fox have turned over in the past few years, but I find it hard to believe that Whedon trusted that Fox would do what it could for Dollhouse when it failed so spectacularly with Firefly. It remains to be seen if the second season will pick up where the first one left off, or if they try to change it so much to gain new viewers that the show gets completely gutted. If you have any interest in this show, or have enjoyed Whedon's products in the past, I emplore you go online and watch the first season on Hulu. It's only 13 episodes long and once you get to the unaired episode 'Epitaph One' I think it will be hard for you to say that your breath wasn't taken away. Let's give Whedon support so we can see what he can do with a full run of television like he did with the essential Buffy the Vampire Slayer.


Edit: Seems like the show will finish the season with a satisfying ending. Although it doesn't look like it'll be back for a third season.

In Defense of Fringe

I don't personally know anyone else who watches Fringe, and I'm not really sure why this is. In fact I don't know what demographic watches Fringe, and how it got renewed for a 2nd season in the first place. It seems that much of the nerd community has dismissed it as either an X-Files ripoff, or just another boring cop show with some 'weird elements'. And it's those 'weird elements' that I would think would turn off your normal NCIS fan or other watchers of CBS style dramas. I think Fringe is an excellent way to spend an hour a week, and find it to be something like a cross between LOST and yes, The X-Files.

Obviously if you were just to describe Fringe in a sentence it would sound exactly like an X-Files ripoff. It would go something like this:

"A team of FBI agents investigates strange and paranormal happenings around the city of Boston as they fight both external and internal forces in order to find the truth behind these strange occurrences."

This is likely how the show was pitched, and that with the addition of the creative force J.J. Abrams (Alias, LOST, the new Star Trek etc...) it got green-lighted. However I think it would be a fallacy to think that Fringe is just another Abrams show, or just another 'weird' FBI show. After the initial growing pains of the first season, Fringe has gone on to combine the best of all of these shows to become something great and unique.

During the first half of the first season we were stuck with the expected 'freak-of-the-week' format that one would expect. I use the word 'freak' here and not the typical 'monster' mostly because all of the paranormal activity around Fringe involves humans, not monsters or aliens or other creatures found in myths. This is the first thing that separates it, possibly just ascetically, from The X-Files. Where The X-Files was more interested in creatures or events that were rooted in mythologies or legends, Fringe takes a more scientific and technological route. People are often found with extraordinary abilities, some malevolent some not, and our team is tasked with figuring out the science behind these strange people or events. The show often explains what is going on, and how they're accomplishing these feats where The X-Files was more than happy to leave everyone in the dark, the viewer included. On a basic level it's an X-Files for a more scientific and technological age.

On a personnel and character level, Fringe is nothing like The X-Files. A show like Bones with its will-they-or-wont-they FBI agents owes much more to the dynamic of Mulder and Scully than Fringe ever will. Here we have the seemingly 'straight-man' Oliva Dunham as the lead and the character that grounds us in this world. She seems to be a typically competent agent who gets caught up in all this due to personal reasons. Anna Torv has steadily improved her performances and while I initially thought she might be a liability to the show, she has really become a strong point. It's also refreshing to have a strong blond woman in a lead role who is not only attractive, but doesn't have to rely on those looks as an actress or as a character. The show doesn't use Torv as a source of T&A for viewers, and I really think it gives the character an air of respectability.

Our other main characters are rounded out by the father/son combo portrayed by John Noble (think the grape tomato eating Denethor in LOTR) and Joshua Jackson (OMG PACEY!!!). Joshua Jackson has really grown up from his Dawson's Creek days and sells his character very well. Noble on the other hand, is absolutely fantastic. I wasn't that into Fringe when it first started, but Noble's portrayal of Walter Bishop brought me back week after week. He plays Bishop as a part loon, part evil genius, and part caring father which only recently was removed from an insane asylum. Not only is he responsible for all the pseudo-scientific explanations and experiments performed on the show, Noble is also responsible for the majority of the comic relief. Often as he's inspecting a body or performing an experiment he lets out a string of non sequiturs that are easily the funniest part of the show. The following exchange takes place as agent Dunham is preparing to enter a sensory deprivation tank:

WALTER smiles slightly: Uh, oh.
OLIVIA: What?
WALTER: I just got an erection. Oh, fear not. It's nothing to do with your state of undress. I just simply need to urinate.
OLIVIA: That's good to know.

He's so perfect that Walter Bishop might be the new archetype for 'crazy scientist' after all is said and done.

After the show started to find its footing in the middle of he first season, it started to connect all these strange events in what is called 'The Pattern'. Besides the silliness of the typical J.J. Abramism of giving something an ominous name (like 'The Passenger' in Alias) having these seemingly unconnected events all have their origin in a similar place really holds this show together. Every freak that we find that does something like mutate into a giant hedgehog/bear creature or person with psychic abilities has some connection to Walter Bishop's past as an experimentalist. Having one of our main heroes possibly be the main source of the problems in which they are investigating gives the series a dramatic element that most procedurals never have, although I'm not sure if at this point you can really call Fringe a procedural. Sure there is the typical 'cold open' where we see a 3 minute scene of the freak or strange event that our heroes will investigate in the upcoming hour, but once everything starts to have a connective thread the show somewhat morphs into a straight up serial. I think you can still enjoy a stray episode of Fringe here or there, but like all great shows it rewards its dedicated viewers.

This season has gone even further with giving the entire series an overarching plot with the introduction of the alternative reality, or what I would call 'Earth-2'. After dealing with Abrams on the set of Star Trek, Leonard Nemoy agreed to play Walter's old partner who may or may not be a sinister force. He lives in this 'Earth-2' and the season has started to put in motion a plot that pits the two Earths in a war with each other. 'The Pattern' may or may not be a way of 'Earth-2' waging war with the Earth in which our characters inhabit, but whatever happens so far this season seems promising. Out of the four episodes which have aired about 2 have been mainly about this upcoming war, and the other ones were very similar to the 'freak of the week' format from the first season (one which was pretty good, one which as terrible). Instead of trying to gain a new following and starting from 'square one' as shows often do in their second season, the second season of Fringe went full steam ahead and picked up where the first season left off. This may be a bad move, and result in lower than expected viewing numbers, but it sure makes for some good television for those of us who know what is going on.

It may be too late for those who are interested in watching the show to jump in now. Luckily we live in the age of 'tv on the internet' and you could catch up some weekend if you ever really got interested in the show. I think it's a shame that not too many people watch Fringe, because I think at its best it contains the best of what both The X-Files and shows like LOST have to offer. It's fun seeing what weird shit the writers can come up week to week, and how Walter can explain it, while at the same time having a strong central plotline to keep the show moving along. Additionally, the characters are not one dimensional and the show slowly unveils interesting aspects about their person or their past, but without completely destroying the flow of the episode like LOST is apt to do. Fringe is a great show and it's too bad that many people to whom this would seem to be right up their alley never really given it a chance.

Zombieland

I'm not really sure what it is about comedies that doesn't really grab me. It's not that I don't like to laugh (who doesn't like to laugh? except these guys), I think it's just that I find them kind of lacking in the context of the format of film. Most good comedies start out pretty great, they have a good amount of jokes and humorous scenes along the way, (as long as the trailers don't spoil everything for you) and then fall apart in the third act. Because they are films they have to follow the conventional formula and this usually leads to large chunks of the movie spent developing and bringing resolution to the (often) half baked plot. They can't just keep the same comedic tempo and pacing throughout the entire film. Because the plot is often an afterthought when comedies are being written, the audience doesn't have as strong of a connection to the characters as you would in a drama. Thus as the movie reaches the final act it looses all steam seeing that the audience isn't invested in the characters enough to keep it going. This leaves many comedies such as Dirty Work that switch pretty drastically from a brilliant work of comedy to a boring plot based drama as the story must be resolved.

I think this is why I am more likely to see and enjoy comedies that are set within or blended with another genre. Because these kind of films are both a comedy and something else at the same time, when the movie becomes more plot driven it still remains interesting because it doesn't only rely on it's comedic edge. Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg are the most recent filmmakers that are famous for this with their movies Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead, and this is where Zombieland comes in. Of course the easiest comparison to Zombieland would be Shaun of the Dead and any review that doesn't at least mention this would be amiss. However besides the fact that they are both zombie comedies (or zomedies) they share little in common. Without considering their very different plots, Shaun of the Dead is more concerned with showing a humorous take on the zombie movie and deconstructing the genre, whereas Zombieland is more about having gross zombies serve as the backdrop for its humor and action.

Unlike most zombie movies which feel the need to explain why and how the infection spread, Zombieland is content to feed the audience a line about a bad hamburger and move on from there. I think this works very much in the films favor seeing that the audience never gets bogged down with some ridiculous backstory. As much as I love exposition, I found it refreshing that Zombieland was free from having to explain itself at every turn. We're thrust into a zombie apocalypse, much like the main characters must have been, and as the characters we try to make the best of it.

The film tries to be many things (horror movie, comedy, buddy picture, road trip movie, it even has elements of romance) but the film is at its best when Jesse Eisenburg and Woody Harrelson are just hanging out killing zombies together. Eisenburg plays his awkward, gangly, Michael Cera speaking self while Harrelson plays a tough-talking, ass-kicking southerner in a snakeskin jacket who feels the need to paint a 3 (in honor of Dale Earnhardt) on every car he co-ops. As Harrelson says in the film, the thing he was put on earth to do is kill zombies, and boy does he enjoy it. The film constantly finds new and interesting ways for him to maim and kill zombies, whether it's with a banjo or from a roller coaster, and it's almost like the movie took all the fun parts of zombie a video game.

The pair of sisters that are later introduced are useful to move the plot along, but they don't really add much to the movie besides to give Eisenburg a romantic interest and give the movie a place to move towards. There is also a 'secret' guest star that I won't ruin for you, but this section is getting a lot of press and accolades. The scenes in which they're in are fun, but they come in a section of the movie that is relatively zombie-free and what I think is the lowpoint for the movie. It just feels that they invested a lot in this having person and it kind of slows down the exceptional pace in which the movie usually moves.

The film is also stylized in way that is both interesting and unique. As is becoming increasingly common these days the movie has a great opening sequence (on par with Watchmen) which consists of a bunch of scenes of zombies chasing people in slow motion that lets you know that you're in for gore, humor and style. The most unique aspect of this style is how whenever Eisenburg brings up one of his 'rules' to surviving in Zombieland the rule appears on screen as text, and then interacts with whatever is happening on screen. Subsequently, the rules then appear on the screen whenever the characters do something in which they are applicable. The 'double-tap' rule especially comes up in humorous ways throughout the film.

As good as most of the film is, the movie is really worth watching for the last 20 or so minutes. I'm not ruining anything to say that the final destination for the movie is an amusement park (part of what gives Zombieland its name) and this is the best part of the movie. It's pretty much nonstop fun zombie kills, interesting action scenes, and a bit of drama that is genuinely interesting. At a quick 80 minutes, when Zombieland ends you wish that you could get right back in line for more of the same.

Ghost Dog - Jim Jarmusch

Jim Jarmusch is one of those filmmakers that most everyone has heard of, but at the same time most people have never seen any of his output nor could they even name one of his films. In this way, Jarmusch is very much like David Lynch, and the fact that he is a white guy from middle America with big white hair doesn't help to separate them. However their films could not be more different. From what I've seen of Jarmusch (Ghost Dog, Dead Man, and Broken Flowers) his movies tend to be very simplistic studies of idiosyncratic individuals while Lynch focuses more on the surreal nature of life and the human mind, and are sometimes complicated to the point where they step on their own toes.

Ghost Dog is a fantastic film that is squarely in Jarmusch's wheel house. It's simple enough that the plot doesn't get in the way, but interesting and innovative enough to keep the viewer interested and engaged. Ghost Dog tells the story of a black man, named Ghost Dog, who envisions himself as a modern-day samurai. He works for a member of the local mob, doing 'cleaner' work for them when necessary. During a job at the beginning of the film, something goes awry that is not the fault of the ever professional Ghost Dog, and the local mob leaders decide to take Ghost Dog out so as to cover their own tracks. The rest of the film follows Ghost Dog as he attempts to take out these mobsters before they get to him, and delves further into the psyche of this modern samurai.

What makes Ghost Dog great is not the plot but the characterization of the title character. It is never really in doubt that Ghost Dog will be able to get to the mobsters before they get to him, but that doesn't make the movie any less exciting. The ways in which Ghost Dog preemptively strikes at the mob are often fresh and innovative and watching him take out the overweight, ineffectual mobsters is very satisfying. Although Ghost Dog is technically a murderer, there isn't much in terms of moral ambiguity here: he's the good guy and he's going to take the bad guys out.

Much of the film is spent going into the samurai code that drives the way Ghost Dog lives his life. He is often seen reading the Hagakure, which records the samurai code and sayings of famous samurai Yamamoto Tsunetomo. There are many sections of voice over where the text of a passage of the Hagakure is displayed on the screen accompanied by Ghost Dog's reading. In many other directors hands this technique might feel clumsy or appear to be spoon feeding the audience, but Jarmusch is able to make it work with an assist by Whittaker's dramatic line readings.

Ghost Dog does have many of those 'quirky' qualities that would qualify it as an 'indie' movie besides just its budget. There are many peculiar characters besides Ghost Dog, including his Hatian best friend who speaks only french yet runs an ice cream truck in the ghetto, and the little girl who takes a shine to him and carries not lunch in her lunchbox but a wide variety of books. One clever scene has Ghost Dog and his Haitian friend view someone building a wooden ship on a roof and have a discussion about it without understanding a word the other one says (this is a recurring theme that could be seen as a joke, or as an examination of the connection two people can make even without the use of words). Additionally, Ghost Dog only communicates to his handler through carrier pigeons and practices with his Katana outside his bird coop even if he doesn't use the sword for his jobs. Finally, at it's core, Ghost Dog is a blend of the gangster and samurai genres that were wildly influential in rap music of the time. And as we all know white indie kids love both blending genres and analyzing black inner city culture that they weren't really a part of.

However as much as I joke, this is not meant as a criticism, Ghost Dog does not feel disingenuous in any way. There is/was a reason that so much of rap music focused on gangsters and samurais (especially the Wu-Tang Clan in the latter case) and this movie does that connection justice.

Forrest Whittaker is absolutely fantastic in a career performance as the title role and the soundtrack (done by Wu-Tang's RZA) is mesmerizing. Hollywood puts out gangster and assassin movies like it's going out of style and frankly I am usually annoyed by them, usually feeling that the genre has nothing new to offer. However, this movie is a great take on those old genres and is one of the best films that I've watched in recent memory.

Angel: Seasons 2 & 3 - Joss Whedon

Hey, remember when I wrote that Angel was more of a procedural than Buffy ever was, and that this 'vampire detective' schtick was exciting, fun and a refreshing change from Buffy? Well that may all true about the first season, but about halfway into the second season all that goes flying out the window. There are multi-season story archs, plot lines darker than most anything I've seen on television, and one ridiculous cliff hanger. Oh, plus Pete from Mad Men shows up as an evil Peter Pan from hell, but I'm getting ahead of myself here.

The second season starts right where the first one left off. Angel is busy being a champion (the show's word, not mine) and saving all sorts of helpless people. Already being more useful than she ever was in Buffy, Cordelia acts as the show's emotional center and as Angel's guide to the higher powers by receiving visions of people Angel is supposed to save. In addition to a tougher and more likable Wesley the show adds to the main cast Gunn, a 'street' (read: black) vampire fighter. Eventually added are Lorne the empath demon (also the most likable 'theater person' I've ever seen on screen) and Fred the quirky but intelligent girl discovered in Lorne's home-world. As well as I thought the 3 man team of the first season worked together these character additions (especially Lorne and Fred) add a much needed breath of fresh air to the show. As the series progresses and gets darker and darker, any level of levity is greatly appreciated. So let's get to those dark plot lines that plague Angel's middle seasons.

At the end of the first season Angel's main rival, the law firm Wolfram and Heart, brought back Darla, the vampire that sired him back in the 18th century. It's never really clear why they do this, nor why this is such a big deal, but they pretty much bring her back to screw with Angel. We get lots of exposition about Angel's past (not really that much more than what we got in Buffy) and when he eventually finds out that Darla is alive he obviously loses his shit. There are some pretty intense (and occasionally melodramatic) scenes where Angel is deciding what to do about Darla being alive. Eventually an old friend turns Darla back into a vampire (she comes back as human) and this upsets Angel so much that he fires everyone he works with, starts to brood constantly, and starts blurring the line between 'hero' and 'villain'.

This section of season 2 was a little melodramatic, especially given how annoying Darla is. It's hard to buy that Angel cares so much about her as a human when he only knew her as an evil fiend. Additionally, we're supposed to believe that Buffy was Angel's true love, so it's hard to understand his actions with respect to Darla seeing that he was only with her when he was evil himself. It also seems a little forced to rely on the possibility of Angel going 'bad' seeing that Buffy's second season already explored this territory very successfully. However after the Darla storyline finishes, and Angel gets everything back in order the show picks back up. The final story arch with the crew going to Lorne's hometown to save Cordelia is especially good, and it's nice to see these characters interact in a more traditional 'fantasy' type setting.

Whereas the episodes of the second season was about half and half overarching story and one-offs, the third season completely destroys this ratio. From the get go we get scenes of a pregnant Darla, and discover that she's pregnant with Angel's baby from a night of hate sex which occurred during the previous season. This pregnant-Darla storyline dominates season 3, and the MOTW episodes completely disappear when a rival from Angel's past shows up to muck up things further. Darla eventually gets out of the picture and dies in childbirth (by her own hand even!) and at that point the series takes an extremely dark turn. There are lots of dire monologues about revenge and vengeance, hate, and the steps necessary to dispose of one's enemies. Gone are the days of the loquacious mayor who is both a germaphobe and an immortal demon, and instead we have a villain who is driven purely by hate of the long-gone evil Angelus. Frankly, Hotlz is not much fun, and every thing he's involved in is covered by a thick depressing cloud.

Having Holtz around to make everyone act out of character was bad enough, and I haven't even brought up the 'prophecy'. Wesley discovers that according to a prophecy (that later turns out to be false) that Angel is destined to kill his son. Being overly distraught, he plans on stealing the baby from Angel and raising it himself far away. Of course Holtz gets involved in this as well and eventually steals the baby (now named Connor) after Wesley takes it, and slits Wesley's throat for good measure. After stealing the baby Holtz takes it to a 'hell dimension', seemingly never to be seen again. Obviously Angel is distraught over these events, but it seems a little extreme to have him try to suffocate Wesley while he's recovering the hospital. Wesley essentially gets ostracized from the group even after they understand his side of the story, and starts hatefucking one of their main opponents from Wolfram and Heart. (There sure is a lot of hate sex in Angel, isn't there?)

The child eventually comes back from the dimension as a teenager (time works different in different dimensions) and after gaining the trust of Angel Investigations he finally turns on them as are Holtz's wishes. The season ends with Holtz killing himself in a manner than makes Connor believe that Angel was responsible, and then Connor trapping Angel in a large metal box and throwing him to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. I cannot think of a darker cliffhanger than having Angel's son betray his father by making the immortal Angel suffer with this knowledge at the bottom of the Pacific ocean for the foreseeable future.

Joss Whedon's shows are famous for their witty dialog and humor even when the shows delve into serious storylines, as they often do, and I think Angel lost sight of this somewhere. This is not to say that I wasn't engrossed in the story, it's just that I wish there was a little more time for the characters to interact and play off each other with the original premise of the show. There are so many character additions in these seasons just having them solve demon or paranormal related events would be more than enough to keep the show interesting. While Buffy also introduced 'big bads', I think that it was much more able to successfully fit those stories within the original premise of the show. By the end of the third season Angel pretty much turned into a supernatural soap opera with teeth.

House - Season 6: Episode 1

As you may have noticed my posting has become a little more sporadic as of late. The main culprit behind troubling trend is the fact that the fall TV season has started once again. When I was a child this time of year was very exciting for me. I loved getting new school supplies and finding out what classes I'd be taking and who I'd be sitting next to in those classes (yes I was a big dork). Combine this with the fact that this was the time that my favorite shows would begin anew and my birthday is not far off made fall one of my favorite seasons (changing leaves and the cooling of the air rules as well).

So as this time has approached I've been a little conflicted on how I should continue writing. I obviously won't have as much time to watch about movies since I keep up with a couple of shows, and thus if I continue with my current format I won't have much to write about. So I have decided to write my thoughts on a couple of my favorite shows as they air. I may not post about every show I watch or every episode of shows that I do write about, but I will comment on things when I find them interesting or thought provoking. So without further ado let's start with the first week of the fall TV season (at least for most shows).


House - Season 6: Episode 1

As was probably the case with most fans of House, I was a little concerned with how this season would unfold. At the end of the previous season House checked into a mental institution after battling a both a drug addiction and hallucinations. It was interesting to see how these would play out in the fifth season, and I think the writers did a fantastic job weaving House's problems within the case of the week plots throughout the season. At it's heart House is a procedural, and it was pretty neat to see how that format could be combined with a riveting season long character arch. They kept the whole 'medical mystery' format of the show while delving into House's psyche in a way that most procedurals don't usually attempt.

Although I appreciated the build up to the end of last season, I was pretty weary about how they could keep House, House with the titular character being completely out of his element. Would they keep him in the mental institution for the majority of the season and have him solve mysteries within the compound or possibly as a consultant to his 'crew'? Or would they have him leave fairly quickly and return to the status quo? The first route completely changes the dynamic of the show and would make House much more of a serialized show. And the second route would seem to negate all of the emotional impact that the fifth season created.

After a fantastic opening sequence set to No Surprises from Radiohead's essential album OK Computer, the episode shows House settling into living in the mental institution and causing problems as you would expect. Even the biggest House supporter can't really defend his bullying of the other mental patients (making suicide jokes at a cutter? really House?) but these episodes eventually show House finally having some of that elusive contentment. After his initial posturing and misbehaving, House actually shows remorse over some bad choices, and even makes a real personal connection. It remains to be seen if the show will continue his personal improvement when he goes back to work next week, but it was a little nice to see House act like a real person.

Overall I was pretty satisfied with the premiere even if I did have a few qualms with it. While it was nice to see House improve as a person, we didn't really get anything in the way of 'medical mysteries' (there was a tease midway through that was pretty frustrating) that gave House a chance to use that brain of his, and there was nothing to be seen of the rest of the cast. It also seemed a little rushed having him get over his addiction and hallucination problems within the first 5 minutes of the show, and the rest of his stay at the hospital pretty much involved him trying to be less of a dick. I think they could have drawn out his addiction storyline and had him stay at the hospital much longer, as long as he was consulting with the rest of the doctors from Plainsboro so that the show could still keep some semblance of what it used to be. Or maybe I've been watching Mad Men too much and just find all this plot development a little hectic and possibly forced.