ploopet (a blog by tom hoefner)

Who Do You Know?

2011-10-14T17:03:00.003-04:00

It is a propagated myth that success as a playwright (or in any number of fields) is about talent, drive, luck, etc., etc. Nobody likes to admit that it's actually about who you know.

Not always, of course. But often. And you can hardly blame those who are known. When you take on an artist's project, you take on the artist as well. And if you're looking to invest in the arts, you probably don't want to be spending money backing a project you love that's been created by a douchebag you can't stand. I get that, I do.

I just wish people would stop lying about it.

There's an instance I often think back to: I was in a playwriting class at NYU, and our professor (an awesome theatre pro by the name of Stephen DiMenna) had brought in a few other theatre professionals to speak to us. There was a playwright, an agent (I believe), and the head of new works at a fairly prominent playwright's theatre here in New York. I don't want to name names or tell tales out of school, but I will say this: the theatre in question begins with a "P" and ends with "Laywrights Horizons".

These three working theatre folk were going on and on about how they love discovering new work, and you never know when you'll luck into a great new play with a great new voice, and it's the biggest thrills of their careers to discover new playwrights. So I raised my hand. "I have a new play opening next weekend," I said. "I'd like to invite all three of you to come. I'll even comp your tickets."

They looked at each other awkwardly for a moment, and then all three said "no". The agent even explained that if a fellow student of mine (here he pointed to that student) were in it or had written it, he'd go, because he knew that other student but didn't know me.

So yeah, it's about who you know. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. But if you don't know anyone, you should probably still keep trying. Because, honestly... what else are you going to do?

Kickstarting

2011-09-17T23:30:00.001-04:00

Look. Everyone and their mother is doing a Kickstarter event these days. (Hi mom!) We know that. And we (by "we" I mean the collective "Race McCloud" family, a.k.a. Team McCloud) are no exception. Pre-production has begun on our Kickstarter video, and...

Wait wait wait wait... you don't know what Kickstarter.com is? Okay, Cliff Notes version: it's a website through which artists can independently raise money for projects. They apply to Kickstarter for a space on the site, the Kickstarter people decide "yay" or "nay", and if the answer is in the affirmative than the Kickstarting begins, with the artist setting up project descriptions and a promo video and donation links and etc., etc., etc.

So we're doing one. Not to raise money for the next production of "Race McCloud", no. But to raise money to set up a backer's audition (essentially a showcase for those who may want to invest real money) as we try to raise the funds and find the people to help bring "Race McCloud" to a legitimate Off-Broadway run.

We shoot the video on October 15th. Expect our fundraising efforts to commence shortly thereafter. I've worked the script to a lean, mean, 94 pages, performed in one act. To compare: our original FringeNYC production of "Race McCloud" was 130 pages long with 4 fights. Now the play is 94 pages long with 10 fights. I have given the audience just what they seem to want... and happily enough, it turns out this is what I wanted, too, because I've never been more pleased with the script.

This is the last shot I'm taking with this iteration of "Race McCloud". Either we raise the money and generate the interest among those who matter... or we won't. And if "won't" is where we land, I'll begin submitting "Race" to publishing companies and regional theaters and what-not, and I'll no longer be the director/producer of "Race McCloud", and simply be the playwright. And nobody can say we didn't try like hell to make this thing work on our terms.

But. We're not tossing in the towel just yet.

See you soon.

Stash My Comics

2011-08-29T02:38:00.000-04:00

Jason Newcomb, the mod over at Stash My Comics (I know, a comic book website, CRAAAAZY!) has very graciously invited me to join the writing staff over at the website and I couldn't be happier to do that. Now some of my comics-fueled rantings (the longer ones) will end up over there rather than here, but I'll be sure to link to all of them right here on ploopet so all eight of you who follow along can go and share in all the comic book bloggin' goodness.

For my first column at SMC, I've interviewed the composer and director of "The Legend of Julie Taymor, Or The Musical That Killed Everybody", a new musical that just finished up a sold-out and critically acclaimed run at the NY International Fringe Festival (and which might soon be singing a post-bow encore) that tells with some fudging and much hilarity the behind-the-scenes story of "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark". Added bonus: "Legend" ALSO happens to star "Race McCloud" family member Kiley McDonald.

So pop on over to SMC and check it out, then linger around and click thru the rest of the site! Also, I was trying to break my own personal record for links in a blog with this post. Total: 9. I'm pleased.

Chris Nolan: Getter of the Benefit of the Doubt

2011-08-07T19:06:00.001-04:00

Director Christopher Nolan's final film in his Batman trilogy, "The Dark Knight Rises", is scheduled for release next summer. I think. I didn't Google for the exact release date; for all I know it could be streaming on Netflix instant right now, shoved in the queue somewhere between martial arts/basketball mash-up "Kung-Fu Dunk" and WWE Superstar Documentary "Twist of Fate: The Matt and Jeff Hardy Story".

Included in the cast of "The Dark Knight Rises" is one Ms. Anne Hathaway (you may remember her as Agent 99 in the Patrick Warburton vehicle "Get Smart"). She is playing the role of well-known Batman foil/love interest Selina Kyle/Catwoman/Eartha Kitt, and recently Warner Bros. released the following promotional picture of Ms. Hathaway on-set and in-costume:

Now for the unawares, comic-book fans are often referred to as Fanboys, and are often painted with a broad brush of stereotypes: lives in moms basement, plays "World of Warcraft", does not bathe, drinks Mountain Dew, eats Funyuns (thanks Stephen Lynch!), goes from zero-to-no social interactivity in under 35 years and shall die virginal and alone.

As with most stereotypes, these are unfair and patently untrue. There is one trait, though, that does rear its ugly head from time to time among Fanboy America: as are fans of all sorts of things (sports, music, needlepoint) we are supremely protective of that which we love... sometimes to a fault.

Now is the time we shall illustrate one of these sometime faults.

It would be unfair to say the above image cause an "uproar" among the members of Fanboy Nation. On the one (solo) comic book message board I frequent/lurk around, there was evident grumbling about how the lovely Ms. Hathaway looked less "cattish" than some would like.

I would like to take this moment to remind the guilty grumblers of this:

This would be the first-look image of the tragically late Heath Ledger as the Joker in Mr. Nolan's 2008 film "The Dark Knight". The reveal of this image, as well as the initial casting announcement of Mr. Ledger in the role, prompted a fair deal more grumbling than the Anne Hathaway casting announcement and reveal did, and in the end the biggest outcry among comics fans in regards to "The Dark Knight" was that it was snubbed of a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars. I personally regard "The Dark Knight" as the best Joker story anywhere ever, even (especially) over the awful, awful Alan Moore graphic novel "The Killing Joke" which is a crime against the character of Batman but I just threw away my geek-cred card with that very minority opinion so let's move along.

I've also seen some wishing and hoping that the Fanboy-adored Darwyn Cooke interpretation of Catwoman would become the model for Nolan's version of Catwoman. Mr. Cooke is a comic book creator par excellence, and his solo "Catwoman" title featured a fantastic character design and characterization of Ms. Kyle:

But the last thing I'd want to see in "The Dark Knight Rises" is Mr. Nolan regurgitate another artist's take on a character. I'm sure Mr. Nolan and his vast team have pored over dozens and dozens of the various iterations of Catwoman that have appeared over the years... and then come up with their own personal version of the character that fits this particular film. So far we've seen the Christopher Nolan versions of the Joker...

... the Scarecrow...

... Ra's al Ghul...

... Harvey Dent/Two-Face...

... Jim Gordon...

... and Bruce Wayne/Batman...

... and you know what? He's knocked pretty much every one of them out of the damn park. So hey, regardless of whatever blue-rimmed Lazer Tag goggles he's shoved Catwoman in, regardless of whether or not she has a pointy-eared cat-themed cowl on, I'm going to give Mr. Nolan the benefit of the doubt on this one. Because if he hasn't earned it by now, nobody has.

Besides, Fanboys, let's remember: a pointy-eared cat-themed cowl doesn't guarantee anything.

Personally, I think we all owe Eartha Kitt an apology.

Spider-Man Vs. Glenn Beck

2011-08-03T19:54:00.000-04:00

Here's Glenn Beck talking about the new man (teenager, actually) behind the mask in the pages of "Ultimate Spider-Man". Listen and enjoy!

Look, I don't care much about Glenn Beck's cancelled TV show and his insane theories about rassafrassa and gobbledygook. My reaction to almost any "conclusion" he draws can be summed up in two words: incoherent sputtering.

Although maybe this is just me. Maybe everyone else in the country, when listening to that audio clip he plays of Michelle Obama, instantly thinks, "She's talking about Spider-Man!" I am, however, going to lean heavily on the side of "I doubt that shit very very much."

What really offends me, though, is not his nonsensical hoody-hoo about Michelle Obama, Spider-Man, and (probably) Stalin. What offends me is when his sidekick practically sneers out the words, "I'm not some comic book geek."

Allow me, on behalf of all comic book geeks everywhere around the world, to offer to that particular comment a loud, heartfelt, "PHEWWW!" And furthermore allow me to clarify: Peter Parker remains Spider-Man in the pages of "Amazing Spider-Man". Peter Parker DIED in the pages of "Ultimate Spider-Man", a completely different and separate publication unaffected by the stories, actions, and events that occur within the pages of "Amazing". Glad to clear that up in two easy to understand sentences.

You may not be a comic book geek, Mr. I-Don't-Know-Your-Name-And-I-Really-Don't-Care-Even-Remotely-Close-Enough-To-Go-Ahead-And-Learn-It-In-The-Point-Five-Seconds-It-Would-Literally-Take-Me-To-Google-The-Words-"Beck"-"Glenn"-"Sidekick"-And-"Stupid". What you are instead, if I may be so bold as to point such things out, is the sycophantic and glad-handing hanger-on to an opportunistic, agenda-spouting, manipulative, ratings-starved crackpot. But I'm sure you're well compensated for your suckling. I hope that helps you sleep better at night.

Look, Glenn Beck and dino-buddy: can't you leave Spider-Man alone? Hasn't Julie Taymor done enough?

P.S. - You'll notice I did not use the words "conservative" or "republican" in my above description of Glenn Beck. I choose not to lump the republicans and conservatives I know and respect, intelligent human beings with political philosophies different in some ways than my own, in with that ego-maniacal marshmallow man. I was very, very close to using the words "tea-party towel boy", though. Still might go back and edit them in. Don't tempt me.

Wow. Hating on Glenn Beck feels like beating a dead horse. I think I'll stop now.

Shelley Watters First Page Contest Entry!

2011-06-24T11:00:00.011-04:00

The following is an entry in a contest being hosted by YA author Shelley Watters on her blog. She's holding a "First Page Contest" to be judged by Victoria Marini, an agent at the Gelfman Schneider Literary Agency. (You may have seen me pimping this out on Facebook and Twitter, those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter.)

I don't participate in many contests and I have to thank Shelley for sponsoring it; even if I don't sniff a win all the contestants who have come here to leave their critiques have been very, very helpful in what has been the hardest part of adapting my play, "The Unlikely Adventure of Race McCloud, Private Eye": the first page.

So the particulars follow... and to my regular readers (all 4 of you) here is yet another blog post dedicated to my 14-year-long labor of love and occasional disgust with Race McCloud.

Title: THE UNLIKELY ADVENTURE OF RACE AND COOKIE McCLOUD
Genre: Young Adult
Word Count: 87K
The Entry...

Prologue: Green-Suited Justice
The night rain fell by the gallon on the bustling metropolis of Westside City. Westside City was a large city, the second largest city in the American Empire as a matter of fact, and when the entirety of the city was being pelted with rain you can be certain the overall result was… well, it was a whole lot of rain on a really big city, that's what it was.

Westside citizens scrambled like bugs under a magnifying glass to find shelter, many ducking into brightly lit stores adorned with brightly lit neon. Those in the perhaps-not-quite-as-friendly-or-well-lit portions of town realized the double negative involved in being both unsafe and drenched, and scurried off in brighter, drier directions.

One young woman, a pretty and smartly dressed student from Westside City University, found herself in one of those unfriendly portions of town when the rain began, there for the only reason such a pretty and smartly dressed woman would be: she was on her way to see her starving-artist boyfriend. Hoping to shave a few seconds off of her trip, she took a shortcut through a dingy back alley, holding her purse over her head to block as much of the rain as she could, her well-heeled shoes quickly ‘click-click’ing as she hurried on her way.

It did not take the young woman very long to realize one as pretty and smartly dressed as she shouldn't go traipsing through back alleys in the unfriendly portion of town on rainy nights.

Just Because I Do My Taxes Every April Doesn't Mean I'm an Accountant

2011-06-14T17:48:00.000-04:00

That's a lie. I don't do my taxes every April. I mean, I PAY them, but I have a guy who does them. Because if I tried to do them I'd probably end up in jail. Why? Because I'm not an accountant, that's why.

I was trying to make a point, and now have just gotten myself into a ham-fisted mess. See, it's a thing I've encountered for a long time: it's very easy to claim that you're a writer. All you have to have done to make that claim (and to actually BELIEVE it) is write something. I've seen this in theater (hey, I wrote a few short plays a few years ago; I'm a writer!) and comics (hey, I can DRAW comics, so I can WRITE comics) and in film (I wrote a spec screenplay once that got rejected by the handful of agents I sent it to; being a writer SUCKS).

You know what makes one a writer? Not by talking about it but by doing it. That means by writing. Even when nobody else is looking. If you write poetry in a journal every day I would call you a writer, even though you're not one trying to show off about it. To me, the WRITING is more important than the SHOWING. I mean, yes, if you're trying to get produced or published, the constant and almost obnoxious showing off of your work is necessary, which is hard for those to whom this is not second nature. But I've met a lot of people in my 32 years who do a lot more showing than writing. I worry about being one of those people, but then I remember: I write (or do something to further my career as a writer) every day, and even in the past three years I've been working on getting "Race McCloud" seen I've finished another novel and another play and am working on one more of each.

So show me the writing, yes please, but most of all, remember that writers write. So don't just be showing. Be keeping writing.

Black Dynamite

2011-06-09T20:50:00.001-04:00

You know why 'Black Dynamite' worked? Because it wasn't shot as parody of a "Blaxpolitation" movie; rather, it was shot as if it WAS one, warts and bad cinematography and all. A movie giving us "the same joke" as 'Black Dynamite' isn't 'Undercover Brother', that awful, awful movie starring Eddie Griffin with the same basic premise. A movie doing the same joke as 'Black Dynamite' is any movie that is a mock-up of the very worst of any particular genre, played straight, shot in the style and on the (usually poor) stock one finds B-movies are shot on. 'Black Dynamite' is so good not because it knows all the strengths and weakness of a 70's era B-movie genre, but because it delivers us all of those expected flaws without winking at us or hitting us over the head with them, trusting that the audience is smart enough to get the joke.

So truthfully, 'Black Dynamite' works because it does what all good movies do: it respects its audience.

Contested

2011-06-08T23:20:00.000-04:00

I've signed up to participate in a "First Page" contest at "Is It Hot In Here Or Is It This Book", the blog of YA author Shelley Watters (you can visit Shelley's lil' piece of the web by clicking this link here!) The process of the contest involves something about posting the first 250 words of your unpublished manuscript, reading a bunch of the other critiquing posts on other authors blogs, and then getting the page read by literary agent Victoria Marini of the Gelfman Schneider Literary Agency later this month. As the contest sends other writers and reputable publishing types to one's blog, I thought maybe I should bury the last post I made. It was in March, and it was entitled "Jackass".

But I probably won't. Meh. Happy contesting, everyone!

Jackass

2011-03-21T02:37:00.003-04:00

You, maybe. Hopefully not.

You are a jackass.

I don't mean that as a personal insult or an attack. I mean that as an observation, a window into a perception. You are obnoxious and holier-than-thou and loud and uncouth, and you insult people and call them names and laugh at their misfortune. See? You behave in typical jackassery, therefore: you are a jackass.

This position you have taken (that of "jackass") robs you of almost all of your credibility and ability to be reasoned with or argued with or agreed with. It doesn't matter if I share your opinion or if I don't; either way I don't care to be associated with you or interact with you because you're a jackass.

Most people spend most of their lives carefully avoiding significant interaction with those whom they perceive to be jackasses, whether it be at work or school, or during recreational activities or in their private lives. So why would anyone ever bother with the jackass? Sometimes people feel the right level of intervention can cure jackassery. Sadly, this is hardly ever the case, as continued exposure to logic, reason, and sound debate results in the jackassness of the typical jackass to increase, to soar through the roof.

Or again, maybe this is just a matter of perception. But in the judgment of who is and who is not a jackass, does anything but perception matter? Yes, of course! What matters most is the choice one makes, to be or not to be a jackass. So, don't be one. Jackass.

The Spidey Project?

2011-02-23T16:35:00.005-05:00

The saga of the "Spider-Man" musical gets weirder and weirder...

So if you didn't know, "Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark", a musical version of the super-hero's adventures with music by U2 and directed by Julie Taymor, is currently lurching through Broadway previews at the Foxwoods Theater. It has been besieged by bad press, bad reviews, bad stunt work, injured and quitting actors... and all of this for the bargain price of $65 million.

Here's the latest twist: according to this article on Playbill.com, playwright Justin Moran is producing The Spidey Project, an effort to put up a full-scale Spider-Man musical from start to finish in just 30 days with volunteering (I assume) artists. He wants to open his new musical on the day before "Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark" finally (FINALLY) opens its own doors. (Yes, that's right: "Turn Off The Dark" hasn't even officially opened yet. Insane.)

I appreciate this in spirit, I do. Spidey can be done so much better than what I gather is happening over at the Foxwoods, as we all know from the very serviceable job Sam Raimi did with his first two Spider-Man films, and I don't even mind the third so much.

The trouble is this dude doesn't have the right to do this. I understand: we live in a world of parody, fan-films, fan-fiction; hell, even the hugely online popular "Very Potter Musical". This Spidey project, to me, doesn't fall into the same category as those listed above, and I detailed the reasons why in a post I left on the message boards of The Spidey Project:

You say outright that you do not intend for this to be parody, which to me means you aren't protected under parody laws. ("Our goal isn’t to tear down Julie Taymor or parody her production," Moran told the New York Times. "Our goal is to do what she should have done in the first place, and that’s just make a really good musical.") Except you don't have the legal right to make that musical. You're giving yourself a month to develop a musical about Spider-Man, a character that you do not own the rights to, and (again) say yourself that this is not a parody.

You really think you can do a halfway decent Spider-Man musical in a month? I don't. Maybe you can, maybe you can't... the bottom line is you don't have the right to do it. I'm a broke playwright, too, and a HUGE comic book fan... I realize that "Turn Off the Dark" is a giant train-wreck. I would LOVE to write a Spider-Man musical, or a Batman play. I can't. I don't own them. Neither do you.

If Marvel issues a cease and desist I expect that you'll take the whole "the corporate man is shutting us down!" angle, but it's really for the artists like you and I (I'm also a playwright) that these copyright infringement laws exist. In such an instance, Disney/Marvel would just be exercising their legal rights, and in my opinion would have to choice but to do so.

I know, I know... fan-made films featuring popular characters and fan fiction appear all over the internet. This is true, yes. The waters of copyright infringement are as muddy as they have ever been these days. In fact, many rights holders let these things go on simply because they see it as good advertising. But this, to me, is not in the realm of online fan-films and fiction, and it is not in the same realm as the YouTube sensation "Harry Potter" student musical, for a number of reasons. Primarily because that was a student-produced on-campus project that was clearly intended as parody and did not pose direct competition in anyway to the primary rights holder. This is a semi-professional guerilla theatre style production that is positioning itself as an alternative to "Turn Off the Dark"; if it wasn't you wouldn't be publicizing your opening night as the day before "Turn Off the Dark" opens.

And all of that fan-created content that's out there is free. I assume you won't be charging admission to your Spider-Man play, correct?

Some people will comment that I have no sense of humor. Perhaps they're right, when it comes to such areas as copyright infringement. I understand the motivation and the passion here, and as I happen to be a HUGE Spidey fan I shudder at what Julie Taymor and co. have done to him. That, though, does not give me the right to write and market and get professionals to work for free on a counter-programming musical that will open one day before and in the same market as the officially sanctioned project. This crosses the line, to me, from fan-created homage or tribute, to theft. I would expect legal action of some sort to be taken against you. Truthfully, in the best interest of all who create theatre and art and music and don't want to see their rights of ownership stolen from them, I would hope legal action is taken against you.

Nothing personal, though.

Excerpt: "Just Debbie"

2011-02-20T03:07:00.004-05:00

This is a chapter from my most recent project, a YA Rom/Com novel called "Just Debbie" that I'm adapting from an old screenplay I wrote years ago. It's probably the only thing aside from Race McCloud that I wrote over the past fifteen year or so period that I've felt the urge to revisit, which is strange because it's really kind of a generic story, if I do say so myself. That said, I've always liked it, a lot, and always hoped I could do something with it. But... I'm not a filmmaker and have no interest in becoming one, so... a novel it is. Here is the blonde cheerleader (though not the HEAD cheerleader) Tiffany and our heroine, Debbie, in the bathroom at the prom talking about boys.

Chapter ??

“Geez, I hate these things,” Debbie muttered as she poked and prodded her left eyeball while peering into the bathroom mirror, trying to get the contact lens that had slipped out of place back where it belonged.

“It’s not like you could’ve NOT worn them,” Tiffany said, watching her friend’s reflection go through its ocular contortions. “You can’t seduce a guy at prom while you’re wearing glasses, y’know?”

“Why couldn’t I?” Debbie asked. “I wear them all the time; that’s what I wear.”

“Exactly,” Tiffay said. “And is Rich Hamilton all over you all the time?”

“No.”

“See?” Tiffany shook her head vigorously, the natural curl of her hair threatening to bounce back out of her expensive wavy ‘do as she did. “No glasses.”

Debbie nodded at her reflection. “Right. No glasses. There!” The offending lens popped back into place.

Debbie blinked a few times rapidly, making sure it would stay put. “No glasses,” she repeated. “But I really do hate these things.”

"Just for tonight, sweetie,” Tiffany assured her. The blonde girl reached into her purse to pull out some eyeliner. “Here, all that poking messed up your face. Lemme fix you.”

Debbie watched the mirror out of the corner of her eye as Tiffany reapplied the make-up that had run down her cheek from her teary battle with the contact lens. For what seemed like the millionth time tonight she self-checked her appearance: hair still cascading, dress still sparkling, bra still lifting… she sighed. Such a pain this was. All for a guy. Did Rich even like girls with this much eyeliner? Should she take some off? Was she wearing too much mascara? Did she need more perfume? She sighed again. A pain.

“There,” Tiffany said, stepping back to admire her handiwork. “That should do it.”

“Thanks, Tiff,” Debbie said, leaning towards the mirror to examine herself more intently. “All systems go, then.”

“Uh… what?”

“Nevermind.”

“So?” Debbie glanced to meet her friend’s expectant gaze. Tiffany was grinning like a cat. “How’s it going?” she asked. “Is it going well? It looks like it’s going well; I mean, from across the room and everything.”

Debbie thought about it. To her surprise, it WAS going well. Very well. She took a deep breath as she realized it. She had spent practically the whole night with Rich Hamilton, and it was going very, very well. “Yeah,” she managed through a mouth that suddenly felt stuffed with cotton. “It’s… yeah, I think it is. Wow. I didn’t expect that.”

Tiffany squealed with delight and grabbed Debbie’s arm. “He's totally gonna kiss you out there. You can totally see it coming! When do you think he’s gonna kiss you? Are you NERVOUS about kissing him?”

Somewhere in the course of her questions Debbie’s head had started spinning. WAS Rich going to kiss her? I mean, she had never imagined… but now, the way things were going…

“Of course you’re nervous about kissing him,” Tiffany went on, answering her own question. “You’ve been thinking about kissing him since freshman year. Don’t be nervous; it’s soooo easy.”

“What?” Debbie narrowed her gaze at Tiffany. “Wait a second. I’ve kissed a guy before.”

Tiffany waved her off. “Oh, please. Ralph Pazuko doesn’t count.”

“Would you keep it down?” Debbie hissed; the bathroom was empty just at the moment but someone could walk in whenever, and she’d rather not remind anyone of her underclass blunder. “We were sophomores; I was young and stupid. And it does too count!” she added. “So, yeah, I understand the mechanics of kissing, Tiff. Thanks.”

“What do you think it’ll feel like?” Tiffany asked, her eyes wide with her own imaginings of it.

Debbie shrugged. “I dunno,” she said, blushing through her evasiveness. “I guess it’ll feel like… you know… like a kiss.”

“Every guy’s kiss feels different!” Tiffany insisted. “Example: when I first started kissing Ethan, it was like being nuzzled by a puppy during a light spring rain.”

“I may vomit. Fair warning. What does it feel like now?”

Tiffany curled up her lips, thinking about that for a moment. “Now it’s more like being licked in the face by a wet monkey. It’s still super hot, though. I bet kissing Rich feels like… like… like chocolate!”

“Fireworks.” Debbie was surprised at the certainty with which the word came tumbling out of her own mouth, but that’s what she had always imagined kissing Rich would be like, in such deep, dark, private moments where she allowed herself to imagine such things. A million, billion, whirling, multi-colored whizzing pyrotechnically delightful fireworks exploding all around, all at once. Her breath caught in her chest as she thought of it again.

“Wow,” Tiffany said dreamily, “fireworks. That’s… that’s… so cool.”

But Tiffany sharing in her fantasy popped it for her, and Debbie suddenly felt the hot flush of embarrassment creep up the sides of her face. “I shouldn’t’ve said that,” she mumbled, fumbling her contact lens solution into her purse and snapping it shut.

“No, that’s beautiful!” Tiffany said. “That’s so goddamn romantic! Listen, let me give you some tips…”

Debbie’s face grew even warmer. “You really don’t have to.”

Tiffany ignored her, though, and began to lecture her on the finer points of how to grope and be groped by guys. “So if you’re nervous, right? And he’s coming in for it and you freeze up, the important thing is don’t panic. Just close your eyes and open your mouth and accept what goes in it.”

Debbie grimaced in disgust; could the girl make kissing sound any less appealing? “Wow, Tiff,” she said, “that might be the single worst piece of advice any one human being has ever given to another.”

“Oh, grow up,” Tiffany said, reapplying her own lipstick as she spoke. “I only mean that once the initial lip-to-lip contact is made nature takes over. Someone could have told me that when I was eleven, y’know? But no, I have to keep futzing around like some kinda amateur until I’m twelve. Okay, next point.”

“I can hardly wait.”

“If you really get into it, like you’re really grabbing at each other and you’re scratching at his back and shit, make sure you don’t break the flesh.” Here Tiffany paused to pucker her lips open and closed a few times, making sure the application was precise. Debbie took the moment to wonder if she was going to inadvertently learn any more awkward honesty about Tiffany and Ethan’s love life. “That’s such a turn-off,” Tiffany continued. “Besides, his tux is probably rented and they won’t give the security deposits back if there’re bloodstains.”

“Huh,” said Debbie, nodding slowly. “Hey, didn’t you and Ethan go to his cousin’s wedding a few months back? Where he was a groomsman?”

“Yeah, why?”

Debbie shook her head. “No reason. Go on.”

Tiffany nodded and leaned in conspiratorially to Debbie, dropping her voice down to a confidential murmur. “And finally -- and this is the most important one so listen up -- and finally, when you guys are together, like TOGETHER together, if he wants you to put the condom on him all you have to do is line it up while it’s flat and then roll it down like a sock. That's it; so easy.”

“Oh my god!” Debbie jumped back, horrified. “What are you talking about?!”

Tiffany looked puzzled, though, at Debbie’s reaction. “What? I mean, I know you’re not on the pill or anything, so you’ve gotta use a condom, no matter WHAT he tries to pull. Oh, wait!” Tiffany smacked her hands together, realizing. “I’m such an idiot; how could I assume that?”

“Thank you, yes,” said Debbie, relieved. “How could you?”

“You probably don’t even have a condom with you,” Tiffany said as she unsnapped her purse. “I mean, Rich should, but you never know what guys'll try to get away with. 'I forgot it; it feels better without it; my dog ate it; I used it as a water ballon.' So not happening. Do you need one? I’ll give you one.”

“What? No!” Debbie reached her hand out and covered Tiffany’s purse with it. “I don’t need a condom! We’re just dancing and talking and… I don’t know what else, all right? But I am not going to have sex with Rich Hamilton!”

“Oh, okay,” said Tiffany. But she didn't LOOK like 'Oh, okay.' She looked surprised to hear it. “Um... does Rich know that?”

Debbie didn't answer right away. She THOUGHT Rich knew that. She HOPED Rich knew that.

But DID Rich know that? A single dark crack suddenly appeared in the golden bubble of fantasy that had been slowly been building around her all night. How deep was she getting into this? And how deep was too deep?

The bathroom door banged upon and three girls tumbled in. Two were propping up the third between them; the one in the middle was green and sweaty and woozy, and the race was clearly on to get her to the sanctuary of a stall in time. Debbie recognized her as a quiet girl from her advanced trig class, although now it looked as though some copious early partying had caught up to her and smacked into her like a truck.

“Anyway,” said Tiffany, gratefully changing the subject as the tree newcomers hurtled into a bathroom stall, just in the nick of time from the sound of things, “when you do kiss Rich, when you KISS him,” she repeated for emphasis, “just don't do it in front of Quentin, all right? The last thing the rest of us need is him moping around all night.”

Debbie's brain tried to figure that one out as Tiffany shoveled her make-up back into her purse. “Mope?” she finally asked. “Why would he do that?”

“Because he's in love with you,” Tiffany said, matter-of-factly.

“WHAT?! Quentin's not in love with me.”

“Yeah, sure he's not,” Tiffany said with a little laugh. “Of course he is! God, how do you not see it?”

“You're insane,” Debbie said, laughing herself now. “If Quentin WAS in love with me, why would he be running around all night trying to set me up with Rich?”

Tiffany shrugged. “Denial, I guess. Whatevs. Works out for you in the end. I kinda feel bad for Quent, though.”

Debbie opened her mouth to protest again... but then thought about it. Quentin? In love with her? Absurd, totally crazy. They were just SEVENTEEN; it's not like any of them REALLY even knew what love WAS. Even the idea of Quentin THINKING he was in love with her was... it was... it... hmmm... well...

She shook her head, clearing it. Such silliness. She was with Rich Hamilton, RICH HAMILTON, tonight, against all odds of everything ever. Finally! She was with Rich.

Yeah... with Rich...

“Looks like somebody's making all sorts of bad decisions tonight,” Tiffany muttered.

“You think I'm making a bad decision?” Debbie blurted out. “Really? Should I forget Rich and just...”

“Of course not!” Tiffany said. She pointed over Debbie's shoulder. “I was talking about her!”

Debbie looked behind her and saw two high heeled feet poking out from underneath a stall; it looked like the girl from her trig class had passed out and now her two friends were anxiously discussing what they should do next. One of them looked up and saw Tiffany pointing at them. “What at are you looking at, cheeri-ho?” the girl snapped at her.

Tiffany barked a laugh and gave the girls a double-fingered salute. “Bang-bang, bitches! Have fun with the hot mess in the stall. C'mon, Deb. Your prince awaits.”

Debbie allowed Tiffany to hook her by the arm and drag her back into the main foyer of the Pink Flamingo Club. All-in-all, it was probably the strangest trip to the girl's room she'd ever had.

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award

2011-02-07T00:16:00.003-05:00

In addition to the many, many query letters to agents and publishers I've been sending out on behalf of "The Unlikely Adventure of Race and Cookie McCloud" (this is the glamourous side of being an unpaid, unpublished writer), I've decided to enter into some contests. The first of those is sponsored by Amazon.com and CreateSpace.com, which is the self-publishing wing of Amazon. There are 5000 entry slots available in the General Fiction category and in the Young Adult Fiction category, with entries closing just this past midnight. I've entered "Race and Cookie" into the YA category, naturally. The first round is just judged on query letters (the one-page missive about your book that you send to agents and such), the second on a 5,000 word excerpt, and the third on the manuscript itself; the winner gets their book published by Penguin Publishing.

What are the odds of winning? Well, I suppose they're 5000 to 1, aren't they? Which, when you think of it, isn't much worse (or any worse) than the odds of getting an agent or publisher to latch onto your project. I've done the contest/community thing before with Project Greenlight and TriggerStreet and Authonomy. I'm certainly not sitting her relying on this, but hey... it's just another thing to try, right?

Like I said: this is the glamourous part.

And now... a brief moment with Race and Cookie

2011-01-16T11:37:00.003-05:00

“Wasn’t so bad,” Race said, dusting himself off as they stepped out of the ejection pod. “Why are my shoes all wet?”

“Because we landed in a fountain in the middle of Pastoral Park,” Cookie said, ignoring the astonished stares of passersby as she splashed to the fountain’s edge. “Dr. Destructo could have at least shot us into Death Valley if that’s where our first challenge is.”

“Nah, I get it,” said Race as he clambered over the low iron fence that separated the fountain from the sidewalk. “He doesn’t want to make it too easy for us. We can find our own transport,” He laughed. “Dr. Destructo. Such a totally fake name. Please.”

“Uh, yeah,” said Cookie, who had taken off her sneakers and was knocking the water out of them. “I’m thinking that maybe you’re not the one to be making fun of someone else’s fake-sounding name, ‘Race McCloud.’”

“Hey, c’mon!” Race said defensively as he wrung out his socks. “That’s my actual name, you know that! That guy made his name up, that’s all I’m saying.”

“Probably,” Cookie conceded. “Still, with all of our family’s talents, we sure did get hit with the short end of the name stick. What was grandma thinking?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Oh, c’mon!” she exclaimed, and began ticking them off. “Dirk, Margolis, Nyte, Race… the only normal one is Percival, and he went and changed it to Green Suit Jacket Man.”

“You’re right,” Race said dryly. “Our names are totally weird. Cookie.”

“Hey, I hate my name,” Cookie said as she slipped her shoes back on. “I could kill mom and dad. But it’s not as bad as you guys. Your names make you sound like you’re members of the Justice League of Morons.”

“Wow, you know what the Justice League is?!”

Cookie shook her head. “No, I just made that up. Is that a thing?”

“Well, yeah, it’s a pretty famous comic book.”

Cookie snorted. “Uncle Race, do I look like a girl who reads comic books?”

Race looked her up and down. “Uh… yeah, actually, you do.”

Cookie scowled at him. “There’s a reason nobody likes you.”

“There’s a lot of reasons nobody likes me.”

“I have a list.”

“That’s not your line…”

“Would you come on?!” she snapped at him, stalking away. Race was pretty sure she didn’t actually know where they should go (for once) but he followed her. He didn’t know where they should go, either.

Originality

2010-11-30T18:49:00.005-05:00

First, the plug: "Do Nothing But Read" is a geek-centric literature Podcast hosted by The Modern Day Pirates, a geek-centric website, and thank goodness because geek culture has until now been sorely underrepresented on the internet. Librarian Amanda and... dude who likes cool stuff Brandon spend a half-hour to an hour discussing books. That's the set-up, plain and simple. Worth a look-see (or a listen).

On their 25th episode, they discussed "Harry Potter" in celebration of Part 1 of "The Deathly Hallows" hitting theaters, and they discussed their own love for JKR's series. Now, there were a few things they hit upon that were actually not entirely accurate that I would have LOVED to have been present for to challenge them on (particularly Brandon's contention that JKR had no idea where the story was going until she reached Book 5, incorrect because she is on record as saying that a large part of what became "The Half Blood Prince" was material excised from "The Chamber of Secrets" which makes complete sense given the numerous ways those two books tie together).

In discussing the weaknesses of the books, of which there are many, Brandon contends that one failing of the books is their lack of creativity, how JKR is an expert in taking that which came before her and weaving it into her own story. Personally, I find that to be a strength of her writing and I would contend that those who write fantasy (which is a genre that includes superhero stories and the vast majority of mainstream comics) are essentially just feeding on what came before them, rehashing old stories in new and clever ways. Now, in a way every storyteller does this; hell, SHAKESPEARE was the master of it... and Homer's Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid are essentially the same story.

So the contention that JKR's masterpiece is comprised of a lot of various parts is something I'm completely in agreement with. The difference being, I think, that I don't think that is a flaw of the work. Brandon's contention, however, that unlike HP "Star Wars is completely original" is screamingly inaccurate, IMO. To repeat: the claim is that "Star Wars is completely original". Now, I love "Star Wars", as anyone who knows me can contest to. When I got married I gave each of my groomsmen a Force FX lightsaber with which to usher Jaime and I into the reception. (Can you believe she went for it?) But "Star Wars"? COMPLETELY ORIGINAL?! I don't think so... so I went to the "Do Nothing But Read" website and got in a discussion on the message boards about that point, concluding with this:

"There was a lot of creation going on in “Star Wars”, granted, but everything in fantasy (and that’s what “Star Wars” is, not sci-fi) borrows from what came before it. In “A New Hope”, who is Obi-Wan but Merlin? Who is Luke but King Arthur? Han and Chewie are Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, except one carries a laser gun and one is a space-bigfoot. Princess Leia is princess… anyone. Darth Vader is, almost literally, the Dark Knight (no, not that one… although Batman is just Zorro, who is just the Scarlet Pimpernel.) Jawas are just elves with hoods. A lightsaber is Excalibur paired with a fluorescent light bulb. R2 and Threepio are Laurel and Hardy (actually, I think they’re based on wandering vagabond characters from a Kurosawa film. And BTW… I love “Star Wars” as much as I love “Harry Potter”. Those are the two DVD collections with the place of honor on my shelf.)

Also, keep in mind: Lucas created these worlds, with his team of artists. There’s no shame in that, but he had lots and lots of help. Until the movies came along, JKR created her world by herself.

Nothing in fantasy is completely original, and even Tolkien was influenced by that which came before him. To argue that “Star Wars” is “completely original” is really a weak stand, as Lucas himself will tell you the whole thing was massively influenced by all the things he loved as a child and young adult. And look… you can take umbrage with the “creativity” of some of the “Star Wars” universe. “Okay, this is a desert planet, and this is an ice planet, and this is a forest planet, and this is sky planet, and this is a lava planet, and this is a city planet.” That’s not serious, mature fantasy. That’s a Mega Man game."

To be clear: I'm not fighting with anyone here. This is not a flame war. This is just discussion, and I wanted to share a portion of that discussion with the 4 or 5 people who read my blog. I love discussing the craft of storytelling, and this was just a way to open a particular conversation up to some more people... as well as to help promote in my own small way a really cool little podcast.

Besides, no storyteller should be embarrassed by or kill themselves trying to hide the influences on their own works. There's a point I made in my "Race McCloud" talkbacks at FringeNYC a year and a half ago, and that point still stands: I truly believe that despite their protestations to the contrary, audiences do not want new stories. They want old familiar stories told in new and exciting ways.

(And they really want new podcasters doing old-skool radio format, so Amanda and Brandon... keep on truckin'!)

Coming Up for Air

2010-11-27T00:13:00.002-05:00

*Whew!*

Been busy. Veeeery busy. But... the first draft of "The Unlikely Adventure of Race and Cookie McCloud" is done, edited, edited some more, and done again. Then edited a little more and done for a third time. But done.

I'm excited about this, I really am. A real sense of accomplishment comes along with the simple act of finishing a whole piece of work like this, true, although now the slog of submission starts anew... but I'm also really excited that I can step back from "Race and Cookie" for a little bit (but just for a little bit) and finish up that second draft of "Writing in a Vacuum". And start adapting and updating my old teen rom-com screenplay "Just Debbie" into a YA novel. And start work on the second "Race and Cookie" adventure. And continue pursuing the stage adaptation rights to... something else.

Eventually one would hope that I may someday get paid for all this work, what with all the effort I put into it. Truth is, though, these days it's just as realistic to hope to get published as it is to hope to get a full-time job in academic theater.

Oh, yeah... almost forgot. In addition to all this? It's time to go after that MFA.

I'm going to stop listing things I have to do. It's making me tired.

But "The Unlikely Adventure of Race and Cookie McCloud" is done. So... that's something.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The Movies

2010-11-10T11:34:00.005-05:00

As a comics fan, I have been peripherally aware of Bryan O'Malley's "Scott Pilgrim" series of black and white indie books for several years now. My first real exposure to the content inside, though, was the first trailer for the movie adaptation that came out this summer. It featured a slew of video game references and big-ass fights with super cool graphics, and a quirky tongue-in-cheek sense of humor. I loved it immediately... which is exactly what a trailer is supposed to do.

Having a 3-year old curtails one's movie-going, and spending my summer writing and directing "Race McCloud" didn't leave too much time for the cinema, either. So I didn't catch "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" in theaters this summer. I did, however, begin to catch myself up to the comics, in anticipation for seeing the films. I liked them. Not loved them, or hated them: liked them. It had all the hipster-cool retro-gaming references I expected and craved (Sex Bob-Omb, enemies that burst into coins, power-ups), but the narrative was a little rambling and disconnected. I'm not entirely sure what the last half of that last sentence means, which is perfect, as I'm not entirely sure what about the "Scott Pilgrim" comics series didn't click for me. Whatever it was, though, I read the first three volumes of the series and didn't feel any pressing desire to read the last three. Perhaps someday I will, but maybe I won't.

But I was still pretty amped up to see the movie, which I finally did the other night as an iTunes rental. Before I get into my thoughts on the film, there's some numbers I want to throw at you: after a huge marketing blitz, "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" made only $31,524,275, after having been made with a budget of some $60 million. Will it recoup after international and DVD money comes rolling in? Yeah, probably. But only making back about half of its budget labels the movie as a big box office stinker, despite largely positive reviews (it garnered an 81% "Fresh" rating on the Tomatometer over at RottenTomatoes.com). But what does the $31 million total above mean? Well, at the average 2010 movie ticket price of $7.95, it means that roughly 3,965,317 Americans paid money to go see "Scott Pilgrim" in the movie theater. Flop-a-roo. Compare that number, though, to the number Oni Press, the publisher of the "Scott Pilgrim" comic book series, just announced: there are now 1 million total copies of "Scott Pilgrim" comics in print. Not sold. In print. This achievement, simply printing 1 million copies regardless of actual sales, is being hailed in comics circles as a massive victory for the publisher and for the title.

What does all mean? It means that a darling indie comic (that sells well by indie comic standards) does not necessarily a hit mainstream movie make. But we already knew that.

"Scott Pilgrim" is the story of Scott's (Michael Cera's) journey (he's a pilgrim, get it?) from man-child to man-ish type person. It's not really a coming-of-age story as much as it is a time-to-grow-up story, and even that is secondary to the film's aesthetic and central conceit: in order for Scott to win the girl he loves, the mysterious Ramona Flowers (Mary-Elizabeth Winstead), he must defeat her "League of Evil Exes" one-by-one in a series of epic battles. All of that is well and good, and moviegoers do love them some fightin', that's for sure. But I'm not at all surprised that "Scott Pilgrim" fell well short of its financial expectations. The appeal of the film lies heavily in its audience's love for and knowledge of old-school video games. Scott and his friends live in a world where people flash red when they're about to die, where they explode into coins when defeated, where characters "level-up" in the middle of combat, where warping through subspace to get to Point A from Point B is commonplace...

One of two things probably happened when you read that last bit above: you shouted "AWESOME!" in recognition, or you said "What the hell... ?" The "Scott Pilgrim" team was banking on more than 31 million dollars-worth of people yelling "AWESOME!", and I'm not sure that was ever a logical expectation. I think all of the above is indeed awesome, but I grew up overdosing on Super Mario Bros., Street Fighter, Double Dragon, and Battletoads. I recognized and adored the visual and audio nods to that existence that Edgar Wright peppered his film with, but I don't think enough members of the mainstream audience do. I know video games are a massive, massive industry right now, but that industry of modern video games more often than not attempts to simulate a reasonable facsimile of our reality, whereas the old-school games of the 80's and early 90's created their own reality and their own set of universal rules. It is that reality in which Scott Pilgrim and his friends live, and if you're an audience whose mindset isn't along for the ride you may be wondering why no character ever says, "Hey, did anyone notice Scott leaping into the air and beating up his girlfriend's ex in an extravagant light show display?", or, "So that dude totally exploded into coins. WTF?" Best example: do you know what a "1UP" is without me having to explain it to you? If not, then you will have no idea what's happening at the end of this movie.

Make no mistake, though: this is a massively well-crafted film, and Edgar Wright is a flat-out directing star. But truth be told, even though I was of the "THIS IS AWESOME!" crowd and I was along for the aesthetic ride, much like the comics I "liked" the film, not "loved" it. Why? Two problems, really: the plot is compressed from six volumes of comics and feels that way, despite winning performances almost all the way around. To keep this review in line with the film's 80's gaming references... I almost felt as if the "story" part of this story, the part that involved characters actually speaking to each other, was being told in rapid-fire "Ninja Gaiden"-style cut scenes. When you have to squeeze 6 or 7 boss battles into an under two-hour movie, though, I do understand that something's not going to make the cut.

But those boss battles were, in some way, part of the problem: I never felt the fighting was a metaphor for anything greater. Maybe I missed the point, but I thought the awesome fights were just that: awesome fights. And that's probably enough, frankly. But Scott's enemies don't blow up into coins for any particular narrative reason, they blow up into coins because that's what bad guys in video games do.

The biggest misfire in the movie for me, however, was Scott Pilgrim himself. Scott in the comics comes across as insecure slacker-cool; Michael Cera comes across more as insecure hipster-dweeb. What's the difference? Nothing and everything. I felt like I did watching Tobey Maguire in "Spider-Man": that this guy should totally work in this part, but doesn't. To be clear, I don't feel that Cera did anything wrong or gave a bad performance. I feel as if he were miscast. It's a shame, too, because the rest of the casting was spot on: Ellen Wong as Knives Chau, Kieran Culkin as Wallace Wells, Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Ramona Flowers, Alison Pill as Kim Pine... all were perfect, as were the entire League of Evil Exes.

So was this film a failure or a success? Depends on who you ask, I suppose. There's enough visual eye-candy and quirky fun here for me to purchase it and watch it again, and I'm certainly very interested in watching a director's commentary, something I haven't said in a long time. Let me make this clear: I really, really enjoyed "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World". I can just totally understand why a lot of other people might not.

A Moment of Silence and Recognition

2010-11-01T00:47:00.005-04:00

I learned of a tragedy today.

And it is unfair, patently unfair, that the world will not stop turning, that the universe will go spiraling on without pausing for even a moment to recognize this loss. But time marches inexorably on, doesn't it? Uncaring and unheeding of the need for sympathy or even for a mere nod of recognition to heartbreak. The fact remains that two children must now grow up without a father, and reality is too cruel to stop and mourn with them. Eternity lumbers on and the trials and concerns of humanity are worth not so much as an eye-blink to her.

So what do we do in the face of such horrific sorrow and relentless apathy?

We must remember for those that are helpless to remember on their own, and a corner of existence, no matter how small, must be handled and stopped and forced to slow down and acknowledge suffering by those strong enough to grab it and rein it in. A man's existence should not have been in vain; he must be allowed to reach on after he is gone, his touch must remain on the lives of those who most need its impact.

We are a species subjected to irrational tragedy and boundless sorrow, but also gifted with a limtless capacity to memorialize and to love. And only love, strong and unwavering and fearless and honest, can hope to stare down and fill the void.

Doc vs. Freak

2010-10-08T15:53:00.006-04:00

Two days ago, Roy Halladay pitched a no-hitter for the Phillies in Game 1 of their Divisional Series against the Reds. Philly celebrated, sports writers everywhere salivated, Mets fans seriously thought about setting themselves on fire.

Last night, Tim Lincecum pitched a complete game, 14K, 2-hit shut-out against the Atlanta Braves to win 1-0 for his Giants. San Francisco celebrated, and a few other people noticed, too.

One of those people was NY Times columnist Dan Rosenheck, who wrote the following article: Keeping Score: Did Lincecum Pitch Better Than Halladay? Here he argued thay, based on advanced statistics, Lincecum's 14K night was actually "better" than Halladay's no-hit afternoon. In the comments section of his article he is naturally shouted down by stat-haters and Philly fans, who argue that NO WAY are 14K's (and other things) more impressive than only the second postseason no-hitter of all time. NO WAY! (And also that advanced stats are stupid.)

I think it's kind of silly (but fun if you're a stat geek) to argue who was "better". It's like asking which is better: a steak dinner or a lobster dinner. Who's to say? Forget "better", both performances were examples of pitching at its finest. But I did say this (I've added a bit for this post):

Two great pitchers, two great performances. I'm not going to sit here and say who of these two was "better", because most no-hitters involve luck, and you can argue about umpire's strike zones and who got more help, etc., etc. But here's why Lincecum's performance was more important than Halladay's: The Phillies are much better than the Giants.

If Halladay had stunk it up, the Phils still have Oswalt and Hamels lined up to go after him. If Lincecum had stunk it up, then the other pitchers behind him (Cain and Sanchez) are very good, but not as good as that Phillies staff. Look at it this way: Price laid an egg for the Rays over in the ALDS. The sense in that series for Tampa immediately turned to, "What do we do now?" Same thing would have happened if Lincecum hadn't shown up for the Giants.

Also, the Phils have the stronger line-up facing the weaker pitching; the Braves staff (Lowe, Hudson, Hanson) is better than the Reds staff (Volquez, Arroyo, Cueto; you'll be forgiven if you say 'Who?'), so it will be harder for the Giants offense (weaker than the Phils offense) to score in games 2 and 3 (and 4 and 5).

Simply put, the Giants needed Lincecum to come up big more than the Phils needed Halladay to come up big, and it's harder to pitch with a 1-0 lead (as Lincecum did) than it is a 4-0 lead (as Halladay did), AND the Reds haven't been to the playoffs in years whereas the Braves organization is more used to October baseball. That familiarity matters.

Halladay's performance was fantastic. Lincecum's performance was more important.

The Plot Hole in the "Toy Story" Trilogy

2010-07-02T20:40:00.008-04:00

"Toy Story 3" spoilers contained within. Huh... I've never had to write that before...

Just saw Pixar Studio's "Toy Story 3", which really was fantastic. I thought it was the most interesting third film that could have been made with these characters, and it essentially explores a toy's acceptance of its own mortality (although it does have a very sweet but almost too-happy ending attached to it.)

While the rest of the toys from Andy's room want to move to Sunnyside Daycare because Andy, now 17 and off to college, doesn't need/want them anymore, Woody the Cowboy (voiced by Tom Hanks, if you didn't know) displays loyalty to his teenaged human owner, insisting they go up to the attic to be there for Andy should Andy ever need them again. They are, after all, Andy's toys, and that is their role in life. (It's good to see that Woody steadfastly remains in that "we belong to Andy" mindset for the majority of the film; after all, the "Andy doesn't need me anymore" dilemma that the rest of the toys go through in this movie was Woody's entire character arc in "Toy Story 2". To see him go through it again would have been redundant.)

Actually, speaking of "Toy Story 2", that brings me to my point: a lot of the second film in this trilogy was centered around Woody's background: Woody is a pull-string cowboy doll based on the marionette lead of a 1950's-era TV show called "Woody's Round-Up". Andy's Woody doll is valuable to Al of Al's Toy Barn, the second film's human foil, because he is a vintage collectible of that era. There's a lot made of the fact that Woody's counterpart doll, the cowgirl Jessie doll, had a previous owner who grew up and left her behind (a plot point nicely referenced towards the beginning of "Toy Story 3" as Andy seems close to doing the same thing.)

So it stands to reason that Woody, being a vintage toy, would not have been on the store shelf for purchase when Andy was a young child. In fact, it's stated in the films that this was not the case: when Al is bargaining with Andy's mom over Woody at the yard sale, she tells him that Woody is not for sale because he is "an old family toy", a family heirloom. All this leads you to believe that Andy was not actually Woody's initial owner, an idea that was soundly confirmed when John Lasseter, "Toy Story" creator and director, explained in a 2009 interview that the folks at Pixar "always imagined that (Woody) was a hand-me-down toy from Andy's father." That's right; Andy DID have a father at one point. Where is he now? Divorced from the mom? Abandoned the family? Well, these are Disney movies, so it's far more likely that Andy's dad is no longer of this Earth. Disney does love their orphans, after all. Also, it's hard to think that Andy's mom would so lovingly call Woody a "family toy" in her refusal to sell him if he belonged to her ex-husband or to a deadbeat that had abandoned them.

So why does Woody feel such exclusive loyalty to Andy? He's been through this before with his previous owner, Andy's dad, to be sure. It would be a simple thing to have him explain just that to the other toys to help placate their worries... but then why does he go through his own existential crisis in "Toy Story 2" when he fears Andy outgrowing him? Granted, in an industry of screenplay trimming that moment of Woody's explanation could be seen as a throwaway one, excised to save room for more plot-important dialogue, but the idea that Woody has already in his history FACED the equivalent of toy mortality and lived to tell the tale makes his fears in "Toy Story 2" seem more selfish and misguided, and a word of his past experiences with Andy's dad certainly would have offered some shelter in the storm for his fellows in "Toy Story 3". In fact, he goes so far as to remind the other toys that, if they go in the attic, Andy may some day have kids of his own, the implication being that they could one day be handed-down... but he stops right there, neglecting to add that Andy is actually the child of Woody's own previous owner, and that he (Woody) has ALREADY been a hand-me-down toy, at least once over.

The only explanation I can think of for Woody's complete disregard of his own (off-screen) history is that, when they switch owners, the toys in the "Toy Story" universe eventually forget all about any previous owners in a show of slavish devotion to their NEW owners. If that is the case, you don't feel so bad for the toys and their dilemma in "Toy Story 3", and you start to feel a little badly for Andy, to be honest.

All of this is, at best, a very minor quibble, and it just goes to show that even the most perfect movies aren't perfect. And maybe now you won't feel so guilty when you cart those old toys out of your closet and off to the daycare center or the dump, whatever their ultimate resting place may be. Odds are they've been there, done that, and aren't going to remember you for any longer than you remember them, anyway.

Why I Don't Blog as Much as You'd Expect

2010-05-04T23:31:00.005-04:00

I follow a good number of blogs. I have a good number of writer friends who blog. I also have a good number of non-writer friends who blog, and do so very well, which kind of makes them writers. I decided for myself that I would like a blog to jot down vague musings and such (as I clearly explained with the blurb in the box above under the words "ploopet: a blog"). But, for a writer, I don't use my blog that much. I mean, I didn't just let it become idle and inactive after a short spurt of excited blogging, as many would-be bloggers do, but I only update a handful of times a month, at best, and on no regular basis, and I feel no great urge to write terribly long-winded blog entries that are full of gripping prose and precise grammar, and if you know my writing, you know that it's all terribly long-winded and precise in the grammar department. (Calling my prose "gripping" is a little too self-aggrandizing even for me. I also enjoy the use of parentheses... and ellipses.)

So why don't I blog all that much? I've thought about it. Not for any great stretch of time, but I have thought about it. And, I believe the reasons are as follows:

I seldom every write anything distinctly autobiographical. "Writing in a Vacuum" is (and forever shall be) the one exception, and even that is very, very stylized.
I find that too much time spent composing and worrying over blog posts is time taken away from my ACTUAL writing. Not to say that blogging ISN'T actual writing, but I have other writing (and directing and teaching and playing Fantasy Baseball) to do that nine times out of ten takes precedent over any blogging.

So, there you have it. I suppose that wasn't very interesting. But, hey, I can write what I want... it's my stupid blog.

Hell Week

2010-04-06T11:55:00.003-04:00

Everything else fades into oblivion. You have things to do, that need to be done, real-life things, that you're not even going to think about doing. Your head becomes encased in a bubble that keeps out all non-play related concerns. You forget that family members and friends exist... sometimes to the degree where you forget to ask them to come. Sleep becomes a luxury. You shuffle through your job or school in a haze. Appointments are not kept. Papers are ignored. You eat crap, and you eat in transit. 24-hour diners become 5-star restaurants.

The set isn't done. Everyone breaks out their "paintin' clothes". Props are cut. Blocking is cut. Dances are cut or restaged. Dancers are moved from the front row to the back and vice versa. Harmonies are drilled or disposed of. Monologues are drilled because they can't be disposed of. That hysterical bit where actors come through the audience just isn't working and now it's gone. Cast members are warned against, yet continue planning to add, inside jokes. The fight scene never quite looks right; does anyone know a fight choreographer? The band doesn't sound quite right; does anyone know a timpani player? The sound doesn't sound quite right; does anyone know anyone who has any experience whatsoever with microphones? Feedback and shadows become your mortal enemy. Closets are raided in the search for costumes and props. Family members won't even notice that hat or jacket or scarf is missing until they see it on stage. You go to stores and pay good money for things that you won't ever use after another week or two. The person with the car becomes everybody's best friend.

There is at least one run that doubles the length of the show. People who complain about 12-hour days get funny looks. Living by the timetable on which the rest of the world runs is not an option. You forget what the sun looks like and what fresh air smells like. You speak of the countdown to opening night like it's a countdown to armageddon. Tempers run hot. Bonds are broken. Alliances are forged.

Somebody snaps. Somebody cries. Somebody's costume is never quite right. Somebody gets sick. Something is left out of the playbill. Somebody kisses somebody they probably shouldn't. Someone's lines aren't memorized. Somebody is under-appreciated. Somebody is a diva. Somebody complains about the show t-shirts being the wrong color/size/design. Somebody kisses somebody they probably should. Somebody brings brownies or cookies or homemade iced tea. Somebody you'd never expect freezes up under the lights. Somebody you'd never expect is reborn under the lights. Somebody gets drunk. Somebody walks out. Somebody shows up out of nowhere to save some part of the day.

People who go through "hell week" for sporting teams/fraternities/militaries/other jobs laugh at the idea of a theatrical "hell week". They'd cry if they went through it. If you survive it, everything always seems to work out all right. If it beats you, you'll never come back.

Truthfully, it's not really that bad. Truthfully, you get used to it. Truthfully, you start to enjoy it.

This one right now actually isn't that bad.

Why I Support Health Care Reform

2010-03-22T01:46:00.001-04:00

Back in 2001, my mother had a stroke. My father was retired and on Medicare. She was a homemaker all of her life and had no health insurance but his. Her stroke was not covered under his Medicare and she didn't have it herself because she wasn't old enough yet. He had to go ask his former boss to pay for her care, and thank God the man is a compassionate soul who wanted to help.

I didn't read the Health Reform Bill. I also don't understand every angle of the issue like many of those who would attempt to jump up and shout down my voice, with dozens of reasons that illustrate why my opinion is "wrong". But here's the thing... if Health Care Reform is going to keep scenarios like what happened to my parents and worse from playing out across the country, then I'm for it. If this bill keeps someone from losing their home in order to pay for treatment for a sick loved one, then I'm for it. If this bill gives coverage to the hundreds of self-employed artists I know, people who live without health care and with crossed fingers, then I'm for it. And the truth is, all of those things are the goal of this reform. Will it work? Well, we won't know until we try. Until we see the reform in action, we're only guessing, on both sides, as to what the ultimate results will be. But trying to fix a problem is a better idea to me than stubbornly rejecting a potential solution for solely political purposes.

That's my opinion, and I'm allowed it. Contrary to popular belief, we do not yet live in a country where a differing opinion can ever be considered a "wrong" opinion. If this bill fails (and again, time and time alone will tell if it will fail or succeed) then I will gladly step to the polls in three years and cast my Independent-registered vote to send Obama out of office. But for now, I'd rather see government take action, attempting to address the rising health care costs that are a major concern to every family I know, as opposed to a government that can do nothing but fight amongst themselves.

Things That Don't Make Sense When You Think About Them: Part 1

2010-03-07T14:49:00.004-05:00

I was in CVS the other day buying diapers and juice and such and such, waiting on line, and I happened to notice that the new annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue was on sale. Now I haven't done the research to confirm this, nor do I intend to, but I'd be willing to bet that the SI Swimsuit Issue is their biggest selling issue of the year, and probably by a lot. In fact, the SI Swimsuit Issue is, I'd argue, a piece of Americana, an expected and well-greeted part of our culture. I'd go so far as to say that this particular issue warms the cockles of many an American heart, much as would a Norman Rockwell painting.

It's tradition.

But then I thought about it, and ultimately came up with this question:

What the hell does the swimsuit issue have to do with sports, anyway?

And don't tell me swimming's a sport. Because those girls ain't doing much swimming in those suits. Some of those suits, I believe, would either A.) fall off, or B.) melt off if actually submersed in water.

But, hey, what says America like mom, dad, apple pie, and barely-dressed swimsuit models?

(Note: I've included a picture of an issue of Sports Illustrated on this post. Note that it is NOT a picture of a swimsuit issue. Nor have I ever OWNED a copy of the SI Swimsuit Issue. See, I'd not like to fight with my wife today.)

The Trouble with Comics

2010-02-19T11:11:00.004-05:00

So on the excellent comic book discussion blog iFanboy.com, there is an article by site co-founder Conor Kilpatrick about how the sales of "Event" comics (company wide storylines that are sold as mini-series and feature all of the major characters within a company's line) are trending downwards. For example, Marvel's current event, "Siege", is suffering from sales much lower than their past two events, "Secret Invasion" and "Civil War".

The problem is, I think that the article on the site and the comments that follow are ignoring the real issue at hand when they discuss the phenomenon of "Event fatigue" (the tendency of comic book readers to grow weary of "Event" comics when they come along to often). I think, and I detailed as such in a post to the site, but I think we're only brushing up upon the biggest reason why sales on these books have dropped, and I'm a perfect example of it: money. I'm not reading comics anymore. Any. It's not because I dislike them, or because I wanted to stop. It's because of the economy. The bottom dropped out of the economy a year and a half ago, more Americans are unemployed than at any point since the Great Depression... and the comics industry responded by raising their price point from $2.99 to $3.99, all while staying married to an outdated distribution model.

Case in point: up until a month ago, I WAS buying select books (X-Factor, UC Avengers, USM, Siege, Avengers, Kick-Ass, ASM). But then, I went to one store on a Wednesday on my commute from one job to the next... and the store was closed for "five minutes", inexplicably. Then, I went to another store two days later, on Friday, and they were already sold out of anything I wanted to buy. Then, the following week, I went back to the first store on Wednesday late in the afternoon and they hadn't gotten their shipment yet. (It was at this point I figured the universe was trying to tell me something.)

The point? To buy comics regularly, one must A.) have more disposable income than they had a year ago, which very few Americans have, and B.) be part of a semi-secret society that knows WHERE comics can found, and WHEN they can be found. For the industry to expand, they have to let go of their outdated business model, say "good-bye" to the specialty stores and limited distribution, and really make an effort to reach a new market and expand the comic-buying public. Until then, sales will drop on events, as well as on every other book.

Final analysis? It's time for digital comics and an iComics store. For THAT, I would seriously consider buying an iPad. (See post below.)

This is not a political post. (The preceding statement was a tiny lie.)

2010-02-07T13:38:00.004-05:00

Look, I'm not a strong follower of politics, at all. And those of you who are, on either side of the fence, you can out argue me on all points, I'm sure. And also, I firmly believe... as we do not live in a world of black and white, or good and evil, but in a world of degrees and shades of gray... I firmly believe that both sides of the U.S. poltical coin likely have good ideas and opinions. And finally, my biggest complaint with our government structure, as it is set up, is that Republicans and Democrats seem too concerned with keeping the other side from doing what they want to do then they're concerned with actually getting things done. That said, here's a few observations:

There are members of my immediately family more qualified for any elected office than Sarah Palin is. Thankfully, she's no longer an elected official, but now seems to be a professional rabble-rouser.
Glenn Beck gives me the willies.
Memo to Keith Olbermann: You are a SPORTSCASTER. Remember? Who gave you permission to talk politics?
Jon Stewart IS the best anchor in America (followed closely by Seth Myers).
I actually think I like Bill O'Reilly, even though he doesn't seem terribly likable. (And his sex scandal a few years back, which I actually just heard about, was less awful and offensive than it was awkward.) I admit to liking Bill O'Reilly with the same shameful trepidation with which I admit to liking Lady Gaga. (See? That's where the picture comes in.)
Can we get a third major political party in there? Just to shake things up and get everyone else on their toes?
I voted for Obama. I like Obama. I like Obama as the president. I respect and admire the man, his intellect, and his ability to actually come across as presidential. This, however, does not mean I won't vote against him in three years if he doesn't start getting stuff done.
I would vote Republican. I would have no problem voting Republican, given the right candidate. But I would vote for a presidential ticket of Snookie and The Situation before I voted for any ticket that included Sarah Palin, who clearly does not like me or the portion of America in which I live. (Clearly, I am not a fan of hers, either.)

Just a few thoughts.

iUseless?

2010-02-04T00:09:00.004-05:00

So the iPad is here... or at least, it's on the way. I'm an Apple believer. Not a fanatic, but I'm a fan of their products and their business model. The iPod was the single most revolutionary gadget of the last twenty years, hands down. It saved a computer company from irrelevancy, and it completely redefined at least two industries. The iMac was the perfect solution for my household desktop: I don't need all the computing power offered by most PC desktops, and the iMac is terribly reliable so long as you don't overpush it. Three years now I've had mine, with no troubles to speak of, and absolutely no viruses, malware, or spam. In fact, the logic behind the iMac (consumers don't want/need all those extras that computer programmers used to foist upon them, so why make them buy it? Give them a less powerful computer at a more affordable price) seems to be the same logic behind the Netbooks, so I'm not sure why Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, hates Netbooks so much... aside from the fact that they are clearly far more cheaply made than the standard high-quality Apple product.

It's this philosophy of Jobs that led his company to produce the iPad, it would seem.

It's somewhere between the handheld device and the laptop. Apple is clearly trying to create a new classification of product with the iPad; trouble is, I don't know that this is a product consumers are clamoring for. Given the Apple track record, starting with the iPod and moving on to the wildly successful iPhone, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Still... I can't imagine dumping my cheaply made Netbook for an iPad, primarily because the iPad isn't ACTUALLY a computer with an ACTUAL word processor, and hey, I'm a writer. The idea of the "virtual keyboard" gives me the willies. The iPad plays movies and displays pictures and is essentially a giant iPod touch... but I'm not sure I NEED that.

The game changer, of course, will be iBooks. Will iBooks take off? Will it do to the book industry what iTunes did to the music industry? If anyone can pull it off, Apple can. Is the iPad a Kindle killer? Who knows? Although the iPad is typically Apple-gorgeous, my earliest concern as to whether or not it will become a successful substitute for books is not the glare of the backlit HD screen. Rather, I think the thing might be too heavy to read comfortably for any period of time. Would you rather read a paperback novel or something as heavy as a mid-sized text book on the subway? Can you hold the iPad in one hand? Of course, if legit digital comics hit the iPad at any point... count me in. "You mean I can download my weekly books every Wednesday? Yes, please."

Either way... the thing is awful purty.

Thank God, the horror is over...

2010-02-04T00:05:00.003-05:00

... that's right. The Food Network has returned to Cablevision. I can now watch my favorite shows on television:

Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives
Iron Chef
Dinner: Impossible
Unwrapped
and, of course... Throwdown with Bobby Flay

I'm a huge loser. But I don't care. Because now I can watch people prepare food in HD again.

Another One Bites the Dust...

2010-01-20T00:36:00.002-05:00

... so I'm watching "Terminator 2: Judgement Day" on AMC. Now, I've recognized something about my tastes over the past few years... stories that I used to think were fantastic, movies in particular, I've watched and realized... well, they're just not that good. One that springs to mind is "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back", which, you know, really ISN'T that good. But "T2" I've always considered to be one of those "epic" works of Sci-Fi; I mean, like, "Hey, that's Sci-fi, or that's fantasy, but it's hands-down just a great movie."

I just watched Arnold's T-800 look at Ed Furlong's John Connor and ask him, "Why do you cry?" And, goddamn... that's a shit line with a shit delivery.

A little piece of me died tonight. It's still a real, real good movie. But it's not great.

I don't think I'll ever let myself watch "Star Wars" again.

Confession...

2010-01-17T14:02:00.003-05:00

Every day of my life I wake up terrified that this will be the day my wife realizes that she can do so much better than me.

Thank God I gave her such a cute kid.

And thank God I'm funny.

...

Okay, the part about the cute kid is true.

My review of "The Hangover

2010-01-14T02:44:00.002-05:00

Funny.

Not THAT funny.

But funny.

The Drowsy Chaperone...

2010-01-13T21:31:00.002-05:00

"The Drowsy Chaperone" has been added to the list of shows I want to direct... because it is now available from MTI.

Huzzah!

Another Reason to Dislike the Amazon Kindle

2010-01-12T00:09:00.003-05:00

So here's something new that disturbs me about the Amazon Kindle, the popular new E-reader device from Amazon.

There's a new book out, called "Game Change"... you may have heard of it... and it's about the 2008 presidential race. Intriguing, I thought, so I decided to go to Amazon.com and check out some costumer reviews, as I often do when I want to get an idea of what people (not critics) are saying about something.

The book had only 3 out of 5 stars on Amazon, so my initial reaction was that either A.) it wasn't very good, or B.) it leaned Left or Right, and the "other" side was submarining their reviews. Okay, that's annoying, but it happens with the screwed-up political climate of this country. So I looked closer, and I saw that the book had 12 5-star reviews, 2 4-star reviews, 0 3-star or 2-star reviews... and 16 1-star reviews. Then I read a bunch of those 1-star reviews. Imagine my surprise when the majority were NOT political in nature, but instead were left by Kindle owners, who were irate the publisher was not offering an E-version of the book until a month after its hardcover publication, and decided to "punish" the publisher by sabotaging the reviews for the book itself.

So, that bothers me, because here people are not criticizing the content of the book or the writing in the book... but they're annoyed at the chosen method of publication. If this trend continues, you're not going to be able to trust the Amazon reviews of any book that was even slightly delayed from appearing on the Kindle... owners of who, I'm willing to bet, still make up a vast minority of readers. E-readers just got a little bit more annoying to me... as did the users of the Kindle. This, methinks, is a case of "get over yourselves, morons."

The Color of Numbers

2010-01-10T02:15:00.004-05:00

I don't know about you, but there are certain colors I distinctly associate with the first ten digits from 0 - 9. Here they are:

0 = black
1 = white
2 = red
3 = orange
4 = dark green
5 = yellow-orange
6 = violet
7 = yellow
8 = emerald green
9 = blue

What does that mean? I'll be damned if I know. But "The Color of Numbers" sure would be a great title for something.

Updated List of Plays on my "To Do" list:

2010-01-06T14:53:00.003-05:00

UPDATED! With active Wikipedia links, and 1 new title!

Fortunately, Blog posts can be edited and changed and updated. Still, right at this second, here's the list as I think of it of material I hope to get the opportunity to direct at some point:

Go ahead and Google some of them, if you don't know them. Great material. Just a wish list. (Subject to change, of course.)

The Wonderful Comic Book of Oz

2010-01-03T17:18:00.003-05:00

Just used some Christmas gift cards to buy the Eric Shanower/Skottie Young adaptation of L. Frank Baum's "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" from Marvel Comics. If anyone needed proof that comics=art, look no further. It is stunning and gorgeous, and don't worry: the same artists are currently working on "The Marvelous Land of Oz", being published now in issues. They could do all 13 Baum-authored Oz books and I'd be thrilled.

I'm a bit of an Oz junkie, myself, and I'm beginning to gravitate my comics buying to hardcovers/trades/graphic novels, but all that is besides the point. Check this book out. You can buy it on Amazon here.

New Musicals with Old Music

2010-01-03T13:00:00.002-05:00

Just read on Playbill.com about two potential "new" jukebox musicals for the 2010 Broadway season: "American Idiot", based on the music of Green Day, and "Come Fly With Me", a Twyla Tharp dance-ical that uses original masters of Old Blue Eyes' vocals over a live band. These are either brilliant ideas or terrible ideas or both. Read the article here.

The same article mentions that "Spider Man: The Musical With the Stupid Subtitle About Darkness Written by U2" is still in big trouble and may not open. We can only wish.

The Mexican Starbucks

2010-01-03T00:43:00.003-05:00

So my wife and I, in our infinite wisdom, decided to take Gabby out today into Manhattan to go to Build-a-Bear and Toys R Us and see the Rock Center Tree. We wrapped her up and strapped her into the stroller and headed out... into twenty-something degree weather, which is painful to readers in Florida but laughable to those in Buffalo. We got off the D train at Rock Center, rolled past the scary-looking Elmo and Sponge Bob and Mickey Mouse (the assorted riff-raff in knock-off costumes hoping to scare a buck up out of parents with squealing children, children who can't for themselves make the judgement that, hey, THIS vampire Sponge Bob probably has Hep-C) and made our way to the tree, where Gabby took one look and said, "Let's see something else now." So off we went to Build-A-Bear, where almost-three year old Gabby didn't quite seem to grasp the concept of how one goes about building a bear, and then bundled our little one back up in a blanket at about 4:30 to brave January in NYC, always much harsher than December or November (and watch out for February).

Gabby was asleep within five minutes, leaving mommy and daddy free to hit up our new favorite restaurant: Chipotle. It used to seem like we had to walk awhile to get to a Chipotle. Now when you're in Manhattan you can't throw a rock without hitting one, the realization of which led me to coin the nickname by which I will now refer to Chipotle for the rest of my days: The Mexican Starbucks. (Patent pending).

Good faux Mex food, though.

Too Much Thinking

2010-01-02T18:56:00.000-05:00

So I need to reassess my approach to blogging, I've decided. My problem is, when I write, I think too much. And I think to blog, I need to stop thinking and stop trying to always create the perfect post. I always overwrite, and I've decided that I need to actively avoid overwriting and overthinking or I'll simply never post. I just have to stop writing when I'm done. Like now.

See? Worked like a charm.

Another "Race" Excerpt

2009-12-13T18:50:00.000-05:00

Here we go, another excerpt. Why? Because.

The General studied Race for a few moments, as if trying to make up his mind about something. Race was trying very hard not to look him directly in the eyes. Finally, Bullit spoke. “Race, I’ve known your family for a long time. I’m asking you to trust me. Drop your case. Lay low. Leave your office slash apartment for a few days. Just play it safe.”

“Wait a second,” Race interrupted. “Am I in danger or something?”

“Just keep your eyes open, and be careful.” At this, Bullit looked up at the world map still glowing from the holographic display. Race followed his gaze; the map was big, bright, and colorful, three things that Race had always liked.

“One more thing,” Bullit said momentarily, still studying the map. “It’s very important.”

“Sure,” said Race, “anything.”

At that, the General turned his gaze sharply to Race, peering directly into his eyes. “Do you know where Cookie is?” he asked, his voice becoming low and ominous again. Race froze, realizing that he had been set-up, and that this was the actual question he had been brought here to answer. Dirk had been right. For whatever reason, Project: Perfect was very interested in keeping Cookie where they could see her. A cool, calm, and collected response was clearly in order here.

“Urrrrrrmmmmmmgggghhhhhh”…. is what he managed instead.

“Race,” Bullit said, speaking quietly and stepping in towards Race, “I’ll ask again. Do you know where Cookie McCloud is right now?”

Race glanced around him. All across the different levels of platforms and catwalks, Perfect Troopers and tech-types were continuing on with their busy work, oblivious to (or desensitized to) their commanding officer moving in to possibly kill a civilian.

“Race!” barked Bullit. Race’s head snapped back towards him.

“No!” he lied. “No, I don’t know where Cookie is. I haven’t seen Cookie in months, years! Who is she, again?”

Smooth, he told himself. Real smooth.

Bullit took a step back. Race realized he had been bent back almost double, and stood up straight again. Jack Bullit still towered over him. “You don’t, huh?” he asked.

“Nope,” Race lied again.

Bullit nodded thoughtfully. “You know what?” he asked. “I don’t believe you.” He looked up into the air around him. “Perfection?” he called out, which struck Race as a fairly odd thing to do, but even as he thought it, a low-level humming noise seemed to rise up around them, and then…

“Online, General Bullit. Awaiting your command.” A silky female voice filled the air in impressive stereo sound. Race looked around frantically to see where it was coming from, but he and Bullit were still the only two on the command platform.

“You’re not going to find her,” commented Bullit off of Race’s scan of the area. “That voice is Perfection. She’s the Project: Perfect mainframe computer. She facilitates control over all of our tech and establishes communication and tracking for the Perfect Agents operating in the field, like your brother and his wife. You with me so far?”

“No,” said Race.

Bullit simplified. “We run everything through her.”

“Even the propulsion system?” Race asked.

Bullit looked surprised. “Good observation, Race. Everything but that,” he replied.

“Still sounds like a bad idea,” Race offered.

“I know,” Bullit replied. “That’s why there’s about a dozen manual failsafe terminals built throughout the island. Any Perfect Agent can access them and take manual control of the vital functions of the system. We’ve never had to use them, though. Perfection was designed by the most brilliant scientist of our time. Generations ahead of himself. She’s the real deal.”

“Nice,” said Race. “Who’s the scientist?”

“In addition to coordinating all of our vital operational systems and communications,” Bullit said, ignoring Race’s question, “Perfection handles a coupla’ thousand other smaller tasks. Got a million little widgets built into her.” At this, he looked pointedly at Race. “One of those,” he said meaningfully, “is a lie detector.”

Race could feel his stomach drop into his feet. “Oh. Very nice,” he managed through the ball of cotton that had suddenly settled in his mouth. “It’s… ah… foolproof, I’d guess?”

“To ninety-nine point nine percent,” came General Bullit’s smug reply.

“And… how does it work?”

“Oh, something about reading brainwaves and I-don’t-know-what-else,” Bullit said off-handedly. “I’ll be punched if I know how it works, but it works.” He smiled at Race. It was not pleasant. “Perfection!” Bullit called out into the air again.

The voice of Perfection returned, smooth as melted chocolate. “Yes, General Bullit?” it purred.

“Activate the lie detection field,” Bullit commanded.

“Activating lie detection field.”

Race yelped as a seat rose up out of the floor beneath him, forcing him into a sitting position. The lights on the command platform dimmed, and a bright white light flared into existence, shining on him from a projector at the top of the holographic display. The hologram of the world map disappeared, replaced by one of a giant rotating human brain, presumably his. A red spiking line not unlike a heartbeat monitor ran underneath the brain, rising and falling sporadically. It seemed to Race to accurately reflect his own state of mild panic. He was unavoidably impressed.

“So, Race, now that we’ll have documented proof or whether or not you’re choosing to answer me honestly,” continued Bullit casually, “why don’t you tell me again: do you know where your niece Cookie McCloud is?”

Race began to think frantically of how to answer the question without giving Dirk reason to punch him when he and Skyler returned home, but as soon as he started searching his brain for a quick response, the red monitor line projected beneath the 3D scan of his brain began to go bananas. Bullit glared at it, and then back at him. “Something you’re not telling me, Race?” the General spat at him? Forcing himself to calm down and stop thinking, Race somehow managed to formulate a reply.

“Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…. no.”

“Perfection?” Bullit snapped. A long moment hung there as Perfection no doubt analyzed to exactly what degree Race was lying. Finally, the low humming increased in volume just a bit and Perfection spoke.

“Detective McCloud,” she began, “is telling the truth.”

Race froze. He had already begun raising his wrists in the air to give Bullit easy handcuff access, and now he tried to play that gesture off into a yawn. It was terribly awkward.

He needn’t have worried. Bullit was staring at the screen above him, jaw agape. “He is?” asked the General, disbelievingly.

“He is,” confirmed Perfection.

“I am!” said Race cheerfully. He hopped out of his chair as the lights around him returned to normal. “Well, Jack, if that’ll be all, I think I’ll just be on my…”

“Listen to me,” Bullit silenced him, putting a warning finger into his face. “The computer says you’re clean, so you go. I’m gonna keep an eye on you, though. Not because I think you’re pullin’ a fast one, but to keep you safe. Race, if anything happens, anything out of the ordinary at all, you have to contact me immediately. Clear?”

Race nodded. “As crystal,” he assured the General as he began to back away. “General Bullit, Jack, we have got to do this again sometime. Let’s do lunch. Your treat. Later!” With that, Race turned on his heel and headed for the ramp off of the command platform.

He had only taken a few steps when he came to realization. Turning, he scurried back to Bullit, who was looking up at the now-frozen display of Race’s brain, a scowl on his face. “Hey,” said Race, “I hate to ask, but… how do I get out of here?”

Bullit glowered down at him, a darkly satisfied smile settling across his lips. “Transit beam,” he growled.

Race nodded. “Yay.”

Hope you enjoyed!

Just like a blog...

2009-12-11T15:19:00.001-05:00

So it's been weeks since I've posted, WEEKS! Yes, I realize I seem to be following the standard operating procedure of the amateur blogger: start blogging, post a whole lot, lose interest, do nothing. My excuse, though, is this: when I write, I tend to write other things. So I thought I'd take a moment here and share some of those other things. An excerpt from the adaption of my Fringe play into a book, "The Unlikely Adventure of Race and Cookie McCloud":

She cut off. It was like somebody had turned a lightbulb on in her head. “It’s ten to twelve!” she blurted out.

“Huh. Looks like GSJM is late. So rude.”

“No, no!” Cookie snapped. “He’s not late! He’s not coming!” She ran to the edge of the building and peered down the road. The sedan was no longer visible. Dammit! How could she have been so stupid?

“He’s not… wait, he’s not coming?” Race had followed her to the roof’s edge, but Cookie didn’t look at him. Instead, she peered down the road, and across the rooftops of the warehouses that ran alongside of them.

And suddenly, she knew. She put it together, and he popped up in her awareness like a contact made on a radar screen. “He’s not coming here,” she said, cursing herself. “He’s going wherever that black car was going.

Silence. Finally, Race asked, “What black car?”

“Never mind!” The warehouses ran the length of the dockside road, off into the distance towards the West Docks and the Northern Docks. Superheroes had the right idea; stick to the roofs if you don’t want people to see you.

Uncle Race, however, would not be able to keep up.

“Get back down to the street,” Cookie hissed at her uncle. “Follow that road towards the West Docks. You’ll know what you’re looking for when you get there. Stay out of sight.”

“Uh… what?”

“Just do it!”

“And what are you going to do?”

Cookie looked at the gap between rooftops. Below, a narrow road ran between them, feeding the main dockside road. Only about 25, 30 yards. Child’s play.

Taking a deep breath, she began to run towards the edge of the roof. Behind her, she could hear her uncle yelling for her to stop. She tuned him out. Had to focus…

Reaching the edge of the roof at full speed, faster than any other 15 year old girl on the planet could run (that was an official measurement), she leaped.

For a moment, the world was still. The silence of the wind rushing through her ears calmed her, took her away… with an ease unknown to the world’s greatest gymnasts, she lazily allowed her body to pinwheel once while airborne, hanging high over the street below…

An instant later, the world came back to life as Cookie landed on the rooftop across the street, rolling and bouncing to her feet in one fluid motion. She looked up and closed her eyes. Yes, Green Suit Jacket Man was certainly this way. The people in that sedan were up to no good, and he would be where they were heading.

Aside from having drawn that conclusion, she had a hunch. And her hunches were usually right on.

She turned back to the roof from which she had come. She could see her Uncle Race standing at the edge. His jaw was predictably hanging open. “Get down to the street!” she hissed. “Follow the buildings!” He would be there well after anything interesting had happened, but Green Suit Jacket Man was still his collar. Cookie would be more than happy to let him have it.

She turned and ran, taking off and following alongside the road below. As she reached the each roof’s edge, she took to the air, reveling in the split-second’s moment of solitude each leap afforded her. After eight rooftops, she stopped and closed her eyes. She was close. Definitely close. Four rooftops later, she stopped again. Instead of running and leaping across to rooftop number thirteen, she instead crept towards the edge and peered across the way.

There, crouched over a skylight on the roof, was Green Suit Jacket Man.

Cookie had to admit it: the jacket was ridiculous, but the man pulled it off. He was very big, very scary, and looked very angry. Confident though she was in her own abilities, Cookie needed only one glance in the dark from a distance to decide that getting into a one-on-one fight with him was probably not going to be her best option. She’d have to find another way to subdue him for Uncle Race.

And that's that. Hope you enjoyed it. More to come, most likely, as I'm going to continue primarily writing that and not blogging here... unless the Mets do something really, really stupid in the next few weeks.

"Why I've Never Liked Popular Music", and other heady revelations.

2009-10-22T01:40:00.001-04:00

I've recently had a revelation of sorts, and it seems fairly obvious to me, now that I've realized it. I have never in my life been a fan of popular music, really, something that continues to this day. I mean, I like the occasional song on the radio and such, that sort of thing. But I've never really followed music or the music industry or music as a form of entertainment with any real sort of passion, which is a bit perplexing given the near-total consumption with which I allow myself to become wrapped up in other forms of entertainment. In junior high I would rock out to John Williams film scores on my cassette walkman; in high school, I most famously added showtunes to my repertoire. This continued in college, where a ride in my '96 green Dodge Neon (lovingly dubbed "Green Lightnin'" until the engine block cracked) was looked upon as a dreaded necessity by most of my drunken friends: they needed my sober-self to drive them around, but knew that they would be forced to listen to "Rent" while in transit. But this illustration brings me to my major point: I have figured out why it is I do not like pop music, and the reason is quite simple. Most pop music, you see, is about going out and having a good time, and partying, and hitting on members of the opposite sex (or of the same sex, who am I to assume?)

These are things that A.) I am not very good at, B.) I have never much enjoyed, and C.) I have simply never done.

I came to this revelation because the tape deck in my car is broken, and I can no long hook my iPod filled with showtunes and podcasts about comic books up to the speakers not-so-cleverly hidden in the doors. So for the past few months I have found myself idly listening to pop music stations, as sports radio has been fairly painful in New York for a Mets fan these days. And while I've latched on to one or two songs I've found catchy and enjoyable, I've mostly found value in their kitsch-ness and their humor. (Just what is a disco stick, anyway? And I'm fairly certain Helen Keller did NOT talk with her hips.) More often than not, though, I just end up counting the number of "rhymes" in songs that are not actually examples of the clean matching of like sounds. (Next time you listen to the radio, stop and check just how many songs include rhymes-that-aren't-really-rhymes. I hope I haven't ruined listening to the radio for you.) Truth is, I own a smattering of random albums by pop and rock artists, albums that I may have bought because I liked the radio single but didn't care for the rest of the thing. (The iTunes era has been good to me...) The only artists for whom I own multiple albums? Weird Al Yankovic, Billy Joel (I think I have two), the Blues Brothers (I don't think they count), and I own every Barenaked Ladies album. I do love BNL, but that doesn't make me a music lover. They're more my token band than anything else.

If you went to college with me you might be thinking, "Wait, Ace!" (I went by "Ace" in college, BTW. Mostly because we were all a bunch of borderline jackasses, as are most college students, really, something I say with the utmost amount of love and affection that can be conveyed with the word "jackass".) Anyway, you would say, "Wait, Ace! I saw you at all of those frat parties, dancing your ass off! You had a great time, a GREAT time!"

Well, actually, not really. I went to those parties because I was in the frat and all of my friends were there and I wanted to be supportive, but the truth is that within about an hour of being at one of those parties everyone else would be so goddamned drunk and I would be so goddamned sober that I would have to do SOMEthing to entertain myself or I would probably have ended up driving my car straight into the dirty window in front of Pop's Bar. Trust me, every night, EVERY NIGHT, I would much rather have been at the movies. And songs about going to the movies, songs that I would very much relate to and enjoy, just simply wouldn't get a whole bunch of radio air play. Consider, if you would, my rewritten lyrics for the Black-Eyed Peas "I've Gotta Feeling":

Tonight’s the night night
Let’s live it up
Hit Barnes and Noble
And read some books
Go out to Uno's
Eat Brownie Bowls
Head to the movies
Previews go OFF

I know that we'll have a ball
If we discuss film theory
And musical theater

I feel stressed out
I wanna nap
Let's go play Nintendo
And trade some comics
Fill up my cup
Mountain Dew
Is that dance music?
Just turn it off
Lets paint some pictures
We’ll build some Legos
In bed by three (sober)
And then we’ll do it again

See? Now THAT'S my jam.

And Another Thing...

2009-10-19T18:09:00.000-04:00

So my mother-in-law spilled water on our computer keyboard... yesterday. It broke the space bar and a bunch of the Mac function keys on the bottom of the thing. Typing without a space bar is a lot harder than you might imagine. Forexampletypingwithoutaspacebarwouldlooksomethinglikethis.Okay,maybeit'snotthetypingwithoutaspacebarthat'ssohardasmuchasit'sthereadingwithoutspacesthatishard.

I had to tuck my thumb under my palm there and force myself not to drop it down and hit space where it normally hovers. Rough. So, whilst we lost a keyboard, it gave me an excuse to go to the Apple Store and buy one of those thin, flat, metallic Mac keyboards, the action of which is about a hundred times better than the other one was, anyway. I suppose I could have gone 3rd party, but buying a Mac means you never have to go 3rd party again. Even when you should.

So now I wait for Gabby to wake up so I can drop her off at her grandmother's to play with the cat. Or as she puts it, "I'm going to see Mee-Maw and the KITTty cat!" She talks with a sing-song cadence that is adorable at 2 but we sort of hope she breaks herself of before high school. Of course, we hope she's potty-trained by then, too.

And then it's off to rehearsal for "The Crucible". A LATE rehearsal for "The Crucible". Late because the Arts and Sciences students at SJC are now taking the later-evening PGS courses (or the courses for the returning grown-ups, two of which I teach at the college.) So that means, depending on which actors are on schedule on a given night, sometimes portions of rehearsal don't start until 9pm. Whee.

Going to the Apple Store in the Staten Island Mall also gave me an excuse to go to the Border's there and purchase the Eoin Colfer-penned sixth book in the Hitchhiker's Trilogy: "And Another Thing", the title of which I have shamelessly stolen as the title of this post. So excited. I'd say "I hope it's better than Twilight", but there's almost no way it couldn't be, as I've read phone books with better plots and more character development than "Twilight". Douglas Adams left us too soon. I'll get to "Another Thing" as soon as I finish reading "Moneyball", in which Oakland A's GM Billy Beane comes across a genius and a prick. Sort of a "geick." Or perhaps a "prinius".

Definitely "prinius".

Now to go wake Gabby up. This should be fun.

Review: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

2009-10-08T15:42:00.000-04:00

So I iTuned myself a rental of "X-Men Origins: Wolverine". (I'd do the Netflix, but tell me if this happens to you, because it has happened to me the last two times I've tried Netflix: movie arrives in the mail. Movie goes on shelf. Movie stays on shelf. Movie continues to stay on shelf. Movie starts getting pretty confused, probably thinking, "When the hell is this tool going to watch me?" Netflix is not at all confused, and after a month or so, I become the proud owner of a DVD in a red envelope that I didn't like enough to buy, only to rent.)

Add the following factors in as well: Jaime and I actually find ourselves to be too busy to watch the DVDs that we actually DO rent/buy, plus Jaime's busy primetime TV schedule is dominated by dance-based reality television and the 10:00 pm Soapnet broadcast of "General Hospital", and Saturday nights are right out because I religiously watch SNL, and we have completely opposing taste in movies and can never agree on anything (although now that I think of it, shirtless Hugh Jackman might have led to her watching "Wolverine"), PLUS Gabby's sleeping patterns follow my sleeping patterns, and Jaime is just as likely to go to be BEFORE Gabby as vice versa, PLUS my own sleeping patterns are notoriously nocturnal and have been since I was, oh, 7 years old... so these are all of the reasons why I find it more convenient, when there is a movie I've missed that I wanted to see that Jaime didn't want to see, to rent it on iTunes and watch it late at night on the computer wearing my headphones as opposed to having to put it on the HDTV in the living room where the explosions from various superheroes blowing up various things would certainly wake up Jaime. Not Gabby. She sleeps like the dead.

SO... this lead to my iTune renting of "X-Men Origins: Wolverine", which I did in spite of 1.) X3's suckitude, and 2.) the various reports detailing "Wolverine's" suckitude.

My review:

Laaaaaaame.

I'l expand on that.

Do we all remember when X-Men came out, and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine was stupid awesome? When he was perfect as Wolverine? And how he was even better in X2? Even while I disagreed that Wolverine should be the lead character of ANY X-Men movie (he shouldn't be), I loved Hugh Jackman in the role, as did (don't you deny it) the majority of X-fans.

What the hell happened?

I don't know if it's because I've seen more of Mr. Jackman, and I now realize what a theatrical song-and-dance man he truly is. Hey, don't get me wrong, I love that about the guy, and his charming and talented and a hell of a showstopper. His turn in "The Boy From Oz" is the stuff of Broadway legend... but it also is a big part of the reveal of the "other side" of Hugh Jackman, the non-Wolverine side, the soft and cuddly side, the side that I found tough to discard when watching "Wolverine".

(BTW... SPOILERS! But honestly, do you care? Honestly?)

But you know what? If the movie had been scripted better, that wouldn't have been a problem. Yes, I recognize that the art of film is more than what is written on the page of the screenplay. But being a writer myself, that's always where I go first. And, look, I know the Wolverine origin story fairly well, being a bit of an X-Men fan. And the first twenty minutes or so borrow from that origin fairly well. I definitely didn't want to see a film that just aped from the "Origin" mini-series, but I did appreciate that opening five minute or so sequence that showed us that part of Logan's past. Also, the title sequence of the film, featuring James/Logan/Wolverine and his half-brother Victor/Creed/Sabretooth (a character that I'm almost positive got killed in the first X-Men movie, which is an entirely overrated movie, but that's an opinion for another day)... the title sequence with the two of them fighting in war after war after war was exciting and incredibly well-done. So at this point, while watching, I'm into it. Then we see James and Victor get recruited into a secret government black-ops force with a bunch of other (we assume) rogue mutants, a team of mutants that did appear in Wolverine's past in the comics. Agent Zero, the Blob (although he's not... Blobby yet), Wraith, some dude who does shit with lightbulbs and elevators.

And Deadpool. Wade Wilson. Played by Ryan Reynolds. Some background, for the non-comics initiated among you: Deadpool is a mercenary for hire, fully masked, who chatters incessantly and often rather humorously. He has a low-selling comic of his own that appears monthly on the stands that is voraciously loved by its followers in which he often shatters the fourth wall and talks directly to the reader... although everyone in the book just thinks he's batshit insane. Which he is, and which is besides the point.

My favorite part of this movie was the first ten minutes that included Ryan Reynolds as a pre-masked, not-yet-disfigured Deadpool, talking too much and selling it really well and generally kicking ass. I was really digging "Wolverine" as we watched he and Creed and the black-ops team... for about ten minutes. Then James/Logan/Wolverine/Hugh Jackman gets very upset by some of the black-opsish stuff that his black-ops team is expected to do, and he walks off in the middle of a mission, and apparently the evil general and his evil brother just let him. Plot hole number 1? Maybe, maybe not. But I could live with this plot hole.

If it didn't lead to about twenty minutes (felt like three hours) of Wolverine the lumber jack living all lovey-dovey in Canada with his Native American (Native Canadian?) kindergarten teacher girlfriend being all sensitive and emo.

This is Wolverine, right? Right?

I knew this movie was destined to fail when Hugh Jackman/Jimmy/Wolvie/Logan delivered the classic Wolverine line to his boo, "I'm the best there is at what I do," and removed all of the claws from it. Hey, look, I know that there's a whole "struggle within" aspect to the Wolverine character, the man who wants to separate himself from the deadly animal struggling to get out, but show us the animal once in awhile, you know? I don't need Hugh Jackman chopping down trees, and when his girlfriend inevitably gets killed (or does she), I don't need him holding her in his arms and screaming as the camera pans upward in a birds-eye shot. Why don't I need that? Because this movie already seemed like a parody of dumbed-down action movies. You didn't need to add to it with the cliche shot of all cliche shots. Besides, the girl ain't dead, and you're Wolverine, and you should have been able to smell that she didn't actually have her own blood spilled all over her. In fact, it looks like she may have paint spilled all over her. Hey, Wolvie, you moron, you can tell the difference between a dead girl and a not-dead girl. You're freaking Wolverine. Plot hole number two.

(Am I getting all "fanboy" on this movie? Only a little. I'm actually getting all "writer" on this movie because, hey, I know this character is behaving in ways he shouldn't, and is ignoring abilities that it has been established he has.)

So, he volunteers for Weapon X. They put him through the whole process, shoot him up with metal and what-not, then the evil general says, "Let's wipe his memory!" and Wolverine hears it whilst in the sensory-depravation tank. Oh, he hears the general whisper that, but can't tell his girlfriend isn't actually wounded at all and is just covered in red paint? Okay, then. Plot hole number three.

So Wolverine runs away. And he runs naked to a farm that, and if it takes him a long time to do so, that isn't established cinematically, so we'll assume this farm isn't too far from the Weapon X people. Who, now that they've spent $500 million creating this killing machine, have decided the second he freaks out after the insane surgical procedure, have decided they have to hunt and kill their $500 million dollar science experiment. THIS is your tax dollars at work, people. Plot hole number four.

Okay, so Wolverine is holed up at a farm somewhere with Uncle Ben and Aunt May. I mean, it's not really them, but it is, come on. He's just had a lot of metal injected into his body and attached to his skeleton. And he has a healing factor and all, but he's totally cool now, a few hours later. Physically and, apparently, psychologically. Because he doesn't go apeshit nuts and kill the old people. Instead, he wears a bunch of their son's old clothes (is the son dead? I don't know if it's creepier if the son is dead or if the son is alive) and then has some comic hijinks slicing up their bathroom sink with his new, shiny claws. Very funny. (Sarcasm doesn't always play well online, but that was sarcasm.) Then they have dinner, talk about motorcycles, and Agent Zero shoots the two old people for no apparent reason (you could just wait for Wolverine/Logan/Jimmy H. to leave, you know.) Plot hole number five.

Then Wolverine blows up a bunch of military vehicles, tells the general that he is now the "animal", and goes and finds his old army buddies, Wraith and Blob, spends some time boxing with Blob for no apparent reason, and then gets a bunch of handy exposition about Gambit and "The Island" and how Victor is evil and working with the general, which means the general lied to Wolverine about wanting him to kill Victor, and THAT'S what makes him evil. So Wolverine and Wraith go to find Gambit, and Wraith gets killed, so who knows why the hell he came along for the ride, and James fights Victor, which happens at random at various points in the movie, and Gambit agrees to fly Wolverine to "The Island", which apparently is Three Mile Island.

Now, I have no problem with the secret mad-scientist general mutant experimentation base being on Three Mile Island. I don't understand, though, that if all the mutant experiments are being done on Three Mile Island, in Pennsylvania, why in the blue hell did they drag Wolverine up to Canada to turn him into Wolverine? Plot hole number... well, I've lost count. Also, would Gambit's rickety old prop plane really fly from New Orleans to Pennsylvania? And why is Gambit in this movie, again? Plot hole number whatever.

Oh, yeah, in between all this Cyclops gets captured and pulled out of his high school by general evil and Victor "Not Quite Sabretooth" Creed.

So Wolverine finds the evil general experimenting on some other mutant, gets a heaping plate of exposition, finds out his girlfriend is still alive and was in on the whole plot against him (but she wasn't really! She loves him!), and walks away all sad. Really? They just let him walk away? Plot hole. And he finds out that everyone he's known over the past ten years has been lying to him, and he's Wolverine, and he just walks away all sad? Plot hole, or at least a character hole.

The Victor's all mad because general evil won't give him the metal skeleton Logan got, and we never quite understand why they gave Logan the metal skeleton in the first place, except it's mumbled at one point they did it to make sure he could survive the process so they could take his DNA and put it in Weapon XI and do the same process to him... and if it's his DNA alone that helped him survive the process, and Victor is his brother and shares his DNA, why wouldn't Victor survive the process? Whopping plot hole number 15 (because I'm sure I've missed a few).

So Weapon XI is Deadpool, but his mouth is sewn shut and he's a mindless automaton, so any appeal Ryan Reynolds had before in the role is completely destroyed. (He's also hidden under tons of disfiguring make-up. Sorry, ladies.) And then Wolverine and Victor team up to kill Deadpool, but he's not really dead, and then general evil shoots Wolverine in the head with an adamantium bullit (really?) which will heal, of course, but as we're awkwardly told earlier, his memories won't. And now he doesn't remember his girlfriend or his friend-of-five-minutes Gambit and he runs off on his own and his girlfriend dies and the movie ends.

They should have ended this thing at the fifteen minute mark. It made X3 look good.

(Oh, yeah, and Patrick Stewart shows up to save Cyclops and the other mutant prisoners, and I'm sure Patrick Stewart came down to set to smile benignly and cash a paycheck, but I'll be damned if it doesn't look like they photoshopped his head onto a badly-dressed body.)

Illiterate Nation

2009-10-05T20:34:00.000-04:00

So I'm a Mets fan, as previously discussed. As a Mets fan, I'm also a regular message board contributer at Metsblog.com, the premiere (and SNY affiliated) Mets fanblog. On a recent Metsblog message board discussion, I offered an opinion on the direction of the Mets heading toward 2010. My post was two short paragraphs and a concluding sentence. A little bit later, I checked back, and somebody had referred to my post by saying "The next time I get my oil changed, I'll read the book ya wrote below." (You can find the thread in question here; it's pretty easy to pick out my screen name:

http://www.metsblog.com/2009/10/05/note-jeff-wilpon-and-omar-minaya-on-wfan-at-5-pm/#comments

My question is this: since when do two paragraphs and a sentence constitute "a book"?

I know my opinion on this matter may be biased; I'm a playwright who has written several plays and screenplays of over a hundred pages in length, I'm a college English and writing professor, and I hold a BA in English Lit. However, this post reflects a truth about this country (maybe this world) that I'm aware of but am still disturbed by: we are a nation of willful illiterates.

As a teacher, it always stuns me when I assign a paper to my class, they ask how long it has to be, I respond with some preposterously short guidelines (five whole paragraphs!), and they groan and moan and generally become filled with angst. "FIVE WHOLE PARAGRAPHS?!" they cry. "THAT WILL TAKE, LIKE, AN ENTIRE HOUR!!"

Look, I know that world society is no longer a literate society, I know that. This is the age of digital media. I'm fine with that, really. My own attention span reflects that. But I feel as though we're reaching the point where any reading or writing, any at all, is seen by the general American as not only torture most foul, but as something that only an idiot would bother themselves with.

Hey, remember when idiots were the people who COULDN'T read and write?

This reminds me of the most absurd criticism I heard during last year's campaign season about then-candidate, now-president Obama: he sounded too smart, and he was too educated, to be president. People would argue that they wanted a president they could have a beer with.

...

I fail to see how it's a problem that the president is well-spoken and well-educated. However, the willfully illiterate, those who think that reading and writing is for losers, and who think that not being able to/not wanting to read or write makes them better than those who do and can, these are the people who actually scoff at those who can express their thoughts and opinions on paper, and against those who are educated. "Book learnin's for suckers!" they exclaim as they roll their vacant, glassy eyes. "Screw that! I'm gonna watch 48 seconds of ESPN and pretend I got me some culture!"

The silver lining of all this, however, is that if you have an idea for a book that you've always wanted to write but were afraid to take on such a daunting task, apparently all you have to do now is generate two paragraphs and a sentence to call yourself a novelist. I know, it'll be tough. Just buckle down and get to it. There's nothing you can't accomplish if you're willing to... oooo! "World's Scariest Police Chases" is on!

- TH

Ultimate Spider-Man: A Primer for the "Best Comic Ever Published"

2009-10-01T20:01:00.000-04:00

I discovered "Ultimate Spider-Man" in late 2001. Twice in my life have I had what I describe to be the "epiphany" reading experience, and they both took place around the same time, in the second half of 2001. I loved Spider-Man as a kid, but comics in the early-to-mid 90's were awful. Just awful. This was because the "big two" companies (Marvel and DC) emphasized superstar artists and spectacle (see: Death of Superman) over quality writing. So, the stories suffered. I left comics in, I think, 1995 or so, when Marvel decided to "clone" Spider-Man. They did this through a ret-con, or through a retroactive continuity action, which means they decided to rewrite some portion of the decades of history behind that giant backlog of story that piles up behind long-running serialized stories, like comics (and soap operas. Comic books and soap operas are very, very similar.)

In the 70's, Spider-Man was "cloned" by a mad scientist, and in that 70's storyline, Spidey's clone died in the ensuing fight. Marvel decided in 1995 to "reveal" (even though they just then made it up) that the Spider-Man that WON the fight was actually the clone, and the REAL Peter Parker ran away to wander the countryside for years, thinking he was actually the CLONE of Spider-Man. So they told their readers, "Hey! You know that guy you've been following for 20 years? Yeah, well, he's not the real Spidey. This OTHER dude is the real Spidey." And they did in such a ham-fisted way that they lost a whole big chunk of readers.

Why did they do this? Because in 1987, for no apparent reason and out of nowhere, Marvel had Peter Parker marry Mary Jane. That issue sold a lot of copies. The problem? They now had a flagship superhero who was dealing with marital issues, paying the bills, discussing whether or not to become a father... you know, things that the teenage male adolescent audience that at the time was STILL the bread-and-butter of the comics industry was totally interested in. (Sarcasm, sarcasm.) No matter how hot their artists drew Mary Jane, Spider-Man was losing readers by the truckload. SO the whole "Clone Saga" was just one of the many attempts to get rid of married Spider-Man throughout the year without making Spidey get a divorce (which would draw bad press) or flat-out just killing Mary Jane (which seemed lazy and contrived, and which the editors were hesitant to do because the biggest Spider-Man story of all time was "The Death of Gwen Stacy", Peter Parker's FIRST love, so doing it to MJ would just seem like telling the same old story again.)

So the Clone Saga lost Marvel a ton of readers, including me. I loved Spider-Man, but the writing was just so abysmal that I just couldn't take it anymore. Every once in awhile I'd go back to the store and pick up a copy of "Amazing Spider-Man", only to find that, nope, they still hadn't figured it out, and Spidey still sucked.

So in 2001, I was reading Entertainment Weekly, and they were reviewing the first trade paperback of "Ultimate Spider-Man" (a trade paperback is a thick bound, ad-free, bookstore sold collection of 6 or so issues that had previously been sold at newsstands in single copies). EW gave that trade an A+, so I thought, "What the hell?" and went out and picked it up, brought it home, read it, put it down, and I remember vividly what I though to myself.... "They got it. They finally got it."

"Ultimate Spider-Man", ironically, was the latest attempt to rid the world of married Peter Parker. They had tried even after the Clone Saga a number of different things, but none of them worked/stuck/were very good. So finally, they just said, "forget it, we're stuck with married Spider-Man and MJ in our regular universe continuity." ("Universe continuity" refers to the shared "universe" in which all of the characters owned by a particular company play. At Marvel, Spidey, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and everyone else live and interact in one "universe". At DC, Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, and all the others interact in another universe.) Both companies publish "alternate universe" stories; stories that they want to tell, that are interesting, but that violate the history and universe established, again, over decades and decades of storytelling. (Marvel universe continuity dates back to the early 60's; DC continuity to the 20's, although DC has rewritten their history twice since then.)

Since Peter and MJ were married and seemed likely to stay that way in the "regular" Marvel universe, Marvel decided to create four ongoing books for what they dubbed the "Ultimate" Marvel universe. Basically, they took their four flagship titles (X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, and The Avengers) and created "Ultimate" versions of those books. (Ultimate X-Men, Ultimate Fantastic Four, Ultimate Spider-Man, and The Ultimates). The idea was, they'd relaunch these four "core" titles to draw new readers with brand new stories that retold new, updated versions of the origins of the characters within, but they would still publish the "regular" versions of those titles as well in regular, decades-old universe continuity, so as not to anger their long-time readers who always railed against any change that violated that which came before it. Basically, Marvel wanted to keep the old and bring in the new... and also un-marry Peter Parker and Mary Jane.

So "Ultimate" Spidey was back in high school (Marvel editorial always thought it a mistake to let Spidey "grow-up" into adulthood, as then young readers no longer could identify with him), best friends with Mary Jane (who didn't appear in the original book until well into its run, when Peter was in college), and the 14 page origin story that originally launched the character had been expanded into over 100 pages by writer Brian Bendis (who still writes the book today, nine years later, an absolutely remarkable run on a comic book). By "retelling" Spidey's story, the editors were giving Bendis permission to re-imagine the key events in Spider-Man's history, create some new ones, and ignore the mistakes. The same logic went into the other titles. In "Ultimate Fantastic Four" and "Ultimate X-Men", the main characters were all teenagers as well (again, drawing in the young, money-spending audiences). Also, in "regular" continuity, both the X-Men and the Avengers have had dozens and dozens of members, some classic, some lame. "Ultimate X-Men" and "The Ultimates" allowed Marvel to look at the flops and the hits, and relaunch those two "Ultimate" teams with All-Star rosters. (Wolverine, Cyclops, Kitty Pryde, Colussus, Jean Grey, Storm, Nightcrawler, etc., in "UXM"; Captain America, Iron Man, the Hulk, Hawkeye, etc. in "The Ultimates". They avoided the groaners like Jubilee! Tri-Athalon! Two-Gun Kid! Maggot! Yes. Maggot.)

It was predicted that Ultimate Spider-Man would be a massive flop, like most of the earlier Spider-Man "fixes". Instead, it was a gi-normous success and readers ate it up. Since its debut, "Ultimate Spider-Man" has consistently sat on or on top of the monthly Top Ten charts, was at various extended points in its run outselling the "flagship" Marvel book, "Amazing Spider-Man", and is credited for almost single-handedly saving a once bankrupt company that just got bought out for $4 billion by Disney. The other "Ultimate" books were also successes, initially, but almost all petered out; today, "Ultimate Spider-Man" is the only one still being published (although "The Ultimates" has been replaced with "Ultimate Comics Avengers".)

So I described this as an "epiphany" reading experience. What does that mean? Twice in my life, I've read something, and have been so enthralled and excited that I immediately ran out and bought everything else I could find. In October of '01 it was USM. I put that book down, thrilled that finally the powers-that-be at Marvel had realized (or rediscovered) just how good a storytelling medium comics could be if they didn't dumb everything down and make it all hokey and campy (that old "Batman" TV series did more to damage comics than anything, ever), and I ran out to my LCS (local comic shop) and started buying up back issues. I've bought my issue a month ever since, among other books... but USM is the gold standard on my shelf.

Wait, wait, wait! I said up top that I've had TWO "epiphany" reading experiences, and that they happened around the same time. Well, in November of '01, after catching myself up with USM, I decided to finally read that stupid little kid's book that my sisters and mom all loved, because the movie was coming out that December and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. And as soon as I was done reading "Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone", the moment I put it down, the MOMENT I put it down, I ran out to Barnes and Noble to get all the other books that had been published in the series to date. Unfortunately, at the time that only brought us up to "Goblet of Fire"... which, as we know, is where the real story ACTUALLY begins... and thus I, like millions of others, waited painfully and (semi) patiently for "Order of the Phoenix". But that's another blog post for another day... (In the meantime, I recommend "Harry: A History" by Melissa Anelli.)

"Ultimate Spider-Man". A bad idea that should never have worked. Instead, Brian Bendis, a former indie-comics crime-fiction writer, and Mark Bagley, B-list comics artists and former ASM writer, turned it into dozens of issues of comics gold. If you haven't caught up on old issues of USM, I'm jealous of you, because it means you get to go to Amazon.com or your Local Comic Shop, get all the trade paperbacks, and experience the best-of-the-best in mainstream superhero storytelling for the first time.

Public Options & Other Government Handouts

2009-09-29T01:26:00.000-04:00

I just had a thought, and I'm not an incredibly political guy, but this thought did just occur to me, and it seems to make some logical sense:

How would a public health care option be any different, philosophically, than public school?

Public school is a cheaper, government sanctioned educational option... but people can still choose, if they want, to pay and put their children into private schools.

Public health care would be a cheaper, government sanctioned medical option... but people could still choose, if they wanted, to pay for privatized health care.

The argument against public health care is that it might force the private health care providers to lower their costs. Okay. Where's the problem there? Economic competition is what capitalism thrives on, not socialism. So why is the public option being viewed as a step taken towards socialism? Because the government would be involved in the process? Well, then why is it okay for private educational institutions to be in competition with the governments less expensive public education options?

If having a public option is so morally bad for the country, if it's another step towards socialism... couldn't the same argument be made about public schools? Should we shout down the public option, and then abolish public schools with the next breath? Opponents of the public option say they don't want to pay for it with their taxes. People pay for public schools with their taxes. Even those who send their kids to private school. Even those with no kids. Is that socialism, too?

Every American has a right to an education. Don't they have a right see a doctor when they're sick?

Why is there no outcry over public schools? What, is there no educational-industrial complex desperate to protect their bottom line whipping up opposition to public schools at a grassroots level, hoping the noise drowns out the logic?

Oh, there isn't?

Never mind, then.

- TH

(My next post is going to be about Spider-Man. Relax yourself.)

Writing about Writing

2009-09-27T19:04:00.000-04:00

When I was a young lad of 19 or so, my writing teacher at St. Joseph's College, Louise Rose, assigned her class to write a poem. I hated poetry. Hated reading it, hated writing it. (I appreciate it, now, a great deal more, as a teacher, but I still don't write it.) So I found myself forced, FORCED, to write a poem. Can you imagine? The audacity! What did I do? Forever the snark, I wrote a poem about how I couldn't think of anything to write a poem about. Oh, how clever I was! How witty! How very "meta"!

I read the poem in class. I grinned like a cat. I was cut down with four very simply stated words: "Never write about writing." Why? It was further explained to me that nobody wanted to read a writer's self-indulgent ruminations on craft. Audiences simply want to read what a writer has to write, and not worry about how a writer wrote that writing. It's all about keeping the Wizard behind the curtain, I suppose. We lose the magic if we're shown the trick.

"Never write about writing". For some reason, some ill-defined reason, that stuck with me. It's the sort of advice that doesn't fly much anymore, to be honest. Now, of course, we live in a world where audiences are routinely taken behind the curtain, and shown not only the wizard, but where he lives, where he sleeps, and what it was he ate for breakfast. You can behind the scenes at your favorite TV show on the network's website, you can listen to screenwriters and filmmakers on the DVD commentary tracks, and get liner notes and other "Behind the Music" content from your favorite band courtesy of iTunes 9.0 But still, I am beholden to that early rule, chained to it through some Catholic schoolboy's unbreakable instinct to do what the teacher says (I was, mostly, the well-behaved kid in Catholic school.)

Yet here I am, a writer, writing a blog. Odds are that at some point I will write about writing. Maybe I'll write about the development of a new draft of "The Unlikely Adventure of Race McCloud, Private Eye", or about my efforts to adapt that play into a novel. Or I'll write a little piece on "Writing in a Vacuum", a collection of my short work I'm putting together... which I also just realized breaks Louise Rose's "never write about writing" rule. I'll write about "Just Debbie", the screenplay-formerly-known-as "The Girl Next Door", or about that as-of-yet untitled baseball play inspired by my cursed existence as a Mets fan... odds are those things will all pop up at one time or another. I suppose that, like many a Catholic school student before me, I have difficultly practicing what I've been preached.

I still hate writing poetry, though.

- TH

Remember when...

2009-09-26T01:16:00.000-04:00

... you were a kid and being sick was awesome? You know you're a grown-up when being sick just makes you think of all the productivity being lost.

But I still managed to post up four blog entries in two days. Who's cool now?

- TH

What the Mets should do for 2010.

2009-09-24T22:47:00.000-04:00

First of all, they should not suck. An impossible task, perhaps, but...

I have the masochistic tendency to give my allegiance to sport teams that are perennial losers, the Mets and the Jets. Today I'll speak about the Mets, because A.) the Jets look pretty good right now, although let's be honest, we're all just waiting for the other shoe to drop, and B.) truth be told, I know a whooooole lot more about baseball than I do about football, and C.) since I'm not lucky enough to be a Yankees fan, I'm spending a whole lot of time these days wondering what, exactly, the Mets should to to be competitive again next year.

Now, we're going to make a few assumptions here. We're going to assume that the Mets can't add a whole lot of payroll. Why? Because Bernie Madoff is a douchebag, that's why. We're also going to assume that the plague of Moses (that might be incorrect; I'm sure there was something about a plague somewhere in the Bible) isn't going to strike down every member of the team again. So my thoughts here assume that Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran, David Wright, Johan Santana, John Maine, Oliver Perez, your mom, her mom, and everyone else's mom are all going to be... relatively healthy next year. A dangerous assumption, I know. This was a season of, "if it can go wrong, it will go wrong", and we're again assuming that next season can't bring more of the same. So, here's a few thoughts on what the Mets might do to be not horrendously embarrassing next season.

1.) Don't let Omar Minaya speak in public anymore. The man can't string two sentences together. This is not because he is Latino. There are plenty of well-spoken Latinos (see: Carlos Delgado). He just simply can not speak. It's humiliating to listen to his press conferences. I could give a better press conference on behalf of the Mets.

2.) Make no trades that involve giving up prospects. I don't care who the prospects are, if it's some 30 year old single A pinch hitter, don't trade him. The Mets system is devoid of talent. No more trading away 3 or 4 players for 1 mediocre would-be "star". At least not this offseason.

3.) Sign a big-time left-fielder. The two names that spring to mind are Jason Bay or Matt Holliday, or if their club options are declined, Carl Crawford or Jermaine Dye. My offseason plan for the Mets includes this as their one big free-agent expenditure, and since they went all of 2009 without anyone to play LF, it seems fairly obvious to me that they should go ahead and get themselves a LF. They may have to overpay a little bit to get a slugger to come play at Citi Field, but then that's what they do. They need legit offensive production, and that's the position they have the best opening at. Now, you may say, "wait, their best prospect is a LF, Fernando Martinez". Well, until F-Mart (and do guys who have proven nothing really deserve the A-Rodding of their name?)... until he proves that he can stay healthy at double A, I certainly don't trust him to be anything in the bigs.

4.) Don't sign a free-agent first-baseman. You keep Daniel Murphy at 1B, which I know a lot of Met fans holler and scream about as he did not have a great year. Well, he started very nicely, his defense in LF was horrible, he sat for about a month, he moved to 1B, he's been a decent defender there, and his production in August and September has been very good. Remember, this is a guy who never played in triple A ball; he jumped straight from double A to the majors. There were bound to be growing pains. Besides, he's incredibly cost effective and will likely give you similar production to the very lackluster list of free agent 1B out there. In fact, the only FA 1B I'd even consider signing... is Carlos Delgado (in a cheap, incentive-laden deal, of course.) Also, the one bright spot in the Mets farm system seems to be heavy-hitting 1B Ike Davis. Why sign a mediocre guy for millions of dollars when the only power-hitting prospect you have plays the same position? Besides, if Murphy proves to be part of the winning formula, you trade Davis. Or if Murphy fails (again), then you promote Davis, and move Murphy into a utility role. Or you could sign Delgado to a 1-year incentive deal. But no more than that.

5.) Don't sign John Lackey. It's tempting, I know. But consider this: Lackey is the only FA pitcher in this 2010 class that's anything close to a number 1/number 2 starter, unless you're counting Rich Harden (injury risk, coming off of a bad year), or Ben Sheets (hurt more than he plays.) The Mets don't want either of those two guys, and Lackey was hurt himself this past year, AND because he's the only legit #1/#2 guy out there for the spending, the market will likely blow up on him. Consider, though, the list of potential SP FA for NEXT year: Josh Beckett, Jon Garland, Roy Halladay, Tim Hudson, Cliff Lee, Javier Vazquez, Brandon Webb. Odds are not all of them hit FA, but some of them do. Save your money for that group... and if the team is contending in mid-2010, then you can probably even trade for a member of that group.

6.) Sign Jason Marquis, Randy Wolf, and/or Joel Pineiro. Let's not be naive: the Mets need more pitching. Odds are one of these three can be had at a reasonable market value, like the fantastic deal Omar managed to swing for K-Rod. You don't let them price themselves as #1/#2 pitchers, and if they do, you walk away. No point making the Oliver Perez mistake again. Getting one of these guys at market value is smart baseball. Maybe you don't get yourself that second stud in the rotation until the 2011 season, but then maybe it's time for the Mets to shed that "win now" mentality and start thinking long-term. (Marquis would be my choice of these three; he's a workhorse.)

7.) Don't sign a veteran catcher to more than a 1-year deal. Why not? Because Josh Thole will probably be ready for full-time duties by 2011. Either way, if he's the future at the position, he needs to be on the big-league roster next year... although I suppose some would argue he'd be better off getting triple A at-bats in 2010. Look, if the Mets went into 2010 with a platoon at catcher of Thole and Omir Santos, I'd be okay with that. Not every catcher is Piazza, and if you have a catcher who calls a good game, blocks the plate, and hits around .300, you're in good shape. (BTW, also a free agent next year? Victor Martinez. Just sayin'.)

8.) Keep Luis Castillo. Look, the contract is still terrible, and that's one of the reasons you keep him: nobody will take the contract. Truth is, he's had a very solid year this year. If you trade him, you're either eating the whole contract or you're taking back somebody else's terrible contract. Probably both. At this point trading him is probably more trouble than it's worth, and besides... the dropped pop-up aside, he's had a good year. (And Orlando Hudson, every Met fan's favorite "second basemen we shoulda had", has been terrible in the 2nd half to the point where he's almost lost his job.)

9.) Sign Jeff Francouer to an extension. Why? 'Cause if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The Mets have enough to worry about without creating a problem that doesn't exist in RF, so just offer Frenchy a contract and move on with the offseason. If he gets greedy, let him walk, but be fair. Personally, I like him a lot, he's young, got a bunch of potential, and he's been the team's best RBI guy since he got here.

10.) Fill bench/bullpen spots with young/inexpensive players. Why pay a veteran 1 or 2 million dollars when a young guy costs a quarter of the price for almost the same production? One of the most overrated "intangibles" in baseball is "veteran leadership". You should pay millions of dollars because a guy has been around for a long, long, long, long time. Julio Franco's experience and Alex Cora's wisdom are not worth the lack of production they bring at 2 million dollars a pop.

11.) Keep Omar and Jerry. Jerry's a lame-duck anyway. If 2010 is another dud, he's gone no matter what. Omar? Well, I'm not going to tell the Wilpons to eat 4 million dollars they haven't eaten started paying yet. I wouldn't if I were them. Besides, let's be fair: this year was a bust, and somebody else has to speak for the organization because Omar can't give press conferences, but he has had the team competitive every year he's been here. Nobody was complaining about the farm system when the entire roster of regulars weren't getting hurt or when he traded for Johan Santana. He should be on notice, absolutely, but I'd give him another chance to fix this Mess.

12.) In light of recent news... get a legit back-up MI, and be willing to pay for it. Marco Scutaro, Felipe Lopez, and Jerry Hairston Jr. are all FA and can play both SS and 2B.

So, my suggestions aren't radical. They're cost-effective and keep much of this year's roster intact. And most Mets fans/media types may scoff at them. But they're level-headed and look to the future beyond 2010. Not that anybody would listen to me. The best we can do, Mets fans, is cross our fingers and hope the Mets don't become the Knicks.

Award Shows A la carte

2009-09-24T13:31:00.000-04:00

I've determined that I have little interest in entertainment awards shows anymore, as the places where I seek out my own entertainment are so diverse, and I sample such a little bit from each particular medium, that an awards show honoring the best in TV, for example, is both too limited (I like more than just TV) and too broad (I don't like or watch EVERYthing that's on TV) for my tastes. I'm not saying I'm eclectic, or superior, or even discerning. I'm just saying that I know what I like, and I'll go to whatever storytelling medium I have to go to in order to find it.

So if I were to put together my own awards show to honor the stuff I had liked over the course of the year, some of the categories would have to look like this:

Best Movie based on a Comic Book

Best Video Game released by Nintendo

Marvel Comics Artist of the Year

Marvel Comics Writer of the Year

Marvel Comics Title of the Year

Best Anything written by Brian Bendis

Best Anything written by Peter David

Best YouTube Video

Best SNL Skit of the Year

Best Guest Spot on SNL (aka "The Justin Timberlake Award for SNL Excellence")

Best on Hulu

Best Episode of Broken Pixels (http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3158497)

Best Performance by a Member of the NY Mets (when applicable)

Best Young Adult Series of Adventure Novels That Has Clearly Only Been Published Because Harry Potter Was So Successful

The Harry Potter Award (given each year to J.K. Rowling for having created the best thing ever)

Best Thing I Discovered This Year That Had Been Discovered By Everyone Else At Least Three Years Prior

Best Musical

Best Show on the Food Network between Midnight and 3am

Best Facebook Post of the Year (My friends only)

Least Irritating Show on Noggin

Best Thread on the iFanboy Forums @ Rev3

Best Issue of Ultimate Spider-Man

Best Animated Film of the Year (aka The Pixar Award)

Best Musical Number on "Glee"

Best Play I Read This Year

... and so on and so forth. There's probably more. What did I realize when compiling this list? 1.) I haven't watched a series on TV on a regular basis since "Friends" was cancelled... unless you count SNL, and unless you count "Glee", which I already missed episode 3 of. 2.) Going to the movies is such a rare occasion for Jaime and I that I can weigh in on them with absolutely no authority, and have little opinion of what "The Best" of the year are. 3.) When we go to Broadway, we see musicals. That's it. Jaime usually chooses. Anyone surprised? Anyone? No? Okay.

- TH

What's in a name?

2009-09-24T13:05:00.000-04:00

So I wanted a blog. I went to Blogger and I started one. That came with all sorts of difficult decisions, like... what do I call my blog? I was going to call it "I Want A Blog", but I had a feeling that title was probably already taken somewhere. So I decided to call my blog "Ploopet" instead. What's "Ploopet"? It's the made-up security "word" that Blogger asked me to type into the little box to make sure I'm not some spamming bot. So... Ploopet. It's as good a name as any, I think.

- TH