| What a Week! (or two) |
| Thursday, 28 June 2007 | |
 Because I only work on this site part-time I don't always have time to add stories as they come along. So, now that my day job has filtered off slightly (I just finished the rough cut of the DVD I've been working on), I have time to go back and take a look at the stories and news that have interested me in the past week or two. This week I focus my dry sarcasm on Disney, my favorite comics, and a TV series that makes me want to fly over to the UK and crack some skulls open. Film: It's about damn time, Disney.http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2007-06-21/ Ding dong, the witch is dead! Disney has finally decided that creating a decent product is more important than milking the youth of America for every cent they have and have halted all production on their "Direct-to-DVD" features. The announcement comes on the heels of Steve Jobs and John Lasseters first viewing of "The Tinkerbell Movie", another craptastic regurgitation from DisneyToonStudios. Later, Lasseter complained to Disney chief Robert Iger that the movie was "virtually unwatchable." Wow. Finally someone says what I've been thinking for the past six years. This decision has been met with great fanfare and rejoicing among animation fans, who have watched the good name of Walt Disney dragged through the mud over the last decade as Disney became synonymous with "money grubbing merchandise whore". Unfortunately this decision comes too late to stop such "classics" as "Lion King 13: Simba's Great Great Grand-Nephew Once Removed", "The Emperors New Hernia", and my own personal favorite, "Stupid Pointless Movie About a Random Background Character In A Previous Movie That We Only Made Because We Already Made Four Sequels and Still Haven't Completely Tapped Out the Market." That one was great. Comics: YeahButWha?Another recent announcement that rocked my world was that in upcoming months, they are cancelling two of my favorite Spiderman series, Spectacular Spiderman and Friendly Neighborhood Spiderman. After the current "One More Day" storyline wraps up, all of the current Spiderman titles will end and be merged into the current Amazing Spiderman series, which will kick off the next story arc titled "Brand New Day".  Do you feel lucky, punk? On one hand, I'm going to miss the three different storylines. A superhero like Spiderman is never really tackling ONLY one thing at a time. On the other hand, the title will still be released three times a month, so fans probably won't feel like they're missing anything. Back on the first hand, less time between comics mean that either a)we'll get different writers and artists each issue, or b)the writers and artists will have less time per issue. Never a good thing. On the other side, with the focus being on one single title, they should be able to take the storyline much further in a short time and really delve into a single arc. I don't know. I guess only time will tell if this was a good move for Marvel or not. Television: Curse of the Cancelled ShowI am so very, very tired of finding a TV series that I like, only to find out that it's now no longer on the air. Case in point: My current favorite show, Life On Mars. If you haven't heard of it, it's a series from the UK about a police chief in 2006 that gets struck by a car while on a case and wakes up in 1973 in the exact same district. Dumb premise, right? WRONG, because they don't use the time travel aspect lightly. The hero, Sam Tyler, isn't sure if he's insane, if he really traveled back in time, or if he's in a coma in 2006, and this is all just a figment of his imagination. There are Lost-like moments where you can't really tell what's going on. He has strange dreams and flashbacks. He hears people in 2006 talking over him amidst hospital noises and beeping life-support machines. To top it off, the show masters characterization in a manner rare for television. Each person on the show is unique, fresh, atypical yet familiar. The district chief in 1973, DCI Hunt, seems like a total asshole at first, but throughout the series you come to like him, hell, even respect him. He's a rough-hewn kind of person, always ready to throw a punch or toss his weight around, but at the same time you see that he only does it out of a well-disciplined respect for justice. The interplay between him and Tyler is classic as old school "round up the hooligans and beat a confession out of them" meets new school "have forensics work up a profile and narrow the suspects logically". They're the yin to each other's yang. The stories are well crafted. For instance, in one episode in season one, we're given a standard "ticking bomb" plot. Sam has one of his surreal experiences where he hears people talking over him, saying that at 2 o'clock, his body will be taken off of life support. Surprisingly, he's also faced with a crazed gunman who has taken hostages at the local newpaper, who also threatens to kill someone at exactly 2pm. Sam, convinced they're connected, is fighting to save the hostages, but also to save himself. Then, at one point, DCI Hunt is shot by the gunman. Remarkably, he survives because the bullet hits the flask in his suit pocket. Typical, right? I mean, how many times have we seen that happen? A person just miraculously avoids death because something just happens to be in his pocket. Bad writing, yeah? Here's the kicker: While everyone stands and gawks in amazement at his "miraculous" luck, DCI Hunt, ever the alcoholic alpha male, sheepishly empties his pockets, revealing four other flasks of varying content. The man is a walking bullet proof vest of booze. The writers take a typical situation, and give it a unique spin. Then, after finishing the first series (or season, as we say here in America) I went looking for the second series, only to find out that it came to a halting conclusion in the finale. Apparently, the writers only prepared for two series, and decided to just go ahead and end it. I haven't seen the second series finale yet, but from what I've heard, they left it open for interpretation. Why does this happen to so many good shows? Nothing is more dissapointing than getting into a show just to find out that you have no hope of ever getting answers. This is why Lost was dragging earlier this year. People need to know that it will all get sorted out. And what's worse is that they've recently announced that they will NOT be bringing it back for a third season, instead replacing it with a sequel of sorts that takes place in the 80s, with a female main character having been transported to the past after an accident. Lame. I'm reminded, in a way, of Quantum Leap. When it was good, it was great, when it was terrible it was godawful bad. But it slowly came down to the series finale and what do we get? Nothing. No definitive explanation about why he was there, and only a black screen with white text that says he was never heard from again. WTF? I hope that current shows are taking notice. Oh well, back to the daily grind. Comments? Thoughts? Post them below and let me know! Comments (0)
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