I just found out that Dollhouse is a goner. In a way that's too bad, because I do like my Whedon, but this season has been pretty weak (really weak up until this latest episode). It feels like they didn't know what to do with the show once it got renewed. The first season, it was really creepy and cool when it was revealed that the Dolls weren't really the way they were supposed to be, and there was a serious possibility that they could get killed for it. But now not only does the viewer know this already, but all the adversaries of the Dolls have been neutralized in one way or another, so there's a lot less suspense and interest there, and the show hasn't really been moving forward to create new kinds of suspense and interest.

This is Whedon, though, so probably he will pull it together in some really awesome fashion just as the show is canceled. Ah, well.

Current Mood: sleepy

I just finished the first season of Veronica Mars. Hm. It's still a good show, but (and maybe this is because I totally spoiled myself by reading the Television Without Pity recaps for the season) watching cable and British shows does make me feel like the standard American television season is just too long. It's like, it's this pretty straightforward murder mystery, and it moves along pretty well, but the 87,543,673rd time Veronica asks, Who killed Lilly Kane? Was it YOU!?! I feel like the show is kind of spinning its wheels. Plus, some transitions just felt a little weird: The way the whole Kane family interacted didn't seem to jibe with what you find out about them, and Logan saying thing like "I just want to protect you"--I mean, please. What, he has two speeds, Smart Ass and Harlequin Romance? I suppose it's supposed to sound utterly fake so that Veronica can ask, Who killed Lilly Kane? Was it LOGAN!?! but it just seems sloppy.

The season finale takes a lot of its visual language from horror movies, and it's gotten a lot of criticism for being too derivative. What bothered me about it was that all of a sudden Veronica--a girl who usually travels with a taser and a humongous pit bull--is transformed into this helpless blond in a horror movie who is incapable of doing anything other than screaming, being chased, and getting caught by the bad guy. I guess I'm just too used to Whedon, but come on--you can't subvert that trope just a little bit? Not even for a character who always--always--has something up her sleeve?

Current Mood: thoughtful

I decided to watch one episode--just one!--of the final season of The Shield before I go to bed.

Aaaaand as I start the fourth episode, I think it's a good thing I don't have to get up early tomorrow, isn't it?

Current Mood: groggy

The CSA box came today, so I made the Tuscan soup with carrot greens for supper. And I am still alive and typing this, lo, these many hours later, so apparently it's not deadly poison. The soup is good, mainly because of the garlic, but the greens themselves are pretty bitter--I'll try either the scramble or greens-fried-with-bacon the next time I get carrots, and we'll see how those taste.

I can tell that Aunt Flo is going to be visiting soon because I am RAVENOUS. I slept in late, so I had a late breakfast, and then I was hungry around the normal lunch time, so I had lunch. Then I was FAMISHED when I picked up the CSA box around 3:30, so I went to McDonald's and got a McNuggets extra-value meal at the drive-thru (the irony of doing so while my passenger seat contained a box marked with slogans like "Make Organic Produce The Heart Of Every Meal" and "Farm Fresh Healthy Food for Families" and "Don't Panic--It's Organic!" was not lost on me). Then I had the bowl of soup, and then a ham sandwich as a late-night snack. Seriously, that's like 50% more food than I eat on a normal day, and that's not even taking into account the amount of calories in McNuggets and fries.

I didn't do any freelancing, because I felt like doing some yard work and reading a book instead. Ordinarily that wouldn't be such a problem, but I just looked at my schedule for the rest of the week and realized that I'm kind of screwed. It's probably OK--whenever I apologize for something being late, they always inform me that I am way ahead of them.

Regan is finally perking up again--she had her shots yesterday, and like Finnegan, she gets miserable afterward. Finnegan has decided that he likes the kitten's turkey kibble; this after indicating that he would rather eat his own poop than eat the stuff. I put it in his bowl, and he ate it, so he means it. The tuna kibble, in contrast, he likes only if he gets to steal it from Regan's bowl--he's a jealous fool.

I also watched disc 1 of season 1 of Veronica Mars. That's a show I tried to get into when it first aired, but I really couldn't. Eventually I wound up reading the Television Without Pity recaps, and some of the things that bothered me about the show (e.g. Veronica's deeply vengeful attitude toward her "enemies") were dealt with in a satisfying way. So I watched the first four episodes in one sitting--honestly, I think in some ways that's a better way to watch a show than one episode, and a week goes by, and then the next episode. It just kind of flows better, and I really enjoyed the show and thought it was very good. Funny, huh?

Current Mood: tired

Yeah, that title's one of those jokes that's so "in," chances are good that only I will get it. We used to call Spanish "es-PAG-nol" because that's how the French word for Spanish is spelled. When properly pronounced, it does sound very much like "espanol," complete with the appropriate "ny" sound that I don't know how to do the accent for.

Anyway, I'm curious. Does it bother anyone else when, in movies or television shows, someone says something very simple in Spanish (right now it's "Agua!" delivered in the tone you use when pleading unsuccessfully for your life, because I am watching No Country for Old Men, and I get the feeling it's the kind of movie where we start with 50 characters and end up with one), and the other character repeats it in English ("I ain't got no water," later further clarified for the truly Spanish-impaired as, "I ain't got no agua").

I find it patronizing. It seems like the director and writer are assuming that white people are all both utterly ignorant and dumb as dirt. (Don't get me started on the ER episode where a Spanish-speaking patient tells George Clooney, very carefully and very slowly, that his daughter had once had an ear infection (that's the horribly confusing word "infeccion," plus he was pointing at his ear), and Clooney--whose character, if I recall correctly, was supposed to be intelligent enough to breathe and excrete and whatnot--thought the fellow was telling him that his daughter had received all her vaccinations.) I mean, even if you're like me and proved in college that you could never, ever learn Spanish because you learned French first and the two are just close enough to really fuck you up, you know "agua." (And any moron could figure out "infeccion"--please.) I don't ever remember not knowing what "agua" meant. I probably learned it from Sesame Street, and nowadays there's Dragon Tales and Dora the Explorer--for Christ's sake, my father has never taken Spanish, and he was able to understand his Spanish-speaking patients just fine. (Talking to them was another matter, but he could understand what they said.)

I prefer what they do on The Shield. People speak Spanish. The good detectives also speak Spanish (theirs is a Spanish-speaking neighborhood); the lousy detectives don't. There's no translation unless it's really complicated, and in that case someone just offers a quick translation at the end to whatever drooling idiot is standing around--there's no line-by-line repetition in English. The attitude seems to be, if you can't keep up, you're probably not bright enough to be watching the show--and you know, I can respect that.

Current Mood: annoyed

Since I got my work done, and the house is as clean as I'm going to get it before my parents come tomorrow (read: Not really that clean, but you won't catch anything), and the cat has decided to crawl out from under the sofa and not to die, I've been gorging on Dollhouse DVD extras.

I'm kind of having that thing about it that drives me crazy when people did it to, say, my book proposal--I've forgotten how good a show it is. I keep going, Oh, yeah, that's right, that episode was GREAT!

But there's an extra episode on there, "Epitaph One," that takes place in the future. At first I thought, OK, they're saying that this is a possible future, but in the commentary they certainly make it sound like this is definitely where the show is going to go. ( In that case, it's really a enormous spoiler. )

The original pilot was interesting to watch. It basically zoomed way ahead with some of the plot lines, and I think it actually helped the show to back things up and slow stuff down. (In other words, I don't think scrapping it was a HORRIBLE idea the way scrapping "Serenity" was.) They reused a lot of it in later episodes, but in at least one point you think it's something they used in a later episode, but they actually went in a whole other direction with it, so it managed to be entertaining even to someone who had seen all the episodes.

They talk about Caroline and Echo as though they are two different people, which they really are, which is really weird when you think about it. It makes me think about the yogic notion of self--that once you strip away all your thoughts and emotions and memories and ambitions and hang-ups, underneath all that (you know, your entire personality) is the essential you. So, Echo is sort of like the essential Caroline, except that she's having a whole new slew of experiences that are in fact affecting her. It's interesting to think about, anyway. It also means that if or when Caroline gets her body back, Echo will essentially die....

It's a little painful to hear Joss Whedon reflect back on Firefly as just being this horrible experience. I mean, I'm sure it was quite awful for him, but it was a truly great show and a truly great movie, and I'm sorry that he thinks of it as being this purely negative thing. Of course, yesterday I heard an interview with Van Morrison on NPR in which he describes Astral Weeks in just those terms--he got ripped off, he was treated horribly, the whole thing was so bad that he just blocked those songs out of his memory, etc. So I guess there's not always a strong connection between how pleasant something is for its creator and how good the piece of art actually is.

Current Mood: thoughtful

I just finished watching Avatar: The Last Airbender, and it ends very well, thank you, and I really enjoyed the show. So much so, that now that the threat of being spoiled is over, I went to Wikipedia to read a little about how it came about.

And they're going to do a movie. And it's going to suck. How do I know this?

1. It's going to be live action.
2. It's directed by M. Night Shyamalan.

Honestly--couldn't they at least have gotten a real director? (OK. Maybe--maybe--the fact that he has to work from someone else's material will help rein in Shyamalan's worst impulses. It worked with Michael Mann and The Insider. But I am not optimistic.)

ETA: And looking at that teaser trailer for the movie--oh, boy. Some concepts (like being able to control the wind) just work so much better visually as animation. I mean, it doesn't look very interesting when it's just some kid waving around a stick and occasionally blowing out candles, does it? Whereas it's really exciting when it's artwork. (That link is to a non-spoilery fan vid--the show has great fights.)

Current Mood: distressed

Some of the high-school kids I used to work with were talking up Avatar: The Last Airbender one day--basically discussing how they had become completely addicted to the show, their lives would never be the same, etc. So I popped it in my Netflix queue, not really expecting great things, because we are talking about a pair of slightly hyper, 15- or 16-year-old boys here.

Well, I'm most of the way through the second season (there are three), and OH MY GOD. I am completely addicted. My life will never be the same. Seriously, it's very well done--great action, funny, and while the emotional issues are typically couched in childish terms (anyone need a hug?), there is a lot there that feels real.

I think I'm going to buy it for my nephew for his birthday/Christmas. Some of it may be a little old for him, but he'll grow into it, and I think the adults will like it.

Oh, the cat has been feeling crappy after he got a shot at the vet, but he's feeling better now. Know how I can tell? I was woken up by "Meow! Meow! Meow!" and that has pretty much continued nonstop throughout the day....

Current Mood: pleased

I just finished off the fifth season of The L Word, and I was so annoyed with what they've done to the character of Jenny Schecter in the fourth and fifth seasons that I looked her up on Wikipedia and spoiled myself for the sixth. And I won't spoil you, but I'll just say that it doesn't sound like she is redeemed in some Faith-like fashion (and wasn't that always the miracle of Whedon, that he can have characters really just go past the point of no return, and then somehow manage to pull them back in again).

I'm really disappointed with the character's arc, which pretty much winds up right in the toilet--she becomes this utterly loathsome individual who you cannot possibly feel any sympathy for. In the first three seasons, Schecter was always flawed, somewhat unstable, and I'll admit, a little snotty and obnoxious, but she was never this cartoon--she was someone who tried to do the right thing in spite of all her problems. But in the fourth and especially the fifth season any effort at balance or subtlety has just been left by the wayside, and she's completely, 100% horrible. It's really unfortunate, because she winds up in opposition to people who are also pretty wretched, and the viewer basically has no one to root for--if you don't care what happens to her, all her storylines are just excruciating and dull.

I honestly wonder what was going on in the writers' room. What happens to the character is so bad, and so not-helpful to the show, that it seriously makes me wonder if the actress who plays her is just this complete cunt. My other theory is that Schecter is basically an Anti-Sue--she's a writer, and she has a lot of the personality problems that writers often have. I wonder if the writers began to parody their own flaws with Schecter, and did that some more, and finally just made her a compendium of all their worst faults, writ LARGE.

Current Mood: disappointed

It's not like I'm wildly pro-gun or anything--I've never owned one, and I don't plan to--but it kind of drives me nuts how in every television show, whenever someone decides to buy a gun for protection, the loaded gun always--always--magically winds up in the hands of a child. Always, always, always, always.

Couldn't something else bad happen? Couldn't someone just stupidly shoot themselves in the ass, like in 8 Mile? Or couldn't the person just get bummed out and impuslively commit suicide? That's how most gun deaths (and most suicides) happen--not because little Timmy finds a loaded Smith & Wesson under the bed.

Current Mood: bored

I'm watching the fifth season of The L Word, and at this point during the sex scenes I am mainly struck by the fact that lesbians apparently wear much nicer underwear than I ever have. And you can't judge a book by its cover! Even the ones that look slovenly or butch on the outside are wearing elaborate lace get-ups underneath.

ETA: And I know you have to expect it because Showtime(!!!!) feels obligated to live up to its name, but honest to Pete, there is just too damned much sex in The L Word. I don't object to the explicitness of it; I object to the fact that it takes up so much damned time. A typical show goes: Person A is happy to see Person B, so there are ten solid minutes of them taking their clothes off, the foreplay, and the climax. But Person B is also sleeping with Person C, so there's another ten solid minutes of them taking their clothes off, the foreplay, and the climax. Then Person D and Person E are talking about A/B/C situation, but since D & E are a couple, we simply must have ten solid minutes of them taking their clothes off, the foreplay, and the climax. Seriously, it gets old. I feel like it would be so much more powerful if they reserved the lengthy, explicit sex scenes for the sexual encounters that are really important and meaningful, rather than sprinkling them evenly throughout the script because they're clearly on some kind of quota system.

Queer as Folk was just as bad, if not worse. Gale Howard was obviously under some kind of contractual obligation to appear naked in every single episode, even when Brian was not, in fact, having sex with anyone (which did occasionally happen). His nudity was so reliable that to this day I feel vaguely cheated when I see him on some other show and he doesn't take all his clothes off.

Current Mood: amused

When you're majorly spoiled for something, and it's awesome anyway. Dollhouse rocks, y'all.

Current Mood: pleased

When they have shots of actresses breast-feeding babies, where the baby is clearly latched on and suckling for dear life, and I presume the actress didn't just recently have a baby and is now lactating, how do they do that? Do they CGI the actress' face onto someone else's body? Or does the actress simply whip it out and stick it into the mouth of some unrelated child, hoping that they get enough footage before the baby realizes it's a fake-out and throws a fit?

I am really curious about this one. Seriously, I may have to consult The Answer B!tch.

Current Mood: curious

You know, some things that people make a HUGE deal out of, actually are THAT good. Yosemite, for one. Niagara Falls, for another. The Sopranos, for a third.

I know this is on par with my news flash that Verdi wrote some nice bits to sing, but for all the nonsensical hype, and all the truth to the fact that other shows are just as good and don't get hyped so much, the fact remains that The Sopranos is a really, really good show. Like a Whedon show, it's not like every episode (or every season) is utterly perfect, but the highs are HIGH--so much higher than anything else--that it's worthwhile. When you invest time in this show, it does indeed pay off at the end.

And for me, personally? It's the fact that I covered New Jersey as a reporter, so there are specific things that I get. When they were in the Pinelands (formerly known, before wetlands were deemed desirable by the EPA, as the Pine Barrens)? And one person says, "Come on. [We can't be hideously lost in the wilderness, just like those kids in The Blair Witch Project.] We're New Jersey," and the other (utterly panicked) replies, "We're in SOUTH Jersey!!!" I GOT it. I got what SOUTH Jersey means to people who live in North Jersey (think: The rape scene in Deliverance. Plus pretty much the entirety of The Blair Witch Project). I also got that they didn't actually film it in the Pinelands, because I was there (covering the cranberries, of course, because the EPA won't let anything else happen there), and it doesn't look like that.

And when the Meadowlands (formerly known as the Great Swamp) are being much abused in the final season? I know what that means. And I know that it won't stay buried....

Current Mood: excited

OK, I'm getting a serious love on for Dollhouse. Right now I'm watching the beginning of the latest episode, and they've managed to make the simple line, "You make people different" into something really unnerving--it's the context that makes it work, what it represents regarding a certain character's understanding of her world.

The line reminds me of Charles Stross' book, The Atrocity Archives. In that book, the line "We are here" is burned in my memory as something truly frightening. Again, it's the context that makes it work: The scene is comical and light, and then suddenly turns very dark indeed--one of these Ha-ha-ha-ha-OH MY GOD!-type things.

Current Mood: pleased

One of the semi-positive legacies I have from being raised by a boxing fan/former wrestler who periodically tuned us kids up is that I understand fighting--what kinds of hits actually hurt people and what is a waste of time. Now, in real life, a good fight is a bad fight, because people get hurt. So, for example when I witnessed a truly pathetic, utterly stupid street brawl in NYC (it was a completely pointless fight that either party could have easily avoided; one was armed with a large chain, and the other with a steering-wheel club, but both walked away), I was both very relieved that no one went to the hospital and very annoyed that no one went to the hospital.

But in fiction, hey, you can just enjoy a good fight, because no one's getting hurt! (One of my favorite Angel quotes is, "Come on guys, violence never solved anything. Although it is entertaining.") And one thing I like about Whedon is that his fights often are very well thought out (especially when he can't rely on super-Slayer powers). So, when you've got teeny-tiny River taking out great big Jayne in Serenity (at the 1:09 mark), it goes: grab the groin, elbow to nose, metal tray to groin, metal tray to nose. Honestly, if you ever had to take someone the size of Adam Baldwin out, that sort of groin-focused attack would pretty much be your only chance.

This week's Dollhouse has a great fight--well, actually a number of great fights, because Agent Ballard kicks all kinds of ass. But the fight I'm interested in doesn't involve him. ( And come to think of it, it's a HUGE spoiler. So go get caught up on the show (it's on Hulu), and then read this. )

It did annoy me when Echo didn't take the groin shot here at the 43:17 mark though--she totally could have stomped that guy's face or groin once they were on the ground. OK, maybe her four fictional Republican brothers taught her to Fight Like a Man (i.e. to rely on upper-body strength rather than the lower body, and to never, ever hit below the belt--these are good techniques only if you want the man to win the fight). But given that the guy was bow-hunting her, and that repeatedly punching him in the face with her fists did nothing effective (see what happens when you rely on the upper body?), I was hoping she would be able to think outside the box.

Current Mood: impressed

Obviously I am a huge dork for Joss Whedon, so of course I am watching Dollhouse. And I am watching it the way I watch Whedon--twice. I watch it, and then I watch it again, because I need that second viewing to really absorb what he's doing.

And certainly with this particular show (and I am not the only one who thinks so), it is benefiting from a second viewing--I'm currently watching the third episode for the second time, and the stuff that seemed really contrived the first time around now appears much more seamless, because there actually is foreshadowing, but it's subtle enough that I didn't get it the first time around.

So, you know, I'm having a good time here. But (as is the case with other shows) I really doubt that this is the sort of thing that helps boost ratings.

The upside? Since I don't have a Nielsen box, watching it on Hulu is actually better for everyone, now that they sell ads there. (Yes, they've finally figured out how to monetize the way I actually watch stuff.)

Current Mood: contemplative

Friday night some people from my new department were having a party, so I went. It was fun, although once again I'm struck by how oddly anti-social Seattle parties can be--we basically played Rock Band all night long, which meant there was little opportunity for actual conversation. I'm sure a big part of it was that these people all know each other quite well already, but I would have liked to get the chance to get to know them all better.

Anyway, I didn't get to bed until the wee hours of the morning, and then I woke up around noon. And then I got caught up reading Christopher Moore's Island of the Sequined Love Nun last night, so I didn't get to bed until the wee hours of the morning, and then I woke up around noon today. I have to put a stop to this soon, because my body will very quickly adjust to being nocturnal, and then I'll be a zombie when I have to teach.

I'm teaching only one day this week because most of the schools are on break, so I'd like to work on Trang. Yesterday was a proper day off (I read the Moore book, watched Dollhouse, and worked out), but today I'd like to be a little more productive.

Current Mood: awake

You know what was nice about the series finale of The Wire? I'm not going to spoil anything here, but I will note that in some cases, things ended well, and in some cases, they ended fairly. In some cases things went very badly, however, and in some cases they weren't fair at all. It was nice because it wasn't predictable.

I was thinking about this because I saw Wall-E last night, and of course, Ratatouille today, and although both were, as advertised, very good children's movies, both ended predictably enough happily-happily-HAPPILY! That got me thinking about such films, and how really the only difference between a horror movie and a thriller is that a horror movie always ends with evil triumphant and a thriller ends with the good guys alive and kicking, suggesting to me that both kinds of movies should all be lumped together in a single "horror/thriller" category in order to prevent spoilers. So after all that, it was nice to see something that wasn't all Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, minus the self-awareness.

Current Mood: satisfied

Before I watch that very last episode of The Wire, I want to share some (non-spoilery) thoughts on Marlo, who is the villainous drug lord of seasons 4-5.

Marlo is one of these very emotionally-controlled characters (as are his henchmen, which points to an interesting little culture they have there--you have never met a more polite, more level-headed, more philosophical pack of rabid murderers in all your life). Such characters always raises the question in my head of whether the actor is genuinely making a choice, or if he just has no ability to emote.

So far, however, there have been two scenes that make me believe the actor is, indeed, someone who can act. The first scene is when Marlo watches someone die--and he just about has an orgasm, it is completely disturbing (and I think points to why his gang is so calm about killing--they don't regard it as something that is, on any level, a bad thing). The second scene is when something relatively trivial puts him into a livid rage--he's not screaming or throwing, but he is completely unhinged. Again, it's pretty damned disturbing.

While there are many other drug lords in The Wire, Marlo's the one that is really scary--even though the others are certainly dangerous. I think you're seeing there the difference between a sociopath and a psychopath--while the other drug lords will kill people, they follow certain rules, which makes their behavior more predictable. Marlo just really likes killing people, and it's always his default option.

Current Mood: impressed