Red Right Hand

A GOOD BAD GUY

2008-10-15T06:05:00.000-07:00

Here in the lair, we cannot sing, and thus we have not attempted to apply for membership in the Evil League of Evil. While songs were not required in the application, I tend to look down...far down on apps that are songless. Even though some are quite amusing. But Red Right Hand has allies, and in the race to join Bad Horse's esteemed organization, favor is given to Fury of Solace. He does evil so you don't have to.

And if you have no fucking clue what I'm on about, go here then here.

Submitted for your approval: Fury of Solace's application for admission into the Evil League of Evil from Fury of Solace on Vimeo.

ATTN: ENEMIES OF THE UNITED STATES

2008-10-14T06:01:00.000-07:00

Apparently, if you want to decimate the United States intelligence and covert ops capabilites, don't bother with the Pentagon or Langley or anything. Take out L.A.

Alias
Chuck
She Spies
24

and now...

My Own Worst Enemy, the latest in a long line of series that have made La-La land into spy city.

As for the show itself...I never got around to reading the pilot script so I just watched the first episode last night with, not high hopes, but reasonable hopes. I dig spy shows, it's a good (if not entirely original) concept and I like a number of the people involved.

Riddled with logic problems and basically fails to use the premise to its fullest, leaving us with a modern day Jekyll and Hyde that comes off as Hide and Hyde. If you get my meaning(s). Though I did like that Edward as a grade-A asshole to Henry. Looked really good though. The money shows. I'll keep on with it.

Now, seriously, can anyone give me a logical reason why CTU would ever require a substation in Torrance?

WRONG CHRIS

2008-10-13T11:38:00.000-07:00

Today most of the country celebrates the wrong Chris. One the who didn't discover the New World and was generally a raging asshole who opened up a hemisphere to not a whole lot of good. An opinion colored by the fact that this holiday is not celebrated by the psychopathic profitmongers (i.e. corporations) that I am generally working for at any given moment.

So, that last movie not withstanding, Happy Birfday, Chris Carter.

"IT'S ON AMERICA'S TORTURED BROW..."

2008-10-10T09:55:00.000-07:00

In short, I am fucking pleased with the first episode of Life on Mars (US). After David E. Kelly's first version that was so faithful to the original that it essentially was a somnambulation through the original UK version, and as such came across fairly lifeless. Appelbaum and friends have found the perfect balance between the original and one that has it's own identity and it quickly established that it will not just be taking the UK show's gimmick to tell crime stories, but can actually speak to American viewers in the same way the the Kudos version can speak to UK viewers. And they did it in no uncertain terms...or images.

It still used the original version's pilot as a hard baseline. Still a lot of the same scenes, and a lot of the same lines with sometimes just an added in throwaway to make it "ours." I think they work. Here's the script if you want to compare, though I'm sure you can "acquire" it if you think about it for .0534 seconds. A while back I got the region 2 DVDs, but if this show does well, maybe they'll take a new look at clearing the copious amount of music and get an R1 release.

The primary variation comes in the approach to Sam's dilemma. The original was bathed in ambiguity and in it's two year, 16 ep run, never put any amount f certainty as to whether Sam was really in '73 or in a coma. A full first season here will already go way past the UK versions limited run, and with any US series looking to get four-to-seven years out of it, you're going to have to spin it different and look at providing some answers here and there anyway, or else run the danger of getting Laura Palmer Syndrome.

Where this version diverges most from the UK and original US pilot is ditching the part where Annie's boyfriend nearly psychobabbles Sam into killing himself. A scene that totally failed in the US version. It new scene is, well, I'll not spell it out in case you haven't seen it yet, and the details are irrelevant to the point that it sets the stage to proceed at its own pace and doesn't commit to any reasoning for Sam's condition and will allow for a greater eventual divergence from the original.

In numbers, the show came in strong with an 8.2/14 in the overnights and it held four/fifths of the Grey's audience, so...fuck, yeah. For the night, ABC saw no significant change over a year ago, so good news there as many other nights for the network have seen big drops.

This could be really, really, specable. I so want to.*

At the exact same time, the same thing is unfolding on CBS. Eleventh Hour. It's the crime-procedural non-weird Fringe...not accurate, but...it's weird science for a more conservative mindset. It's based on the UK version pilot, and while it echoes many scenes, it's more of a rewrite. Most importantly, I think it benefits most from being 42 minutes of show and not 90. The original was too slow for me. Still, prefer Patrick Stewart over Rufus Sewell.

It also had a cool trick (non-story, non-writing) coming out of the teaser. Watch it, you'll see what I mean

*Yeah, could all fall apart real fast too. We'll see how the coming weeks shake out. And, of course, if no one is watching, then it's all moot.

OMG - PARIS HILTON DIDN'T MAKE ME WANT TO VOMIT

2008-10-10T09:50:00.000-07:00

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die

THOUGHTS ON THE FIREFLY 7th SEASON PREMIERE

2008-10-08T06:08:00.000-07:00

The end is nigh. The last season of Firefly started last night and if the season premiere is any indication, it comes a season too late.

Joss was on a roll last season only to be brought to a screeching halt by the writer's strike. Those nine episodes are right up there with the first season's classic hours. It marked a return to form that we thought would be unattainable after the slipping in the third season (except for the Shepherd Book storyline) and the absolutely abominable fourth season that saw Mal and the crew in the employ of the Inner Worlds Provisional Government as System Marshals. The Shield in space sounds good, but in practice, not so much.

The fifth season's attempt to return the crew of the Serenity to some kind of outlaw status was too obvious, having framed them for the assassination of President Ying-Smith. It also went on way too long. However, the political play afforded by last year's return of Inara to the series as she navigated the halls of the capitol on Sihnon trying to uncover the conspiracy, set the stage for the series to get back to it's original status quo. If only we could get Ron Glass back on the show. While his death at the end of the two-parter that revealed his past as an Operative was one of the most stirring on TV in recent memory, I still miss him. He was always my favorite.

But with last night's episode, "Rise and Fall," (the first season premiere not written by Whedon, who has apparently decided the leave the series in Cain's hands for it's final run while he preps Dollhouse and works on the Dr. Horrible stuff) the wishes of fans for things to be like the first season were met a little too literally. Be careful what you wish for and all that. The revelation that new government is actually a puppet of the New Sun corporation almost suggests that everything we and the crew have been though has been for naught. And with no Miranda controversy this time, what's gonna happen to topple yet another corrupt government (though this does serve as an interesting socio-political commentary on the dangers a too-powerful executive branch). Are we headed for a downer ending? A suicidal last battle come May sweeps?

The episode wasn't all bad, though. Jayne's big action piece in the fourth act when he was chasing Mal across the rooftops on Ariel had me actually kinda rooting for him. And Adam Baldwin just crackles when he tries to get all authoritarian and keeps flashing that badge to people who couldn't give a rat's ass.

Also, the rhyming game and Wash and River were playing between taking pot shots as the Marshals was hilarious. When she said "spleen" and got the last guy and then Wash said "washing machine" and killed an appliance...guess you had to be there.

Nothing against Cain, her episodes rank right up there with the Jossmeister's. That one where Saffron gets her memory back after a year as Mal's actual wife, "Missy" was a roller coaster ride and Mal's still carrying those scars, figuratively and literally. She knows the show inside out, having been around since her first season episode, "Dead or Alive."

Still, I wish they would have got Minear back to close things out. He would have given us a season that would makes us cry for an eighth.

Still, I liked it better than last night's Fringe. Not that I should complain about Fox's Sci-Fi Tuesday Especially if they bench Fringe and put Dollhouse on at 9/8c. JOSS NIGHT!

I GOT TENSION ON ME

2008-10-04T15:31:00.000-07:00

Once again, this week, I'm taking my cues from another esteemed member of the scriptwriting blogosphere. From The Mystery Man:

What are some examples of great tension and suspense in cinema history? What made those examples great? What's to be learned by it? What are some bad examples? Because I would really like to know.

However, see that one word? The eleventh one. No. Not doing that. We talk TV around here and there are just as valuable lessons to be learned from the Cathode Arts, so I've chosen to write about...

Battlestar Galactica: "33"

As the Ron Moore-written episode begins, we are given introductory levels of tension. We know there's a clock ticking, we don't immediately know why. There's a nice cool level of tension. We know we're going to get answer, but we can't help being a little twitchy until we get and we're trying to piece together from the clues we're given. Like, why is everyone so tired. Bloodshot eyes, tenuous consciousness. Five o'clock shadow....like five o'clock the next day.

This, right here, is one of my favorite kinds of tension. The kind that doesn't just take you for a ride, but makes you a backseat driver. Something's happening, and the viewer is piecing it together as, if not just before, it happens. It involves, and it doesn't talk down. That's a tricky one, if there's any measure of predictability, you're shot. But it gets the mind racing and the viewer is taken to the edge of seat as they think they're on the leading edge of figuring something out while all that information, and all those moments build to the reveal of what's going on, right at the instant you've think you've figured it out. Or did you? Maybe you were just strapped in at the front of the ride.

Then we understand. This 33 minute tracking interval? When we begin the episode, this has happened 236 times. Every 33 minutes for 5 days. No one is sleeping for more than a half an hour at a shot. If that. No one gets a rest. As soon as you jump, you have to prep for the next one is the toasters will blow you out of the sky.

It's a tension we can imagine well. It's rooted in something we've likely experienced. You ever crammed for a test late a night, but you can't keep your eyes open. Ever faced a deadline that denied you sleep? Yeah, multiply that. And it doesn't need to be spoken, though we do get a line from Tigh, early on, one that we can remember once the first jump is made.

TIGH
We're getting slower.

It's obvious that each iteration is degraded from the previous. This problem needs to be solved and soon or it might be the next cycle that takes the fleet 34 minutes.

It's a great situation that is just fraught with plot tension, but creates tension among character who mightn't not be so inclined and magnifies the tension among others; sexual tension, professional tension, etc. A worn-down Starbuck is resistant to take stims (speed) from her Captain, Apollo. Yeah, both tensions are there. There both frazzled, so much so that when Apollo fails to get on her ass about following orders, she goes off on him for it.

The B-plot in here is the tension of dramatic irony. Roslin has received word from another ship in the fleet that a Dr. Amarak needs to speak with her urgently. Only we and Baltar know that it's most likely (not even certain) that it's because he can expose Baltar's instrumental role in the apocalypse that befell the 12 Colonies.

Both of these plots come together in the tense scene where Apollo and Starbuck are in their Vipers to investigate a returning ship that the fleet had lost in a previous jump. The Olympic Carrier is suspected as having been compromised in some way.
Baltar voices the suspicion.

BALTAR
If they were left behind, why didn't the Cylons destroy them?

Maybe they are the key to the Cylon's tracking abilities. Is there an agent aboard? They might be rigged with radiological bombs. Also, that's the ship that Dr. Amarak is aboard.

Apollo and Starbuck are finally given the order. Destroy it. Another involving tension here. The tough decision. But it's the kind that isn't just in the story, it challenges you too. What would you do? Could you pull the trigger on a passenger ship that may or may not be full of 1300 innocent people because it's suspected being a threat.

What do I take from these examples. There is no tension without engagement. Not just because the plot is interesting, but because it fires the mind. You can write tension, but it's not enough just to put a ticking clock on it or to jsut jump back and forth in a situation. That's cheap. When the story challenges you or lets you in on something, it involves you, and then, that's when tension can ply its...tense...trade upon you.

HEAD FULL OF NOISE

2008-10-01T06:28:00.000-07:00

So yeah, there's this writerly-song meme thing going around. As seen at Emily's and at Bill's and at Piers' (interesting POV on that one)...to name but three.

I thought to myself, "hey, that's a good way to fill a post." I didn't have to think about this one very long. It always been sitting in the back of my mind for this purpose and we'll just overlook that it's on the soundtrack of a really fucking bad movie.

I'll hand it over in a moment, let me just spell out the meme. It goes as thus...

“Find a song that sums up what you think it means to be a writer and post the lyrics on your blog and why you've chosen it. NB: It doesn't have to be your favourite song, it just has to express how you feel about writing and/or being a writer. It can be literal, metaphorical, about a particular form or aspect of writing - whatever you want.”

And I have selected "(Can't You) Trip Like I Do" by Filter with the Crystal Method.

I've got the understanding of a four year old
I've got the peace of mind of a killer's soul
I've got the rationale of a New York cop
I've got the patience of a chopping block

I've got the acumen of a seasoned pro
I've got the legacy of a billion souls
I've got the world down my back, but I don't seem to care
I've got the comprehension of a world unaware

Can't you trip like I do?

Laid out on my back, I can't sleep 'cause I'm slumming
Eyes in my teeth, I can't see 'cause I'm eating
Head full of noise, I can't think 'cause it's crushing
Back on my feet, like a freight train I'm coming

This is me. Writing.

Make of that what you will.

THINGS I DID NOT LIKE ABOUT CHUCK S02E01

2008-10-01T00:57:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed the episode "Chuck Vs. The First Date." I did. It's a fun show. Fun. You know what that is.

Still, these things, I did not like.

Sarah should have unloaded her whole mag and kept on clicking while Mr. Colt's brains spilled out all over hte roof after he dropped Chuck. Not in the series tone, but that what she would have done.

They killed Tony Todd and left Bonita Fried Rice alive.

California-centrism. Whether a Burbank in-joke or or the assumption that the entire nation is familiar with the geography of the Valley, I hate that. Really, I don't even like that the show is set in L.A.

A FRINGE BENEFIT

2008-09-29T00:02:00.000-07:00

Fringe snagged me in such a way that it proves in most unholy ways that I am an utter TV geek. I tell you how in a minute.

I've been conflicted about this show from well before it came on the air. When it was announced, I, like many others thought "I watched this when it was The X-Files." I kinda still think this at points. I was also a little wary of it being another heavily serialized show, Though both Alias and Lost have straddled that line able, I thought Alias was constantly losing its way and then finding it again, until the fifth season...it never got it back. And Lost (in good and bad), well, there's not really a lot of J.J. there. That's all Cuse and Lindelof going on there.

When I got the script for the pilot I was, first, unmotivated to read it and, second, not entirely thrilled with it. There were little moments I loved, but they were very little moments. Then the pilot leaked and my opinion was unchanged. I still thought I'd watch it anyway. It's not bad. It's not.

Also, despite my indifference to the series as a whole, I liked most of the characters quite a bit and thought that this would be a great show to spec. It's got such a broad sandbox, the word Mojave comes to mind. I'd still like to spec this. We'll see how things shake out. Too early to tell if it's going to gain that elusive "specable" status.

Second episode, "Same Old Story" didn't do a lot for me. Title didn't help.

Third one, "The Ghost Network," I thought was an improvement, but it still felt, as did the previous two, slow rolling.

It got me, though in the first few minutes. Maybe this was here in the second episode and I just didn't notice, but this has me on board for the foreseeable future.

Yeah. Darin-fucking-Morgan. It's starting to look like maybe he actually want to work in TV. Since this guy has only ever written six hours of produced television (each one an outstanding example of the series in was part of)...and, as I understand, had to be cajoled into it to some extent. He won the X-Files' only writing Emmy. In fact, the only sci-fi writing Emmy in all of the nineties.

And this is the first and only time he's not working on a show with his bro, Glen. They were both on the ill-fated Bionic Woman. No matter what you may think of that show, any Darin-written episode would have rawked hard, and likely have some degree of self-parody.

I hated the Night Stalker remake, but his unproduced script for "The M-Word" was good.

So until he quits or the show is cancelled, I'm hanging out for Fringe.

WAITING FOR THE NOVA

2008-09-25T11:09:00.001-07:00

BARTLET MEETS OBAMA

2008-09-24T07:14:00.000-07:00

Missed this the other day. Aaron Sorkin in Maureen O'Dowd's column.

AWESOME COMBO #7,421: TINA FEY + PIRATES + MUPPETS

2008-09-23T08:05:00.000-07:00

JIM GORDON

2008-09-19T06:29:00.000-07:00

It may not seem like much, but I think I just found my favoritest Alex Ross painting ev-ar.

Clicky for embiggenment.

Yes, I have an unholy love of Commissioner Gordon.

Note to Nolan, I would watch a whole movie with Oldman as Gordon and no Batman anywhere in it.

BELGIUM!

2008-09-18T07:00:00.000-07:00

So this Eoin Colfer chap presumes to continue and/or conclude the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy with a sixth book. Or is it seventh? Are we counting The Salmon of Doubt?

He writes the Artemis Fowl books. Fine tomes, to be sure. But to this development, I say thee nay. As in "fuck, no!"

This is new for me. I've never had some book series I hold dear undergo the money-grubbing continuation by people who presume to be able to be a dead author (even when they're related to them). I liked the Dune series, but it had already gone past me by the time Frank Herbert kicked, so no great thing there.

I will not spend money or so much as flip though this...wrong thing. I would say I wouldn't be in the same room as it, but that would preclude me being in bookstores, so a line is drawn there...but no further.

What's worse is that Colfer says he will try to capture Adams voice while injecting some of his own. Uh, no. Hitchhiker's books are pure Adams and any deviation from that will just feel off anyway.

I know there is a tradition of mutation in the H2G2 stuff. That what amused me most about so-called die-hard fans that complained that the movie wasn't true to the book. Yeah, well the book wasn't true to the radio series...and Adams wrote both.

But this...I just...I...

BELGIUM!!!

MAD MEN: "Vostok" - PAGE 27

2008-09-16T06:21:00.000-07:00

INT. STERLING COOPER AD AGENCY - DAY
Paul (shaking out a smoke), KEN COSGROVE and HARRY CRANE are not-very-discreetly ogling Joan as she walks to meet up with Hildy, Allison and Marge on the other side of the room. Salvatore notices this as he walks up to join the guys, taking out his lighter for Paul.
SALVATORE
Those heels. Like she’s walking on two Chrysler buildings.
Salvatore holds out his lit Zippo. Paul lights his cigarette from it. Joan confers with the girls.
KEN
I’m not sure I understand that.
PAUL
I have this theory about redheads.
SALVATORE
I think we all have a theory about redheads, right?
KEN
I’ve tested that theory.
SALVATORE
If you mean Tammy from traffic services, I seem to remember her being a blonde before last Easter.
PAUL
Yeah. She’s not a blonde either.
Gets questioning look from Ken.
HARRY
What’s your theory?
PAUL
It’s a stop sign from God. He’s saying “this one is out of your league, move along.”
KEN
If that were true, there wouldn’t be any redheads.
PAUL
There’s always the guy that can run the red, no pun, and never gets a ticket. Right, Sal?
SALVATORE
I suppose.
KEN
(amused)
He supposes.

N S F W

2008-09-12T06:28:00.000-07:00

This about sums me up for the week.

"WISH"

2008-09-07T01:17:00.000-07:00

nine inch nails
los angeles
9.6.08

THE OTHER SARAH PALIN SEX TAPE

2008-09-06T12:22:00.001-07:00

I promise I'm not turning into a political blog, but...

I'm getting really tired of the the liberal media and various left-leaning entities (OMG. Channeled O'Reilly for a minute there, feel dirty) jumping all over this idea that McCain's camp didn't adequately vet Palin.

I look at this more - I dunno - strategically. So far, I've scarecely seen a thing that has popped up in Palin's supposedly unvetted record that doesn't serve a particular and occasionally admirably wiley purpose.

Pregnant daughter gets you undecided right-side progressives. Her censorship views gets help nail down the ultra conservatives who don't like McCain actually having a sense of humor and stuff. The investigation aspect means she gets to play the victim without being whiny about it. Republican base reads anti-polar bear as being pro-people. The base wants ANWR opened up, this is a non-starter. I'm also sure that her having a Down Syndrome child was even a selling-point in their backroom meetings. I don't put it past them.

She appeals to the RNC in her views and appeals to the right-leaning undecideds in being a hot chick. There is not a single thing about her doesn't scream "political choice."

She's vetted. She's too vetted.

Even if there were a Sarah Palin sex tape they didn't find...it would probably only get a few more votes.

This troubles me because I think maybe we (tree-hugging, bleeding-heart liberals) have lost our teeth. We've spent a lot of time relying on Bush and buds to basically look stupid, say dumb things and contradict themselves to make our points for us. (i.e. Daily Show). And that's been working really well, hasn't it? McCain is a politician, yes, and can be counted on to say and do stupid things, but not with the same volume. We need to get back in it.

Now, also, we're getting all Hope-y. I look at my pro-Obama friends and colleagues and fellow internet entities and when I take a step back and look objectively at it, sometimes I'm thinking "could you step into the bleeding-heart liberal sterotype a little more?" In some other cases, I'd swear it's getting downright cult-like. I also see a lot of preaching the converted (in this case, the converted holding DNP cards). All of this sunshine and rainbow idealism, I see as being a turn off to the undecideds. That's who it's all about now. With Obama anywhere between 0 and 4 points up in polls, this is a neck-and-neck race and conversion is a pipe dream.

Screw Hope. Hope is what we have after the election. What I have is want.

This attacking the vetting stuff seems like it's just...naive. Hit harder, hit policy. Hit economics. And start finding ways to turn language against them they way they've turned liberal into a words I don't even like using anymore.

SARAH PALIN SEX TAPE*

2008-09-05T06:03:00.000-07:00

Look at this.

It seems very familiar to me.

You don't suppose...

Also, don't forget what Liz Lemon said in the 30 Rock episode "Fireworks."

LIZ
There is an 80% chance that in the next election I will tell all my friends I am voting for Barack Obama but I will secretly vote for John McCain.

*Oh yeah.. just wanted to see what kinda hits that gets.

THAT WAS A LOAD-BEARING ACT OUT...

2008-09-03T06:38:00.000-07:00

Returned from a fun jaunt upstate to find my house in ruins.

Not my actual house...and not my physician. My pilot. The Black House.

Five days were were quite possibly the longest time I've gone in what feels like ever without actively thinking about writing anything at all. And that space away from pilot showed me that, damn...I'm really good at convincing myself that things work when I'm writing them.

Big logic problem. Overpowered my bad guy. And also made him a little stupid too.

If this guy existed, the United States would be a smoking hole in the world.

So...alternately trying to work out how to solve this problem and considering taking the character I took from another pilot back to the pilot she started in. Some time away from that has opened some doors in that one's plot.

So nothing from me in this week's writer's group...probably. There could be a burst in the next couple of days.

Y TV?

2008-08-28T14:15:00.000-07:00

BooM got all memey. She says write about why we write for TV not anything else. We know the BooM. We like the BooM. We will comply with the BooM.

Why TV? Because early on, I realized that working in jobs you even marginally dislike is no fucking way to live. I wanted to do something I loved. And at the time (this being, like, 12). I loved pop culture. And hey, newsflash, apparently I'm still 12. I loved comics and TV and movies and books. I also liked drawing quite a bit but quickly realized I lacked any talent or skill in that regard, and realized that the fun part was no in the execution, but in the creation of whatever little world was gonna be confined to that 8 1/2" x 11" sheet.

I remember getting a class assignment in school to write our own King Arthur legend/myth/story. It had to be at least three pages. Mine was 15 (little rushed in the third act...my hand was tired).

So I decided I wanted to write. I wasn't sure what at first. I tried comics...I still do from time to time. I tried mysteries...short stories...I think I even sent one or two off to Ellery Queen before I realized that that just wasn't working. I'd like to try that again sometime though, now that I actually know how to write things...some.

Hey, how about movies...big money there, right?

Maybe, but you know what...just not interested. Still, really, not all that interested. I don't have single stories to tell. I have multitudes. My characters want more than 2 hours, they want 13 with an option for a back nine...to start.

Once I started my first spec script*, I felt like I made the right choice. I felt very much at home. All those years being glued to the TV actually did count for something. The form was burned into my psyche. I thought in act breaks. Hooray for the short attention spanning of America!

I realized I love TV more than thought. If you've been reading this site for a while, you've seen my occasional rants about television being not just a medium but an art form. Serling was Shakespeare...and were Willy alive today he'd either be a showrunner or hacking out a Grey's spec in a Starbucks. TV is every bit as good as a film or a play or novel in ways that those things can't touch...when done well, it incorporates all those things. (Though, I'm not saying TV is superior, each of those things has strengths which TV lacks).

It's in my blood and my brain. My huge wall of over 200 TV on DVD sets should tell you that. Or how about the fact that there is always...always an open file on my laptop and that file is always a TV spec or pilot in progress? I do not stop. I don't want to. And if I never get anyfuckingwhere, I will die a miserable old man, working in a job he doesn't really like, with an unfinished TV script on his holographic neural interface thingy.

Maybe I should just use this post for my personal essays in next year's applications.

*And that first spec script actually got me somewhere, ask me and I'll tell you. Just not here.

Oh, and the matter of tagging five people...as I said...I will comply...gimme John Rogers, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, Jane, Our Man in Los Angeles and Amanda.

YEAH, WHAT I SAID ABOUT HBO...

2008-08-27T18:25:00.000-07:00

...this makes me reconsider.

This from Mark Steven Johnson, who has long been developing a TV series with HBO based on Garth Ennis's ridiculously awesome, creeptastic, and profane comic series Preacher.

“We were budgeting and everything and it was getting really close to going, but the new head of HBO felt it was just too dark and too violent and too controversial."

Because, yes, the way to get some of the old cache back is to completely NOT do anything that pushes the envelope and to NOT take advantage of pay cable's unique position to not have to adhere to conventional standards and practices in anyway.

This concludes today's armchair-network-presidenting.

NEWS FROM SORCON!!!

2008-08-22T08:27:00.000-07:00

I missed this announcement because I was at the CosPlay event in the Spencer Room. I went as Lord John Marbury.

I can never get enough Sorkin. I have all the Sports Nights, all the West Wings, I've got the script books, I've got the flicks (including Malice), Studio 60...I saw the Farnsworth Invention...I've got the play Making Movies, I eagerly await his Chicago 7 flick and now...now...oooh. Happy levels reaching critical!

SAN DIEGO—On day two of the 2008 San Diego SorCon, the biggest Aaron Sorkin convention in the world, screenwriter and producer Aaron Sorkin revealed plans for his next project, an animated continuation of his most popular franchise, The West Wing.

"I'm excited to bring my Emmy Award–winning writing to the field of animation," Sorkin said in a speech before approximately 30,000 screaming fans, many of whom were dressed up in the business-suit costumes of their favorite Sorkin characters. "The costs of live-action production restricted me to a set only slightly larger than the actual White House and an ensemble cast of under 15 actors. But animation technology will enable us to provide fans with extended 40-minute walk-and-talks, digitally compressed dialogue for faster delivery, and a cast of over 70 main characters. My vision will finally be presented in its truest, most uncompromised form." (more)

Thanks be to Jane.

THERE IS NO LIFE ON MARS

2008-08-21T07:38:00.000-07:00

Not, however referring to Life On Mars (U.S.), which is looking up, looking at these.

No, I refer to this Veronica Mars related thingy...

"Kristen and I ran into each other, and we did discuss a Veronica movie," - Rob Thomas

Wow. Wouldn't that just be the awesome sauce?

I think not. Let's take a closer look, eh?

It sounds cool, but I think it can't live up to anybody's expectations. I mean, c'mon...everything after the first season didn't even live up to everybody's expectations.

But with less snark, I say let dead things stay dead. A VM movie could only serve to be really disappointing or really aggravating...and I mean aggravating in the same way that season-four-that-could-have-been feature on the DVD's was aggravating.

First of all, we'll be coming at a Veronica who's been away from us for years. We'll have built her up in our heads to be this something awesome, like the youngest and most successful FBI agent ever, but she's getting older and so are we. And what if Rob decided she wasn't going to be an FBI agent after all? Well, we all had our hopes up. Rob might be in a different headspace now. We might be too. Nothing will ever be the same again. You can't get that first season back.

And let's not forget that a feature is a whole different format than our young lady was devised to exist in. We won't get the slow peeling of a mystery onion over the course of a season, or an extended arc. The whole tension dynamic will be different...and if it isn't different and is more like the series, then all we got was one more extended episode. Which seems like a let down doesn't.

But let's say it all falls together and blows us away. It's just going to piss us off that that's all we get. Maybe there would be another movie, but now we're waiting a year or two between episodes.

But we're not getting a sequel. We're not getting a movie. Not for a show that generally fell in the bottom 10% of network shows for the years that it was on. Those are lists that generally ran past one-hundred-fifty shows. And some of the ones ahead of Vera there were really bad and really cancelled. What studio is going to put money behind that property.

Maybe the DVD sets sold well, I don't have the figures on that nor do I intend to do the google-fu to get it, but my experience says that a lot of those people who bought the sets, did so because they weren't watching the show. There's a bit of a Firefly effect there. Those who watched converted those who didn't. The people who couldn't find the time to watch one of the best two or three shows on at that time. They're probably not going to find the time to go buy the movie ticket. They'll be waiting for the DVD. There's a chunk of projected earnings not being projected. And the studio that might consider putting money there knows that and will budget accordingly.

And sorry, but Vera doesn't have the same pull as Mal.

...and there's still tons who can't see past the perceived teen chick genre.

Fact is, this movie's not happening. You know that VM comic that DC was talking to RT about? See it anywhere? Me neither. Rob's busy.

Maybe he'll go back to Veronica Mars in ten or fifteen years and start over. You know, like with Cupid?

He could cast the girl that plays Astor on Dexter. She'd be old enough by then.

And who'd play the new Keith? Hmm?

Let dead things stay dead.

Sometimes.