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Archive for October, 2011|Monthly archive page

#AmericanHorrorStory The biggest, most beautiful, disaster of the season.

In Television on 10/29/2011 at 16:39

(Note: I haven’t seen this week’s episode, so this praise is based on the first three episodes. But the Onion AV club his been slowing raising their episode ratings with each weekly review. Which means they are coming around to this, which also possibly means the death of a good thing.)

This team created Nip/Tuck, which got more and more insane each season. It just got too ridiculous to watch by the end. But since American Horror Story is starting out so confused/absurd/contradictory/stupid/derivative/histrionic I think it has to a real change to go down as one of the nuttiest show in history. It’s very bad on a structural level too: character is inconsistent, exposition is inept (that’s very common in TV, though) and plotting is laughable — except for when it’s nonexistent. Its main protagonist is unlikeable. And I don’t mean unsympathetic in some Tony-Soprano-Robbie-Coltrane-in-Cracker-Bryan-Cranston way. I mean awful. He’s a weaselly, pathetic coward. A Hey-I’m-you’re-Dad-but-I-need-your-approval-more-than-you-need-parenting-so-I’m-not-going-to-narc-on-you-for-smoking kind of father. His practice is doing poorly, possibly because he is the worse therapist in

L.A.  In the first episode we see him standing in front of window naked, masturbating and crying.  He’s sort of gone downhill as a mass of jelly in human form from there. A great challenge for the generally appealing actor, Dylan Mcdermott.

Handsome McDermott portrays frequently-naked, bat-wielding-weasel Ben

Jessica Lange is excellent in her role, seemingly embracing whole-heartedly the southern-gothic-drag-queen nature of her role. Connie Britton, the hot mom from Friday Night Lights, plays the hot mom here. She’s brave and smart. However, the necessities of a weekly narrative format prevent her from doing anything sensible over the next five seasons, so as compensation (and skilled compensation it is) she wears the anxiety of that tension on her face in practically every scene. The sole misfire as a character (not the actor’s fault) is the daughter — who is identical to the morose, snotty, unhappy adolescent daughter on every other show. It would be hard to send this character over the top, because every show pretty much does that already. Maybe they should do an about face on this and rip off another archetype entirely: Rory.

It’s the fiction conceit of Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace with better production values, done for reals, with other people’s money. I have no idea whether the creators are having a laugh, or are a joke. Possibly, as with their other masterpiece, the first season of Glee,  both. I like to think both. I don’t see any value in thinking otherwise, except the easy pleasure of feeling superior without effort through ironical viewings, which I am choosing to stay away from.  American Horror Story is as if someone watched every big mainstream horror movie since The Shining while having the flu, puked up all over Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, looked upon this result and saying, “oh, we are do doing this.” I love it.

Story: S01E04 “The Language of Monsters”

In books, free read, politics, Religion, writing on 10/16/2011 at 01:56

Posting this free story for a minimum of seven days — probably more, because I usually forget. This one’s a bit longer than most of the freebies I put up on the blog: 7000 words.

I once worried that the story would date quickly. Surely rendition would be long behind us before now? I was overly optimistic. The story, however, does not suffer from the same flaw.

THE LANGUAGE OF MONSTERS

Jason comes to my cell, sets his watch’s alarm. No more than a hour’s exposure at a time, no more than every other day.
In the hour we talk about many things: the world, politics, God—and we talk about light. At opposite corners this cell has two naked bulbs, in sockets screwed into the brick.

“I’ll see the next locale has a window—and natural exposure.”

I thank him. I haven’t felt sunlight in so long. The guards had orders to give me an hour a week here, but didn’t. I don’t trouble Jason with this; he works hard. He holds a responsible position despite his youth; he has more important concerns. Today I leave Egypt for another site anyway, so the matter loses significance.

Instead, I ask about my next assignment.

“You’re worried,” Jason says.

My previous assignment: the black-bearded Saudi, heavy browed, black eyed, yielded no intel. To date none have. I tell Jason I fear if I fail again I’ll receive no more assignments and he will no longer handle me.

“That’s irrational,” Jason waves the notion away. “We’re a team.”

“I doubt my abilities,” I tell him.

Jason frowns, wounded. “You have done everything I’ve asked. It’s on me.”

Before Jason gave me a job, I had no meaningful existence. Meaninglessness make solitude unbearable. I can’t return there. I spare Jason this, but he feels it anyway.

“Look at me,” says Jason. “This is the one. A high-value subject. A driver, from Yemen, detained in Basra. This is the break I’ve … that we’ve waited for.”

Jason checks his watch. He calls it a diver’s watch. It resists water, it shows direction, it does many useful things, and now it tells him our time together draws short. “We should pray,” he says.

Continue reading the whole story free until at least 11/01/11.

Available for purchase at Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Diesel, on iTunes and other sites.

Dear 1%: Stop whining, you cry babies. #OWS

In civil liberties, Current Affairs, media, politics, verbose on 10/15/2011 at 12:42

If the 1% “job creator” class doesn’t like seeing people out on the street “whining” who don’t they go out an create some more jobs in the U.S.? When unemployment drops to 2% then they can complain about “slackers”. Until then, shut up, build the wealth that apparently only they, with their non-taxable income can create, and be thankful the protestors aren’t competing in the same dwindling job pool and the rest of us.

Statement of Gratitude to #OccupyWallStreet #OWS

In civil liberties, Current Affairs, politics on 10/08/2011 at 15:17

Through the last couple weeks I’ve heard various commentators who find the protests offensive trot out the old cliches: “got a job!” “They’re just a bunch of slackers!” “They have no clear agenda!” “It’s just a bunch of aging hippies/ skateboarding slackers / what-have-you / all without real world experience or responsibilities”.  The irony of crying GET A JOB! amidst 9% unemployment is lost on these critics. (And we know that the real unemployment numbers are much higher than that; that the stats have been cooked for years to excluded the chronically unemployed, those who have had their spirits broken by winner-take-all capitalism, and have given up. They are not supposed to count. But they exist. So they count.)

I want you to know, that your critics are not fooling everybody. Sustained political protest is hard. It’s hard because many of the people hurting have too much on their plate to commit to it. They have jobs, they have families. They have crushing debts. They have health problems in a society that sees healthcare as a profit-making opportunity, and not a fundamental right like police protection of fire departments. They may hate that the corporations that cut their paychecks have the rights and privileges of “personhood” but not the accountability, but they need those paychecks.

So it falls to the young, or the fanatical, or the misfits, to begin the movement. It’s always been that way. To horribly mix a metaphor, it’s the outsiders, the people on the margins, that start the tide. Now the movement you began is starting to grow.

I won’t say don’t give up, because that would be arrogant. I will say: Keep at it as long as you can. But mostly I want to say: Thank you. You are fighting for me. You are fighting for us. The middle class, the formerly-middle-class, and the impoverished. I know this. A lot of people know this. Your passion, your desire for justice, is noted.