Regarding the Superman/Siegel decision:
Shame on every stupid-ass, morally ignorant fan out there who has expressed even the slightest opinion that this course of legal action in any way reflects an agenda of greed on the part of people not directly involved in the act of creation, or worse, has articulated as their primary concern the potential interruption of their monthly four-color fantasy intake. Part of me wishes we lived in the might makes right moral universe that supports such a piggish outlook, because then I could quit my job and drive around on a motorcycle punching people in the face until they penned a formal apology to the Siegel family.
Pretty much the best news ever.
So I have just one week left at the Hollister Free Lance. Despite all my bitching and moaning, and the fact that I'm mostly thrilled and relieved to be getting out, I'm also going to miss the place like crazy. I've compared the work environment to a freshman dorm, and I think that's pretty apt - but as freshman dorms go, it was awesome.
So good-bye to a great first job, and to a beautiful, fucked-up small town.
Even though no one cares, it will amuse me to post my top 5 movies of the year. (And this may be the first year where I saw enough new movies that "top 5" doesn't just equal "movies I saw that were at least kind of good".) So:
1. Ratatouille
2. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
3. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
4. No Country for Old Men
5. Southland Tales
Honorable mention:
Juno, Sunshine
Yet to watch:
There Will be Blood, I'm Not There
Most disappointing
Transformers
(Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was incredibly stupid of me to expect anything.)
This interview with Kim Stanley Robinson makes me very happy. Yeah, it actually offers a pretty bleak take on contemporary society, but Robinson is smart and funny and draws connections in a way that makes me feel warm and fuzzy and also want to do more writing.
So on the BART ride home from San Francisco, I read Alice's story "The Night and Day War" in the latest issue of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, and it is awesome. Not in a "hey, one of my friends wrote something decent" way, but in the "hey, I'm not sure what the hell that story was about but I need to read it again NOW" kind of way.
Also, I've finished a big chunk of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and so far it feels like this insane, exaggerated version of my own adolescence. Except that I could never convince anyone to play Dungeons & Dragons with me.
Also, Tom Spurgeon's comics-related Christmas list is a great place to start your holiday shopping.
No, really, I had a bunch of nightmares after watching No Country for Old Men on Friday.
That movie is fucked up. It's also probably the best movie I've seen this year, and likely the most depressing I've seen, like, ever.
Any critic who doesn't say that Southland Tales is the best film of the year should be fired.
...
No, I'm just kidding. It's a mess. But it's a glorious mess, one that's funniest and most moving when it makes the least amount of sense.
Yes, the political discussions are mind-numbing. The "neo-Marxists" are often unbearable. There's heavy, heavy cribbing from David Lynch (and more!). And the time paradoxes make no damn sense at all.
But, but, but -- there's so much that's worthwhile, so much that's wonderful. The Rock's performance (as a schizophrenic, amnesiac action hero) alone is worth it.
I wish it was longer.
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born is the best comic book of the year? Really? And the Buffy comic deserves to be in the top 10? Now, I love both the Dark Tower novels and the Buffy TV show (duh), but come on.
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