clarkblog

CAN'T STOP THE SIGNAL

So what are they watching on the International Space Station?

Firefly and Serenity.

This seriously made my day.

linkage via Pop Candy and Whedonesque

TOMORROW'S LEADERS

This week 50 high school students went to the White House to accept a great honor. They've been selected as Presidential Scholars, one from each state of the union, based on their outstanding leadership and academic abilities.

When they met President Bush, they presented him with a letter urging him to abandon the torture doctrine his administration has enforced against suspected terrorists. The letter was signed by all 50 teenagers.

This makes me so damn proud proud proud to be an American. And it gives me such hope for the future.

The off-guard White House staggered into full bullshit mode. "The president enjoyed a visit with the students," said deputy press secretary Dana Perino, "accepted the letter and upon reading it let the student know that the United States does not torture and that we value human rights."

Like most mouthpieces in the Bush Administration, Dana Perino is a lying sack of shit. We know it. These students know it. The world knows it.

If you want proof, check out the Washington Post's gripping four-part examination of Vice President Dick Cheney's imperial power grab. It documents explicity how the morally corrupt neo-cons decided to abandon the Geneva Conventions and institutionalize the cruel and inhumane treatment of prisoners.

And if you can stomach that, read the recent New Yorker profile of the Army general called to investigate these claims in the wake of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal ... and the outright condescension and scorn he faced from then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

This is America. We're better than this.

If you're not pissed off, you're not paying attention.

These 50 teenagers from across the nation are pissed off and paying attention. And I hope each and every one of them runs for elected office someday.

HOT SCRIBES

Variety's posted their yearly list of 10 Screenwriters to Watch (also Directors, Comics, and European Actors ... but they are strangely, tellingly silent on the subject of the top European Comic Actor/Writer/Directors).

WALK LIKE A MAN

(click to evolve)

SIGNS OF INTELLIGENT LIFE

A landmark collection of science-fiction literature finally gets some respect at UC Riverside.

The Eaton Collection contains more than 110,000 volumes of sci-fi from around the world. Most of it was donated by longtime fan J. Lloyd Eaton, a Bay area physician.

Thanks to some shuttered minds, this treasure was almost lost for good. It took a comparative literature professor, George Slusser, and a university librarian years to secure the collection's funding. Along the way, Slusser was told that he wouldn't receive tenure unless he abandoned his studies of such a silly, lowbrow genre:

All the while, fellow faculty tried to torpedo Slusser's efforts.

English professors went after his funding, arguing to library administrators and English department heads that hoarding collectible James Joyce titles was more important than any featuring Frodo Baggins, Slusser said.

Other professors snickered at him in campus hallways. They even grilled his students during departmental exams: Why not study something more meaningful like feminism or multiculturalism?

"It was guerrilla warfare," Slusser said.

I'm glad to see genres such as SF and horror taken more seriously in academe. I've written about my experiences here. The fact is that any mode of narrative -- yes, even reality TV and soap operas, he said grudgingly -- can and should be studied for what it illuminates and/or reflects about its audience. I've no doubt that African-American, Gay/Lesbian, and Women's studies were once held in the same contempt by the dusty, musty old guard that lambastes anything they consider unproper.

Slusser's a hero. So are the colleagues and fans who helped him maintain this collection during its darkest days.

WE COULD BE HEROES

Despite the success of superheroes in mainstream culture -- Batman Begins, NBC's Heroes, and even Bryan Singer's sluggish but earnest Superman Returns -- I keep coming back to a regressive but increasingly haunting thought.

Maybe superhero tales just aren't suited for live action.

Superheroes are by definition larger than life. Maybe it's only through comics and animation that their mythic scale can be effectively portrayed. Think about the sharp kinetic lines of Jack Kirby, one of last century's most potent and influential storytellers. His panels absolutely kill on the page. Click to enlarge this vertiginous splash page from Fantastic Four # 7 in 1963:

Now, take the same subject matter, stuff some actors into tights and latex, and what do you get?

Yeah ... that.

As convincing as Batman's new suit or bike or car might be, I often find myself watching people in tights swinging from wires and thinking: Why, that ain't nothin' but a person in tights swingin' on a damn wire. And even when it works, something at the back of my mind sits there fidgeting with mild embarrassment. Because when it's served up with all the clarity of photo-realism, it's kinda-sorta pretty damn silly.

Heroes and villains of narrative should be larger than life. We learned that much from the Greeks. Modern superheroes sprang out of comics and they're also at home in the world of animation. So should they stay there? Is there something about comics and cartoons that makes superheroes more palatable and convincing?

Over at his blog, Todd Alcott (Antz) convinced me to check out Justice League, a Warner Bros. animated series that ran from 2001-2005 (and can be caught on DVD and on Cartoon Boomerang reruns). After watching a subversive two-parter called "A Better World," he writes:

"... I'm sitting in front of the TV with my mouth hanging open.  This is a far cry from Superfriends. In the span of a 45-minute superhero cartoon, [producer/writer] Bruce Timm and company have just told me more about society, civilization and justice than I ever learned in a season of Law and Order."

I watched those episodes and he's right. The creative team behind Justice League was freed from the constraints of filming only what's possible with live actors and tailored costumes and special effects. Their imagination (and that of the viewers) was freed to explore the most imaginative worlds and situations with total immersion and verisimilitude.

I'm totally digging this series like a junkie right now. I'd say it even tops that acclaimed Batman animated series from the 90s. It's a superhero saga that for my money is so much more exciting and emotionally involving than any live-action effort.

Now I read that WB is planning a Justice League movie ... live-action. They may try to get Brandon Routh to reprise his Superman. There may or may not be Christian Bale's Batman.

Hey, I wish them luck. I'll be in line to buy a ticket. But even if it's good ... if the costumes work flawlessly and the wires are hidden ... even if the script rocks some Greek-level tragedy that allows us to suspend our disbelief, even if only for two hours ... I'll probably be sitting there wishing the damn thing was animated.

MAD MAGAZINE'S STILL GOT IT

(click to embolden)

CAUSE, MEET EFFECT

Some days you really don't have to read any further than the headlines:

Iraq now ranked second among world's failed states

and

Newly empowered Democrats draw wrath of voters

INDEX: POLITICS

It's not surprising that political commentary doesn't date well. Just ask all the right-wingers who frothed about Bill Clinton's consensual sex with another adult. Their self-righteous condemnations about fornication in the White House seem positively quaint these days, particularly after Newt Gingrich admitted to having an affair during Clinton's impeachment proceedings, and especially after former House Speaker Dennis Hastert tried to cover up Rep. Mark Foley's penchant for hitting on minors.

The Bush Administration has been unusually consistent in its ineptitude, so commentary from two years ago feels just as relevant today. The only difference is that Americans are more aware of the idiocy that's taken our great country into the biggest foreign policy debacle in history. I'm glad so many people have opened their eyes to the corruption of the neo-cons and the vile propaganda spewing forth from Fox News. Sometimes Bush's plummeting poll numbers are the only thing giving me hope that we can, somehow, get this country back on track.

Here's some political commentary from Clarkblog. Any and all comments are welcome.

(Inter)National Lampoon's Vacation. While American soldiers fight and die, the Iraqi Parliament takes a two-month vacation. Yay!

Unhappy Anniversary. Four years since the fall of Baghdad. Um, why aren't they welcoming us with flowers yet, like Dick Cheney promised?

Meanwhile, in the Reality-Based World. America starts to wake up. Or is it just yawning?

The Fragrance of Flowers. Her name was Abeer Qassim al-Janabi. Along with her family, she was terrorized, raped, and murdered by American soldiers.

Bizarro World. Fox News broadcasts from another dimension.

It Is Not Just Walter Reed. Our wounded war vets around the nation are being mistreated.

Support Our Troops? Yeah, Right. Bush wants to cut the medical benefits of veterans.

Not My President. Fuck him. No, seriously.

Duck Off. Cartoonist Bruce Tinsley and his unfortunate thinking problem.

America: Now Less Stoopid. Why does Dubya make his daddy cry like a bitch?

Dry Drunk Dubya. Somebody mix this messiah a drink awready, fer chrissakes ...

Throwing Stones. The Republican-controlled Congress is the worst ever.

Nov. 7, 1975. How it all began ...

Truth Decay. Fantasist Neil Gaiman on religion and politics.

Lyin' Sacka Texas Shit. Iraq did 9/11! Naw, wait, I didn't say that! Wait, okay, so I did. Not! Heh-heh!

She Wants the Dumb American. Last August, more Americans suddenly believed the falsehood that Iraq had WMDs. Which begs the question: WTF?

Our Pet Goat. Fact: When George Bush goes on vacation, Americans die.

God Bless Stephen Colbert. The bravest man in American rips George Bush a new asshole -- to his face.

Take Your Medicine. So now you hate Bush? Great! Now bend over for your punishment.

Get Up, Stand Up. Brave students turn their back on Alberto Gonzalez, who's turned his back on the U.S. Constitution.

The Madness of King George. Jane Smiley on the corrupt origins of the neo-cons.

INDEX: MILESTONES

Here's a list of milestones from the first two years of Clarkblog.

Even when things are sad, there's always something worth celebrating. Important to remember that.

• Nez, 1964 - 2007. Saying goodbye to an old friend, and "hello again" to some others.
• Sloshed in the Pulpit. Jerry Falwell fornicated with his mother. Then he said some mean things and died.
• Cletus Anderson, RIP. Remembering a talented film and theater designer, and the many lives he touched.
• Molly Ivins, RIP. This tough-talkin' Texan pulled no punches when it came to assholes both Democratic and Republican.
• Dreams and Prayers Ascending. How my kindergarten teacher changed my life.
• Master Harold. Playwright Harold Pinter wins the Nobel Prize for Literature.
• Octavia Butler, RIP. A talented writer leaves us much too soon.
• Andreas Katsulas, RIP. An amazing actor who created the most human alien since Mr. Spock.
• John Spencer, RIP. The late great actor from The West Wing.
• James Doohan, RIP. The Enterprise's stalwart engineer, currently in orbit.
• Bruno Kirby, RIP. A character actor leaves a distinct impression.
• Bliss. Hanging out with three masters of science-fiction and horror.
• Hubris. A cautionary tale from Aeschylus rings out across the centuries, just in time for 9/11.