Anniversary of the Death of Buddy Holly

February 3rd marked the anniversary of the death of Buddy Holly, who, in 1959, died in a plane crash in Iowa alongside Ritchie Valens, JP Richardson (aka: The Big Bopper) and the pilot of the small aircraft.  Holly was only 22 years old when he died, but he left behind an amazing catalog of music that remains relevant and powerful nearly 60 years after his death.   His legacy is evident in the many generations of rock musicians who followed in his footsteps who picked up on his mix of country and blues riffs, and no less than The Beatles were obviously influenced by Holly and The Crickets work.

I don't want to dismiss the contributions of either Valens or Richardson, but I've been a Buddy Holly man since I was 13 years old, and while I may put Buddy away for a while, every year I put him back on in heavy rotation.

Brandon Routh re-suits up as The Atom

From The Beat

Routh has been appearing on Arrow as Dr. Ray Palmer and now he's taking it up a notch.

I quite like The Atom, especially as a team character, and there's something really great about Routh getting a chance to play the character.  He seems like he really fits the bill, personality wise.

And this is a character I can appreciate wearing a weird, overly engineered costume for all the science-fiction-y reasons you could come up with that would tie to a guy who can shrink down small enough to slide between electrons.

Very excited about this as part of the Flash/ Arrow TV universe.

Artist Norm Breyfogle recovering from stroke

If you're anywhere near my age and you read comics in the 1980's, then you know the work of artist Norm Breyfogle.  Norm Breyfogle and Jim Aparo were some of the definitive 1980's Bat-artists - Aparo leaning more to the Neal Adams illustrative mold and Breyfogle's work more impressionistic and visceral.

Breyfogle's lines in Batman evoked energy and action, something he also brought to page layout and panel management.  He has a keen sense of design that even the better illustrative artists couldn't always bring to the page.  It's something a lot of artists could stand to study a bit.

a pretty awesome 2-page spread

New Mythbusters Format: Plausible

Mythbusters debuted in 2003 and has run for 13 seasons.   It's a program I've followed closely since the pilot, and I've missed, possibly, 3 or 4 episodes of the show, if that.  Really, it's amazing, because I haven't ever watched a show as long as I've kept up with Mythbusters, and  I certainly haven't stuck with any other non-scripted programming anywhere neat that long that didn't include "the news" or "sportsball".

Dan Aykroyd Double Bill: SW Watches "Ghostbusters" and "Trading Places"

With the announcement of the upcoming relaunch of Ghostbusters, I had the movie on my brain.  So when it showed up on Bravo last night after Captain America ended (and it seemed Bravo was playing Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters 2 over and over last night), I tuned in.

There's nothing new to say about the movie at this point, and I kind of feel like any discussion of the movie needs to be refereed by or deferred to Stuart, our resident Ghostbusters nut.


This does give me an opportunity to say that I really like the four announced stars of the Ghostbusters reboot, and I hope the movie does them justice.  But I also hope it's a complete reboot, keeping mostly the concept of a for-profit ghost hunting venture and then paving their own way.  Making the same movie over sounds tedious at best, and the best way to keep us Ghostbusters fans happy is not to just remind us "this is the same but different" with, I dunno, a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man who is a cowboy instead of a sailor.

There's also been the spate of Ghost Hunters-type TV shows that Leslie Jones, herself, has spoofed on SNL that I think would make a welcome launch pad for a different take on the concept.*

And, because it's the weeked and I still have basic cable, I watched the 1983 Eddie Murphy/ Dan Aykroyd/ Jamie Lee Curtis movie, Trading Places this morning for absolutely no reason.  I think there's a rule that all of us have to watch this movie every 3 years or the Elder Gods will return, or something.

I also had the stray thought watching the movie this time that Trading Places could make for a pretty good Broadway Musical, if you got the right music.  It has a ludicrous set-up, unlikely romance, stereotypes interacting, and a pretty simple structure.

Call me, Broadway Producers.  I'm here to help you make money.  I'll also share my thoughts on Police Academy IV with you.





*Buddy Matt and I had an idea for a show called "Ghost C.O.P's." we wanted to do as a web video, but we got lazy and never did it, and I've always been sad about that.  C.O.P's, of course, stood for "Challengers of the Paranormals".  Trust me, it was really, really good.**

**this may or may not be true

SW Watches: Captain America (2011)

It had been a while since we watched 2011's Captain America (or, Captain America: The First Avenger, if you want to get fancy).  I mean, not that long a while, but we kind of forgot to watch it to get prepped for Agent Carter, which, it seems, people aren't watching in significant numbers.

Which... what are you people doing out there?  Stop watching CSI.

If you saw Captain America 2 this summer, the difference between the two movies is certainly striking.  One a warm-hearted nostalgic superhero romp in a world of skeleton-faced villains and good guys on one side and bad guys in black jodhpurs.  Heck, it's got a musical number.  And, of course, Cap 2 being all about the excesses and compromised values of shadow wars and secret power grabs.

I don't have much to add.  You guys know I'm in the bag for the Cap movies.

I'm still glad Marvel didn't see any reason they needed to make Cap edgy or extreme or whatever.  Even in the context of our throwback-nostalgic-era of the movie which people still like to think of in Capra-esque terms, and which the movie plays to, Steve is the idealist to the point of getting beat up on the regular for standing up for himself and for pushing back against bullies.  That adherence to ideals is refreshing not just in this movie, but puts Rogers on a whole other level, giving his allies something to cling to in the storm in the sequel.  It would have been great to see a bit more of Steve Rogers as baritone voiced leader and less as buddy-calling-on-his-friends in the first installment, because I think that informed a bit about how Cap was made the hapless straightman a bit in Avengers.   But Cap 2 certainly took a different tack on that, and I expect something different in the coming Avengers sequel.

And, of course, the movie introduced us to Agent Carter played by Haley Atwell, and that is a very good thing.

SW Reads: Mystic River

blogger's note:  For some reason, this post gets a lot of traffic.  Can someone tell me how you got to this page?  I find the hit count on this post perplexing.

I just finished the audiobook of the Dennis Lehane novel Mystic River, the basis for the 2003 film which drew plum nominations and won a few Academy Awards (and which earned a bucketload of other awards).

Frankly, I never saw the movie, and I really had no idea what either the book or movie were about.  No, I have no recollection of 2003 and what I was doing.  Working, I guess.

There's a guy who works security sometimes in the building where I show up every day, and I think his story is that he does security as his day job (because he can sit there and read), and he goes home and works on his own crime novels.  I admire the hell out of that, and he recommended the book to me about two years ago, and so I finally got around to reading/ listening to Mystic River this year.

Audiobooks are a strange experience.  You're dealing with an actor's interpretation of how this should be read, and sometimes I just feel like maybe the reader missed the mark.  And, this may have been one of those times.  I think he went for "overwrought" and melodramatic when, maybe, he could have pulled it back a bit for a different impact.  I believe I listened to Scott Brick, who also read The Devil in the White City, which I listened to last year, and which I felt was fine, if memory serves.  But this book required a lot more acting and interpretation.

I don't know how I felt about the book.  I guess I'm a little surprised this particular story was thought of so well as to earn Oscar nominations, so I'd like to see the movie soon to see how it worked as Oscar bair.  And it certainly is not the first time a book that maybe wasn't the most inspiring source material worked stunningly well as a movie.  This was certainly nowhere near my favorite book, but what it did, it did well.

Season 3 of The Americans

The Americans returned for its third season Wednesday evening, and it prompted the following thoughts:

• When they say there will be nudity, adult themes, sexual situations and violence, The Americans is not afraid to double down on that @#$%.
• Oh, Keri Russell, you are the kind of the semi-sociopathic Russian sleeper agent men dream of
• Being a spy is a complicated, complicated lifestyle
• This show is so stunningly on-point with drawing comparisons to then and now, it's sometimes embarrassing to watch

SW Watches: Three Days of the Condor (1975)

Man, I have no idea how I never saw this movie.  I remember renting it at least once back in the dark ages when you had to return a movie in 48 hours, and then sometimes you'd get home with it and some friend would be all like "Hey, we're gonna go to Slippy Village for a super rad time!" and by the time you recovered from that journey, all you had time to do was return the videotape.

Anyway - this movie was @#$%ing awesome.  I am not sure it would have been this much in my wheelhouse back in college, but these days, it's absolutely the kind of thing I totally dig.  Super taut thriller with a dude in way over his head, and starring actors I can take seriously?  Sign me up.

BREAKING JIMMY OLSEN NEWS! JIMMY OLSEN WILL BE ON SUPERGIRL!!!

Holy cats!  Variety reports the upcoming Supergirl show will include Jimmy Olsen!

So, who is Mehcad Brooks?  Is he Jimmy Olsen material?

Well, according to IMDB, Mehcad is from AUSTIN, TEXAS, so, how could I NOT pull for this guy?

Now let's see how he looks in a bow tie and sweater vest.