Category Archives: Entertainment

The First Robo-Call, Others to Follow

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A few above-freezing days lately melted our snow cover. That’ll never do, Old Man Winter mutters, and so this morning we had a fresh few inches. At least it’s light snow this time, and proved fairly easy to remove from the driveway and sidewalk.

This was fun to write. Since then, a reader suggested Lex Luthor as a real estate villain. In Superman (1978), he hatched a scheme to sink most of California so his desert land would be the new West Coast, and thus instantly worth a fortune. Not a bad suggestion for a villain.

Still, Luthor’s plot is comic-book logic for you. I’d think the destruction of California would set off a deep economic panic worldwide, and so it might be years before much is developed anywhere. Also, people might be a mite skittish about repopulating the “new” West Coast, even after the economy recovered.

Not long ago, we got the first political robo-call of the year. From an unexpected source. I quote in full:

“Hi, this is Jessica with Mike Bloomberg 2020. We have brand-new yard signs. Will you show your support with a yard sign at your home? Go to w-w-w Mike Bloomberg dotcom slash 2020 slash yard hyphen signs to request one now. Thank you and have a great day. Paid for by Mike Bloomberg 2020.”

The Comics Curmudgeon

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During my free moments recently, scant free moments on some days, I’ve been reading the Comics Curmudgeon. It’s a standard blog of long-standing. A fellow named Joshua Fruhlinger posts a selection of daily newspaper comics — to use the quaint old term — and adds commentary. Generally mocking commentary, but unlike so much writing in that vein, he writes well. Some of it is very funny, or at least highly amusing, and often enough thoughtful too.

The range of targeted comics is broad, including what could be called funnies, except they aren’t funny all that much, such as B.C., Beetle Bailey, Crankshaft, Family Circus, Hagar the Horrible, Lockhorns, Marvin, Pluggers, Shoe, Six Chix (one of the few I’d never heard of) and many others. But not, I see from the archives, Broom-Hilda. I guess some things are so bad, yet have so much inexplicable longevity, that mocking them is pointless.

Also lampooned are the few soap-opera or adventure comics that are still around, such as Mary Worth, Mark Trail, The Phantom and Rex Morgan M.D. From the blog I learned that Apartment 3-G expired a few years ago, an event that had completely escaped my notice. Say, whatever happened to Dondi?

Some samples:

Crock, Jan. 3, 2019, has one of the men talking to the fort’s cook: “Psst… the men are planning a coup for Crock.” As the soldier walks away in the second panel, the cook says, “Will they need any snacks or finger food?” (Shouldn’t that be a coup against Crock? Never mind.)

Comics Curmudgeon says: “Crock’s Foreign Legion detachment is based in an isolated fort surrounded by a hostile, barely subjugated colonial population, and so it probably relies on supplies from the metropole to avoid starvation. A violent overthrow of the fort’s commanding officer, no matter how cruel and incompetent he might be, will certainly be seen as an act of rebellion against the French Republic, and so our heroes are likely to be cut off from any outside support, at least until they can successfully negotiate an amnesty. Thus, the coup plotters need to ensure that the fort’s cook and his staff are on their side and prepared for the hardship to come! But they’re being kind of half-assed about it, in my opinion.”

Beetle Bailey, Oct. 10, 2016, has two panels. First, Sarge (in the lead) and Beetle are climbing a steep slope. “Keep going, Beetle! We’re almost to the top!” Sarge says. Beetle simply says, “Groan!”

Next, at a cliff’s edge, Sarge says, “Wow, Beetle! We made it! Congrats!” and slaps Beetle on the back. Beetle is shown flying off the cliff.

CC says: “Welp, looks like Sarge finally just straight-up murdered Beetle! I guess this strip is over now. Looking forward to seeing what new comic they replace it with, or maybe just enjoying the soothing blank space left over when they don’t bother!”

A single panel Heathcliff, July 15, 2013, shows the cat hitting a baseball, using a fish as a bat. The caption says, “He switched to a lighter flounder.”

CC says: “Today’s panel provides something more in line with the profound weirdness bubbling below the surface of this feature’s modern iteration. Cats like fish, and I suppose cats like “playing with their food,” when their food is alive, but instead here the tenuous conceptual cat-fish connection produced a scenario where Heathcliff has a collection of fish of varying densities that he uses as athletic equipment. How dead are these fish, anyway? Are they still floppy? Do they hit the ball with a meaty smack, or have they started to rot, with contact with any projectile producing a cloud of scattered fish-flesh?

On July 22, 2007, he astutely compared Shoe and Get Fuzzy on politics.

“… while usually I go on about just about everything at great length, the most important thing I can say here is that Get Fuzzy is funny, while Shoe isn’t. Shoe falls into the typical toothless trap of just saying “THE POLITICS AREN’T THEY ANNOYING?”, literally allowing the discussion to be replaced by meaningless placeholder syllables. Get Fuzzy works with established character traits — Bucky and Satchel’s party affiliations have been frequently noted, whereas I don’t believe Shoe and the Perfesser had political beliefs until they became necessary for this cartoon. Plus Get Fuzzy contains actual political jokes that are funny. I love the third-party punchline, but I love “Well, with the proper funding…” even more.

1917

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A while ago I saw the trailer for 1917, before I knew anything about the movie, or even that such a movie was in the works. Often enough you can judge a movie by its trailer. You know full well that it would be a waste of time. The 1917 trailer didn’t inspire any confidence in me that I wanted to see it. Hell’s bells, World War I is getting the Pearl Harbor treatment, I thought. Lots of brainless CGI.

I was completely wrong. We saw the movie over the weekend and I was astonished by how good it was. Much has been made about how the action seems to happen in real time, in one movie-long shot (117 minutes), though of course the cuts are hidden. In that sense, the film is a technical tour de force, but it’s much more than that.

It’s an Iliad and an Odyssey, following two tommies from their own trenches, across no man’s land, into abandoned German trenches, and into places previously behind the lines, all the while facing the strong likelihood of injury or death. It’s one damn thing after another. It’s suspenseful, since there’s a clear objective whose resolution is always in doubt until the end.

It’s also a work of high verisimilitude, including the maze-like aspects of the trench systems, the danger and gore and misery of WWI battlefields, and the ruins of French villages, but also the pleasant springtime countryside beyond the immediate fighting. The cinematography of some of the scenes, especially the bombed out, smoldering ruins, dazzles the eye.

The back stories of the main characters aren’t fleshed out in much detail, though there is a brief but remarkable discussion of cherry trees as part of one soldier’s personal history — the symbolism of which I did not miss — and a few other intimations of a life outside the war zone. I understand that bothered some critics, but it doesn’t bother me.

This isn’t a Hallmark movie. I don’t want them to sit around discussing their feelings — as if two Great War soldiers on a harrowing mission through some hellish landscapes would do that. You don’t need their details. They’re Everymen, and they’re fully human without the exposition, focused as they are on their own situation. The lead actors conveyed all they needed to about their characters through some dialogue, but mostly their reactions to all that they encounter, not quite all of it the horrors of war.

So 1917 is a remarkable movie in many ways, but not without flaws. I wasn’t sure, for instance, that the central conceit of the mission was even plausible. The two tommies were sent to relay a vitally important order countermanding an attack by an out-of-communication British regiment that had followed the Germans after they had made a tactical retreat to the Hindenburg Line in the spring of the title year.

That two men and two men alone would have been sent on such an incredibly dangerous mission, if it were so important, seems a little strange. Some redundancy would have been called for, to help ensure the message got through. Besides — couldn’t the mission have been accomplished by delivering a message by airplane? Even if a plane couldn’t land in such a forward area, it certainly would have been able to communicate with the ground.

“These early aircraft were not fitted with radio sets, but messages about enemy troop movements needed to be communicated quickly,” the Imperial War Museum explains. “Pilots could either drop messages in weighted bags or use message streamers to drop messages to forces on the ground.”

Never mind. 1917 is an epic story, well worth watching on a big screen. Good work, Mr. Mendes.

Falun Dafa by USPS

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Winter hasn’t been very bitter so far. Yet. All of last week’s light snow has melted. But the polar vortex hammer could still drop. Hard.

Back to posting on January 21. I take holidays where I can get ’em, even in the stony bleak mid-winter.

The following is an example of a small item, a throw-away item — literally, though I’m going to put it in the blue recycle bin — with a long story trailing behind it. Today in the mail I received a high-quality pamphlet, 16 glossy pages, rich bright colors, advertising the Shen Yun dance show in the Chicago area this spring. It’s merely the latest example of advertising created by what must be a deep marketing budget for that show.

Mostly I’ve been ignoring the marketing. Maybe it’s the oversell. “A Life-Changing Experience,” the cover proclaims. Gee, I hope not. Inside: “A Gift from the Heavens,” “Watch 5,000 years unfold before your eyes,” “the Divine Origin of a Glorious Civilization.” Sure, whatever you say.

It’s probably a corker of a show, if you like that kind of spectacle, though I doubt — as the pamphlet implies visually — that any of the dancers can actually fly. Then again, I suppose a fantasy counterpart culture of imperial China has some appeal. Just not for me. Well, I might go if I didn’t have to pay.

More interesting to me is text box on the last page. It says, in bold letters: CANNOT BE SEEN IN COMMUNIST CHINA.

“Traditional Chinese culture — with its deep spiritual roots and profound worldview — was displaced by communism in China. While Shen Yun cannot perform in mainland China today, we are reviving this precious heritage and sharing it with the world.”

Hm. I looked a little further. The return address for the pamphlet, for it did come in the mail, cites the Mid-USA Falun Dafa Association as the sender.

Ah. Falun Dafa (Gong), whom the Chinese government hates so much. Seems like the show, then, is a way for the religion, persecuted as it is in China, to poke the Chinese government in the eye. That’s a sentiment we can all get behind, but I’m still not paying to see the show.

Richard III

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In our lifetime, only five years ago, Richard III got a spiffy tomb at Leicester Cathedral, after centuries in an anonymous grave not far away. That came to mind when Ann and I went into the city on Saturday to see a reading of Richard III at the Newberry Library.

It was the same setup as last year, when we saw Titus Andronicus: actors reading their parts, holding scripts, while moving around one of the library’s large rooms, in front of and to the side of the audience. Outside wind blew and rain fell, just above freezing, so that might account for the slightly smaller crowd than last year, but even so a lot of people came out for the tale of murder, intrigue, more murder, double-dealing and a violent denouement. Everything you need in an Elizabethan history play.

Very talented actors, so the lack of any set or costumes didn’t matter. Christopher Prentice, who played Richard, did the demented villain to just the right pitch, and moved himself in ways that didn’t exactly suggest a hunchback, but weren’t quite normal either, and strangely menacing.

One more thing. Here’s the mission statement of the Richard III Society, which was instrumental in finding the king’s bones in our time: “In the belief that many features of the traditional accounts of the character and career of Richard III are neither supported by sufficient evidence nor reasonably tenable, the Society aims to promote, in every possible way, research into the life and times of Richard III, and to secure a reassessment of the material relating to this period, and of the role of this monarch in English history.”

I’m all for historical inquiry, but even so — Richard III gets to be a villain. The literary Richard III is more robust than any historic portrait of him is ever likely to be.

I Hope the Danes Appreciated the Show

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A lot of musicians have recorded “Children, Go Where I Send Thee,” such as the Weavers, where I first probably heard it, or Odetta, just to name two.

But for joy and sheer verve, I haven’t heard a rendition to match this one.

Johnny Cash, members of the Carter family, Carl Perkins, the Statler Brothers and the Tennessee Three, in 1971 in Denmark and in their prime. Solid camera work, too. Somehow or other I never saw this wonderful clip until the other day.

No Fond Memories of Record Hole

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I pinned this to the wall behind the front door today. It’ll be there until I will be obliged to take it down. Why there? Just a passing whim. I was tired of it lying around my office.
Record Hole bagIt’s a plastic bag and a relic of the 1970s or the ’80s at the latest. Not only that, a souvenir from San Antonio. At one time, Record Hole was a local chain of record stores in that city. Or so I believe.

The brand is long gone, and so far I’ve found only one trace of it online — a passing mention in an article about a different and surviving record store, as of 2016. Not that I’ve looked very hard. But Record Hole is so obscure that it didn’t even make in on this list of defunct retailers, which includes Record Bar, Record Town and Record World.

Some time ago, I picked up the bag at my mother’s house — again on a whim — and brought it back home. She’d been using it to store odds and ends. I might well have bought a record at a Record Hole and left it with her 40-odd years ago. I didn’t buy many records, but I did buy a few. Or maybe my brother Jim bought something there.

At one time, Record Hole was established enough to air local TV ads. I vaguely remember them, because they featured a primitive animated version of ’70s-record-listening dude.

record hole bagWho was sitting on a record on a turntable. Trippy, man. The store’s motto, which is also on the bag but upsidedown and backwards in my picture: Whatever music plays in your head, we can put in your hand.

Plastic bags, though they may last for centuries in landfills, are notoriously ephemeral when it comes to being saved elsewhere. Sure, it’s still worthless now, but some happy descendant of mine might make a fortune off the bag in, say, the 23rd century, when the notion of plastic bags and records are historic curiosities that excite collector interest.

Put a Light in Every Country Window

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Winter temps have kicked in, but at least Monday’s drizzle and mist didn’t become ice. Now we have dry subfreezing conditions. Tolerable.

Meandering around online recently — often the best way to find anything interesting — I came across “Put a Light in Every Country Window.” A song about rural electrification in Australia. Can’t say I’ve ever heard one of those before.

Put a light in every country window,
High-speed pumps where now the windmills stand.
Get in and lay the cable so that one day we’ll be able
To have electricity all over this wide land.

Catchy tune. Wasn’t long before I found the liner notes of Folk Songs & Ballads of Australia, recorded in 1964 by Gary Shearston, a star of the Australian folk revival (another thing I didn’t know about).

“A song from the pen of Don Henderson, one of Australia’s best and most prolific contemporary songwriters, who has travelled and written throughout the Eastern States,” the notes say. “This song was written three years ago after a journey through the area of the giant Snowy Hydro-Electric Scheme.”

Of course it isn’t the only song about rural electrification. Surely Woody Gutherie’s “Roll on Columbia” counts as one, and maybe “Grand Coulee Dam” does indirectly. Considering how many songs Gutherie wrote, there are probably others too.

There’s also this recent oddity about Rural Electric Cooperatives, to the tune of “The Battle of New Orleans.” It’s interesting, but a little hard to listen to.

Space Ghost, Osaka Winter & Anticipating Australia

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Not long ago, I dug up a letter I wrote in Japan, dated December 8, 1991. At the time I was preparing to travel to summertime Australia. I’m impressed by the references to obsolete things: VHS, travelers cheques, international land-line calls that need to be scheduled.

The other day, in an unusually listless moment, I decided to watch the Space Ghost tape you sent. As I mentioned, I only had the vaguest memories of that cartoon, and none at all of Dino Boy. There’s nothing especially remarkable about either… SG seems like it was a pretty minor effort, slapped together without regard to originality, a sense of humor, or more than the rudiments of the art of animation. In short, dreck. Ditto for DB.

Today I was off, and some of the time I was at home, cleaning up and re-arranging the furniture a little. I went to the grocery store early in the morning and rode my bicycle around the park late in the afternoon. The day was cool and cloudy. Almost pleasant. This time of the year in Chicago would already be down-coat weather most days, but Osaka makes up for the fierceness of its summers during its mild winters.

I can’t remember that I’ve told you about the upcoming trip. The ticket and visa are squared away, and the itinerary is as complete as I care to make it. I bought some Australian dollars the other day. Some Australian travelers cheques, actually.

I’ll call you from Australia on Saturday, Dec. 28 your time. It may be a little earlier or later than usual, owing to differences in time zones, and my location on that day. I might be on the west coast by then (Perth), or maybe not. This time of the year, the east coast (Sydney) is 17 hours ahead of U.S. Central. They have daylight savings too. I believe Western Australia doesn’t have DST, so that would put Perth only 14 hours ahead of Central. Regardless of my place, I will try to time the call to fall between 8 to 10 your time. It is possible that I will be in transit at that time, in which case I will call 24 hours later.

I’ll also try to get a letter to you in the mail, perhaps after Christmas. And a few postcards from various places. If you have anything to mail to me, remember that Dec. 20 is the last day I’ll pick it up in Osaka for three weeks.

I was pretty hard on Space Ghost. That was before his revival in Space Ghost Coast to Coast, which I’ve only heard about, never seen, but which seemed to give him a new fan base. At least, that’s what I assumed when I saw a reveler decked out as Space Ghost at the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade in 2006.

I don’t care. It was still a substandard cartoon, product of the ’60s Hanna-Barbera cartoon mill.

Tintinabulation &c

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A classic November day outside my window today. Slate gray sky, rain in the morning, chilly but not freezing, gusts of wind pushing leaves around. At least week’s ice and snow are gone. They’ll be back. A brown Christmas would suit me fine, but I can’t count on it.

Back to posting after Thanksgiving, around December 1, after a week-long holiday from posting, but not from work this year. Still, being off on Thursday and Friday — which will include no special consumer activity on my part — ought to be pretty sweet, as always.

We will probably hit the grocery store on Tuesday or Wednesday evening. Meat, carbohydrates, sweets, etc. Exact menu to be determined in conference with the rest of my family in the near future.

Here’s Phil Ochs’ adaption of Poe’s “The Bells.” Didn’t know about it until recently. Nice.

I have a big book of Poe’s work from the library that I’ve been grazing lately. Read “The Bells” again, among other things, after many years. I’d forgotten most of it. Somehow I didn’t notice when I was younger that the poem progresses from silver to gold to brass (brazen) to iron bells — from merriment to happiness to alarm to death, or at least what I take for death in poem, though not the song:

They are Ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pæan from the bells!

Last night I read “Hop-Frog,” which I hadn’t before. A neat little revenge story, like “The Cask of the Amontillado,” though not quite in the same horrifying league. I guessed the ending — what violence Hop-Frog was planning. No matter. Poe’s usually worth a read. The influence of even that minor story seems to turn up in odd places.