I don't have time to be blogging because now that I'm past my (second) kidney stone recovery I should be cleaning the disaster area that's my house... but I just can't shake the bullets for some reason... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Not Todd! Kidney stones wasn't the only pain that I got hit with this week. To the surprise of absolutely nobody, the idiotic fucks at CBS canceled one of the best shows on television, So Help Me Todd. The reason that this is not surprising is that CBS routinely preempts the show, dropping it from the schedule for weeks at a time. How the fuck can even a great show build momentum when it's not available? How can people run across it when it's not consistently occupying a time slot? CBS purposely sabotaged the show, then canceled it. Period. And it's a real shame, because it's on-track to be even better than the first season...
It's like the network is being run by dipshit assholes using 1980's tactics instead of living in the 2020's where streaming exists. Networks who know what the fuck they're doing either dump all episodes at once for binging... or release them consistently because they know that people will expect a new episode every week (even if they are not tuning in on the actual premiere date). Did Apple preempt Ted Lasso? Fuck no. The people in charge of AppleTV+ actually understand how consistency and momentum are critical to a show's success. Fuck CBS. It pisses me off that Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is on Paramount+ (CBS's overseers) so I have to give these stupid fucks money to watch it. Good thing that's about the only show on this fucking network that I find worth watching. Especially since Star Trek: Lower Decks has also been canceled.
• STORYTIME: The Cloud Under the Sea. It's a bit of a long read. But it's a really good one. It's about the people who repair the massive number of cables under our oceans and waters which make the internet happen. Seriously worth your time. Exceptional reporting by The Verge. It must be, because I don't recommend articles like this very often.
• Bunnies! Instagram has really sucked me in these past couple days. How, you might ask? Bunnies. In particular, bunnies eating stuff. Just look at this. LOOK AT THIS...
And, dude. Dude!
I can't. I CANNOT!
The algorithm is getting scary good at capturing people's attention. Yikes.
• FEMALES?! Marvel Studios announced that Julia Garner will be playing The Silver Surfer in the new Fantastic Four film. Of course there were people who lost their damn minds. BUT SHE'S A FEMALE!!! AND SILVER SURFER IS A MALE!!! And it's like... mostly, yeah. But it's not like there isn't a precedent for a Silver Surfer who's a woman. But the outrage farm over it is by people who likely don't follow the comics in the first place. They just hear "GENDER-SWAP!" being batted around, and that's all that matters...
The only thing I care about... ALL I care about... is that it's a good film. And honors the source material in a way that doesn't have to be literal, but should be respectful to what made the franchise such a success after 60+ years. Live-action is a completely different media than the printed page. There will have to be changes to make it work. The Silver Surfer not being a man isn't going to radically ruin anything. Maybe it made for a more compelling character with the story they want to tell? Or maybe Julia Garner was just the best actor for the role? I dunno. I won't know until the film is released. Nobody will.
• There You Go! It's like... I am already dying to see Deadpool & Wolverine so much that it seems impossible that I could be any more excited about it. But then...
Genius. It's like... whomever is in marketing at Marvel Studios managed to capture everything we've been waiting for. And it's so simple in execution.
• NEWSFLASH: Cable lobby vows “years of litigation” to avoid bans on blocking and throttling. My raw, seething loathing of former FCC chair Ajit Pai for his total fucking betrayal of The American People really knows no limits. This week the FCC is going to vote on whether to restore the vital net neutrality rules that Pai repealed (despite them having massive public support BECAUSE THEY'RE THE RIGHT THING TO DO!). And I'm here to tell you... they better fucking reinstate them. Because I am sick and tired of Big Telco and Big Cable and their fucking need to fuck over the internet with their fucking bullshit for a fucking buck. And I literally could not give less of a shit about their threats. Fuck them. Let them "vow" all they want. Here's a one-minute video from six years ago just to show that we are still fighting the same shit because corporations fucking own our fucking government...
Fuck Ajit fucking Pai forever. When I think of people who should be fucking shot for fucking treason, his name is near the fucking top of my fucking list. To this day I wonder what he got in exchange for selling us out.
And now back to everything in my house I've been needing to clean for the past two weeks.
And so we've come to the end of a three-day weekend, and I'm really sad about that, but not so sad that I'm taking a day off from bullets... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Jolene! Okay... so Beyoncé didn't just cover Dolly Parton's Jolene she changed it in a significant way. Instead of begging Jolene not to steal her man, Beyoncé is warning Jolene to not try and steal her man...
A good cover song comes from making it your own. Beyoncé did that completely. AND SPEAKING OF DOLLY PARTON...
Tina Fey's talent literally knows no bounds. She claims to have gotten the part accidentally because it was shot during COVID and she was the only one around, but the fact that she nailed it anyway is incredibly cool. DESPITE THE FACT THAT SHE CLAIMS SHE DOESN'T DO IMPERSONATIONS...
Yeah, Tina Fey is the gift that keeps on giving.
• Ultimate Evil. I don't think I was ever going to be in the mindset to watch the documentary The Truth vs. Alex Jones, but I felt it important to watch so I did. I expected that my takeaway would be sympathy and heartache. It wasn't. It's all-consuming rage. On way too many fronts. Parents who lost their kids at Sandy Hook were already going through hell before Alex Jones started unlashing his fucked up lies and bullshit that had them constantly under attack. He doesn't just deserve to lose all his money, he should be in prison for what he did. Over and over again we hear about how the "absence of trauma helicopters" and how "the parents were acting like actors" was proof-positive of Sandy Hook being fake. How the fuck does any rational human being hear that and say "Yeah, that sounds about right!" and feel justified in screaming at grieving parents? Holy fucking shit. Who needs Satan as a symbol of ultimate evil? We have Alex Jones.
• The Willow World! This new Hulu Shōgun adaptation is not the book, but something... else. I've read the novel multiple times and fully admit some of the changes bother me a bit, but most of them do not. The series is its own thing, and I'm appreciating it for what it is instead of what it's not. It's interesting to me how the latest episode is spending a relatively huge amount of screen time in a brothel. But not for the reason you'd think. They are making an effort to contrast what a "brothel" is in Japan vs. what it is in the Western world. But they're doing so in a way which explains things that are happening in the story, albeit in abstract. It's all so beautiful and brilliant...
What I love most is that the series isn't married to simply following Anjin around. I'd argue that he's not even the main character of this series. He really isn't the focus of this episode... he's an accessory. A minor distraction that pops up from time to time. And it's a bold... very bold... tact to take. Ladies of the Willow World is an episode that is very much the calm before the storm, and I'm thrilled that it exists. This is what happens when you take your time and give yourself ten episodes instead of six. Because it makes the big picture so much more rewarding. This is exceptional, not-to-be-missed television.
• SO WOKE! I'm going to put this riiiiiight here...
• Polska! You guys... YOU GUYS... Netflix has a Polish rom-com streaming! — I swear, in a lot of ways, Polish rom-coms can out-Hallmark Hallmark. This one is called Nic na sile (No Pressure) and it has one of the guys from Uwierz w Mikolaja (I Believe in Santa) in it...
I wish there was a Polish streaming service with American subtitles here. Because I would stream the heck out of that! Good news if you're not into subtitles... Netflix has dubbed it into English if you want.
• Harrassment!
Can somebody please explain the point of texts like this? I am not a Democrat. I never have been. I always support the best candidate regardless of party...
But if I were a Democrat, I wouldn't be after this harassment. I have texted STOP to this same exact text a dozen times. And each time I block the number. But they just use a different number and text me again and again and again. I have very few regrets in this life. But donating to every Democrat I could find in the 2019 midterms via ActBlue is one of them. I have been relentlessly hounded ever since. There is no way... none... to escape it. They text you no matter how many times you tell them to STOP... they text you no matter how many times you block their numbers. I just looked on my phone. I have 78 blocked numbers. Seventy-eight. To be fair, not all of them are from Democrats. But I bet most of them are. I bet a huge majority are. Because they never, ever stop. So good luck getting another fucking cent out of me via ActBlue. Fuck you and your dataset.
• Visibility! Um... before anybody gets their fucking panties in a bunch and start screaming "PICK ANOTHER DAY FOR TRANS VISIBILITY DAY... EASTER IS TAKEN!" You should know that Easter is on a different day each year, but Trans Visibility Day has been on March 31st since it was created in 2009. I swear, nobody loves to be persecuted more than Christians. They are constantly finding ways for their faith to be assaulted... even if it's not even happening. But anyway, happy International Transgender Day of Visibility! Especially to my trans friends who deserve to be seen when society is working overtime to try to erase them just for existing and being themselves.
On with your Sunday then...
Don't even worry about the fact that the world is going to hell in a hand basket. Don't give it another thought. There's no need... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Biggie! This video shows the largest city on earth throughout history, and it's absolutely mind-blowing...
Fascinating how the USA doesn't even register until the end.
• Good on NASA! In a day and age when young Black men are getting told left and right that they have to cut off their locs or they can't be in school or can't be in sports... Tyrone Jacobs released his NASA headshot...
If NASA doesn't have a problem with natural hair, why the fuck do schools think they have a right to say a damn thing? Newsflash: THEY DON'T. Same goes for tattoos. Same goes for any outward appearance which doesn't keep you from doing the job.
• Queer Comedy! Hannah Gadsby is headlining a gender-queer Netflix Special and I finally got around to watching it. I was expecting her to not touch on the controversy she had with Netflix because, well, how can you use your platform to criticize your platform? But she just went for it. Nothing held back. And Netflix is obviously airing it, so good on Hannah and good on Netflix, I guess...
It's not a home-run, but a lot of the jokes are very funny. I enjoyed it.
• More Clavell! The new Shōgun series is magical to me. I love that the Japanese is subtitled and not dubbed. The language is taking me back. And bless you, Hulu, for putting some money into this. It looks incredible. Sure they wander from the book a bit, but I think that their choices are interesting ones. And I love the cast...
If only we'd get a 12-part adaptation of Noble House next. Not a gutted version, but complete with the Cold War elements and fascinating look at Hong Kong through its people.
• Just Poor! Am I being punked? I do not in any way understand the acclaim for Poor Things. I fucking hated this movie despite loving the other films from most everybody in it. Yes, it’s gorgeous, the imaginative sets are genius, and the cinematography is incredible (the use of different lenses throughout is just =chef’s kiss=)... but the story is a big departure from the book. And absolutely not in a good way...
The book is a wonderfully layered story of how men view women, and it uses the concept of “unreliable narrator” so that you truly don’t know who or what to believe. And there are multiple conflicting “truths” that are tainted by things like misogyny, perspectives, and even the wishful thinking of different characters. But the movie? Bella is a child’s brain in an adult body as a matter of fact, which makes the entire thing a fucking nightmare. It’s child porn with a loophole. And it lacks the subtlety and complexity that made the book so interesting. In my view, Bella loses a lot of her agency in the movie. Her experience and story is viewed entirely through the lens of men she encounters, even as she is rapidly maturing and coming to understand how the world works for a woman. Movie Bella really doesn’t face adversity to truly understand anything either. It’s all observational, and nothing feels earned as she wanders from place to place. And, good Lord, the music is a horrific assault that made me want to turn on subtitles and view it on mute. Who the fuck wants to listen to this? So many times I am able to dislike popular movies for myself, but appreciate that they exist for others. But this time? Hell no. I regret the precious time I wasted watching this mess. It gutted a wonderfully interesting book and turned it into soft core porn for the male gaze which is contrary to what I took away from the source material.
• Whistle Broken. John Barnett did not shoot himself? Or maybe he did. Regardless, I am putting the 100% entire complete blame on Boeing. The guy dedicated 32 years of his life to this company but had a conscience. So when management decided to ignore his concerns about declining quality and falsify data on serious issues with manufacturing, he reported the cover-up as a "whistleblower." And now he's dead. Right in the middle of the lawsuit against his former employer. Again, this guy devoted 32 YEARS of his life to this company. They then set out to absolutely destroy what life he had left because he wanted passengers to be safe. They finally succeeded. Regardless of whether he ended it himself or somebody did it to him.
• Cancel, Please! Why don't streaming services allow you to block shows and movies? Take HBO Max, for example. I never want to watch Bill Maher. Ever. Never ever. I don't care who he has on. I'd rather light my pubes on fire and jump into a barrel of gasoline than watch that moronic self-righteous piece of shit asshole for even two minutes. But every time I start HBO Max, there he is. There's no way to block the dipshit. No way to get him off my TV. And no amount of ignoring him will get HBO to get the fucking message. On Facebook I can block somebody I don't want any contact with. But with HBO, there's no options at all. Can't even give him a thumbs-down so the algorithm will stop inundating you with his bullshit. It's nearly enough for me to cancel HBO, because having to look at Maher's smug face is tantamount to torture.
Hope the rest of your Sunday is a good one.
Another Spring. Another clock adjustment to screw up my day. But I am not deterred... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• What Was I Made For? I don't watch the Oscars. I do watch moments from the Oscars after I hear who won. The first thing I watched was Robert Downey Jr.'s acceptance speech for Best Supporting Actor (he killed it, as you knew he would). The second thing I watched was Billie Eilish perform her Oscar nominated song for the audience (she killed it, as you knew she would). But the best part was her reaction to receiving a much deserved standing ovation...
I've linked to a brilliant video explaining how her brother Finneas created the music for the song, but here's him and Billie talking about it...
Good Lord they're a pair of talented siblings. Her explanation of the directions she could have gone, but chose not to, is why the song his so heartbreakingly beautiful. And why it deserved the Oscar win...
That video was shot in a single take. It's one take. One. Ironic after the amount of time spent on the song itself. If you've seen Billie's career over the years, you will recognize where those Barbie outfits came from.
• Guy! The Gentlemen was great. I loved it. But this is Netflix, so I'm not getting attached for a Season 2, even though I'd love to see it...
If I have a criticism, it's that Guy Ritchie has a consistent problem. He is always introducing stupid characters who only exist to fuck things up, and they continue to fuck things up the whole way because the other characters don't ever seem to do anything about them. Which is absurd, because especially in these types of worlds, nobody could afford to indulge stupid like this. Stupid characters would be eliminated... or, at the very least, be neutralized so they can't keep doing stupid shit and fucking things up. It's fun at first, but eventually it's just moronic and boring. But anyway... it's still a great series, mostly driven by the performances of the main two characters and an entertaining story. Still have no idea how this fits into the movie that it's named after.
• On The Daily! I've seen a lot of those "A Photo A Day" videos where somebody takes a picture of their face daily. This is the best one I've ever seen...
Amazing. He's done videos with more frames added, and apparently plans to keep making more, which I sure hope he does.
• Strangers! Turns out that sometimes the critical acclaim is justified. I was finally in a mental place where I could watch All of Us Strangers on Hulu. It debuted last month, but February is a really tough stretch for me every year, and watching a movie about the overwhelming power that grief has over our lives needed to wait. Until now...
It's an incredible film. Highly recommended if you want to be completely shattered for an hour and forty-five minutes. I cannot get over the performances. There are four principal actors, all of them deserving of all the awards, and what they accomplish here will haunt me for a very long time. One of the most important characters in the film is the music, and I think the key to understanding what's happening sits with the song selection. I, obviously, can't discuss that without spoiling the film, so I'll leave how that works up to you.
• Spirit! "It's a love story, you asshole."
The fact that Nick Offerman threw himself into the episode of The Last of Us so completely is what made it so gratifying.
And now I'll get through the last day of my weekend... WITH ONE LESS HOUR IN IT.
Wah! My weekend is already half over and I'm not ready for it to be Sunday! But Sunday it must be... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Goonies Never Die! I watched this video reflecting on the career of Josh Brolin solely in the hopes that he would talk about Men In Black 3. That movie is so incredibly underrated. It's an amazing film. And a large part of that is Josh Brolin doing a Tommy Lee Jones impression... perfectly... for most of the runtime. And obviously GQ knew that's the thing everybody wanted to hear, so they saved it for last...
I sure wish that we could have heard more about his experience working on that movie.
• Otin! Oh man. The new Disney+ series, Iwájú, is Afrofuturism done very well... but it's so much more than that because there's like a lot going on. And it's very much steeped in Nigerian culture, which is to say that it's something wonderfully different than the same old shit we usually get. Bravo to Disney for giving us something fresh and new for a change. And for using amazing voice actors who breath life into these characters...
The frickin' FOOD in this show is unreal. They put a lot of focus on it as a part of entrenching you into Nigerian culture. And, I tell you what, the emotion they pack into these 20 minute episodes is substantial. Tola is the main character of the show... but it's her best friend Kole who will break your heart. Dang they put a lot of hardship on this poor kid. The villain in this series is a very, very bad man! AND GOOD LORD THIS SHOW IS BEAUTIFUL. They use color to illustrate the class divide in this future Nigeria, and it's very, very hard not to see it because it's the visual language they paint with. And, as if all that wasn't enough, the sound design is equally wonderful. Great surround effects to envelope you in the environment. If you have Disney+, it's very much worth checking out. The episodes are short, so it's a quick watch.
• Ramona! Ramona Fradon is a legendary artist whose gorgeous illustration style has been seen on a vast number of comic book characters. I think I first saw her work on Aquaman reprints or the Super Friends comic. But over the years the thing I most remember her for is the "special event" Wonder Woman stories they'd get her to draw. She had a more "cartoony old-style" that wasn't my favorite for the comics I was into, but that didn't mean I couldn't appreciate it from an artistic standpoint. Far from it, her minimalist style is beautiful because she could get some very expressive line-work that stood very well on its own. I remember reading about her retirement (which was January 5th) and she passed four weeks later on February 24th at the age of 97. Her final work was a trio of covers for Women's History Month...
Though one of her more brilliant works was a private commission piece that she did a few years ago...
Rest In Peace. You were a trailblazer and true artist from the start.
• Help Me, Todd! Okay... let's do the math. Paramount+ wants $60 a year to subscribe with ads. Without ads is $120 a year. BECAUSE IT COMES WITH SHOWTIME, WHICH I DO NOT WANT! No option to get CBS shows without ads and without Showtime. I would pay $90 to get a year of ad-free, but Paramount is a joke of a company who wants me to subsidize their Showtime programs which I have no interest in watching. And so... do I pay $60 so I can watch So Help Me Todd with ads... or do I just subscribe to the show on iTunes for $30 without ads and I can watch it as much as I want? Well, because I don't believe in paying for stuff I don't want AND I detest ads, I'll just buy the show on iTunes. It is, after all, my favorite network show on television...
It's not like CBS has any other shows I can't live without. I'll just watch episodes of NCIS Hawaii once Paramount runs out of money from trying to force crap on people they don't want and they're forced to sell episodes of the show to Netflix because the person in charge of the company is a fucking moron. Can't wait for the spin from the Paramount PR office when profits drop to record lows and they have to convince shareholders that the people running the company aren't fucking idiots who just lost $60 from me. Of course, this is the network who canceled Magnum P.I., so it's not like I expect rational thought to come out of their leadership. But hey, maybe they'll renew So Help Me Todd and get another $30 out of me next year? Stranger things have happened!
• Keep Your Fucking Bullshit Politics Out of People's Lives! The insane... FUCKING INSANE... crusade against IVF is usually seen as something that affects only women. That's not true. It affects women, men, and those identifying as neither... it affects families. And I am disgusted to my core that dumbfuck politicians who don't give a shit about facts... or ANYTHING or ANYONE except MONEY and POWER... put these dipshit laws on the books. Fuck them and all the people who vote them into office. A man wrote an article for GQ Magazine talking about what he and his family went through, and it's worth a read.
• NEWSFLASH: Republican senator blocks bill to protect IVF. Cindy Hyde-Smith is a literal ghoul. She's a shell of a woman who has been filled with a hatred for other women that's shockingly brutal and cruel. Nothing quite like watching a woman embrace the patriarchy to dismantle an option for women who want to be mothers. I get why regressive men vote for toxic, misogynistic pieces of shit to represent them in government. But I will never in a million years understand how women vote for... whatever the fuck this horrific excuse of a human being is... who works overtime to endanger their lives and strip away their rights...
If your God didn't want IVF for us, HE WOULD HAVE DESIGNED HUMAN EMBRYOS TO BE DESTROYED WHEN FROZEN! But of course their belief in an all-powerful deity doesn't allow logic to be applied to anything, so here we are. Fucking anti-science dumbshits making a decision for others in the "Land of the Free" over an issue they probably don't even fucking understand. Sadistic fucks.
• Spam! Just when I think I've hit all the keywords to stop spam texts from politicians reaching me, along comes one more to add. Eventually I'll get there! I regret more than just about anything I've ever done sending money to one candidate... ONE... via "ActBlue." And the spam texts and emails have never, ever stopped ever since. No matter how many emails or phone numbers I block. The fuckers just keep making up new ones...
I love how ActBlue, which is about as skeezy an operation as you'll find just says "It's not our fault you keep getting donation requests from us... we just just provide tools for candidates to fundraise! You can't blame us!" And yet... all the people "using their services" are constantly saying "It's not the criminals! It's the guns that are the problem!" So... which is it? If ActBlue acted responsibly and forbade people from using their donation processing system if they send spam texts, and accepted complaints from people getting spammed with ActBlue requests who never "opted in," then there wouldn't be a problem. But ActBlue doesn't give a fuck. The more people using their service, the more money they make. And so I will never, ever donate to any candidate using ActBlue. I wish others would do the same. Then candidates would have nobody to blame but themselves for getting into bed with these fucking assholes.
• Fishy! The first Aquaman was dopey fun. So long as you didn't think too hard, it wasn't horrifically bad. Kind of a fantastical globe-spanning adventure. But Aquaman 2? Yeah, it's horrifically bad. And though some of the visuals are really great... most of it is so bad that it practically looked animated like a cartoon. And not in a good way. As if all that wasn't enough, the film is obsessed with Aquaman having piss be squirted in his mouth. Baby piss. Octopus piss. I spent the movie pretty sure that his wife is going to be pissing in his mouth any minute now. Or just full-on brick in his mouth. Which is the natural escalation we need. Hilariously, they ended Aquaman 2 the same way that they ended Black Panther... and THEN they ended it AGAIN the same way they ended Iron Man! They copied TWO Marvel Studios movie endings in the same film! Holy shit am I glad that the Zack Snyder reign of terror over the DCU is now officially over.
I guess that's enough trash for one Sunday. See you next week.
The snow has all melted, and ... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Mean It! It’s a beautiful song to begin with. But when LANY's lead singer comes in with that hook at 2:47... how do collaborations like this happen? It’s perfect...
Can't believe this track is off Lauv's debut album.
• Winner! (here's a link in case TikTok is being a dick)...
@jamieandblake Keep them guessing 😅 #funny #viral #fyp ♬ original sound - Jamie and Blake
I hope he at least didn't have to pay.
• Patagonia! I don't have very many regrets in life. But the few I do usually revolve around missed opportunities when it comes to travel. Not having been to India yet is something that I very much regret, for example. But bigger regrets are having gone places but not having enough time to see and experience more of the area. My photo expedition to Antarctica was incredible. A true bucket-list-worthy item that I will remember forever. And yet... I sure wish I would have had more time so I could visit Patagonia. But I had new kittens back home that I worried about. A mom in a memory care facility that I worried about even more. And two weeks away was already more than I could take (or afford).
• Streaming Services Are Shit! Cutting cable/satellite was one of the happiest things I ever did. I fucking HATED having to buy bundles that included channels I would never watch and commercials I was forced to suffer through on top of the huge monthly bill. Streaming allowed me to pay for exactly what I wanted to watch and was ad-free. Then, fast-forward to today, and we're back to bundles and fucking ads (unless you pay an absurd amount of money to get rid of them. Not only that, but the amount of content you get is shit too. Which brings us to this...
God. It's so bad that I'm to the point where I subscribe to one service ad-free each month, cancel it, then move on to the next ad-free service. And I know I'm not alone. It used to be that I cared about supporting services that produced content I wanted to watch by subscribing every month. Now I don't give a shit. Fuck 'em. I will pay when there's something they have that I want to watch. For the rest, I pay for YouTube Premium, which is ad-free and has endless content. That's enough.
• Marvel! Today I watched Assembled: The Making of The Marvels and am sad all over again that the movie underperformed. I love Brie Larson as Captain Marvel. Her first movie was SO good. Her part in Avengers: Endgame was flawless. And while there were some serious problems with The Marvels, it was still very entertaining. I loved the power-switching concept that drove it. — I want to see Captain Marvel again. I need more Carol Danvers. I hope that Marvel Studios brings her back somehow. And Photon. Teyonah Parris is a frickin' gift. How awesome would it be to get a limited series which explores her light powers in a cool and interesting way. And of course Ms. Marvel. I didn't particularly care for her limited series, but she was absolute gold in The Marvels. That Iman Vellani could capture the wonder of what her character was experiencing so perfectly is the heart of the entire film...
But my favorite part of the documentary was Laura "LOOK AT ME, I'M WACKY" Karpman on sound design. Makes me want to re-watch the movie just to have a better appreciation for her work on it. And of course I thought the special effects were glorious. =sigh= I am so bummed that super-hero movies are imploding. I love love loved having so much content and watched it all. I would love to have a new Marvel movie every month. Like the comics. But now it's all being scaled back, and there's really nothing out there to replace it for me. I waited so long for something like the MCU to happen. I don't want it to end.
• Housed! It is so weird having spent a month watching every episode of House and now it’s over. I cannot wrap my head around the fact that there are no more episodes to watch. But anyway… the final season was a bit of a mess, but I loved the show. Ten thoughts… 1) I think it’s probably a good thing that the show didn’t have a ninth season. They did everything, and it was time. There’s only so many times you can say “sarcoidosis.” 2) That being said, I want a spin-off with Chi Park. I love her character and want more. Even though they didn’t know what to do with her, and came up with the idiotic Chase love scenario. 3) I missed Cameron after she left. But Cuddy was the one that I cannot believe wasn’t there for the last season… and the way they got rid of her was insulting and stupid. 4) Robert Sean Leonard better have gotten an award for playing Wilson, because damn. 5) I think that Omar Epps probably didn’t get enough credit for his role. He was memorable despite his character being buried most of the time. 6) While I loved Taub when he was in doctor mode, they spent WAY too much time on his stupid personal life. 7) Thirteen was my favorite character. Partly because they made her so interesting, but mostly because Olivia Wilde played her so beautifully. 8] The saddest moment to me was Kutner, not Wilson, because Kutner was all reactions by the characters, and we will never know what he was feeling. 9) I would have liked to get more of the detective guy, Lucas. He was just so… together… and I love that they didn’t feel the need to make him a mess like everybody else. 10) I really do think that the writers backed themselves into a corner with Greg House. It’s like they felt him being a mess was his only quality, and he never really gave him the opportunity to be anything else (even when he was with Cuddy). Fortunately, Hugh Laurie was just so GOOD in the role that it didn’t matter. He made the character fascinating to watch no matter how much the writers were intent on sabotaging him. — BUT ANYWAY... A really good show that I’m kinda sad I didn’t watch as it was airing, because that way it probably wouldn’t have seemed as repetitive with the medical diagnosis jargon. GRADE: A- (though the final season was probably more of a C+).
Until next Sunday then.
I'm scrubbing up after seven months of having my shower doors collecting dust in my hallway, but now that they're moved, I can move on... and blog... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Make Mine Marvel! I fully expected to get a Deadpool 3 trailer at the Superb Owl. And though I'm not watching the game, I wasn't disappointed. Now titled Deadpool & Wolverine, it's absolutely everything I dreamed of...
This may very well be worth a trip to the theater.
• Yawn! I was wandering through the internet and saw a photo of some cats that immediately reminded me of the famous Pet Shop Boys album cover for actually...
Classic. The Instagram account didn't credit the creator of the photos, but a reverse image search pointed me to this Tumblr here. Hopefully that's the right place. Kinda frustrating when creators don't get credited for their work.
• DOON TOO! Um. Wow. Can't wait for the second half of Dune. The whole idea of riding a big worm through the desert is just so comical, but here Denis Villeneuve actually makes it look terrifying...
I've always been a fan of what David Lynch managed to do with his original film back in 1984, but this is phenomenal. If only Frank Herbert could see how his master work has been so beautifully adapted.
• Call Me... Charlie Baltimore! I love maps. This short video is on a subject I've read about many times... but this is a very clear way of illustrating The Baltimore Phenomenon...
Alice Springs was an interesting place to visit. I went so I could see Uluru (AKA "Ayer's Rock), and it feels very much like a place that's there just to service people doing exactly that.
• I'm Blue! Oh how I love science. The story of the development of the blue LED is fascinating...
The implications of sterilization LEDs is mind-boggling.
• Shorted! It's been a while since I've read Optic Nerve. But I was excited when I heard that Randall Park was adapting Shortcomings from the original comic. THEN I saw that it was to star Justin Min (he's Ben in The Umbrella Academy) and Ally Maki (who I fell in love with from Wrecked) and was all in...
It ended up being darn good. Kinda slice-of-life with some humor to it. And though I don't recall seeing Sherry Cola in anything, she is hilarious. All the actors are really good, but holy crap should Justin Min be tearing up Hollywood. Good looking with the bone structure of a god... and incredible talented to boot.
• Poppin'! TRADITIONAL GENDER ROLES ONLY APPLY TO WOMEN! MEN CAN DO WHATEVER THEY WANT! IT'S IN THE BIBLE, YOU CAN LOOK IT UP! Meanwhile... misogyny never looked so fabulous. That lip gloss and those frosted tips are poppin' on him! Way to find a look that's so glam on you, my brother in Christ! (here's a link in case TikTok is being a dick)...
@speechprof This has the same energy for me as Andre Tatertot saying that the tears running down his face when he feels sad isn’t crying.
♬ original sound - The Speech Prof
The lack of awareness is just next level here.
And now? Back to playing clean up.
Everybody is mentioning Barbie when it comes to the Oscar nomination announcement and, yeah, that's pretty fucked up what happened. But to me the most gross oversight is that Celina Song didn't get nominated for Best Director when it came to her Oscar-Nominated Best Picture Past Lives.
It's my opinion that this achingly beautiful film required more deft directorial skills to realize than any of the directors that got nominated. I mean... nothing to take away from any of them, because they've all got films they should be proud of... but the story of Past Lives is like a fragile teacup which required careful thought be put into every scene to avoid breaking it. The core of the story is with the actors, yes, but the choices that Song made feel vastly more critical to making the movie what it is.
A part of me thinks that there was only room for one woman in the nominees, and it wasn't her.
Oh well. I'd really like to see it win Best Picture.
In any event, I am very much looking forward to whatever she does next. Every frame of Past Lives is art, and this is only her first movie!
When it comes to Barbie, Greta Gerwig did get a nod for her (adapted??) screenplay, which seems a more fitting nomination than director, in my humble opinion. But wrapping my head around how Ryan Gosling got nominated but Margot Robbie did not is impossible. I get why people are baffled. I am too. I may not have been utterly entranced by the film as so many have, but I can say 100% that if Ken was deemed Oscar-worthy, then Barbie should be as well. Robbie's performance and commitment was not in any way short.
Worth a look if you're starved for something new to watch...
Several sections almost demand watching in slow motion because the swapping of powers and places creates some crazy-fast action.
The sun is shining, there's no snow on the ground, and apparently Winter is over, but I'm trying not to think about a possible drought come Summer... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Portraiture! Auguste Toulmouche was a wonderful artist who is most well known for his portraits of fancy Parisian women. What made his paintings so notable was the expressions he painted on their faces. The most famous likely being La Fiancée hésitante (The Hesitant Bride)...
But my favorite of his is Vanity...
This past week I was going through my art books and noticed something I hadn't before. There is a portrait of Auguste by another artist of the day, Jean-Louis Hamon...
After Googling for other images of the guy and not finding any, I realized something... this is likely the only record of what Auguste looked like. All articles about the guy show this same image. It's a rough painting, and yet captures a feeling in a way that a photograph never could. One of the many reasons I love art so much. Here's a self-portrait of Hamon...
Amazing artist. I would kill to be able to paint hair like that.
• Méndez! I wrote a whole post over my love of the movie Half Brothers (which you can read here). I'm such a fan that I've been tracking down other works by the people in it. #1 on my list is Luis Gerardo Méndez. The guy's ability to emote what his character is feeling is jaw-dropping. He makes you feel every emotional beat of his character, and is a big reason why I love the film...
BUT ANYWAY... I was thrilled to learn that his latest project is on Paramount+ and is called Los Enviados. Except when I went to Paramount+ I couldn't find it. After a couple weeks, i.e. TODAY, I found out that it's there... you just can't search for its Spanish title. You have to search for The Envoys instead?? Weird, considering it's a Spanish language show. But anyway...
So, yeah. Most definitely checking this series out. The second season just dropped, so I'm assuming the first season must have been pretty great.
• Cameron Classics, Now On Digital! I love James Cameron movies. And two of my favorites are True Lies and The Abyss...
I bought them on both LaserDisc and DVD. My digital version were ripped from DVDs and hi-res broadcast because they've never been available to purchase on Digital (or Blu-Ray). Until now! And iTunes has both of them on sale for $9.99 each! So now I'm digital legal. As I endeavor to always be. The only time I'm not IS WHEN THEY DON'T MAKE THEM AVAILABLE FOR SALE!!!
• Rojas! Every time I rewatch Ted Lasso I find something new that I didn't know. Apparently, Danny Rojas is based on Mexican football star Javier Hernández. While reading up on Hernández, I ran across Diego Maradona, an Argentinian footballer who is rumored to also contribute to Danny's character. And THEN I found this old video of Maradona where he was warming up before a match. The song playing on the field in the background is Live is Life WHICH THEY PLAY AT THE END OF THE SECOND SEASON'S FIRST EPISODE! MIND. BLOWN. The epiode where Danny recovers from accidentally killing the team mascot. The people working on this show really know their football...
And SPEAKING of Ted Lasso... in the second episode Roy is walking out on the field with a young girl, which is most certainly his niece Phoebe. Except the actor isn't credited on IMDB and she doesn't actually appear in the story until the next episode, where Roy tells Ted about her when they visit the school with Trent Crimm (of The Independent). But if she was walking out with the team, wouldn't Ted have already met her and known who she was?
I must have watched the series a dozen times by now. And the earlier episodes even more. It got me through the horrors of the past three years, and it's pretty daunting knowing that there's no more coming to help me through 2024.
• Tidy! A friend posted a story about a mouse that tidys up a man's workbench every night. If there wasn't video evidence, you wouldn't believe it...
I wish my cats were this motivated. The whole incredible story is right here.
• Expenses! This truly is incredible...
And he really does do that...
Don't forget to be awesome. The guy in the videos is John Green. He wrote The Fault In Our Stars, a book I never read... but did enjoy the movie adaptation. He's a really great guy who has some very interesting thoughts. I love his YouTube channel so much, and recommend checking it out if you want to fall down a rabbit hole of awesome.
• Sigma Octantis! Just when I think I've seen all the flat earth idiocy that exists... along comes another one. Note at the top where the North Star (Polaris) is riiiiight up top...
I'd credit the artist... but I have no clue who that is
Polaris. POLARIS?!? Funny... according to this flat earth model dumbfuckery, you should be able to see Polaris from anywhere on earth. But any time I've traveled south of the equator, it was no longer visible. South Africa, Zimbabwe, Antarctica, Argentina, Fiji, Australia, Bali... no Polaris in sight. I checked! But do you want to know what's funny? Sigma Octantis (AKA The South Star) which is not visible in the northern hemisphere, is the star around which the night sky rotates when you are in the southern hemisphere. Almost as if the earth was a globe! Remarkable that! These flerfers really need to like... travel... and stuff. THE CONSTELLATIONS AREN'T EVEN THE FUCKING SAME! JESUS!!!
Really hoping we get some late snows so we have water this Summer.
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