A few quibbles aside, the first Wonder Woman movie was a triumph. Beautifully realized and brilliantly told, it was everything you want out of a super-hero comic book movie. And that scene where Princess Diana of Themyscira crawls out of the trenches and becomes Wonder Woman is one of the best scenes of any movie ever made. I enjoyed it a lot, and feel it sits with The Dark Knight and Superman: The Movie as the pinnacle of of what DC Comic movies could be but often are not.

So obviously I was eagerly anticipating the sequel, Wonder Woman 1984...

   
The short non-spoiler version... I absolutely HATED this film. Easily one of the worst movies I've ever seen. It's garbage from start to finish and trying to find something good to say about it boils down to Gal Godot looking as amazing as ever as Wonder Woman. That's it. That's all I got.

My thoughts are in an extended entry, which will include spoilers...

→ Click here to continue reading this entry...

Christmas is coming, but there's magic happening tonight... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Hallmarked! And... tonight was the last new Hallmark Christmas movie of 2020. I've watched and reviewed them all, as usual, of course. Now I just need to wade through a bunch of the other movies from Lifetime, Netflix, and such, and I'm done for another year. Surprisingly, I think this was the best year in a while. Even so, I'm done. I've been Hallmarked out. Until next year.

   
• RickVertising! If I was a company, I'd have Rick & Morty do all my advertisements...

Serious bang for your buck.

   
• Adopt! Speaking of ads... why is it that I can watch all the so-called "emotional" movies and not get emotional, but a commercial like this has me struggling to keep it together?

Just weird, I guess.

   
• Tater! Please tell me that I'm not the only one who has tried Martha Stewart's baked potatoes. Take LARGE YUKON GOLD potatoes... NOT russets... DO NOT poke holes in them. DO NOT oil or butter. Put a wire rack on the middle rack of your oven (so potatoes don't fall through) then bake at 325º for 90 MINUTES. DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN TO CHECK. Just have faith. — After cooking, smash them on a counter, pry apart, then add your favorite topping (I went with salt, pepper, butter, sour cream, and chives). — Remarkable. So creamy it's more like dessert than a potato. And that paper-crispy skin is like candy. Truly the best baked potatoes I've ever had. I won't be making them any other way ever again.

   
• Jangle! I am not into musicals, or fantasy, or kid films... so I've been putting off Jingle Jangle on Netflix. That being said, the production values and costume design? Holy. Shit. This may very well be the most beautiful film I've ever seen. I will be very disappointed if no rewards are won. Even the smallest details are fully realized... and EVERYWHERE...

Worth watching (on Netflix) just for the visuals.

   
• Cop Doctors! One of the most demented (and hilarious) shows to ever air on television was Children's Hospital on Adult Swim (you can watch on Hulu, I believe). I just found out today that Netflix had a spin-off series with a lot of the same cast that aired back in January...

I binged the entire season and loved it. Boy I hope we get another season.

   
• Swap! I look forward to this every year. It never disappoints. I just wish they did even more of it...

Poor Colin. Though I won't feel too sad. He does get to go home to Scarlett Johansson.

   
And that's a wrap. See you after Christmas!

Last night it snowed. Not a ton, but enough to turn the world white here in the foothills of the Cascades.

In the Northeast, of course, it's another story entirely. Which means even if there wasn't COVID happening, I'd likely be unable to get to my annual December work trip in Maine. Assuming I could even fly into Boston and the roads are open, there's still a matter of 2-4 inches of snow falling per hour... followed by rains which will freeze at night. Not a pretty scenario.

Back on my 2014 trip, similar conditions were brutal, and it took a half hour to scrape the ice off my rental car and get the tires free from having been frozen to the ground...

But I can't complain too much. Being stuck in Portland in the bitter cold gave me the opportunity to go exploring with my camera and I got some really nice shots that trip because so few people were out braving the weather...

It will be interesting to see how my travel goes in 2021. Now that the charity has shuttered and work travel has halted indefinitely, it's entirely possible that I'll take just one or two trips a year for vacation or visiting friends and that's it. Quite a change from the dozens of trips I was making each year pre-pandemic. Though when you consider I had zero flights in 2020, even one flight will be a huge change from where I'm at now.

Oh well. I guess the frequent flier status and upgraded seats were good while they lasted. I had 5 years of good status followed by 25 years of amazing status and nothing lasts forever. Still... I will surely miss getting International upgrades. Domestic flights are no big deal. Seattle to Hawaii is just over 5 hours. Seattle to Orlando is around 6 hours. I can tolerate just about any seat for that long. But those 11+ hour flights? Having legroom and comfy seats makes a world of difference.

2006-2013 were my best travel years. When both you and your mom (who has zero status) regularly get upgraded to World Business Class for international trips... you know you are flying a lot of miles. An absurd amount of miles...

=sigh=

Those were the days.

In other news... hate comments continue to trickle in because I dared blog about the movie Dashing in December and showed a photo of two gay cowboys dancing together. I hardly ever read hate comments and delete them the second I know what they're about... but this morning I awoke to a comment which merely said "YOU WILL BE DAMNED!" and I had to really appreciate the artistry in that. A comment short enough that I had read the entire thing before I realized it. If I were to respond to this kind of idiocy (and I don't) it might be along the lines of "Settle down there, snowflake! It's not like I posted images of the gay cowboys kissing!"

Well I'll be damned. I actually did do that!

Please keep your hate comments short and to the point.

Oh wow... hate comments! It's been months!

Yesterday I wrote about the most romantic scene from a movie I've ever witnessed... the dance at the squash festival in the old rom-com Doc Hollywood... then compared it to a similar scene from the new rom-com Dashing in December.

But because the latter film features a romance between two men, that was apparently a bridge too far for some people to take. And so... hate comments! I can only guess that I was put on some kind of watch-list ages ago because every time something like gets posted, whomever it is that's hate-reading my blog apparently tells their entire cadre of like-minded friends to come leave nasty comments that I'll barely read (and never approve) because life is just too short. The IP addresses are from all over the USA, so it must be some kind of online group (One-Dozen Moms... is that you?).

What the issue always seems to boil down to is A) My acknowledging that LGBTQ+ people exist and this is somehow considered offensive and dangerous, because B) My blog has "cartoons" on it which attracts children who might see such unholy perversions as this...

And all I can say is... you're welcome!

Because if your kid happens to be gay and does come across something as innocent as a photo of two guys dancing together on Blogography, then maybe it will be a little ray of sunshine which validates their existence and helps them to deal with the toxic atmosphere you've cultivated which lead so many LGBTQ+ youth into self-harm and even death.

And if you're one of those people who would rather have a dead child than a gay child, then fuck you sideways, because you're everything that's wrong with our society. Nobody "turns gay" from looking at a frickin' photo like this. I mean, you didn't. Or did you?

The truly telling thing about hate comments FOR THE SAKE OF THE CHILDREN on yesterday's entry is the fact that I regularly drop F-bombs in blog entries and never hear a single discouraging word about that. So it's not all the things I write about here... only some things. Maybe before I started blogging I should have asked the internet for a list of things that are and are not acceptable? Well, too late for that now.

I can no more relate to a movie about gay cowboys falling in love than I can relate to a movie about straight people falling in love (apparently, =insert cry emoji=)... but I find them equally entertaining. Actually, I find the gay cowboy romance more entertaining because it's something I haven't seen a million times before (at least not since Brokeback Mountain fifteen years ago). Happy people falling in love are happy people falling in love and I just don't give a crap so long as it doesn't involve children or unwilling animals. And, on top of it all, Dashing in December is GOOD. Really cute stuff if you are into the whole Hallmark Christmas movie rom-com thing like I am.

And if you think that a bunch of hate comments is going to get me to change my mind about posting innocent photos of LGBTQ+ persons merely existing, read this entry and get back to me.

(hint: the answer is "no")

And now, because I love y'all more than sandwiches, here's the song Take Me Home For Christmas by Dan + Shay which plays at the end of Dashing in December. It's a totally great song... and doesn't have gay cowboys in it, if that's important to you for some reason...

Awwww. Santa puppies are the best puppies.

Falling in love is one of those things that most everybody can relate to. And it all comes down to a moment. That one moment when the wind gets knocked out of your lungs, your heart feels like it's going to explode, and you feel yourself falling out of the earthly confines of your body. There's no other feeling quite like it.

I've had my share of love... and loss. Though the one time I fell the hardest was the time it came back to bite me in my ass the worst. She destroyed me in the worst possible way and I don't think I ever fully recovered. I'd rather never fall in love again than go through that hell again.

The Hallmark rom-coms I have playing for background noise rarely have any kind of authenticity to them. You never see that moment where you feel that the characters have fallen in love. Forget Hallmark movies... you rarely see that in any films.

There are exceptions, however.

The most romantic moment I've ever seen in a movie comes from the most unlikely of places. A Michael J. Fox rom-com called Doc Hollywood. They give you that moment where you feel the characters have fallen in love. Up until that point, there was some clumsy flirtations and you get the sense they might like each other, but there's nothing really past that. Then Michael J. Fox asks Julie Warner to dance as Patsy Cline's Crazy starts to play. It's just a casual social kinda thing...

But then the mood of the scene changes. Colorful lights from the carnival rides start exploding in the background and their posture becomes more intimate...

The dance floor is crowded, but you feel that it doesn't seem that way to them...

And then... the other dancers start to twirl away...

All of a sudden they're the only people left in the whole world. Everybody else has... vanished...

And there's the moment. Their relationship has changed utterly, and there's no doubt they've fallen for each other because you feel it. Then, just like that, the song is coming to a close and the world fades back into existence again...

But they can't even see it. To them, they're still the only two people on earth...

I'm not the most romantic guy in the world, but that scene is about the most romantic thing I've ever seen. Director Michael Caton-Jones and cinematographer Michael Chapman knew exactly what they were doing when they crafted that scene. Something that good doesn't happen by accident.

Doc Hollywood was released in 1991. In the near-thirty-years which has followed, I don't think I've ever seen its equal.

And yet... I did see something recently which comes close. It's in the new gay rom-com Dashing in December (streaming from Paramount Network). And it doesn't matter how gay you aren't... or whether you can relate to their relationship at all... it's still dang romantic.

Peter Porte is a New York financial whiz who returns to his home at a small-town Colorado ranch so he can convince his mother to sell it because it's gotten to be too much work for her. Much to his surprise, his mother is being helped out by Juan Pablo Di Pace, a ranch hand that's living on the property. Naturally, they butt heads immediately. But after they start spending time together, you get the sense that they might be interested in each other.

Then one night after dinner, Juan Pablo Di Pace leads Peter Porte down to the gazebo where he's decked it out like a homecoming dance because he found out that Peter Porte had never danced with a boy before...

As if the setting wasn't romantic enough, one of my most favorite songs... Oh What a World by Kacey Musgraves starts playing on the radio. Despite having been out of the closet for years and having dated a string of guys, Peter Porte is clearly uncomfortable with the idea and goes to get a drink after telling Juan Pablo Di Pace to start without him...

But changes his mind pretty quickly...

Then they pan down to those boots again as they Peter Porte walks up to him, and you know their relationship is about to change...

Peter Porte is nervous, unsure, and every inch of it is written right on his face...

And there it is. There's that one moment...

"Your heart is beating so fast" — "Yeah, that's on you."

I think the reason that this hit me so hard is because it has such a resemblance to the dancing scene in Doc Hollywood. The difference being that, unlike in Doc Hollywood which takes its time, the Dashing in December scene was cut way too short... it's just a brief moment in the film. Less than two minutes. Which seems criminal for such a pivotable moment (not to mention the price they paid for that Kacey Musgraves track which is barely there). I guess either the editor made a terrible decision... or it was truncated so as not to get people too upset that two men would dare to dance together on television. Regardless, it hurts an otherwise good "Hallmark-style" flick.

It's a shame that we don't get more holiday movies with LGBTQ+ characters... or Person of Color characters... or anything other than the same straight, white, Christian stories we've seen a million times before. Because, like I said, the different is what makes it interesting.

Oh well. Hopefully having boundary-pushing movies like Dashing in December getting greenlit will lead the way for more new and different stories to be told.

Dashing in December is playing on Paramount Network or you can buy it for $6 on iTunes.

Now that Apple has released their $550 AirPods Max, it seems fitting that I review my new AirPods Pro. I had done some work for a friend this past Summer who kindly showed their appreciation with an Amazon gift certificate. I never knew what to do with it until I bought a new heated mattress pad and had some left over to buy AirPods Pro. I wasn't going to get them because I didn't like the original AirPods, but they were on sale for $180 and reviews claimed that all the things I hated about the originals had been solved... and then some. And since I may end up traveling again one day, they seemed a handy thing to have. The sound, while nothing great, is good enough when you're traveling and don't want to cart around a big pair of headphones.

So let's get to it, shall we?

PROBLEM: AIRPODS FALL OUT OF YOUR EARS CONSTANTLY
This was my most hated flaw of the originals. It got to the point where I was afraid to travel with them because they would never stay in my ears. Fart with your head turned and you're guaranteed that at least one of them would pop right out, and I was furious that Apple screwed the design up so badly. Eventually I "solved" this by purchasing silicone cups to put over them, but it was a crap solution because I had to take them off in order to fit the AirPods back in the charging case. AirPods Pro, on the other hand, have silicone cups already on them (in your choice of sizes) and stay in my ears perfectly fine. In addition, the seal they make provides better sound.

PROBLEM: WIRELESS CHARGING CASE COSTS EXTRA
AirPods Pro come with a wireless case included, thus saving me from trying to track down the stupid-ass Apple "Lightning" cable with a USB-C connector. Considering I have ONE USB-C charging brick that I can never find (amongst a hundred USB-A bricks), I usually end up having to charge from my MacBook Pro. What kind of life is this? JUST SWITCH EVERYTHING OVER TO USB-C ALREADY!!! Holy shit. The dream scenario of just having to lug around ONE charger for everything will always be out of reach when Apple keeps forcing us to suck on their shitty, antiquated, idiotic Lightning port. But NOPE!. Fortunately the MagSafe puck I'll be traveling with can also charge these wirelessly, so at least there's one less thing to forget at home.

PROBLEM: NO NOISE CANCELATION
When traveling... especially on a plane... having noise cancelation is essential unless you want to blast the volume to insane levels. I really missed it when I upgraded(?) to AirPods, and am happy that AirPods Pro have remedied this. Not surprisingly, Apple did a great job and it works well. And when you don't need the cancelation, there's "transparency mode" which allows outside sound to come through.

PROBLEM: POOR CONNECTIVITY
The original AirPods used the W1 chip which had wonky connectivity problems which popped up at random. Apple then developed the H1 which improved on this greatly in their second generation AirPods. This was carried over into AirPods Pro and it is a far better experience. The H1 also features "Always On Siri" which means she's always listening and can respond to commands.

PROBLEM: SEALED, DISPOSIBLE DESIGN
Of course Apple hasn't solved this problem... they are in the disposable design business! Like previous versions, AirPods Pro are glued together so you can't replace the battery when it won't hold a charge any more, essentially making them landfill poison. About the only thing you can do other than toss them is take them to Apple for recycling. Apparently there's a battery program at Apple, but they don't actually replace the battery, they just give you a new pair and recycle the old ones for a price.

PRO EXTRA: SIZE
AirPods Pro are slightly smaller, but in a way that makes them look a lot smaller when you're wearing them... a good thing.

PRO EXTRA: SPATIAL AUDIO
And here's what convinced me to pull the trigger on the AirPods Pro... spatial audio. This weird, magical technology somehow simulates a kinda "surround" style sound where the speakers know when you turn your head in relationship to the multi-channel audio coming from your late-model iPhone or iPad. And it totally works! Turn to the left and your right AirPod has the center channel directed more towards it. The effect is actually best when your head is turned than when you're looking straight ahead... but it's still pretty good even so, because occasional head movement you're not even aware of keeps the illusion intact. I sincerely wish that this was a feature on the Beats Solo Pro cans I reviewed yesterday.

IN CONCLUSION...
I would not have bought AirPods Pro if it weren't for the gift certificate balance I had. And I certainly wouldn't have paid the full price of $249 for them. But for "free" (relatively) and $180 (on sale)? They're still way overpriced, but ultimately worth it for travel or even just walking to work given that these ACTUALLY STAY IN MY EARS. These are what Apple should have released the first time, design-wise. On the plus-side, the sound is better than other wireless earbuds I've tried (but still not spectacular), pairing with Apple devices is effortless and the way everything works together is magical and seamless, the wireless charging case is great, the spatial audio is fantastic, and they work as advertised. On the minus-side the built-in disposability is awful.

Once I'm able to travel again, I guess I'm set for audio now.

Assuming I ever get to travel again.

I didn't really do much for Black Friday despite it being the most important shopping day of the year for me in past years. But I did make a purchase on Cyber Monday that I had been wanting to make for a while now... new wireless over-ear headphones.

While I live alone and can blast music as loud as I want to, I don't actually end up doing this because it is tough on my cats with their sensitive ears. Sometimes I watch a movie with the sound loud and they don't seem to mind... or run upstairs if they do mind... but I generally don't do that because it's not really fair to them since they can't escape the noise.

Enter the Beats by Dr. Dre Solo Pro WiFi Headphones which were knocked down to $170 (from their usual $300 price tag). And since I had $50 in reward certificates piled up at Best Buy, that knocked the price down to a reasonable $120...

Sexy, aren't they?

Not in the same league as Apple's incredible new AirPods Max headphones, but those cast $550, which is half a mortgage payment, so they're out of my league.

Probably the easiest way to review these is to just run through the pros and cons, so that's exactly what I'm going to do...

PROS:

• The WiFi pairs effortlessly with Apple products. My iPhone recognized them immediately and, now that my iPhone knows I have them, I'm told that the firmware will be kept up-to-date automatically. Likewise, my iPad, AppleTV, and Mac can all have their sound sent to the Beats Solo Pro cans with minimal effort. This is how wireless should work.
• No matter what music source I'm listening to... iPad, iPhone, MacBook Pro, or AppleTV... if I get a phone call, the Beats Solo Pro will ring through. That's a nifty feature, and why staying withn the Apple ecosystem has a payoff.
• The sound is top-notch. Really well balanced without the horrific bass fuzz overload that plagued the older Beats I had tried.
• Very good wireless range. I can listen uninterrupted everywhere in my home except the garage (though, admittedly, my house is fairly compact).
• Stylish to the last detail as only Apple can manage. I love love love the red model I bought because it (mostly) matches my Product(RED) iPhone case.
• They feel like a quality product... not at all cheap and weak.
• The sound cancellation is phenomenal. Seriously good. Puts the BOSE and Sony sound canceling models I tried to shame.
• "Transparency mode" (which allows outside sounds to permiate the headphones) works really well, but is not going to make a difference when listening at high volume.
• Invoking Siri with a long-press of the Beats right-side plate controller is a flat-out cool feature. And since it is getting info from your iPhone connection, you can literally ask Siri for just about anything.
• Includes a soft case that's not going to offer much protection, but it's better than nothing and will at least keep them clean.
• Battery life is very good. I was only down to 50% after about 10 hours of off-and-on listening in "transparency" and "noise cancelling" modes. If you run out of juice you can get a 10-minute quick charge that will last you 3 hours.
• To turn them on, you unfold them. To turn them off, you fold them. This is elegant and smart because you'll always know whether your battery is draining just by looking at them... but I do wonder if it will cause more wear and tear on the hinges this way. In any event, it's smarter than a switch, which I always seem to forget to turn off and drain the battery. It's habit after only three days to "fold them off" when I'm done listening.
• The packaging is gorgeous.

CONS:

• Despite being a Product(RED) color Or close enough to it), from what I can tell no money from my purchase actually went to Product(RED). Absolutely no idea why Apple, who has been such a big supporter, didn't go all Product(RED) with these?
• I disregarded the complaints in reviews from people saying they are "too tight" because I have a thin head. Didn't make a difference. These are tight on my pin-head and definitely lead to fatigue. This is categorically absurd and I have no idea what the hell Apple was thinking. If you have a normal size head, they're going to be uncomfortable. If you have a large head, these are going to be painful. And thank heavens I have thin wire frames on my glasses, because if I had regular frames these cans would be excruciating. I hope that they loosen up over time.
• Not only do they get uncomfortable after a while because they're so tight... they also get hot. There's absolutely no breathability with the vinyl ear pads, and you'll be taking a break after a couple hours or it just gets too warm to be comfortable because of how tight they are pressed against your ears.
• Does not support Apple's new "spatial audio" feature. At all. It's just stereo and nothing but stereo. But wait... it gets worse! While most movies played the sound in stereo as expected, some shows... most notably Ted Lasso on AppleTV+ played the center channel through the right-side and the rest on the left-side? Likely an Apple problem, which leads me to believe that it will happen on others as well. If Apple can't get it right 100% of the time, what hope do I have for others?
• The sound doesn't auto-switch between Apple devices. Listening to music on your iPhone then turning on AppleTV does not switch the audio to AppleTV... in fact, your AppleTV won't even remember that it was last playing to your Beats Solo Pros and will have to be told. Again. Even worse? Sometimes the connections are janky. My work computer recognizes them immediately and I can manually route the sound to them, but on occasion no sound will play even though they are confirmed to be receiving a stream.
• While the sound, as noted above, is excellent overall... there are times I feel the treble is a bit too crisp, and since you don't really get equalizer controls out of most apps, that's what you're stuck with. Not terrible, but could be better. I wish there was a way to adjust this globally in the headphones themselves.
• There's no obvious way to tell whether you're holding them with the right side on the right and the left side on the left because these look identical however you hold them. I thought that maybe Apple had devised a magical way to know which way they were situated on your head and adjusted the stereo feed accordingly, but nope. You have to be sure to look for the tiny "R" or "L" to make sure you have them on correctly. This is a serious design flaw.
• They get plenty loud for me, but I'm surprised that they don't get louder than they do. There are a few tracks that I really want to crank, and these headphones are not having it. Probably a good thing because it will save my hearing.
• The microphone for talking to Siri or answering phone calls is pretty good... but not great. I made a test call to a friend who said that I sounded okay, but they could tell I was not using the handset microphone.
• You can invoke Siri hands-free by saying "Hey Siri"... but if you have other Apple devices (like my MacBook Pro) running, it will intercept the command and force you to do a long-press on the Beats plate to get Siri to listen.
• The charging is via Apple's proprietary "Lightning" port because of course it is. Everything else in the world has gone USB-C (including Apple's own iPad) but because Apple doesn't give a fuck what's logical or convenient, they have to go with the cable that's dying and will soon be discontinued (as I'm sure iPhones will be going wireless-charging-exclusive any day now). Lord how I fucking HATE this bullshit. But it's Apple, and this is the kind of crap that Apple does.
• The controls are kind of janky. The right ear-cup has a "Beats" logo plate on the side. Pressing on the top increases volume... on the bottom decreases the volume. Pressing the plate in the middle will pause/play or answer the phone... but you have to hit it just right or else it doesn't work. You have to push dead-center to get it to play/pause and it took me a while before I was able to get it to hit every time.
• The controls for skipping forward or backwards (double/triple clicking on the Beats plate) doesn't seem to work outside of Apple's apps. When listening from the Amazon Music Unlimited app, for example, it does nothing. WTF? Likewise, telling Siri to skip a track outside of Apple apps doesn't work either.

And that's a wrap. Most everything I have in the "cons" column can be overlooked or dealt with except the tight fit. And I cannot for the life of me fathom what Apple was thinking here. Surely they had people try them on before releasing them to manufacturing? If I were to return these, it would be for that reason alone. It's absolutely infuriating that this is a huge concern and outright complaint on these cans by so many people yet Apple has chosen to ignore the feedback. Infuriating but not surprising... just look at Apple's idiotic "butterfly keyboard" that they stuck to like glue despite years of massive outrage by customers telling them it was shitty. Apple always does what they want and doesn't give a crap about how it affects usability or comfort. You either live with it or you don't. And what a shame.

I guess we'll see if having my head squeezed is a dealbreaker and I end up returning these. In the meanwhile, I sure do like the sound I'm hearing.

I finally caught up on 2020 Hallmark Christmas movies this past weekend. I had been putting it off because after so many good ones (Christmas by Starlight, Five Star Christmas, The Christmas Doctor, and A Timeless Christmas), they were starting to go downhill. And, what's worse, they are not improving. Last night Hallmark finally debuted this year's Danica McKellar movie that I had been looking forward to for weeks... and it sucked. It sucked so hard. Not even my undying love for Danica McKellar could save it because it was just so bad. Not Christmas Coupon tragic-bad, but still... not so great.

Fortunately, other studios have been picking up the slack with excellent Christmas movies to watch while I'm working... like Netflix with Holidate and Midnight at the Magnolia. Even though I am essentially using my television as background noise, I still want my background noise to be good television.

Enter older "Hallmark-style" Christmas movies that I come across which I haven't seen yet.

There I was paging through the movies I get for free with my Amazon Prime membership and I see A Frosty Affair starring Jewel Staite. She's an actor I've had a crush on for near-decades thanks to her being in Firefly, and there was no way I wasn't going to give it a look...

Loved it.

Yeah, yeah, it's no Shakespear. These movies never are. But it's good fun and Jewel Staite was, as expected, perfect in it...

There were some very clever lines that made it well worth watching. "You should probably allow an inch or so for shrinkage... probably two..."

Make no mistake, this is one silly movie. But it's more charming than absurd, and I ended up liking it quite a lot.

In Canada (where the movie was shot and takes place) it was originally released with the title 40 Below and Falling... and was the first ever rom-com shot in 3-D. I don't recall it ever being shown in local theaters here (let alone in 3-D), so I'm guessing it wasn't in wide release? I dunno. I generally don't pay to see rom-coms in theaters, so it could be that I just never noticed it when it was playing.

If you're looking for a distraction, have Amazon Prime, and like Hallmark-style movies as much as I do... then A Frosty Affair just might be to your liking.

I may be spending my day celebrating, but that doesn't mean I've forgotten about this blog... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Happy Birthday! Jake and Jenny were feral rescues, so their birthdate is kinda-sorta estimated. I think. Maybe the person who found them knew the exact date and reported it when they got to the Humane Society, I'm not sure. In any event, December 6th is what's on all their paperwork and their insurance, so this is the day I wish them a Happy Birthday. And this year I am actually home to tell them "Happy Birthday" in person, which is rare. They weren't available for adoption until they got out of foster care and were fixed, and that was February 16th, 2016 (meaning these photos are of them when they were 2 months and 11 days old)...

They were both so scared that it took weeks before I was even allowed to touch them. Most of their time was spent hiding under the couch. Jake was easily motivated by food (and still is) but Jenny took much longer because she's so much more cautious (and still is). Adopting them remains one of the best things I've ever done, so happy birthday to my amazing cats!

   
• AutoSleep! Speaking of my cats... at 3:30am I was awakened by Jake really struggling with a hair ball. My cats rarely have hair balls since I brush them regularly, so I got up to make sure he’s okay and clean up the mess. I would have thought that I dreamed it all, except I've been using the AutoSleep app with my Apple Watch and can verify exactly when I got up...

AutoSleep is an app that has all the data that Apple's own Health app is missing... like the most basic of information, HOW MUCH SLEEP DID I GET? Health just gives you a start and a stop time, leaving you to have to mentally calculate it out, which is plain stupid. AutoSleep does so much more in addition to basic functions, which makes it well worth the $5 price tag, and I highly recommend it for Apple Watch owners who wear theirs to bed at night.

   
• Dysfunction? Since there are so many assholes still not willing to mask up to stop the spread of COVID, maybe this will motivate them... Another Reason to Wear a Mask: COVID-19 May Cause Erectile Dysfunction. We can only hope. Thanks to way too many people not being careful and acting like the pandemic isn't real... and even more of these people getting together for Thanksgiving despite the risks... hospitals are already starting to reach maximum capacity...

This doesn't just affect people who have serious COVID-19 symptoms and will die without hospitalization, it also affects anybody who get a treatable health problem... like a heart attack... who can't get into a hospital because all the beds are taken by COVID patients. Stop being an asshole. This virus doesn't just kill old and sick people, it can kill anyone. A vaccine is just around the corner (along with even more incredible treatments in the pipeline) and everything can just wait.

   
• Weight! On November 19th, I reached the heaviest I've ever been... 192 lbs. Usually I try to stay at 170 lbs. and not exceed 180 lbs. because that's when I feel my best, but gave myself a pass because of COVID shit happening. But enough was enough, and I started trying to eat sensibly again. No more Family Size Bag of Lay's Potato Chips in a single day... no more Pop Tarts for breakfast... no potato salad at midnight. Two weeks later I'm down to 186 lbs., which means I've got 16 lbs. to go to get to my goal weight. It's shocking to think that I managed to put on 22 lbs. since March, but when you sit around the house doing fuck-all day after day, I guess that's what can happen. I need to eat better and be more active, because I'm getting old enough that the weight doesn't fall off as easily as it used to. Bring on that vaccine! I want my life (and body) back!

   
• Mulan? Good Lord is the live-action Mulan a boatload of shit. Very, very beautiful and pretty... but shit. Thank heavens I didn't pay the $30 to see it early... which I was this close to doing because I love the Disney animated classic original so much. The story doesn't even make sense anymore. And they left out Mushu, which is just madness when they've given her magical powers from The Matrix which makes the whole thing fantasy anyway...

Ugh. What a waste of money that could have been put into another Star Wars series or Marvel Studios series for Disney+.

   
• HEADLINE! Warner Bros. Smashes Box Office Windows, Will Send Entire 2021 Slate to HBO Max and Theaters — In an unprecedented announcement, the studio will send 17 films — including The Matrix 4, The Suicide Squad and Dune to its streaming service for 31 days the same day they hit theaters.

Look, as I've stated many, many times, I absolutely hate the "theater experience" any more. Between people texting and talking and letting their kids run around and generally being assholes, it's about the worst form of "entertainment" there is, and I'd rather do just about anything else for fun. The only movies I see in theaters are those that I can't wait for (like Marvel Studios films). Otherwise? No thanks. So, for obvious reasons, I am thrilled by the news that I will be able to watch Dune and The Matrix 4 at home with an HBO Max subscription. But, on the other hand, I wonder what this means for those massively expensive blockbusters that I love. Will they even be able to be made any more if theaters don't exist? My guess is that they will still make them because A) Streaming services are already paying insane amounts of money for movies... B) Special effects are getting cheaper, and expensive actors can be replaced if they refuse to work within the new budgets... and C) This is where the future was headed all along as the home viewing experience gets better and better. So I dunno. I am certainly not rooting for theaters to die off completely... I think they still have a role to fill... but I'm not going to complain about not having to suffer through a theater for the movies I want to watch, that's for sure.

   
• HEADLINE! Elliot Page, Oscar-Nominated ‘Juno’ Star, Announces He Is Transgender. — Hi friends, I want to share with you that I am trans, my pronouns are he/they and my name is Elliot,” Page wrote in a statement that he posted on Tuesday

And good for him. I'm thrilled when somebody figures out who they are and what it takes to live their best life at a cost of $0 to me. Because this is not about me! Who Elliot Page is has absolutely zero effect on my life what-so-ever. How great is it that he's got it all figured out, because many people never do. My gender identity was a cakewalk. I'm a man. I've always felt like a man. My genitals align perfectly with who I am at my very core. I've only ever been attracted to women. I've only ever had sex with women. And I can't imagine somebody telling me that I can't be who I am... just like I can't imagine somebody feeling entitled enough to tell Elliot Page who they are either. Whether you accept it or not, transgender persons exist. And when they have the strength to come out to the world, it will undoubtedly save lives. Far too many transgender kids are killing themselves because they can't picture a world that they could ever exist in. Elliot Page shows them that they can.

   
Now it's time to stop slinging bullets so I can go serve Ocean Fish Pate "birthday cakes" to my fuzzy kids. Be safe, everybody.

David Prowse, the actor who embodied Darth Vader died this past Saturday.

A case can be made for Darth Vader being the best movie villain of all time. All you have to do is Google "Best Movie Villains of All Time" and you'll find that a lot of people believe this to be true (No. 2 is Hannibal Lecter, but I digress). He was menacing, powerful, and the best possible kind of cinema evil. And though he ended up having a bit of a redemption moment in Return of the Jedi (and was completely neutered in the awful prequel trilogy), he will always be remembered by me as The Only Villain That Matters.

David Prowse was half of the Vader equation.

But because James Earl Jones's voice is such a touchstone for the character, the contribution Prowse made is often overlooked. And that's a real shame. Last night I rewatched the Original Star Wars Trilogy and paid careful attention to how Prowse played the character. His every gesture oozed power. Yet it was never overplayed. At no moment did you get the feeling that Darth Vader was a man trapped in a suit. He was the suit. And that was true from the minute Vader first appeared walking through that smoke...

Even when he's just standing there next to Grand Moff Tarkin saying nothing, there's a menace to him. And though it would be easy to say "that's just the badass costume," it's what lead up to him just standing there that is actually what's working. And that was all Prowse. Just look at the way he's pitched forward, looking like he'll choke a bitch at any second...

Which, of course he does. He's Darth Vader!

The lightsaber duel with Obi-Wan Kenobi is a bit tame. Darth Vader looks practically timid throughout everything, and I remember being a bit disappointed that we didn't get something more. But still, my young mind was suitably blown as I watching things go down...

Vader next appears in the battle on The Death Star in his cool custom T.I.E. fighter (of which I had a model when I was a kid)...

Interesting to note that in one scene where Vader is under red lights, the dark red lenses in his mask show Prowse inside. To my knowledge, it's the only time you ever see his face... well, part of his face... on screen...

The movie ends with Darth Vader being knocked into space. When I was a kid I had a T-Shirt that I ordered out of a magazine which proclaimed "VADER LIVES!"

Which, of course, he did in the sequel.

And this time we got a tantalizing glimpse at what's under that dark helmet...

In The Empire Strikes Back, the best of all Star Wars movies, Prowse provided two moments so iconic that my brain still fails to fully process them. The first is when he is revealed to be the dinner host at Cloud City...

"We would be honored if you would join us"...

What's always been interesting to me is that Vader begins and ends this scene... seated. I've never understood director Irvin Kershner's thinking behind that. There was no reason for it, and I think it diminished his power. It would have been far smarter to just have him standing the entire time. The more times I see him sitting down, the weirder it looks to me...

And the second iconic scene is, of course, that pivotal moment in cinematic history which follows a pretty cool lightsaber duel. Far more exciting than the one we got in Star Wars...

And here we go. If you watch Vader as he's confronting Luke here, you can really see how important Prowse was to making the moment so mind-blowing. He is physical, but restrained, which is far more menacing than had he been all over the place...

Then Darth Vader drops the bomb...

Admit it, I didn't need to type a thing. You saw this and immediately heard "Luke, I am your father!" (even though the line was actually just "No, I am your father!"...

Now, this was before the internet. I stood in line to see Empire on opening night. I knew absolutely nothing about the movie except what I had seen in commercials. There were no spoilers to be had. I walked out of the theater putting the pieces of my brain back into my 14-year-old skull. It was such an amazing moment, and it wasn't thanks to the heroes. It was thanks to Darth Vader...

Return of The Jedi was, for the most part, a disappointment to me. It jettisoned all the things that made Empire so great and replaced them with burp jokes and Ewoks so George Lucas could make billions of dollars selling toys. The only thing I like about the movie are what happens in-between the idiocy. That speeder-bike chase. That space battle. The Emperor revealed. And, oh yeah, that final duel...

What's so incredibly sad is that the evil Emperor Palpatine overshadowed Darth Vader in this movie. He was the evil this time. He was the memorable villain this time. He stole the movie this time. Vader was conflicted and embattled, and Luke handed him his ass. Happy Father's Day...

We did get one final cool moment with Darth Vader. Though I never really had a chance to study it until I bought Return of the Jedi on LaserDisc. They animated a skeleton as the emperor's force-lightening struck Vader's armor. I think they enhanced it for the Special Editions, because I don't remember it being this detailed through...

Just look at the mechanical parts in there!

Buh bye...

I think I remember reading an interview with Irvin Kershner (who directed the far, far superior The Empire Strikes Back) that he thought it was a mistake to show Vader's face at the end. I agree 1000%. I didn't mind that Vader had found redemption... even though it seemed a little silly that he could walk back from all those murders he's responsible for... but I did mind them ruining a huge part of the mystique which made Vader so compelling...

I still think it's unfair that Prowse didn't get to play crusty old Anakin Skywalker in this scene. Lucasfilm kinda owed it to him, didn't they?

And that was the end of it. SPOILER ALERT! Vader dies and Luke lights him on fire in a funeral pyre. Thankfully with his mask on...

And that was the end of it. Vader was done.

Until he wasn't, of course.

In later years, Prowse had a falling out with LucasFilm. He claimed that they owed him money that was never paid. This did not go over very well, and LucasFilm were total assholes who them prohibited him from appearing at conventions, which was his primary source of income. Be that as it may, David Prowse left a legacy which will live long past his death, and LucasFilm can't ever take that away from him.

Thank you, sir, for filling my childhood with wonder and giving the world a villain that will quite probably never be eclipsed.

Even when Darth Vader is played by other actors.

Out of the trilogy of trilogie films, I only like Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back. The rest are just weak retreads with no added value. I do like the spin-offs Rogue One and Solo, however, as they seemed more invested in finding those things which made Star Wars so frickin' amazing. A mantle that has now been picked up with The Mandalorian TV show.

Interesting to note that it's in Rogue One where we finally... finally... get to see Darth Vader unleashed. The final scene of that movie leads to the very first scene of Star Wars, and it's glorious. No, David Prowse isn't inside the Vader suit, but he's got his stamp all over this terrifying moment as Darth Vader mows through the Rebel soldiers in an attempt to get those Death Star plans.

The sequence begins in an eerie nod to the original very first scene Darth Vader appears. But instead of him stepping out of white smoke, this time it's red...

In a genius move, the Rebel soldiers are shown to be horrified at Vader's power as he easily cuts a path through them...

And here's The Force being used as you dreamed Vader would wield it. No stupid-ass senseless hand-gestures with no consequences like the idiotic prequel battle on Geonosis... Vader is brutal and ruthless with it. Disarming his opponents and crushing them...

Finally. Finally we get to see Darth Vader exactly how you want to see him. Overwhelmingly ruthless and powerful. And that final Vader scene. Perfection...

Rest In Peace, sir. You'll always be Darth Vader to me.