I felt the need to immediately throw up this Deadspin post due to Dan Patrick being one of my childhood idols. I knew early on I wouldn’t be one of the guys actually PLAYING sports on television, so I always thought it’d be pretty cool to be one of the guys just talking about them. Patrick and Keith Olbermann shaped my upbringing through every episode of Sportscenter I watched morning, evening, and after bedtime. To be more specific, every episode of “The Big Show” in which they were paired up.
While Olbermann has moved on to being a sanctimonious political commentator on MSNBC, Patrick has continued covering sports — albeit no longer with ESPN. Olbermann gets to interview lying douchebags on his show — a show routinely out-rated by The O’Reilly Factor — and Patrick gets to bearhug a pair of hot sisters. Erin Andrews’ fanboys are humbled by DP’s greatness.
- Darren Aronofsky is the man. Not only is he a great director, he’s engaged to Rachel Weisz. He wins at life.
- I can’t wait to see David Wright get picked before A-Rod in my fantasy league again. Especially since this time it won’t be due to my own homerism.
- Louis C.K. is better than your favorite current stand-up comedian.
- I think we can all agree the “spring forward” aspect of Daylight Savings Time is one of the few things more annoying than Jimmy Fallon.
- I’m still amazed that South Africa is in the World Baseball Classic. I didn’t think baseball had ever touched that continent.
- I don’t know why anyone would code their own website. In addition to WordPress — which you might guess, I love — there are a shitload of services out there for every type of site.
- If there’s one thing DSLR’s do, it’s making you feel like a real photographer. My Flickr account will actually be utilized from now on. At least until I move out and have to make do with whatever cheap point-and-shoot I purchase.
- So I hear Watchmen has a ton of blue penis. Apparently, it’s rated R for Smurf nudity. Smurf-God nudity.
- I saw a guy dressed up as Green Man this weekend. It was all I thought it could be and more. He drank his beers through the costume. Awesome.
- I wish Breaking Bad was on Hulu, so I could embed last night’s season premiere in this post.
- Speaking of AMC, the channel is airing Catwoman next Sunday night. Not only that, but it is advertising that debacle. I think this destroys any thought that AMC actually held its movies to some sort of “classic” standard.
Pretty sure this isn’t actually a B-side, but it’s only on an EP, so I’m calling it a B-side. I wanted a unique title for this post, alright?
Apparently, a few websites refer to this song as a “fan favorite”, yet I only came across it in recent years. Granted, I had never listened to My Iron Lung EP up until that point, but I hadn’t really seen this song mentioned on the internet by any Radiohead fans. Maybe because most Radiohead fans on the internet love Kid A and Amnesiac and ignore the early work of the band. I still don’t understand the love for those two albums, even if I am convinced there HAS to be something there, since one of my late good friends — whose opinion I greatly respected — absolutely adored them. Either way, I doubt I’ll ever stop enjoying the early, more straight-forward Radiohead, like this song.
Before you bother reading any of the following, you should probably read this, since it’s better than anything I could ever write: A.V. Club’s Goodbye. And I know an “ode” is supposed to be a poem, but I like the word and I’m not a poetry-writing faggot like Dante, OK?
I am a part of the Conan generation — also known as the Daily Show generation. But I connected with Conan first. He was that crazy guy with the fat sidekick on way too late, way past my bedtime. His hour of television every night contained some of the stupidest stuff I had seen in my young life. Where else would you see a terrible impersonator’s mouth superimposed upon a static picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger? Where else would you witness a bit about the future (In The Year 2000) continue even after that future had arrived? Where else would you see a dog puppet publicly humiliate hundreds of people over a long and storied career? Where else would you see a coked-up werewolf or masturbating bear?
Conan personified the wacky and self-deprecating humor that I have centered my entire life around. I don’t think I ever consciously decided to be like Conan O’Brien, but I don’t doubt it had an all-encompassing effect on my young mind. Why else would I have made a list of “Reasons Why I Suck†on my old LiveJournal? That was just my own form of joking about getting cancelled.
I would be lying if I said I watched the show religiously, but at least until I hit college – if I was up at the time which used to seem so late – I was watching Conan. He was so much better than the dude with the chin before him, and the old guy over at CBS. Yes, I am exaggerating my feelings towards those two, especially since I’ve always somewhat enjoyed Letterman, but Conan was the show seemingly reserved for me and my fellow teenagers.
And while it may have been a blow to the show for Andy Ritcher to leave right in the middle of its 15-year run, it allowed Conan to play off the audience more, and to utilize his band in his antics – of which the former was never more on display than during the writer’s strike just over a year ago. Conan was at his absolute best coming up with inane activities to fill up the time, such as spinning a coin. He spun a motherfucking coin on television. Every night. Who else would be able to pull that stunt and not only get away with it, but absolutely enthrall his audience? Never again will I enjoy a late show as much as I reveled in the shit Conan pulled every night.
Now I officially begin the cycle of growing old. I watched Jimmy Fallon’s first night as host of Late Night, and thought – like many other people – that it was godawful. This must be how Letterman fans felt when Conan took over, but at least I have the moral high ground of being able to form my hate over his many years on SNL. I will even admit that his impressions – particularly his Adam Sandler in a certain Celebrity Jeopardy skit – are pretty decent, but Fallon is a horrific talk-host show. Jesus Christ.
So I eagerly await Conan’s new beginning at The Tonight Show in L.A., but we all know it won’t be the same. An hour and over 2000 miles will make all the difference. In memoriam, I give you the final pull of the Walker, Texas Ranger lever, something we will never see again:
While I still have misgivings about Terminator Salvation, this Michael Mann film looks like it will deliver the goods. Although, I haven’t seen Miami Vice, so I don’t have that experience to temper my expectations.
Here’s your trailer for Public Enemies:
I’m not sure if I like the clean digital look for a period film, but if there’s one thing Mann brings to a movie, it’s style. And Bale and Depp will bring the acting chops, the latter in all likelihood stealing the show.
I’m still reading The Second World War, and I have felt the need again — I think this is going to become a common occurrence — to quote something out of the book. I just finished reading the chapter covering the rout of Poland at the hands of the German blitzkrieg, and had a tough time wrapping my head around this tidbit:
Their [Poland's] horse cavalry, of which they had twelve brigades, charged valiantly against the swarming tanks and armoured cars, but could not harm them with their swords and lances.
WHAT? Why have I never heard of this terrible mismatch before? I knew Poland was defeated in a shorter timespan than it will take me to read just the first volume of The Second World War, but I thought they at least had tanks. Well, they technically did have one armoured brigade, but still — horses versus tanks? I thought that type of shit only happened in matches of Civilization.
So a few days ago, I posted a Scientific Trilogy Meter, which was an average of the user ratings from IMDB and the critic ratings from Rotten Tomatoes. Today, I am applying the same method to only one series, the most successful film series in history. “Bond, James Bond” has to face the reckoning of my excel spreadsheet.
The results are displayed in their beautiful glory below:
Perhaps the first few films are propped up by especially forgiving RT ratings, but I do think many people regard From Russia with Love to be the best, and I know almost everyone loved Casino Royale. I’m not going to bother adding much of my own commentary or opinion, as I haven’t even seen half of the series. Although, all the Brosnan films after Goldeneye were shit, that much I know. Other than that, I think both Connery and Craig are awesome and that it’s no surprise to see their films on top.
If you wish for the underlying statistics, or at least a Y-axis with…ok, I’m going to stop there. Just trust me that this the most accurate depiction of the relative quality of the EON, canonical Bond films ever created. If you really care, just e-mail me.
I don’t even know what happened there. Did they mean to cut out completely? I guess so, since Matt Vasgersian dropped that F-bomb so effortlessly. It’s just so strange that the video went blank for so long, and that the two guys — Vasgersian and Harold Reynolds — are quiet for so long after the faux paux. Oh well, it made for hilarity. And it’s already up on Wikipedia.
Dropped the F-Bomb on March 3, 2009 LIVE on the MLB Network. When referring to Fernando Valenzuela he refers to Fernando Vina – Harold Reynolds interrupts him to say “Valenzuela not Vina†and all of a sudden Matt says “Did I say Fernando Vina, I meant Valenzuela what the F*(k is that.†Screen went blank and then they came back a few seconds later.
The internet never misses anything. It is always watching.
Then again, maybe every trailer with action scored by Nine Inch Nails is bound to get me excited. The 300 trailer with “Just Like You Imagined” is still fucking amazing.
I used to post more movie trailer on here, I feel, and what better way to start doing that again than with what will possibly be the blockbuster of the year.
I’m not even going to attempt to make sense of the Terminator storyline at this point. T2 contradicted T1, and then T3 contradicted T2, when time travel in the sense of T1 contradicted itself in the first place. I don’t even want to think about how the TV series factors in. So some Terminator thinking he’s human — like a Cylon — doesn’t seem out of the realm of possiblity within this franchise’s universe. I just want action and some sense of the indomitability of the human spirit. Wait, no, that last part pussied up this whole post. More explosions! I hear tits are also shown! YES!
P.S. If you want to see a full HD version of the trailer, go here. Or go see Watchmen this weekend.
So I’ve been reading Winston Churchill’s The Second World War, and it fucking owns. For anyone fascinated by World War II — and who isn’t? — I highly recommend dedicating a significant amount of your life to reading this massive tome. Maybe I’m getting a bit ahead of myself, since I’ve actually only read the first book (about half) of the first volume of a six-volume work, but not one minute of it has been tedious or boring. Churchill’s prose is damned impressive, and the personal light he is able to shine on the events leading to the breakout of the war is enthralling and at the same time immensely depressing. The amount of times the Allies blew chances to force Hitler to hesitate if only for a moment is disheartening even today.
But this obviously is not what this post is about, as the title above should imply, it is about how Churchill’s eloquence was on a plane of awesomeness not often seen — or perhaps more accurately, heard — in this world. I just wanted to post an example here, in reaction to the aftermath of Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler at Munich in 1938:
All is over. Silent, mournful, abandoned, broken, Czechoslovakia recedes into the darkness. She has suffered in every respect by her associations with France, under whose guidance and policy she has actuated for so long…
I do not grudge our loyal, brave people, who were ready to do their duty no matter what the cost, who never flinched under the strain of last week, the natural, spontaneous outburst of joy and relief when they learned that the hard ordeal would no longer be required of them at the moment; but they should know the truth. They should know that there has been gross neglect and deficiency in our defences; they should know that we have sustained a defeat without war, the consequences of which will travel far with us along our road; they should know that we have passed an awful milestone in our history, when the whole equilibrium of Europe has been deranged, and that the terrible words have for the time being been pronounced against the Western democracies: “Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting.” And do not suppose that this is the end. This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless, by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour, we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.
That is bloody brilliant. And I’m sure it seemed even more grand in a British accent.
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