Netflix is being weird again

I had complained about Netflix regularly shipping me DVDs from far off cities - thus causing them to take a long time to arrive. To Netflix's credit, not only has it started happening less, but they often send me an extra disc to tide me over while I wait for the far off disc to arrive.

Then today, Netflix didn't send me a movie at all. Even though they received two dics from me today, they are only shipping one out. They will ship the other one on MONDAY. Why is this? Who knows? 

Man on Fire

Misanthropic Period Epics

The Empire Strikes Back

In this series, I plan to go back a examine all those bits of pop culture that have most heavily influenced who I am and what I like. And I will try to keep it in autobiographical order. Mostly, I will be talking about movies. But also some TV shows. And a few musical artists.

I remember a lot about my early movie-going experiences. I remember I had to sit on the seat in its upright position so that I could see over the crowd. I remember always getting popcorn and the salt would sting my lips. I remember that there was only one movie I would not sit still for and had to be dragged out of. However, I don’t remember the name of that movie. All I remember is that it was about a Pegasus in a barn.

I also remember a few moments when I first saw Star Wars. The audience laughed at the “These are not the droids you’re looking for,” scene. I didn’t laugh. I didn’t get it. Also, I was three at the time. I also remember asking one of my parents what the characters were talking about when they talked about the Force. I will never forget the answer (although I’ve forgotten which parent had the answer). He/She told me, “God”. Although I’ve never believed in God, that answer made sense to me.

I also remember a bit about seeing The Empire Strikes Back. To be exact, I remember actually getting a joke. As Han Solo is about to incased in carbonite, Leia confesses to Solo, “I love you.” He stoically replies, “I know.” I laughed. The audience laughed. I was thrilled that we both laughed together. We laughed and laughed.

I don’t know how, but Star Wars was a major part of my life as a kid. I only saw each of the movies once in a theater (my parents have never understood why I would want to see a movie more than once), and the movies didn’t get played on television much. Still, my friends and I referenced Star Wars constantly. I had two dozen action figures, but they were always random bizarre characters that my parents bought. (Thanks for the Hammerhead action figure, Mom!)

I always had different taste than the other kids. So when I would declare my love for The Empire Strikes Back as my favorite Star Wars movie, I was always shouted down. Empire sucks. Star Wars or Return of the Jedi got all the love. In the years since, Empire has come to be the critic favorite of the Star Wars franchise. The reasoning usually revolves around how much more mature the characters are in this installment – which is true. It’s also mentioned that Empire does not depict war as a parade of soaring victories, but instead it is presented as something dire and dark and with consequences and casualties. Even won battles had consequences. Also true, and also very welcome by me. It also drops the hedonistic comic book gloss the other two movies have. And of course, there’s the mother of all plot twist. I’m being sincere (if not a bit hyperbolic) when I say that in a single sentence, movies were changed forever.

When Vader makes his infamous revelation to Luke, he catapults Star Wars from the realm of high priced genre filck, to soapy serial with a deep, mysterious backstory. In this moment, a character who was the walking epitome of one-note darkness, becomes a multi-faceted figure of high tragedy. This was big stuff folks, and god damnit, I don’t remember my reaction to this bit of information. Did I already know this going in? Maybe. I don’t remember. As a bit of shock plot revelation, I don’t know how this weighed on me. And it is nearly impossible to find someone who doesn’t already know about this. It just seems as if it has always been this way.

But as a story-telling device, Darth Vader’s confession splits apart the story of Star Wars like a dam bursting open. These were no longer stock characters we were dealing with. There was a story that existed beyond the opening and closing titles.

But this is all stuff I appreciate as an adult. What drew me to Empire as a kid? The nightmarish imagery. The grandeur foreboding. And the cliffhanger ending. There is so much visual horror that remains seared in my mind. The movie is full of rampant dismemberments. Luke loses his hand. A tauntaun gets sliced open and its stomach and intestines spill out. The snow beast gets its arm sliced off. In a vision Luke decapitates Vader. And in one of my favorite scenes C3PO gets blasted to pieces and lugged around in a backpack. The C3PO scene starts as 3PO spots a similar droid who who spits out some indescernable profanity. “How rude!” exclaims C3PO before investigating a corridor and getting blasted to pieces. Later, when Chewbacca reconnects 3PO’s head to his body (backwards, I might add) 3PO comes to life and gives his belated warning – as if from the dead. “Stormtroopers? Here? Oh, no! I’ve been shot!”

And there’s plenty more dark imagery to haunt the mind. The funeral procession of Solo’s corpse being paraded through the stark sets of Cloud City. The creepy puppet (why don’t more movies use puppets as characters!) Yoda’s whispery response to Luke’s assertion that he’s not scared. “You will be. You. Will. Be.” And the dark running joke in which Vader magically strangles a chain of officers who fail him. Even the camera behaves differently. Shot with low angles and darker cinematography.

What often fails to be mentioned is the nature of the creature that is Empire Strikes Back. It is the middle child of a trilogy. Most of the criticism the movie received in its initial release focused on how the movie has no beginning and no end. Of course, it DOES have a beginning and end, but neither is definitive and absolute. The movie does not reintroduce its characters. It does not assure the audience of their fate at the end, Empire does not coddle the audience in the slightest. And THAT is what I love about it. It doesn’t waste any time setting things up. It doesn’t feel the need to tie up loose ends. It just exists as much as it needs to.

It’s a bold way to tell a story. The writers and director assumed the audience knew as much as they needed to, and they assumed the audience would understand that the story would extend beyond the credits. As a result, the story seems bigger, uncontainable, and not easily brushed away. The story lingers, leaving you to wonder what will happen next. For ten whole minutes after my first screening of Empire, and I was sick to death about what would happen to Han Solo. Maybe even longer. I wasn’t too worried, but let me tell you, it weighed on me. Movies rarely do this. They don’t end ambiguously. They don’t assume the audience can remember small details from one installment to the next. They don’t grow darker, but Empire did.

It is from Empire, that my love for the mid-point of trilogies exists. From The Two Towers, to Back to the Future II, to X2, to Spider-Man 2. The movies that open and close with unresolved conflicts and tensions remain my favorite. And it is precisely for this reason that I came to love The Pirates of Caribbean movies. That second movie that left everything in chaos and dragged the happy ending of the first movie through the mud. As the Harry Potter movies continue, they grow more and more like Empire: dark, unresolved, and rife with casualties.

The first movie is just like any other movie. The last movie is often a let down. But that second movie, that one can raise the bar and turn an ordinary story into a juggernaut. This also extends to TV series. I love serialized shows that build and build, add layer upon layer, and grow darker and darker. I would like to thank Empire right now for inspiring a new generation of filmmakers to take their stories to the next level.

Some Movies I've Seen Recently

This past week I saw three movies that I really, really liked . . . but I doubt many others would like them.

First up: Bruno

I went into Bruno with my arms crossed, waiting to hate it. That's exactly the same way I went into Borat. I remember sitting through the first ten minutes of Borat getting irritated. He seemed to be mocking poor countries and foreign customs. Then something happened . . . I'll confess: I didn't know anything about Borat before going in. As the movie unfolds, I start wondering, "Are these actors or real people?" After just a few scenes, it became apparent I was watching a movie with real people getting ambushed, and it was hilarious. I normally can't deal with public humiliation, and I did watch the movie with my hand over my eyes quite a bit. But by the time the hotel scene unfolded, I was doubled over laughing. 

I had nearly the exact same reaction to Bruno. After the first ten minutes, I got frustrated with the pot shots at gay stereotypes, but by the time Bruno was giving oral sex to a ghost in front of a psychic, my stomach hurt from laughing so much. Is it homophobic? Sure. Is it unfair to the people it ambushes? Absolutely. Is it pardonable? It's sheer audacity and shock tactics push it so far over the top that nothing ever offended me once the movie had me on its side. I've never seen Sacha Baron Cohen in anything else, but in these two films, he has created a uber character that brings hilarious chaos wherever he goes. 

Next: Moon

Moon is a deliberately paced low-budget sci-fi film. Not much happens. For most of the film, we watch Sam Rockwell go about his business harvesting minerals on the moon while occasionally interacting with a computer voiced by Kevin Spacey. Most of the twists can be seen coming from a mile away. On one hand it reminded me of The Assassination of Jesse James in how it reveled in pondering the purpose of an essentially ephemeral existence. Besides the presence of Rockwell, the two movies are nothing alike. It also reminds me of the existential struggle of The Truman Show in how one must fight what role society has enforced on us to be our own force. But naturally, it borrows most from 2001. It's not as esoteric as the Kubrick film, but it borrows much of its imagery and energy from that movie. It's short, not too heavy, but a bit of a mindfuck-lite. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Lastly: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The sixth movie in the Harry Potter franchise is by far the most plotless and shapeless. Experiencing this movie is like watching someone mope and brood for two and a half hours. But it's made tolerable by the presence of werewolves, zombies and curses. A creeping feeling of dread saturates every scene. And Alan Rickman finally gets something to do in the series (the scene where Harry is discovered by the window is pure fucking gold). Of course I say "tolerable" as if I weren't into watching people brood for hours on end. I love this shit. This movie series is dense and atmospheric and dire. It just barely skirts dipping into full out horror, but the dark supernatural is slowly edging into every aspect of the character's lives.  All that is to say, there is enough ominous foreboding for me to overlook the usual bits of awkwardness from the three leads. They're never quite as good as I want them to be. 

I have to admit to being a full on Harry Potter fanboy. I love the books and how they present right and wrong / prejudice and justice / good and evil, but I am easily able to judge the movies as movies - not as adaptations. Still, I wonder how much would be lost if I wasn't familiar with the books, and knew about all the information that is left unsaid. This movie has been called The Empire Strikes Back of the Harry Potter movies. That's accurate. From its opening moments of chaos and dread to the final moments of mourning and fear. This is slow-moving dark stuff for kids, but it's compelling fodder for adults. It's not prestige, but it's definitely fancy pulp. 

My Own Better Late Than Never

This weekend, I finally got around to seeing Galaxy Quest.

I had avoided the movie when it first came out because it looks like the kind of comedy I generally don’t like. One that mocks easy targets and contains performances that are all attitude over characterization. Usually, these movies are too broad and silly and scattershot. I need my comedies with an element of sadness – and I don’t mean some manufactured moment where the lead mopes to a tinkling piano. I mean real pathos. I need my comedies to have a focused sense of satire with targets worthy of ridicule (like oppressive ideals, not people). I need some misanthropy in my humor. I am not a fan of fart jokes and pratfalls and pop culture shout outs. I can't sit through comedies about dim-witted man-children who flail desperately and shout the audience into comic submission. So the idea of a movie that makes fun of sci-fi fans irked me. Especially with Tim Allen in the lead. He just seems drawn to broad, condescending comedies with tacked on, sugary lessons to be learned. Oh, how I hate half-assed comedies that teach me lessons. But then again, this movie also has Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Justin Long and Sam Rockwell – as well as bit parts by Enrico Calantoni and Rainn Wilson.

It often comes up – how much I like Sam Rockwell. I consider him a surrogate into many a film. He's far more extroverted than I am, but there's something about his self-deprecating, excitable dry wit. His ability to deflate on cue. His misleading smirk. From Confessions of a Dangerous Mind to Lawn Dogs to Joshua to Snow Angels, he never lets me down - even when the movie itself does. Inevitably, a friend of mine always brings up Galaxy Quest as a movie of his I should see. And now that I have, I finally understand what the hell she’s talking about every time she mentions “the chomper scene” in a movie.

I enjoyed Galaxy Quest. I didn’t love it, but I liked it. It's harmless and good spirited and pleasant enough. There's nothing to get upset about or offended at. Even the the most cynical, angry characters are likable and huggable. I’ve never been to a sci-fi convention. I’ve never been a huge fan of Star Trek (though I watched plenty of TNG in High School). I don’t feel as if any of the jokes were lost on me, but I couldn’t appreciate them the way someone who is immersed in that world might. I laughed out loud maybe a dozen times, which counts it as a success in my book. The first laugh came about fifteen minutes in when the alien girl makes that unearthly sound without her translator. But I was not in a constant state of giggliness as I am with some movies that win me over in the first few minutes. 

The direction was bland and half-assed and serviceable at best. There was the usual over-reliance on computer effects (although a welcome number of aliens were created with costumes and make-up), and a lackadaisical plotting that doesn't focus nearly enough on character. What saves the movie is the universally excellent performances. Sam Rockwell’s descent from gee-whiz amazement to inconsolable panic. Alan Rickman’s stock-in-trade contempt oozing from every line (“By Grabthar's hammer . . . what a savings.”). Sigourney Weaver’s sexy and cool cynicism (I especially loved the moment when she gives a low key “Hold please,” as the creature beamed up twists inside-out and explodes.). Even Enrico Colantoni's cartoonish, trotting alien was enjoyable. Only Tim Allen seems to be doing his same ole schtick - less an impression of Shatner than a less intolerable version of himself - humbled only briefly by an overheard conversation between two holier-than-thou teens. Thankfully, though, he didn't have any sentimental moment of preachy self-awareness to drag the movie into the pits of the usual moral-affirming crowd-pleaser. 

But what I really appreciated was the sense of danger. Real stakes with real consequences. The characters must rise up to save an entire civilization. There isn't a great deal of tension, but what little there is is brilliantly undercut in one moment with Justin Long's being forced to take out the trash by his mother at the worst possible time. The movie even shows death and torture (in the kindest, gentlest ways possible). And the moment that truly surprised me was near the end when many of the characters are killed in a Peckinpah-lite slow-mo montage. Comedies generally don't go there, and the director of this movie did his best to keep the darkness at arms length and make sure the audience never feels threatened - but it's there. If only this darkness had been introduced earlier in the movie, I would have been sucked in from the beginning.

With a director more willing to explore the danger in the story and having a better knack for composition, this movie could have been great. Here the director (who directed some other movies I haven't seen) just stays out of the way of the observant script and unusually smart performances.

And for the record, the "chomper scene" refers to a moment (usually in sci-fi movies) when the characters encounter a moment of manufactured danger that makes little to no logical sense and serves only to add some fake suspense. A recent example would be in the reboot of Star Trek when the characters are beamed into the alien ship and one ends up trapped in a bizarre plumbing system and must be rescued. Galaxy Quest does an admirable job of commenting on the absurdities in the genre without seeming above them. All in all, a fun movie that didn't bowl me over. 

My favorite throw-away comic moment:

• “But you live with your mother.” [Walks away.]
  

The Muppet Movie

I am reasonably sure that the first movie I ever saw in a theater was The Muppet Movie in 1979. I believe this is my first movie theater-going experience because I remember my initial reaction on arriving at the theater: I wanted to sit at the far side of the theater. There were curtains running up and down the sides, and I was of the impression that the curtains would pull back and I would find myself sitting right next to a Muppet. Close enough to touch.

My parents took me to the movies fairly regularly as a kid. I remember seeing Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Bon Voyage Charlie Brown, The Last Unicorn, The Secret of NIMH, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, The Jungle Book, Song of the South, The Muppets Take Manhattan and more. I’m certain that if they knew how much the movies would come to dominate my life, they would never have even let on that such a thing even existed.

Watching The Muppet Movie as an adult shines a glaring spotlight on how much children’s movies have changed in the last thirty years. Compared to the kind of movies aimed at children today (including current Muppet films), The Muppet Movie looks downright gritty. It lacks the darkness that would come to overshadow most of the movies I loved as a child, but it still has a rough, seat-of-its-pants charm to it. It's not glossy or slick. And the scene at El Sleazo's is just this side of adult in its embracing of Vaudevillian one-liners and, well, sleaze. To the movie's credit, it does not condescend to kids. Still, I can’t help but wonder what exactly about this movie I loved as a kid. I generally assume it was the wonder of movies in general. Despite its children-friendly plot and action, the move’s humor depends on an adult’s sense of recognition. It doesn’t involve double entendres or political commentary. Instead, the movie shamelessly embraces outdated, corny humor, groan-inducing puns, and surreal sight gags. ("I seem to have lost my sense of direction." "Have you tried Hare Krishna?") It trots out guest stars as if in a desperate attempt to gain some kind of credibility – of course, as a three-year-old the presence of these stars was lost on me. I probably didn’t recognize a one (save for Big Bird). And it furiously sidesteps conflicts with jokes and gags.

There was much about The Muppet Movie that proved disorienting to me at the time. Once older, I could see that the disorienting moments were really just stylistic jokes and clumsy blocking. Regardless, I came to appreciate some of the dream-like illogic of how events played out or how characters moved (like how Miss Piggy magically arrives at the top of the stairs during a fight, or how Gonzo’s truck silently flips onto the Studebaker when the two vehicles crash, or how Kermit avoids getting crushed by a steamroller). Harmlessly incongruous moments like that have stuck with me, and I continue to appreciate bizarre inner logic in the movies I see as an adult. Moments that take place off camera and force the audience to fill in the gap, or shrug it off. There's something about those moments in films that draw me in and spur my imagination.

But the movie hasn't aged well for me. Watching the movie again recently, there are many problems that grate on me. First off, the humor is not the biting, dark, sly satirical kind of humor that I've come to love. Instead, the humor is safe, inoffensive, and quaint. But most striking is the movie’s rampant avoidance of conflict. Despite building up the danger with Doc Hopper and Kermit (going so far as to bring in a hired killer (“I keel frogs!”)), the movie resolves the issue with a lame sight gag with little set-up. And while the “Standard Rich and Famous Contract” joke at the end is a clever post-modern comment, it again resolves a major point of conflict without so much as a moment of tension. I need real conflict in my movies! I need consequences! I need sacrifice! Even as a kid, I generally needed this. None of that exists in this movie, but it didn’t matter to me as a kid. The Muppet Movie is about a journey across America, where friends are made easily, conflicts are resolved with sincere appeals to emotions, and bland dreams are shared and understood by all.

In this way, The Muppet Movie reminds me a lot of The Wizard of Oz. Both movies are brightly colored journeys across unknown territories. Both involve chasing dreams. And both involve making friends that share your dreams along the way. Like many kids at the time, I watched The Wizard of Oz every time it was rebroadcast on television. It was a tradition. But The Muppet Movie remains more special of the two to me if just for the way it acknowledges its shortcomings and fully embraces its lame plot points. 

For the record, my favorite Muppet has always been Gonzo – most likely due to his role in this movie. He remains an outsider. Despite having a - um – girlfriend, his eye wanders. His dream is slightly askew from the others (“I want to go to Bombay, India and become a movie star!”), but seems to relent and follow the others. He tries to insert himself into conversations only to be ignored and stared down. And I as a kid, I loved that lonely, forlorn song he sings near the end – although as an adult, the deliberately obtuse, self-pitying lyrics get on my nerves. Regardless, he had a unrelenting energy and enthusiasm. He was different. And in later movies, he was recklessly adventurous.

I remember as I left the theater, my exact words were “I wish I had Kermit and Miss Piggy”. I immediately thought that what I meant to say was that I wish I had all the Muppets. Whatever the hell that meant. Regardless, my dad interpreted my scattershot comment and surprised me with small figures of Kermit and Miss Piggy. Not puppets, but five inch, easily broken action figures. I went on to collect all the Muppet action figures in this line (there were seven). Perhaps this is where my completist collector's nature was born. 

The movie does not remain one of my favorites. It is difficult for me to go back and find something in it that I can still embrace unlike the grim loneliness of Charlie Brown or the fun creepiness of Scooby Doo. I can’t even get behind the half-assed dream chasing expressed by the characters. It’s pleasantly diverting with fun personalities. But the targets of its humor are not that particularly well chosen. The plotting is not clever or tight. And the story is not dramatic. I appreciate the surreal humor, meta-references and elliptical blocking – but not much else. In fact, as an adult, I find the movie's depiction of effortless friendships and dreams-easily-won downright infuriating. If I were to see it today, with fresh eyes, I would only see exactly the kind of movie that I normally rail against with its life-can-be-so-easy attitude. I can honestly say that this movie is directly responsible for my love of the movies, but it is one I have outgrown.

My Favorite Trailers

Scooby Doo

I’m going to start doing a new series of blogs since I seem to have dropped the ball on all the other series of blogs I’m doing. In this series, I plan to go back a examine all those bits of pop culture that have most heavily influenced who I am and what I like. And I will try to keep it in autobiographical order. Mostly, I will be talking about movies. But also some TV shows. And a few musical artists.


Until I was twelve, I accompanied my mom to my grandmother’s house every Saturday morning. While my mom styled my grandmother’s hair and went shopping, I watched television. Specifically, I watched Saturday Morning Cartoons. When I was a kid, my life revolved around television – mostly cartoons. This was in the primitive days. Before cable. Before a time when entire channels were dedicated to playing cartoons 24/7. There were only specific times when cartoons were on. Weekday afternoons, and Saturday mornings.

On Saturday mornings, my schedule was carefully chosen as I switched from channel to channel on the hour and half hour to catch all my favorites. These included Superfriends, Smurfs, Drak Pack, Gummi Bears, Bugs Bunny . . . and my all time favorite animated Saturday morning cartoon, Scooby Doo.

At this time (1979), the iteration of Scooby Doo currently playing Saturday mornings was The Scooby and Scrappy Doo show. I was not so crazy about this. I liked Fred, Daphne, and Velma. I liked the mysteries. The ghosts. The scary settings. Not so much the slapstick. However, I loved the opening sequence – especially the shot of that train coming at the camera. There was a real menace in how that opening bit plays out. Sadly, it is entirely absent from the actual episodes themselves.


The Scooby Doo I knew and loved was Scooby Doo, Where Are you? Which played on weekday afternoons. But only on one or two days a week. The rest of the week was dedicated to the two-parter guest spot episodes, or the mid-seventies Scooby Doo Show. But these versions lacked those special qualities that I loved about the original series.

Even as a kid, I always liked stories with a little danger. I liked villains planning to do harm to the heroes. I liked menace. I liked creepy shit. And Scooby Doo was my horror movie training wheels. Scooby Doo presented a world populated by haunted mansions, secret passageways, bats, cobwebs, skulls, lightning storms, spooky organs, portraits with moving eyes, trap doors, creepy-looking old chests, bats, echoing ghastly laughs, gray skies etc. And always with the ghost hands, grabbing at our heroes from the shadows. I have known those who actually claimed that Scooby Doo was too creepy for them as a child, and granted, re-watching old episodes, it does feature a lot of imagery that cartoons would most likely not feature these days.

Of course there was never any real danger. Death was never explicitly mentioned. Instead, bad guys threatened to turn Scooby and Shaggy into ghosts (which is code for threatening to kill them). And I was never all that clear what would happen if a phantom actually managed to successfully grab a member of the gang. But for a kid who was not allowed to watch anything remotely scary or adult, it was as close as I could get to all out horror for a very long time,

I loved the way the cheap animation was used. How each character had a distinctive way of running and standing. Frantic chases down endless hallways (as a kid, I discovered very quickly that if I run down a hallway, I hit the other end very quickly). The echoing shuffling that accompanied their footsteps. Even the overly dramatic had gestures when a character was “kidnapped” by some mysterious force behind a wall. I even loved the constant rotation of stock music. Also a plus, the hippie chase songs. I was obsessed with the show. At one time, I could tell you which images in the opening titles weren’t really in any episode. (The shot of Freddie in a chair sliding into a secret passage proved an especially difficult-to-see-episode for a very long time).

(While on the subject of grabby ghost hands, I often wandered why the gang never encountered villains with guns. Only costumes. I knew the show was from an earlier era, and I had a very shaky grasp on history, so I began to suspect that the show took place in a time before guns were invented. Unfortunately, I had seen a western or two, and was unable to account for the discrepancies in the timeline of my theory.)

Scooby Doo inspired an entire sub-genre of Saturday morning cartoons: the teens solving mysteries show. And naturally, these shows all featured mysteries with someone dressed up as a ghost. For the most part, ghosts did not actually exist in these shows. Perhaps this was meant as a reassuring message to kids that there is nothing to be afraid of, but I have to admit that what I took away from it was something more pragmatic: that perhaps there is nothing supernatural at all. That everything unnatural is really just an invention of man. This reading may be especially heavy for a kid, but I swear it painted how I looked at monsters, Santa Claus, and God. 

Perhaps what drew me most to Scooby Doo, Where Are you? Was the idea of driving around with my friends and solving mysteries when I grew up. Sadly, this dream was never realized,

In later years, the show went off the rails, but there will always be a special place in my heart for the final continuous iteration of Scooby Doo: The 13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo. In this version, the gang (now in different clothes for the first time in 15 years) opens a Chest of Demons – releasing 13 of the most terrifying ghosts on the face of the Earth. The idea was thrilling to me, but I was initially disappointed that the series opted for a lighter, post-modern take on the material rather than the darker, more dramatic take I was hoping for. Regardless, the bizarro humor grew on me and prepared me for the rising trend in self-referencing animation. Bonus: this iteration featured a warlock named Vincent Van Ghoul who looked and sounded exactly like Vincent Price. 



Later on, I watched a lot of G.I. Joe, He-Man, The Real Ghostbusters, etc, but they all fell short of the euphoria I experienced when Scooby Doo was new to me. While none of the later series were as good as the original, Scooby and the gang remains a vital part of my childhood. I still hope to ride around in my flower van with my peeps and chase a few ghosts around an oversized rundown mansion.

A side note: after watching a lot of old cartoons this weekend, I noticed a great amount of unabated liberal propaganda in my old Saturday morning cartoons. First off, I wish there were more blatant liberalism in today’s cartoons. However, I appreciated how Scooby Doo was generally lesson-free. Except of course that the villains were all selfish, money-hungry meanies. It featured a tight nit group of friends who looked out for each other as they explored dangerous places and encountered faux dangers. There wasn't much more to it than that.

Where did Scooby Doo lead me?:

• Other weekday afternoons cartoons for one thing. In the mid-eighties, weekday afternoons became inundated with first run shows - not just decades-old reruns. So I watched a lot of G.I. Joe, He-Man, even some Ducktales later on.
  
• But what Scooby Doo really did was pave the way for my obsession with horror films. From the stock imagery, to the genre's conventions. Scooby Doo has affected how I view horror movies. It has taught me to empathize with the good guys - the victims. Obviously, the villains are the more dramatically drawn characters in horror, but I remain firmly invested in the good guys despite how stock and one-dimensional they are. Only a few years later, I became obsessed with black-and-white horror movies.  I attribute this to Scooby Doo. 
  

I still can't watch the lightest of shows without longing for at least a  little darkness. For al the lightheartedness of Scooby Doo, there was a darkness in each episode that the characters took seriously. Shaggy and Scooby were terrified in every episode. Sometimes, even Freddie and Velma were scared. I still need this in everything I watch. I NEED the characters to take whatever situation they are in seriously -at least for a fleeting moment. Scooby Doo, Where Are You? wasn't ground-breaking. It wasn't even particularly imaginative. But it filled a very specific niche - and I was its intended audience. 

Bonnaroo 2009

There comes a moment at every Bonnaroo I’ve attended when I hit a low point, and I don’t want to come back. The first year, it was on Sunday afternoon. Not even Bonnaroo could keep my regular Sunday afternoon ennui at bay. Year two, it was Saturday afternoon. All the dust and heat was making me feel sick. I didn’t think I could last through the rest of the weekend. Last year, it was Saturday morning. My phone was dead. My tent was rained out. And the gray skies were fucking with my mood.

This year, that moment arrived about thirty minutes after I arrived. In other words, day one hour one of Bonnaroo this year sucked balls. It took 13 hours to get to the campsite. THIRTEEN HOURS when it has usually taken maybe four hours in the past. Traffic was hell. Absolute hell. I was stuck in one spot for with moving a foot for almost two hours. Someone somewhere fucked up royally. Bonnaroo, for all your posturing about recycling and conserving, you don’t hesitate to burn up inordinate amounts of gas and oil. Then, I was directed to a mud pit for a campsite. I set up in the rain and dark – regularly stepping in a deep mud hole at the corner of where I was setting up. This, in the midst of a tornado warning. As you may know, a warning means that there is an actual tornado in the area. Then, the rains came. Heavy torrential rains that brought down half the tent and soaked my towels. My towels! And my shoes! I tried to venture out to the concerts that evening, but I was informed that the entire site was out of programs. Before I had even arrived, they were out. Thus, I didn’t know who was playing where and when. I went back to my tent, wet and defeated. And wanted to go home.

But the next day was better. I woke up early and headed for Centeroo. The first thing I noticed is how little the place has changed. It never seems to change. For fuck’s sake, Bonnaroo, would it kill you to plant some goddamn grass?! There are small changes. The computer tent has become a DJ Scratch Academy tent. The cinema has a wood floor, a partition separating from the open front, and a concession stand. And the Troo Music Lounge was a series of open tents rather than one big one. But other than that, the same vendors sit in the same places. The same silly art takes up the same space. I think the same trash even stays in the same area. Maybe it was because of the rains, but the entire site felt much more filthy than usual.

I caught a documentary in the mostly empty cinema tent while waiting for the shows to start. It was something about Pete Seeger and how radical his politics were. But once the shows did start, I only had fun for the next three days.

First off, Gomez. A band I’m not too familiar with, but it was a great set. Energetic and rocking. Then Animal Collective, which was excellent. There’s nothing revolutionary about either of these shows, but they were both fun, and the crowd was into them. Sadly I couldn’t stay through all of their show, because I had to head back to the Cinema Tent to see Don Hertzfeldt (one of my favorite filmmakers). I got to sit in the front row (again, the room was practically empty). I did not get my picture taken with him (I was too shy to ask), but I learned that he’s a chatty Cathy. He didn’t offer much insight, but it was cool nonetheless. I could totally hang out with him. I also saw “I am so proud of you” for the second and third times. Amazing short film about mortality and its inevitability.

Afterwards, I caught Al Green (who was in a playful mood), TV on the Radio and Santigold before seeing the Beastie Boys that night. Despite some technical problems and actually dropping the beat a few times (“There is no tape. There is no iPod. This is live music.”), the Beastie Boys was my favorite show of the day. Alas, they performed neither “Girls” (my favorite BB song) nor “Fight for your Right”.

From there, I went to see David Byrne, who had a ridiculous costumed/choreographed thing going on. It was ludicrous, and I started to walk away. Al that stopped me was his breaking into “Burning Down the House”. Later, Phoenix (another band I was unfamiliar with, but liked), Public Enemy, and Girl Talk. By this time, it was almost four in the morning and I was tired of shoving my way through crowds.

For the record, Bonnaroo is overly crowded. You are regularly shoving through people. And at the shows, it’s really bad. Like sardines. I am not one of those who likes to linger at the back of the tent, or find some spot on the ground in ear shot and lie down. I get in there. I push my way close to the front – standing in front of someone. Trying to see past someone constantly bobbing their head or dancing clumsily. Yes, I get covered in the sweat of others, shoved around myself, and assaulted by the oblivious. But being in there. In that energy: it’s exciting.


The next day, it was hot. First off, I went to see the Steele Drivers based on a recommendation by a friend. I wasn’t into it, so I wandered around until I accidentally happened upon Jimmy Buffet singing that one song he has.


I then kicked around from tent to tent, shoving my way through a sea of crowds, until the Bon Iver concert – whose audience wins the award for most gratuitous PDAs. It was very sensitive and pleasant. Afterwards, I went to the Silent Disco to catch DJ Quickie Mart – based on another recommendation. I had never been to the silent disco, and this was the perfect time since there was no line. The idea behind the silent disco is to wear headphones while listening and dancing to the music. Take the headphones off and the bizarre illusion is shattered, and it’s just people bopping around to songs in their head – occasionally coughing out a random syllable along with the music. The DJ used popular eighties songs while keeping up a fast beat. I spent about thirty to forty minutes there before heading off to the next show.

As usual, I did not ride the Ferris Wheel.


Jenny Lewis. I didn’t know much about her, but one song really interested me. “Jack Killed Mom.” I have not yet managed to download it, but I’m working on it. I skipped out on her early to catch Of Montreal, who started late (which means I was right on time). Of Montreal follows the Flaming Lips school of showmanship. Crazy costumes and weird lighting effects. The Flaming Lips still win thanks to puppets, lasers and video screens, but Of Montreal gets a mention for effort. ON the other hand, the Flaming Lips involves too much political rhetoric. Later, I caught Wilco (who performed my favorite Wilco song “Jesus, Etc.” and did the best patter so far – all self-deprecating and intimate) and The Decemberists (who played The Hazards of Love note for note, beginning to end without a bit of patter).

Then, Bruce. Bruce was thirty minutes late, and performed none of my favorite songs (“I’m on Fire” “Nebraska” “Streets of Philadelphia” “Born in the U.S.A.”), but did perform “Born to Run”, a song that I have never been too keen on in the past, but now having heard him perform it live, I really like it. He also performed “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” despite declaring that “It’s too fucking hot for Santa Claus.” The Springsteen show was disappointing. It was to goddamn upbeat and the songs too goddamn poppy. I’m not giving it enough credit, I know, but it wasn’t my thing.


After Bruce, I headed toward the stage where Nine Inch Nails was set to perform, but got distracted by a band in a small tent. The band was The Giraffes. The performance was fantastic. The lead singer screamed out his songs while smoking and drinking. He then jumped into the audience to watch the guitarist tear it up while getting soaked in beer and sweat. The songs were bawdy and dirty and loud and awesome. Plus, some guy dressed up like Teen Wolf showed up and danced. The Giraffes are fucking awesome, folks.

Next up, Nine Inch Nails. Without showing up early, I was unable to get a spot close. And the strobe lighting effects made getting a good picture difficult. But this show remains my favorite (“I don’t know about this starting at one in the morning shit.”). Trent Reznor was on. He never performed “Closer”, but he closed out with a haunting rendition of “Hurt” after announcing that this was his last U.S. show as NIN. He sounded tired, but he didn’t let that slow him down. It sounded great. It looked great. I was all set to begin attending his Halloween shows until he made his announcement.


Afterwards, I went by the Art of Such “N Such tent where vaudevillian shenanigans were afoot. I watched ridiculous displays of naked pleas for attention while dancing for another hour. The such n’ such area is a great place to waste time, but it’s half assed Cabaret-lite. Afterwards, I made my way to the Discoteque, where I actually sat down and fell asleep. Despite being four-thirty in the morning, it was still shoulder-to-shoulder people everywhere. I limped back to my tent for a little sleep before beginning the last day.

The first show of the final day was The Dillinger Escape Plan. A rocking hard metal band. A spontaneous mosh pit busted out around me and I had to flee for my life – swimming against the current of people literally climbing over the crowd to get to the mosh pit. The lead singer regularly tossed bottles of water into the crowd, screamed into his mic, and flung himself onto the throbbing crowd – crowd-surfing with everyone else. It was genuinely exciting.

Next up, the laid back crowd of Todd Snider. They giggled dutifully at his dry humor and nodded in time as he performed. I left Todd Snider early (I wish I hadn’t) and went to the Citizen Cope show. I was so tired of fighting through crowds by this time, I stayed way back. Then, I headed back to the High on Fire show. Another metal band. Too loud (yes, I’m an old man), but I loved the introduction to one of their songs. “Thank goodness he’s no longer president, but here’s a fuck-George-Bush song. RUINS OF WARRRRR!”

I lay down on the ground and fell asleep during the uber mellow Andrew Bird show. Then finished off the weekend with Merle Haggard (who stopped a song to make a pot joke. He knew the audience.), Snoop Dogg (twenty minutes late, dawg!), Band of Horses, and Neko Case. I was drawn to the Neko Case concert by the sound of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog barking “This place has more stages than syphilis!” He then raped Yoda. At this point, I was overwhelmed and tired. I had barely paid attention through the last few shows. I needed the weekend to be over.

I spent the entire weekend stepping over drunks, shoving my way through filthy hippies, maneuvering through currents of drunk and high half-naked kids, and trying to peer around bobbing swaying sweaty bodies. My back was aching and I had blisters on my feet, but my initial frustration from the first night had subsided and I was happy again. As usual, the thought occurred to me that I’m too fucking old to be going to Bonnaroo. But once again I was won over by the crowds and the music and the whole atmosphere. It’s a party with 75,000 guests. And everyone is there for a good time. The overpriced food and drinks. The random strangers painting your hand. The ubiquitous pot smoking. Despite the hellish commute, I will most likely be back again next year.