Every Buffy fan with a high-bandwidth connection (particularly those that don't live in the US) needs to go to this poorly assembled page of mine and have some fun.
OK - this is exactly why I love Wil Wheaton's weblog so much: Son of SpongeBob Vega$Pants: "So I get to the hallway where we're set up for autographs, and, as I am walking up the hallway, I see Dorn, Marina, Renee, Kate Mulgrew, and WILLIAM FUCKING SHATNER. Shatner has always been a dick to me, but I want to say hi, so I approach them, and I say, "Hi! How you guys doin?" Everyone returns my greeting, even Kate, who I don't know, at all. Never even been introduced. Everyone, that is, except WILLIAM FUCKING SHATNER! Old toupee-head won't even look at me! I don't know what this guy's problem is, really. I think he's very funny, I think he's got a great sense of humor about himself, but he is always a dick to me."
In another article from disinformation, there is discussion about the memetic effects of Hollwood imagery. Although the article strays dangerously close to advocating censorship on the grounds of 'putting ideas into people's heads' it does question the relationship between the Spectacle and political and terrorist action. Perhaps it's only understandable that a radical politician of a fundamentalist country should try to make a movie in which the 'bad guys win'.
Disinformation is back, and with a range of perspectives on events in America over the last week.
US terrorist attacks: due to circumstances beyond our control . . .: "The anti-globalist movement has existed at the fringes of American politics for several reasons. Understanding these reasons reveals the hidden complexity and undercurrents of the American political landscape. A more in-depth understanding can also serve as a buffer against the perils of groupthink."
Terrorism and witch hunts: "'Inevitable Ring to the Unimaginable' by Australian journalist John Pilger, argues that "the US and its sidekicks, principally Britain, have exercised, flaunted, and abused their wealth and power 'for so long they shouldn't be surprised if those they have victimized fight back.' Among many examples, he cites the 200,000 Iraqis killed during the Gulf War, and the million others who have since died in Iraq as a result of US/UK sanctions, and concludes that 'Western terror is part of the recent history of imperialism.'
This perspective is directly contradicted by former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's 'Response Must Destroy the Network that Shelters Terrorism.' Kissinger writes that countries harboring terrorists 'must pay an exorbitant price' (ironic given that the US trained and funded Bin Laden and at least a few of the hijackers) and calls the World Trade Center attacks 'a threat to our social way of life and to our existence as a free society.'"
Meg just threw me a list of songs with questionable lyrics that she found on the web. Songs - presumably - that people have decided not to play during the current events. Which possibly explains why everyone feels so suffocated. Part of me thinks that some of these songs should be being played. Why can't John Lennon's Imagine be heard? It's message should be more true now than at any other time, surely? And "Walk Like An Egyptian"? What possible reason could there be for not playing that? [lyrics]. And while I understand why it's not being played, I desperately need to hear REM's "It's the End of the World as We Know It" at the moment. There has to be some release for the anxiety that seems to be building again.
Does anyone have the slightest idea when My Own Private Idaho might be coming out on DVD? I miss River Phoenix. When I visited Kerry in LA, we went to a shop directly opposite the Viper Room where he died.
Third pilot of the week is Alias. When a young woman reveals to her fiancé that she works for the CIA, he is executed by a hit squad hired by her employers. How she deals with this, whether her employers are actually the CIA, and what she needs to stay alive and redeem the loss of her lover are the questions addressed in the first part of the series - which is essentially yet another Nikita rip-off with a couple of twists. That's not to say it isn't entertaining, because it is. That's not to say it isn't exciting, because it is. And that's not to say it doesn't have potential, because it does. But it'll have to do something new pretty soon to maintain people's interest.
Just when you begin to think that the threat of an escalating conflict is behind us - or at least that enough distance has emerged to make a World War less likely - the Taliban declares holy war on the US. And it must be bad, because it's forcing idiots like Jerry Falwell to make half-hearted apologies for saying that it's the fault of feminists, gay people and liberals.
My second pilot of the day is Thieves, which was frankly the most entertaining pile of crap I've seen in months. The plot is totally ridiculous - two crack thieves - one male and one female - are foiled during an attempted hoist. There is continual sexual tension between them and - apparently for this reason - the government keeps them on to recover stolen items for the government. Complete hokum and glorious fun. Hart to Hart meets Nikita with a dash of Moonlighting thrown in for good measure. The copy I saw was clearly mid-production - a variety of special effects shots hadn't been added yet, and the music was directly lifted in from 'relevant' movies as a placeholder (particular treats including bits of music from Out of Sight, American Beauty and Snatch). The end of the episode was a bit mid-budget / Baywatch Nights abandoned warehouse-style final confrontation cliché-of-the-week, but generally, everyone was pretty cool, pretty good and pretty damn pretty.
This afternoon I made my very first ever Flash movie. I've struggled with Flash before, many many years ago, and found going through the instructions supplied with it so frustratingly awful that I gave up and consigned myself to the 'bit technically dim' category. But today I decided to confront my demons and go hell for leather, and having discovered a considerably more helpful article at Webmonkey, I can now present some circles, moving. I can't believe that I am so ridiculously proud of this absurdly simple (and basically broken) piece of rubbish. Sigh.
I've got my hands on a few previews of upcoming American TV series, and I'm planning to plough my way through them over the next few days. First up is 24. Kiefer Sutherland stars in this high-concept piece of TV programming. The series contains 24 episodes, each one is in real time and occupies one hour of one day. In the first episode the Counter Terrorist Unit of LA hears about a potential threat on a US senator, who may or may not have something to hide. In the meantime, our hero's daughter has gone missing.
Watch out for this series, because it's pretty damn good. It's fast-paced, uses a lot of split screen techniques to keep you informed as to what's happening at any one time and it's pretty involving. My main anxiety is that people won't be prepared to spend nearly six months watching one tight and short story - and that we'll get bored of Kiefer's clothing.
Grant Morrison's ... unique ... take on events in New York contains this comment: "Did we bomb Boston to stop the Boston Strangler ? Did we level New York City to get at Son of Sam ? No we did not. So why the fuck should we flatten Afghanistan just to get at a bunch of murderous bastards who have the country's people in a repressive death grip?". [via Darren, the Linkmachine]
An Afghan-American speaks: "What can be done, then? Let me now speak with true fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in there with ground troops. When people speak of "having the belly to do what needs to be done" they're thinking in terms of having the belly to kill as many as needed. Having the belly to overcome any moral qualms about killing innocent people. Let's pull our heads out of the sand. What's actually on the table is Americans dying. And not just because some Americans would die fighting their way through Afghanistan to Bin Laden's hideout. It's much bigger than that, folks. Because to get any troops to Afghanistan, we'd have to go through Pakistan. Would they let us? Not likely. The conquest of Pakistan would have to be first. Will other Muslim nations just stand by? You see where I'm going. We're flirting with a world war between Islam and the West."
Needed: a new age of enlightenment: "You'd think that every possible angle would already have been covered by people writing about the events of September 11th. So why am I writing this, and why now? Because in all the media coverage I've seen so far, nobody has been asking the right, the important, questions. Like: why did this happen, what circumstances got us into a de facto state of undeclared war with the Islamic world, and what can we realistically do to prevent those circumstances from ever recurring." [link via Prolific]
When you are bored and have nothing to do, you do stupid stupid things. This is actually the result of following a tutorial on teaching oneself complex Photoshop operations (although god knows you can't tell by looking at it):
Today on Barbelith: New York: On the Ground - "I could feel the heat three hundred yards away; everything on four or five floors, people and office equipment, came raining down on the crowd. We all ran north while it fell and got away before it hit because it was high up. As I glanced back I saw the contents of the floors: all on fire, people and building, killed without a second to reconsider their life. George Minarik was in New York."
From the Guardian's letters pages, via linkmachinego: The omnipotence of American culture and childhood innocence ended in our house on September 11. I sat with my young son watching the images from the World Trade Centre. Suddenly we saw people hanging from the windows at the top of the stricken tower. "Mum," he said, "where's Spiderman? He could save them." Later, as I tucked him up in bed, he asked sleepily, "Is Spiderman not real, mum?" [link]
