Veronica Mars

Veronica Mars ~ I need to preface this review with the fact that I have never seen an episode of "Veronica Mars," never ever. And yes, as a regular listener to the Better in the Dark podcast, I know I should be ashamed of myself. I am a fan of Kristen Bell however, just from "House of Lies," not "Veronica Mars." I know, it's a whole different girl, but there you go.

Does one need to watch the TV series to understand the movie? It doesn't appear so. The opening voiceover and montage kinda seems to cover it in a streamlined fashion. We know what we need to know, and that it all happened some time ago, far away. This is a new start. The titular character played by Bell was a teenage detective, and now years later she wants to be a lawyer. The catch up is pretty simple.

There is much here about Veronica going back to her past. There is the appearance of baggage without the weight. It's not as seamless as say Serenity to "Firefly," but you feel it. On the eve of her high school reunion, her ex-boyfriend has been accused of murder, so of course she has to help out. You can feel that you're being informed of whatever-happened-to for the first twenty minutes or so, but not to the point of slowing the story down.

From there it becomes a pretty standard very small screen but extended TV mystery episode, entertaining and engaging, but making me happy I waited for cable. I liked it, but the one thing that didn't work for me was why Veronica would help the ex-boyfriend. We're told he has a lot of drama but he seems extraordinarily boring to this TV show virgin. I just didn't buy it.

I enjoyed it though, enough to put "Veronica Mars" on my Netflix queue. Maybe it'll be better when I get all the references. Worth seeing.

Adventures in Podcasting

While I have been podcasting for quite a while, dating back to The All Things Fun! Podcast, and its crazed video child, The All Things Fun! New Comics Vidcast, and for Biff Bam Pop!, I was also a regular contributor to The Biff Bam Popcast. This year I dived into the podcast arena for myself, rather than for other folks. In April of 2013 my friend Ray Cornwall and I started our own podcast, The GAR! Podcast. We jumped in head first with really no idea what we were doing.

GAR! (Glenn and Ray) was an old idea that had finally been birthed. It started with our weird stream of consciousness conversations during dinner and talking on the phone while driving. Always the idea manifested - we should record this and make a podcast. That was the not-so-secret origin. After fooling around with GarageBand and finally taking the advice of longtime online friend and inspiration Derrick Ferguson, I submitted to just-do-it-ism. And we just did it.

We had no idea what we were doing of course, outside of just talking about stuff we liked, loved, and didn't like - just like the conversations we had always had. Eventually we figured out what it was we were doing, and thought we knew how to package it. Essentially we were two nerds, two big grown up kids who had refused to grow up, talking about stuff we loved - comics, games, television, books, movies, music, writing, sports, and somehow we always ended up talking about Prince and "Breaking Bad." Circle of life stuff, really.

I strived to be like the folks I admired who were already doing podcasts that I loved, and I wanted to acknowledge them here. The aforementioned Derrick Ferguson and his partner Thomas Deja continue to dazzle me every week with Better in the Dark, where they talk about movies and television. The class and professionalism of Barry Reese on The Shadow Fan's Podcast has been an equal inspiration. GAR! is nowhere near the league of these guys, but we want to be, and we're trying.

Seeing how 'easy' it was, a few months back, The Bride determined to do a podcast as well, one about one of her favorite topics, Disney. Thus, The Make Mine Magic Podcast was born. Inspiration there came from several other Disney-related podcasts like The DIS Unplugged, and a few others.

Here's to everyone who has helped, inspired, or even listened - thank you. And just for the record, don't forget to check out both The Make Mine Magic Podcast and The GAR! Podcast. Thanks again!

Best of 2008: Everything Else

In my opinion, the best movies of 2008:

High School Musical 3, Mamma Mia!, Iron Man, Wall-E, Speed Racer, 21, Hancock, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Premonition and Justice League: The New Frontier.

Movies not from 2008, but I saw for the first time this year and loved: Déjà Vu, Last Holiday, Man of the Century, Girl 27, Crash (2004), Shoot ‘Em Up, and the absolutely brilliant The Man from Earth.

The best things from the internet in 2008:

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Stephen King’s "N," Watchmen Motion Comics, BloodRayne A Fan Film, Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips podcast, Derrick Ferguson and Thomas Deja's Better in the Dark podcast and The Writing Show podcast.

The best comic books of 2008:

Jonah Hex, Trinity by Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley, Geoff Johns' Action Comics, Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch's Fantastic Four, Gail Simone's Wonder Woman, Lone Ranger, Countdown to Mystery, Brave and the Bold, Joe Casey's Godland, and Garth Ennis' brilliant revival of British space hero Dan Dare.

The best music videos of 2008 in my opinion:

"4 Minutes" by Madonna and Justin Timbalake w/Timbaland, "Rockstar" by Nickleback, "Dream On" and "Konichiwa Bitches" by Robyn and Pink's "So What."



Folks and things I’ve discovered in 2008 that probably didn’t actually happen in 2008:

Robin Renee, Os Seminovos, the “Coverage” album by Mandy Moore, Lacuna Coil, Hollywood Undead, Vitamin String Quartet and just how really good Suzi Quatro was and is.