Throwdown 3/7

Random thoughts, questions, and observations for the week.

1. The judges on American Idol need to be barred from saying that their show is a “singing competition” and that “it’s all about the singing.” How dumb do they think we all are? Give me a fucking break; it’s not about singing, it’s about who is going to be the easiest persona to market. Simon is being completely disingenuous about the “singing competition” when he’s spent his entire career choosing marketability over talent. He doesn’t know shit about music (seriously, he’d never heard “More Today Than Yesterday,” “Baby, Please Don’t Go,” or “Magic Man”?), but he’s a good businessman. He just needs to stop being so disingenuous about it.

2. Disney is planning the following releases for 2011: Cars 2, National Treasure 3, Tron 2, and Pirates of the Caribbean 4: Dear God, How Long Does This Fucking Thing Need to Go On, Why Won't Jack and Will Just Fuck Already So We Can Finally Go Home? Weren’t they just saying last year that they were done with endless sequels and were going to do something new?

3. Is that what they mean by bodyguard? How do I get that job?

4. Some people went nutso after last week’s so-so episode of Saturday Night Live starring Ellen Page. “Did she out herself on that last sketch, OMG, OMG!!!” Some people just really want her to be a lesbian. What bothered me was the opening monologue, with Ellen Page jumping on the Diablo Cody backlash by making fun of her characteristic dialogue. Like I said a couple of weeks ago, if Cody was a man, she wouldn’t have won the Oscar (she basically wrote a Kevin Smith movie, and no one’s arguing he should win an award). Today I can say that, if she was a man, the backlash against her wouldn’t be as personal as it’s getting. What the fuck? Men still hate a successful woman that much? Get over it. She wrote a great screenplay and it won an award. And unless there was some kind of gentle loving subtext I missed in that monologue, that’s awfully bitchy of Ellen Page to jump on that bandwagon, considering that without Diablo Cody she wouldn’t be nominated for an Oscar, nor would she be hosting Saturday Night Live.

5. After a shooting in this country, people always say “I hate how easy guns are to get in this country,” but when someone gets killed in a vehicular accident, no one ever says “I hate how easy cars are to get in this country.”

6. It says a lot about how bad TV animation is now that Fox wants Seth McFarlane to create yet another unfunny, poorly-animated, reference-heavy show. They’re doing a Family Guy spin-off starring Cleveland, the most boring, unfunny character in a show that is lousy (and I do mean lousy) with boring, unfunny characters. Instead of giving him another show, Fox should send McFarlane to classes to learn how to write characters, write humor that’s funny to people who aren’t on dope, and hire actual character animators.

7. A British Army captain came back from Iraq, did a bobsled run, and didn’t realize until after he’d completed the run that, at some point, his leg had been accidentally torn off. They managed to reattach it, then told him that it would take two or more year for him to gain the full range of mobility. So he told them to cut the leg off and give him a false one just to get fucking on with it. That man is either very tough or very stupid; either way, I think his children can’t ever complain about getting hurt ever again.

8. Is this why Jenna Jameson got all skinny and ugly and creepy? Preparing to play a zombie stripper? I guess that makes sense; turns out she’s a method actress.

9. Drew Barrymore donated a million dollars of her own money to the World Food Program. I’m just gratified to see someone with that much money doing something good with it instead of trying to shame me for not doing something more important with the twelve bucks I have in my checking.

10. Jeez, are people still upset that John Cho isn’t Japanese, and yet he’s playing Sulu in Star Trek? Not a week goes by without seeing someone complain about that. I guess he’ll just have to, I don’t know, act the part, then. Oh, incidentally, Zachary Quinto isn’t a Vulcan, either. I hope that doesn’t spoil your enjoyment of what I'm sure will be a very good pointless movie.

11. My only comment on these Watchmen pictures that have cropped up: it looks as ridiculous as I thought it would. I hate that they’re making this movie, and I hate that people are actually excited about it. And I hate that most of the people cast in this movie are in their twenties or early thirties, thus reversing one of the points Alan Moore was trying to make. And that’s the end of the comments for me; it should have stayed a comic book, and as far as I’m concerned, it did. There was probably a way it could’ve been made into a movie (I’ve been saying that for a while now), but I don’t think this is going to be it. I pass. No more comment.

12. Shia LaBeouf to Empire magazine about his arrest in Chicago: “That was complete and utter insanity. I was an asshole, and it was a mistake I’m still completely embarrassed about.” Wow, accountability. I like this kid. You never hear anyone admit they acted like an ass anymore; it’s all the fault of their fame or the pressure of working. By the way, isn’t it funny how you never hear about gaffers or directors or stand-ins or the lighting team freaking out and acting like assholes and getting arrested? And these are the people who work all day; actors relax and then work in short bursts; they work for seconds or a couple of minutes at a time. And they have all the pressure? Anyway, I feel good seeing a young actor own up to something instead of doing the publicist spin. It’s nice.

13. Here’s another celebrity thing from this week that I kind of respect. Marion Cotillard said that she thought 9/11 was a conspiracy conducted by the American government. Lots of people got pissed, of course, although she didn’t say anything that other people haven’t said before (I entertained the theory here on this blog when I first heard about it, and a recent poll shows that roughly a third of Americans believe that 9/11 was some sort of government conspiracy). What I love is that she refuses to apologize for her thoughts; she has no intention to say she’s sorry. I love it. If she was an American actress, you can bet she’d be apologizing in a statement the next day, terrified that this would have a negative effect on her career. Instead, Mlle. Cotillard is sticking by what she said. And I like that. It’s rare to see an actor with any integrity.


14. I think it’s absolutely a ridiculous sham that E! has given stage momager and self-proclaimed “White Oprah” Dina Lohan her own reality show. It’s apparently going to be about Dina managing Lindsay’s little sister Ali and turning her into the same kind of train wreck self-parody that her older daughter became. Even the press release paints Dina Lohan as a loving and concerned mother, which is just demonstrably not true; Dina wants fame for herself and has cynically used her daughters to get it. The only reason E! really wants this show is so that they can showcase the self-destruction of Ali Lohan, and Dina probably knows that. Apparently being a pathetic mother is enough of a reason to have your own reality show these days. Macauley Culkin’s dad must be kicking himself that he couldn’t get a similar deal.

15. Miley Cyrus said this week that she’s creeped out by older, single men who come to her concerts alone. My question is: how does she know that’s happening when she’s packing in arenas full of screaming children? Does she look over each and every person there? I think mostly she just makes that assumption because, of course, society now teaches young girls that they can only be victimized by single men (listen to Aly & AJ retardedly rant about the extreme and constant danger of “perverts” some time). Hey, Miley, there are some adults who like your music, too, like me. And I’m sure there are some who like you for much less wholesome reasons, like me. I don’t know, I guess my advice to you would be to stop posting soft core pictures of yourself online and wearing slips to premieres, because who do you think is really looking at them? Duh. Seriously, in the future, when she’s only getting work singing in Indian casinos, she’s going to miss those single guys.

16. Why do I keep hearing about politicians who have donated money from questionable sources to charity? This week I was hearing about Rezko contributions to Obama being given to charity. I always think that’s a cop-out. It’s something politicians do to save their ethical image after they’ve gotten caught taking dirty money. If they really had ethics, they wouldn’t cash the check in the first place. And Obama petulantly walking out of a press conference because reporters dared to ask him questions about it doesn’t make him look any better.

17. How come no one ever asks why Chelsea Clinton isn’t in the military? I mean, her mother voted for the war repeatedly. Why don’t they ask her why, if she believed in the war so much when it started, Chelsea’s not in Iraq right now? I guess it’s not just conservatives who have a double standard.

18. Spice Girl Mel B did this for an ad for the Helen Bamber Foundation, a British human rights organization that benefits survivors of the sex slave trade. I guess sex slave trafficking didn’t have a sexy enough image? Seriously, what is the point of this now? PETA ads were silly enough, but now women are getting their kit off to highlight the plight of women who are used as sex slaves? Why? What does this add to your message? It’s an important charity and it’s important to throw a light on this, but what is the message this is meant to send?

19. Speaking of PETA, despite their terrorist efforts, fur is making a huge comeback. Which actually makes me a little happy, because I hate PETA way more than I love animals. See what being obnoxious does? It makes me disagree with you no matter your position.

20. Jenny McCarthy is trying to get the medical community to take her seriously when she says that diet and vitamins can ease the symptoms of autism. I think she probably has a good point—her son is autistic, after all, so she’s got some experience with the condition; besides that, doctors and researchers keep finding out more and more that a lot of disorders (especially hyperactivity disorders) are the result of diet and food allergies. I don’t know, is it just that she’s a hot blonde, so she’s supposed to be dumb? Or is that she takes her clothes off for a living sometimes and that disqualifies her from commenting on the treatment of her own son? Because what I see here is a mother who wants to ease the symptoms of a child whose condition is not covered by insurance and being rebuked by a medical community that is more and more reliant on medications as the magical cure-all. Just because you don’t like her movies, it doesn’t make her dumb. I’m not saying diet and vitamins are a magic cure, either, but if she’s had some success with her own child, doesn’t that warrant some kind of looking into?

21. People were shocked—shocked—this week to learn that there were videos on YouTube of soldiers partying, drinking, snorting coke, etc. Why do we afford our soldiers this sort of nobility that doesn’t really exist? In many cases, these are people who are poor, struggling, and sometimes just dumb. A lot of the people being taken by the military are people who were just no smart enough to get into college and don’t want to dig ditches. It’s very easy for people who’ve never been in the military to point at guys doing coke or women taking their tops off and look down on them and say they bring down the image of our soldiers, but have you ever heard these people talk? They’re not samurai, okay? They’re not all idealistic and honorable; some of them are just idiots looking for a trade they can make money at when they’re out. And I’m sure some of them enjoy killing. Have you ever read Dr. Laura’s son’s blog? He loves killing foreigners! He delights in it. I’ve seen pictures of soldiers spray-painting mosques and pushing Iraqis around. And then there were the other videos that came out this week of our brave men and women cavalierly running tanks over peoples’ cars, randomly shooting into someone’s flock of sheep (for kicks, I guess), and in one especially and casually cruel scene, picking up a puppy and flinging it down a hillside (and then bravely shrugging at the camera). I can’t believe that people are pissed off that someone out there is tarnishing the image of people who’ve been sent to murder a lot of people in the name of low gas prices. Remember Abu Ghraib? That’s probably much more common in a lot of places. Seriously, take the biggest, bullying, dumbest asshole you knew in high school. Those are the people that end up in our armed forces. Duh. Now he’s bullying foreigners instead. Did you ever read any of the stories that were covered up from the first Gulf War? Stories about turkey shoots with Iraqi civilians? About mass graves to cover that up? Why are people so fucking shocked to find out that the American soldier is an ordinary human being like anyone else? Get some perspective, already. Yeah, if only our soldiers could find it in their hearts to act nice and polite while they murder a bunch of people and rape their country. This is war. And it is fucking sick. And dehumanizes everyone.

22. Another thing that makes Americans seem childish: shock and outrage over memoirs. This week the book Love and Consequences, Margaret Seltzer’s narrative of being raised in the ghetto by a black foster mother, was exposed as a total fabrication. The only reason there isn’t more anger over this is that Oprah didn’t command her followers to read the book. Look, I’m sure it was at one point very cute that people used to believe that memoirs were always true, movies were always based on reality, photographs were always accurate depictions of what was, and song lyrics meaningfully reflected the singer’s life and attitudes, but it is way too late in history now for people to be so unsophisticated that they’re angered when things turn out not to be real. They should know by now.

23. Or not. This is the one story I read this week that was the most characteristic of how ripe America is for takeover by some other country. There’s a woman in Indiana who left two of her daughters (ages 1 and 3) alone in the bathtub for several minutes because she got distracted watching American Idol. She just forgot the kid was there because, I don’t know, David Archuleta is so dreamy and irritating or something. When she finally snapped to, she had her third daughter, age 7, run and check on the kids. The 3 year old was under the water and unresponsive, and was rushed to the hospital and, as far as I know, is still in critical condition. It probably doesn’t help that they found some marijuana in the house, too. Really, fill in your own symbolism for why America doesn’t care anymore and what it doesn’t care about here.

24. Boy, do I feel sorry for Patrick Swayze. Not because he only has five weeks to live—although that itself is pretty fucking horrible, and I’m so sorry for him and his loved ones who are about to go through this (and are probably already going through hell)—but because the news that he’s rapidly dying of cancer which has spread through his entire body has gotten out to the public (thanks, Enquirer), and now his last five weeks on Earth are going to be spent having to dodge paparazzi who are going to hound him so they can have those oh-so-saleable final pictures of him. The poor guy. Let him spend his final weeks saying goodbye to his family and doing the things he loves for the last time instead of making it difficult for him. (Note: I wrote this on Wednesday; by Thursday it had come out that Swayze does indeed suffer from pancreatic cancer, but he’s not on some kind of death clock. I decided not to alter this because I think the point is still valid. And now that the tabloids aren’t on a countdown, they’re still going to hassle him worse than ever. And I still think that sucks.)

25. Finally, I’m going to end on a somewhat upbeat note (if you’re a nerd like me). Scientists have discovered rings around Rhea, a moon of Saturn. This is the first time a moon has been shown to have rings; scientists thought it was only possible with planets. Alright, I thought it was neat. Also neat: this sound file of the radio waves given off by Saturn’s rings. Listen to it. It’s spooky and awesome all at once. Listen to it in the dark for a really neat experience. Even better: listen to it in the dark while also playing Kaleidoscope or John’s Children or some other obscure psych rock band from the sixties.