Writers' Strike

So let me start out by saying how scared I am about next spring. No tv for a long time could be a terrible time. The Writers' Guild of America went on strike on November 1st. They are mostly looking to get some or more of a share of dvd sales revenue and revenue gained by releasing episodes on the internet. This is fair and I think the execs should shell it out. What we will be most likely faced with this spring is a lot of game shows, reality shows, and talk shows during prime time slots. This could be an awful year.

I propose two ideas to settle this whole thing. This first one was brought up by T-time yesterday after he finished watching an episode of 'Two and Half Men.' We take all of the ridiculous amounts of money that Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer make for that awful show that somehow gets good ratings and we split it up to the writers. That should make the writers happy, and any normal television watcher happy knowing that those two fools aren't getting paid to make a horrible show. The second idea is one that I came up with. Just because the writers are on strike doesn't mean that networks need to stop making episodes. Have the actors write the scripts for the rest of the seasons. Brilliant. Here are a few things I can see happening. Adrian Pasdar finishes the scripts for 'Heroes.' In a few weeks we see Nathan Petrelli all of the sudden getting many powers much more powerful than anything Peter or Sylar have and he kills off Sylar, Adam Monroe, and the Nightmare Man in one episode. Also, Eric Dane takes over the writing for 'Grey's Anatomy.' On the season finale, Mark Sloan saves 17 lives hooks up with Izzie and then Meredith falls in love with him and they get married. In all seriousness though, I think it would be quite entertaining to watch these shows knowing that the actors were doing the writing.

T-Time

T-time is my older brother and I'm sure many of my readers know or have heard of him. Of his many talents, my favorite is his ability to make ridiculous predictions about Heroes. Last year he predicted that Mr. Bennett's first name was Noah around four eps into the season. When Bennett said "Call me Noah" in the season finale I almost flipped my lid. Knowing how incredible that was I shouldn't have been so surprised when it happened again last night. A couple weeks ago T-time told me that this mysterious Adam Monroe character was going to be Takezo Kensai. He said that once the eclipse hit, it wasn't only that Kensai couldn't be wounded or killed, but he also didn't age. It all goes back to his original biblical theory where Noah was gathering heroes like on Noah's ark. In this case Adam was the first hero, just as Adam was the first man. All in all, unbelievable prediction per the usual for T-time.

Rankings and Performers

Performers of the Week 11/3

1. Dwight Schrute-
The Office (31 total)
2. Noah Bennett-
Heroes (11 total)
3. Michael Scott-
The Office (25 total)
4. Danny McCoy-
Las Vegas (42 total)
5. Gregory House-
House (20 total)
6. Earl Hickey-
My Name Is Earl (5 total)
7. Captain Awesome- Chuck (4 total)
8. Marc Sloan- Grey's Anatomy (20 total)
9. Derek Shephard- Grey's Anatomy (7 total)
10. Robert McAllister- Brothers and Sisters (1 total)

Power Rankings 11/3

1. Heroes (1)
2. Lost (2)
3. The Office (4)
4. Las Vegas (3)
5. 30 Rock (5)
6. Grey's Anatomy (6)
7. 24 (7)
8. Friday Night Lights (8)
9. Entourage (9)
10. House (10)
11. Curb Your Enthusiasm (11)
12. Chuck (15)
13. Journeyman (13)
14. Back To You (12)
15. American Idol (14)
16. Dirty, Sexy, Money (16)
17. Desperate Housewives (18)
18. Family Guy (20)
19. My Name Is Earl (-)
20. Scrubs (19)

Boston Sports

So the Juice Box guy started his own blog recently, and his first major post was about how sad he was that all of his favorite Boston sports teams were doing so well. While I can understand what he is getting at, when your teams are bad you get to complain all the time. People in general love to complain so I can see how this was enjoyable. But the fact that this may be how a majority of New Englanders may be feeling is just sad.

Growing up in Connecticut, Mass, and Maine having a strong hate for the Celtics, Red Sox and Patriots doesn't always go over so well. My pops, Big Tom, has a New York affiliation so it was hard to like these Boston based teams. I enjoyed my early childhood of the celtics being God awful, mediocre Patriots and Red Sox always losing out to the Yanks. Now when the Pats started to get championships, no doubt when Belichek started his unbelievable cheating style, my hate grew much larger. This is when I started to hate everyone on the teams of the Pats, Sox and Celts. When the Sox finally beat the Yanks and ended up World Series champs I knew it was all over. Things would never be the same. This is the point when I would start to love players that had left the Boston teams (Antoine Walker, Johnny Damon, Deion Branch). Now that the Celtics seem to be destined to be great, for a couple of years at least, I am sad that I won't be able to show the same hatred for them as I always have. When your favorite player in the league (KG) and another dude that you love (Ray Ray) end up on a team, it is hard to keep that same hatred.

All in all, I am still very sad that the Sox won the world series, more than wanting my favorite football team to win the super bowl, i want the Pats to lose, but I won't be angry at all if KG and Ray get their championship they both deserve in this awful city of Boston.

Darjeeling Limited

I am a huge Wes Anderson fan. Although I truly enjoy his talents as a writer/director, it is him as a person that I admire most. He was best friends with Owen Wilson, growing up in Texas, which puts him up their in my ranks to begin with. Wes puts a lot of his friends in his movies and tends to keep a core group of people involved in his films. This is what I truly love about him. The one aspect of his movie making that I am always amazed by is his use of and taste of music. In the three semi-movies that my brother and I have made over the past four years, we have tried to integrate some of Wes's style and music.
I just watched The Darjeeling Limited, Wes's fifth feature film, and I was very pleased. It starred Owen, Adrian Brody, and Jason Schwartzman as three brothers on a trip across India to find their mother. I always say that it is hard to judge a movie after one viewing so all of this might be a little off, but I liked it more than The Royal Tennenbaums and Life Aquatic (Wes's previous two films). Either I'm more easily picking up on the dry, subtle humor or it was just flat out funnier because Owen was the main character. I really liked Adrian Brody's performance in this movie. The dynamic between Brody and Owen reminded me a bit of the interactions between Owen and Luke Wilson in Bottle Rocket (Wes's first movie). Brody was very straight and somber while not enjoying Owen's schemes until the end of the movie. Another plus to this film, in comparison to Tennenbaums and Aquatic, was that it was shorter and never dragged at 90 minutes. Tennenbaums and Aquatic both were a bit too long for my liking at 110 and 120 respectively.

Wes Anderson Movies

1. Bottle Rocket (below)
2. Rushmore
3. The Darjeeling Limited
4. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
5. The Royal Tennenbaums

Wes Anderson Movie Characters

1. Dignan- Bottle Rocket (above)
2. Herman Blume- Rushmore
3. Francis Whitman- Darjeeling
4. Steve Zissou- Aquatic
5. Max Fischer- Rushmore
6. Royal Tennenbaum- Tennenbaums
7. Bob Maplethorpe- Bottle Rocket
8. Anthony Adams- Bottle Rocket
9. Peter Whitman- Darjeeling
10. Future Man- Bottle Rocket