Monday, December 18, 2006

Holiday Hiatus

The fall finales have come and gone. The TiVo's to-do list is blissfully empty. I loves me some TV, but I'm as ready for a break as anyone, not leastly because I have a lot of writing to do.

I'm signing off here until the New Year. Enjoy some holiday flicks, why dontcha? Here's a list to get you started, reprinted from last year.

IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE - Darker and wittier than you remember.

HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS - WARNING! VERY IMPORTANT!! I mean the ANIMATED version, with charming Chuck Jones art and plummy voice work by Boris Karloff. Not the Jim Carrey redundancy, for the love of Fah who for-aze.

WHEN HARRY MET SALLY - Not strictly speaking a Christmas movie, but many of the story's key moments happen at the holidays. The season of groveling, revelatory Mallomars.

MUPPET CHRISTMAS CAROL - I'm serious. Michael Caine gives excellent deadpan as Scrooge in the face of adorableness (Fozziwig!) and catchy songs, but the movie gets scary and sad right when it's supposed to. All that and mini Miss Piggies. Get over yourself and rent it.

THE THIN MAN - Another not-quite-Christmas movie, but who cares when you have William Powell shooting ornaments off the tree with a BB gun while Myrna Loy watches, amused, in a new fur coat? In a movie that glimmers with champagne dialogue, this wordless moment is a standout.

THE GODFATHER - Okay, okay, I'll stop cheating, but the Godfather saga is framed around moments rich with ritual and family significance: weddings, baptisms, the holidays. I love Al Pacino's tense and terrifying vigil at the creepy, Christmas-quiet hospital.

A CHRISTMAS STORY - Some time ago I came across a rant against this movie, which I just don't get. So it's faux nostalgic. Nostalgia is false almost by definition. A CHRISTMAS STORY is funny, sweet, just arch enough, and yes, authentic, capturing the tribulations and joy of being a kid at yuletide. Plus Peter Billingsley now is poker buddies with Vince Vaughn, so there's that.

BAD SANTA - Christmastime sucks for a lot of people. BAD SANTA is bleak and funny and has heart without dipping into sentimentality. Co-stars Lauren Graham as a Santa fetishist. Oh, Lorelai!

Happy Holidays!

Saturday, December 16, 2006

WGA Television Nominations

Awards season is truly in full swing. Here're more TV noms, this time from the Writers Guild of America.

DRAMATIC SERIES

  • 24
  • DEADWOOD
  • GREY'S ANATOMY
  • LOST
  • THE SOPRANOS

    Excellent list overall, but special huzzahs for hoopleheads, laudanum addicts, jaw-clenching sheriffs, and c**ksuckers!

    COMEDY SERIES

  • 30 ROCK
  • ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT
  • CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM
  • ENTOURAGE
  • THE OFFICE

    I watch some of these.

    NEW SERIES

  • 30 ROCK
  • FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS
  • HEROES
  • STUDIO 60
  • UGLY BETTY

    Yowza, tough call. And what's up with the dueling shows about sketch comedy shows?

    EPISODIC DRAMA - single episode

  • "Election Day, Part II" (THE WEST WING), Written by Eli Attie & John Wells
  • "Occupation/Precipice" (BATTLESTAR GALACTICA), Written by Ronald D. Moore
  • "Two for the Road" (LOST), Written by Elizabeth Sarnoff & Christina M. Kim
  • "The End of the Whole Mess" (NIGHTMARES & DREAMSCAPES: FROM THE STORIES OF STEPHEN KING), Teleplay by Lawrence D. Cohen, Based on the short story by Stephen King
  • "Pilot" (STUDIO 60 ON THE SUNSET STRIP), Written by Aaron Sorkin
  • "Pilot" (BIG LOVE), Witten by Mark V. Olsen & Will Scheffer

    Godsdammit, BSG is finally on one of these awards lists. About. Frakkin'. Time. The show won a Peabody Award, people!

    EPISODIC COMEDY - single episode

  • "It Takes Two" (DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES), Written by Kevin Murphy & Jenna Bans
  • "Don’t Look At Me" (DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES), Written by Josh Senter
  • "Bomb Shelter" (MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE), Written by Rob Ulin
  • "Casino Night" (THE OFFICE), Written by Steve Carell
  • "The Coup" (THE OFFICE), Written by Paul Lieberstein
  • "Jump for Joy" (MY NAME IS EARL), Written by Vali Chandrasekaran

    I'm not sure I watched any of these.

    So there you have it. But again, no THE WIRE! Argh.
  • Thursday, December 14, 2006

    Golden Globe Nominations

    The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has spoken! The key TV noms:

    BEST TELEVISION SERIES DRAMA

  • 24 (FOX) Imagine Television and 20th Century Fox Television i.a.w. Real Time Prods.
  • BIG LOVE (HBO)Anima Sola and Playtone Prods. i.a.w. HBO Entertainment
  • GREY'S ANATOMY (ABC)Touchstone Television
  • HEROES (NBC)NBC Universal Television Studios i.a.w. Tailwind Prods.
  • LOST (ABC)Touchstone Television

    Nice list! Yay, freshman HEROES, for making the cut.

    BEST TELEVISION SERIES - COMEDY OR MUSICAL

  • DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES (ABC)Touchstone Television
  • ENTOURAGE (HBO)Leverage and Closest to the Hole Prods. i.a.w. HBO Entertainment
  • THE OFFICE (NBC)Deedle Dee Prods. with Reveille i.a.w. NBC Universal Television Studio
  • UGLY BETTY (ABC)Touchstone Television
  • WEEDS (SHOWTIME)Showtime i.a.w. Lionsgate Television and Tilted Prods., Inc.

    No weak ones here either. Expect this category to get more competitive as more light dramas like DESEPERATE HOUSEWIVES, WEEDS, and UGLY BETTY enter the grid. Btw, just started watching WEEDS this season -- love it.

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A TELEVISION SERIES - DRAMA

  • PATRICIA ARQUETTE — MEDIUM
  • EDIE FALCO — THE SOPRANOS
  • EVANGELINE LILLY — LOST
  • ELLEN POMPEO — GREY'S ANATOMY
  • KYRA SEDGWICK — THE CLOSER

    No surprises here. I'm a fan of all these shows; no idea how I'd vote if I had to.

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A TELEVISION SERIES - DRAMA

  • PATRICK DEMPSEY — GREY'S ANATOMY
  • MICHAEL C. HALL — DEXTER
  • HUGH LAURIE — HOUSE
  • BILL PAXTON — BIG LOVE
  • KIEFER SUTHERLAND — 24

    Oof, did James Gandolfini lose his spot to Michael C. Hall (love his creepy-cool-adorable performance on DEXTER) or Bill Paxton? THE SOPRANOS is a masterwork, but I'm all for new blood. So to speak, in DEXTER's case.

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A TELEVISION SERIES -COMEDY OR MUSICAL

  • MARCIA CROSS — DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES
  • AMERICA FERRERA — UGLY BETTY
  • FELICITY HUFFMAN — DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES
  • JULIA LOUIS-DREYFUS — THE NEW ADVENTURES OF OLD CHRISTINE
  • MARY-LOUISE PARKER — WEEDS

    Go, America, playing in the big leagues! Julia Louis-Dreyfus deserves much credit for showing that conventional 3-camera sitcoms can still be funny, but I like Mary-Louise Parker's hilarious, spirited, and tender "Lacey LaPlante" FTW.

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A TELEVISION SERIES - COMEDY OR MUSICAL

  • ALEC BALDWIN — 30 ROCK
  • ZACH BRAFF — SCRUBS
  • STEVE CARRELL — THE OFFICE
  • JASON LEE — MY NAME IS EARL
  • TONY SHALHOUB — MONK

    Alec steals every scene of 30 ROCK that he's in, and no jury in the world would convinct him.

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE IN A SERIES, MINI-SERIES OR MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TELEVISION

  • EMILY BLUNT — GIDEON'S DAUGHTER
  • TONI COLLETTE — TSUNAMI, THE AFTERMATH
  • KATHERINE HEIGL — GREY'S ANATOMY
  • SARAH PAULSON — STUDIO 60 ON THE SUNSET STRIP
  • ELIZABETH PERKINS — WEEDS

    The supporting actor categories are an utter comparing-apples-to-bicycles situation, no?

    BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE IN A SERIES, MINI-SERIES OR MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TELEVISION

  • THOMAS HADEN CHURCH — BROKEN TRAIL
  • JEREMY IRONS — ELIZABETH I
  • JUSTIN KIRK — WEEDS
  • MASI OKA — HEROES
  • JEREMY PIVEN — ENTOURAGE

    More apples and bicycles. How do you choose between obnoxious superagent Ari Gold and the Earl of frakkin' Leicester? Still, loving that Masi Oka is in there.

    Any misfires, according to you? Who's missing that should be on here? THE WIRE and BATTLESTAR GALACTICA are two, for me. Anyone on who shouldn't be?
  • Sunday, December 03, 2006

    (Almost) A Massive Waste of Time

    On a recent flight I read the first issue of Massive, the new magazine about MMOGs. The poor thing is hovering perilously close to fishwrap quality.

    Massive needs help. Chiefly, Massive needs a firm editorial hand:

  • Sure, it's interesting to read a blurb about the gender split of MMOG players-- but the pie chart accompanying the text actually shows the player base's age breakdown by gender.

  • A description of ArenaNet's new Nightfall expansion for Guild Wars both spells the company's name wrong and misidentifies the two new character classes as "factions."

  • The colorful (and memorable) phrase "800 lb. gorilla" is used twice in the magazine. Guess I should be happy it wasn't used twice in the same article.

    Nitpicky? Maybe, but it's too bad that Massive shows so little of the editorial zing and professional polish of its parent mag Computer Games.

    Other problems are more glaring. One huge section lists mini-descriptions of pretty much every MMOG out there, including some nifty-sounding ones I hadn't heard of before (Ooh!) but fails to provide URLs where you could, y'know, go learn about them or play them (D'oh!).

    The layout and graphics are solid, but one funny article about chatspeak suffers from a printing error, with half the untranslated lines of text missing.

    The best content of the magazine apart from the teasing URL-free catalog of current games is the selection of editorials from many of the MMOGinati, including Raph Koster, Nick Yee, Richard Garriott, and Richard Bartle (recapping his keynote from the 2005 Austin Game Conference).

    But even Raph notes that most of what can be written about MMOGs has been (albeit not necessarily in a dead-tree periodical), and the most interesting topics aren't quite ready to be talked about yet. Also, Massive may've shot their wad too soon given the sheer number of editorials. At this rate they'll burn through all the top tier developers and researchers in, oh, three issues.

    And I'm not sure what's served by peppering the magazine with irrelevant newsbits about knitting guilds and contested gold in the mountains of Chile.

    I may pick up the second issue, if there is one -- MMOG magazines have launched and failed before -- but here's hoping the folks behind Massive can regroup, with a l33t editor at the helm FTW.