A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

Snow job

Normally I'd be happy about Hollywood tackling a comic book property not associated with Marvel or DC or containing the suffix "-Man" in the title, especially when the work in question is by one of my favorite writers: Greg Rucka.

However, having seen the trailers for the upcoming Whiteout, it's obvious Warner Bros. is trying to market the movie as something it ain't. First, watch the teaser. It's not the official trailer, but it'll do:

We'll leave aside the not at all gratuitous shower scene and go straight to lines like "Nature is not the only thing to fear" and "We hit something big," which would seem to indicate something...inhuman lurking in the frigid shadows and waiting for the right moment to lunge forth and snatch our unsuspecting Marshal.

Of course, if you've actually read the book, you know Whiteout isn't a monster movie at all (or a remake of The Thing, which The Wife suggested the producers were trying to suggest here), but simply a murder mystery set in the world's most inhospitable climate. And even though - judging by the preview and some of the IMDb credits - they may be incorporating elements of Rucka's sequel, Melt, there still aren't any nonhuman bad guys. It's a very good story, but I can't help thinking people are going to be disappointed when the comparatively mundane plot is revealed.

A few other things. To start with, I like Kate Beckinsdale just fine, but she's hardly how Steve Lieber and Rucka originally envisioned the character of Carrie Stetko:

Beckinsdale is a little softer around the ages:

Of course, they were originally considering Reese Witherspoon for the role. But if they stay faithful to the plot it should be a decent flick. A trailer fixated on crashing planes and blizzard-y destruction doesn't fill me with optimism, however.

But probably my biggest complaint has nothing to do with casting the main character, and everything to do with eliminating the one that - to me - proved most interesting. In the movie, Gabriel Macht plays a "U.N. operative" named Robert Pryce. Arguably the most interesting character in the book was a British agent named Lily Sharpe. It was never officially confirmed (and Rucka has actually backpedaled on the subject), but speculation was pretty heavy that Sharpe was actually another Rucka character named Tara Chace, who has her own series of comics and novels (going by the title Queen & Country).

I realize it changes almost nothing about the plot to make the character male, except to inject some elements of previously nonexistent romantic tension and to bow to focus group bullshit that says "America won't watch a movie with two female leads." It's just annoying, and I get annoyed pretty easily these days.

"They're the original Odd Couple!"

Reposted from Rocks Off, because why should my Facebook "friends" be the only people who get to enjoy it?

----------

They announced the pairings for Dancing with the Stars -- like you care -- and while some out there are no doubt crunching the odds of Debi Mazar and that Russian guy squaring off with Chuck Liddell and...that Russian chick in the finals, local interest is still focused on Tom DeLay and his partner, Cheryl Burke.

Burke is a two-time winner, and has had her own share of what passss for controversy on network TV. Granted, accusations of being "too fat" aren't quite up there with subverting the Constitution and being one of the most corrupt Congressmen in American history, but perhaps the two can find some common ground that will help propel them to victory. And hey, there have been weirder musical duos.

Rob Lowe & Snow White -- The 1989 Academy Awards

There really are no words that can do this justice, but we'll try. This was the last Oscar telecast produced by Allan Carr, and it's so Fellini-esque in its madness you almost have to wonder if he didn't do it with the express purpose of getting fired. That people forget about Merv Griffin, Lily Tomlin, and a plus-sized Carmen Miranda is testament to how horrifying Lowe and Snow really were. And the fact that his career survived this, the underaged girl sex tape, and The Lyon's Den makes Lowe the most powerful being in the universe.

"Bohemian Rhapsody" -- Elton John and Axl Rose (1992 Freddie Mercury Tribute)

"Hi Elton, it's Axl."
"Hello, Axl."
"Look, before we go on stage I just want to say, when I sang that line about 'immigrants and faggots' in 'One in a Million,' I didn't mean gays like you."
"Gays like me?"
"You know, the talented ones."
"Well that's very pleasant of you to say. By the way, I just got off the phone with Slash and Izzy and convinced them to leave the band."

"Little Drummer Boy" -- David Bowie and Bing Crosby (1977)

A classic, and still worth viewing to see Der Bingle try and keep a straight face when describing modern music as "really fine." We still wish Bowie would've responded by asking if he preferred "We Are the Dead" or "Diamond Dogs."

"SuperMan" -- Snoop Dogg and Willie Nelson

This is only an unusual pairing if you contrast Snoop and Willie's age, skin color, musical genres, and height. Fortunately for those concerned, marijuana is perhaps the greatest of all equalizers.

"Wipeout" -- The Fat Boys and the Beach Boys

I don't care what he did to Duk Koo Kim, appearing in this video should absolve Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini of all his past sins. And maybe James Watt was right about the beach Boys.

Carpe douchebag

Nickelback, everybody:

My best friend gave me the best advice
He said each day's a gift and not a given right
Leave no stone unturned, leave your fears behind
And try to take the path less traveled by
That first step you take is the longest stride

I suspect that once one reaches a certain level of success, the motivation to keep trying becomes harder and harder to retain. Goodness knows if I was in a multi-platinum selling band with legions of adoring (if tone deaf and clinically vegetative) fans and it was time to make a new record, I might just leaf through my Norton's Anthology and Big Book of Confucius Quotes to come up with inspiration, which is obviously what Chad Kroeger did here.

Chorus: If today was your last day and tomorrow was too late
Could you say goodbye to yesterday?
Would you live each moment like your last
Leave old pictures in the past?
Donate every dime you had, if today was your last day?
What if, what if, if today was your last day?

Assuming today was - indeed - my last, I'm pretty sure "yesterday" would be near the bottom of things I'd want to say goodbye to. Just after ny neighbor's dogs and just ahead of that lady at the YMCA who always manages to engage me in conversation for five minutes when She Who Shall Not Be Named is pulling my arm out of its socket to get to the pool. It's my last day, lady! Go monopolize someone's time who isn't dying.

That reminds me: in the framework of this song, why is today my last day? Do I have cancer? Did the Clanton boys put a price on my head? Killer asteroid? ObamaCare Death Panel(TM)? It's important to know, because I'm sure as hell not going to give away all my money if the world's about to end. Do you know how long it takes nonprofits to put together their budgets?

Against the grain should be a way of life
What's worth the price is always worth the fight
Every second counts 'cause there's no second try
So live like you're never living twice
Don't take the free ride in your own life

[Chorus]

Because if anyone can counsel the rest of us on the art of being original and not relying on formulaic repetition, it's Nickelback.

There's more. Too much, really. It's an embarrassment of...embarrassments that eventually becomes a blur of fortune cookie sentimentality and inspirational screensaver quotes, so I'll skip to the end.

And would you call those friends you never see?
Reminisce old memories?
Would you forgive your enemies?
And would you find that one you're dreaming of
Swear up and down to God above
That you'd finally fall in love if today was your last day?

Only after a thorough examination of Chad Kroeger's lyrics do we get a real sense of how extensive Hallmark's catalog is. After all, greeting cards simply offer minor variations of commonly expressed sentiments that need to be voiced multiple times through the course of our lives ("Get well soon," or "Thanks for the power drill," or "I forgive you for giving me the clap"). Kroeger does us all a favor by collecting these in one place, so we'll never want for the right cliche again. Mission accomplished.

Now please stop making albums.

White cower

To quote the charming sentiments voiced after the 2000 elections: "You lost. Get over it."

Experts who track hate groups across the U.S. are growing increasingly concerned over violent rhetoric targeted at President Obama, especially as the debate over health care intensifies and a pattern of threats emerges.

The Secret Service is investigating a Maryland man who held a sign reading "Death to Obama" and "Death to Michelle and her two stupid kids" outside a town hall meeting this week. And in New Hampshire, another man stood across the street from a Presidential town hall with his gun on full display.

That was this guy:

I guess Obama would be the "tyrant," while Mr. Kostnic is the "patriot." Given the sidearm, and assuming he knows the full quote he's referring to (not an easy call), it looks like a call for murder-suicide. That takes a certain amount of integrity, I guess.

"I don't think these are simply people who are mentally ill or off their rocker," Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center, told ABC News of those behind the threats. "In a very real sense they represent a genuine reaction, a genuine backlash against Obama."

Apparently irrational racism bordering on paranoia doesn't merit a mention in the DSM-IV.

Experts say a sharp growth in so-called militia groups that helped spawn a wave of domestic terrorism in the 1990s - and are now using YouTube, rock music and the internet to recruit members and spread hate and fear - shouldn't be ignored.

"It's certainly a scary time," said former FBI agent Brad Garrett, now an ABC News consultant. Garrett said the Secret Service "cannot afford to pass on anyone," and he believes "they really do fear that something could happen to [Obama]."

Garrett said statements like one recently made by controversial radio host Rush Limbaugh comparing a logo for the White House plan to a Nazi symbol "legitimizes people who are on the edge to go do something or say something."

"And if you go and take a look at this, you will find that the Obama health care logo is damn close to a Nazi swastika logo," Limbaugh said.

Later, someone painted a swastika outside the office of Congressman David Scott of Georgia, one of Obama's supporters.

Nazis, eh? Fine, here's an exercise for anyone who really wants to run with this stuff: write me a 500-word essay that uses the phrases "Reichstag Fire" and "yellowcake uranium." Bonus points will be awarded for comparing smoking guns to mushroom clouds.

Speaking of mental illness, how out of touch with reality do you have to be to listen to Rush Limbaugh?

While officials told ABC News that the President's daily threat matrix has yet to reflect a sharp increase in threats, White House officials privately admit deep concern and have told the Secret Service to keep security tight, even if Obama objects.

"I think the president has, in effect, triggered fears amongst fairly large numbers of white people in this country that they are somehow losing their country, that the battle is lost," Potok told ABC News. "The nation that their Christian white forefathers created has somehow been taken from them."

Yeah, a Christian lawyer/career politician has been elected President. Your world will never be the same.

Oh, I get it

She's a registered nurse, and there's an "RN" in Hawthorne, which is her name, and that's convenient because...she's a registered nurse.

Edie Falco could so kick her ass.

Flight of the Aggravator

Things like this are why I'm almost looking forward to reviving the family tradition of long road trips:

Continental Airlines is apologizing to passengers who were stuck on the tarmac for six hours when a Houston-to-Minneapolis flight was diverted because of bad weather.

Continental says the incident was "completely unacceptable." The airline is also offering refunds and vouchers.

Continental Express 2816 was operated by ExpressJet Airlines, which handles regional flights for Continental. It was diverted to Rochester, Minn., and landed about midnight.

Passengers weren't allowed to leave the plane until 6 a.m. Saturday.

ExpressJet says passengers couldn't get off because security screeners had gone off duty. But officials at the Rochester airport say the passengers could have stayed on the secure side of the terminal, and it was Continental's decision to keep them on the plane.

The only thing surprising about this story is that the airline offered refunds. Living in a Continental hub, I'm forced to use them when I want to fly somewhere not serviced by Southwest (or that would require three flight changes otherwise), and can say without fear of contradiction that there's been a problem with every flight I've taken with them since the 1990s. Delays, mostly...anywhere from two to ten hours, but I've also been removed from a flight where they double booked my seat and had connections canceled while I was in the air. I stopped writing letters to their corporate office when they started sending replies along the lines of, "Deal with it, chump."

When I say I hate flying, it usually means I hate flying Continental. We took Southwest to Florida last year the weekend Ike hit, and they couldn't have been more understanding; pushing our flights back and changing reservations at no charge and with no hassle. Continental may have done the same for their passengers, but that isn't something I'd ever assume to be the case with them. And I'd just as soon not give them the chance to prove me wrong.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but between The Wife threatening to sue the pants of any and everyone involved for wrongful imprisonment and my knack for bursts of focused, destructive violence, we wouldn't have spent the night on that plane.

"Do you have that one with that guy who was in that movie that was out last year? "

My visit to the video store was about to prove fruitless, I feared. There were no Blu-Ray copies, not that I'd expected there to be any, and searches in both the horror and sci-fi sections led nowhere.

Nearing despondency, I approached the clerk.

Clerk: are you ready to check out?
Me: Actually, I needed to check on the availability of a title.
Clerk: Which one?
Me: Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus.
Clerk: Hey, we have that. [he starts walking out to the shelves]
Me: Where is it, in 'Drama?'
Clerk: *snickers*
Me: Don't believe me? Keep your eyes on next year's Oscar nominations.
Clerk: [finds the DVD] Here we go. There were three copies.
Me: Sweet.
Clerk: [snickers...again]
Me: You know, it's not generally considered sound business practice to mock your customers' tastes.
Clerk: At least it wasn't Navy SEALS.

Finally, someone who appreciates the classics.

Maybe now she'll read my script for the sequel to Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone

Meet my new soulmate, Molly Ringwald:

Molly Ringwald isn't logging much sleep these days -- and she couldn't be more delighted about it.

"You get up with one of the babies and feed and change that one and get the baby back to sleep, and the other wakes up, and then you feed and change that one," the star of '80s classics "Pretty in Pink" and "Sixteen Candles" says of her nocturnal routine since the July 10 arrival of her twin son and daughter, Roman Stylianos and Adele Georgiana.

"It is exhausting, but it's wonderful," the actress, 41, tells PEOPLE in its new issue.

The twins join big sister Mathilda, 5 ½, and dad Panio Gianopoulos, 34, whom Ringwald married in 2007.

Does she correct others' pronunciation of their last name in the same snotty way she smacked down John Bender with "Molière?" Because that would be totally hot.

And what's that? She has a 5 ½-year old daughter? I have a 5 ½-year old daughter? She just had twins? I just had twins?* And to think, I always preferred Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club.

Though I guess nobody told her about getting them on the same schedule ASAFP.

*Note: I did not actually have the twins.

"Today on Ben: mothers and runaway daughters reunited by their hatred of Homer Simpson."

Having spent the last several weeks on vacation/paternity leave (in FMLA parlance it's called "bonding" leave, and new fathers get a week of it, because apparently that's all it takes), I've inadvertantly brushed up against an Oprah screening or two.

Hey, The Wife carried The Notorious V.H.T.* for 37 weeks...getting her choice of crappy afternoon TV is a small reward.

From the possibly half dozen episodes I've seen of the show - and this includes the one on Satanism from 1988 - it appears to me that being in the studio audience is a real crap shoot. If you're lucky, you get "treated" to one of the shows where Oprah snags the entire cast of an upcoming movie for an hour (oh, to bask in the presence of Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts during the Ocean's Twelve junket), or watch Bobby Flay smother another dish in cilantro.

If you're really, really lucky, you'll be present during one of her "favorite things" episodes and get all kinds of, I don't know, moisturizers and dildos and what-not. And if you're one of the very few, the happy few, you actually got a car.

And then there was last week. All I can say is, at least I wasn't in the audience when she presented a pretty graphic show on that happiest of topics: child pornography. After 45 minutes or so of listening to grim law enforcement officials describing the pervasiveness of the problem and watching Lisa Ling flinch from evidence in an actual CP case, I was ready to pepper my lawn with anti-personnel mines and sever all internet access, Beijing-style.

But I could, you know, get up and leave the room. What if you're actually in studio that day? I'm not belittling the problem of child exploitation by any means, but can I acknowledge the extent without having my face rubbed in it? Would people mutter to each other if I got up and left? Could I get up and leave? Or are the studio doors locked to prevent this?

And jesus jones, what if Oprah herself noticed? What sort of wrath is meted out to those who dare exit her presence without leave? I'm an aspiring author, after all, and we saw what she did to James Frey. And all he did was lie, what of someone with the temerity to turn his back on the Most Powerful Woman in the World(tm)?

Does the Book Club have a shit list?

* Vonder Haar Twins. Kudos to my friend Erin for coming up with it.