Things on Thursday

• Got the soundtrack to "Black Snake Moan." Many different brands of awesome.

• I think I forgot to comment on the series finale of "Rome". In the early part of this season, I thought S1 was stronger, for the simple reason of narrative clarity in the Ceasar-Pompeii and Attia-Servillia arcs. However, the back half of S2 really worked for me. Part of it was how the Vorenus/Pullo storyline had an almost Lethal Weaponish buddy-cop feel to it. I also enjoyed how the show made us sympathize with perhaps its redeemable character, Attia. In another milieu, I would have expected to hear Elton John playing in the background during the coronation sequence.

• Speaking of gritty TV, The Shield" is back next Tuesday. Like all shows based on shock value, the plot has gotten pretty ridiculous, almost 24ish. But, Forrest Whitaker is still around to battle Vic Mackey. Good times.

• I mentioned last week that I've started playing a little of teh poker again. Just to brag a little, I won two free tourneys for a total of $2000 or so. Of course, if you allow me to bore you with the details, you'll see that skill had very little to do with any of it. ("I have aces, I guess I call...") But nice to know that I still play goot.

• For some reason, this doesn't bother me at all. Even though, I guess it's a slur of sorts. Update: See also DLIC at FreeDarko. Also, this was pretty much the first thing that occurred to me as well:

• 30 is the new twenty. This being my birthday week, I like Captain Picard, "make it so."

Final Four preview tomorrow. Promise. Also, Suns-Mavs on Sunday. I'm FAR more excited for that game than for any alleged basketball game involving the UCLA rugby squad. Maybe they should let them Haka after the national anthem to make sure we get the mood right. With Darren Collison, they remind me of a less tatted and feloned version of the Huggins Cincinnati teams - (Bobby Brannen, yasay!)

a bunch of physical defenders with no discernible basketball skills, and one skilled played who shoots jumpers and works on ball-handling while the rest of the team lifts weights and hits the blocking sled.*



* J-dubs himself has several discernible basketball skills, however. Mostly hitting turnaround J's and convincing refs to hit him with nickel-dime fouls, but whatever. Also, wish I had a picture of him with frosted hair, all he'd really need then is the kick-ass barb-wire tat, and he'd never need a Halloween costume again.

Guess Who's Back...

And there was much rejoicing, like we just ate Brave Sir Robin's minstrels.

Anyway, for those of you who didn't know, my extended absence was occasioned by...the occasion of the Alaska Bar Exam. In an effort to minimize my online time, and therefore maximize the studying, I rather cut myself off from the internet.

I didn't check email, I didn't surf, I didn't read or write blogs/comments. Heck I barely answered the phone...(thanks for the kind wishes those of you who provided them...) And for some reason, bar exam and studying therefore aside (how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?) this was kind of awesome. Except for the 600+ emails I have to sift through now...anyway, a lot happened while I was gone, but I can only review so much:

• The Departed was not the best movie of last year. I think we all know that. The problem is, can anyone think of a movie that was worhty of being called "the best"? For all intents and purposes, I thought "Little Miss Sunshine" was the betterest movie of 2006, but calling it "the best" is a bit like drafting Andrew Bogut #1 overall. Is that all there is? Reese Witherspoon should have won something, just so she could have come onstage again. Al Gore is not running, he was funny, twice, and no politician actually running is going to risk that.

• That Texas-Texas A&M game was all kinds of awesome. Acie Law yelling "That's what I Do!" at his teammates after making some ludicrous game saving three is why I love college hoops. Reminiscent of Cat Mobley telling Dickie V. of the guy guarding him "I'm busting that ass..."

• Tyler Hansbrough needs to stop letting himself be compared to Eric Montross. He should probably transfer to avoid it, at this point. Big gangly white kid? Check. Star for UNC? Check. Bleeds easily against Duke? Check. Vastly overrated pro prospect? Transfer, young man, transfer.

• I liked "The Black Donnellys" better the first time when it was called "The Godfather".

• Immediate post-exam observation: There is nothing worse than waking up smelling like last night's cigarettes. I spent most of the weekend in the shower trying to wash the smell off. That, and I couldn't really complete the thought required to turn it off and get out...
  

XLI Plus - Minus

Plus: Billy Joel, with a huge upset, gives the win to the under on the "1:45 National Anthem" prop bet. Geezeman clocked it at 1:36.

Minus: Billy Joel is really the best that they could do? Was John Mellencamp unavailable due to rerecording the remix of "This is Our Country" for the next round of stupid truck spots?

Plus: A Super Bowl being played in football weather. I agree with MY, Edmonton next year.

Plus: Devin Hester. Gone.

Minus: Everything else the Bears did with the ball.

Plus: Rock-Paper-Scissors (ok, who out there was with me in asking "who throws f'in paper? You p****!"), the BlockBuster Mouse, the New Fist Bump and Connectile Dysfunction.

Minus: Every other ad. Seriously, if the top ten Super Bowl adds includes not one but two movie trailers (including one for this obvious dog, though I laughed and laughed at the T.Rex at the end of the spot for this one: "I have a large head and small arms", it seemed to say. How it longs for a grapefruit), you have problems. Also, I'm all for making fun of K.Fed rapping, but if the commercial is 80% K.Fed rapping...then I just watched 40 seconds of K.Fed rapping. This time does not get credited back to my account because it was presented in ironic fashion. The Go Daddy ad was also very disappointing. If you are going for the prurient, go for the prurient. Tastefully done, my ass...

Plus: Prince. I liked it, damnit.

Minus: Shannon Sharpe plagiarizing the late, great, Robin Harris at half time, acting like it was the height of wit.

Plus: Mmmmm...Steak.

Minus: Large dog trying to steal my steak.

Minus: Jim Nantz as the Official Budweiser Authority on Black History XLI (I'm sure they sold naming rights for this). A tradition unlike any other! Black History and Augusta National, I see no problem here at all. The tiebreaker being Billy Packer...gah...)

Minus: According to Irsay and Tony Dungy, god hates Chicago.


Overall: Giant "meh."

Litmus Test

When he asks "and what did dad get?"


There is only one acceptable answer as far as I see it: "Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeit"

Today's Truths

• Shoals at FreeDarko has an almost indescribably fantastic post about, more or less, basketball as a metaphor for finding meaning in an essentially anonymity inducing consumer culture. Relatedly, I mourn for Francisco Liriano by demonstrating that (shameless) imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
  

• Barack Obama... I mean this is 6 kinds of awesome, and really, for me, this is about 150 kinds of kick-ass. But since we here at WAP are all about substance over style (except when we aren't) how much of this is playing the Saxophone on Arsenio? I just don't know enough to get excited about him for any reasons aside from A) he ain't Hillary, and relatedly B) he might win, even against John (St.) McCain. Now, talk to me about Gore-Obama '08, and I'm ready with the bumper space.
  

• KFMonkey drops the hammer on the third season of Lost _boom. I don't really have anything to add other than to call bullshit on the show's creators any and every time they claim to "know where they are going" with the whole story of the island. If they're just making stuff up at this point, I'll start a fund so that we can get better, uhm, stuff to the writers' room, and we can go full-on David Lynch on this piece.
  

• I am boring (ht: Lance:

How evil are you?

• A tailer-made description of why I keep saying (in comments) that basketball is not-especially amenable to SABR-geekdom from today's Daily Dime:

  
  

  You may never see a highlight of this play, as it did not result in a bucket or dunk, but follow this to get a glimpse of the kinds of things that happen in an NBA game on a nightly basis:

  Deron Williams beats a show by Dirk Nowitzki on a ball screen, drives middle and makes a sweet no-look pass to Carlos Boozer. Boozer, challenged by a good shot-blocker in DeSagana Diop, loses the ball on his way up, sending the ball high into the air. Williams, on the baseline following his pass, jumps high to keep the ball away from Anthony Johnson, who otherwise would have an easy recovery, and bats the ball toward the free-throw line.

  Boozer, Diop, and Devean George all make an effort to get a hand on the ball, but it ultimately goes to Andrei Kirilenko. AK-47 takes an immediate dribble toward the rim and Diop, who gets back into defensive position. Andrei bends his long 6-9 frame down to almost half his size and throws a perfect bounce pass, thru Diop's legs, to a waiting Jarron Collins under the basket.

  As Collins goes up for the layup, Diop reacts quickly and blocks Collins point blank at the rim.

  The entire play takes nine seconds and produces two missed shots, a good hustle play by four players, two terrific passes, and a blocked shot. And no points. Oh, and three verbalized "wow" calls by me as it happened. Highlights alone do not tell the NBA story.

  Nor do the stats as we collect them.

That's all for now. Theo, get it done, or JoBu is coming to get you:

Take Your Pick...

Two entires in the "why I love soccer" notebook...

Matty Taylor:


[Update: Deadspin reminds me that since Taylor has done this before, it's definitely not a fluke:


As I'm sure they're still singing in Portsmouth, Taylor For England!]

Or Michael Essien:

Sorry about the poor quality, when a better one goes up on YouTube, I'll snag it.

(Also sorry, Tim. I along with half of Manchester was hoping that Arsenal would hold on...I would have settled for a draw before a ball was kicked and certainly will live with it considering that shelling Lehman's goal took over the last 10+ minutes.)

These Five Things I Know Are True (12/6)

1. This week's Studio 60 was clearly the best of the year thus far. Sorkin can clearly write a Christmas episode (though I desperately wanted them to Just Shut Up And Let The Band Play at the end) - it got a little dusty during this:


2. "Heroes" on the other hand, might be losing me. Aside from Hiro, and the Cop Who Hears Voices, none of the characters really pop.

3. Via AOL's NBA blog (featuring Shoals of FD fame), Tim Hardaway, respect:



Timmy was probably my favorite player after Reggie Lewis died and before KG came along. Of course the "UTEP Two-Step" signature move from the old EA Sports games had a lot to do with it. (Two crossovers, a spin, and a running floater which went so high it went off the top of the screen, IIRC. And if you think that didn't have a formative effect on my own shot selection...well, as Tall says, I don't have shot selection as it's more of an accumulation.)

4. My Fantasy Football team blows, if you cared. Mainly because I'm terrible at it. The team I drafted would be doing pretty well. Given my GMing skills, maybe I should cut Theo some slack...not likely.

5. Finally, Miss Frankie, very, very very NSFW. Or for having liquid in your mouth while reading. Monitors are both fragile and spendy.

Things I Know Are True

1. I was wrong, wrong, wrong about Vince Young. Good on you, son. Though I can safely say that I was 100% right about Eli Manning. Though Eli is not helped by his coaching being the biggest jackass this side of Bobby Huggins.

2. Ohio State. Give the points. Michigan. Give the points. Whoever is playing Notre Dame. Give the points and then some.

3. To quote myself on Wire #49:

Not to get all Bethlehem Shoals here, but 49 completely validated the agony any fan of the show has come to expect, dread, and crave in equal measures. In previous seasons, they've managed to spread out the heartbreak - this year, they dumped it on us all at once. In a way, it was a relief, because my expectations being what they were, I felt a great deal of foreboding as to what precise terrible things were about to happen.

Is there any way that Child Services lets Bunny take Namond in? Is the world only big enough for one of Michael and Bodie? How does the rug get pulled out from under Daniels?

4. Someone find me the YouTube of Carmelo going all Dr. J from this weekend...

5. I just got caught up on the first 3 shows of "DayBreak" this weekend. Surprisingly strong. Plus it has Jayne, playing, well, a guy just like Jayne. Good times.

A Few Notes From Too Much TV Time (Election Edition)

1. Does anyone have a copy or video of Harold Ford Jr.'s concession speech? It was stunning. I was flipping channels last night, especially when they had candidates giving speeches, but I couldn't click away from his. Chris Matthews on MSNBC was clearly smitten, and with good reason. Magnanimous after perhaps the nastiest race in the nation; poetic; and appropriately upbeat - the man is 36 and clearly knows he'll be back.

Update:Here it is, (H/T Feddie)


2. I like Pat Buchannan. Not his politics (at all), but out of all the talking heads, he is the most honest. He doesn't say what you want to hear or what he thinks advances his interests, he serves it up straight, no chaser. And the rest of the blabbermouths couldn't deal with this. He alone avoids the Pundit's Fallacy. Part of the problem our politics has is that the discussion of it is often too meta - the thinking taking on additional layers of complexity like a Russian nesting doll.

3. Bye Rummy. Good riddance. Not entirely sure if this, in itself, means much in the way of 'change of course,' but combined with the realigned congress and the fact that Gates seems to be at the very least, a reality-based grownup (and thank goodness, not a fleepin' neocon), this strikes me as good news.

4. How does a state dependent on oil and gas (aka fossil fuels) elect a governor who doesn't believe in dinosaurs? FWIW, mom, I called both the governor and house race right to within 1 percentage point of the final margin. Diane Benson did well to get 40% (a female, Native, democratic candidate who favors subsistence over game hunting running against a billion term incumbent anti-intellectual redneck who refused to debate her...)

5. George Allen's quest to be Mini-Bush is getting a little creepy. Recount yasay?

What struck you?

Gregg Easterbrook: Making Sense (almost)

My favorite new show of the season is Friday Night Lights - (Heroes, Studio 60, Shark and The Nine all have their moments, but suffer from certain flaws. KF Monkey covered Heroes overly-portentious dialogue pretty well; Studio 60 is, surprisingly for Sorkin, unsubtle; Shark is an unabashedly terrible show made watchable by James Woods; I think I think The Nine will become less interesting the further in time the characters move away from the opening bank heist.) And I don't think I'm the only one.

Despite this critical acclaim, the show has struggled for ratings out of the block, so TMQ says "save FNL":

Here are the good aspects of "Friday Night Lights." First, brilliant cinematography. Many television shows claim to offer theatrical-quality film values; "Friday Night Lights" actually does. NBC has spent a ton of money on "Friday Night Lights," a reported $2.6 million per episode -- perhaps too much for the long-term survival of the series. In Hollywood, production money often disappears into Ferraris for the director and presidential suites for the cast; "Friday Night Lights" producers are getting their money's worth onto the screen. The episodes have many outdoor scenes, which are more expensive than studio-filmed scenes; lots of crowd scenes; lots of gritty depictions of school corridors, parking lots, restaurants, gas stations and other standbys of daily life. (The greater the number of scenes, the more expensive an hour of television is to produce; many contemporary TV dramas have too many scene shifts, but that's a separate issue.) Next, the acting is first rate. Third, the situations and characters presented are as close to real life as television can come. Yes, the cast is better looking than any representative sample of actual people, and 25-year-olds play 17-year-olds. But there's no over-glamorized action, no preposterous subplots. Surely "Friday Night Lights" would have stood a better ratings chance had the show been some "Gilmore Girls"-esque teen inanity [Pooh: Seriously Greg, Gilmore Girls is your best shot at 'teen inanity?' Afraid to take a shot at The OC because it's on Fox? Tsk tsk]. Instead "Friday Night Lights" challenges viewers with material that isn't flashy or pumped up.

Now to the not-so-good aspects. The pilot episode not only was a total downer -- it ended with the character you thought would be the series focus being paralyzed for life -- but gave viewers the impression the show held small-town life and prep football in disdain. The pilot was heavy on subliminals suggesting the producers thought the sort of people who play or care about high school football are rubes or have warped values. That view might be defensible as an artistic choice, but my informal survey of friends who love football culture and who watched the pilot was unanimous on this point: Everyone one of them said that if "Friday Night Lights" was going to be about bashing football, they weren't going to watch. It turns out the show does not think small-town America or people who care about high school sports are weird; subsequent episodes have been sympathetic to the characters and to the town depicted. But as the saying goes, you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Having the pilot be depressing, then end with a character paralyzed and everyone sobbing, was the sort of touch effete Manhattan critics love, but viewers don't -- who wants to watch more of that? The "Friday Night Lights" pilot was a disaster in terms of stating the show's case for its audience. This show would have been better served to start with the second episode, whose concluding image -- the coach and his petrified backup quarterback standing alone on the field of an empty stadium late at night with all the game lights on -- was haunting.

Okay, so Easterbrook can't help being a populist anti-snob, no shock there. I'm not an effete Manhattan critic, and I loved those aspects of the pilot, features not bugs as they say. However, I think he's quite probably right from a viewership standpoint - the reason that all sports movies are the same is that the 'scrappy underdog making good in the big game' thing resonates. Even if you know it's coming.

And FNL turns that paradigm on its head a little - there have been legit "chill scenes" in every episode thus far (the hail mary in the pilot, the one-on-one under the lights and "eyes wide open" scenes in episode two, and the conclusion to the 'standard training montage' in last week's episode). But the show never ends on these high points, as if to say, after the game ends their is still life to live. Last week's was a particular gutshot sort of moment - bringing in the hired gun QB right after the team building solidarity of the previous day's midnight practice. Perhaps appreciating these reversals do make me a Manhattan elite, but whatever.

In any event, watch the show, it's worth your while to get caught up.

Update: Easterbrook can't help himself from being a tool in some aspects - see Yglesias, who disses so I don't have to...

Pooh's Views of Early Fall TV: The Good

So far the new shows I've decided to watch have been a bit underwhelming We've seen the debuts of several new shows, and I've taken a gander at several of them: Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip; Smith; Shark; Six Degrees and SHeroes. By and large, meh. Today I'll talk about the ones which I have liked so far, later, I'll get into the bad and the unoriginal.

1. "Heroes" - okay, so they are so obviously going for the X-Men storyline to appeal to the immense fanboi base. So what? I'm something of a fanboi myself, so it works for me. Plus, they've made several good choices - only one of the players introduced thus far has the Supermannish whiny-guy thing going, and they have made some very interesting choices not just for powers but for who has them. I particularly liked the inclusion of the Japanese salaryman, as well as the flying brothers.

Additionally, they are aiming more for Darknight era Batman, rather than Adam West. I'll take dark and mysterious over campy pretty much any day. One downside is I'm not convinced that either female lead is up to carrying the show. Well, I'm convinced that Ali Larter isn't, and I don't recognize the girl playing the cheerleader, so I'm, at best, skeptical. A further negative is that they appear to have picked the Most Annoying. Voice. Ever. to do the "previously on 'Heroes'" bit: B+

(However, Kung Fu Monkey has a good point about the dialogue, which is at times...pretentiously portentious:

he first episode was laden with the particular disease of non-genre guys writing genre: "Behoooold. I bring you superheroes WITHOUT CAPES! What brave new world of fiction is this? And look, there's even a plotline using a series of pictures as a narrative device. They are called, in the underground, 'co-mic book-es.'"

Indeed.)

2. "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" - Profoundly disappointing pilot episode. Not saying it was bad, but compare it to the pilot for "West Wing." Maybe for those who never watched "Sports Night", the show might seem original, but I feel like Sorkin is covering old ground with 30 minutes more per week to use. Matt Perry and Brad Whitford seem to have a nice reparte, but I'm concerned that they are not distinct enough from each other either in appearance or personna. I could be proven wrong, but who wants to watch "Smart and Smarter?" I did enjoy the opening teaser (and especially enjoyed the dig at the Media for all reporting the "Network" aspect of it, as if it was an original observation.)

Lest I seem too negative, I thought the second and third episodes were better - a lot will ride on Sarah Paulson, who didn't have much to do in the pilot, but has certainly been growing on me. She'll always be compared to Allison Janney's C.J. Cregg. High bar there. Additionally, I don't feel like we 'know' any of the characters besides Matt & Danny so far - what is D.L. Hughley supposed to be doing? (And after ignoring the 15-year old looking groupie in almost perfunctory fashion, what odds on their being a shocking twist regarding alternate sexuality?) Is Nate Corddry (of "Daily Show" moderate fame) playing Topher Grace playing Jimmy Fallon? Will Danny Concannon, er Tim Busfield ever stop inducing "hey it's C.J.'s hubby! What the hell happened to his beard?" reactions. I know, I know, it's early, but my expectations were pegged insanely high.

But despite all my complaints, it's Aaron freaking Sorkin writing the dialogue, and Matt Perry and Brad Whitford can still in fact bring it: B

(Slate disagrees with my last point, writing the show off as an excercise in "I'm Aaron Sorkin_bitch!, and you're not")

3. "Friday Night Lights" - There was not a single original element in the pilot episode. Isn’t there a rule against a director of a film (Peter Berg) turning around and directing a TV show of the same title? It’s supposed to work the other way, right? (See Miami Vice, Firefly/Serenity, etc…) To my recollection, Altman had nothing to do with MASH the series, for an example of a movie being made into a show.

So, let's see, take the basic plot line of "Varsity Blues," remove the MTV-related goofiness. Mix in the hyperkinetic, shaky camera work from "The Shield," and in the soundtrack from "Any Given Sunday" because it works well for football. Add insanely violent football action, plus the Standard Miracle Comeback ("SMC"). (Simmons has a point:

I can't stomach another climactic game scene in which the home team recovers an onside kick, runs the next play for 20 yards, then, on the final play, the QB throws a 50-yard pass that his WR catches on the opposing 30 and takes off for the winning TD. Not even the CFL has 140-yard football fields. Come on. This isn't rocket science.

I know, didn't occur to me at the time either, but yeah.)

All that said, it was still amazingly well done for network TV, and fully watchable. Even knowing what was going to happen the SMC still had chill potential. Even if the throw should have gone 30 yards out the back of the endzone unless Deer-in-headlights backup QB guy took at 23-step drop before throwing...The trash-talking rapper/preacher running back was surprisingly effective as well - in his prayer following the game, his cadence reminded me uncannily of that of my former college roomie who's now a pastor.

The challenge now is to make the show interesting and believable across a whole season. How many SMC's can we really believe in? And will the show be able to maintain the almost painful earnestness, or will it be reduced to what Tall Guy predicted: "The OC" in pads? B-

I am most intrigued by "The Nine" - after the disappointing premiere of "Lost" (by adding more and more stuff to the island, they are in danger of neutering the essential "Lost"-ness of the whole deserted island thing. More on this one next week, I promise). The pilot teased, and now we really want to know "What happened inside the bank?" Unfortunately, I'm guessing from the previews of the second episode that it is going to be told, in a piecemeal, flashback manner. The premise is "Lost" inverted. And I'm not sure that's a good thing - the backstories make the island happening more interesting, I'm not sure how much I'll care about What Happened After to the Nine until I know What Happened Before. Of course, I could be wrong, and it could be pure marketing genius, as the show will demand repeated viewings once the whole thing plays out, spurring DVD sales, etc...but I'll stay with it for a time, at least. Grade: Incomplete

GGOW? Not So Much...

Via, Andrew Sullivan of all people, apparently the Greek God of Walks, Kevin Youkilis, isn't, er, Greek.

Not sure how I feel about getting my Sawx news from a Brit, but I'll live.

(Read/watch the whole thing...suck it Mel Gibson)

"The Best Show in the History of Television"

I agree with Yglesias - "The Wire" is the best show on television. TV history might be a bit hyperbolic, (how soon we forget the early years of The Sopranos or West Wing) but it is damn good.

For a while there has been opinonating from Jim Emerson (Roger Ebert's guest blogger) on the opportunities presented by "long form" dramatic TV:

Movies, due to their limitations of length and inability to plunge freely into the depths of their subject matter (whether that involves the character's thoughts or pasts or whatever the writer wants to throw into his work), are equivalent to short stories in literary terms. Films based on great novels, no matter how well done, always fall short of the source material for those familiar with it. Yet for some reason, ambitious filmmakers are constantly trying to adapt novels, even though they are demonstrably not great sources for films. (Of course, I am making a generalization here--anyone can come up with plenty of what they feel to be exceptions).

Long-form television truly has the potential to give "moving pictures" a novelistic scope. In American television, market forces have previously hampered this potential: the pressure to crank out a highnumber of episodes each year and rake in as many advertising dollars as possible have usually caused declines in focus and quality. What's disturbing about this is that people come to expect their weekly fix regardless of qualtity: I am shocked every time I see someone who should know better whine in print that new season of "The Sopranos" is delayed too long or that "Lost" shows too many re-runs and should have a new show EVERY week. Do they just want it to descend into unwatchable nonsense like "Twin Peaks," "The X-Files," or "The West Wing"?

I've alluded to this before, but it's the writing, stupid. It could be self serving, but everyone from Shawn Ryan (creator and exec. producer of The Shield to Sorkin to J.J. Abrams has talked about the storytelling options writers are given when they have 12+ hours to work with.

Combine this with the artistic freedom allowed by cable television, (and HBO's boldness or realization that controversy = substribers - take your pick) and it's really no surprise that cable is the best medium. You can certainly get away with a lot more if you aren't worried about losing ad revenues...

But even with these freedoms, The Wire is exceptional - standing above all but the very best of the Sopranos and the first season of Deadwood (and far superior to, for example, Rome. Cue Yglesias:

It's an extremely demanding show offering no flashbacks and very little exposition despite a sprawling cast of characters and very complicated, years-long plot arcs but the rewards to people who watch closely and pay attention are incredibly large. I don't know anybody who's sat down to watch it and not been incredibly impressed.

With time to map out a whole season at a time, the creators are able to maintain consistent themes and put on screen a modern rareity - a three-dimensional character. At times it's heartbreaking, at times bitingly funny. There is also a very strong subtextual commentary about life in a modern American city.

Additionally, they somehow have either the foresight or the pull to cast quality talent in even the smallest of parts, knowing the might be revisted. (See especially the small "Senator Clay Davis" arc in Season 1 and the even smalle "Bunny Colvin" appearance in Season 2, played by standouts Isiah Whitlock and Robert Wisdom, respectively.)

With Season 3 arriving in stores soon and Season 4 starting next month, I cannot recommend this show highly enough.

TIVO Bubble Unpopped

So, was able to see, ostensibly live:

1. The Nutcracker Suite by Wayne Rooney
   
2. Zinedine Zidane partying like it was 1998
3. More jammy BS from the aptly named Italian left-back. Grosso indeed. If Portugal wins tommorow, I'm rooting for lightning, or perhaps a plague of frogs, for the final.

More tommorow when I'm feeling slightly more human.

While I've Been Away Watching Too Much Soccer

So, during the extended dance mix of World Cup '06, it appears one or two things have popped off in the opposable-thumb using world. Some may be worthy of fuller blogging, some may not, but...

• The Sawx have won 11 straight. During the streak Papi has 3 walkoff's. Or one more than the number of goals the U.S. team scoredacquired during that same period. Pedro got cheered, got shelled, got gone. Thanks for the memories Petey. If we see you in October, there's more where that came from, buddy.
• The NBA had it's Draft. FreeDarko, per usual, killed it.
• Speaking of FD, Kaiser and friends have gone similarly all grad-studenty on the Minnesota Twins - it's Tuesday's With Torii.
• For the last sports related tidbit, Fletch is not best pleased (or especially impressed) with the Weekly Standard's anti-soccer missive, which truth be told, sucks enormously - consider the central conceit:

  Soccer is the perfect game for the post-modern world. It's the quintessential expression of the nihilism that prevails in many cultures, which doubtlessly accounts for its wild popularity in Europe. Soccer is truly Seinfeldesque, a game about nothing, sport as sensation.

  More cringe-worthy than an Italian 'earning' a penalty.
• Ezra Klein says not nice things about The West Wing (and here). It hurts because it's a little true.
• And finally in unquestionably good news, SCOTUS reversed then Judge Roberts' ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. Apparently, laws matter again. Not only laws, but legal and legislative process matter as well:

  nothing in Hamdan means that the President is constitutionally forbidden from doing what he wants to do. What the Court has done, rather is use the democratic process as a lever to discipline and constrain the President's possible overreaching. Given this Administration's history, that's not necessarily a bad thing.

  In other words, as I, among others have said all along, if the administration thinks it is too constrained by the Law, as written, go through the proper process and get it changed. All that said, though, at 177 pages of opinion, the decision does raise many of the concerns about the inaccessability of Court pronouncement voiced by Publius (and here). I'm sure to have more to say about this later, but right now, all I can say is 'score one for law and democracy'.

McEnroe

"You CANNOT be SERIOUS"
- Pooh to the cable company service rep

So of course, today is the day my DVR box picked to die...thankfully, I had transferred almost everything to videotapes (digital revolution, my ass...) BUT, not only am I short 1 Brazil game, but all of today's action (save for the France - Togo game which they are replaying on Classic in a few hours) SOOOO let me extend my bleg to cover the following matches:

Brazil - Japan
Ukraine - Tunisia
Spain - Saudi Arabia
Switzerland - Korea Republic

Technojoy turns swiftly to technorage.

Vidiocy

Calimachus, on getting sucked into computer RPG's by his son:

As I was racing off to save the world, other characters kept coming up to me to engage me in side quests, whose purpose I now see, but I kept blowing them off, thinking, "No time for that, I gotta go find that prince and stop those demons"

Hi. My name is Pooh, and I'm a vidiot.

I have a confession to make - I was in Best Buy last weekend to buy blank tapes for my "own the World Cup" project (will take approximately 24 tapes to capture the whole shebang - if you miss a game, you know where to find me)...and I almost impulse purchased an XBox360 just to get the new FIFA World Cup '06 video game - the graphics look better than do the games on TV in HD, and the announcers are real life (pre-recorded) Brits, damnit. No Marcello Balboan meally-mouthed idiocy (any announcer who talks about 'good fouls' in soccer is off the island). No Tommy Smythian barmy blarny. Luckily for me, though they had the console in stock, they were fresh out of the game itself (apparently I'm not the only one.)

In any event, I have long been a confirmed vidiot, though my tastes differ from Cal's son in that I prefer the grand scale of Civilization or Transport Tycoon (vastly underrated model train-set type game) to RPG's and sports games to 'shooters' (though Halo and Goldeneye and Doom will always have special places in my heart...) My vidiocy has had two main consequences.

First, despite what people tell you about rotting the minds of our young, I fully believe that video gaming has done as much as anything to develop my problem solving and spatial reasoning skills. Or, more specifically, given the design of the LSAT, Super Mario Bros. got me into law school.

Second, despite the obvious fiction of the game-world it's never been difficult for me to find 'meaning' among the pixels and sprites, whether building empires or seeing how many consecutive years I can win the World Series with the Red Sox (helps when you engineer a massive trade for Ichiro, who's not quite video-Bo, but in the right hands (and with Papi and Manny and...whomever else I trade for hitting behind him) is good for 300+ runs per season.)

So here's to both vidiocy, and Best Buy saving my credit card balance by not having the game in stock...

A few WC Tidbits

1) Two things I miss about not getting the Euro feed of these games. First, the announcers. They have the Brits announcing the EA Fifa games - (relatedly, I almost impulse purchased an XBOX360 just to get the new FIFA game, absolutely stunning) why can't we get us a few? Marcello Balboa's voice my induce a seizure before the tourney is over. I might even have to switch to Univision.

Second, though is the national anthems - for some reason one of my favorite parts of international matches. Really gives the nationalistic flavor, but almost more importantly, serves as a sort of introduction to who's playing. Incidentally, ESPN is doing a crap job of showing the lineups and formations - it took me about 15 minutes to figure out France's back 4 as the whole game was in Switzerland's half to that point.

2) Via TNR's World Cup Blog every goal of the tourney is here. My favorites to this point are Zihna's header for Mexico and Cahill's rocket of both posts to win the opener for Australia.

3) At ESPN.COM, Michael Davies is blogging the World Cup again. His 2002 diary was quite strong (with its appreciation of the Japanese team. More specifically, their individualistic hairstyles [incidentally, one of the stronger passages in "Thinking Fans Guide to the World Cup" is the entry on Japan discussing the transition from the corporatism of baseball to the individualism of soccer] Most specifically, the glory of the spiky red hair and even spikier game of their midfield enforcer TODA!.)

He's off to a good start this year as well, including his rating of the 'pantsness' of various English players in their unsatisfying victory over Paraguay.

Straws

Tom Delay's #1 defender...Stephen Colbert?

This morning, DeLay’s legal defense fund sent out a mass email criticizing the movie “The Big Buy: Tom DeLay’s Stolen Congress,” by “Outfoxed” creator Robert Greenwald.

The email features a “one-pager on the truth behind Liberal Hollywood’s the Big Buy,” and the lead item is Colbert’s interview with Greenwald on Comedy Central

Seriously, is this the best you've got? At this point, it's well understand that comedy is hard, and not everyone 'gets' Colbert's schtick...but the Report is on Comedy Central. That might have tipped me off as a savvy media consumer that this might not be a straight news program...

I Need A Minute

I don't think I can do this game 7 thing back-to-back...at least not if the first one goes to OT...

Hopefully, Dirk has largely shed the 'soft' label, as that and-1 at the end of regulation was definitely a "MARBLES!" play. And note that as soon as OT started, Dallas started attacking on offense, just as they stopped doing once San Antonio started their huge run in the third quarter (aided largely by Avery Johnson's refusal to make the obvious move and put Diop in the game to guard Duncan.) It seemed more like they were just trying to use possessions to get to the end of the game, rather than executing a coherent plan to keep scoring. But when they needed a bucket, Dirk simply decided that he was too big for a little (or a lot) Bruce Bowen hack to stop him. Now, let's go Suns for a stupendous WC Finals!