I am a big There Might Be Giants fan, and this video of their cover version of “Istanbul Not Constantinople” makes me happy. I’m not going to explain it, my grasp of the song meaning is fuzzy although I’m good at explaining “Birdhouse in Your Soul,” which Liz does in Lavender’s Blue, but mostly TMBG just delights me. I’m good with the absurd as long as it embraces life and knows its limits: “That’s nobody’s business but the Turks.”
I have been reading a LOT lately–don’t even try to tell me you haven’t been, too–and the thing about reading is, it’s hard work. You have to participate. You have to imagine things, anticipate things, THINK THINGS.
Sometimes you just want to veg and watch.
So on some Wednesdays, not all, I’ll be putting up things to watch. This is not Film School. This is stuff that I loved. Most of it will probably be funny. Some of it will be short (I won’t be putting up movies here) and some of it will be writing about longer stuff (that’s where the movies and TV series would probably come in), but it’ll be all stuff that I liked a lot, that rinsed all the stress out of my brain, and that I could drink Diet Coke during without endangering another laptop.
The Phobia Workshop makes me laugh no matter how many times I watch it. Cathy Maxwell sent it to me first, which just shows what a great friend she is, and besides the fact that it makes me guffaw all the way through, I love the writing here, the way it escalates in absurdity to the raucous end. It’s just a great piece of comic writing. (Okay, the ending’s a little abrupt, but I laughed anyway.)
Talking about movies yesterday reminded me that a thousand years ago, Lani Diane Rich and I did a podcast series called Popcorn Dialogues where we analyzed and rated romcoms based on how well they handled the romance. It’s still up there, so I’m going to go back to the five star movies and see what pops up. If you’re interested, the Program Guide is probably the place to start. And here’s the one we did on Two Weeks Notice. (I was relieved to see I liked the romance back then, too.)
AI really annoys me, especially all those dogs-choose-people videos which are supposed to fake warm my heart. But there is one series of AI videos that I love, the Greenland Defense Front, because who doesn’t love a well-armed polar bear. Plus, you know, the walruses.
The new season of Grimm has started, and I’m still hooked; in fact, I think it’s gotten better. I’m trying to figure out why because there’s so much about I shouldn’t like. The romantic relationship is too Mary Sue, the Wesen-of-the-week bit should be getting old, and sometimes the plots don’t quite work (“Quills,” I’m lookin’ at you). But the biggest flaw, the thing that should be the dealbreaker, is that the protagonist, Nick, is one of the most vanilla heroes ever written. The actor playing him does a good job, but there’s only so much Good, Truth, and Beauty I can take in a protagonist before I wander off. Yet I’ll be logging onto Hulu every week to see what happens to him next. Which brings me to the big question: Why? (more…)
You know, I have no problem recommending Person of Interest because it’s such smart storytelling. I love recommending Leverage because it’s such smart storytelling. I tell everybody about iZombie because it’s such smart storytelling.
And then there’s Grimm.
Grimm is run by people who routinely forget entire story lines, shove new characters in weekly, change the rules at any given moment, and often take implausibility so far out toward the edge that it circles back and bites them in the butt. The Grimm people look on smart storytelling the way extreme sports addicts look on yoga. They are batshit insane and so are their stories.
Jennifer Crusie is the New York Times, USA Today, and Publisher’s Weekly bestselling author and co-author of twenty-three novels, one book of literary criticism, miscellaneous articles, essays, novellas, and short stories, and the editor of three essay anthologies. She lives in a cottage in Pennsylvania, where she often stares at the ceiling and counts her blessings.
Find out more about Jenny’s published works by visiting JennyCrusie.com
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