The Good Wife

I think the last time I became so completely obsessed with a TV show that I discovered late, was Corner Gas, a Canadian sitcom that I devoured episodes of when it used to run twice a night on WGN. It went on to feature a great Kiefer Sutherland cameo, and--unfortunately--a really underwhelming series finale. Like the old saying goes, "Canadians are lousy finishers." Or it's possible I just made that up. Who knows.

Anyway, a couple of months ago, I discovered The Good Wife. This is probably my favorite show on TV at the moment, and as I said before, I can't believe that CBS mismarketed it the way they did. They may have well just called it Chick Show. Fortunately, people far more open-minded than myself kept the show on the air until I finally came around.

Having now viewed the entire first season via Netflix and the second season to date via BitTorrent, this seems like the rare show that's actually gotten better in its second season after a terrific first one. Like all legal shows, the case of the week plots are still hit-or-miss, but the political stuff is awesome (if we found out tomorrow that Aaron Sorkin was secretly writing all of Alan Cumming's dialogue, I wouldn't be surprised), and the power struggle for control of the firm is great, although maybe a little rushed.

A few thoughts on the show:

-- What kind of law firm brings on just two new associates and then makes them compete for one opening? Okay, fine, I'll suspend disbelief on that count because...well, I guess I have to. But considering that both Cary and Alicia figured prominently in pretty much every major case the firm handled--not to mention, won--in the first season, it strains credulity that Will and Diane still got rid of one of them for budgetary reasons. Especially since the firm also fired at least ten associates and one named partner over the course of the season.

-- Having said that, Cary works so much better as an ADA than an attorney at the firm, I'm fine with it. I hope nothing comes of Diane's job offer in the last episode, because that would be a huge step back. Matt Czuchry might be the best actor on the show, and considering the cast, that's saying something.

-- Josh Charles was in Sports Night, so he can pretty much do no wrong as far as I'm concerned. And he's great on the show. But it's a bit laughable that someone his age is the managing partner of a law firm full of people older than himself. It's also laughable that someone who seems to have slept with every hot woman in Chicago would find himself drawn to a married woman with two teenage kids and a ton of emotional baggage, but whatever.

-- More women should dress like Kalinda. I'm pretty sure I don't have a boots fetish, but it is a really awesome look. (Okay, maybe I do have a fetish. But as long as I don't get the urge to actually try them on myself, I'm not going to sweat it.) Who knew the annoying, vapid sister in Bend It Like Beckham could pull off a role like this?

-- A lot's been made of the chemistry between Archie Panjabi and Scott Porter. Honestly, I don't see it. Their characters work so much better as rivals, if not outright enemies, that it would be a shame if the show went down the predictable romance route. Besides, this would presumably get in the way of more scenes where Kalinda makes out with hot female FBI agents.

-- If there is a weak part on this show, it's Alicia's kids. Like real teenagers, they'll occasionally be funny and entertaining, but for the most part, you find yourself wishing they'd go away.

-- With so many characters, it's hard to give every member of the main cast attention on a consistent basis, never mind, the recurring actors. But it'd nice if they gave Michael Boatman more to do. And speaking of recurring actors, I wish other shows would stop stealing The Good Wife's, as we've apparently lost Martha Plimpton and Mamie Gummer. Look, I know it'll be tough, but no one hire Gary Cole, huh?

Panel of the Week

From Action Comics #897:

Wizard Magazine

The early '90s were an exciting time to be a comic book reader. Don't get me wrong, the comics themselves sucked. Not all of them, but enough so that if you were to grab ten issues at random of pretty much anything being published during that time, at least seven of them would likely make you cringe.

By and large, they fell into one of the following categories:

1) Barely readable dreck.

2) Convoluted storylines based heavily on old continuity that, for new readers, must have been like trying to read Aramaic.

3) T&A. Like, ridiculous T&A, even for the comic book industry, which has always happily embraced T&A.

So why look back on that period with such fondness? Because as crappy as those comics were, Wizard made them...if not actually fun, at least seem like fun. When you opened one of those early Wizards, it was like a pep squad, whose sole purpose in life was to make you EXCITED AS ABOUT COMICS AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE, leapt out at you.

Is Cable the son of Cyclops and Jean Gray? MAYBE! WOULDN'T THAT BE COOL?!?!?! HERE'S A FIVE-PAGE FEATURE ON WHY IT MAKES SENSE!

Do you like Superman and Wonder Woman? THEN YOU SHOULD BE READING SUPREME AND GLORY! THEY'RE JUST LIKE SUPERMAN AND WONDER WOMAN, BUT WRITTEN BY ROB LIEFELD, SO BETTER AND MORE ORIGINAL!!!

Which superheroine is the hottest? HERE'S OUR TOP TEN LIST! AND JUST TO SPICE THINGS UP, WE GOT ADAM HUGHES TO DRAW THEM IN BIKINIS!!!

I'm not saying Gareb Shamus and company always had pure motives. Sure, they wanted people to dig comics. But as collectibles, and trends that could be easily broken down and replicated, not necessarily examples of great writing and art. Wizard clearly benefited from the speculator boom, and it was in their interest for people to think of comics as commodities. After all, all those people buying and selling comics needed a price guide, which Wizard helpfully provided each month. Comics would go up in price, comics would go down in price, and the really lucky comics would be deemed to be "red hot," which was the nicest thing Wizard could possibly say about something.

These determinations mainly appeared to be arbitrary. The price of a comic often seemed to change simply because Wizard said it did. Why would Crisis on Infinite Earths #8 be worth thirty cents less than it was the month before? Just because, I guess.

Sometimes, Wizard would employ reasoning, and it was hilarious. Not long before DC "killed off" Superman, there was a totally forgettable storyline in the Superman comics called "Panic in the Sky," where at one point, Braniac makes a reference to a secret weapon or something. Fast forward a couple of years, Doomsday shows up, and some Wizard staffer thinks, "Hey, wait a second! What if that secret weapon was Doomsday?!" And that earlier Superman comic ended up on the "Ten Hottest Comics" list, or whatever it was called.

They also had a lot of features that could charitably be called "fluff." Casting suggestions for hypothetical comic book movies. Detailed musings on what would happen if a DC character and a Marvel character were to fight. "Babe of the Month." It was fluff, but it was often fun fluff.

And it should be pointed out that comic books would have sucked regardless of whether or not Wizard existed, so by pushing the idea that comics could and should be bought and sold for a profit (sadly, at one point, I owned all those variant covers of X-Force #1, under the belief that I'd one day be able to sell them and buy a new car), they at least gave readers something to do while they waited for comics to get good again.

This week, Wizard announced it was ending. Not even a last issue. Just ending. The magazine, anyway. It'll continue as a website. But it's existed as a website for a while now, and no one's really seemed to care, so who knows how this'll go?

Honestly, it's not really a great loss. I haven't bought it in years, and whatever role Wizard once filled in the pre-Internet age has been more than filled by Newsarama, Comic Book Resources, and dozens of other comic book websites and blogs. Even the price guide is mostly irrelevant, as a comic's worth is now determined by whatever you can get for it on eBay. And the people who never saw the charm in Wizard's fluff are dancing on its grave. But it somehow made comics fun back when they were anything but, and I'm kind of going to miss it.

Third Round NFL Playoff Picks

3-1 last week; 133-131 for the season

 

Green Bay at Chicago (+3.5): Green Bay

 

New York Jets at Pittsburgh (-4): New York

 

Panel of the Week

From G.I. Joe: Cobra #12:

The Buffy finale. No, not that Buffy finale. The new one.

A typical TV show season in the U.S. is around eight months. The "eighth season" of Buffy The Vampire Slayer lasted almost four years. It was an interesting experiment, but I think it proves that comic books aren't the ideal medium to continue a TV show. Even in comics, where storylines often last for months, four years is an awfully long time.

Additionally, you really have to question whether or not TV shows should be continued. Most quality shows have definitive endings. Buffy's was pretty good. Why keep going? (Aside from money, I mean.) I guess I could maybe see doing a film, since that's a chance to do a bigger, more elaborate version of the TV show. But a comic?

I get why a writer/producer might want to turn to comics in order to provide closure for a prematurely cancelled series. That's what Bryan Fuller is doing with Pushing Daisies. But resurrecting a series that enjoyed a long run just seems like a way to delay the inevitable, which is that all stories have to end at some point. Dark Horse and Joss Whedon have already announced a ninth season, and there'll likely be a tenth one after that. At what point can this just be considered an ongoing Buffy series?

Spoilers for Buffy The Vampire Slayer #40, and the series as a whole...

The TV series ended on a high note. The Hellmouth was destroyed, there were a ton of new Slayers to handle some of the load, Xander was surprisingly okay with Anya's death, and it seemed like Buffy was in a pretty good place.

Let's look at how the comic ends: Giles is dead. There's no more magic in the world (which, in the context of the Buffy universe, doesn't sound all that bad, but Willow says it is, so I guess we have to believe her), all those new Slayers hate Buffy, and Xander and Dawn are sleeping together, which just kind of seems wrong. And I'm not even sure what's up with Angel. It's a safe bet that some or all of these things will be resolved in the next series, but for now, it's a bit of a bummer.

One advantage of doing a comic instead of a TV show or movie is that there is no budget to worry about. So when Buffy and Angel got their super powers--easily the series' worst idea--the creative team was able to go nuts. Flying. Fighting hordes of demons. Having sex in outer space. And so on. Not much of this seemed to fit in with the tone of the TV show. For some reason, Spike had a flying ship. Just because a writer can let his imagination run wild doesn't mean he should, especially when he's working in an already established fictional universe.

There were some bright spots. The mystery of Twilight's identity was handled really well right up until the actual revelation, the Japan story-arc was fantastic, and the dialogue was so spot-on, you could easily picture the actors speaking it. But on the whole, the series was too long, too unfocused, and maybe a little too ambitious for its own good. If Whedon and company really want to stick with this "new season" concept, then they should plot the next one more like a TV show and less like a comic book.

Second Round NFL Playoff Picks

3-1 last week; 130-130 for the season

Baltimore at Pittsburgh (-3): Baltimore

Green Bay at Atlanta (-1): Green Bay

Seattle at Chicago (-10): Chicago

New York Jets at New England (-9): New York

Panel of the Week

From Secret Six #29:

With no power comes great responsibility

Spare a thought for Phoenix Jones, who recently donned a skin-tight rubber suit, a bulletproof vest and a mask over a woolly balaclava, and set out to fight crime in his home city under the nom de guerre Guardian of Seattle. Clearly influenced by the movie Kick-Ass, he got his ass kicked, and his nose broken, when he tried to break up a fight involving a gunman. He's one of a group of nine would-be superheroes who give themselves tough names like Catastrophe, Thunder 88, Buster Doe and Penelope (Penelope?) and look hilariously silly in group photographs.

Can I offer them some advice? Guns. The central implausibility of Marvel comics and their offshoots was that superheroes could defeat gun-wielding villains by moving faster than speeding bullets or flinging sticky goo at them. Guys: you can't, unarmed, get the better of chaps with guns. No matter how impressive your Ninja helmet or your plastic six-pack. (The Independent)

Look, I'm not going to say the advice doesn't make sense on some level. Guns would solve lots of fictional superheroes' problems, too. Batman could just shoot people instead of throwing a Batarang. Green Lantern, instead of hitting criminals with a giant green boxing glove, could just make an AK-47 with his power ring and mow down the entire Secret Society of Supervillains. (Well, obviously, the ones who aren't bullet proof.)

But the simple fact is, superheroes don't carry guns. They just don't. I mean, yeah, they carry guns that shoot knock-out gas, knock-out darts, and laser guns that knock people out. And if Phoenix Jones can get his hands on one of those, more power to him. But no mainstream superhero runs around with actual firearms. Sure, some anti-heroes do. You know, the Punisher, Deathstroke, Hitman, etc. But those guys clearly aren't who Seattle's superheroes are patterning themselves after. Maybe Kick-Ass was the actual impetus that made them decide to put on costumes and fight crime. But it's a safe bet that these guys grew up on a steady diet of relatively wholesome superheroes like Spider-Man, Superman, Fantastic Four, etc.

So here are a few suggestions for how he can more effectively fight crime without turning to deadly weapons.

1) Buy a good car

If you think about it, Batman rarely actually needs to exit the Batmobile. If he wanted, he could just pull up on a crime in progress--assuming said crime was occurring somewhere with motor vehicle access--and watch as the bad guys ran off in terror. It's only because he also wants to get them off the street that he has to get out of the car and bust his ass. Since Phoenix Jones hasn't been deputized by the Seattle police department, and is presumably incapable of subduing more than one or two criminals at a time anyway, he shouldn't be worrying about arresting criminals. Just stopping a crime in process is enough. As such, he should invest in a heavily armored car with a spotlight and a loudspeaker. Most criminals, when a bright light is shone on them and a loud, booming voice says something like, "Crime in process! The police have been notified!", will run off. But if they decide to open fire on the Phoenixmobile, no sweat. It's armored. And at that point, any violent action would be considered self-defense and Phoenix could just run them over.

2) Get some muscle

Every superhero team has it. The Justice League has Superman. The X-Men have Colossus. The Fantastic Four have the Thing. Even the Inferior Five were smart enough to have Dumb Bunny. And those who operate on their own, usually don't need it. Batman's set, because he's an Olympic-class athlete who's been studying martial arts since he was a kid. (Incidentally, was there ever a more oft-used phrase in Who's Who than "Olympic-class athlete"? Pretty much every non-powered DC superhero was an "Olympic-class athlete." How many gold medals go un-won by America every year in the DC Universe, because all the Olympic-caliber athletes are wearing spandex and fighting supervillains, as opposed to track and field? But I digress.) I'm guessing the Seattle heroes can't make the same claim. So they need someone with them to do the down and dirty fighting, while they do spin kicks and make quips and other superhero-ish stuff.

Are there any out-of-work boxers or bodybuilders who the heroes could hire as sidekicks? I guess technically, "bodyguards" would probably be a more accurate term, but no real superhero has a bodyguard, so let's go with sidekick. How about mental patients, who have the crazy strength of ten men and don't feel pain, who could be released into the heroes' custody while they go on patrol, and then are returned afterwards? I think we can probably agree that kid sidekicks are out of the question. Unless maybe they're on their high school wrestling team. Then they could be useful.

3) Eschew style for practicallity

Being a comic book nerd, I've occasionally thought about what kind of costume I'd have if I were a superhero. I mean, I haven't gotten past the basic general design or anything, but I know it'd be all black and green and--hey, fuck you, Incredibles--there'd be a cape. It would be functional, yet snazzy. What's the point of fighting crime if you don't look good doing it? Realistically, though, you can only pull off snazzy if you have some serious game. Superhuman powers, or multiple black belts, or some sort of cosmic rod or Adamantium shield. Clearly, I have none of those. Neither do the Seattle guys, it seems. As a result, if I were designing a superhero costume for actual use, I would just cover the outside of it with razor blades, and laugh when some thug tried to punch me and just ended up cutting himself. Also, a Kevlar vest may not be the sexiest look in the world--in comics, superheroes have long known how to make costumes that are bulletproof, yet still skintight, so you're able to see their abs and boobs and what have you, but I suppose the real world is still years away from figuring out how to pull that off--but it'd probably save your life.

4) Develop actual super powers

Admittedly, this one might be a bit difficult. In comics, if you're hit by a bolt of lightning, you're likely to obtain some sort of lightning-based super powers, whereas in real life, you'll probably just die. Similarly, you can't walk five feet in a comic book without stumbling upon an ancient magical artifact or a dying alien who offers you a power ring. In real life, the odds of this succeeding seem slim.

But has anyone really tried? Has anyone held up a bunch of antique hammers to see if they're transformed into a Norse god? Has anyone ever irradiated a spider and let it bite them? Has anyone tried locking themselves in...whatever the hell that chamber was in Watchmen, to see if it makes them an omnipotent naked blue guy? Probably not. So is the reason no one has super powers because they don't exist, or just that no one has ever been bothered to make a real effort to acquire them?

Of course, if Phoenix Jones does decide to get a gun, it seems like it would only be a matter of time until he crosses some sort of ethical line, effectively becoming a villain himself, and his fellow heroes have to hunt him down and bring him to justice. You know, that actually sounds like a pretty exciting story-arc. He could go all grim and gritty, changing his costume--something with skulls, maybe--and his name, because Phoenix Jones is too upbeat. Phoenix Doom? Phoenix Death? Mayhem Jones? Oh, hey, I like that one! Catastrophe, Thunder 88 and Buster Doe, vs. Mayhem Jones...it'd be like a real life comic book crossover event! Crisis in Infinite Seattles!

You know what? Forget what I said earlier, Phoenix. Get a gun. Become a villain. We'll worry about your redemption arc later. Hey, don't worry! If Hal Jordan can go from hero to villain to dead, and then back to hero, so can you.

The War on Charity II

Once more, I find myself fighting the good fight against those who would help people less fortunate than myself.

After the Haiti earthquake, I had the urge--and to be perfectly honest, it was a really uncharacteristic urge--to donate a decent amount of money to the relief effort. And of course, when I say "decent," I don't want to make it sound as though I was going to gut my checking account or anything. As Homer Simpson once said, "I'm not running for Jesus." But not like just $5 or $10, either.

I actually put a fair amount of thought into which charity I was going to give to. I didn't want to donate through one of the corporations that were collecting money, and I didn't want to call into that celebrity telethon thing, because I knew that if I got a bad celebrity it would put me in a bad mood for days. I mean, you see George Clooney and Bruce Springsteen on TV and you think, "Awesome!" But then you call and you hear, "Hi, this is Robert Pattinson," or "Hey, Jay Leno here!" or whatever, and it has to be a huge let-down.

Anyway, I ended up going with UNICEF. It was a known entity, and I liked the idea of my donation going to help kids. So I figured that was that, and as with most cash transactions, we would now go our separate ways, both of us better for the experience.

It turns out this was completely naive of me, as UNICEF quickly decided that ours should be an ongoing relationship.

First came the emails. Then the letters. Some simply asking me for more money. Others pointing out specifically how additional donations would help kids around the world. Others just blatantly trying to guilt me into giving.

The emails were easy enough to stop, but unfortunately, U.S. mail has no unsubscribe link you can click on. So every couple of weeks, I get a new plea for money from UNICEF. And every time, they go in the trash. It's not that I'm totally heartless. Just...mostly so, I guess. Hey, I have needs. You know...shelter, beer, Xbox. Needs.

Late last year, I found an oversize envelope crammed into my mailbox. When I opened it, this is what was was inside.

For a brief moment, I was horrified. Did I buy a fucking calculator through UNICEF?!? That's not something I would do sober. It's not even something I would do drunk. After a few seconds, I realized with relief that they'd sent it to me for free.

It wasn't an especially nice calculator. In fact, it was cheap. Really cheap. Which isn't a surprise, seeing as how there's a reason they could afford to send thousands of these things out. Even if I didn't already have a calculator--not to mention, one on my computer and another one on my phone--I wouldn't use it. It felt like I might break it just by looking at it.

Here's how it tied into UNICEF's fundraising drive, from the letter that accompanied it:

The enclosed calculator is our gift for you - I hope that every time you turn it on and the number '0' appears on the screen, you will be reminded of how your support is bringing us closer to our shared goal of zero preventable deaths.

That's nice. The calculator's now in a landfill. Throwing it away, I didn't feel nearly as bad about it as I thought I would.

Look, I get it. UNICEF has to keep sending me letters because they believe that if I donated once, there's a good chance I'll donate again. And since they've been doing this for a long time, I guess they know what they're doing and enough good souls who do donate money will cover the expense of sending letters to douchebags like me who just throw them away.

But come on. If you're a charity, don't waste your money with stupid gimmicks like free calculators. If you absolutely have to give something free away, give a pen. Or a T-shirt. Everyone likes a free T-shirt.

First Round NFL Playoff Picks

9-7 last week; 127-129 for the season

New Orleans at Seattle (+10): New Orleans

Indianapolis at New York Jets (+2): New York

Baltimore at Kansas City (+3): Baltimore

Green Bay at Philadelphia (-2.5): Green Bay

Panel of the Week

From Batman Beyond #1:

Papa Smurf says to get back to work

I've never really embraced iPhone gaming. Sure, like everyone else, I play Angry Birds and Words With Friends. And I've gone through brief bouts of fascination with games like Flight Control, Skee-Ball and Canabalt. (I eventually had to stop playing that last one just because I found it was seriously bumming me out. Games needs to have endings. Or in the very least, achievable goals. Simply jumping from rooftop to rooftop to escape an alien invasion until you eventually plummet to your death over and over, is a profoundly depressing experience.) But in general, they don't do much for me.

So I'm a little surprised by how much I've become completely obsessed with, of all things, Smurf Village.

In the game, Gargamel has chased the Smurfs out of their happy little village, forcing them to relocate elsewhere in the forest and start all over again. You build Smurf houses, grow crops, complete mini-games like helping Papa Smurf make potions, and so on. As you progress, you get gold to spend on things to customize your village, and in one of the coolest features, you can look at other people's villages to see what they're doing.

Yeah, yeah, I know. It's not exactly Gears of War. But seriously, it's fun.

One of the more interesting aspects of the game is that you're forced to be patient, as it takes a certain amount of real-world time to complete various tasks. It takes five minutes to grow a bunch of raspberries in your Smurf garden, but 18 hours to grow pumpkins. Food is then exchanged for gold and experience points. Houses take two hours to build, but for some reason, it takes five days for the little bastards to build a small bridge. I'm told this is a lot like Farmville, but I think all Facebook games are stupid, so I'll have to take people's word for it.

(One guy thought of a clever way to game the system, but Capcom caught on and put a stop to it.)

You can also spend real money through your iTunes account to buy Smurfberries, which can then be spent on more elaborate structures. I haven't given into the temptation to do this. Yet.

Which brings us to the dark side of Smurf culture.

While Papa Smurf leisurely strolls about, supervising and assigning you tasks (i.e., build some paths, send a Smurf out into the woods to get rid of some wolves, etc.) and Smurfs like Brainy and Jokey just wander around aimlessly, all the nameless, personality-less Smurfs are left to work the fields.

It didn't take long to realize why this made me vaguely uncomfortable. The Smurf village is basically operated on a slave economy.

There's no upside to giving your slaves...er, Smurfs...breaks, either. It's to your advantage to have them working 24/7. Like I said, crops mean money and experience points. So once you've collected one harvest, you start growing another one right away. I usually try and time it so that they get to work on some tomatoes, which take eight hours to grow, right before I go to bed.

Sometimes, Papa Smurf has to remind his Smurfs of their place on the socioeconomic totem pole.

Yes...toil, my little Smurfs, so that the Prince can have his cucumbers!

For my part, I'm embracing this dystopian existence favored by Papa Smurf. You're given three sections of land on which to build your village, each one separated by a river. When my village is eventually completed, the left section will be exquisitely landscaped, containing only two homes: Papa Smurf's and Smurfette's. (In case you're wondering, yes, I'll be imagining they're fucking.) The right section will hold a fenced-in residential community of nicer mushroom homes, and high-end commercial space occupied by establishments such as Greedy Smurf's bakery and Painter Smurf's studio.

The middle section?

It's squalor by design. At one point, they had decorations like flowers and Christmas trees, but I took those away because if the Smurfs see nice things, that might give them hope, and that might spark rebellion.

Anyway, it's a great game. The only thing I would change is that it'd be nice to have the option of attacking other player's villages. Forcing my Smurfs into slavery in order to maintain the pampered lifestyles of their leaders is nice, but being able to conscript them into an army? That would be positively Smurfy.