Summer Glau Holding Things

This idea popped into my head for some reason, perhaps because I haven't worked the Summer Glau theme into a post since January, and the one before that was the first reference in nearly a year. Also because it seemed like it could be a lot of fun, and I was right! You could probably start up a whole other blog based on this idea. And now I'm tempted, but may just settle for the occasional rundown of celebrities holding things. Thus the new category I've added.

All right, let's run down ten things the image search pulled up.

10. Broadsword

(fireflyfans.net)

There can be only one Summer Glau. Which makes her immortal, I guess. No one is complaining.

A screenshot from the movie Knights of Badassdom, currently in post-production. And yes, the trailer unabashedly takes advantage of the fact that Summer Glau in a short skirt with a broadsword is hot enough to contribute to global warming. But she's joining Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones), Danny Pudi (Community), and Ryan Kwanten (True Blood) for a movie about LARP nerds accidentally summoning a demon. It looks awesome.



9. Up A Bank

(summer-glau.net)

Because Summer is sick of Fox canceling her shows and she needs to make some money somehow and everybody get on the ground RIGHT NOW.

A screenshot from the pilot of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicle in which Cameron and the Connors need to get to a time machine hidden in the bank vault or safe deposit boxes or something. Well maybe if you'd just asked nicely...

8. Serenity

(summerglauwiki.com)

Here Summer holds (and kisses) a model of the Firefly class starship Serenity. The ship comes from the cult series Firefly, where Summer played the mysterious character River Tam.

Wait, what's that? You think it looks like what?! Oh, you've got a filthy mind. And crooked anatomy. Go see a doctor.

7. Gum

(gotceleb.com)

Eh, gum. Never been a huge fan, just makes you hungry and loses its flavor and...er, I mean, I love it! Especially that 5 sugar-free gum from Wrigley! I'm going to by some right now and "stimulate my senses," ha ha!

This is purportedly Summer at a Comic Con appearance in New York. The picture she's standing in front of includes something on the "Human Preservation Project," no doubt a Terminator franchise thing. Why it involves all the 5 gum promotion, I don't know. Maybe Wrigley has the launch codes.

6. The Wee Baby Seamus

(tsccwiki.wetpaint.com)

Summer inspects a child for service in the robots' capacitor mines. Yes, good tiny hands on this one. They'll be able to have it crawling into tight spaces to unclog gears in no time.

No, of course this is just Summer holding a fan's baby during a FanExpo event.

5. Another Kid, In A Threatening Manner

(summer-glau.net)

Would someone get Summer on a TV show that lasts longer than two seasons? Seriously, she's shaking down little kids for lunch money now.

Another still from TSCC, in which Summer calms down a bratty kid destined to be part of the future human resistance by neutralizing his gravity a little bit.

4. An Apple

(onlyhdwallpapers.com)

"Alas, poor apple! I knew it well, Horatio, a fruit of infinite zest, of most excellent juiciness..."

And I could probably try for more of the Hamlet speech, but as with most Shakespeare it goes on for awhile and it might take more time than I'm willing to spend to substitute apple words for skull words. Another TSCC image, this captures the moment in an episode when grocery shopping causes Cameron to go all Windows Vista on us.

3. A Tin Heart

(newsgab.com)

I'd like to think this is from some promotion where Summer Glau appears in different parts of the world with various clues, leading us on some grand mystery tour to a greater truth. Or maybe she's just waiting for a maelstrom to arrive so she can get that thing to Oz.

This is apparently a Warner Brothers photo shoot. Or something for Valentine's Day. Or a symbolic TSCC shot illustrating the question of whether robots can feel. Or maybe she was just at the coast and needed a breadbox.

2. Puppet Bono

(summerglauwiki.com)

Summer contemplates all the terrible, horrible, no good very bad things she's going to make the lead singer of U2 go through now that she has a Bono voodoo doll.

Another shot from FanExpo, it looks like. The explanation given is that the Bono puppet was created by an Etsy designer who has it pose with celebrities and go on wacky adventures, which you can follow here.

1. Breast Cancer Bear

(summerglauwiki.com)

Summer is un-bear-ably cute. Urghh, ooh, I forgot about that ulcer that acts up whenever I make a bad pun. It's on my pun-creas. Owwww...

Here, Summer displays a bit of awesomeness by taking part in a fundraiser for breast cancer research. The bear she's holding was auctioned off for $2,007.64, with the winner getting the bear and this picture framed.

That's What I Miss About Maine: Celebration Barn

I've sometimes joked about Maine since I moved out of the state, but it's all in good fun. At one point I told someone about how most people think of the state as the coastline and all of its lovely tourism-heavy towns and cities, many of which shut down over the winter. They responded that they had heard it wasn't worth checking out Maine north of I-95, the highway that hugs the coast most of the way through the state.

It's true that there's a big cultural difference between the coast and northern regions of Maine, to the point that a state representative wasted everyone's time a few years ago with a whiny bill suggesting that maybe the coast should split off as its own state called Northern Massachusetts. It's true that there's a lot more wealth in the oceanfront communities, and more to see. I lived perhaps a half-hour drive from the coast, and made the occasional trips to Freeport, a hip little community built around the L.L. Bean headquarters, and Portland, the state's largest city and its nerve center of nightlife and other fun. Northern Maine has a few of these gems (a friend lived in Hallowell, a great little Main Street community just outside the state capital of Augusta), but in general the towns are settled into the Maine wilderness and are a lot smaller and more sedate. In other words, there's not much to do.

OK, so there's this.

You can still find a few things to do on the weekend, though. Where I lived in western Maine, there was a surprisingly vibrant theater scene. The tiny community of Brownfield has the Stone Mountain Arts Center, a beautiful lodge-like arena combining musical performances with dining. A little ways north, the Deertrees Theatre in Harrison is chock full of musical performances during the summer and has an art gallery for you to peruse while you wait. A stone's throw from where I used to live in Norway, the Grange Hall was host to a play or two each year put on by community troupes. And I was very much saddened to see that one of the best parts about the miniscule community of Buckfield, an Oddfellows hall converted into a theater known simply as the Oddfellow Theater, held its final performance last year.

And out in the woods in the middle of South Paris is this place, the Celebration Barn Theater. It's perched on the curve of a quiet rural road, surrounded by some meadows and even a chicken coop. From the outside, it looks an awful lot like the farm building it apparently once was. But the red and white siding has been spruced up, a subtle ramp at one entrance provides handicapped access, and of course the entrance sign lets you know that, chickens aside, the farm is long gone.

Inside, the space has been nicely renovated with a stage and seating space. Posters and photographs of past performances and actors hang around the foyer, which does triple duty for ticket sales (done from a table and chair), gift shop (a bookshelf with mugs, DVDs, and other assorted things), and concession stand (also from a table, as I remember). Hidden away among the upper floors are the rooms for for actors who live at the barn during summer programs, although some of their habitat extends to the main floor. A secondhand library, dominated by old National Geographic magazines, is tucked away in a nook. There's also a kitchen there with a prominent white board letting everyone know what their chore duties are.


The Celebration Barn was founded in 1972 by Tony Montanaro, a theater instructor and performer whose goal was to create a school for mime, storytelling, improv, and other theatrical shows. I remember the range of shows keeping true to this idea, with comedy performances, one-man shows, juggling, music, and more. Montanaro died in 2002, but his work was carried on for 18 years by Carol Brett, who took over as executive director of the Celebration Barn in 1989. Since Brett's death in 2009, the Celebration Barn has established a fund in her name for the theater's upkeep.


Brett's retirement in 2007 meant I arrived in Maine just as a young woman named Amanda Huotari was taking over the Celebration Barn. Amanda describes herself on her website as a seventh-generation Mainer who got her academic chops at Emerson College with further study in France and Italy. There are plenty of times when she takes to the stage herself, chiefly as the effervescent character Elizabeth in the show The Soirée. When I first started working in the Oxford Hills, I was worried that the only young people I was going to see would be names on the arrest log. It was certainly a breath of fresh air to meet Amanda, who has become well-known as a leader in both the community and among the young professionals in the area.

I could usually only catch a performance or two each year, but each time it was well worth it. I hope the Celebration Barn and Amanda are still doing well, and wish them the best.

Whatever Happened To: The Cast of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air?

Look back at any popular sitcom from the 90s and more often than not you'll probably find that it hasn't aged well. They're overly wholesome, jokes fall flat, and the "very special" episodes are unbearably preachy. Of course, you've always got your Adventures of Pete and Pete, or the older episodes of The Simpsons, or The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air...



You still know all the words, I bet. Well, maybe not the extended version. But anyway, this show established a number of great characters and a lot of sharp, witty dialogue between them. The stories were sometimes taken from a sitcom plot generator, but they usually had a unique spin to them. And when they did do something in the "very special" vein, it actually wound up being really powerful.

I've seen a few jokes about the non-Will Smith characters since the show ended its run. An older Family Guy episode had Peter and Brian debating whether Alfonso Ribeiro had been in Silver Spoons and finally just asking him, since the episode portrayed Ribeiro working as a repo man. And an SNL "Weekend Update" joke noted Will Smith's musical success and compared it to the related news of DJ Jazzy Jeff, "who wonders if you're going to finish that."

Well, what actually did become of the actors involved in the show?

Will Smith (Will Smith)

fashioningman.com

I'm not sure how many shows outlined the series' premise in the theme song, but The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is probably the most triumphant example. You know, how Will got in one little fight in his hometown in Philadelphia and his mom got scared, so he sent him to live with his uncle and aunt in Bel-Air. Will was certainly a fish out of water, dropping into a fairly lavish environment after a difficult childhood where his father abandoned him at a young age. Will's activities and sensibilities frequently clashed with the Banks family, as he was generally carefree and irresponsible. Nevertheless, Will was also portrayed as good-natured, charming, and intelligent.

thegrio.com

Like I even need to do this one. Even if the show helped propel Smith, now 43, to stardom, he was already well-known as a rapper. Starting out with childhood friend Jeffrey Townes (see below), he became fairly successful but nearly went bankrupt when the IRS determined that he owed the government quite a bit of money. The show not only helped keep him afloat, but launched a successful acting career. Smith's notable movie roles include the Men in Black and Bad Boys movies as well as Independence Day, Enemy of the State, Hitch, and I Am Legend. He was twice nominated for an Academy Award, for his roles in Ali and The Pursuit of Happyness. Smith's albums have also been successful, frequently reaching gold or platinum status, with 1997's Big Willie Style hitting an astounding nine-times platinum.

James Avery (Philip Banks)

thatssodad.blogspot.com

Having not seen the show in ages, the only thing I really remember about "Uncle Phil" is that he was a judge, conservative, tried unsuccessfully on an occasion or two to lose weight, and was usually aggravated by Will's shenanigans but became a father figure for his nephew as well. The incredibly detailed Wikipedia entry mentions that he was heavily involved in the civil rights movement, is an adept pool player, and can occasionally be a bit greedy. Oh, and God help you if you don't follow due process.

dearme.org

James Avery, now 63, is a Navy veteran of the Vietnam War and first got into television as a scriptwriter for PBS. Before he started on Fresh Prince, Avery did the voice of Shredder on the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon and James Rhodes in the Iron Man cartoon that debuted in 1994 (midway through Fresh Prince's run). He has continued doing a mix of voice and acting work, mostly small parts. His most notable roles since Fresh Prince have included Alonzo Sparks on the show Sparks, Charles Haysbert on The Division, Officer Kennedy on That 70s Show, and Dr. Crippen on The Closer. He was also a host on the short-running PBS travel series Going Places.

UPDATE: Avery died on December 31, 2013, following complications from open-heart surgery. He was 68 years old. 

Janet Hubert (Vivian Banks, Version 1.0)

dailymail.co.uk

Vivian Banks was the intelligent, strong mother (or mother figure, to Will) in the family. Relying on Wikipedia to refresh my memory, it seems she worked her way through school to earn a Ph.D and is a retired doctor by the time the series starts. She's not above confronting Phil or defending the children, but there are certainly limits to her patience. And perhaps the most memorable scene from Janet Hubert's run is her attempt to return to dancing, succeeding in doing so and showing up some snobby younger dancers in the process.

biography.com

Hubert, now 56, herself first came to Broadway as a dancer and landed a number of small television roles before The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. She was on the show from 1990 to 1993 (70 episodes), at which point she was replaced with Daphne Reid with a few aside jokes to the audience ("Who's playing the mom this year?") However, Hubert said this departure was a result of the show offering her restrictive contract after her pregnancy, and had harsh words for Will Smith. She said the show's star was arrogant and abusive, and penned the 2009 book Perfection Is Not A Sitcom Mom about the experience. She has been largely absent from the screen since then, with the exception of bit roles and an 11-episode run as Lisa Williamson on One Life To Live, but continues to do live performances.

Daphne Reid (Vivian Banks, Version 2.0)

tbs.com

No, I'm not going to review Vivian's character again. See above.

virginmedia.com

Daphne Reid, now 63, graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in interior design and architecture. She started a modeling career, and her TV career began with a number of bit parts and recurring roles on Simon & Simon and Frank's Place before she took over the role of Vivian for the final 56 episodes of the show. Reid has continued to make appearances on a number of TV shows, most recently Let's Stay Together, but since 1997 she has focused on running the production company New Millennium Studios with her husband.

Alfonso Ribeiro (Carlton Banks)

ugo.com

Carlton grew up looking to follow in his father's footsteps, meaning he shared Philip's conservatism, sense of responsibility, and smarts. Of course, he was also extraordinarily geeky and arrogant, sometimes acting condescending to people around him. He wasn't very good in crisis, panicking in difficult situations. Though the two came to respect each other, Carlton got into frequent spats with Will, who often levied jokes at Carlton about his height. And of course, there's Carlton's undying love for Tom Jones.

allstarpics.net

Ribeiro, now 40, got his start as a child actor and musician, releasing some singles at a young age and playing Alfonso Spears in the series Silver Spoons. He attended the University of California before joining the cast of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and since then has dabbled in minor roles, commercials, reality TV, directing, and production. His biggest acting role since the show has been voicing Roland Jackson in the show Extreme Ghostbusters. Ribeiro also did a bit of car racing, twice winning the Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race in 1994 and 1995.

Karyn Parsons (Hilary Banks)

studentsoftheworld.info

Hilary was the oldest child of the Banks family, but by far the most dim-witted. Ditzy and self-centered, Hilary is obsessed with fashion and shopping. Hilary later became a weather reporter and started hosting her own talk show. She also started dating the station's lead anchor, Trevor, who in a twisted but hilarious scene was killed when he proposed to Hilary while doing a bungee jump that was broadcast live.

sweetblackberry.org

Even in the pre-Internet days of the show fans of the show knew that Karyn Parsons, now 45, was actually pretty smart. She pursued her acting career after graduating with honors from Santa Monica High School. After The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Parsons had roles in a few movies but wasn't able to find much luck with television, starring in a couple of short-lived series such as Lush Life and The Job (her last role, in 2002). Since then, Parsons has moved on to non-profit work. In 2005 she founded Sweet Blackberry, which has the mission of bringing little-known stories of African-American achievement to children.

Tatyana Ali (Ashley Banks)

randomnetstuff.com

As the youngest child in the Banks family, there were plenty of times when Philip, Carlton, or Will were concerned for or downright overprotective of Ashley. Which, of course, sometimes meant she was a bit of a rebellious teenager and wouldn't miss a chance to be snarky to Carlton or Hilary. Of course, this is a 90s sitcom so you know she always had a wholesome core. At least one episode featured Ali's singing talent, having Ashley briefly achieve stardom (and a massively inflated head) with a popular single.

stylebistro.com

Now 32, Ali has appeared in a number of movies since the show ended. However, her main focus has been on her musical talents. It helped that Will Smith was a bestselling rapper at the time the show was going on, and the songs that appeared in various episodes also helped her gain a following. Her first album, "Kiss the Sky," debuted in 1998 and went gold soon after. This same year, she won a Grammy for Best Musical Album for Children with the song "Precious Wings" on Elmo in Grouchland. She's received a number of other awards besides, including the Young Artist Award, NAACP Image Award, and (most recently) the Caribbean Heritage Organization Living Legacy Award. Ali graduated from Harvard University in 2002, and since 2005 has owned and operated HazraH Entertainment. Parsons also lists Ali as one of the people involved in Sweet Blackberry.

Joseph Marcell (Geoffrey)

bestuff.com

The English butler at the Banks mansion, Geoffrey was a bitingly sarcastic fellow ("I would prefer an assassin's bullet to this kind of living hell"). His specialty usually seemed to be passing by at the perfect moment to interject a pithy rejoinder in a conversation. Later in the season, he accepted a request by Philip to be Nicky's godfather. There was also that time he cheated at the Olympic marathon and the Queen personally stripped him of the gold medal.

lct.org

Like his character, Joseph Marcell was born in St. Lucia in the Caribbean. Now 63, he resides in London and continues to have small parts in a number of movies and TV series. He graduated from the Central School of Speech and Dance and has done a good deal of theatrical work as well, serving on the Artistic Directorate and Council of the Globe Theatre in London since 1985.

Jeffrey A. Townes (Jazz)

humblecollective.com

Will's best friend in California, Jazz wasn't all that smart and was apparently never employed. He spent most of his time hanging around with Will or trying unsuccessfully to flirt with Hilary. Though not a bad person, he easily annoyed Philip and a running gag had him literally being thrown out of the Banks house. Later in the show, he was briefly married and had a child.

djjazzyjeff.com

Jeffrey A. Townes, also known as DJ Jazzy Jeff, was Will Smith's music partner prior to the start of the show. The duo was successful enough that they released a number of gold and platinum albums and won the first Grammy Award for rap in 1989 for their album Parents Don't Understand. Now 47, Townes founded the production company A Touch of Jazz in Philadelphia after Smith branched out on his own. He has continued to do solo work and partner with other artists on songs. His last album (The Return of the Magnificent) was released five years ago, but was successful enough that it went gold.

Ross Bagley (Nicky Banks)

funnyordie.com

Ah, little kids on sitcoms. Is there any real point? According to Wikipedia, "Master Nicky" was mainly a plot device to "add motivation for other characters, comic relief, or an emotional punch to the show's storyline." Nicky was an infant for awhile after he showed up at the end of the third season before they did a time warp and advanced him to a young but speaking age for the remainder of the series.

missnevainc.blogspot.com

Ross Bagley, now 23, also played Dylan Dubrow in Independence Day and Buckwheat Thomas in The Little Rascals. His roles are few and far between after the child actor phase, though he did win three Young Artist Awards for these roles. He was in an episode of Providence and did a voice in The Wild Thornberrys in 1996, and also appeared in an episode of Judging Amy in 2004. It seems he's taken a break from acting but is interested in pursuing it, going for a cinema and television arts degree at California State University Northridge and on track to graduate this year.

Read This Book: Bill McKibben's "Long Distance"

Somehow my city doesn't support a bookstore at the moment, although there is a record store which includes a sizable book selection and an antiques store where several sellers include books among their offerings. For supplementing my bookshelf, though, the best option in the area is a used bookstore called The Book Barn (topic of a future Greatest Thing of Anything). There's an extraordinarily wide selection, including a sports section with titles on not only the big-time activities like baseball and football but more specialized things like boxing and mountaineering.

I'm not a big sports nut, but I do enjoy hiking and cross-country skiing and tend to visit this section to see what's available. The skiing section is usually disappointing. Cross-country is lumped in with downhill, and the latter tends to dominate what's available. The section as a whole is usually made up of outdated guides on ski areas or yellowing guides on the best practices for Nordic skiing in the 1970s.

But then one day I came across this:

(betterworldbooks.com)

There were two copies of Long Distance by Bill McKibben, and a cover photo that nicely captures what it's like to take a secluded ski on a crisp winter day. And no, you can't judge a book by its cover but it certainly helped that the book had earned kudos from Bill Bryson, author of the Appalachian Trail book A Walk in the Woods, and Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air and Into The Wild.

McKibben isn't the first person to take a break from their everyday activities and try something to test their body and spirit. Instead of hitting the Appalachian Trail or Mount Everest or backpacking around some exotic country, however, McKibben took the unusual step of taking a year to undergo Olympic-level training for cross-country skiing. He didn't have any illusions about actually competing in the Winter Games, of course, but expected that he would take part in several challenging races and experience a change in his health and attitude.

McKibben's name may have rung a bell when I saw it, but it wasn't until later that I found out more about his background. He's a former New Yorker staff writer who has since become a leading writer on the environment and climate change, including the books The End of Nature, Fight Global Warming Now, and Eaarth. He also founded 350.org, a movement whose goal is to strive toward reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to below 350 parts per million.

It's not to knock McKibben's writing or environmentalism, but the only times when Long Distance really falters are when he brings the green message into the book. It's a big part of his persona, but it doesn't quite work given the main impetus of his journey. The year he chose to train was a terrible one for snow, and it's certainly frustrating for skiers when we want to hit the trails and instead are treated to rain and mud in December. Yet I've always understood global warming as involving subtle but far-ranging changes: increases in average temperature, damage to fragile ecosystems, extreme conditions in summer and winter, etc. McKibben's references basically seem to suggest that global warming is to blame for any winter with lackluster snow, something he certainly wouldn't be contending if he had tried this last year when New England was getting hit with blizzards seemingly every five days. I think the idea that any blizzard disproves global warming is why the concept has changed to climate change over the years.

And why it's so easy to find things like this online (imissglobalwarming.com)

The major strength of the book is its seemingly effortless ability to capture the experience of cross-country skiing. I raced in this sport for about 10 years, and though I've fallen off it as I've moved away from major ski venues there are still plenty of things you remember about it. McKibben is a newcomer to skiing, and writes in such a way that non-skiers will be able to understand what he's talking about and people involved in skiing will enjoy the way he describes various aspects of the sport. He hits upon the frustration of not being able to ski in poor conditions, the thrill of pursuing other racers, the exhaustion of a long race, the tranquility of a good solo ski, and the constant pursuit of a good kick for classical skiing.

Given that McKibben is doing Olympic level training, the book also offers a glimpse at other aspects of skiing that you wouldn't get if he had simply done one-on-one with a coach at a local ski area. He visits races around the world, ending with the original Birkebeiner in Norway, and gives memorable descriptions of his time on a roller-skiing treadmill at the Lake Placid training facility. The one in this video is in Calgary, but you get the idea:



Long Distance also expertly incorporates another theme into the narrative. Partway through his training, McKibben's father came down with a terminal illness. For awhile, both McKibben and his father are dealing with their own personal challenge: McKibben to improve his racing performance, and his father to stay alive. The juxtaposition between McKibben's growing strength and his father's weakness comes with some touching reflections on losing a parent and what McKibben's father meant to him.

Granted, McKibben doesn't have much competition when it comes to non-instructional books on cross-country skiing. But Long Distance is well worth a read by athletes and non-athletes alike.

Top 5 Shows I'm Putting On Hiatus

When I moved a couple of years ago, I opted out of setting up a cable package. I figured there would be plenty of times when I would be working during the evening, and that it would make more sense to catch up on things on Hulu and whatnot. So I've gone the quarter- or maybe even half-hipster route in that I still have a TV but no signal, and watch plenty of stuff online or via Netflix. Perhaps even too much stuff, it sometimes seems.

The list of shows I keep up with is gradually shrinking. Rescue Me wrapped up last year, others have been canceled, and even though I took up watching Alcatraz there should be a net loss before long once Breaking Bad brings things to a close. As I've kept up with shows, however, I've realized there are some series that I shouldn't really be committing to. They still have their moments, but it's clear that they've lost direction or that the networks are trying to milk it as much as possible beyond its best years. It's possible that I'll dig them back up again sometime later, but for these series I've decided that it's time to put things on hold and stop giving them any sort of viewer points in the hope that they'll obey the "Please Wrap Up" sign:

5. The Walking Dead

(screenrant.com)

I hadn't heard of the comic book series this TV show is based on, but I've tended to enjoy the various zombie survival tales that have showed up in the past few decades. It seems the comic is one of the most expansive storylines in this genre, following a group of survivors as they deal with both the undead and hostile bandits. The pilot, and for the most part the first season, didn't fail to disappoint. A creepy atmosphere, incredible zombie creations, impressive sets, and so on.

You'll notice how storyline and character aren't included in this list, which is a little troublesome. I'm not sure how it's handled in the graphic novels, but the series suffers from the fact that while zombie movies can tell a survival tale in a couple of hours, a TV show has to keep an ongoing narrative. Unfortunately, that means that when the survivors find a safe haven where they can settle down for awhile, they do so. And then the story slows right down, too. Most of the past season of The Walking Dead has involved the characters hanging around a farm, occasionally killing or getting killed by zombies, and otherwise whiling away their time feuding with one another. The characters themselves have been drawn much too thin, as the show accumulates a massive cast and generally assigns a few cursory attributes to each person and calls it good.

This season just wrapped up recently, and I'll have to see whether I renege on this decision. There have been some improvements as of late, with some good scenes and surprising moments. But if this last season is any indication, I worry that each time a new one starts it will simply involve the survivors hanging around a new shelter and arguing.

4. Weeds

(news-tracker.com)

I started watching Weeds when five seasons had already aired, and by that time I'd already been sucked in by Breaking Bad. So even from the first episode, Weeds seemed just a bit too cutesy in some aspects. It made some arguments or jokes on religion and Middle America and a lot of other topics with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Still, it brought in a lot of good characters, amusing dialogue, and some clever storylines. At least until it decided to break out of the cloistered community of Agrestic where the series was originally set and send the characters cavorting around North America.

The early seasons of Weeds worked so well because they managed to weave so many factors together. There was the absurdity of Nancy Botwin turning immediately to the drug trade after her husband's death, the dramatic undercurrent of the stress Nancy faces as a widow trying to provide for two children (and the dangers of drug trafficking itself), the many signs that Nancy has no idea what the hell she's doing, the haughtiness and hypocrisy of the Agrestic community itself, and the general interplay between the various characters.

And then it just seemed like the show didn't know where to go. Agrestic burned down as something of an offshoot of a turf feud with a group of bikers, several (but not all) of the characters found themselves in another California community, then the Mexican cartel got involved, then there was a road trip all around the country, and suddenly we're in New York with a fraction of the original cast (although a couple older ones were clumsily shoehorned in). The original focus of the series has vanished, and what we're left with is characters who are generally unlikable and have no clear motivation. And considering that Nancy's children are now grown up and have proven themselves able to care for themselves, and that the most recent season started with Nancy being freed after serving a prison stint for murder, it's clear that even the titular marijuana isn't really a focal point or point of danger anymore. The show is coming back for at least one more season, but hopefully it's the last.

3. South Park

(clutch.mtv.com)

South Park is the success story aspired to by any student who gets by and even does well in school but spends at least some of class doodling raunchy cartoons. The series from creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone saw the gradual rise in quality typical of any good TV show anywhere. Even if some of the early episodes may have relied a little too heavily on potty humor and catchphrases (there's a reason South Park is probably most watched by people around my age, who first heard of the show in elementary school), it grew to become uproariously smart and entertaining. Parker and Stone mercilessly skewered countless people and topics and approached subjects in ways few people would have thought of.

As of late, however, it seems the show has been following a formula of finding something recent in news or trends and mocking it. The show still adds some originality to these stories, but virtually every episode for the past few seasons seems to have at its core some recent movie or political issue. There's been at least one article where Parker and Stone have said they're getting stressed out coming up with new ideas for the show. And considering how they've had successful side projects, namely the movie Team America: World Police and the Tony Award winning Broadway musical The Book of Mormon, I've also seen suggestions that the duo would prefer to quietly wrap up South Park and move on to other things. When the last season finale dealt with the main character coming down with crippling cynicism after his 10th birthday and his parents getting divorced, reviewers generally saw it as a reflection of the creators' increasing frustration with the show and there was even a rumor that it was a surprise series finale.

And then suddenly they did a bit of a reversal and proclaimed how much fun they were having making the show during a Daily Show interview. Shortly after that, the show was renewed not just for another year or two but all the way through 2016. I've generally had a problem with shows getting renewed for multiple seasons, especially comedy shows that rate well but are much more susceptible to decline in quality. To renew for five years just seems like they're dragging it out well past its lifespan. Best of luck, but I think I'm going to sit these hopefully last seasons out.

2. Dexter

(psychologycorner.com)

Network television debuts some kind of shows in waves after one model catches on. Remember when Survivor and Big Brother did well and so every godawful reality show got greenlighted? I read a lot of books in those years. As of late, it's been cop shows as Law and Order and CSI each had a few successful spinoffs. These in turn have been followed by a slew of replicants as networks decided we apparently want to follow the fictional cases of any criminal investigation group anywhere.

So it was a bit of fresh air when Showtime began Dexter, a series based on Jeff Lindsay's novels. Sure, it involves a lot of people in the Miami Metro Police Department's homicide division. The hook is that the titular character is also a serial killer, molded since a young age to control his homicidal urges by going after murderers and other criminals who manage to worm out of the justice system. It was a cop show with a clever premise, and you became captivated by both the individual episodes' stories as well as the underlying season theme involving Dexter going after another serial killer.

The risk, of course, is that this model gets a little formulaic after you've seen a few seasons. Right around the fifth season, Dexter started to slip. Characters had been bumped off and the show's few attempts to replace them have fallen flat. Other characters are still underdeveloped and underutilized after six seasons. It wouldn't be fair to say the show has consistently declined in quality from season to season (I liked the fourth season better than the third) but the latest, sixth season was pretty much universally panned. Between problems such as an underwhelming villain, a mid-season twist predicted by fans after just a few episodes, and a few vestigial plots that went nowhere, there were plenty of viewers suggesting that they wouldn't come back for season seven.

The show has been renewed for two more seasons, and the cliffhanger at the end of the latest one was certainly enticing. But if the latest run of episodes is any indication, it just won't be worth it to check them out.

1. The Office

(blogs.nytimes.com)

The British model for sitcoms sometimes seems to be: 1) Get a good idea, 2) Produce some hilarious television, and 3) Call it good after two seasons so the show can wrap up before getting stale.

This is certainly the case for the original run of The Office. The primary plot involved a documentary crew following the employees at a dismal office, focusing in particular on the romantic tension between unmotivated salesman Tim Canterbury and secretary Dawn Tinsley. Much of the supporting cast was more loosely sketched, though Ricky Gervais made an unforgettable performance as asinine boss David Brent while Gareth Keenan also became an easy fan favorite as an overzealous, oddball employee. The whole thing wrapped up in a mere 14 episodes, with Tim and Dawn finally getting together and Brent ousted from the company but finally achieving some maturity.

The American version had its weaknesses when it first came out, such as the pilot essentially being a word for word remake of the original's first episode, but it eventually found its own footing. It was at its strongest when it kept the same focus as the original, following a similar romance between characters Jim Halpert and Pam Beasley. The show managed to develop the characters in a new way, and bring in a successful reimagining of Gareth and Brent. It also worked on developing the other office workers with their own personalities. It all made for some great episodes and a successful enough show that even some British viewers have said they prefer it to the original.

But, once again, American TV seems to enjoy a formula of extending successful shows well past their natural lifespan. The Jim-Pam thread pretty much wrapped up at the end of the third season, and much of the motivating factor for the show went with it. There were some decent plots involving Michael Scott and the ailing health of the company. Jim and Pam's story collapsed into an everyday domestic tale of marriage and children, and when the show decided to forge on even after Steve Carrel left you knew it wasn't likely to have anywhere near the quality it once did. This past season has just been a meandering collection of episodes that halfheartedly contemplates whether or not to bring back a long dormant relationship between Dwight and a coworker and starts up a few more love stories as well. The show has pretty much completely aimless, wrapping up its most compelling plots and having no idea where to go without them.

Double Feature Review: 50/50 and Drive

50/50

(filmcritic.com)

Synopsis: A 27-year-old man is diagnosed with a rare type of cancer with only a 50 percent probability of survival, and tries to cope with the illness with the help of his family and a friend.

The bad news first: Since I did enjoy this movie quite a bit, I'll admit that I glanced through IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes for this one. And thanks to the Internet being a giant whiny vortex of negativity, there were a few things to pick up and add here. The first, more salient point is that the movie has a somewhat meandering narrative. You're following Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) through his medical treatment and psychological treatment and family interactions and romantic entanglements and so on, and some reviewers felt that this never really coalesced into a story. There's also the fair warning that Seth Rogen isn't exactly breaking new ground here (he's kind of playing himself), and while it's a little more understated than previous roles it's likely that you'll be annoyed by his character if you've tired of the stoner buddy roles he's played in several films already.

There's also something of a character shortcoming in Adam's girlfriend Rachael, played by Bryce Dallas Howard. Writer Will Reiser, who based the movie on his own battle with cancer as a young man, said Howard's character is an amalgamation of people who abandoned him in his time of need. As such, there are certainly scenes where Rachael is likeable, and even though her ultimate failure to stand by Adam is selfish you could see how someone could feel as she does. Other moments, such as one where she forgets to pick Adam up at his chemotherapy, seem to take a bit too broad of a route to paint her as a villain.

The good stuff: The biggest complaint I've seen related to this movie, and I wholeheartedly agree, is that Joseph Gordon-Levitt was snubbed in the Oscar nominations for best actor. He covers a wide range here, from the uncertainty he feels about how he should be reacting to the disease to the foil he plays for Rogen to the downright terror that he might die. 50/50 is always right on the line between drama and comedy, and Gordon-Levitt's strongest scenes are undoubtedly in the dramatic roles. A few scenes near the end of the film are incredibly moving, and they rest mostly on his shoulders.

There are plenty of other strong performances as well. Anjelica Huston does an excellent job as Adam's caring but overbearing mother ("I only smothered him because I loved him"). Even if Rogen's character as Adam's friend Kyle is a little familiar, he still hits just about every comedic note. Anna Kendrick makes her character as Adam's psychiatrist endearing from her first scene where she admits that Adam is only her third patient on her way to earning a doctorate. Even the more minor roles, such as Matt Frewer and Philip Baker Hall as Adam's chemotherapy buddies and Serge Houde as his Alzheimer's afflicted father, are very memorable.

If the characters are the strongest part of the movie, the dialogue is a close second. Rogen carries most of the comedic parts, but the interplay between the cast is enjoyable to watch.

Verdict: Well worth a watch.

Drive

(therealkatiewest.tumblr.com)

Synopsis: A mechanic/stunt driver/getaway driver finds himself caught up in a dangerous plot while trying to help out a neighbor.

The bad news first: A fellow I know went to the same show as me, and I noticed that he soon after complained on Facebook that the movie would have been better entitled "Staring" and that pretty much every substantial scene from the 100-minute movie had been distilled into the two-and-a-half minute trailer. Indeed, there was a woman who actually filed a lawsuit complaining that the trailer was "misleading" because the the movie turned out to be a character-driven, art house type of film rather than a Fast and Furious style romp of car chases and adrenaline.

I do have to admit a certain disappointment with the way the automotive focus dwindles into nothing about halfway through the film. You get a glimpse of each of the unnamed main character's professions, a couple of car chases, and then it becomes a bit more of a gritty drama. I don't consider it aggravating enough to file a friggin' lawsuit, though. The more noticeable weakness, as my pal there already pointed out, is that sometimes the stoic nature of the Driver and other minimalist aspects slow the pace to a crawl. When the film ramps up the violence and machinations in the second half, it seems a bit out of place thanks to the rather more lighthearted opening.

The good stuff: The only love Drive got from the Oscars was a nod for best sound editing, but it could have easily been in the running for a few other production categories. The film is extremely stylish, making great use of its sets and location. Every shot makes excellent use of the light or, if the sun's on the other side of the planet, of the bright lights of Los Angeles. It's all helped along by a soundtrack, hot pink credits, and a few other factors lending a certain 80's feel to the modern setting.

The movie is also buoyed by some strong acting performances. I was kind of on the fence about Ryan Gosling, since it seems like the director explicitly asked him to keep his facial expressions to a minimum. Ultimately, though, this means he has to convey a lot of emotion through subtle means and he manages to do this quite well. And since I'm a Breaking Bad fan, I'll generally trust anything Bryan Cranston is in.

And even if the movie hits a sluggish plateau after the first 15 minutes or so, it does pull you in once the main part of the story starts.

Verdict: Drive is certainly flawed and maybe a tad overrated, but it's worth putting on your Netflix queue (hey, if yours is like mine they've passed you over for Moneyball five times anyway).

I Make Fun of State Quarters: Colorado

Ah yes, Colorado. Another one of those states that you just know is packed to the very edges of its square borders with snow-capped peaks, pine forests, scampering wildlife, burbling brooks, and just about every other beautiful aspect of nature you can imagine. It's known as the Centennial State because it gained its statehood in 1876, but if it had been a year earlier or later it may well have been the Landscape State or some such thing. So the state quarter will surely have to take in some of the-

TheUS50.com

Oh come on.

All right, so it did at least take in a scenic landscape, even if it is just the one mountain. But when you put it on a quarter it still looks like a desolate, gray, apocalypse-blasted wasteland. I half expect Viggo Mortensen and Kodi Smit-McPhee to be trudging along in the foreground in a futile journey to find salvation. The mountains are pretty much gray anyway, although the surrounding landscape tends to be a beautiful mixture of greens and blues when you actually see it. You have to use a bit of imagination to see this as the "Colorful Colorado" it is in reality.

Like this! (aircoreyell.wordpress.com)

Norman Nemeth designed and engraved this quarter, which portrays a scene in the Rocky Mountains. According to StateQuarterGuide.com, it won out of a field of 1,500 entries and got final approval from the Colorado governor and U.S. Mint. The other options also seemed to be mostly nature-based, although one would have portrayed the 10th Mountain Division.

Since several other quarters have used state symbols as a way of garnishing their coins, I also thought to look at the list of Colorado's symbols. These include the greenback cutthroat trout, which would be perfect because hey, it's already got money in its name. And there's even a state grass: blue grama grass. Thrilling stuff. And in 1992 the state adopted square dancing as the official folk dance of Colorado, because apparently the legislature had nothing better to do than weigh in on the fierce rivalries among the different factions of folk dancing.

These two were high-kicked down by a rival Bulgarian dance troupe soon after this photo was taken (barynya.com)

It makes sense to include the Rockies, though it did risk a demand for more garnishing features. The Aspen community may have insisted that there be an addition of ski lifts and time-share condos to the slopes of the featured mountain. Frat boys may have wanted a shout-out to the brewing history of Golden by having giant Phi Beta Kappa members "tap the Rockies." Or maybe they would have asked to just scrub the whole thing and have a Coors logo as the design, with the unforgettable Coors slogan: "It's cold, and we're taking credit for what the refrigerator did."

In the end, though, as long as quarters are always going to have that bleak end-of-world color to them, perhaps the Colorado could have gone with a theme from Stephen King's apocalyptic plaque novel The Stand. Hey, maybe they could have even made the official design Mother Abigail Freemantle and redone George Washington a bit to make him Randall Flagg. Need to choose between good and evil but aren't sure where you stand? Flip a coin!

Mother Abigail Freemantle, official state seer of Colorado (sharetv.org)