goblin cartoons

My appearance on The Walt Bodine Show yesterday went well. I had a good time, at least. I didn’t get to say everything I wanted to say, but I did get to make some good points. Listening to it is a bit painful for me, though. I say, “Oh, absolutely!” WAY too many times. Still, people keep telling me I did a good job, and who am I too argue? The archived show is posted, so give it a listen if you haven’t already.

After the show, I listened to a good portion of Up to Date while driving back to work. I highly recommended listening to the archived show. It’s an interview with Sister Berta Sailer, co-founder and director of Operation Breakthrough, and she gives an inspiring account of her fight against poverty. It made me sad and horrified to hear about the poverty in Kansas City, but Sister Berta and the people who called in made my heart sing. These people are superheroes. Seriously, give it a listen.

This isn’t a review of the most recent Doctor Who Christmas Special (although I will say that I quite liked it and thought David Morrissey was very good) but my thoughts on the announcement of the actor to play the Eleventh Doctor.

I was not familiar with Matt Smith before today. Personally, I was sort of hoping they’d go with an actor older than David Tennant, and I think Paterson Joseph would be smashing in the part. But I think Steven Moffat is all kinds of smart, so if he feels Matt Smith is right for the role, that’s good enough for me. After watching an interview with him about getting the part of the Doctor, I will say that I like his enthusiasm and reverence for the part. The changing of the Doctor is always an interesting part of the program, so as much as I love David Tennant as the Doctor, I’m really excited to see the show change.

This coming Monday, I will be a guest on The Walt Bodine Show at 10 a.m., on KCUR, our local NPR station. The topic will be “Libraries in the 21st Century,” which I’m always pretty excited to talk about. Not only can you listen to it on the radio, you can stream it live online and the show will be archived on KCUR’s website. So, there’s no excuse for not listening to me babble about libraries. Unless listening to me babble about libraries really isn’t your thing–but who in their right mind would cop to that?

In 2008, I got back into playing role-playing games on a regular basis, something I’d fallen out of.  I joined a regular Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay group, which was good. (I can take or leave the Warhammer game itself, but the group I played with was a lot of fun.) I also started playing Burning Wheel with two guys I met online, and I’ve fallen in love with the game. Burning Wheel has quickly become one of my favorite games.

But there’s an itch that still isn’t getting scratched. I love being a player, but I also love being a game master, so I’m determined to run a game in 2009. I would very much like to run the new Mouse Guard RPG, and I think I can get enough players to make it happen. I’d also love to run a few sessions of In a Wicked Age, as well as try out Vincent Baker’s new game, Storming the Wizard’s Tower. Of course, my big dream is to run a regular, long-term superhero game, almost certainly using Chad Underkoffler’s nifty Truth & Justice, but I don’t know if I could get that going.

At any rate, I want to run something. And I’m feeling inspired and fired up enough to make it happen.

So, it’s the end of another calendar year. Well, good riddance! 2008 has been a tremendously trying year for the most part, and I’m not sorry to see it go. On the bright side, Barack Obama was elected President, and Julie and I seem to have found medication that helps our mental states. Otherwise, I’m optimistically looking forward to 2009. It doesn’t have to be a brilliant year, but I’d like it to be better than 2008 was.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Happy Solstice, everyone!

We had a very nice Solstice this year. Because of our finances (which I’ll blame on the lousy economy), we had a smaller Solstice this year than in previous years. But we all got some great presents and spent the day slacking around the house, playing with our new toys. Then I made a delicious Solstice dinner (roast chicken, orange-mustard gravy, mashed potatoes, and carrots and peas).

As usual, we have some photographic evidence. Now, we enjoy the days growing longer!

I just upgraded to WordPress 2.7. I’m using the QuickPress feature for this post. Mostly, I want to make sure the upgrade went OK. The process was fast and easy. And I like the new backend design.

In 1997, CBS produced a pilot for a Justice League of America TV show. It was apparently never aired in the US, which is probably one of the main reasons I only just recently even learned about it. I managed to get a copy of it and watched it last night.

Boy, am I glad it was never picked up as show!

To be fair, it’s not nearly as bad as I worried it would be. There are some nice bits to it, and all of the actors do a good enough job with what they’re given. But overall, it’s really, really bad, showing very little understanding of the Justice League, the original comics characters, or even superhero stories at all.

The Good:

• John Kassir is great as Ray Palmer. You could say I think that just because he wears glasses and bow ties, but no, Kassir plays Palmer as a sweet, earnest nerd and does a great job of it.
• David Ogden Stiers is good as J’onn J’onzz. No, his physique isn’t really, um, superheroic, especially around the middle. And the make-up he has to wear is…not good. But Stiers is one of those actors who could read the phonebook and make it sound incredibly compelling.
• Michelle Hurd and Matthew Settle are pretty good as Fire and Green Lantern, and I liked their interplay as once-involved-now-just-friends. OK, so the Guy Gardner in here is nothing like Guy in the comics (more like Kyle Rayner), so it’s beyond me why they called him Guy Gardner, but Settle makes him likeable.
• The overall plot isn’t all that bad, and the “Super Friends” take kind of works. It’s interesting, at least. It would’ve worked better if it weren’t the Justice League, though.

The Bad:

• The costumes suck hard, especially the Atom’s and the Flash’s. The Atom looks like a football quarterback in an outfit designed by Playskool. The Flash just looks like an idiot.
• Barry Allen as a jobless Joey Tribbiani really doesn’t work, and the actor (Kenny Johnston) doesn’t help by doing a lackluster job.
• It seems like the heroes mostly just save people from natural disasters (when not fighting Miguel Ferrer), which is really lame. They’re the Justice League! Why not show them actually fighting crime? Why not give them actual costumed supervillains to fight? As a villain, the “Weatherman” is lamer than lame. He’s no real threat to superheroes, except that the script keeps him away from the heroes until the very end (and then only Green Lantern goes up against him, in an exceptionally lame bit of “confronting the bad guy”).
• While the plot isn’t bad (except for a few massive holes), the show as a whole doesn’t even begin to live up to the history and potential of the Justice League. The old Batman show was camp, but at least it had style and vision. This is just a watered down version of what Hollywood imagines superhero comics are like.

Really, this pilot is tragic. It could’ve been quite good, but was utterly ruined by some incredibly boneheaded decisions. I took a bullet for you all by watching it. You can thank me with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.

This has not been the best year of my life, which is particularly bad as I was saying the same thing last year. It hasn’t been all sewage and shadows–I’ve had some really good times this year. But it feels like the bad has exceeded the good, in effect if not in actual instance. There’s been a whole lotta feh this year, is what I’m saying.

So I’ll gladly take this day to give thanks to all the good, to polish the sunlight and kick depression in the kneecaps.

I’m thankful that Julie and I found each other and continue to discover good things about each other. I’m thankful I get to be Morgan’s father and have her in my life. I’m thankful my parents (in-blood and in-law) are doing relatively well. I’m thankful my siblings (sister, brother and sister-in-law) and their beautiful children are doing well.

I’m also thankful this is the last Thanksgiving I’ll ever have with George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and their whole cabal in the White House. I will sing and dance when the Worst President Ever leaves Washington. These are bad, bad people, and I want them out of my life.

As my friend Steve Lawson says, I’m thankful for the internet and the World Wide Web. (I’ll throw in cell phones and other information-communication devices, too.) I’m not sure I would have made it through this year without the friendship of the amazing people I’ve met and grown to love online. I’ve also reconnected with old friends because of the internet. This is really a fantastic time to be alive, and I’m thankful that I am alive to live through this and enjoy it. To all of my friends, near and far: thank you.

I’m trying to synch my posts here with my Livejournal account. Let’s see if it works.