Whale Wars starts off it’s 3rd season this Friday, June 4th at 9pm Eastern on Animal Planet. The ad above (which I’ve spent numerous hours staring at on the subway) kinda says it all. This isn’t a show about whales, it’s a show about these “die hards” (read: crazy people) on a mission to protect them.
Check out this commercial for the new season and then let me tell you all about just why you should watch this show.
Dead in the Family is the 10th installment in the Sookie Stackhouse/Southern Vampire series from Charlaine Harris. This is the same series which the show True Blood
Buy your own True Blood at HBO
Anyway like the other books, you should have some knowledge of the rest of the series since this builds on the others. Harris does do a decent job of including details of things that happened in the past but it helps to have that knowledge going in. There’s also a whole lot of different plot lines going on. Overall I wasn’t impressed with this particular book. It felt short and there really wasn’t any mystery and everything was too neatly wrapped up at the end. There were no surprises or anything really interesting. But if you’re a fan of the series you’ll probably still wanna check it out.
Or get the audiobook at Audible
Wild Things Foursome is the third sequel to the movie Wild Things (Blu-ray), which was followed by the straight to video sequels Wild Things 2 and Wild Things – Diamonds in the Rough. This 3rd sequel is directed by Andy Hurst (Diary of a Serial Killer) and written by Howard Zemski & Monty Featherstone (Hammerhead: Shark Frenzy). The eye candy here is mostly provided by Jillian Murray (Fifty Pills) and Marnette Patterson (various tv guest spots, Stormship Troopers 3). The male eye candy is provided by the effeminately named Ashley Parker Angel (Apparently from a boyband named O-Town).
The plot is pretty all over the place but basically it involves a cop investigating a rich guy’s murder and it seems like everyone is in on it, including his son and his girlfriend. Click on more for the trailer.
When this post goes live LOST will be over. I’m writing this the night before and do not know what happens in the finale, but whatever happens I can honestly say I’m pretty sure I’m going to enjoy it. Because you see a show is not merely it’s ending, especially this show. Showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have been saying for a long time now that people are putting too much stock into a single episode and not thinking of the big picture. Of course everything isn’t going to be tied up with a nice tidy bow on top. It’s going to be open to interpretation and argument and the world will keep going. We just won’t be privy to what these character’s lives are anymore.
But the end of LOST is about more than the show itself. It’s a goodbye to an era of television. We had a brief period where television became much more than what used to be thought of as television. Over the past few years we had new types of shows that actually let and made the audience think, shows such as LOST or The Wire or the new Battlestar Galactica that played out like novels more than series. They were movies except they aired weekly for free (kinda). Before LOST was playing with pushing the medium forward there were shows like The West Wing, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, & Arrested Development (just to name a few) playing with just what television could accomplish by pushing their productions, budgets, and networks to the limits with stunning results. Even one of LOST’s creators, J.J. Abrams was doing the wonderful Alias.
And then we get into other things that we’re losing with LOST. TV is not doing so well these days. With the internet and a billion channels TV is more and more becoming less profitable. It’s very unlikely we’ll ever see a show done like LOST ever again. It’s shot on film, scored by an orchestra, employs 2 complete full time crews as well as smaller 2nd units, dozens of actors, one of the best writing staffs on television (perhaps only 2nd to that previously on Buffy, all of whom are still hot writers), and a very large post-production crew. Even if you don’t understand why a lot of that stuff is so rare, at least take away this very important piece of information: after LOST and fellow play by it’s own rules show 24 (which should have gone out on a high several seasons ago but ends Monday in the shadow of LOST) there are now very few things on TV that are actually shot on film. Everything is HD now. Is this good? In some ways HD is great, but for me you can never replace good old film. HD will never look as good.
But we’ll get back to the state of television in general in a moment, let us now actually discuss LOST. From the very first moments of the pilot you knew you were seeing something special. It felt like a movie, not like an episodic television show. Then as that first season played out and we discovered everyone’s amazing backstory and fell in love with these characters it became crystal clear that there was never anything like this. This was a character study that happened to fall into a genre show. The show always has been about the characters, not the island, not the mysteries, the characters. The moments we lived and died with all involved us sharing a connection to these people. A con man, a fugitive, a former Iraqi soldier, a doctor, a lottery winner, a rock star, a Korean couple who only spoke their native language, a pregnant woman, a brother & sister with an odd relationship, and a wheelchair bound man who no longer needed a wheelchair. Later we of course lost some of these and gained many others. We got incredible characters like Ben, Juliet, and Desmond and got to learn all about their lives. And in between learning about these people’s pasts and futures and presents we got gunfights, explosions, crazy plot twists, polar bears on a desert island, magnets, hatches, planes full of heroin, ships filled with dynamite, mysterious beings, ghosts, smoke monsters and time travel. And to top it all off everything was surrounded by wonderful visuals and a score that is so good they can perform it live and it will instantly evoke the emotions you felt when you saw the scene it was originally in. If you’ve never watched LOST on a big ass HDTV, I suggest getting yourself a Blu-ray player and experiencing this show in full HD. It’s beauty is astounding.
Beyond what was on the screen, the producers used the show to educate as well as entertain. Certainly the vast multiculturalism of the island is one thing, and having an ex torturer in the Iraqi republican guard being a hero was great and hopefully taught at least one young person some tolerance, but there was so much more. The show explored real science and history and encouraged viewers to learn more about these topics on their own, last years release of Lost University on the Season 5 Blu-ray (a feature that will be on the Season 6 Blu-ray as well) helped out with this with not only actual lessons about themes and ideas on the show and the real life things behind them, but pointers to actual books to read for more information. While this could help with enjoyment of the show it was totally unnecessary, but education, especially optional education is never a bad thing and if the producers managed to get you interested in a topic you may not have ever delved deeper into then isn’t that something to be applauded? Then there’s literature. They set up a LOST book club and frequently put characters reading books the producers were personal fans of that might have similar themes to LOST, or even were just influences, or just great books, into the show and tons of people would go out and read these books. Reading is fundamental. And just getting people to read classic literature is an achievement on its own.
So LOST I salute you and look forward to the finale with equal parts excitement and sadness. But let’s look to the future. Although there are some good shows on TV right now, I’d argue that the number of great shows is pretty slim (some people would argue Mad Men or Breaking Bad, I’ve yet to get into either of those but I do see merits in these arguments and it’s too early to say if Treme will be great as well). This is why I mourn the passing of a golden age. I don’t want any more reality or procedurals. I don’t need to be able to jump into a show at a random episode, I need art. Art that will inspire me, move me, and entertain at the same time. Give me comedy that rises above the lowest common denominator (there are admittedly a bunch of shows doing this, like this year’s breakout Community and of course 30 Rock), give me drama that makes me think, care, love, hate, and explore. There will never be another LOST, although they keep trying to come up with one, but I hope that right at this very moment a possibly unknown writer is turning off the finale and sitting down at their computer, inspired, and typing what will be the next truly great show.
Goodbye Lost, you will be missed.
Lost The Complete Collection comes to dvd and Blu-ray on August 24th. Buy it now on Amazon:
Wow, so tonight was the last show of Media Decay’s Pearl Jam week, and also the last show of this leg of Pearl Jam’s tour. It was the second night at New York’s famous Madison Square Garden, and revered home of some legendary Pearl Jam performances. This show in particular sold out incredibly fast and tickets were almost impossible to get. Everyone wanted to be there. Everyone was hoping for something spectacular. And the band delivered. They not only delivered a super energetic 2 hour 40 minute set, but they delivered a crazy setlist and even a “new” song (more on that a little later). Perhaps the best part was that thanks to my fan club membership and a worked out trade with another fan club member, I found myself sitting in the 11th row center for this amazing show.
I’ve just returned home from the second show of Media Decay’s Pearl Jam week. Tonight was the first of a 2 night run at Madison Square Garden. Pearl Jam has played some legendary shows at the Garden and is best known for the show they eventually wound up releasing as a dvd
Well it’s the first show of Pearl Jam week here at Media Decay and we’re kicking it off in Newark, NJ. This was a sort of last minute show. It was announced after the rest of the tour and went on sale several weeks after the rest of the tour as well. Eddie Vedder mentioned at one point that this show almost didn’t happen but they were glad it did. Anyway there was some trepidation going into this show. Last night in Boston the band put on an incredible show (and also had incredible one off t-shirts made to look like Red Sox shirts, Newark got the shirt above, hopefully they’ll pull out something awesome for NYC) so a lot of the hardcores were worried this show wouldn’t be as great. We’ll I wasn’t at the Boston show so I can’t speak to anything but the setlist, but the band certainly didn’t let it show they’d just done an epic show the night before.
Dirty Deeds (aka Dirtier Deeds) is a 2005 movie written by Jon Land & Jonathan Thies and directed by David Kendall (Boy Meets World). The plot is fairly simple. The night before homecoming at their high school there is a tradition of “Dirty Deeds”. These are 10 dares/tasks that must be completed in 12 hours and have been passed down from generation to generation. No one has attempted them in many years and everyone to ever attempt has failed, except for one person who has since disappeared. So a kid who is sick of being bullied by the football team volunteers to try the deeds. His sister Meg (Lacey Chabert) is very against this though so she asks her friend Zach(Milo Ventimiglia) if he can do anything to save him. Zach has a crush on Meg so he volunteers for the deeds instead and since he’s a senior and the other boy only a freshman he gets preference. Trailer below.
Pretty Persuasion is a dark comedy written by Skander Halim and directed by Marcos Siega (Veronica Mars, The Vampire Diaries). It’s about a group of girls at an upscale private school (Evan Rachel Wood, Adi Schnall, Elisabeth Harnois) who accuse their teacher (Ron Livingston) of abusing them. But the leader of the group might have a secret plan in store. Rounding out the cast is James Woods as Evan Rachel Wood’s character’s coked up father, Selma Blair as the teacher’s wife, and Jane Krakowski as a lesbian local news reporter who is breaking the story. Check out the trailer below.
Pearl Jam is one of my favorite bands of all time and they’re great in concert as you can tell from the last Great Concerts post. This week they’re playing NYC and I’ll be there. So this week I’ll be seeing them 3 times in 4 days and re-counting every show right here on this site. So happy Pearl Jam week on Media Decay.
PS one of the main computers I use for material for this site died on me and is in the process of being replaced so a few planned articles have been held up, like our next Great Concerts posting that’s way overdue.
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