Today's AT40

Is May 17th, 1986.  I'm 8 days shy of the (re)discovery that would change my musical life, and the rest of my life in the process, that of the existence of Pink Floyd.  Generally, most of my sophomore year was spent in and out of typical adolescent depressions.  Nothing serious, just the typical moping, pining over unrequited love (girl in my math class - how typical of me), catering into depressing musics in the pop and film score scene.

2 weeks later my eyes were opened, literally, to a much larger world.  Really, I've never had a depression so deep since.  I also started to give up on the pop world and embrace the (new to the market) classic rock scene.  I didn't get a haircut the entire summer!

Yes, Pink Floyd can do that.  I'm not sure how.

This particular one I heard on the road last year, while heading to an MSFB meeting.  Today, I'm home cleaning, so here it is.

Well, the recap of "last week" is
#3 - Greatest Love of All - ick
#2 - Addicted to Love - ok
#1 - West End Girls - Excellent

The countdown at this peak of the 80s sound features other hits by Falco, Tears for Fears, Julian Lennon, INXS, Simple Minds, Simply Red, and much more.  Yeah, a very big week for British and European artists (21, more than American acts).

( On with the countdown... )

Speaking of Pink Floyd, this week had marked the point where Dark Side of the Moon crossed its 12th consecutive year in the album chart (yes, after the album was released and did its first year on the chart, it dropped out per any pop album's lifecycle, but then re-entered and stayed in for an eventual 14 years (741 weeks) straight, rekindled regularly by subsequent releases and the great reforming and tour in '87, plus, of course, being one of the most anticipated CD releases of all time (several times over).  Casey celebrates by playing Money (though the 45 edit, oh well, sorry Dave, but I'll hear your guitar solo in full later).
( Back to the countdown... )

on morning sickness and dead european parrots

Causes of Morning Sickness Revealed | LiveScience:

As irritating as morning sickness may be for pregnant women, it may protect embryos.

Doctors have long known that morning sickness — the nausea and vomiting usually experienced in early pregnancy — is actually a good sign of a healthy pregnancy, despite the discomfort it brings.

However, scientists have debated whether morning sickness actually helps pregnancies succeed. It could just be an annoying byproduct of a healthy pregnancy, as pregnant women and their embryos carry out a tug of war over the body's resources.

Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted): Monty Python's Dead Parrot Discovered:

A team of researchers, including a former postdoctoral colleague of mine, recently described fossils from two Lower Eocene parrot-like birds that were discovered in Denmark. The analysis of the fossils reveals that one of the ancient parrots, named Mopsitta tanta, is the largest fossil parrot found so far and it has the most northerly distribution yet known. Further, it resembles modern parrots almost as closely as younger fossils found from the Miocene, making it the earliest modern parrot yet found.

[...]

The new species has been nicknamed the Danish Blue Parrot in honor of the Monty Python "dead parrot" skit where Michael Palin claimed that a newly purchased "Norwegian Blue Parrot" was not "bleedin' demised" as his disgruntled customer asserted, but was simply "shagged out following a prolonged squawk."

This Mopsitta tanta fossil humerus provides support for the hypothesis that modern parrots appeared approximately ten million years after the K/T boundary.

yeah, i still read comics, too. so what?

Neil Gaiman - Neil Gaiman's Journal: not really about anything...:

Had a conversation with Paul Levitz the other day about Gaiman's Law of Superhero Movies, which is: the closer the film is to the look and feel of what people like about the comic, the more successful it is (which is something that Warners tends singularly to miss, and Marvel tends singularly to get right) and the conversation went over to Watchmen, which had Paul explaining to me that the film is obsessive about how close it is to the comic, and me going "But they've changed the costumes. What about Nite Owl?" It'll be interesting to see whether it works or not...

FYI Paul Levitz was a writer for Legion of Super Heroes back in their Keith Giffen peak of the mid 80s (and hired Marv Wolfman and George Perez into the DC comics fold, whom together would create DC's biggest non-Batman hit, The New Teen Titans).

As for strict adherence to the costumes?  X-Men got away with making MAJOR changes to the costumes from the 80s looks most of them had back when Jean was still alive.  Look is only partial - if the feel is right, the look can be updated.  Batman Begins is a clear sign of that on the DC/Warner side; while Batman is his usual self, the batmobile and many other toys were modernized with no problem at all to the audience's perspective.

The real thing for me is the vision and who owns it.  Marvel's film output still comes from Stan Lee, even if he seems 10 stages removed by the time the film is getting made.  It remains influenced as if it was ONE person's vision, especially the successful Spiderman series.  X?  not so much by #3 - the change in directors showed a bit too much.

For DC, that "one person's vision" idea that made the first movies of Superman (Richard Donner) and Batman (Tim Burton) is lost to Warners today.  Every time a writer or director is assigned the project, his vision is diluted by the influences of the "Hollywood" that is Warner today.  Take Kevin Smith's story about the giant fucking spider he was supposed to write into his version of Superman, ordered upon him by some Warner exec who just had an obsession with giant spiders.  When that didn't pan out, that spider showed up anyways, making a mockery of any chance for Wild Wild West to actually feel like the original TV show.  Why?  the same stupid Hollywood exec who simply wouldn't realize his vision sucked.

So too, how many prospective films from the DC canon have all had multiple writers, multiple directors, discarded ideas that still have to be somewhat held on to.  After so much, its an f'in' miracle Batman Begins was so good.  By contrast, Superman Returns walked STRAIGHT into the worst "jump the shark" plotline of all, "lets give them a kid", 'cause now every film after this has to be about the kid and not about Clark/Superman as we know him in the comics.

But Wonder Woman, Flash, how many others on the DC side have been through rewrite after rewrite, fired director after fired director, all 'cause Warner won't leave well enough alone and let the people who KNOW how comics work on film actually get around to doing their job?

Granted, some of that is the fault of the fact that Warner already owns these characters by owning DC, where-as Marvel remains an independent company.  When Marvel licenses to a studio, it is in control and can hold the licensee to nailing the work down to the right attitude and have final editing control.  Captain America's utter failure on screen not-withstanding.

DC as an entity belongs to Warner, and thus the movie weenies have more power than the comics wing when it comes to messing around with the creation.