“Sun is shinin’ in the sky, there ain’t a cloud in sight…” Life imitates art as scientists attempt to achieve “therapeutic forgetting”, a.k.a. the focused erasure of memories. Right now, though, they haven’t got much past dulling the edge off old remembrances. “Our experiences and our memories in a lot of ways define us and define who we are,” notes Stanford ethicist David Magnus about the field, “[a]nd so that’s a scary step to go down. We should be very careful about going down a path that could lead to a serious alteration of the core essence of our identities.” Can you hear me? I don’t want this anymore, I want to call it off!
Month: October 2004
Heroine.
If Hero didn’t satisfy your quota for arthouse kung-fu in 2004, the teaser for Zhang Yimou’s House of Flying Daggers is now up, and it looks to be more of the same aesthetic…hopefully, with less jingoism this time around.
Reclaiming Texas.
In “something of a surprise,” the Supreme Court authorizes a three-judge district court to review its earlier decision upholding Tom DeLay’s partisan gerrymandering of Texas. It’s too late for 2004, but perhaps this will bear fruit before 2006, as the Hammer’s other shady dealings come to light.
Undercover Latverian.
Superhero Hype! posts what’s purported to be the first official pic of Victor Von Doom in Fantastic Four, but all I’m seeing is a guy in a suit. Please don’t tell me they’re foregoing the mask…that’d be the worst costuming decision since Willem DeFoe’s static faceplate in Spiderman. Slightly more promising are these new pics from Batman Begins, which include Ken Watanabe as Ras Al Ghul and Tom Wilkinson as a mafioso.
Frellin’ A.
It’s finally here…at 9pm tonight and tomorrow, Sci-Fi will air Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars, the long-awaited and warmly reviewed conclusion to what TV Guide long ago correctly deemed “the best science-fiction series on TV.” Apparently, it’s still fun even if you don’t know the continuity, so come on aboard…there’s lots of room on this here interstellar bandwagon.
If you never saw Blake’s 7, which is ‘Scape‘s immediate ancestor, then here’s the basic gist: Smart-ass, gung-ho astronaut John Crichton (Ben Browder) was inadvertently sent through a wormhole to the far corner of space several years ago, whereupon he fell in with a bunch of rag-tag aliens aboard the living prison ship Moya. For the past four years or so, Crichton has been battling the nefarious Peacekeepers (Think Star Trek‘s Federation gone bad) while falling in love with one of their number, Aeryn Sun (Claudia Black), refining his knowledge of wormhole tech in order to get back home, and annoying all manner of extraterrestrial species with his inveterate pop culture referencing. (He’s already made it back to Earth a few times now…don’t worry, this ain’t Quantum Leap, and the show never takes quite the tack you expect.) In recent seasons, however, Crichton and his band of cranky shipmates have discovered that there’s a much bigger danger lurking in the far regions of space than the Peacekeepers…the reptilian, take-no-guff Scarrans. There’s obviously been a lot of twists and turns along the way, which I highly suggest you check out on DVD, but basically the Moya crew has had to align with some of their most dangerous past enemies (namely, the Scarran half-breed Scorpius) in order to outwit, outfox, and outlast the new Big Bads. Where it goes from here is anyone’s guess…but if you’re a fan of either quality sci-fi or smart, funny, sexy television in general (I’m looking at you, B5’ers, Buffyites, and Whedoniacs), you owe it to yourself to check Farscape out. Update: Brief, spoiler-filled thoughts in the comments.
Start Spreading the News.
“We look back on the past four years with hearts nearly breaking, both for the lives unnecessarily lost and for the opportunities so casually wasted. Time and again, history invited George W. Bush to play a heroic role, and time and again he chose the wrong course. We believe that with John Kerry as president, the nation will do better.” The New York Times endorses John Kerry for President. Not much of a surprise, sure, but still worth reading.
Routh-El?
Has Latino Review unearthed Bryan Singer’s Superman? They believe so, and his name is Brandon Routh. Well, Singer did say he’s looking for an unknown… Update: Routh is confirmed.
Dubya’s Dubious Certainty.
“[Bruce] Bartlett, a 53-year-old columnist and self-described libertarian Republican who has lately been a champion for traditional Republicans concerned about Bush’s governance, went on to say: ‘This is why George W. Bush is so clear-eyed about Al Qaeda and the Islamic fundamentalist enemy. He believes you have to kill them all. They can’t be persuaded, that they’re extremists, driven by a dark vision. He understands them, because he’s just like them…This is why he dispenses with people who confront him with inconvenient facts…He truly believes he’s on a mission from God. Absolute faith like that overwhelms a need for analysis.'” Ron Suskind, co-author of The Price of Loyalty, delves into the sadly myopic halls of Dubya’s faith-based presidency (and attempts to explain why our current Prez can’t distinguish between Sweden and Switzerland…no one in the White House ever openly challenges his ignorance.)
Fear and Loathing at Gitmo.
A NYT report finds mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo is much more widespread than earlier suggested by Rumsfeld and other administration officials. “One regular procedure…was making uncooperative prisoners strip to their underwear, having them sit in a chair while shackled hand and foot to a bolt in the floor, and forcing them to endure strobe lights and screamingly loud rock and rap music played through two close loudspeakers, while the air-conditioning was turned up to maximum levels…Such sessions could last up to 14 hours with breaks.”
More Friendly Fire.
Brent Scowcroft, former National Security Advisor and consigliere to Bush I, decries Dubya’s diplomacy in the Financial Times, calling Iraq a “failed venture” and questioning this administration’s penchant for unilateralism.