I’m a huge fan of the “Harry Potter” books. I believe J.K. Rowling deserved every penny she earned from them. They are, simply put, wonderful. They tie into each other and “pay off” completely and are utterly and wholly satisfying.

I also really enjoy the “Harry Potter” movies. The characters are great. The stories are great. And they did a fantastic job at “boiling down” what needed to be put on screen to make them work in movie form. That being said I believe television, not film, would be a much better medium to translate the books into.

Films which are based on books are always going to be lacking. Partly because they are made to be watched and not read. So you can’t do things like “listen” to what people think. Or easily show translated timelines and different points of view simultaneously. While television has a lot of the same limitations you’re not limited by the most massive one — actual time.

A film can be, at most, 3 hours. Any longer than that you have to break it into multiple films. And breaking it into too many over too long a time period you risk losing your audience. Television works differently. You can get people who instantly commit but you can also have people “jump in” later on and catch up. You can spend actual years telling stories and developing characters and even teaching the audience to “read” the way you’re choosing to tell the story. The use of actual time in “24“, the “different points of view” used in “LOST“, or the way things are “misrepresented” on purpose in the telling of the story on “How I Met Your Mother” are all good examples of that sort of audience teaching technique. People are much more easily accepting of it. That’s why I believe a network like AMC or HBO should tackle “Harry Potter”.

Imagine having a vetted network like AMC take on a project like this. Imagine being able to spend one whole episode — or more — on one chapter of one book! Being able to have episodes that retell and retell a chapter, or parts of a chapter. Seasons that loop back and show things from different points of view. It could all work on a television series. They could literally (and I literally mean literally) take every line of every book and move it to television.

Obviously it would be a massive commitment. Getting actors who would be willing to sign on for this sort of run would probably be one of the least of the worries. Mapping it out so things were filmed while actors were young that might not be shown until much later seasons would be logistically daunting. But… just imagine if someone would take it on. Imagine what an amazing series this could be.

It would be… well… magical.

At first the show seemed a bit like it was trying to be too funny. But after two or three episodes we realized that’s part of its charm. Giles and Sue have a great chemistry and it’s simply a fun show. But, it gave me an idea…

I think the “Supersizers Go” should make a new series where they spend one week eating like characters from fantasy and mythical stories!

Imagine spending a week eating like Hobbits — 2nd breakfast and elevensies!

They could enter the realm of the Game of Thrones; travel the high seas as Pirates of the Caribbean; dine on Terry Pratchett’s Disc World and so on and so on.

The Star Trek universe alone could comprise an entire series; Klingons, Ferengi, Vulcans.

What about eating like the professors of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?

With the amount of science-fiction and fantasy lore with well documented eating and food habits I would think it’d be a relatively easy thing to do. And what an amazingly fun series THAT would be to watch!

So… Giles, Sue, BBC… feel free to steal this idea and use it.

(Just let me be a guest in at least one episode… Ferengi… Hogwarts… whatever. I’m not picky.)

The cast, characters, costumes, quotes, sets, make-up, props, storyline, writing, directing, and special effects all came together perfectly in the first “MiB” film. It took a premise which had been obscure folklore and turned it into a blockbuster. The chemistry between Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones was canned brilliance. It literally, and ironically, revealed a world most people didn’t know existed. A world of aliens, gadgets, dry wit and science fiction genius. It was the first movie I remember seeing with my dad that he didn’t fall asleep in… at all!

So, when “Men in Black 2″ was announced fans were skeptical. Sequels are not, historically, Hollywood’s best product. And, while the film was very good — especially for a sequel — it was arguably missing some of the “je ne sais pas” that was captured in the first film. For fans, however, that was okay. Making a subsequent film that is better than its original is next to impossible and no one expected it to be.

Time jump 10 years ahead and here comes “Men in Black 3.”

All fans — me very much included — know that a 3rd film in a franchise is usually like cloning a clone. Unless you’re talking about the exception or a series which was written as multiple parts in the first place, you’re probably going to end up with something that looks a lot like the original but really calls everyone “Steve.” It’s just… not… going… to… work. So fans were worried we were going to get a sub-par film that missed on most levels.

We were wrong.

On May 25th, 2012 “Men in Black 3″ neuralyzed every worry we might have had.

Seriously, I can’t say enough good about this film. The chemistry between Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith was, again, perfect. Josh Brolin did more than stellar as the young Agent K. The villain gave Edgar a run for his sugar-water. And the story was brimming over with everything that made the first “Men in Black” the amazing film that it was.

I’m not going to say more about it here so as not to spoil it for those who haven’t seen it. But I will say that I actually believe this Men in Black was better than the first Men in Black… the only caveat to that is that the first Men in Black had to be the first one so that this one could be the third one.

Unless… of course… this is the one where I don’t have a coffee after publishing this post…

I first downloaded it on my iPhone and went through a lesson on greetings. I was instantly loving it. The trick with learning Arabic is I had to make sure everything was/is in the dialect I was learning — in my case Egyptian. With German I’ve a lot more freedom to look for, find, and use many more products and, even though I’ve barely started in with it, Babbel is quickly hitting the top of my list of awesome language learning tools!

There are a few things I like about Babbel right off the bat.

First of all its interface, both online and on the iPhone, is very clean and user friendly. It uses the same sort of approach (not exactly the same) as Rosetta Stone where you hear the words and associate them with pictures.  This is also good because you actually learn to read and “write” (i.e. type) the language at the same time.

Secondly the things Babbel is teaching me are — right out of the gate — more useful than Pimsleur or Rosetta Stone. They skip the entire “do you speak English?” phrases of Pimsleur’s first lessons — because if they do you don’t need to know how to ask it in their language — and also move well past the “horse,” “boy,” “two boys” baby-style vocabulary of Rosetta Stone putting you right into the real, usable conversational German of greetings and meetings.

Third, Babbel is right up front with what is formal and informal. Within the first lesson you’re learning the “colloquial” ways to say “hello” as well as the “proper” ways. Both Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone start with formal and move you to informal over time. Learning it up front seems so much nicer to me.

Finally, what I learned with Babbel thus far — and as I’m writing this “review” I’m talking about having used it for less than two hours total — has stuck with me to a degree that I’m sort of shocked about.  Pimsleur is great at long term memory too but it does take a few days of listening to the courses before you get in a “groove” and if you miss many days in a row I tend to forget.

Babbel has something really good going for it and I’d love to hear other’s stories who have learned German using Babbel.

If you’re looking to learn a language and Babbel has it available then click here to get a free week of their courses!

This is my two little girls with our family puppet, Murf. They love playing “train” together with him. I put my iMac on the floor by the cabinets, remove the drawers above-head, turn off all the lights and load up a POV Train video from YouTube. This is literally one of their favorite things to do.

Here’s our favorite YouTube video to use for the train ride…

You can learn more about Murf here.

I know (or knew) little-to-nothing of the “Judge Dredd” character. I saw the “older” movie when it came out (though couldn’t remember much of it at all) and have some friends who are and were putting together some great “Dredd” costumes — because his helmet/badge/etc. ARE really cool — but, as far as the story, I doubt I could’ve told you much beyond the facts of “it’s set in a post apocalyptic future when the cops are ‘judges’ who have the right to act as officer, judge, jury and if needed executioner” that are revealed through the previews.

The story is, simply that. To give a bit more (without giving spoilers) Dredd takes on a “rookie” and they get locked into a massive apartment complex (basically a micro-city located within one of the few “Mega-Cities” left in the world) and have to stay alive until reinforcements arrive… all while dispensing justice and preforming their duties.

That’s the basics… and that’s about what I expected from the film and the story. I’m not sure what other people who thought the movie was horrible were expecting, but it delivered on everything I thought it would. The visuals were great. The “droning” sound effect/music was really perfectly depressing, and the gore — which many people complained about — was actually very comic-book like and worked well in the film I thought. (There was never a part that “disturbed” me or made me want to look away… even though it was, in deed, gorey in parts!)

The film was good enough I’ll probably watch it again, it made me “daydream” of having a “Judge Dredd” costume (always a good sign) and it made me want to Google the character and learn more about him. Those things, in my judgement, make a good film.

A couple of weeks ago I quit Facebook for just over two weeks.  It was right after something big had happened in the news and everyone was doing the “I’m right… look at THIS meme!”… “No, I’m right! Look at THIS meme!!” thing and I got tired of it. Plus it was right around Christmas and I was going to be traveling with my wife and girls to see my family and friends “back home” so I thought, “Why not just sign off until the new year and let it be.”

Man… that was tough!

The first couple of days it was all I could do not to take my iPhone off my hip at random places and see what everyone was saying and doing. But… after a few days I wasn’t missing it as much… and after the two weeks, when I finally signed back on, it was a slight consideration not to do it at all and just to let it go. But it was the idea that people would be “wondering” about me that made stay.

That’s been just over one week. Two weeks off, one week on, and already I feel ready to leave again.

My reasons fit in a LOT with the reasons that “TechSavvyButterfly” list on her blog post. Things like spending more REAL time with friends and family. Staying connected in real ways — I love her story about listening to her friend’s conversation over lunch and getting to see and hear her reactions. My reasons also include many of the things you can find on blog after blog from people who have done it already.

The main thing is I think Facebook is going to be gone “soon” anyway. Couple with that an overwhelming sense of freedom at the consideration of leaving and it’s almost a no-brainer to me to do it.

The truth is I’ve been “leaving” Facebook for a while now. A couple of months ago I “purged” my friends list. Keeping 764 friends after deleting 1,744 others. Instantly the “re-friending” began again. And since I’ve been consistently been un-friending and even blocking people at almost random — “Oh… I don’t like that… *unfriend*…”  ”Oh… no, that’s silly… *block*…”  I’ll freely admit it’s kind of ludicrous and I’ve actually heard (2nd hand) that some people have gotten angry with me for it… which is also, I believe, ludicrous. But it shows what Facebook has ALREADY become to me.  It’s more of a waste of time than anything else anymore. A way to prove to myself that I’m funny… or “liked”… or whatever. Stuff I get PLENTY of from my wife, children and friends that are around me anyway!

Understand… I’m still considering it as I write this. In fact, I’m writing this partly to post a link to it ON Facebook and thus give my friends a “heads up” about it.

There are a lot of friends I’ve met via facebook that I’ve never met in person and whom I really would hope — should I leave — that they would continue to keep in touch. That may mean an email a year. Or a phone call if they’re in my city. But it would be that REAL interaction instead of the pseudo-interactions and relationships that Facebook provides.

Of course there are other “downsides” to leaving. Giving up administration of pages I help on is one… but, honestly, that’s not something that

So… we shall see…

“Arrow” (a more obvious choice) is fantastic. “The Vampire Diaries” is wonderful. And “Gossip Girl” is up in my favorite shows of the last ten years — especially after the finale!!!  So, when they announced they were going to begin airing “The Carrie Diaries” — a show based on one of my other all time favorite shows, HBO’s “Sex and the City” (yet another series I doubt I was in the demographic for) — I couldn’t wait! Needless to say Celeste and I have high hopes for this series but if The CW does as well with it as it has its other series I believe we’re in for another great show with a long, satisfying run.

There are a few things, however, that I’m really hoping for in the show… especially for the ending of the series. Thinking this may be a few years, if not more, away I thought, “Why not post about them NOW?” — you know, before the show even starts. Then, when the time comes for the finale of “The Carrie Diaries“ this post will be easily findable by The CW execs and writers and yet old enough that they can easily “steal” the idea and no one will be like, “AH! They stole that idea from that dude on the internet!” Or, if people remember the post or are finding it “then” (is that now?) they’ll just say, “Wow! How cool they used this great idea. I love “The Carrie Diaries” and The CW. I think I’ll send them a bunch of money.”  Right?

So, that’s my thinking in posting this now… my idea is simple, and surely not original, but let me say a couple of other things about my hopes for the show first…

Obviously Carrie can’t have the same friends. Miranda, Samantha, and Charlotte never mentioned knowing her or meeting her in high school. With that obvious connection aside my hope is that they put in lots of “Easter eggs” for fans of ”Sex and the City.”  Things like how Carrie got into writing, what she thinks of computers, what her dreams of life are/were. We’ve been re-watching ”Sex and the City” all the way through again the past few weeks and have caught a couple of references to high school that Carrie makes… with each one I’ve said to Celeste, “I wonder if they’ll reference that in ”The Carrie Diaries?” So there is plenty of things that they can do that would make fans of “the original” show laugh and love “the new show” even more. Which brings me to my finale idea.

I believe in the final episode of the final season of ”The Carrie Diaries” Carrie should “run into” Mr. Big.

Of course she won’t know it’s him. In fact most of the audience might not realize it — until the wave of internet buzz and “spoilers” hits.

Have her bump into an “older boy” somewhere. Get an actor that resembles a young Chris Noth and have some flirtation between him and her go on. Maybe the show has been seeming to end on a “down note”… with a bad break-up from someone Carrie had been with for a long time. Maybe she’s reminiscing about it in her narration and postulating on the future. Then she bumps into “Mr. Big.”  They flirt. She smiles. He introduces himself as “John” and calls her “Kid.” She makes some comment about, “… then again, maybe you can’t know what the future holds. And maybe, it’s brighter than you could ever guess.”

The End

Watching a show that takes place at one table, in one diner, with one main character may seem boring but ”The Booth at the End” is anything but. In fact this simplicity that works to the series’ advantage. The lack of special effects, elaborate settings, and even “flashbacks” showing what people are talking about keeps the show grounded and real. It makes it about the acting and in turn about the story.

The series also keeps things simple in terms of set up. There is one premise to the show… and they have stuck with that premise throughout. I think that it’s too easy to want to try and “fix” a good thing and usually it ends up breaking it. I see this again and again on series where they set up “rules” — what is possible, who’s good, what are characters like — and then end up feeling it necessary to “explain” things which really don’t need explaining. If the rule is “this man can do this” and it’s a given then you don’t need to explain HOW he does it later on. ”The Booth at the End” has done a masterful job of not trying to fix things that aren’t broken. It set up the rules and now it’s simply continuing to play by those rules.

The simplicity and keeping its own rules are great but without a compelling story ”The Booth at the End” would still be boring. It is, in fact, the story that makes the show so brilliant.

I’ll admit I’m a sucker for human nature — sometimes I wonder if I should’ve been an anthropologist. Stories really get me when they examine human nature. Motivations. Desires. Ideas. Dreams. Language. ”The Booth at the End” has successfully hit on ALL things like the human ability to be causative; our idea of what happiness is; what we believe is right and wrong; how we define terms. It looks at each “case” honestly and sometimes the characters get what they thought they wanted, sometimes they get what they want — which is also what they thought they wanted, sometimes they get what they need, sometimes they don’t, and so on and so on. Each “case” is full of good fodder for conversation and Celeste and I find ourselves pausing the show often to talk about what’s going on.

Thanks to our good friend Chris Taylor for recommending the series to us… and to HULU for making it!

Talk on the internet is that it won’t be picked up… but personally I hope it is.

First off, I believe Bryan Fuller is a genius. “Dead Like Me” and (especially) “Pushing Daisies” were brilliant shows. “Pushing Daisies” was a satisfying show from beginning to end!

Secondly, I love, love, love the original “The Munsters.” I still watch it on DVD (I own them all) to this day. My girl’s (3 and 1) know the theme song. The theme song is my alarm clock. I costumed as Herman one year — and my wife as Lilly — for our Halloween party. So I am a fan. And when I heard they were thinking of “re-imagining” the show I probably groaned louder than anyone else. My groan subsided a bit when I heard who was writing and producing it. A bit more when I saw the cast. And now… I can honestly say… my groans are gone and I am a fan.

The thing is you can’t remake “The Munsters.” It was perfect. The time, cast, sets, make-up, costumes, writing, guest stars, everything… all perfect. Can’t be remade. So no need to try and improve on it. No need to try and fix it. No need to try and do anything to it at all. The only thing you could, possibly, do is to “re-tell” it. And that is what NBC and Bryan Fuller have done with “Mockingbird Lane.” The names are the same. The house is the same (pretty much). The music is the same; thank you everyone who did that! But, the things that should’ve changed did.

Here are the things I believe they did right…

1. “The Munsters” was a comedy, in every sense of the word. It was slap stick and prat falls. It was vaudevillian in many regards. “Mockingbird Lane” is funny… but it’s more like how “Fargo” is funny. Or, better yet, like “Pushing Daisies” and “Dead Like Me” are funny. It’s not REALLY a “comedy.” Well done!
2. “The Munsters” thought of themselves as “normal” for the most part. Everyone else was weird. Because of this they had two worlds — one where everyone was scared of them because they were freakish monsters and they couldn’t figure people’s reactions and the other where they held jobs, went to school, and had friends who (somehow) missed the reaction that the first group had. It worked because it wasn’t supposed to be “plausible” anyway. “Mockingbird Lane” has made the entire family “look” pretty normal. So they can have the life of school, work, etc. It has also made sure that the Munsters know very well who (or what) they are. They don’t “hide” it in the show in the slightest. Vampires, werewolf, Frankenstein monster. No joking around. YES! Well done!
3. As I mentioned above “Mockingbird Lane” kept the things they NEEDED to keep to make it a true re-imagining. If you’re going to tell me the story of Superman but give it your own “twist,” great! I’ll listen. But it better have a guy named “Clark Kent” who changes into Superman. In other words you can’t mess with “the core.”  ”Mockingbird Lane” didn’t mess with the “core.”  Well done!

So… will it last? Not sure. I hope so! In a world of entertainment overrun with reality shows and teens dating “vampires” (in quotes on purpose) I would love for there to be a good monster (sorry… MUNSTER!) show on the air!  But, I know that just because it’s a “good show” that doesn’t mean it will last *cough*cough*firefly*cough*…

Here are two things I think they could do to make it last…

1. Have celebrity guest stars… like “Tales from the Crypt” and “The Twilight Zone” did. Let Grandpa kill (or something) a different celebrity every week. I think this would be a great addition to the show. Give people something to talk about… “Hey, did you see So & So on ‘Mockingbird Lane’ last night?!”
2. Make it political! I don’t mean jokes about elections, I mean do with it what shows like “Star Trek” and (again) “The Twilight Zone” did. Turn the episodes into water-cooler talking pieces. Twists on morals. Or morals with a twist. That is, after all, what shows like “The Walking Dead,” are doing — not to mention reality shows. Again, give people something to talk about… “So… what did you think about what the Munsters did on ‘Mockingbird Lane’ last night?”

I really, really hope this show lasts. I’ve read a lot of good reviews on it and also read some (well written) bad reviews on it. But I hope NBC gives it a chance.

Is it a good remake of “The Munsters?”  No. It doesn’t claim to be.
Is it a re-imagining of “The Munsters?” YES! It’s a wonderful telling of a favorite part of American folklore.