All hail and praise unto Victoria Groce! She was the champion of the Jeopardy! Invitational Tournament! Her victory also meant that the interminable "tournaments" of this season were finally over.
On Wednesday, we were back for the first time in 10 months to regular Jeopardy with a returning champion and two new contestants. And lo, there was much rejoicing.
Even though the game was a bit of a snooze.
There's just no pleasing me, is there?
On to the Touchbase!
This week I'm going to write about Invincible.
If you're thinking, "Oh just what the world needs! Another movie or TV show based on a comic book super hero!", this show is a counter argument to the phenomenon of "super hero fatigue".
The story of Mark Grayson as he grapples with the responsibilities of young adulthood and his role as super powered hero Invincible makes for compelling viewing. Trying to make something of being a college student and having a steady girlfriend (Amber) is in conflict with his role as Invincible.
Halfway through season 2, Mark is stuck on the planet Thraxa for months. Back on Earth, that is a long time for Amber and his friend & roommate William to cover for him.
And there's the shit that went down on Thraxa. This is where Mark's father Nolan (Omni-Man) wound up after leaving Earth in season 1. Having failed the Viltrumites in conquering Earth like he was supposed to and not subjugating Thraxa either, Nolan is in the crosshairs of an invading Viltrumite force to collect Nolan and make him pay for his crimes of NOT enslaving other races.
Messed up bunch, these Viltrumites.
Nolan has also settled down with a Thraxian female and produced a son.
Say hello to Oliver, Mark's half-brother.
The Viltrumites show up, blow up a bunch of Thraxa 'cause they're in the neighborhood and beat the unholy shit out of Nolan and Mark. As they drag Nolan away to meet this fate (death), they give Mark a parting instruction:
Finish what Mark's dad was suppose to do and conquer Earth already. Or else.
Because Oliver is not safe on Thraxa, Mark takes his baby brother home to Earth. Gee, wonder how his mom will take this development?
"Hey, Mom! Remember how you and I thought Dad was a super hero but he's really a planet conquering super villain? Well, funny thing about that. Oh, this purple baby? Yeah, Dad had sex with a purple alien insectoid and this is my step brother. Whoa! Mom, you should pour yourself a glass of wine and not drink from the whole bottle."
Don't let the clean lines and bright colors of the animation fool you. This show can get gruesomely ugly. Just like in The Boys, we see the consequences in Invincible when super strong fists punch all too human flesh: people 'SPLODE!
When super powered people punch super powered people, those results are not pretty either.
One thing about the animation. The artists take time to shade around the crotch to provide some realism to suggest the folds of trousers or shorts. The effect is everyone looks like they peed themselves. Or that could just be me. I'm weird.
Back to the story...
Despite everything, Debbie throws herself into the role of being a mom to Oliver. Thraxians age faster than humans so Oliver has quickly moved from infant to toddler. But their unusual but idyllic life is upturned when Angstrom Levy shows up to use Mark's mom and brother as leverage for his revenge on Invincible.
Levy has the power to warp through space and time and has seen a multiverse where on every single Earth, Mark Grayson has taken up his father's work to subjugate and terrorize the population of Earth.
Angstrom Levy decides Invincible has to die. Even though he's the one version of Mark Grayson who is determined NOT to follow Nolan's path.
After terrorizing and torturing Debbie, Mark finally has enough and beats the living hell out of Angstrom Levy until he is a puddle of goo.
And now, Mark is worried he is on the path of turning into his father.
And that is not all the shit that's going down on this series. Atom Eve, Rex Plode, the rest of the Guardians of the Globe, Cecil Stedman and his Global Defense Agency (GDA), hostile alien squids from Mars and yes, the Viltrumites are still coming.
There's a hell of a lot to explore in season 3. I hope the producers don't make us wait as long as they did for season 2.
A lot of what makes this show work is the voice work with Steven Yeun (Mark) Sandra Oh (Debbie), J. K. Simmons (Nolan) and Walton Goggins (Cecil) delivering dramatic but natural sounding performances.
Invincible kicks all sorts of ass. It's the comic book super hero TV show that both delivers on AND defies the expectations you might have for such a show.
Before I wrap up this week's Touchbase, some Star Trek news:
Today is Monday, April 15th.
Which is tax day.
I did my taxes a few weeks ago.
I owed money to both federal and state.
I know paying taxes is a civic responsibility to help to pay for things that benefit society at large like paying teachers, fire fighters, fixing roads and bridges and so forth.
It still burns me up that I pay more in taxes than billionaires like Jeff Bezos.
Also every since the Republican party (whose mantra is always "Cut taxes! Cut taxes! Cut taxes!") has been in control of the North Carolina state legislature, I owe MORE money for state taxes. Gee (really going hard for sarcasm here), I wonder why that is?
Today is also a taxing day for Donald Trump.
He's going to be in court for doing shit.
Could I be more specific?
He's going to be in court for doing fraud shit.
Could I be more specific?
He's going to be in court for doing fraud shit for paying off a porn star he had sex with right after wife Melania had given birth to son Barron.
Doesn't it say something about this motherfucker that we can't just say "Donald Trump is in court" without having to narrow which legal shit he is in court for.
I am not prepared to go into detail about this case. If you really wanna know, click here.
I do know that someone has already spent time in jail for paying off porn star Stormy Daniels: Trump's former lawyer and "fixer" Michael Cohen. In the Cohen case, Trump was identified as a "co-conspirator".
So barring yet another last minute hold up, Trump's trial begins today.
Trump's been running up legal bills having his lawyers file daily briefs to delay the porn star pay off trial. Efforts to stall every other damn thing he's in legal trouble for have worked so why not here?
Nope, not here.
So is Donald Trump finally going to be accountable for doing shit, not through an indictment but through an actual trial?
I will believe it when I see it.
From 1963, it's The Birds.
While watching this with Andrea (look, it was her idea to stick around and watch this with me!), I greeted each bird attack by calling the birds "the BOIDS!!!"
It just got funnier every time!
Loosely based on the 1952 short story of the same name by Daphne du Maurier, the film was also inspired by a real life event that occurred August 18, 1961, a mass bird attack on the seaside town of Capitola in California.
The film opens with the credits (of course) as they pass sans music across a montage of birds (BOIDS!) in shadow and silhouette, flapping across the screen.
Melanie rents a boat in town and crosses the bay to stealthily leave the lovebirds at the Brenner farm. While returning by boat across the bay, Melanie is attacked....
By a BOID!
Now we're getting somewhere!!!
It's a seagull, flapping it's wings furiously, clawing and pecking at the hapless Melanie in her boat, gashing her forehead. Mitch witnesses the attack, helps Melanie to get her wound treated.
Boy that bird attack was weird, huh?
Mitch invites Melanie to dinner to meet his sister and mother, Lydia, who has a problem with Melanie's socialite reputation (she reads the newspapers). Lydia also has a problem....
With BOIDS!!
Her hens are all in a tizzy and on a hunger strike, refusing to eat their feed.
Melanie spends the night with Annie (No, it's not like THAT... but it feels like it could be?) so she can stick around Bodega Bay another day for Cathy's birthday party.
It's quite a lovely party with cake, ice cream and....
The BOIDS!!!
Yep, there's screams and terror as Cathy's nice little birthday party is attack by seagulls!
What the hell?
That night at dinner at the Brenner farm, Melanie, Mitch, Cathy and Lydia have to contend with...
The BOIDS!!!!
A god damn flock of sparrows rush in through the chimney and ATTACK!!!!!
Melanie should get in her car and drive back to San Francisco but NO! She sticks around another day.
Hitchcock sets up this really cool scene. Back in town near the school, Melanie is sitting on a bench with a playground behind her. The short is framed with Melanie in the foreground and just over her shoulder you can see some monkey bars.
A bird lands. Followed by another. The another. Melanie needs to turn around and see the bird are starting to gather.
Then Hitchcock zooms out and we see the entire playground is just covered in a ton of birds.
BOIDS!!
The school where Annie teaches is attacked....
By BADGERS!!!!
No, dammit! BOIDS!!!!!!
And Annie gets killed. (So she may have been a lesbian?)
Then downtown Bodega Bay is attacked by....
Pandas!!!
Fuck NOI!!!! BOIDS!!!!!!!!
Who cause a gas station to catch fire and explode?!?!?
Melanie joins Mitch, Cathy and Lydia as they barricade themselves into the Brenner home. The birds cannot get in now.
Except....
Mitch missed a spot and Melanie enters a room that is jam packed with....
Balloons!!!
Oh come on! It's BOIDS!!!!!!!!!
And they almost peck and claw poor Melanie to death before Mitch can drag her out of there.
Tippi Hedren (making her movie debut as Melanie) spent a week shooting this scene and it was a traumatizing for the actor as it was for the character.
Come the dawn and Melanie is desperate need of medical help. And the house is still surrounded by lots and lots of bird who are just...
Sitting there.
Menacingly.
Slowly, step by tentative step, the foursome make their way to Mitch's car and they drive away, the assembled masses of bird just watching them as we reach...
The End!
...
The end?
What the hell???
Wait! What was the deal with the birds? Why were the birds attacking? Why did the birds not attack at the end???
Alfred Hitchcock hears your questions and is slowly counting the fucks he gives about them.
Zero. The number of fucks he gives about answers is zero.
In fact, that scamp Alfred did not want to include a "The End" title card at the end, just have the cast drive off, fade to black and leave the audience wondering, "Is that it?"
The studio made Hitchcock put in a "The End" title card.
What the studio did not make the director put in the film was a reason for the bird attacks.
Screenwriter Evan Hunter had proposed some foundational ideas such as the townspeople having a guilty secret to hide with the birds an instrument of punishment. Hitchcock wanted to up the ante on the horror of the bird attacks by keeping the reasons for the attacks ambiguous. The characters are uneasy knowing the birds could attack at any moment and they don't know why AND the audience is also uneasy, not being privy to any knowledge the characters do not have.
By the way, the film used mostly real birds. Some of the crows were ravens and the seagulls had been gathered from nearby landfills. The sparrow invasion used a combination of wild sparrows and others purchased from a pet shop. About a quarter of a million was spent on making some mechanical birds to fill out the avian cast.
The Birds is a masterful example of suspense and horror in film with Alfred Hitchcock ratcheting up the tension with each successive bird attack. Even if you've seen the movie before, there is still a remarkable sense of tension, pondering when there will next be an attack by...
The BOIDS!!!!
Next week, Cinema Sunday's spotlight on Alfred Hitchcock continues with North By Northwest.
And for this edition of Cinema Saturday, the creature on the loose is a BEAR!
On COCAINE!!!
Yep, it's Cocaine Bear from early last year, a mixture of horror AND comedy directed by Elizabeth Banks.
In 1985, a plane full of cocaine is flying into Georgia.
A whole bunch of shit goes wrong and a whole fuck ton of cocaine falls out of the plane into the Chattahoochee–Oconee National Forest.
A black bear eats some of the cocaine with two results:
And lo, Cocaine Bear is born!!!
OK, so here's the deal. There's a bunch of people wandering around the Chattahoochee–Oconee National Forest.
"Ja, det är bra att vara i Amerika och vandra i sina skogar och... Å NEJ! Varför är den där björnen täckt av vitt pulver? Björnen, den attackerar... ARRRRRRGH!!!"
Oh yeah, and Cocaine Bear!
How much does Cocaine Bear want cocaine?
There's a sequence when one of the kids and the nature expert park ranger have each been chased up a pair of trees. Somehow, a cocaine brick exploded covering the ranger in white powder.
The bear is climbing the tree with the kid when the bear stops, sniffs the air, then focuses like a laser on the hapless ranger in the other tree.
So the bear lets the kid go, drops to the forest floor, zips over to and up the other tree and...
Alas, one dead ranger but one more taste of that sweet, sweet cocaine!
Yes, cocaine!
A lot of people die in this movie.
Some of whom are killed by the bear.
Others are killed by gun fire or incredibly stupid accidents.
Let's just save some time and assume everybody dies.
OK, spoiler: the mom and the two kids do not die.
And a couple of others but let's leave you pleasantly surprised when they make it to the end still alive.
Cocaine Bear is pretty much what you think it will be: funny, scary, gruesome, bizarre, weird and just plain fucking crazy.
It is a great film? No. And it's not for everyone. (For the record, I watched this one on my own without Andrea. When Cocaine Bear rips out a victims of intestines like a string of sausages, I figured I made the right call.)
Weekend Movies' "Creatures on the Loose!" continues tomorrow with a Cinema Sunday post about an Alfred Hitchcock horror classic, The Birds.
Your Friday Video Link is a video featuring one my favorite internet stars, Tiptoe the 175 pound tortoise and his human, Caitlin.
Today's video is Tiptoe's first neighborhood walk of spring.
So we are about 4 weeks out from new episodes of Doctor Who which will premiere on Disney+ on May 10th and on the BBC on May 11th.
That is still a sore point with Whovians in the United Kingdom and although Russell T Davies has commiserated that he doesn't like it either, he has also stated that deference to the streaming platform is not unexpected and that the future of Doctor Who is dependent on a strong relationship with a viable streaming service.
Building up to the debut of new episodes, Andrea and I are rewatching over the coming four weeks the 4 specials that came out in 2023.
Here are the deets we have on the forthcoming episodes with titles, writers and directors.
OK, technically I am in the office. I working at my work-work computer which is within sight of my personal laptop wherein I compose this bl...
