The Secret To Marriage

I can't believe I let last week go by without mentioning this: last Friday was Andrea and I's 32nd wedding anniversary.

Last year I was chatting with a young man who had just gotten married and he was impressed that Andrea and I had been married for over 30 years.  He asked me what was the secret to our marriage lasting so long.

So I hauled out this old chestnut: "Never go to bed angry."

Then I added this: "I'VE BEEN AWAKE FOR OVER THIRTY YEARS!!"  

The young man laughed and laughed and laughed and then he sold us a new HVAC system for the house.

But seriously, what is the secret to our marriage?

Andrea gave me an anniversary card that I think perfectly encapsulates our long and enduring partnership.

Yeah, that sounds about right.

If you're familiar with this blog, you might've guessed we went to Olive Garden to celebrate our anniversary.

Why?

• Because Olive Garden is Andrea's favorite restaurant.
• I love my wife.
• And I had a free Olive Garden gift card I won at work.

By the way, Andrea's gift to me inside the anniversary greeting card was (you guessed it!) another Olive Garden gift card.

Which I will likely use when her birthday comes 'round next year.

• So we understand each other.
• And we love each other.
• And yes, we annoy each other. 

And that is the secret to marriage. 

And I'm so glad my suffering amuses you. 

Tuesday TV Touchbase: Lanterns

Sunday, the season finale of Lanterns dropped and wow! What a wild ride!

Lanterns has been challenging and I mean that in a good way.

Expectations were set and then defied.

The core mythology of the Green Lantern comics was embraced and then reshaped into something new.

The TV series set a course for somewhere new while twists and turns in the narratives carried us through to a surprising destination.

Who knew that HBO's next Game of Thrones level hit would be based on Green Lantern comic books? 

I want to take a moment to speak in defense of Kyle Chandler as Hal Jordan.  Yes, the concept of Hal could be a struggle to accept as this character was frequently an ornery old often unlikeable sonuvabitch. 

And yet he was also funny, charming even and yes, insightful.  

Hey, comic book nerds complaining Kyle Chandler's NOT the Hal Jordan from your precious comic books, I would assert you weren't paying attention.

Comics Hal could be an arrogant asshole with ring but  a constant fuck up without it.  

As I covered in this post from last month, comics Hal complained to the Guardians that if they didn't stop mucking about with his life, he was gonna quit. Then he whined like a bitch when they let him.  

As for the TV version of Hal being cranky about training John Stewart to be a Green Lantern, you may recall from this same post that comics Hal griped about recruiting John to the GL Corps in Green Lantern#87.

Look, TV Hal may have dialed up his asshole quotient to "11" (twice he abandoned John in a crashing automobile) but Kyle Chandler's take on Hal Jordan was not as far removed from the comics as the fan boys were complaining about.

Here's an adjective I can apply to Kyle Chandler's Hal Jordan that I rarely could apply to comic book Hal: "interesting".

A word also about Aaron Pierre who takes John Stewart on quite journey over the course of the season, from the cold stoic soldier just following orders to an older, wiser and crankier person who has had enough of this shit. I've enjoyed watching Aaron's John Stewart evolve.

So we come to the end of the season? How did the season finale unfold?

We find out Zoey was not the last Manhunter; her grandson Noah is a Manhunter.

But Noah isn't the one who shot Hal Jordan; it was Kerry.

So Halogram (Ring created Hal Jordan hologram) was right about who murdered him!

John Stewart gets his own ring and power battery and lays out the deal with Guy Gardner what's what regarding Green Lanterns on Earth.

Halogram says good-bye! (Forever? We're told it is but yeah, probably not.) 

John Stewart powers up and learns to fly! About damn time! 

And we've reached the end! 

I think I'm happy with the how when where & why things ended up.

So whazzup with season 2?  While the Lanterns production team has assembled a writer's room to plot out season 2 and apparently HBO Max would love to sign off on that, DC Studios has not made known it's intentions on that subject. 

So that is that for this week's Touchbase. 

Next week it's all ABC with Scrubs. Abbott Elementary and Celebrity Wheel Of Fortune.  

Until next time, remember to be good to one another and try to keep it down in there, would ya? I'm trying to watch TV over here.

Other People Have Something To Say

If you read today's earlier post on my thoughts about Christa Pike and the death penalty, well, God bless you and thank you for your sacrifice.

But you might wonder, "Gee! Dave-El, where is your weekly diatribe about whatever fuckery Donald Trump was/is/will be up to?", well, sometimes I need a break and will turn to others to do the heavy lifting.

First up, here's Dave Columbo with his "Week In Trump" to catch you up to speed of the most recent 7 days in hell.

Feeling despair over the god forsaken world that Li'l Donnie has made for us?  Here's Elle Cordova to provide some context and perhaps a glimmer of hope. 

But if the words of other people are not sufficient, let me remind you of the official position of yours truly, Dave-El and I'm So Glad My Suffering Amuses You Inc..

Donald Trump is a  lying, petulant, bullying, unintelligent, sociopathic, dishonorable, treasonous, gutless, moronic, heartless, soulless, slimy, loathsome, vile, incompetent, psychotic, crooked, disgusting, reprehensible, revolting, horrible, malicious, obnoxious, hateful, narcissistic, small-minded, despicable god damn, motherfucking piece of shit!

There! I hope that tides you over for your weekly Trump post.

We're back tomorrow with the Tuesday TV Touch base.

Remember to be good to one another and...

HELL YEAH! BRING ON THE DAMN MIDTERMS! 

The Revenge Business

The topic of today's post is the death penalty.

WARNING:  This post is not going to be fun at all.

This is going to get into some intense stuff.  

The purpose of this post is to try to put into words some semblance of order on my thoughts about the Christa Pike case in particular and the general overall idea of the death penalty.

I do not assert any special wisdom or insight.  I'm just one guy with some opinions I want to put down in writing.

_________________________________________

In "Take This Sabbath Day", the 14th episode of the 1st season of The West Wing, President Jed Bartlett is facing a decision, to commute the death sentence of Simon Cruz, a drug trafficker who murdered two drug kingpins.

President Bartlet asks a visiting Democratic operative named Joey Lucas why she opposes the death penalty.

Joey:  "The state shouldn't kill people."

Bartlett seeks religious advice from Father Cavanaugh who cites Romans 12:19.   

Cavanaugh: '''Vengeance is mine,' sayeth the Lord.' You know what that means? God is the only one who gets to kill people."

But I think it's the counsel Bartlett receives from his young aide, Charlie Young, that has resonated with me the most over the years since I saw this episode.  

Charlie's mother was a police officer who was shot dead in the line of duty.  The president asks Charlie if the person who killed his mother was caught and convicted, wouldn't Charlie want to see the state put that person to death?

Charlie says no.

Charlie: "I wouldn't want to see him executed, I'd wanna do it myself."

I'm not sure if it's made clear why the case of Simon Cruz merits the special dispensation of review by President Bartlett but nonetheless the case is before him and he grapples with it.

Jed Bartlett the man would rather not put this man, any man to death.  

Jed Bartlett the President has to consider the rule of law, the will of the people and I'm sure some other damn 3rd thing and...

The moment passes.

The execution of Simon Cruz is carried out. 

Like a lot of people these days, the subject of the death penalty has been put front and center in my thoughts of late, put there by the drama surrounding the execution of Christa Pike.

And the failure of that execution. 

On September 30th, Christa Pike was strapped to a gurney and given two injections of pentobarbital.  These lethal injections are designed to cause the recipient to become unconscious, stop breathing, and develop a heart arrhythmia, culminating in death.

Witnesses to the execution noted Pike was calm during the procedure but admitted to feeling pain and discomfort in her arm. Then she became unconscious.  

And began snoring.  

The two doses of the drug designed to kill her had failed to do so.

As I write this, Christa Pike is currently in a hospital on a ventilator as the medical staff work to purge the pentobarbital from her system.  

While watching videos and reading stories on this unfolding saga, I have been struck by the uniformity of the comments which can be summarized as this:  Christa Pike is an evil bitch who does not deserve our sympathy and we should not forget what she did to Colleen Slemmer.

Let's discuss what Christa Pike did to Colleen Slemmer.

Caution: this part is very grim and gruesome.  

In 1995,  18 year old Christa Pike and her boyfriend 17 year old Tadaryl Shipp lured 19 year old Colleen Slemmer into the woods. Over the course of 30 minutes, Colleen was tormented and tortured.  A pentagram was carved into her chest while she was still alive. This frenzy of torture ended when Christa smashed Colleen's skull with a large chunk of asphalt, the resulting brain injury leading slowly but inevitably to Colleen's death.

No one should suffer and die like Colleen Slemmer did. 

I'm pissed off thinking about this poor young woman suffering such brutality and dying, cold, in pain and abandoned in the woods.

For his role in the murder, Tadaryl Shipp was sentenced to life in prison.  Christa Pike was sentenced to death.  

For what she did to Colleen Slemmer, a merciful death by execution is too good for Christa Pike, that bitch. Forget the state putting her to death,  "I'd wanna do it myself."

Which is a valid emotional response. 

But is it a judicial one?

Do we need to consider what brought 18 year old Christa Pike to the moment in the woods in 1995 with a chunk of asphalt in her hands to bring it down on Colleen Slemmer's skull?

One response is to say "Who cares?" 

• Colleen was murdered.
• Christa killed her.
• Christa needs to pay. 

But should we consider that Christa Pike has been diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder and bipolar disorder? 

Do we need to think about the allegations of physical and sexual abuse Christa Pike endured as a child? 

None of this changes the horrible reality of Colleen's death and the sheer brutality of what she endured.

But weighing the need for justice and holding those accountable who act against the welfare of our citizens, we need to ask, is committing the murder of Christa Pike for her murder of Colleen Slemmer an act of justice or revenge?

"Should the government be in the revenge business?" 

For those who read their Bibles, it bears remembering "Vengeance is mine,' sayeth the Lord."

it does seem to me that a lot of those who read their Bibles are the ones calling the loudest for the ultimate retribution of death for Christa Pike.  

It's a hard business, isn't it?  The needs of a society for accountability of those that would defy the most basic moral tenets of that society need to be balanced with a dispassionate and objective application of the law.  

Did 50 year old Christa Pike deserve to be put to death for an insane act committed by an 18 year old Christa Pike?

But did Colleen Slemmer deserve to not see life beyond age 19, bleeding out on the cold ground in the dark woods?  

What is the dividing line between justice and vengeance?

I'm not going to lie and say that if someone hurt my wife or son, that I would not want the full weight of punishment brought down on that person.  

"Vengeance is mine,' sayeth me!" 

In exchange for someone hurting those I love, would I be satisfied the perpetrator of that harm was sentenced to a roof over their heads with health care and three square meals a day at taxpayer expense? Hell no! I would want that person to die.

Which is a valid emotional response. 

But we need the state to not be emotional.

Even when the situation is hard and personal, perhaps we need to reconsider our use of the death penalty and understand "The state shouldn't kill people."

I don't think the government should be in the revenge business. And ultimately that's what the death penalty amounts to in my humble opinion.    

Star Trekking: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 4 In Review

 

No new episodes of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds this week as season 4 has come to an end.

So I guess this is a good time to look at the season gone by.  

At the halfway point of season 4, I ranked the first five episodes of the season.

#5 - "Human Best Friend"

#4 - "The Griffin Incident" 

#3 - "Level-Five Transporter Accident"

#2 - "Valles Marineris"

#1 - "A Case of Chiaroscuro"

I suppose in the interest of symmetry, I will rank the last five episodes of season 4.

#5 - "Once La'an A Time"

The set up for this fantasy based episode is convoluted and confusing.  Saving points for this episode: 

• Christina Chong as La'An and a princess in a sword fight with each other.  
• Enterprise vs. Space Dragon

Otherwise, this one is a wipe out.  

#4 - "Like Chronitons Through An Hourglass"

I actually kind of liked this "Star Trek as soap opera" episode and it is a very strong spotlight for the criminally underutilized Anson Mount as Capt. Pike. 

Mount was so good as Pike in Star Trek: Discovery that fans willed Strange New Worlds into existence so it seems a shame we've spent so little time with him this season.    

#3 - "Orders of Magnitude"

Upside: Powerful outings for Nyota Uhura and Jim Kirk.  

Downside: the appearance of the "Bad Admiral" trope. 

#2 - "Off Hour"

An episode with everyone has something to do as everything that can go wrong with the Enterprise goes wrong.

We get to spend some quality time with Christine Chapel as she valiantly struggles to keep  M'Benga alive.  

And haggard young engineer Scotty makes the first steps to becoming "miracle worker" Scotty.

In the midst of chaos and disaster, Scotty calmly puts a hand on the deck plate and confidently reports to Pike, "The Enterprise will hold!" That is such an epic and powerful scene. I totally geeked out over that moment!  

#1 - "Tomorrow's Enterprise"

I don't want to oversell this episode but damn! I cannot say enough good things about this season finale.

• Epic space stuff! 
• Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey!
• Nyota Uhura kicks ass! BOTH of her! 

So I suppose the task now is to merge my first half of the season list with the second half of the season.  

#10 - "Human Best Friend"

#9 - "Once La'an A Time" 

#8 - "The Griffin Incident" 

#7 - "Like Chronitons Through An Hourglass"    

#6- "Level-Five Transporter Accident"

#5 - "Orders of Magnitude" 

#4 - "Valles Marineris"

#3 - "A Case of Chiaroscuro"

#2 - "Off Hour"

#1 - "Tomorrow's Enterprise"

This is admittedly a subjective list.

I would posit that "Like Chronitons Through An Hourglass" was objectively better than "Level-Five Transporter Accident" but damn, my love of Muppets gets the better of me and I gave the puppet one the edge.

Likewise, I would argue from a purely objective perspective, "Valles Marineris" was better than "A Case of Chiaroscuro" but I am a sucker for classic B&W film noir and Rebecca Romijn.  

Season 4 received a lot of grief online for the "gimmick" episodes.  And you may note that all but one of the gimmick episodes are in my bottom five. 

But I'm fine with the weird swings that helped Star Trek: Strange New Worlds stand out from the rest of the Star Trek canon and stand apart as a unique television viewing experience.  

That being said, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds works best with a solid sci-fi plot married to nuanced character building. 

"Tomorrow's Enterprise" is an extraordinarly powerful example of this kind of storytelling.  

Overall, I think season 4 Star Trek: Strange New Worlds was good more often than not and certainly corrected for the mis-steps of season 3.  

Sadly we're looking down the barrel of the end of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds when season 5 drops next year.  It will only be six episodes but we should count ourselves lucky to have that.

Paramount wanted to end the series with season 4. A last minute appeal by the producers to save the show was met with a lackluster offer to do a Strange New Worlds movie.  The production team said they needed more time than 1 single movie so a reluctant Paramount green-lit a 5th season for 6 episodes.

Paramount sucks! 

OK, now I'm in a bad mood.  I need to think of something positive.

Scotty: "The Enterprise will hold!"

That helps.  Thanks, Scotty!

So that is that for Star Trekking's tour of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 4.

What's next for Star Trekking? 

Next week we're back to the beginning with a series of posts looking back on season 2 of Star Trek, the original series.

Until next time, live long and prosper, y'all! 

Movie Time: Two On a Guillotine

 Last weekend, the number one movie in America was Avengers: Endgame.  A nifty trick for a movie that came out 7 years ago.  

To solidify connections to the forthcoming Avengers: Doomsday, the re-release contains about 5 minutes of extra footage.

I'm not really sure how I feel about the return of the Avengers to the MCU.  I kind of think the bloom is off that particular rose.

I gave Captain America: Brave New World a miss last year and despite it's resounding success with critics and the box office this year, missing Spider-Man: Brand New Day has not particularly hurt my feelings. 

I don't feel much anticipation for Avengers: Doomsday.  Still, can I resist a Marvel movie that features everyone who was ever in a Marvel movie?  

I will know more about how I feel come December.  

__________________________

After watching Supergirl the week before, Andrea and I decided to re-watch the 2025 Superman film.  It was a delight to see this film again, even without any extra footage.

Watching these two movies back to back does really highlight the shortfalls of Supergirl compared to Superman.  

Maybe the best idea for a sequel to Superman would've been a spotlight on Mr. Terrific.  I'm down for a movie or TV series project starring Edi Gathegi as the world's smartest annoyed person.

Now it's on to this week's movie post.

It's... Movie Time!   

It's October now which means we're on a countdown to Halloween.  

We're on a countdown of Andrea bugging me on when I'm going to put up the Halloween decorations. (Which will be followed in short order by pressure to put up Christmas stuff.) 

The horror! The horror! 

So as we face down the cold clammy embrace of Halloween, I'm going to dedicate this Movie Time space to some older horror films of questionable quality and taste.

Today we're going back to 1965 and Two On a Guillotine, an American horror film produced and directed by William Conrad and starring Connie Stevens, Dean Jones and Cesar Romero. 

The movie opens on a scene of torment, terror and torture.

A blonde woman in a diaphonous gown, her hands bound over her head, watches in helpless horror as a man with sinister eyes and a learing expression approaches with a sword. 

With a sudden thrust, he pushes the blade into her stomach, as blood gushes from the wound.  Struggling and screaming in pain and terror, she is subject to another lunge of the sword and she slumps against her bonds as death claims her.

Then a curtain falls in front of our dead damsel as her assailant turns to face the applause of his theater audience.

Yep, this was all a magic trick and the woman enters the stage, totally unharmed saved for the patches of blood on her gown where she was impaled by the sword.

OK, I will grant this is a really good trick.  

But how the hell was any of that entertaining?  

Behold John Harley Duquesne, magician extraordinaire, and his lovely wife and stage assistant, Melinda.  Apparently his particular schtick is putting Melinda in various death traps and pretending to kill her.   

His latest scenarios of lethal legerdemain involves a guillotine. Duquesne demonstrates the lethality of the device by cutting of the head of their daughter's favorite doll.  

Daddy will just buy her another one.  

So the blade is super sharp but it is all still just a magic trick and Melinda will not be in any real danger.

No fair, all of you out there guessing where this is gonna go.

Yeah, yeah, yeah! The trick will go awry and John Harley Duquesne will behead his beloved Melinda and go koo-koo for Cocoa Puffs until he dies, a broken and tortured man.  

But you're really not supposed to know that because the movie jumps from Duquesne demonstrating the device on the daughter's doll to 20 years later and we're at his funeral.

The funeral is a weird deal.  Duquesne's coffin has windows on the top and sides so you can see his head. Apparently it's part of some insane bet he made that after he died, he would pull off the ultimate trick and escape from the grave. Hence the windows, to prove he's in there and he's dead.

Showing up at the funeral is ... Melinda?

Nope, it's Duquesne's daughter, Cassie.

(Connie Stevens plays both roles.) 

Cassie has been on the outs with dear old dad since her mom "mysteriously disappeared" years before and was  quite surprised to get the call that her father was dead and she was in his will.  

Congratulations, Cassie! Your psychotic magician dad has left you a haunted mansion and all you have to do to own it forever is stay in the damn thing for seven nights.

Reporters come sniffing around, thinking there's a story in all these shenanigans but Cassie wants nothing to do with these vultures.  

Val Henderson thinks he has a shot at charming his way into Cassie's good graces and getting a really big scoop as long as he doesn't let her know he's a reporter.  

What follows is a serious of weird occurences in the  Duquesne mansion, some of which are clearly cheap parlor tricks.  The screaming skeleton on a rope pulley is a nice touch.

Other strange happenings are not as easy to explain, things appearing and disappearing, the whispering voices, the disturbing cries and mysterious moans.  

Is the mansion really haunted?

Is it in fact haunted by John Harley Duquesne?

Has he kept his vow to escape the grave?

SPOILER:  John Harley Duquesne ain't dead! 

This very much still alive delusional dad has been sneaking about the house, pyschologically torturing his daughter who is the spitting image of his beloved Melinda.  

And he's ready to perform the guillotine trick one more time because he's worked out what went wrong last time and he's intends to star Melinda Cassie in the performance.   

Cassie is laid out on the guillotine, her neck in the path of the threatening blade.  Oh, one more point of order: Duquesne has changed an unconscious Cassie out of her clothes into one of Melinda's dresses.  

So THAT creepy factor is cranked up pretty damn high.

Henderson barges into to save Cassie but gets into a fight with Duquesne. In the course of the fight, they bump into the guillotine and hit the lever holding up the blade.

Oh shit! The blade comes down and a head falls into the basket!

Fuck no! Cassie's dead?!?!

SPOILER: No! 

He may be a crazy crackpot but John Harley Duquesne has successfully pulled off his great guillotine trick.  

Cassie is all right, no thanks to Henderson but the two of them kiss as the police arrive to arrest Duquesne for crimes.

And we have mercifully reached the end.  

Connie Stevens thought the script was stupid but hey, what's a girl with a contract with Warner Bros. supposed to do? 

The score was Max Steiner's last film score. Here are some much better movies that featured Steiner compositions.

• Gone With the Wind 
• Casablance
• Now Voyager
• King Kong

As for the film that would serve as Max Steiner's swan song, he was less than magnanimous towards Two On a Guillotine.  "It wasn't a picture, it was an abortion ... The guillotine was placed in the wrong place ... they should have cut off William Conrad's head for producing the thing."

William Conrad would only direct two more feature films after Two On a Guillotine. He mostly directed for television and also worked as an actor on crimes shows such as Cannon and Jake & the Fatman.  BONUS: Conrad was also the voice of the narrator on Rocky & Bullwinkle. 

The role of reporter Val Henderson was played by Dean Jones, an affable actor known for more family friendly features. After  Two On a Guillotine, Dean Jones' next movie was That Darn Cat for Disney.  In 1995, he was inducted as a Disney Legend for his film work.

In the role of John Harley Duquesne was Cesar Romero.  With dozens of film and TV roles on his resume, Romero's greatest notoriety came from playing the Joker of the Batman TV series in the 1960's.   

Romero refused to shave his signature mustache to play the Joker so white make up was applied over the mustache.

Speaking of a TV show based on a comic book... 

Dell Comics published a comic book adaption of Two On a Guillotine.  

cover by Dick Giordano
& Vince Colletta

Two On a Guillotine is a bit of a rote by the numbers thriller saved by a winking self awareness of it's goofy haunted house setting and some pleasant romantic chemistry between Connie Stevens and Dean Jones.  

While it is by far so not a great movie, Two On a Guillotine may well be the best one I'm going to writing about in this space for October. 

Next week: a movie the producers described as "The Maddest Story Ever Told" as a family of genetic mutants terrorize guests in their strange and dangerous home.

From 1967, it's Spider-Baby.

We've got that to look forward to next week. 

Your Friday Video Link Goes To the Dogs!

Like it says in the title:

Your Friday Video Link goes to the dogs! 

First up is Pop-Tart who finds a safe and loving forever home but it takes awhile for her to believe she's gonna be OK.

Your next video is a shelter dog going through a gamut of emotions realizing he's being adopted.  

Finally, a little kitten meets a Labrador puppy and it's TOO CUTE!   

That is that for this week's Your Friday Video Link.

Over the weekend, we've got Movie Time and Star Trekking.

Until next time, remember to be good to one another.

Especially be good to dogs.