The Problem With Jennifer's Body

Please wake me up in about two years, so that The Hunger Games movie has come out and the fandom has had enough time to make their way through all the usual complaints a fandom undergoes when their beloved source material is changed on its way to the screen and I can talk with people again about the actual content of the story as opposed to whether or not every single person cast looks right for the role. And by looks right, not, I don't mean is made to look right via training and make-up and costume. I mean bitching about how a young actress actually has meat on her bones and is thus an inappropriate choice despite what the author and director say.

Despite being a bit above the target age range for Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games trilogy, about a month and a half ago I decided to give it a spur of the moment read and I admit I was instantly addicted. It's an engrossing story with what I think are generally interesting characters and pretty decent writing. I will happily discuss whether the love triangle is annoyingly overplayed in Catching Fire, whether Katniss' behaviour in Mockingjay is either due to proper characterization or author laziness, and whether the ending is sufficient or not.

What I cannot stand, however, are the same debates I participated in, intensely, mind you, once upon a time when I was a thirteen-year-old crazed and newly indoctrinated Harry Potter fan. Was I pissed that Daniel Radcliffe had blue eyes and not green and found it silly he wasn't wearing contacts to fix that? You bet. When I was older and I realized that a) such an obsession was stupid, b) that it really didn't matter that much, and c) that Daniel Radcliffe was unable to wear the contacts because of irritation, I got over it. I think most fans did eventually because we realized what a stupid little debate it was. Harry's blazing green eyes, like his mother's, are a huge deal in the books. In the movies, they're less so. They're still a deal - Lupin remarks on them particularly in the third film and I imagine they'll play their related role in the final film - but the films adjust for the problems faced.

These sorts of issues, as The Hunger Games movie inches slowly towards filming and, eventually, completion, are floating around the fandom in abundance. People are bitching about everything, and while Willow Shields' unibrow was a big hot topic, the biggest hot topic of all is the casting of Jennifer Lawrence as the beloved lead character of Katniss Everdeen. Now, I think Jennifer Lawrence is a great actress and I can completely see her personifying what I think is a strong female protagonist in Katniss. She probably doesn't look anything like I originally imagined Katniss to look like, but I can see it in her, just like I started to see Peeta in Josh Hutcherson, who also looks differently than one might have imagined Peeta (and don't get me started on the fans who are still obsessed with picking naturally blonde actors who are rather stringy in my opinion). Some people, however, are far too obsessed with the appearance, particularly parts of Jennifer Lawrence's appearance that are harder to fix than her hair color - and I'm not talking about the debate raging over Katniss' skin color, I'm talking about her weight.

The objections to Jennifer Lawrence's curves, to put it bluntly, piss me the fuck off. It rings in my ears of all the horrendous standards that we hold women up to and the ways in which women are still objectified so much in film as having to be whatever image we deem correct and if it doesn't fit with our mold, then it is wrong. I know that when most people comment on Jennifer Lawrence's curves, they don't mean that actresses can't be curvy. Of course not, we have Queen Latifah, known for her bodacious body. But this is really not the norm. We have such bizarre and unrealistic and every-changing standards for women and we never seem to be able to do it right. As Jennifer Hudson has lost weight, many of her fans have been rather shocked and disappointed that she felt the need to lose weight, while simultaneously people are constantly wondering if Gabourey Sidibe should lose some weight because she might be dangerously unhealthy. Don't get me wrong, I do think obesity is a problem in this country and not one we should glorify. But neither should we glorify appearances that are unattainable or at the very least extremely difficult for normal women to attain. While we encourage girls to embrace their curves, we continue to bash women whose weight changes regularly, like Kelly Clarkson. When Lady Gaga puts on a few pounds, suddenly her stomach becomes a huge national problem - Why isn't she as skinny as she was in the Telephone music video!?!?!? we wonder, because it's wrong for these women who are supposed to be visually perfect to ruin our images of them by being human. Weight fluctuation is hardly unheard of amongst the normal folk and beneath the personal trainers and strict diets, celebrities are normal folk too.

That said, then, shouldn't we choose actors who can physically embody the very specific framework we have in mind for a character? Dumb, dumb, dumb. I get it, Katniss' character is very specifically one who has suffered from malnourishment her entire life. But even if we get a sickly stick of an actress who could potentially perform the role of Katniss brilliantly, there's still a difference between a healthy, skinny body and a malnourished, skinny body. And let's face it, we're not going to cast someone that is literally malnourished - that is, unless Christian Bale was in the role and he would just make that choice on his own probably and the fans would hail him for it, but would it be right? Everyone also worries when Christian Bale does such a thing, and we'd worry for whatever actress that played Katniss that would do it too. But, BUT, beneath that worry, don't even lie to yourself, you'd be proud of that actor for taking such a dramatic step. You'd be impressed and pleased that the actor would be willing to take such a risk for the sake of art. I'm not going to lie, I'd probably be impressed too. But while being impressed, I'd also be disgusted.

There is a poster that hangs in the health services office in my college. It shows two pictures of legs. One is a starving child. One is a runway model. Their legs, despite one pair being cleaner than the other, are indistinguishably similar in shape. That horrifies me, which is the point of the poster. If you are naturally skinny, there's nothing you can help about that. Same with if you're curvy. But there is still, always, a difference between what is natural and healthy and what is unnatural and unhealthy. You can suffer from either no matter what shape or size you are.

We need to stop boxing women into categories based on their size though. Daniel Radcliffe has grown up to be a lot stockier than I imagined Harry in the books to be - Harry always seemed so stretched and, at times, lanky. Daniel Radcliffe is of more average height and weight in appearance. But he has also grown into becoming a better actor and a better Harry over the years. Movie!Harry and Book!Harry are different in their appearance and y'know what? That's okay, because Daniel Radcliffe still manages to capture the general essence of what the character of Harry Potter is, at least in the movies. A smaller debate has raged in the Potter fandom community over the looks of its female characters. In the books, Ginny is supposed to be very popular and supposedly pretty good-looking, but Bonnie Wright's beauty doesn't seem to be particularly played up in the movies making her a bit more plain. Alternatively, in the books, Hermione is generally pretty average looking from the perspective and her hair frizzy, but by the third movie, Emma Watson was clearly turning into a pretty young woman and her hair was no longer made to look quite so frizzy. I have long contended, particularly in Hermione's case, that these are just examples of how different the book and movie versions of the characters are. And THAT'S OKAY.

Why is that okay? First of all, when it comes to movie adaptations of books, I tend to believe that the best adaptations are more interpretations. Good adaptations should be done by fans of the original source material, but intelligent fans who have enough distance from the source material to be able to know what the story is about without obsessing too much on details that may be less important. My favorite example of an adaptation is Lord of the Rings. I love the books and the movies, but though they capture a similar plotline and a similar essence, they are truly different stories, but they are both grand and know what story they want to tell. My main problem with, say, the Harry Potter movie adaptations is that they're a bit scatter-brained, not just because of the different directors, but also because most of the earlier films didn't give strong enough hints of what this story was supposed to be about. I have no expectation that The Hunger Games movie will be just like the book, and I really hope it isn't. I want to watch something that takes the plot and the morals and the characters and shape them ever so slightly different to fit the very different medium that film is from novels. I want the actors to be good and the script to be strong and the effects to be well-done and all the elements of filmmaking to be well-executed, and if it isn't the same as the book, so long as it's well-made, I am totally okay with that.

Secondly, reality is not so easy to manipulate as the written world of a book and whatever live-action movies are, they are capturing something that was physically there, in reality, at some point (not counting CGI). Reality can be manipulated, but in a different way, for different reasons.

Finally, I want to break out of the boxes we have created for women. Katniss can still be Katniss even if her ribs aren't frighteningly protruding. I cannot accept the fact that women have to be defined by their appearance, that Katniss can only be a skinny girl, for instance. Stanley Tucci is a pretty fit individual, small and seemingly average in his weight and yet isn't Caesar Flickerman supposed to be rather rotund? I have not heard a single person complain that his stomach isn't the right size for the role. You may argue that that isn't the same, it doesn't define Caesar like it does Katniss, but Katniss is defined by much, MUCH more than her weight. If all Katniss was was a malnourished girl, she wouldn't be the strong character I believe her to be. Women's appearances are a part of who we are, certainly, but there is so much more that goes into defining ourselves, just like men, that I really wish we could stop placing more value on a woman's appearance than her other features. "The Girl Next Door" is more of a look than a personality type. "The Blonde Bombshell." "The Femme Fatale." These types and the many others women exemplify are so defined by appearance in our minds rather than attitude, and most of the categories really are about the attitude.

So, in conclusion, either the entire world needs to change or I really need to learn how to bite my tongue. Well, I've already got a scar from biting through my tongue a lot as a kid, I might as well keep up the hard work.

Pop Culture Dreams: Installment I

Okay, so, being so immersed and interested in the entertainment world and pop culture, sometimes this seeps into my subconscious, as proven by a variety of dreams, including one I tweeted about back in June:


Last night I dreamed I was smoking pot with my BFF and Naveen Andrews' Sayid. Too much Lost? No. I'm more curious where I got the weed from.
1:52 PM Jun 15th via web

Also, not very long ago, I dreamed that I was actually in the top 10 or whatever of next season, season 8, of So You Think You Can Dance, despite the fact that I really can't dance very well and I haven't taken a dance class since I was eight-years-old. Regardless, I made it to like the top 8 or maybe it was even the top 6, but then, of course, I was knocked off because, well, probs because I can't dance. Everyone was sweet to me. It was great.

So, I thought, after these dreams (plus a few others) I should really start a segment on this blog about some of these pop culture dreams because I think it's hilarious.

ON THAT NOTE...

Last night, I had a sort of extension of my earlier SYTYCD dream, only this time it appears I was in season 7 because Robert Roldan and I were, like, kinda tight. And by kinda tight, I mean my RL crush on his gorgeousness and talents translated into my dream, except I could be tots obvious about it in my dream because he was right there in my house. We were chatting and he was sad I had left the competition, but I was happy for him for making it so far and was gushing over him essentially, telling him how he was talented and also very pretty. He was all blushy about it and gave me a hug, and while I wanted it to be a hug that was like "okay, so, talking time over, making out time, yes?" it was a friendly hug and I was like "OH SHIT. Is he gay? Or into someone else?" But before I could really obsess over it, he was asking me to dance, so we went into my living room and somebody else was there (I think it was Ashley Galvan) and I danced around rather shittily, in my opinion, but they seemed to like it. My dad was walking around and kind of stared at me as he passed by, but Robert was like shooing him or whatever. That's where it ends.

Also, there was another part to this dream that I think came earlier where we were all dancing for the show and I was a choreographer and I had choreographed Lauren's amazing Argentine Tango she did with Pasha last week and we were kind of doing a "best of." Except - the stage we were performing on was my high school's stage. AND THEN Lauren and Pasha did this other routine that looked nothing at all like the tango "I" had choreographed for them. I was sooo furious and then the stage manager or whoever told me that that routine had never been on the list and it was another routine entirely even though they were wearing the same costumes... and it was somewhere around there that my dream ended, though you know dreams, they're very fluid, and there was a lot of other routines going on.


There you have it! Sarah's pop culture dreams, now shared for the whole world to see and know and love and appreciate and analyze and freak out over. Or, y'know, the handful of people who actually read this.

...Robert Roldan, if you're reading this (which you probably aren't), I adore you; go win SYTYCD, plz and ty. And I'm sorry if I've freaked you out. Blame my subconscious. And the fact that you're pretty and talented.

(For those of you who are not Robert/don't watch SYTYCD, here are some links so you too can appreciate where my subconscious is coming from: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Yet Another Reason I Hate Twilight... and some gender ranting

'scuse me that I'm bringing this up, but there's something interesting that was touched on in this article over on Entertainment Weekly that I addressed in the comments but felt was really worth sharing.

The quote that bothered me most?

“A grand paradox in all this is that a great many professed Twilight haters are young men who, though they may not acknowledge it, are threatened by this pop-cultural juggernaut.”

My response?

"To be quite fair, I am the exact demographic, a young woman, that Twilight is aimed at and I know plenty of young women just like me who are professed Twilight-haters. Sure, I believe that there are plenty of young men who hate Twilight, I know quite a few myself, but for young women like me, it’s hard not to be insulted by the creation of these books and their aim at people like me. The belief that I am a sucker for anything dazzling romantic just because I’m a young woman? Insulting. I mean, I can stomach some rom coms every now and then and sometimes I even actively seek them out, but story still matters, even then. Just like how I can’t stand a shrill heroine (a la Katherine Heigl in Knocked Up – TBH that girl has every right to trash that role), I can’t stand a, not only passive, but downright inconsiderate and selfish heroine like Bella. Why would I ever want to watch or read about a girl who is supposed to be like me, but doesn’t appreciate anything in her life despite parents and friends who care about her? I would never want to be like Bella, and I think it is incredibly insulting that people think I should want to be like her just because I am a young woman."

All in all, women have more of a reason to be Twilight haters than men.

Men have plenty of their own say in pop culture - people make the argument that it's all them for the superhero movies, for things like Transformers and James Bond flicks or things like Star Wars or Star Trek. To be quite honest, that's a stupid, sexist stereotype as I am hardly a tomboy (love me some stilettos and skirts) but I have seen at least one movie in each of the aforementioned franchises and enjoyed them immensely. My favorite effing movie is probably Star Wars. But regardless, if the argument is that men are jealous of Twilight hogging some spotlight in pop culture, I think it is an immensely weak argument. If men were supposed to be the sexist stereotypes people write them out to be, they'd probably be thrilled that women were drawn into something so bad rather than going to the movies for incredibly intelligent fare which would show them as a true threat.

Of course, this is all complete bullshit. Sure, there are sexist stereotyped men out there, but it's unfair to say the whole gender is that way, just as it is equally unfair to say that women love Twilight.

It is because of this second assumption - that young women should be very interested in the Twilight franchise according to market research or whatever - that is the reason I think many a woman hates Twilight. We are insulted by these assumptions about ourselves and what kinds of stories we like. I think men should be just as insulted when things like "men have to love Transformers 2 even if it sucks, but because things blow up" pop into the conversation.

All in all, trying to figure out the success or failure of a franchise still, unfortunately, comes down to this sexist crap. Women movie-goers fit into one category, men movie-goers into another. When an audience is over 70% one gender, CLEARLY the movie is made for that gender. But 30% of the other gender is nothing to sniff at. And it's rare that you hear such a huge percentage for one gender. Most of the time, I see the range is usually smaller, the difference usually less than 30%. It's sometimes a big gap, but I doubt there's a single movie that has never drawn both genders for whatever reason.

Women and men both like crappy movies. Women and men both like good movies. Women and men hate the same movies. Women and men hate different movies. For every girl who says a war movie is too bloody for her, you get a girl like me who adores a good war movie, no matter how bloody it is. For every guy who complains about chick flicks, you get a guy who can actually enjoy a clever enough chick flick.

I know marketers have a job to do when they're selling a movie, and they're trying to find the right demographic. I understand that, but stop boxing us up too. Just because Twilight draws a female-heavy box office doesn't make "women between the ages of 18-34 love Twilight" accurate because I am in that demographic and I can't stand that crap. You're just making me hate it more by assuming I like it.

Worst Episode of Good Shows - COMPETITION TIME

(edited 2:20pm 6/12/2010 - added synopses)

Before wasting sleeping hours rewatching episodes of So You Think You Can Dance (my latest obsession... and my return to actually enjoying reality television that isn't What Not to Wear or on HGTV), I managed to finally watch the much-hated episode of Lost that, in my anticipation, I compared to Battlestar Galactica's "Black Market." Not just for being totally useless as an episode, but also for the negative reaction and the admission of the actual creators that "hey, we made a crap episode." I also mistakenly thought the chick in Lost was also a hooker... but seriously, besides being a psychic tattoo genie or whatevs, she probably is. I mean, look at those clothes. No self-respecting woman would dress like that in dark alleys unless she's trolling for something.

So the verdict? Which sucks more? "Stranger in a Strange Land..."



...or "Black Market"?



First a brief, biased synopsis of both:

"Black Market" - After the success of the awesome Pegasus story arc and Roslin's life being saved, the show decides to kill some time with dear ol' Lee Adama and a random prostitute named Shevon that we're supposed to believe he's been seeing and is seriously into. Colonel Fisk, Cain's successor in commanding Pegasus, is killed and Lee is asked to investigate... why Lee? I'd think this is set up for Lee's ventures into lawyerhood later in the series, but it's a season too early, so it's more like a convenient plot device. Lee finds out that Fisk was involved in a black market that's been happening in the fleet (OH NOES) and then Shevon's daughter gets kidnapped and Lee feels responsible because he's been playing house with the kid and totally creeping her out. Oh and this is the episode where we start to see Dee and Lee flirting together, which makes me hate this episode even more for ruining my darling Billy's life. But anyway, back to the main suck of a plot, Lee goes after the head of the black market, kills him, and tells off the black market, but not entirely, more like "just don't take important stuff... oh and kids, kk?" Roslin gets pissed, but Bill lets Lee's arrangement go ahead. So essentially, NOTHING HAPPENS. We never hear from Shevon again (partially because she's not interested in playing house with Lee and partially because NO ONE CARES), the black market is never mentioned again, the fleet doesn't change at all, and... yeah. Pointless. Then the next episode we watch Starbuck get totally wasted, try to have drunken sex with Lee, and then almost kill herself for the billionth time, until Kat shows us that she doesn't suck as much as she used to.

"Stranger in a Strange Land" - This episode also kicks off after some intensely awesome stuff happening. Last episode was Desmond centric, which was great because Desmond is great, and we learned all about course correction (which, a few years later, FlashForward blatantly rips off in its failed attempt to be the next Lost) and how the universe is trying to kill Charlie. So what does the audience get next week? Zero Desmond, zero Charlie, and a whole lot of Jack, Kate, and Sawyer. Before Kate and Sawyer broke out of their cages, that would have been interesting, but instead we watch Kate and Sawyer bicker and lose Carl and find Carl and Sawyer lets Carl go and there's all this tension about having dead man walking sex and nobody cares because they reach their own island and that's about that. Jack's regular plot isn't so horrible, although the whole time I keep thinking Jack is being totally conned, but I think I was proven wrong, for like the first time ever when it comes to these characters conning each other. But anyway, Jack tries to protect Juliet for killing Danny or whatever his name was when she was letting Kate and Sawyer go. She's supposed to be killed, but he gets Ben to take that option off the table, so Juliet gets marked in a tramp-stamp way instead. Jack applies aloe. Fresh aloe hurts, I can tell you that. Tension is born, but I don't want it (as much as Juliet is growing on me). There's also some random sheriff chick, Isabel, if I remember correctly, who can read Jack's tattoo and all around just acts like a douchebag. The main problem with this episode though, of course, is the flashback. Jack is in Thailand to find himself (...) and starts by flying a kite on the beach (...) when he is helped because he can't fly a kite to save his life by some pretty thing that can speak English and is totally dressed like a hooker (... yeah). Jack and the chick start sexing it up and it appears she comes and goes as she pleases in his bed. They also fall off his bed at some point. Oh man, THAT was exciting. Then Jack drunkenly stalks her like the loser he is and finds out that, though she's dressed like a total hooker and wandering in dark alleys to some secret place and receives huge envelopes of money, she's not a hooker (well, maybe, I'm convinced she still is) - she's a MAGICAL TATTOO-IST. She can see who people are, so Jack acts like a douche and forces her to tell him and tattoo him although he's an outsider. Happy-go-lucky Jack leaves his house the next day, freshly inked, and creeps out some kid and then gets beaten down by the chick's brother and some of his friends. Jack presumably leaves Thailand now, having gotten inked. Whoo. I'll take the not-supernatural tattoos, please.

Well, those weren't that brief, but for being totally pointless, both episodes do eat up roughly forty-five minutes. THE VERDICT?

Honestly, it's a tough call. I was going to say that "Black Market" sucked more until the tattoo genie chick was all "I AM NOT A TATTOO ARTIST - I SEE THINGS IN PEOPLE." But it's tough, because I'm still really down on "Black Market" for its stupid retcon with Shevon the prostitute and her daughter, Lee's surrogate daughter for the one that exploded in his (OUT OF LEFT FIELD) pregnant girlfriend before she was born that Lee left before the apocalypse in the Twelve Colonies.

I also give favoritism to Battlestar Galactica for being a show I like more. No offense, Lost, but you move at a snail's pace at best. By the middle of the third season, Battlestar Galactica's characters had all frakked each other, made war and nice and war again with the Cylons, and had tackled issues of genocide, survival, abortion, crazy religion versus politics, religion in general, suicide bombings, forced occupation, and biological warfare. Lost has... coined some cool catchphrases, killed off a lot more central characters, and toyed with maybe two or three of those topics. Seriously, Emmys, can I hate on you times a zillion for ignoring Battlestar Galactica for, like, six years? And yet, giving the prize to Lost which, although being a great show in its own right, is still no BSG. There is no show like BSG.

Ahem. But we're comparing these episodes against one another, not the shows against one another. So I think I still might have to go with "Black Market" sucking more. Because, although Jack's flashbacks totally bite and the Sawyer and Kate plotline is just infuriating as per usual with them (and Kate lately has been pissing me off even more than usual), Jack's current day plot wasn't made of total suck (just partial suck). I mean, at least "Stranger in a Strange Land" fits within its narrative better. The question of Jack's tattoos is one that nobody cares about, sure, but nobody even asked "huh, I wonder how Lee's prostitute surrogate girlfriend and her daughter are doing?" BECAUSE THEY NEVER EVEN EXISTED BEFORE OR AFTER. Jack's tattoos at least will always be there. So now if anybody asks about them, we have the boring lengthy answer of that useless episode. But "Black Market" isn't just a useless episode but a horrible episode that disgraces everything that Battlestar Galactica is. Despite the occasional melodramatic bits of the show, it's usually pretty grounded (luls, har har, see how it's funny - it's because it's set in SPACE most of the time).

I do much more appreciate the controlled flashbacks of Battlestar Galactica, that held onto them mostly until the finale (save a bit of Kara flashback to Zak and ignoring the preggers!gf flashbacks of ten seconds Lee has in "Black Market" ...oh and the Final Five's memories on Earth) and just offered a couple character-defining moments that were really some of the most beautiful, sad, and touching moments in an otherwise action-packed and ending-packed finale. Lost, for being innovative in its use of flashbacks, also tends to overuse them on some characters (particularly Jack and Kate, but most characters really don't need like ten centric episodes. NOBODY is that interesting. Even Eko, for being fucking awesome and wicked interesting always only needed the three episodes he got). I long for the episodes where nobody gets a flashback and we can all live in the present because I am BORED with their pasts. I get it. Kate and Sawyer are criminals with hearts of gold. Jack had daddy issues. Charlie had drug issues. Locke had major daddy issues. Hurley was fat and crazy and is still fat and may still be crazy. I honestly don't care that much because that means half of the time the plot isn't moving forward, which is frustrating because already so much that is set in the present plotline isn't moving anything forward.

But this post wasn't supposed to be about Lost's shortcomings (though I could go on for quite some time with both praise and critique) - it is about the competition of bad episode against bad episode. And in that competition, "Black Market" takes the rotten tomato, mostly because of its horrible retcon in combination with the other bad elements that it shares with "Stranger in a Strange Land."

As my darling Television Without Pity ends their brief description of "Black Market" -



"Roslin is displeased with everyone and everything. She is right."

...and goodnight.

PS: I got McDonalds - TWICE, actually - and that commercial still won't leave me the fuck alone while I'm watching Lost on hulu.com, no matter how many times I say that the ad is not relevant to me. It is one of the few ads, if not the only, I have said that about. I AM MAD AT YOU, HULU.

And Heroes!?

This is the comment I posted in regards to EW.com's recap of the Heroes season four premiere:

"I was sure I was going to give Heroes up after this premiere, after being someone extremely proud of her commitment to Heroes all through three seasons no matter how bad, predictable, and lame the storylines and characters got. But then I watched the season premiere and although FAR from being good or properly redeeming, there were enough good points (and the bad points were comical enough) that I might actually bother to continue watching (that is, DVRed episodes when I find some spare time). I really like the carny folk, and for the first time in forever is Peter’s nice guy behaviour actually interesting and refreshing. And, although everything about the Matt/Sylar storyline referred to far better scenarios (firstly, the already noted BSG subconscious nestling cylons incredibly lamed-down by Ricky Worthy’s appearance; secondly, the use of a substance abuse program to refer to a substance no one else has in common like in season 2 of Dexter (except that Dexter wasn’t even trying to get better and his “power” of serial killing is far more interesting); and thirdly, the whole bad cop, uneasy marriage calls back to the far superior new series FlashForward’s main characters), I actually found Zachary Quinto’s performance to be wonderful. Of course, especially with Star Trek’s (and his) success, he’s really too good for the show anymore, but he was fun to watch. So Heroes is definitely nowhere near my favourite show like it used to be back in its first season, but I might actually bother watching. Plus, the way it’s going, it’s not going to last much longer anyway, right (God, I hope so)?"

So I suppose I might bother to keep watching. It's not exactly fun in the way it used to be because it's just lame television (that makes me say "WTF?" about every five minutes), but there's still a part of me that enjoys seeing those characters (well, maybe except for Claire... I hate her so...) do their weird things. Plus, the battle between Peter and Edgar-The-Fast-Dude-With-Swords was NICE; I've always been hard on Heroes for skimping on the whole power-battles thing and it was nice to actually see one, even if it was relatively short.

Nine

Let us take a moment to note just how bitchin' Nine looks! I have not seen the musical, as I have seen very few musicals live, but I just watched the trailer for the upcoming movie three times and am still in love with how it looks like it will turn out. Just note that amazingly awesome international Oscar-winning cast (save two; one is a nominee and the other is Fergie). Daniel Day-Lewis amongst many women, such as Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Judi Dench, Kate Hudson, Sophia Lauren, Nicole Kidman, and Fergie, with FAB vocals over the trailer. The visuals are already stunning, and I just rewatched Chicago, so that this is being directed by the same guy, Rob Marshall, makes me enthusiastic (I had forgotten just how amazing the movie Chicago is).

I was lamenting over how few movies I was psyched for this coming fall season (also known as I Want An Oscar! season), but then I stumble into Nine, which I had heard about before but not ventured much into. But after seeing the trailer and obsessing over the cast... I'm excited.

And also, major props to Kate Hudson for doing a real movie again. It's been too long, Kate. Please, hang up the rom coms and do real movies. You were so good in Almost Famous! You're a past Oscar nominee! You deserve better. At least pick your rom coms better if you're going to do any.

And although I pay little to no attention to Fergie despite my respect for her as a good vocalist and performer (I just don't pay much attention on the music front), I am very excited to see her in Nine as well.

Last note: other movies this fall I'm excited for? Mostly Sherlock Holmes, which comes out on Christmas. Although Tim Burton-produced 9 looks very interesting and potentially good. I was almost excited for The Road since I started reading it and already really love it, but then I watched the preview and can't hide my displeasure at it looking rather mediocre. This is disappointing as Cormac McCarthy is a great author and No Country for Old Men was wicked good. Oh well. I'll just settle down and enjoy the book.

Final note, for reals: Where the fuck is the Academy going to find 10 Best Picture Nominees without any filler? BTWs, Academy, Star Trek and Up will be filler when you nominate them. They are both good, but we all know they have no chance of winning. The point of five nominees was that they all had a chance of winning... even if it is a slim to none chance like going up against Slumdog Millionaire. But my point is that if Slumdog Millionaire hadn't been the awards sweeper it was, the other four films would've had a chance (well, maybe not The Reader... but I'm still spiteful over the lack of The Dark Knight). I loved Up and really liked Star Trek, but let's not kid ourselves, unless every drama that comes out this year is total suck, neither of those films would ever win Best Picture.

So screw you Academy for another stupid decision. Oh and PLEASE bring back the clips. Seeing Tilda Swinton in another bag, Sophia Lauren with way too much makeup and boobage, and Whoopi Goldberg's unfortunate pattern choice talking about actors they may or may not know very well (which totally ruins it when one winner and nominee are paired perfectly and another are a total mismatch; completely unfair to the poor nominee that was mismatched!) is PAINFUL. I much prefer seeing the clips from movies that actually show us why these actors deserves an Oscar. Isn't that the point of movies? To be shown instead of told (something Public Enemies should have known better)?

And thus ends another longer-than-intended Sarah-rants/raves-about-movies segment.

Have a good night.