Stephen Tobolowsky on the Kevin Pollak Chat Show

Speaking of good podcasts, Stephen Tobolowsky recently appeared on the Kevin Pollak Chat Show to promote The Tobolowsky Files. It is a pretty dynamite episode, if I do say so myself. Listeners of the Files will recognize many of the stories that Stephen tells, but he also pulls out a few that even I haven’t heard yet.

The whole thing is 2 hours long, but I found it enthralling enough that I was able to watch it in its entirety within a few sittings. Also of note: around 53 minutes into this episode, Kevin Pollak mentions my name numerous times! I mean, he doesn’t know who I am or anything, but still! Stephen Tobolowsky and Kevin Pollak discussed me like I am actual person or something! Another life goal achieved.

Todd VanDerWerff’s Extraordinary Interview with Dan Harmon

Todd VanDerWerff over at the AV Club has just finished publishing his complete interview with Community creator and showrunner Dan Harmon. This interview is extraordinary for its length and insight. Harmon is an articulate man with big ideas about television, and is probably one of the most compelling and interesting people working in the medium today. He’s also exceedingly good at speaking at length about his own show (as well he should be).

There are occasions when I question the value of what we do at slashfilm.com and in the entertainment press in general. Interviews like these reaffirm that we cultural commentators have the ability to produce and disseminate criticism and content that not only illuminates, but also in some way contributes to the conversation in a way that almost becomes its own artistic work. This interview is the full realization of that potential, and it’s certainly made me better understand what is possible in this game (in other words: it is time for me to start demanding 90-minute interviews!)

You can read the interview in four parts:

It took me probably about an hour or two to read through the entire thing, so make sure you make the time.

The History of the Showrunner

Emily Nussbaum has written a wonderful history of showrunners, and how their status has waxed and waned over time:

[I]t wasn’t until 1990 that TV experienced a truly cataclysmic cultural event: the premiere of Twin Peaks, a series that was described, again and again, as being “like nothing else on TV.” The show stood out not merely for its style but for the way it was made, as the product of one big, weird brain, conceived by the intimidating David Lynch, he who had directed Blue Velvet (middle-aged nudity, bug-covered ear). At this point, I’d graduated from college, and my friends and I would gather to watch, thrilling at David Duchovny in drag, retro brunettes with bruises, dwarves, cherry pie, and a general air of adult perversion. Within a few episodes, we all agreed the series had gone off the rails (a flash-forward to future TV fanhoods), but it was the first time I’d watched a show while thinking—with worship and anxiety and eventually a twinge of betrayal—about the person who had created it.

Steve Prokopy’s Review of ‘Transformers: Dark of the Moon’

It contains the phrases “best entry in the Michael-Bay-directed franchise,” “clever script,” and “strong effort.” This movie just became one of my most-anticipated films of the summer.

Stephen Colbert Uses His Powers for Good

Stephen Hoban describes how Stephen Colbert is using his platform to illustrate the ridiculousness of our political finance system:

This new reality that Stephen Colbert and his lawyer Trevor Potter keep bringing up in Stephen’s run-ins with Viacom is the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision from 2009, because Citizens United allows corporations to make unlimited political donations. Where once we feared that corporate money could be misused to buy elections, now we honor corporate money as free speech. (It’s not hard to predict that the effects of Citizens United could be as destructive as the deregulation of the banking industry in 1999. Many economists believe that deregulation led directly to the “Too Big to Fail” banks, the global financial crisis, and the bailout. Imagine something like that happening in politics.)

Walter White’s Most Memorable Science Experiments

Breaking Bad, whose fourth season is coming up, is one of the best shows on television. AMC has just run a list of its protagonist’s most memorable science experiments. Major spoilers lie within.

Please Die

Scott Weinberg asks 3D to die:

3D sucks, and even when it doesn’t suck (Avatar and Beowulf come to mind) (fine, and My Bloody Valentine), it’s a glitzy little light show that exists just to make your tickets 30% more expensive. And the 3D blu-ray? That’s about 50% pricier than the “plain” option. If only a similarly revolutionary new advancement in the craft of screenwriting took place, then maybe we’d be somewhere. As long as our huge leaps in filmmaking lie solely within the realm of technology, we’re missing something. A studio will spend millions to make a film “look 3D,” but they won’t spend a fraction of that to make sure their shooting script is kicking ass on all cylinders.

I agree with most of what Scott says, although I would say that films like Avatar and How to Train Your Dragon by themselves are almost enough to justify the unfortunate rise of 3D in recent times. I actually specifically chose my Thor screening to avoid seeing it in 3D. Seeing Thor at its optimal luminance without the need for cumbersome glasses felt good, but it was also sad that I had to go out of my way to ensure that experience.

Post-Credits Sequences

I recently watched Fast Five and Thor, then discovered after the fact that I missed post-credits sequences for both films. This frustration reminded me of Eric D. Snider’s rant about this very topic three years ago (almost to the day):

It has been well established that when a list of names starts scrolling up against a black screen, the movie is OVER. You’re done. Whatever story you had to tell, you told it. That’s the way movies work. You want to put something cute after the credits, fine. Knock yourself out. A lot of times that stuff is fun. But it doesn’t count as an actual part of the story. If it’s something we need to know, tell us. Don’t hide it after the list of gaffers and production assistants and humane society certifications.