Trish's May recommendations

Just one recommendation this month:

The French Open began it's second week of play this afternoon. The men's final is on Sunday. If you haven't watched any of it, start tomorrow (it begins live coverage at noon on ESPN2), and if you have been keeping up-to-date, keep up the good work! The top four are still in it (#4 pending finishing the match that was suspended due to darkness today) and the women's side is anyone's game as usual.

I can't make any other recommendations when the majors are on. I'm sorry.

Oh, and never, ever see Thor. Unless you enjoy watching terrible movies that don't follow the mythology they're based on. And watching Natalie Portman destroy her career. (Ok, so I lied about not recommending anything other than tennis. Forgiveness?)

Unknown Persons: Terrible show, fantastic ending

So I don’t really have a “random” review to provide you with this week. This past week has been full of packing, moving, unpacking, moving around, and working a lot of hours to cover my co-jewelry worker’s vacation, so I haven’t had a lot of free time to whip up any funny reviews. And I do not want to review my moving abilities because I think it goes without saying that they are lacking. Also, my room is far from being unpacked so thinking about it is also extremely depressing to me. So, instead of forcing something, I am going to cheat a little and review some television this week (because I always have enough time for that in my life).

I just recently decided to splurge on myself and opened up a Netflix membership. Now, I shamelessly watch a lot of bad televisions and movies that it keeps recommending to me. (As a side note, whoever came up with the algorithm for that site needs to find a new vocation.) My latest series that I just finished yesterday morning was a mini-series that played on NBC last summer, Persons Unknown.

What initially drew me into watching the series was that the description made it seem strikingly similar to one of the Saw movies, which I will admit is a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine. Here’s what it’s about: a group of seven individuals wake up in a mysterious town with no idea how they got there, or where the town is located, and are trying to figure out a way to escape while solving the mysteries of the town. And it was similar to Saw (in some ways). Much, much, much less graphic, but it maintained the ideal of: how far would you go to survive?

The series was far from perfect. A lot of what happened was downright stupid and unnecessary. Out of the seven main characters, I could only stand to watch four of them, and I only enjoyed to watch two of them (only one of them by the finale), and all the other characters really annoyed me. I hated the guest stars that popped in and out, only there to serve one purpose or another. And I didn’t really care whether they escaped the town or not.

But I loved the final episode. I really loved it. Because, for once, the makers of the show did what they promised they were going to: they answered all the questions about the town, and showed you the people who were running it. Of course, if I were to sit down and analyze the show, I would probably be able to come up with a million questions they didn’t answer by the finale, but I felt satisfied that by the end credits, I knew what I needed to know about that town. I certainly knew enough to know with certainty that I didn’t want to end up there.

Beyond the answering of questions, I thought the final two or three scenes of the show were two or three of the best final scenes I’ve seen of any show. It was one of those times when you feel pity for the characters, but you can’t help but to smile at the intelligence of the people running the show (both on and off screen).

If it were possible to understand the show by only watching the final episode, I would recommend only that one, but since it’s not, I would say this is the type of show that a viewer should proceed to watch with caution. And it’s not for the type of viewer who wants to be instantly entertained or gratified. This show requires perseverance, for sure.

Let The Right One In

*WARNING: may contain spoilers *( I don't normally do this, but it's fine if you skip the last paragraph!)

I haven't gotten the chance to read a lot in the past few months. Well, not do the type of reading that I want to do, anyway. Sure, I could tell you all about what the experts are saying about the biological effects of drug addiction on the body and mind, but as far as reading for pure entertainment goes, my life has been kind of lacking. Which is why is my first priority upon graduation was to sit down and sink my teeth into a good novel. Maybe it was that particular desire that lead me to pick up John Ajvide Lindqvist's Let The Right One In.

In the age of Twilight, vampires have lost a lot of their luster for me. They've gotten soft, and I've missed the days of the Anne Ricean vampire running around taking innocent victims and seducing hapless humans. The best part of LTROI is that it effectively combines that down-and-dirt parts of vampirism while humanizing Eli, the story's main "vampire" (although she adamantly denies being a vampire and simply refers to her ailment as an "illness").

I guess I should backtrack and say what it's about a little. Meet Oskar, a twelve-year-old boy whose life is marked by the torture he faces from his classmates. That is until he meets Eli, the girl who moves in next door. Being around Eli gives Oskar not so much courage as a detachment from his own fate, and allows him to stand up for himself. Meanwhile, Eli and the older gentlemen she moves in with are wreaking havoc on the town and its inhabitants, generally creating a mess that they don't seem to have any concern about picking up.

I hate synopsizing books or movies because they always seem flat. They always make the work seem less interesting (or possibly more interesting depending on what it is) than they really are. They are, at their root, false advertising. Also, they can never describe the best parts (without giving away too much about the plot). In order to experience the best parts, you have to experience it for yourself. LTROI is the type of book that I thoroughly enjoyed, but I can't quite think of why. Sure, the characters were great and the dialogue was phenomenal, especially considering it's been translated. But I could say that about a lot of books I didn't enjoy. So what sets this one apart?

For me, I think it could mostly be attributed to the way in which the relationship between Oskar and Eli plays out. They discover each other as we discover them, and because of how strongly Oskar feels drawn to Eli, and vice versa, I felt drawn to both characters, and I felt a really investment in their safety. Because this a horror novel and Eli is a typically villainized character, every page leaves you on the edge of your seat. I expected Eli to hurt Oskar just as equally as I felt like she was going to protect him. And because it wasn't clear what exactly she wanted from him, I never lost interest in their exchanges. I wanted more, and I think that's the biggest compliment you could pay to a book.

I haven't wanted to strongly recommend a book to anyone as much as I do this one in a very long time. I read a lot of books, and this is the best horror/vampire novel I have ever read. If horror and vampires are your thing, and you haven't read this for whatever reason, go out to nearest bookstore and do so now. You will not regret it.

All that being said, I feel no desire to see the film. I have heard from everyone I know that's seen it that it was one of the best films of 2008 (and not just for being a horror film), but I just don't think I could watch it. Especially not by myself. Reading about someone who pours acid on their face is a very different thing from seeing it on the big screen, and it's not something that I particularly want to see, either.  But go ahead and try to convince me. Everyone knows horror movies are my weakness.

Own Worst Makeover

Please forgive me for performing a disappearing act for awhile. These past few weeks have been busy, busy, busy for me. I successfully survived writing my Capstone and finally received my bachelor's in Professional Writing this past Saturday. Suddenly, I have a lot more free time on my hands. It's amazing how much time is freed up when you aren't doing homework. Which is why I decided that this blog could use a bit of a makeover to make it less sporadic and random, and a little more adult (because that's what people tell me I am now). Also, it could really use to be organized. If there's one thing that  college taught me, it's that I am organized.

So, here's the deal. I'm going to start posting once a week (I think the day is going to be Wednesday, but depending on my work schedule for that week, it may go the day before or after).  And here's the plan for what I am thinking each week. And for each week, to add variety, I'm going to mix it up with sometimes reviewing the best I've seen in the past month with the worst. And during those lulls when the networks aren't airing new things and I've seen everything I am willing to see at the movies, I'll review things I find on Netflix or recommend things that I've really enjoyed, or recommend not watching things that I think are awful.

Week 1: TV show

Week 2: Movie

Week 3: Book. I'll try to mix up the genres a bit and step out of my normal reading zone to provide variety, as well as reviewing both new and older books.

Week 4: Miscellaneous. Some weeks maybe I'll write a joke review just for fun (like my weather review), maybe review a date I've been on or a holiday that just happened. Maybe I'll review a concert I've been to or a comic strip I come across. I'm also thinking that if I have any fun short stories I've written, this would be the week that I would share those, as well. Just to keep a little bit of whimsy so I'm not too cut-and-paste.

End of the month: Trish's recommendations. Here is where I would talk about the trailers for the upcoming month that look interesting to me, or the things that I saw in the past month that I didn't get the chance to review, but I thought were good and worthy of checking out.

Stay tuned for the upcoming posts of my new and improved blog <3

Moral lessons and missing identities

I think some of the best shows on television have been cancelled prematurely. Some of these shows go on to be somewhat of cult classics (My So-called Life, Freaks and Geeks) and some of them were just horrendous and never deserved to receive air-time in the first place. And then there are those that are gems that just got lost and forgotten in the mix.

One such of these types of shows was one of my personal favorites, Samantha Who? which ran two seasons before having the plug pulled.

Starring Christina Applegate, the show is about a woman, Samantha Newly, who wakes up from an eight-day coma with no memory of anything that happened before getting run over by a car, including forgetting her semi-crazy parents (Jean Smart and Kevin Dunn) who she hasn't spoken to in two years, her live-in (ex)boyfriend Todd (Barry Watson), and two best friends, Andrea and Dena (Jennifer Esposito and Melissa McCarthy, respectively). The more memories she reveals about herself, the less she likes the person she was before the accident and the more she tries to make herself a better, reformed woman.

 What made this show so great was that each episode outdid the last one. Every time you thought that Samantha couldn't possibly discover anything worse about herself than what she had already discovered, she did. From helping her mother dump her father's car into a lake to sabotaging her best friend's relationships to causing the extinction of a species of butterfly, there was no stone left unturned by her in her evil path. And every time the "new" and improved Samantha tried to make things better, she, of course, made them much worse in the appropriate comedic fashion.

There were, of course, times when the show made cheap, slapstick type of jokes, but it never felt like they had to put on the "clap" sign for the audience to get a sympathy laugh, so I can overlook the occasional cringe factor. Most of the time, it was witty and engaging to watch her discover all these terrible things about herself, mostly because it isn't me who has amnesia, and it isn't me who didn't pass along the message about the job interview to my boyfriend in order to go on vacation. This show is made for people like me who enjoy watching other people mess up their lives and basking in the simple joy that at least it isn't happening to me.

 The only gripe that I have with the show is that it's riddled with underlying moral messages. And by "underlying", I mean in-your-face obvious moral messages that are revealed to the audience by the completely unnecessary voice-over narration. I have never been a fan of narration, I think there are better ways to tell a story, but as far as this show is concerned, the narration isn't too annoying most of the time. And at least there are good-looking men (Barry Watson has grown up a lot since his Seventh Heaven days) to combat the fact that the show was about a woman trying her hardest to take the moral highroad after thirty years of taking advantage of everyone she encountered. I only wish that we didn't have to take the highroad with her every episode.

Overall, Samantha Who? is a fun, quirky little show that entertains and teaches