The supreme genius of Deadliest Warrior

File this under guilty pleasure. If you haven't been paying attention to Spike's quality programming (1000 Ways to Die leading the charge), you may have missed Deadliest Warrior.

Let me just say: there has never been a more perfect dude show. Ever.

In fact, it's as manly as great dude films like Predator and Rambo (but not quite Commando or Point Break) and makes us mere mortal men feel inferior for only having two balls.

The premise is simple. What would happen is quasi-historically accurate warriors fought one another in totally ludicrous battles? And what if we simulated it 1000 times, with a number of different weapons? Finally, why don't writers just quit their jobs? For a greater show can never be created.

In Samurai vs. Viking, we had the legendary Japanese fighter shoot a goddamn arrow in a dummy's fucking eye (go to about 3:30 in the video) -- twice. I challenge you to find something better on television. That includes anything on The Office.



Really though, this show's got it all: cheesy re-enactments, faux history, "science," computers, glorious arguments between supporters of each warrior, and high levels of violence.

But the crowning achievement of the show has to be how it changed my mind about the Indians vs. Vikings debate spawned by the feature film, Pathfinder. I, a staunch Viking supporter, have been converted. Apaches are fucking boss.

I can't argue with a guy named Snake Blocker.

The Rise of Citizen Journalism

With news coming out that the Boston Globe may be pushed to chapter 11, and the fact that several big name newspapers across the country are shutting down or switching format (the Christian Science Monitor went online only) I've been thinking about the decline of journalism of the past. Television journalism, with some obvious exceptions, focuses a lot of its time on sensational stories and gotcha journalism. My favorite thing lately is WHDH and the Fox boston affiliate going after public employees that are making decent money... by working over 100 hours a week - vilifying them for busting there asses to provide for their families and providing vital public services at the same time.

To me, the best journalism has always been one of the strong suits of the major newspapers. Writers that are able to get to the heart of the issue and know the inside actors and can actually get some access to their subject matter. It's not "gotcha" journalism in the sense that it is meant to be in-depth with analysis of subject matter, not a quick hit on some unsuspecting bus driver who happens to be 50 with 4 kids under the age of 18. Instead of trying to evoke rage among subscribers, it tries to find answers, reasons, draw connections, and provide explanations for the question at hand. These stories fall in many categories: human interest, business, politics, science & health, you name it. The point of this post is that I'm worried that we may be losing high quality journalism in the mass media.

One of the investigative journalism programs on tv is Front Line. Their programming is done by WGBH in Boston and is top notch, I've seen and heard of many of their programs used in academic settings. A loss of funding for that program would be a big blow to investigative journalism on tv. 

What would fill the void if major publishers like the Globe went under? Would blogs have the same effect? I don't think so. 

While we've seen a large jump in citizen journalists and bloggers, I don't think that most have connections and access to produce content of the same caliber as traditional journalists with big name outfits do. I also don't see most bloggers willing to invest the time and effort into this kind of thing. Blogs are typically narrow in scope and have no funding for these kind of things.

Enter: Arianna Huffington and the Huffington Post.

This past Sunday the Huffington Post announced their new investigative journalism fund. Their mission statement is essentially to combat the consolidation of newspapers and the cutting of investigative journalism by hiring laid off reporters and providing resources for staff members to conduct quality investigative journalism. They also want the citizen journalist to submit their own pitches and story ideas, and they'll be picking up many of them I'm sure. 

One issue that I see with this is the ideological bent of the HuffPo (as its known). Being a far left blog it's easy to dismiss all of their content as ideological in nature, and in general being opinion oriented. Perhaps this is an opportunity for some rebranding for them, and to tap into another audience that they may not be reaching with their current format. Maybe its just a great idea to help preserve some of the best journalism out there and provide a way for these laid off writers with a way of maintaining cash flow. Either way, I think we come out ahead as the reader. 

So what do you think about the fall of print journalism, the rise of the citizen journalist, and the merits of blog based investigative reporting?

TV is dead! Long live TV!

As y'all know, I've been looking at my expenses and weighing what I'll be doing once I get a job and apartment in terms of services. Part of that is determining the whole TV thing. Reality is that there are traditionally 3 choices: the local cable provider, Verizon FiOS if it's available in your area, or one of the satellite providers.  

Over the past couple years the tv networks have finally started to get it. The old business model is dead. Service providers are a dying breed. They serve only as middlemen at this point. With the continued evolution of websites like Hulu, which let's be honest, started because hackers and tv-links thought (accurately) that on demand internet streaming is the future of TV. NBC and Fox have collaborated on Hulu, and all the major networks seem to have an equivolent site.

This is fantastic, only there is one problem. THEY EPISODES UP 8 DAYS LATER! Seriously, what the fuck? That's after the next episode airs! Do they not realize what that does? You miss a broadcast episode and you have to go pirate it to catch up! YOU IDIOTS! You get to put targetted advertising in, and you're missing the boat! Or you have to pay like $3 for the show on itunes. It's kind of ridiculous. Defeats the whole point. Once they get the Simulcast going then they'll be onto something.

Until that point, it's still up in the air in my view. Another alternative is the Slingbox. I've been using it since 2007, when I bought it so I could watch TV while making phone calls at work. I highly recommend it to anyone that wants to install it at their parent's house and streaming it over their broadband network. Then all you gotta pay for is the internets. 

With Netflix now available over xbox 360 and other systems, its only a matter of time until services like Hulu are available in that way as well. Combo TiVo, Modem, Netflix/Hulu box? You bet it'll happen. Just a matter of when. TV is dead my friends. Long live TV!

Catering to the lowest common denominator

One of the side effects of unemployment is having a ludicris amount of time to do nothing. In the parlance of our times, having many a day-off to j-off. What I really mean is that there's a lot of time to watch TV. I find it astounding how terrible the shows on TV have gotten. TV networks seem to be going out of their way to place new shows that show any promise in timeslots that will doom them to failure (Sarah Conner Chronicles, Dollhouse on Fox to name a few) in favor of more shitty shows like the bachelor and reairings of American Idol. What? Oh, I guess that's like the 4th season, not the 1st. I couldn't tell. 

The catalyst for this post was scrolling through the TV guide and trying to find something to watch. The best sounding thing on? "15 Shocking Acts of Violence" on E. Really? That is the best they could come up with? It is then followed up "15 Unforgettable Tragedies." That's some good stuff right there.

Let's talk about original programming for a second. How many iterations of Law & Order are there? How many versions of CSI? I find it hard to believe that there is really a shortage of ideas for television shows out there. NBC is moving Leno to 10pm on weekdays, this takes even more time that they have to fill up with decent programming. Everything on TV now is either some reality TV trash, or a Law and Order or CSI ripoff (see Numb3rs and The Mentalist). I think Lost and Heroes may be the only shows outside of that. Cable TV's programming is either home make overs or home buying reality shows. 

Joss Whedon has stated that he'll never work on TV again after Dollhouse, and work only on the web. Is that the future of quality programming? Given the current industry paradigm, I think that's the only alternative until it wakes up the big networks and they realize there is money to be made in quality shows. They just wouldn't know because it's been so long since they invested in that.

TeeVee: 1 line review edition

By network:

Fox:

Fringe: I haven't watched an episode of this, I've only seen commercials. But already I know it sucks and its a ripoff of the xfiles without David Duchovney and Gillian Anderson. He probably wasn't around because he was off indulging in his sex addiction, and she dropped off the face of the earth and hasn't clawed her way back to the surface.

House: Growing tired, still witty, but apart from that, the same as every hospital show out there. Except this one has Kal Penn and a british dude imitating an american accent.

24: Jack Bauer was just elected chairman of the RNC and this is now their PR arm. But if it isn't addictive, I don't know what is. I've heard they're using it to ween people off of heroin. Also, Janeane (whatever) Garafalo should stick to comedies and WHAS sequels.

American Idol: I think we saw this 5 years ago. And 4 years ago. And 3, 2, and last year. 

NBC: 

The office: Good as ever.

30 rock: I've only seen a couple episodes so I can't comment much.

Chuck: I watched 5 minutes of this tonight in 3d. All I know is that there was a grenade labled IG-88 in a best buy-like store. I may be only one of 3 people on this blog that got the reference. They get props for that.

Scifi: 

Battlestar galactica is the greatest show ever made. Everything else on that network sucks.s another day.

Superlatives for 2008

Since people are doing some reflections on the past year I thought I would do some one liners on the topic.

2008 was voted:

Revolutionary

Biggest flirt (Economy shits the bed, gas gets cheap)

Ok fuck that, 2008 was pretty sweet for me. I helped deliver the first primary win for a serious female candidate. I graduated from college. Put myself enormously in debt. Took a job, moved to virginia beach, beat our vote goals, swept the state. That was pretty sweet. 

Next thing I know, I'm back in town, expecting to find a job in Boston or DC with ease. 3 months later here I am. It was a pretty good epic ride that went from 100mph to 0 instantly if not sooner. Bummer, man.

2008 was a good year. We'll leave the job hunting for a later post of epic ranting. 

Tops for 08:

Movies: 

Ok I actually only saw like 4 movies in all of 2008. AVP 2, Cloverfield, Dark Knight, and I swear there was something else. Oh well. Anyway, Dark Knight was easily the only real movie in there, and as part of my office's forced family fun program we were required to see it as a team. Best thing I did all summer. I liked the fresh take on the Joker, and the reimagining in general. 

Music: 

Introduced to MGMT, Crystal Castles, Girl Talk, Cut Copy, that was probably about it. Been a tough year trying to find time to find new things. Crystal castles is still one of my favorites out of those. They're one of those groups that I can just zone out to. Electronic music has always been something I've liked and I'm glad it isn't just dismissed like it has been in the past. 

TV:

Again, haven't had much time for this. Battlestar Galactica had a decent half season, ending on a really strong, depressing, and altogether soul crushing note. Which was really awesome if I do say so. It's refreshing to having something that isn't always a fucking ray of sunshine, where you never know when main characters will be unceremoniously killed off. For 2009 I'm going to take several people's advice and watch The Wire, which is more or less a spiritual successor to one of my favorite shows of all time Homocide: Life on the Street.

Anyway, I know this is a weak first post, but I'm just doing it off the cuff. Tomorrow I'll have something a bit more substantial.