Milo Ventimiglia, one of my favorites from Heroes, went on a USO tour and talked about the show a bit.

He met many soldiers who were familiar with his show, and had strong opinions about his character’s nemesis, Sylar (played diabolically by Zachary Quinto).

“When I was over in Iraq and Afghanistan, a lot of soldiers were like, ‘Dude, will you just kill Sylar already? Will you just get rid of him?’” Ventimiglia told The Associated Press during a telephone interview this week. “And I’m like, ‘Man, I don’t know if you’re gonna want that just yet. I think you’re going to be very surprised as to what happens.’”

Yeah, that’s what I say. No real spoilers in the article, but Milo brought up the possibility that his character may turn bad, and Sylar may turn good. Now that will be interesting.

Steven Colbert had a hilarious segment on Israel’s national bird, and the recent decision that giraffes are kosher.

Spit-monitor warning is in effect. Absolutely priceless video of Colbert drinking Manischewitz. The grape concord, if I’m not mistaken.

Whoa.

I was about to give up on Lost at the end of last year. It really came back strong in the third season. I’m looking forward to the fourth.

Maybe I’ll get to do an episode summary this weekend. That was a lot of episode to summarize, some good, some bad, some “I knew it!” moments, some “Huh?” moments. And one big giant “Awwwwwwww.” So yay for that, at least.

I probably won’t be home in time to watch it live, or even almost-live via my new DVR and Comcast (it’s craptastic!), as I will be visiting Sarah and the G family’s synagogue tomorrow night for a service and a neat party. But I will be watching it when I get home.

And I have a new theory on who is the twelfth Cylon. I’m still holding out for Baltar, but there are two others.

My theory below the more prompt, and by the way, I’m always wrong about stuff like this, so take that into account. I’m superb at guessing real-life puzzles, and totally suck at games and TV shows. I get the ends of some books and movies, though. I never figured out anything about Babylon 5. Straczynski had me guessing until the very end.

(more…)

Just in time for me to catch up before Season Four begins, I treated myself and bought a big-screen TV and got HDTV and the Sci-Fi Channel.

Y’know, I didn’t care much for the remake when I saw the miniseries all those years ago. But I borrowed Season One from a friend, and it sort of grows on you. So I bought Season Two, and was utterly hooked. Been waiting for Three to get here for a while—it’s months later than it should have been, but at least they stopped doing that stupid “2.0″ and “2.5″ crap. Season Three is all in one package. I have that, and Razor (extended edition, of course, though I’m going to take a wild guess that some of the “SCENES WE COULDN’T SHOW ON TV!” are between Kain and Six. Yawn.), which I’ll get to after I get through all of Three.

I should also like to point out that the guys from Circuit City did a great job hooking up the new set. Delivered it first thing in the morning, hours earlier than I thought they would, and put all the wires and cables right, and got me started. Comcast totally screwed everything up, so I was on the phone for an hour last night unattaching and re-attaching cables, and we won’t talk about the two trips to the Comcast center to get a box that worked with my HDMI cable. Or the fact that the box I did get finally still had hours of the previous customer’s recordings on it, puzzling me to no end as to how Comcast knew I watched ABC soaps, and why they were pre-set to record for me. Especially as I’ve given them up again to regain a little more time in my life.

The thing I can’t figure out is how to program only the channels I want to run through. But that’s because I haven’t really sat down with the manual yet. I want to set all the HD stations that I will actually watch (forget about HD Travel Channel, who the hell cares?), and, oh, yeah—I have to get a new DVD player. Mine’s too old to show anything above 480i. I know this because the TV tells me so when I try to complain to it that my DVD output sucks. (The upgraded cables didn’t do it, Chris, it’s at least eight years old, and maybe ten, so it’s pre-HD.)

I think I’ll buy a DVD/VCR recorder if I can find a decent one that’s not too expensive.

I have to say, I am really happy with my new TV. When the Circuit City guys came to set it up, they were trying to figure out how to center it in the living room. “Oh, no,” I said. “See that chair?” [Points to The Chair That Swallows You Whole, the overstuffed leather chair on the other side of the room] “That’s where I watch TV. Center it on that.” They laughed, and did.

As for the rest of you, well, tough. It’s my living room, and my TV. Guests are just going to have to suffer on the sofa. Okay, maybe I’ll share the chair sometimes. If I really like you.

Next on my wishlist: My own living room, in my own condo or townhouse, to put it in. There’s another development going up about halfway between my and Sarah’s house, not too far away from where I am now, that I might be moving to by next year. It’s right near 288, so it doesn’t really extend my commute to northern VA on Mondays.

I’m still in shock. There’s no buyer’s remorse at all. Probably because this is the first big-ticket item I’ve bought since I bought my car, and that was back in 2000. I think I’m due.

It’s good to have a good job. And to have money again.

Many, many years ago, I was watching a show on TV that affected me so strongly, I never forgot it. It was about a man who wakes up in a cube-shaped room, where people come in and out of the panels, but he can’t leave. None of it makes much sense. It’s all theater of the absurd, and they’re trying to convince the guy he doesn’t really exist at some point. I never forgot the ending, either. The thing is, when you’re twelve years old, you tend not to notice the writers or producers of shows.

Well, another big cheer for the internet. I found “The Cube” on IMDB. Turns out Jim Henson(!) wrote and directed it. And better yet: It’s on Google. For free.

I’m going to grab an hour tomorrow and watch it. Wow. And to think, I got into arguments with people who insisted I made it up, or dreamed it. Nope. I was a kid, but I wasn’t wrong about this play.

Okay. I have watched the latest—and saddest—episode of Lost, and I have several questions and thoughts.

Why on earth would anyone—ANYONE—who has spent more than an hour in Ben Linus’ presence ever, ever trust a word he says? I mean, really. The only way this series ends happily for me is if Sayid or Jack or Sawyer or Kate or even Hurley walks up to Ben, say “By the way, I should have done this ages ago,” and shoots him dead. I don’t even want to hear an explanation. Don’t want to know why he did what he did. Because the man couldn’t tell the truth if it walked up to him, gave him a drink and said, “Dude, I’m the truth, and that’s the truth!”

And come to think of it, I think I’d like to see the main writers of Lost. Personally. And hit them on the heads, repeatedly, with, oh, not a baseball bat. Something light, but painful, that won’t leave lasting damage or scars. Like, a yardstick. Or a wooden paddle.

Really. If someone were to ask me to describe Lost in one word, I’d say: Mindfuck. It’s worse than the X-Files, because at least the X-Files had some non-storyline episodes where you could remember that you liked the show regardless of how stupid it got.

I hate that the acting is so good, and the storyline has managed to suck me in so much. Because it makes about as much sense as Alias, which was also J.J. Abrams, and which I watched because it was fun and silly and I never tried to make much sense of it.

I really don’t try to make much sense of Lost, either. Because when I do, my head hurts.

Remember the poison gas from the other season? The one where they did Ben’s history and showed that he was callous enough to let a whole bunch of people die? The fact that there were two rival groups of people on the island? That was never really explained. “Hey, we’re rival groups on this island where weird stuff happens. Let’s kill the other group!” Why? Never explained.

Remember how “The Others” had these, like, superhuman tracking abilities? And superhuman strength? And it turns out that they’re just human after all? Never explained.

The smoke monster? Never explained. The bears? Never explained. The fact that turning off the electromagnetic thingie would destroy the island? Never explained.

Will I watch the rest of the series? Yeah. Because it’s still good, no matter how stupid the things that don’t get explained become. Will I parse every single action and reaction? Nope. It’s J.J. Abrams. It’s stupid. It’s a step above Alias, which was a step above Felicity, but it’s still just plain dumb.

Speaking of Jameel, you simply must read this post about the effect of the loss of eight Torah students in that horrendous terror attack last week.

Every morning I take the 35 bus line to work. It’s a quick ride and usually takes no more than 12 minutes. The third stop after I get on by the shuk is directly in front of Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav. This morning I found myself a bit anxious, unsure of what I was going to see as we passed by. As I looked around, I saw death notices pasted all over the street and flowers that had been brought lined the entrance to the Yeshiva. When the bus pulled up to the stop, the driver shut off the engine and stood. With tears in his eyes he told everyone sitting on the bus that one of the boys killed on Thursday night was his nephew. He asked if everyone on the bus would mind if he spoke for a few minutes in memory of his nephew and the other boys that were killed. After seeing head nods all over the bus he began to speak.

Read it all.

If you’re not watching Jericho, you’re not watching one of the best shows on TV.

CBS has full episodes. You can catch up.

Go. It’s worth it.

I just caught up on the last episode.

Wow.

If you’re really geeky, all episodes of the original Star Trek series are available for download at CBS. (h/t Crossing the Rubicon3)BTW, why is this on CBS and not NBC, as you might recall.

Mr. Spock: Here is the readout, Captain. The computer has identified the alien vessel as a 1968 Chrysler Imperial with a tinted windshield and retractable headlights.Captain Kirk: And the little blue and orange numbers?

Mr. Spock: That’s called a “California license plate”, and it’s registered, or was in 1968, to a corporation known as “NBC”. Wait.. there’s something more.. The computer isn’t sure, but it thinks this NBC used to manufacture cookies.

So my best guess is that CBS has a hand in the producing the upcoming Star Trek movie so it’s hoping that making the original show available will generate interest in the movie. (Though CBS and Viacom have split there’s still a production company called CBS Paramount.)

(The main post is about the Church of Spock, which Daled Amos figures is one of the more mainstream tourist sites in Lynchburg.)

If you’re super geeky here are Star Charts of the whole Trek Universe. So if you want to trek through the Romulan Empire or vacation on Bajor, here’s all the info you need. (h/t Colossus of Rhodey)

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Gee, nothing could go wrong with Israeli prisoner releases planned with the Palestinians, eh?

The two terrorists who were killed Thursday evening after breaking into a yeshiva in the settlement of Kfar Etzion were released from an Israeli prison last week, Palestinian sources in Hebron told Ynet.

According to the sources, the terrorists were identified as relatives Muhammad and Mahmoud Sbarana, both 20-year-old Hamas members from the village of Beit Omer, near Hebron.

The terrorists, armed with a gun and a knife and dressed in uniform, threatened the students and the instructors with the weapons before being shot to death by the yeshiva’s instructors, two of whom were lightly injured while struggling with the terrorists.

Palestinian security officials told Ynet Friday morning that the two were imprisoned in Israel for the past two years for attempting to steal weapons from an IDF base in the Gush Etzion area.

They don’t even need “blood on their hands” to try for blood on their hands.

Another Israeli was killed by a Fatah—excuse me, Al Aqsa Martyrs group—terrorist.

A Border Guard police officer was killed and three people were injured Thursday evening in two simultaneous terror attacks which took place in the Jerusalem area.

Two Border Guard officers were shot at the northern entrance to the refugee camp of Shoafat, north of Jerusalem. Twenty-year-old Lance Corporal Rami Zuhari of Beersheva was critically injured, and later died of his wounds despite paramedics’ attempts to resuscitate him. Another female officer sustained moderate to serious wounds and was evacuated to the Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in the capital.

And oh yeah—they’re going to keep on killing.

Fatah activists belonging to the “Brigades of Return” and to “Black September” claimed responsibility for carrying out the shooting attack in Shoafat Thursday evening. The attack left one Israeli dead and another one seriously wounded.

A spokesman on behalf of the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, Fatah’s military wing, told Ynet that the attackers “returned to their base safely.”

[...] “This is our proof that we are no longer committed to the calm and that we do not intend to continue handing over our weapons,” the spokesman said. “We are only committed to resistance against the Israeli occupation. The next attacks are already underway, we promised a response within a few days and this is the first operation in a series of operations.”

These are Israel’s “partners in peace.” And the head of Fatah is: That’s right. Mahmoud Abbas, the man who called the deaths of Hamas terrorists a “massacre.” You know, I’ve searched in vain to find a single reference to Mahmoud Abbas condemning the terrorist attacks in Jerusalem. Huh. It’s almost like he, well, doesn’t actually care that terrorists are murdering Israelis.

Go figure.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles started last week. I forgot. Thankfully, Fox has the pilot and current episode available for free. Click on the down arrow below the screen for the pilot episode, and then the plus sign to enlarge the screen. Or you can get it for free from AOL and, I presume, watch it on your HDTV.

I don’t care for the actress who plays Sarah Connor yet, but I suspect she’ll grow on me. Summer Glau of Firefly has a surprising role, and John Connor is played by the kid who played Zach (the cheerleader’s friend) on Heroes. Both of them are excellent.

C’mon, everyone. Watch the show. Run it up in the ratings. It’s on Monday nights at 9, to fill in the void left by Heroes. And you can catch up on the first two episodes.

In season 4 of 24 there’s an excellent exchange between a politician and one of his former aides. I’m going to leave out the character names so this won’t serve as a spoiler to anyone who still plans to see the series.

Aide: … I know you believe my actions during your term in office amounted to a personal and political betrayal.
Pol: It’s not something I believe. It’s a fact. Get to your point.

The aide was trying to weasel out of his responsibility toward his former boss. The boss wouldn’t let him get away with it.

Which brings me to one of my pet peeves about reporting from the Middle East. In Israelis Cool To an Offer From Hamas On a Truce Isabel Kershner writes the tired line:

Hamas, which was at the vanguard of a suicide bombing campaign in Israel in recent years, calls in its charter for Israel’s destruction. Israel, like the United States and the European Union, classifies Hamas as a terrorist organization and refuses to deal with it.

Hamas is a terrorist organization, not because anyone classifies it as such, but because of how it operates. So to paraphrase the character from “24″ - it’s not a classification, it’s a fact.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Okay. If you saw it, you have a theory as to what will happen next.

I am so bummed that there is a surviving twin. But I don’t believe anyone else is really, most sincerely dead, either. Heroes fell. They’re not dead yet.

I have ideas about Nathan, Nikki, Adam, and Bennett. And who this year’s Big Bad is. (I don’t think we’ve met the boss yet.)

Your turn.

The original episodes of Sesame Street have been issued on DVD. But our children better not watch them. It wouldn’t be right.

Just don’t bring the children. According to an earnest warning on Volumes 1 and 2, “Sesame Street: Old School” is adults-only: “These early ‘Sesame Street’ episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child.”

Virgina Heffernan explains in Sweeping the Clouds away:

Live-action cows also charge the 1969 screen — cows eating common grass, not grain improved with hormones. Cows are milked by plain old farmers, who use their unsanitary hands and fill one bucket at a time. Elsewhere, two brothers risk concussion while whaling on each other with allergenic feather pillows. Overweight layabouts, lacking touch-screen iPods and headphones, jockey for airtime with their deafening transistor radios. And one of those radios plays a late-’60s news report — something about a “senior American official” and “two billion in credit over the next five years” — that conjures a bleak economic climate, with war debt and stagflation in the offing.The old “Sesame Street” is not for the faint of heart, and certainly not for softies born since 1998, when the chipper “Elmo’s World” started. Anyone who considers bull markets normal, extracurricular activities sacrosanct and New York a tidy, governable place — well, the original “Sesame Street” might hurt your feelings.

What?

Well for one thing, there was Cookie Monster doing his Allistair Cooke impersontation:

I asked Carol-Lynn Parente, the executive producer of “Sesame Street,” how exactly the first episodes were unsuitable for toddlers in 2007. She told me about Alistair Cookie and the parody “Monsterpiece Theater.” Alistair Cookie, played by Cookie Monster, used to appear with a pipe, which he later gobbled. According to Parente, “That modeled the wrong behavior” — smoking, eating pipes — “so we reshot those scenes without the pipe, and then we dropped the parody altogether.”

Cookie Monster? wrong behavior?

As for Cookie Monster, he can be seen in the old-school episodes in his former inglorious incarnation: a blue, googly-eyed cookievore with a signature gobble (“om nom nom nom”). Originally designed by Jim Henson for use in commercials for General Foods International and Frito-Lay, Cookie Monster was never a righteous figure. His controversial conversion to a more diverse diet wouldn’t come until 2005, and in the early seasons he comes across a Child’s First Addict.

No we wouldn’t want our children to follow his example.

Unfortunately one of the examples does strike as a reason to be careful.

Back then — as on the very first episode, which aired on PBS Nov. 10, 1969 — a pretty, lonely girl like Sally might find herself befriended by an older male stranger who held her hand and took her home. Granted, Gordon just wanted Sally to meet his wife and have some milk and cookies, but . . . well, he could have wanted anything. As it was, he fed her milk and cookies. The milk looks dangerously whole.

Some of the reasons why Sesame Street isn’t fit for children sound like warmed over political correctness. The last one mentioned here, though, reflects the our society’s loss of innocence. At the same time that our society has become overprotective of children in silly ways, in other ways new hazards have appeared that we must protect them from.

UPDATE: Ed Driscoll adds:

Forty years from now, when the current season of Sesame Street is being assembled for release on whatever the successor format to the successor format of DVD is, how much of it will have to be reshot to comply with how much further the nanny state is sure to have expanded further?

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

James Kirchik in the LA Times writes Don’t bow to the ‘Muslim Street’

America’s firebombing of Dresden during World War II surely “angered” many Germans, and our bombing of Belgrade during the Kosovo war perturbed Serbians. Did the fact that we (and our allies) antagonized people during these military actions make those interventions unjust? And while it’s true that the overthrow of the Baathist regime in Baghdad has angered Muslims around the world (many of whom, it ought to be noted, cheered Saddam Hussein and ignored his crimes against their fellow Muslims out of a cruelly misplaced sense of Arab nationalism), it has also delighted the Kurds, the Marsh Arabs, Iraqi trade unionists and the many other victims of Hussein’s regime.There are lots of things that “anger” the “Muslim street:” Women not wearing burkas. Adults drinking alcohol. Homosexuals. But virtually no one seriously suggests that we make America less free in order to suit the tastes of the Muslim world. So why should we let something as nebulous and reactionary as “Muslim opinion” get in the way of preventing genocide in Sudan?

The context of Kirchik’s argument is the mass killing in Darfur. Should the ‘Muslim street’ dictate American actions in Darfur?

This question is especially pertinent considering that the United States is enormously popular in Africa. A Pew Global Attitudes poll released during the summer revealed that the majority of people in eight out of 10 African countries believe that the United States is their “most dependable ally.” More important, the poll found that most Africans fault the United States for not taking a more active role in Darfur. Continuing to avoid intervention there to please the “Muslim street,” therefore, will make us less popular with Africans. You cannot please everybody all the time, and in the case of Darfur, intervening will endear us to the people actually living in the region.

Barry Rubin applies the question more generally (and in slightly different terms).

Indeed, there are four main arches critical to the Middle East’s dominant ideology:* That its problems arise from Western and Israeli oppression.
* That the struggles and violence of radical Arab nationalists and Islamists are based on genuine grievances.
* That the West behaves wrongly because it is hostile or ignorant about Arabs and Muslims.
* And that Arab and Muslim society is vastly superior to the West which justifies their rejection of it and ultimately will pave the way for their victory over it.

The first three are too commonly accepted in the West; the last is largely ignored altogether. But the key to understanding the Middle East is not “Islamophobia” in the West but the region’s own “Westphobia,” “modernityphobia,” “secularphobia,” “democracyphobia,” “freedomphobia,” “femaleequalityphobia,” and “JudeoChristianphobia.”

The bottom line is that change is needed not in Western policies and perceptions but in the Middle East itself. After all, the West succeeded precisely-as Arab liberals well understand–because its societies pit a priority on internal change: education and honest inquiry; productive virtues; better social infrastructure; more human and civil rights; and a freer culture.

In other words, the West ought to ignore what’s widely called the “Muslim street” and appeal to Muslim moderates. (I assume that he’s not talking about the Muslim brotherhood that Jackson Diehl portrays as “moderates.”)

In this regard, a British student who lived in Syria has written a personal account entitled “Syrian Journal,” which reduces prevailing myths about the region to rubble. It brilliantly portrays a dictatorship using repression, demagoguery, and modern public relations’ techniques to stay in power.
…
Then compare this to a New York Times article on precisely the same topic, “Students of Arabic Learn at a Syrian Crossroads,” which falls for every regime trick and generally portrays Syria as a pretty good society.

All too often in the West those supposedly devoted to liberalism and enlightenment are those who seemingly respect the anti-Americanism (and generally the anti-liberalism) of the Muslim street. PostGlobal has a feature that I discovered yesterday, How the world sees America by Amar C. Bakshi. A quick look at the titles and you start to realize that series ought to have been titled “How negatively the world sees America.” The author isn’t looking for Africans or British students in Syria who appreciate America and the West, but rather for those who hold hatred of the West as one of their primary political beliefs.

Take for example How the world sees Jack Bauer.

Though he’s outrageous, Bauer is inevitably intertwined with America. He fights for it, after all, and embodies some of its stereotypes: multiple love affairs, an affinity for pyrotechnics, fierce patriotism, and most of all these days, a go-it-alone attitude. After the unilateral invasion of Iraq, America’s belief in the individual, once embodied by on-screen heroes like Rocky Balboa and The Terminator, increasingly reads as a political mantra.As Australian journalist Antony Loewenstein writes, Bauer’s use of “torture and the whatever it takes mentality is precisely why the U.S. is so despised right now.” From India, student Akshay Bawa writes: “Jack Bauer is James Bond on coke.” The cool, cosmopolitan imperialism of Britain’s 007 is replaced with the brutish patriotism of Bauer.

I will not pretend to be an expert on “24,” being a recent discoverer of the series. However as we’re approaching the end of the second season, barring any more unforeseen twists, the theme of the second season - clearly visible despite being obscured by all manners of violence - is “Why can’t we just get along?” It seems to be a plea of understanding to the Islamic world, not an indictment of that world.

If Bakshi - who seems to admit enjoying “24″ - finds critics of America who use “24″ as an excuse to hate America, it reflects on him too. Like those who give too much credence to the ‘Muslim street’ he sees a value in hating - or at least criticizing - America.

The United States ought to look to its interests first and not worry about how others react. In many cases the objection to America is not well thought out, but a posture that is celebrated as “sophisticated” by those who ought to know better.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Actually, it’s a mini-episode summary. With no real spoilers.

[SOMETIME NEXT YEAR]
MAMA PETRELLI: Peter, you have to remember! You have to!
PETER: Okay. [remembers everything] Mom? Holy cow! Your special ability is guilt!
AUDIENCE: Oh, like that’s a superpower? You live in New York and you’re unfamiliar with mothers making their kids feel guilty? You’re Italian and you don’t know about guilt? Yeesh.
NATHAN: I’m not! You have no idea how much that woman has ruined my life.
AUDIENCE: Oh, shut up and shave. Stop whining, you big baby.

[SOMETIME THIS YEAR]
OLD MAN PARKMAN: Muahaha, I have the power to bring dead actors back to life so that the fans won’t be too upset that we killed off D.L.
NIKKI: Ew. Send him back to the grave. He doesn’t love me anymore.
AUDIENCE: Didn’t we see this last year with Candice? Recycling plots already?

MOHINDER: Bob, I have a confession to make. Even though only two weeks ago I believed you were part of an evil organization that is bent on ruling the world by subjugating mutants and their powers, I’m going to confess to you that I’m working with Noah Bennett to take down your company and probably kill you all.
BOB: What’s up, Doc? You’re either with us, or you’re with Adam.
MOHINDER: Who? What? Gee, could you get any more symbolic? Adam, Eve, blahblahblah. Who am I supposed to be? God?
BOB: Nah, that was your dad. By the way, take this gun so you can shoot Bennett in the eye for us, would you?
AUDIENCE: Oh, yeah, like he’s really going to die. Please. But if you can kill off that whiny boyfriend of Claire’s, we’d be grateful.
WHINY BOYFRIEND: Hey! What’s wrong with me? I’m cheerful, smart, I can fly, and I get to make out with Hayden Paniettiere.
AUDIENCE: What are you, like 30, and you’re playing a high school kid? Please. Major “Ew” factor going on here.

More later, maybe.

Media Backspin writes of the documentary To die in Jerusalem, which somehow balances the death of Rachel Levy with the death of the girl who killed her. (My guess is that the movie ignores the hero, Haim Smadar, who died that day.)

Backspin notes that the source material, the article in Newsweek was just as wretched as the portrayal of the two girls in the NY Times. Someone else noticed this at the time, Bret Stephens, then editor of the Jerusalem Post.

There’s a hero to this story. She’s a quiet, studious, beautiful Palestinian girl, with a rich and mysterious inner life, who one day bids a nonchalant farewell to her classmates, leaves a “grim warren of alleys and tightly packed dwellings,” and commits something perfectly abrupt and terrible, in the stylized manner of ritual Japanese suicide or a French art-house film. The Rachel Levy of Greenberg’s telling is, by contrast, just another transplanted JAP. More problematic is that Greenberg’s evident concern for balance is such that he tells us nothing about Akhras save the details of her life that mirror Levy’s. Which is to say, everything about her that’s banal. But it is not a banal girl who walks into a supermarket with explosives wrapped to her waist to detonate herself and every other living thing within a 20 meter radius. To limit the profile of Akhras to the fact that she went to school and did the laundry is a little like telling us that Charles Manson likes mustard on his burgers and is a huge fan of the LA Lakers.

Absent from Greenberg’s account is some idea of how a young woman can be raised, educated and eventually recruited to become a suicide bomber. What were her family’s politics? On what diet of literature was she schooled? How did the suicide squad find her? What sort of training did she get? What kind of society makes murderesses out of its future mothers?

But we get none of it, except that Akhras “was quite normal.” Within that artless remark there’s a story worth telling about this killer and the world that made her. Too bad Greenberg misses it.

…

Yet for all this, Hammer’s story disappoints. “There was something about staring into the almost-twin faces of the bomber and her victim last week,” he writes, “that moved the seemingly unending tale of strife in the region to a deeper and even more unsettling place… Martyrdom - or, depending on your point of view, murder - is becoming mainstream.”

Depending on your point of view?

“To die in Jerusalem” is not the first dramatization of this terror attack. A few years ago, there was a play “Paradise” that was being produced in Cincinatti and upset the Muslim population there. I found out about this in an obscure blog, David’s Israel Blog.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Just breaking …

Christopher Pine has been cast to play the young Captain Kirk in the next Star Trek movie.

The bridge of the starship Enterprise is filling up.

Chris Pine, who had been in talks to join the cast of J.J. Abrams’ “Star Trek” flick, will play the young James Kirk, while Karl Urban will take on the role of Dr. Leonard McCoy, distributor Paramount confirmed Thursday.They join previously announced cast members Zachary Quinto as Vulcan scientist Spock, Simon Pegg as engineer Scotty, John Cho as helmsman Sulu, Zoe Saldana as communications officer Uhura and Anton Yelchin as navigator Chekov.

Leonard Nimoy, who played Enterprise science officer Spock in the 1960s TV series and six “Star Trek” feature films, also will appear as an older version of the Vulcan.

Eric Bana, the star of Steven Spielberg’s “Munich” and Ang Lee’s “Hulk,” is playing a villain in the “Trek” film, which begins shooting in November and is due out in December 2008.

They couldn’t find someone named Christopher Pike?

UPDATE: It occurred to me that if Nimoy will be playing an older Spock, the story will likely be told as a flashback. So in the framing story will Spock have returned to the Federation or will he still be, where we last saw him, fomenting revolution on Romulus?

UPDATE: I know nothing of these actors, but someone isn’t happy with the choices. (h/t Transterrestial Musings)

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Okay. Here’s the thing that should be the first rule of Sylar, now and always: If you find yourself alone with an evil mutant who can eat your brain, don’t stop to think, talk, or mention how good you can be together. Count zero and run away. Preferably screaming.

I mean, come on. Candace just flunked Supervillains 101.

The hype about Pushing Daisies is true. The pilot was excellent. It reminded me of Tim Burton’s humor, back when he was creating Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands. Plus, it’s from the folks who brought us Wonderfalls and Dead Like Me, both good, but short-lived, shows.

And a great big plus: Swoosie Kurtz and Ellen Greene (who looks much younger than she did playing Sylar’s mom on Heroes, phew!) were in the pilot, and may show up from time to time later. I would hope so, anyway. I love the actors.

The show was funny and sweet and heartbreaking, sometimes all at once. I haven’t seen a romance this tragic since my first-ever viewing of Romeo and Juliet (the Franco Zefferelli version). The concept is just great, and my, the producers really know how to screw with their main characters. No surprise, as that’s what their previous two shows were all about.

So go. Watch it. Another good new show to go with Heroes and the Bionic Woman.

Here’s my Heroes tip of this season: Watch The Bionic Woman. It is superb.

The series is brought to us by the same folks that brought us the update/remake of Battlestar Galactica, which is also pretty damned good. The producers really have a great way of writing strong women characters, and oof—I really like the new Jamie Summers. Plus, she has a doppelganger, played by Katee Sackhoff, Starbuck from BG.

It’s a great match for Heroes fans. And like Battlestar Galactica, there’s obviously a past that we’re going to be filled in on as the season goes along.

And for those of you trying to figure out who the actor is who plays Will’s father, he played Badger in Firefly. (That was driving me nuts until I IMDB’d him.)

If you missed the pilot, it’s on Sci-Fi network sometime, and probably online as well. Really. Watch this one. It was great.

Well, I’ve watched a few of the new shows this week, and have some opinions.

Grey’s Anatomy: So glad it’s back. Just as funny and fun and sad and surprising as ever. Really like bringing in Meredith’s half-sister. Really hate the George/Izzy plotline.

Private Practice: Addison, you should have stayed in Seattle. Everyone in Private Practice is boring. Their lives are boring. Their patients are boring. The hospital scenes is what makes Grey’s Anatomy more than just another nighttime soap. The conflict on Private Practice? Boo-ring. Won’t be wasting my time on that one.

Ugly Betty: Huh. I’ve generally only caught the last few minutes of it, but I caught the season finale last year, and decided to watch the opener this year, and y’know, it’s a lot funnier than it used to be, and still fairly dramatic. I may have to start watching.

Big Shots: Gee, a show about man-sluts. Just what this country needed, a show about man-sluts. Great cast. Some hot guys. And it’s a show about—man-sluts. Plus, it’s a badly-written show about man-sluts. Sorry. That clip you see with the guys talking about how they’re the new women in town? They are. And they’re not nearly as interesting as the ladies of Wisteria Lane (who are going to be joined by two of my favorite soap stars this year, so waiting for Sunday to arrive).

Reaper: Kevin Smith’s new show about Jay and Silent Bob, excuse me, two other guys who merely resemble Jay and Silent Bob, working for the devil to capture souls that have escaped from Hell. It was funny and interesting. I’ll keep watching.

Men in Trees: This was a charming, sweet show that I fell in love with last year. Looking forward to seeing the rest of last year’s episodes, plus the new ones. It isn’t Gilmore Girls, but it’s a good substitute. I need my TV show/chick flick every year. Before there was Gilmore Girls, there was Sisters, and now there is Men in Trees. Now if only Joss Whedon would get another show on a network somewhere.

Shows not yet seen: Bionic Woman (have it on tape) and Pushing Daisies. And what the hell happened to Lost? When is Jericho back on?

Overall, though, not much good on TV these days. There’s Heroes, of course. And the above shows. That’s about it for me, unless you’re watching something good that I’m missing. Oh. Scrubs isn’t back yet.

No, I will not be watching the new Cavemen show. I’ve read enough about it to know it’s going to suck. There hasn’t been a decent new comedy in ages.

in about four minutes.

Did you remember?

I forgot to keep up on the online comics, but I did what my friend Lynn suggested and just watched the finale again.

And I was so right about Nathan and Peter. (Had to get that in one more time.)

Commence talking in this post after the West Coast had a chance to see the show.

The terrorists in Gaza say they’re going to stop firing rockets at Israel.

Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip agreed on Sunday to stop firing rockets towards Israel, a Palestinian official told Ynet.

The official said the agreement was the fruit of talks between the dismissed Hamas government and representatives of armed groups responsible for daily rocket attacks against the Jewish state.

The official said that the agreement was sped up by the attack on the Zikim military base last week. The attack left 67 soldiers injured and increased public pressure on the government to launch a large-scale military operation in Gaza to halt the attacks.

The official said that the armed groups had been limiting their operations to attacks against Israeli soldiers operating in the Gaza Strip.

Shyeah. Two things about this:

1. It’s bullshit. The Palestinians will use any excuse to break the “truce” that they’re calling, such as the apprehension of a terrorist by the IDF, even if that terrorist is caught red-handed on a “martyrdom” operation.

2. Please note the boldfaced type above. This is an attempt to keep the IDF from finding, killing, and capturing the rocketeers, as well as taking out a substantial amount of terrorist infrastructure in Gaza. It is merely a technical, temporary cessation of hostilities.

Watch for this new “agreement” to break down almost immediately.

MSNBC is running the NBC 9/11 original coverage this morning, presumably uncut.

The thing that strikes me as most unusual is the way all of the journalists almost completely manage to cover their emotion. Katie Couric actually caught herself about to say “What the hell–” and changed it to “What the heck is going on here.” Their Pentagon correspondent was there when the plane hit, and is calmly and rationally explaining every tiny detail of what he felt when the “bomb” went off (in actuality, the plane hitting the building).

The closest we’ve gotten to emotion is the Pentagon correspondent pausing for a moment and saying, “Thank goodness that’s a helicopter going by. For a moment, I thought it was another plane.”

I didn’t see a lot of the early coverage, as I was at work that day. But the TV sets came out fairly quickly, especially after the major news sites on the internet were crushed under the weight of people at work (and around the world) looking for information.

I do remember hearing the wild rumors, such as that the Pentagon was bombed and that there were two or four more planes unaccounted for and heading for various sites. I had forgotten that a Palestinian terrorist group originally claimed credit for the attacks.

I also remember seeing the towers burning, and the fact that one tower was missing absolutely not registering in my mind. The enormity of it was unbelievable. The anchors saw the first tower fall, and have yet to understand what they saw. It took them about 20 minutes to understand that the building had collapsed.

When the second tower collapsed, Katie Couric, Tom Brokaw, and Matt Lauer were utterly calm, and the only blip of emotion comes from their correspondent at the site, who can’t find his coworker after the second tower collapses and can be heard shouting for him/her over the phone, not hearing the anchors asking him for news. Later, he apologized for sounding melodramatic as he described the aftermath of the attack and the towers’ collapse.

I am so glad I was never interested in becoming a television journalist. I could never do what they do.

Once again, I recall my cousin’s husband driving up to the WTC in the morning in time to see the first plane hit, turning around and going straight back home. My upstairs neighbor never got to work that day in the WTC, on one of the floors where none survived, because of his habit of never getting up for work on time.

I found myself unable to work beyond noon. I left. After stopping at a supermarket to buy food (I was obsessed with the idea that everything would shut down the next day and decided to stock up just in case), I headed towards Eagle Rock Park. Eagle Rock has a stunning view of Manhattan. I wanted to see with my own eyes what I’d seen on TV. But thousands of other people had the same idea, and the police detoured me around the park, so I went home.

My upstairs neighbor and many of my other neighbors were sitting on the porch steps of our apartments. We stayed outside together for a long, long time. I kept the television on most of the rest of the day, and scoured the internet for information. That’s how I discovered Charles Johnson, and Glenn Reynolds.

People have forgotten, really, what happened that day. I never believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11, and I don’t believe the Bush Administration tried to sell it that way, either. But the war that started before 9/11 has not ended, and Iraq is only one of its fronts. Israel is another, and six years later, the world still refuses to acknowledge that role.

Never forget. Al Qaeda is still trying to hurt us, and Iran is working with them to harm us in any way possible. And Iran is getting closer to nuclear weapons.

We should be running this footage on all of our stations today, during prime time. People have forgotten what it was like six years ago.

I haven’t.

It took me a long time to get up the nerve to look at the changed skyline.

Having caught the last half of an early Gilmore Girls episodes, I am now utterly sure that I will not waste my money on season seven, none of which were written by Amy Sherman-Palladino.

You really can tell the difference.

Back to cleaning house. As soon as my stubbed toe stops throbbing.

Dammit.

Robert Fisk went Troofer last week. And here, on 26h, he’s fisked. Beautifully. Remember, Bobby: The troof will set you free.

Via Harry’s.

Okay, folks. I do not own an HDTV. I intend to own an HDTV next year. In fact, I am adding several thousand dollars to the cost of my condo/townhome for the HD widescreen home theater system that I intend to buy at the same time.

I’m going to purchase Heroes on DVD. If I get the HD version now, will it display normally on a normal TV, or will it look funny?

Got home after a long day out, and went searching for Gracie, who was in her new hidey-spot: The corner of the spare room, between two bookcases, where it’s very difficult for Tig to bully her. And because I have a long history of show tunes and movie musical tunes in my head, I started singing “In My Own Little Corner” to her as I lured her out for some attention.

Scanning the TV Guide listings tonight, I find that our Richmond PBS will be showing—you guessed it—Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Cinderella,” whence (ooh, fancy word!) came the song I was just singing.

Guess what I’ll be doing from 8 to 10 p.m.?