The 1960’s on tv. As a little kid, it was hog heaven. It seemed like everything was an explosion of color and dynamic action. Night time stuff like Batman was great but there were a bunch of cartoons I was addicted to on Saturday mornings during the second half of the decade. It was an odd mix of sci fi and superhero, which I’m sure shocks you. 

Hanna Barbara was just going nuts during the ’60’s in this regard. You had Space Ghost, a beefy do gooder who flew around the galaxy with power bands on his wrists and two young assistants, Jan and Jace, plus Blip the space monkey. Together, they battled all form of space tyrants, monsters and natural disasters. You had Birdman, you seemed to fly around screaming “CAAWWWW!” with his hawk friend, Avenger. You had the Herculoids, the most bizarre group of creatures– mutated dinosaurs, cave people and globs of sentient goop hanging out on some crazy planet and fought off invaders weekly. You had the Arabian Knights, a group of freedom fighters in old world Persia with various powers that would have fit right in with Aladdin himself. There was a strong guy, a donkey that could start bucking and spin into a tornado and a magician who, after shouting “Rosan Kobar!” could change shape, go invisible, animate carpets, turn to smoke, you name it. This was actually one of the animated segments in the old Banana Splits show, which…. yeah maybe another blog. But so many crazy cartoons from this studio.

Why did I love Space Ghost or any of these shows? You know, besides being in the very impressionable where it’s easy to be impressed, it was an interesting mix of dynamic action and a thrilling soundtrack. Hanna Barbara had a really excellent collection of in-house orchestral compositions, all done by Hoyt Curtin. He did all the distinctive music for over 250 cartoons throughout the decade, from The Flintstones, to Jonny Quest, to the Jetsons and everything in between. Every conceivable mood and theme for the sitcoms to the adventures. 

And the sound effects packed an even bigger wallop and they were all handled by one company, Sound Design, all throughout the ’60’s. Again, also very distinctive. It was mostly those SFX that made the impact, even more so than the visuals, which were usually fairly impressive, with character designs by Alex Toth, an illustrative giant in the world of comics. The shows also featured an incredibly talented cast of voice actors.

Decades later, Adult Swim, part of the Cartoon Network would turn some of these properties into comedies with various success. They had the animated Space Ghost, Coast to Coast, which transformed the superhero into a talk show host. Birdman became Harvey Birdman, attorney at law. Birdman, dressed in suit and tie with his mask and wings still in play, would tackle court cases against old animated enemies. They even took the old Sealab 2020 show, and utilizing existing art, turned into a sitcom called Sealab 2021. Usually pretty funny and honestly, probably more entertaining than the originals, which did have their charms. But the Hanna Barbara collection of cartoons was only half the story. Then you had Marvel.

Specifically, the Marvel superheroes show. This was an odd project. There were five mini series created, featuring Captain America, the Hulk, Iron man, Thor (sound familiar?) and the Sub Mariner. Most, with catchy theme songs. The animation was very limited, as original panels of artwork was taken from existing comics of the day, and *partially* animated. On one hand, it was great to see the artwork of Jack Kirby on display in this manner, seeing *his* Avengers battle the Masters of Evil on New York streets in an animated fashion. OTOH, what little animation there was, was often very crude and I’m sure Jack wasn’t getting any extra money for having his artwork used in a new medium. But again, some great voicework, SFX and music rounded out some great stories. 

My most memorable episode? Oh, I couldn’t tell you. The only thing I remember is the Cap theme song and parts I’d the other theme songs. That’s what was memorable, not any of the actual stories. Same with all the Hanna Barbara stuff. Great SFX, music, character design, great, love ’em. But the stories were not memorable. 

The ’60’s Spider-Man cartoon was another perfect example of that. The animation and stories were third rate at best. BUT, the insane, beautifully painted watercolor skies as a backdrop for his swinging around town over a jazzy soundtrack? Fantastic. And the theme song, well who *doesn’t* know it? One of the finest ever. But the episodes, forgettable. 

The next time you’re wandering around YouTube, check out some of the Herculoids, Space Ghost, Bird man, Arabian Knights, or other Hanna Barbara productions from the era.

OR maybe the old ’60’s Marvel Superhero shows, the old Spider-Man show, if only for the theme song. Definitely worth a few minutes of your lockdown time! 

Trilogies are a tricky breed of movie convention. So many things can go wrong–and they have. Some creators don’t know when to stop (hello Sly, hello George) and they flew right past the three film mark. The crazy up and down quality levels of Rocky, Rambo and Star Wars could probably be a whole other blog, but I digress.

Some, like Wachowski siblings, had an excellent film in the Matrix, only to then do two sequels that weren’t nearly as well received. I don’t know if they simply never intended to do more, but the studio backed up the money truck and if so, it’s hard to turn down the extra millions. Or maybe they *did* have a plan but the latter two thirds were simply not good parts of the plan. I’m not sure if the Wachowski’s really ever hit the same heights again with any of their films but they never got a chance to do any more trilogies (I don’t believe).

Two excellent examples of “should have stopped at two” are the Sam Raimi Spider-man films and the Chris Nolan Dark Knight films. 

Raimi’s Spider-man 1 and (especially) 2 are still regarded as the best Spider-films by most fans. The whole main Ock/Spidey train battle in 2 represents some of the best old school Marvel material including even the current MCU output. But then something happened. Raimi decided to co-write the next one with his brother, which resulted in MJ being depicted in the worst light possible, and Sandman being awkwardly wedged into the Uncle Ben death show, AND being a sobbing sad sack. And of course Peter and the dancing and the bangs. At least we got the lovely Gwen Stacy. Too bad it was in this film. Raimi *was* slated to film 4 & 5 together and being the old school fan he was, dollars to doughnuts, there’d be a Sinister Sixth movie to end on. But Sam found out the hard way that fans can be fickle. Maybe he just didn’t take 3 seriously? Maybe that was because the studio insisted on inserting a next gen villain like Venom in there? Don’t know.

Christopher Nolan did a great take on the caped crusader in Batman Begins and followed it up with the epic Dark Knight. He even publicly stated that he put everything he had into DK. The tank was empty. But siren call of “trilogy” rang out, perhaps again with the money truck. I bring up the money truck only because they had plenty of room to drive it through all the many plot holes and past the inanities and idiocy of Dark Knight Rises. At least we got the entertaining Bane. But yeah, Sam and Chris should have stopped while they were ahead.

I suppose we could also throw the Godfather in there. Shouldn’t have gone for three but they dragged ‘em back in!

Superman the movie led off a string of movies, but since Superman 1 and 2 was originally one script, one *could* say they ended up with a trilogy with 3 and 4. But the point is moot, because whether you count either as the third movie, there’s little quality in the former and none in the latter. 4 (The Quest for Peace) ranks down there near the bottom of all superhero films and is a cautionary tale regarding trilogies or quadralogies.

1989’s wonderful and successful Batman led off a very similar descent into crap, lowering standards a bit in Returns, sinking very low in Forever and plunging to the bottom area, nestled comfortably with Superman 4 and the Spirit. Again, the third movie was a bad idea, so it’s no wonder people would start to roll their eyes when there was talk of a third movie. 

Even the X-men franchise was vulnerable. I myself like The Last Stand, but many didn’t. Although some are changing their tune after the X-producers decided to do *another* trilogy on top of the old one and once again failed to produce a winner with Age of Apocalypse. Then they added Dark Phoenix to confuse and depress people. 

Sony tried the Amazing Spider-man but it only got to a second film as it tanked worst than the first. 

But then there are the successes. 

Toy Story’s maintained a solid quality across four movies. Men in Black arguably did as well for their first three films (international was the start of a new trilogy I believe and a very different one).

The Wolverine trilogy is the most uncommon of all. That rare breed that started off with an “so-so” film set in the past (X-men Origins: Wolverine), then did a better job on the second set in present day (Wolverine), and ended with a fantastic third film set in the future (Logan). That is rare.

In the MCU, they’ve done a great job on their trilogies so far. Captain America might be the gold standard with varying levels of excellence throughout. The Avengers simply just kept upping their game with Infinity War and Endgame. As a rule, you actually look forward to the third movie in the MCU.

Maybe it’s because when someone has a solid plan, backed up with solid creative talent, things tend to go well. 

When they don’t plan properly, you tend to get the latest Star Wars trilogy. Yeah, you’d *think* that with over 40 years of history on the line, they would have approached the last trilogy intelligently, creatively and professionally. You’d think. Ah well.

Myself, I’m looking forward to Deadpool 3. It can’t get here fast enough. So I hope they start planning soon…..

You never know how you’ll react when you’re facing imminent death.

I should point out that the following story is true. I have some fairly interesting stories from my past and in the course of this year, I will get to all of them. Half the time, it was me being an idiot, or drunk or both. And young. Yes, *that’s* a swell excuse. But sometimes, I’m put in a situation. The gator dog story I told a while back was another situation. This was worse. This time, it was very close to a no win scenario.

This was sometime around 1990, possibly shortly after Lin and I got married. I’m approximating a year because it was before we had Theresa in ’94 and yet I think I was still trying to win over Lin’s parents or at least make it seem feasible to them that their daughter married a guy with at least half a brain and was somewhat decent. 

I would not win them over this day, no.

Linda and I had traveled *with* her parents to the upper peninsula of Michigan to spend some time with Linda’s brother Mike and his family. We drove up there in Linda’s parent’s van. Got there, a good time was had by all, probably. Frankly, the trip home kind of blots out everything else. It was a six hour drive back from the UP and I volunteered to drive. Linda’s mom, Sylvia, sat in the passenger seat to keep an eagle eye on the speedometer. Linda was in the back seat, ready to take a six hour nap, seated next to her dad, Joe. He was perhaps the friendliest, most mild mannered guy you’d ever want to meet, with laid back sense of humor. Think Bob Newhart meets Winnie the Pooh. Joe also had a fondness for electronics, putting on headphones to listen to sports, books on tape, music, etc. So he was plugged in and would also be drifting off shortly, leaving me and Syl in the front seat. Me staring at the road, her staring at the speedometer, and occasionally having a smoke. I really got the distinct impression she was wary of me operating a vehicle. Up in the UP at the time, I don’t think we had any radio stations, or at least one that would suit both of us so it stayed off. The silence was thick.  

Conversely, the road was thin. A two lane country road, which was currently backed up about a dozen cars deep, all held at bay by an old station wagon out in front going maybe 40 in a 50 mph zone. In the oncoming lane, there were enough bends in the road combined with occasional cars to prevent anyone from passing the wagon. And so it went. We were only maybe 20 minutes into a six hour trip and this was threatening to turn it into double that. I kept my hands at ten and two. Syl cracked the window. The sleepers in the back seat had drawn the curtains on the windows. The van having *curtains* on the windows… there was something off about that that I couldn’t put my finger on. But it made it nice and dark back there for napping. And so it went. Twelve of us behind the wagon. Actually, eleven anxious people in front of me and who knows *how* many behind me?  I couldn’t tell and besides, the curtains were drawn. Beautiful country though. On both sides of the roads, before the decline to the ditches, were pretty little mailboxes up by the edge of the road, sentries made of tin and wood, lil red flags saluting! And so it went. The minutes ground by. 

Suddenly, an opportunity! We hit a nice, big, long, straightaway, with only an occasional car coming the other way. People saw their chance and took it. One by one by one, the cars were passing the station wagon! Children somewhere were singing! Six cars to go….five cars to go….four…three….two, one. MY TURN. Opposite lane was clear and we had a straightway. I wanted to make it as quick and smooth as possible, so I moved out and floored it. 

Several things happened then, or didn’t happen. I floored it but it was only at that moment that I realized the van had absolutely no pick up. AT ALL. Simultaneously, the driver of the station wagon must have been fed up with getting passed by so many cars, that the sight of a van with flowery curtains in the window was the straw that broke the camel’s back. HE SPED UP. Now I’m trapped in the left lane.

So I speed up, he speeds up. I’m pissed off but I can’t even call him a ********** or a ************ because my mother in law is next to me and my wife and father in law are asleep in the back and I hate waking people up. It’s rude.

Only about 20 seconds have passed since I started the maneuver but we’re still neck and neck and now, in the distance, I see a car coming towards us quite quickly. I have maybe 10 seconds to get out of the way. I let the A-hole in the wagon go ahead and drop back to get in behind him but –from what I can see in the small gaps between the curtains, there’s a solid line of another dozen cars right *behind* the wagon AND THEY WON’T LET ME IN. The oncoming car is now honking and closing in. I now have two seconds to get out of the left lane and I can’t go right, so I go left and off the road. 

So now… we are diagonal on the grass, going at what passes for top speed in this vehicle, as the street-facing mailboxes are whizzing by. Above us. On our right. 

And I am calm. 

I know, I know, I complain about this, stress about that, even the small stuff. Worry is my natural habitat. But at this moment, diagonal, going fast, believe it or not, I am calm and say nothing. I like to think of myself as efficient as far as getting a job done, so I employed that mindset here. I just considered my next move, because I have no idea how far I can off-road on this incline. So I move up closer to the street, and see that the last car in the caravan on my side of the road just went by, so I scooted across the now clear oncoming lane and back over into ours, behind 20 cars now. Worse off than before, but alive. 

There was a different kind of silence in the car now. Hard to put this one into words. Syl started to say something “Well…” then drifted off into a mumble. There were no comments from the back but I’m fairly certain they were now awake. Suddenly, I had a real bad urge to start laughing but I didn’t. At that point, we all kinda suddenly decided we should pull off the road to have some lunch. Why not? We were all awake, alive and it must have been nearly 10:30 in the morning. It was a quiet lunch, a very polite lunch. At one point, Syl casually said “I’m sure Joe wouldn’t mind driving the rest of the way.”  Ooohhhhhhhh, no. Nu uh.

“No, I’m good,” I insisted, “I’ll drive the rest of the way.” 

The *last* thing I wanted in the world was to get back behind the wheel of that damn van with that horse power and those curtains but of course you see, I had too. If I *didn’t* complete that horrible, dull, drive from hell, and prove that I could do it without killing the family, that’d be hanging over my head FOREVER. I *had* to finish that trip.

I drove the rest of the six hours. We turned on the radio. The rest of the trip went off without a hitch. You’d think that some day, we would have gotten to the point where we’d look back at that day and laugh. 

We didn’t. 

Sometimes, I take a look eBay for new, interesting, INEXPENSIVE Thing figures–some of which I’ve highlighted here on the blog. 

But yesterday, Lin saw something in a Target sales paper. She asked if it was something I already had and taking a look, I was about to say yes, I’d picked up one of those a while back– but then she noted the size of it. 

!

Stunned, I shifted away from my clase de Espana (I’m-a-learnin’ Spanish!) and said in a such a way as to convey the message that I’d very much like it if my wife would buy it for me:

“Oh no, I certainly do not have that!”

So she got me an early Father’s Day present. 

I present #153 in the Thing collection. The ten inch Funko Pop giant Thing Bobblehead. 

It is the stuff… of which dreams are made…

Well, you know, lockdown, things are slow, then a truly cool surprise, it’s just neat, because the Thing IS.

*side note: with any of these recommendations from any era, all the individual stories are available on DVD and some of the seasons are now available on Blu-ray as well. When going to Amazon, if you go to the TV/movie section and type in Doctor Who William Hartnell, then the name of a recommended story, it will usually pop up, etc.

This basically rounds up the best of the 1980’s and ’90’s, with Doctors 5, 6, 7 and 8.

Why did I not give each of these guys their own post? Because Doctor Who in the 1980’s was not that great. Under John Nathan Turner’s watch, the show was often over-lit, did a lot of stunt casting and bad casting and veered more toward bizarre costumes for the Doctors as opposed to simply clothes, BUT the decade did have some story gems! The Paul McGann movie wasn’t half bad in the ’90’s but the man himself did the part justice. 

Peter Davison:

1)The Visitation is grand story set during the time of the Black plague and the fifth Doctor acquits himself well, in confronting a small band of Teryleptil convicts seeking to accelerate the plague to kill all humanity.

2)Earthshock is a fast paced, four part thriller that sees the fifth Doctor facing off against the Cybermen and sees the death of a companion. 

3)Enlightenment is a wonderful four part story that features a race of incredibly advanced, eccentric beings who partake in galaxy spanning races in solar ships resembling sailing ships from past centuries. Highly recommended.

4)The Five Doctors is a special celebrating the show’s 20 years and brings most of the surviving Doctors back to face a threat from Gallifrey itself. Great fun.

5)Caves of Androzani. Davison’s swan song and easily his finest story, in fact, one of the best of the classic era. This stunning four parter was written by the magnificent Robert Holmes.

Colin Baker:

1)Vengeance on Varos is an excellent commentary regarding violence on tv and is a great primer for Colin but also introduces the delightfully evil and disgusting Sil. A scheming alien slug.

2)Mark of the Rani is a wonderfully atmospheric period piece in the 19th century as the sixth Doctor has to deal with not only the Master but also, the ruthless Time Lord renegade, the Rani.

3)The Two Doctors features the return of Patrick Troughton and Frazier Hines as Jamie McCrimmon and pits Doctors two and six against the Sontarans and the Androgums, dangerous omnivores. Wonderful, colorful characters in this Holmes’ script.

4)Revelation of the Daleks is a bizarre story, filled with interesting characters and dark humor that ended the 22nd season before the show went on hiatus.

5)Mindwarp is an even more bizarre story, with even more interesting characters! Highly recommended just for Brian Blessed! It IS the second story in the over all linked “Trial of a Time Lord” storyline of the 23rd season.

Sylvester McCoy:

1)Remembrance of the Daleks. A good outing for the seventh Doctor set in 1963 and a nicely done story. 

2)The Curse of Fenric takes place during WWII and features the Heamavores, vampiric aliens. Well done adventure. 

Paul McGann:

Although there’s not much to choose from…

1)The 1996 TV movie where the eighth Doctor debuts is worth watching for a few reasons. Although certain bits in the movie seemed crazy at the time (the kiss, the half human comment, the OTT Master) after all we’ve seen in the revival, these revelations are not so crazy. Also, McGann is wonderful as the Doctor and we even get to say goodbye to McCoy before he regenerates.

2)Night of the Doctor was a surprise. A brief, six minute video filmed in 2013 as an introduction to the War Doctor and a lead in to the show’s 50th anniversary. It was a wonderful, magnificent surprise and fandom went crazy with glee. (if you buy The Day of The Doctor on DVD–the 50th ann. special—, Night of the Doctor is included in the extras.)

The CW collection of DC superhero shows *might* be in a bit of trouble. I say this for a variety of reasons. 

*First, after 8 seasons, they no longer have Arrow anchoring the “Arrowverse”. This is not really that bad but it seems a tad awkward. I’m surprised that they not only allowed Ollie to die as Ollie but to also die as the Spectre in Crisis. Especially since the Spectre shouldn’t really be able to die, plus, it would have been kind of interesting to see Ollie pop up in the future in a green hood of a different, sepulchral nature. But that’s a small niggle, not really an issue.

1.Ruby Rose leaving Batwoman. *That’s* an issue. As is how they’re addressing it. Both officially and unofficially, the arrangement wasn’t working out for her *or* the production company and the rest of the crew that had to work with her. Tensions and attitudes on set made for problems, so both sides decided she had to go. The producers could just recast the role of Kate Kane/Batwoman but instead, they’re going to cast a new character to be Batwoman. This new character will be a former drug runner who made a lot of bad decisions but is also kind of goofy and an out lesbian. Not sure how they came up with this decision. They’ve stated that they’re looking to cast an out lesbian actress as well. 

I was initially happy to see Batwoman get a show on the CW, roughly based on the comic. IN the comics, Kate Kane is a pretty cool, formidable, capable character, with an awesome costume and impressive backstory. That being said, the CW screwed it up, in my opinion. For whatever reason, this Kate Kane didn’t seem that capable or impressive and when it came to villains, they focused almost exclusively on her sister Alice. I got bored and bailed after Crisis. She was fairly useless in Crisis as well– so was Ollie, but he got the honor of dying a couple times. All in all, the show was quickly taking a nosedive.

The producers now bringing in an entirely new character to play Batwoman makes no sense to me at all. Are they ditching the entire supporting cast? Because I’m not sure how a brand new character would just insert herself into the system of working with Luke Fox in the Batcave. I would have thought they’d just insert Kate’s old girlfriend from the academy or maybe even Julia Pennyworth, Alfred’s daughter, who’s also an out lesbian to take over. Keep it in the family. But no. Good luck to them and this entirely questionable new direction.

2.Supergirl has taken the biggest nosedive as far as ratings go, starting out with 12 million four years ago, and now trying to scrape by with less than a million. Mind you, I’ve heard the show is a bit better now that Lex Luthor (Jon Cryer) is a regular in the post Crisis version but whether it’s helped the ratings, I don’t know. Although it’s worth noting that CW will gladly take any ratings, being a third rate cable network. I also don’t know how many more seasons Supergirl will last. I haven’t been able to stomach the show, mostly because the writers and Benoist made Kara/Supergirl out to be a bit of a nerdy, perky, wimpy, precious idiot. Usually acting more like an insecure sidekick to Superman than a hero in her own right. The majority of the supporting cast was decent, although there is the typical comic relief that undercuts the intellectual content thanks to Brainiac 5–although I’ve been told that’s changed since Crisis too. I think Supergirl’s going into its sixth season next fall, if filming resumes depending on COVID-19. It might be their last since Superman and Lois are getting their own show this fall. 

3.Heart to hearts and pep talks. The sheer volume of instances where heroes have a weekly crisis of faith in their own abilities and desperately need to be talked down off the insecurity ledge EVERY WEEK is frightening. This mushy soap opera crap is part of the CW “house style” and my god it is annoying. A few weeks ago in an ep of the Flash, in the span of 15 minutes, they wasted all of our time by having six straight pep talks back to back to back to back to back to back. It doesn’t matter that half the characters needed the same heart to heart talk the week before but evidently they are either just really really insecure or have crap memories. 

4.Legends of the DC Universe… it’s continued existence mystifies me. I mean, it has its fans but it’s not my cup of tea. Why these cartoonish buffoons are even allowed to call themselves “Legends” is laughable, but I guess that’s all part of the joke. I guess it’s offensive to me on one level because they’re taking established heroes and turning them into scatterbrained imbeciles and laughing stocks. But then it’s also offensive to me on a comedy level because the humor is aimed at the lowest common  denominator, and is not the slightest bit clever, just very remedial. The Hudson brothers had smarter material than this (look it up, kids). Somehow, the show even manages to offend me regarding its idiot handling of time travel. The producers claim to be big fans of Doctor Who but guh. You’d never know it from the writing quality.

5.Hartley Sawyer, who played Ralph Dibney/Elongated Man has been fired from the Flash because of sexually and racially insensitive tweets from a few years ago. Some really stupid, violent tweets that sat there like a digital time bomb for 6 to 8 years. You’d think by this point, producers would start including Twitter history in the background checks when hiring actors because it is astonishing how many celebrities came right out of the Tweet-box with incredibly career ending comments. The atmosphere is more more sensitive and intolerant today but even 8 years ago, these were deal breakers. See ya, Ralph.

BUT there are positives. 

1.Black Lightning is going into its 4th season this fall, COVID-19 permitting. This show has been an impressive production at almost every step. It runs with a shorter season of 16 eps, thus, a tighter narrative and far mess padding eps like all the rest of the CW selections. The characters and relationships are more real and grounded as well. Up until now, it’s been the best of the CW. And Black Lightning himself is resoundingly kick-ass.

2.Stargirl is three eps in and so far, it’s been hitting some home runs. Good performances and stories so far, that set the show apart from most of the usual CW fare. There are only 13 eps this season. Again, like Black Lightning, very smart. No huge, padded, bloated 23 ep seasons like Flash or Supergirl. Less soap opera. Better scripts. This is probably because this show was created for the DC streaming service as well as being made available to the CW. As such, it’s possibly not as beholden to some of the lame CW rules and “house style”. We’ll see how the rest of the season plays out, but Stargirl, so far, is a bright spot on the roster.

Sadly, the series starts with a flashback to ten years earlier, when the original Justice Society of America is killed in battle. It’s really a shame because first, they were all more interesting characters and second, I get the feeling a batch of inexperienced teens are going to try and take up the mantles. I see disaster awaiting –probably some really unfortunate deaths–but we’ll see which way it all goes. 

3.Green Lantern is another property being developed into a DC tv show, but I don’t know much about it other than it’s slated to appear only on HBOMAX, the latest streaming service, the second to hawk DC material and another service I won’t be buying. It’d be nice if they showed it on the CW, like they’re doing with Stargirl.

Honestly, I had hopes that they’d put together a Justice League of America show at some point, but it doesn’t seem like that’s going to happen. Even if it did, seeing as how the writers handled Legends, maybe it’s for the best. Besides, it doesn’t look like we’ll ever have Batman, Aquaman or Wonder Woman showing up, Green Arrow’s dead, Flash has only got maybe one or two seasons left in him and GL isn’t even here yet. So, probably not.

 All in all, the producers (the Berlanti group), still have some good cards up their sleeves. I just hope more are coming, because the thing IS.

By the turn of the century, Timm and his gang were revered as comic and animation gods, after giving us the best realization of Batman ever (even to this very day), a wonderful Superman and even expanding the Bat brand Beyond. The biggest surprise was still to come when it was announced that Timm was doing a Justice League series. And as I say, think of how much we normally trust Kevin Fiege when it comes to the MCU these days, that’s where the trust level was with Timm at this point around 2000 and he did not let us down.

He simply expanded the BTAS universe to include all the rest of the superheroes incrementally. First step, they brought in a slightly redesigned Batman (Conroy!) into the team, then Superman (George Newbern), Flash (Michael Rosenbaum), Wonder Woman (Susan Eisenberg), Green Lantern (Phil Lamar), Hawkgirl (Maria Canals) and Martian Manhunter J’onn J’onzz (Carl Lumbly). Together, these seven heroes had 52 episodes across two seasons, battling Luther, Joker, the Injustice League, monsters, alien threats, you name it. But just as interesting as the threats were, the personal interactions were also very well written. 

The buttoned up, military minded Jon Stewart/Green Lantern was sometimes at odds with the more laid back and comical Wally West/Flash. At the same time, Stewart was becoming close with the war-like Shayera Hol/Hawkgirl.  Batman’s methods were sometimes at odds with Superman’s, and most of them felt like loners, being either orphans, the last of their kind, outsiders, or all of the above. The show worked on every level but it took a few stories for Timm and co. to nail the mechanics of animating a team book as opposed to a lone hero. They initially had trouble finding ways to keep so many powerful heroes occupied but they figured it out brilliantly in the end. They brought the second season to a close with an epic three parter, which shook up the status quo. 

The first two seasons were 26 eps each, usually two part stories, but for the third season, they changed things up, going with a 13 ep season, usually stand alone eps, expanded the roster by adding dozens of heroes, and calling it Justice League Unlimited, with a new look, new satellite HQ, and a rockin’ new theme. It was bigger, better, bolder and this continued for three seasons. 

Part of the magic of all five seasons was their ability to bring second and third string heroes to the forefront and make you appreciate them for the first time. Even those that had been around for 50 or 60 years. The Jon Stewart Green Lantern had been around since 1970 but has never been a big headliner. This show transformed him into the favorite GL for a whole generation of fans. Hawkgirl had always been known mostly has Hawkman’s wife for decades and a C list character. Shayera Hol was now A list material. The Question (Jeffrey Combs) raised his profile dramatically in the show, as did Vixen (Gina Torres), Vigilante (Nathan Fillion), Shining Knight (Chris Cox) and so so so many more. The show elevated so many heroes that never had that chance in the past, it proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that ANY character can be amazing if you’ve got the right creative team behind it. And it must be said that most of these latter eps had fantastic direction from the likes of Joquim DeSantos (Invader Zim). Beautiful stuff.

But all good things must come to an end. After a combined 300 episodes between series, plus the the feature movies, this part of the party was over. Timm and company went their separate ways to produce other shows. The DC animated universe went in a different direction, mostly doing feature adaptations of existing comic stories. Honestly, it’s a mixed bag. Some adaptations are faithful and really well done (Dark Knight Returns, Batman Year One, Justice League/New Frontier), others are incredibly screwed up and lesser end products (The Killing Joke, Doomed, Doomsday). Plus, a bunch of others of varying quality. There’ve also been some original productions that were great such as Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, or Batman: Gotham Knight. I haven’t bothered with the vast majority of the direct to videos because of the varied quality, and in some cases, Timm’s notions about some heroes and their personal relationships (Batman and Batgirl) have not gone over well with the public. More’s the pity.

But in the end, the gang did give us some of the finest adventures of the DC heroes we have or will ever see. During a lockdown, you could a lot worse than to immerse yourselves in:

Batman the Animated Series (4 seasons)

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

Batman: Sub Zero

Superman the Animated Series

Batman Beyond the series 

Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker

Justice League the series

Justice League Unlimited the series

Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths 

Justice League: The New Frontier

Batman: Year One

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns

Batman: Gotham Knights

 Back in early 1970, New Zealand had its first successful television show called “What?”. It starred a relatively unknown Japanese/Irish-American actor named Harry Finnegan (pronounced Harquort Faraday), who portrayed the breakout character, Mewley Burke.

“What?” was a story about a man (Burke), his common law wife and their six daughters who move to NZ to start fresh, maybe marry off his daughters and enjoy the quiet life. Things get complicated when Burke loses all their money in a crooked land deal and they’re forced to start a circus to make ends meet. Hilarity ensues when they gather only the native animals in the vicinity for their exhibitions and the daughters try to grow beards, gain weight, and lift heavy weights for their acts.

The show was the brainchild of Arther Preck, late of Australia (the prison continent), who had a definitive vision for the story. The show, broadcast twice weekly, had over 100 episodes in it’s one season but the success was all down to Finnegan and his emotive talents.

Finnegan had “one of those faces” where even at the reported youthful age of 26, he had a “character’s face”, a real, leathery, grizzled mess. Almost impossible to tell how old he was, it allowed him to pull off the character of Burke, who was supposed to be in his 70’s.

His physical comedy was actually enhanced by his boneless left arm. His normal left hand, which swung at his side like a ham in a tube sock, was used to great effect. And his catch phrases are still around today in the NZ.

“Well, crap in my hat and call me pinky!”

“What?”

“Insouciant youth! FACE ME!”

and “Don’t crap in my hat!”

All these elements came together seamlessly in a truly beloved show by some of its fans.

Finnegan, it turns out, was lying about his real age during the show and really *was* 70 at the time, with his real age revealed to be 120 at his demise under suspicious circumstances last week in Lisbon. 

Mr. Finnegan is survived by his older brother, Barry.

R.I.P.

No, that’s no metaphor, as it is just about summer, the spring rains have let up, the backyard is no longer a swamp and there are several big pieces o’ wood to get to a choppin’!

The winter months are full of P90X, insanity, jumping jacks and 500 rep challenges but everyone needs a change of pace and the hot months mean doing the walk/run and choppin’ the wood. So far, I’ve been able to get in about a couple weeks straight, about 20 to 30 minutes a session. 

It is wonderfully exhausting, trying to muscle an axe through wood. I *think* I’ve got enough to keep me busy for another month or so, I’m not sure. Just have to get them into small enough pieces for Lin to burn in the fire pit. 

Of course the only danger–aside from me swinging an axe around–  is if my form is off on the chopping. If I err and really screw up on the swing, I could aggravate the sciatic nerve. That’s no picnic. In fact, that’s what stopped my last chopping summer a few years ago. Or was it ten years ago? Time passes at an alarming rate these days. 

Well, fingers crossed. I’ll try to keep good form, take regular breaks, etc.  Got a decent pair of gardening gloves too. Good grip, yet doesn’t easily allow blisters.

Yes, from here on in, it’s smooooooth sailin’, Skipper!