FMC 3.0

So I saw on Kate’s blog the blog rating system. I was pretty disappointed with mine:

I got that for a one time use of the word ‘crappy’. I think they missed that Sopranos post a few bits down when I was imitating the show itself with all of the uses of the word “fuck”. Part of me wants to challenge this system, and try to get my rating as high as possible. I wonder if they have an NC-17 rating.

My, there’s a lot to cover.

Nighthawk cleared 56k last night. It rolled over just as I was getting off of route 1 on my drive home. The next checkup might be brutal - i’m gonna have the rear brakes checked out, cause i think they’re a tad noisy at times. Also, I think I might have blown a speaker. I need to confirm that though.

(I just realized the actual gap in posting. Yikes.)

So there’s another new dog. While I was hoping to name a new one Hawkeye, this rescue came with a name already attached to him. So we’ve welcomed Pete into the family with usual gusto. He’s a black lab mix. Mixed with what, who knows? Either way, here’s his picture:

Wizard World Philly came and went. I kinda forgot to post about it in the wake of the Sopranos finale. I filled in most of the gaps I had in series, and found some interesting new stuff. Also added a bit to my geek t-shirt collection. I did get two autographs - Richard Keil, and Michael Turner. I waited in line a long long time for Turner’s, and then didn’t have the energy to wait in another line for Hayden Panettiere. I’ve made a mental note for next year - take a camera. There were just some ridiculously good cosplayers there. Some of them that even had the bodies to portray the superheroes they came as (sadly, I missed Power Girl, who I heard was amazing.) As usual, I saw a few things I really wanted but couldn’t afford. If I ever hit the lottery, one of these Cons is in serious, serious trouble.

On a TV note, more of you should be hooked on Doctor Who. This season has been quite a thrill ride, they just keep taking the bar higher and higher. The BBC has also started a new series I’m really getting a kick out of - Jekyll. It’s a modern version of Jekyll and Hyde. If and when it hits BBC America, watch it.

Looking forward to a few days at Matt’s new digs in Arlington this weekend. His new place is a few blocks from a stop on my favorite color Metro line - Orange. All I know is that we have some movies to catch up on, but no set plans yet. I like weekends that start that way.

I did indeed catch up on all the comic book series I had wanted to. I even added one or two the to the lineup at Wizard World. Or at least as a result of it. I’m never going to be fully caught up, since I get my subscription box at the end of the month, and new titles are released every week. From what I hear, there are some surprises in store.

Over the weekend I got to participate in something Odyssey related I’ve never done - the training tape. Every year a tape is made to train judges. That’s right, every judge that gets trained for the 2007-2008 season is going to see me. Dad too, as he was at the taping as well. It was an interesting process to see, and to see how the problems originate and change before they’re finalized for September. Oh, and while I was there, I was invited to my first non-Delaware tournament for next year. So much for an “off season.”

I feel like I’m forgetting something. Oh right, the hook I started with. Nothing major, as I was there part of today as well. Just jury duty. Which is oh so fun. (What did you think I was in real trouble? Like having been arrested, or there to get married?) At least I’m catching up on reading before working really bizarre shifts at work to make up the time. So far I haven’t been selected for any trial juries, but it is a two week stint in the pool of potential jurors. At least there’s one free day - July 4th. But then I’ll still have to come to work.

This thing may or may not contain spoilers. You have been warned.

Wow. 2.33 outta 5. I will admit that when the credits started to roll, the first words out of my mouth were “What. The. Fuck?”. That came shortly after the screen went black and I said “David Chase wouldn’t…” (Which my father followed up with “Yes, the mother fucker would.” - can you tell the Sopranos have worn off on us?)

At first I was kinda ticked. That would be yet another show to end this year that didn’t come to a conclusion (Stargate SG-1 winning that award first. Wait, has that finale aired on Sci-Fi yet? Sorry if that was a spoiler, but trust me, you’ll be pissed.) I was formulating this rant in my head about how PC Hollywood has gotten that they don’t want to offend any predictions so they just go for zero closure. I’d only been that ticked by an ending of a show ever, and that was Farscape. If you’ve seen it, you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, suffice it to say I boycotted the Sci-Fi channel a long, long time after that happened (well, till they green-lit PeaceKeeper Wars.) There were some obvious plot points hashed out, and one or two interesting moves. But it was mostly filler without closure. I wasn’t a happy camper.

So, I’m mulling this over in my head while watching John from Cincinnati, the next HBO drama to start (it came on right after the Sopranos. It has potential.) Anyway, about half way through I started not to hate the ending of the Sopranos. It started to fit.

The last sequence is Tony waiting for his family in a restaurant. One by one they meet up there. There’s tension building. Tony watches every person that comes through the door. He’s look at them, looking over his shoulder. Always alert. Carmella comes in, and he’s chatting, and still watching. AJ walks in (I was right about that, Emo boy stopped crying) with a guy on his tail that looks shady. Shady guy sits at the bar. Last we have meadow, trying to parallel park her car out front. The scenes cut between the family at the table shooting the shit, Tony keeping an eye out, and Meadow trying to Park. This description isn’t doing this justice, but the scene is just building this crescendo of tension - going back and forth between the resturant and the parking lot. The shady guy heads for the restroom. You don’t know if he’s about to come out blazing, or if the place is about to get blown sky high, or what. At this point anything is possible. Meadow finally parks her car, and heads into the resturant. You can feel it, something big is coming. 6 seasons of this family has come to this moment, something big is coming. Meadow walks up to the resturant, goes inside the door, and…

nothing. blackness. silence. That stays on the screen about 30-45 seconds, and the credits roll.

You may now understand why I was pretty ticked at 10:02 PM. But the more I thought about it, it fits. So long as he’s alive, Tony will never know whats around the corner. It could be a jail cell, it could be an assassin. The rest of their existence is going to be that very moment. Trying to hold together this rather fucked up family, and always looking over shoulders.

At first I thought that they just didn’t have the balls to make and ending, and would just leave it open. Now I think that was the point - to leave you in that adrenaline pumped shape, not knowing what’s coming. That’s the bleakness of the existence the Soprano family has to look forward to.

I’m sure this discussion will continue on for days. Weeks even, as there are lots of fans of this show. It seems amazing that show could garner such a large and devoted following in only 86 episodes. I’m not sure what else HBO can conjure up to take its place. For a while I thought Rome would be it, but it was too expensive, and the BBC pulled out of the deal. But there will always be more stuff down the pike.

For those of you paying not paying attention earlier, I wrote this on Friday night. I just time delayed the post till after the Sopranos had aired so that we could all see how well I did. My 5 predictions in no particular order:

1. Tony and the family are all alive at the end.
2. Phil, Silvio, and Paulie are not.
3. With Silvio gone, Meadow (the law student) becomes consigliere.
4. Paulie doesn’t buy the farm from Phil’s side but from Tony’s - after it’s discovered that Paulie has been sending the NY crew information.
5. A brush with death causes AJ to realize that things don’t all suck, and emo boy finally stops crying.

I realize that it seems weird that I’m expecting this crazy mob boss killer to come out on top - especially since most people don’t expect him to make it - but is it the top? Sure, he beat back an assault from the bad guys, and he’s still breathing - but all of his friends are dead, and his family has all but succumbed to the dark side. Is that really winning? I think the dark irony of this show is that Tony makes it out alive, at the cost of the souls of everyone he cares about.

I’ve been doing a lot of that lately, mostly with comic books. I had a box or two of comics dating back 8-9 months that i needed to catch up - including weeklies like 52. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I started to go back in fill in story gaps after they’re One Year Later idea. Somehow, even knowing the stuff that filled the gap, most of the books make just as little sense as to what happened to their characters. At least Supergirl is that way, I guess Wonder Woman and Superman made sense. I still need to catch up on Hawkgirl, Flash, Teen Titans, Outsiders, JLA, Superman, and a few others.

One I did sneak in there is the new Buffy the Vampire Slayer book being written by Joss Whedon. It’s nice to get to know these characters again. The dialog is just what it was on the show, but there can be a little more imagination added since there’s no limits of TV (or the disbelief of the average TV viewer.) I’m looking forward to that one month to month.

So Wizard World Philadelphia is this weekend. That’s right, I’m going back to another convention. Part of me goes because I’m fairly normal compared to some of these people. Another is that I have a shopping list of things to catch up on. Mostly its for the guest list - it’s rather impressive. I may even get Richard Kiel’s autograph. (I linked that, cause none of you are gonna know who that is.) Hayden Panettiere is also gonna be there. (That I won’t link, cause you should all know that one, it’s not as archaic a reference.) Non-tv wise, some of my favorite comic book artists are gonna be there, and I might get some stuff autographed. (My backpack may be full before I walk into the joint.)

Nighthawk is well past 54K and pulling up on 55K. I don’t know how bad the next checkup is, but I’ll probably need the brakes checked out too - they’ve got some whine every now and then.

Tonight ends the world of the Sopranos. I’ve made my predictions post already, it’ll go live just after the show ends. I don’t know how right I am, but I don’t think anyone can really predict anything. But we in the family are trying - we’ve jotted down our predictions, and put a little wager on who is the most right (out of 5 predictions). I may be 2 bucks richer at 10 PM.