I figure I should try to sneak a third post in this month so that the July 05 archive page doesn't look too sparse. You'll have noted, of course, that my blog output has dropped considerably again. What can I say? Consistency has perhaps never been my strong suit.

Of course, what exactly my strong suit is supposed to be is still kind of up in the air. I doubt somewhat that it is what I am into right not, although I realize by doubting anything all you are actually doing is creating your own expectations and therefore I should not doubt, not outloud and certainly not here on my blog where it will be preserved in easily accessible format well beyond the point that I and all my cherished doubts have shuffled off this mortal coil, but what are ya gonna do?

Now I'm sounding dour, which I assure you that I'm not. I just don't know what to write about exactly, so I thought I would just run my mouth. Fingertips, whatever. Naturally, I wouldn't expect the result to end up over there in the Greatest Hits column any time soon but you think I could at least scrape together some better material than this.

Oh, maybe this will be productive: I've gotten word from a very reliable source--one who looks like a white version of this astronaut toy, incidentally--that the Cartoon Network is looking for two writer teams for new Adult Swim cartoons. So, if you are someone who would make a good writing partner with me, you should contact me and we can become rich and famous.

What does it say about me that in a day where I made a sale, made appointments like nobody's business, and made a minor breakthrough in thought process that the thing that made me scream with joy was driving past a kid wearing one of these?

Too sweet.

War of the Worlds is getting pretty good press, but I have to side with the 28% of critics who find it underwhelming.

Most of the positive word concerning the film has to do with three things: the realism of its special effects, its references to the post-9/11 American mindset, and the way the film focuses only on one family.

On the matter of 'special' effects, I will say that, as a rule, in this day and age, no big budget film should be awarded points for convincing effects. There's nothing special about them any more. Now, a film should lose points if the effects suck, but if you've made a $128 million alien invasion film and it costs me $9 to sit and watch it in a room full of strangers, utterly convincing special effects should be automatic or you're ripping several people off.

Oh, and the movie's best sequence as far as suspense goes is pretty much a direct copy both of the more clever spider search sequence in Minority Report and the more visceral Raptor escape from the first Jurassic Park. Given the common element in all three of these films, I don't think you can classify this as homage.

As for the 9/11 stuff, I can't speak for everyone, but I found it to be a little disturbing. I'm sure the intention was to show panic and disaster as it really is, but that is no excuse for showing airplanes reduced to rubble just to remind of us that terrible day. Some other 9/11 references made no sense either: the wall of home-made "have you seen this person" posters felt a liitle artificial -- after all, alien war machines are destroying everything in sight; who has the time to make a poster? I did think some of the scenes of chaos and panic were good in and of themsleves, but I don't think the film as a whole struck an effective tone in this regard. For every scene exploring the selfish savagery of man in the face of terror, there was a scene about following orders from authority figures. If the film was trying to make a point about something, I missed it.

Now, the film does focus on one family. This may be a wise decision. I liked a couple of the family scenes. Others made no sense. (The peanut butter sandwich scene, for example, left me scratching my head.) I think Signs did the "one family amid an alien invasion" story much better and it also had a better "confrontation between the family and the aliens in a basement" scene.

Of course Signs also had a crap-out ending and so does War of the Worlds; both the invasion and family discontentment are wrapped up suddenly and without anything but an obligatory explanation.

Overall, I think War of the Worlds is unimaginative. Well-made, but unimaginative.

**