Unfettered Brilliance: A Digression That Isn't

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

A Digression That Isn't

I know, I know. You want more dirt on my Big Easy trip and fear not - it's coming. There's much to discuss there - post-Katrina tours, voodoo shops, mule carriage rides, learning about "Romeo & Juliet" spikes, the accepted horror of the "Quadroon Balls," and more besides!

But at the moment, a few other items bear mentioning. So please - enjoy this tonight and more on the fine city of New Orleans tomorrow. Let's go to the tape. Or DVD. Or DVR.

First, the film class reconvened today after Fall Break. We started our next unit of focus with Ridley Scott's Alien. Although 30+ years old, this is a film that holds up nicely. Scott melds science fiction with horror and also creates a scary, scary place by focusing our attention on what we don't see. Space is very, very large and air ducts are very, very small and fear comes in both sizes. Raw capitalism is alive and well beyond the frontiers. Technology can save us or set us up for the kill. And the magnificently human Ellen Ripley saves the day (and the cat!) instead of the more traditional male captain.

Second, the Rewatch continues to rocket through Season Six. Our fair moderator, Nikki Stafford, is still enjoying the charms of the Big Easy, but Stacey May Fowles, the poster this week, has things well in hand. "Dead Things" is a difficult episode to watch and her analysis explains that there are some darned good reasons for that. As Angel reminded Faith way back when, sometimes it's supposed to hurt and this is an episode that stings. And sings.

Last, did you see - I mean DID YOU SEE - the finale of Season 4 of Breaking Bad Sunday night? Holy. Cow. (Don't worry - the link is to a spoiler-free promo.) They need to make some extra Emmys for Best Supporting Actor. I'm not sure where the next season will go, but FryDaddy has a theory that I think is just delicious. I'll keep it under wraps for now, but if he's right, then the final season of Breaking Bad will blow the top off the television set.

Next: Back to N'Awlins. Having eaten the Godiva chocolates that we treated ourselves to during the layover in Memphis, it's time to find a beignet, explore a cathedral, and tour the Quarter.

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Points of Interest

Lurker's Guide - Excellent fan-run resource guide for Babylon 5

Breaking Bad - The official AMC site for news and recaps about the best show on television

Mockingbird's Nest - What I do outside of my day job

Ensley Guffey's Blog - Musings and links worth noticing

Nik At Night's Blog - Most things TV, including the 2011 Rewatch

TV Tropes - What you've seen, over and over and why it matters

Slayage - Whedon given the scholarly treatment

Whedonesque - Clearinghouse of all things Whedon

BuffyWorld - Shooting scripts, screenshots, and more

Who?

K. Dale Koontz may have watched too much television as a child. She learned to count via Sesame Street and first learned that genres could cross-pollinate through M*A*S*H. When she discovered Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the die was cast. In 2008, McFarland published her book Faith and Choice in the Work of Joss Whedon which focused on themes such as redemption, choice, and consequences in Whedon's work up to that point. (She's fairly sure Volume 2 could be written to include Dr. Horrible, Dollhouse, and The Avengers.) She is a founding member of the Whedon Studies Association (a great group of people, but don't mention Twilight. Just sayin'). She has presented original work on the Rossum Corporation in Dollhouse, Kitty Pryde, and Japanese anime. In 2014, she and co-author Ensley F. Guffey worked with ECW Press to publish the critically-acclaimed Wanna Cook? The Complete, Unofficial Companion to Breaking Bad. Her most recent project was to team again with Ensley and ECW to publish A Dream Given Form, which is the only guide to all the canonical works in the Babylon 5 universe. That book is currently available for preorder and will be released in September of 2017. Dale is available for speaking engagements and only occasionally uses puppets in her presentations.

What?

I have long been interested in storytelling - how we do it, why we do it, and what happens when we mix things up. This interest might be the result of being born and raised in the American South, a region that has long celebrated the involved story over the quick answer. Television - the good stuff, anyway - does this brilliantly. Far from being film's red-headed tacky cousin, good TV lets characters and relationships build slowly and often mixes up genres, so horror is next door to humor and fantasy rubs shoulders with procedurals. This blog focuses on both the "good stuff" being broadcast that catches my fancy (with a special emphasis on Babylon 5, since that's the book that's in the process of being written right now) as well as film. The films are usually new releases being watched for TV19's weekly Meet Me at the Movies, although I reserve the right to veer off into classics and under-appreciated gems as well. Older posts cover what my introduction to film class was up to - currently, I'm not teaching that course, but who knows what the future may hold.

Notable Whedon Work