J Marcus Daily
Star Wars: May the DVD be with you
Star Wars Trilogy DVD
The long awaited release of the ultimate science fiction trilogy onto the DVD format has been a topic of main stream press and the fan community at large. Everyone has an opinion about this release, mostly about George Lucas’ decision to release only an enhanced Special Edition that was originally released to theaters in 1997. Again, George Lucas has been tinkering with his movies an attempt to bring it closer to his imagining. And that is where true die hard fans lose there minds.
Forget the fact that he warned everyone when the last set of VHS copies of the original film was released, that this would be the last chance to purchase the original film as seen in the theaters. (If you were wise enough to buy the Widescreen that is.)
Forget the fact that these are his movies. Yeah, I said it. These are his movies. He envisioned them, worked damn hard with a lot of people to make it happen, and footed the bill himself so he could retain ownership. We the fans made them popular and gave him the chance to keep entertaining us with the Star Wars universe, but he owns it and can do what he likes with it.
But what you can’t forget, what’s undeniable is that these movies look better. Don’t take my word for it, and don’t go by your memory of what the movies look like, pop your cassette into the player and watch the movie. You can’t deny how pitiful the film looks on VHS all these many years later. The Greedo Solo debate over who shot first aside, Lucas put a lot of stuff into this edition that was sorely lacking and cleaned up a lot of effects that are showing their age.
Grab Return of the Jedi and watch the Rancor fight with Luke. The bluescreen effects are quite noticeable, especially when the door slams down on his head. Now, the movie looks and sounds great. I cranked up my surround sound, stuck the trilogy on my projector and was awestruck at how good the movie looked and sounded. Tie-fighters roaring through the room and explosions that shook the floor brought back a touch of what it was like to watch the movies on the big screen.
We’ll leave the debate on the actual scene changes for another time, but these DVD’s are the definitive DVD collection. One in only a handful of titles that actually make use of most of the technical improvements in owning a DVD player.
Damn it, now I don’t have any other reason to keep my Laserdisc player. Andrea will happily give that one away.
Who's cooking the shoe?
This morning Tristan got up at five in the morning right after Andrea left for the airport. While I dozed back into dreamland after saying goodbye to Andrea, Tristan was otherwise engaged cooking his shoes in the microwave.
I awoke to set of beady little eyes staring at me and a strange smell in the house. Jumping up I ran downstairs thinking he had touched the stove and started a fire. No. The fire was in the microwave. There it was open with his melted shoes sitting on the glass dish in the microwave. A puddle of goo coated the bottom of the dish but it was the thick smell of plastic seeping into every nook in cranny in the house that was the real problem. After burning my hand on the plate taking it outside, I jerked open every window in the house to try and stop the noxious fumes from getting any worse. If they did we were going to have to evacuate the house because I was starting to see spots in front of my eyes.
He played like he didn’t know what he had done and to a certain degree I think that is true. I think he knew what he was doing right up until the moment the shoes actually had fire running up the sides of them and so he opened the door and tried to blow it out. Obviously that didn’t work and he came to get me. Definitely a unique if not somewhat creative way on his part to get me up at 5 am.
Being a stay at home father I don’t have the natural instincts that stay at home mothers seem. My gender hasn’t had countless millennia to hone maternal instincts and coping skills for dealing daily with these occurrences. Of course, we make sure and lock our many household poisons in cabinets out of reach and never let them cross the street without hold our hands. But who knew that a three year old would test out the integrity of his shoes in a microwave oven. I clearly didn’t.
Built-in bookcases for the bathroom
Reading in the bathroom
One of those dirty little topics no one wants to admit too, like farting in bed or the five second rule on dropped food. When visiting a friend’s or neighbor’s home, will you find magazines to read or will it be perfectly decorated and pristine? In my little world, there seems to be wide berth in tastes as far as restroom reading material.
My parents have a virtual library in their bathroom complete with at least 20-30 magazines from a dozen or so different publishers, a handful of books most notably the widely popular Bathroom Readers Series along with the last remnants of the Sunday paper. In their defense this public bathroom is the only one on the ground floor and it also serves as their personal bathroom.
My grandfather usually only has a newspaper handy in his public restroom. My brother and his wife’s house don’t keep any reading material at all, but there are lots of Anne Geddes pictures on the wall. This is about the same for our friends Dave and Aja except it isn’t Anne Geddes decorating. My mother-laws house doesn’t normally have anything for reading, unless I’m visiting of course.
I can’t tell you what would be found in any of their personal bathrooms or if they even spend their time on the throne going over their papers. For our part around here, the guest bathrooms don’t have any reading material in them. We keep the downstairs for guests, and don’t really expect any of our guests to stick around long enough in the bathroom to need entertainment. Especially since it’s only five feet from the kitchen.
I will admit to being an avid fan of reading in the toilet room. I’ve completed more books while otherwise engaged than most people read in their lifetimes. If I had my way, their would be built-in bookcases for bathroom books, that way you don’t have to mix your collection or search for something to read at the last minute. My wife is of course strictly set against this and she’s not too fond of the three novels sitting on the back of the toilet and the five magazines propped up in the corner by the garbage can.
I can’t be alone on this one, but I think I’ll be hard pressed to find many people willing to admit how much they read on the toilet. Because then we’d be forced to think about how much time we spend there as well. Enough to write a novel perhaps.
Deetoo
Star Wars has been unleashed. No longer relegated to imprisonment in my study R2D2 and the rest of the toys from the Star Wars world have been given new life by my son, Tristan. He’s only 3 but he has gone crazy for the galaxy far, far away. Flying the Millennium Falcon on strafing runs in his toy room, mowing down invaders to the toy houses with their little people, he sees an entire world in the minds eye of his imagination. Does a father proud.
R2D2 is his favorite character by far.
“Deetwoo- Deetwoo- Deetwoo” he runs through the house screaming, waiting for us to turn on the newly released DVD trilogy. Pulling his D2 helmet over his head (an old large plastic flower pot) as he goes beep-beeping into furniture waiting for the movie to start.
There are those who probably think that three is too young to be watching these movies. Too much violence and all that jazz. If my alternative is Spongebob, the Wiggles or God save us all, Barney, I’ll take my chances with an Anakin wannabe.
Besides, who doesn’t like little Deetwoo.
Magazines: Bathroom or coffee table reading
A waiting room at home. How many magazines do you read?
Magazines come in all shapes, sizes, and flavors. You name the lifestyle and there are at least a dozen competing mags on the market. More and more American’s coffee tables don magazine collections typical to most doctors’ offices. Averaging 4.95 a pop on the newsstand consumers jump at the chance for 70% off for the subscription. According to recent studies in the publishing industry most a majority of households have on average 5 magazine subscriptions.
How many subscriptions do we really need? Or for that matter are these magazines really worth our time. While I might feel that book prices are outrageously high, it just isn’t so when compared to the price of an off the rack magazine. Why are we paying to increase the advertising revenue of these companies? With advertisements on nearly every other page they should be paying us to read their mags.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m part of the problem. I’m part of the industry. I write for magazines and get paid for my work. It’s a living. Still, I question the business and the cost to consumers even with subscription level pricing. Television is one product, that for all intensive purposes is free because of advertising revenue. Why should the magazine industry be any different?
Just think about these things the next time you fork over 5 bucks at the airport newsstand, or a telemarketer calls you at night to sell you subscriptions.
