I'm confident it will be 1000000000000% better than the Star Wars Holiday Special

There's going to be a Cabin Pressure Christmas Special!

I'm betting most of you don't care about a BBC radio sitcom that you've never heard of, BUT YOU SHOULD because a) I've just told you about it and b) it's hysterical. The writing is tight and tremendously clever and there's something magical about the simplicity of the set up (the adventures of tiny, single jet airline crew) that lends itself to sitcom gold. There are four main characters (a good pilot, a safe pilot, an excitable steward and their boss), each vivid and ridiculous in ways that only comedy can allow. I've spent a lot of time trying to stifle giggles when I'm listening to an episode on the train.  Cabin Pressure has also become a staple of any family road trip lasting longer than 29 minutes, with both my mom and I reaching to hook up our iPod's to the radio the moment listening to an episode is suggested.

I really can not praise it highly enough. It's easily one of my favourite sitcoms of all time.

Yeah. That's right.

I watched Van Gogh: Painted with Words last week. And you know what? I enjoyed it. I was watching it and was all not interested for about the first three minutes and then that documentary voice kicked in and the dramatization was suitably engaging and I was bloody FASCINATED. I was very depressed when the train ride was over but I still had 40 minutes left to watch. But the next day another commute awaited me! I've never learned so much about Van Gogh while commuting. Thank god for ipods.

And I threatened someone with a 50 question Quiz on Van Gogh: Painted with Words, and frankly, this is the kind of threat I keep.

Arbitrary Appreciation: Movie Posters that use the "tilt head down and make eye contact" pose

Ray Park as Darth Maul demonstrating the "tilt head down and make eye contact" pose.

This poster was the first poster I owned that used the "tilt head down and make eye contact" pose in order to make someone look epic. This shortcut to epicness is used in countless posters, some deserving, some really really not.

There are more. Lots more. 

Warning: Trying to recreate this pose without a marketing team, reasonably high budget, brand name or certain level of fame is a surefire way to look very silly.

Adventures in Filmographies

I love movies. And I love the process of discovering new movies (and TV shows and books and radio plays and audiobooks and…)

Star Trek 2009 blew my mind and made me want MOAR. Which was totally fine, because there's more Star Trek around than I could ever want. So off I went, watching the Original Series and enjoying the hell out of the awesome life lessons offered (Rule #1: Don't wear red shirts). But at the same time, I was also going through the actors filmography, adventuring into their past in film and TV series appearances, some of which were far more entertaining than others. The unquestioned winner of the Star Trek phase was Incubus: a movie filmed entirely in Esperanto starring William Shatner from the 1960's. 

By including an actor's past work in the excitement of "Yay new movie I love!" I'm introducing a highly random element. Sherlock Holmes (which has the original stories as well as literally hundreds of adaptations to pick through) also started the Robert Downey Jr filmography phase, which led to me discovering one of my favourite movies (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang) and sitting through some of the most bizarre films I've seen (Rented Lips, Hugo Pool.)  I'm pretty confident no actor or actress will be able compete with the sheer bulk of WTF that ye olde Robert Downey Jr films can provide. 

And the tangents that come from these adventures in filmography are unexpected and delightful. I ended up spending a couple weeks appreciating a bunch of "Patrick Dempsey films made before 1997", which I can truthfully say is a line of interest I could not have predicted. It's also cool to see what films keep popping up. Seven separate quests led me to Bent, a film which has somehow become the Kevin Bacon of my movie world.

The best part of questing through past works is, without doubt, finding something AMAZING that otherwise I would never have come in contact with. Cabin Pressure, a BBC radio sitcom that I listened to because Benedict Cumberbatch was in it, is now one of my all time favourite sitcoms. Of course, the danger of such  method is that there are fantastically awful movies and TV shows waiting to be unearthed. But dodging or suffering through movies that define "why was this made?" just add to the experience and to the joy of finding something awesome.

First Official "Arbitrary Appreciation" Post

First up: Benedict Cumberbatch's name.

Holy shit guys. Look at this name. I am still not over how epic it is. Like really, KNOWING your kid is going to have "Cumberbatch" as a last name you go with "Benedict". Brilliant.

My name will never be that ridiculous/awesome. I'll never forgive my parents.