John’s Blog

30 Days, on FX Network, is a fantastic show by Morgan Spurlock, who did SuperSize Me! It’s a show about walking for 30 days in someone else’s shoes.

Everyone should watch.

Kathy & I watched one of our very favorite movies this weekend, for maybe the third for fourth time: Big Night. Fantastic, fantastic movie about 2 Italian brothers who come to the States to build a restaurant. It’s not a movie with a ton of action, but what a wonderful, beautifully written, filmed, acted & directed movie. The performance by Stanley Tucci is one of my favorites in any movie. I was introduced to this movie by my friend Al about a million years ago, and just love it. It’s one of those where if you’ve got the time and can notice the details, it doesn’t really get any better.

also in the Big category: season finale of Big Love this weekend. good work. watching the Sopranos finale tonight if I don’t fall asleep at 9:30 again.

Obviously, blogging seems to be a nervous twitch for me when I’m in an audience — I have a hard time focusing 100% on presentations, but find doing actual work-related…um…work to be too distracting for me to get anything out of the presentations. So I’m blogging for a bit. TV thougths:

– Survivor finale last night was boring boring boring. Aras is the worst winner ever: I’m #2! But worth a million bucks now. Shane was a funny guy. Crazy, but funny. I’ll probably keep watching, but it’s getting a little tired.

– The West Wing finale was pretty lame, I thought. Some nice moments, but mostly the echoes of the great moments of the series, no great moments themselves. “Bartlett for America” remembered the start of the first campaign. President giving the Constitution to Charlie remembered the Thanksgiving episode when he gave him his family’s carving knife. But it did remind me that deep down inside, I want to believe in our government and leaders. I want someone in the Oval Office (and Sacramento, and over on Olive Ave in Sunnyvale, for that matter) who I can be inspired by, who can govern, who makes me proud to be American. Maybe that’s a remnant of another time, but it’s what I’d like.

– Lost is awesome. What a great show. I don’t know who that Alvo Hansar dude is, but he had a bunch of cool stuff back in 1980.

– Thief was a good show. Sadly, gone. But means that Rescue Me is about to start, and that’s definitely good.

– (I know this is radio, but “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” was super-funny this week, with Tom Hanks telling them to Go to Hell. (they were making jokes that he’s the nicest guy in Hollywood.) But my favorite part was when they were recounting that W said last week that the high point, for him, of his presidency was catching a 7 1/2 pound fish of some sort or other. Roy Blount, Jr said: “You know, I think he’s right.”

– We’re 3 episodes behind on Big Love. That’s not a bad sign — sometimes happens to us with HBO shows. Can’t decide if I like it or not yet, but it’s creepy.

– The season finale of The Office was pitch perfect. But a painful break point. I was really skeptical about the US version, but not anymore. It’s terrific.

– I find myself wanting to watch The Colbert Report more than The Daily Show. Sort of shocking. I thought Colbert was going to get boring quickly, but it hasn’t. Weird. I’m pretty sure it’s the most respected news source in America today. Books didn’t tell me that — that’s what my gut tells me.

– Sopranos is good. Lots of foreshadowing. But I’m really geared up about Deadwood coming back. They say it could be the last season, which would be both a bummer, and potentially great, since it would give them crazy creative freedom. Sort of like The Wire, except that that ended up not being the last season. I’m both scared & excited for The Wire to return. not sure what to expect.

– Last, I could not possibly have any higher expectations for Studio 60, the new show from Aaron Sorkin. They got maxed out last night when I found out Brad Whitford will be on the show. How did Josh go from the White House to an improv show in LA? Did he get fired as the President’s Chief of Staff? Maybe we’ll find out next season, until he’s eventually replaced with Josh Malina. (sort of an Aaron Sorkin in joke.)

And that’ll wrap it up from day 1 of my OpenAjax get-together experience. I’m going to endeavor to pay more attention tomorrow, so less blogging. Probably enough for a while, anyway.

Just watched the 4th episode of Thief on FX. It’s on a 6 episode arc for this first season, and this episode was great. Andre Braugher at the top of his game. Makes me want to start watching Homicide reruns again…

Final cut: they’ve canceled Arrested Development. They apparently had offers from Showtime to continue the show with the full cast, but Mitch Hurwitz, creator and producer, decided not to take the offers. While I’ll miss the show — I think it’s the funniest on television — I think this was the right decision. They ran a whole bunch of story arcs to ground in the last few episodes on Fox, and it clearly wouldn’t have been the same show.

In other news: I’m excited about Andre Braugher in Thief, starting tonight on FX. FX has done a great job lately — “The Shield,” “Rescue Me”, and “Over There” are all tremendous television shows. I’m very hopeful for Thief. Also means the return to television of Andre Braugher, star of the very best network drama ever, “Homicide”.

And: after everyone who I rooted for in my blog lost (Cuba), I’ll not tell you who I’m rooting for in the final four. I’ll just say it’s one of the schools named after a founding father.

Also: crappy, crappy year so far for Stanford sports. Thank god it’s baseball season. The Stanford 9 isn’t as good as they usually are, but seem to be scrappy this year. Almost time for Sam’s first baseball game.