Desktop Girl of the Week: Rooney Mara

If you follow movie news, you may have heard that Rooney Mara -- the younger sister of former DGOW selection Kate Mara -- was selected to play the role of Lisbeth Salander in the Hollywood adaptation of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo". If you follow football, you may recognize her name for a different reason.

Mara, who was born Patricia Rooney Mara, is the granddaughter of longtime New York Giants co-owner Wellington Mara (and her father Tim Mara is the Giants current VP of player evaluation). Her great-grandfather on her mother's side is Art Rooney Sr., the founder of the Pittsburgh Steelers (that's where the Rooney in her name comes from). So, like her sister, Mara has both hotness and the football connections going for her. Basically, she's like 19 levels out of your (and my) league.

Rooney Mara has been acting since 2005 and had a supporting role in the 2009 Michael Cera project "Youth in Revolt.". She's probably best known for her starring role in the 2010 remake of "A Nightmare  on Elm Street" and will also be seen (though not by me, since I'm not seeing the movie) in "The Social Network" later this year.

More importantly to THIS site, Rooney Mara is the 100th different Desktop Girl of the Week selection. If you visit the album, you'll find 105 desktops, but three girls (Britney Spears, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Kelly Clarkson) have been selected twice, and the album contains bonus pictures of Christina Hendricks and Scarlett Johansson. So how will AdamReisinger.com mark this milestone? Check back tomorrow for some big DGOW news.

• Rooney Mara on IMDB
• Faces of Kibera (Rooney Mara's Charity)
• "The Social Network" Official Site

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

2010 Baltimore Comic-Con Pictures

As promised, my photos from this year's Baltimore Comic-Con, mostly of the part of the costume contest I attended and the pieces available at the art auction.

I also included pictures of the original artwork and prints I bought at the show. Click the jump to see the full slideshow, or view the images in my Picasa gallery.

Baltimore Comic-Con: Late Day Two Recap

Well, later than promised, it's finally here. Day 2 of Baltimore Comic-Con was much easier on my legs, since the only thing I was carrying around was my art portfolio (for original art and prints), rather than a massive pile of books. There was also a lot more sitting involved, since the main highlights of the day for me, going in, were the costume contest and the art auction.

Now, while Baltimore Comic-Con is in its 11th year, this was only the second year of the costume contest, so they're still working out some kinks. They did make a positive change from last year, moving the contest (and all the panels, actually) from a temporary room on the show floor to a larger room on the third level of the convention center. This allowed more people to get in to see the event. They also moved the event up on the schedule (it was at 4 p.m. on Sunday last year, and scheduled for 1 p.m. on Sunday this year).

However, I don't think the organizers anticipated quite the level of interest this year, from both a spectator and participant perspective. Because of the increase in both audience and contestants, they had to open up an extra room, which ended up resulting in a one-hour delay. Also, because there were so many contestants, they couldn't squeeze the contest into its previously allotted time. So, don't ask me who won. I don't know. As much as I wanted to see the whole contest, I also wanted to go the art auction, which was scheduled to start at 3 p.m. -- two hours after the scheduled start of the costume contest, but only one hour after the actual start -- so I bailed.

Now, the art auction was actually moved down on the schedule. Last year it was held at the end of the day Saturday, technically after the show had closed, but this year it was scheduled for 3 p.m. on Sunday. Only, it didn't really get started until 3:30 p.m., which cut it real close to show closing time. By moving the event from Saturday to Sunday, they were able to get a lot more pieces into the show, but I think it also made it tough for people to sit there and wait for each piece to get auctioned off, since that would have meant missing out on that last trip around the show floor. I again had to bail on the event before it was over, this time to go and pick up a commissioned piece. That said, I was in the room to get a chance to bid on the three items I had my eye on, and just like last year, they all went for more than I was willing to pay.

That doesn't mean I left the show empty handed. Far from it, because -- spoiler alert -- ANGEL IS TWILIGHT!

Jersey Monday: Jamal Lewis

Having just spent all weekend in Baltimore, now seemed as good a time as any to spotlight one of my two Ravens jerseys. And yes, I've now been to four days of Baltimore Comic-Con over the last two years, and I've worn a jersey every day but I've never worn a Ravens jersey to the show (for those wondering, last year was Champ Bailey and Hines Ward, this year was the LeBron Heat pair). That's because I hate the Ravens.

So why do I own this jersey, if I hate the Ravens. Well, two reasons. First, I own a jersey of EVERY NFL team, so that's why I have a Ravens jersey. But, more specifically, there's a story behind this one.

It was the end of the 2001 season, and the business manager at my school paper asked me if I wanted to go with him to the Ravens game that week. He had season tickets and normally he went with his father, but that week was a Monday night game, specifically the Monday night game that had been delayed from earlier in the season (due to 9/11). Since it was now January, his father wasn't really interested in sitting out in the cold to watch a good Ravens team dismantle a bad Vikings team (in Mike Tice's coaching debut). So my friend offered me the ticket with the stipulation that I couldn't wear my authentic Vikings Randy Moss jersey to the game.

Now, he didn't say I had to wear a Ravens jersey either, and even if he had, I could have worn my out-of-date Vinny Testaverde Ravens jersey, but I decided to go out and buy a new one. At the time, there was a store at the White Marsh Mall that stocked authentic NFL jerseys and usually by the end of the season they were selling them at half price. That was the case here, which is how I ended up with this Jamal Lewis number, with his full name on the back (at the time, the Ravens had more than a few players on their team with the last name "Lewis", including Jamal and Jermaine on offense, thus the FNOB). I wore the jersey to the game, and we froze our asses off as the Ravens sleepwalked through an uninspired 19-3 win that featured five field goals and a defensive touchdown. I haven't been to a whole lot of NFL games in my life, but I'd be hard pressed to go to a QB matchup worse than Elvis Grbac against Spergon Wynn.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Charmed Comic Review, Issue #2

First things first. This issue -- which hits stores on Wednesday -- starts with a "letter" from Paige that recaps the first issue (and the Issue #0 prequel) and breaks the fourth wall a little bit. I know some fans might be upset by the fourth wall breaking (Paige specifically referring to issues and the letter being a recap) but I thought the whole thing was really in tone for the character and was nice since a lot of fans might have missed the first issue.

Also, on the first actual art page, we get 100% confirmation of a time frame for the comic: one-and-a-half years after the events of the series finale. That page also features a continuity error carried over from the series. It's a splash page of the exterior of Halliwell Manor, and just like the house used for exterior shots in the show, there's no visible attic. I actually enjoy the fact that they didn't change this for the comic, even though they could have.

As the issue begins, Piper and Phoebe are preparing to attend a funeral, and Phoebe is making inappropriate jokes, about both the funeral itself and Leo. I had actually forgotten about Phoebe's earlier attraction to Leo way back in Season 2 (before Leo and Piper were an item), and her dialogue in this scene felt like THAT Phoebe -- which was a little weird, since this is supposed to be Season 9+ Phoebe, albeit one who still dresses more appropriately than she ever did on the show.

Meanwhile, Paige is meeting her new charge, a 19-year-old boy who is reluctant to believe he's a witch (and gets caught up in the terminology in a scene that both serves as humor and an introduction to "Charmed" structure for readers who weren't fans of the show). I still don't like that Paige has gone back to her lighter hair color, but there were moments in this scene where she at least bordered on Rose McGowan-esque, which is an improvement from issue #1.

This Week in Buffy History: August 29-September 4

August 31
1972 - Phina Oruche born (played Olivia in season 4)

September 2
2009 - Season 8, Issue 28, "Retreat, Pt. 3", released by Dark Horse Comics

September 3
1970 - Rob Nagle born (played Robson in season 7)
1974 - Clare Kramer born (played Glory in season 5)
2008 - Season 8, Issue 18, "Time of Your Life, Pt. 3", released by Dark Horse Comics

Remember, you can always get your Buffy anniversary updates at The Ultimate Buffy Calendar (now featuring the release dates of the Buffy: Season 8 comics)

Baltimore Comic-Con: Day One

Remember back in April when I recapped Boston Comic Con and I said I needed a better system for getting books signed at comic book conventions?

Well, I still need a better system.

Actually, to be entirely fair to myself, I can't judge the system I used this year until after tomorrow, but right now, my legs really hurt. I mean, really. Like, my right knee is so swollen that my right thigh is actually numb.

But even with dealing with that right now, it was all worth it.

I made the decision early this morning that I was going to try to get all my signings done today, because I had no interest in carrying around large piles of books tomorrow. So I split up the big pile into three smaller piles and made my way over to the convention center at 8:00 a.m. -- two hours before the doors were scheduled to open.

After some initial confusion from the organizers about where we should be lining up, things went pretty smoothly, and the two-hour wait wasn't that bad (thanks to WSOP and Netflix on my iPhone).

My first-wave plan of attack involved hitting up about 10 booths to get books signed, and getting on a handful of commission lists. One of the key stops in that early wave was at Georges Jeanty's booth. We've been trading e-mails for awhile on a set of pages I wanted to buy from him, and we came to a price today. I'll save the details of that for tomorrow, when I actually pick them up.

Baltimore Comic-Con: Day Zero

This weekend marks a milestone in my Nerd life. For the first time ever, I'm attending the same comic book convention in consecutive years. After last year's fun at Baltimore Comic-Con, I'm back for another adventure. And, for the second consecutive year, thanks to horrible horrible traffic on I-95 in Maryland, I had to take Route 40 all the way from Aberdeen into Baltimore. Somehow, this traffic was never a problem during my repeated trips to Towson football games last year, only to Comic-Con. And while it's easy to attribute the traffic difference to the different times of day, I'd like to imagine that there's some big Northeast exodus to Baltimore Comic-Con.

What you see above is my pile of books to get signed this weekend. Last year, I brought more than 160 books with me and got all but two of them signed. This year, despite what you may think about the image above, my stash is considerably less. I may, in fact, be able to get all the signing done on Saturday, which would be nice because that way I wouldn't have to carry around a heavy backpack on Sunday.

Tonight is just a chill night, and I'll probably end up icing my right knee and ankle, which both tend to swell up after long drives (fuck, I'm getting old). The hotel I'm staying in -- not the same one as last year -- is very nice, and I actually ran into a bunch of creators who are guests at the show when I was arriving. Also, the Baltimore Ravens are staying here, and apparently one of my least favorite coaches of all time has a Mac:

AdamNPooZ.com Podcast - Episode 3.3

For those of you that don't always follow me on Twitter, or scroll down to see the RSS feeds on the right-hand side of AdamReisinger.com, you may have missed the update that there's a new AdamNPooZ.com podcast out.

In this month's edition, PooZ and I go over the history of skeptical comic book movie casting, off the news that January Jones will play Emma Frost in "X-Men: First Class".

So, click over to AdamNPooZ.com to give it a listen, or subscribe via iTunes.

Another Tale of Best Buy FAIL

So yesterday afternoon, I sent out this tweet:

Just bought the "Lost" mega box set. Anyone interested in my extras of Seasons 1-2 (DVD) and 3-5 (Blu-Ray)?Tue Aug 24 18:58:03 via TweetDeckAdam S Reisinger
adamreisinger

Then, a few hours later, I sent out this one:

I don't know why I'm surprised when BestBuy.com's in store pickup sucks, because it does every time. #bestbuy #failTue Aug 24 22:41:31 via Twitter for iPhoneAdam S Reisinger
adamreisinger

Related? Absolutely. I should be watching "Lost" Season Six on Blu-ray right now, but I'm not. And it's entirely Best Buy's fault. And, as I hinted at in my second tweet there, this is far from the first time this happened.

First, a little background. There are two Best Buy stores I frequent: the one in my current hometown and the one in my former hometown which happens to be just about halfway between work and home. I have never had a problem purchasing anything from the Best Buy in the town in which I currently live, whether in store or via BestBuy.com in-store pickup. I rarely use BestBuy.com in-store pickup, saving it only for items that I know could sell out quickly (and usually when I'm at work and won't be able to get to the store for a few hours).

On the other hand, I have had nothing but problems with the other Best Buy, including an incident back in 2004 where it took them nearly six months to replace a clearly defective HDTV, only to have them replace it with one that had been dropped on its screen. Where this store shines at failing is in the BestBuy.com in-store pickup system, which they've managed to screw up repeatedly.

Before I get to the details of yesterday's story, two quick background incidents. Back in 2008, I ordered a movie from them (for the life of me I can't remember what it was and BestBuy.com's online order system doesn't go back that far). I got the e-mail that it was ready for pickup. When I went into the store, I went to the counter, showed my order form, watched the girl behind the counter dig around in the online order pile for about five minutes, then watched as she walked over to the Blu-ray aisle and picked it up, thus negating the whole purpose of the online order.

Last year, I purchased a Nintendo Wii and a whole mess of accessories as a gift for my sister and her family. Again, I waited to receive the "your order is ready to be picked up e-mail" before going into the store (and, to be fair to Best Buy, a large majority of the complaints I see about the online order/in-store pickup process involve people who didn't wait until receiving that e-mail). When I got there, the only thing they had waiting for me behind the counter was the Wii itself. I stood there for 30 minutes as two guys ran around the store getting the rest of the items on my list and putting them into a giant cardboard box. It was like something out of a Benny Hill sketch, just slowed down to make the process all the more painful.

Desktop Girl of the Week: Alice Eve

I realized last week when I did the Emma Frost post that neither January Jones nor Alice Eve had ever been DGOW selections, which seemed like an egregious oversight. So, today, I rectify at least half of that problem with this desktop picture of the lovely Alice Eve.

While Eve apparently will not be playing Emma Frost, she is potentially in the running to play The Enchantress in "The Avengers" and "Thor 2", and possibly Sue Storm in the "Fantastic 4" reboot, at least according to this "crazily complex" rumor from io9.

As for parts Eve has actually received, her most high-profile role was in the romantic comedy "She's Out of My League", which wasn't actually a great movie, but wasn't as bad as some people expected. Plus, she looks amazingly hot in the movie, which is one of her specialities. Allegedly, Eve also had a small role in "Sex and the City 2", but I wouldn't see that movie if you paid me. Eve's next scheduled movie is "The Decoy Bride", a British romantic comedy also starring David Tennant of "Doctor Who" fame.

• Alice Eve on IMDB
• Alice Eve's Maxim Shoot
• "She's Out of My League" Official Site

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

"Blah, Blah, Vampire Emergency, Blah" - True Blood At Its Best

As frustrating as "True Blood" can be sometimes, every week it has a moment that reminds me why I watch the show. Last week, it was the entire ending, with Russell eviscerating a newscaster on live TV (then flippantly tossing to the weather at the end). This week, it was Pam (who has been restored as my second favorite character behind Jessica, even if she still doesn't get enough screen time), who interrupted Sookie and Eric with the greatest line in "True Blood" history.

"Blah, blah, vampire emergency, blah."

Holy fuck that was just awesome in its flippancy. From now on, that's how I'm greeting people. Oh, Pam, why aren't you in our lives more?

My second favorite part of the episode went, in a way, to my favorite character (that'd be Jessica for my readers with an attention span of less than four lines of text). Jessica and Hoyt had another one of their emotional conversations and as Hoyt was leaving Merlotte's, Tommy said something to him. So Hoyt, being the goody-two-shoes choir boy that he is... punched Tommy in the face! Yes! Way to man up, Hoyt.

Tommy didn't react to this well, turning into DoggieTommy and biting the shit out of Hoyt's arm. This caused Jessica to speed onto the scene and FUCKING PUNT TOMMY INTO THE WOODS. Now, I'm no advocate of violence against animals -- it's deplorable -- but that was fucking awesome. Plus, it finally got Jessica to admit she loves Hoyt, which was sweet (even if it was happening as she fed Hoyt her blood while trying to resist Hoyt's bleeding arm).

There was all sorts of other stuff going on in last night's episode, but for me, those two moments were by far the best developments. Now there's only two episodes left in this season, and so many loose ends to tie up that you know these next couple hours are going to be crazy. So, until next week, "blah, blah, vampire emergency, blah."

Jersey Monday: Michael Westbrook

It's almost football season (preseason football doesn't count) which means it's almost time for me to be disappointed by the Redskins again. Yeah, I tend to be pretty pessimistic about my favorite teams annually, but if you had some of the jerseys I had, you'd feel the same way too.

One of my many embarrassing Redskins jerseys is this Michael Westbrook replica from the late '90s. I actually wore this to a Redskins-Eagles game at the Vet in 1997 and made it out alive. However, on my way out of the stadium -- following a Redskins loss -- a drunk Eagles fan suggested I burn the jersey, to which I replied, "I tried, but it keeps flaming out after a couple minutes."

It was both an attempt to not get my ass kicked (a successful one at that) and a statement on Westbrook's career. By that point, he former No. 4 overall pick was in his third season in the league and had yet to crack 600 yards receiving in a season. His best season as a Redskin was still two years off, and he finished his Washington career with 277 receptions and 4,280 yards in 80 games. That comes out to 3.5 catches and 53.5 yards per game, which isn't really worth the No. 4 overall pick, but honestly isn't as bad as I remember from Westbrook. He wasn't helped by the fact he missed 32 games during his Redskins career.

This jersey itself is a Wilson replica and is of pretty flimsy quality, which I guess is apropos, because like Westbrook, it LOOKS like a decent enough facsimile of the real thing, but doesn't hold up under scrutiny.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

This Week in Buffy History: August 22-28

August 25
1981 - Rachel Bilson born (played Colleen in Episode 7.18, “Dirty Girls”)

August 28
1973 - J. August Richards born (played Charles Gunn on “Angel”)
1977 - Brian Thompson born (played Luke and The Judge)

Futurama "The Prisoner of Benda" Reaction

After an episode that was a little too topical for my tastes, "The Prisoner of Benda" was just the right style of "Futurama" episode for me. It mixed zany situations with unbelievable science fiction to put together 20 minutes of pure insanity.

The crux of the episode centered around the professor's mind-switching machine, which worked, but was quickly discovered to have a flaw: once two people swapped minds, they couldn't swap directly again. Now this set up some ridiculousness with people in other people's bodies, switching every which way but right (at least until the end when the Harlem Globetrotters showed up with the proper math and body solution to the problem).

Amy ended up in Leela's body and just kept eating and eating until she was a fat tub. Farnsworth ended up in Bender and joined a robot circus as "Nonchalanto". Bender ended up in a Robo-Hungarian Emperor, who was the subject of a traditional identity switch trope -- making the poor peasant thinking they're getting the good side of the deal when really they've ended up the target of an assassination plot.

But the best switches involved Leela and Fry. Leela ended up in Professor Farnsworth's body, and was upset because she thought Fry only liked her for her body (when in reality, Fry dating his distant nephew would just have been gross). So, to prove that Leela could be just as shallow as Fry, he switched bodies with Zoidberg. This led to the two of them going on a date, where they tried to out-gross each other out, and ended up... making out on top of a restaurant table... which led to them having sex. That's right. Fry and Leela had sex as Zoidberg and Farnsworth. This was so disgusting it was amazing (note: we didn't actually see the sex on screen, just the post-coital snuggling, but still, so gross it was awesome).

The other great scene in this episode involved Scruffy and his robot wash-bucket, who was in Amy's body at the time. I can't do it justice, so I'll just show you.

The antics between the Emperor (in wash-bucket, pretending to be Bender) and Zoidberg (in Fry) were also top notch. All-in-all, this episode didn't really make much sense, but Futurama has proven through the years that it can do a nonsense episode and have it be sublime.

Now, on to this week's best lines:

Review: Buffy Season 8 "Riley" One Shot

Wow, has it really been more than three months since we got any "Buffy" related comics? Well, it has. And considering that Issue #36 of Season 8 is scheduled to come out in just a couple weeks, the timing of this "Riley" one shot could have been better, but even with it coming out relatively late, it's still much appreciated.

COVER TWO

As with the last one-shot, we get a standard Jo Chen cover and a cover by issue artist Karl Moline. I love the Chen cover on this one, as she really manages to capture Marc Blucas. And though her Sam Finn doesn't quite look like Ivana Milicevic, it's close enough to work. Moline has more of an action focused cover, which masks the fact that his Riley doesn't really look like Blucas, at least not on the cover. Still, since he puts a beautiful image of Buffy in the corner, I'll let that slide.

Also, I should mention the "Riley" title font, which I really like. I prefer the Chen cover's use of the BTVS logo, but I can understand why they didn't use it on the Moline cover (it really would have cluttered things up).

THE WRITE STUFF

Having had the experience of the "Willow" one shot already, I went in to this one with a better idea of what to expect -- a story that would fill in some of the backstory of Riley in Season 8, but wouldn't take us all the way up to his first appearance. And from the Riley perspective, that's exactly what we got.

Riley has never been one of my favorite characters (I feel about him the way most "Buffy" fans feel about Dawn), but I actually liked him in this issue. His justifications for doing what he was doing -- going undercover with Twilight at Buffy's request -- made sense. He wasn't doing it just because Buffy was asking, he was doing it because he knew the only way Buffy would even ask if because it was end of the world type stuff. I also thought the stuff between Riley and Sam regarding their "retired" life together and each one's recognition of the other's eagerness to get back into the action was really well written.

However, while this issue gets the "Riley" title, it's not just a Riley issue. Twilight, who we now know is Angel, plays a major role. And not only is he unmasked in this one, but we see that he's working with Whistler, who you should remember as just some immortal demon sent down to even the score between good and evil from Season 2's "Becoming". While the backstory on Riley was satisfying to explain his whole role in Season 8, the Angel/Whistler stuff was the meat of the issue from an expository standpoint.

I also think the subtitle, "Commitment through Distance, Virtue through Sin", does a good job summarizing why both Angel and Riley agree to play the roles they did early in Season 8. Yes, the issue never actually shows Sam leaving Riley, but it gives you all the necessary dots to connect.

Amazing Spider-Man #640 Review: One Moment in Time, Part 3

The ongoing Amazing Spider-Man arc "One Moment In Time" has been a lesson in lowered expectations for me. Part 1 (issue #638) had three years of build up behind it, and for me it fell so woefully short of my expectations that I couldn't help but to hate it. With my expectations reasonably lowered for Part 2 (issue #639), I actually found things to like about the issue -- particularly Paolo Rivera's artwork -- but still found it lacking overall.

Now in Part 3, it seems my expectations have been sufficiently lowered to the point that the things I like about the issue are balanced with the things I don't like.

Up until this issue, we hadn't really seen anything that would have served as a reasonable explanation for why Peter and Mary Jane weren't even a large part of each other's lives in the post-OMD continuity, but this issue provides the background for that. After the Kingpin finds out that Aunt May survived the assassination attempt, he send an assassin after MJ's Aunt Anna. MJ manages to stop the assassin, but in the subsequent fight, it's made clear that no one in MJ's family is safe. That spurs Peter to go to Doctor Strange to set in motion the mojo that will make the whole world forget he's Spider-Man.

In the greater universe we've been presented, those events actually make sense. What doesn't make sense is the scene between Aunt May's doctor and Peter, in which the doctor seems convinced that what saved Aunt May was the power of love. That's not even a good Huey Lewis and the News song, much less a good explanation for a continuity altering storyline.

Also, when Doctor Strange went off into his out-of-body experience, I was kind of hoping he'd encounter Mephisto, connecting this back to One More Day, but instead he was holding an astral summit with Tony Stark and Reed Richards. That DOES connect this all back to Civil War, which would be great, except five pages earlier, Peter specifically said to himself, "publicly revealing my secret identity was my own choice."

As mentioned above, Rivera's art is outstanding. I love how his MJ looks. And in contrast to past issues, there are only two pages of the exposition filled apartment scenes, as drawn by Quesada, so that negative is nicely minimized here.

I'm not ready to give a passing grade to the OMIT arc, but at least this issue didn't feel like a total failure to me.

Beloit College's Mindset List: An Exercise in Ignorance

So, every year, Beloit College in Wisconsin puts out something called "The Mindset List", which is supposed to prepare their professors for the "mindset" of the incoming class of students, who are likely to not understand the old teachers' outdated references. And every year, the mainstream media, just as stuck in their old ways, faithfully reports the items on this list as a cultural touchstone of the changing times.

What generally goes unreported is just how inaccurate these lists are. Normally, I wouldn't even care, but this entry on this year's list obviously caught my eye:

6. Buffy has always been meeting her obligations to hunt down Lothos and the other blood-suckers at Hemery High.

Umm... where to begin with the wrongness of that? Well, I guess they're trying to make the point that prior to 1992, when the Class of 2014 was born, Buffy Summers was just a normal girl, but ever since then, she's been The Slayer... The Chosen One... One girl in all the world with the power to blah, blah, blah, you know the drill.

However, the references to Lothos and Hemery High are specific to the "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" movie, which was released in 1992, and probably is completely irrelevant to someone in the Class of 2014. Even the TV series, in which Buffy was meeting her obligations to hunt down the many demons attracted to the Hellmouth under Sunnydale High, was probably in the "before their time" category, as most Class of 2014ers would have been only 11 years old when the show went off the air. Now, it's entirely possible that a current 18-year-old would have caught the magical TV series that is "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" on DVD (or Netflix Watch Instantly, or iTunes, or whatever) but the Lothos and Hemery High references would be lost on them.

I was going to go line-by-line and critique the rest of this year's Mindset List, but that wouldn't really be fair, since I'm 12 years removed from these kids, and this is the same generation that thinks Ke$ha (*shudder*) is talented. So instead, let's take a look at the list from my college class, the class of 2002 (holy shit, when did I get so fucking old?) and see how insane it is.

Is January Jones Miscast as Emma Frost?

So the news came out today that January Jones (of "Mad Men" fame) has been cast as Emma Frost/The White Queen in the new X-Men prequel, "X-Men: First Class".

First, let's address the obvious physical, umm, "deficiencies", I guess, of Jones-as-Frost. Just look at the picture above. That's Emma Frost (as sculpted by Sideshow, based on art from Adam Hughes) on the right, and Jones on the left (as if you couldn't tell the human from the fictional character). Sure, Jones has the right skin tone and hair for Frost, but her shape is severely lacking.

Reportedly the much more curvaceous Alice Eve was in the running for the role. At first, I thought that possibly the producers of the movie chose to go with Jones because of her height, but Jones is listed at 5-foot-6, while Eve is 5'5 ½", so that couldn't be the reason (though honestly before looking it up, I would have pegged Jones at about 5'8" and Eve at 5'4", so their listed heights may not be accurate).

Look at a side-by-side comparison of Alice Eve with Emma Frost, this time in drawn form, rather than sculpture (though I've got more Emma Frost statue photos I could post):

Visually, that seems much more compatible. It helps that the outfit Eve is wearing in that shot from "She's Out of My League" could easily translate to a classroom setting, but I think if there is an actress in Hollywood that could pull off the body of Emma Frost, it's her. The acting required for the character, well, that's a different story?

However, I'm still not sold that Jones is the right choice either. Yes, Betty Francis (neé Draper) is pretty much an ice queen bitch, but Frost actually has an aloof, sardonic quality to her as well, which I don't get from Jones on "Mad Men" at all. She generally just comes off as wooden, at least for the past couple of seasons, which may not be entirely Jones's fault, but she can't be blameless either. I don't doubt that at times Jones has been a very good actress, but I just have this feeling that she's the wrong choice for this role -- much in the way that Halle Berry, while a good actress at times, was the wrong choice for both Storm and Catwoman.

I will say that the casting of Jones is the first time in awhile I've even cared about this movie, so that has to count for something. But for now, count me among the skeptical.

Desktop Girl of the Week: Karen Gillan

This week's "Desktop Girl of the Week" selection comes via a recommendation from my sister, who has been pushing for Karen Gillan, of "Doctor Who" fame, for a couple weeks now.

I was reluctant to make Gillan the DGOW not because she's unattractive (quite the contrary, she's actually very attractive) but because I've never seen her in anything. However, I then realized this wasn't a roadblock, but an opportunity.

"Doctor Who" is one of those shows that people who watch it tell me I would enjoy, but the simple fact is the show has run in some form for 31 seasons. Sure, I caught up on "24" after it had been on for five seasons, but I'm not going back and watching all 700+ episodes of "Doctor Who". So I ask you, my readers, if I was going to jump in on this show, where do I start? Maybe once I figure that out, I can catch Gillan in action.

• Karen Gillan on IMDB
• Official "Doctor Who" homepage

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

Jersey Monday: John Elway

You can have your Tim Tebow, with your fancy "new" style Broncos jersey (that's actually more than a decade old at this point). When it comes to Broncos quarterbacks, give him John Elway, orange crush style.

This is actually one of two Elway jerseys I own (the other is a Stanford throwback) and one of three Broncos jerseys I own. However, this is my only Broncos jersey from before they changed to their modern style in the late '90s.

Sure, the Broncos may have been a better team wearing their Nike-designed jerseys, but when I think "Denver Broncos", these will be the first jerseys that come to mind -- well, techinically something like this, since this particular jersey is a cheap Logo Athletic model with the TV numbers in the wrong place (they should be on the sleeve, not on the shoulders). The name font is also wrong, but that was fairly common in replica jerseys in the early '90s. Most manufacturers simply used the same font for all teams.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

This (Past) Week in Comics: Aug. 11 (Spider-Man, Iron-Man, X-Men)

So exactly one month ago, I did a "This Week in Comics" entry that focused on Invincible Iron Man, Ultimate Spider-Man and X-Men. And today, I finally get around to this week's TWIC, which focuses on... hey, look at that, it's the same set of books! Aren't monthly release schedules amazing?

Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man #13
As I mentioned in that post a month ago, sometimes when certain characters show up, you expect certain things to happen, and the Chameleon plot progresses somewhat predictably. He finds out that Peter Parker, the person whose identity he's stolen, is Spider-Man, so he pretends to be Spider-Man and commits crimes, ruining Spider-Man's reputation. Normally this would be the part of the story where J. Jonah Jameson sees what's happening and yells something like "I told you! I told you he was a criminal! A menace!", but in this book, Jameson is tied up with Peter Parker, being watched over by a second, female chameleon. A female chameleon who SHOOTS J. JONAH JAMESON IN THE HEAD! Look, in comics, a character isn't actually dead until you see a body in a coffin and then see that coffin get buried, and even then half the time it turns out to be a clone or a body double or the person is magically resurrected anyway, so I refuse to believe Jameson is dead. But just in case, let me make it clear that J. Jonah Jameson is one of the few characters who should be off limits for killing. Oh, and the last page, with Aunt May playing the Nick Fury role and telling her team of in-house superheroes to suit up, was just awesome.
Grade: A-

Invincible Iron Man #29
See the second and third words in that title? "Iron Man". This book is called "The Invincible Iron Man", not "The Relatively Defeated Tony Stark". Sure, we get Pepper back in the Rescue suit in this issue, but her only action is flying off, which isn't exactly satisfying. This arc seems to be unraveling slower than most, and could really use an Iron Man-Hammer showdown pretty soon. Also, these issues that are dialogue and story heavy really don't make use of the artist's talents, as Salvador Larroca does great stuff with the action, but his talking heads look strangely distant and lifeless.
Grade: C-

X-Men #2
This is a book that has the right balance of action and story, and the story, while convoluted, is enough to keep me interested. It totally makes sense for Blade to show up in this story, and I'm glad they didn't wait until issue #5 or 6 to bring him in. I also like that they kept Blade true to his character, even though this isn't HIS book -- he was the only one that truly objected to the X-Men's plan -- resurrect Dracula to take on Xarus, the new king of the vampires -- and his objection was the right level of inappropriate. I still don't care about Jubilee, and I'm not sure why she's so important to the vampires, but it least it makes it easier to hate her for being so stupid (and she was pretty stupid in this issue).
Grade: B

I also bought Spectacular Spider-Girl, which I'm once again not going to even give a mini-review. I got it because I like the character, and I want to support her since Marvel seems to be doing everything it can to eliminate her from continuity entirely. The story wrapped up neatly enough in the last part of this four-part mini-series, while leaving enough unresolved so Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz can resurrect the character in the future.

This Week in Buffy History: August 15-21

August 18
1976 - Daphne Duplaix born (played Serena in Angel Episode 1.12, “Expecting”)

August 19
1969 - Randall Slavin born (played Male Oracle in Season 1 of Angel)

August 20
1962 - James Marsters born (played Spike)
1975 - Amy Adams born (played Beth Maclay in Episode 5.06, “Family”)

Remember, you can always get your Buffy anniversary updates at The Ultimate Buffy Calendar (now featuring the release dates of the Buffy: Season 8 comics)

Reviews: "The Expendables" and "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World"

Normally it's pretty rare for me to see any two movies in theaters in the same weekend, much less two movies on opening weekend, but both "The Expendables" and "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World" appealed to me enough to get me into my local theater this weekend to check them out.

First up, "The Expendables", which I saw last night. There's no getting around it, this is a guy movie. There isn't a single female on the poster and there are about four in the entire movie (in fact, there are more MMA fighters than females in the movie). The "Buffy" fan in me was mildly excited about seeing Charisma Carpenter (Cordelia) on the big screen, but she's in the movie for all of three minutes.

Even without any real depth, the movie totally works. The plot is completely inconsequential, and I'm not going to bother getting into it, since really all it does is slow things down and serve to get the key people in place for the action scenes. And the strength of this movie is its action scenes. The final 20 minutes of the movie are basically one long extended ass-kicking sequence, upping the ante from hand-to-hand combat to shootouts to bombs to a missile -- a missile that is THROWN by Terry Crews and shot it mid-air by Sylvester Stallone.

The star of the movie isn't Stallone, or Jason Statham or Jet Li or anyone else whose name appears on the poster. No, instead, it's Crews's exploding-round shotgun, which loudly serves as the marker for the "this shit is about to get out of control" point in the movie. In fact, it's entirely possible the movie was written around one of Crews's Old Spice commercials. EXPLOSION!

As for the much-hyped uniting of Stallone, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger, well, really it's just one scene. Neither Willis nor Schwarzenegger ever actually gets in on the action (nor does Mickey Rourke, who also has a momentum-killing blue-lit monologue in the middle of the movie) but the scene still works as a nostalgia piece for '80s action fans, and also provides the best line of the movie (I won't spoil it for you, but let's just say it involves Arnold and a job he can never have).

Futurama "A Clockwork Origin" Reaction

Maybe it was just because I've been so tired from work this week, but watching last night's "Futurama" episode, I just didn't feel into it. I tried re-watching it today, but on the whole, "A Clockwork Origin" just fell flat for me.

When I try to think of why I didn't like this episode, I think back something Hermes said in "The Duh-Vinci Code":

Farnsworth: We must fly to Rome and exhume the body of Saint James!
Hermes: Didn't we used to be a delivery company?!

While I sometimes like the grand scale of "Futurama", when EVERY episode takes place in a wider universe, it just gets tedious. Also, maybe I just wasn't in the mood for a "Creation vs Evolution vs Intelligent Design" story, especially when the outcome was painfully obvious to me (and probably to most viewers) while somehow Professor Farnsworth remained oblivious.

That wasn't to say last night's episode wasn't without its moments. I mean, hell, it had robot dinosaurs, which really appealed to the seven-year-old in me -- and I'm not being snarky when I say that. While animated shows like "Futurama" are definitely made for adults, there's no reason they can't include something for the kid in us, and I don't know any American boy who hasn't dreamed of robot dinosaurs at some point. In fact, I kind of wish they'd done a whole episode about robot dinosaurs. The Bronto/T-Rex/Tricycletops fight wasn't nearly long enough.

Some other quick thoughts: while the main plot didn't do anything for me, the Zoidberg/Cubert subplot (Farnsworth leaves Cubert behind and puts him in Zoidberg's care) was just right ... I can only hope Dr. Banjo becomes a recurring character, since he provided some of the best laughs last night ... I know it's juvenile of me, but I laughed every time they referenced "Homo Farnsworth" ... Bender's "evolutionary" spring robot was so stupid it was hilarious.

Lastly, the "Jurassic Bark" shoutout -- when Hermes found "another" of Fry's fossilized dogs -- was phenomenal. Hell, ya know what? Even an episode that for the most part I didn't like still has some pretty good parts. Which is more than I can say for "Family Guy".

OK, on to this week's top five lines:

The "Glee" Britney Episode: The Songs They Should Do

One of the reasons I decided to catch up on "Glee" when I did was because of the confirmations that this fall, "Glee" will be doing a Britney Spears episode. In fact, this week it was confirmed that Ms. Spears herself will be appearing in the episode, which just increases my level of excitement for this episode (remember Britney's "How I Met Your Mother" appearances? Those were awesome).

Now, I may not officially be a Gleek yet, but when it comes to Britney Spears, I feel confident in my expert cred. I own every one of her albums (including domestic and international editions of multiple albums), every CD single from her first four albums and the deluxe collectors edition of The Singles Collection. I've seen her in concert nearly two dozen times, including five times last year alone. I have 319 Britney Spears tracks in my iTunes Library, four of my top six most-played songs are by Britney and just last year I ranked every Britney Spears song ever.

So, with all that said, here are the six Britney Spears songs I think would work best for the all-Britney Spears episode of "Glee".

"Baby One More Time"

Britney's first single is a must. This isn't negotiable. I actually think this one could be given to one of the guys on the show without losing too much (the song's been covered by some alt-rock bands and hasn't sounded half bad). Puck (Mark Salling) could probably put a nice spin on it.

My Top 10 Favorite Things About "Glee" Season One

So with my negative thoughts (or, more accurately, my nit-picky thoughts) on "Glee" in the past, it's time to focus on the positive. And let me be clear, there's a lot more positive than negative. "Glee" will definitely be on my weekly schedule this year, and will probably be one of the shows I look forward to more than others. In fact, watching the show last week, I found myself lamenting the fact that I hadn't been watching it all along, while continually finding new things to like about the show.

In fact, there were so many things I liked about Season One that I had to condense some of the together to keep this list to just ten. So, without further ado, here are my top 10 favorite things about "Glee" season one:

10. Lea Michele's Weird Hotness

At first glance, I'm not sure I would call Lea Michele "hot." She sure isn't helped by the horrid wardrobe of her character (one character on the show accurately described Rachel's style as dressing like both an old lady and a toddler at the same time). But there's just SOMETHING about her that works. Yes, a huge part of that is her voice, which is probably the best among show regulars, but she's attractive in her own weird way.

9. Emma Pillsbury's Quirks

Speaking of weird, I'm not sure there's a weirder character on the show than Emma Pillsbury (played by Jayma Mays), and on a show like "Glee", that's saying something. At first, I was convinced that her quirky behaviors, marked by her germaphobia and OCD, would grate on me, but instead they made her all the more lovable. And she looked amazing in her wedding dress (pictured above) -- I'm just happy she didn't actually go through with the wedding.

Catching Up on "Glee" Season 1

As I mentioned yesterday, I recently caught up with all of Season 1 of "Glee". Throughout the TV season last year, I generally encountered two types of people with regards to "Glee": those who'd never seen the show (and many of whom dismissed it entirely based on the premise) and those repeatedly told me how great the show was. In fact, pretty much everyone I know who HAD seen the show was more than happy to sing its praises. "Glee is great!" they'd say. "The music is GREAT! The characters are GREAT! It's a GREAT show."

Then the 2010 Emmy nominations came in and "Glee" was nominated 19 times, so by that point I really had to check out what the hype was all about. And after watching all of Season 1 of "Glee", I feel I can safely say this:

"Glee" is NOT a great show.

Desktop Girl of the Week: Dianna Agron

I just finished watching all of Season 1 of "Glee" about a week ago, so I figured I'd kick off three consecutive days of "Glee"-related posts with my first "Glee" DGOW selection, Dianna Agron. The 24-year-old from Georgia played pregnant cheerleader Quinn during Season 1, and will be back for Season 2 sans baby bump.

Agron has been acting since 2006, playing the preppy Jenny Budosh in Season 3 of "Veronica Mars" and head cheerleader Debbie Marshall in Season 2 of "Heroes". I watched both shows religiously, but I have to admit that Agron fell a little below my radar. That happens when you're on screen up against Kristen Bell and Hayden Panettiere. Also, what is it with Agron consistently getting cast as the good looking rival to the female lead? I guess maybe it's the striking good looks (at least by the end of Season 1 of "Glee", Quinn was no longer a rival for Rachel... whoops, spoiler alert, sorry...).

• Dianna Agron on IMDB
• Follow Dianna Agron on Twitter
• Dianna Agron's tumblr site

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

Brief Thoughts on This Week's "Mad Men" and "True Blood"

Even when I don't particularly enjoy an episode of "Mad Men" or "True Blood", it seems like my favorite redheads are always there to save the day.

Let's start with "True Blood", since that was the episode I actually enjoyed less. Rather than dwell on all the things I didn't like, I want to say just how much I love Jessica (played by Deborah Ann Woll). Her little wave to the werewolf before their fight (pictured above) was such an adorable moment. I really enjoyed her entire training scene with Bill, which was probably the first time I'd enjoyed anything involving Bill this entire season. She even got a nice twist at the end of the episode, when it looked like they were setting it up so that Hoyt, driving around, would end up saving her from the werewolf, but nope, our baby Jessica was handling herself just fine, thank you very much.

As for the rest of the episode, I'm getting a little tired of all the mixed allegiances, though Eric's little hidden revenge tour is actually somewhat engaging. The Crystal storyline is already boring me, but Jason manages to amuse me at least once or twice a week (he's just the right amount of naive and stupid).  My favorite non-Jessica part of the episode had to be the random appearance of Rene during Arlene's dream. I miss that crazy fake Cajun.

As for my other favorite redhead on TV, Christina Hendricks (actually a natural blonde, but we'll let that slide) was killing it on "Mad Men" again, while dealing with a very delicate subject. At the start of the episode, Joan was visiting her OB/GYN and made reference to having two "procedures" that could affect her fertility -- and she wants to make sure she's fine, since she and her husband want to have children at some point in the future. While the word "abortion" was never uttered, it's clear that's what they were talking about. I'd assume one of the "procedures", the one done by the doctor, was after her then-fiance now-husband raped her. But who was the father in the case of the other procedure? "Mad Men" has a tendency to introduce things then leave them for resolution later (take Anna Draper for example, who showed up this week for the first time since Season 2), so I don't expect this to be resolved soon, if ever, but it's a nice little mystery to keep in our back pockets.

The rest of the Joan stuff in the episode was pretty cool. I loved the interactions with Lane, and when she fired Sandy, that was just awesome. The scene with her husband stitching up her cut finger was actually kind of sweet, almost enough to make you forget what an ass this guy's been in the past (almost... but not quite). Even at the end of the episode, an episode that was very Don-heavy, Joan was the one sitting at the head of the conference table (oh, and it's nice to see that SCDP has a table now, ditching the "chairs in a circle" thing that Bertram Cooper hated so much).

Jersey Monday: LeBron James (Heat, White)

OK, so I totally didn't intend to get another LeBron James Heat jersey for awhile -- at least, not until he'd actually played a regular season game for the team -- but then I was in New York this past Saturday and I stopped in the NBA store and one thing led to another and... well, here we are.

So, what do you think of this famous news anchor Ron Burgundy?

You know what, that's fair. When it comes to my NBA fandom, I am pretty much a whore. But I promise, no more LeBron Heat jerseys until at least the regular season.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Britney Spears "Radar" Boston Video Hits 100K

Last week when I uploaded my Lilith Fair videos to YouTube, I noticed that one of my Britney Spears videos -- the "Radar" performance from last year's show in Boston -- was nearly at 100,000 views. Earlier today, it finally cracked that number, which might not seem like much, but it's pretty cool for me.

My total video views on YouTube are actually approaching the 1,000,000 mark, and would probably already be there if YouTube hadn't taken down my Buffy mash-ups. Once that happens, I'll figure out some special way to mark the occassion, but until then, just enjoy the Britney video that is easily my most viewed:

Awestruck by Creation and Destruction in New York

As you may know if you follow me on Twitter (and if you don't, why not?) I spent the day yesterday in New York City. Normally my trips to New York are for very specific reasons, but yesterday was pretty much an open day with no set plans, which gave me the opportunity to experience things I hadn't before. There were two things about the city in particular that left me awestruck.

The first was Ground Zero. Now, it's been nine years since 9/11, and I've been to New York dozens of times since then, but somehow I'd never made it to Ground Zero before. It's... well, it's hard to describe the experience of being there, especially now. There's not "nothing" there anymore, like there was a few years ago, but there's not really "something" there either, at least not in the way there used to be. Even walking away from the site, I looked up in the sky and remarked that just a decade ago, There would have been two massive buildings obscuring the view, but now you look up an actually see sky. You wouldn't think that would be a bad thing, but it is. It's as simple as that.

Later in my journey around the city, Jen and I stopped at the New York Public Library. Now, outside the building I was making jokes about "Ghostbusters" and pointing out the exact spot where Uncle Ben died in "Spider-Man", but once we were inside, it's a different story. The building itself is an architectural beauty, but that wasn't what caught my attention. The NYPL has one of the few remaining copies (though an incomplete copy) of the Gutenberg Bible.

Now, I'm not a religious person, but I could have stood there looking at that book for hours, even though it's enclosed in glass and not available for page-by-page viewing to the general public (it's also written in Latin, which means even if I could flip through it, I couldn't actually read it). This is the most important book in human history, not for its content, but for its creation process. The Gutenberg printing press brought reading to the masses -- prior to the printing press, all books were handwritten, and it took about a year to produce a single Bible -- and ushered in the start of the information age. The Gutenberg Bible represents such an important part of history, and yet somehow in all my trips to New York, I'd never taken the time to stop and see it in person.

Even without making these two stops, yesterday's trip to New York would have been worthwhile, but this elevated the trip to another level.

This Week in Buffy History: August 8-14

August 9
2001 - Connor, Jake and Trenton Tupen born (played baby Connor on “Angel”)

Futurama "That Darn Katz" Reaction

After what I thought were two of the best episodes this season, "Futurama" was probably due for a let down, and that's what happened last night. "That Darn Katz", in which super-intellegent but super-cute feline aliens attempt to harness the rotational power of the Earth, was just an average episode that had a few laughs but beat its primary joke into the ground too long (and that includes the annoying speech impediment the people under the hypnosis of the cats kept using).

I actually happen to be one of the people who thinks that cats are both adorable and evil to the core, but that's the backbone for a three-minute web short, not a 22-minute "Futurama" episode. The history of the cat planet, the arrival in Egypt and their eventual self-inflicted downfall was solid, but for the most part, the episode just elicited a "really?" from me, and probably won't be one I add to my re-watch rotation (it probably didn't help that the classic episode aired immediately after this one was "Jurassic Bark", one of the best episodes in "Futurama" history).

That said, even a mediocre "Futurama" episode isn't without its moments. Nibbler using his real voice is always a plus (but even that seemed a little overused in this episode) and any appearance by Bubblegum Tate is good for some laughs.

Part of me feels like the "Futurama" writing staff was challenging itself with this one, to see if an episode featuring Amy and Nibbler as the main protagonists could succeed. Well, if that was the case, then the answer is no. Besides, we already had an Amy-centric episode this season, and she's best when used sparingly. Given the Earth-shattering implications of the plot (the cats stopping the rotation of the Earth to restart the rotation of their home planet), couldn't Zapp Brannigan have been involved?

OK, on to this week's top five lines (as always, in chronological order in the episode):

Leela: If you wanna be treated like a fellow crewmember, fine! But no more purse rides, and no more dressing you up in your cute little sailor suit.
Nibbler: I keep telling you, that's my real Naval uniform!

Professor Katz: Enough! The committee members will now vote yay or nay. Nay.
Dr. Wernstrom: Nay.
Bubblegum Tate: Hell nay!
Professor Fisher Price Speak-N-Spin: The horse says, 'Doctorate denied'.

Amy: Professor Katz's last name is "Katz". Do you think he has something to do with these cats?
Nibbler: The conclusion is as inescapable as it is moronic.

Cat: At last, they located a planet with the necessary orientation and magnetic field to harness its rotational energy.
Nibbler: Earth!
Cat: Indubitably. Although we call it "Blue Blue Shiny Ball".

Nibbler: Even so, you'd still need a tremendously powerful static charge to trigger the process.
Cat: Ever had a cat rub up against you?
Nibbler: If you're propositioning me, I'm not interested!

Dear Joss Whedon, Please Don't Kill Dawn Summers

So a couple days ago, the solicitations for Buffy #38 hit the web, and once again Buffy fandom was buzzing over a possible spoiler. The Jo Chen cover for this issue features Xander carrying what appears to be Dawn's dead body, and the solicitation text for the issue reads as follows:

While Super Buffy is fighting side by side with Spike in Sunnydale, Angel is on the other side of world fighting demons of his own. As Twilight he was given a clear mission in regard to Buffy-help her reach the next plane, together create a new world, and end all suffering. But Buffy doesn't play by the rules, and this "higher plane" and a lifetime of happiness with Angel wasn't gonna cut it-not if she had to sacrifice her family to keep it. And now Angel has to answer for his failings as Twilight-willingly or not.

Back in Sunnydale everyone is fighting for their lives against a horde of demons, and someone close to Buffy joins forces with a villain from the past to strive for a common goal-protect the seed.

OK, the whole "not if [Buffy] had to sacrifice her family to keep it" line makes me a little more optimistic, but it's hard to look at that cover and come to any conclusion other than Dawn not being long for this world. In fact, in each of the last three seasons of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", a major character has died: Joyce in Season 5, Tara in Season 6 and Anya (among many other minor characters) in Season 7.

Beyond "Buffy", Joss Whedon has regularly killed off characters as seasons or series have come to an end. Season 4 of "Angel" featured the terminal coma of Cordelia, and in the series finale a year later, Wesley was killed (just weeks after Fred had been killed and inhabited by Illyria). "Firefly" didn't get a true finale, so Joss upped the ante by killing off both Book and Wash in the "Serenity" movie. And in the last two weeks of "Dollhouse", both Mellie/November/Madeline and Paul bit the dust.

However, it's the Anya death that sticks out in my mind, because of something I wrote back in my review of Buffy #28 (and now, for an AdamReisinger.com rarity, I'm going to block quote myself):

Also, from a creative history standpoint, every single love interest of Xander’s has either turned evil or died, and in many cases it’s been both of them. I don’t want to see an evil Dawn. I don’t want to see a dead Dawn.

Don't believe me about the Xander Love Interest Corollary? Well, let's go all the way back to Season 1 and work our way to the present:

- Ms. French ("Teacher's Pet") - always evil
- Buffy Summers (asked out in "Prophecy Girl") - died IN THAT SAME EPISODE!
- Cordelia Chase (Seasons 2-3) - impaled, then evil (on "Angel"), then tragically dead
- Willow Rosenberg ("Lover's Walk") - evil (now reformed, but probably evil again in the future, then dead by Buffy's hand... whoops, spoiler alert for those who haven't been reading the comic)
- Faith ("The Zeppo") - went all murdery, got evil, got better
- Anya (Seasons 3-7) - was evil, then evil again, then tragically dead
- Joyce Summers (dream sequence in "Restless") - tragically dead
- Tara Maclay (another dream sequence in "Restless") - really tragically dead
- Nancy ("Beneath You") - neither dead nor evil, though nearly both thanks to a re-demonized Anya
- Lissa ("First Date") - always evil
- Renée (Season 8 comics) - tragically dead

Xander is to women what the "Madden" cover is to NFL players. And as I said in that review, I don't want to see a dead Dawn, but given Joss's love of killing characters and Xander's death touch, Dawn's screwed.

But, let's be honest, haven't we screwed with Dawn enough already? She was the key, then she was a klepto, then she was a potential but not really, then a giant (who had to battle a robot version of herself), then a centaur, then a doll... I mean, can't we just leave Dawn alone (note: I may be the only person who feels this way)? And Xander, poor Xander, can he just fall in love ONCE without having it end in tragedy?

So I ask you Joss, please let this rumor be false. Leave Dawn alone. I'm over my initial objection to their relationship and now hope they get to live happily ever after and die surrounded by fat grandchildren. Or, ya know, at least get to make it to Season 9 as a couple. And if you still feel like you need to kill someone at the end of this season, fine. Kill... Riley, I guess. Or Andrew. Or, hell, kill Satsu (Buffy warned her!). Just please, leave Dawn alone.

Shaquille O'Neal: The Big Journeyman

It was a little over a year ago that I was so excited about Shaquille O'Neal, one of the best players in NBA history, joining my favorite team and teaming up with LeBron James in an attempt to bring a title to Cleveland. Oh, how things went so wrong.

Now Shaq is signing with the Celtics, taking a 93% paycut in the process, hoping for one last shot at getting that elusive 5th ring.

When Shaq signed with the Celtics, there was immediately speculation on what his new nickname would be, because that's what we do with Shaq. Some suggestions included The Big Shamrock, The Big Leprechaun, The Big Dig and other variations on "The Big [noun]". Well, I've got one for you:

The Big Journeyman.

Actually, let's take out the "big" and just say it like it is: Shaquille O'Neal, who once famously and accurately proclaimed himself the "M.D.E." (most dominant ever), is now a journeyman. Boston will be his sixth NBA stop, and third in the last three seasons.

It's not unheard of for this to happen, even among players of Shaq's caliber. For example, only 15 players in NBA history have scored at least 25,000 points (Shaq being one of them). Among those 15, only three have played for three different teams in a three year span. Alex English did it early in his career, before blossoming. Dominique Wilkins did it in a two-year span, when he was traded from the Hawks to the Clippers, then signed with the Celtics as a free agent. And Moses Malone did it at the end of his storied career. Shaq is probably most similar to Malone, a former MVP and champion who kept hanging on well past his prime, but actually provided solid numbers in limited action right up until his final season (his PER didn't dip below league average until '94-95, when he was 39 years old and played just 11 games for the Spurs).

The Celtics have their own experience with this, though from the other side. Celtics legend Robert Parish, who like O'Neal was among the NBA's 50 greatest players, ended his career with a two-year stint with the then-Charlotte Hornets, followed by a year playing as the third string center behind Luc Longley and Bill Wennington with the champion Chicago Bulls. And based on advanced metrics, O'Neal is actually declining faster than Parish, who was still an above-league average player in his Age 40 season.

I mentioned the 25,000-point club above, and Parish falls just outside of it (23,334 pts, 19th all-time). Also just outside the club are Patrick Ewing (24,815 pts, 16th all-time) and Allen Iverson (24,368 pts, 17th all-time), both of whom also had Shaq-like ends to their careers (assuming Iverson's career is actually over, which it appears to be). Ewing finished his career in Orlando wearing #6 and backing up a collection of centers including Steven Hunter, Pat Garrity and Andrew DeClercq, while Iverson bounced from the Nuggets to the Pistons to the Grizzlies to the 76ers in the span of 13 months.

It's interesting to note that for a period spanning the late '90s and early '00s, Shaq and Iverson were the two biggest stars in the NBA, meeting in the 2001 NBA Finals and battling for scoring titles, and now they're both in the washed-up twilight of their respective careers. God that makes me feel old.

Now, I'm not saying Shaq will be remembered long-term as a journeyman, not in the way that fellow No. 1 overall pick Joe Smith will be. But simply put, that's what he is right now (it's also worth noting that journeyman isn't entirely a bad label, because it does indicate that year after year there's at least one team out there that wants you -- hell, Allen Iverson would kill to tack on to his journeyman rep at this point). And as a journeyman, Shaq has lost another luxury afforded superstars: the ability to wear his preferred jersey number.

We went through all this last year when Shaq got traded to Cleveland, but a little refresher: back in high school and college, Shaq wore 33, started his NBA career wearing 32 in Orlando, was forced to switch to 34 in LA, then went back to 32 for his stops in Miami and Phoenix, before switching to 33 for the first time as a pro in Cleveland (though it turned out he could have simply waited six weeks for Joe Smith to officially leave the Cavs and kept 32). But 32 and 33 are both retired in Boston, and 34 belongs to Paul Pierce. 23 (the reverse of 32) is retired too, as are 31 and 35. So, according to the Celtics roster, Shaq will wear number 36. That's not the number of legends. That's the number of Shawnelle Scott, Etan Thomas, Royal Ivey and Igor Rakocevic (four of the 13 players in NBA history who've worn 36). Only one Hall of Famer has ever worn 36, and that was Dave Cowens in his ill-fated 1982-83 comeback with the Bucks. At least Shaq will be able to claim that he's the best Celtic ever to wear number 36. Of course, he's also the first.

Amazing Spider-Man #639 Review: One Moment in Time, Part 2

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome.

I don't know exactly who said or wrote that (and the Internet seems to be split on the attribution as well, so don't bother telling me to Google it), but it is definitely appropriate here.

The second part of the "One Moment In Time" series picked up right where the first part ended, with Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson sitting in Peter's apartment, recalling the story of how they failed to get married. But rather than supplementing the subtle changes from the last issue, this issue forges ahead like an out of control train, stuck on the "sure, it makes no sense, but just go with it" tracks.

We learn that once Peter and MJ finally connected after Peter missed their wedding (due to the actions of a criminal, a story that wasn't resolved at all in this issue), MJ decided she couldn't marry Peter unless he stopped being Spider-Man, so she left. This sent her into a funk, and Peter into a complete depression where he was only leaving his apartment to be Spider-Man. Eventually MJ decided to go back and talk to him more to explain that she still LOVED him, she just couldn't MARRY him, because the only reason she would get married would be to have a child, and she couldn't see bringing a child into the dangerous life of Spider-Man.

On the one hand, this did at least give Joe Quesada a chance to bring in the whole "child you'll never have" loose end from "One More Day", but on the other hand, he introduces Mary Jane's belief that having a child with Spider-Man would be akin to having a child with an abusive parent (which her father was). Just to prove I'm not making this up, here are the panels in question:

Umm... what?!

I need to move beyond that logic, because it's just... well, I refer you to the quote at the start of this review.

OK, so once they agree to the no child/no wedding thing, they decide they're going to stay together, just not be married, which prompts present day Peter to ask "so where did it all go wrong". That leads into the unmasking from the "Civil War" storyline.

Look, we all knew this was coming. Sure, it would have been easier to re-write the post-OMD continuity so that Peter never unmasked himself, but the creative forces at Marvel had always said that wasn't the case, at one point explaining that the world had known Peter Parker was Spider-Man, but just "forgot" (and I'd assume the mystery behind how that happened will be explained in the next issue). But it's still frustrating to see it here. Again, to not make this totally negative, Peter does at least couch his criticism of his own unmasking by saying it was the worst mistake he made "outside of what happened to Gwen". If he hadn't added that qualifier, I absolutely would have stopped reading ASM right there.