Ho boy.
First off, spoilers spoilers. Season 3 has been out for nearly a month now, so I figure if you were dying to find out what happened you would know by now.
Okay, so, when we left off in season 2 (apparently, because I had to catch up via Wikipedia), Frank Underwood had just been made president and henchman Doug Stamper had been beaten to death by former prostitute/born again Christian/budding lesbian Rachel Posner. Posner, the only person left aside from Frank and Doug who have any knowledge of the murder of Peter Russo, has disappeared.
So the first revelation of Season 3: Doug Stamper isn't dead. Someone finds him in the woods, he gets sent to the hospital, and he is brought back to life. It takes 6 months for him to sort of get back on his feet, with the aid of a cane.
And when he hobbles back to Washington? He finds that he has been shut out of the Underwood whitehouse, mostly by his ambitious press secretary Seth Grayson. Former lobbyist Remy Danton, instrumental in orchestrating the downfall of the absent Raymond Tusk, is now the chief of staff. He starts drinking again a little bit (so much for 15 years sober) and hunting for Rachel Posner with the help of a former hacker employed by the FBI who helped take down Zoe Barns love interest. Perhaps he hopes to find her, kill her, and prove his loyalty to Underwood. It is the only thing Underwood seems him to want to do. I fear that when he does find her and kill her, Underwood will do away with the last loose end; Doug Stamper himself.
Okay, so that takes care of that. Frank Underwood, it turns out, is a lousy president. His approval ratinngs are low, he has some sort of ridiculous America Works program which will slash entitelments to give people jobs somehow....He has also made his wife the US secretary to the UN, on a recess appointment.
Episode 3 is a bizarre dinner with the Russian President, who sort of looks like Putin but has some other name. Frank Underwood sings a song to the delight of all present afterwards, and it is the one time he looks human.
Did I mention that at the opening of the season he is seen pissing on his father's grave? No? Hmmmm.
The problem, I realize, is that now that Frank is President he can't be diabolical anymore. He can't really have his opponents killed. He is under more scrutiny than ever before. He has to be mindful of the political climate. He has to dole out patronage and watch his back for challenges like any other president does. He is angling for re-election, and he is lying and cheating all the way, but in today's political climate that doesn't really seem too much different from a normal politician, or only a few degrees worse than the obstructionist whiners who sit in the halls of power today.
It's like watching the West Wing where the falliable but likable president Bartlett has been replaced by a twisted, evil machine who has no redeeming values. And it's hard to enjoy.
It makes me question my initial buy into the new "House of Cards" franchise. But here we are on a collision course with Russia, and a re-election campaign that Frank has already said he won't participate in even though, somehow, we know he will.
Well, onto Season 4. Will it get any better? Will it make any more sense? I have my hopes, but I also have my doubts.
Saturday, March 28, 2015
Books You May Not Like: "Matterhorn" by Karl Marlantes
As such, I am not even really sure what to say about this book. Nothing I could say could really do it justice. I don't know if this book will become the classic the dust jacket says that it is destined to be, though I thought it was excellent and when it came in 2010 it won a host of awards and notoriety. But for my money (and there is none really at stake, because I checked it out from the library), this is the best, most authentic novel centering on the experience of war that I have ever read, barring perhaps All Quiet on the Western Front.
It is the story of Marine Lt. Mellas, who is based at least to a certain extent on Marlantes himself. Marlantes can be seen in the History Channel documentary "Vietnam in HD"...which is kind of a dumb name for such a good miniseries...describing an assault on a hill just south of the DMZ, during which he earned a Navy Cross. In the documentary he describes elements of the battle that make it into the book.
Anyways, Lt. Mellas finds himself in charge of a platoon of Marines from Bravo Company, 1st Batallion, 24th Marine Regiment. The company CO is buckling under pressure, the Batallion commander is a colonel with a drinking problem hungry for glory and his general's stars, and the war they fight together is not one based on territory but on body counts and politics.
It does have all the elements of your usual Vietnam narrative: the meaninglessness, the numbered hills taken and abandoned only to be taken again, the drugs and alcohol and steaks in the rear, the hope of nights with bar girls in the paradise of Okinawa.
But the book is laced with details that ring with authenticity and deep emotion; making coffee with pieces of C-4, the fear of attack at night, leaches dropping from the trees, jungle rot eating away at flesh, the eerie beauty of NVA traces arcing through the night from an adjacent ridge, jungle utilities that hang in rags off of starving, tired bodies, racial tensions threatening to tear the platoon apart.
I am grateful that Marlantes has written such a powerful novel, and shared his experiences with the world. If war can only be understood by those who have experienced it, then I think that the many of us who live our lives in peace should try to stare into the tragedy of war with all of its complexity, so that we might not joyfully send of our best and brightest to die. Reading books like this would help us to consider better the truths of war in the future, and we'd all be better for it.
Monday, March 23, 2015
In Which Ted Cruz Runs for President and I get a Twitter Account
So I heard this afternoon that Ted Cruz officially declared that he was running for President today at a speech at Liberty University. I find it kind of odd that a man made it known he wanted to become the leader of the free world to a crowd of people required to be at a thrice weekly convocation---
But no. No no no. It won't do to sling barbs and arrows at Ted Cruz or those things that are associated with him. There is such a long way to go before now and the elections, I just couldn't possibly start to even begin to think about the long, long road that is before us.
And so I started to think about the end, and the end of Ted Cruz's road, where he is giving the speech where he drops out of the race about a year from now, and people are yelling "NO!" and "We love you Ted Cruz!" and I am rubbing my hands with shameful joy.
For some reason, as I thought of this moment, I thought it might be fun to keep a diary of the Ted Cruz Mystery Tour, to just kind of keep track of where he is day by day, see how many miles he logs, see what little real American towns he goes to, see how many corn dogs he eats.
It's an exciting exercise to me, because I actually enjoy thinking about just the epic struggle that running for the Presidency is. It's fascinating. All the travel, the hotels, the bland chicken in cold conference centers.
And good God man, the temptation! I mean, you can't drink whiskey because you'd be seen to be intemperate, and if you can drink beer (provided it doesn't clash with your squeaky clean image) you can't drink the good beer from Germany because people will only vote for a Bud Light kind of guy. But you are a Doffelschlanger kind of guy, brewed in Bergen-Op-Zoom by buxom European Ladies and yeah, they don't shave their pits and they don't really bathe as often as they maybe should but that is honestly kind of a turn on for you. But you can't tell anyone that. Okay, you told your campaign manager and he said "SHHHHH! you dumb son of a bitch stop talking! You like Bud Light! You like cleanly shaven armpits that smell like soap! You like Corn Dogs and Football! You don't spend Saturday riveted by Bourssia Monchengladbach fighting their way to a nil nil draw against Bayern Leverkusen! You spend it watching American football and praying to Jesus to ask Him help you figure out what the hell you are going to pray about the next day in Church! That is what you do! That is who you are!"
It's clear that to lead the free world, you must kill the self in an epic, year long quest. And I find it fascinating. And just once I really want to follow along with someone on their epic, Quixotic, hopeless quest.
All this effort is all for naught, at least for Cruz, because in the end the road leads to a ball room crammed with people saying "NO!" as he talks about how important it is to reunite the party after his crushing defeat in....South Carolina. Yeah.
The idea really took hold of me, and it wouldn't let go. So I decided to do it. And what better way to keep track of Mr. Cruz than to follow him on Twitter?
So I got me a Twitter account, for the first time (follow me @wasso2005). Ted Cruz was the second person I followed (after Jimmy Fallon but before my wife), so hopefully I can stay pretty up to date on his whereabouts.
I will be checking in on Cruz daily, and keeping a brief log of his events. Every now and then I will let you know how he is doing. My honest hope is that he doesn't do too well....The running price for my vote is a dozen fresh Krispy Kremes, but I think in his case I would have to up that price significantly to....two dozen fresh Krispy Kremes.
But no. No no no. It won't do to sling barbs and arrows at Ted Cruz or those things that are associated with him. There is such a long way to go before now and the elections, I just couldn't possibly start to even begin to think about the long, long road that is before us.
And so I started to think about the end, and the end of Ted Cruz's road, where he is giving the speech where he drops out of the race about a year from now, and people are yelling "NO!" and "We love you Ted Cruz!" and I am rubbing my hands with shameful joy.
For some reason, as I thought of this moment, I thought it might be fun to keep a diary of the Ted Cruz Mystery Tour, to just kind of keep track of where he is day by day, see how many miles he logs, see what little real American towns he goes to, see how many corn dogs he eats.
It's an exciting exercise to me, because I actually enjoy thinking about just the epic struggle that running for the Presidency is. It's fascinating. All the travel, the hotels, the bland chicken in cold conference centers.
And good God man, the temptation! I mean, you can't drink whiskey because you'd be seen to be intemperate, and if you can drink beer (provided it doesn't clash with your squeaky clean image) you can't drink the good beer from Germany because people will only vote for a Bud Light kind of guy. But you are a Doffelschlanger kind of guy, brewed in Bergen-Op-Zoom by buxom European Ladies and yeah, they don't shave their pits and they don't really bathe as often as they maybe should but that is honestly kind of a turn on for you. But you can't tell anyone that. Okay, you told your campaign manager and he said "SHHHHH! you dumb son of a bitch stop talking! You like Bud Light! You like cleanly shaven armpits that smell like soap! You like Corn Dogs and Football! You don't spend Saturday riveted by Bourssia Monchengladbach fighting their way to a nil nil draw against Bayern Leverkusen! You spend it watching American football and praying to Jesus to ask Him help you figure out what the hell you are going to pray about the next day in Church! That is what you do! That is who you are!"
It's clear that to lead the free world, you must kill the self in an epic, year long quest. And I find it fascinating. And just once I really want to follow along with someone on their epic, Quixotic, hopeless quest.
All this effort is all for naught, at least for Cruz, because in the end the road leads to a ball room crammed with people saying "NO!" as he talks about how important it is to reunite the party after his crushing defeat in....South Carolina. Yeah.
The idea really took hold of me, and it wouldn't let go. So I decided to do it. And what better way to keep track of Mr. Cruz than to follow him on Twitter?
So I got me a Twitter account, for the first time (follow me @wasso2005). Ted Cruz was the second person I followed (after Jimmy Fallon but before my wife), so hopefully I can stay pretty up to date on his whereabouts.
I will be checking in on Cruz daily, and keeping a brief log of his events. Every now and then I will let you know how he is doing. My honest hope is that he doesn't do too well....The running price for my vote is a dozen fresh Krispy Kremes, but I think in his case I would have to up that price significantly to....two dozen fresh Krispy Kremes.
The Restraining of Mario Balotelli
This is just a great picture:
This picture was taken shortly after an incident between Liverpool's star crossed striker Mario Balotelli and Manchester United's Chris Smalling. During a challenge Smalling sort of pushed Balotelli into the advertising boards ringing the pitch. Balotelli then held onto Smalling's foot as he tried to walk away and Smalling, knowing that Super Mario was already on one yellow card yet clearly losing his head, said something to Balotelli concerning his mother or his country of origin or the fact that his banana bread was still bland and leathery.
The fans know Mr. Balotelli all too well, and upon hearing the insult took it upon themselves to keep Balotelli from lashing out again at Smalling, possibly earning himself a second yellow and an ejection to boot. Balotelli actually thanked fans on his facebook page for keeping him back.
I love this picture because it just captures a huge range of human emotion. There is the childish anger, white hot rage, jaw dropping shock, thoughtful disdain, drunken indifference, eager anticipation, and then there is that poor old lady in the front row, covering her hat lest it be blown off in the vitriolic wind. It's a fantastic shot.
And incredibly, in the middle of it all, is just sheer absurdity. A man in a Superman shirt wearing some kind of floppy hat who can merely shake his finger in self righteous indignation at the insulting Smalling, a kid who looks, honestly, flat out drunk to me. Not "War Machine" drunk, but pretty well stoned. And above him is a tired man who kind of reminds me of a disapproving Kermit the Frog.
Classic. Just a classic. Well done Paul Ellis. Well done.
 |
| An Angry Mario Balotelli is restrained by fans after an altercation on the pitch with Manchester United's Chris Smalling. Picture Credit: Paul Ellis / AFP / Getty Images |
The fans know Mr. Balotelli all too well, and upon hearing the insult took it upon themselves to keep Balotelli from lashing out again at Smalling, possibly earning himself a second yellow and an ejection to boot. Balotelli actually thanked fans on his facebook page for keeping him back.
I love this picture because it just captures a huge range of human emotion. There is the childish anger, white hot rage, jaw dropping shock, thoughtful disdain, drunken indifference, eager anticipation, and then there is that poor old lady in the front row, covering her hat lest it be blown off in the vitriolic wind. It's a fantastic shot.
And incredibly, in the middle of it all, is just sheer absurdity. A man in a Superman shirt wearing some kind of floppy hat who can merely shake his finger in self righteous indignation at the insulting Smalling, a kid who looks, honestly, flat out drunk to me. Not "War Machine" drunk, but pretty well stoned. And above him is a tired man who kind of reminds me of a disapproving Kermit the Frog.
Classic. Just a classic. Well done Paul Ellis. Well done.
Sunday, March 22, 2015
In Which Nick Watches House of Cards -- Prelude
So I was pretty excited when Netflix finally released the third season of House of Cards. So excited in fact that in typical Nick Marickovich fashion I decided that the only way to do the event justice was to watch the previous two seasons before diving into the final installment (or the latest installment...).
I think the first time I did this was with the Harry Potter books, and I remember doing it when the last book came out. Part of it was that they were so good they seemed worth reading a second or third time - the other part of it was that I honestly could not remember everything that happened in books one through six (I had forgotten, for example, that Sirius Black had met his maker in book number five).
I've repeated this maddness with Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and the Twilight movies (though that was really more about wanting to see Taylor Lautners perfect pectorals again...they are so beautiful, sometimes my soul simply cannot handle it, and I am moved to tears). So it seemed natural that I would do so with House of Cards.
And now I am asking myself why, God? Why?
Look, the first season is really pretty good. It was worth watching again. We get to meet the Underwoods and see how fucked up they are, how Frank and Claire really only seem to care about power (and yet in an odd way about each other as well). The Peter Russo story arch is fascinating and sad.
And what's more all the moves make sense. It's implausible and improbable that it would have all actually worked, but you can see how B follows A and allows for C to happen.
But the second season? Its kind of shitty. I've heard it said in other places and I would have to agree that the Frank Underwood of Season Two is more a cartoon character than anything else, a Yosemite Sam bonking people on the head throughout the greater Washington DC Metro area. And the moves just don't make sense. Samarium? Something about a bridge? I get the cover-up aspects of the story, the whole thing with Lucas Goodwin, but what fuels the fight between Raymond Tusk and Vice President Underwood is something I have a hard time grasping. It's almost like the viewer is supposed to accept that its there, and with every episode another layer, another implausible double or triple cross, gets added. It's maddness.
So, all 20 of you (yes, I think my readership has probably jumped from 12 to 20. I'm on my way!), allow me the liberty of catching up with the second half of season two on Wikipedia and then diving into the third season. I hope they at least decide to go all in on the cartoon aspect of the show or return to something more serious and realistic, rather than trying to bridge a gap between the two. But with Frank Underwood at the reigns of our Happy Republic, I have little hope that anything good will come of it.
I think the first time I did this was with the Harry Potter books, and I remember doing it when the last book came out. Part of it was that they were so good they seemed worth reading a second or third time - the other part of it was that I honestly could not remember everything that happened in books one through six (I had forgotten, for example, that Sirius Black had met his maker in book number five).
I've repeated this maddness with Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and the Twilight movies (though that was really more about wanting to see Taylor Lautners perfect pectorals again...they are so beautiful, sometimes my soul simply cannot handle it, and I am moved to tears). So it seemed natural that I would do so with House of Cards.
And now I am asking myself why, God? Why?
Look, the first season is really pretty good. It was worth watching again. We get to meet the Underwoods and see how fucked up they are, how Frank and Claire really only seem to care about power (and yet in an odd way about each other as well). The Peter Russo story arch is fascinating and sad.
And what's more all the moves make sense. It's implausible and improbable that it would have all actually worked, but you can see how B follows A and allows for C to happen.
But the second season? Its kind of shitty. I've heard it said in other places and I would have to agree that the Frank Underwood of Season Two is more a cartoon character than anything else, a Yosemite Sam bonking people on the head throughout the greater Washington DC Metro area. And the moves just don't make sense. Samarium? Something about a bridge? I get the cover-up aspects of the story, the whole thing with Lucas Goodwin, but what fuels the fight between Raymond Tusk and Vice President Underwood is something I have a hard time grasping. It's almost like the viewer is supposed to accept that its there, and with every episode another layer, another implausible double or triple cross, gets added. It's maddness.
So, all 20 of you (yes, I think my readership has probably jumped from 12 to 20. I'm on my way!), allow me the liberty of catching up with the second half of season two on Wikipedia and then diving into the third season. I hope they at least decide to go all in on the cartoon aspect of the show or return to something more serious and realistic, rather than trying to bridge a gap between the two. But with Frank Underwood at the reigns of our Happy Republic, I have little hope that anything good will come of it.
Sunday, March 15, 2015
In Which I Read McCarthy's "No Country for Old Men", watch "Birdman", and Find Myself Wanting to Write Endless Swear Words
So here we have two items that are no doubt very "good", but not at all very fun.
First, Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men. I had already seen the movie twice; I saw it when it came out in theaters and then again on the plane home from a trip to Germany in 2008. Why they decided to show it on the plane home, in its full un-edited form with all the blood and guts and all I have no idea. But they did. And I enjoyed as much the 2nd time as I did the first, though it left me just as bewildered. Anton Chigurh as played by Javier Bardem ranks high on my list of best villians -- number one, in case you were wondering, would have to be Jason Isaacs portrayal of British Colonel Tavington, the only thing in my opinion that still makes The Patriot worth a watch.
So the book lacked a bit of suspense because I knew how it all would end up going down. That being said I thought it was very good, but like the movie it sort of had an odd ending. Anton Chigurh just slips away after the car crash. The one thing that is different is that there is much more of the sheriff's thoughts in the book, which explains the sololiloquy that ends the movie and left us all scratching our heads. So THAT makes sense, now, at least. I do have a hard time figuring out what exactly McCarthy is getting at. Is Chigurh a symbol for the evil of drugs and violence and relative morality that American has let out of the bag? Whatever Chigurh is, McCarthy does at least seem to think that America is kind of a messed up place. His writing style (pretty much sans punctuation) is also interesting but maybe too direct for my taste. I'd be interested to read more McCarthy, as long as all of his books aren't written the same way.
Second - Birdman. Won a bunch of Academy Awards, you got everyone saying how awesome everyone is in it, etc. etc., yeah yeah yeah. It's on Amazon Prime as a rental so I figure "eh, what the heck," and I download it, watch it, and....
Okay, honestly, what this movie made me want to do was get on my computer and write a string of swear words, plain and simple. "Fuck fuck shit fuck" or "damn damn double damn damn damn damn damn!" I'm not sure why....I guess it's because maybe I didn't like it.
But it's hard for me to say that, because it seems like this is a movie I SHOULD like. It's artsy. Its bold. It's unsettling. It has some deeper meaning that I can't quite figure out. I'm not sure but I think the movie is picking on Hollywood's propensity to just trot out a bunch of handsome dudes in capes flanked by explosions and a big breasted love interest, which is something I think deserves to be picked at. It's apparently filled with brilliant performances. The people at the Academy are daring me not to like this film, because if I was like them I would "get it".
But I didn't like it. It wasn't fun to watch. I didn't enjoy it. Which makes me wonder about the nexus of art and entertainment, and how movies fall into that. Does art have to be entertaining?
The answer clearly is no. Dostoevsky's The Brother's Karamozov isn't exactly fun to read...but its a great work of literature, and it's deeply interesting if at the same time difficult. I wouldn't consider it entertainment, but there is a lot to grab hold of in the book and you can come away with a lot of meaning (and in some parts, surprisingly enough, it can actually be something of a page turner). It may not be the author's intended meaning, but it at least means something to me.
But in Birdman? I can't really make heads or tails of it. It's so abstract, so oddly disconnected even though it's edited to look like it was all made in one shot, so full of smart little snippets that don't seem to add up to anything at all.
So, if that is a "smart" movie, well, I'll reckon I'll take my gravy and my grits and go watch a man fly around in capes, hitting space aliens on the nose while his big breasted love interest zooms around on a motor cycle dodging explosions and Nazi Zombies. It may be dumb, but at least it's something I can understand.
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