Klaatu Barada Stinko

In the poetic justice department:

On my last Friday at work, Santa gives a sci-fi fan the best present ever: The remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still has jumped the snark.

Klaatu barada stinko

If you’re looking for chuckles this holiday season, bypass the miserably unfunny “Four Christmases” and go where the real comedy is — “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” a clumsy, moronic remake of Robert Wise’s brilliant 1951 classic about an alien invader trying to save the human race from its own self-destructive impulses.

What did poor Wise do, incidentally, to deserve such treatment? His chilling horror masterpiece “The Haunting” was already put through the meat-grinder with an effects-heavy 1999 remake, and his thriller “The Andromeda Strain” was revisited with ill results in a SciFi Channel re-do earlier this year. What next — a hip-hop reinterpretation of “The Sound of Music”? (Granted, Queen Latifah could totally tear up “Climb Ev’ry Mountain,” but still…)

The new “Day” can’t be bothered to include the thought-provoking dialogue of the original, choosing instead to bury the audience with special effects that are visually impressive but no substitute for an actual script. And what words do remain are so exquisitely awful that they provide some of the season’s biggest laughs.

My personal favorite? Astro-biologist Helen Benson (Jennifer Connelly) takes alien Klaatu (Keanu Reeves) to see a Nobel Prize–winning scientist and notes that her colleague was honored “for his work in biological altruism.” What would that entail, exactly? Helping frogs cross the street? [guffaws mine]

Yes, Hollywood, that is an excellent question—what did Robert Wise ever do to you? Why do you keep picking on his work? He’s one of my favorite directors of all time! Hands off of West Side Story! You just keep your grubby little committee red-tape we-gotta-update-it-for-the-youngsters, Far And Away-will-be-a-hit paws off of The Hindenburg and Blood on the Moon and Run Silent, Run Deep!

If you’re going to remake his films, why don’t you pick on his least admirable Star Trek: The Motionless Picture*?

Try this on for size: Star Trek: The Emo[tion] Picture

Kirk: George, I mean, Sulu, I wish you’d shut up about being gay. Just shut up about being gay, all right? For five seconds?
Sulu: Even if I’m referring to your jacket? Oh, excuse me—robe.
Kirk: Jacket.
Sulu: Robe, captain. [Said so that it sounds like “Rogue captain.”] The belt is tied around your waist.
Kirk: That the particular cut of this jacket. It suits me better.
Sulu: Better get a bucket before you throw up!
Kirk: George, I’m just sick and tired of hearing about your sexuality all the time!
Sulu: Ohhhhh. You know what, Bill? It’s called having fans. Because I’m not the one [Kirk: That’s what I’m talking about! …Oh—hey, I have fans, too!] talking about my sexuality. They talk about my sexuality. I can help it if they talk about my sexuality. I don’t talk about my sexuality at all.
Kirk: Yes, and you don’t talk to me at all! You didn’t even invite me to your wedding. We [Sulu: I sent you that fucking invitation via FED EX! What, can’t see the ground over your beer-gut robe?] don’t communicate anymore! What do you have against me? Why don’t we talk anymore?
Sulu [giving up]: You don’t send me flowers, Randy Sally. [aside] He has fans, too.
Kirk: Because you didn’t invite me to your wedding!

Heh. I envision some spectacular special effects coming up after that.

*credit to Lenny Flank for the pun.

In Memoriam: Arthur C. Clarke

My favorite science fiction writer has just died.

He has stipulated that a secular funeral be held at his home in Sri Lanka.

He was a far-seer and while the veracity of his predictions enjoy a mixed success, I will always remember him for being the first science fiction writer I read.

My favorites:
"Trouble with the Natives"

"The Wind from the Sun" (the short story; also a book of collected short stories)

"Reunion"

"The Food of the Gods"

and many others, including, of course, the story and the screenplay 2001: A Space Odyssey. I shall miss him. Eulogy at The Marquee Blog.

Star Wars: A New Pope

A parody that made a Christian laugh and an atheist snigger guiltily, "Am I a bad person if I find this funny?"



Gee, imagine. Art and humor uniting people (if even momentarily). Can we risk that?

I'm gonna send fellow librarian Claw of the Conciliator some shimmies and check out his sci-fi posts. I mean, he liked Donnie Darko.

All that Glisters is So Hawt!

"Space 1999." Good music, first season; okay music, second season. Silly premise. (Even sillier premise, second season.)

Laughable plot. (Even more laughable plot, second season.)

Inability to make audience (even the twelve-year-old audience that I was) suspend disbelief.

Dissed for its scientific absurdity by Asimov and Ellison.

Sniggered at for its English accents mouthing plodding dialogue from American writers.

New Agey "introspective" psychobabble, first season.

Goofy monsters, second season. (I'm talking about the thing in a costume, not the actors mouthing lines worthy of amateur re-dubbing.)




A script even the lead actor finally threw against the wall in disgust.*

Hawt lead actor.

Nostalgia - I has it.

*From Wikipedia: Members of the Space: 1999 cast became disenchanted with the scripts. Martin Landau: "They changed it because a bunch of American minds got into the act and they decided to do many things they felt were commercial. Fred Freiberger helped in some respects, but, overall, I don't think he helped the show, I think he brought a much more ordinary, mundane approach to the series." (Starlog 108 1986, pp. 44-47). Under the pseudonym of Charles Woodgrove, Fred Freiberger wrote three episodes, The Rules of Luton, The Beta Cloud and Space Warp, known pejoratively as the "Woodgrove Trilogy" for its simplistic approach to storytelling. One particular episode (All That Glisters, which dealt with the threat of an intelligent rock) was of such allegedly deficient quality that it sparked a confrontation between Freiberger and the cast. Landau disliked the story so strongly that he wrote the following notes on his copy of the script: "All the credibility we're building up is totally forsaken in this script!"; "...Story is told poorly!"; and "The character of Koenig takes a terrible beating in this script — We're all shmucks!"

Martin, you were a hawt shmuck.

The Food of the Gods

Various ambrosia to sip:

(I say ambrosia, because we don't want to upset the tummies of Mr. Chairman and Senator Irving.*)

December 16 is Arthur C. Clarke's birthday. You can go here to send him birthday wishes.

It's also Ludwig van Beethoven's birthday.

Biologist Ken Miller gives an explanation of the significance of the recently-published Chimpanzee genome here:



And PZ explains it here. (Warning: Casey Luskin aftertaste.)

Shimmies to Pharyngula and, of course, Ken, Ludwig, and Sir Arthur.

*"Until a few centuries ago, the favourite food of almost all men was meat – the flesh of once living animals. I’m not trying to turn your stomachs; this is a simple statement of fact, which you can check in any history book…

"Why, certainly, Mr. Chairman I’m quite prepared to wait until Senator Irving feels better. We professionals sometimes forget how laymen may react to statements like that. At the same time, I must warn the committee that there is very much worse to come. If any of you gentlemen are at all squeamish, I suggest you follow the Senator before it’s too late…"
—Arthur C. Clarke, “The Food of the Gods”

Cleansing the Palate

Tequila and beer after a long bike ride should be enough to wash away the taste of that awful Left Behind flick, but if that doesn't do it, the Twilight Zone marathon will.

John and I rode the Midtown Greenway today, and I'm now sore and pleasantly buzzed. Happy Fourth.

UPDATED: Hermagoras just sent me this patriotic video (not safe for work).

William Dembski and Barbarella!

Where do I begin? To tell the story of how great a link can be?

The Dembski story of a link that's hawt ID - The simple story that shows up this dumb theory?

Where do I start?

To top it off - as if anything could be more funny than William Dembski linking to a man who uses intelligent design in a, ahem, highly creative fashion - I just saw "Barbarella," the Ballet of the Dolls version - frigging awesome! - and John A. Davison just told me that he luvs me. [Update: we're off again. Whew. Just in time before I went to bed and cheated on him with my own boyfiend. *Wink!*] It's just a summer of love!

Oh, my stars. Dembski links to a site by a man who also claims to use intelligent design for Pleasurianism - "a mixture of intelligent design and Hefnerian Playboy philosophy":

ID Pleasurian philosophy is a non-religious amalgam of ID science and Hefnerian Playboy philosophy. It serves as a strategically unified and archetypal counter proposal to orthodox ascetic religions such as Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and Islam. It is also somewhat resonant with Wiccan and “mother nature”- based pagan cults (in the west) and Tantric Buddhism (in the east). Pleasurian-ism is an earthy, sensuous and physically celebratory form of “monistic idealism” or infocognitive monism.” Pleasurian science is naturally driven by the "pleasure of finding things out."

COWABUNGA! Count me in! Count me iiiiiiinnnnnnn! I can get behind that (or, er, any other place).

I believe in intelligent design! Hallelujah!

I'm a believer!

(Somewhere, in all of this, starting with the rise of intelligent design, through the Dover trial, Dembski's fart animation, and this, there is a sci fi space opera musical just waiting to be written. Complete with bacterial flagella costumes and a blood-clotting cascade dance sequence.)

(Starring a snarky belly dancer and surrealist poet enthusiast-librarian-pirate-secret agent-scribe. I'll get right on it, Mr. President!)

Shimmies to Duae Quartuncia, Stranger Fruit, Red State Rabble, After the Bar Closes, Afarensis, Clever Beyond Measure, Paralepsis, Bill Brookfield and Penny (did you get lucky, Bill?), William Dembski (feeling lucky, Bill?), and to Jane Fonda, Ballet of the Dolls, the stars, the bars, the barmen, and to the whole lovin' galaxy out there!

UPDATED: Remember all that guff about "It was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve in the Garden, blah, blah"? Well, according to Ken Ham's creationist sideshow it was Adam and Steve!

Between this, William Dembski becoming an unwitting porn star, and Sal Cordova thinking that he's Han Solo, I might not stop laughing for days! (And I mean "laugh" in the Inuit way, as in, "together in bed." *Wink!* )

Shimmies to Ed at Dispatches. Rhymes with...

What Sci Fi Writer Are You?

Head over to the Triumvirate (or scroll down) to see who I ended up to be. Yeah, okay, cut it out. You can stop laughing now. Sheesh.

At least I didn't end up as the author of Morphodite, eh? (I wanted Le Guin or Stanislaw Lem or Arthur C. Clarke or Ray Bradbury or Vonnegut--you know, someone I've read--or at least Larry Niven, author of The Mote in God's Eye, which I admit I have not yet read.)

Take the quiz, courtsey of Pharyngula, and tell me all about it. Yeah, we'll see who's laughing now!