Gripes

[oselle]

Unnnnh. 27 days into the new year and only a week away from the inauguration and unnnnnnh....where have all the good vibes gone?

First of all, Kim Manners. Of course the great loss here is to those who actually knew him, to his friends and family and colleagues. But I'm just a fan and speaking as a fan, this does not bode well for the show. At all. I was just speaking recently with someone about how I don't know what happened to this season -- the last few episdoes haven't exactly been awful or anything, but IMO they've really slumped from the high of the season's first few episodes. And now I'm wondering how much of that had to do with Kim Manners' illness and no doubt lack of involvement with the show.

Now I know there are those of you out there who think Eric Kripke and Sera Gamble can do no wrong and that Ben Edlund is a visionary genius but I'm not and have never been one of them. Sera Gamble rocked when she was writing with Raelle Tucker but her solo act hasn't been as impressive. As entertaining as Ben Edlund's episodes can be, they often seem to be written more for his own personal jollies -- which are best served up in extreme moderation. And I just don't know about Kripke. I think left to his own devices he'll sink down into a sophmoric stew of babes n' bullets and annoying reliance on the word "douchebag." These folks needed the likes of Kim Manners around. The guy had a better resume than any of them and, I think, was almost wholly responsible for the show's visual style and tone. He grounded them, he grounded the show and he brought out the best in the cast. In a statement released by the show's publicist, Kripke called Manners the "patriarch" of Supernatural and I honestly don't know what they're going to do without him.

As for the rest of the world...oh my God. Our new president is trying to "compromise" with the Republicans over the economic stimulus. There is no compromise with Republicans. It's their way or the highway and for God's sake I don't know why our supposedly "liberal media" is bending over backwards to tell the Repubs' side of the story. They have no ideas. They have no plans. They have nothing but ill will towards the American people. They are solely interested in their own twisted Randian ideology. You don't compromise with that. You give it some lip service and then YOU FUCKING IGNORE IT. We voted these fuckers out of power for a reason, Mr. President.

America lost another 70,000 jobs yesterday. On 60 Minutes this weekend I watched a report about a town in Ohio where just about everyone worked for DHL, which is closing up all of its operations this month. One of the people they interviewed was a woman who described how she was "stockpiling" non-perishable food while she still had a job...you know, peanut butter, cereal, spaghetti, etc. For God's sake, how long before the roads are clogged with modern-day Okies? But where will they go? There is nowhere to go.

Meanwhile, twice this weekend I caught televangelists (Pat Robertson and Joel Osteen to be exact) telling their congregations that the more they give, the more they'll receive. Robertson's 700 Club profiled a couple who claimed they could draw a direct correlation between their donations to Robertson's CBN (Christian Broadcasting Network) and the success of their lunchwagon business. And the always-oily Osteen predicted that his faithful would all be receiving "explosive blessings" in 2009 in the form of sudden, unexpected cash windfalls so there was no need for them to pinch their pennies. I'd say that it was unchristian and exquisitely cruel to prey on people this way during such hard times, but you know what? Anyone who buys this "God wants you to be rich" crap is so stupid that they deserve to be fleeced down to their last dime. In fact if I thought I could affect a cornpone accent and a beauty-pageant hairdo I'd create my own fucking "ministry" and start raking it in. Hey, God WANTS me to be rich, after all.

The tag says it all:

Comments

Re: amen sister...

[oselle.livejournal.com]

It's quite the racket. I'm just sitting there wondering how I can get in on it.

[agentotter.livejournal.com]

I agree with everything you have said. Does that make me a yes man? Or just really lazy? Or possibly just brilliant?

[oselle.livejournal.com]

Does that make me a yes man? Or just really lazy? Or possibly just brilliant?

Why can it not make you...all three......?

*strokes chin*

[layne67.livejournal.com]

But still, Kripke directed WIAWSNB, didn't he? One of the best eps, IMO. And I know you're not very fond of Ghostfacers, but I LOVE that one to bits. There's still hope for the show ... even though the last two were not quite up to par.

Btw, I think it tragic that Kim would now never know what's the end going to be like for the Winchester brothers :(

[oselle.livejournal.com]

He directed it but Raelle Tucker wrote that and that episode was pure Raelle, as far as I'm concerned. It's not just Manners' talent as a director that will be missing from the show but his influence as Executive Producer. I think the latter will have even more of an effect. Don't get me started on Ghostfacers. I could have put up with it in a regular season but in such a dramatically shortened season, the writers had no business indulging themselves like that. Mileage varies, as they say.

I think it tragic that Kim would now never know what's the end going to be like for the Winchester brothers.

Maybe they can hold a seance and Manners can give them expert guidance from the Great Beyond? He can write the series finale via Ouija board!

[layne67.livejournal.com]

Hee!

http://www.buddytv.com/articles/supernatural/glaad-nominates-supernatural-t-25954.aspx

[oselle.livejournal.com]

I know, I heard about that and I think GLAAD needs to give that episode a closer look.

[janissa11.livejournal.com]

Half an hour ago I worked myself into a righteous lather over whether or not you can safely use a microwave to soften butter.

That tells me something. Well, first, it tells me that my period is riiiiight behind me readying itself for attack.

But second -- you described my feelings about this season perfectly and explicitly. I don't know that I've ever dug deeply enough to know that it was Kim Manners (and Tucker) who did the work I best admired thus far, but I KNOW it isn't Sera "I want to fuck Jared Padalecki and I don't give a shit if 100% of the viewers know it" Gamble, and it sure as FUCK isn't Ben "My ego is the size of Jupiter" Edlund. The former writes love letters to JP and his junk, and the latter could care less about the characters, it's mostly a big j.o. session for him.

Sorry, I really AM PMSing. But the only high point for this week I can think of so far is Obama saying, "I won." I hope we will see more of that spirit, preferably TOMORROW.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

I just made a pan of Betty Crocker cornbread and I melted the butter in the microwave. It is perfectly safe but the problem is that it is hard to strike that balance between just softening it and melting it. You'll probably have more luck putting it in a very low-temperature toaster over for a few minutes (take wrapper off first).

The former writes love letters to JP and his junk, and the latter could care less about the characters, it's mostly a big j.o. session for him.

Ha ha ha! Yes. Especially re:Edlund. I belive it was catdancerz who said after "Monster Movie" that Edlund writes for himself, not for the show, and there's a lot of truth to that. It's like he dreams up some gimmick and contorts the show to fit that rather than writing an episode that fits the show. Like I said, it's fine in moderation, but Edlund's a standing producer on the show, not just an occasional contributor and I worry that he's going to have more influence now that Kim is gone.

Yes on Obama asserting himself and I'd really fucking appreciate it if the media would stop giving a platform to Republican "bipartisanship" rather than calling it out for what it is: mindless obstructionism for the sake of their fucked-up, brutally destructive ideology.

[sixth-queen.livejournal.com]

I'm less worried about President Barack Hussein Obama. We have not only a smart President, but an educated one, educated in history as well as politics and law. While the Republicans are playing checkers, he is playing chess. Obama proved this repeatedly through the campaign.

I understand Obama had to give a couple things up from the stimulus package. Big fucking deal. Obama has four years -- he can sneak stuff in later.
That's called "sequencing," where he passes the bills that are the most palatable to the opposition party first, to earn their trust. Then later on he goes more liberal. It's akin to the fable of the boiled frog. (I learned this on the 60 Minutes interview). Obama probably wanted to go more slowly, but the economic issues are too pressing. I hope the original package is enough to keep us from collapsing altogether, until we can get our infrastructures back up and running.

I think Obama is just pretending to placate the Republicans, to make himself look good. He also allowed Harry and Nancy to pretend to show a backbone (Harry said he works WITH Obama, not FOR Obama.) THat's another smokescreen, just to make them look good.

It doesn't matter if David Gregory gives John Boehner a blow job live on camera during Meet the Press. At the end of day, the D's are +100 in the House and +9 in the Senate. Complaining is ALL the repubs can do.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

I want to believe you, I really do. But the conservative machine is well-oiled and well-funded and we have all seen it destroy good people and good policies before -- and solely because any Democratic success threatens their power. If Democratic policies succeed, the nation will know once and for all that modern Republicanism and conservatism are BUILT FOR FAILURE. The failure is a feature, not a bug, of Republican ideology as they say. The Republicans are more than happy to see the country go down in flames -- are even hoping for it -- in the hopes that they can point fingers and claim Democrats don't know how to govern and that Republicans have better ideas.

The American public has a stunningly short memory. Obama has inherited this appalling mess and the next few years are going to be rough -- and that will be blamed on him. The fiction that Obama is responsible for this will be picked up and pushed hard by the likes of Limbaugh and Hannity and the mainstream media. How long will it take many people in this country to start believing that things were better when Bush was around?

[sixth-queen.livejournal.com]

yeah, I hear you. The Republican ideal is to use power to make themselves rich, meanwhile destroying government. Then they can say See, ALL government is bad, Democrats want to make government bigger, which is a bigger bad, vote for us etc...

Americans are smartening up, thankfully. If nothing else, demographics are on the side of the Dems. The young were something like 69% Obama, and racism doesn't work on them.

[i-o-r-h-a-e-l.livejournal.com]

How about Robert Singer? Can he take over what Kim did?

But yes, yes, for Raelle Tucker, like you told me. :)

[oselle.livejournal.com]

I don't fully understand Robert Singer's role. He's struck me as more of a business dude than a creative type and I've always felt (with no proof whatsoever) that he's more responsible for the business of getting the show produced and not the show's creative direction.

[oxer12.livejournal.com]

You know, I finally got my sister watching this show. She borrowed Seasons 1-3 from me and watched those, then downloaded everything she'd missed so far from Season 4. And now that Kim is dead, I don't want the show to start sucking and my sis get pissed at me for making her watch this show.

Yeah, I managed to turn that into "all about me," but still... ;-)