So, as mentioned in the last issue, we took a trip down to Oklahoma on Thanksgiving weekend. That trip more or less made us decide that we don’t belong in Michigan and we will be moving back to the Sooner State. The wheels have been set in motion pretty quickly for the re-relocation. We put an offer on a house. It was accepted. We have listed the property that we are currently living in. So needless to say, we will be moving back to Oklahoma pretty soon. Possibly in a month or two. It’s funny how much you can say to yourself and others how much you hate a certain place and want to get away from it and then realize that you really didn’t hate it as much as you thought you did. I guess that is how Oklahoma turned out for us. I am going to miss being so close to Chicago and being able to see all the really good shows and I made a friend up here that I’m going to miss. But after everything is said and done, there are more positives to moving back than there positives for staying here. The move itself, that is, physically moving all of our belongings and ourselves is going to suck. I have been moving all of my life. I grew up in a military family and spent some time in the military myself. So yeah, I’m used to moving. But it’s getting kind of old. Hopefully, this will be our last move.
With the Chrismas season upon us, I submit to you that the very best Christmas movie ever made is Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas. Although it is technically not a movie. It was a television special released originally in 1977 by Jim Henson and was based on a 1971 book of the same name written by Russell Hoban. Strangely, I have never read the book. However, I have seen this special more times than I can remember. According to the Wikipedia article about it, it was originally shown on CBC Television (a Canadian broadcast station). I never saw it on “regular” TV though. My first experience with it was on HBO. If you’ve never seen this, I highly suggest that you go check it out. It was announced a couple of years ago that a film adaptation of Emmet Otter was being made and was being written by Bret McKenzie but I haven’t heard or read any updates about it. Anyway, you need to go watch this right now. You will not regret it. According to the Roku website, you can stream it on Prime Video and Peacock TV.
Before I go any further, here is a picture of Earl.
Violent Night - This new holiday film stars David Harbour as Santa Claus in a tale of a Christmas party gone horribly wrong. It was quite violent (as the title suggests) but Harbour made a great Santa and the movie was hilarious. I have seen this movie in the theater twice now.
Spirited - Another new holiday movie. I read about this somewhere a few weeks ago and it sounded like a good idea. It was based on Dicken’s A Christmas Carol but told from the perspective of the ghosts. It was also a musical. It was not great. Like I said, good idea but not executed very well.
Father Stu - This one was not what I thought it was going to be. Similar, but not exactly. It starred Mark Wahlberg as a boxer that has to give up his boxing career due to an injury and eventually becomes a priest. It wasn’t bad. Probably not something I would view multiple times though.
While on the subject of movies, I put together a list of all of the new release movies that I’ve watched this year. You can find that list on my Letterboxd account.
Rogue One Radio
This week we did our 2nd annual Christmas special and talked randomly about some of our favorite Christmas movies. I say randomly because prior to the show, we listed a bunch of our favorite Christmas movies and wrote them down on separate pieces of paper. Then, come showtime, I put those pieces of paper in a hat and pulled one out and then we talked about it. We also played come Christmas tunes from The Aquadolls, Lamonta, and Amy Gabba and the Almost Famous. Checking out the replay of the video below or the audio on the various podcasting apps.
Also, in the week(s) of podcasting, Dave starting up his One Band 5 Songs podcast again and put out 2 episodes. The first dug into the music of NOFX and the 2nd talked about the cowpunk band Two Cow Garage. You can check those out on Spotify at the links below:
My pull list last week consisted of 2 comics: Star Wars Hidden Empire #2 and a Nocterra: Val one shot.
This week, however, there was only one comic that hit my pull list and it was Star Wars Bounty Hunters #29. It is strange that this one hit my pull list because I’m fairly certain that I asked Comixology, Amazon, Kindle, whatever…to cancel that title because out of all of the Star Wars comics, this one to me is the least interesting. Oh well.
I finished that Once and Future trade paperback that I had been reading. It was fine. Nothing to really write home about. I feel like it was over-hyped. It didn’t suck. It just wasn’t the incredible story that got built up in my head. Oh well. I also started reading the Cavan Scott book Dooku: Jedi Lost. I’m sure I’ll get distracted by something else and never finish it though. LOL!
Oh yeah, I wrote a review of the 1st issue of Paul Dani’s Riddler: Year One series for The Future of the Force. You can check that out here:
Comic Review | The Riddler: Year One #1
Based on Last.fm this track is the song I’ve been listening to more often than any other this week:
Have a great weekend and a happy holiday. Also, remember to BE MORE KIND!