I am so, so very touched.

My good friend John Hopkins, current president of GANG, is as big a fan of the Apollo program as I am. We can trade Apollo stories all night. And John has been making me envious the last few meetings with tales of Virtual LM: A Pictorial Essay of the Engineering and Construction of the Apollo Lunar Module. I'm too pragmatic: I can never really picture myself as one of the Apollo astronauts. But the engineers of the program, those folks I can empathize with. My favorite episode of From the Earth to the Moon tells the story of the team who built the LMs. Well, this book is full of incredibly detailed design sketches and notes for the LM, as well as stories from the design and construction. And the bonus CD includes lots of photographs of LM test units, as well as operations manuals and checklists for the LM. It's a true delight.

Tonight, after my presentation at GANG, John gave me a copy of Virtual LM. So I wanted to take this opportunity to thank him publicly. This is truly a book I'll treasure.

I'll let you know when the slides and sample code for my presentation are up at the GANG site. I would post them on my site tonight; but I've got something else to occupy my time right now, thank you very much. (And thank John very much!)

So for Christmas, besides a super-cool Superman Returns lunch box with the two-disc Superman Returns DVD inside (and dang, I can't find a link for that lunch box online anywhere!), Sandy got me The Tick vs. Season One, available on DVD at long last (and for sale by Disney, not Fox, where the shows originally aired — no idea how that happened). And I was reading the back, and saw a little asterisked notice: "Does not include episode 11".

Well, that made me curious, so I went to TV.com and found that episode 11 is The Tick vs. the Mole Men. I remembered that episode: it involved a beautiful supermodel named Mindy who was pursued by a bunch of subterranean Molemen, who were themselves pursued by the evil Lava King. It turns out that the lead Mole Man is in love with Mindy, who actually is a visitor from the mole lands herself. Once the Lava King is defeated, Mindy returns to be the Mole Queen.

So that left me wondering: why leave that episode out? And that led me to this discussion and a bit of unofficial speculation:

""The Tick vs. The Mole Men" features an unauthorized use of Cindy Crawford's likeness, that's why it will not be included

Officially, the episode is missing for "creative considerations", and "may appear in a later collection". But ya know, I've seen this episode maybe half a dozen times; and I just realized that Mindy Moleford does indeed have a prominent mole, just like some other supermodel.

On the other hand, Comics2Film insists that's not the reason, and that there's another reason that they do know but won't discuss because that would complicate legal negotiations between the parties. I can't imagine who else might have an opinion on this episode...

Note: I bumped this to the top, because I got the film from Sandy for Christmas. Merry Christmas, to all! And to all, a good night!

Whoa...

Wow...

Hahahaha...

Yes!!!

Yeehaaa!

Whoa...

Those are a few of the spur-of-the-moment thoughts I recall from the time I just spent watching Superman Returns in IMAX 3D.

And just in case I forgot: Whoa...

OK, this review is going to wander a bit. And there may be spoilers. Just so you can't say you weren't warned.

[Oh, no, Mommy. When Martin tells us he's gonna wander, that means it's gonna be real long. I know, dear. But if he wants to stay at Kinko's until after midnight writing a silly movie review, getting eaten up by mosquitos, how are we going to stop him? I'll bet if Superman were here, he could stop 'im. I don't know if even Superman's that powerful, dear. Once Martin starts making up conversations with imaginary characters, he's pretty much past the point of no return.]

Just so you know where I'm coming from here: Superman is my fav'rit. (And if you don't get the reference there, then you just haven't been reading enough Superman.) Oh, I've been teased away by lots of other, newer superheroes over the years; and I enjoy them all: Batman, Spider-Man, Captain Marvel (the original, please), Metamorpho, Green Lantern (every one of them, even Kyle), Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Supergirl, the Legion of Super-Heroes, Infinity Inc., Blue Devil, 'Mazing Man (for the truly discerning comics fan), the Flash, the Fantastic Four, the New Gods, the Phantom Stranger, the Outsiders, Black Lightning, Luke Cage... Plain and simple, I love mainstream superhero comics. I know, it's corny and old fashioned. I know, anime or indies are what all the cool kids read. (Actually, I like a lot of indies, too. Anime? Eh.) I know, grown ups aren't supposed to read comic books. And I just. Don't. Care. Make fun of me all you want. I'm sure I would find your hobbies to be just hilarious, too, but I'm too polite to point that out.

But of them all, Superman is the one I've read most consistently. While I can't say for certain, I'm guessing I read my first Superman comic roughly 40 years ago. Well, OK, 39 years ago: with the help of indulgent parents and big brothers, I taught myself to read at age 4; and I gotta believe one of the first things I read was a Superman comic. See, one of those brothers bought lots of comics, and so they were always there at hand. And for not being a big comic fan today, he bought some amazing classics: the first issues of Kirby's New Gods and Forever People, half of the Kirby Jimmy Olsen issues, the last three issues of O'Neill/Adams's Green Lantern/Green Arrow (the phrase "Send me a bill" still sends a chill up my spine), "Spider-Man: No More", and a good chunk of the "Kryptonite: No More"/Sandman Superman saga. Brother Joe, if you had kept those in mint condition, they would be worth some money today. But instead, you let little brother and later little sister read them. Thank you. And again: thank you.

[Mommy, is Martin ever going to write about the movie? Shh. Be patient, dear. He thinks he is writing about the movie.]

And so I've been reading Superman all my life; but in a sense, I've been reading him nearly twice that long. Over the years, I've gotten to read a lot of the historical Superman tales. I'm keeping up with the modern Superman tales. And I've also watched the Superman cartoons, from the Fleischer classics to the 70s not-so-classics to the Super-Friends to the modern cartoons. I've also watched Lois & Clark. Thanks to Sandy, I'm getting to see the old George Reeves episodes that they never seemed to rerun in our area when I was growing up.

But for me, the Superman will always be the Superman of the 70s. Part Kirby, part O'Neill, to be sure; but in larger part, the Superman of the 70s was the work of two gentlemen. Carey Bates was one. But the other, and my fav'rit, was Elliot S! Maggin. (The "S!" is because comics scripters of the day tended to go overboard with exclamation points, so Mr. Maggin felt it was an obligation.) But what made me recognize his name was not his comics. At the time, I was fairly ignorant of who was creating the comics. No, I became his fan after reading his first Superman novel, Superman: Last Son of Krypton. And I became a permanent fan with his next book, Superman: Miracle Monday. No, they're not in print any more. (If you ask nicely, Mr. Maggin may explain why. Wear a spittle shield.) Yes, as a matter of fact, I do own two copies of each. No, you may not have my spare copies. Those are for loaning out to close friends and cherished family members, so that if perchance the borrower loses them, I'll still have my originals.

Those two books, published as tie-ins to the first two Chistopher Reeve movies, are in my opinion the two best Superman stories ever. Period. (The third best happens to be Kingdom Come, the novelization of Mark Waid's ground-breaking story of Earth after Superman gave up The Never-Ending Struggle. When Mr. Waid knew a novelization was planned, he knew just who he wanted to write it; and when his chosen author balked, he decided to sway the author by hook or by crook. And so, the very last page of the comic series has this note: "Dedicated to Elliott S! Maggin." So mayhaps I'm not the only one who thinks Mr. Maggin is his fav'rit.)

[Mommy, I was really bad today. Could you send me to my room? Not yet, dear. I think there's a point coming soon.]

And what made these books so much the definition of the character was a bit of Kryptonian philosophy Mr. Maggin dreamed up: There is a right and a wrong in the universe, and the distinction is not very hard to make. And that right there defines Superman at his best. It defines his biggest weakness: no, not kryptonite, but rather a moral blindspot that makes him simply unable to imagine that anyone would do anything but the right thing, and just as much as they are able. He cannot see the world from a criminal's perspective, because it just isn't in him to do so, so criminals can often surprise him. And this philosophy also defines his greatest strength: by always doing what's right no matter what the cost to himself, he inspires the rest of us to try just a little harder. It's not the Super that counts, it's the Man. (We can argue later about whether that Kryptonian philosophy is just a little too simplistic. In the real world, sometimes the best you can do is to choose the least wrong.)

And the fourth and fifth-best Superman stories ever, in my opinion, were the first two Christopher Reeve films. I have never heard a theater crowd explode like they did at "General. Would you care to step outside?" I'm still getting the chills here, just typing that line. Yes, I would have much preferred if they had filmed Mr. Maggin's books instead; but honestly, those were just a little too steeped in DC Universe lore to make good movies for the general public, I think. Even with the too-gimmicky ending in Superman II (come on, where did those powers come from?), those two films were simply the best Superman stories put to film. (Note: were.)

And before you go see Superman Returns, I stongly recommend that you go rent Superman I and II. Let's just ignore III and IV for this discussion, OK? And especially Supergirl. For the purposes of this film, those don't exist. But this film is very much a sequel to Superman II. Not juat "inspired by": it follows directly on the events of the second film.

But beyond sequel, it's an homage to the Christopher Reeve Superman films. And somewhere along the way, I started to see it as an homage to Elliot S! Maggin as well. And without giving too much away, it's an homage to fathers as well.

And one more thing: while it's truly respectful of the Christopher Reeve films, it's better. I expected a lot of things from this film; but I didn't expect to be drying my eyes as I left the theater.

[Yay! He's finally writing about the movie! Hush, dear. You might distract him, just when he's found the point.]

This film starts before it starts: an opening text frame tells how Superman learned that astronomers had found remnants of Krypton, and he left Earth to investigate. This all took place shortly after Superman II. Five years have elapsed. We never really learn much about what he found out there, other than that Krypton really is gone.

But what he finds when he comes back, now there's the story! His mother is still alive, and welcomes him back. (His father died near the start of Superman I.) The Daily Planet is mostly unchanged, except for one vital difference: Lois Lane. She has changed dramatically. She's engaged to Perry White's nephew (Richard), she's a single mother of a rather weak and asthmatic son (Jason), and she has won a Pulitzer — for an editorial entitled, "Why Earth Doesn't Need a Superman". She seems to have moved on; and with that one change, everything in Superman's life is changed, even though nothing else has.

Yes, folks, this is a relationship movie. Oh, it's a superhero movie — and a very cool one at that, especially with the IMAX 3D (selected scenes are in 3D, and they flash glasses on the screen to let you know when to put yours on) — but it's really about Superman's two most important relationships: with Lois, and with his birth father, Jor-El. Even though Jor-El barely puts in an appearance, Superman spends most of the movie trying to live up to his father's legacy. And in the end, he finds that legacy has some mighty big shoes to fill, shoes he never expected. (I won't spoil the ending, even though the "surprise" actually happens about two-thirds of the way through the film. And it wasn't much of a surprise to me, since I guessed it six months before I saw the film.) When he's not trying to live up to the legacy, he's trying to understand how Lois was so hurt by his leaving, and to get her to understand why he had no choice: if he had tried to tell her goodbye, he could never have left. But she's too bitter, for some reason, she can't seem to forgive him.

But while Superman struggles to live up to Jor-El's legacy, Lex Luthor corrupts it. Yes, ol' Lex is back, and meaner than ever; and he uses what he learned about Kryptonian technology in Superman II for his latest scheme: to create a new, Kryptonian continent, so that he can get rich as its owner — while he just happens to drown most of the Americas in the process.

And that's just one example where this film is an homage to the first two. In those two films, Lex's grand schemes always revolved around mega land grabs. In this one, he finally succeeds. Well, for a while. We all know Superman will stop him in the end. (And kudos to the filmmakers: I just now realized just how ironic Lex's final scene is.) Here are some other ways in which this film pays homage to the earlier films:

[Mommy, what's an "omaj"? It means "tribute", dear. Remembering someone in a very nice way. Martin's just being pretentious again, because some of his favorite comics are from a company called "Homage Comics".]

• The opening credits are just about exactly the same design. It was eerie, like I just fell back in time 25 years.


• While newcomer Brandon Routh doesn't exactly look like Christopher Reeve, he certainly sounds like him. In fact, he sounds like him twice. Mr. Reeve affected two different voices for Superman and for Clark Kent. Mr. Routh nails both of them close enough to make you comfortable that you're watching the same characters. (Noboy else consciously imitates their predecessors; but Superman.Clark was the one who counted.)


• Physically, Mr. Routh does very well what Mr. Reeve did so perfectly: play Clark Kent in such a way thatyou really believe no one would notice he's Superman.


• The whole production and art direction is completely modeled on the first two films — especially the Kryptonian technology. The Fortress, the ship, and the all-important crystal are all old friends here.


• The music is a very nice update of the classic John Williams score.


• A running sight gag in the first two films was Luthor's baldness and his various wigs. Well, the gag continues in this film. One very tense but funny scene was when Lois and Jason stumble into an unknown bedroom, and Jason laughs at all the wigs. Lois looks at them, and instantly all the other pieces of the puzzle fall into place (but too late).


• In the first film, Luthor tracks down his first Kryptonite metorite in Addis Abbaba, a city in Ethiopia. In this film, when a meteorite is mysteriously stolen from the museum, the smashed display case includes a sign saying that it came from, yes, Addis Abbaba.


• And the lines. Ah, classic little lines from the first two films show up here. Only now, they're loaded with additional emotional meaning. "I'm always around, Lois."

And there's a lot more. And then, just in case you missed the homage, there's a line in the end credits: "Dedicated with love to Christopher Reeve and Dana Reeve." For those who didn't hear, after seeing her husband through the years of his paralysis and doing what she could for his legacy after his death, Dana Reeve died this year from cancer. And the filmmakers paid their homage to both of them.

But that's not the only homage in this film. We also got two guest stars from the old Adventures of Superman series: Noel Neill (who played Lois Lane) and Jack Larson (who played Jimmy Olsen). Their parts here were small, but it was still a nice nod to them and their fans.

OK, OK, so it's an homage; but how is it better? Oh, in oh so many ways:

• The special effects are 30 years better. Superman I was truly ground-breaking for its day. Today, most personal computers can do better effects. Even though everything looks the same in some ways — the Fortress, especially — it all looks better. One tiny example: the explosion of Krypton in Superman I was actually a microscope recording of a histamine cell exploding. In this film, it's a wonderfully detailed CGI rendering. (In 3D, at IMAX theaters!)


• And wow! What special effects. Now I've said more times than I can recall that special effects in movies aren't that important to me. And as a general rule, they aren't. But come on! This is a superhero film! It has to have larger-than-life action! And this film delivers. The airplane rescue is stupendous. The New Krypton scenes are really creepy. And the crushing of Metropolis — well, I have to save that discussion for just a little bit.


• The whole thing just looks better. Street scenes in the first two films had the feel of soundstages, even when they weren't. Here, you just know you can actually walk around Metropolis.


• No offense to Margot Kidder, but Kate Bosworth just looks more like Lois Lane. Also, she got much more mature dialog to work with.


• And that maturity. That's probably the biggest difference. The first two films had just a touch of camp about them. This film plays it straight.


• And where this film particularly plays it straight is with Lex Luthor. I love Gene Hackman; but his Lex Luthor had a lot of the buffoon about him. (Rather surprising for Mr. Hackman, really.) Even though Kevin Spacey's Lex Luthor surrounds himself with buffoons, he's really, really scary. And when he tries to be funny, he's even scarier. Think the Joker, and you won't be far off: if he's trying to be funny, it's to distract you from his trying to kill you, or to gloat over having already killed you.


• And yet there is humor in the film; but it's more subtle, more gentle than in the first two films. Some of it's in-jokes, like the Addis Abbaba meteorite. Some of it's very subtle, like the name of Luthor's ship (you've got to look fast for that one). And some of it's pretty clever, like when a kid with a cell phone gets better shots of Superman than Jimmy can get with his expensive camera. (Don't worry, Jimmy fans, he makes up for it eventually.) None of it's laugh-out-loud funny (although I laughed at the Addis Abbaba sign, as did the similar-in-age guy next to me); but none of it's camp, either. It fits the story more naturally.

OK, OK, OK. You liked it. But how is it an homage to Mr. Maggin?

Well, it may not be. That may just be me reading into it. But I really felt like there was, if not a Maggin homage, then a definite Maggin influence, in at least five ways:

• First, there's that whole crushing of Metropolis scene. I won't tell you the details, because that would spoil it. But one of Mr. Maggin's specialties in his novels is what I think of as the "Superman is everywhere" chapter. Some criminal plot or some menace comes up, and it has lots of ramifications in lots of places all at once. This is a job for Superman! See, among his many powers, Superman is just a wee bit faster than a speeding bullet. Faster than that, even. So Mr. Maggin tells the story at Superman's rate of perception as he zips from crisis to crisis and handles each in the most appropriate way: disarming a villain here, crashing two villain-laden hang gliders together there, all while using super ventrilloquism to convince another villain that the plan has been called off. Pages and pages of detailed action, all at a leisurely pace for Superman, and all in under 12 seconds for the villains. Prior to this film, I would've called such a scene unfilmable. In fact, I would've predicted exactly what bugged me about some of the fight scenes in Batman Begins: to make the action believably fast, they would have to make it too fast for the viewer to follow. Well, somehow, director Brian Singer defied my expectations. While the crushing of Metropolis isn't quite as involved as one of Mr. Maggin's "Superman is everywhere" chapters, it's pretty involved. There are a lot of menaces in a lot of places, and Superman manages to be everywhere at once, dealing with them. The scene where Superman flies through the city streets but then rolls leisurely over onto his back, so he can look back and vaporize a whole street full of falling debris — priceless! I just looked at that whole section and said, "Wow! That's worthy of Maggin!"


• In Superman: Miracle Monday, Mr. Maggin has a very poignant scene in which Superman turns up his superhearing and listens — really listens — to the whole Earth at once. And eventually, he hears a kind of symphony; and he hears that he has a part in it. In this film, Superman tells Lois that despite her article on why no one needs a Superman, he can hear all over, and he just keeps hearing people calling for help. It wasn't exactly an echo of Mr. Maggin's scene, but it made me think of that scene.


• There's a definite element of "There is a right and a wrong..." here. This is a Superman who just has to do what's right, no matter what. To be blunt, Superman gets the stuffing kicked out of him in this film, far more than in Superman II; and yet he just keeps trying, no matter what. It's simply what he has to do.


• Mr. Maggin had another recurring theme. In fact, he originally wrote it for a writing class; and when he got a lousy grade, he sent it to DC instead, and they bought the script, and they hired him from there. (And now he's teaching writing. Kids, don't give up just because someone tells you you can't succeed, even if it's a teacher. Sometimes teachers are wrong, too. Did you ever see Superman give up? Huh? Huh?) That story, "Must There Be A Superman?" dealt with the possibility that by solving all of our problems, Superman was stunting our growth and making us dependent on him. He learned to let us solve our own problems, stumbling along the way and picking ourselves up and learning in the process; and he just gave a helping hand when the problems were too big for us. Well, that theme came up in this film, in a briefly remembered bit of advice from Jor-El; and in fact, it's Lois and Richard who end up saving Superman at one point. And Superman also steps back at one point to let people solve their own problems. This is straight from Mr. Maggin.

And the last bit of Maggin influence — Well, I want to close with that. So let me just say that this film, while very good, isn't perfect. It's a bit long. The end, especially, drags a bit, and could've been trimmed at least five minutes. And the director relied a little too heavily on slow motion in a couple of places (although one slow-mo scene that I thought dragged on a bit too long was justified in the end with a wince-inducing special effect that was actually kinda cool, if you're not squeamish about eyes). But those are minor quibbles. In most films, I can come up with a dozen quibbles more than that. None of that stopped me from saying toward the end, "OK, when's World's Finest coming?" (For the non-comic fans: World's Finest was a long-running Superman/Batman team-up book. After Batman Begins and this film, it's time for a World's Finest film.)

Back to that last bit of Maggin influence — and again, I'll concede this may be me reading into it. Maybe it's just a coincidence that the theme is so strong in Mr. Maggin's books and in this film, since it is kinda central to the whole Superman mythos. It has to do with fathers. A big element of Mr. Maggin's books was just how much Jor-El loved his son, and how hard he worked to protect him and guide him even though he would be long dead before his son grew up. He left lessons, and he chose protectors, and he chose the best, safest environment he could find for his son. He saw his responsibility to his son as his last, most important duty. And that's pretty much how this film opens; and in subtle ways, that comes up in places throughout the film. And it's how the film ends, as Superman finally fully appreciates just how important those sacrifices were to his father. (And I tried to be oblique, but I probably just ruined the ending for you. Serves you right for being so smart.)

And when I left the theater, I felt — Whoa... I felt — Wow... I felt Hahahaha, and Yes!!! And Yeehaaa! I felt like I was 18 again, seeing this film just after Superman II. I felt awed. I felt invigorated. And a reaction I never expected from a silly superhero film: I miss my fav'rit. I miss my Dad.

[Mommy, Martin sounds sad. Didn't he like the movie? Yes, dear. I think he liked it very, very much. Now goodnight. Sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite.]




Update: Bryce Zabel makes many of the same points. But he uses, like, one-tenth as many words. Bet you wish I'd told you that at the start of the review, huh?

Update 2: Ken Lammers has a very different reaction. (Warning! Major spoilers!) That's OK. I respect that. I don't agree with it, but I respect it. (But, um, dude, if you're going to say that that first action is out of character, then you're going to have to say that the action that led to that action back in Superman II was out of character. It's the same action, really, just cause and effect. And it would never happen in the comics. Movie audiences these days kinda expect it. We can debate the goodness of that expectation, but there it is.)

Update 3: James Hudnall liked it, too, though he thinks there was more room to cut at the end. For those who don't know James, he's a comics writer who has actually written in the Superman series, so I kinda think his opinion has some merit. James also wrote Harsh Realm, which was adapted into a TV series by Chris Carter of X-Files fame. And his book The Psyhco is working its way toward a film version. I first learned of James through his incredible Espers series. And he's a software geek who knows UML. So he's kinda like me, but, umm, cool and all that.

Note: I bumped this to the top, because I got the film from Sandy for Christmas. Merry Christmas, to all! And to all, a good night!

Whoa...

Wow...

Hahahaha...

Yes!!!

Yeehaaa!

Whoa...

Those are a few of the spur-of-the-moment thoughts I recall from the time I just spent watching Superman Returns in IMAX 3D.

And just in case I forgot: Whoa...

OK, this review is going to wander a bit. And there may be spoilers. Just so you can't say you weren't warned.

[Oh, no, Mommy. When Martin tells us he's gonna wander, that means it's gonna be real long. I know, dear. But if he wants to stay at Kinko's until after midnight writing a silly movie review, getting eaten up by mosquitos, how are we going to stop him? I'll bet if Superman were here, he could stop 'im. I don't know if even Superman's that powerful, dear. Once Martin starts making up conversations with imaginary characters, he's pretty much past the point of no return.]

Just so you know where I'm coming from here: Superman is my fav'rit. (And if you don't get the reference there, then you just haven't been reading enough Superman.) Oh, I've been teased away by lots of other, newer superheroes over the years; and I enjoy them all: Batman, Spider-Man, Captain Marvel (the original, please), Metamorpho, Green Lantern (every one of them, even Kyle), Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Supergirl, the Legion of Super-Heroes, Infinity Inc., Blue Devil, 'Mazing Man (for the truly discerning comics fan), the Flash, the Fantastic Four, the New Gods, the Phantom Stranger, the Outsiders, Black Lightning, Luke Cage... Plain and simple, I love mainstream superhero comics. I know, it's corny and old fashioned. I know, anime or indies are what all the cool kids read. (Actually, I like a lot of indies, too. Anime? Eh.) I know, grown ups aren't supposed to read comic books. And I just. Don't. Care. Make fun of me all you want. I'm sure I would find your hobbies to be just hilarious, too, but I'm too polite to point that out.

But of them all, Superman is the one I've read most consistently. While I can't say for certain, I'm guessing I read my first Superman comic roughly 40 years ago. Well, OK, 39 years ago: with the help of indulgent parents and big brothers, I taught myself to read at age 4; and I gotta believe one of the first things I read was a Superman comic. See, one of those brothers bought lots of comics, and so they were always there at hand. And for not being a big comic fan today, he bought some amazing classics: the first issues of Kirby's New Gods and Forever People, half of the Kirby Jimmy Olsen issues, the last three issues of O'Neill/Adams's Green Lantern/Green Arrow (the phrase "Send me a bill" still sends a chill up my spine), "Spider-Man: No More", and a good chunk of the "Kryptonite: No More"/Sandman Superman saga. Brother Joe, if you had kept those in mint condition, they would be worth some money today. But instead, you let little brother and later little sister read them. Thank you. And again: thank you.

[Mommy, is Martin ever going to write about the movie? Shh. Be patient, dear. He thinks he is writing about the movie.]

And so I've been reading Superman all my life; but in a sense, I've been reading him nearly twice that long. Over the years, I've gotten to read a lot of the historical Superman tales. I'm keeping up with the modern Superman tales. And I've also watched the Superman cartoons, from the Fleischer classics to the 70s not-so-classics to the Super-Friends to the modern cartoons. I've also watched Lois & Clark. Thanks to Sandy, I'm getting to see the old George Reeves episodes that they never seemed to rerun in our area when I was growing up.

But for me, the Superman will always be the Superman of the 70s. Part Kirby, part O'Neill, to be sure; but in larger part, the Superman of the 70s was the work of two gentlemen. Carey Bates was one. But the other, and my fav'rit, was Elliot S! Maggin. (The "S!" is because comics scripters of the day tended to go overboard with exclamation points, so Mr. Maggin felt it was an obligation.) But what made me recognize his name was not his comics. At the time, I was fairly ignorant of who was creating the comics. No, I became his fan after reading his first Superman novel, Superman: Last Son of Krypton. And I became a permanent fan with his next book, Superman: Miracle Monday. No, they're not in print any more. (If you ask nicely, Mr. Maggin may explain why. Wear a spittle shield.) Yes, as a matter of fact, I do own two copies of each. No, you may not have my spare copies. Those are for loaning out to close friends and cherished family members, so that if perchance the borrower loses them, I'll still have my originals.

Those two books, published as tie-ins to the first two Chistopher Reeve movies, are in my opinion the two best Superman stories ever. Period. (The third best happens to be Kingdom Come, the novelization of Mark Waid's ground-breaking story of Earth after Superman gave up The Never-Ending Struggle. When Mr. Waid knew a novelization was planned, he knew just who he wanted to write it; and when his chosen author balked, he decided to sway the author by hook or by crook. And so, the very last page of the comic series has this note: "Dedicated to Elliott S! Maggin." So mayhaps I'm not the only one who thinks Mr. Maggin is his fav'rit.)

[Mommy, I was really bad today. Could you send me to my room? Not yet, dear. I think there's a point coming soon.]

And what made these books so much the definition of the character was a bit of Kryptonian philosophy Mr. Maggin dreamed up: There is a right and a wrong in the universe, and the distinction is not very hard to make. And that right there defines Superman at his best. It defines his biggest weakness: no, not kryptonite, but rather a moral blindspot that makes him simply unable to imagine that anyone would do anything but the right thing, and just as much as they are able. He cannot see the world from a criminal's perspective, because it just isn't in him to do so, so criminals can often surprise him. And this philosophy also defines his greatest strength: by always doing what's right no matter what the cost to himself, he inspires the rest of us to try just a little harder. It's not the Super that counts, it's the Man. (We can argue later about whether that Kryptonian philosophy is just a little too simplistic. In the real world, sometimes the best you can do is to choose the least wrong.)

And the fourth and fifth-best Superman stories ever, in my opinion, were the first two Christopher Reeve films. I have never heard a theater crowd explode like they did at "General. Would you care to step outside?" I'm still getting the chills here, just typing that line. Yes, I would have much preferred if they had filmed Mr. Maggin's books instead; but honestly, those were just a little too steeped in DC Universe lore to make good movies for the general public, I think. Even with the too-gimmicky ending in Superman II (come on, where did those powers come from?), those two films were simply the best Superman stories put to film. (Note: were.)

And before you go see Superman Returns, I stongly recommend that you go rent Superman I and II. Let's just ignore III and IV for this discussion, OK? And especially Supergirl. For the purposes of this film, those don't exist. But this film is very much a sequel to Superman II. Not juat "inspired by": it follows directly on the events of the second film.

But beyond sequel, it's an homage to the Christopher Reeve Superman films. And somewhere along the way, I started to see it as an homage to Elliot S! Maggin as well. And without giving too much away, it's an homage to fathers as well.

And one more thing: while it's truly respectful of the Christopher Reeve films, it's better. I expected a lot of things from this film; but I didn't expect to be drying my eyes as I left the theater.

[Yay! He's finally writing about the movie! Hush, dear. You might distract him, just when he's found the point.]

This film starts before it starts: an opening text frame tells how Superman learned that astronomers had found remnants of Krypton, and he left Earth to investigate. This all took place shortly after Superman II. Five years have elapsed. We never really learn much about what he found out there, other than that Krypton really is gone.

But what he finds when he comes back, now there's the story! His mother is still alive, and welcomes him back. (His father died near the start of Superman I.) The Daily Planet is mostly unchanged, except for one vital difference: Lois Lane. She has changed dramatically. She's engaged to Perry White's nephew (Richard), she's a single mother of a rather weak and asthmatic son (Jason), and she has won a Pulitzer — for an editorial entitled, "Why Earth Doesn't Need a Superman". She seems to have moved on; and with that one change, everything in Superman's life is changed, even though nothing else has.

Yes, folks, this is a relationship movie. Oh, it's a superhero movie — and a very cool one at that, especially with the IMAX 3D (selected scenes are in 3D, and they flash glasses on the screen to let you know when to put yours on) — but it's really about Superman's two most important relationships: with Lois, and with his birth father, Jor-El. Even though Jor-El barely puts in an appearance, Superman spends most of the movie trying to live up to his father's legacy. And in the end, he finds that legacy has some mighty big shoes to fill, shoes he never expected. (I won't spoil the ending, even though the "surprise" actually happens about two-thirds of the way through the film. And it wasn't much of a surprise to me, since I guessed it six months before I saw the film.) When he's not trying to live up to the legacy, he's trying to understand how Lois was so hurt by his leaving, and to get her to understand why he had no choice: if he had tried to tell her goodbye, he could never have left. But she's too bitter, for some reason, she can't seem to forgive him.

But while Superman struggles to live up to Jor-El's legacy, Lex Luthor corrupts it. Yes, ol' Lex is back, and meaner than ever; and he uses what he learned about Kryptonian technology in Superman II for his latest scheme: to create a new, Kryptonian continent, so that he can get rich as its owner — while he just happens to drown most of the Americas in the process.

And that's just one example where this film is an homage to the first two. In those two films, Lex's grand schemes always revolved around mega land grabs. In this one, he finally succeeds. Well, for a while. We all know Superman will stop him in the end. (And kudos to the filmmakers: I just now realized just how ironic Lex's final scene is.) Here are some other ways in which this film pays homage to the earlier films:

[Mommy, what's an "omaj"? It means "tribute", dear. Remembering someone in a very nice way. Martin's just being pretentious again, because some of his favorite comics are from a company called "Homage Comics".]

• The opening credits are just about exactly the same design. It was eerie, like I just fell back in time 25 years.


• While newcomer Brandon Routh doesn't exactly look like Christopher Reeve, he certainly sounds like him. In fact, he sounds like him twice. Mr. Reeve affected two different voices for Superman and for Clark Kent. Mr. Routh nails both of them close enough to make you comfortable that you're watching the same characters. (Noboy else consciously imitates their predecessors; but Superman.Clark was the one who counted.)


• Physically, Mr. Routh does very well what Mr. Reeve did so perfectly: play Clark Kent in such a way thatyou really believe no one would notice he's Superman.


• The whole production and art direction is completely modeled on the first two films — especially the Kryptonian technology. The Fortress, the ship, and the all-important crystal are all old friends here.


• The music is a very nice update of the classic John Williams score.


• A running sight gag in the first two films was Luthor's baldness and his various wigs. Well, the gag continues in this film. One very tense but funny scene was when Lois and Jason stumble into an unknown bedroom, and Jason laughs at all the wigs. Lois looks at them, and instantly all the other pieces of the puzzle fall into place (but too late).


• In the first film, Luthor tracks down his first Kryptonite metorite in Addis Abbaba, a city in Ethiopia. In this film, when a meteorite is mysteriously stolen from the museum, the smashed display case includes a sign saying that it came from, yes, Addis Abbaba.


• And the lines. Ah, classic little lines from the first two films show up here. Only now, they're loaded with additional emotional meaning. "I'm always around, Lois."

And there's a lot more. And then, just in case you missed the homage, there's a line in the end credits: "Dedicated with love to Christopher Reeve and Dana Reeve." For those who didn't hear, after seeing her husband through the years of his paralysis and doing what she could for his legacy after his death, Dana Reeve died this year from cancer. And the filmmakers paid their homage to both of them.

But that's not the only homage in this film. We also got two guest stars from the old Adventures of Superman series: Noel Neill (who played Lois Lane) and Jack Larson (who played Jimmy Olsen). Their parts here were small, but it was still a nice nod to them and their fans.

OK, OK, so it's an homage; but how is it better? Oh, in oh so many ways:

• The special effects are 30 years better. Superman I was truly ground-breaking for its day. Today, most personal computers can do better effects. Even though everything looks the same in some ways — the Fortress, especially — it all looks better. One tiny example: the explosion of Krypton in Superman I was actually a microscope recording of a histamine cell exploding. In this film, it's a wonderfully detailed CGI rendering. (In 3D, at IMAX theaters!)


• And wow! What special effects. Now I've said more times than I can recall that special effects in movies aren't that important to me. And as a general rule, they aren't. But come on! This is a superhero film! It has to have larger-than-life action! And this film delivers. The airplane rescue is stupendous. The New Krypton scenes are really creepy. And the crushing of Metropolis — well, I have to save that discussion for just a little bit.


• The whole thing just looks better. Street scenes in the first two films had the feel of soundstages, even when they weren't. Here, you just know you can actually walk around Metropolis.


• No offense to Margot Kidder, but Kate Bosworth just looks more like Lois Lane. Also, she got much more mature dialog to work with.


• And that maturity. That's probably the biggest difference. The first two films had just a touch of camp about them. This film plays it straight.


• And where this film particularly plays it straight is with Lex Luthor. I love Gene Hackman; but his Lex Luthor had a lot of the buffoon about him. (Rather surprising for Mr. Hackman, really.) Even though Kevin Spacey's Lex Luthor surrounds himself with buffoons, he's really, really scary. And when he tries to be funny, he's even scarier. Think the Joker, and you won't be far off: if he's trying to be funny, it's to distract you from his trying to kill you, or to gloat over having already killed you.


• And yet there is humor in the film; but it's more subtle, more gentle than in the first two films. Some of it's in-jokes, like the Addis Abbaba meteorite. Some of it's very subtle, like the name of Luthor's ship (you've got to look fast for that one). And some of it's pretty clever, like when a kid with a cell phone gets better shots of Superman than Jimmy can get with his expensive camera. (Don't worry, Jimmy fans, he makes up for it eventually.) None of it's laugh-out-loud funny (although I laughed at the Addis Abbaba sign, as did the similar-in-age guy next to me); but none of it's camp, either. It fits the story more naturally.

OK, OK, OK. You liked it. But how is it an homage to Mr. Maggin?

Well, it may not be. That may just be me reading into it. But I really felt like there was, if not a Maggin homage, then a definite Maggin influence, in at least five ways:

• First, there's that whole crushing of Metropolis scene. I won't tell you the details, because that would spoil it. But one of Mr. Maggin's specialties in his novels is what I think of as the "Superman is everywhere" chapter. Some criminal plot or some menace comes up, and it has lots of ramifications in lots of places all at once. This is a job for Superman! See, among his many powers, Superman is just a wee bit faster than a speeding bullet. Faster than that, even. So Mr. Maggin tells the story at Superman's rate of perception as he zips from crisis to crisis and handles each in the most appropriate way: disarming a villain here, crashing two villain-laden hang gliders together there, all while using super ventrilloquism to convince another villain that the plan has been called off. Pages and pages of detailed action, all at a leisurely pace for Superman, and all in under 12 seconds for the villains. Prior to this film, I would've called such a scene unfilmable. In fact, I would've predicted exactly what bugged me about some of the fight scenes in Batman Begins: to make the action believably fast, they would have to make it too fast for the viewer to follow. Well, somehow, director Brian Singer defied my expectations. While the crushing of Metropolis isn't quite as involved as one of Mr. Maggin's "Superman is everywhere" chapters, it's pretty involved. There are a lot of menaces in a lot of places, and Superman manages to be everywhere at once, dealing with them. The scene where Superman flies through the city streets but then rolls leisurely over onto his back, so he can look back and vaporize a whole street full of falling debris — priceless! I just looked at that whole section and said, "Wow! That's worthy of Maggin!"


• In Superman: Miracle Monday, Mr. Maggin has a very poignant scene in which Superman turns up his superhearing and listens — really listens — to the whole Earth at once. And eventually, he hears a kind of symphony; and he hears that he has a part in it. In this film, Superman tells Lois that despite her article on why no one needs a Superman, he can hear all over, and he just keeps hearing people calling for help. It wasn't exactly an echo of Mr. Maggin's scene, but it made me think of that scene.


• There's a definite element of "There is a right and a wrong..." here. This is a Superman who just has to do what's right, no matter what. To be blunt, Superman gets the stuffing kicked out of him in this film, far more than in Superman II; and yet he just keeps trying, no matter what. It's simply what he has to do.


• Mr. Maggin had another recurring theme. In fact, he originally wrote it for a writing class; and when he got a lousy grade, he sent it to DC instead, and they bought the script, and they hired him from there. (And now he's teaching writing. Kids, don't give up just because someone tells you you can't succeed, even if it's a teacher. Sometimes teachers are wrong, too. Did you ever see Superman give up? Huh? Huh?) That story, "Must There Be A Superman?" dealt with the possibility that by solving all of our problems, Superman was stunting our growth and making us dependent on him. He learned to let us solve our own problems, stumbling along the way and picking ourselves up and learning in the process; and he just gave a helping hand when the problems were too big for us. Well, that theme came up in this film, in a briefly remembered bit of advice from Jor-El; and in fact, it's Lois and Richard who end up saving Superman at one point. And Superman also steps back at one point to let people solve their own problems. This is straight from Mr. Maggin.

And the last bit of Maggin influence — Well, I want to close with that. So let me just say that this film, while very good, isn't perfect. It's a bit long. The end, especially, drags a bit, and could've been trimmed at least five minutes. And the director relied a little too heavily on slow motion in a couple of places (although one slow-mo scene that I thought dragged on a bit too long was justified in the end with a wince-inducing special effect that was actually kinda cool, if you're not squeamish about eyes). But those are minor quibbles. In most films, I can come up with a dozen quibbles more than that. None of that stopped me from saying toward the end, "OK, when's World's Finest coming?" (For the non-comic fans: World's Finest was a long-running Superman/Batman team-up book. After Batman Begins and this film, it's time for a World's Finest film.)

Back to that last bit of Maggin influence — and again, I'll concede this may be me reading into it. Maybe it's just a coincidence that the theme is so strong in Mr. Maggin's books and in this film, since it is kinda central to the whole Superman mythos. It has to do with fathers. A big element of Mr. Maggin's books was just how much Jor-El loved his son, and how hard he worked to protect him and guide him even though he would be long dead before his son grew up. He left lessons, and he chose protectors, and he chose the best, safest environment he could find for his son. He saw his responsibility to his son as his last, most important duty. And that's pretty much how this film opens; and in subtle ways, that comes up in places throughout the film. And it's how the film ends, as Superman finally fully appreciates just how important those sacrifices were to his father. (And I tried to be oblique, but I probably just ruined the ending for you. Serves you right for being so smart.)

And when I left the theater, I felt — Whoa... I felt — Wow... I felt Hahahaha, and Yes!!! And Yeehaaa! I felt like I was 18 again, seeing this film just after Superman II. I felt awed. I felt invigorated. And a reaction I never expected from a silly superhero film: I miss my fav'rit. I miss my Dad.

[Mommy, Martin sounds sad. Didn't he like the movie? Yes, dear. I think he liked it very, very much. Now goodnight. Sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite.]




Update: Bryce Zabel makes many of the same points. But he uses, like, one-tenth as many words. Bet you wish I'd told you that at the start of the review, huh?

Update 2: Ken Lammers has a very different reaction. (Warning! Major spoilers!) That's OK. I respect that. I don't agree with it, but I respect it. (But, um, dude, if you're going to say that that first action is out of character, then you're going to have to say that the action that led to that action back in Superman II was out of character. It's the same action, really, just cause and effect. And it would never happen in the comics. Movie audiences these days kinda expect it. We can debate the goodness of that expectation, but there it is.)

Update 3: James Hudnall liked it, too, though he thinks there was more room to cut at the end. For those who don't know James, he's a comics writer who has actually written in the Superman series, so I kinda think his opinion has some merit. James also wrote Harsh Realm, which was adapted into a TV series by Chris Carter of X-Files fame. And his book The Psyhco is working its way toward a film version. I first learned of James through his incredible Espers series. And he's a software geek who knows UML. So he's kinda like me, but, umm, cool and all that.

Nick Schulz reviews David Warsh's Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations. It sounds like important reading:

Thus instead of land, labor and capital--the traditional inputs of economic theory--it was "people, ideas and things" that mattered, driving technological change and entrepreneurial creativity. "No longer were the advantages of technical superiority to be understood as a case of 'market failure,'" Mr. Warsh writes. "They were part of the rules of the game." Such superiority was by its nature temporary--i.e., nonmonopolistic. New knowledge constantly trumped old, and the law (rightly) gave ideas only limited property-protection.

More and more, economists came to see that it was knowledge that made the difference in modern societies--e.g., in software, drugs, industrial processes, biotechnology and other parts of the economy where the upfront costs were large, the payoffs enormous and the benefits widespread. Economists inevitably turned their attention to the institutions or invisible structures--constitutions, customs, property rights, cultural sentiments (like trust)--that help to generate knowledge and sustain its effects.

I'll be looking for it.

The second in a series of vaguely related posts.

Did you ever read The Princess Bride?

No, no, no... Not this Princess Bride. That's the movie. And like most fencers I know, I've watched it way too many times, and can quote from it extensively. It is, in my opinion, one of Rob Reiner's finest moments. And that's saying an awful lot.

But as much of a cliche as I know this is: the book is better. Mr. Goldman (who also wrote the screenplay) had time to tell how his characters got to the story in the film. They each had stories only hinted at on screen. And the important story for today's purposes was thet of Inigo Montoya. ("Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." See, I told you I could quote from it excessively — I mean, extensively.) In the film, Inigo hunted the six-fingered man who had commissioned his sword-maker father to make a custom sword, but who then refused to pay for it and killed his father.

But in the book, we learn the story that came before the six-fingered sword. It tells of how the elder Montoya was one of if not the finest swordsmen in the land, and his swords came to be prized beyond any others. He had so much work that he couldn't keep up. So he raised his prices to try to drive business away. But buyers decided that such expensive swords must be even more valuable, so the demand increased. Soon he couldn't keep up with his own standards, and he openly said that the quality would suffer; but people didn't care, because only a genuine Montoya would do. And besides, despite his protests, he was too professional to ever let the quality really suffer.

If he hadn't been such a hard worker, he wouldn't have had to work so hard.

Same lesson, different story: Star Trek. The Enterprise crew is exhausted. They haven't had a rest in months. And on their way to some much-needed shore leave, Starfleet throws them another certain death challenge. And McCoy demands, "Why do they keep giving us all the hard jobs?" And Spock answers, "Because we keep succeeding."

No good deed ever goes unpunished. I really believe this is a law of human nature: the more you succeed, the more people expect from you.

Eight years ago, we of the Ann Arbor Dueling Society decided the time had come to finally do what we had been wanting to do for years: host our own tournament. We were complete newbies; but with a lot of help from the Division and a lot of patience and support from the Y, we pulled it off. We were tired and dirty, but we pulled it off. And we learned. And we vowed to do even better the next year.

And we did. In fact, much better. And better still the year after that.

But at the same time, the Y became a little more strict about the clock. There were various, justifiable reasons — cost of maintenance staff, building security needs, etc. — but probably the biggest was that they were saving and budgeting for a new facility. So while we were getting better at running the tournament, we needed to get better just to keep up.

But here's the thing about fencing tournaments (and I would assume other sports as well, but I can't say): people appreciate a well run event. They like it when things go well, and they get more time to fence and spend less time waiting for things to happen. And when they like a tournament, they're more likely to come back the next year — and to tell their friends about it, so they show up, too. So when you get better at running a tournament, more people show up.

And here's the thing about the Duelist: for various reasons, we chose to hold it in late August. That makes it the first tournament of the season; so people who haven't fenced in a tournament all summer are just a little more eager to show up. And also, it's one of the few tournaments during the pre-Labor Day summer season, when people tend to travel a bit more. So that's another pair of reasons why the Duelist has tended to grow.

And then here's another thing about fencing tournaments: when more people show up, more people want to show up. See, fencers (present company excepted) are all obsessed about improving their ratings. It's like horse racers wanting to run at pole position: a better rating helps you in small ways, and also just indicates that you're a better fencer. And the rules for awarding ratings state the you have to place at-and-such a place with so-and-so-many fencers including a minimum number of fencers of a given rating in order for you to advance in rating. So as more people start showing up at a tournament, the chances for a rating go up, enticing more people to show up at the tournament. It's a vicious positive feedback loop. Yes, we're proud of the size of our tournament; but at the same time, it's vicious.

And yet another thing about fencing tournaments: while the sport is still way less popular in the USA than seems right to us (good grief, one evening I caught two hours of competitive hot dog eating on ESPN, but they still won't air fencing tournaments), the popularity is growing. There are just more fencers out there looking for tournaments. (In our own miniscule way, we like to think we're helping that growth.)

Now here's one more thing yet about fencing tournaments: unless you can add fencing strips and directors, adding more people tends to make the tournament take longer according to the square of the number of people. See, initial fencing is divided up into roughly equal pools, where the number of pools is pretty much limited to the number of directors you have. (Michigan has some fine directors, but doesn't have many directors over all.) So if you add more people without adding more directors, you have to make the pools larger. And since the rules for pools are that each person in a pool fences each other person in that pool, well, that's an n-squared growth problem. Actually, its (n-squared + n) / 2 (George could explain why; but because I studied under him, the answer's intuitive to me.) Six people in a pool means 15 pool bouts. Seven people in a pool means 21 pool bouts, so a 16% increase in fencers means a 40% increase in bouts. And eight people in a pool means 28 pool bouts, or nearly double the 15 we started with. Adding people slows you down. A lot.

So while we have been doing everything in our power to get better and better at running a tournament, the very success we achieve makes it harder to run the next one. Every year we have had to learn from our experience last year and do just a little bit better; but since that sort of improvement can only go so far, we have had to invent new techniques for getting lots better at things we thought were pretty darn good already.

And that's the sort of game that can give certain sorts of control freaks (hey, I resemble that remark — and thankfully for the tournament, I'm not alone) a certain thrill as you try to find ways to beat your past performance. But in all modesty, last year's tournament (The Duelist VIII) was run as close to picture perfect as any of us could imagine. In our post mortem review (that's fancy talk for "hanging out in the bar afterwards"), we shared stories from the day; and we learned from each other of a half dozen to a dozen different catastrophes that didn't happen because someone on our very capable and conscientious staff happened to be in the right place at the right time and noticed the problem and had the presence of mind and the experience and the ingenuity to deal with it in the most efficient possible fashion. If we had simply had normal human failings just once, the whole schedule would've collapsed. And we are only human, after all, so we had to count luck as a significant factor in our success last year.

But with all that on our side — ingenuity, experience, willingness, determination, and lots of luck — we barely snuck out the door 30 seconds before the Y's closing time. Literally: they locked the doors behind us. Luck alone is not going to cut it this year.

On the plus side, the Y has lengthened their schedule by one hour this year. That will buy us some breathing room; but if the tournament grows at all, or if one catastrophe goes unaverted, we're at risk of the whole house of cards falling apart.

And yes, to the control freaks among us, that's a sick kind of game: how do we do measurably better than the best we could do last year? It's sad, I know, but we find it fun. We have to do better.

All of which is preamble to my next post...

So I was on the way home from my Tablet PC class in Louisville. I got a late start (as I'll explain shortly), and I wanted to stop in Dayton to see Apollo 15 at the Air Force Museum. So I checked into a hotel for the night. And I turned on the TV, flipping through channels for something to watch on a Saturday night.

And I came across the world premier of Superman - Brainiac Attacks on Cartoon Network. This premier was, naturally, intended to promote the DVD release on Tuesday (as well as to hype interest in the film that opens on the 28th, of course). And as usual for the recent Warner animated superhero shows, it was quite well done.

Tim Daly, one of my favorite underrated actors, returns as the voice of Clark/Superman, and Dana Delaney returns as Lois. The story has two primary threads: Clark's desire to share his secret with Lois and his fear that he might put her in danger, and Luthor's plan to rebuild Braniac and work with him to conquer the Earth. The two threads come together when the new, improved Braniac tracks Clark down in his secret identity, and Lois gets injured and infected in the ensuing battle. Will he have to choose between Lois and his responsibilities as Superman? Well, that would spoil the ending, so I'm not going to say.

I missed the first half hour, so I hope I can see it again soon.

...this listing for 40 Years Of The Amazing Spider-Man - *NEW for $20.54.

Why did it win the award for most confusing (nominated, selected, and awarded by me, and I'm not interested in doing any actual research to find anything even worse)? Was it because 11 CDs of Spider-Man comics are listed under Books > Nonfiction Books? No, lots of eBay listings are filed under the wrong category.

No, the problem is that the category is right. It's the title that's wrong. Here's the revised description of this book:

Description (revised)

The Spirit of Islamic Law
Item Specifics - Nonfiction Books
Author: Bernard G. Weiss Category: Law & Government
Publisher: Univ of Georgia Pr
ISBN: 0820328278
Format: Softcover Condition: New
Publication Year: 2006
Special Attributes: —

And then there follows a great-big splash page that describes the book in detail; and trust me, Spider-Man is not mentioned anywhere on that splash page.

Look, I know it probably costs, like, a dollar to cancel an eBay listing and create another one. But there's just no reason I can see to leave this listing up under such a misleading title. No one who wants The Spirit of Islamic Law will find the book under that title; and anyone looking for 40 Years Of The Amazing Spider-Man is not going to be happy when they open this listing. Amused, perhaps, but not happy: you see, the asking price for this book is half the original price of 40 Years Of The Amazing Spider-Man; and since the CD set is now out of print (drat!), secondary sellers on Amazon are charging $90 and up. $20.54 is a really exciting bargain... and then you find that you're looking at the wrong book.

P.S. And yes, Epee Bill, they have issued this title as well. And since it's in PDF format, it should work on that niche computer platform you prefer (though there are some user comments that indicate problems on Macs, including possible incompatibilities with Mac's built-in PDF reader).

So while I was researching this post, I found a post by Ron Coleman that's pretty informative. It discusses an ongoing dispute about the trademark "Superhero", which is jointly claimed by Marvel and DC. (Joint claim of a trademark is a pretty unusual circumstance.)

But more than that, the post has a link to the "Which Superhero am I?" quiz.

Normally I hate these quizzes. They're a waste of time, and often completely incomprehensible in their conclusions. And often I find that the questions aren't even answerable, because none of the answers is right for me. "Which would you rather do on a Saturday night? A. Go out to the dance club and party all night. B. Go out to a bar and get plastered. C. Hang out on the street corner, looking for a fight. D. Stay home and sulk." Hmmm, I don't see either "Stay home with my wife" or "Role-playing games" on that list. (This quiz is actually much better in that regard: it has a much larger number of questions; and the questions are all answered on a 1 to 5 preference scale, so I could answer every one of them.) And often the range of possible quiz conclusions is severely limited: often under ten, and sometimes under five. (This quiz has at least eleven possible conclusions, which makes it a little better than most.)

But come on... It's a superhero quiz! Like I could possibly resist.

And while I'm pleased with the results, I wouldn't have guessed them...

So in preparation for my trip to Montreal, I asked my sister-in-law Lynette for help with a simple French apology, since she had taken French in college. She refused to help, based on one really important fact: in French, it's all about the accent. In this simple phrase...

Je ne comprends pas le français. (I don't understand French.)

...at least 7 out of 26 letters are either barely spoken or else completely silent. (At least to American ears. Linguists have demonstrated that before a certain age, children can hear and recognize phonemes from every human language; but as they start to develop language skills, they lose the ability to discern phonemes that aren't in their native language. Weird, huh?) That's over 25% of the letters that aren't pronounced. A written French phrase pronounced as an American would sound out the letters is almost completely unintelligible to a French speaker. Here is, as best I can transliterate, how that phrase should be properly spoken in French:

Zh' n' compra pah-l fra'say.

Even that is too fully voiced: the r's in comprends and français are so softly voiced as to be almost w-like or h-like. When I hear a native pronounce those words, I can tell I'm getting them wrong; but I can't quite make my mouth get them right.

And here is how an unknowing American might pronounce that phrase, based on its written form:

Gee nee comprends pass lee frankaze.

So Lynette was right: it's all about the accent. Well, not all, but quite a lot. She recommended that I go to Barnes and Noble and pick up some of their French language CDs. She said that she had some good luck with their Russian tapes; and she further said that the audience wouldn't expect too much out of me, but would appreciate me making the effort. (And she was right.)

But I'm kind of picky when it comes to language instruction. I've heard from many sources I trust a lot that Pimsleur is the way to go when you want to get functional in a language quickly. And having tried some Pimsleur in the past, I found it to be pretty good at conversational fluency. It works on a few core principles. One is brevity. Their research says that more than 30 minutes of study per day won't do you any good, because your brain saturates. Another principle is anticipation: where some language instruction methods work by having you repeat phrases, Pimsleur introduces the phrases and then later asks you questions, where the phrases are the answers. There is some repetition, but there's a lot more anticipation. And they like to blindside you: you'll be in the middle of lesson 3, and they'll ask you a question from lesson 2 or 1. And what's surprising to me is how often I'll know the answer when the question is asked out of the blue like that.

So imagine my delight when I learned that the Barnes and Noble disks are Pimsleur disks. I had no reservations after I saw that, and I bought them immediately.

I've been listening to these disks and working the lessons for about a week now; and though they didn't keep me from embarrassing myself in Montreal (a speaker who won't embarrass himself for the audience's amusement just doesn't understand the power of cheap laughs), I honestly feel like I understand more French today than I do Russian — and I spent two long, miserable, interminably frustrating years studying Russian in college. In fact, my Russian experience convinced me that I have almost no aptitude for languages; and yet now thanks to Pimsleur Instant Conversation French, I'm actually having fun learning a language. That's a new experience for me.

Now there is a downside to Pimsleur: it's based exclusively on spoken language, not written. The emphasis is on conversation first, just like children learn their native tongue. The problem with that, though, is that I honestly think I can already comprehend a lot of written French better than I can understand spoken French. Why? Because again: it's all about the accent with spoken French; but there's no accent in written French. When I look at that phrase...

Je ne comprends pas le français.

...I can see a lot in it. The "ne" implies negative (though I would never have guessed that "pas" also implies negative, and I would never have guessed that a language would commonly use two negative indicators in a single phrase). "Comprends" all but screams "comprehends". "Le" is "the", even I know that. And similarly, I've heard "français", but I probably could have figured it out regardless.

But when I hear the phrase...

Zh' n' compra pah-l fra'say.

...there's almost nothing there that I can recognize. "Fra'say" is about it.

Why do I understand so much of the written phrase? Well, I first learned the answer in a fascinating old PBS documentary, The Story of English, that first aired when I was in high school. (And boy, I'm thrilled to learn that's available on DVD! When crap like this makes it to DVD, it makes me worry about the future of a society that actually wants to dredge up such programs; but then when I learn that this amazing PBS documentary is also available, it gives me new hope.) Hosted by Robert MacNeil, this series provides an overview of the history of the English language. As much as I jumped on the Cosmos bandwagon with the rest of the geeks, The Story of English was actually a more significant PBS series in my life. Cosmos just told me more about the scientific world view that I already held; but The Story of English opened up a whole new world view for me, the world of linguistics, of language as history. One of the many things that had fascinated me about The Lord of the Rings was how Professor Tolkien had invented all of his own languages, and how he had in fact written his "histories" (in part) as a way to explain how the languages became what they were. Suddenly, The Story of English made me see that that was exactly how real world languages work: the language is what the history led it to be.

And then I learned the answer again from Professor Thomas E. Toon, one of the two best professors I ever had at the University of Michigan. (The other was Professor George Piranian, who I'm delighted to see is still listed on the Emeritus faculty of the Math department. Some day, I have to write down my George stories...) Professor Toon roped me in with a class on Tolkien. I mean, come on! Tolkien! I read Tolkien's books over a dozen times before college. It had to be an easy A, right? Well, it wasn't easy, but it was a lot of fun; and that was due in equal parts to Professor Toon's knowledge and to his wit. (When his son was born, he posted a notice in the English department for a "Name That Toon" contest.) And so when I saw the listing for his English 301 class, The Power of Words, I couldn't resist. Here was a class on one of my favorite subjects (the history of English) taught by one of my favorite professors. I had to take it. And I enjoyed every minute of it, despite the fact that my papers were graded by a rather humorless TA who just didn't appreciate my style. (For an assignment on humorous language, I wrote the whole thing in a format that consisted of block-quoted jokes, each followed by a one-paragraph essay inspired by the joke; and then the jokes and paragraphs were arranged in such a way as to form a larger rhetorical point. It would've made a brilliant magazine article, I'm telling you, with the jokes as call-outs and the text as responses. But the TA felt that the jokes should've appeared in-line within the paragraphs, and the paper should've been structured in a more traditional, more academic style. Terminally stuffy, I swear. No imagination, no sense of style at all!) I just kept writing my papers my way, regardless. And I felt vindicated when Professor Toon returned my final paper to me, said some very kind words about it, and gave me a retroactive A for four papers. That final paper — a rather prescient essay (if I do say so myself) on how the evolution of computer terminology and its expansion into general use is a microcosm of the evolution of the English language itself — is still kicking around my office somewhere. After Professor Toon's praise, I just can't let that essay go. (And after all that, I still went into computer programming instead of English. It's a disease, I tell you!)

So after those two rather lengthy digressions (if you don't want digressions, you've come to the wrong blog), what's the answer? For that matter, you may have forgotten what the question was by now, so I'll reiterate. Why can I more easily understand written French than spoken French? The accent is what makes the spoken French harder for me, of course; but what makes the written French easier than, say, written Russian? No, it's not the alphabet, though that's a good guess: Russian uses the Cyrillic alphabet, which

Stop, Martin, stop! Please, please stop! Just get to the answer!

All right, all right, I'll stop digressing (yeah, right). The answer is the Norman invasion of 1066, in which William the Conqueror led a Norman force to conquer and occupy England. And when the Normans became the central government, the Anglo-Norman language became the official language of government. And since the English upper class wanted to curry favor with their new rulers, it became the language of the upper class as well.

And since Anglo-Norman is closely tied to French, that means that the English language gained some very strong French influences. In fact, English became something of a bifurcated language, with two words often standing for one concept: a word for the elite, and a word for the commoners. Professor Toon liked to point out examples from food, since food was one thing the two strata of society had in common: the commoners raised it, and the commoners and the elite both ate it. Thus...

• We raise cows, but we eat beef (from boeuf).


• We raise pigs, but we eat pork (from porc).


• We raise chickens, but we eat poultry (from poulet — though "chicken" is used on American menus a lot more often than is "cow" or "pig").

And so on. There are countless examples where English has two words for one concept, and the more "elite" word is derived very clearly from French. I know it might offend the pride of some Brits; but the language of their aristocracy has an awful lot of French in it to this day. And since American English derives from British English, the same is true here.

See? Language as history. Exactly what Mr. MacNeil and Professor Toon (and even Professor Tolkien) were trying to teach: language is never static (unless it's dead: nobody's inventing any new words or grammatical structures in Latin these days); and as a language changes and grows, it reflects the history and changes of the people who speak it. That, my friends, is very fascinating to me. It is a fundamental insight that changed my view of so much of the world, and still colors my approach to all sorts of topics. It made me, like Professor Tolkien and Professor Toon, a philologist: a lover of words, as Professor Toon explained. (Though the etymology is a little confusing: "philo" = lover + "logos" = knowledge leads to "lover of words"? But apparently "logos" also has a secondary connotation of "speech" or "words".) Oh, I'm strictly amateur in the subject. I have more of a Trivial Pursuit level of linguistics knowledge than any real academic knowledge. But still, the ideas fascinate me, and stick with me, and matter a lot to me. (Witness the length of this post!)

And as an amateur philologist and something of an avid reader, I like to think I have both a sizable English vocabulary and at least some familiarity with the sources for many words. I can recognize some degree of French roots, and Latin roots, and Germanic roots. (I can even sometimes recognize Slavic roots, thanks to those two years of Russian; but those are pretty uncommon in English.) But as those roots have been adopted, they have changed. As English has grown, it has modified in one direction; and meanwhile, despite the best efforts of l'Académie (hehehe), French has grown as well, but often in different directions. From my outsider's view, it sounds like the French language has evolved toward efficiency, toward saying more with fewer sounds by deemphasizing and even eliminating extraneous sounds in the words. The result sounds somewhat liquid or even melodious to me.

So when I see written French, it strikes a chord: I recognize a lot that's there, even though I'm still just beginning my study. But when I hear spoken French, that liquid efficiency undercuts all my knowledge. Sometimes when I hear a sentence on the Pimsleur disks, I have this strange feeling that if I just saw it written down, I would puzzle out the meaning. Practically the first sentence Pimsleur teaches is "Je comprends le français." (I understand French.) Three out of the four words there I can puzzle out with little effort when they're written down: "comprends", "le", and "français". That leaves only one word, "je"; and it's short, and I remember that short words are usually simple, fundamental concepts. In this place, I would guess a pronoun: he, she, you, or I. From movies and books, I know that you is "vous", so I would be left with three choices. I'm betting that I would guess I from context.

But "Zh' compra-l fra'say"? When I hear that, there's nothing I can easily pick out, especially when the speaker speaks at a normal conversational speed — and especially with those softly voiced r's. The first time I heard it, it sounded like "Zhucompal fra'say." All the English vocabulary in the world doesn't help me to recognize that.

So while I'm enjoying the Pimsleur disks, I'm supplementing them a lot. In particular, Babel Fish is my friend: it has done most of the heavy lifting of translating for my Ink in 60 Seconds talk, and for this post. I usually listen to the Pimsleur lessons while I'm driving; but when there's something I just can't get, I translate it on Babel Fish later, and it often clears up the confusion.

I think when I get a little farther along, I'll try to pick up some French books (or maybe comic books). I'll say it again: for the first time, I'm actually having fun learning a language. I know I'll get busy with a lot of things, and it will be hard to stay with this; but I hope I can manage it. It would be nice to say that I finally learned another language.

Eh. Mr. King could've stayed in retirement. His style is engaging as ever. He knows how to make sympathetic characters. But endings? The ending for this one is pretty flat.




I finished it, but I probably won't reread it. I'll give this one to Mom.

And the word in question this morning is "retirement". And it's hard to believe of a man who has written so many books, but apparently Stephen King just doesn't know the meaning of the word. And here's more proof. And more (though he might be forgiven for that one, since it's a non-fiction book about a once-in-a-lifetime event that he as a fan must have savored). I can think of a lot of authors who would love to be so "retired".

The man really just can't help himself. He will write, and no resolution is going to stop him.

Unfortunately, his latest work (Cell) demonstrates why he went into "retirement" in the first place. It's not a bad book at all. Mr. King has a natural talent that makes bad writing all but impossible for him, so the book reads well.

But one thing that led to his "retirement" was his feeling that he was repeating himself, that he had somehow mined all his ideas. This feeling came to him when he wrote From a Buick 8, which bore a superficial but unmistakable similarity to Christine. While the books are very different in almost every way, both are at the core stories about myserious cars which control and possess the lives of the people that encounter them. As Mr. King said in an interview on the Mitch Albom show (paraphrased), "Wait a minute. Haven't I been here before?"

And that's the problem with Cell: it has superficial but strong echoes of The Stand. That book told the story of a sudden release of an engineered virus that wipes out most of the world's population. A few of the survivors then go on a road trip toward some looming confrontation between Good and Evil.

And Cell? It tells the story of a mysterious signal that goes out over cell phones, transforming most of the civilized world's population into drooling zombies that slowly evolve into a group mind. A few of the survivors then go on a road trip toward some looming confrontation with the group mind.

Does that make Cell a rehash of The Stand? No. For one thing, it's only one-third the length. For another thing, it's much smaller in scope, both thematically and geographically.

But if Mr. King wanted to avoid repeating himself, this book was not the way to do it. That's not a criticism of the book itself — I'm quite enjoying it, actually — but I think it points out a flaw in his reasoning when he "retired" in the first place. When you write as many books as he has, you can't help revisiting old themes and motifs. He has largely covered the field already, so there's little room for truly new works. And honestly, I think all great artists revisit and build on their earlier works. For that matter, other artists build upon their ideas. So why shouldn't they?