My last trip home to Chicago, I asked my parents about their genealogy research. On my dad’s side, the story I always heard was that theBartlettsmarried into the Carrolls; my grandfather and father were then given the name Bartlett Carroll. I ended up as Bart Carroll on my birth certificate, and later changed it to [...]
Archive for the ‘Stories’ Category
The Bartlett Family Name
Posted: May 20, 2012 in General, StoriesTags: Bartlett, Charlemagne, chess, genealogy
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Mockingjay
Posted: May 8, 2012 in Heroes, StoriesTags: Arnold Schwarzenegger, coin, fafhrd, frodo, grey mouser, harry potter, hero, heroine, hogwarts, hunger games, iron man, katniss, lord of the rings, mockingjay, peeta, president snow, the avengers, wizards
So, here’s my book report on Mockingjay—the final book in The Hunger Games trilogy. At least, my take-away impression, not so much of the heroine, Katniss, but on expressions of being a heroine. For anyone that hasn’t read the book—spoilers, dead ahead! Katniss, in this conclusion to the trilogy, has escaped the namesake Hunger Games [...]
Eternal Sunshine: Script to Screen
Posted: April 20, 2012 in General, StoriesTags: charlie kaufman, eternal sunshine, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
My only knowledge of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’s original script came from a piece of trivia in its IMDB listing (I love picking through IMDB’s trivia section). It mentioned Joel and Clementine originally written to have erased each other multiple times, into their old age, pointing to the doomed nature of their relationship. [...]
Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Movie
Posted: April 15, 2012 in General, StoriesTags: break-up, charlie kaufman, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, jim carrey, kate winslet, zaftig
I forgot how much I love Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, however sad it makes me feel. It’s one of my favorite movies, weirdly personal concerning past relationships—and having watched it again this past weekend, I enjoyed again how well crafted, well written, well acted it is. All of its scenes fit together so [...]
The Hunger Games, G.I. Joe, and Prison
Posted: April 8, 2012 in Heroes, StoriesTags: cliche, G.I. Joe. renegades, hunger games, katniss, prison, suzanne collins, tropes
It comes as no surprise that last week I watched The Hunger Games. So did everyone else in the world, plus a few citizens of the moon. And for good reason—it’s a well executed, faithful adaptation of the book, which itself was a fairly well written page turner. The most legitimate complaints I’ve heard so [...]
Hugo: Rewritten
Posted: January 30, 2012 in General, StoriesTags: hugo, invention of hugo cabret, review
It’s Oscar season—and since most Oscar-bait is released as far into the year as possible, that means we’ve been trying to catch up on our movie watching around here. This weekend, it was Hugo. Very briefly, the movie involves the titular Hugo, orphaned son of a clockmaker who haunts a Parisian train station. While evading [...]
A Tale of Two Books
Posted: January 22, 2012 in StoriesTags: hunger games, iain banks, suzanne collins, transitions
I’m currently in the middle of two books (48% into Iain M. Banks’ Transition, and page 90 of Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games). Usually this happens when I start a book, but it fails to catch enough of my interest that I drift over to something else. Life is too short to finish a bad book, [...]
Jack, the Giant Killer
Posted: December 16, 2011 in Heroes, StoriesTags: fairy tale, giant killer, jack, snow white
I’ve written in the past about Snow White’s double-jump to the big screen next year, with both Snow White and the Huntsman, and Mirror, Mirror. She’s not the only fairy tale character. They really do seem to be the next broad trope. I missed this latest version of Sleeping Beauty, perhaps for good reason. The [...]
Battlestar Wrap-Up
Posted: December 2, 2011 in StoriesTags: Adama, Apollo, battlestar galactica, cylon, earth, Starbuck, virus
An older post, but reposting here for the sake of archiving! Fair warning: this post is completely self-indulgent, having finally made my way through Battlestar Galactica (the SyFy Channel series). So sue me, I have to rant. I missed the show when it first came out (as I did with Firefly), but everyone who watched [...]
Last week, I reviewed The Immortals. This weekend, I caught Melancholia (which does sound like a disease, doesn’t it?). Here’s my two second review: Don’t watch it. They should have dropped that planet on Kirsten Dunst’s head 5 minutes into the film, and saved me the remaining 131 minutes. And now, hopefully, I’ve saved you [...]
