Star Wars: X-Wing: Solo Command (1999) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Well, I managed to wait to finish Solo Command until last night so I didn't have to review it over the weekend. So that's what we're going to be doing today. Let's get into it.

Published on February 2nd, 1999, Solo Command is the first Star Wars novel to be published in 1999, AND it's the second last one to be published before the novelization of The Phantom Menace by Terry Brooks was published by Del Rey. It was also the first of the last four novels and one short story compilation to be published by Bantam Spectra before the Star Wars novel license completely shifted back to Del Rey after sixteen years, six being in limbo since no Star Wars anything was being made, and ten with Bantam having the license. You know what? I think I'd like to go down that rabbit hole for a little bit before I actually talk about this book.

I haven't found anything about this, but when Lucasfilm negotiated the book license for a novelization of the then still upcoming movie, I'm assuming they also made a deal for spin-off/tie-in material as well. Besides the novelizations of the film trilogy, Del Rey published seven tie-in novels between 1978 and 1983. Splinter of the Mind's Eye, which was meant to serve as the basis for a low budget movie sequel should Star Wars be a moderate success, and two trilogies. One focusing on Han Solo and Chewbacca presumably prior to the events of the movie, and one focusing on Lando Calrissian, before he lost the Millennium Falcon to Han. Once Return of the Jedi came out and the Lando novels came out in late 1983, the novel publishing license for the trilogy ended and laid dormant as the rest of the merchandise licenses did. 

In 1989 or 1990 the license for Star Wars shifted to Bantam Spectra and a year or two later Heir to the Empire by Timothy Zahn was published. Everything that we know as the Star Wars Expanded Universe truly started here as the earlier Del Rey novels were pretty much ignored in the early days. By the time The Han Solo Trilogy by A.C. Crispin began publication in 1997, the earlier Han Solo and Lando Calrissian books started being acknowledged, though I don't think Splinter of the Mind's Eye was ever acknowledged within the novels and comics that came out between 1991 and 2014. I could be wrong on that, but I don't think anyone within the books and comics ever reference Splinter.

In 1999 the novel license shifted back to Del Rey most likely because the novelization for The Phantom Menace was being published by them. Besides the novelization of the then upcoming new movie, Del Rey published Vector Prime by fantasy author R.A. Salvatore. Vector Prime was the first book in a planned 19 book series called The New Jedi Order which shook up the Original Trilogy era of the novels, basically because the Bantam novels had stagnated since George was working on the Prequel Trilogy, so no novels could be published in that era, and there's only so many times you can have Han, Luke, Leia, Chewie, and the Solo kids get kidnapped without any real lasting consequences. So this series not only shook up the status quo, but it launched a whole new era of Star Wars publishing that opened up all eras of the in universe timeline now that the prequel movies were coming out and there wouldn't be a Sequel Trilogy of movies as this was long before the Disney buyout happened.

However, while the license for new Star Wars novels went to Bantam for the '90s, Del Rey had retained the license to reprint and republish the novels they'd put out in the late '70s and early '80s. In addition to three book compilation editions for the movie novelizations and the Han and Lando novels, now known as The Han Solo Adventures and The Lando Calrissian Adventures, Del Rey published individual editions of the movie novelizations and The Han Solo Adventures, and a new edition of Splinter of the Mind's Eye under the "Classic Star Wars" banner as you can see on the cover of Splinter above. 

What does all that have to do with Solo Command? Almost nearly nothing, but I wanted to highlight the history of Star Wars book publishing, and illustrate where this book fits in, since it was one of the last Star Wars books published by Bantam before Del Rey regained the license in 1999. 

I loved Solo Command when I was a kid. I still do, but rereading it now, it feels like Allston was trying to do too much in the book, focusing too much on gap filling because within the franchise's in universe chronology the very next book after this is The Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton, which was first published back in 1994. Because of this the focus is no longer on Wraith Squadron but instead on guiding the story to where it can match up with Courtship. It matches up well, but it takes any emotional connection to the squadron away from them. It also lessens the impact the mental breakdown that Myn Donos has when he discovers the woman he loves, Lara Notsil, is actually Gara Petothel, the person who caused the destruction of  his unit, Talon Squadron, by giving information on the New Republic to Admiral Trigit in Wraith Squadron, has on us as the readers. Especially those of us who have read The Courtship of Princess Leia before and know where Han and Zsinj's antagonistic relationship goes next, therefore guessing where it has to go here in order to get to that point.

It's kind of like how for those of us who followed the movies our whole lives, and saw the Original Trilogy before the Prequel Trilogy started coming out, knew where Revenge of the Sith had to end, and the basics of how it would achieve that ending. We knew Anakin was going to become Darth Vader, we knew the Jedi Order would get wiped out, we knew Palpatine was going to declare himself Emperor and turn the Old Republic into the Galactic Empire, we knew Luke and Leia were going to be born, and that Padme would get killed off or get written out of the story in some way. We may not have known the specific details like Order 66, that the Fall of the Republic would coincide with the end of the Clone Wars, and that Palpatine would manipulate Vader by revealing that he (Vader) supposedly caused Padme's death, but we knew the Republic had to fall, the Jedi had to go extinct, that Padme had to be written out somehow, and that Anakin had to become Darth Vader. We knew that.

The Wraith Squadron books are like that too. We knew that Zsinj couldn't die and that the Iron Fist couldn't actually be destroyed because they both showed up in The Courtship of Princess Leia, which takes place right after Solo Command. We also knew that Wraith Squadron had to be decomissioned or otherwise written out of the book because they don't exist in any of the Bantam era novels that take place after this book does, nor do they exist prior to their formation in Wraith Squadron. Though they do get mentioned in the next two X-Wing novels. Despite them being mentioned in those books, we don't see the Wraiths again until the 11th book in the The New Jedi Order series, Rebel Dream, which was published in 2002. And then outside of a few more New Jedi Order books, the Wraiths don't show up again until the final X-Wing novel, which was written by Allston and published in 2012. So even though they work for New Republic Intelligence, later Galactic Alliance Intelligence, they're just gone after this book.

Because of that Lara's relationship with Donos doesn't feel earned to me. Mostly because she had two scenes with him in the previous book, and he's a bit too forceful when he asks her out in this book. I get not every couple in this universe can be Mirax and Corran or Asyr and Gavin but the reason I like those relationships is because they evolved organically over the course of those first four X-Wing novels and we got to watch them grow and develop in the story. The problem with all of the romantic relationships in the Wraith Squadron books is that we see the beginnings of them in each of the three books, but then we don't get to spend any time with the couple in question one on one and so we don't become as invested in them as we did with the ones in the Rogue Squadron books. 

One of my favourite scenes is where Wedge, Chewie and Squeaky, the protocol droid who's Wraith Squadron's quartermaster, are on the Millennium Falsehood, the ship the Wraiths got to act as a fake Millennium Falcon, and Squeaky complains that he won't get any combat pay on this mission, and Chewie replies that he could rip Squeaky's arms off and beat him with them, ensuring that he would get combat pay. And when Squeaky translates this to Wedge, Wedge says, "You should've said, 'thank you, maybe later'." with Squeaky saying, "Sir, I don't think you understand this Wookiee's violence laden sense of humor." Proving that Wedge is being influenced by the Wraiths more than he's willing to admit. And then, like a page and half later, they've shut down the ship's systems and Squeaky asks Wedge and Chewie what they should do while they wait and suggests a few nmemonic memory games they could play. Chewie then suggests they play a game called Droid Crushers, Squeaky tells him he's never heard of that game, and Chewie replies that he'd be happy to demonstrate. This scene gets me every time I read this book just because it's so funny. Especially because Chewie and Squeaky have a similar relationship to the one Chewie has with Threepio, though Chewie doesn't threaten Threepio with dismemberment quite as often as he seems to with Squeaky.

Zsinj and Melvar aren't as bombastic or as funny in this book as they are in Iron Fist. Most likely because they aren't funny at all in Courtship, so Allston has to start reconciling his portrayal of them in this book and in Iron Fist, with how Wolverton portrayed them in Courtship. Zsinj and Melvar are great villains, two of the best villains in the Bantam era. Having said that though, because Timothy Zahn hit it out of the park with Grand Admiral Thrawn, Captain Pellaeon, and Joruus C'Baoth in the Thrawn Trilogy, none of the bad guys that came after them, or before them in the case of the books that are set before Heir to the Empire, could really hold a candle to that trio. The only ones who come close are Ysanne Isard and Warlord Zsinj. But everyone else, including Admiral Daala from The Jedi Academy Trilogy, Darksaber, and Planet of Twilight, aren't anywhere near as good as villains as Zsinj, Isard, and Thrawn. Which is fine, but at the same time it does stagnate the story because you don't have Palpatine or Vader to act as good foils for the heroes. 

 Like with the rest of the X-Wing series, Solo Command got a Legends banner edition sometime between 2014 and 2017. And like the other books I've talked about in the series so far, I don't know when exactly this Legends banner edition was published, because neither Wookieepedia nor the publisher's website indicate what year the reprint came out in. I also don't own the Legends banner editions for any of the X-Wing books, so I can't even check the copyright information inside the book itself to see what year is shown. Goodreads is a good resource for some of the Star Wars novels that got Legends banner editions, but not all of the books have that information included. I think it just depends on how popular or well known a Legends novel is. So like Heir to the Empire might have that information, but one like Solo Command might not.

Solo Command was the first X-Wing novel I read that Garrett didn't lend me. In fact, it's the first one I bought for myself that I hadn't read before. I actually didn't find out about it until sometime in mid to late 1999 or early to mid 2000 when I saw somebody reading it in the waiting room of the Respirology clinic at CHEO. Before that, I had no idea that more X-Wing books had been published after the first six because Garrett didn't have the three that came out in 1999 until we were both in middle school, me in grade 8 and him in grade 7. The thing is some of these later Bantam era novels didn't include that novels description/excerpt timeline in the back of them the way all of the earlier ones did. I don't know about The Bounty Hunter Wars, but Solo Command and Isard's Revenge, which is not only the next book to come out in the X-Wing series but also the very next Star Wars novel to come out overall, don't have it, so the very next time I've experienced this timeline is in the final X-Wing novel to be published by Bantam, Starfighters of Adumar, and it only goes up to Isard's Revenge for the X-Wing books, and book 2 of The Bounty Hunter Wars, Slave Ship, with a "Coming Soon" underneath it for book three in that trilogy, Hard Merchandise. So until that day, I had no idea that more X-Wing novels had been published after Iron Fist. It was probably about 2003 or 2004 by the time I actually got my hands on those last three books in the series, as that was when I had really started building up my Bantam era Star Wars book collection. 

Overall I still love Solo Command. While it has some problems, they're problems the book has always had, I've just never really thought about them before this reread. And I think that's the real power of these books. They continue to make you think about them every time you read them. Even 24 to 32 years after they've been published. The stories might suck and the characters might be stagnate, but if you're still thinking about them after you've finished reading the book and put it back on your shelf, or returned the eBook version to the digital library if you read eBooks, then I think that book has done its job. Which is pretty cool.

Alright my friends, that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back soon though with more blog posts. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Beetlejuice (1988) Movie Review

 Hey everyone, happy Friday! I'm back with a movie review. This time I'm talking about Beetlejuice directed by Tim Burton and released by Warner Bros. Pictures in 1988. I realize I kinda did that backwards, reviewing the TV show before the movie, but given that the show is only loosely based on the movie, you don't need to have any knowledge of the movie to watch the show. Especially if you're like me, and were introduced to Beetlejuice through the animated series rather than the movie. So, let's get into it.

Beetlejuice is one of those movies where everything you expect to happen in the movie, either doesn't happen, or doesn't happen the way you expected it to. For example, you'd think that Beetlejuice would be the main character since his name is the title of the movie. However, he doesn't fully appear in the movie until about thirty minutes in. In fact the main characters are Adam and Barbara Maitland, played by Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis, with Lydia Deetz, played by Winona Ryder, as the third main character. So not only is Beetlejuice not the main character of the movie, but Michael Keaton doesn't get top billing in the opening credits, though, unlike with Batman, which came out a little over a year later, Keaton at least gets top billing on the movie's posters, and on the home video covers.

Out of the entire cast of this movie, Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder are the actors I'm most familiar with, having seen them in a bunch of movies and shows over the years. The first time I remember seeing Winona Ryder in anything was Mr. Deeds in 2002, followed by Star Trek (2009) where she played Spock's mother, Amanda. The rest of the cast are people I'm not as familiar with, though I have seen Jeffrey Jones in both Howard the Duck and Ferris Bueller's Day Off both of which came out in 1986, and Catherine O'Hara in the first two Home Alone movies, which, spoilers, I'll be reviewing this year. The only thing I've seen Geena Davis in is Stuart Little (1999). I can see why Burton chose Keaton to play Batman after this movie was finished.

It's actually pretty odd that Beetlejuice was responsible for Batman getting made. Warner Bros. was a bit wary of greenlighting Batman because Tim Burton had only directed Pee-wee's Big Adventure up to that point, and, despite that movie being a success for them, Warner Bros. was unsure about entrusting a big budget feature film to such a rookie director. So, they gave him a trial run on Beetlejuice. Once the movie was successful, WB finally greenlit Batman after nine years of that movie being in development. 

I remember hearing Harry Belafonte's "Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)" on the radio alot when I was a kid, even going right up to when I was a teenager in the 2000s. Even before that though, the "Day-O" part was sung by Beetlejuice in the opening of the cartoon's first episode. My favourite scene in the whole movie is when Charles, Delia and their business partners start dancing and singing to the song. 

Honestly, I'm not a big Tim Burton fan, but the movies of his that I've seen, I've liked. Mostly. Batman Returns is my least favourite Tim Burton movie, and my least favourite Batman movie. Beetlejuice is a really good movie though. I never owned it on VHS or DVD, but I'm glad I have it on Blu-ray. As I said in my TV show review, I don't remember seeing the movie until it was on TV sometime in the mid 2000s, once I had a TV in my bedroom. It's possible that I saw it earlier than that, but if I did, it was one time, and it's not a movie that we rented regularly, if at all.

There's a sequel coming out in 2024 or 2025, with Keaton, Ryder, and O'Hara returning from the first movie. But, honestly, I have no idea if the movie will do well at the box office. Despite the success of the original movie in the '80s, Beetlejuice hasn't returned in any major way since the animated series ended in 1991. So while the movie was pretty successful in 1988 and has a fanbase, I don't think the sequel will have mass appeal. But, I guess we'll see in about a year or two when it finally comes out.

Overall Beetlejuice was a fun movie to watch. Like I said, I haven't seen it since the mid-2000s and hadn't watched it much, if at all, before that. So it was fun to revisit after so many years. Especially because I'm not a big Tim Burton fan, and I don't revisit his movies, except for Batman and Batman Returns. Now I can add Beetlejuice to that list, since I have it on Blu-ray now.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for this week. Unless I finish reading Solo Command this weekend. I'm trying to not do that but we'll see. So until next time have a great rest of your day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Sabrina the Teenage Witch #1 (1971) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm here to do a comic book review. Since Halloween was on Tuesday, I decided I would review Sabrina the Teenage Witch #1 from 1971. So let's get into it.

Having been a fan of Sabrina Spellman, her familiar, Salem, and her two aunts, Hilda and Zelda, since I was nine years old, I've wanted to cover the comics on one of my blogs for a really long time. Since I have the Sabrina the Teenage Witch: Complete Collection Vol. 1 in my collection, it was easy to do to get this issue read. Like most comics from Archie Comics, this one has multiple stories in them. 

First appearing in Archie's Mad House #22 in 1962, Sabrina is a character that has appeared in cartoons, two live action TV shows and a trilogy of TV movies, the first one essentially acting as the pilot for the 1996 sitcom starring Melissa Joan Hart. Though many many changes were made from the TV movie to TV series. When I was a kid, I knew that Sabrina was originally a comic book character, published by Archie Comics. What I didn't know is that Sabrina and her aunts, and Harvey, actually interacted with Archie, Jughead, Betty, Veronica, and Reggie, along with the rest of the Riverdale crew. I found that out in the 2000s, after the show was over and I started getting Archie Digests, which included Sabrina stories in them. 

The first story in this issue, "Strange Love" actually has Sabrina interacting with Ethel, Archie, and Veronica. Even though Zelda first appeared in Archie's Mad House #65 (1968), she doesn't appear very much in these early comics. Particularly not in this issue. Hilda actually predates Sabrina by three issues, first appearing in Archie's Mad House #19 (1962). 

What I like about this first story is that it establishes Sabrina's powers and her tendency to use them on silly teenage things, like getting back at Harvey for being out with another girl, despite the fact that Sabrina has no idea who Harvey is out with. Naturally, the first person she sees just happens to be none other than Archie Andrews. and she puts a spell on him, making him fall in love with her. Which angers Veronica, because, again, naturally it would.

The second story, "Mission Impossible", features Sabrina's cousin, Sylvester, who is a hippie (this is the '70s afterall). This is the story were Zelda appears, but she doesn't have any dialogue and only appears in a single panel. The conflict is comedic in that, Sylvester represents the kinder, gentler, witches, while Hilda represents the classic witches, who are nasty towards humans. Being a gentle witch herself, Sabrina is kind of thrust in the middle of the classic argument. Sabrina doesn't really do much in this story, as it's focused on Hilda and Sylvester, but it's her book, so she's not written out completely.

The final story, "An Uncle's Monkey", has Hilda fed up with Harvey's clumsiness, basically like Mr. Lodge's relationship with Archie, and threatens to turn him into a monkey. Comedy ensues when Cousin Ambrose, who wasn't in the 1996 TV series, but was a main character in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and I think he was in the early 2000s animated series as well, shows up with a monkey while Sabrina is up changing her clothes, due to Harvey accidentally spilling milk on them. She sees the monkey when she comes back downstairs and thinks that Hilda had changed Harvey into a monkey while she was upstairs changing, so she turns the monkey into Harvey. I think you can guess how that ends up going right?

This is a pretty good issue. It's funny because there's nine years of stories from when Sabrina originally debuted in 1962, to when this issue was published in 1971, yet this is a perfect jumping on point for kids who maybe weren't around to read the earlier stories in the '60s. Being a comedy book, and an Archie comic, it's easy to pick up any Sabrina comic, at least from the '60s and '70s and read them in any order. Mainly because, there's no continuity except when a character debuts and then continues on as a recurring character. Not like the superhero comics of the time that hadn't been one and done issues since the '60s. 

That's it for me for today my friends. I think I'll be back tomorrow to review the original 1988 Tim Burton movie, Beetlejuice, but I'm not quite sure yet. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care. 

Beetlejuice (1989) TV Show Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm taking a look at the 1989 ABC/Fox cartoon, Beetlejuice, based on the 1988 Tim Burton movie. I watched the three episodes from the show's first two seasons that are included on the Blu-ray of the movie last night since it was Halloween and decided I wanted to talk about the show. I'll be focusing on the show overall rather than on the three episodes that I watched last night specifically, though I will say which episodes I watched. So, let's get into it.

Beetlejuice was one of the many cartoons that I watched on Global in the early '90s along with Droids, Ewoks, The Care Bears Family, The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin, Inspector Gadget, The Real Ghostbusters, My Pet Monster, The Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show, and Dennis the Menace. The movie had come out in 1988, and while this show was based on the movie, it was not only its own thing, but was the only other Beetlejuice thing we'd end up getting aside from three video games based on the movie until Beetlejuice 2 comes out next year, unless Warner Bros. Discovery delays it until 2025 due to the ongoing actor's strike. Either way, Beetlejuice has been a dead franchise since the show ended in 1991.

While I didn't see the movie until it was on TV in the 2000s, I loved the cartoon. It was funny, well animated and the characters were fun. I probably saw the entire show when it was on TV, but until I got the Blu-ray of the movie I hadn't seen the show since I was a little kid. So I actually don't remember very much of it from then. Including the three episodes on the Blu-ray. Those episodes are Season 1, Episode 2b, "Skeletons in the Closet", Season 2, Episode 2b, "Spooky Boo-tique", and Season 2, Episode 7b, "A-Ha". Which brings me to something that I didn't remember from when I originally watched the show. Most of the show's episodes are only 12 minutes in length, so they were aired together as individual stories, similar to other cartoons that aired at the time, like The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, with one opening title sequence and one closing credits sequence. Though there are still plenty of single 24 minute episodes (30 with commercials of course), with the fourth season, which was the show's final season, only having 24 minute episodes. Again, there were alot of cartoons that were out in the '80s and early '90s that had episodes that had two stories, so it's not like this show was unique in that respect.

Besides the opening title sequence, I think what I remembered most about Beetlejuice are the extra supporting characters. Obviously, Lydia and her parents carried over to the movie, but in the Neitherworld, there's a ton of characters that weren't in the movie. The main one being Jacques the Skeleton, Ginger the tap-dancing Spider, The Monster Across the Street, who looks like a hairy, eyeless monster wearing cowboy gear, and his dog, Poopsie. There are others, like Lydia's friends, Bertha and Prudence, and her rival, Claire, but the Neitherworld characters are in the opening title sequence and are in the episodes a bit more since there are some episodes where Lydia's in the Neitherworld for the whole episode. 

As for the three episodes that I watched last night, they were all pretty funny and really good. I mean most of the jokes in them were pretty bad, but they're the kinds of things that I think are funny. They also gave a decent preview of the series as a whole, since one was Lydia and Beetlejuice looking for their car, Doomie, one had the pair interacting with the other Neitherworld denizens, including Jacques and The Monster Across the Street, and the third episode had them interacting with the people in Lydia's life in the real world. No Sandworms in the episodes though. 

Overall I really had a great time revisiting Beetlejuice after thirty years or more, as, even though Global continued airing reruns until 1998, I probably stopped watching the show sometime around 1992 or 1993, because I don't actually remember watching it at the log house or the other two houses that my family lived in until we moved to where my parents and I live now. It's possible I did watch it later than that, I just don't remember doing so, since that was the era of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Sailor Moon, Animaniacs, and Eek! the Cat amongst other shows I watched on Global at the time. Regardless, it was still fun watching the show again after having not seen it in more than 30 years.

Alright my friends that's going to be it for me for today. I'm gonna try to have a comic book review out tomorrow. Nothing big, just a single issue that I haven't picked out yet. So we'll see what I end up picking. Until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

The Big Bang Theory: The Definitive, Inside Story of the Epic Hit Series (2022/2023) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I'm back with another book review. This time I'm actually taking a look at a non-fiction book. As you can see from the title of the book, it's about the making of The Big Bang Theory. It's The Big Bang Theory: The Definitive, Inside Story of the Epic Hit Series by Jessica Radloff. The author interviewed the entire cast, including guest stars like Wil Wheaton, Mark Hamill, and Bob Newhart, as well as the show's co-creators, Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, the showrunners, Steve Molaro and Steve Holland, and other members of the production crew. I can't really give a spoiler warning, because it's non-fiction, but, I'll be talking about the show and my personal history with it. So, let's get into it.

The Big Bang Theory is one of my all time favourite shows, and my favourite comedy, with The Goldbergs being my second favourite comedy. The characters are so relateable, and it's about geeks and how we struggle to live in this world that is mostly anti-geek. This book illustrates that extremely well. Particularly how the show's creators and writers talk about how they approached each character in the writing process.

When the show was on the air from 2007 until 2019, I didn't follow the production of it very closely. So all the information in this book about the writing on the show, and how the writers came to certain decisions, was completely new to me. I even didn't really know that much about the show's creators. I knew who Chuck Lorre was as he'd worked on Roseanne, and created Two and a Half Men and Mike & Molly among many others, as well as being the guy who created the theme song for the original 1987 Ninja Turtles series. But, like, I didn't know that Lorre got rid of his TV in 1969 after Star Trek had been canceled along with another show, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1967-1969), and then just didn't have one until the late '70s. I also didn't know that co-creator, Bill Prady, was diagnosed with Autism during the third or fourth season of Big Bang, or that Steve Molaro and Steve Holland had worked at Nickelodeon on Zoey 101 and iCarly before being hired as writers and showrunners on Big Bang.

I also gained so much more respect for the show and the people who made it for how socially conscious they were at a time where that wasn't such a big deal. For example, they knew they needed more women on the show, which is why Maria Ferrari and Tara Hernandez were hired as writers, and Melissa Rauch and Mayim Bialik were cast as Bernadette and Amy in seasons 3 and 4. But the writers and producers supported Melissa Rauch when she was pregnant, which isn't really something you hear about when it comes to production crews and the heads of a show. Especially after hearing so much negativity about the producers and head of the franchise throughout the history of Star Trek in the '90s and early to mid 2000s. Even Wil Wheaton, who had been trepidacious about doing the show when he did his first appearance in season 3, admitted that the producers on Big Bang were the best he'd ever worked for on a show, citing his bad experience working on Star Trek: The Next Generation from 1987 to 1990 as being what affected his view of showrunners and producers.

As for the writing, they never wanted these characters to do things how we're told we're supposed to do them. Which is why Sheldon and Amy's relationship slowly progressed and didn't become sexual (and even then only once a year) until season 9 and they didn't get married until the end of season 11. It's why Leonard and Penny had so many ups and downs in their relationship from their big breakup in season 3, to them getting back together in season 5, to them getting engaged at the end of season 7 in the weirdest way possible, because that's how humans work.

They also explained why Raj didn't end up with anybody at the end of the series too. Sometimes we don't find the love of our lives. Sometimes we're fine being single and just spending time with our friends, if we have friends who are able to spend time with us despite their busy lives. All too often TV shows and movies, and other entertainment mediums, tell us we need to find our partner in our 20s and 30s. That we have to get married, have kids, and make a certain amount of money to be considered successful. The Big Bang Theory didn't do that. Not entirely anyway. Sure, Leonard and Penny, Howard and Bernadette, and Sheldon and Amy all got married, and they all had kids (Sheldon and Amy were revealed to have had kids on Young Sheldon via voiceover), but not Raj. With Raj they showed someone who wanted to find love, but, wasn't able to find exactly what he was looking for, outside of his friendship with Howard. Because, sometimes, when you have the right friends, that's all the love you need. Which is why I'm okay if I don't find the love of my life. I have the best group of friends that I could ever have asked for, and that's enough for me. If the right person comes along, sure I'll be happy, but if that never happens, I'll be okay.

This book also delves into the hardships the cast and crew went through during the 12 years the show was on the air. Which is interesting. But, what really made me love the book is that the writers admitted that the stuff with Wolowitz early on in the show, before his relationship with Bernadette helped him grow out of being the sleaze that he was, didn't work and were things they wished they hadn't done. They also admitted that many jokes in the early seasons of the show would never have flown on TV today. Because when the show first started back in 2007, social media was just starting to become a thing, so the show didn't have as much scrutiny as the later seasons ended up having. On top of that though they said that they learned what not to do as the series went on, and grew as writers as a result. So that was really cool to see just how candid everybody was.

I have to admit that I stopped watching The Big Bang Theory as regularly as I did when the show first started. Not really because I didn't like it as much, though I did feel they didn't do enough with Raj once Emily Sweeney (Laura Spencer) was out of the picture. But, the real reason I stopped watching the show regularly is because by the time seasons 10 and 11 came out in 2016 and 2017 the Arrowverse shows had really taken off with Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow starting in late 2015 and early 2016 respectively, and then Star Trek returned to television with Discovery in 2017, and it was on on the same night as The Big Bang Theory, and during the same start time. I was also still watching The Goldbergs every week as well. I still watched Big Bang for the big episodes like the 200th episode in season 9, Sheldon's proposal to Amy in season 10, Sheldon and Amy's wedding in season 11, and the series finale in season 12. I just wasn't watching it week to week the way I had been up until 2016.

This book is not only a testament to the people who worked on the show for 12 years, but it's also a reminder. A reminder that shows like The Big Bang Theory is just as important as any superhero show or any Sci-Fi or Fantasy show. Because while it is a sitcom, the heart of the show is the characters. We root for Penny, Leonard, Bernadette, Howard, Amy, Sheldon, and Raj because we're them and they're us. Even if their successes aren't what's the norm on TV. They reminded us, and continue to remind us that it's okay to be single, it's okay to be neuro-diverse, it's okay to be a geek, it's okay to make mistakes and then learn from them, and it's okay to be different from other people. Which is a message I really like, as someone who is neuro-diverse, physically disabled, geeky, single, and who makes mistakes, but then learns from them.

If you're a fan of Big Bang, I highly recommend getting your hands on this book. I loved it. I have the 2023 paperback edition, which came out earlier this month, so it has additional pictures courtesy of the cast and crew that weren't in the 2022 hardcover, and it also includes a little tidbit that on April 12th of this year, Warner Bros. Discovery announced a new spin-off of the show is in development. Young Sheldon was the first, but there's no details on what the new show is about given that almost right after that announcement was made the writer's strike started, and then the actor's strike shortly after that. So we'll see what happens in the future.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I hadn't actually planned to do too many blog posts this week because I had planned on getting my next Covid shot. So, I guess, maybe, I'll be back for a comic book review later this week and maybe a movie review at some point too. We'll see. But, until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care. 

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S01E01 "Strange New Worlds" (2022) TV Episode Review

 Hey everyone, happy Friday! How's it going? I'm pretty good. So, I'm back for the final Star Trek pilot/premiere episode review, in terms of both what I have access to, and the fact that SNW was the last Star Trek series to premiere up to this point. Of course, I already have a review for this episode up on the blog from when it originally aired last year, but this review will focus on things that I noticed upon my rewatch of the episode last night. So, let's get into it.

Television hasn't really changed for me much over the years. I usually don't revisit shows after I've seen them, unless I have them on DVD or Blu-ray. One of the reasons TNG was one of my favourite shows is because I had a decent amount of episodes on VHS, both retail releases, and episodes taped off the TV, so I could rewatch them even if I didn't have access to reruns of the show. Same goes for other shows that I grew up watching. And even though the majority of new shows I watch are Disney+ shows, or Hulu shows that come out on Disney+ here in Canada, my brain hasn't quite grasped the fact that, as long as the shows are still on Disney+, I can go back and rewatch them whenever I want. And I think that's just because most modern shows are a single story told over six, eight or ten episodes that make up the season. But with SNW, which I have the first season of on Blu-ray, the series is episodic. So I can pop in disc 2 of the Blu-ray and watch "Spock Amok", as an example, whenever I want, without having to do a full season watchthrough. But with something like Goosebumps, Ahsoka, Only Murders in the Building or The Mandalorian, it's alot harder because each episode is only a piece of the story. 

Up to this point Star Trek has had a rough go of it since Discovery debuted in 2017. The first couple of seasons of both Discovery and Picard were almost nothing like Star Trek. They were gratuitously dark, gritty, pessimistic, with mostly undeveloped new characters, and in the case of Picard, out of character legacy characters. Lower Decks resorted to crude humour and general meanness to attract an audience and it worked because Lower Decks is, unfortunately, the Star Trek with the most mass appeal. Prodigy suffered from Nickelodeon's stupid scheduling pattern and all of the problems that plagued the Nickelodeon era of Power Rangers in the 2010s. Then came SNW and it was a huge breath of fresh air because, well, it was Star Trek. Sure, modern day TV drama beats were present, but the characters actually liked each other, and generally had good outlooks on life. Except for La'an. But, given what we know about her now after two seasons and twenty episodes, she has a reason for being the way she is. And the show was episodic, though each character had an overarching story that carried throughout each season of the show, and they all grew and developed as characters in a way that seemed to elude the characters of Discovery. Though that show did get better as it rebooted itself by sending the USS Discovery and her crew into the future, effectively ending the prequel series it started out as, it still suffers from the same problems that Michael A. Stackpole's Star Wars: X-Wing novels suffer from, an ensemble cast of characters, that doesn't work as an ensemble cast of characters.

Something I noticed upon rewatching the first episode of SNW for the first time since it aired, without commercials I might add, is that La'an and Pike's conversation at the end of the episode doesn't actually make sense. La'an apologizes to Pike for not informing him that she and Una had known each other prior to the mission on Kiley 279, as if it was a secret she'd been hiding from the crew. Except, the way the episode is written, from the point where Pike and Spock meet La'an on the Bridge, to when they find Una and the astrophysicists that had been on the Archer with her, La'an had never given Pike a reason not to trust her, and there was no indication to us, the audience, that she was on the Enterprise for any reason other than Starfleet had assigned her to the ship as her chief of security, and had assigned her to replace Una as First Officer until they recovered her. It was as much a twist to me, as a member of the audience, as it was to Pike in the show, when it was revealed that La'an and Una knew each other and that it was Una who had rescued La'an after the Gorn had killed La'an's entire family. So that whole conversation didn't make sense within the context of what we were given earlier in the episode. But, it is a good way of seeing how La'an and Pike interact with each other.

I thought it was funny at the end of the episode when Admiral April told Pike and Spock that Starfleet was changing General Order One to the Prime Directive and Pike replies, "That'll never stick". I laughed, both times I saw this episode, because in TOS they still call the Prime Directive General Order One and use the two names interchangeably, but by the first season of TNG, which is set in 2364, it's simply the Prime Directive. I wonder if Pike's line was meant to be a tongue in cheek nod to the interchangeable term in TOS on the part of Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman, and Jenny Lumet, the three writers of this episode.

Also, seeing where Pike ends up by the end of this season, and by the end of season 2, I think it makes his story here even more solid. And seeing how the crew gels with each other is cool. While Ortegas, Spock, Una, and Mitchell have been there for a while, M'Benga, Chapel, La'an, and Uhura are new, yet they all work together as if they've always known each other. Despite the fact that Uhura and Chapel meet for the very first time in this episode. Of course, we find out in season 2 why M'Benga and Chapel work so well together. 

SNW was one of Paramount's worst kept secrets. After seeing how popular Anson Mount, Ethan Peck, and Rebecca Romijn were as Pike, Spock, and Una in season 2 of Discovery and season 2 of Short Treks, the rumour that Paramount was developing a series starring those characters started circulating even before the second season of Discovery had ended. At the same time though Paramount wasn't acknowledging anything of the sort, until they suddenly did at the end of 2020. And, honestly, I didn't think this series would be very successful. Pike was an unknown character to most casual viewers of Star Trek, because despite having numerous novels and comic books dedicated to his time as the captain of the Enterprise, none of them are considered to be canon, and other than "The Cage", which didn't air until 1988, "The Menagerie", which was the original audience's look into the Star Trek that could've been since it used footage from the unaired pilot as flashback material, and the 2009 movie, set in a parallel universe and Pike being in the hands of the Romulans from the future for the vast majority of the movie, audiences didn't have much of an exposure to the character of Christopher Pike.

There are millions of Star Trek fans around the world, however as we saw with DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, if the general audience isn't onboard, the show simply won't be successful. And that's true with any franchise in any medium. I just did not think that setting a Star Trek series on the original Enterprise during Pike's tenure as Commanding Officer would appeal to an audience that would be big enough to justify Paramount's faith in it. Especially at the time this show was announced, when Paramount+ was still CBS All-Access. They did the restructuring not long after SNW was announced. Because, let's face it, Star Trek hasn't really been that popular with the general audience since TNG went off the air in 1994. The box office numbers declined as each TNG movie came out, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise all failed to gain a new audience during their original runs, and the alternate reality films didn't even come close to making the kind of money Paramount had lost when the MCU moved from Paramount and Universal to Disney/Marvel Studios. Not to mention the current slew of shows all started on a barely surviving streaming platform.

No matter what franchise you're looking at, and no matter how big of a fanbase that franchise has, the ultimate goal of these shows and movies is to bring in a wide enough audience in order to sustain them financially, because a studio, a network, or a streaming service won't want to finance a show or series of movies if said show or movie doesn't warrant it. That's one of the reasons so many shows never make it past their first season, and why TOS was canceled back in the '60s. While there was a small, dedicated, fanbase during the show's original run from 1966-1969, the audience wasn't big enough to warrant Paramount and NBC to renew the show at the end of the third season. Especially because syndication wasn't a thing yet. Episodes would air during the season, maybe air one more time between seasons, during the summer, but that was it. Plus given the amount of negativity surrounding the other then current live action Star Trek shows on at the time, I had no faith in SNW.

I am extremely glad that I'm wrong. SNW is a fantastic show. It's my favourite of the modern era of the franchise, and it's my second favourite behind TNG. And this episode came out swinging in terms of the quality of the storytelling. I mean, we got a Prime Directive episode right out the gate, and a strong one at that. Which is a far cry from the series premieres of both Discovery and Picard. I'm also glad that Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Meyer are the showrunners because they are Star Trek fans themselves. And not just TOS fans, but they're fans of everything Star Trek. I've said this many MANY times over the last year and a half since SNW started but I'll say it again, I am very certain that they're fans of Star Trek: Early Voyages and the few novels that take place during Pike's time as the captain of the Enterprise, because there's so much in this series that I swear came from the comics and novels, which are pretty obscure.

I love SNW, and this first episode holds up extremely well, a year and a half later. It's a solid introduction to the characters, both new and legacy, and it leaves things for future episodes to build upon. We got so many dense and interesting characters, written a great group of writers, and played by an awesome cast. "Strange New Worlds" is tied with "Emissary" as the best of these pilot/premiere episodes for me.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I might be back with a review of Hocus Pocus 2 tomorrow, or I might wait until next week to do it. I haven't decided yet. So until then have a great rest of your day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Hocus Pocus (1993) Movie Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I'm back with another movie review. This time I'm taking a look at the 1993 Halloween cult classic film, Hocus Pocus. I doubt there'll be spoilers in this review, though I might do some minor ones, depending on how things go as I write it. We'll see though. If there are spoilers, this is your spoiler warning. Let's get into it.

Hocus Pocus isn't a movie that I grew up with, despite growing up in the '90s. I don't remember seeing any commercials for it on TV, I don't remember seeing any previews for it on any other Disney home video releases, though apparently there's one on the VHS for Super Mario Bros. (1993), and I never saw it at the video store or for sale at K-Mart or Zellers. It most likely aired on Family Channel at some point in the 2000s, but, I never saw it, and I never saw it on TV anywhere else either. I've actually heard more about it in the last tfour or five years than I ever did growing up. But, with it being on Disney+, I decided to give it a shot because, despite it bombing at the box office when it originally came out 30 years ago, it's gained a cult following through DVD releases and airings on various Disney owned TV channels. Which is interesting, because, normally a movie gains that following through the original home video release, in this case VHS, but, it wasn't until the DVD release, which came out in 2002, that people started to watch it.

The movie came out on July 16th, 1993, which was the same day that Free Willy came out. Though, according to Wikipedia, Hocus Pocus was ahead of Free Willy at the box office opening weekend, but obviously quickly fell behind. The thing is 1993 didn't have a ton of major box office successes. The biggest one was Jurassic Park. So it's not like Disney had any major competition that year. Maybe it's because it came out in July, and most kids maybe aren't as interested in seeing a Halloween movie in July. I don't know. 

The cast is spectacular. You have Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kathy Najimy, Omri Katz, Thora Birch, Vinessa Shaw, Doug Jones, Sean Murray, Jason Marsden, and Kathleen Freeman. I'm not super familiar with Bette Midler's work though she did voice Georgette the poodle in Disney's 1988 animated classic, Oliver & Company, which I have seen, and she voiced Grandmama in The Addams Family in 2019 so I have seen her in a couple of things, but nothing major. I mostly know her from her 1989 version of the 1982 song, "Wind Beneath My Wings", which I used to hear on the radio quite a bit when I was growing up. Particularly in the 2000s. I'm also not super familiar with Sarah Jessica Parker's work. I've seen her in season 4 of Glee, but I mostly know her from commercials for Sex and the City. The rest of the adult cast is great, with particular shoutouts to Doug Jones as Billy Butcherson, who is the man of a thousand faces though I know him as Saru on Star Trek: Discovery, and the late Kathleen Freeman as Max and Allison's teacher, who I know as The Penguin in The Blues Brothers (1980) and as Gloria, one of the ladies that Jake (Jonathan Taylor Thomas) gets a ride from (all Tom Jones fans) in I'll Be Home for Christmas (1998). She's the one who rips the Santa Claus beard off of him and says, "Did I hurt you Santa? Good". 

The younger cast was amazing. Omri Katz as Max, Vinessa Shaw as Allison, and Thora Birch as Dani did such an amazing job. I've seen Omri in Matinee, which also came out in 1993. He played Gene's friend, Stan. I admit I only know who Thora Birch is from an article that the November 1995 issue of Disney Adventures magazine did about the movie she was in at the time, Now and Then. Vinessa Shaw is the only one of the three main kid stars that I'm not familiar with at all. She's done a ton of movies, but I've never seen any of them. One more note to make on the cast is that Sean Murray, who everyone knows as Agent McGee on NCIS, plays the original human form of Thackery Binx, and Jason Marsden, who voices Max in A Goofy Movie, and is a major voice actor for animated TV shows, voices Binx as a cat. Marsden apparently appeared as a Ferengi in a season 4 episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, which is hilarious. I'll have to keep an eye out for his character when I get around to doing a watchthrough of DS9.

Honestly, I really like this movie. I don't like it as much as I might've had I watched it growing up in the '90s and early 2000s, but, it's a solid movie. The jokes are funny, the action is pretty intense, and it has an incredible cast, as I've been raving about for the vast majority of this review. It's not a horror movie, but it is a Halloween movie. There isn't anything in the movie that didn't make sense to me and I liked all of the characters, except for Jay and Ice, the bullies of the movie, who steal Max's shoes for some reason. Yeah, that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Of the three Sanderson Sisters, Sarah, played by Sarah Jessica Parker, is my favourite. Probably because she acts the least evil of the three. Not to mention the least scary of them.

Honestly, I had no idea what to expect when I turned on Disney+ to watch Hocus Pocus for the first time last night. Like I said earlier in this review, I'd heard of the movie, but not a super ton and not until sometime in the last four or five years. I was completely unaware of its existence when I was a kid. Nobody I knew watched it, or if they did, they never talked to me about it. So despite hearing about it as an adult, I had no real preconceived notions going into it. I also didn't watch or read any reviews online before watching it, so I wasn't influenced by anyone else's opinions of it.

Overall this is a great movie. The sequel, which came out last year, is on Disney+ so I'll be watching that tomorrow night probably. But, for now that's it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for my revisit review of the first episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, "Strange New Worlds", which is the last Star Trek pilot/premiere episode review that I'm doing since I don't have Discovery, Picard, Lower Decks, and Prodigy to watch their premiere episodes. So, until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.