Arnold Schwarzenegger: “HAN SHOT FIRST.”

It is not often that Arnold Schwarzenegger  and I agree these days but on this one I agree 100%.

Arnold and I agree!

THE MARTIAN by Andy Weir

Just finished the best book I’ve read in a very long time, maybe years. THE MARTIAN by Andy Weir. This is a fantastic and fascinating book of real-science science fiction about an astronaut inadvertently left behind on Mars when his crew thinks that he is dead and lost.   He has to find a way to survive with the few supplies left in the meager temporary shelter still there.  He has no way to communicate and  he has to wait until the next ship comes from Earth…in four years!  Add to that the fact that no one on Earth knows that he’s still alive. Thrilling, scientifically accurate, funny and just a great read, and a real testament to human intelligence and ingenuity.  Can’t say enough how much I liked it.

I understand Ridley Scott is making the movie with Matt Damon.

R. I .P. B B KING

I had the great pleasure of seeing BB King perform many times.  The first time at the Hampton VA Jazz Festival in 1983.

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS

Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton

Just rewatched the entire series FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS over the past two weeks. This is a wonderful series unlike any other show because this is not a show about bombs, terrorists, serial killers or intrepid, hip and cool rule-breaking cops tracking down bad guys.

What FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is, is a show about the small town of Dillon, Texas and the people who live there, all of whom have one major connection to each other, their love for their local high school football team, the Dillon Panthers.

Although football is the connecting tissue that holds this small town together, this show is really about the lives, loves, loses and wins of its citizens, the high school kids, their parents and friends and all of the hopes, dreams and frustrations that fill their lives.

It is about the football team. The anchor of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is the strong-willed and highly principled coach of the Panthers, Eric Taylor, played with intelligence and conviction by so KYLE CHANDLER, who has been so brilliant lately in the Netflix series BLOODLINE. The co-anchor, CONNIE BRITTON (Nashville) plays his wife, the high school guidance counselor.

It is a heartfelt show with football as a metaphor for life, but you do not have to be a football fan to enjoy this show.

Originally a documentary book by H.G. Bissinger, it then because a feature film directed by Peter Berg, who then developed it for television.

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is available on NETFLIX.

DAREDEVIL ON NETFLIX MAY BE THE BEST COMIC BOOK TO TV ADAPTATION

Binge watching the new Netflix DAREDEVIL series. This is a great show even if you’re not into the Daredevil comic books or any comics at all, and may well be the best of all comic book to TV adaptations. British actor Charlie Cox is terrific as Daredevil and Vincent D’Onofrio is channeling his inner Charles Foster Kane as a very scary and fascinating villain Wilson Fisk AKA The Kingpin.

ELMORE LEONARD: Michael Connelly hails the book world’s king of cool

Elmore Leonard

Must read article of appreciation of ELMORE LEONARD by one of America’s best and biggest selling crime writers MICHAEL CONNELLY in the L.A. TIMES.

Michael Connelly

MATT HELM – ONE OF THE FIRST AND MAYBE THE BEST

Cover of the first MATT HELM reissue, “Death of a Citizen”

I’m so happy to see that the early MATT HELM novels of Donald Hamilton have been rereleased by Titan Books.

I first started reading the MATT HELM spy series in my early teens.  Helm was a tough, cold, often merciless bad-ass action hero spy who wreaked havoc on Communist agents deep in the cold war throughout the 1960s all the way through 27 novels to 1993.

Helm was created by writer DONALD HAMILTON, who delved much into western and crime fiction before creating his ultimate fictional hero MATT HELM.

R. I. P. ELMORE LEONARD

So sad to report that Elmore Leonard, one of my favorite writers passed away this morning from complications following a stroke not long ago.  I already expressed my admiration for Leonard’s work in a previous post.  He was active and writing even at the age of 87.

PRAYERS FOR ELMORE LEONARD

It was reported yesterday that the great ELMORE LEONARD suffered a stroke at the age of 87.

In case you don’t know, ELMORE LEONARD is one of the great crime writers of our time. And forty years ago he was one of the great western writers.  Leonard was writing westerns all the way back in the 1950s, switched to crime novels in the sixties and is an icon in both genres today.  I’ve read all of his westerns and most of his crime novel as well and can tell you there is no one better.  He also wrote plenty of excellent screenplays.  

FOUR TV SHOWS OF THE LAST DECADE THAT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN CANCELLED PART 4

NUMBER 1:  FIREFLY  (2002)

Talk to sci-fi fans anywhere about television shows and inevitably one show above all others heads the category of : “The one that got away.”

FIREFLY is that one show that most fans recognize as being the greatest missed opportunity any network ever had to run with something special.  Unfortunately the execs at FOX in 2002 just did not get it, could not see it, and were oblivious to what a great, entertaining show they had.  And as a result probably missed the greatest opportunity to create what could have become the next billion dollar STAR TREK level franchise.