Books I'm Looking Forward to in 2012

SFGate.com has already posted my list of the Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2011. So, what books  am I eagerly awaiting in the coming year? Here's a short list, a mix of crime and sff/horror:

1. Liminal People by Ayize Jama-Everett (January)
Small Beer Press seems to be pushing this one hard, and Jama-Everett is currently local to the Bay Area, so I'm intrigued. A mix of thriller, science fiction and superhero saga, the novel doesn't seem to lend itself to easy description.

2. The Chalk Girl by Carol O'Connell (January)
O'Connell's feral cop Mallory was kicking ass and taking names long before that girl with the dragon tattoo arrived. Glad she's coming back for further adventures after a brief hiatus in the series.

3. The Mirage by Matt Ruff (February)
Ruff's "Set This House in Order" is one of my favorite novels of psychological dissociation, and I like his "Bad Monkeys" quite a lot. His latest sounds mightily ambitious and is set in an alternate Middle East after Christian fundamentalists have flown jetliners into the Tigris & Euphrates World Trade Towers in Baghdad. Yikes.

4. The Troupe by Robert Jackson Bennett (February)
Bennett's "The Company Man" was my most pleasant surprise of 2011. I've described it as similar to an "X-Files" episode written by Clifford Odets. I can't wait to see what he's up to next.

5. Hide Me Among the Graves by Tim Powers (March)
Powers never fails to surprise and amuse. Details are unclear, but this new novel seems to be about vampires and painters in the mid-1800s. We'll see.

6. Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway (March)
Harkaway's first novel, "The Gone-Away World," was smart and ambitious, but didn't seem to take off in the U.S. as I thought it might. Now he's back with a book about clockmakers, doomsday devices and superspies.

7. Point and Shoot by Duane Swierczynski (March)
The conclusion of Swierczynski's paperback-original Hollywood trilogy. Should be a blast.

8. Poison Flower by Thomas Perry (March)
Perrry is one of the most consistent crime writers in the business, and his Jane Whitefield novels are always good to great.

9. The Wind through the Keyhole by Stephen King (April)
Another chapter in the Dark Tower sequence, this time featuring a tale-within-a-tale. 

10. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century 2009 by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill (June-ish)
It's been a long time coming, but the concluding installment of the third series promises to be suitably apocalyptic. 

Comics Review -- "iZombie: Dead to the World" by Roberson and Allred

At this point, the living and/or walking dead hold almost no interest for me. Over the past five years, I've received more zombie and vampire novels, comics and pop cultural detritus than I can deal with, and still it keeps coming.

There are a few writers, however, that do I trust to do something interesting with the tired old tropes, and Chris Roberson is one of them. I've enjoyed his science fiction, including the novels "Here, There & Everywhere" and "End of the Century." So, when he comes along with a new DC/Vertigo zombie-starring monthly, my interest is piqued, especially when the art is by Michael Allred, the creator of "Madman."

"iZombie" focuses on Gwen Dylan, a gravedigger who also happens to be a zombie, and her friends: Ellie, a girl-ghost stuck in the Sixties; and Scott, aka "Spot," a "were-terrier." Gwen needs to feed on brains, otherwise she'll become a mindless, shambling husk. The trouble is, after a meal she is overwhelmed by the thoughts and emotions of the recently deceased, spurring her to resolve their unfinished business.

There's a very cool "Groovie Ghoulies" vibe about this whole project, and Roberson's dialogue and Allred's art mesh perfectly, creating a welcome balance of humor and horror. Unfortunately, "Dead to the World," which collects only five monthly issues, is mainly set-up. The characters are introduced, including a pair of monster hunters, a pack of female vampires and a resurrected Egyptian mummy. Some plot complications are set in motion, but nothing gets resolved in this initial collection.

Which is fine, given the narrative potential on display here. It's a fun start, and Roberson and Allred have the chops to ferry this story through many more volumes.

Comics Review -- "Daytripper" by Fabio Moon & Gabriel Ba

Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba are twin brothers from Sao Paulo, Brazil, with more than 15 years of experience in comics. I wasn't familiar with their work until I picked up the two collected volumes of "The Umbrella Academy," written by Gerard Way. Their ability to depict hyperkinetic surrealism adds a lot to that gonzo superhero series. So I was intrigued when I received the non-superheroic "Daytripper, both written and illustrated by the brothers.

"Daytripper" is a much more somber affair. When we first meet Bras de Oliva Domingos, he's 32 years old, unenthusiastically composing obituaries for a daily newspaper. His stand-offish father is a revered and best-selling writer, and Bras finds it difficult living in the older man's shadow, especially since he wants to write a book of his own. On the way to a black-tie tribute to his father, Bras walks into the wrong bar and comes face-to-face with death in its most concrete form.

The subsequent chapters of "Daytripper" shuttle back and forth in time, presenting a day in Bras's life at 21, at 11, at 38. He falls in love for the first time, loses his best friend, awaits the birth of his son. But each time, the day ends with an unforeseen, often utterly capricious, tragedy.

I'm not sure I would have stuck with "Daytrippers" had I read it as a monthly pamphlet. Across ten issues, ending each chapter with a version of Bras's death begins to feel gimmicky by about Chapter Four. But as the clues begin to pile up, and Bras's continuing encounters with mortality hint of a possible resolution, the narrative becomes clearer and compelling.

"Daytripper" is a trippy, thoughtful piece of Latin-flavored magic realism, serious in intent, but joyous in its details. I'm hyped to see the next Umbrella Academy limited series, but this graphic volume was a welcome side-trip.

Late to the Party -- 5 Neat Things I Only Recently Discovered

One problem of being a critic is that you can lose sight of interesting material that doesn't conform exactly to your expectations. There's so much stuff out there that it's often impossible to keep track of books, comics, movies or TV shows that are not right in front of you but that you would really enjoy if someone would simply push you in the right direction..

The folks at the AV Club offered their own take on this dilemma a little while ago, but I have my own selections and undoubtedly thought for this article idea first. Ahem..

Comics
The Umbrella Academy
I would normally be wary of any comic created and written by a rock star, since most such books would reek of "vanity project." But "The Umbrella Academy" by My Chemical Romance member Gerard Way, with art by Gabriel Ba and covers by James Jean, is actually pretty great.

Imagine the X-Men crossed with the Doom Patrol, add you've got some idea of what the Umbrella Academy is all about. There's time-travel, an approaching apocalypse, hit-men who dress as cartoon characters and a disbanded group of superheroes with a lot of excess emotional baggage. "The Umbrella Academy" has the weird whimsy of Grant Morrison at his most accessible but manages to remain true to its own hinky vision.
So far, there are only two collected volumes, "Apocalypse Suite" and "Dallas," though a third arc, "Hotel Oblivion," has been announced. I hope it comes to fruition soon.

Scalped

I've grown tired of bad-ass bald guys in Vertigo books, but the shaven-headed protagonist of Jason Aaron's "Scalped"  isn't a retread of Grant Morrison's King Mob or Warren Ellis's Spider Jerusalem.

Dashiell Bad Horse returns to South Dakota and starts working for Chief Lincoln Red Crow, the local crime boss obsessed with opening a new casino that will supposedly improve the lot of every Oglala Lakota on the rez. Turns out, though, that Bad Horse is working for the FBI, and his superiors aren't above blackmailing him into stepping outside the law for their own purposes.

This is American noir of the bleakest sort, and Aaron keeps everything off-balance by continually upping the stakes and revealing new depths to his characters. After a while, it's easy to lose track of who the good guys really are, but that's rather the point.

It's unclear how long Aaron plans to spin this story out, but there are six collections available and seventh due in February. You can read the first issue of the series here.

Hark! A Vagrant!

Kate Beaton's online comics are a marvel, and I can't recommend them highly enough. They're literate and silly, knowing and well constructed. Favorites to sample include "Wonder Woman," "Dude-Watching with the Brontes," The Great Gatsby," "Mystery Solving Teens," and, especially if you're a Bowdoin College grad, "Henson and Peary."

Beaton has started selling to Harper's and The New Yorker, and now she has a book deal with Drawn + Quarterly, which is the best news of the year so far. And don't ignore her Twitter stream, upon which she posts links to sketches that are more personal but just as amusing as her more polished offerings.

TV
Jekyll
Everybody thinks they can do a new twist on Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," but few adaptations add anything really fresh to the endeavor. Watch the cold opening of the 2007 BBC six-episode series written by Stephen Moffat and starring James Nesbitt, though, and I defy you not to want more.

The whole series is clever combination of  conspiracy thriller and horror with a comedic edge. The ending doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but I guess they were hoping for a second series. "Jekyll" is hard to find at your local video store, but it's easily available through Netflix.



Music
Pomplamoose

Yeah, they're the cute, almost twee, couple in those Holiday Season Hyundai TV ads, but they've been around YouTube for a couple of years now. Good originals, clever covers, joyful videos and Nataly Dawn is freakin' adorable. And they've gathered more than 60,000 book donations for the Richmond School District, so don't be hatin' on them. Their covers of "Mr. Sandman" and "September" are especially good and worth checking out.

Ten Books I'm Looking forward to in 2011

There are always plenty of books out there that I would be happy to read, had I enough time and energy. But a handful of upcoming titles fill me with genuine anticipation, whether I'll have the chance to review them or not.

Started Early, Took My Dog -- Kate Atkinson
I'm already nearly a 100 pages into the latest by "Case Histories" and "When Will We Have Good News?" An impulsive purchase at a mall, the rescue of a small dog and a search for a client's natural parents lead to violence and other unforeseen complications. According to Atkinson, this is likely to be her last Jackson Brodie book for a few years, so enjoy him while you can.

A Drop of the Hard Stuff -- Lawrence Block
Lawrence Block is among the last of the great  crime fiction traditionalists, and he's returning to Matt Scudder after a long hiatus. This new entry in the series jumps back in time to when Scudder was still struggling with his alcoholism. That strategy worked well in "Before the Sacred Gin Mill Closes," so we'll see whether Block can construct another satisfying flashback.

Satori -- Don Winslow
You wouldn't think that Trevanian's "Shibumi" calls out for a follow-up after 30+ years, but Winslow, author of "California Fire and Life"  and "The Death and Life of Bobby Z," has decided to resurrect Nicolai Hel. Will Winslow be able to emulate Trevanian's tongue-in-cheek tone in the midst of all the super-assassin hugger-mugger? I'm certainly intrigued.

The Wise Man's Fear -- Patrick Rothfuss
Rothfuss's "The Name of the Wind" was one of the most intriguing fantasy debuts of the mid-2000s. Fans have been impatiently clamoring for more ever since, and finally a new installment is ready. Middle volumes are notoriously tricky, but Rothfuss managed to sidestep many of the high fantasy pitfalls with his first book, so perhaps he'll be able to beat the sophomore slump.

Flashback -- Dan Simmons
After three big historical novels, Simmons returns to science fiction with a near-future thriller. A new drug allows users to re-live their favorite moments from the past, and one ex-detective strives to break his addiction while investigating a murder. Simmons does "hardboiled" well, and this book might given him a welcome chance to stretch those muscles.

Fuzzy Nation -- John Scalzi
The author of "Zoe's Tale" channels H. Beam Piper, for reasons that aren't quite clear but which will undoubtedly prove amusing. Note: Ewoks and Fuzzies are not related.

Listener -- Warren Ellis
Few details are available about the second novel by the co-creator of "Planetary" and "Transmetropolitan." His first novel, "Crooked Little Vein," didn't quite live up to its promise, but Ellis knows his way around a

Other Kingdoms -- Richard Matheson
Matheson's recent output hasn't matched the standards of his early classics, but I keep hoping that he'll muster some more of the mojo that powered "Hell House" or "I Am Legend." This latest novel is set in England after World War I and involves fairies, witches and the like.

Embassytown -- China Mieville
Mieville is hit and miss for me. I lost patience with "The City and the City" but really enjoyed last summer's "Kraken." "Embassytown" promises more "New Weird" weirdness, so I'm eager to see what Mieville has come up with this time.

iZombie -- Chris Roberson with Michael Allred
I'm done buying monthly pamphlets, but I liked the sample first issue I received of this on-going Vertigo series. Allred's art is always awesome, and I trust Roberson to do something interesting with the overworked "The dead are back!" scenario. The first collection will be available later this spring.

Link Hodgepodge

Here's a small mishmash of links. Enjoy responsibly.


Nabokov, on TV in the Fifties, talking about "Lolita."

The final issue of Ellis and Cassaday's "Planetary" is on its way, swear to God!

Hard Case will publish a posthumous novel by the late, great Donald Westlake.

Your brain enjoys learning.

"The Friends of Eddie Coyle" is the quintessential Boston crime novel. The film adaptation is pretty good, too.

Who's better informed, newspaper readers or web surfers?

Review -- "Madame Xanadu: Disenchanted"

I didn't pick up the first issue of the new Vertigo on-going series "Madame Xanadu" when it appeared, for a number of reasons. To start with, I've stopped buying monthly comics, the habit having become both expensive and frustrating. Then there's the fact that Madame Xanadu, as a character, didn't hold much fascination over me. Finally, Issue One was set in the sylvan forests surrounding Camelot and I'm rarely in the mood for anything druidic in comics. So I took a pass.

But if the new collection of the first 10 issues is a reliable indicator, "Madame Xanadu" has much to recommend it. Written by Matt Wagner of "Grendel" and "Sandman Mystery Theater," with art by Amy Reeder Hadley, the story follows the enchantress formerly known as Nimue as she travels across the centuries from Britain to the court of Kubla Khan to Paris before the revolution to the U.S. in the Thirties. She crosses paths with Marco Polo, Marie Antoinette, Jack the Ripper and other assorted historical figures, but her chief companion/adversary is none other than the enigmatic Phantom Stranger. Again and again, Madame Xanadu and Ol' Blank Eyes spar about free will versus determinism. She feels a need to help people avoid disaster. He's all for leaving destiny undisturbed.

What's nice about "Madame Xanadu" is that it's the kind of Vertigo book you don't see much anymore. It's adult in tone, yet thoroughly connected to the DC Universe, allowing for cameos by such fan favorites as the Demon Etrigan, the magician Zatara in his prime, and Neil Gaiman's version of Death. Wagner keeps the action lively, and Hadley's art is expressive and bouyant.

I'm not sure "Madame Xanadu" is sufficient to entice me back to the monthly comics. But I definitely look forward to the next collection.

Review -- "The Nobody"

DC Comics has a couple of minor characters who appear bandage-swathed in nearly all of their adventures — Rebis, the hermaphroditic energy being from Grant Morrison’s weird and wonderful run on “Doom Patrol,” and The Unknown Soldier, originally from “Our Army at War.” It’s a cool, if disconcerting, look.

Neither of those characters, unfortunately, appears in the new Vertigo hardcover written and illustrated by Jeff Lemire, creator of the “Essex County Trilogy.” Rather, the enigmatic protagonist calls himself “Griffen,” a name familiar to readers of H.G. Wells or, more likely, Alan Moore.

When Griffen, sporting bizarre goggles and wrapped from head to toe in weird bandages, arrives in the small town of Large Mouth, he evokes immediate suspicion. After he takes up residence in a run-down motel, a young waitress named Vickie tries to befriend him and gradually learns about the events that drove Griffen into seclusion. Meanwhile, a series of crimes ratchets up the level of distrust and paranoia among the locals.

Lemire’s scruffy black, white and blue artwork isn’t to my taste, and although I appreciate his feel for a tourist town in the thick of winter, I found the plot of “The Nobody” rather slow, pedestrian and predictable. I’ve seen the “caterpillar into butterfly” metaphor employed to greater effect elsewhere, and I wish there was more beneath Griffen’s bandages than, well, what I expected to be there.

If I had not received a review copy, I would begrudge the $19.99 cover price of “The Nobody.” If DC ever wants to do a new hardcover devoted to Rebis, though, I’ll be flinging cash at them.

Hi-Def Printing: What It's Good For

After a lot of preparation, the San Francisco Chronicle has officially begun printing on new, state-of-art presses based in Fremont, CA. Some of the advantages were immediately obvious -- more color at higher resolution; fewer wrinkles; a smaller, more convenient width. Other changes will roll out over the coming months -- heatset glossies, different ad configurations, innovative marketing products. I've spent a lot of time over the past few months working on the marketing campaign announcing "Chronicle HD," as it's called.


For the purposes of this blog, though, I want to publicly state how pleased I was with the first Hi-Def Sunday edition. My article about recent comics and comix was the cover story in Books and ran as a double-page spread, illustrated with color panels by Jason, Darwyn Cooke, David Mazzucchelli and others. And it looked gorgeous! The colors were accurate, the registration was correct, the pictures "popped." For the first time in five or six years, I made an effort to track down hard copies. The archived Web page doesn't do it justice.


I'm not about to make any prognostications about the long-term health of the newspaper printing business. But in terms of my column, I'm really happy with this new development.

Review: Air: Letters from Lost Countries by G. Willow Wilson & M.K. Peker

DC Comics did G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Peker's new on-going series a serious disservice when it previewed "Air" in its other books from the Vertigo line. The disjointed pages excerpted from the first issue did little to convey the charm of this tale of air travel through the not-so-friendly skies. Now the first five issues of "Air" have been collected in "Letter from Lost Countries," and it's an introductory volume well worth picking up.

When acrophobic flight attendant Blythe becomes intrigued with Zayn, a mysterious male traveler of indeterminate national origin, she helps set in motion a violent on-board incident that culminates with her and the stranger jumping from the plane with only one parachute between them. After Blythe recovers from her minor injuries, Zayn leaves on a mission to Bangladesh, only to disappear in another presumed air crash. A letter with a return address from Narimar, a country that appears on no map, gives Blythe hope that, with the help of two co-workers, she can rescue her lover, wherever he is.

Wilson and Peker are the team behind the Vertigo black-and-white hardcover "Cairo," and they seem to be developing a comfortable groove for their first monthly series. Blythe is a good antidote to the usual Vertigo heroine. She's complicated but not kooky, she's a genuine adult, not an angsty teenager, and she seems free of the usual daddy and mommy issues. The antagonists are little over-the-top and too on-the-mark in their dialogue, not to mention too fond of explaining their nefarious plans exactly where they can be overheard. At the ends of the fourth issues, though, Wilson and Peker stage a reveal that pushes the premise of "Air" in a promising and unexpected new direction.

I'm not sure I'll become a regular reader of "Air," but I'm sufficiently impressed by "Letter from Lost Countries" to keep that possibility open.

Review: "House of Mystery: Room & Boredom"

I've mentioned before that I seem to be closing in on my final days as purchaser of monthly comics. Two more issues of "100 Bullets," and I'm done, I think.

For a long while, I stuck with Bill Willingham's "Fables," but even its clever take on folklore and fairy tales couldn't keep me reading past Issue 75. Now Willingham and Matthew Sturges are collaborating on a monthly series, "House of Mystery," with art by Luca Rossi and various guest contributors, and the first five issues have been collected in a new trade.

One of DC's longest-running series, the original "The House of Mystery," an anthology of short horror stories hosted by homicidal "caretaker" Cain, was open for business from 1951 through 1983, most notably under the editorships of Joe Orlando and Karen Berger. (Its counterpart, the House of Secrets, was home to Cain's hapless brother/victim Abel.) Alan Moore put a new spin on the concept in his "Swamp Thing" saga, and Neil Gaiman gave Cain and Abel the spotlight in a few episodes of "Sandman."

Sturges and Willingham's incarnation of the House of Mystery abruptly evicts Cain for reasons unknown. The focus of the main narrative is now a young woman named Fig Keeler, who finds herself within the house and unable to leave. She's one of five permanent residents who attend to the needs of various visitors who stop in its bar, where the cost of a drink is a good story. The others seem mostly resigned to their fates, but Fig is determined to escape.

Sturges and Willingham employ a light touch with this material, introducing some genuinely creepy elements without getting all dour and angst-y (as happened with the "House of Secrets" reboot of the late 1990s). But somehow the biggest questions about where the main narrative is heading are not terribly compelling yet. The five- to six-page bar tales offer little bursts of humor or terror and hint at future connections, but they don't offer the one-two-punch ironies that characterize the best of, say, the old EC horror comics.

"House of Mystery" has potential, but it doesn't yet succeed as a serial or an anthology -- or as a unique hybrid of the two. I won't start buying the series monthly, but I'll welcome the next trade collection.

The Latest from King, Hill and Baker

SFGate has posted my review of new books from Stephen King, Joe Hill and Kage Baker. King's latest is a collection of 13 short stories, most of which are pretty good. It's not my favorite gathering of his short work, but there's enough of a mix to make it worthwhile for most fans. Stand-out stories include "The Gingerbread Girl" and "Ayana."

Joe Hill (who happens to be King's son, just in case you hadn't heard) created an on-going comics series for IDW. It's called "Locke and Key," and the first six issues are collected in hardcover as "Welcome to Lovecraft." (Minor quibble: I don't think H.P.'s surname works as a New England place name. Just sayin'.)

As crazy as I was for Baker's Company books, I'm really conflicted about her fantasy novels. I know they're well-written, but they just don't grab me. It seemed to take me forever to read "The House of the Stag," but don't let that stop you from giving it a try.

Various and Sundry

I was on vacation last week and managed to post a few items to my other blog. I wrote about good advice from Nick Mamatas, the new series of Richard Stark comics from IDW, Books editor Oscar Villalon's departure from the San Francisco Chronicle and three new first novels.

Avast! It's Another Chronicle Review

Today's San Francisco Chronicle includes my latest science fiction and fantasy roundup. Discussed are Gene Wolfe's "Pirate Freedom," "Ha'penny" by Jo Walton, "Black Dossier" by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill and "The Gunslinger Born" graphic novel from Marvel.

By the way, I do happen to know that the correct term for a story set in a timeline different from our own is an "alternate history," not an "alternative history."

Most of the time, copy editors are our friends. But not always.

Vertigo Fatigue

Comics from Vertigo, DC's "mature" imprint, just make me tired these days.

Back in its heyday, I used to read practically everything from this imprint. Gaiman's "Sandman." Morrison's "The Invisibles" and "The Filth." Ennis's "Preacher." "Hellblazer" by Delano and Ennis. Carey's "Lucifer."

Not anymore.

"Hellblazer"? Stopped when Mike Carey left.

"Y: The Last Man"? Bailed about 40 issues in. Figure I'll get around to reading all the trade collections one of these days.

"DMZ," "Scalped," "Crossing Midnight." "American Virgin," "Exterminators," Testament"? Read review-copy trades and was never tempted to pick up another single issue on its own.

"Army @ Love," "The Un-Men," "Faker," "Jack of Fables"? Nope, nope, nope, nope.

The only Vertigo books I buy anymore are "100 Bullets" and "Fables." "Fables" alone has the momentum and personality to keep me engaged month-to-month. I purchase "100 Bullets" more or less out of habit. I want those characters to just start killing each other and be done with it. I'm ready for the bloody saga to end. I get the sense series creator Brian Azzarello is too.

Have I aged out of the Vertigo demographic? Am I just too damn cheap to spend more tha $7 a month on these comics? Or maybe I just need a nap?

History Repeating

The semi-retired Lynn Johnston has pushed her strip halfway into its cryogenic chamber, freezing the cast at their current ages while allowing them to reminisce ad nauseum about their "best of" moments. And what's among the first things of which we're reminded?

That nobody in the Foobiverse knows anything about birth control!

I never knew that Michael Patterson was a "surprise." But his younger sister, late-in-life baby April, certainly wasn't planned. And Michael's spawn were both "whoops" events, even though his spouse is a pharmacist who has at least heard of barrier methods. (Liz Patterson may be the product of an early experiment in in vitro fertilization, but don't quote me on that.)

Johnston's depiction of reproduction in modern marriage strikes me as a tad creepy. The husbands are seed-slinging doofuses who don't have a clue that they might actually, well, mate with their mates. The women are either lazy/forgetful or downright manipulative. None of these couples seem to have sat down and actually discussed family planning.

Oh, wait, Granthony browbeat Therese into producing a daughter to bless their spite-filled union. And we all know how well that turned out.

Cancelled Check

What's wrong with this picture? Not much.

You know your comic strip has run off the rails when the parody of it is only slightly more ridiculous than the original.

What's really interesting is the way Johnston is desperately attempting to ret-con her Foobs. Granthony's hilarious pornstache? All his evil wife's idea!

Here's a prime example of a writer losing control of her characters and forcing them to behave irrationally. You can find my musings about this situation at my other blog.

GAAHHH!

Get me to the eye-wash station, stat!

We all knew this day was coming, but did Johnston have to spoil Independence Day for us Americans? The barbecue, the fireworks, the interminable pops concert from D.C. with two-fifths of the original Beach Boys -- they've all been ruined by the Love That No One Wants to Name.

If you need an antidote to Granthony mackin' on Liz, check out the re-mix of the "Shannon Takes a Stand" saga. UPDATE: Sorry, but "Shannon Takes a Stand" has been shut down by The Man, or more accurately, by a polite-but-firm letter from the official FBofW Web developer.

Mustache-Bereft Granthony: The Face of Fear!

Sweet sainted mother of Mordecai Richler, has Granthony shaved off his pornstache AND undergone a spur-of-the-moment nosejob? All the "For Better or For Worse" pundits have an opinion.

The train wreck, she is a'-coming.

"Spider-Man 3": Get Out Your Handkerchiefs

Is "Spider-Man 3" the weepiest superhero movie ever made? Everybody in it has gelatinous tears running down their faces. Spider-Man cries. Aunt May cries. Mary-Jane cries. Dead Uncle Ben in flashback cries. The Sandman cries. Harry Osborne cries. Hold it together, people! Sheesh! (At least J. Jonah Jameson doesn't start blubbering.)

In general, this iteration of the ol' Webslinger is entertaining. Better than the first in some ways, not as good as the second in many more. Could have used a lot more Venom, a lot less Sandman.