Um, Actually…

Missives from and to the internet, delivered by a series of tubes.

Welcome, dear readers, to our Thursday feature – a letter column of horrors culled from our inboxes. There will be things that are real and decidedly unreal – but hopefully all content presented here will be entertaining.

That said, WE ARE LOOKING FOR LETTERS! We are hiding in your bushes, metaphorical or otherwise. We crave your sweet correspondence. Contact us by clicking on that handy contact button right above the site banner to save yourself from our sweet lips on your power bills.

Letters might be edited for space, but not for intent.

Thank you, internet.

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Pssst… Did you know that today is the second anniversary of C!TB?  It’s true!  And to mark the occasion, we’re celebrating it the best way we know how: lording our expertise over you.

[NOTE: We will also be getting drunk and seeing the latest Chris Pratt movie on Friday.]

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Jay (@jayrunham) asks: Thoughts on the Oscar nominations?

James: Yes, it’s true!  Today marked the release of the 2013 Academy Award nominations, which means that the rest of the day marks people getting upset about what was nominated, what wasn’t and criticizing the entire institution of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

And dudes, I get it, I really do.  The Academy has a lot of issues, from its emphasis on a certain type of movie to the relative exclusion of genre films like science fiction, fantasy, low action and light-to-medium comedy, to the frustrating politics of “paying dues.”  As a result, it’s often easy to look at a list of nominees and immediately say, “Well, that actress won’t win because she’s 15 and it’s her first movie, and that comedy is just there to give the appearance of genre diversity and maybe give Alan Arkin an award.”  It’s why I generally prefer the Golden Globes, despite the Awards themselves’  own respective failings.

But at the same time, I just can’t really manage to get even marginally annoyed by a list of Oscar nominees.  Joss Whedon wasn’t nominated for anything?  I never expected him to be, and whether or not he is doesn’t affect my enjoyment of the movies he released this year.  It certainly doesn’t affect his status amongst his fan community.  Chris Nolan wasn’t nominated for The Dark Knight Rises?  Well, I’ve established on the site before that sometimes people are wrong about Batman.  I don’t really crave any sense of validation from the Academy of my own tastes and preferences, and I don’t think anyone should, period.  

As a result, I tend to look at the Oscars, like all awards shows, as an excuse to see actors, writers and directors I like look good, laugh, and maybe give a speech if they’re lucky.  With a good host, they can be funny and entertaining (an aside: I’m genuinely curious at Seth MacFarlane hosting this year’s Oscars.  I may not be a fan of his body of work, but he’s got a good knowledge and appreciation of Hollywood glitz and history, and when he’s not making AIDS jokes he can be affable and charming.  This year could go either way).  Overall, I think they present a good overview of the general quality and state of a certain field. Movie X wasn’t nominated?  Well, Movies A-W are still generally pretty dang good!  The state of movies is pretty good, all things considered.  

As much as the Oscars themselves are literally a direct competition, I don’t actually personally watch the ceremony like that.  Maybe I’ve bought into the “It’s an honour to be nominated” and “We’re all winners” rhetoric a little too deeply, but the reality is that when I watch the Oscars or another award show, the only thing that really gets me annoyed is an overly long or repetitive speech.  To me, the night is primarily a celebration of the medium, and watching it through that lens keeps me happy.

With the nominations themselves, there’s a lot of movies I’ve seen in the nominees list, and a lot of movies I’d like to see.  So really, I’m fairly pleased with the list.  Instead of thinking about what was omitted, my gut reaction is to look at what was included, and there’s a lot to like.  I’m particularly pleased with all the nominations that Silver Linings Playbook received.  It was one of my favourite movies of last year; it’s funny, sweet and moving, and features a great performance by Bradley Cooper, who I’d never really seen in a role with as much dramatic depth before.  As someone who works in mental health and has worked on psychiatric hospital units with schizophrenic and bipolar patients, Silver Linings Playbook has one of the most realistic presentations of that kind of mental illness I’ve ever seen.  Very often, mental illness in movies is treated as something exaggeratedly humourous or melodramatic, and one thing this movie does that I adore is showing how deeply that kind of mental illness affects even “normal” moments.  It’s a movie full of really fine touches far more than broad comedic ones, and I can see why it got nominated for pretty much all of the major categories; it certainly deserves to be.

Brandon: True story? I’ve watched a grand total of five movies in the theatre this year. I think. Avengers, Cabin in the Woods, The Dark Knight Rises, Looper... aaaannnndddd… Josie and the Pussycats. Oh! And Scott Pilgrim. And I don’t think those last two technically count, as they were screenings James and I helped put on. So to say the Oscars mean next to nothing to me is probably accurate. At best, it functions as a list of recommendations for movies I’ll check out eventually, and in that capacity, I’m quite pleased with this year’s nominations.

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Josh (@joshbazin) asks: What are some comics in the last year that you were blown away by #1, but the story never developed as well as you hoped?

James: Honestly, I don’t think so.  The comics I generally get the most excited or blown away by tend to be ones that end up having a consistent level of quality.  Plus, the combination of this site’s focus on the positive and the sheer number of comics I buy means that it’s hard to remember series that didn’t quite pan out.  My mind gravitates towards the things I like, so my legitimate first reaction to your question was Hawkeye because it had a fantastic #1 issue and only got better, which is actually the complete opposite of what you asked.

Make sure you’re reading Hawkeye, is what I’m saying.

Brandon: While it sounds like a cop out, I can’t really think of any books that didn’t live up to their potential for me in the past year. That said, much like James, this is probably because I’m reading so many books that the forgettable ones end up being forgotten. The only thing I can say for certain is, the fact that nothing is popping out to me means that most of the books I read didn’t flame out spectacularly. There are probably more than a few that I’m now only checking out sporadically buuuutttt for the most part, they were titles that I was only marginally interested in to begin with.

And yeah, Hawkguy is the sauce, my friend. And also, Love and Capes. And the new FF books. And Captain Marvel. And Saga. And Stumptown. And…

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Marc (@dasnordlicht91) asks: Favourite C!TB interview?

James: That’s super hard to pick, because they’ve all been great in certain ways.  It’s probably a toss-up between Bee Talk with Alejandro Arbona and our first podcast discussion with Kelly Sue DeConnick, because of how surprisingly deep and emotional it got.  It was certainly the most surprising interview, personally, that we did, and I enjoyed it greatly.

Brandon: Very hard to pick. Aside from what James already said, I’d put the one we did with the Immonens up there, as there was dancing and Hemingway and Patsy Walker Hellcat.

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Jess (@starkers_in_yeg) asks: What are you looking forward to the most in 2013?

James: It will surprise exactly no one that what I am looking most forward to is the baseball.  Even though it looks increasingly like the Edmonton Capitals – whose location a five-minute walk from my apartment was like the #3 reason I picked that place – won’t have a season this year while they look for a new league, there’s still the MLB season.  Not only am I a MLB.tv subscriber, meaning I can basically watch any game that’s played in the whole league, but I’m actually making a trip to Oakland in July to see the Athletics’ interleague series with the Chicago Cubs.  It will be my first MLB game(s) ever, and I’m excited to see my two favourite teams playing.  Plus, between the dirt cheap airfare and bargain-priced A’s tickets, I can do the whole trip fairly cheap and still take some time to visit my friends near the Bay Area.  Plus, my favourite pitcher (R.A. Dickey) is now a Toronto Blue Jay, meaning I might try and see a game during my late spring trip to Ontario for a friend’s wedding.

Plus, there’s still my weekly pickup game to look forward to; last year was the first year, and by the end of the summer there was a dedicated group of players that were bringing friends of their own.  Even more people are interested this year, and it should be even more exciting than before.  I also purchased some catcher’s gear, meaning that we can actually pitch without fear of murdering each other now.

Brandon: One of the things I’m most excited about this year is a thing I absolutely can not talk about – but rest assured, it means good things for my position at my current place of employment.

I’m also quite excited to spend another year with the darling Miss Danica LeBlanc. Sometime this year we’re going to head off on our first vacation together – which will ALSO be my first non-family vacation. Should be exciting!

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Jess continues: Skiing, snowboarding or Zipfy?

James: I had to look up what a Zipfy is, so probably not that, even though it’s cheap.  Let’s just say I’d try it.  Otherwise, I have more experience with skiing than snowboarding, so I lean towards that.  I like snowboarding, and I like the idea of doing it more, but I have such little experience that when I think of it I don’t think of carving down the hill; I think of the time I spent a day trying to learn and kept falling backwards and rolling down the hill while trying to work on my toe edge for the first time, as my heel edge kept slipping and catching.  My butt was numb for the rest of the evening!

Ladies.

Brandon: I would probably try to Zipfy once before my legs snapped off after accidently hitting the ground (I am a giant), so I’ll have to go with skiing. I’m awkward enough on the ski hill without gluing my legs together.

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Jess has one last question: After watching Adventure Time’s episode “Jake the Dad,” which rainicorndog is your favourite and why?

James: It’s gotta be TV, due to the sheer, cold fury on his face when he’s upset with Jake, and the fact that he’s perfectly round.  But let’s be real: those are some flippin’ adorable rainicorndogs.  I really loved how touchingly the show portrayed Jake’s love for his children and being a father.  The show gets a lot of credit for how well it’s handled sadness and regret through the character of the Ice King, but this was a surprisingly mature look at parental love that not a lot of cartoons actually delve into.  I may have been uncomfortable with the idea of Jake and Lady Rainicorn having sex, but I’m totally cool with their babies.  James Leask is officially a fan of babies!

Ladies.

Brandon: My *ahem* ADVENTURE TIMING is off and I have yet to watch the episode, so considering the fact that James and I have identical opinions on nearly everything, let’s just go with what he just said.

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Scott (@scottowilliams) asks: What is the most delicious thing?

James: For my money, it’s hard to beat a fresh buttermilk biscuit with some butter and either tupelo honey or good jam on it.  I… spend a lot of time thinking about how much I want buttermilk biscuits.  I am literally going to go get a biscuit right now.

Brandon: My Granny’s homemade apple pie.

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Scott continues: Who is the coolest person?

James: Alan Alda.  Alan Alda is the greatest man.  Tom Hanks is second.  I guess Gandhi was pretty okay or something.

Brandon: Mr. Freeze probably.

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Scott goes on: What is the best David Bowie phase? Best song?

James: First things first: how fucking incredible is Bowie’s new single?  I basically pre-ordered that whole album the very second I found out I could.  I was thinking as recently as last week about how I wanted a new Bowie album because it had been a decade since Reality, and there we go

As for my favourite Bowie phase, as much as I love his various glam phases, or his characters (Aladdin Sane > Ziggy Stardust > Thin White Duke, by the way) I’ve gotta come right down on the side of his Berlin era.  Its haunting minimalism, as well as Bowie’s own relative straightforwardness and newly clean lifestyle, made for some fascinating music, and that era is the most persistently intriguing for me.  Brian Eno has been one of my favourite producers for a long time, and the work he did here is some of his best to date.  The second album of the trilogy, “Heroes”, also gave us my favourite song of his, the one that gave the album its title.  ”Heroes” is such a brilliant song – simultaneously sincere and uncomfortable enough with it to take on the affectation of the punctuation – and maybe the perfect cold war pop song.  It embodies that era, and that of its youth, beautifully, and it’s one of the most moving things I think Bowie’s ever done.  Plus, it’s basically a straight line from that to U2′s best work in the first half of their career.

Brandon: I like the David Bowie who is perplexed by technology era.

Also, some Ziggy Stardust.

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Scott mumbles: What’s the best wild animal?

James: Bees, scott.  It’s always bees.

Brandon: Penguins.

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Scott moans: MC Hammer or Vanilla Ice?

James: It’s not exactly a battle of titans, but I’ve got to give it to Hammer, if only for the parachute pants and absence of a reality series about house flipping and being on Psychopathic Records.

I’m not down with the hatchet or whatever, I guess.

Brandon: MC Hammer also did like a mash-up with Psy that one time, which was pretty cool. It’s probably the platonic ideal of whatever that kind of thing is.

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Scott shakes, rattles and rolls: Blink-182 or Sum-41?

James: Blink, easy.

Now, I don’t dislike Sum-41 or anything.  Being a young Canadian adult in the early 2000s, both bands were obviously a big part of the musical background of my life, and they both have a lot of energy and what the WWE used to call Attitude.  ”Makes No Difference” and “Fat Lip” were great party songs (and you’ve gotta love the insanity that is DMX riding an ATV through a house in the video for “Makes No Difference”), but my favourite song of theirs has to be “In Too Deep,” which is about as perfect a song as they’ve made, balancing their punk stylings with pop rock and some really great bass.

That said, Blink take it easily because they’ve put out consistently good music for almost twenty years and have shown both a lot of depth – “Adam’s Song” was on the same album as “What’s My Age, Again?” – and artistic growth.  Their self-titled album featured maybe their most consistent group of songs and singles to date, and they did so without having to be funny while also shifting to a more varied aesthetic.  Not only that, it was a natural evolution from Take Off Your Pants and Jacket. At some point, the members understood that they couldn’t be 17 forever, and that realization gave them a lot of confidence.  As a direct result of this, they made an album that almost servs as a sequel to all of their other ones before it, with elements of ambivalence, romantic decay and the realization that youth is fleeting in opposition to the more optimistic and lighthearted material before it.

Brandon: I listened to a lot more Sum 41 than Blink 182 when I was younger, but as the years have gone on, my preference has shifted. If I had to put my finger on it, I would say it has everything to do with what James just said. Blink grew up, and Sum did not.

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Scott raises his fist to the sky: How can I seek revenge on people who stand side-by-side on the escalator?

James: Bottle all that anger up inside until it erupts and you really let it show.  That’ll show them!

Brandon: Do what I do, and push them off.

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Scott wraps up: Best Disney star-turned-singer since Miley?

James: A lot of this depends on whether you’re being specific to Disney or using the company as shorthand for “teen/preteen entertainment”.  With the former, it’s basically the casts of Shake It Up (and a toss-up between Zendaya and Bella Thorne at that), A.N.T. Farm,The Suite Life and Austin & Ally I haven’t actually watched any of those shows or heard any of those artists, because despite the totally understandable belief otherwise, I don’t actually spend a lot of time watching children’s entertainment, even if I did recently watch a full episode of Big Time Rush.  I’ll give it to Bella Thorne because she was on an episode of The OC and involvement on that show, Everwood or Boy Meets World is basically how I determine a young actor’s worth.

Now, if you go with “Disney” as shorthand, that opens it up to Nickelodeon, which opens it up to iCarly and VICTORiOUS, which means I can pick Victoria Justice or Jeanette McCurdy, which is to say I can pick Jennette McCurdy.  Congratulations, Jennette!  That appearance on Cupcake Wars wasn’t for nothing.

Okay, so I guess I should have specified that I don’t spend a lot of time watching children’s entertainment not made by Pendleton Ward or Dan Schneider.  I am really excited for Sam & Cat, is what I’m saying.

Brandon: Aren’t we all James? Seriously, if you’re not excited for Sam and Cat, I don’t want to know you anymore. Get out. GET OUT.

And really, I’m not sure who has been hatched at Disney lately, but Jeanette McCurdy’s song on the second iCarly soundtrack was one of the better “original” songs on there… even if I have a soft spot for Miranda Cosgrove’s brilliantly out-of-touch “Million Dollars” in which she equates losing a loved one with losing a million dollars. It’s great.

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Liz (@piggtailgirl) asks: HOW AMAZING IS COUGARTOWN?!?

James: Finally, a real question!

The answer is very, Liz.  How amazing is it?  I literally spent half (okay, two thirds) of this last weekend, my final one before going back to work after the Christmas break, watching Cougar Town.  A month earlier, I spent a weekend rewatching the third season and this time last year I wrote an article about how amazing the show is that resonated with a surprising number of people.

I spend a lot of time watching or thinking about Cougar Town.  I’m actually trying to think of a way to write another article about it, and by “it” I mean Brian Van Holt.

Brandon: It’s probably okay maybe. James, why do you look murdery?

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Liz is all about theming: Is Cougar Town a great show, or the greatest show?

James: It might not be the greatest of all time (M*A*S*H, All in the Family, Seinfeld and The West Wing take that, in my correct opinion), but out of the ones currently on the air?  Out of the comedies currently on the air?  It’s basically the greatest.

I like other shows too, and we’re currently in a wealth of amazing comedies, but let’s be honest: Cougar Town is pretty great.  It’s both esoteric and broad, straightforward and subtle (again: Brian Van Holt!) and both dark as all hell and incredibly optimistic.  If I were going to make a TV comedy (and believe me, I am), it would be a lot like Cougar Town.  It’s the show so good that even Community thinks it’s great.

Brandon: Put down the axe James it was just a joke oh god why did it have to end this way whhyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

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The lovely Danica (@danicahere) asks: What percentage of your memoir will feature Brandon?

James: First of all, I would like to just say that when I went to type Brandon’s name below this as I was setting up the article, I wrote “Leask” instead and it was the fourth time I did that today, because that’s basically the answer: zero percent.

Write your own damn memoir, Brandon!  Don’t piggyback on my egotism.  Let’s do this, Rashomon-style, where to get the whole story people have to get and read both books.  Then let’s released a combined edition with new material.  Basically, let’s take these rubes for all they’ve got.

Guys?  …Guys?

Brandon: It would probably be 50% about myself, 10% about the wonderful people who have been a part of my life (s’up girl), 10% about the terrible people in my life (s’up James),  10% about the comic book industry, 10% a detailed description of watching the various eras of TGIF, and 10% pictures of Martin Scorsese’s eyebrows.

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That’s it for the fortieth installment of Um, Actually!  Check in every Thursday for a new batch of questions.  If you have anything you’d like answered, hit up our Contact page!  If you submit anything via Twitter – to @blogaboutcomics, @leask or @soupytoasterson - remember to include the hashtag #UMACTUALLY so that we don’t lose it.  Remember: you can ask us anything.