Oh What a Serkis, Oh What a Show

Only four more days to wait until we see Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.  The nerd and I spent the last week watching The Colbert Report's "Hobbit Week", and if you haven't yet seen it, I suggest you find it on Hulu.  Watching one actor (sorry kids, Colbert's an actor) totally geek out over a novel from his childhood is charming, warming, and smile-inducing.  Watch him match wits with Ian McKellen, out-Hobbit director Peter Jackson and set Martin Freeman up for this joke of all jokes (please wait until the end of the clip):

Also on "Hobbit Week" this week was Andy Serkis.  Every network news station doing a performance capture segment this week will suggest that we know Serkis' work without knowing his face.  Malarky, I say!  For those of us glued to every special feature/behind the scenes extra released, we know that face, those eyes, and the fact that Gollum's voice was inspired by a furball-laden cat.

So, I decided it was high time I sat down and watched the other major Serkis and Jackson collaboration: King Kong.  The DVD was leant to me over a year ago and I just haven't felt like watching it.  I kept reminding myself there are a hundred reasons I would like it.  I kept ultimately deciding I had no pressing interest.  My renewed admiration for Serkis swayed me.

#notimpressed.  

I waited 70 minutes to even see King Kong.  Granted, everyone else watching the movie waited 70 minutes, they just probably had less wine than me.

Then, I had this strange anxiety attack.  As I watched, and the CGI bugs crawled and clicked, I got more and more worked up.  When King Kong fought the giant handful of T. Rexes, I started crying.  When Naomi Watts was hiding from a T. Rex while being chased by a giant bug, I lost it.  We turned the movie off, and put on Mel Brooks' History of the World: Part I instead.

Given this, no one in their right mind would take my review seriously.  That's why I blog.

So, the scenery is beautiful, and there are some period accents, and Naomi Watts is a blonde treasure (Side note: I realized that nothing like this would ever happen to me because I'm brunette.  There are zero directors alive or dead who have convinced brunette actresses to sail towards ultimate peril).  King Kong's rare moments of honesty and believability are when you look into his eyes.  And that's a testament to Serkis more than the movie.

Rather than spend some money and time on making those fights convincing, and taking the care to ensure that I believe that our heroine is being carried by a 25 foot simian, I felt like everyone involved said, "Ah, Serkis can handle it.  Look at what he did with Gollum."

Serkis has said he doesn't want a performance capture Academy Award category.  So I wait, alongside thousands of other geeks, for this brilliant, brave, intelligent and humble man to receive his Lifetime Achievement Oscar.

In the mean time, I await with gleeful anticipation my return to Middle Earth this Friday.

This just in: I have no willpower

As is probably evident by my last post, I intended to watch the nine available hours of Sherlock and blog on them.  I watched the first 90-ish minute episode and thought, "Let's stop here.  Let's write what I think, rightthissecond".  I wanted to explore the progression of sexy as seen in the show's lead, Benedict Cumberbatch.

Guess what!  I blew it!  Two days ago, my nerd and I watched the 7 1/2 remaining hours of Sherlock.  I barely stopped to eat.  To go to the bathroom.  We did find time to refill my wine glass.  This show is incredible!  

And, along the way, I realized that both Benedict Cumberbatch and Sherlock Holmes are sexy.  This speeded the realization:

I wanted to drag this one out, but oops!  I can't!  Thesis done.  QED.

A Sherlock-Worthy Mystery

Guys.  Have you been watching British TV?  Seriously... These guys are giving it.  Steven Moffat especially.  More on him later (I'm guessing).

I occasionally (not!) troll some Pinterest Geek boards.  Because I'm that type of person.  And for quite some time, I've been seeing images of Benedict Cumberbatch pop up with various fangirl squees of approval.  And each time I wonder to myself: "Is Benedict Cumberbatch actually sexy?"

My nerd and I finally watched episode one, "A Study in Pink", of Moffat's superb, critically acclaimed, award-winning, star-studded (Martin Freeman is  totally a star!) series Sherlock a few days ago.  As I watched, I marveled at the modernization of a classic mystery, the textbook flawless British acting, the running (MOFFAT!).  I also pondered: Sherlock?  Sexy?  

Cumberbatch's cheekbones are divine.  The way he turns that collar up on that trench coat?  That's what frat boys dreamed of... back in the day when I was in college and all the frat boys turned up the collars on their pastel polo shirts.  I want to ruffle his tousled curls nearly as much as I long to rumple David Tennant's hair (certainly more on him later).  And yet...

Are his eyebrows a little wiry and undefined?  Is his sneer off-putting?  Does his "Sherlock" influence how we feel about this actor?  

We are no strangers to this phenomenon.  Look no further than our current Doctor, Matt Smith.  Is Matt Smith sexy, or is the Doctor sexy?  And before him: David Tennant's and Chris Eccleston's Doctor(s), Rupert Grint's Ron Weasley, Matthew Lewis' Neville Longbottom, Orlando Bloom's Legolas, Chris Pine's and William Shatner's Kirk, Harrison Ford's Han Solo, anything Nathan Fillion ever did (oh so much more on him later) and perhaps even statistical genius and humblebragger Nate Silver?  Sure, many of these guys are conventionally good looking.  But is that why we fall in love?  Or is there something in the side kick?  The loner?  The guy who's too smart for everyone else?

I wanted to address this thought one episode in.  I'd love for you, esteemed reader, to journey with me through the inevitable evolution of "Yeah, he's decent looking" to "Shut up, he's on the list!".

I'm thankful for many things this year, but right now, I'm thankful to be writing.  And experimenting.

*and as I type, my New York Jets are losing 49-12 to the New England Patriots on Thanksgiving,  This has been a welcome distraction from the game.

Sidebar: Sherlock available on Netflix streaming

Benedict Cumberbatch photo source: Telegraph

Origin Story

The idea for this blog came to me December 31, 2011 in a drunken New Years Eve blaze of (self-appointed) genius.  I sat on my couch and watched my boyfriend have a lively discussion with a friend (in a Flash t-shirt) about something extremely geeky.  The subject alludes us now, because it's 11 months later and we had hit the champagne a little hard.  As I watched them delight in their conversation, I realized how lucky I was to be with a guy who cares about stuff.  Video games, sure, and Star Wars and science and technology and a whole bunch of stuff that's supposedly lame.  I decided I wanted to explore the concept of dating your very own nerd: what makes it great, what makes it frustrating, what makes it always fun.

First, I implore every reader to embrace the things that make them "nerdy".  It doesn't have to be Pokemon or Star Trek, but find the thing that you're totally crazy about and geek the hell out!  Know Harry Potter's middle name!  Be able to identify the operas of Wagner in 3 notes!  Tell me how to best use coriander!  Name the starting line up for the '68 Mets (Mookie Wilson... is that a thing?)!  Teach me a mean cross stitch!  Or, know what "Green Grow The Lilacs" means (guilty!).  Know what you love and own it.

I wanted to wait to start this blog until I had a couple of entries in the can.  Guess what.  It's the minutiae of my daily life with my nerd that needs documenting.  The day to day is the good stuff.  When I look for the big picture, the details get lost.

Anyway, it's my boyfriend's birthday today, and he put on Fellowship of the Rings as his personal idea of a birthday treat.  And once Howard Shore's exceptional score began to play in the Shire, I swelled with emotion. I'M A NERD!  And it compelled me to finally start chronicling the joys and pains of a nerdy, passionate, sometimes absurdly inane relationship.  Live long and flourish, as they say.




Kidding.