Thursday evening, possibly coming down from hypomania

[cleolinda]

More American Idol links/discussion/Pips: I know, I know, you guys think the whole show's a crock, but--isn't this exactly what y'all complained should happen? Producers shoving their teen-friendly pick down America's throats, the fix appearing to be in, but then the nation rising up as one (or at least, 56% of it) and declaring, "HELL NO, WE WANT THE ONE WHO'S BEEN THROUGH PUBERTY"? Anyway, David Cook has always come off as a genuinely nice, decent, talented guy, and he's also the first Idol they've had, including Kelly Clarkson, whose album I would go out and buy right now without reservation. (I just really like his voice! Shut up!) Anyway, links: EW liveblogs the finale ("Oh no, Archie's going to be kept in the cellar tonight!"); EW has a few photos (Mike Myers' heinous Love Guru skit; that "I Am Your Brother" guy in the white hat; the moment I started shipping Blake and Jordin again; the Tropic Thunder guys pipping [video]; Carrie Underwood's massive unisleeve); David Cook's Guitar Hero commercial (now, I also saw one with David Archuleta as well. But his underwear was much more substantial). Also, from the NYT: Music: ‘Idol’ Finale: (Pop) Power to the People. "Stylistically he occupies the same broad pop-to-rock territory as Bryan Adams, one of several star guests at Wednesday’s finale, but Mr. Cook is a better singer." OKAY NOW LET'S NOT GET CRAZY HERE. Okay, maybe he is, but there's a thirteen-year-old girl circa 1992 inside me who is hurting right now.

sneaky_minx and I got to talking about Natascha McElhone's husband's death: "Just so wrong and sad. I was wondering if you'd be able to plug the charity he co-founded: http://www.facingtheworld.net. Not necessarily for donations, but to give people an idea of the work he did."

lolathehated: "In a couple of weeks, June 1-7, I'll be riding my bike from San Francisco to Los Angeles. It's a seven day, 545 mile journey aimed at raising money to fight AIDS. The AIDS LifeCycle event benefits both the SF AIDS Foundation and the LA Gay and Lesbian Center, both of which are tied to Pangea Global AIDS Foundation which fights AIDS worldwide. There's still time to donate here: http://www.aidslifecycle.org/2003 (yeah, that dorky picture is me). Even if you or your readers can't donate (and I know money is tight for many right now), leaving a message of support is great, too. Or even just visiting the page (I get to see how many times my page has been seen!). The deadline for donating is next Wednesday. NO AMOUNT IS TOO SMALL. I've gotten nearly $400 in just spare change."

ID-protection ads come back to bite pitchman. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Vandals damage Stonehenge.

Stars Gone Wild!: Supernova Caught on Tape [Space Porn].

The Electronic Frontier Foundation on why artists should support the Orphan Works proposal.

Exclusive: Facebook Was Supposed To IPO This Fall, And Four Other Revelations From Ben Mezrich's Alleged Tell-All Book.

Best Buy dance party.

The "Star Wars Kid" Was As Popular as "Revenge of the Sith."

Steamy tell-all memoir by a Disneyland "Jack Sparrow." And the excerpts are... whoa.

Female Fantasy Writers Accused Of Being "Simple."

Will Davis at the Guardian Blogs that Vampires Are Forever.

Book buzz: Frey's 'Morning' after; Meyer's 'Host' is a big hit. "Next up: the Aug. 2 release of Breaking Dawn, fourth in the series. First printing: 2.5 million." I have absolutely no problem admitting here that I am insanely jealous. Speaking of which: Leaked: the preface to Breaking Dawn, and apparent first-chapter spoilers in which we discover that >>"Edward buys Bella a car as a wedding gift, Renee isn't bothered that Bella and Edward are getting married and Charlie blows up at Bella thinking she's marrying Edward because she's pregnant. And Seth and Edward are apparently.. friends?"<< See, I told you they would go out for beer.

James Frey's Lies Are Bestsellers Again.

Out, Out and Away as TV Prepares for World's First Gay Superhero.

Indiana Jones Delivers the Best X-Files Movie of Summer [Review]; Indiana Jones 4: The Kingdom Of The Crystal Dull [Critical Mass].

Filming for on "Half-Blood Prince" Now Complete; John Hurt to Return as Ollivander for "Deathly Hallows"?

Pet Shop Boys: 'We're not working with Amy Winehouse'; Beyonce For Bond Theme? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Must Watch: Trailer for Sundance Gem 'The Go-Getter.'

Oliver Stone's 'W.' Completes Casting, Starts Filming; Finally, We've Got Dick Cheney: Richard Dreyfuss!

Simon Pegg and Nick Frost Introducing 'Paul.'

'Sahara' Director to Helm New 'Flash Gordon' Flick.

Brian K. Vaughn's 'Runaways' Will Be Angsty Movie.

First video clip from 'Changeling.'

More On-Set Photos from Woody Allen's New Comedy.

Dragonball Scans From Roadshow Magazine; 'Dragonball' First Look: Chow Yun Fat as Master Roshi. "Even as someone who cares absolutely nothing about Dragonball, I'm pretty astounded by how far this movie is deviating from the source material, when I'm pretty sure only the most devoted fans who will even bother with this."

Polish Brothers Start Production Company, Prep Two More Films.

The Uwe Boll Slot: Uwe Boll Plans To Improv For New Movie On Darfur Massacre, ‘Janjaweed.’

Comments

[vampychick.livejournal.com]

It's Perry Moore, what do you expect? He twists everything to suit his agenda and make himself out to be The Most Speshulest.

[amberdulen.livejournal.com]

See, he KNOWS this, because he runs the list that's analogous to the Women in Refrigerators list, for gay superheroes that were killed or depowered. I just don't know what calling out that "first!" tag is supposed to get him except derision.

[vampychick.livejournal.com]

Even the list he runs is ridiculous. It's full of misinformation, things taken out of context, stuff that has nothing to do with the character's sexuality, and outright lies. I'm not familiar with all of the characters on the list, but I've been told that at one point there were characters on there who aren't even gay.

For example: The list claims that Apollo was gang-raped. He was raped, this is true, but by one person, he recovered well, and Midnighter killed the person who did it horribly. The list also claims Apollo does not appear in Midnighter's solo series. This is an outright lie. A previous version of the list tried to paint Midnighter's supreme violence as negative in context and tied in some way to his gayness, when in reality that's just par for the course in that series. The oh-so-straight Jack Hawksmoore was Midnighter's buddy in beating people to death, for crying out loud.

The list also claims that Karolina Dean, Billy Kaplan, and Teddy Altman were captured and tortured during Civil War: Runaways/Young Avengers because they are gay. Karolina and Teddy were captured because they're aliens. Billy was not captured at all, if I'm remembering correctly--I don't have that trade to hand. And they weren't actually tortured. The torture had not begun when they were busted out.

They were rumbled and captured by a straight superhero teenager, by the way, who had been tortured to the point of being completely insane and brainwashed, but no one mentions that.

The entry on Obsidian is also disingenuous, as I understand it (I don't read much DC), blaming his mental troubles on his sexuality, when I think the problem is that his powers make him crazy. Either that or he's just schizophrenic, which is not tied to sexuality. From what I've seen, he has a nice boyfriend, making his sexuality about the most normal thing about him.

It also leaves out any positive follow-up, like the parts where, say, Northstar has recovered from being an evil zombie ninja and bonded with his sister.

I'm not denying there are problems. How about the fact that Northstar was around and coded queer for like ten years before they actually admitted it? Or that plotline where he was an actual fairy from the mystical fairyland (later retconned, orgininally a retcon itself because the editors wouldn't let them give him freaking AIDS)? How about the fact that of Marvel's four main gay teen superheroes (Billy, Teddy, Karolina, and Xavin) three of them are aliens? But Moore is barking up the wrong trees, and I'm sick of him making himself out to be the Great Gay Hope.

...wow, this got kind of into "my thoughts on yaoi" territory. Sorry about that.