Curse you, Lost!

Lost is one of those shows that intimidates me as an aspiring writer. I don't think I'm a bad writer by any means, but when I see something that is so well plotted, so intricate, and so entertaining week after week, I can't help but get a little nervous. I'm just not sure I'd ever be able to do something like that.

But who knows. Part of the appeal of Lost is the myth that it's all perfectly constructed and planned out (much the way George Lucas insists on claiming Star Wars was all perfectly constructed and planned out). It's part of what makes the show fun. What we don't see, though, is the team of writers banging their head against the wall every week, tossing idea after idea into the trash, and generally despairing of ever coming up with a satisfying moment. The pressure these guys are under must be enormous.

Writing, thank God, is not like landing a plane. You get a lot of chances to get it right, and in the case of TV writing, a lot of colleagues to bounce ideas off of. What seems brilliant now came from a lot of false starts, dead ends, and bad ideas. One of the real tricks in writing is knowing when you're done, when you've finally got something as good as you can make it. This is where the Lost writers excel. Writing is a process--just because we're lucky enough to see the end result doesn't mean the road to get us there wasn't bumpy, chaotic, and filled with mediocre ideas.

I was actually going to post my thoughts on this season's finale, but the internet is already awash with plenty of opinions and theories. This article goes into more depth than I would ever have time to. Suffice to say, the series will once again keep me interested all through the summer.

Never Thought I'd Say This, But...Live Long and Prosper, Star Trek

Okay, Star Trek, you got me.

I tried to get into Star Trek before, I really did. Episodes of The Next Generation were reasonably entertaining, but all the subsequent series bored me to tears. Even the much heralded Wrath of Khan, while not a bad movie, never really made its way onto my list of favorite films. The only Star Trek that I universally enjoyed was the original series, with its Twilight Zone-like philosophizing and cheesy production values. Now I’ve only seen a handful of episodes, but every one I have seen is both intelligent and fun. Seems like since the 60s Star Trek has been heavy on intelligent and light on fun.

No more. Even if you don’t know a thing about the Star Trek franchise, J.J. Abrams’ new version of Trek is phenomenal. Going back to the original crew was a masterstroke. Everyone and their mother know who Kirk and Spock are, and I would wager just about everyone who has heard of them has a fondness for the characters, even if they’ve never seen a single episode of Trek. These characters, and their relationships, are what made Star Trek such a phenomenon in the first place. But thanks to Abrams, these interesting characters are actually doing interesting things for the first time in 40 years, and that makes all the difference.

This is one of those edge of your seat summer blockbusters to be sure. There are show-stopping action sequences starting from the very first scene. I especially enjoyed the opening and closing space battles and the entire sequence with the drill on Vulcan. This Star Trek actually uses the setting to give the movie some excitement. Back in the days of the original series it always felt a little like a show about pirates in space. The Enterprise was the boat, and each week there was an exotic port of call. Until the day space travel becomes commonplace (and we’re all hoping it will) the idea of being on one should be a fun adventure, not a bunch of boring procedural nonsense.

But exciting as the movie is, it doesn’t forget that people love Star Trek because of the characters. Even if you’ve never seen an episode of the show, I don’t know how you won’t get a tiny bit emotional when an aged Spock tells a young and inexperienced Kirk, “I have been, and always shall be, your friend.” The relationship between Kirk and Spock is just so powerful, so much a part of our culture, that it means something to everyone, even if they don’t realize it. The new Star Trek chooses to make that relationship its central focus, and that is where I felt it was most successful. I’m not a “Trekker” so I feel it would be outside my authority to talk about the friendship between Kirk and Spock, but for me its always been a moving and brilliantly understated part of the Star Trek mythos.

I can’t say enough good things about the movie. The performances were all great, especially the new Kirk, Spock, and McCoy (although I don’t know why Winona Ryder was here) and having Leonard Nimoy there to play the older Spock really helped ground the movie in the established Star Trek universe. Eric Bana is good as the villain, Nero, but I wish we would have gotten a little more time with him. The music was appropriate, if not incredibly memorable, though the return of the original theme over the credits is a wonderful touch. There were lots of great little callbacks to the original series (and, I’m told, many of the other series) and moments of real emotion. This is Star Trek the way it was always supposed to be: Character driven space adventure.

You know it’s a good movie when you just can’t think of anything else but seeing it again. Unless something comes along to really surprise me, there’s no doubt this will be the movie of the summer. This movie felt a little like Batman Begins: Great in its own right, but laying the groundwork for something even better. I’m going to have high expectations for the sequel, but it really has the potential to expand on what this movie set up and be something even greater. I can’t wait.

I always considered myself a Star Wars fan instead of a Star Trek fan, but this movie might have changed my mind, at least for the present. It’s baffling that a Star Wars prequel, depicting the seemingly awesome story of Anakin Skywalker’s transformation to Darth Vader, can be so lifeless, while a Star Trek “prequel”, depicting the seemingly mundane story of Kirk and Spock pre-original Star Trek, can be so phenomenal. Just one of the mysteries of the universe, I suppose.

(NOTE: I’ve been having a blast lately watching original series Star Trek on youtube. If anyone is interested in seeing where it all began, that’s a great place to start!)

Bye Scrubs!

It’s taken a few days to sink in, but I’m really going to miss Scrubs. If the ratings are any indication, the show hasn’t been popular at all for a very long time, and I’ll admit it probably lasted a season or two longer than it should have. Even at its worst, though, it was a great example of a show that perfectly blends real drama with the most off the wall sort of comedy.

These days every show and movie tries to shoe-horn drama into their comedy, and personally I’ve been Apatow-ed out for a while now. I don’t always want a happy moral at the end of my story. I’m not big on characters that spent the previous ninety minutes making fart jokes suddenly trying to tell me that all I need is love.

So why did Scrubs work for me? The drama never felt forced, and the characters always felt real. People think of drama and comedy as two separate genres, but the best entertainment understands that life is as silly as it is sad as it is sweet. Sometimes Scrubs got very silly, but the silliness was almost always confined to fantasies and flashbacks. Sure, the Janitor was insane (and who would have it any other way?) but even that crazy character had a shade of humanity that made it work.

The best shows, the best movies, the best art in general comes from a real place. If it’s ridiculous, if it’s depressing, if it’s horrifying, if it comes from reality it makes sense. Even my other favorite Bill Lawrence show (and possibly my favorite show ever behind The Simpsons) Clone High, understood that zaniness is better when you’ve got solid characters. Compare any random episode of Clone High to any random episode of Family Guy, and I challenge anyone to argue that the greater attention to character and plot on Clone High don’t help it come out ahead.

When a great show leaves, you miss the characters like you miss your friends. Scrubs was a great show, no question about it. Any doubters need only take a look at the last five minutes of the finale. Not since the last episode of The Wonder Years have I gotten quite as emotional at the end of a TV show.



This is why people get into the entertainment industry—in the off chance that maybe someday, something they create will mean something, will make other people smile, even if it’s just for a little while. So thanks Bill Lawrence and Scrubs for making me smile, and, more importantly, for always reminding me why I’m here in LA, where things can seem pointless all too easily. But if it’s possible to create something that can mean to someone else what Scrubs has meant to me, well, then it's worth every bit of the trouble.

UPDATE (5/15/09): So it looks like Scrubs will probably be back again next year. Quite a shame to end the show so well and then just drag its corpse around for who knows how much longer, but that's the way the industry works. "Always leave them wanting more" has been replaced with "Make them beg you to stop."

Really People? It's Not THAT Bad

Against my better judgment, I went to see X-Men Origins: Wolverine last night, and I have to admit I didn't think it was nearly as bad as some have claimed. Is it good? No, of course not. Is it better than X-Men 3 and Spider Man 3? By a long shot.

What surprised me about this movie, in fact, was just how close it came to being good. You could tell that there was a pretty serious, Wolverine and Sabertooth story buried under too many characters and a terribly executed plot. I was expecting a movie with no redeeming values at all--literally, I said when I sat down to watch it that "I fully expect this to end up in my bottom ten of all time." And yet there was ALMOST a movie here. Liev Schreiber was a perfect choice for Sabertooth, and I've always thought Jackman was perfect for Wolverine. In a better story, these two could have been absolutely stunning together.

I even liked the inclusion of Gambit here, though it remains a crime against nature that Josh Holloway never played the character. (He was supposed to play Gambit in X3, but supposedly turned it down because it was too close to Sawyer. Which makes sense.) Taylor Kitsch does an okay job with the part, and other than the missing New Orleans accent I liked the take on the character, but I really wish he would have been in either the whole movie as Wolvie's sidekick or else just in a small cameo. As it is it feels like the filmmakers never really knew what to do with him, and his presense seems unjustified. Gambit makes a great sidekick to Wolverine, but they needed to set him up a lot better than they did.

The worst part is unfortunately the story. The original script was probably a simple revenge plot, which could have worked just fine. Instead we get unecessary plot twists, an overabundance of cameos, and general incoherence. A particular "shocking revelation" at the start of the 3rd act had most people in my theater rolling their eyes, and pretty much killed any motivation Wolverine may have had to begin with. There are great moments, particuarly the opening credits and almost any scene with Wolverine and Sabertooth, but on the whole there's nothing driving the movie forward, only a series of action sequences held together by a common theme: Wolverine fighting.

The X-Men have been my favorite superheroes (behind Batman, obviously) since I was in 5th grade, and so here's what the 11 year old kid in me got from the movie: Wolverine vs. Gambit, Wolverine vs. The Blob, Wolverine vs. Sabertooth, Wolverine vs. Deadpool, and Wolverine vs. a helicopter. All the rest is just window dressing. I'm not saying Wolverine doesn't deserve a good movie (as far as I'm concerned, there hasn't been a really good X-Men movie yet) but I had some fun with this movie despite its flaws. Nothing has ever come close to capturing the spirit of the X-Men the way the 90s cartoon series did, and most likely nothing ever will. It's just too big a universe for a 120 minute movie.

So let's be clear. Wolverine isn't very good. The story is a mess, the effects are rushed, and the characters have no motivation. It's just not nearly so bad as people have said. There are plenty of worse movies out there (right now I'm watching Van Helsing on TV). I think it's far better than something like the 2 hour nap that was Transformers, for example, and yet that garbage seems to have gotten a free pass, while this garbage is torn apart. Ah well, there's no justice in the world.

Wolverine would probably make a great video game. There's some great fights and a skeleton of a plot. They should just recut the movie as a series of cut scenes in some kind of excellent video game (actually, I hear the game based on the movie is suprisingly good). Otherwise we're just left with a very forgettable, but not terrible, movie.

C'mon Wendy's! Advance the Plot!

Like many fans of the blockbuster film The Dark Knight, I was thrilled when I saw that Wendy's would be continuing the story of the popular Dark Knight character Thomas Schiff (David Dastmalchian) in their 3conomics commercials.
However, it's now been several months, and I've yet to see any noticeable advancement in Schiff's character from lovable, George Washington impersonating fast food bargain hunter to psychotic Joker-henchman. The scene has been well-set for sure, the characters are all established, and the spectre of economic downturn festers on the periphery of the spots like a cancer, threatening to spread at any moment, to turn the once joyful office breakroom into a place of fear and sorrow. However, there has not been one indicator, one single connecting thread to link the Schiff we see in the commercials to the desperate schizophrenic we meet in The Dark Knight.

I'm not sure how long Wendy's plans on running the spots, and while the whole Dark Knight prequel thing is a fantastic idea, fans need some character development in every commercial to keep them interested. By now we should at least have gotten some hints at Schiff's backstory, or the conditions in his life that would make him susceptible to recruitment by the Joker. But Wendy's hasn't even introduced the Joker yet!
You've done a great job so far Wendy's. You've taken a character that was portrayed only as a villian in the original movie and fleshed him out. I cannot watch that scene in the Dark Knight now without thinking, "Wow, Thomas Schiff used to be a regular guy just like me. He liked getting a good deal on fast food and joking around with his friends about said deal. I guess anyone could turn to evil if pushed far enough." And it makes a good scene even better. But, please, Wendy's, show us the next step. You've given us the dots. Now connect them.

It's not a big leap. $.99 for a Junion Bacon Cheeseburger? At that price, the question isn't "How does Thomas Schiff go crazy." It's "How has he managed to stay sane for so long?"

The Best of Books, The Worst of Books

One of my goals for 2009 has been to ready more books. As a kid I was a voracious reader, often guzzling down a few books a week. That wasn’t so terribly long ago, but even in the 90s we didn’t have constant internet, Tivo, etc. to distract us at every turn. All the innovations, plus the added pressures that come with being an adult, make it more and more difficult to sit down and spend time with a good book. This is a shame, because unlike a lot of the stimuli we have available in the 21st century, reading is an entirely intellectual, interactive pastime. (Though they get a bad rap from many, video games may be the closet modern parallel. But that’s a topic for another day.) So far I’ve been doing pretty well with books this year, though I wish I had the time to read even more. One of my favorites so far is the poorly marketed and classified but ultimately enjoyable Drood by Dan Simmons.


Simmons has been a popular horror and science fiction writer for a long time, but I (along with many others) first became aware of his work with the phenomenal 2007 historical horror novel, The Terror. This book combined the real life story of the doomed Franklin Expedition which disappeared without a trace on a mission to explore the Arctic in the 1840s, with supernatural horror to fantastic effect. With their ships frozen in the ice, the crew’s struggle for survival gets increasingly desperate; all the while they are threatened by a terrible, polar-bear like monster that seeks to tear them limb from limb in the best horror tradition.

Simmon’s prose is so rich you can feel the sting of the -40 degree temperatures and see the blood of the monster’s victims as it streaks across the ice—all this set against a backdrop of beautiful and absolutely terrifying isolation at the top of the world. Even with the horrors of the climate and the monster to contend with, the real danger comes from within the crew itself, and as the struggle for survival becomes more and more desperate, the crew members begin to turn on one another. I’ve never read a book with a character more loathsome than Cornelius Hickey, who commits actions against his fellow men far more disgusting than anything perpetrated by the monster.

To watch this vile man ruin the crew’s hopes for survival time and time again is heartbreaking. In modern fiction it has become too much of a cliché that villains are the most sympathetic and wronged characters—in Cornelius Hickey, Simmons created a monster that was just that: a monster. All the worst instincts of humanity squished together in a horrible package. It is a testament to Simmon’s skill as a writer that this character was so utterly detestable, and The Terror is stuffed to the brim with similarly well drawn characters, moody descriptions, and a plot that makes it’s 700 plus pages fly by.

Drood is not that good.

Don’t get me wrong. I loved the book. But after an achievement like The Terror, it’s only natural that the follow up is somewhat disappointing. Most of the problem is in the way the book is marketed. On the cover we see a shadowy figure against the familiar backdrop of Victorian London, and from the description inside the jacket Drood seems to be another historical horror tale in the exact same vein as The Terror. It is even placed in the horror section of the bookstore, so the reader can be forgiven for coming to the book with a certain set of expectations. There are horror elements, for sure, and some of them are quite terrifying, but this book is far more history than horror. Instead it takes a cue from Simmon’s portrayal of Hickey and makes its monster not some external nightmare creature, but that most ugly and disgusting of human emotions: Jealousy.

I will go ahead and damage my English major credibility by admitting right of the bat that before I read Drood, I knew very little about the novel’s two main characters, Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins. Of course I knew who Dickens was and had read a few of his books, heard the stories of the people waiting at the docks for the latest installment of his tales, and had used the adjective ‘Dickensian’ in multiple situations over the years. But I knew almost nothing about the man. As for Wilkie Collins, the book’s narrator and central protagonist? Sadly, this was the first I’d heard of him.

Like I said, I went into this book expecting a tale of Victorian horror; something along the lines of Dracula or Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, with perhaps a bit of A Christmas Carol or Oliver Twist thrown in for good measure. I’ve always been a fan of the time period, and when I was in high school I even attempted a god-awful Victorian novel of my own, something about the true story of Jack the Ripper. (I think my brilliant original take on the idea was that Jack was actually the sympathetic hero of the story, and the world simply didn’t understand, i.e., the Anakin Skywalker explanation of evil).

In any event, the first few chapters of the book definitely met my expectations, both for a horror novel and for a successor to The Terror. Dickens explains to Collins in vivid detail the events of the Staplehurst rail crash of 1865—a horrific disaster in which Dickens’ train jumped the track and hurled into a ravine, killing many. Dickens and the book’s title character, the mysterious, corpse-like Drood, flit among the dead and dying, doing their best to help (?) the survivors. It is a scene of wrecked fuselage, shattered bodies, severed limbs, and the desperate moans of the wounded. Hovering above it all is the mysterious figure of Drood, who we later learn was traveling by coffin. Is he a man? A zombie? A vampire? These are the questions the first section of the book lays out for us.

And then they’re not answered. Or they are answered, but after the first hundred pages or so they hardly form the focus of the book. It becomes much more historical and biographical, and, some have argued, less interesting. But I disagree. If you can divorce yourself from expectations, what you will find in Drood is a story of two men, both of them writers, and their competition with one another. Wilkie Collins is Dickens’ friend, but, more importantly, he is jealous of the older, more famous writer, who he calls the Inimitable with no small amount of sarcasm.

This jealousy, combined with Collins’ growing addiction to opium, forms the basis for increasingly twisted ideas, visions, and actions. We never quite know which of Collins’ hallucinations are real and which are false. They all share one thing in common, though: The signs of a jealous, sometimes petty man who would believe in anything except his own inferiority. Whether this is a massive character assassination on the real life Wilkie Collins I will never know, but for me our narrator’s cruel cynicism and selfishness came off poorly against Dickens almost childlike joy at everyday life.

This is a book for writers. It gives physical manifestation to the all too common reality of professional jealousy, and both main characters have an intimate understanding of the writer’s life. In one of my favorite passages, Collins writes:

When the last autumn of Dickens’ life was over, he continued to work through this final winter into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation?

Would we trade all of those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute?

There is no one who has lived the life of the writer who has not had these thoughts from time to time—some more than others, of course, but thoughtful passages like this keep the often reprehensible Wilkie from coming off as completely despicable. Writing can be a lonely profession, and often one that brings with it no clear signs of reward, at least not immediately. What I love about this passage and this book is that you can tell it was written by someone who takes writing seriously, who knows all to well the pain and setbacks and frustrations that come with failure, but also, in the person of Dickens, the beautiful joys that come with effort. Unlike Dickens and Collins, most writers are both Dickens and Collins—at one moment frustrated by loneliness or lack of recognition, and at others overcome by the overwhelming joy that comes with being creative, with creating characters and stories, with the simple use of words and language.

Another favorite moment is earlier in the book, when Collins takes an unfinished draft of his upcoming novel, which he plans to call “The Serpent’s Eye (Or, possibly The Eye of the Serpent).” Dickens loves the novel, he says, but then lays into poor Wilkie with a list of possible corrections and changes. This moment is very real and well done, and anyone who’s ever tried to do anything creative has been there. Listening to someone else easily rattle of possible changes and alterations to something you’ve been working on for months is difficult in any situation, but oftentimes, as is the case with Dickens, those suggestions are right on the money. It’s a wonderful little moment, us alone together with these two great writers, watching them work, watching as Wilkie’s resentment of Dickens builds and builds despite the obvious wisdom in his suggestions. In the end, Wilkie takes the advice, and the result is a better, more popular novel.

Eventually, and by slow degrees, Wilkie’s jealousy descends into madness. As I’ve said, we are never sure which of his delusions are real. I would have liked some more explanations and follow up to certain things, certainly (Just what was in the servant’s stairs at Wilkie’s house? Some type of Lovecraftian horror? Or another delusion?). But in the end, that’s not what the book is about. Drood has far more in common with the movie Amadeus than with a horror novel. There were many moments in the book, such as the revision scene above, when I was reminded of the final moments of Amadeus: Mozart on his deathbed, composing another masterwork with baffling ease, while Salieri can only look on in awe and wonder. If you go into this book expecting The Terror II you’re bound to be disappointed. If you go in expecting Amadeus with writers instead of musicians—well, that’s exactly what it is.

Writing, like music, like all art, is mostly subjective. You can learn various rules, sure, but what makes people fall in love with a movie or a poem or a story or a painting? That is unknowable. Sometimes it can seem unfair. In the final pages of the novel comes what I consider the book’s most powerful scene. After Dickens has died, Wilkie rummages through some of Dickens old books, trying to prove to himself Dickens’ inferiority. He finds problems with characterization, plot, and more, but finally, in a passage in Bleak House, he comes face to face with the Charles Dickens the world saw and loved:

Dickens had gone on by having the fog in the harbor lift over Esther’s shoulder by writing, “these ships brightened, and shadowed, and changed…,” and I knew in that instant…merely passing over these few words in these short sentences, that I would never—not ever, should I live to be a hundred years of age and retain my faculties until the last moment of that life and career—that I would never be able to think and write like that.

The book was the style and the style was the man. And the man was—had been—Charles Dickens.

Simmons is a master at portraying the ugly side of human nature, and this ability is on full display in Drood. There is perhaps no human emotion worse than jealousy and the book is an excellent look at the hideous manifestations of that at once understandable and reprehensible feeling. In many friendships and professional relationships there's a very fine line between love and hate, and this is a book that explores that line wonderfully. Don’t go in expecting a horror story, and you just might find a lot to like.

I Love YOU, Man

I got around to seeing I Love You, Man this weekend, and am very glad I did. Paul Rudd and Jason Segel are probably my favorite actors in the whole “Apatow crew,” and their easy everyman likability elevates the simple premise.

Watching the movie, you really get the feeling that Jason Segel’s character Sydney is the kind of friend everyone needs once in a while—the guy that’s discovered the secret for gathering up the wisdom and perspective that come with adulthood without sacrificing the lifestyle of an adolescent. He’s even got a Rush poster on his wall. You really feel these guys’s friendship, and it helps to show that some of the greatest moments in life are the ones where you’re not doing much but laughing with your friends. Most of the movie is just Paul Rudd and Jason Segel onscreen together having fun, and most of the time that’s all you need. If just watching these two jam out together to Rush’s “Tom Sawyer” doesn’t bring a big stupid grin to your face—well, I don’t know what else I have to say to you.

I’ve been somewhat critical of the recent comedies from Apatow and others for focusing a bit too much on upholding traditional family values and social roles (I went to a self-righteous liberal arts college, so it’s okay for me to think of things like this). There’s 40 Year Old Virgin’s implication that the world breaks down into people who postpone sex until marriage, and crass, selfish hedonists; Knocked Up and Juno’s strong anti-abortion undertones (I’m okay with Juno’s treatment of adoption, less okay with Knocked Up’s premise that two people who have a baby together should be together); even Superbad descends into a saccharine paean to the value of male-friendship.

That’s not to say I Love You, Man doesn’t suffer from some of these issues, notably in the suggestion that Paul Rudd’s character is somehow missing out on life without male friends. But it’s always bad to let a general impression get in the way of a specific story. Paul Rudd didn’t need male friends in his life, but he did need Jason Segel. He needed someone to go out and have a beer with, to talk Rush with, just to do the things he couldn’t do with his wife. And that’s fine. The film deals with the sometimes awkward world of male friendship without falling prey to the bizarre and overly sentimental version of the same thing in Superbad. These are two real characters in a real world that happens to be, embellishment aside, pretty damn funny.

And that’s the main contribution of the new wave of comedies. Only a few years ago we were dealing with Austin Powers III and Scary Movie—Now we’ve got movies like Forgetting Sarah Marshall and I Love You, Man that for the most part deal with real people suffering through real situations. Things don’t always go well, and there’s a lot of pain and other nonsense to deal with, but the end result is something decidedly hilarious. The Ancient Greeks had it pretty well right on this: Tragedy generally deals with the god’s relationship with people, comedy with people’s relationship with people. I’d take 40 Year Old Virgin, Juno, Knocked Up, and especially Forgetting Sarah Marshall and I Love You, Man, over the manufactured over-the top crap that so often passes for comedy any day of the week.

Anyway, that was a long pretentious rant. But the short version is I Love You, Man is a hilarious and very real movie that has a lot of fun with the sometimes difficult world of male friendship in a society where gender roles have become more confusing (ACK!! There I go stumbling into liberal-arts talk again. I am sincerely sorry. Once you’ve spent a couple semesters in Gender Studies or Feminist Theory classes, it’s harder to control than Dr. Strangelove’s Nazi sympathies) I loved I Love You, Man for showing that adult male friendships don’t have to be the poker playing chug fests so hilariously illustrated by Jon Favreau’s character and his friends. Being a perpetual teenager and a responsible adult isn’t mutually exclusive, and there’s a lot of fun in life (at any age) if you just get out there and find it.

Shorter version: Great comdey. Loved it. Now bring on Jason Segel's Muppet movie!