fancollectorgeek

On the internet, nobody can hear you scream first.

2011-12-22T16:48:00.000-08:00

I rarely try to be particularly timely in my posts here - to provide breaking news on geekdom happenings - but the look at the Prometheus trailer that premiered online today does make me want to jump into the pool of voices eagerly crying it's either a prequel or otherwise related film to the Alien movies - and particularly to the 1979 classic that started the series.

First, take a look at the trailer here.

Despite overall feeling like the Alien series - which could be simply dismissed as both being science fiction films from the same director - there are two dead giveaway elements from the first film.

1) The space jockey.

As he was called, the dead pilot of the alien ship found by the Nostromo in Alien. His seat, at least, is clearly seen in the trailer at 0:39.

2) The ship.

Several shots reveal the same horseshoe shaped spaceship that the Nostromo discovered crashed, and explored:

Here's another image from Prometheus, clearly showing the whole horseshoe shape:

This is all news to me, but if you search the internet, you'll find plenty of references to the upcoming film, and even a quote from Scott confirming it is about the space jockey from the original film. I don't know how many of these are true, but I know I'm looking forward to this one with almost the same anticipation I felt for the first when I went to see it in theaters back on my 13th birthday in 1979.

This also underlines how much movie making has changed since the first sequel Aliens was released in 1986. Then, returning to the ship depended on the existence of the model, which had been stored somewhat exposed to the elements in a driveway in Burbank CA for several years.

Damage to the model had lead to the idea that a lava flow had cut through the ship since Ripley had last visited, but now I can't recall if that appears in the film or just in the comic book / novel adaptations.

The space jockey couldn't have appeared again without CGI (hence adding to the need for a path into the ship that didnt pass him). I'm told the original giant space jockey, sculpted out of foam, was on display in the forecourt of the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood when the film premiered, until a stray cigarette caught it on fire and destroyed it in a matter of seconds.

Egyptian Theater photo swiped from here.

Next time: 'Tis the Season to Collect....

Apparently, we have a new theme.

2011-11-15T21:14:00.000-08:00

It's "footage of 1970's TV spaceships that ends up in karaoke videos on new programs." Last week's episode of Community featured scenes of Joel McHale as Jeff Winger and Jim Rash as Dean Pelton (that's him on the left screaming) making karaoke videos in the mall. They break into a fight as another video starts rolling behind them, and there once again appears the Salvage 1 spaceship on network screens for the second time in thirty years. (See the last entry if you're confused at this point).

Is this a new trend in television? Or the last time it'll ever happen? How odd.

Quark flies again - sort of...

2011-09-27T23:03:00.000-07:00

Just a few weeks ago I was watching Breaking Bad - easily one of the best dramas on TV today - when something very unusual but very familiar caught my eye.

Not to give away any spoilers, a side plot involved viewing a karaoke-style video one of the characters had made to the tune of Peter Schilling's Major Tom. Behind him ran mostly space themed stock footage.
And, unmistakably, footage of the space ship from Quark.
In fact, it was clearly from the episode "The Good, the Bad, and the Ficus," which is about the ship being pulled through a black hole and, with dazzling disco-y effect, splitting into two copies - one good one evil. (Ficus, being the emotionless Vegeton alien, is neither good or evil - hence the title). I recognized the ship right away not just because it's so distinctive -
but because I had recently commissioned this model of it online, and had sent the manufacturer every angle of the ship I could find on the show. They built it with the garbage collecting door open, and the trash bag collecting arms extended.

Once you're commissioning models, I think you have to admit to a certain obsession with a show - or at least, in this case, an obsession with collecting everything possible on the program. With this model, plus all the scripts (except one) and dozens of press stills and more, I think I can safely literally say what I once joked: I almost certainly have the largest collection of Quark stuff assembled.
The music video also included footage from a show even more obscure than Quark, if only because it was never released on DVD.
That odd 3-engined rocket is Salvage One, the ship from the Andy Griffith show by the same name. Griffith played an ex-astronaut who used NASA surplus to make his own rocket to go to the moon and salvage everything NASA had left behind, plus bring back his own moon rocks too. I don't remember much about the show, but I remember enjoying it.

A bit of trivia: Quark may be about the only science fiction show that never named it's spaceship - all the scripts only call it "Quark's ship."

More soon!

Big Bang 5.0

2011-09-22T20:45:00.000-07:00

I'm writing this up just as the season 5 premiere of "The Big Bang Theory" is recording on my DVR upstairs. Thinking back to the start, it's a tribute to the cast and crew that the show was 1) created in the first place, and 2) good enough to last this long. (Also notable, it garnered what I believe is still the best syndication deal ever for a TV show.

I've been collecting stuff from the program since the beginning, and it's worth noting that without the San Diego Comic Con, there'd be a heck of a lot less stuff out there to collect. Probably the prize of my collection is the set of posters from each season, signed by the cast at Comic Con. These are all framed similarly and hanging near each other in the living room.

Above is the latest, which for the first time is illustrated: a super-hero version of the whole cast. This one includes seven signatures, including both Mayim Bialik (Amy) and Melissa Rauch (Bernadette).
Last year's poster featured the cast in a tribute to, um... the Beatles? Barbarella? Casino? I feel like there's a specific pop culture reference being made here that's eluding me. (If you know, please fill me in). In any case, they look cool. Signed by the 5 cast members.

Season two's art featured a "Usual Suspects" style line up, equating each character's height with their relative IQ - and Penny breaking the rank to come out on top. Five signatures.

Finally, the first year's art features Sheldon and Leonard in their Flash costumes, with the rest of the cast represented in small photos at the bottom. This one is notable because it's not only signed by the 5 cast members, but also producers Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady.

I'm not sure how many of these they sign each year - maybe 100 at most? But I'm guessing the first is the rarest simply because they had no idea what to expect at the Con. According to Johnny Galecki at their second Con, it was the overwhelming response at the previous show that first showed them how big the show was catching on.

More soon...

Mystic Warlords of Ka'a comes to life!

2011-08-10T18:04:00.000-07:00

I didn't see these at all while at Comic Con, but that's easy to understand: it's a big place. Ultra big. Like, there was a full size recreation of the town of South Park across the street, and we didn't even notice it for the first two days.

Anyways, these cards started showing up on Ebay and, after noticing the address on one and dialing in, I discovered there's a real live version of the collectible card game "Mystic Warriors of Ka'a" up on facebook!

While it seems to be a little buggy, it's kind of fun, as the characters from the show appear to teach you the rules and then, play against you.

I'm still checking it out myself, but go try it out and have fun! Link here.

Stan in the picture...

2011-08-08T19:30:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update here - last season, Stan "The Man" Lee made an appearance as himself on The Big Bang Theory. But did he enjoy it? This image shot off a monitor at SDCC proves that indeed he did. Confirming what my good friend Josh Shipley from The Josh and Croz Show told me after he was lucky enough to interview the Man himself, "The Man" has a photo of himself on the set of BBT right by his desk in his Beverly Hills office. (Upper right). And just in case you can't make it out, he's in the living room with the whole cast, and it looks like Kaley is giving him a smooch! Who said comic book guys don't get girls?

The Oversized Carry-all Anticipation

2011-07-13T12:28:00.000-07:00

Hopefully, I'll be using Comic-con to jump start my regular posting here again. For now, though, I just want to preview the new Big Bang Theory Bag that'll be at this year's con:

You can see the rest of the bags for this year here.

The Second Final Frontier

2011-03-30T01:06:00.000-07:00

I recently viewed the latest Star Trek film for the second time. First was in the theaters, second at home on Blu-Ray, much later, much removed from all the hype about whether or not J.J. Abrams was destroying the franchise, or broke the Prime Directive, or any of that. I was watching it as pure entertainment, as a science fiction fan but also a lifelong Star Trek fan.* ("Spoilers" follow if you're actually reading this before you've seen the film).

I thoroughly enjoyed the film. Abrams played it safe - or smart - by setting his Trek in an alternate universe created when the uber-Romulan villain bounced back in time and attacked the USS Kelvin, just as one James Tiberius Kirk happens to be born. So, everything we see in this timeline is completely new and therefore free from any continuity scrutiny you can apply.

Ordinarily, a film set in the formative Star Fleet Academy years of our heroes would require - at least to the hardcore continuity buffs - a look somewhere between Captain Archer's Enterprise and Captain Pike's Enterprise as seen in the original pilot "The Cage" or the two-part episode "The Menagerie." But since the film starts with a disruption to the time stream - a huge, deadly attack by an unknown enemy that never happened in "our" Trek history - all bets are off. Assuming a greater focus on offensive and defensive power for starships after that, there's no reason to insist anything in this film has to match anything we've seen before. Only that brief scene on the Kelvin needs to fit into the original timeline,** and I'm surprised on close inspection to believe that it does:

On Captain Archer's Enterprise (left), the controls are large manual slides and hard buttons, like on a 1980's stereo console. By the time of Kirk's Enterprise (right), controls are very simple and very solid, like a 1960's cassette player. The detail of the Kelvin shuttle from the film (middle) shows nice, hard-wired type toggle switches, like a 1970's mixing board (Ok, I'm guessing on that one). To me, a believable intermediary step. (It was already interesting to note, once the original series was placed in a timeline between the movies produced in the 80s+, and "Enterprise" produced in 2001-2005, both with greater detailing to the sets, it implied there was an intentional decision around the time Captain Pike came along, to make the starship corridors very plain and straight, and consoles made up of simple hard buttons. Maybe one too many "Fire torpedoes" apps froze up when they pressed their touch screens...)

That's the really picky, tech analysis of the film. In any case, I found it very entertaining, and most of the performers captured just enough nuances of the original characters to feel true to them without just spewing bad imitations of the originals.
Simon Pegg's wry half-smile perfectly evoked James Doohan's good-natured performance as "Scotty."

It's an interesting study of the nature of "suspension of disbelief" what is the only part of the whole movie that, as a Star Trek fan, gave me pause: the size of Engineering, when Kirk and Scotty beam into it. It's HUGE.

Huge, with lots of empty space, and apparently a lot of it constructed out of concrete, as well. I know the Enterprise is big, but this amount of space looks like it should literally take up the entire secondary hull and then some. (Some of this concrete construction is seen on the Kelvin, too).

On the original series, Engineering looked big, but believable. You could at times see a couple levels, and maybe a ladder poking up higher, but it looked like it was built with an economy of space (no pun intended) in mind.

This kind of detail shouldn't pull you out of the narrative, but it often does. The truth is, they found some kind of real - world refinery or such to film in, and decided it looked futurey enough to be the Enterprise. Money saved on building a set or even rendering one.
It's not as if the Enterprise is the size of the Red Dwarf, which is established as having thousands of levels, a Huge prison system entirely hidden from the normal crew, and cargo bays big enough to dwarf T-Rexes. Anything goes there, and they often shot in real world industrial plants that looked perfectly like part of the ship.

Not that this is a review, but I enjoyed the film even more the second time than the first, and watchign it at home gave the chance to look closely for all those details of design and performance that you miss on first viewing.
Plus, you gotta love outtakes where you get to see the Vulcans crack up...

*That's, right, Star Trek fan. Not a Trekker, or a Trekkie, just a fan of the whole franchise.

**Okay, bonus points if you wanted to point out that Ambassador Spock's ship is from our timeline too, but since it's from the farthest future point we've ever seen in that Universe (and perhaps ever will?) it's safe from scrutiny too.

I don't like yer mug.

2011-01-17T23:13:00.001-08:00

Mugs strike me, personally, as generally uninteresting - probably because I rarely drink hot liquids, and usually intake a larger quantity than your typical mug can hold. Still, a few mugs made it into my collection and stay there permanently. From left to right:

Bluth Company: Fox made this available on their web site early in the third season of Arrested Development, just as Michael Bluth began sipping from one at his desk on the show. Remember an easy way to build on your prop budget is to develop merchandise that works on screen as part of the show. Even so, I don't think there're too many of these around.

Oceanic Airlines: This belongs to the airline from Lost, and like the Bluth mug above, appealed to me as a prop replica. If it's something a character on the show would hold, I usually want one.

Drew Carey: This, on the other hand, appears to be a cast and crew gift, meaning there are very few around. Found it in a Salvation Army store in Pasadena.

MST3K: I inherited 2 Mystery Science mugs, one with Mike and one with Joel. Interesting, and just meaningful enough to hang around.

Oh - and Happy New Year! Hoping 2011 is a considerable improvement over 2010; it's already looking like an improvement.

'Big Bang' creators given science honors

2010-10-07T10:45:00.000-07:00

'Big Bang' creators given science honors

French Fries Parmesan, please?

2010-09-09T21:40:00.000-07:00

I have been very neglectful of this blog of late, but for good reason. I recently started a new job after 17 years in the same place. The curious thing is that, in my old position, I enjoyed writing at home for a change of pace. Now, I write in the daytime - incredibly satisfying, but it does burn up that creative urge. 'Nuff said.

In any case, I wanted to take a moment to share these images from my visit to Syracuse earlier this year. My mother and I went out to dinner to a small Italian restaurant in Liverpool (north of Syracuse) that she had long liked. While eating, I happened to notice something odd about the stained glass windows in the front of the restaurant. Take a look.

That's right - Fry guys from the old McDonaldland characters of the 1970's. At some point, plastic windows from a McDonalds were salvaged and placed in this restaurant. they make a nice enough accent, as long as you don't take close notice of the bug-eyed little sneaker wearing freaks jumping around in them.

That's all. More of a placeholder and a hello than anything real to say. I hope to be back soon.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: No Spoilers, and a lesson in swag

2010-08-07T20:45:00.000-07:00

About a week ago, I had the opportunity to see the new movie Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. This is a good time to state my Rule #1 for this blog: no spoilers, ever. I have no interest in seeing something early to run home and write out my synopsis of the movie or show. If I like it, I like the way they told the story, and I don't think you're going to appreciate it better by reading my truncated summary. The most you'll get from me is "it's good. I think you'd like it if..." In this case, gamers, comic book fans, and music fans are all likely to enjoy this film. From the director of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. 'Nuff said.

The funny thing is, only after leaving the theater and seeing the poster in the lobby did I realize I had picked up a ton of swag for the film at Comic Con. in fact, my fiancee and I stood in a line across from the convention center to each get a bag of stuff:
See? Stuff. They were giving it away right at the "stuff" sign. I didn't make it upstairs, so I don't know what kind of party / immersive environment they had going on up there, but it looks like more t-shirts were involved. Here's the free stuff they gave us:

T-shirts, a bag, post cards, free online stuff - all sorts of things. notice the bag says "Scott Pilgrim vs. Comic Con." These are the kinds of things a completist collector of Scott Pilgrim will be wanting to track down.

In fact, if you were really serious about wanting to collect all Scott Pilgrim stuff, you'd have to track down the Comic Con badge from somebody who stood on that line, because they stamped your ID with an oh-so-neat Scott Pilgrim rubber stamp to make sure you didn't come back in line the next day and get another bag of stuff.

If it sounds ungrateful of me to not know I already had all this stuff from Scott Pilgrim (or at least, maybe, that their promotion was unsuccessful in my case) it may help to consider all the free stuff that is given out at the San Diego Comic Con. To help, I laid it out on the living room floor and photographed it:
Free comic books, cards, magazines, buttons, t-shirts, patches, Dexter cheek-scar tattoos, trading cards, Mad Men paper dolls, Archie wedding invitations (both Betty and Veronica), etc. Somehow, I managed to be given four copies of a comic called "radical" over the week without realizing it. Granted, much of these are advertising flyers and catalogs, but it shows how the stuff adds up.

(Collectors note: even though I am not particularly interested in collecting the "Showtime" buttons for Dexter, Weeds, Nurse Jackie, and Californication, it does bug me that I got 3 Weeds buttons and no Nurse Jackie. Just a little bit of OCD manifesting itself...)

A lot of stuff, right? But that doesn't include all the bags I was given there, shown below (with a t-shirt from the "Green Hornet" car garage that I forgot to include above):

Some people list their Comic Con swag on Ebay and try to sell it all for 50, 100, even 200 dollars to recoup their expenses for attending - and I guess people do pay it. Let's face it, if you collect Mythbusters, there isn't all that much different stuff out there to collect, so you'll be wanting their oversized Comic Con bag.

Oh - and to be fair, the above didn't include the free stuff for The Big Bang Theory that I already pulled out into that collection:

No, I don't need four copies of the TV Guide - I'll probably end up giving or trading some to other collectors. But looking at all of this stuff, it occurs to me someone could have a very interesting collection of stuff if all they ever did was go to Comic Con every year and save all the free stuff they got. That would be an interesting cross-section of pop culture.

Hmm. I wonder where those free pogs I got there back in '93 are now...

Post# 150: Our "Secret" Identity Revealed

2010-08-02T00:20:00.000-07:00

For our first 149 posts, fancollectorgeek has been curiously anonymous - "curiously" because the only people who likely noticed it was anonymous all knew who was writing it, and no one else likely cared. It has been easy enough to figure out who's writing, either from my Dad's obituary recently linked, or from the many links from the excellent (and personally inspirational) blog of Jim Fanning, Tulgey Wood that identify me by name.

The reason for this (however transparent) anonymity has currently been suspended, making this an excellent time to share the collectible, below, which bears my name:

Astronaut Edgar Mitchell was the sixth person to walk on the moon, in 1971. It also happens that his first and last name are the same as my first and middle - a coincidence, I'm named after my father's uncle, Edgar Mitchell Davis. Still, that coincidence was enough to make me very interested in the space program when I was a kid. I was only four years old when Mitchell walked on the moon during the Apollo 14 mission, but I vividly remember watching it on TV while visiting my grandmother's house in Akron, NY that summer. I had never heard of anyone that had any name in common with myself (well, unless I had heard of Edgar Allen Poe by that age), so I was very interested in his exploits.

When I heard that you could order an autographed photo from Mitchell's website, I decided I wanted to own one myself. Like actors like William Shatner and June Lockhart, many astronauts charge a premium for signed items. The high demand from fans who want to be sure they're getting the real thing makes it a very lucrative sideline for them. It's my understanding that for years Lockhart didn't do autographs at all until finally, in the early 90's, she acquiesced to sign at a Lost In Space convention in Los Angeles for the then unheard of price of fifty dollars a pop. Fans lined up by the hundreds keeping her busy the whole time she was there.

Now, if she was signing at the same rate that Mickey Rooney was (every 12 seconds, five signatures a minute) when he put his scribble on a Fox and the Hound photo for me, she cleared about fifteen thousand dollars an hour that day - slightly less if she took a break to stretch her wrist or get a drink of water.

Nice work if you can get it!

(Just for the record, Mickey Rooney charged 20 dollars a signature, and for charity. not bad).

Bazinga-fest 2010

2010-07-22T02:02:00.000-07:00

San Diego Comic Con 2010 is officially here, with preview night done and gone. Regular readers know I always enjoy the con, and right now I'm glad to be able to update you on The Big Bang Theory's presence at the show. Judging by the t-shirt vendors, licensees are putting a lot of stock in the show, expecting Sheldon's face to move much merchandise. This is amazing - these t-shirt dealers are a regular feature of the SDCC, and I don't ever remember a single theme dominating so much of their stock all at once - not Star Wars (well, to be fair I wasn't going back in the late 70's), not Harry Potter, nothing. While "Bazinga" far outnumbers the rest, "Sheldon Cooper Supervillain," "Knock Knock Knock Penny," and the friendship algorithm are well represented too. (I have to confess to being a t-shirt snob. I prefer, if I can, to wear a shirt almost nobody else is likely to be wearing. I was given an "Oh My God, they Killed Kenny!" South Park shirt ten years ago, and I'm saving it to wear at least eleven years after the show is off the air.
I wasn't sure if I'd get the new BBT bag at the con, and was prepared to go to Ebay for it, when good friend (and regular reader of fancollectorgeek) Jason Ryan showed up - he had traded his Batman bag for the BBT one just as a favor for me. (Note: good advice to collectors is to know good people. It makes it much easier). The bag is shown here next to the Khan Mego-sized doll I picked up today for size reference. (It's well known that Mego-sized dolls are the standard unit of measurement for oversized bags). If it goes like the past two years, this will be the artwork on the season 3 DVD set (first season to also be available in blue ray!). Does anyone out there know if they're parodying a specific film poster or album cover or something here? Penny vaguely re minds me of Barbarella, but I can't place it...
Jason also nabbed for me these sharpies on lanyards that were given out at the CBS booth to promote the show's move to Thursday night. They made sharpies because, um...I guess smart people like to write with things tied around their neck?
Just the back of the CBS booth. Odd expressions on all the actors. There's supposed to be a signing here tomorrow - we'll see if I get in, or if it turns into another huge siege like last year. Yikes. I'll keep you posted, probably after the show.

Take care!

Cheers! (Pretty clever, huh?)

2010-07-16T06:22:00.000-07:00

I have been a huge fan of the show Cheers since I first found my parents watching it late one night during its first season - we're talking late 1982 here. (Dates me a bit, huh?) To be honest, I don't really remember if I liked it right away, but I did get into it pretty quick. Back in those days, if you missed an episode, you just might never see it again, and I soon began taping it on Beta tapes, and trading with others who had taped episodes I missed. (It's funny: tapes were expensive then - as much as 10 dollars apiece - so pretty much everybody paused during the commercial breaks to save tape. It was a valued skill to be able to anticipate when the show was coming back on and start up without missing the first seconds of act 2 and so on. Now, in the days of DVD series releases, it's the commercials that everyone wishes they had recorded).

Generally for a sitcom, it's rare for there to be much to collect. The shorter the show runs the rarer (explaining why I treasure everything I've ever found for the 7 episode show Quark. Cheers lasted 11 seasons, so eventually it was not hard to find games, t-shirts, and of course beer glasses emblazoned with the series logo. Of more interest to me is ephemera (which I define as "stuff nobody meant to be saved for long) like the unused show ticket, above. When I first moved to Los Angeles I lived one block from Paramount Studios, and before I had a job I'd wake up early to stand online trying to get into that night's show. I went three or four times before I made it in (Cheers Has Chill, aired March 14 1991 - Rebecca wants to turn the pool room into a tea room). I saved the tickets from the times I didn't get in, I also got to see the Arsenio Hall show once when I was too late for Cheers tickets, with musical guest Iggy Pop.
Back to collecting: also collectible are items from the Bull and Finch pub in Boston, which served as Cheers in the exterior shots of the bar during the credits. I got to visit during my tour of duty as a knee brace salesman soon after I came to LA, a job that let me travel most of the country. This button was a little freebie giveaway, and I know I have a matchbook or two from the pub somewhere. (Sadly, I didn't have a beer when I was there - I had a hamburger. )

This catalog that I picked up there is full of merchandise, and could be considered a collectible now itself. I have always naturally saved stuff like this, and you have to wonder, almost 20 years later, how many of these exist. Either a handful of them or spread out with tourists around the globe like myself, or someone in Boston has hundreds of them in mint condition in boxes in their basement or store room. Either way, they're only a thing of the past, as merchandise is now available online from the pub's website.
Of special interest to anyone who liked my now-classic post on the dilemma of saving and collecting food is this page offering Cheers logo chocolate bars. I wonder if any of these still exist? (And does hanging out in Cheers t-shirts really make you that happy?)

Up next: Penny's last names (Big Bang Theory) and just around the corner, San Diego Comic Con 2010!

The Mega-Merchandising Initiation

2010-07-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

I'm running exactly a week late with my promised "every Monday a Big Bang Theory" entry. Those close to me know why and I thank you for the support - the rest of you, I apologize if you've been waiting. I'm afraid this first one isn't much, but I just wanted to finally note that just as the show was wrapping their third season on the Warner Brothers lot last May, they finally had Big Bang Theory merchandise for sale in the Studio store. I was lucky enough to receive one of these caps for my birthday. I haven't seen them anywhere else - is it possible they're studio exclusive? Please let me know if you've seen them out in the world.
Otherwise, all they had was a wrack of t-shirts that seem to be everywhere - several odd images of Sheldon with Klingon or Bazinga! references, and the one I like best, reproducing Sheldon's Friendship algorithm, above.
I also had the opportunity to try the peanut butter cookies from the Warner Studio commissary that Jim Parsons said he loved back in the 5 questions interview I reproduced previously (click Big Bang Theory over on the right to see it and earlier entries). While the first one in the pack of three was unimpressive, the other two were delicious - a slight taste of toffee in them, adding a little extra chewiness. Oh, and the pizza was quite good too.

In the next Big Bang Theory entry in a week, I'l recount the Museum of Television & Radio's first BBT event from a year ago January. (Do you see why I'm forcing myself to do a weekly BBT entry? I have many backed up!) I haven't seen the info presented anywhere else, so it may be of interest to fans. For example - do you know any of the potential last names for Penny? They named three of them that night!

Be well.

Shambling soon on a TV near you...

2010-06-28T22:46:00.000-07:00

I'm lousy at getting information out there in a timely manner. For example, at the simplest, I have been meaning to write up and recommend The Walking Dead comic book, and talk about collecting comic art, since I first started this blog. Since that time, about 40 more issues have come out, and the book has gone from incredibly popular to mega-super-popular. (Those are my estimates; industry standards may actually label it ultra-super popular). On top of that, it's now being adapted to the small screen on AMC. Given that creator Robert Kirkman wanted to essentially tell in comic form a "zombie movie that never ends" (because when a typical zombie movie ended, he always wondered what happened next to the characters)... given that, a series is a natural way to develop the story. Given that AMC is creating the best dramas on TV now - Mad Men and Breaking Bad - I am really looking forward to the series.

So - I'm way late for any of the above to be news to Walking Dead fans, but I think I'm first with an image of the director Frank Darabont with the comic book (above). I'm not a friend of his, but I could claim to be an acquaintance. We have mutual friends in common, and I often would be at the same events - usually at or related to the legendary Creature Features store in Burbank. I would never expect him to know my name, but the few times we've run into each other he has recognized me slightly, enough to let me say hi and remind him who I am. The last time I saw him was just a few days after he was pegged to direct The Walking Dead series, in The House of Secrets comics in Burbank. He was buying every copy of The Walking Dead available for reference, and he graciously let me take this photo provided I promise not to put it online until a date was announced. I assume he meant a shooting date, and since they're now shooting and it's been announced to air in October, I think I'm safe running it now. Permission is granted to reproduce anywhere provided you leave the copyright notice attached, and please (if possible) link back to this site.

Walking Dead was such a good comic it got me into collecting original comic art much more than I had before. Buying the art for pages is a curious thing to collect: it's taking something you already own and bought for a few cents (a page of a comic) and buying it again, for much, much more money. I got interested in the book just about as issue #24 was on the stands, and it was a great time to buy up some really good pages - like above from Issue 19, the first I bought - for a good price.

One danger of buying online of course, is having a one of a kind piece damaged. I got page 2 of issue 2 - the only piece I ever saw from Tony Moore's original 6 issues at an affordable price, and a great full page splash of main character Rick. It was in Canada, and it arrived, as you can see to the right - with a hole all the way through the outer cardboard, a layer of inner cardboard, an envelope,

and the ART ITSELF. I promised myself I wouldn't write negative opinions here, but I have to tell you, when I tried to file an insurance claim with Canada Post, they eventually just stopped answering my phone calls. Thanks, Sandro...

The funny thing is, I got this for such a good price, it's still a good price even with the damage, and it will display just fine. Oh well.

Starting next Monday, this blog will be updated regularly every Monday and Thursday, with each Monday entry being Big Bang Theory themed until I run out of topics. Thanks for reading!

My Father

2010-06-20T12:34:00.000-07:00

My father passed away last month. Besides being a great Dad, he was a world class collector of Theodore Roosevelt. Memorabilia, writings, everything. If Roosevelt was on it, he wanted it, I remember as a kid happily finding a Richie Rich comic I had contained an imaginary story where Dollar the dog helped Roosevelt dig the Panama Canal and happily giving it to m Dad - it went on the bookshelf in the dining room right with the "real" Roosevelt books. (For years my Mom sacrificed the dining room to the Roosevelt library, until us kids moved out and an upstairs room became my Dad's office). It was always exciting to find something for Dad, even game pieces at McDonalds when they had a presidential game in the 70's. The Roosevelt figure you see fallen above was made in 1941. I just found it at the San Diego Comic Con last year, and sent it to my Dad at Christmas. He loved it, and it was amazing to find something that was around since he was a kid that he hadn't come across yet.

Dad's collection was truly world class - arguably the largest, most complete on Roosevelt privately assembled. One of the guiding philosophies of his collecting was that, if something said it had nothing to do with Theodore Roosevelt, it belonged in the collection.

As far as I'm concerned, Dad absolutely "won" as a collector - he not only created something valuable (the best place to research one of our most influential presidents) but he kept the collection together and sold it for a good amount to New York State, where it now resides under his name. A legacy. (The postcard collection alone is linked here). His collection was unquestionably relevant - it is a real pleasure now to see Dad's name listed as a source in documentaries and books about Roosevelt.

Dad loved going to the Flea Market in Syracuse every Sunday he could. I've often noted that part of the appeal of collecting is the hunt, and that was definitely true for him too. My sister said she might go to the Flea Market today in honor of him, and I hope she (and any other family back there into it) does.

Like, I would say, most collectors, Dad started when he was a kid. He treasured the books he had a child, like the one above, and still had many of them in his office now. The top on the left, and the giant's ring on the right (quarter shown for size reference) were treasured possessions that were amongst a very few things he kept atop his dresser or in the top drawer. I will continue to treasure them.
After he sold the collection to New York, he went right on collecting Roosevelt and amassed a fairly decent collection again. A pleasant find as we were looking through this was the book Room For Mr. Roosevelt which is about a family in Syracuse NY that was inspired by TR during his life after the presidency. I'm currently reading it, and finding a surprisingly personal connection to Dad, who also was always somewhat a local historian too.

Late in life, Dad acquired an interest in antique, mostly wooden tools, especially planes - and quickly acquired over 400 of them. For anyone else it would have easily passed as a lifetime, sole obsession, but that just underlines the zest with which Dad embraced his interests. (I swear, one of the last times I was home we went to a book store together and Dad found a wooden plane to buy. Seriously.)

One of the reasons I started this blog was to explore the question "Why do people collect?" I know the answer in part for me: I'm a collector because my Dad was.

I miss you, Dad. Happy Father's Day.

We interrupt these messages...

2010-04-19T19:36:00.000-07:00

Sorry folks, I was really on a roll to start posting every three days, but my plans have been put on hold while I return to Syracuse for my Dad, who's in the hospital. He's doing better.

I should be back in Los Angeles pretty soon, and I intend to continue posting twice a week - every Monday and Thursday, I think. Until then, here's this completely non-ironic look at the Spider-man 3 version of Operation. (Spotted in a thrift store in Syracuse).

From Springfield, WIth Love

2010-04-05T22:31:00.000-07:00

A recent episode of The Simpsons, "Stealing First Base," Bart experienced his first kiss, or something like that, while receiving mouth to mouth resuscitation. I thought he had his first kiss about fourteen years ago, but since he's only ten years old, maybe that episode doesn't count anymore...

Anyways, the kiss set off a great little montage of iconic cinema and TV kisses. It's interesting how easy they all are to recognize, even with the characters Simpsons-ized and no other context or sound included. I'm sure of all of them except the third - it looks like John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara in The Quiet Man - but I don't recognize the setting. Did they kiss in some church ruins at one point? I only saw the film once.

Enjoy.

This last one is my favorite. If you're old enough to remember this, it was probably one of the biggest laughs ever on television.

When Worlds Collide

2010-04-02T20:17:00.000-07:00

Couldn't resist this on Ebay recently. This scene never took place on either Barney Miller or Welcome Back Kotter, but it sure could have. Kotter was set in Brooklyn, and Barney Miller's 12th precinct was somewhere in New York, so it's entirely possible they could've busted the Sweathogs at one time or another.

The truth is, they just ran back to back on the same night, but I loved it when shows crossed over like this. Remember when there was a blackout on every NBC Thursday night show set in New York? I believe it was Friends, The Single Guy, Seinfeld, and Carolyn in the City. Or even further back, when Loni Anderson took the Love Boat to Fantasy Island? (Well, not exactly, but almost). It can get a little complicated: Kramer on Seinfeld sublet his apartment from Paul Reiser on Mad About you. Ursula, the waitress on Mad About You, was twin sisters with Phoebe on Friends. (I recently heard the part of Phoebe was adapted to make her the twin of Kudrow's part on the other show). Paul Reiser's character on Mad About you did a documentary on Alan Brady, the star of the show Rob Petrie wrote for back on The Dick Van Dyke. Morey Amsterdam's character from Dick Van Dyke, Buddy, once appeared on the Danny Thomas Show. Now, the Williams family on The Danny Thomas show once shared a home with the Ricardo family on the Lucy-Desi Comedy hour, which featured the same characters as I Love Lucy, on which little Ricky was once visited by Superman - the real, super-powered Superman from The Adventures of Superman, played by George Reeves. So....Seinfeld lives in the same world as Superman, and every character in between. (Which would've made Jerry's day, he was a big fan of Superman on the show...)

Don't think I'm such a big TV fan I know all this off the top of my head. Out there in the interweb, there's a site where they kept track of all the crossovers ever done on TV here. Between the grid here, mapping how the shows connect, and the key here, it's easy to spend hours seeing how almost every show you watched growing up is connected. And, if you believe the last episode of St. Elsewhere, they're all an autistic boy's imaginings within a snowglobe.

Sadly, neither Welcome Back, Kotter or Barney Miller appear anywhere on this grid - but at least this photo proves their worlds did intersect, somewhere out there in the multiverse, briefly.

Brick by Brick by Brick by

2010-04-01T11:49:00.000-07:00

I don't often just throw up a link to someone else's site here, but this one is a little different: a friend sent me this link to a visit inside the Lego Archives. Aside from just being an amazing look at 1) corporate organization in a toy company and 2) a neat look at real old stuff in mint condition, I have much the same reaction when I come across the old space Lego sets as the author does. I Spent many a summer afternoon with my friend down the street (who's now a congressman) making up our own games of space battles between red and white space men (I think the blue and yellow were too scarce to be a whole side unto themselves). The best thing about playing space battles with Lego ships? Any time your ship takes damage, you just break off bricks from the appropriate spot.

Anyways, hope you enjoy.

Paradoxers, take note...

2010-03-28T23:20:00.000-07:00

When Sheldon and Leonard first laid eyes on Penny, they had a fairly normal conversation:

LEONARD

New neighbor?

SHELDON

Evidently.

LEONARD

Significant improvement over the old neighbor.

SHELDON

Two hundred pound transvestite with a

skin condition? Yes, she is.

Recently I was lucky enough to acquire

a copy of the pilot script signed by Kaley, Johnny, and Jim. Pilot episodes are tricky things - characters often aren't quite defined yet, and there are one or two lines in the Big Bang Theory pilot that I think most fans quietly agree are not truly canon. the pilot script can be even further removed from what the show becomes. It's been widely discussed that the first pilot for TBBT featured a Penny character who was a kind of tough goth chick (or punk, or something like that. I forget). I believe this was even filmed, but it just didn't work, and they recast with Kaley Cuoco in the role.

I haven't even read the whole thing, but I almost immediately noticed a little variation in the above dialogue that Sheldon/Penny shippers (did I say that right?) will no doubt find very interesting. Click to enlarge:

–adjective

(of light) produced by incandescence.

glowing or white with heat.

intensely bright; brilliant.

brilliant; masterly; extraordinarily lucid: an incandescent masterpiece; incandescent wit.

aglow with ardor, purpose, etc.: the incandescent vitality of youth.

You can choose for yourself which definition of "incandescent" you think Sheldon was using:

1) bright, 2)hot, 3) really bright, 4) brilliant, or 5) the perfect woman...

I'll let you know if I come across any more little gems in the script.

Go there in your car automobile

2010-03-25T22:50:00.000-07:00

I've stated before that I like the TV show Flash Forward. If you follow me on twitter (@fancollectrgeek) you know they often shoot in places I go in real life - a bird store, a diner that doubled as both a coffee shop and a cocktail lounge within ten minutes on the show, and the hospital, which is actually an office building much of my work takes place in.

Now, above, they've created my favorite Fake-Address-You-Aren't-Even-Really-Supposed-To-Read: 946 Avenue Street. How perfectly generic! This is one of the things I enjoy about watching on a huge projector screen, you can catch little details.

This has been widely reported elsewhere online, but I think many of the readers I know wouldn't have seen those: the first episode had a very obvious callout to Lost: a billboard for Oceanic Airlines right in the center background. I didn't catch until the recent recap of the series, which I saw in high def, that it reads "Perfect Safety Record" on the top - obviously, this is not the world that lost Oceanic Flight 815 to the mysterious island. If you're watching Lost now, you may wonder (spoiler) does that mean it's set in the alternate world we're seeing now, where the flight never crashed? Maybe... I guess we'll only know for sure if everyone on the show suddenly blacks out for two minutes seventeen seconds...

Collecting, Depression, and Hoarding 101: an overview

2010-03-22T21:55:00.001-07:00

Sorry I've been away so long.

The fairly recent suicides of Marie Osmond's son Michael Blosil and Walter Koenig's son Andrew both seem to have been related to chronic depression. It's a terrible shame to lose them both to that, but it's difficult to understand how extreme chronic depression can be, how it can take over and sour your thoughts. I am lucky enough to have recently realized I was depressed to an extreme point: the depths my spirits had sunk to were far, far more extreme than the situation I found my life in called for. I say I'm lucky to have realized this because I spoke to my doctor and found it easily treatable - I am much better, feeling myself, and able to handle things emotionally in a reasonable manner.

Collectors seem to be more susceptible to depression than your average person. Somewhere on that scale from the casual collector, past the completist, and on to the obsessive hoarder is a point where objects are being accumulated and held onto for emotional reasons - the hoarder can't bare to part with anything because of a great attachment to them. (Of course, I would hope anyone who collects at least does it for the emotional reason "because they like to" but that isn't always the case). It's an easy trap

to fall into: if you have any fond memories attached to it, it becomes easier to just find a box or a corner to shove the item into than to decide to get rid of it. I was holding onto this ratty old Trapper Keeper for decades, just because it bore the name in stickers of the ship from a Star Trek parody comic book I wrote in high school. U.S.S. Apathy. (Get it? Apathy is an antonym of Enterprise. Ha.) When I came across it recently, I was able to chuck it out, but took this photo just in case I ever wanted to gaze on it fondly again. Actually, I found it more useful here in the blog than I feel any sense of nostalgia on viewing it.

Hoarders are interesting, and there's a show on A&E that tries to help a couple of them clean up their act every week. (Be careful with that link - every time I go to the page the preview blasts me with static. Just skip it.) It's a bit heavy handed and grim, and I've found it very repetitive after watching several shows, but it can still be fascinating to look at what people get themselves into. I used to study these shows with a "there but for the grace of God go I" attitude, always finding it easier to clean out the closet a bit after viewing. This image shows the clutter of a beer can collector - over 55 thousand cans in boxes littering his house - being transferred to the shelves long ago made for their display. (Apparently to the psychologist on site, organization is the difference between a collector and a hoarder. I think that's simplifying it a bit...) you can see a clip from this show here. After a short Nyquil commercial. Sigh.

I'm rambling a bit here, but I guess my most important message is if you find yourself extremely depressed, talk to someone, at least your doctor. I'd relate that to collecting, or feeling like a geek, but there's really no reason to qualify it.

Why the Star Trek books up top? When my friend Bruce passed away, I inherited his set of all the autobiographies of the Star trek cast. They each wrote one except for DeForest Kelley, who passed away before they got started. I read them all, and Walter Koenig's just happened to be the best read, followed by James Doohan's, which I seem to have misplaced. George Takei's was okay, but it was written before he came out of the closet, and I was reading it after, so it suffered from obvious omissions of any romantic life at all, and allusions to minor encounters with women as bigger than they were. I honestly think he'd do well to rewrite it in an expanded, more honest version - not sordid or illicit, but, well, if it was tough to be a Japanese-American growing up in mostly hispanic East L.A. after World War II, it must have been even harder to be gay also.

Thanks for listening. I'm always glad to hear your thoughts in comments or at fancollectorgeek@earthlink.net. I will be back with more on a lighter note very, very soon - no more month long breaks!

More views from Pasadena

2010-01-13T22:23:00.000-08:00

As always, life disrupts intentions to post more regularly, so I'm finally just going to post more of the best views from the Christmas party shared last time. Above, just a little bit more of a view of Penny's kitchen than we usually get.
I'm not sure how many of these holiday decorations were there for the holiday episode this year, "The Maternal Congruence," and how many were placed by the set decorators (at least one of whom was in attendance) for the party. (Does Penny know the bald guy in the frame?)

I threw this photo in to show you (well, just barely) one of the rarest Big Bang Theory

items out there: a clear-front refrigerator that sits in the back of the stage, with a "Big Bang Theory"panel on top where the brand name usually goes. Sorry it's so dark, but I really like this sort of thing. There's one (well, probably only one) in the entire world. It would go great in a fan's rec room, right by this custom ping pong table Kuyal Nayyar tweeted this picture of awhile ago. Aside from a prop, where are you going to find anything rarer than these?

Sort of a more normal angle from Leonard's desk towards the door - looks like the desk has some extra party related ribbons and candy on it.

Finally I lightened up a bit this view from high in the audience area, showing the sets laid out exactly as you see them on TV - Penny's apartment to the left, the hall, then the living room and kitchen. Looks like Sheldon's bedroom is off to the right of that, in the same location where I've seen the college cafeteria, and the lecture room Sheldon and Leonard came to blows in. To the left of Penny's apartment I've seen Leonard's room ("It's cooler when girls aren't looking at it.), the Physics Bowl, and Wolowitz's bedroom. Oh yeah, and once, the lobby of the building where Penny and Sheldon got their mail was being filmed way off to the left, out of sight of the audience.

That's all for now - just been wanting to get back to posting more regularly, of course. I hope you enjoy these views.

From the Desk of Doctor Sheldon Cooper: Literally

2009-12-24T23:06:00.000-08:00

Some departments at Warner Brothers this year had the unique pleasure of holding their holiday parties on Stage 25, home of The Big Bang Theory set! I was not able to attend - employees only for these functions, which is fair - but someone very special to me went, and was able to share some terrific photography with me. These are just a couple of choice photos, I have plenty more to share later.

From up closer than we ever get to see Sheldon's desk, a view of superhero figures high in the kitchen that I'd never seen before - Batgirl, Superman, and possibly Black Canary look on frpom above the cookie jar made famous in "The Bat Jar Conjecture" - one of the episodes I got to see live. The folder - usually visible on Sheldon's desk right where it is here, is labelled "Hemoglobin test results." If I didn't know about the random nature of such set dressing, I'd be wondering what our favorite physicist is doing mucking around in the life sciences?

In this wide study of Sheldon's room, I'm glad to see one of the "House of Secrets" posters that used to be visible in the back has moved to a spot on his bedside not generally seen on the show. I believe these are called "fly"walls - if I remember correctly - extensions of the set often containing details never seen on screen. Don't worry about the photo on Sheldon's bedside, by the way - it's not a prop from the show, but was placed there as a gag by one of the gals taking pictures at the party.

Happy Holidays to all who find their way here - Big Bang fans and Michael Jackson researchers from all over the world alike. And also, happy holidays to my family and friends who make it here, and those of you afflicted with that interest called "collecting" that enjoy hearing about my struggles with the accumulative urge.

Happy holidays!!

The Persistence of Vision Principle

2009-12-13T22:04:00.001-08:00

I've said before that I watch pretty much anything that's animated. While that's not entirely true, more discerning viewers than I might have missed a surprise appearance by Sheldon, Leonard, and Penny from The Big Bang Theory on tonight's episode of Family Guy, "Business Guy." To summarize:

When Peter's father-in-law Carter Pewterschmidt is in a coma, Peter ends up in charge of his company, Pewterschmidt Industries. When Carter recovers, Peter stays in control of the company and as Carter's boss, forces him to do embarrassing things, like go cubicle to cubicle inviting coworkers to come over for a Big Bang Theory viewing party.

When no one wants to come over, Peter still makes him throw the party. Even his wife won't watch with Carter, but we get to see a clip of the show:

Sheldon: I'll have you know that I can bench press over 630 nanograms.

Leonard: Sheldon, that's less than two pounds.

Sheldon: Sounded better the way I said it.

Carter (watching): HA ha ha ha! Ohh, when I tell that joke at work tomorrow, people are going to be sorry they didn't come. This, this was a good night.

Johnny Galecki and Jim Parsons recorded their characters voices! I think they did a pretty good job of animating the look of the living room set, too. But is this show taking a cheap shot at BBT? No, for Family Guy, this is a virtual love letter. And besides, at the end of the episode:

Carter invites Dr. House (actually voiced by Hugh Laurie) who he and Lois caught posing as a swamp monster, over to his house next week for a viewing of The Big Bang Theory.

Lois: Daddy, you don't have to do that any more.

Carter: I know, I know. I like it now.

You see, they were posing as swamp monsters to trick Peter into giving back control of the company. If you watch Family Guy, you understand. If you don't, but you want to see the BBT guys animated, you should be able to catch it soon on Adult Swim or Hulu.

Friends to Big Bang Theory in Two Moves...

2009-12-07T20:53:00.000-08:00

I've always been a fan of obscure television. It's like, the harder a show is to see, the more interested I am in it. The less people have heard about it, the more I want to know about it. (Remember Struck By Lightning? The sitcom starring Jack Elam as the Frankenstein monster? No?). Whe I was a kid, with my first Beta VCR, the Syracuse papers used to always say on the tv page when a show was airing for the last time - and I would always tape it. That's why I have a Beta tape somewhere with the last episode of AfterMASH on it, and one episode of Dreams, the 80's trippy music video inspired dramedy starring John Stamos and Jami Gertz as members of a struggling rock & roll band. That's also probably why I bought the DVD set of the first season of Joey, the Friends spin-off starring Matt LeBlanc in the continuing adventures of actor Joey Tribbiani, moved to Los Angeles.

Of course, I also got it because of my interest in filming locations. The apartment house shown as Joey's on the show was less than a block from the apartment I lived in up until a year ago. There's a kind of a kick in seeing a real life location you know on TV in fictionalized form. (Notice how much bluer the sky is on tv....hmmmm)

As an aside, I want to relay a story Penn Jillette told on his radio about the time he guest starred on a fourth or fifth season episode of Friends. He said it was really interesting to observe the cast. They were all running around stressing about holding onto the level of fame they had obtained on the show. Only one of them was just enjoying every minute of it: Matt LeBlanc. So, in a way, it's kind of nice that he was the one that ended up with his own program for two more years than the rest of them.

Just recently I revisited Joey through the DVD set for the first time since they aired. I was kind of surprised to find that Joey's nephew Michael, played by Paulo Costanzo, really reminded me of the guys on The Big Bang Theory. Michael is a grad student at Cal Tech, and the humor comes out of his contrast with the less bright Joey:

Michael: Actually, right now we're designing a mock up for an escape module from the International Space Station.

Joey: (laughing) What are you, a rocket scientist?

Michael: (deadpan) Yes.

Sound familiar? But the similarity doesn't end there:

Notice that Michael tends to dress in a wide range of cool but nerdy t-shirts. Look familiar?

Well, I figured this unexpected little similarity between a fairly forgotten show and TV's new number one comedy might be fun about. I was more surprised, though, when I got to the third episode: Joey and the Party. In it, Joey and Michael throw a party to get to know their neighbors, and Michael's longtime rival Seth Tobin shows up with a girlfriend - meaning Michael is the last guy from his school to have a serious relationship. (Plot). So check out Seth when he shows up at the party:

That's right - Simon Helberg, better known as Howard Wolowitz on Big Bang. He's dressed more like Leonard, but his character is very similar to the Howard we all know.

Seth: I'm bench pressing 90 pounds. Can you bench press your body weight?

Even more like Howard, from the end, when he and Michael reveal that they've been jealous of each other for years, and his girlfriend is a fake:

Michael: Seth, why did you lie?

Seth: So I could beat you for once, ok? You got into CalTech's doctoral department, I got rejected. You've got this killer apartment, I live at home and share a bathroom with my grandmother!

I'm not, by any means, suggesting that anything on The Big Bang Theory was taken from, or even inspired by Joey... but it's likely that Simon had some great scenes on his reel when he was being considered for the part of Howard Wolowitz.

...I wonder of Matt LeBlanc gave him any acting tips?

Flashforward: Shrodinger's Tivo (spoilers?)

2009-11-14T21:42:00.000-08:00

I'm really enjoying the new ABC show "Flashforward" - at this moment I'm one episode behind and just about to catch up. From a Quantum Mechanics point of view this is an interesting point to be: I don't know if that next episode, there in my Tivo DVR, is the best episode yet, or if it's just ok. Until I observe it, it's both, according to QM. Quantum Mechanics is a truly fascinating arm of science: it literally seems to break down to, for all intents and purposes, magic at the basics. We've observed a particle cease to exist in one spot and appear in another without existing in the space inbetween - teleportation. A split particle, whose halves vibrate identically from stimulus on one no matter how far apart they are may prove the key to faster than light (indeed instantaneous) communication over great distances in space - explaining how Captain Kirk and all those admirals could hold a conversation without delays in it light years apart.

The premise of Flashforward is that everyone on Earth simultaneously has a vision on what they'll be doing for 2 minutes and 17 seconds at the exact same time six months into the future. A fascinating idea. Some people see themselves in new jobs, which they go out and apply for after their visions. Others see unhappy changes in their lives that they hope won't actually unfold. Still others see nothing at all, leading them to believe they'll be dead in six months time. What's interesting, though, is that while many of them see themselves in a position that is created by the flashforward - like the FBI agent Mark Benford who literally sees himself investigating the cause of the flashforward, using clues seen in the future to guide his investigation in the present - none sees what is the most obvious thing that will occur at that moment: a pause, like midnight on New Year's Eve, as we reach the moment we have seen, feared, and anticipated for the last six months. One flashforward overhears a newsman on TV describing a senator's scandal - in fact, wouldn't he be saying "Here it is, we've reached the moment that changed the world when the global community saw it six months ago!"???

Of course, a vision of the future that merely reveals itself to

be aware of having been seen in the past (whew!) does not make for good TV. Rather than getting an immutable view of the future, the world in Flashforward seems to have been placed in a six month long Schrodinger's box - but given the view of one possible outcome. It's already clear on the show that's not the only possible future, as Agent Al Gough commited suicide to avoid his future vision of a world in which he accidentally killed the mother of two young boys. Despite having seen a future for himself, he now undoubtably will not fulfill it. Both states - alive and dead - were possible outcomes of the six month long box.

If you're not familiar with Schrodinger's Cat, Wikipedia can help you out here. Animal Man - one of the better, most underused characters in the DC Universe (for reasons I'll hope fully explain here one day) once described the thought experiment using a pizza, a hot pepper package in the box being either broken - making the pizza too spicy to eat - or whole, leaving the pizza edible. I only mention this because I really liked Animal Man, and I hung this comic on the wall for a long time.

Just as an aside, The X-Files once dealt with the question of future knowledge in a differentway. In the episode "Clyde Bruckman's final repose," Peter Boyle as Clyde warned Mulder that he would find himself in the dark kitchen of a hotel, chasing someone, only to be jumped and choked from behind. Mulder, finding himself in a dark kitchen and suddenly

realizing this is the vision described to him, whirls around with gun in hand to get the drop on his assailant - only to be set upon by the assailant, in the shadows that were directly in front of him, now choking him from behind. Mulder's vision was not a box with two possible outcomes, it was truly an immutable future, and any twist and turn he made to avoid it only brought him closer to it.

Poor Schrodinger's cat. Or not. As long as you don't open the box, it's okay to feel fifty percent sorry for him.

Fridge part 2

2009-11-09T20:21:00.001-08:00

Well, I didn't quite manage to give away one of these snazzy 70's Superman magnets yet, though I did get some good guesses as to the geek interests seen on my fridge, below. Maybe five was too many to ask for. For the record, here's how I count them:

1) Freakies Magnets

2)DC Superheroes

3)Disneyland ride vehicles

4) Milk and Cheese (Evan Dorkin comic)

5) Star Trek monster magnets from the Las Vegas Hilton

6) Peanuts characters (Spike and Shermy from Schulz museum).

7) Mystery Science Theater 3000

8) Coca Cola machine

9) Young Simba from The Lion King

10) Lost (ABC TV)

The reason for keeping multiple Superman and Robin magnets, is they have different color schemes, so as a true completist collector I have to keep one of each variation.

This still leaves me with one Superman magnet I'm trying to give away - so maybe I should look for a Superman fan. I'll mail it to the first person who comments the answer to this Super-question:

What are two types of Kryptonite besides Green and Red?

2009-11-03T09:42:00.001-08:00

Over at Questionable Content this morning, Jeph Jacques has depicted a typical interaction between a comic artist and a super fan. Check it out here.

The fridge of a geek

2009-11-01T22:11:00.001-08:00

Taking a close look at my refrigerator, it's clear it belongs to a collector. And, that I like Pollo Loco. Some of these magnets I picked up here and there, because they happened to fit my interests.

Chief here are the plastic DC magnets that I got as a kid. Very textural and bright, I bought these when I was a very young collector, and you don't see them much anymore. And who can believe they did a magnet of the Riddler? How cool. I vaguely remember they might've done the Penguin as well, and I'm always keeping an eye out for any I don't have.

There's also a complete set of Freakies magnets here. I'll be writing more about Freakies shortly, but basically they're cereal-selling monsters that completely captivated me in the early 1970s, despite their distinctly unappetizing appearances. You'll see seven of them on the fridge, that's all of them.

Now, I've got a spare Superman magnet (besides even the two you see here) and I thought it would be interesting to give it away to a reader here. So, I'll mail it to the first person who can correctly answer the questions below.

1) I count 9 different categories I collect on this fridge, including Freakies and superheroes. Please name five of the others.

2) I have two Superman magnets and two Robin magnets. Can you see why? (Hint: it's a collector thing).

Please send your answers to fancollectorgeek@earthlink.net. This is open to anybody, whether I know you, am related to you, or you live on the other side of the globe. I'll post in comments when someone has completed.

Enjoy!

Happiness is a little book

2009-10-26T22:40:00.000-07:00

Growing up in the late 60's early 70's I have many, many fond memories of Peanuts characters in my life. I was way too little to read or understand the comic strips, but I remember cherishing a number of these little square hardcover books when I was a very little kid. Happiness is a Warm Puppy (first published in 1962) was a huge hit in the decade of peace, love, and bomb-banning, and this was very much the look of Peanuts merchandise at the time: Strict black line art printed on very heavy - not always particularly pretty! - colors. These may look odd compared to the mostly pastel stuff you see today from Peanuts, but back then shirts, banners, and sleeping bags with Peanuts characters and quotes are slogans were everywhere. (the torn dust-jacket here may throw you off - the title isn't carried through to the book below).

I couldn't help but share this odd example from Puppy. I can't help but think Charles Schulz couldn't have been entirely happy with this depiction of the kids in a tree. They look more like they were drawn sitting around a campfire, then had a tree drawn in instead. (They all also look like they're a second away from slipping off their branches!)

Happiness is a Warm Puppy inspired sequels, like Happiness is a Sad Song. It also inspired many parodies, some "ribald" as they would have been labelled back then, and some innocent. Probably the best known is "Happiness is a Warm Gun," a slogan seen in a gun magazine which inspired the Beatles song.

Much less known these days, I think it's safe to say, is this example from Johnny Hart's line of B.C. comic strip paperbacks. I didn't make the connection myself until I saw it on the shelf near the Peanuts books - but I'm sure it wasn't lost on the book-buying public back in 1972 when it was released. Hart preferred puns in his strips, and even book titles, but he probably just couldn't resist a little self-deprecating comparison to the number one selling Peanuts merchandising juggernaut he was "competing" with.

Well, they're all good reads, and remind me of my childhood. anytime I come across a B.C. paperback I don't have for a quarter, or one of those funny little square solid-color books for a good price, I still like to pick them up today.

The Quintuple Quandary Quizzification

2009-10-22T22:39:00.000-07:00

I'm going to sprain a brain lobe trying to come up with a Big Bang Theory-esque title each time, but heck, it's fun. Here I am trying to post more than once a week, and about the whole range of my collecting and fandom, but I keep getting so much cool Big Bang theory stuff sent my way, that's all I'm getting on here. But I'm not complaining!

I had handed to me tonight (in the Pasadena Cheesecake Factory, no less) a hard copy of a very nice Warner Brothers Employee E-Newsletter that I'd never heard of, called "Behind the Shield." (Referring to the WB logo shield). In it last month was a "Five Questions With...Jim Parsons" column that I hope they won't mind me sharing with you now:

What's your favorite thing about playing Sheldon?

In a weird way, (it's) all the longer passages they give him to say-especially the ones laden with scientific terms. I mean, they are mind-numbing at times, trust me, but there is no satisfaction like the kind you get from not only memorizing these, but from making sense of them-both for yourself and the audience.

When you heard that "The Big Bang Theory" had been picked up for two seasons, how did you celebrate?

I lead a very lame life in terms of celebrations. So, there was no champagne uncorked or anything like that. I remember thinking immediately of all the new scientific terms this would mean I would have to memorize (or, in reference to the above question, "GET to memorize!").

When you're not shooting your own TV show, are you a big TV watcher?

I tend to always have the TV on, but this doesn't mean I am actually watching anything. I am unfortunately remarkably talented at singing commercial jingles and can identify most commercial products within just a few notes. this really can't come in handy any day...

What do you order from the Commissary on the Studio lot, and what's your favorite thing from craft services?

The Commissary has the most wonderful peanut butter cookies I've ever eaten. As far as our own craft services is concerned, Jeannette is such a wonderful human being-she not only always has something delicious set out, but is constantly asking if she can make one of us something in particular. I love her.

Who is the biggest celebrity you've seen on the Warner Bros. lot?

John Stamos. And I say this having laid eyes on George Clooney as well, but I have to tell you that I was more stunned to see Mr. Stamos. No offense, George...you're still number two in my book!

___________________________________

So, kind of fun to see something a little inside like this. this hard copy will definitely be a permanent part of my BBT collection, and I'm going to make a point of trying the peanut butter cookies next time I'm lucky enough to have lunch at the Warners Lot.

And also - I've seen both John Stamos and Arnold Schwarzenegger over there, and I was way more impressed when I saw Stamos too.

Great minds stun alike? :)

The Hofstadter-Cooper Haute Couture

2009-10-13T18:39:00.000-07:00

I was very surprised to learn this week that CBS publishes a magazine called Watch! It's been around for about four years, and literally covers all things CBS, past and present.

I discovered this publication existed when a copy turned up on Ebay offering one of seven current covers featuring the Big Bang Theory cast elegantly dressed in a way beyond the means of their characters. As a collector of all things BBT, I snatched it up right away. (Hurray for "Buy it Now!")

Even better, the cover offers a way to order all seven different covers directly (or specific individual ones, in case, say, you're more specifically a Kaley Cuoco and/or Jim Parsons fan). Too impatient to wait for my Ebay purchase to arrive, I contacted the magazine and they were kind enough to oblige me with a copy of the ad to order from, reproduced below.

I suppose I shouldn't feel left out that I hadn't heard of Watch! - as you can see in the clip here, David Letterman had never heard of it when Neil Patrick Harris mentioned the publication sent him off on a luxurious trip on the Orient Express for the cover story in the last issue.

Letterman pointed out that he'd been working for CBS since NPH had a paper route and he'd never heard of the magazine, or been sent on the Orient Express by CBS...

Kids, and Big Bang Theory fans, you can check out the magazine's web site here. Best of all - free three year subscriptions (that's 18 issues) are being offered to the first 50,000 subscribers who sign up by next September, so it looks like you can get your first BBT issue for free! I'm looking forward to seeing this - it looks like a slick publication, and you can't beat the price.

Here's the offer for the collector covers - it should expand when you click on it.

Read!

James Mason... a thing like that! (aka Don Draper, eat your heart out)

2009-10-07T20:58:00.000-07:00

Nobody needs some guy with a blog to tell them how good Mad Men is these days - you either are already watching it, already want to, or have already decided it's just not for you. I love the show, watching it on Blu Ray. I will caution that it's not one of those programs you can just leap into the middle of and appreciate - I tried to watch the 6th episode when it was first airing. and friends were first raving about it, and I could not get into it at all. Starting from the beginning, I found it totally engrossing, not just for the compelling characters and story; but for the carefully crafted glimpse into a world that just no longer exists: America, 1960. Mad Men is careful to not just use the early 1960s as an attractive setting, it reminds us how different that world was at almost every turn: after Betty's pregnant neighbor smokes and drinks, without a second thought. A new copy machine - the size of the Buick - is viewed in the office as something that could possibly cause sterility. The Drapers, after a picnic, cheerfully dump their trash on the grass and walk away - they're not bad people, it's just the concept of "litter" was not widely considered at the time. bits of the show remind me of my own childhood, even though I was born in 1966, I had plenty of time to deal with rotary telephones and televisions that required vertical hold. (Kids, ask your grandparents).

It's curious, also, to note that the Game Show Network offers a little glimpse into the real-life world of the early 60's right now with Password, Alan Ludden's word play game, running an episode each night. Currently they're showing programs from 1963, right in line with where Mad Men's third season is. What's interesting for me personally is the chance to see celebrities I've never seen out of character before, as themselves, as they were then. Carol Burnett is a delightful player, loves the game, and appeared in an episode playing opposite Garry Moore, her boss - long before she had her own show. Following are a few screen captures of recent moments"

They often include the original sponsor plugs, something the guys at Sterling Cooper would be glad to see.

Johnny Carson, delighted when his partner guessed "joint" on a difficult clue. Double entendre words that could relate to casual drug use are often greeted with a chuckle when the celebrities first see the word - then it's never mentioned again.

A very young Johnny Carson tries to come up with a one word clue for "allowance."
Jane Fonda vs. James Mason, 1963. I had never seen Jane Fonda pre-Vietnam, she is quite the 5th Avenue Hollywood starlet. To her credit, though, she was so engrossed with her partner, a typical guy who worked at a tool and dye company or some such, she chatted with him all through Alan Ludden's entrance.

Dahh-ling! Jane was simply delighted when Ludden asked "How do you play Password?" and her partner answered "badly."

James Mason stiffens noticeably when his rather boisterous partner smacks him in the arm for getting "Laundry" right.

The next time, he's ready for it, but he's also laughing.

Jane had this odd little move while trying to think of a clue for "blackmail."

Jane illegally gives the "sounds like" signal when she comes up with "hangnail" for "blackmail."

I'll be honest, I never expected to be much interested in the Game Show Network's programming myself, now I watch it nightly. It literally is a glimpse back into a simpler time. Darren McGavin, when giving the clue "tongue" for the word "lick" to his female partner, said "Please pardon the expression" first.

A simpler time.

By the way, about the Big Bang theory Comic Con Panel

2009-10-05T18:35:00.000-07:00

I was right about there.

Why am I here?

2009-09-29T21:22:00.001-07:00

And I don't mean that in any sort of a philosophical way. Why am I here on blogger?

I started this blog over a year ago, in part to understand and examine my own urge to collect things. As you can see by the list of labels over on the right side, I have many, many interests. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it can become very frustrating when you're compelled to collect items from all those interests. And - you don't even know the half of it. I've barely mentioned comic books, and I considered myself a comic book collector ever since I was a little kid. I have a huge interest in original comic art, and zombie comics and movies right now, and they haven't even made it on here much. I feel like I have far too many interests, and I was tired of feeling compelled to buy something because it was cool, only to have it end up in storage - or, now, in a box in the garage. So writing here has helped me to deal with stuff I've collected, share and celebrate it, and feel like there's a use for it.

It has not helped me to stop collecting, however. I have developed a sense that just because something is cool, that doesn't mean I have to buy it, independent of writing here. I have actually bought a few things just because I wanted to talk about them on the blog, if you can believe it. Way back here I rediscovered my old collection of James Bond paperbacks, and I ended up buying a sort of rare copy of Live and Let Die to talk about there. And that's not the only time I've done that, either. I bought a stack of comic books I wanted to write about over a year ago. Now, with the move, it's going to take me awhile to find them, let alone write about them here!

Part of the problem with being a collector, for me, is I have a very hard time getting rid of things, too. This button above was something I wore at a trade show 18 years ago when I travelled around the country selling knee braces. It doesn't hold a lot of meaning for me, and has little or no value, but it's hard for me to get rid of. Good, bad, or indifferent, it represents a period of my life.

Something like this, though, is good for me to take a digital picture of, talk about briefly here, and actually throw away. This may not sound like much, but it's a step for me.

I have taught myself to have more focus in what I collect. Just because something is cool, doesn't mean I have to buy it. However, if it falls specifically in an area I collect on, it's fair game. I still collect animation cels - specifically, obscure or odd animation cels. One advantage in this is they rarely cost very much - most of my purchases were under 20 dollars apiece, like this original cel and original background from a Bill and Ted cartoon series. ( I say "a" series because there were two of them, believe it or not. One was better than the other, but now, I can't even tell them apart by just a cel). I really enjoy this piece, and the fact that they're reading a comic book in the image only makes it better for me.

I also am still really looking around for anything on or from Alan Hale's Lobster Barrel, the restaurant he owned at 826 N. La Cienega Blvd., "The celebrity end of restaurant row." My interest spilled out to the rest of the boulevard, too, largely because it was once such a big deal and now there's scarcely a whisper of "restaurant row" anywhere - even on Restaurant Row. I have a lot more to share both on the Lobster Barrel, the other restaurants that have occupied 826 La Cienega, and the rest of the boulevard. Why? Because I enjoy researching, that's why. (By the way, the mug here really has nothing to do with Alan Hale's restaurant, but come on - a lobster and a barrel - how could I resist?)
I've semi-seriously set out to get two items from every restaurant that I can on the Row, and I've had pretty good luck again without it costing much. Like from Ed Debevic's: Debevic's was a late entry on the boulevard, open when I came out here in 1990, and I dined there several times myself. It was famous for rude wait staff who dressed like 50's and 60's icons (my last waiter was Howdy Doody. Seriously) and danced on the tables and bars. they also had tiny, tiny sundaes which they gave you free for your birthday. I collected a menu and four of the tiny sundae glasses you see here, so that counts as two (different items to represent the restaurant for my collection).

So, I'm just taking a moment to reassess what I'm doing here: you'll see more of what I actively collect, what I used to collect, and what I can't believe I (or anyone) collected. More, of course, Big Bang Theory, and everything associated with being a fan of the show. And more of everything a fan, collector, or geek could want.

Your comments and questions are always welcome here; I appreciate nothing more than a good question I can do some research on. You can comment on the blog or write me at fancollectorgeek@earthlink.net - sorry, I don't know how to make that the kind you click on that conveniently pops open your email.

Also, follow me on twitter at fancollectrgeek (notice the second o is missing)! There, I post anything I'm watching that I recommend, and anything I come across that fits in the Fan/collector/geek categories. If you follow me, please just send a Horton hears a who type "We are here!" message so I know you're a real person.

Oh, and of course: we've got at least one more visit to the Michael Jackson auction to write up. It's a good one.

Thanks for listening - I'll see you in the funny papers.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-09-02T23:42:00.000-07:00

Exit: Silk Spectre, Enter: Harry Potter

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-09-02T19:39:00.000-07:00

It's truly one of the odd things about Comic Con: you can practically trip over a science fiction legend like Nichelle Nichols without even realizing she was there.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-09-01T23:49:00.000-07:00

Okay, I don't have anything funny to say about this one - I just thought it was great to see these folks dressed up as Venture Brothers characters. Orpheus, Triana, Dr. Girlfriend, the Monarch and another Dr. Girlfriend. Fantastic.

This was just about my biggest geek moment at the con - the crowd sort of parted and they were right in front of me and I just said "Oh, wow!" They immediately moved into "take a picture" pose; I just snapped this one.

Just an aside - I was starting to fix the redeye, but I stopped. I enjoy posting photos here in a fairly raw form, so here you go.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-09-01T23:33:00.000-07:00

Dr. Henry Jones Jr. meets Dr. Henry Jones Jr.

Bring Me the Head of Doctor Sheldon Cooper

2009-08-24T17:30:00.000-07:00

The Big Bang Theory will be back on the air with new episodes in about another month. I'm really looking forward to the new season. It's interesting that the guys all showed up at comic con with beards except Jim Parsons. It's not unusual for actors on a regular series to let their hair go wild during the summer, when they're not working, but I'd guess we're going to start off with a look at Leonard, Raj, and Howard with 3 months of arctic facial insulation on their chins. Sheldon would not bring his routine of daily shaving just because of weather conditions.

On a recent Saturday, I noticed I suddenly had about 100

more visitors than normal here - a huge spike for me. They all came from Paradox, a community of Big Bang Theory fans who, as they put it politely, "would like to see Sheldon and Penny as the end couple of the series." They've gone so far as to catalog every smile, arm-touch, and tender moment between the two, and the site is full of fun fan art like the beautiful piece to the right here, "The Subconscious Tango Betrayal," by artgyrl. (You can see more of her terrific art here).

It seems they noticed my speculation that Jim Parsons named "The Las Vegas Renormalization" as his favorite episode because he liked to hear Kaley sing "Soft Kitty" to him. Well who wouldn't?

I believe some sections of Paradox may be less than family friendly but they are VERY well marked, so feel free to explore over there even if you're faint of heart.

So on to some other news of interest to all fans of Sheldon Cooper: an artist is selling custom "Jim Parsons" heads for 1/6 scale dolls on Ebay. I stumbled across this and, although I'm not usually interested in unlicensed collectibles, found the likeness so intriguing I had to order it. She painted the first one up for me, that's what you see above.

Looking at it unpainted, you get a sense of just what amazing work this is. You can checl out this auction here, and check out all her amazing other sculpts here. 1/6 scale is basically the same size as Ken, so if you have a spare Star Trek Ken lying around, you may have a ready-made body for your own Sheldon Cooper doll. Now, if only there was a blonde doll to that scale that could fill in for Penny. Hmm...

In other Big Bang Theory fandom news, it looks like the guys have made their first comic book appearance in Power Girl #4, out last Wednesday. I honestly never knew much about Power Girl, except that she was known for being, well, stacked. So she's a natural for Howard to show some interest in:

Official? No. Is it definitely meant to be the BBT boys? Absolutely. To me, this is some of the best stuff to have in a collection. Years from now, those little side trips and appearances by the characters and actors will be forgotten by many, making them stand-out items to have in your collection in the future.

Coming soon, I'll be sharing more BBT collectibles, as well as an account of their appearance at the William Paley festival earlier this year. Enjoy.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-22T22:50:00.000-07:00

If Lego doesn't license the properties you like, make your own.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-21T22:04:00.001-07:00

Seth Green is happy to take a moment to chat with a

Slave Princess Leia at the Adult Swim booth.

Wouldn't you?

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-16T15:39:00.000-07:00

Comic writing rule #91:

The number of superhero names available is always infinite.

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-16T14:21:00.001-07:00

Normal @ Comic Con > normal in real life

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-15T00:03:00.000-07:00

Best Wonder Twins toy and package EVER!

(okay, so it's not a very big field. still...Con exclusive Gleep!)

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-14T00:00:00.000-07:00

Old School Cylons

Images of Comic Con '09

2009-08-13T23:59:00.001-07:00

Star Trek guys check out new Star Trek toys.

Big Bang Theory Comic Con Overview Part 3

2009-07-26T18:29:00.000-07:00

Just updating here to include the images of the Big Bang Theory bag given out at the WB booth, and the large banner of the same art that hung over the booth. you can tell how huge the bag is if you know the size of a Mr. Spock Mego doll. (Eight inches approx.)

Big Bang Theory Comic Con Over view Part 2

2009-07-25T23:20:00.001-07:00

I'm not going to try to write exact quotes, or in order - but I can give an overview to what was discussed by the group. Let me start with this: the panel was great. It was a lot of fun to see them all together, and it's clear they enjoy working with each other. This is in my opinion the funniest cast on television right now, and their answers were hilarious. I can't do their humor justice, so I'm just going to convey the information as best I can.
Most of the questions and conversation centered around Jim Parsons and Sheldon. Early on, someone congratulated him for his Emmy nomination, and at least twice people told him they were certain he would win. He was asked what Sheldon would do if he was nominated, and Jim said Sheldon would think it was ludicrous to have any sort of nominations for others at all - just the idea that he had "peers" was ridiculous. Asked what he would do with his award when he won, Jim said he'd like to have it out where his friends could handle and "play" with it, because nobody ever does that. also, he said he would -never- refuse it, or give it back, even if he felt someone else deserved it. (All in a very charming way, of course).

We also learned that Sheldon's creepy fake smile (best seen when Kuthrapali wins an award) was inspired by a real-life driving safety poster of an insane-looking clown the cast encountered in Rome near the Coliseum. Seriously. Jim performed the smile (not this), but it took him awhile because everyone was laughing.

They were all asked if they were real geeks themselves, growing up. They (the boys) pretty much all confessed to being Star Wars fans as kids. Simon (Wolowitz) said when he was little he carried a Luke Skywalker figure everywhere and called it his "man." Kunal (Koothrappali) had a Millenium Falcon when he was little - and that's pretty much all I remember him saying. Actually, they almost all spoke so low you could barely hear him, and Kaley's microphone was adjusted for her once so we could hear her better.

Kaley said that when she looked really confused by the guys on the show, she wasn't acting. She was actually confused. Also, when someone prefaced their question with "Kaley, you're hot!" She gave a long answer then ended with: "And you're hot too." Miming winks and "call me" signs. Much laughter.

They were asked if the 9:30 time slot would allow some of the relationships on the show to be "consummated" (would there be more sex) and they said they enjoyed the innocence of the show and it wouldn't really change.

A college student asked why the shows couldn't be viewed for free online, in whole episodes, because he didn't have a TV because he was broke. Chuck or Bill (I think) asked everyone in the audience to give him a dollar.

Someone asked if they would do a location shoot at Six Flags Physics of Fun Days. Bill said location shoots were a horrible inconvenience to them, and when they shot in the little park right next to their stage on the Warners lot, it was a big deal. This lead to a long discussion about how odd it was when the Brady Bunch went to Hawaii and the Grand Canyon, or the Facts of Life went to Russia. Somehow, this lead to a discussion of their car scenes, which are generally not shot in front of the audience, but with a green screen at another time. On the night of the taping they end up performing the car scene with a couple of folding chairs and a stick with a wheel on it for the audience. Kaley and Jim really enjoyed doing these, he said it felt like performing an old vaudeville show.

Someone asked if they could do an episode with Sheldon getting jury duty, and they said they thought about it, but the problem with a jury show is you take a character and put them with a bunch of people not as funny as the rest of the regular cast. This idea sort of lead to the DMV episode for Sheldon.

Simon got a huge round of applause for his character "Moist" in Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog. He cautioned the crowd to be careful about shouting "Moist" in public.

Asked if they were much like their characters, Simon said he wasn't, and Jim said he wasn't then realized the way he rationalized denying it sounded very much like Sheldon.

Someone asked if Sheldon would ever get a girlfriend, it was stated it was pretty much decided Sheldon was one of those whose work was his life, and "science was his girlfriend." (They expanded on this back at the Paley festival; I'll write up an overview of that soon).

Someone asked Johnny who else from Roseanne he would like to work with on BBT. He seemed to really like the question. He said they were all great to work with, but you just couldn't go wrong with John Goodman, he was just so funny.

Somehow, they got into talking about how Johnny felt at home at anyone's place (I think they said 'except his own') and that he would fall asleep at any of their places - even the dog licking his face didn't wake him. I think Simon joked when they licked his face, it didn't wake him either.

They were asked if they watched themselves on TV, and Jim said he did every Monday - he loved seeing the story that way for the first time; while acting it you never saw the whole thing, basically.

Their favorite episodes - they pretty much all said the Christmas episode (The Bath Item Gift Hypothesis), but Jim said the Vegas Renormalization was his. (I think he likes to hear Kaley sing "Soft Kitty.")

This is the moment when Jim looked right at me (as you can see here) and recognized me from the two tapings I attended, plus signing my program at the Paley festival.

Just kidding. I love this show. I hope this was fun for any who couldn't make it, and be sure to check Youtube for clips. They're hysterical.

Big Bang Theory Comic Con Over view Part 1

2009-07-25T21:54:00.001-07:00

First of all, the panel started at 1:00 PM on Friday, five minutes after the Battlestar Galactica panel ended. They don't clear the room between panels, and I'd say 80 percent of the people from Battlestar stayed for Big Bang Theory. People were waiting as much as 4 hours for BBT, so I'm guessing if you only waited 3 hours, you might not have gotten in.

The panel was hosted by Mike Mignolla, creator of Hellboy comics. Why? Because he's a big fan. He said he had seen one taping, and they provided all the Hellboy merchandise they could to the show, so in the comic book store set, Hellboy is visible in every shot. Also, with Hellboy mentioned in one episode, he was cool to his (15 year old?) daughter - for about ten minutes.

Creator Chuck Lorre introduced first, came out photographing the crowd.

Co creator Bill Prady.
Johnny Galecki next, with beard, also photographing the crowd.

Followed by Jim Parsons.
This little photo shows Johnny taking a shot of Jim as he comes out.
He also shot Kaley's entrance.
Simon Helberg also enjoyed the crowd's response to his entrance.
And of course Kunal Nayyar.

After showing a clip reel mostly of especially comic-book geekish moments from the show - including any mention of the San Diego Comic Con - and introducing the cast, it was basically questions and answers. First Mike asked questions, then they were handed over to the audience, who had some great ones. You can also view a lot of clips here.

The biggest laugh, as I've already said, was probably when a fan asked Jim Parsons to "use" a napkin so they could retrieve his DNA and clone him - like Sheldon was so excited to have Leonard Nimoy's napkin for. He complied, and Kaley was good enough to wipe his brow with it before it was returned to the audience member.

More to come in a bit.

All told....

2009-07-25T19:23:00.000-07:00

The photos are looking ok, considering I shot them of the big screen in the lecture hall.

As you can see, the camera looks MUCH better than the phone picture below. Why did they put Sheldon behind the pole? This is inside the WB booth, right where the cast signing was to take place later. (I still don't know if the signing went well!). I'm glad I picked up that cable.

More to come in a couple of hours.

The San Diego Conference

2009-07-25T14:31:00.001-07:00

Report on the Big Bang Theory panel at Comic Con coming today. I have to run out and get a mini USB cable to download the pics & and movies from my camera. A couple tidbits from my twitter feed at fancollectrgeek:

http://twitpic.com/bm8ca - My best swag from SDCC 09? The huge Big Bang Theory Bag from WB last night

Jim Parsons favorite episode, btw: The Vegas Renormalization. Most of the rest said Bath Item Gift Hypothesis - (the Christmas episode)

Absolute high point of the BBT panel yesterday: a fan asked Parsons to use a napkin so they could get his DNA and clone him... and he did. Kaley Cuoco was kind enough to use it to wipe the sweat from Jim's brow, and it was passed back to the requestor. Start scanning Ebay! :)

Above: the horribly fuzzy picture my cell phone took of the Big Bang Theory art inside the WB booth. Let's see how much better my camera took later!

Iron shoes

2009-07-23T22:23:00.000-07:00

Wow. It's trickier to twitter any sense than I thought it was. Looking back at the two or three word blurbs that I thought made perfect sense, they read a little scant to me.

Also, It's frustrating how fast the Iphone battery goes if, you know, you do something crazy like USING the phone. A couple hours of camera and email use, and it's at 20 percent. Oh well.

I'll have more from the floor tomorrow, and more after the con. In the meantime, please enjoy this view of collectibles, including 350 dollar Iron Man sneakers from Japan.

And now...Fan Collector Twit???

2009-07-22T19:28:00.000-07:00

The Michael Jackson collection is temporarily being suspended for the San Diego Comic Con. I will be going down on Thursday and Friday, and probably one day on the weekend.

Last year, I posted a picture a day from the Con for several days after I went. This year, I will be posting them live on Twitter. Please follow me there at fancollectrgeek - same name as this blog, but without the second "O."

Moving forward, this Twitter will be used for short updates and picture posting of all things fancollectorgeeky, including the Big Bang Theory Forum at the Comic Con on Friday at 1:00 PM Pacific time!

Coming soon for Big Bang Theory fans here, I'll have an account of the Paley Festival Big Bang Theory night (complete with blurry Iphone pictures), and more collectibles. Like these ping pong paddles - a gift to the cast and crew. Kaley Cuoco gave one of these to Ellen Degeneres on her show. She saidwn the cast and crew play ping pong on their breaks, and I've seen the table and paddles by the "back" door at Stage 25 on the Warner lot. (Also, this summer, the stage was completely empty, except for several pieces hanging on the back wall including the giant "Physics Bowl" banner from the episode "The Bat Jar Conjecture." Today I peeked in at lunch, and the sets are going back up.

So, I hope you'll follow on Twitter, if you find this stuff interesting, and I'll be sharing as much as I can both there and here after the Con!

Kid's Stuff: Michael Jackson's collections part 7

2009-07-20T22:45:00.000-07:00

Hey long time readers - remember back when FCG was about more than just the preview of Michael Jackson's cancelled auction? Well, it will be again soon. I'm only getting these up here while still relevant, and also - it's helping me to get used to posting more frequently. I'd like to be updating this at least 3 times a week, normally, and I have plenty of good stuff to get to. (Hint: Big Bang Theory). So, this is the penultimate look at Michael's stuff - we'll wrap it up tomorrow, then on to coverage of the San Diego Comic Con 2009.

Another giant room of the abandoned department store holding this preview was full of "kid's stuff" - games and things. Like, this odd generic slush machine. I guess Michael couldn't afford a Slurpee or Icee machine? (Or even Slush Puppy?)

Blurred photo of walls of pinball machines. The blue and red blur on the wall was a framed autographed photo of Christopher Reeve, the matte falling apart.
The instant photo booth actually kind of creeped me out a little.

But, I rather like the John Romita-esque Spider-man on the wall.
Another photo booth.
Odd robot shaped toy dispensing machine.
Odd military man shaped toy dispensing machine.
Ziggy the clown toy machine.
As you can see, tons of arcade games - and is that a Power Ranger?
This is a real person - Rob, who went to the auction with me. (He was anonymous back in part one, but he told me he didn't mind being shown).
More vehicles - bikes and a bike/cart thing. Hey, there's Darth Vader (Return of the Jedi era, seated) and Darth made out of Legos (standing).
I don't know how they chose which little cars went inside, and which were parked out in the sun (back in part 1)
Luigi and monkey toy dispensing machine.
Hey - a slot machine! Like for grown-ups!
Another view of the pedal car.
Remember Virtual Boy?
A big ride on type video game - never really seen one of these before.
No surprise to see a couple of ETs there.
Oh, and there's a C-3Po standing by the Darths we saw in the distance before. you know - there are a heck of a lot of fake people from Neverland Ranch here...
...there's a Spider-man. And remember all the Michael Jackson's?
And a Lara Croft...
....Marilyn Monroe, Superman in the back...
Bruce Lee sporting a Jacko-type hat...
...um, Willy Wonka?
Elvis Presley-
A particularly unnerving old animated baby doll.
And remember the statues of servants I mentioned before? You can see at least five of them in this picture!
And all the kids statues that were outside? There were even more inside. It's weird, but...even if nobody was there, there were a lot of people at Neverland Ranch.

You could never feel completely alone.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow: Michael's Disney collection (Jackson Julien Auction part 6)

2009-07-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

Michael Jackson was a big fan of Disney, and obviously, had the means to get or have made pretty much anything he liked. For example, this little sculpture featuring Disney characters and ET all wearing the signature glove along with "The King of Fantasy" as the medallion Jiminy is holding reads.

One large room of the abandoned Robinsons May store that hosted the auction was devoted almost entirely to Michael's Disney items.

Like this great "lifesize" figure of Morty & Ferdy, Mickey's nephews. I know Disneyland and Walt Disney World made one of a kind pieces like this for sale in-between park projects. I'm not sure if these were gifts for Michael or commissioned by him; probably a mix.

I really didn't get an adequate photo of this one: a huge animated tableau of the Blue Fairy bringing Pinocchio to life, set up and working. The crest over the top says it was created by Walt Disney World.

I misse dphotographing the best part, though: on a little stool in the corner on the right, stood a tiny Michael Jackson who did the moonwalk in circles when Pinocchio came to life. Seriously.
I remember from Barbara Walters' visit to Neverland these figures celebrating Captain Hook getting electrocuted were in the rafters high above the Neverland kitchen.
See? Peter Pan is pushing the "on" button,
And Tink is closing the connection to electrocute the Captain. Whee!
Similar to the Pinoc scene, here's an animated tableau of the kids flying over London in Peter Pan.
A seperate Peter holding his shadow.
Mickey Mouse, true to life sized.
This was an amazing piece of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, done about half "life size."
Some fairly ordinary cookie jars - did they all hold cookies?
Not at all Disney, but lots of Fairies.
Lots of Walt Disney Classics Collection pieces, almost all broken (notice Pan's arm lying in front of him). I have the impression children werr encouraged to handle these and, well, busted them.
An odd little bronze portrait of Walt, and a very ordinary letter signed by Disney. It's not unusual Michael had Disney's signature, but the pieces here were frankly very common - framed general correspondence - the kind of thing you'd see in shops outside Disneyland or in the Beverly Center for a couple thousand bucks. So, more the impression Michael bought pieces he stumbled across, rather than sought out interesting pieces from Disney dealers.
Blurriest photo of the day: an uninteresting memo signed by Walt.
And a collage of random Duck images with a card signed by Walt.
Finally, a Disneyland antique refrigerator. Nuff said.

Up next: Kid's stuff - arcade games and more.

Michael's Michaels: Julien's Auction Part 4

2009-07-18T21:25:00.000-07:00

Michael's collections contained several.... Michaels. Life size wax or other recreations in various icon garb - generally what you'd recogize as "at the height" of his career. I can only imagine the effect of wandering the halls of Neverland, never knowing if the Michael Jackson you come across is a figure...or the real thing. Do you think he ever played at being a statue? I bet he did.

The same as above, from behind.
A collection of gloves, belts etc. It's interesting now to hear the glove was part of an early attempt to cover the vitiligo that was discoloring his skin in splotches.

This Michael was displayed beside a limousine.
Also a chauffeur. There were several of these "servant" figures around; I didn't really take pictures of them. Old men and women as butlers, maids, cooks. And the Michaels. And the children statues.
Inside the limo - this gets my "sorry for the blur" apology this time.
A throne, of course.
A couple of well - done portraits in this style.
Top painting by Michael Jackson, 1998. Bottom by MaCaulay Culkin, 1991.
A very 80's portrait of Brooke Shields.
Signed by her, limited edition print.
Many, many costumes on display.
At the Grammies with Quincy?
Just to show you there were other people there - but really not a heck of a lot of them for a Saturday afternoon. Certainly nowhere near what the same exhibit would get today.

More Michael: Julien's auction preview part 3

2009-07-15T22:10:00.002-07:00

Wow. It is taking me much longer to get through all this Michael Jackson stuff than I thought it would! Trust me, it'll be worth it. The last time the public had such an inside look at the collection of a private individual was when Charles Foster Kane died, and he was fictional. Remember - this was all on display before Michael Jackson passed away - put up for sale - and I pretty much got the impression one of the big reasons he was doing all those concerts in London was so he could keep all this stuff.

Today's selection mostly looks at stuff that no one in the world but Michael could have collected - his awards, and movie props. Like this first piece - images representing Michael's career framed by One Hundred Platinum Records - representing over 200 million records sold. I don't think they give out too many of these. But seeing the previous evidence of Michael's insecurity, I'd hate to think of an item of such genuine recognition of talent going on the auction block.

Costume from a video (I believe it was part of History?)

These look like life molds made for Michael Jackson's Ghosts - an amazing bit of motion capture of Jackson's dancing in that film, to animate a skeleton. Plus, I think, another look at Michael's world view.

Australian award for History.
MTV Music Award!
This looks like a flor panel from the Michael Jackson Burn Ward.
Just interesting photos of Michael with the Reagans. Again, apologies for the blur.

This is a very cool award for selling 750 thousand "units" (videos? CDs? both?) of "Thriller" in Switzerland. Think about it, Just in Switzerland. Not bad.
A life cast of hands?
Ok: being from the 80's, this would have to be about one of the coolest possible things you could have: a Will Vinton original clay model of you. Remember they used Michael's music for one or two of the California Raisin commercials?

Pretty good stuff. More soon.

Part 2 of Julien's Auction: Michael Jackson's Michael Jackson collection

2009-07-03T00:10:00.000-07:00

Well, the last few days have been interesting. For awhile there, it sounded like there was going to be a memorial service at Neverland Ranch, and I could only wonder what the place looked like now stripped of all the items I showed in the last entry. I apologize for how soft some of these photos are; I only had my camera phone with me. But it's interesting to look at the whole as a collection, literally, and what it says about the collector. Most of these images will enlarge when you click on them.

The Neverland gates were set up at the entrance to the abandoned Robinsons May department store that held the exhibit.
A detail of the right gate. "Mon droit" = "My right in French. I'll have to look up what the whole phrase is.
Behind the counter where we paid admission, the first of many artisitic depictions of Michael happily leading the children of the world, along with another of his poems (or an extension of the earlier poem) in gold on marble slabs. This poem. like the earlier, ends with the line "Those are the moments when babies smile."
Inside the exhibit hall. Where did this crown hang in his home?
Sorry this is so blurry, but - another depiction of Michael leading the children of the world.

And another. This was a huge painting, maybe 10? 15 feet wide?
A detail of that painting. The boy on Michael's left hand is so specifically rendered - patch on his knee, old fashioned crutch, looking at Michael with such adoration. He looks kind of like a lame Tom Sawyer depicted by Norman Rockwell. But what was the intended audience of this painting? Michael Jackson.
This sculpture is a very odd piece" Michael stands in the middle, wind blown and screaming as he appeared in some music videos, surrounded by the utter chaos of children going every which way.
In case you think I came up with the phrase, read the label: Children of the World.
This is a one of a kind ceramic piece depicting - you guessed it - =Michael leading the children of the world, with doves of peace behind.

The hood of this golf cart type car literally depicts Michael as Peter Pan.
The seats are embroidered with Disney's Peter Pan.
This ice cream cart is emblazoned with his initials, MJJ. This got me thinking - no surprise, but this is clearly decorated for his benefit, not for guests. Why use the middle initial? It only gives your typical viewer a moment's pause. No, this is one of Michael's toys.

A Neverland Ranch logo on a rug. Notice again, how poorly the auction items were treated. This one-of-a-kind piece owned by Michael Jackson was just thrown on the floor for every yokel (like myself) walking through to trample on.
Another Neverland image, reminds me of the Dreamworks logo.
Reproduced here on a cooler.
A painting of this Neverland "logo" - I don't know what the significance of the tiny satyr is?
This looks like a fan-created piece of Michael with Disney and Warners cartoon characters.
Michael and Peter Pan are entertained by an unusual group of classic entertainers, and Stitch.
Historical figures and E.T. pay homage to Michael wearing his signature sunglasses.

I'm running out of observations here, but I'm glad I took as many pictures as I did, so you can see how themes repeat again and again.
This image and the following two are part of a giant, single piece incorporating all three in a giant frame, shown left to right in this order.

"I am the thinker, the thinking, the thought

I am the seeker, the seeking, the sought

I am the dewdrop, the sunshine, the storm

I am the phenomenon, the field, the form

I am the desert, the ocean, the sky

I am the Primeval Self in you and I"

- Michael Jackson

Another depiction of MJ as royalty, behind his batman suit.
You can actually see both clearer behind this Neverland espresso machine (two there looked completely untouched).
This was -the- oddest painting of Michael there, and that's saying something at this point. I studied it for awhile and took many detailed photos of all the little things in the corners. Winding through it is a text essentially about spending time on earth in order to learn "in slow motion" and return to a greater existence.

Isn't that red thing an alien from The Twilight Zone? Or Outer Limits?

Michael, we hardly knew ye.

Man in the Mirror: Julien's Auction preview of Michael Jackson's collections (Part 1)

2009-06-28T22:33:00.000-07:00

The next few entries here are going to be a little different, but please bare with me. Back on April 19th, during my hiatus from posting, I had the opportunity to visit the display of Michael Jackson's collections that had been put up for auction, but removed from sale. You can read the whole story elsewhere, but basically, much of the contents of Neverland Ranch were to go on sale, then removed from sale when Jackson arranged to do 50 sell-out concerts in London. Though the auction was called off, Jackson's collections were still on public display for a couple of weeks.

I went to this preview with an eye towards seeing a collection in an unusual situation: it was gathered together to populate and decorate a private world, then wrenched out into public light for all to see, and judge, out of context. Michael Jackson was an amazing artist, and whatever else the case may be, he was clearly a troubled soul who, on some level, found solace in his collections. I'm offering up many more of the photos I took on that day than I had intended, to share the experience more fully. In this part one, we'll just take a look at the pieces exhibited outside.

First off, the display was inside the abandoned Robinsons May department store in Beverly Hills, next to the Beverly Hilton, giving it an odd feeling. The whole place had a look of rundown retail opulence. Below you see several of Jackson's vehicles, parked on top of the garage.

Autopia-like go carts.
My anonymous friend posed with the Neverland fire truck, by a giant watch/clock. Notice,not much care was taken to preserve items or display them well. See the watch parts sticking out of the cardboard box?
A detail of the fire truck.
Mini bikes and planters, beyond the watch.

A crest on the side of this classic car - MJJ for Michael Joseph Jackson, as I understand it. The masks of comedy & tragedy, plus a musical note.

The Simpsons car - notice Bart & Lisa seats.

Rear of the Simpsons car - I believe it's electric?

A "Welcome to Neverland Ranch" sign, displayed with a couple of planters.

Jackson apparently collected many, many of these bronze statues of children, so Neverland must have never looked empty. This was on the second weekend of the public display of these items, and there weren't many people there. I imagine the biggest fans all came on the first weekend.
There were two books with this quote there, I imagine from different gardens on the Neverland property.
A different book with a different quote.

Again, little attention paid to the care of the items on display.
All in all, it felt like walking among the abandoned relics of a Disneyland, in an overgrown, forgotten courtyard.
An odd juxtaposition created between a Neverland frame and graffiti artwork on the department store's exterior.
Water fountain with two levels - for adult & child to use at the same time.
A lot of the pieces there had a surprisingly amateurish look to them.

Note that hotel rooms at the Beverly Hilton looked over this unusual display. (I'd freak myself out imaging the statues were moving at night).
Many items were in an advanced state of disrepair. Was this all since Jackson left after the trial?
Again, Neverland art with graffiti on the department store.
Some very Fantasia-esque cherubs on a goodbye sign.

In fancollectorgeek, I like to stay away from negative observations, but I have to say this public display felt, well, creepy. It may be too obvious to say the many, many statues suggest to me a fear of being alone. At the same time, it was kind of sad to see all this stuff that had been so cherished just unbolted and moved to be put on the auction block.

Next: inside, looking at Michael's collection of Michael Jackson memorabilia. (Don't worry folks, more Big Bang Theory to come soon - and I'm not forgetting all you Restaurant ROw fans).

Up Chuck (my apologies)

2009-06-25T22:53:00.000-07:00

Just sharing this poster of Chuck that's part of the green movement at one Studio Lot in Burbank...

Meanwhile, the anti-squirrel message evident in a recent animated film is clear on another lot nearby.

Note: This is a joke. The squirrels there are actually very fat and happy. The sign is to keep them from becoming aggressive.

You wouldn't like squirrels when they're angry, Mr. McGee!

Prop collecting: Do you have an arm and a leg to spare?

2009-06-17T23:24:00.000-07:00

Any collector of TV or movie memorabilia knows that these days, actual screen used props cost a mint: the more important or unique the prop, the more it costs. I saw the Holy Grail from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade on sale in a memorabilia store by Disneyland for $10,000 dollars several years ago - and at that, you can't really be certain it was a real prop they were selling. Remember, it's easier to make a certificate than a fake prop, so don't think a "certificate of authenticity" means much on it's own. Consider who issued it. A Certificate from PAramount Studios would add a lot of weight to the validity of the prop; one from the store just doesn't mean that much to me. Enough said.

Sometimes, at least in Los Angeles, you can come across real props for real cheap - especiially if you're not too picky. I bought the framed article above from a charity prop sale at a Major Motion Picture Studio about a year ago for the princely some of One Dollar. It has a production number on the back, and was obviously created with a particular show and scene in mind, but I actually have no idea what show or movie it was in. I just like it. If you have any idea where this was used - probably in a TV show - I'd love to hear it.

This piece is now hung in a place of honor, right by the light switch in my bedroom, where I see it every day.

Everything you Know is Wrong

2009-06-14T22:48:00.001-07:00

As everyone who writes a blog knows, there's only one sure way to build your readership: stop writing for approximately five months. With each day passes without an update, regular readers become frantic for more, and new readers are constantly hearing about your site and getting hooked in, waiting desperately for a new post. That's why I haven't posted in so long.

This is, of course, ridiculous. The actual reason I haven't posted in so long is in fact because I moved. Back in December I had the opportunity to buy a condo much closer to my office. This made the holidays a bit unusual this year - essentially happening while I was packing - and this year, I've spent most of my spare time working on fixing the place up.

Another interesting thing about this; I bought and moved into the condo that had belonged to my good friend, Bruce, who passed away as I wrote about here. It is a little odd moving into his place, but it's also kind of nice to keep a little bit of his memory alive here. In part, it's great to keep his pride and joy, the home theater he built himself, active and "in the family" as it were:

(It's very difficult to photograph, but you see here the "upholstery" he put on the walls; that's a menu from a Frasier DVD up on the screen). I made the place my own a bit by adding the bookshelves along the sides to turn it into more of a theater/library, and also house and display some of my larger collectibles.

This move also means that everything I've said in the past about where collectibles are kept and displayed, or packed away, is totally invalid. I have tons more room to display things now. For example, the bar in the living room has become the main display area for Restaurant Row memorabilia - as well as the fictional beverages collection, and some other odds and ends:

The Scooby Doo van - previously reported as being on top of the bookcase in my bedroom is now sitting on the window sill of the landing up to the third floor - right above a shelf full of Scooby Doo toys previously packed away in storage:

I don't know if it's going to stay there, but for now, it seems like as good a place as any. If anything, moving made me consider almost everything I have, as a collector; where it is and where I want it. I rediscovered things I forgot I had (like those Scooby toys) and in some cases, started collecting something that I hadn't actively collected in years when I rediscovered it.

I'll be writing about all of this soon. And more. Just one thing you won't see anymore: Tales from Storage. It'll have to be replaced with "It Came From the Garage" because that's where it has all moved to now.

I'm glad to be back to writing here. As always, my mission will be two-fold: to examine the nature of fan-collector-geekdom, and also, to bring up those interesting little things from my collecting, fandom, and childhood that don't seem to have made much of an impression on the internet yet.

Also, coming soon - very soon: free stuff!

Coming soon

2009-04-22T22:39:00.000-07:00

Regular updates commencing shortly. Please stay tuned.

In the meantime, please enjoy this early 90's Simpsons tie.

The World's Largest Quark collection grows

2009-01-22T11:31:00.000-08:00

I promised myself when I started this blog that I wouldn't write about not being able to write. However, I haven't been able to write for awhile for a reason that has to do with collecting, in a way, so I'll explain more soon.

In the meantime, please enjoy this TV Week with a cover of Quark that I picked up awhile back. The article inside quoted Buck Henry as saying Quark was meant to do for Science Fiction what "Get Smart" did for the spy genre. And it did, just not for very long.

"The World's Largest" is a joke I use for when I collect something incredibly, incredibly obscure and imagine no one else in the world has even bothered to put two items together. Please note I'm aware that most likely there is a larger collection out there somewhere. That has nothing to do with the joke and I'm not trying to get nto the Guinness Book. It's more to the point that I'm collecting something fairly obscure.

Like, for example, my World's Largest Collection for "Carpoolers," the short-lived ABC show from last year: this air freshener, and a single episode still saved on my Tivo. I really grew to like that program. Why do all the best TV shows seem to have less than 13 episodes?

Before Lobster, Snapper

2009-01-09T00:39:00.000-08:00

Returning to my current fascination with the history of Restaurant Row, and more specifically, Alan Hale's Lobster Barrel:

After stopping by the Melrose Trading Post looking for Restaurant Row memorabilia (but instead finding this great historic photo), I went down to Santa Monica to check out an antique mall I hadn't been to in a few years. It is still there and was packed with tons of tiny items of interest to me, squirreled away in the shelves and tiny drawers of about 200 dealers stalls.

If you're a collector, often it's the hunt that is the most fun, and that afternoon, I was in the mood to go over the place with a fine toothed comb. I was probably there at least 2 hours, and found many, many great items. Like the matchbook for "Clif Herd's Red Snapper" on Restaurant Row, above. As you can see, it's the same address as the Lobster Barrel - 826 La Cienega. From the graphics I'd say this was in the late 50's or early 60's - just a guess - and sometime after it was "The Famous Restaurant." I have no idea who Clif Herd was, but apparently he also had a Red Snapper restaurant in Monterey Bay (at least according to this auction).

A curious feature of Ebay for the masochistic collector is that you can search completed auctions too. Though I found nothing currently offered from the Red Snapper, a completed search showed me that a mere couple weeks before I learned the place existed, another collector bought the menu above, unchallenged, with a bid of 10 dollars. Well, at least I swiped this scan of it from the auction for free... but as I've said before "virtual" collecting isn't quite as satisfying as the real thing.

Mother Met

2009-01-04T09:32:00.001-08:00

SPOILER ALERT: If you've been reading along here, you may have noticed this is not generally a "spoiler" blog: visiting recordings of "The Big Bang Theory," for example, I went out of the way to not comment on the episode details until they aired. On "How I Met Your Mother," however, I believe it's fair game to share my speculation that the "Mother" mentioned in the title has been "Met,"on the show, by main character Ted. I have I had been told by a producer of the show or such that yes, my theory here is true, I wouldn't be printing it. Sharing speculation is part of the fun of enjoying a show; sharing insider information to me ruins it.

Luckily in this case, I don't know any of the creators of How I Met Your Mother. However, if you don't want to read my theory on how the show will play out, don't read on.

Ok. It was established very early in the 3rd season (now available on DVD) that the "short version" of the story of Ted meeting his bride-to-be is "that thing with her umbrella," and establishes that she carries a unique yellow umbrella. Next, in the episode "No Tomorrow" it is established that Mom is at a St. Patrick's Day party Ted attends, in part by showing the yellow umbrella on line. Ted says they didn't meet at that party, but if he hadn't gone, they might not have ever met.

At the end of the episode, Ted returns to the bar to retrieve his lost cell phone, and borrows that yellow umbrella when a sudden downpour starts as he leaves:

So, we can guess that at some point in the future, Ted will use the yellow umbrella, and "Mom" will confront him or some such, love at first sight, series over.

I believe, however, that they did meet at that party: In one scene as Ted crosses the room, he bumps into an attractive brunette and excuses himself:

She says "That's okay," gives him a very brief once over and moves on. Is this Mom? I think so. When you're telling a story in 22 minutes, you don't waste a moment on anything unnecessary. And when you pay actors more to speak than not, you don't give them a line when a smile and a "no problem" nod would suffice. That's why I believe this innocent little encounter is a nod to a character to come on the show.

Usually I end up writing about collectibles here, but "How I Met Your Mother" is a rare case of a show I'm just a fan of - at least so far, I have the DVDs, but I'm not seeking out autographs, posters, or books from the program.

Yet.

Happy New Year, Charlie Brown!

2009-01-01T04:00:00.000-08:00

Just in time for New Year's Day, this is a program from the 1974 Tournament of Roses Parade, signed by the Grand Marshall that year, with a sketch of a little character he was known for drawing.
Jack Whitehead was an official with the Tournament for some time - I can't find any details about him - but several years back he decided to sell a lot of his memorabilia, through a friend of mine, including this program signed by Charles Schulz along with a photo of Jack and Charles together. The Snoopy rode in the car with him. You can see a photo of Schulz during the parade, as well as (at least just about) the only self-referencing Peanuts strip Schulz ever wrote, on the Charles M. Schulz museum's timeline page for the 70's here.

Happy New Year, folks!

Tales from Storage and Planet Ten

2008-12-29T22:00:00.000-08:00

A Banzai Institute T-shirt. Vintage original 1980's rarely worn. Will Be Long Treasured.

Ebay Selling tip #1

2008-12-27T09:31:00.000-08:00

Suppose you have a program for a small high school production of "Guys and Dolls" from the 60's, and nobody bids on it on Ebay. Here's a tip: check the ads in the back. Maybe the back cover is for something someone collects...

You get my point. This great ad with coupon for a "Big Barney" was listed on Ebay as such, and I bought it for ten bucks. It came, of course, attached to the whole program. Very clever listing! the seller knew there were more Red Barn collectors than small high school Guys and Dolls program collectors.

Another Red Barn collectible that I actually passed on bidding on for the longest time were the giant stuffed dolls of the "Hungries" from the early 70's. They are, to say the least, frightening.

And they're huge! Look at how the stuffed (I say stuffed because he's definitely not "plush") Hamburger Hungry towers over the mug of the same character. He's big enough to help me drive in the carpool lane here in California. And the way his hamburger bun - shaped head translated into the odd mangy-dog looking fur...I wonder how many of these survive? I mean, how many kids really wanted these back then?

Still, I can't wait to get the stuffed "Chicken Hungry," shaped like a giant furry drumstick with a face...

Merry Christmas from Max & Alex (Zach too).

2008-12-24T20:32:00.000-08:00

I have "collected" a lot of different Christmas stuff - when they started doing great action figures based on the Rankin Bass specials, and the Peanuts Christmas Special, I got a lot of those. I also like to collect different holiday songs - I've always liked different covers of songs I like, so I like to compare The Partridge Family's "Silent Night" to Bing Crosby's, for example.

One of the odder Christmas things I have - more so from an American perspective - is this Annual for the short-lived TV series "Mr. Merlin." For one full season of 22 episodes starting in 1981, I loved this odd comedy about "Zach," a teenager working at "Max Merlin's" garage, who one day pulls a crowbar out of a block of cement and proves himself to be apprentice-worthy of the great wizard Merlin who, surprise surprise, Mr. Merlin really is. Of course, being a teen in a 1980's comedy, Zach often used the magic he learned inappropriately, to pick up girls or make money - always with zany consequences. (The show had enough of an impact on me that when I saw Barnard Hughes in Tron a couple years later, I kept thinking of him as Mr. Merlin. Same when he showed up in Lost Boys even later).

I distinctly remember first seeing a promo for Mr. Merlin running on a monitor at the Channel 5 booth in the Horticulture Building at the New York State Fair in August, 1981. (Their booth was right back by where they gave away the free baked potatoes, but I didn't like baked potatoes myself. The State Fair was an amazing destination in the end of summer each year, and I was lucky to live pretty close).

British Annuals are a bit trickier to explain than 80s comedies, unless I have it right: basically, they seem to be books printed about a popular show, sport, or comic strip or book that are published at the end of the year, pretty much as Christmas gifts. Every one I've seen is filled with comics, games, and photos. Doctor Who has an annual each year again these days, as do many popular brands. It's interesting just to go to Amazon UK and search "annual" and see what turns up.

The Mr. Merlin annual includes some comics, some stories with oddly proportioned illustrations of the actors (see above) and lots of photos of the cast. Lots. I think there wasn't much to say about the little show. there is a two page spread showing the recipes to make real magic potions from the middle ages, with ingredients including parts of lions and gorillas, with the caution "please don't try these at home." Darn, I was just going to go for my mortar & pestle.... I found this Annual in a used book store here in Southern California and Had To Have It; I knew if I put it down I'd never see another copy.

Merry Christmas folks. (If you don't celebrate Christmas, I hope you have a great day on December 25th of my calendar anyway, and enjoy any holidays you do observe). If you'd like to see something a little more "Christmassy," I recommend taking a look at Jim Fanning's recent Tulgey Wood posts: among some other great holiday things, he's posted a terrific rare Peanuts book called "Charlie Brown's Christmas Stocking" which I had never heard of. Enjoy!!

Skating in a Winter Wonderland

2008-12-19T22:51:00.000-08:00

I believe I've mentioned before about my decision at one point to find focus in what I collect - basically, deciding I didn't have to buy everything I stumble across just because I think it's cool. Seeing how many separate interests I have - just count the labels on this blog and know there are plenty more coming - you can understand why I want to keep an eye on branching out into new collections that, in the end, I maybe lose interest in quickly and abandon. With Focus, I recognize that I buy pretty much every Carrols item I come across (within reason price-wise), but don't buy every Indiana Jones action figure - just the ones I like.

Sometimes, though, I come across something that is so cool and so cheap that I have to buy it, no matter wether or not it fits in any of my collections. The photo above is one of those things.

With my recent, new-found interest in Restaurant Row and the Lobster Barrel in particular, I went one Sunday morning to the Melrose Trading Post - a swap meet at Fairfax high School in Los Angeles that is only a mile from Restaurant Row itself. I thought it was a likely place to turn up some matchbooks or other memorabilia from the restaurants, but I came up with nothing of the sort.

One dealer had boxes and boxes full of photos - thousands if not hundreds of thousands - all sizes, all ages, taken, apparently, all over the world. It occurred to me there may be a photo of Alan Hale with a visitor to his restaurant in there, but one of the two guys who ran it assured me there wasn't. (Apparently, he had looked at and memorized all the images?) I wasn't quite willing to dig through the bins myself, but I did spot this image on top of a bunch priced at 2 dollars apiece.

I'm not a Howdy Doody fan - it's way before my time - but

there's something perfect about this photo. The famous Clarabelle the clown ice skating down the street, in a perfect pose. An "Apothecary Shop" in the background. I wonder about the two circles on the building up top, and the third that's filled with something. Is that building still there? From the height of the hand in the foreground, I'd guess this may have been taken by a younger photographer - and I really like that there's a photographer in the shot itself, to the right. An added observer in the image seems to make a photograph more interesting, as if it impresses on the observer a new point of view to consider. I even like the way it's labelled, in blue ball point. "Clarabelle at St. Paul Winter Carnival 1960." Perfect, no doubts about this image.

I wonder how this ever found it's way to a folding table in a sunny southern California parking lot, almost 50 years later?

You can read about the Winter Carnival and its history here. Interesting stuff - but I don't think I'll take up collecting that memorabilia. If I ever get to know a Howdy doody collector, though, I already have a great Christmas present for them...

Generic, Yet Famous

2008-12-17T23:35:00.000-08:00

As I said last week, I've become obsessed with the history of "Restaurant Row" in Los Angeles, and especially 826 La Cienega, home of the legendary "Skipper Alan Hale's Lobster Barrel." (If you don't think it was legendary, check out the forward to Ben Stiller's "The Ecstacy and Agony," a book of Los Angeles photography, here. The Lobster Barrel comes third in his list of childhood memories of California, after "Disneyland" and "sunshine." Not bad).

I quickly turned up evidence of many, many other restaurants that had occupied that location at one time. One of the first I turned up is this matchbook for "Famous Restaurant," serving Jewish Cuisine - probably the only restaurant I found in the history of the location that didn't serve shellfish. It's also, I think, the only one with a "Bradshaw" prefix on the phone number, so that may help narrow down when it was there - looks like the fifties, probably.

By the way, the first time I wrote about the restaurant I got wrong what's actually in that location now. It's really "The Spanish Kitchen," which I've now visited three times. They have the best Steak fajitas I've ever had, and there are several features inside that just might date back to the "Lobster Barrel" days, like the wrought iron railings in the dining room. (check out the gallery at the Spanish Kitchen site for a look inside).

More Lobster Barrel history coming at you soon!

The Cheesecake Concordance

2008-12-15T20:00:00.000-08:00

The Big Bang Theory just gets better and better. I'm really enjoying this show.

If you've been reading here, you know I went to a couple of the tapings back in the first season, after the Writer's Strike was over. At sitcom tapings, the audience is usually wrangled by a stand-up comedian who keeps you entertained in the long breaks between shots, and makes sure everyone quiets down when cameras are rolling. Most importantly, he keeps up the audiences enthusiasm as the night wears on, and you have to laugh at a joke the fourth time just as if it's the first time you heard it.

At Big Bang Theory, the warm-up guy was pretty good (I hate to say I don't recall his name, I'll add it if I find one of my programs). He did the exact same corny jokes both times I went, but I expect they get few repeat visitors. Anyways, both times he had scripts to hand out to some of the audience members who played along with him. I wanted one, but I didn't volunteer to sing, or play a game, so no surprise I didn't get one.

The second time I went, he also had color photos signed by the whole cast. I wanted one.

While I didn't get one at the show, it did occur to me that someone who got one at one of the tapings might not want to keep it, and might put it on Ebay... and I saw this picture up for auction shortly thereafter. Few bidders, it's mine. This one was actually not signed at the show, but at the San Diego Comic Con. It's identical to the ones I saw being handed out, though.

Not too long ago, I had the chance to visit one of the real-life locations often "seen" on the show: The Cheesecake Factory in Pasadena, which I'd assume is the one where "Lonely little" Penny works. I don't know why, but on the show this restaurant is always shown as being sort of plain, almost Denny's-like. In real life, they're borderline Very Fancy Looking, with that "jeans and t-shirts are okay" air that so many places in California pull off so well. I haven't tried the burger there, but Sheldon recommends it.

(A note: Jim Fanning and I tend to call her "lonely little" Penny because that's sort of how she was described in the program handed out at the show. You can see that program over at Jim's excellent and personally inspirational blog here. You can also read some more news on Big Bang at Jim's December 15th post here).

Top Ten Oddest Published Sheet Musics. Number 10:

2008-12-13T12:09:00.000-08:00

Who'd have thunk it? I wonder how many they sold?

This is one of the many collectibles I inherited when my friend Bruce passed away. I helped the family liquidate many of his collectibles, but this one was one I couldn't let go myself. It is off my "focus" - Letterman is not something I collect - but it scores high "keep me" points for sheer "odd" factor.

The World According To Dwight

2008-12-11T21:09:00.000-08:00

I've been a fan of "The Office" since first seeing the UK version. When I first heard there was going to be a U.S. version, I was certain it was as doomed as the ill-fated adaption of "Coupling" that had just recently premiered and died after only three episodes. (Sadly, the third episode was the first one shown that was all new instead of adapted from a UK episode, and it was actually not bad - but it was far too late for the show. It had gained an Ishtar/Heaven's Gate type reputation and there was no saving it.

The "American" Office, luckily, proved to become as good and even better than the original - less dark, with more complex characters and relationships. It's easy to like the show, but there really isn't much to collect. NBC has some great merchandise, but the chart above of Dwight's plans to reorganize Dunder Mifflin Scranton under his command was handed out at the San Diego Comic Con this year. Like so many of the episodes, there's more to it than there seems: Dwight has added in his Cousin Mose, who we've seen on the show several times, but also

several family members I don't think have been mentioned... Vater? Mutter? Are those Dwight's parents? Also, note that Creed Bratton's name is in quotes, suggesting Dwight doubts that's his real name. Given what we've seen of Creed's personal life, he's probably right, but it's ironic that this is the one character whose name comes fully from the actor who plays him: Creed Bratton.

Another little item that has come my way is this Emmy-campaign button pushing Steve Carrell for best comedy performer. NBC made many of these for their different shows this year. (Sadly for Steve, Alec Baldwin's button for his performance on "30 Rock" had more sway with the Academy voting members).

Not exactly a collectible but a great "fan" experience for me, though, was visiting the location where the show is filmed. Watching an episode where time is spent outside on the roof of Dunder Mifflin convinced me the building was somewhere in the San Fernando Valley. (It's the one where Michael is threatening to jump. If you freeze frame some of the views, you can see where little blotches of green where plopped over palm trees to make them look like proper Pennsylvania-type foliage). A quick Google search revealed the address and I soon dropped by.

Interestingly, the outside of the soundstage where they shoot serves as the outside of the Dunder Mifflin branch, and you can drive right up and take a look at the place, and stand where Jan threw her car keys to Oscar, and see where Michael ran across the street to the train tracks. There are usually a couple of show cars parked in the lot, and you can see Michael Scott & Bob Vance's (Vance Refrigeration) parking spaces.

If you get the chance to go by there yourself, please don't bother the studio. They seem to be very tolerant of polite, quiet visitors who stay on public property. I arrived once while they were actually filming outside in the parking lot - Toby's going away party from the end of last season. While the production assistant was very polite and just asked us to pull over in a spot where our car wouldn't be filmed, I left pretty quickly. I hate to be a bother/concern to people who are working.

Please note: I've violated Dwight's intellectual property rights by sharing his chart here - he holds them for the next 1,000 years. If you see him, don't tell him where you saw this copy, okay?

fancollectorgeek

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I don't like yer mug.

'Big Bang' creators given science honors

French Fries Parmesan, please?

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Post# 150: Our "Secret" Identity Revealed

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Cheers! (Pretty clever, huh?)

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My Father

We interrupt these messages...

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The fridge of a geek

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By the way, about the Big Bang theory Comic Con Panel

Why am I here?

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Bring Me the Head of Doctor Sheldon Cooper

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

Images of Comic Con '09

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Big Bang Theory Comic Con Over view Part 1

All told....

The San Diego Conference

Iron shoes

And now...Fan Collector Twit???

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Michael's Michaels: Julien's Auction Part 4

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Part 2 of Julien's Auction: Michael Jackson's Michael Jackson collection

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Up Chuck (my apologies)

Prop collecting: Do you have an arm and a leg to spare?

Everything you Know is Wrong

Coming soon

The World's Largest Quark collection grows

Before Lobster, Snapper

Mother Met

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Ebay Selling tip #1

Merry Christmas from Max & Alex (Zach too).

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Generic, Yet Famous

The Cheesecake Concordance

Top Ten Oddest Published Sheet Musics. Number 10: