As my favorite series draw to a close for the season, I look forward to my summer TV viewing, which will probably consist mostly of Netflix, but there are at least three weeks where I’ll have something new to look forward to:

Pushing Daisies, cut down in its prime, will air three final episodes starting May 30 on ABC.  This is a show that had some of the best writing and, not for nothing, production design on television.  It also had a stellar cast, including Chi McBride in a role that deserved Emmys on a per-episode (sometimes per-facial expression) basis.

The good news is that, in a move not unlike Joss Whedon saying he’d continue Firefly on stone tablets if he needed to, Daisies will live on in comic book form.

Come to think of it, pretty much every Whedon property lives on in comic book form, too.  Is the comic book genre Ned incarnate?  Touching dead series and bringing them back to life?  As long as it doesn’t touch them again?  And then if it doesn’t within 60 seconds, does some other series get canceled?

I’m probably stretching the metaphor too far.

Trek (which was as good as Wolverine was bad) may not hit the heights I predicted, but it should easily crack $200 million, making it the most successful of the franchise by far (already it’s opening more than doubles it’s closest competitor, First Contact, which grossed $30mil. in its first frame.)  Of course, it’s also the most expensive of the franchise by far, more than double the previous record-holder, Insurrection (yes, really).

5/15

Wide

ANGELS & DEMONS

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Da Vinci Code sequel (though novel was a prequel) with better hair.

WILL IT SUCK?
Director Ron Howard has built up enough good will in the second half of his career (not that the first half sucked, it just wasn’t consistent) for me to watch pretty much anything he makes.  And I didn’t exactly hate the original.  I didn’t think it was the bees knees, but it was entertaining for a spell.

Screenwriters Akiva Goldsman and David Koepp both shoot about 50% and Goldsman already wrote the first one so I wouldn’t expect much to change. Ewan McGregor, Armin Mueller-Stahl and Stellan Skarsgard should all be welcome additions to the cast.

Early buzz has this being as much an improvement over Code as Tom Hank’s hair.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
If you’re going to open between Star Trek and Terminator: Salvation you might as well be a sequel to The Da Vinci Code.  Still, probably not going to be the phenom that its predecessor was.  $145mil.

Limited

THE BROTHERS BLOOM

(Moved from December)

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Dirty Rotten Indie Scoundrels

WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is good. From Brick maestro Rian Johnson. Outfitted this time with Rachel Weisz, Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo, Rinko Kikuchi and Robbie Coltrane.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Not as overshadowed here as it would have been last December. $6mil.

MANAGEMENT

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Steve Zahn stalks Jennifer Aniston, but in a cute romcom-y kind of way.

WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is good.  From the guy who wrote Tape.  But probably less creepy.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Brothers Bloom has a bit more buzz going for it.  But Aniston tends to hit, even in indieville.  $7mil.

O’HORTEN

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
After Norwegian Hours

WILL IT SUCK?
From the writer/director of quirky Norwegian comedy Kitchen Stories.  Early buzz is mixed.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Since the director’s American debut Factotum didn’t make him an art-household name, probably not much better than Kitchen Stories.  $500,000.

BIG MAN JAPAN

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Trials and tribulations of a giant man who fights giant (and generally fucked-up-looking) monsters.

WILL IT SUCK?
As a guy who grew up on Japanese monster movies, I’m predisposed to like this film.  So I’m happy to report that the early buzz is very, very good.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
This is one of those situations where my tastes don’t represent the majority.  $250,000.

Next Week: God help those machines if they stand in front of Christian Bale’s light.

I was thinking the other day how inadequate the phrase Comic Book Movie is.  I think what is meant to be evoked is Spider-Man, Batman, X-Men.  Superhero movies.

But comics, of course, also provide the source material for Road to Perdition, Ghost World and A History of Violence.

But when I got really picky about it, superhero movie didn’t really cover it either, since Batman and Iron Man have no powers and, with the exception of Dr. Manhattan, neither do any of the Watchmen.

But it’s a phrase I first heard in Watchmen that I found to be much more descriptive and much more interesting.

Costumed hero.

It’s not that you go out and fight evil.  It’s that you take the time to put on a costume before you go out and fight evil.

And that costume, as is explored quite well in Batman Begins, is as much theater as identity.  Practically speaking it might be easier to do battle without a get-up (well, unless you’re Iron Man or Batman), but narratively and psychologically speaking, iconography is important.  We need symbols.

(Identity concealment, ironically, is the oft-stated motive for the costume, although in many cases the costume hides nothing – Superman – or the hero’s identity isn’t terribly difficult to figure out – Spider-Man, Batman, etc.)

From a good/evil perspective, the opposite seems to be true, albeit in a different genre.  Look at Mike Myers, Freddy Kruger, Jason, Leatherface.  They, too, dress up before they go out to fight good. (Although in their case you don’t get the sense that they have a lot of wardrobe options.)

We buy, relatively easily, the concept of someone wearing the same clothes every time they act like a hero for a very good reason:

Firefighters, police officers, soldiers.  Uniforms are costumes.  Uniforms are (and often have) symbols.

Yet crime dramas and war films (usually) have little to do with “superhero” films.

I’m sure somebody’s done much more in-depth and articulate work on costumes, identity, iconography and genre.  If you know of any, please share.

…but I’m not about to give up my blog.

I cannot tell you how much I disagree with this article.

Yes, if you want to get noticed, blogging alone is not the most effective way to go and at least needs to be part of a much larger social web strategy, but that assumes that the point of blogging is to get noticed.  That motivation is fairly recent in the history of blogs.  Talk to most of the early bloggers, and they weren’t trying to get noticed, they were just trying to express themselves.  Most of them “got noticed” by accident.

And to say that even expression for the sake of expression is better served by Facebook, Twitter, etc. is to equate comic books, poetry, short stories and novels as identical writing formats.  Each serves its own purpose.

Of course, I’m saying all this as a blogger, so take that with a grain of salt.

For no particular reason I asked Dr. Wife the other day if anyone could actually pull off a bow tie (non-tux). Her response prompted me to tweet thusly:

People who can pull off a bowtie: Indiana Jones. That is all. (via @dr_wife).

Well, let me tell you, that set the Facebook-i-verse a buzzing. So here is an attempt to create a more thorough list of people who can pull off bow ties:

Indiana Jones

Prof. Henry Jones, Sr.

Malcom X

Bill Nye

Porky Pig

Anyone else?

Update: Mr.Kuba

via Jessa June

So, if not for all the illegal downloading some estimate Wolverine would have grossed an extra $20 million this weekend to become the highest opening flick in the franchise instead of the second highest after X3.  Others estimate that it doesn’t matter because they both sucked.

5/8

Wide

STAR TREK

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Kirk Begins

WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is pretty much along the lines of “I need to change my pants.” Literally, one guy said, “It melted my pants!” That was after what had to be the best bait-and-switch ever.

I have to say this comes as a pleasant surprise. I have faith in J. J. Abrams and most of the cast, but writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci have let me down before (Transformers). When teamed with Abrams, however, they tend to up their game (Alias, Mission Impossible III – and I hear Fringe is improving).

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
There are blockbusters and there are blockbusters. This is the latter. $294mil.

NEXT DAY AIR

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
If Guy Ritchie directed an “urban” comedy.

WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is good. I’ll watch Donald Faison and Mos Def in just about anything.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
There will probably be a few people who can’t get into Star Trek. But they will probably go see Wolverine, since they couldn’t get into that last weekend. $15mil.

Limited

RUDO Y CURSI

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Two brothers (Gael Garcia Bernal, Diego Luna) vie for a professional soccer slot.

WILL IT SUCK?
From writer/director Carlos Cuaron (Alfonse’s younger brother). Carlos also co-wrote Y Tu Mama Tambien with Alfonse, so he’s got the chops. And the reunion of Y Tu Mama‘s Bernal and Luna is almost too good to resist. Early buzz is positive.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Some trouble from Brothers Bloom next week, but love for Bernal and Luna should win out. $3mil.

LITTLE ASHES

WHAT’S THE PITCH?
Apparently, Salvador Dali, Frederico Garcia Lorca and Luis Bunuel all knew each other back in the day, two of them in the Biblical sense.

WILL IT SUCK?
Early buzz is good. Robert Pattinson (Twilight) plays Dali.

HOW WELL WILL IT DO?
Will draw about as much of the Twilight crowd as December Boys did of the Harry Potter crowd. $2mil.

Next Week: Tom Hanks’ hair really got it together.

Of all the new lingo that’s been added to the dictionary over the years, this is the phrase I probably use the most.  Its onomatopoeticism is infectious.  It describes so much of our world.  I doesn’t hurt that the origin is largely traced to:

Homer: Kids, how would you like to go to … Blockoland!
Bart + Lisa: Meh.
Homer: But the TV gave me the impression that –
Bart: We said, “Meh!”
Lisa: M-e-h, meh.

Quote via The Simpsons Archive