- The end of an era: the last typewriter factory in the world shuts its doors. [via]
- How food breaks sway the decisions of judges] [via]
- Comics re-imagined as secondhand paperbacks [via]
- “The closure of the Japan-based factory that has the monopoly on production of a tape crucial to the TV and film industry has Hollywood insiders scrambling to cope with the shortage.” [via]
- And finally, an exclusive interview with the writer of Fast Five [via]
Today Now! Interviews The 5-Year-Old Screenwriter Of “Fast Five”
comics
Thursday various
- The other night, I was watching Jeopardy, as I am wont to do, and was deeply saddened when none of the three contestants knew Terry Gilliam’s film Time Bandits. Now comes the even sadder news that the film might be re-made. Seriously?
- Speaking of re-makes, I never thought I’d say something like this, but this trailer for MTV’s new Teen Wolf makes me miss the Michael J. Fox version. (I was eight when I saw that film in theaters, though, so I already have way too fond feelings for it.) I was more forgiving of this version when I realized it’s meant to be an on-going television series, rather than a movie, but it seems like such tired, Twilighty territory, and surely there were better titles for it.
- A helpful reminder that, when the dictionary adds new words, even slang words, it is not the end of the world. (It’s actually probably a good thing. You know, because that’s what dictionaries are for.) [via]
- “Zombie” Ants Found With New Mind-Control Fungi. [via]
- And finally, because I’m sure you’ve been wondering: just how does Aquaman build his own x-ray machine?
Wednesday various
- A couple of weeks ago, they unveiled the new costume for NBC’s upcoming Wonder Woman series. The internet responded with the appropriate amount of disgust and horror. “I feel like my eyes are not only bleeding,” I myself wrote, “they’ve been top-coated with a carcinogenic plastic laminate.”
Well, not to worry: NBC and producer David E. Kelley have heard our complaints and all is better now. Her boots are now red instead of blue.
- Making Light lays out a recent timeline of Dorchester Publishing, explaining why it’s probably a good idea for writers and readers alike to stay very, very far away from them.
- Military ranks of the British Invasion. [via]
- “Though the efficacy of standardized testing has been hotly debated for decades, one thing has become crystal clear: It’s big business.” [via]
- And finally, Ryan McGee on the Comedy Central Roast of Donald Trump:
All of this proceeded banally for the first half of the show, until Sorrentino [the Situation] got up and did something that, had it been done by an Andy Kaufman, Norm MacDonald, or Zach Galifianakis, might have been called performance art. What he did was manage to stretch seven minutes of stage time into what felt like 36 hours of aural waterboarding. Trump, who was already a nearly invisible presence up until that point in the overall proceedings, receded even further as each ensuing comic opened up both barrels on The Situation, sensing blood in the water. Sorrentino’s performance will probably get the roast more publicity than anything else, but that’s part of the problem: The show clearly booked him so he’d bomb, not because he would do a good job.
And maybe that’s fine with you, if you enjoy train wrecks that involve baby seals and orphans inside said flaming train.
Wednesday various
- Twenty-or-so questions with comedian Mike Birbiglia. On what makes someone a real New Yorker: “The willingness to live within ten inches of someone else at all times.”
- So much for that new Dune movie.
- Sperm whales may have names. [via]
- Would you pay $50 a month to rent original artwork?
- And finally, Warren Ellis asks artists to re-imagine the Fantastic Four. Chip Zdarsky’s contribution, the third at that main link, would likely substitute Dr. Doom for Dr. Heiter, but a lot of the reinterpretations are equally interesting.
Tuesday various
- On WNYC, the Leonard Lopate Show has recently started posting picks and suggestions from any given week’s guests, asking them questions about what books they’re reading, what music they’re listening to, etc. They also ask, “What’s one thing you’re a fan of that people might not expect?” Teller, the silent half of Penn and Teller, answered, “Novel forms of pancakes and waffles.” I love that I have almost no idea what he means.
- All this time, I had been avoiding the Huffington Post mostly just because it’s a time-sink. Like io9, Metafilter, or Boing Boing, I was only visiting occasionally, and even then only when another blog redirected me there. But, it turns out, there’s a whole bevy of other reasons to avoid it, namely that, although it earns millions of dollars — and even more in its recent merger with AOL — it still doesn’t pay its writers, nor did it even pay for the blogging platform that runs it. Plus, it seems less like an interesting time-sink and more one that just re-purposes what other news blogs have written, with occasional liberal celebrity cameos, for the purpose of aggrandizing the Huffington Post. Maybe that’s unfair. As I said, I don’t spend much time with it, except when others occasionally direct it there. But it would be nice if some of that AOL money went to the people who day by day create the product AOL bought.
- A teenage burglar killed three goldfish because he didn’t want to leave any witnesses behind. In his defense, he may just have been reading The Cat in the Hat one too many times. Then again, reading might not be too high on this brainiac’s agenda. [via]
- I don’t think it will surprise anyone that Donald Rumsfeld is full of shit. This is what I think he himself would call “a known known.”
- And finally, Wolverine or two Bat Men? [via]