As such, below the below video, I’ve listed and explained the actual 8 most important movies of my life, at least as of today.

Watch this first, since it still contains valuable information.

One thing to note – these aren’t my 8 favorite movies, just the 8 I feel are the most important. Influential is probably a more precise term – these are part of why I write the way I write, and part of why I like the things I like.

In no particular order:

Back to the Future
Simply my all-time favorite movie. It has everything I love, from time travel to comedy to an amazing, distinctive score that wouldn’t work for anything else. (The 80s had to be the best time for movie themes, right?)

Back to the Future: Part 2
The intricacies involved in weaving this story through and revisiting the first one kinda blew my mind, and was the most literal translation to screen of the types of stories I liked in comic books at the time.

Top Gun
This introduced me to the idea of the iconic movie star, a concept I love.

Return of the Jedi
Luke in his black Jedi outfit was one of the stand-out images of my childhood. I also think this is where I first started to understand the concept that characters could grow and change.

Hudson Hawk
If you know anything about me, you’re thinking this should be Die Hard, but Hudson Hawk is what I consider Classic Bruce Willis.

I’ll always hold that this is totally underrated. It’s punished because people expected Die Hard 2, but this succeeds as the screwball adventure comedy it sets out to be.

I don’t know that I’d cite it as a direct influence on anything I’ve done, but it’s not afraid to be outlandish and weird, while also having huge stakes that it takes seriously within its own world.

There’s a balance I admire between “this is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen” and “omg I hope everything’s going to be okay”.

Airplane!
This you can cite as a direct influence. I have no idea when I first saw it, but…yeah.

Batman (1989)
This was (in my young mind) the first time something I loved was taken seriously by the general public. I took personal responsibility for this movie, i.e. if someone didn’t like it, I felt it was my fault.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Obviously great in 400+ ways, but the thing that hit me was that you could just throw a musical number into the middle of a “normal” movie. I’ve repeatedly tried to replicate this in so many things I’ve written, and it’s tied right to Ferris Bueller.

(WSM? had a dance sequence with Inflatable Ben that was shot but ultimately left out of the final movie. The opening of Flight of a Super Airplane (Amazon link) – big dance sequence.)

Honorable mentions: Die Hard, Cobra, Superman: The Movie

Originally posted as The 8 Most Important Movies Of My Life on Brian Spaeth.

As is customary in most civilized cultures, lunch in the American state of California has a halftime period.

In our case, there was a mercury incident at the restaurant during the half, and we couldn’t resume our meal until the next day.

Convenient, considering what happened.

Another thing to note is Go Spurs Go.

Originally posted as 10 Times I Couldn’t Remember Who Vin Diesel Was on Brian Spaeth.

Regardless, here is the video below, which was referenced above. It has video of me talking, a few graphics, and then it ends.

It should be available on Netflix in January 2014. The rest of my videos will be on Amazon Primal, except my 50 Shades of Grey review, which will be on Smithsonian Streaming.

Originally posted as 10 Times I Used My Turn Signal That Made Dogs Go Crazy on Brian Spaeth.

I used nbadraft.net’s Mock Draft to see who the top 3 prospects are, assuming that one of them would be the pick, and that CLE won’t trade down.

Next, I entered these names into the advanced search engine, Google, to find their highlight reels.

Intending to watch as much footage as possible, I found myself bored after 11 seconds of Nerlens Noel, and decided that would be my criteria for all three young men, none of whom I’ve ever heard of before.

I honestly used to love sports.

Here’s my breakdown.

NERLENS NOEL

NN spent the first 7 seconds staring off into space, and then blocked a little guy’s shot. Despite being 7 inches taller than me, he weighs only 6 pounds more.

When did 5-10 guys who only averaged 10 and 9 become #1 draft picks. Tony Battie managed 18 and 11.

BEN MCLEBRON

BM also wasted his opening sequence by doing absolutely nothing to show me why he should be the pick, and I don’t like his shooting stroke. Ugly follow-through. His name sounds like a college player’s name.

OTTO PORTER

OP managed to make two plays in his allotted time – he clearly plays at a fast pace. I think the shot he blocked was the same angle – and same player – as the one Nerlens did. He’s a small forward whose name sounds like an ABA stud from the ’70s.

THE PICK: OTTER POTTO

Originally posted as Who the Cavs Should Draft Based on Watching 11 Seconds of Each Top Prospect on Brian Spaeth.

I let it settle a bit, did some pushups, and the answer quickly presented itself.

The constant nods to and outright swipes from the old version of Trek damages the movie in several ways, from concept, to script, to final presentation. (I’m being as broad as possible there – I don’t want to spoil anything.)

These nodswipes aren’t jarring enough to take Darkness out of the “good movie” category, but they’re problematic, in that I don’t think this rebooted series needs them.

The casting is great, the action and effects are great, and the tone is fun.

This production team was and is fully capable of going in their own direction with completely new concepts and stories, and of creating their own iconic moments, and I wish they would have.

Darkness is a good movie and well worth seeing, but the idea that it’s a missed opportunity is standing out more to me right now.

I discussed this at length in two separate spoiler-filled podcasts yesterday.

First, an iTunes link to a special edition of my own podcast, wherein I invite my brother Tim, a lifelong devoted Trek fan on (also embedded below): Harold Potter, You Wake Up!.

Second, my weekly appearance on Waiting For Next Year (Summer Movie Edition, Star Trek Into Darkness).

Originally posted as One Thing About Star Trek Into Darkness That Bothers Me on Brian Spaeth.

I’ve always felt there are three reasons to remake a movie:

1) Special effects have advanced to the point where it can be a new visual experience.

2) The story can be updated for modern times. (And yes, that means I think a 2015 remake of Back to the Future – my all-time favorite movie – is completely viable.)

3) The previous version didn’t work.

Running The Great Gatsby through the above, one can see that there’s a certain amount of difficulty in remaking a well-worn story that’s largely character and era-based.

Yes, you can make a snazzier version of 1920s New York City now, but it’s not that profound of an improvement – or that necessary to the story – to say the remake (or the new adaptation, rather) is needed.

It’s not like King Kong, where advances in special effects allowed for a wholly new experience. Say what you will about the quality of Peter Jackson’s King Kong, but modern CGI made it worth attempting. Past versions of Kong didn’t look real enough to the modern filmgoer.

Moving to the second rationale, you can’t exactly transplant Gatsby into modern day without losing too much of the source material’s essence. 1920s America is as much a part of the story as Daisy or Nick. Giving them iPhones changes it too much into something else.

As to the third reason to remake, you could argue the 1970s version of Gatsby didn’t work, and I’d probably agree to some extent. That said, was that because of the film, or because of the story it was based on? Can a new version be significantly better without becoming something else? Is it worth doing?

That brings us to Toby Maguire’s The Great Gatsby. I found it well done and enjoyable, but like many reviews have noted, there’s just something kinda flat about it.

To me, that’s as simple as knowing the story already. Having re-read the book in preparation for Toby’s film made this even more of a factor.

(Hopefully it’s not a problem with this week’s release. I’m reading and watching every single piece of Star Trek material ever created in prep for Chris Pine’s Star Trek Into Some Darkness.)

Inevitably, Gatsby will see another remake at some point, and I’d put forth that the best way to do this would be doing it next year.

Here’s your cast breakdown:

Jay Gatsby: Vin Diesel
Nick Carraway: Paul Walker
Daisy Buchanan: Michelle Rodriguez
Tom Buchanan: The Rock
Jordan Baker: Jordana Brewster
George Wilson: Tyrese Gibson
Myrtle Wilson: Gina Carano

It’s amazing how perfectly this casting doesn’t work, right? (I almost put Ludacris in there as Myrtle, but that’d just make the whole thing too “ha-ha” of a joke.)

I FULLY believe that if they used this cast and played it totally straight, Vin Diesel’s The Great Gatsby would be a sizable hit.

There’s nothing quite as fun and interesting as inappropriate casting, and this group of actors in an elegant, bold, and emotional retelling of Gatsby is nothing if not that.

As for directing duties, you want someone who’d direct this as if it’s a serious take on it.

No winks-and-nods about why Tom is the 280 pounds of pure, sweaty muscle, or why Nick speaks with a surfer’s monotone, or why Jay Gatsby needs to be shot 45 times before he finally dies. (I don’t think that’d be in the script, but would rather be a stubborn acting choice by Mr. Diesel that our director would be unable to edit around.)

And while it’s hilarious, nothing like this can be included:

@brianspaeth “I live my life one quarter-mile at a time, old sport”

— Grimey (@loljocks_grimey) May 12, 2013

That’s the type of fun for we, as a collective audience, to share in before, during, and after each of our 25+ viewings.

And you’d have to see it that many times, because this would be a take on Gatsby that’s unexpected and different, while still adhering to the source material’s story and themes.

Toby’s Gatsby succeeded in achieving the latter, but not at all the former; it was just about exactly what you’d expect it to be. This doesn’t hurt it as a work, but in some way seems to hurt the reception of it.

That said, it opened to a sizable box office number and I liked it quite a bit, so maybe an update with modern actors and filmmaking styles is reason enough.

Perhaps a remake using the cast of The Fast and the Furious isn’t so necessary after all.

But it really is.

Maybe just do one scene for me.

Please.

Originally posted as How To Remake The Great Gatsby Some More on Brian Spaeth.

1) Could it be that a simple boy made from simple peanut butter would be able to do such an unsimple thing as getting the Fish Tax reinstated?

2) Shia, get back in the hotel!

3) Television was in the midst of a massive creative resurgence, yet FX insisted on showing X-Men Origins: Wolverine no less than twice a day, every day.

4) Inside the heart of every champion was the heart of another champion, and then another, and that was three hearts in total.

5) She’d been researching the topic for years, as Megan knew her dissertation wouldn’t feel complete until she found at least one logical reason for the design of 9-volt batteries.

6) He knew he’d regret it later, but Shia Labeouf wanted those french fries.

Originally posted as 6 Amazing Sentences That Will Make You Think About Shia Labeouf Against Your Will on Brian Spaeth.

Based on recent traffic reports to my dot com website, the best way to do this is with an animal, a set of numerically separated points, and an overblown, unnecessarily long headline.

That said, and in contrast to the teachings of The Internet Success Guide 2013, this will also need a lot of WORDS.

1) Cleveland never wanted to fire him in first place.
All reports say that LeBron had no contact with the Cavs after his final game against Boston in 2010

With Brown coming off 66 and 61 win seasons, it’s not a huge leap to assume that letting Mike Brown go was a shot in the dark that the team hoped would somehow appease or sway LeBron’s The Decision.

2) The Cavs inserted LeBron into this equation.
Despite the raging lunatics on sports radio and in various comment threads net-wide, one must assume that Cavaliers management considered how this hire might affect LeBron’s potential desire to return to Cleveland in 2014.

Unless Gilbert, Grant, et al live in some kind of absurd, impossible bubble, this is simply fact.

That means they’re either confident (assured…Rich Paul?) that LeBron isn’t anti-Brown, OR they know there’s no chance he’s coming back, anyway.

Personally, I don’t think LeBron had major problems with Mike Brown. The defense was always superior, and don’t forget their offense was pretty fluid the past few years, save for the “LeBron stands around” segments…something he also did quite often his first year in Miami.

That goes back to something I said over and over on my old site: Mike Brown didn’t coach LeBron to stand around. LeBron just chose to stand around.

I’m not saying Mike Brown is an offensive genius, but I don’t think he’s inept. (Los Angeles was an impossible gig, and his first year, he did take the same team Phil Jackson had to the exact same place PJX did the previous season.)

In any case, the Cavs couldn’t make this hire based on guessing what LeBron would or would not want. As noted already, Byron Scott got the job based on this very reason, and look how that went.

Despite his status as an all-time great and the best player in the world, self-holding your franchise hostage to LeBron is a bad idea.

History has proven that, so I’d lean toward not repeating it.

3) It’s possible, but not probable, that LeBron could return.

Despite a shirtless LeBron James being the last image of him as a Cavalier, I’ve never been convinced he wanted to leave the team.

Rather, he wanted to go play with Wade and Bosh more than he wanted to stay. I know that technically means he wanted to leave, but you get my point.

Squeek squeek squeek!

4) Mike Brown is a nice person.
He’s been thrown under the bus in his last two gigs, both of which were high-profile in their own way.

You try coaching a post-surgery Dwight Howard when instead of rebounding, all he’s trying to do is make up new knock-knock jokes.

He’s taken all of this in stride, and Mike Brown wants to live in Cleveland, whether he’s coaching or not. This makes him objectively good and just.

5) The Cavs aren’t very good.
Good talent – even when coached poorly – wins more than 24 games. Yes, there were a lot of injuries, but there’s no coach out there who’s gonna come in and make this team into a contender in 2013-14.

You can at least be respectable with almost any group of talent if you’re working hard as a cohesive defensive unit. It’s someplace to start, and Mike Brown can do that.

Under Brown, it’ll be rare that this team gives up 20-point 4th quarter lead multiple times, if at all. On that alone, the Mike Brown Cavs 2.0 are already better than Scott’s.

He’s not perfect, but he’s better, and he’s proven, and these Cavs…if you’re a championship team, Tristan Thompson should be your fourth-best player, at best.

Brown might be right for a young team that needs a consistant system – we haven’t seen what he can do with that set-up yet.

6) Dan Gilbert should next throw money at the Phoenix Suns training staff.
They’re miracle workers.

Just get all of ‘em, and add in Tim Grover, who should spend every single day with Kyrie Irving, a set of weights, and a yoga mat.

7) There aren’t an endless string of viable better options that aren’t huge risks.
Brian Shaw, Potential Elite NBA Head Coach, is one of the more interesting media creations of the past 7 years.

I have no idea if he’d be a good head coach or not, but I do know that nobody else has hired him. I keep hearing people say, “I really wish they’d talked to Brian Shaw.”

Why is that, other than that’s what you read from hyperbole-master Adrian Yahoo? Is there a real reason, outside of, “Um…”?

The franchise could also have gone for a well-respected, untested assistant, but who knows what that yields. Randy Wittman was the next big thing at one point, remember.

8) Everyone needs to calm down.
Mike Brown is the once and future coach of the Cavs.

You can’t change this by screaming at sports radio hosts or virtually screaming via your Twitter, Facebook, and excitement blog.

9) Dan Gilbert is a gambler.
Clearly this move was the result of a bet that he couldn’t get the Cavs in the Cleveland sports headlines one day before the NFL Draft.

Originally posted as 9 Things This Cute Hamster Assumes About the Cavs Rehiring Mike Brown on Brian Spaeth.

Screengrab.

Still, people LOVE IT, especially if animals and/or basic life lessons are involved.

Let’s do that, using some of the most memorable, spiritually educational moments from 1989′s Michael Keaton is…Batman.

1) Have an iconic catchphrase that nobody can forget.

2) Answer simple questions simply and wear your costume when you do that. Ruff ruff!

3) Don’t be afraid to let loose when you are by a fireplace and a bad guy is with you and he’s being bad at your pretty friend.

4) Take a bath sometimes, but not when you’re counting your money dollars.

5) Be a gentleman because of how mad she got at him for asking that.

6) Don’t go to parties alone because you won’t know anyone and also you might have a silly dress on.

7) Eat vegetables even if they are somebody else’s vegetables and that’s fine if they’re giving them to you.

8) Carry a camera because of the spy missions your boss with the chemical condition on his skin might make you do.

9) Say who it is when you call someone and they’re not there, and then they can call you back.

That last one is kinda out of date because of cell phones, but it’s the best scene in the movie, as well as a valuable lesson these 13 dogs need to know or something.

Do you like bats.

Originally posted as 9 Unreal Batman Moments That 13 Adorable Dogs Go Nuts For on Brian Spaeth.

I always liked their comics best, and the characters lend themselves to a wider variety of stories and personal dilemmas.

That said, no character from the genre makes me more excited on a baseline level than Superman.

No idea when I first saw it, but this has always been one of my favorite movie scenes, and while I’ve watched it countless times, it always gets me.

Anything from a simple smile to actual tearing up is in play. The uploader’s description is undeniably cheesy, but I wholly embrace it:

Feeling bad, grumpy, or sad? Angry or Hate America? Take a look here, focus on the good, and spread it like peanut butter all over your heart! There is a Superman in you, too!

Superman needs to inspire triumph, and hope, and a compulsion to be good and to do the right thing, and the best of Superman needs to nail this in the way the scene linked above does.

(This is only one of many reasons 2006′s Superman Returns was such a failure, what with all the “Superman abandoned us for 5 years” and “Superman has a son he didn’t know about” and “Superman kinda hates being Superman” and “Superman uses his powers to stalk Lois Lane” stuff.)

Such is why – in addition to a booming, building, surprisingly unique score – the screengrab included in this post is what has me most excited about this summer’s Man of Steel.

The new trailer just couldn’t be more perfect, and that final exchange between Superman and Lois tops it off in all the best ways.

Superman will always have his slight “where do I fit in with the human race” angsts, but he also needs to have that calming wink-and-nod to humanity that says, “Hey, it’s okay. I’m taking care of things.”

Many would say that the character is outdated or too pollyanna for 2013, but really, that type of innocent optimism and sense of good is what we’re supposed to aspire to, so absorb it – follow it – with a genuine happiness, if you can.

It may feel simplistic to imply that a movie trailer can inspire in these ways, but simplicity is what makes Superman such a great character.

He does the right thing to do because it’s the right thing to do, and for no other reason.

We should all live that way, with accompanying muscles, as necessary.

My only reservation – and I choose to ignore it in favor of rampant optimism – is that Zack Snyder’s trailers are always excellent.

The past couple go-rounds, the actual films have been kinda flat (Watchmen) or just bad (Sucker Punch).

Originally posted as One Amazing Thing About the Man of Steel Trailer That 33 Dogs Can’t Even Handle Right Now on Brian Spaeth.

1) Remember when he took the 310 to Yuma?

2) And when he was getting in his car with a kid?

3) He was getting healthy in this hat!

4) But then he was like “Whaaa…?”

5) Maybe he was thinking about wearing a hat in The Fighter.

6) Or remembering when he wore this hat in Public Enemies.

7) Christian’s Jesus sort of wore a hat.

8) Bet his wife likes this hat.

9) But not when he wears a jacket, too.

10) I’m Hatman.

Please let me know if you’re here because you were genuinely interested in seeing some unbelievable “Christian Bale in a hat” scenarios AND/OR you clicked this knowing ahead of time that you’d look at all ten, while regretting it both during and afterward.

Originally posted as 10 Times Christian Bale Wore A Hat That You Won’t Believe on Brian Spaeth.

This is the first time I’ve filled out an NCAA bracket in like 6 years, and the first time I’ve ever filled out a 2013 NCAA bracket.

It’s become quite automated since 2007. Computers.

Since I literally can’t name one college basketball player, I went with a the best picking system I could conceive, and chose winners alphabetically.

My Final Four are thus the 15, 6, 11, and 12 seeds.

The one hangup I had was Florida v FGCU. I didn’t know what the latter was, didn’t care to look it up, and either team was getting a 5-letter annihilation by Akron in the next round.

Speaking of, not long into the process, I realized Akron was my champ. “Not long into the process” being defined as “when I saw Akron”.

At least there’s sentimental value, and for those interested, I bet you’ll see LeBron James without a shirt if I nailed this.

Originally posted as 2013 NCAA Bracket – Best Picking System on Brian Spaeth.

Go read the whole thing, but the title – CNN Reports On The ‘Promising Future’ of the Steubenville Rapists, Who Are ‘Very Good Students’ – is a good summation.

This is maybe my favorite sentence of the recent past:

For readers interested in learning more about how not to be labeled as registered sex offenders, a good first step is not to rape unconscious women, no matter how good your grades are.

CNN isn’t alone, though.

Dan Wetzel at Yahoo! is trying to get to the right point and hits it here and there – that what happened was wrong, end of story – but still ends up blaming the culture of the town.

The boys drank. They drove around. They went to each other’s houses until 2, 3, 4 in the morning. They exploited permissive parents who let the party continue. They, according to so many locals, knew there were bars that would serve them, liquor stores that would supply them and adults who would look the other way.

This may all be true, but to connect it to why a rape occurred is misguided at best, and idiotic at worst.

Let me put it this way. The above perfectly describes my high school experience, save that sometimes we stayed at those houes until 4:30.

Big difference?

Not once did myself or any of my friends desire, consider, or attempt to have sex with unconscious people.

Y’know what normal people do with unconscious people?

Pile sofas on top of them, draw on their faces with permanent marker, pose for Weekend At Bernie’s styled pictures, or even just put them someplace safe and make sure they remain that way.

Worst case, they’re deemed done for the evening, and basically left to sleep in the corner, or wherever they left themselves.

Wetzel’s excuse above could certainly be the source of many of the stupid activities of youth. You could use it as a reasonable pathway for drunk driving, vandalism, or even just being mean to classmates. Arrogance, invincibility, etc.

You can’t use it as an excuse for taking off a girl’s clothes and hitting her with your penis while your friend penetrates her.

Nor can you blame alcohol, which is something else the pundits say we should be thinking about. I’m pretty sure the one guy wasn’t drunk when he was texting everyone and laughing about his rape experience over the following couple days.

Raping someone and then bragging about your hilarious adventure makes someone objectively horrible. End of story.

Maybe not, according to Mr. Wetzel.

It’s not that these kids were pure evil. Far from it. Most were headed to college or the military. They appeared presentable.

Because rapists don’t wear neckties? Rapists don’t go to college? They just rape all day while wearing potato sacks or garbage bags? You can make up for raping people by wearing decent clothes?

What’s he even trying to say here?

Maybe the lack of info on the girl due to privacy laws is leaving the media – and Dan Wetzel – struggling to fill columns and commentary, but all this apologetic/sadness/excuse talk is gross to me.

I was about as close to a juvenile delinquent as you can get without crossing into crime, and I can connect the dots in order to rationalize a lot of terrible acts, from smashing mailboxes* all the way to murder.

There’s an endless string of valid reasons to murder people. Like if you rape my sister, I’m probably gonna murder you, and I think that’s a perfectly rational response on my part.

Speaking of rape…! Here’s how you connect those rationalization dots. Wait, that’s not possible.

Rape is something bad people do for no reason other than they’re bad people. You don’t rape someone because you used poor judgement.

When rapists get caught, convicted, and punished, it’s something to celebrate, not a reason to fish for excuses.

That’s all that need be written or said about these previously promising young men, because they were never promising at all. They’re rapists.

*For example, I can admit to smashing my share of mailboxes back in the day, BUT this was actually a warning to the homeowners that their mailbox needs to be upgraded in case of tornado.

In its own way, it was a public service.

Originally posted as Steubenville Rape Trial Studs on Brian Spaeth.

There’s some grumbling out there that it’s distasteful for him to arrive at this mindset only for selfish reasons (his son came out in 2011), and I get that.

You don’t want to criticize him for doing the right thing to do, but of course, it’d be a lot nicer if people just reached these conclusions because they’re the right conclusions to reach.

That might not be the whole story, though.

Consider this: what if he knew his son was gay years ago, has thus always been okay with gay marriage, but never said so, only for political strategy reasons?

That, I would argue, is even worse than needing the poke in the side that he needed. It’s a “screw you, son – we’re talking about my career” agenda.

OR…what if he knew his son was gay, wasn’t okay with that, and then mounted his militant anti-marriage campaign in some insane attempt to get his son to not be gay anymore. Ridiculous, but so is the idea of being against gay marriage.

Another scenario: what if he’s always felt this way, and then mounted the campaign in conjunction with his son, for the sole purpose of becoming the Official Face of Changing Sides at exactly the opportune moment in this process?

In this one, he’s been working for gay marriage in secret for years by becoming one of the largest opponents of it. Some kind of Nick Fury of gay marriage.

We could all keep going with these probings into the mind of Mr. Portman, and many columnists will for the next few days.

It’s kind of a waste.

Let’s just take him at his word, and more than anything, be glad he’s doing the right thing to do right now, and at just the right time to do that thing to do.

Be glad momentum is swinging toward what’s just, that the scenario for enabling real change is imminent, and that we, as a society, will possibly be in a better place after this Supreme Court Conference Party later this month.

A change in the law isn’t even going to change everyone’s mindsets, but a change in the status quo will change it for future generations.

Best of all, maybe everyone can get married, and the jerks who oppose it will just look like bigger jerks.

There’s never wholesale change in thought of that sort. Just forward progress, and this is that for Mr. Portman, no matter how or why he got there.

Originally posted as Rob Portman, Gay Marriage, and Doing the Right Thing To Do on Brian Spaeth.

Two small complaints.

1) While I appreciate going international – and the boost that gives the foreign box office – I fear the subtitles distract from great sequences like this one, which you can already see will become an iconic entry in action/adventure film history.

There’s pretty much “Indy shoots the swordsman” and then “Andrew Garfield tells the Toothache Alligator there’s probably a cake nearby”.

2) The Spidey nerd inside me is whining that Toothache Alligator’s problem in the comics is he just doesn’t brush – it has nothing to do with a sweet tooth.

I assume this is a grab for the Entenmann’s licensing dollars, but I’m for character and story over merchandising. Again, I get the need, but it irks me.

These are the only strikes against this early look at AGi…ASM2.

Originally posted as Amazing Spider-Man 2 Spoilers on Brian Spaeth.

Mom and dad can’t save her now,
No allowance, not this time!

Who knew dinner cost this much?!
Who knew cable tv was a cost?!

Not her! (Oh no!)
Not her! (Oh yes!)

No more college,
Not today,
But she’s gonna find her way! (Oh yes!)
She’s gonna find her waaaaaaaaay!!

DOWNTOWN! (YEAH!)
DOWNTOWN ABBEY!!
DOWNTOWN (YEAH!)
DOWNTOWN ABBEY!!

And she’s on her own agaaaaaaain!
(For the first time!)

Originally posted as Downtown Abbey on Brian Spaeth.

12. Copyright page. Why put that in the front matter when people skip over it and it takes up sample space?

He’s put this out there before, and if you own the current versions of any of my books, you know I’ve followed the advice – it makes perfect sense.

My reasoning is somewhere in the same family, ie nobody’s reading it, so why make it the first or second thing they see?

Similar to a YouTube vid or even a blog post, don’t give people a chance to click away. Silly as it sounds, the copyright statement does this.

I’ve done it.

He suggests putting what is essentially your back cover copy first, since many people buy ebooks on a whim, only to forget what is was or why they picked it up months later.

(I’ve also done this, but not so often that I need to italicize it.)

So this is all great – it was the perfect ebook formatting…until the other day.

That’s when Amazon quietly updated their Kindle apps to automatically make the following show up after the last page of your book:

I can’t find the Tweet, but I begged for this some two years ago.

Couldn’t be happier it now exists, except that nobody will ever see it if there’s anything superfluous at the end of your book…especially a copyright statement.

This superfluous material might even include your about-the-author page, bibliographies, pencil sketches your brother drew of you, etc.

People won’t keep flicking through.

Here’s how this should go, if you’re trying to get someone unfamiliar with your work to read and then review it:

1) Pseudo-back-cover copy.

2) Book.

3) Review form.

Under this paradigm where you’re both snagging your reader and getting them to review your book, you can’t put all your extra garbage at the start or at the end.

Thus…

Next time I reformat my books, the copyright statement, author page, and all other informational text is going right in the middle.

Call it an intermission – if people have read that far, they’ll flick past and continue. It’s harmless and safe.

This may seem extreme, but reviews being as precious/valuable as they are, you don’t want to take a chance of someone missing that easy-to-submit form when they’re fresh off their read.

You may even place a false cliffhanger on that last page instead of THE END, just to be sure they see it.

Originally posted as Where Should Ebook Copyright Statements Go? on Brian Spaeth.

Talking to strangers like a turtle on a daily basis is the type of experience I found impossible to let go of, especially when you get this quote during your first call back:

“I was having dreams where everyone was benefitting.” – @Adam_Jacobi

Then you get emails like this:

Hello Turtle,

I just got off the phone with Allyson in New York and I thought you might like to hear some of her thoughts on the turtle. She did not know I was the one who purchased her turtlecall, yet I was still the first person she called with this knowledge:

“I thought maybe he was calling because this is storm Nemo and he’s a turtle? And I was shoveling.”

“He sounded like a serial killer. I was picturing a Captain Hook mustache but he was still sort of good looking.” “Like the Dexter of turtles?” “I was kind of picturing the guy from V for Vendetta but better looking.”

“His voice was the weirdest part! It was almost like he was Indian and British and a Pirate but all mixed up. He sounded like a serial killer. But he was so chipper I just wanted to keep talking to him.”

Lots of references to you being a serial killer, albeit a good looking British/Indian/Pirate one. Thought you might like to hear some thoughts from the other side.

With all my turtle-y love,

Amanda (In New York)

There’s nothing quite like being called a Good-Looking, Chipper British-Indian Pirate Serial Killer, or making reservations for Don Cheadle at Applebees:

Originally posted as Inspirational Quotes, or Why I Started Making turtlecalls Again on Brian Spaeth.

The Ongoing Adventures of Han Solo isn’t terrible on a conceptual level, but I can’t help but think that instead of a random tale from the life of a galactic smuggler, we’d get this.

Even if they can avoid the above and make a solid Han Solo film, I’m not sure why they would.

Particularly at this juncture, any film put out under the Star Wars banner will be an instant pop culture moment, and be massively successful. There’s just no way it won’t be.

Why not take that opportunity to introduce an entirely new character, concept, and even timeframe or era?

Were I in charge of the franchise, there’d be an unwritten rule that any non-Episode 7-9 films have to take place either 500 years before or after the Skywalker Era.

Originally posted as A Han Solo Movie is a Pretty Terrible Idea, Even My Mom Knows That, and Nobody Has Even Told Her About It on Brian Spaeth.

The following gchat with my mom only explains one of them.

me: i had a dream last night that dad was in charge of a scam to steal $4M from an insurance company

mom: Awesome – did he succeed?

me: i don’t know i woke up and was sweating and then stubbed my toe and fell into my closet

mom: lol – seriously?

me: yeah and when i fell i was like whoaaaaaoaaa and i think i woke up the dogs that live in the apt of the guy upstairs

mom: lol lol lol…is your toe ok?

me: it was funny because then i was like ugh shut up dogs i can’t sleep
me: i don’t know about my toe i haven’t looked at it yet

mom: Do you have a nightlight in your room? :)

me: no but i bought this new phone charger and it has a little blue light and it’s pretty much like a lamp lol

Do you like how my mom is an aggressive loler.

Please don’t take my HNC consumption as sign I’ve lost my health and fitness enthusiasm – it was actually an experiment related to something I’ll never tell anyone about.

Are you intrigued on a scale of 1-10.

Originally posted as How To See In the Dark After Eating a Whole Box of Honey Nut Cheerios Before Bed on Brian Spaeth.