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Review: Red Dwarf XII Episode 1: “Cured”

Post-revival Red Dwarf has been pretty uneven. I think it’s safe to say that. Fans may not agree on the particular high points and low points, but I don’t think I’ve seen anyone say that Dave-era Red Dwarf is unilaterally good. We can disagree about where it stumbles, but at the same time we can all agree that it does stumble.

I had no idea what to expect from series XII. And, well, one episode in, I still don’t. I feel a mix of optimism and trepidation. Optimism because series XI was, I felt, the strongest the show has been since series VI. And trepidation because…well, series X and “Back to Earth.”

The show could go either way at this point, but that arguably represents progress. From series VII through X, the show felt pretty stuck. Which is an odd thing to say, I admit, as every one of the series in that group feels completely different from the others. When I say “stuck,” though, I mean stuck in terms of quality. The show had trouble shifting out of low gear, no matter what the vehicle itself might have looked like, or who was in it.

It probably sounds like I’m being dismissive of Doug Naylor’s solo work on Red Dwarf. And I am, but not because Rob Grant left after series VI or because I don’t think Naylor is capable. I just feel that it took him a very long time to find his footing after Grant’s departure. That doesn’t mean he’s lazy, untalented, or any number of other clearly false accusations I could throw at him. It just means the machine worked a lot better when there were two people manning the controls.

Red Dwarf was still alive, which could be seen as a good thing. But the lows were much lower and the highs nowhere near as high or frequent as they had been. That’s a pretty heavy counterweight.

But then we had series XI. Specifically, we had “Twentica,” the first episode of that batch.

And it felt right. It felt like Red Dwarf. It felt like the past few series hadn’t happened at all. And it wasn’t just good…it felt effortless.

It made me laugh, it made great use of a solid concept, and it told its story in a really fun and unexpected way. It was the best episode I’d seen since the original run, and it proved that Naylor’s solo version of Red Dwarf really could recapture the magic of the show at its best.

The rest of the series, I’d argue, proved that that episode wasn’t a fluke. I didn’t love all of series XI, but I sure as hell appreciated it. Even the weaker episodes (“Samsara,” “Officer Rimmer”) had a lot to recommend them, and the strongest (“Twentica,” “Krysis”) absolutely deserve their placements pretty near the all-time best. In other words, when series XI misfired, it still worked. And when it was good…well, it made VII through X feel even stranger.

So we’ve proven it. Naylor crafted for us his first sustained run of episodes worthy of the Red Dwarf name. And, of course, we turn to XII to see if that can last.

I don’t think “Cured” answers the question, but I do think I’m being a bit harsh on it simply because the previous series was so good. “Cured” feels, at times, an awful lot like classic Red Dwarf. But series XI already proved that Naylor could do classic Red Dwarf. That’s no longer the pleasant surprise that it was…it’s the expected baseline. And I don’t really think “Cured” rises above it.

The central concept, it has to be said, is great, and feels absolutely ripped from the classic years. If I was told this was an idea from the show’s heyday that they never got around to making, I’d believe it. The crew finds a research station that has developed a cure for evil. Proof of the cure’s success struts around in the forms of harmless versions of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Messalina, and Vlad the Impaler.

It’s a classic-feeling idea, and it mainly brings to mind the waxdroids of “Meltdown.” (Even moreso when it’s revealed that these figures are indeed robots.) There are a lot of possibilities for this to play out, but the important thing is to explore the idea in interesting ways and have some fun with it.

“Cured” does that. But it still feels rather…empty.

I think part of that feeling comes from the fact that the show’s two strongest characters — Rimmer and Kryten — don’t get much to do. The Cat and Messalina have a dynamic, Lister and Hitler have a dynamic…and the other two just disappear for a while. Even when they are on camera, they just sort of take up space. The opening scene — in which The Cat develops his poker face — has a few token lines from Rimmer and Kryten, but otherwise they just wait quietly while Lister and The Cat have their fun.

It’s a little weird. We’ve had plenty of scenes in which two characters play off of each other alone. (Such as Lister and Kryten at the beginning of “Camille,” or Lister and The Cat stuck together in “Samsara.”) But we don’t usually have other characters present, doing nothing, and it feels a bit off. Scenes like this would have been a perfect opportunity to give Rimmer and Kryten some business if they weren’t much involved with the main plot, but it didn’t happen. Couldn’t Rimmer have taught The Cat about a poker face instead?

To be frank, though, I liked the scene. I liked it a lot, and I thought it was genuinely funny. Danny John-Jules has been a consistent highpoint of Naylor episodes, and I don’t think that’s going to change any time soon. I just wonder why Rimmer and Kryten got so clearly sidelined.

I will, of course, contradict myself right now, because I liked the fact that Rimmer was sidelined toward the end. As Kryten is reading the results of the psychopathy test, I can’t have been the only one who expected the psycho to be Rimmer. That’s the way jokes like this have been structured in the past (“Justice” being perhaps the most obvious example), and those jokes work. Rimmer is a deeply flawed human being, and earlier in this episode he both suggests leaving five people behind to die and carps about potentially having a wheelchair-bound scientist aboard Red Dwarf. All signs point to Rimmer.

And yet it’s The Cat. Which is the more surprising outcome, and yet totally believable. It’s funnier. It’s smarter. And it sets up a great conclusion in which The Cat is the hero of the day. Not, of course, because he behaves in any heroic manner at all, which makes it even better.

I liked so much about “Cured.” I liked far more than I disliked. The guest actors were all very good, with probably the most adorable Hitler we’ll ever see in any form of media. There were good laughs sprinkled throughout, even if I didn’t see the extended guitar duet as the highlight the episode clearly thought it was.

My main problem with it, though, is the reveal that the scientist himself is a villain. So many great episodes of Red Dwarf explore a concept — and/or introduce danger — without there being a clear villain. “Meltdown,” again, is a good example; there are warring factions, but the episode doesn’t give us a big bad, and so allows Rimmer to become one. Or “Legion,” in which the title character is in no way a bad guy, and yet must be overcome in order for the crew to escape. Or “Better Than Life.” Would that episode have improved if Rimmer had a rival other than himself?

Episodes with distinct bad guys can work fine. (“The Last Day,” “Quarantine,” “Out of Time”) But “Cured” didn’t feel like an episode that needed one. It had a strong enough central concept that some kind of episode-ending decision (as opposed to defeating a bad guy) could been spun out of it. In fact, we toy with one such decision: do we leave them behind to die or take them with us?

As written, the “right” answer is clearly the latter, but with some tweaking, it could have posed an interesting ethical dilemma. Maybe Starbug with its busted thruster can’t hold the weight of five more people. It can only hold three more, say. Evil’s been cured, so these folks won’t fight and argue and backstab to get the spot. What do they do instead to curry favor? It would be interesting to find out.

Instead, though, the point is abruptly rendered moot. The historical figures are only robots, and the only actual living human is a bad guy.

That’s not interesting. It gives The Cat a great moment, but it deflates so much of the episode’s potential.

I liked “Cured.” I have a feeling that watching it again will make me laugh instead of think, though, and that’s a shame, because there’s a really strong concept here. And while the episode by no means fails, I think it does shirk the opportunity to explore it the way the best episodes have done.

Red Dwarf is back. It feels like itself again. It’s justifying its existence.

Now I’m just waiting to see if it can — or wishes to — do a little more.

Misspeak, Memory

Have you ever had a memory that was later proven to be so far from reality that you begin to question the way your mind works?

I’m sure it’s happened to me other times, but the most recent example comes courtesy of Roseanne. I’ll get to that in a moment, but first let’s talk about the show as a whole.

The entire series is currently available for streaming through Amazon Prime, but sadly those are syndication cuts. It’s worth pointing out, though, that the complete series boxset is available for under $30 new, and I’ve heard those are the original broadcast edits.

Anyway, I’m working my way back through the series on Prime. I remember really liking the show when I was young. It debuted when I was seven, and revisiting the episodes for the first time in my adult life, I can definitely confirm that my family started watching from the very beginning. I even remembered a lot of lines and moments from the pilot. Maybe my mother or father was already a fan of Roseanne’s standup or something. For whatever reason, we were able to catch a truly great show from the start. I’m grateful for that.

Years ago, before I started reviewing ALF on this site and shaved eleven years off my life, someone suggested I review Roseanne. Watching the show again (I’m about two seasons deep), I’m glad I didn’t. It’s very good television. The characterization is sharp, with characters arriving fully formed and every actor perfectly cast. The stories are well chosen and well told. Comedy and drama are balanced perfectly, with the show nearly always leaning toward the former, but keeping the latter at a steady hum that reveals genuine sadness whenever you look past the jokes.

Which, really, would have left me with very little to say as a critic. I’m sure there are at least a few dud episodes scattered throughout the run (and from what I hear it concludes with a complete dud season), but, on the whole, my reviews would have struggled to find interesting ways to repeat “here’s why this works so well” over and over again. By contrast, I never struggled to repeatedly make fun of Max Wright’s crack-fueled hobo sex festivals at all!

It’s almost puzzling to me that I liked Roseanne when I was so young. Why did I not think it was boring? At that age I liked cartoons, and puppets, and things that screamed for my attention. Why was I interested in a show that did episodes about who would cook dinner? Or getting ready for a rummage sale? Or bickering over money?

Well, frankly…I think the credit goes to Darlene. Sara Gilbert’s character was…different. I’m sure I’d seen plenty of adult characters in the same vein, but never a child. Another child. One who was so clearly detached from the family and the town around her. One who struggled to make friends, or to find value in the things that others seemed to take pleasure in. One that thought so differently about the world she occupied that she couldn’t connect with others…not genuinely…and had to default to being an isolate.

That resonated with me. It resonates with me now. In many ways, it’s also why I felt drawn to Lisa Simpson as a character. Between Lisa and Darlene, I understood to some degree that I wasn’t alone. These characters were fictional, but they were reflecting real experiences for me. Behind them, there were writers. Writers who understood the things I felt. Writers who had words for what I couldn’t say. Writers who provided a quiet promise that you’ll grow up one day…and when you do, you can find the place that you fit.

Through Darlene and Lisa I was able to learn about art. About expression. About depression. About channeling my emotions. These were shows — and characters — that helped me not just to grow, but to become a healthier person who understood himself just a little bit better. A little was enough.

I’m not trying to say I wouldn’t have learned about those things eventually…but rather that I hadn’t before. And the friends I could eventually count on to guide me through difficult times…weren’t in my life yet. Television, films, movies, music, books…all of these things gave me a chance to understand myself that much earlier. And if I continue to take them all a bit too seriously now, it’s only because I know how seriously they helped me back then.

And so I look back on Roseanne and The Simpsons as two shows that were far smarter than anybody at the time was giving them credit for being. They spoke truths. I may not have understood most of them, but I recognized them as truths at least. The only real difference between them was that I’d revisited The Simpsons many times throughout my life, and found a bit more in those incredible first eight seasons each time.

Roseanne, though, was just a memory. A positive one, for sure. When someone suggested I review Roseanne, it was listed among a bunch of other shows that were clearly (or very likely) crap. And I remember thinking, “Wait…wasn’t Roseanne good?” I’d forgotten so much about the show, but retained what my brain must have thought was the most important thing: it was quality television.

There were a few episodes that I remembered quite well, though. There was the one where they smoke pot in the bathroom. The one where Roseanne and her sister Jackie visit their childhood home and reflect on the abuse they suffered. The one where Darlene reads her “to whom it may concern” poem.

And my favorite one…the one I remembered so well, so vividly, so strongly above anything else: the one where the door-to-door salesman dies in their kitchen.

At least…I thought I remembered it.

See, I remembered Roseanne being good. Sharp, insightful, daring. Well written. Flawlessly acted. Sadly relatable. Watching it again, I can say that I was right; I stand by all of those impressions. Probably even more strongly now. But the one episode I would have pointed to in order to illustrate my claim was the salesman one…and my memory of the episode couldn’t have been further away from what it actually was.

Here’s what I thought I remembered: an old man shows up at Roseanne’s door to sell her something. He starts to feel sick and asks for a glass of water, so she invites him inside. He passes away suddenly in her kitchen. They cover him with a sheet and wait for the coroner, with the family dealing — each in their own way — with death, now that it’s confronted them in their home. During all of this, people stop by the house to see the laundry set Roseanne is selling, which complicates things a bit further. There’s a physical comedy setpiece when the dead man’s hand slips off of the table and slaps Dan in the butt.

That’s a lot, right? And…well, all of it’s accurate. I really did remember it well. The episode stuck with me as a child, and I know it’s come up in conversation with friends before. I’d tell them about it…about how much it felt like nothing else I had ever seen in a sitcom. Those shows handled death — sometimes frivolously, sometimes seriously — but rarely did they seem intelligent in their handling. This episode of Roseanne, however, did. It felt like it said something larger…or at least explored a larger space.

In school I gravitated toward English and creative writing courses. In college I majored in English Literature. And ever since I was a child, I spent most of my leisure time reading and writing. This probably caused me to remember one thing about the episode more than any other: the way the individual characters confronted death, and how they processed it. That said a lot about who they were. It was true to what we already knew about them, and it revealed even more. It was good writing. And as I was becoming a writer, it was right for me to internalize what I’d learned from the episode.

Morbid Darlene responds with curiosity, sneaking into the kitchen to investigate the body after she’s told to keep away. Dan is creeped out by it and refuses to touch it, even when a police officer asks for help. Oldest daughter Becky insists that they give him a name, so that he isn’t just some anonymous, forgotten nobody. Little DJ doesn’t understand what’s happening, and makes his family a set of toe tags as a gift. Roseanne…well, I didn’t much remember how she reacted, but now I can report that she’s essentially a blank slate; she’s our audience surrogate in this situation, observing and absorbing rather than projecting.

Again, I remembered all of this with varying degrees of clarity.

The reaction I remembered most vividly, though, was that of Jackie. Rewatching the show, I see now just how incredible Laurie Metcalf is in that role overall. Jackie is a great character. Troubled, helpless, aimless, filling the void inside of her with booze and men. She keeps it together externally, but there’s always the sense of something much sadder within, and sometimes the mask even slips, allowing us to see it directly.

It’s really great stuff, and it’s no wonder Metcalf won three Emmys for the role. She’s fantastic.

It’s also her reaction to the salesman’s death that I remembered most.

She sees it as a blessing for him. If she feels any emotion, it’s jealousy.

An old man died in the home of a family he didn’t know…and Jackie would trade places with him in a heartbeat.

What a tremendously sad moment of characterization.

She even opens up to her sister about it. She makes clear in a calm, measured way that death is preferable to anything she has in life.

“He’s probably doing better than any of us,” she says. “That’s the cosmic joke, Roseanne.”

That phrase has stuck with me ever since. “The cosmic joke.” I’ve thought about it a lot. The cosmic joke that none of us are ever in a position to laugh at. The one at our perpetual expense. From other sitcoms, I might remember specific gags. From this one, I remembered a muttered, bitter sadness.

Jackie goes on:

“He’s the happiest man on the planet. His troubles are over. He’ll never again have to stand in a line. He’ll never again have to listen to the muzak version of ‘Muskrat Love.’ He’ll never again have to eat a hamburger and bite into one of those little hard things.”

She trails off. This litany of mundane inconveniences sounding…well, real. Not like the work of writers, but rather like the realistic despair of a depressive mind. Most writers would — understandably — fill a speech like this with larger, more impactful examples. “He won’t have to watch his loved ones die. He won’t have to suffer and waste away. He won’t ever again watch the latest horrors on the news and wonder how the world could get so bad.”

Those are things a writer might come up with. Instead, Jackie is human. She focuses on the small things that add up enough to weigh you down. She reveals her life as so empty that even the bad things are hollow. She discussed personal and universal tragedy on the same level, because she’s trying desperately to use one to understand the other. You know…like humans do.

Maybe it’s just because she mentioned hamburgers, but I’m reminded of another formative, insightful moment in The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy after the planet Earth is destroyed. Lone survivor Arthur Dent doesn’t (can’t) quite understand the magnitude of such a loss. He can’t process the destruction of his home planet — of his entire species and its history — and, so, he doesn’t. It’s something that happened, but not something he can feel. Until it occurs to him that there’s no more McDonald’s…and then he breaks down.

Some things are just too large for us. Too big to be understood. But we can all boil them down to the small, bathetic little components of our lives, which is where we find room to identify.

And we move on from there. We learn. We grow. Not from grand lessons, but from small flickers of understanding that grow steadily into flame. We don’t decide to change. We are changed by things too small to see.

Pretty great episode, right?

Well, I rewatched it, and it turns out that I misremembered the entire thing. I had the details right…but not the episode’s actual approach.

It’s not played for drama. In fact, it’s the most deliberately silly episode Roseanne had yet done in its run. It’s full of corny jokes and big guffaws from the audience. It’s played as a comic event in the reality of the show, rather than a tragic one. The closest thing to actual sadness we find comes from Becky — whose insistence on naming the man is sincere — and, tellingly, the episode shuffles her away from nearly all of the action, so that it can concentrate on the laughs without cheapening her difficult feelings. They exist…they just exist off camera.

Even Jackie’s speech, which I typed above, feels to me like it should exist in a relatively dramatic episode, but the audience laughs through the entire thing. Every one of her sentences is funnier than the last. What I remembered as being an impressively profound moment for a primetime sitcom was…actually just another moment from a primetime sitcom. It was a series of jokes delivered by Jackie, building toward the bigger punchline from Roseanne: “How do you feel about electric shock therapy?”

And that’s…all it is.

I know that’s all it is, upon rewatching it, because I can gauge it against other episodes that prove Roseanne knows how to get the audience to take it seriously. Such as when Roseanne worries about Jackie’s safety when the latter decides to become a cop. Or when Darlene visits her cool aunt at home, to find her in a lonely, drunken stupor. Or when Dan ruins a night out by letting himself get drawn into a confrontation in a bar.

Roseanne does serious moments. And the moment I remembered as its most serious — the episode I remembered as its most serious — wasn’t serious at all. I remembered it as being Roseanne‘s version of “Death of a Salesman.” It was actually its version of “The Kipper and the Corpse.”

See, my site’s tagline isn’t really an exaggeration. I really have been reading too deeply into these things as long as I’ve been alive. And while I do think there’s value in viewing an episode like this through a more somber lens, if only to see which of its ideas holds true beyond their value as laughlines, the fact is that I remember this episode — “Death and Stuff,” season one, episode 21 — as essentially being of an entirely different genre.

It was interesting to me to watch it again, and see that I remembered just about every one of the trees, and yet somehow forgot the forest.

Have you had an experience like this? Has there ever been an episode or film or song or anything else that you remember being meaningful in some way, that you later discover was completely a projection from your own mind, and had little or nothing to do with what was actually presented?

I’d be curious to hear about more experiences like this.

And no, don’t anybody bring up the Berenstain / Berenstein Bears thing. Because that’s just fucking stupid.

Vintage Sesame Place swag and memories

This is a story I meant to share a while back, but I didn’t have the time to actually write it up. Now, with the big kerfuffle between Steve Whitmire and seemingly everyone else Steve Whitmire has ever met, it seems like a good time to actually post it. Hopefully this reminds folks that while the people operating the Muppets may be flawed and sometimes shitty human beings, what the characters teach us still makes a difference.

A few weekends ago, I spent some time at Denver Comic Con. I enjoy conventions for one major reason: vendors.

I’ve had conversations about this. About the fact that I’m paying admission just to go buy things…and about the fact that anything I’ll find there will be available — in some way — online anyway. And, really, I can’t argue with that. But I keep going, every year. Sometimes I’ll hit other conventions as well. I think part of the appeal for me is the feeling that comes with being part of an event, but there’s also the more logistical appeal: seeing the vendors in person, with their inventories spread out before them, allows me to browse.

Sure, whatever books or DVDs or figurines I pick up at Comic Con are exactly what I could find online later. But would I find them online? As much as I love Amazon (and I do love Amazon), I still like spending hour after hour in physical book stores. That’s because Amazon is a great service when I know what book I want, but bookstores are great for browsing…for when I have some approximate concept of what I’ll enjoy, but am otherwise open to new titles, new authors, new experiences I can’t even imagine yet.

Comic Con, to me, offers a vast array of great experiences I might never find it I didn’t have the chance to browse. And every year I come home with a bag of stuff I didn’t know existed. Rarely am I disappointed with my haul; not everything I find there will change my life, of course, but I always feel at least a little more enriched for having read, seen, or listened to whatever it is I discovered.

This year I did my normal thing of walking around the various booths, seeing what was on offer before I spent any money. You can count on seeing largely the same kinds of products from year to year, but sometimes there’s a surprise. And fairly quickly I found my first and favorite surprise of the year.

What caught my eye was a big banner with the Sesame Place logo on it. One guy sat behind the table, and there were stacks of books in front of him. Just seeing that banner brought back a lot of memories I don’t often think about. They’re from my childhood, so they get excluded along with much of what I actively try to forget.

For those of you who don’t know, Sesame Place is a Sesame Street theme park in Langhorne, Pennsylvania. I’ll always remember the name of that town, because I grew up in Southern New Jersey and remember seeing the commercials constantly. Here’s one I remember quite well. It was my first experience of the song “Short People,” by the way, and if you watch this video maybe you’ll understand just a bit of my shock the first time I heard the actual song on the radio.

Langhorne, Pennsylvania seemed like a special place. Had Sesame Place existed in Pittsburgh or Philadelphia, the town name wouldn’t have registered the same way. We knew those cities already. They were just places on a map that contained things. But Langhorne wasn’t a name I ever heard in any other context. Langhorne was Sesame Place. And that was magical.

At some point, I got to go. I’d guess I was around 10 years old. I could have been 8. It was me, my brother, and my mother. We were joined by our neighbor and her two kids, Jennifer and Brian. According to Google Maps, Langhorne was a drive of an hour and a half from where I grew up. As kids it felt like much longer, or maybe that was the anticipation magnifying everything. I remember playing a game in the car that I don’t think I played at any other point in my life. We’d take turns using our fingertips to “draw” on somebody else’s back, and they’d have to guess what we drew. These were definitely the days before I had a Game Boy.

By this time, I’d been to Disney World, which is unquestionably the larger and more significant family theme park. But…I didn’t love Disney. I had nothing against it, and of course I could recognize Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck easily enough, but I wasn’t actually a fan of any of their films. To be honest, I’m still not. It wasn’t until the Disney Afternoon introduced me to Duck Tales and Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers that I became an active fan of anything Disney. The Muppets, on the other hand…I loved those guys. And I was excited about the trip.

So, of course, I went over to the table and talked to the man selling books. He introduced himself as Guy Hutchinson, one of the authors of Images of Modern America: Sesame Place.

If you’ve traveled around America, you’ve probably seen books with this identical cover design everywhere. I don’t think I’ve ever picked one up prior to this, let alone purchased one, but they’re out there. Visit a decent-sized town or city and there will be some equivalent of this book with photos of old railroad bridges, buildings that are no longer there, significant construction projects…you get the picture.

I always figured they were more souvenir than anything. You’d pick one up as a memento, the same way you would a refrigerator magnet. I didn’t really care. Then again, I didn’t really care about railroad bridges or construction projects in general. The Muppets, on the other hand…

Guy — who shares his name with a Sesame Street Muppet — started to tell me about Sesame Place. Not specific facts or trivia about the park, but rather a very basic introduction to the fact that it exists. He likely wasn’t expecting many people in Denver to know about it. He’d have to start with Sesame Steet‘s familiarity and move on from there.

But I told him that I knew about it, and that I’d been there. He was clearly enthusiastic, and I wasn’t trying to deflate him as much as I was trying to let him know that he could skip the introduction and get right to the really exciting stuff.

And he showed me his book. Which was, I admit, really exciting.

Again, I haven’t picked up other books in this series, but this seems to support my assumptions about them. There’s very little straight writing…in keeping with the Images of Modern America theme, they’re almost entirely visual, with very informative cutlines.

To be frank, I think I could have read and loved a 500 page book about the history of Sesame Place whether or not it contained photos at all…but I understand that I’m mentally ill and other people might prefer pictures of the rides.

I immediately knew I’d buy the book, but we talked for a while longer. He talked about how cooperative everybody was at the park, how they provided photos and information for him, how they described attractions that were planned but never made it to the public.

This book might be a souvenir, but it was also a fascinating one…and just talking about it transported me back to that trip I took as a child…one of which no photos exist. But the book — broken down into eras in the park’s history — provides the next best thing to me.

One of the things the park provided to Guy was master artwork of Buford T. Higgenbottom, a Muppet who was created specifically to serve as the park’s mascot. Guy used this to have stickers made — among other things — and he very kindly gave me one.

That might not sound too interesting on its own, but while Buford has a page on the Muppet Wiki, there’s no image of him there. And a Google image search turns up completely dry as well. The park was really his only hope for getting that art, as it doesn’t seem to exist in any quality anywhere on the internet.

Of course, now Noiseless Chatter will show up in a search for it, which WAS MY PLAN ALL ALONG.

I told him about my few memories of the park. About a clear little rubber ball with Big Bird and the Sesame Place logo inside that I had for many years and finally lost. And mainly about one particular attraction, which I’ve always wondered about.

Remember, I was a kid, so my memory is not reliable. But I recall some kind of attraction in which you had to cross a long, narrow platform, suspended a terrifying height in the air. I remember there was water below, and I think more was falling down like a fountain. I remember the platforms being yellow and, for some reason, I remember it being themed after Count Von Count. In my mind, it was a very dangerous activity and I was afraid I’d fall and die. That’s not the work of excited imagination, mind you…that’s the work of actual fear. I was scared while navigating that attraction and still retain an image of what it looks like in my memory.

He wasn’t sure what attraction I was remembering, but he did tell me about a Count-themed Halloween show that evidently was scary enough to earn the park some complaints.

I told him I’d buy a copy of the book, and he smiled and said, “I’ve got some swag to share with you, too.”

One bit of that swag was another, more general, Sesame Place sticker:

Then he gave me some really cool things.

Evidently when the park launched, there was — for lack of a better term — an arcade. There may still be one, I don’t know, but it was less of a traditional arcade than it was a computing area, where kids could learn and work at computer stations. Something like that would be much less of a novelty today than it was in the late 80s, but it was apparently pretty cutting edge at the time.

Guy gave me four tokens from that computing area. While doing his research, the park revealed that they had buckets of them collecting dust. That was a lucky find for him, and then again for me.

Those are really great. They’re all the same design; I just flipped two of them over to show off both sides. But even better were these season pass badges:

These are two different designs: Big Bird and Super Grover. They are slightly different sizes and colors in addition to the different character, so I don’t know if one entitled the wearer to more perks than the other, or if you just got to choose which one you liked best when you bought a season pass. I don’t know if Sesame Place even has season passes anymore, but if they do I’m sure they’re just little cards you keep in your wallet.

But…man. These things are incredible. They’re beautiful. I love these.

When he gave me these, I laughed. Grover was my favorite character as a kid, and I loved his Super Grover persona. In fact, when I was little I had a Grover doll that was almost as big as I was. Here’s a photo of that and proof that I used to have hair:

Guy told me that Grover was the one everybody liked, and nobody involved with the park or the show seemed to realize it. I’d believe him. He said that the park wanted the badges to feature Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch, as they were assumed to be the two most popular characters. But somebody had the idea to actually ask people which character they liked best…and we ended up with Grover.

I didn’t want to eat up Guy’s entire morning, but I thanked him for his kindness, and for some really incredible vintage goodies I never would have expected to have in my entire life. It was like getting a chance to visit the park again in 1986 or whenever I went and having the foresight to keep all these little things you never would have thought would matter to you. It actually meant a lot to me, and I told him he made my day.

He signed my book before I left, and drew Cookie Monster. Why Cookie Monster? Because, according to Guy, he’s the only character you can draw without worrying about his pupils. If you draw Big Bird or Bert or Elmo or somebody and their pupils are slightly off, they look wrong. But with Cookie Monster, who has crazed eyes that wander constantly and asynchronously whenever the puppeteer moves, you can put the pupils anywhere and they’ll look right.

I felt really lucky to meet Guy that day. Not only was he a friendly and interesting person, but he clearly loved the work he had done. And he relished the chance to share it with someone who could appreciate it. I hope he met a lot of those someones over the course of the weekend.

What I do know is that he reminded me of a positive childhood memory, and gave me vintage trinkets that, miraculously, survived the decades that passed since the park was founded.

I hope he enjoyed speaking with me as well…if only because I could then feel like I repaid the favor somewhat.

I have a friend who is pretty busted up about the whole Steve Whitmire thing. About the negativity that’s been passed around among people he admires. About the ugly underside to what are supposed to be comforting and reassuring productions. About the fact that it’s impossible to know who’s in the wrong…Steve Whitmire, or everybody else who’s ever lived?

But meeting Guy…interacting with him…listening to him talk and watching him get excited about an amusement park…this is what the Muppets are all about. Someone who grew up loving them so much he wrote a book about them, and someone else who grew up loving them buying that book. The two of them meeting and sharing memories. Two strangers who may have nothing else in common in the entire world sharing a moment over something that’s given them both so much joy. That’s offered such valuable escape. That’s guided them through difficult times and helped shape them into who they are today.

The Muppets have allowed me to connect with and bond with more people than I can probably count. (Ah, ah, ah!) Those of us who grew up with them remember them not as characters on some shows we used to watch, but as early friends who helped us understand that however different we are, whatever our strengths or weaknesses, however small we might feel at times, we each had something unique to bring to the world.

Guy reminded me of that.

He could have sold me his book and moved on. I wouldn’t have blamed him. That’s what vendors do.

Instead he showed me great kindness long before I expressed interest in buying anything.

That’s more valuable than the book could have been to me or the money could have been to him. In scary, uncertain times, it’s important to remember that there are still little rafts of sunlight out there to find. I credit the Muppets. And no amount of behind-the-scenes idiocy will change that.

—
The book is available for purchase from Amazon here, if you’re interested.

H-H-H-Hank and Dean, Venture Brothers

I love The Venture Bros. You know that. It’s one of my all-time favorite shows, and even if I thought this past season was a bit shit tbh I can’t say that my love or appreciation of it has been diminished at all.

I’d like to say that I realized something when rewatching it lately…but I haven’t been watching it. I’ve just been living my life, going about my business, and a thought occurred. I’ll share that with you in a moment, of course, but here, now, I want to point out that that’s part of what makes The Venture Bros. so incredible to me in the first place. Sure, you can watch it over and over again and find things you missed…but you can also just let it sit. Let it simmer. Let your mind go where it will…and you’ll still find new ways to appreciate it, and new things to consider about it.

Compare that to ALF. I haven’t rewatched that shit either, but I sure as hell don’t catch myself in the middle of the day realizing that “Don’t it Make Your Brown Eyes Blue?” is secretly brilliant.

Okay, so, anyway: late in season one, The Venture Bros. has what might be its first masterpiece: “The Trial of The Monarch.” It harvests seeds that had been passively planted by previous episodes to incredible effect, tearing apart a central relationship and positioning The Monarch — the show’s main villain — as its emotional core. No mean feat, and the episode that accomplishes it is tense, beautiful, hilarious, and unexpectedly heartbreaking.

In short, it’s fantastic stuff, and it’s still one of my favorites.

The titular Venture brothers themselves don’t do much in the episode, but it opens with a fantasy sequence that sees them in costume. Hank is dressed as Indiana Jones, and Dean as Thomas Magnum, from Magnum, P.I. You can see the boys in the screengrab above. And, for reference:

Fine. Everyone knows this. Hank and Dean are dressed as those characters. Few people overlooked that fact; it’s pretty obvious.

But…where did Hank and Dean get those ideas? From the movie and from the TV show, obviously.

…except that in season four’s best episode, “Everybody Comes to Hank’s,” we learn that Hank doesn’t actually know who Indiana Jones is. He wears the iconic hat…which came with a whip that he assumes is a “detective’s whip.”

So Hank wears part of an Indiana Jones costume in that episode, and in doing so he reveals that he doesn’t know Indiana Jones. Odd, as he dressed as the character three seasons prior. Dean may or may not know Thomas Magnum, but that’s academic; Hank doesn’t know his character, and that’s enough to question things in The Venture Bros., where continuity between episodes is important.

Indiana Jones and Magnum, P.I. are a pretty odd pairing. They come from different media and don’t have a clear relation to one another. They come from different worlds and time periods, and they don’t pursue or desire the same things.

They fit Hank and Dean well enough, of course. Indiana Jones is brash and daring, and Magnum is (relatively) focused and methodical. The adventurer and the detective. Hank and Dean.

But Indiana Jones and Magnum, P.I. on their own merits don’t really go together, and it’s not a pairing we’d ever see outside of this fantasy sequence.

Or…would we?

That’s right. The Venture Bros. paired up these two characters in 2004, but Chip ‘n’ Dale: Rescue Rangers did it in 1988.

Rescue Rangers was a very popular show, airing during the enormously successful Disney Afternoon programming block. And while Chip and Dale were already established characters by that point, it was Rescue Rangers that dressed them respectively as Indiana Jones and Magnum, P.I.

And that is interesting.

The same odd pairing of characters happened twice, and it doesn’t strike me as coincidental. Combine this with the fact that Hank doesn’t recognize an Indiana Jones costume when he actually encounters one, and I start to wonder if Hank and Dean in “The Trial of The Monarch” are actually dressed as the Rescue Rangers.

That’s a show they’re likely enough to have seen, and there’s a little more in common as well. Hank, Dean, Chip, and Dale are all four-letter names. It’s always Hank and Dean, as opposed to Dean and Hank…just as it’s always Chip and Dale as opposed to Dale and Chip. Hank and Chip are both Indiana Jones, and Dean and Dale are both Magnum, P.I. Each pair is part of a larger team that goes on new adventures week to week…

I have to wonder if that’s a subtle nod there. The joke being less that they’re dressed as two famous characters and more that they’re dressed as two different famous characters aping source material unfamiliar to the boys.

The Venture Bros. gives us a lot to consider, even in its silliest moments. It’s an impressively layered and incredibly well-written show. And the fact that I can still find new things in a thirteen-year-old episode (holy crap…) is incredible.

Oh, also: I just realized that the episode title “Powerless in the Face of Death” refers not to being unable to revive the boys, but rather to the blackout Dr. Venture accidentally causes. That’s some lovely misdirection I didn’t even notice. There’s still so much to find in this show…

Check out this ALF syndication trifold!

Yeah, I know, my post title sucks, but I don’t really have a running feature on the blog I can tie this to. It’s just a piece of pretty cool television history that I can’t find anywhere on the internet. For all I know, I have the last surviving copy and am therefore morally obligated to drop it into a volcano.

But, what the hell, I’ll archive it for future generations instead.

I saw this at a convention, and Casey Roberson was nice/vindictive enough to buy it for me. The vendor described it as a piece of promotional material sent to networks to see if they wanted to air ALF. He wasn’t wrong, but I assumed he meant for its initial run. Instead this was distributed in 1989, toward the end of the show’s run, promoting the availability (starting fall of 1990) of ALF for strip syndication.

Strip syndication refers to a show’s reruns airing at a fixed time across the entire week, thereby showing up as a long “strip” when laid out on a TV schedule.

Of course that also means the trifold gets to play into the naughty definition of “strip” and present ALF as a Playmate centerfold. This means I own the only official piece of ALF pornography ever produced.

Now you see why I’m bothering to archive it!

Anyway, I’m including pictures, but since I just have an iPhone I’ll also transcribe the text. I intend to be as accurate as possible, right down to any typos or punctuation issues. Feel free to point out any you see in my transcription, though, just in case they’re my own.

I have seen some of the details here in other places (such as ALF’s favorite Melmacian TV shows) but since I can’t find a copy of this anywhere, I assume there was just some overlap with copy found in other materials.

Interestingly, but not surprisingly, the Tanners aren’t mentioned here at all. This is trying to sell a show without even paying lipservice to four of the five main characters.

That’s our ALF!

Anyway:

Front: The Centerfold

The centerfold features ALF lying naked on a beach. You’re welcome.

The only text is “CELEBRITY OF THE MILLENNIUM” and “MR. TELEVISION.”

There’s also a “Love, ALF” signature. Thanks to this and the next page, we have the best look at his handwriting we could ever want. Analyze away, graphologists!

Yes, I know the copyright notice says 1987 and I said it was circulated in 1989, but you’ll see where I got that date later. This must just be the copyright date for the image, as the text is clearly selling the show for syndication in 1990, which is not something they would have been doing in 1987. The text, therefore, may not be copyrighted at all, so feel free to use it to advertise your own show about a farting puppet.

Inside Left: Celebrity Data Sheet

This page features three promotional photos of ALF and one from “Don’t it Make Your Brown Eyes Blue?” where he’s dressed as legendary womanizer Elton John. We also get some definitive MELMAC FACTS regarding his birthday, but I don’t get whatever joke they’re trying to tell by giving him two of them. Then there’s the insight nobody expected that he wants to fuck the cat from the 9Lives cans. (And, I guess, Mr. Ochmonek.)

Anyway, the text:

CELEBRITY DATA SHEET

NICKNAME: ALF REAL NAME: Gordon Shumway
HEAD SIZE: 33″ WAIST: 33″ HIPS: 33″
HEIGHT: 3’2″1”’ WEIGHT: ‘Till the Sun Shines, Nellie
BIRTH DATE: August 12 and October 2, 1757 PLANET: Melmac (Lower East Side)
FAVORITE EXPRESSION: “Curiosity Killed the Cat” (Usually followed by the expression “Pass the Plum Sauce”)
TURN-ONS: Morris the Cat, High Nielsens, Hawaiian Shirts
TURN-OFFS: Empty Fridge, Short Jokes, Alien Task Force
FAVORITE MOVIES: “It Came From Outer Space”, “Mars Needs Women Now” and “Hair”
A GOOD WOMAN IS: Friendly, Funny and Furry
SECRET FANTASY: To be a regional sales manager for Meow Mix

Inside Center

THE HOTTEST THING IN PRIME TIME IS AVAILABLE FOR STRIPPING.

Inside Right: Interview

He’s hip, he’s hot, he’s ALF, the biggest thing to hit television since the remote control. On the occasion of his highly successful NBC-TV prime time smash being made available for strip syndication (starting fall ’90), we interviewed the old ALFer.

We caught up with ALF at the refrigerator on the set for a candid, far-reaching conversation.

Q: Thanks for taking the time from your busy schedule to do this interview.
ALF: No problem. Mind if I eat a pot roast while we chat?
Q: Not at all. Were you ever on television before you got your own series?
ALF: Yes. I was a contestant on Melmac’s most successful game show, “Wheel of Cheese.” I won a sofa, a set of mock luggage and a styrofoam goat.
Q: Pretty impressive. Were you the biggest winner?
ALF: No, actually Tyrone Split was the biggest winner. He was seven foot three and weighed three-hundred and forty-seven pounds. Ha! I kill me!
Q: And us as well. Are you the only Shumway to enter show business?
ALF: Oh, no! My Uncle Goomer Shumway was a famous actor. He starred in great Melmacian movies like “Cat on a Hot Tin Griddle,” “Gone With the Fish,” and “Luncheon Counters of the Worse Kind.”
Q: Let’s talk about your amazing success on television. Your popularity on NBC has been growing stronger each week, your demographics show that you have a perfect audience composition, and now you are destined to become a hit in syndication. Why do you think that you made such a huge impression on our whole planet?
ALF: I hit it pretty hard when I crash landed. Hey, if I wasn’t wearing my seat belt, I’d look like Sean Penn.
Q: What do you think of earth television?
ALF: Hey, by watching television I learned that the world was black and white before 1953! But television on Melmac was funnier. Shows like “I Dream of Homer,” “Bowling for Rice,” and “As The World Explodes.” Even though the last one hits a little close to home now.
Q: Sounds interesting.
ALF: It does? Is this going to take a lot longer? I have a drumstick here that’s growing bacteria!
Q: Just a few more questions. You’re entering the syndication marketplace next to shows like “Cosby” and “M*A*S*H.”
ALF: I can see the line-up now. Huxtable, Hawkeye and Hairball! Ha! I kill me!
Q: You’ll be making lots of money.
ALF: Yes, but it’s only paper. On Melmac we paid with fur. If you over-spent, you went bald. And we don’t want station managers going bald. I realize in some instances we may be a bit late.
Q: Well, ALF, I’ll wrap this up. You’re an alien who has it all. A hit network show, the admiration of millions…
ALF: This drumstick that’s hardening before my eyes…
Q: But what’s next for ALF? What are your dreams?
ALF: I do have one recurring dream about showing up for work and realizing that I’m not wearing any pants. But then I remeber that I don’t work and I never wear any pants.
Q: Thanks for your time, ALF. Many thanks for this revealing interview.
ALF: My pleasure. Sure you don’t want some pot roast?
Q: No, thanks. There’s no silverware.
ALF: So?

ALF
alien productions

LORIMAR™
SYNDICATION
A LORIMAR TELEPICTURES COMPANY

So, yeah, there you go! It’s actually pretty cool. It was wrapped in plastic when we bought it, so I didn’t get a good look at it until later. The Playboy similarities are pretty tame, and it’s nothing a child would recognize, so I can imagine this was a really nice take-home for station managers whose kids loved the show. It’s a cool bit of very rare memorabilia, and if I had gotten my hands on it as a kid I would have thought it was great.

Does anyone else know more about this? I wonder what other bits of ALF ephemera are lost to the ages.

It’s laminated like a restaurant menu, which means it’s stayed in pretty good shape through the years, and I’m both happy to have it and thrilled that I get to be the one to preserve it online. Mainly, though, I hope you are as upset as I am that this is the third different “here’s what Melmacians used for currency” joke. Whoever wrote this should be FIRED FROM ALF.