Are Americans reveling in a culture that’s anti-intellectual? Probably. Education’s not that valued, and (bad) reality tv is probably going to be the downfall of western civilization. Well, that’s my theory anyway.
Kind of creepy: the discovery of a solar system that looks a lot like ours…
Is it a good sign that the writers are done with their strike but can’t remember what they were working on prior to the strike? Hmm. Maybe that’ll mean some of the bad stuff that was on prior to the strike can be scrapped for better ideas.
“Is PBS necessary?” NY Times Charles McGrath says “yes” to NPR but “not quite” to PBS tv. — well, I think it’s still necessary, but as McGrath notes, the Powers Behind PBS aren’t too good at keeping the PBS identity distinctive. I don’t listen to NPR, but I do like Newshour on tv — so I think PBS is still better than some stuff on cable.
Slate on romantic poetry, or Robert Pinsky’s past selections anyway – always good stuff.
And, as another post-Valentine’s thing, TV Guide did a photo gallery of “TV Lovers We Will Always Love” (thought it was amusing that they even included Agents Scully and Mulder – who for years tried to convince people that they were not lovers; then again, their relationship kind of entered the soulmate arena, considering how much they went through (alien conspiracies kind of make relationships too hard), and Entertainment Weekly did an interesting and broader photo gallery of “Pop Culture’s (Fictional) Lovers.”
Sad but true – on Sunday night, it’s the return of Knight Rider on NBC. Good lord, they’re not even using KITT’s old voice. Scary enough, they’re bringing back David Hasselhoff? I’m having one of those 80’s flashbacks now, aren’t I? The previous returns of KITT and friends haven’t been that spectacular (well, the original show wasn’t that spectacular either, but so that goes): the tv movie “Knight Rider 2000” killed off Devon, the principled boss of Michael Knight, and was about a weird year 2000; plus the short-lived (single season) syndicated tv series “Team Knight Rider,” which had a (what else?) a team of talking cars. One character was a possible daughter of Michael Knight. I actually watched that show and thought that it needed … improvement. Having one more go at the Knight Rider franchise? Sigh.
Well, I’m more vaguely curious about the return of The A-Team than a return of Knight Rider.