Category Archives: Geek Life

by | January 14, 2014 · 11:47 am

Confessions of a Geek: Cinematic Influences, Part 1

Continuing on with the Therefore I Geek discussion of influences, today we’re talking about movies and television shows that have influenced us. I have loved movies since I was a little kid. When I’m feeling down and need a pick me up, I turn to movies. They are one of my favorite forms of escapism entertainment—not quite as immersive as books, but also requiring less active thought. They are perfect for those days when I’m feeling brain dead, which occurs more often than I would like. Television shows are great because every week has the same cast of characters involved in some different adventure or dilemma. After a while, the audience starts to feel like they know them as actual people and are part of their lives. These are just a few of the movies and TV shows that have had an impact on my life.

• Star Wars – This one is a no brainer. I can still remember the first time I saw any part of Star Wars. We were on a cross country trip, my dad couldn’t sleep so he was watching TV and Star Wars was on. I woke up and watched a few minutes, was rather confused by what I saw and then went back to bed. Phantom Menace is the first DVD I ever owned and Revenge of the Sith is the first midnight movie showing I went to (also the first time I had Red Bull. It was a memorable night). My favorite Star Wars movie is The Empire Strikes Back.

• Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan – While I love all of Star Trek, this is by far the best of the films and the one that made me really love all things Trek. I’ve played Star Trek games, read Star Trek books and had daydreams set in the Star Trek universe. A close runner up is Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, which has some nice action, but doesn’t quite hold the same gravity

• The West Wing – I hate political ads. I hate them so much in fact that I give up watching live television during presidential elections. The real problem with this is that I’m interested in politics, but the ads cause my blood pressure to go through the roof. In comes The West Wing. While I don’t agree with a lot of the political ideas, I love the idealistic view of how politics should work. It also helps that the writing is quite good.

• Alien – One of the greatest science fiction movies ever made. It is one of the few horror movies I’ve ever seen and it scared the crap out of me the first time I saw it. This movie has lead me to look into the other Alien films, B-movies, Ridley Scott’s films and H.R. Giger’s art. That is a serious amount of research all because of one movie.

• The Hunt for Red October – Submarines are one of the things that interest me most and while this movie may not be particularly accurate, it is a great action picture. This movie is one of the things that help me figure out what I wanted to do with my life (and also that I didn’t want to actually be in the Navy).

• Firefly and Serenity – This was, of course, a great show. Despite its short initial run, Firefly has had a significant afterlife on DVD and Netflix. It also happened to be my first real exposure to Joss Whedon. (I’m not very familiar with Buffy; what can I say.) I named one of my cats after everyone’s favorite engineer—though if I’m being completely honest she’s less Kaylee and more Jayne (or that homicidal Russian guy).

I love her… cause she’s pretty!

• 10 Things I Hate About You – This was the first time I’d ever seen Shakespeare that wasn’t literal Shakespeare (Taming of the Shrew in this case). While it is certainly not Ran or Scotland, PA, it’s a fun movie with a surprisingly strong cast (Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles and Joseph Gordon Levitt) that does a good job of telling the original story without the original Shakespearean language that many people find difficult to understand.

• The Big Lebowski – The Cohen Brothers’ parody of The Big Sleep (which is also a fantastic film) is the movie, after Star Wars, that I quote the most. If you include F-bombs, then it is by far the movie I quote most. John Goodman is in rare form as Walter and matches perfectly with Jeff Bridges’ inspired portrayal of The Dude. Because of The Big Lebowski I’ve looked up some classic movies as well as other Cohen Brothers’ films (big fan of Raising Arizona). It’s also got one of the best soundtracks I’ve ever heard.

What movies and TV shows have you found influential? Let us know in the comments and stay tuned for part two, wherein our editor provides her list of cinematic influences.

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by | January 13, 2014 · 4:41 pm

Editorial | RegularJOE, and why I like him

The first time I saw Joseph Gordon-Levitt was not Third Rock from the Sun.  It was Inception.  Since then, and especially over the last couple of years, he’s done a lot of stuff  that has caught my eye… and always in a good way.   It’s appropriate that I mention the first time I saw Joseph Gordon-Levitt (or JGL, as he’s lovingly called by his fans—Joseph Golden Rabbit on reddit), because last week, he introduced the world to his new show HitRECord on TV.  Its first episode was about firsts.

The glasses are a not-so-subtle reminder that he’s a geek just like us

Joe’s geek status seems to have originated organically.  His good friend Zooey Deschanel says that when she first met Joe, he was “Very intellectual. Very, very serious and very intense… you would say something, and he would go, ‘What do you mean by that?’ Not a word went unexamined, you know?”  Now, he’s much more open, friendly, and able to express himself freely; and that is also something he admires in others (such as his older brother Dan, who passed away in 2010).

JGL seems to be enthusiastic about everything that he helps create.  I think it is inherently geeky that he is so in love with what he does and shares.  His big box office hits may make him a well known and wealthy man, but he seems incredibly grounded—even drives a 2005 Honda.    His passion appears to actually be about what he does, rather than about making money by doing things.  He has given multiple interviews in which he declaims the idea of “celebrities” and the culture that makes their words and actions more important than those of other people.  On the internet, he goes by “RegularJOE” or “hitRECordJoe,” to put emphasis on his work rather than his status.

Joe believes that the media plays a large—perhaps too large—role in forming public opinion about the way the world is and should be.  “My mom and dad brought me up to question dominant cultural gender roles,” he says at one point.  The “old media,” as he calls it, is on its way out.  Thanks to the connectivity now afforded by the internet, a new type of media is forming in which artists can connect directly with their audience without the Hollywood song-and-dance.

He’s able to geek out about the same types of things that his fans are passionate about.  “Movies are something I care deeply about,” he says, in an interview about Dark Knight Rises, “Often times in our culture, movies are thought of as something more disposable, a bit of entertainment.  That’s not how I feel about them; and it’s great to be a part of something where people aren’t just looking at is as some piece of disposable entertainment but as something that means a lot.”

Now, after his directorial debut with Don Jon, he’s putting his efforts into a new form of art:  HitRECord.  For the past few years, Joe has been working on a project that is now hosted on hitrecord.org.  Creators of all forms of media—singers and songwriters, artists and animators, even just people with fantastic speaking voices—come together to make collaborative pieces.  Now, for the first time, some of these pieces will be on a television show hosted by Joseph Gordon-Levitt himself.

regularJOEJoe seems to have a unique way of reaching out to connect to his fans, and it shows in this project.  It is hard to comprehend how a young man who has acting for the public’s entertainment is able to empathize so perfectly with those who love his work.  Somehow he always does the right thing—like right now, when he released the first episode of his new show HitRECord on TV a week early to his internet fandom, and announced it with an AMA on reddit.  (You can check out the AMA here and the show here).  His sincerity and zeal are obvious—this type of public relations cannot be taught.  Unsurprisingly, this appeal resulted in an enormous response from his fans.  It seems to have worked, because HitRECord on TV has already been picked up for a second season—still a couple of days ahead of its January 18th premier.

It is rare for me to speak so glowingly of anyone—especially a celebrity—but I just really like this guy. I like his down-to-earth style. I like his grasp on social media, and his ability to advertise without appearing to advertise.  I really, really love his enthusiasm for his life and his art.  I’m excited to see what else Joseph Golden Rabbit and his brave new world of media has to show us and wish him the best in all of his endeavors.

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by | January 7, 2014 · 10:10 pm

Confessions of a Geek: Literary Influences, Part 2

I lived a very sheltered childhood, and so books have been the staple influence in my life.  My mom read to me when I was very small (we started the Little House on the Prairie series with her reading to me, and ended them with me reading to her).  I was off and running into the wild world of books that ended up taking me all over the world and beyond it.  Some of the authors and books that have influenced me (and this is only a partial list) are below.

  • As a girl, I was obsessed with horses, and thoroughly enjoyed Marguerite Henry’s White Stallion of Lipizza and of course, Misty of Chincoteague, as well as Cinnabar, the One O’clock Fox (although this one was more about the fox than the horses).  I preferred the less well-known books.  White Stallion of Lipizza had me sitting backward on kitchen chairs for months, because that was how the Lipizzaner trainers would stretch the inside of their thighs to fit over the extra wide barrel of those gorgeous horses.
  • The Colored Fairy Books were another huge influence on me.  Andrew Lang took me all over the world, from the snowy, troll infested forests of Germany to the oyster beds off the coast of Polynesia.  I can’t wait to introduce my nephews to this series.
  • C.S. Lewis was a huge influence on me very early on in my life.  I read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe so early that I cannot remember reading it for the first time.  I lost count of my rereads at number nineteen.  I also read and enjoyed the space trilogy.  Perelandra  was a beautiful picture of an idyllic world that made me ache for a place I had never been.  That Hideous Strength was a book that I read long before I was ready.  It was terrifying, but beautifully written.  Till We Have Faces was amazing and profound.
  • I was also really interested in all of the classic authors; Dickens, Austen, and the Bronte sisters were high on my list.  Unfortunately, thanks to the Great Illustrated Classics, abridged books for children, many of these books were ruined for me.  I couldn’t even get through David Copperfield until I was in my late teens.  That abridged series taught me to loathe spoilers.  I guess the children’s versions had some influence on me as well as the original versions.
  • I continued to read books that I could technically comprehend, but was not old enough to properly digest.  I read Jane Eyre when I was fourteen, and I was not particularly impressed.  I felt that Charlotte Bronte got lost on her way to the conclusion.  On the other hand, after I read Wuthering Heights, I wandered around the house in a funk for a couple of days.
  • One of the greatest influences on my life was a series called The Young Underground, by Robert Elmer.  These books were about a young brother and sister, Peter and Elise Anderson, who smuggle underground newspapers, and later humans, in Nazi occupied Denmark.  These books influenced me, not because of their content, but because my mom used to read them to my siblings and me to keep us close as a family after she had to go back to work.

This can only be a partial list (it’s not even CLOSE to a full one), because there were so very many books that influenced me growing up.  I am happy to say that I continue to find books that change the way I see the world, so the list continues to grow. -t

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by | January 7, 2014 · 4:58 pm

Confessions of a Geek: Literary Influences, Part 1

An artists vision of what Starship Trooper's power armor looks like.

An artists vision of what Starship Trooper’s power armor looks like.

A few weeks ago I was looking over a friend’s Facebook page and noticed they had posted a list of movies and/or books that had influenced them. It was a nicely mixed list and I soon found myself considering the books that had influenced me. I have decided to share with you three separate lists of books, movies and comics that have influenced me and a little of the reasoning behind why. Today we’re going to start with books, in no particular order (well, they’re in the order in which I thought of them).

  • Starship Troopers – This is one of my all-time favorite books. Robert Heinlein masterfully combines a science fiction, war story with Libertarian political views, without ever making it seem preachy.  While I don’t agree with all of the political things that Heinlein has to say, they do make for interesting thoughts and debates.
  • The Hobbit – Honestly, this almost goes without saying. Like many of my generation (and my parent’s generation) this was my first introduction to the fantasy genre.  The Hobbit really is just that, an introduction.  Tolkien gives just enough of all the various pieces to make readers want more without feeling as though they’ve been cheated.  It’s also a pretty light read, which cannot be said of The Lord of the Rings.
  • The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe – Keeping with fantasy for a moment, this is the C.S Lewis classic. I first came across this book sometime around third or fourth grade (maybe earlier) and was so immediately enthralled that I read the entire thing in a single night. This was the first time that I have been so in love with a book that I physically could not put it down.
  • Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Anyone who has read Hunter S. Thompson knows exactly how bizarre his work can be. Underneath the layers of drug use and general weirdness in his books There is a surprisingly accurate and thoughtful look at America. I certainly don’t share Mr. Thompson’s political views, but from time to time there are things in his work that I find myself agreeing with.
  • Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – There are two things that have fueled my interest in comics history:  a panel about the history of censorship in comics at the 2012 NYCC and Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, which I also got at NYCC. This book was so good that despite being in the middle of two other books, I dropped everything else I was reading and read this as much as possible. It reads more like a novel than a history and makes the reader feel like they know all the people personally. It has also had the effect of driving me to get more books on the history of comics.
  • Horus Heresy: Horus Rising – I picked this book up on a whim in college and then spent every moment of the next three days that I was not in class (and probably somewhere I should have been in class) reading.  This series isn’t always very good, but it has reminded me that I can enjoy purely indulgent fiction. And I’ve read TWENTY-TWO of the books, so they’ve had to have some influence.
  • Complete Works of Shakespeare – This is cheating a little, I know. Shakespeare is not only one of the greatest works of literature in the world, but it has also had a considerable impact on my life.  I started reading Shakespeare in fourth grade and it opened up a whole new world of ideas to me. Back in high school I was vice-president of school’s Shakespeare Society.  Some of my favorite books and movies even now are adaptations of Shakespearean works.

To Be Continued…

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