For religious types, Harry Potter controversy may have just been a warmup for The Golden Compass.

I'm not convinced that the talking bear et al is really going to convince any kid of the invalidity of religion any more than a talking lion will save anyone's soul.

Pullman is so overt that I guess I can admire his ability to manipulate the praise and fear his work has garnered....

Still, I think I generally feel that they are the kind of thing that exist to make people feel like they're smart for having read them/participated in their culture.

But, maybe not quite as bad a situation as the adults who claimed that J.K. Rowling was doing some great literary writing in an absurd attempt to validate their own reading....

Newsday saw the Wolves in the Walls theatrical adaptation, and it sounds worthwhile.

I'd like to see a freewheeling Yo La Tengo show. Sounds like it might happen in Brooklyn, but tickets don't seem to actually be on sale. Here's an article on the touring scheme, and Q & A with James McNew.

Interview with Harry Bliss:

Scene: In your most recent children’s book series with Doreen Cronin—Diary of a Worm, Diary of a Spider, Diary of a Fly—do you feel lucky that something like a minotaur isn’t keeping a diary?

Bliss: Yeah, Diary of a Horse would suck.

For the record, I like all three of the books that are out. So do kids.

I don't know why these collector's editions of Harry Potter 1 exist, but I know that today approximately 2000 of these books were given away. Also you could build a house out of these books. Like in the House of Paper, but probably more structurally sound.

I maintain minor relevance with the tween demographic through my knowledge of comic book characters, mostly supplied through the half hour cartoon versions of the characters. Once in a while my credibility slips, like when I thought I heard kids talking about a ghostwriter movie instead of a Ghostrider movie. But for the most part, I'm ok...

I ended up watching season 1 of The Batman yesterday and today. It's a lot more anime looking than the earlier animated series. Which I find a bit harder to watch...the whole thing strikes me as a little bit too X-Games (everything is slightly out of date, like theme music by The Edge), but the interesting spin is that it's set to start with the third anniversary of Batman's crimefighting birth. They also refer to him as "the Batman" rather than just Batman throughout the episodes.

The other characters all got new images and tweaked stories. I guess the explanations for some of them are ok (zany crazy Joker, young martial arts Penguin) but some of them just look silly (Catwoman).
I should possibly watch this season's episodes as they are apparently Justice League crossovers, according to Wikipedia.

How did I come to own the DVD of The Batman? Blame the ineptness of Blockbuster video, rapidly disappearing from everywhere they used to be. I was given a Blockbuster gift card (not as a gift, but because the recipient didn't think she'd use it). I went to a Blockbuster and to avoid the embarrassment of not wanting to buy anything unless it was free, I asked the clerk to check the balance. Which he couldn't do, because some computer thing didn't work. I then called the number on the card to check the balance, and instead of punching in the numbers to get some automated response, I was told to hold approximately 27 minutes for the next available customer service rep. I then looked on the Blockbuster web site. It wasn't possible to check the card's balance, but you could spend the card, if there was a balance. The online Blockbuster shopping experience is pretty terrible so i resolved to add the first at all possible item to my cart to see if I could get it for free. And that turned out to be The Batman: Season 1, which was free.

Stupid parent tricks aren't limited by geography...
The Happy Ending Foundation is planning a series of Bad Book Bonfires for later this month, when parents will be encouraged to burn novels with negative endings

The NY Times Magazine has a big article about the Todd Haynes Dylan movie, written by the author of that Rats book

The WFMU blog shows how records get manufactured

Controversy over Paddington Bear's endorsement deal with Marmite
(Darkest Peru is mentioned a couple times, but no mention of controversy with that issue)

Here's a trailer for Tim Burton's Sweeney Todd

People connected to Spoon, Wilco and R.E.M. talk about the Radiohead download promotion

The Wall Street Journal on the newest McSweeneys book [It's a long way from being involved in the creation of Mr. Magoo to writing about the insanities of war-torn Iraq, but 90-year-old first-time novelist Millard Kaufman made the journey.] and the new Fiery Furnaces album.

Here's another George Saunders interview
and outtakes

Found this while I was looking around McSweeneys...upcoming...

Maps and Legends
by Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon's sparkling first book of nonfiction is a love song in sixteen parts — a series of linked essays in praise of reading and writing, with subjects running from ghost stories to comic books, Sherlock Holmes to Cormac McCarthy.

E of the Eels is writing his memoirs

Spoon interview and a/v stuff

Sony is suing someone else regarding that CD DRM/spyware stuff from a few years ago, because it's not their fault, I suppose.

The NY Times on tv on dvd, which most people seem to like. Except for the stuff they watch on TV the first time around, which sells no dvds (reality, procedurals)

an calendar coincidence led to a Roald Dahl Day/Google controversy
I think that Roald Dahl was probably anti-everything

Horn Book is covering the [I'm kind of sick of the] boys books/girls books discussion
including
Brian Selznick on gender

John Green hates the Hardy Boys but has a different feeling toward the Babysitters Club

Get Him Eat Him did a Daytrotter session with an Elvis Costello cover

The Belle and Sebastian guy is doing some kind of movie musical and is soliciting vocals from internetters. There are a couple instrumental tracks for download, which are kind of pleasant anyway.

Craig Thompson has a blog:
Doot Doot Garden Blog
where I found out that people have tattoos of Blankets scenes etc. Which is sort of "of course" in 2007, but still a bit odd to me.

Paul Auster talks a bit about his new film here.

Watch an edited NASL (that's North American Soccer League) game here, complete with commercial interruptions...Shep Messing likes smokeless tobacco while he's keeping goal. Anything with Shep Messing is funny...

That field is pretty disgusting, with the colored penalty areas and soccer ball center circle...

Yesterday's soccer...David Beckham got injured and Chris Klein scored on a bicycle kick.
Glad we saw that great game against Beckham a few weeks ago. Sounds like he's done for this season.

The NY Times visits the new Music Hall of Williamsburg...indie rock isn't pretending to not be upper middle class anymore, I guess.

The not really much of a trailer for The Dark Knight Batman movie was better than a lot of the Simpsons movie that came after it.

Here's a bunch of information on the 2008 movie in a preview of The Dark Knight from Channel 4 Film.

It's no joker: Leahy's in Batman: Times Argus Online
An article about Vermont Senator Pat Leahy, who was in Batman and Robin and is now in The Dark Knight.

Leahy has donated his $2,000 appearance fee from the movie to the Kellogg-Hubbard Library. They also receive royalty checks annually from his work in "Batman and Robin," which amount to about $12 per year, according to library executive director Martin Hahn.

Unrelated, but comicsish:

Here's a cover gallery of Jack Kirby stuff

Also, library filters are dumb

(via everyone I know):
A Hipper Crowd of Shushers - New York Times

another one?

There's a skeletal website up for the Persepolis movie...
which will not be seen at the Bangkok International Film Festival after intervention by the Iranian government.

Last night we saw Danielson and some of Animal Collective at the Seaport.

The Danielson set was quite enjoyable; I think the Ships version of Danielson really play to the strengths of D Smith and his cohort.

We didn't stay for all of Animal Collective. Definitely rockcritic rock, I see the interesting part of what they're doing, but the potsmoking high school contingent of this show's crowd made it a reasonable decision to take off early. The crowd for this show was huge; I think the internet may have ruined free summer concerts.

Photo from Hypewriter's Flickr.

a new yorker article on Imus and from Richard Sandomir and Mark Reiter, editors of The Enlightened Bracketologist: The Final Four of Everything
Good Imus, Bad Imus : The Bracket (pdf)

"Using free wireless internet outside library described as theft"

Touring with a human skull?!

Thought that Raschka Caldecott was a bit unexpected, but Hyperion is nice to me, so good for them!

Here's a little bit about the new Louis Sachar book, Small Steps, a sequel to Holes.

DC Berman is taking some Lambchoppers and Pernice Brother Peyton Pinkerton on the road as Silver Jews. DCB is also still booktouring Actual Air.


Here's a bit on new Danielson music.

NY Times loving on Colin Meloy. here's an interview with CM, who apparently is touring with a human skull.

Audio stuff:
MP3 link via Largehearted Boy to Sufjan Stevens cover of "she is" from the Tim/Jeff Buckley tribute

MP3 link to Two Gallants' Waves of Grain

KEXP will start podcasting a song of the day on 2/6, with an unreleased Ted Leo song.

A bunch of new interesting music out today. The Bonnie Prince Billy/Tortoise covers album, Cat Power, Robert Pollard albums and Jose Gonzalez EPs are on emusic new today. Team-love seems to be down today...I wonder if they are going to give away downloads of the Jenny Lewis album, the way their older albums were up as MP3s. I am also somewhat intrigued by the forthcoming Beth Orton album, mostly because of the involvement of Jim O'Rourke and M. Ward.

I remember devoting a good amount of schooltime to making fun of the WB and UPN when they started; now they no longer will exist independently.

Harry Potter and unrelated links

So last night we saw Harry Potter. I guess it was well-enough made, but i found it dark overall. Goblet of Fire was the last HP book I made it all the way through; after seeing this movie, I am not sure I want to see the next adaptations. Call them Harry Potter and the Pretend Wizard World is Depressing, that seems apt.

Otherwise:

Michael Chabon has posted a new story/column thing on his website.

NY Times looks at the viewer response aspect of the Historical Society's Slavery in New York exhibit.

Also in the NY Times, how corporate decides who's in a hip-hop crew.

Big Takeover redid their website, so it's no longer 2003.

information that hopefully won't make heads spin

Korean baseball players using Cabbage as a cooling agent.

Christgau on the indie rock hits. It's nice that he doesn't feel the need to deal with things right on their release.

A Voice article about the Vashti/Animal Collective EP.

More about that raid on Kim's. I guess it's old news by now, but oh well.

The Star Maker of the Semipopular - New York TimesAbout KCRW. The article title reminds me of some Post Paint Boy lyrics. Anyway, I prefer KEXP, in terms of semipopular somewhat independent public radio to listen to on the internet.

there is now a Wonka Industrieswebsite. Here is the fancy new Johnny Depp movie website.

So the neurologist told me to drink Mountain Dew or Jolt for the caffeine, as this is supposed to help my head. How much caffeine is in various soft drinks? Jolt has about 72 mg, Mountain Dew has 55 mg, Coke has 47. I couldn't actually find Jolt anywhere and am not sure that I would want to. I don't like Mountain Dew but have had some. What is sneaky is the high caffeine count in Pepsi One according to this site.

I hope I can stop with the soda soon. I had managed to cut out the soda between January and June, so hopefully I can manage to return to that approach.

Mr. Vertigo Movie Spoof

Mr. Vertigo: Belgians have a lot of vacation time, I think.

Scroll down for scandal

The NY Times is doing a pseudoblog from Bonnaroo.

Village Voice titles sometimes say it all: Narcissistic brothers of white whine try to regain our interest(tying together weezer and matchbox 20, probably to the distaste of each band's fans)

Here's today's Spoon article.

Newsday is not so into solo SM

Here's another SM article. And another.

From the Guardian,They Might Be Giants and kid songs is old news, but St. Etienne has an album of kids songs now, and Belle and Sebastian are making some kind of compilation of kid songs.

An article about LCD soundsystem.

White stripes review

Your scandal: Mondo Kim's got in trouble

Cyndi Lauper sues to have her rent reduced to $508 each month

New York Daily News - Home - Lauper's singin' blues in rent fight