LnC and Mobile Insanity!

[ladymirth]

I’m ashamed of myself. I really am. I mean, granted, I’m so bad at connecting faces and names that I’d probably be unable to place my own mother if she suddenly gained a few more pounds than I’d last seen her with. I have no eye for detail. I get that. It’s probably a birth defect.

But you know, I used to watch Xena and Hercules religiously. They were, without doubt, the two most revolutionary and creative and innovative shows in their day and age. Oddly enough, despite my eternal lust for Kevin Sorbo and idolatry of Lucy Lawless, my favourite characters were always the secondary characters such as Joxer, Salmoneous and Autolycus. Especially Autolycus. He was such a good-hearted rascal! I was too young, of course, to remember that his real name was Bruce Campbell. Arguably the best-loved B-movie actor in the business.

 

So here’s the deal. I told you I got down the second season DVD box-set of my beloved Lois and Clark recently. So, there I was, watching Individual Responsibilty for the umpteenth time, trying to figure out why I felt so fond of the villain, Bill Church Jr. and why he seemed so damn familiar I felt like I knew his face better than my own. I had dreams about it, where I’d meet him at a party and he’d hang upside down from the ceiling and dance till I told him who he was, whereupon it annoyed all the other guess and he and I got thrown out. And I still had to stand outside in the rain, with him doing cartwheels on the front lawn.

 

I need a shrink, I know.

 

But today, out of the blue, it hit me.

 

“Oy!,” I screeched mentally to myself, “that’s bloody Autolycus, the King of Thieves, from Xena!!”

 

 No wonder he was swinging from the rafters in my dream. In Xena, he frequently liked to live up to his image as The Ultimate Thief by engaging in all sorts of showy, death-defying acrobatics.

 

So I looked him up on IMDB and Wikipedia and got another shock. He apparently also appeared in both Spiderman movies. Now this is not to be borne. Those are two of my all-time favourite movies. I think I have a subconscious Sam Raimi fixation. Anyway, I have watched Spiderman II to death. I should know if my darling Autolycus had ever made an appearance there. But, apparently, I had failed to recognize one of my favourite comedic actors playing the obnoxious usher who won’t let Peter in to see M.Js play. Why? ‘Cause he was a couple of pounds overweight!

 

Sheesh! I despair of myself sometimes.

 

Watching Lois and Clark again, after all these years is a real blast though! I was only ten years old when I watched it first, so any and all famous names on the guest appearance list completely went over my head at the time. The second season was when the show was at it’s peak popularity, so as John McNamara says, “people who didn’t have time for us before were suddenly available,”. The only real shock last season was seeing James Earl Jones as Franklin Stern, I think. But this season, the names just keep comin’. Dick Van Patten. The people from The Jeffersons, Sherman Hemsley and Isabel Sanford. The guy who plays Raymond’s dad in Everybody Loves Raymond. The stunningly beautiful Emma Samms, whose accent I can’t get enough of.

 

One of the real shockers was seeing Denise Richards playing a very minor role. Back then of course, Denise was barely a starlet. She looks so young! Well, she is young. Just in her twenties, I’d say. So very sweet and different from what she looks like now. You’d never think she’d grow up to make off with Heather Locklear’s husband.

 

Okay, I’m not that catty! That’s none of my business. I just don’t like her! I don’t even know why. There’s something about her…Maybe it’s because she looks like Samantha Torres, Dean Cain’s ex-girlfriend who was also a playboy model. Okay, I might not have minded if he’d had a kid with Brooke Shields, also one of his exes. But a Playboy model? I mean, what’s the kid gonna say? “My Dad played Superman and my Mom worked for a girly magazine,”. Ugh! But, to be fair, Dean seems to be pretty good Dad material. And at least he didn’t marry her!

 

Dean is only 39, but from the interview clips I’ve seen, he has sadly gone to seed. Bulking out does nothing for his looks. Compared to his immeasurable boyish gorgeousness and killer smile as seen in his Lois and Clark days, it’s a bit depressing. But at least the unmarred glory of his prime shall be immortalized on DVD. I swear, I cannot see that man without wanting to jump him. He may not be the world’s greatest actor, but he can really pull off that earnest Clark Kent persona. I think I wouldn’t want Dean, on the whole. I’d want Dean as Clark Kent. Like Paro, I have a thing for males with hero complexes…

 

Although, he does look illegally cute in a police officer’s uniform. Even more so when he’s kicking butt in it!

 

Teri Hatcher- man, I love that woman! She is soo damn beautiful! Even more so than I remembered. I remember how I used to be so crazy about her hairstyle (everyone was crazy about her hair style!) I had mine cut just like hers. Only the ends would never curl and bounce so prettily as hers did, even after hours of curling my hair with a roller brush. And she has such incredible eyes! She still does. She was absolutely breath-taking in the 3^rd and 4^th seasons, like a fairy with that perfect, soft, cameo face. I know I’m as straight as Prince Charles’ parting line but she looks so beautiful even I can’t help but feel wobbly-kneed sometimes. No more, though. I mean, for being over forty, she’s certainly a very attractive woman but she’s getting thinner and more sallow. Her eyes, though, will never change.

 

I don’t mean to sound disgustingly superficial with this though. I’m just saying. Anyway, Teri’s acting is certainly remarkable. I don’t know about Desperate Housewives but there were definitely some Emmy Award moments in Lois and Clark. She is so very, very, funny and so versatile an actress. In the space of one episode she can be a hard-as-nails reporter, a spoilt child and a romantic heroine with a deep womanliness to her. I’m just surprised it took her this long to win a Golden Globe.

 

I think it’s possible that we’re connected on some cosmic level. She played Lois Lane, my all-time favourite television heroine and the embodiment of everything I’ve always wanted to be – driven, determined, compassionate, idealistic, incisively intellectual, stunningly intuitive, acerbically witty, nobody’s fool, takes-no-bull-shit, never lets silly details like possible death get in the way of her getting a scoop and stubborn as pit bull. The ultimate feminist. And so adorably flawed. She babbles incessantly, she’s ludicrously over-confident about her own abilities yet her ego is extremely fragile. She has a very petty side to her,  that hangs onto grudges and jealousies very childishly. She constantly exercises a system of double standards when it comes to honesty between herself and Clark, and uses bizarre rationalizations for it. Some how, I never minded those flaws. I’ve never had them, but I understand them.

 

Now she plays Susan Mayer, the exact polar opposite of the inimitable Miss Lane, and also the one character I hold most in disdain. And I only recently found out why. It’s because Susan Mayer and I are startlingly alike in many ways. Both hopelessly good-natured and naïve (suckers), both are quite ineffectual, prize klutzes, are infamous for finding ourselves in bizarre and embarrassing situations, incorrigibly indecisive and impressionable, useless in a crisis and it is the tacit understanding of family and friends that we need to be baby-sat constantly. In short, Teri Hatcher now portrays a character that personifies everything I hate about myself.

 

Whatever that means on a cosmic level, the fact remains that I somehow always get the feeling that her face is more familiar to me than my own. I haven’t yet decided why that is. I’ve had this feeling ever since I saw her on TV for the first time when I was barely ten years old. Granted, at that time I did look rather like her, with my pale oval face, big eyes and bob-cut. It didn’t last long, of course. Hormones caught up with me and I’ve ballooned, face and all.

 

In other news, my Mumsie dear is back!! The joyful, tearful reunion as envisaged by Holly was distinctly lacking however. There was a miscommunication as to the time when we were supposed to pick her up from the airport and Thatthi had to go alone to collect her. So we waited to ambush her from the doorway when she got in. That didn’t pan out the way we thought it would either. The door was thrown open and we were preparing to pounce on her with the appropriate squeals -  when the lady of the hour barreled past us, barely greeting her long-sundered offspring and hurtling right into the nearest bathroom!

 

Anyway, everything is good! She actually bought me the new video phone I’ve been badgering her to buy me for months, now. It’s pink and shiny and so funky that it seems to sneer at my old, battered little mousy grey phone (I call it Dee Dee) with its colorless screen and chewed-out head-set that doesn’t work anymore. Reminds me of a high school cheerleader putting down the class nerd, really. And I don’t hold with prissy-faced, shiny newcomers sneering at my faithful old friends. Even it is an expensive pink inanimate object with video and GPRS.

 

So I’ve decided to give away Miss Prissy-in-Pink and hang on to my battered old Dee Dee. My sister thinks I’m finally declaring my eligibility for the local psychiatric hospital. I can see why the world would think so, but…my Dee Dee is my first phone and we’ve spent the last year getting acquainted with each other and becoming inseparable. We’re used to each other and doesn’t give up on me when I bang her around a bit. She’s comforting, solid and dependable. I can text on her in my sleep. She’s not just a phone, she’s a friend.    

 

Is that being materialistic, because of becoming attached to earthly things, or sentimental?

 

I don’t care, anyway. In this point, I’m sure, both Lois Lane and Susan Mayer would be as one. Neither of them would ever trade comfort and familiarity for convenience and prestige.

 

What would I want with video and GPRS, anyway?

Comments

[guipago.livejournal.com]

Lucy Lawless is also in Spiderman :) She's gone all punk rocker for her cameo :)

[ladymirth.livejournal.com]

As in Spiderman 3?! Wheee!! Must watch! Must watch!
I REALLY love that woman!
Hey, I heard you and Scott watched Superman Returns. How was it?

[guipago.livejournal.com]

Nope she's in the original Spiderman :) Look closely for her. Punk hair, 30 second cameo :)

I liked Superman returns (Loved the originals but haven't seen them in years), it had issues though. Mainly too much fawning and not enough kicking ass. I'm a bit more forgiving than some about the plot cause it's a moooovie, but I'll probably attempt to get it after it comes out on dvd. :)