The Muppets is another movie marketed to kids, but it is really for nostalgic adults. And evil tycoon (Chris Cooper) is about to destroy The Muppet Studios (to drill for oil) and the only way this disaster can be averted is to “put on a show.” Part of the movie shows how Kermit along with new character, Walter, Jason Segel (from “How I Met Your Mother”), and Amy Adams reunites The Muppets to save their past. Cameos by a dozen other “stars” including Jack Black, Emily Blunt, and Alan Arkin pop up throughout the film. However, most kids will find this movie a drag. Adult fans of The Muppets will rejoice. GRADE: B

Otis Adelbert Kline cloned Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars novels and produced Swordsman of Mars and Outlaws of Mars. Two Earthmen are sent to Mars through a telepathic mind swap. In Swordsman of Mars our hero is Harry Thorne, a young man from a wealthy family who has been falsely compromised. Thorne agrees to the incredible experiment and finds himself thrust into a dangerous political battle with the second, evil, Earthman. In Outlaws of Mars an American soldier, Jerry Morgan, agrees to be transported to the Red Planet. Morgan arrives on Mars and is instantly embroiled in a civil war. Both books are based on Burroughs’ John Carter novels. Readers who love the action in Burroughs’ Mars novels will find plenty to like in these two imitations.

Martin Scorsese’s Hugo follows fairly closely the book it’s based on: the Caldecott Award winning The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick. The disappointing box office numbers for this movie are due to its subject matter (memory and loss) and its length (128 minutes, but it seems longer). This is not a kid movie to take some squirmy pre-teens to see. Adults will appreciate its message and the homage Scorsese makes to early French films. GRADE: B+

Ryan Blair grew up abused by his father. Later, his divorced Mom married a businessman who taught Ryan how to turn away from drugs and violence and to be successful in business. Nothing to Lose, Everything to Gain provides plenty of business examples of what to do–and what not to do. One of Ryan’s early mistakes was sleeping with one of his employees. But he learns quickly from his mistakes and becomes rich and successful through plenty of hard work. Nothing to Lose, Everything to Gain is one of those inspirational books I’d like to use with a class of students who have a lack of hope. GRADE: B

Some critics think that Season Five of Alfred Hitchcock Presents was the best season of them all. Hitchcock directed the first two episodes, “Arthur” and “The Crystal Trench.” I enjoyed all 38 episodes especially “The Specialty of the House” and Steve McQueen in “Man From the South.” I own all five seasons on DVD, but if you only want to buy one season, Season Five is the one you want! GRADE: A+
EPISODE LISTING
Episode 1: “Arthur”
Episode 2: “The Crystal Trench”
Episode 3: “Appointment at Eleven”
Episode 4: “Coyote Moon”
Episode 5: “No Pain”
Episode 6: “Anniversary Gift”
Episode 7: “Dry Run”
Episode 8: “The Blessington Method”
Episode 9: “Dead Weight”
Episode 10: “Special Delivery”
Episode 11: “Road Hog”
Episode 12: “Specialty of the House”
Episode 13: “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”
Episode 14: “Graduating Class”
Episode 15: “Man From the South”
Episode 16: “The Ikon of Elijah”
Episode 17: “The Cure”
Episode 18: “Backward, Turn Backward”
Episode 19: “Not the Running Type”
Episode 20: “The Day of the Bullet”
Episode 21: “Hitch Hike”
Episode 22: “Across the Threshold”
Episode 23: “Craig’s Will”
Episode 24: “Madame Mystery”
Episode 25: “The Little Man Who Was There”
Episode 26: “Mother, May I Go Out to Swim?”
Episode 27: “The Cuckoo Clock”
Episode 28: “Forty Detectives Later”
Episode 29: “The Hero”
Episode 30: “Insomnia”
Episode 31: “I Can Take Care of Myself”
Episode 32: “One Grave Too Many”
Episode 33: “Party Line”
Episode 34: “Cell 227”
Episode 35: “The Schartz-Metterklume Method”
Episode 36: “Letter of Credit”
Episode 37: “Escape to Sonoita”
Episode 38: “Hooked”

Riffing off of Harold Bloom’s classic The Anxiety of Influence, Jonathan Lethem writes about the influences that helped him write novels like Gun, With Occasional Music and The Fortress of Solitude. The biggest influence on Lethem is Philip K. Dick. Lethem cites Philip K. Dick in many of these essays. Lethem is also open in his acknowledgement that PKD was an uneven writer: masterpieces and dreck rub shoulders in those Library of America volumes. Speaking of those Library of America collections of Philip K. Dick’s work, Lethem lobbied hard to have PKD included in the series. If you’re interested in what influences a writer’s style and artistic development, The Ecstasy of Influence provides a model case study. GRADE: B+
TABLE OF CONTENTS
i: My Plan to Begin With
My Plan to Begin With, Part One
The Used Bookshop Stories
The Books They Read
Going Under in Wendover
Zelig of Notoriety
Clerk

ii: Dick, Calvino, Ballard: SF and Postmodernism
My Plan to Begin With, Part Two
Holidays
Crazy Friend (Philip K. Dick)
What I Learned at the Science-Fiction Convention
The Best of Calvino: Against Completism
Postmodernism as Liberty Valance
The Claim of Time (J. G. Ballard)
Give Up

iii: Plagiarisms
The Ecstasy of Influence
The Afterlife of “Ecstasy”/Somatics of Influence
Always Crashing in the Same Car
Against “Pop” Culture
Furniture

iv: Film and Comics
Supermen!: An Introduction
Top-Five Depressed Superheroes
The Epiphany
Izations
Everything Is Broken (Art of Darkness)
Godfather IV
Great Death Scene (McCabe & Mrs. Miller)
Kovacs’s Gift
Marlon Brando Breaks
Missed Opportunities
Donald Sutherland’s Buttocks
The Drew Barrymore Stories

v: Wall Art
The Collector (Fred Tomaselli)
An Almost Perfect Day (Letter to Bonn)
The Billboard Men (Larry Sultan and Mike Mandel)
Todd James
Writing and the Neighbor Arts
Live Nude Models
On a Photograph of My Father
Hazel

vi: 9/11 and Book Tour
Nine Failures of the Imagination
Further Reports in a Dead Language
To My Italian Friends
My Egyptian Cousin
Cell Phones
Proximity People
Repeating Myself
Bowels of Compassion
Stops
Advertisements for Norman Mailer
White Elephant and Termite Postures in the Life of the Twenty-first-Century Novelist

vii: Dylan, Brown, and Others
The Genius of James Brown
People Who Died
The Fly in the Ointment
Dancing About Architecture
Dylan Interview
Open Letter to Stacy (The Go-Betweens)
Otis Redding’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Rick James
an orchestra of light that was electric

viii: Working the Room
Bolaño’s 2666
Homely Doom Vibe (Paula Fox)
Ambivalent Usurpations (Thomas Berger)
Rushmore Versus Abundance
Outcastle (Shirley Jackson)
Thursday (G. K. Chesterton)
My Disappointment Critic/On Bad Faith
The American Vicarious (Nathanael West)

ix: The Mad Brooklynite
Ruckus Flatbush
Crunch Rolls
Children with Hangovers
L. J. Davis
Agee’s Brooklyn
Breakfast at Brelreck’s
The Mad Brooklynite

x: What Remains of My Plan
Micropsia
Zeppelin Parable
What Remains of My Plan
Memorial
Things to Remember 435

The Serpent Sea continues the story of Moon and the Raksura of the Indigo Cloud court. The story is set on a strange planet where various groups, sky people, water people, and groundlings, compete for domination. The Serpent Sea takes Moon and a group of the court into dangerous waters to recover an important magical artifact. Wells creates a unique (for me) setting for the bulk of her story. I don’t want to spoil the surprise when you get to that part. The Serpent Sea features more court intrigue than The Cloud Roads, but it will certainly satisfy your need for a fantasy fix. I’ll read the next book in the series whenever Night Shade Books publishes it. Bill Crider has more to say about The Serpent Sea here. GRADE: B+

The Cloud Roads is the first book in a new series about a misfit called Moon who lives on a very strange planet with floating islands like in Avatar. The planet is divided into sky people, sea people, and groundlings. Moon is an orphan who drifts around, trying to fit in with the groundlings. But he meets a flying creature called Stone who shows Moon who he really is. But that only complicates things as Moon becomes a key player in the battle against the evil Fell who are intent on conquering the entire planet. The Cloud Roads features plenty of action and a satisfyingly complex plot. I’ll be reviewing the just published second book in this Raksura series tomorrow. For Bill Crider’s more detailed review of The Cloud Roads click here.  GRADE: B+