Book Review: Joss Whedon: The Biography

Joss Whedon: The Biography

*Update: I was informed by author Amy Pascale on Twitter that Joss Whedon: The Biography is not an “authorized biography” and have edited this review to remove any references to it as such.  I apologize for the mistake.

I had some mixed feelings about reading a biography of Joss Whedon.  For starters, I rarely read non-fiction (just as a matter of personal preference), but what made me more reluctant was my personal admiration and loyalty to Joss, the man who has created so many of my favorite stories over the past fifteen years or so.  The man who created “cult classics” like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly in addition to writing and directing The Avengers, one of the most successful films of all time, is certainly a subject ripe for study, but what to expect from a biography?  Could it capture the essence of this Lord of the Geeks that his fans all know and love, while managing to explain to the uninitiated why he’s worthy of our praise, while managing to find something new that will surprise even his most devoted followers or that could give a deeper meaning to his work?  While I found the book to be an enjoyable read, the bigger answers to these questions turned out to be something of a mixed bag.

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Quote of the Day

Scoobie Gang, Prophecy Girl

Giles:  The vampires?

Cordelia:  Gone.

Angel:  The Master?

Giles:  Dead. The Hellmouth is closed. Buffy… Buffy?

Buffy:  Oh, sorry. It’s just been a really weird day.

Xander:  Yeah! Buffy died, and everything!

Willow:  Wow! Harsh.

Giles:  I should have known that wouldn’t stop you.

Jenny Calendar:  Well, what do we do now?

Giles:  I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’d like to get out of this place. I don’t like the library very much anymore.

Xander:  Hey! I hear there’s a dance at the Bronze tonight. Could be fun.

Cordelia:  Yeah!

Willow:  Buffy?

Buffy:  Sure! We saved the world. I say we party! I mean, I got all pretty.

Jenny Calendar:  And what about him?

Buffy:  He’s not going anywhere. Loser.

Giles:  I’m not dancing, though.

Jenny Calendar:  We’ll see.

Willow:  You can come with us, Angel.

Buffy:  I’m hungry.

Xander:  So what’s the story with the car?

Cordelia:  Oh, that was me, saving the day!

Willow:  (to Angel) Get something to drink.

Buffy:  Is anybody else hungry?

Willow:  (to Angel) Well, no, don’t do that. Just hang.

Buffy:  I’m really, really hungry.

Angel:  By the way, I really like your dress.

Buffy:  Yeah, yeah. Big hit with everyone.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1: Episode 12 – “Prohpecy Girl”

Quote of the Day

Xander and Angel, Prophecy Girl

Angel:  What?

Xander:  You were looking at my neck.

Angel:  What?

Xander:  You were checking out my neck! I saw that!

Angel:  No, I wasn’t!

Xander:  Just keep your distance, pal.

Angel:  I wasn’t looking at your neck!

Xander:  I told you to eat before we left.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1: Episode 12 – “Prohpecy Girl”

Quote of the Day

Buffy:  So! What’d you do all day?

Angel:  Uh, I read a little.And just thought about a lot of things. Buffy, I…

Buffy:  My diary? You read my diary? That is *not* okay! A diary is like a person’s most private place! I… You don’t even know what I was writing about! ‘Hunk’ can mean a lot of things, bad things. And, and when it says that your eyes are ‘penetrating’, I meant to write ‘bulging’.

Angel:  Buffy…

Buffy:  And ‘A’ doesn’t even stand for ‘Angel’ for that matter, it stands for… ‘Achmed’, a charming foreign exchange student, so that whole fantasy part has nothing to even do with you at all…

Angel:  Your mother moved your diary when she came in to straighten up. I watched from the closet. I didn’t read it, I swear.

Buffy:  Oh! Oh…

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1: Episode 7 – “Angel”

Quote of the Day

Giles:  That’s all he said? Fork Guy?

Buffy:  That’s all Cryptic Guy said: Fork Guy.

Giles:  I think there are too many ‘guys’ in your life. (laughs at his own joke)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1: Episode 4 – “Teacher’s Pet”

Quote of the Day

Xander:  Who’s that?

Willow:  That must be Angel! I think?

Xander:  That weird guy that warned her about all the vampires?

Willow:  That’s him, I’ll bet you.

Xander:  Well, he’s buff! She never said anything about him being buff!

Willow:  You think he’s buff?

Xander:  He’s a very attractive man! How come *that* never came up?

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1: Episode 4 – “Teacher’s Pet”

This is not the Joss Whedon article I intended to write…

I had every intention of writing an article exploring Joss Whedon’s treatment of sex in his various works, and then I started doing some research online.  When I write articles like the one I was envisioning, I worry about unintentionally copying someone else’s ideas, so do a bit of searching to make sure that I still have something new to say.  Sometimes I find that someone else has put out an essay that says exactly what I wanted, only better, and I’ll simply abandon my idea.  Other times, I’ll find an article arguing the opposite of what I want to say, but in a way that allows me to write my opinions as a rebuttal (this worked really well for my Star Wars prequel analysis).  It’s important to read a variety of opinions, because challenging ourselves is the best way to grow, both as a writer/blogger and as a person.

But something different happened to me when I started searching for articles about Joss Whedon and sex.  I still have a lot to say, and maybe I’ll write that analysis soon, but for the moment I’m giving up on it.   Continue reading

Review: Much Ado About Nothing

(This was movie #4 of my 4 movie marathon day.)

How do I become friends with Joss Whedon?  If this is how he spends his vacations, filming Shakespeare adaptations at his absolutely stunning house with a troupe of enormously talented actors and friends, then sign me up.  Much Ado About Nothing is damn near perfect, the melding of two brilliant minds across 400 years.  It’s clear that both Joss and his cast have a deep understanding both of the subject matter and the Shakespearean dialogue, and I hope we get to see a lot more of this sort of thing from him, once The Avengers 2 is done filming.

Much Ado About Nothing tells the story of two romances that take place as a prince comes to stay with a local governor.   Continue reading

Not Exactly a Review: The Cabin in the Woods

It seems a bit silly for me to review a film that came out over a year ago, just because I finally got around to watching it.  So instead of a traditional review, I’m instead going to offer up some disorganized thoughts about The Cabin in the Woods.  (For the record, I give the film an A.)  I didn’t see it in the theaters mostly because we generally don’t go see horror films, both out of personal taste and a general lack of quality.  I’ve never been one for the sort of “jump out and get you” scares, but prefer more cerebral horror.  Give me Hitchcock or The Exorcist over Saw any day.  (We also don’t see a lot of comedy in the theater, but that’s a story for another time.)

Obviously I should have known better, considering the script was by Joss Whedon and one of his frequent collaborators, but the trailers didn’t help the situation.  They presented it as a standard “cabin in the woods” type thriller with a sci-fi/conspiracy twist.  That sort of thing has been done before.  So after it was released I read the plot on wikipedia and it seemed more creative than I had originally supposed, but still not enough to get me to go see it.  However, I recently read the script online out of curiosity which changed my mind, and I finally rented The Cabin in the Woods.  Here are my thoughts: Continue reading

Trailer Tuesday: Much Ado About Nothing

Welcome to “Trailer Tuesday” where I talk about trailers for upcoming movies, since I’ve always found them to be endlessly fascinating.

When Joss Whedon announced that he had secretly filmed an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing with his acting troupe at his house as part of a stay-at-home vacation, I freaked out.  I wasn’t alone in this either.  The idea of Whedon doing Shakespeare is perfectly brilliant.  We should have all known it was bound to happen, considering the references to the Bard in his shows and films (“We few, we happy few…” “We band of buggered.”).  Take a look at the trailer and read on for my thoughts:

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