Stuff I Like: Breaking Bad

Allow me to introduce what I hope will become a regular feature on this blog – the only obstacle being my short attention span. "Stuff I Like" will feature, ummm . . . how to explain this . . . stuff I like. Media – movies, TV, music – will be the primary subject matter.
I wouldn't call myself an expert in terms of movies and TV, and though I am a classically trained musician, I'm not necessarily a music nut who has all the latest and greatest albums. My conceit, though, is that I believe I have very good taste. I know what I like. And I like cool stuff.
For my first foray into this realm, I can think of no better piece of media to recommend than "Breaking Bad". Now I'm as big a fan of "Mad Men" as anybody, but for my money, its AMC cousin "Breaking Bad" is the best show on TV.
I believe we live in a golden age of television drama, and "Breaking Bad" represents all the best elements of the medium at the moment. The production values are more in line with what you'd see in a movie, but when you give a talented writer/producer like Vince Gilligan the freedom to tell a story over multiple 13-episode seasons, the end result is delicious. Movies tend to be like fast food; great TV shows like "Breaking Bad" are slow-cooked to perfection.
I was late hopping on the "Breaking Bad" bandwagon, to be perfectly honest. Based on the promo commercials, the premise didn't grab me right away. High school chemistry teacher Walter White, played by Bryan Cranston – best known at the time for his role as the dad on Malcolm in the Middle – has been diagnosed with lung cancer, so he decides to cook crystal meth as a means for providing for his family. It just didn't seem like a barrel of laughs.
I happened to stumble across a couple episodes midway through Season 2, and the show gradually started to burrow its way into my cranium. I watched Season 3 in its entirety, then went back and bought the first two seasons on DVD and caught up on all the episodes I've missed.
Season 4 is set to debut on AMC on Sunday, July 17, and I'm positively giddy. "Breaking Bad" is what I imagine it would be like if the Coen brothers made a TV show, with a little dash of Tarantino in the mix.
The show is dark, no doubt about it, and it isn't for everyone. But it is undeniably brilliant. Cranston has been full value for his three Emmy awards as outstanding lead actor in a drama series, and his wingman Aaron Paul (playing Jesse Pinkman, Walter White's junkie-with-a-heart-of-gold partner in crime) really came into his own in Season 3. He won he Emmy for best supporting actor last year. Their complex father/son-type relationship is the heart of the show.
White's unlikely journey from bland family man to drug kingpin is a fascinating one, and it's written and presented in logical way, as much as such an unlikely scenario could be.
The show is darkly hilarious at times, and the supporting characters are well-conceived. My favourites are Hank Schrader, White's macho brother-in-law who happens to be a DEA agent, and Walter Jr., White's son who suffers from cerebral palsy.
If you're not sold on "Breaking Bad" just yet, there was an excellent feature in Newsweek analyzing the success of the show, and previewing the upcoming fourth season. You can check it out by clicking right here.

Soaking up some Colorado culture

Just returned home after a glorious poker-free, TV-free week of vacation in Colorado. I'm always fascinated by the United States, so I figured I'd share a few observations.

-- The first face I saw when I stepped off the plane in Denver was John Elway's. The legendary Broncos quarterback was on a billboard, hawking some product or another. But as my Colorado stay progressed, it became clear to me that the entire state has fallen in love with another QB - Tim Tebow (pictured right). The former Florida Gators superstar - a first-round pick by the Broncos a couple months back - was everywhere. At a closet-sized sports store in the airport, Tebow's No. 15 was the only Broncos jersey available. I ran into a man wearing a Tebow jersey while hiking up a 12,000-foot peak at the Continental Divide. And let's not even start on the blanket Tebow coverage in the media, both locally and nationally.
The thing is, it's likely going to be a while until we see what Tebow can do in the NFL. With incumbent QB Kyle Orton inking a one-year contract extension last week that will keep him in Broncos silks through 2011, Tebow's first legitimate shot at the starting job won't likely come until 2012. But that's good news for Tebow - he's regarded as a work in progress, and will need time to develop. Whether Broncos fans are willing to be so patient is another matter.

-- The major reason for my trip to Colorado was to attend my cousin's wedding. She was married at the Stanley Hotel, a historic building in Estes Park, about an hour and a half north of Denver. The coolest thing about the place, to me, is that it is linked closely to The Shining, the Steven King book that became a classic film directed by Stanley Kubrick. According to Wikipedia, King once stayed at the Stanley, which inspired him to write The Shining. Scenes for the mini-series version of the book were filmed at the hotel, though it was not used for Kubrick's cinematic version. Channel 42 on all guest room televisions at the Stanley shows the Kubrick movie on a continuous loop. How cool is that? All the place was missing was a hedge maze.
-- On our way to hiking at the Continental Divide, we drove through Black Hawk and Central City - former Colorado gold rush towns which are the only municipalities in the state where gambling is currently legal. Thus, casinos dominate the square footage in these towns. It feels like they're practically stacked on top of each other.
The thing that got me chuckling was a banner on one of the casinos that advertised "THE LOOSEST SLOTS IN TOWN!" The ad went on to state that the casino paid out 99.485 per cent (or thereabouts, my memory isn't perfect) of the money that people fed into its slot machines. It completely slayed me that a casino would lay out its larcenous business plan in such brazen detail - "We intend to bleed the cash out of your wallet, slowly but surely!" And the genius of it was that they made it look like they were doing people a favour - "We could be taking even more of your money!" Seems to me, the only smart people involved with slot machines are the people running them.

-- I had a couple of interesting political conversations with Americans. First of all, everyone I talked to seems to believe Barack Obama is intent on driving the U.S. economy into the ground. The main worry is that Obama's business taxation plans will crush an already fragile economy. Take that for what it's worth - I was mainly speaking with Republicans. But at the very least, it does offer an interesting counterpoint to the optimistic portrayal of Obama in the Canadian media. Which is, in a nutshell, "At least he's not George W. Bush. And he seems cool."
Beyond that, I had a fascinating exchange with a man who casually ripped the Canadian medical system during an anti-Obama vent session. The president's medicare plan, he argued, is inherently flawed because it's modeled after the Canadian system. "Everyone who wants to get a surgery done goes down to the States and pays for it," he said smugly. The fact I'm Canadian was not lost on him.
Point taken. We have issues with surgery wait times in Canada. But no more than 15 minutes later, the same guy told a story about a car accident he was involved in. Basically, another vehicle pulled in front of him, and the driver slammed on the brakes to intentionally cause an accident. Turned out, the brake-slammer had a pre-existing medical condition that required a hip replacement. Not having $90,000 to pay for the surgery, he caused the car accident and sued the other driver - and settled out of court with the insurance provider for $140,000.
Aside from the fact that this lawsuit scheme is utterly insidious, it occurred to me that if the hip-replacement dude had Canadian-style medical coverage, he would not have needed to cause a car accident to raise funds. He may have had to sit on a waitlist for a few months, but he would have gotten his surgery. So you tell me - which system is better?
-- On the plane back home, I was somewhat surprised when the 20-something gentleman seated next to me ordered a jack and coke. Before noon. Kind of odd. Then I looked over and noticed he was reading "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" by Tucker Max - a New York Times bestseller that is more or less a how-to guide for womanizing drunks. Suddenly, it all made sense to me. I was grateful to be seated between this guy and my wife.
-- One of the underrated joys of returning from vacation is seeing what wonders have accumulated on the PVR over the course of a week. I've already watched the latest episode of Mad Men (one of the best episodes ever, utterly incendiary), and I'm looking forward to devouring a couple of new WSOP episodes. It's good to be home.

Media blitz

Movies, books, TV . . . I love 'em all. But I hate wasting my time on sub-par media.
Lately, though, I've been fortunate enough to hit the jackpot, so I figured I'd share my good fortune with you.
MOVIES: INCEPTION
If you enjoy having your mind blown, go see Inception. Simple as that.
It's been more than a week since I watched Inception, and I'm still not quite sure what to make of it. What I am sure of is, I loved it. It's two and a half hours long, but it feels like half that. It's one of thos movies where you walk out of the theatre in a daze.
The basic premise of the film is that the technology exists to infiltrate people's dreams. Leonardo DiCaprio's character is the leader of a team that does just that. That's as much as I'll reveal in terms of plot. I will say, the ending was awesome.
DiCaprio aside, the real star of this movie is writer/director Christopher Nolan. He's most famous for reviving the Batman franchise, and anyone who hasn't seen The Dark Knight at this point simply doesn't enjoy movies. Inception, for me, was most reminiscent of Memento, the flick that put Nolan on the map a decade ago. Like Memento, Inception is a complex psychological thriller. But where Memento was minimalist, Inception is sprawling, with epic action scenes set in multiple universes. If that makes any sense.
(A quick aside: I honestly haven't seen a Nolan movie I haven't enjoyed. Insomnia, with Al Pacino and Robin Williams, and The Prestige with Christopher Bale, are also worth two hours of your time).
In Inception, Nolan riffs on the sources of inspiration, the power of dreams, and the very nature of our perceived reality. Excellent movie.

BOOKS: DOWNTOWN OWL
For a guy with a blog called "The Hipster Doofus," it's inexplicable that I hadn't read a Chuck Klosterman book until last week. So when I stumbled upon Klosterman's 2008 novel "Downtown Owl" during a recent trip to the library (retro, I know), I figured I had to pick it up.
Prior to reading Downtown Owl, I was aware Klosterman was a big sports fan (he occasionally co-authors columns with ESPN.com's Bill Simmons), and had a penchant for sprinkling his writing with pop culture references. On both those counts, Downtown Owl lived up to my preconceived notions. Klosterman's writing voice is so unique, it's hard to explain. But viewing the world through his eyes is simply fascinating.
Downtown Owl, a dark comedy set in 1983, is a three-pronged story chronicling the lives of residents of a middle-of-nowhere town in North Dakota. Klosterman's tale is tightly written, and somehow witty and profound at the same time. I don't read a lot of books, but I devoured this one in less than a week; it will not be my last encounter with Klosterman.

TV: MAD MEN
My favourite TV show these days is Mad Men, the brilliant AMC series about the troubled cast of characters at an ad agency in the 1960s.
Thus, I was pretty stoked about the season premiere last Sunday evening, and I was not disappointed. The show has a different feel for the fourth season - the central characters have established a brand-new ad agency, and with that comes a fresh new set that lends the show a brighter look. The characters are likewise dymanic. Don Draper's rage is closer to the surface. Peggy is more confident - likely a product of having Don beg her to join the new agency in the Season 3 finale. And it's fascinating to watch Betty Draper and the kids adjust to their new family situation.
If you missed the Mad Men bandwagon, I own the first three seasons on DVD. Feel free to borrow them.