Sometimes things happen...

Sometimes things happen for a reason. Call it God-inspired direction, serendipity, being in the right place at the right time, you name it.

Today I went to my alma mater, where I got my bachelor's and master's degrees, to apply for a student recruitment position and also for a position in the registrar's office. It turns out that the lady in HR referred me to the vice-president of academic affairs, who was one of my former teachers as an undergraduate student. She suggested I put in for an adjunct teacher's slot, and my former teacher recommended I put in for an assistant webmaster's position as well. Both of those, where I did web work by day and taught classes by night, would be wonderful opportunities for me to get back on my feet at my former college once again.

This comes on the heels of a pretty productive day yesterday that saw my teacher's license renewed until 2013, as well as a job interview scheduled for Friday afternoon after another job interview that same day. I have to admit, for being back only a few days, I've made some serious progress in my job search that's yielding some pretty decent results.

I don't know what's happening or why, all I know is that God's directing my footsteps now for a reason, and I want to find out what that reason is. I mean, it's obvious, I need a position so I can get back on my feet and take care of my daughter and family. Even if it does wind up in divorce, at least I'd be able to provide for my daughter. All I know is that I'm ready to go back to work...very soon.

Branching out, or returning to familiar territory...

Before and even after I moved to Alabama, one thing that I enjoyed doing in my free time was reviewing all of the latest Star Trek titles from Pocket Books. From 2002 to 2006 I was the regular book and media reviewer for TrekWeb.com, one of the largest Star Trek fan-maintained websites on the Internet. Part of its success came because of my many contributions to the site in the forms of regular book reviews (sometimes I would have as many as three or four per week, that's how up to date I was!); DVD reviews of many of the different Star Trek season sets, Battlestar Galactica, and miscellaneous films and TV series; and on occasion interviews with writers (when my schedule permitted it).

Unfortunately, I had been forced into a corner by my wife where I had to give it up. In her words, she said, "It's either me or Star Trek." So she forced me to throw it all out, and I walked away from it by the end of 2006. All of the DVDs, not to mention the books and magazines that were in the house, even the Starship Creator CD-ROMs and the CD collections of Rich Handley's excellent comic strip compilations - all gone. On rare occasion I would return for an occasional DVD product review, but otherwise that was the extent of it. I had been pretty much forced to give it all up.

Flash forward to 2008. My wife and I are going through a separation at this time, one that I wish I could say could be peacefully resolved and result in us getting back together, but at this point it doesn't look like that's going to be the case. As a result of a job loss that was beyond my control, months of struggling to make ends meet, and a mother-in-law who had repeatedly made false accusations against me (all of which my wife believed and wouldn't stand with me to oppose), I returned to Mississippi to start job-searching once again, which has resulted in a number of good leads through job agencies and direct applications, and I haven't stopped. I'm also making plans to return to Alabama to bring my three-year-old daughter to live with me here in Mississippi. My mother and I have been in contact with our attorneys, one here and one in Alabama, and both have indicated that I have an equal right as my daughter's father and that I can move her to Mississippi. When that will be, I don't know.

In the meantime, I've been reconnecting with some old friends... namely, the crews of the starships Enterprise and Voyager, among others. I've caught a few episodes on TV, and the majority of the novels are still at my mother's house. There's also a few comics, I would say about ten percent of the complete collection, still intact. I'm in the process of trading other comics out for the remaining Star Trek comics to rebuild my collection. I'm also looking at getting the series and films on DVD once again, which I know will be costly and will take a long time to reacquire. Not to mention getting hold of those missing books and keeping up with the current and upcoming titles.

Which brings me to this... since launching this website last year I've been thinking about branching out into conducting book reviews as well as DVD and CD reviews. Make it all three of those forms of media. I think it would only be a natural progression to expand my reviewing skills on this blog site. I'm hoping to get in contact with someone in the PR department at Pocket Books to get me back on the mailing list to get all of the latest and current Star Trek titles for review here - hopefully I'll be successful. If that happens, then look for book reviews here in the near future, along of course with the latest DVD product reviews.

All I can do is try. When you've got nothing much left, all you can do is pick up and start over again. We'll see what happens.

The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones, Volume 3: The Years of Change - first thoughts

Well, yesterday I happened to find at my doorstep the third and final volume of "The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones", entitled "The Years of Change". This 10-disc set contains the final seven chapters of the series in mostly re-edited form from their original broadcast versions, along with 31 all-new historial documentaries and a historical commentary on Disc 10. All of the discs are reproduced in their original full-frame broadcast aspect ratio in Dolby Digital 2.0 sound with optional English subtitles, and the discs look and sound great.

All good and fine and dandy, yada yada yada. Enough said of that. Now for the really big news about this set that will please all of the Indy fans out there:

HARRISON FORD IS IN THE SET!

That's right, the original Indy's cameo appearance in "The Mystery of the Blues" is preserved intact from the original ABC telecast from 1992-93. The only minor edits to this segment are in a slight re-editing of the main title credits and cleaner bridgings from one segment to another (as opposed to its original telecast, with the commercial break fade-ins and fade-outs included). Other than that, this remains the sole "Young Indy" segment with the original bridging bookends preserved for DVD.

YES!!!!!! I knew it would be sacrilege to edit out Ford's bookend segments from the episode. Good thing I was wrong about the editing on this one! Hopefully I'll have a more complete review of the set in a few days.

Somewhere in transition...

I wish I had better and more enjoyable news to share with you, but this is much more serious than any DVD review commentary I could ever do...

April and I have separated.

Things finally reached the breaking point with us because of her mother's repeated accusations of reproach, passing it down to my daughter Lily, not actively job searching when in fact I had been looking for better work to take care of my family, and one repeated accusation after another that I know in the bottom of my heart and spirit are completely false and inaccurate. And instead of standing with me, as she should have, April chose to believe the lies and spin her mother was creating just to get me out of the house. Needless to say, this has hurt me more than anything in my life, more than even my dad's death.

Right now I have relocated back to Mississippi to get the pieces of my life back together into some form. This means looking for work here and doing what I can to bring Lily here to live with me. April had said on Tuesday, if not on multiple occasions, that I could bring Lily to live with me and my mother. But when I left on Tuesday, I had no more room in the car for anything, much less my three-year-old daughter.

So now I'm having to start all over, look for a new job, and do all I can to get Lily out of Alabama. My mother has said that Lily shouldn't be without her mother, but right now she's without her father. Which is the lesser of the two evils? I have no idea.

I don't know when I'll be back on to report on new DVD releases. Right now my main focus is getting my life back together and being with my daughter again.

This hurts like hell... no, worse than hell itself. And all I can do is cry and mourn.

My interview with Mike Matessino...

I've known and talked with film and music restorationist Mike Matessino off and on for nearly a decade, and I have to admit he is one of the top go-to guys when it comes to restoring and preserving film and music scores. He's extremely knowledgable in his field, especially when it comes to films like "Alien", the original "Star Wars" trilogy, "The Sound of Music", "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", and, of course, "Superman". I first had the pleasure of talking with Mike back in 2000 in hosting a special online chat with him upon the release of Rhino Records' 2-CD release of John Williams' "Superman" musical score, then at the time the most complete version released to the public.

Flash forward to 2008. Mike, Lukas Kendall, and the guys at Film Score Monthly and Screen Archives Entertainment have significantly raised the bar when it comes to film score sets with their magnum opus, the eight-disc "Superman: The Music (1978-1988) soundtrack set. Far and away, it is extremely light years ahead in terms of completeness and sound quality, definitely unparalleled to anything I've heard - and I've followed film music for 30 years now!

In addition to his credentials, Mike is one of the nicest and friendliest guys you could ever talk to, not to mention a serious film fan like the rest of us. What began as an e-mail of congratulations to him on the FSM set has turned into a great interview with him that's now posted at CapedWonder.com. Here, he answers my questions on the eight-disc set, as well as reflections on his beginnings, his thoughts on a possible "Superman IV" restoration (look for a separate article by him coming soon on the FSM web site), and possible future projects down the pike. Check out the interview, along with the latest information on the eight-disc set!

Just to let you know, the original first edition pressing of 3,000 has sold out, and it looks like it'll be before the end of May before a second edition pressing is made available. That's how hot the set is!

Thanks to Jim Bowers for posting and hosting the interview, and a big special thanks to Mike for all of the hard work and fun he's given to everyone!

Superman: The Music - 1978-1988 (first thoughts)...

Well, believe it or not, when I got to work yesterday, what was waiting for me was none other than the queen mother of all music CD box sets, the long-awaited eight-disc "Superman" soundtrack box set of all the music from the four feature films and the 1988 Ruby-Spears animated series. Just looking at this box set makes my mouth water with excitement!

I've got to tell you, I've only sampled a few tracks from the set thus far. I started out with some of the action-oriented pieces from "Superman IV", then checked out some of the variations on the Main Title theme as heard in II and III, followed by the long-awaited alternate version of "The Dome Opens" from STM (which was adapted as the villains' theme music and some of the action music from SII) and the Main and End Title themes from STM. All I can say is this...

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The music thus far is solid and clear, reproduced from the very best elements around! Mike Matessino, Lukas Kendall, and the guys at Film Score Monthly have completely outdone themselves with this CD box set! Everyone needs to stand up and take notice, this is how the game is played, and this will no doubt be the benchmark for all soundtrack CD sets for years to come in terms of sound reproduction, extensive research and liner notes, and all-around fun and excitement in just listening to the music. And not only that, but with "Superman IV" you get the complete score to the original 120-minute cut of the film that was in progress but never completed after the Orange County sneak preview, which in my opinion could have benefitted from another 6-8 months of completion on the visual effects. With this score, coupled with the 2006 Deluxe Edition DVD and the 93-minute international print (which should have been released on DVD), you get a very clear picture of how the film would have turned out, and it would have been much broader in scope than the B-picture budget revealed.

Hands down, this is the CD soundtrack set of the year to beat, and it's going to be completely impossible to top this set with any other release from any studio. Once I have a chance to listen to the complete set, I'll provide a further detailed review, so look for that soon.

Congrats to Mike, Lukas, and everyone for a job well done!

Indy returns, Superman flies, etc.

With the release of the fourth "Indiana Jones" film Memorial Day weekend, Paramount Home Video is re-releasing the first three films on DVD in all-new special editions. Apparently none of the extras from the original four-disc box set will be on these new re-releases, though it looks like there will be a host of exclusive bonus features including a preview of the upcoming "Lego Indiana Jones" videogame. Will it be worth the double-dip? Hopefully I'll be able to provide a review soon.

The latest word on the "Superman" score box set is that there are fewer than 600 copies left from Film Score Monthly's initial pressing of 3,000. According to Lukas Kendall, there should be a second pressing down the road in a few months. From everything I've read thus far, it's been an extremely big hit with Superman and music fans. I'm trying to get a copy for review, but it's been no luck at all with nearly all of my leads. Hopefully I won't get left out of the party.

On a side note, I'm in early talks with album producer Mike Matessino to conduct an interview for one of the Superman-based web sites. I had the privilege of hosting a special online chat with him back in 2000 upon the release of Rhino's 2-CD "Superman" set, and he and I have kept in touch on occasion since then on different things. He's quite knowledgeable about the material he's worked on, and he's quite a nice guy to boot. Look for that interview soon.

Finally, I heard this morning that with the upcoming release of "The Dark Knight", the late Heath Ledger has delivered such an extremely powerful performance as the Joker that talks are in the works of considering him for a posthumous Oscar nomination. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if that happens.

On that note, I'll touch base again soon. Take care!