TV Series Review: Merlin, Season 1

This summer, NBC picked up the British show "Merlin" for a 13 episode summer run. According to Wikipedia, this marked the first time in 30 years that a major network has picked up a British show. I for one, hope that NBC picks up season 2 of Merlin...if they don't, I'll have to get it from Netflix.

"Merlin" is a retelling of the King Arthur story before Merlin and Arthur rose to prominence. Sort of like "Smallville", but with the Arthurian legend rather than Superman. In the show, Merlin comes to Camelot, where King Uther Pendragon has banned the use of magic. Merlin has significant magical abilities, and under the tutelage of the King's Physician, Gaius, begins to grow his magical talents. Of course, he has to hide this from everyone, which is made more difficult by the fact that Merlin is also Prince Arthur's servant.

In the first episode, Merlin learns that his destiny is to help and protect Arthur until he becomes King. This is complicated by the fact that, early on, Merlin and Arthur despise each other. But, as the season progresses, their relationship grows.

"Merlin" is definitely a low budget production. The effects feel like SyFy Channel low budget effects. But, the cast is very good, and the stories are well written. I didn't think there were any particularly weak episodes, and there were several very strong episodes. I went back and forth on a 4 or 5 star rating for this show, so it's probably a 4.5.

Poor Baby Gonna Take His Ball and Go Home

I think Nuke is right, I should quit following sports. As I've stated numerous times, the Denver Broncos are, by far, my favorite sports team. The last 6-7 months haven't been so glorious for us Broncos fans. First, they fell apart and missed the playoffs. Next, Mike Shanahan was fired, ushering in Josh McDaniels as coach. Then star quarterback Jay Cutler got traded after a long feud with Josh McDaniels over reports that the team tried to trade Cutler.

Now there's this...Pro Bowl wide receiver Brandon Marshall has been suspended for conduct detrimental to the team. Marshall is upset because his buddy Jay Cutler is gone, and because he wants a new contract, even though he has 2 years left on his current contract.

A little history on the petulant Mr. Marshall. He was a very gifted receiver in college, but dropped to the 4th round in the draft because he was viewed as immature and high risk. In his 2nd and 3rd seasons, Marshall caught over 100 passes in each season, making the Pro Bowl last year. However, his play on the field was often overshadowed by his off the field problems. Marshall was arrested multiple times, and injured himself while "rough-housing" with his brother. The NFL even suspended Marshall at the beginning of 2008 under its conduct policy.

So, I say let him sit!!! He is more trouble than he's worth. He has proven that he is a "me first" player. Never was this more evident than last season when he caught a game winning touchdown, and was going to celebrate by putting on black gloves to symbolize his joy over Barack Obama's victory in the election (should have been a clue right there if you ask me). Luckily his more mature teammates stepped in and stopped him...he would have gotten a 15 yard penalty for excessive celebration had he completed the stupid act.

Brandon Marshall is a prima donna, plain and simple. He thinks he's better than he is, and is acting like a big baby. I think the Broncos should sit him, with pay, for the entire season. Right now, the Broncos are planning to bring him back on September 6th. I hope they change their minds and he misses serious time. Football is the biggest team sport there is, and there is no room for selfish divas on any team, let alone my favorite team.

Politics of Distraction

Today, the Obama administration announced that it would investigate the CIA for "harsh interrogation" techniques during the War on Terror. This came approximately 2 months or so (don't quote me on that time frame) after President Obama said that he wouldn't investigate CIA interrogation techniques, because he "wanted to look forward rather than backward". But, as Rush Limbaugh says, everything Obama says has an expiration date, and that date came today for the CIA.

Supporters of Obama will claim that the President didn't want to do this, but he had no choice, because the law is the law, and if there is a chance that laws were broken, it must be investigated. These same supporters will claim that Obama knows this will hurt him politically, but he is doing what he has to do.

To that, I say, what a bunch of bull honkey!!!

This is nothing more than Obama's latest attempt to distract us on the right from the real failures that are going on in his Presidency, while bolstering his support amongst the Bush haters that voted for him. His hope is that this will distract those of us on the right from what he's attempting to do with health care and cap and trade. He wants us focused on trumped up issues, rather than real problems. The recent protests of the right against Obama-care have shown that we can still influence our Representatives in Congress, to the point where even some Democrats are now saying that Health Care Reform likely won't happen this year.

Meanwhile, this is having an effect on Obama supporters already. Today at work, a coworker told me all about how the law is the law and Obama is doing what he has to do...at the expense of his approval rating. He told me that, none of the media pundits think that Obama should do this at this point, but that he has to. I could hear the admiration in his voice. The Bush haters are getting what they want...an investigation into something that went on during the Bush era. Meanwhile, those who think Obama is a moderate are bolstered. They are buying the media spin that Obama is doing something that will likely hurt his approval rating because it's the right thing to do.

To this, I ask, why wasn't it the right thing to do 2 months ago? Why didn't he feel he needed to look into potentially broken laws 2 months ago? To answer this, we have to understand the man. Obama is all about spin. He spun a lot during the election to convince people that he was different. The truth is, he's no different than any other politician, using political tricks and gamesmanship rather than focusing on real issues. Add this to the fact that he's already proven that he isn't the moderate he claimed to be during the election, and a lot of Obama voters must be realizing they were lied to.

The only reason for this timing is to distract us from the real issues!! But we're learning that Obama has no substance, and if he can't fool us, he can't get what he wants. A lot of people were fooled during the election, but some of those people are wising up. We can't let him distract us now. We need to stay on this and stop Obamacare from happening. We need to keep Cap and Trade from happening. We need to keep communicating with our Representatives to make sure they understand how we feel about the issues. We have the power to do this, but we have to stay vigilant and keep our eyes on the REAL issues.

Meet Me In St. Louis

My family and I just got home from a 3 day weekend in St. Louis, Missouri. St. Louis is one of my favorite major metropolitan areas, possibly my favorite. There's just so much to do, and it's relatively inexpensive to do it.

This is the first time we've taken our boys to St. Louis, so this was a very kid friendly trip. We stayed at a Drury Inn, near Forest Park. Forest Park is a huge inner city park on the west end of St. Louis. There are multiple attractions within Forest Park, including an Art Museum, History Museum and an Opera House, but the 2 attractions we hit were the St. Louis Science Center and the St. Louis Zoo.

The St. Louis Science Center is a free admission Science Center, and is connected via sky walk to the McDonnell Planetarium. There are tons of cool, hands-on exhibits, but the best for me was the dinosaur exhibit. They had 2 "life sized" robotic dinosaurs. A T-Rex stalking over a wounded Triceratops. You could spend hours if you tried to do everything at the Science Center. We spent about 2 hours there, hitting the highlights.

The St. Louis Zoo is awesome! It's every bit as cool as Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo, and an easier walk. Also, it's free!!! We spent about 7 hours at the zoo...my older son is an animal nut. He spent an hour in the Insectarium. But, there were plenty of places to sit and rest if we got tired, and lots of different types of food to keep us energized. The highlight for me was the Asian Elephant exhibit. They had 5-6 females, a huge male (I've never seen such a big Asian Elephant), and 2 babies (ages 2 and 3). They were out and active when we went by. The last time we visited St. Louis was 10 years ago, and the exhibit wasn't done at that time, so it was neat to see it done.

As far as food goes, our hotel had a great, hot breakfast. If you ever get a chance to stay at a Drury Inn, take it...it was a very nice hotel. For dinner, the first night, we ate at a Steak and Shake. None of us had ever eaten there before. I know it's a chain, but it was really good. I liked the Steakburger, and the fries were delicious. I'm told the shakes were good too...I just had a Sprite.

The eating highlight was Bartolino's Restaurant, which was attached to the hotel. It's an Italian Place, but not a chain. I think there 2 or 3 in St. Louis, but that's it. The food was absolutely delicious, and there was plenty of it. My youngest son had a pizza, and it was one of the best pizzas I've ever tasted. I had a spaghetti with Italian Sausage. I was expecting Italian Sausage meatballs, but it was actually 2 full Italian Sausages...my mouth is watering now just thinking about it. Definitely a place to stop if you are in St. Louis.

Finally, this morning we went to Mass at the Cathedral-Basilica of St. Louis. This was definitely the most ornate and beautiful church I've ever been in. Sadly, it was only 1/4 full or so. It's enormous, so the singing and everything echoed a lot, making it seem even more empty than it was. I enjoyed going to mass there, but it made me appreciate the smaller size and fuller pews of my local parish.

We had a great trip. I doubt it will be so long before we go back.