IT’S BATUSI TIME!

So let me take you in a time machine. I got one right here. We can go back to the furthest reaches of time in this puppy. Where to go, where to go? I know, how about 1990?

Let’s go to a land where TV was stranger than it had been in a lot of ways. A land where teenagers don’t act or look like teenagers. Where California is some magical land that doesn’t really exist in any provable way. A time when David Austin Green was roughly three feet tall.

Yeah, I watched the opener of Beverly Hills 90210 today.

I haven’t seen it since it first aired, mind you. Back then it was this show that you watched because … it was there. It was zany and wacky and you only hoped they meant it that way. They did. For the most part. It’s aged … interestingly, let me tell you.

The California they use is familiar to children of the 80s, teens of the 90s. We saw it in Beverly Hills Cop, in all sorts of movies and shows and all 90210 did was make it a bit stranger and then drop the characters to teens. That way we could relate. Or something.

Watching these pans across campus with people randomly dancing, wearing outfits that no one on Earth wore in public to High School, much less a costume party, and generally acting like they were being paid to be there (well…) it becomes this carnival. It’s a wonderland. Land of Misfit Humans.

These days Brenda and Brandon’s relationship is still verging on creepy (She asks him to help pick out her outfits? Not that she takes his advice but that she asks? And they’re sixteen? Really?) and yet also bitchy as hell. They will ditch each other at the drop of a hat for social reasons and yet when they both get home from dates far past curfew say “Tell Mom and you’re dead!” at the same time and laugh. Like they’re nine.

And maybe that’s the secret. Mentally they were about nine. Physically they were about thirty-nine. Oh, Andrea. Oh why did they have to cast the “poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks who is also ultra-smart” with an actress who looked to be about forty? I keep thinking she’s the journalism professor, not a student.

Ian Ziering, and this hurts me to say, is the breakout for me in this first pair of episodes (the two that make up the pilot) because he is the only guy who comes across as remotely believable - for a college show. Except that outfit at the party! Steve! STEVE! Listen to me! Who told you a white polo shirt, white shorts and a long blue blazer were a good fashion choice? Who did it? I don’t care that Brian Austin Green wrecked your car, fuck the car. Kick the ass of your fashion consultant.

Brandon is written to be so white bread and pure that it breaks him. Let’s see - gets a date with a hot girl who is also one of the richest girls in school, while at his first party ever out there, check. Takes her on a date where she rides her dad’s motorcycle and then let’s him drive it, check. Girl suddenly exclaims, in the hot tub, “Let’s take off all our clothes!”, check. And then Brandon talks her off the ledge and wants to take it slow and easy because hey, he’s a good guy. This only happened, of course, to set up a whole “Is Brandon scum? No he’s a STAND UP KINDA GUY” bit that shows everyone that, it is true - this man has no dick. I’m not saying he should have fucked everything offered, no of course not, but it felt so false and so faked and determinalistic that the laughter didn’t stop.

Brenda, of course, fakes being in college to go out with the lawyer. Now, I hadn’t seen this episode in 18 years remember, so when we first see this guy in the club I said, to my cat “Brenda is meeting her designated date rapist for the evening, kitty, pay attention.” But he wasn’t. No he was just a hip and happening lawyer who hangs out at clubs and can’t tell a sixteen year old from a twenty-one year old. Well, on this show I suppose I can see why not. She does look about twenty-five, but do we have to admit it?

They did play one moment perfectly (and by perfectly I mean hysterically) though. When they guy finds out, after three dates, that Brenda is only sixteen (But only when she admits it! Come on! She was supposed to be an astronomy major and yet she described a black hole as “A hole. That’s black.”) he gets pissed and drives her home. On their way home she tells him that she can’t believe she was going to sleep with him that “You were going to be the first…” and they get a one second shot of this guy’s face and you just know he’s thinking about forgiving her lies, if only for the night. Fucked up? Sure. But perfect.

They also had a wonderful payoff earlier, to something that I don’t think was meant as a set-up. Brenda calls Kelly. Light is streaming through the windows of both bedrooms. Bright, the-sun-has-landed sunlight lighting the sets. And Kelly’s mother comes in and lectures her about having people call “in the middle of the night.” I started to laugh. And then her mother said something about how could people call each other at 6am. All right, that wins. When 6am is the middle of the night - your life is full of that Beverly Hills 90210 flavor! Kinda like cold coffee aftertaste, but I digress.

This show has aged with flavor, I tell you. It used to be something I would watch because it was so impossible and ludicrous that it had to be seen to be believed, at turns incredibly heavy-handed and misinformed. Pure fucking magic. But now? Eighteen years later? It’s even better. It looks kind of like someone in the future decided to make a show about teens in Beverly Hills and used bad future design sense to guess at what free-wheeling teens must’ve worn back then. And then they wrote it like they thought this sort of show should be written.

Except it wasn’t a message from the future. It was done in its time. And that is what makes it even more magical now than ever. Christ, this show is like the bubblegum you would get with baseball cards - you don’t want to chew it but you have to see if it’s fresh enough to actually chew and then… well yeah it tastes kinda funny but you’re chewing it and it is somehow strangely addictive.

Fuck. 90210. Yeah, man. Yeah.

So Robyn put the interview up as cartoons and then she did this. So I felt the need to post it as a little bonus slice to the interview. Enjoy.

In time with the CANNONS?

Just so you know - this is what it is like inside my brain as I work:

This is the best idea ever. No, really, this idea is shiny and fantastic. I love it. I love it like a little shiny thing made directly of untouched awesome. It is shit. First of all, twenty other people have done this in the last week, you moron, and secondly you couldn’t handle it right if you were given a map. Which is why it will be awesome to do, because this idea is so cool. This opening? It hits the right tone. Except it sucks. But other than that it is great. Now how can I get to the plot here, because these characters wouldn’t exactly do things this way but I don’t want to shoehorn them into a messy angle of… well I could just start over. I could cheat! Cheating is ok, so long as no one notices. But everyone will notice. No, I’m crafty, they will look at this other hand over here. Misdirection! I dated her once, I think. Miss Direction. Never knew where we were going, needed a GPS. This is no time for jokes! Save the jokes for the writing! Except that one because really, that wasn’t funny. No, no it wasn’t and I apologize. It’s ok, you got it out in your head instead of anywhere else, so we’re both safe. So back to work, yes let’s. Ok this whole thing sucks. I should restart it. Except restarting it will waste time I don’t have. Deadlines matter. True but can I rework it and save time or will that waste more time? You know what would really waste time… I haven’t seen Ghostbusters in at least four months.

90 minutes later

That sure is a good movie. Unlike the shit I write. Except.. I could totally use this new idea to add to the old idea and then merge them with a slight adjustment. Maybe 60 degrees off center and then the characters will all be facing the right angle for the rest of the plot and everything will make sense. This will never work. It will be fantastic! All right I gotta try it and if it doesn’t work I can wipe it. It worked! Unless you aren’t a monkey, I am just a monkey. A fucking word monkey, that’s all I am. But this is good, for the first time I’ve done something good. Well there was that one story, I admit I still do like it. Yeah that one was ok, maybe this can be better! It sucks. I just have to work out a few kinks! The Kinks, man I like the Kinks, I wonder if Wikipedia has anything about the Kinks?

3 hours later

Back to work time. Here we go. Time to rock it, whose house? Run’s house! Why don’t I add a Run D.M.C. reference to this story? Well shit, I do like pop culture. But these characters don’t. All right can I toss one in anyway? Maybe a side character? An NPC can come in and be all “Run’s House, bitches!” and then… rob a bank? Yes! I need a bank robbery in this story. It’s about dinosaurs. Right. DINOSAUR BANK! Dinosaur… sperm… bank? Stop it! FOCUS! All right, so the plot is set the characters are straight and the story is moving. It’s laying bricks now. Just work work work. Nothing to do but hammer and get it done. Unless… that bank idea could work. It could be a time travel story instead. A time travel hijinks-filled, bank robbin’ story. That might be even better. Man I like hijinks. You know… I haven’t seen a good caper movie in like a week. I wonder what I have on the shelf? I have time to watch movie…

And so on…

The last part of Robyn’s interview with me, done in the wonderful bitstrips format. Look for a possible bonus non-interview strip tomorrow.

I got the mad beats, like the sad beats, except they ain’t sad. They mad! Mad like a hatter, my mom is fatter, fuck you what rhymes with fatter?

I lay so much smackdown, you just can’t be around, you gotta run and hide. Run! Hide! Run! Hide! Hide! Run! Yeah. You confused now, bitch. Like Daffy Duck and Bugs the Bunny, I got you running, I steal your honey. Like Winnie the Pooh, I mix my references all up, on my resume, it’s got sway, I forgot where I was.

And then I open my eyes, and I steal your soul!

I AM SHIVA! I AM MIGHTY! GIVE ME WHISKEY! IN MY PANTS I GO POTTY! NO ONE IS STRONGER! NONE SHALL SURVIVE! IN ALL CAPS I WILL SCREAM! AND SHIT OUT A BEEHIVE!

Not the hairdo you fool. Actual bees. Real bees, with stingers, they’ll attack you like a ladder. After it gets tipped over. It’s like a video, you know, with people who fall off ladders, fuck you why you gotta play me? You ain’t Kid! You ain’t Play! Shit, you ain’t got the mad hair!

Now you listen here, and you listen with fear! I’m the Hammerpants, and in my fur coat I go pimping! I keep my pimp hand stronger, and my wrist it ain’t limpin’. Like I did after that time I tripped over my own shoes. But shut the fuck up fool! I won’t tell you again!

NONE SHALL REMAIN! MAKE YOUR TIME! I WILL SEND YOU UP THE HIZZOUSE BOMBSHELLS! LIKE MANUEL I WILL DWELL IT WILL BE SWELL SEE MY RHYME! MAKE YOUR TIME!

‘Cause this land it’s your land, this land it’s my land from the… fuck I’m bad at maps. Fuck this. Peace out.

I’LL SWALLOW YOUR SOUL!

Steven, Steven, Steven. Why are we here? Are you asking yourself that just now, or have you already worked it out? I mean it could be the whole guitar thing you have going on. It may be. I admit I don’t get it. Sure, all right, we all love to shred. We all do. But must you look offstage so often with this look of “Hey, lookit me, I’m shredding!” that just makes us all want to pop your pear head with a pin? Must you? And then that shirt. I saw that shirt, in Chinatown. Women’s XL, I’m guessing, on you. Not only is it a brave step toward a new film Steven Segal’s MUMU, but it really doesn’t go with jeans. Plus the vest/shirt thing? It’s like you want to throw so many things at me I can’t pick what to laugh at. Maybe that’s your plan. If so, well played Segal. Well played.