So, what do I think of Penny Dreadful?

Glad you asked  :-)

For starters, I can say that the cinematography, set design, costuming and casting is all excellent. The show looks fabulous. I found the opening credit sequence to be less than amazing, but perhaps I've been spoiled by Game of Thrones' inventive title sequence.

The first episode left me a tad underwhelmed as I found a lot of it to feel derivative. That should be expected, I suppose, when you're doing a mash-up of all these 1800's era horror characters. Still, I couldn't help but feel a little League of Extraordinary Gentlemen vibe as Sir Malcolm (Timothy Dalton) assembled his little team. Especially with the addition of six-gun toting Ethan Chandler, played by Josh Hartnett.

The premise is fairly simple -- Sir Malcolm's daughter has been taken by . . . something, and he's trying to get her back. And he needs a team of singular individuals to help him track her down. Mystery and paranormal weirdness ensue.

Part of Sir Malcolm's team is the mysterious Vanessa Ives, played with sultry smokiness by Eva Green. Ives' takedown of Chandler in one scene was so eerily similar to Vesper Lynd's deconstruction of James Bond in Casino Royale that I half expected Chandler to say that he felt skewered afterward.

We're introduced to a young Victor Frankenstein in the premiere as well. The young doctor has arrogance to spare and enough of a god complex that he can stand toe to toe with the formidible Sir Malcolm. I was a bit disappointed that Frankenstein's creation was given life in the first episode, thinking that it left little to work with as the series went on. But after watching the second episode (available on Showtime on Demand in SD only), I see I didn't give the writers nearly enough credit.

In the second episode, we learn much more about all the characters. So much, in fact, that it will take several viewings for this old guy to take it all in. Hartnett's Chandler is hiding out in Europe because of some serious problems with the law back home in the States. Sir Malcolm apparently took either one of his children or his wife on an expedition up a mountain and lost her (perhaps due to his single-mindedness of achieving a goal at all costs). Ms. Ives, besides being quite psychic, is also being hunted by something. Perhaps "the" vampire. Which may explain why she can stop a charging vampire in its tracks. And we learn that Dr. Frankenstein's creation in episode one isn't the first thing he's brought to life. Hmmmm . . .

And speaking of vampires -- these certainly aren't Bram Stoker's vampires. They seem to be created by some sort of Egyptian mythology instead, something about a conjoining of the Gods Amun-Ra and Amunet. And you can apparently kill them with simple bullets or sword thrusts. So we're going down a different road altogether with the vampires.

There's also former Rule 5 girl Billie Piper as an unfortunate that both Chandler and Dorian Grey (almost forgot to mention that he's here as well) spend some time with. I wasn't sure what they would do with Grey, but his introduction has him exuding some lurid goodness. An immortal, he's unafraid to take dangerous risks. As he says at one point -- "I never say no."

I can't see where they're going with Piper's character, if she'll be a continuing one. Biggest problem I have is that I can't understand half of what she says. She's got a hard-edged twangy, perhaps Cockney, accent and combined with the typical sort of fast mumbling style of Brit-speak, I'm shaking my head and cranking up the volume trying to make out her dialogue.

Since they're doing all this 1800's era characters, I'm wondering if we'll get a little Sherlock Holmes at some point. Maybe not a recurring character, perhaps just a little drive by action. The Holmes short stories had a scary edge to them. And if you're going to call your show "Penny Dreadful" you might want to add in one of the most famous of those.

So check it out if you're looking for something a little bit gothic. This might just turn out to be pretty cool.

And here's a bit of Eva Green hotness for you to enjoy as well:

Random internet blogger?

I had that hurled at me today as a pejorative in a comment over a post I put up about a year ago.

Back in June of last year, I lashed out at the New Yorker magazine over their cover that perverted iconic Sesame Street characters Bert & Ernie in the magazine's celebration of the SCOTUS striking down the DOMA (don't you just love all these acronyms?)

Well it took this commentor until now to find my post and he submitted two really lengthy comments dripping with sarcasm and chock full of left wing/MSNBC talking points.

Rather than just tell the guy to "f*ck off" I decided to do a detailed response in the body of the post to explain my thoughts and answer as much of his misguided pronouncements as possible. Yeah. That went about as well as you might expect. I finally got a response today that was, in short form -- "you're wrong about everything because . . . shut up . . . you're stupid!"

Well now he claims he's leaving my blog never to return *sheds single tear* . . . guess I'll just have to keep my chin up and soldier on.

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And to help me through my grief . . . here's some random internet busty hotness:

Daily Duffster

Some photog managed to catch my Duffster without her trademark gorgeous smile:

But there's no hiding her curvy goodness, especially when she's rockin' the skin tight jeans and boyfriend v-neck t-shirt:

Of course Sydney Leathers was at Exxxotica 2014

A career as a television personality talking politics and culture can wait . . . that porno tape isn't going to sell itself ya know:

Can't get enough of that tattooed toothy stuff? Here's a couple topless bikini pics for you. Click for uncensored at your own peril:

When it comes to nipple tape, Taylor is still > Miley

I guess Miley Cyrus has a video out for her song Tongue Tied where she spends most if not all of the video topless in one form or another:

I'm not overly impressed with the visuals (I haven't seen the entire video yet, most places have had it yanked over copyright violations), but it seems a little try hard to me. Though I have to give her a few points for the mild bondage element, that's something new to her repertoire:

Update:
Okay, finally watched the video. Not sure what's going on, it's like 2 minutes long. Maybe it is just a performance piece or something. Very artsy...lots of crazy eyelash stuff, and I can't understand a word she's sings, so I'm not sure what it's about. Just weird.

Nope, for my money Taylor Momsen is still the queen of electrical tape as outerwear:

Not only does Taylor bring that craziness when she's onstage, she isn't afraid to show up at a meet & greet with the goods hanging right out there:

Always more bonus points for live over Memorex. Plus frankly, I sort of like Taylor's music better anyway. So Taylor wins this round again:

Don't hear much about these anymore

I've been contemplating whether or not to write something about my mother for Mother's Day this year. In the past, I've written about my father, but Mom has always been a different subject. But in thinking about her, I've been reminded of something that used to be quite the "thing" back in the day, but seems to have dropped off people's radar these days.

Progressive Dinners.

If you're not close to my age, I doubt you've heard or been to one of these affairs, but back in the 60's and early 70's they were not uncommon at all.

It's a pretty basic idea -- you get maybe a half-dozen couples (and they, at the time, were mostly a couples driven thing, no so much for bringing the kids along) to agree to host a "course" of a meal at their house. And then, along with perhaps a few tag along couples, you traversed your city or neighborhood going house to house for each course.

Cocktails here, appetizer there, main course somewhere else -- you get the idea. It was a way for folks to host part of a party, get to see each other's houses or show off your own abode, etc.

It made for a long evening, especially if there was a lot of driving involved. But they were fun, and the perils of finding someone's house you'd never been to always added some hilarity to the proceedings. But so what? An interesting evening full of fun and conversation and good food . . . what's wrong with that?

Not sure why they went out of style. Perhaps the change in generations -- a social laziness where it's easier to text or skype or simply meet at a bar to interact rather than put some effort into an "event." More's the pity, I think. Another bit of our past lost to our "evoloving" culture.

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And, apropos of nothing, here's Dylan Penn in a recent issue of Treats:

Dylan is the child of Sean Penn and Robin Wright. Sean Penn is a raging, paparazzi punching, murderous dictator loving, eco douchebag, but he's got some good genes working for him. Moves in mysterious ways indeed:

Daily Duffster

Hilary Duff heads to the gym looking a little excited (if you know what I mean and I think that you do):

Man, that's like twice in one week that Hilary's gotten a little nipular. This is a trend I can get behind. Now we just need to see some bikini pics, perhaps a few saucy modeling layouts, and I'm good for the rest of the year   :-)

And just out of curiosity, who is this pap that's always getting these pictures of her coming out of that garage? This dude must live across the street in a dumpster like Oscar the Grouch or something. And she always has such a nice smile for the guy. Amazing.