Score: Clarke 1, Goldstein banned from the sport forevermore

Civilized Celts would send skillful bards to sing satires in great competitions. I applaud the idea of returning to such a literate tradition, but really…a skilled writer who knows something of meter and meaning vs. a clumsy, chattering hack who strings words together in lumpy, clattering arrhythmia? If this were a boxing match, it’d be like pitting Mohammed Ali in his prime against Steve Buscemi with a hangover. It’s Bambi sans charm vs. Godzilla with a keyboard. It’s the Philadelphia Philharmonic playing over a gurgling drainpipe. Who put together this embarrassing mismatch?

Summertime priorities

I say, “Fie on you, Superman Returns.” I’ll probably go see it if it shows up here in Morris, but otherwise, Jesus in spandex has little appeal to me.

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The only summer blockbuster I care about is the one with the pirates, and most importantly, the villains based on marine biology.

It takes a tortuously long time to get all the narrative plates spinning, but things fall into place once the real villain of the piece is unfurled. This is Davy Jones – of locker fame – and if that sounds like a cliché too far even for a camp pirate flick, Jones, played by Bill Nighy, and his crew are to this film what Depp was to its predecessor. They’re like a bad acid trip at the sealife centre. They sail in a living wreck and have bodies composed of aquatic lifeforms: one has the head of a hammerhead shark, another has cheeks like a pufferfish, and Jones himself has a giant lobster claw for a hand, and a wonderfully slimy octopus head with a prehensile beard of tentacles, through which he barks the fruitiest Scottish brogue this side of the Simpsons’ Groundskeeper Willie. It’s a triumph of special effects that this cephalopod creation is both unnervingly freakish, yet unmistakably Bill Nighy.

<swoon>

Music? Bah! Totally irrational!

But it’s science themed music, so that makes it a little bit OK. Easternblot.net links to music from This Week In Science, and in the comments, I discover the media empire of Doctor Steel. My kind of guy.

Oh, and since I haven’t done a Friday Random Ten in a while, here’s a science themed Friday Nonrandom Ten.

Evolution Rocks Overman
Jocko Homo Devo Greatest Hits
Dr. Worm They Might Be Giants
Do The Evolution Pearl Jam
Apeman The Kinks
Monkey To Man Elvis Costello
Monkey Gone To Heaven Frank Black
Primitive Science Kiril
Evolution is a Mystery Motorhead
What We Need More Of Is Science MC Hawking