The Mix : What are people talking about today?

Mindy Newell: Weekend Hoosier?

dc-bombshells-8265958“I’ll make it.” •  Jimmy Chitwood (Maris Valainis) • Hoosiers (1986)

Wow. Two weeks. That’s a long time to wait with bated breath. My apologies to everyone who turned blue while waiting to find out if I had broken my ankles.

To reprise: A little more than two weeks ago, Wednesday July 9 to be exact, I fell down the last flight of stairs of my apartment building. Immediate, serious pain in both feet and ankles – my knees weren’t doing so great either. Afraid to move, I yelled for help, but nobody came – it was 6 in the morning – and as I reached for my cell phone…duh! I had left it upstairs. But somehow, whether it was through the surge of adrenalin rushing through my veins or just pure stubborn idiocy, I got up, gritted my teeth, and shuffled/hobbled to my car.

Just using the gas and brake pedals sent sharp knives up my legs, but I told myself that if any bones were broken I wouldn’t be able to be doing this. I didn’t drive to my local hospital though; I wanted to get to work where my friends were, who happened to be nurses, plus of course there would be doctors. I wasn’t thinking clearly, I just wanted someone to tell me that nothing was broken;

I had some crazy idea that I could stick my feet under the C-arm and have Fantastic Frank, as Stan Lee would say, X-ray technician extraordinaire, also as Stan would say, take a picture and ease my fears – or not. I don’t know why I didn’t just go straight to the ER at the hospital across the street – it’s a Level One trauma center, and I had visions of sitting there all day while other, more seriously ill and wounded people were seen and attended to; and let’s face it, I didn’t want to know that I had broken anything, because I was supposed to fly out to Indianapolis on Friday – the day after tomorrow at the time – for the wedding of my cousin, Delightful Devin to his beautiful Marvelous Maria, as Stan would describe them.

See, I kept remembering a tale my brother had told me about how one autumn morning he and a bunch of his fellow residents were out having a game of touch football, and how one of the guys fell and was moaning and clutching his leg and saying that he had broken it, and how my brother and his band of merry medical men jeered him, saying “don’t be a baby, get up, walk it out,” and how they made this poor guy play out the rest of the game before taking him to the ER, where they all discovered that, yes, indeed, the guy had broken his leg.

So I was a mess, physically and emotionally.

But as I was laying on a stretcher in our Post-Anesthesia Care Unit – PACU, otherwise known as the Recovery Room – and realizing that the ice pack and cold soda cans weren’t do a thing, and that the pain was getting worse, not better, I admitted to myself that I was being really stupid, because the only way I was going to know if I had broken any part of my ankles or feet would be courtesy of an examination in the ER….

…where I discovered, that regardless of whether or not my bones were broken, I wouldn’t be going anywhere. I wouldn’t be getting on any plane in less than 48 hours…

…because the second worse thing happened on that fucked-up miserable day:

My driver’s license wasn’t in my wallet!

Where the fuck was it!

Shit! Shit! Shit!

By the time I was admitted and seen (by a fabulous, young, handsome physician) and told that I wouldn’t need X-rays, that I just had majorly “soft tissue damage” to my ankles and feet, i.e, really bad sprains, and was discharged with the usual instructions about ice and heat and elevate and to “try to walk normally so nothing stiffens up,” all I could think about was oh my fucking god how the hell am I gonna get on the airplane for the wedding?

I was desperate. No, I was beyond desperate; I was a madwoman.

That afternoon I tore the house apart looking for my license. Then I called the New Jersey Division of Motor Vehicles; hell, I even went there – I swallowed three Advils before leaving the house – and, yes, I was trying to “walk normally so nothing stiffens up.” I brought everything I could think of to identify myself, including the driver’s license renewal form I had just received in the mail and my passport – which expired four years ago and of which the DMV informed me that the cut-off date for expired passports as identification is three years – and for my troubles the bitch at the DMV sneered after explaining my situation to her: “Well, I guess you’re just shit of luck.”

I should have reported her. But I was tired, my feet and ankles were really, really hurting me despite the Advils, so I just left.

Aside: Will someone please explain to me why the New Jersey DMV cannot simply look up your credentials via computer, including your picture, especially when you’re 61 and have been a licensed driver since the age of 17? Will someone please explain to my why the New Jersey DMV sends renewal forms – generated by computer – to licensed drivers but still requires six million forms of ID when you go to renew your license?

Aside continued: Especially when, after getting home and calling the Department of Homeland Security and finding out that yes, I should be able get on the plane even though I had lost my driver’s license because they could, by searching the system – looking up on their computers – identify Mindy Newell as a born and bred citizen of the United States with no stains on her record and not on any “No-Fly” list. And by the way, the person I spoke to at the DHS was really nice – she didn’t say, “Well, I guess you’re just shit of luck.”

Still, I was worried about my driver’s license. My writer’s imagination took over. What if someone had stolen it out of my wallet, and what if that someone was a terrorist/jihadist, and what if he or she used my driver’s license for some nefarious and horrible deed? Yeah, I went straight to that – never mind using my license to get into my bank accounts and screwing up my credit and finances.

I finally laid down and elevated my feet and put one of those gel ice packs on my ankles; I also lit a candle, and this nice Jewish girl said a prayer to St. Anthony, patron saint of lost things and lost causes. (I asked him to help me even though I’m Jewish, “because your boss was.”) And I threw in some Wiccan blessings, too.

Well, let me tell you, this Jewess’s prayers were answered.

Though not right away.

By Thursday my feet and ankles were black and blue and swollen, but by walking carefully (though “normally”) I could get around okay. Though more than once I stepped the wrong way and OWWWWWW! But still no license. I was very depressed and worried; called ye old editor Mike for some cheering up and a pep talk. It helped…some. (No offense to Mike.)

Thursday night. No license. I had just sent off the column you read two weeks ago. Then I noticed my checkbook, lying on the radiator cover that is next to my computer. What was it doing there? I picked it up. And something – or someone? St. Anthony? – made me open it.

There it was.

My driver’s license.

I don’t know how the hell it ended up inside my checkbook.

“Hey, St. Anthony,” I said. “It’s me again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

On Friday the only trouble I had at the airport was lagging way behind Alix, Jeff, and my grandson as we walked to the gate. Oh, and security did check my ace bandages for, I guess, any hidden weapons. They didn’t make me unwrap them; just ran a metal detector or something over them. So while so many of you were fulfilling your dream of attending the San Diego Comic-Con two weeks ago, I was in Indianapolis, that fair city, at the wedding of Delightful Devin and Marvelous Maria (as Stan would say), and telling everyone was a great guy good ol’ St. Anthony is.

Or maybe it was the Wiccan blessings?

 

•     •     •     •     •

And to bring this back to comics…I read Ed Catto’s column (She Made Me Do It! Fangirls Lead The Way at San Diego!) with interest and delight. It’s so gratifying to know that women are standing up and proudly proclaiming their fangirl status and being noticed and appreciated.

Back in the dark ages (the ‘80s) when I first became a professional writer at DC, I was so innocent of the “old boys club” in the comics world that I had no idea that it was considered weird for a woman to love comics and/or to write them. Besides, there was my editor, Karen Berger, our own Martha Thomases, and so many other women at DC; and over at Marvel there was Louise Simonson and Jo Duffy and Bobby Chase, just to mention three. So I walked around the halls of DC for a very, very long time before it dawned on me that I was “unusual” in any way – to me it was just about loving the medium, it had nothing to do with gender. And when I went to conventions, I met plenty of professional women creators: Kim Yale, Joyce Brabner, Colleen Doran, Jan Dursema, Trina Robbins, Jill Thompson, Wendy Pini, and so many others.

You want to know how innocent I was? When people – especially younger women–tell me that I was a “glass ceiling” breaker, or that I was an inspiration to them, I used to say “I was?” And not in any make-believe false modesty, either. I just didn’t get it.

Now I do.

But if I was, so then also were all the above and all the women who have worked in comics and newspaper strips and graphic novels and all “sequential storytelling and art” since the industry began.

Brava!

 

Ed Catto: The Retail Panel That Started 35 Years Ago

maxwells-1641224 Another one of the panels I moderated at San Diego Comic-Con was called “The 7 Comic Shop Archetypes.” “Who Will Triumph, Thrive and Survive?” was the admittedly over-the-top subheading. The purpose of this B2B panel was to explore the business aspects of this retail outlet that serves as both the sentry guard and encouraging ambassador for the exploding world of Pop Culture. In many ways, comic shops are on the frontier of one-to-one customer service for many communities and customers.

img_2923-5011949I was excited to start this panel on that Saturday of SDCC, but I think it really started way back in the ‘70s. I clearly remember that point where I had graduated to buying my own comics each week. Before that, my dad had bought me a comic each Sunday after our traditional Italian Pasta Dinner. He’s a very generous guy, and sometimes still buys me comics. Now I had reached a point where I was really into purchasing comics myself with money I earned. Imagining myself as a “world’s greatest detective type,” I took great pride in discerning the shipping schedules for all the comics.

I learned that Thursday was the day they’d rack the new comics. And then I decrypted the Marvel monthly schedule. The Avengers always showed up on the first week of the month, then Captain America and Thor the second week, Spider-Man was the third week and Fantastic Four was always the last week of the month. This was well before the Diamond Previews catalog existed, and I was still a couple of years away from discovering fanzines like The Comic Reader.

So each Thursday I’d ride my bike down to Maxwell’s Food Store at Five Points in Auburn, NY. In typical upstate New York fashion, this was a wonky place where five roads intersected. Maxwell’s, a family owned store, was a kind of “prototype 7-11” style convenience store. When I was there, the stock boy always lurked about, suspicious that I would steal comics. After a while I tolerated that. But I never got used to the “aren’t you a little old for those funny books?” stare from them all. Thankfully, I think that’s stigma’s finally been erased for today’s comic buyers.

One day, on my way home, with my stack of new comics, I saw an incredible sight. Right next to the local barbershop, a man and a woman were moving boxes into the tiny storefront. (We never got our hair cut there – he wasn’t Italian). And they had a sign out front: Kim’s Collectible Comics and Records.

Wow!

I was jumping outta my skin. I introduced myself and pestered them, anxious to go into their store. But they just weren’t ready and explained they were opening the next day. They gave me the “come back tomorrow” line, and I sure did.

The next morning, I was there waiting for them to open up…. and, as you can guess, I went back again and again.

Since then, I’ve always had the good fortune of having a great local comic shop in all the places I’ve lived:

  • Comics For Collectors in Ithaca
  • Million Year Picnic, New England Comics and Newbury Comics in Boston
  • Chapel Hill Comics when I was doing my graduation work at UNC (“Go ‘Heels! Dook sucks!”)
  • Joker’s Child when we settled down in New Jersey
  • Midtown Comics & Jim Hanley’s Universe were perfect for a weekday visit when I commuted into NYC

And now I’m lucky that I can always rationalize a comic shop trip when I’m traveling.

Comic Shops are an important lynchpin for Pop Culture. They also represent a vanishing breed of community-based retailer. Most of us no longer have a neighborhood butcher, a neighborhood vacuum-cleaner-repairman or a neighborhood bartender. Even the person who does your hair probably doesn’t have an exclusive relationship with you. Some of us are lucky enough to have independent, neighborhood bookstores, but not many.

But to many consumers, comic shops are the place where they can find a friendly advisor as they walk down the perilous path of pop culture. And at the same time, they provide a real world “water cooler” opportunity to speak face-to-face with someone passionate and knowledgeable.

Last year at this time, Business Insider proclaimed, “The Comic Book Industry is On Fire, and it’s not just the movies.” Reporter Gus Luben talked about the increase in graphic novels and comics and about the perfect storm of media exposure and conventions. They projected the sales of just comics and GNs at $870 Million at that time. As you’ve been seeing if you’ve been paying attention, that’s all just increased and intensified in 2015.

In my job, as I help connect brands with pop culture in authentic ways, I know that more companies and marketing agencies take geek culture more seriously. Smart marketers understand how important comics shops can be in developing those conversations and relationships. You didn’t have to attend my SDCC panel to understand that.

 

John Ostrander: VOX

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As part of the Kickstarter campaign for Tom Mandrake’s and my new project, Kros: Hallowed Ground (which, by the way, is still going on at x.co/kickkros), I’ve done a number of podcast interviews, which have been fun, and I always try to listen to them. I want to get an idea of how Tom and I sound to the fans who might be listening. However, my voice always surprises me. It’s not how I hear myself. I’m told this is the same situation for many people. How you sound to others is not how you hear yourself.

The same has proven true in my writing. Every writer develops a “voice” – a style, a way of expressing oneself that is unique to the individual writer. If authentic, it will reflect your views, your values, how you think, how you feel, how you react to the world around you and so much more.

Can you imitate someone else’s voice? Of course you can just as all the Elvis imitators out there try to channel Elvis Presley. It’s a whole industry. Within that industry are variations and nuances as each imitator tries to develop their own “voice” as Elvis.

In addition to all your own experiences you add the influences that work on you. What you read, what you see, the music that you hear and so on. One of the ways you develop your voice is by imitating the works that have made an impression on you. You take a bit from here, a touch from there and gradually it becomes how you express yourself. Imitation is certainly permissible at the beginning but, to be a good writer, you must develop beyond that. You take what you learn and make it your own.

The first time I came to the halls of DC comics, I met several editors including Dan Raspler who would later become the first editor on Tom Mandrake’s and my version of The Spectre. Dan did a double take when he saw me and confessed he was startled. He was a big fan of my work on GrimJack and, from my writing, he thought I’d be a big burly and surly young biker type. Instead, he got a genial, balding, pudgy white guy edging into middle-age. I’ve been told I’m very personable and pretty easy to get along with. Some editors have said that if you can’t collaborate with me, you can’t collaborate with anyone. I don’t think that’s how my stories read and that surprises me as well. Dan was right; I write like a surly biker. My work is often cynical, with a dark sense of humor, and I love conflicted characters. I prefer villains to heroes. That’s not who I am in life but it is how I am on paper. And, yes, that sometimes surprises me.

So if you meet me at a convention, come up and say hello. I don’t bite. (Hard.) I’m not that guy you’ve encountered on the pages I’ve written. Overall, I’m pretty nice.

Just don’t cross me.

Kidding.

 

 

Tweeks: SDCC 2015 Part 2: The Haul!

This week is our 2nd San Diego Comic Con Recap…and our HAUL!  See all our stuff (well, most of our stuff) we got at the con, watch us play KISS pinball,  & hear our exciting stories about the Scholastic Party, meeting Jem, the fashionably nerdy mixer,  Holland Roden, Snoopy & Belle in fashion, & a lot of other stuff.

 

Avengers Age of Ultron Invades Homes via Digital HD & Disc

marvelsavengersageofultronbluray-e1437833408298-1865092Marvel Studios reunites Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in the unprecedented movie event, Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron.  Iconic heroes are forced to reassemble and face their most intimidating enemy yet – ULTRON.  Pushed to the brink of their physical and emotional limits, the team must recruit both new heroes and familiar allies to face an escalating danger that threatens the entire planet.

SYNOPSIS:                 Marvel Studios unleashes the next global phenomenon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron. Good intentions wreak havoc when Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) unwittingly creates Ultron (James Spader), a terrifying A.I. monster who vows to achieve “world peace” via mass extinction. Now, Iron Man, Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo)—alongside Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) and Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) —must reassemble to defeat Ultron and save mankind… if they can! This action-packed adventure is a must-own, mind-blowing blast!

CAST:                            Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man (Marvel’s The Avengers, Marvel’s Iron Man), Chris Hemsworth as Thor (Marvel’s Thor, Marvel’s The Avengers), Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner/Hulk (Marvel’s The Avengers, Shutter Island), Chris Evans as Steve Rogers/Captain America (Marvel’s The Avengers, Marvel’s Captain America: The First Avenger),Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow (Lost in Translation, Marvel’s The Avengers),
Jeremy Renner as Clint Barton/Hawkeye (The Hurt Locker, Marvel’s The Avengers), James Spader as Ultron (TV’s The Blacklist, Lincoln), Samuel L. Jackson (Pulp Fiction, Django Unchained) as Nick Fury

PRODUCER: Kevin Feige, p.g.a. (Marvel’s The Avengers, Marvel’s Iron Man)

WRITER / DIRECTOR: Joss Whedon (Marvel’s The Avengers, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D)

COMPOSERS: Danny Elfman (The Simpsons, Corpse Bride), Brian Tyler (Marvel’s Iron Man 3, Marvel’s Thor: The Dark World)

RELEASE DATES:          September 8, 2015 for Digital 3D and Digital HD

October 2, 2015 for Digital SD, 3D Blu-ray Combo Pack (3D Blu-ray+Single Disc Blu-ray+Digital Copy), Blu-ray, DVD and On-Demand

PRODUCTS:                     Digital HD/SD, Disney Movies Anywhere (DMA), 3D Blu-ray Combo Pack, Blu-ray, DVD and On-Demand

BONUS:                             Digital HD*, Disney Movies Anywhere (DMA), 3D Blu-ray Combo Pack, Blu-ray

  • Never-Before-Seen Deleted Scenes
  • Making-of Featurettes
  • Gag Reel
  • Audio Commentary

*Digital bonus offerings may vary by retailer                

DVD:

  • Making-of Featurette

FEATURE RUN TIME:   Approximately 141 min.

RATINGS:                          PG-13 in U.S.; PG in CE; G in CF

ASPECT RATIO:              Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray & DVD = 1080p High Definition / 2.40:1

AUDIO:                       Blu-ray 3D & Blu-ray 2D = English 7.1 DTS-HDMA, French-Canadian 5.1 Dolby Digital, Latin Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital, English DVS 2.0 Dolby Digital

DVD = English/Latin Spanish/French Canadian 5.1 Dolby Digital, English DVS 2.0 Dolby Digital

LANGUAGES:                 U.S.: English & Spanish

Canada: English, French

SUBTITLES:                  English, French & Spanish

YouTube                https://www.youtube.com/user/MARVEL

The Point Radio: Nothing Complicated With Jessica Szohr

Actress Jessica Szohr has landed on the hit USA series, COMPLICATIONS. She fills us in on all the action, why you should be watching and talks about her upcoming roles, too. Plus we look at what may TV’s most unique concept, Comedy Central’s DRUNK HISTORY. How do they do that?

In a few days, Denis Leary joins us to talk about SEX, DRUGS and ROCK AND ROLL,  Be sure and follow us on Twitter now here.

Marc Alan Fishman: Marvel – Make Em’ Laugh. Make Em’ Laugh!

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Howdy ya’ll. I’m back from Nashville. And you know what they say about Music City: What happens in Music City, stays in Music Ci… wait, no, they don’t say that. Feh!

It was a day-job convention. It was exhausting. It was very much not about comics, pop culture, or anything fun. But since ya’ll wanted to know, I saw Barbara Mandrell’s mansion and it was everything I expected it to be. Isn’t this cool, kiddos? I’m not even one paragraph in, and I already need to utter ComicMix’s favorite catchphrase, stolen directly from Peter David… But I digress.

So this past weekend I was able to enjoy Marvel’s latest movie, Ant-Man. And I emphasize how much I enjoyed it. Amidst a well-balanced story that juggled the motifs of loss, fathers and daughters, mentorship, and morality, there was an underlying current of pure joy that rooted the near-two hour run time with positivity. This spat in the face of the pre-movie trailer roll, which included Fantastic Four, as well as both the teaser and full trailer Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice: Brow Furrowing: I Hope You Bleed: Don’t You See How Much I Care? It leaves me dumbfounded and baffled to ask this – have Warner Bros and Fox simply not paid any attention to Marvel Studios for the past seven years?

Ant-Man, much akin to nearly every other movie in the Marvel Movieverse, ensured that laughter permeated the periphery of nearly every scene. When wonderful things happened, a quip wasn’t far behind. When things got awkward, Paul Rudd’s Paul-Ruddyness broke the tension. And when the world needed to be saved, grimaces were grimaced, long enough to solve the problem. And then, on with the yuck-yucks. This is as it was in Iron Man, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Avengers (1 more than 2). By the time Thomas the Tank Engine was ramrodding YellowJacket in the mush, I’d realized I’d not frowned once. My usual resting bitch face ached from the corners of an upturned mouth – a feat only last realized when Captain America: Winter Soldier was on free cable while I was in Nashville.

It begs me to ask: who here caught themselves smiling during Man of Steel? Who caught those sneak peaks of Batman v. Superman or Suicide Squad, and rocked back and forth in their chair with glee (save perhaps for our own John Ostrander, who is given a pass while The Wall is given quality screen time and played by a wonderful actress)? The only time we may have had the slightest guffaw might have been when Lex “Not the Facebook Guy” Luthor cackled that “the red capes are coming.” Suicide Squad‘s trailer did elicit a chuckle from me – but only when I was snarkily grimmacing at Will Smith’s Men In Wild Wild West Robot Independence Day impression of himself. And the less I say about the dark nightmare that Fantastic Four is to be the better.

In all of these cases I simply can’t understand the logic, or the lack there of. Marvel has been killing the box office with each outing. Paired with a ton of licensing deals for merch, streaming contracts, and cable air-play, it’s literally the cash cow they can’t stop milking. Every new movie could spin-off a trilogy. And with Agents of SHIELD and Agent Carter making dub-smash videos showcasing that even on TV Marvel can’t stop having fun… it’s starting to become ludicrous to me that the others in the same space seem to think that the polar opposite must be the key to hidden treasure.

Forgive me if I get a bit philosophical before I wrap this up. More often than not, we turned to the funny books with the capes and cowls because they were fun. And while the industry at large grew darker over time – at the core, the fun remained.

And now, even amidst massive hits like the Walking Dead or Crossed (which is about as bleak as they can get), you can’t shake a stick without hitting brilliant explorations of innocence and joy. Beneath any layers of dread, angst, or fear, our pulp roots cling hard to the light in the world. Superman is, was, and will always be a symbol of hope. To yoke that with the sadness and pain of reality – and then double down with a dour and fighty Batman – is to celebrate those things that simply get in the way of how we want to feel when our heroes are given the opportunity to become that much more real.

If DC (and Fox) can’t see the forest for the trees… all they have to do is lighten up. Forgive me: Someone get those Pepsi-drinkers a god-damned Coke, and let them really taste the difference. There’s a reason why 7-Up ain’t even in third place, kiddos.

 

Would you Believe Get Smart is Turning 50?

get_smart-tv-e1437705682445-7221326New York, N.Y., July 23, 2015 – When it originally debuted in September of 1965, Get Smart, the multiple Emmy®winning classic spy-spoof comedy series from comic geniuses Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, generated countless catchphrases like “Would you believe?” and “Missed it by that much.” This fall, to mark the 50th anniversary of the legendary series, HBO Home Entertainment® is bringing those catchphrases to a new generation when all five seasons of Get Smart are made available for digital download for the very first time. With the digital release, longtime fans will have a chance to watch the series in an exciting new format, while new fans will be introduced to the antics of Maxwell Smart for the first time.  Get Smart will be available as a digital download August 10, 2015 across all major retailers. Suggested retail price is $1.99 for each SD episode and $19.99 for each SD season.

“You lucky dogs. You’re gonna get to see Don Adams talking on his shoe telephone and watch the unbelievable antics of Maxwell Smart and The Chief trying to hear each other under The Cone of Silence,” said Mel Brooks. “Can’t wait to see it myself!”

Full of bumbling spies, gadgets and gags, Get Smart features the beloved characters Maxwell Smart/Agent 86 (Don Adams), Agent 99 (Barbara Feldon), and the Chief (Edward Platt) – members of a top secret U.S. government agency called CONTROL, who battle the forces of their nemesis KAOS, an equally inept foreign spy agency. The series was ahead of its time in the way that it created a vast, complicated mythology and mastered the art of self-referential comedy to reward its loyal audience for tuning in week after week. The series originally debuted on NBC in 1965 and enjoyed popularity and a cult following before moving to CBS for its final season. Since ending, it has inspired numerous spinoffs, sequels and remakes, including a 2008 summer box office hit starring Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway.

The Law Is A Ass

Bob Ingersoll: The Law Is A Ass #366: ROUND UP THE USUAL SUSPICIONS

lawass-550x275-2536619Okay, a show of hands, who’s ever heard them say this one on a TV show? POLICE: “You’re under arrest.” SUSPECT: “On what charge?” POLICE: “Suspicion of murder.”

Why did I think a show of hands would work in a written medium?

Here’s a little tip for the next time any of you might be writing dialog for a police procedural; unless you’ve got Joan Fontaine married to Cary Grant in a Hitchcock movie, there’s no such thing as suspicion of murder. Or suspicion of anything, for that matter.

In our criminal justice system, all crimes are statutory. That means laws were written which created the crimes and defined the crimes’ elements. Let’s take murder, for example, because that’s the crime people are arrested for “suspicion of” committing on TV. The elements of murder are, most commonly, that the actor 1) purposely, 2) caused the death, 3) of another person. So if Cain shoots Abel with a gun and Abel dies we have a crime of biblical proportions. We also have all the elements of murder. But if even one element is missing, we don’t have murder. We may have some crime, but it’s not murder.

Say Cain didn’t know the gun was loaded then shot Abel and Abel died. Then Cain wouldn’t be guilty of murder, because Cain didn’t kill Abel on purpose. It would be some form of a negligent homicide, but not a murder.

Or if Cain shot Abel and Abel didn’t die, you wouldn’t have a murder. You’d have an assault of some sort, but not a murder, because no one died.

Finally, if Cain killed Abel, but Abel was a dog you wouldn’t have murder, because no person died. You’d have some form of animal abuse, but not a murder. (And calm down, PETA, no animals were harmed in the writing of this hypothetical.)

Suspicion is not a crime whose elements are defined in a statute. At least, I’ve never seen any statute which created a crime called suspicion and I’ve looked at the statutes of a lot of states. If your jurisdiction has a crime called suspicion on its books, let me know. I’d love to find out what it’s elements are. (I’m guessing oxygen, because it would be a lot of hot air.) However, because there’s not crime called suspicion on the books, the police can’t arrest someone for suspicion.

In the same way that the police can’t arrest you for suspicion, because it’s not a crime, they also can’t arrest you simply because they suspect you committed a crime. An arrest has to be based on probable cause not suspicion.

To have probable cause, the police have to be able to establish that it’s more probable than not that every element of the crime exists. (You do remember the elements of the crime, don’t you? We’ve talked about them periodically today.) The police also have to be able to establish that it’s more probable than not that the person they suspect of committing the crime, performed the acts which violated the statute. If they merely suspect someone, but don’t have probable cause, they can’t legally arrest that person.

In Terry v. Ohio, the Supreme Court ruled that the police may temporarily stop someone if they reasonably suspect that the person may be about to commit a crime. If the police see someone who looks like he’s casing a store he intends to rob later, the police may reasonably suspect he’s going to commit a robbery. In that case, the police may stop that person and ask him questions find out what he’s up to. Once the police have done that, they have to let the person go. The bad news is they can’t arrest him. The good news is, as the person knows the police are on to him, he’ll probably abandon his plans to rob the store.

If the police happen upon a crime – say someone has just been murdered in an alley – and the police see somebody lurking around, they may reasonably suspect that somebody met the body while the body was still alive and killed him. Under the Terry rule, the police may approach that person and ask him some questions. But they may not arrest him no matter how reasonable their suspicion may be.

Sometimes while questioning the person they suspect, the police get some actual information which gives them probable cause. A witness might come up and say he saw that person commit the murder. Or the suspect might make the classic Murder, She Wrote http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086765/combined mistake and says something about the corpse that only the murderer could know. Once something like that happens and the police get probable cause, then they can arrest the person. But not before. Not when they only suspect him.

So, if the police can’t arrest someone for suspicion of committing a crime, how did that whole cliché start? Here’s my theory.

Last week, I talked about another common, but illegal, police practice: the investigatory hold. That’s when the police put someone they suspect of committing a crime into custody so that they can investigate the matter further. If the police get enough information to charge the person, they will present the case to the district attorney for formal charging. If they don’t they’ll release the person. I suspect arresting “on suspicion” was simply another way of saying performing an investigatory hold that the police started using because it sounds cleaner. It sounds more like the person being detained actually did something wrong – after all, he’s suspected of something rather than being investigated.

Well, police in movies and on TV, anyway. Did the police in the real world ever actually say that? I don’t know. But I have my suspicions.

REVIEW: Silicon Valley the Complete Second Season

silicon-valley-11-203-no-copy-smiling-e1437705433873-5530850It’s a challenge to begin watching a show during its second season. After all, the characters have been introduced, the dynamics established and the backstory in place. Season twos tend to show evolution as the cast and crew all find their rhythm but don’t always remember to reintroduce themselves in case newcomers have wandered by.

I had been hesitant to try Silicon Valley, the Mike Judge-created series on HBO, largely because we sat through the wildly uneven first season of AMC’s Halt and Catch Fire and felt that was our technology quota of television. So, when HBO invited me to review Silicon Valley the Complete Second Season, I decided to take the plunge. First, there was watching it video Digital HD, not disc, and there was exploring something new.

The show is funny and engaging, as much an office workplace dramedy as it is a commentary on our growing connection virtually, and less so as human beings. These ten episodes were filled with characters, mostly well realized, all well-acted.

Silicon Valley S2This band of misfits run Pied Piper, a music app, and the season opened with back and forth over ownership issues, an all-too-common problem with intellectual property these days. Apparently PP was created while members of the team worked for Hooli and their CEO Gavin Belson (Matt Ross) wants it, meaning its valuable, a plus to the team. Of course litigation tends to scare people off and sure enough this complicates locating investors willing to weather the storm.

As a result, they accept the offer from the eccentric Russ Hanneman (Chris Diamantopoulos), whose actions take the PP team into uncomfortable territory. What could have been an interesting breakout character felt like a retread of the dude who took over ACN on HBO’s sister program The Newsroom. Opposing him and acting as the moral voice at times was Richard (Thomas Middleditch), who seems to grow stronger as a leader throughout the season. Of course, there sometimes comes a price to be paid which happens in the season finale. The app gets a real world test so we build up to that moment and deal with the aftermath along with the percolating court case.

There’s some nice chemistry with Dinesh (Kumail Nanjiani) and Gilfoyle (Martin Starr) as they prank one another that allows the series to veer into other tech realms such as Kickstarter.  Then there’s Jared who is the team optimistic and perhaps its quirkiest member.

For a 30 minute series, it has a large sprawling cast, made larger by many new additions notably Laurie (Suzanne Cryer), the new CEO at Raviga Capital. The arrival of so many new faces, including Carla (Alice Wetterlund) at the Hacker Hostel, also meant others got diminished screen time and overall, it’s hard to provide more than a handful of characters any depth.

The storylines drew tighter by the ninth episode and the tenth and “Two Days of the Condor,” the final episode proved the most satisfying with moving storylines along and making a marked social commentary with a human life at stake. Things came to a climax and reset the status quo as things settle down but Raviga, the new investors in Pied Piper want Richard out and he’s fired. From what I saw this season, it was totally justified.

Overall, the series is funny and often wildly so, but it also presents a skewed view of software engineers (I know, I’m married to one) as well as corporate shenanigans. Judge, who did give us the brilliant Office Space, seems to be stretching credulity now and then in the interests of being quirky. Props, though to the real tech, tech theory, and law that was infused throughout the season, grounding it when it could otherwise floated away as a lightweight series.

The show is definitely entertaining and easy to binge so here’s a chance to catch up. The Digital HD release is as pristine as the cable broadcast and streams cleanly with good picture and audio. Will I be around for season three? Probably, there’s enough here to like and the 30 minute slices are good so it doesn’t wear out its welcome.

 

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