The Walter White Guide to Middle Age

Being middle-aged isn't generally considered to be cool. It's usually the time when people begin contemplating how much they've changed and how close to death they now are. Of course a little latter when they become seniors those concerns become less pressing and thoughts turn to Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune and Fox News.

Very few actors for example, have made a name for themselves after they turned 45. Bryan Cranston is one of those. AMC's Breaking Bad accomplished something quite remarkable - and has empowered middle-aged white men everywhere. Breaking Bad made the mid-life crisis cool. How did they manage to accomplish this seemingly impossible feat? It was Walter White of course...

The five season long series that redefined television finally concluded this month and as a tribute to that show and middle-aged men everywhere we've collected some wisdom and advice from the show's lead character on how to deal with middle age.

Walter White - White, Middle-Aged and Funky

• Tip 1 - Don't trust Social Security to provide an adequate pension for you or your family; you will need at least $9 to 14 million in ready cash.
• Tip 2 - Conflict resolution is a thing of the past - it's better to deal with problems head-on - and make them just go away (permanently).
• Tip 3 - Driving a beat up Pontiac is just fine. 
• Tip 4 - Don't let anyone ridicule your funny hats.
• Tip 5 - Share your wisdom, mentor a young person.
• Tip 6 - Don't just build a business, create an empire.
• Tip 7 - Science and Chemistry are cool. Remote control machine guns are a great hobby too.. 
• Tip 8 - Never go into business with Ayran prison gangs.
• Tip 9 - Don't wait for Obamacare to get the treatment you need.
• Tip 10 - Encourage your wife to work, laundering your excess cash.
• Tip 11 - Don't waste your money on expensive legal advice. 
• Tip 12 - Accidents happen, get over it.
• Tip 13 - Do it for the family, do it for the fun.
• Tip 14 - Product quality is just as important as distribution.
• Tip 15 - The goatee is a reflection of raw power.

One of the many tributes to middle-aged cool

We will miss you Walter White, that is unless AMC decides to bring you back in the Walking Dead or as a teen intern in Madmen.


copyright, Raving Reviews 2013

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Breaking Bad AP Chemistry 101

Hello and welcome to the Breaking Bad AP Honors Chemistry course.

We have lot's in store for you this semester and we're sure it will prove to the most exciting science class you've ever taken. Your professor this year is our Dean of Chemistry, Walter White. Professor White brings an unparalleled academic record and an absolute love for chemistry into every course he teaches. He is recognized worldwide for his skills in growing crystals and also runs a thriving small business in his spare time. Your course assistant this semester is Jesse Pinkman, he is majoring in Meth Production and Distribution as well as punk rock.

Your AP Chemistry course Professor, Walter White

Course Syllabus
This semester's course will be divided in the following categories or sections; we'll denote within each area when labs are required:

Bomb Making Essentials - We will explore a variety of chemical compounds used to produce explosives and even create triggering devices. These techniques will come in very handy whenever you may feel the need to blow the face off of any rival druglord.

Lab 1 - Mercury mini-bombs.

Lab 2 - Glycerin (how to turn soap into dynamite)

Lab 3 - Plastique basics   

Dissolving Bodies - There's nothing worse than using the wrong acid compounds to eliminate evidence, it can lead to serious damage to your lab or basement. This section will explore how to most efficiently dissolve corpses while leaving your lab intact.

Lab 1 - Dissolving Guinea Pigs in milk cartons

Meth Production - Baking crystals isn't easy. Professor White takes you from theory to large scale production. 

Lab 1 - How to make super-pure Blue Meth Crystals 

Lab 2 - How to clean your lab without driving your mentor insane

The Big Rock Candy Mountain...

Setting up Mobile Labs - Being stuck indoors all the time is no fun for anybody let alone homicidal chemists - there is a way around this dull routine however; build a mobile lab. This section will explore everything from the types of recreational vehicles to choose as well as finding the equipment best suited for mobile chemistry. 

Lab 1 - Properly weighting down the RV

Killing your co-workers - Competition within the chemistry field can be cutthroat and let's face it, who needs the aggravation? Whenever you find yourself at odds with up and coming talent why not just eliminate the stress altogether? Or what about that partner who got rich off of your discovery and screwed you over? This section explores the myriad of ways you can use what you love (chemistry) to kill jerks you don't like.

Lab 1 - Killing co-workers at the lab

Lab 2 - Killing associates outside of the lab

Mixing Poisons - Ever wish you could make your own Ricin? We'll cover that and much more in this section.

Lab 1 - Using household items to produce deadly toxins.

Chemistry and Glam Rock - Even Chemists need to unwind; why not do it by creating elaborate Karaoke videos to David Bowie or David Bowie knockoff songs. This section of the course will show you how. 

this seems so harmless... ha ha ha

Chemistry and Glam Rock go hand in hand

Copyright 2012 - Raving Reviews - All Rights Reserved

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Why do Bad Shows do Well?

While truly great cinema and television fail to make it? This is today's question. A question that comes in the wake of:

• The massive Twilight opening
• The biggest Bond film ever
• The impressive showing for Lincoln

Of the three movies listed above we attended two of the premieres. We won't attend the third (Twilight) on principle - the first Twilight movie was Ok, the follow-ons have gotten sillier and seem to represent an opportunity to see the main characters again in a sort of teen worship scenario. The other movies listed above seemed very promising from the initial reviews and trailers yet we walked out of both highly disappointed. 

If these three were ugly, how many teens would go to watch their movie?

Lincoln, which we just saw on Friday was a relatively lifeless and unimaginative take on Lincoln which chose to suck in every oddball piece of Lincoln mythology developed over the past 150 years. Skyfall was a movie that didn't seem to know where it was going for more than half of the picture with a James Bond who seemed as though he was doing his best to get out of his contract by turning in the most apathetic Bond performance in a generation  Yet both films have done exceptionally well. On the other, Cloud Atlas, which was remarkable on many levels, fell flat in the box office (at least here in the US, it did much better internationally).

Now, there are exceptions where great shows are actually recognized as being great these days, although most of that is coming from television cable networks. The best example of this is AMC who have developed and stuck by Mad Men, The Walking Dead and Breaking Bad in just the past 5 years. Other great television shows over the years haven't fared so well with comedies like Outsourced being cut, shows like Firefly being ditched and so on. Often times, truly great shows need time to build up audience or need at least not to be pitted against top-rated nonsense like American Idol. 

Hunger Games, Harry Potter, Twilight - Kid's books and Comic Books now dominate Hollywood

Before Twilight, the last big hit at the theaters was the Hunger Games. It was perhaps even sillier than the Twilight saga and worse yet had stolen its entire concept from a Japanese movie called "Battle Royale" (a film which turned out to be more entertaining by far than hunger games - it's on Netflix). 

The book "Hunger Games" was a Ripoff Royale

So, this brings us back to our original question? Why do so many crap movies or shows do well while truly remarkable cinema and television get ignored? Here's our thoughts:

1. More and more decisions on what gets produced (and how it is produced) is being based on demographics rather than story. 
2. We have a precious few really talented writers these days in Hollywood. 
3. People respond to trailers - and most of these trailers represent false advertising. Lincoln is a good example - it includes fully half of the most dramatic scenes of its entire 2 hours and 29 minutes in the two minute preview. Instead of watching the 2 hours of riveting cinema we expected there was maybe 5 minutes of real drama in the whole movie.
4. People respond to brand and are afraid to try new things. Hunger Games is a brand, Twilight is a brand - they were both brands before they were movies. Lincoln is a brand as well - sort of. 
5. People going to movies don't like to think too hard - or so Hollywood assumes. Sequels, brand franchises, re-tellings of the same old stories represent perhaps 2/3 of all Hollywood revenue. During Looper, which in fact wasn't even that complicated, we personally witnessed people acting as though their heads were about to explode.
6. When people come to the movies expecting it will be good, often they're unwilling to admit that it wasn't. That's real loyalty - but it doesn't help guarantee that future movies will be made with any skill if you reward films that are flimsy and un-entertaining. 
7. There seems to be lowered expectations for film quality these days. In this regard, cinema and politics seem to be competing with one another to see how dumbed-down they can get. Contrary to popular belief, however, the United States doesn't operate at a sixth grade level. 

There is nothing worse than going to a movie expecting to enjoy oneself and end up being stuck for two hours wishing you were somewhere else. We're grateful for gems like the Cloud Atlas when they do occur, but we think it's about time that Hollywood started raising the bar again in general on their major releases. Stephen Spielberg is a genius, we credited him with the best movie of all time, yet in Lincoln he makes the high point of the movie a bathroom - sorry - wash closet joke. 

That's just sad.  

Copyright 2012 - Raving Reviews - All Rights Reserved

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The Velvet Elvis

We don't just review movies and television shows on this blog. On occasion, when we are so moved, we'll review just about anything. Last year we explored Las Vegas to find the World's Tallest Milkshake and today we are going to take you to the tiny town of Patagonia, Arizona to find some of the best pizza in the country. First of all, it's probably worth noting the peculiar cultural sub currents behind the name of the restaurant. While there may be a couple of Velvet Elvis paintings in the restaurant, it isn't by any means a shrine to the King. (nor are they're any velvet paintings of dogs playing poker, at least not that we remember).

We aren't the only ones who like their pizza...

So the implication of what a 'Velvet Elvis' represents is kind of cultural throwback, a sort of Hillbilly homage or perhaps Spencer's Gifts attempt at home decor. It is emblematic of a variety of eclectic tastes associated with 20th Century Americana and in the case of this restaurant it gives the owner license to create pizzas and an atmosphere a bit out of the ordinary.

How did we hear about it? Well, we were traveling/staying in the area and it was a word of mouth recommendation.  We didn't know how far away it was from where we were (or everything else for that matter) but we boldly trekked across the rugged Southwest Arizona landscape to find it. And it's about 30 miles from anywhere, but that doesn't mean the drive isn't interesting. Patagonia is nestled in the Mountains in he high Sonoran desert in between Sierra Vista and Nogales. It is very close to a little town called Elgin which happens to have some of the best wineries in Arizona and those wineries are surprisingly good.

Patagonia is also near a variety of nature-related destinations and is just twenty miles north of the Mexican border so expect to pass through Border Patrol checkpoints on your way back North (towards Tuscon or Interstate 10). The restaurant is also not too far from the tourist locations of Tombstone and Bisbee, Arizona (on route 80). Tombstone is a great tourist locale - lot's of locals dressed up like its the 1880's wearing guns (real ones) and Bisbee is a kind of alternative destination - part hippie hang out and part historic mining town. 

It's a pizza pie - fresh organic and fairly unique

The pizza itself at the Elvis is amazing - sporting a type of whole wheat crust that doesn't taste at all like whole wheat. There are a variety of gourmet pizza varieties to choose from - "Designer Pizzas" - including El Mariachi and Tuco's Revenge (not sure if that's a reference to Breaking Bad as we haven't visited the Elvis since 2009). They've also got a lot of interesting desserts, salads and more. So next time you're within 100 miles of the place check it out.

Tuco says, if I were still alive 'd be eating pizza at the Elvis

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The Walking Dead - Season 3

Occasionally, on Raving Reviews we actually watch TV shows and movies and that aren't completely idiotic - one of our favorite of these shows is the Walking Dead. Walking Dead Season 3 began last week, just in time for our Halloween Meltdown. Why do we like the Walking Dead? Here's some of our rating criteria:

1. It's post-apocalyptic.
2. It happens down South instead of where we're living (makes it seem more realistic).
3. It has better than average quality Zombies.
4. It has an excellent cast of characters and even the stereotypical roles are well played by the ensemble cast.
5. We care about what happens to the characters, in other words it transcends the gratuitous Zombie killing that often is associated with the genre.

Just when you though it was safe to drive through Atlanta...

Now having said some nice things about the show; we do have a few issues with the Walking Dead; these include:

• Why doesn't AMC allow any other networks to make good television shows?
• How many times will they let Carl Junior go out and endanger the whole group before they realize he's just not worth it? (and isn't there a Hamburger joint call Carl Jr.?)
• Why don't the characters ever bathe?
• Why don't they all own Samurai swords by now?
• Why don't they find their own island - preferably in the Bahamas?
• Why do they let Ricks wife drive?
• Why does Hershel seem to confuse the flu with flesh easting insanity?

 

 Some criticism is warranted.

And we're not the only ones who have issues with the Walking Dead - it has become a cultural phenomenon and has inspired a number of interesting parodies.

 

This parody is kind of like Walking Dead meets Deliverance....

In previous posts we've tried to uncover why Zombies are so popular in our culture - what is about cannibal corpses that never gets old (besides the fact that they're dead)? Is it that by shooting zombies we can stare death in the face and keep on living, who knows. What we do know for sure is that Season 3 of the Walking Dead is shaping up to be more action packed than the first two seasons combined with lot's of new locations and characters and an endless supply of - Zombies...

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