Quote of the Day

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"He's a good kisser. But we both have scruffy bearded faces even if we shave. So, us putting out two beards together... man, when the kiss was over I pushed him off, like, 'Damn!'"

Damn indeed. That's Brian Bloom, who we just celebrated the birthday of yesterday, talking to TV Guide back in the day about making out with Chris Meloni on Oz. Great big bountiful thanks to Ruben for leaving a link to this in the comments; we'd never read it before and we, uh, dig the way it makes us feel. In related news our pal Manuel's series on the gay history of HBO over at the Film Experience actually got around to Oz today, along with notes on a few of the channel's other homo-friendly series too.

The Moment I Fell For... Brian Bloom

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Longstanding MNPP crush-object Brian Bloom is turning 45 today, so there are a couple of pictures of a young Brian probably in Teen Beat magazine (he put the beat in Teen Beat, you better believe it) back in the day, which I think is probably where my crush first developed, looking at him in those magazines. (As a side-note bless those magazines. Before the internet they were super important to a growing boy's health and development.) Anyway I maybe probably saw Brian on his episode of 21 Jump Street and/or Empty Nest too? Whatever the case I had my crush before he did those non-nude but still super-hot pictures for Playgirl magazine - that would come later. And then of course much later came Oz...

... speaking of growing boys.

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By Brian Bloom's Beard

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I don't know where or when this was taken, or anything having to do with the context of this shot of one of my longest-standing crushes Brian Bloom, where he's sporting a big beautiful full face of fuzz, I don't if it's for a role or what, but it's a big beautiful thing. He should keep it, or grow it back if he doesn't have it right this minute, is my point. Brian's turning 44 today - click on here for lots of him. He's the reason I'll always have a thing for super dark hair and super light eyes - well him plus just the general fact that it's the perfect combination. (It blinded me to Jared Leto's douchiness for much longer than should've been possible.)

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Happy 40, Brian Bloom

I hope where ever you are today there's a shower...

...or a weight room...


... or a supply closet...


... with Chris Meloni waiting for you in it.
(also a video camera)
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Good Morning, World

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Hey there, Brian Bloom! No idea why he's on my mind. Well, that is to say, I have plenty of idea why, it's the usual reasons why, but it came outta nowhere. Here's some more of him that I posted previously, if you care. And here's a whole video (NSFW) of him romping around. Love him long time.

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Anyway! A happy holiday week to everyone, if that's your deal. Not sure what this week's gonna look like, posting-wise, I'm always crazy-busy with stuff at work right before the long break, plus I'm distracted and a distracted brain is notsomuch a fertile place for posting anything coherent. We'll see. And it's not like anybody's coming here to MNPP for coherence anyway! So let's get to it. Or whatever.
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Thursday's Ways Not To Die

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The Stuff (1985)

Doesn't that really make you crave a fluffernutter? Does me.

How much do you miss this sort of crap? CG has destroyed the art of the terrible exploding dummy head. I don't mean to knock the people who built this Garrett Morris head (sidenote: Garrett Morris! Playing a character named "Chocolate Chip Charlie!!!); in terms of 1980's special effects this is pretty great, almost right up there with the probably pricier dummy work in John Carpenter's The Thing (which came out two years earlier). But yeah... it's cheesy.

And I miss this cheese! Will we look at the shitty vampire hordes in I Am Legend the same 20 years from now? Somehow I doubt it. RIP Shitty Exploding Dummy Heads. You are missed.

One more thing about The Stuff... the little boy was played by Scott Bloom, and his brother in the movie was played by his real-life brother Brian...


It made me feel a little funny, since Brian was only fifteen here, suddenly flooded as I was by memories of my crush on him a few years later...


Ahh, what a perfect post! I managed to include both exploding heads and beefcake! These are the moments I live for.

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Previous Ways Not To Die: A Hot-Air Balloon Ride... Straight To Hell!!! -- Puppy Betrayal -- High-Heeled By A Girlfriend Impersonator -- Flip-Top Beheaded -- Because I'm Too Goddamned Beautiful To Live -- By Choosing... Poorly... -- Fried Alive Due To Baby Ingenuity -- A Good Old-Fashioned Tentacle Smothering -- Eepa! Eepa! -- Gremlins Ate My Stairlift -- An Icicle Thru The Eye -- Face Carved Off By Ghost Doctor After Lesbian Tryst With Zombie Women -- Electrocuted By Fallen Power-Lines -- A Mouthful Of Flare -- Taken By The TV Lady -- Bitten By A Zombie -- Eaten By Your Mattress -- Stuffed To Splitting -- Face Stuck In Liquid Nitrogen -- Crushed By Crumbling Church Debris -- Bitten By The Jaws Of Life -- A Machete To The Crotch -- Showering With A Chain-Saw -- In A Room Filled With Razor Wire -- Pod People'd With Your Dog -- Force-Fed Art -- Skinned By A Witch -- Beaten With An Oar -- Curbed -- Cape Malfunction -- In The Corner -- Cooked In A Tanning Bed -- Diced -- Punched Through The Head -- Bugs Sucking On Your Head
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Minear's Drive

Looks like there's another show coming down the turnpike that I'll have to turn my attentions to in the near future: the brillaint Tim Minear, writer on Angel and Firefly, and showrunner of the missed-something-wicked-by-me Wonderfalls, has got his next project lined up for this Spring. From Variety:

"Fox has greenlit series production on "Drive," an hourlong actioner from creators/exec producers Tim Minear ("Angel") and Ben Queen.

Net has ordered 12 episodes on top of the already-filmed pilot. Goal is to get the 20th Century Fox TV-produced show on the air in time for a spring debut, possibly taking advantage of the net's "American Idol" lead-in...

[The show] has been described as a sort of "The Amazing Race" on acid, focusing on an illegal cross-country race in which every participant needs to win, but only one can. Minear told Daily Variety the show also has elements of "Cannonball Run" and the Michael Douglas starrer "The Game."

"I described it to Joss (Whedon) as 'Magnolia' on wheels," Minear said. "It's really about the people in those cars."

Scribe said the tone of the show is "deeply action, deeply funny and deeply emotional," all at once.

"It (can) be as silly as 'Rat Race' or as scary and cool as 'The Game,' " he said. "It's a canvas on which we can do anything we want."

"Drive" features a large ensemble cast that Minear said can expand or contract at will. In addition to the drivers in the race, skein will eventually explore the people staging the race -- "the puppetmasters," as Minear calls them."

Members of that "large ensemble cast"? Well, from IMDb I see listed for the pilot all sorts of familiar names, including Alan Ruck from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Shawn Hatosy from The Faculty, Taryn Manning from Hustle & Flow, oh and a one-two punch of somewhat dated crushes of mine, Brian Bloom and Ivan Sergei, seen below when they were in top-form:


But most exciting, most thrilling, is Melanie effin' Lynskey, a little gal who endeared herself to me 12 years ago as Pauline, the other-murderous-teen, in Heavenly Creatures. Why Lynksey hasn't been cast in everything filmed in the past 12 years I don't know, but she shows up far-too-little on my radar, and hopefully she'll be an integral part of this show - Minear knows from good casting.
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