Too Much of a Good Thing?

Karen: In the Star Trek episode "The Trouble with Tribbles," small, furry critters called tribbles breed rapidly and begin filling up the Enterprise. Lieutenant Uhura defends the fuzzballs, telling Captain Kirk that they're the only love money can buy. A frustrated Kirk responds, "Too much of anything, Lieutenant, even love, isn't necessarily a good thing."

 I thought about this statement when considering our current geek existence. It's a pretty good time to be a geek. Look at this list of major motion pictures that have been or will be released this year that have comics or science fiction or fantasy themes:

• Deadpool
• Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice
• Jungle Book
• The Huntsmen: Winter's War
• Captain America: Civil War
• X-Men Apocalypse
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows
• Warcraft
• Independence Day Resurgence
• Legend of Tarzan
• Ghostbusters
• Star Trek Beyond
• Suicide Squad
• Pete's Dragon
• Gambit 
• Dr. Strange
• Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Yes, there's really a Dr. Strange movie

That's a lot of genre-related movies! And that's just a partial list. I recall when we were lucky to get one or two major films a year. Now, there's one almost every week it seems.

We also have a ton of TV shows right now that are geeky, too many for me to remember and name, but off the top of my head, there's The Flash, Supergirl, Agents of SHIELD, Penny Dreadful, Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow, Daredevil, Orphan Black, Twelve Monkeys, and so on. I mean, more than you can keep up with and still maintain a life.

And merchandise? Holy Cow. You got high end, low end, and everything in between. There's stuff for every show or character you can think of, no matter how obscure. It's incredible. You really have to watch your budget. We've seen a real explosion in trade paperbacks in recent years, with a lot of C-listers and even Marvel's horror characters  getting collected. And toys? I've become quite fond of the Hot Toys sixth scale figures -the detail is fantastic! -but I can't go buying them willy-nilly. These Megos on steroids are way too expensive for that. My husband sometimes gets them for me for birthdays or Christmas, and I buy one or two a year myself. I'll admit I just pre-ordered the Hot Toys Alien Warrior -but now I'm thinking Ant-Man looks cool. Ant-Man! Seriously. There's so much neat stuff out there.

So here's what I want to ask you. Are we hitting a saturation point of geeky goodness? Are we in danger of reaching, as the Captain said, too much of a good thing? Are there too many movies, too many TV shows, too many books and action figures? Will the fans -or even more importantly, the general public -get tired of so many super-hero movies coming out every year? I keep hearing about "super-hero fatigue" but the movies seem to keep making a ton of money. 

Or is there no such thing as too much of a good thing? Should we, the generation of "that's all we had"(copyright, David B.), just be damn glad we lived this long to see popular acceptance of the things we love, and ride it out as long as we can?

Guest Post - A Short Theme...

Doug: Redartz is along today as our host, and does he have a fun topic for us. This is one, no doubt, that will be near and dear to all our hearts.

Redartz: Good day, all!  Before we start, let me issue a proactive apology: if this topic has been covered previously here, you may all grant me 10 demerits.  Memory can be a nebulous thing, but this subject is (hopefully) a bit of fun. Therefore, here goes...

Television Theme Music! The tuneful introductions that open, and often close, our favorite programs; the variety here is as wide as the variety in the shows themselves. Some featured spoken introductions, such as Rod Serling's classic “Twilight Zone” intro. Others were sung, ballad style: think “Gilligan's Island” or “The Beverly Hillbillies”. Some were purely instrumental, as in “Hill Street Blues” and “The Bob Newhart Show”. Some even impacted the public consciousness enough to earn a spot on the Billboard Pop Singles charts (Mike Post's theme from “The Rockford Files”, as well as his above-mentioned “Hill Street Blues” each reached number 10, while “S.W.A.T.” and “Miami Vice” both reached number 1!).

As a boy, the “Batman” theme would get me stoked  for the “wham, pow” adventures soon to be filling our black-and-white console screen. In my teens, Cindi Grecco”s “Making Our Dreams Come True” (Laverne and Shirley, of course!) would bring a smile of anticipation for the impending laugh fest. A good theme song will stick in your mind; certainly a show's creators hope this is the case. Often a theme song becomes so indelibly linked with it's show; just hearing a few notes will bring the  program to mind. Angelo Badalamente's theme from “Twin Peaks” always does this for me; it so perfectly evoked the mysterious, somewhat creepy feel of the show. With all this in mind, here are a few of my favorite theme songs:

Jonny Quest Theme: greatest saturday morning show theme from arguably the greatest Saturday morning adventure show.

Lost in Space: John Williams provides this memorable winner.

Barnaby Jones: a bit obscure, but a very cool theme tune...

By the way, the CD cover presented above is representative of a series of such collections issued by TeeVee Tunes. The first collections were released originally on vinyl; and were among the last LPs I bought before converting to digital. These CDs are a great source of television themes, ranging from the late 40s up to the 90s ( and a great party soundtrack: at college we played the first collection at a weekend fest, everyone had a blast trying to identify the associated programs and singing along with the lyrics). I'd say a few of the recordings may be remakes, but most are the original versions we knew and recognized.

So, here is my first question to you: What theme songs are your favorites? Which ones are most memorable, which are excruciating to hear even today? Feel free to make your lists!

Incidentally,  there were also the variety shows (I sorely miss those...), whose hosts often had their own theme song: Dean Martin and “Everybody Loves Somebody Sometime”, or Sonny and Cher signing off each show with “ I've Got You, Babe”. This brings us to our second question today:  imagine you are starring in a show based upon your life . What would be your theme song? What song would be playing as you enter the room, take the stage and let the world see who you are?

Again, to get things rolling, here is my personal theme song: Thomas Dolby's “ She Blinded Me With Science” (don't ask; suffice it to say the song reflects my interests, and my nerdish nature; as my wife nods in agreement...).

Discuss: DC's Current Crop of Live-Action TV Shows

Karen: I'm only watching The Flash, and so far I find it to be about a C+ for me -neither terrible but not really a 'must-see' show. It seems to have potential so I'll hang with it (I stuck with Smallville for years so I must have some masochistic tendencies). I saw two episodes of Constantine and dropped it. I have no interest in Arrow (or "we wish we could do Batman on TV" as I see it) or Gotham -a Batman show without Batman? Anyone else watching any of these shows? What do you think of them?