Clay Aiken Has Come a Long Way to Get to On My Way Here

When Clay Aiken released his last album, A Thousand Different Ways, many complained about its focus on classic love songs at the expense of original music. I had no objection to the direction Clay chose to take there, but it was still exciting to see that the On My Way Here, his latest effort, is made up of new songs. I had hoped that more songs would bear his name in the writer's credits, but at least several seem to have been written specifically for him, and all suit him well.

The collection, firmly in adult contemporary territory, is thematically similar to his previous albums, with plenty of love songs along with some anthems of self-awareness. The titular ballad, perhaps my favorite track, is the strongest example of the latter. It has an autobiographical feel to it, with specific details like the kitchen floor in a childhood home, parents' divorce and an adulthood filled with mobility. Add to that all the hints of adversity and a terrific melody with clever phrasing, and you've got a song with the right message and emotional punch for an American Idol finale number that feels much more intimate than the incredibly catchy but somewhat vacuous This Is The Night.

The Real Me also explores Clay's personal journey, though it's entwined with a love song. This piano-driven track is among the quietest on the album and probably the most emotive. Clay comes across as endearingly shy and geeky here, reminding me of the very young Paul Simon in Just a Boy. There's almost a whispered quality to his voice, and he glides into a gentle falsetto at several points in the song, creating a gorgeous effect.

As Long As We're Here is a love song as well, with a second verse lyrically reminiscent of Billy Joel's An Innocent Man. Urging the object of his affections to give their love a shot despite past scarring, he makes a more general statement in the chorus about making the most of the time we have by focusing on love. Celtic instrumentation gives this song a unique flavor.

Sacrificial Love has Clay questioning the sincerity of his significant other. It's an interesting bookend to The Real Me; instead of being grateful that his girlfriend sees "the real me," he doubts whether he is seeing the real her. I love the melody on this one, especially on the chorus, which in patches bears a slight resemblance to Once's Oscar-winning Falling Slowly, and the violins augment the emotional quality of the lyrics.

Lover All Alone is the sole album offering penned by Clay, along with two other songwriters. Some fans have heard it before, as it was offered as a bonus track on his previous album, but it's a nice inclusion nonetheless, an introspective exploration of loneliness and misplaced affections. I purchased my album at WalMart and consequently received the bonus track Forget I Ever Knew You. It's a nice song, but frankly I find the bonus track trend annoying, as it often means you have to buy the album two or three times in order to get all the potential songs. I haven't heard if there are any other bonus tracks offered at other stores; KMart and Target, for instance, often have them as well. The price is right at WalMart, though; it only cost me ten dollars, well below the advertised price.

Other albums standouts include Everything I Don't Need, whose growly country-rock flavor is unusual for Clay; Something About Us, an incredibly soft and tender love song rich with piano and strings; the guitar and percussion-driven Falling; and Where I Draw the Line, an energetic number that Clay has performed on television to promote the album. There's also rising from adversity-themed Ashes, Weight of the World and Grace of God. The latter is especially nice, as it focuses not primarily on him but on others in this world who are suffering. As a Unicef ambassador and the founder of the Bubel Aiken Foundation, Clay has shown his commitment to relieving the burdens of others as much as he can, so that song serves as a reminder of his dedication.

Clay has been very productive in the five years since he came in second in season two of American Idol. A Thousand Different Ways came out just a year and a half ago, but for devoted fans, that's long enough. May is off to a terrific start for Claymates with On My Way Here.

Weird Al Produces a Twisted Tribute to the Simple Life With Amish Paradise

When my brother Benjamin was in middle school, he discovered Weird Al Yankovic, and he was eager to introduce the rest of the family to this wacky producer of novelty songs. I wasn't convinced. At the time, it was my policy to disapprove of whatever new music Benjamin brought into the house, but gradually he wore me down, getting me to embrace the man who has since become a major inspiration to me in my own parody-penning efforts. Amish Paradise is probably the song that really sold me on him.

That's a bit odd, since I've never had much time for rap, though Gangsta's Paradise is a song I always felt had merit. What really drew me to Al's parody was his subject matter, as I have always had a fascination with all things Amish. My grandparents live near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, so I've seen my share of the long beards, plain clothes, intricate quilts and horse and buggies that are common to these deeply religious, agriculturally-minded people. But I always welcome to opportunity to read a new story or watch a new movie about them, so why not a song?

Granted, Al pokes fun. But he never comes across as mean-spirited, and he packs his song with all sorts of references to the Amish lifestyle. The vast majority of the words are rapped, but he sings the chorus, which, with the exception of a deviation that makes entertaining use of the Gilligan's Island theme song, consists of "livin' in an Amish Paradise" and as many phrases as he can think of that legitimately rhyme with it. There's also a severe-sounding choir that "ah-ah-ah"s at the beginning and end of the song, giving it an appropriate feeling of antiquity.

As with so many of his songs, the video adds a whole layer of amusement. A friend of Benjamin's taped a special that played several Weird Al videos right after the original videos on which they were based, making for easy comparisons. Al incorporates several clever spoofs of Gangsta's Paradise, while still making it entirely accessible to those who aren't familiar with Coolio's video.

Al's ability to manipulate his voice and appearance to suit his songs has always impressed me, and in this video he looks perfectly natural with his long beard, little glasses and black ensemble, complete with hat. I love the little visual details like the man checking his sundial watch and the "How Am I Driving?" bumper sticker on a horse and buggy. Still, it's the cleverness of Al's lyrics that pack the biggest punch. Stuff like "We ain't really quaint, / so please don't point and stare; / We're just technologically impaired" and "So don't be vain, and don't be whiny, / or else, my brother, I might have to get medieval on your hiney!"

The response of the stricken Amish community to the tragic Nickel Mines incident goes to show that retribution probably isn't high on the priority list of most of these people, but other details, such as all the references to raising barns, churning butter, plowing, feeding livestock, creating quilts and studying the Bible, ring pretty true. If you want a respectful, realistic portrayal of the Amish, look to Beverly Lewis or Witness. If you just want a silly reminder of some of the things that make this culture unique, Weird Al is the way to go.

McFarlane's Jin Skates Through His Troubles

When I saw that McFarlane would be coming out with a second series of LOST figures in July of last year, I was excited. Though it was a bit of a let-down to discover that series two included only four figures and no diorama, I was still tickled to have the chance to own four terrific characters. One of these was Jin, whose character I’ve grown to like more and more since the beginning of the series, when he didn’t make such a great first impression. He went from distant and domineering to warm and gentle, making it very easy to understand how his wife Sun fell in love with him in the first place. Their relationship has been full of complications, but it’s remained one of the most positive examples on television of a marriage enduring through a variety of pitfalls.

Sun and Jin are so much a part of one another that it almost seems they might have been released as a pair with an extra-large landscape and a scene capturing a moment of tenderness between them. Instead, Sun’s figure is a snapshot of defiance against her husband, while Jin is caught in an instant of extreme distress. On the one hand, his figure is probably the most action-packed of ten that have been released thus far, but it doesn’t seem quite right to immortalize Jin as a man in bondage, restrained not only by the handcuff that remains as a reminder of his unfortunate confrontation with Michael early in the series but, more substantially, by the stick and ropes used by the paranoid survivors of the tail section.

Jin’s head is lowered, but if you look at his face, his mouth is open in a scream of petrified warning, while his cheek bears a bloody scar. There are three small holes in his brown pants, and his off-white shirt is torn and dirty. Jin’s been through a really tough time, and it’s not over yet. Like Sun, Jin has a sandy base, though his is rockier than hers. Still, the bases could almost match up, but it would be hard to make a romantic moment with him in such an unpleasant situation. One possibility: if you ignore his face and binding and gaze at him from a distance, Jin looks like he’s figure skating, so you could remove both figures from their bases and put them on a mirror, perhaps surrounded with bits of cotton for snow. Instant Olympians!

If I had to point to a favorite Jin moment early in the series, I think I would have to go with his role in the birth of Aaron, during which he manages to be very helpful despite the language barrier. His emotion as Claire delivers her son, meanwhile, prefigures his exhilaration at learning that he will be a father. It might have been nice if one of Jin’s quotes could have reflected that, but the only thing that would have been remotely quotable, I suppose, would have been “Jack. Doctor.” Out of context, that wouldn’t have made much sense, but it would’ve been about as good as “Bahlie!”, which is Korean for “Hurry!”, but I can’t for the life of me recall when he said it.

Jin actually has more sound clips than any other character thus far, and the others are more memorable, particularly “Others! Others! Others! Others!”, which is the frenzied warning to Michael and Sawyer that accompanies his mad dash away from the Tailies, though if you don’t know what he’s supposed to be saying, it sounds quite a lot like a violent sneezing attack. Also included are “I… love… you,” spoken to Sun and even more romantic than usual under the circumstances; “I can't talk to anyone. I can't understand them. I need you, Sun,” which is in Korean; and my favorite, the accentless “Everything is going to change,” from Hurley’s trippy dream in Everybody Hates Hugo. The voice box is at the bottom of the base and takes two AAA batteries, and it’s activated by pressing a large rock toward the front of the base. For some reason, when I press the rock, it doesn’t always seem to catch; sometimes it takes two or three tries before I get the sound clip. Aside from this, however, the base is quite satisfactory, and because Jin only has one shoe attached to it, he fits into his constraint much more readily than most of the other figures do.

Finally, there’s the fun prop of two pages from Sun’s translation book that show Jin how to say “aft,” “stern,” “wind,” “current,” “hurry,” “help,” “ship,” “crash,” “island,” “you are welcome,” “survivors,” “flare,” “conserve,” “danger,” “silence” and “sleep.” This provides interesting insight into Sun’s psyche, as it shows what words she thinks will be important, and it’s very cool-looking, with several lines of Korean characters. Though I really like this particular prop, I find it a little disappointing that all of the season two props are essentially two-dimensional products: two slides, a boarding pass sleeve, a letter and two pages from a translation book. What’s more, because there is no backdrop to the series two figures, there’s no good place to keep these pages. I’ve settled on sticking mine in a notebook between protective sleeves, where I know I won’t lose them.

Jin has arrived at a very interesting place on the show, and I’m anxious to see where the rest of the season will take him when we get back to new episodes in a month. Until then, I have this figure to tide me over. Long live Jin!

McFarlane's Slightly Softened Sawyer Is Ready to Sail

From the beginning, one of the LOST characters who has intrigued me most is surly, sarcastic sweetheart Sawyer. He starts off his run on the island by antagonizing everyone in sight, but gradually, though he never quite loses his edge, he evolves into a useful part of the survivor pack and forms genuine relationships with the other survivors: fiery Kate, who he’s had his eye on since day one; heroic Jack, with whom he’s butted heads but whose friendship he reluctantly values; vulnerable Charlie, who ends up his co-conspirator in season two; gentle Hurley, who rises above his insults to become both pal and mentor.

The sad thing about Sawyer is that he is on a path to redemption that is consistently hampered by his lust for revenge, which is embodied in the note that serves as his prop. Sawyer winds up on the island because of a misguided attempt at revenge, and since arriving his “overdeveloped sense of vengeance,” as the Six-Fingered Man in The Princess Bride put it, has led him to kill two more people, which has only gnawed away at his soul more. Yet in the most recent episode, he implies that he has a new target for his vengeful impulses. Will he ever learn?

The note is something of a curiosity to me. I’m not at all surprised that it was chosen for his prop, since it’s by far the most iconic object the show has introduced in connection with him. However, I find it quite strange that the wording of the note was altered. Instead of “You had sex with my mother,” the note reads, “You slept with my mother.” Presumably this was changed because these figures are sold at Toys R Us and are in some way considered potential toys for children. Clearly, however, the main market is adults. These are more collectibles than action figures, and while there undoubtedly are some children who watch LOST, I’m guessing a very small percentage of these figures are sold to kids. Moreover, if the kids like the show and Sawyer enough to get the replica, then they almost certainly have heard the note in its entirety before. Finally, doesn’t it seem a little silly to try to soften the phrasing of an adulterous act when the next part of the letter references murder without flinching? Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.

The figure of Sawyer is pretty nice. He stands in a pair of fading jeans, one hand on his hip and the other leaning against the side of the raft whose construction he’s been supervising. His blue shirt is torn. His muscles ripple. His wavy hair flaps in the wind, as much as plastic can seem to, and his face wears an appropriately cocky expression. It’s a reasonable likeness, though still not as precise as Charlie, which remains my favorite figure. The troublesome thing is that his feet don’t want to fit into their assigned pegs, and one of my pegs actually broke off as I tried to position him. His hand is almost as resistant to resting properly on the raft rigging.

But I just love his base, which is definitely my favorite of the series two offerings. The raft is a very important element in the end of the first season and beginning of the second, and here it is recreated in all its glory, from all the sticks that make up the floor to the metallic underpinnings. It’s a gorgeous vessel, considering that it was handmade, and it rests atop a sandy stretch of beach. Underneath the raft is a little knob that triggers the sound clips, the battery compartment for which is located at the bottom of the base and takes two AAA batteries. Sawyer is almost certainly the most quotable character on the show, since hardly a sentence escapes his mouth that doesn’t have some witty edge to it, so selecting the clips for him must have been especially difficult. I don’t know that I have a favorite Sawyer quote, at least from the first two seasons; I am partial to his lame “I don’t like blankets” comment to Claire in Left Behind, but that’s both too recent and inconsequential to be included here. I also love his speech to Jack about Christian in season one's Exodus: Part 1, but I’m not sure if that could be effectively whittled down to just a sentence or two. So I’m fine with the included clips:

* “I'm a complex guy, sweetheart.”

* “There are nicer ways to wake a man up, Freckles.”

* “Fun time is over, Bongo. Why don't you go hit the buffet.”

* “There's a new sheriff in town boys, y'all best get used to it.”

Of these, I’d say the last is the most iconic, though the first may be my favorite, since he sounds ever so much like Han Solo in that clip, and I’m always up for any excuse to compare the two characters.

And besides, Sawyer is a complex guy, no doubt about it. He’s one of the hardest characters to figure out, and I just hope that by the end of the show, his too-often submerged decency will overpower his misdeeds. Other fans who are just as fascinated by him as I am will want to snag Sawyer for themselves while he’s still on store shelves.

Here Comes the Sun in McFarlane's Second LOST Series

One of the most pressing questions that season three of LOST left fans with was the issue of whether or not Sun Kwon would survive her pregnancy and successfully give birth. I didn’t expect an answer so soon, but through the use of flash-forwards, LOST has provided key insight into her fate. That’s not to say that mysteries don’t still swirl around her character, and one can only hope that the writers will decide to showcase her more often than they have.

When I first started watching LOST, it took me a while to connect with Sun and Jin. They were so cut off from the others, separated by a language barrier and Jin’s stubbornness. The Sun figure from the second series of McFarlane figures inspired by the show captures the young Korean wife in a moment of defiance, exhibiting an independent streak that would eventually allow both her and her husband to be fully integrated into the group of crash survivors.

It’s a little strange to see Sun in a skimpy, two-piece sky blue bathing suit with striped accents, since throughout most of the show, her clothes are quite modest. Here, she dares to leave herself exposed, disregarding her husband’s stern reproofs. A midnight blue blanket whips in the wind behind her shoulders. In terms of the figure, this blanket is problematic; it stubbornly resists being placed into her hands in such a way that it will stay put, almost as if to emphasize her desire to be free from unwanted coverings. Maybe it was intentional on the part of the sculptors. More likely it was just imprecise design; it’s frustrating to have an object that clearly belongs at a certain spot within this little diorama and be unable to place it there.

Sun’s feet, like most of her body, are bare, and they stand on a sandy expanse that probably is uncomfortably hot. The expression of her face is mostly one of serenity, with a flash of anger. Unlike the series one figures, there is no specific backdrop for Sun; instead, there’s a generic green, vaguely leafy-looking piece of cardboard included with all the series two figures. Also included is the life-size sleeve of her Oceanic boarding pass.

As with the other series two figures, the black box containing sound clips from the show is integrated within the stand rather than attached to a backdrop. Though the second is the only one of the English clips directed at Jin, all of Sun’s quotes involve him in some way:

* "Have you never lied to a man you've loved?"

* "I was going to leave you... I was going to get away"

* "My wedding ring ... it's gone!"

The final quote is in Korean, which is a nice touch, and translates as “I'm not saying you should go alone. I'm coming with you,” which is, of course, spoken to Jin. The black box takes two AAA batteries, and the clips are accessed by pressing down on one of the rocks on the beach.

The focus of this figure in Sun’s relationship with Jin, which makes sense, but it would have been nice to see something that featured her working in her garden, which both provided her some relief from her initially aggravating husband and gave her a purpose, allowing her to help her fellow castaways even though most of them did not yet know she spoke English. Probably my favorite season one Sun moment occurs when she finds some eucalyptus and uses it to help the asthmatic Shannon breathe. Later, she stands by Jack in her tireless effort to aid the injured Boone. I think the figure’s creators might have done well to incorporate her role as a nurturer.

Still, Sun is a very nice figure for fans of one of television’s most complex couples, and the fact that she has been cast in plastic is an acknowledgment of the value she brings to the show. Here’s hoping the writers agree!

Number 1600: There's Really Something There in Beauty and the Beast

I’ve never been very good at picking favorites, but if someone were to ask me who my favorite Disney heroine is, I wouldn’t even have to think about it. Brave, bookish, compassionate Belle from Beauty and the Beast is the best of the best, and her role in that powerful story of redemption and inner beauty is magical in every sense of the word. She is housed within an utter masterpiece, and one of its most noteworthy aspects is its fantastic soundtrack filled with songs through which characters are expertly revealed. It’s one of my all-time favorite movie soundtracks and a worthy subject for my 1600th post on Epinions.

It begins with the solemn prologue, with all its austere overtones indicative of a fairy tale setting. The haunting melody seems to breathe sylvan antiquity and somber royalty. Ebbing and flowing with David Ogden Stiers’ masterful narration, the music, with its deep, resonant notes and occasional sprightly hints of enchantment, sounds lovely but distant; the beast is not a real character to us yet. He’s an arrogant young man in stained glass, a mere two-dimensional representation of the living, breathing prince he truly is.

This opening track is probably the most memorable of the instrumental offerings, but woodwind-heavy To the Fair, which alternates between quick, lively runs and moments of wistful melancholy with some terrific percussion scattered here and there, is fun and West Wing, whose tone swerves dramatically from melodiously enchanting to dire and dangerous, is fantastic. The Beast Lets Belle Go, which carries hints of Beauty and the Beast theme music, is perhaps the most melancholy of the tracks, an achingly tender moment of farewell full of searing strings, while Battle on the Tower is the most fun, at least to begin with, when it is largely a faster, more orchestral version of Be Our Guest as the Beast’s servants find creative ways to guard their castle, though the tone turns dark and urgent as it follows Gaston’s pursuit of the Beast. Transformation, meanwhile, is simply gorgeous, beginning soft and gentle and taking on a majestic quality as the song slowly builds to the Beast’s long-awaited return to humanity, all the more miraculous given his near-death state a moment before. Both intimate and triumphal and culminating in a final chorus Beauty and the Beast, it’s the perfect way to end the film, and nearly end the soundtrack.

The final track is the phenomenally popular radio version of the title song, as performed by Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson. This is the first time I remember Disney releasing a different version of a song more suitable for the airwaves than the one included in the film. Perhaps it even influenced later songwriting choices, since the next few films all include songs that work equally well when taken out of context. This is a lovely duet that introduced the world to Celine Dion, and Angela Lansbury’s film version makes a gentle, melodic backdrop to Belle and the Beast’s big ballroom scene, encapsulating the theme of the movie in a few well-chosen words. It’s all about forgiveness, redemption, striving to become a better person, and the movie’s beautiful exploration of these topics is something to love indeed. But it’s always been my least favorite of the movie’s songs, partly because both the spinning of the room and the phrase “tale as old as time” give me vertigo and partly because it’s so detached. All of the other songs reveal the personalities of those singing, and with the exception of the short but spirited soliloquy of Belle (Reprise), they all involve several different characters. Next to those action-packed numbers, this legato ballad just seems a little too sedate.

Not so Be Our Guest, which Disney has often used as its theme music since the movie came out. This whirlwind of a flashy show, a spur-of-the-moment offering by castle workers who are desperate for someone to entertain, is a showcase mostly for the talents of Jerry Orbach as the seductive, hospitable Lumiere and Angela Lansbury as grandmotherly Mrs. Potts. The choreography of this scene is so clever that you’re missing half the fun if you’re only listening to the album, but it’s still one of the highlights. Orbach and Potts come together again and are joined by David Ogden Stiers for Something There, a sweet, reflective song that basically does the job of Beauty and the Beast but captures the transformation of the Beast’s personality and his relationship with Belle as it happens. Paige O’Hara and Robby Benson’s observations of each other are especially telling, and it’s nice because this is the last time we hear Belle sing and the only time the Beast sings at all.

Richard White, whose bombastic baritone voice is a joy to listen to, gets to do more singing as the nefariously narcissistic Gaston than just about any Disney villain I can think of. He has a starring role in four different tracks, most notably Gaston, a rousing, hilarious song in which his right-hand man LeFou (Jesse Corti) leads his buddies at the bar in an ode of appreciation to the most popular muscle-bound hunter in town. It doesn’t take long to improve his spirits, and soon he’s back to his smarmy, boastful self, perfectly capable of coming up with a dastardly plan in the quieter Gaston (Reprise). The whole rowdy bar scene reminds me of I Saw a Dragon in Pete’s Dragon, particularly once the seemingly delirious Maurice bursts through the door and is treated as a blathering idiot. I can’t help but wonder if this alcohol-drenched scene would fly in a G-rated movie today, but I love it.

The menacing The Mob Song is also terrific and much more of a traditional villain song. Gaston has gone from being an obnoxious annoyance to Belle beloved by the rest of the town to an indisputably cruel rabble-rouser bent on revenge for a dream that was never really in his grasp. His goal is no longer to marry Belle; it’s to kill the one who managed to claim her restless heart. This is a terrifying moment in the film, but it’s brilliant.

My favorite track, however, is the exceptional opening number, into which the prologue segues. It begins with the soft trilling of woodwinds meant to evoke birdsong, and we meet Belle with O’Hara’s soft but gorgeous voice beckoning us into her “little town full of little people.” She complains of sameness and boredom, but there sure is a lot happening in Belle, where the whole village turns out to weigh in on the problem of this unusual girl. Rather like The Sound of Music’s How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? but more frenetic and mean-spirited, it becomes deliciously complicated as all the townspeople chatter at once as an oblivious Belle moves dreamily through the streets and a determined Gaston goes to impressive lengths to pursue her. The song serves as a wonderful introduction to Belle, Gaston, LeFou and the town in general, and I consider it the real masterpiece of the movie.

Alan Menken and Howard Ashman created a work of enduring brilliance in this soundtrack, and it makes me sad to realize how early Ashman’s outstanding career was cut short. Meanwhile, Menken continues to produce excellent songs, but I think this album will always stand as my favorite of his achievements.

Beauty and the Beast. Pure enchantment.

I Won't Call Foul on Ferrell in Elf

Lately, I've been deluged with advertisements in which a dopey basketball player with big hair played by Will Ferrell promotes the movie Semi-Pro. Although Ferrell was my favorite Saturday Night Live cast member during his time on the show, largely because of his hilarious impersonations of such venerable figures as George W. Bush, Alex Trebek and James Lipton, I've generally found his films to be crude and stupid. However, there has been one notable exception to that trend.

Elf stars Ferrell as Buddy, the tallest elf in Santa's workshop. He lives in a world built for people half his size and smaller. Though he's bursting with Christmas cheer, always wearing an exuberant grin as he prances about in his green suit and yellow tights, physically, he just doesn't fit in, and there's a very good reason for that. Buddy is not an elf.

No, he's a regular old human who stowed away in Santa's (Ed Asner) pack as an infant and wound up at the North Pole, a fish out of water but still presumably much happier than he would have been at the orphanage he left. Though he loves his frosty home and especially the elf who raised him (Bob Newhart), when he gets the shocking truth about his past, Buddy is determined to go to the big city and meet his father (James Caan). But the naive young man with the emotional maturity of a five-year-old isn't prepared for what lies ahead...

Ferrell completely throws himself into his performance, making Buddy funny without being obnoxious, sweet without being saccharine. Yes, he's over-the-top, but having seen what Ferrell is capable of, I'd say he exercised admirable restraint. While Buddy was physically out of place at the North Pole, he is mentally out of place in New York City, impossibly bright-eyed and naive like Giselle in Disney's Enchanted.

Like Giselle, he finds himself falling for a jaded New Yorker. In this case, it's department store elf Jovie (Zooey Deschanel), who isn't too full of the Christmas spirit. Their romance unfolds gradually, prodded along by Buddy's encouragement for her to sing, an activity she doesn't want to admit she loves. Speaking of singing, the movie got a nice little squeal out of me with an off-hand reference to Simon and Garfunkel; if you love Paul and Artie as much as I do, keep an ear out!

While I don't expect much out of Semi-Pro, Elf is a thoroughly enjoyable movie, a gently funny showcase of all the best Ferrell has to offer, and I hope he has a film or two along those family-friendly lines in his future.

McFarlane's Eko Captures the Enigmatic Priest's Spirit

I recently received the distressing news that McFarlane Toys is on the verge of canceling its production of LOST-related action figures. I found this especially disappointing when I learned that the third series of characters would include Desmond, who holds an exalted position in my quartet of favorite characters, and Ben, who is firmly in the second tier, along with Rose and Tom, who are sure to never get action figures, and Sawyer, who has been cast in plastic already. It was actually Sawyer I'd planned to purchase when I decided to do my part to keep the line alive earlier this week. After all, I've been wanting the series two figures for months but haven't bought any because I figured I'd wait until the price went down. Apparently, that's what everyone else thought too. But I went to two different stores and found no trace of either Sawyer or Jin, so I went with my second choice, the fantabulous Mr. Eko.

Eko is almost certainly the most intriguing new character of season two, with the possible exception of Desmond. But Des only shows up in a handful of episodes that season, while Eko is a major force in the progression of the story. A Nigerian priest with a violent past, he seeks atonement and purpose on the island. His personality is just as forceful as John's, and he is more intimidating, keeping quietly to himself most of the time and never taking orders from anyone. He is a spiritual leader, but it also becomes clear that despite the authority with which he carries himself, he still has a lot to learn.

This figure is taken from The 23rd Psalm, a brilliant episode that explores Eko's dark history and his bizarre connection to the island. While LOST frequently dabbles in religious themes and imagery, rarely does it do so as overtly as in this Emmy-nominated installment, whose key elements include a cross necklace, statues of the Virgin Mary and a recitation of the titular psalm.

The aforementioned cross is around the plastic Eko's neck, and he also brandishes his "Jesus stick," which can be removed from his right hand. The only trouble? There are no scriptural inscriptions on the stick, a rather glaring omission if you ask me. He carries himself in a hulking stance, a yellowing shirt draped in tatters over his muscular chest as he glares ahead of him in steely determination, still sporting the odd little beard he later cuts and gives to "Henry Gale" as an act of contrition. His dirty black pants are torn, his shoes worn, a mark of the trials he has faced on this island.

Eko stands on the rocky jungle floor, unless you take him off the pegs holding him there. Both of his arms move at the elbow, so there are a few posing possibilities. Behind him are several bunches of weeds that press into depressions in the stand, and they give it an especially cool 3-D look. Conversely, the green backdrop with its patch of jungle is more generic than those in series one. I would have preferred a glimpse of his brother Yemi's plane, but in any case without those annoying plastic poles, the backdrop doesn't fit snugly around the figure, so it feels much more superfluous.

Among the rocks is one just in front of Eko's right foot that serves as the button that delivers his three quotes from the series. This is one of the nicest aspects of the figure. All of the season one figures featured a black box that was attached to the cardboard backdrop with a series of plastic rods. Having the button incorporated directly into the stand makes for a much more streamlined display. The batteries - 2 AAAs - are inserted in the bottom of the stand, which is a bit more awkward than with the box, but it's well worth it.

All of Eko's quotes are very apt and delivered in a low, vaguely menacing tone:

* "Hello. I am Mr. Eko."

* "And tell your friends I let you live. That Mr. Eko let you live."

* "I understand that you live in a world where righteousness and evil seem very far apart, but that is not the real world."

The latter two are especially demonstrative of Eko's struggle to balance survival with compassion, self-preservation with morality. It's a dangerous dance that is fascinating to watch. Lest the avid Eko fan be disappointed that this figure is rooted almost entirely in his back story, the special prop is two stills from the portion of the film strip that was removed from the orientation film in Desmond's hatch. One is a shot of Dr. Marvin Candle and the other of the symbol for the Swan hatch. While I would rather have had a replica of Yemi's cross, the slides are interesting and serve as a nod to the epic battle of wills between Eko and John that will follow.

Take home one of the greatest characters LOST has seen, and perhaps increase the likelihood that four more of the cream of the crop will soon be released. Until the enigmatic drug lord-turned-priest makes an appearance again, I'll be proud to have him on my piano.

Don't Lose Track of the Date - Get the LOST Calendar!

Yes, that's right. I'm rising to new heights of dorkiness and reviewing the 2008 LOST calendar. After five years of working in a calendar kiosk, I suppose it's about time I showed a little love to the goods I keep hawking. Though I adore LOST, this is the first year I purchased the calendar. The first time around I was afraid of spoilers, and the second I just didn't grab one in time. But this year I'm prepared, and right now I have Jack staring out at me every time I walk in the living room, boldly declaring, "Nobody gets left behind!"

It's no surprise Jack is January, but the calendar doesn't focus disproportionately on Our Hero. February features Kate among the trees. March is Sawyer, which makes me laugh because my friend just told me he thinks that there is one particular line he says in which he always sounds Irish. In April, both John and Eko are on display, which is an interesting but logical choice since the two are such forceful characters whose destinies are deeply entwined.

It makes even more sense for Sun and Jin to be pictured together for May, and they look like a pair of vibrant spring flowers, she in a pink top, he in purple. In June, we get a close-up of Sayid, lost in an intense gaze. His eyes are perhaps the most arresting of all the characters, and the accompanying quote - "I am not a soldier anymore" - reminds us of all the pain that lies behind them. July is graced with an Aaronless Claire, only one month away from August's pensive Charlie. At this point it seems cruel to separate them, but I won't complain about having more of Charlie to pore over.

An insufficiently shaggy Desmond's hair is whipped about by the ill-fated winds of September. It's lovely to be able to stare at Desmond for a month, but even though I have this picture - albeit with a jungle backdrop instead of the ocean - as my desktop background, it seems out of place, since Desmond's hair hasn't been that short since the beginning of season two. Give the guy a beard already!

In October, Hurley's puppy dog eyes peek out from a face sunk into a sullen expression. I know our resident millionaire can't be happy all the time, but he possesses a certain joie de vivre that lights up the island, so it might have been nice to show a picture of him smiling. The year concludes with the Others, who we get to know so much better in the third season. Juliet is November, while lovably psychopathic Ben closes out the year, perhaps in honor of his birthday, or maybe because, as leader of the Others, he makes the perfect bookend to Jack.

Along with the full-page pictures, the bottom half of the calendar includes six small photos of the featured character, and these are generally a lot more interesting than the canned publicity shots. The cover shot, a green-drenched collage of characters, is fantastic too, and a border of jungle green surrounds both the photo and the calendar page for each month.

I wish there was a planner and page-a-day calendar for LOST, which would allow for much more pictures, along with trivia and quotes. I'd definitely snatch one of those up, but I've never seen one. Still, I'm satisfied with the wall calendar, on which Thursdays are not even marked because it's completely ingrained in my brain: 9:00 on Thursdays means LOST. I know right where I'll be.

The Mysteries Deepen in LOST's Third Season

It's been a long wait between the season three finale of LOST back in May and tonight's season four opener. Eight months, during which we learned that the already short sixteen-episode season would probably be cut down to eight courtesy of the Writers' Strike. In November, we finally got a little something to tide us over with the mobisodes, brilliant little scenes first sent to cell phones and then posted on ABC.com a week later. Each of these nuggets has been pure gold to me, whetting my appetite for the excitement to come. I'm especially intrigued by the revelation in the 13th mobisode, though my favorite probably remains King of the Castle, in which Jack squares off against Ben in a game of chess and shrugs off suggestions that he might not really want to leave this island for good.

This month, we got the fantastic www.find815.com, an interactive website whose contents I still have not fully explored. It allows fans to follow the journey of Sam Thomas, former Oceanic employee and longtime boyfriend of an 815 stewardess named Sonya, who decides to conduct his own search after Oceanic gives up on finding the fallen airplane. Filled to the brim with fascinating tidbits, it no doubt offers some hints about the upcoming season.

But there's nothing like the show itself, so I was eager to pick up season three, which came out in mid-December, though I waited until January to buy it. I've heard and read a lot of complaints about its unevenness; most reviewers seemed to agree that the last few episodes had saved a substandard season. Maybe it made a difference that I saw the first six episodes close together, so I didn't have to wait such a long time to see what had happened to everyone after the season two finale, but I had few of those frustrations with the season.

Oh, sure, it was aggravating to see Kate and Sawyer stuck in bear cages and Jack in a shark tank, unable to roam freely and being manipulated by the Others. I worried that they might not make their way back to the beach, but in my heart of hearts, I figured they would. I think the writers could have given one of the second season's key characters a more graceful exit, and two of the third season's most superfluous characters a more natural entrance. But for the most past, I found the season absolutely riveting, and I was thrilled to be able to watch it in real time at last.

Season three is very focused on the Others, who are mostly hinted at in the first season and still shadowy in the second. We get to know the deliciously creepy Ben, formerly known as the sniveling Henry. Michael Emerson's exceptional Emmy-nominated performance kept me hanging on Ben's every word and gesture. Ben is especially compelling in conjunction with Jack (Matthew Fox), who gets intimately acquainted with the Others this season, and John (Terry O'Quinn), who despite long absences manages three centric episodes, the intensity of which were enough to score O'Quinn the Emmy.

Our castaways are very fragmented, particularly at the beginning, with Jack, Kate (Evangeline Lilly) and Sawyer (Josh Holloway) in captivity; Sayid (Naveen Andrews), Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) and Sun (Yunjin Kim) in decoy Otherville; Hurley (Jorge Garcia) wandering through the jungle; Eko (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), John and Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) unaccounted for and the rest of the gang back at the beach - save Michael (Harold Perrineau) and Walt (Malcolm David Kelley), of course, who have skipped the island in the Others' motorboat. As the season progresses, the fragmentation continues as the characters shuffle around, but in the entire season, we never see all of the castaways together in the same place - though we come close at one point, with only John off on his own, becoming more embroiled in the mysteries of the island and demanding answers from Ben.

Because the Others are now a prominent faction, there are many scenes, especially toward the end of the season, that don't involve the castaways at all. Much of the action hinges on the loyalties of Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell), a fertility specialist brought to the island because every pregnancy in recent memory has ended with the death of both mother and baby. Controlled by Ben for three years, all she wants is to get home to her sister and the nephew she's never met, and she's willing to do anything to facilitate that escape. She seems to have bonded with Jack, but is it all an act?

Richard (Nestor Carbonell), a soft-spoken man with heavy eyeliner who "looks fair but feels foul," recruited Juliet with some wheedling words and a little help from the dearly departed Ethan (William Mapother), who, like Christian (John Terry), has a habit of popping up frequently even though he died in the first season. Richard seems to be Ben's advisor, and quite possibly a scheming one at that, while Tom (M. C. Gainey), hitherto known as Mr. Friendly, is his lackey who is not nearly as intimidating without his beard. My favorite of the secondary Others, Tom is known for his congeniality, and in this season he generally comes across as a regular guy without as many sinister underpinnings as his cohorts.

Cohorts like Mikhail (Andrew Divoff), affectionately known as Patchy. This one-eyed Ukrainian first pops up on a television screen in the surveillance hatch. A loose cannon, he lives reclusively on a farm equipped with communication devices and shoots at anyone who comes to visit. He's surly and unpredictable, and he's much more important to the season than it at first appears. And then there is Jacob, the enigmatic leader of the Others who no one but Ben seems to have seen. Supposedly he calls all the shots, but does he even exist, or is he just another way for Ben to exert control over others?

The mysteries pile up in this season, but some compelling questions are answered, among them What is the Dharma Initiative, and how does it relate to the Others? Who is the original Sawyer? How is it that polar bears are wandering around on a tropical island? How did Locke get in the wheelchair? Some less intriguing questions receive an unwarranted degree of attention, most notably What's the deal with Jack's tattoos? But I'll forgive that debacle of a back story because the episode also focuses on the teenaged Karl (Blake Bashoff), who may be Luke to Sawyer's Han Solo and who shares a gorgeous Somewhere Out There moment with Alex (Tonya Raymonde), unhinged island resident Rousseau's (Mira Furlan) long-lost daughter, as the episode closes.

Sawyer certainly is one of the most riveting characters of the season. Though he hasn't grown any less snarky, he seems to be advancing steadily in his maturation process, and Jack's absence is doing him some good as it gives him the opportunity to step up and take some responsibility, with a little help from the wise Hurley. But this is Sawyer we're talking about here; can it be long before he backslides? All of the characters face new challenges this season, but the one I couldn't keep my eyes off of was Desmond, who we only really got to know during the season two finale. Now he's a regular part of the gang, though all that time in a hatch didn't do much for his social skills. He's a loner, but as he spends the season haunted by disturbing visions foretelling the death of Charlie (Dom Monaghan), the pair remain predominantly in one another's company, which is lovely for me, since they are two of my four favorite characters.

Charlie's supposed doom comes to light in Flashes Before Your Eyes, an episode whose format is unique among all those we've seen so far. Framed in the present, the bulk of it takes place at a key moment in Desmond's past - or is it? With its mind-bending premise and epic overtones - not to mention a terribly romantic storyline for a show that aired on Valentine's Day - it firmly establishes Desmond as a key player in the third season and makes the question of Charlie's survival a principal concern. Expose, on the other hand, disposes of two much-maligned characters and is widely regarded as a wasted episode, but the light-hearted tone and alternative perspectives actually made it one of my favorites of the season - though I am cross when I realize that while we are putting up with Nikki (Kiele Sanchez) and Paolo's (Rodrigo Santoro) pointless shenanigans, we could be getting some more time in with the fantastic Rose (L. Scott Caldwell) and Bernard (Sam Anderson), who are missing in action for the vast majority of the season.

LOST just keeps getting more and more complex, and it's nice to know that the writers now know exactly how much longer they have to wrap up the series. Presumably, this provides assurance that we're actually going to unlock most of the show's mysteries - though no doubt some will be left for us to discuss long after LOST has ended. I wish I could say that the show seems to be building toward the optimistic conclusion indicated by the first season, which was largely an idealistic study in how flawed people from disparate backgrounds can learn to live together peaceably. If you discount those killed upon impact in the plane crash, there are about twice as many deaths in the third season as in the first two combined. I certainly hope that trend doesn't continue. But whatever the case may be, I know exactly where I will be on Thursday night at 9 p.m., even if it is only for the next eight weeks. LOST has lost none of its appeal for me. I can't wait to see what Damon and Carlton have in store for us next!