Late-night host Conan O’Brien takes aim at President Obama’s plans to “streamline” the military through reduced defense spending while the rest of the Congressional budget inflates.

From Team Coco:

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President Obama’s joint-session, prime time, pass-it-now jobs speech was so feckless that even Jon Stewart’s ridiculing it.

The American people aren’t all that impressed, either.

Obama becoming a late-night punchline and subject of ridicule might be the most glaring example of how much trouble he’s really in. The easier the jokes are to write and deliver, the more of “a joke” the subject becomes. Watch the first clip of Conan O’Brien. All he has to say is “jobs plan” to get a laugh.

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The biggest release this week, for this movie fan anyway, is the Blu-ray of John Milius’s masterful fantasy epic, Conan the Barbarian.  No doubt this is being put out to lead up to Marcus Nispel’s upcoming interpretation of the character, which I’m actually looking forward to, albeit with some skepticism.  This movie kick-started the sword & sorcery craze of the eighties, but even more to its credit, it made the great Arnold Schwarzenegger a star.

Milius, who rewrote an earlier draft of the script by Oliver Stone, is a filmmaker who loves big, manly stories, and Conan the Barbarian is his best film.  Arnold’s portrayal of Conan isn’t really the sleek, panther-like killer of Robert E. Howard’s brilliant short stories, however he perfectly embodies the imaged realized by the legendary illustrator Frank Frazetta.  Milius’s direction gives the film a visual weight rarely achieved in fantasy cinema.  Arnold only speaks when he needs to (“Conan! What is best in life?!”), and it makes his presence all the more intense, driven, and mysterious.

 James Earl Jones plays Thulsa Doom, the evil sorcerer whom Conan has sworn to kill for murdering his family, and Jones brings the same sinister presence he brought when he performed the voice of Darth Vader (fun fact: Thulsa Doom never appeared in Howard’s Conan stories, but was actually a villain in Howard’s short stories about his Conan prototype, Kull the Conqueror).  Add a supporting cast featuring names like the gorgeous Sandahl Bergman, the legendary Max Von Sydow, and the great Mako (who also narrates), and you have a perfect film when it comes to providing instant gravitas in its characters.  If you listen to the commentary track, Milius talks about the trilogy of Conan films he had planned out, it’s a shame all of his ideas were never realized in future films.

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–’ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK’ REMAKE DEAD … FOR NOW–

A draft I read of this intended remake was extremely well written but also an environmental allegory and warning. If memory serves, Manhattan had become a prison due to the flooding caused by *prepare for eyeroll*  man-made Global Warming. After director John Carpenter’s own disastrous return to his 1981 classic with “Escape From L.A.,” it wasn’t as though we really needed another reason to wish doom upon a remake.

Man, I remember sitting through the dreadful “Escape from L.A.,” which I had dragged my dad to, all excited in the knowledge that Pam Grier was going to show up onscreen. Just the vision of her beautiful-ness would lift these awful two hours into something worthwhile … only to discover Carpenter cast her as a man, or something.

Regardless, you can’t replace Kurt Russell.

You can’t.

No one working today comes close to his mixture of menace, masculinity, unspoken intelligence and charm. He’s a one-of-a-kind who created an iconic role for the ages and you might as well have someone else try to play Cool Hand Luke or Bullitt.

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With all of the talk of vitriolic rhetoric and images, the Left conveniently ignores so many vicious attacks–verbal and physical–on conservatives, Republicans, and anyone else who disagrees with them.  They attempt to bully their political opponents into submission and silence–with the MSM in lock step with them.  And if there was even a shred of hope that the MSM would get back in the game of reporting the news, we now have confirmation that it is gone.  Completely.

Obviously, this hatred of the Right and America is a long-term issue, but the torch continues to be passed.  Alec Baldwin, one of the Left’s darlings and possible seeker of public office, may want to hire a good strategist to develop a PR image plan to diffuse this one again, ’cause apologies and saying it was a “joke” is soooo yesterday. The reality is, Alec, you meant every word.  And it’s long-lost rants like this that make for great campaign ads.

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Just as Nina Totenberg meant it literally when she wished AIDS on Jesse Helms’ grandchildren as she giggled away, these are such good liberals, indeed, with their venom.  Such a hideous display of the inner dark soul of the Left.  I’m still confused by Totenberg’s comment–a child should suffer and die because of his or her grandfather’s political affiliation?

However, what Alec does on Conan’s show in 1998 is even more horrifying.  I remember watching this as it went down and have never forgotten Alec’s violent call to kill an elected Republican Congressman. Is that what he learned in Africa–that they stone people to death there–as stoning appears to be very prevalent in Africa.  And where were the bills then against threats to lawmakers?

Here’s the transcript (emphasis mine): (more…)

[Ed. Note: This is the internal memo from Steve Koonin, President of Turner Entertainment Networks, to his staff.]

Everyone,

Over the past decade, we have set our sights on growing TEN’s business by demonstrating that our programming and marketing are valid substitutes for broadcast TV. Generations of Americans have switched their viewing choices to cable TV in news, sports, kids programming and, in the last few years, original series.

Broadcast’s last stronghold has been morning and late-night television. But our sister network, Adult Swim, proved that there is a viable audience outside of broadcast for young adult viewers. Just six months ago, TBS entered the fray to steal viewers and revenue from broadcast with the launch of Lopez Tonight.

Now I am pleased to share news that will accelerate our growth in making late-night TV the territory of Turner Entertainment Networks.

Conan O’Brien has agreed to bring his Emmy-winning comedy to TBS. Starting in November, Conan will take over the 11 p.m. time slot on TBS.
George Lopez, who assisted in our recruitment of Conan, will follow at midnight. The combination of these two hosts – with their core audiences of young, diverse viewers – should lead TBS to a leadership position in late-night television. (more…)

How do critics stay employed? Next to Weathermen and Wall Street Analysts, only critics are more incompetent forecasters. In fact, it would seem that critics are so bad at analysis, that if the critics loathe a movie, play, or television show, there is a fairly good chance it will be a blockbuster.

I often wonder how these people keep their jobs. Perhaps the editors share their disdain, and they like to keep them around so the rest of the staff will know which productions to avoid. Because it seems that most newspaper writers are left-wing drones who hate anything that might be entertaining, even in the slightest way. In certain circles, what you like to watch is less important than what you don’t watch. The most popular stance you can take with these elites is to claim that you NEVER watch television and rely on NPR for all your news.

A recent example of this was seen with the debut of Jay Leno back into the Tonight Show desk. Critics panned his opening monologue. But his ratings were huge. And the audience came back the next night, fueled in part by his selection of Sarah Palin as a guest.  Now after two weeks, it seems that Jay is back to the number one slot that David Letterman held during the reign of Conan. (more…)

It’s going to be a very sparse one this week, since Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Bill Maher, Stephen Colbert, and Jon Stewart were all on vacation. (Last week, everybody but Stewart and Colbert were on vacation so I didn’t watch. They re-ran those episodes this week, but except for the Michael Jackson stuff, there wasn’t really enough overlap material to judge them fairly).

Lamest Attempt at Obama Joke: David Letterman claimed that Obama was in Russia, hiking the Appalachian trail.

Letterman also used John McCain as a foil on three different nights to compare the disparity between winners and losers of the last Presidential election: While Obama traveled to Russia to meet with Putin, McCain was chasing kids off his lawn. While Obama was in Italy, McCain was heating up a can of Chef Boy-Ar-Dee; While Obama was in Italy meeting with the G-8, McCain was on his front porch in Arizona, waving at cars. (more…)

While the President was pitching health care and the Speaker was rounding up support for Cap and Trade, the Late Nights were focused on Mark Sanford: a Republican governor that seemed like a comeuppance for Democrat Rod Blagojevich. In fact many of the hosts brought up the Illinois Governor in their jokes.

Craig Ferguson said after Spitzer and Blagojevich, the most normal governor was Jesse Ventura. He also said that a family values governor having a mistress is like Al Gore needing four SUVs to bring his lunch to him.(It was disappointing that Ferguson didn’t see the irony in his remark, because Al Gore DOES require multiple SUVs when he travels) Funniest line went to Conan O’Brien, who said the affair was a shock, because usually, Republicans don’t do well with Hispanic women. (more…)

After a week that will go down in history as the moment Republicans finally stood up for themselves, comics are not laying off John McCain’s former running mate just yet. Bill Maher said that Iran was propped up by oil revenue and run by a religious whacko, just like Alaska. Letterman, despite frequent jokes about the amount of hate mail he has been receiving, couldn’t help mentioning that Gay Pride week was the only time of year when you can see hundreds of men dressed up like Sarah Palin.

The big topics of the week were Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the presidential fly killing:

The election of Mahmoud was compared by the talk show hosts alternately to the 2000 Presidential and the 2008 Minnesota Senate elections. Fallon claimed that now that his opponent lost, he’ll go on to make a documentary about Global Warming.  David Letterman actually did a joke almost every single night, changing the punchline from Florida voting machines, to Pat Buchanan, Al Gore, Al Franken and Jeb Bush.  Bill Maher used Norm Coleman then criticized his audience for not knowing who he was talking about. The funniest line was Ferguson’s who claimed that Iranian politics have finally gotten as corrupt as Chicago. (more…)

Dear Mr. Letterman,

Several weeks ago I wrote you a heartfelt letter expressing my concern for the direction that your show was headed. I am sad to see that you have not only not reined in the nastiness, but that your spin cycle is now on viciousness overload.

Mr. Letterman, this is not about your liberalism. I was a fan of yours for 20 years, and put politics aside as my fellow Republicans abandoned your show in droves. I defended you sir, and I am now being forced to eat my words. (more…)

In the short span between my last review and today, we’ve seen the President sign a stimulus package so full of pork that Obama’s father would have been forbidden to touch it, along with a bump on the head, a scripted and sputtering press conference, and a contradiction from someone who actually understands how business works. Obama also appeared onstage in the theatre where Lincoln was shot, alongside a Lincoln impersonator (ouch).

Certainly there’s some topics ripe for ridicule. So what are the Late Nights talking about? I thought it was time for another review, so I fired up the DVR Tuesday night and watched David Letterman, Jay Leno, Craig Ferguson, Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Kimmel. (Jon Stewart, and Stephen Cobert both have the week off.) (more…)