So, all hail the new A-Team.  I just hope they’ve fixed the one hackey sucker punch aspect – the lame use of U.S. contractors as, once again, the villain du jour.

Now, anyone who at any point in the 1980s was unable to legally drive knows The A-Team and its mythology.  Basically, a bunch of Vietnam War commandos are falsely accused of a crime, escape from a stockade and dodge the military police while acting as soldiers of fortune.  George Peppard was their leader Hannibal Smith, Dirk Benedict was Face, the good-looking con man, Dwight Schultz was “Howlin’ Mad” Murdock, the resident wacko, and Mr. T portrayed, well, pretty much himself.

Every week they crashed a lot of cars, shot millions of bullets without ever hitting anything, made smartass remarks and issued memorable catchphrases.  This was all highly entertaining – particularly if you were a college student like me who enjoyed accepting creative drinking game challenges.  Here’s a hint – designate not just a driver but a stretcher-bearer if you dare join in a round of “Let’s Watch The A-Team and Down a Brew Whenever Something Explodes.” 

The remake updates the story and amps up the action.  Liam Neeson is the new Hannibal, Bradley Cooper is Face, some guy I never heard of named Rampage Jackson (was that his given name?) is Mr. T, and that dude who morphed into a shrimp in District 9 is Murdock.  The new A-Team is now composed of Iraq war vets falsely accused of a massive theft of artifacts from the Baghdad Museum.  They get arrested, convicted, bust out and then – oh hell, you can watch the trailer yourself, but here’s a plot summary anyway:  

Bang, pow, punch, “I ain’t getting on no airplane,” BOOM, cigar, “I love it when a plan comes together,” BOOM, vroom, pow, crash, more and bigger BOOMS, bang, bang, bang, set up for the sequel, the end.

This is quality entertainment.  Plus Jessica Biel is in it and she’s on fire.

Now, the script does provide some moments of humor, some intentional and some unintentional.  The unintentional stuff probably derives from the screenwriters’ (and there are lots of them, credited and uncredited, on this project) complete ignorance of the military.  I like how the script has a C-130 carrying two M1A1 Abrams tanks and a Blackhawk helicopter in its hold.  The Hercules can do a lot of things, but not defy the laws of physics. 

But don’t get me wrong.  I’m all for this kind of summer rollercoaster big screen insanity.  In the trailer, we see them fall out of the plane inside one of the tanks while lighting up an attacking Predator drone with a Ma Deuce .50 cal on the drop down.  My departures from military aircraft in flight were not quite so colorful, but if you’re heading to The A-Team expecting the vivid realism of a cinema verite documentary you need to substantially recalibrate your expectations.

The action is suitably over the top both on paper and even more so in the trailer, but there are a couple of scenes on the printed page of surprising harshness.  I’m hoping the tone gets smoothed out in subsequent drafts, and the trailer looks as if it did.  There’s nothing wrong with tough, brutal acts in some films, but that is kind of the antithesis of The A-Team aesthetic.  This shouldn’t be the Omaha Beach scene from Saving Private Ryan.

Alas, there is a sucker punch of sorts, in that it appears the villains are that hoariest of current clichés, military contractors.  James Cameron has been a pioneer in trashing American military members without the guts to just come out and do it with his “But those weren’t American Marines we were slaughtering – they were mercenaries” dodge in the unwatchable Avatar.  Give me a break.  The mere notion that American soldiers become evil the moment their camouflage fails to read “U.S. Army” on the nametape is as insulting to the audience’s intelligence as it is offensive to everyone who has served or is serving today.

Let me be real clear about something – U.S. military contractors like Halliburton protected me, fed me and did a bunch of other chores for me while I’ve been deployed, and today they are doing the same for hundreds of thousands of other American service members overseas.  Many of them died doing it, killed by the same sons of bitches that shoot at our troops and murder civilians.  Are contractors perfect?  Nope.  Neither are service members. 

The fact is there is a real enemy out there.  Can you Hollywoodoids guess who that might be?  Here’s a hint: They killed 3000 Americans in 2001.  Sure, portraying our real enemies as, well, our enemies, might cost you a few cocktail party invitations, but maybe you hacks might want to make them the bad guys once in a while and see what happens at the box office.

The fact is that American contractors are the current villain of choice for many in Hollywood because many industry types are too gutless to come straight out and trash our troops in the wake of the utter failure of every film that’s done it since we liberated Iraq.  Come on, have the courage of your lack of convictions – you know you want to say it, just like your unwashed hippie mommy used to do to Vietnam vets before she sold out, showered off, and went mainstream in 1977: “Baby killers!  Baby killers!” 

The spitting on the troops is optional, but I’d strongly advise against it unless you love the idea of undergoing substantial dental reconstructive work.

Not only does trashing American contractors let them get in some punches against the troops they are too gutless to admit they hold in contempt but it’s safe too.  No contractor will be parking a ticking SUV outside of their studio; even abject cowardice and submission didn’t keep Comedy Central’s parent company safe from that guy Mayor Bloomberg and the media hoped was just mad about health care reform.

Perhaps I’m overthinking it.  Hell, with The A-Team, any thinking is overthinking it. 

Now, based on the script and the trailer, it seems unlikely that the writers of The A-Team have any conscious agenda beyond making things go boom in the most spectacular way possible.  Their sin is most likely mere laziness; it’s too bad that their laziness happens to correspond with the very real loathing some in the industry feel for our troops and even our country.  It would be nice, in a world full of real bad guys, for a movie to have the intestinal fortitude to actually name one of the real bad guys instead of trashing proud, brave Americans by falling back on the cheesiest and most tiresome of clichés.

Will I see The A-Team when it hits theatres June 11th?  Well, as always, I’ll wait for the Big Hollywood review of the movie’s final version before plunking down the $12.50(!) a ticket they want.  Hopefully, the contractor sucker punch will be nothing more than a sucker jab that is overshadowed by the smoke and flames and flying catchphrases.  And all will be forgiven if they roll out Mr. T for a cameo.  But if they don’t, well, I pity the fools.

At my very first convention, I was coming out of an elevator as a fan was entering. She glanced at me, gasped and said, “My God, what happened to you?” It took me a couple minutes to understand her statement. What she was gasping about and referring to was the all too visual fact that I no longer looked the same. I had changed! AGED! She found this fact surprising. Stunning, perhaps, from the size of her gasp. This gave me pause.

This experience would be followed, innumerable times, with similar reactions. These people had not seen me since both “The A Team” and “Battlestar Galactica” were cancelled, neither in person nor on the glowing screen in their living rooms – and they were completely taken aback that I no longer looked the same as I did three decades earlier. That Mother Nature or Father Time or both in cahoots, had had their way with me. I found this profoundly sad. Not that I had changed, but that they were surprised that I had. It made me think, as I am wont to do, while chopping firewood in my Montana hideaway. It goes like this.

During the past one hundred years, mankind has split the atom; walked on the moon; invented the radio, the telephone; discovered penicillin; made advances that stagger the imagination in every arena of human endeavor. But none of the men and women responsible for any of these incredible achievements can compare with Mickey Mouse when it comes to being a Celebrity. Mickey Mouse is the most famous image of the past century.

There isn’t a celebrity anywhere, be it President, Movie Star, Rapper, TV Star, or Talk Show hostess, that doesn’t have Mickey to thank for showing the way. In 1928, Mickey made his first film “Steamboat Willie,” and quickly became the most famous individual in the world, and still is according to most polls. Truly, the star of all stars. And while he has yet to buy a second home in Montana (or the South of France) or run for President, there are plenty of those who live vicariously off his fame that have.

It’s all Mickey’s fault. He has shown us all the power that comes from releasing “image” from the prison of reality. Unlike lesser stars, he is free from needing plastic surgeons, private trainers, PR spin doctors. He, that is, his image, will live forever, effortlessly conquering reality with each new generation of fans. Long after Madonna has given up her steel tits for a platinum coffin, Mickey will be packing them in. He is a marketing marvel and the envy of all those whose dream is immortality through celebrity. We idolize Mickey because we know he, and he alone, has defeated death. And our specific fear of death is nothing more than the ultimate expression of our general fear of the aging process … growing old.

We live by our image and we die by our image. And when that image no longer reflects back on us in the same way that brought us our celebrity, to whatever degree, we “fix” it with the surgeon’s knife. But in the end, there is no surgeon that can save us from the truth. To be alive is to change. To change is to let go. Continually. Of all things, not just youth and beauty, but of old age and, finally (horrors) life.

If it weren’t for Mickey, we wouldn’t have to have the mortality of our selves and our stardom continually rubbed in our surgically enhanced faces as we tenaciously hang on to youth, fame and fortune. Mickey needs no rejuvenation. He is, after all, the perfect star and therefore pure image and not really human at all.

Mickey is God.

The old God is dead. Long live Mickey. He is the essence of our own divine image, of our celebrated selves, as we struggle for rejuvenation ad infinitum. We have created a new God and he is Us. We idolize our Selves. We are the viewer and we are the viewed. We keep our despair buried beneath our material possessions and eternal youth and two week vacations as we gaze constantly upon our own Perfect Image until the fatuity of this viciously spiritless cycle dawns on us and we do, finally and against our will, change, grow old and, alas, die. And in that same instant recognize that God is NOT dead. That Mickey is a lie. A hoax. Mirage. Nothing but pure image and personality, void of spirit.

Surgical rejuvenation is violence committed against ourselves as some misguided but socially acceptable, socially required notion of it as an expression of individuality. And control. Perceived as a means of empowering the individual, it is precisely the opposite. An admission of powerlessness and fear. Plastic surgery is a member of the same family as acts of suicide. The surgeon’s knife, as it alters our face or changes our sex or tucks our tummy, is different only as a matter of degree from the suicide bullet or slashed wrists whose goal it is to alter completely our state of being.

Both are acts of terrorism committed against one’s self as an expression of one’s individuality. Suicide is the last desperate cry of the individual as he struggles to control his fate. It is the ultimate (final) face lift and full body tuck, taken in anger and borne out of fear that there is a Higher Power to which he or she will finally and forever have to answer.

Fear, in other words, that it is not God, but Mickey Mouse who is dead, who has always been dead. Not in image, but in spirit. Spirit-less. A poseur. Not even a real rodent (they too are mortal) but the mere image of one, mass marketed by the same propagandists and sellers of false dreams that sold us our own image of ourselves. And if Mickey, our hero, our God, our star of stars, is dead … then what chance have we?

Choose your poison. More surgery? More toys? More fame? More fortune? More…? All suicide. All attempts to avoid the Hemingwayesque death of the individual too long in idolatrous worship at the altar of his own image. Our options dwindle as our desperation grows. Less surgery? Fewer toys? Smaller fortunes? Less fame? But like the alcoholic, one drink is not enough, two drinks are too many.

Were we to let go of our false images; peel the onion layer by layer; take the mirror off the wall and let go until finally we found our real uniqueness buried at the bottom of all the imagery … on the other side of the looking glass, what would we discover? That it is not just “us” at all but rather …what?

God? Spirit? And then what…?

And then nothing.

Then we must take the blind leap of faith into the web of life. Into the spirituality of our existence, so that we may then begin to enjoy the process of our life experience. Wherein lies real celebrity and celebration. Real love and strength and beauty and individuality. Real life and immortality.

The rest is all Mickey Mouse.

Unless, of course, they do finally re-imagine ”The A-Team” as a feature film, and then I take it all back.

Fortunately, I was young, my imagination fertile and adrenal glands strong, because bringing Starbuck to life was over the dead imaginations of a lot of Network Executives. Every character trait I struggled to give him was met with vigorous resistance. A charming womanizer? The “Suits” (Network Executives) hated it. A cigar (fumerello) smoker? The Suits hated it. A reluctant hero who found humor in the bleakest of situations? The Suits hated it. All this negative feedback convinced me I was on the right track.

Starbuck was meant to be a lovable rogue. It was best for the show, best for the character and the best that I could do. The Suits didn’t think so. “One more cigar and he’s fired,” they told Glen Larson, the creator of the show. “We want Starbuck to appeal to the female audience for crying out loud.” You see, the Suits knew women were turned off by men who smoked cigars, especially young men. How they “knew” this was never revealed. And they didn’t stop there. “If Dirk doesn’t quit playing every scene with a girl like he wants to get her in bed, he’s fired.” This was, well, it was blatant heterosexuality, treating women like “sex objects.” I thought it was flirting. Never mind, they wouldn’t have it. I wouldn’t have it any other way, or rather Starbuck wouldn’t. So we persevered, Starbuck and I. The show, as the saying goes, went on and the rest is history for, lo and behold, women from all over the world sent me boxes of cigars, phone numbers, dinner requests, and marriage proposals.

The Suits were not impressed. They would have their way, which is what Suits do best, and after one season of puffing and flirting and gambling, Starbuck, that loveable scoundrel, was indeed fired. Which is to say, “Battlestar Galactica” was cancelled. Starbuck, however, would not stay cancelled, but simply morphed into another flirting, cigar smoking, blatant heterosexual called Faceman. Another show, another set of Suits, and of course, if The “A-Team” movie rumors prove correct, another remake.

There was a time, I know I was there, when men were men, women were women and sometimes a cigar was just a good smoke. But 40 years of feminism have taken their toll. The war against masculinity has been won. Everything has turned into its opposite, so that what was once flirting and smoking is now sexual harassment and criminal. And everyone is more lonely and miserable as a result.

Witness the “re-imagined” “Battlestar Galactica,” bleak, miserable, despairing, angry and confused. Which is to say, it reflects in microcosm the complete change in the politics and morality of today’s world, as opposed to the world of yesterday. The world of Lorne Greene (Adama), Fred Astaire (Starbuck’s Poppa) and Dirk Benedict (Starbuck). I would guess Lorne is glad he’s in that Big Bonanza in the sky and well out of it. Starbuck, alas, has not been so lucky. He’s not been left to pass quietly into that trivial world of cancelled TV characters.

“Re-imagining”, they call it. “Un-imagining” is more accurate. To take what once was and twist it into what never was intended. So that a television show based on hope, spiritual faith and family is un-imagined and regurgitated as a show of despair, sexual violence and family dysfunction. To better reflect the times of ambiguous morality in which we live, one would assume. A show in which the aliens (Cylons) are justified in their desire to destroy human civilization, one would assume. Indeed, let us not say who the good guys are and who the bad are. That is being “judgmental,” taking sides, and that kind of (simplistic) thinking went out with Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan and Kathryn Hepburn and John Wayne and, well, the original “Battlestar Galactica.”

In the bleak and miserable “re-imagined” world of “Battlestar Galactica,” things are never that simple. Maybe the Cylons are not evil and alien but in fact enlightened and evolved? Let us not judge them so harshly. Maybe it is they who deserve to live and Adama and his human ilk who deserve to die? And what a way to go! For the re-imagined terrorists (Cylons) are not mechanical robots void of soul, of sexuality, but rather humanoid six foot tall former lingerie models who f**k you to death. (Poor old Starbuck, you were imagined too early. Think of the fun you could have had ‘fighting’ with these thong-clad aliens!) In the spirit of such soft-core, sci-fi porn I think a more re-imaginative title would have been “F**cked by A Cylon.” (Apologies to “Touched by an Angel.”)

One thing is certain. In the new un-imagined, re-imagined world of “Battlestar Galactica” everything is female driven. The male characters, from Adama on down, are confused, weak and wracked with indecision, while the female characters are decisive, bold, angry as hell, puffing cigars (gasp!) and not about to take it any more.

One can quickly surmise what a problem the original Starbuck created for the re-imaginators. Starbuck was all charm and humor and flirting without an angry bone in his womanizing body. Yes, he was definitely “female driven,” but not in the politically correct ways of Re-imagined Television. What to do, wondered the Re-imaginators? Keep him as he was, with a twinkle in his eye, a stogie in his mouth and a girl in every galaxy? This could not be. He would stick out like, well, like a jock strap in a drawer of thongs. Starbuck refused to be re-imagined. It became the Great Dilemma. How to have your Starbuck and delete him too?

The best minds in the world of un-imagination doubled their intake of Double Soy Latte’s as they gathered in their smoke-free offices to curse the day that this chauvinistic Viper Pilot was allowed to be. But never under-estimate the power of the un-imaginative mind when it encounters an obstacle (character) it subconsciously loathes. ”Re-inspiration” struck. Starbuck would go the way of most men in today’s society. Starbuck would become “Stardoe.” What the Suits of yesteryear had been incapable of doing to Starbuck 25 years ago was accomplished quicker than you can say orchiectomy. Much quicker, as in, “Frak! Gonads Gone!”

And the word went out to all the Suits in all the smoke-free offices throughout the land of Un-imagination, “Starbuck is dead. Long live Stardoe!”

I’m not sure if a cigar in the mouth of Stardoe resonates in the same way it did in the mouth of Starbuck. Perhaps. Perhaps it “resonates” more. Perhaps that’s the point. I’m not sure. What I am sure of is this…

Women are from Venus. Men are from Mars. Hamlet does not scan as Hamletta. Nor does Hans Solo as Hans Sally. Faceman is not the same as Facewoman. Nor does a Stardoe a Starbuck make. Men hand out cigars. Women “hand out” babies. And thus the world for thousands of years has gone’ round.

I am also sure that Show Business has been morphing for many decades now and has finally become Biz Business. The creative artists have lost and the Suits have won. Suits. Administrators. Technocrats. Metro-sexual money-men (and women), who create ever more efficient formulas to guarantee profit margins. Because movies and television shows are not made to enlighten or even entertain, but simply to make money. They will tell you it is (still) about story and character, but all it is really about is efficiency. About the Formula. Because Harvard Business School Technocrats run Hollywood and what Technocrats know is what must be removed from all business is Risk. And I tell you, life, real life, is all about risk. I tell you that without risk you have no creativity, no art. I tell you that without risk you have Remakes. You have, “Charlie’s Angels,” “The Saint,” “Mission Impossible,” “The A Team” (coming soon), and “Battlestar Galactica.”

All risk-free brand names, franchises.

For you see, TV shows (and movies) are made and sold according to the same business formula as hamburger franchises. So that it matters not if it is the “best” hamburger, what matters is that you “think” it is the best. And you do “think” it is the best, because you have been told to; because all of your favorite celebrities are seen munching it on TV. The big money is not spent on making the hamburger or the television show, but on the marketing of the hamburger/show. (One 60 second commercial can cost more than it does to film a one-hour episode.) It matters not to Suits if it is Starbuck or Stardoe, if the Cylons are robots or lingerie models, if the show is full of optimism and morality or pessimism and amorality. What matters is that it is marketed well, so that all you people out there in TV land know that you must see this show. And after you see it, you are told that you should like it. That it is new and bold and sleek and sexy and best of all … it is Re-imagined!

So grab a Coke from the fridge (not the Classic Coke, but the re-imagined kind with fewer calories) and send out for a McDonald’s hamburger (the re-imagined one with fewer carbs), and tune in to Stardoe and Cylon #6 (or was it #69?) and Enjoy the Show.

And if you don’t enjoy the show, or the hamburger and coke, it’s not the fault of those re-imaginative technocrats that brought them to you. It is your fault. You and your individual instincts, tastes and judgment — your refusal to let go of the memory of the show that once was. You just don’t know what is good for you. But stay tuned. After another 13 episodes (and millions of dollars of marketing), you will see the light. You, your instincts, your judgment, are wrong. McDonald’s is the best hamburger on the planet, Coca-Cola the best drink, and Stardoe is the best Viper Pilot in the Galaxy.

And “Battlestar Galactica,” contrary to what your memory tells you, never existed before the Re-imagination of 2004.

I disagree. But perhaps, you had to be there.

Commenters, please keep writing in your own names (and linking to your personal web sites/blogs), if you can. It has helped to keep up the quality.

The media highlight of the week was Rush Limbaugh reading and riffing on Andrew Klavan’s, “Why We Fight.” The most poignant and righteous post was clearly Charles Winecoff’s, “The Awakening of a Dumb (Gay) American.” The comments tell us everything we know about the truth about tolerance on the right. And the lie about tolerance on the left. I am extraordinarily proud to call Charles a patriot, an ally and a friend.

I am still cleaning up my britches from multiple readings of Iowahawk’s introductory post, “Movies Are Your Best Entertainment Value.” Prolific Gutfeld and Orson are the site’s Omar Sharif and Erma Bombeck.

I have to spend time with my family so I can’t thank every new contributor that came in this week, but suffice to say I am grateful and I think people are slowly getting the idea that we aren’t alone in Hollywood with our crazy non-leftist ideas.

And liberals, you will be thanking us later when our ideas get to play out in the marketplace of ideas. Trust me. It’s way too boring when everyone agrees with each other. Start giving us a little more slack, you’ll see.

Next week brings some surprises and some new names from Hollywood and the political establishment. I promise you won’t want to miss Dirk Benedict’s forthcoming piece describing his battles in the 1970s trying to keep Starbuck, his beloved Battlestar Gallactica character, a masculine rogue. He also takes on the latest feminized incarnation of the show. Dirk has a humorous and deeply analytical mind. As you will see, Dirk was fighting political correctness in Hollywood well before most of us.

And I can’t wait to see what Pat Dollard has in mind as he makes his return to Hollywood in his Big Hollywood debut.

Only had to delete one off-topic post. And sorry to readers (and the contributor) that I wasn’t as watchful as I should. We need to stay on topic.

Here are the basic guidelines:

1) Non-Hollywood voices can offer content that relates to either pop culture (film, television, music, celebrity, etc) or the intersection of pop culture and politics (e.g. Sean Penn travels to Venezuela to kiss Hugo Chavez’s ring.)

2) Hollywood voices can offer their thoughts on the above… AND talk about the political issues of the day as they see fit. If Hollywood lefties feel so free talking about their ideas, those that differ should have the opportunity to publicly express themselves — on a soapbox and in their work.

Off to take Charlie to a friend’s birthday party at the Eco-Station. Check their politicized promo. Yes, Virginia, liberals are judgmental. Until we have our kids extravaganza (Milton and Rose Friedman Nerf Land!), the left is going to be beating us using our free market ideals against us.

Yes, friends, we have our work cut out for us. Onward to week three.