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[This post is participating in South Dakota Dark's X-Files blog-a-thon.]

I can’t resist a good blog-a-thon, and South Dakota Dark’s X-Files blog-a-thon, anticipating tomorrow’s release of the new X-Files movie, seemed as good as any. For the past couple of weeks I watched the date of the blog-a-thon approach and waited for a good idea to strike. By the time it began on Sunday, none had yet. And I don’t appear to be the only one — sad to say, the X-Files blog-a-thon appears to be even more sparsely attended than my “I Can Do It Better” blog-a-thon of a few months ago.

What can account for this? The X-Files was a major pop-culture phenomenon in its time. Was its time too recent? It takes a while to ferment a classic after all. Those who were fans while the show was on the air have long since moved on, finding no shortage of well-written, well-acted conspiracy/mystery/thriller/science-fiction shows. (I’m thinking particularly of Lost, whose jaw-dropping third season I just finished on DVD last night.) And it takes more than a scant decade for a new nostalgia-minded fan base to build.

As for myself, every time I tried to think of what to write about The X-Files, my mind kept drifting instead to The West Wing. Why was that happening? I think I know, and if I’m right, it doesn’t augur well for tomorrow’s premiere.

During the late 90’s, Andrea and I used to love sitting down and watching The West Wing each week. It took place in a progressive paradise where, even though the moneyed interests sometimes won — it was about presidential politics, after all, and dealt believably with moral and political dilemmas — at least the public interest was usually uppermost in the minds of the fictional senior officials.

Star Trek had nothing on The West Wing when it came to enticing visions of an enlightened possible future.

That all came to an abrupt end during a few wrenching weeks in late 2000. The real-life presidential election results were up in the air, hinging on voting irregularities in Florida. The bad guys gamed the system and bent the rules to get the count to go their way. The good guys, being too principled, didn’t put up enough of a fight. During those weeks there were reversals of fortune and counter-reversals and counter-counter-reversals. I was a wreck. I followed every development as closely as I could and each scrap of news flayed my nerves raw. Democracy itself was under attack, and everyone involved in the battle had a stake in the outcome — meaning there was no disinterested authority to help settle the matter reasonably, not even, in the end, the Supreme Court. That authority vacuum felt like a taste of anarchy; the election battle, a gang fight in a bad neighborhood where the cops never patrol. The bad guys won, democracy lost — and at once The West Wing went from uplifting, optimistic, educational entertainment to simple-minded, far-fetched wish-fulfillment fantasy. The very thought of watching another episode was almost too painful to bear. We did try a few times, but we weren’t entertained and we weren’t optimistic for the future. The show’s only remaining power was to remind us of the brutality perpetrated on our ideals and the ease and speed with which it had been done, and was continuing to be done.

I think something similar may have happened to X-Files fandom. After seven and a half years of George Bush, who could be entertained by the idea of a shadowy government conspiracy? Who would even find such a story remarkable? Our real-life news is a constant barrage of conspiracies and corruption taking place in broad daylight. Cigarette-Smoking Man, with his furtive ways, would be laughed out of the Bush administration! The Lone Gunmen wouldn’t be three weirdos in a basement shining light on official misdeeds, they’d be DailyKos! As for Mulder and Scully, if they wanted to keep their jobs at the FBI they’d have to accept assignments trumping up new terrorism fears, busting consumers sharing mixtapes, or cracking down on porn. (Hmm, that’s one Mulder might actually like.)

Well, there’s one thing that George Bush hasn’t managed to ruin, and that’s a good working relationship between two intelligent people with a lot of integrity and courage and a little sexual tension. If the producers were smart and made the movie be about that, then tomorrow’s premiere stands a decent chance.

My kids’ latest favorite thing is Indiana Jones. Thanks to the release of the newest movie, the attendant schoolyard chatter, and the impossible-to-avoid merchandising, Jonah’s and Archer’s zeal to see the original Raiders of the Lost Ark was stoked to a fever pitch, and ultimately we just couldn’t resist, especially considering that Raiders is awesome. After filling in the kids with a little history (about the Nazis), a little Bible lore (about the ark), and a little science (about archaeology) — and after stern warnings about fighting being lots of fun in the movies but not OK in real life — we sat down for a family viewing, and we all had a great time.

Inevitably Andrea raised the question, “Did that guy ever do anything else?” referring to Paul Freeman, the actor who turned in a memorable performance as Belloq, Indy’s Nazi-collaborating rival.

Opening a mental filing cabinet I said, “I only remember seeing him one other time, in a British TV series on PBS of all things, a year or two after Raiders. I think it had something to do with solving mysteries with science. It might have been called Q.E.D. Come to think of it, Sam Waterston might have been in it!”

When I went online to confirm this, I found that my recollection was faulty in one way: I had seen Paul Freeman two other times, including in the very funny Sherlock Holmes parody, Without a Clue, in which he played Professor Moriarty. But I was exactly right about Q.E.D. — it was a British TV series about solving mysteries with science, its few episodes aired on PBS between one and two years after Raiders, the star was Sam Waterston, and Paul Freeman was indeed in one episode. I remember being disappointed that he was nowhere near as suave as he’d been in Raiders. (But that was OK, because Sam Waterston was the main attraction. In my house growing up, we were all big fans of Waterston thanks to his droll performance in the movie Hopscotch.)

Incidentally, despite my having seen Freeman in a total of only three roles, his filmography lists nearly a hundred film and TV appearances I managed to have missed.

Now here’s a Lucky Strike extra: co-starring with Freeman in Q.E.D. was Julian Glover, who a few years later would play Indy’s other Nazi-collaborating rival, Walter Donovan, in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

I was all prepared to be disinterested in the HBO series Rome, the first disc of which arrived last week from Netflix, but I had to give it a try because everyone who mattered said I did.

Of course the first episode was terrific and I was hooked, dammit. This brings to six the number of current or recent TV series that I must follow on DVD, the others being Prison Break, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Weeds, and the final season-and-a-half of The Sopranos, which I still haven’t seen (but have had spoiled). I also have yet to sample Dexter or Big Love, both of which sound like they also have the potential to hook me. Thank goodness I lost interest in Veronica Mars and Deadwood and never even liked Heroes.

Anyway, back to the first episode of Rome. As with many first-tier TV productions these days it had outstanding writing, performances, and production values, but when I think about the show, the one thing I keep coming back to is Polly Walker’s nipples.

In her introductory scene as Atia, scheming niece of Julius Caesar, she is astride her lover Timon, both of them oblivious to the slaves and attendants who surround them at a discreet distance as they hump their way to climax. Prominently on display in this scene are Atia’s (that is to say Polly Walker’s) erect and, I have to say, impressive nipples.

Now, I’ve been around a bit. I’ve seen my share of erect nipples, in person and in pictures. I’ve seen plenty of sex in film, both real and simulated. I would not have expected a detail like this could so captivate me this late in my sexual life.

Yet somehow I can’t escape the image. And I doubt I’m alone in this. My tastes are extremely conventional, after all; and as Howard Hughes says in The Aviator, “Who doesn’t like tits?”

That means there is a good chance that the success enjoyed to date by Rome, and by Polly Walker herself, may be attributable in large part to the shrewdly early viewer-hooking use of those tiny but strangely fascinating anatomical items.

Well, it wouldn’t be the first time that nipples have made a career…

Here are some of the top queries from various search engines that resulted in hits on my blog during the past year or so, reproduced verbatim from my server logs. (Last year’s results are here.) Each related family of queries is listed with a main variant in bold and selected other variants, plus the percentage of query-hits represented by that family.

I was at first surprised to see that hits for “James Bond villains” outnumbers hits for “vampire lesbian girl scouts” (etc.) and “sex” (etc.) combined, but then realized: the percentages are a function both of the popularity of that search and of the ranking of my site in the search results. In other words, if you’re looking for anything about vampires or lesbians or sex I regret to say there are a lot of likelier websites for you to visit before mine.

[This post is participating in Only the Cinema's Short Film Week blog-a-thon.]

My kids have outgrown it by now, but for a few years there our household was swimming in Thomas the Tank Engine videos and toys, and I could tell you the name, color, function, and personality of every engine on picturesque Sodor, and so could my wife and kids. I was amazed by that — and am now equally amazed at how quickly (and mercifully!) it has all faded from memory.

I wrote the following at the peak of our Thomasmania and dedicate it to all parents of Thomas-obsessed toddlers who think this phase will never end. It will.

It was a beautiful day on the island of Sodor. [Engine X] was very excited — today was the day of [an annual celebration or completion of a major construction milestone]. As [Engine X] chattered about it with the other engines in the shed, Sir Topham Hatt came to see him.

“[Engine X],” he said, “today I have an important job for you. You must ferry the [children, celebrants, performers, or party goods] to the [celebration].”

“Oh my,” said [Engine Y] to [Engine X]. “That means you’ll have to [traverse a notoriously tricky section of track]. Be sure to [travel at an appropriate speed].”

“I’m sure I always do,” sniffed Gordon.

On his way to [yet another among tiny Sodor's impossibly many stations], [Engine X] grew more and more excited and started to sing a happy song. “Oh, I’m going to pick up the [children, celebrants, performers, or party goods],” he sang as he chuffed along. He was having so much fun that he forgot all about [traveling at an appropriate speed]. Closer and closer loomed the [notoriously tricky section of track] until, all of a sudden–!

(Here [Engine X] makes an off-track excursion and causes property damage.)

Fortunately, no one was hurt. A short time later, Sir Topham Hatt arrived. He was very cross. “[Engine X], you were not paying attention. You have caused confusion and delay. I have asked [Engine Y] to take your place. You must go back to the shed for repairs.”

“I’m sorry,” said [Engine X]. He felt terrible. Not even jolly Harvey could cheer him up as he helped pull [Engine X] back onto the tracks. Now [Engine X] would not get to carry the [children, celebrants, performers, or party goods], and he wouldn’t even be able to attend the [celebration]!

On his way back to the shed, [Engine X] passed [Engine Y]. “Hi, [Engine X]!” called [Engine Y] cheerfully. “Hello,” replied [Engine X] glumly. As they passed, [Engine X] noticed [a condition with negative consequences for safety]. “I must alert [Engine Y, Sir Topham Hatt, or the switchman]!” thought [Engine X]. So he raced to [the celebration] and [averted a disaster].

Everyone cheered for [Engine X]! Sir Topham Hatt said, “You are a really useful engine.”

And he was.

Among the very earliest artifacts available for Star Trek fans to own was the book, The Making of Star Trek, by Stephen E. Whitfield and Gene Roddenberry, and I read it in the 70’s.

One anecdote that I remember from that book had to do with production of the original pilot episode, “The Cage.” In one scene, the actress Susan Oliver dances as a seductive “Orion slave girl,” covered from head to foot in green body makeup. The optical lab that processed the film footage from those scenes believed they had screwed up — and they color-corrected Oliver back to her normal skin tone! As I recall the story, this happened two or three times before the studio finally sent explicit instructions to the lab and they got it right.

I thought of this story when I learned from my dad a few weeks ago that someone made an unwanted “correction” to my mom’s cemetery headstone (on the proof that he saw). As long as I knew her, my mom jokingly maintained at each birthday that she was turning 29 (a source of extra hilarity when I “passed” her in age). So we put it in her epitaph, since with my mom, humor was paramount. But someone saw fit to change it to 73, which is correct only in a narrow-minded arithmetical sense — pah.

Fortunately we were able to correct it before production of the real headstone, which is newly erected.

Just in time to concentrate my pop culture obsession on the new Harry Potter book, which arrives from Amazon tomorrow — er, later today — a few minutes ago I finished watching season one of Prison Break on DVD. It was outstanding. It’s the story of Michael Scofield, a respectable white-collar professional who gets himself thrown into the same prison where his ne’er-do-well brother is on death row. Scofield has come prepared with an intricate plan to help them both escape and save his brother’s life.

A few interesting things about this show:

• Scofield’s prisoner number, 94941, was my ZIP code for 10 years.
• Scofield holds up a bank in order to get arrested and imprisoned. Although this scene is set in Chicago, the exterior shot of the bank he robs is of the distinctive-looking Ridgewood Savings Bank in Forest Hills, New York, where I had a passbook account in elementary school.
• This was the final viewing recommendation made to me by my mom after a lifetime full of them. When she first started watching it, beginning with the pilot episode, it was mainly for the hunky Wentworth Miller, who plays Scofield. I thought the premise, which she described to me, was too far-fetched, but as the season unfolded she continued to rave about it and finally piqued my interest. She was right, and as I neared the climax of season one, the discs couldn’t come from Netflix fast enough.

www.simpsonsmovie.com

So what if it looks nothing like me? It’s still cool.

It hasn’t been easy avoiding spoilers about the Sopranos finale. I’m still only halfway through season 5, and the finale came at the end of season 6. (Being far behind the broadcast schedule of my favorite shows is what convinced me finally to disconnect my cable service, and I’ve never looked back.)

By assiduous avoidance of my usual pop culture haunts (such as Salon.com’s and Entertainment Weekly’s TV pages) I have managed to remain completely in the dark about the ending — until this weekend, when I accidentally ran across a key piece of information in the unlikeliest of places: the headlines in sex writer Susie Bright’s RSS feed! I didn’t even have to click through to an article to have the surprise ruined. Susie, I admire you for a lot of things, but jeers to you for that gigantic unconcealed spoiler.

Yay, it’s the Cathy Lee Crosby/Ricardo Montalbán Wonder Woman TV movie from 1974, online for free (courtesy of AOL Video)!

[Updated: inline video player removed due to errors in certain browsers. Click here to view the complete Cathy Lee Crosby Wonder Woman movie.]

Cathy Lee in this movie was my second TV crush, after Nancy, the irrepressible nine-year-old from the original 1972 Zoom. Ah Nancy, the six-year-old in me yubbearns fubbor yubbou stubbill.

Hooray for the long tail, and — though I thought I’d never say this — hooray for AOL!

Now if only someone would put that other terrible TV movie from my childhood online somewhere: Stowaway to the Moon!