AJ's Daily Devotions: Jay Z says 'Jesus Can't Save You' On His New Album, What Are You Doin Everyday To Disprove This Statement

AJ's Daily Devotions: Jay Z says 'Jesus Can't Save You' On His New Album, What Are You Doin Everyday To Disprove This Statement

This discussion is a good one. Some of the comments are eyeroll inducing, but some of them put a lot of thought into what they wrote, and I respect that.

Glee season 1

This is a much-talked about show for a lot of reasons. First of all, it features a bunch of high school students who don't always fit the mold...a lot of them are outcasts, an they';re a motley crew drawn together by the fact that they all have talent. they can sing and dance (to varying degrees of success, but that's a minor quibble that I'm tired of hearing). Honestly, I heard nothing but positive things about this show for months, and I finally watched it and fell in love with it, and it was only then that I learned that a lot of people hate this show. It's been called racist, sexist, abelist (for its depiction of disabled people, for those who aren't familiar with the jargon) and homophobic. It's been slammed for trading in stereotypes, and people complain that it maligns the very students it's trying to showcase as talented and worthy individuals. I don't agree with this portrayal, but I don't really have time to address each and every slam this show has received, and it wouldn't help anyway. those who are determined to hate it won't be swayed by anything I have to say since they've heard it all before. what I will say is that while this show might not be perfect, it at least TRIES to show outcast minority students (who don't fit in for many reasons) coming together and growing and changing as their love of music unites them. They express their feelings through song, and a lot of the songs are familiar tunes you'd hear on the radio, which helps people relate to the show even if they don't normally enjoy "musicals." I love music and I often find listening to music is the only thing that keeps me from snapping and killing lots of people, so I relate to this show. I laughed, I cried, I sang along, and I loved it. I didn't like every episode ("Funk" was particularly flat for me) but I found SOMETHING to love in every episode, and that's something I can't say about every show...ok, about just about any show. So I dig it, and I think it will find a home among those who will always dig it too, even if it isn't always perfect.

TV I Watched: Law and Order: The Second Year

This is the second season of the long-running primetime TV drama "Law & Order." Some changes this season were evident right from the beginning. Detective Max Greavy was killed in the first episode of this season, and Detective Mike Logan had to track down his killer. Of course, being Mike, he broke a bunch of laws to do it, and the case almost got thrown out. when I was a kid, I thought Logan (Chris Noth) was the coolest cop ever, but now that I'm pushing thirty, I definitely see him for the hotheaded jerk he can often be. I really enjoyed Paul Sorvino as detective Phil Ceretta in this season (Greavy's replacement) because he was cool and calm and levelheaded, which was the perfect compliment to Logan's tendency to fly off the handle. This season was just as hard-hitting as the first, and like the first, still holds up today.

TV I Watched: Law and Order: The First Year

This is the first season of the critically acclaimed show "Law & Order." The original series has been on for over 20 years now, and it has always been and will probably always be my favorite TV show, no matter how many other shows I happen to like along the way. I keep coming back to this one, and I can watch episodes over and over again, even ones I've seen time and time again. I started watching reruns of this show on A&E =back when I was 12 years old (I wasn't allowed to watch it, but I'd watch it while my mom was at work) and I fell in love with it. The setup, the cops investigating the crime, catching the suspect, and the DA and ADA trying to convict the suspect (and often failing...even when the suspect is convicted, the show offers conflicting messages about how there can't ever really be justice for victims of homicide and the lives of the victims' families are often torn apart beyond repair). this is a show that didn't like happy endings and pat answers. sure, you can mock it for any number of presumed failings, but the fact remains, it often gets its law and its facts straighter than any other show on primetime TV dares to do. Maybe it has deteriorated recently, I wouldn't know, but these classic episodes are still just as good (if a bit dated) as they were when they first aired.

The Life Before Her Eyes

This is a movie that I'd heard about for a long time but somehow missed seeing. Somehow I got the impression that critics loved this movie, but when I checked out reviews after I saw it, I was surprised to learn that most critics panned it, and a lot of them unfairly so. they made really stupid observations too, like more than one review bitched that Uma Thurman and Evan Rachel Wood don't look anything alike...um, excuse me? First of all, that's a stupid objection to a movie, and second of all, it's patently untrue. Sometimes it's hard to tell the two actresses apart in this movie. Wood plays the rebellious teen Diana, and Thurman plays the grown-up Diana who keeps flashing back to a tragedy that occurred 15 years ago at her high school. Forced to make a choice between life and death, to choose between her life and the life of her best friend, Diana is haunted by the consequences of this decision.

The twist ending is another thing that critics bitch about, but they can just get over it. Yes, I've seen this twist done other times in other movies. Most of those movies suck. this one doesn't. I'll also say that while I usually guess twist endings right at the beginning of the movie, this movie had me so engrossed that I forgot to try and figure it out so it took me until almost the end of the movie to realize what was going on, and I'm a pissy little movie snob, so that's hard to do. I enjoyed this movie and think you should ignore then critics and give it a chance.

The New Daughter

PG13 horror movies have a bad rep among horror fans. We expect them to be dumbed-down and removed of all gore and shock value. There's not much gore on display here (but there's enough that it surprised me) and this movie delivers on the shocks. Kevin Costner plays a complete idiot in this movie (he doesn't know enough not to squeeze glasses while washing dishes, so they break, and he forgets to buy his cat a litter box when he moves, so he takes the thing outside to pee like a dog and is surprised when it runs away...moron) but he's likable enough. We feel for him, moving to a new house in an isolated location with two kids who grew up without him due to his job keeping him away from them for years. His kids are believable...the younger son is doting, and the teenage daughter is...well, a teenage daughter. One minute she's cuddly and loving, the next minute she's screaming at him and stomping off to her room. Teenage girls are so moody anyway (damn those hormones...you couldn't PAY ME to be a teenager again) that at first, it's hard to tell whether she's just being moody or whether something is really wrong, but soon it's clear that something at the house is changing the girl and making her do increasingly frightening things.

I won't spoil anything, but this movie has the balls to do some things that even R-rated movies won't do, and some of the images really got under my skin. I respect that. Give this movie a chance.

Legion

It's probably best to come into this movie like I did. I saw the trailers for this movie and they sucked me in and I totally wanted to see it, like most people did. then everyone I knew saw it and told me how awful it was, one right after another, and I lost all expectations and when I finally saw it, I was prepared for it to be terrible. It isn't. Oh don't get me wrong, there are many things that are terrible ABOUT this movie (the ending was so unintentionally hilarious that I was almost rolling on the floor with laughter) but there's enough good here to keep me entertained, so I ended up enjoying myself. I think it's because I expected it to be so bad. If I'd expected it to be good, I would have been royally pissed.