“Thriller a Broadway musical?”

That’s how the Associated Press derisively reported plans to adapt Michael Jackson’s classic song/music video to a Broadway musical. It goes downhill from there; it seems the haters have written this one off about as fast as the Internet’s collective knee can reflexively jerk.

Make a music video a musical? Silly, right? Not really. First, it’s not just based on the music video; there’ll be plenty of other Jacko songs in the show (I know, that makes it a “jukebox musical,” but that’s a rabbit hole that I won’t go down right now). But at its heart, this is just another adaptation of the visual styling and plot from one art form (music video) to another (musical theater).

How is this so different from…say, the upcoming Watchmen movie?

(Image from Rope of Silicon)

There, I did it. I compared the “Thriller” musical to the Watchmen movie. OK, I know, not all adaptations are created equally (No Country for Old Men, novel made into a movie. Wing Commander, video game made into a travesty.), and that the “Thriller” musical is getting bad buzz partly due to Michael Jackson’s tarnished public image. But it’s an adaptation, and that by itself is no reason to condemn a work of popular culture.

So I, for one, welcome the ‘Thriller’ musical, and I do hope that it sets the precedence for a Guns ‘n’ Roses “November Rain” musical:

Hey, you know what else would make a great musical?

Watchmen.

Not a huge week in the popular culture… Oscar Noms are a week old, and February sweeps and mid-season replacements are a couple days off.

So how do you occupy yourself when our corporate overlords aren’t providing you food pellets of entertainment in response to your increasingly frenzied pushing of the lever in your cage?

Have at it in the open thread.

We’re all weighing in on which pop song has the best plot. Make sure to read Part 1.

“The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” The Charlie Daniels Band
from fenzel

Some stories reward that first read (like, say, Clear and Present Danger). Some stories reward rereading (like, say, The Pokey Little Puppy). Really good stories manage to do both. Truly great stories are elegant — they excel at both at the same time while giving ground to neither. “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” is more than the best story in a pop song — it is one of the most elegant American stories of the 20th century.

At first, it is a blazing country/rock ballad about a young boy’s fiddling contest against the Devil with strong, simple themes — Southern pride, the Faust story, tradition vs. progress, the power of music, youth, vigor and glorious defiance. It’s even written in the timeless ballad stanzas and refrains that produced about a thousand years of the best songs in English, and could stand up next to any of them. It is meat and it is potatoes.

Below the surface, it goes for miles.

This is the first of what we hope will be a regular feature. In Think Tank, we’ll all join forces to tackle one question. To kick things off:

Which pop song has the best plot?

“Jungleland,” Bruce Springsteen
from lee

To be honest, I have no idea what this song’s “plot” is about, but I assume it must be the most epic and grandiose tale ever told in the New York metropolitan area. The cop’s not just a cop; he’s the “maximum lawman.” Gangs don’t just fight; they have an “opera out in the turnpike,” fight their ballet in the alley, and “flash guitars just like switchblades.” Which I assume means that they duel with totally sweet hybrid knife-guitars. All of this takes place against the backdrop of the “giant Exxon sign that brings this fair city light.” That sign must be HUGE. And it all comes to a tragic end when the protagonist’s “own dream cuts him down” in a hail of gunfire in the “tunnels uptown.”

[Guest writer Trevor Siegler offers a personal appreciation of literary giant John Updike, who died Tuesday. —Ed.]

John Updike passed away yesterday, leaving a huge gap in the literary genre known as the “grocery store short story.” As far as I know, his “A&P” is the only memorable short story set within the confines of a supermarket. Twain could have had a lost chapter in “Huck Finn” where Piggly Wiggly crops up at an important plot point, but Updike reigns supreme in the depiction of just how much it sucks to work at a food-dispensing hellhole.

For a long time, I blamed Mr. Updike for my decision to enter that seedy world of climate-controlled milk shelves and artificially-colored fruit displays. On the surface, my crippling student loan debt and the fact that my grandpa could help me get the job with a minimum of ass-kissing the boss on my behalf were more important reasons to seek employment with a certain grocery chain located primarily in the Southeast (Winn-Dixie). But I’m a voracious reader, and Mr. Updike’s story went a long way towards selling me on the notion that I could be a stud in the bagboy corps of my local store.

Let me take you back to a more innocent time, a more refined time, a time in history when nothing seemed like it would ever change from the peace and prosperity of the recent past: the summer of 1998, particularly memorable for me because of two factors.

“Human,” the lead single from The Killer’s latest album Day and Age, poses a baffling question:

“Are we human, or are we dancer?”

Many were quick to point out that, although not all humans are dancers, most dancers are, in fact, humans. The two are not mutually exclusive, as this handy Venn diagram illustrates:

Honestly, I've never known a Venn diagram to be anything but handy.

“Human or Dancer” is only one example of the many false dichotomies found in pop music. More logical fallacies, after the jump.

Warning: Spoilers for Wall Street and Kill Bill within.

From the “too long to Twitter but too dumb to be an OTI feature” files comes this interesting question: is the classic 80’s film, Wall Street, a prequel to the Oughties classic, Kill Bill?  Or, in other words, does Bud Fox from Wall Street grow up to become Bud from Kill Bill?  Maybe only Daryl Hannah could tell us for sure, but I tend to think so.  Here’s my evidence:

In Wall Street, up and comer, Bud Fox, throws his lot in with evil capitalist Gordon Gekko.  Gekko, in turn, introduces Bud to Daryl Hannah, a beautiful blonde who seems too good to be true.  Bud soon falls for Daryl, unaware that she is in cahoots with an evil older man (Mr. Gekko).  In fact, Daryl once even dated Gekko, and her livelihood depends on him.

But…

The Overthinkers (well, some of them) gather in New York’s East Village. Matthew Wrather hosts a panel including Matthew Belinkie, Mark Lee, Jordan Stokes, and Ryan Sheely (live), and Peter Fenzel and Dave Shechner (remotely) to Overthink listner questions, the inauguration, Barack Obama’s cult of personality, and the Oscars.

As always, call 20-EAT-LOG-01 (that’s (203) 285-6401) to leave a voicemail. (Email is still down.)

Download Episode 30 (MP3)

In scientific publications, most of the articles are original research. There are also review articles–overviews of the work that’s been done on a particular problem, for the benefit of those in the field who want to keep up.

This is a review article on the Tommy Westphall Hypothesis. I’m not introducing any brilliant new observations of my own. But if you’ve never heard of Tommy, and you like Overthinking™ stuff, let me get you up to speed.

So I’m watching The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford the other day. It has a great cast which includes Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Rockwell, and Clinton strategist and CNN commentator James Carville. The Ragin’ Cajun shows up 90 minutes into the two-and-a-half-hour-long movie as the Governor of Missouri, and he’s got two big scenes – one where he gives a toast at a fancy ball, and one where he sends Affleck’s character out to get Jesse James one way or another.