His life and work speak for themselves. Godspeed.

(This has been attempted three times now, so I'm glad it's finally going through! Looks like the blog bugs have been worked out...?)

Football season is back (hence my change in image!) and while both of my teams had rocky starts, things are looking up after Week 3. The Washington Redskins, with a new head coach and coming off a very shaky 2007 season, are back with two consecutive wins following a loss to the Super Bowl champ Giants. They beat the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday, 24-17 in a game where both teams seemed to lose interest by the end of the third quarter. Jason Campbell has been looking good, and Clinton Portis had a very good game. Next week is Satan's Minions - the Dallas Cowboys.

Meanwhile, my Yahoo Fantasy Football team started out the season 0-2, but we had a big win on Sunday to put one in the "W" column. I'm currently ranked 8th out of 10 teams in my league, but I'm hoping for another big win this week to boost my point total and hopefully bump me up a few slots.

And, football means fall which means new TV! I've written and reviewed Fringe, which is my pick for best new series. But I've also been watching House (because my wife still likes it...I think it jumped the shark with Season 3) and we both watched the return of Heroes. After a rough second season, I thought the premiere was fantastic, even if the ratings are off. Other than that, I'm waiting for the returns of The Office and 30 Rock after some great Emmy wins. For some reason, I watched the Knight Rider pilot on Hulu and turned it off after 10 minutes. I'm all for light adventure in this age of too-serious drama, but this is the biggest piece of crap network TV has rolled out in the non-reality category in years.

Summer's gone and it's really back to work. My wife just had a 2 day conference for work that was a success, and now she's gearing up for a major event her non-profit is hosting in November. It's her pet project, so she's got a lot of work ahead of her, but last year's was a major success and (though I admit my bias) I know she's going to do a great job.

As for me, work is starting to pick back up after a slow summer. Unfortunately, it's as a result of the recent economic crises. Even more unfortunate is the fact that this whole situation is likely going to get much worse before it gets better.

In lighter news...I got a bunch of submissions in over the last few days, mostly for actors from the "golden ages" of radio and TV. In the midst of all of that, I picked up another person editorship (my 22nd). It's John Dehner, a great character actor who was a frequent villain on TV. In addition, he was a very accomplished radio actor, starring in two of radio's finest western series, Frontier Gentleman and Have Gun, Will Travel. It all bumped me up to Level 36 after I had been idling on 35 for a while.

My wife and I finished watching Season 3 of Weeds and are about to start Season 2 of Heroes through Netflix. We're thinking about trying to get through it in time for the new season on Monday, but we may end up waiting until DVD. It's getting to be a drag to wait a whole week between new episodes!

But one new show has caught our attention - Fringe on FOX. I'm not a JJ Abrams fan, but this is a very slick show reminiscent of X-Files (one of my all-time favorites). If you're looking for a good drama with some sci-fi overtones, I recommend it.

That's about all I've got for now...hope everything is well with everyone else.

The man who wore a rumpled raincoat and puffed on a cheap stogie is celebrating a birthday today. Peter Falk is 81 years old. Though he's slowed down in recent years, he's still turning in great performances in movies like The Thing About My Folks. Of course, he will always be known for his role as Lt. Columbo, which brought him four Emmys in a role he played for over 30 years. Falk's performance has turned Columbo into TV's greatest detective. If you've never seen Falk in Murder by Death, check it out...he does a fantastic job in this mystery spoof as the resident Bogie hardboiled PI. I'll be watching some of my favorite Columbo episodes tonight to celebrate.

This is a little late, but I just found out that actor Julius Carry has passed away . Though he had a long career in TV, to me he will always be Lord Bowler, the colorful bounty hunter and friendly rival of Bruce Campbell on The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. He was fantastic on that show and created an incredible character. Mr. Carry died on August 20. I most recently saw him on an episode of The Unit. A sad loss of a good actor who died too young.

Bill Melendez, the Emmy award winning animator who brought Charlie Brown and company to TV, has died. One of the genius minds behind A Charlie Brown Christmas, It's the Great Pumpkin and so many others, died Tuesday at age 91.

His partnership with Charles Schulz began in the 50s when he was animating a Snoopy cartoon for Ford and the team (along with Lee Mendelson) produced over 70 Peanuts specials. Mr. Melendez also animated some of the earliest Garfield cartoons and the 1979 version of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Mr. Melendez also earned his place in cartoon history by providing the distinct and lovable "voices" of Snoopy and Woodstock in all of those Charlie Brown cartoons.

It's getting closer to Halloween, which means I'll be popping in my Great Pumpkin DVD. This year, I'll watch it with a special thought of a largely unsung hero who brought the world so much wonderful animation.

Summer is winding down - my wife starts her new semester of grad school this week, much to her dismay - and I, as always, am on the lookout for new TV and movies to watch.

Here's what I've been watching recently...what have other people been viewing of late?

Lonesome Dove - It's one of those movies I've always wanted to see, but never got around to renting it. Well, I finally did and I've watched the first two parts, and I should be receiving the second disc today. AMAZING. Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones are perfect and I'm amazed at the depth of the supporting cast. As a Western fan, I'm kicking myself for not seeing this earlier.

Weeds - This one is for my wife and I. DVD is a chance for us to catch up on recent shows we didn't watch in their run. We worked through the first season quickly (it was addicitive, ha ha) and are a few shows into Season 2. Personally, while I enjoyed Season 1, the second season has been a bit of a letdown so far. I'm sticking it out until the end, but the magic may have worn off after the freshman year.

And from my own DVD collection, I'm still working through the first season of Mannix and the amazing Perry Mason 50th Anniversary Collection.

For the past several months, I've been getting ready for my wedding...and the first eight months of 2008 flew by!! After seeming like it was a lifetime away, August 9th rolled around and my fiancee and I became Mr. and Mrs.!

Our wedding was fantastic - the weather gave us a three day window of perfect skies and temperature (not an easy feat in southern Virginia in the summer!). We had a blast, and our honeymoon in New York was terrific. Among the highlights of our trip...

Museum of Modern Art

FAO Schwarz (I have some great pictures of my wife dancing on the Big Piano!)

Wicked and Mary Poppins on Broadway

Empire State Building (it's amazing that they filmed King Kong there!)

Ellis Island (if you have immigrant ancestry, this is a place you've got to visit sometime in your life. It was the longest wait we had for anything, but it was WELL worth it.)

We got back home on Saturday for a few days of R&R before we both went back to work. It still hasn't quite sunk in (we both do a double-take when we introduce the other as "husband" or "wife.") Now we're putting our apartment together and starting on the mountain of "Thank You" notes to write.

Thanks to the people who sent words of encouragement and congratulations! It was an amazing day, though my wife and I agree it seemed to go by in a heartbeat.

YouTube has a homemade video of the trailer for the upcoming 24: Exile, airing this November on Fox. Kiefer Sutherland and company made a stop at Comic-Con and showed off the preview. It looks fantastic - enough to make me believe in 24 after the last abysmal season. It looks like it's going to be a good bridge between Seasons 6 and 7 with some familiar faces from last year (the always welcome Peter MacNicol and Powers Boothe) back to help introduce the new characters (including Jon Voight as the heavy.)

Any other 24 fans out there as excited as I am? Granted, it would not take much to be better than Season 6, but if these clips are any indication, this should be another bad day for Jack Bauer and another great day for us.

I got so much good feedback from my 10 Best TV Detectives List a while back that I thought I'd do another. This one is focused solely on my personal favorites from the sleuth pantheon - the private eyes. Share your thoughts!

10. Paul Drake (William Hopper, Perry Mason) - Sure, he was a supporting player (and he seemed to only have Perry Mason for a client!) but Drake did the leg work that earned Mason his acquittals, and his humor and charm provided a nice balance to the usually stone-faced Perry.

9. Thomas Banacek (George Peppard, Banacek) - Despite a short run on the NBC Mystery Movie, Banacek is quite memorable among the field of TV dicks. For one thing, he investigated thefts, usually elaborate "locked room" mysteries for insurance companies. For another thing, he was loaded, thanks to his large fees. This guy was no low-rent operator.

8. Adrian Monk (Tony Shalhoub, Monk) He's also a police consultant, but Monk does a lot of private investigating, as well. While he's not a match for some of the folks on this list in the "tough guy" department (he is, after all, afraid of milk!), his brilliant mind and powers of deduction make him a force to be reckoned with. After he finishes cleaning up, of course.

7. Robert McCall (Edward Woodward, The Equalizer) An ex-spy weary of the toll of the work, McCall used his expertise to help people in trouble. Think Burn Notice, but better.

6. Remington Steele and Laura Holt (Pierce Brosnan and Stephanie Zimbalist, Remington Steele) - They were more Nick and Nora than Sam Spade, but this duo solved cases week after week while also pursuing romantic notions with one another.

5. Philip Marlowe (Powers Boothe, Philip Marlowe) - There have been many Marlowes over the years - Bogart, Robert Mitchum, Dick Powell, Elliot Gould...but none has captured Chandler's definitive private eye the way Boothe did in this HBO series. Marlowe's a cynical guy, but he's no sell-out. He's a tattered white knight surrounded by corruption, but is never corrupted himself.

4. Paladin (Richard Boone, Have Gun Will Travel) - So what if it's a western? HGWT basically took the modern idea of a private eye and transported him to the west. If you needed him, you could wire Paladin and he'd answer the call.

3. Frank Cannon (William Conrad, Cannon) - Easily the BIGGEST PI on my list, Cannon lived large. He was an ex-cop whose fees from his investigations supported his lavish life. Like most of the sleuths here, he could hold his own in a fight, even with his extra padding.

2. Joe Mannix (Mike Connors, Mannix) Perhaps TV's most "hard-boiled" private eye, Mannix was much more rough and tumble than some others, but he was no slouch in the deducing department either.

1. Jim Rockford (James Garner, The Rockford Files) He was usually broke, would rather go fishing than fight, and kept his gun in a cookie jar. But Garner's wry, sly portrayal and one of the best supporting casts on TV make Rockford the king of the TV private eyes.

I've been meaning to post this for a while, but with wedding planning, etc. I haven't had time. So I embrace the idea that I'm late to the party instead of not showing up at all...

Where to begin? The biggest story about The Dark Knight since January has been the untimely death of actor Heath Ledger. But ever since the credits rolled on 2005's Batman Begins, movie-goers (and particularly Batman fans) knew that this would be a special movie. Director Christopher Nolan, with Begins, really captured the essence of Batman and saved the character after the tortuous Batman and Nipples...err...I mean, Robin.

So even before Ledger's death and his much-hyped performance as the Joker, expectations among Bat-fans were tremendously high for Nolan's second Batman film. Thankfully, expectations were met and exceeded. Not only is The Dark Knight hands-down the best of the summer 2008 movies, it's the best movie I've seen at the theater in years.

Batman is still patrolling the streets of Gotham, and his murky status as an urban legend/crime-fighter has done a great deal to curb crime and mob activity in the once widely corrupt Gotham. It's almost gotten to the point where Bruce Wayne (the amazing Christian Bale) feels he could give up the cape and cowl, especially since Gotham has a new wave of unmasked heroes - Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman, who disappears into this role and steals every scene he's in) and newly elected D.A. Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart.) Plus, Bruce wants to rekindle a flame with Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhall).

But the joke's on Batman. More specifically, the Joker is on him, and Gotham as well. The mob, in desperation to get rid of their Bat problem, turns to the mysterious Joker (Ledger). An enigma of a man behind dried, caked clown make-up with a grin accentuated by knife cuts to his face, the Joker has no motive, no backstory, no trauma to explain his atrocities. Life and particularly death are hilarious to him, and he finds joy in the chaos he creates. Suddenly, the Joker has embarked on a wave of terror, scaring even the mobsters who hired him. Batman knows his work is not done, but even he is reluctant to take the steps he must take to fight this new nemesis. Meanwhile, when the Joker cannot take down Batman, he targets those close to him. And while Harvey Dent survives the attempt on his life, he'll never be the same again.

To give away than this would be criminal. There are so many brilliant dialogue exchanges, so many bone-rattling fights, so many moments of agonizing suspense, so much humor, that The Dark Knight must be seen to be experienced. If you're a Batman fan, Bale has now officially dethroned the great Kevin Conroy as THE definitive Batman. If you shy away from comic book movies, don't with this one. Nolan has created as realistic a world for a comic book movie that you'll ever see. The characters here are flesh and blood - when people die, it's visceral. The cast is uniformly excellent. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman do the most with their relatively small screen time as Batman's allies and mentors. Oldman is the unsung hero, and delivers a fantastic performance as the one good cop in a bad town. Eckhart has taken flack for his "pretty boy" performance, but it's necessary for the transformation he undergoes 2/3 of the way through the movie.

The best reason to see the film is Heath Ledger. In his last performance, Ledger guarantees his spot in film history. Much like the short-lived Robert Walker in Strangers on a Train, Ledger has given us one of the greatest villains in film history. His Joker is a twitchy, giggling maniac. Every minute he is on screen is frightening, funny and unpredictable. The bigger tragedy is that the Joker will not be back to do battle with Batman again.

I cannot recommend this movie highly enough. Don't be scared off by the running time - the lights will come up in the theater when it's over and you won't even realize how much time has gone by. If The Dark Knight is an indicator, Nolan and Company's next Bat-epic cannot get here fast enough. A+, 10 out of 10, 4 stars, etc.

My TV-on-DVD viewing of late has been filled with a deep baritone, a bulky figure and a knack for solving crimes. I've recently started in on watching William Conrad in his two mystery shows - Cannon and Jake and the Fatman. As an old-time radio buff, I'm a big fan of Conrad. He was Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke and a busy character actor who popped up on numerous detective and anthology shows. His great voice also delivers the wonderful narration of The Fugitive. But I had never seen him act on camera. I'm more convinced now, after watching these shows, that Conrad is a truly underrated talent; he was one of those performers who could prove to be interesting to watch, whatever the role.

Cannon, at first blush, falls into the gimmick detective trend of the 70s (Barnaby Jones was old, McCloud was a cowboy, etc.), but once you start watching you see that while Frank Cannon is large and in charge, his weight isn't played for as many laughs as you'd think. Cannon is an ex-cop (pretty solid PI credentials there!) He's a rare combination of brains and brawn (yes, he gets his licks in, mostly karate moves), a TV private eye who, while not side by side with the best of the best Jim Rockford, he definitely is in the same cla$s

I was more cautious going into Jake. I'd heard (and read) less than glowing reviews - after all, it is the only American TV show to have 100+ episodes and never be syndicated. And 80s crime shows are a tricky thing - when they're good, they're very good. When they're bad, you want to avoid them like the plague. But after watching the first three episodes, I'm very pleasantly surprised. Like a modern Nero Wolfe, this show combines the streetwise detective with the homebound master sleuth, and thanks to good chemistry with co-star Joe Penny, Conrad has another winner.

It's interesting - Cannon is an overall better show, with tighter plots and better acting from the guest stars. But Conrad's performance as the Fatman is more fun to watch. As Frank Cannon, for all of his girth, he's a pretty standard issue TV private eye. But J.L. McCabe gives Conrad so many facets to play - he's part Perry Mason in the courtroom and part Columbo at the crime scene. The Fatman is more of a character than Cannon - Conrad clearly loves the part, and as a result, it's more fun for the audience.

My Netflix queue is Conrad-heavy (no pun intended!) for a while. If you're a fan of mysteries, I strongly recommend both of these shows. The only downside is Paramount only released the first half of each show's first seasons. Once the kings of vintage TV DVD releases, Paramount has really slipped, IMO, with these split season releases and the Fugitive music replacement debacle. Here's hoping they straighten up and roll out some full seasons. I'm hungry for more Cannon and Jake and the Fatman!

I realized the other day it had been a while since I wrote anything here - the truth is I've been a little preoccupied. My wedding is less than a month away (!) and I'm working on starting a new job search. I'm still in my current job (the economy is too bad right now to quit, then start looking), so that's making it more frustrating, but I have some leads and contacts so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

In the meantime, once personal things settle down a bit, I hope to be back here, posting and commenting and reviewing. Right now to destress, I'm turning to (surprise) older TV shows! Thanks to Netflix's instant viewer, I've watched a fair amount of McMillan & Wife and McCloud, as well as my DVDs of Cannon and Mannix. Just the cure for the summertime blues. Hope everyone else is enjoying the summer!

As if we needed anymore evidence that there are no more new ideas...TNT has announced plans to remake the acclaimed British crime drama, Cracker. (If you haven't seen it, I suggest you rent the DVDs). Now, remakes are nothing new - and there have been many attempts to bring British shows across the pond with mixed success. NBC struck gold with The Office, but there are more misses on that list than hits.

But there has already been an American Cracker. In 1997, the late Robert Pastorelli filled Robbie Coltrane's shoes as Dr. Eddie "Fitz" Fitzgerald, a psychologist just as twisted and troubled as his patients, working with the police on particularly baffling crimes. Airing on ABC opposite the final season of Seinfeld, the US Cracker faded away after only 16 episodes.

But TNT is going back to the well to bring us another Yankee Cracker. I'm curious to see how this turns out, but I think it will fail just as ABC's effort did. That's not to diminish the ABC series - I really enjoyed it when it aired. It's that the British Cracker is a very atypical, non-traditional mystery series. The show is more about the troubled lead character and how the crimes he investigates impact those around him. It is not a "catch the bad guy and wrap everything up in 60 minutes" kind of show. The ABC version tried to duplicate that, which led to some dark, gloomy viewing - and Americans tend not to enjoy that.

We'll see what happens. American audiences passed on Fitz once, so they may do it again. On the other hand, TNT may have a surprise hit on it's hands...I guess it all depends on the tone of the show and who they cast as Fitz. My hope is they stick with the template and don't get some photogenic guy in his late 20s. Get an older actor who can, God forbid, ACT. Were he not fresh out of The Sopranos, I think James Gandolfini would be a great Fitz. Oliver Platt, Ray Winstone and Chris Cooper are others who spring to mind.

I guess it shouldn't be a surprise. This summer saw a revamp of The Incredible Hulk, just five years after the first movie. Remakes of the remakes of TV shows fit right in with the "do over" trend sweeping through Hollywood.

An icon of TV history has passed away. Earle Hagen was perhaps best known for co-writing (and whistling!) the theme to The Andy Griffith Show. He also penned the themes to many other shows, such as Dick Van Dyke, The Mod Squad, That Girl, and (for my money, one of the coolest theme songs ever) I Spy. It was for I Spy that Hagen won an Emmy in 1968; he was doing whole soundtracks for episodes at a time when most TV shows just used canned music. Sometimes the role of music in a movie or TV series doesn't get as much acclaim, but when you think about some of the cla$$ic shows that could be identified immediately by their themes and incidental music, you can see how important this was. Talk about a guy whose work will live forever!

P.S. - Unrelated to Mr. Hagen's pa$$ing, but I had to amend this because of my use of the word "cla$$ic." Can't TV.com move on from this and allow us to use that word? For fans of...err...vintage (?) TV like myself and others, it just becomes a nusiance after a while!

After 19 years, Indiana Jones finally swings back on to the big screen in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. He'd have been better off leaving us with the final image of riding off into the sunset at the end of The Last Crusade. Is KotCS the worst Dr. Jones adventure? No, that honor still belongs to Temple of Doom. But to say that it's a better movie than Doom isn't saying much.

The movie immediately gets off to a bad start with a car full of teenagers drag racing an Army convoy along a Nevada highway in 1957. Elvis is playing, in case you forgot it's 1957. Later in the film, there's a fight between greasers and college kids in a malt shop, in case you forgot it's 1957. And look, there's Shia LeBouf with a DA and a switchblade. In case you forgot...

My point is this: the other Indy films never hit you over the head with the period setting, other than costumes and cars. Here, Spielberg and Co. can never get past the setting. There are so many unnecessary call-outs to the 1950s that it's incredibly distracting for the first third of the movie. It isn't until Indy heads to Peru that the whole movie starts to seem like an Indiana Jones movie.

You'll notice I said seem. That's because it never reaches the heights of the previous films. In Raiders and Crusade, the adventure worked because (a) there was a clearly defined objective and (b) a sense of urgency. Ex: We've got to get the Grail before the Nazis use it to build an immortal army! Here, the Skull needs to be returned...we're not sure why...to gain a power, and we don't know what it is. It's like the filmmakers were so eager to get this thing before the cameras they didn't take the time to develop a good story. All of the ingredients are there (globe-trotting, booby traps, etc.), but somehow they never gel together. The climax is lifted almost exactly from the second National Treasure movie and the CGI at times makes the on-screen events look more like a video game cut scene. I blame the writers (particularly George Lucas who came up with the story), because the cast does the best they can.

All of the concerns about Harrison Ford's age are put to rest almost immediately. When he puts the hat on, it's like no time has passed since 1989. He's quick on his feet, throws a mean punch and has all of Indy's charm. Too bad the script makes him into an almost absent-minded professor. I'm sorry, but the Dr. Jones I know wouldn't stop in the middle of sinking in quicksand to explain the definition of it.

It's great to see Karen Allen again, but she hardly has anything to do and she especially lacks the firey spirit she had in Raiders. Cate Blanchett could have been a great villainess, but she's saddled with some of the worst dialogue in the film. John Hurt gets to run around acting like Gollum and Ray Winstone never registers as an actual character. Jim Broadbent shows up long enough to get a screen credit.

Shia LaBoef may be Spielberg's fair-haired boy, but he doesn't belong in this movie, ESPECIALLY after a secret about his character is revealed. LaBoef, like the 50s references, takes us out of the story. He's incredibly one-note as an actor, and his tough guy shtick gets old really quickly. When you consider Ford's past screen allies (Denholm Elliot as Marcus Brody, John Rhys-Davies as Sallah, Sean Connery!), little Shia is even more of a pipsqueak.

Is the movie worth seeing? Yes, if you're an Indy fan. There are enough entertaining scenes (though they are scattered and brief) and Dr. Jones gets a nice denouement at the end. But definitely catch it on DVD and not the $9.00 or upwards movie ticket prices. You're better off watching a double-feature of Raiders and Last Crusade.

It's nice to see Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones again, but whereas John McClane came back in a Die Hard movie, they've dropped Dr. Jones into a movie undeserving of his franchise. Just like Indy in a decrepit tomb, proceed with caution.

It's about freakin' time! Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is in theaters!

Unfortunately, I'm moving to a new apartment tonight and tomorrow (agh!) so I'll be seeing Dr. Jones & Co. on Sunday. But I cannot wait. Reviews overall have been good (80% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes last time I looked), so fears of a Lucas-inspired Star Wars prequel crapfest may seem to have been misplaced. I'll post my thoughts after I see the movie.

Other than that, I got into law school, but it's in DC (Catholic University's Columbus School of Law) so I'd have to, in the next few months (1) move, (2) find a place to live in DC/Northern VA, (3) find a job and (4) take out loans for school. So I'm going to try to defer until Fall 2009, but that has to be approved by the admissions panel, so we'll see how that goes.

Big weekend...new apartment...new Indiana Jones...it's the busiest Memorial Day weekend I've had in a while!

Whatever you do for this long weekend, I hope it's fun!

Apparently, things may be looking up for Tom Cruise's freaky behavior-tainted film career. The chairman of Viacom (which owns Paramount) Sumner Redstone has said he's open to Cruise starring in a fourth Mission: Impossible film. As a fan of the TV series, I wasn't wild about the first three (though at least Mission: Impossible 3 was a little more about teamwork than the first two). I've really loved watching Seasons 1-3 of the show on DVD and it's too bad that a film hasn't been made that really follows the spirit of the series.

But (here comes a tangent!) when I read this news, I got to thinking - I know Tom Cruise faced some box office backlash because of his antics. As for me, I now have trouble distinguishing the actor from his characters. I was watching Rain Man again recently and could not get the image of a psychology-bashing Cruise out of my mind. Maybe because his behavior was so vitriolic that it really left an impression. The same thing has happened with Mel Gibson. After it came out that he's a crazy anti-Semite, watching him clown around in Lethal Weapon isn't quite the same.

Has anyone else experienced this, or am I just nuts? I guess there's a double-standard...I saw Iron Man and thought Robert Downey, Jr. did a great job and his drug-abusing past was far from my mind as I watched him as Tony Stark. Again, maybe it's because Cruise and Gibson were hurting OTHER people, and RD Jr. was being self-destructive? I don't know. Cruise hasn't driven me away yet, but I won't see anymore Mel Gibson movies because of his tirades.

It's nothing new...Fatty Arbuckle saw his career go down after standing trial for rape and murder. William Talman of Perry Mason almost got canned for some pot smoking (which always gives me a laugh when I imagine Hamilton Burger lighting up and cursing that SOB Mason!)

So, I put it to you...if an actor has off-screen trouble, does it change how you view their movies, or do you continue to view their movies?

Hope everyone's enjoying the start of spring weather...high 70s in Virginia today!

After X-Men, Batman Begins and the Spider-Man films (1-2 anyway) raised the bar, superhero movies are now judged with a more critical eye. Explosions, eye candy and the excitement of merely seeing a favorite comic book character on the screen are no longer enough; audiences expect good performances from strong actors and a story worthy of their attention. It's what separates the afforementioned films from duds like Hulk, Ghost Rider, Daredevil and Superman Returns.

Fortunately, the newly released Iron Man falls into the first category, and for my money it rivals Batman Begins as the best superhero movie ever. It's an example of what happens when you give a talented filmmaker the reins of a character he has enthusiasm for, and cast a leading man who is one of the best actors of his generation. Robert Downey, Jr. makes the role of Tony Stark his own with his first appearance in the movie and makes the weapons designer turned superhero the best on-screen likable cad since Han Solo.

Avoiding spoilers, Iron Man finds Stark experiencing a crisis of conscience after almost being killed by terrorists (armed by his weapons) in Afghanistan. Escaping and returning home, he rededicates himself to eradicating the world of such weapons, much to the dismay of his No. 2 man, the wonderfully named Obidiah Stane (played by a bald, bearded Jeff Bridges). When Stane tries to shut Tony out and create an ultimate weapon, Stark uses his technical know-how to become Iron Man, an armored hero with a suit capable of flight, super strength and armed to the teeth.

Along with Downey and Bridges, the cast includes Gwenyth Paltrow and Terrence Howard as Stark's friends and allies. Like Batman Begins, the cast is stocked with marquee players who could carry a movie on their own - instead, they gel as a perfect ensemble and elevate the already sharp script to new levels. The special effects are fantastic, but not so overdone that we ever lose interest in the film. And there's a healthy dose of humor, both with Downey's antics and some sharp one-liners.

Whether you're a comic-book nerd (like me) or not (my fiancee loved this movie too), I strongly recommend Iron Man. It's a great way to kick off the summer movie season. 4 stars out of 4.

P.S. Comic-nerds should ABSOLUTELY stay through the end credits.