- How does a network kill “The Killing” and make it stick?
AMC has tried to answer that question before, axing the popular drama once only
to see it revived for another run. Having already cheated death once appears to
be all the show can muster because AMC has announced for a second time that it
is ending the series, which didn’t sit well with star Mireille Enos. She and
the show’s fans may have thought a critically acclaimed Season 3 would be
enough to extend its run, but AMC executives clearly felt otherwise. They have
decided to end Enos’ character Sarah Linden's story after her shocking decision
to kill her former lover-turned-serial killer in the Aug. 4 finale. Enos
admitted that she holds out hope for another reprieve, but knows the odds are
against her show. “I'm disappointed," she admitted. "The season
finale for Season 3 was such a surprising choice for Sarah that I definitely
hope to see how that affected her life. I'm very, very proud of the third
season. When it got cancelled after Season 2, I was disappointed, but I wasn't
surprised because it was a logical ending. The Rosie Larsen case was done. And
then when AMC came back around, I really thought that meant that we had at
least two [more] seasons with them." Enos has been around her share of un-deadness
of late, starring as Brad Pitt's wife in “World War Z,” and she holds out some
hope that AMC may change its mind. "Never say never — stranger things have
happened," she added, pointing out that the production team is "doing
what they can to find it another home. We'll see what happens. Either way, I'm
very proud of the work that I got to do on that show." Shows that are on
the verge of cancellation every year rarely survive for long, although the
underdog stories of shows such as “Chuck” offer some hope……..
- That is absolute garbage – and it’s exactly why residents in one New Haven neighborhood are
extremely angry. Yes, folks who dwell in the home of an Ivy League institution
– Yale, in this case – can be arrogant, elitist and entitled, but these
particular people are livid because a garbage truck comes up and down their
street at 4 a.m. each day. Perhaps they are merely light sleepers and should
take some more Sominex, but instead they are claiming that the privately owned garbage
trucks are breaking the city's noise ordinance, which prohibits loud noise
before 6 a.m. To make her case, one woman took a video of the trucks and showed
the noise they were causing. Government response has been slow, but the alderman
for the area said he has been reaching out to all of the private trash removal
companies to remind them about the noise ordinance. Police has dragged their
feet as well, admitting that violators of the law can face fines of up to $100
but insisting they have yet to hear any of the trucks causing excessive noise
prior to 6 a.m. and saying they cannot take action based simply on video
someone shot with their iPhone at 5:15 on a Thursday morning. John's Refuse
Removal, one of the companies accused of making noise early in the morning,
explained that their early hours are designed to avoid having trucks driving
around when children are getting on and off schools buses. New Haven's public
works department does some trash collection, but is exempt from the law. Still,
department officials say they have been working with neighborhoods to alter
routes to help keep the noise down. Such are the travails of life in
Yale-land……..
- First, here is the good news for U.S. soccer. The U.S.
men’s national team clinched its seventh straight World Cup berth with Tuesday's
2-0 win over Mexico, securing a spot in next summer’s tournament in Brazil. On
top of that, the U.S. has climbed to 13th in the FIFA rankings, its highest
position since July 2010. Those are the pieces of positivity for the Americans,
who rose six places in the September rankings announced Thursday after dropping
to as low as 36th in July and August in 2012. The bad news for U.S. soccer is
the fact that being 13th-best in the world in a sport is viewed as an
accomplishment and worth celebrating, along with the fact that soccer in
America is still a fourth-tier sport that ranks behind every level of football,
basketball, baseball, golf, tennis and even non-sports like auto racing on the
totem pole of sports importance. Even if the U.S. were ranked fourth or fifth,
soccer still wouldn’t matter to the average American sports fan because….well,
soccer is a low-scoring sport with asinine rules and populated by mulleted,
injury-faking floppers. In countries where soccer does matter, the FIFA
rankings are of more importance, especially in Spain, which remained first for
the 25th consecutive month. Argentina took a step up, rising two places to
second after qualifying for its 11th consecutive World Cup. The beer-and-brat
lovers in Germany slipped to third, one spot ahead of their European
counterparts, the Italians. Colombia, a.k.a. Nose Candy Land, managed to tumble
two spots to fifth, followed by Belgium, Uruguay, Brazil, the Netherlands and
Croatia to round out the top 10. At present. Argentina, Belgium, Brazil,
Colombia, Germany, Italy, Spain and Uruguay would be the seeded teams for the
World Cup draw on Dec. 6, if they all qualify. Amazingly, the Netherlands and
its pot-fueled awesomeness would be unseeded if the 2009 draw system is
retained and so would England and the United States. For the U.S., that’s
business as usual and so will the Americans’ early exit from the tournament
after a loss to Ghana or Paraguay or Tanzania or some other Third World
nation……….
- Facebook’s stock is up and so are its aspirations to
upgrade the social media experience. With its stock hitting an all-time high of
$45 this week, the company announced plans to make videos on its mobile
app begin playing automatically, in the process turning users’ News Feed pages
into one giant clusterf*ck of running footage. When it launches, Facebook's
mobile News Feed will resemble a Web page of Vine videos running all at once,
but unlike Vine, those videos won't be limited to a few short seconds. The new
feature has already been rolled out to a few select users and Facebook plans to
make it available to more users in the weeks ahead. The change is obviously
meant to make Facebook more attractive for advertisers by allowing for sponsored
content that automatically starts and targets interests people have already
expressed with "likes." Of course, Facebook insisted it wants to
judge how the new feature rates with users and that it won't be running
sponsored videos at this point, but the second the idea catches on, using the
video format to make money is the obvious next step. With online video
advertising poised to skyrocket and revenues from such ads forecast to as much
as double from $4 billion this year to $8 billion by 2016, there is no way
Facebook won't jump on that train. For now, Facebook will only automatically
play videos from individuals or those with verified Pages and only videos
directly uploaded to Facebook will run in the auto play mode, along with those
from Instagram and other apps integrated with its platform. Videos playing from
YouTube, Vimeo and other embedded services won't play automatically. Sound on
all auto-play videos will be off by default and users will be able to expand
them and turn the volume on if they want to watch……….
- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! Blame is flying around in India
after weekend religious
riots that killed at least 31 people and forced hundreds to flee from their
homes. Various political parties are blaming one another for the chaos and the
uprising is the latest sign of rising tension between Hindus and Muslims ahead
of a general election due by May. The sh*t hit the Asian fan in the district of
Muzaffarnagar, 80 miles northeast of New Delhi in the state of Uttar Pradesh,
in an area that has been the epicenter of some of the worst communal violence
in years. Police evacuated both Hindus and Muslim villagers as attackers beat
children and burned property, hid in fields and police stations and fled the
area in ox carts and tractors, The state's top security official, R.M.
Srivastava, confirmed that 31 people were killed in the violence. "We are
on a high alert and curfew will remain in parts of Muzaffarnagar city, while
security forces are doing regular rounds in the affected villages," deputy
police chief Arun Kumar added. Muslim v. Hindu violence in Indian politics is
nothing new and has been a party of the agenda since the country's traumatic
separation from Pakistan in 1947, when hundreds of thousands of people were
killed and millions were displaced. Religion and caste system violence
play a major role in politics in Uttar Pradesh, one of India's poorest states
and a place with a population larger than that of Russia. During the weekend’s
chaos, several high-ranking politicians attempted to reach Muzaffarnagar but
were detained by police who said their presence could stir up more
violence. Increased police presence eventually calmed the scene down, but
even then, party leaders accused one another and the government of not doing
enough to stop such incidents. As always, both sides denied any
wrongdoing or culpability……..
No comments:
Post a Comment