Meh-Fest: 'The Power of Six'

This review was originally published on The Film Yap.

I didn't see "I Am Number Four." I was vaguely intrigued by Dianna Agron as the love interest, as she is quite possibly one of the prettiest women on Earth. However, the movie looked like every other young-adult sci-fi wannabe out there.
 I also didn't read the New York Times-bestselling novel on which "I Am Number Four" was based. That said, I'm a sucker for young-adult fiction. When the Yap was sent a review copy of "The Power of Six," the sequel to "I Am Number Four," I decided to take a crack at it.

 The verdict? I wasn't exactly depressed, but I was far from impressed.

"The Power of Six" continues the story of John Smith, who is part of an alien race of nine young people sent to Earth when their home planet is overtaken by evil forces, living in hiding throughout the world with assigned adult guardians. When the first three were hunted and killed by the evil forces, John (Number Four) had to make some difficult decisions and eventually go on the run with the female Number Six and his best friend Sam, whose father was a human ally to the race and mysteriously disappeared.

The book has two parallel stories: John, Six and Sam's cross-country travels and combat training in the States, and Marina (aka Number Seven), undercover in a Spanish convent school and discovering her own unique abilities (called Legacies, which develop when the individual needs them most).

Though "The Power of Six" is a sequel, catching up on important plot points isn't an issue: Everything a new reader needs to know is scattered throughout the book. Action pops off nearly every page, and the relationships — Marina's struggle with her now-reluctant adult guardian; John's conflicting feelings for Six and for Sarah, the girl he left behind; John and Sam's mourning for their lost father figures — are never boring. Technically, Pittacus Lore (a pen name that figures into the book prominently) does everything right.

And yet, I was never completely drawn into this fictional world. Though I kept turning pages, I couldn't bring myself to care about the characters. Like standout series such as "The Hunger Games" and "Harry Potter," "The Power of Six" seeks to create a parallel universe with oddly named characteristics but grounded-in-reality issues. Unlike these other series, "The Power of Six" has drier prose and slower pacing, which contributes to a sense of distance from its characters and conflicts. Yes, it's cool that John can illuminate things with his hands and Marina can breathe underwater, but why should I root for them?

Clearly, the author wants "The Power of Six" to transition to the silver screen. The novel has a cinematic quality: long on action and dialogue, short on description. I don't know if "I Am Number Four" did well enough at the box office to warrant a sequel. I do know I wouldn't pay $12 to see it.

"The Power of Six" is now available in print and ebook.

You Just Can't Get Enough...Of My Writing! (Right?)

Miss me? You know you do!

So I have a guest post over at the nostalgia-rific Children of the 90s, about my favorite TV best friends. This blog is super-fun and you should totally follow it if you're not already.

Just as a friendly reminder, I write/blog about movies, TV and whatever else is on my mind over at The Film Yap and RedEye, under my real name, Lauren Whalen.

If you're not following me on Facebook and Twitter, I swear you won't regret it! I post random pop culture snark, plus all of my writing for easy access. I think some of my "friends" (aka people I went to grade school with and wasn't fond of even then) have hidden me, but that's okay, because I don't want to look at 835 pictures of their babies anyway.

Happy Humpday! (P.S. Humpday is a great little film and you should watch it.)

Forever You and I: 'Chain Reaction'

If you've read this blog, well, ever, you know my reading propensities: I like angsty teenagers. I adore romance. I dig forbidden love. I read YA well after I was in the target age range and well before Rowling and Meyer made it acceptable for adults to publicly peruse, and I've never apologized for it.

You know what I also love? Free books!

So you can imagine my dorky squeal of happiness when I received a review copy of Chain Reaction by New York Times-bestselling author and fellow Chicagoan Simone Elkeles, whom I interviewed last year. (As I have all my packages sent to work to prevent theft, our mail dudes know to ignore me when I jump up and down.)

First, a disclaimer: I don't gush about something just because it's free. Hell, I don't read something just because it's free, as my TBR pile is too big to begin with.

That said, I loved the everloving crap out of Chain Reaction.

Chain Reaction is the third in a trilogy about the Fuentes brothers (as I've learned over the past year and a half, it's a common romance novel trope to follow a family, usually a set of siblings, over several books. I really like this, as it's fun to have characters in the same universe, and a good family dynamic makes for compelling reading). After Alex (Perfect Chemistry) and Carlos (Rules of Attraction), Luis is the youngest brother and quite possibly the most intelligent. He's been mostly kept away from the gang life that almost consumed his oldest brother, but he's still an adrenaline junkie and a girl magnet. When Luis is reluctantly relocated from Boulder back to the Chicago suburbs, he falls hard for straitlaced Nikki, whom clashed with at Alex's wedding a few years back. But when Luis' family is threatened by Alex's former gang, and Nikki holds back some secrets of her own, both their love and their lives are put in grave danger.

In other words, Chain Reaction has everything I like in a YA and in a romance. A believable family who don't always get along but who truly care for one another. An interesting hero and heroine, neither of whom are TSTL (Too Stupid to Live. Thank you, Smart Bitches Trashy Books). Complicated problems that can't be solved in one chapter, and intimate scenes that bring back the fumbling adrenaline of first love. (And I know I've said this many times before, but physical intimacy - especially between teenagers - is really, really hard to write. Try it sometime.)

Also, I hate to judge a book by its cover, but how hot is that cover? Seriously.

The one small thing that bothered me was some of the Fuentes brothers' dialogue. Apparently they don't pronounce their "ing"'s, so everythin' was spelled as such. I get that Elkeles was trying to be realistic with speaking patterns, but I found it rather annoyin'.

Overall, however, the author hit it out of the park with Chain Reaction, and with the Fuentes family trilogy as a whole. As Elkeles will tell you, she had to fight for the trilogy's first book, Perfect Chemistry, even switching agents in the process. It's inspiring to see what can come out of never giving up on a good story.

Chain Reaction is out in bookstores and ebook tomorrow.

I Learn a Lesson: Writing Movies for Fun and Profit

Apologies for the absence: last weekend I was dreaming up ideas for my brilliant (ha) fiction at a phenomenal Little Writers Retreat on the Prairie. Now I have returned to wrap up State Month (or technically, State Five Weeks) with a review of Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant's latest opus! And no, it's not Taxi 2.

Some families bond by playing board games. Mine goes to movies. One May in 2009, my siblings and I were all visiting my parents. Not much in the theatres looked interesting, so we decided on Night at the Museum 2, even though we were way out of the demographic (my youngest sib was 19 at the time). It was cute: clearly for younger kids but still fairly enjoyable. I never pass up a chance to see Hank Azaria semi-shirtless.

Anyway, about three quarters into the movie, which took place at the Smithsonian, there was a cameo by Orville and Wilbur Wright. Ever the trivia dork (thank you, discovery of IMDb during a bout with insomnia sophomore year of college!), I elbowed my mom and whispered, "Those are the guys who wrote the movie." The "guys" were Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant, scribes of both Night at the Museum movies, which did very well at the box office; Taxi, which did not; and Herbie Fully Loaded, which was a disaster of Titanic-epic proportions (and which I sort of want to watch while drunk).

Say what you want about these State and Reno 911! alums (Lt. Jim Dangle and Travis Junior, if you don't recognize them by their real names) and the quality of their work: they're out there, they're writing, and they're making a pretty nice living while still doing their own stuff and being funny. Recently, they co-authored Writing Movies for Fun and Profit, where they hold forth on everything from pitch meetings to stage directions to parking in L.A. to why In-N-Out burgers are the yummiest ever (they are).

Even if I weren't a State devotee interested in writing, I'd still have enjoyed the hell out of Writing Movies for Fun and Profit. When it comes to working the Hollywood system, Lennon and Garant know their shit. No two ways about it. Granted, they write like, well, screenwriters (there are a LOT of CAPITAL LETTERS and underlined phrases....and ellipses) and they talk about boobs a lot (sometimes I sighed and said out loud, "Good heavens, boys, I hope you are being satirical!").

But weirdly enough, in between laughing at their bossy-yet-silly collective voice and occasionally saying, "hm, that applies to all types of writing, thanks guys!," I learned some LIFE LESSONS (and how to use Caps Lock, apparently). So here they are, The Top 5 Life Lessons I Learned from Writing Movies for Fun and Profit (Besides the Fact That I Want to Do Naughty Things With Ben Garant, Which I Already Knew):

1. Jump In.
What I found most interesting about Writing Movies for Fun and Profit was its structure: Lennon and Garant tell the reader how to SELL a screenplay, THEN how to write one. Business first. To sell, you need to know the ins and outs. You need to live in Los Angeles and be on speaking terms with words like "arbitration." And most of all, you need to "ALWAYS BE WRITING."

I hate driving, so I could never call L.A. my home, so I will probably never be a screenwriter. But I like the idea of jumping in. As I've gotten older, I've grown more cautious, and it's good to be reminded that sometimes risk-taking and throwing oneself into what others might call a shitty pipe dream could really pay off in the end. Or not. Which brings me to Life Lesson No. 2:


2. Sometimes Things Go to Crap. Deal With It.
One of Lennon and Garant's first films was Taxi. Remember Taxi? Jimmy Fallon and Queen Latifah in a cab having adventures? The total box-office bomb that Adam Carolla has dubbed "the worst movie of all time"? Yeah. They wrote that. They own that most of the writing in that film was, in fact, theirs. And then came Herbie, Fully Loaded. Lennon and Garant wrote this as a fun family movie, like the  ones they used to watch at the drive-in as children. It was greenlighted ON THE FIRST DRAFT, which almost never happens. And then...yeah.


And they dealt. They kept working. They own their failures every bit as much as their successes. While working on Taxi, they got to hang out at Luc Besson's estate in France, and Gisele Bundchen hugged them. They tell the reader, "Even the poop clouds that bring shit storms sometimes have a silver lining." Who the hell can't learn something from that quote?

3. Always Be Nice and Easy to Work With.
Apparently "the industry" is made up of the same seventy-five people who just rotate jobs. Today's intern can be tomorrow's vice president. So you better not be an ass to any of them. Now, Lennon is a native Midwesterner (from the suburbs of Chicago, in fact!) and Garant hails from the South (and has the adorable drawl to prove it), so it makes sense they'd be big on politeness and manners. But really, it's not just Hollywood: it's a teeny tiny world wherever you go. So be cool. Don't be a pushover, but establish a good reputation and maintain it. And people will remember.

Even if Billy Crystal is really mean and makes fun of your Southern accent (I learned that on the Internet. All Lennon and Garant say in their book is that Crystal's a dick).

4. Love What You Do.
Early in the book, Lennon and Garant outline one of the very basic tenets of writing for the studios: "ALWAYS BE WRITING . . . You should feel COMPELLED to write every day. Always. It's that simple. If you don't feel the desire to write every day--skip it. And let everyone else in the world get rich writing screenplays."

Again, I'm not an aspiring screenwriter. And you, my superawesome reader, might not want to write for a living. But I like this advice. Even if it's not your day job, if you have a passion and want to get ahead, you need to be disciplined. (Especially if your passion and your day job are not one and the same.) This advice is so important that these two even restate it in interviews promoting the book. Garant once said something like, "I'd write all the time even if I weren't getting paid. If you feel that way too, you know it's the right thing for you to be doing." I have no doubt horribly mangled that quote, but you get the sentiment, right?

5. Don't Be a Dick.
"Hey Unpro, you covered this in #3!" you might be saying right now. Maybe, but it bears repeating. "Don't be a dick" is also the life philosophy of the forever-cool Wil Wheaton. It seems so simple and clear, but it's astounding how many people in this world don't follow this rule. Whether you're negotiating with the studios to put your name in the credits of Starsky and Hutch or trying not to whap someone with your purse as you hurry to work, just don't. Be. A. Dick. Not only could this help your career, whatever that may be, it's good karma besides.

Oh, and Ben? Please call me if your impending marriage doesn't work out. You sexy Southern nerd, you.

Ingenious: Stella

As with many things in a twentysomething's life, my introduction to Stella began with a hangover.

You know those nights when you and your friend decide to get drunk because he's fighting with his boyfriend and you're not speaking to your friend-with-benefits? Those nights when you start out at a bar on Halsted Street, end up at your pal's apartment doing shots of Sambuca and then decide to break out the keyboard and sing the entire score of The Last Five Years? Those nights when you both stagger to Jewel in your pajamas for brownies and margarita mix you will not consume, before passing out on the hide-a-bed to a VHS of Saturday Night Live: The Best of Adam Sandler?

What? I've never had those nights. This is hypothetical, y'all.

Um, if the above had happened, when I was 25 and my friend 21, let's pretend we woke up with the mother of all hangovers. Let's pretend we went for iced coffee and later Baci's pizza, before once again collapsing on the hide-a-bed with still-pounding heads. I had my arm over my eyes when my friend reached for a DVD. "Did you see Stella when it was on Comedy Central?" I muttered something and shook my head. "It's those guys you like from Wet Hot American Summer, basically doing long-form improv. You'll love it."

Even before I started blogging, my tastes were always pretty obvious, and despite his hangover my friend was spot-on.

It's tough to describe Stella, which is probably why I warmed up with a drinking story. "Long form improv on crack" is an apt phrase, as is "wacky theatre crossed with the low production value of student film, with random celebrity guests." The Stella trio consists of State alums Michael Ian Black, Michael Showalter and David Wain (the latter is surprisingly adorable with glasses), who have been performing together as a group since 1998. The moniker comes from a pregnant club owner who informed the guys of the name she planned on giving her unborn daughter.

Basically, the boys live in a parallel universe where they run around in suits and do things like have mustache-growing contests, crash yoga classes, and travel back hundreds of years via cardboard time machine. Nothing's unrealistic, untouchable, or sacred. The Comedy Central series is slightly cleaner, but the shorts made between 1998 and 2002 are absolutely filthy (at least 75% of them contain a very realistic-looking dildo). And not to sound like a hipster, but Stella resembles Kids in the Hall in terms of humor: either you're really into it, or you're really not.

I'm the former, obviously.

There are a few things I really love about Stella.

One: it appeals to my IMDb-memorizing nerdiness. Like I said, random celebs show up in the early shorts and later on the series, and I love dorkily figuring out how they know the Stella guys. For example, "omigod, it's Bradley Cooper, who played Michael Ian Black's lover in Wet Hot American Summer, which also starred Michael Showalter and was directed by David Wain!," "Oh look, it's Julie Bowen, now on Modern Family, but this is when she was co-starring on the NBC dramedy Ed with Michael Ian Black!," and "I swear to God, Santa Claus is played by Zack Galifinakis, because I'd know that voice anywhere!" (Told you: I'm a DORK.)
Second: the always-and-forever theatre geek in me revels in the trio's balls-to-the-wall openness. Stella isn't pure improv, but you can tell the boys are well-versed in the form's golden rule: "yes, and..." "Yes, and..." boils down to taking your improv partner's idea and running with it (sometimes it's a good life philosophy as well). Though The State was more tightly scripted, you can see "yes, and..." in many of their sketches, for example the "copy shop" in an early season. (Also, one of my favorite State sketches ever clearly began with the idea: "what if someone went camping...in a house?" I like to think after someone brought it up, the group was "yes, and"-ing all over the place.)

Third: remember how in your twenties, you knew a lot of people who did really bad improv and really bad short films? Picture what would happen if they were, well, really good. That's Stella in a nutshell.

For your viewing pleasure, here's one of my favorite shorts, "Pizza" (caution: it's pretty dirty):



And a bonus video: The State's impromptu sing-along at an MTV Christmas party, in the days before they had their own show. It's like a comedic Muppet Babies--if you'll notice, the future members of Stella are standing together--plus...Ben Garant at the halfway point. As my friend tinypants wood Tweeted, "Oh my hotness."

Idiocy: Top 5 Best Moments of Reno 911!

Continuing State Month on the blog, here's a little something about Reno 911! 

If you revisit The State--and I can't be the only one doing so, right?--you'll see alliances form within the group as the show progresses. For example, David Wain, Michael Showalter, Michael Ian Black and Ken Marino are often together in sketches. Ditto Tom Lennon, Ben Garant and Kerri Kenney. ("The Inbred Brothers" sketch is not only pants-pissing funny, but also an example of how two minutes of tight comedy is way better than seven minutes of beating a dead horse. Saturday Night Live, are you listening?) Lennon, Garant and Kenney went on to create and star in the best largely-improvised cop show parody ever, and one of my favorite shows, period. If you haven't seen Reno 911!, get thee to Netflix. You can skip the final season, where two of the cast members were replaced and thus, the chemistry wasn't quite the same. However, if you need some help to get started--or you want to remember an old fave--here are my top 5 favorite episodes of Reno 911!

1. "And the Installation is Free" (s3 e7)
The title of this episode comes from the High Sierra Carpeting radio jingle that golden-voiced Deputy Jones (Cedric Yarbrough) is paid $200 to warble, with residuals (or so he thinks). Naturally the hypothetical money and adulation go to his head, and he sings this very line throughout the episode, much to the chagrin of his partner Deputy Garcia (Carlos Alazraqui, aka the voice of the Taco Bell dog). Hubris reigns supreme and because the Reno Sheriffs' Department is always down on its luck, comes back to haunt Jones--after he fails to pay a bar tab, of course. The B plot, which involves Lt. Dangle (Tom Lennon) and Deputies Travis Junior and Trudy Wiegel (Robert Ben Garant and Kerri Kenney-Silver, respectively) trying to solve a drug-related murder, has the most hilarious Arby's product placement this side of Fargo.

2. "Execution Tickets" (s1 e3)
What's a sheriffs' department to do when everyone wants to attend an execution, but only two tickets are available? "What we always do," proclaims the hot pants-sporting Lt. Dangle. "Scavenger hunt!" And so it goes, as the officers track down such specific perps as a crackhead with a wig ("easy!"), and someone with a tattoo (bonus points if they are also Jewish). It's a cutthroat fight to the finish, because as redneck Deputy Junior enthuses, "Getting two tickets to an execution is like getting two tickets to NASCAR, except you know Jeff Gordon's gonna die!"

3. "Whose Birthday Is It?" (Reno 911! Miami)
I saw Reno 911! Miami in theatres before I started watching the show, so I wasn't 100% into it at first. Even so, the movie's brilliantly dumb sequences started me on the path of conversion. Clemmie's boob tattoo! The dead beached whale! The self-pleasure-at-the-nasty-hotel montage! However, the absolute best scene has Dangle and Junior responding to a noise complaint at Suge Knight's birthday party. They have no idea who Suge Knight is. When Dangle fires his gun and ends up with a plethora of weapons pointed at him, courtesy of Knight's guests, Dangle and Junior improvise a striptease...well, Junior's improvising. You get the feeling Dangle's done those moves many times before, in front of his mirror. When I first saw Reno 911! Miami, I hadn't seen The State in years...and then I remembered why my 14-year-old self always got excited when Ben Garant went shirtless. Dayum.

4. "Mayor Hernandez" (s5 e4)
I've always been neutral about George Lopez. I wasn't into sitcoms when his was on the air, and I'm not that into stand-up comedy. So I was pleasantly surprised when his guest turn on Reno 911!, as the city's mayor who gets more paranoid and whacked out with each morning briefing he crashes, made me laugh out loud. Also, this episode features one of Reno 911's best recurring perps, Terry the roller-skating prostitute (Nick Swardson). I don't care how much of a dick Swardson reportedly is in real life, Terry's lisping interactions with the Reno S.D.--which usually involve badly-worded denials of his illegal activities--are always a highlight.

5. "Dangle's Wedding" (s4 e14)
Despite knowing very well it was a product of The State alums, I wasn't always into Reno 911! My ex-boyfriend and I had always bonded over The State (and later, Wet Hot American Summer) and I was afraid Reno 911! would bring back too many memories. (What can I say? The brokenhearted are not always rational.) Even after I saw the movie, I didn't immediately dive in. However, several months later, my new roommate was watching a rerun of "Dangle's Wedding" before the new season started. I vaguely remembered the characters, plus I was too tired to get my ass off the couch. Let's just say the combo platter of 1) male cops in kilts, 2) a gay wedding proposal in front of an audience of bored middle schoolers, 3) an awkward, naked pregnant Wiegel going into labor after popping out of a cake--and subsequently getting wheeled to the hospital in said cake by said male cops in kilts--and 4) Dave Holmes shrieking "until the last dance IN HEAVEN!" made me say, "My ex was a jackass, but The State has never let me down! Hey roommate, can we TiVo Season Pass this show?"

Are you a fan of the Reno S.D.? Any favorite episodes I missed? Leave a comment!

Irreverence: The Ten

One of the best things about having my own blog is getting to write about whatever I want. If I'm obsessed with certain clip-show hosts turned NBC stars, I can pen three or four posts and those who don't want to read them, don't have to. The other day, a friend on Facebook said she hoped her writing didn't sound too fangirl. "Dude," I responded, "I started writing because I'm a fangirl."

With that in mind, I hereby declare July to be State Month here on the ol' Unpro. For the next few weeks, I will explore the subsequent work of my eleven favorite Tisch alums (well, Michael Ian Black dropped out and Michael Showalter ended up graduating from Brown...yeah, I'm the nerd who knows this). First up, David Wain's 2007 Biblical satire, The Ten.

Though he was hysterical as a performer on The State, David Wain also did a lot off camera. Who can forget the episode when he re-edited the opening credits? Not I.


Since The State ended, Wain's concentrated on directing. Between Wet Hot American Summer (read my friend Robin's hysterical love letter to the film here) and Role Models, there was The Ten.

I first saw The Ten when it was released in 2007. I believe it was supposed to coincide with the release of The State on DVD. However, the latter was put off for another two years because of yet another battle over music rights. I remember liking, not loving, the movie. Some scenes worked much better than others. It was decidedly okay.

Once I revisited it, I gained a new appreciation. Though some scenes still work way better than others.

It goes like this: each of the Ten Commandments is presented as a vignette. Some are slapstick, some dark, some just plain bizarre (in other words, vintage State). Hosting the vignettes, and starring in "Thou shalt not commit adultery" is Paul Rudd in his nicest of nice-guy modes. Except not really, because he's cheating on his wife (Famke Janssen) with a younger woman (Jessica Alba). Some characters appear in multiple vignettes, such as Ken Marino (who co-wrote the film with Wain) as a doctor who kills a patient "as a goof" and ends up the object of two rapists' affection in prison. And it's really, really funny.

Again, The Ten has its weak points. First, I know every comedy needs a straight man, but Rudd is just so much funnier when he gets to be goofy, which doesn't happen nearly often enough thanks to his conventional good looks. The commandment "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor" is almost entirely animated and it comes across like Wain is trying and failing to ape Monty Python. And I can't decide whether Winona Ryder's ventriloquist dummy-loving character is humorous or just whiny. Then again, I always was on the fence about Ryder when she wasn't playing Lydia Dietz or Jo March.

That said, The Ten is worth a rental, for the following awesome vignettes:

• "Thou shalt have no other gods before me:" A regular Joe (Adam Brody) gets stuck in an awkward position following a skydiving accident, and experiences the ups and downs of sudden fame and the hubris that accompanies it. This represents the one and only time I have liked Adam Brody.
• "Thou shalt not take the Lord's name in vain:" On a Mexican getaway, a shy librarian (Gretchen Mol, who really should have a better career) has a love affair with a carpenter named Jesus (Justin Theroux, who needs to break up with Jennifer Aniston and marry me instead. No offense, Jen, but I'd be a better writing partner).
• "Thou shalt not kill" and "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife:" The aforementioned vignettes featuring Marino's murderous doctor, who gets what's coming to him (ha) in prison. Rob Corddry is hysterical as a fellow prisoner with his eye on Marino, and his scenes are oddly romantic.
• "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods:" Liev Schreiber takes a break from his uber-serious typecasting as a suburban dude competing with his neighbor (Joe Lo Truglio) over...CAT scan machines.
• And finally, "Honor the Sabbath day and keep it holy:" A husband and father (A.D. Miles) finds a fulfilling alternative to church...involving a lot of nudity. And it ends with a musical number.

However, what may be the absolute best best best thing about The Ten: all of The State appears. Some have leading roles in the vignettes, others pop up in Rudd's segments (really, does anyone drop the F bomb better than Tom Lennon?), a few are blink-and-you'll-miss-it (though I never miss naked Ben Garant), and one shows up in a photograph (Michael Patrick Jann, who had a scheduling conflict the day he was supposed to film). For fangirls like me, it was so much fun to pick out everybody--and to marvel, "Oh cool!  They still get along!" in my little fangirl reptile brain.

So declareth The Unprofessional Critic:

Thou shalt Netflix The Ten.