the photo

newyorkmug.jpg

the info

Dan Carlson
Los Angeles, California

I'm a twentysomething white male with ambitions to be a professional film critic and generally spend my days getting paid to watch movies and write about it. I try not to think too hard about how I want to build my life around talking about other people's creations and not mine. A compulsive reader and stubborn cineaste, I take an often contrary stance to my more fundamentalist peers and upbringing by celebrating the pursuit of the good, and the Good, in life, love, art and film. If you watched enough episodes of a few TV shows ("The Hungry and the Hunted," "The Cut Man Cometh," "The Body," "The Zeppo," "Waiting in the Wings," "Out of Gas," "April is the Cruelest Month," "20 Hours in America," "Colonial Day," "An Echolls Family Christmas," and "Look Who's Stalking," for starters), you would understand me completely, and you'd also realize that much of my worldview and philosophical insights are heavily influenced by fictional works/programs, and many of the good things I've said in my life are just a regurgitation of someone else's imaginings. I guess I was made to be a film critic.

Calendar


August 2008
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31

Categories

The Counter

the world

Locations of visitors to this page

Search


the library

The Words

the shots

www.flickr.com
This is a Flickr badge showing public photos from dan_carlson. Make your own badge here.

the city

the politics

The Alumni

« Review: The Happening |Main| I Ain't Here For Business, I'm Only Here For Fun »

June 17, 2008

I Hear The Bells, They Are Like Emeralds

By Dan Carlson

vmart1.jpg

Over at Pajiba, it's my turn at bat again in our continuing survey of the best TV seasons of the past 20 years. We've bumped the roster from from 15 to 20, which should carry us through the summer and allow us to write about some favorites that we just couldn't pass up. This one, however, was always on the list. My struggle wasn't to decide whether to write about "Veronica Mars," but which season to write about. For reasons I hope I make clear, I went with the first.

The piece can be found here.

Comments: 6

Jen

That was beautiful Dan. It may have brought a tear or two to my eyes. Oh, how I miss Veronica and peps :(

Jun 17, 2008 4:12 PM

Chris Dowdy

we watched the pilot again tonight after reading your column (and the hilarious comment thread)...God this show is good

Jun 17, 2008 9:14 PM

Chris Dowdy

We watched the pilot again tonight after reading the column...God what a show

Jun 17, 2008 9:19 PM

WestCoastPat

Thank you for including this. I was hoping this would be one of the last 2 (now 7?).

This may be the single best stand alone season of the past 20 years. There have been better seasons of other shows, but all require prior seasons setup. VM starts from nothing and rocks it.

Jun 18, 2008 7:54 AM

Clitty McGoo

Dear Pajiba,

When it comes to this list please for the love of all things sacred... do not fuck up and neglect the Sopranos.

Respectfully,
Clitty

Jun 21, 2008 1:41 AM

JMW

Veronica Mars is awesome. Haven't seen the second season yet, but glad to hear you think it holds up. The first season set a pretty high bar.

Looking forward to posts describing your debauchery in NYC...

Jun 22, 2008 2:00 PM

Post a comment

the post

Questions? Comments? Complaints?

Drop 'em in the mailbag.

homefeed.png

The Lines

The Quotes

"The critic is the only independent source of information. The rest is advertising."
— Pauline Kael

"Film lovers are sick people."
— Francois Truffaut

"I hope I strike a blow for chubby bald men everywhere. I hope they rise like an army."
— Paul Giamatti, quoted in the Los Angeles Times, 12/14/04

"Let others praise ancient times, I am glad I was born in these."
— Ovid

Current Reading

In Rotation















the humor

the screens

the tube

the sounds

The Plugs

Recent Posts

Subscribe to this blog's feed
[What is this?]

Archives

Powered by
Movable Type 3.33

the wisdom

Remembering speechlessly we seek the great forgotten language, the lost lane-end into heaven, a stone, a leaf, an unfound door. Where? When?

O lost, and by the wind grieved, ghost, come back again.
— Look Homeward, Angel, Thomas Wolfe

Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives.
— John Stuart Mill

We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.
— G.K. Chesterton

We were, for the briefest of moments, something greater than the sum of our uncertain parts; we were youth itself, in all its painful glory and sharp joy.
— Me, Fall 2003

There is a time in the lives of most writers when they are vulnerable, when the vivid dreams and ambitions of childhood seem to pale in the harsh sunlight of what we call the real world. In short, there's a time when things can go either way.
— Stephen King

Los Angeles, give me some of you! Los Angeles come to me the way I came to you, my feet over your streets, you pretty town I loved you so much, you sad flower in the sand, you pretty town.
— Ask the Dust, John Fante