Given our conversations about SOPA and legacy media’s willingness (or lack thereof) to embrace the ways technology is changing the way we consume media, one of the things I was most interested in at the Television Critics Association press tour was the way executives from the networks talked about technology and how it’s affecting everything from ratings to storytelling. I have a piece on the Atlantic about the five biggest tech ideas at press tour, and FX’s John Landgraf, Fox’s Kevin Reilly, ABC’s Paul Lee, and Hulu’s Andy Forssell all deserve significant credit for creative thinking. I want to pull out one point, though, because I think it’s an important question without an easy answer:

If you want people to put television on their calendars, make television that’s worth the appointment—in every way.
Executive: Paul Lee, President, ABC Entertainment Group
Lee isn’t alone in recognizing this. But he was the executive of the press tour to point out that if you want people to plan their weeks around television shows, you have to give them not just can’t-miss plots but visual spectacles that they want to see on television screens, which have gotten larger and cheaper even as we’ve added multiple smaller screens. “I think part of that is we are taking risks and having fun and a lot of feature [movie] directors are attracted to that…that’s one of the reasons you saw Phillip Noyce” (the movie director who helmed two episodes of ABC’s Revenge and an upcoming episode of HBO’s Luck) “coming in. I think you’re going to see feature actors as well as directors.” The profusion of movie actors, such as Anjelica Huston on Smash, Josh Lucas on The Firm, and Dustin Hoffman on Luck, coming to the small screen in mid-season seems to be proving him right. It may not have worked for The Firm, which is floundering, but we’ll see how Smash and Luck do.

With notable exceptions like Avatar (which was also downloaded illegally with very high frequency), audiences seem at least somewhat resistant to the idea that there are things that simply must be seen on the big screen in theaters or on a decent-sized television, and that lose all their power when shrunk down to tablet, laptop, or phone size. Certainly, the skepticism of 3D, which I think is seen as a means of cash extraction rather than storytelling, is one indicator that it’s going to be tricky to sell folks on gimmicks. I’d absolutely argue that something like the Luck pilot, with its gorgeous color and heart-stopping horse races, is much better on a decent-sized television than on your phone at the gym. But if networks or studios are going to claim that something needs to be seen big, and seen in its time slot, and expect audiences to believe them, they have to have both the storytelling and the visual chops to back it up.

In December, an Arizona judge upheld a state law that bans classes that “promote the overthrow of the United States government, promote resentment toward a race or class of people, are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group or advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.” That ruling’s already cost Tucson public schools their Mexican Studies program, and as part of that elimination, Shakespeare’s The Tempest is being removed from classrooms and sent to the district’s book depository. As nuts as it is to think that the Bard’s story of a sorcerer and his daughter could promote a rebellion in Arizona, there are a lot of other books that could fall under scrutiny if this law is allowed to stand.

1. Paradise Lost, John Milton: Sure, this is supposed to be John Milton’s repentance of his republican apostasy, but what if red-blooded American kiddies get confused by the eloquence of that wily creature Satan? That whole “Farewel Remorse: all Good to me is lost; / Evil be thou my Good” thing could cause all sorts of kerfuffles and uprisings, like those darn video games my grandson is always playing.

2. A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens: It’s a short leap from Marquis Evrémonde to Mitt Romney, and we wouldn’t want to invite that comparison, now would we? Darnay is such an avatar of the politics of envy.

3. The Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling: This one might be a squeaker. Sure, the hero advocates strongly against the anti-Muggle, Squib, and Mudblood race politics of Voldemort and his cronies. But that Potter kid is awfully disrespectful to the Minister of Magic and forms of authority in general.

5. Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card: Pre-teens plotting an overhaul of world government and resisting the efforts of the military that’s recruited them to manipulate them. Total recipe for disaster. Especially now that blogging is an actual thing that kids can do. Nuke this one. And parents, shut down your kids’ Tumblrs just to be safe.
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I’m not usually one to police the behavior of celebrities, but Mark Wahlberg’s recent statements about September 11 are really egregious and deserve a thorough fisking. He told Men’s Journal: “If I was on that plane with my kids, it wouldn’t have went down like it did. There would have been a lot of blood in that first-class cabin and then me saying, ‘OK, we’re going to land somewhere safely, don’t worry.”

First, who knew Mark Wahlberg knew how to fly commercial aircraft?

Second, for the love of all that is holy, do you know nothing about what went down on September 11? When people get out of their seats and start murdering members of the crew, it wouldn’t have been particularly surprising if people were shocked enough not to react until it was too late. And as it turns out, they weren’t. The passengers on United 93, including a judo expert and a rugby player (who may not be as fit as Mr. Wahlberg, but are not incapable people), fought back against the men who hijacked their flight. As it turns out, people with weapons who are determined to die are decent at thwarting the people fighting back against them who want to live. The hijacker at the controls of the plane dipped and rolled to thwart the passengers’ efforts. And he crashed it before they could get to the cockpit.

This is just profoundly disrespectful to everyone who died on planes on September 11, whether they fought back or not. It shows no understanding of their ordeal, or their courage. And it mistakes action movie theatrics, where the fights are scripted and all the participants share an interest in making a great scene rather than finding themselves at deadly odds, for the struggle to live.

I’d be curious to hear a comic of David Letterman’s stature weigh in on the question of whether or not women can be funny. But when it comes to who gets to appear on his show, it turns out that it might not matter that much what Letterman himself thinks. The show fired Letterman’s comedy booker, Eddie Brill, after he told the New York Times that “There are a lot less female comics who are authentic. I see a lot of female comics who to please an audience will act like men.” In the process, he reignited the debate most recently fueled by Christopher Hitchens about whether or not women can be funny, or whether they’re funny in the same ways as men, or whether men and women find other things funny.

But I actually think the more important point here is less in positing an answer to those ultimately unempirical questions and more in pointing out the critical importance of gatekeepers in diversifying entertainment. Letterman is, of course, the CEO of his show, so his opinions matter. But just as important as his feelings about about female comics is whether he cares enough to make sure everyone on his team is on the same page about booking. It’s the same across the entertainment world. It’s a good thing for Bob Greenblatt at NBC to want to find stories with more diverse casts and a great show about a black or Asian family, but he’s also got to make sure that the folks who are reading pilot scripts know that he’s got his eye out for something like that. We need good executives at entertainment companies, but we also need good gatekeepers, because those roles aren’t always the same. It may take time to get there, but hopefully Letterman will replace Brill with someone who knows how to find the best female comedians. And it’s good to see the Daily Show finally hiring a black woman to deliver reports:

This post contains spoilers through the January 17 episode of Justified.

Before plunging into what looks to be a tremendously exciting season of Justified, a thought: why is it that our great prestige television about cities that aren’t New York, Los Angeles, or Washington, DC has to be about the drug trade? Baltimore is defined by the drug trade in The Wire. We see Albuquerque largely through the lens of people who participate in the meth trade, or who are trying to shut it down in Breaking Bad — the city’s geography is bounded by the houses of the participants, Los Pollos Hermanos, the laundry, and Hank’s office. And Justified gives us a Kentucky populated by a colorful variety of narcotics wranglers. The Sopranos is a notable potential exception, though drugs are certainly part of the mix, and there’s an extent to which the show is about New Jersey’s relationship to New York.

I understand why we tell stories about criminal enterprises in general and drugs in particular. Cops and robbers, chase and race are both classic storytelling models. And the networks and problems of production, trade, and distribution make for fascinating character and power relationships between criminals and present substantial challenges for law enforcement officers. But are drugs really so psychically important to our country that they deserve this level of attention? I know I’m not alone in considering the War on Drugs both an over-investment and a failed strategy. And while I appreciate living in a neighborhood that isn’t blighted by drug-linked crime, I’m also not exceptionally concerned about Marlo Stanfield or Walter White showing up and upsetting that balance. So is this pattern just a result of the structural rewards of telling drug stories? Or do we see something rotten at the heart of America, a blight worse than the troubles we identify in our great cities?

I wanted to start on that note because I appreciate the way the show used Quarles’ arrival in town to set up a running conversation about real estate, and by extension, territory and a sense of home. When he first showed up, I actually assumed he was talking about the city of Detroit, rather than the criminal enterprise based there that he happens to represent. It quickly becomes clear that it’s not, but I like the idea of Detroit as a criminal conspiracy, the city’s profound troubles providing opportunities for men like Quarles to rise. “You picked a shitty time to get into commercial real estate, and now you’re under water. Detroit did not make an investment. It made a loan,” he warns. “Things are getting tough all over. So if you can’t have the money here by tomorrow, I trust you tell me right now.” He makes good on the threat by the end of the episode, but he’s set a theme that persists for the rest of the episode. There’s Boyd and Raylan fighting over Raylan’s broken promise, with Raylan spitting, “You think we’re in the holler? I’m a deputy U.S. Marshal.” Geography will reach out to pull you back, if you let it. And Raylan and Winona, they lie in bed after making love for the first time since Raylan was shot, property and geography become a proxy for talking about commitment. “Maybe we need more room,” Raylan proposes, baby planning. “After all the time I’ve spent redecorating?” Winona asks, a prickliness that’ll come up again when Raylan tentatively proposes naming their baby Felix, like the cat. “It’s sweet. It’s sweet that you think you have a say in the name,” she tells him.

Those twitchy power dynamics are all over the episode, and make for some of its best moments. “Didn’t wear your suit,” Raylan observes as he meets Boyd in the conference room. “Why do you say that as if I’ve only got one suit and not the whole closetful?” Boyd complains. And they poke at each other over the question of asset forfeiture. “How sizeable, Raylan?” Boyd asks.”Well over 10 dollars,” Raylan tells him. “If I had that kind of money, I’d be in Mexico by now,” Boyd tells him. One of the reasons things get so nasty is because the stakes are smaller than they are in Albuquerque, but the people involved need the money and the assertions of power more. When Ava clocks Devil with the frying pan and is told she didn’t have to, she forcefully asserts that it is, “Otherwise I wouldn’t have done it.” Duffy slaps back at Raylan by treating him like a low priority, saying, “I would love to be of more help but I’ve got to get back to watching women’s tennis.” And Fletcher Nix, who on another show would be a great season-long villain, projects his air of menace in Raylan’s house in part by playing naive. “I look like I know anything about watches?” he asks Raylan. “I could take those off your hands. Give you $20 a piece for them,” Raylan plays along, a little bit classy and a little bit cheap. But he beats him by playing very, very cool. It’s going to be a terrific season.

The bridge is yours.

-Turning hallucinations into music.

-The Hunger Games: boosting the economy of the Pitcairn Islands!

-Woo, Jedi origin stories.

-Ladies (Still) Love Cool James.

-More Azelia Banks to get you through your day:

Many organizations, most notably among them Wikipedia, are going dark or gray for today to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act. When they come back, a lot more Americans will likely be aware of the now substantially altered legislation. And my hope, however unlikely, is that after this day of action, we can reset the conversation, especially now that DNS blocking and rerouting appear to be out of play.

It might help for both sides to acknowledge the legitimate fears held by powerful interests on both sides of the SOPA debate. Changing the way the internet is governed, especially after a year when free access to it played a major role in critically important liberation movements, is a hugely momentous thing to propose, even if you feel that your industry is at stake. It may be difficult to quantify the economic impact of piracy, but that doesn’t mean that there is none, or that it’s illegitimate for the people who work in an industry to feel insecurity about its transformation and their prospects for stable employment in it. Tech companies could do more to sell themselves to legacy content providers as beneficial partners. And legacy media companies could spend more time talking to consumers about customer service and cross-platform accessibility than scolding them.

Content and technology companies are not inextricably enemies, and there’s likely to be less and less daylight between them in the future. Netflix is making investments in shows like mob drama Lillyhammer and a remake of the classic British series House of Cards. On a smaller scale, Hulu is doing the same with its unscripted series from Morgan Spurlock and Richard Linklater and its first scripted drama, Wisconsin campaign series Battleground. Tom Hanks’ Playtone production company is making American Gods for HBO — and an animated science fiction series, Electric City, for Yahoo. Google-owned YouTube is shoveling money into content channels curated by actors and celebrities.

These companies may approach their long-term plans for their content differently than movie studios and television networks, and may have different approaches to copyright and distribution than the legacy media organizations. But my bet would be it’s a matter of emphasis rather than of a wholly new approach. It makes much more sense to embrace that connectivity and common interest, and for legacy and new media born out of tech companies to learn as much as they can from each others’ experiences getting rich content to broad audiences on diverse platforms. The SOPA debate has been bruising. But if it helps us lay out the issues that prevent these sides from working together, perhaps it’ll be worth it.

The Times Magazine’s profile of George Lucas is very interesting, particularly in its description of how his long-term girlfriend, Mellody Hobson, or as Al Sharpton calls her, “black America’s business princess,” has transmitted Lucas’s dedication to racial equality and channeled it more directly into politics, whether calling Obama a Jedi or showing up for the White House Correspondents Association Dinner. And it captures his determination to make Red Tails a truly black movie (he’s joked about Spike Lee making a prequel to it):

“They say, Now, who are you making this for?”

“I’m making it for black teenagers.”…

“And you’re going to be very patriotic — you’re making a black movie that’s patriotic?”

“They have a right to have their history just like anybody else does,” Lucas said. “And they have a right to have it kind of Hollywood-ized and aggrandized and made corny and wonderful just like anybody else does. Even if that’s not the fashion right now.” [...]

To execute his popcorn vision of “Red Tails,” Lucas turned to Anthony Hemingway, a 36-year-old director who made his name on TV shows like “The Wire.” Hemingway, who had never directed a feature film, comes from the church of David Simon, which values moral murkiness over naïveté, documentary detail about East Baltimore over an ethnography of the Ewok village. It was like hiring a “Hill Street Blues” veteran to direct “Return of the Jedi.”

But from the beginning, Lucas wanted “Red Tails” to have a black director. “I thought, This is the proper way to do this,” he said. Indeed, to scan the credits in “Red Tails” is to see Lucas’s fidelity to African-American filmmakers. There are two black writers and a black executive producer. Terence Blanchard, a Spike Lee collaborator (“Jungle Fever,” “Malcolm X”), wrote the score, and Art Sims, another Lee veteran, designed the one-sheet.

I really hope Red Tails does well not simply to disprove the idea that black leads can’t open blockbusters or that black history is a niche genre. Lucas has said that this will be his last blockbuster. So if the movie makes bank, maybe Lucas could do for black artists what Tyler Perry hasn’t entirely done yet, and what Queen Latifah still might do: spread the wealth and give a financial springboard to projects that could be commercially viable if only they could find financing and support, and an imprimatur that would reassure distributors. The battle might be to get individual non-white (or for that matter, female) writers and directors credentialed and established. But the war is about getting a lot of them in the game.

I’ve enjoyed SyFy’s weird-things-happening-in-the-world-we-think-we-know shows like Eureka and Warehouse 13, but I sort of thought TNT and Fox stole a bit of a match on the network with shows like Falling Skies and Terra Nova that were based further in the future and did more to posit alternative societies. So I’m excited to hear about Deliverance, SyFy’s upcoming program set in “a world where humans and aliens live together on a planet ravished by decades of war.” Apparently, it’s kind of a western, with a human sheriff and mayor trying to keep peace between the human and alien populations of the former St. Louis.

My boredom with alien invasion stories is well-documented, so this is a nice variation, and the first pop culture product of its ilk since District 9, really. Cowboys and Aliens foundered in part, I think, because it didn’t have a clear sense for who or what its alien invaders were meant to represent. An old-school Western with aliens standing in for George Hearst and his minions, a kind of sci-fi Deadwood would have been sort of amazing, but Cowboys and Aliens was not that thing. The fact that humans are in charge of governance in Deliverance suggests that humans are somewhat more powerful than aliens, but I do think you could do something interesting where aliens are the more powerful constituency without being tyrannical or enslaving humanity. And a situation where aliens and humans are close to parity or co-dependent could be a really useful tool for exploring our attitudes towards immigrants or to coalition-building across constituencies. Stories are better when they know what their metaphors are for specifically, rather than standing in for a Random Big Bad Thing.