Episode 109: The Steven Seagal Scifi Special!

[Gilberto]

Greg, Sean and Lynn compare new scifi shows and movies to the good old days, discussing how far removed Caprica is from the classic Battlestar Galactica, why Avatar isn't as eco-friendly as it claims to be, the merits of the new Spartacus TV series and the mysteries of the Coral Castle, another monument purporting to be America's Stonehenge.

And somehow we manage to blame Steven Seagal for the decline of modern scifi.

media.libsyn.com/media/darkcrazy/TVAMD_seagal.mp3

[lynn]

That's because it is his fault.
This was a fun episode to do, because you rang me out of the blue and Ben was in the room with me, hearing one side of the conversation, which is always funny. Then my computer went and shat itself. good times.

[Esteban]

Yes! I highly recommend Coral Castle. When I moved down here to southern Florida last year I stayed briefly in Homestead and checked it out. It was a strange little place and definitely very cheesy but worth the price of admission. It's funny how it's smack dab in the middle of a Miami suburb so it doesn't have the remote feel of a Stonehenge or those Georgia Guidestones but I think it was moved from its original location in the Everglades.

My favorite part was how there's an audio tour where the disembodied voice of Ed tells you about the different sculptures as you visit each of the stations along the tour. Of course it's not really Ed but the actor does a great job and it's like you're being guided by a ghost. Although the whole area is maybe half a city block it would still take hours to get through if you visited all the sculptures and listened to all the audio presentations. It's very interactive and you can even visit the small room he made in a tower where he slept and kept his tools.

I love the piece "In Search Of" did about the castle. It's on YouTube titled In "Search Of... The Castle Of Secrets". There was also a somewhat recent article on the castle in Skeptic Magazine that I remember being pretty good but I only read it at Barnes&Noble and never bought it.

If you guys wanted to make the most of your time there's an upcoming pop culture convention in Miami that you could plan your trip to Coral Castle around. It's called Florida Supercon and it's not really as big as the Atlanta conventions I imagine you've been to but it would make for a full weekend. It's June 18-20. They'll have guests like the guy who played the Flash in the old TV show, Larry Kenny the voice of Lion-O from Thundercats, the Iron Shiek and Tia Carrere amongst other media and comic celebrities. They'll also have the guy who played the stormtrooper who said "These aren't the droids we're looking for". It might sound lame but it should be fun. Also Botcon the annual official Transformer convention will be in Orlando the week after, and that's at one of the hotels adjacent to Walt Disney World. As you're driving back north you could hit that up, too. It's just stuff to think about if you guys do plan on coming down.

[Gilberto]

You, sir, are full of good ideas. Didn't you also see JJ Armes in real life? I'm really stoked about Coral Castle! Supercon looks awesome; it's a little soon, but maybe we could shoot for it next year.

[drivebyluna]

You guys could come out to the Maker Faire next year too

[Esteban]

May 24, 2010 19:16:31 GMT -5 Gilberto said:

Didn't you also see JJ Armes in real life?

Yeah his mansion was halfway between my parents' house and my grandma's house so we always drove by it when I was a kid growing up in El Paso. Actually I couldn't remember what my login for the TVAMD boards was but I remembered I posted about JJ Armes the last time I was here so I went looking for that post. Boy was that a sad ten minutes as I realized what had happened to the boards. I remember putting down some good reminiscinces and I was a little downhearted that they've disappeared. But like Walt Disney said, we gotta keep moving forward.

[Gilberto]

Yeah, we lost a lot of good talks (and a few people I think) when the old forum went down. It made me sad too. But every day's a blank canvas waiting to be filled, right?

[lynn]

yeah, it's given us the opportunity to start new talks