Fringe Promos

Today represents the final episode of Fringe. I have yet to watch the series, but I have started. This is my tribute to the series finale and my launch into a year long look at the show. The promotional images for Fringe have been beautiful and exceptionally well-designed in their simplicity. These are mostly official, but I suspect I have let a few unofficial fan works slip into the mix and I may have omitted one or two that I missed along the way.

Fringe Friday

Welcome to FAB FRIDAY FRINGE Friday [this week only!] in honor of the final airing of the Fringe series by J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci culminating in five seasons and 100 episodes of science fiction television concluding on this day January 18, 2013.  Congratulations Fringe!

Now it's time for The Sci-Fi Fanatic to find out just what he missed all these years.  It's just like me to miss the wave, but I'm looking forward to getting started.

I Remember That: Big Wheels

"Ever since I was a little kid I have always thought I could run faster than the wind."

-Corey Hart, In Your Soul-

My brother texted me this picture.  A whole lot of memories came flooding back.  Of course, it was more like the 1970s, but you get the idea.



When we were kids we had Big Wheels.  They were made of pure, unadulterated, hard-molded plastic.  They went as fast as your little feet would take them by spinning that front wheel into next week.  How many times did your feet hit the ground spinning that wheel furiously?  How many times did it hurt?

My brother and I commonly road our big wheels up and down the driveway and we would fly into a generally quiet street of oncoming traffic that our driveway spilled out into.  So you damn well better have paid attention.  As we reached maximum velocity at the bottom of the driveway we reached down for the plastic break and yanked that bastard up like our lives depended on it.  Sometimes it did. It created a spin out into patches of dirt like you wouldn't imagine.  Sandy gravel from the previous winter's sand trucks would kick up dust and we would revel in the glory of our driveway runs.  It seemed like we had sandboxes in the street there was so much sand.  We immediately grabbed our big wheel with two hands on the front bars sometimes with tassels and with our legs off to the side running them back up the driveway feverishly for the next ill-fated run.



My father had a red Chevrolet - a real classic.  That car by the way was so loved by my father that there was literally a hole in the passenger side floor.  You could literally see that pavement rolling by whenever we drove on the highway.  Was that safe?  I suspect not, but hell it was fun watching that roadway go by.  Were we seat belted in the back seat?  Doesn't sound like it does it.

On our Big Wheels our tiny little foreheads crashed into the bumper of that red car like melons more times than I could count.  A good many tears were shed, but that never deterred us.  It was right back to it.  In fact, we went down that driveway so many times that the Big Wheels with their hard round back two tires began to wear from the break and friction of the pavement.  It got so bad it was to the point where segments of the plastic tires were becoming flattened.  Obviously attempting maximum speed with a tire that was no longer entirely rounded presented its challenges, but hell we persisted and drove those semi-square mothers into the ground.



We played hard as kids.  There were no knee pads.  There were no helmets.  My God we could have used them too.  I remember when we moved up to bikes.  We built dirt mounds and proceeded to thrust at them full velocity for jumps.  We used the classic clothes pin trick on the bike spokes to generate fake motor sounds.  It felt like we were sailing into the sky.  It was unbridled freedom.  We quickly discovered the joys of those fleeting moments were met with an occasional crash landing, a mangled bike, serious scrapes and bruising and a whole boat load of pain.  When you landed perfect though it was bloody magic capped off with a rousing YEAAAHHH!

We had this little bridge that linked my neighborhood to the local elementary school over a little pond, which sadly closed down a few years ago.  The hills down the bridge and up the other side were really steep.  At the bottom where each hill met somehow managed to build up an excessive amount of sand and gravel.  We would ride down that hill so fast and normally plow through that sand with the typical still one attains by becoming one with their circular steeds.  One day, I remember we went down that hill and one of us lost control through the sand and crashed. It was no ordinary crash.  It was bad.  The rest followed suit.  My arm was badly covered with bloody raspberries it was like pain you don't know.  Imagine someone taking your arm and scraping it on pavement for several feet.  Torture I tell you.  I'm sure many of you had similar experiences.



And through it all, through all these nightmarish crashes, somehow our melons survived the carnage helmet-free.  I don't know how, but they did.  Vegetable boxes were much safer.

Boy we had a crazy ass neighborhood too.  We had these older bullies in the neighborhood that would stop you when you were on your bikes far from home and issue you a fake citation with their little pads and pencils.  We were young so we often just stood there with our bikes like we had to.  What for I have no idea, but the whole situation was very uncomfortable.  Who the hell are these guys?  You can't give out a citation to a bike rider?  But it was crazy ass stuff.  I was normally just making my way back from the local 7-Eleven with a bag of Wonder Bread.  You know, the ones with the Star Wars cards.

Getting back to the Big Wheels though, my brother and I moved up from those wooden vegetable boxes we turned into imaginary spaceships for a time.  Those vegetable boxes were colorful and fun and yielded great rewards from the imagination.  But, along came the Big Wheels and one step closer to freedom. Yes, we got wheels and we were actually moving.  We were no longer pretending to move while my father washed his red car with the hole in the passenger side floor. We had wheels and they were big ones like the big ones we seemed to have as kids!

Unfortunately, one day, once again, everything changed.  My brother got the Green Machine.  Son of a bitch!  Man, I remember that.

The Secret Society: Sons Of Anarchy

Man cannot live by science fiction alone.  Well, that's not entirely true, but it sounded good. Still, perhaps a self-respecting Sci-Fi Fanatic can step away now and again.

I'm endlessly fascinated by the secret society in its many incarnations be it the mafia, Skull And Bones, the Freemasons, Hell's Angels, and in television, the Sons Of Anarchy [2008-present], now heading into its sixth season with seven slated to be the last. Perhaps its the fringe-like nature of those groups and their existence and in some cases the application of that universe especially in science fiction-related film and television.

I had a real opportunity to delve into that world for the 2012 publication Back To Frank Black: A Return To Chris Carter's Millennium.  It was the perfect canvas to really delve into the subculture through the character of Frank Black, played by Lance Henriksen and his fragile alliance/relationship to the Millennium Group in the unforgettable, compelling and continually rewarding series Millennium [1996-1999] by Chris Carter.

Over Christmas I took in the first season of popular FX TV series Sons Of Anarchy. It's not a program I'll be writing about outside of this one post, but it was indeed dramatically fascinating television with the cameras, like a window, offering us a glimpse into a world outsiders would likely never get to see, regardless of some of the over-the-top drama.  It's not surprising the series draws comparison to the likes of The Sopranos [1999-2007], which was one of the best to explore the furtive world of the mafia family.

Like some of the best written series it takes time for reflection through the lead's narration of his father's ideals for the Sons Of Anarchy as a secret society.

"First time I read Emma Goldman it wasn't in a book.  I was sixteen hiking near the Nevada border.  The quote was painted on a wall - in red.  When I saw those words, it was like someone ripped them from the inside of my head.  'Anarchism stands for liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion, the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property, liberation from the shackles and restraints of government.  It stands for social order - based on the free grouping of individuals.'  The concept was pure, simple, true.  ... Ultimately, ... true freedom requires sacrifice and pain.  Most human beings only think they want freedom.  In truth, they yearn for the bondage of social order, rigid laws, materialism.  The only freedom man really wants is the freedom to be comfortable."

Of course, the irony for any group with a code is that there is no true freedom. Like any group whereby members are beholden to that family rule base, no one is ever truly free.  I recall the simple but true lyric of Mick Hucknall's To Be Free from the recording Blue [1998], when he sang, "To be free is to feel free and the first one is a myth."  That myth looms large.  Even society is governed by norms, social mores, laws - a whole host of guidelines.

The Sons Of Anarchy like many secret groups is steeped in myth and the belief that freedom resides within the family, which is in many ways likewise a prison.  The intelligent Frank Black ultimately rejected the secret family group in the series Millennium understanding freedom would be restricted and that strings would indeed be attached.   Of course Millennium cleverly infused the series with tropes tied to horror and science fiction, which made that series even more infinitely appealing.

In the real world-grounded Sons Of Anarchy, Katey Sagal's character informs the wife of one of Sam Crowe [the Sons Of Anarchy group/family] that she and the Sons Of Anarchy are family to them and they should turn to them and count on them.  This is a familiar refrain within this world echoing Millennium's this is who we are.  The secret society as family offers a fascinating window into another world or subculture that works primarily within the framework of society breaking with the established law and rules where required to maintain their own insular place in society.  If you ever enjoyed The Sopranos, Sons Of Anarchy is a worthy successor.

Honestly, the secret society as family is something of an endless fascination for me.  The mafia has always been a riveting arena for it and has certainly been popularized and to a great extent glamorized in television and film for decades.  It's not often one gets a glimpse into the world of the biker gang.  Sons Of Anarchy is flawless and infinitely enjoyable television like some bastard cross-section of The Sopranos meets The Shield, while creating something entirely fresh.  It's pure addiction for a pop culture junkie.

I would have enjoyed seeing this series before penning my chapter for the aforementioned book, This Is Who We Are: Secret Society And Family Redefined.  There are a few ideal quotes to lend even more weight to the arguments surrounding the case of the secret society as family.  They would have been perfect.  I had a similar reaction regarding the film We Are Marshall [2006] and the tragic events surrounding the death of 37 football players in 1970 and the strength of the football family outside of the nuclear family.  While not a secret society the simple parallel was effective when considering that kind of tight-knit fraternity.

Nevertheless, Sons Of Anarchy is as serious as a heart attack, definitely good fun for motor heads, but equally good fun for anyone looking for just plain great television [Breaking Bad].  It doesn't capture the mysticism or darkness on the level of something as poetic as Millennium, with that artistic flourish that Carter brought to the art form, but Sons Of Anarchy presents its harsh world with an equally uncompromising eye too.

Sons Of Anarchy, which immerses us in biker culture, may be an acquired taste or may not be for everyone.  I can't say.  For me, I purchased the series on Blu-Ray on a hunch that I would enjoy it.  I wasn't wrong.  It's a brilliant series and ranks as the highest rated series for FX since The Shield.

My flirtations outside of science fiction will certainly continue, but in keeping with the genre to end all genres, here's an enjoyable little Star Trek: The Original Series connection from the solid Sons Of Anarchy, Season One, Episode 4, Patch Over.  Not unlike Captain Kirk and Star Trek, Sons Of Anarchy is a complete bad ass all its own - an eventful escape into another world.