Jack Flacco

Amber Atkins

Posted on March 5, 2014March 7, 2014 by Jack Flacco

Once a year, hundreds of young girls compete in The Sarah Rose Cosmetics American Teen Princess Pageant all across America. This year, Amber Atkins is one of those girls. A documentary film crew sent to Minnesota will commemorate this occasion.

Sarah Rose Cosmetics’ motto goes like this: “Making American teens beautiful for over 50 years!” In Mount Rose, Minnesota, Pop: 5,076, a handful of girls sit in the gymnasium waiting to wow the organizers with their talent and intelligence. Actually, only nine girls sit there. The rest of the town’s teen population couldn’t care less.

Before I get to Amber Atkins, let’s talk about the cast of Drop Dead Gorgeous. The movie features a whack of actresses who are now staple names in Hollywood. Girls such as Kirsten Dunst, Denise Richards, Amy Adams and the late Brittany Murphy have made their mark on the entertainment industry since this movie came out in July 1999. Adding to the roster are Kirstie Alley and Ellen Barkin who play the matrons of the film.

With such a recognizable cast, you’d think they’d get in each other’s way, but this dark comedy has a few surprises for viewers who have never seen it. Don’t worry I won’t spoil it. I’ll only touch on Kirsten Dunst’s character Amber Atkins for this week’s Women Who Wow Wednesday series.

The first thing the audience has the pleasure watching consists of a scene featuring a big sign on the outskirts of town that says, “Welcome to Mount Rose, Minnesota, Home of Freda Hegstrom—Minnesota’s Oldest Living Lutheran.

She was Minnesota’s oldest living Lutheran, but now she’s as dead as a doornail. This sets the tone of the comedy.

Getting back to Amber, her two favorite people in the world are her mom and Diane Sawyer. She wishes however, she’d grow up like Diane Sawyer. After school, she has a job like any other teen. Of course, unlike other teens, she works in the town’s morgue. She practices her tap dance routine every chance she gets, including doing hair and makeup on dead corpses.

Many of her competitors take ballet to learn grace, something Amber already possesses. Between a regiment of “tendu, close, tendu, close, tendu close, plié,” the choreographer believes Amber has a chance of winning. It’s a dream of Amber to win, but her main goal is to get out of Mount Rose and become a big-time reporter like Diane Sawyer.

Dreaming big makes Amber one of a kind. In the midst of competition, she keeps her cool and delivers. The best part about Amber is her easygoing nature, taking things in stride and not letting others sour her mood, even if others can be sour on her.

Told you I wouldn’t spoil it for you.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Have you ever seen Drop Dead Gorgeous? What did you think of it? What did you think of the cast involved in the production of this film?

Monday Mayhem

Zombie Animals

Posted on March 3, 2014March 5, 2014 by Jack Flacco

Why aren’t there any zombie animals in The Walking Dead? I’ve wondered this since the first episode. I have yet to see a zombified dog, cat, horse or goat, let alone a zombified pig, donkey or squirrel. And as anyone who follows my Monday Mayhem series would know, I can’t let go of an idea until I’ve exhausted all possible solutions to the question.

During my first stop of the show’s folklore, I looked at the virus that’d infected the walkers. For those unfamiliar with the show, walkers are what become of humans who contract the deadly virus ending human life, spawning a zombie life—or rather an undead life, if that makes sense. I noticed those who’d fallen victim to the virus caught it from a bite delivered by the infected. The other form of transmission affects victims after they’re dead, lending credence that the virus always existed in humans but a condition occurred to awaken the dormant strain. The typical effects of the condition varies: Pale skin, fainting, dehydration, chills, soreness, loss of hair, portions of scalp missing, fever/hallucinations, dilated pupils and coughing blood.

Once I’d learned about the virus and its effects on humans, I next investigated its transmission to animals. Apparently, if a walker encounters an animal it will do what it can to eat it as the animal breathes its last. This rule of thumb goes for all living creatures a walker meets. The caveat to this scenario rests on the expected behavior of the animal bitten by the walker. Like humans, animals should rise from the dead after the bite. They don’t. Therefore, walkers can bite human and animal alike, but only humans will spawn as the undead.

This is where I tossed my preconceived notions and allowed myself the benefit to indulge in some interesting speculation.

To begin, the general makeup of a virus dictates its effectiveness on its target. It is common for a virus to affect only humans. However, when a virus hops from one species to another (eg. human-to-human, animal-to-human), this process goes by the name of zoonosis. The West Nile Virus falls into this category. Birds transmit to humans, but humans can’t transmit to dogs and cats since these animals possess the immunity to fight the bug. The opposite stands true when humans carry the virus spreading it to animals, called reverse zoonosis or anthroponosis. In The Walking Dead, the infection bounces from human to human making it a zoonosis-type virus. Therefore, the possibility we haven’t seen zombie animals on the show lies in the fact the infection itself cannot spread to animals.

Sounds good, doesn’t it? It’s a dry explanation, but good, nonetheless. Don’t you think? But what if science or medicine has nothing to do with the lack of zombie animals?

Another theory came to mind. Growing up I read the story about Noah’s Ark. I read how God became so angered with humanity’s penchant for sinning that he brought a flood upon the earth to wipe everyone out of existence. You might call it divine retribution. In the story, God commanded Noah to build him an ark to house all the animals of the world. Too bad mosquitos survived. At least we have our delicious turkey for Thanksgiving. Anyway, this demonstrates God’s love for animals. Perhaps we don’t see zombie animals in The Walking Dead because it’s God’s way of protecting them from his anger directed toward humanity due to the disobedience of his law, much like he had done during the time of Noah.

That makes sense, too. Right?

Wrong. It has nothing to do with zoonosis. It has nothing to do with God’s wrath. There is a reason, though. Avid fans of the series probably already know this. Some of you may have even skipped to the bottom of this post to read this final paragraph. Are you ready for it? Are you? Okay. The reason The Walking Dead does not feature zombie animals is that the original comic book illustrator Charlie Adlard “loves drawing people, loves drawing zombies, does not enjoy drawing animals so much,” Robert Kirkman, the creator of the series said on Conan, Mar. 7, 2013. That’s it. Nothing scientific. Nothing divine. It’s a personal preference. And here we’re thinking it has to do with some grand scheme.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Did you think the answer would have been a complicated scientific explanation?

Freedom Friday

Life

Posted on February 28, 2014March 3, 2014 by Jack Flacco

I write about zombies. There, I said it. I write about the atrocities zombies commit on humans during an apocalypse that should never have happened. I write about the horrors of being undead. I write about death and how it’s not the end but an unpleasant beginning for those chosen to die a second death filled with agony and despair.

Although, it’s not all I write about.

I enjoy the touching moments between humans when they make that one connection in their lives they wouldn’t have known otherwise had they not taken a chance to explore an alternate universe. I’m talking about love.

Yes, I write about love and I write about death.

This is one of those strange Freedom Friday posts I could not have written hadn’t I lived through it myself without taking notes to understand what I had experienced. Don’t worry I haven’t lost my mind nor have I taken anything to help things make sense. Think of it as a philosophical autobiography of sorts that may ring true for you—or not. In either case, life is about experiences shared with others to reveal one’s true self.

Years and years ago when working in the printing industry, I had a task to supervise printing of decals that went on the side of courier trucks. These decals had to be perfect. Not a spot. Not a smudge. If the colors were off, even by a hair, the company who placed the order would reject the whole load.

One day, while operating the printing press—a monster of a press having a fifteen-foot printing arm affixed to a thousand-pound frame that would drop on an aluminum base covered with the material for printing—I had to get under the frame to clean the screen where the ink would pass in order to make the imprint on the material. Now, I didn’t worry the frame would fall on me because all around the machine emergency arms surrounded it that would prop the frame back to its upright position.

What’s Murphy’s Law again? Oh, yes—anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

I had to crawl deep into the press to remove the dirt on the screen above, but that also meant I didn’t have access to the emergency arm. One foot taller, I would have had full access to the switch.

Sure enough, the frame began to drop on me. Now, at this point, I don’t know how to explain it. I phased out? I really have no memory of the experience other than crawling back out and one of my coworkers asking me if I was okay. To give you an idea, had the frame fully dropped on me it would have crushed me whole. I’m assuming he saw the frame falling on me and pressed the emergency arm. He didn’t. He said it popped back into its upright position on its own. For a long time, I didn’t believe him. Of course, when you’re in shock, anything and everything anyone says is somewhat a blur.

That’s one.

During the summer after eighth grade, I wanted to take swimming lessons. The very first thing the instructor asked us to do was to dive into the deep end to find out how much we knew. I didn’t know when I registered for the course that I’d registered for the intermediate class. What did I know? While everyone else swam gracefully through the water, I slowly sank to the bottom of the pool. I’ll never forget a time I’d held my breath for what seemed as if history had stopped. A few seconds more and I’d have been dead, I’m sure of it.

I felt hands grasping my waist, pushing me to the surface. By the time I sat on the edge of the pool with my feet dangling in the water, I coughed so much I thought I had already died.

I don’t know who pulled me to safety. I’m assuming the instructor did. Again, no one really admitted anything and even though I felt grateful, to this day I question what actually went down that morning.

That’s two.

How can I describe what I felt when these near-death situations occurred? I wish I could say it’s easy to utter a few words that can capture the meaning these experiences convey to me. In some respect, I long for simplicity in the matter. Yet, sometimes, we don’t know why things happen the way they do. They just do. That’s life. While I can’t say I’d like to go through another one of these, I’m grateful for having had my life spared twice.

Someone once said these things happen in three’s. Let’s hope they’re wrong.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Have you gone through something similar, where you can’t explain what happened, but you’re thankful for having survived it, nonetheless?

Women Who Wow Wednesday

Sue Storm

Posted on February 26, 2014February 28, 2014 by Jack Flacco

Hard to believe Fantastic Four came out nine years ago. And yet, watching the film once again after such a long time, even if it’s not in the theaters, brings interesting thoughts to mind. Sue Storm, Susie, Susan—whatever her name is, she’s Ms. Invisible, the girl with the hots for Reed Richards, the brain of the outfit.

Women Who Wow Wednesday begins with a radiation storm. Four friends hit by deep space rays attempt to cope with the aftershock of the change. Little by little, things change. Sue’s brother, Johnny Storm, burns the ski slopes—literally. Reed Richards has an episode where he can stretch his hand under a door. Ben Grimm turns into a stone. And Sue Storm disappears. She changes from being a beautiful woman to someone who no one can see.

First order of business is to save Ben Grimm, depressed about losing his wife. Sue gets more than what she bargains for. Her ability to create a force field allows her to prevent a fire to spread beyond its means. Saving a number of people along the way, she becomes the reluctant hero among the four.

Then there’s Victor Doom. We won’t get into him just yet. He’s Sue’s attraction. Beyond Reed’s past relationship with her, Victor’s attempted to ask her to marry him.

Now, Sue’s big dilemma is not Victor Doom’s infatuation with her but her ability to control her powers. Unlike many superheroes who have an uncanny talent to hide their powers, Sue Storm has nothing to hide because she’s the epitome of covertness. Her middle name is Hide. She gets angry, she disappears.

Her date with Reed brings back memories of the past. She doesn’t want Doom. She wants Reed. In a planetarium setting, she tells Reed how she remembers the good times.

Her biggest asset though is not the invisibility, not the incredible force field she exerts, but her power to stay focused and clearheaded. For her, her most valuable asset is her single-minded talent to keep her wits about her.

In the epic battle for her life, she takes on Doom in a quick game of Marco Polo. And although she loses, she gains in the end by working with the others as a team to put away Doom for a long time.

Sue Storm—a fantastic superhero, a Fantastic Four.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Have you seen Fantastic Four? What did you think of Sue Storm?

Monday Mayhem

Zombies & Aliens Too?

Posted on February 24, 2014February 26, 2014 by Jack Flacco

The movie Alien presented an interesting concept to the viewing audience when it first came out in theaters in 1979. The premise goes something like this—humans act as hosts to alien birthing eggs until such time they’re no longer needed and die a miserable death by chest explosion. Interesting, right? Since I’ve been on a zombie/alien kick lately, I thought I’d explore this idea further for Monday Mayhem.

If you’ve read my post Zombies & Aliens? last week, you would know I delved into the unsettling topic regarding a zombie apocalypse brought on by aliens as opposed to a virus. Seeing how many commenters liked the connection, let’s continue on that train of thought to see where it goes. M-kay?

In the 1956 movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers, aliens embark on an invasion of earth by replacing humans with exact duplicates, except the copies express zero emotion and individuality. Even though the film reflects a perfect commentary of communism in the 1950’s, it also goes on to explain what people would be like should they decide not to express their free will—in essence, the first inkling of a zombie apocalypse even before George A. Romero hit the scene. The only thing missing is the duplicates don’t eat people.

I know I’ve touched on this idea before by mentioning how zombie propagation changes with the times. For instance in the early 1900’s, zombies originated from supernatural practices in Haiti where voodoo doctors resurrected the dead to have them work on sugar plantations. In the late 1960’s the movie The Night of the Living Dead had fun with the notion zombies could originate from a radioactive satellite bursting in earth’s atmosphere rendering those caught in the debris undead. And just recently, The Walking Dead, although not based on an original concept, is burning the ratings by depicting a world gone crazy due to a virus turning people into walkers (a.k.a. eaters of the fleshly kind).

Having all these other interesting causes to choose from, why not entertain the thought that aliens could cause a zombie apocalypse?

For instance, a meteorite could scream to earth and crash in the middle of the woods somewhere in the United States. The Department of Defense sends in a team of scientists to survey the area to investigate if the meteor would present potential harm toward anyone approaching it. One by one, the scientists die by radiation exposure. From the belly of the meteor, an organism crawls its way to the bodies of the scientists, penetrating their mouths, making them their hosts. The bodies soon rise from the dead and moan their way to civilization, but not before attacking a multitude of campers in the area, spreading the organism from one host to the other with a simple bite.

It isn’t until half the country becomes hosts to the dreaded aliens that a nuclear solution gets a green light from the presidential office.

Wouldn’t that make for an awesome story?

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

What do you believe will cause the zombie apocalypse? Alien, virus or voodoo?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

The Love for a Child

Posted on February 21, 2014May 10, 2017 by Jack Flacco

There comes a time in people’s lives when they have to decide what they want out of life. For some, they know as soon as they’re born. For others, it takes a lifetime. That’s a lifetime of going through the motions of living, making mistakes, hurting—but learning—learning what makes them tick, what makes them feel, what makes them happy.

No one ever said life is easy. In some respect, it’s not. It’s a matter of perspective. The choices will either encourage change in a person or force them to resist. One thing’s for certain, change will happen, whether someone wants it or not.

When I was a young boy, I knew I wanted to be a writer. I had creativity in my blood. On my mother’s side, music dominated our genes to produce a multitude of musical geniuses including a symphony composer and conductor in South America. On my father’s side, sports lives in the Flacco blood. The Flaccos have always pushed the limits in anything they put their hand to.

Then, there’s me. My story? I drifted. After finishing high school, I went from knowing I wanted to be a writer to working in blue-collar factories for seven years. If that wasn’t enough to learn a lesson, I then went into accounting for another seven years. That’s fourteen years—gone. That’s not including the added distraction of wanting to be a rock star. I mentioned that somewhere, didn’t I? Yes, I studied musical composition in Toronto, following the lead of my mom’s gene pool. Suffice it to say things didn’t work out quite as expected.

Ages later, after many hits and misses, I’m happy to say I’m doing the very thing I should have pursued right from grade school when the inkling of being a writer sprung into my mind.

Now, I’m going to play the part of devil’s advocate here and say a few things folks may not like. Kids know what they want to be. I really believe that. I believe kids not only know what they want to do with their lives, but they express it from an early age. They’re not going to say straight out “I want to be a doctor” or “I want to be an astronaut” or even say anything at all. Sometimes they’ll say it in the most beautiful and powerful language known to us—the language of doing.

A child may draw all day, may dance, sing, read, write, swim, laugh, throw, act, play, jump, crawl, watch butterflies float, dream upon the clouds, help mom bake, help dad put the car back together, mow the lawn and yes, shovel the driveway—the point is they’re telling us what they’re good at.

So my Freedom Friday question is this: Why on earth would anyone want to discourage them from being anything other than what they’re good at?

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Do you have kids? Do you know what they’re good at?

Women Who Wow Wednesday

Family Women

Posted on February 19, 2014February 24, 2014 by Jack Flacco

Today’s Women Who Wow Wednesday feature has not one, but two women who wow! If you haven’t seen The Family, grab yourself a copy and enjoy some good ol’ fashioned dark comedy.

Not wanting to spoil it for anyone, I’ll only give you a general idea of the film’s premise.

Set in the quiet climes of Normandy, France, the Blake family relocates to what appears as an interesting square-peg-in-a-round-hole situation. Written and directed by Luc Besson, the writer and director of Léon: The Professional, the audience has some pieces to put together before the true picture of the film reveals itself.

Starring Michelle Pfeiffer as Maggie Blake, the pragmatic mom of the family, she proves right away that she can be a handful. As soon as they move into the new digs, her first remark to her husband Fred (Robert DeNiro) is, “It’s cold here.” He quickly says, “I’ll make a fire. Okay? I’ll make a fire.” That’s power.

First things first, Maggie walks into town and she finds the village folk aren’t so nice. All she asked for was where she could find the peanut butter in a small market. The owner didn’t have to speak French behind her back thinking she only knew English. He didn’t have to allow his customers to diss on the Americans, “They liberated us in ’44 but ever since they’ve overrun us.” And he didn’t have to say, “They eat burgers for breakfast, lunch and dinner.” Not at all.

Of course, Maggie, being the practical person she is fixes the situation the best way she knows how. She bombs the place.

Then there’s Belle Blake (Dianna Agron), the daughter. A genuine belle. Blond, blue eyes, and incredibly attractive. Every male in the new school can’t help but turn his head in appreciation of her great looks. Every male, that is, including the idiots. She gets into a car with four idiots who thought they could drive her to a park and take advantage of her. Little do they know she grew up in tougher neighborhoods. When one of them decides to slip the shoulder strap from her dress and says, “Oops,” she smiles. They smile back. After all, they unloaded the car to have a picnic.

Now to Belle, being American and all, what picnic would it be without tennis? Right? She pulls the racquet from the trunk of the car and beats the crap out of the boy with the sticky fingers. Her solution.

The women of The Family are not ordinary women. Not at all. They have a way with making things work, even if situations are unworkable. They don’t take flak from anyone and they always, always get what they want. What’s more beautiful than a woman who knows what she wants?

Besides, they look like girls who can get things done.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, now on sale.

Have you seen The Family? What do you think of the women in the movie?

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