"Love Death and Robots" episodes - ranked from best to worst (1 -18)

1. Alternate Histories
2. Ice Age
3. Zima Blue
4. The Secret War
5. Three Robots
6. The Witness
7. Lucky 13
8. Helping Hand
9. Suits
10. When the yogurt took over
11. Good Hunting
12. Fish Night
13. Shape Shifters
14. The Dump
15. Blindspot
16. Sucker of Souls
17. Sonnie's Edge
18. Beyond the Aquila Rift

Michael Moorcock's Steampunk Trilogy

Written in the early 70's, before steampunk was a thing, these books are ripping yarns. It's Biggles meets Jules Verne, part H.G. Wells, part Arthur Conan Doyle.
Our hero, Oswald Bastable, a captain in colonial India in 1901, travels in time to three alternate 20th centuries. Our very pucker captain encounters towering airships, monorails, "hovergyros" and gleaming Utopian cities. We encounter new versions of Joseph Stalin, Enoch Powell, Harold Wilson and Ronald Reagan (as an obnoxious boy scout leader).
The narrative is sometimes bogged down by political science debate. The fun stuff is finding out what happens when Brits stay too long in the steamy colonies - copious gin and tonics, visits to opium dens, characters spouting: "now steady on, old chap".
The last quarter of "The Steel Tsar" (final in the series, published in 1980) is a bit ponderous, with the narrator trying to make sense of the 'multiverse'. Mrs Persson, one of the reappearing characters (a member of the "League" of "chrononauts") is the trilogy's most intriguing individual.

Avco-Embassy, Joseph E. Levine guilty pleasure movies

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Joseph E. Levine was a movie producer who founded Embassy Pictures. He once said that you can fool everybody if the advertising is right. And he was a master. He produced classy pictures like "The Graduate", "The Producers", "The Lion in Winter", "Carnal Knowledge" and the war epic "A Bridge Too Far"; but mostly they were trashy but fun movies.

Being a teenager and a young adult in the 70's and early 80's I watched a lot of schlocky Avco Embassy films. Here's my guilty pleasures for what they are worth:

"The Carpetbaggers" 1964 roughly based on Howard Hughes, trashy = sex+Hollywood+planes+power, this ain't Scorsese's "The Aviator".
"Robbery" 1967, based on the Great Train Robbery in 1963.
"The Day of the Dolphin" 1973 Mike Nicholls directed this George C. Scott movie about training cute sea mammals to blow up the US President.
"The Manitou" 1978, Tony Curtis does horror (to pay his debts obviously)
"Murder by Decree" 1979 Christopher Plummer and James Mason (as Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson) meet Jack the Ripper in this nifty Canadian production. Directed by Bob Clark - a versatile director - from teen flick "Porky's" (1982) to the delightful "A Christmas Story" (1983). Now that's a big jump!
"The Fog" 1980, John Carpenter horror
"Escape from New York" 1980, John Carpenter sci fi with Kurt Russell kicking butt.
"Scanners" 1980, David Cronenberg horror sci fi
"The Howling" 1981, Ground breaking werewolf makeup, Joe Dante has a lot of fun in this, avoid sequels.
"Swamp Thing" 1982, Wes Craven directed.


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