Tim Hanley’s INVESTIGATING LOIS LANE: The Turbulent History of the Daily Planet’s Ace Reporter shows that Lois Lane is a paradox. On the one hand, she’s one of the world’s best known female characters, a talented, fearless, award-winning reporter. On the other, she’s “Superman’s Girlfriend,” later wife, so even when she has her own book she’s seen as more an attachment to the Superman legend than a hero in her own right. And that’s Lois at her best; at her worst, Superman and his writers (overwhelmingly male) have written her as the butt of the joke who has to be humiliated or taught a lesson, even in her own book. The Curt Swan image here, for example, involves Superman tricking Lois into thinking she has kryptonite vision to teach her a lesson (5,000 in a series).
Since the Silver Age, Lois has gone up and down, embracing feminism, reverting to Superman’s girlfriend, dating Clark for a couple of years, eventually marrying him. But Hanley concludes that hasn’t helped: before the New 52 reboot ended the marriage (it’s been retconned back since) Lois spent most of her time at home with Clark instead of the at the office, and her apparent death was used as a way to torture Superman a half-dozen times. Hanley does a good job covering all this and Lois’s appearances in other media. Despite a couple of minor errors (Lois started her nursing career well before her brief “women’s lib” period), it’s well worth reading.
I reread SEEING IS BELIEVING: How Hollywood Taught Us to Stop Worrying and Love the Fifties by Peter Biskind to see if it provided some insight into 1950s SF films for Alien Visitors. The book is in general an interesting analysis of political themes in 1950s cinema, which Biskind classes as centrist (the system is good. People should trust the army/government/medical establishment and work within the system), radical (the system is a conformist monster. Individualism and rebels are the ones to trust), left-wing (trust the white-collar technocrats or lone geniuses, depending whether you’re centrist or not) or right-wing (trust the GI over the officer, the local cop over DC officials). Thus Biskind sees the 1950s films about the burden of command (as described in The War Film) such as Twelve O’Clock High as liberal centrist: the enlisted men must trust their officers and choose duty to the platoon/battalion/group over saving their buddy.
As to insight, it’s a mixed bag. Biskind’s analysis of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers is that it has an anti-communist message but that’s just a cover for the film to attack American conformism (just as the giant ants of Them are a communist allegory, but just a cover for attacking American radicals). While the film can be interpreted as anti-communist, it wasn’t written that way, nor initially seen that way, and Biskind’s idea of a double-attack is just plain silly. However I do think he has a good point that any criticism of conformity doesn’t translate into supporting non-conformists (that had to wait for the 1978 remake). He does have some interesting points about the role of scientists in the movies and whether trusting the aliens makes them visionaries or fools. So worth the reread.
#SFWApro. All rights to the images remain with current holder.
JOAN OF ARCADIA was a 2003- 05 series starring Amber Tamblyn as a high school student named yes, Joan, who finds herself hearing messages from God — not mentally, God manifests in various people throughout Arcadia, giving Joan various assignments, from trying out for cheerleading to ruining her best friend’s art project. It’s the sort of show I usually hate, where everything’s working for the good and seemingly random events all tie together (e.g., Kiefer Sutherland’s 2012 show Touch). Here show-runner Barbara Hall and her crew pull it off: things are just dark enough and unjust enough and complicated enough not to be too saccharine (one of the special features on this S1 set says it would have been a lot more saccharine pre-9/aa). It helps that the cast is first rate, not only Tamblyn but Joe Mantegna and Mary Steenburgen as her parents. It’ll be a while before I get to S2, but I look forward to it. “Is this a real conversation or an Abbott and Costello routine?”
—and she found central heating much preferable. Which is fine, except that the dogs seem to get more excited about dealing with her the longer she’s in the house (I pray to God this wears off!). Plushie, in particular, freaks out when Wisp has food and he doesn’t, or if she jumps onto the arm of the couch (“The not-a-dog flies! AAAAAH!”). This requires me to put in a lot of time making sure they’re getting along. So far, when the dogs do chase her, they don’t seem to be aggressive as much as playful, and she doesn’t claw or bite. Still when they’re sitting and staring at each other I have to worry. Monday I dropped out of my Shut Up and Write meeting early because I was watching the dogs (usually TYG takes them) and when Wisp came in there was no way I could focus on writing.
That uses up a fair amount of mental energy and time. And while Wisp stayed in a couple of nights without mewing for attention, last night she woke me around 11:30 and I could not get back to sleep, even after she left. So feeling really beat today on top of everything else. However we’re going to keep letting her in unless I absolutely can’t stand it — if we want her to be more of an indoor cat (and we do) then I’ll just have to approach this as a transitional period and hope things improve.
I was much more entertained by Netflix’ WE CAN BE HEROES (2020), in which the Justice League/Avengers-like Heroics go up against an alien invasion, and promptly go down. Their government watchdogs hide the kids inside the Heroics’ base, but the aliens are closing in so the kids go on the offensive. Unfortunately, they’re not ready for prime time: Missy (YaYa Gosselin) has no powers, Wild Card has every power possible but no control over which one manifests, Slo-Mo has super-speed but warps time so that he still moves super-slowly. It turns out, though, that the aliens are actually helpful: believing the older generation has failed, they want to force the Heroics’ kids to step up and become the heroes the world needs. The results are pleasantly amusing; if you’re a fan of The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl, this is a quasi-sequel (with the same director/writer, Robert Rodriguez) with the grown-up characters among the Heroics and their daughter Guppy as one of the kids. “‘We can be heroes/Just for one day’ — I know, I know, but it was just sitting there!”
An uncredited cover dealing with “liquor and lust!”
This uncredited cover may look like the lead’s got a bizarre fetish but his passion is just his love for the sea over his landbound wife.
Anthony Buckeridge’s second Jennings book, JENNINGS FOLLOWS A CLUE has Mr. Carter introduce Jennings to Sherlock Holmes, who blows the boy away much as it did me at that age. So naturally, he and Darbishire set out to become the Holmes and Watson of Linbury Court Preparatory School (I had no illusions I could pull that off, just in case you were wondering). What follow are the inevitable misunderstandings and catastrophes as the boys spot crimes and thieves that don’t exist, before the equally inevitable climax in which they redeem themselves by busting a real crook. Not up to 
My friend Ross’s present to me this year was THE MARK OF ZORRO (1920), Douglas Fairbanks’ first swashbuckler. As the listless, effete Don Diego and the daring outlaw hero of Spanish California, Fairbanks is a wonder, a living special effect tossing off acrobatic feats effortlessly. As I’ve 
