The Devil's Playground

Since Halloween has just passed, I thought I would take time out to write about a show that dealt with the Devil and paying for your sins. That show is Brimstone.

Every once and a while, a show comes along that resonates with a core group of people. In this crazy world of TV ratings, demographics and core viewing groups, some shows although excellent, fall through the cracks because they don't post the big ratings that the networks would like. Unfortunately for us, Brimstone was one of those shows.

The basic premise of Brimstone is this....Ezekiel Stone was a highly decorated New York police officer. His wife was raped and when the case went to trial, the rapist was let go due to a technicality. Several weeks later, Detective Stone tracked down his wife's rapist and killed him in cold blood. Months later while on a routine drug bust, Detective Stone was shot and killed in the line of duty. Since he killed someone in cold blood, he was sent to Hell. The show starred Peter Horton as Ezekiel Stone and the brilliant John Glover as the Devil.

Fast forward 15 years and we find out that 113 souls have escaped from Hell and have gone back to Earth. Since Stone was a cop, the Devil makes a deal with him. Send back all 113 souls to Hell and you will get a second chance at life on Earth. I thought this was an excellent concept. The show was created by Ethan Reiff and Cyrus Voris, who now have the show Eleventh Hour on CBS. Like I said before, great concept, but it doesn't mean the show will work with the general public. The show was to debut on a Tuesday night for FOX. Then president of the network had high hopes for the show and began promoting the show in the 9pm time slot. 2 weeks before the show was to air, he stepped down as President of FOX network to take another job and a replacement took over. This person did not like the dark nature of the show and wanted more programming that was upbeat and light, but decided to give the show a chance anyway. Brimstone was moved to the death time slot of 8pm on Friday nights, paired with another great show Millennium. Without any big promotion or support from FOX, the show aired it's first thirteen episodes with decent numbers. FOX had ordered 6 more scripts of the show, but during post production on episode 14, FOX cancelled Brimstone. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper!

The final episode of Brimstone entitled Mourning After, aired on February 12, 1999. There was no announcement publicly that the show was cancelled, it just stopped airing. After a couple of months, I decided to go on the internet and find any information that I could about the fate of the show. Nothing was on the FOX website, although the Brimstone link was still there. While digging for information, I came across a save Brimstone website. There I found out that the show had indeed been cancelled and that I was not the only fan of the show. After weeks of talking with other people on the site, we decided to start the usual steps to try and save the show. Start writing to FOX, Warner Bros and other stations to see if we could save Brimstone. After 4 months with little head way, we gathered money from people who could contribute and placed and ad in Variety magazine, yes, Variety! It garnered our little campaign some national attention...so much so that the head of the SciFi channel wrote to the head of our campaign to state that they were interested in Brimstone. Almost a year later, the SciFi channel picked up the rights to air the original 13 episodes, which was great. We were actually seeing results due to our hard work. We later found out that Warner Bros. would not give the SciFi channel the rights to produce new episodes. So after 6 months of showing the original episodes, Brimstone was taken of the schedule. The campaign was obviously disappointed that the show stopped airing on SciFi, but was happy that we were able to get the show back on the air. I was proud to be part of that campaign.

In February of 2009, will be the 10 year anniversary of Brimstone being cancelled. Over the years I have tried to find copies of the 13 episodes with varying success. Most of the complete sets I found were on VHS and not in great quality. Recently I came across a great site that actually put a DVD set together of the show and I got my copy a couple of days ago. It is by far the best fan made set of the show and the picture quality is a solid A. I watched the episodes from the beginning and it made me remember why I was so into this show. You may be thinking to yourselves, why is this guy so wrapped up in a TV show. Hasn't there been anything that you were passionate about? That you wanted to make sure that people knew about? Well, one of my passions is the show Brimstone. Excellent acting, writing and top notch storytelling that just pulls you into the world of Ezekiel Stone from moment one. It gave you a mixture of humor, drama and fantasy all rolled into one. It made you ask questions about faith, religion and what is truly good and evil. If you haven't seen the show, find it and watch it. If you have seen the show, watch it again.

Remember, nobody beats the Devil....or so I hear.

The fading Palin star...

Unlike many people in the press, bloggers and other political entities, I do not think that Governor Sarah Palin is a stupid person. It would be foolish of anyone to think such a thing. You do not become Governor of a state by being a stupid person. Also, I do not care that she is a female running for the Vice Presidency. There will be no woman bashing in this blog. I could care less that a woman is running for Vice President, President, or any other political office. I just want someone who is informed and can make good decisions. Watch the following Sarah Palin clip and you tell me if she is an informed candidate:



I still to this day have no idea what her point was in that clip. This is the problem that Palin has, no clue as to what is going on. Could it be she was placed in the limelight not being ready to handle it? Could it be that McCain chose her just for political reasons? Or is it just that she doesn't know what is going on in the world. Here is Palin defending her foreign policy experience:



It is very simple people...we are living in serious times right now and need someone who can attack these issues with the calmness, knowledge and the respect of the American people. This again is not a blog to knock down Sarah Palin. She should be proud of her accomplishments as a woman and as a politician, but no more of the nice hometown stories. No more dodging questions when you don't truly have an answer. Let's be real for a minute, no politician knows everything, but I have never seen a candidate as unprepared as Palin.

Maybe the expectations are so low that no matter what happens, she will come out of the debate no different than she was when she went it. Joe Biden seems to have a problem. Not too look like he is attacking her, but at the same time point out her weaknesses and push the Obama policies. Can he walk this tightrope?

I just don't think she is ready to be one heartbeat away from the most powerful job in the world.

What do you think?

Tha Darkside Vibe #52

Topics:

Show Intro

Tha Darkside asks God for help

The Presidential debate

Male enhancement with Extenze

Artist spotlight - Hots

You too can talk to Aliens

Outro

The Republican Disgrace...

We all know that the world of politics is dog eat dog and isn't for the faint of heart. Constant character attacks, personal attacks, highs, lows and everything in between...but what the Republican party has done in the past 10 years is a downright disgrace.

This is not to say that the Democratic party is not without it's faults, but the way the Republican party has used personal and character attacks in recent campaigns can not go overlooked. Barack Obama was at a town hall a couple of days ago and while talking about John McCain and President Bush, he made the comment that you can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig. He was not referring to Governor Palin, but Bush and McCain. No more than an hour after he made this statement, McCain's camp fired back and wanted Obama to apologize for the so called sexist remark against Governor Palin. Almost as fast, they had an attack ad on the web called Lipstick.


It just cracks me up how they just splice a couple of clips together to make it seem one way when it actually isn't. This has Karl Rove written all over it. How can you support a party who looks to Karl Rove as an inspiration and leader. He should be in jail along with several other prominent Republicans, but guess who is helping them out, Bush.

I have to give it up to Barack Obama for trying to turn the other cheek when it comes to gutter politics. But he has to remember what those gutter politics did to John Kerry and his bid for President in 2004. Questioning his military service just to cast doubt. John McCain is a hypocrite, a true hypocrite. I seem to remember a certain politician saying the exact same thing:

See what I am talking about? The Republican party seems to have forgotten about Senator McCain saying the same thing about Hillary Clinton's health care policy. He wasn't called a sexist or asked to apologize. The reason is because it's NOT a sexist or derogatory statement against women.

This has been a theme throughout the primaries and now the Presidential campaign. Sexism and racism have reared their ugly heads and certain parties have chosen to play on these fears in order to gain support. Obama wants to keep racism and sexism out of this race, make it about the issues, but not the Republicans. You want to know why? When you don't have an answer for 8 years of this country losing all respect and the economy in the tank, you play on people's fears and try to divert their attention away from the real issues. The Republicans have even used these character and personal attacks against each other. Remember when McCain and Bush were going head to head for the Republican nomination years back and the Bush camp put out a story that McCain had fathered a black child? Are you serious? What the hell does that have to do with any of the important issues? Nothing. It's a diversion tactic. Get the news media and people around the water coolers talking about salacious gossip and not what is important.

John McCain likes to play a cool game. He says he is against negative campaigning and he seems genuine when he says it, yea right. Here is what McCain does. He will have his sheep float out an attack to the media and hours later, McCain will come back and say something like that has no place in politics... trying to make himself look like the good guy. Give me a break.

So, John McCain is the one who is going to defend women against sexism? Remember, this is the same person who made several disgusting jokes and cracks towards women.


Here is the bottom line people. I have no problem with anyone running for office. My thought is that McCain has chosen Governor Palin to try and sway some of the Hillary Clinton vote. We need to stop listening to the crap that Republican party is trying to hammer us with and pay attention to the issues. That is what the Republican party does not want. Ask yourself this question..

Which 8 years were better, the Clinton years or the Bush years? If you answer Bush, then you deserve 4 more years of what we have endured with George Bush. I feel sorry for you.

Tha Darkside Vibe #51

Show intro

The Chelsea Lately contest

My new 3G iPhone

News:
The Death of Bernie Mac
Aniston/Mayer break up
Mini Me sex tape

Booger lives again....sort of

Artist spotlight: Falling Wallendas

Movie review: Boxing Day


The Hills returns!

Outro

The Best of Tha Darkside Vibe Vol II

Here it is folks! Episode #50! This episode is a best of that last 50 episodes of the show. From some of my favorite moments, to some of the moments you told me you really enjoyed. So sit back, download the show and enjoy some of my comic genius. Of course, comments are always welcome! So, click the link above and listen to a synopsis of some of my best work.

History has been made...

This is an absolutely amazing thing. Senator Barack Obama has clinched the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. This is huge folks, huge! I never in my lifetime thought I would see a black person with a legitimate chance to win the White House. Take a minute, sit back and reflect on what this country has gone through when it comes to race. Slavery, lynchings, race riots of the 60's, the killing of Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X and the KKK. We as a race have gone through many trials and tribulations but are here still standing tall. Barack is a shining moment for us and should be noted as a major story in the history of this country.

Not since JFK has a candidate fueled such excitement and enthusiasm when it comes to a political campaign. With both Hillary and Barack, more people have signed up and voted than any other time in history, truly amazing. Now, I am one of the Obama supporters that does not hate Hillary Clinton. You have to give her her due on what she has accomplished in this Democratic primary. One of the problems that I have with the Clintons is that they seem like sore losers, especially Bill. She did not even acknowledge his winning of the nomination tonight, which I think was in poor taste. But I will not let Hillary take our thunder away, not this historic night.

Now Obama faces off with Senator John McCain, a candidate who couldn't be futher from the ideals that Obama believes. I think the fall campaign hinges on 2 important topics, the economy and the Iraq war. McCain wants to continue the war in Iraq, Barack does not. I think this war was a mistake from the beginning and 4000 Americans have had to die during the war. The economy is in complete shambles due to Republican policies. We are in the midst of a recession and McCain does not have a solid idea on what to do to get our economy back on track.

I remember when I was a little boy and asked my mother would there ever be a black president? She basically me that in her lifetime and my lifetime. She would have a tremendous smile on her face now if she was still here.

I salute you Barack Obama for proving that anyone who works hard and believes in their dream, can accomplish anything. If Martin Luther King Jr could only see this now.



God Bless the United States!