Sgt. Angle reporting for duty! Short and sweet this week, as I’m on deadline for resting mine eyes.

I’ve just been pontificating what’s in store for all you heavy readers and viewers out there in the upcoming MYTHOI: BIRTH issue to be released soon, and words cannot describe what only pictures can. See for yourself.

Then again, words cannot describe all that music has to offer. Music has that uncanny ability to actually represent more than the lyrics tell you. Thanks to contrasting melodies, choral harmonies, and dizzying sound engineering, music can be known to make our hearts beat faster, or stop them all together. Which brings us to Michael Jackson (Effing Segues). THIS IS IT is the documentary revolving around MJ’s rehearsals for his final “curtain call” tour of London. As of today, “…It” has earned over $34 Million at the US BO. I haven’t offered money to the Jackson Family Fund seen the film yet, but I hope that you do, sirs and madams, and that you tell us about it. However, I do know that Jackson’s dance steps will live forever, just like Keanu Reeves is immortal, and was AKA King Charlemagne. Or a vampire.

Until you get the chance to watch the source of Neverland Ranch dressing King of Pop in his final dance moments, you can think long and hard about how to spend the next five years of your life building on the moves and creations of others.

For instance, you can join the recent Hollywood trend of remaking character-driven foreign films to fit the American filmmaking mold.

I don’t have a large axe to grind with remakes. The Departed was a fine film. So was 3:10 to Yuma. What I have a problem with is the idea that American audiences “on a wide scale” cannot already see “Let the Right One In” as it was intended to be seen, in the glorious Scandinavian snow quality. Why remake it at all? Why not plop down a huge chunk of change if you love the movie so much and blast it out into theaters across the country, tell the audience “you should see this,” instead of allowing the director of “Cloverfield” to lay his handheld fingers on it? Just screen the original. If you screen it, they will come.

I want that to be your mantra as you also think about the movie reboot of Battlestar Galactica. This is a property that has been a cult favorite ever since the original TV series in the 70s, and has already had a spectacular “reboot” which began in 2004, thanks to the creative, adaptive vision of Ronald D. Moore.

The Moore reboot added layers of philosophy and religion, of humanity in every one of the characters, and developed an entire universe that is similar yet unique from our own. What will Bryan Singer bring to the table, and why now? Could he be capitalizing on the recent success of Moore’s series and the title in question?

A type of reboot I can usually get behind is the movie-to-TV launch of a popular film, or at least, a film worthy of deeper exploration. Think of Friday Night Lights, and I’ll take you there. What Peter Berg was able to lift out of the book for the film, he made fly for the TV series. Now entering its’ fourth season, FNL is more than football, more than teenage drama. It’s about heart. It’s about hope. And it’s about a coach who still stands for integrity and decency despite his losses, because in life, it’s not about losing, it’s about how you deal with the loss. Have clear eyes (a clear vision for your future) full hearts (pumping blood through your veins and hope through your mind) and you can’t lose (you will always emerge victorious). This is a show that began as a true story, was written in a book by H.G. Bissinger and adapted into a film starring Billy Bob Thornton. The characters beat through the heart of America, and their weekly lives have become a dramatic mirror of clarity for millions of viewers.

I can think of reboots that work (Star Trek, Casino Royale, even) and remakes that are terrible and unnecessary (the wood block of Keanu Reeves gave only stiffness to The Day the Earth Stood Still, and is Leo DiCaprio seriously thinking of tackling The Third Man? Orson Welles shall roll over in his grave!). Can you? Perhaps venture into foreign lands and discover the French films of Jean-Pierre Jeunet before he jumped over to the Alien franchise (again, another reboot) to see how original movies from other lands can be. Broaden your horizon over the ocean once in a while, please.

But back to the subject at hand: This Is It. Michael Jackson. Did he have a heart worth beating for another 50 years, or did it just give up because he thought he’d lost everything? Dance your words into our comment section, and tell us: Is This It?

So Say We All.

Sgt. Angle