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Thom Dunn is a Boston-based writer, musician, and utterly terrible dancer. He is the singer/guitarist for the indie rock/power-pop the Roland High Life, as well as a staff writer for the New York Times’ Wirecutter and a regular contributor at BoingBoing.net. Thom enjoys Oxford commas, metaphysics, and romantic clichés (especially when they involve whiskey), and he firmly believes that Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" is the single greatest atrocity committed against mankind. He is a graduate of Clarion Writer's Workshop at UCSD ('13) & Emerson College ('08).

Oh, Marvel Cinematic Universe, WHY WON'T YOU LET ME LOVE YOU?!

Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show has had a rocky first season, but this past week's tie-in episode to Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier was totally also. And also emblematic of everything that's wrong with the show in the first place. Because I'm incapable of turning off my critical writer mind and simply enjoying a lighthearted situation secret agent series, I have articulated my frustrations with Agents Of Stupid Hydra Infiltration, Everything Lame and Dumb (see what I did there?) in a new article for Tor.com. So check out, and share your thoughts in the comments, 'natch.


(but seriously this show would be so much better if it had more Hasslehoff)

Upcoming Stuff & Events & Things (Nov. '13)

Hello, website! Long time, no update! I swear that one of these days I am going to actually train myself to just make brief updates here as they happen, instead of these info dumps. ANYWAY. I've got some stuff going on, because of course I do. It goes like this:

Meanwhile, in addition to my normal duties at Five By Five Hundred, I have a review of Eric Smith's new book The Geek's Guide To Dating on Tor.com, and some coverage of SpeakEasy Stage Company's world premiere production of Make Up Your Mind, a brand new play by Kurt Vonnegut even though he's dead.

And then, ya know, the youge (like, the slang/shortened word for "usual," but spelled phonetically? Is that right?): Workin', writin', so on and so forth. Tonight at the Huntington we start performances for The Cocktail Hour by A.R. Gurney, which is directed by Maria Aitken, a favorite of ours at the theatre. Here's a little video I made for that:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xa_ckErMzAY]

I also wrote some fun stuff about ghost stories at the theatre on the Huntington's blog which is still worth reading even though it's after Halloween, as well as two pieces of flash fiction in this "Quantum Shorts" competition that you can go read and vote for so I can win some monies: I Kill Dead People and Not Dead Yet (which was the basis for my story in Grayhaven Comics' Fifth Dimension anthology).

Wow that's a whole lot of dead stuff. In that case, I should end this on a happy note, which is that Maurissa Tancharoen both listened to and enjoyed my song "I'll Fight A Whedon For You"; unfortunately, her husband Jed was less than impressed.

So now I've pissed one Whedon and armwrestled another, which only leaves Zak for me still to cross. But overall I think that means that I've successfully become a Whedonverse villain?

Holy crap, I'll be 28 in 2 weeks.

"I'll Fight A Whedon For You," My Newest Nerd Rock Single

 A few years back, my friend Jeremy and I were joking around and discussing our adoration of Maurissa Tancharoen, a TV writer on Dollhouse and Spartacus and now one of the showrunners on Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., plus an occasional actress in her own right on Dollhouse and Dr. Horrible's Sing-ALong-Blog. On top of all of that, she's also (sadly) married to Jed Whedon, brother of Joss. And she's just super cute and lovely, so Jeremy and I talked about writing a nerd rock song called "I'll Fight A Whedon For You," a sentiment which in our circles is pretty much considered the pinnacle of romantic sacrifice.

Well, I finally got around to actually making that song happen. I wrote the lyrics up for a Five By Five Hundred post a few weeks ago (and I'll include the annotation below, after the jump), and recorded the entire song at home over the last week or so. I play everything on the tune except for bass, which comes to you courtesy of the inimitable Jake WM. (okay I didn't technically so much play drums as I did edit and re-arrange pre-existing Logic Pro drum loops but it's pretty much the same thing.

Please feel free to download and share with your friends!

Annotated Lyrics

The first time I saw you in pony tails,
that Horrible Doctor's fan, -- in DR. HORRIBLE'S SING ALONG BLOG, she played one of the"Fans," and wore pigtails. "Ponytails" just fit the rhythm better. I knew by your groove when you sang that tune that I wanted to be your man.

But then your Commentary made me Asian Aware-y -- the DVD Commentary for DR. HORRIBLE'S SING ALONG BLOG is a full musical entitled, naturally, COMMENTARY: THE MUSICAL, and Maurissa sings a song in it called "Nobody's Asian In The Movies," because, well, she's the only Asian in the movie. and I knew what I'd have to do:

I'll fight a Whedon for you: Zak, Jed, or Joss, -- The Three Whedon Brothers, Jed being her actual husband, Joss being the more famous one, and Zak being, well, I just didn't want to leave him out. Yeah, you know that it's true. There's more a chance I'll see DOLLHOUSE renewed -- I think I was one of 11 people who watched that show when it aired. I REGRET NOTHING. But it's true: I'll fight a Whedon for you.

Echoes remain from that song that you sang as Kilo the cutest Doll. -- Uhh, well, she sang a song called "Remains" in an episode of DOLLHOUSE, which was written by her and Jed. She also had a recurring cameo as a doll named Kilo, and the protagonist on the show was a doll named Echo. I'm too poor for STARZ or for SPARTACUS, but you know that I'll give you my all. -- Pretty safe explanatory there. She worked on SPARTACUS; I never watched it.

No, I'll never yield; I'll back AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. -- She's now showrunner on Marvel's AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.LD., and the original S.H.I.E.L.D. comics used the catchphrase "Don't yield! Back S.H.I.E.L.D.!" because it was the 60s until Agent Coulson dies (I mean, again, like, for real this time) -- Technically, Agent Coulson already died in THE AVENGERS, but he's mysteriously back to life on AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. You're Pretty In Pink, I don't care what they think -- She was apparently in a girl pop group called Pretty In Pink, according to Wikipedia. I don't know. Then I saw you with another guy. -- Being her husband, Jed, because I'm clearly working in the established trope of heartbroken nerd rock power pop songs here

Even though you have lupus -- Uhh, well, she has lupus.  I thought we could this but then werewolves devoured my heart. -- Sometimes I genuinely get confused between "lupus" and "lupine," like a werewolf. Whoops!

But I'll fight a Whedon for you: Zak, Jed, or Joss, Yeah, you know that it's true. There's more a chance I'll see DOLLHOUSE renewed But it's true: I'll fight a Whedon for you.

Did you know that our birthdays are one day apart (except plus or minus ten years)? -- A fun fact that I discovered while trying to find something to write for the bridge: her birthday is in fact on November 28, 1975, whereas I was born on November 29, 1985. Which I guess is like a sign or something? And sure, Jed is hot -- what's he got that I'm not? I mean, like, besides his career -- Pretty self-explanatory there, I think

So Mo, won't you go with me, baby, you know we'd be cool (ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh)

But I'll fight a Whedon for you: Zak, Jed, or Joss, Yeah, you know that it's true. I hope AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. makes it past season 2 -- The show only just got picked up for a full first season order, and Whedon shows are kind of infamous for being prematurely cancelled. 'cause it's true: I'll fight a Whedon for you.

Damn you, Jed.

Damn you, Jed.