HOME RENDITION

Okay, for those of you who wanted to know why I thought of 'The Prisoner' (my all-time favorite TV series!) during the season finale of 'Burn Notice', check out the image from the final minute of "The Devil You Know".......

And here's the opening from 'The Prisoner' to illustrate why I thought of it.....

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: ALONZO MANN

ALONZO MANN

AS SEEN IN:
"The Murder Of Mary Phagan"

AS PLAYED BY:
Jordan Marder

From the New York Times:

AP
[Published: March 20, 1985]

JOHNSON CITY, Tenn., March 19

Alonzo Mann, who broke a 69- year silence to say the wrong man was convicted of a notorious killing and hanged by a lynch mob that led to a resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan, died Monday from pneumonia at the age of 87.

Three years ago Mr. Mann, a resident of Bristol, Va., after keeping silent since 1913, said in a sworn statement that Leo Frank, a Jewish pencil merchant, was innocent of the murder of 14-year-old Mary Phagan at an Atlanta pencil factory.
He said the real killer was Jim Conley, a janitor at the factory.

In 1983, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles disregarded Mr. Mann's sworn affidavit and pleas by three Jewish organizations and declined to pardon Mr. Frank, saying it was impossible to determine the truth after 70 years.

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: MARY PHAGAN

MARY PHAGAN

AS SEEN IN:
"The Murder of Mary Phagan"

AS PLAYED BY:
Wendy J. Cooke

Around 3 a.m. on April 27, 1913, Newt Lee, the night watchman for the National Pencil Factory, carried a lantern with him to the factory basement to help him light his way to the "Negro toilet." When his light fell upon a prone human form, Lee called Atlanta police, who arrived ten minutes later. The body was that of a thirteen-year-old girl. Her skull was dented and caked with blood. A piece of jute rope was wrapped around her neck. A worker at the factory called to the scene identified the body: "Oh my God! That's Mary Phagan."

The murder of Mary Phagan shocked a city already reeling from crime, violence, and desperate working conditions. Within the previous decade, Atlanta had experienced a serious race riot and recorded the highest arrest rate of any major city in the country. Child labor laws were widely ignored and children worked for as little as 22 cents a week. The Mary Phagan murder unleashed a pent up frustration with the pathological conditions of the city.

Unfortunately, it now seems, events and the South's anti-Semitism conspired to lead to the conviction of the wrong man, the factory's Jewish superintendent, Leo Frank. The case ultimately drew the attention of the United States Supreme Court and the Governor of Georgia, but neither the Constitution nor a Governor's commutation could spare Frank a violent death at the end of rope strung from a Georgia oak tree....
- Douglas O. Linder (2008)

BCnU!

A NEW NUMBER SIX?

For those of you who watch 'Burn Notice'.....

Did the final minute of the season finale put anybody else in mind of 'The Prisoner'?

(I can't put up a picture from it because Hulu doesn't show clips from 'Burn Notice' until 8 days later. Which is just as well, because it was a spoiler, and I have no clue how to hide things behind a link......)

BCnU!

PRE-DETERMINATION

Lee Goldberg pointed out this bit of Nostradamia in his Facebook status update the other day:

Ahead of its time -- from a rerun of YES, DEAR: "Telling me not to think about sex is like asking Tiger Woods not to think about sex."

BCnU!

LOOKING FORWARD TO LOOKING BACK

Every year I grouse here at Inner Toob after the Oscar and Emmy telecasts about the "In Memoriam" segments of those award shows. This year should be no different.

But at least now I better understand the process......

I'll probably still bitch about how they're presented at least at some point on Monday......

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: JIM CONLEY

Not someone who deserved to be profiled back in February.....

JIM CONLEY

AS SEEN IN:
"The Murder of Mary Phagan"

AS PLAYED BY:
Charles Dutton

From Wikipedia:
On May 1, Jim Conley, the pencil factory's janitor, was caught by the plant's day watchman, E.F. Holloway, washing a dirty shirt. Conley tried to hide the shirt, then claimed the stains on the shirt were from "rust". Conley denied under oath that he was literate, had a grade-school education and could read and write. This would later become crucial with regard to the murder notes.

The factory foreman, Holloway, told the Georgian that he believed Conley "strangled Mary Phagan while about half drunk", resulting in a May 28 headline reading, "SUSPICION TURNED TO CONLEY; ACCUSED BY FACTORY FOREMAN." Seeing the headline, Conley conjured up a new story: an agitated Frank, in a dramatic meeting in the dark, ordered him to hide in a wardrobe to avoid being seen by two women, later dictated the murder notes to him, gave him cigarettes, and told him to leave the factory. Afterward, Conley went out drinking and saw a movie. Phagan's $1.20 in pay had also disappeared, leading the police to wonder whether Conley might have killed her for the money. The police asked Frank to confront Conley. Frank refused because his lawyer was out of town, though even when Rosser returned, no meeting took place.

Under further pressure from the police regarding the discrepancies in his story, Conley gave another version, in this account he gave his final statement. During the trial Conley admitted the reason he lied in the beginning of the investigation and did not immediately tell the truth was that he was trying to cover for Leo Frank. Conley stated Frank originally offered him $200 on the day of the murder to destroy the body and evidence. Frank asked Conley to move and dispose Phagan's body by burning it in the basement furnace. When the police asked where was the alleged $200 Frank had given Conley, Conley then responded to this question by saying when he wouldn't immediately burn Phagan's body for Frank in the basement furnace, Frank had asked to see the money, taken it back, folded it and put it in his pocket, Frank told Conley if he came back later and disposed of the body in the furnace he would get the $200 back. Conley also said Frank, in foreshadowing words, told him on the day of the murder, "Why should I hang? I have wealthy people in Brooklyn."

Two unsworn witnesses came forward to incriminate Conley. Will Green, a carnival worker, said that he had been playing craps at the factory with Conley and had run away from him when Conley had declared his intention to rob a girl who walked by. William Mincey, an insurance salesman, had met an intoxicated Conley on the street. He said that Conley, trying to brush Mincey off, said, "I have killed one today and do not wish to kill another." Mincey had thought it was a joke. Neither man signed an affidavit or testified in court.

BCnU!

JAKE'S JUNK

So I'm hanging out today at my buddy Michael's apartment, watching an episode of 'Jake 2.0' on Syfy. I explained the premise to Mikey and his first question was about the extent of the nanobot infestation of Jake's body. As the scene on TV was of a romantic nature, I'm assuming that he was referring to Jake's "boys" swimming around down in their holding cell.....

It reminded me of a very funny essay by Larry Niven, "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex". I have to say that it's the height of comic book geekiness.
With Jake Foley, I think the same problem would apply. Any woman whom Jake wanted to have sex with would have to get NSA clearance.

JAKE: Diane, I have millions of microscopic robots running around inside of me. Please tell me what the next step in this relationship is, because I have no clue. I mean, the best I can hope for is that I don't lie to her, because she can never know the real me. Nobody can ever know the real me. Nobody ... except you.

And it would have to be performed under clinical conditions, to make sure she never got pregnant. Would an individual born with superhuman abilities lose their right to be their own person? Would the government confiscate such a baby?

It seems like the kind of topic 'The Prisoner' might have tackled.....
I'm surprised the government never insisted on Jake getting a vasectomy. Chances are though that the nanites would only repair the damage.......

BCnU!

PS:
Sorry, folks. I run a fairly clean ship here. That's all of the 'Smallville' slash-fic picture you're going to see here....

AS SEEN ON TV: HUGH DORSEY

HUGH DORSEY

AS SEEN IN:
"The Murder Of Mary Phagan"

AS PLAYED BY:
Richard Jordan

From Wikipedia:
Hugh Manson Dorsey (July 10, 1871 – June 11, 1948) was an American lawyer, jurist, and the 62nd Governor of Georgia associated with the Democratic Party.

He was born in Fayetteville, Georgia, Georgia in 1871 and moved with his family to Atlanta, Georgia in 1879. Dorsey graduated from the University of Georgia in 1893. Dorsey is noted as the prosecuting attorney (serving as the solicitor-general of the Fulton County Superior Court) in the Leo Frank murder trial. His fame from that trial led to two consecutive two-year terms as the Governor of Georgia from 1917 to 1921. Dorsey also served as a superior court judge in Atlanta from 1935 until his death in 1948. He is buried in Westview Cemetery in Atlanta.

BCnU!

LONELY GOLLUM (PART TWO)

With regards to that piece I posted earlier today about Russell Hunter being the inspiration for Gollum in Peter Jackson's adaptation of "The Lord Of The Rings", it could be that Jackson had also seen him in the Lord Peter Wimsey mystery, "The Five Red Herrings".

Here's how Hunter looked as Matthew Gowan by the end of the story: BCnU!