New and gloriously stupid project: 100 Buddy Hollys

Ten of the proposed 100 Buddy Hollys.

What is life without its pointless projects? As I look back on my own half century of existence, I see that I have always been the most productive when the work I am doing has no practical application in the real world. If it's completely and utterly useless, I'm all in. Often, the work only has "meaning" because it brings me some strange, indefinable enjoyment or satisfaction. I suppose this entire blog (which has been running since October 2009) is my ultimate boondoggle. I have faithfully maintained this madman's journal largely for my own amusement and at the expense of more noble or profitable pursuits. But it's far from my only folly.

Lately, for instance, I have embarked upon what might be my single-dumbest endeavor: a project called 100 Buddy Hollys. The idea is to create 100 different parodies and remixes of the 1994 Weezer song "Buddy Holly" and post these to my YouTube account, mostly as shorts. Why this song? Why now? I don't know and I don't know. But the project is already moving forward at a furious pace. I started on October 19 with a video called "Buddy Holly but Rivers fired the rest of the band and replaced them with The Moog Cookbook." I have since created several dozen sequels, combining "Buddy Holly" with numerous other pop culture properties and rearranging the song in various ways.

The most popular of these videos has garnered about 1,800 views -- not even a blip on the YouTube radar. The least popular currently sits at a miserable 23 views. I have no idea why some of them perform better than others, and I don't really care. All I know is that, at some point, I decided I'd make a hundred of these things and then stop. Will I make it? Will I lose interest or run out of ideas? Stay tuned, true believers.

Ed Wood Wednesdays, week 251: The last footage of Bela Lugosi

A scowling Bela Lugosi made his last onscreen appearance in Plan 9.

It's one of the most famous anecdotes in the life of Edward D. Wood, Jr. It could even be the linchpin of the entire Wood saga, the source of much of Eddie's mystique. According to legend, the director took a few minutes of footage of a dead actor and built a whole movie around it—not just any movie, either, but an infamous movie! If you've seen the Tim Burton-directed biopic from 1994, it's a story you already know well. But how much of it is the truth? Let's talk about it.

"This is the acorn."

When legendary Hungarian actor Bela Lugosi died in August 1956 at the age of 73, director Ed Wood was devastated. Not only had he lost a good friend, he'd lost his leading man. Bela had starred in Glen or Glenda (1953) and Bride of the Monster (1955) for Eddie and was supposed to star in numerous upcoming Wood productions, like The Ghoul Goes West and The Vampire's Tomb. Now those plans were permanently canceled.

But Eddie had an ace up his sleeve: a reel of silent test footage he'd shot of Bela Lugosi shortly before the great man's death. Sure, it was only a few minutes of film and it didn't really tell much of a story, but Ed Wood still felt it could be the starting point for a feature-length motion picture. As Johnny Depp puts it in the Tim Burton film: "This is the acorn that will grow a great oak." Eddie's plan was to film a bunch of new scenes and extend Bela's role through the use of a carefully-disguised body double. 

The amazing thing is that Ed Wood actually carried out this seemingly insane plan. The result was a completely bonkers sci-fi/horror hybrid called Graverobbers from Outer Space, which premiered in Hollywood on March 15, 1957. It was later retitled Plan 9 from Outer Space and eventually gained a reputation as the worst movie ever made, thanks to coverage in various sci-fi/horror fan magazines and the book The Golden Turkey Awards (1980). It is, hands down, the most famous project Ed Wood was ever involved in.

Podcast Tuesday: "Garry Marshall is for the Children"

Anne Hathaway in The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement.

About a quarter of a century ago, author Meg Cabot had a revelation: girls like stories about princesses. Cabot herself liked stories about princesses as a child and still did as a grownup. And so she wrote The Princess Diaries (2000), a popular YA novel in which an American teenager named Mia finds out she is the rightful heir to the throne of a small European country called Genovia. Director Garry Marshall successfully adapted Cabot's book to the big screen in 2001 with Anne Hathaway (in her first major screen role) starring as the clumsy but endearing Mia. Cabot has since written many more books in the Princess Diaries franchise, while Marshall and Hathaway reunited for a sequel to the first movie called The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement in 2004.

I've yet to read any of Cabot's novels, but I have now seen both of Garry Marshall's Princess Diaries movies. To me, this is a classic "chosen one" narrative. At the beginning of the first film, Mia feels very un-special. Her prep school classmates either mock her or ignore her entirely. Even her one friend, Lily (Heather Matarazzo), treats her with some degree of scorn. But then, out of nowhere, her grandmother Clarisse (Julie Andrews) shows up with the very unexpected news that Mia is of royal blood. According to Clarisse, the unassuming American girl may be Genovia's last hope for survival. And so, Mia has to overcome her own self-doubts and rise up to claim her rightful place on the throne.

There's no denying that the Princess Diaries movies were made in the shadow of another, even more popular multimedia franchise about a chosen one. The first Diaries movie actually beat the first Harry Potter movie to theaters by three full months, but J.K. Rowling's books had been a worldwide sensation since 1997. To me, the influence of Harry Potter on The Princess Diaries (at least the movie version) is undeniable. It's a very short distance from "You're a wizard, Harry" to "You're a princess, Mia." Mia is Harry. Clarisse is Dumbledore. Clarisse's bodyguard Joe (Hector Elizondo) is Hagrid. Lily is Hermione. And throughout the film, Mia divides her time between a fancy private school and the Genovian embassy (where she studies to be a princess). Put these two together, and you've got Hogwarts. Mia even has a snotty, blonde-haired rival, Lana (Mandy Moore), the equivalent of Draco Malfoy.

This week on These Days Are Ours: A Happy Days Podcast, we talk about The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement. Is this sequel merely a cynical cash grab or does it manage to tell a compelling, entertaining story on its own? That's what we're hoping to find out. Please do join us.

So I was on TV, talking about Happy Days...

Adding some necessary labels to TV We Love.

It used to mean something to be on television, especially national television. When I was a kid, there were only three major networks (CBS, NBC, and ABC), plus PBS and a handful of independent stations that didn't always come in clearly. And that was your home entertainment, apart from books, magazines, newspapers, etc. The internet was still far in the future. There was no such thing as "streaming." Even cable and VCRs were but distant lights on the horizon back then. And so, my family and I would gather around the television set in our shag-carpeted, wood-paneled basement and watch shows like Alice, Fantasy Island, The Wonderful World of Disney, and Happy Days. Mainstream fare, in other words.

Many decades hence, long after television became irrelevant, I finally made it onto the boob tube. On Monday, November 10, 2025, my episode of the documentary series TV We Love aired on the CW. Had I not been on the show, I never would have heard of it. But I was, so I did. What can I say? It was still exciting to see myself on the screen, talking about Happy Days. My sister's family watched. Some of my internet pals and high school classmates tuned in. I tried to get some of my coworkers to watch, but I soon realized they had no idea what the CW even was.

Did you watch? If not, I have some good news: my entire episode is available for free right here. Enjoy! And if you want to know how I got involved in this project and what making the documentary was like, you can find out here.

Ed Wood Wednesdays, week 250: Bill Ash (1926-2011)

Bill Ash has a brief but memorable turn in Plan 9.

There are just 21 credited actors in Ed Wood's Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957). The majority of these folks were members of Eddie's social circle and worked with him on multiple projects, often spanning years. If you're reading this article, you know their names by now: Criswell, Duke Moore, Connie Brooks, Dudley Manlove, Tor Johnson, Carl Anthony, Lyle Talbot, Carl Anthony, and so on. The troupers. The ride-or-die crowd. Even Vampira and John Breckinridge, neither of whom ever appeared in another Wood film, found their names forever linked to Eddie's because of Plan 9.

But some of the credited performers in Plan 9 must be considered ringers. Or, better yet, hired guns. Eddie cast them for this one project only, then never worked with them again. These were fledgling actors in mid-1950s Hollywood, and Plan 9 was likely just another job. How odd it must have been for them to realize that this cheap little sci-fi throwaway would haunt them for the rest of their lives. Gregory Walcott (who played Jeff Trent) eventually learned to have a sense of humor about it. Joanna Lee (who played Tanna) didn't. Guess who seemed to be having more fun.

Ed Wood Wednesdays, week 249: The Tragicall Historie of Plan the IX (2018)

Let's get Shakespearean all up in here.

This series is called Ed Wood Wednesdays, and it aims to cover the wonky oeuvre of Edward Davis Wood, Jr. (1924-1978) in its bewildering totality—from the primitive Westerns he made at the beginning of his career to the even-more-primitive porn loops he made at the end of it. But I could have limited myself to discussing Eddie's most famous film, Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957), and still not run out of material for many years. This one movie, just an hour and twenty minutes in length, has inspired an absurd amount of spinoffs over the years: books, articles, essays, stage adaptations, merchandise, and countless parodies. There's even a video game. It never ends.

There's so much Plan 9 flotsam in the world, frankly, that I cannot keep up with it. Just two weeks ago, for example, I reviewed Killian H. Gore's Plan 9 from Outer Space Quiz Book (2018). As the title indicates, it's a collection of trivia questions about the movie, supplemented with an original sci-fi short story. You'd think, as a certified Woodologist, I would be smack dab in the middle of the target audience for such a product, and yet I only stumbled upon it (seven years after it was published!) by pure chance while searching for something else entirely.

So what was the "something else entirely" I was trying to find?

Where is the 'Krapopolis' discourse?

The cast of the animated series Krapopolis.

The Fox animated series Krapopolis is currently in its third season. It has already been renewed for two more. Fifty episodes have already aired. The show's creator, Dan Harmon, is the man behind the cult classic NBC series Community and the co-creator of the pop culture juggernaut Rick & Morty. The voice cast includes Richard Ayoade and Matt Berry of The IT Crowd, as well as Hannah Waddingham of Ted Lasso. Numerous famous comedians and character actors have lent their voices to the show as well.

Fox has not been bashful in its promotion of Krapopolis, which currently airs in the 9:00 EST Sunday night timeslot as part of the Animation Domination block alongside such hits as The Simpsons and Bob's Burgers. The animation budget is obviously robust, and the stories are often quite ambitious, referencing both ancient history and Greek mythology while commenting slyly on the foibles of modern times.

So why is no one talking about this show?

Seemingly every aspect of The Simpsons has been scrutinized, parodied, analyzed, criticized, and recontextualized over the course of the last few decades. Similar attention has been paid to South Park, King of the Hill, Bob's Burgers, Beavis & Butt-head, and many other so-called "adult animation" shows. This genre tends to attract obsessives with strong opinions. But it's rare that I see anyone online discussing Krapopolis. Where are the video essays? Where are the think pieces? Where is the fan art? Where are the memes? Where are the tweets?

There should be plenty to discuss here. Krapopolis is set in Ancient Greece and centers around a family that contains gods, humans, and monsters. (Yes, all three in one family.) These characters have a lot to deal with, since they're always fighting among themselves and fending off attacks (often supernatural ones) from outsiders. And if that's not enough, the family is also attempting to get civilization off the ground and govern the first-ever city, despite the general public not understanding what a city is, what civilization is, or how government even works. Big things happen every week on Krapopolis. The characters embark upon quests, go to battle, cast spells, etc. Just this season, a major power shift has occurred within the family, with neurotic human Tyrannis (Ayoade) ceding the crown to his jovial, hard-partying father, Shlub, a combination centaur and manticore. And, again, this is all presented as satirical commentary on the modern world.

Somehow, despite its prominence on the Fox schedule, Krapopolis has managed to remain functionally invisible since it premiered in 2023. I think this is the first time I've written about it, and I've seen nearly every episode. That's the weirdest thing about this show. I generally find myself indifferent to it—not bored or irritated, necessarily, just strangely unmoved. In the abstract, I can appreciate the cleverness of the writing, but I can't honestly say the show has ever provoked me to genuine laughter. I'll never find myself thinking back on some joke from Krapopolis and snickering with delight.

My guess is that the rest of the world is as indifferent to the show as I am. And so, Krapopolis exists in an airless, soundless comedic vacuum. Fox will continue to produce and air episodes of it. The public will continue not to care. And the cycle will continue for, what, eight or nine more seasons? It's like this show is a "blockbuster" movie that plays to empty houses but continues to get sequels that no one asked for. I'm starting to suspect this entire enterprise is some sort of money laundering scheme or tax writeoff.

Am I wrong? Do you have strong opinions, positive or negative, about Krapopolis? Let me know.