Greetings airmen, I hope all of you are gearing up for the holiday season which kicks off next week with Thanksgiving. Personally, I’m getting very excited about the line-up of fantastic genre movies that will be coming our way starting with this very weekend.

HARRY POTTER & THE GOBLET OF FIRE is the fourth movie in this mega-blockbuster series based on the marvelous books by J.K.Rowling. When my first grand-daughter, Kristi, was born, Valerie and I
offered to babysit her when her mom, our daughter Michelle, went back to work. For the next three years, that brown-eyed bundle of joy totally ruled our hearts. Of course you have to know, having a grandfather who is into comics and fantastic literature, this little beauty was given a daily dose of storytelling from day one.
Enough so, that by the time she was in pre-school, she had AN unsatiable appetite for fiction and became an avid reader. It is a habit we clearly encouraged. Well, sure enough, that old adage about what comes around applies here as well. You see, when the Harry Potter books began arriving, naturally Kristi, about eleven or twelve at the time, became one of the legions of fans of that series. Enough so that she persuaded her old grandfather to pick them up as well. And of course made a Potter fan out of yours truly. I have loved all the books and the movies based on them and I am most eager to see this new one. It is remarkable to watch the three young leads actually maturing and growing up in front of all our eyes. The USA TODAY reviewer gave GOBLET OF FIRE three out of four stars. That’s plenty good enough for me.

Of course you can’t have a hit childrens series without everyone in Hollywood Land wanting to imitate your success, ergo the competition is going to be fierce. Alas, to date nothing has come close to being as well done and fanciful as the Potter films. Whereas I honestly believe that’s all going to change come the 2nd of Decemeber when Disney releases its spectacular adaptation of C.S.Lewis’s classic childrens adventure…THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE..the first in his NARNIA CHRONICLES. You have to believe, if this first entry is a winner, we’ll be seeing the sequels soon after. Which if fine by me, after having seen many of the movie’s trailers. It certainly looks like we are about to have two family friendly fantasy series on our hands. And what’s wrong about that? It’s a whole lot better than those violent video game based movies we’ve been force-fed lately.

Finally, on the 14th of December, Peter Jackson is going to give the world his take on the greatest fantasy adventure movie of all time, KING KONG! This is a movie I can honsetly say I’ve been waiting most of life to see. Having seen the original 1933 movie at nine years old, when it was in re-release in 1955,
its images and grandeur branded themselves on my psyche and to this date it remains my favorite movie. Now, another fan of that same classic,
has used all the tricks of modern film magic to reimagine it in any ever bigger, bodler fashion, while retaining the heart of the story. The tragedy of a wild thing brought to defeat amidst the power of the mechanical age. Any guesses where I’ll be on the 14th of December? The gray hairded dude in line in front of you at the local theater.

Besides these top three blockbusters, the next couple of weeks are also going to offer up
the cinema bio-pic of Johnny Cash as portrayed by the super talented Joaquin Pheonix. And Charlize Theron is about to bring to life the old MTV animated sci-fi assassin, AEON-FLUX. All good stuff. When you consider it, we are clearly living in the golden age of movie magic.

Can’t end this week’s log without saying a big thanks to all the fans who stopped by my table at last week’s Portsmouth Con hosted by the good folks at the Paperback Bazaar. It really was a great day and we met lots of old friends and made many new ones. Tom Bonello,
one of our students in the Comics School, is an art teacher at the Barrington Middle School and has started a comic club there. Well, lo and behold lots of his kids showed up and experienced their very first con. Way to go, Tom. Would love to see more such clubs in local schools to get kids back to comics and reading.

And lastly, Valerie and I are flying out to Ft.Collins, Colorado in two days to spend Thanksgiving with our son, Alan, and his family.
I want to wish each and every one of you a joyous, fun filled holiday. Don’t eat too much good food and do take a minute to thank God for your blessings. Ask Him to give you the good graces to share them with others.

See you next week, from Colorado. Ron, over and out.