Category Archives: This Wacky World!

Cinematics, This Wacky World!

My Brief Career as a Professional Ghoul

Elizabeth Taylor has died, which I don’t have any particular comment on. I mean, I’m certainly not glad she’s dead; I just can’t add anything to the discussion of her lengthy career. But when she died, as many people pointed out, her New York Times obituary was written by theater/film critic Mel Gussow–who himself died almost six years ago.

This jarred two memories loose from my head. The first is that I edited a book by Mr. Gussow years ago (this one, if you’re curious) and had no idea he died, let alone died so long ago. The second is that I myself was once tasked with preemptive obituary writing.

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This Wacky World!

Ah, Mr. Verbard, You Have a Nasty Habit of Surviving

The tweeting of Martin Degrell (who runs the awesome Best Show Gems podcast) alerted me to the following insane story over at BBC News. Super-villains hoping to flee back their underground headquarters, take note: Here’s an evil genius who knows how to get things done!

A convicted sex offender and cult leader has escaped by helicopter from a prison on the French Indian Ocean island
of Reunion, officials say.

Juliano Verbard, 27, serving a 15-year term, and two followers, were pulled on to the helicopter by three accomplices.

The three had pretended to be tourists when they boarded the
helicopter, but then forced the pilot to land in the prison grounds
before flying off again.

They then landed a few hundred metres away, and drove off in a waiting van.

…whereupon Mr. Verbard welcomed a fluffy white cat onto his lap, stroked it, and proclaimed, “Yes, my plan has come together perfectly!”

Local police have few leads, but suspect that Verbard may have fled to a remote part of the island, and its mysterious skull-shaped fortress carved into the side of an active volcano.