The Friday High Five

Football dreams, noping out of work, and hot nerd summer

WHY DIDN’T ANYONE TELL ME BERNTHAL WAS IN THIS??!?! Image: FX

Every Friday I share 5 things I enjoyed this week. Also, high fives are inherently cool, and I think we can all agree Friday is the bestest day. Hence the Friday High Five. 🙏🏻

Last weekend we returned to my wife’s ancestral lands and the rural country I begrudgingly adopted as a displaced city boy. Though I did gradually learn to love all that good green.¹

Sometimes I think I’d like to return to Northern Michigan in retirement. There’s a tranquility that’s sorta unmatched. I know part of that’s just being away from home, with all its demands and chores. But it’s also just nice to sit outside in all that unspoiled nature.

We golfed Saturday morning and hung out with family and had a great time. But the highlight was Friday night.

I brought Tecmo Super Bowl with me to play with my brother. We took over the living room and put on a show for my incredulous parents and sister-in-law.

It was not the brazen manner with which we seized the TV that was so shocking; for years, my brother and I routinely brought an Xbox for the 3 days we were home, and once we even rented one when neither of us packed ours. Everyone knows our whole deal. No, it was the rudimentary graphics and gameplay that so baffled our audience.

It was sorta eye-opening, listening to them trying to understand what was even going on. Like, can they not see me running with the ball? It’s right there. Couldn’t be clearer. What’s so confusing?

Tecmo in action. Image: Tecmo

It wasn’t too far off from my son’s reaction when I had him play a game with me. Or my wife’s reaction to watching me play the original The Legend of Zelda. They can’t look past the ugliness of the game. On some level, I get it. But it’s interesting because I don’t see the plainness at all.

I see greatness. I’m not even joking.

Tecmo Super Bowl and The Legend of Zelda are two of the greatest games ever created. But it’s increasingly clear that this is not currency that will spend much longer. The torchbearers for these retro classics are getting long in the tooth ourselves. Who will carry the torch once we’re no longer able?

Nobody.

That’s natural, of course. I’m sure there was once someone who cherished the classics of the silent film era, and tried unsuccessfully to extol their virtues even as Hollywood moved on. The world went full color and stereo surround. Charlie Chaplin never stood a chance.

Chaplin is actually a great example. I know the name, and even know what he looks like. But I’ve never seen any of his films. Why would I? They’re old and, well, ugly. Maybe they age well, but I’ve honestly never felt inclined to find out.

Somebody will take offense with that, but I’m speaking truth. The people for whom Chaplin films matter are a minority of a minority. The rest of us are tuning in for new things, and newness is just another word for relevance.

So it is with everything. Even the classic video games of my youth.

Maybe it’s a sign of getting older, but more and more I think about this kind of thing. The fleeting nature of life. The passage of time. The relevance of a nerdy pop culture newsletter. Sometimes writing about this stuff feels like jamming on a tuba while the Titanic slides into a watery grave.

I got a bit off course there, but I’ll revisit this sometime because it’s been on my mind.

Btw, I totally worked my brother in Tecmo.²

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Hard Knocks: Offseason With the New York Giants

HBO

I’m a big fan of HBO’s Hard Knocks, a sports documentary / reality TV show that closely follows one NFL team during the summer as they prepare for the upcoming season. My Detroit Lions were featured in 2022, which rates as my favorite season of the show.

This year we get 2 versions of Hard Knocks.³

The Chicago Bears will be featured as the traditional team, in which cameras record the practices and preseason action; the drama primarily arises from which bubble players will make the 53-man roster. That season starts August 6th.

In the meantime, HBO has gifted us this treat.

I think most NFL fans sort teams into one of 4 categories:

1. My Team: For me, this is the Lions. Some fans put more than one team here, which breaks all known rules of physics.

2. Teams I root for when not playing My Team: Cleveland, Buffalo.

3. Teams I actively despise: The Dallas Cowboys.

4. Teams I’m ambivalent about: Any team not listed above.

The Giants are firmly a category 4. I don’t think about them, I don’t care about them, but I also don’t hate them. What I know about them is thanks mostly to fantasy football, that great equalizer that turned football fans into degenerate gamblers. I know the skilled players for the Giants. The front office staff? Not so much.

So it’s a bit surprising how much I’m enjoying Offseason with the New York Giants. Unlike traditional Hard Knocks, the players aren’t really featured. Instead, the camera follows the Giants General Manager and his staff as they navigate free agency and the NFL draft.

It’s a better, more exciting version of the Kevin Costner film Draft Day.

A strong part of fantasy’s allure is the sense that you’re creating a team. I think a lot of fantasy players approach the draft as though they are a hybrid chess grand master and shrewd military strategist, when in reality it’s more like drawing Bingo balls and hoping to hit on something.

Fantasy football is as close as I’ll ever get to building my own team. But watching Offseason is a very close second. I’ll go one further: I think this is my favorite season of Hard Knocks.

Playing Hooky in the Middle of the Day

Working from home is weird.

On one hand, super convenient. The commute is a dream and I get to do it in whatever I woke up wearing. My coworker mostly ignores me unless her food dish is empty (and then she barges in meowing angrily). I can listen to music or podcasts without headphones, and even throw on the TV if I’m doing something that doesn’t require all my cycles.

But I’ve also turned into a hermit. There are days when I don’t go outside. Like at all. I’ve started taking Vitamin D supplements because I probably don’t get enough sunshine.

It’s gotten to the point that I actually look forward to running errands, if only to get away for a while. True story.

Wednesday I blew off work around 2:30 and ran a bunch of errands, then had an early dinner out. It was crazy how much longer the day felt. I should maybe quit early more often.

It’s easy to just fall into a routine and not really question what you’re doing or why. I’m a fan of spontaneity and this week I remembered why. Novelty is underrated.

Final Fantasy I

You’re limited to 4 letters in naming your characters. Also, apparently I take crooked photos. Image: Square

Hot Nerd Summer 2024 continues!

This week I beat The Legend of Zelda for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), which is the O.G. Nintendo for those who don’t celebrate Hot Nerd Summer. Remember the game cartridges that only worked if you blew in them a certain way?⁴ That Nintendo.

I had a blast revisiting Zelda. You’ll get to hear more about it in next week’s podcast.

After finishing Zelda, I immediately fired up the sequel, which I have no memory of ever playing. For a reason, apparently.

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link jettisons everything that made the original a timeless classic, in favor of an ugly side-scroller that feels like a cheap Double Dragon clone. Yuck.

So I pivoted to the original Final Fantasy, which I know I’ve never played. It was not for a lack of desire. I somehow came into possession of a strategy guide for Final Fantasy I when I was 10 or something and used to read it religiously, even though I didn’t have the game, and never would. This was the era in which you got maybe 2 video games a year: one for your birthday, and one for Christmas. And that was only if your parents were cool.

Mom was down with Nintendo and kept us in cartridges.⁵ Dad, not so much.

One year we got an Atari—I want to say it was the 5200—and my Dad and Stepmom set it up in my brother’s room. He was like 8 or 10 at the time, so having a console AND a TV in his room was a Big Frigging Deal. Only downside: TV was a privilege closely metered out, and video games even more so. To this day I’m not sure if that was a gift so much as an underhanded slap.

As for Final Fantasy—the gameplay is simple and evokes a classic D&D vibe I seriously dig. I’m only maybe 2 hours in but I already rescued a princess and saved a town from a band of ruthless pirates. I’m the Ron Burgundy of heroes.

Other Stuff I’m Currently Watching

Sometimes it’s hard to bring something new to this column every Friday, especially when I’m in the middle of a bunch of shows. I don’t want to talk about the same thing every week but like, I’m also watching things.

Here’s an update on shows I’ve previously mentioned in this space. (Links to when I originally wrote about each.)

• Suits: We just started season 7. Curious to see what the newly-released season 9 looks like, which was filmed after a several-years-long hiatus. So far, Season 5 is the high water mark and I get the sense it won’t be as good as that again.

• Parenthood: We’re halfway through season 2. Still solid and reliably heartwarming.⁶

• The Bear: Resisting the urge to just guzzle this from the fire hose. It’s so good. Still in season 1, just watched episode 5 or 6. Why didn’t anyone tell me Mike is played by Jon Bernthal? I shared my list of My Guys for a reason!⁷ I was simultaneously elated and crushed by this discovery.

• House of the Dragon: We’ve only watched the first 3 episodes, mostly because of life things. At the end of a long and tiring day, sometimes the last thing you want is a bunch of drama.

• The Wire: I’m on season 2, episode 3. Not sure why but season 2 isn’t grabbing me like the first season. It’s not begging me to watch it, so I haven’t been. But I’ll stick with it.

• Obi-Wan Kenobi: The rewatch continues. I just finished episode 4. Much as I would’ve preferred Vader not be part of the story, I gotta admit he’s a Big Damn Problem. The scene of him floating shirtless in a bacta tank… what an absolute unit.

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That’s it for this edition of the High 5. What are you digging at the moment? Drop a comment and let me know!

1. I was referring to trees with this, but it works just as well for the other sort of green. Every time we return home, I’m shocked at all the marijuana dispensaries that have cropped up.

2. We played 3 games of Tecmo, I won 2.

3. Technically we’ve gotten 2 versions of Hard Knocks in a single year before. A few years ago, HBO introduced an in-season variant, which seems like it would be even more dramatic and exciting. But I prefer the pre-season version, in which hope endures and everything is on the table.

Plus, there’s real football on at that time, so why watch an in-season documentary about it?

4. If you never blew a game cartridge before, it might sound like a weird form of fellatio. But it’s totally legit, and was the only way to get the games to work after a while. Nobody knows why.

If you claim this is an analogy about how video games suck the life out of you… points for being clever, but you obviously better go someplace else with that talk.

5. To this day, one of my favorite birthday gifts was getting NHL 94. So much excitement. Thanks, Mom.

6. Last night I tried to figure out which Parenthood character I’m most like. I initially suggested Adam (the responsible one) with a tinge of Crosby (the irresponsible boyishly charming one). I then quickly amended my answer because Adam is a little too square, and settled on Joel (the scruffy handsome handy guy) and Crosby.

My wife was kind enough not to disagree.

7. My Guys are actors I’ll watch in pretty much anything, and also would draft in the event fantasy football collided with Hollywood. My list: Harrison Ford, Denzel Washington, Eddie Murphy, Nathan Fillion, John Boyega, Jon Bernthal, Sterling K. Brown, Timothy Olyphant, Karl Urban, Sam Rockwell, Vince Vaughn, and John C. Reilly.

One of these days I’ll work out a My Gals list. Here’s a partial off the top of my head: Cate Blanchett, Kate Winslet, Sigourney Weaver, Viola Davis, Rachel McAdams, Regina King, Charlize Theron, and, of course, Meryl Streep. Melissa McCarthy was on this list for a long time but I got burned by too many crappy collaborations with her husband.