Boomer Basement

I'm a late Boomer, b. 1959. If neurologists poke around in the furthest darkest reaches of my brain, they'll find comic books, Bewitched DVDs, an Addams Family cartoon book, and other stuff now in my basement. For this blog, I've looked back fondly on cultural icons from my first ten years. Here's a list:

Batman (and friends) Re-connecting to my Inner Joker: Sixties Batman (12/2013) is an appreciation of what a team of creators and actors achieved for three years in the mid-1960s. In Jokers at the Gate (07/2008), I reflect on the Joker, post-9/11.

I knew DC before it was a universe. I was there when Jack Kirby came over from Marvel to bring his vision of a "universe" to the DC lineup. See King of Comics (06/2015).

Here are some blogposts about other DC characters:

• 7 Wonders of Wonder Woman (06/2017)
• Superman Returns: Myth or Merchandise? (07/2006)
• So How Did You Like Man of Steel? (06/2013)
• Atticus Finch and Superman: Who Owns Them? (07/2015).

Bewitched I binge-watched the first season of this sitcom and came away with new appreciation for Bewitched-craft (07/2014).
There were other good role models for someone whose fondest dream was to ruffle a black cape and disappear in a puff of smoke. For a little soul-searching, I dig up Grampa Munster, Dracula, and Wendy the Good Witch. See Happy Halloween (10/2017). I go much deeper into The Addams Family through the sitcom, the original Charles Addams cartoons, and the Broadway musical inspired by all of these sources (12/2015).

MusicA Millennial radio host said, "I get it, the Beatles were good." But that's not getting it. Other bands were good; for us, the Beatles were more than a band. I tell how in Beatles for Boomers (07/2019).

Here are some posts about other singers and songwriters we heard on the radio:

• Carole, Joni, and Carly in Context (last names withheld as unnecessary)
• Cass Elliot's Voice
• Traveling with Joni Mitchell's Blue and Just Songs: Rediscovering Joni Mitchell 40 Years Later

Mad MagazineOne of the last editors of Mad said in an interview that "everyone says the magazine was funniest in the first year they read it." Well, 1968 really was the funniest year for Mad. Read MAD Sanity (04/2013).

Mary Poppins I loved the magic and the music, first. Then, the story of a business man who has no time for his family after work resonated with me and my fellow boomers. Two recent Disney films play up that angle. In Saving Mr. Banks, it's about Walt Disney's dealings with P.L.Travers, creator of Mary Poppins, who obstructs the writers of the movie. Memories of yearning for her own father's love are woven into the texture of this exhilarating film. Mary Poppins Returns was "practically perfect in every way," but I wish they hadn't made it.

Star Trek

When actor Leonard Nimoy died, I wrote this brief tribute with an anecdote from late in his life: Leonard Nimoy, Gratefulness (02/2015).

Burt Bacharach Our parents didn't know that Bacharach's music wasn't rock. But nothing brings back that era for me quite so strongly as a Bacharach song. Beyond nostalgia, there are good reasons to appreciate his work. See Boomers for Bacharach.