“HELLO DERE!”
Alexandre Dumas pere is synonymous with swashbuckling historical adventures like The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo and The Man in the Iron Mask.
His name became SO associated with swordplay and intrigue that even a Dumas novel like The Corsican Brothers, which in reality lacks any true action elements, has long been adapted as if it’s a swashbuckler. That has always involved altering the original story beyond recognition, which is why no two Corsican Brothers movies bear much resemblance to each other and can’t even seem to agree on a time period.
That’s a shame since plenty of other novels by Alexandre Dumas are loaded with action and historical intrigue yet have been largely overlooked when it comes to movies and television.
GEORGES (1843) – Published just one year before The Three Musketeers, this novel is not only a rollicking adventure full of action, romance and double-crosses but it deals with racial issues in such a way that you would have thought it would have been adapted for film four or five decades ago. The title character uses his sword to fight slavery! Continue reading
SALTY (1974-1975) – From some of the team behind Flipper came this short-lived series about a trained seal named Salty. The program was based on the 1973 film Salty, which featured Clint Howard in the role now played by Johnny Doran. 
KNOCKING OFF NUMBER THREE – In NCAA Division Two the UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA AT DULUTH BULLDOGS took the field against the visiting number 3 team in the country – the MINNESOTA STATE MAVERICKS. The Mavericks were up 7-3 at the midpoint but UMD rallied from there to topple Minnesota State 17-14. 
DOWN GOES NUMBER FIVE – In this game D2’s number 16 PITTSBURG (KS) STATE GORILLAS played their guests, the 5th ranked GRAND VALLEY STATE LAKERS. A scoreless 1st Quarter was followed by a 10-0 Gorillas advantage by the break. The Lakers made it a 10-7 game to end the 3rd Quarter, but Pittsburg State held on in the 4th for a 17-14 win. 
ANOTHER NUMBER FIVE IS TOPPLED – Over in the NAIA, the 11th ranked MONTANA TECH OREDIGGERS faced the visiting number 5 team – the UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA-WESTERN BULLDOGS. The Orediggers were in control 27-9 at the Half, then kept UMW at arm’s length to win the game 34-23. 
CRACK COMICS Vol 1 #17 (Oct 1941) 
CLOSE CALL FOR NUMBER THIRTEEN – In NCAA Division Two the 13th ranked COLORADO STATE AT PUEBLO THUNDERWOLVES traveled to face the UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL MISSOURI MULES. A 10-10 1st Quarter tie became a 17-10 Mules lead by Halftime. The 3rd Quarter ended with the Thunderwolves on top 20-17 and the 4th in a 29-24 CSU-Pueblo victory.
STAMPEDE – On the other hand, D2’s number 2 team in the nation – the HARDING UNIVERSITY BISON – had no such difficulties with their guests the SOUTHWESTERN OKLAHOMA STATE BULLDOGS. The Bison seized a 14-0 advantage in the opening Quarter and doubled that to 28-0 at the Half. From there Harding U. buried the Bulldogs by a final count of 55-0. 
WITHIN AN ACE OF THE END OF THE WORLD (1900) – Written by Robert Barr. No doubt about it, Barr was obsessed with the notion of humanity possibly bringing on its own demise through ill-considered scientific tampering. Recently Balladeer’s Blog reviewed another of his stories, The Doom of London, which mined the same creative territory. 
Previously, Balladeer’s Blog reviewed various examples of Bruceploitation Movies, that odd subgenre full of martial arts spectacles exploiting and otherwise trying to cash in on the explosion of popularity in kung-fu films that the real Bruce Lee brought to the west. 
BRUCE, KUNG FU GIRLS (1977) – Also released as Bruce’s Angels, Bruce Lee’s Kung Fu Girls and several other titles, but I have a soft spot for this more inane title selection. I really hope that movies titled Bruce, Gone with the Wind; Bruce, Whose Life is it Anyway? and Bruce, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues also exist. But as we’ve established, I’m kind of weird. 
THE BARON (1966-1967) – This ITC/ABC venture starred rugged he-man Steve Forrest as wealthy Texan John Mannering, who works for British Intelligence under the codename the Baron. Mannering’s assistant was Cordelia Winfield, played by the British actress Sue Lloyd. 
Mannering’s cover in London was an antique dealer and jet-set playboy. He drove around in a Jensen C-V8 that had the personalized license plate BAR 1. The Baron was originally a character from novels but John Mannering bore little resemblance to his printed page counterpart.
By 411 BC the Peloponnesian War between Athens (and its allied city-states) and Sparta (and its allied city-states) had been raging for roughly 20 years. The war provides the backdrop for many of Aristophanes’ surviving comedies and is especially relevant where Lysistrata is concerned. Weary of the long, drawn-out conflict the women of Athens, led by the title character Lysistrata (supposedly based on Lysimache, the Priestess of Athena in Athens at the time), join forces with the women of Sparta and decide to withhold sex from the men until they agree to bring an end to the war. 
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