The point of a column like this is not to be a consumer guide, or to give “thumbs up”/”thumbs down” to the latest media product (which is just as well since Ebert owns the whole thumbs-up thing and could sue the pants off me for copping his gimmick). I’m trying to engage some of the ideas underpinning popular culture — notions of authenticity, influence, presentation, expectation — and kick them around to see how they fall. I’m trying, in short, to start a conversation.
And sometimes I’m trying to start an argument. It falls to the critic sometimes to assume a contrarian stance, either by default or by design. The aim is not simply to be disagreeable, not to reflexively oppose received wisdom, but to take nothing for granted. By taking an opinion that “everybody knows” is wrong, you put your interlocutor in the position of defending the view that “everybody knows” is right, and examining why it’s right. And that’s how you get at deeper truths.
And so, in the spirit of the pursuit of knowledge (and also in the pursuit of pissing people off, why isn’t particularly helpful but which can be a whole lotta fun), here are my fightstarters — a selection of my contrarian, heretical, or just plan Wrong ideas about pop culture. You may disagree: in fact, that’s kind of the point.
You are, of course, forgiven if you hadn’t. Heck, Saturday night on Channel 4 here in L.A. – the city that’s hosting the final two rounds! – the WBC’s first semifinal game didn’t even rate a mention on the 11 p.m. news, shunted aside by extensive coverage of UCLA’s humiliating exit from the NCAA basketball tournament and quick glimpses at the Dodgers’ and Angels’ spring-training action. (Never mind that Angels fans might have wanted to know that the club’s newest high-priced acquisition, outfielder Bobby Abreu, dropped an easy first-inning fly ball that opened the door for Korea’s 10-2 rout of his Venezuela team.)
HATE: The timing. March is a problematic month in which to play games that mean something – not just because of weather (most of the nation is still inhospitable to outdoor activity, limiting the tournament to friendlier climates or … yeccchhhh! … domes), but because this is the time when ballplayers traditionally are shaking off the winter rust and recapturing their timing at the plate, not diving for an up-the-middle grounder with national pride at stake. MLB commissioner Bud Selig says the WBC is in March to stay, but it absolutely needs to move — either to a midsummer fortnight when MLB takes a break (as the NHL does for hockey’s World Cup and the Olympics), or, preferably, to November. Sure, in the latter case the tournament would still be limited to southern cities, but at least the players would be in shape, the eyes of the sporting world would still be on baseball … and, most important, the sport’s owners might not have such a cow over potential injuries (see below). 
Every great football game, at its heart, is like an action movie. Once you cut out the commercials and halftime, they’re both about the same length. They both build along the same story arc. Depending on your home city (or which side you happened to gamble money on), each game has a protagonist – a burly male hero – with a few trusted allies that faces down an black-hearted maniac and his band of unforgivable, faceless thugs.