The Robert Halmi-produced Hallmark miniseries Merlin originally aired on April 26 and 27, 1998. Sam Neill stars as Merlin in a story that covers his time being raised and trained by Queen Mab as a child and continues to the end of the story of King Arthur.

Directed by frequent Jim Henson collaborator Steve Barron, this is one of my favorite interpretations of the Arthurian mythos, in large part because it leans so heavily on the mythology of the Merlin and the world of fairy. I know the current vogue for the Arthur story seems to be gritty realism mixed with an attempt at plausible historicity, but I don't want that. I want magic and fairies and griffins and the ideals of doing the right thing. It's an allegory. It's a fairy tale. It's a legend. Let it be magical.

A lot of creators I like worked on this, too. Two of the writers are playwright Peter Barnes and Ladyhawke screenwriter Edward Khamara. The conceptual designer was Alan Lee. The cast includes Isabella Rossellini, Helena Bonham Carter, Rutger Hauer, Lena Heady, Billie Whitelaw and Nicholas Clay (from Excalibur!). I especially want to point out Miranda Richardson, who is excellent as Queen Mab, and Martin Short, in one of the best performances of his career, as Mab's gnome servant Frik.

Something like Breaking Bad, for example, has low squiggability (that’s what I’m calling this quality). It’s tightly written, the characters are consistent, there’s little left to interpolate or extrapolate. Obviously, people DO write fanfic of Breaking Bad, but it still has a low squiggability score. Whereas something like Supernatural has a high squiggability score. Fantasy and science fiction often have high squiggability scores. This suggests squiggability could also be related to worldbuilding and potential for people to borrow a premise or setting.

Saying a courtesy call would have been nice even if nothing ever came of it, E.T. told reporters Monday he was shocked at not being contacted by director Steven Spielberg for a cameo in his new sci-fi movie Disclosure Day. “I knew I wasn’t going to be the lead, which was totally fine, but are you telling me that after more than 40 years of friendship, he can’t pick up the phone and say he’d love to throw a few lines my way?” said the extraterrestrial, adding that it was him and his “glowing fucking fingertip” that gave Spielberg one of the top-earning movies of all time.