Friday Links really should have been on Mount Rushmore

As expected, the HBO miniseries John Adams is doing swimmingly - it's HBO's best miniseries debut in four years.

With that in mind, here's an all-Adams Friday Links.

• An interview with David Morse, who's playing George Washington. (TV Guide, via the Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
  
• A review that includes interviews with lots of cast and crew. (AP via Newsday)
  
• TIME's review.
  
• And here's a more light-hearted review, from Sarah Riley of the Appleton Post-Crescent in Wisconsin.
  
• For those of you who want to know more about John Adams in general, whether it's because you don't have HBO, you're distracted by Paul Giamatti's facial expressions, or you're just plain intrigued, here's a public-domain biography on Google Books. And of course we have to remember the ladies, so here are Abigail's letters.
  
• And Wikiquotes has some great Adams sound bytes if you're into that sort of thing.

For those of you who don't have HBO, never fear - it'll be out on DVD in June. Add it to your Netflix now!

Ungainly Mass of Friday Links

• 20 Things You Didn't Know About Science Fiction. (Discover Magazine) My favorite little factoid from this? Robert Heinlein's role in the conceptualization of the waterbed, which, if you have ever read Heinlein, should surprise you not at all.


• Presidential Elections and Height Differences (Mental Floss)


• 5 Places to Watch Movies Legally Online (PBS) This isn't directly history-related, except in the sense that there are some great historically-significant films available in the public domain that you can, and should, try to catch.


• The 5 Nastiest Presidential Elections in U.S. History (Neatorama) Thomas Jefferson actually pretty much called John Adams a hermaphrodite. True fax. Expect more on the topic of election mudslinging in the future. 'Tis the season and all.

Finally, speaking of John Adams, how psyched are you for the HBO John Adams miniseries?

Links Galore

A couple of new articles are in the works, but for now, just enjoy this slice of the latest interesting, absorbing, and just plain weird history-related news items:

• Why are folks so fond of 'weird history'? (Sydney Morning Herald) - that's "weird" as in "a little nutty and probably bogus", not weird as in bizarre.


• The many adventures of fictional explorer Tintin, and his many resulting head injuries, likely caused hormonal imbalances. (ABC for Kids)


• Joe Ellis on his favorite founding father: "[T]he one that I want to have a beer with is John Adams. Maybe we'll have a Sam Adams together." (Bloomberg)


• British historian sees Johnny Depp as the ideal actor to play Stalin. (Russia-IC)


• The assassination of Benazir Bhutto sparks this interesting analysis of assassinations in history. (Daily Press)


• An oldie but a goodie: Richard Nixon used the wrong "Wilson Desk" in the White House. (Snopes)

Also, did you catch the new PBS documentary Andrew Jackson: Good, Evil, and the Presidency on Wednesday? I'll keep my eyes open for a re-airing, and if I find anything out, I'll let you know. It was fun, but woefully low on badassery.