Pulp Secret Report

Wired sat down with certified comic book fan Patton Oswalt to talk about the important issues, on the eve of the release of Ratatouille. Some choice excerpts:

Wired: You're nearly 40, and you've returned to playing Dungeons & Dragons. Please explain.

Oswalt: It's a benign way to have a midlife crisis that doesn't involve sports cars. My wife is probably hoping, "Maybe tonight he'll just go to a strip club..." Instead, I'm out rolling dice and saying things like, "I don't know if a Wall of Fog spell lasts that long!"

Wired: There's a great line on your new album, Werewolves: "My geekiness is getting in the way of my nerdiness." What's the distinction?

Oswalt: A lot of nerds aren't aware they're nerds. A geek has thrown his hands up to the universe and gone, "I speak Klingon — who am I fooling? You win! I'm just gonna openly like what I like." Geeks tend to be a little happier with themselves.

Read the rest of the article here.

And as a side note, Ratatouille is great, a really excellent comedy. More than that, I think it should be required viewing for all the comic book message board haters out there... The movie, more than just a "funny cooking rat" movie, is essentially a meditation on criticism and its relationship to art. In particular that it's easy to hate; and that if critics have any place, it is to support that which is new and special. So there.

- Alex