Bart Andrews (1945–2009)

I remember getting this at a book fair in grade school and, even though I hadn't seen any of the movies it discussed (with the possibly sole exception of Star Wars), it was still great fun reading through all the questions and answers about films like Soylent Green, Zardoz, The Fly, The Beginning of the End (how ominous that sounded!) and tons of others. It made me want to see all of them, at least until I eventually saw how cheesy most of them were. I have seen a few since then, though...

This is the standard on which I judge other overviews of bad TV, for while "The Worst TV Shows Ever" isn't encyclopedic by any means, Andrews and Dunning give excellent coverage to the misbegotten shows that DID make the cut. We need a new revision of this book; awful drifts in and out of the zeitgeist, but never really goes away.

Useful in its time but, in a Wikipedia age, the only thing that sets it apart are the photos. And there are lots of those that are very fun to look at.

Set in the 13th century, this is a story of the sea, pirates and adventure. Young Ragnor MacHelli becomes captain of a trading ship when his father dies and his cousin is kidnapped by pirates. Ragnor and his faithful tillerman, Deigan, set sail to find his cousin and help Sir John de Courcy chase the marauding pirates from their hidden coves.