Rating: 
Summary: The life and death of Bluto
Review: Bob Woodward's account of the life of John Belushi is an excellent piece of journalism in that it is a quite believable story that is vivid in the telling. Unfortunately, it ultimate is pretty depressing. That an intelligent guy like Belushi could fail to see where he was headed and waste his tremendous talent is good lesson about the hazards of fame. "Live fast die young and leave a good looking corpse," so the quote goes. Belushi wasn't the first or last show-biz star to live his life by that mantra. And his story is probably fairly representative of stars from Jim Morrison to River Phoenix. One note: the book "Wired" is far, far superior to the travesty of a movie it later became.
Rating: 
Summary: Wheaton Wounders
Review: Hailing from the high school of both John (Class of 1967) and Jim Belushi (Class of 1972), as well as Bob Woodward (Class of 1961), I find this book by Bob Woodward to show the true power and inspirations sides of Belushi. Bob Woodward does an excellent job with his style of writing about John's career from his days at Wheaton Central to his final days after his short career as an actor. This book is a must read for Chicagoans, Blues fans, and fans of Belushi.
Rating:
Summary: A book of learning, tragedy, and love
Review: I found Woodward's Wired to be a great piece of work. Not as mesmerizing as All The President's Men, but still, a great and worthy effort by Bob Woodward. There was a critique about this book here that said his widow's book was better, because Judy Belushi knew John better than anyone. While I agree with that, I will add that Judy was as high as John was during their relationship. Also, this author of the critique (who hales from the UK), does not know John Belushi, so, in essence, does not have the faintest clue what John Belushi was really like. I think Wired was too rough on her idol, and she refuses to think he acted as wild as he did. I like Elvis Presley, I know had a wild streak in him, I don't refuse to accept it though. As for Wired. I hope people, as WIRED as Belushi & Chris Farley was, take notice of how drugs can kill you. After reading the book, I formed a one sentence moral to the story: You can eliminate the drugs & still be the world's best entertainer!
Rating:
Summary: Puts things in perspective
Review: I read this book about once a year to remind myself of how much I want to live. For anyone caught up in the illusion of the glory of life in the fast lane, the second half of this book, dealing with Belushi's last great binge in minute-by-minute detail, should be a real eye-opener. Woodward paints a balanced portrait of a much-loved, charasmatic individual trapped by his own demons. Alternately fascinating and horrifying, this is perhaps the best celebrity biography I have read. I sincerely hope it comes back into print - if not, I suggest you try to hunt a copy down; it is worth your time.
Rating:
Summary: WIRED is a riveting book and not a mere celeb biography.
Review: I've always been a huge fan of John Belushi's. He was a gifted performer and now twenty-two years after his death there still hasn't been another actor who's managed to capture John's unique presence. Jack Black really doesn't compare, in my opinion. With that being said, I think the book "Wired" should stand on its own as a great, cautionary tale of how ANYONE can be destroyed by a system, or a substance and ultimately by themselves. I think too much emphasis is put on the fact that this is strictly John Belushi's life and problems. Many have said the book exposes John's private behavior in an unfair, biased way and doesn't give any answers. I revel at how Woodward wrote the book in a creepy, detailed manner much like a police officer's report of a homicide or something. Towards the end of the book Woodward breaks down the chapters by Belushi's final days and then final hours so the reader feels an impending doom that makes turning to the next page truly dismaying. You know unfortunately how the story ends and it's so frustrating and sad. I think this method is much more effective then trying to tell this story with poetry or psychological analysis which is exactly where the dreadful film version in '89 went so wrong. The cold reporting of events again reiterates my point that this book shouldn't be looked at as a true biography of John Belushi. He's merely the source material for a lurid journal of Hollywood corruption. I don't think even John's wife Judy managed to get a truly revealing portrait of John. In "Samurai Widow" what you get is her biography basically. I guess John died too young and his behavior was either too mysterious or accidental in nature to really get a meaningful history of him. A person, especially a celebrity, in the end is frequently remembered for one entity sometimes even apart from the person they were in life. I think John Belushi's comic genius should be how he's remembered and not simply as a drug addict.
Rating:
Summary: A Sad Story
Review: John Belushi was a funny man but his story was not very funny. Bob Woodward does an incredible job of dredging up Belushi's life from a scared high school kid trying out for a play in Chicago to his coughing fit right before he died. It seems Woodward only focuses on the negatives in the book, but John Belushi's life was too short to have too many ultimite highs. SNL was a huge hit, so was Animal House, and so were the Blues Brothers. Belushi barely made 5 million dollars in his life and he spent that quickly on cocaine. He loved life so much, he never wanted to sleep. Woodward details all of it, in gut-wrenching detail. At times, Belushi's behavior gets redundant and Woodward's journalistic style gets a tad boring, but it is a good, quick read. If you can find the book and you were ever mesmerized by one of Belushi's characters, this book is a great read.
Rating:
Summary: great for John Balushi fans
Review: Michael J. Chavez
June 4, 2004
Period 6
This book is based on the life of John Balushi, famous for being on the show Saturday Night Live and movies like Animal House. John Balushi started his acting career when he was young after graduating high school when trying to get a job for college. His acting career went big when he played a part in the improvation play called Lemmings. After acting in Lemmings and other small parts of plays he got a job in Saturday Night Live and that's when his comedy career went big. Since Lemmings he had been taking all different kinds of drugs and got way out of hand. He started to have problems when shooting parts in movies but people loved his acting and wanted to see him in more movies. Eventually, he died of drug overdose.
This book is very nice to read if you are a big John Balushi fan. The author Bob Woodward interviewed many people in Balishi's life to get enough information to make the biography more like a novel. The book goes in order of his life basically from days to weeks and tells the peoples emotions and conversations unlike a normal boigraphy book that would mostly have just facts. It was very convincing to think that those could have been the conversations that really went on when directiong different movies but the book is mostly based on what people told the author what hepppened and no one will really know what went on in his life.
The downside of the book is that it is really repetitive. It usually consist of what he did between the filming of the movies and Saturday Night Live which was mosltly taking drugs. He had fights with the directors or didn't really feel good to film that day or was too speedy/slow to do anything. He was always taking drugs and people that were friends or family told him to stop but he wouldn't. Unless you're a Balushi fan the book dosent really have that much of a point since the protagonist of the book keeps doing the same thing until he dies.
Rating:
Summary: great for John Balushi fans
Review: Michael J. Chavez
June 4, 2004
Period 6
This book is based on the life of John Balushi, famous for being on the show Saturday Night Live and movies like Animal House. John Balushi started his acting career when he was young after graduating high school when trying to get a job for college. His acting career went big when he played a part in the improvation play called Lemmings. After acting in Lemmings and other small parts of plays he got a job in Saturday Night Live and that's when his comedy career went big. Since Lemmings he had been taking all different kinds of drugs and got way out of hand. He started to have problems when shooting parts in movies but people loved his acting and wanted to see him in more movies. Eventually, he died of drug overdose.
This book is very nice to read if you are a big John Balushi fan. The author Bob Woodward interviewed many people in Balishi's life to get enough information to make the biography more like a novel. The book goes in order of his life basically from days to weeks and tells the peoples emotions and conversations unlike a normal boigraphy book that would mostly have just facts. It was very convincing to think that those could have been the conversations that really went on when directiong different movies but the book is mostly based on what people told the author what hepppened and no one will really know what went on in his life.
The downside of the book is that it is really repetitive. It usually consist of what he did between the filming of the movies and Saturday Night Live which was mosltly taking drugs. He had fights with the directors or didn't really feel good to film that day or was too speedy/slow to do anything. He was always taking drugs and people that were friends or family told him to stop but he wouldn't. Unless you're a Balushi fan the book dosent really have that much of a point since the protagonist of the book keeps doing the same thing until he dies.
Rating: 
Summary: A Tragedy
Review: The Belushi saga, not the book itself. I bought a hardback copy upon release, and I reread it not long ago. Bob Woodward devoted the first third to Belushi's childhood and formative years, the second third was devoted to his explosion into national prominence, and the final third detailed the ugly final days of his life. The book is a bit dry, but Woodward gets enormous credit for simply reporting what he found, rather than page after page of editorializing. There's interesting information about the Saturday Night Live years, namely some of the personality conflicts and egos among the hugely famous Not Ready For Prime Time Players. It's clear that Belushi loved wife Judy Jacklin (and vice versa), and it's clear that he had close friends who loved him and would have done anything for him, so it's difficult to understand what led this incredible young talent down such a path of destruction. At any rate, like other reviewers have pointed out, Belushi spent the last days and weeks of his life caught up in the seamy side of the fast lane. If nothing else, this book serves as a rock-solid reminder of how quickly things can get out of hand for people who come to believe they're indestructible.
Rating:
Summary: Hollywood Free Fall
Review: There comes a point when reading 'Wired' that you want to go no further, when you wish that Belushi had pulled himself together and turned a highly promising career into a truly great one.
This book is a very upsetting read. The title 'Wired' itself does not describe Belushi for who he was and Woodward, for all his credibility as a top jouralist, does not portray an accurate, intimate portrait of a talented and intense man, but instead focuses on the dark side to his character and his poor qualities.
If you're a fan of Belushi, read his wife's biography of him, 'Samurai Widow' by Judith Jacklin Belushi, which gives a more accurate portrayal of John Belushi and includes the thoughts of those who knew him personally. It is no less an upsetting read, but this one makes you feel better, as you become aware of Belushi's ample good qualities. His best friend, Dan Aykroyd described him as 'a good man but a bad boy' and 'Wired' only gives the impression of Belushi as 'a bad boy'.
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