5/31/2007 - Crazy Asian Mother

This is one of the funniest videos I've ever seen, but for those who do not have the same background as I do, they might not get the joke. It is simply a dead-on portrayal of what it's like to be a first-generation Asian-American whose parents immigrated from China so that their progeny could "live the American dream". Oh, the horror of imperfection in your scholastic duties... a B-plus! That's the greatest fear of an Asian-American student.

Forget about any kind of a social life... you'll spend every waking moment studying, practicing, memorizing for those exams that you'll have nightmares about (it's been almost 10 years, and I still have those nightmares). Because if you don't get that A, you'll pretty much be disowned by your parents, or laughed at by your siblings or cousins who did get 4.3 GPA's. You have it drilled into your mind that you'd be the first to fail in the family if you don't get all A's!

Sorry about the rant... I just had flashbacks. The scenario in this video didn't actually occur to me since I didn't get a B until my Junior year in college, but trust me... it's not too far off from what really goes on behind the curtains of a real Asian-American household.

5/30/2007 - Mario Yeah!

It's quite remarkable that gaming's most famous icon and one of the most recognizable mascots in the world is a chubby Italian plumber named Mario. If you look at his live-action counterpart as played by Captain Lou Albino on the short-lived Super Mario Bros. Super Show, you wouldn't think that he could save any kingdom:

And yet, he has endured as Nintendo's flagship mascot, thwarting Bowser's every scheme and getting in a good game of tennis or soccer here and there. And if you think about it, Mario's unassuming image does give him kind of an everyman type of quality that people can relate to. Interestingly enough, Shigeru Miyamoto's design for Mario came not as a desire to portray a blue-collar hero, but out of technological necessity. This is from Mario's Wikipedia article:

The design was strongly affected by the technical limitations of the hardware, which permitted only 16x16 pixels for the main character. The mustache was easier to represent than a mouth, and formed the image of a large nose. The multicolored clothes provided contrast with the black background, and the overalls served as a distinction between the body and the arms, so that one recognized their movement. Because of the cap, it was not necessary to represent the movement of Mario's hair if he jumped.

And thus Mario, or Jumpman as Shiggy first called him, was born. Today's video compiles pretty much every commercial featuring our favorite rotund plumber, even some from Japan (which includes a very creepy peeping-tom Mario).

5/29/2007 - Mega64: Paperboy

These Mega64 guys are nuts! They've taken the Tom Green/Jackass formula and applied it to video games. As we saw previously with the Mario: Game Over video, if you literally take the gameplay elements of a video game and applied it to the real world, it would look pretty ridiculous. Mega64 took this idea and ran with it, creating several hidden-camera ambush videos centered around specific games.

This one features Paperboy, a video game that originally appeared in the arcades as sort of a paperboy simulator where you would navigate the neighborhood streets delivering papers to subscribers and breaking the windows of those houses that don't. That later action alone would disqualify it as a serious simulator (I would hope), but the arcade game did simulate the experience with bicycle handlebar controls. If you would like to see the game in action, click HERE.

Of course it wouldn't be a fun video game if there weren't any obstacles for the paperboy. The game throws everything at you... from RC cars to mummies to breakdancers to Death itself (I think he's in the later stages)! This is all gold to the Mega64 crew as you can see them ambush a real "paperboy" as he makes his rounds:



I wonder if the "paperboy" got the joke...

5/28/2007 - Hamster Wheel

I don't have any pets, but if I were to have one, it'd be this hamster:



...and I would name it Speedy Gonzales! Seriously, I don't think I would ever get tired of seeing that.

5/27/2007 - Optimus Prime vs. Megatron (2 videos)

Transformers The Movie (animated) came out when I was ten years old, the perfect age for getting sucked into the cross-platform marketing hype that was Transformers. The synergy of transformable vehicles, robots, and the cartoon that featured these action figures is something that the advertising geniuses of today cannot recreate. Oh, they're going to attempt to do so with the new live-action movie, but kids just don't have as much interest in action figures in general as we did back then.

I didn't get to see Transformers The Movie in the theaters due to circumstances I cannot remember, but I do remember renting the movie three times (purchasing movies were crazy expensive back then) and watching it over and over. People generally focus on how unusual it was for major characters to actually die in the movie, but for a Robotech fan like me, it was nothing new. What hooked me in was the animation... it's something that you just won't see these days because of CGI. It's my theory that animators hate drawing the straight lines that are necessary to portray these robots. It's a shame since all of the recent "animated" Transformers shows pale in comparison to the old-school animation.

The highlight of the Transformers movie was, of course, the epic fight between Optimus Prime and Megatron. This was the fight all the cartoon fans were waiting for but never really got a chance to see. I'm not sure if the movie got it's PG rating because of this fight, but it's pretty brutal for a kid's movie:



SPOILER ALERT: Yes, Optimus Prime did die as a result from this fight. So did Megatron, but he was reborn as Galvatron soon after. Of course, that caused a lot of controversy back then because Optimus was a good guy... not just that, he was the LEADER of the good guys! It was a lot for us pre-teens to accept.

But I digress... as I've said before, we have so many tools available to us to pay tribute to our nostalgic whims. One of them is MUGEN, a PC program that is sort of an open-source fighting-game engine that allows people to customize sprites and animation to use them in their own fighting game. You want to see Ryu (Street Fighter) vs. Scorpion (Mortal Kombat)? No problem! How about Hulk (Marvel vs. Capcom) vs. Thing? Just draw your own Thing sprites! Of course, it didn't take long for someone to recreate the Optimus Prime vs. Megatron fight on MUGEN... and here it is:



It was a nice "touch" to include the Stan Bush music!

5/26/2007 - Are Your Base GENESIS original

Before there was Rockstar, EA, and Rare, most video games originated from the Land of the Rising Sun, Japan. The Japanese are such creative folk, giving us such popular fads as anime, Tamagotchi and Iron Chef. The dilemma to porting over dialogue-heavy games is the translation to English. One can't just use Google Translate and expect a good translation, especially when trying to make it comprehensible to a younger crowd. Yet, some games like the original Metal Gear manages to mangle the English so badly it's laughable. Remember "I feel asleep"? Or "The truck have started to move"?

As bad as Metal Gear was, it was God compared to Zero Wing. This, of course, gave us the "All your base are belong to us" craze a few years ago. The funny thing is, that was the just tip of the iceberg as to how bad the translation was. The only quote that makes any sense in the following video is "It's you!!" Didn't they have anybody proofreading this stuff before it went out? To quote the Angry Video Game Nerd, "WHAT WE'RE THEY THINKING?!"

5/25/2007 - Pokemon MARVEL Ver.

I never got into the whole Pokemon craze... mainly because I've never been into RPG's in general. The whole idea of leveling up with experience points just seems like too much work to me. The whole idea of playing a video game should be to have fun, and fighting small enemies over and over again just to be at a certain level to fight a boss is not fun!

That's why I enjoy fighting games. You start out with a character with all your special moves from the beginning and you fight against opponents one by one. Your character doesn't get stronger as you fight, but it's up to you as the player to be more skilled as you play. Isn't that what being a gamer should be about?

Nobody does 2-D fighting games like Capcom does and they hit their stride with the Marvel vs. Capcom series. Whoever thought of having that kind of crossover with those licensed characters was a genius. And whoever thought of creating a crossover with Pokemon and Marvel vs. Capcom is an evil genius, because they created a Pokemon game that I would actually try.

5/24/2007 - What really happened after the Deathstar blew up

It really bugs me that Emperor Palpatine wasn't in Episode IV. We spent the entire first three episodes of Star Wars building him up to be the biggest bad guy in that galaxy far, far away, and he's nowhere to be seen after he's built the Empire. Don't get me wrong, it was a great story of how a measly senator from Naboo came to power simply by having some kind of Sith power to fool ALL the Jedis around him! Alright, that may seem a little far-fetched, but this is George Lucas' universe here where Jedis/Siths can make everything float except themselves (because that would mean flying Jedis, and we can't have that, can we?).

Anyway, back to Palpatine... if Lucas ever decided to digitally insert him into Episode IV like Jabba the Hut, this is how it should be done:



...love the CTU ringtone!

5/23/2007 - CNN ridicules Microsoft Zune

I'm not a Microsoft hater... I use Microsoft products all the time. I use their operating system at work, our servers are running Windows, and I program using Visual Studio. As someone who provides computer support at work, though, I just get sick of using Windows, dealing with its shortcomings, and fixing problem PCs. That's why my home computer is a Mac.

I've used Macs since around 1990 and I've never really had a problem with them. In fact, I just like using them better. People may think they're like toys, but hey, I like playing with toys! I can get my work done on Macs and do recreational activities without giving much thought as to the internals of the machine or the delicate balance of managing applications within the operating system environment. See, when I use a PC, these are the things I have to worry about... because I see everyday what happens when you ignore these things!

A microcosm of the Mac/PC battle can clearly be seen with the iPod/Zune rivalry. The way Microsoft copied OS X with Vista is so blatant, it's almost laughable. Microsoft's patent-ignoring ways carried over when they created the Zune. But no matter how many features they copy from Apple, they will always lack that special elegance that Apple products have. The following video sums it up beautifully. What begins as a tepidly positive review of the Zune, turns into a "meh"-fest when all the limitations of the Zune are presented. The best part is when one of the news anchors whips out her iPod Shuffle, though. They can't stop gushing over it!

5/22/2007 - Hungry Like The Wolf

Here's another entry into the pantheon of living gods walking this Earth: Bruce Campbell. He just exudes coolness without making an effort doing so. Yes, he's smug, but it's an act... he knows it, and you know it. Like Christopher Walken, he shows a certain amount of ego without being obnoxious about it.

Modern day audiences will mostly likely recognize Bruce Campbell from all his Spider-Man movie cameos. He gets better in each one, and his performance as the maitre'd of a French restaurant truly steals the show. Also, if you've played any of the Spider-Man games based on the movies, he's the narrator that gives you the tutorial. The wisecracks he makes while you're trying to learn how to control Spider-Man are priceless!

This Old Spice commercial perfectly exemplifies Bruce's epic smoothness. I guarantee you that no one else can sing a cheesy '80s Duran Duran song and still be cool. The ironic thing is that Bruce doesn't really need the Old Spice to woo the ladies.

5/21/2007 - Kylie Minogue - Come Into My World

I'm afraid that the music video as an art form is almost lost upon us. What was really popular in the '80s and '90s has pretty much faded away ever since MTV decided to be some sort of reality show TV network for the youngsters. I don't know why they even have a music video award or even call themselves "Music TV". I thought the reason they came up with MTV2 was so that they would show music videos there, but they've gone the same route as MTV has. Same with VH1 as well!

Perhaps if more music videos were more like the following one, they could make a comeback. "Come Into My World" by Kylie Minogue is one of the most creative videos I've seen, if not the most. It takes the concept of the Mobius loop and puts a spin on it by adding the concept of multiplicity. It's simply mind-boggling to watch and even more so to comprehend how the special effects were conceived. Whoever storyboarded the video must have been on acid or something.



Every time you watch the video, you spot something new... and I think that was its intent. The actual song is a pretty good one too. One bit of trivia: Kylie Minogue played Cammy in the live-action Street Fighter II movie. She's probably one of the few good things in that movie.

5/20/2007 - Starfox 2 (The Unreleased)

Starfox 2 is probably the highest profile example of vaporware from Nintendo (I'm not sure if you can consider the Sony CD add-on to the Super Nintendo as an example since it was released as the Sony Playstation!). I'm pretty sure I remember reading about it in Nintendo Power.

As an owner of the original Starfox, I was really looking forward to it. Even though Starfox had very rudimentary polygon graphics, it was still a fun shooter with an awesome soundtrack. The Super FX chip embedded within the cartridge gave us a taste of what the next generation systems would bring us.

One of the biggest complaints about the original Starfox was that even though it was a true 3-D game, it was still an on-rails shooter. It did not allow for free-roaming around an expansive space. Starfox 2 would have changed that. As you can see from the video, you can actually choose your path in the Lylat system and roam free when chasing the giant missiles. You could even choose a different pilot and wingman!



Man, this looked like it would have been a really good game! I love the fact that you can transform your Arwing into a walking robot similar to that of the transformable Veritechs in Robotech. Even with a low polygon count, there is a certain beauty to these early Starfox games. It kinda forces you to use your imagination as to what the polygons are supposed to represent. Luckily, the creative artists at Nintendo made these 3-D forms spring into life with such vivid animation. Let's all hope they can port this game over to the Virtual Console!

5/19/2007 - Millimetres Matter

What do you get when you mix a high-speed camera with macro photography? You'd get something like this next video. Mythbusters may be the masters at capturing explosions at high-speed, but I've never seen anything like this. The filmmakers somehow built a tiny catapult that launches what appears to be miniature pies. Their target? Insects!

I find it amazing that the pies even hit the targets. I mean, have you ever had trouble swatting at a fly? I sure have! Those buggers are annoying! Just when you think they've landed for a rest they fly away just as you go for the swat. I work near a bee lab and nothing annoys me more than having to wash the bee poop off my car every week. And thus nothing satisfies me more than seeing one get nailed by a "tart"! I just wish it was a toothpick!

5/18/2007 - Berlitz Ad -Learn English German Humor

I'm not going to give away the punchline of this commercial by giving any details. Needless to say, if there was any commercial deserving to be on the Superbowl, it's this one:

5/17/2007 - Blue Oyster Cult

Here it is, one of the most popular SNL skits in the modern era. Of course, I'm talking about the Christopher Walken "more cowbell" skit. It's taken on a life of its own and has even inspired countless t-shirt designs:



What makes it such a great skit? First, you have the necessary Jimmy Fallon foul-up. Second, Will Farrell in a shirt that is two sizes too small. Third, the ridiculous nature of the cowbell (how is that an instrument anyway?). And finally, Christopher Walken is a god. Yes, it's quite apparent he's looking at a cue card, but he really delivers his lines.

5/16/2007 - Nintendo Wii: Welcome Back

There's definitely a market for the classic games out there. Microsoft started to really capitalize on it with the XBox Live Arcade. What's cool about some of their classic emulations is that they've enhanced the games to include multiplayer gameplay online and achievement events. Of course, Sony and Nintendo had to get into the act with their next-gen systems, the PS3 with the Playstation Network and the Wii with the Virtual Console.

The Wii's virtual console doesn't have all the bells and whistles of the XBLA, and that's a shame. I'd really love to see the original Super Mario Kart with online capability. I think I'd get a Wii on that basis alone! What it lacks with the extras, it makes up for in the games. You're never going to see any of the Nintendo games on the other emulation engines. That will be the biggest advantage Virtual Console will have in the long run, and this "commercial" exemplifies that fact. It' truly a well-done piece of fan-work:

5/15/2007 - Hi, I'm a Marvel...and I'm a DC.

The Marvel vs. DC feud has been going on pretty much since Fantastic Four #1 when Stan Lee was commissioned to do a book that would rival the Justice League. Stan took it upon himself to break out of the mold and create a superhero team that would be radically different in that it was more like a traditional family with family problems.

Stan would go on to create a mythological pantheon of heroes that stood out against the more bland DC heroes at that time. These heroes would be believable in the "real" world and always had some kind of edge to them that made their powers somewhat a curse as well as a gift. That was the genius of Stan's creations and I consider him to be a personal hero of mine.

It took the movie and special effects industries close to 40 years to catch up to Stan's vision, and now we are finally seeing the results with such hits as the X-Men and Spider-Man trilogies. Of course the DC superheroes have their own movie franchises, too, and thus the feud between the two comic book companies has extended itself into the movies. Of course, being a Marvel fan (my favorite hero is the Incredible Hulk, btw), I got a big kick out of this next video.



Whereas Marvel is releasing two or more movies a year, DC is struggling to produce one a year. While Batman Begins was a decent way to reboot the series (anything would have been an improvement over Batman and Robin), Superman Returns struggled to gain mass appeal as Bryan Singer's X-Men movies. Don't get me wrong... I'd like to see both studios doing well, as I really enjoy the comic book superhero genre. It's just that I see a similar parallel in what happened in the comic book feud between Marvel and DC as to what's happening in the movie feud. DC may be more iconic, but Marvel appeals to a greater audience.

5/14/2007 - Midget Fight On Springer

You know the term "it's like watching a train wreck"? Well, that analogy definitely applies to this next video. Fights on a Jerry Springer show is nothing unusual. In fact, I'm sure there are more episodes with fights than not. The sheer variety of them has extended to all permutations possible. There have been catfights, trans-gender fights, race wars, and those between every species of redneck out there.

This one between two dwarfs (or little people to be politically correct), however, certainly takes the cake. Just look at them go at it! The smaller one doesn't have quite the "reach" the other one has, but he makes up for it in his "pluckiness". The manner in which he manipulates himself across the floor tells me that this isn't his first brawl.

Yes, enjoying watching a spectacle like this is not a particularly admirable quality. Stuff like this is degrading to our culture and certainly does not promote brain cell activity. Why do we watch it, then? Why is it we can't avert our eyes or turn the channel? I suspect it appeals to some primordial remnant of our genetic makeup leftover from our caveman days. I'm sure that even back then there was some version of a Jerry Springer organizing versions of the fight you see in 2001: A Space Odyssey. And I'm equally sure that the surrounding cavemen were shouting "JERRY! JERRY! JERRY!"

5/13/2007 - Triumph interviews the Dorks

When Conan takes over for Leno in a few years, I certainly hope he brings Triumph along for the ride. Conan is usually on too late for me to watch, but I happened to catch this Triumph bit when it first aired and I was howling with laughter. There are just too many great lines in here to repeat.

As I mentioned in a previous blog, the people who are first in line for any big "geek" event such as the launch of a new game system or in this case a huge sci-fi/fantasy movie are probably the best group of people you'll ever meet. As Triumph demonstrates, it's quite easy to make fun of them because their fan activities wouldn't adhere to the conventions of societal normality for the other 364 days of the year. Generally speaking, they are a bunch of misfits and outcasts who have found this common purpose to congregate, and they can find comfort with each other to display their fan worship knowing that they will not be looked down upon within this inner circle.

Of course, Triumph sort of rains on their parade with a sobering dose of what people really think of them, and that makes for comedy gold. But at least they are still having a good time and they're on TV!

5/12/2007 - Mario: Game Over

It's not an accident that 8-bit nostalgia is at a peak right now. Those who grew up on the gray-box classics are now in their late 20s to early 30s, like me. We now have the resources and know-how to pay proper tribute to that which we spent many hours of the day, every day. From video reviews, to hacked ROMs, to musical skits, it's all coming like a 60's revival, and I for one couldn't be happier.

Another prevalent genre is the comedy skit, and this is the best one I've seen yet. It features Mario trying to cope in the "real" world. I always wondered what was the deal with mushrooms making Mario "Super". Was there a hidden subtext that Miyamoto was trying to put it? Were all these evil reptiles just a hallucinogenic dream? This video may shed some light on the subject...

5/11/2007 - Guy Gets an Insane Flying Kick from a Cow

Not much to say about this one... enjoy!

5/10/2007 - Banned Mythbusters Segments (2 videos)

One of the coolest Mythbusters episodes was the one with "Facts about Flatulence". I admit it, I laugh at toilet jokes, so this episode kept me rolling on the floor. You'd have to admit it too, the idea of a grown man trying to collect a sample of his own "gas" with a flatulence containment unit while laying in a bathtub is pretty funny. Adam Savage did this to test the myth that you can die from your own fumes (this myth was false, by the way).

Despite being on cable, they sort of held back on what they could do on the show. For example, they purposely did not use the "fart" word. Instead, they used the scientific term "flatus". As it turns out, the Discovery Channel banned them from airing two more flatus myths: Pretty Girls Don't Pass Gas, and Farts Can Be Lit. I only found out about these banned segments through YouTube, of course. These were shown at MIT when the Mythbusters visited the campus:





Where can I get one of those Flatus Ignition Seats?

5/9/2007 - Unnecessary Censorship

Another thing I watched when I first subscribed to cable was Loveline starring Dr. Drew Pinsky and Adam Carolla on MTV. The show was basically a call-in advice program for people with relationships problem, sex problems, addiction problems, etc. It was a guilty pleasure to see how much more weird each call to the show would get. Dr. Drew would, of course, give smart advice while Adam Carolla would just be a smart-aleck. I have to admit, though, he was pretty funny.

When Comedy Central announced their new program The Man Show would be hosted by Adam Carolla, I thought it was a perfect fit. Adam knows what real men (not metrosexuals) think, and I thought this show would be a perfect vehicle for him to cut loose. When they announced that Jimmy Kimmel would be his co-host, I said "Jimmy who?" Apparently, he was on some other Comedy Central show I never watched, so I had no idea what to expect. As it turns out, Adam and Jimmy are real life friends, and they were really good together on The Man Show. Their best skit was probably when they distributed a petition to "end women's suffrage". They took advantage of the fact that not many people know what "suffrage" really means.

Needless to say, The Man Show went downhill after Carolla and Kimmel left. I think it only lasted one more season. Jimmy Kimmel would go on to host his own late night show (named after himself). While I don't watch much of it (I'm a Leno guy), there is one skit he does each week that's a must-see. It's the "Unnecessary Censorship" segment where various video footage is shown with bleeps edited in to give the impression that an expletive was used. Something that might have totally been innocent before would sound really vulgar with a well-placed bleep. So here is a "best-of" collection of these segments:

5/8/2007 - Shop at Home people are idiots

When I first subscribed to cable TV, one of the channels I was most looking forward to was the Home Shopping Network, believe it or not. You see, I'm an infomercial junkie and I love the idea of a channel that was basically 24 hours of mini-infomercials. I don't watch the clothing items or jewelry stuff, but I really enjoy the household helpers, kitchen gadgets, and electronics. I'm easily influenced, but I have enough self-control not to go crazy and buy everything in sight.

For years it was just HSN and QVC as the premier home-shopping channels. As it turns out, QVC is really the better channel as they generally have higher quality stuff. I don't know why there was a need for another channel, but eventually Shop at Home appeared and jeez, is it crappy. They sell really generic stuff, and the discounts aren't that great. What really puts them at the bottom of the barrel, however, is their on-air personalities. I think even to call them idiots is an understatement. This video is a perfect example:



A horse? How do you mistake that for a horse?! I love how Mr. Einstein tries to delineate the "horse" features on what is clearly a moth. How anybody can buy anything from this guy is beyond me.

5/7/2007 - Developers

My brain can't get around the fact that a man like Steve Ballmer is president of the most successful software company in the world, Microsoft. This guy reminds me of Dennis Kozlowski, the former CEO of Tyco and current felon serving time. They're both real-life Lex Luthors as far as I'm concerned: greedy bald guys with big egos.

Dennis Kozlowski	Steve Ballmer
Separated at birth?

Steve Ballmer, though, is a real piece of work. This is a guy who basically gained his fortune by hanging around with Bill Gates and drinking his Kool-Aid. What really gets my goat about Ballmer is how he constantly criticizes and derides Apple and yet the Vista operating system is a bad photocopy of Mac OS X. And don't get me started about the Zune!

You can always rely on Ballmer to make a donkey of himself, however. His keynote speeches are those of a raving lunatic. Some creative Joe remixed this video and this one to come up with the next great music video. It's quite catchy, actually...

5/6/2007 - Tetris Ninjas

I got one of the original Gameboys when it first came out, and yes, it was a frickin' brick! It was supposed to be a shrunken-down NES that you could fit into your pocket. The only thing is, if you had pants with pockets THAT BIG, you'd probably be beaten up! I'm really surprised it became a hit. It was bulky, black & white, and could not handle fast-moving graphics (everything would blur like crazy). After dropping it once, my screen would have one or two columns of pixels that became missing. Also, I got tired of it eating my AA batteries so I got an external battery pack that completely destroyed the Gameboy's portability.

It did have one thing going for it, though, and that was the pack-in game Tetris. When I first heard that a puzzle game was going to be the pack-in instead of Super Mario Land, I was scratching my head. Why would Nintendo be shooting themselves in their foot like this? The original NES packed in Super Mario Bros., and Nintendo made gaming history with it. I didn't have a PC, so I did not know anything about this Tetris phenomenon. I thought that it might have been some kind of edutainment thing that would bore me to tears. Boy, was I wrong!

The beauty of Tetris (and of other good puzzle games) is that it's so deceptively simple. Complete lines with falling blocks? Sure it sounds easy, and it is at first. As the pace gets quicker, you'll see how your hand-eye coordination skills come into play. In Game A, you're trying to outdo your High Score. In Game B, though, you're trying to complete a set number of lines with random blocks in the way at startup. You weren't any kind of a Tetris guru until you beat Game B, Level 9, High 5. It's still hard for me this day. What was cool was that you'd actually get an ending! Looking back on it now, it was correct for Nintendo to have Tetris as a pack-in game. It was fun, addictive, and its graphics were so simple that the Gameboy blurriness wasn't a factor at all.

Seeing Tetris as a skit in the Boston 2007 Anime convention has definitely brought back some flashbacks. They got every little detail right, including the music tracks (my favorite was Music-1, though) and the pause screen. The folks that come up with these skits never cease to amaze me!

5/5/2007 - Super Mario Dance

I really don't know how Night at the Roxbury became a movie. I mean, the first skit on SNL was great. But the only reason I really liked it was because Jim Carrey was hilarious in it. Chris Kattan and Will Ferrell were just his comedic sidekicks as far as I'm concerned. The skit was so good that they made it a reoccurring series, sometimes featuring another guest celeb. I just don't think they were as funny as that first one.

Well, just because the movie or the following skits weren't all that great doesn't mean a parody can't work. Especially one with Mario! It's always a hoot to see Mario outside of his Goomba-stomping environment. This video also features a bit of the great Super Smash Bros. commercial.



One more thing... you KNOW this song is in my iTunes! ;)

5/4/2007 - mythbusters

I like my job, but I'd leave in a heartbeat if I were chosen as an intern for the Mythbusters. I know there is a lot of work behind the scenes, but what is onscreen looks like so much fun. What I also like about the show is that they generally follow the scientific method in their pursuit to bust popular myths.

One of the great appeals of the show is that they love to blow stuff up. From toilets to airplanes, they've blown up everything. Their most spectacular explosion, I believe, is when they blew up a cement truck to test the myth that you can clean the dry cement within the truck by using dynamite. The build-up to this explosion is great and I just love the sound of the explosion and Jamie's reaction to it.

Past Favorite - X-Men TAS Anime

The 90's X-Men animated series was probably the best Marvel cartoon series ever made. The only other series rivaling it was the 90's Spider-Man animated series, but to me, the later seasons were too serialized (how many parts were there to Sins of the Father?) The X-Men storylines were VERY faithful to the comics, and the core team they used were a pretty balanced group (I don't know why they made up the Morph character, though). I loved how they broadcasted the Dark Phoenix Saga as a 5-part primetime special during the summer. That ruled!

The only real complaint I had was the animation. It just wasn't anything special. The characters were probably drawn too realistically... I would have preferred something more stylized like Batman: The Animated Series. I was disappointed because I was expecting something along the lines of the Pryde of the X-Men pilot that aired a few years back. When the series was brought to Japan, they decided to improve the animation of the opening credits and did it anime style! They completely changed the theme song, however, and put in Japanese lyrics. While it's not bad, I preferred the American theme music.

Apparently, so did DeathsHead2 of YouTube, and thus this mashup was created. I really admire the job that was done here. Everything is synchronized down to the SNIKT of Wolverine's claws!

5/3/2007 - AOL Interview

Whoever still has an AOL account should watch this video. Really, why would anybody still use AOL as their ISP? Even if you want to keep your old AOL e-mail address, you can still use it with their WebMail outside of having an AOL account. It's the same with AIM. I really don't know what they have to offer besides an interface that's supposed to be "user-friendly", but I just find it extremely annoying.

Anyway, this poor fellow saw the light and decided to cancel his AOL account and got the customer representative from Hell. This video doesn't even show the whole call as you can see the timer jump in the window. It's amazing that Vincent didn't lose it at some point in the call. If it were me, I'd bang the telephone receiver against the table screaming to the idiot to cancel the account! Even though this "John" guy was fired by AOL, I'm sure he'll find another job at some phone bank for a credit card company.

5/2/2007 - Celebrity Jeopardy Compilation

After watching Old School, I finally understood the appeal of Will Ferrell. It's the simple fact that this man has no shame. He can go from running naked in the streets to wearing a ridiculous elf outfit to skating in a male pair team with ease. It amazes me how well he plays a drunk too.

What I miss most about him being on SNL isn't any of these fratboy antics, however. I really miss his straight man performance as Alex Trebek in the Celebrity Jeopardy skits! It doesn't matter that he doesn't look like or sound like Alex Trebek (I don't think he was even trying), the feud between him and "Sean Connery" was just classic. The insults Darrell Hammond as Connery laid on Will Ferrell got funnier each skit. You can tell they were having fun with it too.



It was also fun to see the celebrity hosts make fun of other celebrities in their imitations of them. It's just too bad they had to get rid of these skits with Will Farrell's departure. I'd really like to see Farrell, Hammond, and possibly Norm MacDonald on a real Celebrity Jeopardy show. I wonder what would "Sean Connery" say to the real Alex Trebek...

5/1/2007 - 30 minutes of 80's cartoon Openings

Man, what happened to morning and afternoon cartoons? What does a kid watch nowadays? The Today Show? Dr. Phil? You have to have the Cartoon Network to be able to watch any cartoons at all. I really don't have an explanation for this. I mean, kids have spending power... just ask my parents. :)

When I grew up in the 80's there were all these cool cartoons that captured my imagination and sparked playground conversations (there weren't any watercoolers yet). They may have been shameless in their advertising purposes, but hey, that's capitalism and it worked! We bought the action figures and playsets to recreate scenes we saw in the cartoons. Now action figures are more for collectors, never to be opened from the box. It's really sad.

Well, it's nostalgia time, and here is half an hour's worth of 80's cartoon openings. All the great ones are here... Transformers, G.I. Joe, He-Man. I just wish they included Robotech. Hmmm... none of them have aged particularly well, with the possible exception of Beetlejuice. Must be that Tim Burton post-modern design thing...

Past Favorite - Son Wins a Wii o.o

Rated R for language.

I've always thought the Stacker games you find at the malls are rigged. I mean, they look so easy. Even if you have no gaming skills, you should have enough hand-eye coordination to stack the moving blocks to reach the top. But no. I always see people "miss" on the last stack. They're doing perfectly well for the bottom stacks, and the drop exactly matches their button bush. But with the last stack, however, they're one block off and they lose. It's as if the timing for the last stack is different than the other stacks. Does this next video disprove my suspicion? Maybe, but I still wouldn't put my hard-earned cash into a Stacker game.



Man, how lucky is that guy? Winning a Nintendo Wii from a Stacker game? That's just unheard of. I was able to secure a Wii after waiting an hour and a half outside a GameStop store and I still consider myself lucky. Before that, I waited two and a half hours outside of Best Buy and I couldn't get one. And this guy wins one from a Stacker? The cellphone camera operator says it all for me.