Actually, the bits of the 90's I didn't "H8".
I guess this would actually be my "I LOVE the 90's".
So, yeah, the last two were a little dark and bitchy...so...to show the decade wasn't all horrible to me, here's my from-scratch list of things that were actually awesome about the 90's.
This stuff wasn't in VH1's lists, because...I dunno, they suck.
No...they just had to cater to mainstream tastes...but...I actually don't think the real 90's was mainstream.
The real 90's was the geek underground.
Then, the geek culture became the mainstream culture in the 00's.
But..that being so, it should've been catered to more...
So, this is the real 90's.
The one I loved, and partook in.
1990
Stephen King's It
One of the better Stephen king miniseries.
I find it to be a very worthy adaptation of the book.
Tim Curry's Pennywise is a pure delight.
And John Ritter is in it.
A fellow Stephen King fan on top of everything else that made him cool.
I really miss that guy.
Anyhoo, they're gonna remake this soon, R rated for the theater, I don't know how to feel about it.
The Incredibly Strange Film Show.
This was a series of documentaries on pretty much all the underground/maverick filmmakers.
Ray Dennis Steckler (Rat Pfink A Boo-Boo), Sam Raimi, Don Coscarelli (Re-Animator), John Waters, Jackie Chan (before he hit it big in the states), and many others.
A magnificent show.
Loved it, and it really broadened my cinematic horizons.
I was jazzed for every episode, and I wish it were out on DVD, because it still holds up.
Red Dwarf.
Loved it.
There was nothing quite like it, and still hasn't been to this day.
It's comedy sci-fi from BBC if you haven't seen it, and it's just fucking great.
Think Futurama meets Hitchhiker's Guide.
It started out with a shoestring budget, and I actually liked it better then.
It was like, a sitcom in space, complete with laugh track, and I dug that vibe.
You don't get many sitcoms in space, and if ya do, they must mostly suck, and get axed before broadcast.
Anyway, later seasons, they got more money to play with, so it became more like a funny Star Trek.
Which is still cool, and the characters were still the driving force, but...eh, those first 3 seasons had a little more magic to 'em.
But...that's just my opinion.
Anyway, track the DVDs down for these, great show.
I hear they're actually doing another season soon.
Blackadder.
A fucking masterpiece.
Fuck Mister Bean, this is the real shit.
I can barely express it in words, I just fucking love it.
This has an easy to find box set, go get it.
Oh, and Miranda Richardson, and Hugh Laurie were in this.
So that's cool.
You wanna see Hugh Laurie be not only funny, but fucking hilarious, you gotta get these.
Especially season three.
Two and three are my favorites.
Oh..right..the story.
Okay, the show is about Edmund Blackadder, and he's kind of a weasel faced prick, and he's the hero.
But, what's important to know, is each season, he dies, and then re-incarnates in the next one, and in this way, he descends through history.
As do his sidekicks.
That's kind of the gimmick.
So, first season is medieval times, second season is Elizabethan times, third is the time of King George, fourth is World War 1, and then there's a millenium special.
Anyway, Miranda Richardson is Queen Elizabeth in 2, and Hugh Laurie is Prince George in 3.
And they're fucking great.
Oh, here's a little bit of trivia for ya.
The actress who plays "Miss Miggins", in Blackadder 3, went out with Craig Ferguson for like, 8 years.
And Craig Ferguson played "confidence", in the Red Dwarf episode "confidence and paranoia".
And man, you'd barely recognize him.
But yeah, all those Blackadder and Red Dwarf people knew each other.
Great shows, both.
Mega Man 3
Well, this one was good, but it was essentially a rehash of 2, and 2 was my favorite.
But, 2 was late-80's, so I had to use this one as my way in to ranting about Mega Man.
Great series of games.
Just enough challenge to make you keep playing.
And the items were the best part.
Great powers they had through the whole series.
Metal blade from 2 was one of the greatest video game weapons ever.
A big circular saw-blade you could throw in 8 different directions, even in mid jump, or even off of ladders, and it could kill pretty much anything with 2 shots.
And it didn't use a lot of energy.
And since you could mow through literally whole swarms of enemies, you were guaranteed a steady flow of energy dots to refill the thing, so it really never ran out.
3 had a similar thing I think, but you could only throw it in 4 directions, and it had limited range, and came back like a yo-yo.
Not as good...
Oh, yeah, right, 3 added Megaman's dog, Rush, who could change into 3 vehicles.
Well, there were vehicles in 2, just without personhood, so...Rush was just some storyline razzle-dazzle, really.
3 was a rehash in every way.
But, you had new levels to play, so...
Anyway, fun games.
Kept me fairly well entertained.
Castlevania 3
I loved the Castlevania series of games.
This one was fucking hard though.
But, it's the origin of Alucard, who'd be the star of "Symphony Of The Night", so it bears mentioning.
They Might Be Giants: Flood
This came out in '90, but I bought it in 94-95.
It got me through that frikkin' Hanover job, what a bore that place was, I listened to this for a couple hours every time I got home to wash the stuffy constipation out of my head.
So, yeah, this was my soundtrack to that year.
The Ben Stiller Show
Ben Stiller before he sold his soul to Disney, Janeane Garofolo before she sold out every conviction she ever had by being on "24", and Andy Dick before he became a total fucking mess.
And Judd Apatow was one of the writers.
So, yeah, nifty little show.
George Carlin: Doin' It Again
Ah, yes, Carlin was truly becoming himself, he even admits this in his autobiography.
I wasn't hip yet though, I discovered this one retroactively.
Here's a clip...
1991
Liquid Television
Great show, birthed Aeon Flux, and Beavis & Butt-Head.
Lot of great little short films. You can find stuff like this (including the old liquid TV shorts themsleves) on Youtube now. Don't have to wait for MTV to dole it out in their little parcels. But, back in the day, TV was where you had to go. That, or animation festivals, and you have to chase that shit all over the continent, and know people. Anyway, thank you, MTV, you hadn't quite rotted away yet, and were still capable of cool things.
Super Nintendo.
Ahhh, I still get warm and gooey inside remembering this. Lotta great memories. Well, like I ranted about Pac-Man, and then NES, this was the final evolution toward TV realism.
Games finally looked like cartoons, the reality barrier had been cracked. Well, the arcade had had 16 bit for a long damned time, but us unwashed masses finally could bring it home. Yeah, games have come a long way after this, and get realler and realler with each jump in console generations, but from 16-bit onward, you really knew what you were looking at. There was no mistaking. If you couldn't get your point across with 16 bit, you sucked. Then, towards the end of it's run, they pushed even further, with lineal bitmap scans of 3-D computer models (Donkey Kong Country), photo captures of real people (Mortal Kombat), and even claymation (Clayfighter). So, yeah, they got a lot out of this little system. Lot of inventive stuff, lot of great games. Ironically, the N64 had way less of a lineup in comparison. Some jokingly call it "the Goldeneye Entertainment System", because Goldeneye was its best game. Anyway, yeah, SNES was great. I didn't get any new systems after this until all the way up to Playstation 2.
Super Mario World
The game that started it all off for the SNES. Now, this one is great, and I do love it, but I actually think Super Mario 3 was the better game.
Super Castlevania 4
I think this might quite possibly be almost the best platformer game of all time.
You could do anything.
You had this whip, that you could crack in all 8 directions, or spin around, or do all sorts of loopty-loop tricks with, or use as a grapnel in some spots. Simon's whip in this one was an even better weapon than Megaman's metal blade. The character movement was smooth, you didn't die doing jumps, play control was absolutely perfect. Just a wonderful gaming experience. Shit, I want to fire it up right now.
*Races to the Dingoo*
Metroid II: The Return of Samus
Quite possibly the best game on Gameboy. No, it is. It even looked best in color (compared to other Gameboy games) on Super Gameboy later on. Yep, I loves me the whole Metroid series.
These were up there with Mario, Megaman, and Castlevania for the all time great platformers. Y'know, it's funny, this one's kind of vanished. Metroid 1 gets re-ported to other systems, and is an unlockable in "Metroid Prime", "Metroid: Zero Mission", is a remake of 1, "Metroid Fusion", is a direct sequel to "Super Metroid", and the entire "Metroid Prime", series squeezes between 1 & 2, so the series is acknowledged, but...you can't really get 2 anymore. Either you gotta get it on Ebay, or, emulate it. Sad, they should all be remade, and put onto an "all-stars", for the latest system. What'd that be? Wii I guess... Well, Nintendo has always had a tight leash on their properties to the detriment of the fans.
Every other game nowadays, is on multi-platforms, but not Nintendo.
Never Nintendo.
Nope, you could only ever play Nintendo properties on Nintendo systems.
Mario, Metroid, Zelda, these were always jealously gaurded like a dragon's hoarde.
No need of it.
It just made their games die along with their obsolete systems.
Bad business.
Well...anyway, at least I have my memories of Metroid 2 if nothing else...
Final Fantasy 4.
Now see, this is the opposite, this came out on SNES, and got re-ported to PlayStation.
So, you can still play it.
Those in the USA may know it as Final Fantasy II.
This is IMHO, the greatest RPG ever.
They never topped it.
A lot of folks have fonder memories of 7, but..I never played it, and friends have said 7 wasn't as good as 4 & 6, so...
And I haven't heard hardly anything good about the post-7 games, indeed, I've seen brutal parody reviews.
So, yeah, 4 is the best of the FF series, which is the best series of RPGs bar none.
So, 4 is the best RPG ever.
Great everything.
Characters, story, items, spells, it's just literally ultimate.
You even get your own friggin' starship.
Best. Fucking. Game. Ever.
Star Wars: Heir To The Empire
The first of what I consider to be the Star Wars sequels.
These should have been movies with the original cast.
And this bullshit that Lucas was waiting for CGI to get good enough to make the prequels is..well, bullshit.
We've all seen the shitty things now, is there anything in there that justified 16 fucking years of thumb twiddling?
No, there fucking wasn't.
There was ample technology for films in 86, 89, & 92.
Particularly the Thrawn trilogy.
They were written with the 80's style in mind.
There was no dinosaurs, or liquid metal men or nothing.
They could've gone for it.
Hell, what little bit of CGI they might have needed for say, Kashyykk, or Coruscant...they HAD.
Fuck, they could've kept going, and done films in 95, 98, and 02, and STILL worked in the stupid prequels.
I dunno, second trilogy could've been...Jedi Academy I guess.
Anyway, these were great books, they were worthy of being films, and George Lucas really screwed the pooch.
But, least I got the books, I guess.
I'll just pretend they happened.
Alien Vs. Predator (comics)
Yep, this is where the movie franchise came from.
This pretty much put Dark Horse Comics on the map.
Now they've got their own indie studio.
Since New Line isn't New Line anymore since they booted Bob Shaye, I think Dark Horse is the new New Line.
Things don't die, they just change.
Anyway, the AVP comics were better than the movies.
Easily.
Freddy's Dead
Yeah, this wasn't really goodbye.
What a great party though.
Fun little film.
Robert Englund was clearly having a blast.
And, it was a good apology for 5, which kind of fell on its face.
Well, I already ranted about my love for this series in the 80's ones.
So, ditto all of that.
And yeah, this one was a bit cartoony, especially compared to the first couple, and how scary they were, but....eh, Freddy couldn't scare us anymore, we'd grown up with the franchise, it was time to just go out with a bang.
I didn't mind this one being a bit silly.
Although, it did have its dark moments.
I went through a film snob phase of looking down on this one for a couple years, but I got over it.
5 is the only one that really lets me down anymore.
DOS for dummies.
The birth of the "for dummies", books.
Over 2,000 of them now.
I think I had "DOS 6 for dummies", at one point.
Or, I borrowed it, I can't remember.
I think there's "HTML for idiots", lying around here somewhere too.
Yep, you can get one of these for pretty much everything.
Hopefully, they really do walk you through in a casual easy manner.
I assume so, they seem to sell well.
The parodies of these in movies and shows are as infinite as the books themselves.
"Voodoo for dummies", in "Bride Of Chucky", springs to mind.
They're quite the unstoppable cultural phenomenon.
Hey, I'll take helpful educational books with cutesy titles over worthless junk like "baby on board", any fucking day.
Got nothing bad to say about 'em.
1992
Batman Returns
I saw this at the theater, and was appalled to see small children there.
Now I find it hilarious.
The older this gets, the more I see it as a punk rock middle finger from Tim Burton, and the more I laugh and applaud.
Very subversive little film.
Even to the first one.
It left a bad taste in my mouth the first time, cuz it was so relentlessly gloomy compared to the wacky antics of Jack Nicholson's Joker...but no, it's perfect.
I'm grateful the 90's started with goodies like this.
Fuck Pretty Woman.
Dark Empire
Another Star Wars classic.
The Luke/Vader/Emperor fight was the juiciest bit of Jedi, and here we get a sequel to just that bit stretched out.
Palpatine comes back as a clone, Luke becomes the new Vader, Leia's gotta save him, and along the way, Emperor gets re-cloned into a younger version that can sword-fight.
Y'know, before the bullshit prequels said old Palpy could.
That's pretty much all you have to know.
Oh, and Boba Fett comes back (armor protected him from digesting).
It's just pure fun.
Nothing super deep.
It's Star Wars, buckle up, and enjoy the ride.
You want less fluffy, reread the Thrawn books.
They did a sort of radio play of this that was pretty decent.
Which further backs my point.
Tragic that comic book weenies could make better Star Wars than its own creator.
But, this all ties into my over-arching point about geek culture being the real culture of the 90's.
The mainstream was rotting, geekdom was where it was at.
Mostly Harmless
I was so jazzed that a new Hitchhikers was coming out.
I had read, and reread, and re-reread, and re-re-reread this series all through the 80's, since 4th grade, and loved, loved, loved them.
Well...it kind of disapointed...but, in hindsight, nowhere near as much as Star Wars prequels.
With age, I've warmed to its charms.
The ending is still a bummer though.
Then Douglas had to go and fucking die on us.
Yeah, I know, they tied the series up with "...and another thing", and I'm sure it resolves the plot threads of the characters, and I'm sure it's cute...but no way it's gonna have the genius of Douglas Adams.
I can't bring myself to read it.
Well, I got my leather-bound collection of the original five, that's my treasure.
Always will be.
Wish I could swear on the thing in court, or if I became president.
What a cool world that'd be eh?
King's Quest 6.
Okay, this came out a year before I got my first computer, and then it took another year for me to add on my first CD-ROM drive, and this came with it.
I really dug this game.
It was the first talking game (after Gauntlet) I ever played, and it was cool that every little thing you clicked in the whole entire game had some narration to it.
And everything was click-able.
Fun quest. Just the right balance of exploring, and item finding, and puzzle solving.
Story moves a good clip, lots of fun surprises, plenty of humor, just an all around neat little game.
And not too shabby for a free present to come with one's CD drive.
This, and video CDs, is when I knew for sure where computers were going, and I was excited.
This blew consoles away, and it was a world that seemingly only a few other geeks even knew about.
I was seeing a world of progress through electronics unfolding, and I wanted more of it.
And I still do.
The growing world of computers gave me something to look forward to.
This, more than anything, kept me sane in the 90's.
The world outside was full of slacker assholes, terrible music, empty nihilism, and mediocrity all the way up to politics.
Especially politics.
But, the people at Microsoft, Intel, Apple, and the various software companies didn't seem to get the memos.
They were stubbornly plowing ahead, and making the world.
And the game CDs were their secret postcards.
I loved them for it.
It was an exciting time.
A frontier time.
But, as you may know from my rants about cable, Atari, VHS,...the frontier times are always magical.
Oh, and here's some clips.
Batman: The Animated Series
Kevin Conroy IS Batman for a whole generation.
Rightly so.
Ditto Hamill's Joker.
Wonderful series.
Can't be topped.
Put it in the Smithsonian.
George Carlin: Jammin' In New York
Another George Carlin masterpiece.
I still wasn't hip.
Had to discover this one retroactively too.
The Planet Is Fine.
1993
The 7th Guest
And yep, this is when this one came out, but again, it'd take a couple years for me to find it.
Another wonderful CD game.
I think it still holds up as a classic.
This used full motion video in its cut scenes.
Think it was the first to do so...
No biggie today, but that was really something for the time.
And as a horror story, it does a good job of establishing a spooky atmosphere.
You don't see that much anymore.
Horror movies today go straight for the torture porn, and as for the novels...shit, ARE there even horror novels since King semi-retired?
Even the stuff he writes anymore is essentially sci-fi.
Nice game, full of memories, gave me funky dreams, one of those ones where you feel like you've actually been to the place, and if you go back, it's like a literal memory lane.
Vice City does that to me too.
I never played the sequel "The 11th Hour", I heard a lot of people say it sucked, and...my crummy computer couldn't handle it.
Bare minimum was Pentium, I was 486 for the longest time.
By the time I bumped up to my second computer, it had swept out of the stores.
Which was weird, because you could still get 7th Guest for ages.
Eh, doesn't matter, 7th Guest is the one I fondly remember.
I peeked at 11th Hour cut-scenes on Youtube...meh.
Didn't miss much.
Anyway, like I ranted about KQ6, this was another push of the edge of a frontier, and it was exciting.
I'm so glad I was there for it.
Oh, and here, enjoy the opening, and some of the music.
Joe Bob Briggs.
Joe Bob hosted "TNT's Monstervision", a showcase of old horror flicks, and relatively modern B-movies, and he was really cool.
Funny bastid.
Always dug how nothing phased him, and he kinda smirked and drawled through no matter what it was.
He'd even give a total of how many kills and boobs were in the flick.
They don't have hosts like that anymore.
Shit, they don't even do up horror good on TV anymore, last Halloween was a wasteland, I was stunned.
Luckily, I got enough DVDs, but I could always use more.
The State
A funny little sketch comedy show from MTV.
The cast of "Reno 911", pretty much all came from this.
If you liked that, you'd like this.
Same people, same humor.
Course, it was good, and on MTV, so they killed it.
Army Of Darkness
Another great trilogy came to an end.
Why, ten years after Return Of The Jedi even!
Yeah, you had to be a well versed Evil Dead fan to recognize from the ads that this was really Evil Dead 3.
But, it was easy.
Ash with his chainsaw hand, the little couple-second bit of the Oldsmobile plopping to the ground, what else had that but Evil Dead 2?
It took a few times of that ad playing before it truly clicked, and I got all jazzed.
Still love this trilogy, naturally, I've got it on DVD.
Oh, man...Evil Dead 1 used to be a bitch to get ahold of on VHS, and I remember paying 50 bucks for the fucking thing at the closeout sale at Home Vision Video.
Ouch.
Now you can get the DVD everywhere, and for sure, somewhere, it must be discounted to under 10 bucks.
*Head shakes, and sighs*
Well, not like I should've waited for DVD, cuz I would've been waiting a long time, so, still glad I grabbed that VHS.
Oh, and of course, I saw Evil Dead 2 back in '89 on the recommendation of my dead friend, Mark.
There truly shone a good deed...
*Sad sigh*
Howard Stern: Private Parts (the book)
This was yet another big life changing moment.
Imagine the holy-roller chick choir in the background, and the shaft of sunlight in the face.
Pretty much it.
I had kind of been beaten down by the system, and been momentarily hypnotized into thinking it was time to put away weird/geeky things to be "more mature", or some horseshit, especially with graduation, and my first neck-tie job.
Then Private Parts comes along, and shows me this guy who built his life up on telling The Man where to get off, and saying whatever the fuck he wanted.
It was fucking beautiful.
I literally almost wept reading this thing.
He went through as much, if not MORE adversity than I had, putting up with grey, fearful, constipated fucking people, but he WON!
I saw someone who had been doing what I'd been doing, and WON.
That was VERY exciting.
Very inspirational.
Fuck "chicken soup for the soul", "Private Parts", is inspiration!
It cured me of the programming they had been trying to beat into me over night.
That night it was all gone, like a light switch being flicked.
I mean, yeah, I put on my mask for my dumb jobs, and shit, but I was reminded by Stern's story how fake, and NASTY this so-called "civilized", society can fucking be.
That's what always got to me while growing up, all these rules, and manners, and phony religious/political/civic beliefs they try to impress onto you, are allegedly meant to make life NICER...but these people get so fucking NASTY and VINDICTIVE when you don't eat, breath, blink, and smell exactly like them.
It's not about NICE, it's about POWER.
Petty small power too.
Fuck 'em.
Fuck 'em all.
That was my take away.
But it wasn't upsetting, it was thrilling.
Someone else got it.
My only regret reading this, is shitty fucking Maine never, ever, ever, EVER picked up his show.
Stupid rustic hicks.
Yeah, you'll listen to Rush though, ya troglodytes.
Okay, that's not fair, we just never got the show all through the 90's...like how the cable companies fucked us out of MST3K,...we got Stern for like..6 months or so...just before he went to Sirius.
And it had an audience, so, the state ain't all cavemen.
I gotta find those people.
Ayway, yes, this book filled me with joy.
I was far from alone.
Not by a long shot.
I saw this now.
Even though I've always been cut off from his radio show, at least I had the books, and the movie, and other little thin trickles, talk show appearances, the short-lived E! show...
Now there's Youtube.
Thank you, Howard Stern, for opening new doors, by re-opening old ones.
That's a helluva trick.
Hail to the king of all media!
The John Larroquette Show.
The last truly edgy live-action sitcom.
Larroquette started out as the voice-over in "Texas Chainsaw Massacre", then he was best known as the sexually depraved Dan Fielding from "Night Court", then he did some promo ads for the free-preview weekends of Disney Channel, and then he was in this.
He played an ex-alchoholic who ran a bus station, and his friends were pretty much all hookers and hobos.
I'm genuinely amazed this was on TV.
The network fucked with it, but surprisingly, it hung on until '96.
I wasn't exactly a fan, I only caught a handful of episodes, but admired Larroquette as an actor, and was glad this show existed.
I gotta tell ya, you know me, I like edgy, and this thing, especially in its earliest episodes was almost TOO edgy, even for me, I actually got creeped out a few times.
I gotta rewatch this someday, I could probably take it now.
I miss Larroquette.
Oh, he didn't die or nothin, just..where is he?
Last I saw, he re-did his monotone deadpan for the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre", remake.
It was the only highlight.
Truly.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
The best of the modern Trek spinoffs.
It had a bit of a rocky time in the first couple seasons, the nerds were brutal, but it found itself, and really took off, and shut up the whiners.
Great show.
Ended right on 2000 too, so we had it through most of the decade.
Yep, there was always good Trek to watch in the 90's, I always forget that.
Took it for granted, I guess.
Late Night With Conan O'Brien
Loved it.
Had a rocky start, but I dug what they were up to, even when it was clunky and awkward.
A noticable generatonal change from Jay & Dave.
Oh, I got a letter on there once.
It was a homemade "get well soon", card for The Gaseous Weiner.
The actor who played him broke his leg, y'see, and fans were encouraged to send letters.
Mine got on air.
That's kinda neat.
Look, you'll just have to believe me.
Anyway, the new TBS show is like a timewarp back to '93.
I gotta watch it more.
Movies Unlimited catalog
Don't know what caused us to get on the list, but my family got one of these out of the blue.
It was pure Heaven.
Basically, a movie catalog as thick as a phone book, with every single movie that was out on VHS that could ever be had.
This was shortly before DVD, mind.
I call it "paper Amazon".
They're still around, except now they deal solely in DVD.
Also, they've partnered up with TCM.
You see ads on there all the time.
It was hard for me to remember exactly what year we started getting these, but I remember ordering Evil Dead 2 in high school, so it had to be '93 or thereabouts.
We started getting stuff out of this immediately.
And the beauty of the book was, you could use it as a paper IMDB too, the write-ups were good, and you could cross-reference by actor.
Between this, and "Incredibly Strange Film show", I became an adept film geek very quickly.
The former was the match, this was the dynamite.
Now, there's IMDB, and Amazon, but this is how we did it in the old school.
I still wish these came, they're still cool, and you don't have to boot-up a catalog.
Jason Goes To Hell
Okay, this movie was ass, but, the ending hinted towards "Freddy Vs. Jason", which got me chasing every scrap of news, hoping each year that it was coming.
Little did I know it would take almost exactly a fucking decade.
Thankfully, it didn't disapoint when it finally did come.
Lotta waiting for movies in the 90's...
Beyond 2000
Well, this is when it started on Discovery Channel, anyway.
This was a pretty cool show.
It was an Australian import.
Pretty much the first "what gadgets are coming up the pike", show.
Now there's the whole G4 network for this.
And BBC's got a show like it, I think.
Yeah, a lot of the junk on here went nowhere, but a lot of it we have now, and a lot of it we still don't have.
Like terabyte instant-retrieval holographic crystal hard drives still haven't become commercial products.
What's the holdup on those, scientists?
I find it odd that a holographic DVD is coming up the pike before these.
Anyway, the show was literally ahead of its time.
The title lived up to itself.
I devoured this as faithfully and eagerly as "the incredibly strange film show".
1994
Megadeth: Youthanasia
Ah, yes, a metal band who paid no heed to the rest of the music scene.
They plowed right ahead pretty steadily.
Wonderful.
Fell in love with this, and "countdown to extinction", at Toys R US.
Had to go out and buy them immediately after.
Still have 'em, still play 'em.
Youthanasia is my favorite.
Everything on that one is gold.
Geez, I gotta catch up with their newer stuff...
..or, maybe not, maybe the magic of this album is that it takes me back to my only good work experience.
Anyway, great metal group.
They're pretty much the real Dethklok.
Well, personality wise, musically, they're better.
Duckman.
Fun show.
Who knew Klasky/Csupo had this in 'em, eh?
The satire plays a bit ham-fisted now, but at the time, it was pretty edgy stuff.
Remember, Family Guy and South Park hadn't come around yet, and Simpsons, while clever then, was still restricted, and pretty toothless.
So, this was the edgiest game in toon-town.
And Jason Alexander was just friggin great.
Especially doing a rant.
So, naturally, they wrote at least one for him per episode.
If not three or four.
He was almost a sort of animated Morton Downey.
Fun shit.
Yeah, not exactly as great as I rememebered, but nostalgia fills in the gaps for me, and I still love it.
The Critic.
Yeah, the satire and parodies in this one were pretty limp, I won't pretend, but this one was more about characters.
You had Jon Lovitz, you had Park Overall as his girlfriend, you were all set.
Everyone else was gravy.
Often a bit cutesie, but compared to shitty live-action sitcoms out there...
I think I said it before, but the music scene had gone to shit, but animation took up the torch for that social significance.
Like I said about New Line, things don't die, they just change.
I wasn't appreciating that on a conscious level at the time.
I should have been, I wouldn't have been so mopey.
Well...yeah, I would have.
I was just plain depressed, that got in the way a lot.
But, I can cut through that bullshit now with hindsight.
Babylon 5
Well, at the time, I thought this was a fucking masterpiece, but I'd like to see it now to see if it holds up.
I've heard friends say it doesn't.
I'm gonna have to go with nostalgia for now, and say masterpiece.
They should have won awards.
Well, they probably got every sci-fi award the nerd community could muster, but I'm talking Emmys.
They should have had a garage full of Emmys.
Well, again, mainstream, rotting, you know the drill.
Space Ghost Coast To Coast
I caught the reruns in the 00's but this was great.
A friggin' riot.
I wish they were still making these but...you can't fight the writers getting burnt out.
You could tell.
That'd be a hard show to keep up, I'm amazed they did it as long as they did.
Oh, right, I had to catch it in reruns, cuz Cartoon Network was another one the cable company was playing keep-away with.
Fuckers.
Miserable hateful fuckers.
Inside The Actor's Studio
Said it before, I just plain like this show.
Kiss my ass if ya don't, I don't wanna hear it.
I was first aware of its existance from the Will Farrell SNL parody.
Which even Lipton thinks is great.
I wish more of the best episodes were out on DVD.
Especially Carlin.
Super Metroid
Metroid finally came back to console.
And it was worth the wait.
Very good entry in the series.
Beautiful graphics.
Although, I miss the spider-ball power from 2, that was awesome.
One of the best game powers ever.
Maybe they brought it back, or its equivalent, in Metroid Prime, I dunno.
I'll never know, I ain't got Gamecube.
But, this one was good.
I love how one of the later levels is the first level of the first game, so, it's literally going back home.
I love nostalgic shit like that.
Well...hence these lists, eh?
Final Fantasy 6.
A.K.A Final Fantasy III.
Kind of a homicidal Ziggy Stardust.
Yeah, it's a good one, but again, I prefer 4.
4 and 6 together are the Final Fantasy series to me.
Final Fantasy: Pray
I think I bought this in '95-96-97.
Sometime around there.
Could be as late as '99, but I don't think so.
I'm gonna go with '97, cuz I sampled the MP3s off the 'net, and my second computer was up to it, not my first, so, that would make it post-Wal-Mart.
Anyway, it was music from Final Fantasy 1-6 orchestrally jazzed up, and sung vocally by this Japanese chick.
The songs were sung in various languages, including English, Japanese, and French.
And IMHO, they were beautiful.
It was a small clique of geeks that even knew about this at the time.
It was pretty underground.
I think they've re-released it since, so awareness may have increased.
But, yeah, anime/game stuff like this sustained me musically.
It was out of the mainstream, and different, and didn't have the American passive-agressive selfish stupid nastiness to it that most of the culture was tainted with at the time.
It was just sincere, and well constructed, no bullshit.
It really mellowed me out.
Fond memories.
Here's a couple tracks..
Donkey Kong Country
Cute game, never beat it all the way through, though.
I thought they could have gone a long way with pushing the bitmapped 3-D model trick, and squeezed some more years out of the system.
I think they even could have cheated a bunch of the N64 games.
But...no, they had a new console to sell, so, these were the waning years for good ol' reliable SNES.
Tch, alas.
Cuz the first generation of 3-D was pretty clunky and ugly.
I thought DKC actually looked nicer than a lot of the N64 lineup.
Anyway, the times, they were a changing.
Like it or not.
Tekken
Okay, I never played this, or knew anyone who did, but I do have a memory involving it.
A spambot was gatling-gunning the early boards I went to with ads for this fucking thing.
Annoying ads.
Fucking annoying ads.
And 'round about the same time, the dot-com bubble was still inflating, and this whole new generation of miserable Wall-Street obsessed, day-trading, neo-yuppie pond-scum were slurping off of the game industry, and thus, part of the ad was like, arcane sales figure shit about the game that only one of these insufferable yuppie douche-bags would care about, so I flipped the fuck out, and attacked the bot with a parody.
I can't remember how exactly it went, but the thematic arc was how all these gen-y kids coming up were being hypnotized into the game industry for cynical money reasons, and not artistic creativity, and button-mashing mind-numbing fighters like Tekken represented that cold intellectual dullness, and one of the key repeated lines was "play Tekken Johnny!!".
I was like those dancing 9/11 Palestinians.
Anyway, it was indeed a good thing in the long run, the evolutionary chaffe was cleansed away.
The real digital future could proceeed unhindered by greedy morons.
Well...less of 'em.
I hope those people are still in pain, and that Johnny shot his folks, and ran away to Mexico.
And he tossed the Tekken CD at their surprised dead faces.
It's a warming image, and I can dream...
Nine Inch Nails: Closer
Yeah, some of this early goth-rock was actually interesting.
It stole a lot from Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson's stage antics especially, but..dammit, we needed something to jar us out of the grunge doldrums.
Anyway, I dunno about NIN's other songs, but this one holds up.
This one will be remembered for awhile.
Especially the artsy-fartsy video.
It's just pretentious enough.
And you've got pig heads, and boobies, and a monkey.
Fun stuff.
Oh, and it got used in the ads for "The Maxx".
I didn't hate this.
I didn't hate this a lot.
Kids In The Hall (ends)
Good show.
Caught the reruns on Comedy Central in the 00's.
Didn't have fuckin' HBO.
Steve "of the karate kid incident, and the Freddy initiation", was an insufferable git about how he got to see it, and how it was so much better than SNL.
Well, it was, but it wasn't so good that one could be a pretentious asshole about it.
I mean, seeing it in the 00's it was pretty hit or miss, as much so as SNL ever was.
And the weaker skits were pretty clunky indeed.
And you know what? I hated Bruce McCuluch.
I found him obnoxious, annoying, and hacky.
The true stars were Dave Foley, and Scott Thompson, but no, Bruce fucking McCulloch was shoved in your face.
Mark McKinney's fucking chicken lady sucked too.
Lotta lame shit on there.
But, a lot of good too.
They pushed boundaries SNL had pussied out on ages ago, and have never gotten back to.
Well, as bad as some of it has held up, including whole friggin' castmembers, it must have been an absolute fuckin' revolution in the late-80's/early-90s.
I'll never have that experience of seeing it all the way through in its proper timeframe.
I can only faintly imagine.
Maybe I would have gotten on with Steve better on the tail end of high school.
...nah, we grew apart.
Y'don't fix that.
Anyway, they've come out with a new show "death takes a holiday",..meh, they're old farts now, it ain't the same.
It's like aging Beatles, y'know?
The Big Book Of...
These were fuckin' great.
I think they won Eisner Awards.
It all started with "The Big Book Of Urban Legends", and indeed, it has all of them.
Anyway, they're graphic novels done by multiple artists and writers each, that contain every miniscule detail of the subject in the title.
I have them in my reading list.
Here's the direct link.
Collect the whole set, and I swear there's practically a college education in the things.
Well, you'll need the Dune novels for your humanities.
But yeah...
Razor & Tie 80's CDs
(Totally 80's, Awesome 80's, Forever 80's, Back To The 80's)
Ahh, yes, these babies came along in the nick of time.
A treasure trove of 80's goodness.
Well, I'd had some similar tapes before this, but these were better.
A wonderful collection.
Well chosen hits.
Megadeth, anime, and 80's classics were my antidote to, and escape from, the awful music scene.
Damn, it was awful.
MTV and the radio were poison, you couldn't go near 'em then.
It sure didn't help my depression.
Man, wouldn't MP3 players have come in handy.
People take their power of infinite choice and mobility those bring so much for granted now.
Don't ever.
You have no idea.
Or, if you relate to my tales, maybe ya do.
Ed Wood
I think I can safely say, this is the best Tim Burton movie ever.
Gotta be up there with the best Johnny Depp movies too.
A masterpiece.
If there were nothing else, this film alone would single-handedly save the 90's.
It's just great.
Its history is a bit fuzzy, but it can be forgiven.
Think of it as an Ed Wood movie about Ed Wood.
Martin Landau was simply magnificent as Bela Lugosi.
Well, he won an Oscar for it, didn't he?
Well, anything I could possibly say about it has been said a million times.
This one will live forever.
I love it. I could watch it every day.
Wes Craven's New Nightmare.
I gave a fist pump and a "YES!!!", when the ads came out for this.
I knew Freddy wasn't dead.
Well...it's an interesting film.
You'll hear that line a lot from fans.
Well, Bob Shaye himself says it "it was cerebral, but not scary".
But, I happen like the cerebral stuff it does.
It's an interesting reflection on the series, particulalry the first one, I like all the ways it mirrors the first one, I like its brutal sendup of Hollywood, and its stepping outside of the Freddy fandom phenomenon.
And I like the way it plays with the layers of reality moreso than the first one.
It's...kind of a bonus feature.
You wouldn't watch this at all unless you were a fan of the series.
And it's kind of a prelude to the "Never Sleep Again", documentary.
I like it.
It's grown on me.
Well, I go back and forth with it.
But, so does Craven himself.
The George Carlin Show.
Now, here my memory plays tricks with me, cuz I could've SWORN I saw "back in town", before this.
But, I guess that's empirically impossible.
So...I guess this is where I got hip to Carlin.
Well, I had of course seen him before in "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure", and "Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey", and as the gay guy in "Prince Of Tides", and...I have very faint recall of seeing bits of his HBO special "Carlin At Carnegie", way back in '83, but...at the time, he was doing observational stuff about breakfast cereals, and pets,...so I payed it little heed, so, I wasn't really tuned into Carlin yet.
But, this changed that.
Despite network restrictions, this was the curmudgeonly Carlin I would come to love.
What a great show.
This should be on DVD.
Think of some of the miserable shit they put out that had even shorter episode runs.
It's literally a cultural crime this isn't for sale.
Well, I have my fading memories, anyway.
There's one line I remember, that burnt into my head forever.
Well, more like, my brain instantly grasped onto it, like Golem clutching his precious.
Yeah, George was leaving an impact on me right away.
Little did I know what was coming.
Bill Hicks dies.
Sadly, I was oblivious to this.
Now...Spencer once ranted about who his favorite comedian was, and that he was edgy, and a chainsmoker...and dead.
I didn't retain the name...but on reflection, it must have been Bill Hicks.
Who else could it have been?
But, Bill Hicks was super-duper underground at the time, and I didn't know anyone who could hook me up with bootlegs.
Hell, spencer was clearly hesitant to do so.
Ahh, I hate how I was left out of stuff.
Always turned out to be brain nourishment I desperately needed too.
What, I wasn't evolved or hip enough?
Of course not, I hadn't seen the thing yet!
Anyway, little did I know, his death would be the catylist for me learning about him.
Too bad it wasn't him being alive, and making it as big as Carlin or Pryor.
If I had known, I would've been busted up by it.
Wish I could have known about him in the 90's, that would have fixed everything.
Everything that depressed me about the 90's, he hated too, and sliced and diced it.
It was a thing of true beauty.
That kinda drives me nuts, one of the feelings that fueled my depressions then, was this oppressive sense of lonliness, and...here was this secret community of like minds I was cut off from, and I didn't even know it.
Goddammit.
Well, it would get better.
Thanks to Hicks.
And thanks to the internet.
But later.
Tch,...always later.
1995
Final Fantasy: Love Will Grow
The companion/sequel to FF:Pray.
Bought it at the exact same time as Pray.
Ditto what I said about Pray for this one.
Hmm, yeah, probably was '97 when I got these.
FF7 was out at the same time, I know that.
Yeah, 97.
Here, more clips.
Aeon Flux
This was MTV's last brush with artistic magnificence.
Well, this, and "The Maxx".
All downhill from here.
This show was pure art.
It was strange, surreal, dreamlike, and indeed, it turns out Peter Chung got a lot of ideas from his dreams.
It's impossible to describe, you just have to watch it.
The '05 live action movie didn't live up to this at all.
It was okay, as its own thing, but...you could've stripped the Aeon flux name off it, and hardly notice a difference.
Well, at least you get to see Charleze Theron prance around in spandex and leather.
I think Michelle Forbes was a better live-action dead-ringer for the animated Aeon though.
Every geek thought so.
But, y'know, Hollywood...
Well, it's freakish the movie even got made.
I mean, a cult animation property from a decade prior?
All right...
Anyway, great show.
Beautifully weird.
The Far Side (ends)
Wow...its been gone this long?
Well, it was a great run of a great strip, and I'm glad Gary Larson bowed out before it got as tired as Garfield, or Blondie, or one of those.
When you look at how lifeless the funny-pages are now, you really appreciate what a gift this strip was.
I miss ya, Gary.
I miss ya a helluva lot.
Well, I got the 5 collections, and "pre-history of The Far Side".
I miss the pull-off calenders though.
Yeah, life was sweet with some Far Side sprinkled on.
Something else I took for granted.
Howard Stern: Miss America
Or, as I think of it, Private Parts 2.
Yeah, this one was okay.
It covered his unsuccessful run for governer of New York, some stuff about the attempted Fartman movie, a bullshit account of him meeting Michael Jackson, and some random snippets from his show.
Funny, but not the revelation Private Parts was.
I was happy to add it to the bookshelf though.
Crumb
My favorite documentary of all time.
Another one I could watch every day.
About the underground cartoonist, Robert Crumb, who created "Fritz The Cat", and "Mr. Natural".
I keep reading stuff like "disturbing", and "unsettling", in the reviews, and...I must be really fucked up, cuz I get warm uplifting feelings off this thing.
I see a misanthropic misfit leading a pretty okay life, on his own terms, with a family that understands and loves him.
Okay, those brothers of his are a fucking mess, but...I was fascinated.
I found a lot to relate to with his artistic struggles; and like the Stern book, it was encouraging.
I keep waiting for a sequel/update of this.
I better not hold my breath though.
Shit, I feel like watching it right now.
Canadian Bacon
Even people that hate Michael Moore's guts love this movie.
John candy had done a string of...let's say...disapointing films, and thankfully, Moore released this at just the right time after his death to give us something better to remember him by.
Everyone's probably seen it by now, but just in case, it's about the US economy being in a slump, so the government engineers a phony Cold War with Canada.
It's a fuckin' riot.
And, sadly, it predicted a lot of the horseshit we put up with surrounding "the War On Terror". But, that only makes it more intetresting IMHO.
Anyway, it's got a wonderful cast, everyone's great, there's even a Dan Ackroyd cameo.
I happen to think it's a comedy classic period, not just a cult film.
If you somehow missed out, check it out.
Tank Girl
I had a weird crush on Lori Petty in this.
Eh, still had my 80's punk-rock girl fetish going on...
It's not a GREAT film or anything...but I enjoyed it.
You got Malcolm McDowell as a villain, that's always a plus.
Ice-T was a kangaroo man...
Rachel Talalay who directed and co-wrote "Freddy's Dead", directed this, she's pretty cool.
Just a fun flick that made me happy.
*Shrug*
Sliders
This showed so much promise, but never before have I seen a show jump so many fuckin' sharks.
Ouch.
But, in those early seasons, it was really good.
I gained a new appreciation for John Rhys-Davies from this.
He's really a cool cat.
He lobbied for the show to be hard-sci-fi, and bailed when they wanted to make it dumb for the masses.
So, if you Netflix, Torrent, or buy this, bail on it when his character gets killed off.
One thing this show did demonstrate, was Jerry O'Connel's luck-invincibility powers.
The implosion of this show didn't seem to touch him, and he keeps getting plum roles, and ended up with Rebecca Romijn.
And Piranha 3-D?
Piece of shit, it made 80 million dollars.
The guy stumbles over piles of gold.
It's infuriating.
Yet I like the guy.
It's part of his damnable superpower.
Curses.
MadTV
Yeah, this is gone now.
It was a bold experiment, and it was often funnier than SNL.
Which wasn't hard.
And it attached the MAD brand to something successful, when the magazine had gone to shit.
A lot of memorable characters, it never made any BIG stars, like SNL, but it had people I liked, and continue to follow.
Alex Borstein, who voices Lois on Family Guy came from this.
Nicole Sullivan was the queen of this show.
*Checks wiki*
Well, she's on "Shit My Dad Says", right now, that seems to be doing good.
Michael McDonald was like, the Phil Hartman of this show, he had a million characters, and hung on for a decade.
He shoulda been a star.
Will Sasso, and Deborah Wilson were cool.
Artie Lang was on for the first couple seasons, I dug him, but he got fired for being a major drunk.
Come on, Belushi never got fired.
Meh...he's got the Stern gig now.
MadTV had a lot of clunky shit, but every sketch show does.
Hell, even Python.
I remember it fondly overall.
It was my escape pod from SNL when it got really shitty.
Course, when MadTV itself lost all its good castmembers, and got awful, it WAS time for it to leave.
Now, if someone would just have the balls to put a mercy bullet in SNL.
Goodbye, MadTV, you meant well, and did well.
Few shows do these days.
I thank you.
Oh, and there's currently an animated "MAD", show on Cartoon Network now that's trying to be like the magazine...don't watch it...just don't...
Cybill
Okay, I have only one clear memory of this.
One time, at a hotel in Nova Scotia, I conked out watching TV, flipping channels, and this came on while I was asleep, and the theme song became part of my dream.
In the dream, I was driving a car made of tinfoil, and being chased in a real car by Cybill Shepherd, and the Cybill theme song was the chase music, that kept repeating over and over in a loop.
My tinfoil car finally stalled out, so I got out, and started running, and Cybill Shepherd grabbed the tinfoil car by the bumper, picked it up, (as it essentially weighed nothing) and slammed it repeatedly against the curb until it caved in, and crumpled into a nugget.
She had this weird look of demented satisfaction on her face while she did it too.
So, the moral is, if you have a tinfoil car, don't drive it anywhere you expect to run into Cybill Shepherd.
She'll crumple it up on ya.
She's just like that for some reason.
Don't bother to ask why, it's just one of those things.
WB network premiers
I'm totally with with Dave Chappelle when it comes to the frog mascot.
Yeah, there was never anything good on this.
Well, okay, there was some good cartoons I guess.
Now, it's "The CW", and it's got..um..Smallville...which is okay, but their one good show..*shrug*
UPN network premiers.
Well..it had...um..Voyager..and...Enterprise...um, yeah.
And now, it's the other half of the transporter fusion that makes up CW.
Meh.
Well, it shows how hard it can be to make a new channel...but...cable seems to have no problem popping 'em out like bunnies..*shrug*
Drew Barrymore flashes David Letterman
The last sweet thing she did, before getting tainted by Tom Green, and then becoming an obvious Hollyood player phony.
Man, I really wanted to plow her back in these days.
I mentioned having her Playboy pics in the 80's ones, right?
Yeah...
That crush has died out.
1996
DVD
I remember reading the storage specs on these in a science mag before they even came out, and being excited.
I already knew from CD-ROM what was possible, this was the next jump.
I thought they'd be a side thing, like Laserdisc.
Not for once, did I imagine them replacing VHS.
Which was slow of me, cuz I'd convereted over to CD by then, and knew how that jump went.
I was a really late adopter.
At first, it was because the players cost a fortune, of course.
Then, my excuse was how snobby the video-philes were, and didn't want to be a part of their scene.
Then...it really came down to I stubbornly didn't want to, because I'd invested over a couple grand in my VHS collection, and it'd be a bitch to pull a u-turn with a cruise ship, y'know?
But, meh, it wasn't that bad, looking back.
I got frugal about what movies I really love, and after 10 years, I have a decent sized collection, even with the crap eliminated.
Now, it's all about Blue-Ray, and on my last visit to Best Buy, they're phasing DVD out!
DVD was one stinking aisle!
Shit...
Wonder how long they're going to keep backward-compatibility around...
Anyway, my first DVD player was Playstation 2.
And I got that solely for Vice City at first.
Yeah, DVD was leaps better, no doubt.
And it's stunning how quickly it wiped VHS out.
From DVD to Blue-Ray seems to be going head-spinningly faster than that.
Tenchi Muyo.
Okay, this actually started in 1992, but this is when the Tenchi movie, "Tenchi Muyo In Love", came out, then came to cable, on Sci-Fi Channel's "saturday anime", lineup, and thus, when my awareness of the series started.
Then, via the internet, I found out more, and used Movies Unlimited, and websites to gradually aquire the whole series in VHS.
I've since switched over to DVD, of course.
DVD was easier, thank goodness for box sets.
Lightsabers, time travel, paradoxes, superheroes, punk rock girls, monster battles, explosions, humor, it's like the Japanese peered into my head.
So, naturally, I was an instant fanboy, and needed more.
Ayep, Tenchi fandom, expanding to an all purpose anime fandom, was another layer of alternative geek culture that got me through the 90's.
Oh, yeah, and everything I said about FF:Pray as compared to American culture, apply that too.
Yep, had me a good time with Tenchi.
Ghost In The Shell.
Fuck "The Matrix", this is the real shit.
Well, you can see the heavy "Blade Runner", influence in this, no doubt.
Eye popping animation, great atmosphere and story, juicy philosophy, really is a modern classic.
I recommend it highly.
Duke Nukem 3-D
Before this, there was Wolfenstein 3-D, then I think DOOM, then this one hit it out of the park.
The First Person Shooter had truly risen.
Yeah, Duke steals a lot from Ash, and Snake Plisskin, and even the guy from "They Live", but, it's a loving tribute, and it's a fun as hell game.
Unlimited mods out there on the internet.
Could probably play it forever.
One wonders how new games get sold with play value like this.
I hear the next sequel to this is out.
Or..on the way...I dunno, I don't stay on top of the game scene anymore.
Star Trek: First Contact
The first and last good one of the Next Generation movies.
I'm with the folks that place it up there with "Wrath Of Khan", "Voyage Home", and "Undiscovered Country", for all time great Star Trek flicks.
I guess I could add the J.J.Abrams one too.
Wow, FC is 15 years old now, hmm...
Yeah, 15 years after 1982 would be 1997, and Khan was considered a classic by then.
Yep, FC is a classic.
Kewl.
Fargo
Man, VH1 saw fit to throw in "the big Lebowski", for Coen Brothers movies, then left out THIS one?!?!
This is their fucking "Citizen Kane", man!
Yep, love this movie, everything about it.
Yeah, most people rave about the log chipper scene, but I like every minute Peter Stormaire is onscreen.
Spooky villain.
He needs to be on a top 10-20 list somewhere.
Well, like Ed Wood, it's all been said by everyone else.
If you haven't seen this...what, have you been in a coma?
The Maxx
MTV's other last brush with pure magnificence.
This show...is impossible to describe without ending up writing a fucking thesis.
Here's a wiki link.
It's only a shame that they only got 13 episodes in.
And, that, (IMHO) the comic jumped the shark, so that later episodes would have been a let-down anyway.
But, those first 15 issues or so, masterpieces of the medium.
Sonic CD
I never actually played this, but the song I remember...
Sonic Boom!!
Tool: Aenema
Dedicated to Bill Hicks.
I wasn't hip to Tool, or Hicks at this point.
Always playing catch-up...
Anyhoo, dig the chorus.
"Here in this hopeless fucking hole we call LA
The only way to fix it is to flush it all away.
Any fucking time. Any fucking day.
Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona bay".
"Arizona bay", of course, a reference to the Bill Hicks album "Arizona Bay", which in turn is a reference to what would be left when California has the final death-quake, and breaks off of the United States, and sinks into the ocean.
Ahh, a fun ditty, Bill would've loved it.
Here, enjoy the video.
Aenema.
Nintendo 64
Heh, heh, like I said above "Goldeneye Entertainment System".
But that ain't fair.
There was also "Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time", and "Legend Of Zelda: Majora's Mask".
Those were pretty big.
"Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon", was a laugh riot of Japanese weirdness.
The Castlevania games blew donkeys though.
They don't count.
Count, get it? Heh heh.
And of course, like NES, and SNES, it started off with a Mario game, that being "Mario 64".
It was pretty fun.
And of course, there was Goldeneye.
That's being re-released with upgraded tweaks for Wii I hear.
But...like I said before, there wasn't much of a lineup.
NES had hundreds, SNES had a couple hundred, N64 had...I dunno a little over 100, and only a handful were any good.
I never had N64, but I played some of the games.
An okay little system, but it always felt like a middle-state in evolution to me...
Turns out I was right.
Playstation 1 was clunky, but it showed the way as far as media went.
Sony would be the winner in the long run.
Shadows Of The Empire
Speaking of N64...
This was one of the great games of the system, I count this as a bona-fide Star Wars movie.
But, the game was part of a larger thing, a media tie-in event described as "everything around the movie but the movie".
So, if you pretend there was a movie for Shadows, this was all the stuff for it.
There was the novel, the comic, the audiobook, the soundtrack, the toys, the game, the whole shmeal.
But, I think the novel and game accomplish the existence of the movie well enough.
And it's a neat story.
Worthy of being a film, along with the Thrawn novels, and Dark Empire.
But noo, we got prequels instead....
Yeah, a bunch of the snobbier geeks turn their nose up at this whole deal as merely merchandising, but..in the end, all films are products, even their most beloved stuff, what makes it more than that, is if the artists involved gave a damn, and put some heart into it.
Well, Shadows isn't friggin' Kubrick, but neither is the classic Star Wars trilogy.
So, y'know, get over it.
Shadows is good enough for what it is.
That being, Star Wars.
Doctor Who (TV movie)
Yeah, this is a bit corny in hindsight, but I dug it.
This was supposed to herald a new Who series, and it would've been great, but it fizzled.
We wouldn't get a real new series for a decade.
Helluva wait.
Always a helluva wait for us geeks.
Well, everything finally paid off in the 00's and 10's, so...things are sweet for us at last.
But now it looks like the world's gonna blow up...
We could really use a real Doctor about now.
Loveline.
I dug this.
It picked up where Dr. Ruth left off.
Course, I was already well-versed in everything via my own studies, so I played "diagnose-along".
I was pretty good.
And man, so many of the callers were idiots, or fakes, but Adam & Drew always handled it well.
And Adam was a freaking riot.
The calls gave him good material.
Fish in a barrell.
That's what I really watched it for.
Adam & Drew were really one of the great comic duos.
Course, Adam Corrolla would go on to do "The Man Show", with that idiot, Jimmy Kimmell, then Jimmy Kimmell would inexplicably get both that awful little show of his, and Sarah Silverman.
Then, he'd totally blow it with Sarah Silverman.
Haa haaa!! *points*
Corrolla had a failed talk show, then was producer and a voice on "Crank Yankers", and IMHO, Jerky Boys totally should have sued.
Then, "The Man Show", was taken over by Joe Rogan, and Doug Stanhope, then it imploded.
Then, Joe Rogan went to war with Carlos Mencea, and they both went up in flames.
Now, Dr. Drew has "Celebrity Rehab", and a Headline News show coming in the spring.
And y'know, gimme Dr. Drew over Dr. Phil any friggin' day.
Drew has actually fixed people.
Anyway, Loveline was a great moment in time, I wish it were still on, but, it was on MTV, so y'knew it was doomed.
Lasted longer than most shows on there.
The Phil Donahue Show (ends)
Oh, man, do I miss Donahue.
He was just great, and he fucking had on everybody.
Right, left, politicians, celebrities, racist yahoos, Satanists, crystal wavers, trannies, fetishists, inventors, activists, authors, doctors who actually knew their shit, and full blown wackaloons of every stripe.
But the best part, is if someone was full of bullshit, it didn't go unchallenged, the audience and callers would give 'em a good grilling.
And his audience was pretty bright, not knuckle draggers like on Springer.
It was just fucking great.
I learned a lot from it.
I think a lot of my worldview was shaped from deciding what I thought of the parade of yahoos on this, and the issues of the day they dissected via the brighter guests.
There hasn't been a talk show like this since he retired.
Especially not Oprah, she played lip service to idolizing Donahue, but it was just empty words.
When celebs have gone batshit on her show, it's just been let go, when a guru has been on, everyone lapped their horseshit up, and no one challenging or truly interesting was ever on.
And again, no audience interaction, no calls.
And Donahue played Devil's advocate a lot to be fair.
You don't get that anymore.
Course, by the time he left, it was kinda jumping the shark, but that was the network fucking him around, cuz Springer, and Sally Jesse were the "in", thing.
Bastards.
Yeah, daytime talk is just PPPPT.
Flush it. Worthless.
Donahue's 26 years will always cast a shadow.
Rightly so.
George Carlin: Back In Town
And here's where my fucking mind exploded.
Turns out, in terms of mind-expansion, "Private Parts", was just that farty little test firework, "Back In Town", was the Disney World full on fireworks extravagana.
Every line is gold, it's his masterpiece.
Now, Carlin himself thought the preceeding one, "Jammin' In New York", was his masterpiece, and it is fuckin' great, but...this one was so much better IMO.
Anyway, I didn't have HBO, but I did have an old 80's cable box with a tuning wheel that played out slack forever, and I could almost get the static out of Cinemax (hence the ability to watch boobie movies) and I could get the sound on HBO.
And for Carlin, the sound is mostly all you need.
So, yeah, going from his sitcom, to this, blew my friggin' mind.
And this is just when he totally turned into the edgy Carlin, so I caught it right on the wave.
Been a huge fan ever since.
Hooked instantly.
I owned the VHS tape of this as soon as possible.
And when it became possible, I caught up on his material from "Jammin..", and "Doin it again", via the internet.
Now, I have all his stuff on DVD.
Man, I wish he'd gotten to do another 14 concerts.
I had that gloomy alone feeling again when he died.
Well, at least there was still "Last Words", to be published, and that gave me good closure.
Well, here's a clip...
State prison farms.
1997
Daria.
A neat little show.
The only spinoff of Beavis & Butt-Head.
I really dug it, and I dig it even more in hindsight.
See, where Beavis & Butt-Head tore down the the past and present of what was shat out of MTV, Daria predicted and tore down MTV's future.
Daria the character ripped on the moron cheerleaders, princesses, and jocks,...and look at MTV's lineup...Britney pop, and Jersey Shore.
Those characters come to life.
So, this show is a retroactive nail in the coffin of the old MTV.
The capstone, the garbage can lid, whatever analogy you wanna use.
I guess they wanted Daria to grow, and learn, and find happiness, and yadda yadda..
And I guess since she was the opposite of Beavis & Butt-Head, and they could never do that, it was unavoidable.
So, yeah, the morons rule MTV now, so...what happened to the nerds, and goths, and alterna-hippies?
Well, they went to Youtube, I guess.
Fuck MTV, it's over.
But, I kinda ranted all that before.
But now we come full circle.
Castlevania: Symphony Of The Night
Best platformer game ever.
Remember, I said "Super Castlevania IV", was ALMOST the best platformer ever.
This one truly had everything.
You had 3-D exploration like Metroid, you had item screens like "Final Fantasy 4-6", and you had the smooth rapid fire fighting play control of Castlevania.
And, you had real music, and voice acting, like a CD-ROM game, which this was.
They really pushed platform to its zenith just before everything went over to 3-D polygon style games.
And, as mentioned with "Castlevania 3", Alucard returns as the main character, rather than Simon Belmont, or his descendants.
Although, if you beat the game, you can replay it as Richter Belmont, which increases the challenge, because he can't achieve the power levels of Alucard.
And man, Alucard fully powered up can fucking do anything.
He can turn to a bat, or a cloud of poisonous gas, or he can summon sidekicks.
Nevermind his arsenal of spells and gizmos.
My favorite summoned sidekick is the little purple devil with a trident who flies around stabbing airborne enemies, and occasionally shouting "DIEEE!!!".
Hee hee, little stuff like that tickles me.
Yep, very impressive game.
And the castle in this one is HUGE, and you have to play it twice, once regularly, then again in a mirror universe upside-down.
So, you get a lot of play out of it.
The only downside, as virtually everyone who's played it has said...is the crummy voice actors.
The drama scenes are pretty damned corny because of it.
Otherwise, almost the perfect game.
Many overlooked it, because it was on Playstation 1, and it was either neglected outright by those who opted instead for N64, or, the system was about to be replaced by Playstation 2, so there was little enthusiasm even from Sony.
So, it was kinda underground.
I didn't get it until long after I'd gotten my Playstation 2 in the 00's.
PS2 being able to play PS1 games, y'see.
Other Castlevania games have come out for portable systems, and emulated the style of this one, but...this will remain my favorite.
Although, it only edges out "Super Castlevania 4", by a nose hair.
Princess Mononoke.
The greatest achievment in conventional animation ever.
You won't believe it possible that it was made by human beings.
CG dominates the industry now, but Japan still respects, and thus produces cel animation.
Although, mostly Pokemon type shit nowadays.
But masterpieces like this still trickle through now and then.
But, technical wise, this one hasn't been topped.
Not even by Miyazaki himself.
A jaw dropping achievement, you owe it to yourself to have seen this yesterday.
Radiohead: OK Computer.
Well, like I said in the last one, Radiohead saved music with this.
Not much more to say than that.
Except that once I had the CD of this, I played it compulsively.
Until the next couple albums came out, anyway.
Here, watch this video.
Let the song, and the nostalgia, wash over you.
Paranoid Android.
Private Parts (the movie)
Despite Howard having long since divorced his first wife, and his mainstream popularity inevitably waning, leaving only his hardcore audience, um...this still holds up as a neat little movie.
And it had a really great soundtrack (which I also have).
It surely captures the essence of the times better than shitty "reality bites".
Yeah, one of the great films of the 90's, dammit.
I gotta upgrade this to DVD.
Oh, I remember when this came to TV, they censored the hell out of it, but they had Howard Stern repeatedly walking into frame describing what was cut.
It was kind of like a Howard MST3K.
That was pretty funny, I hope that version is on the DVD.
King Of The Hill
So, this was Mike Judge's followup to Beavis & Butt-Head....
...yeah...
Well...I watched all 13 years of the thing, didn't I?
Must've liked it.
Well, I liked the characters, but...had I known they'd virtually stay in the same place for the whole damned thing, I might've thought twice about getting invested.
Eh, boils down to, it was better than a lot of other shit that was on.
Now, "The Goode Family", that blew.
Un-creative too, I mean, Judge used his Tom Anderson voice for Hank Hill, so he simply used his David Van Driessen voice for Gerald Goode.
All he needs now is a show centered around his Coach Buzzcut voice, and he'll have the trifecta.
Well, he made "Office Space", and "Idiocracy", so he still had the genius spark in him.
I hear he's gonna do some new B&Bs, so...let's see...
Final Fantasy 7
Never played this, knew it was a tremendous hit though, and caught slivers of storyline here and there from friends, sites, and magazines.
And of course, there's this famous moment everyone knows...
One Winged Angel!
Apparently, it was all downhill from here for this series though...
But, it was PS1's biggest hit.
The "Vice City", of PS1 if you will.
And it would go on to spawn the CG animated film "Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children", which I've never seen, because apparently, you have to have played the game to understand it.
Waiting For Guffman.
You either love or hate these Christopher Guest mockumentaries.
I'm in the former camp.
Dug 'em all...except I never saw the last one "for your consideration".
Heard it wasn't as good as the rest, but I'll have to see for myself.
Anyway, the other ones are "best in show", and "a mighty wind", which I consider to be the peak of the series.
But, bear in mind, that's not having seen "for your consideration".
Spawn (the movie)
Yeah...well..erm...
Well...I liked John Leguizamo as the clown.
Leguizamo is an underappreciated talent.
Other than that, I walked out of the theater disapointed.
And, y'know, I had the same gut feeling within that disapointment as when I saw "The Phantom Menace".
I should have payed attention to that.
But...y'know, schlocky as this flick was...it made good bank, and that's what matters to the bean counters, so this quite possibly led to the upsurge in comic based properties in the 00's.
So, there's that silver lining I guess.
And it's a pretty big one.
As for the Spawn phenomenon overall...eh....I just couldn't get with it...
Comics, like music, was another area that mostly left me cold in the 90's.
And like games, the speculator vampires latched on to the industry.
Unlike games though, they almost killed the industry.
So, yeah, between the crappy titles, and the collector's bubble, the artform I loved almost died.
You can't forgive people who almost kill what you love.
At least I can't.
Hence my contempt toward investor scum in the Tekken rant.
It's well earned by them.
Star Wars: Special Editions
Well, in hindsight, I can see how these shouldn't have been fucked with, and it chaps my ass how Lucas refused to release the old versions alongside the SE, and even went so far as having old prints destroyed.
Back again to swine destroying what I love.
*Head shake*
But, the bright side, was seeing these in the theater again took me back to the first times.
I could barely remember seeing the first one when I was two.
Of course, I'd seen 'em a million times on HBO, and VHS tape leading up to this, but man, it was fuckin' STAR WARS in the theater!
It was great to see it for the first time again.
I missed Empire, I still kick myself for that.
But, my memory of ESB from '80 is still pretty clear.
And, then, I saw Jedi.
Didn't hit me like it did in '83, that's damn near impossible, but it was still neat.
And, I didn't hate the "enhancements", yet, so they were fun to spot.
And anyway, what else was in theaters at the time?
Anaconda?
Blah.
Rant In E Minor, and Arizona Bay
So, these finally got officially released, instead of being bootlegs only the geek elite could get near.
But, I was still oblivious.
But, when I finally did discover these (via the message board grapevine, and file-sharing ), it was a revelation.
Bigger than with Stern, but along the same lines.
Here was a guy making verbal images in his comedy that complimented what I had done all through Sweetser, and high school, with my comics.
I'd not only found an artistic hero, but a brother from another mother.
It was very exhilerating.
I still love these.
Always will.
I have just about everything Hicks out there now.
There's some obscure stuff around the edges I probably need, but the main bulk I think I have.
And I got 'em everywhere, CD, ripped to both my players, on the PC, anytime I wanna listen, I'm a button push away from Hicks-y goodness.
Life is good.
Anyway, here's clips..
Tool was right, another dead hero.
1998
Cowboy Bebop.
Well, not quite the peak of anime series, it's up there, and there haven't been many truly great anime series after this.
There's been "Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex", and from the makers of Bebop "Samurai Champloo".
Those were fairly excellent.
Then, the next tier down, you've got "Paranoia Agant", and "FLCL (Foolie Coolie)".
Then, from then on, it's been mostly overrated fighter crap like "Bleach", and "Naruto".
But, Bebop was pretty damned excellent, and has been roughly equaled, but never topped.
90's was pretty good to anime.
Some would say a golden age.
Transformers: Beast Wars (comes to Cartoon Network)
Hmm, I'd have to say this is about as good as Transformers ever got.
You could tell fanboys who loved the old show made this, it was very steeped in the continuity.
I didn't follow it religiously, but I caught enough episodes to be impressed.
I've seen a couple episodes of the new "Transformers: Prime", and that seems along the same lines of goodness from what little I can tell from such a small sampling.
Anyway, who knew there'd be so much quality SF squeezed out of a line of toys that change from robot to car?
Well, I guess writers can do anything.
Oh, and can you fucking believe Transformers are over 25 years old now?
Ho-ly shit.
Bride Of Chucky
Well, like I said way back in 80's 1, this is when the series got good.
IMO, all you really need to see is "Bride..", and "Seed..".
They're fucking great comedy-horror.
Especially "Seed".
By "Seed", it totally becomes The Jennifer Tilly Show, and that's all right, because she kicks ass.
I'd put this duology up there with any of the slasher greats, Freddy, Evil Dead, you name it.
Hell, I'd like to see "Freddy vs. Chucky".
And you know who loves these?
John Waters.
Now there's a filmmaker.
Oh, and guess who was in "Bride"?
Yep, John Ritter.
Dirty Work
Man, I miss Norm MacDonald.
Apparently, he's become a gamble-holic, and imploded.
Ah, well.
I still like this movie though.
Bob Saget directed this, can you believe it?
And, you've got Artie Lang as the sidekick, so instant funny there.
Yeah, it's a bit corny in places, but when you follow the inevitable "Save the camp/hotel/orphanage/factory/sick relative", formula, it's to be expected.
But, what you pay attention to is the jokes, and bits.
And they're pretty decent in this.
Ya got hookers in trunks, ya got anal rape, ya got Chris Farley with his nose bitten off.
What more do ya need?
Just a fun little flick, and it makes me remember Norm when he was great.
Very Bad Things.
This movie is just fuckin' messed up.
It's such a black comedy, it's damned near a fucking horror.
It took me several viewings to be able to process the fucking thing.
You need a strong stomach, and a twisted sense of humor to be able to enjoy this.
Both of which, I have. :D
Hey, Christian Slater was in this, and "True Romance", and the social-conservatives blubbered and sniveled about both of 'em.
Christian Slater was at the scene of the cinema crime an awful lot in the 90's.
Heh, heh, my hero.
Kurt & Courtney.
Yeah, she killed him, but you can't prove it on court.
Well, okay, I think low enough of her that it becomes possible to me.
Anyway, I saw this only very recently on IFC.
Well, even if she doesn't happen to be a murderer, it shows her to be the miserable life-sucking scag that she is.
You'd think she'd be more hated wherever she goes after this.
One funny Pam Anderson roast, and all seems forgiven.
Gotta remember though, this is the country that thought rape was romantic at one time.
People are plain fucking goofy about what they like to forgive, and what they don't.
Saving Private Ryan.
Speilberg's masterpiece.
If only he'd retired after this.
Nope...we had "AI", and "the terminal", in our futures...*sigh, head shake*
Anyway, I'll always respect it for making war horrible again in our cultural consciousness.
WWII in particular has been a fuckin' cartoon fairy tale in film and television, so there needed to be an antidote to that distortion, and this flick does that.
And, tells a good story.
Not the greatest movie ever, mind you, it has its flaws, but for Speilberg, it's hitting it out of the park.
That 70's Show
Yeah, this was pretty good.
Especially when Chong joined up.
And I wanted to nail Laura Prepon.
Who didn't?
Well, those that preferred Mila Kunis, I guess.
Anyway, this launched a bunch of careers.
And gave Clarence Boddicker from "Robocop", a job for 8 years.
There hasn't been a proper "that 80's show", though.
They actually made one, and it lasted two episodes, and was a huge stinkbomb.
And now there's "glory daze", and that's just fucking horrendous.
Well, I'm told by some that "freaks and geeks", is "that 80's show", and was great.
Kinda wish I'd watched it now.
Ah, well...
The Powerpuff Girls
Yes, I liked the Powerpuff Girls.
It was funny.
You wanna fight about it?
The episodes with "Him", in partular were actually pretty sick.
Yeah, I dug that shit.
If you could get past the outer candy shell, there was a lot of subversiveness going on.
1999
David Bowie: Hours
Good ol' reliable Bowie.
As much as Radiohead, Bowie was the antidote to the rubbish out there.
But, music was just plain changing by this time anyway.
Both in content, and in the delivery systems.
That side of the transformation hasn't been allowed to complete, thanks to the RIAA digging in their feet, but it'll happen, and they'll be dead at the end of it.
It's inevitable.
And good riddance.
Anyway, this was a damned good album.
I dug it so much, I threw a song reference into "The Krazyfool Show".
Dilbert (TV series)
I'd long since abandoned the funny-pages due to there being no more "The Far Side", so I missed all the hoo-hah about the strip, but the show was great.
It was kind of "Star Trek: The Next Generation", but given way to the rot of the petty bureaucracy of the corporate office structure.
Funny subversive stuff, gotta love it.
And the cast was great.
(Update- ah, crap, Scott Adams is a douche)
George Carlin: You Are All Diseased.
Not as good as "back in town", but still pretty fuckin' great.
His bit on airport security eerily predicts 9/11.
That makes this one pretty special.
Combine this with "back in town", and "complaints and grievances", and you have a damned good trilogy.
Anyway, here's a clip of the best part...
Religion is bullshit.
Napster
You all used it, don't fuckin' lie.
Millions of users, jillions of downloads, but you're all clean.
Yeah...*laughs"*
Well, in the glory days of 1996, you could get MP3s right off of people's Geoshitties pages, and you could find anything with a Yahoo search.
It's how I came to learn of and sample "FF: PRAY", and "FF: Love Will Grow".
But, they cracked down on that, then BAMMO!!
Napster arrived, and changed everything forever.
Man, I loved it.
Still miss it.
The setup, and small system footprint were gorgeous.
This is where all the pieces above came together.
This is how I caught up on "George Carlin: Doin' It Again", "George Carlin: Jammin In New York", "Bill Hicks: Arizona Bay", "Bill Hicks: Rant In E Minor", Tool's "Aenema", how I sampled countless anime songs, and reunited with a lot of fond 80's memories, this tapped me back into the scene.
And I bought a lot more CDs than I ever would have because of it.
So fuck your lying whining, RIAA.
And fuck the stupid faces it comes out of.
Fuck. You.
Anyway, they killed this, but it just kept re-incarnating.
WinMX, Limewire, now it's all about Torrents.
Can't kill the revolution.
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.
Not quite as inspired as the first one, but still a worthy flick to mention.
After a couple stinkbombs, Mike Myers was finally on a good roll.
Dogma.
Eh, I've gotten past Smith's over-reliance on the Jay & Silent Bob characters, and this one's grown on me in the past 12 years.
And hey, it's got Carlin!
Tch, Smith hung out with Carlin & Stan Lee, don't think I ain't jealous...
This pissed off the Catholics, but what fucking doesn't?
The hoo-hah over this was way out of proportion.
But..again, ain't it always with religious folk?
Especially ones with fat wallets, and foolish hats meant to be impressive.
This, the 2 Clerks flicks, and "Zack & Miri make a porno", are the best Kevin Smiths
IMHO.
YMMV.
Well, this was fairly decent religious satire, but if you really want to see it done better, track down a copy of the original 1967 "Bedazzled", with Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.
Galaxy Quest.
Best Star Trek movie of the 90's.
Seriously, I personally put this, and "Forbidden Planet", into canon.
Fun flick, clearly inspired the J.J. Abrams reboot/prequel to no end.
Which is why it kicked ass.
Toy Story 2
*Sob, sniff...the cowgirl song...sniffle, blubber*
*Blows nose*
...SHUT UP!!
Home Movies
Anything with John Benjamin makes me laugh.
Or, at least smile.
Brendan Small would go on to create "Metalocalypse".
And Loren Bouchard, John Benjamin, and Melissa Galsky went on to make "Lucy: Daughter Of The Devil", which I think deserved a longer run.
Now Benjamin is in "Bob's Burgers", and "Archer", simultaneously.
Eh, Home movies ain't for everyone, I guess, I'm part of a relatively small cult.
And CN plays it at like, 4 AM if at all.
Good thing I got the DVDs.
Still need season 4 though.
Courage The Cowardly Dog
John Dilworth rules.
Been a fan since "The Dirdy Birdy", and "Smart Talk With Raisin".
More subversive sickness allegedly for children.
Eustace reminds me of my grandfather.
Family Guy
You know, the first couple seasons of this were just fucking dreadful.
Reruns confirm this.
I hated this show's rotten stinking guts.
I was HAPPY when it got cancelled.
But then...it came back, and got good, and won me over.
The biggest thing, was they took everything that I hated,...and made it a self-aware joke in the show.
They acknowledged that Meg was boring, Peter was an asshole, Brian was a snob, and Stewey was a shit, and made those things running gags that have snowballed and evolved into the new flavor of the show.
So, I like it a lot now.
The spinoffs...not as much.
"The Cleveland Show", is just...okay...and I still fuckin' hate "American Dad".
That one refuses to find its legs, and click for me.
Guess it's just gonna stay "The Roger Is An Unpleasant Unlikable Asshole Show", for the rest of its miserable run.
Ah, well.
Still better than new "Simpsons".
Farscape
A science fiction masterpiece.
Even better than B5.
Bashers call it "Muppetscape", but fuck them.
No one has a problem with fuckin' Yoda being a Muppet, so fucking get over the Muppets in this.
They're great characters, dammit.
Everyone in this is.
Excellent show.
And Sci-Fi channel treated it like shit.
Fans had to batter them with pelted batteries to get them to resolve it with a miniseries.
I gotta get the DVDs of this.
So damned many DVDs to collect...dunno if I got the fuckin' lifespan for it.
Futurama
Another sci-fi treated like shit by the network.
Took a decade to get it back.
Which was just about the same gap between original "Star Trek", and "Star Trek: The Motion Picture".
So, there's that parrallel.
Anyway, it's back now, and good as ever on Comedy Central.
In my dream world, Simpsons finally dies, and Seth McFarlaine moves all his shows over to Cartoon Network (where they play them uncensored anyway), and the Fox empire collapses.
Oh, shit, they still have "House", for ransom, don't they?
Ahh, we'll never be free...
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
Okay, like I said with my ramble for "Spawn", I walked out of this with a deadened disapointed feeling.
But, I'd waited for this fucker for so fucking long, I immediately started rationalizing, and defending this piece of shit.
I fought people to the hilt on message boards.
Again, I'm sorry.
Well, the Plinkett review lays out every single miniscule thing wrong with it.
Okay, so why include a bummer of a flick in a list of stuff I liked?
Well, for one, because it was a historical occasion.
And, because, like the Special Editions, it had its silver lining.
The long wait for this thing dragged me along through all the good Star Wars stuff, even if it was under the assumption that the prequels would blow it all away.
Then, I realized, all that "filler", was the real good Star Wars.
It was the Star Wars I wanted all along.
And it was there under my nose.
Like how a guy in an 80's teen comedy realizes the brunette tomboy best friend is his real girlfriend, not the stuck-up blonde cunt he's been chasing the whole movie.
So, yeah, yay for perspective.
And speaking of that...
Hey...y'know, the 90's were actually pretty damned good to me.
And y'know...I think BETTER than the 80's, when I think about it!
I mean, I had all this cool stuff of the 90's, AND I had my 80's nostalgia on top of that, that I got to take along with me!
I mean, I may get misty about the 80's, but I didn't have no fuckin' COMPUTER in the 80's.
And if I had, it woulda been a crappy APPLE IIC, or a black n' white Mac.
80's computers were shit!
90's computing was where it was at!
Fuck yeah!
And yeah, my folks wouldn't have let me read "Private Parts", if it had come out in the 70's or 80's.
It would have been one of those things I missed out on like "Taxi Driver", and "The Warriors".
Most of what's on this list I woulda been sheilded from.
And there's so much MORE of it!
Fuck, the 90's were fuckin' AWESOME!
What was I thinking, thinking that they sucked?
I was so damned lucky to have come into adulthood in this time.
Yeah....there was a lot of miserable shit, and VH1 put it front and center on their shitty lists, but even then, there was a sprinkle of good even on those ones.
And there was a lot of miserable shit in the 70's and 80's, but I payed it little to no heed.
Man...all this time, I've been looking at this decade from the wrong angle.
Well, I hit the goal I set out on with the first one, I found the good 90's.
There's a good version of every decade, I'm sure of it.
And the shitty-90's?
Like I said in the first one, marketing bullshit.
Toss it in the bin.
I'm cured, the 90's won't haunt me anymore.
The shitty-90's are defeated.
So, I guess I'm finally done, and can move on to the 00's now...
Sunday, March 6, 2011
I h8 the 90's (part 3!!!)
Soft language.
Indeed, when SMB3 was remade in 16 bit for "Super Mario All Stars", it truly did dominate, even in the updated "Super Mario All Stars + Super Mario World". But, this one was pretty damned good. As said above, Mario finally looked like a cartoon. From all the way back to Pac-Man, games had paintings, and/or cartoons, on the arcade cabinet, or on the cartridge box, that you were supposed to imagine the characters looking like. Well, now there was no more play-pretend, there the characters were, right there onscreen. No more bullshit.
Catwoman is going to be in the third Chris Nolan Batman film, it'll be interesting to see what take they go with for the character, because the Pfeiffer version has become pretty iconic.
But so too had the Nicholson Joker, and look how Heath Ledger blew that out of the water.
Anyway, this is easily my favorite of the Burton Batmans.
Anyway, this too, would've been a good film, or two, or three.
So, Hitchhikers 5 was like...well, Star Wars prequels, a big fucking deal.
Here's a clip..
Andreas Katsulas, and Peter Jurasik in particular were just magnificent.
It wasn't Final Fantasy 4, but it had some nice new tweaks, a pretty sweet airship, and one of the best villains ever, Kefka.
Johnny, of course, being the imaginary child being browbeat by his striving yuppie parents to get into tech via gaming, and Tekken being his hellish training simulator.
See, while I admired this world of tech progress, I could see its dark side sprouting already.
Man, when the dot-com bubble burst, and a whole generation of scum-yuppies with their shitty z-string dot-coms where wiped the fuck out, I was loaded to bursting with schadenfreude.
He turns to the woman character, who's trying to be some kind of model, or actress or something, and he says to her "look at the society you're trying to please! It sucks!".
That's the red flag.
Oh, it's not? Shit.
Aaanyway, on to my experience with the movie, it had everything I liked run through a blender.
Here's a couple tunes...
Also, the cartridge had to go.
Well, at least through a good chunk of the 00's.
It was done up with all the bells and whistles of Star Wars, and fits into canon nicely.
Or, at least tried to glom a guest spot.
Well, the show itself got a little soap-y at the end.
I'm hesitant to call this one of the great movies of the 90's, but I'm hard pressed not to.
Bullies of the world.
This, and "Reboot", were some well plotted CGI 'toons that didn't insult the kids it was for, and drew in the teens and twenty-somethings too.
Delightfully messed up little show.
These, the Shreks, ain't nothing bad about being Mike Myers.
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4 comments:
Strange that anyone can like any Tim Burton Batman. I've been meaning to review them to see if they are as bad as I think they are. Even before Nolan penned his masterpieces, I had come to realize that persons to whom Tim Burton was extending his middle finger were the creators of a half century of Batman, and the people who thought they might have actually had something interesting to say about Batman.
I dunno, I think you're thinking of the Schumacher Batmans.
Those were deliberately made with Happy Meals, action figures, and collector cups in mind, and IMHO, that's the crowd Burton was flipping off before they kicked him off, and brought in their lackey, Schumacher.
Mike!
Let the fanboy slugfest begin!
Tim Burton produced one of the Shmumacher Batman films, so he had more than a minor bit of editorial control of the excess to which Shumacher is sometimes prone. That direction I thought was an excalation of style over substance and the through-line with the art direction is really a vision (greatly elaborated upon) by Tim Burton. And Burton by the way, claims never to have read any of the source material.
Batman almost does it right. Though Kim Basinger screams too too much. Jack Nicholson captures some of the madness, and anarchy of the Joker, but essentially he is just channeling Cesar Romero and giving him a PG-13 streak. In retrospect, for all the noir elements that I thought were so cool, are really overshadowed by all the garish color that Burton provided. It is almost, though not quite, an updated 60s Batman TV show. The other problem I have with Burton's first outing, is the fact that Batman kills the Joker, and has Gatling Guns on his car. Guns, and murder are two fundamental no-nos in the modus operandi of the Batman. I didn't mind it at the time, because, Holy Fucking Shit Batman is on the big screen and he doesn't look half bad.
Batman Returns further revealed that Burton thought he knew better than fans, and creators with Catwoman, and Penguin, and again with Batman putting the murder down on some people. The Penguin and Catwoman are actually kind of anomalous in the Dark Knight's Rogue's Gallery. They are both sane, both are criminals, though Selina seems to be troubled with some ethics, whereas Cobblepot doesn't. Burton put Cobblepot in dirty diaper and made him a mutant, and hid Danny Devito under a ton of make up (too bad really, because Danny could have crushed that role). And What was that Catwoman business. Hell Here?
My opening volley Mike. If you survive the withering storm of my nerd logic, feel free to send your counter volley my way. I must go batten down the hatches, er...or whatever.
laters
Okay, focusing on your criticisms of Batman Returns, cuz that's the subject that started 'er off...
Well, your main beef seems to be the interpretation of the villains, and Batman killing.
I admit, these bugged me back then, now, not so much.
First of all, 40's Batman killed.
It's the Comics Code era that made Bats and Supes non-lethal.
Fuck the comics code.
And hell, Batman let Ras Al Gul die in Batman Begins.
Then he saves the Joker??
WTF?
Second, I look at the movies as Elseworlds.
You have to.
The live-actions alone have been rebooted, and look how many animated incarnations there have been, hell, just between the 90's/00's, nevermind the last 40 years.
Your mind has no trouble at all leaping between Kevin Conroy, "The Batman", and "Brave & The Bold".
And in an Elseworld, Penguin can be a mutant.
Dunno why that ever bothered me.
And, IMO, Devito DOES crush the role.
He's deliciously evil.
That's what I want from a Devito villain.
And as for Catwoman and Pengy being nuts...well, that goes to the whole question "Watchman", puts forth...what sort of person runs around in a mask past Halloween?
Watchmans answer is...wackos.
At least neurotics.
Burton merely ran with that motif.
I think it works.
And again, there's that punk rock middle-finger quality.
To the comics code, to the happy meal crowd, and good on 'em.
That's the edge comics had before the 50's crackdown.
That's the edge Miller was trying to bring back, and IMO, Burton took it the next step.
And Nolan took it another step, but in a different way.
And as for "knowing better than the fans", well...yeah, it can happen.
I cite the new "Star Trek".
If Abrams had listened to fans, the fucking thing wouldn't have gotten made, and Trek would be dead.
There's too much continuity, and too much fragmentation of opinion, you can't please everybody.
So, fuck it, he did what he wanted, and it worked.
Same deal.
IMHO.
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