The Best Of: I h8 the 90's.

Okay, we've peeled through the 70's, and the 80's, now, to tackle...this one...

Original uncut version.
Part 2.
Part 3.

Man...I loathe including some of the stuff I did on this one...but either I had a good rant going, or a comment would continue a running theme, so...*shrug*
It would be trimmed more if it could be.
Believe me.

Also, bears mentioning that a decent sized chunk of part 3 is quoted over to "Heroes of Vidya Games", so...yeah, check that out if you haven't.

Also, part 3 is my homemade one, so, you'll notice a jarring jump from the mainstream shit VH1 was shoveling, and the stuff I cared about.


1990


Pretty Woman

Really?
We fucking start with this?
Shit...

Well, I always thought it looked like insufferable garbage just from the stupid trailers, so I studiously avoided it.

BUT...man....it made like a zillion bucks, hung on in the theaters for-fucking-ever, and every critic, even ones I normally respect, cummed all over the fucking thing, like it was the rebirth of movies.

This thing had the planet in its fucking grip, it was unreal.

Well, I finally saw it for free on regular-ass TV in the 00's...and I was right, what utter shit.
What utter, utter, shit.
Americans are really fuckin' stupid.
There's no escaping it.

Richard Gere, as stated in prior entries, is a fucking trout.

Julia Roberts is the Madonna of actresses, overrated as shit, and shoved in your face
(although, she's finally faded in recent years in favor of Jennifer Anniston, whom I actually like, even if a lot of her movies are ass).

Their chemistry in this is just horrible, you'd sooner watch a bear fuck a bison carcass.

Just horrible.
There's nothing good here at all.
An unmitigated piece of shit from start to finish.
What the fuck is wrong with Americans?

I'll give it that it was the most relentlessly marketed piece of shit I've seen in my life.
Never before or since have I seen something exist solely on the merits of its ad campaign like fucking Pretty Woman.
No...there were probably others I'm blotting from immediate recall....

Still....fuck, America....you really do like to have people think for you, doncha?
Fuck.
*Head shake*




Jack Kevorkian's controversial suicide technique

I agree with Kevorkian.
Scientifically, and ethically.




Edward Scissorhands

The Johnny Depp & Tim Burton marriage begins.




Fanny packs

Geez, I used to roll my eyes at these things, now I fucking got one.
Well, until I find a better utility belt substitute....




2 Live Crew

Couple of the cute girls in high school thought these guys were the shit.
I thought they were hacks.
I was into real comedians, man, I couldn't fucking pretend shitty raps were good just because they had swears.
Too nerdy for my own good.
Could never play along with the dumb shit everyone was into, even to get laid.
Couldn't physically do it.
Can't compromise my standards.
It fucks me over endlessly, but I still can't do it.
So I'll be a monk...*shrug*
Least I won't have to sit through Pretty Woman, and 2 Live Crew records.




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.



1991


Beverly Hills, 90210

No, I take it back, the 90's were really fucking repellant.
This piece of shit was on for like, 14 years or something, and now it's back as a remake with no signs of ever stopping.
Way to go, viewing public.
Congratulations on your incredible taste.
Dipshits.




Boyz n the Hood

This is actually one of the better gangsta flicks.
Actually pretty decent.




Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and the rise of grunge music

Early grunge was actually cool, then Cobain offed himself, and it degraded into that c-string Blind Melon-y whiny hippie shit.
And like I ranted previously (headbanger's ball) you weren't allowed to like metal, it was just ripped out of the marketplace.
You were just TOLD this was what was "in".
Like, they couldn't co-exist?
Fucking rap co-existed.
What the fuck?




Pee-Wee Herman caught masturbating

I ranted about this after the Rob Lowe deal.
Total hypocrisy, injustice, you name it.
Culture warrior horseshit.
Sons of bitches railroaded him, from cops, to news-zombies.
And no one said a thing.
Too busy buying that fifth Pretty Woman ticket I guess.




Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

Costner's Robin Hood...Richard Gere's Lancelot...make it stop...make the hurting stop..



Lollapalooza

The Woodstock of alterna-crap, right?
Yeah, no thanks.



Soviet Union goes out of existence

The fear of them as a boogeyman never took for me.
Well, said it on my rant on GI Joe the whole jingo package never took for me period.

Anyway, I just hoped their people would be free and happy, and I thought even back then, the US should have had some kind of Marshall Plan to make sure they evolved the way we wanted...but...we just sorta left 'em to fester, then we have the nerve to act surprised about the mess they have now.
I'm never listened to.





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.





1992


Billy Ray Cyrus's "Achy Breaky Heart"

The Cyrus virus.
Poor Bill Hicks.
He hated on Billy Ray Cyrus so hard, and he hated on Debbie Gibson, and Tiffany...
If he knew, that Cyrus would breed a little she-demon singer of that ilk, as well as outliving him, I don't think he could have gone on.
We were fucking warned.
*Sigh*




Ross Perot

Elections have never been so much fun before or since.




The Real World

The beast is born.
Things are never the same.
Mediocrity holds an iron grip forevermore.




The Ren and Stimpy Show

Oh, man, I loved this show so much, it actually made me high.
Finally, a show that was weird enough.
And on top of that, look at the ocean of shit I was in so far.
I needed release.
This show came in the nick of time.
Yeah, the 90's had its good stuff...but it was buried in some serious manure.




Beavis and Butthead

*Thumbs up*
Love how Judge got away with crapping all over the hideous music scene MTV helped create right on their own shitty evil channel.
Brilliant.



George H.W. Bush vomits on Japan's prime minister

Gorgeous.
International politics was never this entertaining before or since.




Northern Exposure

Pretentious limosuine liberal claptrap.
From boomer assholes.
With a touch of racism.
I mean, the only two Native American characters are essentially retarded.
Oh, how cute.
*Eyeroll*
Hideous television.



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.

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.
I'm grateful the 90's started with goodies like this.
Fuck Pretty Woman.




And here comes the year I graduated...


1993


The Waco Siege

They murdered those people you know.
And you all just sat and watched.
*Head shake*




The Chicken Soup For The Soul series

The author of this shit looks like the guy from "Saw".
Just sayin...




The U.S. military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy

And after 12 years of Reagan/Bush, Democrats came back, and reminded me of their disgusting spinelessness.
So, they all make me sick.




Falling Down

A fun little film.
I always forget Michael Douglas made this.




True Romance

Seen this just recently.
Wow!
How in the hell did I miss this?
It would've changed everything.
Dammit...



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.





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!




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.



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


Reality Bites

I tried to avoid this, but it was on TV, and....ugh...worse than I imagined.
The Big Chill for gen-X posers.
I didn't care much for my generation.
There, I said it.
I think I got a raw deal.
In high school, my senior class was a bunch of little whitebreads that wanted to be their mommies and daddies; I related more to the underclassmen, and talked with them more.
And even now, I see more subversive rebellion, and upstart-iness in people of Mark Zuckerberg's age group, but, people my age....gawd, bunch of sellout conviction-less whets.
Not all, but enough.
Enough to divorce me from that sad lot.
I can't be the only one that feels this way, I just can't.
Well, Carlin did, Carlin was older than boomers, but he related to the hippies more than their parents.
Age wise, he was in-between, so could pick.
I don't think I'd be a good hippie, I would have been a great yippie though.
Yeah, a yippie, or a punk, I woulda been good at one of those.
But what did I get when my time came?
Grunge/granola shit.
Fuuuuck yoooou.



Crash Test Dummies' "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm"

Fun ditty.
I can totally do that guy's voice.




Pulp Fiction

Okay.
Overrated as shit though.
Holy fuck.
Like, not Pretty woman overrated, but damn...you'd think Hollywood had been blown up by a nuke, and this was the first new movie after the rebuild.
Well, it was a revelation compared to the Julia Roberts stuff being shat out, I guess.
But still, come on.




Woodstock '94

A big, fuckin' corporate joke.




Forrest Gump

Eh...
You wanna know who really hates this in a funny way?
John Waters.
Now there's a filmmaker.




Clerks

I liked this.
I don't like everything by Kevin smith, and as a person, he can rub me the wrong way sometimes, but..this was good.



Natural Born Killers

Ahhh, finally another good movie.
They were spaced so far apart.





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 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.




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


Toy Story

Wow...'95, holy shit.
That old now...
Well, first fully CGI film.
Now, CGI toons dominate the industry, and it's almost no big thing.
Shit, FILM as a transfer medium is almost dead as a dino.
Crazy.




Snapple

Am I the only one who remembers they started out in the 80's with clear soda?
If not them, then there's a defunct soda company they stole their name from, cuz I distinctly remember having me some clear cola and rootbeer with "snapple", on the fucking bottles.
No one will believe me.




Heroin chic

Someone should've been brought up on charges.
Possibly executed.
We don't live in a rational society.




Clueless

What ever happened to Alicia Silverstone?
She gained one stray ounce in the face, people acted like she was like 300, and her career went up in smoke.
Hasn't been seen since.
You're dumb, America.
You won't be un-dumb until you stop this behavior.




Tattoos and piercings

Tch, it's like clothes now, no one even cares.




NewsRadio

Fun little show.
Alas, Phil Hartman.
Far as fun little shows go, we didn't get a lot of these in the 90's.
Seinfeld was good.
I'm told Larry Sanders was great, but it was on fuckin' HBO.
There was MST3K, but I missed the entire original Joel run, cuz our shitty cable service stubbornly refused to let us have Comedy Central all through the 90's for some inexplicable reason.
Caught up on syndicated reruns, and tapes though.
...y'know, I'd forgotten what a dick move that was by our cable company...I hate their rotten stinking guts all over again.
It wasn't like they couldn't afford new channels either, they gave us new ones, they were just utter shit, like the religion channels.
"Yeah, you yokels can't handle funny, here's some Jesus shit instead".
Fuuuuck yoouu!



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.



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.





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.



1996


Alanis Morissette

Another blown out of proportion performer.
Seriously, people acted like she was the friggin' risen Jesus, or something.
She's just a crap singer, fuck, get OVER her!
Oh, man, there was like, some intimate concert thing she did on MTV, and there were knuckleheadeds in the front row WEEPING, and BASKING in her, like there was an aura coming off.
Seriously.
It was pathetic.
Really?
The "one hand in my pocket", song?
That's the one that brings you to your knees?
Shit, I get more verklemft over Ray Charles's rendition of "it's not easy being green", than anything Alanis shits out.
Her voice sucks, sounds like she's got a throat full of spinach or something.
Well, I couldn't blame the boomers anymore for elevating this bullshit, could I?
Nope, it was my generation doing it this time.
*Sigh*...son of a bitch...
Well, again, why I divorced my generation.




Sling Blade

Great flick.
Still miss John Ritter.




The Unabomber

Go out on the far-right blogosphere, and this guy is pretty garden variety.




Evita

Punishingly terrible.
The very idea of it....
The girlfriend of a fascist dictator from a country that proudly hid Nazis?
You suck, Argentina.
In my world, you don't get a musical.
Kiss my ass.
Oh, and then stack Madonna onto the whole sad sorry mess...blaugh.




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.




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.




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


McCaughey septuplets

Fuck off with rewarding all this breeding shit.
It's still going on, with all these gross reality shows, like "19 and counting".
Some goofy religious cultist moron is abusing her twat, therefore, it's gotta be on my TV?
Bullshit.
What is this shit really about?
Are they trying to get us to want to churn out these gross monster-families so we can fight the Chinese?




Beanie Babies

*Eye roll*
Yeah, I've done that a lot in this one but...come on, look at the dippy fucking decade I'm dealing with here.
70's had its fucking pet rocks and shit, but it had fucking TAXI DRIVER!




Boogie Nights

Burt Reynolds's other good movie.




Fiona Apple

Turdier than Alanis as a person, better set of pipes, songs were lousier.
It evened out.
Thankfully, she wasn't hyped as much as Alanis.
She was laughed off the stage mercifully quick.




Tamagotchi

Pet rocks with screens.



Jewel

Gawd, another painful pseudo-hippie singer idiot.
The rule of Britney was miserable, but aren't you so glad THESE clowns are gone?



"Death" of Joe Camel

Ronald McDonald should have been strangled to death in front of children as well.





The beginning of ratings for TV shows (e.g. "TV-MA", "TV-14", "TV-PG")

Oh man....I think they're an obtrusive waste.
Far from giving people the freedom to make more "MA", shows I think we have as much, if not MORE watered down pablum, and the handful of edgy shows, are on networks that would've taken those risks anyway.
So, we've just got more electronic garbage cluttering our screens.
Really, it's digital litter.
And people that NEED that shit for reassurance...are fucking pussies.
No fucking grown-ass adult needs a TV-G show.
And no kid above 7 worth anything doesn't want a TV-MA show.
And no parent worth a damn should keep them from it.
It's all a stupid political game.



Titanic

Fuuu-uh-uh-uh-uuuuuuck yooouuu-oo-oo-oo-ooohhh!!!!!!




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.

Well, the show itself got a little soap-y at the end.
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.




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).

I'm hesitant to call this one of the great movies of the 90's, but I'm hard pressed not to.
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.




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..

Rush Limbaugh.

Bullies of the world.

Tool was right, another dead hero.





1998


Marilyn Manson's "The Dope Show"

Didn't like this one.
Like ones like "the fight song", better.
Dope show, the rythm is droning, like something a small kid would pound out on a frying pan with a wooden spoon.
Then I want to strike that child.




The Big Lebowski

A classic.
Anything from Coen Brothers took the pain of the 90's away for a bit.



The Swing Revival

Fun.
A welcome relief from the grunge puke, and the bubblegum alternative to alternative.




The soccer mom

SNKKTT PATOOEY!




There's Something About Mary

Eh, this got all the money and hype, but I think "Kingpin", was better.




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.

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.

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.



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.
Delightfully messed up little show.




1999


Y2K

Fake.
No one apologized either.

John Rocker

Another sports-dummy saying crap.
Inspired some of the monologue for "the Krazyfool Show", that's how old that is now.




Lou Bega's "Mambo No. 5"

I'm telling you, none of this is new, Bega had a hit in the 80's too.
"Endicott", look it up.
I remember this shit.




Teen pop explosion, specifically Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Mandy Moore, and Jessica Simpson

And true hell comes to mainstream music, and never leaves.




Lance Armstrong

So...this guy rides bikes and lost a nut, so he's supposed to be my idol?
Fuck you.
Try again.
Gimme a real goddamned hero.
Greedy?
Fuckin' right I am.

This is what sickened me most about the 90's the mediocrity in everything.
It wasn't just shitty music, and shitty movies, hardly anyone tried hard in anything.
No one wanted to make the world better, no one wanted to be a hero, not for real.
No, everyone got all complacent, and despised excellence, that's why people suddenly hated rock stars, and that's why we got fucking grunge.
Everyone wanted the mediocre.
Cuz it was easy, and everyone wanted to take it easy.
Well, I fucking didn't.
I thought,...well, like I ranted before, that my generation would want to follow up the good things the boomers did, and be like, yippies, y'know?
Nope...pure self absorption.
Wallowing in mediocrity.
Especially in thought.
I thought some of the post-modern stuff my friends were into was maybe like...some kind of rebellious statement that was leading somewhere.
It wasn't.
They stood for nothing.
It all stood for nothing.
And then I thought...maybe there was some sophisticated philosophy behind this bullshit I just wasn't getting...
There wasn't.
It was just pure lazy apathy.
Then I really was lost.
I didn't know how to cope with a world like that.
I tried to do my stupid little jobs, but it was all so fucking pointless.

So...then a Lance Armstrong comes along, and I can see why people would want a hero of some kind...but..no, I ain't lowering my standards.

The guy rides bikes well, good for him, but he didn't save a busload of orphans, did he?

Gimme real heroes, or get out of my fucking face.




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".

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.




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.




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...



Aaand, there, I don't wanna re-re-rehash the rant from the end of part 3, but...taken all together, the 90's weren't really all that bad.

There was some horrible shit, but it came from the lame-ass mainstream, and that's always going to be the case.

On to the 00's...