Holidaze 2012: video spiel & thanks!

* Not sure what this post is about? Click here and maybe you'll figure it out... eventually. =)

Santa's sick of everyone's poop! He gives and gives, and what does he get? Not a lot is the frickin answer. Oh, no—That's not why he's in his biz, of course. Not for reward! (But the cookies do hit the spot.) He got into it out of generosity and faith (in humanity). But, as the years roll by, the one list gets longer and longer and the other one, shorter and shorter. You know which list is which...

So! Santa's looking to be a little more proactive, looking to get lessons out there. Not carrot or stick, but examples, y'know? Stories. Sure, holiday songs and specials are fine. They get the word out, but by their nature, the *are* only once a year. He's going for a new platform, something, well, timeless...Syndication. A new show, starring himself and about himself. No—NOT reality TV crap. Boo. Not real stories. But, while they may not be real, they will be true... if you get my meaning.

Good crack.

Whatev. You stopped reading three paragraphs ago, didn't you? Bah humbug!

Also—Happy frickin holidaze.

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Of course, Louis C.K.'s LOUIE is the inspiration for this hot mess. The show stars C.K. and is about a kind of alternate reality C.K. The guy who does and goes to and says all the difficult things that everyone wants to do/go/say or wishes they knew to do/go/say. It really is Remarkable and Wonderful.

If your'e not watching the show, you may be a real dum dum.

The music—and the opening credits sequence all together (or is that altogether? : P)—is brilliant all on its own, too. LOUIE's music is a version of "Brother Louie" recorded by Ian Lloyd exclusively for the show. He originally recorded it with his band The Stories in 1973 and they covered the original by Hot Chocolate, released six months earlier. The television show them is an excellent mix of Hot Chocolate's original with Ian Lloyd's vocals.

I think it's serendipitous that C.K. ended up casting the African-American actress he did to play his ex-wife on LOUIE. If you listen to the original song, Brother Louie is "whiter than white," a guy who's fallen in love with a black woman. He and his girl each try to introduce his/her true love to their respective families and meet with less-than-joyous excitement. In the show, their skin color doesn't (or at least, hasn't so far) come into any kind of controversial play, but I still feel like the show and the song have aligned in a sympathetic way.

I make stuff up like that sometimes.

Anyway... The incredibly professionally recorded and produced version of the song that accompanies SANTA is a composition Frankenthemed from pieces of the LOUIE theme, sections of a karaoke version of the Hot Chocolate recording, and, obviously, a number of howling stray cats.

Also, some jingle bells. =)

Note that nothing here is used with permission, but also that its use is certainly not for any profit. Except maybe to push the Goodness of the Brattle, LOUIE, and "Brother Louie," so... Not for any of my profit. : P

Keep on keepin on~

* Not sure what this post is about? Click here and maybe you'll figure it out... eventually. =)

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If you're having trouble making out the "dialogue" in the movie theater bit...

Dialogue/audio from IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is audible, accompanying the film playing on screen. Over the course of this segment the film moves from the early scene in which Clarence is talking to his heavenly superiors to the introduction of young George Bailey in holy flashback.

Jack A. (always whispering, too loudly): Is that a talking star?

Jack: Is this a cartoon?

Jack: What's with the talking stars?

Santa (to himself): Really?

Jack: Oh... Those are AN-gels!

Santa (to himself): Allright. That's it. You made the list.

Jack: I thought you said Jon Stewart was in this.

Santa (to himself): Seriously...?

Santa SIGHS.

Jack: Hey... Is the whole thing in *black-and-white*?

Santa CRUMPLES.

Holidaze 2012: tunes!

Music to sky-ski by...

"Dance Of The Sugar Plum Sprites"
8-Bit-w0nder
Christmasasaurus Vol. 2

"It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year (A Shrift Remix)"
Andy Williams
Christmas Remixed

"Snowfall"
Esquivel
Merry X-Mas From The Space-Age Bachelor Pad

"Christmas Don't Be Late"
Mafialligator
A very 8-Bit Christmas

"Christmas Time Is Here"
Vince Guaraldi Trio
A Charlie Brown Christmas

Happy frickin holidaze! =)

Keep on keepin on~

EMPIRE STRIKES BACK uncut!

Keep on beepin on~

Dear Colbert SuperPAC...

After watching coverage of the context clippage by the right (by talking heads and in campaign ads) of Obama's very reasonable, fundamental, and completely correct description of how any business gets started in America, I got in my head that Colbert's superPAC might float an enlightening demonstration of the ridiculousness of the tactic...

Dear Colbert SuperPAC---

In regards to the out-of-context-taking of "You didn't build that" by the Romney campaign (or supporting superPACs?), would the Colbert SuperPAC consider producing a response ad that stitches together word- and phrase-sized soundbites of Romney set to a beat to re-create "Call Me, Maybe?"

"Con-Text Me, Maybe?"

Or maybe it could be a sorta non-partisan issue ad that stitches together bites from both Romney and Obama to re-create... I dunno... "Summer Lovin'?" Something from ROCKY HORROR? Or the original/complete "This Land Is Your Land?"

Or... go non-musical and re-create Gekko's "Greed" speech or Jack Nicholson's "You can't handle the truth" tirade, with an end-credit "We don't need no sticking badges"...? I'll take my answer off the air. Thanks for your continued awesomnitude!

THE DAILY SHOW - "Back In Black" - 7/24/2012.
THE DAILY SHOW - 7/25/2012.

Also, *love* the Daffy Duck cameo in the "Moment Of Zen" =)

Keep on keepin on~

pre-PROMETHEUS crazy talk

So I was surprised when someone recently described PROMETHEUS as a "maybe-prequel" to ALIEN. I've done everything possible to keep my distance from any PROMETHEUS intel, basing my desire to see it on the rep of the director, the series, and what I've seen in the first couple of trailers.

From that, I was pretty certain that this movie would reveal to us how the shipwreck that Ripley and company discover in ALIEN came to happen. The scale of that shipwreck, along w the fossilized, chest-bursted, remains of the alien pilot(?), seemed to point to a race of giant humanoid dudes. This ship and its crew apparently fell prey to the Alien. I was never quite clear on whether the Alien eggs were cargo or the worst kind of luck for the giant guys, laid in a subterranean chamber of Acheron (or whatever it was called - can't remember) that the ship's crash/landing exposed.

For now, I'm gonna go with cargo.

Jumping back a bit in time... Human archaeologists uncover a message left by extra terrestrial visitors in ancient times, found in the remains of cultures from all over the globe. They decipher it as a map and an invitation. The map leads them to this planetoid and an outpost of the Giants. It being an invitation, they expect to be warmly received. Not exactly what happens. Their arrival wakes the Giants and their outpost from a long sleep. Their mission: return to Earth and wipe it clean of its intelligent spacefaring race so that they can pillage it for its resources and tech (no pesky radiation or the like). Their tool of choice: the Alien.

Hrmm... I wonder if the Giants have an anti-Alien? Or maybe there's some later form of the Alien that is more dormant or docile and we've never lived long enough to observe it...?

Or maybe what they need a race of intelligent hosts - humans - to turn into an army of mature Aliens for use in some star- and centuries-spanning war with another species or culture...? Predators? Hrmm...

Anyhow, the invitation turns out to be bait. A puzzle, a test that only spacefaring cultures can pass. The Giants, for whatever reason, have judged other space travelers to be threats, perhaps to themselves or their dominance, perhaps to the well-being of the galaxy in general. So, they once their outpost fully powers up, it launches its massive ship of eggs at Earth. The naive humans figure it out, almost too late, and end up sacrificing themselves, and probably their beautiful ship, to knock the Giant ship out of the sky.

I wonder who triggers the warning beacon that lures the Nostromo down in the first movie... The humans, or that actual Giant pilot we see fossilized.

This sort of p/re-appearance of the misinterpreted message has me feeling like there may be a motif/plot-resonance between PROMETHEUS and ALIEN the way there was between TRON: LEGACY and the original. Also, the Company regulation android - Fassbender's whoever / Holm's Ash. I could see him being a stealth android, like Ash was. That would fit in the prequel world easily, right?

But hey, like I said at the start, someone called this a "maybe-prequel..."

That got me thinking... What if this happens between ALIEN and ALIENS? Would the Company know anything about what happened in ALIEN before they recover Ripley's shuttle? Well, Mother and Ash communicated enough or had enough classified protocol to follow that they were ready to put an infected member into cryosleep in order to bring a sample of this weaponizable biology back home. We've gotta believe that the Company KNOWS. I mean, establishing Newt's colony before ALIENS is no coincidence, right?

So, when these archaeologists find out that their invitation points to this planetoid, the Company happily underwrites the mission. Maybe these guys visit the Giant ship after Kane and friends, but have the tech and know-how w them to power it back up, or inadvertently trigger it.

Hrmm... And Kane and friends disabled the warning beacon, right? They'd have no clue.

Interrresting. Doesn't change all that much, except maybe on their way in they might encounter some log or record of the Nostromo's encounter that they only decrypt after they land and probably just about when the Giant poop hits the Giant fan, eh?

Right, well, I guess I'll found out later today! =)

In space, no one can hear you scream... Woo-hoo!

Keep on keepin on~

Setting up for the next AVENGERS...

Holy crap! Okay, can we say that Coulson died heroically?

Can we say that he died at Loki's hands?

Where do heroes go when they die, in Asgardian lore?

Valhalla!

It seems a stretch given that we don't see a lot of development in the relationship between Thor and Coulson, but there's definitely camaraderie and respect, right? Perhaps even something of a debt, as Coulson pulled strings to keep Jane Foster out of harm's way during AVENGERS...

It really seems that it's Iron Man/Stark who has the strongest relationship with Coulson, but maybe it's at his behest that Thor journeys in search of Coulson in the Asgardian afterlife. His death, while heroic, was brought about by his half-brother's machinations and meddling in Midgardian affairs. A Wrongful death. In order to right that, he would recover Coulson...

This could be part of the next IRON MAN and maybe all of the next THOR, in whichever order. Would be nice to have Stark get to tinker with some Asgardian magic/tech at the source, no? Or maybe get a look at Odin's vault, maybe be there when they discover that Loki has scarpered away with the Gauntlet, leaving behind some cheeky note... "Avenge this, pretty boys!"

Actually, I've got to rework this a bit. Maybe it's double wrong because instead of Valhalla, Coulson has been consigned to Hel. Why this would have happened...? Loki's magicks? The corruption of the spear? Bleah. I don't know, but I really want this to be the case because we need to have Hela introduced as a Big Bad in the solo movie/s before we reveal that SHE is the manipulating Death that Thanos courts!

=)

Keep on keepin on~