Media Masochists Anonymous

Weekly Dose of Head Trauma: Cutthroat Island

2011-06-15T17:00:00.000-07:00

Let's be honest here, pirate movies have never been great. When good, they're entertaining romps with roguishly charming characters. When they're bad, they're either stupid or bordering unwatchable. Why do I bring this up? Well, today we're going to discuss a little film called Cutthroat Island.

Let's start off by saying that this movie tanked worse than Waterworld at the box office. Think about that. This movie sank lower than a movie that was so bad, it staked Kevin Costner's career in the heart and tossed it off the rim of the Grand Canyon. To be fair it's not an AWFUL movie. There are far worse out there, believe me, and this is an entertaining sort of bad. Is it frustrating? Yes. Do the characters make you want to keelhaul them? Also, yes. But, I'm hard pressed to say that I don't enjoy this movie in an incredibly ironic sort of way.

That out of the way, let's pick on the first thing I generally will make fun of in any movie: the actors. Why? Because I'm petty. Cutthroat Island is a Geena Davis vehicle and, despite how badly this movie handles her character at points, I don't blame her too much. I prefer to blame her agents because she's pretty good when given a decent script...problem is that doesn't happen often. We're talking about the woman who went from A League of Their Own (probably one of my all-time favorite movies) to Earth Girls are Easy.

The other 'protagonist' (I use that term in the loosest possible sense) is played by Matthew Modine. Don't know him? If it makes you feel better, I didn't either until I IMDB'd him and found out he'd been Private Joker in Full Metal Jacket. That's the ONLY thing I recognized on his page. If that raised your hopes, I'm sorry because he is the most obnoxious character I've encountered in recent memory.

If this seems like I'm stalling, it's only because I am. *sigh* Well, let's get this started.

The opening credits of the film throws an old timey map up and moving period nautical paraphenelia that makes me both think of Indiana Jones and Muppet Treasure Island. Be prepared for this trend folks, because this movie will continually remind you of better movies that you'd rather be watching. We then cut to a very low shot of a floor that does not look like something that would be in the Caribbean and we get this handy little subtitle informing us that we're in "Jamaica, the Caribbean".

Oh, thank you movie for informing us that we're on that Jamaica that's the in the Caribbean instead of the other one that DOESN'T FUCKING EXIST. Seriously movie, you just started and you're already patronizing me. The movie then breaks me out of a rant in record time by starting in on the most awkward scene possible. It does this by doing a pan up a woman getting dressed. That's not what makes this scene break my concentration though. What does is the extremely ugly dude crooning at Geena Davis in a really crappy Italian(?) accent. Luckily he stops this soon enough by reaching down under the sheets and...pulls out a gun (if your brain took you to a really dark place before I finished that sentence, you're welcome. Mine did that to me while watching this.)

This man (?) will haunt my nightmares.

Apparently Geena Davis is a wanted pirate, but before Ugly McLonghair can do anything else, Davis informs him that she knew he was just screwing her so he could bring her in and then gleefully proclaims that she "took his balls" as her monkey hands her his two pistol shot balls (just, don't get me started on how she snagged two shot balls when a flintlock pistol can only fire one at a time, we'll never get anywhere if I point out every inconsistency that drove me up the wall in this movie) Get used to the crotch stuff folks, it'll be present the entire movie.

Somebody loudly shouts "MORGOOOOON" in an honest to god Caribbean accent. We then cut to our pirates...riding horses. With a bright orange sunset behind them. Um...maybe I'm missing something, but I thought this was a pirate film, not a Western. While Morgan (Geena Davis), some...short guy whose basically the writer from Unforgiven and the black guy that was shouting earlier are riding along playing western, we get some exposition about some guy named Dog (Spelled Dawg for some stupid reason) who has Morgan's Dad and they need to go rescue him, blah, blah, blah...hey movie, if you're going to keep pretending to be a western, can I go watch The Magnificent Seven now?

Okay after the exposition is done, Morgan rides up to some dude sitting by a longboat minding his own business and TACKLES THE FUCK OUT OF HIM! He didn't even do anything! Then she HIGH KICKS HIS FACE and leaves him face down in the surf, presumably to drown. I know she's a pirate and all that, but the guy could have been fishing or something for all she knew.

So, after watching Geena Davis kill a dude and steal his boat, we get our first view of the villainous pirate Dawg (as opposed to those...other pirates who are not villains, but still kill, lie, wench and steal) who's trying to get a map location from Morgan's Dad. Morgan's Dad basically tells Dawg to eat a dick, then promptly drops overboard with an anchor tied around his legs. Morgan, having pulled her purloined longboat alongside The Reaper (Dawg's ship) grabs her dad and somehow manages to keep a dude who has an anchor around his fucking legs above water. While Morgan and her dad snipe at each other, Dawg's pirates (who apparently trained at the stormtroopers marksmanship academy) shoot at them. They do manage to hit the dying old guy who has an anchor around his legs, but that's not saying much. Morgan then dives after her dad and cuts the rope around his ankles before swimming off with him.

After some bad dialog with Morgan and dear old dying dad, we cut to a party that looks like it's taking place

in Versailles, based on the location and costuming, but later turns out to be Port Royal (These people clearly either half-assed or didn't care about historical accuracy). Two snooty British blokes are sitting in a corner being British and snooty about women when Shaw (Modine in all his most obnoxious glory) swoops in and gropes the woman they're making fun of. Ignoring the fact that Shaw's basically crossed the line and jumped over the cliff in regards to things considered inappropriate in the 17th century, this scene is just...well, it's pointless. We later find out (after one of the snooty British guys establishes Shaw's not who he says he is) that he robbed just about every woman at the party, but this whole scene serves no purpose beyond crowbarring Shaw into the story.

We then cut to the Morning Star, Morgan's Dad's ship. Morgan and the short fat writer are getting hammered while Shorty McWuss the Wordsmith tries to talk her out of taking command of the ship. On deck a rather articulate pirate is making a case for being captain when Morgan finally decides to get her drunk ass out of the scuppers and be productive. She pulls out of her pocket her dad's SCALP. Eww...that's just creepy and wrong on so many levels. After disgusting me, Morgan proceeds to say that this is a map to Cutthroat Island, which is basically the nirvana of pirates, and the crew basically jumps on board with that. However, the problem is the map is in LATIN which no one can read. Makes me wonder how they know it's LATIN if that's the case, but whatever, there are bigger problems in this movie.

On top of the LATIN problem, this is only one of three pieces of the map. One is in the hands of Morgan's uncle Mordecai, but the other piece belongs to Dawg. The pirates are all "fuck that noise" but then this burly pirate with a bitchin' face tattoo tells them to stoping being whiny bitches because if Morgan can hook them up with Mordecai they should be able to manage. Morgan thanks him and then shoves her cutlass into the mast and we cut to Port Royal again.

The face of a man you do not mess with.

We see one of the Pirates, Morgan and the Black Dude all dressed up in finery rather than their pirate duds as they talk about how there's only one person who speaks LATIN and he's about to be auctioned off as a slave. Okay, a couple of questions here, how can this guy be the only one who speaks LATIN in the whole of Port Royal when there's a heavy Spanish influence on the entire Caribbean and HOW the blue blazes do they know this one slave speaks it? Does he just brag about his kick ass LATIN speaking skills to everyone? I mean there's suspension of disbelief and then there's being so god damned convenient it doesn't make sense. On top of that, instead of trying to get a whole hold of a slave who speaks LATIN, why not kidnap a priest? It's cheaper and, again, given the heavy Franco-Spanish influence on the Caribbean, surely there's a number of jesuits and priests floating around for you to Shanghai.

Anyway the LATIN speaking slave is, of course, Shaw, who when asked about whether or not he speaks LATIN will NOT. SHUT. UP. Christ, this guy's been in two scenes and I already want to disembowel him. Anyway Morgan tells him to shut up and "say something Latin-ish". Really movie? LATIN-ish? You're really going to use that? *sigh* Alright, let's keep moving.

Anyway, Shaw goes up for auction so Snooty British guy and Morgan get in a pissing contest over which one will get Shaw. Morgan eventually wins by STABBING THE GUY IN THE ASS. What the hell movie? That was unnecessary. So Morgan goes to pay for Shaw, except a couple of the Redcoats on duty spot her mug on a wanted poster. They're quick to pick her out, but to be fair it's a really damn good drawing and even without that there are three things to look for when trying to find a pirate:

1.) A rudimentary prosthetic like a hook, eyepatch or peg leg

2.) A parrot

3.) MONKEY (which Morgan never goes without)

So basically a chase ensues. Black dude and random pirate go back to the ship while Morgan kicks a guy in the nards so hard his testicles probably shot out his ears afterwards and then picks up a shovel and nails two more redcoats in the joy department. (see what I told you about the groin thing this movie has going?) She then drags Shaw off to have the obligatory action movie chase scene.

I won't do a blow by blow of the chase because, well, it's pretty standard Hollywood fare and actually kind of fun. I will point out three specific stupid moments in the chase though.

1.) Morgan and Shaw hijack a carriage and use it for the chase. Several guards drop on it and Morgan (who's driving it) hands Shaw the reigns and fights the dudes while Shaw gives running commentary. Shaw, if you're not man enough to help out in the fight, shut your trap and drive please.

2.) Morgan have to jump into a building because an archway is too low. In theory, this is cool. In actuality it just means Morgan's apparently the fucking Flash because she's just walking through the comically placed obstacles yet she can catch up to a SPEEDING CARRIAGE. That doesn't even begin to make sense.

3.) The ship of the line gets word that the famous Morgan Adams is in port. Their reaction? FIRING THEIR TWELVE POUNDERS INTO THE CITY. What. The. Hell. Are you stupid? Firing cannons into a densely populated city is the worst idea ever. I would love to read this guy's report: "Was alerted there was a pirate. Unloaded twelve pounders into the city. In retrospect, may have overreacted a touch."

Pictured: Overreacting.

Now we get to something that had me frothing at the mouth a little. After our intrepid 'heroes' laugh off the collateral damage of their escape, Shaw reads the LATIN on the map, which is apparently a collection of psalms. This stumps them for 30 whole minutes of the movie. Christ, Morgan, they're CO-ORDINATES! You're supposed to be one of the best pirates out there and you can't tell coded co-ordinates when you see them?! You are just MADE of fail.

Anyway, Shorty McWuss the writer gets bludgeoned by the Governor into spilling everything. This'll become relevant latter. Sort of. Now we cut to Spittlefield Harbor, where Mordecai be chillin'. It's your run of the mill

pirate town and you can tell Tortuga of Pirates of the Caribbean took inspiration from it (which, again, reminds me of a movie I'd rather be watching). Instead of doing the rational thing and going to talk to the dude with her business proposition, Morgan opts to go the stupid route and poses as a prostitute to get in and see him. Mordecai's guards 'pat her down for weapons', which means we get a shot of a grungy pirate dude groping Geena Davis' boobs. She stops him before he gets too far down by saying "that costs extra". Truly a skilled bluffer, our heroine.

Anyway, she gets in to talk to Mordecai, pulls a gun on him and they exposit for a bit. Eventually she talks Mordecai into helping her. As they walk out, Morgan gets chained around the neck and loses her gun in time for Dawg to come in and chew the scenery. Eventually he decides to threaten her and waves a hilariously bad animatronic eel in her face for a bit.

Shaw decides to break up the situation by uncorking a barrel some black powder that just happened to be sitting on the bar and setting it off. The place descends into a fight as things in Pirate bars are won't to do. Of course, through it all, Shaw will not shut up. Also, Modechai gets a knife through the gut courtesy of Dawg and Morgan gets shot in the side.

Then they run outside (Morgan stopping to show Shaw up in manliness by knifing a guy), and get surrounded. However McBitching Face Tattoo shows up with an anachronistic grenade launcher to turn the tide. In the middle of this, along with ignoring Morgan's sucking stomach wound, Morgan figures out the Psalms are co-ordinates. Took you long enough, Jesus Christ in a handbasket.

They get back to the Morning Star which Shaw comments "nice ship". Really, that's all you got? *sigh* then we cut back to The Reaper, where Dawg insists they leave, cutting the anchor, their only means of

stopping, loose. His Quartermaster points out they don't have enough supplies, to which Dawg eloquently responds by shooting the guy in the chest. Hey, the guy was just doing his job, ease up there Dawg.

After Morgan gives the co-ordinates to her men, the crew and the writer remember that Morgan has a sucking stomach wound. They're just going to cauterize it with a hot poker before Shaw intervenes with the idea of actual medical procedure. He does quite well, aside from not sanitizing his hands, and then for some reason, after taking the bullet out of her side, Morgan and Shaw make out. Um, riiight. Hey, if you guys find surgery and stomach injuries sexy, who am I to judge?

Dawg chases the Morning Star into a storm during which Shorty McWuss complains and Shaw attempts to find out the location of Cutthroat Island. Morgan, catches him in the act, finds out he hid the other map piece under the "seaty thing" (Jesus, do I need to say it at this point?) of the longboat and has Shaw hauled off to the brig. Also, we have a major plot hole in the form of Shaw not being a doctor. Either he's really damn good at faking knowledge of medical procedure or he's bullshitting again. I'll go with the latter, if only because it doesn't hurt my brain.

So the Morning Star deals with the obligatory nautical movie story. During said storm, a wave hits the prow and BLOWS THE STERN WINDOWS INWARD. So now we've just started breaking the laws of physics now, have we movie? I know I shouldn't care but cripes WAVES DO NOT WORK THAT WAY.

Of course, realizing their captain has basically dragged them into a suicide mission, the crew mutinies. They dump her and her loyal crew members on a longboat in the middle of the story in a scene that comes almost directly out of Mutiny on The Bounty. Shaw somehow gets loose from his shackles, despite the fact that they were old clunky ones that are hard to pick the locks on and he was too much of an idiot to keep his feet on the ground while chained up.

The unwashed face of reason is at the front there.

Well, the longboat capsizes and they wash up on Cutthroat Island by happy coincidence. After wandering through the jungle and grabbing an iguana for dinner, they spot the Reaper and Morning Star now both controlled by Dawg. They wait until night and then Shaw cut the remaining map piece from around Dawg's neck. Why they don't just slit his throat and be done with it, I'll never know. Also, why does Dawg have a hut and his men are sleeping on the ground? Does he just terrify his men enough that they spent all day building him a hut lest they face his wrath?

Morgan and the crew find Shaw stuck in a pile of leaves that's supposed to be quick sand. Shaw tries to fast talk his way out of the situation, but Morgan will have none of it. He gives her the map piece and for one, brief, blessed moment, you think Morgan's going to leave him to get pulled under, but no, he gets rescued.

Morgan and crew follow the map until they get to a cliff. Morgan and Shaw repel down to a cave and Morgan makes a torch with dry cloth and bone. They then find the saddest pirate hoard in existence. Morgan leaves Shaw, the con artist, with the gold and goes back up to look for her crew, who have vanished. Morgan gets her stupid ass caught and dragged back to the cliff. Shaw bluffs about the gold and gets Morgan thrown off the cliff. She catches the rope and she and Shaw jump off it into the water below.

Truly, these spray-painted props are worth a king's ransom.

Shorty McWuss finds Shaw on the shore and Morgan is nowhere in sight. Shorty manages to BLUFF shaw the CON ARTIST into coming into a redcoat encampment. Dawg and the snooty British Governor are

having tea (because it is always tea time when you are British and evil). They also have allied themselves, though Dawg smartly intends to shank the governor after he's stopped being useful. He even mocks the poncy fop, saying he'll need a certain 'style' when he's governor of Jamaica. I've got to say, I'm starting to like Dawg.

As they prepare to make way and raise Anchor we learn Morgan has been hanging onto the anchor for God knows how long.

She goes and frees the crew, who take down the comically ineffective crew and redcoat guard in all of two seconds. They then go through a preparation montage (including the monkey loading shot into a pistol). The governor thinks it's minorly odd the Morning Star is following them, but Dawg is genre savvy enough to know something is up, and preps his men.

Worst. Midboss. Ever.

They decide to hang Shaw and go about it in the longest way possible, giving Morgan enough time to make a precision shot with a fucking MUSKET. They then engage in ship to ship combat during which the cannons make a lot of smoke and no damage. Eventually they actually start engaging each other with guns and cutlasses. Shaw spends the entirety of the fight being completely fucking useless. In fact, as a friend pointed out, he'd be more useful at this point if he fell on someone and knocked them overboard.

This picture is deceptively full of action.

Morgan goes below to deal with Dawg and Shaw goes down below to attempt to cut the treasure loose. I say attempt because there's a chain on it as well as rope. Morgan lights some black powder to scuttle the ship and Shaw gets trapped by debris from the battle in a section of the hull slowly flood. Dawg finally stalks in and he and Morgan engage in combat. They then stop and climb some rigging (while the crew watches) before engaging in combat again. Morgan groin shots Dawg, who then starts pwning her. He then makes a "join me" speech, pushes Morgan off the mast and poses to show off his awesomeness. Morgan lands, relatively unharmed, in the cargo hold. Shaw hasn't, to my disappointment, drowned. Dawg comes down to taunt Morgan some more. Morgan then uses the most conveniently placed canon in history, which happens to be fully loaded, to shoot Dawg out of the ship with the line "Bad Dawg". Truly this is the most absurd moment in a movie of absurd moments.

Morgan saves Shaw (whyyyy), they escape without the treasure, and swan dive off the ship at the most dramatic moment. Shaw bemoans the fact that he's poorer. Never mind that Shaw is a SLAVE and worth nothing, so has no room to complain. Anyway, Morgan actually is competent and manages to save some treasure. Her men could retire on this, but no, they take Morgan up on her offer to continue to pillage and plunder despite the scurvy, harsh discipline and possibility of hangings. The movie ends with Morgan telling Shaw she'll see him in her cabin, the monkey cringing from this horribly pick up line, and the crew setting sail.

So there you have it. Ultimately, it's a pretty harmless little flick that is quite fun IF you shut your brain off. Is it as bad as Waterworld? Hell no, but it is certainly bad. But it's an entertaining sort of bad...if you can get past Modine's inability to shut up.

Really needs to maintain a schedule better,

Jenna Darknight

All pictures here belong to their respective owners and are only used for the purposes of review.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly of Asian Martial Arts Films

2010-11-19T08:51:00.000-08:00

There have come various points in my life where I think nothing media related can find away to hurt me because the stuff I've watched has killed little parts of me in the most excruciating ways possible. I mean, I've sat through Manos the Hands of Fate (MSTK 3000 once touched on this gem, I believe), Troll 2, Halloween 3 and all four Leprechaun movies for Christ's sake. Unfortunately, whenever that thought crosses my mind something from across the Pacific decides to flying kick its way into my brain and injure me in an entirely new fashion.

This leads me into the three films I'm going to talk about today: Yo-Yo Girl Cop, Tokyo Gore Police and Silver Hawk. Silver Hawk straddles the line of things I probably shouldn't talk about on MMA because it's self-aware enough to considerably mitigate the retardedness factor, so it's mostly up here for comparison with the other two. Yo-Yo Girl Cop received a review earlier on my own blog, but I felt the need to bring it up again, because it shares a lot of the same problems as Tokyo Gore Police.

So let's get to the summaries of the film plots and the reasons why they injure me. I'll start with Yo-Yo Girl Cop, since it's already received a full review elsewhere.

Yo-Yo Girl Cop is a film about a girl whose mother was a former special agent in a unit that only uses combat yo-yos (I'm not making that up, I swear). She gets called in to investigate a series of suicides following methods posted on this website called the Enola Gay, run by some bitchy chick at this high school (who also fights with yo-yos for no adequately explained reason) and some guy who is either posing as the school janitor or is the school janitor. I'm not really sure because things get convoluted as hell and there really isn't a whole lot of cohesion as far as plot goes. Basically nothing happens until the last 20-30 minutes of the movie, where there's a yo-yo fight between Bitchy Girl (who has a name, but I'll be damned if I remember it) and the protagonist and a "showdown" between the protagonist and the janitor. I say "showdown" with ironic quotes because all he does is show her he's got a bomb strapped to him and rants. I really had stopped caring and paying attention at that point, so the guy could have been explaining a possible theory that would link gravity, electro-magnetism and nuclear weak/strong forces together for all I know.

The main problem with Yo-Yo Girl Cop is the lack of ANYTHING going on for a good part of the movie. The first ten minutes brings up some rather intriguing questions. Why is this chick tied up with a bomb on her? Is it a suicide? Is she some convoluted murder victim? Someone using her as "an example"? Why is she carrying a yo-yo? The movie only answers the last question and the answer is incurably retarded. It's mostly a bunch of dramatic, yet pointless and horribly boring, dialog and characters doing mundane things until the last half hour. Making a majority of your movie a sufferance means that when you get to the stuff we rented the movie for (the hot, hot violence in the form of yo-yo kung fu) we no longer care.

This lack of interesting shit going on is sort of the same problem Tokyo Gore Police has. The latter's a bit better because it feels like the writers didn't forget that they were making an Asian Grindhouse film and kept throwing mildly interesting stuff into the morass of boring "exposition" at random. The whole movie seems to be built around the question of "What the Hell?" though, so the mildly interesting stuff ranges from "Am I looking at what I think I'm looking at?" to "Holy shit, I think this movie just gave me an aneurysm."

To understand what I mean with that last bit, let me give you a play-by-play of the first ten minutes of the movie. We open up with a bunch of Japanese cops wearing what looks like what happens when someone decided to run through the costuming department for Ran while in SWAT gear. There's also this mopey chick sitting in a cop car and looking at a box cutter. Then we cut to an open area in the half-finished building all the cops have been looking at, where some hobo is hunched over a makeshift table.

We cut back to the cops looking worried/constipated and mopey girl glaring at her box cutter. Then, out of nowhere, this voiceover starts and I swear the chick doing it is on some combination of sugar, caffeine and crack because she is the peppiest human who has ever lived. She basically starts reading the dossier of this cannibalistic serial killer, who apparently was the hobo we saw earlier. The shot cuts up there with the voice over still going on and we see the guy is grungier up close. Oh, he's also eating chunks of a blatantly rubber woman whose coated in Kensington Gore except for one boob and...well, her hoo-ha, to put it rather juvenilely, but hey, I'm not above being juvenile when required. Like when movies just make blood dribble out my ears and nose.

We then cut back to the cops and the camera stops on mopey girl as super-happy-voice-over-chick finishes up the dossier and gives some orders. We then cut to what looks like the room of a tween girl who likes police themed décor, and a short, attractive Japanese woman with bleached blonde hair dressed in a sequined costume police uniform. Apparently she was the one doing the voiceover because she points and the screen and says in the same voice she just finished delivering this guy's criminal record in, "Okay, boys. Go get em!"

Ladies and Gentlemen, the perkiest woman ever.

On cue the cops rushing in and mopey girl starts cutting on a Kensington-Gore-filled, flesh-colored plastic balloon that's supposed to be her wrists. The cops rush in and hobo picks up a chainsaw, sending appendages and gore everywhere. Finally one cop gets it together and shoots the guy's hand off. Now this is where everything goes nuts, because the guy screams and he GROWS A CHAINSAW HAND before ripping the cops a new one.

He rampages around, yelling and generally chomping on the scenery until Mopey Girl, apparently bored of cutting on herself, shows up with a katana. They have a cheap wire-fu fight for a few minutes before Mopey Girl gets bored and CUTS HIM IN HALF, which turns him into a blood fountain.

That, ladies and gents, is the first TEN MINUTES of this thing. "What the Hell?" doesn't even cover my reaction to this. The friend I was watching this flick with and I had to pause the move because we were shouting variations on "WHAT?" over the dialogue. A lot of the WTF factor gets cleared out of the way off the bat....sort of. By which I mean that they clear up some stuff to make room for more insanity. The whole "growing weapon appendages" thing is unique to a group of criminals who call themselves Engineers. They get this power from....key shaped tumors (I wish I could make this shit up) somewhere in their body and the only way to stop them is to cut off where ever this tumor is. Hence the hack-and-slash happy mopey girl, who is the member of the now privatized Tokyo PD (who all wear the armor mishmash as a uniform. Except for Mopey Girl, but she's important, so she gets to avoid being dressed like an escapee from the set of the new post-apocalyptic Yojimbo) and apparently is the one who specifically hunts these guys. Also, she's our designated protagonist for the film, so get used to a lot of long mopey stares off into the distance and morosely flat dialogue deliveries.

As for random voiceover girl? She's the police dispatch. Basically the PD is batshit nutso and their intro is all sorts of awesome. The Police Chief is this jovial badass who adopted Mopey Girl and has a "dog" (and later when his character goes to shit, sex slave) in the form of a quadruple amputee girl who later gets Katanas for limbs. The other notable member aside from the dispatch is the coroner, who has a wicked dissection tool for a hand and is lovably eccentric. Basically this messed up force is our heroine's adopted family after her dad's head was shot open in a fashion that makes an exploding melon look conservative. Unfortunately, after their awesome opening bits they suffer some massive character derailment which leaves them all as irredeemable assholes, but I'll get to that later.

Another character worth mentioning is Mopey Girl's "normal" friend who runs a bar. She's sort of inconsequential until the last quarter of the movie, but she's probably the only actor in the flick trying to play a genuine human character. She does get awesome though, which is the one thing about this movie that is leagues ahead of Yo-Yo Girl Cop; every "relevant" character gets some form of Crowning Moment of Awesome. However, as the plot is irredeemably stupid, these moments of awesome do little to save the movie from ultimately being shit.

The long and short of the plot is that Mopey Girl is put on the tail of the guy who they think has been giving the Engineers tumors (and yes it makes about as much sense as you'd expect). After a lot of tangental crap that's irrelevant and/or weird (like a legless chick with a tooth-filled crotch and a dude with a giant shlong gun, but I like to pretend those things didn't happen), Mopey Chick gets a tumor herself and tracks the guy down. Given that in the scene where he gave her the tumor, he rips off the top of his head and ends up having a PVC pipe eyes attached to his head, that can't have been that hard, even if it takes fifteen damn minutes of movie time. Pipe-Face's story is as nonsensical as you'd expect. He was a medical genius studying the genes of serial killers when his poor farther was conned by Mopey Girl's adopted father into shooting her real father and was then killed himself. In grief, Pipe-Face jammed a syringe full of all those serial killer genes into his arm and....somehow this let him meet the devil, who is both A.) a midget and B.) the one who gave him the key tumors in the first place. Given how irritated Satan the Midget is, he probably gave the dude the tumors just to get him off his lawn.

Our villain, Ladies and Gentlemen

After Mopey Girl hears all this nonsensical crap she does the logical thing: slashes his head in half and leaves. however, all the stuff about her adopted dad being a dick is true, as the once insane-but-lovable Tokyo PD falls completely off the tracks of awesome and crashes head first into Pricksville. They run around killing, torturing and mauling everything. Even the awesome normal chick dies, but not before killing three of the officers. Mopey Girl runs up in time to see the awesome normal chick die and somehow her hand mutates into a mouth, despite the fact that we never see an Engineer get their wacky mutated limb until they lose their conventional one, which she didn't. I know I shouldn't question the logic of a movie that has a plot built around magical satanic key tumors that give people chainsaw hands, but a little consistency would be nice.

Anyway, Mopey Girl gets a scope eye to go with her toothy hand and stomps off to the PD HQ where crazy coroner awaits her with the goofiest weapon ever, the hand gun. It's a gun that shoots hands. I'm not kidding. It's so ridiculous that it's actually kind of awesome. He's choked by one of his own hands and Mopey Girl continues her march towards the final battle.

Hand Gun: Best weapon ever or BEST weapon ever?

There she fights Quadruple Amputee Girl and, after a brief fight, Mopey Girl breaks all four of her katanas and dukes it out with her adopted father. After cutting his legs off and seemingly ending the fight, he injects himself with something and his legs become....blood jets. I can't believe I just typed that, but that is exactly what happens. He frigging flies around the room using the blood that shoots out of his legs. Anyway, she kicks his butt and the last shot we see is of Mopey Girl in all her goofiness and quadruple amputee girl with her katana limbs replaced with machine guns.

This movie is definitely as bad as Yo-Yo Girl Cop, but at least it's interesting. Interesting in a "Hey, did I just see a bear in a clown suit ride by on an ATV?" sort of way, but that's not enough to ultimately save the film. It's definitely more worth a look than Yo-Yo Girl Cop at least, but really, that's not saying much...

Unlike Yo-Yo Girl Cop and Tokyo Gore Police, Silver Hawk is good. It's very aware of what it is, a goofy Kung Fu film, and revels in it. Much like Zebraman, it embraces the clichés of its genre, but instead of becoming a very good satire on fan culture and the internet at large, Silver Hawk just wants you to come along for the ride.

Before I get into the plot of Silver Hawk, I have to point out that this is a Michelle Yeoh film. I'm a rather big fan of hers because she always seems to enjoy what she's doing. Even if the film is terrible, she will be awesome. In this case, however, she takes the film from being a pretty decent self-aware Kung Fu film to being a really good self-aware Kung Fu film, simply because she seems to enjoy the silliness of the movie as much as the audience.

The plot is...well, as ridiculous as the other plots of the movies in this review. Michelle Yeoh plays basically the female version of Batman: a wealthy business tycoon who likes to beat up bad guys in her spare time. However, unlike the broody Batman, Silver Hawk does superheroing just because. We're never given any motivation for why she does it, but given how much she grins like an idiot when breaking mook bones, I think she just does it because...well....why the hell not?

The first scene pretty much sums up what this movie is about: cool vehicles, explosions and Kung Fu. Some thugs have stolen some Panda cubs and Silver Hawk has come after them on her sweet motorcycle, which I shall henceforth call the Hawkcycle. A quick chase ensues, Silver Hawk shoots at them with her motorcycle missiles and then proceeds to jump onto the trailer. Kung Fu and righteous ass-kickings follow, culminating in Silver Hawk rescuing the panda cubs and calling it a day.

From there we jump to Silver Hawk (known as Lulu in civilian mode) on a plane. She sits next to a guy who recognizes her from magazine covers. She recognizes him too, and we get a flashback about how they trained at a martial arts academy as kids. Funnily enough, the dude doesn't recognize her name, immediately leading me to dub him Idiot Love Interest for the duration of the film. He brags to her about how he's being brought in to catch Silver Hawk, to which Lulu responds by smiling indulgently like he's a five year-old telling her he's going to be an astronaut, and asks for her number. She mucks around with his phone so she can track him, and tells him he gets a date with her if he can remember her.

Cut to Lulu's swank pad where she's cheerily telling her female Alfred about the bust we saw at the beginning. Cue comic relief relative who brings a professor with her as a blind date for Lulu. Things get awkward until Lulu gets word of a robbery and quickly weasels her way out of the date as fast as humanly possible. Another series of awesome Kung Fu fights follows, until Silver Hawk stops a mugging, only to find out it's a sting and Idiot Love Interest was cross-dressing as the victim so he could fight her. Silver Hawk basically makes him a laughing stock to his underlings and takes off on the Hawkcycle. She makes it back to her place and finds out that the professor has finally figured out that there will be no date and has left. However he stuck one of his poor grad students to wait around and let Lulu know he'd like her to come to his presentation tomorrow. The dumb shmuck of a grad student slinks off after this, clearly hoping that he'll get some sort of benefit out of doing something that could have been handled better through a voicemail.

The student shows up the next day to basically make sure Lulu goes to the damn exhibition. On the way to the presentation, poor dumb grad student (Kit) reveals he's a Silver Hawk fanboy, which Lulu is amused at. Idiot Love Interest interrupts Kit's gushings about Silver Hawk to let her know he does remember her. The presentation happens and we get the movie linchpin: an A.I. chip that's supposed to make recommendations on how to make your life better based on it's interactions with you. Professor is promptly kidnapped after the reveal of the MacGuffin by a black dude with bling brass knuckes and a raver chick whose hair will change color between appearances.

All Henchmen should be this ridiculous

Chase/fight scenes follow and after a bit, Silver Hawk lets them go in order to save someone, but not before the black dude snaps a picture of her to send to his boss. Idiot Love Interest is off being non-productive in a way that leads him to cross paths with Silver Hawk again and the professor is dragged to meet the villain of the film, Alexander Wolfe, who wants the professor to make the chips work like mind control devices. The professor whines a bit before caving after Wolfe fixes him with an irritated glare.

Basically the next 20 minutes is Lulu actually doing detective work while idiot love interest is working damn hard at being a giant millstone around her neck. Every once in a while we'll cut back to Wolfe chewing scenery and basically being every Bond villain ever. Oh, and at one point Lulu rescues her uncle (whose some bigwig CEO for a phone company) and the black dude takes another picture of her, leading Wolfe to figure out who she is.

CEO is later duped into being whisked off by Wolfe, and all Lulu can do is snap a pic of him. Deciding to hit up the only semi-competent person she knows, she sends the picture to Kit as Silver Hawk, knowing her fanboy will immediately jump at the chance to help her out. Idiot Love Interest has started being less of an idiot at this point and is starting to figure out that Lulu and Silver Hawk are one in the same. He pops over to talk to her about it, only to find her getting ready to head out to a secret meeting with Wolfe. He ends up doing one of two sort of useful things he will do this movie, and puts a tracking device on her.

We then cut to possibly one of the most ridiculous fight scenes I've ever seen in my life: Michelle Yeoh versus bungee ninjas. She proceeds to kick the shit out of them until Wolfe gets bored and injures her with his weaponized prosthetic arm. Down, but not out, Silver Hawk knocks one of the bungee ninjas off his set up and uses his bungee chord to scale up the wall and out of the building.

Despite being injured, she manages to make it back to her apartment before passing out from the pain. Idiot Love Interest has still been tracking her and basically breaks in to question her about the whole Silver Hawk thing. Seeing she's pretty much unavailable for questioning at the moment, he starts to take care of the wound, but Kit busts in and, after a moment of shock, starts gushing about meeting his idol. Idiot Love Interest drags Kit out and starts pumping him for information, leading the two of them to put together what Wolfe's plan is.

Silver Hawk is cleaning her own wound when she recalls a Kung Fu lesson and gets an idea of how to beat Wolfe. The next day, Kit and Idiot Love Interest have a plan, they just don't know where Wolfe's hideout is. As they contemplate this very large, very obvious hole in their plan, they get an e-mail with an address from Silver Hawk, whose already speeding to the scene. There we get the second most ridiculous fight of the movie: Michelle Yeoh vs. Hockey Thugs.

It's epically silly, made worse by the SWAT team, Kit and Idiot Love Interest busting in and joining in the fight against the hockey thugs. Also, Raver Chick and the black dude show up and fight Silver Hawk until she drops Raver Chick. Idiot Love Interest decides this would be a brilliant time to charge the black dude, but Silver Hawk stops him and lets the black dude pick up Raver Chick and leave. Silver Hawk then stomps down to have an epic showdown with Wolfe. Cue another Kung Fu fight interspersed with Idiot Love Interest, Kit and the professor trying to stop the mind control signal from going out. Unfortunately, they can't because they need Wolfe's retinal scan.

Silver Hawk kicks Wolfe's ass and drags him over to the main control panel. Wolfe childishly keeps his eyes shut for a good minute before Kit tricks him into opening his eyes. The scan stops the brainwashing whatchamawhosit that was Wolfe's plan, but it sets the self-destruct off. Everyone escapes, except Wolfe who is crushed to death. Cut to a bit later, where Idiot Love Interest and Lulu are having dinner and talking about everything that just happened. Lulu asks him if he'd arrest her as Silver Hawk, but he's called away before he can answer. As Idiot Love Interest rushes to the scene, he's passed up by the Hawkcycle and the two exchange banter as the movie ends.

Silver Hawk epitomizes everything good about a silly martial arts flick. It's fun, fast-paced and well shot. The characters are a little silly and the plot's goofy as Hell, but that works in its favor rather than to its detriment, and honestly you can tell that the actors were having a blast shooting it. From Idiot Love Interest's goofy mugging, to Wolfe's gleeful scenery chomping, it's a really entertaining watch.

Unfortunately films like Yo-Yo Girl Cop and Tokyo Gore Police are more common imports, but hopefully this article has semi-educated you in what to look for in a Kung Fu film. If not, well, at least you know two films to avoid unless you like being bored and/or confused as hell.

Is very aware that this article is huge,

Jenna Darknight

NEXT TIME: Cutthroat Island. Be afraid.

All images belong to their respective owners and are only used for the purposes of review.

Why I Love Shadow Hearts Covenant,or How to Actually Write Characters in Video Games

2010-06-21T23:26:00.000-07:00

Two articles in a day (or close to a day), that's pretty rare for me, folks. Yep, I'm out of college and coming out fists flying this summer Hopefully I can maintain this momentum, but I make no promises. Anyway, this is going to be an article on a great game a good friend sat me down to play last quarter: Shadow Hearts Covenant. It defies so many conventions that a general article did not cover it, so there will be two following articles covering two characters in particular and how they are arguably the best characters in a game I've seen in a long time.

A bit of background info should probably preface my ranting so here's a highly abbreviated version of the vague history for the Shadow Hearts series.

Covenant came out in on the PS2 in 2004 to a fairly widespread release and gained a cult following in Europe and the States. The response in Japan was considerably stronger, so much so that it warranted a special Director's Cut release that those of us unfortunate enough to not live in the land of the rising sun will never EVER see like half of the other awesome releases over there (Why, no, I'm not bitter about the whole not releasing Persona 2: Innocent Sin, why do you ask?). Covenant was a sequel to Shadow Hearts (cue every reader rolling their eyes and commenting on my intelligence level for feeling it necessary to state the title), which was released in 2001 on the PS2 and featured less refined versions of Covenant's control mechanics. Shadow Hearts in turn was the spiritual successor to a largely forgotten survivor horror RPG called Koudelka which came out on the PSX in 1999.

Shadow Hearts has some ties to Koudelka through character references and the fact that the titular character's, Koudelka, son is in your party. However, most of those ties are largely forgotten in Covenant. The things which makes the Shadow Hearts series interesting (Covenant in particular, since I'll be focusing on that one mostly) as opposed to most conventional JRPGs, and also the reasons I'm talking about it, boil down to two essential points that inform other aspects of the games, the time period and the characters.

The Shadow Hearts games are based in history, which is pretty rare for the genre in general. The first game takes place in 1913. Much of the first half of the game takes place in Japanese occupied China and the locale from there switches to Europe as events unfold. Covenant takes place during the 1914, the first year of World War I for those of you too lazy to look it up. This is sort of relevant as among your rather hodgepodge party are a Lieutenant of the Imperial German army and Princess Anastasia Romanov herself. You interact with such historical figures as Thomas Lawrence, Czar Nicholas II and Exotic Dancer/ Spy Margerete Gertrude Zelle (a returning face from the 1st Shadow Hearts) better known as Mata Hari. Hell, One of the major enemies for the first half of the Game is Grigori fucking Rasputin, I kid you not. How epic is that? The locales and character occupations aren't the only thing affected. Clothing, particularly for the NPCs (I won't comment a lot on your party because they're sort of...odd and their clothing is just one aspect of oddness) is accurate to the time and many of your less outlandish weapons and armor are grounded in reality.

The third one (Shadow Hearts: From the New World), which I like to pretend didn't happen because it sucks, takes place during 1929, misses those little details. You have a talking cat in your party who was Al Capone's bodyguard. Talking. Cat. Bodyguard. Think on that for a second.

That's not to say there isn't a fantasical element to the first two Shadow Hearts games, but it's balanced well by the historical context and never overplayed the way it is in the third one. But enough about the suck of Shadow Hearts: From the New World. Let's get back to the point of this article...or at least, what I think was the point when I started this.

Your party in Covenant is sort of an interesting mix of eccentricity. To give you an idea, your main character (Yuri Hyuga and the subject of an article all his own) is a half japanese, half Russian (sort of, but explaining that would be a HUGE SPOILER and I'm not that much of a jerk that I'd spoil probably the biggest twist in the game. Not going to stop me from spoiling other things, but still...) ruffian who can fuse with the monsters he's killed to turn into a monster himself, and he's just the start. Your party will grow to include the aforementioned German Lieutenant who is the only sane man (or rather, woman) of your party, a lecherous old puppeteer who fights using a Lolita-esque puppet designed after his late daughter, a wolf, a wresting vampire who makes weapons out of objects he picks up at random, a bimbo Florentine fortune teller, Princess Anastasia Romanov and a Japanese swordsman with the same ability as Yuri (and is honestly quite dull, but that's just my opinion).

All of the characters are interesting, varied and blatantly fly in the face of a lot of tropes that so plague RPGs. Hell, the fact alone that they are indeed CHARACTERS, not plot contrivances to keep things moving and to get you from point A to B makes them notable. Granted there is some fan service in regards to the female characters, but it's sort of mocked by the fact that the guys in the game (well, except Joachim the vampire, but he's...unique) treat it as such and this fact is played up for laughs. I mean, here's where you first meet the fortune teller character.

Just try and tell me that's not being meta about the whole fanservice thing.

NOTE: The characters bios are all a little bit spoilery. They need to be to make my point. If that bothers you, skip to my conclusions and I hope you enjoyed this very general discussion of Shadow Hearts and it's characters.

Lucia is the earlier referred to Florentine fortune teller. She's raised by Carla, a former member of Sapientes Gladio, an organization that seems to want Yuri dead/out of commission so she's a bit sheltered. Coupled with her occupation that's left her with a bit of an...odd perception of things. Well, rather than explain it, here's a couple of examples of her oddness:

Aside from...well being a bimbo airhead and one of several comic relief characters (she, Anastasia and Joachim are the three stooges of your party), she doesn't have much depth aside from a cat fight/feud with her former fellow student Veronica, who's now working for Sapientes Gladio. However, because she's comic relief she's sort of freed up to regularly lean on the fourth wall. Granted, all the characters do this quite frequently, but she does it in a fashion that reminiscent of Osaka from Azumanga Daioh; odd, quirky and, as one of the clips showed, sometimes a bit disturbing.

Anastasia is sort of in the same boat. As a royal, she's lived pretty removed from everyday life and you can see that in her interactions with other characters. Her impetuous and spitfire attitude only makes her come off worse initially. However, she's much more politically aware than one would expect and this cutscene in particular illustrates how very aware she is of the situation in Imperialist Russia and it's causes.

It's interesting to see a character who is very much a young child, but at the same time forced by birth and situation to mature very quickly and Anastasia balances the two quite well.

Joachim Valentine, a wrestling vampire, Anastasia's personal pack muleand the gayest straight man I've ever seen manages to come so close to so many tropes that he becomes a mockery of them. He is the ridiculously over done hero complete with wacky secret identity.

Yes, his form is basically "Grand Butterfly" and yes, he uses that voice every single time he opens his mouth. He's ridiculous, over the top, and completely unaware of how gay he is. His master, the Great Gama (also a historical figure, don't know if he's as gay as he is in the game. A bit scared to find out one way or the other to be honest.) is teribly, terribly gay, and Joachim is so dense he doesn't get it. He and Lucia seem to be competing for who is the densest character in the entire game. However, in being that dense and playing so many superhero tropes so completely straight (see the below clips for proof) he ends up making them one big joke and it's awesome.

Kurando, the Japanese swordsman, is...well he's sort of dull. You get him in the last leg of the game, so he really doesn't get fleshed out so much as the other characters react to him in what little screen time he gets, so it's forgivable. Gepetto the puppeteer is pretty much how I summed him up earlier. He's a lecher and a drinker who fights with a lolita-esque puppet modeled after his late daughter. There is literally nothing I can add to that.

That just leaves Blanca Blanca is the wolf who joins your party with Yuri and Gepetto shortly after some major plot shit goes down and Yuri gets a rather rough introduction to Sapientes Gladio. He and Karin (the German Lieutenant) are the two "sane men" in a group full of eccentrics. However, unlike Karin, Blanca can't exactly talk so it's not as though he can comment much on the craziness around him. That particular problem gets him started in his wolf bout sidequest actually.

Aside from being a sane wolf with a party of oddballs, Blanca also ends up pretty much saving everyone's asses on a few occasions and even gets a solo side bit when you first get to Japan.

There are a number of secondary characters of Covenant who are notable as well. Roger Bacon and Saki Inugami are definitely worth the mention at the very least.

Bacon is, in this game's canon, a 700 year old alchemist/scientist/eternal love child (his words not mine) who created the party's means of travel to Russia and Japan and serves as exposition for much of the Rasputin plot. He also is a central player in what is arguably the most heartwrenching scene I've ever seen in a game, but that will be addressed in one of the other articles.

He also seems to be the party's unintentional punching bag, since they...seem to forget him a few times.

Saki Inugami is Kurando's mother, Yuri's aunt, and frigging nuts. She's a powerful mystic in her own right and actually helps you out in a big way when you first meet her. What makes her nuts is the fact that she:

- Tries to hook up her son with Anastasia, who is CONSIDERABLY younger than him. Granted she is very, very into him, but that's beside the point.

- Hints at things in a fashion that makes you want to look for a quick exit.

- Drops a huge bomb on Karin (though you're not privy to it at first) in a really roundabout, pretty causal, way.

She cryptic without being frustrating about it and an entertaining character in her own right.

The last bit of this article will be devoted to four of the game's antagonists. Rasputin is not included in this list because he's actually pretty generic and sort of annoying because of it.

Nicolas (Nicolai) Conrad is Rasputin's main flunky who later steps out and becomes the major villain (sort of) of the Japan arc. He's a Cardinal and a member of Sapientes Gladio in a hope that he will be able to overthrow Rasputin after he takes power in Russia and take control himself. He makes a soul pact with the demon Astaroth to this end, even though by the time you take him out he's been posessed by Astaroth.

Nicolai is interesting because he is still flawed. He has a serious inferiority complex when it comes to Yuri and obsesses over Karin because of it. However, because of this complex he is aware of what a threat Yuri poses and even points that out to Rasputin, who doesn't really take it into consideration. Manipulative and driven, Nicolai is a believable threat.

Lenny is one Nicolai's henchmen whose a decent guy but a terrible bad guy. He's easily tricked into giving up information, enforces politeness and teaches arithmetic to a petty thief to help him get his act together, He's portrayed at a guy who is trying to do his job well, but just doesn't fit the role and it works brilliantly.

Veronica, as mentioned before, was one of Carla's students along with Lucia and the two of them are sort of catty about that. She's the typical bondage queen character who pops up in JRPGs every now and again, but she's so undermined by the party and those around her, her act never quite works, which makes her much more comical than threatening. Still, she doesn't fall for the tricks Lenny does so that is something.

Kato is the game end boss and one of the toughest kinds of villains to make: the sympathetic villain. He's a returning character from the first Shadow Hearts and he lost his lover in the course of that game. He attempts and sort of succeeds at reviving her in this game only to lose her again. His struggles and failure to posess this one small bit of happiness in his life is what makes him believably sympathetic and even as he plans to go back into the past and remake the world, he still manages to come off as a likable guy...you know, if he wasn't ending the world as we know it. It's a less cut and dry confrontation than the Nicolai or Rasputin ones are and a perfectly fitting end boss for the game.

That's a brief summary of the unconventional characters of Shadow Hearts Covenant. Next time is a closer focus on one of the last two characters: Karin Koenig.

Keep on Gaming,

Jenna Darknight

(Just because I'm having far too much fun with the embed feature, I included this vid of the party undermining one of the minor Japan arc bosses, enjoy.)

(all images/videos property of Midway and Aruze who produced this awesome series of games and are nice people and...don't want to sue me.)

An Open Letter to Tim Burton (About Things He Does to Piss Me Off)

2010-06-21T18:25:00.001-07:00

Okay, Tim Burton, we need to talk.

Well, I need to talk and though I doubt you'll ever find this blog entry, you need to listen. I finally had a chance to see Alice in Wonderland, and while it wasn't a total mess of a film, it illustrated a lot of problems I have with you and was bad enough that I'm using it as a basis to write this. Now I know you're making fantastic money off all the goth kids buying Nightmare Before Christmas stuff at Hot Topic, but really, Tim Burton, that's not a legitimate excuse for these half assed efforts you've been turning out in recent years. Granted, many of them are enjoyable, but they lack the creativity of your earlier films. So, let's get this little discussion rolling and maybe, we'll get some work done here.

5.) Stop using CGI for everything.

Now, I understand that CGI is a great tool for film makers. It lets them accomplish things they couldn't have before and it's great that it helps you do your job (entertaining your audience) better, but it's no reason to phone it in. Your movies lack any sense of danger because you're not bothering to make good CGI. Your Bandersnatch and Jabberwocky made Power Rangers villains look threatening. Think about that. You just made Rita Repulsa threatening. That's bad and you should feel bad.

4.) Stop being creepy for creepy's sake.

Look, Tim, you do great creepy. We love your creepy. Mars Attacks!, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice....all really great, but you've pretty much fallen into replicating two basic atmospheres for your movies: "whimsically creepy" and "dark and creepy". While you're really good at them, it wouldn't hurt to mix things up. I mean, couldn't you do another Big Fish type movie? something that's charming and whimsical without pandering to the goth kiddie crowd? Or what about another arty sort of film like Ed Wood? I know that one flopped at the box office, but you still put yourself out there and tried, so why not do the same now?

3.) Please put plot ahead of visuals.

This is sort of a common problem in Hollywood now, so don't feel too bad that you fall into this category. However, you've always been able to balance style and substance pretty well so maybe this is just a sign to re-evaluate things. Alice in Wonderland was ALL about the visuals. There was little in the way of plot and what was there didn't make sense. Same with your re-envisioning of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, it was gorgeous but ultimately forgettable. That's not the reaction you want from a filmgoer, so you might want to think on this.

2.) Stop doing remakes

Seriously. Just stop. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was a classic, as was the original Planet of the Apes and Disney's 1951 version of Alice and Wonderland, even if the latter did sort of scar me as a kid. Your best stuff in my book: Beetlejuice, Nightmare Before Christmas, Mars Attacks! and Big Fish were all original pieces. Because of that, they stand out all the more. Don't fall into the remake pit, Tim, be better than that.

1.) STOP PUTTING JOHNNY DEPP (AND HELENA BONHAM CARTER) IN ALL YOUR MOVIES!

The Helena Bonham Carter thing is a new one, since she's only been a regular in your films since '01, but seriously Tim, Hollywood's a big place. There have to be other people you can hire. And that's not to say they're not good actors, they are, but Jesus Christ on toast having them in every film is not the greatest idea. Depp was not the best choice for the Mad Hatter and he was not the best choice for Willy Wonka. You could have done better, so why didn't you broaden your scope? Does Depp have some blackmail material on you? Did you lose a bet? What? Whatever it is, get rid of it and fast.

And there you have it Tim Burton, my suggestions for your improvement. Take them or leave them (seriously, take them, at this rate I will stop going to your movies seriously), but I've gotten them off my chest and that's what matters to me.

Intends to do more than rant eventually,

Jenna Darknight

Petz Bunnyz [DS]

2009-11-08T11:51:00.000-08:00

Does this make me too lazy to write or creative enough to make a video? Eh, prolly both.
Serenity Frost

Bravestarr (my brain is too much jelly to think of a creative name)

2009-09-09T21:53:00.000-07:00

The Marshal sadly awaiting his tentacle raping.

Okay, so I was mucking about Hulu the other day and came across an old cartoon series called Bravestarr. I'd never seen the series, or even heard of it, so I decided to check it out. After having watched the first episode my brain had turned into goo.

To give you an idea of what's in store here is the intro on youtube. At the :50 mark is when the show starts to melt your sensibilities.

The pilot is called New Texas Blues and it does nothing that a pilot is supposed to do. We get no explanation as to why Marshal Bravestarr has the powers that he does and we meet two characters that I cannot for the life of me remember being in the intro. According to IMBD the first episode was called The Disappearance of Thirty-Thirty, but really I can't be bothered to watch it.

The first person to talk is Deputy Fuzz. If you recognize his voice that's because it's done by Charlie Adler who has saturated your Saturday morning cartoon life with characters on his roster like Cobra Commander, Doctor Doom, Starscream, Buster Bunny, Professor Monkey-For-A-Head, and nearly the entire cast of both Cow and Chicken and Rocko's Modern Life. With a character list like that he really should be ashamed of himself. Though, he was also Eric Raymond, Zipper and Techrat in Jem so I suppose, what with voice acting being such a lucrative business, whatever got him a paycheck was good enough.

Anyway, Deputy Fuzz takes his cues from other tiny animal sidekicks like Orko and Snarf. Be cute and just vaguely useful. As you can see when he mentions the plot of the episode, a music competition. Next we get to meet Thirty-Thirty BraveStarr's talking techno horse. The one we saw in the intro sprouting humanoid arms and legs. He has a giant gun he's named Sarah Jane and it's the first name for these character's we've gotten thus far. Next is hot red headed Judge J.B. McBride. She's the romantic interest, which should be obvious since she's going to a) sing in the competition and b) is an attractive girl who we meet in the first few minutes. She makes a point of needing to go practice and the scene moves on to the show's main villian.

We meet the back of the head of Stampede, a wrinkled old green dragon with what looks like metal bull horns stuck on his head. He's complaining about how much of a complete failure Tex Hex (also voiced by Mr. Adler) is at being a villain. He then gives the man a guitar that has the power to make people riot and take down buildings. He's named it The Black Widow. Tex Hex asks what he's supposed to do with a guitar, which is a reasonable question, really, since he'd probably have no idea there was a music competition going on. Stampede gives him simple instructions. Give it to someone who wants to win. Just proving that Stampede trusts a total stranger to pull off the job more than he does Tex Hex.

The next scene we meet the 'guy who wants to win' and his bandmate who's the voice of reason. Don't let the strange character design fool you, they're plot characters. They serve no function other than to drive the plot. Though, the 'guy who wants to win' does have a really magical way of playing that keytar.

Next we have the hero group complaining about the lack of backup. Apparently they feel something will go down at the concert (probably because they're attending) and the local law enforcement felt it was best to focus their efforts on the robot rebellion rather than indulge the Marshal's gut feeling.

Meanwhile Tex Hex is explaining his job to two more villians Vipra and Outlaw Skuzz. Vipra has the power to hypnotize people and carries a snake gun that paralyzes people. Outlaw Skuzz has a nasty smoking habit (SMOKING IS BAD KIDS) and carries a really keen insight on the human (and alien) mind. Of the badguys so far he's really been my favorite. He's actually the most competent at completing a task, even if the ones given to him are of a sidekick nature.

Tex Hex tells the two he wants them to start trouble. I'm not sure why, as one would think staying on the down low would be the best plan here, but this is probably why Tex Hex fails and villainy. Outlaw Skuzz actually asks this question. Tex Hex tells him it's to distract Marshal Bravestarr. Of course, if he didn't try to distract him, the man wouldn't know he was there. But then he also thinks that if he can just get things into enough disarray then he can just take over. So his plans aren't really that thought out.

So now the Intergalactic Music Contest begins and we get to hear some space music. Each of the bands are caught in a three movement loop while the music is performed, and it's really just god awful. It repeats the same few lines over and over again and they're not sung that well. I'm actually agreeing with Vipra on the whole hating music thing.

The Marshal complains about nothing eventful happening while Outlaw Skuzz uses his keen observation skills to pick out the alien not enjoying the music and then pesters him about it until he declares he doesn't like it. Then after a bit of rib poking 'oh ho ho' to the human next to him he actually manages to get them to fight one another. He hightails it out just before Thirty-Thirty and Marshal Bravestarr show up to break up the fight with a flowery speach. Outlaw Skuzz, being bright enough to leave after starting the fight, isn't there, but he's described so the Marshal knows who it is.

At about the same time Tex Hex is giving the Black Widow to our plot drivers. It was sure lucky he broke his keytar and refuses to play his old one.

The second band takes stage, this one's robots and they sound just like the first band. Marshal uses his EYES OF THE HAWK to scan the crowd. He spots Vipra.

More complaining with plot driver voice of reason.

Vipra picks a fight with the couple who just want to leave the blasted competition. She pulls her gun...yeah and Thirty-Thirty shows up to stop her from...paralyzing some people. He lets go of her arm, she points it at him, Marshal lassos her arm, yanks her out of the seats, ties her up, then shoots her out of the stadium with a grappling rocket of some sort. Now the Marshal suspects Tex Hex...for whatever reason. He goes back stage.

Our plot drivers are testing out the guitar it kills some flowers, but since the likelihood of that being connected to the guitar playing really is pretty slim, they pay it no mind. Well, the dude does, the girl is the voice of reason, after all.

While that's happening the Marshal is talking to the Judge about seeing anything strange. She didn't, seeing as how she was in her own trailer. She's announced to go on stage and we get to hear her sing.

Next the plot devices take the stage! They play and the riot breaks out. They somehow just know it's the guitar, but they play again anyway making the place start to crumble. Also, apparently the guitar shoots lightening. NO! He doesn't WANT to win with fighting and property damage!

The marshal spots Tex Hex. Tex Hex runs on stage, takes the guitar, and does what he probably should have done in the first play. Plays it himself. And OF COURSE! Having the bands play a song about peace and love will stop the riot AND nullify the guitar! AND IT DOES! Of course, one has to wonder why a guy who has the power to shoot off energy bolts, blow up mountains, transform, and summon creatures called 'fire-snakes' would let the fact the guitar stopped working make him give up. He even leaves in a burst of purple flames as a giant black skull. He really does just fail as a villain.

Funnily enough the plot devices don't win and the dude who wants to win declares he'll win of his own merit and not some strangers guitar. Good for him. Snarfo shows up to get his autograph and everyone has a good laugh.

At the end of the episode we get a Inspector Gadgetesque moral summary. DON'T BE TEMPTED, KIDS!

I only bothered to watch two more episodes of the show. Sherlock Holmes in the 23rd Century parts one and two. Because I enjoy hurting myself.

Good god, techno horse,
Serenity Frost

A Heaping Helping of Overanaylsis: Cartoons

2009-09-03T00:12:00.000-07:00

I've had this written for a bit, but shameless procrastinator that I am, I failed to put it up. To get this out of the way to make room for my ramblings, I will get another "Weekly Dose of Head Trauma" up before I have to pack up and move back down to college come next saturday. Today, however, I'd like to share my thoughts on this week's punching bag of choice: cartoons.

As a kid raised in the 90s but old enough to have still enjoyed a heaping helping of 80s cartoons, I was in a pretty good place growing up. Disney had come out of it's 80s suck phase (That's not to say every movie that came out in the 80s was "Oliver and Company" or "The Black Cauldron". There were some genuinely good films like "The Great Mouse Detective", "Tron" (bet you didn't know that was a Disney film), and "Return to Oz". Hell, "The Little Mermaid" came out in the tail end of that era in '89. My point is that the film quality from the mid 70s up until the early nineties overall sort of blew in a big way.) and was turning out excellent clever movies; their channel not only ran great shows based on older characters like "Talespin", Goof Troop" or "Chip n' Dale Rescue Rangers" but also had shows like "Gargoyles" which remains deep and thought provoking even now or ones like "Darkwing Duck" that had a very strong tongue and cheek aspect to them.

Nick was still running good shows and quirky programs like "Rocko's Modern Life", "Hey Arnold", "Doug" (before it's disney era of suck and ultimately losing what was good about the show), "The Angry Beavers", "Aah! Real Monsters!" and a slew of others. Cartoon Network was firmly entrenched in running vintage cartoons like "Thundercats", "Battle of the Planets" and "Voltron" while running newer 'edgy' fare like The Batman and Superman animated series'. On top of that, they also ran "The What-A-Cartoon! Show" which gave small time animators screen time and led to really unique shows like "Dexter's Lab", "Johnny Bravo", "The Powerpuff Girls" (yes, I'll come out and admit I watched it, stop laughing) and "Courage The Cowardly Dog". All the while the WB was turning out insane crap like "Freakzoid", "The Animaniacs" and "Pinky and the Brain".

Most of these shows I mentioned, and many others that were equally good were great as kids shows, but there was a certain depth to them that left them enjoyable to more mature audiences. Hell I still sink a lot of time into watching them when I can. Of course, I'm a huge media geek who's never really stopped being a kid so that might be part of it, but I'm not the only one who does this because there are fansites and, in the case of "Gargoyles", even conventions around some of them. Fans of these cartoons are dedicated, no doubt.

But, as I get older it's hard not to notice a sad trend in animation these days. When I say animation, I'm not talking about Anime because there is a very strong difference in approach. Japan has seen animation as just another medium of expression whereas, excluding Matt Groening and Seth MacFarlane for the most part, animation will and always has been for kids in western culture. It is this difference that I think leads to the problem with Western animation: it's increasingly become drivel with no value beyond momentary entertainment.

It's not as though this has been a sudden transition though. there have always been a fair share of insipid pointless cartoons (I'm looking at you "Rugrats"), Sturgeon's Law affects everything after all (you know, that fun little law that states 90% of everything is crap?), but they didn't seem to be based in the predominate thought process of the people making the shows. I mean, even on the crappy old "Godzilla" series (the horrific old Hanna-Barbera one with the Minilla *shudder* knockoff called Godzookey, not the horrific one based on the horrible 1998 Matthew Broderick film) there was a message or something. The difference is that they were trying to TEACH kids something rather than keeping them preoccupied for a half hour. Hell, education was the whole premise of "The Magic School Bus", "Histeria!" and "Captain Planet".

The problem started becoming prominent (or perhaps I just noticed the problem becoming prominent) about the time the "Spongebob" movie came out. Prior to that it felt as though there was some semblance of quality control still in place. I mean, "The Fairly Oddparents" while a little on the absurd side, was still fairly clever and enjoyable even if you weren't five and the target audience. Hell, I'll even admit I genuinely liked "Spongebob" in it's early days (I mean a squirrel scientist living underwater and a feud between two fast food places run by a miserly crab and a megalomaniacal piece of zooplankton? How could that NOT be awesome?) but when it became glaringly obvious that you could made quite frankly ludicrous amounts of scratch simply by having a beloved cartoon character star in it, no matter how inane, well, I think that was the beginning of the downhill slide.

That's not to say that there haven't been attempts at more mature cartoons. "Teen Titans" did a good job of walking that line as did "Danny Phantom" (I'd throw the "Jimmy Neutron" series up since it's been consistently clever and amusing since the movie with some really funny homages and winks to older movies, TV shows, etc., but, well, I'm sure I'm like one of five people over ten who liked that series) and "Avatar", though the first and the last hid under a cloak of faux anime. Not to mention "Family Guy", "American Dad!" and "The Simpsons" have always made a killing and "Futurama" did well enough in the direct to DVD movies and the show DVD sales that it's coming back for a second season.

The point I'm laboriously making is two fold. Firstly, kids are a lot more intelligent than cartoonists now are giving them credit for and they deserve better than brightly colored dross with the depth of a spoon. Cartoons can be a teaching tool instead of a time waster and there's no reason for them not to be. Secondly, there is an audience beyond kids that enjoy cartoons, that's why the old 90s cartoons like "Freakazoid!" did so well on the DVD sales. Any of you cartoonists, if you're reading this, all I'm saying is there's a lot of money to be made reaching out to older fans like me. Think about it.

Wondering when the hell "Tiny Toons" is finally going to hit DVD.

Jenna Darknight

A Heaping Helping of Overanaylsis

2009-08-19T15:02:00.000-07:00

I know I should probably be working on a new "Weekly dose of Head Trauma" since I've yet again been putting it off, but really I haven't had a whole lot of time to watch movies lately since I've been studying for the GREs and doing other things to get ready to go back down south to my apartment and another 10 week gauntlet that is the Quarter system. However, I figured I need to at least post something, so I think I'm going to start (along with still venting on shitty/absurd movies) running a segment that basically lets me run my mouth about games/movies/media in general since:

a.) This blog IS called Media Masochists Anonymous

and...

b.) I like to vent about things and this would give me a chance to do so in a way that might get some people thinking.

Now as for the topic of my vent this time around, the first topic that came to mind as I sat down to write was remakes/revamps of old franchises. The main reason this is probably because of the new G.I. Joe movie which I have not yet seen, but mainly it stems from a long running dislike of rehashing ideas by the terminally unimaginative because they know they can make a quick buck on nostalgia factor. Now, I've done a short vent on this before back before "Speed Racer" came out on "Brain Traumatizing Media", my little Livejournal movie critiquing blog that's been rather ignored since this one started. It was mainly to express my frustration with the movie industry's lack of creativity as well as my reservations about the Wachowski Brothers' foray into live-action animeville. Well, that's long come and past; Speed Racer was awesome, I saw it in theatres somewhere around three times (seriously, if you haven't seen it, go fucking watch it. Right now. I'm not kidding, go do it. you'll thank me later.) and my ire for remakes has dampened only slightly, but the point I'm rather laboriously trying to make is that I've said my piece on this topic before and while I most certainly will revisit it again at some point, I'm not going to in this blog.

No, instead, I'm going to talk about one of the biggest things aside from movies, cartoons and comics that helped make me the nerd that I am today: Video Games. More specifically one of the many, many things that piss me off about the industry, and this one has dogged it since practically day one of the home console: The console wars.

Firstly, I need to get something out of the way: I was born in 1988 so I missed the first round of the console wars between Intellvision, Colecovision and Atari (though I got to catch the great 80s cartoons and stuff), I'm a Zelda/Star Fox/ Metroid fan, I was a NES/SNES kid, not a Genesis kid. If any of those somehow make you think that I don't have a right to talk about the crusader like fervor surrounding consoles because any of those things go read another blog and come back next week.

As stated, I was a Nintendo kid growing up. My grandparents had an SNES at their place to distract us grandkids, and I can still remember buying my first Gameboy. That doesn't mean I didn't play any Sega, I did play a little, but only because a cabin we rented for the infamous family vacation had one. so, yes I was familiar with Sega, but stuck with Nintendo because that was what was available to me. The Sega-Nintendo wars were off my radar and it really wasn't until the Playstation hit the market that I truly realized how utterly and insanely dedicated people were to their consoles.

It's honestly something I don't really understand. I mean, I get the argument that the reason people get so up in arms about something this trivial is that consoles cost a lot so generally your mom is only going to buy you one, leading you to get very defensive about your choice. However, that argument stopped working about the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era because, let's be honest, at that point most of us playing games were in our teens to early twenties and paying for our own consoles.

I think my lack of understanding comes from the fact that the last two "wars" (The PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era and the Wii/Xbox 360/ PS3 era we're in now) have had three very balanced consoles. The PS2 had amazing third party support and they had fucking Clover making games for them. Okami was god damn amazing and one of the best games I'd played in a while. the Xbox had Psychonauts, the singularly most underrated game of that generation (if you thought I was going to bring up Halo, I'm not because I think Bungie hasn't made a good game since Oni. There, I said it, and you can flame away, I really don't care) and it was probably the first console to make good (if abused) use of extensive online support. The Gamecube was admittedly the under the radar console of that generation, but gems like "Killer Seven", "Viewtiful Joe", "Metroid Prime", "Tales of Symphonia", "Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door" and "Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princesss" (which was originally GC exclusive and still plays better on that system) all made it at least compete at the same level.

This just illustrates what the console wars is about; narrow-minded mud flinging without an objective look at the consoles and judging them based on actual faults rather than perceived ones based around the fact that they are not your preferred console. It's stupid, petty and really guys, we should be beyond this by this point. This narrow-minded stupidity inhibits the growth of the community because we're too busy tearing each other down about graphics and control schemes instead of worrying about bigger issues like government censorship of games and the media scare mongering about the effects of violence in video games.

In the end it doesn't matter if your console has better graphics or better online supports, what matters is the enjoyment you take away from the time spent with it. Maybe if more console fanboys looked at it in that light things would be different. So to you console fanboys reading; maybe next time you're ragging on someone's console, sit down and play some co-op with them. You might find you have more in common than you think

I'm just saying, think about it.

Probably Needs to Get Out of The House More,

Jenna Darknight

Weekly Dose of Head Trauma Extra: UltraChrist!

2009-07-24T16:12:00.000-07:00

First off, I have to say I never realized that intentionally looking for bad movies could be such a pain in the ass. I literally spent several hours to find this (my sister was the one who insisted we watch it actually), but wow....just wow, "UltraChrist!" melted sections of my brain that somehow survived my viewing of "Jesus Christ: Vampire hunter".

The plot begins with Jesus coming back down to earth and the first 3 minutes pretty much deal with him getting clothes. Yes, you read that right. If your first thought was "what the hell?" that pretty much sums up this movie. After he finds a smoking jacket and a pipe (God, I wish I were kidding) he meets and gets drunk with an ex-marketing guy who isn't really relevant to the plot until like the last 20 minutes of the film. Anyway, this guy sends the film on a further downward spiral by recommending Jesus should mimic a superhero in order to "reach out to the youth of today".

So yes, most of the movie is focused on Jesus running around in spandex fighting sin and building very flat romantic tension with his seamstress friend, while God (understandably) wants him out of the costume and sends an archangel to get him out of it. Lurking in the background of this is the AntiChrist, who has taken the role of the most important man possible (at least according to this movie) the head of NY's park service.

(This man decides if you can use parks and the torment of your immortal soul, fear him)

So after Satan fails to kill Jesus with a PDF (yes, I know this shit is bananas, just run with it) he summons the most evil people he can think of to be his personal Legion of Doom, if you'll allow the incredibly geeky analogy; Hitler (well, a rather portly one who likes bestiality), Vlad Ill Tepes a.k.a Vlad the Impaler done up Drac style, Richard Nixon (basically a dude in a Nixon mask with a recorder taped to the side of his mask), and the lead singer of The Doors for some reason.

The rest of the plot is mind meltingly bizarre, and it ends with a cage fight between the archangel sent down to take Jesus' spandex horror suit and a dude in a Richard Nixon mask. This is followed by a bad musical number about how Jesus approves of sex, which somehow converts most of the world's youth to christianity. The only good thing about the end is watching a "terrorist" toss a bomb into the trash because he decided he was through with terrorism.

Overall the movie looks like it was done by three guys and their friends one booze-soaked weekend. The movie just feels either like a cheap class project, only the content is something you'd never want seen publicly, or, given how many things are explicitly about sex, a bad soft core porn. I honestly can say this is a brain stabbingly bad movie and if you feel like torturing yourself for an hour and a half, have fun with it. I just needed to share this little horror and purge myself of what it's done to my brain. Now, I just need to stop the blood leaking out of my ears...

Forsees no Spandex related panic in the near future,

Jenna Darknight

(The pictures are used for non-profit purposes. Ultrachrist belongs to Kerry Douglas Dye and the others involved in the project. ...who are nice people and don't want to sue me.)

Weekly Dose of Head Trauma: The Spirit

2009-07-21T13:59:00.000-07:00

Okay, I confess, this has become less a weekly thing and more a "whenever the hell I feel like it" sort of a thing, but since we're now two months into the doldrums (better known as summer break) I will try to keep this at a more regular interval. Well, after next week, I've got family crap to do and I will have no internet for that time, but after that I'll try to do an article once a week.

Now, normally when summer comes around my sister and I sit down and pick a theme (well not so much pick as walk into the video store and realize there's a whole section of ridiculous we hadn't sat down and watched yet). Last year it was Spy movies/TV/media. This year it's westerns and Film Noir. Firstly, no, I have no idea how those two got paired together and secondly, shut up.

Why we ended up renting The Spirit, I'm not sure. I'm admittedly a bit of a graphic novel geek, but The Spirit was one of those comics that was way before my time and I had only a basic knowledge of coming into this film. Aside from the general plot (cop gets killed, but his thirst for justice is so great he comes back to life to continue his civic duty as a masked vigilante, hence the title of The Spirit) I knew it was a Frank Miller movie and while I'm not a big Frank Miller fan, I will say that I rather enjoyed Sin City.

Anyway, my point is that, coming into this I was expecting a gritty Sin City styled version of The Big Sleep or something similar. What I got was an over the top comic book-esque action movie that was equal parts awesome and just plain ridiculous.

Firstly, I have to talk about the cast because I would never pass up a chance to be petty and make fun of the fact the Eva Mendes is a mouth breather with Baywatch pontoon lips who can't act. Granted, my most recent experience with her was Ghost Rider, a movie that somehow managed to make one of the coolest Marvel characters lamer than hell, but that doesn't change the fact that she just seems to play the same sort of character in most of the films I've seen her in. In this one she's the Spirit's old flame who happens to be a thief after Jason's Golden fleece (because a super hero film noir movie wasn't weird enough apparently). She sort of sits around, has two guys kill themselves for little to no reason and flirts with the Spirit. Of course the Spirit is played as a skirt chaser of Bond proportions, so I suppose you can't fault the film for being consistently shallow.

Honestly the two best actors in the film are Scarlett Johansson (who plays a deadpan lackey to Jackson and complements him beautifully) and Samuel L. Jackson to my eternal surprise. l Normally I think of Jackson as this guy who's pretty much played the same role his entire career (meaning he's an angry Black guy who's tired of your shit and isn't going to take it any more), but he really went all out as the Spirit's archnemesis, The Octopus. He's ridiculous and over the top while still managing to seem threatening. Plus he beats a guy over the head with a toilet. I'm not joking about that.

He changes costumes that range from slightly normal to completely outlandish, even ending up in a Samurai outfit (complete with topknot and fro sideburns) to cartoonishly hack his henchmen apart (aside from Johansson, but she's the only competent henchperson in the entire flick) to a Nazi outfit complete with a monacle that makes him look like a poor imitation of Rommel. To add to it, Jackson seems to revel in the absurdity he's participating in and proceeds to consistently steal every single scene he's in.

In terms of plot the movie is pretty standard noir fare up until the last half hour or so. The Octopus grabs a chest and some guys show up dead, so the Spirit looks into it. However, it then devolves into some insane plot that's built around the Golden Fleece (which is armor for some inane and arbitrary reason) and Samuel L. Jackson wanting to drink Herakles' blood (That's Hercules to those who aren't so mythologically nitpicky). The latter part of the plot is more in tone with the beginning of the movie where the Octopus and the Spirit engage in an over the top and ridiculous fist fight in the mud that escalates into hitting each other with a toilet and a sink, where the straight up Noir stuff feels way to serious in a movie that doesn't seem to take itself or it's audience seriously.

Overall, I found myself enjoying The Spirit even though I shouted at the screen repeatedly (to the point where my mom actually told me to stop shouting "That's insane!" at the screen or she'd come and sock me). It was insane and over the top, but it seemed to enjoy being so outlandish that you couldn't help but be sucked in. I recommend it, even if it will make blood come out of your ears at points.

(not quite) Dead and loving it,

Jenna Darknight

(the images used here were used for non profit reasons and belong to Frank Miller and Lionsgate Studios...who are nice people and don't want to sue me.)

San-X Feel Good Plushie Time

2009-05-29T15:30:00.000-07:00

I started my journey to alleviate boredom today by kicking off Google's parental and country filters and clicking the I Feel Lucky button. The first place I fell into was San-x's Japanese site. http://san-x.co.jp/

It seemed pretty innocuous at first. Got some bears on there, a button of what appears to be two seal sacks humping in the corner. Nothing strange for Japan. Then I started to click around and I realized where I'd seen the word San-X before. San-X is a company that deals entirely with kid's toys. Mostly plushes. I actually own one on their nyankos. (White kitten that dresses up as various foods, mine is a strawberry cake. You can see it here.) I bought it at MTAC and didn't think too hard about it. It was four of my favorite things in one, cat, plushie, strawberry, and cake. Yay Japan.

My curiosity was peaked. I decided to look up what other sorts of forms my nyanko came in. (By the way, for anyone interested, the word Nyanko is a lot like us saying Kitty. Nyan is the sound they associate with Meow there, and Ko means child. Often child of, so if someone has the name Kumiko, then it usually means child of Kumi or even nicer, child of everlasting beauty. The more you know!)

The first picture I found on Google was one of a nyanko nugget meal on a website called Spiral and Circle which seems to specialize in Japanese collectibles. A lot of these were sort of cute up until I ran into ones like the Nyanko Cat Hot Pot Plush Set for $175. "Free Shipping!" the site boasts. I'd hope so for that lot of cash.

Deciding to wander back to the San-X website I found something even more fun.A downloads section. Complete with wallpapers and icon sets of their different products which include:

Rilakkuma in Japanese is sort of the mashings of the word relax and bear. According to the website Relakkuma is apparently often see sitting by a clothes line of suits that look exactly like him and waiting for them to dry. With him is a smaller white bear and a duck. The duck is often playing straight man to the pranks that the smaller bear plays on Relakkuma.

Kerori is a frog that changes color depending on his mood.

Nyan Nyan Nyanko I mentioned earlier.

Monokuro Boo are minimalist pigs. There are two of them, one black, one white, square and simple.

Tarepanda means lazy panda. Or droopy panda, which is the translation I prefer. According to the site Tarepanda is very lazy and gets around by rolling at 2.75 meters per hour. The word Tare specifically means to lay on your tummy. Tarepanda is really popular as he got the most hits on my google search.

Mamegoma means bean seal. As you can tell, the people at San-X are really creative at naming things.

Jewel Cat is, from what I can tell, meant to appeal to older Japanese girls. Kind of like how we have Lisa Frank . Come on, girls, I know you remember her.

Kutusitanyanko. Oh God Kutusitanyanko. Kutusitanyanko creeps me out. So very very much. The name means cat wearing socks and he apparently enjoys piano.

Sabokappa is a kappa mixed with a cactus. This one is actually meant to be an air freshener. The word Kappa means river child and it's pretty famous in Japanese folklore. Just in case you were wondering, a real kappa looks like this. Yeah.

San-X also makes plushes out of foods. A chestnut named Amagurichan, a family of cheeses, a rice grain that's always found at the bottom of the bowl named Ginshari-san, apples, bean vread, peas, a tangerine, and yogurt.

And not to forget Tissue-san and Beer-chan a 20 year old beer fairy.

Om nom kittehs,
Serenity Frost

Weekly Dose of Head Trauma: Zebraman

2009-04-21T13:49:00.000-07:00

Jen here, finally getting a post up. In this week's descent into things that make my head cave in, we're going to take a look at a movie I'm actually rather fond of, despite, or perhaps because of it's infinite weirdness.

American cinema could take lessons from what goes on in the Far East. Here we are, living our predictable lives watching another generic boomfest when an Asian movie will run past us in a technicolor dream coat, bringing with it perplexed joy and amusement for us confused Americans. Takashi Miike, who happens to be a favorite of contemporary Asian Director of mine because his movies are mind blowingly awesome is one of those directors who approaches movies as a story-telling medium and, not only that, but he also utilizes it amazingly well. Zebraman was the first of his works I was exposed to, thanks to a friend who likes to E-mail me movie suggestions, and it's still probably my favorite from him, though The Great Yokai War (another great movie I'll talk about another time) is a close second.

And when I mean good, I mean it's borderline something I shouldn't be able to talk about on a blog segment that will deal mainly with bad movies. The only legitimate reason for the article being posted is that the movie is just so far out that it somehow sticks the dial on awesome even as it makes parts of your brain short out.

Zebraman reminds me a great deal of Neverending Story, Stardust and Princess Bride in that it functions within it's genre, yet it's very tongue and cheek. Zebraman is about a guy who's wife is cheating on him, his kids don't respect him, has a job where he's not respected or noticed, and his only joy is dressing up like the superhero from an old obscure 70s show and pretending to attack his pillows. He is both a satire on the fan culture that the internet perpetuates, where adults can sit and argue about whether He-man would kick Thundarr the Barbarian's ass until they're about to pass out, and a fan fulfillment. He gets to become Zebraman, a reward for never letting go of the childishness most people try to shed (The Great Yokai War also deals with this theme).

There's also a lot of scenes that point out the functional retardedness of superheroes. There's scenes with Zebraman running up to a lady being mugged or peeking from behind the snack food isle at the Japanese equivalent of a 7-11. Even the victims in trouble stop and stare at him, because well, he's a grown man running around in a black and while Zebra superhero costume. It reminds us of why many superheroes have a nocturnal regiment; it doesn't matter how badass you are, you're still a guy in a goofy costume. I mean, just look at Superman, it's amazing he's never been laughed out Metropolis (Of course Superman's kind of a DICK so that might be why no one's laughed at his red sew on boots and matching undies outside his clothes).

It's a quirky watch and one I recommend to people when they ask for a movie suggestion simply because one has to experience it for the sheer uniqueness of the experience.

Black and White Ecstacy, baby. Shine on, Zebraman.

Jenna Darknight

(the images used here were used for non profit reasons and belong to Takashi Miike and the people who made this amazing fim...who are nice people and don't want to sue me.)

Sen's Dissociation Filler

2009-04-21T13:15:00.000-07:00

Just as the title claims, I'm making up for the lack of MMA ariticle this week by, how you say, writing any random thing that comes to my head nonstop. For those of you with no interest in just how utterly random my thoughts can be, don't bother reading further.

How come they don't make gingerbread men small enough to fit into their houses? And why are their houses made of the same things gingerbread men are made from? Wouldn't that just be really really nasty? And how do we get more gingerbread men? I don't see many gingerbread women, and if I did I don't know how they could make little gingerbread babies. Would gingerbread babies be like animal crackers? That box does sort of look like a crib. Animal crackers is like a utopia of small slightly sweet animal shaped bread stuffs. You have a lion in there with giraffes and elephants. The rhinos are the same size as the donkeys. Are they saying that if put in animal cracker form all the species of the animal kingdom would scale to the same size? If so then would that work with other things? Maybe that's why gingerbread men can't fit into their houses. But if that's the case how big are they normally? You don't see any giant gingerbread men running around. And I know they run. There's a whole nursery rhyme about it. And nursery rhymes don't lie. Why would our parents coo lies to us in our sleep? For that matter, why would they want our first bout with literature to be so bloody basic? Little jack horner sat in a corner eating a pumpkin pie. He stuck out his thumb and pulled out a plumb and said 'Oh what a good boy am I!' How does that make sense?! His mom put a plumb in pumpkin pie? And why is he sitting in a corner while he eats it? Is he on time out? Is his mother forcing him to eat weird hybrid pie? Then why is he saying he's a good boy? And can't you give that kid a dang fork? Or even a spoon? Maybe he's eating it ala mode? And it's plumb ice cream with pumpkin pie? If that's the case then why didn't they just say so?!

How come I can't type in the word catgirl in the google image search without having to sift through all the soft core kitty porn? But I think what bothers me the most about it is how detailed and skillful it's drawn. There are so many pictures of catgirls I would love if they were just wearing a mite more clothing. And while I'm complaining, how come catgirls look so surprised all the time? Were they not expecting to be drawn? I guess the artists just think they look cute that way, but really it seems demeaning. I don't know about you, but I haven't seen a lot of real cats that weren't fiercely independent and proud. So how come their catgirl counterparts seem to be skittish? Is that the only thing that catgenes can incorporate into human DNA?

I know that corn is useful for many things other than delicious eats. Apparently you can make fuel out of it. That and moonshine. I wonder if moonshine has a corn taste to it? Oh no wait, they make moonshine out of cough medicine...no...hang on...I think that's crack. Yeah, crack out of cough meds, moonshine out of corn and whatever the hell else can strip paint off your walls. I should really repaint my room. The white on it now is flaking off in spots where I had tape or that sticky gummy stuff. That stuff rocks. Except when it peels my paint off that is. I wonder which is more exciting; watching paint dry or watching grass grow? I'm inclined to think grass grow because if it's spring or summer you might get the occasional bug. Then again if you sit close enough to paint drying you might think you're being attacked by giant bugs. That would be more exciting, except you're destroying your brain and lungs that way. So I guess watching paint dry is more of an extreme sport. You know what I saw the other day? X-TREEM corn nuts. I'm not kidding. It says on the packet corn gone bad and the corn guy has this really mean face on him. He's like the bad arse gangsta thug of corn stalks I guess. At least Little Debbie doesn't X-TREEM her stuff. Twinkies! I'm personally not a fan of the twinkie. If I absolutely must destroy my colon I can do it with swiss rolls, but some people can't get enough of the things. I'm sure there's a restaurantin cali that probably sells them deep fried, dipped in chocolate, or ground into a fine powder so you can inhale them off a hooker's back. Of course if you're inhaling Twinkie dust off a hooker you have a whole new set of problems. Mainly you probably spent all your money on the hooker and therefor didn't have enough for crack. Unless the hooker is your girlfriend. Do they give discounts for that? You'd think they would, but I guess it's the same as a massage therapist taking work home everyday for his or her boyfriend. They say that a Twinkie can outlast a nuclear holocaust, but I bet it would snuff out the cockroaches left to eat it. Nah, cockroaches are smarter than that. Can you imagine cockroaches up the evolutionary chain though? Especially fueled by radiation? If we can believe everything comics tell us they'll all have super cockroach powers. Yes! That is our ultimate future folks! Super cockroaches! Da da da daaah! It's SUPER COCKROACH FROM THE FUTURE!

DING! Muffins are ready! There, that should be enough to appease yon frothing masses.

Jem iz Excitment!!1!LOL

2009-04-17T15:44:00.000-07:00

The show looks nothing like this.

From the intro theme one can already tell that this show didn't cater to the intelligent eight year old girl by our heroine Jem's repetition of insisting that Jem, Jem is her name. It does have some rather nice, fluid motion to it, but unfortunately that's the only thing this show has going for it.

The first episode speeds through the introduction in about fifteen minutes. The main character Jerrica (Yes, Jerrica, Jerrica is her name.) has just lost her father, but gained a record company, a house full of orphaned girls, a very realistic holographic woman who is suspiciously similar to Gaia from Captain Planet only not nearly as cool, and a closet full of women's clothes that's been kept in a secret lair.

I think you can see where this is going. In fact, you'll find that's true in most of the episodes.

I would give a detailed summary of the first episode, but to be honest, Byrd Man of Retrojunk.com did a way better job of it than I could already. I thought about giving the show a girl's perspective, but I found myself saying pretty much the same things he did. So instead of just rehashing an already amusing review just click the link and read his.

I can, however, give you a list of the characters you'll find in the show. If you plan to watch it then, trust me, you're going to need this.

Goodies

Jerrica Benton/Jem: This is our main protagonist. The plot pretty much revolves around her and keeping her secret identity as Jem a secret. She's supposed to be the nicest person in the world, a real Disney Cinderella type, but really, she's just a bitch. Oh sure, she runs an orphanage for young girls, and is generally nice to everyone she meets to a puke inducing degree, but when you see her with her boyfriend you really get to see who she is. You see, Jerrica has decided to not tell her boyfriend Rio that she is two people. Not really a big deal if not for the fact that she continues to act as if they're a couple while being Jem, and then getting jealous of Jem when he starts to reciprocate the feelings she's been practically throwing at him. If she and Rio have a fight, she'll become Jem and all is right with the world again. She never tells him who she really is. Not even at the end of the series. Bitch.

Rio Pacheco: That isn't to say that Rio isn't without fault. Yes, he is quite possibly the only redeemable character in the show, but he's also one dimensional. He's strong, intelligent, good hearted, and handsome. In fact, he has no flaws whatsoever, and that is a bad thing. The closest he gets to a flaw is in the Midsummer Night's Madness episode where Jerrica takes on another identity named Jamie and hits on him again. Not surprisingly he falls for her. The episode plays it off as Rio being so in love with her that he loves her no matter what she looks like. It's a bit more likely that he's got a fetish for girls who sound like Jerrica.

Kimber Benton: Kimber is Jerrica's sister, and the bitch gene runs in the family. She supposedly plays keyboard and write the music for the band, but that's not shown as prominently as her willingness to date any man that's remotely cute and even gets caught dating two at once in an episode and has no idea what's so wrong about that. She plays off as being the innocent one, sweet and adorable, with an occasional plot reserved for her just to show her getting jealous as a frantic attempt at depth.

Aja Leith: You would think with such brightly colored hair it wouldn't be so easy to confuse characters, but it is. Aja is lead guitarist, and I think she's supposed to be some sort of Asian. I can't really give you much on her. She hardly has any screen time, and thus rarely gets my attention.

Shana Elmsford: Ah, Shana. She's the drummer for the first season then moves to guitar. She's also a fashion designer and create the outfits that the band wears. This seems sort of silly since they have a hologram that projects their clothing onto them and a closet full in an underground lair, but Shana needed something to do to make her stand out. That's right, Shana is the only black character and she needed to be a clothing designer for people to notice her existence. I'm not sure if that's sad or liberating.

Carmen 'Raya' Alonso: Raya shows up in the second season to play drums. She's a shy girl and doesn't get a lot of development time beyond her intro episode. In it we learn that her father is the florist, and that even when his greenery is threatened and gobs of money is thrown at her she won't betray Jem, who she'd met for about five minutes max when the deal was given to her. Easily a very likable character, which is a problem. All of the character's are incredibly likable and thus it makes them impossible to tell apart. Raya didn't even get added to the introduction theme in season 3, and I'm not sure anyone noticed.

Synergy: Synergy, without whom the show wouldn't even be possible. She is a computer that gets nearly no screen time at all, but doesn't really need it. She was supposedly built by Jerrica's father, which would hint towards him being a super genius, but having met his offspring I'm pretty sure Synergy is really just an alien that crash landed on the planet with no memories and so he just made some up so she'd be willing to partake in his 'I'm a pretty lesbian' fetishes. Synergy does get some spotlight in Midsummer Night's Madness, but it's as a sage and wisdom sort. Nothing spectacularly illuminating.

The Baddies

Phyllis 'Pizzazz' Gabor: This woman is rich, angsty, and on permanent PMS mode. She's the lead singer and guitarist of the Misfits. A group that gets in Jem's way so much that I'm surprised there was never a restraining order put out on her. It's pretty obvious when they first enter the scene that she is an angry angry woman who needs a good deep dicking.

Roxanne 'Roxy' Pellegrini: I know nothing about Roxy other than she's just as much a horrid wench as Pizzazz.

Mary 'Stormer' Phillips: Stormer is the sweet hearted talented girl of the group. She's in the group only to make the Misfits a tad less hateable. It doesn't really work though. Stormer, while sweet, is also a total pushover, and often acts just as bitchy as her friends do.

Sheila 'Jetta' Burns:Jetta is the most racist stereotype in the show as the angry Brit rocker. I guess that's a point in their favor?

Eric Raymond: Eric is pretty obviously evil upon meeting him. His squinty eyes, devil horn styled hair, angry disposition, and infinitely padded pockets makes him instantly hateable. The slightest bit of development he gets is in The Singer and the Princess where he shows that while he's more than happy to ruin Jerrica's life and career, he doesn't actually want her dead. Good save there, Eric.

Rory "Riot" Llewelyn: Riot is the lead singer of the Stingers and apparently the most handsome man in the universe. I say apparently because it doesn't translate well on screen. I'm sure if I met the man in real li-oh right. Riot's power over women points to him either having magical powers, or he really is the most awesome man in existence in the same way that Keith Richards is. He's also completely manipulative and has real control issues. Again, probably like Keith Richards.

Phoebe "Rapture" Ashe: Rapture is a conartist, but not a very good one from what I've seen. She gets some development time in Midsummer Night's Madness and That Old Houdini Magic.

Ingrid "Minx" Krueger: Minx is pretty full of herself, but she honestly has every right to be. Until she gets to the whole 'I have real talent' part. She honestly does care about the band though, as proven in That Old Houdini Magic where she actually saves Rapture's life.

Also, there's been rumor that the creator of Jem, Christy Marx, wants to revive and modernize it. I imagine it'll be a lot like what these girls have already done. In fact, I'm taking bets on it.

No one else is the same,
Serenity Frost

Parasite Eve [PS2]

2009-04-17T15:26:00.000-07:00

Mmm, dig those sexy sexy pixels.

Back in the days of the ol' gray disc eater the psx there was once a game called Parasite Eve. The game was about Aya a no nonsense super sexy lady cop that took ass and kicked names...wait that's not...yeah. Yeah that's right.

The game was also about Melissa a sick young woman who wanted nothing more than to sing opera.

In the intro sequence we're treated to Aya in a sexy black dress and some rather clunky controls to make her do what you want. (Lol! Just like ALL girls, amirite?) After a bit of an adjustment period we get her into the concert. Where this shit happens. Yeah. Fun.

Well of course Aya the gun toting crazy ass bitch that she is, follows that thing into the sewers. (Yes, the game does let you leave the theater, but there isn't really a 'Fuck this fucked up shit, I'm outie five thousand!' option once you're out there.)

You go down some poorly located stairs (took me five actual minutes to figure out where they were) and you get treated to this. Yeah, did I mention this game is rated M?

Well you kill them, which was quite obviously the best choice other than 'leave'. Travel some more, fight an alligator, and do more stuff, and move on to the next chapter.

That morning you go talk to your boss who in his youth was probably also a no nonsense super sexy cop that kicked ass and took names. He tells you to go get some weapons, but good luck finding where you were supposed to go to get them!
Once you manage to stumble into the place you get your gun and go. Where you get treated to another plot scene between Ben (who will need serious therapy when the game is over, you'll see why in a minute) and his dad. (Who also happens to be your partner. How convenient!) Then talk to the captain for another long cut scene before getting to go to the museum for (you guessed it!) another long cut scene. Only this time it's with SCIENCE! Actually, to be fair, this is the bit where he explains the entire situation as to why people burst into flames and you're having to fight mutated rats and things. However, his speech, to a real scientist, is pretty laughable as far as logic goes. Even someone who isn't a scientist would have to stretch their imagination a bit to buy it, but it is a game, after all. And really, most people playing Parasite Eve aren't in it for the RPG element. They just want to shoot stuff and stare at a sexy woman's behind while they do it. It's the same logic applied to tomb raider.

Anyway, you return to the precinct only to find that central park has some problems, and Ben's son is there for a concert (OH NOEZ!). Reason Ben will need therapy #1. So you go there, fight some giant worms, and Eve shows up in a chariot being drawn by a flaming horse. That's right. A carriage with a horse that on fire! You get to fight her and things end about how you'd expect it would. Eve gets away, but not without giving Aya a great flashback to the past she doesn't remember! YAY!

I'd give a description of the scene (couldn't find it on youtube), but to be honest, I have no idea what the hell was going on. Eve and Aya are related somehow? I think? Maybe? I don't know. Not that it really matters though, right? Right. Moving on.

You wake up that morning to find this guy outside your house. Apparently he fell asleep on the sidewalk waiting for you. Nope, that's not creepy. Anyway, you hit the pharmacy for some magical healing drugs and then raid a gun store. The city got evacuated after the whole people melting thing, so you can pretty much just take stuff.
After you're stocked go back to work.

Turns out, Eve attacked the place while you were out. Daniel, like the good daddy he is, left his kid there so he runs in. Maeda the dorky scientist gives you a special good luck charm...nope...still not creepy.
Run through the station, take some stuff off a bunch of dead cops. What? They're dead. It's not like they're going to want it. Screw the fact that these were Aya's colleagues and she probably knew all of their names. Run around and eventually we encounter reason #2 that Ben is going to need some serious therapy. That was a police dog at one time, and Ben was pretty fond of it.

Third day in, Meada explains more of what the hell is going on. Apparently Eve wants to make a baby. It's what all women want, right? Time to go to the hospital!

Meada gives you another super special good luck charm. You run around some more, fight some more mutated things, read some diaries that tell you pretty much what you already know, get to the top and find Eve melting a guy in a jet so the other jet will crash into it. Did I mention how much I love Eve? Yeah, after that you just go on to the next chapter.

Next you get to go to China Town! (Or a warehouse, but nothing happens there.) Run through it, fights a giant centipede, then notice that the goop of a thousand screaming souls is heading towards the museum.
Oh, and by the way, the goop is kind of a dick.

Then it's back to the museum, where you follow a dude in white, do some puzzles, and the goop does sort of the most predictable thing ever. But hey, at least now we get to fight a dinosaur! How many sexy ass kicking lady cops get to say that? Win, run to Eve's chambers and ew, oh my god, shoot it. Crazy bitch. Anyway, after that are a lot of cut scenes, conversations and eventually things get really messed up. Then moar planes! Brilliant! *sigh* Well Aya will have none of this. She gets herself a copter then blows it up. Good job there, Aya. After that disaster Eve shows up again. Yay! So Aya gets a parachute, jumps down there, and they fight. Guess who wins. Nope, it's not Aya. Just in case the screen is too blurry for you to see just how terrifying this thing is here. Not creeped out yet? This should do it.
Anyway, you get to fight that. Four forms worth of that. Then comes the obligatory sacrifice scene. Yay. And it dies, the ship explodes, and Aya survives in time for the angst session. Did I mention that Daniel doesn't die? YAY!

And we're done. It's over. Waaaait. Crap.

That's right! We're not actually done yet! Want the real ending? You get to play through ANOTHER game! This one is a dungeon crawl!

To be honest, I didn't bother. But I did want to know what happened, so I found someone who did on youtube. Ah, so that's what the hell was going on. Thanks for not telling me in the actual game Square! Also, that's kind messed up.

As you can tell I have sort of a love hate relationship with this game. On one hand it's dark a beautiful, but on the other it's so cliche it makes my brain cells pop. It's a good game, but it could have been better!

By the way, there's also a movie and a book that this game was based on. I've seen the movie (it was entertaining, but nothing ground shattering) and haven't read the book yet. Though if the book/movie ratio in Japan is the same as it is here, it's way better than the movie or the game could ever hope to be.

The carriage ride is a trap!
Serenity Frost

Harvester [PC]

2009-04-17T14:53:00.000-07:00

Lol, get it? DNA.

Warning! The game isn't safe for work and neither is this blog about it!

So what's Harvester you ask? Well in 1994 it was the goriest most pointlessly violent game on the market. I think it might still hold that title...

I turn the game on and I'm treated to this nifty title sequence. I have a feeling I'm going to be laughing a lot in this game, and that's terrible.

After grabbing stuff from my room I get to meet amnesiac main character Steve's family. His brother is pretty into blood and guts, but that's pretty normal for a kid his age. Then you find out your mom has your dad locked up in their bedroom...okay that's sort of creepy...then your baby brother eats a wasp...yeah...maybe I won't be laughing as much as I thought.

So you do a bit of running around and learning about things and generally find out that this town is friggin crazy. Everyone in it. Apparently there's this lodge called the Order of the Harvest Moon that will probably be a big fat plot point later. Then you talk to the woman who explains the wasp thing, but I still don't actually get it. I wanted to find a video of her, but I couldn't. You'll just have to live with the mystery as well. You also find out that everyone who has ever visited the sleepy town of Harvest has come to a rather gory and untimely demise. Fun!

After picking up some dirty magazines for the deputy (a gesture of good will that leads to a fun little scene of the deputy getting whacked like a bad dog with a rolled up newspaper) and learning about the sheriff's addiction to pie you logically go to the diner and talk to the rather attractive woman there. Yeah, I've been doing a lot of talking so far. I won't go into all of them as most are rather disturbing. Suffice to say after collecting things you're going to need for puzzles and discovering that everyone in this town is totally loony and wants your death. You finish filling out the lodge invite, find out you can't give your dad some meat until he fills out a slip of paper, and go to bed. Yeah, that wasn't ominous at all...

The next day you blackmail a lecherous principal, get offered a bat, use a jar of Oralube on a manhole key, and take a screwdriver to a car's paint job. All in hopes that the lodge will let you join them. Yay!

The day after the kid who belongs to the diner owner Edna gets kidnapped. So you actually go and save her. At last, something not deviant and disorderly. Up until you steal clothes from a fire station, break into a barbershop and steal a lamp, and burn down the diner. Finally! They'll let you into the lodge! What was the point of all this? I haven't a clue, but fun times were had by all! Except for Edna who kills herself and her little girl the sheriff who won't get to enjoy her pie anymore, and your little brother who got his eyes pushed out by some wasps. Oh and your girlfriend Stephanie who...ah...died of natural causes... Yeah, so you take that invite to the lodge, right? I mean. They seem like such a honest group of guys. Well apparently the invite isn't enough. You have to steal her spine for them as well...fun.

To be honest I was very tempted to not finish the game, however, my OCD required it of me. Basically you kill every blasted person in the lodge at the request of the midget/amputee valet. You also find out that your girlfriend isn't dead. It's pretty safe to assume everyone in the lodge is crazy. There was one scene where you find some triplets eating their mom's thighs...yeah...and this other guy who hacks himself in the head because he lost at chess.

You get to pick from two endings. Both of which are pretty disturbing. Okay, so that was a joke. I thought you needed something sugar sweet if you've been clicking all the links in this thing up until this point.

Bad Ending

Good Ending

Honestly I couldn't tell the difference, but the bad ending has probably the best PSA against violence in video games messing with kids minds I've ever heard.

If you wanna buy this game try Amazon, if you don't want to spend 15 bucks then watch this nifty walkthrough here.

That's bullshit, mom!
Serenity Frost