More self indulgent than myspace

In 10 years we'll have a prequel trilogy

2009-05-25T22:57:00.011+01:00

Did you know it's coming up to the 10th anniversary of the first Matrix movie? (Well in the UK at least). So with that in mind I started having a think about the trilogy as a whole and how it could of been improved (because now is the time to face facts that it wasn't the best trilogy of films ever - even though I'm pretty sure Keanu Reeves personally promised me that it would be in some deleted scene).

So without further a do, my own personal revisions to the Matrix trilogy.

Not made Morpheus such a damn pussy
I can't exactly remember how old I was when I first saw the original Matrix movie but I can remember one of the major thoughts I had. "If Morpheus wasn't chained down and being pumped full of drugs. I bet he'd be rocking the shit right now. The 2nd one of these movies is going to be awesome". Now granted I've paraphrased a bit there. I wouldn't have said rocking the shit as I had't heard that phrase then. But still the sentiment was there.
So cut to the Matrix: Reloaded and Morpheus hardcore-ness was missing. Granted he did have quite a cool fight on top of a lorry. But organising a rave in a cave? That's just not how I imagined things would be. I thought he'd be more like Leonidas in 300 (which is quite impressive as that film was many years from production when I orignally had these thoughts), but with bigger metaphorical balls and more windmilling suckers in the face.

Stopped the Architect from talking like such a prick.
The scene where Neo met the Architect for the first time in the Matrix: Reloaded was one of the most important scenes in the entire trilogy. It wasn't the best scene in the world (far from it) but it was one of the first scenes with any real explanation of what had been going on in the Matrix and what Neo's next possible move would be. So taking into account that the scene is critical and had to explain plot points and contain a metaphorical level of remainders, anomolies, human consciouness and computer science. So why the fuck would the architect pepper his speech with such complex wordplay? Because the Wachowskis hate you - that's why.

Actually put a plot twist at the end
In the months that led up to the release of Matrix: Revolutions I can remember several magazines and websites running possible plot twist endings to the Matrix trilogy. "Everyone" or losers like myself were betting there would be some big plot twist(s). But instead there wasn't one, which actually struck me as pretty lazy. I remember one possible twist which suggested that all the renegades who thought they were human (Neo, Morpheus, Trinity et al) were infact computer viruses and all the agents trying to stop them would be human beings who dealt in anti virus software. I don't quite know how Zion would've played into this, but it would've been better than the actual ending involving an old lady on a bench and an evil old bastard who had complex verbal diarreah.

Made Neo and Smith less powered so their fights actually meant something
It took comic books a surprising amount of time to learn the lesson "don't overpower your Heroes or Villians". If you had broken that rule, you would get fight sequences where protagonists and antagonists can smash each other in the face but it wouldn't matter due to them being infinitely powered. The Matrix: Revolutions completely stacked it, and fell face first into this trap; it wouldn't matter how much flying around Neo and Smith did, or how many kicks or punches landed, it ultimately doesn't matter as neither Neo or Smith could be killed in that fashion. Luckily Matrix: The Path of Neo (the videogame) learned this lesson so instead of an overpowered Smith, Neo fights a collection of consumer objects (ie washing machines) which join together to form a giant Smith. And yes that was as retarded as that sounds.

Made a prequel movie about how Morpheus came to be
To be honest this probably wouldn't have made the trilogy any better but it would've been cool. If someone took all the footage of Laurence Fishburne acting in other films and then edit it down to make a prequel movie of Morpheus origin. The starting footage would be from Apocalypse Now (Larry Fishburne aged just 14) and would continue all the way through (Boyz in the Hood, Event Horizon) to the beginning of the Matrix. A voice over would provide a description of what was happening (just like audio description soundtracks on a DVD) and any scenes in the zion world (which wouldn't be covered by film footage) could be provided in the form of cartoon stickmen. I think it would be a winner

New Post Coming Soon

2009-03-31T23:41:00.000+01:00

The Oscars 09

2009-02-18T17:32:00.004Z

Over the previous month I've been running an event on Facebook that involved trying to see as many of the films that would be nominated for Oscars as possible. Unfortunatley Facebook is a tool and the event is closing in a few days -> this is because a facebook event cannot exceed a month and this event is going to last longer than that.
So rather than set up a new event I have decided to move all activities into this blog post, which I'll continue to edit. Hopefully by the end I'll have put the films into an order of preference and written a small review for each one.

The following information is copied directly from the Facebook page:

Ok so it works like this.
I've been looking through a variety of media and noticed that a huge amount of excellent films are coming out pre - Oscar season. The majority of these movies are in all likelyhood going to be Oscar nominated.

So my suggestion is that every week, (between 11th of Jan and 20th Feb) "we" go to see 1 or 2 of these films at a variety of different cinemas.
We do this for three reasons:
1. It'll will increase our overall highbrow-ness and overall smug-oscity.
2. It'll make Mark Kermode proud.
3. Most of these films will be amazing.

So the films (complete with release dates)
Che part 1, 2nd Jan
Che part 2, 20th Feb
The Wrestler, 16th Jan
Doubt, 6th Feb
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, 6th Feb
The Reader, 2nd Jan
Revolutionary Road, 30th Jan
Slumdog Millionaire, 9th Jan
Australia, 26th Dec
Milk, 23rd Jan
Gran Torino, 20th Feb
Valkyrie, 23rd Jan

General information:
1. If you don't know what each film is about look it up on IMDB.com.
2. The earlier released movies we might not get a chance to see - just because they may have left the cinema by the time we start.
3. I don't expect everyone to go see all these movies. Although I'm going to try to.
4. If I've invited you to join this group and your at University and can't make it to Surrey, this is light handed suggestion that you get on the Oscar 09 bandwagon.
5. Valkyrie is only in this list because it's one of those crazy "cursed" films as pretty much everything that could have gone wrong on the production of that film has.

This event actually starts on the 11th of January and ends on the 20th but because Facebook is an idiot it can't cope with an event that goes over 31 days.

I just thought I'd give a progress report on what I've seen.

Australia
The Reader
Valkyrie
The Wrestler
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
The Curious case of Benjamin Button
Revolutionary Road
Doubt
Gran Torino

Che part 1 escaped before I could see it but I'm hoping some cinemas will screen it with Che Part 2.
Also I'm in two minds whether to see Rachel getting married because I personally believe that Anne Hathaway is one of the shittest actresses of our time and even though she is being nominated for an Oscar I just can't see how she can possibly be any good. But on the other hand it is an Oscar nominated performance which is the objective of this little venture.
If anyone has seen Rachel getting married I could do with an opinion, just write it on the wall.
Che Part 2 is not being screened anywhere - I don't think any cinema near where I live could be bothered with it. Both Part 1 and 2 are out together on DVD in June.

It is always darkest before the Twighlight

2009-01-31T23:58:00.002Z

If this were another blog (and luckily for you it is not), the first post after the New Year would be a run down of all the excellent stuff that happened in that previous year.
Unfortunately I've pretty much forgotten what exciting advances in entertainment happened in 2008 and what exciting advances happened in 2007.

Although I think I may remember the key ones:

The band formerly known as Guns and Roses finally released Chinese Democracy. I have to say I haven't listened to it (I'm waiting until Duke Nukem Forever comes out so I can enjoy the two simultaneously) but that album has been in production so long that it really would have to be one of the greatest albums ever for it to be anywhere near worthwhile.
The Dark Knight was good.
Iron man was good.
Indiana Jones and the kingdom of the crystal skulls was absolutely dia-fucking-bolical. It was so bad that it made the idea I put down on this very blog look good, and that idea featured Indiana Jones fighting the real Sean Connery which in turn makes more sense that anything that happened in the actual movie.
Twighlight didn't make me want to stick pins into my eyes which was a plus. That doesn't mean it was good though. Look I know it wasn't aimed at my demographic but a movie and book that were written/directed by women should not have the overarching message of teenage girls should submit to older men, that my friends is morally dubious. Also the vampires skin went sparkly when they were in direct sunlight, you know instead of bursting into flame - so that age old visual metaphor was ruined for a generation of teenagers. It's at times like this I miss Buffy/Angel at least they had vampires that ate people, set on fire in sunlight and had bumpy foreheads. My other problem with Twighlight (excluding the complete lack of sexual tension between the leads) is that it never pushed the idea that being 17 forever would be absolutely shite, I mean you wouldn't be able to drink in a bar (which is the best place to find people to eat), you're right on the cusp of 16 and 18 so you'd be constantly asked for ID to get a lottery ticket. Finally you'd never be hit on by an older woman because Cougars tend only to pray on men 18 and above. So yeah it would suck. I don't want to end this dissection of Twighlight too negatively so I'll tell you this - in the movie there is an old American Indian guy in a wheelchair who really looks like he can really "rock the shit" out of anyone in that movie. If he teams up with Bella's Dad who is a sheriff with a shotgun I think there is potential for an awesome spin off of Twighlight. Something along the lines of both of them travelling round America shooting vampires in the face. Now that would be film of the year.

Replacement swearing

2008-12-12T01:37:00.004Z

I got this courtesy of xkcd.com I now post it here for your amusement.

One day I'll get round to posting something that's actually mine, but that day is not today.

Oh and from now on I'm counting both alfresco and bespoke as swear words. They just have that harsh sound to them, the same kind of harshness that all the extreme hardcore swear words contain.
So if you're looking for a new pair of swear words to replace F**k and C**t (yes I don't usally star them but somehow it makes it look more offesnive) may I suggest bespoke and alfresco to take their place.

Thinkb4youspeak (Hilary Duff)

2008-11-05T00:25:00.003Z

Gah!
This hasn’t been updated in so long I’m not even sure people other than me will ever bother reading it. I have given myself an impossible situation to try to break free from – after a gap of so long what do I post as my comeback?
After all this needs to be my amazing comeback album of a post (not like Limp Bizkit’s Unquestionable Truth (Part 1) (also on the topic of Limp Bizkit they’ve got a new album planned for 2009, does anyone even care… really?)).

Anywho so what do I write about? Shall I circle jerk myself by going on about how my name features in the credits of a soon to be released videogame? No I shall not do that, because that would be vulgar (COUGH! - http://www.burnzombieburn.com/)

Instead I’ll let Hilary Duff do the talking:

Yes that’s right ladies and gentlemen Hilary Duff has opened my eyes. I’ll never be using the term gay in a derogatory form again….
I know the thinkb4youspeak campaign isn’t really aimed at me but shouldn’t time and money be put into something a bit more worth while? Like I dunno Transformers for under privileged kids? Also (as shown in these videos) gay is not being used in a abusive manner to the homosexual community it is being used to describe something as shit, so does that mean the word is taking on a new meaning (after all English is an ever developing language) so in turn does that mean by supporting this campaign Hilary Duff is standing in the way of progress? (The stupid luddite bitch). Anyway if homosexual people are really offended by the term “gay” (obviously being used in its slang meaning for shit) I am officially giving my permission for them to use Hetero as a retort. (Have to say though I’m not sure my permission has that much worth in the current global financial climate).

Well whatever I think Hilary Duff should write a song/album discussing the use of gay in a slang context and whether stopping its use would halt the developing language progress.

Also as a final thing I would like to state that I will be moving away from using the term “gay” to describe something bad and instead will be fully integrating “your mum” or that’s so – “shitstainedpissflapsfurryaxewoundcumdumpsterfundipHoudinicheesecakecajunstylespitro-astfootnoteofsocietymonkeymagichilaryduffisastuckupwhorebutIwould”

Oh and also someone left an anyonmous message on my last post recommending this:

If that were you thanks – I love midgets

By the way there's an Xbox 360 and Wii in my house

2008-08-31T23:27:00.004+01:00

So the summer is almost over. And thus things might happen that'll actually get me writing again. However until this occurs console yourself with some shiny internet things I found (or was shown).

I found this amazing MSN article explaining to women what a guys choice in videogames console says about him. (I really wanted to find a copy of the article but it seems to have gone - and I can't seem to work out how to search just their articles on MSN.com (also that kinda rhymes so it must be true)).
Well basically the article broke it down that men who own PS3s are rich and need the latest gadgets. Guys who own a Wii are overly sensitive and full of fun and men who own an Xbox 360 are blood spilling potential psychos who are quite social with other muderous mentalists.
As far as I can see the whole article was devised using press releases and lifestyle photography. It was really funny and I'm sorry I cannot show you the article in all its glory.

Another great internet find is this video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wl9VgSaCanI

Someone has made some really hardcore Super Mario Bros levels (using some kind of level editor). Anyway what's funnier than watching someone trying to play these levels through is listening to the song in the background basically explaining that Mario is attempting his entire quest to try and get laid.
This puts a completely new spin on the old "Who is cooler Mario or Sonic?" argument. I mean Sonic is just questing to beat up a guy with a ginger beard/moustache who tortures animals for poops and giggles. But Mario is a fat plumber trying to get his end away and he beats up the wild life just for looking at him funny.
Now tell me who is cooler...

Why was this not a sketch on Monkey Dust?

2008-07-30T02:00:00.005+01:00

Well every year I write about Big Brother and complain about how it interferes with my Channel 4 viewing. (Just as a recap: late night Channel 4 is for weird documentaires about people with freak problems I don't understand and not for watching strangers sleeping). Well this year I didn't bother complaining about Big Brother as it has become such a non-event and more importantly it doesn't seem to be on that much. This leads me to believe that Big Brother is on the way out, after all Russell Brand doesn't do Big mouth anymore and Dermot O'Leary found the luck of the Irish was on his side when he got offerred the job of presenting Xfactor. And I'm probably right in thinking that Davina McCall said this was the last series she was going to present.

(Sorry just going off on a tangent here but I just read that Davina was the female voice dubber on the 1st series of Eurotrash - I miss that show, how else are teenagers supposed to learn that Europe has some really weird sex stuff going on and that the French guy who used to be on the Fruit Pastilles advert was actually a bit of a creepy pervert).

Right back to topic. Big Brother looks like it is dying and I'm rather happy about it but what I was thinking was that it should go for one more series but make it the most controversial series ever....

Ladies and Gentlemen I present to you Big Brother: 7 Deadly Sins

So there are 14 contestants to start with and people are only added in if someone leaves (leaves by choice ie not evicted) - there would be 10 public voted evictions (I'll explain why 10 in a minute).
So what happens is the people who are selected to be a contestants are people who embody one of the 7 deadly sins (Gluttony, Greed, Lust, Sloth, Vanity, Envy and Wrath). Obviously there are only 7 deadly sins but to make the number up to 14 there would be a male and female version of each.
I'm not sure I've explained this very well so I'll lay it out with a nice little list.

Gluttony - To represent Gluttony an obese man and obese woman would be contestants. (Obviously the people used would be fat of their own accord rather than have that disease where you can't stop eating).
Greed - Male and Female wallstreet traders or lawyers or perhaps a corrupt plastic surgeon. Someone who values money over everything else.
Lust - Male and Female serial adulterers.
Sloth - Male and Female stoners/wasters. One of those kids at school who was bright enough to achieve anything but just too lazy to go do it.
Vanity - Male and Female variants of someone who values beauty over everything. Perhaps an aspiring model or WAG.
Envy - (This was a bit of a shit to realise but I think I've got it). Someone who marries for money. They married for money because they wanted a richer lifestyle instead of their own. They didn't want to better themselves they were just envious of what others have. (Ok it's not brilliant but the best I could do).
Wrath - Failed attempt to murder cheating spouse (for extra controversy the cheating spouse could be the representative for Lust).

Anyway so as per usual the public votes out who they don't like (the people up for eviction are - again as per usual nominated by housemate votes) and contestants do tasks - this time inspired by stories from the Old Testament. Anyway when only 4 contestants are left in the house all the lights go low and Kevin Spacey is flown in via Helicopter onto the roof. Being a method actor he is in character of the guy he played in Seven. He creeps round the house with a tranquilizer gun and tries to shoot the contestants as they hide round the house. The last person to be shot wins and and Kevin Spacey is text clues about where different people are hidden via viewers at home (obviously the Big Brother producer has some say in which text messages Kevin Spacey actually recieves).

The usual winners ceremony follows but then it is revealed to the general public that actually it was a massive social experiment to see who the majority were prejudiced against (in all honesty probably fat people). Then Kevin Spacey gets 2 mins of plugging time to advertise his next play at the old vic.
Big Brother is then officially over forever and we all go on with our lives.
The day after this final a new series of Eurotrash is announced... The End.

Kid Rock vs Nickelback

2008-06-27T01:11:00.003+01:00

So one of these songs is the worst song of the summer. (Although it should be pointed out that this Nickelback song has been kicking about for ages but I've only just heard it.).

Nickelback - Photograph

Kid Rock - All Summer Long

I thought (hoped) Kid Rock was dead or at least not producing "music". I have to say I wasn't sure this was even going to be released in the UK is there even a market for Kid Rock? I can't imagine that many people can relate to rock, rap and country mixed and All Summer Long even makes me dislike Sweet Home Alabama a bit which is clearly a hate crime in itself - that song was in Con Air for Gods sake.

I'm not going to complain about Nickelback as it's pointless all the usual critisicms apply only this time it is underpinned by me not being convinced the video is filmed in Canada (where they are from) and clearly the song is a nostalgic piece so that's just stupid.

The thing is these two songs take me back to an argument I had many years ago when the Lostprophets released Last Summer. One of my friends was arguing that the Lostprophets were corporate bastards for writing a song that was designed to cash in on the emotions of teenagers leaving their home for University. I counter argued suggesting they were merely writing a song form personal experience and it was up to the record labels as to when the song was released. This argument will clearly never be solved until I gain the ability to read minds. And when I do finally have that ability I won't be wasting it on Lostprophet based arguments. Instead I'll be finding out What women want - writing it down on a piece of paper then visiting Mel Gibson to explain how very wrong his movie was.

Anywho back to topic.
So what can we learn from Nickelback and Kid Rock's contribution to "music"? Both songs are clearly aimed at the youth pre - University cash in market, but that may be the label not the band(although it is pretty obvious that both Kid Rock and Nickelback love giant piles of money). I can also tell you for certain that - both songs contain some of the worst rhymes I have ever heard - so congratulations to both artists for that.

Also kids it is worth noting that there is no need to get nostalgic in the summer. The winter is actually the time to get nostalgic because the chances are that is when you will die. Because you'll be old and most old people die in the winter due to that year's flu.

On a cheerier note, check this video -

It appears robots have already invaded and rather than going for the Skynet evil I had heard so much about they are infact playing in a band. So that's good news for everyone worried about the robot invasion but bad news for Flight of the Conchords as they appear to have competition to their song The Humans are Dead.

Back in black

2008-06-21T03:43:00.003+01:00

Well you'd probably thought I'd given up on this blog but you'd be wrong I was infact biding my time like a non political, non fictional Spider Jerusalem.
So there....

Anyway as you can see stuff has been changed; background colours have gone darker and pictureshave been added. Hopefully you can work out what the top two pictures mean (I plan to change them semi regularly). In the process of updating I lost the blog card which was made for me. This upset me greatly so to compensate I have added a Shenmue III placeholder - that game will exist one day - mark my words.

Another thing I'm thinking of adding on here is my own unique banner instead of the more Self Indulgent Than Myspace title so if you have any ideas send them in to the usual address (or as it is more likely you don't know where I live write in the comments section - if however you do know my address I'll accept suggestions on the back of a sealed stamped addressed envelope).

So what's been going on the world?
Well the Eurovision song contest happened. So here is my (belated) traditional Eurovision song contest rundown. The best entries (in no particular order) were Armenia, Ukraine and Greece. Here are their performances at the final:

So what have we learned?
If the UK are to stop scoring in the bottom three our entries need to feature quality drum rhythms, stupid noises and be sung by smoking hot brunettes. (Obviously I like all three of those things).

It should also be mentioned that Bosnia Herzegovina had the scariest entry.

I don't know what's going on but I think I saw something like this in a nightmare once - you know the kind of nightmare that's deeply deeply locked away in the subconscious and never spoken about for fear of re-occurring night terrors.

Daily Dilbert!? More like monthly - what a tool I've been

2008-05-26T18:38:00.005+01:00

So my first post in a month - so what shall I do?
I could attempt something profound or I could just chuck up a load of those Dilbert cartoons that I meant to post daily and then just didn't.

Yeah that'll work....

(By the way I haven't tried to resize these comic strips so you'll have to click on one to be able to read it).

Daily Dilbert part 1

2008-04-24T15:17:00.002+01:00

It's time to prove I'm as skilled as Alan Davis

2008-04-24T01:01:00.008+01:00

Hello Everyone
I'm exceedingly busy so I'll have to be quick.
First of all it was the 2nd year birthday of this blog on the 18th April. An achievement I know. (that's got to be worth at least 100 gamer points (sorry that's an Xbox 360 joke)).
But in all seriousness if you do read this regularly (when I do bother updating) thanks. It is so awesome when people comment and help massage my bouncy Ollie (some fat kid when I was at school) sized ego.

Anyway Dilbert is a pretty famous cartoon in national newspapers across the world. Dilbert.com has a section where you can add the end box (or punchline) to the end of the daily updated comic strip. so for a few days I may be adding to this blog my own take on the crazy world of business (also I hope you can actually read the blurry text).
So enjoy.

This update is purely for informative purposes, normal service will resume shortly.

2008-03-19T18:54:00.005Z

Youtube is running a comedy skit competition at the moment. The rules of the competition were to make a sketch that was about a roadtrip and somehow featured a musical instrument. I think the sketches were all done by amateaur members of the public (although some of them do look a little too professionally done).
So I've included the sketches which I thought were funniest on this blog.

The competition is in the semi-finals stage at the moment so members of the public (ie you) need to vote for sketches they like the most the winner gets an amount of money. Cick here or if that doesn't work www.youtube.com/sketchies2

Even if you don't vote you can always just watch these sketches just to piss some time away - and isn't that what's important here?

I think the only person this post is going to appeal to is future me, but tough.

2008-03-13T21:50:00.006Z

The other day I was reading an article on Cracked.com entitled 5 Important Lessons Learned from Street Fighter 2 the article was mildly funny as per usual (I should point out there are some absolute brilliant comedy bits nestled deep in cracked.com which is why I have now added a link to this website in the sidebar).

Anyway about two thirds of the way down the article I found a picture of these guys.

These dudes are Kid n Play and they were a comedy rap duo from 1983-1993. The reason I bring them up is that they were in a cartoon I used to watch when I was a kid and it's taken me over 10 years to findout who the hell they are or were.
I won't explain the format of the cartoon but everytime I tried to explain it to anyone they told me kid was Vanilla Ice - people are such idiots.

That's the beginnning of a show and the into

That's the full song Rollin with Kid n Play

Also it must be said that Kid's hair is "off the hook".

Previously on pancake day

2008-03-03T15:24:00.006Z

It seems to be the curse of the blogger that whenever they say "I'm going to update this blog more regularly" that infact what happens is they take the longest time possible to write a following update.
This has happened to yours truly and it is only now do I realise I haven't written a single update for February.... how annoying.

Still nevermind, we all have our crosses to bear and I'm sure I'll get over it.

Anyway February 5th (or Pancake day) saw Scottish band Biffy Clyro perform an impromptu acoustic gig which I was lucky enough to witness. And yes they were very good and stuff and I've included a couple of pictures for whoever it interested.

But this blog doesn't review gigs. Infact usually what happens is it complains about stuff. Which is what is about to occur:

1. The BBC are pissing licence fee money away on the TV programme Sound.
On Saturday afternoons there is this TV show called Sound which is basically the BBC trying to make a music show to engage with Teenagers. It's shite. Really shite. Nearly all the performances get interrupted with talking or they only show 30 seconds of the band playing. The Biffy Clyro acoustic gig was on Sound the following Saturday and featured only a fraction of the footage taken, (I know how much was filmed I was there in the audience having to put up with camera getting in my bloody way).
Also the male presenter Nick Grimshaw is an arsehole click here to see why you should hate him as much as I do.

2. Couples at gigs. I'm a sad bitter old man - that is a given but even when I was younger and hadn't had my heart crushed by a riotous stream of idiot bitches I hated couples at gigs. Why you ask? Because two people supposedly in love always seem to be lauding it over you - there's no hand holding, that's too subtle what we need is full on face suckering and always during the most inappropriate song.

For instance I like Glassjaw. Now I know for a fact that a load of the singers songs are about not being able to get a girlfriend due to his terrible bowel illness. It would be at a point during an "I'm so bitter, I keep pooing and can't get a girlfriend song" that the stupid couple in question would get off with each other.

So how would the singer in Glassjaw feel about that? It's just rubbing it in his face - and that is just spiteful.
So the next time you are enjoying a band with your girlfriend remember hand holding and cuddling is ok but a larger showing of affection is impudent behaviour.

Block Party

2008-01-31T03:10:00.000Z

I'll start this with an apology (you wouldn't believe how often I have to say that).

I'm sorry I have not been updating this blog as regularly as I should have been, but in my defence I have been pretty busy. (Well busy in a watching movies and playing videogames kind of way).
But now I'm taking a stand and I'm going to update more regularly. (In all fairness I'm not expecting you to really care that much, but if I keep this lack of updating going you'll stop reading this blog and my ego will become hugely deflated).
So yes more regular updates.

Anyway....
Lego was 50 years old on the 28th of January and I have to say those blocks are ageing well, they don't look a day over 25, they haven't lost their shape, the sides are still firm and the nobbly bits on the top are still pert.
So to celebrate this momentous occasion I stole some videos off youtube which involve cool Lego things, so watch these and learn something:

1st did you see how quickly that elastic band gun fires? How cool is that?
2nd That level from Super Mario Brothers isn't quite correct but that must have taken ages to film, so I'll let him get away with the lack of accuracy.

The funniest thing to happen in the history of Australia

2008-01-15T18:26:00.000Z

Oh yeah this is the 1st post of the New Year so Happy New Year.

So this 16 year old kid throws a party in Melbourne and 500 teenagers turn up. They all get drunk make loads of noise in the street.
The police get called, then have to retreat as the 500 teenagers throw bottles at them.
It takes 30 police, the police dog squad and a helicopter to restore calm. An estimate $20 000 (Austrailian money) worth of damage is done. But as amusing as all that is, it's this youtube video of the kid who threw the party that makes me laugh the most.

He is just such a little shit, who is clearly not sorry for anything that's happened. Still on the plus side those sun glasses are awesome.

You should have said no to Leon Jackson

2007-12-24T17:03:00.000Z

This is by a band called Reuben and the song is called "Christmas is Awesome"
It also should have been Christmas no.1
I have to say I am a fan of their previous work (which kind of increases my enjoyment of this song).

Well all that is left to say is: Merry Christmas to you all.

Sequels that should exist: Part 2

2007-12-24T00:42:00.000Z

Again they are making a an Indiana Jones 4 but I'd be grossly surprised if the film is going to be anything like my idea.

Indiana Jones: The Bronzed Kingdom of Connery

Plot synopsis: Indiana Jones is running away from some Nazis. (If you've seen any of the films you'll know he does this a lot). On this particular occasion he boards a small plane which then crash lands on Barbados in an uninhabited region (Indy doesn't know it's Barbados). When Indy finally finds civilisation on the island he finds that none other than Sean Connery (being Sean Connery not Indy's father) has taken this town and the whole island and is forcing the inhabitants to build a giant statue of himself. Most of the movie is taken up with Connery and Ford trying to beat each other in a game of wits (face it Harrison Ford is getting on I'm not sure I want him to do the more physical stunts). Anyway this game of wits escalates into Connery and Ford fighting on the open palm of the giant golden statue. The twist of the tale is Connery beats Ford and knocks him off the hand of the statue. Indiana Jones dies, Connery wins. No more delayed sequels can be made and I remain happy, the end.

Most memorable scene: When Indy fights Sean Connery on the open palm of the giant Sean Connery statue.
Moral: Harrison Ford is not as great as Sean Connery and this proves it.
Possible spin off: The crazy time traveling adventures of Lucas and Spielberg. These two giants of film go through the archives of their work trying to find old franchises they can re spark, if you're lucky maybe a sequel to Howard the Duck will get made (The Horror, The Horror).

Just some youtube videos to fill the time

2007-12-19T21:43:00.000Z

I've been meaning to chuck these on here for absolutely ages but what can I say? I'm chronically lazy:

Ok so this is a guy called Tay Zonday who is 25 or something. And he didn't hear any modern music until he was 13 because his parents locked him up in a box (maybe). The point is I find his voice amusing. And he became an internet phenomenon about 6 months ago but I only heard about it recently.

That is the remix he did to help advertise Dr Pepper. Again listen to that voice.

Here he is destroying Christmas with that voice - show this video to a child and make them cry.

Mark Kermode of culture show fame reviews (slates) Pirates of the Carribean 3, oh how I laughed. He didn't however enjoy Tranformers (but that's a private matter between him and God).

So that's the videos.
On a final note have you seen the video for the Westlife song Home? I hate the song (obviously) but something about the video just fundamentally infuriates me, maybe it's the way it is edited or perhaps it's the way they stare through the camera trying to pierce my very soul with their eyes of persecuting evil.
If someone does work out what it is about this specific Westlife video that kills me a little do leave a comment. Cheers.

Sequels that should exist: part 1

2007-12-07T03:17:00.000Z

I could write a film.
I know that's a pretty bold statement but I am absolutely convinced I could.
Whether it would be any good or not is another thing. But I could definitely write one.

So with that in mind and based on the fact that both Indiana Jones and Rambo are getting long delayed (unnecessary?) sequels. I've decided to sit down and list three films I would like to write the sequels to.

(Also note there is a new Jurassic Park in pre production and if this turns out to be the plot I'll be majorly surprised).

Jurassic Park IV: Sentient o Saurs

Plot Synopsis: Another Jurassic park, but this was one is set on the 1st island and is from the Dinosaurs point of view.
Thanks to the dinsosaurs all being created via cloning mass production they are starting to evolve rapidly (no scientific explanation needed)and now are able to think and communicate in dinosaur-ese (this is subtitled). Mathematician Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum)comes to the island to shoot the dinosaurs due to his new discovered love of big game hunting (again no explanation needed).
As the movie is from the dinosaurs point of view we see groups of them eating, craping and doing general animal stuff while conversing about the weather. Ian Malcolm turns up at random points (always leading to a big audacious fight). Malcolm kills a few of the hyper intelligent dinosaurs each time then disappears into the undergrowth.
Eventually the dinosaurs hatch a plan and trap Malcolm. They hold him captive for a year getting him to teach them English, mathematical mechanics and how human society works.
One day Malcolm awakes to find his Dinosaur captors gone, he leaves the cage and goes to try to find a way off the island (bothered on occasion by the stupid un evolved dinosaurs). He finds a boat escapes the island and heads for mainland America. When he gets to whichever city is geographically closest to the 1st Jurassic park island he finds the city partially destroyed and deserted.
Grabbed suddenly and pulled into a nearby building he looks on the face of some very troubled humans. He asks them "what is going on?" and explains how he has been away from civilisation. They tell him a chilling tale (shown in flashback) of how Dinosaurs came to the city in helicopters made of scrap and bombed the shit out of all the strategically important areas of the city. So now the Dinosaurs have full control of this city or perhaps the world.
The film ends with Ian Malcolm realising it is all his fault for teaching the Dinosaurs many things.

Most memorable scene: Either when the Dinosaurs are bombing the city or when Ian Malcolm has to teach the head Dinosaur how to speak English by singing that song from My fair lady.
Moral: Dinosaurs shouldn't learn mathematics for fear of them rising up against humanity.
Possible spinoff: Ian Malcolm Dinsosaur Hunter, it's like Planet of the Apes meets that bit in the Jungle book with King Louis the monkey.

P.S: I may write another one of these possible movies later or perhaps I'll decide they are too stupid and write something completely un related.

The Triforce Paradigm

2007-11-25T18:04:00.000Z

A fair few weeks ago I saw some TV show about kids getting Asbos.
I've no recollection of what the show was.
Infact I've so little recollection and the memory seems so hazy it may even have been a dream.

Anyway the point is the show (or dream) told me that the reason kids are getting so many Asbos or getting into so much trouble is because they don't have any role models. Or if they do have role models they are trashy celebrities found in Heat magazine (Girls Aloud not withstanding in my opinion).

This got me thinking maybe the reason I'm such a rounded human being is because of the celebrities I perceive to be my role models. Strong male role models who have helped shape my moral outlook on life.

Lets take a look:

1. Sean Connery

A man who commands respect. Not only does he always steal scenes in a movie (The Rock and Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade being the best examples) but he was also Mr Universe which surely makes him king of the universe. Also he fights for Scottish Independence even though he lives in Barbados and no one questions this (because he'd punch them in the face). And he'd have your Dad in fight when infact Connery is an old man.

2. Christian Bale

Nearly every movie he does is a new breed of amazing. Plus he made a film (the Prestige) where magicians didn't look like absolute idiots. And he helped resurrect the Batman movies from being unwatchable messes (Forever and Robin) into the best comic book movie adaptations ever.

3. Optimus Prime

He's just so damn righteous and with an inbuilt respect for humanity. This can only be bettered by the fact he is a robot that turns into a lorry.

Now on it's own that information is interesting but not particularly useful. I mean surely everyone already knew this; Connery, Bale and Prime are exceedingly good role models. But if we take this data and try to pictorially display it (by putting it on the Triforce).

We now see that Connery becomes Power (because he is King of the Universe).
Bale is wisdom (he has the foresight to choose amazing films - or makes films amazing either way wisdom).
And Prime is courage (he preaches to the other Autobots about not killing humans even when it would make his goals of stopping the Decepticons easier).

So what's the moral of all this I here you ask, is it that the role models kids should have today to stop their destructive behaviour should balance power, wisdom and courage?

Nope the moral is kids should be made to play the Legend of Zelda because then they wouldn't be on the streets playing near my damn bins.

The key to sellling your product

2007-11-25T15:39:00.000Z

So yer I haven't written on here in ages which I do apologise for.
However I don't apologise for how short and lame this post is going to be - that you'll have to put with.

Basically lifestyle product photography is shit and if you click here you'll see why.

You should really click that link and read that whole post because it is amazingly funny and sums up what's wrong with Lifestyle Photography in a much more precise way than I ever could.

Go on trust me, have I ever led you wrong before?

Arnie in Japan

2007-11-06T11:57:00.000Z

Yes I know I've been neglecting this blog but a combination of nothing very interesting happening coupled with being kinda busy has led to a lack of updates.
Anyway a few people have said they enjoyed Arnie's adventures in Brazil so in the spirit of pleasing them I've added these Arnie japanese adverts - check them out they're mad.

It's just like Mr Sparkle well hopefully that'll tie you over until I come up with something interesting.

You're sick and twisted misses

2007-10-24T22:31:00.000+01:00

Look at this photo

That was once a dog, now it's inhumanely been made to look like Leonardo the leader of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If you look into it's eyes I'm pretty sure you can see that it wants to die - still at least it raised a chuckle.

" Sierra? Sierra? "

2007-10-15T23:09:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone.
I haven't written on here in a while due to nothing interesting happening. As per usual things have been a little dull.
Anywho I was lucky enough to be shown (by one of my friends) this incredible Arnie video.

I won't analyse the whole thing but pay close attention to Arnie trying to say cheers to that lady (in her native tongue) and later grabbing a lot of ladies arses - quite clearly without their permission.

Also just incase this blog ever becomes a piece of influential academic reference material in regard to the media; Ian Hislop Arnie is not the worst actor ever he was in Terminator 2 - a highly regarded classic (he was also in Total Recall, Predator, Terminator and True Lies, not definitives masterpieces of cinema but very good none the less). So there.

Also does anyone know what's happened to the website stupidfuckingcustomer@blogspot.com I miss its very existence.

How to make yourself look cooler than you actually are

2007-10-03T17:52:00.000+01:00

Because I'm cool I play guitar.....

Actually scrap that, because I wanted to be cool/ and I liked At the Drive In/ and I wanted to write silly songs I learned to play guitar.

So anyway my 1st guitar was in a bit of a state (the electronics needed repairing, the paint at the bottom was chipped

and more importantly (due to my younger self attempting to customise it without the correct tools - damn you past me) the overall paint job was a bit screwed).

Well recently I was introduced to this bloke who happens to be mildly artly talented and customises guitars. So I've handed him my 1st guitar with the hope that he could fix up this visual disgrace and then assuming he did a good job I would pay him some money.

So here are the preliminary photos of what he has done (also note this is obviously not finished).

No your eyes do not decieve you that is indeed an unfinished Optimus Prime standing on my guitar, waiting for some sort of Decepticons invasion. I think it looks really cool and assuming all goes according to plan this should finish as an exemplary piece of awesome.

Also if you want something painting you can check out this guys work at: http://www.myspace.com/carillioncustom

Nuts TV update: Big Cook Little Cock

2007-09-21T22:44:00.000+01:00

Well Nuts TV stoops to a new level by being presented by the bloke who plays little cook in Big Cook Little Cook.

As you can see in this photo he is flying on a broomstick.

I think the picture is pretty self explanatory on why that man is a fool. But my inner anger also comes from the fact he did a TV show for BBC 3 where he kept complaining on how having ginger hair was impeding his getting with girls.

What actually was impeding this girl related action was starring in big cook little cook, and being a tool.

Still on a lighter note Nuts TV was talking about broadsheet newspapers today so at least it was teaching people something which as you can see is funny.

The day that TV went wrong

2007-09-19T22:29:00.000+01:00

Originally this update was going to be a list of TV shows that got canceled and how it was an actual disgrace. But now I have a televisual event that's even worse than all the shows I love getting thrown into the great rubbish bin of stuff I care about.

So last Wednesday Nuts TV began.

For all those who don't know Nuts is a lad mag, not just a lad mag probably the lowest common denominator lad mag that exists. Full of tales of how the editors get pissed up everynight and hang out with pretend lesbian glamour models. (Not that I don't like half naked girls or jokes and other such things but it's just so poorly handled, once I read an issue on a train journey and I was just so bored).

Anyway they've taken the Nuts format and turned it into a TV channel on Freeview. It runs from 9pm til 1am and it's so crap. Ball achingly crap infact.
It's presented so badly and it's so unfunny.
And then it ends with this:

It's Lucy Pinder reading Shakespeare.
Now I like Lucy Pinder she is hot. But that beautiful shell of a woman houses the most hideous voice and sorry to be so middle class (I'm not sorry) but her Shakespeare pronunciation is well off.
Disgusting.

On the plus side at least Nuts the magazine has made FHM look like a classier lads mag with better photo skill and funnier humour.

The crazy world of comedy

2007-09-07T23:12:00.000+01:00

A couple of weeks ago I saw Knocked Up at the cinema.
I have to say I enjoyed it. Actually I really enjoyed it.
It wasn't the funniest comedy I'd ever seen, it just had this weird sense of realism, some of the scenes you could actually imagine happening (or at least being vaguely similar in real life). Also the humour swung from stoner, gross out stuff to observational comedy.
The final thing that really did it for me was seeing a load of actors from Judd Apatow's (the directors) previous work (Freaks and Geeks, Undeclared and the 40 year old virgin) in new roles, it was an entertaining case of recognise the cameo.
So in conclusion Knocked Up = good times.

A couple of days before that I saw Evan Almighty.
It was shite.
I had heard as much but I was hoping that Steve Carell could still make it amusing to me. The problem with that movie turned out not to be the cast or the ridiculous but hilarious premise but the fact the writers had forgotten to put any jokes in. How do you make a comedy without jokes? I dunno, maybe this was originally intentioned as a documentary, possibly? Yer that's right a documentary about a senator becoming the reincarnation of Noah.
Anyway the only thing I drew from this film is that Morgan Freeman would make an excellent God.

Finally the IT Crowd has been on Channel 4 for a few weeks now and so far this second series has been really funny (even though they did kill of Chris Morris who is a bit of a legend). I fully recommend you watch the next few episodes or get hold of them on 4OD.
Just so you know what to expect I'll tell you that tonights episode covered those crappy piracy info-ads, German cannibals and the smoking ban now making smokers feel like persecuted Russians under a communist dictators regime, well I thought it was funny even if you don't.

You never get remixes like this for songs from the UK.

2007-08-31T00:32:00.000+01:00

This absolutely proves to me that Avril Lavigne is cool.

Now which is the emoticon for knowing cynicism or irony?

The curse of Thandie Newton

2007-08-26T00:13:00.000+01:00

Hey everyone how have you been?
You've probably noticed I haven't updated this in weeks, that's because I haven't had anything to say - you see nothing interesting has happened it's all been very boring.

That was until today when I went to the cinema, where (as well as seeing a film) I also saw a trailer for Simon Pegg's new movie Run Fat Boy Run.
Now I find Simon Pegg a funny guy. I also find Dylan Moran who he is co starring with a funny guy. But the trailer looked remarkably unfunny and I couldn't work out what could ruin the comedic combination of Pegg and Moran.

And then I saw it - Thandie Newton.

Now I'm not saying that Thandie Newton is a terrible actress who can't act in films - that's just mean - I'm just saying any film she is in becomes crap. She is like the albatross from the Rime (spelt correctly) of the Ancient Mariner (you shoot her with a camera (not crossbow) and immediately your film becomes cursed).

Anyway enough of that let's look at the body of evidence to back up my theory (please bear in mind I'm only using films I've actually seen).

2006 The Pursuit of Happyness - Will Smith plays on human emotions and tries to win an Oscar.

2005/2004 ER - Yes that's right she starred in the TV show ER, infact she conveniently appeared opposite Dr Carter just as ER started to go downhill, coincidence?

2004 Crash - A film about how racism is bad and effects many different classes of society in everyday situations - Holy Shit really? I thought racism only occurred in prison on the feast of Scotchtoberfest.

2004 The Chronicles of Riddick - Pitch Black was good this was really bad, but in all fairness that was probably also down to Vin Diesel being self indulgent.

2000 Mission Impossible 2 - 1 and 3 are actually rather good. This movie is overly simplistic and clearly built around a poxy motorcycle chase, it's best described as mucky.

1994 Interview with a vampire - This didn't suck, but that's probably because the combined efforts of Brad Pitt, Christian Slater and Tom Cruise kept it afloat. Yes even Antonio Banderas half arsed acting can't ruin this.

So there we have it that's my theory. Now for once I'm not absolutely certain in my convictions instead I ask you the question:

Thandie Newton albatross of cinema or some random actress?

I stole this from popjustice.com

2007-08-03T22:27:00.000+01:00

This is the Girl Aloud press release for their greatest hits.

It is probably one of the greatest contemporary things I have ever ever read. And supposedly it was written by Nicola (the ginger one). SO with this in mind I hereby declare this: Nicola Roberts I've always found you attractive (even though my friends claimed you looked sickly and had a fish head) but I figured we were mentally incompatible. If you did indeed write that press release we are in fact very compatible and I will actually marry you - FACT.

(Disclaimer: If on the other hand someone from the marketing department wrote that, then congratulations you have smashed the delicate illusion I envisaged around Girls Aloud and I'll never trust a televisual manufactured pop band again - ever).

Uber quick update

2007-08-03T21:17:00.000+01:00

A) Transformers was great - an over solid 8/10 - yer it was flawed but it was really cool and visually arresting, so go see it. Oh and even if you hate the cheesey bits you'll have to admit that special effects wise it's spectacular.
B) The Simpsons movie was well plotted but just not as funny as it should have been 6/10.
C) Kate Nash' single Foundations must be absolutely blindingly brilliant as pretty much every person I've spoken to loves it (even some of my metal head friends) so well done her 8/10.
D) Turns out Waitrose Tropical fruit juice is an excellent Um Bongo substitute (it tastes exactly the same) so thus the problem was solved.

That is all.

Robot Week: The Killer 7th

2007-07-23T22:05:00.000+01:00

Robot No.7 HK47

When George Lucas invented Star Wars all those years ago he probably didn't realise that A) Droids would be on the light and dark side of the force and B) Star Wars videogames would get so shit and find so little inspiration from the prequels they were supposed to tie in with that the best Star Wars game in years would be completely removed from the original world Lucas envisaged.

Anyway droid HK47 is a droid on the Dark side of the force who regards humans as meat bags and is a little head mental. (I'd quote it but I can' remember of the funny key lines). The point is HK47 is not humanities last hope just a random orange psycho.

Strengths: The Dark side is strong in this one.
Weaknesses: The Dark side is strong in this one.
Stuff it's been in that's great: Knights of the old Republic I and II

Robot Week: 666

2007-07-23T21:25:00.000+01:00

This robot may not have as many weapons as Metal Gear but is still pretty terrifying. It also has less of a sense of moral decency than Bender.

Robot No.6 Paris Hilton

I'm pretty convinced Paris Hilton is a robot it would explain a lot. Like why she is so dead behind the eyes or what her actual function is in life.
Obviously being a robot is not an actual function in life, but being a sex-bot is.
I'm not one for conspiracy theories but I'm pretty sure Paris Sex-bot Hilton was sent in by some minor foreign nation to infiltrate the USA's social "elite". She was programmed to get in the pants of these tycoons young male offspring and thus manipulate (son to father to government) benefits for this foreign nation.

Strengths: She can manipulate the financially strong and mentally weak.
Weaknesses: Like Bender Paris gets her energy from alcohol.
Stuff she's been great in: Uh nothing counts as a choice, maybe.

Robot Week: 5

2007-07-23T01:39:00.000+01:00

Robot No.5 EVA 01

It's huge, purple and green and humanities only hope (that's definitely a pattern in robots).

Strengths: It has a sonic knife for stabbing, access to giant automatic weaponry and something called an AT field which is basically a massive inbuilt shield. Also once it regenerated a limb.
Weaknesses: Although it has a battery to power it this only lasts 5 minutes, to be fully functional the Evangelion has to be plugged into the mains.
Stuff it's been in that's great: Neon Genesis Evangelion a morality tale about modern society and big robots.

Robot Week: Part 4

2007-07-23T00:42:00.000+01:00

Moving away from the Robots in videogames thing.

Robot No.4 Bender

He's a smoking, drinking, swearing, stealing, manipulating machine that has a desire to kill all humans. But yet he does have a bizarre personal sense of moral decency.

Strengths: He can bend stuff.
Weaknesses: Alcohol provides him with the strength to work.
Stuff he's been in that's great: Futurama - probably my favourite animated comedy show. Yes I prefer it to the Simpsons it's a load of the jokes about videogames and Tron and the 80s and The Beastie Boys, it's as if Matt Groening made a show specifically for me.

Robot Week: Threes

2007-07-20T00:57:00.001+01:00

I just posted the Probotector bit and realised due to the time I was one post down. So here we go again:

Robot No.3 Metal Gear

In the future we'll all have one of these to drive to work.

This is what Metal Gear Rex looks like in Lego form - you can see more of this guys work here

The little known Metal Gear Gander. Sorry I'm going on about this but I just think robots are neat.

(By the way: I don't know if the very definition of a robot means artificial intelligence is involved and as I'm too lazy to find out I'll just pretend it doesn't).

Metal Gear is a great big walking tank, that likes to shoot things. There are many different versions/iterations but the important things to note are A) It's bigger than you B) It has more weapons than you and C) It can't think for itself, but it probably does hate you.

Strengths: Lots of weapons (rail gun, laser, mini gun, missiles and Nuclear capable) and some form of quality radar system, Metal Gear Ray can swim.
Weaknesses: Requires someone to operate it (so may not technically be a robot). A single man with a rocket launcher can destroy it if he knows wear to shoot it. Also I'm not sure it's legs are that stable.
Stuff it's been in that's great: I very much recommend Metal Gear Solid on the Playstation (or Gamecube remake) and Metal Gear Solid on the Game boy Advance.

Robot Week: Part Deux

2007-07-20T00:05:00.000+01:00

Robot No. 2 Probotector

The 2 gun approach is the way to help rebuild a post apocalyptic future.

America had Contra - a videogame series where a Rambo type bloke and a Schwarzenegger in Predator type bloke shot robots and aliens in the face. When it came to a European release (possibly because Germany had very strict videogame laws) Konami changed all the graphics of the Rambo guys (and some of them more human looking enemies) into Robots. So Rambo and Predator guy became robots called Probotectors and unsurprisingly they are humanities last hope in an Alien War (well at least in no.3 which is the best one).

Strengths: Probotectors carry two guns which have different firing and ammo modes depending on the power up collected. They also seem to be able to pull off excellent ending poses at the end of each mission.
Weaknesses: They get hit once and they die. If you were building humanities last hope would you really make them so on the cheap?
Stuff they've been in that's great: Probotector 1,2 on the NES and Super Probotector: Alien Rebels (or Probotector 3) on the SNES.

And so Robot Week begins

2007-07-18T23:14:00.000+01:00

In celebration of the Transformers movie being in cinemas from Friday the 27th I have deemed this week robot week. Now this means I'll be writing a feature on a robot each day (if I can remember) for at least a week.

Now many of you have probably thought why don't you start this epic robot related extravaganza on Friday and then do it up to the day the Transformers movie is officially released. The answer is twofold: 1. I'm away for some of next week. 2. Previews for "possibly the best Michael Bay film ever" start next Tuesday.

Robot No.1 Astro boy/Megaman

Put a shirt on you'll catch a virus.

You'd be happy to if you were blue like that.

These two little guys count as one choice because it is obvious they are infact the same robot. It's just one was created in the 50s then the other one ripped off the one from the 50s in the 80s.

Strengths: Astroboy can fly, Megaman is Blue. Both have a gun in their arm. Megaman has a cool theme tune.
Weaknesses: Astroboy is plagued by weird men (that's what happens when you're a child and don't wear a shirt, and do wear shorts), Megaman relies too much on his dog.

Stuff they've been in that's great: The Astro boy TV series from 2004. Any show that features a line (that ws something like) "that robot ate the Rollercoaster and the Super Safari ride, by this time tomorrow the town will be flooded with unemployed hippobots" deserves a mention.
Megaman games are selectively good, I personally enjoy Megaman 2 , 7 and X (that's an X not a 10, there has never been a Megman 10.)

Staring into the Abyss

2007-07-15T00:08:00.000+01:00

I've literally just reached the end of the internet it looked like this:

Or this:

Or perhaps this:

Infact when I searched "then end of internet" there were so many pages, so I was a bit confused as to which was the real one. But one of these must be... probably.

You are what you see (on Tv)

2007-07-07T02:10:00.000+01:00

I know I've been using too many videos recently but I saw these and I just knew that you would want to see them.

This song is a Girls Aloud B-side.

I'm not going to pretend there is any hidden meaning to these two videos they are what they are, but they did keep me amused.

Also today I saw probably the 2nd best music video cameo I had ever seen. I was watching the video for Fergie (from the Black Eyed Peas) song Big Girls Don't Cry and who did I see? None other than Peter Petrelli of Heroes fame (he was playing a greasy Mexican bloke).

One day I may tell you about the greatest music video cameo I ever saw but that is a tale for another time (like when I haven't written a blog update in weeks and I need a filler).

Talking of filler, to pass some of the time I've been watching a bit more TV than usual. How in the 7 levels of hell does MTV continue to produce such vapid shit? Seriously I can watch almost anything beginning to end but Laguna Beach has shot me down time and time again. Ir's supposedly the real OC but these kids really do nothing, they sit and complain about who fancies who then cop of with each others respective partners, whilst clearly spending loads of money that has been given to them by their parents. I'm starting to think the real reason this show exists is because one of the executives who commissioned it is one of the kids parents and he was fed up with them lounging round the house:

"Here Jason, here's your own camera crew, make a show about your own life, just get out the damn house, I'm fed up with your lounging and complaining. Also if you see your mother while you're out tell her to come home soon, we're having guests over tonight and I'm gonna need a partner if we're to play the car keys in the hat game. "

40,000 signatures why won't they make another one?

2007-06-26T01:15:00.000+01:00

Well I was hoping I could welcome you all back to this blog with an exciting story of how I met Mr Biffo (for all those who don't know he is this bloke who pretty much shaped my comedy outlook. He wrote a set of videogames pages on Teletext that I read everyday for 5 years during my "idiotic" teenagehood). He is a personal hero of mine and one day I will write an entry on here on why he is brilliant. Anyway instead of hanging out with him at a signing of his new book Confessions of a Chatroom Freak I was stuffing envelopes in a factory/warehouse type place. I won't tell you how many I did because it'll just make me sound petty - but believe me it was a fair few.

So while I was doing that one of my good chums set up a Facebook group to celebrate the beauty and all round goodness of Ellie the hot female presenter of Newsround. If you have a Facebook account I suggest you add it as one of your groups. I suggest this not just because Ellie explains the news in a simple but eloquent manner but because she deserves to be recognised as a master crafts woman. A woman whose job it is explain to children that people are dying in conflicts all around the world and to this end she does a very good job. So go search (on Facebook) Ellie Crisell (the fit one from Newsround) Appreciation Society to get involved in the cult.

If you look to the right of my posts you'll see a list of links of websites I read. Now one of them ickle computer people has suggested that a really cool new craze to start would be blog cards. The idea would be that every blog would feature a blog card that could then be saved as and collected. (Yes I am aware there would be millions). Now as I have come from the collection generation (Pogs, Go gos and Pannini sticker collections) I thought this was a bandwagon I wanted to be part of. Hence why sitting on the right hand side is a big "Blog Card".

The face of my blog card is Ryo Hazuki probably the greatest fictional character of the past 10 years, he appeared in both Shenmue games on the Dreamcast. I could go on about the importance of the character and what relevance he bears to our society and how infact he is actually a post ironic metaphor of our 21st century lifestyles, but here is what you need to know:

1)The game Shenmue cost millions and was the final nail in Sega's massive bloated coffin.
2)Once Ryo went "Looking for some sailors", he then beat the crap out of them in a bar fight.
3)He has a mysterious plaster on his face.
4)In his wardrobe are 10 sets of identical clothes and shoes.
5)What the hell was actually going on in Shenmue is a giant Xfiles esq mystery, and somewhat like the Xfiles there will probably never be a satsfactory conclusion.
This is also the reason why there is a 43,784 signature petition to make Shenmue 3 kicking round the internet.

To be honest Ryo Hazuki and Shenmue represent this blog really well. A massively ridiculous self indulgent mess that to the casual observer looks like it doesn't know where it's going and doesn't really make any logical sense, but in spite of these flaws 40,000 people want a sequel to be made - oh no wait that doesn't work as a clever comparision.

The summer starts here

2007-06-09T00:06:00.000+01:00

So the lack of regular updates recently would suggest that the summer has started.
This doesn't however mean I've run out of things to talk about (that'll kick in about July) it instead means I've been too busy to sit down and write something.

Anyway I'm going away for a couple of days so instead of writing a load of blog updates over a series of days I will instead just dove tail a load of crap together in a quick and meaningless chunk of information for you to digest.

This is the 2nd trailer for the Transformers movie (27th July UK).

I think this movie looks absolutely amazing and more importantly they had the Transforming sound (listen to when Optimus Prime transforms) from the 80s movie. As far as I'm concerned the only way this could possibly be messed up is if the pacing was Star wars episode 2 style (leave all the action to the last half an hour and feature an embarrassing chicken run style sequence (that bit in the robot factory)). Dialogue is a complete irrelevance with this kind of movie too so theoretically (and I'm really hoping here) Michael Bay should have knocked out a really fun ridiculous movie with lots of spectacular destruction and no Armageddon style failings (oh and of course no Ben Affleck).

I WARN YOU from here on in this article is muchly sinking into the realms of videogames so if you are adverse to such things you may want to leave the rest of this article.

Still here?

Good I'll carry on then. Today I was reading in Edge about Sonic Xtreme which was going to be a 3D esq Sonic game on the Saturn, then while surfing the net (reading something completely unrelated) I came across some videos of it (in its early stages).

Then I went and found this a 3D section of Sonic Jam on the Saturn (a compilation of old Mega Drive Sonic games with a 3D world map section to swap between games).

Now my point is how come these ancient 3D Sonic games all have a working 3D camera and the new games are all feature a very broken buggy mess of a camera system. Also I hate the way the new games are set in the real world - what's wrong with patchwork brown and orange escapism?

Finally on a completely unrelated non-Sonic note if the Big Brother house this year had started full of men instead of women would the men have taken the bath out the living room and instead re plumbed it in the bathroom? Then put the fridge back in the kitchen? All in the same night of course. And then by the end of the week added a loft and balcony to the house?

That's nothing against women I'm just saying that in all likely hood the men going in would know a trade and have brought power tools as their luxury items.

It was literally the greatest thing I had ever seen, well at least the greatest thing I saw that day

2007-05-27T02:59:00.000+01:00

I was shown this a couple of days ago.
I think I may have actually weeped a bit.

The press sensationalises everything

2007-05-25T03:11:00.000+01:00

So I read today that an Orangutan had escaped from it's cage at a zoo in Taiwan and was wrecking up the place. It sounded really exciting with claims that "it picked up and threw a motorbike" and "ran about in a riotous fashion".
So obviously I wanted to said exciting Orangutan shenanigans and this is what I saw:

Running about!? It's moseying about at best (or strolling about at worst) and a motorcycle was thrown? More like a scooter was pushed over.

It just find it depressing that my hopes were built up, and then dashed, by someone who just obviously doesn't appreciate the comedy and excitement that a riotous monkey relative can cause.
I mean I understand that when you're reporting you have to try to make the event interesting but surely for the majority of people the single line description of Orangutan escapes cage and dosses about would have been enough to get people engaged. Then I wouldn't have been so disappointed with the relatively mundane monkey outcome (alright I know it's not a monkey but I fancied some alliteration).

Anyway I'm off to watch Dunston checks in or Every which way but loose. Now those Orangutans knew how to be funny.

2007 will be a golden age of Eastern European music

2007-05-21T18:25:00.000+01:00

I know I've been exceedingly slow to jump on this one but the two best songs of the 2007 Eurovision song contest were:

Georgia's entry: Visionary Dream

and Russia's entry: #1

For those unable to access the videos, Visionary dream starts off sounding like the opening operatic piece of a Final Fantasy game and then spirals off into a muddled mix of synths and dance beats (which Eastern Europe likes apparently). It's a bit different and I think quite interesting.

#1 is classic Girls Aloudesq stuff. Eg. dirty bass line and cheeky vocals. Nothing to complicated really.

On a side note Popjustice.com also decided that Russia's entry #1 was the best song at the Eurovision song contest. This proves to me that my ability to make my own decisions has been eroded away due to years of Videogame abuse and I now make my decisions by pre-empting what my favourite websites are going to write.

Anyway the main point still is that neither of these songs won.

Sigue Sigue Sputnik were actually good.

2007-05-14T01:56:00.000+01:00

Ok so I haven't updated this properly in ages.
The reason being I've been exceedingly busy, also as I wrote 10 posts in a pretty short space of time (granted they were at varying degrees of goodness) I figured I'd written enough for a while.
Anyway the point is I'm back and it's time for me to learn you something.

I now have actual proof that the 80s was the greatest decade for pop music.
The proof comes in the form of this: I have recently purchased the soundtrack to the Breakfast club and The Transformers movie. Now both albums contain the lowest common denominator pop music of the time (obviously that isn't shocking). What is shocking is that pretty much every track is amazing. (You'll have to trust me on this as it would be impossible for a mere mortal to describe how good these songs are).

So this means that if the shittest pop music (always found on film soundtracks) of the decade is superb then the best pop music of that decade must be the greatest ever made.

Now usually I would end this post with a picture of Optimus Prime looking glorious, but I've decided to take this blog in a more adult direction.

That's Hot Rod he became leader of the Autobots after Optimus Prime.
Interestingly a lot of kids were so upset that Optimus Prime died in the Transformers movie (which is why Hot Rod became leader (Ultra Magnus doesn't count)) that they locked themselves in their rooms and cried because they were so upset.

They went in as boys, but came out as men - and that is what being an adult is about - accepting death. Be it the death of a fellow human being or the death of a 10ft tall robot who transforms into a red lorry.

Will they actually perform the school musical this time?

2007-05-07T04:26:00.000+01:00

High School Musical 2 - Seeing this promo photo proves to me we're in for a great summer.

We've come a long way

2007-04-18T21:24:00.000+01:00

So here we are.
You probably don't realise this but today marks not only the 100th "article" or post or whatever you want to call it but it's also the 1 year anniversary of when I started my blog.

You may however have noticed I've been posting a lot within the last 4 days and with this quantity there was a sharp decline in quality.
What infact happened was I noticed that the birthday of this blog was coming up and if I really pushed the quality I could make the 100th post on the birthday, so I did. Hence the lack of recent goodness.

Anyway I'm going to keep noting down ridiculous things because they are funny (even if I am not) and hopefully people will keep responding with such positive comments as "That was really funny when" or "I don't like it when you put videos on coz I can't watch them" or "None of that blog is funny - you're an idiot."

Well whatever the outcome I'll keep writing.

Also still no Um Bongo.

Hull: hyperborean for kingdom of the northern monkeys

2007-04-18T04:28:00.000+01:00

Well people ask me about Hull all the time and what it's like to live in what is regarded as one of the worst places in the entire country so to satisfy people's curiosity I've put together a list of facts about Hull.

1) It's true there is no coloured sky just an absence of light.
2) Sometimes at night you can smell this weird smell of burning chocolate this is caused by the caramelising factory on an industrial estate.
3) It is illegal to fly a small plane under the Humber bridge.
4) One night the bridge did transform into a giant robot - 5 people died.
5) Scientific investigation proved water in the river Humber is twice as dirty as dirt.
6) The nightclub Spiders is run as a charity that is why it's so cheap.
7) The art museum in Hull contains a mural of the day Hull fought for independence from the rest of Yorkshire.
8) Next doors dog contains the spirit of Hull's love for the rest of humanity, that is why it's dying.
9) Once in the butchers we saw a headless carcass lying on the floor - it may have been a dead alsatian.
10) The people of Hull believe caramelised alsatian to be a delicacy.

Way down deep in the middle of the congo....the clawless otters were employed to package Um Ognob

2007-04-18T04:12:00.000+01:00

Ok this is less an article more of a request.
Has anyone seen Um Bongo recently?
(The fruit juice drink usually in a carton).
I've been looking to get hold of some to be the basis of a fruit cocktail. I think it'd be awesome-o.

Anyway to stop me looking like some kind of information moocher I've sweetened the pill by giving you some Um Bongo facts courtesy of wikipedia.

"For a short period of time in the 1990s, Um Bongo was renamed Um Ognob as a marketing ploy.

Song Lyrics

Way down deep in the middle of the Congo, a hippo took an apricot, a guava and a mango. He stuck it with the others, and he danced a dainty tango.
The rhino said, "I know, we'll call it Um Bongo", Um Bongo, Um Bongo, They drink it in the Congo.
The python picked the passion fruit, the marmoset the mandarin. The parrot painted packets that the whole caboodle landed in.
So when it comes to sun and fun and goodness in the jungle, They all prefer the sunny funny one they call Um Bongo!

The song was sung by Tony Jackson, a member of the band 'Rage', best known for their 1992 number 4 chart hit, "Run to You". "

I've also loaded up a youtube video of the song sung by some bloke on xfm.

My new favourite show (part 2)

2007-04-18T03:46:00.000+01:00

So kids part of my fascinating series on Tv now continues. I bet you can't wait.

Well my second new favourtie show is a little program called Heroes which is one of the most popular Tv extravaganzas in America at the moment.

I could go on about all the subtle little things that make it well worth watching but the main point is it's Lost meets the Xmen.

The hook of the show is ordinary people around the world are realising they have superpowers. What is causing this? Who has these crazy superpowers? Does the government know this is happening?

The story telling is pretty much the Lost style with a nice load of questions posed at the beginning and then more questions are added in later. However unlikeLost it seems to be pretty good at answering questions it sets up and more importantly doesn't waste all our time with crappy character flashbacks when we all know that what is currently happening in the characters lives is a lot more interesting.

I could go on about Heroes' characters and who has what power but that would kind of ruin the show (Peter Petrelli and Hiro have the best powers and are the coolest people in it by far).

I think it starts on BBC2 in June so try to watch it - and that's the end of that.

One of the best toys ever...

2007-04-18T03:26:00.000+01:00

Before I begin on this one I'd just like to explain that I have a younger sister (9 years old) and that's how I know about current children's toys. I don't buy toys anymore I'm too old or something.
(Unless it was a reissue Optimus Prime in which case that would be acceptable).

So these toys are called Pixel Chicks and make the best use of the LCD screen I've
seen in quite a while (since the Gameboy probably).

The 1st one I saw looked like this:

It's a house, and when it's switched on the screen displays a person who lives in it
and you can interact with said person and feed them and plays games it's like the Sims in a toy.

Another one look like this:

It's a car and a little person appears driving the car on the screen. I can't remember what else it does but I do know that if you link the house and the car together the person walks out the door on the screen of the house and gets into the car.

Then there's this one:

It's a shop and the screen can be moved from the bottom to the top and the little person serves in the two separate shops. You serve customers and clean up and earn money to spend on clothes. It's great as it teaches my sister the responsibility of being 16 and having a job when she is infact 10.

Finally this one is exceedingly odd, when it's round this way:

a dog lives in the house and you feed, pet and groom it.

But when it's round this way:

The dog starts acting like it's on stage and playing a gig. The buttons then allow you to play some kind of musical mini game.

So to conclude: LCD screens are now being put to their best use by allowing kids to play the Sims in some kind of plastic house/shop/car/kennel thing.

Any respect I now have for Avril Lavigne is BECAUSE of Girlfriend

2007-04-16T21:32:00.000+01:00

Here is more proof if needed that the current Avril Lavigne single (Girlfriend)is absolutely brilliant. Music is supposed to be a subjective and this has been proved by the fact that I have a friend who has a completely different musical taste to me. It is almost the case that anything I love he will hate and vice versa (obviously there are small exceptions to this).
However with the single Girlfriend both of us are really really into it. So I left him this message on his facebook wall:

"Ok check this facebook group:
Any Respect I Ever Had for Avril Lavigne is Now Lost Because of Girlfriend"
Ok so by enjoying that song does this mean we're weird and child like when we enjoy the cheap guitar licks and uninspiring drum rhythms coupled with the lyrics of a simplistic pre teen. Or does this mean we're adult and cool because we have seen and ignored her faux musings on love and relationships and instead embraced the bubble gum pop nuances of her 1st self penned single in these her early years of post matrimony?

You decide."

To which he replied

"I've spent a lot of time trying to work out why I love this song so much.

This is possibly because I'm in the library so much and going mad.

I do, however, think that it is genuine pop genius, and heir to a long line of heartbroken bravado in pop music. There's none of the bollocksy emoting of the previous stuff: if you looked at the lyrics on paper then they're basically desperately sad and insecure, but they're dressed up - like much good pop - in incredible bluster.

I think most immediately of Kelly Clarkson, but before that Talulah Gosh, even The Blue Nile, right back to motown stuff and the Shangri-Las. Also, the chord progressions shamelessly bite
'You Can Make Him Like You' by The Hold Steady, and that can only be a good thing.

All this proves that most people are idiots and can't identify good pop when it is pounding them in the face: also, some fucking wank rock group will probably do a ballady acoustic version for the FUCKING live lounge and completely...
...miss the point."

His reply was infact so long that it filled the entire Facebook character limit and he had to make two posts.

So there you go it "proves" Girlfriend is brilliant and more importantly has temporarily united mine and my friends musical tastes. Thus making me happy.

Case study - Danny Boyle vs Alex Garland: It's like that

2007-04-16T20:04:00.000+01:00

Before I begin this I just want to say that I think Danny Boyle is actually a pretty damn good director. I would also like to state that for the record Alex Garland is also an exceedingly good writer and hugefan of Digitiser so well done to him for that.
Anyway this writing/directing duo have done several films together ofwhich I've only seen two. Interestingly both these films had not the same flaw but the same place in the movie where I got disinterested.

28 Days Later: Zombie film set in London. Cillian Murphy wakes up to find London
deserted (from human life at least) and with a few fast moving zombies kicking about. He finds some survivors and they head to Manchester. As of this point (1/3 through the movie) things get a bit silly with Cillian and the last few survivors held "hostage" in a slightly gay army base.

Sunshine: A team of astronauts have to detonate a nuclear bomb in the middle of our sun to stop it from dying. There are no aliens, the main threat comes from the sun itself (how do you fly a ship close to the sun without it bursting into flame?) The point is that the last 1/3 of the film it changes from a film of 2001esq wonder into some kind of horror movie with lots of running about in the dark. Cillian Murphy stars as one of the astronauts.

So the question is can Danny Boyle and Alex Garland not make the last 1/3 of a film consistent or does Cillian Murphy just ruin it intentionally?

Listen to this I'm facting you up

2007-04-16T20:01:00.001+01:00

So let's have a simple conversation.
The national newspapers take a while to catch on to new technology and recently (and currently) "the buzz" has been over Myspace. The media seem to have a big thing about how Myspace is about building yourself as a brand and then selling yourself or your brand on Myspace.

Of course this is rubbish Myspace was designed to link people together with people writing details about themselves on their own Myspace page which others can see and their friends can link to.

The point is that Myspace is actually very very crap for networking and there is 1 hell of a better program out there to use for that sort of thing and it's called Facebook. So here are 8 reasons why Facebook is great and if you're into the whole networking with friends things you should really get on it:

8) You can leave messages on a persons virtual wall, for them to collect later.
7) Facebook started out as a tool for linking University friends together and
initially only universities could sign up so it has elitest beginnings.
6) You can make whole albums of photos from 1 occasion.
5) The amount of space to load photos is significantly larger than Myspace.
4) You can invite people to come to real life events.
3) All your friends are grouped sensibly by geographical areas.
2) You can make your own group up about anything then get people to join it.
So for instance if you like the fruity drink Um bongo you could start the Um bongo appreciation society and get friends to join it.
1) It never comes up with a server too busy message.

Please note this update is not supposed to be funny, it is factual. People occasionally need facts otherwise life would be some kind of living circus.

My new favourite show (part 1)

2007-04-16T19:49:00.000+01:00

So I've been meaning to go on about this for ages but I haven't due to time constraints and apathy.
Anyway I've pretty much given up on watching English Tv as it's got really really terrible (with the exception of Peep show - which is so brilliant it may have to get its own blog entry at some point).
So instead of English Tv I've moved over to watching American shows pretty consistently. I still watch the obvious shows (Lost, South Park, Family Guy, Scrubs)But I also have two new favourite shows that may have slipped under the radar of a few people.

(Please note this blog entry is over two parts as I don't know when I'm going to be working on this next).

"A long time ago we used to be friends but I haven't thought of you lately at all."
That is the opening line to a Dandy Warhol's song (can't remember which one) and also the theme tune to Veronica Mars - my 1st new favourite show.

The overview of the 1st season is: Veronica Mars is best friends with Lilly Kane the most popular girl at Neptune High. One night Lilly is found murdered and it's up to Veronica's father (as town sheriff) to solve the crime. Unfortunately Keith Mars pins the crime on Lilly's father. Later someone else comes forward to admit to the crime (a man named Abel Koontz), the town revolts against Mr Mars previous decsion and he is sacked as sheriff.
Keith Mars decides to stay in Neptune and set up as a private detective. Veronica takes her father's side in the case and gets completely rejected by her so called friends.Then Veronica's mother can't cope with the stress of the situation and leaves
Veronica and Keith. Finally Veronica vows to properly solve her friend's murder.

And that is where the show starts with the main story arc being about Veronica trying to solve Lilly Kane's murder and smaller episodic stories with her helping her father and solving classmates injustices (if they're willing to pay anyway).

The point is what sounds as a disgustingly lame teen show turns out to be great with engaging characters, interesting stories and plot twists you can't guess.I do nothing but sing its praises even though it's pretty impossible to jump into half way through the season and it's a bit of a slow starter.

Basically if you get the chance to see it, do.

Also to add it's list of good deeds Steve Guttenberg (80s superstar from such movies as Police Academy and Short Circuit) guest stars in a load of episodes and Kevin Smith and Joss Whedon are in an episode each.

Subtext is for cowards

2007-04-11T02:11:00.000+01:00

I'd like to warn you of Natasha Bedingfield's new video "I Wanna Have Your Babies" contained below this paragraph it contains a subtle and aggressive message to the youth of today.

What happens in this video (for those of you not able to watch it or whatever) is she dates an Asian guy, a blonde bloke who is clearly German, a black bloke then a plain looking English guy.
The 1st three (read foreigners or of foreign descent) she doesn't stay with or accept but the last guy, the English guy, she ends up staying with or marrying or really having kids with (it's all a bit confusing what's going on as it's a bit of a trippy video) anyway the point is the English bloke is the Baby bear to her Goldilocks.
I found this shocking. In these multi cultural times I was absolutely shaken to my very core that such blatant jingoism would be the basis of a modern pop video. I mean are other cultures not good enough or is this a social comment on mixed race children?

.....

Also the song is shit.

Briefly

2007-04-09T23:12:00.000+01:00

I wish they'd re show Old School Byker Grove with PJ and Duncan.
I think it would be a useful exercise because:

1) It would show young people the danger of being blinded while playing paintball.
2) Hardhitting issues that affect the "kidz" would be on Tv again.
3) Gang crime would go down as gang members would see the shocking results of violent acts (this was covered repeatedly in Byker Grove).
4) I could make a joke about Geoff's beard and people would understand it.
5) The entire audience of Ant and Dec's saturday night takeaway could be shown (or reminded) where their hosts come from.
6) I could re learn how to speak Geordie as Byker Grove acted as some kind of self help book to learning foreign (Newcastle) languages.

Dear Diary...

2007-04-09T18:04:00.000+01:00

In a bit you'll be able to read some of my recent thoughts.
What I've managed to do is link each point together rather tenuously.

1. I saw Michael J Fox and Julie Bowen (Carol Vessey in Ed) as a couple in Boston Legal - if they actually had children in real life they'd be beautiful.

So Julie Bowen (mentioned in point 1) starred in Ed. Once guest starring in Ed was the guy who did the noises in Police Academy. He obviously acted with Tackleberry (mentioned in point 2).

2. Big Phil from the Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Tackleberry from the Police Academy movies were both in The Brady Bunch - I've watched a lot of stuff (read crap) and I figured those two had never acted again (after their appearences in those respective shows).

Marsha from the Brady bunch movie (mentioned in point 2) is married to Ben Stiller who is best friends with Owen Willson (mentioned in point 3).

3. If Armageddon was made today Owen Willson wouldn't die, infact he'd probably play Steve Buscemi's character.

Bruce Willis stars in Armageddon (mentioned in point 3) he also did a voice to the movie Over the Hedge. Avril Lavigne (mentioned in point 4) did a voice in the movie Over the Hedge.

4. Avril Lavigne currently looks like like Veronica Mars crossed with Jennifer Love Hewitt which makes her doubley hot.

Avril Lavigne (point 4) is married to one of the guys out the band Sum41. They provided a song to the movie the Santa Clause 2 which starred Tim Allen. Tim Allen does the voice of Buzz Light Year (point 5).

5. Why do all the Buzz Light years in Toy Story 2 (you know the ones, the packaged ones in the toy aisle). Why do they not know they are toys but all the other toys featured in Toy Story (packaged or not) know they are toys. Are Buzz Light Years brainwashed when they are manufactured?

Also in Toy Story 1 early on in that movie Andy doesn't play with Woody he only plays with Buzz (this is when Buzz and Woody don't get on). But later when Woody and Buzz are friends Andy starts playing with Woody and Buzz together and teams them up. So does that mean Woody and Buzz have psychological power over Andy?

And if that's the case what have my toys done to me?

Hey Hey You You I don't like your girlfriend and stuff

2007-04-09T17:32:00.000+01:00

Sorry I haven't written on here in a while but seriously nothing has been going on, it's all been a little bit boring.
I have to say this Avril Lavigne video/song is a little bit brilliant.

Having watched that video you're probably wondering why it's good. Well it breaks down like this:

A) The opening line (Hey Hey You You I don't like your grilfriend) makes an excellent sentence to text people at random.
B) It reminds me of the Lolly version of Rocky Robin.
C) It's a bit silly.
D) Avril wrote it herself.
E) The video is completely morally bankrupt Miss Lavigne is absolutely horrible to some random nerdy girl with obvious self esteem issues. Infact she is playing a playground bully - welldone Avril this one is clearly for the kids.

One of my mates believes this song may be the start of a new pop music era. I hope so it'd be beautiful.

The Majestic Silver Marvel

2007-03-27T21:26:00.000+01:00

I meant to tell you this weeks ago but I didn't as I forgot.
Basically you remember back when I started this Blog I was going on about a roundabout that was vaguely near where I live?
You don't?
I'll reiterate - I said this:

This is near where I live...
It's a roundabout
Sometime in the distant future a giant statue of a chicken is to be placed on it.
I literally cannot wait until that happens it will clearly be one of the funniest/pointless things that I have ever witnessed.
On a more serious note this will have cost the council thousands of pounds. This money should have gone on more worthwhile causes, like that overdue operation to have that big stick forcibly removed from all council members arses.
I don't usually comment on politics but this might be a worthwhile cause.

Well now the chicken is on said roundabout and it looks like this:

Also nothing to do with anything but I was hoping that Enter Shikari got their name from a combination of Shinji Ikari the Hero from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
It turned out they didn't.

The day the Earth stood quizless

2007-03-15T23:34:00.000Z

Well I hope your happy ITV play has got cancelled and it's all your fault!
I'm sorry, I didn't mean that I'm just a bit shaken up by the whole business.

For those of you not aware ITV has cancelled ITV Play (the service of premium rate phone in Tv quizzes) so now I don't get to watch The Mint or Make Your Play, I mean sure there is Glitterball but it's just not the same.

I sense you might be confused by this so I'll explain:

What - ITV ran a series of quizzes presented by hot girls (and gay Brian from Big Brother) where people at home phoned in to win cash. Most of the time the presenters just meander about talking crap. The games are mostly word games (like fill in the blanks) except Glitterball which is a series of Anagrams which I'm really rubbish at.
When - From late at night to stupid o'clock in the morning.
Where - Channel 3 on Terrestrial
Why - ITV Play has been cancelled because "officially" there were "commercial" reasons. I'm sure it didn't help that a week earlier the service had been suspended after concerns were raised that viewers phoning in could be losing money.

Anyway the point is no ITV Play so that means
A) No early morning word games that inevitably become ridiculous things you've never heard of.
B) No fake mansion sets.
C) No presenters telling rubbish life stories.
D) No attractive female presenters.

For gratuitous reasons here's what we'll all be missing out on:

Debbie King from Quizmania (she hasn't been on TV for ages but it's always worth mentioning)

Cat Porter from the Mint (she wears evening dresses and would make lovely dinner middle class conversation about different types of jam.)

Kat Shoob from the Mint (she's quite funny and stuff)

Alex Kramer from Make your Play (She's on my legendary written document "the list").

Anyway I'm sure you all see now that ITV Play was an amazing Tv service and we should all be as upset as I am that now it's gone.

In all seriousness I'll stop going on about it now.

Myspace is consistently rubbish

2007-03-15T23:23:00.000Z

1) Read the title
2) Look at the picture
3) Draw a conclusion

Some updates write themselves.

You think you've got problems

2007-03-08T14:54:00.000Z

Jayz once gave the immortal line "If you're having girl problems I feel bad for you son. I've got 99 problems but the bitch ain't one - hit me."

I'm pretty sure these were his problems.

99. His house has a squeaky door.
98. There is a leaky tap in his kitchen.
97. His Ipod is broken and therefore needs a new one.
96. The TIVO is full and he hasn't watched what is on it.
95. He needs to fill out an IRS form.
94. Wants to change his ISP as the customer service on AOL is poor.
93. Windows in the house need cleaning.
92. Cars all need a wash.
91. He hasn't bought Beyonce a birthday present.
90. 1 of the spinners on his Hummer spins in the opposite direction.
89. E-mails need archiving.
88. Needs a new portable hard drive -
87. To backup laptop hard drive.
86. Shoes could do with a clean.
85. His Xbox Live subscription needs renewing.
84. Been meaning to watch Boys in the Hood again.
83. Hasn't decided when to retire next.
82. Wants to change Windows XP over to Vista.
81. Could do with a shower.
80. He's been meaning to check his ebay account as there was this jacket he quite wanted, but it was getting expensive and he just wasn't sure if he wanted it that much.
79. Wants to shave head as it's getting quite stubbly.
78. He needs to renew subscription to TIME magazine.
77. The attic needs a clear out.
76. The Sceptic tank is overflowing.
75. The chandelier needs a polish.
74. The wooden floor in the hall needs a wax.
73. The driveway needs re - tarring.
72. The dog needs shampooing.
71. The cat needs it's nails clipped.
70. The hamsters need cleaning out.
69. The towels need a wash.
68. CDs need re - alphabetising.
67. He needs to shout at Beyonce's producer for ruining a single.
66. He wants to organise a guys poker game.
65. Needs a poker set ie cards and chips.
64. Needs food for game.
63. Needs drinks for game.
62. Needs smokes for game.
61. He wants beautiful women to be serving at the game.
60. He needs clear out the garage for the poker game.
59. He hasn't brushed teeth today.
58. He hasn't loaded the dishwasher.
57. He needs to soak the pasta bake dish - which won't clean in the dishwasher.
56. Make dentist appointment.
55. Make eye test appointment.
54. Return library books.
53. Return 50 Cent's pornography.
52. Buy more memory for digital camera.
51. Member of entourage is leaving and needs a retiring present.
50. Listen to the new Linkin Park album and see if he can cash in on it.
49. Watch needs a new battery.
48. He needs to make a copy of his house keys.
47. The bins need taking out.
46. He wants to buy a new house to be shown on cribs.
45. Been meaning to phone Chester from Linkin Park.
44. He wants to brew his own beer.
43. He has been meaning to write his own memoirs.
42. He wants to become 1st Black President.
41. He still hasn't and wants to visit all 50 states.
40. The house maybe haunted so needs exorcising by a priest.
39. Worried and confused about the buttered cat paradox.
38. He wants to get the southern states to accept him as an equal.
37. He is worried about potential debt problems.
36. He has signed up to neighbourhood watch and is worried people are judging him.
35. He is panicked about global warming and his carbon footprint.
34. He has been meaning post on a fan's website forum.
33. He needs to go to the gym.
32. Wants to buy This is Where the Fight Begins by the Ghost of a Thousand.
31. He needs to set himself up as a loan shark.
30. Needs to change the lightbulb in the basement of his house.
29. Jayz needs patenting as a brand.
28. He needs to get an equity card so he can register as an actor.
27. Wants to watch all 7 Police Academy movies.
26. Needs to then watch the animated series of Police Academy.
25. Then follow that with the live action Police Academy.
24. Start religious group based on Jayz brand.
23. Sort out his own videogame (50 Cent style).
22. Build time machine to -
21. Ensure he is best rapper ever.
20. Register Jayz monopoly.
19. Setup Jayz university.
18. Contact Tupac through a medium.
17. Invest money in kids with psychic abilities.
16. Destroy the magic circle.
15. Start his own channel on cable.
14. Get HBO to make a Jayz behind the man documentary,
13. Take Beyonce to the modern art exhibition she wants to go to.
12. Invent and patent the "Jayz dance".
11. Come up with title for new album.
10. Buy some guns.
9. Put money into R&D of new medicinal drug then brand it with Jayz.
8. Get new sponsorship to receive new trainers.
7. Clone self.
6. Do the voice in an animated Disney movie.
5. Buy a monkey.
4. Build a castle.
3. Put money into R&D of life size Transformer.
2. Become a Ghostbuster.
1. Worried about death and thus wants to live forever.

Pre 2000 the world was a simpler place

2007-03-02T03:31:00.000Z

Sometimes things are so painfully obvious they don't need an explanation.
And that is why I hope that by reminding you of the scene in Armageddon where Bruce Willis gives the speech to the colonel about how he can plant that bomb in the asteroid you'll remember how great that film is:

OK so I'll set the scene.
Bruce Willis has been sent into space to blow up an asteroid which is going to hit the Earth. To achieve this he has to dig a hole (in said asteroid) and put a nuclear bomb into it.
Back on Earth, the president is about to blow the bomb up without it being in the hole as he doesn't think Bruce will be able to dig to the required depth.
The Colonel flying the spaceship Willis is on, is trying to get the bomb out the spaceship, so he can then pilot the ship back to Earth and avoid being blown up by the bomb.
Bruce needs to stop him, hows he going to do this?
BY damn well giving him one of the greatest speeches ever written that's how.

(Scene: Inside the space shuttle, Music: Slow building dramatic strings)
Bruce: For God sake's think about what your doing. Why are you listening to someone whose 100,000 miles away? We're here, no one down there can help us. If we don't get this job done, everybodies gone.

One of Bruce's men: 1 minute (until bomb detonation)

Bruce: I've been drilling holes in the Earth for 30 years.And I have never, NEVER missed a depth that I have aimed for. AND by God I will make this one, I will make 800ft

One of Bruce's men: 42 seconds

(Camera shot of bomb)
Bruce: But I can't do it alone Colonel, I need you help.

Colonel(looking very stressed): You swear on your daughter's life and my families that you can hit that mark?

Bruce (super serious): I will make 800ft. I swear to God I will.

Colonel: Then let's turn this bomb off (manly handshake).

The thing is there's no real point to this article I just want everyone to remember how good Armageddon is, people these days don't sing it's praises enough. And it truly has everything: pathos, acting, explosions, man's hubris, Aerosmith, comedy Russians, Owen Wilson's death, asteroids, Greenpeace, that bloke who isn't Ving Rhames and of course the legend that is Ben Affleck.

So the next time Deep Impact is on Tv (it'll be on at around New year) I hope you think to yourself "I wish this was Armaggedon, because that was so the better movie because at the very least it features the acting talents of Ben Affleck and he's amazing."

So thankyou Michael Bay you make a trip to the movies special.
(In all seriousness if you mess up the Tranformers movie I hope you have an underground bunker to escape to because the wrath of nerds is not something to be taken lightly, not to mention the ass kicking from the "real" Optimus Prime you'll be receiving.)

My +10 sword does 50 damage and that's not even a critical hit etc

2007-02-20T02:58:00.000Z

Yes I know I've been neglectful recently (I've been really busy) but don't you even worry about it, I can promise you that I've been sitting on some articles that I think will prove amusing. But I've had to wait for certain things to happen before I can harvest the sweet goodness of stupidity and knowledge. As ominious (or ludicrous) as this sounds I can assure you the articles in question will actually prove to be very normal (well by my standards anyway) I just thought I'd keep you updated.

Oh and apologies this is going to be about videogames.
But the videogame in question does play host to 8 million players...
I am talking about the World of Warcraft.

Now I don't want anyone to be bored or confused by the knowledge fest that is this article so I'll give you a brief description of how the game works:

1. You buy the Game
2. You install the Game
3. You register your credit card (it requires a monthly fee)
4. You spend all night updating the Game via the internet (if you're "lucky", in my case I had to try to fix a problem that caused my computer to crash.)
5. You go to log into the Game
6. You realise you can't play because it's a Tuesday and that's when the servers are down for maintenance.
7. You curse the day you ever bought this game but hope you'll get to play it because everyone has told you it's really good.
8.You finally get to play and a magical world akin to dungeons and dragons has opened up before you (oh yer you choose a race of character but that really is a side issue).
9. You do some quests (ie collect a certain amount of something by killing stuff).
10. You talk to some real life people
9a. You do some quests
10a.You talk to some real life people
9b. You do some quests
10b.You talk to some real life people
9c. You do some quests
10c. You talk to some real life people
9d. You do some quests
10d. You talk to some real life people
9e. You do some quests
10e. You talk to some real life people
9f. You do some quests
10f. You talk to some real life people
11. You run out of quests as your character is not strong enough (levelled up) to get new quests or go to a new area.
12. You grit your teeth and try to fight the wildlife which is now strong enough to kill you in a few hits.
13. You eventually pass that stage but realise all the quests are exactly the same and you're really not getting that much from this experience but decide to press on as you've spent all this time and maybe it gets better.
14. Steps 9 and 10 are repeated.
15. You get to a dungeon and recognise your character is not anywhere near strong enough to deal with it.
16. You exit the game and uninstall it and go to bed because it's 3am and you've got to be up early.

I'll point out now that I didn't actually have to pay a monthly fee as I was on a 10 day trial. But it didn't stop the fact World of Warcraft appeared to be very shallow and a bit shit. Oh and it kept logging me out on occasion which was damn annoying.

And just incase anyone tries to argue it's point:
A) I did have people to play with.
B) Yes I do like RPGs

So to you World of Warcraft player I say: You're addicted - the 1st step to solving the problem is admitting there is one. Just let it go, I know you've spent a lot of time and money but it's not very good and you're hurting yourself (and possibly family and friends). Go cold turkey and play something less addictive like Tetris or the real life RPG world of drug addiction.

Society has collapsed it's official

2007-02-08T19:33:00.000Z

This is really bad. I'm sure you can see how.

Straight from the mines of Youtube

2007-02-08T14:19:00.000Z

Just when I thought I was running out of things to say Youtube mined these gems with its tiny electronic gnome workers.

Watch this:

What a tool.
And yes that possibly is the kitchen from Napoleon Dynamite.
Also why would you put yourself on YouTube like that? Prancing round the kitchen like a fool , he might as well be singing into a hairbrush in front of the mirror.
Having said that it is exceedingly funny so well done him.

Right this is Ashley Tisdale (the blonde one from High School Musical) using YouTube to wish everyone a happy new year.

Wasn't that a horrible piece of viral marketing subtley promoting her tour? (Also she is 21 she must be the youngest looking 21 year old ever but that's a side issue).
Anyway if her blatant abuse of YouTube wasn't bad enough check out the reply she got from a "fan".

It's like the live floor show of the Hills Have Eyes.

Youtube - What happens when Tv is handed to the people

Super Intelligent man and the tale of extravagence

2007-01-26T03:50:00.000Z

I don't quite know where this update is going to go so bear with me. (Also that rhymed and it's important that we accept as a society that anything that rhymes is instantly true).

Anywho, last night I wanted to watch Skins on E4 except we can't get E4 at Nerdhouse (our aerial is old and corroded by Hull sea air) . You see this article was going to be a review of Skins but now it can't be as I didn't see it.

I think Skins must be one of the most over hyped/pushed shows I've ever (not) seen. Usually when it comes to advertising I just let the whole process wash over me (granted I don't go and try out every product I see but I don't really have a problem with the whole consumerism process). This time however even I was starting to get a bit pissed off. The little adverts for the show (not sure the word Ident is applicable here) have been on since before Christmas and have featured in between pretty much every channel 4 show it's getting exceedingly annoying.

Plus it's showing all the smelly signs of being absolutely terrible (not just a bit rubbish, I'm talking full on Wesley Snipes money grabbing awful):
1. It's only on E4 which is still a bit of a test the waters dumping ground.
2. It's about Teenagers going to excess - which is not new or really that entertaining.
3. The Channel 4 announcer person was all like "Watch this it's brilliant!" Which stinks of desperation.
4. It's got the grown up kid from About a Boy in it. Now this guy gets a special section on this blog. This bloke is apparently a bit of a Teenage heart throb/dreamboat but if you actually look he has the hideous face of a Gnome, yes that's right a gnome. And I saw him on T4 the other day and he wasn't witty or compelling.
To illustrate my point June Sarpong was interviewing the Gnomey freak when she tried her hand at some subtlety (which was like watching someone with no arms trying to juggle- sad, ridiculous pointless but at least they tried) in one of the interview questions. I can't remember the exact question but she was trying to ask the boy genius if he would be romantically interested in one of the other female presenters. Captain Clever drops the dialogue ball at this point by not really understanding the meaning of it all and ends up sitting on the sofa with the quizzical look of a simpleton - idiot.
She's trying to be subtle you fool and coming off as obvious - please use your brain it's ever so important.

Gnome Face

5. The show has its own Myspace with each character in the show having their own separate Myspace which let's face it is an internet travesty.

As a final note to this Russell Brand said something really sarcastic and funny about this show when he had to plug it for E4. The exact words aren't important, it was the sentiment that he thought it was appauling and ridiculous. That man's really growing on me like some kind of back combed London fungus.

Three things you'll want to know (but don't know it yet)

2007-01-17T03:26:00.000Z

Hello again,
It's been a mild while since an update was done but I'm here to rectify that situation with some general facts I think you should know:

1. Remember I did that update about the ITV game show the mint? Amusingly ITV Play have been told by one of the Tv governing bodies (Ofcom I think) that the answers to some of their games have been too obscure. The example given was in the quiz "What would you find in a ladies handbag?" the top 2 answers were Rawl plugs and a balaclava. Well I found it funny even if you didn't.

Kat Shoob from the Mint

2. One of my housemate's has setup a web cam in our living room that takes pictures of our sofa (and possibly us) at 15 second intervals. I don't know if you want to see our house or possibly how we live our lives (playing Wii and shouting at the neighbour's dog - which has been making some odd noises in the past couple of days) but now you have the option. The website is http://helpineedsleep.net/nerdhousecam.php or click here. Oh and I'll point out now that the camera may not always be on so sometimes you won't a surreal story unfolding before your eyes, but then again sometimes you will.

3. My Internet Explorer 7 won't work. Don't update it as it's rubbish.

The things I liked during 2006

2007-01-09T21:33:00.000Z

So many magazines and websites have done a countdown of things in 2006 so I'm jumping on the bandwagon. The difference being we're a week passed New year so I have the gift of hindsight.
Many said this year was the worst year for music, tv, film and videogames. I'm pretty sure the same people say that every year so here is what I enjoyed (in no particular order).

People Came Back
Nelly Furtardo and Take That returned, you probably didn't care, I didn't to start with but then Take That turned out to be funny (that show they hosted on ITV is the key example here). And Nelly Furtardo released a poptabulous album with two good opening singles, plenty of funky bass hooks and synths that sounded like Mega Drive sound effects.

The Xmen
The 3rd film was enjoyable (too many characters but good nonetheless) but the really great Xmen stuff lay in the comic book Astonishing Xmen. Well written, funny and interesting. Yes this was the year a comic actually took my money (instead of just borrowing it from the library).

Taking Back Sunday
I don't care what you previously thought of TBS their 3rd album Louder Now is worth a listen. It's been in my CD player a helleva lot and it's not so emo this time round it's a little bit heavier. Basically one of my chums who didn't like their previous stuff loves it, so check it out perhaps.

The Prestiege
As previously stated I don't like magicians I think they're tricksy. Anyway this film is about two magicians in Victorian with a vendetta against each other. The performances and direction are exceedingly watchable, the story is intriguing and there is a love it or hate it plot twist. It's a movie I think about often and I want you to see it.

Edinburgh Festival
It's fun, it's different, the locals probably hate it, people keep telling me they're meaning to go. So go there.

Wii
When I started this blog I wanted to keep the videogames mentioning down to a minimum. But the Wii deserves a special mention. Having a house full of people on launch day eating tins of celebrations, playing with motion sensitive controllers then ordering a massive chinese is a memory I will keep for a long time. Every person who has played it loves it and laughs along with it. Family members, girlfriends, people who have "retired" from videogames. I think it genuinely will be loved by the entire world. If you haven't played Wii Sports Tennis go find someone with one and play it. Oh and to my friends in London who I spent New Year with and didn't bring my Wii with me - I'm genuinely sorry, I'll bring it next time.

Bands you don't remember and that I thought were dead.

2006-12-29T17:25:00.000Z

I'm having to write this on an exceedingly slow computer so if the article suddenly ends without any conclusion it's because I got fed up with the slowness of this machine and I published the article as it was when I had enough with it.

So, bands.
The other day last month a conversation in my house led to us dredging up the past. Basically we were discusing bands we remember from back in the day and wondering where the hell they are now.

The bands in question were:

Kinesis
Serafin
Hepburn
Thunderbugs

So without further ado I'm going to go over who these bands were and what happened to them.

Kinesis
Who on Earth were they: From what I recall a bunch of 6th formers who supported Hundred Reasons and The Lostprophets on tour. Lots of people who I knew thought they were great, I on the other hand was less bothered about them. For a while it looked like they could be the next "Big Thing".
Where are they now: Following the split, three of the members returned to education. Tom Marshall is studying International Relations at Toronto University, Canada. Neil Chow is studying Graphic Design at the University of Plymouth, based at the Exeter campus. Conor McGloin is due to begin a degree in PPE at Oxford University in Autumn 2006, whilst Michael Bromley is currently working as a website designer and is a member of the Church of Scientology. (Yes I stole that paragraph word for word from Wikipedia).

Oh and you might want to know Captain's of industry have made their 2nd album available for download for free from their website.

Serafin
Who were they: Some band around the same time as Kinesis they had this one song that was pretty popular and quite good, although I can't remember what it was called.
Where are they now: Members have come and gone but they are technically still together touring and playing around the London area. They have only released one album (No Push Collide (2003)) but another one exists it just hasn't been released.

Hepburn
Who were they: Before Girls Aloud made all girl groups cool again the music industry in all its wisdom believed the way forward for (in the year 2000 at least) pop music was for all girl bands to play their own instruments, so that it what Hepburn did. The most famous single was called "I quit" and was on the Buffy season 1 soundtrack. Also once they played at my secondary school.
Where are they now: I don't know. Although I'd guess somewhere very far away from pop music.

Thunderbugs
Who were they: A year before Hepburn exisited Thunderbugs tried the same trick. Eg. A girl band who played their own instruments. Their 1st single Friends Forever reached #3 their second single It's About Time You Were Mine reached #43. So they got dropped by their record label.
Where are they now: Again with the I don't know. They fell into obscurity even quicker than Hepburn.

Post No.75

2006-12-25T10:11:00.000Z

I just thought I'd apologise for the lack of updates. (These last couple of weeks have been exceedingly busy). So apologies.

I don't have time to write anything substantial at this moment in time but I'll try to write an "article" in the next couple of days.

Anyway I'll leave you with a message of Merry Christmas and try to be kind to your fellow man. (If you don't celebrate Christmas then happy generic inoffensive religious festival A and that be kind to your fellow man thing still applies).

3 albums and 13 top ten singles and a knowledge of how to get kids to vote? It can only be Girls aloud.

2006-12-15T04:05:00.000Z

Things just seem to get weirder these days with Girls Aloud voicing their opinions on politics and actually making some sick kind of sense.

I mean sure I don't agree with everything they say:
"They need people like us to go into the schools and help spread the word," says Cole. "Our fans would definitely listen to us. They'd think, well, if Kimberley and Cheryl and Nicola are interested in it, then I want to know about it".

I'm not so sure that'd work for 6th formers or Year 11 but generally they're talking some sense.
The full article is here and I suggest you read it as it's mildly interesting.

So my main point is maybe I'm wrong perhaps Girls Aloud could provide me with the female dinner conversation I've been looking for.

Oh and of course the obligatory picture of them -

And to think that mate of mine Dave was trying to convince me certain sectors of society shouldn't be aloud(pun) to vote - the elitist git.

Social Issue #4,355,988C

2006-12-14T02:55:00.000Z

How to solve the Iraq situation:

Sorted!

See it's not difficult to write a political blog Rob Cheesewright: http://www.robcheesewright.blogspot.com/

Sound of the Underground

2006-12-13T02:20:00.000Z

OK everyone I'm afraid this post is going to be a bit of an advert for a band that I like. I'll do a "real" update in a few days - I promise.

So this evening I was taken to a gig by one of my housemates. The headliners of the gig were called The Ghost of a Thousand and he knows them because he went to secondary school with one of the guitarists and is good mates with them. (That's just a bit of irrelevant information for you).

The point is T-GOAT (as they're known or something) played an absolutely amazing live set and were freakin awesome. They jumped about a lot and made a bit of a scene which is what live rock music is all about. In the next few months they have an album out and they'll be touring or about near you. Go see them if you get the chance as they are superb. Also they are in this month's RockSound magazine.

Information you need if you want to find out more.
Myspace: www.myspace.com/theghostofathousand
Website: Doesn't seem to be working
Album title: This is Where the Fight Begins
Album release date: 19/02/2007

Oh and they were with a support band called The Mirimar Disaster they were good too.

Tune in next time for an "article" that hopefully won't be a glorified advert.

Take That an institution for 30 something women

2006-12-02T22:52:00.000Z

In these last two days I have been genuinely amazed by Take That.
Yes, that's right, you have read that previous sentence correctly - Take That have genuinely amazed me - and not in some kind of teenager post ironic way.

Anyway the start of this realisation took place yesterday when I ended up watching a documentary about Take That from their conception to their eventual splitting up. What was so brilliant about said documentary was that every member told the truth about the situation within the band and this "truth" was infact the same as the stereotypes that exist about them.
I've just realised I've written a horrible sentence there, so to put it more clearly: Take That were living up to their own stereotype.

(Just to point out this isn't my own 15 minute internet psycho-analysis they pretty much said this themselves)

Robbie Williams: He drank a lot and got a bit messed up. He has the strongest individual career of all of them but he would trade it all for the family stability Gary has. Robbie still has beef with "The Barlow".

Gary Barlow: Writes and produces successfully for other people and has a loving family and lives in a big expensive house. But he still desires the career Robbie has.

Howard Donald: Howard doesn't even get to release his album. But he does work as a house DJ - maybe he mixes his unreleased album as part of his set. His daughter is the reason he goes on.

Jason Orange: He didn't know what to with himself after the breaking up of the band so he goes travelling and then back to college. He also acts in the play "Gob".

Mark Owen: Releases a few albums of varying success over the years. The singles that come from these albums have varying successes too. Oh and he wins celebrity big brother in 2002.

So like I said I found that documentary pretty awesome.
Then today they performed on an audience with Take That Live.
Not only did they do some mildly amusing banter with the crowd, and have enough attractive background dancers to make it interesting.

But they also performed proper old school boyband style. None of this standing around a piano new school Backstreet boys style or sitting on chairs Westlife style. They got up and had proper ridiculous dance routines, and they did it well.
(Also just to point out most of the talking was done by Howard or Jason who must've been trying to prove they weren't just the other 2 in Take That - there's some good advice for everyone - speak up today otherwise you'll be regretting not saying anything for the next 10 years).

So I salute you sirs may you carry on doing what you do best - living up to your stereotypes and dancing like maniacs.

Whatever happened to the Power Rangers?

2006-11-24T01:03:00.000Z

Was in trouble with the law last thing I heard. Came back to Power Rangers as the Gold Ranger.

Died on September3rd 2001

Sells crack to children - Actually he salsa dances and was 1st in 2004 Mayan International Salsa Championship.

A "serious actress" and released a couple of albums the debut of which was titled "The Trans-American Treatment".

Missing Presumed Dead... or more accurately TV producing. He was in all 4 seasons of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and the 1st season of Power Rangers:Zeo and for that he should be commended.

Worked on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers/Zeo/Turbo/Wild Force and Dino Thunder. He was also inducted into the World Karate Union Hall of Fame as Master of the Year "American Karate". He has his own karate style "Toso Kune Do" and it's between him and Jason Statham to win my award "the new Steven Segal".

Guildford's top attraction

2006-11-22T17:05:00.000Z

Let's start at the beginning.
Beards...
I have a beard, you have a beard all women have honourary beards (you can read that how you will).
The point is I like a good beard. And there is no better beard than that owned by the bearded woman of Guildford.
I had actually completely forgotten "it" existed but thanks to facebook.com and myspace.com I've been reminded about of "its" existence.

Anyway the myspace address is this, should you want it:
http://www.myspace.com/guildfordbeardedlady

But for all those of you who can't be bothered to frequent it here are the key photographs:

I don't know that man but she is going to kill him. I've seen that look before.

The caption below this photograph on Facebook.com "Bearded lady at one of her favourite habitats, outside burger king, no problem if she's hungry, plenty of children about. As you can see from the photograph bearded lady carries the standard issue bearded lady shopping bags and leopard skin jacket. In this particular scene bearded lady can be seen scouting out potential babies or young children approaching White Lion Walk or 'The Killing Grounds' as we newspapers have begun to call it."

Oh how I laughed.

The media have done a lot of these - so it's my turn.

2006-11-15T01:43:00.000Z

The new Bond movie is just around the corner and no one will shut up about it.
So here is my contribution:

Best Bond: Sean Connery (he slaps women about just like Bond does in the books).
(I'm joking)
Best Bond Girl: Sophie Marceau (From the World is not Enough) - All you Denise Richard's fans are fools, she is but a girl. Sophie Marceau is a "real woman" (the kind who steals all your personal possesions when you are asleep) - now that's when you know you've had an experience.
Best Bond movie: Not Moonraker
Worst Bond Movie: All the Roger Moore ones.
Best Bond bad guy: the studio head who had Pierce Brosnan "removed" (from the franchise not murdered).
Best Bond gadget: The Goldeneye N64 game engine.
Most underrated Bond: Timothy Dalton
Best Bond action scene: The entirety of Goldeneye on the N64.
Best Bond song: View to kill by Duran Duran
A Bond film that needs mentioning just because I don't like it: Tomorrow Never Dies.

Oh and here is the video for a View to Kill because it funnied me up:

I'm about to write about my own blog - Does that make me self involved?

2006-11-15T01:18:00.000Z

I think advertising has gone too far.
Guess what pushed me over the edge -

Well it wasn't a McDonalds advert

or a Cilit bang advert

or that annoying Frosties advert with the kid who sings the song and is now involved in a shit load of internet urban legends.

Nope it was this - posted as a comment on my blog:
"Hi, i was looking over your blog and didn't
quite find what I was looking for. I'm looking for
different ways to earn money... I did find this though...
a place where you can make some nice extra cash secret shopping.
I made over $900 last month having fun!"

Then there was a link to some kind of "scam" website. (Or at least what I interpreted as a scam).
So be warned even "innocent" internet blogs have become a hot bed for weird advertising. It's a disgrace I say.

Quick note to whoever wrote that comment -
A)Thanks for reading my blog
B)Thanks for leaving a comment
C)I apologise if that was some sort of crazy joke I was too stupid to get. Please be clearer next time.

If selection C does not apply please see selection D.

D)I don't apologise you're a twat and no I don't want to give money to any Nigerian Princes.

Facts of the week: Cocaine and Fish

2006-11-04T03:31:00.000Z

This post may seem a bit random but -

According to the vice President of Columbia Kate Moss is responsible for the countries civil war.
Well kind of...

He actually said that the cocaine industry is funding the countries civil war. He singled out Kate Moss and said;
"When she appeared to snort a line of cocaine, she put land mines in Colombia, she killed people in Colombia, she displaced people in Colombia, she helped finance kidnapping."

Sounds to me like she is almost some kind of super villian.

Well if the World survives the tyranny of a model/super villian from Croydon we have bigger problems as by the year 2050 we'll have run out of resources and will need to colonise another planet.

Or so I read...

This, however pales in comparison to the fact:

"By the year 2050 we'll have over fished the seas so much we'll have no fish to eat."

To break it down for you I have read two completely separate articles one telling me we'll have no "resources" (which I took to mean fossil fuels) and another telling me we'll have no fish.

Sounds to me like something weird is going on. The same year we run out of fossil fuels is the same year we run out of fish. What is the link? Is it that fish are employed to mine for oil? Or something more sinister.
I theorise that the fish swimming causes the planet to rotate on its axis, so that when all the fish die out the Earth will stop turning causing the temperature to rise (it was the turning keeping it cool - making a small breeze (like a windmill)).

So the lack of fish will finally finish this planet off. An increased temperature will melt the ice caps and raise the sea levels. This seems somewhat ironic as the only animals to truly gain from this are the fish, which are now dead.

So it would seem (assuming my theory is correct) that over fishing destroys the planet, don't think Al Gore saw that coming.

Frances Amey keeping it real since 1996

2006-11-02T21:00:00.000Z

I was eating dinner the other night (the other night about 3 weeks ago) when one of my chums asked me who played Dinah Glass in the BBC adaptation of the Demon Headmaster.
This seemed odd as no one was talking about anything to do with the Demon Headmaster, infact I don't think I've thought of the Demon headmaster in about 10 years.
Anyway my reply was "I don't know". And left it at that.

Time passed.... (several hours)

And suddenly I realised I desperatley needed to know who played Dinah Glass in the Demon Headmaster.
I'm not going to go into how I found out who she was (paid a private detective, who found a computer hacker, who hacked into the government files, which gave me blackmail information on the Triads who were harrassing a chinese laundry, which I then saved whoose customers happened to be the mother and father of the work experience tea boy, who worked on the set of the Demon Headmaster and was a pen friend of the girl who played Dinah Glass).

Actually none of that I just used Tv.com.

The girl's name is Frances Amey and I was exceedingly intrigued as to what she does these days. So I did another search (this time cutting out the middle men and going straight for Google).
It turns out she does a dental degree at Newcastle University and is part of the drama society. This is their latest play:

"'Out of the Corset' is a seductive lesbian romance set amidst the sordid underworld of Victorian London. Follow the journey of Nan Astley as she begins her life as an innocent oyster girl who is slowly led astray by a series of intense and passionate relationships with some very colourful women. Will Nan's tour of debauchery through the tantalizing realms of theatre, prostitution and sex slavery make or destroy her?".

I think it sounds like good stuff.

The theatre group were at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival so I could've seen them, but I didn't.

Cheap Update 2

2006-11-02T20:54:00.000Z

I was always going to do another one of these I just had to wait for the resources to become available.
Anyway here is some more footage of the subtley sublime Mitchell and Webb. Basically I just really like these sketches.
Enjoy:

As far as I know this could be common knowledge

2006-10-27T02:06:00.000+01:00

Yesterday on Teletext I read that a Pelican ate a pigeon.
Then later on the news I saw the footage of the Pelican eating the pigeon (this supposedly freak occurence happened in St James' Park in London).
Anyway now I present to you some footage of the pelican swallowing the pigeon.

I don't mean to be a "negative nancy" but I think this might be the start of the end of days - having watched Ghostbusters recently I can safely say this would be the type of thing that could be a sign of the Apocalypse.

5 Disney movies that make me cry

2006-10-17T01:55:00.000+01:00

God damn it has taken me an absolute age (11 days ish) to formulate my answer to the question I set myself (What are the 5 worst Disney films?).
Basically it was a stupid question to ask and thus I'm never asking myself anything again (excluding What would I like to eat? Or what's zero/zero).

Well as stupid as the question is I will attempt to answer it and explain why it took me ages to find the answer.

So without further ado - Worst 5 Disney Films.

Actually no, I'll announce them in a bit. I'll explain myself first, the reason it took me so long to decide on the worst 5 Disney movies is due to the scientific terms of "Disney's shit period(s)" or "The Madness of Disney".
Disney started off by making some excellent movies (Snow white not so much - but it was only the first one so doesn't count) then seemingly went mad between the 60s and 80s making appalling films concentrating and obsessing on anthropomorphism. Then they produced superb films in the 90s (this period ended with Mulan) then caught the madness again and this period has seemingly not ended.

I'll point out now this is a bit of a generalisation there are exceptions - (The Black Cauldron in the 80s was good and Pocahontas in the 90s was really poor).
So in conclusion it took me a while to get 5 truly bad Disney films because a lot of their movies are either bad or indifferent.

Anyway now without further, further ado - Worst 5 Disney films

5. The Aristocats

Set in France a mad old woman plans to leave all her family money to her cats instead of the butler who has lovingly cared for her all these years. The butler is understandably pissed off and tries to abandon the cats on a farm. They come back, and end up posting the butler in a box to Africa. What's so bad about this film? I'll tell you - Human cruelty (butler posted), anthropomorphism, a weird party with animals and swing music at the end and a moral that says "no matter how hard you work, the aristocracy (in any form) will steal your hard earned money". Also the animation is rubbish.

4. Basil the Great Mouse Detective

"I know let's make a film about Sherlock Holmes but instead, right, get this, instead of a man he's a mouse and he has to fight Ratigan the World's biggest rat." Wrong, wrong, wrong no more anthropomorphism and no shitty detective stories with mice. Have you learned nothing from the Rescuers? (1977) (The Rescuers isn't in here based entirely on the fact the "bad guy" Madame Medusa says "Bottles" in a really funny voice). In defense to Disney it's based on a book (not Sherlock Holmes - idiot) so it's not entirely their fault. And apparently it has a large fanbase so I'm in the minority but I still preach to you that the Black Cauldron (year before this) is the better movie. So as far as I'm concerned this is almost the pinnacle of the Disney decline in the 80s but it's not because of:

3. Oliver and Company

This is the Everest of Disney being terrible in the 80s. It's Oliver Twist with Oliver as a Cat and Fagin as a hobo and his gang as dogs. It's absolute crap (dreadful characters, more awful anthropomorphism and it bad mouths 80s business men - yuppies were funny). It's made worse by the fact that when I was a kid we had a video with the trailer for the cinema release on it. I waited years to see it then we finally got it on video and it was so awful. Oliver and Company was a bitter pill from Disney that stole my youth and started me on this dark path of writing blogs.

2. Bambi

I don't feel I need to really go into detail of why this film is so bad. Disney sanitised a perfectly fine dark story and made it all cutesy with more damn anthropomorphism (you are allowed to animate animals in silence - look at Fantasia no words just the orchestra). If you're going to change your source material so much don't use the name of the book call it "Tragic the deer and the forest of forever."

1. The Fox and The Hound

"Two friends who didn't know they were supposed to be enemies" is how the tagline read. "A studio that didn't know it used to make excellent family films" would probably be a more accurate description. This film is so by the numbers the plot was probably knocked up on a post it note. Now I'm not saying that Disney films have the most developed plots of all but they usually contain something that makes them special, that's why they are loved so much. But his doesn't contain anything of the sort, it's an inferior production that's just so pff. Nothing really happens that's worth mentioning but there is an evil bear in it (you can tell he's evil he has red eyes).

Disney the man and machine

2006-10-07T03:53:00.000+01:00

Hello there, gosh you're looking swell! I haven't seen you look that well in ages. So what's going on with you? Nothing? Do you want to know what I've been up to? You don't? And you think the only reason I'm being this nice to you is because I want to boast about something? Well that's bloody typical! I haven't seen you in time and you start acting like a complete prick on the first chance meeting we have in this season of Autumn. No don't apologise the damage is done. I'm seriously hurt.... ah I'm only joking don't worry about it, I have tougher skin than that you know. But could you please listen to what I was going to say I was hoping you would find it interesting....

The other day (on a complete whim) I looked up Walt Disney on wikipedia. There were two reasons for this, 1st I heard that when he died his head was frozen in cryostasis. 2nd I heard he was a big rascist. Well basically I was intrigued to see if this was true. Well what I found out was that nope neither of those things are true - he was cremated (yes even his head) and there was no mention of rascism so I assume that's just an urban legend.

There were a couple of other things in the article I found interesting (namely Snow white was known as Disney's folly because it was so expensive everyone thought it would bankrupt the Disney studio and Disney pumped out a load of propaganda films for WWII because they were conscripted to do so by the American army. ( Well I found that interesting even if you don't)). The point is I've realised that I've seen a lot of Disney movies in my lifetime and I've decided to give my list of the 5 best Disney movies and the 5 worst. The difference here is that instead of the obvious ones (ie Aladdin, Little Mermaid) I'm going for the slightly weird ones.

5 Best Disney Movies

5.Tron

The plot is a little complex but basically this dude gets sucked into a computer where programs are real life people and computer users (outside the computer) are given a role of God. It was the 1st ever film with computer generated graphics and it served to be my revision for an Electronics exam. Sure it's cheesy and dated but the plot is actually really neat when you work your way through the "tricky" metaphor. Either that or I like the idea of tiny people worshiping me inside of my computer.

4.The Black Cauldron

Made during Disney's shit period (more on that in the worst film section). It's a Disney cartoon based on a book and aimed at the Teenage fantasy market. There were no songs and the whole film has a darker overtone than usual. Also the bad guy (the Horned king) looked like the physical representation of death. Story wise this kid Taran ends up leaving his life as an assistant pig keeper to help a princess, a bard and some really annoying creature rescue an oracular pig captured by the Horned king. Taran goes on a quest to get a magic sword and sort out this black cauldron business (the Oracular pig was needed to find said cauldron).

3.Muppet Treasure Island

This film was technically made by Jim Henson's company but nevermind I still count it as a Disney film. It's a simple formula really Muppet's + songs + pirates = absurd edutainment. Also in it's favour it had Tim Curry as Long John Silver and Jim Hawkins was the comedian who played George Michael the other day in star stories (I'll write something about that soon). I'm not going to go over the plot of this as it's Treasure Island with Muppets. (If you really want a plot descrition go read the blurb of Treasure island off the back of the book in a Waterstone's then imagine it with Muppets).

2.The Reluctant Dragon

The actual cartoon's alright but the real reasons this is up here is because at home I had this version where this guy takes the book of the Reluctant Dragon to be made into a film. He then spends the next hour wandering round the Disney studio seeing how the animation is done and watching people record voices and also watching other animated shorts. It's like a making of within the film and it's great (well it was great, my youngest sister broke the tape and I remind her of it everytime I see her).

1.Return to Oz

I always felt the Wizard of Oz film sucked it had lost the darker overtones of the book and Over the rainbow is a painfully dated song that just reminds me the general public are idiots. This film was a Disney sequel (from the 80s) that was a lot darker then the original and to be honest it was a little bit mad (talking chicken and a woman who takes her head off anyone?). Dorothy Gale is depressed and keeps talking about Oz, so naturally her Aunt thinks she is a bit mental. She takes her to a local crazy doctor who plans to do tests involving hi- tech (it's the end of the 19th century) machines on Dorothy to find what's wrong with her. Dorothy stays in the hospital overnight - there's a storm and she ends up back in Oz. The Scarecrow isn't king, infact he's frozen as a statue and so are the Tinman and Lion. Basically Oz is a mess. So Dorothy has to find out what's gone on and put it right... trust me it's awesome. Also the film doesn't end with a shitty line like "and Scarecrow I'll miss you most of all." I always thought that was really harsh on the Lion and Tinman they must have really hated that Scarecrow for getting all the attention and he was made king of Oz - the git.

So that's my top 5, I'll do the bottom 5 later when I'm ready. I'm sure it'll be worth the wait.

They've just tried to remake Grease

2006-09-29T01:33:00.000+01:00

Ok hands up if you've heard of High School Musical.
Well for all those who haven't I'll tell you about it.
A straight to TV movie made by the Disney channel it follows the exploits of the new girl at school and the captain of the basketball team auditioning for the leads in a musical at said High school.
In the States it's a massive thing with it scoring 9 singles in the top ten or twenty or something like that.
Basically I saw it this evening and it's a bit good. I mean it must be good containing lines such as:

Chad Danforth "You can't be in the muscial Troy your the basketball captain not a singer".
Troy Bolton "Dammit can't I be both?"

See amusing and dramatic and it's like that the whole way through. Infact it's almost as dramatic as the Top Gun 2 script I've got ideas for - one of these days.

Anyway here's a list of why it's good.
A) The beginning is a complete rip off of Grease.
B) The whole movie is quite a rip off of Grease.
C) They never actually make a musical (it's about the auditions).
D) The male lead (character name - Troy Bolton) looks like Mark Hamill
E) It is filled with Neighbours style acting (ie overly dramatic)
F) The director is listed as a Director/Choreographer - so he must know what he's doing.

Here is why it's bad
1) No big screen kiss at the end - all musicals should end with one it's tradition.
2) Post credits there is a really odd coda.

Well here is the end sequence.

Hopefully after seeing this you'll want to see the entire thing (it's being shown on the BBC over Christmas). Oh and this routine looks like it's stolen off of the opening of Bring it on.

Update: That last video has been removed from youtube by someone (probably Disney - though it is television so it should techinically be in the public domain). Anyway watch this fan made thing it is brilliant.

A real update - not one of those fake ones I've been doing

2006-09-25T01:09:00.000+01:00

Recently on this blog I've been getting away with just adding videos and not really putting in content. The reason for this is A) I've been feeling lazy and B) there has been nothing to really write about. You don't really want second rate ramblings do you? No I thought not.
So today I've tried to rectify this by adding videos but putting in my own written content to link the two together.

Anyway Girls Aloud are great!
They seem to be a proper genuine pop phenomenon the kind that just doesn't seem to be about anymore. Most pop acts these days seem to be either serious vocal acts (the Sugar Babes), shitty pop punk esq bands (Fall Out Boy (not real emo)) or Lily Allen and Sandi Thom (there's a genre there but I'm too tired to work it out, oh and by the way I do quite like Lilly Allen - she's alright). But Girls Aloud are old school generic fun pop music from girls who are nice to look at and aren't that strong vocally.

Yes, so Girls Aloud if you have noticed they are the only real survivors from the crazy world of Popstars/Pop idol and X factor. (Apart from Will Young and Myleen Klauss who for the sake of this article I'm ignoring). And although it's obvious why they are popular (I've told you back in the previous paragraph ( - they're old school) I'm going to use some videos to illustrate the other reasons they're excellent.

That's their performance of Jingle bell rock it illustrates the fact they are dead hot and sugary sweet. It's like eating lava with canderel.

That's their "live" performance of Jump on this show they did for T4 where they went and performed in people's hometowns. Needless to say the show was shite. If channel 4 want to make shows for Teenagers/Students they should employ me as I'm cheap to employ and I wouldn't make the mistakes most of these show designers do (ie using June Sarpong as a presenter). Anyway what's important here is that Girls Aloud must have a choreographer who finds it amusing to make them start and end in hilharious statue esq positions (you might not be able to view the end it may be corrupted - sorry).

That's their new single Something kinda ooh. This illustarates the fact they can't really dance or that their choreographer is a git and wants to make them look stupid.

So in conclusion Girls Aloud are superb based entirely on the fact they are manufactured, attractive and funny leading me to believe I should be dating some kind of sexually appealing clown robot.

Oh and just to answer the most important question (who is (are) my favourite(s) Girls Alouder) - Cherryl Tweedy and Nicola Roberts are the best. Tweedy because she is blatantly the hottest. Nicola I've no idea (according to one of my mates it's because my brain thinks she is the least popular one and I'd have more of a chance with her. (This may or may not be true my mind is an idiot)).

Cheap update 1

2006-09-19T19:55:00.000+01:00

David Mitchell and Robert Webb are brilliant that's an actual FACT.
So their new show the Mitchell and Webb look is thus brilliant.
I figure that some people forgot to see it or haven't seen this superb duo before so I present to you some of this genius:

Well that's it for today. Come back soon for more cheap updates.

BTW: MTV, ATDI and RGB FYI :P (Yes I feel dirty and ashamed with that kind of title)

2006-09-08T23:13:00.000+01:00

Several updates, in two days?
This is a sign the summer is finally over I'm actually starting to use this blog again.

Anyway apparently teenagers aren't watching the shows that are actually being made for them (that's why Top of the pops got cancelled - teenagers weren't watching it) instead they're wasting their time with Desperate Housewives.

So after hearing this I started to get a bit worried that there would be no more teenage shows (think about it no OC, no T4, no Hollyoaks). But then I realised there would always be MTV, their entire output is shows for teenagers (granted American teenagers). MTV have got loads of money so there is no way they'll go bankrupt and they'll never change so they will make shows for teenagers for as long as western society survives.

Well anywho after thinking MTV were great I decided to watch more of their shows. And that's when I finally realised that pretty much the majority of their output is actually diabolical. I could write the whole list of dreadful dreadful shows they make but the highlight for me is a show called MADE.

Basically horrible loser teenagers try and achieve something that they just weren't meant to do: The social outcast nerd (with no balance and a complex about her looks) tries to become the cheerleader, the non cheerleader tries to become the homecoming Queen and they had a girl become an American football player (just to clarify I've no problem with girls playing American football but she was playing against guys which I'm sure is not legally allowed). Anyway bottom line is it's retarded but funny. I couldn't find any footage of MADE but I found this spoof which like all good spoofs is damn close to the original.

Bizarrely the soundtrack to the real Made features repeated use of 10 second exerts of different songs one of which was Invalid Litter Dept by At the Drive In which I have to say is one of the greatest songs EVER from one of the best albums EVER.

Here is some ATDI footage off French TV. A live performance of One armed Scissor followed by Invalid Litter Dept.

And yes the sound is a little off but it's all about the performance.

And finally something completely un MTV related. I found this footage of The Real Ghostbusters edited together with some German song.

I just thought it was neat.

It's official the internet is the scariest place ever

2006-09-08T01:05:00.000+01:00

OK sorry another update is needed.
Just as I was logging off I got contacted by one of my chums who runs a clothing line for mountain biking and such. (Rythumandflow.co.uk)
He just found this video on youtube.com

Disclaimer: This video is not for squeemish people it's a bit nasty.

Anyway we have no idea who this guy is he's not sponsored by rythumandflow.co.uk and we have no idea why he found that necessary.

The internet can be a weird weird place.

Update: Found out how this all came about. That guy knew a friend of a friend and heard about rythumandflow.co.uk and chucked it in when he decided to do that. (Still don't understand why that was necessary). Anyway just for a moment that was really rather freaky.

(And yeah even though the mystery was solved I'll keep this update simply because it's the only legitimate not encouraging violence kind of way to include a video like that. This also provides an excellent way to shoehorn in rythumandflow.co.uk (just like The Sun does, making an advert look like an article).

Transformers a religious symbol in disguise

2006-09-08T00:25:00.000+01:00

Yet again I'm doing a "dual" update because I'm feeling wordy today.

I recently bought the Transformers movie on DVD for the bargain price of £5 and it was worth every one of those 500 pennies (or 1000 half pennies). It's a really funny film with amusing dialogue and an amazing soundtrack. It's filled with 80s power rock tunes and when combined with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles soundtrack of "white" hip hop provides a musical overview of the late 80s / early 90s. Also just worth a mention one of the tracks on Tranformers: the movie is provided by Weird Al Yankovic, so does that mean it's ironic? I just don't know.

Anyway after watching the film I went on to reading up on Tranformers via wikipedia just to see how many seasons there were how long it ran for - that kind of stuff. It was after I scrolled the page to the bottom that my head metaphorically exploded. The Transformers universe is absolutley massive there's so many spin offs and back stories I was at a complete loss.
And people say kids don't learn anything from TV.

Also worth a mention Tranformers: the movie was Orson Welles last film (he died in the middle of recording his voice for it) which also proves the angel of death has a sense of humour.

So weeks later I show Transformers to one of my good chums. He points at the TV and shouts (in the Optimus Prime Vs Megatron sequence (2:40 on this video)).

"Look he's shot in the side, you know what that is? It's a Christ reference!"
Just to explain Christ was pierced in his side by the lance of Longinus. So now any side wound equals a Christ reference.
Well anyway I thought back to my Ten commandments - thou shalt worship no false idols (well thats the modern take on it).
And thought yeah, maybe we have made Optimus Prime a false Idol he's a robot and a truck.
A man and machine.
Think about it...

(For all of you who are confused I'm being profound).

You Know this song deserves to be no.1

2006-09-08T00:05:00.000+01:00

I don't know how many of you have noticed but a lot of my updates have actually been completely ripped off of Popjustice.com

And today is no exception...

Earlier on at the beginning of June I was championing this song as my "official" song of the summer. But then it disappeared, without a trace.

But now it has re-appeared and this time with a video!
SO watch this:

The band are called Superjupiter and they are Norwegian.
You know (that's the single's name) is out on October 23rd
I hope this single goes to No.1
And I demand all the Djs I know (all of one) to play this song in their sets.
(Interestingly I did used to know more Djs but I haven't seen them in ages).
(Also interestingly when I previously said interestingly I meant boringly).

The Mint

2006-09-01T00:58:00.000+01:00

As I haven't done many updates this month I figured I'd go "a little bit crazy" and do two in a row. So here is the second.

I'm currently watching the Mint which is a really rather shite gameshow on ITV which starts at late o'clock and ends at stupid o'clock. I'm not going to go into the details of the show because trust me you really won't care. I'm here to talk about the one highlight of the entire show...

Cat Porter...
In these lonely early mornings of the summer I find myself wanting to have dinner conversation (not a eupherism) with Cat Porter. She makes the mint watchable and these are the reasons why she's great.

1. She wears evening dresses.
2. She has a nice accent.
3. She lives in Tunbridgewells (which is not that far from me)
4. She was an extra in James Bond - Die another day (to be honest that's just a fact not really a reason to like her).
5. She tells the worst anecdotes ever (that's endearing).
6. She has a degree from Kings College in biological sciences (and I wouldn't mind lighting her bunsen burner (and that is a eupherism) although in all honesty not a very good one more of a chemistry one than a biology one)).

French people don't wear converse

2006-09-01T00:06:00.000+01:00

I've been away for a week in France - it was an adventure as I travelled there on the Eurostar which has reduced check in times when compared with flying.
However it also has a band playing whenever the train to Disneyland Paris departs. Seeing men in Lederhosen with tubas and banjos playing "It's a small world after all" at 8am is just not cool and liable to give you a headache. (Also Lederhosen are obviously German not French so I didn't quite get why they were dressed like that - maybe they just liked it?)

So anyway as the title suggests I didn't see a single person in France wearing a pair of Converse. I found that rather strange. ( It's stranger still as one of my mates tells me all the French people he knows wear Converse. (Just to clarify, it probably seems a bit odd that I'm going on about Converse but they are just such cool shoes and I keep seeing them all over the place .... even when I close my eyes. Ha ha again I joke when I close my eyes I see Nikes and those hideous images of Cream the rabbit)).

So back to talking about my trip. While I was there I was eating dinner when my Grandmother suddenly says to me; (by the way my Grandmother was there at dinner with me she didn't just start talking to me from "beyond the grave" or anything). "Do you ever say or do supid things?" And I say (because I'm feeling honest) "Yes actually I do all the time." To which she replies "I was just wondering because on one side of our family there is a real streak of doing and saying stupid things. Your father does stupid things, your uncles do stupid things and your father's cousins do stupid things. Infact when I was at a family reunion I spoke to a relative of ours who was telling me their son says and does stupid things all the time - so it definitely runs in our family".

My reaction to this was not one of dismay but of acceptance. The next time I look back on doing something and think "that was really stupid" I won't get embarrassed I'll just shrug my shoulders and think "well I was always going to do something stupid it is inherently in my nature" - you see it's brilliant I can blame everything on genetics, explain to everyone my stupidity is due to genetics and never have to accept responsibility for some of my behaviour. Now if I can just find that my family is genetically inclined to being Pretentious, Depressing, Complaining, Hypercondriact, Emotionally Hypersensitive, Perverts I'll be sorted.