I didn't bother doing funny pictures for this one.

We all have our little berserk buttons. Small things that happen in our daily life that most people don’t notice or care about, but which drive us batty. One of mine is when someone quotes a character from a fictional work, and then cites the quote to the author, making it look like it’s something they said. Another is when something is quoted out of context to make it seem like it means something else. And one writer gets both of those applied to him way too much. So now, with my handy guide, the next time someone says, “Well, in the words of Shakespeare…” you can feel free to correct them. Or just punch their stupid face.

“Now is the winter of our discontent.”

What you think it means: “This current time is the winter of our discontent. Metaphorically speaking.”

What it really means: As with many of these, the solution lies in the full line. “Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of York.” Richard is saying that the bad times are over, not present. Of course, he’s also being a sarcastic bitch about it, but hey, it’s Richard, that’s just how he roll.

“Neither a borrower or a lender be… This above all: To thine own self be true.”

What you think it means: “Don’t lend people money. Also, be your own person.”

What it really means: To be fair, these two often-quoted lines do technically mean what they seem to. But the context in which they arrive is to highlight Polonius’s hypocrisy. These aren’t meant to be deep insights, they’re meant to be shallow platitudes that the speaker preaches, but does not practice. "Be true to yourself, son. Now Ophelia, go get yourself tarted up and spy on your boyfriend for me." And the prior line usually has him giving Laertes some money, just to drive the point home.

“Brevity is the soul of wit.”

What you think it means: “Shut up. You’ll sound smarter.”

What it really means: Ah, another gem from Polonius. Unlike the previous statements, which served to highlight his manipulation of his children, this one was just a joke. “Hey, the guy who won’t shut up is saying that smart people don’t talk much. He’s stupid!”

“If music be the food of love, play on.”

What you think it means: “I love love! Play some lovey music so I can love some more!”

What it really means: You’ll always hear this one quoted as some lovely bit of romance, but once again, we need to look at the whole line. The Duke continues: “Give me excess of it; that surfeiting, the appetite may sicken and die.” He doesn’t want love, so he’s asking the musicians to feed his love so that it will go away, as the appetite for food goes away when you eat. And if you don’t think that ‘sicken’ was a puke joke, then you don’t know Shakespeare.

“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”

What you think it means: “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers. I am Shakespeare, and I mean that.”

What it really means: The line is spoken by Dick the Butcher, and you can already see where this is headed. Dick was part of the Jack Cade gang, who are trying to spread chaos in order to usurp the throne. The reason he wanted to kill the lawyers was because they were moral and kept the law and would stop the rebellion in its tracks.

“Rock thy brain”

What you think it means: I can’t be held responsible for what you personally think it means, but it was at one point the slogan of the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey.

What it really means: It’s part of a line from the play-within-the-play in Hamlet, “Sleep rock thy brain, and never mischance come between us twain.” It’s grammatically iffy; it was written, in the context of the play, by a crazy person; and it’s rock as in “Rock-a-bye Baby”, not “Detroit Rock City”. Come on, STNJ. You should know better.

New Stupid Wizard Post!

I know I've harped on the guy before, but he's just so dumb. Click the pic to see for yourself.

Mega updates and Alice Part 3

Well, schooling is a tricky mistress, and while I’ve kept my blogs going in this busy time, I haven’t been making announcements here. So in case you missed it…

* You know that butler, Jeeves, and that lesbian, Marcie? Follow those links, and the sidekick blog can clear up some things. Also, please enjoy this BRANDY NEWISH post on the sidekicks of Veronica Mars.

* Harry Potter may have a book series named after him, but that don’t make him perfect. Follow the link for some of his more notable failings.

* A remarkable two Robin Hood reviews were posted within weeks of each other. One was a Syfy original movie, and one a 1950s Disney flick. Gary is upset he didn’t get to do an announcement pic for these, but them’s the breaks. Follow the links to see which schlock factory comes out on top!

Now that the housecleaning’s out of the way, let’s get to…

ALICE IN WONDERLAND - PART THREE

So we’ve dealt with the adaptations, but since Tim Burton’s version is a crazy interpretation rather than a straight adaptation, those aren’t really very apt comparisons. So… sorry.

THE END.

Okay, seriously,

ALICE IN WONDERLAND: A MUSICAL PORNO (1976) - Sometimes, I have some trouble writing blog entries. For example, it can be hard to write about a sidekick without mentioning too much of their prominent partner. Little John tends to get the short end of the staff on characterization, so how to make his segments on Under The Hood unique? And occasionally, there is something about which saying anything would be redundant. You already know this movie is called “Alice in Wonderland: A Musical Porno”. What more can be said? This was made in a time when porn could be released in actual movie theaters, and this softcore piece was re-released the following year with its X-rating softened to an R after only 3 minutes were cut, so it’s nothing terrible, especially by today’s standards. I haven’t seen it, but that’s less to do with an aversion to porn and more to do with an aversion to mid-70s musical comedies.

NECO Z ALENKY (1985) - AAH! Goddamn Czech puppeteers! Stay out of my childhood classics! This film, by noted lunatic Jan Švankmajer (meaning “John the Major Švanker) uses stop-motion puppetry, surrealist imagery, and bat-fuck insanity to make one of the most disturbing versions of Alice ever. Technically, this one and the porn were straight-up adaptations, in terms of story, but get included here for their (hem hem) distinctive visuals. Notable images from this film burned into my subconscious include: The White Rabbit being an actual taxedermied rabbit whose stuffing is leaking, causing him to refill himself with garbage and raw meat; the Caterpillar being a sock with taxidermy eyes and human false teeth; Alice being trapped inside a doll of herself and having to tear through her own skin to escape; and the fact that not only is every line of dialogue dubbed by the young star, it’s always followed by an extreme closeup of her mouth saying “…said Alice.” Or, you know, whoever the character was that said it. As is often the case, the whole thing is available on YouTube. I won’t make specific recommendations, it’s all equally terrifying.

ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND (1991-1995) - This aggressively formulaic Disney Channel series followed their previous series “The House at Pooh Corner” and “Dumbo’s Circus” by taking something we loved and leeching all the fun out of it. This series outdoes the ’80s shows by not looking even slightly like the classic movie. Actually, I guess that makes it unfair of me to relate the two, but I’m not here to be fair. In every episode, Alice would have some real-world problem, and would go home and bitch to Dinah about it. She would then walk through her mirror to Wonderland, where, wouldn’t you know it, they’re having a similar problem! So she’d fix their shit, and then know how to fix her own. For 100 damn episodes! Please enjoy the opening sequence, which answers the question that’s on everyone’s minds: What would it look like if Alice in Wonderland fucked the ‘90s and had a deformed baby?

AMERICAN McGEE’S ALICE (2000)- Arguably the starter of the current vogue for Alternative Alice, this well-reviewed PC game picks up shortly after the events of “Through the Looking-Glass” with Alice being the only survivor of a horrible fire that devastated her family home. Racked with survivor’s guilt, she attempted suicide, then fell into catatonia. Ten years later, she emerges, though she must first go through her own subconscious, where her childhood daydream of Wonderland has been twisted by her years of insanity. This interpretation, though owing a whole lot to the film “Return to Oz” is notable for its fantastic visuals courtesy of lead designer/ego-case American McGee. (Yes, that’s his actual name.) McGee has spent most of the time since the release of this game by aiming big, failing hard, and promising that he’s making a movie soon.

THE LOOKING GLASS WARS (2006)- This book is incredibly stupid, and if the author was here, I would say it to his face. Wait, no I wouldn’t. I can say that with some authority, because at the 2007 New York Comic Con, I was passing a table with a friend, and indicating this book said “Oh, I’ve heard of that. The author takes characters from Alice in Wonderland and…” It was at this point that I noticed the nametag of the guy at the booth and the name of the author on the book bore some remarkable similarities, e.g. being exactly the same. So rather than ending my sentence with “…turns them into generic YA epic fantacrap,” I ended with something like, “…and uses them to tell a big… different… I hear it’s good. I’m probably going to get the audiobook. Oh, hey, it’s Dan Parent! Let’s go get an autograph.” Later that day, I may have inadvertently insulted Alex Maleev to his face. But enough of my brushes with fame and encounters with the fabulous Dan Parent.

To go into more specifics, The Looking Glass Wars is about (ugh) Alyss Heart. Alyss is the princess of Wonderland until her wicked aunt Redd invades and takes over. Alyss escapes to England, where she tells her story to Lewis Carroll, who writes a book, and years later she must return to blah blah blah. To give you a basic idea of how this adaptation relates to the original, let’s look at the TLGW version of the Mad Hatter. His name is (uugghh) Hatter Madigan, he’s the queen’s bodyguard, and he’s sane, serious, and his hat turns into bladed boomerangs. The Tweedles are General Doppel and General Ganger. They can join into one person. Guess what their name is then. The Cheshire Cat is an assassin called The Cat. The White Rabbit is Bibwit Harte, an albino who is Alyss’s tutor. Basically, the book forgoes any sort of actual clever references in exchange for surface similarities and blatantly padding world building. It’s the worst, and most common, kind of fantasy.

ALICE (2010)- After the success of writer/director Nick Willing’s bizarre-yet-enjoyable Wizard of Oz adaptation Tin Man, the Syfy channel decided to ask the guy for some more of the same. Well, I guess Nick had got some crazy ideas directing the 1999 TV movie I talked about in the last Alice bolg, because this is what he came up with. In this version the White Rabbit is an organization that lures unsuspecting people, called “Oysters” to the magical Wonderland casino, ruled by the Queen of Hearts. Once they are there, their emotional highs and lows are bottled by the Queen and used as placating drugs. Alice, a martial arts instructor whose boyfriend was taken by Rabbits joins the Mad Hatter, an unhinged and disloyal subject, to stop her. Basically, this is everything The Looking Glass Wars failed to be. It takes the old characters and stories that we know, and twists them to tell a story that’s completely original. The only flaw is the same as the one found in Tin Man, that rather than straight-up remaining, they instead try to tie it in to the original story and make it a sequel, albeit one set 150 years later with a different Alice. But it’s clever and weird in that special Syfy way, and a lot better than their usual crap. Plus, it’s got Harry Dean Stanton, Tim Curry, and Colm Meaney in it, all of whom elevate a work by their mere appearance. Oh, and Matt Frewer, who doesn’t do that, but I like him.

New Downdate.

I sure hope people besides me like this show, or you'll be pretty lost. Click the pic.

Alice Blog Part Two

Who on Earth ever thought it was a good idea to make a movie of Alice in Wonderland? The story follows a dream-based logic, i.e. no logic at all, there’s mostly nothing in the way of plot cohesion, and most of the characters and situations are parodies of things that no one knows about anymore. The dreamlike nature of the story is a particular difficulty when it comes to movies, because we expect things we see to make a different sort of sense than things we read. So the directors can’t just try to film the episodes of the book and leave it at that, but attempts to make a more cohesive story wind up muddled because the essential nature of the story rejects it. In addition, the movies always mash up the two Alice books into one story. And I know this goes against what I said about there not being any logic, but the episodes go together the way they do for a reason, and you can’t just jumble them around as you see fit. And if that seems contradictory to you -hey, welcome to Wonderland. (Or the Looking-glass world. Which are distinct locations.)

But as fruitless as this endeavor may seem, there have been more than 20 attempts to bring Alice to the screen. I’m not going to start a whole blog about them, but here’s a little bit on the six I've seen, and what makes each one… special.

(Hey, superimposed titles. That must have been the hight of technological wizardry.)

1903

Why the hell would you make a silent movie of a story known primarily for its witty wordplay? That’s the question that this very early effort aims to answer. It’s available for free online, and if you seek it out, you’ll just about be getting your money’s worth. Actually, you’ll have to spend 8 minutes on it. Don’t expect much of a return on that investment. The worst scene is the tea party, where Alice sits down, the hare and the Hatter waggle their arms about a little, and Alice leaves. The most annoying scene is the Cheshire Cat’s which consists of Alice waving her hankie to get the attention of a regular cat while the director turns the lights around it on and off. This scene takes up a full minute of an 8 minute movie. That’s like going to see a movie today and having to watch 12 straight minutes of Will Smith trying to get a cat’s attention. Wait, actually that sounds pretty cool.

(And not the less famous book by Edmund Wells.)

1915

Well, it’s been 13 years since the last one, and surely people are better at making movies now, right? Well… technically, yes. For one thing, they know how to make them like 7 times longer. In just a few months, America would see D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation, and realize that they could move their cameras, that they could do cuts and close-ups, and that black people were after our womenfolk. But for now, they just sort of stuck the camera in one spot and let it film as it may. And while they have more time and ability to post title cards, the story still loses a lot of its trademark wordplay. Some excuse these as limitations of the time, but I say bull malarkey. If Griffith could figure out how to make a good movie, so can these jerks. Anyway, after spending a tenth of the movie on exposition, we meet the White Rabbit, who is creepily gesturing for Alice to follow him. Once we get to Wonderland, Alice proceeds to overexplain the jokes, recite poetry, which is fantastically boring in a silent movie, and interact with a lot of people in ill-fitting fursuits. The one truly bright spot is the Mock Turtle scene, which not only has better costumes and was filmed on location at a beach, but features the Lobster Quadrille, where two guys in ungainly lobster suits dance around with two guys in ungainly walrus costumes, and I start checking my food labels to see if I’ve eaten anything expired or containing mescaline.

(Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Cary Grant. Or so I am informed.)

1933

Here we go. Now we get into the kinds of things that affect all the major Alice movies to come. An all-star cast, state of the art effects, and loads pf lines taken verbatim from the book with complete disregard to the other lines they’re supposed to be relating to. Actually, I’m not so sure how all-star the cast is as of 1933. I mean, now we may look at it and say, “Wow! Cary Grant as the Mock Turtle!” But I can’t think of a single thing he’s done before like 1938, and if they were getting him for star power, why would they keep his face completely covered? Same goes for Sterling Holloway, who was much beloved as of the 1950s, but here just plays the Frog with a big rubber head and all of three lines. Edward Everett Horton is the Hatter, but I don’t know if he’s a real star, or if I just think he is because of Rocky and Bullwinkle. At least he avoids the big rubber head. It’s one thing for the animal characters, but most of the humans wear them, too, and it’s terrifying. Plot-wise, there’s an interesting step taken in this one in that she doesn’t fall down the rabbit hole, but rather pushes through the looking glass. The two books are always mashed together, but this is the only time I can think of that they used the second book’s intro. The dialogue is horribly adapted, featuring setups without punch lines and vice versa, but it’s the first major sound version, and as I noted in my Robin Hood blog, script cohesion was sort of a novelty back in the 30s.

I’ve included a video here for your edification, the opening credits. Now, we’re all used to opening credits from old movies being a bit long and draggy, but this sets a new standard for pacing issues. Still, it’s worth a watch to see the cast, and all those nightmare-inducing rubber heads.

The second video I meant to show you was the trailer, but I can‘t remember where I saw it, and my searches have proven fruitless. Sadly, it gave no indication of who was considered a star, since it gushes orgiastically over every actor who happened to wander by the set. I do like that it ended with a song explaining the plot. I think all movie trailers should end like that. And speaking of Sterling Holloway…

(Wonderfilm? That's worse than Merry Men-agerie.)

1951

DISNEY! Yes, this is the version known by most, and it’s okay. Could be a hell of a lot worse. It has way more cohesion than probably any other version I’ve seen, which is debatably a plus. The voice acting is stellar. Ed Wynn as the Hatter is particularly notable. The color palette is bright, even for a Disney movie, and set against dark backgrounds for a nice contrast. And… there are songs. I’m sorry if I’m courting some kind of controversy by saying this, because I know how passionate musical people can be, but holy crap, these are some of the worst songs Disney’s ever put in a movie. I think the idea was to give them a frantic nature to match the wildness of Wonderland, but they just wind up confused jumbles of rickety rhythms and simplistic rhymes. Considering that the intricate and literate nature of the songs and poems is one of the most enduring aspects of the books, this is doubly annoying. But all in all, it’s fine. A steady plot may sacrifice some of the book’s dreaminess, at least it’s not just a random collection of scenes, which is more than can be said for most of these.

1983

I can’t really say anything about this one, since I’ve only seen a few bits. It’s a videotaped performance of an semi-avant-garde stage version. It tries to play it pretty much straight, and on the level of an adaptation it’s a failure of the standard collection of episodes variety. But I would recommend checking out on Youtube the Tea Party, which stars “My Dinner With” Andre Gregory as the Hatter, scary-ass character actor Zeljko Ivanek as the Hare, and a before-they-were-stars Nathan Lane as the Dormouse. Also, dig the Cheshire Cat scene. It’s… well, it’s kind of rapey. Anyway, check out the cast, featuring Old Alice and her Famous Dad.

(With Larry King as the Red Knight! Tim Conway as Tweedle Dorf! And Dean Cain as Dinah!)

1999

This all-star TV adaptation is likely to be remembered vaguely by most of you reading this, which is fine, since I’m remembering it pretty vaguely myself. The mid-late 90s were a fine time for network TV miniseries based on books, both Stephen King and otherwise. Eventually, someone had the bright idea to scrape together all the celebrities that weren’t up to much else, and have them do this movie. Some of them are the kinds you expect to find on a TV movie. Whoopi Goldberg as the Cheshire Cat, George Wendt as Tweedle Dee, etc. Some are a little more unexpected, like Robbie Coltrane as Tweedle Dum or Miranda Richardson as the Queen of Hearts. Some are just bizarre, like Ben Kingsley as the Caterpillar, or Peter Ustinov as the Walrus. In this version, Alice runs away from her parents’ party because she’s afraid to sing a song for all the adults. After her visit to Wonderland, she sings a song she learned from the Mock Turtle (Gene Wilder), after the characters in general teach her to believe in herself and have confidence.

It’s a good adaptation, though not a great one. The effects are nice, and with actors this good, you can’t help but get good performances. The ones that stand out most in my memory are Christopher Lloyd’s melancholy White Knight, Ben Kingsley’s randomly militaristic Caterpillar, and Whoopi Goldberg’s Cheshire Cat, which is generic and not crazy enough to be good, but holy hell, you try and forget a cat with Whoopi’s head. The moments where it really shines are when it abruptly changes style. The Walrus and the Carpenter is done as a puppet show, with Peters Ustinov and Postlethwaite acting inside of a tiny box. The Tea Party takes an extended break to showcase the Hatter (Martin Short) and Hare singing a bizarre little song called “Auntie’s Wooden Leg” as the tea-table becomes a music-hall stage. The effects are good for the TV budget, particularly Short’s digitally embiggened head, and the various Henson Creature Shop puppets. Frankly, this is probably the best a straight up film adaptation can be, due to it’s actually making an attempt to adapt, rather than simply portray. Oh, and Alice is Deb from Napoleon Dynamite.

So there you have it. All the versions I’ve seen. There’s plenty of others, but since I had basically the same complaints about most of them, I doubt you’ll find much better. Too much devotion to the original dialogue, a lack of understanding of why it originally worked, orphaned punch lines and setups, hammy actors, and jumbled scenes in a non-plot are the order of the day. Of course, the movie currently in theaters isn’t a straight adaptation, it’s a twisted take on the original story, which is SUCH an original idea, I’m sure I won’t have four more versions to talk about in my next entry. Stay tuned for part 3.

Alice Blog Part One

(What do these have in common? Journey on, dear reader!)

There are some movies that I look forward to because I think they will be awesome. Often I go see these in theaters and have a lovely time, rarely disappointed. Others, I look forward to out of a sense of obligation, because they’re based on something else that I like. I almost ALWAYS go to see these in theaters. I don’t know what it is, but my nerdy nature won’t let it rest. Even if I know they’re going to be crap, I still find myself there. When they announced that League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was to be made into a movie, I knew it would suck. They were making Allan the hero and Mina a vampire, they couldn’t use the proper Invisible Man and were inventing a new character, Tom Sawyer was added so they could have a hot young American, even though he should have been at least 60 by the time the story took place. Yet for every stupid piece of news that emerged, every bad review, every idiotic picture… I knew that I would find my butt in that theater. Probably opening night. It always happens. Ghost Rider, GI Joe, the lesser Harry Potters, War of the Worlds, The same week, I had my mind blown Pan’s Labyrinth, I paid the same amount to watch the unpleasant, cluttered, and vaguely racist mess Michael Bay had made of Transformers. I’m doing right now, with (speaking of vaguely racist) the upcoming film The Last Airbender, based on the amazing television series minus all the Asian cultural references and plus a bunch of white people.

(Yeah, they're white.)

But there is one director who holds a special place in my heart because I look forward to all of his films in both ways. I love the director and think he’s amazingly talented, but his spotty track record, particularly when it comes to adaptations, leaves me nervous and fidgety, fearing that each new film is going to be… Well, Planet of the Apes. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I refer to Tim Burton.

(What an awkward date.)

There’s no doubt in anyone’s mind that Burton’s capable of greatness. But I still get nervous. Plenty of his movies I just have not enjoyed, and they’ve all been adaptations, usually of something I quite liked to begin with. I’m not going to get into a huge analysis of what I liked and what I didn’t, it’s just that sometimes, he gets a little too into himself and makes a movie which I find crappy. Now this Alice isn’t exactly an adaptation, but it’s still based on a book, and when Burton gets it into his mind to put a unique stamp on a book, I get nervous. I also feel that he casts actors he likes at times when a different actor would be far better suited for the part, and when the first ad, released a year or so before the movie comes out is just a picture of Johnny Depp, I get nervous. Burton sometimes lets his unique visual style that get in the way of the plot, and when he’s got a huge-budget CGI fantasy world story, I get nervous. So, you know, I’m just a little wary. Maybe he’ll hit every note and I’ll love it. I’m certainly hoping that’s the case, and half of my mind is really looking forward to this. The other half is just kind of worried.

(I hope this essay doesn't make you think of me as a Mad Hater.)

And feeding the other half is the fact that this is based on Alice in Wonderland. Has that ever worked out? Come back to this spot tomorrow to read my thoughts on that matter.

(Besides, he wanted to dress Superman like this.)

New Wizard Post

Well, I went home with the waitress
The way I always do
How was I to know
She was a Death Eater, too

I was gambling in Knocturn Alley
I took a little risk
Don't send lawyers, guns and money
Those wizards don't know shit

Now I'm hiding out in Hogwarts
I'm tired of this bull
Don't send lawyers, guns and money
Unless you're a muggle

CLICK IT!

New Christmas Carol Post

Hey, remember when I said I had another one and a half Carol entries done, and then posted nothing else all season? Well, the fact of the matter is I wasn't happy with the 'finished' one, and couldn't stop tweaking it. Eventually, I realized a total change of format was called for. So from now on, all Bah Humblog entries will be in the format of a straight-up plot recap. I realized that while the real interest here is still the way the characters are portrayed, the best way to show that is to go through the already-familiar story and note how it's doing along the way. So - Let's see how well that worked. To read it, click the picture of Kelsey Grammer being humiliated by actors more charming and talented than he. It seemed appropriate.

New Downdate.

So click the pic and you'll read a tale

A tale of a stupid show

That Brian thinks would be improved

If set so long ago

If set so long ago

New Robin Hood post

Hello everyone! I'd like you to say hello to Under the Hood's new mascot, an action figure of Connor Hawke that I bough loose at my comic store for two bucks. I call him Gary. Click on Gary for the new review, but first, read below!

I'm feeling optimistic about my ability to stay on schedule, so I figured I'd let you know what's in the months to come. Don't forget, I am in grad school, and that can take over my life at any moment. But if I'm able to stick to my schedule, you'll have these to look forward to, plus some bonuses:

February:

Under The Hood: The Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men

Side Project: Jeeves

Stupid, Stupid Wizards: Lawyers, Guns, and Money

Downdates: Gilligan's Island

March:

UTH: Beyond Sherwood Forest

SP: Mac MacKenzie, Weevil Navarro, and Wallace Fennel

SSW: Harry Potter

DD: Kolchak

April:

UTH: 2006 BBC Series, Season 2

SP: Marcie

SSW: Voldemort, part 2

DD: The West Wing

New Wizard Post

I hate to rag on the guy, seeing as he is one of the more likable characters in the series, but... well, he deserves it. So I'm throwing him a party before I tear him back down. Clicky Yon Picky.

New Sidekick Post

Six Texas Rangers (Hi-yo, hi-yo) rode in the sun (Hi-yo, hi-yo); Six men of justice rode into an ambush, and dead were all but one.
One lone survivor (Hi-yo, hi-yo) lay on the trail (Hi-yo, hi-yo);
Found there by Tonto, the brave Injun Tonto, he lived to tell the tale.

Let's read about him, won't we? Click the pic to jump on it, jump on it, jump on it.

New post at Downdates - finally.

Yeah, yeah, I know it's been forever and a half since I announced this one, but on the other hand, I have no explanation. So there. Hey, there's more important things to worry about, so come. Knock on our door.

Narration: It Almost Never Works

THE WORST MOVIE NARRATION I’VE EVER HEARD

TUCK EVERLASTING - The problem with the narration in this movie is that it’s so noncommittal. It shows up at the beginning and intermittently throughout to give exposition. But exposition is also given in the normal way, and nothing the voice over says is something that couldn’t be done through dialogue, or something we couldn’t figure out for ourselves. The movie is well-directed enough that no extra help is needed, but there it is. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the narration is done in the past tense by the actress who plays the main character, despite the fact that in the only modern-time scene in the movie, her grave is visited by her immortal lover. She died at 100 and he is still 16. (By the way, Twilight, this is how you do it.) An older person narrating would have added to the poignancy. Or maybe it would have made it seem like The Wonder Years, I don’t know.

DARK CITY - This is the only movie I’ve ever seen where the narration seems to have it out for the audience. Or is it have it in? I’m never sure. Anyway, the narration appears only at the beginning of the movie and does nothing except explain the end of the movie. We’re left with a nice, tight mystery-thriller that has no mystery because we already know what’s happening. Also the narrator is William Hurt, who has a lovely voice, but plays the character least qualified to be telling us any of this.

STAR WARS - Oh, yeah. I went there. The opening crawl of Star Wars is intended to resemble the old Flash (Ahhhhh!) Gordon serials, giving information on what happened previously. The only problem with that is that those were intended to be reminders for people who had already seen those, not to just tell you what happened before the movie starts. The viewers of the serials would have actually seen Flash and Dale steal the Death Star plans, not just read about them. In a stand-alone movie (Which is what Star Wars was intended as, no matter what George Lucas says,) an opening like that robs much of the opening suspense. Imagine the opening of Star Wars. Is there anything in the narration that isn’t revealed in Vader’s conversation with Antilles? Only the destructive capability of the Death Star, and wouldn’t it be more dramatic to reveal that at the point where Tarkin first uses it? No and Yes, respectively. Comparatively, the opening crawl of Empire is useful, and sets up the Hoth base and probe droids without tedious exposition. Funny how George Lucas didn’t write or direct that one.

ARABIAN KNIGHT - The Thief and the Cobbler was to be the masterpiece of Oscar-winning animator Richard Williams. He spent 26 years making it, grabbing funding wherever he could. After he built up a huge wad of cred as the animation director of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, he made a deal with Warner Bros to fund and release the film. But masterpieces take time, and Warner pulled out. The film was given to the “Completion Bond Company” and Williams was fired. The finished version the producer made, retitled Arabian Knight, was an atrocity. Remaining animation was shopped out to various hack houses, the film was made into a musical, and several mute characters were given voices. Including the Cobbler. And the Thief. Yes, the two former-title characters, intended to carry the movie only through their actions now have extremely irritating voice overs by Matthew Broderick and Jonathan Winters. And the final moment of the film, where the Cobbler says “I love you,” in the deep and manly voice of 1967 Sean Connery is robbed of its awesomeness by way of never happening.

The Weirdest Oz Characters Ever

The Weirdest Oz Characters

Johnny Dooit - Johnny Dooit is a creepy old man who shows up whenever you ask for him, with a strong implication that he’s been watching you the whole time. At one point in the fifth book, Dorothy and her companions du novel need to pass over the Deadly Desert that surrounds Oz, so called because if you touch the sand, you turn to dust. So one of the travelers, a hobo called the Shaggy Man who has a magnet that makes everyone fall in love with him, asks Johnny Dooit to show up, and he does, and builds them a “sand boat”, which they sail to Oz. The fact that this made perfect sense to me at age 9 will probably be something you want to keep in mind when you read the rest of these.

Betsy Bobbin - Betsy’s not weird, her existence is. See, Dorothy was a girl from Kansas who got washed away during a storm at sea and landed in Ev with a farm animal that was suddenly able to talk, and then made her way to Oz. Betsy had the exact same story, except she’s from Oklahoma. Sure, she’s got a mule instead of a chicken, but otherwise, her story could have been told with Dorothy and not lost anything. There was, by the way, one other girl in the same age group that wound up in Oz, but Trot was from California, not the Midwest, and instead of a pet she had a one-legged sea captain.

Toto - You all know Toto, right? That’s what you think. Toto is a little black dog which Dorothy had with her on her first trip to Oz. On her second and third, she had a yellow hen and then a kitten and a cab-horse, all of whom learned to speak as soon as they hit magic country, as did Betsy’s mule and Trot’s sea captain. Starting to see why Toto is so weird? And it’s not that there’s anything wrong with him. He can talk, he just doesn’t. Except in the eleventh book, The Lost Princess of Oz. For some unknown reason, in that one he is completely the same as every other animal in Oz, despite saying a grand total of one sentence across 13 other books.

Captain Fyter - Also called “The Tin Soldier”. And you can probably see where this is going. See, for those unaware, in the original book “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”, the origin of the Tin Woodman was that he was a woodcutter by the name of Nick Chopper, who was in love with the servant girl of the Wicked Witch of the East. Upon finding out, the Witch naturally decided to enchant Chopper’s axe to hack off his legs, arms, what have you, which he had replaced one by one with tin surrogates. Well, anyway, he rusted and just sort of hung around until he was oiled by Dorothy. He then went to the Emerald City to get his heart so he could love his fiancee again and marry her. Which he got around to trying in book twelve. Sheesh, maybe he should have asked the wizard for an attention span.

Well, on the way to her parents house, where they assume she still lives after twenty years or so, they happen across… another tin guy. Completely identical to the Tin Woodman, save for a different hat. He is similarly rusted, and they oil him, and he reveals himself to be Captain Fyter. See, he was a soldier who was in love with the servant girl of the Wicked Witch of the East. Upon finding out, the Witch naturally decided to enchant Fy-Ter’s sword to hack off his legs, arms, what have you, which he had replaced one by one with tin surr… Whoa. I think there’s a glitch in the Matrix. No, wait, it’s just Frank Baum adding extra drama to his story by repeating it exactly.

Not only did Nimmie Amee (Oh, that’s the girl, by the way.) fall in love with the guy who was completely dismembered and magic-cyborged, she was completely uninterested until he was tin… Of course, being tin means he can’t love her. (Also, it apparently makes him too stupid to come out of the rain.) Getting engaged to an emotionally unavailable person identical to someone who abandoned you is creepy enough to get Nimmie on this list herself, not to mention the tinsmith Ku-Klip, who just made identical faces rather than trying to match what his clients actually look like. But that’s not the weirdest thing either of them have done. To examine that, let’s look at these next two characters…

Nick Chopper’s Head - Oh, you read that right. See, after the first Oz book came out, Baum decided that nobody in Oz could die… Even on dismemberment. And when he apparently decided to spend his dozenth book fixing up the Tin Woodman’s origin, which I’m pretty sure nobody had complained about for the past 18 years, he had to deal with this. If the body parts live after getting removed, what happened to Nick Chopper’s head?

Well, it’s in Ku-Klip’s cupboard.

Seriously, it lives on a little post in Ku-Klip’s cupboard, and it find’s the Tin Woodman’s claim that they are the same completely ridiculous. The head, of course, has no heart, and therefore no emotions. All it can accept is what’s right there in front of it, which is usually a cupboard door. Anyway, they decide he’s an asshole, and leave him in there. But they can’t find poor Captain Fyter’s head anywhere. WAIT FOR IT.

Chopfyt - See, after all the business his tin men had brought to him, Ku-Klip decided he could use an assistant, and since he had all these living body parts just sitting in a barrel, he did what any sensible man would do and… glued the parts together… with “Meat Glue”. Plus one tin arm, since the left ones were both missing. Anyway, once he had “got together a very decent body, with heart and all the trimmings complete," he tried to put his unholy abomination to work. But with Ku-Klip having accidentally given him two stomachs or something, ‘Chopfyt’ was eating the poor tinsmith out of house and home, and was discharged into the world to seek adventure. Then guess what happened?

Well, as fate would seem to require… He fell in love with the former servant girl of the Wicked Witch of the East. Fortunately, the Witch was dead, and Chopfyt had the good sense to not carry anything sharp. They got married. Yeah, she married the Frankensteined body parts of her two former robot fiancees. That girl is FUCKED UP. Dammit, this book is messed up. I didn’t even tell you about the part where a giant turns them all into monkeys and shit.

The Hungry Tiger - This character was introduced in the third book as a friend for the Cowardly Lion. And like ol’ Cowie, he has a defining personality trait. He is hungry. He just eats and eats and eats and nothing ever satisfies his hunger. Now, I know you’re thinking that for a children’s book character, that’s not so unusual, but what gets him a spot on this list is that he knows what exactly would stop his hunger. A baby. Yes, he is certain that if he ate a baby, he’d be so totally satisfied and his hunger would dissipate. Fortunately for all the babies of Oz, his conscience will not allow it. But that doesn’t mean he won’t stop talking about it. Just look at these actual quotes.

"Fat babies! Don't they sound delicious? But I've never eaten any, because my conscience tells me it is wrong."

"A fat baby. I want a fat baby," said the Hungry Tiger. "A nice, plump, juicy, tender, fat baby. But, of course, if I had one, my conscience would not allow me to eat it. So I'll have to forget my hunger."

"You certainly look delicious; Will you kindly give me permission to eat you?"

"If I could eat grass I would not need a conscience, for nothing could then tempt me to devour babies."

"There will be lots of fat babies at the celebration, I hear," remarked the Hungry Tiger, "but of course I can't eat any of 'em."

"Is he ALWAYS hungry?" asked Loo the Unicorn. "I am," replied the Tiger, answering the question himself. "I am always hungry for fat babies."

Those are all taken from different books, and I only took a few of the times he was talking about himself. There’s plenty of other occasions when someone is discussing him or introducing him, or in one memorable case singing a song about him.

Bah Humblog '09 begins.

Now that Thanksgiving is finally over, and we can all get into the Christmas spirit without feeling weird, let's celebrate! I recommend a watching of the below Youtube video, which must be seen to be believed, and reading the Christmas Carol review at this link. And god bless all our wacky asses.

Hello, Sarcastic Voyage fans!

Welcome to the blogroll, anyone who came here after hearing my guest spot on The Sarcastic Voyage Podcast. It's all pretty clearly laid out. The first ever post can be easily reached, and will give you a notion of what I'm all about. Yes, I know some of the blogs are light on content now, but in the coming months, I will be embarking on a regular update schedule. Or not. Mind you, I am a grad student, and free time tends to equal naptime. But I have a half-finished Downdate to be put up soon, and two-and-a-half complete Christmas Carol blogs I'll begin posting as soon as it's a reasonable Christmas season. Which is not now, no matter what the radio at Wendy's says.

There's also to be some content posts on this very blog. Just stuff that I think of here and there that doesn't fit into any of my categories.

So welcome, and if you like what you see, stick around. It's gonna be splendid.

New Sidekick Post

I like this one. The once-thriving trend of Kid Sidekicks has fallen a bit by the wayside, but in the 1940s, everyone thought it was a great idea to have a 10-year-old fighting muggers and nazis and giant alien robots. You know, for the kids to identify with. Click on the very good point to read about some.

New Post at Under the Hood

You know, some time ago, I caught the movie Hot Shots Part Deux on TV. I assumed that the reason I liked this movie so much as a child back in the days before GoGurt and Heelies was that I was less sophisticated. This was, after all, a lad who numbered among his favorite movies Super Mario Brothers and Lost in Space. To my surprise, HSPD was still quite sharp and funny, with layers of jokes I didn't get as a young'un. No masterpiece to be sure, but still a fun watch. Would that I could have the same experience again...

Click the pic to find out...

First Content Post at Stupid Wizards

Wherein I am Extremely Judgmental About An Antagonist's Reliance on Coincidence and Luck.

Not that I'm saying I could have done better, but I'd have tried to come up with a more foolproof plan. Clearly, Rowling wanted him to look like a brilliant chessmaster, but...

I'm getting ahead of myself. Click on the amusing visual pun for more.