...because, me, I haven't posted in like a week, me. Seriously get on that, myself, or I shall be very upset.
And on a similar note, what the hell happened to that movie I was apparently making with that one guy who used to write for this blog?
Short answer: it died an ugly ugly death.
Long answer: see above, but that doesn't mean nothing's happening ever.
I've written about eight sketches (short comedy scenes for all you sad souls who never saw Monty Python), and Tom and I are editing them now. Hopefully something will come of them over winter break.
I wanted to post a line or two from one of the sketches, but our lawyers went over what I was going to post and cut most of it out. So all I'm left with is this:
OSCAR WILDE IV: [Spoiler].
That should whet your appetites.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Half-Life 2 vs Assassin's Creed
Wait, why? They're totally different games made quite a few years apart. Why on Earth are we having this comparison?
Because I want to, that's why.
Marks against Half-Life 2:
It's on rails. As someone who was introduced to video games by Super Mario 64, I find games on rails to be annoying. What makes HL2 worse is that it sometimes pretends that it's not, by not making it obvious what you have to do to get to the next area. And this brings me to my next point:
1st-person platforming. I should not be held responsible for falling into toxic waste if I am incapable of seeing my own feet. End of story.
The loading screens. Especially when you're in a vehicle and they kill all your forward momentum.
The music. This isn't the Matrix, so it shouldn't sound like it either.
In the plus column, water doesn't freaking kill you instantly (well, unless you swim too far out). In fact, the one thing that can drive your health almost all the way down instantly is one of the scariest things in the game, not an irritating design flaw. It's much more moody and atmospheric than Screed is, Alyx and Barney aren't morons with attractions to death, and the characters are actually memorable. And while it does switch back and forth an awful lot between "fight enemy soldiers in open, well-lit areas" and "fight zombies in dark, enclosed spaces," the bit in the middle where you get to be King of the Giant Mutant Grasshopper Things broke up the repitition quite nicely. Oh, and there's a gravity gun.
Marks against Assassin's Creed:
It's repetitive as hell. Go to town, do 3 of the 6 subquests, infiltrate bad guy's lair, kill him, run away, repeat.
Unskippable cutscenes. For the people who program those, I hope their personal purgatory consists of nothing but cutscenes. For eternity.
After about the fourth or fifth level, if you've done every side quest and scaled every tower, you now have twenty health bars and a counter maneuver. Congratulations, you are unkillable, so long as you stay away from...
The Sibrand assassination. Just... the Sibrand assassination.
In the plus column, after you beat the game you can kill anyone with impunity (much more fun than it sounds), the entire level loads before you set foot in it, so you'll never be interrupted by a "loading" caption, the music is amazing, there's a clever framing device to explain why you can "die," the buildings aren't so amazingly poorly constructed that you'll be incredibly likely to take a flying leap off them to your death (see Assassin's Creed II for an apparent lapse of reason), the platforming is sublime, and stealth is an actual option because the game lets you go anywhere.
Because I want to, that's why.
Marks against Half-Life 2:
It's on rails. As someone who was introduced to video games by Super Mario 64, I find games on rails to be annoying. What makes HL2 worse is that it sometimes pretends that it's not, by not making it obvious what you have to do to get to the next area. And this brings me to my next point:
1st-person platforming. I should not be held responsible for falling into toxic waste if I am incapable of seeing my own feet. End of story.
The loading screens. Especially when you're in a vehicle and they kill all your forward momentum.
The music. This isn't the Matrix, so it shouldn't sound like it either.
In the plus column, water doesn't freaking kill you instantly (well, unless you swim too far out). In fact, the one thing that can drive your health almost all the way down instantly is one of the scariest things in the game, not an irritating design flaw. It's much more moody and atmospheric than Screed is, Alyx and Barney aren't morons with attractions to death, and the characters are actually memorable. And while it does switch back and forth an awful lot between "fight enemy soldiers in open, well-lit areas" and "fight zombies in dark, enclosed spaces," the bit in the middle where you get to be King of the Giant Mutant Grasshopper Things broke up the repitition quite nicely. Oh, and there's a gravity gun.
Marks against Assassin's Creed:
It's repetitive as hell. Go to town, do 3 of the 6 subquests, infiltrate bad guy's lair, kill him, run away, repeat.
Unskippable cutscenes. For the people who program those, I hope their personal purgatory consists of nothing but cutscenes. For eternity.
After about the fourth or fifth level, if you've done every side quest and scaled every tower, you now have twenty health bars and a counter maneuver. Congratulations, you are unkillable, so long as you stay away from...
The Sibrand assassination. Just... the Sibrand assassination.
In the plus column, after you beat the game you can kill anyone with impunity (much more fun than it sounds), the entire level loads before you set foot in it, so you'll never be interrupted by a "loading" caption, the music is amazing, there's a clever framing device to explain why you can "die," the buildings aren't so amazingly poorly constructed that you'll be incredibly likely to take a flying leap off them to your death (see Assassin's Creed II for an apparent lapse of reason), the platforming is sublime, and stealth is an actual option because the game lets you go anywhere.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Half-Life 2
Excuse me. Is this the year 2010? It seems I've overshot a bit. Let me just pop back a few years. Maybe I'll bring a few newspapers back with me, surprise everyone in 2007 about just how absurdly bad things have gotten...
Anyway, if you're the one person left on the face of the planet who hasn't played Half-Life or any sequals/expansions thereof, congratulations. You're very, very silly.
I bought Portal about a month ago on the advice of a friend who used to write for this blog, back when it was about a movie we were making. Because I don't believe in downloading things from the internet, the means by which I aquired Portal was the purchase of The Orange Box. It also included Team Fortress 2 (or as I call it, how many different comical ways can you be killed by people halfway across the country) and Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2 Episode One, and Half-Life 2 Episode 2. Again, as if I should even have to say it.
So I beat Half-Life 2 today. And let me just say this. Every single game that has an escort mission, or a co-op with an NPC, absolutely must simply copy Alyx Vance's AI. Okay, yes, she has an absurd amount of health... but at one point near the end of the game, she shows up and the hallway behind her is full of dead bad guys. This is such an improvment over the usual "I'm going to get in the way of your bullets now - oh look I'm dead again" AI that too many games try to saddle your allies with (and, yup, most of the "resistance" members are hopelessly worthless).
In fact, the resistance members are so utterly worthless that I found myself wondering just why Dr. Breen wanted me to surrender on their behalf at the end. He had two of the only three resistance members worth a damn - that'd be me and Alyx, and the extent member was Barney - captive at the time. Really, an all out strider/gunship mop-up was all that was needed at that point.
During the penultimate level, you're running around inside his base making ragdolls of his goons and doing an uncomfortable amount of first-person platforming (the biggest problem I had with the game was the first-person platforming, which is just a no-no), and he's talking to you over his video intercom. At one point he asks something along the lines of "tell me, Dr. Freeman, you've caused all this destruction, but what have you created?" And you know what?
The man had a point.
Not that the game ever gives you the option to surrender, no. It's on rails from start to finish, despite the percieved immersion (complaint number two - number three is the way the game interrupts the action every five minutes to load the next five minutes of gameplay, because nothing but nothing wrecks immersion faster than a time-stop and the word "loading" appearing in front of your face).
Yup, Breen's an opportunistic snake. He probably doesn't had a problem with anything the Combine does or what it stands for. But from his message about collaboration on, it became clear to me that the game's designers had gone out of their way to make sure the villian wasn't just a one-dimensional "conquer the galaxy, crush the lesser races, unimaginable power, unlimited rice pudding" villain. If it weren't for him, or someone like him, would there still even be a society for Gordon to save? In all likelihood, Gordon would have woken up to an inhospitable black rock, or one entirely overrun by aliens.
Let's not forget that the war between the Combine and Earth lasted for seven hours. If aliens showed up right now and wiped out everything you cared about, I think you'd lose all hope. This isn't freaking Independence Day, because the aliens invaded much faster - there was still so much of America left to trash 36 hours after the first blow was struck.
Breen never thought Gordon had a chance, right up until everything went to hell for him. Ultimately it was his lack of faith that did him in. Well, that and my unholy fury. But far more so than Andross in Star Fox 64 or Al-Mualim in Assassin's Creed (my other two favorite games), I liked Breen.
It's a game set on Vichy Earth, where every little detail reminds you that yup, we're all stuck under the heel of a brutal and uncaring regime. Breen put a human face on that (literally), and definitely helped sell the story.
Anyway, if you're the one person left on the face of the planet who hasn't played Half-Life or any sequals/expansions thereof, congratulations. You're very, very silly.
I bought Portal about a month ago on the advice of a friend who used to write for this blog, back when it was about a movie we were making. Because I don't believe in downloading things from the internet, the means by which I aquired Portal was the purchase of The Orange Box. It also included Team Fortress 2 (or as I call it, how many different comical ways can you be killed by people halfway across the country) and Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2 Episode One, and Half-Life 2 Episode 2. Again, as if I should even have to say it.
So I beat Half-Life 2 today. And let me just say this. Every single game that has an escort mission, or a co-op with an NPC, absolutely must simply copy Alyx Vance's AI. Okay, yes, she has an absurd amount of health... but at one point near the end of the game, she shows up and the hallway behind her is full of dead bad guys. This is such an improvment over the usual "I'm going to get in the way of your bullets now - oh look I'm dead again" AI that too many games try to saddle your allies with (and, yup, most of the "resistance" members are hopelessly worthless).
In fact, the resistance members are so utterly worthless that I found myself wondering just why Dr. Breen wanted me to surrender on their behalf at the end. He had two of the only three resistance members worth a damn - that'd be me and Alyx, and the extent member was Barney - captive at the time. Really, an all out strider/gunship mop-up was all that was needed at that point.
During the penultimate level, you're running around inside his base making ragdolls of his goons and doing an uncomfortable amount of first-person platforming (the biggest problem I had with the game was the first-person platforming, which is just a no-no), and he's talking to you over his video intercom. At one point he asks something along the lines of "tell me, Dr. Freeman, you've caused all this destruction, but what have you created?" And you know what?
The man had a point.
Not that the game ever gives you the option to surrender, no. It's on rails from start to finish, despite the percieved immersion (complaint number two - number three is the way the game interrupts the action every five minutes to load the next five minutes of gameplay, because nothing but nothing wrecks immersion faster than a time-stop and the word "loading" appearing in front of your face).
Yup, Breen's an opportunistic snake. He probably doesn't had a problem with anything the Combine does or what it stands for. But from his message about collaboration on, it became clear to me that the game's designers had gone out of their way to make sure the villian wasn't just a one-dimensional "conquer the galaxy, crush the lesser races, unimaginable power, unlimited rice pudding" villain. If it weren't for him, or someone like him, would there still even be a society for Gordon to save? In all likelihood, Gordon would have woken up to an inhospitable black rock, or one entirely overrun by aliens.
Let's not forget that the war between the Combine and Earth lasted for seven hours. If aliens showed up right now and wiped out everything you cared about, I think you'd lose all hope. This isn't freaking Independence Day, because the aliens invaded much faster - there was still so much of America left to trash 36 hours after the first blow was struck.
Breen never thought Gordon had a chance, right up until everything went to hell for him. Ultimately it was his lack of faith that did him in. Well, that and my unholy fury. But far more so than Andross in Star Fox 64 or Al-Mualim in Assassin's Creed (my other two favorite games), I liked Breen.
It's a game set on Vichy Earth, where every little detail reminds you that yup, we're all stuck under the heel of a brutal and uncaring regime. Breen put a human face on that (literally), and definitely helped sell the story.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
IG2EUS: Progressive Rock
The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of Progressive Rock:
Progressive Rock is supposedly a highly technical form of music. The pinnacle of expression is the concept album, which is supposedly high art. In actual fact, the concept album is just a clever means of recycling the same riff for 45 minutes.
Progressive Rock is supposedly a highly technical form of music. The pinnacle of expression is the concept album, which is supposedly high art. In actual fact, the concept album is just a clever means of recycling the same riff for 45 minutes.
Who Review: The War Machines
Doc... tor... Who... is... re... quired... Bring... him... here.
-WOTAN
Swinging London, 1966. The Beatles are about to release Revolver, and Doctor Who is about to change forever. This is the last "intact*" Hartnell serial, and really the only time that the First Doctor gets to spend four episodes in the present day. So it's already going to jar a bit with everything that comes either before or after.
*actually, due to censor cuts, about two minutes of footage are missing. The DVD release has ingeniously covered this up by patching in different shots from elsewhere in the serial over the soundtrack.
The plot: The Doctor and Dodo land in 1966. The Doctor gets goosebumps when he looks at the Post Office Tower, and he learns that a computer named WOTAN lives at the top. WOTAN has the unique ability to figure out what "TARDIS" means (because Doctor Who exists in the Whoniverse. Q.v. Remembrance of the Daleks). It also has the ability to control people. It amasses an army of thought-slaves and starts building War Machines, which basically look like overly cumbersome Daleks. They go on a rampage until the Doctor stops one of them, reprograms it, and sends it to annihilate WOTAN.
Firstly, we have this bizarre notion that the Doctor is a respected scientific authority on Earth. This is really down to the writer, Ian Stuart Black, who takes it as read that the Doctor's a celebrity everywhere he goes. This doesn't sound out of place in the new series, or indeed at the latter end of the UNIT era, but in 1966 it's a bit strange.
The second bizarre notion is the one that a computer capable of taking over the entire world takes up an entire room. No wait, this is 1966, so that's perfectly natural. What's bizarre is that the concept of all the major computers on Earth being linked together seems to foreshadow the internet to a really creepy degree.
Thirdly, this serial has a very early case of companion hypnosis. Dodo is brainwashed by the machines and ordered to recruit the Doctor. Interestingly, later in the serial, the Doctor brainwashes one of the machines and orders it to kill WOTAN and the thought-slaves who helped brainwash Dodo. (Yeah, he has an ulterior motive, namely saving humanity, but still it seems like revenge is suddenly/still in the Doctor's playbook.)
It's a UNIT story without UNIT. The army gets called in and obliterated, leaving the Doctor to save the day. Again, this is the only time Hartnell does something like this.
I give The War Machines a score of 7/10. It has a fairly decent pace, and Hartnell seems perfectly comfortable doing a contemporary story. You can go on about this being the end of an era, but honestly, between Peter Butterworth's Troughtonesque performance as the Monk in The Time Meddler and the movie starring Peter Cushing as Dr. Who, Hartnell's been on borrowed time for an entire year by this point. The UNIT formula is laid down here, four years early, and frankly, the UNIT years themselves rarely top this.
Who Review Index
-WOTAN
Swinging London, 1966. The Beatles are about to release Revolver, and Doctor Who is about to change forever. This is the last "intact*" Hartnell serial, and really the only time that the First Doctor gets to spend four episodes in the present day. So it's already going to jar a bit with everything that comes either before or after.
*actually, due to censor cuts, about two minutes of footage are missing. The DVD release has ingeniously covered this up by patching in different shots from elsewhere in the serial over the soundtrack.
The plot: The Doctor and Dodo land in 1966. The Doctor gets goosebumps when he looks at the Post Office Tower, and he learns that a computer named WOTAN lives at the top. WOTAN has the unique ability to figure out what "TARDIS" means (because Doctor Who exists in the Whoniverse. Q.v. Remembrance of the Daleks). It also has the ability to control people. It amasses an army of thought-slaves and starts building War Machines, which basically look like overly cumbersome Daleks. They go on a rampage until the Doctor stops one of them, reprograms it, and sends it to annihilate WOTAN.
Firstly, we have this bizarre notion that the Doctor is a respected scientific authority on Earth. This is really down to the writer, Ian Stuart Black, who takes it as read that the Doctor's a celebrity everywhere he goes. This doesn't sound out of place in the new series, or indeed at the latter end of the UNIT era, but in 1966 it's a bit strange.
The second bizarre notion is the one that a computer capable of taking over the entire world takes up an entire room. No wait, this is 1966, so that's perfectly natural. What's bizarre is that the concept of all the major computers on Earth being linked together seems to foreshadow the internet to a really creepy degree.
Thirdly, this serial has a very early case of companion hypnosis. Dodo is brainwashed by the machines and ordered to recruit the Doctor. Interestingly, later in the serial, the Doctor brainwashes one of the machines and orders it to kill WOTAN and the thought-slaves who helped brainwash Dodo. (Yeah, he has an ulterior motive, namely saving humanity, but still it seems like revenge is suddenly/still in the Doctor's playbook.)
It's a UNIT story without UNIT. The army gets called in and obliterated, leaving the Doctor to save the day. Again, this is the only time Hartnell does something like this.
I give The War Machines a score of 7/10. It has a fairly decent pace, and Hartnell seems perfectly comfortable doing a contemporary story. You can go on about this being the end of an era, but honestly, between Peter Butterworth's Troughtonesque performance as the Monk in The Time Meddler and the movie starring Peter Cushing as Dr. Who, Hartnell's been on borrowed time for an entire year by this point. The UNIT formula is laid down here, four years early, and frankly, the UNIT years themselves rarely top this.
Who Review Index
Entertainment in Decline: Posers
The music industry is going the way of the dinosaur. Book publishing is sure to be almost directly behind it, and I can't imagine DVD (sorry, Blu-Ray) sales are going to remain afloat forever.
The culprit behind all this?
It's the posers, of course.
See, posers believe that people will pay for anything. Well, actually they believe that they're the next big thing, but they're stupid and wrong. But more importantly, they believe that people will pay for what they're making.
News flash: only fools pay for anything.
There is no way in hell that I'll ever pay for a Nirvana album. It's not because I am a commie, it's because I genuinely don't want to hear their noise at all. I have in fact listened to commercials instead of Nirvana.
As recording and distribution technologies got cheaper, more and more people could jump on the bandwagon. Suddenly there was more and more music out there, and the people responsible for keeping the filth out were asleep at the wheel. Instead, this new awful music was considered "inventive" or "avant-garde" or "stripped-down" or "alternative."
Here's another thing: The Godfather is nearly entirely unwatchable today. So is Citezen Kane. So is The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. It's because CGI-obsessed hacks (and their explosion-and-boob-obsessed predecessors) have changed the rules. If your movie goes ten minutes without something exploding, no one will watch it. The only exception to this rule is the romance genre. And if I could explain how that genre stays afloat without sounding like a sexist monster, I could win a Pulitzer.
Yes, stagnation is bad, variety is the spice of life and all that. This does not justify bad music and bad movies. But this generation, and the one before it, doesn't seem capable of doing much else.
For a view that blames the consumers instead of the producers, go here.
The culprit behind all this?
It's the posers, of course.
See, posers believe that people will pay for anything. Well, actually they believe that they're the next big thing, but they're stupid and wrong. But more importantly, they believe that people will pay for what they're making.
News flash: only fools pay for anything.
There is no way in hell that I'll ever pay for a Nirvana album. It's not because I am a commie, it's because I genuinely don't want to hear their noise at all. I have in fact listened to commercials instead of Nirvana.
As recording and distribution technologies got cheaper, more and more people could jump on the bandwagon. Suddenly there was more and more music out there, and the people responsible for keeping the filth out were asleep at the wheel. Instead, this new awful music was considered "inventive" or "avant-garde" or "stripped-down" or "alternative."
Here's another thing: The Godfather is nearly entirely unwatchable today. So is Citezen Kane. So is The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. It's because CGI-obsessed hacks (and their explosion-and-boob-obsessed predecessors) have changed the rules. If your movie goes ten minutes without something exploding, no one will watch it. The only exception to this rule is the romance genre. And if I could explain how that genre stays afloat without sounding like a sexist monster, I could win a Pulitzer.
Yes, stagnation is bad, variety is the spice of life and all that. This does not justify bad music and bad movies. But this generation, and the one before it, doesn't seem capable of doing much else.
For a view that blames the consumers instead of the producers, go here.
Entertainment in Decline: Commies
The music industry is going the way of the dinosaur. Book publishing is sure to be almost directly behind it, and I can't imagine DVD (sorry, Blu-Ray) sales are going to remain afloat forever.
The culprit behind all this?
It's the commies, of course.
See, commies believe that people should work for nothing. Well, actually they believe everything should be free, which is really the same thing.
News flash: only fools work for nothing.
Here's another thing: Television. Used to be, commercials paid for TV shows. Way back in the 50s and early 60s, it took televisions such a long time to warm up that you'd inevitably leave them on all day. So you'd be hearing commercials all day. Or perhaps you'd turn the volume down; you'd still be seeing commercials all day. And as technology got better, the ubiquitousness of commercials declined, but you'd still watch them in between the act breaks of your favorite shows.
And now we have DVRs and such. Hasta la bye-bye, commercials. Television ratings are crap today because these ratings refuse to take into account DVR recordings. Why should they? Nobody who DVRs a show is going to sit through the commercials (go ahead and prove me wrong, it's your life to waste).
So why is television still being made? Because people are silly, that's why.
Let me tell you what stealing is. Stealing is taking something that cost money to make without paying for it. Yup, you paid for your DVR, yup you paid for your internet, but none of that money goes to the people who make the television shows or the music or whatever.
And people will not work for nothing.
Am I suggesting that you donate to the Lars Ulrich Platinum Yacht fund? Only if you want to hear another Metallica album. If you don't, then don't.
The entertainment industry's going to pot because everybody knows they're not going to make as much money as they could have 10, 20 years ago, so why try very hard? Why try at all? No doubt there are talented, inventive people out there who are toiling away at 9-to-5 jobs because they know how screwed they'd be in today's entertainment industry.
And it's all thanks to the commies.
The culprit behind all this?
It's the commies, of course.
See, commies believe that people should work for nothing. Well, actually they believe everything should be free, which is really the same thing.
News flash: only fools work for nothing.
Here's another thing: Television. Used to be, commercials paid for TV shows. Way back in the 50s and early 60s, it took televisions such a long time to warm up that you'd inevitably leave them on all day. So you'd be hearing commercials all day. Or perhaps you'd turn the volume down; you'd still be seeing commercials all day. And as technology got better, the ubiquitousness of commercials declined, but you'd still watch them in between the act breaks of your favorite shows.
And now we have DVRs and such. Hasta la bye-bye, commercials. Television ratings are crap today because these ratings refuse to take into account DVR recordings. Why should they? Nobody who DVRs a show is going to sit through the commercials (go ahead and prove me wrong, it's your life to waste).
So why is television still being made? Because people are silly, that's why.
Let me tell you what stealing is. Stealing is taking something that cost money to make without paying for it. Yup, you paid for your DVR, yup you paid for your internet, but none of that money goes to the people who make the television shows or the music or whatever.
And people will not work for nothing.
Am I suggesting that you donate to the Lars Ulrich Platinum Yacht fund? Only if you want to hear another Metallica album. If you don't, then don't.
The entertainment industry's going to pot because everybody knows they're not going to make as much money as they could have 10, 20 years ago, so why try very hard? Why try at all? No doubt there are talented, inventive people out there who are toiling away at 9-to-5 jobs because they know how screwed they'd be in today's entertainment industry.
And it's all thanks to the commies.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
IG2EUS: Headaches
The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of headaches:
If my head is this badly split open, I must be so hungover I don't even remember drinking.
Gaaaaaaaaaah.
If my head is this badly split open, I must be so hungover I don't even remember drinking.
Gaaaaaaaaaah.
Monday, October 4, 2010
IG2EUS: Doctor Who
The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of Doctor Who:
Doctor Who was a television show that ran on the BBC (and later BBC1) from 1963 until 1989. It was subsequently resurrected in 2005. Among its many contributions to culture are long multicolor scarfs, an irrational fear of salt-shakers, and the knowledge of what they call French fries in France.
The show was conceived by Winston Churchill, a suspected Time Lord, in 1941 as a way of showing just how bad the world would be if the Nazis won. However production could not begin yet because no budget could be allocated to anything not essential to winning the war effort. Terry Nation's Nazi script was put on hold until the war ended.
Once the war was over, Churchill was thrown out of power. In a drunken rage, he burned Nation's draft scripts, thus setting precedent that everything associated with the show would be burnt. Fortunately, because he was drunk, he forgot to burn one of the scripts and instead locked it away in an attic somewhere.
In 1962 a man named Alice Frick, whose parents obviously hated him, discovered these scripts and proposed the creation of a television show around them. Nation's script was now unsuitable as an opening story. The production team decided that instead of Nazis, the main threat had to be nuclear war. A thirteen-episode series was commissioned: one episode to introduce the main characters, three episodes set in a nuclear wasteland, seven episodes dealing with future Nazis, and two episodes of putting all the clues together and figuring out who Doctor Who was.
Unfortunately, the scripts had to be rushed out in a hurry, because the script editor, David Whitaker, was literally on a different planet. After turning down scripts from Gene Roddenberry, because they were too optimistic, and Douglas Adams, because he was eleven at the time, Whitaker took two shots of vodka and a noseful of cocaine, sat down with his notes, and banged out some nonsense about cavemen. Then he banged out more nonsense about Doctor Who's time machine and how it was alive. Then he banged out more nonsense about the French Revolution, the Crusades, the Norman Invasion, the Battle of Culloden, Atlantis, space pirates, cave-monsters, Atlantis again, the EEC, Atlantis yet again, giant spiders, giant robots, and giant mice. He also sounded out Terry Nation about recycling The Lord of the Rings in space. Then he died of a heart attack, leaving quite a mess behind him.
The BBC realized that, while Whitaker had laid out an interesting plan, fully implementing it would take about fourteen years. With Nation's new scripts coming in, they had no choice but to go ahead and grant the show a full season. Then the show somehow became a hit with the fans, who demanded subsequent seasons. This caused some consternation among the cast, who became increasingly upset about having to spend so much time in the company of giant saltshakers. One by one, they all quit. As they did so, they were replaced with younger and sexier actors and actresses, because the writing team was slowly forgetting how to write decent scripts. "More saltshakers!" was the constant cry from higher up. The last cast member to quit was the original Doctor Who, William Hartnell. He went on to time-travel into the future and audition for the role of Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films, but the homophobic actor pulled out when he learned of the character's sexual orientation. He went back to 1973 to make sure the show was going along all right without him, mumbled something about coming back one day, and then blasted off for the 22nd century. The BBC, incensed that they'd hired a real Time Lord who no doubt could have saved them a bunch of money in effects, burned much of his last season.
Meanwhile, back in 1966, the producers agreed to hire one of the Beatles, Patrick Troughton, to carry on in the role of Doctor Who. Troughton was initially hesitant, and for the rest of his life would bemoan the fact that "A Day in the Life" did not have an epic recorder solo.
The Beatles were forced to hire a replacement, thus leading to the famous "Pat is Dead" theory, even though he was obviously alive and well and playing Doctor Who. He ultimately left the show in 1969, rejoined the Beatles, and turned Abbey Road from another example of White Album and Let it Be-era self-indulgence into the masterpiece it is. Shortly afterwards, Troughton became a priest. It did not end well. The BBC, incensed at his decision to leave the show to make music and spread the Gospel, burned most of his episodes.
Also in the year 1969, International Man of Mystery Austin Powers was cryogenically frozen so that one day he could face his nemesis, Doctor Evil, again. The producers of Doctor Who decided to make the next incarnation of Doctor Who an homage to Powers. They cast Jon Pertwee, who happily obliged his paymasters with an impromptu nude scene in his second episode. He was later informed that by "homage Austin Powers," the BBC had meant "copy his outfit and nothing else. Not his teeth, not his glasses, and certainly not his habit of shagging anything in sight." By this point it was 1974, and the star had gotten rather tired of partying it up every night.
He was replaced by Tom Baker, alias Rasputin. Perhaps the most famous Doctor Who of them all, Tom stayed in the role for longer than should be legal. It's actually possible that he was going to be sacked after his third year, but then the producer was sacked instead. (For more on the sacking of this particular producer, please see The Stupidest Things Ever.) During the seven years he was on the show, he married each and every one of his female co-stars. In Tom's final episode, he was strangled by his own scarf, and then he was shot, poisoned, possessed by a zombie, decapitated, subjected to vast quantities of entropy, and finally thrown off the BBC's transmission tower in an effort to get him off the show. However he survived all of this and regenerated with the help of Rupert Giles.
Realizing that once again they had a real Time Lord on their hands, the producers allowed the "new" Doctor Who, "Peter Davison," to stick around for three more years. By this time the show had gone to hell anyway, thanks to the producership of Jonathan Turner Classic Movies. He demanded that the next Doctor Who wear an obscene multicolor suit. The only taker for the job was Colin Baker. Public reaction to his suit was to put the show on hiatus. Baker's reaction to the hiatus was to gain a lot of weight. Ultimately he was fired; nobody knows the reasons why because all of the paperwork was burnt.
The last Doctor Who of the original run was Sylvester McCoy. His attempt at proving that the show wasn't a tired old mule was to play Doctor Who in almost the exact same style as Patrick Troughton. To be fair, this is what almost every Doctor Who since Troughton did, but this time the audience caught on. The show was cancelled and Jonathan Turner Classic Movies was burnt.
There were some movies in the mid-60s starring Grand Moff Tarkin, but those don't count. There was also a movie in 1996 starring an actor known only as "I," thus making him the most appropriately-named Doctor Who to date. Whether this counts or not is a matter of debate and has been the cause of a surprising number of saltshaker-related injuries.
In 1999, American filmmaker George Lucass enquired about making "Special Editions" of classic Doctor Who serials, such as The Talons of Eng-China, Genesis of the Dales, and The Caves of Andreana. Nobody has heard anything from Mr. Lucass ever again. According to Tom Baker, history was really lucky there.
In 2005, the show was revived. The ninth Doctor Who was played by Christopher Eccleston, who had to quit after one season because of an allergic reaction to his leather jacket. He was replaced by David Tennant, probably the most controversial Doctor Who since Tom Baker. Either you like this enthusiastic gentleman with his unyielding optimism, or you can't stand this skinny idiot who gets upset when anyone else gets to play the hero.
Eventually, Tennant was replaced by Matthew Smith, best known for playing Young Voldemort on the cutting room floor. His female co-star has legs. This is all anyone currently watching the show knows about either of them. Mostly because of his female co-star's legs.
Doctor Who was a television show that ran on the BBC (and later BBC1) from 1963 until 1989. It was subsequently resurrected in 2005. Among its many contributions to culture are long multicolor scarfs, an irrational fear of salt-shakers, and the knowledge of what they call French fries in France.
The show was conceived by Winston Churchill, a suspected Time Lord, in 1941 as a way of showing just how bad the world would be if the Nazis won. However production could not begin yet because no budget could be allocated to anything not essential to winning the war effort. Terry Nation's Nazi script was put on hold until the war ended.
Once the war was over, Churchill was thrown out of power. In a drunken rage, he burned Nation's draft scripts, thus setting precedent that everything associated with the show would be burnt. Fortunately, because he was drunk, he forgot to burn one of the scripts and instead locked it away in an attic somewhere.
In 1962 a man named Alice Frick, whose parents obviously hated him, discovered these scripts and proposed the creation of a television show around them. Nation's script was now unsuitable as an opening story. The production team decided that instead of Nazis, the main threat had to be nuclear war. A thirteen-episode series was commissioned: one episode to introduce the main characters, three episodes set in a nuclear wasteland, seven episodes dealing with future Nazis, and two episodes of putting all the clues together and figuring out who Doctor Who was.
Unfortunately, the scripts had to be rushed out in a hurry, because the script editor, David Whitaker, was literally on a different planet. After turning down scripts from Gene Roddenberry, because they were too optimistic, and Douglas Adams, because he was eleven at the time, Whitaker took two shots of vodka and a noseful of cocaine, sat down with his notes, and banged out some nonsense about cavemen. Then he banged out more nonsense about Doctor Who's time machine and how it was alive. Then he banged out more nonsense about the French Revolution, the Crusades, the Norman Invasion, the Battle of Culloden, Atlantis, space pirates, cave-monsters, Atlantis again, the EEC, Atlantis yet again, giant spiders, giant robots, and giant mice. He also sounded out Terry Nation about recycling The Lord of the Rings in space. Then he died of a heart attack, leaving quite a mess behind him.
The BBC realized that, while Whitaker had laid out an interesting plan, fully implementing it would take about fourteen years. With Nation's new scripts coming in, they had no choice but to go ahead and grant the show a full season. Then the show somehow became a hit with the fans, who demanded subsequent seasons. This caused some consternation among the cast, who became increasingly upset about having to spend so much time in the company of giant saltshakers. One by one, they all quit. As they did so, they were replaced with younger and sexier actors and actresses, because the writing team was slowly forgetting how to write decent scripts. "More saltshakers!" was the constant cry from higher up. The last cast member to quit was the original Doctor Who, William Hartnell. He went on to time-travel into the future and audition for the role of Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films, but the homophobic actor pulled out when he learned of the character's sexual orientation. He went back to 1973 to make sure the show was going along all right without him, mumbled something about coming back one day, and then blasted off for the 22nd century. The BBC, incensed that they'd hired a real Time Lord who no doubt could have saved them a bunch of money in effects, burned much of his last season.
Meanwhile, back in 1966, the producers agreed to hire one of the Beatles, Patrick Troughton, to carry on in the role of Doctor Who. Troughton was initially hesitant, and for the rest of his life would bemoan the fact that "A Day in the Life" did not have an epic recorder solo.
The Beatles were forced to hire a replacement, thus leading to the famous "Pat is Dead" theory, even though he was obviously alive and well and playing Doctor Who. He ultimately left the show in 1969, rejoined the Beatles, and turned Abbey Road from another example of White Album and Let it Be-era self-indulgence into the masterpiece it is. Shortly afterwards, Troughton became a priest. It did not end well. The BBC, incensed at his decision to leave the show to make music and spread the Gospel, burned most of his episodes.
Also in the year 1969, International Man of Mystery Austin Powers was cryogenically frozen so that one day he could face his nemesis, Doctor Evil, again. The producers of Doctor Who decided to make the next incarnation of Doctor Who an homage to Powers. They cast Jon Pertwee, who happily obliged his paymasters with an impromptu nude scene in his second episode. He was later informed that by "homage Austin Powers," the BBC had meant "copy his outfit and nothing else. Not his teeth, not his glasses, and certainly not his habit of shagging anything in sight." By this point it was 1974, and the star had gotten rather tired of partying it up every night.
He was replaced by Tom Baker, alias Rasputin. Perhaps the most famous Doctor Who of them all, Tom stayed in the role for longer than should be legal. It's actually possible that he was going to be sacked after his third year, but then the producer was sacked instead. (For more on the sacking of this particular producer, please see The Stupidest Things Ever.) During the seven years he was on the show, he married each and every one of his female co-stars. In Tom's final episode, he was strangled by his own scarf, and then he was shot, poisoned, possessed by a zombie, decapitated, subjected to vast quantities of entropy, and finally thrown off the BBC's transmission tower in an effort to get him off the show. However he survived all of this and regenerated with the help of Rupert Giles.
Realizing that once again they had a real Time Lord on their hands, the producers allowed the "new" Doctor Who, "Peter Davison," to stick around for three more years. By this time the show had gone to hell anyway, thanks to the producership of Jonathan Turner Classic Movies. He demanded that the next Doctor Who wear an obscene multicolor suit. The only taker for the job was Colin Baker. Public reaction to his suit was to put the show on hiatus. Baker's reaction to the hiatus was to gain a lot of weight. Ultimately he was fired; nobody knows the reasons why because all of the paperwork was burnt.
The last Doctor Who of the original run was Sylvester McCoy. His attempt at proving that the show wasn't a tired old mule was to play Doctor Who in almost the exact same style as Patrick Troughton. To be fair, this is what almost every Doctor Who since Troughton did, but this time the audience caught on. The show was cancelled and Jonathan Turner Classic Movies was burnt.
There were some movies in the mid-60s starring Grand Moff Tarkin, but those don't count. There was also a movie in 1996 starring an actor known only as "I," thus making him the most appropriately-named Doctor Who to date. Whether this counts or not is a matter of debate and has been the cause of a surprising number of saltshaker-related injuries.
In 1999, American filmmaker George Lucass enquired about making "Special Editions" of classic Doctor Who serials, such as The Talons of Eng-China, Genesis of the Dales, and The Caves of Andreana. Nobody has heard anything from Mr. Lucass ever again. According to Tom Baker, history was really lucky there.
In 2005, the show was revived. The ninth Doctor Who was played by Christopher Eccleston, who had to quit after one season because of an allergic reaction to his leather jacket. He was replaced by David Tennant, probably the most controversial Doctor Who since Tom Baker. Either you like this enthusiastic gentleman with his unyielding optimism, or you can't stand this skinny idiot who gets upset when anyone else gets to play the hero.
Eventually, Tennant was replaced by Matthew Smith, best known for playing Young Voldemort on the cutting room floor. His female co-star has legs. This is all anyone currently watching the show knows about either of them. Mostly because of his female co-star's legs.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
IG2EUS: Time Lords
The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of Time Lords:
Time Lords fall into two categories. Most of them are nasty, bureaucratic, officious, and callous. They live insular lives on the island of Hellfire, Ireland, and demand that nobody ever interfere with anything, ever. They have been known to kill hobos for interfering. They have also been known to attempt to kill cricketers because they might be a possible threat. They have been known to attempt to kill Colin Baker for having some truly awful taste in clothing.
The other type of Time Lords are fun-loving nutcases who tend to leave large swaths of destruction in their wake, but also very entertained people.
Time Lords normally have thirteen lives. However, this number can increase when exposed to the Ring of Rassilon, and it can decrease when exposed to the Gauntlet of Rassilon, and also mind probes.
Ninety-nine percent of Time Lords are white males, and all of them speak English.
The following people are confirmed to be known Time Lords:
Syd Barrett
Colin Baker
Tom Baker
James Bond*
Chewbacca
Peter Davison
Roger Delgado
Bruce Dickinson
Christopher Eccleston
Elim Garak
William Hartnell
James T. Kirk
John Lennon
The Man With No Name
Sylvester McCoy
Paul McGann
Wolfgang A. Mozart
Jimmy Page
James K. Polk
Rassilon*
Keith Richards
Teddy Roosevelt
George C. Scott
William Shakespeare
Benjamin Sisko
Agent Smith
Matt Smith
Doctor Strangelove
David Tennant
Patrick Troughton
Martin Van Buren
Vincent Van Gough
H. G. Wells
Joss Whedon
Woodrow Wilson
*It is possible that James Bond is a subsequent incarnation of Rassilon.
Time Lords fall into two categories. Most of them are nasty, bureaucratic, officious, and callous. They live insular lives on the island of Hellfire, Ireland, and demand that nobody ever interfere with anything, ever. They have been known to kill hobos for interfering. They have also been known to attempt to kill cricketers because they might be a possible threat. They have been known to attempt to kill Colin Baker for having some truly awful taste in clothing.
The other type of Time Lords are fun-loving nutcases who tend to leave large swaths of destruction in their wake, but also very entertained people.
Time Lords normally have thirteen lives. However, this number can increase when exposed to the Ring of Rassilon, and it can decrease when exposed to the Gauntlet of Rassilon, and also mind probes.
Ninety-nine percent of Time Lords are white males, and all of them speak English.
The following people are confirmed to be known Time Lords:
Syd Barrett
Colin Baker
Tom Baker
James Bond*
Chewbacca
Peter Davison
Roger Delgado
Bruce Dickinson
Christopher Eccleston
Elim Garak
William Hartnell
James T. Kirk
John Lennon
The Man With No Name
Sylvester McCoy
Paul McGann
Wolfgang A. Mozart
Jimmy Page
James K. Polk
Rassilon*
Keith Richards
Teddy Roosevelt
George C. Scott
William Shakespeare
Benjamin Sisko
Agent Smith
Matt Smith
Doctor Strangelove
David Tennant
Patrick Troughton
Martin Van Buren
Vincent Van Gough
H. G. Wells
Joss Whedon
Woodrow Wilson
*It is possible that James Bond is a subsequent incarnation of Rassilon.
IG2EUS: Pink Floyd
The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of Pink Floyd:
Pink Floyd were an English rock band, best known for composing the title track to the famous musical, The Phantom of the Opera, and the sountrack to the famous motion picture, The Wizard of Oz.
The band was fromed in 1966-ish by a displaced and delusional Time Lord named Syd Barrett. Preoccupied with the "drugs" part of "sex, drugs and rock & roll," he soon left the band to pursue this venture full-time. Before he left, they recorded one album Sgt. Piper at the Gates of the Lonely Hearts Club (1967). Following his departure, the band wrote several clueless albums, including A Saucer Full of Secretions (1968), which covered sex; Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh (1969) and The One With a Cow on the Cover (1970), which covered drugs; and Metal (1971), which covered rock and roll. Metal contained a cover of the Doctor Who theme and ended with a song called "Echoes" which took up five of the album's six sides. The band were asked if they would consider letting Stanely Kubrick use the song in his film 2001: Are We There Yet? for a considerable amount of money, but declined in favor of letting Andrew Lloyd Webber have it for free to use in a musical about a man in a mask who haunts a theater.
Tempted by the offer of scoring a movie, the band settled down in 1972-3 to record the soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz. This was possible because Syd Barrett, being a Time Lord, had access to a time machine. Once the soundtrack was finished, they wrote their next album, Wish You Were Here (1975), about him.
Now totally out of ideas, they began writing concept albums such as A Day at the Zoo, I Never Got Over My Father's Death, and Margaret Thatcher is Evil. By this point, the band was in the totalitarian grip of its lead singer, lead bassist, lead writer, manager, and only roadie, Roger Waters. He left the band after this because he couldn't stand working with people who had no ideas, and went on to have a solo career where he surrounded himself with peopel who had no ideas.
The rest of the band, which consisted of drummer Nick Mason, keyboardist Rick Wright, and guitar god David Gilmour, soldiered on for two more albums before finally calling it a day in 1994.
There has yet to be a Rock Band or Guitar Hero game about this band, probably because all of the songs are in the same tempo: slow. As far as lyrical themes go, the band has covered everything ranging from drug-induced depression and isolation to loss-induced depression and isolation to feud-induced depression and isolation.
They are one of the five biggest selling bands of all time. The soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz is one of only a handful of albums to outsell Led Zeppelin IV.
Pink Floyd were an English rock band, best known for composing the title track to the famous musical, The Phantom of the Opera, and the sountrack to the famous motion picture, The Wizard of Oz.
The band was fromed in 1966-ish by a displaced and delusional Time Lord named Syd Barrett. Preoccupied with the "drugs" part of "sex, drugs and rock & roll," he soon left the band to pursue this venture full-time. Before he left, they recorded one album Sgt. Piper at the Gates of the Lonely Hearts Club (1967). Following his departure, the band wrote several clueless albums, including A Saucer Full of Secretions (1968), which covered sex; Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh (1969) and The One With a Cow on the Cover (1970), which covered drugs; and Metal (1971), which covered rock and roll. Metal contained a cover of the Doctor Who theme and ended with a song called "Echoes" which took up five of the album's six sides. The band were asked if they would consider letting Stanely Kubrick use the song in his film 2001: Are We There Yet? for a considerable amount of money, but declined in favor of letting Andrew Lloyd Webber have it for free to use in a musical about a man in a mask who haunts a theater.
Tempted by the offer of scoring a movie, the band settled down in 1972-3 to record the soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz. This was possible because Syd Barrett, being a Time Lord, had access to a time machine. Once the soundtrack was finished, they wrote their next album, Wish You Were Here (1975), about him.
Now totally out of ideas, they began writing concept albums such as A Day at the Zoo, I Never Got Over My Father's Death, and Margaret Thatcher is Evil. By this point, the band was in the totalitarian grip of its lead singer, lead bassist, lead writer, manager, and only roadie, Roger Waters. He left the band after this because he couldn't stand working with people who had no ideas, and went on to have a solo career where he surrounded himself with peopel who had no ideas.
The rest of the band, which consisted of drummer Nick Mason, keyboardist Rick Wright, and guitar god David Gilmour, soldiered on for two more albums before finally calling it a day in 1994.
There has yet to be a Rock Band or Guitar Hero game about this band, probably because all of the songs are in the same tempo: slow. As far as lyrical themes go, the band has covered everything ranging from drug-induced depression and isolation to loss-induced depression and isolation to feud-induced depression and isolation.
They are one of the five biggest selling bands of all time. The soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz is one of only a handful of albums to outsell Led Zeppelin IV.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
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Friday, October 1, 2010
You know that show...
...the sci-fi television show that started back in the sixties, survived being cancelled, and now has more than 700 episodes in its franchise?
...the one with the literal cast of thousands, though nobody stayed a cast member for more than seven consecutive years?
...that had at least one movie made based on it, and at least one movie that, well, isn't very good?
...that re-cast the original lead at one point?
...where the pilot episode wasn't the first one aired, and had its plot recycled into another episode?
...where the first actor to play the main character was named "William" and the second actor to play the main character was named "Patrick?"
...that had Maurice Roeves, Gregg Palmer, Simon Pegg, Deep Roy, Daphne Ashbrook, Guy Siner, Christopher Neame, Barrie Ingham, Olaf Pooley, John Franklyn-Robbins and Alan Dale guest-star at one point or another?
You know, Star Trek. Also, Doctor Who.
In unrelated news, it's now a confirmed fact that Jar Jar Binks was in fact a minion of Satan.
...the one with the literal cast of thousands, though nobody stayed a cast member for more than seven consecutive years?
...that had at least one movie made based on it, and at least one movie that, well, isn't very good?
...that re-cast the original lead at one point?
...where the pilot episode wasn't the first one aired, and had its plot recycled into another episode?
...where the first actor to play the main character was named "William" and the second actor to play the main character was named "Patrick?"
...that had Maurice Roeves, Gregg Palmer, Simon Pegg, Deep Roy, Daphne Ashbrook, Guy Siner, Christopher Neame, Barrie Ingham, Olaf Pooley, John Franklyn-Robbins and Alan Dale guest-star at one point or another?
You know, Star Trek. Also, Doctor Who.
In unrelated news, it's now a confirmed fact that Jar Jar Binks was in fact a minion of Satan.
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Image of the Week: Pearl Harbor and the Fog of War
I follow a lot of naval history accounts, so this "Japanese map showing their assessment of the damage done to the United States flee...
