Darth Vader versus M. Bison

The new Star Wars III reminded me of how Darth Vader is the greatest movie villain ever. That made me think of the other great villains. Of course, there's Agent Smith in The Matrix, the Joker in Batman, the Mad Bomber in Speed, the Alien and the Predator, Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs, and Hans Gruber in Die Hard. But one of the best villains in movie history has gone unnoticed because he was in one of the lousiest movie ever: M. Bison in Streetfighter.

Raul Julia gave the performance of his life as the egomaniacal dictator who had nightmarish goals and the power to bring them to life. M. Bison was clearly insane, but not in the slobbering, wisecracking madness of most movie villains. He had a calm, even regal air as he commanded his forces, while guiding them to kidnap the Queen Mother or slaughter innocent humanitarian aid workers. It was as if he couldn't see his own madness, living in a world of his own. Plus, unlike most world rulers, he could roll up his sleeves and beat the crap out of anyone who dared oppose him. I'd like to see Tony Blair do that. And he was ambitious. M. Bison wanted nothing less than world conquest, and he had a plan for doing it. While Darth Vader was always in control, M. Bison could suddenly snap and blow up Hawaii for fun.

Yeah, Streetfighter was a lousy movie, but I defy anyone to watch M. Bison and not be impressed. He may not have been the best villain ever, but he was certainly up there.

Never Sleep Again: Maggots in the Brain

Anyone who's ever seen the movie Alien or even Star Trek II will feel a shiver of horror at the idea of being invaded by some hideous creature who slips into your body and eats you alive. We cling to the comfort that such things don't happen in real life. Well, prepare to scream in horror at this true story...

A woman in Thailand went to the hospital, complaining of pain in her cheek. When the doctors looked in her nose, they found a nest of maggots consuming her nasal cavity. Turns out a fly laid eggs in her nose and they hatched, using her nose as food. When the doctors dug the maggots out, they found they were headed for her brain.

Don't believe it? Sky News even has a picture of the maggots they dug out. The same hospital also reported a case of a man with a sore throat discovering a live leech nesting in his throat. Mental note: never go to Thailand.

Urine Disposed

What's up with guys who wanna talk to you at the urinal? When I go, I go to do business, not have conversations. But some guys will greet me, ask me questions, like we're standing around a water-cooler instead of hunched over a drain with our units hanging out. I'm just not that comfortable. Sometimes I'm in there and I hear guys come in talking, do their business talking, and leave talking. To me, going to the bathroom is like a bank job; you wanna sneak in, get the job done, and leave with as little notice as possible. When people start talking to me, it feels so bizarre. It's like eating lunch while somebody wants you to go dancing. That should be a public service announcement - "Talking and peeing, they just don't mix."

Flashback Friday: Gumfighter

Most gum commercials are just about kids chewing the gum, maybe floating around like balloons. But back in the eighties, they made a western. Hubba Bubba Bubble Gum made a series of commercials featuring the Gum Fighter.

Set in a western town, other men would come and challenge the Gum Fighter (who was an almost exact double of John Wayne) to duels. They would stand in the main street and blow a bubble with their inferior brand of gum, and the Gum Fighter would blow a bubble with Hubba Bubba. Their bubbles would pop and the townpeople would recoil in horror. Would the Gum Fighter be defeated at last? No, because then the Gum Fighter would casually peel his gum off his face while his opponent ran off with gum all over his face. The Gum Fighter would turn to the camera and say his classic catchphrase: "Big bubbles, no troubles." So cool.

Of course, I ran out and bought Hubba Bubba Bubble Gum, but no one challenged me to a duel. Hubba Bubba did indeed peel off your face, but I also discovered that Hubba Bubba has more sugar than any other brand of gum. Heck, even cookies didn't have that much sugar. When I chewed it, I could actually crunch on the sugar crystals mixed in. I think at least one of my cavities can be blamed on Hubba Bubba.

TV Acres - Good overview of the Gum Fighter. Apparently, Hubba Bubba was wildly unpopular and discontinued for decades. The fact that I never noticed says something about the brand. The Gum Fighter, Don Collier, even has his own website.

Top Ten Star Wars Moments

I normally hate Top Ten lists because they're so subjective. But when I stumbled across an article at MSN on the top ten moments in the Star Wars series, I had to read it. It's pretty even-handed, taking not only the original series' moments, but some from the new movies. Even I had to admit that the Darth Maul fight and the Jango Fett battle were awesome.

But just as I was about to link to it here, I found another list. And another. Somewhere in the middle lies the truth. So here they are: MSN, Evening Times, Virgin, Colorado Springs Gazette, and most important, the fans' opinions at Comingsoon.net.

And for balance, the worst moments in Star Wars.

Nobody Beats the Whiz

NFL player Ontarrio Smith was detained in the airport when they found a vial of white powder in his luggage. I know what you're thinking...another athelete on drugs, what's the big deal? Well, it wasn't drugs. It was dried urine.

It turned out that Ontarrio was carrying a kit called the Original Whizzinator. It's designed to let you pass drug tests. You mix the dried urine with water, and give that to the tester. But what, you ask, about the guy who watches you whiz? That's where the flesh-colored prosthetic penis comes in. You stick that out of your shorts and pour the fake urine through it. But wouldn't it be cold? No, it also comes with a heating pack to warm it up. Somebody put some serious thought into this thing.

What struck me first was, where do they get the dried urine? Is there a urine factory out there somewhere? A big factory where guys come in, drink about ten gallons of water, and stand in front of a urinal all day? I can just see having that job...called in to the boss' office: "I'm very concerned about your work lately. You know the daily quota is five gallons of urine a day, and you've only produced two. I don't think you're working hard enough. Why, everytime I walk by your desk, I see you doing paperwork. I can't remember the last time I saw you wandering by the coffee machine or chatting around the water-cooler. Next time I catch you not standing around the water-cooler, you're fired!"

Here's the capper - the Whizinator is $150, urine is $10 extra. I don't know what drugs cost, but wouldn't it be cheaper to just not use drugs? How many junkies can afford this thing? If you're gonna invest in that kind of money to avoid a drugtest, you might consider rehab. Buying that is like saying, "I'm doing drugs now and will continue in the near future, so I'd better be ready." That's like paying a year's rent in advance for a room in a crackhouse. You'd better overdose in ten years, otherwise you won't be getting your money's worth.

Giving Wendy The Finger

Well, they finally found the source of the infamous finger that lady "found" in a bowl of Wendy's chili. As amazing as it is to say, the story of a severed finger in a bowl of fast-food chili just keeps getting weirder. This has got to be the dumbest scam ever. Hasn't this lady ever heard of putting dead mice in food? A lot harder to trace.

News Nuggets for 5/11/05

In an ABC special, a former contestant of American Idol accused judge Paula Abdul of coaching him and then having sex with him. Even more disturbing, he accused Simon Cowell of doing the same thing with Clay Aiken.

A long search for a missing bride revealed that she had faked her own kidnapping and fled to Las Vegas to escape the wedding. That's funny, I didn't even know Michael Jackson was engaged.

The prosecution rested its case in the trial against Michael Jackson. The prosecution team has impressed many during this trial by achieving what seemed to be impossible - making Michael Jackson look innocent.

Falling Idols

I've never liked American Idol. I think Jim Rome said it best when he called it American Karaoke. So when I heard a scandal threatened to bring it down, I was so there. I saw the ABC special "Fallen Idol" and expected it to be a "he-said, she-said" type of thing. No way. They had phone records, phone messages, and witnesses that all proved Paula Abdul had a relationship with a contestant during the show. Did she sleep with him like Clark claimed? Who knows, but he had some pretty detailed things to say on Howard Stern. I believe him and I'm stunned that Paula would do something so stupid. Then again, the whole show is a crock, anyway. But it did put Paula Abdul in a new light. She seemed like a washed-up pop singer before, but now she's hot. Who knew she was secretly a smoldering cauldron of lust. Wish I could get her to judge my singing contest, if you know what I mean. Uh...yeah.

Flashback Friday: Kidd Video

It's rare to find a television show that doesn't translate outside of its time period. Even The Brady Bunch, with its groovy shirts and bell-bottoms, holds up. But this Friday, let's journey back to a cartoon show that could never exist in any other time...Kidd Video. It was basically an animated version of MTV, about a group of kids who get sucked through a mirror into a cartoon world called the Flipside. Everything about this show screamed "the eighties," from the synthesizer-laden music to the fairy who looked like Tinkerbell with leg warmers. It bent over backwards to be weird. How about a car that had a mouth that opened so you could walk down its tongue and leave? Or a fairy who had to sneeze to get stronger? And of course, music videos. I haven't seen this show in years, but just my memories of it feel dated, so I can't imagine the actual program would be any better. The sad part is, once upon a time, multi-colored suspenders were cool.

The best website for Kidd Video is Kidd Video's Flipside. You can even download episodes if you have broadband. I don't, so...if you happen to have DSL and a CD burner, hook a brother up.

News Nuggets

"People" magazine released its annual "50 Most Beautiful People" issue this week. Once again, by an astonishing coincedence, all fifty of them are rich and famous. Last year's most beautiful person, Jude Law, is not this year's most beautiful person, which means over the course of a year he has become hideously ugly.

George Lucas announced at a convention that he plans to create two Star Wars-themed television shows. Just what this world needs, another reason for geeks to stay indoors.

Toads have been mysteriously exploding in Germany in a case that's baffled scientists. One theory - the toads are being kissed by Camilla Parker-Bowles.

Yes, Prince Charles did marry his long-time mistress Camilla Parker-Bowles several weeks ago. The marriage caused massive earthquakes all over England from the Royal Family rolling in their collective graves. On the plus side, the prospect of Camilla becoming queen has driven British scientists on a quest to make the Queen Mother immortal.

Cars went out of control at a NASCAR race, causing a huge twenty-one car pileup that almost managed to make the race interesting. Officials claimed to be upset at the crash, but off-the-record were quoted as saying, "Them hicks sure do love the crashes."

Baseball commissioner Bud Selig called for a stronger drug-testing policy for the sport. The first and boldest step? Testing for drugs.

Scientists are Stupid

When you're a kid and you sit through science class, you're basically taught that we know everything. Dinosaurs, the color blue, VCRs, yeah, we got it all. Except scientists don't know everything. Did you know there are fierce arguments about why planes fly or how aspirin works or how crude oil is created? So for all those kids sitting through science class right now getting brainwashed, here are the top 13 things scientists don't understand by the New Scientist magazine. And believe me, they aren't the only ones. Stay in school, then get a real job. Or become a science teacher.

Flashback Sunday: Dr. Shrinker

Once upon a time in the 70's, Sid and Marty Krofft owned children's television. Seriously. They made children's television their bee-yatch. And they cranked out a lot of shows, most of them horrible. I spent some time going through them, but I could do Flashbacks on all of them, except Electra-Woman and Dyna-Girl, which I missed somehow. What a shame, since they were hot. I decided on Dr. Shrinker, because it seems to be the most obscure.

Literally all I remembered for this show was the theme song, and not even the whole theme song. Just the part where it goes "Dr. Shrinker! Dr. Shrinker!" And some kids running. Turns out it was about these kids who stumble across an island with a mad scientist named Dr. Shrinker.

And with a name like that, he'd better invent a shrinking machine. I mean, imagine Dr. Shrinker going to a science conference and introducing himself as "Dr. Shrinker." "Oh, so you shrink things?" "Well, no, I'm actually a marine biologist. And I'm working on a cure for cancer." "So you shrink tumors?" "No, I'm trying to break them down with ultrasound." "Oh. You should try to shrink things." And imagine the jokes at school. "Hey, there's Weenie. Hey, Weenie Shrinker!" Apparently, the curse of living with the name Dr. Shrinker drove him to madness, but also gave him the burning desire to shrink things. And so he created a shrinking machine.

Bad timing for the kids...the doctor decides to shrink them. Why? I don't know. I guess he was using them as prototypes for his new line of miniature children. "Got problems with your kids? Cost too much to feed and clothe? Use Dr. Shrinker's new Kid Shrinker."

Of course, the kids escape and spend the rest of the series trying to a) get back to normal, b) keep from being captured by Dr. Shrinker, and c) get off the island. To me, all these goals are mutually exclusive. Avoiding being captured just means spending the rest of their lives six inches tall on an island. Getting off the island means spending the rest of their lives six inches tall. Getting back to normal is good, but then the doctor captures and shrinks them again. Probably too many goals for one series.

I actually liked this show, because I wanted to be small. All the giant stuff was cool. Turns out this was a rip-off of Land of the Giants, which I also never saw. Sounds like a better show, too. With all the television I watched in my life, I'm amazed there are still shows I missed.

Links
*The best webpage on Dr. Shrinker, but it's still not much.
*The theme song from a cool website...check out the Disturbing Children Book section, it's hilarious.
Categories: entertainment

Hello Kitty?

Like everyone else, I've seen Hello Kitty on lunchboxes, posters, stickers, but I never really knew who or what it was. I always assumed Hello Kitty came from a cartoon show or something. In reality, the character exists solely to stick on products. Check out this retrospective at Hilary Magazine.

Digital Dieting

You ever look at an amazingly hot picture of your favorite actress and think, "Wow, she's almost too beautiful." Yeah, me either. But did you ever wonder how much was real and what was digital?

That's why I hate Cosmopolitan. That's because they always airbrush the heck out of their cover models. Even my favorite actresses like Jennifer Love Hewitt and Angelina Jolie look fake in their hands. I found an interesting website that shows before and after of an airbrushed model. When you see the magic they can do, you'll never look at any picture the same again.
Categories: misc

Movie of the Lost

It's official...Will Ferrell has signed on to play the father in the new Land of the Lost movie, which means it's now on the fast track. I'm totally looking forward to this movie, because I think Ferrell could do it right. They made a new version in 1991, but they took the concept too seriously. Even the original didn't take itself that seriously. Hopefully, Will Ferrell will give the show the wacky, campy feel it needs. Sort of a Brady Bunch Movie meets Jurassic Park. And this a week after our Flashback on Land of the Lost. Coincedence? Probably.

Even Little Vader Hates Star Wars

It turns out that not only did the fans hate the little kid in "Phantom Menace," so did the little kid. Jake Lloyd, the boy who was given such classic lines as "yippeee!!" has done his first interview in six years for MTV.com. Turns out he's been in seclusion all these years, trying to recover from the humiliation of that movie. And he's sixteen! Can you believe it's been that long? How time flies.

We also have an exclusive interview with the other most hated character in Star Wars, Jar Jar Binks.

Q: What drove you into hiding?
A: Oh, meesa be gettin' death threats from muy-muy fans. Meesa seen cartoon where Jar Jar get chopped up. Meesa no like it, so meesa sayin' bye-bye. Jar Jar bein' in college for few years, thinkin' on Art History major. Meesa also been doin' few independent films, plays off-Broadway, and commercials overseas.

Q: How have you coped with the criticism?
A: It'sa bein' hard on Jar Jar. So many people be hatin' Jar Jar. Meesa be seein' all dat, meesa wanna bury head in da sand. Jar Jar even get into the prescription pain medication. Dat be makin' Jar Jar all crazy up in head for long time, but Boss be doin' intervention last year. Meesa go into rehab, get cleaned up. Meesa also be goin' to therapy, makin' muy-muy progress on self-actualization. Jar Jar be knowin' it not Jar Jar people be hatin'. It be character on film. Meesa be knowin' his limits now, learn to love Jar Jar first.

Q: Did you ever take some of the criticism to heart, try to improve on your character in the second film?
A: Me be wantin' good scripts, good lines. Meesa hire writer to help out wit' Attack of the Clones. Me wanna make subplot where Jar Jar be gettin' smart, become Jedi like little Annie. But Lucas, he no listenin'. He be puttin' in more scenes of me trippin' on bantha poodoo, hittin' head, stuff like dat. So I be askin' George Lucas, "cut me outta dere." Only have few scenes in Clones, havin' no scenes in third episode. Jar Jar outta dere.

Q: What will you be appearing in next?
A: Meesa gonna do Death of a Salesman at off-Broadway playhouse in September. Meesa also be in studio, got a new album comin' out wit' best buddies Eve and 50 Cent. But meesa be really wantin' to direct.
Categories: entertainment

News Nuggets

Britney Spears confirmed that she is pregnant, thus ending the sexual fantasies of men all over the world. The unborn fetus has already signed a music contract, gotten a quickie divorce, and kissed Madonna on the mouth.

A hotel in France burned down this week, killing twenty. The French guests died when they surrendered to the smoke and flames.

Millions have flooded to Rome to visit the tomb of Pope John Paul, but one person has been barred from visiting the tomb - Sinead O'Connor. The tomb is so popular that Disney has announced plans to build a theme park around it called PopeLand.

The mother of Michael Jackson's accuser took the stand, and begged the jury not to judge her. Michael Jackson immediately tried to do the same thing, just in case it worked. The mother became so distraught that she had to be subdued with a Coke can full of Jesus Juice. But really, just because she let a suspected pedophile lick her son's head and sleep in the same bed, does that make her a bad mother? Yes.

The president signed the bankruptcy reform bill, which reduces the number of people who can file for bankruptcy. The bill also issues everyone in America a pre-approved credit card.

Two enormous bombs exploded in Baghdad today when the first showings of "Alexander" and "Gigli" aired in Iraq.

The Washington Nationals played and won the first baseball game in D.C. in decades, but the winner was cast in doubt when the opposing team demanded a recount. The president threw out the first pitch, which was helped across the plate by several players in black suits and sunglasses.

Mad Max: Beyond Blunderdome

A group of fans of the Mad Max movies were on their way to a marathon of the series, when they came up with a great idea. Why not re-create the classic battle at the end of Mad Max 2: Road Warrior, where the bad guys surrounded and tried to take down a moving oil tanker? So they got themselves some cars, a tanker truck, and some plastic machine guns and had themselves a time.

Great idea...except they forgot to warn the people who lived alongside the highway in San Antonio where the re-enactment took place. The police were flooded with calls that a "militia" was attacking an oil tanker. Eleven people were arrested - nine for obstruction of a highway, and two for possession of knives. Worst of all, the movie marathon was cancelled.

I know what you're thinking, and I'm thinking it, too; that was a really stupid thing to do, and man, that sounds awesome. I wish I had a video of that. One of the guys arrested said he couldn't understand why people couldn't figure out it was a prank. I guess the guy with the leather strap over his eyes and mouth, peacock feathers on his head, and pants with the butts cut out weren't enough clues for them.

We don't have the video (yet), but you can check out some homemade Mad Max costumes...I think they might have looked something like this.

Flashback: Land of the Lost

This week, we journey back to the Land of the Lost, the classic 70's TV show. I think this show succeeded at tapping into the love of dinosaurs we all had before science got in the way. Okay, so the T-Rex and the caveman never really co-existed. All right, so there's no way to go back in time. But what if the fantasy world of dinosaurs and cavemen really existed, and anyone could get there if they took the wrong step? That's what this show was. Plus, you had a little Swiss Family Robinson thrown in. There's a fantastic article in Wikipedia on this show.

Unlike a Virgin

How far we've come...five years after Britney was wearing schoolgirl outfits and preaching abstinence before marriage, Britney's lived with a guy, gotten tattoos, started using profanity, smoking, and drinking, written a song about masturbating, gotten married twice, divorced once, and now she's pregnant.

That last one only confirms my belief about gossip, which is to consider it true until proven false. Britney's been saying for months that she's not pregnant, even while tabloids were writing stories and showing photos proving she was. Oh no, she just gained weight. She's buying maternity clothes. Oh no, she's buying them for her cousin. She's wearing a maternity dress. Oh no, she was just wearing it for a costume party. She's admitted to the hospital for a possible miscarriage. Yeah, okay, she's pregnant.

The most interesting wrinkle in this story is that her marriage to Loser McDo-Nothing, also known as Kevin Federline, is rumored to be on the rocks. They're "allegedly" sleeping in separate rooms and calling on Kabbalah priests to try to save their marriage. That leaves the possibility that Britney might end up divorced twice and a single mother before she's twenty-five. Now all she needs to do is die in a flaming car wreck caused by an overdose of drugs, and the train wreck that was the life of Britney Spears will be complete. I'll bet Behind the Music is prepping the cameras as we speak.

C is for Celery

Brace yourself...the Cookie Monster will be eating vegetables. That's right, Sesame Street will be introducing a storyline where the Cookie Monster is taught that cookies are a "sometimes" food, and that it would be better to eat fruits and vegetables. I'm not usually one to cry "politically-incorrect" or Thought Police, but even this smacks of going a little too far. Leave me my Muppets, that's all I ask.

Come On Baby, Work Them Daisies...

When they first announced that Britney Spears was aiming for the role of Daisy Duke in the new Dukes of Hazzard movie, I was horrified. Britney just doesn't have the sexy innocence of the original Daisy. I heaved a sigh of relief when I found out Jessica Simpson got the role. Finally, new pics of Jessica Simpson in her Daisy Dukes have arrived and I have inspected them for accuracy.

You know what? Jessica's cute, but she has almost no butt. I know the original Daisy Duke wasn't exactly Jennifer Lopez, but the character whose name is synonymous with short-shorts needs to have something to fill them out. On the other hand, Britney has a reasonably-sized trunk. They could at least have padded Jessica up a little.

While we're on the subject, since when is Daisy Duke blonde? They couldn't get Jessica to dye her hair brown?

Gay Who

Only days after the enormously successful launch of the brand-new Doctor Who series on the BBC, it's all come crashing down again. The celebrated actor Christopher Eccleston who plays the new Doctor has refused to sign up for a second season, leaving the BBC with a mountain of toys and other merchandising that will be obsolete by the time it hits the shelves.

What's even more interesting than the departure is the reason. It seems Eccleston finds his character too gay. I haven't personally seen the show, but this photo doesn't exactly screen macho, does it? And the fact that the new Who writer used to write the gay series Queer as Folk isn't exactly a plus, either. There's a rumor that Orlando Bloom will be the next Doctor Who. All I'll say about that is I don't think he'll mind the gay-oriented approach (cough cough).

O.J. 2.0

And so it's begun again. Robert Blake, famed actor and murder suspect, was acquittedof all charges. The uproar was immediate - rightous indignation, questioning of thelegal system, vows to never forgive him. Very familiar, isn't it? Almost like thetrial of a former football player a few years back. Blake and O.J. both need money -they should go on tour. Call it the Injustice Tour, where they go around the country,stand on stage, and let people throw vegetables and abuse at them for two hours.

To be honest, I had the same reaction when I heard Blake was acquitted. "Howcould this happen? He's guilty, isn't he? Jay Leno said so." So unlike most people, I actually went to CourtTV and did some reading up on the trial. I'm not saying Blake is innocent, but just like O.J., the case wasn't as open-and-shut as everyone led me to believe. There wasn't a shred of direct evidence tying him to the murder. No fingerprints, no murder weapon, no witnesses, nothing. So I suggest all those who are quick to judge Blake do the research.

Bottom line - it's not society's job to judge and execute punishment. That's what courts are for. The court found Blake innocent. Move on, people. Like there's a chance of that happening.