GoldbergBlog

Brandon Bird: Master of All Things

If you haven’t been to artist Brandon Bird’s website, you need to go RIGHT NOW. And if you have been, you need to go RIGHT NOW because he’s updated his site with some new work. I’ve only looked at two and I’m already in awe.

Brandon Bird is the master of Pocket Monsters.

Brandon Bird is the master of Halloween costumes.

Brandon Bird is the master of the missing episode of The X-Files.

And he is the master of the t-shirt I am wearing right now.

All hail Brandon Bird.

Planned Parenthood

A recent segment on ABC News spoke about the disturbing fashion trends for pre-adolescent girls. While it’s not exactly new (there was a South Park about this a few years back and even then it was already a trend) and the previous generation will always think that the new one is growing up way too fast, six-year-olds dressing like skanks is still pretty disturbing. It may seem unfair that we’re focusing on how girls dress while ignoring boys, but boys aren’t dressing in a provocative manner. To be perfectly honest, I don’t even understand how any male could dress provocatively. I’m not gay, but even if I was, what on the male fashion market is provocative? Does Macy’s have codpieces? I guess there’s tight t-shirts, but only Vic Mackey seems able to pull those off (That previous “not gay” comment may have been premature).

But there just seems to be something incredibly wrong about pre-sexual girls trying to dress sexy. It’s one thing to dress your little girl in a bikini. It’s cute. It’s acceptable. It’s not like there’s anything to show off so it’s kind of like her dressing in mommy’s clothes except mommy doesn’t get all pissed off about it when she finds out. This is more like your little girl dressed in her teenage sister’s clothes and those clothes were tailored to fit.

The logic is that these little girls soak up the marketing and the sexpot idolatry, they go to the store, and the weak parents give into their little girl’s demands because God-forbid their child be unpopular. You know what? I could stand it if my little girl was unpopular with her classmates because you know who else she’d be unpopular with? Pedophiles. Granted, sex appeal has nothing to do with their pedophilia (it’s about power, according to Dr. Huang) but it does encourage her to have sex at an earlier age because she’s already sexualized herself and if the clothes make the man (or in this case, girl) and they’re forming their identity, then they must think that sex is only natural at a pre-sexual age.

And while there may be the “girl code”, i.e., no girl puts out easy because they don’t want to be known as a slut, if mentality towards that label changes and the connotation goes from negative to positive, then that taboo is no longer in place to stop the sexuality of pre-sexual girls. Think it’s not possible to change the connotation of the word “slut”? Okay. How many women under the age of thirty do you know that wear the word “bitch” like it’s a badge of honor? As if it’s a sign of strength? I understand that it’s a matter of co-opting a word in order to deprive it of its offensive nature, but all it’s done is made those who would use it move on to the insanely more offensive term, “cunt”. And I’m sure that in twenty years, that word will be co-opted. But by then, men will have moved on to a new derogatory term. My guess is “merkin” (Firefox’s dictionary refuses to acknowledge it as a real word, but it totally is.)

The segment ends with the solution of “compromise” and learning to meet your daughter half-way. I say hell no. I’m not a parent and I don’t know if I’ll ever have a daughter, but if I do, we’re becoming Amish. I will be the worst Amish since Brother Hezekiah Munson, but at least my daughter will be clad in black from head-to-toe. Sure, I could convert to Islam and dress her in a burkah, but Muslims have to pray five times a day. I can barely remember to brush my teeth. And they’re really strict about the rules. So are the Amish, but they seem more forgiving.

Honestly, if you’re a parent, and you’re uncomfortable with your daughter dressing like a skank, then don’t let her. You’re the adult, you have the power, and she has no money to buy these clothes on her own and she has no transportation to go to the mall and shoplift. And yeah, she’ll resent you for a little while. Guess what? Children sometimes resent their parents. It happens. She’ll resent you when you don’t get her a pony for Christmas. She’ll resent you for grounding her when she comes in past curfew. She’ll resent you when your shotgun accidentally goes off in the chest cavity of her boyfriend that you hate. You’ll never be friends with your kids. But you can be the one who protects them, supports them, and helps them to grow into decent human beings.

The Poster Every Human Being Should Own

This poster just left some love stains on my heart. You’ll see:

Hot Israeli Women Soldiers > Killed By Terrorists

As a Jew, I am entitled to partake in the Taglit-Birthright trip to Israel. Even though I have friends who have gone on the trip, sing its praises, and remind me that since it is my birthright, the trip is all paid for (although I apparently may have to buy the occasional snack or souvenir; cheap Jews…), I did not find the trip appealing because getting murdered by Palestinian terrorists was not my idea of the ideal vacation, and for me, it is most definitely a vacation because as a non-practicing Jew, I have little desire to experience any kind of spiritual fulfillment-by-proximity. My spirit is filled by the words “Free Trip to Israel”. But my spirit is then crushed when I think, “You’re gonna get blown up in a cafe and you don’t even drink coffee; you just went in to look at the muffins; what a way to go,” And while my friends assured me that the trip was perfectly safe and the group was always escorted by a soldier, I still felt that the risks (however exaggerated in my own mind they may be) outweighed the benefits.

But then I remembered two very important things: 1) All Israeli women must serve in the Israeli army for two years after they turn eighteen; 2) Some Israeli women are incredibly smashable. And if you take a hot woman who fears that she may die in combat (however slim that possibility may be) and you present to her a young, virile, American male she can “hit it and quit it,” so to speak, then my chances for sex skyrocket from 0% to 5%. And as a man at 0%, I can’t sexually afford to ignore those incredibly slim odds.

Sure, I can visit the Wailing Wall and take in a culture that is both familiar and exotic, but more importantly, I will have the opportunity to have sex with a woman that knows how to kill me quickly and efficiently using only her bare hands. L’chaim!

Harry Reid: Weak-Sauce Democrat

I’ve given Speaker Pelosi a bit of grief but she’s not the only “powerful” Democrat who’s content to stand by and let our country slowly get raped to death. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is also content to let our country succumb to forces of corruption and the perversion of our laws.

Here’s the story: Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-VA) is a telecom buttboy who has placed a provision in the FISA bill that would give telecoms retroactive immunity for helping the government’s warrantless wiretapping program. If this isn’t buying our government, I don’t know what is. Contributions to Jay Rockefeller from Verizon totaled $23,500 in March 2007 and contributions from AT&T totaled $19,350. Previously, Rockefeller had barely received any money from either of these companies or any telecoms.

Senator and Presidential Candidate Chris Dodd (D-CT) proposed to place a “hold” on the bill and filibuster if necessary. Dodd’s really stepped up and why he lacks attention of the mainstream media, he’s proved to me that he’s a serious candidate and worthy of consideration.

But along comes Harry Reid who apparently will disregard the honored tradition of respecting holds and bring the bill to the floor (and certain passage because God forbid the Democrats actually use their majority to stop injustice). If he does this, if he does not back Dodd and stnad up to this administrations and major corporations that are using their power to steal our right to privacy, then the Democrats are completely fucked in both houses and our supposed majority means nothing. We couldn’t override Bush’s veto in the House so millions of children will have to get sick and die.

The Democrats have been in power for almost a year and have yet to score a major victory over a President who has an approval rating in free-fall. The Republicans always carry themselves as the party of strength whereas Dems are the part of weakness. But if the Democrats can’t do anything to protect us and change the direction of this country when the American people have given them the request to do so, then their weakness stems not from Republican spin but because they have truly earned the title through their own cowardice.

The Daily Show Forever

The Daily Show now has its own, easy to recall website: dailyshow.com. What makes this website great is unlike digging through ComedyCentral.com’s shitstorm of a website, the videos are fairly easy to access (a date-archive system would be nice), go back to 1999, and best of all, feature no expiration date for embedding. Yes, there are brief ads but they’re totally unobtrusive. If we have to suffer through ads in order to enjoy free content, then this is the way to do it.

Also, Jon Stewart has signed to do the show till 2010, keeping us laughing well into the oncoming apocalypse.

In honor of the show, I present to you a classic favorite: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert discuss Colbert’s real name (which might pose problems in his upcoming bid for president):

I Want to Believe in the Creed

There are three things I pray for every night before I go to bed: the safety of my family and friends; peace on earth; and for Assassin’s Creed to live up to its potential. It looks fantastic and I think “How could this game be as bad as I’ve heard from people who have played it?” And the only rational conclusion I can come up with is that if you built the game, the of course you can play it perfectly. But if you’re new, you’re going to make tons of mistakes and what should be a game with a ton of freedom is going to end up being endlessly frustrating and prohibitive. And you can see the subtle signs of this like when producer Jade Raymond says you shouldn’t approach those guards because they look like they’re barring the way or you should walk past the guys holding crates so as not to knock them over and draw attention to yourself. But if the game has the poor hit detection that I’m hearing about, you’re going to find all the stealth is for naught because you got a little too close to guard and now you’re on the run again.

There are other possible problems. Jade mentions that if you tried to sword-murder the guy who spotted you instead of using a throwing knife, you’d be fucked because you drew the attention of too many guards. Well how does that really speak to the freedom of the game? I understand they want a reasonable level of difficulty but that’s a pretty big leap to assume that someone will just know to use the knife and that if they don’t they’re probably going to fail the mission.

Something that is clearly a problem is the fighting. It seems that they’ve opted for this clumsy one-on-one combat where you’re in a pit full of guards but they only attack you one at a time. The others stand around like morons waiting for their turn to be murdered.

Please God, let this game be good. And let us have peace on Earth. Amen.

Reheated!

No ideas are popping into my mind cavity right now but I’m trying to do a blog entry at least once per weekday, so for your viewing pleasure, I’ve formatted and updated my lists for the Top 10 and Worst 5 of 2005. Marvel at how my proficiency as a writer hasn’t improved in two years (but really, how do you improve on excellence?)

Top 10 Films of 2005

Worst 5 Films of 2005

Brütal Legend Makes Me Sad

There is little doubt in my mind that Brütal Legend will be brilliant. Psychonauts is one of the best games ever made. I wish I had easy access to Tim Schaefer’s other games but I don’t have a DeLorean and even if I did, it would have to be equipped with a Mr. Fusion in order to generate the 1.21 gigawatts necessary to power the flux capacitor (This reminds me: isn’t about time we had a good Back to the Future videogame? You could pimp out the DeLorean, sneak around in BTTF: Part II, play the world’s easiest drinking game with Doc Brown…actually, nevermind. The game would end up sucking. No use in dragging one of the greatest film trilogies (and even Part III is acceptable) through the mud).

But no one other than hardcore gamers who were in the know bought Psychonauts. Unless a game starts with “Madden,” “Halo”, or “Grand Theft Auto”, it will have a tough time getting older gamers to open their wallets (Sure, Mario and Zelda games sell great but they’ve had about twenty years to establish a brand). Imagine if in movies, the only films that were successful were franchise flicks. Granted, these are the ones that make the most money, but they’re also the ones that cost the most. Films like Superbad and Knocked Up would be under-marketed, unnoticed, and totally flop at the box office instead of making $121 million and $148 million, respectively.

Brütal Legend is destined to financially flop because it’s clearly genre bending, very stylish, and not easy to stuff into an easy, predetermined category. And while you could argue that Jack Black will be a selling point for the game, I’d like to remind you that Black has never opened a film based solely on his presence. Yes, School of Rock did well but it had fantastic word-of-mouth and generally positive reviews. Since then, the only film he’s tried to open by himself is Nacho Libre, which granted, did do well but paled to the grosses of School of Rock and Jared Hess’ previous film, Napoleon Dynamite (it was a small indie flick; I don’t know if you heard of it). While you could point to the success of King Kong or The Holiday, he wasn’t carrying the entire film. There were enough stars or other elements (love, giant apes) to attract viewers. So calling your game Brütal Legend and saying it’s from the creator of Psychonauts and features the voice of Jack Black isn’t going to get it off shelves. It will go in the ranks of great but underplayed games, alongside Ico and Beyond Good and Evil.

And that’s the marketplace. I love that sites like 1UP, Destructoid, and GameTrailers, devote so much time and energy to so many videogames and I appreciate that. I really and truly do. But they should know as much as anyone that while the hardcore gamers are always trying to find the great games that are gonna fly under the radar, the best selling games are the ones with a pedigree. Ironically, the non-franchise titles that gain that pedigree only get it through the work of the hardcore. So why wasn’t Psychonauts a huge success? I wish I had the answer. I truly do because then, I might know how to stop Brütal Legend from sharing a similar fate.

Guillermo Del Toro’s Proof of Talent: BLADE II

Guillermo Del Toro is one of the best directors working today and if you need me to tell you that, then clearly you’ve never seen any of his films. The guy was absolutely robbed of the Best Foreign Film Oscar for Pan’s Labyrinth but the only film of his that I don’t like is Mimic and that one was taken away from him (to read more about it, you can check out the gossip-heave Down and Dirty Pictures by Peter Biskind; also note that Del Toro was too classy to note how Miramax fucked him on the film). But for me, the film that proves Del Toro’s talent isn’t The Devil’s Backbone or Pan’s Labyrinth, but Blade II. It’s not that I think Blade II is better than these films, but rather that it was a film that could have easily been utter crap had other directors tried to take a shot at it.

To begin, I am not a fan of the original Blade. I think Stephen Dorff is a terrible actor and a whiny villain. I don’t think the character of Blade is particularly interesting (he’s vampire Batman, essentially and Alfred is more of an ass-kicker) and the only memorable part of the entire film is when he presses Donal Logue’s face up against a moving subway train. But it was financially successful and New Line ordered up a sequel. Enter Del Toro.

Now all the elements are there that play to Del Toro’s strengths: there’s the comic book world (although clearly Hellboy is closer to his own heart), there’s the opportunity for fun monsters and imaginative gore, and there’s even a grandfather/mentor figure. I’ve always found this last aspect of his films most intriguing. In Cronos it’s Jesus Gris (Federico Luppi) who’s actually the main character instead of the supporting role, in The Devil’s Backbone it’s Professor Casares (Luppi again), in Blade II it’s Whistler (Kris Kristofferson), in Hellboy it’s Professor Broom (John Hurt), and to a lesser extent, it’s Dr. Ferriero (Álex Angulo). And all these characters have some relation to death. And with Del Toro, I think it’s more than just a standard narrative trope.

Anyway, back to Blade II. So all the elements are available but it takes Del Toro to bring them out and weave them into a downright amazing action-horror flick. In some ways, I wish Hellboy was rated R, not because I think it needs to be, but because he’s such a master with the grotesque that he makes gore beautiful but still shocking. Yet the film never forgets the action or the humor. It’s a real testament to his directorial style that he can make film as different as Blade II and Pan’s Labyrinth and yet you know they’re from the same guy. It’s just that Blade II knows what it is and it knows it doesn’t have to hit the deeper notes of Pan’s because it’s main goal is to entertain. And it does this in spades.

Before The Matrix Reloaded got all the acclaim for using CGI stunt doubles in the Burly Brawl, Del Toro already did it with a fight scene between Blade and two ninja vamps. And while Reloaded may have had more CGI stuntmen, it did not have the humor and wit of Blade II. That film is constantly entertaining and it even gives the tremendously dour Blade a few quips and the jokes work. And he didn’t have to put in those jokes (like he had to with Hellboy or else they would have been notably absent) or he could have overdone it like David Goyer did in Blade: Trinity, but there’s just the right balance. And while Goyer is credited with the film’s script, Del Toro’s fingerprints are all over that baby.

Blade II is just constantly impressive. With Pan’s Labyrinth and to a lesser extent, Hellboy, I expected greatness. Those were Del Toro’s babies and he raised ‘em up big and strong. Blade II was an adopted child and it’s in far exceeding any expectation of an already established character and moderately successful origin film that Del Toro stepped up and proved to the American mainstream that when left to his own devices, few could match his amazing talent. While most didn’t learn his name until Pan’s Labyrinth, looking over his filmography, Blade II is the surprise standout that shows Del Toro’s massive reach never extends his mighty grasp.

Oh, I also hear from people who’ve met him and developed friendships with him that he’s an incredibly warm, affectionate, and all-around nice guy. So that’s cool.