Is Disney Steampunk? You would be surprised how much so.

Pro-tip: They have been steamy for almost as long as they have been around.

Tim Burton's Disney's Alice in Wonderland review

Not just a kid's movie, but exceptionally serious. Shocking I know, or maybe I am reading too much into it. YOU DECIDE!

is steampunk a sub-culture

i had a hell of a night getting beaten down by popular media. first there was a poor showing on ncis: los angeles. they could have called it anything, but wanted some realism and picked "steampunk" /sigh. then some friends got wise to snot topic was starting a steampunk line. i had known this for a while now and well... that clothing line was just sad and disapointing. what happened next was a heated discussion on a friends my spaze's status comments. the bomb dropped. steampunk was not a sub-culture. the following is a direct message i sent to a friend regarding the event and my nerd rage. names have been changed.

i mean, what DOES make a sub-culture? unique fashion, music, literature, maybe even films. oh shit, goth has all that. so does steampunk. are their steampunk clubs? i would not say right now. not regularly. sure malediction society could be said to have started as one, but only now is it really catching on. but it is only catching. i bet in 1975 there were no goth clubs either.
sure, anime is an obvious inspiration to steampunk. but anime did inspire all the comics and films. howle's moving castle and steamboy are great. they did a lot.
how did wild wild west and briscoe country, jr be inspired by anime?
what about video games? how about the entire final fantasy series? especially 1-6. skies of arcadia. and there are a ton of little flash games coming out all the time. luke sent me a link to a kick ass one.
what about literature? jules verne, obviously, but damn near any good bit of victoriana is a source. and william gibson's "the difference engine" i always tell people steampunk started out as a genre of literature rebelling against cyberpunk. instead of having the future now, what if the present was in the past? from the concept everything else flows from.
everything from league of extraordinary gentlemen, abney park, to the god damn horrible van helsing film.
steampunk IS young. sure i was into forever really, but only now are people dressing like it. trust me, no one was as surprised by that than me. it was a neat feeling to not be "the only one".
i can go on and on. i think i am done venting. i seriously need to relax.



thoughts, comments, concerns, please share them.

Green/White/Red Ranger Danger

Tommy's a UFC MMA fighter now. Will his opponents disappear when he punches them in the chest? We shall see...

story: http://www.tmz.com/2009/09/02/green-power-ranger-white-ranger-jason-david-frank-mma-ufc/

Disney acquires Marvel: The beginning of armageddon

Reuters: Disney to Acquire Marvel Entertainment

I hope everyone realizes that this means no more Marvel fan art. No more Marvel fan fiction. No more Marvel fan-made youtube videos.... Disney are notorious for pulling Disney-related videos from youtube, claiming 'copyright infringement'. They even pull their own trailers.

So this is the beginning of the end folks. Say goodbye to a once great company.

It has been swallowed by the beast.

Turtles Forever!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtles_Forever

A new direct-to-DVD movie featuring.... get ready.....


..... the ORIGINAL 1987 turtles AND the 2003 turtles..... It's a crossover. The two universes collide and there will be EIGHT turtles. It will also feature Bebop, Rocksteady, Tohka, Rahzar, and KRANG (among others). This is pretty sweet.

You can hear some audio clips of it here:


Theme song HERE:

Green Lantern: First Flight Review

People will look back at the summer of 2009 and think "Wow, that summer Green Lantern was everywhere and it kicked ass!"

Not only is the greatest comic book event cross-over Blackest Night centered on Hal Jordon and the rest of the Green Lantern Corps but we also get this straight to home relase.

What we get here is an origin story of how Hal Jordon got his power ring, joined the Corps, and revealed to the Gaurdians how corrupt Sinestro really is. Honestly, how stupid are the little blue guys ? The guy is named SIN-es-tro. Sounds too close to sinister to be a good guy. He has that supervillian moustache. You know he up to no good with that thing. He has red skin like teh satan! and lastly, he is left handed. The only Lantern that is left handed. Goes with the whole sinister thing too.

Back to the plot, Sinestro crafts a plot to overthrow the Gaurdians because frankly, their inaction and bureaucracy is not enough to establish order in the chaotic universe. So he will order things, by his might. Through the Weaponers of Qward he gets an ultimate weapon, powered by yellow power. The one thing the Lantern's green rings are weak to. Will the universe be ruled by Sinestro's iron fist or will Hal Jordon prevail?

As a fan of Green Lantern there were plenty of nods to the books. Lots of blink and you miss them cameos of Corpsmen. Carol Fenris as Hal's boss is adorable and I chortled with every "Poozer!" out of drill sargent Kilowag. My fave fan momment was Sinestro donning his yellow uniform, complete with Paralax symbol. I really wish they got a little deeper into the whole yellow = fear and green = willpower mythology, but there can always be room for that in a sequeal.

In the end we get an action filled story of a man showing what the human strength of will can do in the face of terror itself, as a space-cop. WUUUUUUUUUt? Yea, sounds weird but it works. A non-fan can instantly get into this. It plays like Star Wars meets Men In Black, but fun.

See this thing or else Rage Kitty will vomit acid blood in your face.

Iron Man & Wolverine Anime Teasers

Marvel Entertainment Inc., has partnered with renowned Japanese animation studio Madhouse (Paprika, Tokyo Godfathers) and multiple-Eagle Award winner Warren Ellis to create four all new anime versions of classic Marvel Super Heroes. Get an exciting first glimpse of IRON MAN and WOLVERINE, two of the planned four series!

These Marvel Anime TV series are being created as a way of merging the beloved Marvel Super Heroes of western culture with the bold animation tradition of Japan. The resulting product will be four visually groundbreaking anime series featuring popular Super Heroes redesigned and repurposed as emerging from the fabric of Japanese culture. The series is expected to begin appearing on the Animax channel in Japan in spring of 2010.

wolverine



......uhhh ooookkkk.i really dont know what to say about that..whats up with wolvies HAIR??

iron man



WOW now that looks amazing..do we even get this channel?? anyone know? cause i have to see that one

A Living Pokemon In Real Life?

This thing is real. Look it up.

It's called the "axolotl"

It's my new favorite animal.

Attack of the Megamanatee

Racist Cartoons and the Great Garloo

I was watching a collection of old Porky Pig cartoons with my son today. I love old cartoons from the 30's - 60's because animation back then was actually quite fun to look at. The storylines/plots were basically irrelevant (in my opinion), because the visual gags and the way the characters move and act is just as funny and fun to watch (if not more so) than the so-called "entertainment" of the 80's and 90's (TMNT, Thundercats, X-Men, and The Tick notwithstanding.... Those cartoons are AWESOME). But as cool as the X-Men are, I often find more enjoyment watching the complete absurdity that was the hallmark of the "Golden Age of Animation". Betty Boop, Popeye, Casper and of course Bugs Bunny and the Looney Tunes Gang are among my favorites.

After growing up with the heavily-edited versions of these cartoon shorts (as shown on Saturday Mornings throughout the 80's), I eventually discovered the original, unedited, sometimes insanely violent (by today's standards) and sometimes blatantly racist and sexist cartoons of yesteryear.

So... back to the Porky pig collection....

Knowing what I know about the racist past of the old cartoons, I was (slightly) shocked while watching the 1940 Porky Pig cartoon called "Ali Baba Bound" (which can be seen here in it's entirety ). There is one scene in particular in which an Arab with a bullet strapped to his head is identified as a member of the "Suicide Squad". He watches the warfare from afar and gets visibly excited at the thought of getting shot at. Eventually he just decides to head right into battle, thus concluding the episode.



Presumably, at the time of its' release, "Ali Baba Bound" didn't cause quite the uproar of the Muhammad caricatures of 2006, but one could only wonder at the amount of hullaballoo this cartoon would have stirred had it been released in recent times.

Now, I'm not racist, but let's all watch these racist cartoons together and remember the good old days:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=racist+cartoons&search_type=&aq=f

For no reason in particular, I'm closing this entry with the completely unrelated, non-racist, fantastically-named "Great Garloo".

Enjoy:


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Turtle Day 2008

Thank you to all who made TMNT Day 2008 a success.



Click here to see previous TMNT Days.

COWABUNGA!