Tag Archives: Transformers

3-D’s Nuts

3-D movies employ greatly improved technology today. Previously, they used the same glasses as 3-D comic books did; cardboard with acetate lenses in red and blue.

My personal pair, since 1991’s Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare. (As much as would fit on my scanner.)

3-D comics were unreadable without these glasses. I still have two issues: Gumby 3-D and Transformers in 3-D #3, both from Blackthorne Publishing.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Comix Classic & Current, Faint Signals, Idiot's Delight, Magazine Rack, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Robot Toy Fetish, Saturday Movie Matinee

Joe Satriani

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Filed under Comix Classic & Current, Faint Signals, Magazine Rack, Nostalgic Obsessions, Thousand Listen Club

Before It Was Choked On

Look, choking sucks. I don’t have to point that out, do I? And truthfully, most toys have small parts these days, and there’s a warning about them on the package. But those clickers are long gone. They blocked a toddler’s airway better than a spoonful of shellac.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Comix Classic & Current, Eatable Things, Faint Signals, Idiot's Delight, Nostalgic Obsessions, Robot Toy Fetish, Saturday Movie Matinee

Ze Brain On Ze Table

In case you’re a neophyte to this website and its redundant obsessions, 2009 saw the release of the hysterically divisive toy movie Revenge of the Fallen. To be kind, I reference this beloved turkey a lot. So often, in fact, that I’ve tried in recent months to avoid referencing it, to keep from wearing it out.

So much for that.

I bring it up almost as frequently as I do my time in jail. It even showed on the giant TV in stir- and the other inmates had seen it so many times they were sick of it. It was like hanging out with a hundred friends in a warehouse, bickering over what to watch. Continue reading

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Filed under Bad Influences, Don't Know Don't Care, Idiot's Delight, Robot Toy Fetish, Thousand Listen Club

Invisible Legends

DIY stands for “do-it-yourself”. You knew that, right? It was once a point of pride in music production. People love DIY, because it lights that little bulb in the mind that signals “I can do that”. 

Ideally, you should feel that way about anything people do, aside from brain surgery or bomb disposal (and you can learn how to do those). Shoot, you could change your gender if you set your mind and wallet to it, but that’s a personal matter, and not something you want to capitalize upon. Still, there’s a lot to be said for taking a grass-roots shot at an admittedly lofty goal. For example, producing a homemade movie.

Random duders from an early series of Invisible Inc. ©Matty Boy Anderson.

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Uncle Owen’s Cabin

Deep cleansing breaths.

Some people are fans of something because the person that created it paid them attention.

I’m kind of curt about the fact that I don’t take suggestions from the audience. I don’t mean to be rude, but here’s the issue. If I take a suggestion, I am now beholden to the one who made it.

Not only that, I’ll have set a precedent, wherein that person will peruse my work in perpetuity, hoping for another use of the suggestion. It’s a kind of writer/audience codependency, and it’s unhealthy for either party.

It’s common practice in digital culture. Continue reading

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Filed under Bad Influences, Don't Know Don't Care, Faint Signals, Idiot's Delight, Worst Of All

Disappointment: Childhood’s Elegy

From BIUL III.

From BIUL III.

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Gridbug Chasers

In the 1982 science-fiction fantasy TRON, there comes a moment inside the computer world where the protagonists are imperiled by “gridbugs”.

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Clearly a threat.

The danger is underlined by dialogue spoken by Cindy Morgan, as the shapely input/output program Yori:

“This isn’t going to be easy. If those gridbugs get us, we’ve had it.”

The gridbugs in question get a ten-second interlude, complete with a unique and rather corny soundtrack cue, and then go on to never affect anything or even be mentioned in passing again. Continue reading

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Filed under Animation Analysis, Don't Know Don't Care, Faint Signals, Idiot's Delight, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Robot Toy Fetish, Saturday Movie Matinee, Unfairly Maligned, Worst Of All

Brian Froud’s World of the Dark Crystal

When crafting a fictional universe, where does one begin? The introductory story, the characters, or the world itself?

From the back cover

From the back cover

Today, the general process involves cribbing from whatever made the most money previously, and changing just enough to keep from getting called a plagiarist. Actually, that’s not completely true; your average latter-day Hollywood mogul couldn’t care less about charges of appropriation. Cash comes first, imagination and progress later.

This was not the way it used to be. Continue reading

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Filed under Faint Signals, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Saturday Movie Matinee, Unfairly Maligned

Thrills: A Retrospective

The life of a hardcore junkie.

thrills1
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