Category: media

Don't Love Lucy

Lucille Ball

The reality of I Love Lucy hadn’t really sunk in for me till just the other day.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYd0mmmQEd0]

Born of the same television era that happily allowed the concept of “The Lovable Drunk”, Lucy is obviously a caricature of a woman who suffers from untreated anxiety and depression. Our lack of medical and social understanding led to ill people being considered fair comedic game, as were the aforementioned drunks – or, really, black people and the mentally & physically handicapped – and all of the signs are there: the lack of self-confidence, the manic focus, the extreme swings in emotion.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFLLw7JcU74]

It wouldn’t be tough to “Garfield minus Garfield” every Lucy clip, but the truth is undeniable: laughing at Lucy is equivalent to laughing at mental retardation.

Tea Partyin'

I’m stealing the link to this Teabonics flickr group from Warren Ellis, but it’s just too good not to spread around*:

Repeel Congress

Hey, so what if the guy needs a nap now and then, it's a stressful job.The saddest thing about this, to me at least, is that someone took the time to pencil in some perfectly straight lines before screwing up nearly every other aspect of their sign.

I do not think that means what you think that meansAs you might discern, my favourites are the ones that imply something the sign-holder never intended.

*and all week I’ve had a slowly building cold, which makes it tough to get the brain functioning much beyond work-makes-food.

Now In 3D

Bwana Devil in 3D

Until the technology reaches a level that doesn’t require socially awkward glasses, or cause migraines, it’s my personal belief that 3D TV and movies will continue to be a fad with re-occurring interest. This hasn’t stopped the current hype behind 3D televisions however, as the market is still jacked up on the high of successfully forcing everyone in America onto HD.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frjqMX6OueA]

Still, last week I was poking around for info about Legend Films, the company that released the colourization of House On Haunted Hill. Colourization is a bit of a tough & seedy business – colourizers are sort of seen as the grave robbers of the entertainment industry – and maybe that’s why Legend decided it needed a new business plan: 3Derizing, er, 3Dimensioning, uh, Depthing…

They’ve decided they’re going to take old films and make them 3D.

Seriously, that’s a business now.

Friday The 13th Part 3 in 3DSomewhere, Ted Turner is cackling.

Graves

Dear Peter Graves,

Now that you’re dead I feel kind of bad about telling everyone what an alcoholic you were. Lets face it though, we both know that it wasn’t  your heart that did you in. I’m not sure if it’s the same fellow who got you stuck in Parts: The Clonus Horror, but your agent did you a favour by getting out in front of the story with this heart attack spiel.

I’m not Peter Graves,
A Fan

P.S. I always liked you better than James Arness.
P.P.S. This message will self destruct in five seconds.

No Haim Done

The Coreys

I don’t mean to be a jerk, but: did Corey Haim die, or did he just succumb to the inevitable? We’ve turned out a pretty solid generation of young stars who eventually grow into their gaunt faces and crack teeth. Next it’ll be Aaron Carter, Tara Reid, or maybe one of the Culkins.

If “Child Celebrity” was an invasive microbe we’d be seeing kids in front of grocery stores with pledge sheets and charity chocolate bars attempting to raise money to cure or curb it – if it were a geographic location we’d be seeing Sunday afternoon commercials featuring on-location shots, asking us to sponsor a former B-level Mickey Mouse Club member.

Titanic vs. Lusitania: Get Rich Or Die Tryin'

I’m almost tempted to print out this TIME article in broadsheet format, just so I can read it while wearing a monocle and puffing at a comically large pipe – feasibly while fiddling with an extravagantly well greased moustache.

From mid-article:

The results told a revealing tale. Aboard the Titanic, children under 16 years old were nearly 31% likelier than the reference group to have survived, but those on the Lusitania were 0.7% less likely. Males ages 16 to 35 on the Titanic had a 6.5% poorer survival rate than the reference group but did 7.9% better on the Lusitania. For females in the 16-to-35 group, the gap was more dramatic: those on the Titanic enjoyed a whopping 48.3% edge; on the Lusitania it was a smaller but still significant 10.4%. The most striking survival disparity — no surprise, given the era — was determined by class. The Titanic‘s first-class passengers had a 43.9% greater chance of making it off the ship and into a lifeboat than the reference group; the Lusitania‘s, remarkably, were 11.5% less likely. – TIME

The discussion later in the article about polite behaviour  vs fight-or- flight self centered action is interesting, but I can’t help but notice that ‘polite behaviour’ basically saves rich ladies, a category I will likely never be counted in.

Olympics

Dear NBC,

Thank you for helping to cover up how bad a nosedive the Olympic closing ceremonies took after Neil Young. (Who, frankly, put all the projectors and dance numbers and ridiculous inflatables to shame with his acoustic guitar.) Your greed has saved a lot of Canadian embarrassment.

Thanks again,
54º 40′ and Surroundings

Diff'rent Strokes & The Bicycle Man

As far as I know, Diff’rent Strokes was really the show that began the trend of Very Special Episodes – which arguably peaked and receded during the final season of Blossom.

A lot of things can be ‘Very Special’ however, and Diff’rent Strokes liked to cast a wide net. Have you ever heard of The Bicycle Man?

Gordon Jump, (the boss from WKRP in Cincinnati & The Lonely Maytag Repairman,) played a bicycle shop owner who was quite interested in cutting Arnold a deal – in exchange for his pants. It’s surprising, for an early ’80s sitcom, how far they went with this Child-Molester warning.

It might have been a little more effective without the laugh track though.

Here’s the crux, but you can find both episodes dealing with the subject on youtube:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlkoxsEpODo]