#cuckoo dvd

[spryfilm]

DVD review: “Cuckoo” (2012 - 2019) 

“Cuckoo” (2012 – 2019)  Television / Comedy Thirty Three Episodes Created by: Robin French and Kieron Quirke Featuring: Andy Samberg, Taylor Lautner, Andie MacDowell, Greg Davies, Tamla Kari, Esther Smith, Tyger Drew-Honey, Helen Baxendale, Matt Lacey and Kenneth Collard Cuckoo: “I gave this speech on our wedding day. Now I’d like to give it again with clothes on and you, our family,…

[herrlindemann]

Sonic Seducer - September 2004, interview with Till and Flake - part 1

Thanks to ramjohn for the scans!

For a long time it was quiet around frontman Till Lindemann's scandalous, muscle-bound troupe, who completely cut themselves off from current music events after their last album 'Mutter' and, apart from the DVD 'Lichtspielhaus' at the end of last year, didn't let anything be heard of themselves.

But from July 26, the Berlin Neue Deutsche Härte flagship rockers will break their strict news ban with their single 'Mein Teil' and the fourth album that will follow at the end of September, in order to once again put the tolerance limits to a hard test after their abstinence and in domestic bourgeois idylls again blowing the deer antlers, cuckoo clocks and dusty Spitzweg oil ham with their bombast metal from the oak paneled walls.

Rammstein are back — with a vengeance! For a good year and a half, singer Till Lindemann, drummer Christoph Schneider, keyboarder Christian 'Flake' Lorenz, guitarists Richard Kruspe-Bernstein and Paul Landers as well as bassist Oliver Riedel have holed up with regular producer Jacob Kellner to work on Album number 4 (whose ultimate title at the time was not 100% certain when this issue went to print, after having already discarded working titles such as 'Reise, Reise' or 'Das rote Album') to go into group dynamics intensively, to collect oneself and to discuss the impatiently awaited successor to the controversial one in Stockholm, completely undisturbed 2001's chart-busting ‘Mutter’ to work. The fact that a lot has happened in the meantime with the notorious Provo Rock pyromaniacs from the Spree can now be clearly heard on the first single release 'Mein Teil', with which Rammstein, after numerous heated discussions, settled for artistic freedom , good taste, piety or political views in the past once again best recommend as probably the most controversial and most polarizing German band of the hour: In the usual ambiguous manner, 'Mein Teil' invites you to a macabre feast, the source of inspiration from the sensational cannibal murder trial of Rotenburg is fed in the middle of last year. After its successful general overhaul, the battleship Rammstein is once again tackling all existing conventions and moral concepts - and it's not just musically that you shoot out of all guns, as Till and Flake, who lined up for the six-eyes talk, make clear in great detail in our multi-part interview.

However, the Berlin command center is not aware of any concerns about finally breaking the bank with his calculated taboo. Fire free for Rammstein: "I wouldn't expect anyone to get upset about 'Mein Teil'. Making a song about something that really happened is the most normal thing in the world to me! Nobody complains to the spokesman for the Tagesschau either, what horror reports he reads again”, says Flake indignantly. "Of course people will get upset again — whether I understand it now or not," Till Lindemann, in the past rather reluctant to be interviewed, also intervened. “With the last album, the headline in BILD was about us: 'Disgusting - dead baby as record cover! This band should be banned!' I was really happy about that and thought for the first time: We've really made it... I think there will be something really, really bad to read about us this time too... “ (smiles). And even with songs like 'Mein Teil', 'Daila Lama (Fear of Flying)' or 'Amerika' the chances of a respectable repeat success in terms of page 1 scandal band are more than good. Since the release of the 1995 debut 'Herzeleid', the blameless average citizen has had a highly allergic reaction to the distorting mirror held up by the widely misunderstood metal satirists and will presumably also react to the new tracks about plane crashes, the Iraq war or masturbation of any kind of humor or Traditionally closed to sarcasm. Entertainment or derailment - as with all uncomfortable artists, the crucial question, the answer to which each listener must be left to themselves against the background of great art. “Actually, you can go just a little bit deeper into the subject matter of the individual songs, read the lyrics or take a look at us, you can't misinterpret Rammstein - unless you're really really stupid!” “Or malicious,” adds Lindemann. “I very often have the feeling that Rammstein is dragged through the dirt with spiteful superiority! I do not know why. There is absolutely nothing to misunderstand with us.”

Such discussions have been held too often and for too long in the past, against more or less unfounded accusations, false suspicions and nasty slander, for one to still feel any great desire today to explain oneself and one's texts to the masses like a mantra . Although, as in the case of some of the content on the last album, this seems to have been a matter of urgency for some. Rammstein is undoubtedly one of the very few German/German-singing bands whose lyrics and forms of expression make you reflect and question them, as Till Lindemann's very own (thought) world and lyrical expressionism are not always easy to understand; the quirky, deep black humor and latent sarcasm are not always immediately apparent and misunderstandings seem to be inevitable. “Many will once again not understand it and will be terribly outraged at us... But you simply cannot change the world, and so we don't care anymore! Let them get upset with us as much and for as long as they want!” That the relationship between Rammstein./. While the general public is irreparably shattered, Flake also has to admit: "One example: I don't like Daniel Küblböck either, but I would never scold him or call him an asshole or a spasm. He gives me no reason to get upset with him and no one forces me to listen to his music either! That's why I can't understand why people complain about us — we don't force anyone to listen to our records either! If people don't bother to find out what our songs are about and if we possibly do things, then they have no right to judge us!”

“It's getting on our nerves so much now, talking about these stories over and over again, discussing it, evaluating everything... - our success simply proves us right! However, the fun stops at these malicious things: If the press writes things that we didn't say, or cuts our statements together incorrectly, then there's a bomb in the leg, as is well known, someone must have noticed that painfully (a few years ago Rammstein played on at a festival, they 'pranked' the then MTV program executive by tying him to a chair and tying a smoke grenade to his leg because the TV station had spread falsehoods about the band). That's just the last thing for me, you just don't do that! Then the journalists should just pull something out of their fingers and write about us in their newspapers and just leave us alone! But if you meet face to face and it is then distorted or lied to afterwards, then it's on the mouth!” Unmistakably clear words from Till Lindemann, who, however, cannot really deny that the cultivated middle-class household shock effect has always been a more or less important part of Rammstein's artistic identity.

With the tongue-in-cheek to sarcastic anti-USA song 'Amerika', they venture into completely unknown territory for the first time; This time, Rammstein pull the manic national pride and the almost totalitarian American Way Of Life hysteria of the American throwaway culture through the cocoa in an almost cabaret manner.

In the past they repeatedly emphasized that they wanted to do without deeper messages in their songs, but this time they seem to be making an exception. “We don't transport a message in 'Amerika', but state facts and facts in a slightly sarcastic way. We dealt a lot with the Iraq war at the time of writing the song and felt that now was the time to say something about it.” Flake adds: “Everyone is quite outraged by the lyrics and asks us how dare we suddenly say something about politics. (laughs). We tried to make a song that sounds very positive and beautiful at first and which is also in a little bit of English so that Americans would be happy! We look forward to the moment when Americans think they're being courted and that Rammstein also ended up writing an anthem to America and that everyone — even Rammstein — would end up loving it now. We think it's a great gag, since anyone who listens to the song more closely will immediately understand what the lyrics are actually about. When it comes to the live implementation of 'Amerika', I could very well imagine that we will drop a few bombs, you could do a great job here with pyro and airplanes...” Rammsteiner-style humor, with many a politically correct joker saying this this time too Laughter should get stuck in your throat...

But it gets even funnier: The second part of our big Rammstein interview will follow in the next issue! No animals had to suffer for this photo session. It is a photomontage.

[transboykirito]

sao characters + where their names come from

i got an anon asking me this about lis BUT i love all this stuff so i wanted to just make a big post about sao characters who were named after someone/something

lisbeth

reki very intentionally left it vague but said lisbeth was named after "some european queen" and after HOURS of research literally the only possibilities i can come up with are queen elizabeth or queen elizabeth the second - i now also have an intense knowledge of scandanavian royalty.

please note, reki (in the same interview) said that he named lisbeth after lisbeth salander, the character from the girl with the dragon tattoo book series. however, those books were published after sao, and he corrected himself later by saying he wanted to give her a european/scandanavian name, and named her after a queen.

alice

alice is, very obviously, named after alice from alice in wonderland, originally called alice's adventures underground, which is where reki got the name for the underworld.

humbert

in one of my favourite references in sao (bc i love the easter egg in the dvd menu), reki wrotea portion of the alicization arc inspired by the book lolita by vladimir nabokov. humbert is named after the narrator and main villain of the book, humbert humbert - interestingly (to me, at least) the sword art online anime uses a different pronunciation of the name than the original lolita book did. vladimir's humbert is pronounced as hum-bert, whereas reki's humbert uses the french pronunciation, um-bear.

oberon and titania

the second-most obvious ones, behind alice, oberon is named after the character from william shakespeare's a midsummer night's dream, the play that the fairy dance arc is based on. oberon, the fairy king, is the husband of titania, the fairy queen, and one of the play's plotlines follows their troubled marriage. sugou references the play throughout the arc, so i think most people know about this one.

while i'm here, i think it's interesting to note that oberon's nickname for asuna (little bird, tori-chan) might also be a far subtler reference to midsummer. during the third act, bottom (the character kirito takes the role of in sao) sings a song all about birds at the specific moment that titania wakes up and falls in love with him. the song is meant to be a joke, asking who would trust a cuckoo bird (something with little intelligence). it's possible oberon's nickname for asuna is a reference to this song, though i'm including it here just as a fun fact.

vassago

this is explained in sao itself, but i've still seen people ask about it, so. vassago is named after a minor demon from the ars goetia. the demon is known as the prince of hell, which is where vassago got his username of poh.

charlotte

charlotte the spider is named after the spider in the book (and adorable childhood movie) charlotte's web. charlotte helps her friend wilbur the pig avoid getting killed on the farm they live on. if we extend this metaphor, reki was indirectly calling eugeo and kirito pigs. the more you know.

[tawneybel]

WRITING A COHERENT REVIEW OF SKINAMARINK IS HARD.

Song of the day: “Jack-o’-Lantern-Man” by the Bravery. 

Tomorrow’s my birthday. I’m going out to get vaxxed, then get brunch and dinner. I’m slowly redecorating my room, so I got some posters but won’t unwrap them until tomorrow. Also bought more winter clothes. Wearing black jeans rn. The first jeans I’ve worn in years. I don’t usually like wearing pants lol. 

Finally saw Skinamarink. Expectations were met. It blew me away. Like, an entire essay could be written on why I liked it so much. Watch it if you value aesthetics over plot in film. I do. 

At least when it comes to horror movies. I tend to watch horror and read (murder) mystery. Not so much the other way around. Whereas mysteries are plot-driven, horror media can either rely on plot or visuals/descriptions and be enthralling.

One problem I have with a lot of films is their cinematography. It often seems to take a backseat to plot, dialogue, and score/soundtrack. Which is why I love aestheticism. Well, that and symbolism. Deeper meanings are great, too.

I adore all the fan theories Skinamarinkers (?) are coming up with. Normally, “he’s in a coma” fanons bore me. But the dad said Kevin bumped his head, then the rest of Skinamarink is basically a hundred minutes of nursery nightmares. Faces aren’t shown properly.

MAKE SURE TO WATCH WITH SUBTITLES. (Unfortunately, the director’s commentary doesn’t have those.) AND THE SHORT PROOF OF CONCEPT HECK BEFOREHAND. It’s on YouTube. If you like it, you’ll like Skinamarink. Also, it unnerved me a bit more.  

Skinamarink made me feel so many things. Excitement. Nostalgia. Sympathy. Nostalgia. Fear. Well, mostly just fear when the phone got those toony eyes. There are a couple jump scares, but the movie’s more about slowly mounting dread. Plus making viewers pity the protagonists.

I feel like I’m super biased towards Skinamarink because it taps into my nostalgia. The amount of media it makes me want to reminisce about... All those “child(ren) up against a bogeyman” stories.

Those parallels between the classic cartoons and what the Voice in the Dark does to Kaylee and Kevin. The same Fisher-Price toy phone we had. Classic cartoons that were on either VHS or LaserDisc, watched in our snug basement. “The Cobweb Hotel” creeped me out so badly as a kid. At least I had my great-grandmother’s elephant figurines to watch over me. Dad’s cuckoo clock, too. 

The commentary mentions there are some anachronisms, like with the toys. Skinamarink takes place in 1995, but has that orange LEGO brick separator from 2011. Which just makes it more personally relatable to me.

My family’s always been practical, using things until they break. I have a DVD player that’ll turn twenty next year. So it wouldn’t surprise me if someone else has the VHS player somewhere. The only movies I remember watching on LaserDisc were The Wizard of Oz and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. But Oz is one of my all time faves and got watched a LOT. We had a bunch of obsolete or antique things and new things.

Going back to the toy phone… There was a Bruce Coville Magic Shop book that had a witch call the protagonist and her little brother on one. Jennifer Murdley’s Toad? And I’ve seen creepy art of Fisher-Price phones before.

Disclaimer: ED IS WRONG. CANADIANS NEED TO GET WEIRDER. I hope Skinamarink inspires people to make more weirdass movies.

[sharpestasp]

Foul Play

Foul Play, a movie thread

I have not seen this since I was less then ten, I believe. it's from 1978, Goldie Hawn, Chevy Chase, opens with the murder of a church official.

Burgess Meredith, Dudley Moore, and Brian Dennehy in supporting roles.

Chevy Chase is very Bruce Wayne as played by Michael Keaton in his first scene

There will be numerous themes that were contemporary to the 70s, but I want to see if it was as slick an homage to Hitchcock as I remember it being touted as. Oh, yeah, there's the open-your-sexuality theme for the divorcee

"I don't pick up strange men."

"That's your problem."

"So, why don't you try it?"

Ahh, Barry Manilow, who was part of my childhood soundtrack.

Dialogue is vaguely stilted. Convertible yellow VW Bug! And wow Marlboro Reds have not changed the box design THAT much in all these years. Okay. The dialogue thing is part of the Hitchcock thing, given how THAT conversation went.

EEEEE! BURGESS MEREDITH! I love him so much. Red herrings. I love the red herrings in this. Snake warning, btw. Oh I love Burgess in this.

+blinks+ This came out in the year of Three Popes. The plot is centered on an attempt to murder the Pope. I am… amused?

"Rape's not an act of sex. It's act of violence." --Well that's a message.

Very easy to see how Dudley's character jumped to the idea of sex. Poor guy.

And I know I missed the reference of "beaver trap" as a kid. I had not encountered that euphemism that early. CW: "spanish fly" bee gees ftw (Side note: music rights for film back then were far more permissive, but on the same hand, the artists got paid far less, and that's why there are rights' disputes in later works, when it is time to license to DVD) I feel like Goldie's character is a little neurodivergent

"plop plop fizz fizz, oh what a relief it is" She stabbed him with knitting needles. We had a shower scene moment. The cuckoo clock was cuckoo-ing. Rear Window moment too.

Hello Brian Dennehy. You look young but still manage to look very mature.

This is such a a silly movie, and YET.

Also, the casual affirmation of masculine security, because now Chevy has hit on Brian playfully.

I think that little old lady just played "fuck" on the scrabble board And her opponent added "er" yes, yes. Because original tried to play 'mutherfucker'

"I always had a yearning for the criminal life"

"But you're a cop"

"Same difference"

Twice now, men have told her that they believed she believed what she said. And further 'she may be ND', she remembered a licence plate in the dark and rain while trying to avoid being killed

And the pieces come together… Chevy has them and is putting it all together.

Mistaken Identity in progress. Billy Barty is GREAT, by the way. I love him. That was a great Rube Goldberg sequence.

Reference to Panty Hose wearing quarterback! LOL I lol at Chevy's character. He's playing this with humor, but subdued in a way that makes it charming. Free Love themes running freely through this.

deliberate view of birds flying over water The dog's name is Chaucer. Amused.

Aww, Burgess is so sweet to her. And the plot device was just destroyed but that's okay

Burgess and Chevy acting together to rescue Goldie is adorable.

Rex Harrison's ex-wife is the mastermind here. Rachel Roberts, Welsh actress. Who is now having a kung-faux match with Burgess Meredith.

This movie manages to combine humor, action, and a half-decent plot very nicely. I am just absolutely amused at the mix of humor into this movie.

She just calmed a pair of immigrants in the taxi Chevy commandeered by comparing him to Kojak, and they're big fans. I miss movies being ludicrously fun like this car chase.

We are having a shootout backstage during an opera

There's an analogy in the Pope leading a cheering applause when there's two people visibly dead on stage now…

Overall impression: a fun once in a while re-watch movie. Dudley Moore was over the top which is best Dudley Moore. Chevy Chase was a delight as he often was in his earlier films. Goldie Hawn is not an airhead and helps substantially in her own fate. Burgess Meredith is HEARTS. Brian Dennehy was great support. All of this movie entertained, but I am certain the pacing, as well as how the humor meshes with the action, would be a no-go for many modern viewers. I did not catch all the Hitchcock references, I think, but enough were his more known films for me to pick up on them.

[tetrix-anime]

Kakkou no Iinazuke (A Couple of Cuckoos) - Blu-ray/DVD Volume 8 Illustration. Release: 22 February 2023

[byneddiedingo]

Michael Redgrave in Mr. Arkadin (Orson Welles, 1955)

Cast: Orson Welles, Robert Arden, Patricia Medina, Michael Redgrave, Akim Tamiroff, Katina Paxinou, Mischa Auer, Peter van Eyck, Paola Mori, Suzanne Flon. Screenplay: Orson Welles. Cinematography: Jean Bourgoin. Art direction: Orson Welles. Film editing: Renzo Lucidi, William Morton, Orson Welles. Music: Paul Misraki. 

"What if?" is the question that haunts every Orson Welles film after Citizen Kane (1941). What if Welles had had the financial, production, and distribution support for his films? Of none of them is the question more appropriate than Mr. Arkadin, which was edited by other hands than Welles's and not even shown in the United States until 1962, and at one point was said to exist in at least seven different versions. In 2006, the Criterion Collection released a three-DVD set that edited together all of the existing English-language versions of the film, following what was known of Welles's original plan, along with his comments on some of the other versions that had been released. It's probably as close as we're going to get to what the director had in mind. So what if Mr. Arkadin had been under Welles's control all along? Would we have a more coherent narrative and style? Would the protagonist, Guy Van Stratten, have been played by a more skilled actor than Robert Arden? (It's a role that would have been perfect for someone like William Holden.) Would Welles have called on the best makeup artists to provide himself with a more convincing prosthetic nose and a wig and beard whose edges don't show? Would the function and the fate of Patricia Medina's character, Mily, have been clearer? And does any of this really matter? For what we have here, despite Welles's later description of the film (or its handling) as a "disaster," is one of the most fascinating works in his storied, troubled career. There are sequences that are haunting, even if their purpose in the film is unclear, such as the procession of the penitentes, who in their tall, pointed hoods look like exactly what Mily mistakes them for: "crazy ku kluxers." Or the Goyaesque masks at Arkadin's ball. Or the sequence of truly wonderful cameo performances, including a hair-netted Michael Redgrave as the junk dealer Burgomil Trebitsch, who keeps trying to sell Van Stratten a busted telescope (which he pronounces "telly-o-scope"). Or Mischa Auer as the proprietor of a flea circus. Or Katina Paxinou as a Mexican (?) woman named Sophie. And then there's one of Welles's most celebrated speeches, perhaps second only to his "cuckoo clock" monologue in The Third Man (Carol Reed, 1949), in which Arkadin tells the fable of the scorpion and the frog. Though analogues have been found in folklore around the world, this particular formulation of it seems to have been Welles's own:

This scorpion wanted to cross a river, so he asked the frog to carry him. No, said the frog, no thank you. If I let you on my back you may sting me and the sting of the scorpion is death. Now, where, asked the scorpion, is the logic in that? For scorpions always try to be logical. If I sting you, you will die. I will drown. So, the frog was convinced and allowed the scorpion on his back. But, just in the middle of the river, he felt a terrible pain and realized that, after all, the scorpion had stung him. Logic! Cried the dying frog as he started under, bearing the scorpion down with him. There is no logic in this! I know, said the scorpion, but I can't help it -- it's my character.  

Perhaps it was Welles's character that betrayed him into making movies that flopped but turned into classics.

[believerindaydreams]

Four watch continues with the two part "The Sontaran Experiment", which is essentially "what if bad guy does whump". Nobody ever intended it to be watched on a postage stamp sized corner of a phone screen but my ex got all the DW DVDs, so.

Cut

Poor Tom with the scarf carefully wrapped around his neck brace. He notes in his autobiography that he was very worried Hinchcliffe might use the accident as a chance to run with a different actor he'd actually picked, so...we're all glad that didn't happen, right? Right.

"Help I'm upside down and only my duck pants and wellies are visible" Sarah saying she's only been hurt in her dignity and Harry nods sympathetically. Of course Harry would know all about that.

Sarah really really does not like Quiet places. She had similar comments in Invasion of the Dinosaurs as I recall.

Ian Marter heroically attempting to make a slide down a very mild slope look serious. Result: almost plausible if Harry is v clumsy

Sarah: I'll fetch the Doctor!

Harry, in a trap, looking around the trap: ...I'll wait here then.

lol

Completely random guy: yells

Doctor: oh great that's Harry isn't it

...

it's very sweet that the crew are scripted to Rough Up The Doc violently, but poor Tom is in no shape for that so they just. Yank his curls dramatically and gently poke his shoulder and whatever. relatable.

I know the fandom dotes on Harry's magical sideburns of lurrrve but Tom's are rather nice too. just pointing that out.

Also the speech about clocks. I never wrote for the DW review sites back in ye day because they had a rather academic flavor and "Tom saying 'cuckoo clock' is very yum" was not in the spirit of the thing. all praise the blue hellsite.

Sarah getting to say "I'll explain later" after successfully executing a plan she worked out off screen is just nice storytelling economy.

"What would I do without you?" is just. the moment Tom just Gets It as the Doctor. I will not be clarifying this.

Hi Terry Walsh! *Waves*

[mysticmayhem1337]

Movie Review #008

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Directed by: Milos Forman Year: 1975 Length: 2h 13m Rated: 8.7/10 Genre: Drama Stars: Jack Nicholson, Will Sampson and Louise Fletcher.

Summary In 1963, a violent criminal pleads insanity and is sent to a psychiatric hospital where he inspires the patients to think for themselves.

Review A film that doesn't get mental illness totally wrong. It reveals the truth about psychiatric hospitals at that time. Surprisingly refreshing.

Honest Thoughts Wow. I walked away from this film a different person. It is by no means a perfect film, (and perfection doesn't exist) but for the 70s, it gets right what many modern films still don't. I believe it was certainly worth the watch and I'm very excited to study it. Yes, it was a hard watch, not just because of the disturbing nature of some of the scenes, but because it also drags on for a bit too long. However, this can be seen as an advantage, the boring bits and the fun bits make the alarming bits all that more alarming. This is a film that sits with you and shocks you the more you think about it

Scores Performance: 5/5 Plot: 4/5 Effects: 4/5 Flow: 3/5 Engagingness: 4/5 Overall: 4/5

Information Source: IMDb Watched On: DVD

[cultfaction]

Preview: Jamie and the Magic Torch Complete Collection: Series 1-3 (DVD)

Every night when his mum (Kate Murray-Henderson) calls out ‘Sleep Well Jamie’, the naughty rascal gets out of bed, picks up his magic torch and with his dog, Wordsworth, travels down a helter skelter into the magical world of Cuckoo Land. With 39 fantastic stories to watch, join Jamie and Wordsworth in all three series of their exciting adventures. Presented for the first time as a complete…

[the44magnumisamonster]

Just got home from clothes shopping with my mum and holy shit I bought so many clothes (bday presents) and I even bought two DVDs (Brazil, one flew over the cuckoo's nest)

[ljaesch]

Crunchyroll Announces December 2023 Anime Home Video Releases

Crunchyroll has announced its anime home video releases for December 2023. Utawarerumono Mask of Truth – The Complete Season – Blu-ray – 700 minutes – $69.98 – 12/5/23 Bonus features: Textless Opening and Ending Songs, Promo Videos, Teaser A Couple of Cuckoos – Season 1 Part 2 – Blu-ray/DVD – 300 minutes – $69.98 – 12/12/23 Bonus features: Textless Opening and Ending Songs, Web Trailers,…

[unleashed-passion]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Jack and the cuckoo clock heart necklace or keyring,new handmade.

[adultswim2021]

Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! #16: “Carol” | December 24, 2007 - 12:15AM | S02E06

You know what I’ve been forgetting to do? Watching the DVD extras as they pertain to each episode of Awesome Show. I’m halfway through the freaking season, goddamn it. If I had been doing this, I would have realized that two of the special bumpers Tim & Eric made for the Snuggler stunt were right under my nose on digital versatile disc. I feel like a fool. 

The reason I was moved to check them out for this episode is that it’s another Carol/Mr. Henderson episode. The outtakes for these sketches are usually really great, especially any sequence where Tim is hanging out at Carol’s cubicle. Those guys are masters of their craft when it comes to Mr. Henderson saying disgusting, humiliating things to Carol. 

Before we get to that, we start off with an okay Brules Rules. I wonder if this was leftover from season one, which had a small handful of Brules Rules throughout the season. This one doesn’t do much for me, but I like he starts off by saying he has a Brules Rules “that you can’t live without if you wanna stay in school”, which is just garbled nonsense that only sounds sorta right. Very good dumb guy stuff from Brule. 

We’ll circle back to the Carol and Mr. Henderson sketch, which recurs three times in this episode. I’d rather talk about it at the end. I wanna talk about Candy Tails. This is a fairly gross product; a fake pony tail made of horse hair that you dip in candy sauce and clip to your actual hair. With a mess like that, you might as well just use your own hair. This has some really funny visuals, like the mom’s eyeballs going cuckoo when she tastes her daughter’s Candy Tail. There’s also Candy Tails for boys, which tastelessly appropriates Jamaican culture in the name of marketing the Candy Tails in a more masculine way by calling them dreads. Later on we see a cartoon show tie-in where cheery horses discuss how happy they are that their tails are getting bobbed so that a wealthy child can suck juice out of it. I forgot about this sequence completely. 

Just like in “Chunky” (the previous Carol and Mr. Henderson episode) we get a Crystal Shyps sketch. I wonder how intentional that was? At one point, Tim & Eric submitted “Chunky” as their worst episode to Adult Swim’s Turkey Day marathon. Doing what feels like an intentional sequel to it seems gratuitous on a sketch show, which for some reason makes me think it might be a coincidence.

Anyway, the director of Crystal Shyps is selling Crystal Shyps merchandise on a shopping network. He has a chunk of fools gold on the table that he’s really proud of, and points out that it’s not for sale. That’s such a hilarious detail. The sketch is about tempers flaring when somebody calls in to abuse him over the air, causing him to smash his own merch. This is a good one, and feels pretty visceral. A.D. Miles smugly smashing one of his own mugs with his hunk of fools gold is so hilarious. This transitions into a little animated sequence called “Space Horse Course to Course”. Respect must be paid to Tad Ghostal. 

David Liebe Hart gets a song with his new son, a doll puppet that he got to replace Chip the Black Boy, his original “son” puppet. Chip the Black Boy was a regular staple of his public access show Junior Christian Teaching Bible Lesson Program. This song has a very pleasingly dumb bit at the end where they go back and forth with a lame comedy bit, they trade the lyrics “I’m the best dad” / “I’m the best son” and then they start bickering “No, I’m the best dad” “No, I’m the best son” as if they somehow negate each other. DLH’s donkey brain at it’s best. I love this song!

Tim’s asleep, so it’s time to wake Tim up seems like it might come from the same season one well of them horsing around at Abso Lutely studios, or the sketch where Tim & Eric are pranking each other. Tim takes the prank in stride: “you got me, friend”. Fans of bein’ silly, take heed! This sketch is for you and your silly heart. 

The main running sketch is the Carol and Mr. Henderson bits, which sorta appear here instead of the normal “Tim & Eric are hosting” segments. It’s very similar to the first sketch, with Mr. Henderson cruelly mocking Carol while they are both seemingly turned on by the abusive dynamic. The extended sequence of Tim berating her at the cubicle is worth seeking out if you are a DVD haver. What made the cut is great, too. I could watch an entire 11 minute Awesome Show that is just Mr. Henderson saying disgusting things to Carol.

In this installment, Carol makes a sexy music video for Mr. Henderson, who immediately shows it to the entire office just to humiliate her. She’s hurt by this, and writes a resignation letter, but when she goes to deliver it she discovers Mr. Henderson watching the tape in private, pleasuring himself. This is set to a touching Aimee Man song. The ending is weirdly sweet: with Mr. Henderson mouthing “I love you” through his office window to Carol on the sidewalk, and her mouthing back “I know!”. They repeat this action over and over again; a Tim & Eric specialty. On their recent Valentine’s Day watch-along they chalk it up to not knowing how to end their sketches. I’m glad they ended it this way. Just fucking wonderful, man. GREAT episode.

EPHEMERA CORNER:

Christmas and end-of-the-year Marathons

I figured I’d just discuss Adult Swim’s Christmas/year-end programming here! There were a few things of note! First, Adult Swim had a couple weeks leading up to Christmas where they routinely played Christmas episodes at midnight (as to not interrupt their regular weekday showings of Futurama, Family Guy, and anime).

On Christmas eve, they aired a Christmas episode marathon. They showed (as per swimpedia):

11:00PM: Futurama: Xmas Story

11:30PM: Futurama: A Tale of Two Santas

12:00AM: Family Guy: A Very Special Family Guy Freakin' Christmas

12:30AM: Robot Chicken: Robot Chicken's Half-Assed Christmas Special

12:45AM: Robot Chicken: Robot Chicken Christmas Special

1:00AM: Stroker & Hoop: I Saw Stroker Killing Santa (a.k.a. A Cold, Dead, White Christmas)

1:30AM: Aqua Teen Hunger Force: Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future

1:45AM: Squidbillies: Rebel with a Claus

2:00AM: Astro Boy: Snow Lion (premiere)

I don’t think Astro Boy was a Christmas ‘sode, but it sure sounds wintery to me. Put on your winter best and (splash) dive in. Speaking of Astro Boy: On Christmas day, there was an Astro Boy marathon.

Then, from December 26 through December 30th, Adult Swim said goodbye to Futurama with one last Futurama marathon. five straight nights of just Futurama and nothing but. Their contract ran out. At this time they started producing direct-to-video movies that they later cut up into 30 minute episodes. The repeats moved to Comedy Central, who eventually produced new episodes. I think they played every episode. On December 31st, they showed the first and last episodes back-to-back. Then it was midnight, and Futurama was done. Adult Swim recently picked it back up, and I believe it’s currently airing now. Isn’t that nice?

That’s it for 2007! Tomorrow we will roll directly into Space Ghost week, covering the 1998 episodes of Space Ghost Coast to Coast. So fire up your HBOMax and/or illegal torrent and/or majorly expensive OOP DVDs and lets get Ghosty. Hey, that’s not bad.

[tetrix-anime]

Kakkou no Iinazuke (A Couple of Cuckoos) - Blu-ray/DVD Volume 7 Illustration. Release: 25 January 2023

[andswarwrites]

Day 14

We're almost halfway through the month and the last few days have been pretty heavy.  If anyone read all four days' worth of “bipolar” writing, thank you so much and I'm so sorry.  And if anyone has read all fourteen days' worth of writing total , besides S-, who reads everything I write, I don't know what to say.  Anyone who reads my writing and enjoys it moves me to continue my craft, and I am exceedingly grateful.  So today's thousand words is going to be about my love of storytelling.

We've already established that I love reading, and I love writing.  I also love movies and TV shows, Youtube and/or Tiktok videos and online articles: stories can unfold in so many different ways.  From an anecdote over coffee to an epic tale at the cinema, storytelling shapes and enriches my life.  I love a story that makes me laugh or just feel good, that's why my go-to favorite shows are comedies and slice of life anime.  I also love something that stretches my imagination or makes me reflect, and that is why I love science fiction.

When I was little, my parents would rent a few movies over the weekend, and that would be how we would unwind as a family, we'd watch together.  After S- and I got married, we would rent movies too, but he would rent movies he'd seen that I hadn't and I would rent movies that I'd seen and he hadn't, so we could get to know each other's tastes.  He only messed up twice: he had me watch Twelve Monkeys (1995) and Hero (2002).  I would probably be able to watch them at this point in life, but then I was too sensitive, and those movies made me cry uncontrollably. S- was very distressed.

One of my very best friends took a cinematic course in college where she learned about film noir, westerns, and I can't remember the third genre.  Anyway, she would come over and we would watch classic movies from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) to In the Heat of the Night (1967).  I was used to classic movies because my mom loved old musicals, but exploring everything from Hitchcock's works to Casablanca helped me to develop a taste for pacing, dialogue, jump scares and plot twists.

When S- and I were dating, I told him how much I had loved the movie Serenity (2005).  When he figured out that I had seen the movie but was unaware of the show, he went out and bought the DVD box set and I watched it.  Apart from some TV shows I had watched as a kid, like 3rd Rock From The Sun and The Pretender, oh, and of course Star Trek Voyager, I didn't watch that much TV.  Our TV was reserved for movies; we didn’t have Cable.

So S- and I started renting or buying certain boxed sets of TV shows on DVD, from House MD to Babylon Five and Stargate SGI + Atlantis.  I developed such an obsession with the Stargate world that I wrote a fanfic about Elizabeth Weir, called Weir's Gate.  It's the only fanfic I have ever written.  When we finally broke down and got Netflix, we started watching a lot of shows, and some of them were anime.  Thanks to anime, I started reading manga, because I wanted to know how the stories continued.

Anime on Netflix led to anime on Crunchyroll.  That was when my appetite for slice of life formed.  From Laid Back Camp to Chihayafuru, I love to immerse myself in Japanese culture.  We didn't keep Netflix.  I know, what's wrong with us?  Crunchyroll seems to suit us better, as does Disney Plus.  If we start subscribing to all the streaming services out there, we'll go broke.  We have to pick and choose.  I'll be honest, even though I have a healthy (or unhealthy, depending on your point of view) love of science fiction, it wasn't until The Mandalorian that I started to have affection for Star Wars.  Please don't hurt me.

So the point I am trying to make is that as time has gone on, I have found all these different formats of stories to entertain me, from musicals as a kid, because my mom had four VHS tapes that my sister and I would watch together, to science fiction and sitcoms as a young adult, and also anime, in healthy doses, as well as classic black and white movies: my tastes in stories are ever evolving.  And that is only visual media.  In my reading I have discovered authors like Ken Follett and Barbara Kingsolver.  Plus we lived near a comic book store for a few years, so I accumulated TPBs and graphic novels!

My daughter recently introduced me to certain Youtubers who tell stories through their artwork, most notably Neytirix.  One of her videos features her garden, and how she fixed it up with the help of her mom, and at the end of her video she shares the art piece that she was inspired to create from her experiences.  Spoiler alert: it is breathtaking.  Another artist who uses nostalgia in her storytelling quite a bit is Whatsupbeanie, who I first started following on Instagram, but now also follow on Tumblr.

Most of the stories I enjoy are wholesome.  From Fred Astaire to Alina Tysoe, all my life I have gravitated to something visually colorful and uplifting.  And yet.  Sometimes I crave a story that will destroy me.  Run me through, pierce me to my very soul.  Why?  I have no idea.  And yet other times I want to escape to a completely different reality: far off in the future or far off on some distant planet.  All of these tastes are reflected in my writing.  We write the stories we would like to read.  Or at least we should.  Our stories should stir us first.  When I cry while writing a scene, S- cries while reading it, I kid you not. 

So to cap it all off, what I am trying to say is with each passing year I am honing my skill as a storyteller through my love of stories.  I'm not copying or plagiarizing,  I'm absorbing.  I'm assimilating and creating my own spin.  Because nobody can tell a story the way I can, and I can't tell a story the way anyone else can.  I need to embrace my distinct perspective, my distinct style, my choice of words.  A close friend told me recently that I can't write a weak character.  That made me want to try.  She also told me my weak character would turn out to be strong in the end.  That is probably true.  Some of my friends REALLY know me well.