#poor mudflap

[gallonofgoldfish]

Flowers and Fireworks

Returning to business as usual on the ranch is hardly monotonous with Abby around. New faces and old trails make for good company, even if it means getting sidetracked.

Pairing: cowpoke!abby x reader (sort of)

Content: established relationship, brief cowboy ellie, fluff, poor attempts at writing southern accents (i dont even think theyre in the south), reader isn't described, sort of a part two?, author needs a cowboy partner asap, i know less about horses than before, i don't think any warnings apply

A/N: the brainrot is brainrotting. i wanted to write cowboy ellie but then got distracted by both abby and the excitement of a motor vehicle. had a very specific song stuck in my head while writing this but now icant remember what it was (something colter wall??). anyway hopefully this is a fun read even tho its not too eventful (and also was not proofread lolz). planning to have more ellie in the next part if it ever gets written bc we're going to the CLERBBBB

WC: 1508

You haven’t met her yet, but you’ve felt the tension in the air like something’s about to snap into place.

She’s the rookie. The new kid. The hotshot from some bigger, richer ranch further west with a reputation that stirs more talk than her name—whatever it might be. She’s the racer on the back of a chestnut mare in a denim jacket with rolled-up sleeves and workboots that must’ve lost their shine long before she came here.

And she’s lunging in the ring outside the stables, faded black hat crooked, casting a stubborn shadow over the leafy tattoo wrapped around her forearm. Choppy brown hair brushes her shoulders and burns a color like coffee in the dying sunlight. 

Not that you care. You’ve got places to be, and she’ll fall in with the rest of the wranglers eventually.

Gravel crunches some ways down the road behind you, but Abby doesn’t kill the ATV’s engine in time to sneak up on you completely. She comes coasting down the dusty path, toothpick hanging from the corner of her mouth as she grins sideways at you and rolls to a stop. 

“You talk to ‘er yet?” she asks, and the sun flashes over the lenses of her aviators when she tilts her hat out of the way. 

“Not yet. You?”

Abby shakes her head. “Heard she ain’t done too much talkin’ to anyone yet.”

“Uh-huh.” You plant your hands on your hips and nod. “What else’d you hear?”

“Well, what’d you hear?”

“I asked you first.”

She bites down on her bottom lip, jerking her head at you. “Get over here and I’ll tell you.”

“You’re an ass,” you tease, but hop up onto the quad’s grate so your back leans against hers. 

“What, I get one record and you think we’re some big-timers?” Abby scoffs, nudging you with her shoulder. Her braid shifts in the humid breeze. “We got work to do.”

“Yeah, yeah,” is all you mumble as the ATV purrs back to life and jolts towards the barns in the distance. “Tell me what you heard.”

“Not much,” admits Abby. “I mean, not much you don’t already know. She’s got just about the same story as the rest of us. Some ribbons under her belt.”

Dust kicks up from the tires, funneling right past the mudflaps to gather on your jeans. “She got a name?”

“Relax. I’m gettin’ there.” Abby leans to the side to shoot you a skeptical, if halfhearted, glance. “What’re you tryin’ to get under her belt, too?”

“Abby.”

She laughs, then turns her focus back to the road. “Ellie,” she finally says. “Ellie Williams.”

“Alright.” The smell of fuel mingles with the freshness of the tallgrass scrolling by on either side, either one a welcome break from the tinge of manure drifting in from the neighboring fields. 

“Just alright?”

“Well, what the hell else am I supposed to say?” you ask. “I don’t know the girl.”

“I got a good idea.” The engine cuts again. The two of you come to a stop in the shadows just outside one of the stables, before the open sliding doors that stare right out over the mountains. Abby twists to look at you head-on. “How ‘bout you just tell me when we’re good to go?”

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“Y’know—” Your nose crinkles as you squint against the sun, shifting in the saddle with every step the horse beneath you takes. “I thought Manny was helpin’ you with this run.”

It’s muscle memory—tacking, adjusting, swinging up into the seat. Practiced. Routine. But it never gets old. Not the cool tones of the mountains shattering the skyline on the far side of the valley, or the steady gait of the horses as they fall into step beside one another. And definitely not Abby.

“He was,” she confirms. One hand holds the reins while the other settles her sunglasses on the brim of her hat. “‘Til he got busy.”

“With?”

The corners of her eyes crinkle with a smile. “The usual.”

“Sure.” You raise a brow. “And who’s the usual this week?”

“Beats me,” says Abby with a shrug. “Long as it ain’t you, it ain’t my problem.”

“Speak for yourself. The last usual kept leavin’ him notes.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. In the wrong fuckin’ bunk.”

Another grin creeps across her lips as she looks back. Gold falls over her freckled face, flooding the scar on her cheek with light. 

“A little light readin’ never hurt nobody,” she teases. 

“You think?” You tilt your head, unable to avoid the same expression writing itself into your features. “Then next time—”

She’s drawing away, picking up pace.

“Hey, now,” you call, but she doesn’t seem to hear. You nudge your horse’s side to urge them on. Still, though, Abby’s got a good lead. She passes under the low-hanging branches of the trees bordering the path, through a set of rusted iron gates. 

Then, she flicks the reins and takes off. 

“Abby!” you shout, and with no choice left but to do the same, chase after her. 

A cloud of dust stirs up behind her, but you ride right through it, and soon, the trail falls away. 

“I thought you said you got work to do!” 

She laughs, easing up and straightening to drop back and match your pace when you slow. Tallgrass rises on either side of the makeshift path—trampled dirt and dust and the curled-up bodies of flowers unlucky enough to fall into the path of passing hooves. 

“We do,” she says. “That don’t mean we can’t take our time.”

“It’ll be dark soon, yeah?”

“Not that much time.” Abby rolls her eyes and smiles. “We’re just takin’ the scenic route.”

“You know where we’re goin’?” you check.

“Just c’mon.” Turning back to the trail ahead, she nudges her horse to a quicker gait. The unbuttoned front of her flannel flutters around her, giving way to the thin white tank top underneath. 

The ground slopes down, further into the field, as the sun fades over the jagged peaks. Through the yellowed straw and the waves of rippling green, pops of color appear where bright flowers have pushed through the soil and bloomed.

“You ever been this way before?” asks Abby.

You shake your head. “Not that I remember.”

The field is glowing, burning under dusk’s light. She’s glowing with it.

“Well, then.” She shoots you a wink. “You’re in for a treat.”

Just like that, she’s off again. 

The rough path winds down the ridges in the hill, between weeping trees with lazy, swaying branches that force you to duck. Over wooden planks laid out across the marshier parts of the lower pastures and a bridge where a dried-up river leaves a gash in the ground. Back up another slope, another patchy flower field, another grove. 

Until Abby stops to look back at you.

The Ranch sprawls over the acres of land before the two of you, windows lit in the bunkhouse and the barns and lanterns burning alongside the settled paths. The dark shapes of other hands wander like ants across the grass, while the mingling shadows of cattle fill the squares of plains just below. 

“Wait,” Abby urges. The horses paw boredly at the dirt, but, like you, remain in place as the warm summer breeze snakes around you. “Heard about this from a friend last time I was in town.”

You shoot her a curious glance.

“Don’t look at me.” She waves you away, grinning, and points towards the horizon instead. “Over there.”

The first stars are peeking through the bluish parts of the sky, just where it meets the hills. There’s a flash. A burst of red sparks. 

“Fireworks?” Even from afar, their light unfurls over your face. 

“Sure are.” Abby falls silent as the bang from the explosion crashes, muted, through the valley. “They had some leftovers from the fourth.” She sighs, then asks: “Some view, ain’t it?”

Another smattering of colorful bursts erupts over the hills. Another chorus of pops thunder over the grass. The sky changes from one color to the next, smoke gathering in thin gray wisps along the skyline, before you look away.

The lights dance in the lenses of Abby’s aviators where they’re still sitting on her hat, but don’t quite reach her eyes. She hasn’t been watching the fireworks at all; she’s been looking at you instead.

“Yeah,” you murmur, leaning over to kiss her. “Some view,” you say against her lips.

“Anyway—” Clearing her throat, she straightens, then jerks her chin towards the cattle in the field below. “Race you down there.”

“Hey—”

But she’s already gone. Racing back down the hillside, still bathed in the far-off lights.

“You’re gonna owe me a drink!” she calls, though she’s already dropped out of view.

After a last glimpse at the fireworks blooming over the ranch, you pick up the reins again and turn to follow.

The flowers and the fireworks blur, blooming and bursting against the shaded countryside. Lining the hills and lighting the sky and leading you.

Leading you right back to her.

[mskenway97]

G/T in Transformers Revenge of the fallen (2009)

Well I promised you that I would have the second g/t review this time with transformers revenge of the fallen. As in the previous one this review is subjective of my opinion and as the previous one if I miss something or other you can comment quietly :)

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Well, we started with the introduction some time ago, and you are already presented with a comparison between the natives. The pyramid (the harvester) that the fallen's followers are building with the humans watching already leaves a good impression at the beginning but we are not finished there, we see the humans trying to defend themselves from the fallen to see that their attempts are useless, besides first trampling him and secondly throwing the other human as if he were a bug.

Apart from the introduction scene of optimus explaining what had happened in those two years, at the end of that explanation when ironhide comes lennox tells him that they are close as brothers in arms, it is seen that those two years there has been enough contact (to see this is in the comics of tf:alliance that explains what happened in that time).

Well and we already have the entrance of demoslishor for me impressive and terrifying at the same time, what better way than being a bulldozer to transform around the factory disorienting the enemy without giving opportunity to the allies to attack or defend themselves. Demolishor is directly superior to them, even pushing away a helipad as if it were a fly.

Well the Sideways chase scene I'm going to put aside that the twins try it their way. I find it funny how Sideways enters through the window of a house, arcee and the rest too, the old man so quiet like 'what's up' Xd

Noteworthy is the stellar appearance Sideswipe cutting the decepticon in half.

Demolishor creating chaos by his passage, here comes one of my favorite parts, when Epps comment to drop the big load, here we have optimus jumping from the plane, that is how to make a stellar entrance …. this truck does it for you and the transformation sequence with 3 parachutes (I was surprised there weren't more) even though Optimus is the biggest compared to Demolishor it's like a human versus a standard cybertronian size something like that, the meeting of both of them with a bridge in between, gives more to the destruction of the place. Aside from the brutal combo of optimus and ironhide, the former shooting to the head and the latter to the wheels (or legs as you prefer to say it), just because he was stopped doesn't mean he won't stop doing more brutal destruction around, basically.

We move on to Sam's house to the scene where the AllSpark part appears and falls into the kitchen. Seeing the entire kitchen transform is the reverse case of what we are used to, that some appliances are smaller than Sam. Bumblebee most adorable the how he shows up to the rescue, and tries to help with some collateral damage, Sam's mother hysterical, Sam scolding Bumblebee, bumblebee trying to explain to himself that he was trying to help is that I melt with tenderness. Although the part where he tells him go to the garage and he has a hard time getting in the poor guy, also in part you see how great beings try to get into limited places.

Already one of the scenes that I have some fixation to Sam, boy you have a super adorable autobot and you do not take it to the university (where I live if they let you take the car) apart from the scene makes me feel sorry and Bumblebee even cries that made me want to hug him, the way Sam takes Bumblebee by the chin to pay attention to him and the reaction of joy to be heartbroken. We also see the appearance of wheelie as a radicontrol car haha

Next the NEST base, here the scene of Skids and Mudflap's shapeshifting is striking, it would be a little taller than human if you look a little more closely, Well I also don't forget soundwave as a normal satellite, it's a bit small compared to him and how easy it is for him to hack the system. And well, another of my favorite scenes of the movie, the transformation of Optimus Prime to 360 degrees to talk to the general, the face of Galloway and the phrase of Epps is that more better impossible, that there is a lectern bet for the autobots also seems to me a detail.

Well we all know Mr. Galloway and his sympathy that he gives off wherever he goes (sarcasm activated) the whole scene and the cameras showing how big Optimus is compared to the rest but he still stands firm despite all the words of Galloway. Well I'm not going to skip the two scenes that stand out the most from the interaction the first one when Galloway comments on the weaponry advancements and that he doesn't share them. I found it funny how Optimus points at him with his servo, it's like reprimanding children of the damage they can do and Epps defending the autobots of all they have fought, you can see everything they have been through together and he doesn't tempt me and Optimus saying 'easy' with his servo calming the mood haha and the other part when Galloway tells them to leave peacefully…. Well Optimus' warning and how he is approaching a calm anger me every time he says it gives me goosebumps. Imagine if it was you, just thinking about it gives me more chills. XD.

The next scene is more tiny bots, highlighted ravage, the bots are known by the size but despite being as big as a wolf, it easily sneaks into the base. The minibots forming a larger bot, it is like nanobots the detail of how it is formed little by little, because it is smaller does not mean it is not less lethal.

Next scene is already when Sam is in the college scene, Bumblebee trying to warn him that the girl has something different all the time, surely he would have transformed to stop the danger but he would be respecting Sam's wishes to have a normal life, although the spraying him (like Simmons in the first one XD).

Well now comes one of the scenes that I like the most of the movie, the scene of the talk in the cemetery, the comparison of Optimus with one of the statues of the cemetery, there the cameras were sublime, taking the scenes approaching Sam, talking about the destruction of Cybertron… And how Optimus tries to convince Sam not with brute force but talking giving him the choice, as you can see he is still the gentle giant (although less points for Sam, is that to give the kid).

Moving on to the next part, the resurrection of Megatron, it strikes me that a few Decepticons do not attract attention on a ship. Megatron was full of starfish and marine elements as if he was part of the landscape. Here is a part where the Decepticons are not safe among them either, they had to sacrifice one to give Megatron parts, the doctor looks cute to me and also reminds me of the broken object that I revive with dark energon in transformers prime. Although the first thing Megatron does? He blows a submarine in half with his new body while he meets up with the fallen. You see the environment where the new hatchlings are being raised (this is partly what strikes me about the way they are raised) how small and fragile they are. If you want to know more about the relationship between the fallen and Megatron is to look at the comics tf: defiance where he tells part of their relationship.

Moving on to the wheelie vs Mikaela, this is with g/t fearplay detail but this time being Mikaela giantess, wheelie going through an area full of obstacles and some that get stuck on her foot and how she gets scared afterwards. Mikaela doesn't hesitate to melt her an optics. Calm goddess war and she says that it is her worst nightmare. Besides taking it in a box. It's perfect I mean it's completely g/t that scene you're not going to deny me XD.

The part of Sam and Alice well I'm going to categorize it as something special since Alice is the same size maybe a little bigger, what would stand out is her glossa here to say how long that is XD, Although she also generates great destruction in the university.

When everyone thinks they were safe well comes the blackout version of this movie (grindor was I think) good to catch the car as if nothing to an abandoned factory and the car split in two by Starscream himself. Along with Megatron who would not be very happy to see Sam throwing him and paralyzing him with his servo. Imagine being in the hands of this Megatron, defenseless and surrounded by Decepticons. You caused the death of only one and you are at his mercy. You feel it, don't you? Add Megatron's predator-like growls with the phrases of grabbing at human flesh. Complete fearplay.

This part can also be added in reverse with the doctor examining Sam and using a bot to get the information out of Sam's brain. Of taking Sam's brain, like a guinea pig without further ado.

Okay comes my favorite part and at the same time the part that hurts the most. The appearance of Optimus and Bumblebee in the factory, you see Mikaela and Leo running and the comparison is impressive. After throwing Megatron away. It's an unpredictable moment if you don't look closely Optimus pulls Sam carefully out of the factory to get him away from danger.

Then the jump into the forest as he instantly transforms and leaves Sam as far away as he can add how the trees and the ground ends up ripped up by the roots. Sam is not safe, he adds that Grindor and Starscream are chasing him all the time. Optimus trying to hold off three Decepticons by himself. It's like a bigger cat and mouse game.

"Is the future of our race not worth a single human life?"

"You'll never stop at one. [Unsheathes his left blade]I'll take you all on!"

My favorite part of the movie not only shows that he cares for Sam but for all of humanity to kick ass by dispatching all the totally daddy wolf protecting his brood. After he's dispatched at least grindor to hunt him down Sam like crazy. Too weak? you attacked him from behind? I'm sorry I got sidetracked already when he hits him from behind and making him fall on the ground right next to Sam. The boy looking disconsolate and well… optimus dying and telling him to run away (this part still hurts me a lot, he is still one of my favorite optimus) in spite of dying he was worried about the boy, and then at the end the rest of the autobots appear to the rescue.

Well here comes harder Starscream and Megatron talking on a rooftop of a building are somewhat small in comparison some skyscrapers is a detail to note. And the arrival of all the decepcticons to the strip in search of Sam. Some decepcticon on top of a New York bridge and Megatron using an antenna to help in the transmission. Also affecting the U.S. fleets and especially falling in France where Sam's parents were on vacation, led by a large Decepticon, kidnapping at the same time. In addition to the message of The Fallen destroying the planet without more seeing the forces that have some Decepticons and the destruction caused by Demolishor before…

The part where they tell the facts and Leo justifies his situation as a kidnapping. I find it funny how the three of them discuss the situation despite the seriousness of the situation.

And when they bring Optimus' corpse… they throw him out like it's nothing… It breaks the soul to see it, and when other vehicles come to surround them, making the Autobots see a threat something that is clear is that Optimus appeased the discussions between the two species and happens what is happening in that part. Galloway saying that the army will be able to fix it there I agree with Ratchet is not very well informed, despite everything that has happened. Ironhide decides to stay because of what Optimus wanted.

The scene afterwards talking to Bumblebee, Sam admitted his guilt but Bumblebee despite everything is still by his side, supporting him no matter what and insisting he doesn't turn himself in.

Also Skids and Mudflap trying to say that they don't read and picking on Leo partly makes me feel a little sorry for the kid, he didn't deserve so much hate.

The detail of Simmons keeping the Frenzy head is a highlight. Another funny scene is when Mikaela shows Wheelie saying that she is training him and Simmons comments that he is like a chihuahua hahahaha I was laughing for a while. And how Mikaela convinces him with a kind voice to read the symbols and not burn his other eye xD.

Part of the museum, I'm going to skip straight to when he finds Jetfire, the horrified face when he uses the shard on a Decepticon the instinct directly to run away, even though Jetfire is not at his best, that it's better to get out of there, Simmons worrying about the mess that may be in the museum xd. Try to talk to him as you can, chase a bigger roboto that he doesn't generate more chaos and listen to them. I also found it funny that he commented on how the war is going, as if it were a soccer game. The mention of the change of side for Wheelie to be autobot and well how "happy" he is shown (this part let's say it could be slightly suggestive but I don't want to get into trouble). How they ignore him for a moment and he reacts by hitting them with the baton making them all fall to the ground. Sam trying to calm him down so he can explain the situation to them is that the whole Jetfire encounter is a lot to take in, haha.

The next part is how to use a space bridge but wrong, some of you are used to transformers g1 and transformers prime.

Well here let's say they all flew through the air to different parts of Egypt, see how they fall even you can see bumblebe spitting sand and wheelie falling on top of jetfire's head.

Already as Simmons and Sam reproaches them that he has not told them any information about it and see how the robot complains that they are not insolent is that it is to see tfa Ratchet all the time is great. Well here we have to applaud the cameramen for the change the angles between jetfire and humans are simply beautiful, that even though he was Decepticon and now is autobot maintains the attitude that I have commented about the autobots with humans. Well in jetfire's vision, you can see The Fallen attacking more humans the theme that the Decepticons already looked superior and us as insects.

Already if you see the battlefield in the past, imagine in that era if you see all that battlefield would create right now the legends of monsters or represented in cave paintings in short that I digress again XD. Also note the detail of how jetfire's beard approaches the ground and how Sam approaches the comparative is quite amazing.

Well next part see how the autobots are about to be transported and even the body of optimus that occupies more to be loaded on a plane, that optimus itself needs its own plane and the rest fit in the others shows how big it is.

Well there is a small moment when they pass the checkpoint, seeing Wheelie for a moment between them, just highlighting that for a moment.

Already when they all climb to get to the pyramid see the differences again, Skids telling them to camouflage themselves as part of the scenery.

As Bumblebee takes a swing at him, it's also funny how Wheelie, a minibot scolds the big guys telling them not to draw attention to themselves XD.

In the plane with NEST you can see that Lennox and the rest of the team are in the same plane as Optimus, you can also see at that moment how big he is.

Al-Khazneh along with the soundtrack 'tomb of the primes' gives the air of mystery seeing how the humans help each other get on and Skids and Mudflap too haha. When Leo says we trust grandpa, Simmons responds to his defense it's the biggest gate I've ever seen(g/t by far).

Despite Skids and Mudaflap being the smallest they can also do considerable damage, from the fight they had earlier they could have crushed Sam like nothing, Bumblebee's reaction of throwing them out is more than understandable.

The "entrance to the tomb of the Primes", see how each part of the body of each of the Primes is highlighted, including the gerogryphs.

Well here I return to comment the exit of the plane of the autobots, in the other plane there were only most of the bots compared to Optimus who only needed one. Also the detail as they fall and how again three parachutes carried the body of Prime. You can also see how the bystanders were poking with sticks the body of Optimus and see how they cover it.

Well the comparison of Megatron and Strascream in the pyramids, although they look big in structures like this they look smaller.

Let's see a group of soldiers and a few autobots against a group of 16 decepticons, it's a very uneven balance. Although I like the detail that both the autobot and the human stay together to plan strategy.

Well this scene is the one that basically brought out one of the IMAX computers (no kidding there are videos of that XD), Simmons' comparison to the movie 'Gunfight at the OK Corral' with what is going to happen now is right on point. Seeing the transformation of all those robots into one, the simple beauty of seeing something so big, we present to you Devastator.

We move on to Sam and Mikaela who are in no better condition than Leo and Simmons, they are in a house, surrounded by a bunch of robots going after them everywhere. Shooting, destroying buildings….

The simple detail that a small bot bug, that Sam ended up with was the alarm…. Well with that move it alerted Starscream directly, tearing the roof off, alerting the rest of the decepticons and attacking them non-stop. Flee while you can and do it fast.

The detail of Sidewispe protecting the soldiers and Ironhide and Arcee and the rest helping others hints at more of the NEST union.

Also to see Megatro on top of the pyramid and the comparison with Devastator to the rest of things as if he was miserable fleas so to speak. crushing a vehicle with his fist. So you think that's not dangerous? I'll add that Decepticon can suck you into it (considering the g/t role it would go another way…) destroying in parts what it has swallowed… Skids and Mudflap have a tough time here.

Well Mudflap ends up literally eaten (don't come to me, we've all seen the movie, so) running to his feet in some g/t is not usually good and day and a while later Mudflap appears well and seeking revenge (it could be considered safe vore? I leave it written) Well the fight of these twins against Devastator is like David and Golitath so I saw it in that perspective yes.

Okay back to Sam and Mikaela, remember Sam's parents who were kidnapped? Well here they are as a change to make the boy give himself up. Rampage is clearly trying to enforce his goal of threatening and Sam trying to keep the situation under control, except Bumblebee wasn't far behind, the way he shows up and attacks him with a death kick and putting on his battle mask is when the matter has become serious. Although Ravage wasn't far off but a lesson Bumblebee is adorable but he can also do his executions just like Optimus, Ravage and Rampage found out the hard way. Bumblebee always helping to get Sam's parents to safety.

The military wasn't having an easy time either, they've been fighting for years but several Decepticons can take out a helicopter with one shot, see Devastator approaching the pyramid.

Sam was finally able to meet Ironhide and the rest showing that the big guy is willing to do anything with the boy. I feel sorry for Arcee and Elita One (I think they were just mentioned in the movie and I had to look up the information) killed in combat.

Now the next scene the pyramid, Devastator climbing it and Simmons right next to it the camera comparison at that moment is sublime. and as that pyramid is destroyed like nothing in Devastator's fists like unwrapping a gift.

Here seeing the state of battle from the point of view of the soldiers is quite disheartening.

Watch Sam and Mikaela run as fast as they can in the face of the enemy with Megatron in pursuit. The soundtrack 'precious cargo' perfectly represents the moment of chaos role of battles between autobots, decepticons and humans, a scene to remember.

It seems a pretty desperate situation until Jetfire appears to finish off an enemy that was on top of Sam, Mikaela, Lennox and Epps, Scorponok also returns but crushed right away by Jetfire's cane although he managed to hurt him.

We return to the scene of demolition of a pyramid and aspiration of the pieces. well as Simmons refers to where he is right to the 'balls' (I do not know how to say this without losing my composure do not keep in mind me).

With just one shot I end up with Devastator falling right into parts.

Already the rain of explosives that has affected Ironhide, making the autobots jump away, Sam believing that he was going safely to Optimus? well not from the shadows as a monster appears Megatron making the final shot.

Already when Sam dies not only see the despair of Mikaela, parents and bumblebee as he runs and tries to say his name several times and kneeling with a sad face. That friendship for someone he swore to protect.

And the mysticism of the meeting of the Primes with Sam, feeling small between them. That encounter was the best.

And now my favorite part of the movie, how Sam climbs on the chassis of Optimus to reactivate the spark with the matrix.

Those optics activating and hitting that buzz, how he coughs up sand and watching him move to see and say thank you to Sam (I was super excited at this part, it's still one of my favorites to this day) and how Jetfire showed his joy. But the joy is short-lived because The Fallen appears by energy expansion causing everyone around him to end up scattered and at the same time trying to skewer them with the cane, recovering the matrix. The detail of how he also tramples Optimus.

Optimus finds it hard to move, from the damage of the battle in the forest, everyone saying that he will get up but he can't, the reactive matrix doesn't leave the body as it was before.

The military trying to stop the reaper and the fallen but with their powers it is impossible.

Another favorite part let's say the fusion between Jeftire and Optimus Prime (powerlink in armada) but seen in the movie it's awesome. See how he flies straight to his target destroying the harvester. In size and strength Optimus surpasses with expectations Megatron throwing him through the air and The Fallen ripping off his face and the spark.

So with the end of the battle see the size comparison of Optimus with the same sphige! When I watched that scene I literally freaked out.

And then the final scene with the aircraft carrier, seeing Optimus from above, the camera changes to zoom in and show Optimus thanking Sam. Being the comparison of the two together during the speech that is a great scene.

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I think I have commented as much as possible, it must be said that this has been long (when I play age of extinction I'm going to laugh for a while haha).

[cuppajj]

What is your least favorite transformer/Cybertronian? can be from any continuity. Mine is Getaway because FVCK THAT GUY.

Overlord I'd say 75% of the bayverse transformers but especially wheelie? that guy sucks. I don't dislike many transformers characters but the bayverse transformers are just, icky to me. Maybe it's because of how I think their designs and some of their personalities were butchered. but wheelie sucks. so do skids and mudflap, they all reflect poor decisions by the writers/director.

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales: The Treasure of the Lost Lamp Movie Reviewcap! (Patreon Stretch Goal)

Hello all you happy people! And we have a special review today for two reasons. The first is that this is my second patreon stretch goal review, having hit the 15 dollar goal back in march thanks to my wonderful friend Emma, the same patreon whose responsible for the Green Eggs and Ham Reviews,  who helped me hit the 15 dollar goal.  As a result you fine people are getting three movie reviews each based on a Disney Afternoon Movie with Treasure of the Lost Lamp today, a goofy movie at the end of the motnh for  a weeklong tribute to my favorite dogmandadguy.  Extremley was going to be part of it but the length of this review convinced me otherwise, but I will be doing it this summer so keep an ear out. If you want to help me hit my next stretch goals do yourselve a favor and zip on over to my patreon YOU CAN FIND MY PATREON HERE. My next stretch goal at “OH Look 20 Dollars” would give everyone patreon and not, a monthly review of Darkwing Duck as decided by my patrons, reviews of BOTH season 2 mini series from Ducktales 87, introducing Fenton to the world and blighting it with Bubba before the 2017 series fixed him, and as a brucey bonus added last month a review of Danny Phantom the Ultimate Enemy. And if that wasn’t enough if you help me get to the goal after that at 25 unlocks another trilogy of disney film reviews, this time for the proud family and recess movie and the best kim possible movie, and dcom period, so the drama as well as Bryan Lee O’ Malley’s two stand alone graphic novels, lost at sea and seconds for you Scottaholics in the audience.

The other reason now the shilling’s done. is that the plan WAS to review this back to back with Treasure of The Found Lamp, to the point the orginal review had a whole thing about that, why it was delayed etc... but now that review’s been scrapped all together as something sudden and wonderful happened. After just kinda giving up someone came through with a translation of Della’s first apperance so presumibly i’ll be doing that as part of the build up to mother’s day, and since I still want ot do maternal instincts too, and already had to let the Floyd Gottfredson birthday special slide away as well... it had to go as I want to leave the only open space on the schedule for the lovely person who found the story for me. But this review is still done, i’m very proud of it so join me under the cut won’t you?

Behind The Scenes: Before I get into it i’d just like to note this article from SyFy Wire. It , along with articles I found via wikipedia citations, was an invaluable resource. 

The film was an experiment: It was an experiment to see if one of their tv properties could bring in theatrical money, to see if a movie made on a cheaper budget and still rake in decent money, to see if a film could be made being outsourced to several diffrent places, and to see what one of those places, their recently aquiried french stuido, could handle this kind of work. 

The film, if succesful would be the first of Disney’s MovieToons line, a series of films based on their shows. As you can tell by the fact only this movie and Goof Troop happened and the Movie Toons label wasn’t applied to that one it very much failed. While the film was warmly recevied by people who liked the show general audiences didn’t turn out for it. As a result the MovieToons label was scrapped, future projects with it were canceled.. but the stellar work put in by the french stuidio lead to it perserviering for several more decades and lead to them working on the Goofy Movie, which we’ll get to later this month but needless to say was a MUCH bigger hit with a much bigger budget. 

As for why the film failed... I have two theories. THe first is that parents were stupid back then and didn’t want to pay to see something on the big screen they could see on tv’s. This is a stupid mentality to me as generally a movie of a tv show puts in a ton of extra effort and usually goes bigger and dosen’t go home. It’s a likely theory given most liscened films of the era didn’t do quite well, with all three hasbro films tanking. And look I get Transformers the Movie is cheesy and killed a lot of people’s childhood toys, but damn if it ain’t aweosme.. and also something I need to cover at some point. Thankfully this died out by later in the 90′s with Rugrats getting a hugely succesful if flawed film, a better sequel and a third one that was also a crossover with the wild thornberries. 

And even now in 2020 we’re getting the Loud House and Rise of the TMNT movies sometimes this summer, we were SUPPOSED to have gotten the bobs burgers movie this summer but arne’t because Disney is being a dick about it.

And we got a phineas and ferb movie last year. With this trend hopefully thsi means we’ll get a Ducktales 2017 movie at some point since season 4 left a huge sequel hook laying right there to grab for a feature film.  One final note: The film was conceptually thought up as a 5 part serial like “Treasure of the Golden Suns”, “Catch as Cash Can”, “SuperDucktales” and “Time is Money, something that DOES show as the movie weirdly has act breaks. In a feature film. Yup. 

The Guest Cast:

I won’t go into the full cast since I’ve sung Alan Young and Russi Taylor’s praises PLENTY on this blog before, and I plan to go into Beakly and Launchpad’s actors when they show up in the pilot movie. But i’d be remiss if i didn’t talk about our three guest actors for our three new parts. 

First up is Merlock voiced by legend and if I had a hall of fame, hall of famer Christopher Lloyd.. I need to get me one of those. Lloyd is of course known for playing Doc Brown in back to the future but has done countless other films, voicework, and other good stuff. Among his MASSIVE filmography includes The Back to the Future Trilogy (Already mentioned it but it bears repeating), Star Trek III, Who Framed Roger Rabbit as the pants destroyingly terrifying Judge Doom, The Addams Family duology as fester, a role rip torn would ironcially play for the animated series made to captalize on said movie, Hey Arnold! The Movie, The Oogieloves in The Big Ballon Adventure (Look everybody needs money sometimes okay?), and Art of the Deal: The Movie, which was not, thankfully an ego filating nightmare made by trump himself but a film made by funny or die parodying his terrible book and having Llloyd return as Doc Brown. TV Wise he’s known for Taxi, Back to the Future the Animated Series, Cyberchase and he most recently popped up on Big City Greens. How I missed that ep I.. do know as I haven’t watched season 2. Gonna fix that later this month. Lloyd is utterly awesome, a great guy and thankfully still alive at the time of this writing, so I was happy to have him here. 

Less familiar to me but still known is Rip Taylor, a comedian known for his flamboyant unique way of speech and his marvelous mustache. He showed up in things occasionally and always seemed like the nicest guy and his passing in late 2019 truly is sad. He does a terrific job here but more on that in a moment. 

Finally we have Richard Libertini, a comedian I never really saw in anything besides this who according to IMDB was most famous for his ablility to do a foreign accent. I REALLY hope all of them aren’t as horribly racist as this one. We’ll.. get to that in a sec as it’s time for the plot!

A Treasure Uncovered:

We open our film gorgeously. The animation is great in the film, having some rough edges I chalk up to the film’s hectic production, the studio being new at working at disney properties, and the film not being meant for HD. That being said a few rough spots here and there aside.. the film looks ungodly gorgeous. Like most theatrical films based on a cartoon it takes an already great style and makes it look great. It feels like a more fluid evolution of the cartoons look and it’s a shame we didn’t get more movies in this style for both this show and others, ESPECIALLY Darkwing Duck. Can you imagine a Darkwing Duck movie with this lush animation? Hopefully we’ll get one eventually. 

So our heroes are going to somewhere in the Middle East. That’s.. that’s all wikipedia gives me and all the film gives me. As usual Scrooge is after treasure in this case the Treasure of Collie Baba, the greatest thief there ever was based obviously off Ali Baba from 1001 nights and that one Beastie Boys song. 

It’s here we find the WORST thing about the film, the thing that makes this a hard one to watch depsite otherwise being pretty good, and that makes my skin crawl knowing i’m a white man and a BUNCH of white guys, Ducktales series creator who did the voice casting for this character, the writers who wrote him, the direector disney them fucking selves who thought this was okay. 

The film has some horrible steroytping. It starts with a bunch of backgorund guys surronding Scrooge, with crooked teeth and steotypical voices. This on it’s own is odious. 

It somehow gets worse. Then we meet one of our antagonists. We meet Dijon. 

This Fucking Guy 

Djon is horribly offensive reminding me of other such luminaries in being ungodly offensive yet somehow getting put to film as Jar Jar Binks (With all respeect to his poor actor Ahmed Best, this is not his fault), Rob Schinder as a Sterotypically asian preist, Skids and Mudflap, Rob Schinder as a sterotypically mexican bandit, The Whitewashed cast of The Last Airbender, and Rob Schinder as a stereotypically asian preist. What i’m saying is Djon is an AWFUL, horribly offensive character.. and that Rob Schinder should be shot up into space, not to watch cheesy movies, he’s not funny enough for that, but instead to be sent to a satlitie that’s liveable, but also filled to the brim with spring loaded boxing gloves. Just tons of boxing gloves that feel like getting punched by a heavewight boxer all hidden... they could hit his legs, his face, his nuts, his face and his nuts, the point is he’s in constnat pain unless he moves carefully. 

And lest you think i’m exaggerating for starters this is his design. 

It just screams “vaugely but sterotpyically middle eastern” along with cowardly. The fact he’s also a literal rat is just the icing on the cake made of broken glass, shrapnel and broken DVD’s of Transformers; Revenge of the Fallen. They say if you eat a reveng eof the fallen dvd John Tutoro appears at the foot of your bed and watches you while you sleep.. and by they I mean me. It was a bad bet. I got rid of him with some insese and a bribe of five dollars. 

Oh but that’s just design.. when he talks it’s MUCH worse. His voice is like if they took Apu from the simpsons and said “This but MORE offensive”, and his perosnality is WORSE. He’s a thief.. and not in the endearing loveable rogue way but he’s a pick pocket and a running “Gag’ is that he’ll often grab eveyrthing within reahc. As the deisgn shows he’s a coward running at every opportunity. Oh and to top it all off he’s the willing servant of the white coded, given all ducks in this series are white coded and voiced bby white actors, big bad. And the actor is naturally VERY white to make this cocktail of offensivness so complete that if Disney ever got rid of this film I GUARANTEE the republcian party would be running in with accusations of cancel culture gone amok and never shutting up about this like they did the muppets. Which for the record THEY DIDN’T CANCEL THEM, YOUR POINT IS ILLEGITMATE, THEY JUST WANTED TO BE SENSTIVE YOU GHOULS. 

I do have a reason for bringing up Disney’s content warnings... most damming of all given just how DEEPLY uncomfortbale this character is.. there isn’t one for this movie. I double checked: There isn’t even wanring notes on the website. It’s just.. on there. And given just how ghastly a sterotype Djon is.. that’s not right. Seriously they DID put them on certain episodes of the show, theyk now this sort of thing is wrong and they done wrong.. but for NO reason they haven’t done so for a film released 31 years ago. Around the same time as the series and just offensive as that show at it’s worst if not more so. This is flatly inexcusable.. par for the course for Disney’s incompetence but still horribly furstrating, disgusting and shameful.. which has been the theme of the last three days really. I expect better because when it comes to putting that warning label on this stuff, they usually are better. First the scheduling mixup and now this. You already do a handful of things wrong Disney why add this to the list?!

It’s just draining not only to run into another Disney Fuckup after a weekend of dealing with one of their worst in recent memory, but just to watch Djon. To see this horrible caractrure saunter onto the screen and go on with his harmful schtick, to see that THIS is what Ducktales 87 reduced non white people to more often than not.  It’s remarkable just how throughly and awesomely Frank and Matt completely and totally reversed this. Instead of horrible sterotypes in the reboot, we got TONS of loveable people of color, an endearing latino hero, a smart african american buisness woman who takes no shit but is still a consumate professional, and an egyptian HERO with an intresting story and a strong moral code instead of this horrible reminder that racisim in media was such an afterthought not ONE person brought this up during the scyfy wire stuff or in any inteview i’ve seen. No one cared. Djon was POPULAR enough that he got three episode sin the series. THREE FUCKING EPISODES. This film could be GOOD.. but it’s just so bogged down EVERY FUCKING TIME this artists interpreitation of what Tucker Carlson sees when he looks at a middle eastern person I had to pause to compose myself and had to take a break writing this review to avoid tyiping this in all caps and using the phrase YOU RACIST MOTHERFUCKERS every other sentence. And again i’m white, I get this is second hand offensiveness.. I do... but it dosen’t mean I can’t be offended other white people were so callous about other cultures behaviors this happened.

And what makes me feel worse.. is that I just sorta... never thought about white people voicing non white characters. Things like this I noticed sure, I realize now part of the reason I didn’t like this movie the first time I saw it was this alex jones version of a looney tune, but I do feel shame for not noticing or caring long before this. Sure I loved it when a character of color got played by a person of color.. but I didn’t realize just how deep that problem was and how LONG it went on for before the outcry post george floyd and the call to action lead to most shows still going course correcting. It’s why stuff like this extra botehrs me: because THIS was just as okay at the time. No one blinked twice about this and odds are the creators involved still haven’t. And that.. that’s just terrible and it hurts to think about and  I still have most of the movie to go.  

The Pyramid of Peril:

So we do get a gorgeous unvewling scene of a box Scrooge found out about from Collie Baba’s horde that should lead them to the treasure. This scene reminds me of Indina Jones.. and I bring this up because the poster was specifically made to mimick an indinia jones poster, to the point of getting drew struzan to do it. THe creator of Ducktales objected..l but I do not get WHY. While I”m not sure if he had yet, Speilberg flat out admits the Carl Barks comics were an inspiration for Indina Jones, with the iconic bolder chase coming from a similar scene in one of Barks Stories. Gotta cover that too. So yeah I don’t get not wanting an indina jones style poster when both were inspiried by the same work and it’s just simple logic and it looks so neat. Thank you. 

Scrooge finds seemingly just clothes.. and a map. Jeff Dunham’s Most Racist Puppet reports to his master, Merlock. Merlock is a.. meh villian. Christopher Lloyd does try.. but Lock is your standard evil overlord wants to take over the world type. He dosen’t have much depth, or personality and only his style saves him from dragging the film down along with Dana Carvey’s most racist disguise in master of disguise. He does have a deent shape shifting gimick and being played by Christopher Lloyd means he’s acted TREMENDOUSLY. Alan Young was apparently in awe watching him work and that’s wonderful to hear. The guy did his best. Weirdly Merlock would show up in tons of other works, mostly video games.. but even weirder he NEVER showed up in ducktales 2017. Both Djon and Gene would, Djon thankfully renamed we’ll get to all of that tommorow thank god. I need it after this. But Frank has outright said they didn’t use Merlock because there simply wasn’t anything they could do with him they couldn’t dow ith magica. My likely guess is the might of found a way to revamp him EVENTUALLY, it’s not like radical revamps weren’t there thing come on, they just had way more stories with Magica and didnd’t get around to it before the show was canceled. Just make him some sort of evil god or something. it’s what I might do. There’s a lot of angles with him. Though I would’ve still gotten christopher lloyd back. I mean most of the recasting is good but he’s still alive and deserved a better shot at things. 

So Merlock sends Djonn to go with scrooge as his guide to find the treasure, as there’s something of imense power within it. And I gotta ask WHY does Merlock need a minon. No really. This isn’t a situation like reboot magica where he’s trapped in another realm. He can shapeshift into any animal. We only see him use falcon, rat, cockroach and bear but theoritically he can become anything and bear alone is still a LOT. Why does he need this sterotype even other sterytopes ar eashamed of? The film dosen’t NEED Djonn. Just let Christopher Lloyd monologue and leave this post 911 propogranda cartoon at home. 

So our heroes nad rejected jar jar prototype head into the desert, and seemingly find nothing before finding a small pyramid all while Merlock follows desecretley as a mighty hawk. 

Scrooge makes the boys and Djon dig... because they clearly forgot the “work hard” part of his ethos. 

Our heroes unveil the pyramid... and while Merlock SAYS he searched the desert and I get it’s hard to see thourgh all of that.. the dude is immortal, had decades to search and had Mickey Rooney there on standby to force him to go comb the desert. I have an artist rendering of that hang on

So our heroes enter the pyramid and it goes.. really how you’d expect: there’s a bunch of traps our brave explorers have to pass, the boys minintpret a juinor woodchuck saying about loosing your marbles to mean using the ones they actually have which geninely comes in handy as they trip the traps and Rob SChinder as a carrot stumbles into one. Also launchpad is wearing a hawaiin shirt and shades. This has no baring on the plot, but it does bring the movie up a notch in my book and I question why the reboot never used this outfit. Then again they also never properly used Donald’s Quack Pack Outfit (Which bad show or not, is objectively awesome), or his Quack Shot Indiana Jones Riff Outfit, so  it’s not like there isn’t a presdecnt for not giving a character a cool costume change from a previous medium. I really should do a top 12 missed opportunities list for the 2017 cartoon.. the ideas for stuff are really piling up. 

OUr heroes eventually find the treasure which has insidiously clever security the more I think about it: at first I thought it had none, just a pit with some... scorpions? I mean their supposed to be but they look like they crawled out of the same stygian hole in the sky Doofus crawled out of. And if your asking me “wait which Doofus” the answer is both. Both these abominations crawled out of a stygian hole in the sky.

But the treasure is on a platform surrounded by scoprions with the only way out being the trap filled way they came in. Unless someone comes in with a full team and a bunch of lootin sacks, they aren’t getting out with EVERYTHING. They can steal SOME of the treasure but there’s no way to get any signifigant portion... and the team thing itself is an issue, something Collie defintely predicted being a thief himself: while some thieves can work well as a team, hence why we have four oceans movies 3/4 damn good, and for the record 12 is the bad one, 8 is how you do a soft reboot and a female led reboot right, a good chunk of professional crooks will turn on each other or try and swinldle... and tha’ts dangerous in a trap filled temple but hey some criminals ain’t so smart.  If they all were Rudy Gulliani wouldn’t have two razzies for preparing to pull his pants down, and have waved his phone around on tv like a dare for future adminstrations to arrest the shit out of him would he? 

But Scrooge has his family so they get loading. But not before Webby finds the lamp. Not knowing about it Scrooge has no intrest in it, but Webby does. We also get a really simple but hilarious gag where SCrooge dickers over the idea for a second.. before Webby picks up a Jeweled tiara to possibly take instead. The best gags to me are often the ones that just let the character’s perosnalities take the lead and bounce off each other. It’s why when I reviewed the four lilo and stitch crossovers recently I harped on character interaction as their biggest weakness: it’s what MAKES a good work for me. It’s why my faviorite comics and shows often follow a loveable group of disfunctional misfits. I like a group of big personalities who despite in theory should NOT be able to work making it work anyway. And it’s honeslty what’s made Scrooge last so long: Scrooge on his OWN is awesome.. but iwth the boys, donald, and in the case of this series and the reivival Webby and Launchpad, with people to bounce off of who he contrasts heavily with, from Launchapd’s buffonery to Webby’s inehrent sweetness in both versions, to the boys genuine honesty and sense of adventure.... it makes him truly stand out. He’s a great character on his own, don’t get me wrong.. but it’s the people around him that give him chances to show WHY. A good character on it’s own is fine and dandy.. a good character with other good characters around them is where it gets truly special. 

Merlock naturally bursts in and in a VERY Black Heron move needlesly outs what micheal bay sees when he closes his eyes as a bad guy... no really he grabs the guy with his talons as he captures the treasure and reveals he’s a bad guy. I don’t even get why keep Djonn alive. He’s done all Merlock possibly could’ve needed and Merlock is ruthless... this makes no sense and only happens because they need Djonn for later in the plot.

Our heroes barely escape, rafting out on the platform itself in a thrilling sequence.. but it’s the one right after that catches my attention. Scrooge utterly defeated, having searched for this treasure for forty years and unresponsive to everyone else. The anmation, coupled with the incomprable Alan young’s acting makes this the highlight of the film for me. Beneath the armor of wealth and skill.. is only a poor old man who just lost something he’s been chasing after most of his life. Scrooge tries his hardest not to be vunerable and both shows and the original comics all use that so when he truly is devistated like this, and i’ts belivible since this treasure is a personal goal of his and as someone who has had things that they seek out specifically, loosing them always hurts. It hurts to ALMOST reach a goal only to have it crumble out under you

But while this alone is good.. what’s next makes it great. Webby sweetly offers up the lamp. Scrooge turns it down, and her genuine gesture reinvgorates him and reminds us of who he is “I’ll find it if it takes another 40 years”> Scrooge may be bitter, mean and selfish a lot of the time.. but deep down, he’s a good man and one who will not give up, and a momentary setback can only stop him so long as long as he has his family to remind him of who he truly is.. and what’s truly important. It’s genuinely sweet and to me is also a reminder of why 87 Webby is a good character: Shes’ not perfect, her main personality trait is often Girl Sterotype”.. but she’s a genuinely sweet small child with a huge heart. It’s telling that while 17′ Webby is almost completely diffren,t and far better, that heart remains her biggest strength. Sure her reboot self could kill a man nad no one would ever find the body, but it’s her heart and empathy that makes that possible and makes her Webby.  That inherent loving nature is what makes Webby webby wether she’s a toddler having a tea party or a tween getting ready to intergoate a guy with a meat tenderizer while saying ‘Cute girl stuff”. 

Gene Genie Let’s Himself Go:

It’s a few days later and this is the point where it REALLY becomes obvious this was written as a bunch of episodes. Though to the film’s credit while it does ake this feel like a compliation movie as a result... it dosen’t hamper the film’s quality, condiment from Rush Limbaghs’ hot dog stand does that just fine, but once you notice it it’s impossible to unotice it. Weirdly though it seems chunked up into four episodes rather than the usual five, likely cutting down an episode, though I can’t see where they cut out material frankly if they did and i’ts just as likely they woudl’ve had to make one to fill in the space.

So Scrooge is in a mood, being grumpy with his secretary Mrs. Featherly, quackfaster in all but name, and having to be sent home. So while Duckworth goes to fetch him Webby polishes her treasure at long last readying for a tea party, something the boys roundly reject because their sexist little twits and swo were the writers or executies who assumed all little boys act the same. It’s easily my biggest pet peeve with the series as a whole: anytime this crops up with the boys it turns them into the worst dicks imaginable. It’s telling this, being mean about her wantin ga tea party with her surrogate brothersi s TAME. Normally they’ll say she can’t do things because she’s a girl or mock her hobies outright instead of just be mildly dickish. And while she dosen’t look much younger Webby is VERY CLEARLY, in this series anyway, supposed to be say 5 or 6 to the boys 8-10. 7 at most. SHe’s a small child and while it is realistic for older kids to bully younger ones, it’s not fun to watch. It’s why I get annoyed at all the big sibling bully characters.. some work, but most aren’t fun to watch because there’s nothing funny or intresting about it. It’s the same deal here. 

Thankfully that quickly goes away as the lamp moves when Webby rubs it and does so again to prove it did move. Huey finishes it and we’re introduced to Gene, the best part of the film.  Gene is a Genie and he takes a second to dart around before messing with the appliances in the kitchen, as he was last around during the time 1001 Nights Came About. Cleverly though, and so we thankfully don’t have 80 dozen fishout of water jokes that have already been done before. As you can probably guess i’m not a huge fan of time travel fish out of water stuff. Now from another dimensoin or planet, i’m on board with with Star Vs, Steven Universe and Sym-Bionic Titan being great examples of this, as is the comic resident alien. (Despite having the wonderous Alan Tuduk the show sounds way more mean spirited and misses the entire point of the comic as given by the author in the credits, i.e. that the alien is supposed to NOT be a threat and just be gently waiting for a ride) The inverse is also good with Amphbia and owl house, taking a human and plopping them into our world. But time travel stuff just usually runs the same beats of “look at the shiny thing” and what not. The only time i’ve sene something SIMILAR work is with thor where their society is SIMILAR to vikings time but still it’s own thing.. it also gave us a classic gag in..

So yeah i’m glad they dropped this and instead had a clever way around it: Gene reads the encylopedia at the mansion. Granted it’s Scrooge so I don’t know how current it is and given this came out in 1990 thus HOW racist it is. It’s not a questoin of IF it was, but how much.

But having caught up the kids confront him with the fact he has to grant wishes. This lamp runs on what I now realize are Aladdin rules: Whoever currently holds the Lamp is the Genie’s master, they only get three wishes, and that dosen’t reset if it changes hands. The only big diffrence from the usual is Gene dosen’t have to TELL them about the wishes like Genie did, and Gene very begrudginly agrees to it. He also seem’s phsyically pained when doing so. 

So since all 12 know about him, each of the kids gets a wish though it seems unfair with HDL. Their one person, they shoudln’t get 9 wishes just because their brain is spread out over three bodies. 

This film continues the weird simliarties to Aladdin by attaching rules though they instead come up as a result of our heroes talking rather than the Genie just flat out tleling them: both share the “you can’t wish for more wishes” thing, a common rule in these stories and usually only broken nowadays as a clever twist as the rule is SO common place, not having it is a twist. But it is there for a reason: to limit the sheer power of a reality warping wish. The wishes can also only go so far. In a nice line, when Huey, Dewey or Louie suggests wishing for peace one earth, Gene says “No pipe dreams’ He can’t bend people or reality on THAT scale. He can bend reality as we find out, but it’s smaller scales like turning someone’s possesions over ot someone else, warping the bin into a castle, or bringing inanitamte objects to limited life. Still HUGE feats worth of a genie, so Gene’s power isn’t so nerfed it’s unusuable, but it does explain why his evil pervious ownder Merlock, more ont hat in a bit too, didn’t just wish to have eternal dominon over the earth or something. Gene can do just about anything but he can’t change the world on a fundemental level. 

And I do LIKE having rules in wished based stories like this, I chalk it up to growing up with Fairly Odd Parents... though they eventually went too far in the oppsoitie direction, pulling rules out of their ass to suit the episode, instead of simply having some very standard, very understandable rules that still pose challenges but don’t outright cheat so the episode can happen. 

So Webby does her first wish.. and wishes for a Baby Elephant, something Gene is against as he prefers they keep the wishes small: otherwise he gets found out, and the fight over him begins. So one of the boys wishes him away. Or Webby does. Point is it’s gone though not before Beakly sees it and Scrooge smells something is up. Our heroes try to hide gene, but gene thankfully simply dresses up like a modern kid and thus is able to pass as a friend of there staying for the night. 

So with the rules established and what not the kids find a clever solution: they simply go a ways away from the mansion into the woods, far enough from town to avoid any suspcion, and same iwth the mansion and just wish for all kinds of stuff: a giant bunch of ice cream toys, standard kid wish fufillment but it’s nice... in part because the kids treat Gene like one of them. Wihle they STARTED asking him about the wishes, this starts the bonding process. Soon he will be part of the hive mind.. SOON. 

Until then though after using another wish to make scrooge not mad at them for coming home late and missing dinner, that night we find out Gene’s backstory.... and it’s an utter tearjerker. As it turns out Merlock wants him back because he’s Gene’s former master and as you’d guess.. it was NOT a happy existnace, used contstnatly to do horrible things with no power to stop himself. Pompeii and Atlantis were both directly Merlock’s fault and it was only Collie Baba stealing the lamp that put an end to his hell. He also answers the two obvious questions botht he audeiince and the boys have: How the hell is Merlock still alive and shoudln’t he be out of wishes then? The first is simple. Unlike pretty much every DBZ Villian whose WANTED to do so, Merlock wished for immortality first chance he got, taking the Zamasu route instead and thus leaving him free. 

As for the wishes thing it turns out his amulet, in adition to shapeshifting, also gives him extra wishes becuase fuck it. 

But the boys sweetly offer to protect him. 

The next day, Apu’s Cousin let’s Merlock know the maps in the mansion and Merlock has him help sneak in with Merlock taking rat form. This backfires as Mrs. Beakley notices the form and chases after him with a broom

Meanwhile Webby has her tea party with Gene after he and the boys played cops and robbers earlier, and he’s bored.. though nicely not because it’s a girly thing, but because the stuffed animals aren’t alive and she naively has him fix that. This leads to 

Which sadly is jsut scrooge vs a duck toy but admit it, you want that movie for Disney Plus yesterday. Call Charles Band Disney. CALL CHARLES BAND! 

Whelp Scrooge Still Sucks:

Scrooge takes for a turn for the obnoxious in the next part, but i’ts fine by me as it’s part of the plot. Naturally this reinactment of Cult of Chucky has lead to Scrooge finding out about the Genie. To his credit, Scrooge is tactical about his wishes. As said by the Duck himself “I could wish for a diamond, no the world’s biggest dimaond, no ten world’s biggest diamond, no a diamond mind, no the MINING INDUSTRY!”

The sheer power this gives him is TERRIFYING, both because of his status.. and because unlike the kids who all wished for simple kid stuff and used up their wishes quickly, he both gets how much he can do with this and could conquer the world economy if he truly wanted to. 

The obnoxious part comes in as he treats Gene as not a person, figuring he’s just there and forces him into the lamp despite the kids protests after Gene grants his first wish: Collie Baba’s treasure. It also dosen’t feel like the wishing nor him using the lamp to get the tresure back goes against his hard work ethos: for the former while he is getting all this magically, he’s still having ot use his wits to get the most out of it, and he did earn the lamp itself square. For the latter, he already earned the treasure square too and had it stolen. He’s onlyg etting back what’s by all rights HIS. Granted he plans on giving most of it up for a tax break but still it’s his by right. 

However the reason his assholery works is twofold: first it’s Scrooge. While he’s not a TERRIBLE person, in the comcis and this cartoon he isn’t a GOOD person either. He DOES have a good heart and will usually do the right thing, but his first instnct is always to get more money and to be a cantakerous old bastard to eveyrone and everything. While he’s subtly grew out of “I hate eveyrone and everyone hates me” as his guiding principal, it’s still his defualt reaction to most situations. But he first relents by letting Gene attend the party, part of why the Collie Baba thing stung so bad was that he’s told the historical society he’d get the treasure for years only to come back empty handed, if shrunken. But he still manages to have a good time while Asok and Merlock infiltrate.. well I’mRunningOutofINsultingNIcknamesCanYouTell steals the silverware. Yes... that.. that really happens. 

Look we’re almost done, i’m almost free of this racist mummies curse. Let’s continue. Gene sees melock and freaks and drags SCrooge with him and while at First Scrooge is cranky...

No but now I want a Donkey Kong Country crossover too dammmit. And to talk about those games. Another thing for the list. But Scrooge is righ tot be a bit surly...

Okay now your just pushing it. As Gene whisked him away without telling him anything other than vauge worries... but then he gets a full idea of why Gene’s so terrified when Merlock shapeshifts into a bear and starts breaking the door down. Eh, could be worse. 

Gene shrinks them to escape and Merlock leaves thinking they fled but leaves Skids Minus Mudflap to go look for them. Scrooge sneaks out but bumps into a cart running from the photo you see when you look up stereotype on google. I mean I assume.. let’s try it. 

Huh you know I HOPED but I never expected... 

So Google Proving My Point plans to give his lamp to the master because of his weird Torgo-Esque obession with helping a man who clearly wants to murder him but takes his sweet time doing so because plot, and Gene figuring this COULDN’T POSSIBLY go as bad as Melock getting him urges the dummy to keep him and make his own wishes.

This goes about as well as you’d expect....

Wiped Out With A Wish:

Scrooge returns home to find Watto has wished to take his poessions, fortune, everything and Scrooge gets thrown in jail for breaking into his own house. We get two great moments back to back. The first is Scrooge lamenting loosing his fortune in jail, and realizing the sheer power and risk of the lamp, especially since he worked hard to earn it, every bit of it.. and Sam Wilson’s 70′s Backstory came in and took it all in an instant. 

The second is Scrooge’s family coming for him, including Launchpad , Beakly and Webby obviously and bailing him out. Though Beakly is UNGOLDLY annoying in this scene, sobbing hysterically and adding nothing and it’s not nearly as funny as the  film thinks. Turns out Goliath getting buried wrapped in chains threw them out. 

Scrooge takes a bit to rebound from all this.. but eventually realizes something: he knows the security of the bin inside and out. He had it put in after all. So it’d be easy enough to break in. So they gotta break in to break out the lamp, undo this nightmare, and END THIS MOVIE. Seriously this review has taken two days  as is I do NOT want to miss my invincible review. 

So they break into the bin, and it’s a tightly paced Scene, scrooge going in one way while the kids go the other and we even get a nice callback as the marbels come in handy to get past one of the traps. It’s just a good scene. it’s only real flaw is that Launchapd just sorta disappears as does Duckworth despite the fact their in a plane, and the bin later gets turned into a floating castle. Kinda a plot hole to not have Launchpad crash in to save htem just saying. 

Scrooge eventually does get to Djonn, whose been ignoring the imminent threat of Merlock while Gene sweats it out... and this backfires horribly as Merlock hitched a ride as a roach (Though there was a hilarious scene of him getting fried constnatly by lasers when Louie went through a laser hallway, as while Louie had the directions, it dind’t take into account passengers on your head. 

So Merlock remanifests in full gets the Lamp and unleashes his wrath on Tin Tin in the Congo and turns him into a wild pig. 

Not you sweetie. He then forces Gene to turn the castle into a fortress and float it back to his home in parts unknown. It’s a DAMN cool scene with impressive and horrifiing animation as the bin melts and crumbles into thte castle and the kids barely make it up the stares as they shift and disolve. Really top notch stuff.

Scrooge stands up to Merlock... and this naturally goes poorlyw ith Gene begging Merlock not to respond.. and Merlock having him blow scrooge off the top of the forgtess storm eagle style, though scrooge understands. And this is the true reason why scrooge being a dick didn’t bother me so much. Because it helps create a great contrast between him and Merlock. Both thought of Gene as a tool rather than a person.. but Scrooge grew to realize he was wrong and what he was dealing with wasn’t some magical goodies creator.. but a child forced to constantly grant wishes, in sheer agony to do so no less, likely so sick of it because again and again and again people used him as a slave to get what they wanted and to hell with what Gene wanted. He realized he was terrible for making this poor boy into his slave simply because that’s his job. In contrast Merlock could give no shits and is a malevolent monster who glefully uses Gene despite the pain the wishes put him through and his protests. It’s why Gene is the best part.. he’s  athroughly likeable, throughly inncoent character with tons of personality and a truly tragic and horrifying backstory and Rip Taylor acts the hell out of every scene with the guy. 

Thankfully the marbles come in handy one last time and Huey, Dewey or Louie snipes the lamp away and a struggle for it insues between Scrooge and Merloc mid air. it’s fucking awesome.. and it get sbetter in how scroogewins. He simply gets rid of Merlock’s amulet, taking it then throwing it. Grante dhe COULD’EVE used it for unimited wishes.. but it was too risky to do that and as we’ll see in the ending , Scrooge realized the Lamp was too powerful to keep around for much longer and too much of a tempting target for his rogues.. not that we see them this movie as the crew wanted it to bea ccesaible and thus kept hte cast to the main cast from season 1 and just made new vilians and a new supporting character, but still. 

He does use his second wish though to undue the damage Merlock had done and the bin and clan mcduck are returned to duckburg in good condition.

Time for our ending, which is genuinely and wholly touching. With the lamp too dangerous to use Scrooge considers just sending it to the earth’s core, which horrifies the kids as it’d mean Gene would be trapped there forever... if the molten lava iddn’t just outright destory the lamp and probably kill him. But Scrooge.. isn’t the bastard he likes to potray himself as. Instead he makes Gene into a real boy. He gives the poor kid HIS wish, which designrates the lamp and undoes all the spells... so Merlock is PROBABLY dead but he does return for some games so maybe not? 

And so we end on two things: Gene happily playing cops and robbers with the boys finally free.. and Birth of A Nation grabbing all the loot he can in his patns and running off. Ha ha ha thank god i’m done with this prick. And no I will not be looking at his ducktales episodes unless I have to. 

Final Thoughts:

This movie is OKAY. It has a solid plot, gene is a wonderful chacter, the animatoin is pretty prettay pretty good, and the voice acting as usual is excellent, with Rip Taylor being the standout. 

But as my paragraphs of rage shoud’ve made Clear Djonn is just BAD. Easily the worst character i’ve encountered in my year of reviewing and some of the worst writing i’ve ran into. And that writing includes a goblin man voyerstically forcing two teenagers to make out, making jokes about santa renaming himself Clem the sceneafter he tearfully confessed to letting the elves and ms. claus die, accidental transphobia via the u-men, and Bryan Lee O malley thinking we needed more than one volume of Julie Powers being around.  This was disgusting, even by 1990 standards and especially by 2021 standards and it drags the film down considerably. Without it the film is okay.. with it the film is just VERY hard to watch any time he pops up.  He made getting through the movie a nightmare and while I pause a lot becaue it’s a bad habbit I did so more simply because as I said earlier in the review I could not stand him. 

It makes it a hard film to recommend. If you can stomach the racisim, then it might be worth it, but be aware of what your putting up with going in. But if you can’t.. there’s no shame in that, it’s carbombya levels of bad. Which yes was a real fictoinal country. It was so bad Casey Casem quit transformers over it. True story. So yeah, it’s an okay film, on par with the series at it’s best for the most part.. but Djonn just spoils it for me. 

If you liked this review, like it, share it around that sort of thing and if you want MORE disney movie reviews, in addiiton to the goofy movie one later this month, if you help me hit my 25 dollar stretch goal on patroen.com/popculturebuffet, i’ll do reviews of the Recess, Proud Family and Kim Possible MOvies (Well so the drama anyway), so help me out would you and i’ll see you at the next rainbow.

[deceptichubs]

✒ One night BD defends the Dirty Mudflap against a group of vandals by throwing them out. He does it for entirely selfish reasons, he just wants to stuff his face in peace at his local bar, and he complains all the while how he's too full to put up with this scrap, too. He then proceeds to drain the entire Visco supply, but perhaps it actually isn't all bad that BD keeps showing up every day? Maybe? (Your latest post is sending me, but I also wish for the poor barmech to be less stressed XD)

Send me “✒  + a headcanon “  and I’ll tell you if I approve it or not

Anon, I laughed. Canon (and strikingly IC, and frankly hot).

[thethinkingman]

There are so many drivers that can't do basic repairs and it costs you and your company large sums of money. I'm not talking about fixing a valve cover leak or a regen issue, I'm talking about hanging mud flaps, replacing lights, fixing a wire, checking and replacing a fuse before going to a shop. The list of possibilities doesn't stop there.

Think of all the time wasted waiting on a spot to open in the shop or for the service truck to arrive. Waiting 3 hours for the shop to hang a mudflap is crazy when you can do it with two adjustable wrenches in 20 minutes.

Waiting long hours for little pay over a simple fix can increase your income by not having to reschedule the pickup or delivery causing you to miss the next load.

I've hung many mudflaps, tightened many hose clamps, patched a few hoses, fixed numerous wires and replaced more than a few lights. I've run down a few electrical problem and was able to fix a ground or change a fuse. Last night I ran down an APU issue and got it running.

The goal is to better yourself, increase your value, increase your income and increase profit margins. The more profitable your company the better the likelihood they will survive poor economic times like now.

#trades #skilledtrades #bluecollar #bluecollarroots #trucking #truckinglife #truckerslife #truckinglifestyle #cdl #cdllife #repairs #wisdom #advice #income #selfimprovement #18wheels #lifeontheroad #bigtruck #driverslife #drivinglife

[tf-imagines]

Can I have the TFP bots reacting to a pair of Cybertronian twins as their partners that often throw hands at each other, but when they work together, they are a force to be reckoned with? (Like Skids and Mudflap, they're always at each other's neck cables) (P.S. Love your work)

Let me note here that I have absolutely no clue who Skids and Mudflap are, but I’ll do my best. And I’m guessing you mean partner in the sense of fighting together

Optimus Prime

Optimus is admittedly a little frustrated with how often the two twins fight with each other, but at the same time it seems to be a good way for them to train. As a result, he allows their squabbles to continue, so long as it doesn’t get out of hand, then he’d step in. He tries to encourage them to work together more often, citing how well they fight together when they aren’t trying to fight each other.

Ratchet

Ratchet can’t stand the fighting. It loud, it could be dangerous and destructive, and he doesn’t want their bickering to land one of them in the med bay. They don’t have the resources for that! So he tries to make them stop fighting, extremely frustrated with the poor behavior. But then he sees them fight together, and while in awe of how great they work together, he gets even more frustrated because for some reason they can’t work together all the time? He doesn’t get it.

Bumblebee

Bumblebee is not the best influence because he’ll encourage playful fights, teasing them happily, essentially making himself a triplet, but without the fighting. He tries to help keep it from becoming anything more serious, because he cares about them and doesn’t want them to get hurt! Though seeing the two of them fight together is always a treat for Bee, sometimes even distracting him to the point of him taking a hit or two before he can focus.

Bulkhead

Bulkhead honestly isn’t phased by the fighting, because I see the Wreckers as having similar things. So it’s familiar to him. Though he does kind of play referee, making sure that the twins keep it under control and don’t go overboard. He compliments them every time they work together, always beaming when he sees them working together since it’s amazing to watch.

Arcee

Arcee tries to be patient with the twins, she really does. But with how often they fight, it wears on her. She’s snapped at them a few times to knock it off, because they don’t need to be fighting, especially in the base. (And she reminds them that no, you can’t go fight outside either, or you might draw attention). But when she sees them working together, in a fight or otherwise, she can’t help a proud little smile. Now if only they could learn to be this civil all the time, that would be wonderful...

[cubicscubedemon]

hostnamexception replied to your post “((Vessel Verse Morph’s probably going to be “dead”/stuck in the...”

(( bury it quietly behind the station ghsdjf ))

“Okay, buddy, rise and shine! You’re free to...go...”

Durland took a solid three minutes staring at the lightly frosted former vessel of the Amorphous Shape.

“BLUUUUBS!” he wailed. “We killed ‘em!”

.....

Later, standing at the edge of the river that ran by the Northwest mudflap factory, the traumatized deputy was still inconsolable. Blubs may have been confident that they weren’t going to be locked up if the Shape was already dying when they were brought in, but poor Durland still couldn’t look as the vessel was rolled into the water, to join the mutant frogs.

[hesperie-s]

A list of things I've noticed in Germany, in no particular order and subject to random additions because it's 4:00 pm at home and my body refuses to sleep:

Food packaging, as far as I can tell, is all paper or glass and no plastic. Which I appreciate. It's like how Coke tastes better out of a glass bottle but with everything.

Outside of the towns it feels weirdly similar to Pennsylvania in a way I can't really explain. It makes sense if I think about it (the PA Dutch likely colonized where they did because it reminded them of home), but it's still pretty unexpected.

I don't know if it's just a general upset stomach from the plane, or if jet lag applies to appetite like it does to sleep, or just my ADHD meds fucking with me because I'm wildly off schedule now, but I haven't eaten properly in two days. Just now I downed an entire pizza by myself because I was suddenly and immediately starving. I'm lactose intolerant and regret nothing.

Getting food is actually more difficult than I thought it would be. There hasn't been a real language barrier (thank god, because the only being on earth that needs to hear my German is the Duolingo owl), but there's a million unspoken social rules and I don't have the guidebook for this expansion pack.

On that note, I was warned to expect "poor service" in restaurants. Every server who's had to deal with my dumb ass the last two days has been wonderful, and the fact that they don't have to hover over me to be at my beck and call is very much appreciated.

DST is apparently a couple weeks later here than at home, so I had to do that shit twice this year. 🙃

This is a very dog-friendly area and I've not had the opportunity to pet a single one. My vacation is ruined.

The TSA stole my sister's Reese's bar when they pulled her carry-on for additional inspection. That's not a specific thing about Germany; I just find it funny as hell.

I'm kind of delighted by the fact that every website I visit lets me opt out of tracking. Usually I either have to accept the cookies or not view the site at all.

On the whole, drivers on the Autobahn are shockingly responsible. The main highway I avoid taking at home has a speed limit of 55 mph, but you have to do at least 70 or else someone whipping in and out of traffic will cut you off -- and even then it'll probably still happen.

And like, people are actually giving up the lane and allowing others to merge when necessary?? (I drove through New Jersey to get here. It makes me want to cry, I swear.)

On the way to the airport we ended up following a truck with ONLY JESUS SAVES FROM HELL spray painted on the mudflaps. I don't think I've seen so much as a bumper sticker so far.

I haven't seen any pick-up trucks either, now that I'm thinking about it. Especially none of the LIFTED DODGE RAM TRUCKS that are pretty common on the edge of Pennsyltucky.

[sndwave]

what the ACTUAL fuck!!!!

today on the weirdest possible fucking car accident possible, i got backed into by a semi at a red light

yes, backed into. its behind, my front. at a red light. i was stopped for at least thirty seconds and gave it several feet of clearance because it was like 15 feet into the intersection, the light was green at the time, but it’s at the merge into one lane for construction, so he’s pulled ahead in order to get in before the light turned and failed, and the light goes yellow then red, and he’s... backing up? just a little, then he stops. okay, not too weird because trucks do that back up a bit when they stop thing or whatever. then he just... keeps... backing up

i started on the horn when it got way too close and didn’t let up long enough the car behind us, according to john, was like actually concerned. and nope the semi truck is still backing up just fine???? YOU DON’T BACK UP A FUCKING SEMI LIKE THAT??????? EVER?????????

crunch

i get the park on and the hazards and go talk to the guy cause red light means thankfully the other cars arent going and he’s like “something wrong?” “yeah you backed into my car” “oh” then because im a fucking idiot that cant understand words when it’s NOT loud as hell and im like 2 second away from either flipping my lid or having a panic attack, we’re not sure yet, i cant understand what he says next despite asking like six times, all  iget is something about “stage” and him pointing ahead. okay, i dont know, there’s a right turn lane we can take that’s like 50 ft away past the light, i guess were going there so we’re not literally blocking the soon-to-be-only lane in a construction zone??? okay, makes sense

i go to my car, light goes green as i do that, and truck moves. i can finally see front of my car--no damage, okay, yay, maybe well get to go a whole year without this poor car getting a fender bender technically speaking. i get in the car and.... the truck has driven off. not to the right turn lane, or any place you can stop, but well into the one-lane-only construction zone with no indication of stopping (even if he did plan on it, he’s only in a worse spot than we started)

what the fuck????

before i even got out of the car john and i got pictures since the license plate is Literally In Our Face, but the number on the mudflaps (the only one i saw cause im an idiot that didnt get pictures of the cab and also forgot the exact street and “the one on southbound 59 where the construction merge is” wont cut it so i need to take care of that later fuck) is for the actual trailer’s rental place, not whatever company the driver’s for, plus they’re closed sundays, so i guess i get to call them tomorrow and be like “hey, i need to be directed to the reporting number for whatever company had this trailer yesterday” and that’s gonna go so well ugh

BUT WHO THE FUCK BACKS UP A SEMI TRUCK IN THE MIDDLE OF TRAFFIC??? JUST STRAIGHT UP REVERSE ON IT???? SEMIS HAVE LITERALLLY ZERO VISIBILITY FOR LIKE 50 FEET BEHIND THEM AND YOU’RE BACKING UP 15 FEET AT A RED LIGHT WITH TRAFFIC EVERYWHERE??????????????

AND THEN YOU DRIVE THE FUCK OFF?????????????????

[poresorpixels]

Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988)/

Halloween 5: The Revenge of

Michael Myers (1989)

gluishtuuks: return/revenge flick, Pleasence in extremis, creepy uncle, seasonal afflictive disorder, Haddonfield follies, formula soluable

This review is tougher to justify than the Ms. 45 one, which at least I hadn't seen. These two I am somewhat well acquainted with, and am pretty sure are more bad than good. Not to mention Wham City's pseudo-interactive livestreamed call-in melodrama (The Call of Warr) is back on Adult Swim for the next few days. If it's as scary, hilarious, demented and original as last year's The Cry of Mann (they even did a fantastically vapid accompanying show-about-a-show parody called Tanking Mann), then there is next to no reason to be wasting my time with these crummy sequels.

But I made this arbitrary October commitment, so I'm gonna go ahead and shovel some overdue dirt on this sorry pair and pat it down.

First of all, there's Donald Pleasence. He don't look so good. Particularly in Revenge, it seems as though the movie itself is trying to kill him as we watch on, bemused and more than a little bored. Danielle Harris is Laurie Strode's daughter Jamie, who is now a foster child, but her uncle strides past the Videodrome-for-dummies corporate death conspiracy (easily the best sequel, both because of and despite its crazy Michael-less storyline, for starters) and death itself to cut that family line. Harris was great as Furry Tom and the thorn in her McClane-redux-daddy's side in The Last Boyscout. She's solid here too, conveying more believable traumatized intensity than either film earns.

I was ten when I first got steeped in these sorts of movies, and the ruthlessly simple machinery just worked. The mockery of the more silly elements (though more so with the Friday/Elm Street movies) was often over-eager, barely containing the rising dread. That the anticipation dulls with age is a phenomenon often fixed on the viewership, but I'd argue that the blame lies more with cynically crude bottom-lining, crass presumptions of audience by the money. Horror is a genre with merit beyond watching people get butchered, but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who'd go too far to attest to as much. No matter what you're watching, exploitation is the name of the game. But if you're producing, as is the case here, purely rote content, who can blame a viewer for glazing over till the killing starts?

Depsite some nice flourishes here and there, the Jamie saga portion of this franchise is as dull as it is anti-climactic. Particularly regarding the kills, which are all flat. The original and naturally best of the series wasn't particularly gory, but it had a lot more on the ball than anything that came after. It was working within budget constraints, but its perfect score and naturally winning cast (namely Curtis, PJ Soles and Nancy Kyes) and masterfully scored autmnal atmosphere made it work. These two films strive to recapture that original spark, but wind up feeling like drab, minor, tv movie-slight variations.

At a glance they may seem classier than the Friday the 13th stuff, but that's kind of what makes them obnoxious. They're slashers with delusions of thematic heft. The fact that they manage to stick some of their stylistic landings only seems to make this pretense worse. In Return there is a droning minimalist credit sequence comprising a series of drab, desolate country exteriors. It is a great mood setter, but when we leave these outskirt locations for the suburbs, it seems superfluous. All the best stuff happens outside of Haddonfield. Loomis gets nearly blown up at a sevice station, then hitches a ride with the boxcar hobo from Pee Wee's Big Adventure (still boozin' his cares away, but with a somehow worse singing voice and a sweet gig as a turn of the century fire and brimstone preacher). Sam actually smiles in this bit, and the unPleasence of this is mitigated by the fact that its a small relief to see the man take a brief siesta from the ceaseless wide-eyed flailing.

After that (and this holds for Revenge as well) it seems as though aping the highschool crush mini-drama of the original and endless hallucinatory false scares is supposed to suffice. Loomis would be hilarious in his stumbling mania were it not for the fact that he seems more horrific to poor Jamie than her stabby Uncle Mike. It doesn't help that, as has oft been remarked, they kept fucking with the mask to worse and worse effect, leaving one to wonder if it was ever scary to begin with. One thing's for sure, "humanizing" Michael (apparently what they were going for in Revenge) was never the fucking point! He was called "the shape" for good reason.

Even if they're roughly the same ratioed templates, Revenge squeaks ahead in the quirky teen dept. Though its anachronistic greaser boyfriend in Revenge pales in comparison to those rat-a-tat-tooie boys in the fifth Friday movie (and we have to spend considerably less time with them). But Jamie's friend (foster sister? who fuckin' cares) Tina is actually kinda charming and smarter seeming than her ditsy lines and misguided notions (including ones of neon-hearted love w/r/t the aforementioned greaser) would suggest.

Sadly, it looks like Tina's Wendy Kaplan may've never went on to anything more substantial. But here's as good a place as any to remind people that there's much more to Donald Pleasence than this babbling shrink with a gun (or the Bond villain, Blofeld). Despite having some decently budgeted technical chops (most exemplified in Jamie's nerve shredding, claustrophobic knife/laundry chute sequence in Revenge), these two are not the beat use of one's viewing time. So why not check out the 1971 film Wake In Fright? Directed by Ted Kotcheff (First Blood), its a nasty, sweaty, drunken trip set in the outback with a lively Pleasence, unhinged as you've never seen him. And if you've seen it, see it again. It's better than both of these movies combined, with a lot of room to spare.

Halloween movies ranked:

10/11

Halloween 1/2 (Rob Zombie has too much money and no/dumb ideas. shoulda just stuck with that rusty rutabega mudflap metal what made him famous)

9

Halloween: Resurrection (reality tv premise bites hard, though that similarly plotted Tales from The Crypt ep with Morton Downey Jr.* was a hoot)

8

Halloween: The Curse of MM (Paul Rudd is wonderful and all, but he cannot begin to save this tedious exercise in myth padding - but here's a clip anyway.)

7

Halloween 5 (roman numerals...

6

Halloween [2018] (I can remember nothing about this, except that I don't see myself watching it again. i guess it was loud and expensive, and wasted Judy Greer and Toby Huss. Just another cash-grab reboot nail in imagination's coffin.)

5

Halloween 4 ...are for squares, man!)

4

Halloween II (creepy enough, strangely dreary, but more than a bit sluggish)

3

H20 (the boarding school setting works and its slick cast and production values don't smooth over the grit. plus there's the weird kid from The Ice Storm that Christina Ricci deflowers)

2

Halloween III: Season of the Witch (Tom Atkins, heads exploding into bugs and snakes, mustard-bleeding robuts and a catchy jingle. Bites off more than it manages to chew, but in an uncommonly satisfying way)

1

Halloween (best John Carpenter film after The Thing and one of the best horror films period)

* "Television Terror"/S02/E16/1990

[supernova1us]

Just a fic of my take on a reboot of the idea of the scavengers from the IDW transformers comics

Slipstream narrowed her optics then pinched them in exhaustion.  The purple and mint seeker stared at the projected star charts warily, trying to find their next destination. The black and yellow mini-con bird that had previously been looking over her shoulder sternly had vanished.  She looked to see it now perched on a console, in recharge. Suddenly a target appeared on a random planet on the chart.

“tidal wave think we should go here” a deep booming voice projected

She looked to see a holographic head project from the main console of the control room; a projection of their “host”.

“why?” she groaned

“big; lots of room for tidal wave to walk around”

“aaaaand?”

“that it.  Getting cramped, need to stretch legs”

“aaaaaaaaah, fine. At least it’s something. Maybe we’ll find something of use there”

Slipstream marked the planet on the chart and the massive ship-bot changed course.  She left the control room to go get some recharge.  She heard commotion from the main room.  The massive warriors’ ship mode was not very big and could only afford so much space to his passengers, or teammates; whatever they wanted to consider each other. In ship mode, he was only about .2 miles long and 170 yards wide.  In the main room, which the crew primarily used to relax, talk and overload on energon, she heard the others arguing loudly.  

“typical” she thought

On one end of the table was a bulky tan and red bot and a white and light blue bot. The bulky bot was arguing with the even larger blue bot on the other side while the white bot just laughed and a small purple and gold femme was sitting to the side, smirking. It was a 50/50 chance that she had instigated the spat or was just enjoying the naturally occurring confrontation.  

Groaning and not having the energy, she ignored the other bots and went to the makeshift room she had made for herself. The innards of a giant war bot, even one with a ship mode, were not the most accommodating home. She did not expect her self-imposed exile to be like this.

Escape from the war and keep her secret safe; that was the offer buzzsaw had presented to her.  Both he and tidal wave, feeling unappreciated, had planned to flee cybertron in the midst of a massive upcoming offensive against the autobots.  Having spied the seekers secret and coded the data tracks to keep soundwave from reading them, he had approached her. It’s fairly hard to commune with a squawking bird bot, but once he remote connects to your comm, they’re at least understandable.  

The proposition was clear; leave with them as an added gun to ensure her secret is kept unknown.  That was more than what she had to hear.  She already wanted to escape the thumb of her spark-twin and obnoxious commander, starscream.  With the addition of her deepest secret being kept safe, which was what mattered to her most, it was the best she could dare to hope for.  She was far from the most devout member of the decepticons anyway. As far as she was told, buzzsaw and tidal wave were her only accomplices. Buzzsaw, resentful of soundwaves favoritism towards his fellow bird bot, laserbeak, decided to go rogue.  Tidal wave, a massive warrior and once the muscle of the decepticons, had found himself diminished and replaced by the endless horde of seekers and vehicons, as well as the more compact combiners.

At the agreed time, she managed to go AWOL from the battle and meet where tidal wave waited in his ship mode. Instead, she also found four other bots that had been recruited to join in their escape.  While buzzsaw was a fierce bot, he was still a small one and likely wanted as many larger bots to hide behind as possible. First there was mudflap, the largest of them, save tidal wave of course.  He was a light and dark blue bot with a crane slung behind his arm.  He was rather moody and distant from them all, even more than her. Next there was demolishor, a gruff red and tan tank bot; large turrets protruded from his shoulders and one of his eyes had been replaced with a target lens. Like her, he was a bot who, while fierce in battle, worked close with the high command in tactics as well.  There was also snowcat, though she recalled that he used to be called something else and looked different before being reformatting.  He and demolishor had been Amica Endura for centuries and the skiing white bot was known widely as a cackling berserker. Finally there was the purple and gold speedboat Thunderblast, a flighty, flirtatious bot who never did any work for herself.

A poor, motley crew indeed; still, they all knew how to shoot straight so there was at least that.  

Clearly they all had their own reasons for wanting to abandon their posts.  She had yet to bother to figure out why though, and would never tell them hers, outside of the obvious one that is.  She had been forced to take charge of the rag tag exiles; despite spearheading the escape, buzzsaw lacked both normal communications skills and any ability to lead.  Tidal wave was worse so, being too simple minded.  He was far from stupid; it was just that far more power was redirected from his brain module to his strength and firepower. And not since titans existed had there actually been cases of ships commanding their own crews.  

Unfortunately for them, outside of going AWOL, no other long term plans existed.  They had resigned themselves to scavengers, hunting and picking through anything the galaxy left for them to pick through. Any number of troubles could come their way; autobots, bounty hunters, the terrifying decepticon justice division, the galactic council and any number of unknown horrors the universe favors spitting out at them.

“my life sucks” she said aloud

“at least now, you’ll be safe, my love. Forgive me” she thought to herself as she drifted into recharge              

[raidram0n]

Gooooddddd my poor truck I ripped off one of the front mudflap things cause these FUCKING cops that are always at my neighbors house were in the way and didn't think to Fuckin move their shit so I hit the curb backing in 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

[shanelewis]

Whatever happened to this dude being on every mudflap ever? Poor little guy. ✍️. . . llustration #process #artist #penandink #penandpaper #screenprint #posters #art #shanelewis #shanelewisart #instart #instartist #artcollective #linework #pencildrawing #pencils #draw #drawing #sketch #sketchbook #instaart #instaartist #yosemitesam #looneytoons

[kelleyswitf-blog]

Incorrect Ways To Maintain Diesel Engine

Since the cost of replacing the diesel engine in your pickup is about the same as buying a new car from the dealership—it’s important to keep it alive as long as possible. Although almost everyone thinks of themselves as diesel experts, bad maintenance and usage practices abound. We know this because these easy-to-fix mistakes are keeping diesel shops very busy across the country. We’ve made a list of the top 10 deadly sins, which are damning far too many diesels to an early demise.

1. You’re Not Changing Your Fuel Filter

A clogged fuel filter can damage expensive injection pumps and injectors. Diesel fuel injection systems create a great deal of heat, and they rely on unobstructed fuel flow to keep the pump and injectors cool. As the fuel filter plugs up, the flow of fuel is restricted. In extreme cases, this extra pressure can cause a filter failure, which sends contamination directly into the injection system.

2. You’re Not Changing Your Air Filter

When the air filter gets clogged, fuel economy begins to suffer. A clogged air filter also causes the turbo to spin faster as it attempts to supply the engine with air. If dirt gets past the air filter because it was not installed properly or there is a leak in a boot—severe turbo, valve, and piston engine damage can occur in minutes. Driving down a gravel road may be all it takes to scour the cylinder walls.

Changing your in-cab air filter on a regular basis will make your fan motor live longer and keep your hard-to-clean air ducts less dusty. This will make you want to keep your truck alive longer.

3. You’re Not Changing Your Oil

Oil filters are important because they remove contaminants found in the oil. Oil analysis laboratories examine samples of oil from diesel engines and can determine a motor’s health without performing major surgery. The tests include a spectral exam that establishes the amount of wear metals in the oil, which indicates the level of bearing failure or other mechanical problems. Silica (dirt) is by far the biggest factor in engine wear and intrudes past seals and filters. As it combines with carbon, silica forms an abrasive called carborundum, which is similar in hardness to diamonds.

 Silicone is an oil additive and anti-foaming agent also measured by the labs. From this information, you’ll be able to see how far you can extend your oil change. Coolant in the oil can indicate a major engine problem—some say glycol is the number one engine killer. The flashpoint of the oil is also typically tested. This information will tell you if you have fuel in the oil, which also accelerates engine failure.

 4. You’re Forgetting to Mind Your Fluids

It’s important to change your engine oil, coolant, transmission fluid, and power steering fluid. One look inside the valvebody of a modern automatic transmission reveals the precision internals that need clean fluid in order to operate properly. Not adding a bypass engine and transmission oil filter to your engine isn’t murder, but it could be considered neglect. These devices work by screening the fluid down to 3 microns or less—that fine filtering would clog a full-flow filter. They can do this by only taking a small amount of oil at a time—so as not to affect normal flow. Installing a coolant filter is like giving your truck a liver or a kidney. Although the initial expense hurts—your truck will pay you back. Bad coolant will clog passages, which will cause overheated parts.

 5. You’re not Letting Your Engine Warm Up

Don’t be that guy who starts his cold engine and immediately revs it up. The only thing you’re showing off is that you don’t know your turbo and engine bearings won’t get lubricated properly with cold, thick oil. Let your engine warm up like you warm up in the morning. Let the glow plugs and intake heater do their job. Fire the engine and give it some time for the combustion heat to warm the engine evenly.

This practice is very important on extremely cold mornings. Hot and cold engine parts expand at different rates, so gaps can form, which could cause leaks or gasket failures. Wait until your engine oil and coolant temperature gauges show you are in the right operating range. You do have these readings…don’t you? Also, if it’s really cold, don’t turn the steering wheel too much right away or you could risk blowing a hydraulic hose. The other thing that’ll keep your engine running longer is preheated coolant. The more cold-starts your diesel is subjected to, the shorter its lifespan will be. Inconsistent metal expansion and poor-flowing (thick) lubricants don’t provide protection from moving parts.

Another thing to worry about is fuel washing the cylinder walls before compression ignition can occur. Here is a message we got from a reader from the North Pole: “I have both batteries heated, the block heated, and two heating pads on the oil pan. The transmission is not heated, because it’s a stick. The intercooler is totally blocked as well. I might just put a pad on the transfer case and front differential, but it warms after about a mile of driving in four-wheel drive.” Diesel-fueled auxiliary heaters are also an option. It’s also just as important to let your diesel cool off before you shut it down. A turbo timer will do this automatically for you, because if it gets shut off too soon, oil will overheat, break down, and destroy turbo bearings.

6. You’re Not Reading the Smoke Signals

Don’t assume you can get by with worn-out injectors. If your truck is smoking black more than usual, that’s a possible sign your injectors need replacing. Another sign they are bad is if they start making noises. A diagnostic tool is able to individually shut down each injector to see which one is the culprit. White smoke often indicates coolant in the combustion chamber—either a sign of a head gasket failure or EGR cooler failure (if equipped). Blue smoke usually indicates engine oil in the combustion chamber—either from leaking piston rings or a bad valve seal. Insufficient compression can also cause a smoky engine.

7. You’re Not Keeping Your Truck Clean

Even if your truck is in perfect mechanical shape, it can still fall apart underneath you because rust never sleeps. Those who live in the Southwest don’t really have to worry about rust because it is too dry for the chemical reaction to take place. Everybody else should make it a point to keep paint chips filled with touchup paint and have a fresh coat of wax applied at least three times a year. During the winter months, when chemicals are applied to the roads to melt ice, you can’t wash your truck enough. During the rest of the year, avoid splashing through puddles, make sure your mudflaps are functioning, and try to avoid gravel roads if possible.

8. You’re Overheating Your diesel Engine

We’ve watched the vicious cycle of modify, race, and then destroy one’s engine play out more times than we’d like to see, but some people still don’t believe certain truths until they learn them the hard way. When making any modification to your diesel, it’s absolutely necessary to keep track of all the engine temperatures. Even stock vehicles can use the extra insurance that comes with knowledge of the coolant, exhaust gas temperature (EGT), and engine oil temperature. You can also use this information to diagnose oil coolers or cooling system failures.

9. Centrifugal Force Is Wearing Your Truck Out

For those on a tight budget, the unforeseen cost of a new set of tires (because the old ones prematurely wore out) can be a truck’s death sentence. Poor alignment, along with under-inflated tires, can cause bad fuel mileage and tires with uneven wear patterns. A bent rim or severely unbalanced tire can cause axle-bearing failure. An out-of-balance driveshaft can cause axle pinion bearing wear and transmission or transfer case damage. It’s also important to keep the U-joints greased or replaced. Driveline maintenance also includes changing your differential fluid.

  10. You’re Poisoning Your Fuel Tank

According to the marine diesel industry, most engine problems begin in the fuel tank. This is because water intrusion is more present on the seas than it is on land. Still, according to BP, “Under normal storage conditions, diesel fuel can be expected to stay in a usable condition for 12 months or longer at an ambient of 68 degrees Fahrenheit.” Yet the lifespan of diesel drops to, “6 to 12 months at an ambient temperature higher than 86 degrees Fahrenheit.” As diesel fuel ages, BP points out that, “fine sediment and gum forms in the diesel brought about by the reaction of diesel components with oxygen from the air. The fine sediment and gum will block fuel filters, leading to fuel starvation and the engine stopping. Frequent filter changes are then required to keep the engine going. The gums and sediments do not burn in the engine very well and can lead to carbon and soot deposits on injectors and other combustion surfaces.”