"forehead subject to zoning laws in 38 states"
rivers cuomo on emo "For the most part, emo is worthless. Pinkerton is worthless. And all of it is gonna die. It's bad music. I really think that. It's just not rock."
jon yu on rivers cuomo "You fucking hypocrite."
bug bites In the wake of the Spider-Man movie release, I recently spoke with other people who have been bitten by insects and subsequently become superheroes.
Jon: Hello.
"Hi."
Jon: Who are you?
"I am Moth-Man."
Jon: I take it a radioactive moth bit you.
Moth-Man: Yes.
Jon: What are your superpowers?
Moth-Man: I'm psychic.
Jon: Really? Okay then… What am I holding in my hand?
Moth-Man: Chapstick!
Jon: Wow. You're good.
Jon: Hello.
"Hi."
Jon: Who are you?
"I am the Scorpion King."
Jon: So, Scorpion-Man…
Scorpion King: It's Scorpion King. I didn't stand alone before the fury of his armies to be called Man, thank you very much.
Jon: Hey, aren't you Evander Holyfield?
Jon: Hello.
"Hi."
Jon: Who are you?
"I am Termite-Man."
Jon: And what, pray tell, do you do?
Termite-Man: Um…I…eat wood.
Jon: You…eat wood.
Termite-Man: Correct.
Jon: Tell me, do you ever get together with Ladybug-Man? Hahahahahaha.
Termite-Man: Shtup!
Jon: I hear Cockroach-Man's looking for a good time. Hahahahahaha.
Jon: Hello.
"Hi."
Jon: Who are you?
"I am Wasp-Man."
Bodyguard: Mr. Ashcroft, the press room's over here!
John: Oh. Why doesn't anybody tell me these things?
in my life When a wrestler applies a hold on another wrestler, lifts the victim up, and falls backward, dropping the victim, we call it a suplex. When a wrestler suplexes another wrestler off the top rope of a ring, we call it a superplex. Someday, I want 1996 Olympic gold medalist in freestyle wrestling Kurt Angle to superplex me off an aquatic center high dive platform.
mark twain in the adventures of huckleberry finn I don't know why I find the following passage so amusing:
"Do you reckon that nigger would blow on us? We'd skin him if he done that!"
"How can he blow? Hain't he run off?"
"No! That old fool sold him, and never divided with me, and the money's gone."
"Sold him?" I says, and begun to cry; "why, he was my nigger, and that was my money. Where is he? – I want my nigger."
"Well, you can't get your nigger, that's all – so dry up your blubbering. Looky here – do you think you'd venture to blow on us? Blamed if I think I'd trust you. Why if you was to blow on us—"
He stopped, but I never see the duke look so ugly out of his eyes before. I went on a-whimpering, and says:
"I don't want to blow on nobody; and I ain't got no time to blow, nohow. I got to turn out and find my nigger."
He looked kinder bothered, and stood there with his bills fluttering on his arm, thinking, and wrinkling up his forehead. At last he says:
"I'll tell you something. We got to be here three days. If you'll promise you won't blow, and won't let the nigger blow, I'll tell you where to find him."
main event I had to one-up Mr. Bruno.
How do I do it? I dunno. I just a-do it.
"The first 300 people to show up at the Mann Village Theater in Westwood will receive a Spider-Man t-shirt and a raffle ticket. 50 lucky winners will get to attend the screening of the movie. Bleacher seating will be available so that you can watch stars as they arrive at the premiere."
I came late. I saw Stan Lee. I conquered.
Turns out there was no raffle. A security guard just distributed laminated passes to whoever was nearby and luckily, I was nearby.
Before that though, Sony forced me to put up with two hours of fans in the bleachers going TRL apeshit for celebrities on the red carpet while I tried to read Huck Finn. Jennifer Love Hewitt, the boy from Jerry Maguire, Matthew Perry, Leann Rimes, Danny Trejo, Tyrese, Mario Van Peebles and The Bachelor. How do these people get invited to the Spider-Man premiere?
the spider house rules I was disappointed. I'm sure a lot of people will enjoy it, but I found myself bored at times watching the most anticipated movie of the year. Spider-Man is a Sam Raimi melodrama — tearjerker sentiment mixed with B-movie production — and I can't stand campy melodrama.
CGI is the movie's gift; it is its curse.
Tobey Maguire has the range of the Dell computer guy.
How does Willem Dafoe go from playing Jesus to dressing like a Power Ranger and spewing dialogue like "time to die" and "the itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout, down came the Goblin who took the spider out"?
Nice to see Sony, Dr. Pepper and Cingular Wireless prominently displayed in the movie. Not so nice to see Macy Gray. Singing, no less.
Hooray for the kickass wrestling sequence. Macho Man Randy Savage goes one-on-one with Tobey Maguire in a cage match featuring some crazy chairshots and Bruce Campbell as the announcer. Good shit.
The action sequences are generally fun, though repetitive. You'd think you would never tire of seeing a guy in red-and-blue jammies sailing around the New York skyline on self-made spider tethers. But it does get old.
There's also a redundancy about the fights between Spider-Man and the Green Goblin. Every few minutes, Gobby turns up to bellow at Spidey, lob a grenade or two and trade punches. The lack of a dastardly scheme of mass destruction or conquest makes the Green Goblin more of a nuisance than a menace.
The film well establishes the comic books' conflict between Harry Osborn and Spider-Man for the sequel. I expect the Hobgoblin and Venom as the villains in the second movie.
Spider-Man hits theaters almost halfway between The Scorpion King and Attack of the Clones for good reason. Quality-wise, it's somewhere between The Scorpion King and Attack of the Clones.
go capitalism! I went to the Giant Robot store. So much cool shit. I wish I could buy the whole store. Instead, I bought the Shaolin Soccer DVD (all region code) for $27.99. Fun movie. Miramax will release it in North American theaters next year.
I bought the Hives album Veni Vidi Vicious at Best Buy for $6.99.
I bought a ticket to see Finch and The Starting Line at the Troubadour on May 21 for $10.00.
I bought student tickets to see Spider-Man again on May 3 and 4 for $7.50 each. The trailer for The Hulk awaits.