Look At How Cute You Are
Is it about a woman? Is it about a cat? It's strangely appropriate for either.
Lyrics
Look at how cute you are
do you even know it
I bet you don't even know it
when you walk into the room
all eyes are on you
but you just try to hide
i really hate you sometimes
do you even know it
i bet you don't even know it
when you ignore me
can't you see
you're driving me mad
can't stand the way you whine
do you even know it
i bet you don't even know it
when i talk to you
am i getting through
you just stare at me
look at how cute you are
do you even know it
i bet you don't even know it
but you run from me
everytime it seems
i want to get close to you
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Top Ten Episodes of G.I. JOE: A Real American Hero - Number 02
Lasers in the Night
Written by Marv Wolfman
A lot of legendary cartoon and comic book writers have worked on G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero, and it doesn't get much more "legendary" than Mighty Marv Wolfman. Comic book aficionados will recognize Wolfman's name immediately. He has written countless books for both Marvel and DC, notably Crisis on Infinite Earths.
Lasers in the Night is one of the most tightly packed episodes of the whole series. The episode focuses on Quick Kick, the Joe's resident martial arts expert. At a public exhibition, he meets Amber, a young, beautiful, idealistic college student. They start up a serious relationship. Amber frequently pressures Quick Kick to let her join G.I. Joe, but he tries to convince her it's not as glamorous as she thinks it is.
Meanwhile, while Quick Kick and Amber go to ballets and baseball games, Cobra Commander is planning a secret attack. He sends troops to a Joe base, looking for the guidance coordinates system for their giant laser. Cobra burns down the base but they don't find the coordinates. Unfortunately, Lady Jaye is injured in the attack.
Back at Joe headquarters, Duke is concerned because Gung Ho hasn't reported in during his
current mission and is presumed captured or missing. Their meeting is interrupted, however, by Amber. She sneaked into the base in an attempt to show how capable she is of being a Joe. Duke brushes her off and tries to go back to the more important matters.
During all of the mischief at the Joe base, a Cobra spy was able to steal their defense codes, allowing Cobra to disable the Joes and steal the guidance coordinates codes. Amber, worried that the Joes think she is the spy, tries to break into the Cobra base and stop them herself. She is immediately captured and thrown into Cobra's dungeon where she meets Gung Ho and...Lady Jaye! As it turns out, the Baroness knocked out Lady Jaye and took her place at the Joe base, allowing her to steal their codes.
Quick Kick singlehandedly breaks into the Cobra base to rescue her, but ends up being rescued himself after Amber breaks herself, Gung Ho, and Lady Jaye out of the dungeon. Then it is revealed what Cobra Commander's evil plot was. He wanted to steal the laser guidance system codes so that he could carve the image of his face into the moon. But the Joes stop him and Amber decides that she needs to finish college before she goes in for any more excitement.
There's a simplicity to the structure of this episode. It is deftly paced, every scene furthers the plot and increases the suspense, building up to the dramatic and exciting conclusion. The fact that Cobra Commander's secret plan is merely, as Destro angrily calls it, "cosmic grafitti" is just hilarious. The whole episode has a straightforward but somewhat lighthearted dramatic tone, what with it's focus on Quick Kick and Amber's relationship. Since there's no sense of slapstick comedy set up throughout the whole episode, the punchline of Cobra Commander's stupid plan is much more powerful.
The main star of this episode, of course, is Quick Kick. This is his big solo episode, and the writers waste no time developing his character and giving him room to breathe. Wolfman gave Quick Kick a great character quirk, which is that he is a huge movie buff, and frequently quotes and name drops classic film actors. It's fun and we get to see him do silly impersonations of
Humphrey Bogart, Jimmy Stewart, and even Steve Martin.
And although much of the episode is played out like a romantic dramedy, there's still plenty of spy action, laser shoot outs, and kung fu fighting. Lasers in the Night is an episode where everything from the writing, animation, voice acting, and direction just comes together perfectly. There's not a single flaw in it.
Written by Marv Wolfman
A lot of legendary cartoon and comic book writers have worked on G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero, and it doesn't get much more "legendary" than Mighty Marv Wolfman. Comic book aficionados will recognize Wolfman's name immediately. He has written countless books for both Marvel and DC, notably Crisis on Infinite Earths.
Lasers in the Night is one of the most tightly packed episodes of the whole series. The episode focuses on Quick Kick, the Joe's resident martial arts expert. At a public exhibition, he meets Amber, a young, beautiful, idealistic college student. They start up a serious relationship. Amber frequently pressures Quick Kick to let her join G.I. Joe, but he tries to convince her it's not as glamorous as she thinks it is.Meanwhile, while Quick Kick and Amber go to ballets and baseball games, Cobra Commander is planning a secret attack. He sends troops to a Joe base, looking for the guidance coordinates system for their giant laser. Cobra burns down the base but they don't find the coordinates. Unfortunately, Lady Jaye is injured in the attack.
Back at Joe headquarters, Duke is concerned because Gung Ho hasn't reported in during his
current mission and is presumed captured or missing. Their meeting is interrupted, however, by Amber. She sneaked into the base in an attempt to show how capable she is of being a Joe. Duke brushes her off and tries to go back to the more important matters.During all of the mischief at the Joe base, a Cobra spy was able to steal their defense codes, allowing Cobra to disable the Joes and steal the guidance coordinates codes. Amber, worried that the Joes think she is the spy, tries to break into the Cobra base and stop them herself. She is immediately captured and thrown into Cobra's dungeon where she meets Gung Ho and...Lady Jaye! As it turns out, the Baroness knocked out Lady Jaye and took her place at the Joe base, allowing her to steal their codes.
Quick Kick singlehandedly breaks into the Cobra base to rescue her, but ends up being rescued himself after Amber breaks herself, Gung Ho, and Lady Jaye out of the dungeon. Then it is revealed what Cobra Commander's evil plot was. He wanted to steal the laser guidance system codes so that he could carve the image of his face into the moon. But the Joes stop him and Amber decides that she needs to finish college before she goes in for any more excitement.There's a simplicity to the structure of this episode. It is deftly paced, every scene furthers the plot and increases the suspense, building up to the dramatic and exciting conclusion. The fact that Cobra Commander's secret plan is merely, as Destro angrily calls it, "cosmic grafitti" is just hilarious. The whole episode has a straightforward but somewhat lighthearted dramatic tone, what with it's focus on Quick Kick and Amber's relationship. Since there's no sense of slapstick comedy set up throughout the whole episode, the punchline of Cobra Commander's stupid plan is much more powerful.
The main star of this episode, of course, is Quick Kick. This is his big solo episode, and the writers waste no time developing his character and giving him room to breathe. Wolfman gave Quick Kick a great character quirk, which is that he is a huge movie buff, and frequently quotes and name drops classic film actors. It's fun and we get to see him do silly impersonations of
Humphrey Bogart, Jimmy Stewart, and even Steve Martin.And although much of the episode is played out like a romantic dramedy, there's still plenty of spy action, laser shoot outs, and kung fu fighting. Lasers in the Night is an episode where everything from the writing, animation, voice acting, and direction just comes together perfectly. There's not a single flaw in it.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Blog-A-Song 08
Successful People
I've been playing a lot of other people's music lately, which partially inspired this song. The rest of the inspiration comes from the soul crushing depression and jealousy that comes from seeing other people succeed.
Lyrics:
successful people have great hair
successful people wear silk underwear
successful people have nice teeth
successful people don't eat beef
successful people have lots of money
successful people have personality
successful people have lots of time
successful people know how to rhyme
look at all the regular people
going to their regular jobs
they've given up on their dreams
and still they seem
happy
successful people drive fast cars
successful people drink in martini bars
successful people wear dress shirts
successful people never have their feelings hurt
look at all the regular people
going to their regular jobs
they've given up on their dreams
and still they seem
happy
successful people are arrogant
successful people have no talent
successful people have lots of luck
successful people, go take a flying...
duck
In case you are wondering, the chorus to this song is lifted directly from the greatest animated show that never got a chance.
I've been playing a lot of other people's music lately, which partially inspired this song. The rest of the inspiration comes from the soul crushing depression and jealousy that comes from seeing other people succeed.
Lyrics:
successful people have great hair
successful people wear silk underwear
successful people have nice teeth
successful people don't eat beef
successful people have lots of money
successful people have personality
successful people have lots of time
successful people know how to rhyme
look at all the regular people
going to their regular jobs
they've given up on their dreams
and still they seem
happy
successful people drive fast cars
successful people drink in martini bars
successful people wear dress shirts
successful people never have their feelings hurt
look at all the regular people
going to their regular jobs
they've given up on their dreams
and still they seem
happy
successful people are arrogant
successful people have no talent
successful people have lots of luck
successful people, go take a flying...
duck
In case you are wondering, the chorus to this song is lifted directly from the greatest animated show that never got a chance.
Monday, June 6, 2011
Top Ten Episodes of G.I. JOE: A Real American Hero - Number 03
"The Traitor"
Written by Buzz Dixon
Buzz Dixon wrote a slew of great G.I. Joe episodes, including the movie, but The Traitor is easily the best story he delivered. Split into two parts, The Traitor tells the story of Dusty betraying the Joes and joining Cobra. It's a compelling episode full of intrigue, action, and comas!
The story begins in a ship docking harbor, where Cobra attempts to steal a chemical that can be used in a "mind control" formula. Unfortunately for Cobra, G.I. Joe has some kind of new chemical that, when sprayed onto their vehicles, makes them completely invulnerable. Cobra is successfully repelled and are seemingly helpless against the Joe's new technology.
Dusty takes this opportunity to make use of his leave time and goes to visit his sick, invalid mother. Sadly, Dusty's mother can't afford the special treatment she needs and already owes money to the bank. Cobra takes advantage of Dusty's situation and offers to pay his mother's medical bills in exchange for the armor chemical formula.
Two of my favorite Cobra villains, Xamot and Tomax meet Dusty at a cowboy bar and try to
make the deal. Xamot and Tomax were some goofy, but visually interesting characters. They are weird, European, arrogant, acrobatic twins. Specifically, they are mirrored identical twins who share an empathic connection. They always finish each others sentences and feel each others pain. This actually makes them pretty lousy soldiers because this connection is constantly shown in every fight they get into. You punch one of them and they both fall over. Still, they are fun characters.
Desperate to take care of his mother, Dusty starts giving Cobra top secret information. Suspicious that Dusty is a traitor, Duke sets a trap to flush him out; but an unexpected explosion puts Duke into a coma. Dusty gets captured by the Joes and court marshaled. Having no where else to go, Dusty joins Cobra. Now a member of Cobra, Dusty gives them the armor formula and leads a number of missions to get the rest of the chemicals for their "mind control" formula. Eventually, Cobra gets all the ingredients and captures a bunch of Joes in the process. But just before Dusty is forced to gas the Joe prisoners with the "mind control" formula, he gases the Cobra soldiers and frees the Joes.
The Joes get out and storm the base, then to their surprise, all of Cobra's equipment starts deteriorating. As it turns out, Dusty was a triple agent, working for Duke. Duke knew that their armor formula was unstable and, although at first making an object invincible, eventually caused it to deteriorate at a molecular level. Duke wanted Cobra to destroy all their equipment. Dusty's name is cleared and all's well that ends well.
Like all the two part episodes, there's a lot going on. The extra space allows the action to breathe and lets various other characters have a moment without feeling cramped or rushed. Although the action and intrigue is very straightforward, it's handled very well and focuses on broad concepts such as morality and loyalty. Despite being an alleged traitor and having all his friends turn on him, Dusty sticks to the mission and tries not to hurt anyone. When Shipwreck attacks him in an angry rage, Dusty spars with him then saves him from a burning building. When Cobra Commander forces Dusty to fight for dominance in a pool of piranhas with "rocket nunchukus", he saves his opponent from being eaten alive. Dusty's a good guy.
The animation is pretty top notch in this episode, too, with one glaring exception.
The nature of animation means that all characters are drawn from model, including background characters. In the case of the Cobra Troopers, they all look the same because they're all based off the same model. In this episode, there's a new Cobra Trooper that is given a face, Lieutenant Claymore. The animators took this opportunity to give the show some diversity and made him a black man. Unfortunately, there were numerous animation gaffes where the character was constantly switching skin color. G.I. Joe had consistent animation errors and coloring was the most common one, it's just unfortunately obvious in this case.
Written by Buzz Dixon
Buzz Dixon wrote a slew of great G.I. Joe episodes, including the movie, but The Traitor is easily the best story he delivered. Split into two parts, The Traitor tells the story of Dusty betraying the Joes and joining Cobra. It's a compelling episode full of intrigue, action, and comas!
The story begins in a ship docking harbor, where Cobra attempts to steal a chemical that can be used in a "mind control" formula. Unfortunately for Cobra, G.I. Joe has some kind of new chemical that, when sprayed onto their vehicles, makes them completely invulnerable. Cobra is successfully repelled and are seemingly helpless against the Joe's new technology.Dusty takes this opportunity to make use of his leave time and goes to visit his sick, invalid mother. Sadly, Dusty's mother can't afford the special treatment she needs and already owes money to the bank. Cobra takes advantage of Dusty's situation and offers to pay his mother's medical bills in exchange for the armor chemical formula.
Two of my favorite Cobra villains, Xamot and Tomax meet Dusty at a cowboy bar and try to
make the deal. Xamot and Tomax were some goofy, but visually interesting characters. They are weird, European, arrogant, acrobatic twins. Specifically, they are mirrored identical twins who share an empathic connection. They always finish each others sentences and feel each others pain. This actually makes them pretty lousy soldiers because this connection is constantly shown in every fight they get into. You punch one of them and they both fall over. Still, they are fun characters.Desperate to take care of his mother, Dusty starts giving Cobra top secret information. Suspicious that Dusty is a traitor, Duke sets a trap to flush him out; but an unexpected explosion puts Duke into a coma. Dusty gets captured by the Joes and court marshaled. Having no where else to go, Dusty joins Cobra. Now a member of Cobra, Dusty gives them the armor formula and leads a number of missions to get the rest of the chemicals for their "mind control" formula. Eventually, Cobra gets all the ingredients and captures a bunch of Joes in the process. But just before Dusty is forced to gas the Joe prisoners with the "mind control" formula, he gases the Cobra soldiers and frees the Joes.
The Joes get out and storm the base, then to their surprise, all of Cobra's equipment starts deteriorating. As it turns out, Dusty was a triple agent, working for Duke. Duke knew that their armor formula was unstable and, although at first making an object invincible, eventually caused it to deteriorate at a molecular level. Duke wanted Cobra to destroy all their equipment. Dusty's name is cleared and all's well that ends well.Like all the two part episodes, there's a lot going on. The extra space allows the action to breathe and lets various other characters have a moment without feeling cramped or rushed. Although the action and intrigue is very straightforward, it's handled very well and focuses on broad concepts such as morality and loyalty. Despite being an alleged traitor and having all his friends turn on him, Dusty sticks to the mission and tries not to hurt anyone. When Shipwreck attacks him in an angry rage, Dusty spars with him then saves him from a burning building. When Cobra Commander forces Dusty to fight for dominance in a pool of piranhas with "rocket nunchukus", he saves his opponent from being eaten alive. Dusty's a good guy.
The animation is pretty top notch in this episode, too, with one glaring exception.
The nature of animation means that all characters are drawn from model, including background characters. In the case of the Cobra Troopers, they all look the same because they're all based off the same model. In this episode, there's a new Cobra Trooper that is given a face, Lieutenant Claymore. The animators took this opportunity to give the show some diversity and made him a black man. Unfortunately, there were numerous animation gaffes where the character was constantly switching skin color. G.I. Joe had consistent animation errors and coloring was the most common one, it's just unfortunately obvious in this case.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Comics Review: Paying For It
Paying For It is the autobiographical memoir of author Chester Brown detailing his experiences soliciting prostitutes. Brown has a lot to say about to about the nature of monogamous love and his interpretation of it. He writes about his conflicting needs for sexual gratification and physical intimacy with his desire to not have a girlfriend.
If half of this book is philosophizing about the origins of the idea of Romantic Love, then the second half is Brown's argument for the decriminalization of prostitution. He argues passionately for the plight of sex workers and goes into great detail about the difference between legislation and decriminalization.
This extremely personal work is written and drawn with a deep passion for both the subject matter and the people in it. Although there's a detached formality to the narrative, Brown is also unconsciously emotional about the women with which he's had relations, without the slightest amount of eroticism.
This is a very personal and intelligent approach to an extremely taboo, but no less important subject.
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