Dude, hit the reset button.

I was excited to hear that Fox is looking to reboot The Fantastic 4, because it neatly reaffirms everything that I imagine I know about the film industry. And that boils down to this: when something works, fucking do it all the time!

I hate to blame people that have good ideas and execute them well, but this is Christopher Nolan’s fault. He knocked it out of the park on Batman Begins and The Dark Knight – because he had a good idea. Because he made sure that a solid, coherent script got written for each movie. Because he stocked his films with competent-to-fantastic actors. Because he orchestrated events around what served the story. Because he made good goddamn movies.

But, sadly, the industry doesn’t see that – they see that they took a franchise and rebooted it, made it more serious and quasi-realistic, and more importantly than anything else, made it “darker,” and “grittier.” And that’s all that they’ll do here. They’ll skip story, and character, and plot that anyone will actually give a shit about, and instead as a means to get at those aforementioned cool buzzwords they’ll just, I dunno, shorten the film’s title so that it somehow seems more badass. Instead of The Fantastic Four, it’ll just be THE FOUR. Because fuck Fantastic, that corny shit’s for retards! THEY DON’T NEED FANTASTIC, THEY’RE JUST THE FOUR.

And they’ll all wear leather jackets and have five o’clock shadows and maybe occasional substance abuse issues, and from time to time they’ll stare off into the middle distance and that will be the point that you’ll know, sitting in the theater, that these characters are tortured and gritty and real and fuck you, we rebooted it!

Wait, what? What did you just say?

There is MORE SNAKES ON THIS PLANE?  GODDAMN!

PrintGigs – The Commercial

I’ve always thought that I should be employed in some capacity in marketing/advertising. I think that I’ve got a great mind for memorable slogans and ad campaigns, but, tragically, like Ween and Tim & Eric (yeah, there’s a great group of minds to group myself with), I think that most big companies simply lack the vision to hire me and/or implement some of my ideas.

And I understand that – they’ve got wide audiences to think about. They can’t just go disseminating really cutting edge stuff to the entire world all at once. Cutting edge artistry in advertising and otherwise blooms on the fringes of pop culture and then slowly works its way to the middle, to everyone. I get that. And that’s where Ryan comes in.

Ryan works for a print company that is, to put it respectfully, on the fringe. That is to say that it’s small, and being small, it can/could get away with pitching some really non-traditional marketing gimmicks. Out of respect for Ryan’s job, I’m going to falsify the name of the company, but I really and truly think they could get away with implementing the ad campaign I’m including after the jump. Hell, maybe they’d even gain some customers and interest they’d otherwise not see. Maybe people would sit up and take notice, and eventually purchase some products and/or services.

There is an outside chance that they would be fined by the FCC or the subject of civil litigation.

“The summer I was 8 years old, five hours disappeared from my life.”

As we sat there listening to the carolers, I wanted to tell Brian that it was over now and that everything would be okay. But that was a lie, plus I couldn’t speak anyway. I wish there was some way to go back and undo the past. But there wasn’t. There was nothing we could do. So I just stayed silent and tried to telepathically communicate how sorry I was about what happened. And I thought of all the grief and suffering and fucked up stuff in the world, and it made me want to escape. I wished with all my heart we could just leave this world behind. Rise like two angels in the night and magically disappear.

The AV Club has an article on one of my favorite movies – Mysterious Skin. Check it out.

Headbutt

Have you ever headbutted someone?

Charles Barkley

Taken from Bob Ryan’s column on Boston.com this morning:

Count me among the many who have been continually charmed by the great wit and candor of Charles Barkley. Count me, as well, among the many who fear we’ll be soon writing his obit if he doesn’t mend his wild-and-woolly, I-do-whatever-I-want ways.

What a crock of shit, Ryan. Seriously.

Wardrobe Malfunction

My driveway is more than a little narrow. The border on one side is our front porch, which juts out a little onto the pavement, and opposite that is the side of our neighbor’s house. It’s not hard to park there, but the close proximity of our stairway and our neighbor’s house can make it a tight squeeze once you actually want to get in or out of your vehicle. Usually, navigating this is little more than a matter of sucking in and squeezing through and muttering a few broadly-addressed curse words, but this morning I must have accidentally seasoned my breakfast cereal with Tard, because I had myself a problem.

Actual Conversation

me: Perhaps a recurring feature of some sort
Perhaps an internet ram gigs
Ryan: Internet+ram+gigs=?

Lit-Boner

There’s a new Jayne Anne Phillips novel. I want to fill a waterbed with the pretty words you sling, Jayne, and I want to just roll around in it.

“Using homemade lab equipment and the wealth of scientific knowledge available online, these hobbyists are trying to create new life forms through genetic engineering…”

Fantastic choice. Have fun with that. My response? Please see EVERY HORROR MOVIE EVER MADE. You are setting into motion the real-life existence of Pinhead.