Just finding out that there's a Peanuts store in Akihabara has made my need to visit there all the more pressing. Why do the Japanese get one but we don't? (We don't, do we?)

I'm reminded of the scene in the Robin Williams movie Toys when they're working on new kinds of fake vomit, like the "Wolfgang Chuck" and the "Don Heave Ho."

What of it? Simple, yet effective. And there was a certain symmetry with Mark's segment.

Harrumph! What do you take us for, Mr. Johnson? It's all well and good to promise results, but until we see this contraption at work upon its intended audience we cannot simple take your word for its efficacy. Indeed!

Zorak finds the coolest stuff.

Back in the early '90's heyday of technical manuals (spearheaded of course by Star Trek, the technobabbler's wet dream), Marvel published books with the specs of Xavier's School for Gifted Youths, Stark Industries and the Punisher's arsenal. Is it still escapism when you have to work so hard to make it tangible in your mind?

I don't doubt it'd work, but for how LONG? With the gee-whizzery about prototyping fabricators and other prefab goods like this, is there a related field of research investigating how the sudden uptick of even more disposable consumer goods will be more ecologically disposed? Conversely, will nothing be made to last anymore? These may sound like contradictory questions, but items made to last don't need to be replaced, or at the least tossed.

@StPete420: Burton REVIVED Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by staying true to Dahl's version of the book.

This is likely a rhetorical question given your handle, but are you high? There was no subplot with Wonka's father in the book. Burton excised the subplot with Slugworth, which removed any real reason for Charlie to not immediately get the factory, yet kept in Wonka's paranoia of spies, rendered pointless. And Wonka, though an eccentric, was not a delusional pedophobe. And I never said I didn't like Burton's rendition, but the Gene Wilder version is far superior; even my nephew thought so, without coaching.

@TheCat17: "the girls playing Tweedledum and Tweedledee are twins who get to have real, genuine sex with each other."

Ah, but will they eat each other's scat out of a cup and vomit all over one another? Gotta ride that zeitgeist.

Actually, seeing that still linked above I'm less psyched than I was. Why retread the high points of the movies? Are you saying that with nearly the entire original cast on board they'll waste the opportunity with what amounts to a "best of" album? Cripes, at least recycle a plotline from one of the cartoons.

@ Pepik: In the words of The 2000 Year Old Man, "Did you know that many parts of a pine cone are edible? And that pussywillows make a lovely dessert?"

I finally saw the better part of an episode of Wired Science this weekend and quite liked it, though it can be a touch dry and/or stiff at certain moments. Hardwick is in his element, though whether some of his guests are in his element is debatable.

Good going, kids. Mark, I think your glasses would actually look good on-screen. Xeni, you would look better if... well, I'm actually not sure how you could look better. I look forward to screentime for Cory, Pesco, Battelle and Joel, and BBTV ad infinitem, especially as a template for other videoblogs/podcats.

That Theremin-playing robot needs a little tremulo in its approach if it wants to sound like anything but a siren.

I swear, I was just talking to one of my friends about an idea like this within the past couple weeks. I love repurposing anachronistic tech. Until the advent of the Wiichucks I'd still intended to mod my PowerGlove into a wireless mouse, and I still might.

I forgot to say, Anderson ought to banninate any and all parties involved in this pissing match; I can't imagine he'll want to hear out of an affiliated cakehole ever again.

Mark, you look like as though Kurt Russell played Prof. Julius Kelp. That's good! It means you'll bust out a soulful bass solo on that boing box to make the ladies swoon, or perhaps a raga. Didn't I say your glasses would read better? (Your definition of "better" may vary.)

The shot of Xeni waiting for Paul's call was a nice analogy. E.T., phone home, dammit!

I didn't want to be too negative before, but I much prefer this 8-bit intro to the slicker CGI Jackhammer Jill; the two looks didn't mesh well. I spotted "Bob"; IAIAIAIAIAIAIAIA!!!

I did a short stint in a pretty powerful PR firm in NYC, and it was kind of stunning just how unpleasant and out of touch these people were. On the upside, however, I did get to meet Karen Duffy and see the Disney/Dali collaboration "Destino" through the gig.

Hardwick was, of course, the former host of MTV's "Singled Out," which also launched the non-nude career of Jenny McCarthy. Though now that she's seeing Jim Carrey, that's an onerous credential.

Now Hard n' Phirm's "Pi" song and video makes more sense as an extension of their arskum geekiness.

I was going to comment on yesterday's about the great use of Ape Lad's art for the Unicorn Chaser, and then you go me one better and feature him! Keep broadcasting direct from my brain! Especially when it's in black & white. (nudge, wink)

She is... and from frame one I thought that was quite the fetching ensemble.

Wil, on the other hand, shows up rocking a Nightwing t-shirt, and that's damn cool, too. His address at PAX, which is d/lable off the PA site, was a great manifesto, too. "I'm Wil Wheaton, and Jack Thompson can suck my balls."

So anyone else think "Moonlight" sounds like a retread of "Forever Knight," among all its other clones?

You just know Chevy's going to release one, simply to be contrary.

Now where can one find the video shot from the opposite side of the sheet?

I lust that EPCOT pocket protector.

Amiga graphics swear revenge on emobots... film at 11.

With great respect to Gareth, what precisely qualifies this as steampunk? I realize that's mostly an aesthetic descriptor these days, but this is, at best, UNIVACpunk. No Nixie tubes? FAIL.

The best way to learn about the effects of 2G1C without needing to see it is to watch the 1st episode of "Mongoloids on the Interwebs" on SuperDeluxe.com. The central segment is a brave fellow subjecting himself to it. (Be warned, there are a couple split second views of the screen when the cameraman wanders too far left.)

That "Metal Fingers In My Body" video is surprisingly (though not unwelcomely) explicit (yet I get annoyed by animation that skimps by repeating sequences to fill time). Who knew Louise Brooks digs on droids? You can use R. Steven's robot-loving Diesel Sweeties to connect it to his Dumbrella partner Jeffrey Rowland's nastygram. C whut I did ther?

@Rick: It is truly hard to believe that the juxtaposition of this remark with the photo was not intended to convey the idea that the Masonic flag was secretly raised on the moon's surface.

There was actually a cottage industry of lunar astronauts where they'd take certain items with them to the moon on behalf of others, if for no better reason than so they could claim it had been to the moon and back. It's not hard to think Aldrin, as a Mason, would have performed that courtesy for the grand muckety-mucks of Masonry. Anyone who'd believe that obviously P'shopped cover image deserves their inevitable ridicule.

As someone who grew up in NYC but rarely got the chance to venture alone into the wilds of Times Square during its golden age of sleazery, I may just have to get that book. I remember the uproar, both indignant and hilarious, when it was suggested Times Square could be made hospitable to even the greenhorns. Of course, now it's intolerable to the people who have to live in the town.

Nice Rob Ullman sticker on the bongos, BTW.

I've still got my 2600 (and original NES). Funny how modern gaming consoles don't quite have the same appeal to me. (Then again, I also don't have several hundred dollars to drop on anything so spurious.) Oh, I enjoy them when I play them, but there's something about 4- and 8-bit graphics that appeals to me on a very primal level. Maybe it's only a certain segment of society, now in their 30's, that will ever feel this way; more's the pity for those too young to have to imagine that a red splotch is Spider-Man or a khaki blob is Pitfall Harry. How strange to feel fogeyish about this sort of thing.

Was Mr. Jalopy stashing DMT inside his drive-in-cycle? And wouldn't someone playing that Accelerator potentially STILL get queasy even if they synched up with the image?

I dunno if that Unicorn Chaser cleansed the palate so much as left a potato vodka aftertaste.

But, on the upside, perhaps it was the weekend withdrawal, but today's installment seemed meatier than previous ones. This has become part of my morning routine.

I would love to see this image above a fluorescent leopard print couch in some futuristic crime lord's den of sin, preferably while drinking moloko.

That Tom Ford segment may have been the most deserving of being followed by a Unicorn Chaser yet.

(I wonder when someone's going to invent a drink called a Unicorn Chaser. Would it taste like bubblegum? Or maybe like Vulva...)

I'm actually working on a comic wherein the titular character ends up a butt-biting fetishist at the end. I claim no inspiration from the eponymous bug. I do, however, admit to ripping off the punchline from an old Daffy Duck cartoon.

I like the color combination of the red top with the grey background. Keep experimenting. Were the second and third episodes taped significantly apart? Xeni's hair looks longer.

@ Kristofer: I have that, along with a mini Pac-Man machine.

Keith David has one of the most distinctive voices around; he portrayed both Goliath from Disney's Gargoyles and Spawn. Having just watched it the other night on TV, I should note that he gets to be in the longest, most pointless street fight ever committed to film with "Rowdy" Roddy Piper in John Carpenter's They Live:

"Put on the sunglasses!"
"Why you dirty motherfucker."

Seconded on Cracked, Starlog (and sister publication Fangoria) and Omni, Om. One correction, though: Kathy Keeton wasn't Bob Guccione's daughter, nor was she a tramp; she was his wife. The great irony is that she was such a health nut, and launched Omni's failed spinoff Longevity; within a few years, she died, only in her 50's.

I was a huge fan of Omni, from the time I discovered it in 1987, precisely the midpoint of its run, until it folded in 1995. I do have a number of earlier issues, including the first and a couple others from its first year, but I still don't know what you mean by it becoming Penthouse Jr., Om. As far as I could tell, it always was classy, albeit a touch lame in its latter days.

Other compilations I'd love, if only for the sake of nostalgia:

* Sesame Street (my uncle did a lot of photography for them in the early days)

* 3-2-1 Contact (ditto)

* Weekly Reader

* Dynamite and Hot Dog

* AXcess (it straddled between Mondo 2000 and Wired)

* Heavy Metal

* The Weekly World News

* The Comics Journal (naturally, given recent developments, they'd have to excise interviews with Harlan Ellison)

* The Onion

I'm sure more will come to me, but that's a healthy sampling for now.

I wonder, if you sold merch composed of that particular 6-sided shape, the angle of it offset, a black-edged white circle, the component colors, a rundown of the font used, would it still count as trademark infringement? Because although IANAL, I'm pretty sure that unless they've trademarked them all individually, their combination, especially using obviously and unmistakeably different words gives them exactly jack right to complain.

We can test their squeamishness with a simple web-based experiment: have a Flash site randomly generate a reconfigured design using all the visual elements in the Best Buy logo. At what point would the elements line up closely enough to the original to induce a vomit of nastygrams? If the logo was black and the lettering was yellow? How about if the letters were arranged perpendicular to how they usually are? If the tag is shaped like a buttplug? What'll it take, overeager retained corporate lawyers?

And to think, I was just listening to one of the IE mp3 experiments today. I think Best Buy HQ needs a visit from Steve, The Omnipotent Voice From The Sky.

Magellan's the offspring of a Gonk and an Imperial Mouse Droid. They met aboard a Jawa crawler and it was digital love.

Until I saw the reverse shot I thought it was going to turn out to be a riff on the classic drinking bird novelty toy, and that soon enough the "beak" would dip into the melon and swing back up. Don't think too badly of me that when I realized what was actually up I immediately got bored.

Bonnie sez: Now if there was only a way I could rent RoboCop for my next event I would be set!

I think you're looking for the "Metal Fingers In My Body" entry in the link roundup.

May I note that goofy Xeni is 10x hotter than the already white-hotness that is staid, newscasterly Xeni? I believe I just have.

Donopolis beat me to the punch. Rick Vietch's RARE BIT FIENDS is fantastic stuff, like most of the rest of his oeuvre. He's like what you'd get if Steve Ditko and Jim Woodring were spliced together.

I can usually touchtype, but I do wish there was some way in which to give away which letter was which. Maybe make whomever's on each key correspond in some way with the character on there. It'll make every keystroke rife with meaning.

This story is its own Unicorn Chaser.

I thought I'd heard that the Toth molepeople book was largely unsubstantiated, exaggerated and/or fabricated. Hodgman, on the other hand, is unimpeachable.

The rap is painful, but I have a penchant for weird crap like that, so onto the hard drive it goes. I'm surprised the star-nosed mole didn't get a Cthulhu reference.

And it's such a joy to see someone as mad talented as Aplelad at work at his craft. I've long hoped that art might develop into a spectator sport. Oh, wait, I've just described Win, Lose or Draw.

Oh Zod, I hope we don't see The Simpsons in 10 years. Not that I don't have great love for the franchise, but it's been exactly that for no less than the last 10 years.

I'd written out a long question on the integrity of signing Groening's name to someone else's work, but I decided it was a question far larger than the world of The Simpsons. How about this for something less combative: will we ever see an actual "Life in Hell" animated series? Perhaps online? And other than "Futurama," are there any other Groening-inspired animated works in the works?

That's "good news, everyone!" I'd loved and missed FFF; they're like The Onion and the old FTL Newsfeeds from the early days of the SciFi Channel rolled into one.

I can safely say that of all the weird prepubescent autoerotic fantasies I might have had, manipulation via minifig claw was not one of them.

I can't wait to see this wash up on a beach somewhere.

Someone alert Ted Gunderson: FBI and anyone's whore if you need a soundbyte about satanists.

@ Hoke: Off the top of my head, Cory's "There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (Now Is The Best Time of Your Life)" is more about mechas, cyborgs, transhumanism, the (unnecessary) clash between cultural and ecological conservation, post-apocalypse... and Romeo & Juliet-style teenage love. Can you really make a compelling case for why you don't read an author because of net extrapolation on the basis of a single story written precisely for a Business 2.0 theme? Sounds like a self-fulfilling prophesy there.

@ Dip: Would Jeff Gannon be among the "Mistresses of Karl Rove"?

@ Teresa: Actually, on my last psychedelic excursion, five years ago now, I had an insight that W was an unwitting agent of The Age of Aquarius/Aeon of Horus by poisoning public opinion against whatever it was for which he stood. These days that seems ever more likely.

Reminds me of Alex Grey's Chapel of the Sacred Mirrors in NYC, though that's a more modest endeavor. (Which, if you've ever seen it, is probably the last term you'd use to describe it.)

I was surprised and glad to see Jordon Crane among the craftsters; I enjoy his comics muchly. Was there also a booth for Fantagraphics? I thought I spotted a cluster of their books. This was probably my most favorite episode in about two weeks (Xeni's interview with John Hodgman being the previous contender).

Carla's still got lovely elbows worthy of cryonic preservation. The rest of her ain't half bad, either. Well played, Mark.

When I hear former Mexican president Vicente Fox talking up something akin to the NAU during his book tour, I don't consider that "debunked." I consider that "very possible and a bit scary." I don't want to come off all Lyndon LaRouche, but a serious reevaluation of our monetary system seems increasingly in order.

I 'spect some Kenny and Sante Kimes-style chicanery, where one or both of them deceased the supposed dead son, she reports him missing, IDs the corpse positively, has the body destroyed to erase the evidence, and then LEAPIN' LAZARUS! The son pulls a "I go away to Cancun for the weekend and what happens?" routine. Someone call Grissom. Or Batman. Either will do.

It was a bit on the fluffy side, but I'll take it over THE TODAY SHOW any day of the week. (And Xeni is more photogenic and warm than even Ann Curry.)

The music in the "Sensors & Sensibilities" segment, was that lifted from KINGDOM HEARTS? I'm not a videogamer by any stretch of the imagination, but I recognized the melody from the commercials.

Has Reccardi worked on the Erin Esurance campaign? Does his specific visual idiom precede that of Shag?

Are Ernie Hudson, Rick Moranis, Sigourney Weaver and/or Annie Potts involved? I'd really love if this turned into a complete original cast reunion. (I'd love it more if they got over themselves, got to a gym and made an effing GB3, but I'll take what I can get.)

Anyone else going to the SubGenius Mid-Atlantic Devival on Nov. 10 in Baltimore? I am. Never been to a SubG event before, but since I've been following the Church for over a decade I figure it's long past time.

Relatedly, did you hear Gene Simmons' comments about the Radiohead model and mp3 downloading in general? The gist is that he thinks the record labels ought to have sued the bejeezus out of anyone who dared do so as soon as the practice started and the problem wouldn't exist today. He also said that illegal downloading is the reason why he hasn't produced and has no immediate plans to produce any new KISS material. Because, as you all know, modern college kids listen to KISS.

Aww... I wanted to see Evan Dorkin's design for I Love You, Beth Cooper.

@ Neuracnu: While it's refreshing to see a supposed Furry wanting to bypass the stage of familiarizing the general populace with the concept and normalizing it for them, obviously this is far from even remotely assimilated into the public consciousness; I'd say the majority don't even know it exists, much less would be comfortable with it. Hell, I've known about Furries for at least a decade and I'll freely admit it still squicks me on a few levels, as understanding and sympathetic as I endeavor to be. It's a sensitive topic from both sides of the aisle, and while I am a great champion of humor as a cure-all, you need the set-up before the punchline.

That said, you talk about defusing the stereotype of Furries being sexual deviants, then in the next breath about the French Orangina ad being hot. I don't think I need to add anything to that.

For my own part, while the exploration of "the beast within" is interesting, I wish there was a more cohesive movement of playacting FORWARD evolution. Actually, Lionel's lion head is pretty forward-thinking, if in a bestial idiom. Extropians and Transhumanists (and Trekkies, who've got their documentaries) notwithstanding, where are the "more human than humans"? You know, the exotically-beautiful transracial post-singularity high foreheaded mutants that make White Power troglodytes squirm? I'll take mine Olivia Munn-flavored with a dash of Quentin Quire rhetoric; ORDER UP!

Doorframe: The story and tone of the McGee Alice are dead on ripoffs of Burton's sensibilities, much like the bulk of commercialized goth culture (read: Hot Topic).

I wish Burton would go back to tapping into his own muse rather than servicing others' trademarks. Other than Batman and perhaps Mars Attacks his most successful films, at least artistically, have been born out of his idiosynchratic view of the world (ie, Beetlejuice, Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Edward Scissorhands, Big Fish, et al).

1) What was he caputured for? We seem to have his side of the story and maps of his cell, why not his "alleged crime"?

Most likely because he committed no crime. If our government had even an inkling he might have THOUGHT of looking at a U.S. corporate interest askance, you could bet your children's college fund this man would still be in his pain box. The fact that he was let go means that they had jackshit to hold him on, and likely never did, and such scared little boys in men's bodies that they couldn't own up to their mistake.

Would you rather be held for an unknown amount of time and waterboarded OR have your beheading broadcast on the internet?

I would rather be fed candies and cakes and brought skillfully to orgasm.

How would the average Muslim fundamentalist treat you, based on your personal beliefs?

Ah, the dodge. How "they" might or might not treat any one of us individually is irrelevant to a discussion of how we live up to the virtues for which we purportedly stand. No doubt there is a rabble-rouser on "their" side challenging moderate, logical thinkers to defend diplomacy when "we know how 'they' conduct negotiations!" And "they" would be right.

But there is no "they." There's only us all. You don't think this exact same conversation is going on all over the world, with just the names changed to protect the ignorant? And what you'd like to dismiss as naivete is in fact the ONLY thing that will cure this sickness running rampant at present. We're all on the same side because there is only one side, and the protestations of an individual or even a cluster under a common banner can never be a larger truth than that. I can be killed or tortured or humiliated, but what a pathetic, petulant act that would be in the face of the undeniable.

So peddle your dichotomies elsewhere. If you were actually "just curious" you'd go out and get those answers with your own eyes and hands and ears and heart. You want your fears echoed so they can be changed into hate, so you can make those you fear instead fear you more, and the cycle begins all over again. You won't get that here. Stop being afraid.

First online handle(s): When I started using BBSes in the DC area in 1992 or '93 I was simultaneously Rusty Bukitz and Houdini (inspired less by the actual man than by his character as portrayed in a Batman graphic novel). The first two girls I dated were both met off BBSes, the first with the handle Asparagus and the second was Zute (a misspelling of the character from Monty Python & The Search for the Holy Grail).

Worst handle: For both the unintended connotations and the experiences that went along with it, Krapfruit was regrettable. I still have an email account by that name to this day, though I use it primarily for mailing lists and similar spambait.

Beyond the sabreplay, is there any discussion of the philosophies that supposedly go into being either Jedi or Sith? I'm not going to Google them now, but I'm fairly certain there are treatises out there on both, considering that a substantial portion of Australia identified on their census as Jedi.

Xeni, how do you walk around in fur in L.A.? I realize it's winter and you're always in the height of fashion, but it doesn't ever get quite cold enough to justify that extravagance, does it? You've got kids in shorts there!

@Glossalalia Black: That review is great. Now I gotta see that movie. Actually, the whole thing about kids changing their skin color isn't too far flung now.

@T.A. Adjuster: That's AWESOME. As a practitioner of thrift fu, I think I may have to incorporate a scale like that when I codify the discipline.

@Deadfrog: Ah, as a recent ex-pat from the land of used books, those pictures struck a chord. Pre-millennial computer hintbooks, decade-old travel guides and Super 8 film manuals are all landfill bait. Better to donate them to a shelter or some other charity, though, than just leave them on street corners.

Oo, Not a Republican, aren't you a speaker of forbidden truths. How very dangerous of you. I love that the desperate ploy of many conservatives now is to posture themselves as the last honest people in America. Never mind that they've been exposed countless times now as being utterly without scruples.

everybody has to accept the war in Iraq or stfu.

Mm, no, sorry, we don't have to. This is America and we get our say. I think you may have taken a wrong turn at Burma.

We went to war in iraq for the wrong reasons, but it was to take down an oppressive and sadistic leader, a good thing.

Wait, so the wrong reasons were actually the right reasons, is that what you're saying? You really get off on the doublespeak: "Intolerance of intolerance is intolerance!" Hey, whatever keeps you warm at night.

Nobody seems to mention how Saddam would put upwards of 10 prisoners in a room with hammers and saws, as well as various other crude weapons, and say the last man living is a free man. The men would then go on to murder each other in cold blood. But hey, we shoudln't do anything about that right? It was none of our buisness...

If you can't keep your own yard clean you have no business criticizing that of your neighbors. Especially when you're the one who got him the lease in the first place.

Man on Pink Corner: I love this argument.

That is not an argument. That's what we in the reality biz call a fact. It is not up for debate. Whether you believe he won Florida or the national popular vote is irrelevant to that FACT.

The whole cottage industry that's grown up around Bush-bashing is nothing but misdirection. You can't blame Bush for this. It's not about Bush. It's about us. We failed to demand ethical behavior from our leadership, and we got what we deserved.

There I will agree with you: the ultimate responsibility for our (s)elected leaders' actions and their consequences lays squarely in our laps. But in order to get to a point at which action might be taken, opinions must be swayed so that the process will be affected. If that requires a "cottage industry" of Bush-bashing, in this specific case, I do not have qualms with that. Certainly, they don't want for fodder.

My old roommate is in the habit of leaving books he's read in random spots around NYC, though I doubt any of these are his. I think one of the reasons Future Shock has such a high turnover rate still is that lazy used bookstores (like the one I just quit) see the word "future" and shove it in the sci-fi section.

@Father Brown: In his book Chaos & Cyberculture Timothy Leary wrote that among his top favorite books, which included Gravity's Rainbow and Neuromancer, was Magister Ludi.

@Messinger: The U.S. loves Geo. Bush. We elected him and reelected him. Many of us will vote for a member of his party next year.

In the immortal words of Tonto, "What you mean 'we,' white man?" (I should not assume you're either white or a man; you take my meaning.)

My point being, the U.S. does not love Bush. He is REVILED, even by lifelong Republicans. He is a stain on their record that they may publicly champion but privately cringe at. And to be completely accurate, he was not elected in 2000; he was selected by the SCOTUS. Plus the jury is still out on whether there was significant interference in Ohio, both administerial and electronic. Like rendition and black sites, our present difficulty in maintaining focus on any one issue beyond the news cycle is not an indication of its truth or lack thereof.

They'd just better look out for the Black Tar. Or Ultimate Vision.

It's not a videogame, per se, but it may be preceded by an 8-track cartridge for the 2-XL, which is one of my favorite childhood toys. I don't think I had the one in question, and I doubt there was much more than a simple few exercises, but it had to have possessed some pseudo-interactivity, which puts it in the right ballpark.

"Thing? Is that you, old man?"

snap, snap.

I've not read this one, and will be on the lookout for it, but earlier this year I read Stephenson's The Big U, which I believe was his first novel. As usual in his oeuvre it's filled with amazingly huge ideas that he obviously understands in proper context better than your average skiffy hack latching onto the concept of the hour. Sure, it's got some truly ridiculous plot twists, but it's a black comedy, so I can forgive the giant mutant rats and Baltoslovenian terrorists.

I'm glad to see you guys are covering more comics-related stuff, Mark, especially the more esoteric material that the entrenched legions of Big Two fanboys begrudge shelf space because they don't feature impossible anatomies in dayglo ensembles that showcase every possible bulge.

I remember the only reason why I saw this movie in the theatres was because it debuted the teaser trailer for Spider-Man, the one that was pulled because it showed Spidey catching a runaway helicopter in a web between the Twin Towers. At least I could say it was on a date, though the dog of a movie didn't lend to any romance.

@ #11 KyleKlip: The demise of Jim Henson happened over 17 years ago. For good kids television, check out Nick Jr.'s Yo Gabba Gabba! It was created in part by the lead of ska group The Aquabats.

I was talking about these exact animations just last night, as my stepmother is organizing a celebration of Glass all next year at her school, and in fact is in NYC tonight seeing Einstein On The Beach at Carnegie Hall. Among his many other works Glass also did a new soundtrack for the original Bela Lugosi Dracula, performed by the Kronos Quartet.

@ #2 Halloween Jack: I feel you on both counts.

I am so disappointed I won't be in town in time for this party; so many of my favorite people, not just in comics but period, will be guests of honor. May I add my completely worthless endorsement of this event to anyone on the fence about going and supporting the CBLDF; as the case with Gordon Lee in Athens, GA, demonstrates, comics are still too easy a scapegoat for some demagogues that they should have to fend off the crazies out of any one individual's pocket.

The taller gal with the hair cone had a sort of Sean Young vibe going for her, so at least there's that much of a sci-fi reference going on. Seems mostly like the show's organizers grasped at the straw of space, but most outfits shown I can't imagine ever seeing anywhere other than a fetish club. I need a scotch and vodka and bourbon just watching this.

@ Bud: Three important points:

a) Such a video is not new; I remember hearing about something similar, maybe even the same one, about 20 years ago;

b) Smear cat food on an entertainment center and cats will pay attention, maybe even reach up to get some; and

c) It's BOB and Doug MacKenzie. A "Crazy Canadian" should know that.

If you're going to so transparently shill, have the balls to do it openly and, for that matter, creatively; the "I heard about this guy with this product" tactic is so played. If this is the sort of thing that would inspire you so much, I can't wait until you see an actual film.

Was it a bomb? Seems to me Moore can sell his own used toilet paper (coffcoffJudgmentDaycoff) and it'll still do boffo biz.

I also have all the issues. I wonder which shard of the shattered original Image U owns the rights to those characters. My guess is on Silvestri, since I think some of the 1963 characters have surfaced in his Golden Age Shadowhawk stories.

Moore hasn't weakened since buying his own hype; pretty much all his ABC books were phenomenal. If it seems like mystical gibberish you might consider researching what he's talking about and be surprised. Like The Invisibles, the more you look into the topics alluded to the more sense it makes.

This is hardly the first place to use older music in mashups; I think there was one that mashed up Eminem's "Without Me" with Lawrence Welk.

@ Father Brown: While I agree that the base formula of a mashup (Vocals A + Music B = GOLD) has become a bit tired, there are people who are doing new and interesting things with the concept. Exhibit A would be Greg Gillis aka Girl Talk on the Illegal Art label, whose tracks are like a "Where's Waldo" of bits and pieces of new and old music, constantly changing, speeding up, slowing down, going from the backing track of one section to the vocals of the next. From what I understand, though I've not yet had a chance to experience in person, his live shows turn normally button-down posing hipsters into exultant, sweaty wrecks.

There are also many other DJs, famous for their mashups, who indeed have parlayed their fame into opportunities for original work, such as Freelance Hellraiser, who created one of the first prominant mashups, "A Stroke of Genie-Us" (The Strokes vs. Christina Aguiliera). So don't write off the entire concept just yet.

Those are some pretty sweet planes, but what's the inspiration for the name "Flying Puppets"? It's good branding, but by that logic you could call RC cars "Rolling Puppets."

It goes past pretty quick, but does the stop-motion bread creature put BBTV on its screen? That'd give that screen more nutritional value than an entire loaf of Wonder Bread.

Are these still-suit shorts for summers on Arakkis?

Because heaven knows men have never done anything scary and weird. Thank you for not trolling.

I'm using Firefox and had no trouble. I do wish it was a .mp3 rather than .m4a; I'm on a Mac, but I sometimes play my music on PCs.

Spooky/Miller is so awesome. I own his Viral Sonata album, which he describes as the musical equivalent of negative space in art. I also love his remixes of Kool Keith's "Object Unknown" and Metallica's "For Whom The Bell Tolls."

This is obviously a cousin to your garden-variety kite-eating trees, native to the Midwest and a plague to little round headed kids.

Two items of related interest:

* First, there should be a link to the story about the "O RLY?" owl photographer nastygramming Jeffrey Rowland for his Internet Ouija Mouspads; and

* my college friend Sarah Becan produces wonderful minicomics illustrating transcripts of ouija sessions she and her brother have performed, some sweet, some silly (some ghosts have a sense of humor, it seems), and one very, very chilling.

Whether he knows it by that name or not, Mr. Jalopy seems to practice my personal spirituality/divination of thrift fu. The way I explain it is that whatever the universe wants you to know or have or use it will put in your path at a price which you are willing to pay for it. As an avowed craphound and an employee of a used book store the universe obviously wants me to know and have and use a lot.

The two shots from the 3-D cams and the BBTV cam looked like some nerdy mating ritual; if they'd been yelling in Klingon it would have been perfect. I'd like to see that tech applied to the production of custom View-Master reels (one of my anachronistic tech obsessions).

This... THIS is how epidemics start. People stop going to work and just curl up into warm fuzzy balls, or if they do go it's just so they can afford bandwidth and the best headphones and tins of Fancy Feast. You think phonesex is addictive? Big Old Purr Is The New Baby Now.

Zombified meat cells. This should end well. Ever seen John Carpenter's The Thing?

That said, this is one of the funniest lead-ins yet. And Xeni's girl reporter ensemble just needs a little hat with a press pass in the band.

NickD: You can tell this comes out of a comic book aesthetic, as opposed to the punk aesthetic

As an aspiring comicker and a legit comic teacher, I can most certainly assure you the two are not mutually exclusive.

Jolon: Don't question a coop drawing unless you can make something sweeter, which has a likelihood of about %.0000112

In the immortal words of Han Solo, Never tell me the odds!

I would not be so foolish as to attempt to try to outdo Coop in his native idiom. His ladies are sexier than those of Adam Hughes, Frank Cho and Milo Manara combined. I will be satisfied to be the best version of me possible, thanks. This does not preclude commentary on the wisdom of utilizing his imagery, which has nothing to do with the quality thereof.

Balloon Head seems a ringer for Marvin from the recent movie adaptation of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

There's a joke stewing in my brain about clowns, Shriners and carpooling, but it's not quite there yet.

Despite my default hornballitude, I think I actually prefer Jill unsexy, as in the banner, or the way ApeLad interpreted her. I have nothing but the utmost love for Coop's chops (doesn't everyone love his cover for Lords of Acid's Voodoo U?), and I still might get this tee, but as a mascot she works perfectly as is.

Well, there goes my paycheck.

Very nice representation for indies, too, which is the standard by which I judge any comic retailer. I can walk into any "Hey Kids, Comics!" hole in the wall and get fifteen different Spider-Man titles; it's the places who give equal billing to some book you've never heard of that I like to support with my business, especially as I intend to be on the opposite side of that equation before long.

he was taken to a hospital but police did not say what was wrong with him.

In my professional opinion, I'd diagnose him with lethal idiocy with related kidney damage.

There's a whole bunch of other artists working in the chiptunes idiom. One of the better collectives thereof are the 8-Bit Peoples, though some of their offerings can be a bit too either ambient or cacophonic for casual listening. Another wonderful one is Paul Slocum's Treewave, which is comprised primarily of an old Commodore 64, a Compaq 286, an Atari 2600 with a custom-programmed cartride that he sells, a dot matrix printer and his girlfriend Lauren singing. The visuals the 2600 outputs are pure digital LSD.

@ Teresa: I've been saying much the same thing for years now. Comics used to be an impulse buy thing, but at least they were placed somewhere where they'd be subject to impulse. Now, they don't tend to find you; you have to be inclined to look for comics in the first place to find them, ergo there are fewer new comic readers all the time. (There's a side discussion to be had about the accessibility and age-appropriateness of the contents of more popular books, but that's a secondary concern, moot if nobody new is coming in.) Direct distribution killed that; now the Diamond (nigh-)monopoly has gutted competition and is imposing measures meant to alienate and make life more difficult for the small potatos publishers and retailers, who they don't much care about to begin with.

@ TJIC: Thanks for the info, and for being such a big supporter of the indyist of the indies. I'm still flabbergasted by retailers who don't seem to understand that there's where what's left and growing about consumer interest is shifting ever more quickly. I'll be in touch when my minicomic comes out.

@ Ape Lad: Your retailer sounds like the one I've been using by default; they actually consider Image and Dark Horse indies. I say, if you've had more than one movie made about a property you publish, you're no longer an indie.

Good to see that he's keeping busy during the WGA strike. Come to think of it, I haven't seen any new PC/Mac commercials in a while, either. Little Grey Book shows, mayhaps?

That rendition of "Gin & Juice" is very similar to the infamous cover that always gets confused for Primus or Phish but is actually The Gourds. I'mma hafta check out podsafeaudio and see what else of worth is roundabouts.

And I can (and occasionally do) look at Apelad's drawings all day. It's such a friendly line.

All right, then, howsabout Vibranium?

I read an interesting quote somewhere to the effect of "Yoko Ono didn't ruin John Lennon's career; if anything, John Lennon ruined Yoko Ono's career." I'd never had any particular feelings about Ono up until a little over a year ago when I read her '60's compilation Grapefruit and realized how brilliant she is. I wrote this whole treatise on how it's a magickal grimoire in art book drag; I have to try to sell one of the occult blogs on it. It's remarkable how much ostracization this woman has endured in her entire life, yes, even while of aristocratic breeding, and yet she maintains a generally sunny perspective, in large part to honor her late husband.

I think you need to clarify what you mean by that, Zipster. I don't believe there's so much an anti-religious movement, per se, so much as a growing number of individuals who independently would prefer religious institutions to remain in their native milieux, and will respond to overreaches with criticism. If you don't see the difference, that's unfortunate but not unexpected; therein lays the disconnect. As Howard Bloom says, it's a great testament to our society and human development that, by and large, biting rhetoric is the worst you need fear.

At the Mid-Atlantic Subgenius Devival last weekend in Baltimore, Rev. Ivan Stang gave a shout-out to the FSM, though as a point of saying "Bob" is not a joke like the FSM, revering it nevertheless. And, as the Subgenius central tenet says, Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke.

I don't get how anyone mistakes Fox "News" as the mouthpiece of social conservatism when it's the sister station of Fox, the network, which carries some of the raunchiest and odious programming on broadcast TV, "Simpsons" notwithstanding. I guess it's the same as how those who vote Republican or worship at a fire-and-brimstone altar are shocked, SHOCKED, I say, when so many of their "moral" leaders turn out to be gay and/or kiddie-fiddlers. (BTW, it's not the gay part that's immoral; it's the hypocrisy. Just making sure that's clear.)

There is an H.G. Wells story that deals with exactly this sort of situation. He called it "The Mysterious Island," but it's more commonly known as "The Island of Dr. Moreau." I've never gotten the impression it's meant as a utopia.

I work with someone who identifies as a furry. Unfortunately, he does so within five minutes of meeting him. After that, what's interesting about him is a steep dropoff.

@ Father Brown:

Don't be a douche.

I hope that was sufficiently unambiguous.

Despite its impracticalities I think it's a great idea. Give it a few more revisions and I think they'll figure out how to make it more viable.

I dig the hell out of English. He's that rare artist with technical ability, original concepts and a sense of how to market himself without being anyone's whore.

Orange Julius, meet Dr. Bronner's.

I love how it looks... but does why does it have antlers? Seasonal? Then again, my favorite robot of all time, Voltron, has antlers. It's a proud tradition. Carry on.

"I think I need a 1980's keytar set to electric mandolin."

-- Bret, Flight of the Conchords, "Boom King"

The Poopmonster has spoken; all hail his pixelly gudnis.

My friend Dan Goldman, artist on the Iraq graphic novel Shooting War and his own online comic Kelly, has a custom Cintiq tablet rig built directly into his drawing table. The only way I could ever hope to outdo that sweetness would be if I finally built my PowerGlove mouse.

I'm going to have to side with Mark on this one, ShortFatSteve. The Subgenii have gone so far up their own asses to dig up bullshit that they managed to come out the other ends with truth. Pretty much all other organized religions go in and stay in. I once wrote a paper on what have been termed "neophilic irreligions," more or less meaning any organization that mimics the structure and activities of actual religions but eschewing dogma; the Subgenii would seem to be the most successful example thereof.

I picked up The Bobliographon last month at the Subgenius Mid-Atlantic Devival in Baltimore and have still barely scratched the surface. I do think I preferred the slightly junkier look of Revelation X over the slicker graphics and layout of this one (I also missed so many illustrations by indie cartoonists like Paul Mavrides and Hal Robins), but I'm sure whenever they put out their next major tome I'll be pining for the simple days of 2007 and this book.

The role is still technically up for grabs since Cap got killed ("killed?") earlier this year. Better act quick, though, since a new Cap with a crappy costume is coming down the pike.

I saw Brown's show when it was aired on the SciFi Channel in the US and enjoyed it enormously. It's incredible just how reliably he can befuddle people, though I'm sure there were failures that ended up on the cutting room floor. Cory, is this video available yet to either Region 0 or 1 DVD players? I have a friend who's a licensed hypnotist who tends not to watch TV who I'd like to see this.

@ Certhas: You're shooting the messenger here. Reporting on perspectives is not the same as endorsing them. Because of more institutionalized attacks upon science in recent years science itself has closed ranks and is less open to ideas that come from outside its orthodoxy. I will almost universally accept science's word over that of blind faith, but science ought never EXPECT to be taken at its (often callously dismissive) word; it becomes no better than any other institution, putting cohesion and lockstep ahead of further pursuit of truth, science's very mission statement. There are a good many ideas that were once considered mysticism that have been borne out by scientific investigation. It's also foolhardy to believe the two are mutually-exclusive; attempts to understand the universe will always come up short, after which there is only wonder.

"Calling Dick Tracy, come in, Dick Tracy..."

I love custom action figures. I'll wager there's more than a few professionally-produced toys that mightn't have come to be if their producers hadn't realized there was an interest and that it would translate to 3 dimensions. To date I've only made one myself, but it's a hobby in which I'm always aspiring to become more active; for me, the challenge is more about producing some of the most obscure characters, ones likely to NEVER get their likeness in plastic.

That all said, you can never have enough Spider-Man 2099 toys.

Why NOT carry a shield that puts you in danger of having been created by Jack Kirby??

Besides, if you want inexplicably boob-like pecs, tiny, indistinct feet and about 70 teeth, Liefeld's your man. Personally, I'd rather take The King or, barring that, Ron Garney.

@ Brother Provisional: I hope you won't judge the bulk of the BoingBoing reading and commenting community by what a handful of cranks cut and paste. It seems lately we've been swarmed by provincial types who think it's their mission from Gahd to outshout those of us who love novelty and the richness of the world, particularly those corners that don't see as much exposure. Apparently they don't even need to make a lick of sense, just so long as they keep the rest of us occupied in their pointless debates and in heated tempers. As I believe most who visit here do to see both what is original and good in the world and what we all might do to better what is at best mediocre and at worst detrimental, it is easy enough to differentiate between those here for the right reasons and those here in a vain attempt to satisfy a need they are working overtime to avoid addressing directly by fomenting unhappiness. Let us all rededicate ourselves to being of the former than the latter group in the new year. The nutters will come and go and remain miserable regardless; we happy mutants are under no obligation to justify our joys when we come by them through the correct channels.

Very I Am Legend. Though the effect would be more profound without the kids' voices in the background.

By this logic, oughtn't the Jews actually own the copyright on the pyramids, et al?

Apelad was there at the beginning of the LOLcats phenomenon, and is largely to thank for its having legs as long as it has. If anyone remembers LOLcats in 20 years it will be in small part due to his efforts. Betta reckanize.

That should be "in no small part." I'm going back to bed.

@ Brett: Well, if we're going to split hairs here, most historians don't believe there was such a people known as The Jews at the time, and were not formally until the Deutoronomical Congress turned what had been a disorganized tribal oral tradition into a codified faith. On the other hand, the current residents of the land of Egypt are not thought to be the same ones of the Pharaonic Age.

I think I'm in love with this style. The chintzyness is part of the appeal. Sort of reminds me of the styles of Jim Steranko and Wally Wood.

Does "Carousel of Progress" still exist? Was that the pavilion they gutting to make "Alien Encounter"?

Honestly, at this point, since Disney has made Tomorrowland less an attempt to look like a likely future and more a retro one, the last stage in Carousel of Progress ought to have steampunky representations thereof, maybe riffing off the styles and appliances in the first stage, and to a lesser extent the later ones.

Then at the end a nanite storm liquifies the family, their burbling, bubbling song barely breaking the surface of the grey goo.

BBB (quite the honorary title you've bestowed upon yourself), your summary of the entirety of rap betrays a paltry familiarity with it; it's akin to the shorthand that all country is about "mah wife dun left me an' my dawg dun died in the trailer home". And whenever anyone prefaces a remark with "not to be racist," it's a pretty sure bet that what follows is going to be exactly that. Scads of white people managed to disgrace themselves just fine before the assimilation of urban culture into the mainstream.

A very good friend who is black told me just this week that the debate over the use of the word "nigger" (or, as the distinction seems to be relevant to the discussion, "nigga") is absolutely meaningless, and is mostly a public relations tactic, less for the black community so much as for the white community. It makes us uncomfortable when marginalized groups take ownership over those pigeonholes which formerly were seen to own them. But that's only if we accept the guilt for those institutions. As someone whose family has been in this country for only about a century, and whose largest affiliation was minimally involved in most of these oppressive institutions and in fact was more involved in said institutions dismantlement, I do not feel any such guilt. I do not take an interest in the culture and rights of other peoples out of "white guilt"; I do so because to know and support difference is to also better know and encourage commonality.

BBB: Or maybe I am mad because the last refuge of whiteness- my Ziggy Stardust LP- has been stolen by thug-a-bees?

"The last refuge of whiteness"? Are you serious with this shit? That'd be pretty sad if so. Because, as we all know, white people don't make good music anymore. You do know David Bowie is married to an African supermodel, don't you?

Also, I'm betting that if you go look for it, your Ziggy Stardust LP is right where you left it. No thugs broke into your home and stole it. It will sound the same as it has for 30+ years.

And I wonder, have you considered the possibility that DJ Man-Cat is anything other than black? Hell, Man-Cat might not even be a man (or a cat, for that matter). No, of course not: I forgot, only black men are DJs. Would it still be a crime against caucasians if it's perpetrated by the melanin-deprived?

No, I believe you're just discomfitted by the cross-pollination and genre-blurring that started long before Bowie, was evident in his works and those of his peers, but has really bloomed in the last generation. By the examples you give of what you consider "good" black music, both of which are indeed great though hardly contemporary, you seem to prefer that "they" stay on their side of the tracks. They will make black people music, we will make white people music, and everyone will know exactly who they are primarily by their ethnic identity. A metal band like Sevendust being fronted by a black man or the burgeoning field of white rappers are simply people trying to be something they're not, right? And yet, there they are. Enigmatic, no?

Boy, if you get this prissy over this album, I hate to see the fit you'd throw if you ever found out about "Q-Unit" or The Kleptones' "A Night At The Hip-Hopera". Way to be on top of that whole music production field; you're a credit to your profession.

Cpt. Tim: is it just me or does it always sound pathetic when white people name drop black people in an effort to sound not racist, whether they are or not?

Believe it or not, I did consider that before noting that my friend is black, but it's contextually relevant; his comments would probably be viewed in a much different light had I left his race vague. He has some great insight into racial politics, if somewhat cynical: on New Years Eve I hoped aloud we'd have a black man in the White House by this time next year, to which he replied, "Yeah, he'll be the janitor."

TURNTABLE HERO!

I'm not sure it could stand alone, but given it's growing presence in ensembles this could easily be included in future editions of "Rock Band."

Xeni's statement of "technology is yummy" needs to be a ringtone.

The real test would have been to call the cells after they were deep-fried and see whether they still worked, and what sort of reception they got.

I love the secret bar, but for all the cloak and dagger rigamarole all they serve is Bud?

@ KRosebud84: If you love Motel of the Mysteries, you should also check out Macaulay's Great Moments in Architecture, which includes, among other things, classically-adorned outhouses, an escalator to nowhere, and tourists visiting the vanishing point. There's not the same sort of narrative, but each picture tells its own story.

I wonder whether it mightn't be cheaper just to build with actual Gameboys. They could be rigged to chime the hour in unison, or maybe have a cascade effect from one corner of the house to another.

Joel debuted "Cinematic Titanic" at Skywalker Ranch for the ILM folks with the classic Sean Connery drug-fueled mess Zardoz. There's a pretty extensive interview with him on starwars.com. (Where's Bonnie? Why am I doing her job??)

I very much doubt there's that much animosity between Joel and Mike. I think Joel just recognized there's still very much a demand for the process he invented in today's media marketplace, and why should Mike have all the fun? I'm glad there's room for RiffTrax, The Film Crew, Cinematic Titanic," Brad Neely's "Wizard People, Dear Reader," et al.

Back in Usenet days a friend and I used to participate in "Mystery Usenet Theater 3000," which were scripts starring the MST3K cast riffing on bad net fanfic. (Hooo, boy, you wanna talk turkeys... I remember a Star Trek: TNG fanfic which included the line: "Hey baldy! Why don't you shut your Shakespear [sic] addicted mouth?") At the time I ruminated there were much wider formats rife for kibbitzing, and even suggested a live theme restaurant. (This was in the period in which I thought I would grow up to be a Disney Imagineer.)

More recently, I've written on the idea of trying to create a sort of "channel" that would overlay network TV, movie stations, etc., with simultaneous commentary, be it audio or like Pop-Up Video from VH1. I imagine the networks would protest, but it's not like you're hacking their signal. The more shows and movies riffed upon, the more available commentary there would be to sync up, especially in reruns. The layered entertainment found mostly on DVDs nowadays is just waiting to erupt into a wider punk DIY ethos.

Ah, ya beat me to it, Dan. But isn't FM3 just one dude, Tristan Perich, who works primarily in 4-bit audio? Or am I thinking of something different?

That's pretty dope right there. Now someone's got to take the next step and make a sequencer out of a pachinko machine.

[does Bela Lugosi hand gesture]

Come back to us, Vampira... hear me...

One less lovely, offbeat Finn in the world. I loves 'em. A current character on the convention circuit, Captain Schoolgirl aka Satu, is also of Finnish stock, and is in the same vein of beauty.

This must be where Jim Woodring lives.

Say, she is cute. And any further comment I might be inclined to make would likely brand me an enormous perv, so I'll just leave it at that.

Cap-tain CAAAAAVEMAAAAAN!!!

@ #52 Encarnacion: To LiscenseFarm alone, when it comes to the matter of just who God is not a matter of "different perspective"

Actually, yeah, that's exactly the case I'm making, as evinced in the pronouns we're employing: you refer to God as a "who"; I refer to God as a "what." This distinction may seem trivial to you, but I assure you, to me and many others it is not. And yet I do not begrudge you what to me seems a misconception of that ultimate truth, so I try to avoid employing value judgments as your statement of "not a matter of 'different perspective'" seems to imply. It is ALWAYS a matter of different perspective; it is never anything but. None of us is an absolute authority, no matter what book we wave around; try to bear that in mind before you lecture anyone on exactly what a "good" "Christian" ought to be doing.

Well, that'd ensure it would be a show no one had seen nor ever would...

I think the idea is sound and this would be a good way to farm the concept until a following and backstory was rich enough to potentially pitch. Or perhaps it's best for all concerned if it remains potential. It reminds me of some of the concepts in Polish sci-fi great Stanislaw Lem's A Perfect Vacuum, which is a collection of reviews of books that don't exist and in some cases couldn't possibly.

@ #10: "Jew" is usually seen as a racial grouping, not just a religious one; "Christian" isn't.

There is no such thing as "the Jewish race," especially the whole idea the gene for it being carried by the mother. That idea was an invention of the Roman Empire that certain Jews took upon themselves. There is only patterns of breeding within the same pools, same as you find in any cohesive culture. Both misapprehensions have contributed to the persecution and stagnancies of Judaism in recent history.

Also, there is a perspective on Judaism that "God" is not an entity to be believed or disbelieved in, but is the inevitable result of one living according to the ideals and framework of Judaism as prescribed. Therefore, the question of "believing" in God is rendered moot; Jews collectively create God through belief in themselves, not vice versa. IF there was a Jesus (a B-prime-style statement I don't think is made enough), it's more likely that the particular brand of Judaism he was preaching was closer to this idea, given his conflicts with the institutionalized temple of the time as an inert idol unto itself. Ergo, I doubt that a Jesus like that would want to be worshipped as an idol himself.

@ #4: He could turn your lawn into weed.

@ #7: Way to miss the point by retreating into catchphrases. How about that he's not "wrong," he just has a different perspective than you and most institutionalized Christianity?

I'm so smitten on multiple levels. Too bad (for me) she's married. Such is life, or, at least, mine.

iBrator, anyone?

I don't see Wii-implemented remote fucking taking off until there's some sort of haptic feedback beyond the vibrating Wiichucks (which is really only of use to those who get their jollies by something that can be stuck inside them). I make no assumptions about your bedroom habits, but for myself the experience does not focus solely around a single organ. I doubt you'll get more than the bleeding edgers and nymphos lining up to try it until it becomes a completely immersive experience, and I think we're still at least a decade away from that.

Now it needs little Byrne-era X-Men minifigs to pilot it to The Savage Land.

I love these Walter Robot clips when I see them. Whimsy and menace rolled into one.

@ #42 The Reverend: It seems pretty clear to me that the whole point to Judisam is that a specific diety and a specific tribe reached a mutually exclusive arrangement.

For someone calling himself The Reverend that's a pretty literalist and anthropomorphasizing assumption. I'm telling you as someone who is by background if not by practice of that group, that's the most simplistic reading possible, and is less reflective of the actual Jewish attitude than it is of other faiths trying to force more of a parallel than there actually exists.

@ #7 Lia: Things that vibrate get us off just fine, and they don't have to be inserted anywhere.

Your assumption that I was speaking solely of women is unfortunate; if you check, nowhere do I mention gender. My point was that for anyone for whom the sexual act is anything more than a race to the finish line, this will be no more fulfilling than any other autoerotic activity or device.

And thankfully, though perhaps I've never even talked to a woman, I seem to have little difficulty in making them say the darndest things.

I happened to pick this book up for only $1 unused sometime last year. I'm way behind the curve on video games, having lost most interest about 15 years ago until the introduction of the Wii, but I never discounted the medium's relevance. I may give my hardcopy to a friend studying video game design (if she hasn't already read it) and keep the PDF to read.

GI - GAN - TOR!

Ah, but I love good machinima; it transcends being just vidcaps of dudes screwing around in videogames (which have their place, don't get me wrong) and really aspires to actual cinema. I agree with Hugh: the woman is really nicely realized, especially her hair. "The white man" looks suspiciously like David Bowie.

Seems as though the machinima field has been relatively quiet in the past couple years, "Bloodspell" aside; maybe the latest generation of systems is proving either technically or financially burdensome? Maybe I'll get some answers at the next Machinima Festival.

Is Condi pregnant? W's got some 'splainin' to do...

It's an interesting gesture. "Here, eat my offspring's weight in rice so my wife doesn't look so fat postpartem!"

#1 + #2 = SEX ROBOTS

You cannot argue with arithmetic. Even if you can, you're boring, so you lose anyway. Sex robots.

Kerist, people, get over yourselves. I modestly believe myself to be in the upper echelon of comment content, and I don't believe to date I've been disemvoweled or censored. It's a little trick called "having something relevant to say and knowing when and how to say it." Try a little self-censorship before you bellyache about anyone else doing it. I'm sure you're all precious snowflakes who need to be allowed to express yourselves in the moment and without reservation to truly indulge your muses, but it's pretty obvious you're just parasitically using the high profile of BB as the most visible venue from which to spew your bile. Your senses of entitlement are astonishing; you may be writing from the comfort of your parents' basement but you are in public, children, so put it back in your pants. Go work out your mommy and daddy issues elsewhere.

@ #97 Nepenthe: For someone who supposedly loves everything about BB that your one and only comment to date is to be an utter twat to one of its key players puts lie to your word.

Two other great comics about going through the Hollywood rigamarole are Fortune & Glory and Total Sell-Out by Brian Michael Bendis (Avengers, Powers, Ultimate Spider-Man, about half the books Marvel publishes nowadays). At various points his and Marc Andreyko's graphic novel Torso, about Eliot Ness in the days after Prohibition tracking one of the earliest American serial killers, has been optioned for film, and it's yet to be realized because of Tinsel Town's lunacy.

Ah, Adventure, a classic. Now lets see them work some sort of narrative out of E.T..

The role of God is played by an industrial robot. There's something poetic and truthful in that. Now if baby J's gestation looked like the teaser trailer for Terminator 2 I'd be squealing with delight.

Though they don't get to talk about it, you briefly see one of my favorites of IAA's projects, i-See, a map of Manhattan that shows where all the public security cameras are posted and the shortest route between two points to avoid as many of them as possible. (It doesn't appear as though it's been updated in at least a couple years, though, so your guess is as good as mine whether that info is still accurate.)

His questionable terminology aside, Duality is right that this sort of device is rife for hacking or circuit bending. Bring it to Graceland and start fights. Rig it to overheat and melt like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Make it sing Abba. Y'know, fuck with people.

@ #17 WWEBoing: The best thing that ever happened to a tree is a piano, a baseball bat, or a piece of paper.

Thank you, Ronald Reagan. Because trees pollute and ketchup is a vegetable. Nature exists to serve us. Gotcha. Completely unegocentric. Thank you for putting us in our places with your sterling logic.

I'm not 100% on board with popular ecological doom n' gloom, but taking precautions, even from a pragmatic point of view due to the societal ills 20th century industrialism has wrought, is far better than the energy being expended to promote ignorant denial. Now THAT'S suicidal.

As the uncle of a ever-more tech savvy seven-and-a-half year old (seriously, the kid schooled me in Wii Bowling), I wonder how much of other online-affiliated kids toys and games imbed more info than is necessary (or, depending on your definition of "necessary," appropriate), and what is done with said info after the fact. With the growing trend, including such fads as Neopets and Webkins, I'd say it's less a question of if than when some skeevy fuck perpetrates a violation. Conversely, consumer profiling could begin in the womb and dogs one for life, which is in its way almost a greater violation.

I actually came close to working at a Build-A-Bear in NYC a couple years back. I think they're generally looking for women, though. Guys like stuffed aminals, too! *sob*

Officially the best BBTV screencap evar.

...oh, the clip? Nice, too. The pulsing image around the 1:15 mark reminded me of Ken Jacobs' Nervous Lantern "filmmaking" technique. (Quotes because said technique involves no film, created realtime in projector.)

Isn't "Crab Fu" also the name of a steampunk modelmaker? Or is it just a special down at Hunan Palace? Fun animation either way. Now let's see it throw down with a Tai Kwon Do lobster.

As someone who has done some mail-based art in the past (and potentially would again) I find this pretty worrisome. Granted, I don't think anyone would confuse me for a terrorist (though I am a Semite), the intolerance for any deviation from "normalcy" makes even the most innocuous goof not sponsored and defended by corporate interests (and even some that are, like the ATHF Lite-Brite hack in Boston) suddenly grounds for overreaction.

It's blackly funny that these sort of things become hot-buttons a few years after I indulge in them. When Columbine happened everyone reminded me that in high school I could be found in a black overcoat almost year-round. Had I still been in school in 1999 no doubt I'd have been hauled down to the guidance counselor's office and scrutinized until I wanted to shoot up my school.

I watched this last night and thought it was all right. The continual reuse of the more impressive bits of animation (and some of the lesser ones, too) began to grate after a while. I'd also have liked to see more about how animals would develop without our influence; there's a great book by Dougal Dixon called After Man that explores where evolution would go if the larger mammals became extinct.

But it did reinforce the idea of how fleeting our civilization is, and that if we were to just vanish tomorrow most signs of our existence would disappear in short order after us. Perhaps we ought to consider "backing up" our greater works in a vessel not subject to the conditions terrestrial housings are, such as the moon.

please build me a LEGO steampunk Star Wars woman so that I may marry her and make dozens of meaty minifig babies.

Dude, Joel, that Lego fetish is ticking over into the creepy zone. Do you frot against the displays at Kid Robot?

My love for Disney and an interest in video games mostly having been left in my teens, I nevertheless find this so freaking cool, somehow moreso than if it had been developed for the iPhone or Blackberries. I wonder if a port of the old NES Adventures in the Magic Kingdom game will be bundled.

I want the headdress, the Doombot head and that cretin Reed Richards cravenly cowering at my feet!

How do you say "Skynet" in Hebrew?

Yahweh.

I don't assume anything about the religious affiliations of anyone posting on here, but as I've mentioned elsewhere, I am of a Jewish background, though I do not practice the faith as it is generally conceived, nor do I subscribe to its status as a race or ethnicity per se. I am not ashamed of Jews, but I am ashamed of Israel. Even more than that, however, people who equate criticism of Israel with being anti-Israel (or worse, anti-Israeli, and worse yet, anti-Semitic) are the same undifferentiating reductionists who call criticism of our government's policies anti-American. Holding our institutions to higher standards or, hell, even the baseline standards, is in fact the greatest show of support one can demonstrate. Dogmatic cheerleading in defiance of reality is not support but fear of rejection, like members of Elvis' entourage who wouldn't tell him 'no' and ended up with a stiff on the john. The motivation is not for the one they are supposedly protecting but their own agendas. The dishonesty of yes-men is disgusting and insulting, but more so, it is insanely dangerous to all concerned.

Wigglypricks, do you think anyone believes you'd be so brazen to Xeni were you to meet her in person? Because I have a feeling you would stammer like a little boy, emasculated by a young woman with more going for her by this point than you would in five lifetimes. As I said in the Greasemonkey post's comments, put your flaccid cocktail weiner back in your pants, numbnuts; no one's impressed.

Phil's XXXenophile was the first explicitly erotic comic that I bought when I was 16; always very imaginative stuff executed with quality. When I met him a couple years back at the NY Comic Con and told him so, he interrupted me and said, "You of course mean you were 18 when you bought that."

"...oh, yes, of course, I-was-18-when-I-bought-that."

Also, he was the illustrator of certain editions of Robert Asprin's Myth Inc. books, though I think my first exposure to him may have been in a "Dr. Deranged" spoof in Marvel's What The--?!

Pig snouts for everyone!

RORSCHACH...

...IN...

...SPAAAAAACE!!!

@#9 Freddie Freelance: If you're looking for a handheld that plays 2600 cartridges, you may have to pay a little more, but Beck Heckendorn has you covered, as well as portables of a good many other systems, and tutorials and a book on modding classic videogame platforms into handheld, if you're up to such a task.

I do like the solar panels; other major manufacturers might take a cue and make those standard, as they were in the Game N' Watch days.

Abductions? Homey don't play that!

Sorry, it had to be said.

Cripes, I said "Beck Heckendorn." That should be BEN. I must have Xenu on the brain.

You know, I have CDs full of papercraft PDFs that I'll likely get to on the day after never, and even I look at this and say, someone has too much time.

Or, slightly less orally-fetishistic, a toothpick.

It's a great idea, but I echo #6 Gyusan's concerns that with certain models of one-off ballpoints they can potentially break. Even if they don't leak, there's a chance of shards of clear plastic mixing in with your meal.

God, I wish this wasn't such a common type of story in comics and affiliated disciplines. The template is: eager young kid pretty much gives away a character that nets a savvy marketer (or just a lucky stiff) multimillions, and said kid becomes a jaded burnout and dies with far less credit to their names than they rightly deserve. Happier renditions have said kid(s) eventually getting something of their due (though arguably too late to enjoy it), as was the case with Siegel & Shuster for Superman, or going on to work of comparable importance, as was the case with Jack Kirby. Unhappier versions tend to be fairly self-destructive or just unremarkable, like the near disappearing act Steve Ditko pulled, or the fate of some of the EC stable who got shitcanned in the wake of HUAC. Let's not even get into the imbroglio over who owns the rights to Miracle/Marvel Man.

One ought not discount the impact success can have, too: Jack "Plastic Man" Cole offed himself at the top of his game when he was cartooning for PLAYBOY and reaping the benefits of that association, possibly because of them.

Whether Disney himself was or was not any of the laundry list of charges levelled against him is a secondary consideration now 40+ years after his death. What individuals now do with his legacy is exponentially more important. That an independent organization has the sort of clout to celebrate people and their contributions that in a lesser system would be footnotes at best deserves nothing but respect. Shame on you, Deepy, for attempting to piss on that. What have you done that people you've never met, who perhaps have yet to be born, will still be speaking of in glowing terms when you reach your dotage?

Given the reaction to this and other stories of late, perhaps as a corollary to BoingBoing's title as "A Directory of Wonderful Things" the comments ought to have the subtitle "...And the Pedants Who Lurk, Slavering to Crush Those Things Into the Dirt of Mundacity." Go outside and smash butterflies while you're at it.

@ #1 Gene: I get the same conundrum over my comics: I know exactly the sort of talent I'm up against, and it's bowel-chillingly impressive compared to my amateurish attempts as yet. But on the other hand, there are people who seem like they'd not be out of place on the bulletin board of a fourth grade classroom who are somehow prospering, so really, how tough can it be? Damn confusing, that. At least I suspect you're not trying to make a career out of painting miniatures, so feel free to screw up as badly as you like.

Oh, I didn't forget him, Phill. But Bob Kane sure did.

This is another of my favorites of the BBTV crop. That this work of art is more than an inert sculpture, engaging in both a physically participatory way AND a narrative, is really quite inspiring. I hope the SteamTreeHouse team considers bringing it east at some point, or that I hie myself to an event westernly at which they exhibiting.

I don't believe it to be pomposity, Sonny. If anything, it demonstrates that we understand we may be little more than a passing phase. That's pretty humble, if you ask me. And our successors might appreciate knowing where we went right, but also perhaps more importantly where we went wrong, so they don't cover the same turf.

Oh, you silly people. Everyone knows New York has the best pizza in the world. Possibly the best in the entire city is Two Boots, especially since they also run a little arthouse movie theatre. Now that's added value.

Cory: HIGH FIVE!

They really do look like Bender's skull, though. And they're staring into my SOOOUULLLL...

@#5 A New Challenger: I've never played Grim Fandango, and yet I have the soundtrack, which is nicely jazzy.

Such delicious irony. I've needed me one of these since I saw them on your Flickr stream months ago, Cory.

@#2 JayKinney: What are we saving Stan from?

The wrath of Steve Ditko? The poor editorial choices of Joe Quesada? The tedium and insulting stereotypes of season 2 of Who Wants To Be A Superhero? Take your pick.

@#19 JG: I'll take a 'pop and a slice" at a stand-up joint any day!!!

You are no New Yorker, sir. No self-respecting New Yorker uses the term "pop." It's soda. Your cover is blown due to shoddy research.

@#22 PGEI: I'm from Italy and I thought that pizza had only a genuine italian style... since pizza s one of our specialties

Sorry to break it to you, but like hamburgers, they're more American now than their countries of origin. As I'm led to understand, actually Italian pizza bears only a passing resemblance to what we know here as pizza, for better or worse, and our particular take, for all its regional variations, is what has been marketed to most of the world.

Word, Takuan. Years from now people will look back at the lunacy of being forced to make a transaction with a guarded, locked box as one of the few semi-legal ways to acquire what they could just as easily grow themselves. Deburden our legal system of people who've nothing worse than anyone who has a glass of wine or, on a macro-level, operates a brewery. Among other issues I think the question of the waste of this farce ought to be put squarely in the faces of anyone running for office with their reasoning over their positions explained. The incarceration industry is one of the larger lobbies in Washington; their business could shrink almost half overnight. You'll note I've note even touched on "benefit vs. risk"; I hope no one's honestly confused about that in the face of what rates regulation and taxation. I think we could pull this country out of the looming recession by legalizing marijuana, between the suddenly available and absolved workforce, the end of subsidies, the dismantlement of Prohibition and the creation of a new industry. Is this scenario even up for consideration? Maybe this is the year it happens, and even if it isn't, perhaps it's the foundation for it coming to pass soon. Join up with NORML or the MPP or a more local organization and increase the dialogue.

As a child I was apeshit for robots, but I think if one approached me while I was lost I might've freaked out, not out of direct fear but disorientation on top of disorientation. Maybe what was fantasy for me would be simply comforting and cool for kids today.

[falls backward out of frame, legs up, feet perpendicular to ground]

@#2 FKR2275: I get the impression that, especially since his documentary came out but probably before, Crumb was more or less in his comfort zone as far as his income. I think he deserves all his fortunes, but likely he sold this outright himself years back; barring certain contracts, he gets no say over the object itself. I'm under no illusions that artists have been treated remotely fairly, but other than his Fritz the Cat experience he's been dealt a decent hand.

Xeno, about half of what you wrote is true; if you're going to villify the man to the point of wishing him death, at least know what you're talking about. Stan Lee was only an emeritus of the board at Marvel when it went bankrupt; that was Ron Perelman being a sheisty bastard. He was not implicated in the plundering of Stan Lee Media because the blame lays with his business partner Peter Paul, who pled guilty. Also, Marvel preexisted the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby/Steve Ditko days as a company named Timely that had been around at least since the '40's, so none of them "founded" the company. Lee has done some scummy things in his time, but he was neither the first nor the worst.

And if you understood the Sex Pistols reference in this shirt, you'd understand that this is not necessarily a flattering allusion.

I know it's a crass marketing plot, but it works for me! Please tell me it leaps flaming barrels and dodges giant mallets.

You mean that isn't a euphemism?

Nicely brassy; they look legit yet likely won't be confused for the real thing by trigger-happy officers of "the law."

While it's definitely not the same guy, there's a fellow known as Lockwasher who has made motorcycle models among other neat things out of scavenged parts of vintage vacuum cleaners and other such appliances.

Of course, these are probably less suited to actually, y'know, EATING.

For a class I was taking a little over a year ago I had to real Capek's The Gardener's Year, which is also illustrated with cartoons by his brother Josef. As I have little interest in gardening I thought it would be a snooze, but thankfully it's written with such humor that it won me over. It's obvious that Capek loved his subject matter, and was able to both do it justice and also savage it mercilessly. As amusing as I found it, I imagine that anyone who actually puts themselves through such trials will find it infinitely more so.

Sad afternote: When the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia in 1938, Capek contracted a fatal bout of double pneumonia, and his brother later died in a concentration camp. There's a certain irony there considering his fame for the modernism and issues of human value in R.U.R., but it's a very black irony.

Reyyy is aka Corey Lewis, the author of the slam-bang manga series Sharknife as well as a number of one-shot comics and a webcomic series that's part of DC's Zuda online initiative. I dig him immensely.

Apelad posted some pics on his Flickr stream months back of the official Disney/Star Wars mash-up merch that inspired this series. I remember at the time thinking that Pegleg Pete and not Goofy should have been cast as Vader.

But I also recalled a vinyl LP I had as a kid and may still possess in storage called Irwin & the Ducks From Space, an obvious Star Wars cash-in by a kids record producer to string studio song covers together into a weak storyline. The hero looked like Donald Duck wearing a Yorkshire Terrier on his head to resemble Mark Hamill.

Say what you like; I maintain that it's the influence of the energies at Herald Square.

I own the DVD of their performance and the camera, which I'm guess is medical grade, never gets any further than beyond the teeth. There's an obvious dissolve, and the footage changes to something prerecorded; the image eventually "emerges" above the stage. Sroden is almost definitely full of shit, and quite possibly out of his mind.

As dubious as the claim is, it's refreshing that an ad of the period would paint child abuse as anything but acceptable. I guess the modern equivalent would be a tagline, "SANKA: Calm the fuck down, jagoff." Man, do I want to see that ad.

@#7 Gilbert Wham: Were those the same as the ones in Rogan Gosh: Star of the East by Peter Milligan and the insanely talented Brendan McCarthy, published by DC/Vertigo? The sitargun is such a stylin' weapon.

Flaming pasties and giant geisha already make this 10x better than the "space couture" show. The Fahrenheit 451 firemen and aerialists make this something I'd have pushed and shoved my way in to see.

I hope nobody's eating these and then, say, swimming or otherwise engaging in activities in which it would be dangerous to cramp up. Caffeine can also dehydrate you, so especially in warmer temps it would be better to just have a swig of coffee or soda and wash it down with lots more water.

Hell, I could probably emulate this puppy on my watch, and I'm wearing an analog.

That also explains Joel's uncomfortable fetish for minifigs: they were switched at birth.

Joel, your fixation may be able to answer this without my needing to Google it: what was the Lego brand that was intended as a half-step between Duplo and regular Lego, maybe angling on some of Playmobil's market, that featured minifig-type characters with big animal heads? I think I may still have some of those someplace.

As an unrepentant View-Master nut, I approve of this image.

One of my best friends and I have an inside joke culled from a monster truck show commercial, probably 10+ years ago, where the announcer in the typical fashion is screaming, "KIDS UNDER 10 GET IN FREE!" then stage whispers, "Now that's value." We will randomly pull out that latter line, along with 20+ years of other non sequiturs, to ensure no one has the first clue what we're talking about.

Exactly three of these are AWESOME. One is, er, pretty.

@ #2 JymDonovan: There's something idiosynchratically Japanese about this. Naughty but submissive. Like a guy who pinches girls' asses not for the asses but for the slaps he gets as a result. If there's a gameshow where they shove live jellyfish down the front of one's pants he'd probably be first in line.

@ #8 Grey: How would she know you weren't lying? Was she going to wait until you got your phone bill and have you send her a copy?

@ #3 Deadmeat: I remember clearly the last line of his speech, "And people ask me, when was the last time I took acid? And I tell them, today!"

This is similar to a line RAW spoke on Politically Incorrect back in '96, I think, on an episode dedicated to Tim Leary (on which Leary was supposed to guest but was too ill by then): "I am proud to say that I have not done acid in well over two... weeks."

Let me add my voice to the chorus thanking Mike for putting this out there. I have a copy of Saracen I've yet to get to; I may just read this first. Oh, and very cute with the 23 chapters.

If I could understand NikFromNYC I might agree with you, LDP.

Is this cover drawn by Kim? Looks like his style. If Hamm has an analogous style that's a great match. Same Difference has some great dialogue and characterization, too, so I hope Kim has brought that same sensibility to this despite just penning it.

I remember the PAC-MAN game. Every time you moved you'd have to press your Pac-Man down to suck up the marble. It was like Hungry Hungry Hippos, except, y'know, lame.

This reminds me of the old Capsela mechanical construction kits. Man, those were awesome. They're probably due for a revival any day now.

They also remind me of the bongs a friend in college would build out of pilfered chemistry lab equipment. There was this one he called Gargantua...

"You are vun oglee muzzabricka."

I applied to work for Robot Village a little over two years ago, inspired by a BoingBoing post about them. I didn't get the gig, but I did help hawk their wares around the corner in front of Zabar's just before Christmas, dressed in a white lab coat. Thing is, I transformed into a carnival barker and delivered a spiel at the top of my lungs. The other street vendors got pissed that they couldn't compete and were practically plotting my demise.

The owner, David Greenbaum, is good people, and can often be seen in the neighborhood on a "tandem" bike shared with a robot.

Just when I think she might be getting too old to be hot anymore she reinvents kink. She can be queen of my colony anytime.

@ #12 Bonnie: I really hope the next president does a total rehaul of TSA so it's actually useful for once.

I hope the next president addresses the issues that are making it "necessary" to have an agency such as the TSA in the first place, so as to render it perfunctory.

Because nothing screams CARNIVAL! quite like the genocide of millions. This has to be for the Brazilian production of The Producers.

It is for things like these, one of which is right in my home state and the other thousands of miles away, both exemplifying some of the most creative collaborations possible, that now 15 years after I got my first modem I cannot conceive of how dull life might have been if not for the advent of the internet. Once again, BB lives up to its billing.

@#1 The Boy: That seems to be the modern equivalent of "my kid coulda painted that." The point being, sure, perhaps you might have been able to achieve the same results, but you didn't. He did. It looks great, however he achieved the results. Is that not enough?

@#2 Billy: I'm glad the voice of Valley Girls from 1984 are still present in our public discourse.

I love Improv Everywhere; they're such happy ontological terrorists. That said, this is similar to an event they staged in a Best Buy in NYC where they all froze, then moved in slow motion. I hope they're not lapping themselves.

Sorry, that should have been a Home Depot. Best Buy's the dinks who want to sue IE for parody and anyone who reports on that parody, too.

My 7 year old nephew just got a Wii; I'm pretty sure he's gonna get this for his birthday if it's out by then.

Again, I'm seeing Capsela. There's some zeitgeist happening.

Robo looks quite different from his wearable computing segment. The Gorgon shirt is something I'd wear.

I see where SimpleHuman is coming from, but at the same time, it's exactly because sex tech shows are so assimilated now that if the journalist can inject more personality into the story they deserve to be the focus.

I didn't read the kind of single-minded superficiality in this that Marco did, though my first thought when seeing the nymph in high heels was "Lo-LEE-tah!" I was more fascinated that such an advertising campaign for a major high-end fashion line would have been unheard of a generation ago.

Only tangentially relevant to this competition, but I'm reminded of one of cartoonist B. Kliban's few political cartoons, "The Richard M. Nixon Presidential Monument," which was a picture of an enormous black hole in the ground. I expect a companion monument for our current prexy proxy, deeper and blacker. Kliban's spiritual inheritor, Tim Kreider, can design it for print; he's got more than enough vitriol to spare.

@ #1 Nunks: Your English is better than that of too many native speakers. They owe you the apology, not vice versa.

Now that whatever marketing blitz for the movie and subsequent DVD of Stardust has come and gone, I'd recommend that. It's short, so whatever sales the beancounters might fret they're missing out on will be of a lower-priced item, and there's still the edition lavishly-illustrated by Charles Vess published by Vertigo that anyone who might love the story enough can then buy for added value. Additionally, if the book goes viral that might then make the movie more of a cult hit.

If I have a second choice I'd vote for Neverwhere. It's Neil's first full-fledged solo prose novel, so it has its weaknesses, and by now there's enough copies of it floating around that one could just as easily obtain it at a decent second-hand bookstore without him or HarperCollins seeing a penny. It also has the Henson-produced BBC miniseries and a more recent Vertigo miniseries adaptation it can advertise. Gotta parlay these things into the functions they may serve to still bring Neil profit indirectly.

I'm an alum of Beloit College, and this has definitely been around longer than 10 years. I don't believe it's compiled in the conviction that most college freshmen honestly believe certain things have "always been," much less are starkly ignorant of information about that which predates them. The professor most in charge of it, Tom McBride, teaches courses in rhetoric; this is intended less as a "these kids today" fuddyduddydom as it is to incite dialogue as a socialization device.

I do wonder sometimes whether less curious types who might be surveying colleges mightn't believe that Beloit students are somehow less informed than the average college freshman. But then, less curious types seem to be less in danger of surveying colleges in the first place.

Truly your best creation yet, and a collaboration, no less.

P.E.F.N.T.D. is going to be hell to monogram, though.

Again, congratulations, and again, and again.

Did the "Anonymous" message say "a voicemail from Stephen HawkinS"?

The "original" clip was a skosh too long, without enough insane laughing. This whole situation has been a comedy goldmine; Jerry O'Connell did one, too. (Of course, if, like him, I was sleeping with Rebecca Romijn, I'd be laughing a shitload, too.)

@ #6 Ernie: Patton Oswalt has a hysterical routine about the KFC Famous Bowls:

"Could you take all those and pile them together into a single bowl for me?"
"Uh, yes, I could. I could also arrange them on a plate as though you were an adult with some dignity."

"Why don't they LOOK??"

Congratulations, NikFromNYC! You are batting 1000 for completely incomprehensible, batshit loony comments! Did you learn English from Dr. Bronners' labels? DILUTE!

@ #12 NikFromNYC: I believe you're thinking of Taco, and "Putting On the Ritz" was a cover.

Well... that's one of the more disturbing things I've ever seen.

However, I too have my doubts. Wouldn't a rat that feels itself to be stuck attack, claw and gnaw its way out of that sort of predicament, even at the cost of its own tail or perhaps its entire hind quarters?

I expect there will be a movie called Rat King bearing mostly an accidental resemblance to this concept on the Sci-Fi Channel next month, latest. It will star Marc Dacoscos, Yancy Butler and Mickey Rooney.

Say what you will about the judge's ethics, but those are 20 truly stupid people.

Xeni, the babydoll tutu looks like some deranged version of Josephine Baker. But the sound it makes as they smack heads is so very satisfying.

So explain to me the Text-O-Possum: is it pretty much just a stuffed possum with a Bluetooth text messenger built in? No, it doesn't have to be anything more; I just want to be certain there's not some feature I'm not seeing, like a speech synthesizer to make it speak your messages. That'd be like some fucked up cybernecro version of A Wind In The Willows.

What a delightfully weird idea. Now when he builds in the Koopas and Goombas I'll be really impressed.

Silly ransomer, poopie doesn't come out your weiner!

What? OH.

Yes, so I gather from the jingle. You going to post an mp3 of that so we can savor your pipes?

Fence unicorn is watching you masturbate.

Don't forget What The--?! and all the Fred Hembeck stuff from Marvel Age and Fred Hembeck Destroys the Marvel Universe. DC has gotten into the act a little in recent years with the Bizarro Comics anthologies.

Dude, it's a preschool class. Of course it's the teacher's handwriting. I don't think I want to meet the four year old who's that anal.

I think "humans" suits just fine, thanks.

On behalf of caucasians everywhere, I would like to tender our apologies to the melanin-enhanced.

This seems like either a really great surreal SNL sketch, or the pilot for a REALLY BAD sitcom. Like, worse than ALF. But still better than Unhappily Ever After.

Turn it upside down and you've got the home version of "Kicked In The Nuts."

The lengths kids used to have to go to for whippits.

As a kid, I took it as a given that we'd likely have people on Mars by now. If by the time I reach my dotage I can retire to the moon I'll consider that good enough to say I lived in the future.

I agree with AndyHavens: my nephew will be 8 this year and I've still not exposed him to Indy, and it might still be a couple more years before I do unless his parents beat me to it. Granted, I saw them when I was very young, but they scared the piss out of me then, and there was no PG-13 rating at the time.

So why do are toys made for kids who are ostensibly too young to have seen what the toys are licensed off of? They can exist in a vacuum, sure, but what's the point, then, other than crass profits?

Also, as nifty as HD is, is it any more detailed than traditional movie photography? If not, I don't see how anything more than traditional movie makeup is necessary. Are blu_ray cosmetics cheaper knockoffs of movie makeup? That's the only selling point I can imagine.

[slapping inside elbow]

Oh GOD I need these. I wonder if it's possible to get the reels without the viewer; I already have a black View-Master, and the Nike swoosh doesn't increase its value in my eyes, certainly not up to $45. It's an old model, too; newer View-Masters are a bit more streamlined.

@ #1 Calud9999: I'm pretty sure these are going to be 3D; I doubt they'd have gone to the trouble otherwise. And of course they won't blow up the images enough to see the stereoscopic image. They want to sell them. Though I agree it would have been nice if they'd given at least one example, maybe even an outtake from the set.

And thus, the game Boogie was born.

Ah. Then I declare this officially lame. EPIC FAIL.

There needs to be a series of these. If nothing else they might help turn kids onto the classics, or give a new experience to the overly familiar. Between redubs and commentaries my case for a What's Up, Tigerlily?/MST3K/Pop-Up Video-style network grows ever stronger.

It should be noted that most of these voice actors perform multiple roles, not just on Spongebob but other cartoons. Tom Kenny alone could probably do 75% of the male voices.

I don't have so much a problem with something on the site being sponsored; that's nothing new. You guys have expenses, especially with BBtv, and you deserve to profit from your labors. What gives me pause is that it's a sponsorship of something that doesn't add value to the site, just does something that's always really been there. Also, it asks us to associate Honda with those concepts that are pinned on posts that have nothing to do with Honda. Granted, a sponsorship of anything, from TV to magazines to the net, has an implicit approval and association on both sides of the bargain; the problem here is that whatever is being linked to in those tagged entries have no say about tacitly advertising for Honda with their work. It may even create conflicts with endorsements they have accepted.

Despite having moved three times in less than a year a couple years back (one of them being from a 2 br I had to myself to a 3 br I shared with two other guys) and having eliminated no less than a third of my belongings at that point, I seem to accumulate stuff; it's an inevitable side effect of my thrift fu. I know and agree with so many of the arguments for living more spartanly, but I don't seem to be constitutionally capable of divesting myself of material goods; I'm not quite zen enough. This would be better suited to my old roommate, who is constantly endeavouring to be as stripped down as he can be.

I've said as much on other blogs, but the tit-for-tat spookery of Anonymous vs. Scientology does not make me specifically favor the former over the latter. The tricky nature of Scientology's status, which they have admittedly exploited for years, also makes it tough to criticize their activities without seeming intolerant of their beliefs. (Of course, whether these are actually held beliefs and what the upper echelon "knowledge" [read: bulldada, in the terminology of the Subgenii] squares with the more publicly known dogma makes it all the more difficult to scrutinize and respond to said beliefs, but that's another semantic trick.)

I hope Anonymous remains clear about exposing criminal activities and not about "debunking" Scientology. Anyone who is genuinely curious about self-actualization will quickly discover, with more than cursory research, there's far better ways to achieve inner peace and accomplishment that you needn't pay anyone to confer upon you.

BB Gadgets entry on BurningCanoe, then! Waste not the bandwidth on "artistes" who render the use of stereoscopic technology pointless!

HARD TIME was a great series, Don. Closest thing to OZ done in comics, with a little supernatural edge thrown in. Why DC wouldn't have yet compiled the entire series is beyond me.

I also quite enjoyed the miniseries he did with Phil Winslade for Vertigo called NEVADA, about a Vegas showgirl with a pet ostrich who becomes a nexus for interdimensional phenomena. It included a mob boss with a lava lamp for a head and a homeless guardian angel. Freaky enough in places to have been written by Grant Morrison.

@ #41: thats pretty odd though its been done before (im lookin' at you church of the subgenious)

Actually, the Church of the Subgenius was created in part as a response to the Scientologists, not before. Much of Subgenius "dogma" directly parodies Scientology, down to their motto, "You'll pay to know what you really think!"

I remembered this brilliant article by Harmon Leon from the mid-90's about infiltrating the Hollywood Celebrity Center as an obscure Austrian polka accordionist.

A few I regularly check in on:

Escape Pod (previously mentioned; always quality)

Triple Feature (three web cartoonists who specialize in movie commentary give their reviews and take calls)

Downloadable Content (Gabe & Tycho from Penny Arcade bullshit and come up with their comics in realtime)

The G-Spot (Alterati.com's house podcast, the occult movement)

HalfCast (ontological goofery from down under)

The Church of the Subgenius' Hour of Slack

The R.U. Sirius Show and its sister podcast, NeoFiles (link seems to be malfunctioning presently; neither appear to have been updated lately)

Indie Spinner Rack (so much more interesting to listen about comics pushing the medium than who's "dying" this week in underwear pervert books)

I've actually known about Vladimir for years, and thought to suggest her in the wake of the Arkitip fiasco, but never got around to it.

This specific style of animation, using live actors (but not adding anything beyond straight photography) is known as pixelation. It's woefully underutilized (though I suppose anything other than CGI could claim much the same thing these days).

Jesus, Doomstalk, they show a little kid playing with it. If you're trying to convince me that a kid wouldn't think that was the coolest thing ever you were obviously grown in a lab.

These concepts are fantastic. Lucas is an idiot for declining them, though Episode I itself was proof enough of that. As the STAR WARS licensing machine continues to chug along, I suspect we'll still see these down the line.

I had a Transformers bed tent. I think I slept in it until I was 16.

I met Clowes a few years back at the MoCCA Festival in NYC and told him I'd used Ghost World for a class I taught on comics at my alma mater. Turns out his sister went there, too.

I wish he'd get back to putting out Eightball more than twice a decade, but these PDFs help tide me over... for now.

@ #5 Doomstalk: Again, I maintain you are evaluating what kids would find cool by the standards of the older, more image-conscious types. Under age 10, kids think nothing of dressing like bugs or walking on all fours for a day; in fact, that variation from the norm is what makes kids cool in the eyes of their peers. Puberty is what suddenly makes any deviancy, like, OMG gross-me-out.

There's another customizer out there who has done an assortment of Marvel heros in steampunk/Victorian fashion, though his name or his URL presently escape me and Google.

Wrote everything but what I wanted.

or

Anything I could say depresses me.

On the basis of the last few Monochrom contributions I was ready for this to be really lame, but this was actually amusing and informative.

Do the various snippets of Ms. Gumm play in random order, or just one long loop?

A little deelishus taste of Xudi Gardin at the end, too.

The world would have a different image of Japan if we use that.

No, I really don't think it would. I think it would confirm a lot of things we've always known in our hearts.

I had a very visceral "aww" reaction to the dolls with the "everything is going to be all right" shirts. I also like the Twilight Turtle, though I'm guessing only the head and paws are cuddly, which seems to defeat the purpose of having anything cuddly on it in the first place. (See: Teddy Ruxpin)

I'm going to be the one to say that I love this idea, and not ironically, as in "so ugly it's awesome." No, executed with the right figures arranged into some interaction I would proudly display this. Sure as shit a lot more becoming than gaudy pseudo-Baroque or faux-Rococo crap you see all the time.

Thank you for beating me to that observation, Arkizzle.

Whatever you call it, it translates to "FUCKIN' A."

Now that I have a PDF of the book, I can give away my hardcopy. Maybe now that the idea of stealing it is moot, the title ought to be changed to Gift This Book; the idea of "sticking it to The Man," while romantic, pales in comparison to "teaching a man to fish."

All skiffy nerds got beat by Everyplace.

So instead I just offer: up up down down left right left right B A B A select start.

Good morning, Professor Falken; would you like to play a game?

Joel, since you're in NYC, The Halloween Adventure down in the Village has a lot of these types of displays for sale. They used to be huge, then they bought the connecting lot that spans the width of the block and now they're GIGANTIC.

So the Raelians have moved from genetic engineering to transportation design, have they?

Is the guy with the gas mask and umbrella Sandman, and the guy with the tin-star and goggles Starman? I'm pretty sure I know who everyone else is, though why is there no visible green on Green Arrow?

I do love that the Victorian equivalent of Powergirl's normal immodest look is knee-length bloomers. Cor blimey, 'er elbows 'n knees is all exposed-like!

How about just that it's funny? Yahtzee reviews specific games; these seem just to be PSAs.

I could almost, ALMOST understand if the air marshalls were flying IN on international flights. Of course, like a chicken, they'd have to get to the other side first. But honestly, once that plane reaches international airspace, it's no longer the U.S.'s responsibility, nor is it our right, to patrol that craft. If this were 2002 and we still had the world's sympathies, I might see why developed nations would let us pull this crap; as it is, we've squandered that. I'm guessing it's merely the symbiosis (mutual parasitism?) of our economies and looming military endowments that compel anyone to want to do any fool thing we ask.

Sharper Image was greedy and wanted it both ways: they wanted the average schmuck on the street to entertain the notion that they might be able to afford some of their wares, but they were actually courting Hammacher Schlemmer's consumer base. Problem is, Hammacher Schlemmer does that just fine on their own. Sharper Image couldn't even steal customers from FAO Schwarz. I wonder what they'll restructure as, if they even do.

Sword boner FTW.

One word:

CEREBRO.

You have been warned.

IANATC (I am not a toy collector), but I think this base is from a Marvel Masterworks Sentinel figure, which was offered piecemeal with the smaller figures in its series. So the toy itself isn't broken, per se, just incomplete. I would say it's complete now.

This is The Tibetan Book of the Dead written specifically for Shigeru Miyamoto.

Is that 3rd child Jack-Jack, or will he grow up to be Syndrome?

This was one of the first photos I favorited on Flickr. The mom don't hurt none, nope.

Thanx, RyanDestroys, I knew it was one of those toy line brand names that smear together in my head.

Personally, I've always wanted to see a bong made out of a hollow MODOK figure, but that's my willful glee at destroying others' precious childhood memories.

@ #15 Iain010100: One of the joys of being a comic geek over the past decade-plus is seeing the ranks of fandom (and, to a lesser percentage, creators) become more unabashedly coed as the nerd ethic has gone mainstream and the ladies realize there are plenty of guys who dig gals with brains and pop cultural fixations in common. Granted, more of them tend towards the cuter manga side of the spectrum, but if they're unself-conscious enough to cosplay they're nevertheless true blue geek grrls.

Yes, I would pay handsomely for the thrill of not being able to undo my pants in the event of explosive diarrhea.

I was mildly disappointed that a mob-style hit didn't occur at the crescendo of that solo. I suppose it was good enough that elves were dying slowly everywhere. Fucking elves. Oh, they'll bake you cookies in a tree, but none of them show up in the middle of the night to fix my boots anymore.

I would like to triumphantly declare this the proverbial smoking gun, gather up the posse, get some good strong hangin' rope with a side order of torches and pitchforks, throw these scumfucks into irons and heal this nation's wounds by making these vicious animals drag boulders down Pennsylvania Ave. and on across the expanse of the country via donkey collars around their necks, driven by dominatrixes on lizardback with cat-o-nine-tails, as the entire populace stands on either side of the road, booing and throwing batteries.

That's what I would like, yes. Unfortunately, at this point, after this country has had shit thrown in its collective face for so long, the collective response, if this even penetrates that far into the news cycle, will be to shrug, scratch our asses and turn American Gladiators back on. But think: wouldn't it be so much more fun to watch Wolf and Helga chase down a smug shit with a bum ticker so his final thoughts in this life are absolute terror and knowledge that anyone with a soul wishes him dead as unpleasantly as possible?

@ #38 Gadfly: I hope you've never read any Hunter S. Thompson; I have a feeling you'd assume he personally drove Nixon from office with a cattle prod rectally-inserted.

Of course I'm not speaking literally. Do you know of any lizards presently living large enough to ride like horses? Because if you do, I want to buy some.

But here's the thing: I'm glad you wondered whether I was speaking literally. Because I hope Dick Cheney and those who would follow his example might wonder whether I'm speaking literally. Do I hope to be disappeared like this were Stalinist Russia? No. But this is a man who does as he pleases without fear of reprisals, human or otherwise. He is a nihilist at the head of a party that supposedly caters to those of devout faith. He believes in nothing greater than himself. Which is why he is an abomination.

We might think ourselves more civilized than people of mere centuries before, who'd finalize a coup d'etat by executing the parties who they blame for their ills, and perhaps we are. As Howard Bloom observes, it is a testimony to evolution that the harshest response to personal rhetorical offense in the developed world is usually just more of the same. But any system by which we might do otherwise to hold persons of power accountable are rendered toothless without the threat of the ability to put them into action. When peaceful assembly by millions worldwide, much less millions domestically, fails to change the course of megalomaniacal policy, dismissing it as "focus groups," and the electoral process seemed compromised, what then?

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." -- JFK

I don't write the net abbreviation LOL unless I've actually laughed out loud.

LOL

Don't kill my dreams, Ceronomus. I wanted so much to say, "After dark, Ariel's seashells come off, and after midnight, Cinderella loses more than her slipper!"

Of course, the dark side of this fantasy is furries yiffing in their natural environment. Sort of a sticky, smelly, psychologically-scarring version of The Jungle Cruise.

As I used to say, Fuck 'em in a place they've never been fucked. I was commonly thinking of the ear, but it could just as easily refer to someplace like, I dunno, Bayonne.

I must have sensed this implicitly when I've denied every attempt made to upload Flash 9 onto my computer. And hell, I'm not even trying to repurpose Flash video.

Yet.

How convenient. Instead of rolling out a barrel, the barrel rolls itself out.

Poke around his DeviantArt page to see some of his steampunk Star Wars craft designs. Between all of the steampunk interpretations of Star Wars I've seen online you could assemble an entirely new production of it.

Anyone else reminded of the scene in Rocky Horror Picture Show when at dinner Frankenfurter whips off the tablecloth and Meatloaf's corpse is under the glass?

There's a creepy start to my day. Of course, it could be someone else, but this has the air of John Wayne Gacy's clown paintings.

Weren't Mickey Mouse and other Disney cartoons banned in the Third Reich? Of course, Hitler himself probably enjoyed plenty of things he denied the German people. This won't help dispel those apocryphal "Walt Disney was secretly a Nazi" stories.

Ahh, Chuck Jones. Awesome.

This ranks up there with the Bugs N' Daffy take on "Ali Baba & the 40 Thieves": "HASSAN CHOP!"

Best of all times, of course, is in the Wabbit Season/Duck Season one: "No more for me, thanksh, I'm drivin'!" Oh, and Pete Puma vs. Bugs:

B: How many lumps you want with your tea?
P: I don't drink tea; it gives me a headache.
B: What do you drink?
P: KAWFEE!
B: How many lumps you want with your coffee?
P: Oh, three or four...
WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM

@ #1 Pipenta: Funny how if a kid downloads a song, that's stealing, but anybody can nab your personal information and that's not...

Kids don't have moneyed congressional lobbyists, per se.

@ #2 WeightedCompanionCube: So, the only hard facts in that article point to how people have been caught and fired for abusing databases. Nothing but speculation about how much undiscovered abuse might be occuring.

More sweeping, draconian legislation has been put into effect based upon far more spurious speculation than that. Given the iffy oversight of the organizations that have access to this information and how guarded they are about what the public learns of them, it's not exactly a leap of logic that for every abuser who's caught because they're sloppy there may be ten who don't because they aren't.

I love this. It's like the NES port of Grand Theft Auto.

Has anyone tried modding a Wii into an NES case? Tell me that wouldn't get Digg all hot n' bothered.

Looks like something that would be guarding the gates of Black Panther's kingdom of Wakanda.

In case some people don't watch it, that starred Zack Selwyn from G4's Attack of the Show. I knew he did music on the side, but this was the first time I saw something not AOTS-related out of him. If this blows up big enough maybe he'll end up as part of their "Around the Net" segment. I wonder if that's contractually possible.

Bookmarked for later substance abuse.

That's not a raccoon; it's a JACKoon!

(Did the credits say who did the music? Sounded a lot like Atari Teenage Riot, which is one of the few industrial acts I enjoy.)

The Noobies look like monochromatic Playskool Little People.

This reminds me of some traditional African ornamentation of which I've seen pictures, but as I have no idea which tribe or what it's called I doubt I could find a picture online.

Before I opened up these comments I was going to mention that in stark contrast to the ham-fisted Honda tie-in this was a far better integrated sponsorship. Obviously I'm just not judgmental or self-righteous enough.

To the point of the post, rather than trying to impose copyright on this store, which I assume is not Happy Mutants' intent, you ought to be trying to interest them in carrying Craft and Make books as pertain to childcare and other topics of mutual fascination.

Bit of a typo at the end there, Mark: it's 8biTpeoples.com.

Called it.

Given that the BLF have been around for about 30 years now and have sabotaged countless billboards to date, all while remaining mostly incognito, I would say this is very, very real.

@ #8 Takuan: maybe use the Olympics as a way to export fortune cookies to China? any suggestions for one-liners?

"Your voice is just as important as any Communist party member."

"Give me liberty or give me death."

"You deserve a living wage."

"When you take over as world leader please be nice to the Americans; most of them meant you no harm."

IN BED!

By far my favorite BBtv in quite some time. I'm not even sure these should be regarded as spam; the aggravated sense of self-importance from both make it perfectly logical that they should send these manifestos to everyone on earth, or at least the most visible blog on the net.

When I used to work in NYC's biggest comic shop there was a fellow who'd come in regularly, almost always on a Saturday, and drop off manilla envelopes filled with mimeographed manifestos about mind control and Xeroxed comic pages supposedly illustrating where pentagrams had been smuggled into the art...

...except what in the hell he was referencing was invisible to everyone else. It would be so easy to dismiss him as a schizophrenic, but maybe it was just fnorded to the rest of us, and we needed the glasses from They Live to see it.

@ #3 Iain Coleman: As a prelude to the RFID tracking pellet inserted rectally, of course. Schwarzenegger Uber Alles.

Now, the question is whether this is actually a state-mandated practice or just the university being spooky bastards, and whether the teacher attempted first to negotiate the terms of the pledge before simply altering it. If the university regards the pledge as a legally-binding contract, she ought to have consulted a lawyer before blithely writing in her preferred terminology, no matter how innocuous the change was. On the other hand, if the university just wants to see how high they can make their faculty jump, fuck 'em.

I saw something about this a few days from now. There's sister "stores" around the country, like Brooklyn Superhero Supply and The Space Traveler's Mart in Chicago. It's such a great idea to both fund the writing programs hidden inside and also attract and inspire kids. Damn, them McSweeney's cats are creative!

BTW, did you notice the Time Freezy Hyper Slush has a "Bubonic Plague" flavor? Fresh squeezed from rat-kings.

I'd have liked to have seen more of the Peppermelon animation, if there is more. It reminded me of the animation from "The Universe Song" in Monty Python & The Meaning of Life and parts of Heavy Metal. Was that The Chemical Brothers for the backing music?

There's lots in there you could get offended by if you're looking to be offended. The only difference between 9/11 and the other events depicted is that it occurred on U.S. soil (Pearl Harbor was in territory that was not yet a state in 1941). Your grandpa might take issue with Pearl Habor being represented as sushi attacking hamburgers. The point of this animation was that it all amounts to the same thing.

And the drunk dog was such a palate cleanser I nominate it as its own breed of Unicorn Chaser.

You're right, how presumptuous of me. I forgot about the berry bushes that sprout from rat-kings' mass graves. Them's good eatin'.

I've actually got it already, thanks, just not at immediate access. I couldn't remember what techno god of which I was being reminded.

Mental scars? Shit, I'm more concerned about physical scars.

I was trying to remember where I'd previously heard of One Ring Zero until I looked at my Amazon Wish List. 1R0 often has guest lyricists like Neil Gaiman, Michael Chabon and Lemony Snicket. Meanwhile, Michael Hearst also got some ink last summer on BoingBoing, Wired and elsewhere for a collection he put out of new compositions for ice cream truck jingles.

A goodly number of those I recognized. I wonder how many are riffed off of local stations' callsigns. I've long thought that if a modern version of Heavy Metal was to be made it would look a lot like that. There was something about '80's graphic design, with all the neon and reflections, that screamed futuristic; it still has that visceral reaction for me. Like a Trapper Keeper come to life, but not in a South Park way.

There's a very small, specific niche I know of that is probably in need of a fresh pair of underwear at this prospect.

This is getting close to Dylan Horrock's idea from his graphic novel Hicksville of a comic-centric library, though his had the added magic realism touch of it containing the original art of all of the best unrealized or otherwise unavailable comics. His was housed in a lighthouse; I wonder how large a truly complete comic library would need to be.

Is there a difference between freak folk and anti-folk? I also "dig" this "scene," "man," but I wonder whether the lack of any distinct politics in this music is perhaps a sad testament to the nihilism and apathy of those involved and those to whom it caters.

Is there a difference between freak folk and anti-folk? I also "dig" this "scene," "man," but I wonder whether the lack of any distinct politics in this music is perhaps a sad testament to the nihilism and apathy of those involved and those to whom it caters.

These may be disposable, but are they secure? I wonder how long it would be before a hostile captures one and either cracks its frequency to jam the others or reverse engineers it to work to their advantage. They could even turn them into mobile IEDs.

He should go all Hendrix/Townsend/Cobain at the end and eat his instrument.

Tragedy. I went to college with his son Luke. D&D; has always been a gaping hole in my geek cred; despite multiple attempts to get into it in my youth it never held my attention. Something a bit too pedantic about the maps and the dice and everything. But I nevertheless have huge respect for the geography it commands in culture. Pour out a flagon of mead on the ground for Gary Gygax.

Interesting stuff. I've been watching Terminator and it's OK, though given that there's little else on Fox these days that attracts my eyeballs that's saying something. This opens up a whole ontological can of worms, with issues of destiny vs. choice. There's an obvious parallel to Schroedinger's Cat, in that an observer must be figured into any equation, a practice more recent quantum physics bears out. One question danced around on the show is whether one can avoid or encourage a certain result in an essentially open (though actually closed) set of factors without a full comprehension of how all factors interrelate; actions which may seem to be contrary to a result may in fact set other systems in motion that actually promote said result. Given Fox's ever-shifting politics I wonder whether there's a parallel we're meant to draw to the current domestic and international scene. Something to eyeball on all fronts, at any rate.

It's still a library; it's just not a lending library.

Fox did it with Brawndo from Idiocracy. It's what plants crave!

Interesting that Fox should try to license two of their neglected properties into drinks. Does Fox even own the licensing rights to Futurama? I thought that now that it's on Comedy Central it's out from under their thumb.

No, but this is close enough.

The first part's narrator sounded like Tokki from Metalocalypse.

There was a recent attempt to revive the franchise... as animated DVD games. Sort of misses the point.

I was crazy about CYOAs as a kid. I must have had at least 30 of them, not including all the copycats and spinoffs like the Time Machine books. In a fit of selflessness I gave them all away to a kid I used to babysit for when I left for college.

Strange sort of Twilight Zone moment: my favorite one was The Mystery of the Secret Room, of which you actually see the cover barely altered as the Harry Potter on in the Something Awful gallery. I used that book as a template for lucid dreaming exercises when I was 11. (I was prodigious and had a subscription to OMNI, OK?) I had this odd crush on the future girl in the book, whose name I still recall but which I won't embarass myself by reciting here. On my MySpace profile under "Who I'd Like To Meet" I wrote, "The girl with the half green half purple hair from [this book], but real, and adult." About a year ago I was in my old comic shop in NYC when I see a twenty-something girl who is a dead ringer for her (at least her funky hair) and appropos wardrobe. I run into her a couple more times in the next few days. A friend knows her and points her out on MySpace, so I make contact. Never got a reply. Perhaps that's for the best.

In fact, both Penn & Teller provided voices, along with Bridget Fonda, Glenn Close & Christopher Plummer in the Rene Laloux-directed sci-fi animated movie Light Year.

Teller is a collaborator on a production of Macbeth currently playing at the Folger Theater in DC where he's brought back some of the gore and stage magic implicit in the script. He did a roundtable discussion about it a couple weeks back.

I love the silent shtick, especially in contrast to Penn's brassy bombast, but I'd love to see a show when they switch it up for once. Or would that be a stunty shark-jumping moment?

All hail the Poopmonster! Bow B4 his 7334 sweetness! You in the back: I didn't get a w00t outta that guy for the 2nd greatest R. in comics. (Sorry, Richard, you're still entirely too well-adjusted to beat Crumb. Keep eating lead flakes to increase your derangement.)

I have a little of this compulsion in me. Not too bad, but it serves no real function in my life. I have a leaf bag filled to the brim with newspaper clippings which I always intend to organize into file folders, always for some nebulous future use. (Never mind that much of said material can be found archived online.) I also have to visit The Hype Machine every night so I don't possibly miss any mp3 released into the wild that day. My hard drive is clogged with mp3s waiting to be burned to disc, discs which I then don't listen to nearly as fast as I create them, of which there are presently about 200.

It's a good thing my shrink says that stuff is nutty but my eight comic longboxes are perfectly okey-dokey. The hoarding apparently is a behavior born of a need for control, albeit of meaningless crap.

Same here, Jason. As long as the info is accurate, if the fantasy element gets players interested, I have no qualms about it. Certainly, I don't recall anyone complaining about the fantasy allegories in Pan's Labyrinth somehow trivializing the horrors of Franco's Spain. Given the sort of depraved violence that's par for the course in videogames, a slight sugar-coating for the sake of delivering the meme is well within the confines of good taste.

Is it really up to me to be the first to respond:

YEAH, BABY!!!

Nothing quite commands authority and respect like security speaking in the voice of a castrati.

Tomb of the Unknown Pimp-Daddy.