Sarcasmatron

Happy Shanksgiving!

2012-12-02T14:45:00.002-05:00

Hope all guys had a great Thanksgiving and plan on having a good Christmas too. Not a lot has happened since my last post that I haven't really talked about already but I figured I was a bit overdue for an update.

As far as my comedy schedule goes, I don't really have much of one anymore. I didn't manage to make the line-up for the Best of the Midwest contest in Bowling Green back in October as most of the comics were actually punctual for once. And I just found out last night that I didn't make the cut for Stand Up Toledo 2013. I was in the running but there were so many possible candidates that they just did a random drawing for the 10th spot. On one hand, I'm a bit bummed as this would've been my biggest show to date as last year drew like 400 people. I'm not even sure I've performed in front of 100 at any one time. But I start school the week before, so that's a lot less pressure to add on. In fact, I have a 10 minute spot this Wednesday for Wise Ass Wednesdays at Connxtions and unless I get a gig in the weeks before Christmas or the first couple weeks in January, this may be the last stand-up I do until April.

However, I did manage to see both Tom Green and Mick Foley do stand-up in November, so that was pretty swell. I'll be honest, from a stand-up point-of-view, I wouldn't call either show "great". But considering both of these guys were big during my formative teenage years and kinda shaped who I'd become, it was still great to see.

I went to the last Saturday night show for Tom Green, which would be his last one of the weekend, so that kinda ended up being his "Screw it, I'll get drunk and try out some new material" show. Most of the people working the club or who had seen him previously said this was his worst show of the weekend, but it was still solid...save for the annoying drunk people. Even though Tom was getting tipsy himself, you could tell he was annoyed by some of the people and had trouble getting the show back on track. However, the real fun came after the show as Tom Green stuck around and talked to everybody. And when I say everybody, I mean literally everyone there that wanted to talk to him and get something signed could. In fact, when I got to talk to him (and got him to sign my copy of Freddy Got Fingered), I asked him what his method of dealing with annoying drunk people was. It's a secret tactic and I promised I wouldn't tell so I won't say it here, but I plan on trying it out sometime. Even after most of the people left, there were about 30 people ended up crammed in the back bar/kitchen of the club and Tom still hung out and talked to people. I didn't end up going home until about 2 am and there were still plenty of people hanging out, drinking and such. I bet people wonder if Tom Green is as "weird" in real life as he portrayed himself back in the day but he's super mellow and cool to hang out with. After the show, he wasn't really doing any "bits", he was just hanging out talking to everyone. I think he genuinely likes to be around people and see how different every single person is from one another, which is a great quality to have. I wish I could feel comfortable enough with myself to just be in a group of people and get to know every single one of them. So yeah, it was a good night.

I could say the same for seeing Mick Foley as well. Even though he only had one show in Toledo, Foley also felt the need to test out some new material, so it may not have been as solid as other shows. For the most part it was just an audience Q&A with Foley telling funny stories (nothing really "NEWZworthy" for any of you smart marks reading this, unless you consider "Jimmy Snuka REALLY liked coke in the '80s" to be news) and, much like the Tom Green show a few days before, was derailed near the end by a loud annoying drunk and Foley had a little trouble keeping the show on track. But Foley had a signing after the show where you could buy one or bring anything you wanted (I brought my copy of "Have A Nice Day") for free. My friends and I ended up near the line and even though it moved faster than I thought, Foley definitely took time out to make sure to talk to every single person. When I told him about me being an aspiring stand-up, we talked about how comedy really is a "labor of love". You have to want to do it because you enjoy doing it, not because you'll get rich and famous from it, because chances are you won't be. There are so many parallels between stand-up and wrestling, where whether you're in front of 50 or 50,000 people, a good reaction still makes you feel awesome. Likewise, if you bomb you're still going to feel like a failure, even if it's a sell-out crowd. Even though we only talked for a few minutes, it's still shows a lot about his character that he's willing to take the time out instead of just signing something and moving along to the next thing.

Other than that, I haven't done a whole lot else. Honestly, I've spent most of my time playing Hotline Miami. I was lucky to have won a copy from Destructoid but it's definitely worth paying $10, in my opinion. In fact, I've been wanting to buy gift copies for my friends, yet have only done so for one, who decided out of the blue to gift me Half-Life 2 and Portal 2 for no reason at all. Anyways, if you don't know, Hotline Miami is an indie game that has come out recently to much critical acclaim. The best way to describe it would be if the movie Drive and the Rockstar game Manhunt had a retro-fied baby with some elements of Super Meat Boy. You basically have to go in a building and clear out mobsters as quickly, efficiently and, most of all, messily as possible. If you get hit, you'll die, so you need to plan your route, but you also need to be quick. And quiet, because if you use a gun, the rest of the enemies will attack you, but you can also use that to your advantage as well. I'm not a fan of games that make you die repeatedly, nor am I all that good at stealth games, or most games from a top-down perspective for that matter, but Hotline Miami combines it all in one package and everything works. It just wouldn't be as fun if you changed even one of the mechanics. The first few tries, you'll die a lot and may get frustrated. But when you figure things out and finish a level, you feel like you just took part in your own movie fight scene. You'll shoot dudes through windows, use human shields, throw knives across rooms, and you'll find yourself doing it all in one fluid motion before long. Not to mention, the art style and music are retro-styled and top notch. Of course, I'm a sucker for '80s new wave music and this game is chock-full of it but even speaking objectively, if anything works better than the game itself, it's the general aesthetic. Hotline Miami isn't perfect, people are still reporting major bugs even after the game being patched, even though I've never experienced anything beyond slowdown and minor glitches. But it's definitely worth playing. And if you're one of my friends, don't be surprised to find it gifted to you someday.

If you've been keeping track, Steam just had one of their crazy ass sales a week or so ago. Luckily for me, there wasn't a whole lot I wanted, so I bought the aforementioned gift copy of Hotline Miami for my buddy for half-off and Mark Of The Ninja half-off for myself. I can't really talk about Mark Of The Ninja yet as my computer isn't quite good enough to play it. I keep having problems where the game doesn't want to recognize my keyboard and mouse all the time. I've tried to play other games and have installed The Binding of Isaac to start on something new but am having the same problems. I'm pretty sure I need to upgrade my processor but I can't do that until I'm done with school and am working again so that'll be a while.

That's about it. I wish I had more to update on. I'm mostly just killing time until school starts and then I'll focus on that and go from there. If I don't update this anytime soon, have a happy Christmas, New Year's, Valentine's Day, Easter, Arbor Day and so on.

Selected Playlist courtesy of Pandora
Converge - Black Cloud
Mastodon - Island
Converge - Hanging Moon
Mastodon - Where Strides The Behemoth
Ed Gein - Small Towns, Small Minds
Converge - In Her Blood
Acid Bath - Finger Paintings of the Insane
Electric Wizard - Patterns of Evil
Crystal Castles - Empathy
Stegosaurus Rex - Nowhere To Run
Cut Copy - Future

Err'y Day I'm Pig Destroyin'

2012-09-26T16:00:00.004-04:00

I think I have a problem. I've been pumping myself for Pig Destoyer's new album "Book Burner" which comes out on 10/23 so I've pretty much been listening to nothing but "Prowler In The Yard" and "Terrifyer" for the past few weeks. And I'll probably pull out "Phantom Limb" for the remaining weeks.

October's going to be a crazy month for music. Between that and Halloween, I'm getting pumped up. However, I'm so low on money right now that I haven't even bothered going costume shopping like I normally do this time of year. I don't even know if I'm doing anything this year, I hope so because I didn't do anything last year. If I do, I'll probably just be Dr. Orpheus like I had planned last year but didn't. I also wanted to see if I could be Beast from the X-Men after seeing a couple of my comic buddies dress up as Wolverine and Professor X last year. Honestly, all I'd really need would be a lab coat and blue body paint and hair dye. I already have glasses, a large vocabulary, a stocky build and plenty of body hair.

Anyways, back to music. Here's a selected release date calendar of stuff I'm interested in and you should be too:

October 9
Between The Buried And Me - The Parallax Part 2: Future Sequence
Converge - All We Love We Leave Behind
The Birthday Massacre - Hide and Seek (Birthday Massacre makes the best music for the fall/Halloween season)

October 16
Dethklok - Dethalbum III (Honestly, I stopped caring about Dethklok but figured I'd put them here just because)
Stolen Babies - Naught

October 23
Pig Destroyer - Book Burner (duh)
The Sword - Apocryphon

And I'll probably be able to buy none of them. :-(

I have been able to get ahold of some new games to play, mostly thanks to the Humble Indie Bundle once again. The initial bundle consists of Rochard, Vessel, SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies), Torchlight and Shatter, with Dustforce unlocked if you beat the average price. So far, I've only played Shatter but am having super fun with it. Basically, it's Breakout but with added physics elements and occasional space-shooter mechanics. It's been enough for me to drop Terraria for a few weeks, at least. And just yesterday, they unlocked four more games for beating the average: BIT.TRIP RUNNER, Gratuitous Space Battles, Jamestown and Wizorb. I was kinda disappointed considering I had just gotten BIT.TRIP RUNNER and Jamestown in the Steam Summer Sale but moreso bummed because they all come on one Steam unlock code so I couldn't just give away either game to people I knew who didn't have them because both games are quite good. So I was able to get 10 games and the soundtracks for most of them (Shatter's is great and so is BIT.TRIP but again, I got the soundtrack in the Steam Summer Sale as well) for $5.50, which is awesome. If you want those games for yourself, the average price to beat is just over $6 and there's less than a week left cash in. Plus, it's for charity, so do it.

Also, the Rock Band store had a massive sale on DLC songs so I ended up buying some Wii points (though I probably shouldn't have considering my current financial strains) and got a few more songs for my library.

HIM - Heartkiller
HIM - Ode To Solitude
HIM - Wings of a Butterfly
Dead Kennedys - Police Truck
Dead Kennedys - California Uber Alles
Dead Kennedys - Holiday in Cambodia
Metallica - ...And Justice For All
Metallica - Blackened
Metallica - Ride The Lightning
Behemoth - Conquer All
Dio - Holy Diver
At The Gates - Blinded By Fear

And since I had some Wii points left over, I got Donkey Kong Country 2 for the Virtual Console. Playing the first few levels brought back waves of nostalgia but I don't know if the port got messed up or something but I remember the game looking a lot better. Maybe it's just playing an old SNES game on an HDTV isn't the same but whatever, I still like it.

So that's about it. Nothing of major importance, I'm just bored and felt like talking about random music and video games and such.

I haven't gotten back up on the comedy stage in a while but it's going to begin again soon. Like I said in the last blog post, Wise-Ass Wednesdays starts back up at Connxtions Toledo on 10/3. Though I'll be there, I'm not set to perform on that show but I am signed up for the next week on 10/10. Then 10/19 is the Best In The Midwest competition in Bowling Green, which I may or may not perform since I'm the last alternate on the list. That's what October looks like for me in comedy, barring any Open Mics I decide to do or the Wise-Ass shows I'll just sit in on.

As for November, that might end up being a huge month for me, though not necessarily in a performing capacity. Oddly enough, Tom Green is doing shows at Connxtions in Toledo on 11/9 and 11/10. However, I've been alerted that I'm in a contest on the 10th in Michigan so I'll only have one chance to see him. Then on 11/14, Mick Foley is doing a one night special engagement at the Funny Bone in Perrysburg. So in the span of less than one week, I'll get to see Tom Green and Mick Foley do stand-up. I swear, it's like my sophomore year of high school all over again. I get to meet two of the people who got me through my teenage years and helped influence who I would become as a comedian and person in general. It's definitely keeping me excited and will probably be the last major thing I'll get to do before the holiday rush and then starting school again in January for a few months.

Dickman out.

Blog Playlist courtesy of Pandora.com
Pig Destroyer - The Diplomat (via Pitchfork.com)
Pig Destroyer - Scarlet Hourglass
Anaal Nathrakh - Swallow The World
Burst - Sculpt The Lives
Nasum - Corrosion
Agoraphobic Nosebleed - Burlap Sack
Cephalic Carnage - Vaporized
The Ocean - Dead Serious and Highly Professional
Balzac - Deep Blue
Dropkick Murphys - Noble
Stellar Corpses - Cemetary Man
Oxymoron - Faces From Below
The Misfits - 1,000,000 Years B.C.
Sex Pistols - Holidays in the Sun
Black Flag - Nervous Breakdown
Minor Threat - I Don't Wanna Hear It
The Knife - Heartbeats
Glass Candy - Rolling Down The Hills

How I'm Spending My Summer

2012-07-28T18:07:00.003-04:00

I figured I'd keep some of you updated as to what I've been doing lately. Nothing major, mostly because it's too damn hot out. I've basically barricaded myself in my bedroom in front of a fan because Summer is horrible.

The Comedy Scene

Honestly, I haven't been doing much comedy this Summer. Mostly because my usual favorite places to do comedy have dropped off the radar for the time being. The weekly showcases at the comedy club have been canceled for the summer since it's usually the worst season for comedy clubs anyway, but whether or not the showcases will come back for the Fall is still up the air, so I'm kinda worried. And the usual Open Mic I was doing isn't quite worth it because save for a few people there (who themselves have started doing comedy), most of the audience doesn't give a crap no matter what we do. It's sad because I used to kill at that place, sometimes getting multiple applause breaks in one set, only for maybe like 2 or 3 people actually paying attention. There are a few more Open Mics in town but they seem to start up and then die off within a few weeks. One of my buddies started one at his favorite bar and the shows got a very good response. Unfortunately, it seems like the owners don't want to hassle with it so we've only gotten to do it there twice so far. And as much as I'd like to go into Michigan, I'm not going to be driving anywhere without working air conditioning in my car.

I've had a few slightly higher-profile shows this Summer. One of them was at a local battle of the bands and I was getting excited for it because it had the potential of being one of the biggest audiences I've performed for up to that point. But it ended up being one of my worst shows ever, and I'm not completely sure why. I don't want to brag and say it wasn't my fault but looking back, I can't really think of anything I could've done better outside of the usual: stage presence, crowd work, etc. But it was so weird because every comic that went up before me seemed to kill. Then I go up and suddenly no one gave a shit. I think it was just because it was getting later in the night and people were getting more drunk and/or restless. But when I had to get off stage and walk through the crowd I just performed in front of, I felt like absolute shit. Not that I was expecting a pat on the back or a "nice job" from anyone, but it would've been nice. I honestly felt like a leper and decided just to leave instead of sticking around and possibly embarrassing myself further. In the close to two years I've been doing comedy, I rarely have "Why am I doing this?" moments because I instantly remind myself "Hey, this is like the only thing I'm good at" and I forget about it. I've never been down enough to even consider quitting doing comedy but this was the closest. I definitely had to re-evaluate things but I seemed to be over it by the next day. But then I had someone pop back into my life that I necessarily didn't want to see again and...well, that's not funny so I'll just skip over it.

I had another show up in Michigan about a week or two ago and it was part of a contest and I guess my friends and I won because we've been invited back to the next round. But the thing is we were the only ones that were even somewhat prepared or even capable of doing comedy. The first two to go up were the kind of awkward "nerds" that would piss Bill Burr off and really should find something else to do. I mean, I consider myself a nerd and awkward in my own right but it's something I'm trying to work on and improve, not use as a crutch or an excuse for my behavior. The third guy showed promise but unfortunately he forgot his routine mid-way through and spent a legit minute or two completely stopped and trying to remember, only to finish up with some half-assed impressions. Then I went up and did alright. I'm still trying a bunch of new stuff out so it wasn't my best. Then my two friends went up and did better, despite a drunken heckler that started in around my set and progressed to get even more annoying through the rest of the night. By the time the "headliner" got up, he just spent his time yelling at the heckler. So it seems like all I have to do to advance in a contest is take a two hour car ride, wait for another two hours for the show to start and just hope that other people suck worse than I do. :-P

Also, don't forget to pop by my YouTube page for some sets and other random crap.

Video Games

I must say, the only other thing I've really been doing these past couple months aside from comedy and work is sitting on my ass playing a lot of video games. Or rather, BUYING a lot of video games, at least. On one of my last blog entries, I mentioned the last Humble Indie Bundle, which consisted of Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Limbo, Superbrothers Sword and Sworcery EP, Psychonauts and Bastion but then in the second week unlocked Super Meat Boy, Braid and Lone Survivor. Well, turns out my computer is so cheap that I could only play like 2 of those games. Really, all I needed was a new video card so I got a cheap low/mid-range card to play them. Soon afterwards, that's when the Steam Summer Sale started. I gave in and joined Steam now that I had a computer capable enough to play decent games. But I decided to run a little experiment with the sale: Get as many games as possible for just $25. And here's the haul I ended up with:

Audiosurf
The Binding of Isaac (+DLC)
BIT.TRIP BEAT (+soundtrack)
BIT.TRIP RUNNER (+soundtrack)
Jamestown
Peggle Deluxe
Peggle Nights
Terrarira
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines (OK, I didn't buy this one, it was a belated birthday gift from a friend but if I were actually awake during the sale, I probably would've bought it myself.)

After all that, I still have 31 cents left in my account! So far, I've only really played the BIT.TRIP games (liking RUNNER a whole hell of a lot more than BEAT), Audiosurf and Peggle Deluxe. I mostly wanted games I could just pop on and kill a little bit of time with. But I am interested in starting up a Terraria game and sinking tons of hours into it. If you're on Steam, find me at TheRyno665.

Also, I got a couple new games for the 360. At first, I was playing back and forth between Just Cause 2 and Wet. As much as I like Just Cause 2, the open world is a little bit TOO open and it takes too long to get things done sometimes. I had started playing Wet to satiate my urge for dumb shoot-em-up action games because it looked like I wasn't going to get Lollipop Chainsaw as I wanted...but I ended up buying it after all. As it was nearing release, I was getting kinda worried that it wouldn't be worth $60, especially considering I rarely buy games at launch prices anyway. So I waited a couple weeks and Gamestop ran a sale on it for a couple days. Between that and a birthday coupon, I ended up getting a used copy for a little more than $30. Not bad for a game that had only been out for maybe a month at that point. So far, I've only played the first couple of levels and I'm glad I didn't spend $60 for it. Lollipop Chainsaw isn't a bad game, just kinda clunky. For a button mashing game, some of the mechanics don't quite work and come off ineffective. For example, you're encouraged to dizzy zombies before killing them to get more points. But there's a definite lag going between dizzying and attacking that chances are you will get attacked by other zombies that you haven't dizzied or have become undizzy, so you might as well just stick with regular attacks so you don't get hurt, kinda negating the whole purpose of the dizzying mechanic. Also, I was really pumped to hear that James Gunn was doing the writing for the game but it's not exactly his best work. I didn't expect Lollipop Chainsaw to be high-brow entertainment or anything, but he can do better.

Instead, I've been playing Kingdoms of Amalur Reckoning, which I ended up getting at Best Buy for just $10 (Well, $15 if you include having to buy a $5 magazine to get the coupon inside but still, worth it). I'm having much more fun with KoAR, despite not being much of an RPG fan. But since one of the few RPG games I like is the Fable series and considering KoAR plays almost exactly like the Fable games...but better, it makes sense. Really, Kingdoms of Amalur is basically like Fable II but with better gameplay and a better fighting system, unfortunately it doesn't have the interesting characters, story or charm of the Fable games. One night playing the game, I seriously just started accumulating side quests and doing them, not knowing who I was doing them for or why or what I was getting out of it. It was just "Go here, do this, get that, come back, get stuff, lather, rinse, repeat." It's like the video game equivalent of what I do when I'm bored with a book, my eyes continue down the page but I don't actually read the words and nothing ever registers in my brain. Also, for all the random weapons and loot you get in the game, your inventory is so small you can hardly carry anything. Even if you buy backpacks to expand your inventory size, it doesn't help much at all. So I'm constantly picking up stuff and either selling it or trashing it. I've actually gone halfway through a mission in a cave only for my inventory to fill up, so I backtrack and leave the cave so I can sell my stuff. That proved to be too time-consuming so I ended up just trashing it. And I'm the kind of guy who'll pick up just about anything, including books and notes and such, not knowing if it'll come in handy for a future quest or what. So I never know what to get rid of. But other than that, Kingdoms of Amalur Reckoning is fun and will probably be the game I sink the most time into in the near future.

...At least until Sleeping Dogs comes out. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be getting that game anytime soon as I'm pretty strapped for money right now. Oddly enough, I got 2 high profile 360 games and like 10 games on Steam for about the same price I'd pay for Sleeping Dogs on release.

Also, I've been playing Extreme Warfare Revenge (aka EWR for the kids on the streets) a lot. I've been working on booking WWE since January of this year, starting at the Royal Rumble on. Right now, I've hit October and I'm kinda in a transitional period where most of my feuds are ending and I need to be thinking about what to build up to for Wrestlemania.

Movies

I really haven't gotten any new movies either. I did manage to snag Drive, Super and Horrible Bosses on Blu-Ray for cheap at a Family Video sale but I look back and actually mentioned that in one of my previous blog posts. Beyond that, I did get a bunch of new WWE Blu-Rays. Shockingly enough, WWEShop.com was running a sale with a few Blu-Rays for $9.99, including the brand new Falls Count Anywhere set. So I got that, The Best of Raw and Smackdown 2011, The Best Pay-Per-View Matches of 2011 and The Best of Clash of the Champions, all for about $40 total. So that's 9 Blu-Ray discs worth of wrestling that I eventually got through in about a couple weeks. I wrote it off as a birthday present to myself...even though I also bought the video card for my computer soon thereafter.

Music

Honestly, I've been listening to the same stuff I talked about in my last blog entry, same exact CDs and all. I haven't made it out to my local used record store but I got bored while writing this blog entry so I did just that earlier today. I went there expecting to pick up the new Nachmystium album "Silencing Machine" thinking it came out this week but come to realize it comes out next week. Ah well, they've released enough tracks as previews that I feel like I've already heard most of it. So I ended up getting a used copy of "Reign Supreme" by Dying Fetus. I'm beginning to wonder if my shop has some sort of hook-up with Relapse Records or some guy just listens to them and trades them in immediately because the album just came out like a month ago. Last year, I was able to snag "used" copies of Exhumed and Fuck The Facts' new albums right after release. Ah well. Anyways, I've only listened to a few songs on the way home and it's typical Dying Fetus. Then again, I did kinda lose track and stop listening to them after "Stop At Nothing" and apparently I missed the albums where they experimented melody and whatnot so whatever.

Also, I bought WCW Slam Jam No. 1, a compilation of themes from early '90s WCW. This will make a good companion piece for Hulk Rules.

Oh, and I decided to make a Pet Shop Boys playlist on Pandora, even though I haven't even used Pandora in like a month. I've been hankering for '80s new wave, even though I have a Blaqk Audio station that kinda became that by default. But after hearing "It's A Sin" for the first time in years and then numerous times within a week, I figured it was a sign.

Books

Lest you think I'm some sort of heathen, I actually have been reading a little bit more lately. I'm finally getting to the bottom of my stack of books from when Borders closed last year. Right now I'm reading The War For Late Night by Bill Carter, about the whole debacle for The Tonight Show between Jay Leno and Conan O'Brian. But I've stopped reading that for the moment because it's just too damn long. Normally, I don't mind long books but the chapters are so big, they might as well be their own books. It's not a good book to just pick up and read on the toilet (which I usually do) so I end up taking multiple days to finish a chapter or I just have to sit down and force myself to finish it before bed or something like that.

And even though I've sworn off dating and thinking that there would be a girl for me somewhere out there, I decided to finish up The Art of War for Dating, mostly because it was an easier read for when I needed to shit. I'm so glad I'm giving up on dating because this book reminds me that most women aren't worth the trouble of going through all the crap we have to do to attract them. There was one example where a guy goes to his frat party, chats up this girl and they end up talking for hours because they got along so great, but when the girl left to go to the bathroom, she never came back. Instead, the guy found his dream girl giving one of his frat bros a handy. So instead of blaming the girl for being a trash bag ho, they blamed the guy for making a friend instead of sealing the deal by doing her or whatever. Again, not worth the trouble for me anymore. Leave me to my food, at least I know it loves me back.

Then I decided to pick up No Wonder My Parents Drank by Jay Mohr for cheap. When going to a new Chinese buffet in town only for it not to be open yet (or closed down already, maybe), I found myself walking around Big Lots in search of crap. I wanted some books about comedy so it was down to this or Tracy Morgan's book...or Hulk Hogan's book, but I wasn't looking for unintentional comedy. So I picked up Jay Mohr's book, being a bigger fan of his than of Tracy's. But unfortunately, the book is about having a kid and how magical the experience is and all that crap. Jay usually has some long-winded story about how his kid mispronounced a word or something but at least he's aware of how cheesy he comes off, remarking "What kind of a homo has this kid turned me into?" early on in the book. And there are some funny stores, but as a twenty-something who doesn't exactly plan on settling down and having kids anytime soon, it's not exactly my bag. But at least his bits about farting in public and blaming it on his kid are pretty funny.

Music I'm Listening To Right Now

2012-06-09T15:42:00.000-04:00

This entry is going to be a bit of a bonus, one I want to crank out really quickly. Not because I'm lazy (which I am) but because I want to get some exposure for what I'm listening to out there and I suck at writing music reviews (See my April Music Haul entry). I've been spending some of my free time and spare change at the local used record/music/game store and grabbed a few CDs because I'm still one of those losers that buys physical media. So here's what I've been cranking in my car for the past couple of weeks:

Calabrese - 13 Halloweens

Calabrese are a three-piece, all of whom are brothers, horror-punk outfit VERY influenced by The Misfits. I don't mean that as a negative or calling them a ripoff or anything like that. In fact if you do listen to the Misfits and not Calabrese, you are missing out. Calabrese definitely capture the magic that the original Danzig-era Misfits had that the current incarnations just can't recreate no matter how hard they try. Even if Danzig and Jerry Only were to set aside differences and reunite, too much time has passed that I don't think it would be the same. Calabrese have punk-rock and slight psychobilly tendencies but don't fall into the traps many of those other bands do. Sure, they may have Danzig "Evil Elvis" vocals and pompadours but don't employ a gothic pin-up girl or a stand-up bassist who may or may not be the same person. Every single song on this album will burrow into your brain and 13 Halloweens usually ends up being the album out of my current pile that I frequently go back to.

Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles (2010)

For the record, Crystal Castles have two albums, both of which are self-title which I can't tell is trolling or brilliance. This one is the second and wholly better of the two. Any long time readers may remember me talking about Crystal Castles as I've had this album downloaded (illegally) for a few years already. So I finally bought a copy, and a new one to boot. I try to support my favorite bands when I can and I don't even consider Crystal Castles a favorite, but they do deserve some recognition for what they're doing.

AFI - decemberunderground

Also another album I've had downloaded for a few years but finally got my own copy of. Though I like AFI, their more recent albums are more of a guilty pleasure of mine than a genuine like. Needless to say, I felt a bit weird buying this at the same time as the next album on my list.

Watain - Lawless Darkness

Yeah, buying straight up Satanic black metal along with some Hot Topic punk probably simultaneously built up and destroyed any metal cred I had. I've been wanting to give Watain a good listen for a while now and luckily someone had ended up trading in 3 of their albums. Lawless Darkness is their most recent and acclaimed album, hitting #2 on Decibel's Top 40 Albums list for 2010. Watain plays "TROO KVLT" black metal, ensuring that they'll have good company among the likes of Immortal and Mayhem, if nothing else in the "sounds like" category if not "belongs with".

Cattle Decapitation - Monolith of Inhumanity

I mentioned this one in my last blog post and I just picked it up a few days ago. I haven't listened to it a lot but I definitely like it. However, while the band itself is probably the best they've ever been technically (the drums are about as close as a human can get to Agoraphobic Nosebleed-level blast beats and Travis Ryan is still finding more layers to his vocals), the songs aren't as catchy and memorable as they were in early albums like To Serve Man and Humanure. But it's definitely worth a listen if you're a CatDecap or death/grind fan in general.

That's it. That's a glimpse into what I've been listening to for the past few weeks or so. I'm trying not to spend much money...but I just got back from a movie sale at the Family Video right by my apartment and bought Drive, Super and Horrible Bosses on Blu-Ray and Tetsuo The Bullet Man on DVD for like $23 total...and Blu-Ray Steelbooks for Batman Begins and The Matrix for $20. So yeah, I'm bad at this whole "not spending money" thing.

Blockbuster Closing Haul 2012 + Some Podcast News

2012-06-02T17:06:00.001-04:00

As I mentioned in my last post, the last Blockbuster store in Toledo closed down in May. As I've done before, I decided to get my hands on whatever I could. Unfortunately, that didn't really turn out to be a lot, at least not compared to the previous times that local stores have closed. I think maybe a part of it has to do with my upgrade to Blu-Ray, since I probably won't buy something on DVD unless there's no chance of it being on Blu-Ray. But I did get a decent sized and varied haul nevertheless.

Trip #1
Machete on Blu-Ray (New)
WWE Royal Rumble 2007 on DVD w/Blockbuster Exclusive Bonus Disc (Used)
WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2011 for XBox 360 (Used)

I had been waiting a long time to get Machete on Blu-Ray at a decent price, and I think I got this one for like 30% off of $25, so that might be the closest I'd ever get to "cheap". I've never seen Machete on Blu-Ray for sale and I don't know why because, oddly enough, there are little to no bonus features save for BD-Live features. There's a Digital Copy which I'll probably never use but, unlike most Digital Copies, I believe there's no expiration date on it. Also, there's a few Deleted Scenes and the Robert Rodriguez-standard Audience Reaction Track recorded at the Alamo Drafthouse. And that's it! There's not even a 10 Minute Cooking School from Rodriguez, which he normally does for every movie, save for Planet Terror but people complained enough that it ended up returning for the Grindhouse Blu-Ray. So I never understood why it's never been on sale if there's barely anything else to the package other than the movie itself.

A weird tidbit about Blockbuster, they reached a deal with the WWE so that they would include exclusive bonus discs with event DVDs during 2007, featuring bonus matches from Raw and Smackdown. And since they were rental only, they had limited production and were pretty rare. I was able to get one (No Way Out 2007) during one of the previous Blockbuster closings but missed my chance to get more. So I made sure to snag Royal Rumble (one of my favorite WWE events), even though it didn't come with a cover for the case. And after looking at the listings for the other bonus discs, RR '07 actually had the most matches for its bonus disc.

Also, I was able to get a hold of WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2011 but, beyond making a random hot goth-y chick in Create-A-Wrestler mode, I haven't done anything else with it. I imagine if I want some quick wrestling action, I'd pop in WWE All-Stars.

Trip #1 Total = Under $40

Trip #2
Chocolate on Blu-Ray (Used)
The Good The Bad The Weird on Blu-Ray (Used)
Piranha on Blu-Ray (Used)
WWE One Night Stand 2007 w/Blockbuster Exclusive Bonus Disc (Used)

I waited for a few weeks for the discounts to go down and by this time, I think everything was about $5, both DVDs and Blu-Rays. All of the Blu-Rays I've purchased were of DVDs I already owned an have since traded away. Oddly enough, the only one of them I've watched so far is Chocolate. Blockbuster sticks all their Blu-Rays into standard DVD cases so for some strange reason, OCD or something, I want to put them in regular Blu-Ray cases so they'll fit in with the rest of my collection. But I only need them for those 3 and I see them in like packs of 10. I don't need that many.

As for ONS '07, it was the only remaining WWE/Blockbuster exclusive DVD left at that point. I did want to get Wrestlemania 23 as the bonus disc for that show had the ECW Originals/New Blood eight-man tag match from ECW a few days after that was way better than the actual match that took place at Wrestlemania.

Trip #2 Total = $25

Trip #3
The 3 Musketeers on DVD (Used)
Hellbinders on DVD (Used)

A few weeks later, I made another trip and by this time, any decent Blu-Ray I wanted was gone. I think the only Blu-Ray I would've wanted was Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, but I already had that. So I ended up getting two cheap-o straight-to-DVD movies.

The 3 Musketeers isn't what you might think it is. You may think of swashbuckling and horses and candy bars, but no. This version of the literary classic comes from The Asylum studios, makers of such movies as Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus and Mega Piranha or "knock-busters" like Transmorphers, Almighty Thor, Paranormal Entity or American ~~Battleship~~ Warship. Asylum movies are pretty low-budget but are usually endearing enough to rise above their low-quality and venture into so-bad-it's-good territory...or at least be bad enough to laugh at. I can honestly say that The 3 Musketeers is the first Asylum movie that I've felt kinda "meh" on. That is to say, it's not quite bad (by Asylum standards meaning it's not god-awful) but not all that enjoyable either. Really, it's just your typical spy/espionage thriller where main characters just happen to be named after D'Artagnan and the 3 Musketeers for whatever reason. Here, the Musketeers are a special ops squad that are really just archetypical characters of nerdy hacker/joke-cracker, Asian guy who does flips and Butt-Kickin' Chick while D'Artagnan is an up-and-coming agent (played by a woman, by the way), who tries to help them out when they've been double-crossed. And believe me, people do get double-crossed a lot in this movie, but no more than any other spy movie. Really, I think they just copied and pasted this script out of every other secret agent.

Since it's Asylum, it's cheapness kinda shows (reusing the same helicopter for multiple helicopter shots, shoddy CGI, etc) but I think it's real shortcomings comes in the casting. Save for the Asian Guy That Does Flips, I think everyone else was just friends of the director. The Butt-Kickin' Chick doesn't really kick a whole lot of butt and doesn't seem to be in fighting shape. In fact, she's kinda bony. And the hacker character is supposed to be a nerd, yet is played by arguably the most handsome actor in the entire cast (yes, including Baywatch's David Chokachi, who is also in this movie). And when Asian Guy That Does Flips gets in a fistfight near the end with one of the main villains, the actor playing the villain looks old enough to pass for Abe Vigoda, so seeing this kung fu guy get his ass handed to him in a fistfight by someone pushing 70 really threw me off. The only real casting plus here is that of D'Artagnan played by Heather Hemmens. She's young, plucky, fierce, fit, sexy, anything you could want in a young strong female lead and I'd like to see her in more stuff, Asylum or not.

I also got a movie called Hellbinders which isn't from the Asylum but may as well be. In fact, I think this movie was probably made for cheaper than the average Asylum film. I mostly got it for the cover alone and the stars, Ray Park (aka freakin' Darth Maul, Toad from X-Men, Snake Eyes from GI Joe) and Johnny Yong Bosch, who was once a Power Ranger. In fact, this movie kinda plays like a Power Rangers-esque action show for an older audience. Park plays a Guy Ritchie-esque mercenary who inadvertently triggers the beginning of the Devil's takeover of Earth during a routine deal (though it's supposed to be his "last deal" so you know something's gonna go wrong) and ends up teaming up with an overly-brooding samurai that hunts "oni" wearing black leather and guy-liner (Bosch) and a super-strong Templar Knight who has lived thousands of years to help keep the Devil at bay.

On one hand, the movie can be sort of a mess due to its low-budget. There's CGI blood and muzzle flares, for starters. But the premise and story does have promise. I do like how these different belief systems between the Templar Knight fighting the devil and the oni-hunting samurai really do mean that they're fighting the same evil. And the main evil is that these evil souls/oni can possess any other body after their host body has been killed, however Ray Park's character literally does not have a soul (he lost it during a prior near-death experience) and can't be possessed, until he's turned into a "Soul Cage" that can trap all these souls and eliminate them before the Devil can accumulate more. Ok, I know the plot kinda sounds like a mess but that's the best way I can describe it. I mostly just wanted to see it for the fights, and they're not bad. Bosch does most of the fight-work here as Park's character is restricted mostly towards being a gun-toting gangster, which is kinda disappointing. But still, for a low-budget movie, it was ambitious, had decent action and had a decent, if confusing, story that I'd like to see continued. They did leave it open for a sequel if it ever gets made but I'd almost like to see it as some form of webseries. I think it would work.

Trip #3 Total = $5

Trip #4
The Grand on DVD (Used)
Tony Hawk's American Wasteland for PS2 (Used)

This was my final trip, about a day or two before the store finally closed for good. Needless to say, there wasn't much left worth getting and everything was knocked down super-cheap, save for other non-movie stuff like posters or video game stuff, which never seemed to go down. I had my eye on the strategy guide to Dragon Age II but it never went lower than 10% off, which still made it like $20. No dice. I also wanted a Kim Kardashian poster and I was willing to pay $10 for it, but I wasn't exactly willing to be seen carrying it to my car.

Anyway, the only movie I could find to grab was The Grand, a predominantly improvised movie in the vein of the Christopher Guest films, but instead directed by Zak Penn, who mostly writes blockbuster comic book movies. The Grand is about a poker tournament with a cast including Woody Harrelson, David Cross, Chris Parnell, Dennis Farina, Cheryl Hines, Ray Romano and...Werner Herzog? Yep. And from what I read on IMDB, there were only about 20 pages of actual dialogue in the script, meaning that just about everything else was improv'd on set.

Plus, I decided to pick up Tony Hawk's American Wasteland since I traded in my Collector's Edition copy a while ago back when I used Goozex. I don't know if I'll dust off my PS2 anytime soon to play it but I consider Wasteland to be the last "good" Tony Hawk game. Most other gamers will probably stop at Pro Skater 3 or 4 or maybe Underground at the latest. But I stayed with the franchise up until Wasteland and enjoyed myself the whole time. But that was mostly because I was still playing on a last-gen system and by the time they were putting out Project 8 or Proving Ground on the current generation, the PS2 ports were an afterthought and sucked horribly. Then Ride and Shred came along and kinda closed the lid on the Tony Hawk franchise...at least until the downloadable version combining the first two games comes out soon.

Trip #4 Total = $1.50

There you go. Not really that big of a haul but I did get four Blu-Rays, five DVDs and two video games for like $70 overall, so that's not too bad. Honestly, I had a bigger haul elsewhere after Trip #3, where I went to the Best Buy across the street where they were having a sale on select WWE Blu-Rays and managed to snag the Best of Smackdown 2009-2010, Best PPV Matches of 2009-2010 and Royal Rumble 2012 for $25 total.

Before I wrap this up, I want to let you in on some potentially big news. I've been out of podcasting for a while now but recently made my return on an edition of the Smart Ass Podcast, formerly the Steve Wherry Comedy Podcast, which you can listen to here.

Podcast Powered By Podbean

However, that's not even the big news. While still it's still early and the site is still under construction (though you can visit it), we have plans to expand the Smart Ass Podcast into something bigger, possibly its own network of podcasts. If that's the case, there may be a good possibility that I may have a podcast (or two) of my own to talk about. Stay tuned for news as it comes. Until then, make sure to like the Smart Ass Podcast on Facebook.

Finally, I want to plug the Humble Indie Bundle as I've never seen a bundle of games as packed as this. I'm not a huge PC gamer and I'm not even sure my PC can run some of the games in the bundle but I bought it almost immediately. You not only get Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Limbo, Bastion and Psychonauts but also Bastion if you pay more than the average (which is currently sitting at under $8, which is what I personally paid), not to mention soundtracks for all five games! And considering these are some of the best indie games ever, they're worth plunking down money even if the money didn't already go to charity.

So that's probably what I'll be doing until I have something worth writing about again. Nash out.

The April Music Haul

2012-05-05T17:53:00.000-04:00

Alright, so this entry might be a bit short as it'll only be focusing on the music I bought during April. The closing Blockbuster Video store is still open for a few more weeks so I'll wait until then for a final tally before I write about that. But I surprisingly bought quite a bit of CDs for a good price (yes, people actually purchase physical media still) so here's a look at the stuff I've been listening to as of late.

Technically, I bought most of this stuff at the end of March so I could've fit it in my March haul but decided against it, especially since I'm not the greatest describer of the music I listen to anyway. When I checked my email in the last couple days of March, I got one from The Omega Order, a mail-order distribution that specializes in metal and is the main distribution for the label The End Records, who include some of my favorite bands like Mindless Self Indulgence and Dir en grey in their roster of bands. Normally, I tend to pass over these emails so as not to blow all my money, so much so that they've made their way into my spam folder. But this time they were running a special April Fool's sale that I couldn't turn down: 70% OFF the entire order and a free random t-shirt. The Omega Order run pretty good sales every so often but this is the best I've ever seen. And I mostly wanted to see what random shirt I would get. Would I get a badass Darkthrone logo shirt or would I get some random corny hair metal band shirt?

I ended up getting a shirt from the band Early Man. It took a few minutes to figure out the logo and realize the design on it was two sharks and not some weird tribal facepaint but it'll be a cool thing to wear every once in a while and see if any other metalhead notices. (It's the same design showcased in the YouTube video below and the cover for their "Beware The Circling Fin" EP.) As for the band themselves, Early Man reminds me of The Sword, only more thrash oriented, and come fully recommended by me.

Now onto the actual CDs, the first one was Dir en grey's live CD/DVD titled "UROBOROS - with the proof in the name of the living...". I'm a big fan of DEG but I've kinda been on the fence when it comes to their live shows. Singer Kyo's voice can do a lot of things on record that he can't necessarily achieve live on a regular basis so it can be a bit disappointing to listen to. And even then, live shows are meant to be seen, not just listen to. Thankfully this comes with a DVD of their 2-hour long show at Nippon Budokan on 1/10/10. The DVD has twice as many songs but there are a few songs on the CD that aren't on the DVD so it warrants a listen but the way it's edited is so disjointed with no flow between songs that it's only worth listening to about once. The live DVD, however, is great. Focusing mostly on the Uroboros album, the first half of the concert is rather mellow and subdued but just when you think you've been lulled into a false sense of security, they ramp up the intensity and throw some older songs into the mix. And with light show and video screens, I'd take this show over a stoned-out Tool concert anyday.

Then I got "Don't Say We Didn't Warn You" by Does It Offend You, Yeah? Anyone who read my last blog post knows I had just gotten their first album "You Have No Idea What You're Getting Yourself Into" and it's kinda more of the same, but better. I don't really know how to explain it, there are a few songs that are more techno-y, some that are more slow and thought-out, and one that sounds like they stole it directly from Muse. Either way, they're still one of the more energizing bands I have in my personal collection and I'd suggest them to anybody who wants something that should be on pop radio but isn't.

The final album I bought was "Agorapocalypse" by Agoraphobic Nosebleed. Again, in my last haul, I bought another album of theirs, their second "Frozen Corpse Stuffed With Dope" but since then the grindcore gods have released numerous EPs and splits, upgraded their drum machine, added a female vocalist (who kills, by the way) and wrote longer songs. Now, doing a three minute song might not be that big of a deal but when your band's average song before that point is about 30 seconds or less, being able to maintain that same level of blast beats and brutality for a longer period of time takes a lot of work. It's like having sex at a fast pace but still trying to last longer. In that regard, Agorapocalypse is the Tantra of grindcore.

Recently, MetalSucks.net declared Scott Hull as the #1 Modern Metal Drummer despite, you know, not actually playing the drums. Lots of metal fans were quite butthurt but I thought it was a ballsy move. Agoraphobic Nosebleed's drum tracks simply can't be played by a human drummer. A half-human, half-octopus drummer possibly, but not by a person. And due to the advancement of technology, Scott Hull has somehow made the impossible possible. But on the other side of the coin, the allure to an Agoraphobic Nosebleed track is that it's not possible to be played, and when it sounds possible, that allure is missing. The drum tracks sound so real that you almost forget that they're actually not, which is an achievement but then you tend to take them for granted when you're not quite paying attention. I don't know, maybe that's just me. But I will say that's literally the ONLY gripe I have with Agorapocalypse. And naming Scott Hull as metal's current top drummer is way better than Spin naming Skrillex the 100th greatest guitarist of all time. Seriously Spin, you really don't know 100 people that play a guitar?

In the end, I got 3 CDs and a t-shirt from The Omega Order for the grand total of...$15 AFTER shipping. That's insane! It was practically $3 a CD before shipping. I was tempted to buy more but I'm kinda glad I stopped myself when I did.

But that's not all. Later on in the month, I ended up getting another CD from my local used record/game/movie store in the form of "Morbid Destitution of Covenant" by Father Befouled. I mostly got the album by name value alone, remembering it from a bunch of year-end Best Of lists for 2010 and ended up liking it, as Father Befouled sound mostly like a slowed-down doom-y version of Mortician. It's standard '80s-style death metal, in all honesty. And I only spent $5 on it for a new copy, mostly because I traded in a few DVDs for store credit and couldn't find anything else I particularly wanted that day.

So there you have it. I'm going to have to restrain myself more, especially now that I just realized the new Cattle Decapitation album "Monolith of Humanity" comes out in just a couple days. I also want to pick up "Silentium Amoris", the new album from William Control, but I believe the only way to buy it is directly from him off the web as he doesn't have a record label this time around, so it'll probably be a little while before I get my hands on that.

Oh yeah, in non-music stuff, I bought Iron Monkey on Blu-Ray for $5 at Wal-Mart. Because it's Iron Monkey and it was $5. I almost want to see if Iron Monkey 2 would ever get a Blu-Ray release, considering it's quite possibly the worst martial arts film I've ever seen. And believe me, I've seen some stinkers.

The Random Ass-Haul For March 2012

2012-04-21T19:06:00.001-04:00

I think the magic YouTube fairies were trying to tell me to stop doing these "Haul" videos when had to record the video for March twice and both times screwed up. The first time, I had issues with my microphone and it was adding scrambled sounds in the middle of it. Then the second time, which I didn't get a chance to record until about two weeks later, the battery in my camera died halfway into filming. I really didn't want to do the whole process for a third time, hence my main reasoning behind bringing back Sarcasmatron by writing these up instead.

First of all comes my ordeal with Wherehouse.com. If you watched my February haul video, you heard me talk about a site called Wherehouse.com where I decided to trade in a bunch of DVDs that I had recently upgraded to Blu-Ray. The trade-in values were roughly double that anyone else was offering but unlike most other sites, I had to pay for my own shipping to send them my package, which ended up being about $9. Anyways, I ended up with about $25-$30 of credit and here's what I got with it.

First of all, I got a few CDs, coming to another reason I'm writing up these reviews. For whatever reason, it was really hard for me to describe about music, not to mention music that's not particularly mainstream. I wanted to edit in musical clips as a sample but my editing skills suck, not to mention I'm actually using a Slideshow program to edit my videos considering it was the only free program I could find that could playback and edit the .mp4 format that my camera records in without any issues. In fact, the couple week stint between recording my first and second attempts was spent looking for better editing software, which I couldn't find. But doing music "reviews" this way, I technically don't even have to talk about it at all. I can just post some YouTube links and let the music speak for itself.

Does It Offend You, Yeah? - You Have No Idea What You're Getting Yourself Into

Arsonists Get All The Girls - The Game of Life

Now if I may get on a nitpicky side-tangent, a big reason I probably won't use Wherehouse.com again is the fact that they put stickers on their used products. Now normally, I don't have too big of a problem if I can take them off with some Goo Gone or whatever but these stickers I could not get the left behind residue off no matter how hard I tried. On the jewel cases, it's not as big of an issue but with the Does It Offend You Yeah CD that comes in a bright green cardboard folded case, I now have a spot covered in dirt and hair from when I had it in my car for about two weeks. I know, it probably shows more about how clean I don't keep my car but still. And the thing that really burns me is that they usually repackage and shrink-wrap their used items...but they'll put the stickers on first. Why don't they do it the other way around so I don't have to deal with them? Whatever. Onto the rest of the list.

I also bought a new copy of the movie The Machine Girl on Blu-Ray, which in turn screwed up me getting this stuff any cheaper with the Buy 3 Get The 4th Free on used products, but that's my own damn fault. Anyways, I originally had gotten Machine Girl on DVD (surprisingly from Wal-Mart soon after it came to the States, of all places) but Tokyo Shock/Media Blasters are notorious for double/triple-dipping and soon after released an "Ultimate" version with a disc of bonus features and I think was also in a Steelbook packaging. Luckily, the Blu-Ray version includes this disc...but still on DVD. Whatever, at least the movie and some of the bonus features are on the Blu-Ray and look damn fine. I'd talk more in length about the movie but why do that when I can post the trailer?

The final item in my Wherehouse.com order was Borderlands Game of the Year Edition for XBox 360. I have a bit of history with this game as I had bought it new from GameStop for just $20 about a year ago. Awesome price, for sure. But when I pre-ordered Saints Row The Third, Best Buy was running a promotion where they add a 50% bonus as long as you pre-order. So I turned it in and actually MADE money off of it, getting like $28 for it. In fact, I got so much credit for my games that I wasn't only able to get Saints Row The Third...but a Blu-Ray player as well! I didn't get a chance to play Borderlands much and still wanted the game, particularly the GOTY Edition but no one was running a sale as good as that previous GameStop sale. So when I had my Wherehouse credit to spend, I bit on this, even though they were selling it for like $40 used. Yup, horribly overpriced but I had credit to offset it. It wouldn't have been that bad if it weren't a week or two after I got my package, GameStop decided to sell it again for $20 new. And the week after that, Best Buy also had it on sale. *sigh* Well, at least I don't have to worry about getting that game again.

In the end, after credit and shipping and whatnot, I spent close to $40 on those for items. In the end, I can't really recommend Wherehouse.com. Their trade-in values are good but you have to pay for shipping. They use the post office for shipping, which is fine if your postman is reliable (mine aren't because apparently apartment mailboxes confuse them), but they don't give you any tracking numbers, making it one of the few places I've bought from that use USPS but not tracking numbers. Their used products are in good condition but they put stickers on them that you can't take off. Their used games prices are horrible but everything else is decent. If you want to get a Blu-Ray from them, it's going to be hard to find as they don't have that section organized nearly as well as their DVD section. You just gotta look at the list, hope you find something you want and hope they actually have it in stock. All in all, I doubt I'll ever use that site again.

With March being Wrestlemania season, I ended up picking up a few wrestling DVDs. By the way, don't get me started on talking about this year's Wrestlemania (*cough*18 seconds*cough*) but I will say it was better than last year's, though not by a whole lot. Anyways, I started out by getting The Undertaker's Deadliest Matches at Toys R Us for $13. I don't think that's some sort of huge deal, I mostly just bought it because they had a few WWE DVD sets in stock and this was the only one of the ones provided that I didn't already have, plus I didn't want to go in just to buy a $3 camera case on clearance. I haven't been a huge Undertaker fan for years now but I've been jonesing for some early '90s stuff and that was when I liked Undertaker the most. This set has plenty of matches from that era, particularly the infamous Boiler Room Brawl against Mankind at Summerslam and a match before that between the two at King of the Ring. Those two matches alone are worth buying the DVD set for. Oddly enough, they completely ignore the American Badass-era Undertaker, which is fine by me because I never liked him. But it is kinda odd that they just skip a good five years without any matches. Not to mention when Taker came back to being The Deadman, he had some silly feuds like the Concrete Crypt Match against the Dudley Boys and the whole thing with The Great Khali, so those matches aren't all that great. But with matches against Mr. Kennedy, Randy Orton and Batista, quality of matches gets better by the end of the set. I'd probably recommend it more if I were a bigger Undertaker fan but it still a good set.

A few days later, I went to Wal-Mart and bought a two-pack of The Twisted Disturbed Life of Kane and Satan's Prison (aka the Elimination Chamber anthology) for $10. Six discs for $10 is a hell of a deal. The thing is I keep hearing that Wal-Mart is stocking all these wrestling DVDs but when I go to my local stores (I live smack dab between two Super Wal-Marts about 5 minutes in each direction), they never have them. There were supposed to be more two-packs for sale for Wrestlemania season and one of the stores even had one of the endcaps decorated for the sale, but didn't have the DVDs in stock, instead filling the endcap with a bunch of random crap. Not to mention Wal-Mart seemingly refuses to carry the Blu-Ray versions of anything WWE, save for the new Rock set.

Anyway, rant over. I actually had already bought the Kane set previously in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart but it was in a standard DVD case, unlike the original folded cardboard cover which I kinda wanted to have. However, since the two sets were shrinkwrapped together and the Kane set packaging is slimmer than the typical WWE DVD set, it kinda got beat up a bit. Ah well. As for Satan's Prison, it collects all the Elimination Chamber matches to have taken place up through 2010. Yes, even the abysmal ECW December To Dismember match. Oddly enough, I already have Elimination Chamber 2011 on Blu-Ray and I heard the Chamber matches from this year's PPV weren't all that great so really I have all the Chamber matches that matter. If you can find this bundle, definitely pick it up on value alone.

Finally, I got a few things at GameStop, even going so far as to trade in some games. Normally, I'd never trade in at GameStop due to their abysmal values but they were running a 50% bonus credit promotion, which they almost never due. And even then, I probably wouldn't have done it if I hadn't gotten a copy of Call of Duty: Black Ops from my buddy who I recently bought my 360 off of. I'm not a CoD fan and I don't play online anyways so there was no real reason for me to play so I decided to trade it in. The thing was I only had the disc, no case or manual. I figured I'd get docked for not having it, just enough to offset the 50% bonus. I don't know if it was supposed to happen but I did end up getting full trade-in value plus the 50% bonus, giving me like $24. After trading in a few other games, I had like $40 in credit. So I ended up getting WWE All-Stars used and Fallout 3 Game of the Year Edition new, and only paid $12 of my own money.

I always wanted to give All-Stars a try and I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm digging the arcade-y and flashy style and it lends itself well towards playing with friends. In fact, for a pre-Wrestlemania party, I brought my N64 with the legendary THQ/AKI games that my friends and I grew up with and All-Stars and we ended up playing All-Stars more. However, I am kinda stuck in it right now because they still haven't quite figured out to have a steel cage match in a video game where the computer can easily beat you, despite you having practically murdered them throughout the match. It seems to always go like this: I beat my opponent to "obliviacry" (Copyright Shane Douglas) and leave him for dead, go to climb the cage, opponent pops right back up like nothing happened, throws me off, climbs the cage, somehow I can't get up fast enough to throw them off, they win. Weak.

As for Fallout 3, I'll go on record that it might be my favorite game of the current generation. So it was nice to have the GOTY edition back. And though I didn't even really notice until after I bought it, somehow I got a "Gamestop exclusive" edition that comes packaged with posters. One of them is a map of the Capital Wasteland, which isn't that big of deal. But the other poster is called "Faces of Vault Boy", a group photo of all the Vault Boy pictures in your Pip-Boy whenever you level up and get a perk or whatever. If it weren't all folded up to fit inside the case, I'd proudly frame it and hang it up on my wall.

And that's all for March, but there'll definitely be more haul articles soon, especially now that the last brick-and-mortar Blockbuster Video store in Toledo is closing down. Stay tuned.

Dear Diarrhea...

2012-04-21T14:15:00.005-04:00

Whelp, I'm back...I guess. I know I haven't posted anything in about six months, let alone anything all that substantial in longer than that. But after an ill-fated experiment on YouTube, I figured I'd resurrect Sarcasmatron, though whether or not it'll be full-time remains to be seen.

Basically, I tried to do video reviews or "haul" videos of whatever movies or games I got that particular month. I keep seeing all these girls going "Tee hee, look at all these clothes and makeup I got!" and thought to myself "I'm sure someone would want to know my point of view on movies and such". So I tried it out for a few months and found out it's really not for me, at least not in this point in time. Mostly, I wait to record the videos when my roommates are out of the apartment so I can go all out and not get embarrassed. But since I record them in my room, it gets hot and stuffy in there really quick. Then I'll edit them since my YouTube account still doesn't allow for videos longer than 10 minutes for whatever reason but usually I'm lazy so I don't get around to editing for at least a week after filming. So really, it's at least a couple of weeks to do one video. If I had more time or, mostly, more motivation I'd be able to crank these videos out faster but I don't. So I plan on bringing those "hauls" back in written form here on Sarcasmatron, amongst other things.

I've also decided that I'd treat Sarcasmatron a bit as my own personal blog. I wanted to stray away from that sort of thing, believing that people really didn't care about how I felt. But since people don't really care about what I have to say about anything, I guess it doesn't really matter. Seriously though, I wanted to keep Sarcasmatron as a "professional" review site but since I still have the Freakin' Awesome Network for that, Sarcasmatron has since fallen by the wayside. So really, Sarcasmatron will be more of an "exclusive content" site full of stuff that I feel won't exactly quite fit in with FAN.

Speaking of FAN, that too has fallen by the wayside a bit. Since I'm focusing on stand-up comedy, my articles for FAN haven't been as frequent. I got burnt out trying to maintain the Wrestling With Extra Sleaze articles so I decided to change gears and write about another one of my passions, heavy metal music, in a monthly article called This Month In Metal. But I had trouble keeping up with that too, mostly due to the fact that I was simply cut-and-pasting album release dates and commenting on them. Hence, if nothing came out that I didn't have a comment for, then I didn't have a decent article. So I decided to start 4R, which stands for Ryan's Random Rants and Reviews. Basically, I get to write about what I want when I want. So far I've reviewed Saints Row The Third, tried to get my YouTube "haul" videos past as an article and also wrote a scathing half-serious editorial about the controversy surrounding the Mass Effect 3 ending.

As for stand-up comedy, that's going fairly well. I took a bit of a break recently to film a small part in a movie that happened to be filming mostly during my regular stand-up shows. But now with summer coming and club business being slow for the season, our usual showcase shows will be on hiatus. So I'll definitely be looking for some stage time soon and will post the videos of sets that don't suck up on YouTube.

So yeah, that's pretty much where I'm at now. In short, keep an eye out on this space. There probably won't be regular content here like I had originally intended a long, long time ago, but I'll try to post some things worth reading. Stay tuned.

The Final Borders Haul

2011-09-12T19:31:00.000-04:00

So as you probably know by now, Borders has finally closed, or at least is almost closed, by now. My local store's last day was last Thursday and I decided to pop my head in one last time on Wednesday. Pretty much everything else was wiped out but a few hundred books, and quite a few mangas surprisingly enough. DVDs, Blu-Rays, CDs and graphic novels were completely gone. I was quite shocked how quickly everything was gone because I had gone a week or so before and they still had quite a few Blu-Rays. Then when I went back for my second-to-last trip, they were down to about 15, 20 tops. By then, the only movie I was interested in getting was Die Hard. There were still a few DVDs here and there at that time, and I just about snagged the recent 10th Anniversary Edition of Audition for pretty cheap but held off, since I already own the previous release and if I were to upgrade it would be to Blu-Ray. But for the last visit, nothing of importance was left. Though, by that point they were getting rid of books by making them a $1 each so I managed to snag a few things of slight interest and one thing I was super-psyched at finding...though now I'm getting ahead of myself. I know I already posted a list last time but it kinda got buried under all that stuff so here's the final list:

Blu-Rays
Zombieland
Kick-Ass
Ong Bak 2
Inglourious Basterds
Crank 2: High Voltage
Tropic Thunder: Director's Cut
Dawn of the Dead (Original)
American Psycho
Die Hard

DVD
Knightriders
David Cross - Bigger and Blackerer

Books
My Custom Van by Michael Ian Black
My Year of Flops by Nathan Rabin
The Big Rewind by Nathan Rabin
You Might Be A Zombie from the Editors of Cracked.com
The Rough Guide to Cult Movies
Dreamseller by Brandon Novak with Joseph Frantz
Mr. Funny Pants by Michael Showalter
The Art of War for Dating by Eric Rogell
Countdown to Lockdown by Mick Foley
I Only Roast The Ones I Love by Jeffrey Ross
Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan by Jake Adelstein
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Zombie Jim by Mark Twain and W. Bill Czolgosz
The War For Late Night: When Leno Went Early and Television Went Crazy by Bill Carter

Music
Mastodon - Live at the Aragon CD/DVD
How To Destroy Angels EP
Louis CK - Hilarious

Graphic Novels
RED by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner
The Adventures of Dr. McNinja: Night Powers by Christopher Hastings

Miscellaneous
Fangoria Magazine Issue #305
Decibel Magazine Issue #82
Poster Hanger x4

I'm not 100% sure what the final total was for all this stuff. Looking at the receipts I kept track of (mostly the ones I used my debit card on), those only totaled up to $41. I know my first couple trips, where things were only about 30%-40% off, I spent about $40-$50 at a time, mostly buying movies and the occasional book. I'm going to guess my final tally was about $150 or so, which is pretty damn good considering what all I got. Hell, on the last trip where everything had to go, I only spent $6 on 4 books and 4 poster hangers. Sweet deal. One of those was the book I Only Roast The Ones I Love by comedian Jeffrey Ross. Oddly enough, throughout all the previous sales, I usually went straight to the Humor section for books since they had some of the biggest discounts and I really wanted to get some books to help out my stand-up comedy, yet I didn't see this book until the second to last day where it was the only humor-related book left (unless you count The Situation's book, where the only humorous thing about it is the fact that he can read, let alone write). Even though my style of comedy doesn't involve roasting people (not yet anyways), I still think it'll help me develop my style in the end.

There were a few disappointments, namely the fact that I waited so long for Chris Jericho's Undisputed to drop down more, only for it to get sold. And out of that frustration, I ended up buying Mick Foley's Countdown To Lockdown, only to realize they had a ton of copies in stock to the point that they still had like 30 of them left when they dropped all books down to $1. I only spent $10 on it but still. Also, there was still a copy of Nathan Rabin's The Big Rewind left by the end but considering it was already in the bargain bin to begin with and I only spent like $3 on it, I probably could have gotten it for like 50 cents or something. And for the longest time, there was still a copy of Michael Ian Black's My Custom Van left even though it was the first book I bought in the sale. I probably could have held out longer for that one but what the hell. All in all, I'm pretty glad with what I got. I've already gone through all my movies but now I have like 12 books to last me all through the Winter, probably longer considering how often I really read.

In other news, I recently hit my One Year Anniversary in doing Stand-Up Comedy this September 1st. I don't exactly consider it a full-year since the original location for Open Mics closed down a few months later and moved to Bowling Green, which I didn't want to drive to in the Winter, so I literally did nothing for those couple of months. But still, I started out a year ago and I'm still here and that's what matters. I believe I mentioned it in one of my previous blog entries but I've entered in the Best of the Midwest Amateur Comedy Competition on September 30th at Grumpy Dave's Pub in Bowling Green, so I hope to be celebrating my first year by making it a win, or at least making a name for myself. I plan to do something comedy-related in my next blog post, whenever that may be, so be on the lookout for that. Also, I went to last week's Smackdown taping in Toledo. I thought about doing a live report like I did with the live Raw show last year but I decided to hold that off in an article for the Freakin' Awesome Network, where I compare the live experience to the final televised product. Unfortunately, I haven't even started on it but it shouldn't be too hard to crank out. If I have tomorrow off of work (which I should), I'll probably have it done and it'll be up in the next few days.

And that's it for now because I have to drop a monster dook. Nash out!

Podcast. Also, why no podcasts?

2011-08-27T19:02:00.003-04:00

So, yeah, I realized I haven't updated this in about a month...because I'm lazy. Well, really I'm not, I just don't have much to show for it. For one, I've been focusing more on my comedy, but still just doing Open Mics (for now, more on that later). Also, I've kinda dropped the ball on my writing for the Freakin' Awesome Network. Though I have started a monthly feature called This Month In Metal, I've dropped the ball lately on my normal weekly feature Wrestling With Extra Sleaze. Even though I've only done it for about a month or two, I feel like I'm already burnt out on the subject matter, kinda like my friend who decided to write her college thesis on Nazi propaganda films and didn't quite realize "Hey, I'm going to be doing nothing but research on the worst people that ever lived for the next few years." Only with me, it was like "Hey, I'm going to be nothing but watching the worst wrestling that's ever wrestled...even though I've been doing that already, but now I have to write about it!" Obviously, I haven't been able to update this here blog and therefore I decided to shut down (or at least un-publish) the Facebook page for it so, if you haven't already, "Like" my Writing/Comedy page if you want to continue getting updates. Also, my chances to go to GenCon this year and become an extra for The Avengers movie fell through, so there's that.

And now, podcasts. I have actually recorded a couple podcasts of my own but didn't feel like they were good enough to be released. Basically I had just recorded myself ranting about nothing in particular...twice. So for the time being, I'm going to hold off on doing more podcasts until I can settle on a format that's entertaining. But until then, there is a podcast I did make an appearance on that I can plug... I made a recent appearance on my buddy Steve Wherry's Comedy Podcast this past week. I feel like podcasts usually come off better when I'm not talking to myself, so here I am with a few other comics. For my own podcast, I'm debating recording my stand-up sets and posting those but haven't completely decided. But as for my future possible career in comedy, I do have a major contest coming up. There's no Facebook event page I can link to yet but I can give you some details. If you're in the Bowling Green area, the Best of the Midwest Amateur Comic Competition will be at Grumpy Dave's Pub (above the Easy Street Cafe) on September 29 at 9:30. I'll be in a pool of 15 other comics and I know half of them, who I know are very funny, so my competition will be stiff.

So what else have I been doing other than comedy? Well...STORE CLOSINGS BOOYAH!!

As you might have heard, all Borders locations are closing. A few months ago, they had closed a few locations but the Toledo one was safe...until recently when the company wasn't able to get anyone to buy them out so they had to close all locations. It's been a few weeks but currently the sales are up to 50% to 70% off. I've been there like five times within the past few weeks so I'm probably going to be missing a few things and some of them I think I mentioned on my last podcast but here's the complete haul (so far):

Blu-Rays
Zombieland
Kick-Ass
Ong Bak 2
Inglourious Basterds
Crank 2: High Voltage
Tropic Thunder: Director's Cut
Dawn of the Dead (Original)
American Psycho
*Fun Fact: I actually previously owned all those movies on DVD (save for maybe Ong Bak 2 but I do have that on a burned DVD). Yup, I became one of those people.

DVD
Knightriders
David Cross - Bigger and Blackerer

Books
My Custom Van by Michael Ian Black
My Year of Flops by Nathan Rabin
The Big Rewind by Nathan Rabin
You Might Be A Zombie from the editors of Cracked.com
The Rough Guide to Cult Movies
Dreamseller by Brandon Novak with Joseph Frantz
Mr. Funny Pants by Michael Showalter

Music
Mastodon - Live at the Aragon CD/DVD
How To Destroy Angels EP
Louis CK - Hilarious

Also, I got an issue of Decibel and an issue of Fangoria. I don't know how much money I've spent so far, but on my last two trips, where I got roughly half of that list, I only spent like $75. So I'm guessing maybe like $100 or $125 for all that swag. Pretty good so far, but I have been spending more money than I should be so hopefully once Borders finally closes, all this crap will hold me over through the winter.

Also, I bought DJ Hero 2 for the Wii for $10, game AND turntable. And I'm actually having a ton of fun with it right now. I like it a lot more than the Guitar Hero series but that's not saying a whole lot considering the GH franchise went downhill fast. But a part of it might like it better than the Rock Band series as well. My lack of musical talent forces me to play video games with plastic instruments to get the illusion of playing music, but I can't quite fool myself into thinking I'm doing more than pushing buttons in time to the rhythm. However, with DJ Hero 2, I do get the feeling that I'm mixing together a track when I'm doing it right. It was kinda weird that I played it at first and was only getting like 2 or 3 stars on each track, so I didn't play it for a few days, but when I picked it back up suddenly I was getting 4 or 5 songs on each track. There was no gradual improvement, I just suddenly went from being eh to being awesome. It just seemed to come to me. So if you have a chance, I definitely recommend DJ Hero, at least the sequel as I haven't played the first one, even if you already have too many plastic instruments.

PS - Watch Party Down.

Sarcasmatron Audio Time Go! #4 - Birthday Bad Movie Blowout Bonanza

2011-07-25T14:38:00.000-04:00

Wa-hey! I have a podcast! I believe it's the longest one I've done thus far (on my own, at least) but really it's just me talking about what movies I've acquired recently. Most of them suck. But I also got my own Blu-Ray player so I talk a bit about how that's only going to make my movie buying habits even worse. Also, I checked out Captain America: The First Avenger and gave it a mini-review.

So here it is!

Download Link (Right Click - Save As)

A few things before I go:

I did decide to take a trip to Borders this morning (as the podcast was recorded yesterday) but didn't get a whole lot. Deals on books are pretty "meh" right now. On average, most of them are only 20% off, some are 10% while a few are 30% but that's all. So really, if you take into account the markup that Borders normally puts on their stuff, chances are you could still get the same thing for cheaper off of Amazon. Surprisingly enough, Blu-Rays were 40% off while DVDs were only 20% off. I'm thinking they must want to get rid of them quickly, especially considering they don't have a whole lot to begin with. So that brings the average Blu-Ray disc down to about $20 right now, but I managed to snag Zombieland for $15. Sweet. Here's what I got from my first Borders haul:

Zombieland on Blu-Ray
Knightriders on DVD
My Custom Van by Michael Ian Black
Latest issue of Decibel magazine

Total: $41

Not too shabby but I'm going to wait a week or two before I go back. There were still a few things I wanted but not really worth paying that much for, even with the current discounts.

Also, I got my Amazon order today, which was the International Cut of Red Cliff on Blu-Ray, which I believe I said was 4 hours long on the podcast but the sticker on it says 5 hours (yikes!), and Writing Movies For ~~Fun And~~ Profit by Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant. So now I own books written by over a quarter of the cast from The State. Could've been more had I picked up Michael Showalter's book at Borders today but I'll pick that up later if they still have it.

Finally, I'm thinking about deleting the Facebook page for Sarcasmatron. Considering my Writing/Comedy page also posts links to the blog and much more, having a page just for the blog is kinda redundant and dumb. I realize there's only like 5 of you who have liked the Sarcasmatron page and not my Writing/Comedy page so if you want to keep up to date on the blog and my writing stuff (as well as comedy appearances if you're in the Toledo/BG area), then I suggest you make the move to my other Facebook page. I have it linked in the sidebar but just in case I don't, here's a link instead.

Have a fun!

Song Credits
Intro Song: Dying Fetus - Schematics
Outro Song: Alan Menken - Star Spangled Man

Content Free July?

2011-07-02T15:52:00.000-04:00

Sorry about the lack of podcasts recently...or anything really. That is unless you've frequented the Freakin' Awesome Network where I've been continuing my Wrestling With Extra Sleaze column. But other than that, I haven't done a damn thing, and it doesn't look like it's going to get any better for the rest of this month here at Sarcasmatron. Last week, I didn't feel like doing much at all. No podcasts, no stand-up comedy, no nothing. And now it seems like what free time I have to write or do whatever (namely the weekends) is being taken up by other things. For instance, this weekend, I'm not even doing anything for the July 4th holiday. However, I will be house/dogsitting for friends and I don't really feel comfortable writing on other people's equipment. Hell, I barely get motivated to do it on my own equipment. Then next weekend, not only will it be my birthday but I'll also be attending the Glass City Con here in Toledo, which I may be covering for FAN as well. Then the weekend after that, I'll be heading to Cleveland with a few members of the V1kM crew as they'll be filming scenes for The Avengers there. They're actually having a casting call too so we may end up in the movie, even if it just as random extras for a crowd scene. Still, either way it should be fun. But after that, things should be settled down and hopefully I'll have some podcasts ready to go at least. That's it for now, gotta go watch a dog.

PS - RIP Random Hero

A Podcast That Isn't Mine But I'm On It So There

2011-06-16T20:17:00.000-04:00

Sorry about the lack of podcasts lately. Usually the only chance I have to record are weekends and though I could have recorded one, I was having a depression pity-party and didn't feel like doing much of anything. And this weekend I probably won't have a chance to record a podcast since I will be away visiting family at home. But (un)luckily for you, you won't remain podcast-less tonight as I made a guest appearance on the Steve Wherry Comedy Podcast, which was recorded last night.

Here ya go, bastids.

So...that's it. I'm lazy.

Sarcasmatron Audio Time Go #3 - Skanxxx

2011-06-05T10:45:00.000-04:00

Podcastamania is runnin' wild! Whatchu gonna do?!? Umm...how about listen to them, maybe? Just a suggestion. Anyway, it's been a little crazy with the podcasts lately. Not only have I recorded two within a week but I also made a guest appearance on another one. First of all, here's the topics of discussion for Episizzode Number Three:

-Zany madcap misadventures following recent Open Mic Comedy Nights, including encounters with drunk girls of various ages. Unfortunately, this sounded a lot better in my head. I really don't have much of a social life.
-Trippin' balls on Excedrin Extra Strength. Yeah, I am that much of a lightweight.
-Mini-Review of X-Men: First Class (***SPOILER*** - Just go see it right now!)

Get a contact buzz (Right Click, Save As)

Also, here's my appearance on the Steve Wherry Comedy Podcast (again, Right Click, Save As) recorded after Open Mic Comedy Night this past Wednesday. A word of warning: the entire thing is an hour and a half long and gets pretty loud and crazy at times due to random people walking in. Also, if you want to hear what we were working with on the drunk-girl front, just fast-forward to the last 10-15 minutes.

Credits
Intro Song: BrokenCyde - Poppin
Outro Song: X-Men Animated Series Theme

Sarcasmatron Audio Time Go! Episode #2 - Almighty Thorgasmatron

2011-06-02T21:23:00.000-04:00

'Sup? Episode #2 of the podcast all up in the hizzy...or something. I still sound like crap, but now I sound even worse because I recorded this while not feeling well. I tried to cut this down a bit more to prevent rambling but that didn't quite work. I still rambled and it's only maybe like 5 minutes shorter. I talk about a lot less this time. My topics this time have been reduced to:

-Breaking my "No Buying Video Games Until Saints Row 3 Comes Out" oath (PS - Release date is now Nov. 15 bitches!)
-An anti-GameStop rant
-A review of the SyFy Original Movie "Almighty Thor" from The Asylum

Have at thee. (Right Click, Save As)

And that's about it. Anyway, here's the links I was talking about:

Goozex - For all your video game/DVD trading needs. (Don't forget to add "TheRyno665" as a referral friend whatever thing if you join so I can get me some free trade tokens.)
The Backloggery - Registration starts TOMORROW!

And just for the hell of it, even though they're already in the sidebar:

Freakin' Awesome Network - I write shitty articles about shitty wrestling. Sometimes they get warnings from the Editor. I feel special.
My Facebook Page - Alerting any and all fans to blog posts, podcasts, articles and stand-up comedy appearances that I make.

Even though I felt like crap recording this one, I feel quite energized after putting this one together. I may be posting quite a bit more podcasts in the near future. First of all, I'll be making a guest appearance on The Steve Wherry Comedy Podcast after recording one last night after an Open Mic Comedy Show. And I won't quite go into it here but if I have the time this weekend, I'm definitely going to regale you of the recent shenanigans that have gone down after recent Open Mic sessions, especially last night. You won't want to miss it. Believe me. If you do, you'll get scabies.

Credits
Intro Song: Crystal Castles vs The Klaxons - Atlantis To Interzone (Remix)
Outro Song: Amon Amarth - Across The Rainbow Bridge

Sarcasmatron Audio Time Go Episode #1 - The Macho Man Appreciation Station

2011-05-28T10:29:00.000-04:00

Well, it took a little while but here it is: my first podcast. I probably could have had this up a few days ago but I procrastinated a bit. All I really had to do was edit in some music and upload it, a process that should only take about a few hours, but I stretched it out over the course of a few days. Yeah, I'm lazy. As you'll figure out pretty quickly, I've never really done this on my own before so PLEASE leave some sort of feedback as to how I can make this better. I realize it's kinda all over the place and I do stumble on my words quite a bit so I need to know what I can do to not suck. Anyway, the topics for my first episode:

-Stupid Therapists
-(Not) Buying Video Games
-A Tribute to the Macho Man Randy Savage
-Upcoming Superhero Movies

A few corrections before I post the link: I mentioned that Randy Savage passed away "this past Friday" since I recorded this last Sunday. But since I'm now posting this on Saturday, technically that's not true. Whatever. Also, I call the Ultimate Warrior "crazy". I'd like to apologize for that a bit since he put up a very touching tribute to Savage on YouTube after his death. Don't get me wrong, I still think he's crazy, but at least he's redeemed himself a little bit.

I debated whether or not I wanted to put this on a legit podcasting site. I wanted to upload it to Podbean but their free service doesn't offer nearly enough storage space. The next step up was only $5 a month but I figure I better play it safe and see if this takes off before I start throwing money into it. So for now, I'm hosting it on blip.tv along with my Sarcasmatron @ The Movies podcasts. If people catch on and listen to it (and I can afford it), I'll move it to a dedicated site.

Download Link (Right Click, Save As)

Credits
Intro Song: Agoraphobic Nosebleed - Forgotten In Space (Voivod Cover)
Outro Song: Edward Elgar - Pomp and Circumstance No. 1 in D Major

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes.

2011-05-17T19:09:00.001-04:00

It's been about a year and a half (give or take a few months) since I've started this blog. And though I haven't exactly tried my hardest (especially late), I've still been kinda disappointed in my efforts of becoming a T-List semi-star Internet critics. I mean, I figured I'd at least be invited to one of The Cinema Snob's coke parties or an orgy at TGWTG's headquarters. Just kidding. But seriously, I started this blog to get noticed and to have a voice. I know there's an audience out there that thinks this sort of inane rambling about nerdy shit is funny, but I still haven't found it. I've gotten a decent amount of hits but as far as I know, they're all from people I tell to read my stuff, which I don't like doing. Considering a good 90% of the feedback I've gotten from people have either come from a friend who is currently in Basic Training and a friend who is traveling across the UK, it's hard to tell if I'm doing anything right, wrong or even remotely interesting and readable. So I've been thinking a bit about what to do to help rejuvenate my interest in writing my own damn blog and getting my name out in the world. As a great man once said "Enough is enough, and it's time for a change." And if you'll read on, it looks like I have plenty.

Change #1 - I've actually started writing for another upstart website. Here's the short story - The main forum/message board I frequent on the Internet is the one for Wrestlecrap.com. However, late last year, due to some internal struggle or whatever inside information that I'm not privy to and/or don't really care about, Wrestlecrap and the forum kinda split away from each other. Honestly, I never thought it was that big of deal, since Wrestlecrap was only being run by like 3 or 4 people, and thus we were only really losing those 3 or 4 people. We still had a pretty tight community. However, we didn't have our own website. We were just a forum floating around in the ethers of the Internets, pretty much associated with a website that we're not affiliated with anymore. So, the main guys that were left running the forum put their minds together and ended up creating the Freaking Awesome Network (or FAN for short), which is (so far) a collection of articles, essays, reviews, interviews, what-have-youse from some of the forum-goer. It officially launched last week but I wanted to wait until I had settled on a final decision to make an announcement...which coincidentally came on the same day that my article was posted. Yeah, I'm an ass.

Anyways, I'm going to be writing a series of articles entitled "Wrestling With Extra Sleaze", showcasing some of the seedier elements of professional wrestling. I've started with an episode of WEW (Women's Extreme Wrestling) but considering that I have over 40+ episodes of this particular show on DVD to review, I haven't quite decided if I'm going to be doing them one-by-one in a row or what. But trust me, I have plenty of other things to review that falls in this category. But because of this, I will be devoting much of my writing to FAN and not so much Sarcasmatron anymore. That's not to say that I won't be writing on Sarcasmatron, I still have a few ideas for reviews or articles that might not necessarily work for FAN, but I need to focus on something and I've lost my focus here. I don't know if FAN's going to blow up or not, but if it does, I want to be a part of it and say "I was there when it started". And really, much of my so-called "writing" has just been me rambling about random movies I've seen or things I feel like talking about. Which brings me to...

Change #2 - Podcasts. Yup, I'm doing them, thanks to the one person who voted with an "I Don't Care" in my last poll. Ass. Anyway, I felt kinda inspired when one of my stand-up comic buddies started a podcast of his own (The Steve Wherry Comedy Podcast, it's also on iTunes) and thought "Hey, I could do this." Then I thought "Hey, I'm kinda already doing this on my blog, only in text form that no one reads." And really, that's the main reason I'm going to revert to podcasts more often: Ease of use. It's much easier for you to just listen to me ramble about whatever in the background while you work on something important, work out or just work it to Internet porn (I won't judge). And it'll be easier for me as well. I can just hit record, talk for a half hour or so, edit it a bit, upload it and be done with it in an hour or so instead of sitting in front of a computer screen all day stumped for a punchline. Right now, the plan is to record and edit the podcast over the weekend and upload it on Monday or Tuesday, probably. I've been thinking about this for a few weeks and already have the first few podcasts planned out, as far as content goes. It won't exactly be just me rambling about movies and wrestling or such, but instead each podcast should have a specific theme, at least at the onset. Much like just about everything I do, this will be an on-going work in progress.

As an aside, I think in an effort to get more writing on this site, but mostly an effort to lay the insane amount of video games I've left unplayed, I may do a monthly feature called "Game of the Month" or something. Basically, I'll just take one video game for the month and play that and only that (aside from random games of Puzzle Quest). It won't necessarily be a review but maybe a log of what I did when, if I was able to beat it, if I ragequit because I couldn't beat it, any random happenings and glitches that I thought were funny, whatever comes up. Trust me, I have plenty of games I need to play, but I'll probably only restrict this to the backlog of games for the Wii considering I don't have my own XBox 360 and thus won't be able to play a whole lot of those games. More details to come on that as I work on them.

Change #3 - This is more of a personal change than a website change but I should be coercing myself to do more with my stand-up comedy. Like I've said before, I don't really intend on having a serious career in stand-up comedy, but it is another creative outlet for me and another way to get my name out in the world. And, most importantly of all, it's about the only time I get out of my bedroom besides work and hanging out with my friends. I don't really go to many Open Mics as I should. I'd like to get footage of my performances for feedback purposes and to get them circulated a bit but the Open Mic shows haven't been recorded lately, and the only camera I have is the crappy 1 Megapixel one on my cell phone, so who knows what'll be up with that.

But I had a confirmed thought at a recent Open Mic a few weeks ago. I'd call it an "epiphany" but it's something I've been thinking about for a while now. Anyways, I did a routine that I thought was funny. And some of the comics and a few friends who showed up thought it was funny too. But the crowd as a whole didn't think so. It wasn't just me either, they were pretty silent for most of the other comics as well. So, I thought I was funny and a few people thought I was funny, which I was actually fine with, but since everyone didn't think I was funny, it didn't really matter in the long run. Needless to say, no one other than the 3 or 4 people I already knew wanted to talk to me after the show. This is a trend I've noticed throughout some of the more important aspects of my life too. When it comes to dating, I know I'm an awesome, funny and caring guy, but since other girls don't see that, it doesn't really matter what I think or do. When it comes to writing, I know I'm decent at it, but no one outside my group of friends reads it (and even then I'm not sure who actually does) so it doesn't really matter what I write. It's the old "If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" question. The answer isn't "Yes" or "No" but really "Who gives a damn?" All this time, I've been making noises alone in a forest. It's time I got people to start listening.

Oh yeah, to the first person who reads this (which will probably be me), congrats on being my 2500th viewer.

The Wrestlemania Podcast Experiment Plus Some Wrestling News

2011-04-17T20:10:00.000-04:00

As I mentioned before, Wrestlemania 27 was two weeks ago and I decided, with a bunch of the V1kM crew, that we would watch it and riff on it in podcast-form. This was nothing more than a hair-brained experiment, mostly because I don't really know if there's an audience that would want to listen to a bunch of nerds (some well-versed in wrestling, some not so much) talk about a 4-hour show they're watching that the people listening to can't even see. But hey, I guess it was worth a shot. To make it easier on you, the listener, I broke up the almost 4 hour recording into 5 easier-to-digest chunks, ranging from about 30-50 minutes each. But the recording itself isn't perfect. Far from it, actually. For starters, our buddy Will had the recording equipment but his tire unfortunately blew out on the way, so he didn't really make it until an hour and a half in. Luckily, he brought our stand-up comedian friend Jake with him, plus when Wrestlemania ended, there was a replay afterward so we just watched what they missed out on. So the podcast as a whole is kinda out of order. And as par for the course when it comes to V1kM podcasts, we get severely off track most of the time. In all honestly, Wrestlemania was just OK. I'd consider myself the biggest professional wrestling fan out of the group and I repeatedly lost interest throughout the show.

Anyway, enough talk. Let's get with the...well...talking. Here it is, us watching Wrestlemania 27 in its entirety.

Part 1 (Including CM Punk vs Randy Orton and Michael Cole vs Jerry Lawler)
blip.tv link - Download Link (Right Click To Save)

Part 2 (Triple H vs The Undertaker)
blip.tv link - Download Link

Part 3 (Snooki-Mania, The Miz vs John Cena, Not-So-Final Thoughts and America The Beautiful)
blip.tv link - Download Link

Part 4 (The Rock Talks and Edge vs Alberto Del Rio)
blip.tv link - Download Link

Part 5 (Rey Mysterio vs Cody Rhodes, 8-Man Tag, and Punk vs Orton again)
blip.tv link - Download Link

So there you have it. But Wrestlemania wasn't the only wrestling-related thing to happen lately. In fact, this past week has been kinda messed up. Not since the whole Chris Benoit incident has the wrestling business actually bummed me out this much.

For starters, I found out Monday that independent wrestler/manager "Sweet 'n Sour" Larry Sweeney had taken his own life after a long battle with bipolar disorder. Mostly seen as a wrestler in Chikara Wrestling and a manager in Ring of Honor, Sweeney was definitely one of the most charismatic guys on the indy scene, to the point where I would compare him to like a Bobby "The Brain" Heenan or a Jim Cornette for the Internet generation. Unfortunately, in recent years, Sweeney had started to stop taking his medication and his disorder got the best of him as he became visibly disheveled and would challenge fans to impromptu wrestling matches in parking lots. In 2010, it looked like he was getting his career and his disorder back on track as he made a few appearances in wrestling as the "Sweet 'n Sour" of old but obviously it was still a struggle that would end up overwhelming him. Not to try to compare my situation to his but as someone who struggles with depression (Dysthymic, to be exact), has contemplated suicide numerous times and had a friend who had also committed suicide, this particular death hits me pretty hard. But what hit me the hardest was the fact that he was only 29. I'm sure many of you don't even know who I'm talking about but Sweeney touched a lot of people, to the point where the news of his death was even trending on Twitter. "Sweet 'n Sour" will always live on, to me. Ain't no doubt about it, baby!

And soon after hearing that news, I found out that Edge was retiring as well. Since I was coming down from my post-Wrestlemania high of sorts, I didn't intend on watching Raw. That ended up being a mistake as I got online and found out that Edge was retiring out of the blue. I had always heard rumors that he was talking about it for a while but nothing so recent that I'd expect it to happen on Monday. I figure he would take some well-timed breaks and thought that guys like The Undertaker would retire before Edge, especially since he hasn't even hit 40 yet. But apparently, Edge had seen doctors earlier in the day and they told him that, due to complications from a broken neck years ago, he could easily become paralyzed or even killed if he continued wrestling. Of course, I was saddened mostly because it was so sudden, but now that the news has set in, I'm totally glad that he's willing to retire on top and, most importantly, with his health. I've kinda had a love/hate relationship with Edge. I thought he was awesome as he came up through the ranks but thought he kinda took the easy way up with the controversial relationship with Lita. I sided with Matt Hardy then but not so much anymore after seeing the kind of person he's become. In the end, Edge totally hit his stride by becoming one of the biggest heels in modern wrestling. But lately, I thought he was becoming a bit bland as a good guy, but mostly because he's just so good as a heel. In retrospect, I'm kinda kicking myself for taking him for granted recently. Still, Edge will go down as one of the greats in the history of the business.

And though it doesn't even compare to the previous two stories, I was also bummed to hear that Matt Cross was eliminated from Tough Enough on Monday as well. I kinda figured he wouldn't win but I thought he'd at least make it further than the second week. I guess it's not so much that he was eliminated that peeved me off but why he was eliminated. Cross was accused of not having charisma (which is debatable) but since he arguably has the most experience out of anyone (with the possible exception of the hot blonde chick from Puerto Rico), that shouldn't have mattered just yet. But the kicker was during the elimination process, where he asked "Stone Cold" Steve Austin permission to speak, much like you would in the military. But that cheesed Stone Cold off even more and he eliminated him on the spot. Think about that for a second. When compared to a prima-donna skank who disrespects the business by showing up late for practice and a general waste of space who has been nicknamed "Skidmarks", Matt Cross was eliminated for...having manners. That's right. "You're a kind and decent person. You don't belong in the wresting business!" What? I mean, from a reality television show standpoint, I kinda get it. If they're willing to eliminate arguably the most physically talented of the group this early on, then it tells the rest of the contestants to step up their game. Also, it shows that reality shows are definitely fake and probably scripted as all hell. But that's neither here nor there. I don't care if he's "too small" or "not charismatic enough", I think Matt Cross deserves a better chance to shine than 2 episodes of Tough Enough.

Anyways, that's it from me. I could talk about the news bit where a guy in Ohio wrestled while possibly having HIV, creating a lot of panic within the Ohio wrestling scene (which I'm not a part of because it only really exists in Cleveland and the Ohio Valley) but honestly, I'm too tired right now and I don't want to get into it. Plus I just watched Cabin Fever 2 so I'd probably confuse the two and accuse the guy of projectile-shitting HIV blood in the middle of the ring, and I don't want to do that.

Great sex, a perfect nap, or an amazing cup of coffee? Which 1 would you choose to have every day for the rest of your life?

2011-04-11T18:18:00.001-04:00

I sleep too much as it is and I don't really like coffee, so...

Ask me anything. No, seriously, anything.

My Blockbuster Closing Haul and the Insane Videogame Backlog

2011-04-10T15:18:00.001-04:00

I haven't had the chance to write about it lately but, for any long time followers of the blog, I love me some video store closings...as sad as that may sound when you factor in the people losing their jobs. It's been over a year since the Blockbuster near my apartment closed down, and since then, there's been a few other store closings. A few days ago, I was alerted that not one, but two, Blockbusters were closing down, leaving just one brick-and-mortar store (as far as I know) in the great city of Toledo. So I've made a few stops in between the two and here's what I managed to snag.

Trip 1, I went a bit crazy on, considering my roommates just called me up about this and I got there as soon as I could, grabbing a bunch of random stuff before they closed for the night.

X-Men: The Animated Series - Volume 1 - This was the only non-used DVD I bought, which is good considering I got 2 DVDs of the beginning episodes of one of my favorite childhood cartoons. In the years since then, the story holds up...but the animation doesn't exactly cut it anymore. But since this was Volume 1, I was kinda worried that I wouldn't get a full season, especially since cartoon DVDs have been guilty of this a lot lately. Not only is Volume 1 all of Season 1...but the first few episodes of Season 2 as well, which kinda makes me wonder why they didn't do season sets in the first place. Ah well.

Machete - Watching this right now as I type this up. Still just as fun as it was in the theater.

Piranha - I'm wondering how this will hold up not in 3D, especially since this was the most enjoyable 3D movie I've seen thus far.

Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever - Been wanting to see this since I heard that it was directed from the guy who did House of the Devil, even though he doesn't want to admit it since the studio basically took the movie from him and re-cut it the way they wanted to.

Fireball - Here's the plot synopsis from the back cover: "Just released from a juvenile detention center, Tai joined Fireball, an underground team playing ultraviolent basketball based on Muay Thai principles and hosted by criminal drug lords that he believes are responsible for putting his twin brother in a coma." Yeah, I kinda had to get this movie after reading that.

Raging Phoenix - I came home from work one day to find my roommate watching this on Netflix. It's another Thai martial arts movie from the makers of the Ong Bak movies, The Protector and Chocolate. Raging Phoenix stars the girl from Chocolate (Alternate Title: Muay Thai Rainman) and the action in it is great, even though it alternates pretty rapidly between bad-ass realistic fighting and super-fake looking wire-work. But at least the main villain at the end is a hot chick with big boobs that fights in a bikini top. Yay!

District 13: Ultimatum - The sequel to District 13 (Alternate Title: Parkour The Movie), which I also saw bits and pieces of on Netflix. As long as there's dudes flipping off of buildings, it's sure to be a decent watch.

Trip 1 Total: $30

Trip 2 was to the other Blockbuster that was closing down, one that I didn't know existed. It was in a part of town I never go to, and for good reason: it was kinda ghetto. They also didn't have much of anything left, which was weird compared to the first Blockbuster that had a ton of stuff. But I did managed to snag a couple of movies.

Daybreakers - Been wanting to see this since it came out, especially since it offers a fresh take on the vampire genre that has since been hacked apart by the Twilight series. Plus, anything with Willem Dafoe in it is sure to be good, well unless he's watching Madonna fingerbang or getting his wang cut off...man Willem Dafoe is weird.

DOA: Dead Or Alive - My bad movie sense kicked in on this one, especially since it's a movie based on a video game where jiggly babes beat each other up. Bonus: Kevin Nash as a Hulk Hogan ripoff. Maybe he'll create a paradox and give himself the Fingerpoke of Doom.

Laid To Rest - It's been a while since I've seen a good horror movie. I've heard good things about Laid To Rest, but at every single movie store closing I've been to, I've seen it, picked it up and put it down. I wasn't going to let it happen this time.

Trip 2 Total: $10

Trip 3 was where I finally realized that I hate myself. You'll see why...

Jonah Hex - Yup, I now own one of the worst movies of 2010.

The Human Centipede - Yup, I now own The Human Centipede. Now you see why I hate myself.

Dead Snow - Nazi zombies. Need I say more?

Bitch Slap - Looks like it could be crap. But it also looks like it could be an exploitation version Sucker Punch. We'll see.

Death Sentence - I've been wanting to give this one a chance for a long time, though I've known nothing about it other than the cover, which shows a shotgun-wielding Kevin Bacon, and the fact that it was made by the creators of the original Saw (which was awesome before the series got the worst case of sequel-itis ever). But when The Cinema Snob recommended it during a recent review of Insidious (which the Saw guys also made), I picked it up. Even though it wasn't in a case, for less than a dollar it was kinda hard to pass up.

Ashes of Time Redux - I've heard the "Ashes of Time" title thrown around a bit but I don't know much about it. But again, it was in the dollar section so I snagged it.

WWE Backlash 2007 - Also in the dollar section, but it was the only wrestling related DVD I was able to find so I grabbed it without even knowing who even wrestled on the show. Just watched it last night/this morning and it wasn't bad but not memorable in the slightest.

Trip 3 Total: $12

So, 17 DVDs for around $50. Not a bad haul at all. However, I've been going totally crazy snagging video games up too. And honestly, I don't know why because there are a ton of other games I own that I haven't even come close to finishing. But lately a ton of games I wanted have come down to an affordable price. And though I normally don't like doing business with them, Gamestop has been running some awesome deals too.

Anyway, let's start with Muramasa: The Demon Blade for the Wii which I already talked about last time as I bought it at Amazon with my book order. Still haven't even touched the game. To go back even farther, I bought Dead Rising 2 for the 360 and Jet Set Radio Future for the original XBox off of a friend. Still haven't touched JSRF and I've only gotten my character to Level 6 out of 50 in Dead Rising 2. It all started last weekend when I was bored and walked around Best Buy to find they had put out more copies of the Limited Edition of Super Mario All Stars for the Wii. It was only $30 for a game (even if it was a straight port of an SNES cartridge) and a bonus CD and book, so I figured it was worth it. Then I saw on Destructoid that Amazon had the Game of the Year Edition of Borderlands on sale for $20, but I remembered that Gamestop was running a sale so instead of getting it from Amazon and waiting for it to ship, I just went over to Gamestop and grabbed it. Even though there were a few more games I wanted to get, I really did want to stop my buying there. But as I was surfing around yesterday, I found out that Gamestop was running a sale this weekend where if you buy 2 used games, you get 1 free (which ends on the 10th, so if you're reading this right after I post it, you still have time!). So I maximized my savings by ordering online AND in store. Basically, I made an order online for the more expensive games I wanted (which I didn't want to go above $20) and then went to a store and grabbed some of the less expensive games. On the online order, I grabbed Just Cause 2 and Wet for the 360 and Guitar Hero: Metallica for the Wii, with a total of just over $40 after taxes. Surprisingly enough, despite being the newest, and possibly best, game of the bunch, Just Cause 2 ended up being the free one since the online price was only $17 and the others were $20. Then I went to the store earlier today and grabbed a new copy of Rock Band 3 for the Wii and for the Buy 2, Get 1, I settled on No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle, Zack and Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure and Batman: Brave and the Bold, all for the Wii It took me a while to settle on a third game because they didn't have anything I really wanted. I wanted to play Brave and the Bold but this particular copy didn't have a cover. Surprisingly enough, it rang up almost $10 less than the sticker price so I'm glad I picked it. All told, that bundle also came up to just over $40 after taxes.

So over the course of this past week (give or take a day), I spent close to $140 on a total of 9 games. Not that bad of a deal, but I really don't like plunking down that kind of cash at any one time so I really need to stop. I went from buying no games in a long time to buying a metric crapton within a month. So, I've decided not to buy any more video games...at least not until Saints Row 3 comes out. But that doesn't come out until the end of the year, not taking to account any delays or the fact that I almost always wait for a price drop, so I think I'm good for a while. Between this, the Blockbuster closings and the stuff I bought online last month, I probably spent a good chunk of my tax refund already, which I didn't want to do. Ah well, at least I'll have plenty of stuff to entertain me for a while.

As for Wrestlemania, we did record a podcast and it is coming. But considering it's close to 4 hours long and I still haven't gone through it all, in an effort to edit it a bit and break it up in easier-to-digest morsels, it'll be a little bit until I get it loaded and posted up here, probably sometime next week. In short, I thought the show was decent, but not really Wrestlemania-caliber. There were a few good matches, like Rey Mysterio vs Cody Rhodes and Undertaker vs Triple H (which ended up being much better than I thought it would be) but honestly, there wasn't really anything that took place that you'll remember years, or even weeks, from now. The podcast will attest to that, considering we all went off track multiple times per match. While I don't quite share Spoony's hatred towards the event, he does make plenty of good points, though I'm not sure I agree with his statement that The Miz vs John Cena was the worst Wrestlemania main event since Wrestlemania 9. I'll probably have to give it a second watch, considering most of the match was spent talking about random crap. Anyway, look for those podcasts to come soon.

Mini-Random Movie Roundup and Wrestlemania 27 Predictions

2011-04-02T19:07:00.000-04:00

Ok, so I'm still struggling to get that article I had planned down on paper. I don't know why it's so hard for me to sit down and write something that's 75% in my head already. I guess I just need that 25% to come together. Anyway, I have a stack of movies that's accumulated over the past month or so that I haven't talked about. Honestly, I haven't even watched all that many movies. With Wrestlemania coming up (more on that later), I've been watching quite a bit of wrestling, especially now that WWE has put up some of their DVDs on Netflix Instant Steaming. And now I'm watching Sealab 2021, though I think I'm gonna stop before Season 4 because, let's face it, Season 4 sucked. Nevertheless, I did get in a bit of actual movie watching so, what the hell, it's Random Movie Roundup time!

Big Trouble In Little China - This was one of the many movies I watched a few months ago when I got really sick, but when I managed to snag the long out-of-print 2-disc DVD set via Goozex, I had to watch it again. Come on, do you really need an excuse to watch Big Trouble In Little China? It's an '80s classic! (For some weird reason, I started typing the title as "Big Trouble In Little Giants". I smell a crossover!) I mean, you have Kurt Russell with a mullet, kung fu, dudes that shoot lightning, Beholders, Beast Men, old slimy dudes in wheelchairs, what more do you need in a movie? Bonus: it also had a cute Kim Catrall before she became an old whore for Sex And The City. It really is one of those movies where if you haven't seen it by now, you need to ASAP. A

Mortal Kombat - I don't know if it's because of the upcoming game or watching Fatality Fridays on GameTrailers.com. but I've been in the mood for the good ol' MK. I still have fond memories of being an early teen during the height of its popularity and somehow convincing my morally-stuck-up penny-pinching dad to taking me to see this in the theaters. Looking back, I bet he probably hates me for that. Ah well. Anyways, the movie itself, objectively speaking, hasn't totally aged well since the mid-'90s. But it's still the best video game-to-movie adaptation we've seen thus far, albeit mostly by default. Really, how can you fudge up making a movie about a video game about people fighting? B

Mortal Kombat: Annihilation - Guess I spoke too soon. Annihilation has gone down in history as one of the worst things ever made, whether it be video game or movie related. But the sadistic side of me actually enjoys Annihilation and I don't know why. While people claim that it's just plain bad, I can still laugh at it if I don't think about it too much. For me, it straddles the line between "bad" and "so bad, it's good" and flip-flops sides repeatedly, though I do facepalm whenever I hear about "Animalities" and see the horrible, horrible CGI creatures. But that's not all! After watching this about 5 times or so, I finally realized that Motaro (the centaur that looks like Tim Curry from Legend) is freakin' Malibu from American Gladiators! So he joins the bad guy from Cobra as Shao Khan and Dexter's dad/Ajax from The Warriors as Replacement Raiden as some of the random-ass casting choices. If I didn't have my next movie for Sarcasmatron @ The Movies picked out (whenever we end up doing it), I'd probably end up choosing this. C+

Ninja Scroll - I pride myself on being a geek over tons of different types of things, but anime isn't one of them, which is surprising considering how big of a Japanophile I can be. I just tend to prefer live-action Asian cinema instead of anime. Seriously, the only piece of anime I own is Akira. But I did get a copy of Ninja Scroll...and liked it as much as I did Akira. I was actually surprised at how shocked I was by Ninja Scroll. Not because of the quality of animation, I've always respected anime in that regard (well, usually, when it's done well) and not because of the ultra-violence, which I went into expecting. No, what I wasn't expecting was a giant rock monster muff-diving a hot chick within the first 10 minutes of the movie. Yup. That totally happens and it kinda threw me off a bit. But other than that, I totally recommend Ninja Scroll for anime fiends (if you haven't seen this already, then shame on you) and newcomers to anime alike. A-

Night of the Creeps - To me, The Monster Squad was one of the great kids movies of the '80s. That's not to say I'd actually let a kid watch the movie, but instead it's a movie where the kids in it do awesome things, like befriend monsters, shoot automatic rifles and call people "homos" and "chickenshit". So when I heard that Fred Dekker's movie previous to this, Night of the Creeps, was finally seeing a DVD release after years of being out of print on VHS and Laserdisc, I figured it would be just as good as Monster Squad. Maybe even better, judging from the hype from fans. But as far as hype is concerned, it usually tends to let you down. That's not to say Night of the Creeps is a bad movie, far from it. It's very fun and enjoyable but I think nostalgia may have had a hand in most people's opinion of this movie. Trust me, if I had seen this movie when I was a kid and it would become a rare find, I'd probably hold Night of the Creeps in just as high of a regard. But I didn't, so I don't. It's still worth a watch, though. B (And while we're on the topic of Fred Dekker, I'd be remiss to ignore the ONLY other movie he directed: Robocop 3. I watched the entire trilogy straight through on Netflix while I was sick. Obviously, 3 wasn't as good as 2 and hardly any movie will ever be as good as 1. But still, I kinda liked it. I don't get the hate. Come on, Robocop commandeers A PIMP CAR! Erase the hate!)

Young Einstein - I remember watching this when I was younger on video and even then, I still heard about how bad this movie was and kinda forgot about it over time. But a few weeks ago, I was having a movie discussion with my friends and Young Einstein came up, and my friends talked about it like it was a misunderstood classic. So when I found it online for like $5, I decided to grab it. Let me tell you, this wasn't a case where nostalgia tinted my opinion of something, whether good or bad. Young Einstein was as bad as I remember. Well, it's not really "bad" as it is just plain boring. There were a few chuckles here and there but no real gags or quotes that I can remember after watching it a week or so ago. So, yeah, it hasn't held up. And Yahoo Serious hasn't been seen since. D+

Puppet Master 1-3 - Picked this up in the Wal-Mart $5 a while back and, though I remember the franchise (which I still think runs today, with probably as many installments that rivals The Land Before Time series), I've never seen any of these movies. And probably for good reason, because they kinda suck. Well, except for the novelty value of watching puppets kill people. In the first movie, a bunch of psychics go to a hotel and get killed by puppets. That's about it. The "hero" doesn't even do anything. Literally. The bad guy who ends up controlling the puppets gets cocky and treats them like crap so the puppets turn on him and kill him. I'm sure there are plenty of other examples where the so-called "hero" doesn't do a damn thing to save the day, or even advance the plot, but I can't think of any. Then, in the second movie, the original Puppet Master (who died at the beginning of the first movie) comes back from the dead all bandaged up like the Invisible Man. I actually kinda liked Puppet Master 2 as it embraced the inherent silliness of possessed puppets that kill. In the first movie, there were a few moments where all it took to stop the puppets from killing was to just pick them up and throw them, which never failed to make me laugh. In 2, they kinda said "Yeah, this is a B movie. So what?" and went with it. And then in Puppet Master 3, they try to make a sort of universe for the characters by making a prequel, which I thought was kinda cool until I noticed some huge-ass plotholes. For one, you find out in 3 that the Leech Woman puppet was actually possessed by the soul of the Puppet Master's wife who was murdered by Nazis, but when she dies in 2, the Puppet Master couldn't care less. That needs a bit of retconning there. Also, you find out in 3 that the rest of the puppets are also possessed by the souls of other Jews murdered by Nazi and at the end, they hype up Puppet Master 4 with the tagline "When Bad Puppets Turn Good". Ok, they were bad in 1 and 2...but 3 took place before either of them, so wouldn't it be "When Good Puppets Turn Bad". And really, are they all that evil? They only kill whoever the Puppet Master tells them to kill, so really it's the Puppet Master who is evil and the puppets are...well, puppets.

Holy crap, I can't believe I'm starting to try to intellectualize the freakin' Puppet Master series. Ah well. Anyways, 1 kinda sucked other than the death scenes, 2 was alright and 3 was OK but just made things confusing for everyone. Overall, I'll just give the 3 movies an average of C.

Also, if you didn't know and/or aren't a wrestling nerd like me, the biggest event of the year, Wrestlemania 27, is tomorrow night. I'm going to be watching it with some of the Sarcasmatron @ The Movies crew (and possibly recording our reactions for a podcast, so keep an eye out for that) so I figured I'd psych myself up a bit by running down the card and giving my predictions for the show.

Rey Mysterio vs Cody Rhodes - Honestly, Cody Rhodes would benefit more from a win at this point than Mysterio would. Though I don't watch Smackdown much, his "Dashing" gimmick has been getting over with the crowd and a big win at Wrestlemania would help it take off. As for Rey, I'm mostly wondering what kind of outfit he'll wear this year. I'm gonna guess/hope it'll be Tron-themed. Winner: Cody Rhodes

United States Championship Match - Sheamus (c) vs Daniel Bryan - As much as I like Daniel Bryan, I don't picture him getting the US title back tomorrow night. Much like Sheamus last year, I kinda believe that the WWE doesn't want to give their young stars a big win at their first Wrestlemania. Plus, Sheamus just won the belt a few weeks ago so hot-shotting it back to Bryan would be a bit pointless. Let's just hope Sheamus doesn't rip off Daniel Bryan's head and fuck his girlfriend. Winner: Sheamus

The Corre vs The Big Show, Kane, Santino Marella and ~~Vladimir Kozlov~~ Kofi Kingston - Ok, so Kofi's involvement hasn't been announced as of this writing but Kozlov has been "attacked" with his Wrestlemania status in jeopardy. So, yeah, spoilers. Oops. Anyway, I see The Corre taking this one. It's not a title match or a high-profile match so giving these youngsters their first Wrestlemania win won't be that big of a deal if it won't be remembered anyway. Plus, they'll need something to legitimize themselves as successes of the NXT "experiment" after the abject failure of the New Nexus. Winners: The Corre

Randy Orton vs CM Punk - As big of a CM Punk mark as I am and as much as I don't like Randy Orton, I don't see Punk coming out of this match the winner. Oh believe me, if Punk ends up winning, then consider me the happiest man in the world. But Orton is so over with the crowd (I have no idea why) that not having him win at Wrestlemania would be kinda dumb. But a Punk win would solidify him as a major heel for years to come. And if Punk doesn't win, their feud would be kinda one-sided as Orton has gotten the better of him, save for the past few weeks. Hmmm... I'm still gonna go with Orton but I hope I'm wrong. Winner: Randy Orton

John Morrison, Trish Stratus and Snooki vs Dolph Ziggler and Lay-Cool - Yeah, they actually got Snooki wrestling a match to get more mainstream media coverage. No way they're going to let her team lose. As long as Morrison and Ziggler get an opportunity to show what they can do, I'll be happy. If Trish or Layla have a wardrobe malfunction, I'll be even happier. And if Dolph Ziggler re-enacts Jersey Shore history by Falcon Punching Snookie in the face, I'll be the happiest man in the world, like if CM Punk managed to beat Randy Orton. Winners: John Morrison, Trish Stratus and Snooki

Jerry Lawler vs Michael Cole - Special Guest Referee: "Stone Cold" Steve Austin - If you had told me at this time last year that Michael Cole would not only be, arguably, the company's biggest heel but also entertaining at doing it, I would have laughed in your face. But with all the heat that Cole is getting from the crowd, there would be no reason to expect anything else than an ass-kicking by Jerry Lawler...and possibly from Stone Cold as well. Winner: Jerry Lawler

World Heavyweight Championship Match - Edge (c) vs Alberto Del Rio - This is probably the one match where I couldn't pick out a clear-cut winner right away. They are pushing Del Rio awfully hard but I do think it's too soon for him to win a major title at Wrestlemania. He hasn't even wrestled for the WWE for a whole year yet. When I went to Raw last year, he lost a dark match to Goldust! However, Edge as a face is so boring to me and, despite his multiple title reigns, it only seems like he's held the belt for a combined total of a week. But Alberto Del Rio winning the belt would be a shocking Wrestlemania moment, much like how he won the Royal Rumble. So I'm gonna go out on a limb and pick Del Rio. Plus it'd be nice to say that the guy I saw lose to Goldust in a dark match less than a year ago won the World title. Winner: Alberto Del Rio

No Holds Barred Match - The Undertaker vs Triple H - Even with the streak and the hype behind this match, I honestly don't care about this match one bit. I'm not a Triple H fan by any means and I'm kinda worn out on Taker as well. Also, I remember them having a match at King of the Ring 2002 (I think) where all they did was punch and kick each other for half an hour. It was literally the most boring match I've ever seen in my life. And I really doubt that it'll be much different almost ten years later. They made it a No Holds Barred Match because Taker is so banged up that he won't be able to really wrestle, so I'm dreading more punching and kicking. It wouldn't be so bad if they didn't acknowledge Taker being so banged up and practically ready to retire this past Monday on Raw, so that definitely reinforced my opinion that he should hang it up soon. Oh, and thanks to that same segment on Raw, the main person I care about in a match between The Undertaker and Triple H...is Shawn Michaels. That just doesn't seem right to me. Nevertheless, I'd like to think that the legendary streak will remain unbroken. It just remains to be seen if Triple H wants to be the kind of douchebag to break the streak. I think he has enough respect for the business that he won't. Winner: The Undertaker

WWE Heavyweight Championship Match - The Miz (c) vs John Cena - Cena wins. Cena always wins. But there is a part of me that hopes The Miz squeaks his way out of Wrestlemania with the title intact. Between Cena and The Rock's involvement, he has been so overshadowed...but the "smart mark" part of me kinda wants to believe that was intentional, so if The Miz were to win, it'd be all the more shocking. I'd go so far to say that if Miz vs Cena ended up not being the true main event of the show, Miz would win. But if this does end up being the main event match, then you kinda have to have Cena win to end Wrestlemania on a high note and send the kids home happy. Winner: John Cena

Oh, in one final note, seems I was a bit presumptuous in saying that there's no decent music coming in 2011. I did manage to find a few upcoming releases, though nothing really earth-shattering. As I was shopping around Hot Topic.com for some random stuff (yeah, I buy stuff from them sometimes, shut up), I went to their pre-order section to see what they had. I got a bit excited when I saw a new Between The Buried And Me album coming in April...but then ended up bummed when I saw it was only an EP. Apparently, it's the first of a two-part concept EP dealie they're trying and I have no doubt it'll be good...but I probably won't pick it up unless I can find it for cheap considering it's only three songs. Three songs that are close to or over 10 minutes each, but three songs nonetheless. Also, BTBAM released a Best Of compilation but considering I have all of their albums from The Silent Circus on, I wondered if I should get it. When I went to Best Buy today and saw that there was no pre-Silent Circus material on it, my question was answered with a resounding no. Even if it was only $10 on sale, even a DVD and some live songs are enough to get me to shell out for a bunch of songs I already have. Also, I saw that Winds of Plague are coming out with a new album, entitled Against The World. They're pretty decent but I probably wouldn't have noticed it even coming out, except for the fact that they got the freaking Ultimate Warrior to do a spoken word track on it! You heard me! If he manages to sneak in "destrucity" in his speech, I may cream in my pants. Finally, apparently Darkest Hour released a new album back in February called The Human Romance, but since they left Victory Records and signed to some other random label, I never even knew about it. Unfortunately, I never got around to getting their previous album, The Eternal Return, so DH just may be one of those bands that falls off my radar and I just stop keeping track on, which bums me out because I like them a lot. But other than those releases, I haven't heard much of anything else coming out.

PS - I know I wrote about it last time but if you have ten and a half hours to spare, watch Horse The Band's Earth Tour documentary. It's great.

Random Stuff and Shameless Plugs

2011-03-27T19:21:00.000-04:00

It may seem like I haven't been doing a whole hell of a lot, judging by the recent inactivity of this blog...and you'd be totally right! I have an article in the works, I swear, but for some reason getting the stuff out of my head and down onto the page is kinda hard, even though I have most of it in my head. I guess right now, I don't really want to sit down and write. But I am doing a lot of sitting down and doing other things.

Earlier this month, I managed to get my tax refund, at a time when I definitely needed it. And though I would've liked to save all of it, I felt (and still do feel) the urge to spend it on myself. Luckily, I don't need to lavish myself with expensive things...well I DO but I just can't afford it and I'm don't want to open myself up to a huge line of debt. Anyway, I managed to squeak out with a few deals. Surprisingly enough, I didn't spend it all on movies like you'd probably think I would. I did buy a few but only spent about $10-$15 on them. I won't tell you which ones, mostly because they don't really matter but partly because I'm accumulating some movies for my next Random Movie Roundup, whenever that may be.

Oddly enough, I spent a good chunk of change on books, of all things. Honestly, I can't remember the last book I've read all the way through since David Cross' "I Drink For A Reason" last year. So I decided to get back into the ol' book readin'. So I bought the following:

"Zombie Spaceship Wasteland" by Patton Oswalt
"Save The Cat: The Last Book On Screenwriting You'll Ever Need" by Blake Snyder
"Suck It, Wonder Woman!" by Olivia Munn
"The Mystery Method" by Mystery (yeah, shut up)
"Rules of the Game" by Neil Strauss

All in all, I probably spent about $50 on those books, maybe a little bit more, so I'm pretty satisfied. Unfortunately, after I made that order, I remembered a few more books I could have bought, namely Chris Jericho's most recent book "Undisputed". After reading "A Lion's Tale" (maybe that was the last book I read, can't remember), it pretty much tied with Mick Foley's "Have A Nice Day" as my favorite wrestling related book, so I was psyched to read the follow-up. But it just came out so I'm willing to wait a bit longer until the price comes down. Anyways, the first book I got into was "Zombie Spaceship Wasteland". I quite enjoyed it but as funny as Patton Oswalt is, the book could have definitely been longer. It only took me about a week to read it, but only read during a few of those days. Honestly, if I read it straight through in one sitting, I probably could have finished it in about 2 hours. I'd say its essential reading if you're a fan of Patton but really it just makes you wish he had another book to go out and pick up immediately after finishing it. I'm currently reading through "The Mystery Method" and it's taking me substantially longer to get through...mostly because I feel like a dumbass for reading it. I do believe that the science behind it and the examples of human behavior are valid, but the process itself feels very forced. He basically tells you to go out and use "canned material" on hundreds, possibly thousands, of women until it feels natural. I'm not saying that meeting a woman should be entirely serendipitous, but it shouldn't be entirely rehearsed either. And imagine that there are thousands of men doing this, doing this to thousands of women each, wouldn't women catch on after a while? Ah well, I never really imagined that I would be going out and doing this, instead taking all of the good bits from this and "Rules of the Game" and trying to make something work.

Also, while I bought the books, I bought Muramasa: The Demon Blade for the Wii for like $12. But I still haven't played it. I've fallen very behind on my video game playing. I don't know if I mentioned this before but I also bought Dead Rising 2 for the XBox 360 (along with Jet Set Radio Future for the XBox) from a friend who was selling a ton of his games (over 100 of them) and haven't played it until today. And even then, I might have only played it for about an hour. Of course, I might actually play this more often if I had a 360 of my own instead of using my roommates' but oh well. Considering I have these games to play, plus I haven't finished Fallout: New Vegas plus wanting to do another playthrough of Fable III, you can imagine how much time I'd have to sit down and spend on video game catch-up.

Instead, I've been starting to listen to a few podcasts, partially because they're entertaining but partially because I want to see how it's professionally done, instead of the hackjobs that I normally produce. Normally, podcasts don't really interest me because I don't have much opportunity to let something play that I still have to pay attention to. But there have been a few that have caught my eye...or ear, actually. First of them being How Did This Get Made?, a podcast moderated by Paul Scheer (Human Giant, The League, all of the VH1 shows where they get comedians to talk about things) about bad movies. Now, I only listened to the episode for Drive Angry, which they loved probably more than I did, but that was good enough for me to return and listen for when they cover another shitty movie that interests me. But the podcast I've been listening to the most lately comes from I Want Wrestling, created by former WWE writer Dave Lagana. Lagana runs a few different formats...that are actually the same, he just interviews different types of people involved in the business, from wrestlers to the wrestling press to wrestling fans themselves. But the most interesting of these podcasts is Formerly Creative, where Lagana shoots the breeze with fellow former WWE writers, talking about the process of working for WWE and coming up with ideas for wrestlers, whether they be good or bad. Case in point: Did you know that Daniel Bryan, current WWE superstar and proclaimed by many of the fans and his peers alike as being the "Best in the World", was almost given a Homeless gimmick years before he finally made it to the WWE? Also, did you know that instead of basically playing Capt. Jack Sparrows with his pirate character, Paul Burchill could have had a gimmick that of Brad Pitt's character from Snatch? But if I have to suggest any one specific podcast to listen to for a sample, it wouldn't be a Formerly Creative episode but instead the Promote This! episode where Lagana interviews independent wrestler (and recent winner of the NWA Heavyweight Championship) Colt Cabana, who himself runs a very good wrestling podcast called the Art of Wrestling that I don't listen to as much as I should. In addition to plugging the Art of Wrestling, but his road documentary the Wrestling Road Diaries, where he and Daniel Bryan show what it's like to ply your trade and go out on the road as an indy wrestler. Even though he's been in the WWE for a cup of coffee, Colt's dedication to the wrestling business despite never fully reaching his potential, told with his humble and affable personality, is a story that deserves to be heard.

*Segue involving hearing things with your ears!*

So far, 2011 isn't looking the greatest when it comes to music. Honestly, the only thing coming out that I know has a release date (Blaqk Audio, I'm looking at you) is the recent announcement of the remastered re-release of Mindless Self Indulgence's rare first album "Tight". But this year isn't a complete wash. As I have mentioned a while back, Horse The Band had compiled their self-ran Earth Tour from 2008 down to a 7-disc DVD set and 100+ page book. However, it was a limited edition and I was unable to afford one for myself, even though I wanted one. Fortunately, HtheB comes through and have actually made it available for free via a torrent, which is available here, because they figured it would end up on the Internet anyways, so why not have it come from the source? Of course, they do suggest a donation, considering they wracked up massive amounts of credit card debt so they could run the tour themselves and go where the fans wanted them to play. I know that there are a few more important things out there you could donate your money to, namely the situations in Japan and Haiti. But recently, there are few things I believe in as much as Horse The Band, as corny as that may sound. Horse The Band, to me, represents free expression of art, emotion and ideas. I'm not telling you to donate some money to a band you've never heard of just because I like them. But definitely give them a chance and if you like what they represent, float a few bucks their way if you have them. I haven't watched the "movie" yet (all 10.5 hours of it) but I did read through the book (in PDF form) and it was great to see them branch out like they did, even though they did go to some depressing and dilapidated places. But in the end, I found myself a bit depressed, and I'm sure that feeling will worsen as I watch the movie. I thought about it and realized that the album that they toured for, "A Natural Death", came out soon after I moved out on my own. Over the course of time, Horse The Band went out, toured the world, came back, recorded their best album thus far (in my opinion) and even though they came back in debt, they still went out and achieved it all on their own. Me? I'm still at the same low-paying dead end job with no real prospects and an ever-decreasing outlook on my own life and future. On one hand, it encourages me to get out there and do something. But I don't know what to do. And I'm not exactly sure if I want to come back broke because of it. I guess that's just something I'll have to work out with myself.

Sarcasmatron @ The Movies: The Lost Episode - Iron Monkey 2

2011-03-14T16:01:00.000-04:00

For those of you who visit Sarcasmatron regularly (all 5 of you), you may have noticed I haven't put up a shitty movie podcast with my friends and I for the past few months. Actually, we did record one in January but nothing ever really came of it for a multitude of reasons. First of all, I wasn't even involved in the recording, with the exception of supplying the movie. Yup, I'm not even on record for this one. You see, I was on some medication at the time that made me very sleepy for some reason (as if I needed to sleep MORE). So I took the medication, went over to Gabe's to record it, ate some BBQ and could not stay awake. So, knowing my friends, I left the recording in their capable hands. And Chase, who supplied the recording equipment, didn't get the mp3 file to me until late February/early March. But considering the frequency I check my email, I didn't get it until a week or so ago. Seriously, I'm listening to it as I'm typing up this intro and this is honestly the first time I've listened to it. So with the exception of Chase, and everyone else recording though I doubt they remember all they said, you're all listening to this about the same time I am. But so far, it's pretty fun. Anyway, I kinda figured that after so long, the recording would be lost into the ether or buried into a time capsule for future generations to unearth. But considering how many people read this site now (all 5 of you), I doubt there'll be much more in the future so I might as well just release this now.

Anyway, the movie in question is Iron Monkey 2, directed by Yuen Wo-Ping and starring Donnie Yen. You'd think with such pedigree that this movie would be awesome, much like the original Iron Monkey. But no, Iron Monkey 2 is a shakily shot mess that looks like it was recorded on VHS tape and incorporating tons of wire-fu with no attempts to hide the glaringly obvious wires (which surprisingly goes unmentioned in this podcast, in addition to the final credit of the movie being accredited to "Ho Shit").

As for what's next, I have a movie planned, but haven't picked out a time to record a podcast for it yet. For the first time so far, this is a movie that I haven't even seen yet so I'll probably be just as shocked as the rest of the guys...unless they've seen it, which they might have. But I know that it comes highly recommended by people whose opinions on bad movies I respect and has been heralded as one of the most unintentionally-hilarious movies in recent memory. So, enjoy my friends rant about Iron Monkey 2 (amongst other things, like Radiohead and Tang) and be on the lookout for the next podcast coming in the near future...someday...hopefully...if not a podcast for something else.

Go to the blip.tv page HERE

OR

Download the mp3 HERE

Sarcasmatron's 2010 In Movies: The Top 10 (Part 2 - #5-#1)

2011-03-06T18:31:00.000-05:00

Please put on your Real3D Glasses................................................now.

#3) Piranha 3D/Jackass 3D/Tron: Legacy (TIE)

Being the cynical bastard that I am, I'm more than ready to consider the current 3D movement as nothing more than a trend that'll fade away once the novelty wears off. Even though I wasn't a fan and didn't go see it, I can kinda understand the allure of seeing Avatar. But since then, 3D has gotten ri-goddamn-diculous. Really, did we need muddy 3D conversions of Alice In Wonderland (aka Johnny Depp Gays Up Your Childhood While Tim Burton's Wife Enables NBA Jam Big Head Mode), Clash of the Titans (Liam Neeson as Zeus wasn't enough to save it) or The Last Airbender (even if it did end up being a good movie, which it wasn't)? 3D should be used sparingly and for big events, not for fucking Cats and Dogs 2: The Revenge of Kitty Galore! What next, a documentary in 3D about the rise of a pre-teen kid who found fame on YouTube by having a "meh" singing voice and a girl's haircut? Oh... Anyways, with Avatar sequels and Star Wars re-re-re-re-re-re-re-releases lined up until 2017 (for reals), it looks like this trend isn't going to die anytime soon. So while the general populace continues to be suckered in by the gimmickry, I'll be just as judicious with the 3D movies that I do see, just like I am with non-3D.

To me, not only has Piranha 3D become the best modern incarnation of an old-school exploitation film but also the best usage of the 3D gimmick (and this is coming from someone who just saw Drive Angry last night). Piranha 3D is crass and proud of it, to the point where the upcoming sequel has been dubbed "Piranha 3DD". Yes, there are tons of naked boobs in glorious 3D, as well as some of the most gut-wrenching gore found in mainstream horror. Surprisingly enough, Piranha 3D was originally not filmed in 3D but you could have fooled me. As if he were the leading authority on 3D, James Cameron derided Piranha for "misusing the technology". If anything, movies like Piranha were the reason 3D movies were invented in the first place. It can be argued that Jackass 3D was "misusing the technology", I mean, what else would you call shooting a gigantic dildo at the camera? Oddly enough, the 3D in Jackass wasn't that big of deal. I only really noticed it during the on-screen titles of the bits. But as crass as Jackass is, damn if it didn't look crisp as hell. I'm not joking when I say Jackass 3D may be the reason for me to finally get a Blu-Ray Player. As for Tron: Legacy, once again I didn't think the 3D was all that noticeable, but more for atmospheric purposes, which I'm sure pleased James Cameron, the self-appointed Lord and Savior of the Third Dimension. But I was going to see Tron: Legacy regardless of if it was in 3D or not so that didn't really matter to me. I mean, it looked good but it wasn't mindblowing. I was mostly wondering how Jeff Daniels smuggled green beans and a suckling pig into the Internet...or how Olivia Wilde smuggled DAT ASS into a tight latex jumpsuit...or when David Bowie had an albino lovechild with Chris Tucker from The Fifth Element.

#2) Scott Pilgrim vs The World

I won't lie, I went into Scott Pilgrim expecting to hate it. I wanted to give it a chance but the cynic inside me was all like "It's filled with Michael Cera and hipsters. It's gonna suck." But it won me over. Michael Cera branched out and showed the most range since his Arrested Development days, while still playing generally the same typecast character he always has, and the movie was self-aware enough to poke fun at itself, particularly at the whole hipster subculture. Add in all the video game and pop-culture references, a great soundtrack, a solid supporting cast, stellar art direction and direction from Edgar Wright in general and it becomes magic. One of the big reasons I rarely go see movies in theaters is because, when I do, I want to make them an event. I want them to mean something and even if I see a movie I like, more often than not, I'll think "That was fun. What do I do tomorrow?" With Scott Pilgrim, I had a memorable experience that I haven't had in the theater in a long time, probably since The Dark Knight. It's such a disappointment that Scott Pilgrim bombed at the box office, even though I'm sure it's already considered a cult classic by some. When you take into account the fact that I, a cynical jaded ass who hates everything that everyone else likes, ended up LOVING this movie, more people should have given it a shot. I guarantee that if people were more open-minded and didn't go see the same old crap (*cough*TheExpendables*cough*), Scott Pilgrim vs The World could have become huge. But as great as Scott Pilgrim was, and as much as I internally debated with myself repeatedly, I still can't give it the #1 spot of my favorite movie of 2010.

#1) Kick-Ass

In some ways, putting Kick-Ass over Scott Pilgrim Vs The World seems like a mere technicality. I went and saw Kick-Ass twice in the theaters, something I rarely do. I didn't do that with Scott Pilgrim, though I wanted to. I bought Kick-Ass on DVD the week of release. I didn't do that with Scott Pilgrim...but since it was coming out so close to Christmas, I just asked someone to get it for me. But I think the main reason I liked Kick-Ass so much was because I was disappointed in Iron Man 2 so much. While Iron Man 2 wasn't a bad movie, Kick-Ass did a better job of encapsulating the feel of a comic book and reminding me that superhero movies can be fresh and original and not just cash-ins or franchise tie-ins or whatever. In a post-Dark Knight world where every film executive wants to do a "dark, gritty reboot" for every movie ever made, Kick-Ass showed that it could pull off vulgar and violent, while not only being bright and colorful like a comic book should be, but also having heart to the characters. Whether it's the love between Big Daddy and Hit-Girl, the realistic-feeling friendship between Kick-Ass and his friends, Red Mist wanting the approval of his Mafia boss dad or the fact that Kick-Ass doesn't ever have to worry about his secret identity but instead whether the girl he has a crush on thinks he's gay or not; there's a lot more going on here than just "good guys vs bad guys". But of course, most people had to focus instead on a 12 year old girl saying the word "cunt". Well, everything can't be perfect, but nevertheless Kick-Ass is one of the freshest takes on the superhero genre and one hell of a movie-watching experience.

Oh yeah, almost forgot. NICOLAS CAGE AS A GUN-TOTING BATMAN! ("I never said Batman!")

OK, so I'm finally done with going over what I liked in 2010. So get off my back now, will ya? Honestly, while 2010 was a good year for movies and a decent year for music for me, just about everything else in 2010 sucked. Hopefully there's plenty of stuff worth talking about in 2011. So far, I've only seen one movie in theaters (Drive Angry, like I previously mentioned), there's only two video games that I'm really looking forward to (Saints Row 3 and WWE All-Stars) and though there's plenty of bands I'd like to see release albums this year, I don't know anything that's supposed to come out (except for Blaqk Audio's new album, which should hopefully be coming soon). With 2010 being somewhat of a disappointment in my life, I've since kinda come down from the high of falsely believing that my blog would be this awesome springboard towards other things. But as long as there's stuff worth complaining about, I'll be around.

Sarcasmatron's 2010 In Movies: The Top 10 (Part 1 - #10-#6)

2011-03-03T19:37:00.000-05:00

I guess it's kinda convenient that I do a Top 10 list considering I only saw 10 movies last year. But still, that's a good 5 or 6 more movies than I normally see at the theaters, at least. So really, this isn't a "Best Of" considering all the stuff I missed (see the last blog post for my opinions on some of those movies), but really ranking what I saw from worst to best. Luckily, I've seen more bad than good, so let's start off with what I consider the Most Disappointing Movie of 2010.

#10) The Expendables

Seriously, I wish I saw one more movie this year just so I wouldn't have to put The Expendables on this list. I can't remember being more disappointed in anything in recent years as much as this. I went into The Expendables thinking it would be the manliest action film of all time. And sure, people get killed and shit gets blow'd up but whenever people aren't getting killed and shit isn't getting blow'd up, literally NOTHING HAPPENS! To take a line from Scott Pilgrim Vs The World, a MUCH better movie that ironically ran head-to-head with The Expendables and got trounced at the box office, I wanted to pee out of boredom. I'm not joking. I never go to the restroom during movies in fear that I would miss something, but I almost went just to kill some time. I'm sure The Expendables could be filed away as a case of high expectations, as that mine could have been so high that nothing the movie did could ever meet it. But it was almost like they didn't even bother trying. None of the characters came close to being interesting, the action was outclassed by other movies in 2010 (as you'll soon read) and the plot was as predictable as could be. I'm not expecting high art with movies like this, but I do expect to enjoy myself. I didn't. If they do a sequel, they really just need to clone Dolph Lundgren multiple times to make up the cast as he was far and away the only interesting person in an ensemble cast that should have done better. Well, I guess Terry Crews having a shotgun that shoots explosions was kinda cool. And Mickey Rourke had a pretty good dramatic dialogue that was ultimately wasted in a movie like this. Also, in the ultimate case of typecasting, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin punches a woman. But that's about it.

#9) The A-Team

See, now The A-Team is a prime example of how mindless, blow-em-up action should be done. Nowhere is this more evident than near the end of the film before the climactic action sequence, where Liam Neeson's Hannibal says "Overkill is underrated". I've heard some people say that The A-Team is stupid, to which I reply "Damn right it is!" Come on, there's a tank parachuting through the air with it's downward descent being controlled by blasts from the tank's cannon. If you don't think that's awesome, then obviously The A-Team and movies of it's kind in general just aren't for you. It was a blast to see in the theater and I was surprised how good everyone was in their roles. But in the end, the main reason that its so low on my list is because its not all that memorable. I enjoyed The A-Team but honestly, by the end of the next week, I had all but forgotten that I had even seen it. Unfortunately, it bombed at the box office so I doubt we'll ever get a franchise out of the thing, but I'm hoping it'll find its audience on video. As loud and explodey as it was in the theater, The A-Team is a pretty good movie to throw in, sit down and just plain shut your brain off.

#8) Machete

Much like The A-Team, Machete has itself firmly planted in the "fun but ultimately forgettable" category. However, because of the "Grindhouse" feel and the fact that I'm a fan of Robert Rodriguez's films more often than not, it appealed to me just a bit more. Danny Trejo makes for a good action lead, despite the fact that he has about as much dialogue in Machete as he did Predators, where he was the first one in the cast to die. But as good as Danny Trejo is as a blade-flinging ambassador of "La Raza", the bad guys are just that much better. Jeff Fahey steals the show as the main baddie who frames Machete (and literally crucifies Cheech Marin with the help of Sex Machine). Robert DeNiro could be accused of "slumming it" with material such as this but he brings enough to the role of his corrupt politician without it being just a ripoff of George W. Bush (which it totally is). And Steven Seagal swings around a samurai sword with the worst Mexican accent ever, but that's why we love him. Hell, even Don Johnson makes an appearance in a role that I wish would've boosted his career back up. Just a suggestion for Robert Rodriguez, though. If you do Machete 2, please don't bring back Lindsay Lohan. Not unless she's willing to clean herself up and not play herself. Or, at the very least, willing to show her boobs this time. I guess this can go for Jessica Alba too. If you're not willing to either learn how to act or get naked, then what else are you supposed to do?

#7) Predators

Noticing a trend here? Yeah, I'm getting the simple action flicks out of the way fast. Again, nothing groundbreaking here but Predators is great fun between alien hunters and their non-consenting human prey. Sure, Predators pays "homage" to the original film so much that it pretty much rips off the end line-for-line, but there's enough action leading up to it that you just won't care. Of course, there are plenty of awesome things that happen, like a fight between a Predator and a Yakuza. And someone calling the Predator a "space faggot". And officially declaring every day at 5:00 PM as "Bitch Rapin' Time". But I think Predators biggest feat was turning Adrien Brody into a credible action star badass. I've always known him as the skinny guy with the giant nose who'd star in "heartfelt" pretentious indie movies like The Darjeeling Limited so when I heard he was cast, I didn't have much hope for him, and this is coming from someone who thought Heath Ledger had a good chance as The Joker from the get-go. But then Brody got a six-pack and a gravely Solid Snake voice and that totally changed my mind about him. The only that would make him even more manly is if he changed his first name to "Bruiser" and started taping razorblades to his fingertips. Anyways, I'm getting off-track. Predators is good. Go watch it...Space Faggot!

#6) Iron Man 2

If it weren't for The Expendables, I'd be tempted to consider Iron Man 2 as the most disappointing movie of the year. Honestly, it wasn't boring like The Expendables and my expectations weren't quite as high, so it wasn't all bad. But to me, Iron Man 2 didn't even compare to the first one. I kinda expected Iron Man 2 to be a giant teaser for the upcoming Avengers movie, and I was right. But I didn't expect the movie to be so focused on Tony Stark. And that wouldn't be much of a problem if Tony Stark was as awesome as he was in the first movie, but this time around, I just wasn't feeling it. At least not when he was sober. I can kinda understand factoring the whole alcoholism storyline, as in many ways Tony Stark's worst enemy is himself. But if that's the case, why have any bad guys at all? To me, a superhero is only as good as his rogues gallery. But with Iron Man 2, I was getting flashbacks of Spider-Man 3, only not that bad. Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell did such great jobs that they really deserved more screentime. And I think it's pretty telling that Iron Man's greatest fight (and arguably best action sequence in the movie) isn't against Justin Hammer's squadron of robots and it sure as hell isn't the final fight with Whiplash where he goes out like a bitch in about two minutes. Nope, it's Iron Man fighting...his best friend...who is also a good guy...and is also an Iron Man. I know, I know, he's not Iron Man, he's War Machine. I'm being facetious here. I'm not going as far as to say Iron Man 2 is bad or anything, but I feel it could have been a lot better. But in my opinion, Iron Man 2 wasn't even close to being the best superhero movie of 2010.