The Apparently Awesome Show

Episode #20: Golden Shiny Wire Of Hope (or Custer’s Revenge)

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Wed, 07 Aug 2013 23:29:06 +0000

In our second gaming episode, we continue to beat to death Final Fantasy 7. Is it as good as we remember? Was it ever as good as we thought? Why is Sephiroth so popular despite being one of the worst villains ever (in Chris’s words)? We also deal with Chris’s pain and sudden depression upon realizing that Red XIII may in fact be 500 years old. All this plus snowboarding and giant chicken breeding!! WOO!

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Episode #19: Fireball of Awful

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Tue, 16 Jul 2013 02:27:15 +0000

In this very special (and LONG) episode, we talk about not comics but the next generation of video game consoles. Chris stays mostly neutral (except to the Wii U) and Jim tends to curse rather freely and bitch about almost everything while trying to learn about things he isn’t really all that involved in. This is just about the exact opposite of our usual shows, and there is no musical intro/outro to bug the crap out of you. It’s Super, it’s Mega, it should have probably been Episode 64 (or 360 or ONE) but it may or may not have Blast Processing (jury is still out)…

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Episode #18: The Coveted 19th Hole

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 01:19:53 +0000

This week, we talk DC’s Captain Marvel and Dial H for HERO! Should we really support children with superpowers that make them adults (or other strange creatures)? Would it even be smart to operate a device that simply gives you random (and possibly dumb) powers?

We also sneak Ben 10 in at the end, though things quickly spiral out of control to the finish line.

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Episode #17: Dimetapp and Puppies

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 01:53:05 +0000

This week we talk about a sudden depowering of mutants, and all of the hilarious criminal, health care, and racial issues that might come of such an event, be it caused by another mutant, a bad blood transfusion, or simply judgment from a higher power. Either way, it may or may not help the economy. We aren’t exactly sure. It’s the utility perspective, or something.

Enjoy.

Reed Richards, “Super Genius”

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 01:05:40 +0000

Reed Richards, for being of supposed genius level intellect, is not very good at treating people with any sort of proper decorum. Basically, he’s a dick. He takes his girlfriend, his girlfriend’s brother, and his best friend on a space mission – believing them to be totally safe – and gets them fried by cosmic radiation.

Fine. Accidents happen.

Then when they group is reeling from the discovery of their new powers, Ben Grimm is pretty upset about the whole “being mostly rock” aspect of his new life and refers to himself the same way that Sue Storm referred to him – Thing. At this exact moment, ol’ Stretchy decides he’s going to chime in with “I’ll be Mister Fantastic” for literally no reason.

Your best friend is a rock person, you asshole. All you can do is stretch! There is only one thing fantastic about that and if that’s what you are using as a basis with which to name your super-self then you are a much bigger dick than I thought, pun completely intended.

I know that stories show that they came up with these names to be more accepted by society and all of that, but if I am met on the street by someone whose sole ability is to be able to muck about with his own mass and matter, I’m not going to call that fantastic. Now the kid that can light himself on fire and not feel it? That’s pretty fantastic. The Invisible Girl? Fantastic until you even think about getting stretchy in your alone time, then maybe a problem. Even Thing, big old hunk of rocks, is more fantastic than you, Reed.

Stop being a dick. You already got the brain, you don’t need to get all trademark happy on the name and THEN name the group after yourself. Granted, it was explicitly your fault the accident happened in the first place, but that’s no reason to go taking all kinds of credit for your miscalculations adding to the superhero population and thus giving you naming rights to build some kind of brand awareness and commercial success. Just save the damn day if you want to save it. You don’t even need names!

Such a dick.

Episode #16: Mutants Save The Economy

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 02:20:53 +0000

In this episode, Chris spends nearly an hour feeling bad about his feelings on mutants and registering them, watching over them, and forcing them into labor camps (some of this might not be true), only to somehow bring about utopian prosperity in the last thirty or so seconds. It makes sense in context. Continue reading →

Episode #15: Kardashian of Mutants

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 03:21:50 +0000

We are back! This week we talk mutants, genetic defects, and how society would actually treat people that were blue and hairy, have tails, wings, or all other sorts of physical deformities that we wouldn’t understand. All that, plus plant growing, energy making, and somehow talkin’ ’bout butts! The title says it all.

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The Rain City Superhero Movement

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Sat, 12 Jan 2013 14:42:15 +0000

Yep.

Is it awesome that they prevented crime? Sure. Will the media have a field day when one of these amateur Batmen gets maimed or killed in the line of “duty”? Oh, you bet they will. When we spoke about the idea of Bruce Wayne using his talents to beef up the abilities of the Gotham City police force, we were not exactly advocating such a stance in reality. After all, Gotham has Bruce freakin’ Wayne. Seattle has Phoenix Jones, a man who has already revealed his real name (not that it would have been super difficult to figure out anyway had he ran around for long enough), and while he has stated that he doesn’t want people dressing up and fighting crime, he also accepts new “superheroes” who have police/military/martial arts training, a bullet proof vest, and who would be willing to have a background check completed on them before becoming a part of this bizarre Seven Soldiers of Victory.

Whenever a police officer or soldier is killed in the line of duty, it is sad but seen as a harsh reality and risk of their work. People respect the decisions of these people because they are willing to do what they have to do to make sure others are safe.Outside of very few potential actions, the pendulum will swing far away from respect and admiration when someone in a goofy costume and bullet-proof vest loses their life trying to be a vigilante hero. We live in a society that is much closer to Watchmen than it is to the Justice Society, and none of these people is exactly Doctor Manhattan. He was the great equalizer, and is something we will never have.

Just like Bruce Wayne, there are so many better ways you can help better the quality of life of your neighborhood and the world than by strapping on a cape and cavorting through the shadows. You might not have a never-ending stream of cash to help you. You definitely don’t have an alien sun god to back you up. You don’t even have Vic Sage. Showcasing the ineptitude of your police force by taking former members and putting masks on them isn’t a sound strategy to improve the morale of your town’s citizens. Yeah, you did do some good, but just like real comic book superheroes, you can’t be everywhere at once and the first time something bad happens and a person was expecting you or one of your superfriends to save the day? You just failed. So very, very hard.

Don’t be a damn superhero, it’s not as apparently awesome as you think it is.

Episode #14: No, Actually Drowning

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 02:20:54 +0000

Yes, it’s Aquaman time! In this 50 or so minutes we go from killing him instantly to allowing him to make fish have sex and then all the way to being a crazed eco-terrorist with a magic hand and a bone to pick with us about saltwater (and probably freshwater) pollution. He can see into other freakin’ dimensions, but nobody gives a damn. It’s AQUAMAN~!

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The Land vs. The Sea

apparentlysmart@gmail.com (Apparently Awesome Crew) — Tue, 18 Sep 2012 01:49:20 +0000

Statistically speaking, in a world where only Aquaman exists as a superpowered being that is also capable of engaging land-loving creatures (though prolonged exposure does weaken him I am fairly certain it would not kill him to just be on land), he would have quite a lot of leverage.

There are somewhere between twenty and thirty thousand species of land animal (not counting insects) while in the sea we are not even sure how much exists but are almost positive that due to the volume and area of our planet’s oceans that the number does exponentially exceed the land count. Even if we decided that he was too much of a threat and set about damaging the seas, it would be as much of a problem to us as it would be to him and his world. Water is not called “the basis of life” for nothing. Aquaman, were he alone in the world and benevolent about his abilities and his place on the planet, could in a way control all life through control of the water supply. Of course, this would be quite a villainous thing to do, but with how much we talk about on The Show about how easy it would be for someone like Superman (who we all love and respect as a guiding light of truth and justice) to be a complete and utter asshole to anyone who couldn’t match him punch for punch (which is, oh, everyone), a submariner such as Aquaman who at least in our world looking at the comics world treats as nearly a total joke (although not as much as we used to) would find it much easier to go on a H2O rampage that would be worse than any Sea World nighttime spectacular ever devised. Granted, we would have to look at our very own Aquaman the same way as we look at the Aquaman of the Superfriends, but if he makes that goofy sound when he summons a fleet of lobster to try and kill us all, we would probably let out a least a giggle or two before our potential demise.

Then again, if we pissed off Aquaman enough that he wanted to take over the land as well as the sea, I would hope he would send tougher opponents than lobsters, unless I am severely underestimating the lobster attack ability, which I may be. Those pincers are weapons, people! WEAPONS!