MODERN LOSERS

Last week I was introduced to ABC's new comedy series, Modern Family. The show revolves around three 'modern' (read: somewhat more dysfunctional than, say, Who's the Boss?) families who are all related in some way, and it's shot exactly like The Office--single-camera mockumentary--which is the growing trend for a lot of new tv series (Parks and Recreation, Party Down, etc).

I was about three episodes in when I realised I couldn't figure out if I liked it or not. I mean, I found it amusing, and it had made me laugh out loud a few times, but there was something unsettling about it: I got a serious case of deja vu with each episode, like I had seen every joke and storyline before. It was riddled with so many familiar (maybe too familiar at times) tv tropes. And that's when I realised that it was just a remake of the myriad tv family sitcoms from the late 80s/early-to-late 90s. Some of the story lines seem lifted from previous episodes from earlier family sitcoms, and just modernized (with the way it was shot, with current pop culture references) to give it a fresh breath of air. For example, in the second episode, called The Bicycle Thief, the father from one of the families, Phil, from the Dunphy household, steals his son's (Luke's) unlocked bike to teach him a lesson, but--lo and behold--it turns out that it wasn't his son's bike, but some other boy's bike, which is very similar to Jessy stealing what he thought was Stephanie's unlocked bike in Full House in order to teach her a lesson.)

Then again, I could just borrow a fitting quote from South Park and say, "Simpson's did it!"

It also feels like there's a beat added after each joke where the laugh track would have come into play. For example (not verbatim):

Claire (the mother in the Dunphy household): Alex, I thought I told you to tell your sister to come for breakfast.

Alex (while busy on her phone): I'll just text her

BEAT

Claire: Haley! That dress is too short!

Oh, haha, such the life as a modern family.

I find it kind of fitting that Ed O'Neill stars as the patriarch, as he has had a similar role in another dysfunctional family.

That said, it is funny, but funny in an all too familiar way.

THIS IS IT: CARBON FOOTPRINTING LOSERS

So we all know about the 112-minute documentary about Michael Jackson's rehearsal footoge is coming out in a couple of weeks. The pre-sale tickets for this highly exploitative documentary have already broken records, bumping Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring from the number 25 spot in the Top-25 Advance Ticket Sellers of All-Time. And now the people behind the documentary are predicting a $250 million dollar haul in its first five days.

This got me thinking: not about how influential he was to the world or how people all over the world know his name, but rather how fucking big his carbon footprint must be.

Seeing as a carbon footprint is "the total set of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused directly and indirectly by an individual, organization, event or product," his footprint goes beyond all the obvious things like his private jet excursions and fancy neverlands and the like. There are so many material goods put into production because of him. Just one guy has spawned a plethora of, well, stuff. If someone really wanted to calculate the total number of GHGs in the atmosphere right now because of MJ, they'd have to go beyond the millions of albums created and sold because of him, beyond the number of sold-out concerts and the production that went into them (let's not forget the production that went into his elaborate music videos), and beyond all the gas that was burned-up for people buying the aforementioned albums and for the concert attendees to make it to his shows. So much energy went into creating figurines, clothing, memorabilia--just a bunch of shit. So much shit exists in this world because of him. He's on walls, lunchboxes, magnets, bedsheets, schoolbags, clothing, video games, not to mention all the things he's on that's currently residing in trash dumps.

Yes, he will be remembered for a long time. We have his GHGs to prove it.

FWD: FWD: FWD: LOSERS

Are sites like Twitter, Tumblr and, to an extent, Facebook and MySpace just glossy and hip tools designed to forward e-mails for Web 2.0? (Or is it Web 3.0? I can not keep track.)

Seriously. In lieu of the annoying >s and worthless comments that accompany each forwarded e-mail, you get a hipster in an avatar adding worthless comments to the 'amusing' or 'interesting' or 'thought-provoking' or 'must read' things that they found and are trying to share.

Yes, I know. I do it too.

FOUR-LEGGED LOSER

All the four-legged wooden chair wanted to be was a super soft sofa when it grew up, just like the sofa in the room the two pieces of furniture shared. It waited for what seemed like wood-years (one wood year is approximately 14 human years) to enter sofa-puberty. The chair checked itself constantly to see if there was hair or wool or cotton where there was no hair or wool or cotton before. It also measured itself constantly, to see if it was beginning a growth spurt which would not end until it was the full-length of a sofa.

The chair was jealous of the sofa across the room. The sofa saw more ass than the chair could dream of. Day after day, anyone who entered the room would almost beeline towards the sofa. The only ass the chair saw were the stragglers, the ones who couldn't plant their ass on the sofa quick enough, or the ones who were ejected from the sofa by a seemingly patriarchal figure. The stragglers or the ejected didn't beeline towards the chair; they hung their heads in defeat and sauntered slowly towards the wooden chair. Once, just once did the chair want to feel like it was their first choice. And the chair thought that the only way this was going to happen was to become a sofa.

The chair was in for a rather large disappointment. Y'see, neither the lumberjacks who cut the wood down, nor the lumber store that filed the wood down, nor the designer who put the wood together, told the chair that the chair was only a chair, and would not be anything else but a chair.

LOSERBOOK

I'm sure the feelings of the future children/pre-teens who've had their Facebook profiles set up by their newbie parents and/or who've had pictures posted on their parents' walls/albums will be akin to the grown-up Nirvana baby when they realise what their parents have done. Nude baby pictures in a family album tucked away for only family and close friends to see is one thing, but these parents are completely destroying their child's right to privacy by plastering would-be embarrassing photos on a medium that everyone can read. One might say, 'Oh, you could just configure the privacy settings so that's not the case,' but newbie parents aren't familiar with/don't care about that, as Lamebook.com has a few choice pictures of babies covered in their own shit in the midst of a diaper change and of babies breastfeeding on their front page already.

I'm sure all new parents want to show off their newborns because they're so proud and yadda yadda yadda (also see: 16 and Preggers), but I don't think using Facebook is the way to go, especially since anything and everything can be unearthed, or, rather, uninterneted these days. These kids are going to want their privacy when they're older, and I'm sure they don't want their friends in elementary and high school coming across these incriminating photos. It's been stated again and again that one has to be careful when showing their Facebook friends how big of a partier they are and the like because one must assume their prospective employer is going to do a Facebook check to see what they're really like outside the interview/application process. A picture here and there of someone toking up or doing a keg stand isn't going to bode well for their chances at getting hired. If, or, as it is the case these days, when these kids are being stalked by a frienemy, potential girlfriend or boyfriend, or ex-lover down the road, well, I'm sure you get the picture.

MARIJUANA LOSERS

I happened to be in Seattle last weekend during their Hemp Festival. It was pretty busy, with a lot of youth adorning themselves with really tacky pot culture (GET IT?!). The one thing in stark contrast to similar festivals in Canada was no one dared smoked pot in public. In Canada, a large majority of the festival-goers smoke up in the open. I didn't smell any trace amounts of the would-be aromatic smoke wafting in the air as I darted in and out of the large crowd. Sad, that.

What I did see, however, was someone with bracelets on, being man-handled by an obvious undercover cop.

MY FAVOURITE SCENES

My favourite scene from Uncle Buck has to be when he accidentally drops one of the expensive-looking china dishes from the shelf in his brother's house. Cigar in one hand, his free hand explores the decorative wall of plates. After the plate hits the ground and comes out miraculously unscathed, Uncle Buck picks up the plate and examines it. One could only assume his logical train of thought is something along the lines of:

If it doesn't break from a 6-foot fall, it must be indestructible!

How could one test out this theory? Thankfully a grand piano is in arm's reach, and a quick collision of the two objects will put an end to his flawed theory. The plate shatters, and he looks at the pieces with bewilderment.

Genius.

BROKEBACK LOSERS

Brokeback Mountain really bothered me when it received a lot of critical acclaim. It was being heralded as groundbreaking cinema, and the last new place the Western could venture into. It also featured two hot young male actors having sex on screen.

The only reason this was harpooned to the front of the nominations in the Academy Awards was because big Hollywood names were playing fags (gay is the new retarded). Brokeback Mountain was received like it was the best thing since sliced bread, which is how a lot of people view the gay community. I’m not saying this is a bad thing necessarily, but it does put the community on some sort of novelty pedestal. Everyone wanted to show how tolerant they were of fags by showing love and admiration for this mediocre movie. (I’m not racist! I have black friends!)

It was really heavy handed at times. I mean, the last scene in the film really bothered me. The audience, while weeping uncontrollably, is shown a forlorn Heath Ledger, sitting (or standing? I can’t remember) idly in his trailer home. The last shot is of a small closet adjacent to an open window, which reveals a cascading field. Beautiful touch. I mean, really, give me a fucking break. I really wish the Simpson’s had Ralph explain to the audience what this all symbolized. It’s similar to the last shot in The Departed: it was only fitting that Ralph from the Simpson’s was even able to figure out what the rat meant.

CAPE LOSER

I'd love to see a remake of Cape Fear, but with all the male roles played by females, and vice versa. Even if the remake was done shot-for-shot, I think the change would add such an interesting element. Imagine a female face that reads I'm-going-to-kill-you-and-your-family-because-I-fucking-can peering into your soul, all the while sitting idly on a concrete fence outside your home. Maybe it's because I'm not used to female serial killers (not the same as the femme fatales), but I think that'd be truly frightening.

There aren't many films that have a female in the vicious, heartless, ruthless killer role. (The ones that come immediately to mind are few and far between: The first Friday the 13th and Monster.) There are others that do exist, but they have the female killer play by a different set of rules. I mean, there's Jennifer's Body, but one could argue that a) it's the demon who's possessing her that's doing all the killing and b) she uses her sexy charm to lure her prey into striking distance, and not brute physical force. All the Boys love Mandy Lane is similar, in that the female lead lures the boys with her sexiness to be slaughtered, and it's her male friend who does all the ruthless killing.

In this slasher gender equality equation, women are falling short as the killers in these films. So let's have more maniac females cuttin' throats and taking names.

300 LOSERS vs SAM RAIMI

I'll admit right here and now that I didn't enjoy 300. I found it lengthy and boring, and actually fell asleep in the theatre. (I awoke to find a severed head flying through the air, and then fell back asleep promptly as soon as the flying head became a rolling head.) I'm all for blood, violence, sex and nudity in my movies, but 300 wasn't able to combine these elements successfully into a saucy bloody sexy romp, and instead it was just a lot scantly clad Spartans conversing with each other with laughable dialogue* (one Spartan wished that he could've told his son he loved him before the son was beheaded and blah blah blah). The talking usually died down here and there for the stylised fight scenes to help further the plot. The movie played its cards right, however, with quotable movie lines--THIS. IS. SPARTAAAAAA!!! comes to mind immediately, but, really, that's the only thing that I can really remember from the movie. That's kind of sad seeing as it's a movie about an army of 300 buff Spartans flexing their sprayed-on abs going up against Xerxes's ginormous army.

If only Sam Raimi had a part in this...Oh, wait:



This right here is trailer for an upcoming series on Starz, called Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Here's the synopsis lifted from the series' website:

Betrayed by his country. Beaten into slavery. Reborn as a warrior. "Spartacus: Blood and Sand" is a graphic and visceral account of Rome’s most famous gladiator. When he’s separated from the love of his life, Spartacus is forced into the gruesome and bloodthirsty arena, where a grisly death is primetime entertainment. Spartacus must fight for survival, befriend his enemies and play politics in this new world of corruption, violence, sex and fame. He’ll be seduced by power and tormented by vengeance. But his passion will give him the strength to prevail over every obstacle, in this modern and uninhibited tale of death, honor and endurance.

Graphic and visceral is pretty spot on from the looks of the trailer. Sam Raimi is my hero when it comes to awesome violence (see: the gumming of Alison Lohman by a gypsy in Drag me to Hell and the tree rape from The Evil Dead), and it looks like he went all out for this upcoming series. And if the copious amounts of blood and violence aren't enough, the trailer showcases a lot sex and nudity. And if that isn't enough, there are reports that the series will have a nude Lucy Lawless to boot. Who could ask for more?

*I'm all for cheesy dialogue for campy movies, but this movie took itself pretty seriously.

INTERNSHITS

I really don't understand the point of working for free, yet there are a ton of people who are more than willing to do so. They're doing it for the experience--or so I'm told--in order to get their foot into whatever career they so desire. I've heard of people working for beer, but that's more understandable; it's something tangible. This so-called 'experience' is just another bullshit bullet point for someone's resume, which, I guess, makes them more desirable to a future employer because they're letting them know that they'll work for nothing if the need be.

I have gotten myself into a lot of debt already by obtaining a 'higher education,' and now I'm expected to work for free because I can buff up my resume with the experience? I can't afford that! I assume these people have trust funds or bank accounts with lots of money or what have you in order to survive the perils of working for free. I find it kind of odd that slaves (or unpaid interns) used to come from what was considered the lower echelon of society, but now it's the 'upper echelon of society' that's taking advantage of these supposed prestigious positions.

JOBLESS IN (A CITY TWO HOURS FROM) SEATTLE

My last post is over two months old. What do I have to show for myself since that pathetic little entry? NOTHING. I have removed myself from Asia, and have settled--albeit temporarily--in a shitty suburb outside of Vancouver. I'm trying to get myself over to Toronto where I will undoubtedly feel more self-worth, but, as it stands, no one wants to hire a loser. I'm not going to blame myself, however; I'm going to blame the loser.

I comfort myself with the excessive use of mayonnaise in my food. I don't know what it is about the creamy white condimate that comforts me...maybe it's because mayonnaise is the loser amongst its condiment friends. Think about it: mayonnaise doesn't stand out on its own. Ketchup, mustard, relish--all have distinguishable flavours. And when they're added to a mixture of other foods and flavours, they stand out and make their presence known. What does mayonnaise do? Nothing. It assimilates all other flavours, carefully tiptoeing around my taste buds to make sure it reaches the back of the mouth undetected, untasted, unnoticed.

LET LOSING DOGS LOSE

I'm a quarter of a century old, and I have nothing to show for it. In retaliation of my age, I created this blog just so I could bitch about the inane and superficial things that actually mean nothing to anyone else just so I could feel better about myself. I could cry into a cavern or over a lake and have it echo back to me just to prove that I'm alive...OR I could create a blog where my stupidity is everlasting.

I'm going to go with the latter because, hey, someone might enjoy this.

REFLECTING POOL

HALLWAYS AT SUNSET