"Krystal remains the third most requested character that did not make it into the final roster (behind Geno and Ridley). No-one really knows why she wasn’t made a playable character, since less popular characters were selected over her."
It's quite obvious that this statement was based on my damned tally from all those years ago. It was based on the number of letters chosen by the developers (based on their tastes, not on who was most popular). We don't actually know who was requested the most or not (aside from Sonic.)
Grrrrr, two years later and the improper use of my one and only actual effect on the minds of others still lives.
And no, I don't think this post should have gone on the Smash Blawg. This is my personal bullshit, so it makes more sense to put it on my personal blog. Besides, I'd rather not waste a post there when I could not post a strategy for three weeks!
I like my longer posts. They are fun to read. Yes, fun to read for me.
The Youtube time wasting of importance lately? Watching SOME (but not all) of a number of animated movies and specials that the devoted have posted in all their glory. Well, it certainly better than whatever video diary entry or "scary montage" (as I've had my videos described as) one may think of making.
It all started last week, when for reasons I can't remember, I looked up Gollum on Wikipedia (I'm not a fan of Lord of the Rings, so don't look at me like that). While there, I was reminded that those holiday-loving folks at Rankin-Bass made an animated adaptation of The Hobbit in the 70s. I decided to tune in, and watched a select few parts of it, namely the Gollum section (obviously), and the ending.
It looks like a Rankin-Bass animated movie. You know what a Rankin-Bass animated thing looks like, so I won't go into details about that (and if you don't, well, I'm lazy and that's the actual reason I won't go into details about it). One thing that struck me was the way Bilbo was presented. I actually read about half of The Hobbit years ago, and Bilbo always struck me as a grumpy whiner, while this animated version seems more like a jokey fellow. Gollum more or less resembles what I pictured him in the pre-Peter Jackson days. I don't remember what it is that made me visualize him so reptilian. Maybe some of you uber dorks can help?
I have seen bits and pieces of Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings (which technically follows this), and the rotoscoping is rather off-putting (but seems a bit more visually in-line with the definitive versions, even if Aragorn looks like a viking). I haven't decided to watch the Rankin-Bass follow-up to that. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. I'm a rebel like that.
After that, I followed it up by looking for another full-length movie to watch. Unfortunately, the one I decided upon was Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue. I'm sure you must know of this one. It's been a part of my worthless psyche for years now. For the unwary, it's a special made in the late 80s/very early 90s where a bunch of cartoon characters popular forever or at that time specifically (how else can you explain the presence of ALF?) teaching generic teenage (it could be YOU!) that drugs are bad and have bad effects on you, while George C. Scott Mary Jane Smoke Monster eggs him onto harder stuff. It's all very Reagan-era (even though it was preceded by a message from Bush the First and his wife BARRRRRR HE DESTROYED MY MEMOIRS!) The most entertainment you can get out of it is hearing characters like Bugs Bunny, Winnie the Pooh, Huey, Duey, Luey, and Michelangelo of the TMNT talking about drugs...and George C. Scott doing the voice of a Mary Jane Smoke Monster in a business suit (alas, no "AARRRRRRRGH! MY GROIN!") See, I just made two Simpsons references in order to make this funny (X-E could write several paragraphs on it and still be funny, but I'm not that Matt).
One thing I DID find humorous about the whole enterprise is that, after trying to convince aforementioned teenager of the badness of drugs via upbeat, delightful song, it doesn't seem to work. So to get the point across more bluntly, the Toons decide to use a combination of shock imagery and a simulation of a very boring bad trip. That'll teach them kids not to be like Hendrix!
So, here, I'll subject you to the whole thing:
Well after that debacle, I decided to aim a bit higher. So where do I go? Chuck Jones, of course.
What Chuck Jones, you ask? An adaptation of Riki-Tiki-Tavi, a completely unrelated story in The Jungle Book by Rudyard "Isn't British Imperialism Awesome?" Kipling. It's a pretty well-known story, so I'm going to have to say "Fuck you" to everyone who doesn't understand what's going on.
It's a surprisingly 'dark' story, I guess. Well, dark in the way that the titular character just sort of slaughters villainous snakes left and right, and other elements. He also clearly goes insane when doing so, and it's animated appropriately. Chuck Jones, more so than even Rankin-Bass, has a style you can easily identify. I'm unfortunately not a true animation buff, so I can't really expand upon that any further.
Another thing: apparently, the songs of the bird are in the book, too. Because birds 'sing', obviously this very non-Indian sounding bird (who said that the animals need to sound like the people of the region, huh? They could just as easily sound like the white people occupying and enslaving the region!) singing about every event known to man. Oh, Kipling, why don't you get some Indian kids to go pick your cotton.
I've been watching all the new episodes of The Venture Bros, thanks to my new friend, Bittorrent (we had some rocky encounters in the past, but now we are as close as close can be. Oh wait, maybe not close enough to touch. We're not like that) I love all the back story they've been able to cram in the past three episodes. None of them, to me, have been sidesplitting, but they make up for it by being interesting and wildly entertaining. I am itching to see what happens over the course of the rest of the season.
Even though I haven't been watching them (I'M NEW TO THE TORRENT THING, JERK!), I am also anticipating the finale of Doctor Who. I already know what's going to happen, as the Beeb decided to get the jump on the Brit papers this year and pretty much show us who's baaaaaaack. I'm intrigued to see what they do with it.
Torrents has also supplied me with Adobe Premier, which is better than Microsoft Movie Maker. So far, I know I can do things, but can't actually do them. It is better than Microsoft Movie Maker, where I know how to do things, but can't actually do them. There's a difference in there somewhere.
As you can also see, I added a bunch of links to my sidebar. Do you actually pay attention to the sidebar? I don't. That shit sucks ten dicks.
Prairiecon was good, as expected (if it didn't meet my expectations, I probably would have updated earlier with a rant). Toon was good, Wrasslin' was good, Munchkin was good, Illuminati was good, and Heroclix was good. I was worried I would end up sucking this year at clix like I did last year, but the three rounds I was in went pretty well. First guy annihilated me, I annihilated the second opponent, and the the third was an equal, epic better that ended with my Kid Flash and his Blue Beetle trading blows on a rooftop (he won in the end, but it was fun).
The only real prize I got during the weekend was a copy of Principia Discordia, which I got because I was the only one from the Illuminati group the guy running it could find. I shall attempt to tackle it one of these days.
Of course, the event has once again made me want to design a tabletop roleplaying game. This may last for another few months before subsiding, and who knows how much I will do before I get bored with the idea?
Yesterday I bought a cellphone. Not a fancy one, not at all. I probably won't even use text messages because they're charging me 20 cents for every one. Fuck that, I barely have anyone to talk to normally.
The day before the gaming convention. I guess I'm okay. I've been working a lot recently, and that's about it.
Cashier work is alright. I kind of miss the wild freedom of being a bagger (and it's there, dammit!), but I guess more hours is good and all. Plus, I get to interact, with people! That's good, isn't it?
Aside from that, my friend and I have been working extra hard on making our comic work and plan the thing out. It's been going good. But this sort of thing is for that Chamber of Dread thing I'm doing, isn't it?
