James & the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl(re-read) This wasn’t as fun as I remember. I remembered a whimsical Dahl-esque adventure with weird stuff happening and memorable characters. But on the re-read, it becomes evident that this is Dahl’s first attempt at children’s literature. Everything up to when he gets into the peach is fine, but then I started going “get on with it”. The other characters don’t have any real arcs. Instead, they all just bicker with each other while minor obstacles appear and then are solved (usually by running away). I think the movie is better. Al Jaffee’s Mad Life by Mary-Lou Weisman Al Jaffee was one of…
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Why Is There Always a Fashion Girl?
Why does there always have to be a “fashion girl” in every poorly developed marketing plan aimed at young females? I don’t think they have any idea who girls are these days. I feel like they’re just following tradition. I have two daughters. I’ve seen a lot of birthday parties. I’ve seen them and their friends play. I’ve NEVER seen them doing anything close to designing outfits or matching clothes or sewing or anything like what they think. Sometimes they put on princess dresses, but that’s it. And that’s not what I’d call coordinating outfits. Claudia in The Babysitter’s Club. Jade from Bratz (and probably a ton of others). Prize…
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Favorite Disney Animation Moments
Disney is full of grand sweeping animation. Beautiful colors, vast landscapes, fluid motion, unique character design. But it’s the little things that make Disney movies so magical. Little shots, fragments of film, half-seconds that demonstrate the talent of the animators there. Cinderella – Lucifer’s Tea Cups The people on the Cinderella commentary made great mention of this. Partially it’s what inspired this article. Animation is more than just making characters move. It’s adding those little touches. Look at how happy he is when he sees the cup. Look at how his head wobbles so silly. It’s a blink-and-you-miss-it moment, but once you see it, you start noticing all those other…
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Avatar: Not a James Cameron Movie
I recently discovered the joy of Avatar: The Last Airbender — a great cartoon with bad timing. My first introduction to Avatar was on Nickelodeon. A channel that was most known for Spongebob Squarepants and The Fairly Oddparents. In other words, cartoons for stoners. Plus it came out around the time that James Cameron’s movie was big buzz, so I thought it was piggybacking on a known IP. It was an “American-made anime” meaning it had that cheap-looking animation. Heavily Asian influenced style. Who is this main character that looks like the baby from Dragonball Z? With weird blue markings and he looks 10. Then the terrible movie came out…
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And Now My Confession
At first, I was like… But then I saw My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, and I was like… Call me a brony, call me a nutjob, call me mentally deficient. All I know is I have two little girls. Either I can let them choose whatever trashy, shallow 20-minute commercial happens to be on when Daddy needs to pay bills, or I can choose for them. I choose MLP, and they approve. When I pop in the DVD, they fly around with their Rainbow Dash toys which we got from McDonald’s months ago, and had no context for until now. This is not a show I just set on,…
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My Top Ten Hottest Women Who Aren’t Real (10 through 7)
10. Rosalina I had some trouble with the number ten spot, whether to put Rosalina or Peach here (and for a time, it was Magica DeSpell. Jeez, what was I thinking?). Peach has some cute aspects, but ultimately I decided that A) Peach is still pretty damn annoying, always getting kidnapped and B) Peach has only gotten hot in recent years. Before that she was obnoxiously saccharine, bland, and no matter what incarnation, her voice was grating. She only achieved notoriety with me by donning skimpy bathing suits and tennis outfits in fan art. I probably wasn’t supposed to write that part. Rosalina, however, has always been hot. She’s tall,…
