Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Claymation Werewolf. True Confessions.

This is a LoEB post~

Warning.
The following blog post deals with subject matters of a graphically factual nature and may not be suitable for those with sensitive constitutions, allergies to shell fish or regular readers of the Claymation Werewolf Digital Digest. Please do not operate this blog while skiing, driving or participating in the physical act of love. If this blog lasts longer than four hours, then you are an incredibly slow reader.




It’s time to lay it on the line friends. I have tried, in my quest to be a highly respected geek, to keep certain things about me out of the public eye. Unfortunately forces beyond my control (this weeks League of Extraordinary Blogger topic) have forced me to once again reveal these dark truths. And so, with a sense of dread and regret, I present to you My Geek Confessions.



To begin with, I should get a big one out of the way. Comic Books:



I’ve been into comics my whole life. I collected them as a kid, I used to love them! And I still love…the “idea” of them. Unfortunately as ive grown older (and much, much cheaper) I’ve started to look at entertainment, with a “bang for your buck” attitude and at $4 dollars for about 5 minutes of reading the cranky old man in me starts yelling about what an outrage it is…what a waste of money! I know, I know comics are the perfect blend of art and story and the production of comics is an admirable and timeless art form…but come on, four dollars a piece?? I’ll be over there at the bargain bin, drinking some Ovaltine and listening to big band music.



As some of you may know I am a huge fan of Horror…especially slasher movies, growing up during “The Golden Age” of slasher films, I spent my childhood looking up to heroes like Jason, Freddy, Michael Myers etc… much to the confusion and uneasyness of my parents.

As OTHERS of you might know I am also somewhat of a “Brony” which is the cool, hip slang that is given to someone who is a fan of the cartoon My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic. What can I say? I know the cartoon was originally created for girls and I realize that it doesn’t exactly fit with the expectations people have of me but I like quality and MLP is quality humor, quality writing, a quality cartoon. And they give A LOT of nods to their adult fans! Even had an episode with several Big Lebowski jokes (side confession: I HATE the Big Lebowski)



Anyway if you look at my online life like a big party…I spend most of my time trying to keep my family from enteracting with the Biker Gang that I also invited. It’s that constant struggle to reconcile the horror fan in me with the lover of cute funny cartoons, and in fact, that is one of the reasons I originally chose the handle The Claymation Werewolf.



While we’re talking about horror, let me just say that it seems to get worse and worse as the years go by. Each new “fad” in the industry takes it down a peg. There was the slick, overproduced, teenager era ushered in by Scream (loved scream, not a fan of all of it’s clones)

Then there were all the remakes of foreign horror (dark water, the ring, the grudge, one missed call, pulse and the uninvited) I have to admit I’ve never seen a single one of these movies and I don’t feel like I’ve missed anything.

But above all, the bane of my existence, the lowest common denominator of horror; The Torture Porn. Audition, Catch Me If You Can, Toristas, Hostile and of course Saw.

These movies have no story, no character development and no point. They’re popularity would make me fear for the future of one of my favorite movie genres if it weren’t for the popularity of a little movie called Trick r Treat.

The perfect Halloween film and an underrated treasure of an anthology, horror movie. I can only hope that it’s cult following will lead to quality films and an end to torture porn and constant TERRIBLE REMAKES OF 80’S SLASHER MOVIES.



Hollywood, Stop. It.



I’ve saved the most controversial for last. I want to talk about a few tv shows that tv could do without. First: Community.

I know, it’s a darling of the geek world, and I realize I’m in the minority of this but I just don’t get it! It’s full of “memes” and geek references, but I think that might actually be what bugs me about the show…I feel like some people sat in a room and decided “alright, we’ve put all the necessary stuff in here! Now the geeks will have no other choice but to love it!” The end result feels formulaic, boring and predictable.

Speaking of boring, formulaic and predictable, community has a cousin in the animated world, and it goes by the name of The Regular Show.

“But, Claymation Werewolf!” You might say “The Regular Show is FULL of geeky inside jokes!! Constant references to the 80’s!…it‘s hilarious” Not to me. To me, I just see those same tv excecutives saying “Okay Bob, now let’s make another show, the same way…hipster geeky stuff. But starring a…uhh… a Blue Jay!…and a Racoon! It could be a Cartoon. You know, for kids!”

But what about the people who think that Regular Show doesn’t have quite enough inside jokes? The hipsters who think it’s too close to “mainstream comedy?” For the ultra hip cartoon fan who looks down on the unsophisticated swine who aren’t “with it” enough to get the special unfunny comedy in their animated entertainment of choice; allow me to recommend Adventure Time!

Now, just like with Regular Show, I’ve given it a chance. Watched several episodes…but I am truly at a loss! Please! Explain to me why this show is worth my time to watch. Maybe I’m just not smart enough to understand the advanced humor….wouldn’t be the first time.

And, for the record it isn’t that I just live in the past with cartoons and can’t stand anything new…Spongebob is great! I love Phineas and Ferb and I was a big fan of Chowder.

So maybe this poor simple country blogger just needs educated! Anybody?
And so, that concludes my self destruction of any popularity I had built in the geek blogging community (thanks a lot Brian!) I hope some of you stick around after the show for the party (it’s gonna be WILD!) and to the rest of you, get off my lawn! I wanna read my 50cent bin comics and watch the My Little Pony goes to Camp Crystal Lake marathon!

To witness other bloggers letting it all hang out, check out:

The Surfing Pizza's Princess was ALWAYS in another castle

Christopher Tupa! Any friend of Spongebob and MLP is a friend of mine.

Ashley at Life With The Fandom takes on Cosplay...but I still like him

Reis at the Lair Of The Dork Hord Doesnt like Dr Who or Fantasy Novels!

16 comments:

  1. Trick r Treat is FANTASTIC! It's a new tradition in our household. With that out of the way...

    (Removes white glove. Slaps you across the face.)

    Community, sir, is great. Come on! They did a Beetlejuice joke that took three seasons to complete! The paintball episodes! The Goodfellas episode! My god man! It's like I don't even know you anymore!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ouch! first comment full of hate and bile! Just what I'd expect from a community fan! lol In fairness I've only seen about three episodes (all on airplanes) maybe I was just cranky and didnt give it a fair shake. (when i travel for work I'm a constant combination of grumpy and hopped up on dramamine)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Speaking of your comment though, extra confession! I've also never seen a mob movie (aside from lock stock and two smoking barrels) Never seen Goodfellas, Any of the Godfathers, Scarface etc...

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hey man, nice confession! Thanks for sharing, you may get even more flac than me :)
    I too am a horror fan! And I love all things cute too!! The new ponys and carebears are so great!!
    I havent watched Community so I cant say anything about that but I really dig the few episodes of Adventure Time I saw, it's so random! I have seen Chowder and I cant stand that show! Funny how we are so alike in some aspects and so opposite in others. Good times!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Not trying to win you over to it, but I know for me, the reason I love Adventure Time is that the show is written from the perspective of like a 7 year-old kid. He has what amounts to an imaginary friend/pet dog, they live in a tree house and go on death-defying adventures every day. He has two views on women, ones that are his age that are pretty, pink, smell like bubblegum and live in a candy kingdom, and ones that are older, slightly mean, gothy and stay up all night (hence being a vampire.) Everyone he meets is either in need of help from an adventurer, or is there to battle him. And most importantly, story-wise, nothing is off the table. It can literally rain daggers, or his worst enemy's heart can escape it's chest prison to go and try and win the heart of a princess. Again, this is the kind of stuff that little kids put in stories when you let them fill in the Mad Libs blanks.

    As for comics and most of the modern horror (95-present), I'm right there with you...

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great confessions.

    Some of my confessions about your confessions:

    1) Comics are awesome but too expensive. That's why I usually borrow them, get them second hand at a used bookstore or download them semi-legally from places like FilesTube.
    2) I also don't really get the mass appeal of Big Lebowski. It was funny, but not enough to warrant the acclaim it gets.
    3) Community is funny in small doses, but I get what you are saying. You feel the execs are playing too much to the geek. It's rather obvious. Which, conversely, works for a show like Big Bang Theory because the point is that all those guys are dorks and that's exactly how they'd act.
    4) I actually haven't seen Trick r Treat and I'm pretty ashamed about that.
    5) I completely agree about torture porn movies. The Saw movies are complete ass and I hate that people like them. Same with Hostel. Same with Abduction.
    6) I've not even heard of any of the cartoons you mentioned. It looks like I'm not missing anything.

    The only confession you did that was even remotely geek shattering would probably be that you haven't seen Good Fellas or Scarface.

    Oh, and maybe the My Little Pony thing. But everyone has a crazy soft spot for something like that. I love Disney movies and soundtracks from Disney movies. I just do.

    I hadn't planned on writing a confession article for this week's assignment but I may have to.

    ReplyDelete
  7. @Christopher I definitely think I'm getting more flac so far! I'm controversial now! lol. I agree about our similarities/differences thing, very extreme! but i guess that's the spice of life... But really though, you like adventure time and hate Chowder? I feel like I'm in bizzaro world!

    @Shawn That description sounded WAY better than the show was (to me at least) I think that if you wrote adventure time I would be a big fan.

    ReplyDelete
  8. @Paxton Thank you for the comment man! I've had the Big Bang Theory/Community argument with SO MANY people and you just summed up my position better than i ever have! You really have to see Trick r Treat. I think you would love it! It looks like we agree on way more than we disagree about (at least in the boundaries of this blog post) I really hope you decide to do a true confessions post. I can't wait to see what you write

    ReplyDelete
  9. I agree with alot and I know comics are expensive .... but where can you get that form of entertainment anywhere else !?!?! That Pinhead shirt is pretty cool though :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I love the way you write, always entertaining!

    Community is one unfunny show! I have NO idea how people enjoy it (Annie is hot tho)

    I cant do horror ... bad dreams lol

    The mere fact that you have Eek the Cat up there

    #appreciation

    ReplyDelete
  11. I am in full agreement with you, but then you had to go and post a comment about having never seen Goodfellas, the Godfather movies!? Goodfellas is one of my favorite movies! (Of course, if mob movies aren't your thing, you're not going to like it.)

    ReplyDelete
  12. @mike yeah...i know it really is a great art form but a line has to be drawn on the price at some point right? I mean would you still consider them worth it at $8 a piece? maybe im just poor! lol

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I just havent reached the point of "not worth it" yet, but then again I only get maybe 5 or 6 new a month....all older comics I get are used, to read copies and I get em cheap as possible so maybe I'm just not there yet.

      Delete
  13. @Eclectik Thank you for agreeing about the Community thing, I knew SOMEONE had to be on my side! And yes...Eek! rules, not nearly enough people appreciate him.

    ReplyDelete
  14. @Brian Thank you! If it helps at all, I HAVE seen the Goodfeathers segments they used to do with those pigeons on Animaniacs, so I've basically seen Goodfellas right? Anybody?

    ReplyDelete
  15. I changed the Twitter handle to @TeamHellions and not @Team_Hellions anymore, so I just saw you wrote to me about this article.
    Two things I disagreed with - the comics and the TV Shows.
    Comics are way too expensive, to be sure. But all things considering I think its a bargain. To pay all the creators and the parent companies, Diamond, comics shops, all for 3-4 bucks makes sense. Now,I do think 4 is the limit though. $4 is great for the titles you love.
    Speaking of love, I love Community and Regular Show. Community is one of the smartest shows I've ever seen. And Regular Show is just a blast.

    ReplyDelete