Gay Babies!!!

                When we found out that we were having a baby, one of the first things that I said was that it could grow up and marry a friend’s baby in an arranged marriage (halfway joking, but really not).   Then the big question (because this friend’s baby is a girl) from my wife is “What if the baby is a girl?” to which I reply “Then she better be gay”.   Upon repeating this idea to several people (as well as the friend in question), I began to ask myself why I really wanted to have a gay baby.  

                I understand that we live in a society where it is still not 100% acceptable for a gay teenager to come out to their parents.  Sure, when I was growing up, parents would disown their kids for being gay.  Though it has gotten better now (to an extent), I think there are some parents who would still disown their children.   It’s not going to be until several decades when we finally weed out all the old timers built on hate until we have an accepting society and families (same goes for racism, religion, etc).   Yet, I feel like if my child doesn’t grow up to be gay, I’m going to somehow be disappointed.   I feel like if my child, let’s say it’s a girl, has a relationship end badly with a boyfriend, I’d be likely to say “I know Mark’s a jerk, but have you ever thought about Ashlee?  She’s cute, huh?”   Though that, in and of itself, then becomes its own problem because then I will be this mid-forties guy telling his teenage daughter that her teenage friends are cute.   It’s probably not the best road to go down, even if my intentions are only of the homosexual kind.

                So then I naturally started thinking about what the big deal is about being gay and why I would want someone to be gay so badly.   And in my thinking, I found something rather interesting out, which I will now (unfortunately) share with all of you. 

                First off, while I am not gay, I do like the idea of being gay.  I’ve always felt like it was this special club that either get to join or not.   Not being born into it, I always felt a little left out.   And no matter what anyone says to you, being gay is not a choice.   Believe you me, if I could choose to be gay I would.  But, alas, I do not feel the way about men the way that I do about women.  And once you reach that point, you really start to understand that being gay isn’t a choice either because as much as  I just can’t seem to wrap my head around the idea of falling in love with another man, I bet the other side of the coin feels the same way.   This point has actually also been demonstrated in such shows as The Simpsons and 30 Rock, and though only television shows, they still carry such an accurate portrayal of real life that it is hard to deny it.

                While coming to all of these realizations and absurdities, I stumbled upon a concept that actually makes great sense to me.   You can either take this as a genuine piece of knowledge, or disregard it as the good intentions of an old fool (you should probably do both with everything I ever say).

                Imagine there exists a room and in it, a group of people sit in a circle sharing a story.   This story can be one that makes them so sad they cry or so happy they all appear to be glowing and just smiling from ear to ear.   For purposes of my story though, let us pretend that the story is hilarious and they all start laughing.   Then you walk in.   “Hey guys, what’s so funny?” you ask in your heterosexual way.  “Oh, you wouldn’t get it” they reply in their matter of fact but not at all ill intended way.

                Something like this you can perceive one of many ways.   The most common way (unfortunately) is to have the attitude of “Yeah, well I didn’t want to know about your stupid joke anyway!  I’m going to form my own club and none of you will be allowed in it and we’ll tell jokes that we can laugh at but you won’t get!!”   Of course, that is the sort childish/blind hate approach to all of this.  A less likely but still happens scenario is someone simply saying “Well, that’s fine but me and my family will have nothing to do with you”.   That’s a little more tolerant of a reaction, but still not all the way there.   What I feel to be the appropriate response (because it’s the one that I would have) would be to join the group even though you could never really be a part of it and just try to understand the inside jokes.   I mean, if everyone you know watches a movie and really likes it, and then they’re talking about it, do you get mad or do you go and watch that movie?  I’m not saying you have to be gay, but a little tolerance and understanding go a long way.

                Side Note:  One day my baby will grow up and possibly read this.

The Suspension Bridge of Disbelief

                While recently watching the special features on The Creature From The Black Lagoon, I had to listen to some type of movie expert tell me that the idea of a monster movie is something that the audience has to buy into, so therefore it is somewhat harder to market from the start.    Though I don’t completely disagree with this idea, I am somewhat offended by the very notion of it.

                Without trying to convince anyone that “aliens are in fact real, you just haven’t seen them yet”, I will say that nearly all movie plots are somewhat unrealistic unless noted “based on true events” or the such.   That being said, I find the idea of a lot of teen movies and romances to be far less believable than something in the genre of horror or science fiction.

                My first case in point is kind of a classic teen movie that people make fun of yet still enjoy, She’s All That.   First off, ignoring the rest of the “this would never really happen in real life” problems, why does the main character end up with the character that only helped make her over for a bet in the end?   In real life, they’d be married after college and then divorced a few years later (If he didn’t cheat on her and have the relationship end somehow first.)  Their whole relationship started on a lie, so it can never last.   In real life (not the movies) when people treat you like that, you don’t suck it up, say “All right, I really do love you”, you run away from them.  Far away.   And, alas, how many people who have attended high school have ever seen one of the least popular kids end up dating one of the most popular ones?   Sure, maybe after high school something like that could happen, but in high school- real high school- Freddie Prinze Jr.’s character would have been too concerned about his own reputation to ever have anything to do with someone who was once that unpopular.   Or on the flip side, the girl would have realized her new found popularity and snubbed his character because he lied to her.   In any event, the likely scenarios (that is the ones that I would actually believe happening) are not anywhere close to how the movie played out.   I actually feel as if the movie Carrie had a more realistic interpretation of high school. 

                Another movie I find to be really unbelievable is that P.S., I Love You one.   Okay, I admit it.  I’ve never actually seen it.  But based on the previews and ideas I have formed about it, I just don’t think it would ever happen.   A guy finds out he’s going to die, and instead of spending his last remaining time doing all the things he never got to, he leaves clues for his wife to find when he’s gone to prove he still loves her?  Hey jerk, here’s an idea for you:  Why not spend your remaining time with your wife you claim to love so much instead of planning this whacked out scavenger hunt?    But again, I have never seen the movie, so I don’t want to pass judgment on it too much.   Sure, him somehow secretly plotting all of this and having it play out from beyond the grave doesn’t exactly help the woman move on, which should be one of his main concerns toward her happiness overall instead of her spending the rest of her life pining for a dead guy, but you know, haven’t seen it!    As if I need to give you the horror alternative, just think of any zombie movie.   People coming back from the dead?  I can buy that.  People leaving love notes from beyond the grave?   Ehhhhh, not so much.

                My third and final example (because I can do this all day) is simply the movie Knocked Up.   Forget everything else, just know the one simple fact that a guy who looks like Seth Rogen got a girl who looks like Kathryn Hiegel pregnant on a drunken one night stand.    Then they kind of end up falling in love or whatever by the end, and that’s its own suspension of disbelief right there, but we won’t touch on that one either.   The simple fact is this:  Does this happen in real life?   Probably.  I could have some really ugly guy send me a picture of himself and some really hot woman that he managed to have a one night stand with (and maybe even impregnate) whilst drunk or on drugs.   I do not deny that this could or possibly has ever happened.   I realize that.   I just still feel like it’s highly unlikely in my mind.   I do not live in a world where things like this happen, and it’s harder for me to believe something like this would happen as opposed to, say, the plot of Seed of Chucky.  

                Maybe romance is dead.   Maybe it was the way I was raised.   Maybe it’s society.   Maybe it’s any combination of those things.   But I find it a lot more likely that people will meet aliens, monsters or other such things thought to be of myth than they will ever be likely to find that one special person under the most ridiculous of circumstances.   I am not a cynic; I am a realist. 

Me Vs. Chucky P (Round One)

The greatest thing that we, as a country, possess is freedom.  The biggest threat we have to that freedom is censorship.   Past all of the other evils in this world, censorship is the worst simply because it is the one key that could allow all the other evils of this world to be unleashed.

                By no means do I believe that any human being is worth more or less than another.   However, let’s pretend that there exists someone out there who believes that men are superior to women.    While his ideas may sound ridiculous to someone educated with common sense (like me and hopefully you), the fact is that we cannot censor his beliefs and he must be able to state them under the freedom of speech we all share.   Why?  Simple: What if the role were reversed?  What if instead of censoring the guy you want to tell to shut his mouth, someone out there decided to censor the people with common sense who speak out and say women and men are equal.    Censoring one side of an argument is the most cowardly and offensive act that I can think of, no matter how wrong someone might be.

                The very idea of censorship, when it comes to picking a side, then depends upon who wants to pick which side.  While I may very easily admit that men and women are equals, what if it was a different topic?  What if it was a topic you and I didn’t agree upon?  There can be a wrong and a right, yes, but the wrong must still be allowed to exist to prove the right is correct.   It’s like how the bad times in this world are there to make the good times seem only that much better.

                To give you a non-opinionated point of view, let’s talk shop.  Imagine a company, let’s call them Kia, wants to release a car onto the market that doesn’t have brakes.   Why would anyone do this is beyond me, but somehow, I could see it happening in this crazy world of ours.   The selling points would be simple:  No brakes means less production costs, hence they sell the cars for dirt cheap because they don’t cost as much to make as a car with brakes.    Now, in order to sell this to the consumer, Kia decides that they’re going to tell you not to worry about not having brakes because that’s why you have insurance.   Your brakes could go out anyway, even if you had them.   And think of all the maintenance you’ll be saving money on without having brakes to take care of routinely.   Plus, there is always the added notion that a car without brakes is better than no car and, well, it would be all some people could afford.

                Imagine that was pitched to you.   Imagine there was a giant marketing campaign with ads in magazines and on television.   Imagine that the opposite side of the coin was censored.  Imagine the people who were trying to tell you about the health risks not only to yourself but others as well were silenced.    Certainly some people would have enough common sense to say “No brakes means I can’t stop, so I won’t buy this car and I don’t feel safe having others on the road driving it”.  But imagine if they were silenced.   Imagine if all you could hear was what they wanted you to hear.

                There are two sides to every story.  As (fairly) intelligent beings, it is our right to be able to hear both sides and form an opinion of our own as to which we believe to be the correct one.   When you take away one of these choices (censorship) you are essentially taking away any choice in the matter.

                If someone says something to you that you don’t like, ignore them.  Or you could tell them why you think that they are wrong.   But censoring them?  There is just no excuse for that.  And I don’t know if it was the man himself or some lackey of his that runs his official Facebook fan page, but I was recently restricted from commenting on the fan page for Chuck Palahniuk.  All of my comments made over time were also removed.  I was blacklisted and erased right out of his history.   Rather than stand up and tell me why my beliefs are wrong, I was just washed away.   Does that sound like the act of a true man, one who has probably had to fight censorship before in his career as a so-called writer, or does it sound like the act of a coward?   Defend yourself, Mr. Palahniuk.   I dare you to.  I dare you to stop living on the fame of your “Fight Club” book and start doing something that matters.   I dare you to stop selling your soul dollar by dollar and come out from behind the shadows and explain to me why I am wrong.   Why I’m right?  Well… That’s another story.

The End of Television

I feel like the end of “Lost” is really the end of television as we know it.  When I first watched the pilot, I actually enjoyed it so much I watched it again with Gina to show her the awesomeness.   Never before- and never since- have I done that with a show. 

                In a world (of television) where game shows and “reality” shows run wild, it Is very easy to say that a huge part of television is dying with “Lost”.   Mtv hasn’t been “Music Television” for many years, but recently Cartoon Network started airing shows (and movies) that were, gasp, not cartoons.  Also, with the switch from the Sci-Fi Network to “SyFy”, they have also lost a lot of their science fiction credibility, airing comedies that could be seen on CBS and shows about who is buying what piece of Hollywood memorabilia and for how much.   Pretty soon, the Food Network will show people going to the bathroom as some sort of “post-eating” showcase and Lifetime: Television For Women will start appealing to someone. 

                Don’t get me wrong, there are a number of shows currently airing that I do enjoy.   Most noted in the hour long block are Burn Notice, Sons of Anarchy, Bones, Chuck and Supernatural.   But those shows (and others like them that I don’t watch) are all pretty cut and dry.   They’re ex-CIA, biker gang, anthropologist, CIA and monster hunters that all face some sort of problem and usually solve within the allotted time or in a two part episode or by the end of the season if it’s a really big story arc.

                No show has that big feel to it any more though, where you feel you need to watch episode to episode to see what’s going to happen.   After watching an episode of “Lost”, I always felt like I had learned so much but really nothing at all and couldn’t wait for the next episode.   With the shows I listed above, at the end of any given episode you’re either sent home happy or given a cliffhanger which most likely won’t be nearly as dramatic as you’d hoped.

                That being said, there is something to still be said for the half hour comedy.   “How I Met Your Mother”, “30 Rock” (And pretty much all those NBC Thursday night shows, though “The Office” is going away, right?) and some others make me laugh when I watch them.   But that’s really all they do.  They don’t really have a lot that carries over from episode to episode (Hence you can pluck out a single episode to watch at random and not need to know what is going on to find it funny), but they’re not really meant to either. 

                When you ask me what the greatest hour long shows on television are, I will be hard pressed to name shows currently airing over shows that have since ceased.   I feel like “Lost” was really one of the last of those “must see” shows (Sorry, NBC)  Now I feel like we’re just drifting further and further into some strange concept that will be on for three hours every night and will consist of Sarah Palin shooting people from her helicopter with the survivors getting to pick a briefcase and potentially win something.   Of course, it will have to air on Fox.

Worst. Movie. Ever.

                When it was first announced that they were going to be making a sequel to “Manos: Hands of Fate”, I learned that such a title existed as “worst movie ever”.   I guess I always thought people were so much more concerned with giving movies awards and patting each other on the back than they were with labeling the movies as being bad.   It seems really, to me, like something that shouldn’t have even been recognized by so-called movie critics because it should just stay off of their radar and they can go back to drooling over “Million Dollar Baby” and what not.

                Upon doing some research, I found that there exists a label of “worst movie ever” following around “Plan 9 From Outer Space”.   What?  Who are these people and why do they get to label these movies as such?  I would rather sit through Plan 9 (or Manos) than 95% of what is put out in the box office today.  So, of course, I thought it only fair for me to decide- in my humble opinion- what the worst movie ever made really should be.   I mean, come on, it’s time to update the list anyway, right?  Plan 9 is a cult classic.   Can you say the same about “Gigli”?

                Now what I need to define before I begin is simply this:  This is my opinion and my opinion alone of the worst movie ever made (and I’ve seen a lot of movies).   To be fair, I am not going to choose a movie “out of my genre” either.  It’d be very easy for me to pick off any of those movies based on Nicholas Sparks books, but, you know, not my genre.  And just because it doesn’t appeal to me, it does appeal to someone.   And then you start getting into this question of whether or not box office success has anything to do with the overall greatness of a movie.   Sure, it makes millions its opening weekend, but what’s the longevity for it?  Will people know or care about Nicholas Sparks ten years down the line?  Again, things that make me appear out of my element, so I won’t even try to touch upon them.

                Without further adieu, my vote for worst movie ever made is:  Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li.    While there exist several extensive websites explaining the casting flaws and plot holes in this movie, I’d like to look at it as being the worst movie ever made for two other huge reasons (Though plot and characters, which can be researched on your own, are valid enough to make my point)

                First off, this was a reboot to the franchise, as it is not the first movie made based on the video game.   But if only for technology sake, this movie should have been better than the Jean Claude Van Damme version.  Sadly, it was not.   I’ve watched The Punisher be portrayed by three different people, and each time I liked him a little bit more.   How do you make a movie ten years or so after the original, and somehow have it come out worse than the original?  The reboot has to be better, because if it’s not then you’re only left asking yourself what the point of the reboot was.  For this, and many other reasons, I was left asking myself what the point of this reboot was.   In fact, I’m still asking myself that.

                The second- and really the biggest reason- why this movie gets the worst movie ever label from me is simply because of the timing and failure.   This is the age of the computer nerds.   A franchise built on movies based on a video game seems ideal.   In fact, Lara Croft and Resident Evil actually both did a pretty good job of proving this.  So why can’t we have a Street Fighter franchise?  If this movie was really good, it could have spawned a number of sequels.   But someone out there had to go and blow it, so this is officially my worst movie ever.

Change Your Band Name

It has been a long time annoyance of mine when bands make significant changes to their line ups but do not change the band name.  Why?  Is the singer/front man really the sole force behind the band?  Pearl Jam was rotating drummers once on what seemed like a monthly basis and it didn’t bother me.  But it didn’t bother me because Pearl Jam wouldn’t be Pearl Jam without Eddie Vedder. 

                The biggest reason why I believe bands should have to change their name- even if in a copyright lawsuit- is simply because of the name value and the legacy that it holds.   Right now it is 2010, so if someone was born in 1995, they’d be fifteen years old.   Imagine if when Kurt Cobain killed himself the other members of the band decided to go on with a new front man and keep the Nirvana name.   While it wouldn’t seem morally right, I would also find it funny if someone who was only fifteen years old said that they had seen Nirvana live.  “No you haven’t.  Kurt Cobain died a year before you were born”.

                This is also true in the reverse of situations.   Bands like Soundgarden, Rage Against the Machine and Stone Temple Pilots prove that, in fact, the front man does make the band.   Did the members of Rage Against the Machine (minus their front man) plus Chris Cornell of Soundgarden keep the Rage Against the Machine name?  No, because that name left with Zach De La Rocha.  Did they take the Soundgarden name when they took Chris Cornell in?   No, because Chris Cornell alone does not make Soundgarden.   Sure, drummers are replaceable and sometimes even a guitarist or a bassist, but not something as serious as a lead singer. 

                Stone Temple Pilots have had an interesting time shuffling around the board between Talk Show, Army of Anyone and Velvet Revolver.   But instead of using the STP name or Filter or Guns N Roses, they knew better and just changed their name entirely.

                Now imagine for me that you are in a band, and you’re fairly well known but don’t have that commercial radio success or what not.   Imagine you kick out your singer because he suffers from mental illness or got thrown in jail for some reason.   Once your singer is gone, and you leave that part of you behind you, leave the name behind as well. 

                The first time I saw somewhere that Blind Melon was playing shows again I thought, “Wait, what?  Shannon Hoon isn’t dead?”   When I saw Sublime reuniting with the name but obviously not Bradley I felt even sicker.   Sure, Jerry Cantrell was a big part of Alice In Chains, but hey, Layne Staley was part of the band too.  Now, they’re just one step away from being a cover band rather than the original. 

                Sometimes I think bands just don’t have the creativity to think up a new name, so I’ve taken it upon myself to rename five of the bands that I think need to change their names the most.

Blind Melon ~ Deaf Avocado  (It’s clever, but yet, with a hint of the original name)

Chiodos ~ Edwood (or if they get sued over that, simply use “Edward”)

Alice In Chains ~ Alan In Shackles (I’d pick something like “Man In The Box”, but they all sound too much like tribute band names.  Even “Alice Unchained” was stretching it)

Sublime ~ Long Beach Dub All-Stars (I don’t know why, but this sounds like a really good name to me for some reason.   I could see it on a t-shirt)

Escape the Fate ~ Flee From Destiny (Pretty much says the same thing, but doesn’t tarnish the brief legacy of what was once a great band and somehow turned into a generic run of the mill waste of talent)

                People have argued with me that all the members make up the band, not just the singers.  I also heard that people would’ve wanted the band name to live on.  I’m sure it may seem like that, but if I was a lead singer and didn’t even die but just got kicked out of a band I’d be like, “Change the name, bitches”   It’s just about holding onto the past and something great that they once had together.   But they’re not going to have it again because one of their pieces is missing.   Accept it, move on and change your band name.

How I Got Here

When I was in my teens and into my twenties, I used to be heavily involved in music.  I was a man without a band, on my tour with no manager or label to report to at the end of the day.  I would drive hours to see a band no one had ever heard before.

                It all started when I was listening to songs on the radio.  I often wondered why certain songs were on the radio while others weren’t- who chose these so-called “singles” deemed fit for radio play and why was “alternative radio” so afraid to play a Blind Melon song other than “No Rain”?

                The more I listened to complete CDs of music, the less I listened to the radio.  The less I listened to the radio, the more I listened to music that would probably never be on the radio for various reasons.  So, essentially, I fell in love with the underground music scene.

                While I still love music, I moved on in my mid-twenties to television.   A choice I’m still not certain of to this day, I would seek out shows no one had ever watched before and spent countless hours in front of the television just to say I had seen something deemed “brilliant but canceled”. 

                My television phase didn’t last as long as my music obsession, and rightfully so.  I attribute this to several factors.  First, television is a fickle, fickle business.   Find a show you like, watch the first few episodes, and then bam, it’s canceled because it wasn’t getting good enough ratings.   It’s like people in television (on the business end) never heard of the slow build before.   I also just feel like all that television was too time-consuming.  It’s much more relaxing and easier for me to put on a CD and listen to some music than have to get involved in an entire series.   Needless to say, whilst my love for music survives, my fixation with television has been dwindling more and more by the year. 

                As my interest in television faded (and I practically turned my back on the medium), I found a new obsession: movies.  I began to love everything about them and watch them like they were going out of style.  “Hey, have you ever seen [insert random movie name]?” is a question I can usually answer with yes.  (Some exceptions apply, as I refuse to watch certain movies- ever- such as that Titanic one) 

                To become truly engulfed in movies, to not only begin to like actors and genres, but to begin to have favorite directors, well, there is only so far you can go after that.  You have to watch all those commercial movies that big budget studios made and want you to believe are the best ever.  But then you discover the underground of movies, the ones which are the non-radio version of music.   Often referred to as “b-movies”, I began watching these movies in part due to Mystery Science Theater 3000.   Actually, there are several factors as to why I got into these types of movies, but let’s just say it was natural because that answer seems to be the shortest. 

                Along my quest for b-movies, such as “Eegah!”, “Teenagers From Outer Space” and “Carnival of Souls”, I stumbled across a movie called “Destroy All Planets”, which seemed like a good enough idea to me, but later learned was a movie in the Gamera series with a different title for its release by another company.   From there, my interest in Godzilla was peaked.   I opened my eyes, jumped in and became a part of the post kaiju apocalypse.