This is just a random blog where I talk about things that interest me. Movies, TV, books, comics, board games, cooking, and other random events will all be discussed here.
Caution: Almost none of the pictures I post are owned by me, and are the property of the original creators.
People who ever wandered into a video arcade in the early 90's undoubtedly saw this behemoth lurking near the front:
So, who was the second best character to play as? I mean, we all know the best character was Nightcrawler. He was short enough that several attacks would simply whiff over his head, his special attack had the most reach of any character across the screen, and his "hit them when they're down" animation was to actively jump up and down on the enemy.
But the second best?
That'd be this one.
No, that's not Wolverine. It's Dazzler.
Trust me. Dazzler was the second best character, if for no other reason her "hit them when they're down" move was to kick robots in the crotch.
If I told you that toilet-centered video games were going to be the second most bizarre thing I'd be describing that came out of Japan this week, you might find it hard to believe.
That is, unless you know just how twisted and demented things out of Japan really are.
This, though, isn't quite as mind-boggling in the sense of "what makes this socially acceptable." Rather, it's simply leaving me wondering "why was there a need for this?"
While there is a Disk Wars game out there, it's made by Fantasy Flight Games, has nothing to do with the Avengers, and isn't from Japan. I know a video game based on the animated series came out in Japan (which, I'll admit, I want purely for research reasons), but I can't really figure out what the original "core" idea was besides "The Avengers are popular, Pokemon is still popular, let's have people summon superheroes with weird gadgets."
But my place is not to criticize the reason why things exist, it's to- actually, okay, it is my place to comment on why things exist, because this is my blog. But still, let's focus on the show itself and see if we can't figure out just why it felt the need to be.
I've stated before that, for the most part, the LEGO series of games are extremely fun little time-wasters, filled with humor without being too childish, and managing to stay true to the source material and digging deep into the minutiae without completely alienating everybody who isn't a die-hard fan.
That being said, LEGO Marvel is both the most fun I've had with a LEGO game and the most infuriating time I've spent with a LEGO game.
It's not always easy to have a "scary" superhero book. When your lead characters have superhuman strength, speed, and agility, it's a bit hard to ever feel like they're overwhelmed by something "terrifying." Usually it takes one of the "big" monsters in order to provide people with a challenge, but even then, it's not hard to picture superheroes doing pretty well against your standard mummies, Frankensteins, and werewolves. You can bring in your Cthulhus, krakens, and zombie swarms, but even then you need a gimmick to make them actually "scary."
Or stupid, depending on how long they drag the gimmick out.
So how about we bring out one of (arguably) the biggest guns horror comics have? Why don't we bring in Dracula?
First off, we have the commercial for Carl's Jr. featuring the classic X-Men movie character Mystique.
I love the fact that in order to eat this burger, you have to "man up." Because women can't handle the burger. Truly, only bros who you know lift can handle such extreme (sorry, xtreme) bacon.
You wouldn't think that bacon needs a naked blue mutant to add to it, but, there you go.
Why not have the commercial feature some normal people (men and women) buying the burgers, leaving a Carls Jr., then having... man, I don't know, who's a sucky X-Man villain?
Yeah, he'll do.
Have Forearm (get it? Four arms?) show up wrecking some stuff. The normal people look at him. They look at their burgers. They take bites from their burgers, chew meaningfully, and then square their shoulders to face off a guy who might have four elbows but could probably still be brought down with a Nancy Kerrigan-esque crowbar to the knee.
You don't even have to use the phrase "man up." How about "Deal with it." Or quote some Joan of Arc "I am not afraid...I was born to do this." Or heck, quote Steven Pressfield: "F@#( self-doubt."
I guarantee you your ad campaign will get some press with that last one.
Secondly, we have this mess:
...now, to be fair, that opening isn't that far off from how the old cartoon started out with discussions about crime being out of control. The only thing that's missing is that old woman with the shopping cart from the cartoon who pulls out a machine gun.
However, then it starts to get weird. Shredder and April's father tried to make mutant heroes to keep the streets safe? Because that's better than, I don't know, doing things to make the cops more effective? Who would control the mutants? What would you do it they (inevitably) turned on their creator? Why isn't Megan Fox wearing a yellow jumpsuit?
And just how stupid does this look?
...man, I have the dreadful feeling I'm going to have to watch this just to warn you all to NOT watch it and not let your kids watch it.
