And Shooter McGavin shows up.
The game, not the actual trail.
The history of video games is not even a particular interest of mine but these documentaries are so well made, I get sucked in. Kudos to The Gaming Historian, check out his channel if you have any interest at all. It's a thousand pounds of entertainment even though I can only carry 15 pounds back to the wagon.
Happy National Beagle Day to all who celebrate!
Ok, I know it's not particularly new and original to point out the fact that we are long since past the point where there’s a special day for everything in the world. But I do want to use this opportunity to both celebrate and reveal the ultimate Beagle Day irony.
I happen to own a Beagle calendar. Each month, it reveals a new cute photo of a Beagle living life. It also notes all the special occasions and holidays for me so that I don’t have to. Do you know what day the Beagle calendar doesn’t have? National Beagle Day. Unreal. Unreal and outrageous.
Speaking of bad movies, Neil Breen has a new one. Well, not "new" but RLM spaces these things out a bit.
If an hour and twenty minutes is too long for you, you can skip to 45 minutes to get the short recap.
But if you do have the time to watch the full episode, then if you've come this far perhaps you can come a little farther. Read the description on the youtube page.
I don't believe I've ever seen a Don Dohler film before. Everything I know about him is from the frequent mentions by Red Letter Media. The impression they give is that his films are all people wandering around the woods and often in the dark. (And also rundown houses are a "Don Dohler House")
Well, it is that, but I was pleasantly surprised that it's not as dreary as it sounds. It's goofy enough that it stays fairly fun.
And if you're wondering what that crazy accent is, this was filmed in Maryland.
Are you ready for a chick flick? Are you ready to get EMOTIONAL. Time for "Steel Magnolias," if you can handle it.
You can read my weak observations on "Steel Magnolias" here.
This movie was right in the middle of an epic run of theater-going. October 1989 was "Look Who's Talking" and "The Bear"; November 1989 was "Back to the Future II" and "Steel Magnolias"; December 1989 was "The Wizard." Then January of 1990 was "Driving Miss Daisy" and February was "Glory" and it just goes on.
One thing I never noticed before. The old guy who's a love interest for Shirley MacLaine... that's friggin' Dropo, the laziest man on Mars from "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians." Holy moly.
NSFW
The newest hit from the annals of 60's Rhythm and Blues. They just don't make 'em like this anymore.
An opera singer hearing Michael McDonald for the first time. Nice.
Watch the precision here. She zeroes in on both the "bounce" and the smoothness. The Yacht Rock genre is defined by two characteristics: 1) Smoothness and 2) The Doobie Bounce (with some exceptions). Not surprisingly, "What a Fool Believes" is the only song to achieve a perfect 100 on the Yachtski Scale.
Of course she also asks: if Michael McDonald was a smoothie, what kind of smoothie would he be? So there's that.
Her "Happy Songs that are Actually Sad" genre suggestion is eerily similar to a genre I've been thinking about for a while. Maybe I'll write more about that some day. I think the two things are different enough that it could still be valid.
Good news everybody! Cassie is watching Star Trek: The Next Generation. She's going season by season. First she watched a few season 1 episodes and now a few episodes from season 2, where things get better.
When Judge Advocate General Captain Philippa Louvois calls Picard "a pompous ass and a damn sexy man," is that appropriate in the military?
"The breadfruit grows on a spreading tree, about the size of a large apple tree. The fruit is round and has a thick, tough rind. It is gathered when it is full-grown and hard. It is then baked in an oven until the rind is black and scorched. This is scraped off, and the inside is soft and white like the crumb of a penny loaf."
A fruit that tastes like bread? Very intriguing. It is bound to disappoint but I may try the experiment anyway.
Here's a video about how to prepare it, if you'd like to learn more.
The Prequels ambitiously attempted to tackle two very big subjects. 1) How the Republic (or any Republic) devolves into tyranny. 2) How a Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vader. And, again, it's like poetry, they rhyme - it's the Fall on the micro scale and the Fall on the largest macro scale.
But the attempt at great themes is a very minor credit, as the execution is terrible. And most of the most terrible movies are the most terrible movies because they are similarly ambitious. "Plan 9...," "The Room," "Birdemic." The humor is in the gap between what the movie tries to be and what it turns out to be.
I don't know if this is a distinct genre of youtube videos. That is, I don't know if multiple channels are doing it. But this guy has a number of videos and 4.25 million subscribers and it is a unique and compelling format.
Hey, it's a whole new show, some technical difficulties are inevitable. Let's face it. But now it's the third episode, we're fully into it, I think we've worked out the problems and it's just going to be gangbusters.
Right? Right?
Watching the first 20 minutes, I looked up from my painting and saw the following in the chat "MORE GAIN ON THE MIC PLEASE." I love the chatters.
"Oh my gosh, if the Eagles lose everyone is gonna be in deep depression."
Cassie's ability to distill my entire life and community down to one simple sentence is unbelievably impressive.
I love this movie. It's so well made that it actually succeeds in making me care about a dance competition, it's just that amazing.
And an additional note... I had forgotten that it features Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan doing "The Girl from the North Country." Here's that song.
Dylan and Cash got together to record a few songs in a very rough, informal session. Very shambolic and haphazard. I have a bootleg (can't find it online anywhere, maybe it was a Napster hoax) where "they" do "Just a Closer Walk with Thee" and Cash does all the singing because Dylan doesn't know the words. It ends with Cash saying, "What's one you know, Bob?"
Scorch is back with PFG TV and it's everything one would expect.
Looks like the show is going to be every Thursday night.
Last February, almost exactly a year ago, I found that every episode of The Joy of Painting was available online. I noted that it might be crazy to watch them all but hedged my bets, saying that I might do it. I did. Starting from April 11 and watching, usually, an episode per day, I finished the series a few days ago. I have come back with the results of the voyage.
In the early days of the internet when I searched Alta Vista for Bob Ross, I found a graphic similar to the one above. It's Bob Ross' main photo on imdb, it's the photo they use on Amazon, it's the official photo used on the Bob Ross website. Given the ubiquity of the image, I figured it would be fun, as I go through the series, to find the episode where he paints that particular picture.
That painting never exactly shows up but Season 2 Episode 12 is the closest. In retrospect, that painting has too much detail to fit into the half-hour format but Season 2 Episode 12 might be the 30 minute version/variant of that original model.
It is now widely known that Bob Ross grew to dislike his afro hair style but felt he had to keep going with it because it was a trademark of his brand. Going through every episode, I figured I'd track the size of the afro through the seasons.
Here is the graph of the progression over time:
Afro radius is an estimated best guess by myself. I'm not confident in the numbers - I just have no experience in measuring afros.
You can plainly see in both graphics that something happened in Season 9. It was 1986, someone thought it was now the late 80s and it was time for a new look for an updated crowd, I theorize. Short hair and bright colored shirts for the hip almost-90s. That was my working theory but if that was what happened, it is then inexplicable how the early 90s saw perhaps the longest lengths of the series!
As for the exact season with the largest afro, that's a judgment call, you can decide for yourself. But special note should be made of the Special "The Grandeur of Summer" where the especially giant afro size is anchored by the addition of a slight afro mullet.
Bob Ross was a character, full of sayings and stories. But a particular line, is worthy of note as it is perhaps the oddest of the series. From Season 12 Episode 2:
“There’s nothing wrong with making friends with nature… One day nature’s gonna take over again and you’re gonna need a friend.”
Bob Ross, there, right in the middle of the peaceful valley of happy trees, just letting you know that the animal uprising (or else some other natural apocalyptic event) is on its way. I appreciate that Bob alone knows the certainty of things to come and is already in possession of the only remedy.
Bob Ross obviously had a very well defined style of painting. I thought I would note a few paintings that deviated most from that style.
In Season 3 Episode 10, Bob paints a campfire and then adds the silhouette of a person sitting next to it. If I recall correctly, this is the only time he puts a human being in any of his paintings in the series.
But the most unusual painting, the one that actually almost veers into pop art is Season 26 Episode 7:
There is aBob Ross clip/quote about the dark and light in painting being like the dark times and light times of life. It goes viral occasionally and I see it a lot on reddit but if you haven't seen it, here it is:
That was another thing I kept an eye out for. He says it a few times, I believe, but this particular moment is from Season 23 Episode 3. The fans have wondered what "darkness" he's referring to and the thing that goes around is that his wife died shortly before the taping of the episode. That's a myth. This episode aired September 17, 1991 and must have been recorded some time before that. Bob's wife died of cancer in August of 1992. It's possible that she had been diagnosed or was sick at this time, however, that is pure speculation as I don't know anything about it.
So people justifiably like the "dark/light" moment because it's an inspirational quote, applies to everyone and is vaguely sad; but the most emotional moment in the series comes a little later. Season 26 is dedicated to Bob's recently deceased wife (through a graphic at the end of the credits) and then at the end of Season 27 Bob thanks everyone in the audience for their sympathies. Bob is usually guarded with his personal life and this moment falls like a bombshell as he very noticeably chokes back tears. This is the most emotionally stirring moment of the series.
If you asked the average person if they knew who Bob Ross was, probably most would know him as the "guy who paints happy little trees" or "the happy little tree guy." It's all over t-shirts, posters, mugs and everything. The ironic thing is that this phrase is not original to Bob Ross. The "happy little" objects phrasing as well as the other Bob Rossism "almighty mountains" were both coined by Bill Alexander, Bob's mentor.
"The Joy of Painting" has 31 seasons, each with 13 episodes. That's a total of 403 episodes and I watched them all. There is an hour long "special" on youtube, and I watched that. There are two documentaries about Bob and I watched those. But Bob also sold 10 instructional VHS tapes and DVDs, of which I was only able to find 2. The rest could be obtained second-hand on ebay and such but I couldn't bring myself to start shelling out the cash for them. Perhaps some day I will, but the initial goal was to watch every episode of the series and that is complete.
Speaking of Bob Ross merchandise, there is a lot of it these days in addition to successful youtube and twitch channels (as well as the episodes available to stream on Amazon.) But sadly, the people profiting off his likeness are not Bob or his family. In fact, the people making all the money fought against him in his life and betrayed his final wishes after his death. The story on that can be found in the documentary "Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal & Greed (2021)."
At the end of each season, Bob always made the announcement that it was the last show of the season but rest assured they'll be making another season. But at the end of the 31st series, Bob replaces that promise with "I hope to see you again very soon." About a year later, Bob would be dead from cancer.
I have completed a number of television and internet series over the years and almost always there comes a time when you're "over it" and "let's just get this done." This is when I may start watching episodes while eating, watching at 130% speed, getting as many done in a day that as possible, all that stuff - just get it done and out of the way. That never happened with "The Joy of Painting." In fact, as the end approached, I slowed down, I didn't want it to end. I even put off making this post. The format of the show is the very definition of limited and repetitive... but it never got old, exactly. The reason is Bob Ross. Bob Ross was a good man and every moment spent in his presence was an honor.
Could they make it a trilogy? Is it even possible?
The new trailer for Rad Remastered reveals that Rad Remastered will be the movie "Rad".
So... Not very helpful.
But then the Marcus Theaters page has one additional nugget:
"This special event will also include an exclusive Q&A moderated by RAD super fan Ed Helms (The Hangover)."
So is the Q&A going to fill 40 minutes? Q&A with who? More updates hopefully to come.
Fandango, and other sites, confirm that "Rad Remastered" will be released to theaters March 21st. But what is that?
Not many details to go on. The runtime is listed as 2h15m which means it is about 40 minutes longer than the official version. Bill Allen confirmed on facebook that there will be "added footage".... which makes sense, I would assume they didn't make the runtime longer by playing it slower, but what is the footage? The first thing that comes to my mind would be to include the deleted scenes about which so much has been made, but even if that's the case, that would only account for 3 minutes of the 40.
At the 35th Anniversary release, they played a trailer for a new "Rad" documentary that was being made. That documentary, as far as I can tell, never came out. I wonder if this could be a way to hook people into seeing that in the theater as a pre-movie "extra."
The poster states "Celebrate Rad Day March 21." It's my guess that "Rad Day" just means that it's going to be in theaters on the anniversary of the original release (March 21, 1986).
So, what is going on? I don't know. Will post again if additional information is released.
Thanks to Victor for the heads up.
Is this:
A) An episode of Bob Ross with a guest artist.
B) A less popular painting show on public access.
C) A wrestling promo from the 1980s.
Cassie watched, I think, 3 episodes of Star Trek and since then has been making her way through the movies.
I think my favorite Star Trek movie is VI.
I've always loved the nonsensical but dramatic line "DON'T WAIT FOR THE TRANSLATION, ANSWER ME NOW!" I've never found anyone else who feels the same way. In fact, I'm realizing now that people generally hate that line. They resent it, even. Particularly at the DMV.
The tradition of boycotting the Super Bowl when I have no rooting interest and instead participating in activities which are as far removed from football as possible. For my own records, here's the run-down of the previous 30 years...
Pre-2011 - Puppy Bowl I, Muppet Treasure Island, Follow That Bird.
2011 - Bob Ross Marathon
2012 - Family Ties Marathon
2013 - Steel Magnolias
2014 - The Bridges of Madison County
2015 - Various, Poetry
2016 - Best of the Worst, Da BullS
2017 - Cooking, Super Mario Bros. Super Show
2018 - Super Bowl
2019 - I don't know, did I forget?
2020 - How Green Was My Valley?
2021 - Facts of Life Marathon
2022 - Jem Marathon and Film
2023 - Super Bowl (boooo!)
And it's worth re-stating that I claimed this segment jumped the shark way back in 2021.
According to tradition, my task now is to dress down the series in an overlong whirlwind of gaffes and bad puns. As fond as I am of tradition, I really enjoy this series. I love the Western genre, I enjoy the cinematic feel, I appreciate that it's told from the perspective of a child, I'm fascinated by the aspect of frontier life, I'm even willing to pretend that the small girl's echoing voice over is sweet and not at all reminiscent of some "Children of the Corn" horror movie.
The first episode - the 0th episode - the pilot - is an hour-and-a-half TV movie and it's by far the greatest of the 3 I watched. A family travels in a wagon west to the frontier and builds a house, a barn; digs a well, plants a field, encounters Indians and so forth. It completely works as a standalone movie and, for a TV movie from the 70s, it's a masterpiece - sweeping, pastoral, familial, harrowing, touching.
Not that there aren't flaws. There are some weak performances - the actress playing the mother seems to think she's in a 1950s stage play. There are some weak or confusing moments. At one point they caulk the wagon and ford the river. Halfway through Michael Landon's character gets out and slowly sinks below the water like he's easing into a hot tub. Then everyone freaks out. The scene is supposed to convey that he's in danger of drowning - drowning in 2 feet of water - but there's no telling that from looking at him. And the "Indians" are clearly white guys in makeup. I guess I don't know they're white but they're definitely not real Indians.
On to the second episode and there's a clear step into TV Series mode. The father has to work long jobs for a few weeks in order to make ends meet and it wears on him and the family. We're also introduced to the town and townspeople as he meets them. A giant step down but still an excellent show.
In the third episode, we focus more on the daughters - it's the first day of school and they don't know anyone. They are mocked for being unlearned and poor. Still emotional and sweet but definitely another step into the television series formula and another step away from the Western feel. Still, a well-told story with an emotional punch in the end.
So, as I said, I really loved this series, at least according to the 3 episodes I've seen. I highly recommend it, especially if you're looking for family entertainment. I may continue watching it, though I have to finish my current series first. You'll hear about that soon. I have heard that "Little House in the Prairie" jumps the shark most spectacularly somewhere in its 9 seasons and, furthermore, this leads to one of the most bonkers last episodes of any TV series ever made. These are exactly the type of things I should be writing about, but both require an honest watch through all 9 seasons, which I can't do in one day. Future posts, perhaps.
I once watched a documentary that told in great detail all the natural conditions that combined over thousands of years to create the ideal farming soil in the plains of the Mid-West. One thing I never learned was why the greatest soil in the world didn't turn into a forest. Why are do grasslands exist without the trees encroaching? According to my search, the plains are too arid - rainfall is low and erratic - so trees generally can't grow there. That's news to me, I thought trees would grow almost anywhere.
It occurred to me that this show is not so far removed from the Super Bowl as I would like it to be. What was the Super Bowl? The 49ers vs. the Kansas City Chiefs. For the second team, the Ingalls settle in Kansas and encounter an actual Indian chief. The first team refers to the 1849ers, the prospectors of the gold rush, and though the show doesn't take place in 1849, it's not far off. And anyway, "1849ers" and the show are both about westward expansion.
Have you ever noticed that every period drama fails to be authentic to the period and they all fail in exactly the same way? It's the hair. Take this series. They have the period clothing, the period props, the period everything, they're plowing a field with oxen and protecting themselves with muskets but you look at the hairstyles and you can tell it was made in the 70s. It's always the hair.
Last November, right before Thanksgiving, I was laidoff from my job of 15 years. And at that time, and even until now, it didn't occur to me to listen to "Million Dollar Question." I don't know how it happened but I'm rectifying the oversight now.
In the realm of Radiohead B-Sides, there's "Million Dollar Question" and "How I Made My Millions" and they're very different and not related. Always remember that.
Incidentally, 49ers vs Bengals in 1989 is the first Super Bowl I remember. I was rooting for the Bengals but was completely distracted by what debuted during the commercials that year - The Bud Bowl.
Just kind of a fun compilation - times of laughter from 2022.
Does anybody remember laughter? These guys do! They're called Game Grumps.
Oozebear is a "user-generated improv podcast." I don't know exactly what that means but... wow.
I fully lived through the era of music where large groups of musicians were getting together to Make A Difference... Live Aid, We Are the World, Do They Know It's Christmas?, etc. but I wasn't aware enough to really keep track and not having MTV was also a big factor. Case in point, I had never heard of "Voices That Care". Do you know what that is?
"Voices That Care" is the song (and the group) which was released for the Gulf War. With everyone from Celine Dion to Garth Brooks to Kenny G and Michael Bolton, it really underscores the low point that music hit in the early 90s. That's not even getting into the assemblage of non-singing actors and celebrities that is too long to reproduce.
"Hey we're putting together a song."
"OK, who you got?"
"I have Janet Gretzky, Nell Carter, Don King, Jon Lovitz and Mike Tyson."
"I'll tell you what you have there,,, you have a hit."
The song was not meant to be pro-war or anti-war or political in any way, the point was merely to support the troops. It's hard to criticize such a benign stance but I also can't help but laugh at the generic "Sending Our Love Down the Well" nature of it. Perhaps it's the final straw that gave us Famous Helping People. Who knows. "We're sending love and care to all the troops" Uh, okay...?
To round off the topic, there was also a Heavy Metal assembly to help famine in Africa (Hear 'n Aid) and another Heavy Metal group that was limited to just Swedish artists (Swedish Metal Aid) that helped... something. Uh, it was for charity...
And SNL mocked this trend with "Musicians for Free-Range Chickens," "Recurring Characters for Unity" and, a nostalgic favorite, "Rockers to Help Explain Whitewater."
Scorch's PFG TV is filming new episodes this year. The first episode will air 2/29 (and yes, that's a real date, although it would be like Scorch to advertise one that isn't).
To be honest, they're pretty rough but worth checking out as a historical artifact.
I remember The Simpsons being my favorite part of The Tracey Ullman Show and saw many of these when they aired. I liked The Simpsons before it was cool, blah, blah, blah.
A interesting facet of this era is that Maggie actually talks, though incoherently.
Weird bit of synchronicity here, I was just thinking of "The Hook" by Blues Traveler recently.
I don't remember Paul Shaffer being in this video.
It's such a great, perhaps a perfect pop melody. It would be the perfect pop song except for the lyrics. Writing lyrics to say that lyrics don't matter is a waste of time. Hate that.
The harmonica brings me back though.
A montage of Dave talking about the "Jay vs. Conan" saga:
Segment Producer Daniel Kellison recalls his favorite moments from working on "Late Show" and "Late Night."
Call me nostalgic, but do you remember when Madonna looked like a human being? Those were the days!
Today I finished a paint-by-numbers "The Starry Night" by Van Gogh.
It took 11 days and it turned out pretty well. In honor of this, here's "Vincent" by Don McLean.
"Vincent," by the way, was Tupac's favorite song and the last song he heard before he died.
I've been listening to lots of the Jean Shepherd Show lately and I find it difficult to find clips to share. Not that it's bad, but it's all good and you either share all of it or none of it.
But I figured "The Great Ice Cream War" would be a good stand-out episode. The downside being that he shared the story on Letterman, but you probably don't remember that.
There is a new genre of youtube video that's actually a sub-genre of lawncare videos - the Team Leaf Blowing genre.
Similar to pressure washing, carpet cleaning and mowing videos, the Team Leaf Blowing genre ticks the boxes for Oddly Satisfying, Cleaning and 'Disorder to Order.'
I've not dived into the videos enough to give a real analysis. For now, I'm still stuck in lawn mowing videos.
Remembering this song lately... Some class resentment from William Shatner. It's a little Shatner for the new year, come on.
