SPOOKY SHIT.

 

MANDATORY RULE #4:

 

All national anthems shall be made available in chicken cluck, turkey gobble, snake hiss, mosquito buzz, horn honk, cow’s moo, cat’s meow, and dog’s bark cover versions.

HUMPDAY THINGS I LIKE #14:

I like it when someone is trying to say the words “similar” or “similarity” or “similarities” but end up saying “simular” or “simularity” or “simularities.” It’s fun in the same way people attempt saying “nuclear” but end up saying “nucular” and are seemingly constitutionally incapable of ever saying it correctly. I love it. It just gives me that sudden rush of feeling superior. It’s neat!

BURNING QUESTIONS IN A UNIVERSE OF MYSTERY #66:

Can God make a prostate so enlarged that even He is like, “Wow! I kinda went over the top with that one, didn’t I? Heh, heh, heh . . .”

Needless to say, God is channeling big “ain’t I a stinker” vibes with this one.

PEOPLE GET MAD . . . (#12)

 

. . . when their children are losers, and then they get mad when their children surpass them.

People get mad.

HECKLER'S DOCTRINE #4:

. . . and why would anyone ever submit to being the podgrift guest? For fuck’s sake, the only thing standing between you and Host status is your willingness to speak into a microphone on your own initiative as opposed to speaking into a microphone as a function of some “marketing push” and/or “publicity tour.” Take your destiny in your hands. Make the noises that please you and your sensibilities above all other considerations. Never again be the second banana or the wingman or the chatty bestie or the sidekick-assert solipsistic primacy in all things! Your mind is indistinguishable from cosmos. It matters not if you are deeply stupid, generally uninformed on current affairs, full of vicious hatred of self and/or others, unskilled in the art and craft of comedy, incapable of speaking in complete sentences, and/or totally unenthusiastic about recording and editing digital audio-you are the vessel of podgrifting, and through you it must’n’shall be expressed. Fuck your Free Will. If it helps, just consider impulsive online content creation a further mutation/metastasis of your compulsive attendance of weekly open mics . . . or go the distance . . . and call it Fate Itself. Alternatively, you could just lean into the solipsism piece. The next time you’re listening to some other hack’s podgrift, well, y’know, that’s just a manifestation of some aspect of your Universal Mind. It’s beyond ‘everything’s about you;’ now, everything IS you. Seriously, it’ll free up a lot of your time. Solipsism as a labor-saving device . . .

SINCE YOU DIDN'T ASK #8:

. . . whenever ads play on YouTube I yell horrible execrations at them. Hopefully, my mic is being constantly monitored by YouTube’s sinister AI overminds, but I’d settle for those peeping clowns at the NSA.

BONUS: The outlaw superhacker Cyber-Creamer is a well known lover of YouTube ads. Cyber-Creamer even wrote a widely circulated defense of YouTube ads as “the creamily burning frontier of Post-Postmodern art.” What an asshole!

DARK MUSINGS IN A UNIVERSE SANS HOPE #1:

 

You ever wonder if Sarah Michelle Gellar has to deal with well-meaning yet befuddled people congratulating her for her fine work on Sabrina the Teenage Witch?

THEME MUSIC FOR EVERYTHING #5:

 

Theme of Hallucinatory Glory: Accretion Disk by Masaharu Iwata, Hitoshi Sakimoto, and Hayato Matsuo (Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen SNES OST)

Accretion Disk is my favorite from the Ogre Battle SNES OST, but, honestly, I could just as well pick the entire soundtrack. Accretion Disk has this driving, martial surrealism to it that goes well beyond the gameplay experience. This is the music you hear when you believe you can lead an army to a metaphysical victory so perfect it will negate the very concept of warfare from the collective consciousness of sentient beings. 

For years, I’ve played Ogre Battle just to listen to its music. I’m not good at the game. I only know how to beat it as a ruthless force of destruction and therefore end as a bloodthirsty tyrant. All of the other nuances and endings elude me. Sure, there’s FAQs and walkthroughs that delineate every other possible step-I just don’t have the patience to learn any other way. And I can just watch the other endings on YouTube. Or just listen to the music.

HUMPDAY THINGS I LIKE #13:

 

. . . TWO WORDS . . .

. . . BLACKOUT WEDNESDAY . . .

. . . because getting maniacally shitfaced and impacting a hard surface at high speed is what it’s all about.

And what’s it all about?

It’s about family . . .

. . . that drives you to a-drinkin’ and a-crashin’!

A-motherfucking-men.

PEOPLE GET MAD . . . (#11)

 

. . . when they have to think for themselves, and then they get mad when AI does the thinking for them.

People get mad.

BURNING QUESTIONS IN A UNIVERSE OF MYSTERY #65:

 

There’s a voice that speaks to me inside of a recurring dream:

What is missing from your life?

One day, I was walking on a sidewalk. I had no discernible personality or emotions of my own, and all of my desires were implanted by church, state, and capitalism. I was merely a platform extension of the larger interests of Heaven/Hell/USA/dead end job/the free market/expectations of fake friends/vague notions of family values-none of these grotesque entities made even the slightest pretense of giving a fraction of a fuck about my happiness or wellbeing. None of this bothered me, by the way, and in fact I had no objection-then or now-to this state of affairs. In fact, my complete failure to thrive in this scheme-of-schemes was a necessary demonstration effect to keep the conformists on task. They need me. 

As I walked upon that sidewalk, I beheld endless vistas of strip malls and fast food restaurants. I noticed a sign for Popeye’s, the venerable fried chicken chain.

A voice spoke to me:

When was the last time you ate at a Popeye’s?

I knew not the answer. It was even the outermost possibility that I had never eaten Popeye’s chicken.

A voice spoke to me:

What is missing from your life?

Two questions rubbed together inside my mind.

I tell you, Dear Reader, the dilemma was resolved with not a single thought of my own-nor was there even a hint of some grody thing like free will or whatever.

My physical form embodied an answer via bipedal locomotion into the dining room of the Popeye’s. 

I ordered crispy fried chicken. 

I took one bite.

I instantly died of a monumental heart attack.

Within a fraction of yet another instant, I found myself burning deep within one of those pit of Hell type of deals.

My agony flared brightly-I became like unto fire its own self!

As a great fire, I welled up out of the Satanic abyss, destroying all precincts of Hell, including Lucifer and all associated devils, demons, and sinners.

As a great fire, I scoured the Earth of all human life. Heaven didn’t even have the balls to meet me upon the field. The angels all disemboweled themselves in low earth orbit-which they ripped off from The End of Evangelion. God unplugged Itself from the wall socket causing It to wink out of existence-zero trace. Even I was taken aback by this omnicide-had my secret resentments-occulted by a panto of conformity-festered into such an accursed and indiscriminate vengeance wish? 

In the rubble, I made my careful way across the surface of the blasted Earth. I came across a Wendy’s sign absurdly intact among the ruins.

A voice spoke to me:

When was the last time you ate at a Wendy’s?

A heaviness fell upon my shoulders.

A voice spoke to me:

What is missing from your life?

Now, Dear Reader, I did indeed feel something of my own. First, a great heaviness. Deep down in that heaviness, tho’, something twisted, and clawed, and growled, and fought. This squirming sharp belligerence welled up out of the heaviness-

I laughed.

I howled.

I reveled in the desolation. 

I kicked at the concrete base of the Wendy’s sign, shattering it.

I ripped the sign loose and twirled and tossed it like a monstrous drum major working some nefarious routine.

I was the Missing Thing.

I was the Answer.

I strode into the burning wrack and ruin of my Anti-Creation, keeping an insidious measure, each step taking me deeper into my aborning Godhood! 

Cockroaches, ants, termites, spiders, serpents, whales, gorillas, sharks, squid, octopi, tigers, wolves, cougars, vultures, owls, bats, bears, crocodiles, alligators, and elephants gather in martial arrays to meet me on this newly expressed Field of Glory that my rage has authored upon the Earth!

Soon, a Great War shall be joined.

Even if I give my sweetest battle and lose, my mighty body shall be a sustenance and home to all the Critter Nations arising to oppose my power. Even if I lose . . . I win!

No matter . . . I have the Answer.

Well beyond a sniveling purpose for some grind or hustle . . .

I am the Answer that births a New World via Astonishing Martial Dialectics with the Critter Nations-themselves elevated in status by My Creative Destructions!

Yes, indeed.

I bring you the Mystery and Mastery of the Terrifying Potentials of the New Reality.

Only at Popeye’s.

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #73:

HERSCHEL WALKER RUMORED TO DIRECT THE MATRIX ERECTIONS.

ONE LINE MOVIE REVIEW #30: THE MATRIX RESURRECTIONS (2021)

This remarkable movie was made by filmmakers who didn’t want to make it for audiences that didn't want to watch it.

THE NEW DREAM #21:

 

Kirk and Spock come across the corpse of Jim Morrison.

Spock says, “He’s dead, Jim.”

Jim Morrison sits up, says, “No way! You can’t just kill off the captain of the Enterprise like that! That would be like if Columbo got murdered or if Eliot Ness started taking bribes. You just can’t do your audience over like that, man!”

Kirk plays it cool . . . mostly because he’s thinking about banging that green xtro chick, and not actually paying much attention to his immediate surroundings.

Spock considers all this carefully, says, “Most illogical.”

But, despite Spock’s assessment, Jim Morrison is lying back down, dead-as-can-be, by the end of this little scene, so it might be possible that the universe is actually quite invested in Spock’s take on things. Not that a Vulcan’s supposed to get all emotional about this sort of stuff at any rate.

At this point, Orson Welles shows up and eats the entire planet. No, he’s not in character as Unicron. 

We then cut to one of those French cinephilia TV programs where Orson Welles is being interviewed. The big man is putting on a good show as per usual. Welles relates the famous anecdote about how he mistakenly ate an entire planet where Star Trek was being filmed thus digesting the entire cast and crew of the seminal science fiction saga. 

“I swear I thought it was one of my cherished gastropubs. But I’d completely misunderstood the signage. It said ‘astropub,’ well. The only upside to this dreadful ordeal-those Trekkies are still after me to this day-is that Jim Morrison was already dead-so they can’t pin that one on me-ha, ha, haaa!”

At this point, another Orson Welles shows up and eats-

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #72:

BIDEN AND XI SHADOW DROP BLISTERING COVER VERSION OF SCATMAN’S WORLD.

WARDSBACK #4:

Look you.

There’s an innovative new program on your television.

Donuts break the law. Donuts enforce the law.

People are the snack.

Our lead hero detective donut is a driven loner of a cruller. 

The bellowing authoritarian chief donut is adorned with excessive sprinkles and thickly slathered-on frosting befitting their seniority and rank.

A super chill glazed donut is the cruller’s assigned partner.

Verbally skilled donuts with unusually high psychopathy ratings serve as lawyers for both the prosecution and the defense.

Pompous donuts clad in fancy robes serve as judges.

Donut holes get called up for jury duty.

Fearsome bear claws portray the gangsters who rule the underworld with violence and paranoia. 

Powdered donuts play the role of both drug dealers and drug addicts.

Cream filled donuts are the sex workers, of course.

Strawberry jelly filled donuts are bloodthirsty serial killers.

Donuts filled with cash are scummy bribe-taking politicians. 

Plain donuts are party-pooping Internal Affairs agents.

And those dear, dear humans are sold in boxes by the dozen. They scream for their mothers and their God as they are gobbled raw by the donuts who rule over them.

Overall, it’s a formulaic but modestly entertaining program.

Comfort food, if you like.

BURNING QUESTIONS IN A UNIVERSE OF MYSTERY #64:

 

Am I the only one who thinks Silent Hill: Ascension would’ve been better received if it had instead been titled Shart Hill: The Suck?

‘Cause titles set up those expectations, right?

And it’s those expectations that get people so fucked off, isn’t it?

If people had known this was a Shart Hill thing as opposed to a Silent Hill thing then, well, folks would have adjusted their expectations accordingly, wouldn’t they?

Sure.

Yeah.

Audible mega-sharting soundtracks this wretched world.

All those years complaining about those pachislot machines . . . we didn’t know how good we had it, did we?

Yup.

All is shart.

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #71:

 

IRREDEEMABLY CORRUPT U.S. CONGRESS INSPIRED TO ADOPT BOGUS CODE OF ETHICS TO JERK OFF AMERICAN PUBLIC BY THE RECENT DECISION OF THE IRREDEEMABLY CORRUPT U.S. SUPREME COURT TO ADOPT A BOGUS CODE OF ETHICS TO JERK OFF AMERICAN PUBLIC.

FIGURATION #1:

Today, we'll be looking at two action figures from the Meats v. Robo franchise: the Meats Protagonist and the Robo Protagonist.

As you can see, the packaging is meant to resemble the Deployment Cylinders utilized throughout the second half of Meats v. Robo known as Meats v. Robo: Final Dialectic. 

If you're familiar, then you know that Meats Must Contain Robo, and Robo Must Contain Meats. 

For the uninitiated, a Meats Deployment Cylinder contains a Robo Protagonist, and a Robo Deployment Cylinder contains a Meats Protagonist. The Meats Deployment Cylinder is a huge coffin looking thing that looks like it's made out of juicy, tumorous meats. The Robo Deployment Cylinder looks like an ultratech sarcophagus for a space mummy. 

This is all due to the big twist that came at the end of the first half of Meats v. Robo titled Meats v. Robo: The Quixote Protocol. Essentially, the Meats and the Robo aspects of the fictional world were unveiled as intertwined yet antagonistic metaphysical principles the clash of which generated via Glory Signal a Cosmo-Terrific Pan-Arousal State which caused all humans and sapient machine intellects to burst out of mundane masks, uniforms, costumes, wrappers, social roles, jobs, antisocial roles, bathrobes, religious ceremonial garb, radioactive safety gear, combat mechsuits, flightsuits, Founding Father cosplay, catsuits, and pajamas to assert new warlike existences in line with the rivaling ideologies of Meats and Robo. These ideologies are championed by Protagonists, who are "born" via Deployment into battle. This might seem like a strange way to be "born," but what you must understand is that this system was worked out between the leadership castes of Meats and Robo long ago. The Meats v. Robo conflict was so bitter and so protracted that a diplomat-identity and side long forgotten-suggested that each party should have as its leader a Protagonist from the enemy camp. Moreover, this Protagonist should be "born" at the moment of Deployment in the hope that they might view the conflict with fresh eyes. This freshness of perspective might result in total victory or total defeat . . . but if the rival Protagonists were ever to meet maybe they would find a peaceful end to the war. Perhaps they would see their own side-Meats or Robo-in the face of their nemesis and somehow be inspired to seek alternatives to absolute victory and/or defeat. This is all further complicated by the fact that spinoff content-such as the interactive fiction novel Meats U In Robo Louis-suggests that the entire conflict spun off from a malfunction within the mind of a Downtown Arts District Revitalization busker who spent his nights programming an elaborate tabletop war game consisting of clashing armies of Steelbots and Meatbots. Basically, this busker thought it would be intriguing to program in a secret "war bride" mechanic which would kick in if the conflict dragged on for too long, but this was met with overwhelming disapproval by the publisher. Essentially, the war bride mechanic involved enemies spontaneously pairing off to leave the field-presumably-in the name of love. The publisher thought this was too strange, and ordered it to be excised from the final product. The busker pretended to comply even while ensuring that the game would ship with the war bride mechanic intact. The implication, ultimately, of Meats U In Robo Louis is that the world of Meats v. Robo exists within the artificially intelligent descendents of the sophisticated programmable playing pieces of the busker's game. Many in the audience were outraged by this revealed lore. This outrage is considered a contributing factor to the onset of both the Seven Hundredth Fandom War of '84 and the Second Suburbia War of '85, but this interpretation is contentious at best. 

But that's enough backstory.

Now let's examine the figures themselves.

To start, let's go over the Meats Protagonist born of the Robo Deployment Cylinder. 

Face is eyeless, noseless, just lava cooling into pizzarific malignant neoplastic tissues, with a howling mouth below that, a dull red tongue visibly edged by a suggestion of teeth-that mouth's a missile launcher, by the way, easily lay waste to whole city blocks, though it's usually reserved as a finisher for major villains-obviously, you need a big breakfast to fully charge that one.

Much like in the actual show the lava-into-cancer piece leaks down to meatshroud the whole body when it's time for action-nicely evoked by the wavy-melty mold of the plastic. For downtimes you have a floppy hat supplemented with a trench coat that provides civilian cover-all cloth, premium materials for the adult collector's price point.

Right hand shoots, it's got this gun gimmick built into it because on the show it sparks off, and cannon fodder bad guys blast off sparky squibs, writhe, flip all about, explode if the weak points are hit, lots of burning chunks of gristle showering the plate glass sheet in front of the lens. Remember, the Meats Protagonist fights on behalf of Robo which means that the Meats Protag is obliged to kill scores of Meats fodder led by the Robo Protagonist.

Left hand has the option of either fireballs or a fire stream. The fireballs have an explosive effect, usually deployed to blast enemy vehicles and infrastructure, recurring theme of exploding mad science facilities ties into this, re-used footage of shattering vatscat tanks from the previous season-budget cuts went into effect on season two-when the villains were all biosludge abominations-sometimes it gets repeated over and over again in a single episode, but the mad science facility playset's sold separately. The stream option is sticky jelly fire, good for close work, crowd management, lighting an entire gang of last season's vatscat on fire, impressively burning stunt performers leaping and kicking and punching and blasting all over the frame, they never go down easy, do they, even if it's less effective against the Robo Protagonist, who definitely looks cool marching and strutting about with mechanistic arrogance while still aflame. 

Accessories are an omelet-it's definitely an omelet themed show-the aforementioned fabric floppy hat and a nice fabric coat, tho' it doesn't look nearly as cool as what gets worn in the show; there's the crowbar which alludes to themes of crime and survivalism, since our creature only has so many calories to burn, you really do need the labor-saving device; and, of course, there's a tiny Door-Into-Monday, which, in the show, began to pay off about halfway through, but it's clearly the Door from the first half of the show, which makes sense, so as to avoid spoilers, even if Second Door is Best Door but I'll live I guess.

Articulation is great, you can punch and kick every which way just so long as you have it out of the coat which can impede movement for sure. Head doesn't really turn since it's this huge cancer meats cascade thing. But that's fine. Just think of it like Batman'89. We don't begrudge Batman'89 for lack of proper head turning action. May as well extend comparable charity to the Meats Protagonist. 

Overall, the Meats Protagonist action figure is quality stuff. Lots of detail. Sturdy materials. You'll get a lot of playtime out of it. Well balanced for free standing poses. I'd take points off for the Door-Into-Monday accessory being less-than-optimal, but so it goes. It's certainly not a deal breaker. The omelet is a nice touch, since on the show the Meats Protagonist replenishes its reserves of napalm, missiles, and bullets by eating the popular breakfast item. It's a solid fig.

Now, let us turn our attention to the Robo Protagonist born of the Meats Deployment Cylinder.

Okay, so, uh, let me just get something out of the way right at the start. I do not take any sort of a side in terms of Meats or Robo. Frankly, I think they both have their pluses and their minuses. And I'm not just trying to sit a fence here, okay, I got my scars from the Fandom Wars of '97 and '99. I've been through it. I'm not crazy to go through it again-but I say all that to make a distinction between the ideologies versus the action figures. Okay? This is a product review channel, and not a political commentary channel, okay? I don't do politics here. 

So with that out of the way . . . well, just look at it. The Robo Protagonist. It's shiny, I'll give it that. No accessories. Which is fine. Which is thematic. The Robos tend to be self-sufficient. All their powers and special attacks and whatnot basically have to do with energy manipulation. You can see that it's got those three ruby red eyes. On the show it can zap people with a Trinity Eye Beam gimmick. Here, well, obviously it can't shoot actual beams, but if you shine a light down into the crown of its head-see how those eyes light up? So that's a feature, I guess. The articulation is decent, but check out that shoulder gear. See how it impedes arm movement? See how it degrades the range of motion? That's accurate to the look of the show, but for a figure . . . I dunno . . . I might just have to work it out with my hobby knife. I did the same thing with the ridiculous shoulder gear on that one Wolverine figure two months ago.

And, I mean . . . this design? It is strictly Starbucks Basic generic-ass robot bullshit. On the show, it sort of works, 'cause the Robos have this slick'n'shiny always-be-zapping energy thing going on-but I'm already putting visible fingerprints all over this figure-

It's not good. I gotta constantly have my polishing rag to hand. Makes me uptight to even play with it. 

And even though the lack of accessories is accurate to the lore . . . you just feel cheated. It's almost like the toy manufacturer is taking the side of Meats against Robo, y'know?

Yep.

So, the Robo Protagonist is a letdown. Doesn't even come with the other Door-Into-Monday. Which it could've easily included. But no dice.

Honestly, this stresses me out. Because this obvious disparity in quality between the Meats Protagonist action figure and the Robo Protagonist action figure is more than likely gonna spark off another Fandom War.

Yep.

I guess that won't be boring, right?

Hoo boy . . .

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #70:

 

SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER/LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS CROSSOVER DOMINATES ARBOR DAY WEEKEND BOX OFFICE.

LOADING SCREEN WISDOM #19:

DUE TO CONFLICTING REALITY REGIMES, YOU WILL MOST LIKELY FREQUENTLY FIND YOUR FUTURE WEAPONS USELESS; THEREFORE, ALWAYS KEEP A PLAIN OLD SWORD HANDY.