TV

Awful Battle… Clowns On Film

Posted on by sgottahurt

Homey don't... work anymore "My Wife & Kids" went off the air.

One day at lunch, a discussion occurred that revolved around how Saturday Night Live characters had their own movies, but In Living Color did not.  We threw around Actor! names and characters, and it was decided that Damon Wayans’ Homey D. Clown might have the best shot at a movie.

But I disagreed.

Clown movies have never done well at the box office (by my summation).  Here are the ones I could think of…

1) Vulgar the Clown – Vulgar

Howard Stern was repulsed by this movie.

  • This early production by Kevin Smith covered a lot of dark themes, such as clown stripping, clown rape, clown vengeance, and attempted clown murder.  Well, I don’t know if those are themes for sure, but they’re indeed dark.

2) Shakes the Clown

Adam Sandler's the clown in blue.

  • Actor! Bobcat Goldthwait wrote, directed, and starred in this film about an alcoholic clown.  He eventually would follow this one up with a film about a woman that had sex with her dog.  Moving on…

3) Escaped mental patient – Clownhouse

Creepy much?

  • Director Victor Salva went to prison for molesting his child star in this film.  I mean, he didn’t do it in this film.  It happened behind the scenes.  But not necessarily on the sets.  Once again, moving on…

4) Killer Klowns from Outer Space

I'm not afraid of clowns, per se, but aliens - yikes!

  • Of the first four films on this list, there’s a good chance this is the only movie you’ve seen or at least know exists.  That still doesn’t make it a success.  Everybody’s heard of Sarah Palin, too.  (BONUS PARTISAN POLITICAL BURN!)

5) Drunk birthday party clown – Uncle Buck

Deleted line, so I heard - "Buck off, bucko!"

  • Now we’re getting into some well-known movies.  This John Candy classic is on the list mainly because it possibly inspired Bobcat’s Shakes (as well as giant pancakes… why am I so hungry all of a sudden).

6) The Violator a.k.a. Clown – Spawn

Apropos of nothing, John Leguizamo also starred in "The Pest"

  • This comic book character brought to life on celluloid isn’t as scary as he is gross.  Speaking of gross, remember how gross the CGI was in this film?  Relive the horror here.

7) Pennywise the Dancing Clown – IT

The source of my brother's Coulrophobia.

  • This televised miniseries based on Stephen King’s book is well-known for being the source of many twenty-somethings fear of clowns.  Also, did you know that in the book, well, I’ll let the very cool TVtropes fill you in:

Beverly Marsh has sex with the other members of the Losers Club (all six of them, one after the other, in a sewer) in order to re-forge the connection between them after defeating IT as pre-teens. It’s supposed to be a metaphor for moving from childhood to adulthood, but triggered many readers’ Squick.

8) Clown doll – Poltergeist

This one... it kinda gets me. Not a fan of ghosts.

9) Lou Craddock & crew – A Boy and His Dog

Don Johnson played the boy. I don't know who played his dog.

  • Okay.  Even though the people who lived in underground Topeka were painted more like mimes than clowns, it was still weird.

10) Captain Spaulding – House of 1000 Corpses & The Devil’s Rejects

He's as patriotic as he is psychotic.

  • With or without makeup, the leader of his so-called family sure can give Leatherface’s brood a run for the money.  And leave me running for the hills have eyes.

11) Clowning around, though not quite clowns – The Joker, Jigsaw, & Beetlejuice

jack nicholson heath ledger michael keaton tobin bell

Fairly successful as Not-Clowns

These guys are arguable as clowns.  Why?  Well Jigsaw’s a marionette, Beetlejuice is the self-proclaimed “ghost with the most,” and The Joker… well… yeah, he’s a clown.

BONUS FRIGHT:

BONUS HUMOROUS FRIGHT:

Worth 1002 Words… Seinfeld Wars Edition

Posted on by sgottahurt

Newman Hope

Some alternates:

  • Cosmo Threepio
  • Jerry Seinforce
  • George Costandroid
  • Phantom Benes

Coinkydink Or Coinkydonk? The Sean Bean Effect

Posted on by sgottahurt

Should it be pronounced Shawn Bawn?

There’s a common misconception on the TripleDoubleU about Actor! Sean Bean:

He dies in like 85% of his movies!

Another misconception - this is his brother.

The fact of the matter (according to my limited research) is that he’s died in hardly any of his films:

  • Patriot Games
  • GoldenEye
  • Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring
  • Equilibrium
  • The Hitcher

I believe it’s the 1-2-3 punch of his higher profile roles leading up to LOTR.  Not many knew who he was when he played the bad guy in the second Jack Ryan film, but that lead to him getting recognized as Agent 006 in the successful James Bond reboot, and then of course, Boromir – the most noble of his deaths.  And the seed was officially planted.

There are plenty of Actors! that have died more in the movies (Robert DeNiro has 14 times, Bruce Willis has 11, Johnny Depp has 9 1/2… the article that explains the 1/2, and lists more can be found here).

The Sean Bean Effect is alive and well for those guys, and he may one day catch up and surpass them, but what about Actors! that die in television shows?

I’m going to name that effect after this guy:

Jeffrey Dean Morgan, of the Jeffrey Dean Morgan Effect

Not only did Jeffery Dean Morgan have high-profile deaths in Watchmen and P.S. I Love You, he died or was dead or was a ghost in these shows:

  • Weeds
  • Supernatural
  • Grey’s Anatomy

(BONUS: A victim of both The SB and JDM Effects – Alan Tudyk.  He played Wash in the awesome show Firefly, and died in the theatrically released Serenity.  He also died in the reboot of V.)

He did not die in Dodgeball.

Hibbidy-Wah?! Joe’s Crab Sh–?

Posted on by sgottahurt

This is an old commercial, but it’s new to me, which is surprising considering the amount of television I watch.  But then again, I do skip the bulk of advertisements courtesy of a few select buttons on my DVR remote, so there’s that.

The moral of the story is this: If I ate seafood, the above video would make me want to Eat at Joe’s™. If only Taco Bell could push the boundaries and think outside the bun™ box, then I’d oblige.

(BONUS: To clean your palette of foul mouthery, here’s a commercial full of faces that make me smile…)

Drunken Recollection… Other People’s Drunken Recollections

Posted on by sgottahurt

Some pals o’ mine and I were out at the bar, and they got into reminiscing about their old school teachers and the affairs they had (that the teachers had… and not with the friends, but with each other).

Anyqui, apparently this existed:

(via Ridiculous Thoughts)

As well as this:

(Barbapapa’s home page)

For the record, neither of these friends are French (although my buddy at work is).

I merely drank my Guinness and drowned in the sense of nostalgia.  Mostly because they also introduced me to her:

Awesome Battle… The Best Thing George Lucas Ever Imagined

Posted on by sgottahurt

It’s hard to believe that the man who created this, once upon a time a long time ago created this:

(SIDENOTE, BUT I”M SURE YOU DON’T CARE, BECAUSE YOU’LL NEVER MAKE IT DOWN TO THIS PART DUE TO BEING TOO BUSY CLICKING ON ALL THE ABOVE THUMBNAIL IMAGES: George Lucas didn’t necessarily create the look, but he did want it based upon Frank Frazetta’s paintings.)

A Plethora Of Happy Finds, For El Guapo!

Posted on by sgottahurt

Well, El Guapo, though I may not really know what a plethora is, I do know when I’ve cracked one open and it’s spilling candy (oh – that’s a piñata).

Anyway, in all my perusing of the TripleDoubleU, I find so many videos that make me chuckle, it makes me weep.

So today, I’m sort of going for broke and offering up not ONE… not TWO… not THREE… not FOUR… not FIVE… video collections!

  • Numero 3 is in fact Numero 3 in a series of Creed spoofs.  You remember Scott Stapp and crew, right?  Well according to this particular video they only remember to perform when the camera’s on them to not just hilarious, but hil-ar-i-ous, effect.  (More dubs from the Spirit Switchboard.)
  • This video is last because it probably warms my heart the most.  Rhett and Link have made it on this site before since I share my love of terrible local commercials with them, but this piece… play me off, El Guapo!  (And for the record -yes, I’m aware Cuba is not in Mexico… I know it’s in Florida.)

InASense, Lost… Zordon Is A Racist

Posted on by sgottahurt

This has popped up on more than a few of the other websites I frequent, and I’ve watched it every time.  I didn’t expect much from a simple, outdated premise, but it still makes me laugh.

I mean, the blatant racism disturbs me deeply.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about “InASense, Lost… Zordon is a Racist …“, posted with vodpod

BONUS HIDDEN RACISM: This perfectly explains “the underwhelming meh” I felt after watching Avatar.

Coinkydink Or Coinkydonk? The Best Name To Survive With

Posted on by sgottahurt

(SIDENOTE: This is one whopper of a CoC, and I fear it is my greatest discovery.)

I love you, television.

There, I said it.  Are you happy now?  Be it that I’m an idiot for staring into your warming glow (if that’s how you want to take the term “boob tube”) or because I suckle your glass nipple (if that’s how you want to take the term “boob tube”), please know this – you complete me.

Now that that’s out of my system, onto business!  I’m sorry baby, but I’ve got work to do.

Two of my favorites shows on television had “mergers” a couple of seasons ago: Lost and The Office.

Lost had this happen in their second season, and the reason why, as producers explained, was to extend the show’s storyline if needed by adding more characters with new flashbacks (I know this from memory, and I’m paraphrasing because I’m too lazy to look it up).  The “merger” involved having the survivors in the tail section of the crashed airplane join the remaining survivors.  At the start of the third season, the season commitment contract was locked up, and almost all of the new cast members introduced the year prior were eliminated.  Almost.

As for The Office, the third season had two branches “merging,” à la the UK (original) version’s second series (that’s what they call “seasons” across the pond).  Unlike the British version, almost every new character quit out frustration with their new boss.  Almost.

So by now, several seasons later, only two cheeses stood, um, alone.

  • On Lost, it was Bernard Nadler, “tailie” and husband to Rose Henderson:

Actor! Sam Anderson as Bernard Nadler

  • On The Office, it was anger-prone Andy Bernard, a.k.a. The Nard-Dog, alumnus of Cornell University:

Actor! Ed Helms as Andy Bernard

So to recap… the two characters that survived massive cast “mergers” were both named Bernard.  Do I smell a Coinkydink or is that a tinge of Coinkydonk?

BONUS COINKYDINK OR COINKYDONK: An Actor! by the combined name of Andy Nadler played a character named Barnard (sp?) in the independent film, The Guatemalan Handshake.  Consider your mind blown.

In My Brain While Sleeping… Betty White As A Bad Guy

Posted on by sgottahurt

I’ve had a plethora of strange dreams leading up to the new year, but just as the memories of yesteryear have faded, so did those dreams by the time I (finally) woke up.  This one stuck with me.

"Welcome to My 'Ool - Notice There's No... Room"

There was a party going on at a castle, and I was keeping the free drinks coming (of course).  A volleyball game was starting in the pool, but it was packed to the gills (pun!), and my interest in playing was circling down the drain (pun?).

Sure, it was only over-filled to volley for complete pool possession (the winning side got to play), but I’d already made my way indoors.  I found a doorway that lead to a small underground city.  It was kind of like the old game Doom…

With less monsters, and better graphics

…but more medieval, like a Renaissance Festival.

That's about the right amount of monsters

I was creeped out by the panhandlers and the merchants, so I returned upstairs to hit the free bar again (of course).  It was upon reaching the inner sanctum of the castle that I stumbled upon an authentic pub.  Or at least it was like a hotel version of one.

Aaron Eckhart and Anne Hathaway were there... for some reason

All of the sudden, from a hidden door behind the bar, Betty White emerged, looking like a (foreign) assassin.  Or I guess it could have been a foreign assassin disguised to look like Betty White.

"Thank you for being a fiend..."

She grabbed Anne Hathaway and ducked back into the door.  As Aaron Eckhart pursued, I finished my drink and followed.  We were back in the caverns, but they looked more like the tunnel that bridges (pun!) Detroit and Windsor, than the dingy dungeon from before.

This is an old photo.

Except there were copious amounts of bees and rats.

This is a doctored photo.

Aaron was terrified of the bees and rats and was ready to turn back, when a chain of shopping carts started to roll at him.  He held onto a bar above us as long as possible, but then he gave in a rode on top of them.  I ended up doing the same because I wanted to recreate the only good scene my favorite scene in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

"It's mine cart now!" - dialogue cut from the final film

I caught up with Aaron and we decided to look for Anne.  Then I woke up.

DREAM INGREDIENTS: I’m not sure.  But this is the second dream I’ve recently had involving one of the last surviving Golden Girls…