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Monday, October 17, 2011

Monday Matinee - Dawn Of The Dead



The world of retail is one that is constantly changing. What might have been deemed revolutionary five, ten, fifteen years ago can seem extremely outdated by today's standards. We see it all the time. With the invention of Netflix and various video-sharing sites, video stores have been deemed redundant, and are now closing up shop. With automatic bank machines and online banking becoming more popular, some bank branches have downsized their services and operating locations (much to the annoyance of some customers).

Even going to the mall to shop has changed in some aspect.

Yes, in larger communities, the enclosed shopping mall is still widely popular, and millions of people go into the thousands of shopping malls scattered all across North America to spend billions of dollars on everything from raspberry smoothies to raspberry coloured prom dresses.

In some smaller towns however, the life expectancy of the average shopping mall seems to be on borrowed time. With the popularity of big box stores, outdoor outlet malls, and even the expansion of department stores such as Target and Walmart into supercenters, shopping malls have had a barrage of competition thrown their way in recent years. Some malls rise up to the challenge, and manage to stay relevant by adding some bells and whistles to the building (i.e. indoor roller coasters, water parks, ice skating rinks, etc).

Then there are those malls that could be classified as dying, or dead.

You know the ones I mean. When you walk into a shopping mall that is open and find that there are more people outside on the street than inside the mall. A mall that has every other storefront either boarded up or closed up tight. The few stores that are open are either fast food places, a couple of jewelry stores, and perhaps a couple of specialty stores for a specific type of customer.

I would say that the shopping mall in my town is a dying mall, but it never used to be. At one point, our shopping mall used to always be filled with people, and whenever there was an empty storefront, it really stood out. But by the beginning of 2005, it became clear that our mall was not in good shape.

It all started when our Walmart relocated to a larger space in January 2005. Initially it wasn't going to be a complete loss, as the Walmart was actually going to be turned into three separate stores. But then a month later, the Independent Grocer supermarket shut its doors, and soon after, business at the mall began to drop. With two anchor stores vacating the premises in less than two months, the writing was on the wall. Certainly, our mall does have its busy stores, such as Shoppers Drug Mart, Coles bookstore, and during the holiday season, Sears can hold its own. But the last time I was at our mall, I counted thirteen empty storefronts. Our mall can comfortably hold at least fifty. Not a great number.



But at least our mall isn't considered to be a dead mall. Probably one of the most famous dead malls out there is the Dixie Square Mall, located in the state of Illinois. Although the mall closed up sometime during the 1970s, the mall was fixed up for movie scenes in the 1980 film 'The Blues Brothers'...only for it to be demolished while filming the car chase scene. It has remained empty ever since, and the Dixie Square Mall now sits in ruins.

And then there's the mall that features in a 1978 movie that could also qualify as dead. Literally.



The movie Dawn Of The Dead is actually part of the 'Living Dead' trilogy, written and directed by George A. Romero. The movie is the second one of the series, just after Night Of The Living Dead (1968), and Day Of The Dead (1985). And if you want my honest opinion, I find it to be the best of the three. The cream filling in the zombified Oreo cookie, if you will.

The original film was filmed throughout 1977 and 1978, and was first released in movie theaters on September 2, 1978. In March of 2004, the movie was remade by director Zack Snyder. While the characters and plots differ between both the 1978 and the 2004 versions of the movie, there are basic similarities between the two.

The main plot of the movie deals with an unknown virus that causes people to turn into flesh-eating zombies. The virus is transmitted through zombies biting healthy humans, who eventually succumb to their injuries and reanimate into zombies. The more severe the bite, the faster the people become zombies. Both films take place in a large American city (in the 1978 version, it is Philadelphia, the 2004 version, Milwaukee), where the zombies cause civilization to collapse at an alarming rate. A group of survivors meet up with each other and take refuge inside a shopping mall, barricading the entrances to hold off the zombies in the hopes that they will be rescued. When it becomes clear that help isn't coming, the plan then becomes a fight to stay alive in a zombie-filled world.



It's hard to say exactly which version is better. Normally, I hate remakes of movies, and I am definitely the type of guy who prefers the original to remakes. That said, I thought the 2004 film was a decent effort, and a great retelling of a classic film. I still prefer the original version better, but Zack Snyder did a great job with the remake. Even now, the film maintains somewhat of a cult fan favourite, and several events based on the movie are still in practice today, including Zombie Mall Walks.

Now, I imagine that there's lots of behind the scenes stories, and the inevitable comparisons that will be made in regards to both the original and the remake of Dawn Of The Dead, but in order to give this blog entry some padding, I think it would be cool to showcase some trivia facts about each version, and how some of the scenes came to be filmed. You'll also get an idea of how different both movies seem, but yet somehow have more similarities than you think.

Are you ready?



  • One major difference between the 1978 version and the 2004 version is the physical settings of the mall used during the filming. The 1978 version was filmed at the Monroeville Mall during the winter of 1977-1978. The mall is still in use today, and as of 2011 still has tourists and Dawn Of The Dead fans visiting it yearly. The 2004 remake was filmed at the Thornhill Square Shopping Center in Thornhill, Ontario, Canada. A mall that had been closed up prior to filming, the crew renovated the plaza during 2003 to transform it into the fictional Crossroads Mall for the film. The shopping center was demolished shortly after filming concluded.

  • The cast and crew of the 1978 version shot all of the mall footage between 11pm-7am each day. The reason being that the mall closed at eleven each night, and therefore was nice and quiet for filming. The reason filming had to end at seven in the morning was because that was the time when the automated music kicked on over the loudspeakers.

  • Filming for the 1978 version of the film was shut down for the Christmas season, as the film crew decided that it would be too much work for them to take apart the Christmas decorations that the Monroeville Mall had put up specifically for the1977 holiday season.
  • The idea for Dawn Of The Dead was born in 1974. George A. Romero was invited to come down to the Monroeville Mall by an acquaintance, Mark Mason, who worked for the Oxford Development Company. He took Romero on a extensive tour of the mall, which included hidden areas of the building inaccessible to customers. He had joked to Romero that in the event of a national disaster or an emergency, people could survive by hiding in the mall. That was all the inspiration that Romero needed to start his screenplay.


  • The special effects and make-up for the 1978 version were the mastermind of Tom Savini, who was one of three cast members that had parts in both versions of the film. (The other two were Ken Foree and Scott Reiniger).



  • In the 1978 version, there were only four main cast members. Ken Foree, Scott Reiniger, David Emge, and Gaylen Ross. Compare that to the 2004 version, where there was no less than fourteen cast members featured.
  • The original ending of the 1978 version was a lot gorier than what was eventually shown. In the end of the movie, Ken Foree's character (Peter) shoots himself in the head, while Gaylen Ross' character (Francine) throws herself into a spinning propeller blade of a helicopter, killing her instantly. The ending was changed during production to a more hopeful one.




  • With the help of eight crew members, Tom Savini managed to 'zombify' an average of 250 people each weekend of production by painting their faces shades of blue and gray.



  • Some zombies in the 1978 version of the film were given more detailed zombie looks depending on the amount of screentime that they were given in the final cut. One zombie was nicknamed 'Sweater Zombie', played by Clayton Hill, whom one crew member remarked was the 'most convincing zombie of the bunch'. Sadly, Clayton Hill passed away in 2009.

  • Much of the reason why the 1978 film did so well was because it mixed humour with horror. Just check out this scene that airs shortly after Tom Savini's character and his biker gang invade the mall.


  • The 2004 version of Dawn Of The Dead was filmed mostly in Ontario, Canada. As a result of this, many of the cast members of this version were Canadian actors and actresses (Matt Frewer, Jayne Eastwood, Kim Poirier, Lindy Booth, Sarah Polley, etc)




  • Because the 1978 version was filmed in an actual mall that was open, none of the stores were fictional. Not so for the 2004 version. With the exception of Panasonic and Roots, the majority of the stores in the 2004 mall were fictional creations. These stores include Hallowed Grounds, Carousel, Case Hardware, and Reflex Sports).

  • Starbucks turned down the crew's request to put in a store on the mall set.

  • Look closely at the scene in which Ana (Sarah Polley) and group bring in the bitten obese lady. You may notice that there's a clothing store behind them that has the name Gaylen Ross. The store was named after one of the stars of the original film.




  • The film was one of Modern Family actor Ty Burrell's first well-known roles.

  • The number of survivors at the end of the 1978 version is two. In the 2004 version, four survive (well, five if you count Chips the dog).

  • In both films, the way the zombies get into the shopping mall varies. In the 1978 version, the zombies enter after the biker gang breaks in. In the 2004 version, the zombies get in after the group stages a rescue attempt to save Nicole (Lindy Booth) from the zombified owner of a gun shop across the mall's parking lot.




  • Both films show someone getting bitten by a zombie, dying, and reanimating as a zombie. In the 1978 version, the unlucky victim is Roger (Scott Reiniger), who gets bitten during the group's mission to block the entrances of the mall with trucks. In the 2004 version, we see quite a few people succumb to this fate. Steve (Ty Burrell), Luda (Inna Korobkina), Luda's newborn baby, Louis (Louis Ferreira), Frank (Matt Frewer), and an obese woman (Ermes Blarasin).





  • While the 1978 ending was changed so that one of the main characters did not commit suicide, the 2004 ending of the film DID show main character Michael (Jake Weber) doing just that, after getting bitten during the group's escape attempt from the Crossroads Mall.



  • The first half of the 2004 version was shot in chronological order.

  • The final scenes of the 2004 version was actually shot months after the original film was shot. The reason being that during a preview screening of the movie, the audience didn't like the original ending of the film (which was shown before the end credits).


  • While the zombies were bumbling and slow-moving in the original version, the 2004 version showed the zombies able to run as fast as a normal human. This was a change that many viewers seemed to protest, including George A. Romero himself.

  • The events of the original film span over a few months (you can tell because Francine, who reveals her pregnancy during the film, starts to show more by the last few scenes of the film). As far as Dawn Of The Dead goes, the action only seems to last for one month.

  • The beginning of the 2004 version of Dawn Of The Dead is set on May 8, 2004.

That's quite a lot to digest, isn't it?




Dawn Of The Dead is a rather interesting movie. On the surface, it appears to be no more different from any movie that has a horde of flesh-eating zombies waiting to make you their next meal. But I actually think that it's more of a clever social commentary piece. To me, it's actually a brilliant metaphor for capitalism. I mean, watching all of the zombified people stumbling through the mall, weaving their way from store to store in a dead stare and emotionless facial expressions...it's really not all that much different from walking in the atriums and food courts of a shopping plaza during the Christmas season.

I'd almost wager a bet that the scene towards the end of the 2004 version where the group has to maneuver the mall shuttle buses through the parking lot filled with zombies is no different from trying to find your way through a Walmart parking lot on Black Friday or Boxing Day.

It really makes one think. Maybe that's exactly what George A. Romero was going for. Having people so blinded by material goods and possessions that they end up losing awareness of everything else around them. Kind of like the zombies were doing by trying to find fresh blood in both movies.

And in some cases, thanks to the invention of mobile phones, iPods, and handheld gaming systems, maybe we're kind of re-enacting our own live-action version of Dawn Of The Dead as I type this out.

Only without the blood. At least for now.


Sunday, October 16, 2011

Sunday Jukebox - Weird Science by Oingo Boingo

I'd just like to state for the record that for today's entry there will be a little dash from the Monday matinee spice rack to pep up today's Sunday Jukebox entry.

Oh, sure, I'll be talking a little bit about the movie 'Weird Science', but this blog entry is going to focus more on the actual song that appears on the film's soundtrack.

As I was unable to find an actual release date for the song, I'm going to come up with the decision to make the song release date the same as the one for the movie.

So, I don't think I'll waste any more time. Let's get right to the video so we can chat about it.



ARTIST: Oingo Boingo
SONG: Weird Science
ALBUM: Weird Science Official Soundtrack
RELEASE DATE: August 2, 1985
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #45



Weird Science was a movie in which two teenage boys named Wyatt and Gary decide to create their idea of what they considered to be the perfect woman. Through Wyatt's personal computer (and yes, personal computers did exist back in 1985), they input all sorts of photos and data and images and store them onto the hard drive. When the hard drive reaches its limit in memory storage, the boys hack into a government mainframe in an effort to increase the storage capacity of Wyatt's computer and provide more processing power to the machine.

Something goes wrong during the hacking attempt, however. When the boys connect a Barbie doll to Wyatt's computer through a series of wires, and hit the Enter key to start their computer program, a giant bolt of lightning strikes the house, and all hell breaks loose. After an explosion, Wyatt and Gary are stunned to see that a beautiful woman emerges from the bathroom after the smoke clears.



The boys name the woman Lisa, and the rest of the film deals with Lisa trying to help Wyatt and Gary with the trials and the problems that most high school kids face. She is well-intentioned when it comes to doing whatever she can to help the boys become popular and for them to find girlfriends, but as most people know, good intentions don't always lead to positive outcomes.

And, that's all that I really want to talk about in terms of the film, but if you ever wanted to see it, it's worth watching at least once. I liked it anyway.

Now let's talk about the band that brought 'Weird Science' a theme song...and how the track wasn't really one of the band's favourites.

The reason why? It was unfinished...at least according to some sources, anyway.



It was widely believed that when the song was recorded in the summer of 1985, Oingo Boingo had reportedly recorded a few versions of 'Weird Science'. The record company and movie producers were pushing for the final version of the track so that they could include it in the movie in time for an August release, but the band wasn't ready to submit a final recording until they could decide as a band what version they were going to use.

The story goes that one night, the band worked very hard on 'Weird Science', and they had the idea that they were almost there with how the band wanted the song to sound, but they still needed to do some tweaking. But when the record company executives found what they believed to be the finished recording of the song. Therefore, when the song was released on radio stations and music channels for airplay, it is widely believed that the version people heard was one that was unfinished by the band.

Now, don't take my word for it. This is merely just a theory that people have come up with, and I'm just putting it out there. But considering that for years after the song was released, Oingo Boingo rarely played the song at concert performances, it sort of makes sense as to why the band doesn't consider 'Weird Science' to have been their best effort.

But it did make the Billboard charts, peaking at #45 in October 1985, so I suppose it did make some impact.

In fact, I'm going to go out on a limb and state that Oingo Boingo was a really underrated band...especially since its lead singer eventually grew to have a really rewarding and fascinating career as a music composer for film and television.



When the band Oingo Boingo formed in 1976, a man by the name of Danny Elfman was the lead singer of the group. Some of you may have heard of the name Danny Elfman, but maybe aren't sure of where. But, I'm sure most of you have heard of The Simpsons, Desperate Housewives, and the 1989 film, Batman. Well, Danny Elfman composed all the theme songs for the three examples I've posted here. He won a Grammy Award for his Batman composition, and Emmy Award for his work on the Desperate Housewives theme, and has been nominated for four Academy Awards.

Not bad, eh?

He also has done some voice work over the years, and if any of you have seen the film, The Nightmare Before Christmas, he provides the singing voice of Jack Skellington. He also performed the singing voice for Bonejangles in the movie Corpse Bride.

Prior to all of this success, he was the frontman for the band, Oingo Boingo. And, how did the band get the name? You can thank his brother Richard for that.

In the early 1970s, Richard Elfman had developed a love of performing, and by 1972, he had formed a musical theater troupe which called themselves 'The Mystical Knights Of The Oingo Boingo', inspired by a fictional secret society on the Amos 'n' Andy television series called 'The Mystic Knights of the Sea'.

By the mid-1970s however, Richard Elfman's interests changed from performing to filmmaking, and as a result of this, passed the leadership of the group onto Danny. At the time, Danny had just returned from a stay in Africa, where he learned how to play the violin and a variety of percussion instruments. The group began to gain a following in Los Angeles, and in 1976, appeared on 'The Gong Show'. Don't believe me? Have a look for yourselves!



And they never got gonged!

By 1979, the group had shortened their name down to just Oingo Boingo, and had started to release albums. Their first album was released on June 19, 1981, and while the band didn't have huge success on the charts, they did happen to have quite a few songs appearing on some of the most popular movie soundtracks of the 1980s, including Fast Times At Ridgemont High, Sixteen Candles, and Back To School.

And, of course, there was 'Weird Science'.

After the 1980s however, the band didn't have as many releases, and after a lot of changes with the band lineup, the band officially called it quits in 1995, following one final performance at the Universal Ampitheatre on Halloween, 1995. While some of the former band members of the group have reunited for Oingo Boingo tribute shows and have gone on to composition gigs of their own, Danny Elfman rejected the idea of the band officially getting back together. It wasn't because he had lost interest in playing music though. In an interview that Elfman had done back in 2007, he stated that playing in the band had caused him some irreversible hearing loss, and didn't want it to worsen by playing at live concerts once again.

But although Oingo Boingo was a part of Danny Elfman's past, it certainly helped shape his bright future.

Really, the list of things that Danny Elfman has done in his career have been outstanding. He has collaborated with director Tim Burton on all but two of his film projects, and actually got his first composing job because of Burton. When Burton and Paul Reubens contacted Elfman about doing the score for their first feature film (Pee-wee's Big Adventure), Elfman actually had doubts about his ability to take on such a project because of his lack of formal training.

Insert life lesson. BELIEVE IN YOURSELF!!!

Eventually, Danny Elfman did just that, with the help of one of his Oingo Boingo bandmates. Guitarist and arranger Steve Bartek provided Elfman with the necessary orchestration assistance needed to complete the score. When he first heard his work in the finished project played by a full orchestra, he deemed it as the most thrilling moment of his life, and that project kicked off the love of composing that Danny Elfman became famous for.

And to think that his tenure with Oingo Boingo paved the way for this brilliant composer to come out of his shell and earn such a great reputation for his hard work. Kind of makes you have hope that your dreams can eventually come true, doesn't it?



Saturday, October 15, 2011

Saturday Morning - Darkwing Duck

One thing that we can count on in the world of pop culture is that there are going to be huge successes and major flops.

And some things become so popular that in some cases, producers may devise something called a 'spin-off' or a 'crossover' that takes one or more of the characters from the original series to star in or kick off a new series.

Sometimes, this works out great. With all three versions of the CSI series, at least one of the main characters have appeared in Las Vegas, Miami, and New York City (Gil Grissom, Horatio Caine, and Mac Taylor have done crossovers at least twice thus far). Saved By The Bell had two spinoffs, one lasting longer than the other. Diff'rent Strokes launched the successful spinoff The Facts Of Life. Even the Mary Tyler Moore show had a couple of spinoffs, including Rhoda and Phyllis.

Some spinoffs just simply don't work out. Friends was a successful sitcom that lasted ten seasons. When Joey got his own spinoff, it barely registered on the Neilsen ratings scale. After the successful run of Three's Company, John Ritter tried his hand at a spinoff called Three's A Crowd, which barely lasted one season. The Golden Girls may have had a fantastic seven year run together, but when Bea Arthur left, and the other three moved into the Golden Palace, the show didn't do quite as well, but the Golden Girls did inspire the long-running sitcom Empty Nest, which later spun off another sitcom, Nurses.

Those are all fantastic examples of live-action shows which have had spinoffs and crossovers that have either succeeded or bombed.

But what about animated crossovers?

Certainly, Family Guy spawned a couple of successful spinoff series. Some celebrities and live-action characters have been put into animated format as well. Camp Candy is one example. Others include Muppet Babies, The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley, Hulk Hogan's Rock 'N Wrestling, and Rick Moranis in Gravedale High.

And then you have rare instances in which a cartoon character from one show will pop onto another show for a cameo appearance, such as Ren and Stimpy appearing on The Simpsons, or Josie and the Pussycats appearing in Archie Comics. Even more rare is when you take a cartoon character that was established on one cartoon show, and take them and give them a huge role in a different program.



Yet that's exactly what happened on the Disney cartoon Darkwing Duck.

In particular with the character of Launchpad McQuack.



When Launchpad was first introduced in the world of Disney, he initially appeared on the television series DuckTales, which premiered on September 18, 1987. Launchpad's role in the series was that of Scrooge McDuck's personal pilot. Although on the series, he ended up crashing his plane every time he tried to land it, he always manages to do so without injuring any of his passengers. As someone with a huge stature in comparison to the other characters on DuckTales, Launchpad sometimes took on the role of personal bodyguard to Scrooge McDuck, and in most cases, he's seen as a friend to Scrooge's nephews, Huey, Dewey, and Louie.

But on Darkwing Duck, he took on a completely different role. He wasn't involved in as many action scenes in Darkwing Duck as he was on DuckTales, but he still provided a fairly important role on the series, and I'll get into that in just a little bit.

Right now, I want to talk about the show itself, and how it came to be.

The year was 1991. That was the year that Darkwing Duck was first conceived. The show was made especially to be a spin-off of the DuckTales series, which had ended just before the 1990 holiday season. The show itself was inspired by a DuckTales episode, which was entitled 'Double-O-Duck', which portrayed Launchpad as a secret agent. When Tad Stones was approached to come up with a series around the episode, because a Disney executive seemed to like the title of 'Double-O-Duck'. While Stones was unsure of the premise, as he felt the idea lacked heart, and didn't have any sense of family surrounding it, he pitched the idea using a character named GizmoDuck (who was introduced in DuckTales' final season).

That first idea was rejected, but Stones was given a second chance to come up with a better idea. Taking the idea of Double-O-Duck, and turning him into a separate character rather than the alter ego of Launchpad McQuack (Launchpad would become the sidekick of Double-O-Duck). The new show idea would have Double-O-Duck as a 'man of mystery' with a fleet of duck-headed vehicles designed after similar ones used in Batman and Judge Dredd. The character would also be a father to a preteen daughter named Gosalyn, which was basically a plot device used to complicate his life, and play havoc with the sophisticated self image he was proud of.

A problem arose when the title 'Double-O-Duck' could not be used, as the Ian Fleming estate had trademarked the Double-O name from the popular James Bond series of films. A contest was held between staff members of the Disney TV Animation studios to come up with a new name for the superhero. A lot of names were suggested, but Alan Burnett came up with the winning name of Darkwing Duck.



As a result of the new name, Darkwing Duck's appearance soon changed. Initially he was to be designed as wearing a white tuxedo and black domino mask. Instead, the colour purple was brought in, and Darkwing Duck wore a purple mask instead of a black one.

So on March 31, 1991, Darkwing Duck first premiered on the Disney Channel and in the Disney Afternoon cartoon block. The show took place in the city of St. Canard, and depicted Darkwing Duck and his sidekick Launchpad (who had quit working for Scrooge McDuck in the first episode) fighting against the criminals who kept wreaking havoc on the town's citizens.

Like most superheroes, Darkwing Duck had a civilian identity. In this case, by day, he was Drake Mallard, adopted father to nine-year-old Gosalyn. When Drake was younger, he was considered to be a major dork in comparison to some of his classmates, and by his senior year, had developed an interest in crime-fighting. Although he had finally achieved his goal of fighting crime through his alter-ego (which does count as a mini life lesson that if one tries hard enough, they can achieve their goals), he really didn't end up becoming grounded until he adopted Gosalyn and befriended Launchpad.

When Launchpad came to work for Darkwing Duck, he had been a huge fan of his from the get-go, even designing a vehicle for him for over a year because of his obsession (which became the Thunderquack). While Darkwing found him annoying at first, he grew to appreciate him as a friend. He didn't even mind that Launchpad called him 'DW' most of the time.

And then there's his daughter, whose grandfather was murdered by Taurus Bulba. Gosalyn is described as being a bundle of energy, and shares her father's love of crime-fighting, but because Darkwing's biggest fear is seeing Gosalyn hurt or worse, he would often become a little too overprotective of her, which lead to some humourous conflict .



There's also some minor characters in the Darkwing Duck universe. Gosalyn's best friend for instance, Herbert J. “Honker” Muddlefoot, happens to be one of the few civilians who knows that Darkwing Duck is really Drake Mallard...which definitely is another plot device, as the rest of the Muddlefoot family has no idea. GizmoDuck makes a few appearances in the cartoon, as does a sorceress named Morgana, a foe turned romantic interest for Darkwing.



Of course, a superhero cartoon can't exist without villains, and for Darkwing Duck, they come in the form of a quintet known as the Fearsome Five. At least one of these enemies appear in each episode...sometimes even more than one. The Fearsome Five include...

Dr. Reginald Bushroot was a scientist who attempted an experiment to fuse animal DNA with plants so that they may be able to feed themselves through photosynthesis. However, the experiment turned Dr. Bushroot into a grotesque creature that was half-man, half-plant, lovesick, and desperate to find a girlfriend. He has the ability to control plants and use them against people who try to stop him.

Next comes a character named Bud Flud, a slimy salesdog who tried to push bottled water onto consumers. During a battle with Darkwing Duck and Launchpad, Bud fell inside a contaminated vat of water that was manufactured by his competitor, and he mutated into a dog that was made of one hundred per cent water. Dubbing himself 'The Liquidator', he could control all of the water in the world, while speaking in advertising lingo. While 'The Liquidator' would work with the other masterminds in the group, there was one that he didn't mix well with...

...Elmo Sputterspark was a rat and a high school nerd who developed an unhealthy obsession with lightning and electricity. He ended up gaining the ability to control electricity when one of his science experiments was sabotaged, coming up with the alter-ego name of Megavolt in response. He was actually a former classmate of Drake Mallard, and ended up being the first villain to take on Darkwing Duck in a battle at their senior prom in high school.

Then there's Negaduck, who could be considered Darkwing Duck's mirror image. Coming from a parallel universe called the Negaverse, Negaduck is the exact opposite of Darkwing Duck. Where Darkwing is kind and fights against crime, Negaduck is evil, and serves to commit as much crime as possible. Negaduck is actually the founder of the Fearsome Five, and has no problem with hurting people to get control of both universes.

The last of the five is Quackerjack, a former toy-maker driven to insanity, and uses a deadly arsenal of toys and games as weapons in bank robberies and other misdemeanors. He never goes anywhere without his favourite doll, Mr. Banana Brain, which can double as an explosive device. He usually teams up with Megavolt in some capacity whenever teamwork is involved.

Certainly the Fearsome Five isn't the only faction of evil in St. Canard. There are other criminal organizations in St. Canard. There's F.O.W.L. (The Fiendish Organization for World Larceny), an organization devoted to terrorism, and their plots to foil Darkwing Duck along the way. Members include Steelbeak, Ammonia Pine, Ample Grime, and Major Synapse.

Taurus Bulba has also made appearances in the cartoon, which made sense, given that he killed Gosalyn's grandfather. Professor Moliarty is a mush-mouthed mole who plots to put the whole world into eternal darkness. Tuskernini, is a walrus, whose schemes usually involve the world of film and entertainment, and many, many more enemies after that.

With so many bad guys in the show, each causing Darkwing Duck to work overtime, you'd think the writers would have original ideas that could feasibly help the show last years. Alas, this was not the case, as the last original episode of Darkwing Duck aired on December 12, 1992. But the show did have some notoriety worldwide. It was one of the first American cartoons to air in syndication in the former Soviet Union, and the show did run for 91 episodes (despite one episode entitled Hot Spells only airing once on Toon Disney due to the subject of Gosalyn unknowingly makes a deal with the devil which causes Darkwing to lose his soul).

At any rate, Darkwing Duck was quite the interesting cartoon, and I almost decided to go as Darkwing Duck for Halloween one year (before I decided that I really wanted to be Jughead Jones for Halloween instead). I think that it should have gone on a couple of more years, because it really was a cartoon that wasn't like any other.

And to think that if it wasn't for DuckTales and Launchpad McQuack, Darkwing Duck wouldn't have come to be.




Friday, October 14, 2011

TGIF: The Addams Family

I'm sure that most of us have seen at least one traditional family sitcom in our lives. Heck, they were a mainstay all throughout the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. Although the genre was kicked off by such programs as I Love Lucy and Leave It To Beaver, I would say that some of the more popular ones came out of later years.

I think most of us have seen at least one episode of shows such as The Cosby Show, Full House, The Brady Bunch, and Happy Days. By each of their own rights, all of the shows were entertaining enough, and each of these shows lasted at least five seasons or more on the air. But the thing is that if you really take a look at these sitcoms, they weren't really all that much different from each other. The families featured in the sitcoms were of all different races, religions, and configurations, but yet if one were to really list all of the similarities between each of the shows, I reckon that one would find that there are a lot more common links than differences in a lot of sitcoms released over the past thirty or forty years.

So, I thought that I would attempt to go in a different direction from the standard family sitcom that is sweetened with syrupy dialogue and cavity-inducing group hugs. And while we're discussing this non-traditional sitcom in detail, we'll hopefully find a way to incorporate little life lessons along the way, because let's face it...that's what the point of this blog is about. At least I would like to think so, anyway.

Most family sitcoms seem to follow a rather basic recipe. Take a group of actors and cast them as members of the same family. Add one living room set, and one kitchen set. If possible, make sure bedroom sets are available for those who want a variety of locations. Add a season worth of scripts, and a dash of studio audience (or you can substitute a canister of fake laughter should a studio audience prove to be too expensive), and voila. You have a standard family sitcom. But what happens if we tweak the recipe just a smidgen by substituting different ingredients and blending different combinations together? Would the result be the same, or would it pack a punch?



Let's find out by talking about the Addams Family.



The Addams Family may be most well known by the 1960s television series, a few animated adaptations, and two feature films made in the 1990s. But, did you know that the Addams Family actually began as a comic strip?

It all began back in 1932 when a young cartoonist named Charles Samuel Addams began working for the magazine The New Yorker. His first drawing in the publication was a sketch of a window washer, and it appeared in the February 6, 1932 edition of the New Yorker. Six years later, in 1938, the first Addams family cartoon appeared in the pages of the magazine. When Charles Addams first began drawing the cartoon characters that would eventually become the Addams Family, he had meant it to be a satirical look at what society had deemed the ideal American family at the time of the 1930s. The family was portrayed as a wealthy and eccentric family who have a fascination (some would relabel it an obsession) with objects and customs deemed macabre and mysterious. As a result of their interests, outsiders would classify them as weird or scary, and tend to stay away. The clincher is that the various members of the family are confused by this behaviour. They certainly don't mean any intentional harm on any guest that seems to drop by. In fact, I think as far as the Addams family were concerned, they didn't see themselves as doing anything all that out of the ordinary, and honestly seemed unaware, or even ignorant of the fact that their neighbours were genuinely frightened of them.

At any rate, those comic strips soon became a big hit for Addams, and were so popular that by 1964, the ABC network decided to air a sitcom based on the comic strip. The Addams Family premiered on September 18, 1964, and during its two season run aired 64 original episodes until September 1966. Before the sitcom debuted, Charles Addams was asked to provide names for each of the characters, as prior to the sitcom creation, his characters were nameless. He eventually came up with the names for the characters, and without many changes are the names that are still used today.

So, just like I did for a few entries, I figure that the best way to talk about the show itself is to provide trivia bits introducing each of the characters, and providing behind the scenes information about this show. And at the end of this article, I'll share with you the life lesson that we all can take from this show.

  1. The Addams Family recently became a Broadway musical, debuting in 2010. In some performances, the role of Morticia Addams was played by Brooke Shields.


  1. On the television series, Morticia was played by actress Carolyn Jones. She was the first wife of legendary television producer Aaron Spelling, and had a career that spanned three decades. She died of colon cancer in 1983 at the age of 53 years old.

  1. Morticia Addams was described by Charles Addams as “the real head of the family...low-voiced, incisive and subtle, smiles are rare...ruined beauty...contemptuous and original with fierce family loyalty...even in disposition, muted, witty, sometimes deadly...given to low-keyed rhapsodies about her garden of deadly nightshade, henbane, and dwarf's hair.”

  1. Morticia's maiden name is Frump, and while her family tree was shaken up a bit in the 1990s movies, in the television show, Grandmama Addams was her mother-in-law.

  1. Morticia enjoys gardening by chopping the blooms of roses off and keeping the stems, and she also has musical interests.


  1. Morticia can reduce her husband Gomez to mush just by speaking French.
  1. On the television show, Gomez Addams was played by actor John Astin, second husband of Patty Duke, father of Mackenzie Astin, and adopted father of Sean Astin. At the age of 81, he is still going strong, with reports of him teaching a course in method acting and directing at Johns Hopkins University as recently as 2009.

  1. When it came time for Gomez to be named, Charles Addams had two possible named picked out for him. One was Gomez, the other Repelli. Somehow, I don't think Repelli Addams has that same ring to it as Gomez Addams.

  1. In Latin America, Gomez's first name was changed to Homero.

  1. Gomez is extremely athletic, and is a very skilled sword-fighter and fencer.

  1. Charles Addams gave Gomez this description; “Husband to Morticia (if indeed they are married at all)...a crafty schemer, but also a jolly man in his own way, though sometimes misguided...sentimental and often puckish – optimistic, he is in full enthusiasm for his dreadful plots...is sometimes seen in a rather formal dressing gown...the only one who smokes”.

  1. Not that this has anything to do with any trivia or what have you, but Gomez is one of my two favourite Addams family characters. The other one is Wednesday Addams.

  1. Wednesday Addams was named after the famous poem “Monday's Child”, where the line for Wednesday reads 'Wednesday's Child is full of woe'.

  1. Wednesday Addams was played by actress Lisa Loring, who would later appear on the daytime soap opera 'As The World Turns' in the early 1980s playing a woman named Cricket.


  1. Wednesday is a girl of six years old in the pilot episode of the series. Her hobby includes raising spiders, and her favourite toy was a Marie Antoinette doll which was decapitated by her brother, Pugsley.



  1. Pugsley Addams was originally supposed to be given the name of Pubert, but was changed to Pugsley at the last minute. The name Pubert, however, did get used in the 1993 Addams Family Values film, when Morticia gave birth to a third child, that was the name he was given.

  1. Pugsley was played by child actor Ken Weatherwax in the original television series, and has since shifted his career focus to working behind the scenes.

  1. Pugsley's hair colour has changed depending on which Addams Family adaptation you happen to be watching. In most of the live-action performances, he's depicted as brunette, but in cartoons, he's shown with blonde hair.



  1. Cast member Blossom Rock, who played Grandmama Addams, was the oldest cast member of the series, born in 1895. When the Addams Family filmed a television reunion special in 1977, Blossom Rock was too ill to appear in the role and was recast by someone else. She passed away one year later in 1978.


  1. Uncle Fester was played by Jackie Coogan, who began his career as a child actor in silent movies. In 1935, he was in a car with his father and best friend when it crashed in San Diego County. He was the only survivor.
  1. Jackie Coogan was one of the first cases of a child actor suing his parents. He claimed that his mother and stepfather stole upwards of four million dollars from him to spend on luxuries. He sued them in 1938, but only ended up receiving only $126,000 of the money that was left in his account after paying the legal expenses. His friend Charlie Chaplin would later assist him financially when he fell on hard times.



  1. Initially when Ted Cassidy was cast as Lurch, the Addams family butler, he was supposed to have been a mute character. But during one of the first rehearsals of the show, Cassidy ad-libbed the line 'You rang?', and the line proved to be so well-liked by producers that the line soon became Lurch's signature line, and thus Lurch became a character that was capable of speech.

  1. Although it was hard to tell because of the show being filmed in black and white, Lurch's skin colour was supposed to be blue.



  1. Cousin Itt was portrayed by three different people during the course of the show's run. The majority of the scenes were played by Felix Silla, but for a couple of episodes, the role was filled in by Roger Arroyo. Sound engineer Tony Magro supplied the gibberish laden voice of Cousin Itt.

  1. Cousin Itt was one of the only characters that was NOT created by Charles Addams. Rather, the character was conceived by producer David Levy. Cousin Itt did make an appearance as an uncredited extra in previous Addams Family comic strips.


  1. When Thing was introduced, Charles Addams based Thing on a New Yorker cartoon. The cartoon depicted a shocked mailman reacting to a sign that said 'Beware Of The Thing'. Initially, he had the idea that the 'Thing' could be a disembodied head that rolled around the house on ramps and pulleys, but eventually decided on having 'Thing' take on the appearance of a hand.  Thing was played by Ted Cassidy, and he admitted that while he usually used his right hand to play Thing, on occasion he used his left hand to see if anyone would notice.
There you have it! Twenty-six facts about the actors, the show, the characters, and Charles Addams himself. I hope this gave you some more information on the show and why it remains a cultural mainstay even decades after it first appeared in mainstream media.

But what life lesson can we learn from the Addams Family?

Well...deep down inside, the Addams Family aren't really that much different from us. I mean, yes, they do things a lot differently from other people, but that's a part of their charm. I'll even argue that the Addams Family are a lot more functional than some modern families out there in the world. I mean, yes, Wednesday and Pugsley do sometimes cross the line with their sibling rivalry, but deep down, I think they love each other. Gomez and Morticia may not dress and act like Ward and June Cleaver, but I have never seen a couple act more loving or devoted to each other. That's real love right there. And, no, I don't have an uncle who used to turn on light bulbs just by sticking them in his mouth, but I'm sure that everyone has one uncle or aunt that has a quirk to them that makes them just as lovable.

So, I guess the lesson learned is...don't judge a book by its cover. The Addams Family may appear creepy and kooky and altogether ooky...but you know, deep down inside their odd appearances and wacky family traditions, they're more like you or I than you'd think.




Thursday, October 13, 2011

Thursday Night At The Arcade: The Simpsons Hit & Run

Occasionally, something comes along that revolutionizes pop culture as we know it.

We've all seen it. I'm sure everyone who was around during the 1980s would cite Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Prince as just three of the many musical artists who revolutionized pop music as we knew it. Sometimes, the revolution can spread through the movie world, as the release of Avatar popularized the idea of 3-D movies (though recently I'm seeing a bit of a mini-backlash towards this technology).

Television is another area where something can air that changes the way that television is presented for years. Just take a look at Survivor. It started off as a simple television show taking a group of people and stranding them on a deserted island. Now there are dozens upon dozens of reality shows (some good, some bad, some really ugly) showcasing thousands of people in various situations ranging from the practical to the bizarre. Eleven years later, the reality television juggernaut is still going strong, much to the chagrin of those who believe that reality television is anything but 'real' (and yes, I am inclined to agree with this).

The same deal with talent shows. Twenty years ago, the idea of a talent competition airing of television and getting huge ratings would have been enough to make all the network executives howl with laughter. So when FOX took a chance on a little show known as 'American Idol', it's amazing just how huge a success it became. Now we have lots of talent shows where aspiring singers, dancers, songwriters, models, and even chefs can compete to become the next big star.

(Though seriously, unless your name is Kelly Clarkson, Jennifer Hudson, or Carrie Underwood, those chances even are still slim.)

And would you believe that this has also happened in the world of animation? And that this will lead into my Thursday Night At The Arcade topic?

If you turn on the FOX network on any given Sunday night, you'll likely see that the majority of the prime time spots have been devoted to animated programming. In the past, you saw King Of The Hill and Futurama in that time slot, and nowadays you'll see Seth MacFarlane's trilogy of animated programming in the form of Family Guy, The Cleveland Show, and American Dad.



The granddaddy of this animation block though is The Simpsons, which have captivated audiences all over the world for nearly a quarter of a century. When they debuted on the Tracey Ullman show in 1987, they only had a few 2-minute snippits to their name, and admittedly, creator Matt Groening still had some doubts over what the characters were supposed to look like, as they were rather crudely drawn back in '87 as compared to now.

On December 17, 1989, the first full-length Simpsons episode aired on FOX, and that episode was the starting point to a series that as of 2011 is still airing today, and likely was the show that kicked off the Sunday animation block on FOX television. Considering how long the Simpsons have aired, and the amount of merchandise that has supported the franchise from comic books to T-shirts, it's a safe assessment that the Simpsons have shaped pop culture. Through parodies of all sorts of commercials and products, and by the Simpsons themselves endorsing such products as Kentucky Fried Chicken, Butterfinger, and MasterCard, the Simpsons have become a real mainstay.

However, there is one piece of merchandise that for whatever reason hasn't really left the Simpsons in a good light.

Video games.

For whatever reason, most of the video games that have been released starring the Simpsons family have crashed and burned.



One of the first video game appearances for the Simpsons was the 1990 video game 'Bart Vs. The Space Mutants'. The game was ported to both the Nintendo Entertainment System and the Sega Game Gear, but didn't exactly get rave reviews. I personally didn't mind the game so much, but I found it so incredibly frustrating and difficult at times. I remember how relieved I was when I beat that game. Another game, Bart Vs. The World, wasn't much better.



Then when the Super Nintendo was released, 1993 saw a couple of new Simpsons releases. Bart's Nightmare showed Bart trying to find the missing pages of his homework in a sleep-deprivation induced nightmare, while Krusty's Fun House was a puzzle game where you had to kill off all the rats scurrying around the place. Both were failures.

Even as we reached the PlayStation era, the Simpsons seemed to struggle with coming up with a decent game, as The Simpsons Road Rage was nothing more than a Crazy Taxi game with a different look.

But then 2003 came around, and with that, the release of a Simpsons game that was quite fun to play, had brilliant graphics, and had quite a few fun sidequests that could allow the player to unlock certain features within the game.



The Simpsons Hit & Run video game was released on September 16, 2003 in North America, and was originally designed to be a parody of the video game series Grand Theft Auto. What made the game fun was that it was a game that could be played by people of mostly all ages, and had quite a few background jokes mixed in for dedicated fans of the Simpsons, such as myself.



The game is essentially a game where you have various Simpsons characters driving around various parts of Springfield doing certain tasks that will help you advance to the next level. Each level has seven missions, with a bonus eighth mission that will allow you to upgrade your vehicle to a sleeker, faster model.

The playable characters include Homer, Marge, Bart, and Lisa, as well as Kwik-E-Mart store owner, Apu.

The game is set in Springfield during the week of October 25-31, and in the first couple of days, the events that the characters have to go through are pretty mundane in nature. The first mission shows Homer driving to the Kwik-E-Mart for a container of ice cream. Other missions include dropping off Lisa's science project off to school, helping Marge stop a shipment of Bonestorm games from corrupting the minds of young children in Springfield, and returning belongings that Homer 'borrowed' from Ned Flanders.

The first level really has nothing to do with the main plot, but it sort of mirrors a typical Simpsons episode where the first act has absolutely nothing to do with the leading storyline. There are some hints that all is not right though. There are gigantic cameras buzzing around that look like huge wasps, and while destroying them will land you a whole bunch of golden coins (which can be used to buy clothing items and bonus cars), it's still unknown why they even came to Springfield in the first place.



It isn't until the afternoon of October 26 (level two in the game) that we really get into the main plot of the game. This level has Bart jamming up cell phone frequencies, collecting monkeys for Dr. Nick Riviera, and keeping out of the view of Principal Skinner, who wants to catch Bart to throw him in detention. At the end of level two, Bart gets abducted by a spaceship, and isn't seen again until the end of level three, where Lisa finds him in a dazed state on a boat at the Springfield Squidport.



By October 28 (level four), Marge comes upon the truth after she manages to get through to Bart. Bart tells him that aliens came and abducted him and said something about using cola to brainwash the people of the city. With Krusty pushing Buzz Cola on television commercials, and an unusually high number of Buzz Cola trucks and mysterious black Sedans on the streets, Marge comes to the conclusion that the cola is responsible for the strange happenings that have been going on in town. Most of the missions for Apu's level (level five, set on October 29), go about trying to stop the shipments of cola from being distributed at a Buzz Cola promotional party at the Squidport scheduled for October 30 (level six).

Before the end of level six, we discover the reason why aliens are so interested in the town of Springfield, and Buzz Cola. Kang and Kodos (the space aliens who have made quite a few appearances in the television series) believe that they have the makings of an interplanetary reality show starring the citizens of Springfield. By sending the wasp cameras to Springfield, they've been entertained by the daily dealings of the townspeople. Their grand finale was to spike the supply of Buzz Cola with a special ingredient that turns average Springfield citizens into mindless zombies, and can have the ability to bring the dead back to life.

Setting the stage for the final level of The Simpsons Hit and Run, which takes place on Halloween. And kudos to the art department of that final level. It really does resemble a Simpsons Treehouse of Horror special!



I would absolutely recommend this game to everyone. It really is a lot of fun to play, and some of the missions in the game can be quite challenging. There's one mission in Apu's level that gave me headaches because I kept running out of time. It was only by chance that I managed to finally complete it.

There's a whole lot of inside jokes in the Simpsons universe as well. Anyone who has watched the show can pick out little references from the series. Kamp Krusty appears in the game, as do Krustylu Studios, the Duff Beer factory (though I wish Duff Gardens was included), Mr. Burns' mansion...even some minor references like the popsicle stick skyscraper referenced at the end of the episode Marge Vs. The Monorail. The skyscraper appears twice. In Level Two, we see it ablaze, and by Level Five, it's a smouldering pile of rubble. Because levels are revisited twice (or in the cases of levels one, four, and seven, thrice), it can sometimes be a game to pick out all the differences between each playthrough.

So, try it out! You may be pleasantly surprised.