Episode 5- Bots Master

We're back with another edition of Saturday Morning Deathgrip. Courtesy of Giancarlo's apparently demented childhood, it was Laser Time as we watched the pilot episode of "Bots Master," a show designed for people who loved early 90s hip hop but may have thought that "Do the Urkel" was both too risque in lyrical content and too subdued in musical construction.

In today's episode, our topics include Andrea's staunch Libertarianism, the perfect Kevin Costner movie, people with names that are, purely by coincidence, one letter off from a famous person's, and Giancarlo's deviant behavior (nothing new there, amirite?).

Thanks for listening, please subscribe, tell your friends, and don't litter on your way out of wherever you are at the moment you read this.

Download from iTunes (or subscribe and review- pretty, pretty please) or listen right here!

Freezy Freakies

I hate to kick off my inaugural SMDG post by getting all controversial but I don’t much care for winter.  Sure, the season might conjure up charming images of snow kissed trees, rustic fireplaces, Sonny Bono skiing into a tree.  But no matter how much joy one can derive from sticking carrots into balls of snow, it’s impossible to redeem the moment when the temperature dips low enough that it feels as though you forgot to put on pants.  And, more importantly, hypothermia doesn’t complement my natural skin tone.


Elton John in summer doesn't go with my skin tone, either (source).

Of course, as a child, I hated having to bundle up once late November hit.  I didn’t want to arm myself against the elements so much as complain about them.  Zipping up jackets, wearing mittens, donning ski caps – winter apparel felt so restrictive.  Who wants to be entombed in cotton or Thinsulate?  Nature was trying to straight jacket us all and it had convinced the fashion industry to its bidding (typical move fashion industry, typical move)! 

Episode 4- Denver the Last Dinosaur

Our fourth episode, with improvement in 3/4 of the audio and regression on Andrea's audio. I swear, we're on the verge of massive breakthrough on audio quality.

In our latest episode, we turn our attention (and our occasionally wonky audio) to the 80s biggest innovation in television animation: the syndicated cartoon. The honor goes to none other than the Denver the Last Dinosaur episode, "Chinatown Caper." We talk a lot about Chinatown architecture, cats shaped like Rihanna and we get to sit down for a very real and disturbing interview with a surprise guest star from the show. 

Thanks for listening!

Download from iTunes (or subscribe and review- pretty, pretty please) or listen right here!

Ghostbusters 2 Coloring Book

If you were like me, you LOVED Ghostbusters as a kid. As in, the Real Ghostbusters, not the stupid ghost busting ape that Filmation had. (Don’t be fooled, that phrase makes it sound much cooler than it actually was). In the summer of 1989, the feature film Ghostbusters 2 came out and a 4 year old Sean saw it in theaters. Why would my parents take a 4 year old to a film that has scary ghosts, a painting trying to possess a baby and a mink coat coming alive to try to eat its owner? Because they loved me.

I had many pieces of Ghostbusters merchandise.A few years ago, I found an odd piece of memorabilia - the Ghostbusters 2 coloring book. What makes it odd? Well, let me walk you through a bit of it.

Keep in mind this has spoilers for both the movie and coloring book of Ghostbusters 2. So ... yeah.

Pg. 5

We can see why Viggo picks Oscar as a surrogate as he’s already the creepiest baby that’s ever lived.

ALF Colorforms

Gifts from family can be hit or miss, especially when you’re a kid. I think every person who would be reading this (all, you know, six of you) knows this. For the family members who know you, you can get some awesome presents (my mom, who got me this beloved piece of my childhood for christmas 1989  or my oldest brother got me this beauty for my 10th birthday). Sadly, you can’t always get Capcom’s Darkwing Duck NES game. Sometimes you get ALF Colorforms. 

Colorforms, for the uninitiated, are apparently a “classic toy”. I say “classic” because they’ve been around since 1951 and have won honors, including a place on TIME’s 100 Greatest Toys list. If you’re really uninitiated, or just don’t want to read a Wikipedia article about Colorforms, they come in themes, often licensed ones). In each box, you got a laminated background and a series of vinyl cutout characters, props, and speech bubbles. The vinyl adhered to the laminated cardboard, so you could put your colorforms on the background and then... um... peel them off and stick them back on?

They'll do any license, evidently.

I’ll be honest, I don’t get colorforms. Take that Real Ghostbusters one I linked to. Ray looks like he’s farting. And Ray will always look like he’s farting. He doesn’t move. Which leads to people doing this. Additionally, since the characters were designed to stick to the background, you couldn’t really move them around. I really just don’t get this as a “toy”. Maybe as a kid who drew lots of pictures (ahem...), I preferred drawing characters (I wish I still had any of my approximately googolplex of GB drawings). As an 8 year old, I could not draw a screen-accurate Ray, but I could make him do more than look like he had too many beans for lunch. 

Episode 3- Monster in My Pocket

Our third episode, with more marginally improved sound quality!

Today, we watched the 1992 special "Monster in my Pocket" (we have trouble getting a handle on the title in the episode- it's just that good!) Not only do we discuss the reasons this might not have made it as a series, we also talk about some bizarre interpretations of classic monsters (Dracula hypnotizing through a ring? Woody Allen the mummy? An anthropomorphic pile of feces?), the show's inappropriate use of Jamaican culture, the proper classification of birds, and how we all might mathematicians, er, chaoticians. Also, there's a good chance the room we were in had a gas leak, because none of us seemed to be able to, you know, think good.

Thanks for listening and enjoy!

Download from iTunes (or subscribe, pretty please) or listen right here!

Episode 2- X-men: Pryde of the X-men

We're back with episode 2- now with slightly better audio quality (we're gettig there; give us a break, we're new at this).

For episode 2 we watched the 1987 pilot for a unproduced X-men series "Pryde of the X-men". The conversation includes a LOT about the X-men, what circuits looks like, the sensibility of destroying a planet you want to conquer, the disturbing concept of "Hulking out" with middle-aged women, and the always appropriate discussion of Josef Fritzi. 
Thanks for listening!

Download from iTunes (or subscribe, pretty please) or listen right here!