It’s the end of
the month, folks. Pour a stiff one and steel yourselves as we venture down
memory lane and into the breach once more and plumb the depths of my preteen
self’s attempt at fanfiction. This month, we tackle the sixth chapter of AvP: The Story, wherein we’re introduced
to this novella’s United States Colonial Marine protagonist, Corporal Andrew
Harrison. Be prepared for a 12-year-old’s embarrassing recreation of Marine
lingo.
4/30/2012
4/23/2012
Spotlight - Brad Neely
As anyone who
frequents my Facebook profile knows, I’m a fiend for the absurd. My wall is a
veritable art gallery of the staggeringly inexplicable, an endless list of
links displaying nature and society’s greatest “what the fuck” accomplishments.
Over the last half year or so, I’ve included among this debris several short
cartoons, all of which seem to defy anything resembling sanity. They invariably
feature freakish, hastily drawn characters, all devoid of pupils, babbling on
in idiosyncratic voices and residing in a world devoid almost entirely of
sense.
At first glance
these animations appear to be the work of a schizophrenic ex-Nickelodeon
employee, but in fact the man behind them—writing, illustrating, voicing and
piecing them together singlehandedly—is a relatively sane Fort Smith, Arkansas
native by the name of Brad Neely. And for all the seeming incomprehensibility
of his filmography, this bearded, bespectacled Arkansan has become one of my
favourite comedians as of late.
4/16/2012
Rant - Lesser Known Physical Laws
The following fragments were found
scribbled on several napkins left at Professor Brian Cox’s table in a London
pub.
Labels:
but not really,
comedy,
funny,
humour,
Jaws,
Jian Ghomeshi,
Keith David,
Professor Brian Cox,
rant,
science,
tangent
4/09/2012
Analysis - "The feeling begins..."
I want to talk
about Jesus.
Chances are that
first sentence alarmed a few of you. On my behalf, whoa, now. Whoa. Those close
to me know I’m the last person to go on some rambling faith-based diatribe, and
likewise know I’m not inclined to go on an anti-religious rant either. So for the
next thousand words or so, let’s lower ourselves back onto our collective
haunches and chill. There’s no better time: today’s Easter Monday and a
holiday. And, given the season, it’s fitting to kick back and examine Martin
Scorsese’s controversial 1988 film, The
Last Temptation of Christ.
4/02/2012
Analysis - Errday I'm Dumblin'
I don’t often
talk about my Harry Potter fandom. Though I’d been reading the books since
2001, it wasn’t until last summer that I sat down with J.K. Rowling’s seven
novel series and truly realized their depth and creativity. I could go on for
pages listing the heptalogy’s
qualities, but I don’t have the time and I imagine whoever is reading this
doesn’t have the patience. So for today I’m just going to focus on one of the
books’ strongest suits: characterization. Particularly, I’m interested in how
Rowling fleshes out Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore, and how the depth she
gives to the character later on in the series significantly impacts Harry’s own
decisions in the final book.
For all of his
eccentricities and endearing witticisms, Dumbledore wasn’t even close to being
one of my favourite characters for a long while. I discovered The Lord of the Rings not too long after
reading the first HP novel, and anything I might have found appealing about
Rowling’s old wizard was supplanted by my discovery of Gandalf the Grey (later
the White). Both characters had the same, grandfatherly charm, but Gandalf was,
when called upon, a warrior, whereas Dumbledore was more often than not a
passive, expository figure, popping in near the end of each novel to provide
Harry with context and congratulations. On a more shallow level, there was also
the fact that, being old, grey and wise, Dumbledore seemed a knockoff of his
Middle-earth parallel, and therefore inferior (ignoring the influence that King
Arthur’s trusty mage, Merlyn, must have had on Tolkien). But there’s a lot more
to the wizard than the archetypal foundation he’s built on suggests.
Labels:
Albus Dumbledore,
analysis,
book,
Harry Potter,
J.K. Rowling,
reading
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