No kidding. Brutal Legend is a game that's seemingly based around every heavy metal album cover ever made.

I think this one will especially appeal todevonapple . I mean, hours upon HOURS of Jack Black dialogue.  It may be too intense for the rest of us.

( Videos here. See what I mean? )

The following video remix of Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Twilight is interesting, not only for the editing and humor, but also because as a mash-up, it's compare and contrast as social commentary. It really points out the creepy nature of Edward's advances that Twilight fans tend to handwave away, and in the process, does more to comment on the misogynist nature nature of the horror genre than Buffy the TV series seemed to.

And oh yeah, it's pretty funny as well.

( Watch Video )

Or to be more accurate, an Israeli defense company goes pseudo-Bollywood in a video for the Indian defense ministry's annual air show. The result...is...not good. We have the flower -draped missiles, a George Michael clone for the male singer and the desultory dancers, but really what brings on the pain is the refrain: Dinga dinga dee!

Be careful watching this, lest one's love for Bollywood be damaged.

( Dinga dinga dee! )

Kudos to james_nicoll , who has made the sacrifice of not only watching the late, unlamented series Starlost, he's giving us reviews of the entire series. He'll freely admit that these are more like summaries, and that his reviews don't really convey the cheap sets, lousy special effects, and wooden acting. But his reviews at least are entertaining to read, especially when he gets more sarcastic in the later reviews.

And for those of you who really, really REALLY have to see the series that James is reviewing? Don't. It's bad. It makes old Doctor Who serials look like Bladerunner in comparison.

No really, you don't want to do it. Turn away. Read James' review and be content.

( OK, OK, but don't say I din't warn you... )

It's been a while since I've shared a stupid video, and well this is silly enough that I have to share it.

D&D: the Music Video

While the video is really wonderful in its over-tyhe-top sillyness, with explosions, stunts, horsies, and latex-wearing hellaciious babes, it is missing a certain something.  Somethign it really needs, but I can't put my finger on it.  Oh yeah!  It needs music that doesn't make me retch.

"Knights of Cydonia" it isn't.  It's not even in the same league.  Still, watch it.  It's a silly thing.


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Here's some of the references and inspirational media I'm using for my Under the Green Moon worldbuilding project.  homnestly, I have a lot of references, from all areas of fiction and nonfiction.  But these just jumped out at me as important.


Books

Jack Vance: really can be considered the godfather of the stories I want to tell. and his picaresque yet ironic descriptions of alien worlds and cultures is a key resource. Andre Norton: another one of my major influences, in that many of her books involve young, expanding cultures dealing with artifacts of forgotten ancient cultures.  Also, the way magic works in many of her novels, as a type of powerful ESP or psychic power is very similar to how I want magic to work in UTGM.  there are a lot of "look and feel" elements in Norton's works.


Manga:



Webcomics:

...just when you thought you were safe from "Numa Numa". Courtesy of iamradar, we have evidence of what navy crewmen on a nuclear submarine get up to.





The horrifying implications should not be understated. They are out there. Under the waves, lurking. They have nuclear weapons. And they have "Numa Numa".

I don't know about you all, but I am terrified.

San Francisco Artist Tanya Vlach wants a webcam to place in her prosthetic eye.

Oh yeah. THIS is where:



In any case, I highly approve, especially since what she's asking for is really an update of the camera eye in the original "Cyborg" novel. I wish her luck!

...unfortunately.

Everyone of a certain generation has an idea of who Jim Fowler is, or at least would recognize him in the field. He was Marlin Perkin's assistant in Mutual of Omaha's wild Kingdom, the one who would do all the crazy, near suicidal stunts with animals, whenever a critter needed to be lassoed, tagged, diverted, oor given a human chew toy.  Jim undoubtedly inspired the Crocodile Hunter with his "hands on" naturalist style.  More importantly, my friends and I came up with any number of theories to explain his survival; multiple Jims was the easiest explanation, though theories ranged up to instant clones and terminator style cyborgs.

Oddly enough, he seems to have been human, and he's still around.  After doing a number of television nature specials, he's focused on wildlife preservation and the Center for Wildlife Education in New York, a mysterious place that has almost no web presence, but may involve wild animal parks.  Unless of course, that's merely a cover story to conceal the underground factory where vat after vat of bubbling, glowing green ichor is producing an army of nigh-invulnerable Jim clones to take over the world.  Or wrestle leopards or something.

Especially on days like today.



For anyone who's interested, this was actually part of a rather interesting and potentially important experiment on immunology research. 

I had no absolutely interest in "Phoenix Wright, Ace Attorney...until I saw this.

happy Subverted Pagan harvest Festival everybody!

And in honor of Halloween, I shall indulge in an exercise in pure, unmitigated horror. Today I will share with you one of the most terrifying things I've ever seen, a video which will leave your mind reeling from the utter, incomparable cosmic horror.

You HAVE been warned, gentle audience, now prepare for the worst.

HAS Halloween become too commercialized?  You decide!





Maybe, maybe not. I'm just going to go dig out my amulet to be sure.

This seems to be my day for finding interesting videos. In this case, it's an odd music video for the band "Feist" using...not stop motion, but puppets. And interestingly, the puppeteers are intrusive- there's no attempt at suspension of disbelief. In spite of this, the puppets have interesting personality to them. And of course it's very baroque, like a Jan Svankmajer film without the creepiness.

This is a fascinating video, and a piece of classic on-site investigative journalism that's becoming increasingly rare in this day. Mariana van Zeller traveled to a war zone on the border of Turkey, Iraq and Iran, to investigate reports that the U.S. is funding anti-Iran terrorists, effectively engaging in a proxy war with Iran.

I don't think they actually gave good evidence that the U.S. is involved with these groups, but the opportunity to get a look at a guerrilla/terrorist group, one which has a large female contingent, is fascinating. It's a look at a part of the world and a conflict we see very little of in the U.S.

A musical satire from the insane people at JibJab, which takes the piss at pretty much the entire election process. I'm not sure if it's more disturbing or funny...ahh hell, the bit with Obamaland is hysterical.

When you see this, quote Blackadder in your LJ.

"Yes Baldrick, let us not forget that you tried to solve the problem of your mother's low ceiling by cutting off her head."

I was fortunate to get a condensed version of the debate.  I think it's VERY important to watch this, to get a good idea of the issues surrounding the campaign, as well as the debate tactics. 

Courtesy of Wonkette, we have a video where Batman Returns is updated to face current economic reality.  The mashup between the Joker and George Bush is amusing, but with Bush announcing his plan ahead of time in obfuscatory language, does this mean that GWB is really The Riddler?