As far as I’m concerned, Transformers first aired at 5:30 in the morning on my local Fox affiliate. This was back in the halcyon days when the Fox Network bought syndicated series the way survivalists buy bulk foods, slapping them down anywhere a hole in the programming schedule presented itself. Many a school day began with me dragging myself out of bed, the better to catch the theme song and learn the title of this latest episode in the Autobot’s seemingly-never-ending battle “to destroy the Evil Forces of…the Decepticons.”
For a time, the Transformers headed up what felt like my own Hour of Power, their show followed up by that realest of Real American Heroes, G.I. Joe. I often dreamed of an epic crossover event between my two favorite marketing tie-ins. I imagined Cobra Commander shitting himself in fear at the sight of an Autobot assault force rolling over the horizon. I imagined G.I. Joe’s hanging from every open window and flat surface their new their allies could provide, lasers ineffectually blazing. I imagined the unholy alliance between Serpentor and Megatron…not that Megatron would ever lower himself to an equal partnership with so puny a creature. I imagined the whole thing ending with Optimus Prime shaking Duke’s hand as bald eagles soared through sparkling fields of fire works. At sunset. Ironhide and Sgt. Slaughter could arm wrestling in the background, next to a stand of American flags that waved safely in the breeze, secure for another day from all things Evil and noncommercial.
I didn’t know at the time, though obviously I realize by now, that I was fervently hoping for the prototypical Michael Bay film. So, in an abstract, magical-thinking sorta way, this is really all my fault. For that, guys, I really am sorry. {More}
They Live is one of those unfortunately good movies that cannot be adequately analyzed without betraying the very elements designed to entrance first time viewers and inspire the unfettered love that those of us who’ve seen the movie far too many times still hold. As such, standard Spoiler Warnings apply. All bastards unfortunate enough to have never experience a context-free viewing of this picture are hereby placed On Notice. You’ve been warned. They Live, We Sleep.
Where others formed their love of movies in the dank bowls of old theaters with important sounding names, I, your humble narrator, was a mite deprived in this regard. My obsession with this movie formed at an early age in the dank bowls of a crackerjack video rental store in a small Missouri town with a decided lack of apostrophes in its name, typical of the local dialect.
By the time I’d made it all the way to tonight’s piece I was going on 14 and even then Younger Me could sense the hurk and jerk of a movie series tottering on its last legs, begging for a fresh idea to blow through its sagging sails. At the time, Young Me found it odd that this series of films, centered as they are around a homicidal pseudo-zombie, could be so lacking in life.
I’ve never been happy with the Man of Steel’s celluloid incarnations for the same reason cited by all the comics industry pros: the damn Boy Scout is a real chore to write, and a stone cold bitch to write well. Years of previous (mis)conceptions about just who and what he is don’t help. Neither does the fact that his world (by which I mean the 1930s) has moved on.
I may have reduced myself to a monthly reviewing schedule, I may have gone through the interminable burnout of academic paper writing, and I may have surrendered for a while there to myopic self-defeatism (“Oh, god, what can I possibly do? What’s the bloody point to it all if nobody cares anyway?”) but, by the lightning, I’m still here. And I still believe in the Cause. You need people like me. You need me to play the fuckin’ bad guy. Well say, “Hello” to the bad guy because, as I mentioned, I am still here.
I have issues with 
Gamera vs. Barugon is the high point of the original Gamera franchise. After the (relative) success of 
The Yes Men, a not-so-gruesome twosome of Mike Bonanno and Andy Bichlbaum, began their adventures in “identity correction” with a wit, a prayer, and a web site, gwbush.com. Back in 1999, Bonanno and Bichlbaum turned their little domain into the preeminent piece of web-based anti-Bush satire. The Bush campaign, like any good political hit squad, responded with Cease and Desist orders and pitched a bitched about gwbush.com to the Federal Election’s Commission. This generated a minor media kerfuffle for the Governor and a bit of free publicity for Our Heroes.