I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. Cmi7: It may seem a tad common for one of his dazzling grandeur, but the Emperor does enjoy a little stint on Facebook or Twitter from time to time. (This invariably leads to finger-blisters for the Imperial Scribe who keeps a list of dictated future decrees.) But, for the love of ME, people, could you stop posting vapid, pedestrian, mediocre excerpts from song lyrics that a three-year old could have churned out during an inspired potty squeege? Sweet Jesu — what compels a person to take the time to type up “Yeah, baby — yeah; you’re mine and I’m yours and that’s the way it will always be”? This is such a good lyric that it had to be electronically broadcast to the world? This made you sit up and say, “Wow — that’s deep. I must share this.” Cripes. Meanwhile, Johnny Mercer dwells in Facebook obscurity — in the dark refuse pile of the un-tweeted — despite having written: [Read more →]

Tags: music, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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Recently I reviewed The Incal, the epic psychedelic space opera from the all-round holy madman Alejandro Jodorowsky and French comics master Moebius. It is, as I said, good to a consciousness-scrambling degree. But Jodorowsky has many other works available in English, and today I draw attention to two of them, one of which dates from the beginning of his comics career and the other of which appeared at what we must assume is close to the end of it, given that he is now 83. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, books & writing by Daniel Kalder
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10. America’s Funniest Postcards

9. Law and Order: CSI: NCIS:

8. 48 Hour History

7. So You Think You Can Play Pachinko

6. How I Met Your Accountant

5. America’s Next Top Heavy

4. The Sitcom with No Gay Characters

3. The X Chromosome

2. Dancing with the Has-Beens

1. Innocence of Muslims
 

Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, television by Bob Sullivan
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Recently, I saw a post on Facebook from someone who had learned of Osama Bin Laden’s assassination an entire year after it happened. As a well informed American, he was shocked that he had initially missed the story. I’ve never missed news as big as Bin Laden’s death (as far as I know), but I can relate. I was just as shocked when I learned recently from a New Yorker article on the upcoming Cloud Atlas Movie  that the Wachowski Brothers are now the Wachowski Siblings and Larry is now Lana.

What concerned me on learning about the “siblings” was not the news (who really cares?), it was the thought that I may be out of touch. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment by Tyler Samien
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Have you ever tried to track down something you saw on TV as a kid, just to see if it was even real? Many of us are occasionally haunted by snippets of movies and shows we vaguely remember watching when we were children. We may wonder if these memories ever really happened, or if they were dreams. Especially when the memories seem incredibly bizarre! Having grown up in the 70s, I caught a lot of psychedelic stuff on TV as a kid that I’ve become obsessed with tracking down as an adult. Why? Discovering forgotten moments from our youth is the closest thing we have to time travel. We get to relive an experience we had and to see what actually happened. Sometimes, we may even be shocked to find that the story from way back then provides an answer to our lives now. [Read more →]

Tags: religion & philosophy, television by Marc Oromaner
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At the age of 27, I have an iTunes library that more closely resembles someone who’s already outlived the national average life expectancy. The sections of Robert Johnson, Elmore James, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, and the three Kings (Albert, Freddie, and B.B.) alone probably comprise something like twelve days of music. God could create the heavens and the earth again and still not be out of the ’60s.

But my digital music collection is just the way I like it. I’ve got everything I love and almost nothing I don’t. Sure, individual songs like  T.I.’s “Whatever You Like” inevitably infiltrate my anti-garbage firewall (read: are added by friends to annoy me), but they’re nothing a “delete” key can’t fix. It’s wonderful. And it’s awful. The digital age has enabled my music library to reflect Current Me, and in a certain way, that’s a real shame for today’s youth.

[Read more →]

Tags: getting older, music by Ian Micir
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. i-124-B: The Emperor is aware of how hard it is for young musicians and lyricists to approach the profundity of their Springsteenian and Dylanesque heroes — those stretchers of poetic and pop-cultural boundaries. He knows (not from experience, mind you, but from within the depth of his infinite wisdom) what it feels like to struggle with a lack of intellectual and artistic development in the face of a monumental desire to write something truly powerful. In short, the Emperor empathizes (theoretically). He cannot, however, allow these young lyricists to continue crossing the line of sensuality and over into  increasingly frequent  implications of cannibalistic desires. Lately, there have been far too many references to the “taste” of the lips of one’s lover, in popular tunes. This is not sensual and edgy, my young and comically rebellious friends. This is gross. Ye shall quit it.

The Punishment: Violating lyricists will be tied up and forced to listen to three weeks of non-stop jokes about cannibals, like this one: Two cannibals are sitting around the fire, eating. One cannibal says to the other, “I can’t stand my mother-in-law.” The second cannibal replies, “So, just eat the noodles.” THANK YEEEW! (Try the veal.)

Now, go forth and obey.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: music, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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10. DORMITORY = DIRTY ROOM

9. THE MORSE CODE = HERE COME DOTS

8. ELEVEN PLUS TWO = TWELVE PLUS ONE

7. DEBIT CARD = BAD CREDIT

6. THE EYES = THEY SEE

5. ASTRONOMERS = NO MORE STARS

4. CLINT EASTWOOD = OLD WEST ACTION

3. ANN COULTER = A LONER CUNT

2. WILLARD ROMNEY = DRILL RAW MONEY

1. KATE MIDDLETON = NAKED TIT MODEL
 

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, games by Bob Sullivan
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 04-67739: At televised baseball games, people are no longer permitted to yammer into cellular phones while waving to the camera in order to get the attention of the person to whom they are speaking. Those who do this (in the Emperor’s opinion) are addle-pated ninnyhammers. (Yeah, you heard me.) The Imperial Minister of Education/Effective Torture Practices concurs with this assessment. Through the punishment (to follow) a great peripheral social benefit (beyond the mere elimination of myriad undignified pinheads) will also be realized.

The Punishment: All baseball stadiums will be fitted with high-voltage wiring in the seats. Anyone seen, at a ballpark, talking on a cellular phone and flailing his arms about like a juvenile orangutan, will be immediately incinerated by means of a remote button-push. (The button resides on the arm of the Emperor’s TV-watchin’ chair.) The above-mentioned peripheral benefit: Imperial mathematicians calculate that, after only a single baseball season, the average intelligence quotient in America will have increased by as much as fifty points, owing to the removal of numerous fools from the overall equation.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: television, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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With the rise of comedians like Louis C.K. and Bill Hicks, the complexity level of comedy has increased. Comedy is no longer three idiots poking each another in the eye or lighting their flatulence on fire . It’s no longer even just an irreverent and humorous dismantling. As religious explanations fall further and further behind the evolutions of society, comedians have stepped in to fill the gap. Comedians are the new preachers, comedy clubs are their churches, and the audience members that understand it are the frustrated moral progressives. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, religion & philosophy by Tyler Samien
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10. Project Nunway

9. Who Wants to Be a Dental Hygienist?

8. Ferret Whisperer

7. America’s Next Top Ramen

6. Waterboard Confessions

5. So You Think You Can Crochet

4. Real Housewives of Tehran

3. Bagpiping with the Stars

2. Are You Smarter Than A Congressman?

1. Jersey Shore
 

Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, television by Bob Sullivan
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 9932: Purveyors of fine chocolate treats will no longer be allowed to market their products with television advertisements that include women eating, moaning, throwing their heads back and seductively licking the chocolate drippings off of the tips of their fingers. While the Emperor understands the love that his female subjects generally share for chocolate (and while he enjoys similar goodies, himself, from time to time) he certainly would not permit the airing of commercials that include images of gentlemen dry-humping their Audis, or seductively nibbling at the radio antennae. While sexuality can be effective in advertising, the Emperor declares chocolate porn to be frigging stupid, and things that are frigging stupid are not allowed in The Empire.

The Punishment: Violators will be forced to watch a naked Sumo wrestler, recumbent, Rubens-like,  upon a velvet a chaise lounge, eat foot-long chili dogs for an entire month.

Now, go forth and obey.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: television, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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It is impossible to “spoil” something that is already rotten. However, the following post contains specific plot information about the film “The Dark Knight Rises,” so if you haven’t yet seen the film (don’t!) and you don’t want to know what happens in the film (trust me, you don’t!), then read no further.

There is a great deal of irony in the title “The Dark Knight Rises.” The character of Batman cannot rise above this material, and so the character sinks. The film is completely nonsensical and ludicrous, so the film itself sinks, hard. The acclaim afforded the film shows a decline in critical thinking, in particular among fanboys and geeks; fandom sinks. And each of Christopher Nolan’s Batman films has declined in quality. The franchise sinks.

“The Dark Knight Rises” is the worst Batman film of all time. It is worse than Schumacher’s “Batman & Robin.” It is worse than “Batman XXX: A Porn Parody.” It is worse than Leslie Martinson’s “Batman” film from 1966. It’s worse than “The Dark Knight Raises.” [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, movies by Ricky Sprague
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Last week the directors of the Bayreuth Festival got into a kerfuffle with the Russian bass-baritone Yevgeny Nikitin when a German TV show revealed that he has a swastika tattoo on one of his man-boobs. This was a problem because Nikitin had been invited to perform the lead in “The Flying Dutchman,” an opera by Richard Wagner, the music world’s most famous anti-Semite, whose work was much beloved by Adolph Hitler, another noted anti-Semite. It was a Nazi supernova!

[Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, travel & foreign lands, trusted media & news by Daniel Kalder
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 3T-45: Rock and roll stations are no longer permitted to play reggae music. Reggae is the polar opposite of rock and roll. There are no similarities between rock and roll and reggae. The rhythmic stresses occur in different places. Reggae is “laid-back” and rock and roll is “in-your-face.” Barry Manilow fits a rock station playlist about as well as Bob Marley does. (And, no, excessive marijuana use is not enough of a connection between rock and reggae to justify its presence on the playlist.) Hearing reggae on a rock station is like finding a picture of one’s grandmother edited into a pornographic video: it just breaks the whole vibe; lets the air our of the balloon; jams on the brakes; busts the groove; kills the buzz — and all those other cliches that you lowly minions always identify with. It’s a bird in the face of roller-coaster-riding Fabio. When the Emperor is cruising along, slamming his face against the dashboard to “Hell’s Bells” he doesn’t want it followed up with “One Love.” You can’t do the devil’s horns thing to Marley, plain and simple. When the Emperor wants to suck on a juicy mango and loaf in a hammock, he welcomes all things Rastafarian. But when the Emperor feels the need to bang the royal head, he doesn’t want a pillow thrown in front of it. (It just ain’t a party until the crown gets dented.)

The Punishment: DJs who play reggae on rock stations will have headphones duct-taped to their heads and they will be forced to listen to Don Ho singing “Tiny Bubbles” for one solar year.

Now, go forth and obey.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: music, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I’m old enough to remember when the National Geographic brand conjured in the mind images of amazing photos of faraway lands and interesting information about exotic animals, architecture, culture, and conservation. I knew a lot of people who collected the magazine, proudly displaying the spines on ornate bookshelves. The presence of the magazine on your coffeetable was a signal to any visitors that you were an intellectually curious person with good taste and wide-ranging interests.

Just as comic books often publish gimmicky covers to boost sales, so too did National Geographic once release a "hologram" cover in the mid-1980s.

Today, the National Geographic Channel schedules three-hour blocks of television programs in which people hunt for UFOs (it’s balanced, because the team is composed of “one believer, one skeptic, and one undecided”).

Last night, they aired a program entitled “Comic Store Heroes,” which centered around New York City’s Midtown Comics (which is apparently the largest comic book store in America), and the indefatigable fans who shop there.
[Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, television by Ricky Sprague
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The first time I was given advice about the importance of forgiveness was at the most unlikely of places: an advertising school I was attending in Atlanta. The school had brought in speaker Joey Reiman—a very successful advertising executive who ran his own agency. Almost immediately, I could tell this man had a lot of wisdom, but it was towards the end of his presentation when something he said really resonated with me. [Read more →]

Tags: movies, religion & philosophy by Marc Oromaner
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The Amazing Spider-Man is the newest movie to spin a web of excitement around our hearts. It stars Andrew Garfield, of Facebook Is Ruining Our Culture, and Emma Stone, from the Jim Carrey video, as the star-crossed lovers of the title. It is so good, I haven’t actually seen it, because it is too precious to be seen. The most pure way to experience a great film like this, with all its action and romance, is to only dream about it rather than see it, which is what I did.

Andrew Garfield proves that acting isn't just a spectator sport anymore!

The villain of the film is Lizard Man. He was born without arms, so he uses his toes to buy vegetables and play guitar. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, movies by Ricky Sprague
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Recently I was mildly surprised to hear that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are getting divorced. Why, only a few days before I had read an interview in People magazine in which Cruise kept banging on about “Kate” and his daughter Suri, and how he was looking forward to a happy 50^th birthday celebration with his family. And then this Tuesday Tom turned 50, alone… How could it all have gone so wrong so quickly?

I’ve had a soft spot for Cruise since 2002, a year I spent exclusively watching movies made by one of the Toms, either Cruise or Hanks. I was forced into this because I was living in Russia, where English language movies were in short supply. A recent encounter with a preposterous French movie entitled Trouble Every Day had led me to the epiphany that while bad art house films were just that, even the worst Hollywood movies at least had high production values. It was time for a Tom. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, movies, trusted media & news by Daniel Kalder
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My interest in comics ebbs and flows. So much that is published is embarrassingly bad, but I still love the medium, and so I want there to be books that are good. English language comics publishing remains dominated by superheroes, an exhausted genre which was great when the stories were aimed at young lads, but which stinks now that the target audience is 30/40something anally retentive boy-men. Nor have I ever been able to develop a taste for autobiographical “indie” comics, which are often (though not always) a) boring b) poorly drawn and c) solipsistic. As a result, I search hopefully for European comics in translation, where the standard of craft is usually higher, there is a broader spread of genre and there are no images of Cyclops in a red thong. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, books & writing, travel & foreign lands by Daniel Kalder
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