Just forget the words and sing along

Sunday, March 21, 2004

Well, I watched my Saturday morning cartoons, and as always, it has led to some pop culture obeservations.

It was a rerun of Justice League, but it was one of my favourite episodes. A Better World told the tale of the Justice Lords, a parallel universe version of the Justice League who siezed power to become absolute rulers of Earth. Then, they come to our universe, conquer the Justice League, and seek to bring their version of order to our universe. Naturally, the League won't stand for that. Anyway, there's this battle royale near the end, where evil Wonder Woman is about to deliver the death blow to good Batman. Good Wonder Woman sees this, takes off her tiara, and hurls it with enough force at evil Wonder Woman to knock evil Wonder Woman flat on her ass. The tiara then makes a graceful loop in the air and returns to good Wonder Woman. I always wonder if that scene was thrown in as an homage to Sailor Moon.

Right now, I'm watching The Princess Bride on TV. It's the late movie on the Women's Network. I've always had an idea for a similar movie. I got the idea when I'd watch Trouble's role-playing games in university and she'd chastise me for constantly heckling her and her players. Same kind of thing, only instead of a grandfather reading a story to his grandson, it's the players playing their game. I just think it has enough storytelling potential to seperate it from The Princess Bride. For example, each player character has a counterpart in the game; their character. The nerdiest one could have a counterpart in the biggest, beefiest warrior.

And I just always had this great idea for a scene. One of the game characters is an archer. He draws his bow and takes aim. We cut out to the players, where the game master says, "Now, roll this die to see if you hit the target or not." The player rolls the die, and at the same time, the archer lets his arrow fly. We cut back and forth between the arrow in flight and the die tumbling in slow motion. Finally, the die comes to a rest on 1. The game master says those dreaded words: "The arrow...misses." We cut back to our warriors, they see the arrow missing the target, and the archer screams, "NOOOOOOOOO!"

My idea. Don't steal it.

And, a story about Entwistle. Out and about, and I ran into, let's call him, Mr. Blue. Now, Mr. Blue is infamous in the community not because he's a self-published author who can't sell his books. No, it's because Mrs. Blue is his cousin. Yes, in Entwistle, we actually boast a family where the husband and wife are first cousins. They actually had to go to
Scotland for the wedding because marrying your cousin is legal over there.

When I was in Japan, my upstairs neighbour was Scottish. He worked for the rival English school down the street. One day, he shared the tale about how he was at a wedding and was accidentally hitting on a cousin. Naturally, I launched into, "Well, I thought that kind of thing was legal in Scotland." He said, "It is. How do you know?" and I told him the tale of the Blue family. He just said, "Well, just because something is legal, that doesn't mean it's right."

So, my question is, is this tale more telling about Entwistle or Scotland?

And before I go to bed, just one link to pass along. Check out this image. Yeah, I know the last two movies sucked, but my heart always beats a little quicker when I see the teaser image of the latest movie. I think this is just cool.

Next Issue...Scarecrow Begins

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