Common Thought of Sir Rantsalot

people, I’ve been away for some time but I plan to be writing more blogs soon enough

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In America, we know it as simply Ponyo. Since this Miyazaki’s most recent, I figured I’d review this first.

I was a little sketchy about seeing this at first, but I remembered how good Miyazaki’s films are, and plus I thought it would be good to see it on-screen rather than on a TV.

My friend and I hopped into this after seeing GI Joe and it was worth it. Besides, I knew if I had purchased a ticket, 10% would have gone straight to Michael Eisner’s pocket. Tickets are about $10 these days, so screw that.

The ocean is very mysterious and is one of my personal favorite wonders of the earth. The life that can spawn from it is a mystery all it’s own, and who knows what it shall bring next. Miyazaki definitely did an interesting job of fusing the wonders of the ocean shore with what I believe was mild re-telling of the Little Mermaid.

Ponyo (P-oh-nyo is how it’s correctly pronounced) is a straight to the point story about a fish who escapes the spirit of the ocean’s domain and causes a great unbalance to the ocean. The fish swims to the shore of a boys house and the boy takes care of the fish and pledges his undying devotion to taking care of her. Without realization of the situation, the fish can actually speak and falls head over heels for the boy. 

Like I said in the previous blog, Miyazaki’s films are weird, but they do not scar, there’s plenty of parts where stuff like that happens.

A very intriguing element was introduced in this film, the way a young mother would act. Risa (the mother) is shown doing normal things that a mother would, angry that the father’s away, asking and taking bites out of her child’s ice cream, and cracking open a beer. It’s odd how this is displayed in an animated film that’s aimed at kids, but it works just because they are believable actions. In the english dubbed version, she was voiced by Tina Fey and she did a good job. 

A love story between two 5-year old’s is questionable, but it works. I am totally ashamed but glad to say that this movie is too damn cute. I enjoyed it very much but I have to let that go because I am not that age anymore . I didn’t even mind the fact that the demon spawn of Cyrus and Jonas helped voice this, although 100% of the time the original Japanese/Subtitled versions are better.

I give it 4.6 out 5 stars, I love movies about the ocean.

It’s good for kids, I guarantee they’ll enjoy it.

Coming soon: Castle of Cagliostro

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When most people think animation, they automatically think kid’s stuff and can’t seem to move past the fact that a lot of animated features have amazing stories.

In Japan, anime (Japanese animation) is key. Among one of the best hailed animators is Hayao Miyazaki, and his Studio Ghibli.

Miyazaki (even though he doesn’t like it), is recognized as the Walt Disney of Japan. His film’s are masterpieces and I can’t think of one in particular that sucks. The lot of his films contain a magical background with hardly any explanation as well as a very imaginative plot.

Take note that his films are weird, but they do not scar, and don’t make you feel uncomfortable about certain scenes.

Even though his films nowadays are released in America by Disney they push past the Disney barrier, it’s hard to fathom by the likes of one that the Disney corporation would even touch something like these.

Key elements in his films contain children in trouble, an epic disaster, as well as random magic. A certain trademark of his includes flight, the way the air reflects off of the hair of a character, the flapping of the clothes, it’s actually quite interesting.

For the next few blogs, I shall be reviewing his works, for they aren’t recognized enough since mostly everybody is thinking that since it’s released by Disney, it’s kid’s stuff. His most recent film was aimed towards children, but that didn’t stop it from being good. To market stuff to children, one should think like a child, and no one captures that as skillfully as Miyazaki-sama. Bravo!

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Next 5 or 6 blogs will be reviews of my favorite films by him

PS For the record, Walt Disney himself was a genuine P.O.S.

Nowadays, Hollywood thinks that it’s sooo creative for doing live-action films about anime, and about 90% aren’t even good.

In 1995, a live action film for Fist of The North Star was released… it was HORRIBLE! Kenshiro (the main character), was played by a B-level martial artist, Gary Daniels, and well no offense to him, but his movies are terrible. I don’t know if the directors or the writers took time to realize this, but Kenshiro’s Asian!!!! In the anime, Kenshiro does these crazy ass kung-fu moves where he stabs the pressure points on his opponents body, and causes the insides of his opponent to combust. In the film, it just didn’t look believable enough, it looked like he was just mercilessly poking his opponenets repeatedly. Lame.

Recently, there was the release of Dragonball: Evolution, which was a total disgrace to new and old fans alike, once again, a Caucasian main character with an Asian name, right there, I knew it was going to be a stinker. With this movie, they tried to cram everything that is Dragonball into a 90 minute movie with a very lame appeal to teens. Hardly any explanation for anything just made it not work at all.

However only 1 movie was a good translation from anime. City Hunter was made in Hong Kong and kept the same comedic elements that the show had, plus the main character was Asian, Jackie Chan. It’s very silly and has lots of hot babes too. One good thing about this one is that it derives away from being a live-action film thats based on an anime from being a usual Jackie Chan movie + comedy.

Soon the future will bring us American CGI films that are based on anime, such as Astro Boy and Ghost In The Shell. Let’s just hope Hollywood doesn’t screw those up.

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Welcome to the 21st century, where sexual innuendos aren’t as blocked as they once were. 

Coffee. No matter how much you disagree, you hate the taste. Methods are used to make the bland, turpentine-ish, black, and bitter taste go away. Put cream in it, steamed milk, flavoring, among other things and call it a espressa-mocha-frappa-latt-whatever. In theory, coffee stands are like bars except instead of alcohol, they serve coffee. I only drink it because I have to be awake for my classes.

I live in the Seattle area. There are coffee stands EVERYWHERE. Hell, this place started the whole coffee shop idea. And it’s ridiculous to see a Starbuck’s right across the street from a Starbuck’s. It’s stupid just to see a stand within the vicinity of 5 feet from another. The message apparently is DRINK COFFEE OR DIE!!

Coffee stands have decided that putting 20-30 stands in one area simply isn’t cutting it. Female baristas came up with an ingenious idea of attract the average American horny guy; by wearing bikinis.

Reports have indicated that coffee sales have gone up and are attracting certain people to do what people wouldn’t normally do to baristas. There have been a couple of cases with flashers exposing themselves to the bikini clad baristas, and they usually end up with a boiling hot water bath.

Last summer, I encountered a bikini barista booth with a friend of mine, and as we were waiting our turn to get coffee (it was 7 in the morning mind you), a man appeared on the corner with a video camera aimed straight at the booth. He then rotated the camera on all of the people waiting. I got out my friend’s car and he started filming me. I threw some expletives his way, telling him to stop filming me. He then told me that he was making a documentary on how much of an outrage this is. The police got called on him, blah blah blah.

Point is, do I care that baristas are selling coffee with their cleavage? NO. It may be innappropriate to some, but if it is… don’t go to that coffee stand. Plain and simple. If they choose to wear a bikini, they have that luxury, tough luck if they accidentally spill a hot beverage on themselves.

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Since as far back as I can remember, my mother, sister and I always had a preference as to what we’d bump in the car. Michael Jackson’s BAD.

His song’s, written by the legendary Quincy Jones, had an unbelievably catchy hook to them and for the life of me I could not get them out of my head.

I remember seeing his “film” Moonwalker for the first time, and not caring that much about the plot, I just remembered being in awe by watching him do his transformation into a giant robot.

In ‘91, I recollect the Black or White video, and how much controversy came of it. Seriously, can’t a guy cut lose and smash a few car windows, dance in the street, and morph into a panther without there being a huge fuss about it? Who cares?

Shortly after Black or White, came the rumor about him molesting little boys, which we have no idea is true or false, and then came the jokes.

One of my favorites was, When does Michael Jackson shop at K-mart? When Boys Pants are 1/2 off. Haha

After that, he kind of disappeared for a while, by my fam didn’t care much about him being in the limelight by the paparazzi. My sister and I didn’t care about that, we still bumped his tunes and danced around to them.

Around the time I was in High School, I was all about Hard Rock. One day, I remember stopping on MTV and hearing a rock cover of a Michael Jackson song done by a band called Alien Ant Farm. For the purpose of the cover that they did, I became a fan of theirs. They did some pretty cool songs, as well as crashing the BET Awards and a Christina Aguilera and Justin Timberlake show.

At the MTV video music awards one year, AAF performed on top of Radio City Music Hall, and mostly everybody was expecting MJ to come out and dance, but didn’t. N Sync performed later that night and he did a little diddy with them.

One thing I don’t get is how no one really cared that AAF covered that song, not even MJ.

Eminem took a stab at MJ, and MJ wasn’t too happy with what came of it.

The cameo MJ did in Men In Black 2 was the only funny/good part of that movie.

The infamous interview he did brought a whole new light to him, I still don’t know why he dangled his kid off of that balcony.

When his trial rolled around, I thought for sure he was gonna get slammed hard for all of his “rumors”. But he didn’t, I was relieved.

“You rock my world” was a pretty good song, but it was hard for me to believe that that was “him” expressing himself.

If he came to my neck of the woods on tour, I would’ve without hesitation bought a ticket.

When I got wind of him dying, I did not believe it one bit. I refused to believe it. But I checked the internet… DAMN!

I felt as if a part of me had died, I have listened to the King of Pop for so long and I had to do my best to keep cool.

On July 3rd, I payed my respects to him by participating in the Guiness record for biggest flash mob of zombies doing the Thriller dance.

I don’t care if he had vitiligo, how messed up he was, how many face/nose jobs he’s had, how many kids he molested (let alone if he did or didn’t), or who he was friends with, he was the man. His hypnotic dancing and singing are what made him a legend.

His legacy will go on.

RIP Michael Jackson

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Like them or hate them, they deserve props for staying alive this long. I’m angry at myself because I didn’t get into them until later in life, because I never had the courage to even buy one of their albums. I was a little skeptical about picking up a Maiden cd because I used to think “$18 for 8 tracks? That sucks.” But I gotta say, these CD’s are worth it.

Rock Art has been a big influence on me, which is one reason why I got into drawing. Eddie the Head started out as a giant kabuki mask that would breath smoke at Iron Maiden’s first gigs. Nowadays, he’s transformed into many stages of beings, and even does appearances on stage. My next blog will be a tribute to him.

For now, this blog’s about Maiden’s music, and how addicting it is for me.

Influenced by Judas Priest after they started in ‘74, Maiden has been going strong since their first album hit stores in ‘80.

They’ve gone through many line-up changes but seem to have made a staple with Bruce Dickinson as the lead singer. With Dickinson, their tunes seem to sound more like an epic quest through the fear and darkness that surrounds the world, rather than scary images and getting smashed like when they first started. You may think that this band sounds satanic, but fyi: they’re not.

The whole ordeal of Number of the Beast was not about satanic worship, but more of a description of what happened in a dream that bassist Steve Harris (founding member) had.

Their tunes are mainly made to inspire to keep your wits about.

I currently own 10 CD’s of theirs, and a very select few of them aren’t that good. Each album has it’s own diversity, and that’s a good quality.

Like I said earlier, I’m pretty sure that each album brings about fear in it’s own way:

By means of doing that: I’ll go over each of their album titles:

IRON MAIDEN: Who wants to be thrown in an Iron Maiden?

KILLERS: Fear of being killed

THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST: Fear what’s to come by means of the devil

PIECE OF MIND: Fear of going insane

POWERSLAVE: Fear of being entombed

SOMEWHERE IN TIME: Fear of being lost

SEVENTH SON OF A SEVENTH SON: Fear of visions and mysticism

NO PRAYER FOR THE DYING: Fear of losing someone (sucked)

FEAR OF THE DARK: Explanitory (not as good)

THE X-FACTOR: Fear of Torture (sucked)

VIRTUAL XI: Fear of beyond reality (terrible)

BRAVE NEW WORLD: Fear of change (this one was ok)

DANCE OF DEATH: Fear of Dying

A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH: Fear of Battle/War

This might not be what they’re about. But it’s my input and I’m stickin to it.

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Let’s face it peeps, Sly > Arnie. His roles are more memorable and unlike arnie; they carry on a legacy. Rocky was the shit even though some were garbage, Cop Land’s tight, i dont care what anybody says. Cliffhanger was cool, and alot of his other roles (though garbage they may be) are just gold. Even though he and his two other toadies who started Planet Hollywood are Republicans, I tip my hat to his corner.Anyways, RAMBO!FYI: Rambo in Japanese: (ranbou) ?? means violence! I saw part 2 a long time ago at a friends house, and all I remember thinking was, damn! this is cool! so I kinda liked Rambo, he had a cartoon that wasn’t half bad for a cartoon spinoff of an R-rated movie. The NES game sucked, it was a total ripoff of Zelda 2, and thats pretty much all i remember from the time Rambo rolled in to the desolate suburbs of spokane county. Anyway I’ll get to reviewing. First BloodJohn Rambo is an ex-green beret from vietnam turned drifter who wanders through a remote washington town (sultan i think), in search of a former member from his battalion, as he’s passing through, a power-hungry sheriff spots him and tells Rambo to leave, and Rambo flips out on not just the sheriff, but the whole town.3.9 out of 5Rambo: First Blood part 2For Rambo’s crimes, he gets put in a military prison. The US government finds that there are more POWs in Vietnam. Rambo gets hired by a bureaucrat to go and take pics of the prisoners… FUCK THAT! It’s Rambo we’re talking about, he’s going to rescue them and spill blood of the guilty ones. 1 oscar nomination and 5 razzie nominations?! This is 1 of the best action flicks in my opinion. Don’t believe hollywood.4.0 out of 5Rambo IIII’m not gonna bitch about chronology order. An old as dirt colonel gets put on a mission to rescue Afghanistan from being over run by Russians, enter Rambo to save him. It’s worth a peek but it’s got some cheesy dialogue and a little ridiculous in some parts.3.5 out of 5RAMBOHOLY SHIT! After watching everything that has to do with Rambo, you would definitely expect these elements in a Rambo movie these days: The violence just flatout crazy and there were disturbing parts. Anyway the story; good old Rambo has been at peace and living in Thailand. A group of missionaries come by and ask Rambo to take them up the river to a nazi esque Burma/Myanmar. I cant go any further because then I’ll have to type whole movie. It was good but it just didn’t quite cut the mustard. Rambo is Japanese for violence, and that’s what this movie delivers.3.95 out of 5A fifth one is on the way…Catch ya on the flipside 

After years of being a fan of Bob Kane’s vision of a superhero with a dark and haunted past, I begin to wonder who my favorite villain was… there’s too many.

A guy who wants vengeance by freezing everybody? NO

A refugee from Latin America who injects a steroidal compound into his skull? NO

A seductress with a fetish for felines? NO

A scientist who likes to deliver brain farts? No

A mutant juggernaut lurking in Gotham’s sewers?… ok he’s cool too (Killer Croc)

A psychopath with a profound vision of anarchy?

HELL YEAH!

That’s right the Joker. With an attitude as apathetic as the next, and a lone-wolf attitude to taking over, The Joker reigns supreme when all others have failed.

You’re probably thinking that I’m just another moron posting about how good the Dark Knight was, but I’m here to say that I had to say to the lot of you that Batman and the Joker haven’t been shown properly till this movie.

In the live-action show, the Joker was played by Cesar Romero as a joyful being  who just like to cause slightly bad problems.

Mark Hammill  got the character of the Joker down good but was way too comical to be thought of correctly as how the Joker is displayed.

Jack Nicholson definitely filled the void of where the psychoticness that is the Joker to a good spot, but lacked certain anger towards Gotham.

For so long, the media has displayed the Joker as some villain who’d willingly tell a joke at a hospital once he’s released.

But seriously,

Does this look like that kind of person?

Christopher Nolan’s vision of The Joker was spot on, he’s no comedian but a total psycho who would without hesitation open fire on a a sweet little kitten who would rub up against his leg.

Heath Ledger (RIP) had the right idea when preparing to play the Joker. He dug deep into insanity to see get a feel for what this character truly is. Explosives galore, chaos, an attitude that says, who gives a flying fuck about the rest of you? Not only did he play a magnificent Joker, but he played on of the most memorable roles by means of insanity. His role left us with a question that will make us question our own sanity…

Besides all that, he sucks in Mortal Kombat VS DC Universe

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AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We all need a quick pick me up in the morning.

Some of us can’t stand the taste of coffee.

That’s why man created the energy drink.

Carbonation loaded with caffeine, preservatives, and at least 5 spoonfuls of sugar.

A lot of them aren’t loaded with sugar, and in my opinion those ones work the best.

I drink one of these just about every other morning when I haven’t gotten enough sleep. It’s got green tea, b-vitamins and everything a growing boy needs. The wild berry flavor is good too once ya get used to it. The down side is, it goes through you like water… meaning that it digests quickly.

These are dangerous!

Probably the only energy drink that has a warning on the front. I drank one of these when I had 3 hours of sleep at one point, and I was feeling like there was lightning in my veins all day. 7 hours after I drank it, I had the energy to jog to Alaska and wrestle a Kodiak grizzly bear.

Sugar’s bad, and there has to be some way around it, these two beverages are my suggestion to those who are weening off any kind of sweet product for a pick-me up.

Catch ya on the flipside