Even though “the best video game movie” is as low a bar as “the best interior designer at West Point” or “the least murderous Minnesotan,” this movie looks genuinely well-written (if the trailer is any indication).

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One minor quibble: I’m a bit tired of traditionally villainous creatures getting recast as protagonists (e.g. vampires in Twilight, dragons in any dragonriding work, sharks in Finding Nemo, Canadians in Dudley Do-Right, zombies in Play Dead, Godzilla in any non-villainous appearance, etc). Personally, I wouldn’t get into an overcrowded niche unless I was REALLY sure I had something new to say.

Campus police officers in Colorado used tranquilizer darts and a trampoline to safely remove a bear hiding in a tree, leading to the photograph of an apparently levitating bear seen below and/or a Matrix-style battle royale.

#4 is accidentally attempting to assassinate the President–it somehow gets worse.  Oh, by the way, all five screw-ups happened on one ship (the William D. Porter).

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One screw-up Cracked doesn’t mention is that FDR asked his Secret Service attendee to wheel him over to the side of the battleship so that he could see the incoming torpedo.  That reminds me of the Nedelin disaster, where a Soviet space commander got ~120 people killed (including himself) by watching a shuttle from the launch pad rather than the bunker.

Are you a patriot or a vampire?

This is pretty brilliant, albeit not safe for work.

I made this t-shirt on CustomInk. It is a t-shirt for spectacular people.

I ordered a dish at a Korean restaurant and the server said “ooh, that’s spicy.”  ”How spicy?”  She just handed me a pitcher of water.

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Conversations don’t have to be purely linear.  You might be able to develop a conversation in an interesting and/or unexpected direction if characters respond to questions and statements in unexpected ways.

B. MAC: This apartment complex looks nice…

LANDLADY: And the pool is beautiful!

B. MAC: …but I’m concerned that several tenants have had toxic black mold.  What sort of remediation efforts–

LANDLADY: –COME, YOU MUST SEE POOL.  

This is old, but classic.  However, because of profanity, it probably isn’t safe for work.  Unless, of course, your workplace is awesome.

This is an interesting compilation of things that foreigners found notable and/or quirky about life in the United States.  It could be useful if you’re writing about a foreigner visiting the United States or an American traveling abroad.

• “Some places you can turn right on red — wait what YOU CAN DRIVE THROUGH A RED LIGHT if you’re turning WHAT THE HELL PEOPLE”
• “Every employed person rates themselves middle class.”
• “From the UK: much greater tendency to use text on signs – in Europe we tend either to use graphics or not to bother with a sign at all.”
• “One language – I noticed in Europe most people speak more than one language and usually even 3 or more.”  (I suspect that linguistic heterogeneity makes it harder to use words on signs).
• “Seconding flags, but particularly flags in non-civic settings. A French visitor, for instance, wouldn’t be surprised to see flags on city halls, but on car dealerships?”  February 1798 marked the Volvo Plot, a massive conspiracy of Swedish car dealers against the Republic and freedom in general.  Today, it is customary for car dealerships to fly the flag to remind their customers that they are not trampling the sweet cause of liberty by shopping there.  That’s also why BMW and Toyota ads emphasize how superlatively American their cars are.

I have one minor suggestion. Most major donors tend to be older and deeply wealthy businessmen, whereas this video is clearly aimed at a younger, less affluent audience. It might have helped to randomly feature one small donor (maybe by selling $25 or $50 raffle tickets to be featured).

(Caution: Some PG-13 content).

Only if David Chapelle and The Onion pull extra shifts to make up for Two and a Half Men and David Spade.

Unfortunately, it’s really just a generic “here’s what you should do to be ready for any disaster” plan with zombies thrown in for fun.  Food and medicine are great, but let’s be honest: You’re not actually ready for a zombie apocalypse until you have a machine gun and two bullets for everybody in the county.   (In case you miss, silly).

My zombie defense plan is counterintuitive, but it’s the most popular one in the world.

1. Get eaten.

2.  Whatever else happens, it’s not my problem.

Good luck, Vancouver:

Your goalie’s our MVP

Only doom awaits.

Blackhawks ascendant

Canada: “What can we say?

Even dead cats bounce.”

The writing in A Girl and Her Fed is so strong.  The main character isn’t even in the conversation in this page and she still shows an incredible personality.

The art is pretty good so far, similar to The Taxman Must Die but maybe a bit less detailed. (You can see my sample pages here).

For some reason, a lot of the barbs that I find most memorable are British. Probably because Americans spend too much time learning how to cook and rock out on heavy weapons platforms.

• Journalist: “Is Ringo Starr the best drummer in the world?” John Lennon:  “He’s not even the best drummer in the Beatles!”
• Oscar Wilde: “Here are two tickets to my new play. Please bring a friend, if you have one.”  Winston Churchill: “Sorry, I can’t make it to the opening night performance.  Please send me tickets to the second performance, if there is one.”
• Lady Astor: “Winston, if I were your wife, I would poison your coffee.”  “Nancy, if I were your husband, I would drink it.”
• “He loves nature, in spite of what it did to him.”  — Forrest Tucker
• “His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.”  — Mae West
• “I once sent a dozen of my friends a telegram saying ‘flee at once – all is discovered.’  They all left town immediately.” — Mark Twain
• “Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.”  — Oscar Wilde
• “Comparing Stephenie Meyer to JK Rowling is an insult to Chris Paolini.”  — Internet commenter
• “He is the best argument for contraception.”
• “The cruelest thing that has happened to Lincoln was to fall into the hands of Carl Sandburg.”  — Edmund Wilson
• “In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo DaVinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love and 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”  — Harry Lime, in The Third Man

Here are some excerpts from my comments and reviews over March 2011.

• “The only reason a guy would go to see Titanic is if he loves his girlfriend more than his dignity. That’s why ladies make their boyfriends watch Titanic–to test their commitment.”
• “Moral of the story: Beanie Babies will make you a felon.”
• “[There are ways for characters to distinguish themselves besides having different superpowers]. Like how they use their superpowers or the quests they have to complete to attain their superpowers. For example, both Heroes’ Sylar and the Invisible Woman have telekinetic/force-projection powers, but the Invisible Woman uses hers to keep the team alive, whereas Sylar is a serial killer that psychically decapitates his victims to access their brains. (He doesn’t eat the brains, though. ‘That would be gross,’ he explains).”
• “For example, if we’re supposed to really feel how tough these drills are for her, maybe you could talk more about something like the heat or humidity or the air or sun or ground or whatever? (For example, the heat and humidity at Alabama’s Maxwell Air Force Base are almost bad enough to make a Marine cry, and the Marines training at Parris Island have lost enough boots in the muck there to stock a shoe store).”
• “I’m slightly amused that 3 people have shared my oral surgery post with their friends on Facebook. Slow week at work? “
• “’Technically, Okie was a derogatory term, but it was crafted by those that hate Okies’ awesomeness.’ Like Steinbeck. He hated on Oklahoma so much he wrote a book about it.”
• “ ‘[He's] a bit of a hick, but smarter than he acts… which generally results in him getting beaten to within an inch of his life. He doesn’t really have a secret identity, although he does have a codename/nickname. He’s… not super-buff like Superman or the Hulk, and he’s a little on the short side.’ That sounds so much like me it’s sort of scary. “
• “Number 4′s villain was neither interesting nor scary. He doesn’t even get a name! Come on. Even Godzilla got a name. You know who else didn’t get a name? The enemy commander in Battlefield Earth.  Name your villain or surrender to suck.”
• “Your sci-fi setting builds an interesting contrast between the calmness of the trees and the whip flowers strangling each other. I think that helps develop the characters because they react in such a different way than how I would (namely, freaking out–’omgwtfarethoseflowersdoing’).”

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Umm, okay.

Tales from the Bully Pulpit was 84 pages of this.  Teddy Roosevelt steals HG Wells’ time machine and meets up with Thomas Edison’s ghost to stop Argentinian Nazis from conquering Mars.

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The U.S. Army bought about 100,000 M4s last fiscal year, improving the nation’s zombie readiness levels from “doomed” to “screwed.”  In your face, zombies! Also, the Navy is working on a electromagnetic railgun.  When the zombie dolphins are upon us, we’ll be ready.

Other exciting military technology that could mess some zombies up:

• Nuclear rifles
• Flying jeeps
• Chain-saw robots.  Brilliantly, these would be powered by biomass furnaces, which would keep fallen humans and plants from turning into enemy combatants.  (Also, gasoline would surely be in shorter supply than bodies).

The TSA purportedly confiscated a pair of nail-clippers from a soldier on a military charter where some 230 soldiers were carrying (unloaded) rifles, pistols and machine guns, because the nail-clippers could be used as a weapon.  Apparently the TSA is the only thing standing between the world’s unluckiest terrorist and a surefire Darwin Award.

This reminds me of The Boondocks’ (highly profane) trailer for Soul Plane 2…
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A lack of intense fight scenes kept Jane Austen from making the big time.  An oversight finally corrected!

This is pretty funny, especially if you’re familiar with I Have a Little Dreidel (Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel).

Vampires Suck is startlingly bad.  How could try something so easy–finding something hilariously awful about Twilight–and fail so badly?  It’s like going to Alaska and failing to find snow.  If you’re in the mood for a good Twilight parody, I recommend this fake screenplay. Here’s an excerpt:

SCENE 2

BELLA: It’s tough being the new kid in school! Especially when everyone is so friendly and helpful and interested in me. Why can’t they just leave me alone so I can sit in the corner and cut myself?
CLASSMATE: You’re awesome, Bella!
BELLA: See what I have to put up with? Hey — who are those hot people over there?
CLASSMATE: Those are the Cullens. They avoid direct sunlight, they don’t eat food, they sleep in coffins in a graveyard, and holy water burns them. I think they’re Canadians.*
BELLA: They sure are spectacularly gorgeous.
CLASSMATE: Yes, they are.
BELLA: I mean seriously, those people are BEAUTIFUL. Especially the one who keeps looking at me. Man alive, that guy is stunning. I mean, wow. He is hot buttered seduction on a stick. I’m not interested in him sexually, of course, because sex is dirty, but wow — LOOK AT HIM! Yee-ikes! Hubba hubba! If you don’t mind, I’d like to spend the next 75 pages talking exclusively about how attractive he is, and then bring it up again every paragraph or so for the remaining 400 pages.
CLASSMATE: Knock yourself out.

*The makers of Vampires Suck stole this joke.