Wednesdaymania COMMISSION: World Tour 1992

In Which I Watched Something on the Network

One of my Ko-fi patrons was kind enough to commission another WWE Network show from me recently, and they selected the World Tour 1992, which is located under their "ORIGINALS" tab. You may have to go looking for it. What follows are my realtime notes, taken as I watched this fantastic show, which means there are curse words:

World Tour 1992

Colosseum Video

Lord Alfred Hayes in London, England

First Match: High Energy Vs Beverly Bros (Koko B Ware & Owen Hart vs the Beverly bros)

• “Bird Man” is a bizarre and hilarious song
• I love Lanny Poffo trying to speak poetry at the camera despite being completely inaudible
• Owen’s in first in his WORST outfit and I love it
• Owen BITCHSLAPS the Beverly bro and wrecks his elbow. Fantastic wrestler-turned-trainer
• Awesome selling. Why is this curtain-jerker so good? Answer: Owen.
• Chunkier Beverly comes in with a strut, pesters Koko into entering the ring. I see they are chickenshit heels, hence having Lanny, who is stilllllll rhyming quietly outside.
• Ah, chunky Bev is Blake (mustache)
• WHAT IS THAT FLIPPY THING FROM THE TOP ROPE AT 5:47 ON THE NETWORK?!
• Owen was a freaking genius.
• The Beverly bros are… bland, but Owen is hot as heck, despite tagging Koko in.
• Koko is much slower, but he knows how to drive a crowd wild.
• The Beverlys are feuding with LOD which is why the crowd is going bananas.
• Huh. Reference to Pat Tanaka holding the NEVER belt in NJPW?
• Crowd is hot, despite bland bear hug spot. Frankie the bird is squawking up a storm.
• Gorilla Monsoon, on commentary implying that the bird is legit Koko’s manager and gives him advice in the ring lol.
• This match is… a bit too long for its own good. It’s only 8 minutes in and I already want it over.
• Owen could wrestle this whole match for the four of them :|
• Gorilla unflatteringly compares the Genius to Frankie, saying Frankie has added more to the match.
• VOLCANIC HOT TAG FOR OWEN. Owen clears house!
• Beverly Bros DQ themselves by bashing Owen with the Genius’s clipboard scroll, attempt to batter koko in the ring, Koko clears house, Owen slams a bev into the post.
• 1:57-12:33 (11:36?)
• Very fun

Break with Bobby Heenan! And Lord Alfred in the Queen’s Box at Royal Albert Hall, Bobby being as crass as any American can be. “This is where the Queen hangs her hat!” lol

Bobby insinuates they have tractor pulls, Alfred objects strenuously and informs him that rather than tractor pulls, they host the philharmonic… and WWF matches…

We join a 20 man battle royal where Davy Boy is chucking Typhoon but the Mountie punches his nuts, then both men double-team British Bulldog. Mountie gets eliminated on DB’s comeback, which is halted by Typhoon, but Davy wins by shouldering under Typhoon's gut and carefully letting Typhoon’s momentum carry him out of the ring. Win!

14:10-16:50 (2:40 for the segment played)

I did not count the battles royal as separate matches as they were all joined-in-progress, which makes timekeeping a true pain.

We are now on Caunce Ln as Davy comes out of a house that’s very pleasant. Alfred interviews Davy’s parents. They’re adorable. Davy says he eats like a family of six, puts his mother over. Adorable. Sid, his dad, says Davy was rough as a child and is very quietly proud of his boy. He looks like Scotty from Star Trek. His mom looks like a forgotten Golden Girl.

Second Match: Davy Boy vs Repo Man

• Worcester is where they are
• Repo comes in hot, and there’s a cool shot panning up from his repo hook up to the Bulldog being thrown into the corner.
• Repo sells like mad for some nice dropkicks and mounts a good offense, which he sells as hurting him just as much as Davy bc of Davy’s muscles.
• Seriously, Repo is selling really really well here.
• Some of Davy’s hair is slowly coming out of his tiny braids and it kinda looks like a perm.
• Gorilla tells Alfred that he rather likes his accent and wishes it wasn’t disappearing slowly in America.
• Man, Barry Darsow (Repo) is vocalizing like Lex Luger lol “Oh! OH!” lol
• Bulldog has him in a series of rest holds now. Darsow sells these well.
• Aloha Davy, but then he punches Darsow, who gets his revenge with a punch and then a beautiful suplex, though he may have pulled his upper arm.
• Another artistic focus shot on the hook passing focus between the hook in the foreground and the match behind it. Lovely.
• This isn’t perhaps the most rapid of matches, but it’s got some good meat and potatoes. Repo’s stops look brutal.
• Repo choking in front of Hebner, but Davy denies his piledriver attempt.
• I can’t tell if we’ve gone past selling but boy is there not much light in these moves.
• Still that delayed suplex is fantastic, though Repo didn’t sell much and Schoolboy’d him.
• Running power slam wins it for Davy!
• 19:04-25:53 (6:49)

Cut to Davy walking around with the most 90s of 90s British kids. 1/3 of these kids have on enviable 90s windbreaker tracksuits, some have those 90s sweaters/sweatshirts we all miss, and the rest are oozing “WE’RE BRITISH, LOOK MUMMY I’M ON THE TELLY!”

They go to the school Davy went to, hanging out at the boys’ entrance.

Davy’s zubas game is strong, and his fanny pack (er, hip pouch if you’re British) is on his hip rather than his waist. His shirt is made up of spare plaid that someone had laying around the shop.

Third Match: British Bulldog (with Winston the bulldog!) vs The Warlord

• Warlord is bald and massive, but Davy is also massive, so they match, though Warlord looks a wee bit bigger
• It’s a hoss fight – lots of shoulder checking until Warlord rolls out of the ring to get yelled at by… Slick? Why was Warlord with Slick?!
• I like the elbows from Warlord
• Ends with Davy lugging Warlord around like a sack of flour for a bit, which is super impressive, then slams him down and pins him.
• Pretty good hoss fight :)
• 28:08-36:28 (8:20)

Cut to changing of the guards at Buckingham palace and Lord Alfred.

Segment: At Home With El Matador Tito Santana

• Tito’s home… looks like a cheap hotel room someone decorated by memory from that time they saw Zorro as a very young kid who was home sick with a high fever. There are cheap candles in cheap spiral-carved candlesticks, an ugly lamp, a dagger on the wall next to a truly hideous… carved? Panel painting of a bullfight, some fake plants, I think that might be a pinata and an ugly chair with a creepy face on it. In short, it’s very 1990s WWE and faintly, insultingly racist.
• Home is very important with Tito. He has some “family heirlooms” including a dollar store sombrero he claims belonged to “a member of (his) family when he rode with Pancho Villa” (?!?!)
• The ugly carving/painting is apparently supposed to be his Great Great Grandfather “El (Sevito?)” in the late 1800s fighting El Torito the bull.
• There’s a freakin huge fiesta going on for Tito, everyone chanting and singing and dancing and it’s really ridiculous.
• Tito is going for wholesome and it’s all ruined by the very obviously intercut scenes of a bullfight and himself, which aren’t even the same film.
• He plays with a “spara” (the dagger they use to torture the bulls). It’s very ornate. It apparently was his Great Great Great Grandfather’s, and he got it from Spain.
• Ends with a threat to bring the dagger to the ring and a big OLE!

Fourth Match – Roddy Piper vs The Barbarian

• I’m beginning to think they meant it to be Alfred going around the world but they ran out of money in England, and since they didn’t want to put every British Bulldog match on VHS at once, they just started throwing random stuff on it.
• This is happening in Spain, apparently
• Barbarian looks… surprisingly good, despite the fact that he’s wearing a skinned bigfoot costume.
• Alfred and Shawn Mooney on commentary, very fun
• The crowd is losing their minds over Piper, who looks pretty alert!
• Definitely got the semi-mullet going
• Gaaaaaasssssssssssed up (Piper looks like he's on some serious steroids)
• Big staredown, ref has to break it up. This is all before the bell rings.
• Starts with a huge embracing brawl, which the ref, the late great Joey Marella, got between
• More embrawlsing
• Crowd really liked piper slamming his fists on barbarian’s chest lol
• Piper gets a very theatrical side headlock on barbarian, crowd goes nuts
• Barbarian ignores slingshot shoulderchecks and flexes, then demands a test of strength
• It’s not going great for Piper, who is already blown up lol
• Piper literally crumples and rolls out of the TOS
• Tosses Barbarian out over the ropes precariously close to the stairs
• Mooney’s voice is very clear, while Alfred’s is a bit whispier
• This is a very vocal mask, especially with Piper’s moaning and groaning and growling.
• Barbarian’s backbreaker looked rough, but Piper broke free.
• Barbarian is targeting Piper’s back with a bearhug now. Piper is really hamming it up.
• Man are they oily/sweaty
• Joey Marella, Gorilla's son, was a really good ref.
• Piper earclaps his way out of the hold, clambers to Bret’s Rope only to be caught in another bearhug lol
• While this isn’t my favorite sequence in a match, it’s really well thought out and makes sense for these opponents – Piper fights dirty and clever, Barbarian is slow but powerful, so B tries to ground P by rupturing his spine and P is trying to survive
• P tumbles out of the ring – scary dude.
• Aloha Barbarian drops to his knees and after getting his pin denied (he held the ropes) gets schoolboy’d by Piper who wins.
• (44:18-53:15) (8:59)

At 54 min in, suddenly El Matador is punching the Mountie

Ah, it’s another Battle Royal, this one in Munich, Germany, joined in progress

El Matador is out, now Bret Hart is battering Mountie, British Bulldog having fun, it’s a big battle royal.

Bret is tossed out

Oh, poor Repo man going against Hawk

Hawk flies out of the ring

Col Mustafa out

this is a pee break match if ever I’ve seen one lol

Everyone’s chanting USA, but only the Mountie and Davy aren’t American

I believe this is also Shawn Mooney and Lord Alfred on commentary

Yeah, that’s Mooney.

Sags tosses Hacksaw

Mountie has reinserted himself?

Everyone is 1000000x Gassed

Let’s go home guys (my reaction)

Bye Repo (tossed by Sgt Slaughter)

Mountie chucks Linkara’s dad (Slaughter)

Jimmy Hart chucks the shock stick to Mountie, who accidentally shocks Sags(?) out of the ring and Davy tosses him after. Davy wins.

(54:00-1:03:53) (9:53)

We are now at a portrait of her majesty Queen Victoria with a lovely red and cream gown in a garden.

Bobby calls it a prom dress, asks who the artist is, makes a ham joke, and then mistakes it for a paint-by-numbers. Never change Bobby.

Fifth Match: Sgt Slaughter vs the Model Rick Martel

• Ah, this is while Martel is feuding with Tatanka and has stolen his sacred eagle feathers
• btw, that’s a federal crime
• even beyond the theft
• Possession of Eagle feathers is very, very restricted, unless you’re Native.
• Martel is NOT Native American (duh)
• Leadup to Summerslam at Wembley Stadium!
• Alfred is bananas over the Model, Gorilla is… less so lol
• Even Gorilla is impressed by Martel’s physique
• Then he jokes about Martel being lubed up to “Swim the English Channel” lol
• Martel has a lot of energy, which he needs in order to make Sgt Slaughter look quicker than he is.
• Slaughter is using his thighs, which is… certainly a thing lol
• I dunno, Martel not protecting himself from the “bash Martel’s head into the turnbuckle” spot is a bit scary, and boy have I seen a lot of wrestlers lose careers over the shoulder-to-the-ring-post move…
• Still, this is good psychology on Slaughter’s part, working the pre-bruised shoulder like this.
• I love that the Atomic Drop was considered more than a transitional move. I mean, it would really stop someone in their tracks if you shoved your kneecap into their tailbone in real life, but it just looks silly.
• The Cobra Clutch on the other hand, could be very scary if it weren’t so very obviously put on with the least amount of force possible (if you actually squeezed, you’d kill a man by cutting off both arteries in the neck!!!)
• But nay, the model’s atomizer of Arrogance perfume was used as a weapon while the ref was turned away, and Martel wins.
• Match felt longer than it was, but told a good story the whole time.
• (1:08:21-1:16:08) (7:47)

Sixth Match: El Matador vs Kato

• I have just noticed Tito’s pink hair scrunchie and can now think of nothing else
• Boy is the anti-Asian racism WWE is known for on full display while Alfred and Gorilla discuss Mr Fuji and Kato. Lazy mispronunciations of Kato’s name with flippant “who cares” attitude, “Land of the Rising Sun” talk because no one knows the names of Asian nations that aren’t China or Japan, just… they always sucked at talking about Asia.
• Kato is, of course, played by Paul Diamond, who was actually Croatian (born Tomas Boric), though you might know him better as the other guy who played Max Moon lol.
• These two have zero chemistry together. I could see that being because Tito was… unamused by the blatant racism involved in having a Croatian guy play someone who was supposed to be Japanese, but you never know with wrestlers… I mean, Tito’s a Texan being billed from a city that doesn’t exist (is Tocula just Toluca but the white as white writers can’t spell?). Heck, Tito has more experience with Japan than Diamond, since he was at least trained by Hiro Matsuda…
• Diamond is, however, a pretty good wrestler.
• Danny Davis is a very assertive referee
• Neither Alfred nor Gorilla will say Kato’s name correctly :|
• Tito eventually pins Kato, but boy did this match feel long due to the commentary. I’m sure back in 92 this was funny, but today it doesn’t fly as well.
• I will say that Tito’s theme makes me think of Herb Alpert, which makes me very very happy
• (1:18:00-1:24:00) (6:00)

Seventh Match: Macho Man Randy Savage vs Shawn Michaels

• Hey, Mike McGuirk! The ACTUAL first female ring announcer in WWE! She’s great!
• Oh, and I think I’ve seen this match before – I recognize Sherri’s white poofy dress and face-spangles. If it’s the one I’m thinking of, it’ll be amazing.
• Match is taking place in Munich, Germany
• Sean Mooney and Lord Alfred on commentary
• This is early in Michaels’ career, bc Sherri is still singing the theme
• Macho is alone and dayglo
• It’s truly unfair that of these three, Shawn is the one still around.
• Mooney had no idea that America isn’t the only nation with immigrants and tourists, as he’s surprised how many non-white and non-German fans there are in Germany.
• Shawn opens with a lunge like a bored cat, and that’s a good thing lol
• Macho has a limp bc of how rough the European tour has been
• Sherri is distracting as heck because of how beautiful she was
• This match is off to a slightly slow start by modern standards, but it’s still really fun and well-thought-out.
• Macho is desperate to protect his leg, throws a chair into the ring! Wow!
• Ref trying to take the chair, Sherri punches Macho in the calf, screaming loudly for Shawn to “give it to him!” lollllll
• GIVEITTO’IM SHUOAAAAAWWWWWWNNNNN C’MUONNNNN
• Strike heavy match. I wonder if Shawn is calling it or if Macho plotted it out?
• Macho’s flying axe handle might have resulted in his leg being truly borked
• Great match
• Alfred talks about how the match had to be ok’d by the physician, but I think the WWE physician was Zahorian, I think, who was prescribing drugs for fun and bodybuilding at this point.
• Shawn tries to leave, gets dragged back
• Sherri tries to distract Macho on the apron, but he grabs her and waits for Michaels to run up to them. When Shawn gets there, Macho dodges and leaves Sherri to take the brunt of Michaels’ attack. Total Heel move for a Face lol
• Shawn brings Macho’s bad leg down on his knee. Sherri is apparently fine, since she’s wailing for Shawn to beat Macho on the outside lol
• I won’t give away everything, because this is a match well worth watching.
• It is slow by modern standards, but it’s great storytelling, and it’s quite brutal when you think about how each move and blow must feel on an injured leg
• Macho does win this match, but boy is it by the skin of his teeth!
• Sherri pitches an incredible hissy by chucking Mike McGuirk out of her chair by the scruff of her neck, stealing the chair, tossing it into the ring, and rolling in herself. Sherri wallops macho with the chair, Shawn chucks Joey Marella (the ref) out of the ring, slamming the chair on Macho’s leg, and assaults the officials as they come to the ring. It’s a fantastic sore-loser attack. Also, Shawn just battered the kayfabe President of WWE Jack Tunney.
• (1:27:52-1:42:21) (14:29)

We end with Alfred back in front of Tower Bridge, bowler, bowtie, brolly and all. He delivers his genteel outtro and we are finished with this Colosseum Home video.

What a fantastic watch. At 1:44:50 (nearly 1.75 hours!) it can be a bit overwhelming, so I’d strongly suggest breaking it up into a pair of viewing sessions broken up by a meal. Maybe start watching it before lunch, then settle back into it afterwards. It’s not boring, not in the least, but if you are used to the zippy, high-octane matches of today, it is absolutely a culture shock going back to the real meat and potatoes style of the 90s.

8/10 would watch again, but preferably with friends so we can nerd out about the history and storytelling with each other!

I hope that review of what I watched was entertaining to you guys, and I'd strongly recommend going to check it out! It's just called World Tour 1992, so look for that :)

Now Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Weekend Warble 324

In Which I Blather About My Weekend

This weekend has mostly been filled with writing, but I've got some video game, food, and other thoughts to share lol.

I'm watching some shows to help with research on the wrestling book, but I'm also watching other shows to help with another project. If you've been hanging around me, you probably know that I don't believe in ghosts (or, at least, not in the idea of a physical spirit which is released from the corpus upon death). I believe fully that there is such a thing as a haunting. I believe that people have seen and experienced some stuff. I don't believe in angels, demons, ghosts, or spirits. Hauntings are your brain trying to cope with an overload of information. We only have limited experience, limited instinct, and limited understanding, so when, say, a house we know people have probably died in makes weird noises or has strange shadows or drafts, our brains fill in the details with something like ourselves. We're social animals. We look for other humans, and when there aren't any, our brains try to make people so we don't die of loneliness. That's why we personify everything from bloodstained volleyballs to pets to toast with unusual burn patterns. We want other people (yes, even introverts).

We also don't like things we don't recognize.

So we add our innate desire to see other people, our dislike of the unknown, and our innate understanding that literally anything can kill us at any time including our own bodies, and you get a bizarre set of reactions and overreactions to external stimuli, simulating what we call "haunting".

I'm sorry. It's probably not really your grandma you're seeing. It's probably your memories replaying and trying to form new connections, craving what is familiar. It's probably your mind and heart trying to heal from loss.

That's all to say I've been watching a crapload of Ghost Adventures and Ghost Brothers. Mechanically, GA is a far better-constructed show, but if you're going for entertainment, you cannot beat GB.

And the only reason I'm watching them is so that when I write about the ghost hunting group I've got on the back burner, they're believable.

So far, it's looking like I can pretty much do whatever I want. I've learned that with few exceptions, the leader is usually pretty sanctimonious and deeply paranoid, there's one guy everyone craps on who follows along for whatever reasons, and there's someone who should probably be on meds because no one sane drinks in that much woo.

It's always dangerous to write about people you find annoying, though, so here are some of the things I like about these shows:

• These shows tend to increase tourism whenever they go somewhere, so they can be a great economic stabilizer for these "haunted" towns
• I've never seen them litter
• There's at least a surface-level attempt at learning and disseminating real history from locations, without pretending that lynchings aren't murders or saying that a supposed Native American haunting targeting white people (usually middle-aged or older, I've noticed) aren't warrented.
• While there's an overuse of outdated terms (like Indian :|), there are attempts being made to not be dicks about other people.
• Actors are getting paid to do reenactments, and that's always good.

Now, I'm also watching a lot of wrestling to work on my wrestling novel, and someone on YouTube has just added a bunch of vids of behind-the-scenes stuff and satellite feeds from WCW! This is great, because now I have a better grasp on what goes on before the cameras are beaming out to the public. It's also really fun to watch Mean Gene get annoyed with unprofessional crew behavior.

That's my tv habits from this week.

For gaming, I have a few things to talk about!

First of all, I suck at the Trials of the Sword quest in Breath of the Wild. I've gotten to the next to last floor, but... it was all for naught. Dead. Every time, dead. I gave up and now I'm going through Hebra. I'll get Revali's Gale and then blast off to the desert to grab that sweet, sweet lightning (and to finish leveling up my armors...), maximizing my hearts along the way, and then I'll try again. If I can get the upgrades to the Master Sword, then I'll try to go for the Champion's Ballad DLC. I'm pretty sure it won't end well for me lol.

I've also been playing more idle games on Kongregate, including a fun little game called Loot Loop Loot. You play as a character going through a map until you die, gaining skills and loot as you go. It's fairly straightforward, but if you get good at it quickly... it can be pretty short. It took me a week to beat, and that's with me barely paying attention to it.

Since I play a lot of Breath of the Wild, you can probably guess that I've also been greedily consuming all those multitudinous Zelda Theory videos you can find on YouTube. You'd be right. I'm ravenous for them. Here are a few things I've been noticing, myself:

• Yes, if you play the teaser for BOTW2 backwards, the singsong voice is singing "poor Hyrule, for Link has found the body/Poor Hyrule, for Link is gone". And it's freaking me out
• Have you noticed that part of the Castle theme towards the end of BOTW is kind of a variation on the theme for Link's Awakening? Because I swear, it is. The low brass that comes in sounds like a dark version of the theme. Which makes sense, since you're "awakening" both Calamity Ganon and Zelda...
• Do you think that the Stables are modeled after Malanya, or is Malanya modeling himself after the stables? Also, if Malanya is a god, does that mean the Great Fairies are also gods? And is the Horned Statue one of these Old Gods who was naughty and got locked away? Is it going to be a part of BOTW2? How will the fairies and Malanya fare in a World of Malice (which is what BOTW2 is rumored to involve).
• Speaking of the World of Malice theory, what if, instead of being just the same Hyrule, blanketed in evil jam, you're literally transported to a straight up Malice Hyrule - kinda like Lorule or the Dark World or something, where you have to cleanse that realm before returning to save Hyrule? I mean, Ganon would get a kick out of chucking both Hero and Princess out of Hyrule as has been done to him before...
• Since there's a new Zonai theory out right now, here's a thought in addendum to it: what if there were multiple "barbarian" tribes? The Zonai were clearly warlike, but their worship at the Spring Of Courage tells me they were likely closer to Courage than Power. The Lomei were clearly Wisdom-based (their labyrinths!) and likely comrades of the Ancient Sheikah (or perhaps they had housed their own shrines or something in each labyrinth), but who were the last Tribe? The Tribe of Power? Were... were they the ones who became the Bokoblins?
• Uh... Zonai armor is made from Lynel bone. The Zonai were badass enough to slaughter Lynel for armor like we would slaughter cows for hide armor... What were they protecting themselves from??

That's my Gaming Thoughts for this week.

And for food...

Guys, I like food.

I really, really like food.

But I only really like to cook if no one else is home here, and that's not really feasible during Lockdown, even with regulations lifting.

That being said, I'm working my way slowly through a bunch of snacks my partner gifted me, and boy, do I have one thing to tell you:

I do not like fishy fish.

Give me tuna any time, but if I ever so much as smell a sea bass snack again, I'll hurl. Not my thing. Not even the cat's thing - she picked it up, spit it out, and kicked it across the kitchen.

That being said, I really, really liked the mentai-flavored corn snack I had (mentai is cod roe). It kinda tasted like sweet Doritos.

So aside from gorging on tasty Japanese snacks and drinking way too much coffee, I haven't done much food-wise. I've baked some bread twice for my partner, and if you know how to make a quickbread, that's what I did. If you don't, then just look on the internet - it's almost as easy as a box mix, I promise.

I have been watching a lot of YouTube vids on Thai food, so the urge to cook Thai food is strong. Perhaps one day soon... Regardless, I have seen a lot that I want to try making, so here's the easiest recipe I found on Facebook this week:

WENDY'S FROSTY TASTE-ALIKE:

• 1/2 gallon chocolate milk
• 14oz can of Eagle Brand milk
• 8oz tub of Cool Whip

Blend together until smooth, then place in freezer. This mixture should not solidify fully, but remain constantly at Frosty consistency!

That'll do it from me, guys!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Saturday Casual Gaming 308: Epic Battle Fantasy 5

In Which I Talk About A New Entry In A Fun Series

I'm pretty sure I've talked about Kupo707 and their Epic Battle Fantasy series before on here - I'm too lazy to check, but it's a fair bet that I have. I really like this series, too,and their latest offering on Kongregate and Steam, Epic Battle Fantasy 5, is a really great addition!

So far, in the series, we've been introduced to the five main characters: Matt the strength-focused swordsman, Natalie the sexy mage, No-Legs the legless cat who may or may not be a demigod, Lance the gunman who may or may not be a straight-up fascist, and Anna the tough and awesome ranger. They've fought dragons, monsters, gods, cats, and each other, many many times. It's been pretty... well... epic!

Every game is basically a soft reset of their universe, with none of them remembering each other (despite the quintet being in every game!) and with the world not really remembering their past exploits. It's kinda like in Legend of Zelda where there's always a hero named Link and a Princess named Zelda but the maps and everything else are pretty varied. And that's true of EBF5, too - combat and travel and locations are all just a little different.

There's teleportation via a few different cat-slimes throughout the world, and when you interact with them, you're taken to a screen between realities where you can warp out to other cat slimes you've already seen. It's useful, but they're not marked on your map, so you kind of have to remember where you saw the cat slime with the tophat and its relation to the cat slime with the skulls behind it...

Teleportation is fairly important because of the gathering quests you encounter in the world. Someone in the tundra wants new socks? You have to go find those socks (which might be dropped by enemies or discovered in random chests), then you have to come back to the tundra and find the guy you got the quest from to return it. This can be a pain (especially before you have all of your mobility items) but it's worth it for the extra skills and goodies they can give you!

Speaking of mobility items, there seems to be one item per area. Ice is slippery, but with the right item, you can walk right across it. There are booster tiles that send you speeding in one direction until halted by a wall or zoomed away in a different direction, but there are boots that let you stop on certain magnetic tiles! There are lily pads and clouds to walk on, and there are gaps to fill with ladders, and there's water to raft across, and it's all very complicated until you realize that you're probably going to find those items in a similar area to the one you're struggling with - probably from the area boss!

And the bosses are pretty darn fun! Mammoths, trees full of mind-controlled cats, alien artifacts, dragons, mechs... the list goes on! In a browser-based Flash game that lasts at least 30 hours, you're going to have a lot of bosses to kill!

But you don't have to just kill - you can also capture underlings and random monsters like in Pokemon - but by dropping a box on their heads instead! That part can be fun, but it can also be frustrating. Some of the monsters just do not want to get in the box (dragons and monoliths, I'm lookin at you...). Some of these captives can even be useful for upgrading your weapons or armor or they might be required for a quest!

And there are tons of weapons and armors for every single character.

Ever wanted to see a cat dressed like a samurai? How about a mage with an elephant on her head? Or a swordsman dressed like a pirate? You can do it! And they can wield weird weapons, too - swords made of ice, guns made of wood, bows made of pipes, and even a skewered hot dog as a weapon! Then there's the Flair - random accessories to boost various stats on your characters!

The battle system is pretty straightforward: You have a team of three with your two other characters in reserve, when it's your turn, you choose whether to attack, use a skill, change your tactics, change your gear, or use an item or run away. It's pretty easy to figure out what's what, since it's all clearly labeled, and the ability to switch gear in combat has saved my butt more than once. It's fun to bash up your enemies or to land that Area Of Effect spell to blast a whole mob, but sometimes I forget to pay attention to which wave I'm on and use a spell with a longer cooldown too early in the fight.

But enough about the mechanics of this game - what's it like?

Well, it's pretty darn fun, to be honest. You control whoever you've put down as your leader while you're walking around the world using either the arrow keys and spacebar on your keyboard or the mouse and right-click. Some things you can interact with will just give you some flavor (like a book telling you more about the ancient cat religion the world is obsessed with), whereas others will be hidden items (yay more snow I totally needed more snow thanks).

The art is lovely and colorful, the combat is fun, the movement is responsive, and the story is engaging, yet silly. Somehow they make the rise of fascism and eugenics funny? It's pretty great.

My only complaint is that it's really, really easy to accidentally start a new game after dying. For some reason, every time I get killed (usually in the Glitch World segments), I end up accidentally clicking "New Game" instead of "Continue" and when you're 20 hours in, that hurts.

I can't even complain about the paywall(s), guys. There are a few areas in the Kongregate version you cannot access without paying for it, but they're optional areas, and you still get some of the optional areas for free! Yeah, it's about twenty bucks to buy the game on Steam, but the free Kongregate version is still hella fun and you can still access everything you need in order to progress. The money helps Kupo707/Matt Roszak keep making these wacky fun games, and I'm all for paying the creators of video games when I can, so I might start buying some of these on Steam as I go along...

I think that'll about do it for me today, guys.

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Saturday Casual Gaming 249: Soda Dungeon

In Which I Play A Fun Free Steam Game

I love me some Roguelike Dungeon Crawlers, guys, and Soda Dungeon has been suggested to me pretty much ever since it came out. Since it was free on Steam, I couldn't resist and downloaded it.

It's addicting as heck.

Which is funny, because addiction is kinda a big theme in this game.

Addiction, money, fame, and big scary monsters

You are a hapless, impoverished person with big dreams of bigger wealth, but the best way to get money where you are is to venture into a dungeon of certain death... which you're super not into. Fortunately, while hanging out at the local soda bar, you end up with a grand scheme: con a bunch of soda-addicted crazies into going into the dungeon of death for you.

And thus, your journey as a very messed up kind of adventure pimp begins.

But... money!

Ethical complications aside, this game is fantastic. From the peppy, bullet-hell-style music to the awesome arcade-like graphics to the hilarious story (so far), this game has had me hooked from my first run with a mostly naked Soda Junkie.

You have different choices you can make while your party ventures through the dungeon. Do you choose each move yourself, or do you let the game automatically run your guys through? Which of the three boss chests do you open? Do you take one of the alternate paths that occasionally appear, or do you ignore all possible distractions?

Speaking of bosses...

They can be pretty epic...

Look how tiny you are compared to that behemoth! Your party, which can contain up to five adventurers of varying skills and abilities, is always dwarfed by the bosses (and minibosses) of each section. So far, I've only made it to the fourth zone, the ice levels. I'm sure I'll eventually get further, but I'm having a good time, regardless, and earning tons of money.

But what can you spend that money on?

One of the main features of Soda Dungeon is the Soda Bar, where you hire your adventurers to go make you money. You spend that sweet gold on upgrades to the Soda Bar, which let you buy and sell gear, earn money while offline, invite more and stronger adventurers who get buffs depending on the decor and food qualities, and you even end up with a wizard who can warp you to later levels you've beaten so you don't always have to run the dungeon from level 1! At one point, a faintly creepy gladiator guy shows up to let you know you can send a trio of adventurers to die for you in the arena for money. If you want to see how far your loot can take you, that's a fun challenge!

All in all, Soda Dungeon, from AN Productions and Pox Power via Armor Games is a great game, both on Steam and on Mobile, so if you're looking for a free game fix, this is definitely a fun one to play.

And I'm serious about that music being awesome. It really gets you pumped!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Filmic Friday 249: The Human Tornado

In Which I Discuss the Sequel to Rudy Ray Moore's Dolemite

So, for Thanksgiving, some friends of mine were running a Blaxploitation marathon, serving up "Jive Turkey", if you will. Not being one to turn down a good time, I rolled on down to their place and settled in to watch the end of the Isaac Hayes vehicle Truck Turner (and if you've ever wanted to hear Star Trek's Uhura toss N-bombs like they're grenades in Vietnam, then it's definitely a must-watch!). Once that movie was done, we checked in on what Whitey was up to with some random Anglo-centric shorts, then it was on to some more Rudy Ray!

We tossed The Human Tornado onto the tv.

We thought we were ready.

Nothing can prepare you for The Human Tornado

So, The Human Tornado tries to pick up where Dolomite left off, with Dolomite throwing a party in his new mansion in the Deep South. Our only indication that this is, in fact, the Deep South, is an incredibly racist sheriff who tries to kill Dolomite for sleeping with his wife (who may have been blackmailing Dolomite into sex?) It's also the origin of the infamous "b***h, are you for real?!" line.

So the sheriff basically chases Dolomite out of the Deep south and he and his friends flee to California and Queen B's club. They get picked up by one of the weirdest Gay Stereotypes (which... honestly, I can't tell what they're more annoyed by - the fact that he's gay or the fact that he's a white boy looking for dark meat?) I have ever seen in a movie. They basically carjack him (though he's a willing participant) and "drag" him with them to California.

Unbeknownst to Dolomite and co, B's club has been taken over by an evil club owner (sound familiar?) and two of her girls have been kidnapped.

But fear not, Dolomite is on the case!

After some searching, car chases, and incredibly funny sped-up fight scenes, Dolomite does what he does best - seduces the bad guy's "nymphomaniac" wife using a bad disguise and worse velvet paintings. What followed was one of the strangest things I've ever seen on film, and I'm a connoisseur of Neil Breen films.

This scene both makes more and less sense in context.
I have never been drunk or done drugs, but I think I know what it's like now...

As funny as that scene is, the culmination of it, with Dolomite and the "Nympho" having literal house-destroying sex, is even funnier, because "They're in the house on the hill in Pasadena!!!!!" is possibly the worst last lines I've ever heard for someone.

1) Which house on which hill?
2) She literally slithers out of bed screaming this and passes out
3) Somehow, it's even sillier in context!


So while Dolomite is having his bizarre pleasure cruise for information, Queen B and her people are planning to wreck the bad guy's party and have his guts for garters.

Because just like in Dolomite, they're the ones who get things done!
And BY THE WAY! The guy on the left with the black ski cap?
That's Ernie Hudson.
Yes, that Ernie Hudson.

And meanwhile, the kidnapped girls are dealing with some really really awful dudes doing bad things to them in a crazy witch's hovel.

Really bad things.
These are more effective bad guys than the bad guy who hired them.

But, of course, since it's a Dolomite movie, of course the bad guys are killed. There's a subplot involving the sheriff hunting down Dolomite with the grudging help of the local police, but he drops one too many N-bombs and they ditch him. Instead, he tries to take on Dolomite on his own. It goes about as well as you'd expect, but...

Not to spoil you or anything....






Dolomite gets shot in the back and apparently killed.

Yeah.

That was a shock to me, too...

But then he stands up and laughs just as the credits begin to roll?

Is Dolomite a demigod of some kind? I mean, it would fit with his badass Anansi archetype, and I'm pretty sure someone who was better at scholarship than me could write a very good paper on the subject!

Regardless, The Human Tornado is amazing. If you're looking for a good time, absolutely give it a watch!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Wednesdaymania 248: Wrestling Is Awesome

In Which I Like Wrestling

So last week kind of was a bummer on the wrestling front with Cornette and all of that badness. And yes, there's badness this week with the news from ROH firing their women's champion while she's concussed and spilling the tea on her ridiculously crap pay. Yes, there's badness this week with Corey Graves maybe having beef with Mauro Renallo and Dave Meltzer.

But I want to talk about things that don't make me sad.

It's cloudy and I have a sniffle. I don't want to feel bad. I want to feel like wrestling is awesome.

And it is!

Wrestling is still awesome because the bell-to-bell is awesome. The promos are awesome. The shows are awesome. In spite of the crap people keep giving each other, wrestling is still, as it has ever been, awesome.

So first of all, I haven't watched Powerrr since the Cornette awfulness, so I cannot speak to its continued quality of both wrestling and promo work on the part of the wrestlers, but I have to commend Nick Aldis for his cool head and strong presence in the face of a really bad time. He provided a classy face to a very unclassy problem and he's really good about that. tl;dr: Cornette bad. Nick Aldis good.

Secondly, I hear that the NXT guys are really getting popular when they storm RAW/Smackdown, so that's pretty great!

I also keep seeing good stuff from MLW Fusion, though it's been a while since I've watched any. I've been pretty distracted lately, and I apologize for that. I'm sure I've missed some awesome matches, especially since they just created their women's division!!!

Speaking of women's divisions, holy cow I'm loving what I'm seeing from AEW's shows. This week's Dark episode was dominated by the Big Swole/Shanna match, and it was pretty spectacular. While Big Swole was clearly the better wrestler of the two, Shanna has a lot to offer in the ring, and I'm excited to see them both work more with other wrestlers.

I love Leva Bates. I love the Librarian gimmick. Leva is maybe not as dynamic in the ring as many of her contemporaries. Do I think she's a bad wrestler? Not at all. She could definitely work on her flow of movement, but that will come as she wrestles more often. It's been a while since she's had regular matches after all. On a character level, however, I don't know if anyone else is as good at filling her role as Leva is at being The Librarian. It's adorable, it's awesome, and she's great to watch. RIP The Librarian after her match vs Awesome Kong. And Peter Avalon worked perfectly in that moment :) Great match.

I hope the Inner Circle aren't mean to Leva. They did kidnap her, after all...

...

I'd be down with suddenly-evil Librarian Leva. After all, Jericho has written a book...

The Trent vs Pentagon match was insane. I knew Trent was a great wrestler, but I didn't know just how toe-to-toe he was with the best there is out there. If Scorpio loses to Jericho (which I feel would be a probably bad move, but I've been wrong many times) then I could absolutely see Trent becoming a champ. This roster may be too loaded with greatness. It's mad.

I wish I could say the Kenny match vs Jack Evans was amazing, but sadly, since the internet in my town is notorious, we ended up with an overall 12 minute delay for that match and missed the finish. I will go back and watch that match again today, but for now, I will have to tell you that what I saw was still mindblowing, and if you haven't watched this week's AEW Dark, then do it.

So yes, wrestling is still awesome, and pretty much every company out there right now (even IMPACT!!!) has something incredible to offer. Definitely go on a hunt for the good stuff and try a little bit of everything. This is a good time to be a fan of the sport!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Filmic Friday 247: Dolemite 1975

In Which He's Bad. So Bad.
But his movie is very fun!

So I saw Dolemite Is My Name, and it got me thinking about blaxploitation movies and how studios basically forgot they existed after the 1970s. It also got me thinking about

Because I had to know 

Dolemite, the 1975 film whose mad genius creator, Rudy Ray Moore, was the source for Dolemite Is My Name, is everything I'd hoped it would be. My god, Dolemite...

Did I understand everything that was happening at every second? Heck no. Did I have to understand every word spoken or every action taken to understand Dolemite and what it stood for? Not in the slightest. Dolemite is a celebration of a film and it's impossible to watch it and be bored. Confused, certainly, but not ever bored.

How can you be bored when there's a very strange yet very cool man surrounded by beautiful women who know Kung Fu?

How can you be bored when there's a preacher who is also a mob boss?

How can you be bored when Rudy Ray Moore is... hold on, I'm looking up at that poster and what is even happening there?! Where is the lady in pink kneeling? Where are her legs? The lady in green is holding onto the barrel of Rudy's pistol, which looks like a shrunk-down sniper rifle! Where is that thing firing? Were the Hardy Boys in the 2000s copying Rudy's shoes on this poster? What is happening? WHAT IS HAPPENING?!

Awesomeness. That's what's happening.

Dolemite is awesome.

But what's the story?

Well... this is a lot of inference on my part here, but from what I could tell, Dolemite is a folk hero tale where a man who is kind of a pimp (?) is released from prison because his madame found evidence that he was set up by the cops to take the fall on drug charges. He comes out to a world much changed from when he went in, including having had his own club stolen by the villainous Willie Green (D'Urville Martin). The movie follows his quest to get his club back and seek revenge on the crooked cops and Willie Green.

There are Kung Fu hookers, slightly terrifying sex scenes, the aforementioned mob boss preacher, and car chases galore. There are squibs (the blood-filled explosive caps used to simulate someone being shot) going off left and right, seemingly missing footage which might be the result of the camera running out of film at inopportune moments, and absolutely atrocious lip syncing (in the club), and above all...

There is Dolemite.

Rudy Ray Moore is not a good actor, but you love Dolemite nonetheless because everyone in the movie believes in him. It's hilarious, it's fun, and it's absolutely a movie you should see at least once in your life, and once you see Dolemite, you begin to wonder what its sequel, The Human Tornado, is like. You wonder what the blaxploitation Saturday Night Fever film Disco Godfather is like. You wonder if you can get hold of Petey Wheatstraw: The Devil's Son In Law so you can show your friends...

It's an addiction.

A really, really fun addiction.

An addiction with some very attractive women involved...

 As a final note, I'd like to point out that the intestine-pulling scene in Dolemite Is My Name is apparently a running joke where, since that moment abruptly ends without the intestine-pulling or anything else in the movie. Rudy is doing... something? to D'Urville, grunting and gripping, and then suddenly, we cut over to Jerry Jones who gives his iconic "God damn, Dolemite," and fires his pistol into D'Urville to take the heat off of Dolemite.

Also, I just realized that his hat is very clearly crocheted...
Future Fiber Monday project?

So in conclusion, GO WATCH DOLEMITE!
You will not regret it!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Filmic Friday 234: Murder at 1600

Murder at 1600
1997

A few weeks ago, I saw a movie called Murder at 1600. Now, I'm a big Wesley Snipes fan because Z showed me the Blade trilogy early on in our relationship, so finding out that there was a 1990s murder mystery starring Snipes in the White House was pretty exciting!

"Sex. Wealth. Power. The combination is murder."

I find it hilarious that it's just Snipes and Lane on the cover, considering who else is in this movie, but aside from that, this was a great, great time!

I mean, it opens with Snipes punching out an armed, dangerous, and distraught Charlie Rocket,
so you know it's going to be bizarre.

Snipes is a good cop in DC trying to keep his home, which is being taken over by eminent domain. The big reason he doesn't want to move? He has a bunch of Civil War miniatures filling the whole apartment. It's weird, but it also pays off. Which is weirder. Anyway, he and his partner are hanging out when he gets dragged into solving the murder of a secretary at the White House.

I like his partner. He's such a weirdo. Also, they act more married than most married people in movies.
I dig it.

So we've got Snipes in the White house, trying to solve a crime, and no one is cooperating. At least there's Diane Lane, who's trying to do her job as a Secret Service member.

While looking like Dana Sculley.

So Snipes and Lane eventually have to form what amounts to a two-person team fighting the White House, assassins, and even the rest of the Secret Service. The movie gets pretty wacky.

But it has great lighting and Snipes is hilarious.

My favorite part of this movie, though, is who isn't on the poster.

Why yes, that is Alan Alda taking a walk with Wesley Snipes while they discuss
whether or not the President's son is a murderer on top of being a philanderer.

Yeah, Alan Alda is one of the major roles in this flick.

If you've ever wanted to see a movie where Wesley Snipes and Alan Alda interact a whole bunch, here you go. Seriously though, it's awesome to watch these guys trying so hard in a movie with so little going for it, story-wise.

While all of the parts interlock appropriately, this story is a little too overburdened with detail, and it can be easy to get lost trying to follow the plot, such as it is.

Murder at 1600 is best enjoyed for what it is: a made-for-tv movie starring some awesome actors with some great cinematography.

So if you're looking for a movie to watch, check your local library for a copy of Murder at 1600, because it's worth its weight in popcorn!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Filmic Friday 232: Strays 1991

Strays; MCA Television Entertainment; 1991

I love cats and suck at watching horror movies, so you might expect that the 1991 horror flick Strays would be a bridge too far for me.

And yet...

This movie is awesome. It's stupid, it's hokey, it's silly, and it's hilariously bad. I cannot even begin to describe how great this movie was!

Although this cover does a pretty good job of getting the greatness across...

Strays is the story of a family - I'll call them the McStupids because they're about as dumb as people can be - moving into a huge farmhouse that's way too big for the three of them and their dog. Mr McStupid is played by Timothy Busfield, Mrs McStupid is played by Kathleen Quinlan, and Little Ms McStupid is played twins Heather and Jessica Lilly. I feel bad for the child actors because they're doing their best but it looks like they're constantly being overwhelmed by the amount of things they're being asked to do.

Then there's sex-obsessed Sister Claire, played by Claudia Christian, who is Mrs McStupid's sister and also the realtor for the cat house. Rather than the cathouse, which is something completely unrelated. I like the actress but this role is garbage. She's going through a rough divorce and has her brother-in-law (Mr McStupid) as her lawyer, because apparently there were no such things as "ethics" in 1991.

Regardless, the family moves into a house where we've already seen an old lady get mauled by kitties, despite being kind to them. It's just as silly as it sounds, but it made me think we'd be getting a house-sized cat at some point. Spoilers, there's no Catzilla.

Here we see the McStupids adopting a random kitten they find in their attic,
despite Mr. McStupid being horribly allergic. What a great family.

So the McStupids move in with their dog and slowly begin to adjust to life in the middle of freakin' nowhere when the cats attack their dog. Don't worry, the pooch survives because they aren't completely garbage pet owners and have the vet keep the dog with him while he recovers. After all, they don't know about the cat problem yet.

Mr McStupid does try his best to do right by his dog, though.

It takes the movie a long time and some very boring plot twists involving Claire and the Mr, but when we get the bad, bad kitty in charge, it's so worth it!

He's like Salem's grumpy brother! Look how cute!

This thing goes full Facehugger on everyone it attacks. It's hilarious. The moment the cats take over, the movie truly transcends!

She can't find the kid, so she's throwing cats around until she can find her!

The Evil Gray Cat does its best to kill Mr McStupid, Mrs McStupid, and even Little Ms McStupid, but it only succeeds in killing: the old lady at the beginning (implied), the phone man (who they don't find until the end), and Claire. Poor Claire. She gets an epic death, at least.

And don't even get me started on the microwave pink herring.
It's pink, because it does pay off, just not quite the way we wanted :P

The last ten or fifteen minutes of the movie are the McStupids running, hiding, and throwing around cat puppets, and it's glorious.

I can't tell if she's getting her jugular ripped out or singing a power ballad about how the cat is the love of her life...

If you're looking for what may be the best made-for-tv horror movie of the 1990s, give Strays a watch. You will not regret it!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Filmic Friday 229: Back In Action 1993

I love bad action movies. I love watching wrestlers try to have film careers. I love to see action stars who probably shouldn't have been given lines, much less starring roles. I love the 1990s.

This is all of my bad action movie loves!

Back In Action is a movie starring Billy Blanks, the Tae Bo guy. It also stars Mr Crazypants Rowdy Roddy Piper! If you're not familiar with Piper's wrestling oeuvre,  you may also know him as the main actor from They Live. Which means you probably know that I'm not exaggerating by calling him Mr Crazypants.

But what is the plot?

Such as it is...

Roddy Piper plays a cop named Frank, which is the most action-movie-cop name ever, who is going after an Evil McBadguy played by La Croix from Forever Knight. He and his partner are pulling a sting operation, but things go wrong and suddenly, a dude who looks like the evil twin of Dante from Clerks uses a very long knife to disembowel Frank's partner right in front of him.

Evil Edgy Dante is the Secondary Big Bad
And he's possibly the third worst actor in this flick.

Why does the sting go bad? Because Billy Blanks shows up to get his sister out of the hearse she's waiting in for her doofy "bad guy" boyfriend to come back from the deal. I have no pictures of the loser boyfriend, but he's a better actor than Billy Blanks or the lady who plays his sister. Billy, and yes, that's his character's name, too, is mad that his sister is dating a gang guy, so he goes to abduct her and force her to come home with him. For a "good guy", he's really messed up. I'd feel bad for his sister if she wasn't so dumb.

Yeah... this movie is full of dumb.
Also, Roddy looks pretty badass here!

Billy and Roddy are at odds throughout 90% of this movie, which is both funny and really frustrating. The box and descriptions make it sound like something like a buddy cop movie, but it's really just two completely separate stories that eventually get slammed together.

This character is garbage. Absolute garbage.
She's rock stupid, stubborn, and exists only to scream and flail.

The most upsetting scenes in this movie are when Frank's partner gets disemboweled (which isn't actually that bloody - it's just the way it's shot that's unpleasant) and when the sister almost gets a sex scene with her doofy bad guy boyfriend.

Everything else is hilarious.

Billy Blanks gently tilts this guy's head and the guy's neck supposedly breaks.
I've seen rougher chiropractors...

All in all, this movie is hilariously bad. The score is silly and fun, and when you realize that the composer has worked on video game adaptations in the past, the music makes much, much more sense. Actually, the whole movie is written like an adaptation of a bad beat-em-up game that never existed but was totally originally from Malaysia or something. It makes little to no sense, it's barely coherent, and everyone looks silly.

Grab your friends, settle in with some popcorn and other snacks, and get ready for a really weird action movie.

A weird action movie starring the guy from those Tae Bo tapes and the guy who
put himself in a cage with Hulk Hogan after hanging out on Alcatraz for more than a week. 

10/10, would watch again with friends and snacks.

Go Enjoy Something!
FC