Walt Disney World Attractions

March 24, 2010December 5, 2012 / Jared / Leave a comment

I hesitated to post two Disney lists in a row, but what can I say, I have Disney on the brain lately. A few notes: I’ve included each country pavilion from Epcot as its own attraction. If the pavilion includes a movie or a ride, that is listed as a separate attraction as well. This list is relatively comprehensive; if a ride or attraction is not included, I’ve probably never ridden it. Water parks are not included, because other than wave pools and lazy rivers, I hate water parks.

Here they are, my seventy favorite attractions in Walt Disney World (with a bunch of dark, grainy, shaky YouTube videos!):

70) Stitch’s Great Escape! (Magic Kingdom)

A horrible attraction. Who would’ve guessed that putting people in a dark theater, touching them with things, spraying them with water, and spraying bad smells into the air around them would result in a negative experience?

69) Journey into Imagination with Figment (Epcot)

The old version of this ride was one of my favorites as a kid. I had a Figment stuffed animal and everything. The new one is absolutely terrible, and one of the attractions in Walt Disney World least likely to spark a child’s imagination. Maybe the original was terrible, too, and I just didn’t realize it at the time.

68) United States Pavilion (Epcot)

By far the most boring of the World Showcase pavilions. It could have been so much better. There’s not really much going on here. The quick service food is just standard fast food stuff, and the building itself is an uninspired Colonial-style place. Why go with a single building here? Wouldn’t it be more interesting to have a street scene like so many of the other pavilions? They could have gone with an old-timey Boston scene. I haven’t seen the animatronic show, The American Adventure, in a long time. I’ll make an effort to see it the next time I go and maybe my opinion will change.

Continue reading →

The Academy Awards, 2010

March 8, 2010May 10, 2010 / Jared / 1 Comment

Johanna and I are sitting here in a nearly empty apartment. This is our last night in our current place, and all of our possessions, other than our larger pieces of furniture, are already over at the new digs. Even the dog is gone; we’re boarding him for the night so he won’t be underfoot tomorrow when we’re trying to load up the U-Haul. It’s the first night I’ve spent apart from him.

Moving is never fun, especially for a couple of worriers like Johanna and me. There are always a thousand things to stress about, and the worst always seems to happen for us. This time we’re particularly bothered by the fact that it seems like someone is planning on paving our dirt road tomorrow, which could make it difficult to get the truck in and out.

Anyway, because of all of this, I was particularly looking forward to the Oscars tonight. We’ve ordered a pizza, I’ve poured a scotch, and I’m just going to relax and fantasize about being settled in at the new place.

If you read my Grammy or Golden Globe entries, you know that Johanna and I like to fill out ballots beforehand and compete in a winner-picking contest. Johanna snuck out a victory in the last category of the night in the Golden Globes, and I pulled off an untelevised category win in the Grammys, so we’re currently tied, one to one. Nothing like the Academy Awards to settle things for us. Unfortunately, we both read the same predictions online, so we’re either going to tie, or one of us will win based on our short documentary pick. Let’s get this started. Categories and winners in bold. I’ll add some video later if I can find it.

8:00 – We have a weird opening here as all of the best actor and actress nominees stroll out together. That was odd and masturbatory, but those two words describe a lot about the Oscars.

8:02 – Now here comes Neil Patrick Harris to sing a song for no reason. God, Hollywood loves this guy. So do I, though, so it’s cool. But shouldn’t we be opening with the hosts?

8:04 – I’m a huge fan of both Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, and I’m sure they’ll be funny. I’m going to go out on a limb here, though, and say that at the end of the night I’m probably going to feel like it would have been better if the Academy had just picked one of them and ran with it.

Continue reading →

Disney Animated Classics

March 3, 2010November 16, 2010 / Jared / 1 Comment

I’m a very big Disney fan, and sort of a burgeoning animation geek, so I’m much more familiar with these movies than your average red-blooded 27-year-old American male with no children has any right to be. That said, while I’ve seen some of these very recently, a lot of this is based on half-remembered thoughts and opinions. So this might not exactly be my definitive list. Also, Pixar movies don’t count here; this is just Disney Animation Studios stuff. Here’s the official list. In honor of my upcoming, highly anticipated trip to Walt Disney World, here are my thirty favorite Disney Animated Classics (movies I haven’t seen, or don’t remember, are excluded and listed at the end).

30) The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)

I haven’t seen this movie since it came out, and I don’t remember it that well, really. But I was utterly disappointed by it at the time, and it certainly confirmed to us what Pocahontas had hinted at the year before: the modern golden age of Disney classics was over.

29) Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)

This movie is a big deal. It’s the first full-length animated film ever made. At the time, people thought making a feature-length animated movie was ridiculous. Reading about Walt Disney’s drive to get this made and the technological breakthroughs he and his animators made during the production is even sort of inspiring. That said, this movie is boring as hell nowadays. And the animation style, in my opinion, is not at all visually interesting.

28) Pinocchio (1940)

This movie gave us “When You Wish Upon A Star,” which is a great song. That’s pretty much all it has going for it. It’s divided into three completely unrelated, nonsensical acts, each possibly more dull than the last. Rarely does an hour and a half feel this long.

Continue reading →

Songs, 1990-1999

February 19, 2010November 29, 2010 / Jared / 2 Comments

This list has been the hardest to compile so far by a wide margin, for several reasons. When the 1990s began, I was seven years old, and the music I was most familiar with was the Phantom of the Opera soundtrack that my dad was always playing and the Super Mario Bros. theme song. By the time they ended, I was seventeen, had gone through about ten favorite bands, and was eagerly anticipating the release of the new Radiohead album. It’s hard to rank songs from a time period when I was so many different people.

Also, I could never really decide if I wanted this to be a list of songs that I loved at the time, or songs that I really love now. In the end, it’s a little bit of both, and sort of suffers because of that. There are songs on here that I don’t even have in my music collection anymore, and also songs that I never really listened to until five years ago.

But the real reason this was so difficult is that I’m absolutely sure that I’m forgetting things. I have a pretty good grasp on music from the 2000s, and didn’t really feel like I was leaving anything major out. This time I feel like there could possibly be a song out there that I might have put in my top ten that I didn’t even think of. Let me know if you see any glaring omissions.

So, all that said, here are my ninety favorite songs of the nineties:

90) Kris Kross – “Jump” (1992)

An appropriate song to start things off. This isn’t the oldest song on this list, but it might be the oldest song here of which I was a huge fan from day one. I spent about six months of my ninth year listening to my Totally Krossed Out cassette non-stop on my Walkman.

89) Cornershop – “Brimful of Asha” (1997)

This song, and this entire album, really, is such a weird blip on the nineties pop scene. Making this list made it clear to me that while music was much better in the 2000s, it was quirkier and seemed to take more risks in the 1990s. I was introduced to the song, and the band, when this video appeared on the short-lived MTV show 12 Angry Viewers.

88) Coolio – “Gangsta’s Paradise (feat L.V.)” (1995)

Johanna said this had to be on the list, and I suppose she’s right. I loved it at the time, obviously, but don’t have much to say about it now, so instead let me just suggest that all of you go Google the lyrics to another single off of this album “1,2,3,4 (Sumpin’ New).” Johanna and I had each other in hysterics talking about them.

Continue reading →

Polls, Best of the Decade, 2000-2009

February 12, 2010April 8, 2010 / Jared / 1 Comment

So, now that I’ve figured out how to use polls, I thought it might be fun to post a poll for each of my categories thus far. To keep them from being too unwieldy, I’ve only included my top ten as choices, but if you think one of my other choices (or something completely different) is the best of the decade, there is a write-in option. Feel free to finally voice publicly your disagreement with me!




 Continue reading →

The Super Bowl, 2010

February 7, 2010May 10, 2010 / Jared / 4 Comments

6:18 – Queen Latifah kicks off formal activities with “America the Beautiful.” When did we decide that we need to sing this in addition to “The Star-Spangled Banner”? Maybe we just all secretly think it’s a better song.

Anyway, the pizza Johanna and I ordered has arrived, so our spread is complete.

6:25 – Our first big commercial of the night, a remake of a classic. Dwight Howard and LeBron James are infinitely better at acting natural than Larry Bird and Michael Jordan were in the original.

Continue reading →

Characters, 2000-2009

February 7, 2010January 30, 2011 / Jared / 4 Comments

This is sort of a vague list. I’m not really sure what the qualifications were. And it seems wrong that 19 of my 25 favorite characters of the decade are from television shows. I obviously need to read more. But, for whatever reason, these are the ones that really stuck with me. Here are my 25 favorite characters of the decade:

25) Borat Sagdiyev (Da Ali G Show)

Frat guys turned Borat into this decade’s Austin Powers, and no one is really clamoring for Borat II at this point. But the character is brilliantly conceived and led Sacha Baron Cohen into comedic territory that he never could have reached as Ali G.

24) Brian Griffin (Family Guy)

Even I am sitting here thinking this is a strange, possibly unworthy, choice for this list. But I can’t stop laughing when they have Brian actually, you know, behave like a dog. Like when he is afraid of the vacuum cleaner, or uncontrollably wags his tail. A rare talking animal character that still, albeit rarely, acts like an animal.

23) Coach Eric Taylor (Friday Night Lights)

This character’s appeal is helped quite a bit by his relationship with his wife, but he’s on the list alone because he does just fine in the football scenes without her. Friday Night Lights seems to have learned from the mistakes of past shows (I’m thinking specifically of The O.C.): when you have a married couple that serves as a solid foundation upon which to build everything else, do not screw with it.

Continue reading →

The Grammys, 2010

February 1, 2010August 28, 2010 / Jared / 4 Comments

Last year was the first time in forever that I actually watched the Grammys. I was drawn in by the commercials advertising the killer lineup of performances, and it pretty much lived up to the hype. It was worth sitting through the whole show just to see Radiohead play with the USC marching band. Plus, there was all the Rihanna/Chris Brown drama to follow.

This year I don’t think I saw a single commercial for it. So that doesn’t bode well. Plus, I printed out the ballot, and it is just ridiculously bad. I’ll discuss in detail as we slog through this train wreck, but it almost seems like they are trying to piss people off with their nominees.

Anyway, Johanna and I will be competing again in a winner picking game. As usual, I pick who I think is going to win, not who should win (in a lot of these categories, none of the nominees deserve to win). Out of principle, I did not just pick Taylor Swift in every category, even though she’ll probably sweep the night. I did, however, pick a Marley in two separate categories. Let’s get it started. Categories and winners in bold.

8:01 – “Oh Jesus,” says Johanna as Lady Gaga kicks off the night. This is a little too Broadway for my tastes, but God bless her. She looks like a character from Tim Burton’s upcoming Alice in Wonderland. I should also say here that I’m really surprised that they didn’t start with some Michael Jackson thing. I guess MTV stole their thunder.

8:04 – “Everybody’s going googoo for Gaga,” says the weird emcee. And now here she comes on some weird double piano with Sir Elton John. WTF is going on right now? This is like if Disney Imagineers were trying to show me what an acid trip would be like. Again, God bless her. She is talented. She deserves to win in all four categories in which she’s nominated tonight, but I doubt that will happen.

Continue reading →

Movie Adaptations

January 30, 2010December 18, 2010 / Jared / 10 Comments

With the death of J.D. Salinger, speculation about The Catcher in the Rye being adapted as a movie is inevitable. So that got me thinking about movie adaptations that I would be excited about, but secretly dread because of the probability that they would be bad.

That led to a list of ten possible adaptations that will never live up to the hype I would assign them in my brain. That, in turn, led to another list, this time of ten movie adaptations that have already been made, and are already disappointing. But I didn’t want to be completely negative, so I’ll finish with a list of ten movie adaptations that, in my opinion, really knocked it out of the park, and in some cases, surpassed whatever they were based on. I’m sure I’m forgetting some here; let me know if there is anything too obvious. Also, for the most part, I tried to include only examples where I’m familiar with both the movie and the source material (exceptions are noted).

Movie adaptations by which I will inevitably, someday, be disappointed:

10) A Confederacy of Dunces

Apparently Harold Ramis tried to turn this into a movie back in 1982, with John Belushi in the lead role, but then Belushi died. That might have actually been pretty good. Ignatius Reilly is such a weird, delightful character that I can’t really imagine anyone pulling him off. The most recent talk has been about Will Ferrell donning a fat suit to play him. Eh.

9) Then We Came to the End

As far as I know no one is planning to turn this into a movie, but it just seems like the kind of thing that someone might try. For some reason, I picture John C. McGinley, the guy that plays Dr. Cox on Scrubs, getting cast as Tom Mota. And I am aghast at that possibility.

8 ) Lost

Again, no concrete plans in place. But I guarantee there will be a movie at some point. Disney is already talking about the future of Lost as a brand. But what would the movie be? I’m guessing the television finale will give us a pretty definitive ending to the current set of characters’ story. And I can’t imagine a prequel would be all that interesting. So, what happens? A new plane crashes on the island?

Continue reading →

The (Last) Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien

January 23, 2010May 10, 2010 / Jared / 2 Comments

Some might say that The Tonight Show, in its mythical, beloved form, ended years ago, when Jay Leno bashed it down into a formulaic, unfunny pulp. But at the very least, I think we can all agree that going forward The Tonight Show no longer really exists. The brand is sullied. No one cares anymore. And probably because I’m not old, and I never watched Johnny Carson, I don’t really care all that much, either. It never meant anything to me, really. The scene has splintered, and while some bemoan the loss of a cultural institution, all I know is that now I can watch Letterman, Stewart, Colbert, maybe even a bit of Kimmel or Ferguson or Fallon here and there. And in a little more than seven months, I’ll probably be able to watch Conan again. I have a computer. I have a DVR. The more the merrier, guys.

That doesn’t mean that what happened to Conan was fair. Considering that NBC has seemingly done everything possible to undermine his ability to produce a successful show, I think he’s handled himself well throughout this. And so has Leno, in his own way; I mean, I think he’s kind of a scumbag, but I wasn’t going to watch him anyway. He’s portraying himself as a victim, and his is audience is still on his side. I have no doubt he’ll pull ratings that are higher than what Conan was getting prior to all of this mess. But his audience will just keep getting older, and advertisers won’t want to advertise for them, and the death of traditional late night television will be accelerated even more. Oh, NBC.

Anyway, I thought I would do another not-at-all-live live blog with my thoughts during the last night of The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Also known as probably the last night of late night television as we once knew it. I’ll put in some Hulu clips if they get posted; since NBC has continued to somewhat bafflingly put this stuff online, I have to assume they will continue to do so. I’ll also disperse a few photos I took throughout.

Update: Not surprisingly, NBC has taken the videos below off of Hulu. I’m leaving the dead remnants up, though, because it seems appropriate.

11:35 – Our last time hearing this theme song, I would imagine; NBC surely owns it. My favorite Conan opening was the Late Night one where he was running around New York and eventually jumped into the river. He comes out to a standing ovation and Johanna and I both feel very sad.

Continue reading →