Probably a little forced, but I’ll take it

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

On the night of the Oscars, I didn’t bother watching any of it, despite the fact that I probably would’ve been happy enough to see Parasite clean up the awards for Best original screenplay, director and international film.  But there was no way I figured it was actually going to win Best Picture, because Hollywood is Hollywhite, and I would have bet money that the award was going to go to like The Irishman or Marriage Story instead.

So color me surprised, when settling into bed, I looked at my phone to look at the news before turning in, and seeing that Parasite actually did the improbable, and won Best Picture.

Suck it, whitey.

However, after the initial pleasure of Parasite’s victory wound down, I naturally began thinking skeptically about the whole thing, and wondered what agenda there could be to awarding the most prestigious award in film to Parasite.  Naturally, the number one agenda is Hollywood taking a stab at trying to debunk the notion that they’re Hollywhite, and actually giving a major award to some colored folks; among the film industries in non-white cultures, Korea and India stand out, so perhaps giving the nod to a Korean film is the lesser of available evils, since us Orientals are widely accepted in white people-land while Indians are kind of brown and white people hate brown people.

Passive-ironically, I like to believe Hollywhite is tired of all the endless bitching from critics, pundits and SJWs about how white-washey they are, so they’re conducting something of a social experiment where they finally gave Best Picture to a foreign film, to see if the talking heads will shut the fuck up.  The ball is kind of in the court of the talking heads to see if they’ll now bitch about there not being enough black representation, or transgendered performers or any other maligned demographic, but then the narrative becomes that the masses just want something to complain about, but white-washing can’t necessarily be one of those things anymore. 

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Neck Beard Club is 2 sweeeeeeeeet

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Don’t wait, get on board with the hottest merch in professional wrestling!  Official Neck Beard Club merchandise is available at Hot Topics across America and ProWrestlingTees.com.  And why stop with the official t-shirt, when you can get the official fedora, and top it off with the official Neck Beard Club vape pen!  Supplies are limited, get ‘em while they last!

This is actually an idea that’s been rattling around my head for a while now, but just very recently did I get the motivation to actually bring it to fruition.  Maybe it’s because I recently went to my very first New Japan Pro Wrestling show, and even in spite of the mass departure of all the guys that ended up birthing All-Elite Wrestling, Bullet Club remains as relevant as ever, even if it’s sort of kind of beginning to feel like the nWo black and white after Hogan and Nash basically imploded the entire faction.

The point is, Bullet Club started to become kind of lame once it reached peak popularity, and much like the nWo, hit a level of where it began saturating so much of NJPW, it was basically the only thing you saw fans gravitating towards.  Suddenly, the whole world’s wrestling fans all started becoming huge Bullet Club marks, and it wasn’t that they were fans of NJPW, it’s just they were fans of this idea that didn’t originate in the WWE, and it was cool to like wrestling things that weren’t WWE.

And in my own little head, when things become too popular, they become lame, and I barely had any time learning about Bullet Club before I began thinking they were so popular, that it was nigh impossible for them to live up to the hype that the collective internet had put them on a pedestal with.

A year or so ago, I went to Dallas, and with my brother, we went to a Ring of Honor show.  Back in like 2012, I went to an ROH show in Baltimore, and it was an enjoyable experience seeing a lot of talent that I’d never seen before and just witnessing a brand new scene, very different than that of the WWE crowds that I have little desire of going to their shows anymore.  So I had high hopes that this ROH show in Dallas was going to be as good as my first time.

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FEH’s game pass subscription is more like MEH

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When I first heard that Fire Emblem: Heroes was introducing a monthly subscription “Feh Pass,” my initial reaction was more like, not mad… just disappointed.

I mean, there’s little reason to get mad about a gatcha game introducing more ways to make more money, because when the day is over, the ultimate goal of every gatcha game is to make money.  But like most F2P mobile games I ever come across, my goal is to always spend as little or no money at all.  At the very moment I’m writing this, I’ve played both Pokémon Go and Fire Emblem: Heroes consistently since their respective launch dates, and I’ve spent approximately a total of $14.99 in total.  Yet, I’ve gotten tons of enjoyment and have pretty stacked accounts in both games, mostly out of longevity, but the point is that I haven’t spent much money but still gotten just about all that I’ve wanted from them.

FEH has always kind of had kind of a pay2win methodology available at all times prior to the introduction of the Feh Pass, but it was still required to have some skill in the game’s mechanics, as well as the luck of the draw of actually getting the random characters that you’re aiming for.  But the Feh Pass, by virtue of giving those who pay for it an actual statistical stat boost, now un-levels the playing field, and truly becomes a game where you can buy superiority over players that do not.

However, I’m actually writing this after the launch of Feh Pass, and aside from the fact that I’ll always have this annoying glorified ad trying to get me to pay for a Feh Pass, in order to cash in on some rewards I’ve already fulfilled the requisite tasks for, it hasn’t really been all too intrusive to my every day playing of FEH.  I imagine that will change in time, as Feh Pass subscribers begin amassing more and more subscription exclusive character variants with stat boosts, and then I’ll start running into them in modes like Arena and Aether Raids, but for the time being, it hasn’t affected me yet.

Regardless of the inevitability of things like this, I’m still a little disappointed in FEH for going down this route.  It’s already basically the most lucrative mobile game in Nintendo’s portfolio, so to me this is like them just being greedy on top of being already greedy.  It’s not going to stop me from playing the game, but now I’ve got this automatic instant resentment for Feh Passers, and I’m looking forward to taking down these whales with my Klein+10 and three dancers cheese method.

Randy Orton is the WWE’s Friend Zone

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It’s not often where I feel like I’ve hit an analogy home run, but I think I hit the nail on the head with this one.  After watching Edge’s return to the ring in the Royal Rumble, and the subsequent segment on RAW the night afterward, where he was brutally attacked by Randy Orton, it dawned on me much like the sun rising: Randy Orton is basically the friend zone for WWE wrestlers.

I feel like the analogy works so perfectly, because not just in the case of Edge, but any wrestler who has the unfortunate situation of being put into a program with Randy Orton, they have to know it’s a dead-end feud with no gain to be had from doing it, much like any sad schlub of a guy who thinks they have a chance with a girl, but get put into the friend zone, and they’re the only ones who don’t realize that they’re in it.

Randy Orton has just enough name and face value to where anyone stashed with him retains some degree of relevance, but he doesn’t have enough of either to really elevate them beyond the holding pen point of relevance.  He’s basically keeping budding stars warm, but for guys that are trying to re-climb the mountain, or in the case of Edge, come back and rise through the ranks, a feud with Orton is literally being put into the friend zone, where there is no happy ending in sight, but he’ll still work like hell trying to prove something, because he doesn’t realize that he’s in the friend zone.

I mean, just look at the last few guys Orton has been paired up with: AJ Styles’ went nowhere working with Orton. Kofi Kingston not only didn’t go anywhere, all the momentum he had from Kofimania came to a slow stop, and not long after vanquishing Randy Orton, ended up jobbing to Brock Lesnar in 4 seconds to drop the WWE Championship.  It’s debatable that it wouldn’t have mattered who he was paired up against, but Jeff Hardy fell off the wagon after working with Orton.  Rusev will never get a main event push in the WWE, and working with Orton couldn’t have helped that cause, and the list goes on and on, really.

But it really sucks for Edge, considering the nine years he’s been away from the business, and as soon as he gets back, he’s thrust into a feud with Randy Orton.  I mean, this is a feud that could have just as easily happened back in 2011, and in fact have faced each other before several times in the past.  But in a company that’s chock full of young guys and guys from different companies, you’d think they’d try and pair Edge up with any one of them before Randy Orton. 

Continue reading “Randy Orton is the WWE’s Friend Zone” →

Chalk this up under whyyyy????

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

For some reason, The Karate Kid is being adapted into a Broadway musical.  I have to ask again: whyyyyy????

The obvious answer is probably that Robert Mark Kamen, the original screenwriter, probably needs the money.  The fact that it’s been 36 years since 1984, and it’s hard to imagine anyone living forever on the royalties of just one series; and with the recent successes of the Cobra Kai spin-off, it’s probably been no better time than the present to sell out the rights to go Broadway.

But still, my knee-jerk reaction to the news that one of the most iconic films of the 80s, is just now headed for Broadway, for a musical rendition.  Sure, the story is simple and linear enough to turn into a musical, but it just seems like a hokey sellout to imagine particular scenes in the film being danced and theatrically performed instead of the gritty, Ralph Macchio-has-no-real-talent versus a legitimately-can-fight-William-Zabka, like on the beach, or at the finals of the All-Valley Under-18 Karate Tournament.

The eventual training montage, which are basically musicals in their own right, will be replaced by a more over-the-top dance rendition of whatever schlub they get to play Daniel, dancing around, occasionally flailing his legs in whatever they’re going to consider kicks, and I’m going to cringe at just the thought, because I highly doubt that there’s a chance that I’ll actually see it; I don’t have any objection to Broadway or theatre in general, but I do bristle at the idea of the properties of my childhood all one-by-one being exploited and re-imagined in wildly conflicting mediums.

But more importantly, don’t get me started on whatever inevitably-will-be-racist guy they get to play Mr. Miyagi.  The true heart and soul of the entire series, whether it’s a Japanese guy that’s probably not old enough to portray the character, but is cast anyway because of his ability to dance and move, or whether they whitewash the role and give it to like fucking Henry Golding, it’s a no-win situation waiting to happen when they cast Mr. Miyagi, and it’s going to make me nauseated at the idea of some wildly inappropriate looking motherfucker playing what should be the late great Pat Morita.

Long story short, this doesn’t need to exist.  But because nothing is allowed to stay in the past, or isn’t sold to the nostalgia bastardization machine, here we are.  I question why this even needed to become a thing, but honestly, I can’t say that I’m the least bit surprised that it is, unfortunately.

Why does it always have to end in death?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Today Mr. Peanut died in a television commercial.  I’m not sure why it was necessary to have to outright kill him, but it’s clearly a ploy by Planters that is going to lead to something bigger, as it’s speculated that they’re going to have some degree of follow up in a commercial during the Super Bowl.

But come on now, killing Mr. Peanut?  In favor of has-beens and unknowns like Wesley Snipes and Matt Walsh (who?). Why’s it always got to end in death?  And why do Blade and the Tostitos guy get to live over Mr. Peanut?

No matter.  I don’t have a tremendous amount of words to go on about this as I thought I did when I first heard the news.  I think it’s more of being perplexed at the notion of killing an icon of my childhood that triggered the response in the first place.

But if anything at all, I can at least post this classic gif from the Simpsons where Mr. Peanut gains a measure of revenge on people who have been eating his brethren throughout history.

The annual Hall of Fame of bullshit spectacle

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment
This screen grab was too classic to not use

Not really news: Derek Jeter is inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame

Unfortunately news: Derek Jeter is inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, but is denied the honor of unanimous induction by one vote

A year ago, when Mariano Rivera was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, as the first man in history to get a 100% unanimous induction, I figured the doors had been blown off, and that we were going to start seeing more guys getting in unanimously.

Prior to Rivera, such a distinction was basically a pipe dream, and throughout the years, fans have witnessed year after year, legend after legend, fail to garner that hallowed 100% vote, no matter who they were.  Cal Ripken, Jr.  Tony Gwynn. Ken Griffey, Jr. Greg Maddux.  These were all guys that were no-brainer locks to make the Hall of Fame, and I have to ask why if they’re such no-brainers, why none of them ever got to 100% unanimous?

Even guys like Chipper Jones, Randy Johnson, and Pedro Martinez, they were champions, pulled in tons of hardware, put up gaudy career stats; everyone knew they were going to get into the Hall of Fame in their first years of eligibility, but why couldn’t any of these guys get a unanimous selection?

I love Mo, as a pitcher and as a human being, but it’s no secret that the BBWAA hasn’t been kind to relief pitchers historically.  In my opinion, Rivera was definitely worthy of a first-ballot induction, but I’m admittedly surprised that he was the first guy to ever get the 100% unanimous.

Was it because he was such a class-act and a known humanitarian?  Just about every baseball fan knew as fierce of a competitor on the field he was, he was as much of a humble and gracious human being off of it.  But that being said, so were guys like Ripken and Gwynn.

Regardless, with Rivera having broken the mold, I figured that there were still a just a few guys left out there that had the chance to also reach the promised land of 100%, with the first one most definitely being Derek Jeter.

Continue reading “The annual Hall of Fame of bullshit spectacle” →