Garfield the Monstrosity

Things were going real bad for Jim Davis throughout the 90’s. The humor in his Garfield comic strip had gone down the tube. What was the reason? Well, it seemed as though every Garfield comic consisted of just Garfield insulting Jon. Characters like Arlene, Nermal, Liz, and even Odie the dog stopped appearing, and really to this day only make scarce appearances. Plus in 2001, one of the shoes had to drop by Lorenzo Music, the original voice of Garfield, to pass away. A sad event that was. Now we KNEW that any attempt at fully reviving a Garfield series would be meaningless. Nobody could replace Lorenzo. Garfield right there, died on the spot.
Then, Davis got an idea. An AWFUL idea. Davis got a wonderful, AWFUL idea! It was decided, now that Music was gone, to make a Garfield movie right there on the spot, and look for a new voice. But, who could replace Lorenzo? Logically, Davis should have looked for someone that sounded similar to Lorenzo. But, you know, that be too difficult, so Davis decided to just go the easy way out. Look for someone who sounded NOTHING like Lorenzo Music. For some reason, his crystal ball suggested Bill Murray.
Jim must have forgotten that Bill hated Lorenzo’s performance as Pete Venkman on “Ghostbusters”, unless Davis thought that Bill would like to have sweet revenge. Who knows? Bill probably liked the idea and said yes.
Now for a plot. Jim could have easily done what Spike Lee does with his superhero films and have the film be based on actual storylines from the actual comics. But, as The Pointy-Haired Boss from Dilbert once said, “If it’s easy, it probably isn’t worth doing.” Davis knew that, and when on his way. In the movie, Jon gets Odie from Liz the veterinarian, instead of from Lyman, Jon’s roommate in the early years of the strip, thus not being very loyal to his own firmament, or his fans who crave continuity. It’d be like if the Spider-Man filmmakers decided that Peter Parker was GIVEN his spider powers as a Christmas gift from E.B. White. But, then again, Hollywood can do anything they want, right?
The supporting cast is out of whack as well. Arlene is present, but does not acknowledge being Garfield’s girlfriend, and so is Nermal, but does not antagonize Garfield about being cuter than the orange orange. Also, Liz has an actual interest in Jon, and ends up in his caring arms at the end of the film! Uh-huh. But, thankfully the fans knew what to do in response to this unforgivable lumber. Curse it like there was no tomorrow!
Jim Davis must have taken the cursing pretty hard, and was filled with hurt in his controvertible heart. So he decides to gain revenge on us. Something that will teach us a lesson we will never forget. What’s that he plans? A SEQUEL! You heard me right, a sequel! I don’t think there’s anything we can do to fight back on this one. This is the ultimate revenge card Davis could have pulled. I’m sorry to say, but I think Davis has won the war. The only thing we can do is choose not to see it. But, we know it’ll still make good money. All those brainwashed kids, and their skittish soccer moms won’t know the difference between right from wound. They’ll be so confused, seeing an ugly live-like cat dancing around and shaking his sour stuff, completely different from the flat, cartoon feline present in the comic pages next to Fox Trot. Okay, I’m being paranoid. I just see this as an end of the world sort of deal. It’s just frustrating knowing that Jim Davis doesn’t know when to quit, or when to hire real comic strip writers who know how to be funny. It’s also shameful that Davis has ordered his grandchildren and great-grandchildren to take over the strip when his last breath is used. Talk about setting an automatic career for you not-even-old-yet decedents. What a way to be remembered. Not just for letting a cartoon cat be run into the ground, but to assume that the career you dish out is what your grand kids want. Humph! Sure glad he ain’t my grand-daddy.

Happy 9th Birthday to The Angry Beavers!

This is nuts! I'll bet very few people realize that 9 years ago today, the great Nickelodeon series The Angry Beavers debuted. The Angry Beavers is my favorite Nicktoon. I was about two Beaver brothers named Norbert (voiced by Nick Bakay) and Daggett (Richard Horvitz). They were kicked out of their home after their mother had a second litter (it's the beaver way). The two eventually find their own bachelor pad and have all sorts of adventures in the forest and the human world. The show ran for 5 years and had at least 120 episodes (well, okay, just 62, but 2 episodes equaled one whole, and the Halloween episode was split in two parts). After doing some thinking, here are my all-time favorite episodes:
Born to Be Beavers: The episode that started it all. Dag and Norb learn to cope on their own.

Up All Night: The beavers think, since they're living on their own they can do whatever they want include, stay up all night.

Long in the Teeth: The beavers start a forest fad of growing their teeth long (and, yes, while still aware of the dangers).

Enter the Daggett: Dag trains himself to be a ninja, known as The Silent Wind of Doom.

Beaver Feaver: The beavers record a disco hit, that turns out to be nothing but a one-hit wonder.

Dag for Night: The beavers find a long-lost print of a never-finished B-movie. The beavers take it upon themselves to finish it.

Sans-a-Pelt: After a lame magic trick, the beaver lose their pelt and are stranded miles, and miles away from home!

Pass it On: The beavers and their forest friends (Barry the Bear, Bing the Tree Lizard, Treeflower, Stump, and Truckee) tell a "chainlink" spy story.

The Angry Beavers' Halloween Special- The Day the World Got Screwed Up: The beavers are trick-or-treating on Oct. 30th (to avoid competition), and eventually stumple upon the abode of their favorite actor Oxnard Montavo. His home is being taken over by aliens that are feeding on reality.

Mistaken Idenity: A Russian spacecraft crashes in the beavers' home. Neither one wants to clean up the mess (even though, now there are communists running around their dam. I think a simple home mess is the least of their problems). So the two have a bet that neither can go 24 hours while acting like the other.

Kreature Komforts: The beavers recieve a visit from their "simple" cousin who happens to be an expressionless 2-D real-life beaver.

Damnesia: The dam falls on Norb giving him amnesia. Dag informs Norb of who he once was and Norb is terrified of his former self. He renames himself "Troy" and vows to be a nicer beaver than Norb ever was (don't worry, Norb changes back by the end of the episode).

Happy Birthday you guys!

Scary Movie 4... the birds!

I went to see Scary Movie 4 the other day. I have to say, the movie was actually pretty good, despite it's bad reviews. Although in my opinion, the original Scary Movie will always be the #1 pick in my book. The series started wearing thin with Scary Movie 3 (although Leslie Nielson's scenes made up for that), so I went into SM4 with low expectations. It's probably me going in with that perception, that is the reason why I came out of the theatre laughing my ass off (I suppose it doesn't help that I'm easily amused).

The movie is about Cindy Campbell (Anna Farris), much like the other three, and she has become a health care worker where she is assigned to take care of a timid old woman (played by Cloris Leechman) who lives in a house haunted by the ghost of a young Japanese boy. Cindy can't resist a paranormal investigation so she decides to invest paranormally. On her journey she meets Tom Ryan (played by Craig Bierko, the man who turned down the Friends rold of Chandler Bing) in a War of the Worlds-type role as a divorced father trying to take care of his two more-intelligent kids. His divorcee is played by Molly "Superstar" Shannon. Cindy also catches up with Brenda (Regina Hall) even though she had died in the previous movie (but, being a zany comedy, I guess continuity is the least important matter). The two girls get involved in some Amish comunity terrorized by fake monsters. Eventually, she catches up with Tom and his family, and they get held hostage by two clown-like aliens who plan on world domination. I don't know if it would be wise for me to blurt out the ending, and I didn't put a poiler warning. Let me just say that, while the movie itself was a good and funny, the ending was, by far, very much a huge burden to take. A major letdown to what could have possibly been a nice 4th entry in a comical series. Also, the Operah Winfrey bit at the end of the movie (oops!) was so faulty and tedious, that I don't understand why it wasn't left on the cutting room floor. It could have been snipped out and would not have been missed (and hey, that would have meant an extra special feature for the DVD!). Overall, on a scale of 1 to 10, I'll give SM4 a 7.2, because I'm not a harsh critc (or am I?). Hopefully this is the last of the series. A Scary Movie 5 just would be uncalled for. We get the point, a movie that pokes fun at B-horror films. But, if I want to see something like that, done better, I'll just watch Mystery Science Theater 3000, thank you very much.

Open for Business!

Hello. My name is Brandon Pierce. I am a cartoon/film/television freak. This blog that I'm creating is a commentary/analazing habitation. Sure, not very original. There are other blogs that do this sorta thing, but um... I don't really want to write about me. Is that bad? Anyway. I saw the film Scary Movie 4, and plan on writing a review on it. It wasn't bad, but nothing tops the original Scary Movie flick. Anyway, bye. -Brandon "drunk as a skunk" Pierce