Happy Friday #55: Fightin’ Words Edition
CJS is in a fightin’ mood. We’ve been pent up all week, so it’s time to release that aggression. All over your face. Via internet. With words.
Head on in to Happy Friday for links about fallout from UFC 100, top earning comedians, global warming, beer from the motherland, and a whole host of controversial goodness. Don’t make us put our dukes up, ‘cuz we’ll do it. We ain’t afraid of you!
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Leading off is some site promotion news. E Dagger did another podcast over at Natsukashi. Our topic this time was 1989 opus The ‘Burbs starring Tom Hanks. Rob and I spoke with Peter Kuran who was an fx artist on the film. Peter’s also been a few other films you may have heard of: Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Gremlins, Beetlejuice, Ghostbusters 2, Edward Scissorhands, and, Men In Black. He not only tells some great stories about The ‘Burbs, but he drops a never-before-heard tidbit about Predator and indulges our nerd fantasies by taking about the Holy Trilogy. This is our best podcast yet, and we think you’ll feel the same. Check us out at Natsukashi. There’s something in this podcast for everyone.
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As many of you probably remember, UFC 100 was this past weekend. CJS had a small gathering to drink some beers, play Beirut, grill some meat and watch the fights. We succeeded admirably in all of those regards and ended up a bit drunk for the night of fights. Hart slept here (I think) because all I found in the morning was my futon folded down into the bed position and a mostly drank Gatorade.
Anyway, by and large the fights were awesome as the only lowlight was GSP and Thiago Alves putting on one of the most boring displays of laying around on top of each other this side of a Candida Royalle film. Dan Henderson knocked Michael Bisping back to colonial England, Sexiyama had the fight of the night Alan Belcher, and Brock Lesnar went straight up heel on the crowd and his opponent Frank Mir.
After making Frank Mir no longer pretty with a barrage of punches on the mat, he proceeded to get in his face and trash talk him after the bell rung, flip off the crowd and piss off primary sponsor Bud Light proclaiming he’d go home and drink a Coors Light tonight (“because Bud Light won’t pay me!”) and “get on top of [his] wife.” As a former pro wrestling fan, this was enormously entertaining.
Dana White didn’t think so and had a whip the dog session with Lesnar post-fight causing Brock to apologize in the post-fight press conference. But all things considered, everyone loves a good bad guy, and Brock is going above and beyond the call of duty in that regard. As I said last week, I’ll watch every Brock Lesnar fight because there’s never been a Brock Lesnar before.
On a quasi-related note, Rickson Gracie of the famous “Jiu-jitsu, bitch!” Gracie family, is unimpressed with Brock and claims he could submit Lesnar faster than undisputed #1 heavyweight in the world Fedor Emelianenko. That seems somewhat reasonable considering just how good Fedor is, but we found it hilarious that Rickson claims to be 400-0 in his professional career. Not even Jean Claude fucking Van Damme has won 400 fights in his 80 or so direct-to-video garbage flicks. And he’s fictional. Whatever you say, Rickson, you delusional old man.
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The other big happening this week was the Major League Baseball All-Star Game. The National League coughed it up again thanks to another fucking San Diego relief pitcher. 3rd time in 4 years. Maybe pick someone else to pitch next year.
Anyway, we really hate Joe Buck and after he reminded the audience that it’s been 12 years since the National League won an All-Star Game six times in one inning, I actually yelled at the TV and called Joe Buck “a fucking asshole.” Lady E didn’t care for such ugliness directed at a man I don’t even know broadcasting an exhibition game. She’s probably right as the only thing worse than Joe Buck is sitting through the interminable Home Run Derby. Will Leitch returns to Deadspin outlining why the Home Run Derby sucks so bad giving weird praise to Chris Berman in the process. Good stuff here from Leitch as usual.
And since the event was in St. Louis, it gives me another opportunity to mention how much I hate the fucking Cardinals and basically every beer created by Anheuser Busch. However, even I enjoyed this piece by Denver Post reporter Benjamin Hochman about why he’s so proud to be a Cardinals fan. Just a tremendous read all the way through.
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In fake sports news, apparently college dorks all over the country have started Muggle Quidditch leagues based on the sport created by JK Rowling for the Harry Potter books. Chris Bucholz of Cracked.com does an excellent job of explaining all the ways this is pants-shittingly retarded – chief reason among them is in the book the game is played on flying fucking broomsticks – so we won’t spoil the article for you. But we would like to include this pull-quote about watching people play this brain-bendingly moronic sport: “I guess expecting great things while observing people who run around wearing capes with brooms clenched between their legs is a recipe for disappointment and full body shivers.”
Well said, Mr. Bucholz. We often feel that when pondering how seriously people take a series of children’s books about wizards.
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As Congress continues to debate cap and trade legislation, we were struck by an article we came across in Esquire by Bjorn Lomborg. We’ve linked to Lomborg’s articles before, but this one is especially good. Consider this your Required Reading because not only is this a terribly engaging read about the cornucopia of negative effects of carbon-cutting legislation, it’s one of the first sane pieces we’ve read in months about climate change in general from anyone on either side of the global warming debate.
Lomborg argues that the scientific debate regarding global warming is over and that the earth is getting warmer. Fine. But what isn’t debated and needs to be is what we plan to do about it. Rather than tackle the costly and minimally effective task of cutting carbon emissions, our money would be much better spent on incentive programs for research and development of new forms of energy, aiding the third world out of poverty, and basically telling Al Gore to go screw himself, his plan sucks. While those who seek to cut carbon emissions are generally well-intentioned, in this case, and this is what Lomborg argues, they’re misdirected. We can do a much better job of protecting our world for less money with different policies. Even if you disagree with Lomborg about this, do yourself a favor and read this article. Just a fascinating, terribly interesting read.
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Based on just about everything we’ve read, the Transformers sequel sucks a huge bag of dicks. We’re not surprised as the first one looked fucking awful, and this one somehow looked even worse. If you have half a brain, these movies seem like they should outrage you, but considering this one has made approximately 8 gazillion dollars, maybe not.
It enrages Rob of Topless Robot who writes the most hilarious deconstruction of this shit heap we could ever hope to read. Well done, sir. Our collective hat is off to you.
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“In Soviet Russia, Park Souths you!” – Yakov Smirnoff.
Or at least that’s what we think this article is trying to say about the Russian government cutting a scene criticizing Vladimir Putin from a South Park airing. We don’t know. Nor do we especially care. We just wish we had more Yakov Smirnoff in our lives. What a country! Hee hee hee!
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In Soviet Russia…
Wait, that’s not right. Let’s try this again.
In Golden, Colorado, Coors brews Miller High Life! What a brewery! Hee hee hee! We’re ultimately fine with this because we can’t even remember the last time we drank Miller High Life. Our favorite part of this article was the line “In a concession to the Rocky Mountain heritage of Coors’ original Banquet beer, that brand will be made only in Golden.”
That’s right, baby. Coors O.G. is only available in the motherland! Recognize.
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We were depressed to read who the top 10 earning comedians are in the world. Two ventriloquists, two awful, unfunny rednecks, the host of “Deal or No Deal,” and Dane Cook were all on this list. We used to like Dane Cook, but watch half an episode of his smug self-satisfaction and the girlish bickering of his bus mates on “Tourgasm,” and we can all but guarantee you will have had your life’s fill of him.
George Lopez is still okay with us, but he’s still riding that lifetime pass we gave him for the Spanish Rodney Dangerfield impression he did in Ski Patrol. Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock are comedy gods, so their inclusion on the list is also fine and totally expected.
But really, America? Two fucking ventriloquists and two of the painfully unfunny assholes from the Blue Collar Comedy Tour? Gross.
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A comedian who should be on this list is Bobby Slayton. Calling himself “the pitbull of comedy,” Slayton never pulls any punches and always shines with scathing observations and brutal wit. Believe it or not Bobby Slayton was the first comic I ever idolized. I saw him on Showtime’s “Full Frontal Comedy” and immediately became enthralled. He was a guest on the Adam Carolla podcast where he and Adam discuss tourism in Vegas, what it costs for a performer to book a show there, and how shitty it is to drive in LA and live in the LA suburbs. Adam is on his game here as these two guys bring the house down with hilarity. Perfect way to kill a Friday.
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This week’s Confessional topic is one straight outta elementary school. Our nerdy comic book-loving asses always debated about which superheroes were best and who could kick whose ass. This discussion almost always came down to a ranking of powers and how they match up against other powers. Why bring this up? Because you need to consider carefully how you’d answer the following: Which superpower would you like to have and why? No copping out and choosing someone who can morph powers like Rogue in the 1st X-Men movie either. You just get one. Send your confessions to staff@crujonessociety.com and we’ll compare notes on Monday.
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Which reminds us… You probably wouldn’t want to punk Batman (especially not the gutter-voiced, roid raging Christian Bale version), but if you were, say, Superman, we think this is a damn funny way to do it.
How do you like them apples, you surly bat bitch? Were we you, we’d get in our Batmobile, speed over to Metropolis, slap on some Bat-Axe Body Spray, load up on Bat-condoms, and seduce Lois Lane with a few Bat-tinis and a couple Bat-roofies. That’ll teach that goofy Clark to fuck with your Bat signal again. Jerk.
That’s it for Friday, sports fans. See you next week.
17 Jul 2009 E Dagger