Marine Express (1979)

This is a movie I never knew existed until today, thanks to a cool FB group that Dan Ross created.  It's a team up of most of Osamu Tezuka's main cartoon characters, but most of them are playing some different roles in this film.  Certainly Astro Boy is not the same character we all know and love from various cartoons and movies.  I don't know most of them myself, and the names I know are the English names for them- Viper Snakely, Professor Elefun, Mr. Pompous and of course Astro Boy.  But I recognize some of the rest of them.

What do all the People Know? The Monroes

Possibly my favorite "new wave" song. There's no real video for the song, so here's a live version from the Merv Griffin show.  It sounds so new wave to me, with just the right amount of keyboards with the rest of the song.  Plus it's a great song.

The Wolverine (2013)

I've had this ready to watch for several months, but kind of forgot it was on the HD.  This is the extended version.  Man, I miss the days when movies weren't constantly over two hours long AND that there was only one version of any given film.  How many freaking versions of BLADERUNNER are there?  And how many do we really need?  I'm sorry, it's my issue and I'll deal with it.  Anyway, after enjoying the last X-Men movie, which surprisingly didn't have Wolverine in every single shot, I thought it was time to check this film out.  I mostly enjoyed the first solo flick, even if there were no costumes or even code names for anyone.  I still don't get that, I mean, what's the point of making superhero movies if they are just dressed up as normal people?  Yes, that's another issue of mine, I'll get back on track here, I promise.

New York Groove- Ace Frehley

This is the one hit track from KISS' four solo albums. I had all of them, and liked all of them to various degrees, but I can see why this was a hit. It's really catchy. When looking for this video I found the original version, which I had never heard and a cover by SWEET, of all bands. I like Ace's best, of course, since it's the first one I heard, but the original is almost as good.

superheroes!

Just a sampling of some of the great heroes from Japan in the 1970s.  How I wish I had been able to see them in their heyday.  I loved the action of the Batman show, but after that most of the US superhero shows were rather anemic.

Adam & The Ants - Stand And Deliver

Adam Ant had a huge career in England long before most anyone in the States got to hear "Goody Two Shoes". Once the LP "Strip" came out this video made it's premiere on TBS' "Night Trax" in the wee hours of early 1984. They did explain that the album had been released two years earlier and this wasn't a truly new video.

Pacific Rim finale

It took a little longer for me to watch the whole movie than I thought it would.  I mean, robots fighting giant monsters?  That's a lead pipe cinch for me to love, right?  Well, almost.  There will be spoilers below, so you have been warned if you haven't seen the movie yet.

Britain's Scariest Mythical Creatures - Anglophenia Ep. 4

I just discovered this fun series on youtube, I highly recommend you check it out. There's only five or so episodes, but they are pretty short and Siobahn is adorable and has a great delivery. Plus she covers fun stuff.

RIP Casey Kasem

Casey Kasem passed on today, at the age of 82.  He provided so many voices to characters I grew up with, and made much of the pablum of Top 40 music in the 70s entertaining with his show about the Top 40 hits of the week.  It was always fun to get to the top ten songs.  I'd rather remember the way he lived then some of the things that happened in his later years.  I'm not involved, so there will be no comment about them from me.

Battle of the Planets intro

Today's post is in honor of the passing of Casey Kasem.  I'll have more on that later on tonight.  This show was the first US import of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, which showed up on US airwaves shortly after Star Wars was a huge hit.  I knew by then it was of Japanese origin, but knew nothing about the original show.  It was only aired sporadically in my area, around noon on Saturdays.  I really wanted to like it more than I did, but the addition of 7-Zark-7 was such a drag.  The articles about how it was edited appeared later, and then it made sense,  though there were some fight scenes left in here and there, which did make it much better than most of the sanitized cartoons airing in that time period.

MOTW - Mothra

It's been a long time since I've done one of these "Monster of the Week" features, but that's no reason not to start it back up, or at least try to.  Anyway, since the new Xenorama is all about Mothra, I figured it would be a fine time to feature the large lepidotaran in a post of her own.  Any maybe send people looking for copies of this fine fanzine called Xenorama.  It's got a lot of great information about all the movies Mothra has ever been in (to date) plus a lot of other great stuff!

The People's Poem! - The Young Ones

In this segment, Rick, the self styled People's Poet, is upset at a comic book Vivian is reading, even though it's RICK's comic book. I wonder which comic book it was. Yeah, that's just what nerds do, once they get over laughing at the inherent silliness that happens. There's still a bit of the 60s Batman influence showing up here.

RIP Rik Mayall

Rik Mayall, who played "The People's Poet" Rick on The Young Ones passed away today.  Here's an obit with more details.  He also was supposed to be Peeves the Poltergeist in the Harry Potter movies, but that apparently was not to be, which is too bad since he would have been perfect.

Superman 75th Anniversary Short

This is a great cartoon short. No surprise, since it's done by Bruce Timm, us fanboys' favorite producer of DC cartoons. It takes the viewer from 1938 all the way up to the last movie. I reckon I'll have to see it someday. I love that it is all animated, with some slight rotoscoping as well.

Superman: the Mysterious Mr. Mist

This is the cartoon I mentioned last post.  It's a two parter, so there's a lot of action in it, but most of it is rescuing Lois from the mist.  He comes out of a well at Perry White's farmhouse and becomes obsessed with his people having Lois Lane as his people's queen.  It's never explained WHY he wants Lois, or how he knew she would be there, or even what his people actually are.  Of course, casual fans wouldn't think  of such things, especially viewers in the younger age range that would be enjoying the kidnappings and escapes that happen in a 7 minute cartoon.

The New Adventures of Superman (1966)

Just got the second and third "season" of this fine, fun cartoon. I've written about it before, but these are the next 32 episodes. I'm hoping that I will finally see an episode that's haunted me for many years, one in which Superman comes face to face with Superboy. Sort of. I'm not exactly sure of how it happens, but once I see the episode I'll report back. It has something to do with a "mist" of some kind.

more Pacific Rim

Watched about another 20 minutes or so of this movie, and it's very enjoyable.  The monsters really aren't kaiju, since they are not unique.  And I sure miss the sleek robots of years past, but these are pretty cool. 

The Lost World trailer (1925)

I've often wondered if there was a trailer for this movie. This one looks legit, and it's cool to see the dinosaurs in action. I'm pretty surprised at how many versions of the entire movie are on youtube. I wonder which one is actually the best one to watch. It's been a while since I've seen it in any form. I sure do miss these dinosaurs.

X-Men: Days of Future PastM (2014)

It's no big secret I am an old school comic book reader.  The new crop of movies have been hit or miss with me, though I have enjoyed most of the Marvel ones to an extent, and really did like the Avengers a lot.  I don't think I've enjoyed the DC movies very much recently, at least not since about 1980.  I barely remember the Batman movies and never did see the two new Superman films.  Part of the problem is I usually know what's going to happen, due to that extensive comic book history I have in my brain.

And as stated before, the "functional" costumes without masks are really a drag.  What's the point of having code names if they never get used?  Boring.  Oh, there's gonna be spoilers, after the cut.