Better On A Boat

Here's an essay I wrote because I couldn't easily answer a friend's question during conversation this week. It doesn't really fit even the very-loose strictures of this blog, but I need to post it somewhere. So if you want to read 1200 words about theme park theory, or click each link and watch hours of ridethroughs, I hope you enjoy getting into the weeds with me. (Thanks to the brothers of Wedway Radio for the title.)

Storytelling amusement rides (as opposed to the pure thrills of an unthemed coaster, Tilt-A-Whirl, or drop tower) can have varied aims: to set a mood; to explore a location; to capture vignettes of character, place, and time; and sometimes to tell an actual story. For the purposes of this discussion, I'm going to talk about these experiences as works of Capital-A Art. (I understand some people need more explanation and context for that, but that's better-argued other places by other people. I'm interested in techniques here.) I'm also going to speak in absolute terms here, even though many effects are more incremental, and work only in tandem with other elements.

At their heart, these rides, like poetry or songs or film, try to bypass our rational conscious brain. Using sound, light, the architecture (façade is a French word, meaning "false front") and surrounding areas of a park, and even smells, this artform attempts to convince us to suspend our disbelief. Our conveyance certainly plays a big part in this process. (Rides have two basic types of conveyance: the visible and the invisible. Visible conveyance, here, means you're supposed to notice the vehicle: Peter Pan's pirate ship exists in the reality of the ride, like our hangglider in Soarin' or Spiderman's SCOOP. The invisible conveyance is supposed to be ignored once we're in, like the cars in the Fantasyland Snow White/Alice rides, the Doom Buggies in The Haunted Mansion, or classic old-school haunted houses. Both types, whether we're supposed to ignore them or not, still affect our experience.) 

Different forms of transport feel different, ever since cars and electrical power became common experiences around the same time (relative to human history). I'm going to talk too much about the history of transportation here, in a rough order of development, but it's probably necessary to belabor my point. 

When we walk, we control (as much as possible): speed, direction, our orientation relative to motion, even our eyeline height. When we walk, we are in control and our conscious mind feels that. We have agency.

An animal or boat can be steered to a point, but they both seem to have a mind of their own. A horse won't jump something too high, and without a powerful motor a boat is prey to the whims of many currents. And they're both dependent on navigable pathways. Chance takes a role, and human agency isn't complete.

A hot air balloon can be made to go up or down, and some rudders might help steer. Airships steer better, and actual planes can be steered really well. The winds and air currents can still affect us, but a human has a large measure of control, even if it's not us personally. We subconsciously feel the intent, and in art that feels like creative structure. (Soarin' Over California worked so well because it felt unstructured -- we suspend our disbelief, and fly on the air currents. Each discovery feels organic, and we just ignore the trappings of art, the cuts and score. Soarin' Around the World is too big a topic, and each scene is visibly working hard to be perfect, with no "mistakes" like the skiier falling to rebuild the illusion. SATW is too precious -- we happen to be there just when the whale splashes, so it feels like fake magic instead of a lucky accident.)

A railroad is structure incarnate: very limited pathways, decided years in advance, no diversions allowed. A human chose the available paths, and every second someone has picked which path, and the speed we move. An electrical bus-bar ride (like the old-school haunted houses or the Fantasyland dark rides) is like a train. You can choose which direction to look, but your path and speed are deliberately chosen. Our subconscious knows that, even as we consciously ignore that for the pleasure of art. 

A boat ride still feels more organic to us. There's rarely a pilot: we're floating on a river, we feel, and whatever's around that next bend just happens to be there -- a person couldn't have built this clearly ten-thousand year-old river just to trick and delight us. Our speed and direction are just as controlled as they would be on a bus-bar, but our ancestral relationship to waterways helps us forget that.

Obviously, some themes are better attuned to boating: Pirates of the Caribbean, log flumes, The Jungle Cruise. But storytelling rides can sometimes fool us better, hide the structure, and increase our enjoyment of pretending to believe, in a boat. Some nonboat rides are better themed to boats, but it's much cheaper to build a bus-bar. 

So why is it's a small world in a boat? It's not obvious thematically. The promotional materials made hay of "traveling the seven seas", even if we see The Eiffel Tower, The Taj Mahal, etc, which aren't exactly accessible by steamship. I think that one works better because it's so cartoony -- everything is deliberately fantastic, so perfect. The OG version from the 1964 New York World's Fair and Disneyland's transferred version funnel the boats through deliberately, obviously constructed blue concrete troughs. We're on water, and the floating feel constantly bounces us a little, just enough to nudge our subconscious into a more authentic mood. 

The IASW rebuild at Walt Disney World changed very little. The important change is from blue troughs to a flooded reality. We're still on a predetermined track, but each room has water up to the edge of the show scenes, and that fools us even more. We feel like we're randomly floating, which makes the exact same scenes more surprising in their details. Isn't it amazing, we feel, that we happened upon this? (This essay was inspired by the Alton Towers IASW-alike ride from 1981, Around The World in 80 Days. That ride is on a boat, presumably only because Small World is on a boat. It doesn't particularly need to be a boat ride -- anything even remotely resembling ...80 Days makes more sense to me as a hot-air balloon ride.) 

There are certainly pirate-themed rides, and Small-World knockoffs, that run electric cars through the scenes, but they don't feel the same. The jerky car movement makes it more difficult for us to deny the agency of the creators' decisions, so it doesn't seem like anything just *happens*. (At the risk of going too far afield in this discussion, I've also ridden a few hybrid types. During the rain scene in The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, our hunnypot starts rocking, as if the room is flooded, which is a fun cartoony effect after we've bounced with Tigger earlier. Pigeon Forge boasts The Jurassic Jungle Boat Ride, which uses a boat on a mechanical track. The speed is always controlled by the (loud) mechanisms, not water flow. We're always aware that the boat isn't floating free, though the ride has different, and frankly bigger, problems being convincing. I haven't yet been to Singapore, to ride the other notable hybrid form of fully-controlled boat.) 

Using a boat doesn't necessarily improve a ride, if the ride has other problems. But, if it can be fit into the theme, adding real water to the ride gives it a more natural tone, makes it more organic. Humans like to play, and we like to believe. Riding on water, instead of sparking metal, somehow makes that easier.

The Queen's Corgi (2019)

A quick introduction to this review. I wanted to raise some money for all the worthy causes out there, and a month ago I found a terrible movie. So I gave a small group of friends this challenge: if at least three of them donated $81.00 (a dollar, per person, per minute of film) to a bail fund or similar organization in support of BIPOC, I would watch the terrible movie and give them a detailed report. This is my preliminary report.

What do you need to know about this film? Well, first off, it's written by the writers of Gnomeo and Juliet (but not Sherlock Gnomes). It was produced in Belgium. It has a 0% score on Rotten Tomatoes. And, disappointingly for me, they redubbed it for American release. I like Jack Whitehall, who originally played Rex. I even really like Jon Culshaw's impression of Trump, which I hear 20ish times a year on Radio Four's Dead Ringers.


But the American cast is ... less impressive. Trump's voice actor did it under a pseudonym. And the top-billed actor is also clearly a pseudonym (cartoon fans will recognize the joke). Almost like they were ashamed of this.

Too bad Joey Camen didn't use a pseudonym -- he plays the only human character of color in the film. The UK cast avoided voiceover brownface by casting an actual person of Asian descent, but this film couldn't be bothered. (I can't find any decent biographical info on Camen -- please tell me if I'm offbase here.)

I assume the redubbing was done to accomodate script changes, presumably to Americanize the script -- I remember a few things that probably weren't in the original, like using "pee" instead of "widdle" or something. Also, for some reason, the swans in St. James' Park were called "evil geese." I mean, do they assume kids in America haven't heard of swans?

But then, the whole thing is divorced from anything real anyway. Prince Phillip is ugly, but he's also a total dick the whole time. I feel like he was probably the original antagonist in the first draft of the script, but that got rewritten to avoid controversy.

Which, I mean, how do you avoid controversy when Donald Trump's visit is an inciting incident in your film? This movie does it by writing him as a goofy child, which would be fun if it were Gerald Ford or Reagan. But real-life Donald Trump owns no dog. He would never pet a dog, or be nice to a dog, or (as portrayed in this film), push a dog around in a plush carriage and speak to it in babytalk. (If that sounds like fun to watch, let me remind you: ZERO PERCENT.)


Just one more small roundup of Trumpy things about this film, and then I'll move on, I promise. Melania (who, in the American version, has a wery-wery veird accent) mentions how big the President's hands are. He's gracious when he has to eat English food, which is the biggest lie in this entire film. This movie wants to make a few broad jokes about the man and move on, as if the entire world population isn't excruciatingly familiar with his monstrous effect on literally all our lives.

But then this movie doesn't expect us to be familiar with anything, not even other movies. It rips off Puss In Boots' big-eyes trick. It rips off the traffic cone road crossing from Toy Story 2. It somehow thinks a training montage, a la Rocky, is fresh and intriguing grounds for comedy. It thinks we've never heard a single riff on the rules of Fight Club.

There are a few jokes that I almost liked -- the film is set at Christmas, so out-of-nowhere, a group of dogs sing "Jingle Bells," a nod to the novelty record which might well be funny in a better movie. Similarly, a bigger role for the swans would probably work as comedy. I also like how kindly Elizabeth is portrayed here; all real-life personality aside, it's sweet to see her enjoy the dogs so much.

To sum up, this is absolutely the worst film I've seen in 2020, but it was for a good cause. If you have a few extra dollars, might I recommend you send them to the Equal Justice Initiative? Or a local bail fund for protestors, many of whom are still locked up in our COVID-hotspots? Or the Navajo Nation COVID fund?

If you donate, and send me a picture of your receipt, I will gladly answer any questions you have about this movie. Thanks for your time. Don't watch the film.

My Next 100 Movies

Hiya. Here's my next list of 100 movies. Since the last update, I've compiled a new list of films, which we'll get to in a minute. I've started reviewing all the things over on Twitter (my food reviews are here).

(A few notes: The cited release date is, as best I can tell, the first day a member of the general public could walk in off the street and buy a ticket to see the film, so festivals and premieres don't count. This only affected the chronological order in a few cases. Also, even less importantly, I composed this as a .txt document [because I'm an old, old person], so there are no diacritics over letters. Hence, I misspelled the names of a few directors, like Luis Buñuel.) 



1. Broken Blossoms (5/13/19) (DW Griffith)
2. Safety Last! (4/1/23) (F Newmeyer)
3. The Thief of Bagdad (3/18/24) (R Walsh)
4. The Jazz Singer (10/6/27) (A Crosland)
5. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (9/23/27) (FW Murnau)
6. Frankenstein (11/21/31) (J Whale)
7. Freaks (2/20/32) (T Browning)
8. Grand Hotel (4/12/32) (E Goulding)
9. Trouble In Paradise (10/21/32) (E Lubitsch)
10. Footlight Parade (10/21/33) (10/21/33) (L Bacon)
11. Duck Soup (11/17/33) (L McCarey)
12. The Thin Man (5/25/34) (WS Van Dyke)
13. Mutiny on The Bounty (11/8/35) (F Lloyd)
14. A Night At The Opera (11/15/35) (S Wood)
15. Modern Times (2/5/36) (C Chaplin)
16. Grand Illusion (6/8/37) (J Renoir)
17. The Life of Emile Zola (8/11/37) (W Dieterle)
18. You Can't Take It With You (9/1/38) (F Capra)
19. Bringing Up Baby (11/23/38) (H Hawks)
20. Stagecoach (3/3/39) (J Ford)
21. Ninotchka (11/9/39 (E Lubitsch)
22. His Girl Friday (1/11/40) (H Hawks)
23. The Grapes of Wrath (1/24/40) (J Ford)
24. Rebecca (4/12/40) (A Hitchcock)
25. The Great Dictator (10/15/40) (C Chaplin)
26. The Bank Dick (11/29/40) (E Cline)
27. The Philadelphia Story (12/26/40) (G Cukor)
28. The Lady Eve (2/25/41) (P Sturges)
29. How Green Was My Valley (10/28/41) (J Ford)
30. Sullivan's Travels (1/15/42) (P Sturges)
31. To Be Or Not To Be (2/19/42) (E Lubitsch)
32. Yankee Doodle Dandy (5/29/42) (M Curtiz)
33. Mrs. Miniver (6/2/42) (W Wyler)
34. Cat People (12/25/42) (J Tourneur)
35. Shadow Of A Doubt (1/12/43) (A Hitchcock)
36. Meet Me In St. Louis (11/28/44) (V Minnelli)
37. Mildred Pierce (9/28/45) (M Curtiz)
38. The Lost Weekend (11/29/45) (B Wilder)
39. The Big Sleep (8/23/46) (H Hawks)
40. Out of the Past (11/25/47) (J Tourneur)
41. The Third Man (9/1/49) (C Reed)
42. Adam's Rib (11/18/49) (G Cukor)
43. Sunset Boulevard (8/10/50) (B Wilder)
44. A Place in the Sun (8/14/51) (G Stevens)
45. The Day The Earth Stood Still (9/18/51) (R Wise)
46. Umberto D (1/20/52) (V de Sica)
47. Shane (4/23/53) (G Stevens)
48. La Strada (9/22/54) (F Fellini)
49. The Night of the Hunter (7/26/55) (C Laughton)
50. War and Peace (8/21/56) (K Vidor)
51. Around The World in 80 Days (10/17/56) (M Todd)
52. Paths of Glory (12/25/57) (S Kubrick)
53. Touch of Evil (4/23/58) (O Welles)
54. Mon Oncle (5/10/58) (J Tati)
55. Gigi (5/15/58) (V Minnelli)
56. The 400 Blows (5/4/59) (F. Truffaut)
57. Hiroshima Mon Amour (6/10/59) (A Resnais)
58. La Dolce Vita (2/5/60) (F Fellini)
59. The Manchurian Candidate (10/24/62) (J Frankenheimer)
60. To Kill A Mockingbird (12/25/62) (R Mulligan)
61. The Shop on Main Street (10/8/65) (J Kadar)
62. Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid (10/24/69) (GR Hill)
63. Patton (4/2/70) (F Schaffner)
64. The French Connection (10/9/71) (W Friedkin)
65. Harold And Maude (12/20/71) (H Ashby)
66. Cabaret (2/13/72) (B Fosse)
67. The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (9/15/72) (L Bunuel)
68. American Graffiti (8/11/73) (G Lucas)
69. Mean Streets (10/14/73) (M Scorcese)
70. Amarcord (12/18/73) (F Fellini)
71. All The President's Men (4/9/76) (A Pakula)
72. That Obscure Object of Desire (8/17/77) (L Bunuel)
73. Get Out Your Handkerchiefs (1/11/78) (B Blier)
74. The Tin Drum (5/3/79) (V Schlondorff)
75. Apocalypse Now (8/15/79) (FF Coppola) 
76. Atlantic City (9/3/80) (L Malle)
77. Return of the Secaucus Seven (9/5/80) (J Sayles)
78. Ordinary People (9/19/80) (R Redford)
79. Pixote (9/26/80) (H Babenco)
80. Blade Runner (6/25/82) (R Scott)
81. Gandhi (11/30/82) (R Attenborough)
82. Hannah And Her Sisters (2/7/86) (W Allen)
83. Platoon (12/19/86) (O Stone) 
84. Broadcast News (12/16/87) (JL Brooks)
85. The Story Of Women (2/15/88) (C Chabrol)
86. Women On The Verge of A Nervous Breakdown (11/11/88) (P Almodovar)
87. Cinema Paradiso (11/17/88) (G Tornatore)
88. Do The Right Thing (7/21/89) (S Lee)
89. The Freshman (7/20/90) (A Bergman)
90. Dances With Wolves (11/6/90) (K Costner)
91. The Double Life of Veronique (5/15/91) (K Kieslowski)
92. Raise The Red Lantern (9/91) (Z Yimou)
93. The Last of The Mohicans (8/26/92) (M Mann)
94. The Story of Qiu Ju (9/92) (Z Yimou)
95. The Crying Game (10/30/92) (N Jordan)
96. Farewell My Concubine (1/1/93) (Chen/Kaige)
97. Forrest Gump (7/6/94) (R Zemeckis)
98. Babe (8/4/95) (C Noonan)
99. Leaving Las Vegas (10/27/95) (M Figgis)
100. Fargo (3/8/96) (Coens)

If you feel like buying any of these films, please consider using this link. I'll get a few pennies if you do, to help me buy all the films I don't already own. Thanks!

My Big Ol' Cartoon List.

So, how's it been going? I've been doing well, but all my media (and food) reviews have been going on my Facebook page. So you can head over thataway. (I don't like friending people I don't know in person, but all those posts are set to public, so go wild.)

On my 40th birthday, my wife and I sat home and watched a random classic movie from my DVDs-To-Be-Watched pile. It turned out to be Singin' In The Rain, which is absolutely delightful. And so over the course of that year, I watched the 100 Best Movies of All Time (as decided by Jim Emerson). Then, I wrote up a capsule review for each one (or, at least, 72 of them, and the rest are coming soon).

This year (I'm one week into year 42), I'm watching the best cartoons of all time in chronological order. I have two lists. The list of shorts came straight from Jerry Beck's choices for his book (which I haven't read yet but am awaiting via The Pony Express). (I'm considering a third, secret, list of about ten documentaries, but haven't put it together yet.)

The list of features was a lot harder. I couldn't find a good one, so set out to compile one myself. It's deeply flawed, and has a serious case of recency bias, but it's what I've got. (The shorts will help cure the worst recency problems, since almost all of them predate 1970.) Before I get to the list, here's a roundup of my main sources:
TimeOut Magazine (A list of 100 including lots of critics and animators' choices.)
Complex (A group listing of 50)
Ten For Adults (A BBC roundup)
Ten Greatest (From The Guardian)
Richard Corliss (50 Best from Time Magazine)
50 Best of the 21st Century
Elle Magazine (32)
Two lists of stop-motion films   -1-  -2-
40 Best European
I also consulted Metacritic, the Annie Awards, the Academy Awards, the Saturn Awards, and this list of early features. Before doing all the math, I also compiled a list of my 30 must-sees, to fill any gaps in the math. (Features with an asterisk by the score came from that list.)

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Title (Year, Total Score)

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926, 10.1)
The Tale of the Fox (1930, 6)
The New Gulliver (1935, 0*)
The Seven Ravens (1937, 0*)
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937, 17)
Gulliver's Travels (1939, 2*)
Pinocchio (1940, 21.5)
Fantasia (1940, 20.8)
Dumbo (1941, 23.7)
Bambi (1942, 18)
Saludos Amigos (1943, 1*)
The Three Caballeros (1944, 3.5*)
Song of the South (1947, 1.5*)
Cinderella (1950, 7)
Alice In Wonderland (1951, 2.5*)
Peter Pan (1953, 1*)
Animal Farm (1954, 7)
Sleeping Beauty (1959, 4*)
101 Dalmatians (1961, 13)
The Jungle Book (1967, 8.5)
Yellow Submarine (1968, 22.1)
Charlotte's Web (1073, 0*)
Heavy Traffic (1973, 7)
Robin Hood (1973, 5.1)
Fantastic Planet (1973, 14.2)
Allegro Non Troppo (1976, 8)
Watership Down (1978, 17.7)
The King and the Mockingbird (1980, 8.4)
The Secret of NIMH (1982, 15.2)
When the Wind Blows (1986, 11)
Grave of the Fireflies (1988, 20.9)
My Neighbor Totoro (1988, 24.4)
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988, 12.9)
Akira (1988, 21.7)
Alice (1988, 11.9)
Kiki's Delivery Service (1989, 7.6)
The Little Mermaid (1989, 21)
Only Yesterday (1991, 8)
Beauty and the Beast (1991, 28.8)
Porco Rosso (1992, 8.7)
Aladdin (1992, 21.7)
The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993, 24.6)
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993, 8)
The Lion King (1994, 22)
Ghost in the Shell (1995, 10.5)
Toy Story (1995, 31)
Princess Mononoke (1997, 19)
Perfect Blue (1998, 8.6)
Mulan (1998, 8)
South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut (1999, 18.4)
The Iron Giant (1999, 24.4)
Toy Story 2 (1999, 13.1)
Chicken Run (2000, 18.8)
Metropolis (2001, 7)
Shrek (2001, 11.7)
Spirited Away (2001, 40.8)
Millenium Actress (2001, 10)
Waking Life (2001, 18.6)
Monsters, Inc. (2001, 23.4)
Finding Nemo (2003, 28.7)
The Triplets of Belleville (2003, 31.5)
Tokyo Godfathers (2003, 6)
The Incredibles (2004, 30.9)
Corpse Bride (2005, 6.1)
Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005, 31.3)
Paprika (2006, 12.7)
Ratatouille (2007, 29.1)
Persepolis (2007, 31.7)
Sita Sings the Blues (2008, 11.6)
Waltz With Bashir (2008, 23.2)
Kung Fu Panda (2008, 9.4)
WALL-E (2008, 32.5)
Coraline (2009, 22)
The Secret of Kells (2009, 5.7)
Mary and Max (2009, 10)
Up (3009, 31.4)
Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009, 29.5)
The Princess and the Frog (20069, 2.5*)
How to Train Your Dragon (2010, 16.5)
The Illusionist (2010, 11.9)
Toy Story 3 (2010, 31.4)
Chico & Rita (2010, 6.7)
Tangled (2010, 7.6)
Rango (2011, 9.5)
Paranorman (2012, 6)
Wreck-It Ralph (2012, 13)
Consuming Spirits (2012, 9.2)
Ernest and Celestine (2012, 10.7)
The Wind Rises (2013, 7.6)
Frozen (2013, 12)
The Tale of Princess Kaguya (2013, 9.6)
The LEGO Movie (2014, 21.6)
It's Such a Beautiful Day  (2014, 24.8)
Shaun The Sheep Movie (2015, 5.7)
Inside Out (2015, 19.3)
Anomalisa (2015, 14.9)
Zootopia (2016, 10.1)
Your Name. (2016, 8.3)
Coco (2017, 12.2)
The Breadwinner (2017, 3.1*)

If you feel like buying any of these films, please consider using this link. I'll get a few pennies if you do, to help me buy all the films I don't already own. Thanks!

Savory Saturday: Lay's Everything Bagel Chips

Hey, I'm back! And so is the Lay's "Do Us A Flavor" group of food outliers. Let's dig in.

The "Everything Bagel With Cream Cheese" chips don't smell like much of anything, which is a shame. I actually put my whole nose into the bag, and mostly smelled the bag and maybe some fried potatoes. (Okay, I'm fighting the dreaded summer-cold, but that can't account for ALL of it.) The cream cheese is front and center in the taste arena, with all the other things hanging waaaay back. I guess it's too much to hope for the taste of an actual bagel in a kettle chip, but I can't even tell much about the seasonings. (The ingredients list includes actual poppyseeds, which of course leads me to speculate that consuming enough might cause a drug-test malfunction, but people who would eat that many of these chips have bigger problems.)

Of the three new flavors, this was the one I was most excited for. With the kettle chip texture, I even held out hope that we might get those wonderful crunchy bits of blackened onion, but this is a letdown there too.

No matter -- I've got two more new flavors to try, and I'm sure to really like one of them. Oh, and speaking of things I'm sure to really like, I'm off to see the live Mystery Science Theater tour tonight, and I'm finally restarting those reviews here in the next week.

As usual, the buy link is a ridiculous price, but these are currently available ALLLLLLL over the country, so you shouldn't have a hard time finding them at a local store.

Savory Saturday: Sopa Azteca and Tacos Vegetales

Hi, all. It's April, and I'm back from my vacation. I ate farrrr too much unhealthy food, most of which was delicious indeed. This is the only review I'll be writing about my vacation food, though. My wife and I have a tradition of eating in the San Angel Inn at Epcot, which has some of the best restaurant ambiance anywhere in the world.

Sidebar: Not that you asked, but the ride which begins alongside this restaurant has gotten a big upgrade in recent years. I last rode it in 2013, and since then the finale video-screen has been replaced by animatronic figures of The Three Caballeros. They're ancient, in audio-animatronic terms -- they've existed in basically the same form for 46 of the 55 years since Disney started producing AAs. But, they give the ride a real sense of climax. My absolute favorite theme-park blogger, Foxxfur, had this to say: 

The initial climax of Gran Fiesta Tour was just another screen in the back of a stage, and I always found the animation on that final screen to be less inspired than the rest of the animation in the attraction, and especially weak compared to Ward Kimball's masterpiece song sequence from the 1946 film. There's now something that neither El Rio nor Gran Fiesta Tour had in that space: a real sense of payoff, that you rode the boat and reached a goal for a darn good reason.

Sometime since my last visit, there's been another change. The restaurant has finally stopped serving my old favorite, the duck tacos. It seemed wrong to eat duck outside the entrance to a ride which contained a dark joke about Donald's cousin being roasted and served to diners, but they were always tasty. I got a vegetable taco plate instead (and, as you can see, Donald seems happy about the change). The vegetables were well-seasoned, and blended well with the cheese and crema on top. 

I also got the tortilla soup, a perennial favorite of mine in any form. Besides the broth and tortilla strips, it also has avocado, peppers, and cheese. (You can read the official descriptions of both from the menu here.) As always, the ambiance was more impressive than the food here. (But how could it not be?) If you're ever in the area, and have both the funds and even a slight appreciation for Mexican food, I recommend this restaurant with all my heart. Why not make a reservation now?

March's Food Model Spotlight

In honor of Saint Patrick's Day, all the food models for March have been green. In order of their appearance:

The Funko Pop Godzilla is a huge, bulky guy. Like most of the Pop figures, he isn't very articulated. In fact, no part of him is movable at all. I was lucky to be able to balance a potato chip on his arm in one review. But, he looks adorable, and is scaled up from most of the Pop characters.

Playability: 2/10.   Displayability: 8/10.

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Next, the Kidrobot Morbo is a fun guy. I loved the series of Kidrobot Futurama blind boxes, and spent way too much trying to get all my favorite characters. (I ended up with three Frys, for example.) Morbo can turn his head, and rotate his arms. It's not a lot of articulation, but even those few points give him some personality. He even comes with a little accessory of Dr. Flimflam's Vein Cream.

Playability: 5/10. Displayability: 7/10.

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On to our loscannic friends. Naveen is just an accessory, really. He comes alongside the Funko Pop Tiana figure. He can't move or pose at all, really, just sit there. He's scaled just right to sit beside Tiana (and her costars Louis and Dr. Facilier). Still, I think the Funko Pop style works well for this tiny frog.

Playability: 2/10. Displayability: 6/10.

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Finally, Kermit and Robin.  I loved the old Palisades Muppet collection (speaking of toylines I spent far too much on), and was excited to see the new Diamond Select versions in person. They're ... different. I liked the option of the bases for the Palisades figures, which made the characters much more poseable. On the other hand, Diamond has made Kermit extremely articulated. By my count, he has 18 joints! (Robin has 5.) Unfortunately, he doesn't stand very well, so I had to lean him against things for all his photos. Even more unfortunately, his eyes aren't right. It's hard for toymakers to mass-produce Kermit and get the thickness of his pupil-slits correct. (That's also my main complaint about the current Pez design.)

Robin, however, is great. The Diamond Robin looks great, and he can pose well. (The old Palisades Robin was fine, but he could only sit.) But perhaps most importantly, you can get Kermit and Robin (and Bean, who will be showing up in this space next month, and a stool and a banjo -- the more expensive comic-shop version also has a log, a ukelele, and another chair) for like $23. The cheapest Palisades basic Kermit on eBay right this second is $25.00. 

Playability: 8/10. Displayability: 6/10.

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Tomorrow is April 1, but I promise there's no trick; just a salty food review. Oh, and another new food-modeling friend. See you then.

Thursday Treat: Caramel Cheetos Sweetos

Our froggy friends are back to taste-test the other Cheetos Sweetos flavor with me.

I like these much better than the cinnamon ones, and it might have to do with the interplay between the savory and sweet elements. I'm not a huge salted-caramel guy, but these are just delightful. I'm tempted to crush these and sprinkle them on a dish of vanilla ice cream.

Kermit and Robin both appreciated the sweetness of these, though I don't think Kermit's suggestion to add them into dragonfly-ripple ice cream sounds very good.

Naveen doesn't get much junk food, being married to a brilliant chef and all. The only intelligible thought he had is, and I quote: "Eating the whole bag would be nice, yes?"

Yes, it would.

I'll be back tomorrow to talk for a few sentences about all of the green food models that visited this month.

Tuesday Birthday Treat: Party Cake Peeps

You might've noticed that the nonfood posts are a little light on the ground these days. Well, I'm secretly out of town, celebrating my lovely wife's birthday. Let's see who wants to help celebrate.

Why, it's a whole army of frogs! Kermit, Naveen, and Robin all came by to try the first of many different Peeps I'll be eating over the next five weeks.

The first, and most important thing, about these Peeps is the smell. When I opened the package, I got an overwhelming whiff of buttercream frosting. The rest of the experience is kind of a letdown, sadly. The marshmallow and sugar coating taste pretty much the same as usual, sadly. Still, that smell is great.

I'm in a hurry, since we're pressed for time this week, so this review will be just that short (sorry not sorry). More food, and more frog friends, to come!

Saturday Salt: Lay's Beer 'n Brats

Greetings, puny earthlings! It is I, Morbo! Prepare to hear my review of these potato chips. They are flavored with hops and salted meats, for Morbo to devour with his mighty jaws. I gave them to Fawn and the kids, and they couldn't believe it. They were delicious! Pathetic human?

Thanks, Morbo. Hi, folks, it's Mark again. Morbo's right -- these chips are pretty good. The mixture is heavier on the beer than the brats (for some reason, it's real beer flavoring, which I didn't expect). But, these still have that unctuous hot-grease mouthfeel you get from a fresh-grilled sausage, which is a pretty good achievement. In fact, these are so rich that I don't think I'd eat these alongside a sandwich.  Back to you, Morbo.

Morbo has enjoyed this visit to Earth, and the tour of the tiny humans' snack foods. Now, humans, prepare for Morbo to destroy this entire bag of tiny potato slivers! 

While Morbo is finishing off the chips, I better sign off. He hasn't threatened me personally yet, but I know it's just a matter of time. Thanks for tuning in this week. Next week, another green friend (it's March, and all the food models are green) will help me try more snacks.

Thursday Treat: Cinnamon Sugar Cheetos Sweetos

Today, Morbo and I are trying out the Cinnamon Sugar Sweetos. These aren't new for 2017, though I think the seasonal egg shape might be. I've seen the Sweetos brand around since at least last Christmas, though I hadn't gotten around to them until now.

They're ... saltier than I expected. I know Cheetos is a savory brand, but there's almost too much savory in this blend. I like cinnamon sugar as a rule, but these are, oddly, not sweet enough for my taste. (I might prefer just dry Cinnamon Toast Crunch straight out of the box.) What's nice is the calorie count -- this decent-sized bag is just 140 calories (or two Peeps Oreos), probably because there isn't too much actual sugar.

Morbo didn't care for the texture of these, since they have the same give of most cheese puffs. (He and I agree that Cheetos are a superior snack because of the crunch, which for some reason reminded him of puny human bones.)

Still, the taste isn't unpleasant, and the egg shape is nice. I have another flavor of these to try next week, and I suspect Caramel goes better with the savory nature of these. So I'll keep you updated.

(As usual, Amazon expensive. Find local store. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.)

MST3K #604: Zombie Nightmare

It's #604, with more delinquents and a baseball-bat-wielding zombie.

Our movie this time is a low-budget Canadian rock-teen-horror-baseball-voodoo film (yes, ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE), featuring Adam West and Tia Carrere. A chunky baseball player stops two young punks from raping a young woman, and one of them stabs him to death, right in front of his son. Then, years later, his grown-up son prevents a robbery and gets coincidentally run down in front of the store. The new young punks (one is the son of the second, non-murdering punk from the prologue, and is also a rapist) drive off, leaving the son to die in the street. His mother calls on the young woman from the prologue, who luckily is a voodoo witch (there are lots of those in Montreal, doncha know?) and they revive the son. He's not really himself, though, just a vengeance-bent zombie.

Why you should always call before you dig.

There's a young cop trying to solve all the teen murders, and his boss (Mr. West, there), seems to know an awful lot of the players in this case. Since, as it turns out, he's the stabby rapey punk from the opening, and the old baseball guy gets zombified just long enough to drag him down to hell.

The movie is pretty bad, but it kinda knows it. (Or at least the creators did -- the DVD special feature has several of the stars talking about their reflections on the MST version of their film, and how much they liked the show even before they were on it.) Adam West wasn't quite in full self-parody mode yet, though that time wasn't far off. As a result, his character work and mustache are enacted seriously, even his breakdown during the scene pictured above.

A deleted scene from Batman Vs. Soup.

And since Adam's in the movie, it's only right that Mike and the bots spend a lot of time talking about Batman. Crow's even written a sketch about it, but he threw it out, so Mike's wearing those tiny shorts for no good reason. Besides all the obvious Batman jokes, there are also a decent amount of jokes about the Canadian setting (David Steinberg, Andrea Martin, Bob and Doug McKenzie, and even The Kids In The Hall get called out).

Sidebar: Boy, do I ever wish the Mads didn't wear that makeup for their voodoo phase. Okay, maybe even the makeup would be okay, but the Screamin' Jay Hawkins bone-in-nose getup is just so tasteless.

This is my second episode in a row to mention: The NRA, Peanut Buster Parfaits, Chi-Chi's, Frankenstein, an Orlon sweater, Elvis, and ABBA. It's the third to mention Happy Days (four out of the last five, and now retired). And three out of my last four episodes have mentioned The Dilly Bar (that's it, all Dairy Queen references are retired too).

A (dark) joke I had to look up: "Were they the Tonton Macoutes?"
A joke that didn't age well: "He's doing the Nestea Plunge!"
My favorite joke: "George Romero's Casey At The Bat." (Honorable mention to the garage door closing: "That's a really trivial use of her dark powers.")
Overall, I rate this one 6/10. The movie is too dark to see, too noisy to hear. The riffs are on point, but the movie is a tad too serious for me to fully enjoy.

Up next, I'm watching #616, Racket Girls.

Tuesday Treat: Peeps Oreos

Today, Morbo and I are trying the new Peeps Oreos, a mad-science concoction that shouldn't work at all. I was all for them, though Morbo took some convincing. (He was worried that, at 70 calories apiece, the cookies would go straight to his gigantic forehead.)

The creme filling is supposedly the flavor of Peeps, though your basic Peep just tastes like sugar and a little vanilla. I don't know that these taste that different from a standard Golden Oreo, but the pink really pops, and as a whole they are just fine to me. When I asked him how he liked the cookies, Morbo would only shout "Morbo is PLEASED!" So there's that.

If you like Golden Oreos, junk-food mashups, and the color pink, then Peeps Oreos are made just for you.

(The Amazon link below makes you jump through a few hoops to buy the cookies, like being a Prime subscriber, and adding 5 more grocery items, so maybe just find them at a local store instead, if you prefer.)

MST3K #523: Village of the Giants

It's #523, with some giant "teen" delinquents.

Based on Dreams From My Father

Our movie this time is a teen party film, like Catalina Caper but without the blazing wit or hard rock. It's an affable movie, which only wants to make us laugh. And it pulls out all the stops: giant ducks dancing adorably, then being roasted and eaten; Tommy Kirk mugging; and Ronny Howard nearly killing himself repeatedly. Then, the film ends with possibly the most casually distasteful joke I've ever seen in a MST'd movie. (To sum up: Ronny is a chemical wunderkind, and has invented a goo that makes living creatures grow. A troupe of little people wander, on foot, into town so they can get bigger. Get it?)

Eldritch Cleavage

Along the way, we also see Beau Bridges make heartfelt speeches about how hard the teens have it these days (apparently he personally rewrote the dialogue), and the 30-year-old teens dance to a gaggle of pop songs from today's top hitmakers (or at least Freddy "Boom Boom" Cannon, whom I like, but who is no Little Richard). Finally, Ronny creates the antidote and shrinks those delinquents back down to size, The sheriff decides to forget all about that time they kidnapped his daughter and literally threatened her life. It's fun!

He was even stripped of his spitcurl!

You know what's actually fun, though? The arc of host segments. This is the first time in my binge that they've laser-focused on a single story (not counting the run of Thanksgiving skits way back during K02). And what a story it is! Frank has been downsized, and over 90 minutes of in-universe time, he grows a beard and watches weeks of daytime television. Oh, and Torgo is applying for his old job. Plenty of fantastic character stuff from Frank, and I always love seeing Mike's Torgo (there's one theme-music joke here which I can't even describe, but it sure is great). The whole thing is just a lovefest for Frank (with another great song by Mike -- and his lovely bride), and it's not till the nonstinger that we realize it's all thinly camouflaged love for another departed Frank. I'm watching #624 soon, so I'll hold off on my eulogy for TV's Frank till then, but this is a great tribute.

And even without the Zappa tribute, this episode has some out-of-left-field references: Mudhoney, The Fugs, Bukowski, and Ed Gein all get mentioned (putting to rest my complaint regarding too little avant-garde trivia in the last episode). Since Ronny has a lot of screen time, we hear a few lines from "The Wells Fargo Wagon," but more impressive to me is the other song from Meredith Willson: "Chicken Fat," the song despised by generations of exercise-avoiders. And there's a reference to Animal from The Muppets, with a very creditable impression.

This is my second episode in a row to mention: Deney Terio, Honey I Shrunk The Kids, William Conrad, Acapulco HEAT, Dudley Do-Right, Ed Sullivan, What's Happening!!, Dirty Harry, Happy Days, North By Northwest, The Chevy Chase Show, and Gymkata (now retired). This is the third in a row to quote a song by The Who, and the third of my last four to quote Groucho (also newly retired).

A joke I had to look up: "The ravaging effects of Osgood-Schlatter disease."
A joke that didn't age well: "Frank, you haven't been off that couch since Vicki!"
My favorite joke: I enjoyed "The Ope of Greenwich Village," but it was just edged out by "Very, very white-collar crime."
Overall, I rate this 10/10. The movie is perfectly goofy, and the host segments are impeccable. I'd gladly show this one as an introduction to anyone who hasn't seen the show before.

Up next, I'm watching #604, Zombie Nightmare.

Saturday Salt: Lay's Southwestern Queso

Gollyzilla's final snack for the week is one of the new Lay's chip flavors (there are three). It smells like cheese and onion when you first open the bag, but not much.

There's plenty of cheese flavoring, and some tomato and plenty of spices. In fact, this is a little past the limit of heat I personally like on a snack chip. (Gollyzilla thought it wasn't nearly spicy enough -- he said it almost extinguished his inner flame. Poor guy.) The spice doesn't overwhelm anything else at first, but it sticks around long after the other flavors are gone, as heat tends to do. I can't imagine eating the whole bag in one sitting, as I did with some of the last limited-time Lay's. (Did I mention how much I loved the Brazilian Picanha, and even the Tzatziki, from the last batch?)

There's nothing wrong with these chips, but they're not quite my style. Like I mentioned, I have two more new flavors to try in coming weeks, so I'm sure I'll find another one I like better.

The price on Amazon is high-markup, secondary-market stuff, so your buy link today is from Target. You're welcome.

MST3K #519: Outlaw (Of Gor)

It's #519, with a parallel-universe jerk of a hero.

Don't get your hopes up.

Our movie this time is a tiresome fantasy slog, based (loosely) on a notoriously misogynistic series of fantasy novels. And it's a sequel to something. Tarl Cabot (sure, that's believable as the name of a mid-80s American college professor) is a fella from Earth who found himself drawn to another planet, where he had some kind of adventures, though the flashbacks don't tell us much at all. It doesn't matter though, since he's quickly pulled back (along with an irritating sidekick character). And immediately, he has to save the kingdom from evil.

Jack Palance, showing the depths he fell to before City Slickers.

An ambitious woman has seduced the kind, beloved king (whose daughter is Cabot's true love). A priest-king (why would anyone cast Palance as a religious leader??) is colluding with her to overthrow the king, take over the kingdom, and undo all the progressive freedom and justice and stuff. (Nope, no political sidebars from me today. You can write it yourself -- seems pretty obvious.)

Cabot's earthman sidekick betrays him at the first scent of sex, the queen murders the king and frames Cabot, and the princess is imprisoned. Oh, and we see a LOT of body parts. Like, a lot. Thighs and calves, buttcheeks and sideboobs, and plenty of greasy oily sweat. In the end, Cabot is spurred into action by the queen's slaving policies, and manages to defeat her, marrying his princess and becoming king. (It seems the original novels took a different approach to slavery, and spent a lot of time on pretty backwards gender relations. The DVD bonus features include a short documentary about the original novels [they were written by an American college professor -- wishful thinking much?], along with the revelation that this film was shot in South Africa, during Apartheid. Ick, double ick, and damn humanity in general.)

Big, buttery slabs of Fabio! (feat. Crow's Leno chin)

It's my first Mike episode of the binge (his seventh as host overall), and he's already in full-flow. The episode first shows him rough-housing with Tom and Crow (and, naturally, it ends badly.). This episode's "invention exchange" is one in name only, since Mike and the bots are presenting Fabio kits. Clay and Frank present a totally-real time machine. This would be the final invention exchange, and I'm kind of glad they decided to abandon the concept. Mike wasn't that maker guy; he was a song-writing guy. And boy, does this episode have a great song. "Tubular, Boobular Joy" is a masterpiece of pop-novelty music-craft, properly beloved in the fandom.

The quality of the riffs is pretty indistinguishable from my last Joel episode. The obscurest riffs are slightly less avant-garde and slightly more 70s TV, but that's a first, unscientific impression, so take it with a grain of salt. There were an awful lot of jokes I wanted to specifically mention here, so here's just a few:

• "It's time for The Brutal Gourmet."
• "Here you go, Socrates."
• "Honey, I shrunk the Nelson."
• "He dislocated his mandible!"

This is my second episode to mention: Dilly Bars, Cosmo, Marlene Deitrich, a song by The Who, Cliffhanger, The Lambada, and "Sampo!" It's the third in a row to mention Jethro Tull, and the third out of the last four to reference Mr. Ed. Four out of my last five have mentioned The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and five out of the last seven referenced Indiana Jones (both now retired).

A joke I had to look up: "Joe Namath!"
A joke that didn't age well: "Kathie Lee had her baby." (Honorable mention: the reference to Ted Danson's notorious blackface appearance.)
My favorite joke: "This is the life." "For you maybe, not for the women."
Overall, I rate this one 6/10. The movie has a lot of things happen, but it's just so dull. I can't fault the in-theater riffs, but (song notwithstanding) the host segments aren't perfect.

Up next, it's #523, Village of the Giants.

Thursday Treat: Hostess Shamrock CupCakes

Gollyzilla and I are enjoying a tasty one today. It's our second (and last) Saint Patrick's Day food. I've always had a soft spot for the classic Hostess CupCakes, though I only eat them about once a year. These have green icing on top, and the creamy filling is both green and minty.

When you unwrap the cupcake, you get hit with a huge whiff of mint smell, in addition to the traditional chocolate. And unlike the Peppermint Twinkie, the mint is strong enough, well-balanced with the dark chocolate of the cake. Like the classic Hostess cupcakes, it's a perfect hit of sugar delivery, 160 calories right to the sweet tooth and bloodstream.

Apparently these sold out really early most places, and I could only find one online source for it. Again, I can't vouch for this link, but if you really want to try these, you can risk your $8.00. (If you can find any in real life, I would expect to pay less than half that, of course.)

Or, you can just wait for next March, when I hope they'll be back. Just like Gollyzilla. (He -- and I -- will see you on Saturday with a potato chip review. And then we'll both fight King Kong in a summer tentpole movie in 2020.)