Dude, I’ve totally dragged ass this week on writing a post. I was supposed to put up my Best and Worst movies of 2009 but I just didn’t get around to finishing them. I’ve also got another article reviewing original series Star Trek episodes that I could write, but I just haven’t. Or an article about a great book series I just finished on Tuesday. Any of these could have (nay, should have) been your article for this week, but I just decided to do what my friend Steve and I always did in college. I called it a “personal week”. Meaning I didn’t do s**t.
So, to tide everyone over, I’m going to show you two funny videos I’ve found around the net. Sorta keep you entertained. I fully intend to thrust into your consciousness my best/worst movie lists for 2009, so prepare for that. Until then, laugh along with these funny and insane videos.
Everyone here knows my love of the Back to the Future trilogy. Well Tom Wilson, the guy who plays Biff in the series, actually does stand up comedy now. This is one of his best bits. It’s a song about all the dumb questions he gets asked over and over by fans.
Well played, Japan. Well. Played. You have actually won the Internet with this video.
Well, as many of you may have noticed I missed a blog entry last week. It’s rare when I don’t come up with something to post. However, I had some medical issues the last few weeks that culminated in me being laid up on the couch pretty much all last week. You may not care, but let me give you the Cliff’s Notes (or Pax’s Notes, if you will) of my last few weeks. Don’t worry, I’ll leave out the grosser details.
I love time travel. I’ve been fascinated with it as long as I can remember. I’ve read countless books on the subject, including Stephen Hawking’s dense 
The Tardis from Doctor Who – I’ve never really watched Dr Who…EVER, but I’ve always liked the look of his flying time machine/phone booth. This police box is more than just a time machine, it also serves as a base of operations and a space ship. It has the cool feature of being much larger on the inside than you would expect on the outside. They can also change shape to blend in with their surroundings. Apparently, though, Dr Who’s vessel is an outdated model that has a faulty chameleon circuit that is stuck in the police box form. It also is unreliable in it’s time travel because it’s an older model and prone to breakdowns. Sounds like something Han Solo and Chewie would piece together with spit, duct tape and a prayer.
The phone booth from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure – This was a cool idea, and I like the gimmick of it, but in practice it leaves a lot to be desired. There’s not much room on the inside, and other than travelling to the 20th and 21st centuries, the vehicle itself might seem out of place and draw attention. I don’t imagine our forefathers would take kindly to a phone booth popping up in the middle of the White House lawn. However having a “time book” to tell you how to go wherever you want to go would be nice. But, again, Bill & Ted proved it’s pretty easy to be stuck in time when their antenna was damaged. But, again-again, they fixed it pretty easy with some discarded metal canisters. Time travel must not be too hard if Bill and Ted can service a broken time booth. Also, I never liked this movie’s rule that the clock in San Dimas is always ticking. Meaning when Bill and Ted left on their time trip, if they spent 24 hours searching for historical persons, when they return it had to be 24 hours later. That makes no sense. You are in a time machine, you should be able to go back to 1 minute after you left. That’s somewhat the point of time travel, no?
The quantum accelerator from Quantum Leap – This is a cool way to travel as you become someone else and interact with the people around you as that other person. The downside, you have no control over where you are going or if you will ever be able to return home. And you can’t take back souvenirs because your body jumps away into the next situation. So, actually, this time machine sucks. Nevermind.
Time vehicle from Time Cop – This is another cool time transport device. Controlled by rooms of supercomputers, you can pinpoint exactly where you are traveling in time. However, you can’t travel to the future, only to the past and back to your original point in time. Take a look at the picture; the time machine is an angular, wedge shaped vehicle that travels forward on a set of tracks at an extreme velocity towards a brick wall surrounded by some weird, stone circle structure. When it reaches a certain point on the track it pierces the fabric of the time barrier and disappears. Interestingly, the movie alludes to the fact that the vehicle sometimes doesn’t work properly and crashes into the aforementioned brick wall at the far end killing the passengers. My question? Why did they build a wall at the end of the track in the first place? Why didn’t they leave the room open at one end with no wall/giant circle structure to crash into, then when the ship doesn’t pierce the time barrier, it just glides to a stop. Nobody has to die. At the very least they could put some pillows or a giant net at the end to catch the ship. I mean, COME ON, I have three or four better ideas than a deadly brick wall to kill my passengers and I’m not even a futuristic scientist building a time machine. After the ship breaks the time barrier and disappears, the time passengers are dropped into the past…sans vehicle. Where does the giant car-sized machine go as it is not seen in the past at all and magically appears back on the tracks later in the movie?
Delorean from Back to the Future – This is the quinessential time machine. Cool car, acurate time circuits. And at the end of the movie when it gets fitted with Mr Fusion and no longer needs Plutonium to power the time circuits (and it gets the hover conversion), it becomes the easiest and funnest to use. Who wouldn’t want to drive a flying Delorean into the past and/or future? I know I would. Back to the Future made the Delorean cool again.
Cessna plane from Time Chasers – One of the worst movies ever, but one of the greatest episodes of Mystery Science Theater ever. Science geek Nick Miller builds a time machine out of a Cessna airplane and an Apple II computer. Very cost efficient using a small AIRPLANE to power your time machine…WTF?! Did the scientist think it would just be easier to travel in time with a plane? That’s crazy. When he takes a girl in the time machine they go on a date to the future and eat at what looks like an Orange Julius in an outdoor mall area. But you know it’s an Orange Julius in the future because everyone is wearing one piece shiny silver suits and weird head gear. If you watch this, be prepared…or just watch the MST3K version.
Uncle Rico’s time machine – Obviously not a real time machine, but I think it’s the funniest. I laugh just thinking about it. “If only coach would have put me in the game back in ‘85. We would have won State.”
