April | 2010 | Cavalcade of Awesome

Archive for April, 2010

New Coke turns 25 years old this month

Posted in 80s, Coca Cola, New Coke, pop culture, soda with tags Coca Cola, New Coke, pop culture, soda, sodapalooza on April 28, 2010 by Paxton

Coca-Cola officially released New Coke on April 23, 1985. Which makes it 25 years old this month. Hard to believe that whole reformulating Coke debacle was over two decades ago. I was eleven years old.

Go back and read about the history of that troubled beverage in my 3 part retrospective on New Coke called Misunderstood.

Let’s take a look at some “New Coke” commercials.

This commercial was originally for regular Coke, but was changed after the release of New Coke. It features the slogan Coke Is It! I’ve always liked that jingle.

Bill Cosby was one of the big celebrities who helped launch New Coke. Here he is introducing the reformulated Coke in 1985.

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Reviews of 5 brand new sodas in stores now

Posted in Mountain Dew, Pepsi, reviews, soda with tags Mountain Dew, Pepsi, reviews, soda, sodapalooza on April 27, 2010 by Paxton

There have been some new soda flavor releases recently. I’ve picked up a bunch of them and I’m going to review them for you right now.

Mt Dew is back doing the whole Dewmocracy voting thing. If you remember, back in 2008 Mountain Dew released three test market flavors nationwide (SuperNova, Voltage and Revolution) and had people vote on which one became the new permanent Mt Dew flavor. This resulted in Mt Dew Voltage winning a permanent spot on the nation’s shelves. Well, Mt Dew is doing this whole thing again with three new flavors for us to try and vote on. They were released to stores this April and they are Mt Dew Distortion, Mt Dew White Out and Mt Dew Typhoon. Let’s see if they are any good.

Mt Dew Distortion – This flavor is a lime-blasted Mt Dew. The taste is very similar to the Taco Bell exclusive Mt Dew Baja Blast. This Dew is a little bit more bitter on the aftertaste than Baja Blast, mainly because Baja Blast has pineapple in its flavor to tone that down. I like lime, I like Mt Dew, so I like this flavor. However, the coloring and label are too similar to the original Dew and it doesn’t stand out enough for me. A good flavor that may get lost in the shuffle.

Mt Dew White Out – Unlike Distortion, this flavor does stand out. The bright white and blue packaging and disconcertingly white liquid color make this stand out from the drink cooler in every way. How is the taste? Well, it’s labeled as a “smooth citrus” Dew and it doesn’t lie, it is definitely smooth tasting. A light, sweet Dew with very little aftertaste. I’m just wondering how this smooth citrus is different than the regular Dew citrus? Once again, confusion with the existing brand. I can see this getting votes on it’s mild taste and eye-catching design.

Mt Dew Typhoon – This is a tropical Punch infused Mountain Dew. I love the blue/red color combination and the bright red liquid color (but, that too is very similar to Mt Dew Code Red). The taste is very good. It has a nice fruit punch flavor that works well with the normal Mt Dew citrus. The taste actually reminds me of the limited edition Halo 3 Mt Dew Game Fuel from 2008. I would say that this is my favorite flavor so far, with White Out second and Distortion a close third. However, unless they make these in diet, I really won’t be drinking them. Which is a shame, because I like all three of these flavors. I actually think all of these flavors are much better than the Diet Mt Dew UltraViolet they released last fall. If they made any of these in diet I would regularly drink it.

So, how’s the voting going? If you go to Dewmocracy.com, you can see an up to date map by state of the results.
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There will be an heir to my AWESOMENESS!!

Posted in life, personal with tags baby, life, personal on April 23, 2010 by Paxton

I’ve not mentioned this on the blog yet because I didn’t want to jinx anything but my wife is pregnant. She is right at 19 weeks along and we went to the doctor yesterday and found out what we are having.

We are having an AWESOME baby boy! Yay! Since it’s a boy, we already have the name picked out (we were undecided on a girl’s name). The little boy will not only be born with my awesome looks and sense of humor, but my awesome name as well. Paxton Ted Holley, Jr. We’ll call him PJ for short. So never fear, the total collective bad ass awesomeness I currently carry on my shoulders will be passed on to my first male heir, PJ. Hope the little guy can handle it.

So we are now having a boy. You want to see the first thing I bought after finding out?

AWESOME shirt

Are you surprised? I couldn’t NOT get it. You know?

So that’s my kick ass news. I am uber excited right now. I can’t wait for this kid to get here.

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10 Awesomely vintage comic book ads

Posted in advertising, comic books, pop culture, Rubik's Cube with tags advertising, comic books, pop culture, Rubik's Cube on April 20, 2010 by Paxton

I collected comic books from about fourth grade through high school. And even into college a bit. So I’ve got a pretty big collection of comics in my garage right now. I had dipped into the collection the last few months to look for any comics having to do with werewolves as that will be this year’s Halloween theme. While I had some of my favorite issues out, I started scanning the covers and putting them up on my Flickr Photostream. I also started scanning some of the advertisements found within the comic books. Many times, these are even more memorable than the comic book itself. Many of the toy and video game ads are awesome, but you also see many other ads that showed up for decades within many different comics. Many of them are pretty crazy awesome, if you know what I mean.

Here are some of my favorite comic book ads that I’ve come across in my collection. Click any of the images to make them BIGGER.

Charles Atlas – One of the most famous comic book ads in existence.This ad introduced the “98 pound weakling”, named Mac, who birthed the cliche of having sand kicked into his face by a bully. It’s a classic ad that also got a sequel where a new “weakling”, Jack, is bullied at a school dance instead of a beach.

Sea Monkeys – Another ad that EVERYONE on Earth knows about because it was just that popular. Sea Monkeys. On the left you see your normal Sea Monkeys ad from 1972. On the right, however, you can see a 1978 ad for Super Sea Monkeys. These aren’t your average, every day Sea Monkeys, these bitches are SUPER. They grow twice as fast (and probably die twice as fast, too). I bet the inventor of the Sea Monkeys is right now livin’ the good life in Tahiti drinking umbrella drinks and partying with butt-naked freaks.

Cube Lube – This ad is like a flaming hot supernova of AWESOME. Cube. Lube. “We’ve got what it takes to really move your cube!!!” I’m speechless.

Spalding Street Ball ad – Originating in the ’70s, this ad could be found in comics all the way into the mid ’80s. One of my favorite ads that’s on the back of at least 75% of my comic book collection. I also love the artwork. Probably because it’s drawn by Mad Magazine superstar Jack Davis. Check out Davis’ awesome Back to the Future cover for Mad Magazine #260. I don’t want to burst Mr Barry’s bubble, but there is NO WAY that jump shot was a 30 footer. It doesn’t even look like it’s a 3-point shot. He’s lucky if it’s a 20 footer. A 30 footer would be from almost half court.

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Review of Clash of the Titans: Old vs New

Posted in movies, pop culture, reviews with tags movies, Mythology, pop culture, reviews on April 16, 2010 by Paxton

I saw the new remake of Clash of the Titans with my buddy Dr Mike last week. After watching it I got jazzed to watch the original 1981 version, so I queued it up on Netflix streaming and watched it this past weekend. Here is a review and comparison of the two movies.

Clash of the Titans (1981) – I loved this movie when I was a kid. I also hadn’t watched it since I was a kid, so, as happens very often, it’s entirely possible that my 7 year old self didn’t know what the hell he was talking about so I decided to watch this classic again. How does it stand up? Not bad. I was surprised how much of the movie I actually remembered. Like in the new remake, the Gods are played by awesome and well respected actors; Sir Lawrence Olivier, Ursula Andress and Maggie Smith. There’s also an awesome role played by Burgess Meredith, and Julie Bowker, who plays Andromeda, is gorgeous. So the casting, so far was great. Except for Harry Hamlin. I’ve never been a huge fan of him, and this movie did nothing to change that perception, but the movie worked despite me not really even liking the actor (I didn’t mind Perseus as a character). And I love the Harryhausen stop motion effects. Medusa, Calibos and the Kraken just rule in this movie. I don’t know what it is, but the stop motion just works for me in a throwback/vintage way. And the whole “hero’s journey” that is setup for Perseus to save Andromeda really works as a story. There were some slow parts yes, but on the whole the movie rocks. Calibos, the giant scorpions, the battle with Medusa, Bubo, the Stygian Witches. It all just worked. I really enjoyed it. This is one movie that really could have aged and been terrible on a modern viewing, but it is fun, the effects are great and the story is interesting.

Clash of the Titans (2010) – Okay, now let’s talk about the remake. On paper, this looks to be very similar experience for me. Lots of mythology and the Gods are played by awesome and well-respected actors. Alexa Davalos as Andromeda is gorgeous and, again, I’m not a big fan of the actor playing Perseus. However, I didn’t like Hamlin in the original either, and it worked, so it shouldn’t be a big deal. First, the good things in the movie. EVERYTHING with the Gods. Liam Neeson as Zeus and Ralph Fiennes as Hades work on every conceivable level. They came with their game faces on and everything with them and the entire design of Olympus just works…period. I’m a little confused that they cast the great Danny Huston as Poseidon and he only gets one line. ONE LINE!? Anyway, all of the action scenes and effects are exciting and visually spectacular. The Kraken looks awesome as do the Stygian Witches, giant scorpions, Medusa and Calibos. Actually, Jason Flemyng as Calibos is FANTASTIC. He’s not used enough and is dispatched way too easily. But when he’s there, he’s bad ass. The set design for this movie is ridiculous. They really went nuts with the environments.

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