Yes, according to Mt Dew on Facebook, the fan favorite Mt Dew Pitch Black from Halloween 2004 is returning to store shelves in 2011. Being a soda dork this, for me, is like the announcement of another Back to the Future movie or The Fat Boys releasing a new album. This is EPIC.
I reviewed all three of the different iterations of Mt Dew Pitch black in my AWESOME-tober-fest 2008 article here.
Here are some pics of the original Pitch Black:
Box from a 12 pack of Pitch Black cans
Label from a 20oz bottle of Pitch Black.
ICEE version of Mt Dew Pitch Black sold in Target during Halloween 2007.
(via xpectations)
The fairly rare Canadian Pitch Black which was caffeine free. The Pitch Black in the states, as far as I know, was not offered without caffeine.
(via Valeri-DBF)
Mt Dew Pitch Black as a lip balm. For the last few years, this was the only way you could get Pitch Black. Notice that it uses the newer Mt Dew logo (well, newer than the 2004 cans and bottles).
So, despite the fact I am constantly speaking out against this entire series, I continue to watch the movies. I’m committed at this point. For better or worse, I’m finishing the series. I originally spoke out about the books while I reviewed the first movie here. I watched and reviewed the second ridiculous movie, New Moon, here.
So after the debacle that was the second movie, I was actually excited to see the third movie because the trailer looked good. And what I mean by that is that I didn’t hate the trailer on sight. It looks like they decided to push the whole Bella/Edward nonsense to the back and focus on a new vampire who is creating a vampire army to take on the Cullens. It looked, well, if not good, then at least interesting. Let’s take a quick look at that trailer to freshen our memories and to give you the state my head was at when I watched this movie.
See, not too bad…considering what has come before. And I kept hearing from people that this is the best Twilight movie. However, now that I think about that, I’m not really sure how great a compliment that is. That’s like being the smartest guy in Special Ed. But there looks to be some good vampire vs werewolf action, Jacob has that great line about “…killing some vampires” and the new vampire army walking slowly out of the lake. Not bad, Twilight. Not bad.
Anyway, in light of this trailer, I recently convinced my wife to sit down with me and watch the third movie (she hated the first two). I’m going to try to keep my review spoiler free. Here we go.
F**K. THIS. MOVIE.
I hope that’s clear and concise enough to everyone involved in making and writing the movie. F**K. THIS. MOVIE. It’s terrible. That trailer up above? It’s the second trailer. I should have watched the first trailer. In a quick 1:40 trailer you get the best 10 minutes of the movie. The rest of the nearly 2 hours is taken up with Bella/Edward bullsh*t. The big Cullen vampires/Wolf Pack battle with the vampire army didn’t happen until like an hour and forty minutes in. Yeah, for AN HOUR AND FORTY MINUTES I had to watch the sappy EMO melodrama that is Bella with her ENORMOUS two front teeth and hipster Edward who looks like he never washes his hair. I actually hated this movie MORE than New Moon. It’s going to be really hard to sit down to watch Breaking Dawn. I just can’t take anymore Bella and Edward. Plus, Dakota Fanning and the Volturi only show up in 2 scenes. And no Michael Sheen. What’s the point?
So to the entire Twilight franchise, but especially this movie. F**K YOU and everything you’ve done to the lore and myth of the vampire.
Oh, my wife’s review was something like, “…the only part of the movie I liked was when Jacob took his shirt off.”
So there you go.
I’m going to watch the last movie (Or two, since I hear the fourth is supposed to be in two parts a la Harry Potter) but only out of stubborn obligation.
The song, Voices that Care, written and sung in support of the troops participating in Desert Storm (as well as the Red Cross) turns 20 years old today. The single was released on Feb 28, 1991. The song was performed by a “super group” of celebrity entertainers in much the same fashion as USA for Africa and Band-Aid.
The recording of the single and the presentation of the video to the troops was filmed and presented in a TV Special that aired on Fox the same day the single was released.
Here’s the Voices that Care music video:
Participants in this “super group” included TWO members of New Edition (Ralph Tresvant and Bobby Brown), Garth Brooks, Celine Dion, Will Smith, Kenny G (yes, that Kenny G), Amy Grant, Michael Bolton, Luther Vandross, The Pointer Sisters and Peter Cetera. And like We Are the World, there were scores of random celebrities singing in the choir in the background like Alyssa Milano, Jon Lovitz, Clyde Drexler (?), Chevy Chase, Jimmy Buffett, Nell Carter, Alan Thicke (?), Orel Hershiser (?), Brian Bosworth (?), Mike Tyson (?!), Don King (?!), Lando Calrissian, Capt Kirk, The Fonz, Gary Busey, etc, etc. And check out much younger versions of Meryl Streep, Kevin Costner Kurt Russell and Michelle Pfeiffer (actually she looks exactly the same 20 years later). The video, like it’s predecessors, is a time capsule of Hollywood circa 1991.
I’m not going to lie. I owned the Cassingle of this song. And I liked it. Actually, I still like it. It’s as cheesy as you would expect a song like this to be. Maybe even more chessy. Like, super hero cheesy. Everyone does the “hold one headphone to your head and sing into the microphone” bit you see in We are the World. You also get a lot of anguished looks to the side of the camera during singing. Michael Bolton is all Michael Bolton-y. It helps add to the mood and it gets me…right here *points at heart*. Oh, and Nelson showed up. I’m not entirely sure they were invited, but they showed up anyway.
By the way, after you watch the video, in case you were wondering, the balding guy in the Elton John glasses at the very end of the song, the one you have no idea who that is…he’s the guy that sang the original demo that went out to all the celebrities. I always thought that was cool they gave him the last solo lines of the song.
And to sing us out, here’s Kids Incorporated with their version of Voices That Care:
I love movies. I love video games. So, obviously, I love video games based on movies. Well, I love the idea of video games based on movies. And this type of corporate synergy has been going on for years. Ever since the enormous popularity of the Atari 2600, both video game companies and Hollywood have tried to capitalize on popular movie brands to boost sales. And it makes for awesome pop culture ephemera.
So here are 14 awesomely vintage ads for video games based on popular movie franchises.
ET (Atari 2600 – 1982) – This is it. The game that felled the house of Atari. Yes, I owned this game and hated every second I played it. I know a lot of people now retroactively say they enjoyed it, but I HATED it. You can only fall into an empty pit so many times before you throw the controller through the TV screen. Surprisingly, this game was designed by the same guy that did Yars’ Revenge, the highest selling original Atari game (and one of my all time favorites). Talk about Jekyll and Hyde. Seanbaby rated ET #1 on his list of 20 worst video games OF ALL TIME.
Raiders of the Lost Ark (Atari 2600 – 1982) – Around the same time ET was released, Atari also released this game based on the first Indiana Jones movie. And it’s starring YOU!
Bill & Ted’s Excellent Video Game Adventure (NES – 1991) – Bill & Ted. It is amazing this movie was as popular as it was. I mean, the movie spawned a sequel, a cereal, a cartoon show and a live action show at Universal Studios. And Keanu is even talking about making another one. Most excellent. I never played this game but I loved the first movie.
Rambo (NES – 1988) – A side scrolling shoot ’em up adventure game that very closely resembled the Zelda sequel, The Adventures of Link.
(via oldmanwinters) Star Wars Arcade (Atari – 1983) – The original vector based Star Wars game by Atari was extremely popular with fans. So, of course Atari was going to port it to their home consoles. Here’s an ad for the Atari port of the Star Wars arcade game for the 2600 and 5200.
Silence of the Lambs was released on Feb 14, 1991, which makes it 20 years old today. Here are some things you probably never knew about the movie.
The Silence of the Lambs book is a sequel to the book Red Dragon. Red Dragon was originally adapted as a movie in 1986 with Brian Cox (left) portraying Hannibal Lecter.
Because Manhunter was a flop, producer Dino De Laurentis passed on making Silence of the Lambs and gave away the rights to make the sequel for free to Orion Pictures.
The skulls on the Death’s Head moths in the movie are not natural markings. The moths were given coverings with the skull marking.
Despite being released in February (traditionally considered a dead zone for Oscar contention), Silence garnered a sweep of the major Oscar award categories including Actor, Actress, Director, Picture and Adapted Screenplay. It is one of only three films to accomplish this sweep (the others are It Happened One Night (1934) and One Flew Over the Cukoo’s Nest (1975)).
The rights to the book were originally bought by Gene Hackman in order to star. Hackman decided not to do the movie after doing Mississippi Burning because he didn’t want to do another violent movie.
Here’s a newspaper ad for a Sneak Preview of Silence of the Lambs on February 1, 1991 (via Held Over!)
(via xpectations)
(via Valeri-DBF)
Cavalcade of Awesome 