Two Weeks Later

Famine's this weekend? Are you excited? I know I am!

So far we've raised over twelve thousand dollars in the name of less fortunate children all over the world. So... thank you all for your generous donations!

Here's a quick (not really) recap of what's been happening in the days (weeks?) since I last blogged.

! 15/6/07 - Friday

We did not get the ball back. Neither did we hear from the staff of MBS.

Life went on.

! 16/6/07 - Saturday

The Interact Club's kids carnival took place in school. It doesn't really concern most of you, but if you're wondering what a kid's carnival is, it's like a carnival, for kids.

Profound!

The kids were mostly from orphanages or impoverished families around Sentul. The majority were young kids, between the ages of six to twelve. However, the group had a couple of extreme values (that's maths!) in the form of two sixteen year olds and one seventeen year old.

All morning we kept the younger kids busy with musical chairs, station games and sand art, while the others joined us for basketball, football and stories about life in school and church.

Guy: So your principal is Malay or what?
Kevin: No, Indian woman. Used to be a man.
Jun Ian: HAH!

It was a good time. Our photographer guy took like seven hundred pictures in the few hours we were there. Not that I've got any.

Night heralded the arrival of Jamie Neo, here for the weekend.

Jamie: I will have mercy and leave your national landmarks untouched. The Petronas Towers shall stand.

Wow, really? Our humble nation is eternally in your debt.

Jun Ian: And which is your guide? The blind one or the bald one?

A few of us met up for dinner at Bangsar Village - Peako, Lih Fern, En Yaw, Eugene, Jamie, Mahadi and myself.

Peako: Where's En Yaw? Oh he's calling.
Jun Ian: Tell him we're at Nike. Don't say which one.
Peako: How many does this place have?
Jun Ian: Two. One sporting and one casual.
Lih Fern: So which one are we going to?
Jun Ian: Puma.

The restaraunt was a posh deal, but not without its shortcomings.

Eugene: I can't believe everyone's food is here but mine.
En Yaw: Why's your lamb taking so long?
Mahadi: Maybe they're trying to catch the lamb.
Jun Ian: Or maybe their sheep is giving birth.

On a variety of topics.

Jun Ian: Would you really give up a cool name like Neo for one like Mohamadon?
Jamie: Maybe... if you shorten it I guess.
Peako: That wouldn't be all. You'd have to change Jamie to Jamaliah or something.
Jun Ian: They make you do what?

! 18/6/07 - Monday

Dance practice started. It's pretty sad how we only have an hour a day for a month to get our act together for concert.

Practice hours per day: 1
Practice days per week: 5
Practice hours per week: 1 x 5 = 5
Weeks until concert: 5
Total number of practice hours: 5 x 5 = 25

That's like one whole day.

WMS FTW.

! 19/6/07 - Tuesday

My pet sister Joey's birthday.

...What?

junian?: oh wait!
junian?: how about a FISH!
?Jojo?: WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD I WANT THATT?!?!?!
junian?: no wait
?Jojo?: hahahhahahahah
junian?: if it died that would be bad
?Jojo?: WAT THE HELL MAN!!
?Jojo?: YEA!!
?Jojo?: that would be the end of our friendship!
?Jojo?: woot!!
junian?: who asked you not to take care of my FISH?
junian?: one day the fish i give you will save your life
?Jojo?: =____________________=
?Jojo?: if u rly give me a fish
?Jojo?: im SOOOOOOOOOOO gonna kill it

You will learn to love this sweet tropical fish.

! 20/6/07 - Wednesday

Wen Juin's birthday. Celebrated with boxes of Lindt and Chocolate Indulgence, which I discovered was the most delightful cake in the existence.

Some believe a new universe is created every time someone has a taste.

! 21/6/07 - Thursday

Keng Yee threw coleslaw at my head. I got her back though. I won't say where.

But it was an excellent shot.

! 23/6/07 - Saturday

CF Camp today. What can I say about it? It was awesome.

Like a religious rock concert.

Jun Ian: So you said you managed to get some of the best bands in the Klang Valley?
Marcus: That's right.
Jun Ian: How many bands are there in the Klang Valley exactly?
Marcus: Two. One for morning worship and one for night rally.

I went around to everyone's blog looking for pictures or a detailed account of some sort but I couldn't find any.

So I shall be the first. But there will be no actual pictures.

a Never Jumped

Ever been to chapel in the mornings? The barely audible vocals, the trash of the instruments, the futility of the piano, the crowds of Buddhists.

And the jumpers.

Don't know what a jumper is? In the language of our school chapel, a jumper is a person who gets so caught up in the music or worship during chapel that they start jumping up and down during the chorus of a fast song.

For example.

The thing about jumpers in daily morning chapel is that there's not a lot of them. The atmosphere's not that immersive, and people tend to be self-conscious. So what normally happens is that a couple of jumpers will start, in random places around the hall, then stop after a couple of lines.

Camp was not like that.

When XYZ, the second best band (according to Marcus) in the Klang Valley arrived that morning, one of the first things they did was teach us all to wave our arms and jump together, and which parts of the song to do what. Then they played Majesty.

The way the crowd responded was mind blowing.

z Hosanna

Worship's not all about hollering and jumping though, awesome as it may be. The Christians believe in quiet time and prayer, and we had that in spades too. As it turns out, the proper way to calm yourself after vigorous chapel activity is by closing your eyes and singing Hosanna like forty times.

d In Case of Emergency Break Dance

Pastor Andy Yeoh was one of those dynamic young church enthusiasts who never seem to run out of steam. His passion was infectious, and he spoke for an hour longer than the committee planned. But that was okay because he was just that good.

Right at the start, he gets on stage and starts bouncing around.

"Okay, I wanna try something out, and I need someone to help me. Is there anyone here who can breakdance?"

I freeze and my heart skips a beat as every gaze in the hall spins around to fix on me.

"Jun Ian!" Someone shouts.

"MARCUS!" I protest, pointing. Futile.

There I was, standing up on the stage next to him (I almost tripped on his Bible) and he starts talking again. He wants to make up a rap, about God. The drummer would play a beat, he explains, and he wants me to dance while he raps.

Before I know it, the beat is playing, the pastor is rapping and my inner voice is screaming at me in disbelief.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!" Pastor Andy starts flashing crazy ghetto signs at the crowd, walking in true rapper style and looking at me like I'm supposed to be doing something.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

No problem, I think. You can do this. Just step, bounce, step, bounce, cross and turn, step and slide... People are cheering. Guess this isn't so bad after all.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

Step, bounce, step, wait, is Kay Lee recording this? Cross and turn, trip, whoops! Focus! Did anyone notice? Don't think so.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

Step and slide, bounce and spin...

"My G-O-D is BIG!"

He shouts one last time, then it's all over.

m The Shoe and The Tower

The station games at camp were cool in the sense that most of them were original, creative and gave you sense of accomplishment to complete without being too challenging.

Except Marcus's game. Stupid Marcus.

I will not go into detail about Marcus's game. Suffice to say it involved running in circles with your head sideways around a stick until he was satisfied or you collapsed. No prizes for guessing which usually came first.

My favorite game was probably Caroline's. Construct a tower out of tape, newspaper and string. The tallest tower still standing after a blow from Zhou Wei wins.

The heights of the towers were measured in broomsticks. Before my group arrived, the record stood at three and a half broomsticks.

So I tied the string to my shoe and threw it over the branch of a nearby tree. The branch held. I lowered the string to the ground and we started tying newspapers around it. When we decided we were done, we raised the string back up to form a spiraling tower of six and a half broomsticks.

Thinking out of the box. It's awesome every time.

e Hallel

I thought the morning worship session was awesome. The night rally took it to a whole new level. The best band in the Klang Valley according to Marcus, ACTStreme took the stage. Apparently God loves to party hard, because pastor Andy returned to teach us moves that wouldn't have been out of place at a rave. Jumping as high as we could, punching the air, spinning in circles and gyrating wildly were all a part of worship that night.

I was up in front, next to one of the amps with Mike, Jocelyn, Grace, Tammy, Eli, Xyun, Hannah, David, Laura, Carmen, Mariko, Jon Yeoh, Zhou Wei and a whole crowd of people. It was insane.

There was a bit that went something like this, pastor Andy would call out,

"Give me a J!"

And we'd reply,

"J! We got your J we got your J!"

Which we did, with variations, for all the letters J-E-S-U-S and I just found that incredibly fun and cool. And then he taught us a new word.

Hallel.

According to the pastor, Hallel was a form of praise that literally meant go crazy. In accordance with some ancient party tradition, all of us had to take six steps, in each and every way, and then on the seventh, reach Hallel and lose ourselves completely.

"One... Two... Three... Four... Five... Six... SEVEN!"

Time slowed down as the lights flashed, the instruments rang and everyone threw themselves into a frenzy. The world around me exploded into a maelstrom of furious energy. I felt the vibrations of the crowd in the deepest reaches of my body, and while it lasted, I felt a sort of warmth fill me, and everything was clear in my head.

I guess you could call it a peak experience.

So much for my tale of CF Camp 2007 : Floodgates. There are a few things I didn't get to mention, like Ivan and Ju-Hann's sketch of the prodigal son, but it's actually past midnight and I'm really tired from staying up til two every night since the weekend.

I'm ending this post here, but you'll find out about what happened this week in my next post, most likely after Famine.

While you wait, why not have a look at my playlist?

Keep Their Candles Burning

Matthews: Banyak orang ada anjing, kucing, burung...
Brian: Harimau...
Liwen: Babi.

I didn't blog much about things during my last post. Lots of things happened in the past week or two, during the holidays and in school. Some of these things deserve telling.

One such thing happened today.

We were playing football, as is our custom on Thursdays. The ball was a slick looking Adidas model that Wai Khuin brought. About five minutes into the second game, Adi kicked the ball over the wall (rhymes!) into the Methodist Boys School next door.

One of two things usually happens when the ball goes over the fence.

1. Someone in MBS throws it back.
2. One of us has to go get it.

So this occurence, while annoying common some days, has only ever resulted in a slight delay in the game.

Today, there were a few guys on the other side of the wall, so we shouted to them to help us retrieve it. Some of them ran off to search in the bushes, and I started thinking about what a funny thing it would be if they just decided to keep it.

Then a funny thing happened.

An indian boy in a black shirt found the ball and ran over. Instead of throwing the ball to us, he started kicking it around. Then when someone shouted at him he tucked it under his arm and ran into the school.

We stood stunned for a few moments.

Then Dass dashed off towards the school, followed by Adi, Nathan, Hari, Pardeep, Azfar, Daniel and a few other guys. I went with them, kinda hoping there would be a fight of some sort that I could participate in, or at least witness. Mr Siva tagged behind us, trying in vain to turn us back.

Daniel: Check out the size of this stick! We could really beat in some heads!
Adi: Put the stick down, Daniel.

We ran through the school. It was the first time I had ever been in MBS. Everything was so different. The school looked very old, and all the linked fences, open classrooms, worn tables and big metal signboards had a certain charm to them. The kind of charm you might find in say, a prison. But a homely sort of prison.

On the gate was a bright red sign:

Syabas! Kerana Anda Tiba Ke Sekolah.

Translated, that means, congratulations for making it to school!

Stellar. Why doesn't anyone congratulate me for coming to school?

There was another sign in the courtyard:

COUNTDOWN

[___] Days To PMR
[___] Days To SPM

Thankfully, both had been left blank.

Anyway, a quick tour through the school later, we found Dass, standing by the front gate with a security guard and a few students. As it turned out, they saw a boy with a ball under his arm sprint out of school a few minutes earlier. No one stopped him. That was the crazy thing. He just stole a ball, ran out of school and went home without even being questioned.

Defeated, we returned to our school. The MBS told us they'd try to get him when he came for school tomorrow, but for now we were out of a ball. So we split up and some of us went to play volleyball.

Lots of people probably saw us at it, since school was just over and we played like tools. If you get a chance, watch Jason play volleyball. It is a joy and an enlightenment.

Quick Lessons In Bio #1

Punitha: And next to the medulla oblongata are the pons, which control visceral functions like breathing.
Jen Ming: Are there brain ducks in the pons?

Quick Lessons In Bio #2

Punitha: This part is the cerebellum. It controls your body balance and if it gets it hard you can get knocked out.
Jing Hang: So it's like... the balls of the brain?

One more thing... registration for the Interact Club's 30 Hour Famine opens tomorrow.

I don't have to tell you to join up as soon as you can.

Our theme this year is PS the children, which stands for protect and save the children. A common mistake is thinking it means please save the children.

Jing Hang: What is the theme of our famine this year? Form fours!
Eugene: Please save the children.
Jing Hang: Are you sure?
Eugene: Yes.
Jing Hang: Very sure?
Eugene: Yes.
Jing Hang: Do you want to save the children?
Eugene: Yes...
Jing Hang: How are you going to save them?

Why do we have to save the children anyway? Well, simply put, children are the future of the world.

Save the children, save the world.

I know. We are huge fcuking lamers.

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't give your all to save the children.

Help them keep their candles burning.

Fun With English

The Secret Lives Of Panda presents

Fun with English in 5W/P Set One!

On Tuesday, we played a game. I'm not sure what it's called, but it's the one where everyone takes turns to come up with a different sentence to form a story. Sounds childish, I know, but it was dope.

The text in fiery shades is the story we came up with. The text in icy blues is everything else.

Mdm Moses: I didn't know what just hit me.
Wei Han: I felt dizzy.
Sze Jian: So I lied down on my bed.
Mdm Moses: Lay down.
Sze Jian: Right.
Jethro: Then my sister came in... and jumped on me.

The class gives an two-note, ascending oo-OOH.

Jun Ian: Then... I came in and pulled Jethro's sister off him.
Mdm Moses: What? It doesn't work that way. It's you.
Jun Ian: It's me? No it's Jethro.
Wen Juin: Actually it's Wei Han.
Mdm Moses: No the way it works is that you're the one on the bed now.
Jun Ian: Oh okay. Then Jun Ian came in and pulled my sister off me.
Wen Juin: I felt sad because I couldn't spend quality time with my sister.

The class laughs.

Angeline: I sent my sister out of the room and locked the door.
Mdm Moses: So it's just you and Jun Ian in there? What's going to happen?
Phin Wern: We... had a long chat.
Jun Ian: I just realised I wrote myself into the story...
Wen: Yeah...
Jun Ian: That's so cool.
Rachel: We made plans about what we were going to do with Jun Ian.
Mdm Moses: Huh? But you're talking to Jun Ian!
Rachel: Oh I thought my sister. Never mind la.
Chuan Han: Okay... I felt sleepy so I sent him outside.
Eu Jin: And I went to sleep.
Mdm Moses: The story became so tame suddenly! All about long chats and sleeping!
Yan Por: I had a nightmare and I woke up.
Caryn: I saw Jun Ian... staring at me.
Yi Wen: I wondered what he was doing back in the room.
Brian: Then I realised Jun Ian wanted to sleep with me.

The class explodes into furious laughter.

Jing Hang: I... didn't know what to do.

Something about the way he says it makes the class laugh even harder. Even Mdm Moses is laughing.

Lih Fern: I decided to let Jun Ian sleep with me.

The class reacts.

Sherene: But I got hungry so I went out.
Mdm Moses: Okay okay... from now on, no more obscenities.

But she's still laughing.

Lisha: I realised I should have licked Jun Ian.
Mdm Moses: What did you say?
Lisha: Uhm... I realised I should have kicked Jun Ian.
Zhi Mei: Then I went to eat dinner.
Derek: I had my dinner.
Li Wen: And then after dinner I had another cake.
Mdm Moses: Another cake? A whole cake?
Li Wen: Yeah.
Peako: I went to the fridge and when I opened it, I found Jun Ian inside.
Soe Foong: I had a stomach ache.
Mdm Moses: You found Jun Ian in the fridge and had a stomach ache? Okay Denise, finish it.
Denise: Then I heard the sound of my alarm clock ringing. I woke in my bed and realised it had all been a very strange dream.
Jun Ian: Classic ending.

The Holiday

Once, Rufus wrote an essay for Stanley that went something like this.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Here's two. Please forgive my excessive use of words.

Then he drew two pictures. And at the bottom he wrote,

(2018 words)

He really did. But she made him rewrite.

Anyway, here's my 14000++ word blog post.

It's about The Holiday. Like The River, minus the guitar solo.

Juinn: So who sang this song?
Jun Ian: Bad Charlotte. No wait... Better Charlotte.
Shern: We should make a band, call it Better Charlotte.
Kevin: When we meet the originals it'd be like... You're Good Charlotte? We're Better.

On stage we'd probably look something like this. We're actually on top of a boat on the water but you can't tell from this picture.

Clockwise starting from the Vodafone: Kevin, Me, Shern, Juinn.

We'd play songs about white sand, clear water, colorful fish and sunsets.

And volleyball. At least half the album would be about volleyball, considering the inordinate amount of it we played on the island.

Actually, we played lots of bullshit/bluff and mafia (you know, with cards), but I didn't take any pictures of that so here's a picture of us splashing water at each other.

We went places and did things.

Not sure if you can tell from the snaps, but I got amazingly burned. I am really dark now.

Group pictures, of which we took a lot.

We found this boat in the jungle!

Trying out the indian movie thing.

We took the boat all over, to swim and see fishes and corals and stuff.

Just another picture of Kevin, Lin Rui, Wei Yi and Joo Lee.

My eyes are closed, but it's still one of my favorite pictures.

All that and more in just three days? This holiday's tricked already and it's just getting started.

Points Of Interest

Zhi Mei: You and I are inseperable!
Sha: But what about Marcus?
Zhi Mei: Marcus is inside me.

Chemistry tomorrow, but this won't be long, and besides, it looks like you don't need an education to do well in this country.

Just get into politics.

I'm not sure how accurate this is. I have enough to do without tracking the state of our ruling cabinet's tertiary education. But my dad says it most likely is. I trust my dad.

Sort of.

And I don't normally read mail, but this one caught my eye. I thought it was a chain letter from the education minister.

Here it is, reproduced in full except for the colors of the national flags (dutifully added by me).

It is not to say Singapore is really good, (it says) but looks like our cabinet ministers are really teruk!

Singapore Cabinet	Malaysia Cabinet
PM Lee Hsien Loong Cambridge University – First Class Honours (1974) Harvard University – Masters (1980)	PM Abdullah bin Haji Ahmad Badawi University of Malaya – Bachelor of Arts Honours (1964)
MM Lee Kuan Yew Cambridge University – First Class Honours (1949)	Deputy PM Dato' Sri Najib Razak University of Nottingham – Bachelor of Arts Honours (1974)
SM Goh Chok Tong University of Singapore – First Class Honours (1964) Williams College, USA – Masters (1967)	Minister of Foregn Affairs Syed Hamid Albar (can someone tell me his univeristy?) – Bachelor of Arts [UITM]
Minister for Law Prof. S Jayakumar University of Singapore – Bachelor of Law Honours (1963) Yale Univerity – Masters (1966)	Ministry of Works Dato' Seri Samy Vellu (Education Unknown) [Form 6, Anderson School]
Minister for Home Affairs Wong Kan Seng University of Singapore – Bachelor of Arts & Business Admin (1977) London Business School – Masters (1979)	Ministry of International Trade & Industry Rafidah binti Aziz University of Malaya – Bachelor of Arts Honours
Minister for Foreign Affairs BG George Yeo Cambridge University – Double First Class Honours (1976) Harvard Business School – MBA w/ Distinction (1985)	Minister of Agriculture Muhyiddin Yassin (Education Unknown) [Polytechnic Ungku Omar]
Minister for Trade and Industry Lim Hng Kiang Cambridge University – First Class Honours w/ Distinction (1976) Harvard University – Masters (1986)	Ministry of Domestic Trade Shafie Apdal (Education Unknown) [Form 5, Failed English]
Minister for Defence Teo Chee Hean University of Manchester – First Class Honours (1976) Imperial College, London – Masters w/ Distinction (1977)	Minister of Education Hishammuddin Hussein (Education Unknown) [Bachelor of Arts, Social Science]
Minister for Education Tharman Shanmugaratnam London School of Economics – Bachelor of Arts Cambridge University – Masters Harvard University – Masters	Minister of Home Affairs Radzi bin Sheikh Ahmad (Education Unknown) [Kolej Islam Malaysia, Diploma]

Then it says,

**That is why they are so desperate to get Khairy Jamaluddin up so fast, because he is from Cambridge. God knows how he got in!

Okay, maybe you don't need a whole bunch of fancy degrees to head a nation. But this guy here... it says he failed english? In form five?

How do you fail english?

Maybe we should send all these guys back to school or something. Just to get a better looking testimonial.

No one's perfect though. If you read the thingy closely, you'll notice the guy who wrote it mispelled univeristy and foregn.

Though I would like to, I'm not going to show you a photoshopped picture of Samy Vellu sitting in Chemistry, getting chewed out by Haslina. I've got exams.

During English, I fell asleep. I had this weird dream where I think I was planning a party. I remember calling up this malay guy and asking, "Encik, siew pao ada?"
I was thinking about it so much I wrote the words siew pao into my essay.

That was fun. On to my second topic of interest...

I have to tell you about Spiderman 3 again. Some of you didn't like it. That's fine.

Myself, I really enjoyed it. But check out all the scenes they deleted from the movie!

- Following up on his firing, Eddie goes to see Gwen to ask her out. Gwen wants nothing to do with him and explains that they’ve only gone on one date, not counting the time they bumped into each other at a coffee place. Gwen admits that they did kiss, but is confused when Eddie insists she told him that she loves him.

- At the Spider-Man appreciation ceremony, Peter runs into a little boy with toy web-shooters. After getting sprayed on, Peter shoots a little webbing on the kid’s shoe as the boy’s walking away. The kid sees the webbing, turns around and points to his mother that he just met Spider-Man. The mother sees some guy in a ****py suit nearby and figures that’s what he was talking about.

- Some of the Eddie/Jameson dialogue got cut, including a great exchange.
“What’s that smell?”
“Brock, sir.”
“What kind of cologne is ‘Brock’?”
“No, sir. My name is Brock.”
“Why are you named after a cologne?”

- Harry goes up against Venom one-on-one for a round, not counting the impaling scene.

That's just a sample. There's lots more if you clicky clicky.

There's also a petition for the release of the director's cut DVD, which would be pretty interesting if it did include all those scenes.

I really wanna see the last one (Harry and Venom).

Yeah, that's it for now. Just thought you should know.

junian: i just had an idea
oh! ky: what?
junian: one day i will get you and esther ho to stand together
junian: and i will say
junian: look! its OH AND HO!
oh! ky: uh yeah, we wanted to put that on our jerseys
oh! ky: xP
junian: gosh
junian: you beat me to the lameness

Educational

Because the first season is almost done.

The finale is during the exams. Damn!

If you have time to read blogs during the exams, you have time to watch this video.

It's only five minutes, and it's educational, in a way.

Before you proceed, there are a few things you should know.

• The main religion of Israel is Jewish.
• The coalition of the willing are the countries that followed the US into the Iraq war (Mainly the US, the UK and South Korea).
• America lost the Vietnam War.
  
• The United Kingdom, also known as Britain's official currency is the pound.
• Fidel Castro is the president of Cuba.
• Kofi Annan served as the Secretary General of the UN until January this year.
• Tony Blair is the prime minister of Britain.
• The axis of evil consists of North Korea, Iraq and Iran.

If you did not know all these things before, it's fine. If you're reading this you're (most likely) still in school, but you should probably pick up a newspaper or something.

Now watch this.

It's called Why Americans Are Geniuses. Click to watch.

Reporter: How many world wars have there been?
Man: Three.

This morning I watched an Inconvenient Truth. Yeah, it's almost the exams. So?

It was pretty scary. If you watch it you'll see a lot of graphs like that one. That's carbon dioxide levels in the past 60-ish years.

I thought it was good, but there was too much biography on Al Gore. Did we really need to see so much of the farm and even the road where he crashed his car?

Overall, it's really something everyone should get to know about. The pictures of disappearing glaciers and ice caps were just chilling.

Apart from that... I don't have anything serious to blog about.

Yeah okay! I get it! My chinese is bad!

Colour by numbers. Somehow coloring an all-black spiderman isn't as fun as I thought it'd be.

Seriously lame jokes.

On the EST paper.

Azfar: If you add a L-A-M in front, it becomes the LAMEST PAPER!

On Tim Tams.

Lih Fern: Where's Tam? Behind TIM!

Lame enough?

Peako: If Azfar and Lih Fern got married their children would be born with crutches.

Unlike so many others, I don't have a friendship quiz for you.

But you can always take THE IMPOSSIBLE QUIZ!

Take it with a friend. Remember, impossibility shared is impossibility halved.

Credit for the discovery of this insanity goes to Joey.

And if you get past question 50, props to you.

These Are The Days

... that we really should be studying. And not, say, drawing things in our sketchbooks. Well I haven't inked it or colored it yet. And I'm sure I'll be really tempted to.

Spiderman and Rhino!

Hit the books dammit! Hit them! Stop blogging and stop drawing!

Sigh.

Spiderman <3 MO and Heroes + 5

Hiro: Should I stop time?
Peter: No. I haven't had a good fight in years.

What happens next? Something cool no doubt.

Okay, okay. This post contains MAJOR SPOILERS about Spiderman 3 and Heroes.

I had to make the text bigger and emphasize this fact because three people already told me they spoiled themselves.

Spoilers are not good for your health.

If you want to enjoy these shows, leave now and come back after you've watched them.

Cause they're so much better unspoiled.

I warned you.

First, we interrupt this broadcast to bring you a picture of pandas doing handstands. On a tree.

Picture credit to Fox. And now we return.

Spiderman <3 MO

The first thing you have to know about Spiderman 3 is that it's...

Yup. EMO! Notice anything different about this poster? I did it myself.

Look closely dammit.

There are three things you should keep in mind when watching this movie.

1. Forget the comics.
2. Don't sit next to Li Wen.
3. Refer to 1 and 2.

The movie and the comics are two different things. If you get them mixed up you're going to end up making comments like this.

"That's not how the symbiote came to earth! Venom doesn't die that way! I thought Eddie Brock becomes Carnage later how can that happen? Why hasn't Gwen Stacey died?"
- Ben Kane

Personally I think Spiderman 3 was awesome. A couple of others said that the second one was better, but I don't remember it as being that good, and I don't feel like watching it again. I feel like watching 3 again though.

Peter with the black spider suit is completely badass and it is so good.

Out of costume, he has a towering mountain of personal issues. It's not all his fault, but life has a way of handing Peter lemons at every turn. There's a permanent residence in Springfield and then there's life as Peter Parker.

"OMB his life is so screwed up! I mean, I always knew he was a loser... But I didn't know he was that big a loser! WTH!"
- Li Wen, on Peter Parker's life

Okay I don't think he actually said those things but it was close.

If you fell down the social ladder of the Marvel Universe, at the bottom you'd find Grasshopper, a character so unfortunate he only appeared in one issue of the Great Lakes Avengers before being killed almost immediately.

"Five point eight seconds. A new record for shortest membership on ANY team."
- Monkey Joe, team sidekick, on the fast life and tragic death of Grasshopper

Well, Peter Parker isn't at the bottom of that ladder. But his life can and does suck.

This is fact.

So when the symbiote finally gives him a chance to take a walk on the dark side - basically his ticket out of loserville - it's not surprising how his behaviour changes.

I wanted some caps of his wardrobe, but I love this guy as an emo.

Remember the bar scene? When he gets his John Travolta on and then sexes up Gwen Stefani - whoops, Stacey - in front of MJ just to get back at her? As soon as I saw where they were going I knew it was gonna be good. Love his line when he slips the hostess a bill and tells her to "find us some shade".

Well this picture is okay but in the bar she looked so much better.

And when he takes it to the streets as Black Spidey he's ten times as hardcore. Example, the second time when he fought Harry, when they were in the secret room in Harry's mansion. Harry threw a goblin bomb at Peter's back and he just ducked, snared it with a webline and casually flicked it back into Harry's face which was off the charts and probably illegally cool.

You know what they say... once you go black, you can't go back!

Not that he doesn't have his moments as regular Spiderman. The way he destroyed Venom? Driving hollow bars into the ground to make a cage, rattling and banging them all the time to paralyze the symbiote with sound... that was... well.. I'm out of superlatives. Not really. I guess there are the regular ones like extraordinary or delightful. But those aren't extreme enough and besides I always wanted to say that.

Harry is cool as the New Goblin. Too bad he gets impaled on his own flying skateboard.

There was one fun little scene that gave us a hint of Carnage in the future movies. When Peter was using the phone and flirting with the landlord's daughter ("get me some milk" -D), he was doing his best not to pay attention to what Dr Connors was saying but if you did you would have noticed that he did have a sample of the symbiote with him. Spiderman 4, anyone?

If you had a choice, Gwen Stacey or Mary Jane Watson?

The one thing I took issue with was the unreliability of the goblin bombs. Peter's taken a bomb close to the face and all he lost was part of his mask. Harry took one in much closer proximity and developed burn marks not unlike the map of Australia Mahadi's got on his arm. But when Harry launched a bomb into the Sandman's head the resulting explosion had a mushroom cloud.

Maybe Harry's arsenal had a couple of duds. ROFLcopter.

One thing we all agreed on was that the movie at times had a decidedly MCR look to it. The scenes from the bar and the church could have made a video for The Black Parade or maybe I Don't Love You. Any ideas?

Heroes + 5

Five years gone. This episode is a look into a world where the heroes never saved the cheerleader or stopped the exploding man. This world is so much darker and more dangerous, which leads us to more powerful heroes and more intense battles.

I'm already out of blogging steam and I wanna get this to my publisher so I'll be quick. (Promise not to publish any spoilers?)

The future is wow. But it's also... very dead.

1. Nathan (killed by Sylar after becoming president and powers taken)
2. Candice (killed by Sylar after going into hiding and powers taken)
3. The Haitian (stabbed in the neck by Mohinder)
4. Claire (killed by Sylar pretending to be Nathan and powers taken)
5. Mr Bennet (shot by Matt after revealing Claire's location)
6. DL (killed by Sylar after going into hiding and powers taken)
7. Molly (killed by Sylar after going into hiding and powers taken)
8. Micah (died when the bomb exploded)
9. Ando (died when the bomb exploded)
10. Isaac (killed by Sylar and powers taken)
11. Hiro (shot by Matt while trying to teleport)
12. Hana (shot by Matt for helping Mr Bennet)
13. Zane (killed by Sylar and powers taken)
14. Dale (killed by Sylar and powers taken)
15. Charlie (killed by Sylar and powers taken)
16. Eden (shot self in the head to prevent Sylar from taking powers)

At least we have some super super heroes.

1. Peter (completely kickass)
2. Sylar (like Peter, but evil)
   

Okay, not that many. But Niki's a stripper now. And Jessica tragically disappeared somehow

I have a GIF file of Peter and Sylar fighting. Or at least, firing up their ice and fire powers. But for some reason I can't get it to move on blogger. Hmmm?