The History of the Duomo in Florence

"Donatello made a wooden crucifix which was placed in Santa Croce [and] he was anxious to hear Filippo's opinion of it; but Filippo told him that he had shown a peasant hanging on the cross. This provoked Donatello to retort: 'Get some wood and do it yourself"...Filippo kept quiet for a few months while he worked on a wooden crucifix of the same size...Today this work is in Santa Maria Novella."

 

            Once again I am brought to write about something amazing, historical, and butt-fuckingly classy coming from Italy. Really, knowing this, I SHOULD feel pressure, you might think, fear, even, that this topic might not be good enough to top, let alone follow the supreme epic-ness of Venice in all her beauty, romanticism, and ass-holery. But really, I am supremely confident that the dish I have to serve to you this week is so (excuse my french) FUCKING COOL, that if by the end of this essay you are not buying a first class one-way ticket to Italy, I will give you a full refund. Enticed? Aroused even? Well settle down, I haven't even told you what I'm writing about yet- it's the Duomo in Florence that’s what. Though its more properly referred to as Santa Maria del Fiore, or Saint Mary of the Flower, this is just a ruse to hide you from how incredibly un-girly the entire thing is, like naming a boy Mary, or Mike Tyson having the voice of a pubescent Mickey Mouse (it was also named this on account of the fact that it’s supposed to be an allusion to the lily symbol of Florence. Or something). The whole idea for the church started way back in the late 13^th century, because the original church of the city, the Santa Reparata, was ever so slowly turning into a shithole. There were leaks every where, chunks of the building were falling off, people were straight up walking half-way across the city to go to some other, safer church, because hey, they wanted to get close to God, but not THAT close, if you know what I mean.

An artist's represantation of what it may have looked like.

When the Medici, the rulers of the city, caught wind of this, they just got pissed, mostly on account of the fact that other cities, like Pisa, and Siena, were totally building huge new churches, and Florence wasn’t about to get out-churched by a city that was one ‘s’ away from being called Piss. Deciding to pull out the big guns, the Medici called on one of the greatest architects of the time, Anolfo di Cambio to design them the biggest baddest cathedral this side of the spaghetti bowl, or to be a little more blunt, the LARGEST Roman Catholic Church IN THE WORLD. Well he got to work, designed that shit to perfection, and after two years or so, laid the first ceremonial brick on the build site on September 8, 1296, like a Boss. Also, Fun Fact: the cathedral was actually built in the old spot of the Santa Reparata, which had to be carefully demolished. This did not take long, however, since all they really had to do was just kinda of blow at it, and the whole thing toppled like a house of cards (shitty cards, that is). Things were going swimmingly, that is until Arnolfo up and died out of nowhere in 1302, severely slowing down the construction of the project. After that, everyone kinda lost interest in the whole project, until in 1330 they found the body of St. Zanobius in the wreckage of the Santa Reparata (Shitty-Church).

St. Zenobius- Patron saint of "Not my Problem."

 Despite the huge surge of popularity garnered to the church on account of this huge find, it wasn’t until 1331 that Arte della Lana stepped up to take over the whole project, only for him to die like, six years later in 1337. Construction finally resumed in 1355, when this time, instead of appointing one guy over a super huge architectural project that couldn’t afford to be slowed down, in a time when you could die just by stepping in mule crap (Which. Was. EVERYWHERE), they instead appointed a whole bunch of different architects, like Francesco Talenti, Alberto Arnoldi, Giovanni d’Ambrogio, Giovanni di Lapo Ghini, Neri di Fioravante and Orcagna. Sadly, a few years later they all died. Naw, just kidding, they were fine, and they were good too, they managed to finish the nave by 1380, and put up all kinds of marble, and decorations and junk around the cathedral, so that by 1418, the Santa Maria was looking hot- except for the dome. Just imagine the church, as is, and then just erase the dome. Looks pretty stupid doesn't it? It's like a hot chick with a spooky tooth. Just no good.

"I mean, I want this relationship to progress, i'ts just everytime we get close you jump on a broomstick and start cackling" 

And just like a girl with a spooky tooth can't afford the surgery necessary to fix said tooth, none of the architects working on the project could figure out how in the hell they were supposed to construct the world's largest dome to fit on the world's largest cathedral, without it just collapsing all over errverybody. So what did these masters of their craft, the historic architects of the fabulous Renaissance think of? They held a contest for who could design the best dome. Like, on the back of a freaking cereal box. Sadly, this did not draw in as many people as might have been expected, since the whole thing was kind of just between two guys (and a small army of muscle-bound guidos who just signed up to impress their friends, but they don't count), still, quality over quantity, and boy did they get quality. The two competitors were Lorenzo Ghiberti and Filippo Brunelleschi, and talk about a battle royale, Ghiberti had already won a competition a few years earlier to build the bronze doors for the Baptistry in 1401, but Brunelleschi was supported by Cosimo de Medici (to put it in perspective, that’s like getting supported by 2008 post-election Obama), so he was pretty confident that if he wanted to, not only could he win the competition, but he could probably get a blowjob or two from the friggin judges if he felt like it. He turned out to be right (about the winning the competition thing, not the dick sucking thing), submitting a design that not only knocked the socks off of Renaissance architecture, but modern architecture as well. How did he come up with such a brilliant design, the largest known domed ceiling in the entire world? Well, while all y’all real serious architects might have looked through hours upon hours of extensive texts, and researched into the wee hours of the morn, like chumps, Brunelleschi just got up one morning (probs woke up late too and didn’t care) and while making his breakfast of eggs, he noticed that the egg shells he cracked in half (probs with a killer karate chop) managed to stand up on their own- and there it was. So when he showed up on the construction site the first day, with errverybody telling him that there was no way they could make that ginourmous size a dome without some flying buttresses, he just whipped out his design, and then proceeded to watch while literally every single architecture student in the city came to him to professionally ride his dick.

EVERYBODY CHILL THE FUCK OUT- I got this.

Still, even though his design won the competition, the Republic in charge of the construction tried to get him and Ghiberti to work together- this did not work out so well. The two got along well enough, but Ghiberti himself even admitted that the entire project was way over his head (no pun intended, unless you laughed, in which case, pun completely intended), and the two years they were required to spend working together on the site just kind of became really not cool and awkward, like in the American Office (you know, that TV show with Emmy Award winner Steve Carrel- oh wait that’s right, he didn’t win the award, because the Emmys are COCKBLOCKING ASSHOLES) when Jim became co-manager with Micheal, and it sucked, and they had to give some b-s plot excuse to get Jim the fuck up outta there. Eventually though, Ghiberti left, and the real work could begin. Brunelleschi proved to be as great a construction manager as he was an architect (and lover [probs, I mean it was Italy in the Renaissance]), managing his resources so expertly, he would make any Korean Starcraft player proud. In order to lift all the thousands of pounds of crap up the building each day, Ol’ Bruny had to invent hoisting machines and lewissons, machines that astounded people because basically their entire point was to be giant cranes made of wood and metal that could pick up hundred pound stones, and then lift them higher than ten feet. He also managed to convince Baccio d’Agnolo to come and do the decorations of the drum gallery, only for him to punk out after Michelangelo showed up one day, and told him it was dumb. Because Michelangelo just rolls like that. Brunelleschi made many other improvements to the cathedral, and would have made a lot more, expect he died in 1446, and even the most hardcore of architects can’t exactly order construction from the grave. I mean, Brunelleschi probably could’ve, but I guess he chilled out by then. The final touches were made to the cathedral when The Grand Duke Cosimo l de Medici ordered the inner dome to be painted with a representation of The Last Judgment. However, painting the entire dome on one’s own would have taken decades, at best, and Cosimo, like the millions of impatient teens who would one day follow him (who couldn’t just wait fucking five second for their stupid little text message to return from SPACE), did not feel like waiting.

This ceiling was the stupid rainbow spinny wheel of it's day.

So instead, he hired a whole bunch of artists to paint the thing, like Giorgio Vasari, and Federico Zuccari, which, while it did produce results, did not look all that perfect, mostly on account of the fact that the artists almost never talked to each other, so they all just used different styles to paint their portions. Still, as I’m sure Cosimo replied to anybody who tried to criticize this, where’s your big-ass one of a kind World Record holding ceiling? Huh? That’s right. So there you have it, the Santa Maria del Fiore, aka Italy’s sexiest building, and Florence’s main claim to fame (besides the fact that it’s f-ing Florence). I tried to include as much info as I could, but if you have any more questions, feel free to check some of my resource sites listed below, or, if you want a more person to person approach, e-mail me at Ducmm313@aol.com. Of course, I will not respond to you. In all actuality, I will not even acknowledge your hypothetical message’s existence. But it still might feel nice to get that off your chest, right?

Don't mean to creep y'all out but I'm gonna need like, 10 minutes alone with this building.

http://www.mega.it/eng/egui/monu/buq.htm

http://goitaly.about.com/od/florenceattractions/a/florence-duomo-history.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Cathedral

It's Always Sunny "The Gang Goes to the Jersey Shore" Review

There are far worse people at the Jersey Shore than the cast of the Jersey Shore!

-Dee Reynolds

 

Okay, in what way can I sum up how hilarious and awesome this episode was… hmm… well, just take the Charlie throw up scene from last episode, drag it out over an entire episode, aaand yea. There you go. Okay, the entire episode was Charlie just throwing up blood onto a frightened woman, but there was vomiting, among other things. Other things such as Rum Ham, and homeless dudes banging each other under the Jersey Boardwalk. Now I’ve spent an entire summer on the Jersey Shore, so I wasn’t really sure how the Gang was going to do this episode, if they would focus entire on Guidos, maybe try and make fun of the actual Jersey Shore, or what, instead, the Gang did what I love watching them do, they threw their hands up in the air and just said “Screw it, watch Dee get her hair stuck in a Carnival Ride.” I loved everything about this episode, every single story line, Dee and Dennis trying to recapture their childhood at the beach, only to be presented the far uglier side of the Jersey Shore (after Dee gets a piece of her scalp torn off at the Boardwalk, she and Dennis try and party with the locals, only to get caught up in armed robbery, murder, and couple hits of angel dust), Mac and Frank getting stranded in the ocean, then partying with some passing Guidos (and enjoying some rum covered ham [“Eating your booze Frank? That’s genius!”]), and Charlie hanging out on the beach with the waitress of his dreams, who for some strange reason (ECSTASY) is totally attracted to Charlie and all the weird strange things he’s into. Another brilliant episode by the Sunny crew, here’s looking towards a fantastic season, Very Classy!

American Dad "Hot Water" Review

Gee Dad, I’d love to get in the hot tub too, but I can’t, because I’m pretty sure my parents f---ed in it last night!

-Steve Smith

            I’d just like to start out by saying, I love American Dad. It’s a really funny show, and I know Imma catch alotta hate from all y’all haters out thar, but I lke it even more than Family Guy. Which by the by, has gotten progressively more and more uncomfortable and predictable, and Brian really sucks, and aw shit now I’m drinking the hater-aid. But that’s irrelevant, ‘cus I’m here to talk about the season opener for American Dad, “Hot Water.” This was a musical episode (I mean Cee Lo Green guest starred, they kind of had to), and all in all, despite my admiration for the show, I think it was pulled off well, but it wasn’t really great. I found the story to be a little weak, considering the creativity I’ve seen from the writers of the show, as they seemed to ride completely off of the Appliance Comes Alive and Turns Evil trope of TV. I suppose you could forgive this because they were doing a pretty obvious little shop of horrors parody (Little Shop of Hot Tubs), but even the jokes (which usually make even the most lackluster of story genius) were either pretty generic and rehashed, or seriously friggin uncomfortable (kinda the whole foot in the mouth part [yes, that is very literal]). I laughed a couple of times during the show, but kind of only during the parts where Steve and Roger were involved. Which reminds me- HOW DID THEY NOT LET STEVE SING MORE!? I would love to have an entire musical episode centered around that kid, because his voice actor (no-homo, of course) sings like some sort of golden angel riding atop a Pegasus. During his and Roger’s duet, ‘Dad’s Gone,’

I couldn’t tell if I was crying from laughter or pure unfiltered EMOTION. Or maybe it was my time of the month. Either way, the whole episode felt a little lackluster, but overall pretty entertaining, so I’ll give it a Dapper.

Wilfred Season 1 Review

You’re not me. You’re a good person. And you’re a person.

-Wilfred

Wilfred… Wilfred, Wilfred, Wilfred… I’ve gotta admit the truth here, I’ve been staring at my screen for about five minutes now trying to think of something to write here, and normally I would chalk that up to just plain writer’s block, but with a show like Wilfred, that’s not the case- because what I’m trying to do is write a line to start off the essay, and describe the FX show Wilfred and, well… I can’t. Wilfred is a show that cannot just be described in one line, especially so soon after finishing it’s first season. Wilfred takes daring leaps out of the realm of conventional writing, a fact that has earned it the bemused and bewildered adoration of it’s new American audience, and earned it’s place as another successful show from the station that seems to do no wrong.

Starring Elijah Wood as Ryan Newman, and Jason Gann (from the Australian version) as Ryan’s neighbor’s dog, Wilfred, the show unabashedly opened the show with a darkly comedic montage of Ryan attempting (and failing) a drug-overdose suicide. From there, things simply get more insane, as Ryan is greeted the next morning by his cute girl-next-door neighbor, Jenna, who asks him to watch her dog Wilfred- only Ryan doesn’t see a dog. He sees Wilfred, specifically, a man dressed in a dog costume. At first the show teases with the idea that Ryan might be hallucinating, might be insane, might even be dead, but when all the logical theories fail, all that the viewer is left with is the illogical, which must be accepted as fact.

While some have complained they found Ryan’s quick acceptance of Wilfred as unrealistic, I argue that in Ryan’s shoes, anybody would have done the same. Ryan is despondent, miserable, and has reached the point where he just wants to die, but then Wilfred shows up, someone who actually cares about him, who wants to help him from the moment they meet (albeit unconventionally, i.e. making him steal weed from his asshole neighbor, and then shitting in the boot of said asshole neighbor), Wilfred is what Ryan has always wanted, and so he is presented the option of the red pill or the blue pill: reject the notion of Wilfred as impossible, falling back into reality, which to Ryan is on par with hell, or accept Wilfred, and reject normalcy, a path which offers salvation, and a chance at personal redemption. This is just one of the many philosophical questions Wilfred shoves into the face of its viewer, and does so, in my book, gloriously.

 Wilfred is not all about the meta-physical though; one must remember it is also a comedy, and a good one at that. Still, while some of the jokes seem controversial, when it comes right down to it, almost all of them are just different puns off of the fact that Wilfred is a dog, and has dog humor. This is one of the reasons I was interested to find out that the writer to bring Wilfred over to the states was actually David Zuckerman, an old, old, writer from Family Guy, who may have been the reason I was so insistently reminded of Brian (the dog from Family Guy), each time Wilfred made another joke about eating his own shit.

Apart form the jokes though, the writing of the show was superb, each episode bringing a new and refreshing story centered around a certain moral lesson, such as Respect, Pride, Compassion, Anger, etc. I was delighted each episode how true each lesson rang true, and how easily relatable (at least to me) the stories were. And what was really brilliant, I found, was how each and every one of these episodes is so important to the overall show by the finale. As I said before, it is Ryan’s horrible state of living that makes him so willing (eager even) to accept Wilfred no questions asked. But as time goes on, and Wilfred helps Ryan better himself each episode, Ryan starts to feel like he needs Wilfred less and less. And so he begins to question Wilfred more and more, going from episodes like Trust, and Acceptance, to episodes like Isolation, and Doubt. All this leads Ryan on an unavoidable path to the mind-fucking final, Identity. That episode, by far, might be the greatest cliffhanger for a show I’ve ever watched.

 The episode starts with Ryan finally breaking down trying to force Wilfred to explain what the fuck is going- which Wilfred cleverly evades with a reference to Lost. Except now Ryan, empowered arrogant and pissed of at Wilfred for his seeming betrayal (Wilfred trying to tell Ryan it’s okay to go on the slippery slope, as long as you have someone to hold onto), tries to take control of his life, by blatantly ignoring Wilfred, and playing mind-games with those around him. It all falls to shambles though, ending with Jenna now thinking she’s pregnant (she’s not) and has to marry man-child Drew, and Ryan’s sister, Kristin, breaking up with her husband, blaming it on Ryan telling him that he’s dead to her. With nowhere else to turn, and realizing the cost of his arrogance, Ryan tries to go to Wilfred, who is hospitalized because he tried to help Ryan by jumping in front of a car, only to find out Wilfred apparently does not know who he is (a sentiment that was repeated many times throughout the episode). In an absolutely horrifying twist, Ryan realizes Wilfred knew this would happen all along, as he remembers at the start of the episode Wilfred was writing his will, telling Ryan it instructions for when he was gone. Ryan runs home to find the will, his entire life ruined, everything he’d been building the entire season destroyed all because of him, only to open the door to the basement where he and Wilfred had been hanging out in during every episode- was gone. The door just opened to a closet. Out of which came the tennis ball- RYAN’S FIRST LESSON. I have to give this show a 100% Classy, even if I do hate it right now for making me wait UNTIL NEXT FUCKING SUMMER TO FIGURE OUT JUST WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON.           

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia- Frank's Pretty Woman Review

I’m gonna make that whore my wife.

-Frank Reynolds

 

            Aaah Sunny. I waited all summer for you to come back. I built a friggin widows perch in front of my TV just waiting. But I have to admit, as I looked out into the mysterious darkness of the TV screen, sighing, wishing we could be together again, I thought of last season. Of all the seasons. So many seasons of straight up laugh your balls off hilarity, how could any TV show, even you, keep it up? Even the most professional porn star can’t keep it up forever. This was what I was most afraid of when preparing for the season premier, but the second the title card came on, ‘Frank’s Pretty Woman,’ I knew you hadn’t lost your touch. The episode revolves around Frank’s new ‘girlfriend,’ so to speak (she’s really a dirty whore [and no, she’s not a nice lady]), as well as Mac’s newly acquired ‘mass,’ (he’s fifty pounds overweight, wearing Tommy Bahama shirts, and carrying around a Hefty garbage bag of chimichangas), and Dennis’ fear that in the ‘second acts’ of their lives, the gang is becoming “the gross crew.” And so the gang splits up into pairs, and set about on missions of self improvement, which from the Sunny gang, is like a guy trying to get a healthy meal at McDonalds (those salads are considered lethal weapons in some countries). Dee goes with the whore, Roxie, to try and clean her up, and pull a ‘Pretty Woman’ on her, Dennis goes with Mac to try and get him to clean himself up, and lose some weight like Dennis, and Charlie tries to help out Frank, attempting to find him a girl who’ll like him for more than his money (in his own borderline retarded Charlie fashion).

Dee and Roxie’s story might be my favorite, as Dee quickly finds herself emulating the dirty crack-whore when Roxie manages to put one of the many, many clothing store workers to give Dee trouble because of her companions, in his place, with a fist-sized wad of twenty-dollar bills, the sight of which is enough to make Dee think of Roxie as living “a glamorous lifestyle.” She’s also swayed when she finds out one of Roxie’s clients is Tiger Woods (Some say that joke is dead by now, but nobody knows how to kick a dead horse quite like Sunny), only to be dismayed when she finds out that ‘Tiger’ is actually just an impersonator, the same guy who impersonated McNab (is that how you spell it? I have literally no clue, I’m don’t really watch that footyball game) in the Eagles episode. Dee quickly bounces back though when she finds out he’s willing to pay her just to rub her feet (“I’m gonna be a foot-girl!”). 

Dennis and Mac also have a pretty interesting story, with both finding out just how unhealthy they are, Mac having type two “dyabeetus,” and Dennis having multiple other problems, more than likely brought on by his anorexic diet of no lunch, and sometimes not even any breakfast (“No pain no gain!”). To correct this, Dennis accepts Mac’s help in showing him how to let himself go, culminating in them chowing down over an excessive amount of chimichangas, while Mac injects himself with shots insulin, and Dennis talks about going to find some crack. 

Despite all this, Charlie and Frank’s story takes the cake for all out ridiculousness- Charlie’s plan to find Frank a girl is to pose as a rich Texas tycoon on an online dating site, with Frank as his limo driver. Then, during the date, he’ll pretend to be sick, and have the girl continue the date with Frank, so she’ll fall in love with Frank even though he’s not rich. I know there a girls out there who will do crazy things for the promise of money, and the girl who accepted the date surely went through the worst trials of this, only to come out of it covered in puke and blood, and a head full of bad memories. Let me explain. Apparently before the date, Charlie had taken a whole lot of pills, meant to make him cough up a little blood. Instead, while trying to talk up Frank, and his business of finding eggs and crabs under the bridges of Philadelphia, he ended up spewing blood like a fire hydrant from his mouth, covering his screaming date in his bile, not only ending the date, but possibly rupturing my spleen from laughter. Enraged by this turn of events (the fact that the woman left, not the fact that Charlie just emptied possibly one third of his body’s worth of blood onto her), Frank proclaims what has been evident in the series since his character’s introduction, Frank loves eggs, he loves garbage, he loves having sex with dirty whores, and he loves Roxie. 

And so all the asinine story lines are brought together, creating one big insane ending, when Frank calls the gang together to Charlie’s apartment so he can propose to Roxie in front of them (why he wanted to do it in Charlie’s apartment of all places probs has something to do with the previous declaration of his love for filth). Sadly, Roxie had to meet the end that all whores must meet one day, and had to go up to the big dimly lit street corner in the sky, when her crack-overdosed heart finally gives out right after Frank’s proposal. Charlie, covered in blood, dissuades the gang from calling 911, instead agreeing on just laying her body in the hall, but not before Frank gives a heartfelt eulogy to the dead hooker on the filthy, rose-petal covered carpet of Charlie’s apartment. Despite how much I liked this episode, the fact that I had been left cold to one too many of the jokes, this ridiculous scene was more than enough for me to bump this up from a high Dapper, to a low Classy.

Bastion Review

Now here’s a kid whose world got all twisted, leaving him stranded on a rock in the sky

-Narrator

           

            Now admittedly, when I first looked at this game, and this game looked at me, we both said to each other, in our heads, “Yea, pass, doesn’t look so special. Doesn’t even really look like my taste anyway.” But then all our friends told us we’d be great for each other. So we took a second look- tentative at first, of course. Now I personally didn’t have the kind of money in hand to be throwing fifteen Amurrican dollars around willy-nilly, I had to be sure that this game would treat me right. So I waited. I bided my time. And I almost lost her- until I got bored one night and couldn’t find any other games I owned that interested me. So, cash in hand (by which I mean my credit card), I quickly purchased the necessary Microsoft points, and downloaded that shit. So I pressed start, clicked Story, New Game- and fell in love.

Don't worry ladies, we have an open relationship.

Bastion is incredible. Created by WB Interactive Studios and Supergiants Games, it is such a fun game, with a very neat and cool design to it. You play as ‘The Kid,’ a white haired young man who wakes up surrounded by the ruins of his dead home city, which was apparently destroyed by a thing called, ‘The Calamity.’ What makes the game even more interesting is the fact that your entire story, every little action you take, is narrated by a voice, who you meet later in the game, when you arrive at ‘The Bastion.’ The Bastion is the last refuge of peace in the torn and destroyed world, and the purpose of the game is to collect enough crystals and shards to make it operational. Collecting these crystals also adds a thick RPG element to the game, as the crystals allow you to build things on the Bastion, things like an armory, a distillery, a memorial, and more, all things that have the expressed purpose of helping you level up in the game. Along your journey you will of course run into enemies, who you defeat with weapons like your hammer, or repeater gun, or other weapons you find in the game. I found the weapons to be one of my favorite parts overall, as they fit so well in with the game’s Fantasy-Western vibe, and I thought the fact that you could level them up was veeerry cool, giving them special effects, that would later come into play when you had to decide which weapon combination you were going to use for each mission (my favorite combination was the War Machete and the Scrap Musket).

That fat blue thing in front of me? I RAPED IT with my hammer.

I also thought the voice-acting by Logan Cunningham was absolutely phenomenal, grade-A if I do say so myself. I can’t say I believe the game would have been HALF as good if he hadn’t been narrating you every step of the way (something I wish he would do for me in real life, though of course, I’m not half as bad-ass as The Kid, so it probs wouldn’t sound as cool) The music was also top-notch, especially the eerie yet soothing melody of Zia’s Theme, otherwise known as Build That Wall. Literally the first thing I did after finishing Bastion that night was go on iTunes and buy the shit out of that song, which I’m pretty sure I now want played at my funeral (sorry Take on Me, you can be played at my 70^th birthday if I live that long). The song was also perfect for the story, which outlines heavy elements of the dangers of war, of striking out of fear, and retaliating out of anger, even when you may not understand the situation at hand. It did it in a way I hadn’t seen a good story do before, and in a way that I felt was truly fitting considering I played it the night before Septemeber 11^th (I’m not sure if that was the story was truly trying to get across, but whether it was or wasn’t, absolutely brilliant). The game’s design was also very memorable, and I enjoyed it a lot, the game’s mechanic where the path in front of you appears as you progress forward making me feel a little dizzy at first, though I grew accustomed to it quickly, barely even noticing it by the end. This game, even though it’s only an Xbox arcade game, has so much to offer, with so many side-challenges and quests, that if you loved just playing the game as much as I did, you’ll have a hard time putting it down, even after the credits roll. I give this game a high Classy, recommending it to anybody who wants to get an exceptionally thought provoking, fun, and interesting game, that is well worth their fifteen dollars.

The History of Disney

All the adversity I've had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me... You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.

-Walt Disney

Fans of the site may know that the entire purpose of these essays is to hopefully make tears shoot out of your face like cheap sprinklers, and ruthlessly smash dreams like if the sandman took steroids and got pissed one night. But for this essay, Imma talk about my polar opposite in every way (except in exceptional classiness), one man who decided to take his talents, his business savvy, and his overall non-creepy paternal love for all children (as long as they’re not minorities), and build dreams. And then whore them out for profit (that’s where the business savvy comes in, of course).

"Oh what's the Mickey? You DON'T have my money? WELL GET BACK OUT THERE!"

 I am  talking about Mr. Walt Elias Disney, born December 5, 1901, and since his childhood was literally the exact same childhood of every other child living in that time (his father went to California in search of gold, didn’t find any, stayed out west and bought a farm, Bob Loblaw… [Sorry couldn’t help it]), I’m just gonna go ahead and skip past all that to the part where his brother Roy Disney bought land in Marceline, Missouri when Walt was four. That was where Walt ultimately grew up and developed his talents for drawing at his summer job. No, not doodling penises (peni?) on napkins while serving food at McDonalds, just a little creepier. His neighbor, retired doctor “Doc” Sherwood had this young boy come to his home, where he would pay him to draw pictures of Sherwood’s horse, Rupert. If this doesn’t already come off as pretty damn weird to you, remember the fact that he paid this VERY young child to draw these pictures in a time when money was kinda tight (twenty years away from the Great Depression tight), meaning ultimately he was paying this kid daily what you pay Netflix monthly (and we all know how people feel about that), just to draw his friggin horse (so in a way, yes, peni were drawn). Anyway, time progressed, and Walt grew up, eventually moving to Chicago, where he became the cartoonist for his school’s newspaper. Walt dropped out soon after though at the age of sixteen, so he could join the US army to fight in WWI. Which he was too young for.

Well... shit.

 Sooo apparently the reason that he didn’t think to check the age limits for the army BEFORE he went ahead and just straight up dropped out of public education was because he was so jazzed up at the idea of fighting for America, or it was for the same reason he was the cartoonist for the newspaper instead of a writer (I’m implying he’s stupid). Not one to go back on his word, Walt instead joined the Red-Cross, driving ambulances in France until 1919, when he moved back to Kansas. Unable to find good work (apparently he was worse at drawing cartoons for newspaper than writing articles), he ended up accepting his brother Roy’s help again, who got him a temporary job at Pesmen-Rubin Art Studio, where he ended up meeting a man with a sillier name than him, cartoonist Ubbe Iwerks (Word 2003 just put two red squiggly lines under both of those words and I do not blame it at all). Anyway, bonded by their mutually hilarious monikers, when their time at Pesmen-Rubin ended, they decided to start their own studio, and so was born Iwerks-Disney Commercial Artists. But come on, this is Disney here, as soon as he started the company he left to go work for Kansas City Film Ad Company, leaving Iwerks to just go, “WTF man? What in the hell just happened?” It was at Kansas City that Disney gained his love for animation, and with positive influence from his boss, AV Cauger, he started reading up on it. He then decided his boss was an idiot and shouldn’t have been using cutouts for animation, cel was where it was at baby.

Fuck yea.

So once again, he made friends with a co-worker, Fred Harmon, and left the studio to go make his own (AGAIN), with Harmon as his first employee. They became very famous in the Kansas area for their self-titled Laugh-O-Grams (I know, it sounds like birthday messages from clowns), and then subsequently went bankrupt a few years later. Disney, deciding he was tired of fucking around in Kansas, the worlds most boring sandbox, grabbed his brother Roy, and moved on up to Hollywood, California, to make it big in that ‘ol entertainment biz (which they actually had a chance at since neither of them were interested in mainlining coke, LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE IN HOLLYWOOD EVER). Walt really wanted to distribute his ‘Alice Comedies,’ the short animations he had based off of Alice in Wonderland, that everybody else in Kansas had basically told him was garbage. But just like Walt had never finished High School, and never found a business he could run successfully, Walt never took the hint, which was pretty lucky, since it meant that he would then form his own studio in Hollywood to distribute it, and so was born Walt Disney Brothers Studios. Walt managed to talk people into coming over from Kansas to Hollywood to help him with the show, including his old business partner who had so far been screwed by Walt’s failures in business twice, Mr. Ubbe Iwerks (who must’ve had a serious bromance for the guy). Sadly, his bro-love would go unrequited as in 1925, just two years after the formation of the studio in 1923; Walt hired a young woman, one Lillian Bounds, to ink and paint celluloid. He promptly commenced with tapping that ass, and soon the two were wed. It was in fact Lillian who might have influenced the future of Walt Disney Studios the most, as it was Lillian who, when Walt was trying to figure out a name for his new mouse cartoon character, told him to name the little guy Mickey, instead of (ew) Mortimer. Which reminds me, you may be wondering how Walt ever ended up even making Mickey Mouse. Well, it’s a long story, full of betrayal, greed, love, and sex. Well not sex, technically, unless you count the copious amounts of love making between Walt and the lovely missus Lillian Disney. I do.

Mr. Disney, you have a fine taste in women sir.

Anyway, it was near the end of the Alice Comedies that Walt was interested in branching out towards a different cartoon character, this time of his own original creation. For some reason he chose a rabbit, who he coined, Oswald (seriously, where was Lillian when he needed her, right?). The character was actually drawn by good old Iwerks, who continued working with Walt, drawing about 26 more of the ‘Oswald the Lucky Rabbit’ cartoons (which sounds like Lucky Charms and Trix cereals ill-fated imaginary 80’s Saturday morning TV show), until Walt made the infamous decision to try and earn some more money off of Oswald. Disney made a plea to the Mrs. Margaret J. Winkler, the woman who was distributing Disney’s cartoons through Universal, but when Walt finally brought her attention to Oswald, and she saw how successful it was, she basically got two giant money signs in her eyes, and told Disney, in the most polite way possible, she was gonna steal the fuck outta that Rabbit. And since Oswald was technically Universal Studios property, she totally could, and did, giving it to her husband Charles Mintz, to distribute instead. Charles then went ahead and stole all of Disney’s best animators and cartoonists, leaving only one behind- and yes, you guessed right- Ubbe Iwerks, the creator of Oswald. Walt understandably felt like punching Mintz in the dick, but instead just had to wallow in self pity. Which he totally didn’t (bitch, he’s DISNEY). Instead, he tried creating another character, a certain MOUSE character, and the rest is history… which I will continue to explain. Making sure this time that he owned very single character he created, Walt and Iwerks made another series of cartoons starring Mickey, their third one being the most famous, as it had synchronized sound, a new invention at the time. It was called ‘Steamboat Willie,’ and despite the slightly homo-erotic name, the cartoon was anything but.

Awww yea Mickey, you shake that ass.

 It was so famous that it was actually presented in B.S. Moss’s Colony Theatre in New York City on November 18, 1928; now know by its more familiar moniker, THE BROAD-FUCKING-WAY THEATRE. The instant success of the first couple Mickey Mouse cartoons inspired the creation of even more ‘Silly Symphonies,’ which played all over America, with even more iconic characters showing up in them over time, including Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, and Retard McDownsyndrome, or as he was later titled to be more ‘politically-correct,’ Goofy (every group needs a Zoidberg). Walt felt like Disney Studios could handle an even bigger project though, so, using all their assets, Walt began production on the first fully animated Sound and Screen motion picture, in 1934. All kinds of new tech was used to make the film, so that when it was finally released, it was literally proclaimed as one of the greatest movies of all time- and no, Disney did not release ‘300’ in 1937. I’m talking about Walt Disney’s Snow White, which was a lot like Avatar today, in the sense that nobody had any idea how the animation used in the film could have been made to look so real, and so beautiful, and everybody liked the story because it was unoriginal, and hadn’t actually been written by the creators of the movie. And if you think all that success was just because tech was so primitive back then, if those people got a look at the shit we could do just on our laptops with a Flash Program, they wouldn’t give two stinky shits about fucking Snow White, then prepare to be brutally mind fucked. The film has been re-released, usually in company down times, in 1952, ‘58, ‘67, ‘75, ‘83, ‘87, and ‘93, and still netted at least in the tens of millions each time, literally shaming any other movie that had the balls to be released in the same week, and couldn’t make as much dough as Snow White.

I'm gonna straight-up rape you in the box-office.

Walt would continue to ride of this success all the way into WWII, when this time, instead of just up and quitting everything for no logical reason (again), he decided to help the troops overseas by entertaining the families back home. Walt released many movies at the time including Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, and Bambi, but what earned him copious amounts of fame and well-wishers at the time were his propaganda cartoons, which delighted and amused thousands, for some reason. I mean, I know there’s a difference in time periods, but fucking seriously, there’s an episode where Donald play a goddamn NAZI. He hails the fume-here (get it? Because Hitler stinks?) and everything, they even make it pretty funny. Post-war, Disney’s success continued, with him making even more movies, and cartoons, soon becoming one of the richest, most respected men in Hollywood, if not the world. But what Walt was most excited about though, was the creation of a project he’d had in his good old fancy-schmancy imagination ever since he was a kid (don’t worry, it had nothing to do with the horse peni). That’s why in 1954, Walt unveiled an idea that would become paramount to the company’s future, and seriously, was, and is, the exact same dream of literally every single child anywhere, an entire theme park, named after HIM. FUCKING DISNEYWORLD.

This castle is like the Washington Monument for dreams.

Needless to say, when he showed off his designs for the project, everyone involved literally orgasm-ed at once, and set about to making sure that going to Disneyworld even once would be the experience of a lifetime, like the death of a loved one, except happy, and not depressing and shit. Opened to the public on July 17, 1955, the park had a shaky start, but after just one visit from Ronald Reagan, aka the most interesting man in the world’s long lost brother (probably), shit got booming. Another probable reason the park ended up so successful, the reason Walt wanted to make it, was out of pure fucking jealousy of his two kids. He said that whenever he took his two kids to carnivals and amusement parks, he was always pissed when they got to have the time of their bitchy little lives going on merry-go-rounds and such, when he had to sit on the fucking bench, like a world class tool. So he wanted to make an amusement park where adults could have just as much fun as the kids, and if he could get PAID for it, we-he-he-hail shoot, he was gonna do it by golly! Disneyworld grew and grew, with more chapters of it appearing around the country and eventually the world) as time progressed, Walt’s dream finally coming to fruition. Sadly, the stars that shine brightest die the fastest, or at least die after they’ve created an entertainment empire dedicated simply to how awesome imagination and dreams are. On December 15, 1966, Walt Disney passed away, just two years after his crowning achievement, Mary Poppins. His death was like when Gandalf died protecting everybody in the Fellowship. His death was like when Dumbledore died at the hands of Severus Snape (I’m not putting fucking spoilers, if you haven’t read Harry Potter Six by now, you’re probably illiterate, in which case you can’t understand this and you smell like poo so there). Fucking men cried tears at his funeral. God himself sent Jesus to high five him on his way into heaven. Which reminds me- Walt Disney might not have actually made it into heaven. Yea, sorry about that, but there’s some pretty heavy evidence that Walt, in all honesty, was more racist and homophobic than even some of his close friends could handle. And if you don’t believe me, just check out a little thing called ‘Song of the South,’ Disney’s middle finger to black people. Oh, and by the way, Disney also apparently didn’t really care for the jews that much either, he just hated Hitler because, seriosuly, fuck Hitler, go AMUHRICA! Yes, the man had some pretty hardcore faults, and while I won’t go so far as to call any one of them redeemable, the man’s legend, and passion, and overall love for the world (as long as there weren’t any minorities in it) still made him the kind of man millions of people still owe their childhoods too today. And after he died, I’m sorry to say this, but the Disney Company was never the same again. After that, it was all business, and while some of the movies they made are very good, none are on par with the exceptional classiness of the Walt-era cartoons, which still go down in the annals of entertainment history today.

LOVE ME.

Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Disney_theatrical_feature_films

http://corporate.disney.go.com/corporate/complete_history_3.html

http://studioservices.go.com/disneystudios/history.html

Sadly, I've run a little late on my current in-production essay. This is unacceptable. I am extremely sorry to all those who have spent their idle time refreshing the page on my site, hoping, just hoping, that soon some new essay would show it's face. To make up for this tragedy in the only way I possibly can now, I have decided to post this picture to you all, in the hopes that by the time my new essay is finally finished, all will be forgiven.

Pictured here: The Classiest fucking people ALIVE.