Holiday Chicken Special

            I work in an office.  My commitment to giving a dedicated 40-60% of my all to this job on a consistent basis has left me with little energy to write on this blog with any frequency.  Contrary to what you or others may believe, writing takes a lot of mental energy, it is mental exercise that is taxing.

            But while my job does sit on my brain like a big fat dog keeping me from getting up, occasionally it does give me something to talk about… Mostly stuff I can’t post because pointed criticisms of your work, no mater how many layers of anonymity, is not smart.

            Today I have one of the things I can write about, the office Christmas party.  Last year we did a traditional secret Santa format and I gave a picture frame with a picture of myself in it, and in the picture, I am holding up a sign that says, “The Frame is the Present”.  I am (of course) mugging in this picture.  One of my coworkers thought it was such a fun gift idea, she told her husband and the husband decided to do the same thing for all the people in his office.

            I am a trend setter.

            This year we had a Holiday Sock Party… Which is apparently a thing.  The idea being… It is secret Santa, but with Socks.  Alright.

            The organizing member of the office gathered names, favorite colors, candy, hobby/interests, and a preference on whether the person wanted “holiday socks” or just socks.  I listed myself as “ambivalent” on the sock question.

            My draw gave me a woman from the office I have interacted with dozens of times, but her name never stuck, I am kind of an inconsiderate workmate.  Her interest was listed as “Roosters/Country Theme”.  What an odd choice you might be thinking, I made the most of it.

            I went to a craft store, bought a rooster sculpture that was on sale, and made holiday cloths for it out of printer paper.  I also made it a tiny 3D beard out of layers of paper with trimmed edges and secured it with fish line.  I then made her a card, written in character as the “Holiday Chicken”.  That card is presented below along with the image of the titular fowl.

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Season’s Greetings from the Holiday Chicken,

I am obligated to preface all of this by telling you that I am not acting in any official capacity for the Holiday, I am merely passionate about it.

As such, much like Santa reps for Christmas I am attempting to set myself up as a holiday mascot for Christmas Socks.  I will freely admit, I am a poor choice for this job, as being a chicken, socks are… well, let’s just say I have lots of friends who have worn socks.

But!  I want to break into the holiday mascot industry and we all have to start somewhere.

So, socks it is.

Anyway, I have included the receipts, as I feel unqualified to make judgments about what socks people should receive and want them to be able to swap such things if they need to.

Happy Holidays from the Holiday Chicken.

P.S. if you know anyone who works in Santa’s workshop and could get me an interview do not hesitate to pass that information over.  I am not too chicken to ask for help in professional advancement.

(Resume and References available upon request)

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            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

Most Underrated Disney Films

            I have not been posting nearly enough this year and I want to steer back from that.  To that end I have found a 30-day blog challenge and fluffed it out to 31 entries (since December has 31 days).  I have done a 30-day challenge before for movies, though that one was poorly executed (I started it in the middle of a month, at one point I posted 2 entries on one day, it is a mess).  I did another one just this year in August on Video Games, that one was better, go read it after this one, all of it.  Or don’t, no pressure.

            Today is day 25 and the topic is “Most Underrated Movie”.

You know, I give so little thought to Christmas.  I could have reordered my blogs this month to talk about "Nightmare Before Christmas" on Christmas (or Christmas Eve) but I didn't think to.  That was a bit of an oversight.

            I am however willing to point to two movies that I feel are underrated, the first of which came out relatively recently and the other is a forgotten about gem of a film that came out when I was itty bitty.

            First up is “Brave”, the story of a teenage girl who has the gall to not want to get married, flying in the face of pretty much all previous princess characters in the Disney lineup.  She is an able bodied and headstrong fighter with the most awesome hair I have ever seen in an animated character—and I say that as someone who is familiar with and a fan of “Tangled”.

I can't remember the context of this image.
That face could say a lot of different things.

The plot is one of reconciliation with a parent with whom very different life goals and personal priorities have caused a split good bones on which to lay the stories flesh.  And there are monstrous bears.  Bears are serious business.

            It is not perfect.  While I like the setting, characters, premise, and overall plot, some things were not really my cup of tea.  The final confrontation is weak, a character only alluded to earlier in the film shows up as a final boss but has no presence and is not a threat for the rest of the movie.  I feel like there could have been some other monster or supernatural threat in the movie that could have hovered over it all and been there at the end for a boss battle.

I like standing stones and fog choked moors as a visual motif.
The green says, "Alive", the fog says, "Mysterious", and the stones say, "Ancient" and "Unnatural".

The setting as indicated by the presence of the wisps had the potential to be spookier rather than adventurous, I might have liked the movie more if it had gone that way.  But those complaints are kind of thin and amount to asking for more of what was already in “Brave”.  And that is the type of complaint that doesn’t really ring true with me anymore.

The second movie and one that I feel should not be as forgotten as it is, “Duck Tales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp”.  This film is a damn near perfect adventure film, fits right in with the tone of the “DuckTales” series and is both hilarious and fun.

Should have named the genie Bob Cratchit.

The plot is a typical adventure set up.  Scrooge and his family go looking for a lost treasure and find a genie’s lamp.  They are hunted by a sorcerer who has an amulet that would allow him to have endless wishes.  It is actually structured kind of similar to “Aladdin” or “The Mummy” and I wonder if that contributed to it being left behind when the nostalgia train picked up steam, that it is merely a fantastic entry in a much longer series while others were stand alone and released in a bigger push.

I don’t have any complaints about this movie aside from it being hard to get a good copy of it.  It is 26+ years old, they are actually rebooting the “DuckTales” brand with a whole new cast (a cast that I think looks amazing).  So, “Duck Tales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp” and the rest of the 80’s series is soon to be recalled only in the context of a precursor.  Much like the classic Disney cartoons of old.  An artifact with value, but not something that gets looked at too often.

 

The new one's animation looks much better too.

            Share your own thoughts on this in the comments.  I know I am not the only person out there who is nostalgic for Disney products, and I am sure many people disagree with my selection for today’s entry. 

I picked Disney stuff just because I knew there was so much of it to talk about and it lends itself to discussion in the comments.  So please, tell me how my opinion about cartoon movies is biased and how your opinion on cartoon movies is objectively right.

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If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

Best Disney Character Designs

            I have not been posting nearly enough this year and I want to steer back from that.  To that end I have found a 30-day blog challenge and fluffed it out to 31 entries (since December has 31 days).  I have done a 30-day challenge before for movies, though that one was poorly executed (I started it in the middle of a month, at one point I posted 2 entries on one day, it is a mess).  I did another one just this year in August on Video Games, that one was better, go read it after this one, all of it.  Or don’t, no pressure.

            Today is day 16 and the topic is “Best Character Designs”.

This movie took second place in the “Favorite Setting” entry, and edges out “Inside Out” for best character designs.  The glowing embodiments of emotions found in “Inside Out” are rather hard to top, but this movie has an element of that concept—embodying something—and has the advantage of sheer numbers as a good chunk of the opening musical number is introducing the various creative nightmares that populate this little corner of the world.

This thing is an avalanche of fan artwork.

“The Nightmare Before Christmas” was not the darling of Disney when it came out, but due to having strong appeal for the two most profitable holidays on the calendar it has met with enough replay to attain an iconic status.  The unique imagery and strange designs allow it to exist on its own grading scale of style and fashion, allowing it to be the un vivisected golden goose of Hot Topic and a touchstone of modern gothic aesthetic.

Most of the rest of this blog is not about character design but related topics to “The Nightmare Before Christmas”.  Just FYI.

Compare and Contrast

I would say that what makes “Nightmare” work so much more compared to its contemporary counterpart, “James in the Giant Peach” is the mean spirited tone of “James” while “Nightmare” is idealistic and hopeful, in spite of the main character being the villain of the movie.

And before you object, Jack is definitely the villain protagonist of the movie.  Jack kidnaps Santa Claus to steal his place in the pantheon of holidays, that is an evil and selfish act, the Grinch was a villain and he didn’t even kidnap any people.  Sure, Oogie Boogie is a more transparently dangerous threat, but he is not the inciting incident and mostly serves the narrative as a final threat to overcome rather than an insidious force.

BUT, that being said, the idealism shines thru when you see that Jack doesn’t take over Christmas out of malice but because he thinks he could do well at it and wants to grow beyond his personal limitations.  Jack’s character arc is realizing that his limitations exist and that he should embrace his talents.

I also just don't really like the taste of peach in general.
Watching them eat this thing made me kind of sick to my stomach.

Meanwhile, Spiker and Sponge, the villainous aunts in “James” are so transparently vile and have no reason for abusing James beyond just being assholes that the film feels dirtier and more unpleasant for them being in it.  Which is the point, but I am saying that is why it is a less well remembered movie overall.

Another contrast that can be drawn to “Nightmare” is its younger sibling, “The Corpse Bride”.  Made by mostly the same team, both are musicals with macabre subject matter, and both use stop motion animation.  What allows “Nightmare” to stand out in this comparison is how it has a light side to juxtapose with the darkness.  Christmas Town is a bright happy place covered with snow and happy décor, by showing it after showing Halloween Town the creative division is all the more striking and interesting.

MORE GREY!

Conversely, “Corpse” is grey and dower the whole way.  The underworld presented is actually more lively than the living world which is perhaps the moodiest film location I have can recall.  That lack of contrast makes the movie, literally and figuratively duller in the mind’s eye.

Stop Motion Animation

            I have a particular soft spot for stop motion animation.  The idea of bringing toys to life via the magic of photography makes my brain light up.  Unfortunately, even though Disney has made use of the technique in the past it seems to be the forgotten tool in their shed at this point.  While they have expanded in breadth and depth their Intellectual Property stable and have kept the pokers hot in numerous techniques (CGI, hand drawn animation, live action productions, MUPPETS, and news/sports) they have not been supporting stop motion as much as I think they could.

            In comes Studio Laika, creators of “ParaNorman” (which I love), “Box Trolls” (which I love), their adaptation of “Coraline” (Which I love both as a book and movie), and “Kubo and the Two Strings” (which came out this year and I did not have an opportunity to see yet, but I will probably love it).

I love this stuff.

Laika has also produced “The Corpse Bride” which (as mentioned above) I did not care as much for, but that was in 2005, 4 years before “Coraline”, so it is fair to say they are a different company now and that project was very much emphasizing the creative vision of Tim Burton.

Laika is the big dog on the field concerning stop motion animation and THEY DO NOT GET ENOUGH ATTENTION.  Even though their movies are made relatively inexpensively, to an average of $40 million, a steal by animated feature standards, and they consistently produce strong writing and animation they do not get the commercial and critical attention they deserve.

            I actually envision a future in which Laika is bought out by Disney and turned into a stop motion Pixar, running themselves but having the advertising and merchandising empire of Disney to make them much more known and profitable.  I do not know if that will happen, but if it did, I couldn’t see it as a bad thing.

            Share your own thoughts on this in the comments.  I know I am not the only person out there who is nostalgic for Disney products, and I am sure many people disagree with my selection for today’s entry. 

I picked Disney stuff just because I knew there was so much of it to talk about and it lends itself to discussion in the comments.  So please, tell me how my opinion about cartoon movies is biased and how your opinion on cartoon movies is objectively right.

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If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.