Tuesdays on Tape #17-19

#17 - Snow Day (2/5/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: 0/.5
Previews: 1/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: .5/1
Graphics: 1/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: 1/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: 1/1
Total: 5.5/7

Rent or Buy?: Buy

Kudos:

• Custom boxart and orange tape
• Farts on top of farts
• Smash Mouth soundtrack
• Fry cabin homage to Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
• My friend Steve

Personal Thoughts: Snow Day turned out really nicely. I had low expectations for a Nickelodeon movie, but it wasn't bad at all. While not hilarious by any means, it was enjoyable throughout and even had a couple of funny jokes. The cast did really well at not being annoying. If you like fart jokes and turn-of-the-century pop rock music, you will like it. Ultimately, though, it's a kids movie from 2000. Those without nostalgic investment in the period may not enjoy it as much as we did.

#18 - When Nature Calls (2/12/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: .5/.5
Previews: 1/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: 1/1
Graphics: 1/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: 1/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: .5/1
Total: 6/7

Rent or Buy?: Buy

Kudos:

• Lots of sweet previews and a post-movie infomercial
• Bullet Baby
• Cougar fight (with intermission)
• Peep show
• Freddie Blassie
• Copious amounts of stunt animals

Personal Thoughts: This is my kind of movie! Made by the lesser of the Kaufman brothers for Troma in  1985, When Nature Calls is a whacky ride. In true Troma fashion, it combines clever humor with low brow gags for lots of laughs. This came out the same year as Toxic Avenger and reminds me of Troma's older comedies (before all Troma Studios films where over-the-top cheezfests). That doesn't mean it's not a little whacky, though.

It's a spoof of the Wilderness Family series, which I didn't know going into it. I was pleasantly surprised by some of the jokes. There is a hilarious man vs. cougar fight, a crazy tirade by Freddie Blassy, and a slew of funny parody trailers at the beginning. This little-known Troma gem is a classy production, right down to the Gone With the Windesque box art. Troma-fans should consider this essential viewing.

#19 - Balto (2/26/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: .5/.5
Previews: .5/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: 0/1
Graphics: 1.5/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: .5/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: .5/1
Total: 4.5/7

Rent or Buy?: Buy

Kudos:

• Awesome looking grizzly bear
• Colorful aurora borealis grafx
• Morse code dog
• Palette-swapped pudgy dogz

Personal Thoughts: I've seen Balto a million times. My 2nd and 3rd grade teacher was from Alaska. She would fit Alaska and the Iditarod into the curriculum whenever she could. I think I seriously watched Balto every week for those two years of my school career. So, naturally, it's an important part of my childhood memories.

Unfortunately, it's not great. Not bad, just not great. It fits somewhere in the mid-range of the pantheon of 90s cartoons. Balto is better than We're Back, not as good as Mulan. A couple of things that hold this back are a lack of funny jokes and a couple of really annoying polar bear characters. I would only recommend it for 90s nostalgia.

(The actual story of the Nome medicine run is pretty interesting. After re-watching Balto, I looked it up and read about it for a good hour or so. The story is quite impressive!)

Tuesdays on Tape #14 - #16

With the beginning of the new year, we revamped our rating scale. It's still pretty much the same, but point values have changed. We did add a half point for having cool box art, too.

#14 - Explorers (1/15/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: 0/.5
Previews: 0/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: 0/1
Graphics: 1.5/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: .5/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: .5/1
Total: 3.5/7

Rent or Buy?: Rent

Kudos:

• Crazy rock 'n roll dance number 
• Sound fx taken from alternator belt
• Trashbag kid

Personal Thoughts: Personally, this was my least favorite tape we've watched. I can't believe we rated everything that highly, especially graphics. This movie was only decent when the aliens were introduced at the end. I was very disappointed by this because I remember loving it as a kid. It sucks even more because I've grown to be a huge Joe Dante fan since then. (Gremlins 2 and Matinee are two of the best movies of all time.) Oh well.

#15 - Ed (1/22/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: .5/.5
Previews: 0/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: 0/1
Graphics: 1/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: 0/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: .5/1
Total: 3/7

Rent or Buy?: Rent

Kudos:

• Clean Up scene
• Crazy stunt driving
• "I'm gonna spank . . . that monkey."
• Sound fx when kid patted on back

Anti-Kudos:

• No colonoscopy scene

Personal Thoughts: This was the first tape to get an anti-kudos. We had looked up Ed on Wikipedia and read that Ed gives an opposing player a colonoscopy. We were so disappointed to find out this doesn't actually happen in the movie. It turns out that the colonoscopy thing was simply vandalism of the Wikipedia article. When we rated this movie, the shadow of the missing colonoscopy was hanging over our heads. I think the rating reflects that. The movie wasn't that bad (definitely not iMDB bottom 100 bad), but everyone had a bad taste in their mouth afterwards. Upon reflection, I think it's a lot better than Explorers, which we rated higher. Oh well, Tuesdays on Tape is a democratic rating committee, so I only have so much say.

Basically, this movie is pretty much the Cable Guy of animal companion movies. The 90s pumped out tons of those flicks. Like Cable Guy in relation to other Jim Carrey comedies, it's an oddly serious, adult-minded variation of the formula where many of the jokes fall flat. There are better animal companion movies out there, but Ed is definitely far from the worst. Check it out if you liked Dunston Checks In, I guess.

#16 - We're Back: A Dinosaur's Story (1/29/13)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Boxart: .5/.5
Previews: 0/1
Soundz: .5/.5
B&T: 0/1
Graphics: 1.5/1.5
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: .5/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: .5/1
Total: 4/7

Rent or Buy?: Rent

Kudos:

• LaZr Kage
• Naughty Boys Delight
• Hellzapoppin'
• Proto Juggalo/Dark Carnival

Personal Thoughts: We're Back is a stinker. Plain and simple. Mostly the movie just drags on with little of interest going down. The best parts are the fine animation (GRAPHICS!) and musical number by John Goodman. Ultimately, though, this thing fits alongside other 90s animated features like Pagemaster. Basically, the only way you'll enjoy this is if you're a kid. I'd rate this one an avoid.

Find of the Week (5/26/13 - 6/1/13)

Material Issue - Valerie Loves Me 12" Single (Vinyl)

Value: $75 on Discogs

Actual Cost: $0.50

I picked this one up at a local flea market in a dollar bin. It has four songs from the 1991 album International Pop Overthrow. To be honest, this is not the best collection of songs from the album. The A-side is my least favorite song from Overthrow.  The first track on side B, "Diane" is an absolute power pop classic, however. That makes this a dollar well spent! This single is listed for high prices on the web, but the album is even more expensive. I'll take what I can get!

Find of the Week (4/7/13 - 4/13/13)

Warcraft II: The Dark Saga (PSX)

Value: $15 (disc only) on eBay

Actual Cost: $0.50

I was perusing the CD roms at a local thrift when I came across this Playstation game. Warcraft II came in the original case (which was cracked so I switched it out for a typical CD rom case) but no manual. It's a little scratched, but it tested fine. All the video and audio worked well.

Warcraft II is an old favorite of mine. It's probably my favorite real-time strategy game. It plays well enough, but it's probably not as well rounded as some of the other RTS classics. However, it does have great presentation. The voice acting is top notch. The graphics are very 1995, in a good way. The Dark Saga combines the original and the first expansion pack. This port plays pretty well, actually. It's always hit or miss when you're taking a mouse interface and porting it to gamepad controllers. There were a couple of added features too. Sadly, the music and unit voices seemed to have gotten cut to fit the two games to one disk.

Overall, a nice find, but I'm not sure how much more play this will get, considering I can play this on the PC already.

Tuesdays on Tape 2012 The Tapie Awards

The first annual Tapie Awards took place on January 8th, 2013. The top candidates in each category were nominated. Then we voted anonymously and counted up the votes. Here were the winners and runners-up.

Best Previews

Winner: Frailty

Runners-Up: Guyver Gunhed

Best Soundtrack

Winner: King Ralph

Runners-Up: Ocean Drive Weekend, Jury Duty

Best B&T 

Winner: Phat Beach

Runners-Up: King Ralph, Wizards

Best Graphics

Winner: Gunhed

Runners-Up - Guyver, Merlin's Mystical Shop of Wonders

Best Sound Effects

Winner: Volere Volare

Runners-Up: Cat From Outer Space, Merlin’s Mystical Shop of Wonders 

Best Likable Characters

Winner: King Ralph

Runners-Up: Ghost Dad, Ocean Drive Weekend

Best Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion

Winner: King Ralph

Runners-Up: Merlin’s Mystical Shop of Wonders, Phat Beach

Tapette of the Year

Winner: Hardly Boys in Hardly Gold

Runners-Up: Fay’s 12 Days of Christmas, Jackie Chan Adventures

Avoid of the Year

Winner: Wizards

Runners-Up: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2, Gunhed

Tape of the Year

Winner: Phat Beach

Runners-Up: Ghost Dad, King Ralph 

The graduating class of 2012!

Find of the Week (3/31/13 - 4/6/13)

RayStorm (PSX)

Value: $30 on eBay

Actual Cost: $3

I found this in a thrift store which usually has nothing but junk. The disk is scratched pretty significantly but works fine. RayStorm is not only a decent find money-wise, but it's a really fun game too. This Taito shoot-em-up is the sequel to the well-regarded RayForce, also known as Layer Section here in the states.

RayStorm gets a lot of flack from shooter enthusiasts. Apparently it's not as good as its predecessor. Having not played Layer Section, I can't comment on this. As a standalone play experience, however, this game impresses. Most notable are the polygonal graphics. Unlike older polygon shooters like Silpheed that stream the 3D from full motion video, everything here is generated real time. For a game made in 1996, this is very beautiful. I'd say the graphics rank on the high end of all 3D Playstation games.

At first, it can be hard to keep track of everything going on screen. Ships fly below and above you, and bullets tend to have long flame tails. Once you get going, though, you won't have too much of a problem. This game is a little on the easy side. I don't mind that. I honestly had more fun playing this than overrated shooters like Battle Garegga. Then again, I'm not much of a fan of vertical shooters anyways. I prefer horizontal shoot-em-ups like Gate of Thunder and Thunder Force III. Anywho, if you're a shooter fan, forget what the majority say and try this one out.

Find of the Week (3/24/13 - 3/30/13)

The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer

Value: $10 (hardcover) on Amazon

Actual Cost: $7

John King Books is the largest bookstore in Michigan. I stopped by this week to see if they had any good old RPG books. They didn't, but on whim, I decided to check the film and TV section. I picked up The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer by Jennifer Lynch, as well as the neat The Northern Exposure Book by Louis Chunovic. Anyone who knows me knows that I loooove me some Twin Peaks. I've been looking out for this book for a while.

So far, I've read half of it. It's a short read at around 200 pages. The book is basically the diary of an abused girl, but written with the mythos of the Twin Peaks universe. I must say, I was surprised by the quality of the writing. Don't expect beautiful prose coming from a 12-year old's narrative or anything. The strong point here is the quality of the story. Anyone who has seen David Lynch's Twin Peaks knows Laura Palmer's story. For any of you who haven't, I won't spoil the great plot twists.

The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer makes a great companion piece for fans of the show. The quality is good enough to stand alone as a novel in the similar vain of Go Ask Alice. However, I cannot wholeheartedly recommend you read this without having seen the show first. Why? Because it would be a disservice to yourself to spoil the amazing story of the TV series!