The year is 2071. Humanity has spread across the solar system and the Space Police have reinstated the bounty system of the Old West: catch wanted fugitives alive, deliver them to the cops and get paid.
Cowboy Bebop chronicles the adventures (and misadventures) of a group of bounty hunters as they try to catch bad guys and make a living.
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posted by zarq
on May 7, 2013 -
153 comments
For the 2012 iTunes Music Festival, 65 acts (including
P!nk,
One Direction,
David Guetta ,
Jessie J,
OneRepublic,
Ellie Goulding,
Andrea Bocelli,
Matchbox Twenty,
Muse and many others) performed at the Roundhouse in London throughout the month of September. 40 performances are available in full online.
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posted by zarq
on Dec 29, 2012 -
9 comments
DJ Earworm has released his annual "United State of Pop" mashup of the year's 25 most popular songs according to Billboard's charts:
Shine Brighter.
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posted by zarq
on Dec 20, 2012 -
39 comments
This past August, producer Bryan Singer (
The Usual Suspects,
X-Men) launched a new digital series:
H+. The premise: in the near future, 33% of humanity has retired their smartphones, tablets and computers in favor of an implanted computer system,
H+, which connects them directly to the internet 24/7. The story begins as a computer virus attacks the implants, killing billions. In intersecting storylines across four continents (told in part through flashbacks,) the series then unravels what happened, who caused it and why.
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posted by zarq
on Dec 19, 2012 -
66 comments
American paratrooper Arthur Boorman suffered debilitating injuries during the first Gulf War. Doctors told him he'd never walk unassisted again.
15 years later.... [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Nov 27, 2012 -
16 comments
During the Golden Age of Hollywood and until 1967, mainstream movie studios were
banned by the Production Code from depicting taboo topics like drug addiction, explicit murder and venereal disease, or even showing explicit nudity. But in the 1930's and 1940's, films marketed as "educational" could and did fly under the radar, and three of the best known 'educational' propaganda exploitation films are:
Sex Madness (1935),
Reefer Madness (1936) and
The Cocaine Fiends (1938).
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posted by zarq
on Oct 15, 2012 -
30 comments
In 2005, Steven Spielberg and Dreamworks produced a 6 episode miniseries that spanned the period of expansion of the United States into the American West, from 1825 to 1890. Through fictional and historical characters, the series used two primary symbols--the wagon wheel and the Lakota medicine wheel -- to join the story of two families: one Native American, one White settlers, as they witnessed many of the 19th century's pivotal historical milestones. The award-winning
Into The West can now be
seen in its entirety on YouTube.
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posted by zarq
on Sep 20, 2012 -
12 comments
A girl upon the shore did ask a favour of the sea;
"Return my blue eyed sailor boy safely back to me.
Forgive me if I ask too much, I will not ask for more,
but I shall weep until he sleeps safe upon the shore."
For nearly 20 years, Newfoundland group
Great Big Sea have been creating acoustic Celtic folk-rock covers and interpretations of
traditional Newfoundland and Labrador sea
shanties,
folk,
fishing and party songs, which draw from the island's rich 500-year-old multicultural (Irish, English, Scottish and French) heritage.
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posted by zarq
on Aug 23, 2012 -
49 comments
Bohemian Rhapsody. Piano. Drum. Bass. Vocal Choir 1 & 2. Vocal Track 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13. Freddie's vocal track. All vocals. All instruments.
Video and links to an audacity project where you can download the workings yourself.
Previously.
posted by nile_red
on Jul 23, 2012 -
33 comments
In 1984,
The Voyage of the Mimi set sail on PBS, exploring the ocean off the coast of Massachusetts to study humpback whales. The educational series was made up of thirteen episodes intended to teach middle schoolers about science and math. The first fifteen minutes of each episode were a fictional adventure starring a young Ben Affleck. The second 15 minutes were an "expedition documentary" that would explore the scientific concepts behind the show's plot points. A sequel with the same format,
The Second Voyage of the Mimi aired in 1988, and featured the crew of the Mimi exploring Mayan ruins in Mexico.
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posted by zarq
on Apr 9, 2012 -
36 comments
On May 19, 1984, an unemployed ice cream truck driver named Michael Larson went on
Press Your Luck and over the course of two episodes, took home more money than had ever been won in the history of television: $110,237 -- to the shock of the show’s producers and host, the late
Peter Tomarken. How did he do it? The show’s game board had only 5 patterns of 18 squares, and Mr. Larson had memorized them all. After the show, CBS tried to disqualify him but couldn’t, because Larson hadn’t done anything illegal. But they
did refuse to allow those episodes to be aired in syndication. So, they didn’t re-air until 2003, when the Game Show Network produced a Tomarken-hosted documentary about Mr. Larson’s incredible win:
Big Bucks: The Press Your Luck Scandal.
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posted by zarq
on Apr 3, 2012 -
42 comments
Earth, 2147. The legacy of the Metal Wars, where man fought machines—and machines won. Bio-Dreads — monstrous creations that hunt down human survivors... and digitize them!
In 1987, before he created Babylon 5, J. Michael Straczynski was a writer for
Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, a live-action sci-fi show for kids. 24 episodes were produced. Straczynski wrote or co-wrote 14 of them, including multi-episode plot arcs. A
line of interactive toys brought the battle into kids’ living rooms, and
Captain Power was also one of the very first shows on television to feature computer animation in every episode. But in an attempt to appeal to both children and the adults who watched with them, the campy show included some concepts and scenes critics deemed too violent for children and lasted only a single season in syndication.
The full run of the show has now been uploaded to Youtube. [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Apr 1, 2012 -
28 comments
Here is a video playthrough of The Legend of Zelda without a sword. It is possible to get right up to the last boss without one, although it requires knowing a
lot of tricks. That is exactly what mev1978 does in his playthrough, without dying. And then he does it again in the second quest.
First quest (1:61:31) -
Second quest (1:13:18)
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posted by JHarris
on Dec 26, 2011 -
33 comments
The Powers That Be was a short-lived, irreverent sitcom about a dim US Senator (John Forsythe, in his last major starring role on television) and his dysfunctional family, that aired on NBC between 1992 and 1993. Created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, who would go on to create
Friends, the show co-starred David Hyde Pierce (pre-
Frasier) as the Senator's
suicidal son-in-law.
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posted by zarq
on Dec 25, 2011 -
21 comments
Here is "The B.S. of A. with Brain Sack," a show aired on Glenn Beck's TV channel that claims to be a "non-partisan" alternative to the Daily Show. How good is it? Better than the right's previous attempts at making a satire show, but uneven.... Judge for yourself: here's a monologue, in five parts:
1-
2-
3-
4-
5. Here's a few of the better bits:
Kill Panel -
Pilgrim Funnies -
Isle of Skulls MLYT [more inside]
posted by JHarris
on Dec 17, 2011 -
88 comments
From 1935 to 1951, Time Magazine bridged the gap between print & radio news reporting and the new visual medium of film, with
March of Time: award-winning newsreel reports that were a combination of objective documentary, dramatized fiction and pro-American, anti-totalitarian propaganda. They “often
tackled subjects and themes that audiences weren’t used to seeing —
foreign affairs,
social trends, public-health issues — and did so with a combination of panache and subterfuge that today seems either absurd or visionary.”
(Previous two links have autoplaying video.) By 1937, the short films were being seen by as many as 26 million people every month and
may have helped steer public opinion on numerous issues,
including (
eventually) America’s
entry to WWII. Video samples are available at
Time.com, the
March of Time Facebook page and the entire collection is available online,
(free registration required) at
HBO Archives. [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Aug 22, 2011 -
8 comments
