jasonpettus

jasonpettus, 6 months ago to random

I'm a big fan of Charlie Day, so I was willing to cut him some slack when his new movie "Fool's Paradise," which he describes as sweet and old-fashioned in the style of Chaplin, bombed at the box office, which Day blamed on "people no longer wanting these kinds of movies." But after finally watching it myself on Hulu this week, I now realize the problem is actually that the humor is atrocious, the kind of obscenely broad stuff only loved by slow five-year-olds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaYKG5FMhNc&pp=ygUXZm9vbCdzIHBhcmFkaXNlIHRyYWlsZXI%3D

zoomar, 6 months ago to random

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ernie, 6 months ago to random

3M is a massive company with fingers in basically every jar you can imagine. And yet, the thing everyone knows them for—perhaps even better than Scotch tape—is the floppy disk.

It was a huge business for them. Why did they spin it off and get out of the magnetic media game? Today’s @tedium ponders.

https://tedium.co/2023/11/17/3m-floppy-disks-history/

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

The upshot here is that Marvel has decided to only release a single superhero movie in the next year and a half, the niche "Deadpool 3," and have pushed off all their tentpole films until 2025 at the earliest, a breath of fresh air for us grown-ups who have been dismayed by the complete takeover of the adult arts in recent years by children's stories. Also, welcome to a world where the term "superhero fatigue" now exists. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/12/business/the-marvels-box-office.html

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

[Hitler, leading us into commercial break #3 of the reality show he's on] "If I don't finish this invasion of Stalingrad in the allotted time...I'm going home!" [whooshing noise and fast camera pan into Cool Ranch Doritos ad]

billyjoebowers, 7 months ago to random

Not everyone realizes this, but whether or not a non necessity is worth the price is actually a personal judgement call, not a scientific fact. It doesn't require public outrage.

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Having a lot of fun as an editor this week, because my newest assignment is a crime novel where we eventually learn a weird secret about the killer that makes these kinds of stories notorious when done well, and it's my job to examine every little clever reference he makes to the secret beforehand and make sure it's not so clever that people will immediately guess, but clever enough so that people will look at it again afterwards and go, "Ohhh, okay, the secret was there the whole time!"

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Continuing my completist watch of the '90s direct-syndication sci-fi show "Earth: Final Conflict" these days, and episode 2.20 reminded me that up to just very, very recently, if a TV show wanted a cast member of color to have a romance one episode, they were forced to bring in a guest actress of the same color. So if you saw that a black woman was guesting that episode, you knew the black guy was going to get some; if an Asian woman was guesting, you knew the Asian guy was going to get some.

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Next weekend I'm attending my first Halloween party in 25 years, so I thought I'd do it right and actually buy some things for my costume, instead of just slapping something together out of whatever spare shit I can find in the house. The latest pieces showed up today, a black paisley steampunk vest and a black scarf I learned on YouTube how to tie like a 1700s cravat. It's really starting to come together at this point!

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Further into my rewatch now of the '90s gonzo proto-Peak-TV show "Profit," and the backstory keeps getting more insane. Turns out the corporation where our psychopath "hero" is blackmailing and murdering to become CEO is a thinly fictionalized Procter & Gamble, and that he's obsessed with them because when his abusive hillbilly father forced him to sleep in a cardboard box (don't ask), it was a P&G box, which made him develop a dark obsession with the company. This show is so batshit! I LOVE IT!

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Going through the academic editing certification course co-sponsored by the Poynter Institute for Media Studies and the American Copy Editors Society this week, and am impressed that @grammargirl keeps getting mentioned over and over in the course material as an official resource to turn to in cases of questions and confusion. Let me tell you right now that MY blog will NEVER be cited by academics as an official source of information!

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Today at @tedium, Tedium doing what Tedium does best, looking back at the truly surreal sitcom "Family Matters," which over five years changed from a mediocre domestic comedy into a bizarro genre-hopping experiment almost exclusively centered around a character who wasn't even in the main family. https://tedium.co/2023/10/14/steve-urkel-jaleel-white-cultural-appreciation/?utm_source=Tedium&utm_campaign=Tedium_10_14_2023&utm_medium=email

jasonpettus, 7 months ago to random

Best Buy has officially announced that, beginning next year, they will stop selling physical media such as CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays. https://www.pcmag.com/news/stock-up-now-best-buy-to-end-dvd-blu-ray-disc-sales-in-2024

jasonpettus, 8 months ago to random

Spending the evening watching videos for the very first time from my favorite '80s indie bands, because MTV frankly refused to play them back in the day. Just highlighted Husker Du, which got me thinking about Bob Mould's next band afterwards, Sugar, arguably even better. First time I've seen this video too, but in this case because it was released in 1992 when I was 23, and officially "too cool for MTV" anymore. This song hit SO different after Mould came out as gay! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHnFIaLp_ys

jasonpettus, 8 months ago to random

Discussions on Mastodon tonight regarding Violent Femmes and The Replacements had me watching their '80s videos for the very first time in my life, which got me thinking how disconnected the topics of music videos and indie bands were when I was in college in the '80s. I never saw these videos in college because, frankly, MTV never played them, and we took pride back then in liking bands that MTV refused to promote. Probably the last time in history that you can say that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHMJE0rcb8M&pp=ygUOdmlvbGVudCBmZW1tZXM%3D

jasonpettus, 8 months ago to random

Violent Femmes has just announced the 40th-anniversary reissue of their 1983 debut album, which like many Generation Xers played an outsized role in my high-school years. Ooh, just looking at that album cover again is giving me high-school vibes! https://pitchfork.com/news/violent-femmes-to-reissue-self-titled-debut-album-for-40th-anniversary/

jasonpettus, 8 months ago to random

Why have I been so gleeful about the excoriating reviews about the new "Frasier" reboot? Because I seem to be the only person in America who remembers that Kelsey Grammer spent most of the early 2000s stumping for far-right politicians, said that Trump "is great for our country," repeatedly called Barack Obama the Antichrist, and claims that he was cheated out of an Emmy for his unwatchably shitty "Boss" because of a "cabal of Hollywood liberals."

Fuck Kelsey Grammer.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/11/arts/television/frasier-reboot-review.html

drewtoothpaste, 8 months ago to random

more comics: https://instagram.com/drewtoothpaste
more posts: https://bsky.app/profile/drewtoothpaste.bsky.social

grammargirl, 8 months ago to random

An obviously minor complaint, but does my Oxford English Dictionary account really need to be more secure than my bank?

I have to log in fresh every time I go there, even if it's just an hour later than when I was there before.

Also, did you know there are 8 different British pronunciations of "orangutan"?

jasonpettus, 8 months ago to random

Hey, check out THIS fucking Amazon bullshit! Some things in my wishlist are on sale for Prime Day, such as these fold-out trays; but their non-sale price is actually $40, not $72, which means Amazon jacked the price up by double yesterday so they could then cut it back down to $30 and make it look like you're getting a great deal. Same with the slide scanner; this is usually $150 every day of the week, not the $200 they claim, meaning the "sale price" is only $6 less than its normal price.

Screenshot of a Kodak slide scanner on sale for Amazon Prime Day, which they claim "usually costs $200;" but I know for a fact that its non-sale price is actually $150, because I've had it in my wishlist for over a year now, waiting for the day it would finally go on sale.