While raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens are splendid in their own right, there is a multitude of awesome things out in the world. As Christmas approaches, I thought I'd take a look at some of these in a series I'm calling My Favorite Things.
I've written about The Doctor Puppet before, Leila featured it on The Fandomonium, and we've talked about it on The Eclectic Geek Podcast. It's safe to say that Doctor Puppet is most certainly one of My Favorite Things. Created by Alisa Stern, The Doctor Puppet takes a stop-motion look at Doctor Who and adds an interesting element to the fandom. While there is now an on-going story, I fell in love with How the Doctor Puppet Saved Christmas when it premiered last year in time for The Snowmen.
While raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens are splendid in their own right, there is a multitude of awesome things out in the world. As Christmas approaches, I thought I'd take a look at some of these in a series I'm calling My Favorite Things.
Okay, so this isn't actually Christmas themed, but both Benedict Cumberbatch and Tom Hiddleston rank highly among my favorite people in all of time and space. So, when this video began making its rounds on the Intarwebs, I thought it would be perfect for inclusion in this series. Because let's face it, why wouldn't an epic dance-off mashup video featuring Hiddles and Jinglebell Christmaswreath* be the stuff fangirl dreams are made of?
While raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens are splendid in their own right, there is a multitude of awesome things out in the world. As Christmas approaches, I thought I'd take a look at some of these in a series I'm calling My Favorite Things.
When The Master makes all 14(!) faces of The Doctor fight in a battle royale, who will win?
*Warning: If you are waiting until the Christmas episode of Doctor Who to find out who the 12th Doctor is, do not watch this video. While he is not named explicitly, there is a reference to him within.*
In addition to the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, this weekend marks the release of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, the follow-up to last year's YA hit, The Hunger Games. Now, the two have been merged into an amazing homage to 50 years of Doctor Who. There are elements from The Hunger Games and Catching Fire within the parody, but it definitely has more of a focus on Doctor Who. And that's fine, it hits the cultural notes of THG while focusing on the minutia of Doctor Who.
In the past, I've used tapes to relax and help clear my head. I find that no matter your religion affiliation, meditation helps you to center and become a more relaxed and better you. That's why, when I found out about the Dalek Relaxation Tape, I jumped at the chance to learn some basic principles from our Dalek masters.
The Dalek Relaxation Tape has everything you need to helpe EXTERMINATE your tension. You're left with such a feeling of contentment that you're able to OBEY any command. I was surprised that Daleks had a concept of relaxation, but through the Dalek Relaxation Tape, all of my concerns have been allayed. Just take a listen, I know that you will be able to ACCOMMODATE this tape into your own meditation program.
The audio for this was also posted on Tumblr several weeks ago. Here is the original post!
The Dalek Relaxation Tape will definitely ABATE any feelings of stress that you might have. Enjoy!
I've been obsessed with "Gift Shop" by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis for some time now. I even featured a parody of the song using Renaissance Fairs as a subject. But this new video from College Humor Originals really hits home to me.
I'm obsessed with museums. I've been visiting them since I was a kid, I volunteered at a museum in Ashland, Kentucky the entirety of high school and I've been working in them ever since. I love everything about museums and College Humor takes a hilarious look at museum stores in "Gift Shop." It's probably the most accurate representation of what it's like to shop in a museum gift shop.
I came across a parody of Macklemore's Thrift Shop a few days ago. With the addictive beat of the original song, "Renaissance Festival" by Julia Bemi aptly describes the experience of the Ren Faire. I used to go every year with my high school's drama club and it was the best experience even on "school day." Filmed at the Bay Area Renaissance Festival of Tampa, Florida, the video brings together many of the typical things that one would see when they go to the fest, including period costumes, turkey legs as big as your head, mud pits, and jousting.
This weekend, my friend Becky shared the link to an amazing video over on the Twitter, but I wasn't able to watch it until this afternoon. As a now die-hard Sherlockian (I think that's what the fandom is calling itself nowadays) and devoted Cumberfan, I wanted to share it as well. YouTuber 331Erock has taken done metal covers of many favorites, including the James Bond theme. Here, he's adapted the score from Michael Price and David Arnold of the BBC series Sherlock. As a fan of people taking something and turning it into something even more awesome, I totally approve. Bonus video after the jump.
Apparently 331Erock is no stranger to BBC series, having adapted the Doctor Who theme to a metal version last year. It's ... cool.
Pandoracon is a brand new multi-genre convention held in Cincinnati, Ohio. (Which sadly I did not get to attend, though my thoughts were there!) Though it is focused on science fiction, fantasy, anime, LARP, cosplay, and gaming, there is also a definite Steampunk element. And also: Doctor Who. There was a lot of Doctor Who going at Pandoracon. In fact, one of the guests was Travis Richey, who portrayed Inspector Spacetime on Community and has also started his own web series based on the Doctor Who parody character.
So what does this have to do with Gangnam Style? I thought I'd seen it all. Really. The Gangnam Style parodies have abounded in the last few weeks and I really thought that I'd seen all there was. But no. Not until I saw a video straight out of Cincinnati from this past weekend. Team Con-Doc is a Doctor Who improvisational group who put together this parody video and it's absolutely brilliant. With Ten leading the charge, Pandoracon went Gangnam Style. The coolest moment from the video in my opinion is when Richey, Inspector Spacetime himself, begins to do the Gangnam Style dance with Ten. Fantastic.
I had every plan to make it up to Cincinnati this weekend for the convention, but was unable. Seeing this video and the level of commitment that people have to the genre definitely makes me want to attend next year. Especially now that I've become a Whovian!
Huge kudos to the folks from Team Con-Doc and the organizers of Pandoracon.
K-Pop is taking America by storm and artist PSY is leading the charge. The video for his infectious song "Gagnam Style" has amassed 106,340,747 views on YouTube at the time of this writing. The video is pretty much everywhere on the intarwebs. The randomosity of the video and the crazy dance moves have been appealing to everyone. And while I have mostly geeks and nerds as friends on Facebook, I can safely attest that everyone in the community is on board the PSY train.
As evidence of this, this weekend at Dragon*Con, YouTube user Minhnhat employed the use of cosplayers and their awesome costumes to create a sort of lip dub version of "Gangnam Style". Featured in the video are Gandalf (who approves of everything), Deadpool, Captain America, and even Princess Peach with so many other amazing cosplayers that I can't even name because there are just so many. All fandoms seem to be represented; I even saw a Katniss (from The Hunger Games) in there! Kudos to all involved in this amazing video and to YouTuber Minhnhat for making these cosplayers look super badass. Also, thank you to PSY for making a song that will never ever stop being awesome.
Check out the original video for "Gangnam Style" here:
For more nerd news and general geekery, be sure to check out Kentucky Geek Girl on Facebook and head over to Word of the Nerd Online. Bex and Proffitt will be covering all of the Dragon*Con shenanigans over on Good Girls Gone Geek.
Flashback Friday is a new series where I get in the wayback machine and revisit some of my favorite things from years past. It can be anything really, random stuff from teh intarwebz, books, movies, games, et cetera. Basically it's just a way for me to talk about stuff that I continue to think is super awesome, but I'm not quite as obsessed with anymore.
Homestar Runner is a series of flash animations which became wildly popular in the early 2000s. Most of the animations centered around Homestar Runner, but characters Marizipan and Strongbad were featured often as well. One of my favorite things on the site was Strongbad Emails. If you've ever heard reference of Trogdor or Teen Girl Squad, this is where it comes from. This week on Flashback Friday, I'm going to count down my Top 5 favorite animations!
5. Everybody to the Limit
This is a great video that was based on one of Strongbad's emails. When the ILOVEYOU virus was running rampant on the internet, Strong Bad received an email that said "i love you - fhqwhgads" with a string of random letters. It turned out to be quite the catchy tune.
4. Stunt Double
Strong Bad gets an email asking if he ever uses a stunt double.
3. A Jorb Well Done
Coach Z can't say the word "job" so the rest of the gang tries to teach him. It's kind of like "My Fair Lady" but not at all.
2. Teen Girl Squad 12 - Valentime's Day
Valentime's are serious times.
1. Trogdor
In this email, Strongbad is asked to draw a dragon. Awesomeness ensues.
What would you like me to explore during Flashback Friday? Leave a note in the comments!
I love people who make content for the web. I feel like the internet is a place where you can be a lot more free to do what you want. One of my favorite web creators is Candis Phlegm, who I first saw in the web series Awkward Embraces. Her latest project is called Hayley Reports in which Hayley gives a report on the TV movie Mary, Mother of Jesus starring Christian Bale. In true middle-schooler fashion, we get to learn a lot more about Hayley herself than the movie.
I loved this video! Huge props to Candis for capturing the personality of a middle-schooler. I have taught fifth graders who have acted quite similar to this, not even joking. I hope this could become a series where Hayley reports on different things. That would be awesome. Can't wait to see what Candis comes up with next! Check out her actress page on Facebook and follow her on The Tweeters. She's absolutely hilarious, y'all.
Carly Rae Jepsen's song "Call Me Maybe" seems to be the most parodied song of 2012. Not that it's inherently a bad song (like Rebecca Black's Friday was), it's just super catchy and lends itself to new interpretations. Jimmy Fallon and Jepson collaborated on a really great version of the song that went viral last month. Sesame Street has done some really great parodies of popular culture over the years, one of my favorites being Twin Beaks which was a parody of Twin Peaks. In "Share it Maybe", Cookie Monster expresses his aching desire for some cookie munching action. The results are delicious.
This video contains spoilers for Season 2 of Game of Thrones and is NSFW.
So last year, the folks at College Humor posted a hilarious spoof of Game of Thrones using 16-bit graphics to make commentary on the show and I featured it here on Kentucky Geek Girl. They're at it again with the A Clash of Kings Expansion. This video takes a look at Season 2 and the poor decisions of characters, Daenerys' search for her dragons, and the gratuitous boob shots. It's spot on and absolutely hilarious. I would love to see more Ser Jorah Mormont friendzone, though.
I'm no Star Wars fangirl, but I can appreciate the sheer anger that people feel towards George Lucas. Changes here and there, Greedo shooting first, "Nooooooo!" and all that and elicited a strong ire towards the man behind Lucasfilm. Those emotions, according to TeddieFilms, can best be expressed through a rendition of Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know" which has been probably the most over-played song of the year thus far. I do like the original and I really enjoy this parody of it. I'm not even sure you can call it a parody, more like a reimagining of the song.
The visuals are very reminicient of the original Gotye/Kimbra video, but I think the painting could have been a bit more Star Wars related. I know the video is very abstract, but they could maybe have done an abstract Death Star or something. Also, the George Lucas/Kimbra part wasn't quite as strong on his last solo line. It's the line that I'm always signing at the top of my lungs when belt out the original song. Other than that, I think that the vocals were great and quite on par with the original version.
TeddieFilms is no stranger to song parodies with a Star Wars twist. Last year, they released Primeday, which I featured here on the blog. According to the after-video credits, they'll be collaborating with IGN for a video in the near future. I'm curious to see if they'll continue with the Star Wars trend or they'll branch out into more aspects of popular culture.
This has to be one of the most unique Youtube videos I've seen in awhile. Someone has taken Season 2 footage from Game of Thrones and created "Game of Thrones: a Westeros Rom-Com." This is completely accurate of the state of romantic comedies today. We meet the girl, the boy, and the problem as to why they may or may not end up together. It's a very short clip, but well worth watching! Oh, and the theme song is "Call Me Maybe." You really can't get better than that.
Having been born in 1987, I got to experience the wonder of Mister Rogers when I was growing up. There were so many wonderful programs on PBS (or in my case KET - Kentucky Education Television, the local PBS affiliate) but my absolute favorite was Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. It, coupled with Reading Rainbow, helped fuel my curiosity and imagination as a youngster an the enduring spirit of Fred Rogers still resonates with me. I mean, where else could you go learn tai'chi, see awesomely random video tapes from Mr. McFeeley on topics like how shoes are made, and visit the Neighborhood of Make Believe? I was so sad to learn of Fred Rogers' passing in 2001, it was such a sad day for children everywhere knowing that there would be no more new episodes of his program. I hope that today's parents expose their children to Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, because it helped fuel my imagination.
So, musicals are pretty awesome. The Buffy musical episode: awesome, Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog: fantastic, random musical episodes of other television shows: fantastic. And then, there are these gems that we find on the interwebs. Video after the break!
You see what I did there? ;-) I know that these have made their way around the internet over the past few months, but I wanted to share them again. I love "The Hunger Games" and I love video parodies so this is pretty much a quadruple win. Both songs contain basic spoilers for the books and movie. Little details here and there, but they can probably be construed as spoilers.
Oh, the things I find during finals week. Last semester, I brought you the soundtrack to writing my paper on Star Trek and Anthropology. Today, I present "10 Hours of Darth Vader Breathing." YouTube user Murdock129 has uploaded a ten hour video featuring our favorite Star Wars baby daddy doing what he does best, breathing through his big ol' mask. Rather than one continuous picture of Vader, he mixes it up with different images. Can someone get him a refill on his Albuterol?
