The Best of YouTube: Animators – Oneyng

When I was going through misters subscribed channels (because we use his account as he has been sifting through garbage videos since the start of YouTube) I realised that our taste in viewing is pretty broad with many different types of themes. So I realised I had to sub-categorise this series, because, well, it’s the perfect excuse to start ordering this series like an online filing cabinet. Mmmmm sub-categories with posts all organised into sections, gives me about as much contentment as seeing all the M&Ms/Skittles separated and put into their appropriate colour groups. Bliss, bliss and heaven.

Happiness….

The reason I picked an animator to start this series off is because it is the most underrated, underpaid, under-acknowledged category of things people do on youtube. The youtube animator today is like the equivalent of the starving artist 50 years ago, talented but barely recognised in it. But unlike how it was for artists 50 years ago, you have a lot higher a percentage of getting your work out there and appreciated because of the internet and sites like YouTube and Etsy. And this is why you can’t hate on hipsters, because they like all their retro and niche hand-made stuff, it’s now super easy to make your art appeal to people, and the more original and abstract it is then all the better. Because it’s not easy doing what animators do, so the first animator I thought I’d write about was this guy:

Oneyng

This is Chris O’neill aka Oneyng. He’s probably one of the more popular YouTube animators with over 1 million subscribers (trust me, that’s a huge number considering most famous animators still only sit on 500 thousand or less). The reason for his popularity is due to a few reasons.

1. He was doing animations on Newgrounds and was popular on it back in the early 2000s before YouTube even existed. Which is why there are a few animators on YouTube with a fuck tonne of subs, because their fans followed them from the very start.
2. He’s good friends with people who are considered YouTube celebrities. Egoraptor (Arin Hansen) from his channel Egoraptor, or what he’s best known for doing which is Game Grumps, an incredibly popular lets play channel, was making videos and animations with Oney since Newgrounds. Even though Game Grumps has only got about 3 million subs compared to the whopping 47 million of Pewdiepie or even the 12 million that Markiplier has, it is still one of the most well known and respected lets play channels on YouTube, with people like Jackscepticeye, Markipiler and even pewds making shout outs and referencing them. Egoraptor is not only an animator but also a comedian, a proffessional voice actor and musician.
3. He was lucky enough to have one of his videos go viral, and when that happens then you’re good to go with your career on YouTube.
4. He’s a good fucking artist, and regardless of contacts and the rest of it, it still doesn’t cheapen the fact that he’s a talented artist who deserves the subs and views.

And that’s it in a nutshell. Don’t be jealous or angry of other peoples successes, they usually worked hard to get where they were. There’s no such thing as good or bad when it comes to art, it’s all opinion. The difference between you not making it as an artist, but that popular guy making it big even though his art is just shitty stick figure drawings, is not because ‘people are stupid and like stupid things so I don’t stand a chance’. It’s because they fought through the rejection and just kept going, the reason why you might of failed but that talentless prick next to you is doing super well, is because that talentless prick is better at marketing himself then you are. And it may not make his art any less shitty, but you must admit, he’s still a lot smarter then you at getting people to like anything. Yes, this was a bit of a personal rant to myself about the guy who made those fucking annoying ‘My Stick Figure Family’ bullshit things and is happily sitting on his thrown of cash from making the whole world succumb to personalising their whole family with fuck damn, stupid, dumb stick figure people, while I’m sitting here spending hours perfecting a painting, putting all my effort and not only that, my heart and soul and not earning a damn fucking thing!  Fuck that guy! And please, for the love of fuck, if you agree with this rant about the stick figure families then don’t buy one of those stickers that are just stick figures saying fuck your stick figure family, because you’re still buying the same shitty stick figures and the money still goes to the same fucking guy!

I won’t hate you if this is on your car though. Funny cat lady is funny.

But in no way can I even put animation into the same category, even when the animators characters are basically stick figures but with a bit more detail eg Cynanide & Happiness and Dick Figures, it still takes a lot more effort to draw the same character but posing in ever so slight angles, or big, to make it flow into a moving a character. That means drawing out the exact same scene but with tiny differences, like the angle of the characters hand, or their mouth movements. Then you also have to think about the background and setting, if it’s outside you still have to change up the scene and draw a whole bunch of trees in different angles, or the grass, the list of tiny details and shit you need to draw is pretty big. Most use computers nowadays to draw, but you still need to be good at drawing essentially to use those art and animation programs and also make it look like natural movement without being jumpy and cutting a lot.

There are a lot of unique animators on YouTube, there are also ones that are incredibly similar in style (mainly because most of the bigger animators on YouTube are all friends who tend to all do voice acting in the animations). Oneyng was one of the original Newgrounds animator, all those guys made the style that most animators would attempt to replicate for years after it. What made his style unique was the way he drew faces and facial expressions;

These facial expressions, couples with the voice acting that went along with it, made Oneys animations incredibly unique and funny. He used his facial expressions that were constantly shifting, to get his humour.

But the sillier you start making the animation style, the more stupid the content of the animation has to be. Which is is no way a bad thing, and completely works in this case.

Most don’t realise thing, but being super stupid in entertainment such as animation or film is an art form. Most don’t really appreciate stupid or potty humour once you go over the age of 30, which is sad, so you will never realise how amazing terribly stupid things can be. But only certain people can pull it off, stupid content from unfunny people is really, really awful, so if you can truly pull it off, kudo’s to you.

So I thought I’d put 3 examples of videos from the channel I am writing about. Luckily for you (but mainly me because I like how the post feels when I post videos), animations are usually shorter then most music videos so you won’t get as bored so quickly. Yay.

1. Dragonball P

This is a parody cartoon of the anime Dragonball Z. This animation series (there are 2 of these videos but I’ll only post the first one) is more of his older work before he had properly established his unique style which is blatantly clearer in the other 2 videos I’ll post. That doesn’t make this any less funny though, it feels very reminiscent of the humour of old Newgrounds.

2. Wingardium Leviosa

This is a parody animation of Harry Potter, with a particular parody of a certain scene in the first Harry Potter movie. I couldn’t not add this animation because this is the video went viral and that’s when everyone started realising who he was and started subscribing. In my opinion, this video is what really established his style and what he was going for, plus the voice acting and content is something that me and mister like to reference a lot between ourselves.

3. Leo and Satan – Sugar Trip

Around the same time as the Dragonball parody videos, Oney also had another series happening which i think had about 5 or 6 episodes. This is an original Oney idea and let’s just say that it is stupid but also ever so slightly offensive (but considering one of the main characters is Satan, there’s plenty enough warning of what type of content it could be. I picked this episode in particular, because it’s my favourite episode, and also because mister has a Leo and Satan tshirt.

Sugar fo yo pancakes.

So if you like what you saw (if you watched them) please remember to give them a sub or a like on YouTube, the more likes they get the more YouTube will show them off. So if you want your favourite youtuber to succeed, always remember to sub and like.

I ❤ art and creativity. Always support original creators and don’t view any of the original artists videos on any other channel except their own.

Listen Up Muggles, Harry Potter = Ka-ching $$

You better believe I’m going to reference every single thing about this series and post an almost silly level of memes to go in here too, they aren’t even going to be explained they are just going to be scattered throughout.

But seriously, this post is to let everyone that has been fans of the Harry Potter books from the start, I mean, the start of the in 1998, that you could be potentially sitting on a shit load of monehhh! Please read this article if you like money, and to some lesser degree the Harry Potter series itself:

THIS IS YOUR BOOKS WORTH MONEY ARTICLE!!!

I’m actually a very big fan of Harry Potter, the first book was published in 1998 when I was only in grade 3. The first time I heard about it was listening to the teacher read it out loud to the class, after only getting a chapter in at school I was hooked, my my mother bought me the first 3 books: Philosophers Stone, Chamber of Secrets and Prisoner of Azkaban. I was already miles ahead in reading and english at that stage though, so by the time our teacher had gotten through reading the first book to the class, I was already up to the Prisoner of Azkaban. And when Goblet of Fire, Order of the Pheonix, the Half-Blood Prince and the Deathly Hallows came out, I was always the first to get those, just like how it is and was when a Pokemon game came out.

A lot of bad shit happened in the year before I hit 12, shit that would eventually permanently scar me when I actually realised all of what happened. I didn’t start writing poems and all that until I was 12-13, I’ve been reading since I learnt how to do it. Because I didn’t have friends in school, I borrowed books and sat alone at recess and lunch and would read, and then I loved reading time in school because I would get to read, so 70% of what I did in primary school was reading. Harry Potter, for me, took me out of my head when I needed it, it helped me cope, books are great like that. So I’ll always have a soft spot for this series, no matter how much I joke about the franchise, doesn’t mean I don’t love it any less.

My favourite book out of all of them has got to be The Chamber of Secrets. For me, there was a vast difference between the first book and the rest of them, but then there’s also a vast difference in comparison to the first 4 books compared to the rest that followed. The Chamber of Secrets was the second book in the series. For me the tension in it was a lot higher then the first one, like there was a distinct feeling of unease and danger in this book, whereas the first was more of a lighter sense of adventure. Not that the Harry Potter series itself is wonderful and roses like most seem to think it is.

The first 3 books of the series were pretty kid friendly, sure they tackled a few dark subject matters, but by book 4 The Goblet of Fire, the series had definitely taken a turn to the darker more adult side of the audience. I was 9 when we were reading the first book, when the 4th came into the schools library, only the kids that were 12 were allowed to read it because of the themes.

Then something awful happened to the famous book series, they turned them into movies… yay…

But it’s ok though, because without those movies I would’ve never found about Daniel Radcliffe and hence I would of never had any of this funny material for this very post.

The moral of the story is; check publishing dates in your books yo! If you have a book but a famous author, and the publishing date matches the original publishing date, then its probably worth some cash.

You Know What Really Grinds My Gears – Rebooting Old Movies

Yes, this post is mainly inspired by the new Ghostbusters reboot. Even saying that sentence sounds gross.

But it’s not just Ghostbusters that gets a reboot these days, heaps of movies have been rebooted all the way up to the late 90s, or earlier (can’t remember when the reboot of Alfred Hitchcocks Psycho happened, if you haven’t seem that then just don’t, Vince Vaughn as Norman Bates, don’t think I need to add any more to that), and it’s only grown as a trend since then.

Originality? None here, chop. (Watch the movie Chopper)

I cannot honestly think of one rebooted movie that was better then the original, not that any fan would ever give it chance. But can you blame them? Rebooting a movie cheapens the experience of the old one, and it’s nothing more then a way to squeeze out all the cash that they can out of a franchise that’s already popular. That’s totally weak man. Hollywood directors get paid a fuck tonne, obviously originality doesn’t pay the same way as it used to.

The new ghostbusters trailer though, almost blew up YouTube for a day. That video has almost triple the amount of dislikes then it does to likes, so it’s safe to say that the people fucking HATE this idea. And I can’t blame them for that. You can’t just all of a sudden take away every character that made the movie what it was and replace it with a bunch of female characters. It’s so fucking dumb, if that was their way of trying to show some sort of female empowerment then it completely backfired because now people hate the movie because of the all female cast, not because they ripped out the guts of a major motion picture and stuffed it full of gross and is just a shit movie regardless.

Hollywood officially backtracked the feminist movement by 10 years. You can’t just expect to be able to completely change something someone loves and expect people to accept it. If you wanted to have females in the cast then that’s fine, but there are so many ways they could’ve incorporated the idea better. Such as, I don’t know, a team of both genders working side by side equally as a team. Because by having an all female cast, just like an all male one implies that that specific gender is superior, hence the lack of opposite gender. The message of feminism isn’t to gain power over men, it’s to be equal, this reboot does a great job at shitting all over that principle and making more negative attention towards feminism.

Theres a new sub genre of horror that has always been floating around, but it really took off in the last 15 years, French Extremist films. Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like, really disturbing, gory, brilliant, unique films made by the French. Pretty well everyone that isn’t Hollywood knows how to make a good, original movie. Some of my favourites included Inside, Martyrs, In My Skin and High Tension. I was disappointed to find out that America had rebooted Martyrs because obviously reading subtitles is hard, and the French make superior horror films over Hollywood.

(This is the French original cover, if you love fucked up movies I highly recommend this one, it has everything you want in a film, very interesting concept)

But Martyrs isn’t the only horror film that has been rebooted, there were others that shouldn’t of been touched but did anyway; Halloween (fuck you Rob Zombie), The Ring, The Grudge, I Spit On Your Grave, Evil Dead, Shutter, Carrie, Funny Games, Psycho, these are only the ones I thought of up the top of my head, if I went on google I could give you the complete list of rebooted horror films, but that would probably need a whole post in itself to get through the giant list…

The one that pisses me off the most on that top of my head list has got to be Evil Dead. Why????????????? I fucking love the original so much, it was the first horror movie I ever saw at 9 and I fucking shat my dacks! It was scary as fuck back then, and when I grew up I realised it was hilarious and my fan girling of Bruce Campbell increased. Why Sam Raimi, why did you have to give the script to some teen scares director wanker? Why did you have to be such a fucking sell out Sam Raimi, I fucking looked up to you as a director! Such a brilliant, funny, b grade classic that should’ve remained a fucking classic, and because you were such a fucking sellout Sam, they shat all over the memory of it by turning it into a cheap, unoriginal fucking stupid teenagers getting dead stupid… Stupid. It’s stupid, fuck…

Like seriously what the fuck is this even?! They couldn’t even make the most memorable deadite that heads off one of the most memorable scenes of the movie into something that even looked a bit fucking good and not like every other fucking zombie/demon fucker that Hollywood makes?!!??! RaaaAaaage.

I don’t even think I need to say much about the overwhelming amount of Marvel and DC comic book movies that are being brought out of the super heroes closet and rebooted. The one that pisses me of out of all of them though is Spider-Man. We’ve had; Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3 and I was totally cool with those films, they had plots, they were going in some kind of order, so isn’t the next logical step to make a forth and just continue the franchise? No, clearly I’m just another stupid minority who will get excited over the same rebooted movie, except it’s called ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’ so that must mean it’s completely different….

Fuck you Hollywood, it’s never been about making movies, it’s about making money. And this is why I mainly watch indie and overseas films, because it’s original, because you don’t need explosions and bullshit to make a movie better and the main reason, because indie film makers are making films for the love of it, for art, not for money. And for me the quality and artistic talent of these indie filmmakers really shines through, and I remember the comparison every time I sit down and watch a Hollywood blockbuster. No originality, no passion, no artistic talent, just mind numbing special effects that cheat the viewer into thinking they are watching something substantial when it’s really just as bland, boring and unoriginal as the rest of the films Hollywood produces. Especially. Fucking. Reboots!

Now let me just add something serious here, I haven’t seen Deadpool yet, but I want to see it. Why? Because it sounds like a really well done film. I’m not saying that Hollywood hasn’t produced any film with substance, I’m saying Hollywood has not produced any reboot or sequel with substance. Deadpool, from what I’ve heard sounds like a fairly original film, with thought and research spent looking into the original character and trying to tribute it as much as possible. That’s cool, I have no issues with that. But once it has a sequel, it’ll go from being a really cool film, to a money milking cow that lost its heart.

There are a lot of reboots I haven’t seen due to wanting to keep my memory of the original film intact. So that may make me seem like a bit of a bitch to be so harshly critical without seeing the film. It’s about the principle for me. When it comes to music, DJs remix existing songs all the time and people are always doing covers and there’s no issue with that, but when an artist who is earning lots for being a pop star blatantly steals the beat of a pre existing song only to put their bullshit over the beat, without any credit to the original artist, then fuck you, you’re an arsehole, eg Anaconda by Nicki Minaj which is a blatant rip of Baby Got Back (you know, I like big butts and I cannot lie?).

What Hollywood does isn’t much better. They reboot older stuff so that they grab the attention of the people that grew up with the original, and also the younger people who may not even know that it’s a rebooted movie. And so, just like your memories of old songs (which most tend to get confused between who the original artist was), the original film will be forever replaced by the newer, prettier memories of the reboot. And that’s a travesty in my eyes, the original artist who produced the amazing idea, forgotten and replaced by a soulless, empty reboot.

If you wanted an example of a famous song that is a cover, but everyone remembers as the original. Respect by Aretha Franklin was originally written and performed by Otis Redding in 1965, but in 1967 Aretha Franklin not only covered it, but tweaked it slightly to come from more of a strong female perspective, whereas the original was about a man being devoted to their wife and bringing home the bacon and only wanting a bit of ‘respect’ from his wife when he gets home from work. Aretha Franklin won awards for this song as well as it being her most famous number one hit. It also goes down in history as one of the best female RnB songs of the time. But fuck you Otis Redding, you were only the person who invented the song to begin with…

They rebooted the muppets too. I know I should be angry at this, but the humour is kind of funny. At least they built on the already existing characters and tried to do something new with it. They didn’t just replace all the muppets with new muppets and called it the muppets.

Because rebooting the Ghostbusters and replacing every character that made the movie memorable with a bunch of randoms and still having the nerve to call it Ghostbusters, is kind of like replacing Kermit the Frog with Kevin the Cat.

It’s fucking dumb. We are not fucking idiots Hollywood!

Please always support the original artist, they were they ones who had the talent to come up with a brilliant idea in the first place.

 

The Best Of YouTube: Introduction

Most of my time is spent watching YouTube, there isn’t a day that goes by without us watching it, unless there’s no internet, which in that case I don’t watch shit…

I’ve said this before but I do not watch mainstream media, our TVs get used as monitors for the computers so they aren’t even plugged into an antenna, because fuck mainstream media.

(This is our lounge set up. Sorry, I’m the first to say I can’t photography. But there is a computer there if you can see it)

Since I stopped watching that and got off Facebook my life has been so peaceful. But I digress.

One thing that I think is great about YouTube, is that it’s everyone’s platform, there are things that are going to entertain you, not everything is but something will. And kids that are under the age of 13 are online all the time now, you can make YouTube anonymous, it doesn’t force you to share every detail of yourself including your full real name like Facebook does. Much safer, less evil. It’s somewhere for kids to chat (because seriously, what adult writes in the comment section of YouTube unless they like really trying to outsmart dumb kids) even though it’s stupid, better there anonymously then on Facebook. And there isn’t a child that I’ve met that doesn’t use YouTube. I guarantee you if you ask a person under 13 what they do online, they will say YouTube. And when you ask what they watch, they will say either; Minecraft videos, pewdiepie, markiplier, jackscepticeye or anyone that does lets plays, oh and parody music clips about Minecraft, oh and any video about Minecraft that I may have not mentioned.

This is Pewdiepie (did you get the douche chills too?) This is the most famous person on YouTube. He plays video games and screams immature, childish things at a screen while making funny noises. This guy earns fuckloads, he earns as much as a celebrity now, he is a celebrity now! And that’s all he did for years, just kept making videos until he finally gained all 47 MILLION followers.

Heres a little trick to not only make yourself feel pretty good but also so you can easily understand the enormity of those numbers. Check how many followers you have, currently now I have 62 so I’ll use that as an example. Just imagine 62 people in a room, 62 people take up some space, that’s a really cozy pub full, all who liked your work enough to follow you. And heaps more of you have more then 100, so that’s a bit of a bigger venue then mine to see you. The pewds has fucking 47 MILLION people who LOVE him, like in a crazy fan person kind of way. Yet when you sit and watch him, he’s just some fucking douche playing video games, like your mate being silly while you’re playing co op Halo or something. He feels like a real person when you watch him, not some stuck up snob of a Hollywood celebrity who gives 0 fucks about their fans and only cares about status and awards. Markiplier is also another really popular lets player with over 10 million subscribers, it’s no pewds but Marki still earns $100,000 a month on average.

But Kim, you’ve seen a lot of really talented people on YouTube with fuck all subscribers when someone playing video games has heaps. Any idiot with a webcam and a console can do that, so don’t you think lets players are bullshit?

I totally agree, any monkey with opposable thumbs can do what lets players do, that doesn’t mean you’d be good at it those. These people are popular for a reason, and for the record, no I don’t think it’s bullshit because what lets players do does require work, time and effort. Most of the time they are working alone, some have teams some don’t, example: Pewdiepie, markiplier and jackscepticeye all do everything themselves, filming, editing, uploading. Channels like rooster teeth and game grumps also do lets plays, but they are production companies so they work as a team so there are a lot of people doing a lot of work. Keep in mind, lets players are the most popular videos on YouTube because they can just pump out video after video. From what I’ve heard of the you tubers themselves talking about how they make their videos, most will play and film a game for hours on end and edit it all up and make it a series of 20 minute episodes that come out on a daily. Keep in mind to be a lets player you need to be able to not only play video games well but talk and be humorous at the same time. The guys that do game grumps are basically professional comedians who can perform like that and still play video games now. And they have a team that edits the video and makes it all cool. Those solo you tubers do it all themselves, that’s effort man, lots, and because they are self employed they don’t take breaks, because more views equals more money which means make as many videos as possible.

And these are just normal people, that persevered even with little followers and worked hard to get where they were, and that is commendable in my eyes. And they’re all so humble and grateful, seriously, every time those giant YouTube celebrities do a vlog they always make sure to thank everyone and remind us that we changed their lives and made it better because now they are doing what they love on a full time basis.

And that’s why I love YouTube, because anyone could become a star if you have a thick enough skin. So that’s why I thought I’d start another series alongside Weird Movies For The Weird Minorities because there are so many awesome, wonderful things on YouTube as well as some really talented people. The only issue is YouTube is also full of shitty videos.

So let me spare you the burden of finding all the cool stuff to watch yourselves. This series is dedicated to all the hardworking people on my favourite platform.

I’ll leave you with an oldy but goody joke, please search RickRolling if you weren’t on YouTube or new grounds back in the early 2000s.

 

Mediocre

This was a word I was taught to hate as a child. I was trained from a young age to make sure that was never an option.

My father is a very serious, hard-working man, he also has no real tact with children, and with me he made sure I was never on the same level as other children. I could talk in complete structured sentences when I was 4, I never ran around screaming or being a kid when I was a toddler, and my manners were impeccable. When my father heard me sing Advance Austalia Fair (national anthem) in perfect key and rhythm accapela when I was 7, that’s when my father said I should do singing lessons. And it’s not like I didn’t want to, I did I’d already been doing some stage performance (basic ensemble stuff because I was young).

My singing teacher was harsh on me, so was my father. She broke me down, pushed me to my limits and made me a good singer. So I continued singing and performing and as I started getting older I gained a few lead roles and some experience in the more professional side of the amateur theatre world. Actually, pretty well anything with mainly adults carrying the cast where pretty high end shows to me, considering I started with performing 1 hour pantomimes for young children, performed by children and teenagers.

I used to do other stuff like draw and write, but my father never acknowledged it. He thought I should concentrate on singing and stop trying to be a jack of all trades. My fathers favourite quote and one he liked to use on me often was a Bruce Lee quote (my father has a very large appreciation for the martial arts);

I do not fear the man who has practised 10,000 kicks, but I fear the man who has practised 1 kick 10,000 times.

He wanted me to master that one skill that he thought was worthwhile in me, and if I weren’t into drawing and writing then I probably would’ve been fine with that. But I really loved drawing too, but because I was only drawing cartoon characters and not beautiful shaded landscapes and scenery, he thought I was just average it, in his eyes I was far from an artist, I was his little singer performer, my voice is what he was proud of, but that didn’t happen till I had hit at least 14.

I remember I had drawn a group picture of the characters from Dragon Ball Z, it was meant to be on one piece of paper, but since I was 12 and pretty fucking terrible at sizing images when I copied them, it ended up spreading over 15 sheets of a4 paper that I spent ages taping together. It took me weeks to finish it, draw it out, outline, colour, I was so proud of myself when I was finished so the first person I showed was dad (I only ever showed him stuff if I was happy with it, otherwise I considered it not good enough to show dad) and all I got was this:

Don’t start getting a big head now, remember that there will always be someone better then you.

This one comment made a very large impact from me. I didn’t draw for a while, even though my mum encouraged me. Because the joy was gone, I wasn’t that good, it was just mediocre. And when I did eventually pick it up again, I practised so hard, I was copying fucking tank girl at the age of 13! Do you even know how big of a leap it is go from anime and traditional cartoons to a comic book character by Jamie Hewlett, that’s a pretty big fucking jump.

This was the first tank girl picture I copied, this was like the month before I hit 13. And my standard got consistently higher very quickly. But no matter how good I got at drawing, all I got from my father was:

Tank girl again? Why can’t you draw something nice for once instead of this trash.

It’s better now that I’m an adult and I paint, because for some reason he has more of a respect for painting then drawing. And I know he wishes I still sing now but at the end of day, it was everyone’s fault including my own that I stopped singing and doing theatre. I loved performing and the stage sooo much, yet I have it away to hang out with a boyfriend and smoke weed. Because I cracked.

Whether you see this as a cop out is understandable, I think it’s also a bit of a cop out. But it’s still the truth of it. I got too much pressure stacked on me at a young age, I was taught to behave like an adult but also had my age turned against me in other ways. They all wanted me to be an adult but they still treated me like a child. And it wasn’t just dad either, it was fucking everybody, everybody I knew or met when I was a kid told me I was special, I was gonna go far, I was going to be brilliant. And then random people connected to people I knew would also say things like, you stand out in the crowd and just the shit went on. And you may see that as encouragement, but it’s fucking not, not when you’re too young to even have a clue who you are, what you want or what presence you have in public. All it is is pressure, so much fucking pressure. Because that’s all I’ve been taught, you have to do something with your life because you are important, special and talented.

So if be harsh on myself, you can’t not be if you want to get better. And you can’t be nice if you want to learn, to be good on stage and in show business, there are no niceties, you’re either good enough or not, and lovey dovey keep trying bullshit isn’t helpful. Because if you aren’t pushed, then how are you alone meant to push yourself to your very extent. You can’t, and if you can’t handle the harsh reality of theatre, then you’re not cut out for it.

Which is why I haven’t performed in over 7 years. Because auditions were too devasting. I was 15 going for more adult shows, I was good enough to be lead in small shows, but I soon realised that you need more then just a good voice, good dance ability and acting capabilities. No, you need to BE a theatre person to do theatre, and they’re a special breed of people, and sometimes I wished I’d never turned to drugs and just stick to theatre, but even though my heart and soul belong on stage, my personality does not fit properly in a team cast. I think I also stopped as a big fuck you to my father who pushed me so hard.

But I don’t harbour any ill feelings anymore towards my dad. I am his only child, I needed to succeed because he didn’t do what he wanted to do because he didn’t think he was good enough. He didn’t want me to feel the same regret that’s really easy to see on his face when he’s not fake smiling around other people. He may seem fake and weird to others, buts that’s only because he doesn’t really like people, like me he can only deal with someone 3 hours max then he go does his own thing, I’m pretty well exactly the same. And even though he was so harsh on me growing up, I still hold a lot of admiration for him. Because his work ethic is outstanding and the work that he does is immaculate. I just wanted holes punched in a bit of cardboard to hold cotton for cross stitch, yet he still had to measure the distances between the holes so they have exact spacing between them, pretty well overkill for the use I was putting it to. But my dad doesn’t do things half arsed he aims for perfection every time. Some may say that’s not really the best trait I mean, there is no perfect so he’s setting himself unrealistic goals right? No, he is just refusing to let things be good enough, because there is no such thing, everything can be improved, every skill can be practised. Perfect may be an almost epic word like infinity, perfection is like infinity, it doesn’t end there is no such thing. But that doesn’t mean it’s wrong to strive for it. I would rather be a master of my craft then a jack of all trades. The only issue with it comes the crushing feeling of failure and disappointment.

It’s funny how comments affect you as a child. I guess I never told you all, I don’t dance in public. Ever. I may be wizzing at a rave but I’m not dancing, I’m shuffling. All because of one comment said by a girl I thought was the coolest back when I was in morning before school care. There were 3 of us girls there in the same year I think we were all about 8 at this stage. You know how little girls like to make up little dance routines with their friends (they probably all sit in a circle with their iPads now)? I was no exception, except till the young girl I admired said, you suck at dancing you shake your hips too much. So I haven’t danced since, I’m dead serious, it’s like my whole natural rhythm disappeared that day. Put me in a club without techno music or drugs, and all you’ll get from me is me standing there. I don’t dance, unless its theatre and I’m choreographed.

This contradictive song explains it perfectly:

‘But I don’t feel like dancin’ when the old Joanna plays

My heart could take a chance but my two feet won’t find the way

You’d think that I could muster up a little soft-shoe gentle sway

But I don’t feel like dancin’, no sir, no dancin’ today’

 

 

Need Opinions Pweeeeeeeze

So I couldn’t call this post I made a thing, yet. Because I’ve technically only painted on one 10cm x 10cm canvas (which is coaster size for any country that doesn’t measure in centimetres or millimetres) and I’ve still got another 4 to paint.

The plan is to turn them into coasters. You can have 5 coasters in a set right, or does it have to be 6, I don’t know I’m not civilised enough to use coasters! This is why I need opinions, because these are potential Etsy ideas.

My plan is themed pop culture coasters, mainly centring around video games because 8 bit art is cool. So this set I’m currently doing is main Nintendo franchise characters, so I’ve finished Megaman as you can see from the photo above. The date next to him is the date that the first Megaman game was released. The other characters I have are Mario, Link, Pikachu and Donkey Kong, all are going to be 8 bit like Megaman, with the date of their original release and the same patterned background except with the characters own background colour and either a line of silver around the edges (like Megaman) or gold. So either 2 silver and 3 gold or vice versa.

To turn them into coasters I’m tossing up on 2 ideas. The first being glue the canvas onto a tile then put plexi glass over the top. Or, instead of a tile I was thinking round balsa wood glued to the bottom, so it’s be almost raft like down the bottom, with a balsa wood border with the plexi glass.

Both ideas kind of cost the same, one may take a bit more effort but I’m prepared to put in the added effort if it makes it more sellable.

So please let me know what you all think, constructive criticism is encouraged and highly appreciated. So is honesty, I’d rather be told I suck and mope about it then spend all my money and be heartbroken because it wasn’t popular. So yeah, hit me with your best shot…

Unless it’s these things that I’m already aware of; shitty blue paint (I swear it’s the paint not me, the plan is to get better paint), mega mans legs aren’t totally symmetrical, the date looks a bit ratty and my signature looks like a small squished fly.

Aside from those, please nit pick away!

Weird Movies for the Weird Minorities #1

I’ve always liked discussing movies. Part of me really wants to be a reviewer, but then I realised that I’d probably get a lot of hate for my opinions. Why? Because I don’t like Hollywood blockbusters, I think they’re pretentious, bland and all the same. But my movie taste is so obscure, my humour too weird and at times gross so, mainstream reviewing is out of the question. So this is going to be my new theme series (it won’t be every post either) now it’s just my followers that get to see me attempt to write about obscure movies I’ve never seen anyone write about.

Zombie Ass: Toilet Of The Dead

Yeah, it’s a real movie, a shit movie, so much pun intended right there.

My oldest brother (who heavily influenced my taste in music and movies) saw this film at a Horrorfest which is a movie festival in Australia where they just show upcoming indie horrors, international horrors with also a few classics added in there.

My oldest brother is strange, very intelligent, but weird. Not in a creepy way, but more of an endearing one. Zombie Ass pretty well had everything that he likes in a film; zombies, gore, parasite ass worms, fart jokes, toilet jokes, ass jokes and just over the topness.

(These subtitles are also very real too, these are real lines in the film)

These types of Japanese horror films, unlike their popular counterpart ‘Ringu (The Ring)’ or ‘Ju-on (The Grudge)’ these films only have a minority of the fan base of horror. Everything about this movie is so highly offensive in an ‘ewww gross’ kind of way. It took about 2 years after my brother saw it at Horrorfest to finally even download just the Japanese version, then my brother managed to get a copy of the script, put it all through google translate to use as subtitles. This was how I watched it, with very, very broken subtitles, making this movie even more confusing and hard to follow. In about 2013 I randomly walked into an alternative movie store in the city and lo and behold, in their horror section it was there, 2 copies of it. I rang my brother who conveniently lives in the city, and he came down and bought a copy, then bought me the other copy, because obviously I was/still am the bestest sister ever for finding it.

The cover of this film is pretty misleading. The title is Zombie Ass where in all reality, the zombies that are in it are not really in scenes for long, and the movie itself is not really about the zombies at all. I guess the toilet of the dead refers to a particular scene where mean model chick is going to the toilet in a random village, and a zombie comes out of the toilet to grab her (the way the shot it is a bit fetishy too). But otherwise, the storyline doesn’t centre so much around zombies, toilets or shit, even though there’s quite a lot of it in it.

So what the fuck could this movie be about then if it’s not about shit or zombies? Well, I’ll try explain this silly plot.

So at the start of the film, there are two different stories happening between the characters. First scene is you witnessing a child being injected by the thick needle to the butt by a scientist which is also her father. He then grabs a zombie and beats it in the stomach till it vomits up a giant white parasite. He then proceeds to make the child eat it, saying that she needs it to get better and other things like that.

Next scene introduces you to the main characters story. So the main girl Megumi (who for some reason even decides to go camping with her friend and others still wears a school uniform throughout the whole film), got convinced to come camping with her close friend (?) Aya and boyfriend Take and other girl friend Maki and other guy friend Naoi to go camping. The purpose of the camping is so Maki, who is a model, can find a tape worm. The reason she wants one is that she believes that if she eats it it will keep her slim and vibrant.

In the first scene of being introduced to Megami, we get thrown into a memory, which vaguely explains to us what Megami’s deal is. The memory shows Megami standing and over seeing her sister getting bullied by a group of girls in a high school bathroom. The bullies had a jar full of creepy, crawly bugs and were taunting Megami’s sister with them, trying to get her to fart out loud. For some reason, farting is considered the most disgusting, vile and degrading thing in this movie. I’m not sure whether it’s a cultural thing or not or just the director being really silly. The bullies were also trying to convince Megami to fart too, so they’d let her sister go or they’d torture her with the bugs as well, one of Megami’s fears are bugs. But her sister refused to let Megami do that for her and instead makes the sacrifice and farts in front of the group. Being so racked with shame by farting in public, Megami’s sister kills herself. Thus making Megami a whiny and pouty character at the start that ends up turning into a karate badass.

(Most Japanese gore film protagonists, as a rule are usually teenage girls in high school. Or females that have been through hard life situations in general.)

So anyway, they get to their destination, Maki eats a worm and instantly gets sick and turns into a parasitic worm zombie. Then they end up in the same town with the people from the start and that’s when the plot stops making any sense whatsoever, and ends up going on this crazy tangent which leaves you with a ‘what the fuck did I just watch’ feeling at the end. Except that what the fuck did I just watch feeling would be 100x more intense because I guarantee you, if you have not seen anything in this genre then it is far beyond the plain of things that normal people consider entertaining.

I’ll just sum up the rest of the film in 3 pictures, even then those photos won’t even begin to explain the level of insanity, immaturity and disgustingness that the second half of this movie is:

Hehe, no doubt the Human Centrepede would’ve inspired this film, at least a little bit.

Awww, in the end she accepts her sisters death and faces her fear of farts head on. By using her farts to propel herself into the air like a jet pack. Not kidding. Not even a little bit.

Yeah, I don’t know how to explain this but it’s relevant.

But by far, the best thing for me about this film would have to be the subtitles. Either the person who wrote the original script is awesome or the person that translated it to English is awesome. Either way, it’s the best to read. And out of all the characters, Naoi has all the best one liners, his character doesn’t really have any reason to be in the movie at all, other then comic relief.

So, I give this movie a 5 out 5, but I recommend to no one. This movie is weird, it’s gross and offensive, I only recommend it if you’re into poop and fart jokes with your gore.

So, in the end I can’t really tell you why this movie exists, what its even about or what the message is that the director was trying to portray.

All I know is, this movie is best watched with the reasoning side of your brain switched off.

For Now

Yesterday was a pretty big, exhausting day for me. First with the funeral, then meeting misters father for the first time after them not speaking for 2 years.

So yeah, tears for days yesterday…

Some of us cried a lot at the cemetery. I managed to get myself into a fight with a cousin I hadn’t seen in years. There was at least a half an hour bathroom talk between me and my 2 cousins who I used to be close with. Everything was dragged to the surface yesterday, everyone was incredibly close.

Its like a dictatorship fell, and finally, all the people that were under the dictatorship were finally free to talk to each other. And we all faught and cried and reminisced together. But it felt real, it felt raw.

There were no masks or social standards worn or upheld yesterday. For the first time in my life, I actually felt like I was going through the same emotions as everyone else. And they finally all listened to me, and I learnt some things I never knew.

This isn’t going to be a long post, because I’m emotionally exhausted. Just wanted to share this song. These are the songs I play when it’s time for me to try and pull myself out of the depression again.

I love these musicals so much.

I performed this next musical, and I loved the message that this song in particular held for children.

Hooray For Shit Music

Unless of course you like all the songs off this list, otherwise you like AWESOME music.

Ok, that was a big stretch considering I’ve used a couple of these songs as a weapon to get people to fuck off out of my room… No, my mistake, you have a shitty taste in taste in music and are probably about as weird as me 😱

I cracked a bit yesterday and woke up in a heaps silly mood this morning so I thought it’s time to stop being a sad sack on my page and do something different. Most of these songs you’ll probably know, or maybe the more obscure ones you won’t but I’m going to put these in order of likeliness that you’ve heard them to not so likely. And I might write about it. Maybe. I guess I’ll put up some lyrics or whatever. These are all songs that were considered on the lame side, there’s a bit of 1990s and early 2000s, because, well, it’s the generation I grew up in so I’m still semi-stuck in it music wise.

Do Ya Think I’m Sexy: Rod Stewart (1978)

This song is kind of open for interpretation as to whether you think it is annoying or embarrassing or still just as awesome. Considering I was born early 90s, so it was still old and uncool back when I was born, and it’s 2016 and I still only listened to it recently, it’s a fairly embarrassing song for me to like, that is, if I were a normal kid that grew up up to date with the latest music (I had old parents so that was impossible for me to do). Which I’m not, and my favourite band happened to have existed for 3 years in the 70s, so this is the least embarrassing song up here for my standard. Considering my general style I like to display on the surface is contemporary punk, it still goes against all the things I’m meant to like about punk music, so that’s why it’s on the list.

 

The Question Is, What Is The Question?: Scooter (2007)

This is a pretty fun European dance track. I mean, if you’re into electronic music then there’s no reason why this song should be embarrassing. The reason it is though is because the artist is Scooter. He’s a German MC and DJ, and in the European rave scene he’s a joke, Scooter is almost like the equivalent of Aqua in lameness over there, mainly because of his frequent use of the chipmunk voice sound effect he uses. He became popular over in the west from his remix of The Logical Song, originally by Supertramp. When that song came out I was about 11, and I instantly fell in love with Scooters beats and backing music. When I grew up more I started appreciating him for different reasons, like his peculiar use of the English language when he’s MCing, which kind of sounds like he’s reading a bunch of English sentences out of a German to English translation book. I’ll give you an example;

Won’t let you go

Me got the flow

Mash up the show

Shalack

K nami nama

Like a hammer

A burning candle

Fixed up with a spanner

Actually, on second thought it’s about as much grasp on the English language as the average American rapper, makes about as much sense. ‘A burning candle fixed up with a spanner?’ Is it even possible to fix up a burning candle with a spanner? Is there even a metaphor that can be related to make those two lines make sense? I understand why he’s a joke in Europe, but he appeals to my favourite music side as well as my stupid side.

Pika Girl (Nightcore)

As you can now tell this list is steadily growing more in shame. There is a really big Nightcore scene down here. If you don’t know what Nightcore is, it’s happy hardcore, sped up to an almost chip munk level and it centres around anime, so most Nightcore raves are cosplay events too. So, if you’re not that minority of annoying, over the top anime, candy flippers then chances are you’re going to hate it, it’ll hurt your ears and annoy you. If you’re a metal head that hates all electronic music, then this song can be used as a weapon of extreme torture. I made some guy go home early for playing this song and saying it was my favourite, so it’s proven to drive away people you no longer want in your house, or even life maybe. And if they don’t take the hint in the 3 minute version, there’s also the 10 hour loop version that you can just continue playing till they leave, which I’m sure would only be 20 minutes max.

Dragostea Din Tei: O-Zone (2004)

This was my guilty pleasure song when it first came out, every friend I had at the time thought it was the lamest song ever but I didn’t care. That song was on repeat for at least 3 months straight. It’s too fucking boppy, and sometimes I’m just not dark enough to not start bopping along to catchy tunes. As you can tell, I’m a sucker for European pop, dance and techno no matter how lame it sounds to others.

Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom!: Vengaboys (1999)

Come on, just read my last sentence on the previous song, as if this band wasn’t going to make the list somewhere.

Daddy: Psy (2015)

I don’t like I really need to explain why a Psy song is so far down on the list. I don’t quite understand how the west kind of claimed Psy or how Gangnam Style even made it past Korea, but it happened, and we have Psy, and we have a Snoop Dogg so desperate he will star in anything he gets waved a wad of cash towards. The song I’m referencing is called Hangover by Psy feat Snoop, and it is the silliest thing I’ve seen in a while. And this is why people don’t appreciate Psy, he tries so hard to be cool and his dancing gets overlooked at how brilliant it is. Plus he kind of broke the same bland style that is the pop charts of recent years.

Ding Dong Song: Gunther & The Sunshine Girls (2004)

I’m going to admit something to you all right now… This post was all just a giant rouse  so I could justify putting this song in a post. That’s right, this song is just this.

It’s from Europe (naturally), in a year that was slightly confusing for music styles. It’s lyrics are so over the top sexual, the beat is so late 90s dance it just fits together as a song that just oozes with cheese, i mean charm. I only thought about it last night and it made me lol too hard. It’s hands down the lamest, most embarrassing song I can think of to admit to liking.

 

Comfortably Numb

So this is turning in to one of the worst weeks I’ve had in a long time. And I know that this and my last post will make this one my second self pitying post in a row, and I know I haven’t been that popular on here lately. Probably because of the enormous amount of turd that is my life right now not allowing me to communicate properly like I used to. But I’m getting there again just bare with me.

Just to add some more salt to the wounds that my mother has that have recently had the scab pulled off and is about as raw as you get at the moment, first her mother, now her cat. Our cat. One of the cats I grew up had to be put down yesterday. I didn’t even realise I would be as upset about it as I am, but I think I’ve been genuinely crying out of grief over the cat more then Nanna.

We got this cat at the end of 2003, on Boxing Day, the day after Christmas. I was 12, going into high school at the start of 2004. We had already picked up a kitten from the RSPCA (Royal Society for the prevention of Cruelty to Animals) about a week prior to Christmas, but since Aunty D was trying to get rid of some kittens for a friend, mum ended up getting a kitten of D too, for the other one to play with. The first one from the RSPCA I called Rogue. She’s a strange cat, a really slender mix breed with a white/tabby coat. I remember having no choice but to take her because when we walked into the kitten enclosure, she ended up attaching herself to my leg and not getting down so obviously we left with her.

On Boxing Day, we got Roxy, a beautiful little dark chocolate (not quite black) kitten, who’s mother was a pure rag doll, and they had no idea who the father was, obviously a black cat considering rag dolls are mainly white cats. We thought Rocky was a girl, but when we took her to the vet to be de-sexed, turned out she was a he. So her name became Rocky instead. Not after Sylvester Stallones Rocky, no no no. He got named Rocky after the character Rocky Horror from the Rocky Horror Picture Show, because I was still obsessed with that musical at that stage.

Not this Rocky.

THIS Rocky.

And he was truly a gorgeous cat. He was always mums cat because I ended up leaving home and all that, but was still close with the people he saw on a constant. Because he was half rag doll, he used to be floppy so he’d let you pick him up and hold him on his back, he’d also be walking, or you’d be trying to move him with your foot and he’d just flop over, just straight lay there and just flopped around when you tried to move him.

When he was a kitten he used to jump on the broom when mum was sweeping the floor, half the time he’d climb on it and stay there while mum still swept. He caught a lot of little animals where my parents live, they’re kind of in a nature preserve (I hated growing up there but most find it beautiful) so there are a lot of protected species up there, if killed by you or your pet then you can face some hefty fines. So that pissed off dad a lot because he is all about preserving nature and habitat and all that hippy shit.

I remember when I was with my ex and we were living with my parents at the time. We got up to a lot of shit, I mean a lot, crime and drugs was how we rolled. My ex used to hate Rocky because of his incredibly loud meow and the fact that it was mums cat and he didn’t like my mum. He used to say that he reckoned mum put cameras behind Rockys eyes to spy on us, because he did he’d follow us at a distance everywhere and just stop, sit and stare. It was almost like he was keeping an eye on me for mum, Rocky didn’t like my ex either.

And fuck me did that cat talk, he’d talk to everyone. Fun fact if you didn’t already know; a cats meow is a sound they made to talk to humans, not to each other. Cats communicate to each other through body movements, growls, hisses and small noises. The loud distinct meow that you hear from your cat is intended for you, the house cat has evolved to try and be able to communicate with humans. It didn’t help though that mum encouraged the behaviour to a silly degree, she only really spoke to Rocky through meows unless she was calling him or feeding him. So he just siren meowed on a constant, it was so loud and high pitched, again, used to piss of my dad because he meowed about as much, if not more frequently then a small dog.

He was a kitten when I was 12, now I’m 24. On the day my mother found out that her mother had died, was also the day she took Rocky to the vet for the final time. Yesterday, she had him put down. The vet had held him for 2 days, trying to figure out what was wrong with him, his stomach was full of fluid and he wasn’t eating or drinking. They thought it was a couple of different cat viruses at first but then ran more tests to discover it was a tumour in his liver. The procedure to remove it would’ve been risky, then the treatment afterward would be painful for Rocky, plus he’d already been through 2 days worth of being on a drip and through tests. I was on the phone to mum when she got the call saying her mum died, I was also on the phone when she got the call to say they couldn’t do anything to help Rocky. I heard her break on the phone when they told her that her cat needed to be put down, she was perfectly calm and accepting when they told her that her mum had died. I said to mum, ‘it’s kind of sad when you’re 100x more upset over the death of your cat compared to the death of your mum’. And all the replied with was, ‘that’s because he was the only cat I ever owned that showed me so much love’. And that pretty well says it all when it comes to Nanna, doesn’t it…

I wish I had a picture to share of Rocky and Rogue, but unfortunetly the photo is on my phone and my phones fucked at this point in time. Did I mention I’m having a shitty week? Yeah, woke up to the fucked just with a giant crack through the top half of the screen, so I can do some stuff with it but not others. Like, I can open up a browser or the play store because they’re apps that are down the bottom of my screen, but I can’t search for anything in either because the search bar is at the top of the screen so I can’t press it. I can get in to my text messages, but I can’t read any new ones or reply because they go to the top of the screen and can’t press them. I can answer call, I can make calls if I know the number, or we’ve recently been in contact and the numbers are in the log. I can’t get into my address book though. It’s like the biggest fuck you crack in the screen I’ve ever had on a phone, like here you go, he’s a really important message from your brother about the funeral, but fuck you, you can’t read it or reply to it. I’m getting a new phone shipped out to me though, back to iPhone over android, fuck it, I’m over pretending to be a pretentious hipster that cares about technology like that. It only cost me having to start over with my contract when I had fuck all time left till it was over, oh and also another $210 to cover the rest of the cost of the fucked up phone. Lame.

I’ve been asked by my brother to be pall bearer at the funeral along with my other brothers and some other people people that I don’t know but were apparently close to nanna. I was a bit surprised but I agreed to do it. Fuck it, why not, I get to literally send the bitch to her grave.

Even though I haven’t seen or heard mum cry about nanna, I’m still worried, more so now because of Rocky, the cracks are really starting to show with her quickly. But she summed it up perfectly in one sentence yesterday on the phone.

You don’t realise how much you’re still hurting when you find out that the person that hurt you so much has died. Then you realise you haven’t really gotten over any of it at all.

Because once you realise they’re gone, you also realise that your closure has also died, and now you’ll have to deal with things without the apology you deserved, without any words of remorse. And you can’t help but feel sad over their death because death is sad. And then you get sad and you reflect, on their life, on your life, on the impact that you both made on each other. Then the memories come flooding out, raining down on you as quickly and as heavily as an avalanche. I know because I went through that when I heard about her death, I did it again with Rocky except there were no bad memories about Rocky. I can’t begin to imagine the memories that must be coming back again, that my mother has struggled to bury and forget for the last 25 years. She must hurt so much, so must D, and J, J and K, all of us sharing a combined pain.

I spent yesterday a mess, a crying wreck, nearly broke down in the middle of the shopping centre. Today I am now flat, tired, numb. I have so much to do to move out and absolutely no motivation to do it. Waking up at 6 every morning in a row for the past 5 days and puking hasn’t been great either. Waking up in the middle of the night yelling because of panic and anxiety.

I should be excited about my own life, about moving, about changing. But at the moment, I am barely present in my own mind let alone my life….