Episode 25: A Quarter for your Water

Sometime last year, I was at the Movie House when one of my coworkers talked about how we just got in a teaser poster for Hunger Games. I replied with, “What the hell is that?” I was promptly scolded. He went on to tell me not necessarily the content of the series, but rather its pop culture relevance, which I really don’t see how it would have crossed paths with me, but hey, what do I know?

What I don’t know is a damn thing about the storyline of this book series, so how’s about we take a gander at the trailer and figure it out, eh?
Follow along at home!!!

Ok, ten seconds in and it seems like this is the same angst-y teen melodrama as Twilight. Cue shiny vampires, jorts clad werewolves, and the girl from Zathura.

0:32- Lady Gaga? Wait, that’s Elizabeth Banks? What the hell have you people done to her? This is why we can’t have her on 30 Rock?

0:41 Ehhh! The Title!!!!!

Ok, I am gathering that this is some sort of a draft. I take it, being drafted into the Hunger Games in not a great thing, like being drafted to the St. Louis Rams.

1:11 - Katniss Everdeen? Ok, so the writer here clearly took, “JK Rowling’s How to Name Characters 101”

1:15- “There’s 24 of us and only 1 comes out” This is a Thunderdome? Ok, you’ve sparked my interest. Oh wait it’s PG-13, so I can’t imagine we are going to get any good old fashion coliseum violence…Too Bad.

1:30- Stanley Tucci with blue hair. Is he playing Ramona Flowers father, Gus Flowers?

1:32- Donald Sutherland?! Come on!! You were in Space Cowboys, have some dignity…

1:45- Ok so it is a Thunderdome, so why the hell was their first round draft pick that 9 year old?

1:48- Is that Woody Harrelson? Unless he’s playing either his character from ZombieLand or his character from Kingpin then no thank you…maybe if he’s playing Larry Flint.

1:53- Oh hey, teen angst. No kidding…

These last handful of seconds seem a lot like Tron set in the woods.

Finally, what’s with the Old Spice whistle at the end of the trailer?

I don’t get it, but I would never take it away from you, kinda like Sons of Anarchy. Now that I’ve successfully pissed off everyone, let’s talk about a thing I like!

But first. A history lesson. The year was 1999. It was summer, my friends and I had just finished sophomore year and were all jazzed up about a summer of BNL concerts, LaserQuest, and movies. There were two at the forefront that summer, South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut, and the crown jewel of movies we wanted to see…American Pie. We had one roadblock in our way, we were only 16. Honestly, that never used to matter, we got into There’s Something About Mary, The Matrix, and even Life…

RIP Bernie Mac.

But after the tragedy at Columbine, President Clinton called on NATO-The National Alliance of Theater Owners (Their slogan: No you change your name, we had it first!) to crack down on letting kids in to R rated movies. So began a summer of unsuccessfully trying to get into American Pie. In one epic fail, we ended up having to watch Ben Stiller’s Mystery Men, which at the time I hated, but after watching it a couple of years ago, found it, not so bad.

Fortunately for us, Blockbuster hadn’t caught up with the trend, and renting it on VHS was cake! This movie defined a summer for us. Its sequel was released the summer before we all split up for college. The series has  drawn some interesting parallels, at least with the theme of friendship, not defiling beer, baked goods, and one another’s moms. The third one…no, let’s not.

So now here comes the new one. American Reunion. All the same cast, by the way, who would have guessed the Band Girl would be your most bankable star? Yeah you can make the argument for Stiffler, but for every “Role Models” there are like 50 un-watchable movies, (Mr. Woodcock, Bulletproof Monk.) This is the movie I am most looking forward to in the short term. Again, it draws a thematic parallel with the guys getting older and having to become people. Not to mention it comes out on my BIRTHDAY!! MinchDay 2012--yes that’s what I call my birthday, get used to it, you’re gonna hear it a lot in the next month. So frankly I see no other recourse then for the old high school gang and I to sneak into a screening of it. This is made more difficult by the fact that not only are we all by far old enough to watch it, because of my Movie House employment, we wouldn’t have to pay. I’m still working out the kinks in this plan.

You would think that the fact I went through a similar struggle over a decade ago, it would make me more sympathetic to the kids trying to get into R rated movies now. You would think that, and be wrong…screw those punks.

Finally, here’s a checklist for tonight's Sabres/Bruins game.
1-Score 3 goals, getting Rask pulled.
2-Score 3 goals on Thomas, making him cry into his pedophile mustache
3-Kassian fights Lucic.
4-Gaustad fights Marchand
5-Miller gets a shutout
6-Lindy tells BOS coach Claude Julien he looks like Yogi Bear.
The End

Speaking of The End, that’s it for this old boy. Share this one with your friends, on Facebook and Twitter by clicking the links below. Come on, do it. I don’t even charge you for this kind of hilarity! Thanks Everybody!!!

Minch