GeekSix

Captain EO Returns

Christy
Thursday
12:06 am

Disneyland announced that Honey I Shrunk the Audience will be closing to make way for a limited engagement of Captain EO, opening in February.

Here’s the best Captain EO I’ve met.  Nicely done Bryan.  And yes, those are Tic Tac containers.  I heard a rumor that Bryan smelled like oranges for ..read more

The Pee-wee Herman Show

Christy
Friday
4:31 pm

One of the great parts of my childhood was the hours spent watching Pee-wee’s Playhouse.  So imagine my delight when I heard that Paul Reubens was reprising the stage show through the end of January at Club Nokia in Los Angeles.  I saw the show last night and took a nice little stroll back in time with Pee-wee, Cowboy Curtis (sadly, Lawrence Fishbourne did not reprise his role), Chairy, Magic Screen, Conky and the rest of the playhouse gang.  I even got lessons on how to use Bumpits from Miss Yvonne.

And just because I love Large ..read more

Superhero Kit for Nephews and Nieces

Autumn
Tuesday
11:46 pm

My fabulous sisters have out done themselves again when it comes to Christmas time/Nerdy Present time.  What to give the offspring that has everything?  Why, business cards of course – superhero business cards, and badges, and the bane of every superhero – paperwork.

The best part of the evening was when my youngest nephew – who’s name starts with an “S” protested that his name was spelled wrong on his manila envelope, an envelope that read “Top Secret.”  Ah, to laugh at youth.

My sister Apryl has templates of all the paperwork for the Superhero Kit on her blog.  It’s a good read (my favorite line item -  “communications with sea ..read more

Still Christmas Shopping for that Important Geek in Your Life?

Christy
Thursday
1:33 pm

Well, look no further.  This might be my new favorite thing from ThinkGeek.com.   Magic Wand – Programmable TV Remote.

This magical wand learns directly from your current remote control and “maps them to particular magical motions.”  For example, waving the wand from side to side will change the channel.

I plan to order it now and then when I eventually have children I will only change the TV volume, channel, etc with this.  Just so they know that I really do have magical powers.  Mwuahaha.  As a side note, I was deceived on a regular basis as a child so I feel good about perpetuating the cycle.  For instance, ..read more

The most rockin’ cartoon themes of the 1980s

Josh
Tuesday
11:31 pm

The mid-80s were the golden age of kid cartoon music. The previous generation’s music was either corny, or vague action themes with blaring trumpets. And, as the 90s approached, the era of Saturday morning cartoons started to decay.

But for a handful of years, cartoons had their pulses firmly attached to a pop-culture beat, and the theme songs that came out of that stretch of time were fantastic ditties that mirrored the then-exciting Top 40 soundtracks.

We consulted our horrible, Pop-Rock-addled 80s brains to come up with the 6 most rockin’ theme songs from 80s cartoons. It was hard to not just list our favorite cartoons — keep in mind, ..read more

6 geek shows that got away with cast replacements

Josh
Sunday
11:24 pm

It’s one thing to replace an actor between a pilot and the series’ pickup (nobody really knows them that well), or between a movie and the resulting TV series (big screen actors have big-screen egos). But it takes a very special kind of gall to swap out your star talent in the middle of a series run. Yet a handful of shows did. Below are the 6 that we can remember — any others?

This series tied in the 1950s movie and even the 1938 radio play quite admirably. The first season starred a four-person government team trying to track down the titular aliens, ..read more

The 80s Christmas gifts that never appeared

Josh
Wednesday
11:36 am

For me, the 80s were spent in a most Spielbergian fashion: middle class split-level home in a rolling suburb. Weekends were spent at the mall and summer nights were spent playing flashlight tag throughout the neighborhood.

In the fall, the giant JC Penney and Sears catalogues would arrive, and I’d instantly flump them over to the back pages where the toys awaited my approval. I’d pore over those dozen pages so carefully that the spine was permanently bent to visions of Transformers and Lego sets.

And, while I was usually able to make a pretty respectable haul for a pre-teen, some of the coolest gifts consistently evaded my grasp. Those toys haunt ..read more

5 sci-fi franchises that would do well with a reboot

Josh
Monday
12:13 pm

OK, Hollywood. Everybody says you’re out of original ideas, and frankly, we’re inclined to agree. But, if you’re going to remake and reboot your properties, at least reach a little further back! With the rebooted Hulk franchise (can you have a reboot after one film, or is that just a do-over?), talk swirling of a Superman reboot, and the now perennial Batman-reboot-per-decade, we’re hankering for some fresh remaking of old properties. Below are a few properties you may not have considered, and a few that are underway in some form.

The source material: Robotech was ripped from three unrelated Japanese Anime in order to have enough episodes ..read more

9 Things I Don’t Miss About the 90s

Josh
Wednesday
11:23 pm

I loved the 80s, and have really dug the 20-aughts so far, but the 90s were mirrored the puberty I was going through at the time: necessary, but awkward and annoying. I never quite got the hang of the 90s, although I made it through the decade remarkably unscathed, and with virtually no wedgies to show for it.

I spent some time this week reflecting on the decade, but couldn’t come up with enough good things to make a good Internet list. That said, I was able to come up with plenty of things that I hate. So, in the spirit of decadism, here are 9 things I hate about the ..read more

The Best 10 Game Soundtracks of the 8-Bit Era

Josh
Sunday
11:08 am

It’s easy to take video game music for granted these days. A good score interacts with the players, and soars during cutscenes and gets low and vampy during sneaky bits. The music coming out of modern games is every bit as worthy of awards as film and television scores.

But it wasn’t always that way.

Back in the late 70s and early 80s, systems could produce a beep or a boop, but not both, and certainly not simultaneously.

It wasn’t until the Intellivision came along that home game music was even really possible. Still, much of that game music was constrained to introductions, level changes or victories. With a few exceptions, in-game music ..read more