How South Park Grew-Up to be The League

A few weeks ago I started watching a new show; The League.  My co-workers have raved about it for quite some time, but I didn’t feel like I would enjoy it since the show centers around a fantasy football league and I don’t do that kind of stuff.  So The League sat in my Netflix que for almost a year before I checked it out.  And after I started it I couldn’t stop watching!  I’m halfway through season 4, and I know that season 5 has already started.  I feel like The League has filled a void on television that was left when Entourage stopped airing.  The male-friend interactions seem very accurate and I enjoy the hilarity of their idiocracy. 

Around season 2 I started to break-down the framework of the show.  You have the two lead characters, Pete and Kevin, who are the more sensible ones.  Ruxin is the selfish/mean friend you’re not sure why they hang out with.  Then Andre is the wide-eyed dork they always poke fun of.  Then it hit me!  I had seen this formula before, and that’s when I realized The League are the kids from South Park; all grown-up!

Pete is Stan

As the most down-to-earth character of both shows it made sense to pair these two up.  They’re the smartest of both their shows and can’t seem to figure out why everyone is so stupid.

Kevin is Kyle

First of, they're both red-heads, so that’s a good pairing.  Also, Kyle seems to freak out about little things like being Jewish, or his Jersey roots.  Yes, Kevin isn’t Jewish but he does freak-out about little things, just like Kyle.

Jenny is Wendy

I know what you’re saying, “But Wendy and Stan are a couple, so why did you pick Pete as Stan and Kevin as Kyle?”  Well, think of all the times Stan has gotten sick ON Wendy.  How much vomit do you think that girl can take before she thought, ‘enough is enough’ and got rid of Stan.  So who better than to help her get over Stan than his best friend?  Wendy would want someone she can control a little bit after her relationship with Stan.  She’d want to be the dominant person in her new relationship which would be why she chooses Kyle/Kevin. 

As I watch The League I also noticed a few looks between Pete and Jenny.  This would make sense since the two actors are married in real life, but also for their characters if, say, they used to date. Just think about it in terms of how other real-life relationship start and it makes sense.

Ruxin is Cartman

Gee, the asshole friend who always tries to screw everyone else so he can get ahead, I wonder who that would be?  The way I see it Ruxin is Cartman’s revenge for be fat all those years.  He lost the weight, became successful, got a super-hot wife, and now holds it over everyone’s head.

Andre is Butters

Every episode of The League it always makes me laugh when Andre shows up in some ridiculously weird outfit that he thinks is cool.  After spending years with his friends you think he’d learn his lesson and know he is just going to get made fun of.  This reminds me so much of Butters.  He’s the friend that drums to his own beat, but his beat is totally out-of-sink with the rest of the group.  Both characters are extremely gullible and seem very innocent.  Butters would have continued being a dork well into his 30’s I’m sure.

Taco is Ike

Remember all those South Park episodes when Kyle said, “kick the baby” and then sends his little brother flying?  What kind of brain damage do you think that would cause?  We all think that Taco’s stupidity stems from him being a stoner, but what if it goes back further?  What if is low I.Q. comes from his brother kicking him in the head when he was little?  I think that would stunt is intellectual growth.  Kevin/Kyle feels a little guilty about it all, and now looks after his little brother.  Plus, Taco is always so nice to everyone, and Ike is technically Canadian so you have those similarities as well.

I’ve been watching South Park since it premiered in 1997 and I am currently zooming through the first couple of season of The League.  The more I watch, the more it just seems to fit together.  Yes, I have left out Kenny, but with all those deaths throughout the years do you actually think the poor boy survived his teen years?  Go back and re-watch some episodes of both shows and I think about it all.  Then you’ll say, “Shawn was right!”

My Dream Marvel Film Franchise: Animated

Last month DC released the animated film Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox, based on Flashpoint, a mini-series by Geoff Johns.  In this story Barry Allen, the Flash, woke up in an alternate reality.  CAUTION SPOILERS AHEAD, FOR THIS ENTIRE ENTRY.  In this reality Bruce Wayne was shot and his parents lived.  Thomas Wayne became the Batman and his psychopathic wife became the Joker.  Superman never landed in Smallville, KS but the middle of Metropolis where he was taken by the government and treated like a lab rat his whole life.  Meanwhile, Aquaman and Wonder Woman are fighting a war that would destroy the entire world!  Barry must either find a way to change reality back or find a way to stop his former friends from killing billions of people.

This was a great film.  It didn’t stray too far from the source material, and was the right mixture of drama and action to make the story pop.  DC has done a tremendous job with their animated films in recent years with Batman: Year One to Superman: Doomsday.  To dare say I’ve enjoyed their animated films more than their live action.  With a direct-to-dvd animated film you aren't constraint to theater prices, weekend numbers, and big special effects that hike the cost of the film millions of dollars.  Animation is a great alterative to telling comic book stories so long as you have the right story, directing, and animation.  A little well-known voice-acting doesn’t help either.

Last week I read a Robot 6 article describing 5 DC storylines that would make great animated films.  While I agree with them all this inspired me to make my own list of Marvel storylines that would make great animated films.  So, I thought of several separate storylines, but when I started jotting down my favorite Marvel stories they all kind of flowed into each other, minus Civil War.  Then it occurred to me, why not just make them all sequels to one another, leading to one big event, just like the Avengers did!

Part 1) Avengers: Disassembled

This film would see the destruction of the Avengers by one of their own.  Having gone insane over the loss of her children the Scarlet Witch kills several member of her teammates, including her own husband, Vision.  But not before she brings down every hideous villain the Avengers have fought onto the Avengers mansion.

With Marvel Studios hitting it big with Joss Whedon’s Avengers and a sequel on the way with Scarlet Witch and her brother Quicksilver set to appear, this film would be perfect to roll out right after Avengers: Age of Ultron.  Anyone who would watch this film would know most of the characters so you can skip the back story and go straight to the destruction of the Avengers.  You could play the franchise hype like a fiddle.  I’m getting goosebumps just thinking about it!

Part 2) House of M

Following Avengers: Disassembled came this doozy of a storyline.  Professor X has been tapped to help put Wanda, a.k.a. the Scarlet Witch, back together again.  When he can’t the Avengers the X-Men come together to decide her fate.  Suddenly reality has changed and the only person who knows it is Wolverine, head of S.H.I.E.L.D.  Logan finds himself in a world where Magneto and his family rule, Peter Parker is a celebrity, and every hero is living their dream life.  With the help of mysterious girl Logan must rally his friends to give up their happiness and change reality back to how it was. 

The twist at the end of this story is 2-fold.  First, Magneto didn’t tell his daughter to change reality, his son Quicksilver did. Second, when the Wanda changes reality back she makes one diversion, “No More Mutants.” 90% of the mutant population has lost their powers, including Magneto.  This forces the few hundred mutants left on the planet to take refuge with the X-Men and sets up everything to come.  Did I mention Peter Parker is pissed as hell that his perfect happiness got taken away from him?

Part 3) The New Avengers: Breakout

With most of the worlds mutants de-powered and the Avengers shut down of course it’s the perfect time for a super-villain prison break!  Captain America and Iron Man must get the band back together, along with a few new members like Spider-Man and Wolverine, to catch all the bad guys who broke out of the Raft, the maximum security prison.

This would be a first look at Spider-Man and Wolverine brought into the Avengers mix, a formula viewers would already know from Marvel’s big screen adaptations.  It also would re-establish the Avengers and Wolverine for their role in Part 6 of this animated film anthology.

Part 4) X-Men: Messiah Complex

With less than 200 mutants left in the world they are no longer the next step in human evolution, but a species on the brink of extinction. It’s been over a year since a new mutant has been born, until one pops up in Alaska.  The X-Men arrive only too late to see the destruction Mr. Sinister’s Maruders and human Purifiers have caused on the Alaskian town.  The baby is safe, in the hands of Cyclops’ son from the future, Cable.  It’s a race to get to Cable and the baby first and it all ends with an epic battle that leaves Cyclops with the decision to send Cable and the baby girl away, into the time stream, so she can grow-up and decide her own fate.

This story has all the X-Men into the mix and re-introduces X-Force, led by Wolverine.  Again, thanks to all the live-action X-Men films most of the characters have been established to the general audience, just not well in my opinion.  Anyway, I would love to see the 90’s X-Men voice-cast come back to do this film and all the others.  For a generation of kids like myself those voices are what we hear when we read Cyclops and Wolverine's words on the page.

Part 5) X-Men: Second Coming

Cyclops sends Cable and the baby, Hope, into the time stream so of course they’re going to come back just as Cyclops believes they would, and just in time to save them all.  The villain Bastion is making his final move to end mutant-kind and when he hears that the so-called “mutant messiah” is back he’ll stop at nothing to destroy this now teenage girl.  Some notable deaths along the way include Nightcrawler and Cable.  The ending leaves some X-Men wondering if Hope was worth the price they paid, and if that was the Phoenix that twinkled in her eyes at the end.  You ready for the big pay-off?

Part 6) Avengers vs. X-Men

The Phoenix is coming for Hope and the Avengers believe that, like Jean Grey, the Phoenix will corrupt her and surely destroy the world.  Cyclops however believes that the Phoenix has always signaled rebirth and that this could be the salvation the mutant race has been waiting for.  Of course then we get Captain America vs. Cyclops, Hulk vs. Colossus, Magneto vs. Iron Man, etc.  Wolverine falls down with the Avengers, people switch sides, and when it’s towards the end Cyclops is the sole possessor of the Phoenix power.  He then is corrupted so much by that power that he kills his teacher, and surrogant father, Professor Charles Xavier. 

With the help of Hope, the Avengers, and now the X-Men, are able to take down the new Dark Phoenix and re-spark the mutant race.  So this sparks the debate, was Cyclops right?  I’m sure he’ll have time to think about in a prison cell as a now known super-villain.  Remember when everyone thought Cyclops was just an up-tight boy scout?  Suck it!

So there you have it people, six great stand-alone animated features that would kill as one giant animated franchise.  You wouldn’t have to worry about aging actors, make special effects look real, and who owns what because Marvel has the right to make all their characters animated.  I would much rather enjoy this in the privacy of my own home then go back $12 to sit in a noisy theater just see the current A-List celebrity try to act like he has integrity before he goes back to his trailer and does another line.  Was that a little too much?  Oh well.  I know I’m not the only fanboy who would kill to see this happen.  So, to the House of Ideas, here is mine, let’s make it happen!

The Future of Star Trek?

Today Star Trek: Into Darkness came out on DVD and Blu-Ray and it is the one summer blockbuster movie I was planning to buying.  Let me start off by saying I would not call my self a Trekkie.  Growing up my father liked Star Trek.  I remember on Sunday nights, before The Simpsons would come on, my dad watched Star Trek, mainly The Next Generation or Deep Space Nine.  I always found it boring.  I had a soft spot for TNG since it had a kid on the show, Wesley Crusher, and I thought that was cool. To this day it’s still the only Star Trek series that remotely keeps my attention. 

Then I saw the trailer for the 2009 Star Trek movie.  I was curious. It looked exciting, which is something Star Trek had never been to me before.  So I decided to borrow my father’s Star Trek anthology and watch every Star Trek movie, some I didn’t even remember ever seeing.  Maybe it was the fact that I was older and more mature, but Star Trek seemed to have gotten better.  The films that I heard were the best were indeed the best, the crappy ones were indeed crappy, and my favorites were still the ones with Professor X at the helm. 

Then I went to see Star Trek in the summer of 2009.  I thought it was amazing!  It had cool action, drama, laughs, heart; everything a summer movie should be.  It was a sequel and a reboot at the same time! My girlfriend (now wife) even loved it!  J.J. Abrams, the director, even admitted he was always more of a Star Wars fan, but he put together a team of Trekkies and non-Trekkies who would make this film likable for everyone; and they did.  Much like comic book films, there was a fan base already and now the genre was opened up to the general audience with fanboys on the inside track.  Yesterday as I was thinking about Star Trek: Into Darkness I thought about the future of this franchise.  Due to recent events I didn’t know what it could be.

When the first Star Trek film came out in 1979 the cast was from the 60’s TV series.  Throughout the years I didn’t see the cast do much else except William Shatner.  These actor’s careers were Star Trek.  And some of them went on to do 7 films. Leonard Nimoy still plays Spock, for almost 50 years now.  Does Paramount think they can do that with the current cast?  Some have already feared the worst when Star Trek lost their director before his second Star Trek film was even released.  Abrams has been tapped to continue the live-action Star Wars films and direct Episode VII.  This is another huge fan base with a huge voice, much like Star Trek.  Abrams has committed to help produce Star Trek 3(ish), but can he really balance both jobs without botching one, or both of them?  I would not want to be the guy who makes a bad Star Wars film AND a bad Star Trek film.  You might as well just stay off the internet for the rest of your life. According to IMDB Rupert Wyatt is directing Star Trek 3(ish).  Wyatt re-invigorated another sci-fi franchise, Planet of the Apes, with Rise of the Planet of the Apes.  This bestows some of my trust in Wyatt but Jon Favreau trusted director Shane Black with Iron Man 3 and look how polished that turd was.

Going back to the cast, all of these actors are doing other things.  Zoe Saladana and Simon Pegg are becoming household names.  Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, and the rest of the cast are also keeping pretty busy.  It could be another four years before we see the next Star Trek film!  When most actors sign on for a franchise they sign on for three films.  I’m hoping Paramount has thought a little more on this, otherwise they’ll be back where they were before the last film; re-casting.  I hate that they did it with Spider-Man, and I hope they don’t crap out another Batman origin because we’ve seen it on film twice in the last 25 years.  Another option for Paramount would be to take what they did and do it again.  By that I mean re-casting The Next Generation actors and make them the next Star Trek trilogy.  Then Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and so on.  Because we all know Hollywood has run out of original ideas so they’re just recycling anything they can find from books, comics, TV, and films.

I just started liking Star Trek, I don’t want it to start being f*cked up already.  So we will all just have to wait and ponder the future of the franchise just as we all know it will continue in some fashion; like it has for almost 50 years.  Whether it continues to appeal to a broad audience is still yet to be determined, but as a representative of the broad audience I would really like to “make it so.”……..totally nailed that reference :)