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Story: Cold and Despondent in an Empty Room

June 30th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in death | personal | writing - (2 Comments)

NOTE: This is a story that I wrote last year for Machine of Death. Don’t bother looking for it; they rejected it. Regardless, I thought it made for a pretty worthwhile writing exercise, and since it’s going nowhere else it might as well go here. There were certain guidelines, such as: the story must include a machine of death, the title of that story must be the prediction that your protagonist receives from that machine, and the prediction must come true. Enjoy. Or don’t. It’s up to you.

Cold and Despondent in an Empty Room
–Philip J Reed

The man didn’t know what he expected, really, when he showed up to have the exact circumstances of his death predicted, printed, stamped and certified. But one thing he never, in a thousand years, would have expected was that it would turn out to be a very good career move.

Of course he knew he was going to die. Everybody was going to die. That was the point of being alive…at least as far as he could tell. But knowing it so conclusively, so specifically…it was different. It made everything feel different.

“Snoopy or Cookie Monster?” the technician asked him blandly, digging through a crate at his feet.

“Snoopy,” answered the man, rubbing his arm where the needle had been. The technician handed him the bandage, and he applied it himself. The bandage seemed like a formality. Given the circumstances, it only could be.

* * *

His wife climbed into bed beside him. She had come home early. It wasn’t even dark yet. He pulled the shades and got into bed.

“Well?” she asked him softly, nuzzling his shoulder.

He pretended to be asleep.

* * *

The slip of paper read COLD AND DESPONDENT IN AN EMPTY ROOM. He didn’t ask for clarification, but the technician must have been asked for clarification a lot because he immediately offered, helpfully, “Suicide.”

“Suicide?” the man asked.

“It doesn’t say suicide,” the technician said. “But I think it’s pretty clear.”

“You think?”

The technician shrugged. “There’s counseling in the next room,” he said. “You get fifteen minutes, and then I think they charge for any more. But get there now because there’s always a line.”

“I’m not suicidal,” the man said. “It doesn’t even say suicide.”

The technician was preparing the machine for the next client. It was a fairly involved process that involved not only the replacement of syringes (for superfluous hygiene reasons) but also a complete systems check and a full baseline recalibration with a wide range of standards (from “LONG AND FRUITFUL LIFE WITH ULTIMATE TERMINATION IN THE SOFT ARMS OF WINTER” all the way down to “DOG ATTACK IN PARKING LOT”), and then a confirmation of the accuracy of that recalibration by a second, higher-ranking technician.

This higher-ranking technician was already approaching. The man still clutched the short piece of paper that he still needed to have certified by the clerk in the lobby as though he had pulled it from the world’s cruelest fortune cookie.

“Larry,” the first technician said without looking up. “Suicide?”

The higher-ranking technician pulled the paper from the man’s hand, glanced over it briefly, and handed it back. “Who knows.”

“Probably suicide though?”

“Does it matter?” the higher ranking technician asked. “Let’s go with this; we’ve got a tight schedule.”

The man was guided by a woman in white into the lobby, where the clerk recorded and made official the known circumstances of his eventual death.

* * *

These death tests were mandatory, but, for now, they were confined to a relatively small test group. It wasn’t that the machine’s reliability was in question; that had already been established beyond the shadow of any doubt when the inventor of the machine tested it on himself, learned he would die in under an hour’s time in a collapsing laboratory, and relocated in a panic to a much sturdier lab than his own which was then demolished by a wrecking crew who showed up to the wrong address.

The man had been chosen randomly, the letter said.

Very few people were chosen, the letter said.

Very few people were chosen, the letter said, not because the machine was being tested, but because civilization’s ability to cope with the foreknowledge of its own demise was being tested.

The man was a test subject. He was neither willing nor unwilling to be a test subject. He was going to die, he knew, whether he was a test subject or not.

The only question was how.

And it was a question the higher-ranking technician answered without even realizing it.

“Does it matter?”

The man thought about that. Instead of sleeping, he thought about that.

* * *

The man left the next morning before his wife woke up, and took the bus to work. The digital readout on the machine told him he had 59 days left to live, and while he knew that going to work should have felt to him like a poor use of what little time remained, there wasn’t really anything that felt to him like a much better use.

Did it matter? A few days ago, maybe. But not now. Of course it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter if he skipped breakfast. It didn’t matter if he never listened to another record in his life. It didn’t matter because in 59 days, it couldn’t matter.

He was a telemarketer. He was paid a salary too small to support even himself and his wife, let alone the family they had occasionally wanted, to call strangers on the telephone and try to make them buy insurance that he wasn’t even sure existed. He never met any of his customers and his phone did not accept incoming calls. He spoke to everybody once, and then never again. He either made the sale, or he didn’t.

You had one shot at things, and then you crossed the name off your list — whatever the answer — and moved on to the next. One of his coworkers, who was also named Larry, referred to this technique as “slash and burn.”

Larry was not there when the man arrived to work. Nobody was there, except for the cleaning woman, who shuffled from cubicle to cubicle looking for something to clean, hoping both that she’d find something, and that she wouldn’t. She did not try to make eye contact with the man, which he appreciated.

He sat down at his desk, put on his headset, buried his face in his hands, and spoke, one by one, to the strangers his computers called for him.

His coworkers showed up two hours later, and he did not lift his head.

* * *

“Hey,” his wife said.

“I’m too tired,” the man told her.

“Can we talk for a little bit before bed?”

“I’m too tired to talk.”

“Can you just tell me what the machine said?”

“I’m too tired to talk about what the machine said.”

Besides, the man knew, it didn’t matter what the machine said.

It didn’t matter what the machine didn’t say either.

It didn’t matter.

* * *

In the morning he showed up to the office even earlier. It allowed him to make another 20 phone calls than he had the day before. He was supposed to read to his customers from a script, but he started deviating from the text without realizing it.

His mind was nowhere. There was nothing he could think about. He couldn’t think about providing for his wife, because now he never could. He had taken this low-paying job because it was offered to him, and he assumed he would eventually move up. Now that could not happen.

He thought he would make friends who had connections somewhere. Now that could not happen.

He thought he would impress somebody eventually, and that sometime, somewhere, a door would swing open, and he could walk through it and find for himself and for his wife and for the family they now could never have a richer and brighter and better future in which he was — if not somebody — at least not nobody.

He thought he might find something. He thought there might be something to find. He thought that maybe, if he tried, if he lived his life and loved his wife and cared and worked and saved, that he might actually accomplish something.

Now that could not happen. And what was worse, it didn’t matter how he lived. It was too late. He might as well have been a criminal. The machine did not only confirm that his life would be short; it confirmed that whatever time he spent alive had to be meaningless.

He deviated from the script without realizing it. His eyes still glossed over the laminated page before him, but he was saying something different than he had said to customers before. He was saying things that they were listening to.

They were agreeing to sales. When they agreed to sales, the computer transferred them to somebody who would take down their billing information, and then they were gone.

Or, to them, he was gone.

* * *

By the end of the week, his wife resorted to physically cornering him. “You have to deal with this,” she told him.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said.

“Tell me what it said.”

“I’m too tired to talk.”

“Have you been eating?” she asked him. “You haven’t been eating.”

“No,” the man said. “I haven’t been eating.”

At least, he did not think he’d been eating. Why would he have been eating? What difference would that have made?

“You’re not going through this alone,” she said to him.

He held his eyes closed. He left when she was asleep.

* * *

“I’m not suicidal,” the man said. “It doesn’t even say suicide.”

“It gets flowery sometimes,” the technician told him, readying the machine for its next victim. “Me and my brother were in the second batch, last year. It came right out and told me I’ve got nothing to worry about until my trip to Greece, which, the way they pay me, isn’t going to happen for a hell of a long time. But it told my brother that ‘the sullen clap of Heaven’s malaise would steal his hair and life.’ Two weeks later, bam, lightning strike.”

The man stood silent. Whatever the answer was, he knew already that it was irrelevant. The machine either meant that he would commit suicide, or it didn’t. Either way, it didn’t matter.

“I don’t know,” the technician continued, at least partially to himself. “Some of them, it’s just, okay, here’s how. And other’s it’s like it’s channeling Shakespeare or some shit.”

It was either channeling Shakespeare, or some shit.

Either way, it didn’t matter.

* * *

Larry, the man’s coworker, stood beside him while he was on the phone. When the call was finished, Larry pulled the headset off the man and said, “Are you coming out tonight?”

“No,” the man said. And then, “I need to make another phone call.”

Larry said, “Don’t you ever go home?”

“Yes,” the man said sadly, realizing at once that, maybe, he didn’t actually have to.

“What happened?” Larry asked him. “You don’t come out anymore. It’s just a quick drink. You can’t turn into a hermit.”

The man was spared from having to account for his demeanor, however, by his boss, who also appeared in his cubicle and said that he wanted to speak with him for a moment. Larry, whose idea of job security was to evade the manager as often as possible, disappeared for the night.

His boss wanted to speak to him because the man’s sales numbers were extraordinarily high that week.

He said things like, “I don’t know what you’re doing, but keep doing it,” and “What we really need is a whole lot more men like you.”

The man wasn’t sure exactly what he said, because he wasn’t exactly listening. The man stopped exactly listening when he realized that it could no longer have possibly mattered if he listened at all.

* * *

When his wife left him he watched her go, but he felt very little. He didn’t regret her leaving, because he couldn’t blame her for leaving. He didn’t regret consulting the machine, because it hadn’t been his decision to regret, and also because it wasn’t the machine’s fault that nothing he said or did could possibly matter.

He knew that he could keep her — for about a month and a half anyway — if he could only tell her what the machine had said. He knew that she would help him try to make sense of it. He knew that she would stay with him, and comfort him, and help him come to terms with what he knew he could never come to terms with alone. He knew that he could spend every one of his remaining nights in bed with her, feeling her close to him, holding her, being loved by her, and needing her, if only he would speak up and tell her what it was that was pulling the man away from himself.

But he also knew that none of that mattered.

And so she left, and he watched her go, and at some point he either fell asleep or passed out, and before the night was even half over he returned to work, plugged in his headset, and let the computer find another sleepless soul, somewhere, alone and cold in their own empty rooms, the ghosts of optimisms past lining their walls or garage floors, in homes with sputtering heaters and understocked cupboards, their pets blind with cataracts and bathroom sinks adorned with hairbrushes they couldn’t bring themselves to throw away, with yellowed newspapers from better days and a drawer full of loose photographs, a hole in the wall that would never be repaired or a broken window half-heartedly concealed with wet cardboard, a painting never hung or a Christmas gift never delivered, and an overnight bag, empty, still with its original price tag, and dull knives and a broken stove, carpeting leading upstairs to a series of rooms gone unused for years, a Ping-Pong table in the back yard sagging from the rain, the musky smell of thick dust and expired store-bought tomato sauce, and unheard echoes of years-old conversation between people who would not — could not — exist anymore, the imagined phantoms of haunting that would never come, yes, just another of these many sleepless souls who just needed to hear from somebody so young, and already worse off than they could ever be.

* * *

By the end of the month, the man’s sales figures caught the attention of the regional office, and then the national headquarters. Not only had the man outperformed himself; he had outperformed any of the other sales people in any of the offices scattered across the country, tucked, as they were, into strip malls or conference rooms in larger business complexes.

Larry stopped trying to get his attention, and so did the rest of the man’s friends. He stopped calling them, and they disappeared. His wife was the only other one who knew about his appointment with the machine, and she was content to leave messages that were never returned.

It didn’t matter, the man thought to himself, whether or not he returned them. In another month it would matter even less.

“I know you’re putting in more hours now,” his boss told him, “but it’s more than that. Are you using the script?”

The man didn’t answer.

“Of course you’re not. The script is shit. What are you using?”

“I don’t know,” the man said.

His boss waited for something more.

“I just talk,” the man said eventually.

“Whatever you’re saying, it’s working. Your sales pitch. Whatever it is, and I don’t even care what it is, it’s brilliant. In some businesses you can let the product sell itself. We don’t sell anything here. We sell a waste of somebody’s time and money, and you’re selling it like it’s piping hot porno.”

His boss sat on his desk for a moment, thinking.

“Next Thursday,” his boss said finally, “I’m going to the emergency conference in Phoenix. You probably heard about all the lawsuits. Anyway, they wanted me to give a talk and I was going to bullshit my way through 45 minutes of variations on ‘we’re in the people business’ for the fourth year running. But I want you to come.”

For the first time that the man could remember, his boss said his name.

“I want you to come, and just kind of pep people up. Give them a good talk. Tell them how to sell this shit because I am telling you that you’re the only one who’s actually selling any of it.”

The man shrugged, which was as good as any other answer he could have given.

His boss asked him if he had to check with his wife first.

The man shook his head and said that she was dead for all he knew, which he knew was true, even though she had left him seven messages that day, the most recent of which was only an hour ago. The following Wednesday they flew out to Phoenix, and the man pretended to sleep for the entire flight.

* * *

His instincts were slow to change, and when the man checked into his room at the Sharpe Tower Hotel he wondered, as he couldn’t help but wonder, if this room qualified as empty enough to be the room. But then he realized, before the thought was even complete, that it didn’t, wouldn’t, and couldn’t matter. Even if he didn’t know that he still had two weeks remaining, it couldn’t have mattered.

Suicide, homicide, death…three sides of the same coin. It happened, and it comforted no-one to know that it was — or would be — one and not either of the others. The end result was the same. He sat quietly in the armchair and stared vaguely at a blank television screen. It wasn’t to be this room, but it didn’t matter if it was. He blinked enough times that the sun came up, and he shuffled into the conference room on the fourth floor to deliver his speech.

* * *

The man had no notes and hadn’t discussed with anybody beforehand what he was going to say, so there is no way to confirm that what follows is at all accurate. Unfortunately, this record, incomplete or erroneous as it might theoretically be proven to be by an outsider who cannot exist, is all that we have. It is scrawled in only periodic legibility in the margins of a room service menu that one of the conference attendees, a Martin Klein of the Owlstack, PA office, happened to have in his pocket, and it is reproduced here, in its arguable entirety, for the betterment and edification of generations to come:

There is no meaning and we all share an inevitable worthlessness. Nobody will be saved. It is over before it begins. I think I am supposed to make you feel excited about selling insurance. And I think you might as well be as excited about selling insurance as you would be about starting a family, or finding a dead child on your doorstep. It is all equally meaningless and you cannot keep whatever small amount of happiness you may manage to find in a world that does not care that you were ever born. You may disagree, but you’ll never prove me wrong.

You cannot be excited. You cannot be happy. You cannot even be remotely satisfied with anything you’ve ever done or had done to you. Because all of that gives you hope, and what we sell can only really make sense to the hopeless.

When you speak to your customers, remember that you are going to die, and remember only that you are going to die. Wherever it happens, whenever it happens, you will have nothing to show for it, and nobody will miss you. You are not even a human being. You are a voice on the telephone. You could be hit by a bus a few minutes after you leave work and nobody you talked to that day would even know or care.

That is my message to you. We are already dead, even when we aren’t. We stand here or sit here or lie here in our own graves, and nothing will change for anybody else when go quiet for the last time. I have been asked by the hotel to remind you that the breakfast buffet continues until eleven o’clock, and that today’s signature dish is Belgian waffles.

Your Friday Musical Interlude

June 29th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in friday musical interlude - (0 Comments)


David Byrne, “The Man Who Loved Beer”
Grown Backwards, 2004

Review: History Repeating – Blue

June 23rd, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in comics | frank zappa | internet | mega man | music | nintendo | review | video games - (0 Comments)

The mere fact that I’m writing this review sort of gives away my feelings, as I didn’t intend to write anything — or, at least, not much — about it at all. But History Repeating – Blue absolutely shocked me with its quality. For anyone who’d like to purchase it before reading my spoilers, be my guest. I recommend it outright.

History Repeating – Blue is the first half of the Mega Man 3-themed rock opera by The Megas. It’s been years in the making, which for a long time had some folks wondering if it would ever see release. It was not only worth waiting for, but it represents an enormous step forward for the band in both their writing and musicianship.

The fact that History Repeating is being released in two parts is my only real disappointment, but stick with me because I’ll negate that disappointment before this review is through.

The 10 tracks on this album suggest that the Mega Man 3 rock opera is going to be significantly longer than its Mega Man 2-inspired predecessor, Get Equipped. After all, that album only had 13 tracks, and two of those were less than 20 seconds long. Here we have four robot master themes (Top Man, Magnet Man, Spark Man and Snake Man), two Wily themes, a long intro theme (split in half) and a gloriously meditative tune built upon the simple Game Over theme.

I can’t stress enough how impressive it is that the band weaves such an emotionally-invested story based on the Mega Man games. Those titles were famously slight on the storytelling. There were hints of themes and continuity, but, overall, they were just an excuse to dodge traps and shoot things. That’s fine. What The Megas choose to explore is the mindset of somebody trapped within such an existence. On the surface, it’s a fun game. On the inside, though, what is happening? What kind of thoughts would he have? How would he cope with them?

The Megas have now covered three Mega Man games, and the psychological progression of the protagonist is noticeable. Throughout the EP based on the first game, Mega Man is silent. He’s been told to destroy the enemies of Dr. Light, and he does that. The closest thing to an emotional response comes from Dr. Wily, who pleads with Mega Man to acknowledge the destruction that he himself has caused in his mission to take the old man down.

Throughout Get Equipped Mega Man is similarly enthusiastic about his quest, but the album ends on the tellingly introspective “Lamentations of a War Machine.” It’s here that Wily’s words seem to have at last gotten through to him. As Mega Man’s body count rises, is there any reason that he can’t be tarred with the same brush? The refrain sees Mega Man questioning his creator, Dr. Light, and pleading for some justification of his actions, or at least reassurance that he did the right thing. We don’t hear an answer. Mega Man’s concerns go unresolved as the song ends, and the rain begins again to fall.

Here, in History Repeating – Blue, Mega Man opens the album by openly wondering how many more times he’ll need to do this. (If he’s feeling this way now, I can only wonder how exhausted he’ll be by Mega Man 10.) His future seems to be set in this cycle of torment, this unending gauntlet of villains and a race of people that turn only to him when they need help. He’s still going about his work, but he’s at least aware that there are alternatives…which is why “Continue” works so well at the end of the disc.

I was a bit worried about the interruption of narrative flow that would occur with a split release, but “Continue” is as perfect a disc-1 conclusion as anyone could ever hope for. Sung by an unknown figure (Dr. Light? Roll? Mega Man to his reflection?) it gives our hero a chance to consider an alternate path for his life. He never would take such a path, the song assures us, but he’s starting to notice that it’s there. Mega Man is, three games and albums later, finally acknowledging the paradox in his prime directive to fight for everlasting peace. That kind of self-questioning is a beautiful sentiment, and it’s handled with impressive atmosphere and emotion.

The fact that it comes after Mega Man is tempted by Snake Man — who, with a smart move, is portrayed here more as a Biblical serpent than with the more naturalistic connotations of a true-to-life snake — to defect and join Wily’s team. While there’s no chance of that happening on disc 2, the question is more important than the answer. Snake Man weaves a tale of murder, hatred, coldness, blindness and…well…evil. But it’s a tale he’s weaving about Mega Man. Both Dr. Light and Dr. Wily send out their creations to destroy and to kill. Can one be inherently better than the other? Their intentions may be different, but their methods are not. Is Mega Man just as culpable for the war? It’s an interesting question, and it’s clear that Snake Man’s words would indeed resonate for the super fighting robot.

One other fascinating theme is continued from Get Equipped, and it has to deal with the concept of surrogate children. In Get Equipped one of the standout tracks was “The Message From Dr. Light,” which revealed that Dr. Light created Mega Man not as a peace keeper or a war machine, but as a son. Unable to have one of his own, Light created a mechanized replacement. He feels a great deal of affection for his creation for that reason, and Wily by this point has decided to adopt and corrupt that idea as well, and has also begun referring to his own creations as children. This leads to a humorous, almost Sonichu-like, frequency of artificial creations addressing humans as “father.”

Dr. Light legitimately wanted a son and transferred that dormant love to Mega Man. Dr. Wily, by contrast, saw how well that helped keep Mega Man in check, and began employing it himself. It’s a brilliant way of subverting the protagonist’s driving force. He fights for his father because he cares about him…but is that any different from his enemies, who are also fighting on behalf of their father? As Snake Man observes, the lines are blurring between wrong and right. Things are starting to look pretty similar on both sides of the fight. Mega Man takes a walk in the sand halfway through his journey — unlike Get Equipped he can’t even finish his mission first — and looks inward. That’s “Continue,” and it’s one of the album’s many accomplishments. We don’t know what he sees, but we know he doesn’t like it.

Elsewhere we have a pair of swirling, rocking Wily tunes as he preps Gamma, his latest WMD, and the other three robot master songs. Top Man’s is a relentlessly danceable masterpiece of mindlessness and Spark Man’s is a militaristic call to arms, but the real winner here is Magnet Man’s, which characterizes the villain as something of a delusional romantic, who may or may not have actually had a fling with Mega Man’s sister, Roll. It’s funny, catchy, and probably the most accessible tune in the collection.

I was prepared to be disappointed by this release, as I thought it would feel like one half of a greater piece. However it just feels like an extremely cohesive and exciting first act. There’s more to come, and we’ve likely got a pretty long intermission, but it’s already worth waiting for.

I used to wonder what it might have been like when Frank Zappa released his masterpiece Joe’s Garage in 3 parts, with delays in between. How did it feel to have that one story, that one work of art, that one musical journey, interrupted and dispersed over a much longer period?

Now I have a much-smaller-scale analogue. It feels pretty great. It’s a sense of creative excitement. And it gives me a chance to focus my attentions more strongly on a first half that, very likely, could have otherwise been buried beneath the impact of the conclusion.

As such, I’m left with a paradox of my own. I can’t wait…and yet I hope The Megas take their time. I’m happy to savor this as long as I can.

Your Friday Musical Interlude

June 22nd, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in friday musical interlude - (0 Comments)


The Who, “Put the Money Down”
Odds & Sods, 1974

History Repeating: Out Now

June 18th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in mega man | music | nintendo - (1 Comments)

HEY EVERYONE DID YOU KNOW I LIKE MEGA MAN

Anyway, as of today, History Repeating – Blue by The Megas is available for purchase. This is the first part of their rock opera based on Mega Man 3, which is good because it means there will be a second part, and bad because it means we have to wait a while to hear the whole thing.

I haven’t had a chance to give it a proper listen yet, but I will soon. Their Mega Man 2 rock opera was quite good, particularly the acoustic version which was a downright masterpiece (and far better than the original in every way…imho). So, yeah. Go visit their store. I’ll be doing something to celebrate this…once I have time. Until then…support my habit.

Your Friday Musical Interlude

June 15th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in friday musical interlude - (0 Comments)


The Flaming Lips, “Free Radicals”
At War With The Mystics, 2006

10 Songs That Share Their Names With Robot Masters

June 13th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in david bowie | futurama | listomania | mega man | music | nintendo | pee-wee herman | the flaming lips | video games - (5 Comments)

I’ve been playing a lot of Mega Man lately, which is what tends to happen when I’m still alive and breathing. I’ve also been listening to a lot of music, for much the same reason. So I got to thinking…what if I could combine the two? I’d be rich! Then I found out that a lot of other people already beat me to it. Let’s take a look at 10 songs that politely share their names with bosses from the Mega Man series. We’ll also try evaluate just how well they’d slot themselves into the series as replacement stage music.

1) “Fire Man” – Burning Spear
Fire Man, Mega Man


Applicability to the Robot Master: I’d say it’s about 70% applicable. Of course, since 70% of the lyrics are “fire down below,” that’s pretty much a gimme. It also mentions people running around, which is a suitable image for Fire Man’s dropping of those little flaming bastards eveywhere. Burning Spear gets caught up in an homage to “I’m a Little Teapot,” which muddies the waters a bit though.

As Replacement Stage Music: The infective reggae groove is a bit laid back for the industrial hazards of Fire Man’s stage, but it certainly brings to mind feelings of scorching heat, and that’s really all we can ask.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Yes. Come on.

Overall: A good fit for the stage and for the boss. Probably what Fire Man kicks back and listens to when he has a mellow afternoon off.

2) “Ice Man” – Filthy McNasty
Ice Man, Mega Man



Applicability to the Robot Master: Around 60%. The song is sung from an ice delivery man’s perspective, and it’s full of double entendres about the women to whom he delivers his load. (There’s one right there.) Such relentless punning is a suitable fit for the Mega Man series, which is based on some thematic rock-scissor-paper wordplay.

As Replacement Stage Music: It’s certainly repetitive enough to fit on the original Mega Man soundtrack.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: It’s longer, so, therefore, no.

Overall: Both Ice Man and Filthy McNasty would have a blast laughing their asses off over the fact that there are multiple meanings to the word “pussy.” For everyone else, this song is pretty annoying.

3) “Top Man” – Blur
Top Man, Mega Man 3



Applicability to the Robot Master: The lyrics really don’t apply to Top Man at all. Imagine that! He doesn’t reside in a desert, he doesn’t ride a magic carpet, and he doesn’t puke on the pavement. He may or may not like his women clean and shaven, though…his agent has yet to return my call about that.

As Replacement Stage Music: It’s got a fun and bouncy beat that would actually mesh quite well with Top Man’s bizarre ferns-in-glass-casing stage, but it’d certainly give the experience a far less urgent feel.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: No. Top Man’s original music is among the best in a series that’s almost uniformly great. Sorry, Blur…ya can’t stop the Top.

Overall: Not really applicable to Top Man, so there’s little to enjoy about the coincidental title. “He’s a little boy racer” is about the only line that could even conceivably apply to him, and even then it’s not particularly evocative of the NES game. Blur should be ashamed of themselves.

4) “Needle Man” – Skrewdriver
Needle Man, Mega Man 3



Applicability to the Robot Master: At first I’d have said a solid 0%, but after listening to the song I realize that this is providing valuable background information for the notoriously spastic Needle Man: he’s a junkie! No wonder he’s such a beast…the poor guy’s been tweaking in a dark room for weeks on end before Mega Man shows up. Needle Man probably thinks he’s fighting Nazis or something. It also explains his incredible strength and speed. Drugs kill, kids…but in the meantime they sure can make life Hell for the people you slap around.

As Replacement Stage Music: It’d work. Needle Man’s current theme is pretty weak as it is, with a strange kind of meandering salsa that never gets anywhere. This would give the stage some much needed energy.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Without question.

Overall: We now know that the Needle Cannon Mega Man gets is firing dirty syringes…just to further complicate the “war for peace” morality of the series.

5) “Starman” – David Bowie
Star Man, Mega Man 5



Applicability to the Robot Master: I’d say 50%. It’s perfect thematically and the chorus is dead on, but the rest of the lyrics speak of an interglactic rock star, and I’m not sure Star Man harbors the same moonage daydreams. Regardless, “There’s a Starman waiting in the sky” might as well be a warning from Dr. Light, and the floaty, expansive nature of the music fits the low gravity stage and boss fight quite well.

As Replacement Stage Music: It’s pretty perfect. Bowie knows better than any musician alive — barring, maybe, the members of The Flaming Lips — how best to paint majestic starfields with just some guitars or synths. It’d mesh quite well with the gameplay of that stage as is.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Yes. Some people say that Star Man has the best music in Mega Man 5. Don’t trust those people; they are obviously liars or insane. (Charge Man bitches.) Whatever anyone might think, though, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars is a superior album to this Mega Man soundtrack. THERE I SAID IT.

Overall: Let all the children boogie.

6) “Plant Man” – Gary Young
Plant Man, Mega Man 6



Applicability to the Robot Master: 100%. There is only one lyric in this song, which repeatedly states that Plant Man knows if / where / that the plants will grow. Uh…no argument there, Gary.

As Replacement Stage Music: The song is atrocious, but…sure, why not. If we’re playing Mega Man 6 we deserve the punishment.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Yes. It has notes and a melody, and is therefore superior to every track in this game.

Overall: A perfect fit. Speaking of “perfect fit,” Gary Young’s astroturf tuxedo in this video is the same one that Plant Man wore to his junior prom. When he went to his senior prom he didn’t have to wear anything…because he was somebody’s corsage! Fucking lol!

7) “Cloud Man” – Grieves
Cloud Man, Mega Man 7



Applicability to the Robot Master: A whopping 80% or so. It’s not only a song with weather conditions as a major theme, it has a deliberate and contemplative detachment that suits Cloud Man’s isolation and permanent scowl perfectly. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Cloud Man is a bit depressed. Why wouldn’t he be? He’s weak to fucking soap bubbles.

As Replacement Stage Music: I’d say it’s appropriate. The downtrodden, sluggish pace of the song absolutely mirrors the dark and rainy sections of Cloud Man’s stage, and…well…it’s just a pretty great song period. It’d stand in interesting contrast with the sunnier, brighter visual approach to Mega Man 7.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Debatable. Overall I’d say it definitely nudges it out, but Cloud Man’s theme is already pretty great, and this kind of overt moodiness would probably feel out of place among the game’s other tracks, however refreshing the change in atmosphere (see what I did there?) might be.

Overall: This music’s sad and you should feel sad.

8) “Astro Man” – Jimi Hendrix
Astro Man, Mega Man 8 and Mega Man & Bass



Applicability to the Robot Master: I have no idea. 0%, 100%, or anything in between. I have no idea what this song is about, but I’m pretty sure Astro Man, whoever he is in this song, is calling Superman a faggot.

As Replacement Stage Music: Not at all. Jimi’s guitar is as fiery as ever, but Astro Man’s space- and technology-themed stages (he has two) would probably benefit more from some straight, swirling techno than screaming six-string theatricality.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Yes. His current stage themes sound like rejects from a Jane Fonda workout video.

Overall: Astro Man sucks.

9) “Magic Man” – Heart
Magic Man, Mega Man & Bass



Applicability to the Robot Master: Apart from the “he’s a Magic Man” assurance, I’d say nothing. Though, arguably, “try to understand” could be Capcom imploring us to accept the fact that they were so dry on ideas that they had to resort to a Magic Man at all. Otherwise, it’s doubtful that the Wilson sisters would be irresistibly seduced by this robot master, who, to put it politely, looks like Pee-Wee Herman and Steve Urkel got together and had a gay baby.

As Replacement Stage Music: Not really. It houses a great jam, but it wouldn’t at all fit Magic Man’s carnival approach to stage design. The passionate defense of the “Magic Man” in the song though would suit the game nicely, as it’s often derided along with Mega Man 8 as being well worth skipping.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: No question. Magic Man’s stage theme sounds like it’s lifted from an SNES Barney adventure.

Overall: Magic Man wishes someone would sing about him like this. Until then, he sits alone doing card tricks. And masturbating.

10) “Tornado Man” – Las Aspiradoras
Tornado Man, Mega Man 9



Applicability to the Robot Master: I have no fucking idea. It’s pretty clearly not in English so I can’t understand it…but damn do I love it.

As Replacement Stage Music: Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. Absolutely perfect for the rainy, thundery, thousand-mile-high gauntlet of Tornado Man’s stage. Tornado Man’s level is a brutally addictive experience, much like this thrashing, gorgeously filthy nonsense.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: Nah, Tornado Man’s theme, like everybody’s theme in this glorious game, is utterly brilliant.

Overall: Would be a great fit…but Tornado Man’s already well served by his current tune.

11) BONUS: “Sword Man” – His Majesty Baker Jr.
Sword Man, Mega Man 8



Applicability to the Robot Master: I have no idea because I couldn’t find it on youtube. But look at that album cover. Yes, there’s a song called “Sword Man” on this album. This one. By a guy who calls himself His Majesty Baker Jr. with some pretty confusing capitalization.

As Replacement Stage Music: I mean, what is he doing? What is this? No part of this cover makes sense to me. It’s a man with a big smile wearing a green pinstripe suit, a leprechaun hat, and leaning against a pile of money that’s far too large to be legal tender.

Better Than Current Stage Music?: And he’s doing this against a backdrop of more money, with the figure $30,000 indicated above. That’s a lot of money, in a way, but in another way, if you’re going to invent sums to make yourself seem rich wouldn’t you reach much higher than that? It doesn’t register as being particularly large…or small…it’s just somebody’s annual salary, and it’s nobody who could afford to be caught wearing a suit like that in public.

Overall: I don’t understand what I’m looking at. What is this? He has gold rings on every finger of his right hand. And how many points does his God damned handkerchief have? I hate this. I’m going to bed.

Review: Moonrise Kingdom

June 10th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in bill murray | bottle rocket | film | moonrise kingdom | review | the darjeeling limited | the life aquatic | the royal tenenbaums | wes anderson | wes anderson month - (0 Comments)


It’s finally happened…Denver has Moonrise Kingdom. And while I’m sure it will take me several more viewings to really formulate a thorough opinion, I can confidently say this much: it was worth waiting for.

The plot, as everybody knows by now, is that two lonesome youngsters named Sam and Suzy fall in love and take off together, as a massive storm brews and the small town becomes increasingly desperate to find them. Because I’d like to keep this review relatively spoiler free, I won’t say much more than that. I do say “relatively,” though, so if you’d like to remain totally unspoiled, stop reading now…and just know that, yes, it’s a film worth experiencing.

Moonrise Kingdom is a strange film…it both feels like a Wes Anderson film and yet stands pretty uniquely among them. Part of this might be due to the fact that he focused the film completely on a pair of unknowns — the first time he’s done that since Bottle Rocket — and sidelined the few regular collaborators that do appear. This movie very distinctly belongs to Sam and Suzy…and that does leave me with mixed emotions, though they are almost uniformly positive.

The two young actors — Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward — are each fantastic finds. Gilman in particular does an excellent job of portraying Sam as a young man who’s not necessarily wise beyond his years, but certainly troubled beyond them. He’s guileless and without any sort of malice whatsoever…which is both why he becomes an easy target to his fellow scouts, and eventually earns their sympathy.

Hayward’s work here is much more subtle — especially as her more manic moments all occur offscreen, thanks to some artful editing — but ultimately Suzy comes across as someone who alternates seamlessly and immediately between frightened and frightening.

Between them, the two leads do most of the emotional heavy lifting…though it’s almost as though Anderson doesn’t quite trust them to handle the load (more on that later). Regardless, Moonrise Kingdom contains its expected share of painful exchanges, revealing character not by what they say and do, but by what they fail to say and restrict themselves from doing.

One particularly intelligent choice on Anderson’s part was to provide us with information that each of these children, separately, is seen by others as being emotionally disturbed. The intelligent choice is to actually bear that out in how they act and react in their various adventures; this isn’t a case of adults failing to understand their children…this is a case of adults correctly assessing the fact that their children have problems, but not knowing how to handle them.

Suzy, for example, is prone to violent outbursts. It’s completely at odds with her conservative dress and meticulously composed hair and makeup, but it’s always there in her eyes…a lurking, relentless darkness that prevents her from ever feeling at ease. One of Hayward’s best scenes in the film is one in which we can’t hear her…an outburst at her family in the middle of dinner. We catch her in mid eruption, and though we can’t hear a word she’s saying, that’s not important. What’s important is that she can’t contain her anger — which may or may not even have definition — and also that her family sits quietly, absorbing it, not reacting. They don’t know how to handle their daughter…and therefore cannot help her.

Sam’s issues are rooted a little more deeply, and are therefore that much more obscured. He is an orphan who has not recovered from the deaths of his parents, and he wears his mother’s brooch like an exposed scar. At one point he confesses to having committed arson while sleepwalking…and he got in trouble for it because nobody believed he was actually asleep. What neither Sam nor Suzy understands is that it doesn’t matter whether or not he was asleep…either way, he needs help that is not being offered to him.

But the two understand each other, and the two accept each other, and those are things that neither has ever really felt they’ve had before. They each come burdened with baggage, but they’re not judgmental of each other. In fact, Sam takes great pains to transport all of Suzy’s overloaded luggage along with them, regardless of the trouble it causes him to do so. In a clever inversion of the moral of The Darjeeling Limited, which requires each of the brothers to leave their accumulated baggage behind, Sam embraces Suzy’s, understands that that’s who she is, and is always careful to let her know that he’s comfortable with that.

Of course, the two are each living in a fantasy of their own devising. Why this works, however, and why we root for them, is that these fantasies are compatible. Suzy wishes to be swept away, and Sam wishes to sweep away. It gets them each where they think they need to be, and it’s a seductive combination. As short-sighted as their plan really is (tellingly, Suzy only borrows her brother’s record player for 10 days), we want this for them. After all…what else do they have?

One line that many reviewers seem to latch onto as a pretty clear distillation of the film is what Sam says to Suzy when she tells him she’s envious of the fact that his parents are dead. “I love you,” he says, “but you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Personally, I think the defining moment came for me when, early in the film, Suzy asks about a recently deceased dog that Sam used to know. “Was he a good dog?” she asks. Sam, more sagely than he realizes, replies, “Who’s to say?”

It’s a very Anderson-like response, tapping into very Anderson-like themes. Who is to say? We all view ourselves in some way, but, if that’s not what the world sees, then what does it matter? Who are we? Are we the people we try to be? Or are we the people everyone else believes us to be? What are we? What defines our identities? Or, to phrase it in the parlance of this film, what kinds of birds are we?

Moonrise Kingdom catches the protagonists at a pivotal point in their lives, during which the promise of a magical future has yet to die and become the lingering echo that haunts the Tenenbaum family, or Team Zissou. For Sam and Suzy, whatever the future may actually turn out to hold, there is still time.

For the other characters in the film, there’s less time. The major adult characters are resigned to their roles, to their failings, and to their fates. Bill Murray’s character expresses exactly one wish in the film, and that’s for the storm to pull the roof from his house and suck him into space, because his family would be better off without him. It’s a fantastic line perfectly delivered, and it conveys a concentrated lifetime’s worth of disappointment.

There’s more I could say about this film. Maybe, eventually, I will. But, for now, I’ll move on to the very small complaints I think I have after one viewing, which will likely be totally erased after another few, if history is any example.

For starters, this is absolutely Anderson’s most overtly comic film. Jokes and sight gags are packed into these scenes, and they often dominate. It’s not a bad approach, but it’s certainly somewhat jarring for Anderson to be chasing the more obvious laughs, and I almost wonder if it’s because he didn’t trust his young leads to handle the emotion on their own. By undercutting himself and giving the audience a chance to relax into a more comfortable form of humor, he is lightening the loads that his protagonists actually have to carry. It’s a noticeably unrestrained variation on his typical approach, and while I don’t think it hurt the impact of the film, it did seem to make it feel unfocused at times.

Also, I’m not entirely sure that any characters outside of Sam and Suzy experienced any clear growth. The film suggests that they did, or at least that some of them did, but it would have been nice to spend more time with them along the way, and perhaps come to understand precisely how they’ve changed, and exactly why that’s important. Then again, as my girlfriend correctly put it, Anderson isn’t one to dwell on information he doesn’t think we need, and we, as members of the audience, should be meeting him at least halfway. For now, however, after one viewing, I feel as though Captain Sharp and Scoutmaster Ward had their most impressive moments when the cameras weren’t on them.

Overall, though, I loved it. At the end of the film I wasn’t sure what I thought, but by the time the credits ended I was already cycling through dozens of conflicting emotions, and I still am right now, as I write this. Moonrise Kingdom left a mark. I don’t know what that mark is, just as none of the other children understood their compulsion to listen to Suzy read from her stolen library books. It’s a story, and it means something to them. They might not know what. They don’t mind. The experience of feeling it unfold is the reward.

Moonrise Kingdom unfolds in enormously satisfying ways. And it’s okay if you feel a little bit confused…young love has that effect on people.

Your Friday Musical Interlude

June 8th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in friday musical interlude - (0 Comments)


Donovan, “Sunshine Superman”
Sunshine Superman, 1966

Why it Matters to Me That Green Lantern is Gay

June 6th, 2012 | Posted by Philip J Reed in authorial trespass | batman | comics | deep thought | the simpsons | writing - (7 Comments)


…or perhaps that should be Why it Matters to Me That Green Lantern “is Gay.”

Without any question, you’ve heard about this already. Green Lantern is gay. That “is” is a present tense verb there, folks, and that’s why I have something to say about this. It is a fact that Green Lantern is gay. It is not a fact that he was gay, or always has been gay. And that’s a problem, because as progressive as this narrative decision might intend to be, it’s actually quite reductive, ignorant, and insulting.

The problem isn’t that there’s a major gay superhero now, no matter what the Parents Against Whateverthefuck groups would have you believe…in fact, they should be cheering this decision, because it makes it seem as though homosexuality is something that people can add and remove from their lives like an accessory or a piece of clothing…something to be picked up and worn when it suits them, and not at all until then.

That’s just downright wrong, not to mention preposterous. Homosexuality is not like facial hair…you don’t grow it out because you’re going through a phase or because you decided you’d look better that way. It’s an integral part of who people are…it’s what makes them human…and it’s always been there. It’s not a choice, any more than skin color, height, or voice is a choice. It’s part of who you are from birth, and while it might take a while for somebody to realize — or understand, or accept — that they are gay, that’s a gradual process of internal discovery…not an external feature plugged into us wholesale by some cosmic decider.

This reminds me in many ways of the hubbub over J.K. Rowling “revealing” that Dumbledore was gay, however many years ago that was. My concern then was similar, but it was overridden by my disgust for what she did to writing more than what she did to homosexuals.

In that case, it was a clear authorial trespass. As the author of her books, she was able to reveal anything she liked at any point. Until — and this is important — she finished writing them. After that, it’s hands off. She doesn’t get to reveal additional data elsewhere that isn’t sustained within the novels. I’ll admit openly that I haven’t read them…but I’ve known many people who have, and they’ve shared the same concern: there doesn’t seem to be anything in the novels that sustains such a reading. Certainly one could make it fit, just as we could make fit anything we’d like to imagine while we’re reading a book, chalking it up to it being one of the hundreds of trillions of things an author doesn’t tell us along the way but which we would like to believe is true anyway, but this isn’t a case of imagination…this is a case of after the fact authorial insistence.

Whatever else it may be, that’s bad writing. Either Dumbledore was gay all along and Rowling didn’t know how to handle that as an author and so she just stored it away for later blurting at a press conference, or he wasn’t gay until the moment she said he was, at which point she demonstrated an enormous disrespect to the world she created, and the imaginations of her readers that have taken them in other directions. Readers are supposed to meet books halfway…whatever they get out of it, whatever they hear, wherever their magical journey takes them, then that’s what they get from the experience. Rowling of all people should have known better about magical journeys. The author doesn’t get to inject details via syringe long after the fact.

In this case, though, it’s a comic book. Comic books have multiple authors, they span multiple generations, and there’s not just one author. What one might use as the groundwork for his character might be manipulated, discarded, or inverted by his successor. We can argue about the merits of that as well, but, for now, it’s a fact we have to take as read.

The problem, though, is that it’s still the same character. It’s a character that’s had a wealth of experiences and left an enormous imprint on his fans…fans who know every detail about what he’s actually said, done, and accomplished.

And now he’s gay. Just like that.

He wasn’t gay in the background. He wasn’t coming to grips with his sexuality for years. And he wasn’t just waiting for the perfect moment to reveal to those who care about him that he harbors a secret. He was just one thing yesterday, and another today. He donned his homosexuality like a wristwatch. Maybe he’ll like this wristwatch, or maybe he’ll take it off again once everybody gets annoyed by its loud ticking.

That’s unfair. That’s not how homosexuality works…scratch that. That’s not how humanity works. That’s not how people work.

It’s not a decision, it’s not an immediate restructuring. This is something people learn over the course of a lifetime. For Green Lantern and Dumbledore, apparently, they just become gay because someone said so. That’s terrible writing, and even worse humanity.

Regarding this radical change in which one person we’ve been learning about for so many years is killed off and replaced by a person similar in all ways but also gay, writer James Robinson said this: “It’s a realistic depiction of society. You have to move with the times.”

You’re not moving with the times at all. You’re reducing homosexuality to a character trait that can be picked up or discarded at will…that’s emphatically behind the times. That’s the mentality that keeps gays from marrying, or being recognized as functional human beings. If someone can just snap into gayness, well, just don’t snap that way and you can marry and be respected and do all the things us normal folks so love to do. That’s wrong, Robinson.

That’s wrong.

Think of it as though this weren’t a question of sexuality. Think of it as though this were a question of race. Batman, in an issue to debut next month, is revealed to be black.

Not a new Batman. Not somebody else who becomes Batman because Bruce Wayne dies. But the Batman we know. The same guy. The dead parents, the wise butler, the wonderful toys. The one we’ve seen in countless movies and comics and on television.

He’s black. And he always was. That’s the grand reveal.

Could that possibly make any sense whatsoever? It’d be absurd. It wouldn’t get people up in arms about reductivism, because it’d so clearly be impossible.

That’s what we’re dealing with now. Only the impossibility is being ignored. Not debated…just ignored.

I can’t think of a worse way to treat homosexuals than by demeaning the fact that their sexuality has shaped them, affected their lives, and helped them grow into the individuals they are today.

Green Lantern is gay, Batman is black, Wonder Woman actually contains a misplaced space and she’s really Wonderwo Man, and Poochie died on the way back to his home planet.

“It makes sense because we said it makes sense. It goes this way because we say it goes this way.” I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of anything worse than that to say to a homosexual man, woman, or child today.

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