In the Family Guy episode Patriot Games, there’s a part where Peter scores a touchdown and proceeds to sing an entire song from a 1957 Broadway musical. I remember being really annoyed by this because, aside from not getting the reference, the five minute piece served as little more than filler, ultimately wasting around a fifth of the episode. Recently I saw that Seth MacFarlane is in talks to record an album of 40s and 50s show tunes. I then quickly realized what was going on here: Seth MacFarlane is super alt.

Consider this: within the hipster movement, you’ve got a bunch of people who are trying to bring back really old school styles from the 40s and 50s. They have ridiculous mustaches, wear vests and things like that. Having a working knowledge of show tunes from eras like that is totally within hipster territory. And recording an album of such songs? Even more alt.

But here’s the subversive part: MacFarlane has managed to integrate his hipsterness with his TV shows by working obscure references into episodes. What’s a better way to show how you know something that no one else does than to insert references into a show that’s watched by millions? Totally alt. Further, MacFarlane is taking his fame from such references and is funneling it into an album of music that’s predicated on that same obscureness! He’ll now have an album proclaiming how alt he is – but having an album released on a major record label is decidedly not hipster. It’s brilliant.

So well done, sir: you’ve managed to turn your hipster self into a cash cow that’s also mainstream.

I grew up watching Iron Chef Japan on Food Network. This was back in the early days, before Guy Fieri, Paula Deen and the Neelys ruined the whole place. But back then, there was something magical and hilarious about the show. Maybe it was whatever crazy thing Kaga wore each week; or the frenetic atmosphere of everyone running around; or maybe just something about the dubbing. Some combination of all of those resulted in a show that drew me in.

But I think above all, it was the music that drew me in. At the time I didn’t know the music was mostly from Backdraft (there was a little Glory in there as well) but the cues they used just fit so well with what was going on. A month or so ago we started getting the Cooking Channel, the sister channel to Food Network. And I was so excited when I saw that they were going to air the original Iron Chef!

If only. The dialogue and spectacle of the show were all there, but the music.. they gutted the Backdraft music and replaced it with some horrendous generic piece of crap. Maybe it was just my nostalgia kicking in, but something just didn’t feel right. Could the people at Scripps really not find some better piece of music? Hell, just use some epic-sounding trailer music; there’s plenty of it out there.

But oh, how disappointed I was. Scripps, if you’re reading this, I implore you to bring back the music that you used before. Pay Hans Zimmer his rights to the music and just be done with it.

I know I’m probably the last person to finish FF13, but I had stuff to do (like moving) so I didn’t have time to finish it. This was the first Final Fantasy game I’ve played since FF10, so it’s been awhile since I was in the JRPG world. Anyway, my thoughts:

• Graphics: I don’t think it’d be a surprise to anyone that this game is gorgeous. It’s crazy to think that we’re beyond the point of fully rendered animations, but they’re just irrelevant when the in-game graphics are just about as good as the cutscenes. Not that I could really tell what I was supposed to be looking at in the sequences, but they sure were shiny.
• Battling: Overall I liked the battle system. I spent most of the time jamming the X button to go into Auto battle (or whatever the equivalent was) but I get the sense that picking the actual moves wasn’t the main purpose of the system; they wanted us to build the right teams and use them effectively. At first I remember being a bit thrown off by only controlling one character, but they did a pretty good job of making the computer as efficient as possible, so I didn’t really need to worry that it would make stupid decisions in what to cast and so on. Now having said that…
• Summons: Why in the hell did this game have summons? Seems like it was just something that they threw at us at the beginning of the game as a challenge, and then forgot it altogether. I think I used my summon a total of two times, one of which was the end battle – and even then I probably didn’t need it. It just served no purpose and was entirely forgettable.
• Leveling: I think I liked the new system. Get a bunch of experience, pump it into whatever roles you like, and advance on. I guess it was nicer than having to swap out materia or some such – or at least didn’t make me feel stupid for not wanting to deal with all that. The focus was clearly on evolving the right roles to get the best outcome for your team.
• Gameplay: Here’s the part where everyone slammed the game, and I have to agree. There are so many sandbox games out there now where you can just wander around and do whatever you want whenever you want, and this was the exact opposite. You walk in a straight line for pretty much the whole game. Oh, there’s one part where you can wander around a bit, but they sort of push you away from doing that. Maybe I’m just nostalgic for the days when you got a ship and could travel around.
• Plot: I don’t expect to ever understand the plot of JRPGs, so that’s that.
• Music: Masashi Hamauzu did a pretty good job with this one, I think. Character and plot motifs are present throughout the game and add to it without being overly annoying. I still wish they wouldn’t use lyrics (does the chocobo melody really need words?) but I can deal with it.

Alright, I guess that turned out to be an actual list. I think I liked the game as a whole, and it was nice to play it after a long drought, but of course there were some annoyances. Now I gotta go find something else to play. Maybe Super Mario Galaxy 2…

We saw Inception today, and it was totally effing awesome. Christopher Nolan has to be one of the best living directors. And Hans Zimmer did a really great job scoring the film. It was dynamic and interesting without being too distracting, but most of all, it really heightened the tension in the movie and brought it all together. On top of all that, he actually wrote the score himself (rather than passing it off to John Powell or someone!)

But I was thinking about what his process was when he wrote the score, and this is what I came up with.

1. Listened to the score he and James Newton Howard wrote for The Dark Knight
2. Played a few hours of Metal Gear Solid 2 and listened to what Harry Gregson-Williams wrote for that
3. Drank a few pints
4. Found a guitarist, a trumpet and a bass drum, and sequenced it so they just played one after another ad infinitum

To be honest, I really do like Hans Zimmer, and the score was great. But, well, there you go.

Wait, really? My kids can’t eat out of this? Lame..