Beginner’s Bond: Goldfinger

These “Beginner’s Bond” posts are about closing what is probably the largest gap in my knowledge of cinema. So I am watching all of the James Bond movies in order for the very first time, and sharing my reactions and thoughts with you, faithful readers! A quick recap—Dr. No was a pleasant blast from the past, while From Russia With Love was silly and fun despite an underdeveloped script. What does 1964’s Goldfinger have in store for me?

I found the previous two films to be surprisingly grounded, but Goldfinger proved to be significantly less interested in realism. James Bond goes to Miami to basically harass the rather literally-named shady bullion dealer Auric Goldfinger. The powers that be think Goldfinger’s up to “something,” so they send 007 to poke around in the man’s business until he gets pissed off. His mission doesn’t really have any other parameters, and he’s very good at getting under his target’s skin. Bond figures out the villain’s diabolical plan by hiding under the diorama Goldfinger uses to give his class presentation on how to break into Fort Knox. Once again, the bad guy’s right hand woman is persuaded to turn on him after a literal roll in the hay with 007. After saving the day during the siege of Fort Knox, James is invited to lunch at the White House with a grateful Unnamed President.

Goldfinger is the first functional prototype of what the Bond movies were to become: big, explosive action movies full of sexy people making playful banter as they shoot at each other. All of the elements are there. He introduces himself as “Bond, James Bond.” He orders the dry vodka martini shaken over ice. Not a single woman in the film can resist his charm, except probably the old lady guarding the evil lair’s front gate with a machine gun. In my head-canon, that’s definitely Goldfinger’s grandma sitting out there in a shack waiting to waste any interlopers that wanna try her. It would make a lot of sense. We also meet Pussy Galore, the first of a long line of Bond girls with ridiculously suggestive names.

Although Q provides fewer gadgets than in From Russia With Love, he makes up for it by rolling out the iconic Aston Martin for the first time. Fully loaded with smoke screens, oil slicks, tire-shredding spikes… there’s even an ejector seat! Classic spy stuff. At one point Mr. Bond is strapped to a gold table and nearly bifurcated by a slow-moving laser, the franchise’s first instance of the needlessly complex death trap. We also get to meet the hat-throwing mute man-mangler Oddjob, the first superhuman henchman to give James a solid trouncing or two before inevitably being outsmarted. Goldfinger ended with a massive action set piece, a shootout between two armies, which I assume became the standard conclusion for future films.

And then there is the titular villain himself. Auric Goldfinger is a fat, balding, orange-skinned billionaire with no class who cheats at golf and decorates everything he owns with a tacky amount of gold, which made him surprisingly relevant to a watcher in 2025. His plan to murder thousands of innocent people in order to make himself slightly more obscenely wealthy is also distressingly familiar. And when his master plan starts to collapse around him, he kills his own men to create a distraction that will allow his escape, which feels eerily prescient. In the end, Goldfinger gets sucked out a plane window at 30,000 feet, and we can only hope that is foreshadowing. There’s no question he set the bar rather high for future villains to clear. It’s hard to imagine an antagonist that’s easier to hate than Auric Goldfinger.

Goldfinger basically established the blueprint for a blockbuster action movie. I’m interested to see if Thunderball will follow it, but my only wish is that things continue to get more and more ridiculous.

Beginner’s Bond: From Russia With Love

In case you’re just joining us, Beginner’s Bond is a series about finally closing one of the largest gaps in my cinematic knowledge—the adventures of Britain’s top secret agent, James Bond. I’m watching all the classic films for the first time and sharing my reactions with you, faithful reader. Dr. No turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Can From Russia With Love do the same?

Pretty much everything I said about the previous film also applies to this one. It’s still fairly grounded, with a plot born from period-appropriate Cold War paranoia. James Bond is sent to retrieve and protect Tatiana Romanova, a defector from the Soviet Union. She promises a coveted Lektor code machine in exchange for safe passage to the West. Although M and Mr. Bond both call the scenario an obvious trap (because it is), they also agree that the possibility of acquiring a Lektor is worth the risk. Most of the movie is just watching Bond and Romanova travel through picturesque locations, when they’re not snuggled up in their private room making double entendres at each other. Occasionally someone tries to kill them, but other than that it’s a rather lovely vacation.

There are also some really weird choices being made here. There’s a scene where James simply looks around an unremarkable hotel room while the full orchestral theme blares as if he were in the middle of a climactic gunfight. It is puzzling that the final boss fight pits Bond and Romanova against one old woman in a small room, instead of a big explosive set piece like its predecessor. And its pretty funny that 007’s legendary lady-loving skills play a significant part in the plot this time. Romanova is convinced to abandon her assignment as a double agent and defect from the Soviet Union for real after a long weekend locked in a suite with MI-6’s most reliable stud. She never stood a chance.

From Russia With Love gives us the first proper spy gadgets. Although creative, they’re still quite practical. Fun stuff like a briefcase that conceals a small knife in a spring-loaded holster, and its booby-trapped with tear gas if you don’t open it the right way. You can tell the movie is most proud of the tape recorder hidden within a camera, as if disguising a recording device as a different recording device was a brilliant piece of tradecraft. It’s still the first thing the bad guys are going to confiscate, M!

While I certainly don’t think From Russia With Love is a better movie than Dr. No, it is more fun. This film isn’t afraid to be silly, like during Bond’s epic slap fight against Grant that demolishes the interior decor of the train. Or when Tatiana simply can’t stop begging Bond for more “attention” while he tries to take a work call. The cast isn’t always doing something important, but they are enthralling to watch all the same.

Up next is Goldfinger. I’ve heard it is a weird one. I look forward to the escalating ridiculousness.

Beginner’s Bond: Dr. No

Devout action fan though I am, I have a blind spot for a certain classic series about a British secret agent. I saw Goldeneye and Casino Royale in the theaters, and there’s a distant hazy memory of watching On Her Majesty’s Secret Service with my father during a rainy afternoon on family vacation. But for most of my life I have only known James Bond as fodder for countless parodies of snooty spies more interested in getting drunk and bedding their female colleagues than collecting any intelligence. And while that is not an inaccurate description of 007, in my estimation it is far from complete. So I’m going back to watch all the old movies to see if I’m right, and also to examine what has made Mr. Bond the most enduring cinematic hero of all time.

First up is 1962’s Dr. No. Back then it was fairly unusual for a movie to be named after the villain rather than the hero, so it already stood out as soon as you read the title. I always thought it impressive that James Bond had such an extensive career in screen espionage without ever including his name in the title of any of his movies. While we see plenty of villain-led films released in the early 21st century, they are usually ill-conceived origin stories that seek to “rehabilitate” evil characters by inventing paper-thin justifications for all of their heinous acts, as if they were running for public office rather than serving as the antagonist in a fictional story told for entertainment. But we don’t actually see the nefarious Dr. No until the third act. For most of the movie he is nothing but a menacing name that strikes fear into the locals. He finally shows up to exposition his evil scheme over dinner so 007 will know exactly how to stop him. Epic larger-than-life villainy that used to be confined to the pulp pages was now moving around and talking up on the silver screen—just one of the many influences Britain’s top secret agent has had on the history of cinema.

As a franchise that spans several eras of filmmaking, James Bond is a surprisingly reliable measure of the evolution of the typical action hero. Back in the 1960s, a movie’s leading man didn’t have to be the perfectly sculpted specimens demanded by Hollywood today. While Sean Connery was in great shape, he did not have a six-pack or well-defined biceps. He even sports a hairy chest with complete confidence, something that is practically forbidden in contemporary action movies. And ultimately, none of it matters because Connery is so charismatic that audiences would watch him do nothing but smoke and play cards for two hours—all the action is just a bonus. But by the time we reach the Daniel Craig era, Bond is just as shredded and hairless as Captain America. That swole-yet-chiseled physique makes no sense for a spy. Not only would he attract all kinds of attention, the workout schedule required to maintain that body alone would make it impossible for him to ever get any espionage done.

Dr. No introduces a lot of elements that would become standard for the franchise. James Bond is England’s most dashing and debonair double O agent. He is irresistible to women, and although he doesn’t bed all of the female characters, every single one sure does give it her best try. Bond travels around the world cosplaying as a bored millionaire. He makes his iconic introduction, orders a martini “shaken, not stirred,” and makes terrible puns after killing henchmen. We see the gun-barrel opening sequence and hear the classic theme song for the first time. He even flirts with Moneypenny on his way into the office.

But this film is just as notable for what is missing from the traditional secret agent formula it helped establish. The thing that surprised me most about Dr. No was how grounded it was. Until the villain starts throwing his metal hands at Bond, the film is practically realistic. Bond is sent to investigate the disappearance of some fellow agents, not track down a megalomaniacal madman bent on world domination. This prototype Bond is not invincible, losing fights and getting knocked out a few times. While Dr. No’s secret lair is intimidatingly large, it is not some sci-fi mega construct that could never be built in the real world by some determined yet equally deranged billionaire. It isn’t even guarded by a superhuman henchman that almost (but not quite) defeats the hero. The most glaring absence of all was the arsenal of crazy gadgets—one of the tropes hit by every copycat and parody of the genre is not even present in the first movie. He escapes a car chase by driving away really fast; no smoke screens or oil slicks deployed. The most advanced piece of tech issued to James Bond in this film is a silencer for his pistol. No laser watches or cleverly disguised recording devices here.

While it lacks the more fantastical elements that would come to define the genre, Dr. No is still a lot of fun. I recommend giving it a watch today. Even divorced from its historical influence, it’s still a plenty entertaining piece of popcorn cinema from the past. I thought the early films were going to be a real endurance test, but now I’m actually excited to check out From Russia With Love next.

Power Rangers: Excessive Force

I’ve found the episode of Power Rangers with the most ridiculously skewed relationship between the stakes of the story and the force used to resolve it.

In “Reign of the Jellyfish,” the gang is putting together a time capsule for a school project. Every student adds something and explains why its meaningful to them, and the teacher concludes by adding a picture of the Power Rangers so that future generations will know about these great heroes. Watching a teacher lecture a class about the virtues of the Power Rangers is pretty hilarious on its own, but the episode is just getting started.

The main villain, Rita Repulsa, has been using her magic telescope to spy on this high school classroom. And when the teacher adds a photograph of our colorful heroes, Rita totally flips her shit. HOW DARE these humans respect and admire the heroes that have saved them from her countless attempts to kill them all?

No! Rita absolutely will not have it. If people in the future are going to know anything about the 90s, it’s going to be all about her. For maximal pettiness, she decides to replace the photo of the Power Rangers with one of herself, so that future generations will know she’s awesome. To that end, Rita sends a small army of goons, as well as two of her recurring henchmen, to steal the time capsule. In the middle of a public park. In broad daylight. There are numerous flaws in this plan, but I’ll limit myself to pointing out three:

1. Rita Repulsa is here to conquer Earth. She shouldn’t be worried about how people will remember her 100 years from now—of course all the history books will have photos of the evil space witch that took over the world!

2. Rita betrays a defeatist mindset by hyper-fixating on the photo situation. If that picture plays any role at all in her legacy, then she has already lost. Rita is preemptively preparing for defeat before the fight has even begun, which is not typical megalomaniacal villain behavior.

3. We know from the intro sequence that Rita is at least 10,000 years old. She doesn’t need to worry about how she will be remembered in 100 years, as she will most likely still be alive to tell her side of the story.

Of course, the bad guys are seen by the Power Rangers and this kicks off a big superhero brawl. In the middle of a public park. In broad daylight. You can see civilians fleeing in the background, trying to avoid the giant pieces of obviously foam rubble.

From there, the conflict eventually escalates into a giant robot battle in downtown Angel Grove. At one point, the Megazord gets thrown through an office building. There is no way at least a hundred people did not die in the disaster that followed. But that never gets the slightest mention.

Fortunately, the Power Rangers persevere. They destroy Rita’s monster, and send her henchmen skittering back home to hide behind her skirt. Thanks to the strength and courage of these young heroes, the Empress of Evil’s sinister plot was foiled before she could… put her picture in a time capsule. Good thing they managed to stop her with only a few million in damages!

I understand villainous plots on shows designed for children have a tendency to be kind of silly. A previous episode of Power Rangers had Rita infect Jason’s dog with alien fleas so that they would spread to the whole team and then the Rangers would be too itchy to fight. But even if the plot is ridiculous, there are usually real stakes. Alien fleas is a ludicrous plan, but it was done to get Rita’s enemies out of her way so she could conquer the world—pretty serious stakes for such a silly plan. The odd thing about this particular episode of the show was that there were virtually no stakes at all. If Rita succeeds and puts her picture in the time capsule… then what? What horrible fate befalls the denizens of Earth if Rita Repulsa’s photograph is included in this time capsule? The show doesn’t even offer one of its usual hand-waving explanations. The kids just don’t want her picture in their capsule, and they were willing to demolish a city block to keep it out. If they devote the same energy and effort to their schoolwork, I imagine the citizens of Angel Grove will find themselves spectators at a giant robot brawl to determine the class valedictorian.

Modern Mixology: Moby

Moby is one of the most influential names in the history of electronica. There’s no argument—it’s a simple fact. Nobody has moved more records, rocked more dance floors, and scored more movies. People who don’t normally listen to the genre have heard his hits blasting from boomboxes and televisions throughout their lives, and many can’t help but like it. If I play his music for someone that hasn’t heard him before, it will reliably tilt their head to a curious angle before they ask who we’re listening to. Back when I was briefly a wedding DJ in the early 2000s, “Bodyrock” was on every playlist a client handed me, and rightfully so. “Flower” was one of my aunt’s favorite songs, and my dentist bought a copy of Play to put on in his waiting room to keep patients calm.

The crater of Moby’s cultural impact is as immense as it is confusing to behold. How did this happen? Why does it still persist? Twenty-six albums and countless remixes later, the answer might seem obvious. That’s what I thought when I started researching this article. I was fairly certain I would be charting a straight line of Moby’s gradual, yet inevitable, evolution from hardcore faith punk for militant Christian teenagers to easy listening electronica for stressed-out soccer moms. After listening to every album, b-side, and remix in chronological order, I found that the truth was nothing so simple. Moby’s musical journey was not a straight line to a destination, but more of a circuitous odyssey full of branching paths, intriguing side-quests, and occasionally wandering around lost in a circle.

Before he was Moby, Richard Melville Hall learned to play music in church. He was a gifted pianist and a decent guitarist. His earliest performances were as part of various Christian punk bands formed with his friends. More of an interesting curiosity than a noteworthy musical milestone, as Christian punk generally misses the point of both ideas. But punk rock was an influence that would continue to haunt Moby’s sound throughout his discography, waxing and waning with the passage of years.

Moby’s earliest hits were underground bangers. Acid-infused rave anthems like “Voodoo Child” and “Go” blew the roofs off warehouses and shattered dance floors. Tracks like “Time Signature” and “Drug Fits the Face” showcase a young talent just starting to experiment with all of the exciting new electronic tools that musicians discovered in the 1990’s. The hit single “Next is the E” is just straight-up acid house. These tracks sound both technical and raw, like they were recorded on a corrupted translucent purple diskette. Moby’s first self-titled album from 1992 collected many of these singles and plenty of new tracks to create a disc that is pure rave fuel. Think thumping house beats augmented with enough techno sound effects to make a robot dance. Lots of beeps and bloops, but also a few of the piano riffs and distorted vocals that would become signatures of his later work. There are even a fewer softer, more subtle songs like “Mercy” that would be right at home in the chill room. Overall, this album has a decidedly electro-industrial sound, a relic of Moby’s halcyon raver days that would become increasingly rare as his career continued.

For his second album, Moby went in the complete opposite direction. Although still technically electronica, 1993’s Ambient bears little resemblance to his previous releases. It is a slow, simple, and somber affair, with no sign of the energetic beats that characterized his previous underground dance records. While it’s perfectly good meditation music, it was hardly memorable enough to climb charts. It’s tough to have a hit single when all the songs put listeners to sleep. Ambient exists, and it’s a pleasant enough listen, but there’s a reason it’s the only album in Moby’s whole catalogue to never get a remaster or re-release. I’ve come to appreciate the mellow vibe more in my old age, and it’s still more interesting to listen to than his later ambient works. It’s just so ponderously puzzling that an artist would decide to do something so different for only his second album, especially after the first was so successful on the nightclub circuit. But this would prove to be the natural progression of Moby’s career, constantly pinballing between various influences and inspirations, never content with consistency.

Ironically, Everything Is Wrong (1995) is the prototype for everything Moby would become over the next decade. It takes a “kitchen sink” approach to making a record, putting all of Moby’s most persistent influences front and center: punk rock, underground dance, and church music. This album also firmly establishes his fondness for pianos. Tracks like “Hymn” combine plinking keys with swelling synths to create the uplifting spiritual sound that would become the trademark of a Moby song. “Let’s Go Free” is a fantastic breakbeat—short, punchy, and easy to loop and scratch. “Feeling So Real” and “Everytime You Touch Me” are there to represent ‘90s acid house. But these are accompanied by the incongruously shrill punk tracks “All That I Need Is To Be Loved” and “What I Love.” If preachy self-righteous punk is your thing, you may enjoy them, but these tracks always inexorably drew my finger to the skip button. From start to finish, Everything Is Wrong is an audio adventure all its own.

Moby followed that with his most divisive album: Animal Rights (1996). It was built from the same blueprint as its predecessor, but in reverse and upside-down. This time, most of the songs are strident screaming punk and it’s the few mellow ambient tracks (like “Anima”) that seem to have gotten lost on their way to another album. It creates a sense of musical whiplash as the genre completely shifts from one track to the next. Animal Rights was poorly received and aggressively unpleasant to listen to. The ravers that made up most of Moby’s fanbase at this point were not interested, and those that bought the album based on his name alone felt betrayed. Your mileage may vary, but the critical consensus seems to be that it wasn’t very good even for punk music. This record put Moby’s career into a coma it seemed unlikely to wake from. And yet, in his interviews and autobiographies he has confessed that of all his albums, Animal Rights is his favorite one. What an eclectic genius.

Over the next few years, Moby released various compilation albums that collected old hits and forgotten b-sides in an effort to win back the ravers and rekindle the clubland flame that had ignited his career. The results were a mixed bag. Rare: The Collected B-Sides (1996) is an assortment of remixes that actually improve upon Moby’s already great underground classics. “Voodoo Child (Poor in NY Mix)” is an amplified roof-lifter. “Have You Seen My Baby” is transformed into a cyberpunk pulse perfect for hacking the Matrix. All the hard edges get sanded off “Drug Fits the Face,” leaving it as a smooth slice of atmospheric drum n’bass. “Thousand” is more of an intriguing curiosity than something you actually want to listen to—it still holds the Guinness World Record for fastest song, clocking in at over 1,015 beats per minute. And that is but the first of three world records Moby would achieve throughout his career. The Rare compilation also included a bonus disc titled Go: The Collected Remixes. Since Moby did all of these remixes himself, it is reasonable to assume (and many do) that these tracks are all early “drafts” of his first hit single: “Go.” You might think an hour-long mix composed of 14 versions of the same song would get repetitive and boring, but it never does. They’re all just different enough to make it feel like a concept album with many variations on a common theme.

Funny story—back when I was a teenager taking my car to inspected, I left this CD in the player. When the mechanic, a man of at least 60 years, brought my car back out, he excitedly pointed to the stereo and asked who I was listening to. After I told him he thanked me, shook my hand, gave me the keys and walked away without mentioning payment. It makes me smile to imagine the old man heading straight to the music store across the street after his shift and spending his evening at home listening to Moby for the first time. Never underestimate the power of good music.

That double-disc was followed by I Like To Score in 1997. This album is an assembly of songs that had featured in commercials, television, and movies, with a few random b-sides thrown in to fill out the tracklist. You will (probably) remember “God Moving Over The Face Of The Water” from Michael Mann’s 1996 film Heat. Or (probably not) the “Love Theme” from MTV’s first big flop, Joe’s Apartment. But the star of this show is undeniably Moby’s energetic re-version of the James Bond theme, which was featured in Tomorrow Never Dies. This remix almost single-handedly resuscitated his music career. It reminded people what Moby is good at, and so there was a primed fan base ready to receive whatever he put out next.

Fortunately for him and all of us, what came next was Moby’s magnum opus: Play (1999). It will be challenging to say anything about this album that hasn’t been said before, as it is easily the most-discussed record in the history of electronica. Even 25 years later, it remains unsurpassed. So it’s more than a little ironic that Moby originally intended Play to be the swan song for what he considered to be a failed musical career, having yet to achieve the critical respect he sought. Instead he produced the best-selling electronica album of all time, moving over 12 million copies and setting Moby’s second world record. Play transformed an underground dance DJ into one of the most famous musicians in the world. All of the elements that would define his style going forward are present on this record. The funky breakbeats and the elegiac pianos coupled with an old blues sample—the sound people think of when you say the name “Moby.”

“Porcelain” is basically the thesis statement for this new phase of his career. The distorted and otherworldly vocals combined with a drizzling of ethereal keys and an energetic breakbeat make this track equally suitable for the chill room or the dance floor. “Honey” uses the same formula, but comes up with a jazzy party jam. The punk influence is almost entirely absent from this album, save for the occasional guitar riff. Like on “Southside,” the closest Moby ever came to a straight-up pop song, complete with celebrity guest vocal by Gwen Stefani. “Bodyrock” is the high-water mark of this record, and possibly Moby’s entire career. A propulsive track of electric body music designed to make people move, this song also bears a striking sonic similarity to the James Bond remix that saved his career from early obscurity. It was, of course, the breakout single of the album. If you were alive and had ears between 1999-2002, there was a zero percent chance you did not hear this song. It was everywhere—in clubs, on commercials, blasting out of car windows. It was even on a compilation CD my mom bought at Starbucks because it sounded “pretty neat.” Quite frankly, it would be impossible to overstate the significance of this song. Play would still be a phenomenal record without it, but it wouldn’t be the best-selling electronic album of all time.

The unexpected runaway success of Play not only resurrected Moby’s career, but also completely changed how he would produce and release his next few decades of work. In 2000 he released Play: The B-Sides, which assembled the outtakes from the previous album’s singles. It was essentially a whole bonus album built on the same principles and vibe as its predecessor, almost like a sonic sequel to Play. “Flower” captures the same funky energy as “Honey” and was more than good enough to be its own single. “Sunday” sounds like a moment of quiet contemplation slowly expanding to fill a lazy afternoon. “Whispering Wind,” with its synthetic bell tones and distorted vocals, is the perfect lullaby for robots. And “Running” is there to remind everyone that Moby used to make house music. Although Moby himself described this as a collection of songs that “didn’t make the cut” for Play, it’s certainly not due to a lack of quality. “Flower” can be heard in several movies, most notably Gone in 60 Seconds. And “Memory Gospel” soundtracks the final act of Southland Tales. While Play:The B-Sides may not be as groundbreaking as its predecessor, that’s only because it wasn’t released first. Moby followed it up in 2001 with Play: The DVD, which collected all of the music videos from the album and also included an hour-long DJ mix composed of the best remixes of Play’s biggest hits. A showcase of talented electronic artists of the age transformed Moby’s songs into everything from chill dub house to epic stadium trance.

With this trilogy of albums, Moby had firmly established the new approach he would take to releasing his music going forward. He followed a similar pattern for over a decade—he would release a new album, then either a bonus b-side collection, a selection of remixes, or sometimes both. It effectively made every album into two or three, which turned out to be just as beneficial artistically as it was financially. It allowed Moby the freedom to explore all of his crazy ideas to their fullest without worrying if something would “fit” on the album.

After the record-breaking success of Play, Moby had carte blanche to do whatever he wanted on his next release, and 18 is the result. For the first time, he maintained a similar style for two sequential albums. 18 is built on the same sonic philosophy that produced Play—breaks and keyboards tossed with some blues samples—but it doesn’t have even a fraction of the pulsing energy of its predecessor. “Fireworks” is a surprisingly somber piece of piano noodling played on a haunted synthesizer. The titular track, “18,” is a keyboarding showcase that impresses without showing off. The whole album feels like a decisive shift back towards the ambient end of the spectrum. There’s not a single dance floor banger to be found on this record. “The Rafters” is close, but it’s more of a transitional track than a showstopper in its own right. 18 is also host to some of Moby’s worst singles. “We Are All Made of Stars” is a cringeworthy attempt at a pop rock song that sounds like your uncle’s drinking buddies playing Blink 182 covers. “Jam For The Ladies” is so overproduced that it feels like a parody of hip hop; the kind of song that would be attributed to a fictional musician in a comedy to demonstrate the character’s ridiculousness. But just because 18 lacks a runaway hit like “Bodyrock” doesn’t mean it’s a bad album. It just can’t compete with what came before. That’s why it sold less than a third as many copies as its predecessor—this slow and sober record just wasn’t what the public expected from the visionary creator of Play. Unfortunately, that reductive “musical genius” label would haunt Moby for the rest of his career.

18 B Sides was released in 2003. In addition to collecting the b-sides from the previous year’s singles, it also included five new songs. While this record has more energy than its companion, it only reinforces the perception that both are merely made up of the misfit songs cut from Play. “Landing” sounds like synth pop on Ambien. “Love of Strings” is just “Signs of Love” with a slightly faster breakbeat and some extra guitar twangs. “Nearer” is the chopped & screwed version of “Whispering Wind,” slowed to just shy of unintelligible. “String Electro” further adds to the impression of recycled music, sounding like an early draft of “In This World” picked up off the cutting room floor and remixed for elevator play. Puzzlingly, the electro rave anthem “Horse & Carrot” is the sole banger of the bunch—so why was it banished to the b-side collection? Just like its companion, 18 B Sides feels like half of a good album. Perhaps if the best of both had been combined… but probably not.

And then in 2005 Moby released his seventh album, Hotel. It was…different. To say the least.

*insert lengthy sigh*

Hotel is a record nobody wanted to make, and fewer still wanted to listen to. Not even Moby himself. And it is painfully obvious. It feels like he got a homework assignment to make an alt-rock record and turned this in after a weekend. All of his biggest weaknesses as an artist are on full display here, and it’s hard to listen to without constantly frowning and grinding my teeth. For the first time since Ambient, Moby eschews the use of vocal samples and it is a catastrophic mistake that ripples through the entire album. His flat, emotionless affect only draws attention to the rudimentary rhythms that back these tracks, making them feel cheap and slight compared to their predecessors. The characteristically smooth and clean production of Moby is tragically misplaced on this record that is never raw enough to rock, nor energetic enough to power a dance floor. It sold half as many copies as 18, continuing a serious downtrend. At the time, Moby was deep in the throes of alcoholism and a rapidly escalating drug habit, which caused him to alienate most of his friends. He was also high on his own hype, so obsessed with maintaining his fame that he convinced himself he had to make a commercially viable mainstream rock album to prove he was the musical genius everyone said he was back in 1999. He must have been on some really strong stuff to think that the best way to distinguish himself as an artist was to try and do the same thing everybody else was doing. No one asked for this record and no one wanted it, not even the creator. In interviews and his autobiography, Moby freely admits that Hotel is his least favorite of all his albums. And I have to agree with him. This was the album that convinced me to put Moby in a “time-out” for a while. I stopped buying or even listening to his new records for almost a decade, because if this was the sound he was shooting for, I was emphatically not interested. To add to Moby’s unforced error, the deluxe version of the album came with a bonus disc titled Hotel: Ambient, a selection of sleepy songs made by stripping the beats and vocals from Hotel’s lackluster tracks. Although this was much easier to listen to than its companion, it’s always a bad sign when your entire album can be improved by removing two-thirds of the musical elements from it. Sadly, learning from these mistakes would not prevent Moby from repeating them in the future.

Go—The Very Best of Moby was a greatest hits compilation released in 2006, his second such collection. There’s not much to say about it. It’s all of Moby’s best songs, including the post-Play era. If you just want a sample platter of his best stuff, this one’s for you. More interesting was the remix album that followed in 2007. Many of the best DJs and producers of the time put their own spin on Moby’s classics, and the result is his most club-friendly record since 1999. Ferry Corsten takes “Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?”, one of Moby’s most somber and spiritual songs, and transforms it into a pulse-pounding trance anthem. Sandy Rivera reimagines “In My Heart” as a jazz-infused house thumper, while Vitalic manages to create the weirdest remix of “Go” to yet exist. “Porcelain” is unrecognizable as a tribal circle jam that has more energy but significantly less chill than the original. Mylo reinvents “Lift Me Up” as electroclash. CJ Bolland does what he does best to Moby’s version of the James Bond theme, producing a rough and raw acid break straight off a ‘90s hard drive. Even “Bodyrock” gets re-engineered into a funky tech-house banger. “We Are All Made of Stars” still sucks, and no amount of remixing will ever change that. But sixteen out of eighteen songs being good is practically unheard of in the history of CDs. If you were just getting into Moby in the early 2000’s, this double disc was the perfect starter album, packaging all of his best songs and their hottest remixes together for two hours of listening pleasure.

Last Night (2008) is Moby’s long-awaited return to his roots, finally making another proper dance record. The vibe is a wild night of clubbing in New York City condensed down into just 65 minutes of music, from early-evening pre-game to a floor-shattering climax to the peaceful sunrise smoke sesh. And it’s mostly successful. “Ooh Yeah” is the perfect electro jam to get you and your friends pumped-up for an epic night out. By the time this song ends, you’ll be ready to party. “I Love to Move in Here” has just enough energy to maintain your mood on the train ride into the city. “257.Zero” is the track that comes blasting out when the bouncer opens the door into the neon-soaked wonderland of nightlife. It’s time to get your dance on. The distorted vocal sample of a woman reading off numbers sounds like a technician trying to find the best frequency for maximum vibes. “Everyday It’s 1989” is classic piano anthem house. But there are a few puzzling missteps as well. “Degenerates” sounds like a smoke-break in the alley, with the muted cacophony of basslines rumbling down a street lined with nightclubs. “Sweet Apocalypse” is the perfect soundtrack for rolling that last spliff of the night. “Live For Tomorrow” is the most confusingly constructed track on the album, a weird mashup of house and blues that does neither particularly well. “Alice” is another misfit single—too slow to rock the dance floor, but also too harsh-sounding for the chill room. The titular song of the album undercuts the vibe by being the sleepiest, least-danceable track on the whole record. The primary weakness of this album is that it starts to mellow out too soon. It does great on the buildup and the breakdown, but you’ve only heard one true banger before it slides into the electric lullabies Moby so loves to make. You’ve just gotten in the zone by the time this record tells you to head home and crash. It’s a bit abrupt, but overall Last Night is a welcome return to electronica, even though it doesn’t quite live up to its bold ambitions.

Fortunately, Last Night: Remixed (2008) was able to deliver what its predecessor did not. This is what an epic night out in the big city sounds like. Plenty of amazing producers were assembled to put their own unique spins on Moby’s songs, and pretty much all of them totally slap. Holy Ghost transforms “I Love To Move In Here” into a funky disco house banger. Kris Menace’s version of “Ooh Yeah” is upbeat electro pop with a much more vibrant sound than its inspiration. “Live For Tomorrow” becomes a rumbling progressive house track in the hands of producer Tocadisco. The Shapeshifters’ Maximal Remix turns “I’m In Love” into a deep slice of epic trance. General MIDI salvages bits of “Alice” into a tech-break that is a massive improvement over the original. Mason’s Glowsticks Remix envisions “I’m In Love” as a hardcore ‘90s rave anthem ripped off a translucent diskette. AC Slater breaks from the pack by turning “The Stars” into a warbling jungle track, which is an unusual but intriguing flavor for a Moby remix. The only real clunker of the bunch was Drop The Lime’s take on “Alice” that was even more boring than the original, which is an impressive but not interesting achievement. Last Night: Remixed is one of those rare remix albums that is just an overall upgrade to the original. This record fulfills all of the club-rocking promise that its source material could not.

Just when it looked like the old underground Moby was back, he got real quiet again. As was his usual tendency, he departed in the complete opposite direction of what had come before. 2009’s wait for me. is much slower, softer and more funereal than even his previous downtempo efforts. Lots of plinking ivory and swelling synths coupled with ethereal female vocals. “Study War” is a perfect example of the tried-and-true Moby formula in action: a compelling vocal sample hooked over a mellow breakbeat in a bed of pianos. “Shot in the Back of the Head” is techno noir sad dad music; the mournful strings create the impression that the record is crying to be over because it just can’t handle getting any sadder. “Division” is all sleepy synths and strings, a great soundtrack for a moonrise. “Pale Horses” is the typical sad lullaby Moby has always excelled at, while “Walk With Me” is a synthwave hymn for loneliness. “A Seated Night” sounds like the Church of Techno just concluded services for the day, while “Mistake” is exactly that—another ill-conceived alt-rock dud by a guy who should really know better by now. “One Time We Lived” is the only song with any energy, but Moby’s vocals are just as flat and bland as always, deflating what would have otherwise been the album’s only banger. It’s rather ironic that one of the most influential dance musicians of all time has a catalogue that is 90% weapons-grade sleep-aids. Stranger still, the deluxe edition of wait for me. came bundled with a bonus disc of ambient versions of all the songs, as if the whole record wasn’t lethargic enough. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a CD with less of a reason to exist—wait for me. was a sedative of a record already. The ambient mixes are flat-out comatose. Fortunately, it was soon followed by the remix album. A veritable army of DJs and producers turned all of Moby’s lullabies, hymns, and elegies into thumping techno shredders. Highlights included Carl Cox’s bass-heavy re-version of “Walk With Me” and Yuksek transforming “Mistake,” the worst song on the album, into a far superior funky French filter house groove. This remix record was the true successor to albums like Last Night and Play.

As Moby’s remix era continues, I can’t help but wonder if these alternate versions are the only thing still maintaining his cultural relevance. The majority of the music he’s produced since 18 hasn’t got much play on the radio or in the club, and would be completely forgotten if they hadn’t gotten sick remixes from some of the best DJs on the planet. Is he just churning out remix fodder now, waiting for other artists to find and fulfill the true potential of his tracks? While events in the future have made that seem less and less likely over time, it seemed quite plausible in the decade between Play and wait for me.

2011’s destroyed. was and remains Moby’s lowest-charting album, underperforming both critically and commercially. Most of it was composed during insomniac nights spent alone in his hotel room while out on tour, and it shows. Many songs come close to recapturing that classic Moby sound, but they all fall short in their own unique ways. Far too many lilting ethereal vocals make a lot of songs sound the same, like “The Low Hum” & “Rockets”—I can never tell those two apart. “Sevastopol” would be an excellent minimalist techno piece if only it had a deeper bass line to counter its very crowded high end. “The Day” sounds like a thorazine drip daydream, while “Lie Down in Darkness” is yet another variation on the classic formula: blues sample plus synths, multiplied by breakbeats equals Moby. While there are many perfectly fine tracks on this record, none of them innovate enough to feel like an evolution of what came before. No boundaries are being pushed. This album could just as easily be another collection of lost b-sides from Play. It certainly nails the vibe of an empty airport at 2 AM, but never offers any explanation as to why.

It was followed in 2012 by Destroyed: Remixed, the last compilation from Moby’s Remix Era. All the best versions of all the best songs from that album can be found on this double-disc. Holy Ghost reimagines “Blue Moon” as a popping Italo disco record from 1987. John Lord Fonda turns up the tempo on “Sevastopol” without losing any of the sleepiness of the original. For some reason, Ferry Corsten always hears warehouse-shaking trance whenever he listens to a Moby song. I don’t understand it, but I do appreciate the audio results. Tommy Trash transforms “After” into a sizzling electroclash kicker. But “Lie Down In Darkness” is the biggest winner here, with five different remixes of varying quality. I think the Bassjackers did it best, but your mileage may vary. Sadly, this was the end of the great Remix Era. Of course plenty of DJs and artists continue to remix Moby’s works to this day, but after Destroyed: Remixed the fans could no longer count on a compilation to accompany his future albums. For any other artist, this would have been the preface to a major departure from their signature style, leaving all previous influences and references behind. But not Moby.

Instead, he released Innocents in 2013—a nostalgic return to form that was more regressive retread than retro revival. It’s an entire album of hypnotic hangover music, all soft beats and gently vibrating chords. It copies the uplifting spiritual sound that has become Moby’s signature, but it can’t quite replicate the same creative energy he captured back in 1999. “Almost Home” feels like waking up on an airplane you have no memory of boarding, nor any clue as to its destination, and just being cool with it. “The Perfect Life” is another one of the oddly energetic lullabies that have become the most recognizable staples of a Moby album. “Illot Mollo” could be an update to “Everloving,” emphasizing the slow build and swelling strings that have long characterized his sound. The songs aren’t bad, but few can stand toe-to-toe with the great singles of his discography. Unfortunately, this album’s biggest flaw is the same one that has dogged him for his entire career. Moby continues to insist on writing lyrics, and lots of them, even though its consistently been his most obvious musical shortcoming. Despite his best effort, Innocents is full of great guest vocalists singing the most banal middle-school poetry. Although he is great at many things, Moby has never written a memorable line. Yet, he continues to paste them over his otherwise great downtempo tracks, like an interior decorator wallpapering over a Banksy. For the first time since Play, the new album was not followed by a collection of b-sides or remixes. The deluxe edition came with an extra six songs, but they only reinforced the notion that Moby was recycling old ideas instead of exploring new ones. Most of the tracks on this record could have been slipped onto 18 or wait for me. and not seemed the least bit out of place.

Moby didn’t produce another dance record for seven years. He continued his journey backwards with Long Ambients 1: Calm. Sleep. in 2016. These were tracks he engineered as his own personal relaxation mix and then made them available to download for free. It’s a slow burn from start to finish, but that seems to be the point. Is it possible to be aggressively ambient? Most of the songs don’t even have a beat. Or a title—they’re just serial numbers. If all you need is some immersive white noise while you do something more fun or important, this album will keep a vibe chilled for over four hours. A sequel, Long Ambients 2, was released for free in 2019. There’s not much to say about it except that it is more long-form meditation music that will definitely help you fall asleep. But Moby never stayed in that lane for too long.

Like so many of us, Moby was quite angered by the results of the 2016 presidential election. That righteous rage sent him right off the rails, musically speaking, and he reverted back to his young punk days. He assembled his own electro punk band, dubbed The Void Pacific Choir. This cadre of drunken uncles having concurrent midlife crises spent a summer shirtless and sweating in a tiny room while they punished their instruments as if they had caught them stealing the last beer. These Systems Are Failing is a return to Moby’s origins as a hardcore Christian punk. The result is a featureless wall of noise where every brick looks exactly the same. It’s more preachy than catchy, and not nearly raw enough to be a serviceable rock record. Overall, this album is a tedious exercise in shrillness, unlikely to sway anyone that does not already share its point of view. One thing is for certain—Moby is doing whatever the hell he wants, and no one has the power to dissuade him from his most cherished musical delusions. Mainly that a 50 year old man can cut a relevant punk record. I didn’t even know this album existed until I started researching this article, and honestly, it was better that way.

Moby had so much fun screaming in his garage that he just had to do it again. So, the very next year he released More Fast Songs About The Apocalypse, another punk record that nobody listened to. Once again, Moby failed to rock because he just can’t resist making crisp, clean professional productions that are far too tidy to fit in a genre that is entirely about giving zero fucks. Despite being mostly inspired by anger, Apocalypse lacks the raw energy of the records he is trying too hard to imitate. For such a devoted fan, Moby seems to know paradoxically little about actually making a punk song, and he hasn’t learned anything new thirteen records later. But, no one can accuse him of giving up. He’s still writing sanctimonious lectures disguised as music, and they are no more persuasive for it. It’s a good thing this album and These Systems Are Failing were free downloads, otherwise the sales numbers would have been another Animal Rights level embarrassment. Even Hotel is a better listen than either of these misguided punk experiments.

Everything was Beautiful, and Nothing Hurt (2018) definitely has the best title of all the Moby albums. Too bad the record that wears it is a decidedly mediocre assembly of mournful melodies masquerading as electronic mood music, and downtempo to a fault. “Mere Anarchy” is a lonely piano soliloquy that would have been right at home on Everything Is Wrong. “The Waste of Suns” is a cool piece of computer jazz complimented by a cowbell. “Like a Motherless Child” is yet another great bass beat ruined by Moby’s mumbling. He continues to overestimate his ability to sing, inserting unfiltered vocals that do nothing but puncture the atmosphere the song had been developing before he opened his mouth. “A Dark Cloud is Coming” is easily the best song on the album—a melancholic blues ballad with just a hint of breakbeats in the background. This record is a frustrating listen for a longtime Moby fan. At this point in the discography, I found myself wondering why Moby so steadfastly refused to combine the energy of his rock influences with his talent for constructing intelligent dance music. It was this combo that produced all of his greatest early hits, so why is he so afraid to return to that well? He certainly feels no such reluctance about revisiting his ambient and punk works on a regular basis. Why not take inspiration from the best work he ever did, instead of churning out yet another album devoid of any dance floor fodder? There are answers to those questions, but I hadn’t found them yet.

The album was followed later that year by Everything was Beautiful, and Nothing Hurt (Remixes), which filled in many of the blanks left by its source material. Unlike previous remix compilations, all 25 alternate mixes were done by Moby himself. This makes the ponderously slow tempo of Everything was Beautiful even more puzzling, as the remix collection proved that Moby was still perfectly capable of doing the things he has obviously been avoiding for almost a decade at this point—namely, rocking a dance floor. I’ve never seen an artist more determined not to do what they’re good at, and I simply could not understand why. It would be like if Carlos Santana decided “No more guitars!”

Fortunately, Moby released All Visible Objects in 2020. It was a proper club record and a modern update on his early underground sound. “Morningside” returns to Moby’s origins in early ‘90s acid house, combined with his penchant for climactically swollen synths. The main sample almost sounds like an allusion to one of his earliest underground hits, “Voodoo Child.” “Power is Taken” is a dark and intense cyberpunk anthem, while “Rise Up in Love” is ethereal stadium trance—something Moby has never done before. Upon hearing it, I can only wonder what took him so long. “Forever” would be a perfect finale track if only it didn’t wait until the literal last minute to drop the beat. Of course, Moby could not resist including a few lilting lullabies like “Too Much Change,” but they’re all stacked at the end so that they don’t interfere with the rest of the album’s flow. Perhaps Moby finally took the criticism to heart, or maybe a dull monotonous existence under quarantine inspired him to recreate that classic speaker-smashing sound in remembrance of better days. Regardless, All Visible Objects was the Moby record people had been waiting to hear since 1999. This was the album that made me finally let Moby out of time-out and start listening again. To the delight of fans everywhere, Moby debuted the album in a live-streamed DJ mix session, the only way to do a record release party during a global pandemic. This free internet concert didn’t just brighten the spirits of the audience trapped at home—all proceeds from the record sales were donated to various charities as well. All Visible Objects was deliberately engineered to create as much positivity as possible during a dark and dreary time, and it absolutely delivered.

Later that same year, Moby released Live Ambient: Improvised Recordings. It was basically the antithesis of All Visible Objects—a slow and quiet contemplative record with no beats at all. It’s mostly Moby riffing on pianos while the synth swells in the background, accompanied by the occasional plucking of guitar strings. It is quite relaxing and impressively cohesive for something that was improvised live, but it’s not a memorable listen. I’ll go ahead and mention Ambient 23 (2023) here, because it is not significantly different from Moby’s previous ambient works. This one doesn’t even seem to have a unique vibe to it. It’s just more weapons-grade white noise. Just like its predecessors, it’ll help you fall asleep and there’s not much else to say about it.

Reprise (2021) is an album with no artistic reason to exist. In yet another misguided attempt to prove himself a “serious” musician, Moby remade various songs from his career in the classical style with a full orchestra of acoustic instruments. But in transforming his groundbreaking beats into traditional arrangements, Moby removes everything that made his sound unique, leaving behind the musical equivalent of wallpaper. It doesn’t sound terrible, but it’s not particularly memorable, either. Moby made the exact same mistake with Hotel, only Reprise is more tediously insistent on conforming to conventions of style. Once again he is high on his own hype, determined to be the miraculous musical wunderkind too many mythologized him as, rather than the very talented electronica artist he actually is in reality. This record takes some of Moby’s greatest hits and asks “What if that song was boring?” It’s not a remix album. It’s just a retread that has nothing new or interesting to offer, which is a rare occurrence in Moby’s catalogue. Not even the follow-up remix compilation could salvage this dull dud.

Always Centered At Night (2024) is a fitting capstone to an eclectic career, drawing inspiration from Moby’s entire history to make an album full of melodic mid-tempo mood music suitable for a chill hang or an after-party. “Feelings Come Undone” tiptoes right up to the line of being a proper banger, but stops just shy. “Where Is Your Pride?” is an intriguing piece of abstract dub-flavored house that never delivers the climax it sets up. It just… stops. “Transit” sounds like an early draft of a Massive Attack song that needs a little more refinement to be album-ready. “Should Sleep” is a piece of keyboard-driven funk that totally slaps, while “Sweet Moon” is a bluesy meditation on spirituality. “Medusa” is a weird atmospheric electro drum n’bass track. This and “Feelings Come Undone” are the only songs with a danceable energy on the album. Although Always Centered At Night never builds much momentum, Moby’s typical easy-listening formula is elevated by a gathering of amazing vocalists giving the best performances ever captured in one of his songs. Omitting his own voice was the best decision he ever made, and I can only hope this album has taught Moby a lasting lesson. Specifically, that he cannot and should not sing his songs himself.

Despite listening to all of his albums multiple times in a short period, Moby remains a tantalizing mystery. I have absolutely no idea what he will do next, and I must admit that is part of the fun. When I began researching this retrospective, I thought Moby’s musical journey was a mostly linear one between two sonic extremes—a gradual slide from hardcore faith punk to easy-listening electronica. But that didn’t turn out to be true. Instead, his extensive discography revealed a musician constantly embattled with himself, chronically unsure of his own sonic identity as he grappled with different influences and tendencies. That’s why his style often changes so drastically between albums before he inevitably retreats to the safety of the familiar for one record, and then he starts the cycle over, hoping to satisfy his ego the next time around.

Spoiler: he never has, and it’s unlikely he ever will. That’s what makes Moby’s music just as frustrating as it is fascinating. I can’t help but wonder how many more amazing dance records might have been produced if Moby hadn’t been so obsessed with proving himself as a “serious musician.” A fixation which is all the more ridiculous since that has been an undeniable fact since 1999. By any definition, Moby is without a doubt one of the most significant and influential music-makers of the modern age. And yet, that wasn’t conclusive enough proof for Moby himself. All of his worst albums (Hotel, These Systems Are Failing, Reprise) were records he thought he should make rather than what he really wanted to make, and it shows in the slick soulless production coupled with uninspired songwriting. They sound professional, but that’s the nicest thing you can say about them. His best albums (Play, Last Night, All Visible Objects) come from a more authentic place, combining the energy of underground dance records with the ethereal ecstasy of church music to create that singular Moby sound that would dominate radios and clubs around the world. Despite that success, Moby spent a lot of his career running away from what worked so well. For somebody so concerned with his own critical consensus, he was surprisingly reluctant to play to his strengths. It certainly seemed like he was ashamed to be considered “just” a dance musician and tried to distance himself from that part of his work, like it was a phase he had outgrown on his way to becoming a mature artist. But that perspective ultimately did him a disservice.

The existence of Voodoo Child lends credence to this theory about the constant contradictions of Moby’s career. Back in the 1990s, “Voodoo Child” wasn’t just Moby’s first underground hit—it was also his alter ego. While the Moby persona went on to evolve into an experimental musician with a broad and varied soundscape that we all know and love, Voodoo Child continued producing the kind of techno-infused acid house that kept clubs pumping. This wasn’t just some forgotten side project with a handful of singles. Voodoo Child produced multiple EPs and full-length albums over the years. Sweet Childhood, his latest release, came out in 2022. Listening to the Voodoo Child discography, it becomes clear that this is where Moby banished all of his rave-related influences when he put on his “serious artist” act, which became more and more frequent after 1999. For example, Baby Monkey (2004) is a collection of the kind of classic speaker-busting bangers that Moby rarely indulges in anymore. But while they will make decent transitional tracks in any house DJ’s set, they lack the unique sonic texture that made records like Play so memorable. Just like a lot of his prime ego’s later output, Voodoo Child’s music is good, but none of it is truly great. That’s a shame, because it’s not hard to imagine how a lot of Moby’s albums could have been improved by blending all of their influences and elements together, instead of trying to keep his inner DJ hidden away like a dirty secret.

Sadly, a Moby divided against himself cannot stand. He stubbornly insisted on keeping his innovations separate from his inspirations, and it caused a kind of sonic stagnation the longer he kept it up. While his main albums veer wildly from one style to another, most do fall within that nice and comfy easy listening electronica range—the kind of stuff you listen to when the party’s over and its time to chill. Or if you’ve aged out of your raver days, when it’s time to do a deep clean of your kitchen. Moby made plenty of songs that were a pleasant enough listen, but never again ascended to the Brobdingnagian heights of “Bodyrock.” Even though he continued to make dance music as Voodoo Child, those tracks sound underdeveloped and outdated compared to his early underground work. Sweet Childhood and Baby Monkey sound like they were recorded in the same session, despite being separated by almost twenty years. That’s not a good sign for any musician, let alone one with as much history as Moby. Perhaps if he expended less effort trying to “prove” himself a serious artist and simply took all of his music seriously he would have one legendary discography full of classic records instead of two mid ones dotted with just as many missteps as highlights. But, we’ll never really know.

Despite everything I just said, I’m still a huge Moby fan. Make no mistake, he has plenty of room for improvement. But the only reason I’m so harsh on him is because I’ve seen his potential in action and I know what he’s capable of. Even if he can’t accept it, Moby has proven himself one of the most significant musicians of the turn of the century, and I’ve never stopped being curious about what he’s going to do next.

Doc Awesome has put together a 2-hour continuous DJ mix of all the best songs and remixes mentioned above, and you can listen to it here.

Fear & Loathing in the Borderlands

At some point, without ever trying or agreeing to any of this, I became an old gamer. Not one of the wizened ancients who chased blinking dots on 2600s, but I’ve lived long enough to see most of the games I grew up playing relegated to retro classic collections. How is this even possible? Who allowed such a thing to happen? It must be the steep price of progress one must pay to get 4K graphics and net code that actually works. I suppose it is worth it to no longer get kicked from your game whenever you receive a phone call.

For reasons far too dull to include here, I missed everything in the three generations between the NES and the Xbox 360. Gaming was barely recognizable by the time I picked up a controller again. It was a strange landscape—you could barely even see the pixels anymore! Tons of unique new genres with wildly creative mechanics had been invented in my absence, things you just couldn’t handle with only a D-pad and two buttons. It wasn’t long before I realized I was going to have to pick a new favorite game, and that was when my journey into 2009’s Borderlands began.

A colleague and I rented a copy and killed a long weekend with that game, fueled by booze and pizza. As soon as we arrived in the cel-shaded wasteland of Pandora, it was obvious that we had signed up for an ominous quest with overtones of extreme danger, a gross physical salute to all the insane possibilities of life on this crazy hostile rock. This planet of bandits and monsters hid a giant vault full of priceless alien technology, and we vault hunters would blaze a trail of blood from one pole to the other and back again to find it and claim the unimaginable prizes inside. 

Borderlands is a first-person shooter with some light RPG elements stapled on. Most of the action is shooting. Players have a choice of four distinct classes, each with their own unique skill trees and abilities. Although incremental boosts provided by leveling up made no significant changes to gameplay, it does provide a sense of progression and character growth as you work your way through the main story.

We were somewhere around New Haven, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. An annoying robot named Claptrap greeted us with an almost threatening amount of enthusiasm, and pointed toward an office. Suddenly it all made sense. We must be here to talk to that lady with a question mark over her head—she definitely had a quest for us. Most of the locals just need us to fetch this or that, but this woman has a litany of barbarians to be slain. Goons with names like Krom, Sledge, and Bonehead. She then refers us to another woman, a scientist named Tannis, who has another list of names in need of some red marks.

With pockets full of blood money, we go shopping for new gear. No more picking “slightly used” body armor off the dead. For the first time we purchased new guns fresh off the rack, never been fired. They were sold to us by Marcus Kincaid, the Russian arms dealer who owns and operates the ammunition vending machines you see all over Pandora. Even in the middle of nowhere, you’re never far from a Marcus Munitions machine! He was the latest stage capitalist, a ruthless businessman who sold guns to wannabe adventurers and then took his wares back from their corpses to be polished up and sold again. As morally repugnant as that is, you can’t help but like the guy.

A plethora of guns was the big selling point of Borderlands when it was first released. A bespoke procedural generation engine assembles weapons and gear from randomized parts, meaning this game has somewhere between 16-17 million possible guns in it. A world record at the time, which was also added to the hype. While the system is still impressive, it is clearly in its infancy compared to later implementations. Weapons from different manufacturers have their quirks—Vladof shoots a little faster and Jakobs fires slow and powerful, but most of them aren’t all that distinct. The only thing that sets Tediore apart is that their guns are cheap, which ceases to be relevant by level 30. Most of the legendary weapons don’t even do anything all that crazy; they just inflict more damage. All of the guns will get a glow-up in the upcoming sequels, but for now it’s a promising proof of concept. 

Marcus glared at me and said “What the hell are you talking about? Buy something, or leave my store.”

Oh well. Everything moves according to the will of the Great Magnet. Nothing anybody can do about that.

Despite that cosmic truth, Commandant Steele keeps scolding me over the radio like I’m some kid she caught tearing up her lawn. Who told her she was in charge? I don’t see any KEEP OFF THE SAND signs down here. Just a bunch of heavily armed drunks digging for alien treasure all over the planet. How disruptive could we really be? If anything, my colleague and I were performing a public service by culling the herds of bloodthirsty psychos running around. Something ugly was always about to happen. Folks could feel it lurking in the near future, just out of sight.

These psychos weren’t some pesky bandit clan that took a “tax” from every trade caravan that crossed their turf. No, these were the hopelessly insane, people who no longer care about anything but violence. Freaks that will cut your head off with a hand-crafted buzz axe, and then finger paint with your blood. Way back when the Dahl Corporation made its failed attempt to tame Pandora into a revenue stream, they saved on costs by using prisoners with life sentences as cheap, disposable labor. After their whole operation went belly up, the Dahl executives cut their losses and fled, but not before releasing their workforce of violent, angry criminals into the wild wastelands of Pandora. Most of them lost whatever was left of their minds and became the psychos that scream terrible gibberish as they try to murder you. Now they are one of the largest populations on the planet, providing yet another obstacle for any future corporations to overcome. But the corps are all so focused on alien treasure that they can’t see the opportunity in front of them.

The real untapped resource of Pandora is cannon fodder. Need a battalion of bonebreakers between you and your enemy? Maybe a gang of goons to grind your foes to dust? Or perhaps just a moat of madmen to surround your fortress to deter visitors? A surfeit of psychos is the low-budget security solution for you! They will not be deterred by the low pay, high risk, and no benefits. Toss them some raw meat once a day, and you’ve got a limitless supply of cannon fodder. It doesn’t matter if some vault hunter shows up and kills half of them—more will appear, crawling out from every rock, hovel and footlocker within earshot, eager to join the fun. And no one beats the psychos when it comes to enthusiasm. They don’t know what the hell they’re doing, but they’re so damned excited about it they could just stab someone in the face. And they will, if some foolish adventurer gets close enough.

There are vanishingly few decent people left on Pandora. A conscience rarely survives the brutal realities of living on such a savagely hostile planet, so it is a thing to be treasured—not exploited. Those that are still sane in this place all abide by one rule: do not abuse the decent. There is always someone willing to avenge them. Poor TK Baha was one of them, but that didn’t stop some psychos from stringing him up from the ceiling fan in his own home—what the locals call a “Pandoran Piñata.” And nobody shed a tear when the nearby bandit camp burned to the ground in the middle of the night without leaving a single survivor.

According to Tannis, who qualifies as marginally decent, the trinkets we’ve been plucking from the hands of dead bandits are all actually pieces of the vault key. But even with the key, the mythical vault is still on a time lock. It can only open once every 200 years, and if we miss our chance, we’ll all be deceased before there’s another one. Now that we are saddled with a ticking clock, it becomes an all-out sprint to reach the vault first and claim the prize within.

We have to fight our way through Old Haven, which is occupied by Crimson Lance troops in full tactical armor—the Atlas Corporation’s most elite henchmen. The deserted town full of burning homes looked like a war zone before we arrived, and it didn’t look any better once the shooting started. If I turned around too fast in a frenzied firefight with lots of enemies around there was noticeable screen tearing and frame-rate drops, which are not problems you expect to have in a remastered GOTY edition of a classic game. Of course, most of our foes remain blissfully ignorant of such impediments. Their aim is terrible enough that it doesn’t really matter how well they can see.

Now it’s time for a final confrontation with Commandant Steele to determine the fate of the fabled Vault of Pandora. She can’t help gloating as she turns her stolen key, so sure she has won. I tell her that despite its age and many, many flaws, the first Borderlands remains a surprisingly enjoyable experience. The series will improve upon almost everything with future iterations, but there’s no denying Gearbox put down a solid foundation with this game.

Commandant Steele shakes her head and asks what nonsense I’m spewing. So I explain that the only reason I remembered the original Borderlands as such a disappointment was because of the lackluster final boss fight. Just when we think we’re about to exchange bullets with our corporate nemesis, Steele gets skewered and tossed aside by the “real” final boss: a one-eyed blob of tentacles that does nothing to justify its placement. It’s just an underwhelming “twist.”

“Wait… what did you say?” Steele asked. She was impaled by a tentacle before I could answer her. Hard to imagine a more ignominious way to go. Steele deserved the dignity of a proper boss fight, but I guess that’s life on Pandora for you. That one final disappointment had overshadowed all of the fun memories I had with this game for years, and I’m glad I had this chance to reappraise it. That bullshit bait-and-switch final boss fight pissed me off so much the first time around that I completely ignored all of the endgame content, most of which turned out to be pretty good. But of course, none of that matters to the Atlas Corporation, which has decided to accept their losses and move on to a world a little less resistant to exploitation.

Dr. Ned, who is totally not the same person as Dr. Zed, provides the zombie mode all shooters of the era were obliged to include, lest they seem incomplete. Don’t get me wrong—setting hordes of zombies aflame is tons of fun. But the lack of fast travel points in Jakobs Cove means we will be going from one end of the map to the other for almost every quest. By the time Jakobs sends its classy-lookin wood robot to hire me to wrap this whole mess up, I’m just running around the zombies rather than waste my time and ammo dropping them. Never a good sign for a zombie game (or related DLC) when killing zombies becomes a rote chore you’d rather avoid.

Mad Moxxi’s Underdome was more headache than it was worth. While we were up for an endgame challenge, completing even one five-round quest in her gladiatorial arena is an hourlong undertaking that offers no XP for the hundreds of enemies slain and not even the promise of decent loot at the end. On top of all of that, if you leave in the middle of a quest and return later, you have to start over from the beginning. While I’m certainly grateful that this piece of DLC introduced us to Miss Mad Moxxi, the best bartender on Pandora, the sad truth is the Underdome is where fun goes to die. No respawn. Game over for fun.

The Secret Armory of General Knoxx provided more value than either of its predecessors. This DLC extended the story of Atlas’ second failed venture and the fallout that accompanied it, basically picking up right after Commandant Steele’s unexpected demise. During our time driving back and forth down the overly long highway of doom, we learned the humiliating tale of General Knoxx’s fall from grace and descent into manic depression. A highly decorated officer of the highest caliber, easily one of Atlas’ finest soldiers, forced to fight an impossible war while hamstrung by nepotism and corporate politics. Once literal children were being promoted above him, the General completely ran out of fucks to give and started running the pacification of Pandora his way—with extreme force. But this miserable rock and all the freaks and weirdos on it refused to bend beneath the General’s oppression. The locals were thoroughly unimpressed with his despot act. The one fruit that grows in abundance from the sands of Pandora is tyrants, and they always end up cut down in one way or another. It’s never a good idea to pick a fight with an entire planet of crazy people with sharp objects, but many corporations would repeat this mistake over and over with puzzling accuracy. The Atlas Corporation already failed once and is trying again without changing anything about their approach or procedures. Unlike his employers, Knoxx eventually learned, but he foolishly insisted on doing it all the hard way.

By the time we reach his boss fight chamber, the General is completely over all of it. He’s one button away from vaporizing himself in a spectacular display of fireworks and lasers. But since we’re already here with all our guns and shit, Knoxx decides it would be preferable to fall in battle rather than by his own hand. We obliged him with every last bullet in our possession. He died with a smile on his face, no doubt relieved to finally be departing from Pandora.

And then we had to deal with Claptrap’s robot uprising! We made the grave error of underestimating the threat posed by these silly little robots. What was this “Interplanetary Ninja Assassin Claptrap” going to do? Close doors on us?

As is often the case, things were much worse than we thought. In their unceasing quest for ever greater profit, the Hyperion Corporation had manufactured an army that was ready and waiting for a reason to go to war. While melting hordes of annoying bots is a great deal of fun, things were quickly getting out of hand. The Claptraps started reproducing and upgrading themselves at a geometric rate, until they started fully assimilating animals, people, soldiers—even dead boss characters get exhumed for one last gauntlet. At least Commandant Steele finally got herself a real boss battle. Without exaggeration, those dopey little robots were just a few days shy of conquering the whole planet. If the revolution had spread beyond Pandora, well… “catastrophic” would be an understatement. Fortunately, after we poured a few boxes of bullets into it, INAC crashed like a dope fiend with an empty bag. The Interplanetary Ninja Assassin Claptrap responsible for all this was sentenced to forced obsolescence, tossed into the junkyard of history, never to return.

Just when we thought it was time to roll credits on this adventure and drink to our victory, the local bounty board receives a new job with the headline “You. Will. Die.” Which certainly sounds promising. Looks like they were having a serious pest control problem way down in the Deep Fathoms, so we loaded up with all of our best gear and went off to bag us a raid boss. Unfortunately, we quickly learned that Crawmerax the Invincible wasn’t just a cool nickname. This colossal crustacean had a shell that was utterly impervious to any weapon you could find on Pandora. Lucky for us, Crawmerax had a few brightly glowing weak points where he could be hurt. We also discovered a ledge within the boss lair that put us entirely out of his range while allowing us to take potshots from safety. It would almost feel like cheating if we weren’t using this strategy against a literal giant monster. After we’ve finally changed his name to Crawmerax the Vincible, we are rewarded with an insane amount of loot of all kinds: money, weapons, XP. It’s just too bad that it’s all completely useless now that we’ve killed the most powerful thing in the entire game.

Now that we’ve finally run out of things to shoot at, it’s time to depart. As Pandora recedes into the rearview mirror, I find myself reflecting on my strange adventure. Playing through this 15 year old title wasn’t nearly as much of a chore as I had expected. While it certainly could benefit from some improvements (like more fast travel points and a comprehensive map) it is still packed with hours of playable fun. No wonder I and millions of other fans can’t keep ourselves from returning to the Borderlands time and again, just to see if there’s anybody different to shoot or if there’s anything new to shoot them with. Spoiler: there always is!

But for now, our long treasure hunt is at an end. Time to go home, lick our wounds, and count our loot. When Pandora beckons once again, we will be ready and eager to answer.

Kick It: The Best Kung Fu Movies on Prime

You might not know this—I didn’t until a few months ago—but Prime hosts a surprisingly diverse catalogue of kung fu films. Everything from old classics to modern masterpieces. If you want to watch a movie about people kicking each other in the face, you’re rather spoiled for choice. How will you find the ones worth watching? Don’t worry—I’ve got this. 

Here’s a list (in no particular order) of some of the best kung fu flicks you can catch on Prime as of August 11, 2025. For the purposes of this list, a “kung fu movie” is any picture that is primarily about martial artists fighting. The style practiced is not relevant for this discussion. 

Avengement (2019)
Directed by Jesse V Johnson

This brutal tale of bareknuckle revenge stars Britain’s only gift to martial arts cinema: Scott Adkins. He plays Cain Burgess, who starts the movie as a prisoner using his mother’s death as an opportunity for making a violent escape from police custody. Then he knicks over to the pub for a pint a lager, pulls a shotgun, and holds the whole bleeding crowd hostage, a literally captive audience, as he tells them his villain origin story. Suffice to say, a few decades in the most violent prison in England changed Cain from a simple street thug into a cold-blooded killer. 

There’s an extensive montage of flashbacks to different fights throughout his prison “career,” followed by the judges extending his sentence with increasing exasperation. Cain’s learned he has his own brother to thank for all of his miseries, so he waits for him at the pub. When bro finally arrives, words are exchanged, nothing is forgiven, and the audience is treated to one of the most savage bar brawls ever captured on video. Avengement is not a brilliant film by any means, but it is a rowdy good bone-breakin romp. 

Sword Master (2016)
Directed by Derek Yee

Yen Shisan is a master swordsman and deadly assassin with a skull tattooed on his face in an ancient wuxia type kingdom where various kung fu schools fight to prove their style the best. Since he is slowly dying of an incurable ailment, Shisan goes to the Supreme Sword Manor school to challenge the legendary Third Master Shao-Feng—the only man who might be skilled enough to kill him. Upon learning that Shao-Feng had already passed away a month before his arrival, Shisan becomes depressed about being robbed of his last chance at an honorable death in battle. Without the Third Master to keep them in check, the aggressive students of the Divine Might school start wiping out all competing schools and terrorizing the citizens trying to live their lives in peace. 

Despite his drunken indifference, some prostitutes convince Shisan that this is his chance for a final heroic act, a noble last stand against evil. This film is full of beautiful cinematic swordplay, the kind that almost looks more like a dance than a fight. The wire-fu techniques blend perfectly into the mythic setting, and the script by Tsui Hark even includes quite a bit of humor in between all of the graceful combat. Even if you watched this movie on mute, it would still be utterly enthralling to look at.

Redeemer (2014)
Directed by Ernesto Diaz Espinoza

Former hit man Nicky Pardo had a literal “Come to Jesus” moment when he was left for dead in the desert and decided to atone for all the evils he had done in his career. Upon his return, he starts taking down the various drug gangs he used to work for, always giving the perpetrators a chance to beg God’s forgiveness before he kills them. As he fights to protect the innocent and punish the guilty, we get occasional flashbacks showing us just how bad he used to be, until we begin to doubt his hands will ever be cleansed—just like Pardo. But a vicious foe from the past has resurfaced, threatening to undo all the good Pardo had done with his second chance. Even if he wins, can he ever truly be redeemed? 

Marko Zaror, a frequent cinematic sparring partner of Scott Adkins, ironically gives one of his most languid and sedate performances ever. He barely ever speaks above a whisper, and usually doesn’t have more than a few fragments of scripture to say. It stands in stark contrast to the flamboyantly crazy villains he portrayed in movies like Savage Dog and Undisputed III. While it’s not necessarily bad, it also isn’t that memorable. That being said, the fights are incredibly well-crafted. The action of Redeemer is much more grounded and technical than most of the other entries on this list. Characters employ lots of practical techniques that real-world fighters use, including lots of grappling and reversing grips. The most skilled combatants in the movie dodge more hits than they block. Of course Zaror can’t resist showing off a few flying spin kicks, but he employs them sparingly, usually saving them for the boss battles. Redeemer is a flick worth watching with your finger on the fast forward between the fights. 

Lady Bloodfight (2016)
Directed by Chris Nahon

Ok, so hear me out here. Despite the title, this is the fifth entry in the Bloodsport movie franchise. Now I can hear all you readers collectively asking “Wait, there was more than one Bloodsport movie? FOUR more? You can’t be serious!” 

Oh, but I am. The original was followed by three Van Damme-less sequels that went straight to video, with diminishing returns on each successive release—not what you want from a franchise. After Bloodsport IV: The Dark Kumite failed to set the rental counter on fire in 1999, the franchise lay so dormant you could be forgiven for considering it dead. But 17 years later, some studio exec finally had the brilliant idea to make a movie about the women’s Kumite. The main character, Jane Jones, is a young American backpacking through Hong Kong on her own. She is played by Amy Johnston, who probably looks oddly familiar in a way you can’t quite place because she was Black Widow’s stunt double in The Winter Soldier. Anytime Natasha was kicking ass and you couldn’t see her face—you were watching Johnston in action. So when Jane is assaulted by a group of assholes that won’t take no for an answer, she deftly polishes the pavement with all four of their faces. A mysterious woman with the kind of kung fu skill that borders on magic takes notice of Jane’s potential and recruits her to fight as her champion in the all female Kumite. After a brutal training montage, Jane is ready to face the competition, a variety of fighters of many different sizes and styles. There’s a charismatic Australian brawler that cracks jokes and makes friends with everyone, as well as an evil Eastern European giant who’s just there to pile up bodies. Johnston gives a great performance even when the punches aren’t flying, but of course this movie shines the most when they are. Jane Jones’ journey to the final ring is every bit as brutal and bloody as Frank Dux’s was in the original movie, if not more so. These ladies shed buckets of the red stuff before someone gets the trophy. The violence is graphically realistic, mystic kung fu masters aside, but this movie also has an unusual attention to detail with the damage the fighters take. Characters who take a real beating will limp, or favor an hurt arm, and their ability to fight is noticeably affected by their injuries. They move slower, take longer to react, or even making sloppy mistakes that lead to more damage.

I don’t know why the title had to be Lady Bloodfight instead of Bloodsport, but that was a serious mistake by their marketing department because this is easily the best movie the series has produced since the original. They should be praying that people associate this movie with their comatose franchise.

God of War (2017)
Directed by Gordon Chan

In this period war film based on real historical events, a force of Imperial Ming soldiers fights a war on multiple fronts to repel the Japanese pirates at their borders. After another failed assault on the pirate fortress by General Yu Dayou, played by kung fu film legend Sammy Hung, command is given to General Qi Jiguang (Vincent Zhao). He is also given permission to start recruiting and training soldiers fora new army. The movie does get off to a slow start, front-loading a lot of complicated political machinations and other staples of costume drama, but it all leads up to a massive double-siege battle that lasts for forty absolutely riveting minutes. Not only is General Qi protecting the walls of the provincial capital, his wife leads the women in defense of their hometown while the husbands are away. It’s an impressive set piece, able to quickly give the audience an overview of both battles and keep them grounded in space so they are always aware of how close each army is to victory. It is a thrilling ride from the first arrow loosed until the final crossing of swords. Also, the only movie on this list that is “based on a true story.”

Life After Fighting (2024)
Directed by Bren Foster

Multi-talented Australian performer Bren Foster does it all on this impressive personal passion project. He wrote, directed, and starred. The former World Champion of both Tae Kwon Do and Karate is also the executive producer and lead fight choreographer. In this movie he plays Alex Faulkner, a former competitive fighter who has “retired” to teach students of all ages at his karate school. Unfortunately, one of those students has an abusive absentee father who is not-so-secretly abducting students from his son’s class to sell into sex slavery overseas. Angry that his ex-wife would prefer the handsome and respectful martial arts coach who’s great with kids over his snide child-hating arrogance, Mr. Human Trafficker kidnaps his own son and threatens to kill him in order to lure a karate teacher into an ambush. 

Then the movie basically becomes Die Hard in a dojo, with Alex capitalizing on his awesome martial arts skills and familiarity with the building to divide and conquer a ludicrously large army of goons before any children can get hurt. Bren Foster is a much more pragmatic fighter than you usually get in movies—lots of elbows and armbars being used, with fewer of the high-flying kicks that would get you trounced in a real fight. As an audition tape for a future kung fu movie star, Life After Fighting makes a compelling argument in favor of Bren Foster. 

Master Z: Ip Man Legacy (2018)

Directed by Yuen Woo-ping

This movie is a spinoff of Donnie Yen’s immensely popular Ip Man series. Following his defeat at the end of Ip Man 3, Cheung Tin-chi (played by Max Zhang), decides to leave martial arts behind and open a small grocery store to support his wife and child. Unable to ignore the plight of a woman fleeing a drug lord, Tin-chi defends her and puts a target on his back. It’s not long before the drug lord burns down Tin-chi’s house, and although he escapes unharmed, his son is seriously injured. Furious that the police turned the culprits loose with no consequences, Tin-chi and burns down an opium den belonging to Tso Sai Kit. The drug lord retaliates by killing the woman Tin-chi had protected. Tin-chi and Fu, older brother to the deceased, fight their way to the syndicate’s head office and expose the location of Kit’s drug cache to the media. 

This flick is loaded with many famous martial artists of the silver screen, like Tony Jaa and Michelle Yeoh. Dave Bautista shows up to play the evil white man that’s really behind it all, a reveal so glaringly obvious that it’s not even a spoiler. But he does give a surprisingly small and subdued performance before the final boss fight, quietly monologuing about the best way to cook a steak to restaurant full of extras nodding politely. While Max Zhang is inarguably a talented martial artist, his serviceable performance is simply outshone by the raw charisma of his co-stars.  But that in no way diminishes my enjoyment of a great show.

Blade of the Immortal (2017)
Directed by Takashi Miike

The 100th film by visionary splatterpunk director Takashi Miike is nothing short of a masterpiece. In a fictionalized version of feudal Japan, Manji the samurai (played by Takuya Kimura) slays his corrupt lord and is forced to flee in disgrace, pursued by his former fellow warriors. Manji tried to protect and care for his mentally unstable sister while on the run, but she is eventually taken hostage by a group of ronin after the bounty on his head. Although the samurai surrendered and lay down his weapons, the leader of the ronin still killed his little sister. Powered by a vengeful rage, Manji single-handedly slaughters all 100 ronin. He receives several mortal wounds in the process, and accepts his rapidly approaching death. But, he doesn’t die. Before he can expire, a mysterious old lady feeds him some magic bloodworms and his wounds miraculously heal—even his severed hand reattaches. To his dismay, Manji has been cursed with immortality. The only way to lift the curse and end his life is to kill 1000 evil men.

Fifty-two years later, Manji hasn’t hit the target yet. A young girl named Rin Asano (Hana Sugisaki) hires the former samurai as a bodyguard to help her avenge her father. Her old man was slain by the leader of the Itto-ryu, an aggressive sword-fighting school that seeks to conquer all the others. Manji will have to carve his way through an army of henchmen and several anime-level assassins before he finally gets to cross blades with the principal of this murder school. Just like most Miike’s movies, armies of faceless henchmen will paint the dirt with their guts as they race to their doom at sword-point. It’s a film so ridiculously over the top and excessive that you have no choice but to suspend your disbelief before the next wave of insanity hits. Miike can still grab an audience’s attention and hold it hostage for a breathless 120 minutes, which is becoming a rare commodity in contemporary film. 

The Troll Sword Trilogy

Way back in ancient times past, long before the first internet message board burst into flames, a troll wasn’t some cave-dwelling creature waiting to eat unwary adventurers. No, a troll was just a bandit clever enough to know that hiding under a bridge guaranteed a constant supply of potential victims. A long history of these unpleasant encounters eventually gave rise to the notoriously ornery monsters that generations of gamers love to cut down on the path to fight something more fearsome. They were never really a serious threat, just something that got in your way. 

Today, trolls are thriving more than ever. Thanks to the internet, the whole world is their bridge. A new victim is never more than a few clicks away. Now, they are so ubiquitous that their name has become a verb. “Trolling” is the “art” of being really annoying on purpose, and its practitioners are legion. But the internet is not the troll’s sole dominion—even game developers have way too much fun putting the most obnoxious obstacles they can think of in the player’s path. Recently, I had a trolling experience that was so expertly crafted that I couldn’t help but tip the hat I was not wearing. In the interest of avoiding spoilers, I won’t name the game. If you’ve played it, you’ll know what I’m talking about, but if you haven’t, there’s still a good chance you’ll stumble across this one day in the future and be pleasantly surprised. How could I possibly take that away from you?

So, I’m playing this RPG, doing the whole sword & sorcery thing. I wander into a dark forest that’s a bit too high-level for my early-game characters and barely manage to kill the first monster to cross our path. But it looks like the struggle was worth it, because this defeated beast drops a sword called Excalibur. It has an appropriately absurd amount of damage for such a legendary blade, easily the most powerful weapon I’ve encountered at this point. But in my eagerness to play with my new toy, I overlooked some crucial details. First, I had misread the name. It was not Excalibur, but “Excalipur.” And while the damage value was ludicrously high, all of the sword’s other stats, like “Accuracy,” were so low that I could never hit anything with it. This sword would have killed any enemy I’d met thus far in one hit, if only it were capable of actually making contact. Try as I might, I could not hit the broadside of a dragon with this thing. I thought the final insult was when I tried to sell this knockoff blade and received a single piece of gold for it, but this game had just begun to troll.

About midway through the game in some dark Dwarven ruin, I came across an ancient sword still secure in its sheath. This alone made it unique, as every other sword just went into your inventory and was ready to rock. But not this one. When I try to equip it, a message pops up asking if I am sure I want to draw the blade, something no other weapon in the game does. That question makes me reconsider and the sword remains undrawn. I resolve to figure out what the strange runes on the sheath mean first, just to be safe. A scholar in a nearby town tells me it essentially amounts to a warning, something to the effect of “only a hero of noble lineage and pure heart can wield this blade.” Of course, since this is a video game and I’m the main character, I assume that’s me. Who else could it be? Still, the popup message is enough to dissuade me from drawing it just yet. Figure I better save it for when I really need it. Several times on my journey to the last dungeon I was tempted to draw the sword, but upon being asked if I was sure, I always decided the situation wasn’t quite dire enough. Surely I would know when the time was really and truly right. That sword makes it all the way to the final boss battle safe and snug in its sheath. But when I was left standing with five health after the rest of my party was wiped out by one of those totally unfair spells only final bosses have, I knew the time had come. The popup asks if I am sure and I hit the A button with determination. My character draws the sword with an animated flourish and holds it above his head. Then, he bursts into flames and burns to death. Game Over. I just had to laugh. Guess I wasn’t as noble and pure-hearted as I thought. 

Oh well. Lesson learned. I reload my save and go back and kick some final boss ass with a normal magic sword. One that burns enemies instead of me. Very traditional weapon. After the credits roll, it’s time to tackle that endgame content. I fight my way through the ultimate challenge dungeon, carving a bloody path through mechas, dragons, and mecha-dragons, until I was facing down a dragon god superboss. He was so overwhelmingly powerful that my healer didn’t have a chance to heal anyone; she just tried to keep resurrecting party members as fast as they died. But we persevered, and eventually the draconic deity lay slain at our feet. It yielded a single piece of loot, the Apocalypse Sword. The name was apt—it did a catastrophic amount of damage, and all of its other stats were similarly impressive. This blade was meant to fuck shit up. Right as I’m starting to get excited about the possibilities, a realization slaps me in the face. I have just felled the most formidable monster in the entire game. While I now wield the most powerful sword in the world, there is nothing left worth killing. I was just carrying the kingdom’s deadliest paperweight. 

Have to admit, that game got me pretty good. When I started playing, I didn’t think one of my most persistent foes would be my own sword. It happened just often enough for me to notice the pattern, but never frequently enough to dull my excitement at finding a shiny new sword. That’s why I fell for it every time. The developers trolled me at the end of a 50-hour game, and I’m not even mad about it because it was so perfectly executed. 

The Most Important Detail in “The Boys”

Season 4 revealed the most important detail of "The Boys," and I haven't seen anyone else discussing it.

In one episode, we finally see Homelander out of uniform. I don't mean when he puts on his civvies to go visit Sister Sage. No, there's a scene where we see Homelander standing in front of the mirror in just his underwear. While the actor portraying him, Anthony Starr, is certainly in good shape, it is plain to see that he is not even remotely close to the swollen-yet-chiseled beefcake he appears to be when in costume. 

That single reveal that barely lasts longer than a blink completely reframes Homelander and makes his symbolism nakedly obvious. With that scene, a production decision made behind the scenes magically transforms into a diegetic one made by the character. Anthony Starr is not wearing a padded muscle suit so that he can play a superhero on a TV show. No, it is Homelander the character who always wears a padded suit in public because even he cannot live up to the impossible image of the “superior being” he purports to be. To him, it’s not enough to be the strongest man on the planet and practically invincible. His vanity demands he look the part as well. Appearances are reality to him. That’s why he still considers himself the hero of the story even as he casually rips people in half. That’s why he dyes his hair, whitens his teeth, and wears fake muscles. Because even he, the genetically engineered superhuman, is not perfect. No one is. In that scene, we finally see the emperor has no muscles. And nothing scares Homelander more than people knowing that truth. That he is just as damaged, self-centered and desperate for approval as any mortal movie star. Despite his incredible power, he is not special.

This is the moment that completes the metaphor of Homelander. His “superiority” is just a carefully constructed facade. He’s not some misunderstood ignorant fool that simply can’t comprehend that people different from him are allowed to exist. He’s a virulently bigoted hypocrite, as vicious as he is hateful, lashing out at anyone that he perceives as a threat to the narrative of his supremacy. The message was finally so clear that even the angry incel idiots of the internet were forced to realize that their chosen idol has actually been the villain of the story all along. Hopefully that reveal will inspire some introspective reflection in those who were surprised by it. But sadly, that does sound a little far-fetched, even for a show about a drug that turns people into superheroes. 

Game vs. Film: Borderlands

Well, it finally happened. The long overdue Borderlands movie has blasted its way onto the big screen with the resounding impact of a wet fart. I was kind of excited when it first got announced *checks watch* nine years ago. But every bit of news that came out after that made me wince and say to myself, “Maybe it’ll still be good?”

Spoiler alert: it wasn’t good. It was a catastrophic commercial, critical, and creative failure. And yet… it wasn’t that bad. Was it a faithful adaptation of the games? No. Was it a terrible unwatchable mess? Also no. Sure, there was plenty of room for improvement, but I’ve definitely seen much worse. Most of it directed by Uwe Boll. Remember Far Cry? Exactly. There was a whole Far Cry movie we just never talk about because it was that bad. People decrying Borderlands as the worst video game adaptation of all time are forgetting that Wing Commander exists. Hell, the Assassin’s Creed movie was a bigger snore—I don’t remember anything about that movie except Michael Fassbender convulsing in VR. Despite the questionable liberties taken with the source material, Borderlands is far from the worst video game adaptation I have ever seen, and is moderately entertaining for most of its runtime. Nobody could say that about Double Dragon. 

Upon reflection, I realize that most of my criticisms of Borderlands the movie are just the ways it deviated from Borderlands the game. The basic premise is the same—there’s a crazy dangerous world called Pandora that hides a legendary Vault full of ancient alien technology that everybody wants to find. But just about everything else is different, and few (if any) of these changes are improvements. 

This movie does run roughshod over many beloved characters, with only a few even resembling their inspirations. And almost all of them are confusingly miscast. Roland, the stoic soldier-boy with a heart of gold, is played by neurotic loudmouth comedian Kevin Hart. While struggling to play against type he ends up giving a performance so reserved that he literally blends into the scenery. The movie’s version of Mad Moxxi, the top-hatted temptress that seems to tend every bar in the Borderlands, looks like a haunted clown in a corset so drab the real Moxxi wouldn’t use it to wipe her countertop. And when she speaks she sounds far more scary puppet than seductive clown. Instead of one of the series’ great villains, General Knoxx of the Crimson Lance, the film pits its protagonists against his (made-up) daughter, who betrays no character development until she randomly decides to stand up to her boss and gets murdered for it. Tiny Tina, the eccentric thirteen-year-old hyperactive bomb-maker who stole the spotlight so effectively in Borderlands 2 that she got her very own DLC campaign and spin-off game, is barely recognizable. They made her a rather quiet and sullen teen always snarking at the adults around her while doing nothing to move the story forward, despite being stuck as its narrative center. See, they made movie Tina a straight-up Chosen One—she’s a clone made from alien blood, and the only person that can theoretically open the legendary Vault of Pandora. That’s why all of the antagonists are after her, and that’s why Borderlands the movie is a two-hour escort mission. Yet, after her introduction to Lilith, Tina barely even blows anything up, let alone exercises any agency. 

Ah yes. Poor Lilith. The iconic hero of the series. Eli Roth did her dirtiest of all. While being portrayed by the immensely talented Cate Blanchett is an honor any fictional character would dream of, she looks utterly bored for most of the movie, even in the midst of a gunfight. At the beginning of the first game, Lilith is twenty-two years old. She came to Pandora explicitly to hunt for the Vault, and she has cool glowing tattoos as a result of her supernatural siren powers. Lilith is also one of the vanishingly few characters in the series with an intact conscience. She doesn’t even believe in killing people for sport! After the first game, she spends more time running the city of Sanctuary as a community leader, happy to leave the Vault hunting to the player. The only thing Blanchett’s version has in common with her inspiration is the red hair. And later, the powers. The mysterious Sirens and their strange abilities are a major part of Borderlands lore, but the movie explicitly ties them to the alien artifacts on Pandora. Lilith only discovers her powers in the last twenty minutes of the movie so she can serve as its deus ex machina, wiping out the bad guys and saving all her friends in a burst of cheap CG to cover up the fact they still couldn’t write a better ending. Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying in any way that Cate Blanchett didn’t give the best performance she was capable of. Her grumpy and sarcastic bounty hunter is a compelling enough character to lead a movie; she just isn’t really Lilith. 

The same goes for the guns. Your weapons are practically supporting characters in the games, each with their own quirks and personality. A player’s choice of firearms can reveal a lot about them before they ever say a word. A few legendary guns get name-checked, like the Vladof Infinity pistol, and it looks just like the one you can find in the games, but that’s it. We never learn what makes that one special, or even why Lilith chose it out of the eleventy-gazillion guns available all over Pandora. In the movie, none of them shoot anything other than bullets. Which is not just disappointing, it also eliminates a ton of the world-building that makes Borderlands feel like its own distinct place rather than just another generic sci-fi wasteland. 

Other than the existence of the coveted Vault of Pandora, the plot of the movie bears absolutely no resemblance to its source material. Movie Lilith goes on a journey from lonely bounty hunter to a Vault Hunter with friends. But in the first game, Lilith is already a Vault Hunter and her heroic journey is about reluctantly accepting the mantle of leadership. Her and Roland are also in love, but their romance was left out of the movie. Tiny Tina and Krieg don’t show up until the second game, and their inclusion here means that other great characters from the first entry, like Brick and Mordecai, have been cut out completely. Which is a shame, because Tina’s little sister dynamic with big brawler Brick is one of the more endearing pairings in the entire series. They try to replicate this with Krieg in the movie, but its hard to bond with a character that has been turned into a homicidal slab of meat screaming nonsense, with no indication there is anything else going on behind that mask. It is a disservice to one of the series’ more complex characters. 

There’s only two characters that make it to the silver screen intact: Marcus and Claptrap. Benjamin Byron Davis gives a pitch-perfect portrayal of the friendly-yet-ruthless arms dealer Marcus Kincaid—my only note is to use him in more scenes! Marcus Munitions is a pillar of the Sanctuary community. Without his network of vending machines, crossing the Borderlands would be a lot more treacherous for everyone. Jack Black similarly nails his vocal performance of irritating-yet-lovable robot Claptrap, the mascot of the series. He manages to strike that perfect balance of sounding like the character without falling into rote imitation of the previous performer. He’s still the same hilariously obnoxious little bot fans love to hate, and his comic relief moments are some of the best parts of the movie.

So, after reading all of that, I’m sure you’re thinking “Wait… Didn’t you say the movie wasn’t that bad? Because it sounds terrible.” I get it. I understand your confusion. But if you look back at everything I said, you’ll notice a theme. Most of the movie’s problems stem from misrepresenting the source material. If this film was simply Eli Roth’s unique vision for a hyper violent sci-fi action comedy rather than a botched adaptation of a beloved franchise, most of my criticisms fade away like gun smoke. Most, but not all. 

While there are pieces of a decent flick here, they’ve been assembled and edited haphazardly. Visually, Pandora looks pretty good. They visit a few locations and kill lots of CG critters that players will recognize. Sanctuary feels like a real place people live in, rather than just a quest hub. They spend way too long in Roland’s truck having a rather boring chase scene, but Cate Blanchett does look amazing dispatching waves of psychos with a pistol in each hand.

Which brings us inexorably to the film’s most fatal flaw: the PG-13 rating. Let me attempt to explain what a tremendously bad idea that was. The titular setting of the Borderlands franchise is a savage and lawless post-apocalyptic wasteland—think Mad Max with more guns and crappier cars. It is impossible to overstate just how hostile an environment Pandora truly is. In addition to all variety of vicious flora and fauna, it is also home to clans of bloodthirsty psychos that kill just for kicks. Borderlands is the kind of game where you burn through bullets by the boxful spilling buckets of blood and splattering bandit body parts all across the landscape. The most insane weapons you can find will reduce enemies to glistening red chunks in glorious High Definition. Nearly every character you meet is a murder connoisseur of one variety or another, for there is no such thing as an innocent Pandoran. Violence is the global pastime. 

By eliminating all of the blood and guts, the movie renders the dangers of Pandora toothless. It’s hard to believe our heroes are ever truly threatened since we never see anyone get hurt. Waves of psychos get gunned down and just flop on the floor bloodlessly. Krieg swings around a giant buzz-axe, but never seems to cut anyone—it just knocks them aside like a bat. Lilith and company weather the entire film without a single noteworthy injury, which makes Pandora feel more like a carnival ride than the meat-grinder of a world the script keeps insisting it really is. Lots of people talk about what a scary planet it is, but the movie provides little compelling evidence of that. Roland even gets set up for an epic last stand scene, holding back a tide of psychos alone to buy his friends time to flee, and he just… survives? No special tactic or maneuver saves him. He’s just found under a pile of bodies when his friends return and pick him up to continue the story like nothing happened. 

The decision to nerf the violence seems like another unforced error mandated from the executive suite rather than the director’s chair. I sincerely doubt Eli Roth, who directed the disturbingly graphic Hostel films, envisioned a Borderlands free of viscera. But someone made what they called a “business decision” and sanded off all the edges in a desperate bid to make it safe for everyone, thus ensuring it would appeal to no one. Perhaps they should have considered that if the built-in audience of millions of Borderlands fans didn’t like the movie, there would be no one to convince those unfamiliar with the property that it was worth watching. 

The movie wasn’t the cinematic crime critical consensus makes it out to be, but Borderlands is my favorite video game franchise, and I can’t even recommend you watch it ironically. How sad is that? After such an abysmal performance, it seems unlikely we’ll be seeing the Borderlands back on the big screen anytime soon, and that’s a shame. Pandora is a rich and vibrant setting full of interesting characters with fascinating stories—it really shouldn’t be this hard to turn some of that into a decent popcorn movie. 

The original Vault Hunters from the first game

How Olympic Breaking Was Broken

So the first, and likely only, Olympic breaking competition has come and gone. Japan’s B-girl Ami and Canada’s Phil Wizard took home the first gold medals in the history of the sport, and they were well-deserved. While it was certainly fun to watch a lineup that included five former world champions battle it out in the big circle, in the end it wasn’t a particularly good showing for the sport, leaving a lackluster first impression on the global stage. Much to my surprise, by the time the last record spun, I had concluded that the Olympics wasn’t really the best place for breaking to be. Let me explain.

First and foremost, the anchors and commentators and officials and whatever other powers that be completely failed to explain how the scoring worked. Millions of people were watching a breakdance battle for the first time, and none of them had any idea who was winning or why. Other Olympic sports, no matter how odd or obscure, do not have this problem. I was able to learn the basics of curling within half an hour of turning on my TV. Even a more subjective competition, like figure skating, does a better job of informing the audience what a winning performance looks like. But other than a brief rundown of some vocabulary, breaking got almost no introduction to the Olympic audience. There were several decisions by the judges that drew choruses of boos from the confused onlookers. And some of them were bad decisions, but I’ll get to that in just a bit. As far as introducing the sport of breaking to a new audience, the Olympics dropped the ball and it was a totally unforced error. 

The battle between Vicious Victor of America and Hiro10 from Japan made the divide between the judges and the audience all too clear. Hiro10 put on a dazzling display of power combos, spending a truly incredible amount of time spinning on his head, and the crowd understandably went nuts—they were watching something that seemed impossible, but he made it look easy. While Victor danced a very clean, competent set like he always does, it was nowhere near as impressive as his opponent’s, and the quietness of the crowd during Victor’s turn confirmed it. And although it was obvious to even the most casual observer that Hiro10 had won decisively, the judges voted overwhelmingly for Victor, which drew down angry shouts from a stadium full of confused and frustrated people. I can’t recall another time the Olympic judges were booed by the entire crowd. Quite frankly, it felt like Victor was just given the bronze so that an American could stand on the podium for breaking’s Olympic debut. It was obvious to anyone with eyes that Hiro10 could perform every move Victor did, but Victor definitely couldn’t do everything Hiro10 did. In any other sport, that would decide the winner. The ice skater that can’t land a triple lutz loses to the one that can.

Sadly, the gold medal battle was ultimately underwhelming. France’s Dany Dann and Canada’s Phil Wizard performed two killer rounds. But in the third, Dany Dann landed a move wrong and seemingly hurt himself because he abruptly ended his turn afterward, even making a gesture conceding the battle to his opponent. Of course, that’s nobody’s fault and mistakes happen when you’re breakdancing, but it was a bummer of a way to conclude the sport’s first Olympic showing. Nobody wants to win gold by forfeit, and it doesn’t make for compelling viewing, either. 

Now, we have to talk about the kangaroo in the room. *Sigh*

Dr. Rachel “Raygun” Gunn, a university lecturer and self-proclaimed b-girl from Australia, put on such a pathetically shameful display that it has completely dominated all conversations about Olympic breaking. It was readily apparent, even before she failed to score a single point, that Dr. Gunn was completely, hilariously out of her league. She did a kangaroo hop and even the fucking sprinkler—it was like watching your mom dance after her third glass of wine. Dr. Gunn displayed absolutely no command of even the most basic fundamentals of breaking. She had no power, no footwork, no downrock, and zero finesse. Completely unable to do anything remotely interesting or impressive, or even keep her flailing on the beat. At one point, it looked like her opponent interrupted her turn just to spare her more humiliation. To put it bluntly, Dr. Gunn had no business being on that stage, and what she did was an embarrassment to herself, Australia, the Olympics, and the entire sport of breaking. 

So, how did she manage to do all of that in just three rounds? Is she really that bad a dancer?

The short answer is YES. As of this writing, Gunn’s is the only Olympic battle I have not been able to find a complete recording for. Australian news anchors divulged that they “weren’t allowed” to show the footage. The clips I have seen would have been embarrassing even for a first year breaker. But Gunn claims she’s been breaking for 16 years, which actually makes her look so much worse. I haven’t thrown down in a circle in over 20 years, but I could easily recreate Gunn’s entire set right now without a single second of practice, and you could, too. That’s how simplistic and facile her dance was. She kept insisting in interviews that what she brought to the cypher was “creativity and originality” but she didn’t do anything you haven’t seen a hyperactive six year old do. Sure, other b-girls aren’t biting her moves, but that’s because they are awful, not because they’re “too original.” To be brutally honest, there is no context in which what Dr. Gunn did could be described as good dancing. 

Then Australia’s Olympic Chief tried to come to her defense, sounding downright delusional as she tried to play the misogyny card. She told a story about Dr. Gunn crying in 2008 because breaking was such a male-dominated sport and talked about how much Gunn deserved to be there because of her academic dedication. Interestingly, no mention was made of Dr. Gunn’s skill as a b-girl, because she literally has none. This coach actually tried to make her out to be some kind of hero to women athletes because she so bravely showed up in a place she did not belong and made a fool of herself and her country. To be clear, nobody said Gunn didn’t belong there because she was a woman—there were 13 other b-girls who actually deserved to be there doing some world-class breakdancing. And all of them got overshadowed by this Australian set of clown shoes. 

The worst part is that Gunn didn’t just embarrass herself or her country, but the entire sport of breaking. Sending her out there as Australia’s champion was a slap in the face to b-girls back at home and around the world. And the circumstances of her selection are suspect at best. Gunn spent the last few years attending breakdancing competitions all over Australia, where she consistently placed between 40th-70th. But then, miraculously, she won one! From 70th place to first in just a few years. She must be an incredible breakdancer, or a really good cheater. Anyone who saw her performance in Paris knows it wasn’t the former. And that was it. Just the one. Apparently that was enough to let her walk onto the Olympic stage. Every other b-girl in attendance had multiple national or world titles to their names and had achieved top places in numerous Olympic qualifiers. According to the Chief, all Gunn had to do was “want it so bad.”

In short, what Dr. Gunn did was entirely selfish. At first, I wanted to believe she was just delusional, but I eventually came to realize that none of this was an accident. She did it all on purpose. Gunn’s doctorate is in cultural studies, specifically the social dynamics of breaking, which means she knew exactly what she was doing. Nobody misled her to believe she was a good breakdancer—she’s watched the best b-girls in Australia her entire career, and she knew for a fact that she was not one of them. But that didn’t stop her from taking an Olympic opportunity away from a girl that might have done herself and her country proud. Why would someone who loves b-girls and breaking so much do that?

Academic exploitation, plain and simple. Dr. Gunn researches and writes about breaking professionally, so her farcical failure can be mined for content for the rest of her career. She’ll still get tons of papers, articles, interviews and speaking gigs out of that experience, even though she was an utter laughingstock. Because now if you try to search for “Olympics breaking” (or any variation thereof) the first pictures you see won’t be of Ami and Phil Wizard biting their gold medals—no, you’ll see page after page of this clown, each pose stupider than the one before. Dr. Gunn has become the face of breaking worldwide. Instead of the incredible athletes who put on jaw-dropping performances, the public discourse on breaking is now all about a woman that cannot breakdance. This was breaking’s chance to be taken seriously as a sport on the world stage, and she destroyed that opportunity with her unpracticed convulsing. Presenting Dr. Gunn as a world-class breakdancer undermines all of the hard work thousands of real b-boys and b-girls have been putting in for decades. It’s now very unlikely breaking will be taken seriously anytime in the near future—her performance was so bad it damaged the reputation of the entire sport. It won’t be included at the next games. Every asshole out there that says breakdancing is just dumb people rolling around on the floor now has all the ammunition they need, and that’s thanks to Dr. Gunn. No doubt someday in the future another young PhD hopeful will write a thesis about the many negative impacts the selfish entitlement of Dr. Rachel Gunn had on the culture of breaking. She is easily, and without exaggeration, the worst thing to happen to breakdancing in my lifetime. 

The First Reboot (2003)

After its debut in 1987, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was the most popular cartoon on television for the better part of a decade. Although all good things come to an end, profitable things often get to come back. That’s why the Ninja Turtles got their first reboot in 2003—it was a chance to reconnect with old fans and create a generation of new ones while moving merchandise by the metric ton. And it was largely successful at all three of those things. It was proof positive that the Turtles were not an outdated relic best left in the ‘90s, but a powerhouse franchise that could be rebooted and re-shaped to sell toys and T-shirts to a new age. Reboot it just right, and the property could print money in perpetuity!

Of course, the first and most obvious difference everyone notices in the 2003 series is the art. This show adopts a style much closer to the original comic book. The Turtles are each different shades of green, and they have the blank white eyes behind their masks that prove to be surprisingly expressive. The rest of the characters and the world they live in have a bold and blocky minimalist style, with lots of thick lines reminiscent of the black and white pages that birthed the franchise. Their movement looks pretty cheap in the first season, but the animation becomes smoother and more fluid with each year that passes. The color scheme reflects the much darker thematic tone set by this series.

Its theme song is absolute garbage. Doesn’t matter which one. This show committed three crimes in musical form. They represent the worst of the high-pitched pop-punk/hip-hop fusion that was already annoying back in 2001. I’m pretty sure no classrooms full of fourth graders were singing it at their teachers. That the show succeeded with critics and fans despite replacing one of the most iconic theme songs of all time with increasingly worse versions is a testament to how well the rest of the production is executed. This show also tries to avoid catchphrases until the sixth season introduces the lackluster declaration “It’s ninja time!” There are no celebrations of Turtle Power or Pizza Time. I think Mikey says “Cowabunga” once in the whole series, and Raph slaps him on the back of the head and tells him to stop being a dork. 

I know it sounds ridiculous to say this about a show that primarily features mutant amphibians performing martial arts, but the 2003 revival is a much more grounded story. It’s still the kind of Saturday morning cartoon where even the bad guys try not to hurt anyone, but this version of TMNT played it (mostly) straight. The hordes of Foot Clan henchmen the Turtles fight are human beings rather than robots, and there are very few other mutants—not even the classic duo of Bebop and Rocksteady make an appearance. Where the original cartoon was a slapstick comedy with some action in it, this series is a martial arts action show with some humor in it. The titular teenagers take fighting crime very seriously, and while they still crack jokes and make pop culture references, they never turn to camera and address the audience directly. Battles don’t end when someone slips on a banana peel or crashes into a pile of boxes. Sometimes the Turtles even lose, suffer lasting injuries, and grapple with their PTSD while trying to recover physically. 

So let’s talk about the real heart of the series, the Ninja Turtles themselves. The brotherly bond between the four is much more developed and centered in the show. It’s just as much fun to watch them hanging out eating pizza as kicking ninja butt. Like all teenage boys they can’t help starting stupid fights on occasion, but at the end of the day it’s always clear how much they love each other. Oftentimes it feels like Leonardo is the only one legitimately interested in being a hero, and his brothers just tag along to watch his back. Which also makes it more interesting when Michelangelo or Donatello suddenly care about standing up for something that puts them at odds with the rest of their weird little family. All of the Turtles get to develop a little more individual personality as well. We learn that Leo is a history buff and a fan of old war movies. We see that Mikey is an artist who can’t resist drawing stick figures and silly symbols on everything he owns. And we watch as Raphael discovers that he’s a gearhead who loves working on engines and driving way too fast. 

For the most part, the actors playing Leonardo, Donatello and Michelangelo sound like they’re doing their best impression of their predecessors. Which is fine—you wouldn’t want to make too many changes to a formula that works. Mikey is still the chill party dude, and Donny is the awkward high school nerd. But they made Raphael sound like a grumpy cab driver from Brooklyn, and it totally works for him. You know exactly what kind of angry asshole he is as soon as he starts talking. And it also made me wonder: how is Raph the only one with a New York accent? 

Splinter’s voice is uniquely terrible, as it is painfully obvious that a white person is imitating an Asian accent. Just… so bad. Can’t believe that shit happened in 2003, and continued for the entire run of the show. It sounds like a placeholder somebody in the office recorded and forgot to switch it out with real audio. This version of April O’Neil never becomes a reporter or dons a yellow jumpsuit. At the beginning of the series she seems to be on the path to becoming a scientist, working in a lab under future villain Baxter Stockman, until four mutant turtles being chased by a horde of robots she helped create wrecked her workplace. After that, she becomes the second member of the Turtles’ IT department, which is useful when Donny is unavailable, or if he needs another nerd to help him with the science. Thankfully, she doesn’t get the damsel treatment as frequently as her predecessor. Casey Jones gets to be more than a one-note joke as a classic New York knucklehead with a heart of gold who can’t say no to an honest fight. And Usagi Yojimbo, the honorable samurai rabbit from another universe, is as awesome as he is underutilized. 

While the Turtles have plenty of great friends, it is the villains that always steal the show. We’ll save the obvious one for last. This version of Baxter Stockman is closer to his comic counterpart in personality even though his story has a very different arc. Stockman is a truly brilliant man continuously humbled by his own hubris, so assured of his own genius that he overlooks tiny details with big consequences. It seriously never occurred to him that serving as tech support to an evil ninja clan was a bad idea that would lead to disastrous results. Instead of accidentally mutating himself into a fly, this Baxter suffers a far worse fate. Every time he fails, the Shredder punishes him by removing a body part and replacing it with a cybernetic implement, until he is no more than a brain in a jar begging to die. 

This show also created several new villains that became fan-favorites and staples of the canon going forward. Hun, the leader of the Purple Dragons street gang, both worships and seeks to usurp the Shredder as the lord of the Foot Clan. He loves his master so much he starts to hate him, and that conflict makes him more interesting than the average goon. We were also introduced to Agent Bishop, the hyper-competent paranoid xenophobic secret government operative with an infinite budget and zero oversight. He originally mistakes the Turtles for alien invaders and declares war on them. Even after they help him save the world from a real alien invasion, Bishop doesn’t take them off his capture/kill list. Which makes his centuries-long redemption arc all the more impressive.

Obviously, the biggest bad is the Shredder. This show has four of them! One of the more interesting concepts this series introduced was that the Shredder was not one singular bad guy, but a mantle worn by several different villains. The original was a man named Oroku Saki, a ninja lord in feudal Japan who was as notorious for his mercilessness as he was his skill. When the Emperor sent him to slay a legendary tengu, Saki cut a deal instead, letting the demon into his soul in exchange for unimaginable power. He raised an army of monsters and plunged Japan into an age of darkness that he planned to spread to the entire world. The Ninja Tribunal, an assembly of the greatest living warriors, was finally able to defeat and capture the Shredder, but they could not destroy him. So the demonic ninja lord was sealed inside a casket, separated from his magic helmet and gauntlet. The pieces were kept far apart to ensure the Shredder never rose again, but of course he did eventually. 

The second Shredder, although he’s the first one introduced in the show, is an impostor. Under all that pointy armor, he’s actually Ch’rell, a dangerous fugitive from the alien race known as the Utroms—Krang’s people, if you only remember the original cartoon. This murderous pink blob wound up stranded on Earth in the 15th century when his escape attempt went sideways. But Ch’rell isn’t going to let that impede his plans for conquest and domination. To that end, he builds an exosuit that looks like the fabled tengu Shredder and assumes his identity so he can take control of the Foot Clan. In an odd way, this character combines Shredder and Krang into one villain. Using his stolen army of ninjas, the pretender built a criminal empire that expanded far beyond the shores of Japan. The Utroms live for centuries, so Ch’rell gathered his power while he waited for the day Earth’s technology finally advanced enough to repair his spaceship. Then he will return to his homeworld and take revenge on those that banished him. 

Ironically, the second Shredder raised the third. Karai was an orphan girl taken in by the impostor and trained to be his right hand. As she grew up, Karai became increasingly aware that her adoptive father was not a nice man. Despite discovering his true nature and evil plans, and generally not approving of either of those things, she still feels honor-bound to serve the father figure that saved her from a short life of suffering in squalor and transformed her into one of the most dangerous women alive. But Karai cannot escape her father’s shadow even after he is believed to be slain in battle with the Turtles. She assumes the mantle of the Shredder, but instead of pursuing her vision for the future of the Foot Clan, her misplaced honor demands a prolonged quest for revenge that accomplishes nothing, wastes a great deal of man power and resources, and ultimately makes Karai look very foolish, like a child stumbling about in their father’s shoes. Her devotion to her deceased father undermines her authority with his followers. Of all the Shredders seen on this show, Karai’s tenure was the shortest. When her father returns from the grave, she immediately surrenders the clan and all of her autonomy to him. But a glimpse of a possible future showed her leading the Foot Clan once again, suggesting that Karai will tire of dutiful daughterhood eventually.

The fourth and final Shredder is a copy. Not like a devoted fan that went way too far, but a literal digital copy. See, Ch’rell the impostor created an AI backup of his mind as a final failsafe. For very complicated reasons, the copy is awakened in the distant future and hitches a ride on a robot that travels back to the present day. Although he rules cyberspace with a silicon fist, the Cyber Shredder spends most of Season 7 trying to find a way into the real world. The Turtles have to digitize themselves to fight him INSIDE THE INTERNET. Which conveniently necessitated a redesign of all the main characters and a new line of vehicles for cruising the information superhighway that no doubt sold a lot of brightly colored plastic to children. 

Bonus round: a fifth Shredder does make an appearance before the end of the show. But he doesn’t really count for reasons that would be spoilers, and I don’t want to ruin the fun. 

Overall, this show proved the narrative versatility of the Ninja Turtles. Part of what makes the concept so brilliant is that giant talking turtles who do martial arts look weird and out of place even in their hometown of NYC. Since our heroes always look weird and out of place, you can drop them into almost any kind of story and it still makes sense, even if it doesn’t. The Turtles are equally at home fighting street punks, robot ninjas, mutant monsters, or alien warlords. Even this (slightly) more grounded show sends them to outer space and alternate dimensions. They travel back in time to ride on dinosaurs, and they travel 100 years into the future on accident, getting stuck there for all of Season 6. They even go inside a computer to fight a sentient virus. The Turtles wear the weirdness on their non-existent sleeves, simultaneously acknowledging and ignoring it. Looking strange is their normal, so much so that when they are in a place that takes no notice of them it feels wrong. It may not make any sense for giant turtles to show up and start kicking butt all over feudal Japan, but it’s always interesting. That’s why so many episodes of this show start in medias res—it’s fun to just throw the Ninja Turtles into unusual situations and watch them fight their way out of it. 

The 2003 revival was a pleasant surprise for me. I always knew it existed, but never found the time to watch it until now. It seems to have taken all of the coolest stuff I remember from the original comics and cartoons and given it all a fresh coat of paint for modern audiences while adding plenty of new stuff to the canon for future creators to play around with. The artwork, animation and writing are all improvements over its predecessor. Although I didn’t know it back then, this show was proving that the Turtles franchise wasn’t just a beloved relic of the ‘90s—it had real staying power, and the potential to keep producing loyal fans with every passing generation. It’s no exaggeration to say that without this show, there would have been no more Ninja Turtles on our TVs every Saturday morning. And to top it all off, it’s still a pretty good watch today. It still has the obviously neutered action of children’s television, but it never lets that get in the way of telling a good story about four brothers against the universe. 

If you haven’t seen 2003’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I highly recommend you rectify that error as soon as possible. I’m glad I did. It has inspired confidence that I made the right decision starting The Complete Cowabunga Critique, and I’m looking forward to what the next series (2012’s computer-animated affair) has to offer. Am I in for another pleasant surprise? Or am I overdue for a crushing disappointment? Let’s find out.

Intro to Criteria

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are one of the most brilliantly designed pop culture phenomenons ever produced. You can’t really argue otherwise without making yourself look terribly foolish. Even if you don’t care for everyone’s favorite amphibious martial artists, there’s no denying their Brobdingnagian appeal, and their resulting impact on popular culture. New series, movies, and video games continue to be produced. The Turtles have been rebooted no less than four times, with varying degrees of success. But the franchise has never rested for long, with yet another new animated series about to drop even as I type. Whatever the indefinable ephemeral “it” is, the Turtles have “it” by the bucketful. 

I’ll admit right now that The Complete Cowabunga Critique cannot even pretend to be impartial. The original Ninja Turtles cartoon was a big part of my childhood, and the source of many great memories. It may be hard for younger generations to fathom but when I was eight years old, the Ninja Turtles weren’t just the most popular show or the hottest toy in the world. They were the biggest thing in the world. Period. 

For example… on the last day of fourth grade, our teachers threw the kids a pizza party and wheeled in a TV with a VCR to keep us occupied until the final bell of the year. My teacher popped in the VHS tape that came with the pizza—a collection of Ninja Turtles episodes. As soon as the theme song began to play, every kid in the room was singing along at the top of our lungs. I remember the look of shock on my poor teacher’s face. She had been trying and failing to get this class of fourth graders to sing the national anthem in harmony for months, and now here we were belting out the Ninja Turtles theme with perfect synchronicity, completely unsupervised by any adult. There were forty kids in that room, and all of them knew every single word of that song. I wonder if there’s anything that could provoke a similar response in the classrooms of today. Pokemon, perhaps. 

But indulging my old memories is not the point of this post. As I prepare to perform an exhaustive critique of the entirety of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I wanted to lay down the ground rules and establish the criteria for review. All of the animated series will be judged on the following elements:

• Theme Song: Obviously a huge part of the original series’ success. You might be surprised that anyone has ever attempted to replace it, but they have. 

• Art Style: How does the show look? What inspirations and influences are present? How smooth is the animation?

• The Turtles: The titular band of brothers, the cornerstone of this whole thing. How do the characters work separately and together? How do Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael and Michelangelo relate to each other not just as partners, but family?

• Friends: The Turtles are often aided on their quests by a myriad of interesting allies— from Channel 6’s top news reporter to everyone’s favorite samurai rabbit. How many friends new and old do we meet, and how well are they represented?

• Foes: Every series would be more boring without a stable of villains to reliably threaten our heroes. Of course Shredder has been the most memorable, but the Turtles have amassed an extensive rogues’ gallery over the decades. In fact, it is fairly common for new characters created for the show to eventually be integrated into the comics. Who gives the Turtles the most trouble, and looks the coolest while doing it?

• Notable Stories: The Turtles’ origin story gets retold the most, but it’s not even close to one of their best stories. They have fought ninjas, robots, and aliens. Traveled all over the world and through space and time, as well. The Ninja Turtles are remarkably versatile protagonists, so what are the best and most memorable stories of each series?

• Catch Phrases: From “Cowabunga!” to “Hot Soup!”, no Ninja Turtles series is complete without one.

• Lasting Impacts: What new and interesting things does the series add to the lore? How did each show change the Turtles and their world?

Those are the criteria I’ll be using to critique the various animated series. I’ll conclude with an overview of each one and how watchable it is today. And of course, how it compares to my warm and fuzzy memories. Just a reminder, my first critique will be of the 2003 series, since I’ve never seen it before. I’m looking forward to it. 

The Complete Cowabunga Critique

I’m pleased to announce my latest adventure in pop culture over-analysis: The Complete Cowabunga Critique. 

Paramount Plus keeps reminding me that it is the home of all things Ninja Turtles, one of the most beloved franchises of my childhood. So eventually I figured “Why the shell not? Let’s do this.” 

That’s right. I am embarking on a quest to re-watch and review the entirety of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Every show, every movie, every video game. Not the comics. Sorry, not sorry, but I want this critique to end before I die. This post is mostly a public promise to myself so that I can’t abandon the project. 

I’m going to take a unique approach. Instead of beginning with the first cartoon like any sane person would, I’m going to start with the 2003 revival series. My reasons are thus:

1 - I have seen very little of this show, as it aired when I was in college and not spending my Saturday mornings watching cartoons. Starting with something I haven’t seen before will make it more fun for me, which will also increase the likelihood of me finishing this project. 

2 - I haven’t seen the original cartoon since it aired when I was a kid. I have heard and read secondhand that it did not age well and I don’t find that hard to believe, as it was made at the height of “Cheaper is Better!” ‘80s animation. But my own memory of that particular slice of my childhood is still intact and untarnished by the truth. As I watch everything that came after, I want to savor all of the memories that they will undoubtedly trigger and record them honestly.

3 - When I do get to the original series, for good or ill, there will be big feelings involved. Even though I’m a long way from getting there, it already feels like an appropriate finale—returning to a beloved childhood memory with the unkind eyes of an adult.

So that’s the plan. I’ve got seven seasons of cartoons to get through before my first review, so it will probably be a while. But, I wrote it down and posted it here, so now I gotta do it.

The Weird Reversed Career of The Crystal Method

The Crystal Method never made a song better than “Keep Hope Alive,” their very first single. It was (and remains) the most Crystal Method song in their entire catalogue. It is their signature sound, the one that established them as major players in 90s techno. And they’ve never rivaled its heights again. 

That’s not to say the rest of their albums weren’t any good. Tweekend was great dance floor fodder, and their self-titled album was a welcome return to form, but neither had the impact of Vegas. How could they? That CD was a perfectly crystalized slice of 1997, a powerful blend of samples, synths and breakbeats that scored car commercials and action movies when it wasn’t breaking stereos and deafening ravers all over the country. Nearly every track was commercially licensed. As soon as any of those songs began to play, you knew what you were watching was going to be cool. Vegas still sounds like the future almost 30 years later, something that can’t be said of the Method’s subsequent work. 

Again, I’m not saying the other albums were bad. Except for Divided by Night—that one was a terrible disappointment we will eviscerate later. Most of the rest is perfectly serviceable breakbeat shredder. What’s unique about the Crystal Method’s discography is the release order, starting with a genre-defining masterpiece and slowly progressing into a fumbling freeform experimentalism. That’s not a typical trajectory for a musical career. Or rather, it is, just in reverse. 

Most musicians, but especially those that make electronica, begin their journey by just messing around and seeing what interesting sounds they can make. These efforts usually result in music that is fun if unrefined. Strangely, this accurately describes the Crystal Method’s last two albums, The Trip Home and The Trip Out. Rather than the most recent release of a weathered veteran, these albums sound like the first fledgling attempts of a new artist who is still figuring it out, but shows tremendous potential. The songs are quite long and rambling, full of weird spacey interludes and heavy bass punctuated with meandering waves of synth. Although they’re an interesting listen, these two albums contain surprisingly few dance floor friendly tracks from a group known to dominate them. While there are a few bangers in the bunch, there is nothing as iconic as “Keep Hope Alive,” or even “Wild, Sweet and Cool,” for that matter. These are the only two Crystal Method albums where I cannot name a single song from memory. They’re a good time, but ultimately forgettable. It’s just odd that they were produced by an artist with 30 years experience rocking dance floors, and not some rookie cutting his first mixtape. 

The Crystal Method, their self-titled 2014 album, feels like a sophomore effort from an ambitious new musician determined to improve. It doubles down on the heavy synth and big beats heard on The Trip Home and The Trip Out, but tightens up the structure even as it adds complexity. It firmly establishes the “five minutes into the future” sound that would become the Method’s enduring signature. Or it would have, if The Crystal Method was their second album rather than their fifth. As it is, that album served as more of a capstone on an era of electronic music rather than a ground-breaking foray into new and original sounds.

Divided By Night is the ludicrously terrible concept album that somebody should have tried harder to discourage. It’s a hazard that befalls many musicians fortunate enough to make more than two albums, and the Crystal Method was not immune. The Chemical Brothers have the disjointed Born In The Echoes, Moby has the disinterested Hotel, and even the Beastie Boys have that one ill-advised punk record. Divided By Night is trying so hard to sound “different” that it ultimately fails to do anything interesting. It is littered with boring beats and lackluster vocals, including the worst performance I have ever heard from Matisyahu. The “best” tracks this album has to offer sound like elevator music covers of better Crystal Method songs. When you’re ready for the party to be over and you want everyone to get the fuck out of your house, just put on Divided By Night. Your place will be empty by Track 4.

Legion of Boom sounds like the over-correction made in the wake of Divided By Night’s utterly flat failure. On this reversed timeline, Legion of Boom takes the role of a welcome return to form after a disappointing deviation. It doubles down on the most recognizable elements of its predecessors—more synths, thicker basslines, heavier guitar riffs—producing a much more industrial sound. Lots of threatening beats and aggressive vocals. It even has one chill downtempo song, just like all of their best albums. Many of its best tracks feel like a machine struggling to break its programming, constantly pushing the boundaries between breakbeats and techno, but ultimately unsure what to do once it got there. In the end, Legion of Boom was more shrill than it was edgy, a loud statement that the Crystal Method continued to exist, devoid of any real substance. It’s not a bad album, but it never got the radio and dance floor plays that its predecessors did in either version of the timeline. Legion of Boom has no unforgettable classics like “Keep Hope Alive,” but it also doesn’t have any embarrassing flubs like “Drown in the Now.” A fun and energetic listen, it just doesn’t have enough personality to be anybody’s favorite.

Continuing along this timeline, the Crystal Method’s second album, Tweekend, becomes their sixth. And that simple change elevates it into something truly special rather than the first step of a long decline. They appear to have taken all the lessons learned from both their successes and failures, and synthesized them into one fantastic breakbeat record. Tweekend has all of the Method’s strengths, and shockingly few weaknesses. “Murder” and “Name of the Game” are the only ill-advised mergers of grunge and breakbeat on this album, an idea that had plagued all of its “predecessors.” Thrashing guitars are still prevalent throughout, but with the previous two exceptions, they don’t overpower the rest of the song. This record is fast, frenetic, and pulsing with energy. You will find it extremely difficult to sit still when it’s on. Tweekend feels like the Crystal Method refining their own unique electronic sound instead of a rock album made by a robot. In that way, it is strange that Tweekend was actually the follow-up rather than the precursor to the Method’s greatest work, Vegas. 

Vegas is a thing of sublime sonic beauty. A record nobody else could have made in any other time, not even the Crystal Method. A sound sleek as glass and sharper than a katana. It is liquid hype in an aerosol can, ready to burst into flames at the slightest spark. Put on any track, and within thirty seconds you’ll be ready to win a drag race or fight a room full of ninjas. It starts off slow, with the spaced-out acid tech vibe of “Trip Like I Do,” but catches you by surprise when it finally kicks off. After that, Vegas never taps the brakes, pouring gallon after gallon of gas into a vibrant pumping engine of music. The massive reverberating big beat of “Busy Child” builds into the minimalist synthwave rhythms of “Cherry Twist,” which gradually gives way to the fat delicious heavy bass groove of “High Roller.” Trixie Reiss gives the best vocal performances the Method ever had on “Comin Back” and “Jaded.” And of course, Vegas included the dance floor shattering single “Keep Hope Alive.” 

Vegas was the album of 1997. It took off like a space shuttle the first time a DJ gave it a spin. This record was inescapable. You heard it everywhere—on the radio, in the club, bumping from car windows and juicing up action movie trailers. Any footage you had instantly became 95% cooler when it was set to the pulsating vibrations of the Crystal Method. Hell, when my father went to buy his midlife crisis sports car, the salesman showed off the stereo by cranking up the subwoofer on “Vapor Trail.” And it fucking worked. My father drove around in an uncomfortably small gas-guzzling Ferrari that he hated for two years because it was just too rad to resist when the Method was pumping through its speakers. It would be difficult to think of any album from that year that was more influential. The best tracks on Vegas didn’t just inspire future musicians to copy them, they literally convinced us to buy things we didn’t need just because they look so cool with the hook for “Keep Hope Alive” playing in the background. Most musicians of any genre would count themselves fortunate to make an album half as iconic after decades of hard work, but the Crystal Method absolutely crushed it on their first attempt. They continued to make great music after, but nothing as world-flipping as their first single. It’s not really all that surprising that they were never able to surpass the perfect electric craftsmanship of Vegas—nobody could. “Keep Hope Alive” was the pinnacle of a career that just started; a track so amazing that everything that followed it couldn’t help but look derivative.

What a strange, reversed trajectory for a musician. To begin with your magnum opus, and then spend the rest of your career getting close, but never surpassing it. Vegas still sounds like the final refined product of a long percolating process, but it’s more like the Big Bang that created the Crystal Method in a burst of sound and fury, and its been ever-so-slowly collapsing in on itself ever since. 

Wow. That last bit sounds a lot harsher than I meant it. I really do think the Crystal Method is a great producer with more good tracks than bad ones. It was just the order of their releases that struck me as so odd, so perfectly reversed from what you might expect. And it’s still a bit of a mystery—how did they manage to do an entire musical career backwards? Maybe we’ll never know. 

Do You Really Remember Ghostbusters?

When you totally finished reading Moby Dick one high school summer, did you wonder what happened next? It’s not much of a cliffhanger—the whale smashes the ship and pulls the captain down into the depths with him. Ahab’s final fate doesn’t leave much to the imagination. I was pretty sure Herman Melville left no part of his story untold, as his exhaustive novel is still one of the all-time heavyweights, both literally and figuratively. It took me a whole summer to read it. I finished every other book on my reading list just to take breaks from Ishmael’s tragic tale. I’ll be honest: I don’t remember a whole lot of it. But I was pretty sure that Captain Ahab’s pursuit of a personal vendetta against a whale ended with his entirely anticipated death. It never seemed like anything but a foregone conclusion. We don’t find out what happens to Moby Dick after their final encounter, but it’s not like the whale had a character arc to complete. 

But what if he did? I found an answer to the question nobody asked from the most unlikely source: the Ghostbusters. 

No, not them. The Original Ghostbusters.

Nope. You’ve gotta go back further than that.

OK, too far. Technically correct, as they are the first Ghostbusters. There’s a whole copyright kerfuffle back there, which would be enough to fill a whole other post, so I’m not going to get into it.

There we go. These Ghostbusters are the descendants of the originals, except for Tracy the Gorilla. He outlived his partners and continues to serve as gadget master to their sons. They rode around in Ghost Buggy, a car that could talk (with a Southern stutter), fly, and even travel through time. That last one leads us to the subject of today’s post. In the episode “The White Whale,” Ghostbusters finally answers all of the questions nobody had after the end of Moby Dick. This will either amuse or infuriate all the English teachers I know, and I’m looking forward to finding out who is which. 

So, a ghost ship (that is an actual spectral Spanish sailing galleon) and its crew of ghost pirates are just cruising through space looking for a good time. That’s the part of the episode that makes the most sense. Most of the dangers of space travel lose their fangs if you are no longer breathing, or corporeal. Why not get your pirate on across the stars? 

The ghost captain of this ghost space pirate ship has a brilliant evil plan: they are going to stage a jailbreak on the Phantom Prison Planet, basically a correctional facility for misbehaving spirits. Are they going to jailbreak these ghost prisoners and press them into service as ghost pirates? Nope. Think bigger. They’re going to bust out the ghost of Moby Dick, and force the deceased white whale to raid ships all across the galaxy for them. 

How are they going to do that? Quite simple, really. They’re going to kidnap the ghost of Captain Ahab and hold him hostage to make the giant whale comply. Next, you’re probably going to ask why Moby Dick would care about the well-being of Captain Ahab, a man primarily known as the guy who spent a thousand pages trying to kill Moby Dick. Also, he is just as dead as the whale, so how persuasively imperiled can such a hostage be?

Well, it just so happens that Captain Ahab and the former object of his burning hatred have been cellmates on the Phantom Prison Planet for the last 600 years, and in that time they have become the fastest of friends. So many weird things are implied by that previous sentence which go maddeningly unremarked upon. First, that these formerly bitter foes sought each other out in the afterlife. They make it to the sweet hereafter and neither of them looked up departed loved ones before seeking out the one being they hated more than anything? Those two deserve each other. Second, Captain Ahab and Moby Dick have been sentenced to the Phantom Prison Planet the last 600 years for crimes they committed post mortem as ghosts, which go frustratingly unspecified. And since they both received the same sentence, it’s a reasonable assumption that whatever heinous violation earned them such a stiff punishment was committed together. At the end of the episode it is revealed that Captain Ahab and Moby Dick are getting released with time served as a reward for their help in foiling the schemes of the ghost space pirates, which means that whatever they did earned them more than 600 years in the pen. Finally, the captain and the whale have been imprisoned for 600 years! But today, the events of the novel Moby Dick take place a mere two centuries ago. Which means this episode of Ghostbusters takes place over 400 years in the future! And as far as I can tell, there’s no reason for it. This detail is just casually dropped and never referenced again. 

But Ghostbusters, both the original sitcom and the animated adaptation, fully embraces its own excessive absurdity. “Ghosts” are just a reason for lots of ridiculous nonsense to transpire. Like many cartoons of the era, it featured an extended “suiting up” montage. But even by the standards of the 80s, the Ghostbusters montage was beyond extra. The heroes summon a magical skeleton elevator that takes them to some psychedelic dimension that looks like the side of your uncle’s van. They are then ejected from the elevator and caught in a giant spectral spiderweb that instantly dissolves all of their clothes, except for their underwear, of course. Our heroes are slingshotted from the spiderwebs onto a conveyor belt made of bones, which usher them into the maw of a dressing machine that spits them out the other side ready for action. And what special outfits require such an elaborate process to put on? Button up shirts. Khaki pants. Boots. Leather jackets. A hat. Honestly, it would probably be faster for them to drive home and change rather than take the elevator to limbo. But they use that sequence at least once an episode, sometimes twice!

And that sequence is the original Ghostbusters, through and through. This show never has one or two good ideas. No, it fires every idea at the screen as if from a blunderbuss, creating a ridiculous mess that makes no sense, but is no less watchable for it. Few shows these days would be bold enough to create a villain that is a ghost robot wizard because they couldn’t decide on one or even two things—they had to make him everything. Are there still cartoons that crazy these days? For children? It feels like it’s been a long time since I heard a pitch for a kids’ cartoon that made me shake my head and go “WTF?” Maybe that’s progress. But it’s not nearly as much fun.

A Skeletor Christmas Story

I like to watch cartoons to fall asleep at night. During the holidays, I watch all the “very special” Christmas episodes. Everyone from the Super Mario Brothers to the Men In Black is trying to help Santa bring joy to all the kids watching at home. Everyone, that is, except Skeletor. 

He-Man’s arch nemesis travels to Earth to capture the Christmas spirit for his boss, but ends up infected with it himself. After his vehicle is shot down on a snowy mountain, Skeletor must escort his child prisoners on foot. Along the way, the children explain the warm and fuzzy feeling of a Christmas morning to an utterly bewildered villain. Despite his illest intentions for the little hostages, Skeletor gives them coats when they are cold, rest when they are tired, and even defends them from a rampaging snow-beast. When the children thank “Mr. Skeletor” for his many kindnesses, he has an existential crisis and flips his shit. Starts yelling that he’s not nice! He’s soooo EVIL! And yet, when the moment of truth arrives, Skeletor turns on his master and sets the children free in defiance of his orders. Disgusted with his own selfless actions, Skeletor begs the heroes to tell him “Why am I acting this way? What is WRONG with me?” He is very relieved to hear that Christmas only comes once a year.

Although it’s fairly common for cartoon villains to steal the show, especially in Christmas episodes, Skeletor’s anti-arc is a hilariously unique reversal of the typical tropes. The holiday spirit compels him to be kind and charitable to children and small animals despite his vocal resistance. Unlike Ebenezer Scrooge, Skeletor learns no valuable lessons and emerges from his ordeal completely unchanged. He is eager to resume his nefarious schemes as soon as all this Christmas nonsense is over. And I think that’s a valuable lesson for the kids, too. Just because that big mean jerk that makes your life difficult cut you a break over the holidays, it doesn’t mean they’ve miraculously turned over a new leaf. Sure, the Christmas spirit can bring out the best in everyone, but it can’t change who they are. Come New Year’s Day, Skeletor will be wreaking havoc on Eternia once again. A fun and unexpected twist on the usual Christmas adventure.

Top 10 B-boys

With breakdancing’s Olympic debut fast approaching, debate about the best b-boys in the world is at an all-time high. Rather than wade into that mess, I thought I’d create this handy reference for newcomers to learn about some of the amazing athletes they might be seeing at the Paris games. This is just my list of personal favorites, ordered by how much I like to watch them. It is in no way a definitive ranking. I’ve also limited myself to b-boys who are still actively competing so that I don’t have to namecheck every breakdancing pioneer from the last 50 years. Yes, Crazy Legs was amazing, but he danced his last battle over a decade ago. So here’s a list of ten amazing b-boys who are keeping the culture alive and pushing it ever forward.

10) Mighty Jake: The Venezuelan powerhouse that dances mostly on his hands. He can 90, elbow stack, and air flare forever. Mighty Jake can spin on one hand, an elbow, even the back of his wrist. While his incredible power may have earned him that nickname, learning to control it has proven to be his greatest challenge. He frequently has near-collisions when he’s really showing off, and that makes it hard for him to integrate his power moves with the rest of his set. His footwork is expressive and detailed, so it would be great to see more of it between spins. Mighty Jake made it to the world stage this year and performed admirably before being defeated by Dany Dann. But I wouldn’t be too surprised if we saw him in the final circle next year. 

9) Vicious Victor: Two-time world champ Victor from America is your father’s b-boy, with a classic street style that incorporates modern combos seamlessly. He wouldn’t look the least bit out of place at a cypher in the ‘90s. Ironically, he is the most technically proficient yet stylistically neutral breakdancer out there. Victor has a massive vocabulary of moves and executes them cleanly without fail—I don’t think I’ve ever seen him crash. But despite the two world titles to his name, I can’t remember any of his sets. Victor may nail every move exactly, but that’s all he can do. There’s no real personality or passion coming through when he dances. His toprocking is generic, and his energy level and speed stay consistent throughout. I’ve been watching Victor dance for almost a decade now, and the only thing I know about him is that he works out. He is like a clockwork top spinning perfectly forever. It’s incredibly impressive, but you can only stare at it so long before you get bored. 

8) Klash: The best b-boy in Egypt, if not all of Africa. How he didn’t make it to the Olympic Qualifier, I’ll never understand. I first saw him battle Lil Zoo at the African Finals in 2015, and although he lost, his performance was so captivating that I’ve followed him ever since. Klash displays a comfortable mastery of the fundamentals while mixing it up with more abstract shapes and signature variations, like his no-handed backflip into a headstand airchair. He is incredibly fast and flexible despite his size—imagine Gumby as a linebacker. And Klash is the king of the suicide drop. Just watching him makes my ribs ache, but he’s certainly never boring. 

7) Bruce Almighty: The cardboard court jester from Russia. Bruce is the biggest clown in breaking, and I mean that in the best possible way. Many b-boys use humor in their sets, even if only to ridicule their opponent, but Bruce uses comedy as the foundation of his entire persona. He bobs and weaves like a drunk, but his toprock is always on the beat. While he can do all the impressive power moves like flares and headspins, Bruce will often pretend to fail a trick in hilarious fashion before deftly recovering into another. He also does things that are just silly, like jumping out of his sneakers, or removing his hoodie while spinning on his back. Bruce Almighty is the only b-boy I can think of who doesn’t even attempt to look cool—his only goal is to make the audience laugh. That unique philosophy has gotten him dangerously close to a world title more than once.

6) Nasty Ray: A b-boy from San Jose who has it all. Footwork, power, style and a fun, flippant personality that shows just as much on the sideline as in the circle. Nasty Ray manages to be hilariously rude without being aggressive, making fun of his opponents before completely upstaging them. His vocabulary of moves is extensive and he’s a true freestyler, able to mix them up in countless variations. Many world class b-boys develop certain patterns that they repeat without even intending to, like always transitioning from a 1990 into a flare, but Nasty Ray doesn’t have this habit, and as a result his sets are always dynamic and fresh. He also commands the entire space, able to cover distance in the blink of an eye, whether he’s backflipping off his elbow or sliding across the dance floor on his head. Finally, he actually pays attention to his opponents and replies to them specifically. He doesn’t just throw together a string of his best moves and hope to win. A regular fixture at cyphers all over California, it is genuinely puzzling that Nasty Ray has never gotten within striking distance of a world title, despite defeating former champs like B-boy Gravity. Definitely the most overlooked dancer on this list.

5) Lee: A young abstractionist from the Netherlands, raised by breakdancers, who blends the best elements of old school and circus style. The vanguard of a new generation of b-boys that eschews the traditional forms in favor of finding interesting new shapes to take while they spin and slide around the floor. Lee never does just one move—a windmill transitions into air flares, which turns into a headspin that ends with his body frozen in an impossible pose. No matter how fast he’s going, Lee can stop on a dime or reverse instantly. His sharp control over his momentum sometimes makes him look like a glitchy video being rewound and skipped ahead. He made it to the last battle of the world championship in 2022 and placed second in the European Olympic Qualifier, so there’s a decent chance Lee might be the world’s first gold medal b-boy next year at the Paris games. 

4) Issin: Japan’s 17 year old atomic firestorm in sneakers. Already an incredibly well-rounded b-boy, Issin is a solid balance of impeccable toprock and explosive power. His combos are so seamless it can be hard to keep track of how many moves he’s doing. Not only can he perform all of the most difficult tricks perfectly on the beat, he can do most of them with just one hand. And to top it all off, he makes it look so damn easy. Like he simply throws his body onto the dance floor and magic happens. He never slows down, never looks tired, and never looks like he’s trying particularly hard to smoke all who face him. Issin’s made it to the world stage the last two years, and was defeated just one match away from the 2023 final. His battle with Phil Wizard was so epic it completely overshadowed the actual final battle in online discussions. He’s also given impressive performances at the Asian Olympic Qualifiers. I doubt it will be long before this kid is world champion.

3) Phil Wizard: Canada’s champion and Olympic hope. Phil began as a classic power mover, but has gradually evolved into a comic abstractionist, blurring the line between high speed contortion and dance. Slides on his head a lot. Most likely to smoke you with a move you never saw before. When toprocking, Phil always looks surprised, as if his limbs were flailing about independent of his input. But when he nails an impossible freeze, he gives a little smile and a wave to make sure you saw that awesome thing he just did. He’s also a really nice guy, smiling and clapping for his opponents when they land a dope move. Phil’s been a world class contender for years now; made it all the way to the final battle against the legendary Hong 10 in 2023. He’s also performed well in the Olympic Qualifiers, so it seems this Wizard is determined to be crowned best b-boy in the world one way or another.

2) Hong 10: The legend from South Korea. Hong 10 is a like a Shaolin monk that decided to give b-boying a go, capable of physical feats that look like science fiction. He can do a handstand on two fingers, reverse and freeze his halos in any position, and toprocks just as deftly while upside down on his head. I’ve been watching this guy dance for 20 years now, and he just keeps getting better. He took home his first belt in 2006, and won another at the 2013 Contest of Champions. In 2023, he miraculously recovered from what should have been a career-ending spine injury to win his third world title at age 38, making him the oldest champion in the history of the Red Bull BC One. Lately he’s been seen serving other former champs like Wing and Shigekix at the Olympic Qualifiers. It seems more than likely Hong 10 will be taking a medal back to Korea next year. The only question is what color will it be?

1) Dany Dann: The Man From France, Paris’ hometown hero. Dany Dann is the platonic ideal of the b-boy. His footwork is intricate and endless. His power moves are varied, impressive, and flow together perfectly. He has style for days, his showmanship is unmatched, and he is always on the beat. Dany Dann can destroy his opponent’s game with a hand gesture from the sidelines, or by doing halo spins with one hand behind his head. He’ll take your best move and throw it back at you with an extra backflip just to show off. But most importantly, he always looks like he is having so much fun. Nobody enjoys their time in the cypher more. A regular on the world stage, Dany Dann almost made it to the final circle in 2023 before he was defeated by three-time champ Hong 10. He came second in the Olympic Qualifier for Europe, totally robbed by Menno’s lackluster performance. But if I had to bet on which b-boy will win gold at the Paris games, my money’s on Dany Dann. 

Doc Awesome’s Guide to B-boy Insults

I’ve been watching the Olympic Qualifiers for Breaking, and it’s been quite entertaining. You can find them on the official Olympics YouTube channel. After listening to the painful banter between commentators who have no idea what they’re talking about, it occurred to me that the 2024 Games will be a lot of people’s first time seeing a breakdancing battle. And the questions I see getting asked the most are about the various hand signals b-boys use to taunt each other when they’re not dancing. So I decided to write this helpful glossary of breakdancing insults for all the newcomers (and the Olympic commentators). 

This guide is going to focus on gestures unique to breaking. While there’s a lot of middle fingers and crotch-grabbing in the average battle, I don’t think anyone needs me to explain what those mean. Pointing and laughing is also universal, no matter what language you speak. Same for pantomiming violence—more aggressive b-boys will pretend to punch and kick their opponents, shoot them with finger guns or slice them up with invisible swords. Not exactly subtle. But at least if they make physical contact with anything other than a friendly handshake it’s an automatic disqualification. In this DJ’s humble opinion, miming violent acts is the easiest and lowest form of taunt, and the best b-boys almost never resort to it.

With all that said, let’s learn some b-boy insults. 

Home: Sometimes you’ll see this during the face-off at the beginning of a battle, when you’re waiting to see which b-boy will go first. Especially in international competitions. A dancer will hold his arms up over his head in a triangle that resembles the roof of a house. He’s saying that since he’s in the opponent’s hometown, they should go first. But the opponent may reply with a house of his own, insisting that since it’s his hometown, his guest should graciously take the first round. Usually results in a tedious waiting game for the battle to start. Thankfully, the Olympics will eliminate this particular headache with their 10-second start timer.

Smoke: B-boys will often conclude their best sets by doing a pantomime of smoking a cigarette. He’s saying he “smoked” the other dancer, meaning the opponent was completely defeated and it wasn’t even close. This one is the most overused. Sometimes you sit through four rounds and see four smokes, which is just absurd. While b-boys tend to suffer an abundance of confidence, competitive battles are rarely blowouts where one dancer completely “smokes” another. 

Listen: If you see a b-boy pointing to or tapping his ear, he’s saying his opponent is not listening to the music. No matter how impressive your power move set may be, it doesn’t matter if it’s not on the beat. B-boying is a dance, not a competition of strength.

Crash: When the b-boy not dancing slaps the floor, he’s saying his opponent crashed. A “crash” is when a dancer messes up a trick in an obvious way without managing to recover. Quite simply the most embarrassing thing that can happen to a b-boy during their set, made even worse by getting called out by their opponent. It’s so effective that even calling a false crash can throw your opponent off their game by making them overthink, which is the enemy of good freestyling. 

Almost: Holding your thumb and forefinger close together, as if requesting a tiny amount of something, means “almost,” or “so close.” This is for when your opponent doesn’t completely crash, but still doesn’t quite nail the move. Maybe their foot slipped, or they didn’t hold that freeze long enough. The audience might not even see it, especially if the dancer recovers, but an “almost” lets him know you saw that mistake. Another good way to attack your opponent’s confidence during their set.

Bite: Opening and closing the forearms like a large mouth says your opponent is biting. A b-boy “bites” if he copies another dancer’s move, and that’s a very serious accusation in breaking. This only applies to signature moves. Nobody “owns” basic staples like the flare or the headspin, but many dancers develop their own unique variations on these moves, and copying those is considered disrespectful and unoriginal. The one common exception is when a b-boy immediately repeats his opponent’s best move just to show it isn’t that difficult. Bonus points if you do a harder or faster version.

Repeats: When a dancer holds up two or more fingers like they’re counting, they’re saying their opponent is repeating themself. In competition, repeating moves costs you points and makes you look tired and unoriginal. This is often deployed against powerhouses that spend most of their set spinning around on different parts of their body. But, just because two moves look similar doesn’t always mean a repeat—a headspin is different than a headspin while holding one foot, and both are different from a headspin that ends in a freeze. This one is frequently miscalled, but it isn’t as disruptive as a crash.

Choreography: If your opponent pretends to be writing on a notepad, he’s accusing you of just performing choreography rather than freestyling to the music. That’s a big no-no in a one-on-one setting. Both dancers are supposed to freestyle rather than perform a practiced set, and their ability to meaningfully connect with the beat is a huge part of how they are judged. Musicality can often be the deciding factor in a close battle, so no dancer wants to even appear to be rehearsed.

Show me: When a b-boy points to the dance floor, he’s basically challenging you to “put up or shut up.” Maybe you’re spending too long toprocking, or just having a really weak round. Whatever the case, your opponent is unimpressed with your performance, and demands you step it up. This is also frequently used against obnoxiously aggressive b-boys who act like they’d rather start a fight than win a dance battle, and can’t back up their bravado with any moves to match. Another version of this is when the b-boy who just finished his set makes a big show of presenting the dance floor to his opponent, basically daring him to “top that.”

Eye contact: When a b-boy points to his eyes, he’s telling his opponent to face him. You use this one to remind your opponent he’s dancing against you, not the audience or his feet. A battle is basically a conversation between the two dancers, and you can’t respond properly if you don’t pay attention to what the other person is saying. It’s not just about being rude to your opponent, but also a skill-check—the best b-boys don’t need to look at their feet. They can maintain eye contact and even emote with their face while still dancing. It’s a small detail that really sets the amateurs apart from the pros.

Now when you watch breaking’s Olympic debut, you’ll know what the b-boys are saying to each other from the sidelines. Hopefully this will add another layer to your enjoyment of what promise to be some epic battles. I’ll leave you with a great example of these insults in action from this year’s world championship. In this battle, Dany Dann from France is able to use some tactical taunting to undermine his opponent’s confidence, which results in Poland’s B-boy Wigor losing his flow and making several crashes that cost him the match. And since he was able to make his opponent flame out, Dany Dann got to save a lot of his good moves for later battles. A well-placed insult can be surprisingly powerful in a breakdance cypher.

Imaginary Memories

The other day I remembered something I didn’t even know I forgot.

I’ve always had trouble sleeping. My mind just won’t shut up, fretting about things to be done, making up new stories, or just replaying half-remembered songs. One thing that consistently helps my brain wind down is watching cartoons before bed. And I don’t mean anime or the latest episode of Invincible. It’s either got to be appropriate for kids or a light-hearted comedy—no heavy themes or high drama to over-analyze as I lay in the dark. I’ve enjoyed newer finds like Gravity Falls and Dogs in Space, but every now and then I’ll try to revisit a lost gem from my youth. I use the word try because animation has improved so much over my lifetime that it sometimes can render old favorites unwatchable through modern eyes. For example, much as I love the Ninja Turtles, I have to admit their original series has aged like milk in the sun. Today’s kids won’t even watch it, and I can’t blame them. Recently, I returned to a childhood favorite, anticipating another disappointing reappraisal. And while my prediction proved accurate, it unearthed a surprising memory I didn’t even realize had been misplaced.

You should totally watch Dogs in Space

The 1987 cartoon series Brave Starr was a Space Western set on the distant world of New Texas in the 23rd century. It follows the adventures of the titular Marshal as he keeps the peace and protects the good folks of this frontier planet from robot bandits, space pirates, and alien monsters. The main villain is an outlaw sorcerer named Tex Hex, basically a Cowboy Skeletor. Marshal Brave Starr fights these threats by calling upon the shamanistic powers of different animal spirits. “Speed of the puma” allows him to outrun even the fastest of vehicles, while “strength of the bear” can punch boulders into pebbles. You get the idea. It’s the kind of show where everyone wields what I call “plot blasters,” weapons that fire whatever the story needs at the moment, whether that be a grappling hook, snakes made of fire, or even a cage. These guns can do anything—except kill people. And after the bad guys were locked up at the end of every episode, Marshal Brave Starr would explain the moral of the story and tell the kids at home to always believe in themselves. 

Marshal Brave Starr, Deputy Thirty/Thirty, and the nefarious Tex Hex.

Watching Brave Starr again brought back the expected warm fuzzy feeling of Saturday morning cartoons as a kid, but it also shook loose a long lost imaginary memory. As a boy of no more than ten, who had recently graduated from reading Westerns to science fiction, Brave Starr was captivating. Here was a show that took all of my interests and melded them together to create something new. Thusly inspired, I came up with my very first original character: Sheriff Davey Dragon. Yes, he was a dragon who was also a cowboy. In space. He walked upright, folded his wings about his shoulders like a coat, and wore a ten-gallon hat with little holes in the top for his horns. Of course he could spit fire, but he also carried a pair of blasters just in case he was ever short of breath. His arch nemesis was an outlaw named Mr. Frosty who used freeze rays to rob trains. While Davey Dragon went on many adventures in my head and countless crayon drawings, I never wrote more than a few words about him. Since no physical evidence of him survived as I grew up, I eventually forgot about the brave sheriff of Draconia. I went on to create hundreds of new characters and fill books with their stories. Hadn’t thought of him in at least thirty years. But then I saw yet another cheaply animated shootout on Brave Starr and it all came flooding back. I don’t know why it was that particular unremarkable action scene (there are so many), but it must have been the one that inspired a seven-year-old to draw a dragon in a cowboy hat. Why else would this memory be tied to a cartoon I barely remember?

Cowboy Skeletor

It was like running into an old friend from college. “Oh my god, is that Davey Dragon? Good to see you! Where have you been?” We got to catch up with each other and make tentative plans to talk again. I made sure to write down his name and what details I could recall, so I won’t forget him again. Even if I never end up using him in anything, it was a worthwhile and eye-opening experience to reconnect with such an important part of my creative development.

A toast to Sheriff Davey Dragon, my very first character. 

AI rendering of what Sheriff Davey Dragon might have looked like