Marcellis Wallace vs. Zed (Rest in Peace, Peter Greene)

 

The Marsellus Wallace Speech: AEW Edition

 (OOC: I read a blog post today about how Marsellus Wallace's speech to Butch in Pulp Fiction can be applied to any relatable scenario, so I did a parody myself, just like the author did. Ready? Here we go:

We fade in on Bryan Danielson, a 44-year-old pro-wrestler who’s one broken neck away from being confined to a wheelchair. He sits across the table wearing a plain white T-shirt (because he doesn’t believe in consumerism). Sitting on the opposite side off screen is Tony Khan, the Head Honcho at All Elite Wrestling, where Bryan works. Tony sounds like a cross between a delusional billionaire and a giddy fanboy.

TONY (O.S.)

What do you think you’re gonna find when your decades-long career is over? I think you’re gonna find yourself one broken down, sad-ass motherfucker. The thing is, Bryan, you have a shitload of five-star matches. But as painful as it may seem, five-star matches won’t save your life, and yours is over the minute you take another bump. That’s a hard motherfucking fact of life, and it’s one your ass is gonna have to get realistic about. The wrestling business is filled to the brim with unrealistic motherfuckers who say they’re gonna retire but never do. Motherfuckers who thought their asses would age like wine. If you mean it turns to vinegar like Ric Flair and Chris Jericho, it does. If you mean it gets better with age like R-Truth and Trish Stratus? It don’t. Besides, Bryan, how many five-star matches do you got left in you? Two? Wrestlers don’t have an Old-Timer’s League. It was called Heroes of Wrestling and it sucked ass. You came close, but you made it only a handful of times. If you were gonna make it again, you would have done it already. 

Tony holds release papers just out of Bryan’s reach.

TONY (O.S.)

You actually gonna retire this time?

BRYAN

Certainly appears so.

Bryan takes the release papers from Tony’s hand.

TONY

Night of your final retirement speech, you’re gonna feel a slight sting. That’s pride fucking with you. Fuck pride! Pride only hurts, probably about as bad as Jon Moxley suffocating you with a plastic bag. It never helps. You gotta fight through that shit. ‘Cause a year from now when you’re at home banging Brie Bella and hanging out with your two kids Birdie and Buddy, you’re gonna say to yourself, “Tony Khan was right”, which is something I hear from Dave Meltzer pretty much regularly. 

BRYAN

Yeah, me too.

TONY

At AEW Revolution, you job to Jon Moxley. Say it.

BRYAN

At AEW Revolution, I job to Jon Moxley.

The original blog post: https://www.kingdomoffailure.com/post/f-ck-pride-it-only-hurts-it-never-helps

Inglorious Basterds

MOVIE TITLE: Inglorious Basterds

DIRECTOR: Quentin Tarantino

YEAR: 2009

GENRE: War Movie

RATING: R for violence, language, and sexual content

GRADE: Mixed

With all the political tension in today’s world, who wouldn’t want to escape into a world of Nazi-slaying fun? Cutting off their scalps, beating them with a bat, shooting them up, burning them down, if there’s a way to kill a Nazi in World War II, Aldo Raine and his troops will make it happen. You know who else will make it happen? A lone Jewish woman named Shosanna whose family was slaughtered by the Nazi war machine. That’s a lot of vengeful desires from anybody not involved in the Third Reich. There’s no possible way that this movie could be anything but perfect, right? Well, that’s where Quentin Tarantino’s biggest fault comes into play: sometimes his movies drag on for an excruciatingly long time. Inglorious Basterds was no exception to that rule. I realize a movie can’t be all action and no drama, but the reverse is also true if the idea is to make a revenge flick: it can’t be all drama and too little action. Some of the chapters could have been cut short and it wouldn’t have hurt the movie in any way, especially the chapter where the Nazis play the card game at a bar. If you want your bloodthirsty fun, you’ll have to get in line like everyone else.

But when you get exactly what you wanted out of this film, it’ll be exactly as you expected. The outcome of the story was never in doubt for even a second. Aldo Raine and his troops are overpowered in spite of the fact that some of them get killed along the way. Shosanna’s own plans for revenge are so brilliant that detailed that no German soldier could possibly crack her code. Everything that could go right in this movie did go right…except for the element of surprise for the audience. I guess when the genre is described as a “revenge flick”, it doesn’t leave much to the imagination. No serious detective work has to be done. But can I at least believe for one small minute that the good guys have a chance of losing? Having a few of their soldiers killed vulnerability does not make. I want to see some flaws. I want to see some cracks in the world’s most impressive plot armor. Maybe if the German propaganda machine took these kinds of notes, their films wouldn’t look so ridiculous on screen.

If you think this review is going to be a nonstop bash-fest, you’re wrong. It was enjoyable for what it was. Quentin Tarantino’s dialogue will always deliver no matter what the genre of his movies. The subterfuge his characters engage in is also an impressive feat that required an extraordinary amount of creativity. Above all else, however, I must give my highest praise to the character work of Hans Lander, the Nazi colonel nicknamed the “Jew Hunter”. No, I’m not condoning his belief system, just his villainy. Whenever he interrogates someone, he knows he’s got his victims by the throat. He purposefully tiptoes around the answers he receives to give his liars a false sense of hope. I’d call this a perfect game of cat and mouse…if the cat had drill bits for fangs, battleaxes for claws, and venom for drool. I’d dare say that Hans is even more intimidating and dangerous than his boss Hitler himself. He’s so believable as a villain that he can almost negate my earlier point of the outcome being too predicable. Key word being almost.

It wouldn’t be fair to call Inglorious Basterds my least favorite Quentin Tarantino movie, because all in all I did enjoy it. Having a least favorite Tarantino movie is like having a least favorite flavor of ice cream: in the end, it’s still ice cream and it’s still going to be more delicious than the creamy strudel Shosanna and Landers shared in the high scale restaurant. This movie gets a mixed grade from me, but it’ll be a high mixed, which means three-and-a-half stars out of five. In the interest of being decisive and honest, I’ll round it down to a solid three. Being average doesn’t have to be a bad thing, right?

Spaghetti Western

VERSE 1

A harbinger of things to come

Foreheads spitting out bubblegum

Mexican guitarists playing their strums

Spaghetti western, come get some

CHORUS 1

Hey, Sergio! Keep that camera rolling

Hey, Ennio! Keep that music lulling

Hey, cowboy! Should I shoot your ass again?

Spaghetti western! You’re fucking dead!

VERSE 2

Bullets flying in the Spanish sunset

Dynamite blasting, we ain’t done yet

A fistful of dollars, a bellyful of lead

Spaghetti western, bleed them red

CHORUS 2

Hey, Luigi! Take the role of hero

Hey, Giuseppe! Be my Robert Di Niro

Hey, cowboy! Are you ready for a fight?

Spaghetti western! Let’s light up the night!

BRIDGE

We’re taking over the silver screen

Making the bloodthirsty cream

Is it rated R or somewhere beyond?

This ain’t no time for a family bond

VERSE 3

Another sunset darkens the horizon

Another victory is all mine, son

Another masterpiece caught on film

Spaghetti western, shoot to kill

CHORUS 3

Hey, Mario! Put down the pizza pie

Hey, Nero! Be my blackheart bad guy

Hey, cowboy! Comfy in your grave?

Spaghetti western! You can’t be saved!

Yee-haw!

The Land of Milk and Medication

VERSE 1

Take me by the hand to dreamland

Tell me a story of fantastic glory

Everything is ours for twelve hours

The recesses of my mind are all mine

Give me a reason to greet the season

Give me a tale I can write without fail

I do it for a living, it’s all I am giving

Buy from the hovel of paperback novels

CHORUS

The land of milk and medication

Is where I do my best meditation

From reality I take a vacation

To a brand new mystical destination

VERSE 2

Milk and honey for my cinnamon bunny

Milk and Xanax for my creative annex

Milk and cereal for the morning ethereal

Milk and fudge to give my face a smudge

Every day is Christmas, night is Halloween

Thanksgiving is somewhere in between

No Valentines for the girl I shall pine

No firecrackers from patriotic attackers

CHORUS

The land of milk and medication

Is where I do my best meditation

From reality I take a vacation

To a brand new mystical destination

BRIDGE

When the sun is kissing, something is missing

Is anybody watching? Is anybody listening?

Where will I get today’s creative fuel?

Must keep the mind sharp, it’s my only tool

EXTENDED CHORUS

The land of milk and medication

Is where I do my best meditation

From reality I take a vacation

To a brand new mystical destination

A world of wonder and musical thunder

Realm of magic born from something tragic

Imagination is my favorite medication

Milk and pills still give me the chills

Obselidia

MOVIE TITLE: Obselidia
DIRECTOR: Diane Bell
YEAR: 2010
GENRE: Drama
RATING: PG-13 for language
GRADE: Pass

George is a librarian who moonlights as a cataloguist for obsolete and nostalgic items, all of which he hopes to document for a book he’s putting together. He even goes so far as to believe love is obsolete and therefore leads the lonely life of being single. When he meets a beautiful projectionist named Sophie, she tries to get him to come out of his shell as the two of them venture to Death Valley to interview a climate change scientist for George’s book. The ideas of love and the apocalypse collide in a debate about how we should spend our last minutes on earth if they truly are that. Will George live the rest of his life in isolation or will he believe in the power of love humans can give each other? Does he have anything in his heart for Sophie?

The three major themes of this movie (living life to the fullest, romance, and nostalgia) intertwine perfectly with each other as they try to bring George and Sophie together as a romantic couple. With nostalgia, they bond over how the past used to be a happy and simpler time, when technology wasn’t going berserk and people paid attention to each other. With living life to the fullest, they get hard hitting cynicism from the climate change scientist who believes all happy experiences will be erased because of humankind’s sins against the earth. With romance, it’s the classic tale of a socially awkward guy like George shying away from a flirtatious girl like Sophie. With the scientist feeding him all of this negativity, George has to struggle to believe in the power of love when Sophie tries to get in his social bubble.

Near the end of the movie, we ask ourselves if George’s struggle to suppress his inner negativity is worth it. While he does realize how the power of love can make someone happy, he also realizes how it can break his heart. While I won’t give away any spoilers, I will say that Sophie does break George’s heart in the end and he’s sobbing to himself in the comfort of his own home looking at pictures of their vacation together in Death Valley. That is such a powerful image that the audience watching has no choice but to question their own capacity for romantic love. This may not have been the message the movie was trying to send, but to my way of thinking, in this 50-50 bet between happiness and heartache, I was leaning towards heartache. I was so heartbroken and touched by the movie’s end that I spent the rest of the night listening to Seether’s cover of Wham’s “Careless Whisper”.

The best part about this movie is that it encourages the audience to ask questions instead of mindlessly conforming to a singular principal. If the world ends tomorrow, how will we spend our last hours on earth? Is romantic love worth all the struggles or does it lead to easy cynicism? Should we all love each other before it truly is indeed too late? Should we have as many experiences as we can despite the huge risk attached to them? Finding the answers to these questions takes a lot of courage and living with the answers is even scarier than that. Some people become so saddened by the answers that they resort to isolation or even worse, suicide. In the end, positivity will save us. It will get us through the hardships whether they’re in a personal relationship or part of a global crisis. If you’re going to attempt to answer these questions, make sure you do it without regret. Otherwise, temporary heartache will feel like permanent torture.

　

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“I love the way that your heart breaks with every injustice and deadly fate.”

-Flyleaf singing “Again”-

Theatre Roots

Before deciding to go through college as a creative writing major and a theatre arts minor, I originally wanted to double major in psychology and cinema. By the time I was accepted into Western Washington University, I found out that they didn’t have a cinema degree available, so I had to minor in the next best thing: theatre arts. As for psychology, I decided that solving other people’s problems was too exhausting and impossible, so I chose to major in something that I was actually good at: creative writing. Back to the theatre arts major for a moment. The reason I wanted that as part of my educational pedigree was because I liked writing movie scripts and I hoped to make it into Hollywood as a screenwriter. Movie scripts differ from traditional prose because it’s quicker and doesn’t require a great deal of description. Plus, whenever a character talks, it’s as simple as putting his or her name down and writing the dialogue underneath it. When I write traditional prose, it takes me up to half an hour to write three full pages. But when I wrote screenplays, I could get through five pages in almost a third of the time. The process was so quick and painless that I actually wrote a Dungeons & Dragons-style screenplay called Tree Party Nation in a matter of two days. Granted, it’s only about 60 pages, but I still consider it one of my finer moments as a screenwriter. It wasn’t until after I graduated from WWU that I decided traditional prose was more interesting to me. At the time of this discovery, I was playing Dungeons & Dragons with friends of mine over the internet. One of the characters I was using was a level eight human barbarian named Brutus Warcry. I got my start in traditional prose by writing Brutus’ character sketch, detailing his time as a kid in a barbaric tribe to his present day life as an MMA icon. At the time, I firmly believed that it was okay to use hyperbolic descriptions in every other sentence. It made sense at the time because it was so well received by my friends. Two years later in 2012, it dawned on me that it was slowing my writing speed down and most of the descriptions didn’t make sense. So now in the present day of my life, I write using simple descriptions such as one-word adjectives and describing literally everything that’s going on within the prose. I haven’t had any complaints yet. In fact, people seem to like what I do. This is quite the journey to go from a non-reading screenwriter to a bookworm novelist. If it wasn’t for my roots in theatre, I wouldn’t have had the material for my proses. So thank you, theatre roots, for keeping it interesting. Now let’s all do the hotdog dance!

　

***ADVICE OF THE DAY***

If you’re writing a story and you need to use the contraction of “who” and “are“, don’t forget the apostrophe. I can’t stress it enough.