Long-time underground comix stars The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers are about to emerge into the light with an eight-episode animated series, with help from key creative talent behind Rick & Morty, Silicon Valley and Workaholics, among others.
Gilbert Shelton, the Freak Brothers’ creator, will be an executive producer on the animated project. The show will be built around his comic’s original story lines, which follow the misadventures of three pharmacologically impaired non-siblings (and their cat) as they try to find more drugs, It is both celebration and satire of alternative culture, and remains a cult favorite. Freak Brothers comics have been translated into 14 languages with more than 40 million copies sold.
The Freak Brothers debuted in 1968 in The Rag, an Austin, Texas, alternative paper. Three years later, the first stand-alone Freak Brothers comics were published, with new issues from Shelton and eventual collaborators David Sheridan and Paul Mavrides arriving through1992, including runs in publications such as High Times and Playboy. Compilations of the work have been in print in one form or another ever since.
The eight 22-minute episodes of adult-oriented animation are expected to be ready by early next year. The project has not lined up distribution yet, but has enlisted a lengthy list of Hollywood veterans of notable TV and film projects.
There is a small category of films which failed in theatrical release, but which, when played and replayed on television, found their audience and proved themselves to be authentic heart-warming and important films striking a chord with a very wide audience and proving watchable again and again and again.
Kathy Shaidle pays tribute in a review to yet another wonderful case of the same phenomenon, Galaxy Quest (1999).
In a just world, O.J. Simpson would currently be serving the 24th year of a double life sentence; Ronald Reagan would have been president during America’s bicentennial instead of Gerald Ford — and Galaxy Quest would’ve earned half-a-billion bucks at the box office when it came out in 1999.
But inept and indifferent studio marketing (plus competition from another “sci-fi” comedy, Ghostbusters) relegated Galaxy Quest to semi-cult status. Which is ironically appropriate, given its plot:
At a science fiction convention, fans await an appearance by the cast of Galaxy Quest, a hokey interstellar TV adventure series unceremoniously cancelled in the early 1980s. The show’s fatally typecast has-been “stars” (played by Tim Allen, Alan Rickman, Sigourney Weaver, Tony Shalhoub and Daryl Mitchell) are reduced to reluctantly signing autographs at tacky gatherings like this one, when they’re not cutting ribbons (in full costume) at supermarket openings.
That is, until genuine aliens — who, in cargo cult fashion, have based their civilization on Galaxy Quest re-runs transmitted through space — touch down and beg “the crew of the NSEA-Protector” to help them defeat the villain bent on destroying their planet. The adorable Thermians innocently believe the program’s “crew” are fearless, intrepid space warriors and technological geniuses, not just washed-up actors in laughable uniforms. Their language has no word for “pretend”…
Lazily calling this movie “a Star Trek spoof” unfairly slots it alongside broad, coarse parodies like Blazing Saddles or the soulless Mars Attacks! In truth, Galaxy Quest is a tender, big hearted valentine — more My Favorite Year than Airplane.
That the film’s jokes and, more incredibly, its special effects, hold up so well twenty years later is a testament to the loving care with which Galaxy Quest was crafted. Obeying the first (yet often ignored) commandment of movie comedy, all the actors “play it straight.”
Genre veteran Sigourney Weaver of Alien fame never winks “Get it?”; neither does Alan Rickman, a classically-trained Shakespearean actor stuck wearing a rubber prosthetic forehead, portraying… a classically-trained Shakespearean actor stuck wearing a rubber prosthetic forehead:
While I’d have preferred the director’s original choice for the leading role — Kevin Kline — Tim Allen acquits himself surprisingly well as the pompous, Shatner-esque Jason Nesmith, a.k.a., Commander Taggart.
Cast as Thermian leader Mathesar, Yale Drama alumnus Enrico Colantoni conceived of his species’ quirky gait, rictus grin and off-key speech patterns during his winning audition, then led hour-long “alien school” on set each morning to ensure uniformity and, therefore, believability; of all the Thermians, Missi Pyle’s Laliari is so indelibly delightful that John Updike gave her a shout-out in his novella Rabbit Remembered.
Speaking of famous writers, David Mamet has called Galaxy Quest “a perfect film,” ranking it with The Godfather (and another of my other favorites, Dodsworth.)
We soldiers of Erin, so proud of the name,
We’ll raise on the rebels and Frenchmen our fame;
We’ll fight to the last in the honest old cause,
And guard our religion, our freedom and laws;
We’ll fight for our country, our King and his crown,
And make all the traitors and croppies lie down.
Down, down, croppies lie down.
The rebels so bold, when they’ve none to oppose,
To houses and haystacks are terrible foes;
They murder poor parsons and likewise their wives,
At the sight of a soldier they run for their lives;
Whenever we march over country and town
In ditches and cellars the croppies lie down.
Down, down, croppies lie down.
In Dublin the traitors were ready to rise
And murder was seen in their lowering eyes
With poison, the cowards, they aimed to succeed
And thousands were doomed by the assassins to bleed
But the yeoman advanced, of rebels the dread
And each croppy soon hid his dastardly head
Down, down, croppies lie down.
Should France e’er attempt, by fraud or by guile,
Her forces to land on Erin’s green isle,
We’ll show that they n’er can make free soldiers,slaves,
They shall only possess our green fields for their graves;
Our country’s applauses our triumphs will crown,
Whilst with their French brothers the croppies lie down.
Down, down, croppies lie down.
Oh, croppies ye’d better be quiet and still
Ye shan’t have your liberty, do what ye will
As long as salt water is formed in the deep
A foot on the necks of the croppy we’ll keep
And drink, as in bumpers past troubles we drown,
A health to the lads that made croppies lie down
Down, down, croppies lie down.
Officers in Oklahoma made a startling discovery after arresting two people at a traffic stop, only to find that their vehicle contained a rattlesnake, a canister of uranium, an open bottle of whiskey and a firearm, authorities said Wednesday.
An officer with the Guthrie Police Department had pulled over Stephen Jennings and Rachael Rivera for driving with expired tags on June 26, Sgt. Anthony Gibbs told ABC News. After the officer discovered that Jennings was driving with an expired license and Rivera was a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, both were placed under arrest, Gibbs said.
The vehicle, a Ford Explorer, was impounded because it did not have insurance. It was later discovered that the vehicle had been stolen.
“So when the impound of the vehicle begins and they start moving compartments, here’s the rattlesnake in the backseat,” Gibbs said. “It was surprising to the officer, obviously.”
As the officers continued to search the vehicle, they spotted an open bottle of Kentucky Deluxe whiskey near a firearm, the sergeant said. Then they discovered a container of “yellowish powder” that was labeled “Uranium.”
Jennings, of Logan County, told officers that he had the uranium because he recently purchased a Geiger counter to test metals, and the chemical element came with the purchase. He joked with officers that he was trying to create a “super snake,” Gibbs added.
In the county Tyrone, in the town of Dungannon
Where many a ruction myself had a hand in
Bob Williamson he lived, a weaver by trade
And all of us thought him a stout orange blade.
On the twelfth of July as around it did come
Bob played on the flute to the sound of the drum
You can talk of your harp, your piano, or lute
But there’s none could compare to the Old Orange Flute.
But Bob the deceiver he took us all in
For he married a Papist named Bridget McGinn
Turned Papish himself and forsook the Old Cause
That gave us our freedom, religion and laws.
And the boys in the place made some comment upon it
And Bob had to fly to the province of Connaught;
he left with his wife and his fixins, to boot,
And along with the latter, the Old Orange Flute.
At Mass the next Sunday, to atone for past deeds,
He said Paters and Aves and counted his beads
Till after some time at the Priest’s own desire
Bob went with his old flute to play in the choir.
Bob went with his flute for to play in the mass
But the instrument shivered and cried.”O Alas!”
And try though he would, though he made a great noise,
The flute would play only “The Protestant Boys”.
Well up Bob he jumped with a start and a flutter.
He threw the old flute in the blessed holy water;
He thought that this charm would bring some other sound,
When he tried it again, it played “Croppies Lie Down!”
Now for all he would finger and whistle and blow
For to play Papish music, he found it “No Go”
“Kick the Pope” to “Boyne Water” it clearly would sound
But one Papish squeek and it could’nt be found.
At a council of priests that was held the next day
They decided to banish the Old Flute away;
They couldn’t knock heresy out of its head
So they bought Bob a new one to play it instead.
Now the poor flute was doomed, and its fate was pathetic
‘Twas fastened and burnt at the stake as heretic.
As the flames roared around it, you could hear a strange noise ‘Twas the Old Flute still whistlin’ “The Protestant Boys”.
[Chorus] It is old but it is beautiful and its colours they are fine
It was worn at Derry, Aughrim, Enniskillen and the Boyne
My father wore it as a youth in bygone days of yore
So on the 12th I proudly wear the sash my father wore.
Here I am a loyal Orangeman, just came across the sea
For singing and for dancing, I hope that I’ll please thee
I can sing and dance with any man, as I did in days of yore
And on the 12th I long to wear the sash my father wore.
It’s now I’m going to leave you, good luck to you I say
And when I’m on the ocean, for me I hope you’ll pray
I’m going to my native land, to a place they call Dromore
Where on the 12th I’ll always wear the sash my father wore.
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Sahil Matani points out, tongue firmly in cheek, that, as it is now proposed to compensate hereditary victims of Slavery, it can easily be argued that the same principle ought to be applied even more broadly, going back in History even farther, and farther, and farther.
One glaring example is the great evil visited on the Anglo-Saxon population by the Normal Conquest of 1066. By any standard, the effect on indigenous English society was enduring devastation. Through war, invasion and genocide, the Anglo-Saxon ruling class was almost entirely replaced, control of the church and state surrendered to foreign adversaries, English replaced by Norman French as the language of government, and England’s entire political, social and cultural orientation shifted from Northern Europe to the continent for the next thousand years.
This matters because, just as the pain of colonialism continues to be endured by its descendants, the Conquest continues to have lasting effects. In his study of surnames and social mobility, economic historian Gregory Clark concluded that Norman surnames continue to be 25 per cent overrepresented at Oxbridge to this day relative to other indigenous English surnames. As Clark put it: ‘The fact that Norman surnames had not been completely average in their social distribution by 1300, by 1600, or even by 1900 implies astonishingly slow rates of social mobility during every epoch of English history.’ Not for nothing did Nonconformists and Whigs loudly oppose ‘the Norman yoke’ during the 17th and 18th centuries.
Cambridge University, which still drips with Norman money and influence, should now consider to what extent it needs to compensate its Anglo-Saxon victims. The Sutton Trust estimates that Oxbridge graduates earn £400,000 more during their lifetimes than graduates from other UK universities. These figures imply that descendants of the rapacious Norman invader class could be earning tens of thousands of pounds more than other graduates — an undeserved lifetime premium that has survived 31 generations. So, reparations must certainly be made. But who shall pay, and who shall receive?
It should be straightforward for a Royal Commission to trace the present-day descendants of Britain’s Norman usurpers through a combination of genealogical and administrative research as well as — inevitably — mandatory genetic testing. A small tax on the Lampards, Vardys and Gascoignes of the world, payable to the Bamfords, Bransons and Ecclestones, would be sufficient to catalyse healing for the open sores of the past.
What are the sums involved? By 1086, the Norman arrivistes had stolen almost a third of the 12.5 million acres of arable land in England, parcelling it into manorial estates. At a conservative estimate, that land is now worth £7,000 per acre — or £25 billion in total that the Normans owe Anglo-Saxons for the Conquest. France’s liability could, of course, be offset against our exit bill from the EU.
There will be inevitable quibbles, such as descendants of Normans claiming that they were not personally responsible. But this is feeble prattle. Countries typically honour treaties dating hundreds of years in the past, despite no one being alive who signed them. We pay debts accumulated by previous generations.
