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On the Brazilian Elections

Since I just wrote a small rant on Brazilian elections to introduce a larger rant on US elections, allow me to expand on the former just because I have nothing else to do today.

We are forced — I mean, supposed to vote on a new mayor for Rio de Janeiro this coming Sunday. Yes, SUNDAY. On that marvelous day when we can wake up as late as we want and do absolutely nothing AT ALL with no consequences… we’ll have to march to the locations they tell us to and vote on one of the several cocksuckers who smile for us as wide as possible in the posters, probably thinking in our faces when he is finally elected and we see how much we fucked up by choosing him.

I’m doubtful on who to vote on, because all the candidates seem to believe in the same strategy: to treat the population like a tremendous pack of retards. Everywhere I go, there’s a moron handing flyers portraying their candidates. And they don’t just HAND the flyers. They walk up to you, bellow “GOOD AFTERNOON” and proudly hand you the flyer as if they’re the hitman you hired to kill your mother-in-law bringing you her head.

Everywhere I look at, there’s a poster of a candidate, smiling as if he was getting a double blowjob while the picture was taken, with a slogan like “He’ll fix the city!” or “He’s the candidate for you!” somewhere on it. Not a single candidate tried a different approach, maybe a humorous approach. No, all of them thought their ugly mugs littering the city would be good reason to vote for them.

But visual pollution is not enough for them. Oh no, your ears are raped as well. Whenever I’m walking on the street, lost in interesting thoughts, they are cruelly interrupted by a van driving by, with amplifiers spitting BLOODY AWFUL MUSIC praising its candidate by using rhymes so incredibly retarded they make the Teletubbies theme sound like Mozart.

I don’t watch much TV – but if I did I’m sure the programming would be constantly interrupted by political propaganda, with clips of the candidate in question kissing babies as if that’s a I’m-Not-A-Prick certificate.

But I have someone I plan to vote on, because, well, he plans to legalise pot. THAT’S FUCKING ORIGINAL over here, okay? So at least he’s trying something different.

Obama vs. McCain – Additional Thoughts

You know you’re not a fan of your own country when the elections of another country are more interesting than yours. It’s Mayor elections in Brazil. Who do you choose?

1) Dishonest prick who says he’ll give us more jobs.

2) Dishonest prick who says he’ll fix the city.

3) Dishonest prick who says he’ll care about the environment.

(insert all the other twenty political parties this country has with dishonest pricks for candidates)

Now the US elections:

1) Dishonest prick who promises to continue the eight shitty years of disastrous foreign policy and buttfucking the constitution.

2) Young new face who promises change, and who can turn out to be a dishonest prick but so far seems intelligent and truly commited to the country.

Hey! They actually have a good choice there! But you know why I’m so interested in the US Elections?

Because option number one has a good chance to WIN. Because no matter how many times McCain has supported the lowest-rated president in US history, no matter his absolutely ridiculous choice for VP, no matter he’s a conservative fuck who is scared of the Internet, no matter his rape jokes — he can still WIN. He’s right behind Obama, so close he could almost bite his buttocks. And this just makes me wonder whether almost half of the USA is dumb, slow on the uptake or simply bastards.

Eight years of shit the Republicans have made you go through – and so far McCain hasn’t done a single thing that is worth giving them a second chance for. You don’t mess with a winning team, no, but this particular team is losing, so how about instead of replacing the bad player with an equally bad one, we don’t try that young new kid who’s been just itching to do his best?

Dunno. Sounds like a good idea to me.

Metal Gear Solid movie – no, seriously.

Congratulations, Hollywood. Just when I thought you couldn’t give a new meaning to the concept of “being out of ideas”, you go ahead and surprise me.

Just to clarify: I have NO PROBLEMS with game-to-movie adaptations. I don’t think they are cursed and therefore always bad. I think some of them could turn out to be great films, like Silent Hill could if screenwriter Roger Avary (who co-wrote PULP FICTION, for fuck’s sake!) had realized the game he had in hands had much more depth than the piss-poor screenplay he had written. So, there are a lot of games that could potentially turn out to be great films.

And Metal Gear Solid is not one of them. You know why?

Because it is ALREADY a film. Only an interactive one. Any MGS fan will tell you the series’ creator Hideo Kojima never misses a chance to stick a cutscene in the middle of the gameplay, in order to develop his completely crazy (but fun) story. The cutscenes last from five to THIRTY minutes. MGS has, without a doubt, the lenghtiest cutscenes to have ever been added in a game. There isn’t a single bit of the story that isn’t covered by them. Kojima detailed every piece of his universe.

So… what is there LEFT for a film to do? Kojima might be a slightly over-enthusiasmed director, but the action scenes in the original games are exciting and well-done. All the characters are unique in their portrayals, whether they’re good characters (Snake), bad characters (Vamp) or absolute shit (Raiden). The story has a beggining, a middle and an end (well, so far it is still an end, but they’re talking MGS 5 already…). What could a film possibly add to an experience that is already extremely cinematic in its own?

Well, SEAN BEAN, of course! I’m already seeing people asking whether or not Sean Bean would be a good choice to play Liquid Snake.

NO! He wouldn’t be a good choice! Al fucking PACINO wouldn’t be a good choice! You know why? Because there is no NEED for an MGS film. It would be a muddled, pretentious film that could never cause as much impact as the original series and therefore is doomed to failure. Not FINANCIAL failure, mind you, which is why Hollywood isn’t giving up this project.

C’mon, Hollywood. You wanna pick a game to adapt, choose one with a good premise that wasn’t sufficiently developed. Like, say, Prince of Persia! As a matter of fact, there IS a movie adaptation of PoP in production. Well, great! Continue on that road! You can come up with a new story for a game like Prince of Persia, it doesn’t need to be about the Sands of Time, The Two Thrones or, God fucking forbid, Warrior Within. Now MGS HAS to be about MGS because it is a completely story-driven game. So, forget about that one. Concentrate on the games that can be original or interesting in the big screen. And there definitely aren’t enough movies about an acrobat prince.

Exclusion

Comic Timing

Ah, Fuck The Roll Call

With this blog’s current traffic, I’d have to leave the “roll call” post up for days until people actually bothered to post their presence, and I can’t stay too long without updating. It’s becoming addictive. I feel the blog virus corrupting my braincells already. So, if you happen to stumble across the “roll call” post, take one minute of your time to at least say hello.

Unbelievably, only now I noticed wordpress has its own awesome blog stats feature. I love blog stats. They’re enormously fun for some reason, and they tell me whether the links I shamelessly leave around the net are being used to get to this blog, or just plain ignored. September 26th had the greatest traffic, with thirty-five people visiting. But what I truly got a kick out of were the search engine terms used to get to this blog:

“crossed review burrows ennis” – Ah, a fellow comics reader looking for a reviewer who BOTHERED to talk about a lesser-known work instead of Magnificent X-Men or whatever-the-fuck. Actually, the number of people comic reviews draw in via search engines is quite surprising.

“‘if i could vote’ mccain” – YES YOU CAN. But don’t.

“andre navarro” – Mm-hmm.

“andrei navarro” – Whoops. Found me instead.

“andré navarro” – someone bothered to write my name right. Not even I do that.

“abdre navaro” – … close enough, I guess.

“agatha navarro” – Mommy?! (laughs at own joke then proceeds to cry at lack of originality)

Aniway. More webcomics tomorrow.

Roll Call

The “Blog Stats” thingie on the right side of this page tells me 381 people visited this blog. Either I’m the worst blogger in the face of the Earth, or SOME of you stayed to watch where this shit’ll go. So, I’m curious: who are you?

Please say “hi” in the comments so I can have an idea who I’m writing for. And if possible, give me your opinion on the blog so far. Be harsh, but constructive, please.

Technically Speaking

Frustration