Tracy Morgan, who is lucky enough to be in the best sitcom on television at the moment, (and the superior program about behind the scenes antics at a Saturday Night Live Type program, despite what I said HERE), apparently likes to drink and drive. He got busted a couple of times, and got the usual Hollywood star treatment. Probation, endless second chances, the whole package. But check this out, from WENN (IMDB):

A Los Angeles judge has ordered comedian Tracy Morgan to wear an ankle bracelet detecting alcohol consumption and to complete five days of community service. In a New York court in February, Morgan pleaded guilty to drunk-driving in November 2006. Morgan was ordered to wear a Secure Continuous Remote Alcohol Monitoring (SCRAM) device on his ankle, which will test for alcohol consumption every 30 minutes for 90 days. Should Morgan test positive for alcohol use, he will have to start the 90 day period again. If he tests positive twice he will be sent to jail for 30 days.

THEY HAVE A BRACELET THAT WILL DETECT ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION?!?!?!??!

That is brilliant. I can think of three people, off the top of my head, that could use a little mandatory time with the bracelet. They should make airline pilots wear these things. Do they have other kinds of bracelets? If so, this might the solution to the drug problem. Wanna make drugs legal? Great. Go ahead. You can be licensed to inebriate like you might be licensed to drive a car. You just wear the detector when you arrive for your cab driving job or whatever, and then everyone’s cards are on the table. It’s part of the uniform. Are you a drunken asshole? The fine, you can have your drinking privileges revoked. Whacked out on crazy pills? Got all hopped up and punched an old lady in the face? Well, then they can slap the bracelet on you, and if you get high again then all the old laws go back into effect. Your inebriation license is suspended. Sure, the whole thing is a little creepy in a 1984 sort of way, but you don’t HAVE to drink, it’s just to protect society from people doing things like driving oil tankers drunk, or operating giant cranes high on cocaine.

Actually. The whole thing might be an intense invasion of privacy. Huh. It might be a bad idea. Hasty. I can see how the tech could be perverted and used as a stepping stone to constant monitoring of the population by the government. Go figure. This is probably a really BAD idea. Good thing I’m not in elected office. I might accidentally cause the destruction of humanity in some poorly thought out but well meaning attempt at national drug reform. WHEW. Just a writer. What a relief.

This week we have a very nice flash recreation of the classic Sega Flagship title from yesteryear, Sonic The Hedgehog. It isn’t a clone of any specific version of the game, but it feels like it could be a sequel to any of the originals. Loads of fun. Enjoy.

Apparently Indian legal authorities are relatively humorless when it comes to awkward public displays of affection. Read it here:

India court orders Gere’s arrest for “obscene” kiss

Spinal Tap will reunite. Seriously. Apparently there is a new short film and a single in the offing as well. Here’s the whole story from the AP:

NEW YORK (AP) - Spinal Tap is back, and this time the band wants to help save the world from global warming.

The mock heavy metal group immortalized in the 1984 mockumentary, “This is Spinal Tap,” will reunite for a performance at Wembley Stadium in London as part of the Live Earth concerts scheduled worldwide for July 7.

The original members of Spinal Tap will be there: guitarist Nigel Tufnel (played by Christopher Guest), singer David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) and bassist Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer). Rob Reiner, who both directed “This is Spinal Tap” and played the fake documentarian Marty DeBergi in the film, will also be in attendance.

A new 15-minute film directed by Reiner on the band’s reunion will also play at the opening night of the Tribeca Film Festival in New York on Wednesday. The slate for the opening gala, to be hosted by Al Gore, was previously announced, excepting the Reiner short.

The festival is to open with a showing of several global warming-themed short films produced by the SOS (Save Our Selves) campaign. SOS is also putting on the Live Earth concerts, to be held across seven continents.

Reiner spoke to The Associated Press on Tuesday to explain the reunion of Spinal Tap, a band always known more as a parody of rock `n roll excess than environmental awareness.

“They’re not that environmentally conscious, but they’ve heard of global warming,” said Reiner, whose other films include “When Harry Met Sally” and “Stand By Me.” “Nigel thought it was just because he was wearing too much clothing _ that if he just took his jacket off it would be cooler.”

Spinal Tap has reunited several times since the film, but hasn’t for a number of years. For the band _ whose last album was 1992’s “Break like the Wind” _ the occasion warranted a new single: “Warmer Than Hell.”

Reiner provided a sneak peak at the lyrics: “The devil went to Devon, it felt like the fourth degree/ He said, `Is it hot in here, or is it only me?’”

The director said the new short film explains what the band has been doing with their lives lately. Nigel has been raising miniature horses to race, but can’t find jockeys small enough to ride them; David is now a hip-hop producer who also runs a colonic clinic; and Derek is in rehab for addiction to the Internet.

Reiner, 60, has for over 20 years worked with the National Resources Defense Council, an environmental action organization. Though the Spinal Tap reunion will be a lot of laughs, he hopes the SOS short films program and the Live Earth concerts have a substantial effect.

“What I think is going to be nice about this whole effort is there will be marching orders for people,” said Reiner. “Not only from a personal standpoint of what individuals can do in their lives, but a macro perspective with respect to the public sector and government.”

I would love to see that, but alas, I do not live in the greater London area. If anyone would like to send me a couple of plane tickets and pay for my hotel accommodations so that I can cover this historic event, please contact me at thiswillneverhappen@absolutelynoway.com. Thank you.

Alright. I know it’s fun to shit on the ambitious movie that bombed at the box office. Americans are strange that way, we both admire and resent ambition, a fact due probably to our mixed heritage as both a pioneering nation and a puritan one. Whatever. The fact remains that as much as we like to see the long shot pay off and enjoy the cathartic buzz we get from seeing something risky succeed, we like it even more when it fails.

Such is the case with Grindhouse.

BEFORE Grindhouse came out, critics were falling over their wagging tongues to praise this exploitation double feature from Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez. And rightly so. It is brilliant. The movie released, bombed, and then all of a sudden critics everywhere were frothing at the mouths waiting to deconstruct ‘what went wrong with Grindhouse’ and were more than happy to patronizingly chastise the directors for their silly little experiment. If you want a taste of what I’m talking about, check out this plea from writer Mark Harris, who begs Tarantino to go mainstream and “put away his childish things”.

I watched this movie yesterday, and it was excellent. In fact, almost everybody that sees the movie likes it. It has an 81% at Rotten Tomatoes which is high for any movie, especially one that’s three hours long. The only people that don’t like it are the ones that take themselves and their entertainment too seriously.

Here is my message to you today: Don’t listen to any of these people. Grindhouse is fun, fun, fun. If you liked Evil Dead II, go see Grindhouse. If you like MOVIES, go see Grindhouse. If you are overly sensitive or easily offended, go see Blades of Glory.

Grindhouse will win no Oscars. No one has terminal cancer. Nobody befriends a small child that they can then learn important life lessons from. No famous people from today portray famous people from yesterday. At no point does Hiliary Swank or Meryl Streep appear. What do you get is a thrill ride zombie shooting movie, paired with a intense action thriller that will have you cheering, OUT LOUD, by the end. Throw in a handful of hilariously over the top fake movie trailers, a bucket of popcorn and a Freeze, and you have yourself a first rate night at the movies.

I was bored last Saturday and decided to fill a little time by watching the White House Correspondents Dinner. The event is put on by the White House Correspondents Association and is sort of a tradition in Washington. Usually the President and the Vice President come, as well as various other officials and celebrities and whoever. Sanjaya was there. So was Valerie Bertinelli. I think I saw Terri Hatcher. G. Gordon Liddy was invited for some reason.

Anyway, the whole thing is supposed to be this light hearted dinner that usually takes the form of a Presidential roast. Typically the speakers take well meaning shots at the President, if the chief executive has a sense of humor, and then the President takes a few shots back at the media mixed in with few a well prepared self deprecating remarks. It’s all supposed to be in good fun, and acts as a much needed fence mending, blow off steam night that ideally helps to ease the tension between the establishment and the press.

Last year, Stephen Colbert was the entertainer, and things didn’t go so well. Depending on your outlook either, A. Stephen Colbert went to far, or B. The President and his team are not that fond of Self Depreciation. I’ll let you decide which is more likely. Either way, this year the people who decide these things chose to go a safer, less confrontational direction. Namely, to hire a comedian from forty years ago.

Now I don’t mean to shit on old school comics. Most of the giants from past eras are wildly talented, and are masters of their various comedic crafts. I have great respect for the excellence of these comics, and I think that if they’ve lost any of their edge it’s simply because the comedic world of today is built upon the foundation they laid. Many of these guys are still working, at least a little, are still hilarious, and probably would have been happy to work the Correspondent’s dinner. There were, in fact, plenty of safe-yet-entertaining choices that could have been made that would have kept the event free of controversy, and that would have afforded the president safety from even the most light hearted criticism. Instead, they booked Rich Little.

Rich Little is an impersonator. He used to be on Carson all the time because he did a really good Carson impression, and he was well known as the most popular impressionist of his day. He wasn’t even a particularly great impressionist, he just had MORE impressions than anybody else (Frank Gorshin, better known as the Riddler from the old Batman TV show was largely thought of as a better impersonator, but he had fewer voices). Rich Little boasts of over 200 voices, many of which sound sort of like Richard Nixon and/or Johnny Carson, depending on which face Rich Little is making. That’s fine, if you like that sort of thing, but a straight impersonator should never be confused with an actual comedian as the strength of their entertainment value comes from the quality of their impressions, and is in no way based on the strength of their jokes. That’s why you don’t see too many impersonators now. You can thank Saturday Night Live for that, as their impressions were always more about the jokes than the mimicry. They tried to be funny first, good impersonators second, and subsequently changed what people expect from the medium. Chevy Chase’s Gerald Ford is a good example of what I’m talking about.

Back to the dinner. Bush comes up, declares the Virginia Tech Tragedy too serious and too soon for him to make any jokes, and so he just reverts back to the well worn super-earnest George W. Bush we all know and tolerate. Five minutes later he hands it over to Rich Little, who now has to follow the somber Presidential bring down. A hard place to start from for any performer, especially one who isn’t funny. Rich takes the stage, appearing overly tanned and uncomfortable, looking small behind the podium.

Rich Little then proceeds to bomb. Hard. Harder than I have ever seen anyone bomb ever. It was so awkward. So, so awkward. A roomful of jaded political reporters stared blankly up at him like they were as amazed as I was at every decades old Punchline and tired old impression. He sang one point. An Arnold Schwarzenegger impression was performed. It was one big cornball nightmare. Even Sanjaya was embarrassed.

I really don’t know what to say beyond that. The whole thing was sad really. Very, very sad. He worked his antique act for about half an hour, then slunk off the stage. It was a relief when the performance mercifully ended.

Wanna watch? Don’t believe me? Hell, maybe I’m wrong and Rich Little ruled. Here’s the whole thing, you can judge for yourself:

So there you go. I think that speaks for itself.

I dedicate this classic game to my favorite fathead,Mr. Jack Thompson. If he is to be believed, this game has led to countless deaths and the destruction of our culture. Here’s to you Jack!

So if you’ve been following American Idol, and there is no rational reason why you should be, you may be familiar with the Sanjaya Malakar situation. If not, let me summarize: Sanjaya sucked, but people liked him anyway. It was a sort of self fulfilling prophesy wherein a speculative population wondered what it would be like if someone crappy, or crappier than usual, were to somehow win the popular singing related game show. This question was compelling enough to cause people to vote for him in an effort to see if they could find out the answer. National interest built up behind the concept, and it was a race against time for Sanjaya. He would last on the show until people stopped caring about his unique situation and moved on to some other national distraction. Everything was working out well for him, snowballing as these things do, and the apocalypse signaling event was beginning to look like an entirely credible possibility.

Then on Tuesday, something, and I couldn’t possibly think of what it could be, distracted everybody.

Just like that, America blinked, and it was over for Sanjaya.

It was sad really. As was pointed out to me, while the whole ordeal was sort a joke to the pop culture monkeys of the nation, me included, and it was a quirky little game America was able to play on the number one show in America, it was all too real for Sanjaya. He probably thought he was going to win. This was borne out by his reaction to the news that he was cut. He wept. Openly. It was all of a sudden very depressing to watch. He’s this young kid after all, thrust into the white hot viciously sardonic spotlight, the overnight focus of countless snarky news stories, poised for the reality show upset of the century, and then all at once has the carpet cruelly ripped out from under him. Blows.

Hope things turn out well for him. If some of the stories I read are true, then it looks like he may have millions of dollars in endorsement deals to help salve the wound.

If you want to see him get the boot, cry, then be forced to sing a song, click the video below.

This sort of thing is the beginning of what I think will be the real legacy of the Bush Administration. From Reuters:

Court upholds law banning some abortions

WASHINGTON, April 18 (Reuters) - A closely divided U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld the first nationwide ban on a specific abortion procedure, restricting abortion rights in a ruling on one of the nation’s most divisive and politically charged issues.

By a 5-4 vote, the high court rejected arguments challenging on various grounds the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act that President George W. Bush signed into law in 2003 after its approval by the Republican-led U.S. Congress.

The decision marked the first time the nation’s high court has upheld a federal law banning a specific abortion procedure since its landmark Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973 that women have a basic constitutional right to abortion.

In a defeat for abortion rights advocates, the court majority with two Bush appointees upheld the law adopted after nine years of hearings and debate. The law has never been enforced because of court challenges.

So there you go. Bush’s guys vote along Bush’s line, and the president claims another political victory in practically the only place that ever gives them to him. The Supreme Court. I think I know a few conservative justices who can expect another mighty impressive fruit basket sometime soon. (Helpful Tip For The President’s Secretary: John Roberts likes Kiwi)

Hey, Everybody, it’s TAX DAY! WHOO HOO! In celebration of tax day, Brain Pan will be taking the day off. Everyone should get a day off on Tax Day, and we are trying to set an example. (We also feel that everyone should get off voting day too, but nobody asked us about that either.)

SEE YOU TOMORROW EVERYBODY!