Anodyne (PC)



Man, it's like Link's Awakening and Earthbound had a little nightmare baby. But while it might be the biggest mindfuck I've seen since Eversion, as a Zelda clone it's a bit on the short and easy side, and there's checkpoints everywhere.

I also wish the narrative had been more focused. One part of the game has a cat pondering death and reincarnation. Shortly after, you're fighting blood monsters in a giant monster womb. Next, you've got a bear telling you how many times he's had sex. Then you're stabbing people in a black and white town with a noise filter over it. Then there's a fight with a swearing Rorschach look-a-like. Then you've talking triangles that are metaphor for how your online friends aren't really your friends. Then a couple of circus performers commit suicide. And at the end of the game you've got super-optimistic snowmen. I would still consider Anodyne appealingly fucked up, but it does teeter on just being schizophrenic at times.

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Pacific Rim (PG-13)



For the first half of the movie, Pacific Rim seemed to be taking itself seriously, what with the bleak world of humans being devastated by giant monsters and the main character's dead brother. But right about the point when Ron Perlman shows up it gets really, really, gloriously stupid, and angst gives way to a Kaiju getting beaten with an oil tanker and the clacky ball scene. Yeah, it's really a "just for lulz" type of movie, but some of the monster designs are cool, and the scene within the breach was a satisfying "Ha ha ha! Fuck you!" moment.

I was also going to comment on the similarities to another property with humans being attacked by giant monsters out of nowhere, and an attempt to build a giant wall that the monsters end up breaking through anyway, and the name "Jaeger", but then a quick Bing search showed I was hardly the first one to notice that. And man, I noticed the AI sounded like GLaDOS, I didn't realize it was supposed to be GLaDOS.

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The Avengers w/ RiffTrax Audio (PG-13)



Oh boy, another movie that lost its shit halfway through, only this time with help from the RiffTrax crew. Geez, I laughed almost constantly through this, though I did especially like the riffers hitting each other for making worse jokes than Robert Downey Jr., "The Power-Mad Ponce Show", and the followup to the infamous Hulk-smash-Loki scene. But okay guys, we get it, Hawkeye sucks. Although Mike's comment about his use-specific arrows was a right laugh.

I'm also a bit surprised that they referenced Strong Guy, a character I only know about because he showed up in the Totally-Not-Saddam-Hussein arc of the Merged Hulk comics. I also didn't wait long enough after I watched the movie the first time to catch the clip with Thanos.

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Super Mario Bros. w/ RiffTrax Audio (PG-13)



Rejoice, fellow gamers, for there is a God and He loves us. Oh, I had my doubts too, until I saw this on the RiffTrax front page. See, this is how you do video game reference jokes; you balance bone-throwing to fans of Leisure Suit Larry with letting the audience figure out what Koopa sitting in front of a television holding a light gun while thinking "Damn dog keeps laughing at me" means. What you do not do is drown your audience in bad game title puns and remind us that the cake is a lie.

Pointing out that it has little to do with the games is a bit redundant, but there are some fun spins on it like the crew explaining how to unlock the mattress skank slalom race in Mario Bros. 2, and there's plenty more laughs to be had. Granted, it is a bit steep at $10, but you do get the actual film and a burnable .iso to put it on a DVD.

By the way, I could have sworn there was a scene where Koopa's tower appears in New York when the dimensions merge, and then I realized it was New York City where Koopa's smoldering wreckage of a tower would have been standing. Yeeeaaaah, I guess I can see why they would have cut that scene.

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