Media Mix-Up #6 Part 1: The Set Up

Many movies… wish sight upon me. Film in my eyes dog and I can’t see…

Look inside yourself and find… me… telling you what movies are good

I know! It's been a few months since I put out a Media Mix Up out. This is good news for you, because I watched more television, played more video games, and sprung for more movies than you would think a man living on a fixed income could manage.

I've been into so much stuff!

Track 1: Sonic The Hedgehog 3 is as good as every other Sonic movie.

Shadow is practically the same hedgehog, right?!

My mother had a plan. She kept mentioning a movie with a hedgehog in it. It didn't take me long to know what she was talking about, but I didn't know why she kept bringing it up. I think she wanted me to watch Sonic the Hedgehog.

It took a few months, but I finally got around to checking it out on a random afternoon. It was fun! A super-fast hedgehog from another world comes to Earth with an attitude to be a life-saving hero despite an evil doctor looking to catch him and steal his power. That might sound corny, but when Jim Carey plays Dr. Robotnik, aka Eggman, whatever gets made will be worth a watch.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 was in many ways better than the first. The two-tailed fox Tails is looking to be Sonic's new assistant. Knuckles (Idris Elba), on the other hand, saves Robotnik from the mushroom world he was trapped in, only to get betrayed by the villain later. As with most sequels, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was a testament to more. More fun, more fights, more Robotnik, more of his disrespected assistant, complete with a giant robot Sonic, Tales, and a side-switched Knuckles form "Team Sonic" to destroy.

Sonic The Hedgehog 3: I have to finish the set!

Sonic 3 was... another Sonic movie. They had to raise the stakes and provide a single dead person to do that. Shadow (Keanu Reeves) replaced Knuckles who is now part of Team Sonic. Shadow has been kept on ice, on Earth, for 50 years. As an uncontrollable force, Shadow is even faster than Sonic, so when "Team Sonic" goes to stop him, he kicks the everloving shit out of all of them and anyone else that gets in his way.

Meanwhile, Robotnik is so devastated by his losses to Sonic that he's gotten fat, lives in a crab-bot he invented, and watches Spanish soaps all day. Eventually, he meets Grandpa Robotnik who is also played by Jim Carey. Grandpa and Grandson dance their way through danger until Old Man Robotnik's plans of betrayal are finally revealed.. A bunch of other stuff happens and you should absolutely go see it if you like PG kids movies.

Also, I just finished the Knuckles television show post my viewing of Sonic the Hedgehog 3. Seeing this Paramount series first would have set up bits of Sonic 3 perfectly.

Track 2: Fritz the Cat (1972) deserves its X rating.

Fritz! Bad kitty! Bad bad bad kitty!

My friend Andrew told me I had to see this film by director Ralph Bakshi: The Godfather of Adult Animation and Robert Crumb: The Godfather of Alternative Comix released in 1972. It's titled Fritz the Cat and its legacy is that it's the only X-rated feature-length adult animated film in history... probably. Betty Boop was up to some wild-ass stuff. Andrew also told me this film created a feud between Bakshi and Crumb because Crumb hated this movie and said it did a poor job of encapsulating the character he created.

After watching this, I see Crumb's point. This film lived up to its X rating. Ratings don't mean as much as they used to, but I can see early 70s teens wanting to get their hands on it just to increase their rep. Fritz the Cat has animated anthropomorphic animals doing some of the most wild things I've ever seen. It features orgies, nazis, black people (all played by crows), a riot, tons more sex, and a ridiculous ending. It's like the film The Graduate if everyone was an animal and all the cops were literal pigs. Also, there are lots of cartoon breasts of various sizes as well as R. Crumb's favorite BIG LEGS, and penises in the mix so anyone can enjoy it… I think. It's kind of 60's gross but does a good job of highlighting the injustice of that era as well.

It's streaming on Amazon if you want to take a risk and view this uh... classic?

Track 3: Jackpot with John Cena and Awkwafina? Interesting combination.

I love pictures of posters.

In the year 2030, the state of California instituted a new type of lottery. It's very simple: If you get chosen as a winner all you have to do is survive the entire city of LA trying to kill you for 24 hours to collect your winnings! It should be easy since they can’t use any type of projectile weapons on you. However, there are many lottery nail guns available for murders and you can ask Steve Stifler about those as he takes one at the beginning of the film.

Katie (Awkwafina) has recently shown up in town because she wants to be an actor and her dying mother told her to do that before she passed. On her first day there, a nice lady on the bus steals her watch, her teeny-weeny apartment room is leaking sewage on her clothes, and her roommate is a beautiful weirdo who is not helpful in any way. Katie’s roommate’s solution after the clothes are filled with disgusting water is to offer up her own clothes as a replacement. Katie has only been in town a day, knows nothing of the L.A. lottery system, and accidentally presses the enter key on her roommate’s ticket and wins. That's when the city-wide clubs come out.

Basically, all of LA is trying to kill Katie and take the 2.3 billion dollars for themselves. After saving her self from her audition, it doesn’t take long for John Cena to ride in like Lancelot and do some butt kicking of his own. Katie takes a while to figure out what Cena means by asking for 10%. Unfortunately, there is a lack of trust in Katie they'll both have to work through to pull this off. Then Shang-Chi and his lottery protection company show up.

This movie was fun to watch. I recommend it.

Track 4: Quiz Lady shows how good of a combo Awkwafina and Sandra Oh can be.

I guess every combination with Awkawafina is interesting.

Quiz Lady is set in 2023. Heh. Awkwafina is a nerdy introvert who prefers to stay at home and watch Can't Stop The Quiz (aka Jeopardy hosted by Will Ferrell) while knowing every answer like it's not a problem. Sandra Oh plays the wild child sister coming back to town with no money, no job, and no prospects. She's really good at flirting with people though. Speaking of which, do you guys remember Sandra Oh from Sideways? I hated that movie.

This is a pretty standard buddy comedy as these two sisters who do not like each other have to race to get the ever-anxious Awkwafina on Can't Stop The Quiz. It almost feels like Jackpot with more comedy and less violence.

Track 5: Joy Ride: A story about an Asian-American woman going to Asia for the first time.

I see you back there, Deadeye! Lookin all “All my friends are on the Internet-y”

I watched a lot of movies with Asian women (including Single Lady by Ali Wong) these last few months and they were all fabulous. Audrey (Ashley Park) and Lolo (Sherry Cola) have been friends since childhood. Audrey is adopted and a bit shy while Lolo is out there punching boys in the face when they talk shit. Once they reach adulthood, Audrey ends up working at a big-time law firm and Lolo becomes a starving artist. I understand this well because I lived it.

Audrey is chosen to represent her big-time law firm by taking her first trip to Asia to get a deal with Ronny Chieng’s company, and Lolo decides to go along too. The only problem for Lolo is her mother makes her take her cousin, Deadeye (Sabrina Wu), who is even more anxious and awkward than Awkwafina in Quiz Show. Plus Deadeye only has friends on the Internet.

On this trip, they run into Audrey's friend Kat (Stephanie Hsu) who is a beloved actress in China slated to marry the co-star of her classical-era soap opera. Kat has to suppress her ho-tel parts because her future husband is super religious. He must never know what she did in college! During their time together Lolo continually pressures Audrey into finding the mother she never knew. Audrey doesn’t want to bother at first, but eventually relents. That's when all four of these “friends” hit the road across China to make this “find you mother” dream happen and it’s funny and crazy what happens next.

Media Mix-Up #6: HALF COMPLETE!

I can’t tell if I love gifs or if that’s as far as my Internet knowledge lets me go.

That seems like enough tracks for now. There are still a lot more things to go over though, mostly on the televised side. We can check that stuff out in:

Media MixUp #6: Part 2: The Revenge!

There are video versions of my reviews on TikTok now!

Also, check out my musical legacy with Mike Dynamo & Supercrime, and as always:

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