Who Asked You?

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Something a little fancy for you this week. Evan Pederson from the FancyPantsGangsters.com podcasting network in Minneapolis sits in with us via Skype. And what a show he chose to join us for. This week’s presentation of our podcast is probably the closest — to date — that we’ve ever/will come to a full-on political discussion. As you can probably guess, it revolves around SOPA and PIPA, the 2 anti-piracy bills now shelved in the US Congress. Evan chose to make his site go dark on January 18th along with thousands of others as part of the largest online protest ever. As I mentioned in a SOPA rant posted that same day, we at Who Asked You? stayed online mainly because I didn’t want to break our site in fear of not being able to fix it. You’ll hear the wildely different approaches Evan and I had to accomplishing the black-out. His was far less extreme and overall, smarter than the way I wouldn’ve done it. So it’s a good thing I declined to participate.
The SOPA story starts in the form of a Chase-rant. Those role around on occasion. In an attempt to keep my blood pressure in check, I don’t go too crazy and in an attempt to keep you awake, I don’t go to in-depth with political jargon. Charlie is also grateful for this. He proclaims on the show that we shouldn’t get any more political than we do with this SOPA thing. As we’ve always maintained on Who Asked You? we try and limit our conversations on politics and religion because those “cans of worms” are a slippery slope for us and you listeners. They can result in shouting, bad feelings and overall butt hurt. Unlike today’s movies or someone named Zopittybop-Bop-Bop getting arrested for drug possession, which we can all joke about. But something like SOPA directly affects our website, so it feels like a requirement to at least acknowledge it. Charlie again pitches the idea of doing a serious show where these topics can reside, after all, just 10-minutes earlier we were talking about the Squatty Potty. What do you think? Should we have a separate show for serious/political topics… please say no. Another show is more work for me. And in all honesty, that’s what makes Who Asked You? the show that it is; being able to simply go from a product that makes you squat on the toilet to legislation that could terminate our show as we know it.
Once DE-FACE THE NATION ends, we move onto more of what makes our show great… Vince Shlomi for example! He’s the ShamWow guy. Vince has once again straped on his little headset and is hawkin’ made-for-TV gizmos at you like his life depended on it. And it probably does. I’m sure he needs the commissions to pay off his attorney fees. If you don’t remember what he got arrested for, I explain it on today’s show. Or if you want to hear the original story, check out EPISODE 63. What’s funny is that in his infomercial, he’s more than happy to poke fun at himself and includes plenty of inuendo relating to his arrest.
Do to time constraints we skip 2 stories and head straight into Breaking News. Once again, Taco Bell makes our radar. If you frequent the web, you’ve probably seen a joke where Taco Bell is the punchline. The mystery as to how digestible their food is still remains. Also, whether it’s actually food or not. See, there was another one. It seems the fast-food giant has heard one to many riffs and is starting a test market on a new menu featuring fresh ingredients… as apposed to…? See Taco Bell, you bring it on yourselves! The idea is to compete with shops like Chipotle and Q’doba. Offering the same “quality” (in quotations) but for a cheaper price. If you live in Louisville, KY or Bakersfield, CA… please let us know how it goes. Those are the first test markets for “Cantina Bell” as they’re calling it. If it proves a success, they’ll role it out nationwide. Call me skeptical on this one. A fast-food joint with taco shells made out of Doritos can use “authentic” and “fresh” in their menu vocabulary about as convincingly as we can “serious” and “political” in our show’s.

SHOW LINKS:
FancyPantsGangsters.com
The Squatty Potty – Poop Smarter, Not Harder!
SOPA sponsor, Rep. Lamar Smith, violates the very law he’s proposing.
Sign the Google “End Piracy, Not Liberty” Petition
Order Your Schticky Today!
Taco Bell – Now testing REAL ingredients in their food.

New Releases for Tuesday, January 24th:
Real Steel (3-Disc Combo: Blu-ray/DVD + Digital Copy)
50/50
Godzilla (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]
Paranormal Activity 3 (Blu-ray/DVD Combo in Blu-ray Packaging)
Ancient Aliens (Season 3)
Whistleblower
Stripes (Extended Cut) [Blu-ray]
Revenge of the Electric Car
See No Evil, Hear No Evil [Blu-ray]
Roger Corman’s Cult Classic’s Lethal Ladies Collection (Volume 2)

 
 

As you can see, Who Asked You? is not participating in today’s web-based protest by shutting down our site. I’m not sure I understand why you would willingly block your site and its fine content from your visitors. That’s precisely what SOPA wants!!! A better way to protest would be to flood your site with copyrighted content. That would really stick in ol’ SOPA’s craw. Plus, if I turned our site off — knowing my luck — there’d be a database meltdown and it wouldn’t come back on and you wouldn’t be able to read the following rant.
I’ll try not to be too long-winded with my thoughts on one of the worst Internet-related bills ever conceived, so I’ll get straight to the point. I do not apologize for my bluntness or disrespect for Congress or what might be perceived by some as the belittling of the entertainment industry.
SOPA, not the soup, but rather the (Stop Online Piracy Act) and it’s mutant Senate sibling, PIPA (Protect IP Act) is the result of not only poorly written legislation but mostly sheer panic on the part of the motion picture and record label industries more commonly known as the MPAA and the RIAA respectively. These are 2 industries who are mad because they ignored the signs and failed to jump on the Information Super-Highway Bandwagon back when it was starting to take off. They are in a state of terror right now because their profits are in the billions instead of tens-of-billions. So they’re stacking large piles of money on the desks of the corrupt, clueless imbeciles on Crapitol Hill. These are old, out-of-touch, stuffy, greedy, dickheads who can barely operate their Blackberry phones, let alone legislate the Internet. You ever gotten a call from Grandpa or Grandma because they don’t know how to send an E-Mail after they’ve typed it? Yeah… that’s Congress and the US Supreme Court.
SOPA and PIPA would mean the end of existence for sites like Wikipedia and YouTube. Sites that have accomplished something amazing and are now engrained in our society and have become common nomenclature for our everyday lives. Wikipedia is the largest, most vast encyclopedia ever created. YouTube is more than just a site to see some obnoxiously giggly girl filming her emo boyfriend getting kicked in the balls by his skinny jeans-wearing buddy. It’s become what I like to call a “cultural archive”. You can find anything there. Obscure songs, movie trailers, old commercials, newscast recordings, etc. These are not copyright violations, this is our way of appreciating and documenting this content. Case in point, the last 20-minutes of our 192nd episode. If SOPA had its way, that would be pulled down because we played “copyrighted” board game commercials from our childhood off of YouTube.
I’ll never understand this “not on my watch” mentality the movie and music industry has these days. The old fogies that run these industries refuse to understand that their business models simply don’t work anymore. Instead of embracing the Internet, they’ve shunned it and are now pissed off that they’ve become the laughingstock of the web. They make music and movies, but they don’t want anyone to enjoy them. They try… oh boy do they try to keep up the old ways. They cut deplorable deals with Netflix who then gets collectively cussed at for trying to alter their DVD service to keep subscription numbers down so that their licensing fees stay low and they can then pass those savings onto their customers. Granted “Qwikster” was a terrible idea. But the company’s heart was in the right place. Ever wonder why Frank Sinatra’s “Love And Marriage” song has been replaced on Netflix and the DVD’s with a Casio cool-sounding cut of unfitting tunery? Because the licensing fees for it were too high!!! REALLY??? It’s a fuckin’ song from the 50′s… you got your god-damned royalties for 50 years. Just let the people enjoy it for Christ sake! And here’s a news flash… when people hear that song, they think of the Fox sitcom. Not the record company who released it, or the guys who wrote it who I can’t even look up because Wikipedia has blacked itself out today for this protest!!!!
Bottom line… change is coming. I know you’re scared MPAA and RIAA, but you know what? There are other ways of increasing your revenue. Here are some examples… stop making shitty content (i.e. movie remakes, or movies based on other things like books, games and comics, CD’s that are auto-tuned on every track because the idiot Barbie doll you got to sing them can’t hold a note, etc.) Here’s another… stop paying actors so much money. If they love the craft so much, they’ll work for union scale. Not to put any one actor on blast, but we know of many that command… or rather DE-mand tens-of-millions per film. You’re not worth that. Your job is not that hard. Crab fishing in the Bering Sea, that’s hard. Serving a tour of duty in Afghanistan, that’s hard. Imagine the millions a studio would save out of the gate if they hired that struggling waiter with an equally impressive 6-pack to play Marvel’s Green Lantern instead of Ryan Reynolds. Imagine how much money it would’ve made if they didn’t rely on complacent union writers and instead hired a writer who knew the Marvel universe and could’ve written a GOOD script that was well received by comic fans who in-turn told their friends to see it too. I get it, everyone needs to make money. And I agree. But you don’t have to make so damned much, especially if you’re a giant corporation. Why can’t you be happy with $3-billion in profit instead of $4-billion? There are other, less annoying, not-so-stingy ways of maintaining your copyright without killing the Internet.
I digress… I read a headline yesterday that SOPA is being shelved… for now. Not canceled or eliminated, just shelved. President Obama says he’d veto it if passed. That’s fine, but what about when he leaves office. What if the president after him supports ending free speech and expression online? What if that president takes the envelope stuffed with money from MPAA and RIAA lobbyists? In that case… I guess we’re boned and you won’t be able to look up this little posting and have a good laugh years from now.

Tell Congress they’re being stupid as usual.
Sign Google’s End Piracy, Not Liberty Petition.

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For the third show in a row, there’s at least 1 host missing. This time around it’s Mike. Our pal John once again fills the empty seat of a co-host and does his best Mike impression in the process. I think when 1 of us is out, the conversation’s timing gets thrown off. Despite having a fill-in, we’re incapable of always filling the hour. We 5 have become a well oiled machine always delivering 60-minutes of chatter. But a wooden sabot shoe in the form of a missing man, a shitty segment or technical difficulties can be thrown into the gear works and you’re left with something like today’s show.
In this case the sabotage is ‘It’s The Law’. What was once a popular segment on the show doesn’t garner the conversation it used to. With only a few states to go, I feel obligated to finish before retiring the bit. This time we’re looking at laws in Virginia. The state has some pretty strict guidelines you must abide by when getting’ it on. There’s only 1 position allowed, you have to do it in the dark and it’s only aloud in 1 hole. More odd ordinances where those came from.
‘It’s The Law’ wasn’t the only segment where not much was said. At the top of the show we took a moment to recap CES, which by most accounts was pretty ho-hum this year. No major game consoles were unveiled. Most of the flat panels were the same 3D, LED, LCD, or SOB units they’ve been bugging us to buy for 2 years now and the rest was pointless accessories for the iPad. So, not much to talk about there.
The ‘New Releases’ would surely have something worth conversating over… nope. Most of this week’s DVD’s, none of us have heard of. And that’s saying a lot, because our combined knowledge of obscure media is quite vast. I couldn’t even get the guys to stretch on the subject of Andy Dick while I pulled up poll results I forgot to mark down on my paper. Can’t blame them there though… what is there to say about Andy Dick?
We learn that Steven Spielberg will NOT direct Jurassic Park 4. There’s not a whole lot to be said there either. The CW is raiding the box full of DC comics for their next TV series. And they’ve asked the guys that did GREEN LANTERN to develop it. Yeah, because that movie was soooo great right?
No wonder we blast through the rundown with 19-minutes to spare. In our ‘Breaking News’ segment we introduce you to a man arrested for drug possession who has one of the most ridiculous names ever. His first name is Beezow… and there’s plenty more where that came from.
Thank god for YouTube. It’s where everyone goes these days to waste time. To kill the nearly 20-minutes of unplanned Ask-ness we do what we do best, remissness. And what better way to do so on, than old board games and their commercials. The show title is startin’ to make sense now isn’t it? I promise — despite everything I’ve typed here — this is not a ‘bored’ show.

SHOW LINKS:
Hostess
CES
Collider.com
JurassicPark.com
The Adventures Of Tin Tin Website
The CW
Read about Green Arrow
Read about Booster Gold
SyFy.com
Buy Smallville (The Complete Series) on DVD
Amazon.com – Owners of IMDb.com
Junie Hoang on IMDb – Suing Amazon.com for revealing her age.
Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop on Facebook

New Releases for Tuesday, January 17th:
Courageous
Ides of March
Merlin (Season 3)
Abduction
Kevin Hart: Laugh At My Pain
Hetalia: World Series 1 (Season 3) (Limited Edition)
Sliders (Season 5)
Mad (Season 1, Part 2)
Bad Girls [Blu-ray]
Division III: Football’s Finest

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I may have spoiled a surprise. I don’t remember if I previously mentioned what we had planned for our 200th show or not. And I don’t remember if I said it was a surprise. In any case, it’s no longer one… I reveal today what’s in store for that milestone. You’ll have to wait until the end of the show to hear about it though. Or you can just skip to it, your choice. If you do bypass the bulk of this episode, there’s a few things you’ll miss.
First up is GEORGE LUCAS STRIKES BACK! A fake movie trailer posted on YouTube and then on our Facebook Page by a listener. This trailer is hilarious! It was posted on our Facebook in response to our underwhelmed response to the 2012 roster of theatrical releases. If there were more movies like this one coming out, we would be a lot more excited. To see the mock-movie trailer for yourself, scroll down to the Show Links.
Just a couple of weeks ago a man named Trent Arsenault received a cease and desist order from the FDA. What could a single man do to warrant such a stern reaction from the federal government? Should federal government be capitalized? These questions need answers. The former has one. Trent is running his own at-home sperm bank. Couples who are troubled with fertility issues are more than welcome to help themselves to Trent’s baby batter. The FDA claims he’s a quote “tissue manufacturer,” and is not abiding by their guidelines and he should undergo more STD tests and lab work to insure his Cupid’s toothpaste is safe and clean. But just browse Trent’s website and you’ll see he’s done his homework. He’s got test results, family history, sperm bank facts, FAQ’s, tons of pictures and more. And the icing on this cake? He doesn’t charge! Not even for shipping! So it’s not like he’s running a scam. How is this any different than a 1-night stand gone awry? We discuss this and you’re welcome to interject your thoughts as well. It’s this week’s ‘We Ask You Poll’.
Speaking of cakes and their icing. You may be staying away from them for awhile after hearing our next story. I’m going to warn you now, it’s in our ‘Jenkem Watch’ segment, so what does that tell ya? In Pennsylvania, 3 teen girls were just criminally charged for a prank they pulled way back in March on a fellow student at their high school. It was her birthday, what better gift than a cake? They’re tasty, they’re sweet, fairly easy to make and inexpensive. They show you care. Well, that is until you smother them in dookie. Not sure what the victim did to deserve this corn cake, but she didn’t question it when the friends asked her to try it in front of them. And it seems the girls were able to mask the sewer smell well enough she didn’t question that either. Or maybe it’s just girl poo doesn’t stink? Yeah, I’m gonna go with that.
You’ve probably seen the images by now. A hamburger with a black bun being touted as the “Darth Vador Burger”. It’s a new promotional bit by a French fast food franchise to celebrate the re-re-release of the STAR WARS films… this time in 3D!!!! You can choose the dark side and go with the black buns, or you can choose the path of a Jedi and enjoy a more traditional looking patty. There’s also a ‘Darth Maul Burger’. I think its poppy seeds might get stuck in my teeth though. Mike, our resident expert on that galaxy far far away chooses his slab-o-beef. Tune in to hear which one!
As always, Breaking News rounds things up. MC Hammer is being eyed by the IRS. Seems he owes then a shit-ton of back taxes going back to his 1996 bankruptcy filing. He claims he paid those and is even asking the court that he be reimbursed for the legal fees.
With a few minutes to kill we discuss our marketing strategy and merchandising plans on-the-air. That’s how we roll. We’re ramping up a T-Shirt line. Or at least, we’re planning to have a plan to make T-Shirts featuring our hilariously ambiguous show titles. Charlie is heading up our marketing department consisting of… Charlie. He’s looking for funny, cartoon-ish illustrations of our episode titles. Something that would work well on a shirt. And he’s willing to pay you $50 to do it, if we choose your design. This isn’t a contest so much as a Craigslist-like search for artists. If you’re good with crayons or other drawing utensils, pick your favorite title and submit your design to Charlie.

SHOW LINKS:
Follow our good friend, Jason Herder on Twitter @ToyBoatHouse – He made the Arnold Button possible.
Slick Gigolo’s YouTube Channel – Created GEORGE LUCAS STRIKES BACK trailer.
The Hollywood Reporter
TimBurton.com
Robert Downey Jr. on IMDb
The Jim Henson Company
TrentDoner.org – All the benefits of a sperm bank, without the sperm bank.
StarWars.com
eBay
Follow MC Hammer on Twitter

New Releases for Tuesday, January 10th:
Boardwalk Empire (Season 1)
Moneyball (2-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + UltraViolet Digital Copy)
Killer Elite
What’s Your Number
Primeval (Volume 3)
Doctor Who: Invasion of the Dinosaurs (Story 71) and The Android Invasion (Story 83)
An Idiot Abroad
Pacific Blue (Complete Series)
The Scorpion King 3: Battle for Redemption
G.I. Joe (Series 2: Season 1)

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If you’re staring at this week’s show title wondering if that’s a snack in the food aisle at your local adult store, it is not. It’s Channing Tatum’s new nickname. Why would we call him that? Please see the episode titled, “The Beck-ening” which contains one of our more memorable stories still brought up from time to time. Why are we talking about Channing Tatum? Because he’s got several movies coming out this year including G.I. JOE: RETALIATION and 21 JUMP STREET. Both of these films sound awful.
Charlie can count his lucky stars he slept too late and missed this week’s program because it’s not just reboots of 80′s TV series and toy-turned-movie sequel blandness we have to look forward to in the theater this year… oh no, there’s also sequels to films that didn’t need them, sequels to films that shouldn’t have had a first one to begin with, a movie based on the Navy SEALS mission that killed Osama bin Laden, more comic book flicks, a 3D version of a certain chainsaw-wielding wacko who goes on a massacre, a sequel to a comic book movie whose original was really bad, Daniel Radcliffe ditches the wand, the CLASH OF THE TITANS remake gets an unneeded second, Johnny Depp stars in another Tim Burton film, Tim Burton produces a movie based on one of his first stop-motion shorts, Hasbro continues to sell its soul, Will Smith insures his is never coming back, a guy named ‘Webb’ will give us his emo-take on THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, Bruce Wayne slips on his cape for the last ‘good’ time — although DC is probably already planning Batman’s reboot after Nolan calls it quits, you’ll be demanding a recall on Collin Farrell’s version of TOTAL RECALL, Stallone and friends will come back to blow stuff up and blow people’s heads off, the fight against the Umbrella Corp. will continue, Universal’s monsters will be raped a second time in the ass after contracting Hepatitis from VAN HELSING, RED DAWN will also see the dawn of its reboot, KNOCKED UP will get a spin-off, a Hansel and Gretel movie will come out this year with a plot so ridiculous the guys are convinced I made it up. We did that on the 2010 look ahead and it was just as difficult back then to tell the real from the fake. I swear to you, I did not make any of these up this time around. These films are all real!
Somewhere between the messes of movies being rattled off I run out of Sam Adams Black and Brew (my new favorite of theirs having tried it for the first time on today’s show) and we learn what pig semen smells like from Sheena, Charlie’s female fill-in.

SHOW LINKS:
Sheena Johnson on IMDb
Movie Insider’s 2012 Theatrical Releases
Download EPISODE 157 – The Beck-ening

New Releases for Tuesday, January 3rd:
Justified (Season 2)
Contagion (Two-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + UltraViolet Digital Copy)
Alfred Hitchcock Presents (Season 5)
I Don’t Know How She Does It
Serendipity [Blu-ray]
Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark
Shark Night
Marley & Me: The Puppy Years
She’s All That [Blu-ray]
Red: Werewolf Hunter