If you have never played the bawdy, off-color excellence that is Toonstruck, I suggest you give this classic a try. It will be difficult to finagle getting it to work on newer versions of Windows, but the rewards make the effort worthwhile.

For a quick plot summary, cartoonist Drew Blanc (Christopher Lloyd) is on a heavy deadline to create new characters for the Fluffy Fluffy Bun Bun Show before his sadistic boss (Ben Stein) gives him the axe. For some reason, Blanc is pulled into the world of Cutopia where he meets his first creation, Flux Wildly (Dan Castellaneta). Drew and Flux then have to stop the arch nemesis Nefarious (Tim Curry) from destroying all of Cutopia with the Malevolator.

The plot, however, is of little value overall. What makes the game is the all-star voice cast (fans of Tiny Toons, Animaniacs, Darkwing Duck, The Simpsons, etc. rejoice) and the incredibly simple, yet rewarding interface. The game is a very basic point-and-click where you can never actually lose or die, only fail to achieve. The enjoyment is had in the puzzle solving adventures that poke fun at childhood cartoons with noticeable affection. From the S&M cow to the flamboyant scarecrow to the evil robot (I’m pretty sure that one was Christopher Walken), the characters and situations combined with snappy zingers and language that feels just wrong in the context of a children’s world will keep you invested in finding out what’s around the next corner.

Again, if you grew up watching early 90’s cartoons and always wondered what it would be like if the cartoonists were let off leash, then Toonstruck is the game for you. While the game may be relatively quick, the puzzles and challenges should give even a seasoned gamer some pause. The worst part about this game is that it was cut in half before release, and the knowledge that somewhere out there is an entire other game we could have had at our disposal. Enjoy.

–Casimir

Spoiler alert: this review will spoil your expectations for the latest installment of the Bond series.

Now, I have endured my share of criticism lately as a fan of Pierce Brosnan’s Bond circa Goldeneye (although, a friend recently called Daniel Craig the working man’s Bond, which I found apt). However, most of the critique of Brosnan was leveled at the ridiculousness of the story or the flat performances—and only that—of the string of high-profile Bond girls. Well, Craig fans, welcome to your comeuppance.

The plot of Quantum of Solace is little more than a political intrigue piece with villains more along the lines of corrupt Enron executives rather than the stock and trade egomaniacal sociopath hell-bent on destruction. The Bond of this film is a shoot-em-first-ask-questions-later rampaging, murdering machine, which may excite action fans, but does little to progress the plot. It’s hard to understand the importance of characters one introduces when they are killed within the first 10 seconds of exposure. Ironically, M’s frustration with Bond’s massacre mirrored my own; can you please pretend like you understand the importance of information?

In the end, there is very little spy left in the current iteration of the James Bond franchise. Every world player seems to know who he is and who he works for, which certainly makes subtle infiltration difficult. In Casino Royale, he makes sure that Le Chiffre knows who he is, and in Quantum he turns down a discreet safe house opting instead for the most luxurious hotel in the area. The idea now is that Bond is a one man army who travels the globe taunting the antagonists to do something about him while quickly killing everyone in his path.

“This seems like an appropriate metaphor for the plot of our film.”

At the end of the film, one gets the feeling that this was far from cinema at its best. While high expectations may provide insight into the let down, a good film will rise above this challenge (e.g. Dark Knight). It is yet another example of how a bad plot and superfluous narratives will destroy a film, despite the best efforts of the lead character. So, while Brosnan may have appeared in his share of campy, throw away Bond films, Daniel Craig can now add one of those notches to his belt as well.

–Casimir

It is apparently time again for the perennial religious culture wars in the United States. Actually, let me be specific, since there is no end to the culture wars, religious wars, religious culture wars, or religious culture in the United States. It is time for the Christmas driven religious culture war—you know, the one that ends up lasting a solid two month or more (unless a pesky political revolution gets in the way).

Now, I generally try to stay the hell (ha ha) away from this entire hullabaloo, especially since I rarely care one way or the other. One side thinks that saying “Merry Christmas” is the same thing as allowing a religion to take over the government and foisting its brainwashing ideology upon the rest of us. The other side thinks that keeping a mostly pagan tradition alive is the only way to prevent Beelzebub from clearing a path of human skulls by which Lucifer will arrive to enslave the human race. As much as I love hyperbole, both sides seem absurd to me.

Yet, within the context of the ‘war,’ there is always to be found the tireless and tired war of words between the believers and the faithless. For example, allow me to cite a recent CNN article about a group of such nonbelievers who are starting a series of bus ads declaring that we should be good for goodness sake:

“It’s a stupid ad,” [standard outraged religious person] said. “How do we define ‘good’ if we don’t believe in God? God in his word, the Bible, tells us what’s good and bad and right and wrong. If we are each ourselves defining what’s good, it’s going to be a crazy world.”

Plato, and nearly every subsequent philosopher since him, is rolling over in his grave. Also, two things: 1) There is no necessary causal connection between atheism and moral relativism, quite the contrary; and 2) There is no reason to suppose that many religious persons are not in fact proponents of subjectivism themselves. But it goes on:

Also on Tuesday, the Liberty Counsel, a conservative Christian legal group based in Orlando, Florida, launched its sixth annual “Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign.” Liberty Counsel has intervened in disputes over nativity scenes and government bans on Christmas decorations, among other things.

“It’s the ultimate grinch to say there is no God at a time when millions of people around the world celebrate the birth of Christ,” said Mathew Staver, the group’s chairman and dean of the Liberty University School of Law. “Certainly, they have the right to believe what they want, but this is insulting.”

What is insulting, apparently, is the insinuation that there is no god, but we should be good people anyway. Now, I could sit around and stew about how people can think that morality would have anything to do with a god (which I frequently do privately, or amongst like minded cohorts, but never to the faithful), but I would never describe their views as insulting to me. In fact, living in the U.S. means being inundated by a constant barrage of religious propaganda, yet it is very rarely genuinely insulting to me.

I guess I just need to learn to take offense more often and at more innocent things. Also, to develop a persecution complex so that every instance of a competing view being anywhere near the public square causes bile to rise in my throat.

–Casimir

A friend wondered aloud recently if this is what it felt like for Republicans all of the time: to have such an absurd, inflated sense of patriotism that it begins to blind you in a euphoric and almost dangerous way. During art in my classroom yesterday I found myself fashioning an American flag for one of my students—who happened to be black—and the image of him waving it about with a grin on his face blanketed me anew in the alien mix of pride and disbelief.

Why I chose to make that flag, I do not honestly know. I do know that last year in Paris a shopkeeper asked us if we were American, following it up with, “George Bush, yes?” We sheepishly lowered our heads and chirped out a dismissive affirmative. Now, I feel like I could parade through the Marais with the stars and stripes draped on my shoulders and I would be greeted as a citizen of the world, one of millions of standard bearers of hope for the future.

The mind of a Democrat is a complicated world. The New York Times talked recently about how liberals were refusing to let themselves get excited. Disappointment, after all, had been our bread and butter for the last eight years (excusing the 2006 elections, which proved to be fairly ineffectual anyway). There was always the sense that the election would get stolen, an epidemic of racism would emerge, or perhaps the dreaded resort of the vulgar: assassination. It still doesn’t quite feel real yet, but I will be there on inauguration day to ensure that the reality is burned into my mind forever.

It seems like forever and a half ago that I threw my emotional hat into the ring for Barack Obama, and while the risks were high, the payout ended up being even higher. For the first time in a long time, I am excited about politics again, and I feel like the little experiment that was America may just live to see another day.

–Casimir