Pop culture mashups: Who wants to go to Downton Disney?

If you know anything about me (or if you have ever seen my Twitter or Facebook feeds) you probably know that sometimes I get bored, and that my mind starts to wander. Sometimes to strange places. Today was one of those days, spurred on by this article that I saw at lunch that details seemingly definitive evidence that the colonists at Jamestown likely resorted to cannibalism at some point. That got me thinking about the rather dreary Peanuts cartoon from the 80s that gave the history of the Mayflower voyage and the first Thanksgiving and how much weirder that could have been if this cannibalism story had been more well known (colonial cannibalism has been long rumored but without much in way of physical evidence until now).

That of course lead to some of us coming up with possible Charlie Brown/Cannibalism mashups (I told you, when I get bored my mind wanders) and resulted in this list of possible updated Peanuts cartoon names:

“I Bet You’d Taste Great With Some Fava Beans And A Nice Chianti, Charlie Brown.”

“I Never Appreciated Before How Much Your Head Looks Like A Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Delicious, Delicious Pumpkin.”

“Why Are You Looking At Me Like That, Charlie Brown? Put Knife Down, Chuck. Please For The Love of…..”

There was also speculation on how different well known Peanuts episodes would have unfolded with a cannibalism theme, too long and too bizarre to recount here, but you get the picture. (Yes, I know, we’re disturbed people, but life does things to you after a while.)

The point to all of this, of course, is not that we are sick, deranged people possibly in need of psychiatric help, but that pop culture mashups are super fun to speculate about when your mind needs a break from the everyday mundane. It keeps you thinking and keeps your creative juices flowing at the very least (and quite possibly gets you a cease and desist letter from the estate of Charles Schultz, you never know.) I”ll share one more of these that’s crossed my mind in recent weeks, as well as some of my recent favorite examples from the Interwebs.

Imagine for a moment that you are one of the Disney executives tasked with coming up with the next great attraction for your park – what do you do? Do you brainstorm and come up with an original idea? Perform market research and find out what the public wants? No, of course not! You probably turn on your computer or TV and look for the first things that’s already popular that you don’t own the rights to (which admittedly these days isn’t much), and then you throw truckloads of money at the creators for the right to build an attraction around the sweat of their creative brow and then market and merchandise the living daylights out of it. If I were said Disney executive, my first call would be to Julian Fellows, and my pitch would be this:

Downton Disney.

Genius no? What’s hotter right not that Downton Abbey? Nothing! People (and I’m very much one of them) love that silly show, and it gives you a fresh tie-in for an existing part of your property that’s growing a little stale. The best part is, the theme ties in so neatly with most of what is already there. For example, how easy would it to rebrand Raglan Road as “Branson’s,” home of the the first radical Irish socialist journalist chauffeurs turned estate managers turned bartenders? Or, imagine if you will the Candy Cauldron turning into Mrs. Padmore’s Kitchen, and watch all of her and Daisy’s wacky adventures. Doesn’t strike your fancy? How about a new attraction, “Dodging Edith,” a funhouse maze where you have to navigate through to the end while avoiding the romantic advances of Lady Edith (men over 50 only, please). Feeling overconfident? Then come have your self-esteem ripped to shreds in the all new “The Dowager Countess Tears You To Pieces And Then Haughtily Laughs At Your Sorrow,” modeled after the wildly popular Turtle Time With Crush. And you’ve got to be kidding yourself if you think people wouldn’t go see the new Cirque Du Soleil show, “Lady Mary Kills a Turk.”

You’ve got to admit, that idea is 100% Fried Gold. I eagerly await my royalty checks to start pouring in from the Mouse.

As promised, here’s a few of my favorite existing mashups that I’ve come across, starting with one that I just saw yesterday. Thanks to Shawn for providing this:

Seriously, who wouldn’t play this just to unlock “The One Who Knocks” Achievement?

And while we’re talking about Breaking Bad…

This has been everywhere recently, but it makes me legitimately sad that Patton Oswalt isn’t actually writing the new Star Wars movies.

The man is a genius. A small, nerdy genius.

“Just do as I say, and Politico gets a Kardashian.”

This is kind of old, but still mesmerizing: Thom Yorke dancing to Beyonce’s Single Ladies.

And with that thoroughly disturbing image planted into your mind, I bid you good day.

Cheers.

I can ride 55

This post is short and straight to the point: I knocked out a 55 mile ride this weekend, give or take a mile or two. I was planning on going out to West Orange Trail Saturday AM for my ride, but took one look at the weather (temp at 7 AM was 32F with wind chills around 24F) and went back to bed. I’m dedicated and all, but I don’t do sub freezing weather. Instead, I waited for it to warm up a bit, and then put in 4 hours on the trainer. I don’t have exact mileage, but I know from my pace that my final tally was right around the 55 mile mark, so milestone checked. And I didn’t have to suffer frost bite to do it. That’s a win-win in my book.

Now for some quick random observations.

Unlike the rest of the US (apparently) I bypassed the live Grammys telecast and watched Walking Dead (live) and Donwton Abbey (DVR) Sunday night. Walking Dead had its “mid-season premiere,” and had a very high bar to meet after the Shane-induced carnage from last episode. Overall it was pretty good start to the new mini-season, picking up right where it left off, bogging down in the middle a bit, but finishing with a really fantastic, tense scene where the two strangers try to draw down on Rick and end up dead on the floor. I’d rank that final scene up there with the best two or three scene the show has done since the pilot. And huge bonus to the all around awesome Darryl for calling Lori “Olive Oyl,” which made me laugh for about 18 minutes straight.

Downton Abbey was one of the most insanely ridiculous yet thoroughly entertaining 2 hours of television that I’ve ever watched. *Moderate Spoiler alert* The show featured virtually ever significant life event possible, including the end of a war, a flu epidemic, death, near death, a possible murder, a near elopement, infidelity, business deals gone bad, a wedding, a planned wedding that never was, multiple engagements, a funeral, and, best of all of course, the Dowager Countess firing off snappy one liners left and right (best of all “Don’t be defeatist dear, it’s so middle class.”) I’m tired just writing all that.

I did watch some clips of the Grammys, and have two comments. 1) The shows producers obviously don’t have a sense of humor since they missed out on the chance to force Tony Bennett to say “Skrillex,” which would have been comedy gold. 2) For everybody who was rightfully outraged that Chris Brown was given such a prominent spot on the telecast, just Google “Glen Campbell and Tanya Tucker” sometime. Not to pick on a guy when he’s down (Campbell was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s) but let’s not be hypocrites, shall we?” I say that as someone who counts two Glen Campbell songs among my favorites (Wichita Lineman and Rhinestone Cowboy) but fair is fair. Just an awesome song though.

Lastly, when I got off the bike Saturday, my family came home lugging this guy home for my Valentine’s Day gift. I’m fairly sure he is as tall as both of my sons.

That's one big bear.

Cheers.