They were warned…
They are doomed…

And on Friday the 13th, nothing will save them.

Happy Friday the 13th, everyone!

RollerKaty

And who is The Awesome One, you ask?

Wonder Woman is pretty awesome. As is David Bowie, Flash Gordon, David Hasselhoff, and Neil Diamond.

But none of these fine folks are as awesome as the awesomest one of all. One who simply exudes awesomitude. One who puts others to shame with his sheer awesomeness.

One otherwise known as Darth Vader. And I know this is true because it is proclaimed on an Empire Strikes Back Trading Card:

Front of Card

Back of Card

Anyone know the answer to the trivia question on the back of the card? “The sandpeople travel across the sandy wastes of Tatooine on the backs of huge, furry creatures. These beasts are known as…?”

It has been a crazy couple of days.

This past weekend, we traveled to the other side of the state for a mini-family reunion over the Fourth of July. We (meaning RollerReggie, RollerBoy and myself, along with my sister and her dog Kip) piled into my Toyota Corolla for the 5-6 hour drive across the state - a drive with views of the Cascade mountains, the Columbia River, some windmills, and lots and lots of rolling dry hills. Once there we had a great time reconnecting with family and meeting all of my cousins’ children, going on hay rides (seriously!), making s’mores, and swapping tales about our lives.

After only being home for a day or so, we were dismayed to hear that my Dad apparently cut off two of his fingers in an unfortunate accident whilst working on the float for the Everson Days Parade taking place next weekend. He is being flown in a helicopter down to Harborview Hospital here in Seattle in an attempt to try to re-attach the fingers to his hand (fortunately it is his left hand, and he happens to be right-handed). A few of my family members are making the 2-hour drive down to Seattle to be with him at the hospital, and we plan to join them there soon.

But in the meantime, we are listening to the Black Sabbath album Heaven and Hell (1980). RollerReggie is taking advantage of the fact that he got a record player for his birthday, and dug up the record from his collection. So we’ll listen to the rest of the album, and then it’s off to the hospital!

Here’s hoping the rest of the week is a little less exciting

My family has a love affair with the movie Fiddler on the Roof. Every family has its own unique traditions, and one of ours is to settle down for a viewing of Fiddler every Thanksgiving after we have gorged ourselves on turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and my mom’s famous blackberry pie.

Thus I was somewhat surprised to find that Topol, the actor who plays the lead character Tevye the milkman in Fiddler, also has a prominent role in Flash Gordon. Topol plays Dr. Hans Zarkov, an eccentric scientist who is ridiculed for his theories about the destruction of the Earth by an unkown entity. As I watched the film I kept expecting Zarkov to break into a jig and belt out an invigorating rendition of “If I Were a Rich Man” or “To life! To life! L’chai-im!”. So it was a little difficult for me to take Zarkov’s character seriously in Flash Gordon.

Actually it was hard for me to take anything seriously in Flash Gordon. And that is the beauty of the movie - it is an unabashedly campy, over-the-top film. Starring Sam J. Jones as New York Jets quarterback Flash Gordon, Melody Anderson as Dale Arden and Max von Sydow as the evil Emperor Ming the Merciless, Flash Gordon is the lastest movie that I am happy to add to my “So Bad It’s Good” collection.

Flash Gordon begins with Ming the Merciless, Emporer of the kingdom of Mongo, who decides to wreak havoc on the utterly unimportant planet Earth out of boredom. The Earth is beseiged by a series of natural disasters, including huricanes, typhoons, meteor storms, tornadoes, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions… not to mention the deadly hot hail and the dastardly strange craters in the wilderness. This turn of events forces a small airplane carrying Dale and Flash to make an emergency landing, and they manage to land safely in Dr. Zarkov’s laboratory. Zarkov tricks them into launching into outerspace in his rocket so that they can confront the evil entity that is convinced must be attacking the Earth.

The trio lands on the planet of Mongo, ruled by the evil Emperor Ming the Merciless. Ming rules with an iron fist, and by encouraging feuds between the rival kingdoms in his domain. Ming puts Flash to death, but he is promptly resurrected by Ming’s spoiled daughter Princess Aura (Ornella Muti) who smuggles him out of Mongo and tries to seduce him.

Flash and Aura travel to the Kingdom of Arboria, where Prince Barin (Timothy Dalton) imprisons Flash in a cage lowered into a foul swamp. Flash relies upon his wits and manages to escape from Arboria, only to end up in the Kingdom of Prince Vultan (Brian Blessed) and his flying hawkmen. Eventually Flash manages to get the feuding princes Vultan and Barin to work together to overthrow Ming. They all travel back to Mongo, where they interrupt Ming’s wedding to the reluctant Dale and save the day. Oh, happy day! Cue - Flash Gordon theme song!

And what a theme song it is. One of my favorite aspects to Flash Gordon is the soundtrack, entirely composed by Queen. The iconic theme song is the anthem for the entire fim - “Flash! ah-ahh! Savior of the Universe! He’ll save everyone of us! Flash! ah-ahh! He’s a miracle! King of the impossible! He’s for everyone of us!” After watching the movie now I’m just itching to get my hands on the Flash Gordon album.

Pathetic earthlings. Hurling your bodies out into the void, without the slightest inkling of who or what is out here. If you had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, you would’ve hidden from it in terror. ~Ming the Merciless

For today’s Wordless Wednesday post, I present you with a Star Wars Trading Card - this one is from The Empire Strikes back and was published in 1980:

Front of Card

Back of Card

That darn C-3PO! Always making a nuisance of himself!

Thanks to WNGL for providing the card.

Who loves jelly the most?

James Taylor.

Happy birthday, Jellyman Kelly.

A Fantasy. A Musical. A Place Where Dreams Come True.

This weekend we gathered our friends together for a rousing showing of Xanadu, the unforgettable 1980 roller-skating musical starring Olivia Newton-John as a Greek muse, Gene Kelly, and Michael Beck. I’d never actually seen the movie before, but I was intrigued by tales of roller skating, leg warmers, ultra kitsch, and all around bad taste. So naturally I couldn’t wait to watch it. The movie didn’t disappoint.

My friend’s 3-year-old son, Eli, was completely enraptured throughout the film. He lay on the floor with his chin cupped in his hands and had a steady stream of questions, such as “What are they doing?” and “What’s happening?” and “Why are they doing that?” He is a very astute child. I wasn’t exactly sure what was going on as I watched the move either. Luckily for us, Eli seemed content with answers like “oooh - its magic!” and “look - they’re dancing” and the ubiquitous “look at those people roller skating in funny outfits!”

Xanadu has been panned by critics from the moment of its release, and it’s not hard to see why. The terrible dialog, the “ethereal” neon glow surrounding Olivia and her muse sisters, the cartoon bird with leg warmers, the roller dancing… this one definitely falls into the “so bad it’s good” category. We were in hysterics pretty much throughout the entire movie.

Of course, it is precisely Xanadu’s status as one of the worst movies of all time that has propelled it into the beloved cult classic it is today. It is even being remade as a Broadway Musical.

The bottom line:
Xana-don’t? No! This movie is a Xana-must!