Animals!

TEN NEW ANIMALS!

Bear with me, I’m on a nostalgic trip.

Early this morning, I saw that CTV was airing OWL TV. I used to watch OWL TV in my preschool days. It was one of those shows that made me interested in Animals!

How many of these kinds of children’s science magazine-format shows do they have now? Honestly, I think one of the easiest ways to get kids more excited about learning and science is to just show it to them, plainly, because nature has a way of being awesome on its own. I’m sure kids still like animals, and animal facts, right? They damn well better.

This, of course, led down the rabbit hole of children’s shows that I watched. Camp Cariboo, Fred Penner’s Place, The Umbrella Tree (fucking horrifying puppets), stuff like that. Then came…PJ Katie’s Farm. Upon reflection, I now realize the utter strangeness of this show.

Here’s the thing: the show was about a woman manipulating little home-made clay figurines to tell a story about farm animals, doing all the voices as well as narrating. No camera tricks, stop-motion, or anything. She just moved the clay figures and told the story in plain view. It’s sub-Manger Babies level television. Yet there’s something to the low-key affair and its public access production values; it makes me kind of glad it exists.

To show you how this show worked, here is a highlight reel:

The Return of Animals!

This list of weird animals, while containing many old favourites, also has many new entries into the strange and amazing creature pantheon. Aren’t Seapigs, Glass Frogs, Geoducks, and Eagle Owls so delightful? And let’s not forget our old friends, the horrible cancer worm colonies!

But it also reminds me of one thing: MOTHERFUCKING PANGOLINS.

Who does not like this thing? Tell me who you are so I can kill you.

Armadillos have always been my second favourite animal (after the otter), because they are pretty cute and they also have armor and curl into a ball. Pangolins are like armadillos with pine cone armor, and they can climb trees, giving them another advantage. Yes, pangolins are pretty great, for all those reasons and probably more.

On that not, when you think about it, the concept of having a ‘favourite’ animal is odd. I mean, I have generally approached it in the same way I approach favourite designs in fiction…but I’m applying it to real, living things. That’s a tad fucked up.

Oh my god, Animals!

It’s the new craze sweeping the nations!

(Don’t blame me, blame most of my blogroll. Warren Ellis especially.)

Another one for the brainfart files:

Do you know of the late 90s Disney-style, Fox-produced animated movie Anastasia? I’ve seen it a few times, and it just dawns on me how utterly bizarre and slightly disturbing it is, in a historical sense.

The Anastasia story, I guess, is completely divorced from where it comes from (IE the Russian Revolution) at this point, although it really shouldn’t be. So I guess it could make sense for Don Bluth and the crew to think it could make a good base for a more modern fairy tale type thing. However, there is still something incredibly off about the way the movie portrays, in a completely off-hand way, the actual Russian Revolution.

I mean, it’s still mainly a background thing that has no real importance on the overall story…even so, I think implying that the revolution was caused by magic and goblins is a weird weird thing to be selling to children.

So here, my imaginary readers, is the challenge: can you think of the most inappropriate way to Disney-fy a real world event?

There is no need for me to rename the link

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/6098870/American-Pie-actor-Jason-Biggs-attacked-by-Gibraltar-ape.html

For reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_Macaque
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibraltar_Barbary_Macaques

Animals!

Did you know it’s Gen Con this week? Did you care? I don’t really, although I will watch it to see if any good games are coming out. I see UpperDeck has already got a new Marvel TCG coming out to replace the late VS System. It’s based off of the movies! That really doesn’t give me much confidence.

Now that we’re through that, let’s get onto our very special animal presentation today:

Usually, my animals! posts try to spotlight something weird and obscure. But today, I feel like honoring one of the all-time great animals!, the one with one of the coolest names. That would be Megatherium, the giant ground sloth!

It’s a gigantic bear-sloth! How is that not cool? But boy, I am glad I don’t live in the period where things like that roamed the planet. Thank god for mass extinction events!

Animals…?

You know what I love? The sudden appearance of unidentified black goo. Take that, Alaska!

Also, just for fun: The amazing lizard that swims in sand. Lizards have a good track record for being neat, it seems.