Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 31, 2009 in Science
No where in the mainstream media did I see any coverage that there was a space shuttle launch on Friday. This is sad to me because each launch of the shuttle is a news event to this humble NASA fanboy; for what you are seeing is takes a ton of work where the crew is putting their life at risk. Under no circumstance should we fall into the apathetic notion that this is in the same class as an airplane taking off even if NASA makes it look that easy. And here’s some footage of the shuttle docking to International Space Station: Read more…
Shown above is the GeGe no Kitaro Original Version posable figure which goes on sale in October. It’s amazing for me to think that the character of GeGeGe no Kitaro has been around since 1959 yet he’s never become well known in the United States. Kitaro is a demon spirit who was born in a cemetery; his trademark look is that he’s missing one eye which he cover up with his hair. Since his manga introduction he’s gone on to star in about six anime series, a PlayStation game and two live action films. Here are the opening titles from his 1968 anime series which hold up rather well: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 30, 2009 in Television
You can tell that this 1988 promotional spot for Florida TV station WBFS was done on a low budget, but it’s impressive that it features the voice of Pee-wee Herman who had defiantly gone big time at that point. I also love the added touches of the MTV graphics and the matching Madonna soundtrack. It’s funny to think back to a previous era when you’d enter a contest by sending an old school analog letter instead of an email or tweet…
The Terminator Salvation Real Arm Figure can also double as a very impressive back scratcher in addition to serving as a fine conversation piece that can be placed strategically on your coffee table to baffle mundane house guests! This nifty goodie is being manufactured in Japan, but it won’t shop until December — however pre-orders are currently being accepted.
This is a promotional video for the anime themed Nintendo DS game Spice and Wolf: The Wind that Spans the Sea which comes out on September 17th. This is the second title in the series, Spice and Wolf: Holo’s and My One Year came out earlier this summer. Here are some screen shots from the up and coming title: Read more…
Is it me or do you get the feeling that the team that designed the RIBA Robotic Assistance Bear had the entire robot designed — but then only after the fact slapped a moe looking bear head on the poor creature just to get some press? And as much as I love bears from a marketing point of view I just don’t think of them as a nurses best friend! Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 29, 2009 in Videogames
Looking at this clip of Guitar Hero 5 on the surface it feels so wrong: Nirvana was really about punk at heart — a do-it-yourself ethos that rejected commercialism. But sadly I know that’s a lie because the genius of Kurt Cobain was mixing punk with pop music. And that ability to bring the Sex Pistols into the shopping malls of America in the 90s was a sort of wonderful magic moment which for a few minutes made mainstream entertainment a little bit more entertaining. Read more…
Even though she doesn’t have a mouth Hello Kitty can serve you well when making meals: This Hello Kitty kitchen timer can not only time mark the start and stop points of your gourmet galavanting — but kitty also doubles as a USM memory stick! So she can hold up to 2 gigs of your recipes while helping you cook up a storm — hard to top that, no? Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 28, 2009 in Videogames
For your entertainment I’ve stitched together three commercials from the early 80s for Intellivision Major League Baseball. The first spot features none other than sports writer George Plimpton giving a comparison between Intellivision and Atari. What then follows is a spot which show rabid fans in the bleachers who feel the same way, and that’s followed by a French translation! Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 27, 2009 in Animation
This is the third trailer for AstroBoy, yeah there’s a quick shot of Tezuka (at the 1:18 mark) if you don’t blink or get distracted by the bad voice acting. But what pains me is the poor animation I’m seeing here. The danger of doing 3D animation is that you put yourself up against Pixar unless you are doing something very different, and for something that’s very different (it is suppose to anime, no?) this looks like a 2nd rate Ice Age straight-to-video project. Of course the real problem from what little I’m seeing here looks like the script, if you can’t get that all the money you throw at the screen won’t improve anything. Read more…
I think I discovered The Romantic Gift Shop sometime in the 90s by pure accident while wandering around Chinatown. Located at 151 Mott Street in New York City this little shop was an amazing oasis of everything Sanrio! Frankly the store was designed for the more youthful residents of Chinatown who were looking for stationery goodies, but if you were a Hello Kitty fiend this little gem was one of the best kept secrets in all of the city. Read more…
Temple7e has made my fanboy heart happy again with these wonderful Battlestar Galactica Kokeshi dolls! For those not in the know Kokeshi are traditional Japanese wooden dolls, however in this case artist Craig Galentine has updated the themes of the dolls with a sci fi touch: Read more…
I could be wrong but I think this amazing 1986 ad for milk may have been done by Colossal Pictures, which was a San Francisco production company that did a great deal of amazing work back in the day (tons of work for MTV and the like which would always feature a collage of live action and animation). Read more…
Fashion is ever changing and Hello Kitty understands this! This adorable Hello Kitty Optical Mouse features three changeable face plates so you can alter the look of of our mouse every day: Read more…
This vintage 1986 commercial shows off the education values of the then new Teddy Ruxpin Adventure Series. Teddy was first produced just a year before this spot aired and was a marketing powerhouse: Created by Ken Forsse the bear would move his mouth while reading stories which were recorded on audio cassette tapes. The toy would do so well that by 1987 an animated series The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin would run for another two years: Read more…
This fall Dark Horse will be bringing out a line of toys based on the 1997 Tim Burton book The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy & Other Stories. Shown above is Toxic Boy and below is Oyster Boy, these two go on sale on December 9th and better yet the original sculptures for these figures will go on display at Museum of Modern Art in New York City come November! Read more…
Marketed by Parker Brothers in 1970 the original Nerf was designed to be the first “indoor safe” ball, and years later millions of them are still be sold much to the delight of children and board office dwellers. But in the 80s they couldn’t leave well enough alone: In 1984 the animated series Muppet Babies took the world by storms, and suddenly everything needed to be cute. And thus in the 80s Parker Brothers introduced Nerfuls — which have since become a cult collectors item. Read more…
Beasts of Burden got started as a collaboration between Evan Dorkin (Milk & Cheese) and Jill Thompson (Scary Godmother) for the anthologies The Dark Horse Book of Hauntings, Witchcraft, the Dead, and Monsters. The result? They won the Eisner Awards for Best Short Story and Best Painter categories. So I’m pleased to see that Dark Horse is working to publish an mini-series based on this initial appearance which is due to debut on September 16, 2009. Read more…
This rather well produced 1984 commercial showcases the then new AT&T Merlin system — which finally was discontinued in 2006. Today this technology doesn’t look like much, but back then it was a breakthrough, in fact I remember being lectured once in the early 90s that what was on my desk “was not a phone, but a voice terminal!” What made the Merlin unique was that it had a central control unit, and also that a small business could now afford all those nifty features like conference calling and speed dialing. Read more…
Recently I’ve seen tech fanboys Jason Calacanis and Michael Arrington raging at Apple for having the nerve to not let Google put Google Voice into the Apple app store. Frankly not only should Apple have every right to do this — but they should be doing this. The reason? Not only is Google their direct competition, but the reality is that they’re the only company in this environment that you could call a true monopoly.Read more…
As a magazine publisher Warren Publishing was born out as a result of the infamous comic book code of the 50s which made the genre a bit too family friendly: Along with sister publications like Eerie and Vampirella, Creepy magazine kept alive the tradition of horror comics from 1964 until 1983. Next year on January 27th, 2010 Dark Horse will be publishing a set of trading cards based upon covers of the magazine. Read more…
Nothing could be more cute than a well deserving Pound Puppy toy in the 80s looking a caring child to be an owner: But what if your child is a cat person? Well that’s where the spin off Pound Purries came in (as shown in this advert from 1986). While not as a popular as their dog friends from the other side of the pound these little wonders featured and for just $3.50 more you could get a name tag, stickers and an owners certificate! Read more…
These Robo-Q Transformers toys from Japan are ultra cute! They’re each just a bit over an inch high and come with a radio controller. Manufactured by Takara Tomy there’s an Optimus Prime and a Bumblebee model available: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 20, 2009 in Comic Books
At the end of the silver age of comic books (which was sometime the early 70s) there was a well known cigarette ad campaign which would proudly proclaim to the ladies “You’ve come a long way, baby.” But sadly while the wider world of publishing started to open up to women, the comic book biz was — and still today largely a boys club. Now I can already hear the indignation from my fellow fanboys, but here’s the evidence: Read more…
Looking at this clip of Guitar Hero 5 on the surface it feels so wrong: Nirvana was really about punk at heart — a do-it-yourself ethos that rejected commercialism. But sadly I know that’s a lie because the genius of Kurt Cobain was mixing punk with pop music. And that ability to bring the Sex Pistols into the shopping malls of America in the 90s was a sort of wonderful magic moment which for a few minutes made mainstream entertainment a little bit more entertaining. 
