Archive for ‘Blog’

57 results.

Lies that television told me

by Justin on June 22, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Posted In: Blog

As I write this, my in-laws are driving five hours to come visit. According to television, this should frighten me. My mother-in-law will suggest other men my wife should have married, and my father-in-law will glare and sneer at me at the same time–sort of a snare, if you will. Except, this won’t happen. Oh the many splendid lies of television.

Even the best of parents can’t shield their children from television’s grasp, and even the nimblest of minds get corrupted by distorted television portrayals. One of the classic ones to use in a communication class is to ask what percentage of Americans work in law enforcement? Students, having been fed a diet of Law & Order, CSI, Bones, etc. will respond rather highly. Sometimes as high as forty percent or more. The truth is that as of 2004, 3.5 out of every 1,000 people worked in law enforcement (or less than one percent). ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Believe you me or cry trying

by Justin on June 9, 2010 at 1:07 am
Posted In: Blog

Belief is a powerful thing, though slightly less powerful than a mid-ocean oil pipe, apparently. Belief has driven humans out of the cave, across the sea, and into theaters showing Nicholas Cage films. But while you may be powerfully motivated by your own beliefs, you also happen to be powerfully motivated against those of others. Why?

Here’s a little thought experiment. What if you saw your neighbor one day carry their dog outside, bend it over their knee, and then beat it with a belt while crying, “This hurts me more than it does you!” Now, before you could call the ASPCA your spouse would likely be calling the local institution, but that’s beside the point. You’d be disturbed by such behavior. Yet, many of us stand by the principle that receiving spankings from parents made us into the well conditioned people we are today. Why would a pet be any different? ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Of puffy shirts and more serious matters

by Justin on May 27, 2010 at 4:51 pm
Posted In: Blog

There are most likely three reactions one can have to reading the title of this piece. One, you recognize it as a Seinfeld reference. Two, you only just now recognized it as a reference upon me mentioning Seinfeld. Three, you have no idea what a puffy shirt is. If you fall under option three, you most likely often feel left out of conversations among coworkers and friends. Someone mentions a Soup Nazi and you think you missed a History Channel documentary.

Nobody likes to feel left out, but cultural references create this situation all the time. My last two blog posts dealt with Lost, and for many they simply glazed over and hoped for a return to blogs about Christmas and Radio Shack. Talk of polar bears and Hugo was meaningless to them. I run into this often when teaching. I try to come up with a common reference my students can all relate to in order to make a larger point. In recent years hit films such as The Dark Knight have been safe cultural touchstones, but even they can vary wildly between 30-70% of a class having seen them. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Lost was never an intellectual show

by Justin on May 25, 2010 at 7:30 pm
Posted In: Blog

Last week I wrote that the finale of Lost could do nothing but disappoint. No matter how much fans gave it a fair shake, they would end up slightly disappointed after investing six years and not getting an ending that would satiate every nuanced desire. Having read several responses since the airing, I stand by that assertion. Even the most positive responses come with a bagful of caveats.

What did I make of it? I was disappointed, but perhaps not for the reasons many might expect. I liked that we were finally given our climatic showdown between good and evil with mock-Locke and Jack on the cliff. I liked that it was Kate who rose up to defeat Smokey. There have been criticisms of the show over the years that the female roles were weak and always in need of rescuing by the males. In the end, Kate rescued Jack and everyone else. She saved the world. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Why Lost can do nothing but disappoint

by Justin on May 18, 2010 at 10:25 am
Posted In: Blog

I was a quasi-latecomer to Lost. After watching the premiere episode and a couple after, I fell out of regular viewing until I caught up sometime during the third season. Since then, for better or for worse, I’ve been hooked. As the finale draws near, I fear it was for worse.

But wait, I am not simply being blindly critical. It isn’t that I doubt the dedication of the cast and crew to deliver a rip-roarious finale that will satisfy–it’s that I doubt said ability of anyone. Think about it for a moment, what was the last, really great final chapter you were exposed to? When it comes to television, I struggle to name many finales I can even label decent, let alone grand. Perhaps the greatest television finale of all time was for Little House on the Prairie, because they had the guts to simply blow up the entire town. That’s chutzpa! Otherwise? ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Steve busts some heads for his shot at HD

by Justin on May 16, 2010 at 7:27 pm
Posted In: Blog

Steve is an interesting character, since we never originally intended him to be his own character. He began life as part of a trio of Racer Patrol officers. Over time, however, we found we usually only needed one officer, so we settled on Steve. The other two occasionally still turn up, but Steve is definitely the star. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Hiding the Truth from ourselves

by Justin on May 11, 2010 at 3:21 pm
Posted In: Blog

“If life is a comedy, then why all the tragedy,” asks Singer Chris Rice in his song “Big Enough.” If we don’t know initially, we’re soon let in that the object of his question is God himself. Rice makes this clear in the chorus when he sings, “God if You’re there I wish You’d show me / And God if You care then I need You to know me / I hope You don’t mind me askin’ the questions / But I figure You’re big enough.” But God is not the focus of this piece.

Instead, I’ve always admired the song not for any admonishment of God, but for the starkness for which it deals with God. It’s blunt in saying, “I figure You’re big enough.” Indeed, one of my mother-in-law’s favorite question to religious students in her college biology courses was, “Do you believe God created the universe? Then don’t you think he can hold up to studying evolution?” In other words, Truth (and I use a big T not for religious reasons, but to emphasize importance and certainty) can stand up to any questioning. Dullards and cynics fear Truth, but not true seekers of wisdom. It holds true not only in matters of faith, but in all fields of knowledge. Just don’t tell the universities. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Rick joins the HD craze

by Justin on May 11, 2010 at 6:55 am
Posted In: Blog

How do you know a fad has just about jumped the shark (such as, saying jumped the shark)? When people like Rick start joining in. Look, we created Rick and we have a certain fondness for him. But trust us, he’s one trip into The Gap away from wearing pink shirts. He just needs a blessing from the cool gods. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Hobo goes HD, sort of

by Justin on May 5, 2010 at 11:32 am
Posted In: Blog

Let’s say you’re the type that does an online comic strip. That’s a lot of work and time to put into something, so obviously you’d want a break now and then. What do you do with that break? Why, practice drawing the comic some more, of course!

That’s exactly what David has done with these newest Professor Hobo sketches. But you’ll obviously notice right away the look and design of these are dramatically different than what normally appears in the strip (Jimmy is way cooler looking, for one). Is this a sign of things to come? Well, yes for experimental art we share with our readers. No, for a dramatic change in the actual comic or cartoon series. We like the way our characters look, but even we aren’t immune to the allure of “rebooting” the franchise, even if just jokingly.  Think of it as Professor Hobo, if Michael Bay rebooted it. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Humor: A Christmas Tale

by Justin on April 15, 2010 at 11:04 am
Posted In: Blog

In the next few days I will (hopefully) be posting the presentation I did over humor in Professor Hobo. Once posted you can see how much you disagree with my own flimsy analysis. However, having given the presentation twice, it has had me thinking about the subject of humor. What makes something funny?

One technique in humor is to take something to its logical conclusion. You could call this the “slippery slope” approach, but that relies on exaggeration. For example, if we pardon all the illegal immigrants, then next thing you know we’ll have to pardon all the guys trying to marry their goats! Wait, I think I got two arguments confused there. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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