So a few months ago (the last time I had any time to think), Jackson told me he’d be willing to illustrate some of my blogs when he had free time. When I sent him my idea on time travel he came back with a Zack Morris “time out” drawing idea that sounded pretty funny, but didn’t really fit my time travel patents and currency conversion theme. However, this did get me thinking about another topic that had been festering in my brain for about, oh…two decades. Like the dude from A Bronx Tale said, there’s nothing worse than wasted talent. Zack Morris happens to finish in the top three of my biggest violators of wasted talent.
It’s Good to be the King
The late Kim Jung Il, ranks up there among the most deranged tyrannical dictators, which is a difficult task since most dictators are deranged, and I think by definition, tyrannical. Despite the fact that he ruled an entire half of a country, he still felt the need to make people understand how great he was, even if he had to lie (gasp). There were stories in the press of his first golf outing, in which he shot around a 36 with four holes in one. I guess when you control everything your countrymen watch, read, and listen to, you can convince them that you’re a pre-sex-crazed Tiger Woods and Super Man poured into a tiny old man frame with giant women’s sunglasses. Although he had the power to make his people believe anything, he did a sub-par job in convincing them that their international sports teams were decent. When the women’s soccer team lost in the Olympics, the paper reported that the entire team was struck by lightning, leading to a sluggish performance. While understandably believable, this was lazy on the part of Il. When you have the power to make the people believe anything, why not just tell them the Olympics is going to be held in North Korea that year. An entire fake Olympics could have been staged, and every team/athlete from South Korea would win the gold. Shit, Kim Jung Il would take home the gold for boxing, the long jump, and the floor exercise. This was extremely disappointing on the part of Il. Clearly we all should have known his health was deteriorating when he wasn't wracking up fake gold medals in the fake 2008 Olympics. We were blind. But at least our country is good at stuff…sometimes.
I’ll Stop the World
Zack Morris could stop time! He could stop the entire effing universe from progressing forward! And what did he do with this power? He made witty asides to television audiences. That’s it. Really, that’s pretty much all he did with this. He never once called a time out to get every single answer to every single test he ever took throughout his entire high school career, to graduate with a 4.0 GPA, 1600 SAT, and a scholarship to Stanford. At no point did he ever drive the lane, call a time out, reposition the defense, and score an easy lay-up to win the state championship and break an all time scoring record. He never once made a bet, and when the time was running out and his team was losing, go to his bookie’s notebook and change his pick to win 18 grand. Never, not once, did he call a time out to put some jacked dude’s leg out so that it would trip a hot chick, then call series of time outs so that it would look like he beat up said jacked dude, thus making the hot chick want to make out with him. WHY?!?! Was this guy the dumbest 20 year old high school kid in the history of bad daytime young adult programming? I honestly could never watch the show for more than ten minutes without getting furious, and I was 11 years old. What a waste.
He’s a Maniac
Dr. Wiley spent his entire lifetime building evil robots for one reason or another. From what I could understand Mega Man was pretty much the only half man/robot that could stop him. After all the hours put into conceiving, designing, manufacturing, and implementing these robots, he then had to be the architect of a multitude of layers and fortresses. Much to his dismay, no matter how difficult he made the layers, and no matter how strong he made his killer robots, Mega Man always triumphed. While I give the Doctor major props for being able to escape at the end of each game, or at least in the period between sequels, there has always been a major flaw in his strategy. At times Wiley made some very difficult jumping sequences in several of his levels. One that comes to mind is the Heat Man disappearing block sequence. It took a good deal of time to master the order of disappearing and reappearing blocks. Many lives were lost to the lava. However, a few hours on a rainy Saturday and you could get through it. Even better, if you had that rocket dog, you could just jump on his back and ride if straight to Wiley’s skull shaped fortress. So, the question is: If you designed the level, WHY THE HELL DID YOU PUT IN DISAPPEARING BLOCKS?!?!?! How about, oh I don’t know, no blocks at all! Make the lava gap long enough so that that dumb rocket dog can’t reach the other side, and then you’re safe from Mega man forever. That could have been it: Mega Man 2 (The Final Chapter). Now of course, that would have robbed us all from experiencing Pharaoh Man, but really this stupidity just undermined all of my Mega Man accomplishments in the long run. Where did Dr. Wiley get his PhD from anyway, the University of Phoenix?
