Author Archives: balladeer

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About balladeer

I am passionately interested in college sports, ancient Greek comedies, bad/weird movies, mythology, the American Revolution, Puck Magazine, World War I, U.S. Presidential history, silent movies, the English Civil War, epic, lyric and comic poetry, U.S. Supreme Court history, the Revolutions of 1848, the Philippine War and old pulp heroes like The Moon Man, Pilot G8, Silver John and The Rio Kid.

PULGASARI (1985): BAD MOVIE REVIEW

Pulgasari (1985)Kim Jong Un has North Korea in the news again for all the wrong reasons. He’s continuing his insane and despotic family’s policies like starving his own people, constantly threatening nuclear activity against other nations, having his secret police abduct countless people in the middle of the night and running a barbaric prison system. 

Needless to say the childishly spiteful American media is practically encouraging the madman to nuke Guam. They’re still mad that Venezuela has become a hellhole which they used to pretend was a paradise. AND still mad that United States President Donald Trump defeated Hillary “Bugsy” Clinton.

So here’s a re-posting of my 2011 review of the lone venture into the area of filmmaking that Kim Jong Un’s equally crazed father Kim Jong Il engaged in. Of course I’m talking about Pulgasari, the only kaiju movie produced by a man who combined the insanity of Idi Amin with the paranoia of Josef Stalin and the cinematic mastery of Ed Wood.

PULGASARI (1985) – Category: Bad enough and with a classically weird premise but not fun-bad enough for my highest rating     North Korea’s thoroughly deranged dictator Kim Jong Il was responsible for this film and even gives himself a producer’s credit.

It’s the least he could do for himself after having his underlings literally KIDNAP SOME FILMMAKERS from South Korea and forcing them to take part in this bizarre film venture. If you doubt me just use a search engine to find out about the making of this movie. He even made those unfortunate people rot in one of his prisons for four years before he finally got around to setting them to the task he had kidnapped them for in the first place.

It was all part of Krazy Kim’s desire to initiate North Korea’s entry into the kaiju monster film market. (Their previous attempt decades earlier resulted in the equally laughable film Yongary, Monster From The Deep ) The story of the kidnapping and the filmmakers’ subsequent escape would have made a much better movie than this monster flick.

Pulgasari (No, Dennis Rodman, not Pao Gasol, Pulgasari. NBA fans will get it) is the title monster in Kim Jong Il’s attempt to imitate Godzilla and Gamera and other Japanese monsters. Since the story is Continue reading

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MUSLIM ATROCITY ROUNDUP: AUGUST 10th

MUSLIM VIOLENCE AWARENESS YEAR CONTINUES.

Islam and the leftEven though there are plenty of Muslims who want to reform their religion and live peacefully the Democrats in the U.S. and Labour in the U.K. SHUN those Muslims. To the Democrats and Labour the ONLY Muslims who are even allowed to speak at college campuses are the ones who hate the Western World. The others are banned as “Western Triumphalists” who have “internalized Western oppression.” 

At any rate here are just a FEW of the most recent atrocities boasted about by the Muslim fascists that Democrat and Labour voters LOVE.

July 25th: Barno Yasu, Nigeria – Muslim fascists ambushed and killed SIXTY-NINE innocent people and injured over 10 more.

July 21st: Marawi, Philippines – Islamofascists used car-bombs and hand grenades to kill 9 innocent people and injure FORTY-NINE more.  

Islamophobia posterJuly 24th: Lahore, Pakistan – Yes, Pakistan is a Muslim nation but where Islam is concerned the violence NEVER stops. Muslim fascists constantly kill OTHER MUSLIMS FOR WORSHIPPING DIFFERENTLY THAN THEY DO. This is in store for all Western nations, too, if Democrats, Labour, etc have their way.

Anyway, on this date in Lahore, Muslim fascist suicide bombers killed TWENTY-SIX of their fellow Muslims and injured FIFTY-EIGHT more.

July 21st: Khailam, India – The “vulnerable” Muslim community once again showed their hatred and intolerance by THROWING BRICKS AT HINDU PILGRIMS as they passed by, seriously injuring TWENTY-FOUR innocent people. Coexistence! Continue reading

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COOL-NAMED TEAM: BISMARCK STATE

BISMARCK STATE MYSTICS

Bismarck State Mystics

Location: Bismarck, ND

Division: NJCAA

Comment: Now THIS is what I’m talking about! With this institution’s teams you can tie in Otto Von Bismarck, Harry Potter or any other fictional magicians you prefer to use. Continue reading

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MANTIS 27: THE CAUSE OF THE VISION’S PROBLEMS AND THE SHOWDOWN WITH KANG’S LEGION

FOR PART 1 OF BALLADEER’S BLOG’S EXAMINATION OF MARVEL’S SUPERHEROINE MANTIS CLICK HERE 

Giant Size Avengers 3GIANT-SIZE AVENGERS Volume 1, Number 3 ( February 1975)  What Time Hath Put Asunder …

I will point out once again that the creative team at The Avengers did the best job of incorporating these short-lived “Giant Size” quarterlies into their ongoing storyline. And it certainly helped that they had a complex serial like the Celestial Madonna Saga running at the time that Marvel experimented with these Giant Size issues every 3 months. 

We pick up where we left off: in the labyrinthine catacombs beneath the castle of Immortus, the ruler of the realm of Limbo. That realm exists outside of the time-stream itself, making it the ideal battleground for Kang the Conqueror’s latest attempt to possess the Avenger named Mantis, the Celestial Madonna, and through their offspring have control of all space and time.  

Mantis and her fellow Avengers – Thor, Iron Man, Hawkeye and the Vision – had been battling Kang’s Legion of the Unliving. That group consisted of six supervillains that Kang plucked from the time-stream mere nanoseconds before their violent deaths. If they help him obtain Mantis and kill the rest of the Avengers he’ll let them live. If not, he’ll simply return them to meet their deaths.

Mantis, led by the Vision’s scream of agony, found him lying near death after his battle with a member of Kang’s Legion. 

mantis-side-by-side.jpgWHAT TIME HATH PUT ASUNDER …

Synopsis: Mantis cradles the Vision’s dying body like she did with her lover the Swordsman several days earlier when he died at Kang’s hands. The Vision cannot move his android body and is delirious with pain.

He recounts to the now-weeping Mantis how he fought the Silver Surfer’s immensely powerful old foe the Ghost – one of Kang’s Legion of the Unliving. Even the Vision’s devastating tactic of plunging his intangible arm inside the Ghost’s torso and partially solidifying it could not defeat the villain.

That soldier of Kang then used the Vision’s own tactic against him, with the result that the Vision suffered so much damage from his foe’s arm that he is near death, while the Ghost simply vanished from the area.  

With his tale done the delirious Vision hallucinates that his beloved Wanda, the Scarlet Witch is the woman with him as he dies, not Mantis. Mantis redeems herself a bit more by painfully letting the Vision believe the happy but false impression.

(Wanda is really back at Avengers Mansion, still being tutored by the sorceress Agatha Harkness.)     

Soon Mantis’ grief is interrupted as she is attacked from behind by Midnight, the evil half-brother of Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu. Kang had plucked Midnight from his death hoping that Midnight’s martial arts skills would enable him to bring in Mantis alive to become Kang’s bride.

Mantis and Midnight do battle again, this time to the finish since their first battle was interrupted. The Vietnamese Avenger defeats the black-clad villain despite his use of weapons like Ninja Stars and nunchuku.

Again she wonders how her human weaknesses like the anger she just showed fighting Midnight qualify her to be the Celestial Madonna. Before she can pursue those thoughts she realizes the Vision’s dead body has been taken away by an unknown party.

Try though she may she cannot find the culprit in the confusing maze of tunnels and corridors. We readers get to see which member of the Legion of the Unliving absconded with the Vision’s corpse, however. Continue reading

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SOCIAL DISTORTION: BALL AND CHAIN

Balladeer’s Blog’s feature “Give Them A Shoutout Before They’re Dead”  strikes again! I know it doesn’t have anything to do with the rest of the lyrics to this song but for several years I have thought of this country’s criminal organizations called Democrats and Republicans as the “Ball and Chain” which need taken away. 

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TV FOR TRUMP-HATERS

hillary yellingThere appears to be no limit to the psychotic hatred that Hillary’s following make themselves feel toward United States President Donald Trump. Our de facto Third Party President is a nightmare come true for Democrats and Republicans who can’t stand the poor and the working class.

Not content to force wildly frantic anti-Trump comments into every minute of the day in every form of media, Trump-Haters will probably resort to editing anti-Trump remarks into OLD SYNDICATED SHOWS, too!

RadarM*A*S*H – I imagine some day we’ll get treated to a clearly distraught Radar O’Reilly (Gary Burghoff) announcing to the M*A*S*H 4077th:

“Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Blake’s plane … was shot down by Donald Trump … over the Sea of Japan. It spun in … there were no survivors.”

You doubt me? Not in a world where American comedy has been reduced to this:

“Why did the chicken cross the road? To get away from Trump!”

“Why does a fireman wear red suspenders? As a clear rebuke to the Trump administration!” Continue reading

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A PESTILENT VAPOR (1903): ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION

Future washington d.c.A PESTILENT VAPOR (1903) – Written by Alice MacGowan, this neglected story introduced a figure who should have become as famous in his way as H.G. Wells’ Invisible Man. 

The tale is set in “the far future” of 1950. The mad scientist Dr Sylvester assassinates the U.S. President for refusing to grant Sylvester the appointment he wanted to an overseas post where he could continue his bizarre experiments.

The not so good doctor is taken into custody and gets even more spiteful satisfaction out of the way the country is rife with rioting and protests. Dr Sylvester wants to further his plans by exploiting the spreading anarchy and disappears from his prison cell.

Sylvester has discovered a way of transforming his body into a gaseous state. When no one was watching him he turned into a vapor and drifted out of the prison, returning to his human form when he had reached safety. Continue reading

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AN UNINTENTIONAL COMEDY CLASSIC

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DEMOCRATS DO NOT “OWN” BLACK VOTERS, FEMALE VOTERS, GAY VOTERS, THE POOR OR THE WORKING CLASS

democrat ghettosWelcome back to Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog. In the past Democrats/ Liberals (really “illiberals”) mostly attacked Republicans or Conservatives, none of whom understood how to fight back effectively. In recent decades DemoKKKrats/ Illiberals have begun hounding the rest of us, trying to browbeat us into agreeing with every idiotic notion that pops into their heads.

That transformed them into a party that attracted all the kind of totalitarian asses who used to gravitate toward religion and therefore the Republican Party. Fortunately religion in general no longer carries the cultural influence it used to, so totalitarian people who thrive on the urge to tell everyone else how to live their lives realized they had to call themselves Democrats and Liberals and Progressives instead.

Hiding behind such increasingly meaningless labels those people pretend to have “moral superiority” (itself an absurd concept) over the rest of us like they did when religion was their excuse for putting on such airs. 

Even worse is the way that DemoKKKrats, Illiberals and Regressives use all the forces of conformity to try to browbeat black people, women, gay people, poor people and the working class into pretending they are ALL good little obedient subjects of their political party.

The good news is that more and more black people, women, gay people, poor people and working class people are throwing off the yoke of the Democrats and their equally intolerant allies.

The chief way the American Left operates is by co-opting selfish make-believe leaders in various “communities” and presenting those people to the public as if they are THE official representatives of black people, gay people, etc.

Malcolm XPeople like Al Sharpton, Linda Sarsour and others have learned that the way to wealth and fame in the Democrat organization is to promote hatred and division non-stop. The Sharptons, Sarsours and their fellow Kapos live well but not so the suffering people they claim to represent. 

Black, female, gay, Muslim, poor or working class people who WANT TO CO-EXIST PEACEFULLY AND FIND COMMON GROUND are attacked by Democrats as  “traitors” to their race, gender group, etc. Needless to say they also DON’T get high-paying demagogue gigs in the Democrat organization. 

And the more black, female, gay, Muslim, poor and working class people that catch on and break away from the Democrats the more and more frantic they become. The 2016 election made it clear to them how many people from the groups they feel they “own” are rebelling against their ugly tactics and authoritarian ways.

That is why they have gone so publicly insane since last November and have been resorting to such violent and criminal behavior. Continue reading

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COOL-NAMED TEAM: BRISTOL COLLEGE

BRISTOL COLLEGE BAYHAWKS

Bristol College Bayhawks

Location: Fall River, MA

Division: NJCAA

Comment: You almost can’t go wrong with any team name that adds the word “hawks” at the end. Continue reading

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