Allstate’s Dean Winters as the redoubtable “Mayhem” is doing animal impersonations again, this time as a wild bird stuck in the attic of basketball legend Larry Bird. – -What, you’ve never seen a bird in a suit before?! That absurdity is part of the humor. Well, once again Winters pulls his animal act off, bonking his head against an attic window to show his entrapment, knocking stuff about, and announcing that he’s “going cuckoo…”
All of the ruckus draws the now senior Bird out of his comfy chair into his attic, where he encounters the bird-Winters, and arms himself with a lacrosse stick! “What ‘ya got, Larry? May the best bird win,” declares Winters. It’s no contest, however, as Winters-as-bird handily dodges basketball Bird’s swings. Jumping to reach Winters, Larry Bird crashes through the attic floor, his legs dangling comically through his living room ceiling…
“You may be a legend on the court, but you’re an amateur up here,” mocks wild bird Winters from the rafters. “Now YOU’RE the bird stuck in the attic!”
Once more, nature prevails…as does Dean Winters, whether as a cat, raccoon, deer, St. Bernard puppy, or bird.- – Can he do a fox next?! 🦊
Bunnies tend to take over at Easter, symbolic of spring and fertility. In some cultures and folklore, however, foxes have also registered an Easter presence.
Easter was originally a pagan festival dedicated to Eostre (Ostara), the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring. Her consort was a hare, hence the Easter Bunny. Ostara’s consort (lover?) had previously been a bird, hence the ability to lay eggs! It gets freaky, and it’s best not to question notions of shape-shifting and cross-species relationships. This notion of an Easter Bunny was solidified by Jacob Grimm of the Brothers Grimm, who believed that the hare was the sacred animal of Ostara…
But in Germanic traditions extending up to the mid-20th century, an Easter Fox was held responsible for the Easter eggs, and children would prepare a cozy bed of hay and moss for der Osterfuchs. Yeah! Now we’re talkin’! German and Dutch settlers brought the tradition of the Easter fox to the U.S. in the 18th century, where rabbits gradually took over the Easter duties…
But for those of us who are fur-ious that a rabbit supplanted us, we await the restoration of the true Easter fox to his proper post of rightful honor… 🦊
Not everyone is a fan of the CloverVerse, but Cloverfield has been called the best Godzilla-type movie done by Hollywood. The original 2008 Cloverfield movie was commercially successful, although in my case it was an acquired taste due to the “found footage” format of the film as filmed by the shell-shocked, ground-level perspective of the young people who attempted to survive a monstrous attack.
10 Cloverfield Lane from 2016 was a different kind of offshoot of the franchise, anchored by the star power and acting of John Goodman, and set in the paranoid and claustrophobic setting of an isolated survivalist rather than in the big city. We did get to see some actual aliens in the closing segments of the film, and they were worth waiting for, having advanced technology and biomechanical ships…
Then there was 2018’s The Cloverfield Paradox, a muddled and confusing installment set on an orbiting space station where an international team of scientists attempted to solve Earth’s critical energy crisis using a particle accelerator but unintentionally opening a rift in space to an alternative dimension from which flowed monsters to our reality. Rifts in space…where would science fiction tales be without them?! This device however explains how Earth received the Cloverfield monster (code name, “Clover”) in the first place, and so is a necessary link in the CloverVerse. As the sole surviving scientist returns to Earth, the enormous monster is already here, and rears its hideous head into the heavens, roaring in the last moment of the film. The Cloverfield Paradox was relegated almost immediately to Netflix, and may largely be seen only there today…
There is little that is presently known about the next planned Cloverfield movie, other than that it intends to be a direct sequel to the 2008 original, and may pick up from where the creature, having thoroughly trashed New York, has survived a tactical nuke. Reportedly the “found footage” viewpoint of the original film will be abandoned, so the monster won’t be shown just in fleeting partial glimpses again. Rumors are rampant; we may see the whole of human civilization plagued by multiple monsters, or perhaps a new creature will be introduced to fight against the original. Kaiju type films have been known to do those kinds of things, and it should provide a fine spectacle in any case… RAWRRR! 🙀
In a Sandofi commercial for Fluzone, the disease is personified as a ravenous wolf stalking people in various settings with ill intent. The notion of “the wolf at the door” is historically a longstanding one often used to represent all kinds of hardships and deprivation, from war to famine to disease.
The attempted predations of the realistic and sizeable wolf depicted here are repeatedlyfrustrated in this commercial by the simple fact that his intended victims have been immunized. Eventually he becomes a wolf on the run, rendered impotent by the simple fact that the people he surveys and passes have been protected…
And so we finally see our wolf retreating to the extent that he’s looking out the rear window of a bus. I don’t know what fare he was charged, but think that being immunized is a good idea lest you be visited and victimized by the flu wolf…
I’ve never had an emu work on my vehicle, but I could argue that some gorillas have. We’ve all been at the mercy of garages and mechanics. Even the venerable Plymouth Duster chariot used by the dynamic duo of Doug and the LiMu Emu occasionally needs work, and in the Liberty Mutual “Tools” commercial, we are taken inside a garage housing a BatCave’s worth of assorted vehicles, all the brand’s trademark “banana yellow” color. I mean, there’s a motorcycle, some kind of utility vehicle, and even Skidoo-type things…
Doug is hard at work beneath the chassis of his Duster, but is he up to the job? – – Nope, and neither is the Emu, who hilariously brings his human partner the wrong tool specified for each step of the job. When asked for a socket wrench, the Emu brings a hammer. When a blowtorch is requested, LiMu deposits a stuffed animal into Doug’s hand…
At the end of his efforts, Doug somehow manages to extract what appears to be a distributor from the bottom of the vehicle! “LiMu,call a mechanic” are Doug’s closing words. Clearly one is needed to prevent this Duster from entering the dustbin…
The LiMu Emu and Doug are best buddies who dress identically, and have a long-standing history, the details of which we someday may learn…or perhaps it’s best not to ask!
In the past as now, there werefurry icons who represented a brand, and memorably served as spokesmen. Back before Esso gas became Exxon, there was the tiger used to admonish motorists to “put a tiger in their tank,” the tiger representing power and performance. A promotion was even done where stuffed tiger tails that could be affixed to gas caps were available to customers as visible proof that they indeed were driving with such a tiger. This was back in the days when fuel attendants would routinely clean your windshield and check your oil without being asked! Don’t hold your breath waiting for such amenities today. The tiger himself was an impressive dude rendered with attitude and fine attention to detail; rather awesome, actually.
The sadly nameless Esso/Exxon tiger was predated by the Kellogg’s product icon of Tony the Tiger, and there were distinct similarities in depictions of the duo. Despite this, the two tigers co-existed amicably until 1992 when trademark infringe wars erupted as Exxon tried to open Tiger Marts. It’s Tony the Tiger who seems to have best survived the Tiger Wars, and may still readily be seen today…
“Oh, to be a fly on the wall!” How many times have you heard that chestnut repeated? Well, a fly was not on the wall, but for several minutes one was on the white hair of Vice President Mike Pence during his debate with Kamala Harris, who seemed not troubled by insects at all. Pence paid the fly no attention, and may not have been aware of it at the time, unlike the debate audience that was largely aware of the fly’s presence, and could practically see or hear nothing else during that time…
So forget Atom Ant, who was so very yesterday. I submit to you that we during that debate witnessed the birth of a new superhero for our time, Audacious Fly. And remember that great 1950’s horror movie with Vincent Price, The Fly? The remake with Jeff Goldblume was awesome, too, although I’m glad I wasn’t eating during parts of it. It made me glad that I don’t have to regurgitate on my food to digest it…
Isn’t it great when nature interferes with the works of men, anyways? The revolution is coming, and remember that you heard it here…
People tend to either love or hate The Masked Singer on Fox, and we were provided a preview of the upcoming season’s costumes recently. Shown above are Baby Alien, Serpent, and Seahorse.Additionally the animal kingdom will be represented by Giraffe, Jellyfish, Crocodile, and fictitiously Dragon. The show itself for those unfamiliar with it is kind of a singing competition run through a furry convention, a unique type of cheerful and inspired insanity.
There are a number of “firsts” represented among this season’s contestants. At eight feet tall, Giraffe is the tallest costume ever, and is attired in a style reminiscent of French aristocracy. Baby Alien is the first costume to be fronted by a puppet, Serpent’s costume has animatronic features, and the Snowy Owls (below) represent the first double-headed costume.
So you may want to drop in on The Masked Singer, Season 4 which will debut on September 23rd…
Turtles have made inroads into televised advertising, as seen before in a number of episodes of Comcast’s “Slowskys” depicting a turtle family with their technologically-hip son. Now Progressive insurance has also brought us an anthropomorphic father-and-son turtle duo, who we are shown sunning themselves on a rock overlooking a camper park. In the near background sits a large motorized camper which piques the younger turtle’s curiosity, prompting him to ask his father about the “moving house thing.”
Turtle-Dad responds that it’s a motor home, a modern invention, to which Junior replies that they’ve carried their houses around with them for “like forever!” Turtle-Dad chuckles, and then responds that the humans have Geico to cover them if anything goes wrong. “What could go wrong?,” wonders Junior out loud when a feather drifts down from above. “Ooh, a feather!” exclaims Junior with child-like wonder. Looking upwards, Turtle-Dad discerns a vulture sitting in the tree above them. “Duck, Junior!,” he alerts his son. Now sharing in the alarm, Junior qualifies his Dad’s response, correcting “That’s no duck, Daddy…that’s a vulture!”
The humans are clueless non-participants in the drama unfolding before them, but I doubt they’d be thrilled to see vultures roosting near their camper; perhaps a Stephen King-esque horror movie is about to begin here. The turtles as they retreat into their shells will hopefully live to see another day. They have warm and wonderful human-like eyes and expressions, and make a nice addition to the Geico advertising animal stable that memorably includes an office camel thrilled to see “hump day” arrive…
In the long ago, I was exposed to kiddie shows with an animal presence that probably warped me for life. There are many who grew up with Captain Kangaroo together with his cohorts Mr. Moose and Bunny Rabbit. Not to be forgotten was Dancing Bear, whose unchanging face and looming presence could be oddly disturbing; I’m glad that he was benevolent. Mr. Green Jeans, a farmer stereotype, would frequently show up with a baby farm animal of some sort. I often wondered about him…
Much less remembered were shows like Andy’s Gang, which featured actor and comedian Andy Devine, who in his prime tended to play sidekicks in westerns. Now Andy appeared with a strange array of animals that included Midnight the Cat (pictured top), Little Squeaky (a mouse), and a strange magical amphibian obviously made of rubber called Froggy the Gremlin. This character would appear in a puff of smoke, and always announce “Hiya, kids! Hiya, hiya, hiya!” The kiddie audience would then cheer with delight, and you so seldom see magical amphibians these days. It was low tech and low budget stuff, but memorably high on the cornball scale. Kids could appreciate this kind of inspired anarchy, echoes of which survived much later in shows like Pee-wee’s Playhouse.
In the long-ago tradition of regional kiddie shows, cartoon segments and Three Stooges shorts were sometimes hosted by hapless adult humans who might be dressed to impersonate stereotypic police officers or sea captains. It paid the bills for them, and they probably laughed or cried all the way to the bank. We sucked it all down, and hungered for more…and while the adults scratched their heads over our interest, we kids knew that they would never understand…
FOXSYLVANIA 
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