Re-evaluating my priorities, and what that means for my posts on here

I've been unhappy for a few months now.  Super unhappy, having a really hard time getting excited about much of anything, feeling like I was worthless.  So I've been searching for an answer, and I happened to stumble upon this episode of the Cracked podcast last night, and it got me thinking super hard about the way I've been spending my time.  If you've had any doubts of your own, I recommend listening to it.

A Return to the Dreaming

I've said before and I'll say again that I hate editing podcasts.  I love doing them though.  Guesting on other podcasts has always been the best because it means I get to show up to discuss and then do nothing afterward.  For my own, I definitely don't want to present the idea that I hated doing Strangers from the Internet or A Return to the Dreaming.  I love talking to Bethany and JD (as well as our guests on SftI) and I think we had some really great discussions on both shows.  As I listen again to edit, I enjoy our discussions again.  There's nothing cooler than when you're sitting there listening to a show you recorded a while ago, and a topic comes up and you're thinking about the topic while you edit and then a little while later, boom, that thing you were thinking is right there because we're awesome people so of course it occurred to us then.  It's getting down in the weeds, having to clear up every single stutter and verbal tick, listening to a sentence three, four, five times in a row as you slowly clean up those things and make sure it still sounds like a normal proper sentence.  Deciding if it's better to leave in that goof up because taking it out may make the rest sound stilted or odd without the context.  I know from listening to other podcasts that too many verbal ticks can drive a listener crazy and I want to provide a quality product, but the tedium of editing means I can't do it for more than small bits at a time.  So far I have kept A Return to the Dreaming to a once a month schedule but every time it feels like I'm going to end up taking longer.  And knowing I've still got five episodes to get through after the one I'm on isn't helping things, it feels like there's no end in sight.

My point being that I am committed to getting the episodes out, but I don't know what kind of schedule it will be at going forward.  If past history is an indicator, it may stay on schedule.  This may just be a mental thing I need to get over, is my point.  Stop imposing a deadline on myself for no good reason.

Bill Murray Project

Here's an honest confession.  I care a lot about what other people think.  Way, way too much.  I frequently set expectations from myself based on how I think others are going to react.  An image that I feel like I need to uphold.  "If I don't post frequently, people will forget about my blog entirely."  Ha!  As if there's ever been a large number of people paying attention anyway.  "If I abandon a project, people will think I am irresponsible/somehow worth less."  Because all those people I know who start projects and abandon them are totally hated by the people who follow them, right?  Yes, it's true that when those people announce a new project, internally I'm thinking "we'll see how long this lasts" but so what?  It's their time and they can do as they please with it.  Ditto with my own.

I came up with this project because there are a few Murray films I want to revisit.  I added in all Murray films as a way to "post more often."  I switched them to videos in an effort to make videos again even though I didn't have the time to edit.  Also because I quickly found out there's only so much to be said about most comedy films.  I look at the remainder of Bill Murray's work, and I still see some of the movies I want to revisit, but I also see some I feel no need to revisit because I know I don't like them (I'm looking at you, Coffee & Cigarettes) or because I know perfectly well that they're enjoyable, and most of them are popular enough that you don't need me telling you that Ed Wood is good and you should see it.

So going forward I plan to revisit the films I want, check out some of the others I haven't seen before that look interesting to me, and I will post about them if I feel like there's something I want to say about them.

I also plan to find a way to use the "5 minutes about..." videos in another fashion, because I really do enjoy talking to the camera.  The time limit has already proved helpful for Pop Culture Revolver, where Jak, JD and I all felt like knowing that we were limited on time kept us all on point and focused for the discussion.

Beatlemiscellania

Unlike the Bill Murray films, I'm interested in all of these because I'm a big Beatles fan.  Even the ones I've already seen I want to revisit, and even if hardly anyone is listening, I just like explaining Beatle references and talking about them.  These have obviously already been on a "whenever I feel like it" schedule and will probably continue as just that.

Monthly Midnight Movie Exchange

Once a month I sit down to watch a film and then talk to Jak and Noel about it the next day.  Some of the choices haven't been particularly enjoyable for me, but I still like the idea of the project, I enjoy talking to them both, and I see no reason to change anything about it. I would say the main possibility is if I feel like I run out of movies to share.

Castle Rock Companion

Noel and I already worked together on the Golden Years posts and I enjoyed them.  I listened to The Gunslinger audiobook because I want to revisit the series, and conferring with Noel he agreed I should cover it for CRC regardless of whether or not an adaptation ever appears.  Basically, the name of the project is vague enough that it can encompass any and all King related works we wish to cover.  Like the Beatles, I really enjoy King and I will continue to talk about his work in one form or another.  The most likely change that could happen would be not posting so regularly.

No Game New Year

A large part of what started this post is that I started drafting a post for the end of the year, a "what I have learned" kind of thing.  And the ridiculousness of waiting until December 31st for things I already know now began to seem super-duper ridiculous to me.  So I asked myself why, and once again it's all related to these promises I made to myself and not letting myself down, which in my reality means not letting other people down or the imagined "other" down.  So yeah, that post will probably go up pretty soon and I will lift this foolish embargo.  Because giving up on new year's resolutions before the year is up is normal and human, and I'm not going to win the love and adoration of millions just because I make it all the way to December 31st.  Especially if there's a game out there that I have the time and money to play.  And I haven't had the time lately because I've been forcing myself to do these other projects.

Wolverine and the X-men posts

The X-men are up there with the Beatles and King for me.  I love them, and will always want to talk about them and share my love with others in some fashion.  I'm going to keep re-watching this series because I think it's great.  Will I keep writing about it?  I'm not sure.  I've noticed that my last couple of posts were really just me recapping the show, pointing out some cameos.  Some of which I have to confirm through Wikipedia because I missed a good decade of X-men comics.  I think I just took that from a "not sure" to a definite "no," unless I find something I really want to say about them.

Pop Culture Revolver

I think what you can kind of tell over all is that a lot of the above is about slimming things down or slowing them up.  A good portion of them could even be incorporated into Pop Culture Revolver instead - for instance once I get to the end of Wolverine and the X-men, I could invite on anyone else who has watched the series to talk about it.  I don't feel like I need to force myself to watch The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou or Moonrise Kingdom again because I know I like them, but that doesn't mean I couldn't do an episode about Wes Anderson films in general.  There are many Sandman related comics not directly written by Gaiman that JD and I didn't do an episode for, but could totally be covered here without giving me yet another episode to edit.  My general idea is to do this podcast every other week, but we'll see how realistically that can be upheld.

Things that have nothing to do with posting on the internet, gasp!

I have multiple Excel spreadsheets that I use to organize my time.  There is "Week Schedule" where I have columns for Monday through Sunday and rows for hours that I'm awake.  I block out the time when I'm at work and use the rest to plan my meals and activities the rest of the time.  There's "Creative Projects and Ideas" where the first tab is a calendar where I fill out what posts on what day and the remaining tabs are separated by project and I organize what needs to be done for them.  There are abandoned projects, current projects, and possible future projects.  And one thing I noticed is that recently I've been adding tabs that are not necessarily related to something I could post on here.

• I'm tracking which of those gifted comics I've read regardless of whether or not I'll review them.
• I've got my Netflix disc queue prioritized so I can see when I can realistically discontinue that part of the service.
• I recently put my amazon wishlist in there, seeing what I can change from physical media to digital, to see what I can experience through a streaming service instead, and whether there's stuff there I truly want/need.
• I've got a list of movies I only have via VHS to determine whether I should get better versions or just copy them over via a VCR/video camera hook up.
• I've got a list of books sitting around my house that I've never actually read
• The No Game New Year tab is really just a list of games I haven't played yet
• I've got some helpful links on how to make a t shirt quilt out of some old shirts that no longer fit me but I'm too attached to part with.

The point is, my house is currently full to the point that I can't get to things easily.  And I've realized I'm just not that attached to things as a I used to be.  I'm not going to know what is worth keeping and what's not unless I have the chance to go through these things, and going through them often gets deferred because "I must edit" or "Gotta watch this so I can make progress on this project" while I allow myself to be continually miserable because I feel cramped in my packed house.

It's stupid behavior.  I have to stop making myself guilty if  I want to be a consumer rather than a producer.  I have to stop telling myself that cleaning up the house isn't an accomplishment because it's not a creative endeavor.

I'm not going to be rich and famous.  I'm not even going to be internet famous.  Honestly, the idea that that is somehow a good thing to be is ludicrous when you see how those people get harassed and criticized on a regular basis.  Obviously it means enough to them to continue, but I'm so tired of putting things out there and being disappointed because people didn't get excited about it the way I hoped they would.

I've been really stupid.  I started doing videos because no one reads but people like to watch videos, so maybe if I make them they'll love me like they love those other people!  I sit around like an asshole and think "Oh well, Igor and Noel will like this, but no one else will notice" totally under appreciating the fact that I do in fact have two awesome friends who enjoy what I do.  And they're not the only ones, they may be the ones who comment the most but sitting around expecting comments is just sitting there going "Love me!  Validate me!  Need me!  Convince me I'm special!"

There's a line from a Liz Phair song.  She's talking about something else, but she says "If you do it and you're still unhappy, then you know that the problem is you."

So this is the point where I say no more.  No more putting something out there in the hopes that others will notice.  I will write when I want to write and I will work on videos when I want to do them and I will discuss things with my friends and record them when I want to.  And if I want to sit at home and play a game or watch a show or read a book I will without stopping to think about whether or not such thing is something I can review.  And the world will not end!  Imagine that.

Beatlemiscellania - Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978)

In my youth, I really hated the BeeGees.  My parents only listened to the "light rock" radio station when we were growing up, and I guess the 80s were still close enough to the BeeGees height of popularity that they got played quite frequently.  I was completely baffled as to the appeal of these guys with really high pitched voices and big goofy hair.  But the funny thing about the passage of time is that even that thing you grew up annoyed with can suddenly have an appeal to you.  While I still am a little confused as to how women ever considered them sexy, I do have to admit they were talented singers who did a lot of great pop songs from that era.  So while I avoided this film when I was young and at the height of my Beatles obsession, I was cautiously optimistic that I might enjoy it now.

It is a somewhat "adaptation" of the album of the same name, but since that album doesn't truly tell a story it's really just the story of a band, using covers of Beatles songs to move the story forward.  The songs primarily come from Sgt Pepper and Abbey Road with a few others mixed in.  The story is very fantastical in nature and often goes off in strange directions for the sake of covering a new song.  The film is narrated by George Burns, who plays the mayor of Heartland, Mr. Kite.  A large number of other characters also take their names from Beatles songs.

The plot, such as it is, is that the original Sgt Pepper started playing around the time of World War I, and he and his band charmed everyone in Heartland up to his death in 1958.  Shortly before his death, he passed the torch to his grandson, Billy Shears, who recruited the three Henderson boys to join him.  The band becomes an instant success, but while they are being seduced by the evils of Hollywood, Heartland falls to ruin under mean Mr. Mustard.  The boys return home to play a benefit concert to save the town, but an evil organization kidnaps Billy's girlfriend Strawberry Fields to brainwash her and make her love Future Villain Band instead.  The guys stop FVB but Strawberry is killed in the fight, and Billy is ready to commit suicide until the weather vane on the top of Heartland's city hall (which always points to happiness) comes to life and makes everything wonderful again - including bringing Strawberry back from the dead.

If that sounds insane, realize that I didn't even bring up Mr. Mustard's robot girlfriends who tell him what to do, or the moments where the band has to steal back the magical musical instruments from a brainwashing teacher and a demented doctor.  Or that Sgt Pepper's band travels around in a hot air balloon.  Or that Billy is date raped by Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.  Or the big finale on the steps of city hall where all these celebrities suddenly appear and sing the reprise with them, in an attempt to recreate the cover of the album.  This movie is just absolutely crazy, and I'm not the least bit surprised that it flopped.  I will also not sit here and try to tell you that it's a good film by any stretch of the imagination.

That said, I actually really did enjoy watching it.

Peter Frampton is not a good singer, and most of the Beatles songs he sings on fall flat.  But the BeeGees tend to make up for that whenever they do the singing.  They were definitely the band that carried the torch of three part harmonies into the 70s after the Beatles broke up, and so they are really well suited here.  Barry Gibbs' rendition of "A Day in the Life" is particularly strong, but nearly all of their songs are enjoyable to listen to.  Certainly not better than the real thing, but they handle it well.  George Martin produced the soundtrack to the film, and I think that also goes a long way in helping these covers sound great and making all the incidental music really shine.

Some of the covers are really baffling, like having George Burns sing "Fixing a Hole" or Frankie Howerd as Mr. Mustard singing his title song as well as "When I'm 64," or Donald Pleasance doing a kind of spoken word version at one point.  Their choice to tell the story only through songs and Burns' narration means that sometimes you get these singers who are simply not up to par to handle the songs.  Sandy Farina plays Strawberry Fields, and she's at least decent, but she doesn't really bring much to the songs she sings.  Dianne Steinburg as Lucy is a stronger vocalist.

I absolutely loved Earth, Wind, and Fire's version of "We Can Work It Out."  It's very much in their style and seeing them perform it during the benefit concert and the energy they bring to the performance is even better.  Aerosmith's cover of "Come Together" is often played on the radio still, and with good reason.  They perform the song as Future Villain Band, and while they fumble around helplessly in the "fight" with Sgt Peppers the performance before it makes up for it.  And Steven Tyler plays dead pretty well.

Steve Martin's performance as Dr. Maxwell Edison is so close to his performance as the evil dentist in Little Shop of Horrors that Frank Oz had to have seen this and chose him specifically because of it.  He sings "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" in the same style that he sang "King Tut" and many others from his comedy album, and he brings his wild and crazy guy energy to the role.  I also found it amusing that they brought in a bit of Star Wars parody when Billy fights him - this movie has been referred to as a 70s time capsule, and what 70s capsule would be complete without a faux light saber fight and a villain that shoots electricity from his fingertips?

Alice Cooper plays the brainwashing teacher, and holy cow, if I had seen this when I was younger the scene would have been nightmare fuel.  The effects and dark eye makeup are simple, but his cover of "Because" (with the BeeGees providing harmonies) turns the song into something truly creepy, and the images work really well too.  A lot of what Cooper did in the 70s looks really mild now compared to guys like Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie who brought it all to a new level of shock in the 90s, but watching this I was able to get a feel for what kind of frightening, imposing presence he had back then.  I like it.

As I said before, this is not a good film.  It's more like a sequence of moments than a true narrative, and some of those moments can be painful to listen to at times and confusing to look at.  If you're a Beatles fan, you're going to have to be open to hearing new versions of the songs you love in order to be receptive to it.  And if you can't find a copy of the film easily, at least check out the soundtrack.  If you're not a Beatles fan, you're going to have to be a fan of campy, crazy musicals.  But if you're in the right frame of mind, you may be able to accept this film for its madness like I did.

Beatlemiscellania - The Monkees TV series

When I first compiled my list for this project, I didn't include the Monkees because they're not really a direct parody.  You can't really point directly from one Beatle to one Monkee and say they are a copy.  But the fact remains that The Monkees TV show was created after the film A Hard Day's Night became such a success.  What resulted from what was essentially someone's attempt to cash in on Beatlemania became a fascinating story in and of itself.

Besides A Hard Day's Night, the show shares a lot of characteristics with The Beatles cartoon in its structure of playing two songs per episode while the group engaged in wacky antics of some kind.  The show is really like a cartoon in a lot of ways, with its fast paced editing, silliness, and occasional breaking of the fourth wall.  It's this unusual approach and overall charm of the four actors chosen for the group that has made the show almost timeless, charming children and teenagers in the 80s who caught it on syndication just as it had those in the 60s on its original run. The catchy tunes go a long way to help that as well.

I have very vague memories of watching the TV show in my youth.  It was fun watching the series this time around and getting occasional flashes of memory from what I remember seeing back then.  It happened most often when I would recognize something in season 1 they would later use for the opening titles of season 2 (which was what was used for syndication).  I also remember my aunts (who are about a decade older than me, and were therefore teenagers at the time) asking which Monkee was my favorite.  I eagerly replied "the one with the hat!" because apparently I wasn't bothered with remembering names yet.  They were of course all about Davy Jones.  They are crazy.  Mike Nesmith with his southern drawl and quiet but clever demeanor is still the best.    Micky is probably the funniest and Peter wins me over because I can't imagine how annoying it would be to play an idiot like that all the time (and probably get treated as such in real life, no matter how smart you are).  Davy is just kind of boring by comparison with his constant crushes.

The biggest problem the show suffers from is that they were clearly always trying to push the latest singles around the same time, so you get a lot of episodes in a row that play repeat songs.  When you're watching them on disc that can get a bit tedious.  Apparently in the 70s they re-aired the show but edited in then current Monkees songs into some of the episodes.  While that might create more variety, some of their later songs simply aren't as good and therefore that isn't really much of an improvement.

The other problem that stops at least some of these episodes from being completely timeless is their use of various foreign stereotypes for humor.  Probably the worst was the "evil Chinese" episode, with white actors using makeup to slant their eyes and speaking in Engrish.  "I have you in my crutches!" the villain exclaims at one point.  It's painful to watch now.  Fortunately, these episodes are fairly few in number, leaving the majority of the series to good clean fun that holds up well today.

There's even some particularly smart episodes that I liked a lot.  The Monkees in general stand for self expression and being yourself, and I really enjoyed the episode where they are chosen as "Typical Young Americans of the Year" by a magazine that then chooses to misrepresent them as what they want them to be.  Their behavior at the reward ceremony puts the magazine in their place and brings their own message to the forefront.  It's a fairly common theme for late 60s media, but it's still enjoyable.

The songs from season one are mostly very strong ones, with the exception of  "Your Auntie Grizelda" which grates on my nerves and made me groan every time it popped up in yet another episode.  The performance sequences are also pretty amusing to watch in their own way - while Mike and Peter were actual musicians, they clearly didn't have much stage presence yet and they look just as awkward if not more so than Davy and Micky.

The songs in season two are a little more of a mixed bag - by that point they were starting to insist on being a part of the writing process at least some of the time, and they simply weren't very good song writers. The performance sequences are actually stronger, because the four of them had a lot of chemistry and look like they're having a lot of fun together, but the episode format was changed slightly. While season one often had a song in the middle of the episode to break things up, season two is just straight plot for most of it, ending with a romp where a song plays and the Monkees terrorize whoever has been the villain the whole episode. We then get another performance video right afterward. There are also fewer quick cuts and breaking of the fourth wall becomes all about the Monkees forgetting their lines or literally reading the script on screen. It makes the episodes seem duller, because they're just generic plots that the Monkees don't make any more interesting. Apparently after a long bout of touring, the guys had a hard time recording these episodes, and it shows. There's also a fair number of them where Mike is just not there, because he had a tonsillectomy and they didn't want to stop their schedule for him to recover.

The above applies to about 75% of season two, with the remaining 25% standing out as markedly different and downright experimental. There's a fairy tale episode set up like a play, with minimal sets and Mike playing double duty as himself and the princess they are rescuing. There's an alien episode that features segments with Pat Paulsen doing the comedy he was best known for at the time. Frank Zappa appears in an intro for an episode, where he destroys a car and calls it music. "The Monkees Go to Paris" has no plot to speak of, and is really just a series of vignettes of them running around the city set to music. And then there's the finale, co-written and directed by Mickey Dolenz where an evil magician mind controls everyone with the help of a talking alien bush whose name Frodis was the Monkees code word for marijuana. These odder episodes stand out from the rest and make the season worth checking out, and show that the Monkees themselves were yearning to do something a bit different than the standard plots being thrust on them. Unfortunately the studio wasn't ready for it and so the show was cancelled.

The Monkees kept making music long after the show ended, but at least in my opinion, most of it isn't very good. These guys had a lot of natural charm and comedic timing, but they were not very good musicians. The music they fought so hard to write just doesn't compare to the fantastic songs written for them in the early years.

After the series the Monkees made a film called Head, which was far, far different from the show. I have not watched it yet, as it is perfect material for the Monthly Midnight Movie Exchange.  But included on the second season disc of The Monkees is the televised special 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee. It's been referred to as the television version of Head, and oh boy does it give me a lot to look forward to in that regard. It's definitely closer to performance art than a typical variety show television special, though there is a great middle segment featuring Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, and Fats Domino. Beyond that though are strange dance numbers and an evil Charles Darwin. It's really hard to describe on its own, you just have to see it for yourself.

There was also Hey Hey It's the Monkees, a special that aired in 1997 and marked the last time all four of them got together before Davy's death. It was written and directed by Nesmith, and the main joke is that it is supposed to be episode 781 of the show, acting as if it was never cancelled and the guys have just been living in that beach house still trying to make it big all this time. The jokes are incredibly corny and I can't tell if it's just that the guys are of the age that they can't make anything other than goofy dad jokes or if this was Nesmith's view of how bad he thought the original show was. The special also works as a promo for Justus, their reunion album that had come out the year before, and those songs are just plain awful. They also do a medley of their classics "Last Train to Clarksville," "Daydream Believer," "I'm Not Your Stepping Stone," "I'm a Believer," and "Pleasant Valley Sunday" which is pretty good. I was a little disappointed by the fact that someone on the show requests Mike to wear the hat again, and he puts in a line about how he lost it. As if someone couldn't have recreated a similar one for the special. Don't be such a grump for once and just wear the hat, Mike. Yeesh.

That kind of frustration is a lot of what I feel for the Monkees in general. When you watch interviews from the 90s, it's amazing to see how much ire they still had thirty years later for things that happened to them. Don Kirshner was the man who chose the early hit songs for them, but if you listen to Mike and Peter in particular, you would think the man was a demon. I'll admit from the interviews of him I've seen, the man doesn't have much charm himself, but it's pretty clear that he had an ear for music and knew how to choose hits. The Monkees were the first boy band in a lot of ways, and the auditions they signed up for seem to make that pretty clear, but they always seemed to fight that from the start. With no established record of this kind of model of business, I guess you can expect some kind of kickback from your talent but these guys seem to be living in some kind of lala land.

Of course, it's been nearly another two decades, and I'll admit I haven't caught any recent interviews to see if maybe they've mellowed out since. I'm sure the criticism they received in their early years didn't help either, and was truly ridiculous considering that session musicians and songs written by professional song writers rather than the band themselves was something quite common place for the time period. If they hadn't been structured to resemble the Beatles so much, they probably never would have received that flack at all. But I think by the 80s at least people had a much better understanding of what they were about; it's a shame they never let go of that chip on their shoulder and just embraced it themselves.

Beatlesmiscellania - The Beatles cartoon series

Quite probably the earliest version of parody (on film anyway) for the Beatles was this cartoon that aired on Saturday mornings in America from 1965 to 1969.  It was the very first cartoon series to ever be based on real people, and it's clearly not meant to be an accurate portrayal, both in that the Beatles are largely caricatures of the real thing and the situations far too out there to ever be based on anything in real life.  They also didn't even try to pick voice actors who could sound like the Beatles, which is a little confusing considering that each episode has a total of four Beatles songs incorporated into them.

Paul Frees voiced both John and George.  John has no trace of an English accent at all, and has a voice very similar to one I know I heard Frees portray in various Rankin/Bass stop motion animated specials.  George's voice has a bit of an Irish lilt to it.  I'm not sure if that was chosen because George's mother is Irish, or if that was just some kind of strange coincidence.  Paul and Ringo are voiced by Lance Percival who has the bonus of actually being English.  He gives Ringo the scouse accent that you most commonly hear people do these days when mimicking the Beatles, though Paul's accent is very slight by comparison.

As far as personalities, John is presented as the leader and at least once referred to as the brain of the Beatles, whereas poor Ringo is the brainless one.  Paul and George tend to shift a little depending on what's going on.  George doesn't seem to be necessarily "quiet" and Paul is never referred to as the "cute one."  He does develop a strange kind of skepticism as the show goes on, strongly arguing that everything in Hollywood is fake and that he doesn't believe Robin Hood was a real person.  I don't know if that was based on anything Paul once said that has now been forgotten, or if they just needed a role for him and chose that.

As I mentioned, most of the situations the Beatles find themselves in are quite bizarre.  The very first episode finds them in Transylvania trying to rehearse, and having to head to what they believe is a deserted castle to do so.  The place is full of monsters, but it's all okay as the monsters love the music and dance along.  These Beatles also have far more free time than the real ones did, as a lot of times they seem to just be traveling the world going on adventures rather than playing shows.  They also exist in a strange limbo where they are broke but also have to pay a lot of money to the taxman.  Basically, whatever the short needs at the time, that's what they are.

Each episode contains two shorts named after Beatles songs, as well as two singalong songs included in the middle.  The singalongs are usually very minimalist animation or even a sequence of still frames with the lyrics included.  I counted quite a few errors which tells me no one was giving them an official copy of the lyrics and it was just left to someone to transcribe them.  The singalongs also have a lead in where either Paul, George or John encourages you to join in and sing with them, while Ringo fills in for the prop man who is always out sick.  One such exchange has  John saying the next song is a ballad, so Ringo brings out a voting ballot.  When that's not acceptable to John, he comes out in a tutu saying he's ready for the ballet (pronouncing the T).  They only made a very smaller number of these lead ins to the singalongs.  In fact there were only five for season one and three used for both seasons two and three.  It can get a bit tedious when you're watching the episodes in a row.  I can't imagine it could have been much more fun as a kid on Saturday mornings.

Besides this kind of cost cutting, the animation is just very cheap in general.  Most of the Beatles performance animations are recycled episode to episode, and I saw at least one background character reappear  - he was a Spaniard when they were in Spain and a Frenchmen when they were in Paris.  Movements are minimized and any time they can have a still scroll across the screen they will do so.  However given the time period it makes sense, especially when you consider they pushed out 26 episodes for the first season.  They had to make them very quickly, and they were no doubt thinking that Beatlemania was only going to last so long.  The second and third seasons have only six episodes a piece, and do have a few updates and improvements in the animation here and there.  It's also worth noting that while their movements are repeated so often, they do look pretty accurate.  John holds his guitar high and bounces in place, George shuffles his feet back and forth, and Paul moves his bass around in his arms a lot.  Even Ringo adorably bobs his head from side to side.  Some of the later episodes even add in John playing keyboard or piano.

As far as the shorts themselves, most of them have plots as basic as the Transylvania one described above.  Others get a bit more zany, but it always results in them playing the song toward the last quarter of the short and almost always ends with Ringo uttering a goofy laugh. "Huh-huh yeah" will now be a secret in joke only to me when someone is doing something silly.  Some shorts are related to the song, and others feel like the song was shoe-horned in.  For instance, a doctor comes up with a shrinking potion and drops it in a pool to show it works.  John dives in and becomes miniature.  The other Beatles talk about how adorable he looks, and Paul decides he will belong to him, therefore leading into the song "It Won't Be Long" (because they sing "it won't be long 'til you belong to me").  On the other hand, some do fit quite well.  For"Penny Lane" the Beatles walk the street and we witness everyone Paul is describing in the song.  And "Strawberry Fields Forever" has the Beatles stop by an orphanage and bring color back to it (in the most wonderful psychedelic way of course) when they play.

When I first started watching the cartoon, I was completely charmed.  It was all very silly, but also adorable.  The humor is witty while still being simple enough for children to understand, and of course you've got the great music thrown in.  But I quickly found I had to limit my viewing to only an episode or two in a row.  Despite having about 5 albums of material to work with when they began season one, the songs are often repeated from one episode to the next episode's singalong, or vice versa.  It wore on my attention span a little to be hearing the same songs repeatedly.  With the fewer episodes in the later seasons that is improved, but yet they also started repeating a few of the singalongs.  I'm guessing they were either pressed for time or knew they were being cancelled so didn't bother.

Apple Corps Ltd. has had the rights to this cartoon series since the 90s, but has never released it officially.  At first I thought that was unfair, but the deeper I got into the series I began to understand why.  Because they travel the world a lot, most of their adventures rely on "ethnic humor" for lack of a better term.  Any time they go to a foreign country, the accents are extreme and the clothes stereotypical.  This affects plenty of European countries and even Texas (where the Wild West apparently still exists), but the absolute worst of it affects Asian,  African, and Polynesian people.  Slanty eyes and buck teeth for Asians, tribal masks and spears for Africans, etc.  While it wasn't intended to be cruel at the time it was made, these are just the kind of things we don't find acceptable anymore.  That said I don't see any reason why a collection with the more offensive episodes removed could not be released.  Remove the repetitive singalong lead ins  while you're at it and maybe just let those speak for themselves, or even have them in a separate grouping in the collection.  Each short has its own credit sequence, so it would be really easy to do.

While it's obviously a bit difficult to get your hands on, I would recommend this for both Beatles fans and fans of 1960s animation if you can find it.  Just be prepared to cringe at those offending episodes and I think you'll find something to enjoy in the rest of them.

Beatlemiscellania - The Flintstones - "The Hatrocks and the Gruesomes"

This post features a melding of two things my father exposed me to at an early age - The Beatles and The Flintstones.  I never thought it was odd for an adult to watch cartoons because both my parents loved The Flintstones their whole lives.  I'm fairly convinced one of the reasons we owned a VCR in my youth was so my dad could tape as many of the episodes off television as he could.  When we weren't in school, we came inside from playing at 2:05 to watch the show.  It would only take a few minutes back then to go "Oh, so it's the episode where Fred gets hit on the head and can't remember who he is" or whatever.  Watching this episode again after so long brought back many fond memories for me.

This episode is from the 5th season of the show, so the gang is all here.  The Flintstones have Dino and Pebbles, and the Rubbles have Bamm-Bamm and Hopper.  This is a return appearance for both the Hatrocks, hillbillies who had a feud with the Flintstones in Arkanstone, and the Gruesomes, the Flintstones' other neighbors who are a clear parody of The Addams Family and The Munsters.

The main plot is that the Hatrocks are passing through town on their way to the World's Fair and announce to Fred that they will be visiting.  He starts off afraid they're coming to rekindle the feud, but they just wanted to say hello.  Fred then opens his big, fat mouth and says he wishes they could stay longer, and they do just that.  They take over the Flintstones' home, eating up their food, sleeping in their beds, and controlling what they watch on television. Fred's mouth extends their stay from one minute to one night to one week to indefinitely.

Frustrated and uncertain of what to do to get them to leave, Fred thinks he's found the answer by having them go over to the Gruesomes' house, convinced their menagerie of monsters and man eating plants will scare the hillbillies away.  Naturally, the Hatrocks love every second of it, posing for pictures with the octopus, taming the man eating crocodile, and asking for a sprig of the man eating plant because "it makes a great baby watcher."

There is one and only thing that bothers the Hatrocks, and that thing is "bug music."  The 4 Insects with their mop topped look and their song that goes "She says yeah yeah yeah, he says yeah yeah yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah!!"  The Flintstones use a magic screwdriver and the help of the Rubbles and Grueseomes to wire the radio and telephone and don wigs to surround the Hatrocks with bug music and send them back to the hills.

Even the World's Fair isn't safe for them.

This is a fun and absolutely adorable episode of The Flintstones.  It's also fun to see something parodying the Beatles as they were at the height of their popularity.  I imagine there were probably a lot of adults in particular who were pretty sick of hearing "She Loves You" at this point that this parody song would have felt spot on.

In doing this post I remembered another episode of the show featuring The Way Outs, who were another band who kind of parodied the Beatles.  If the tie is strong enough, I may cover that one in another post.

Beatlesmiscellania - The Rutles 2 - Can't Buy Me Lunch

When I originally planned these reviews, I assumed the two Rutles films were separate stories.  I had seen the first before, but not the second.  The description on Netflix described this second film as a parody of The Beatles Anthology, featuring interviews from the Rutles looking back on their old days.  I suppose the fact that they called the interviewer Stanley Krammerhead rather then Melvin Hall should have been a clue to me.  The Krammerhead character isn't even in this film, so I guess the person in charge of writing that description had a bit too much tea to drink that day.

In reality, this film is just a do-over for Idle who apparently wanted to add on a few jokes for the Melvin Hall character, get a lot more celebrities in, and visit a few more locales just for the hell of it.  He also changed a few of the details here and there - instead of the Maharishi stand in being into Ouija boards, he recommends eating curry to attain enlightenment.  If you're a big fan of any of the celebrities involved here, it might be fun for you to see them getting a bit silly and having fun with it.  But for me personally, even some of the people I did like fell a bit flat.

There is some previously unseen Rutles material here, but it's all scenes that were cut from the original film, as Idle did not involve any of the other three performers in this project.  He did use some songs from The Rutles Archaeology, an album recorded by Innes, Halsey, and Fataar in 1996, their own parody of the music version of The Beatles Anthology.  Idle did not appear on that album, but he didn't appear on any of the original songs either.

Some of the celebrities are stronger than others.  Tom Hanks just seems odd sitting there with an unflattering mustache discussing the whole thing, and Robin Williams as a German sexologist went over like a lead balloon for me.  But Conan O'Brien and Billy Connolly are pretty funny, as is Carrie Fisher.  Idle also uses some extra footage from Bill Murray's original appearance as Bill Murray the K and that's fun.

Hands down the absolute worst part of the film for me is Jimmy Fallon.  Of course I'm also kind of baffled that a guy who giggled his way through most of his Saturday Night Live appearances went on to have the career he now does, but his recurring bit with Idle of interrupting and trying to take over the documentary goes on for far too long, and the end "reveal" that he's actually Melvin Hall's son isn't really all that funny either.

When I finished watching it I was frankly left kind of confused why this even exists.  I suppose we can debate whether or not an artist has the right to recreate their own work - Star Wars fans certainly love to do so, but I'm more of the opinion that once something is out there and released, it's time to walk away.  If you want to revisit that world, make something new rather than just rehash the old. 

I'd recommend checking out The Rutles Archeology if you were thirsting for more Rutles rather than this film, because at least that was something completely new and feels much more fresh.

Beatlemiscellania - The Rutles - All You Need is Cash

Trying to point out every Beatles reference contained in All You Need is Cash would be a mammoth undertaking.  Writer/director/star Eric Idle meticulously looked through photographs and books to try to capture something as close to the history of the Beatles as possible for this mockumentary. George Harrison even provided him access to The Long and Winding Road, an unreleased film Neil Aspinall had put together that was essentially an early version of The Beatles Anthology.  This film is the story of the Beatles, just twisted around a bit to have a laugh and poke fun at it all.

The film started as a short created for Rutland Weekend Television, Idle's television series at the time.  The short was a parody of the Beatles in the field in A Hard Day's Night, and Idle also brought the short to Lorne Michaels for him to play on Saturday Night Live.  Everyone loved the skit and Idle decided to expand it into a full film that Lorne agreed to produce and pushed for it to appear on NBC.  What we get is an interesting hybrid of both Monty Python and Saturday Night Live style humor wrapped into one, featuring performers that appeared on both shows, as well as excellent parody songs done in the Beatles style by Neil Innes.  Some of the songs are more traditional and could easily fit side by side the Beatles tunes, while others are direct copies of existing songs with (if possible for "I Am the Walrus" and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds") even sillier lyrics.

The attention to detail on the project is really quite stunning, and makes The Rutles essentially one of the first Beatles tribute bands.  Throughout the musical performances, not only are they often matching the outfits the Beatles would wear, they frequently match their movements and facial expressions as well.  Innes even sounds like John Lennon on most of the songs he sings lead on.  Even though the details are changed for the sake of comedy, the events still mirror most of what happened to the Beatles exactly, and stretches out to the other major players along with them.

What comes off the most poorly is the portrayal of Leggy Mountbatten, the parody character of Brian Epstein.  It's a well known fact that Epstein was gay, and Leggy is as well, supposedly only managing the Rutles because he liked their tight trousers.  He's repeatedly made fun of until he eventually takes a teaching gig in Australia, which is a stand in for when Epstein committed suicide.  It's the one part of the film that I feel comes off a bit more mean spirited than the rest.  While you might say that having the Yoko Ono stand in be a daughter of Hitler is worse, I felt like that one had more to do with the public's reaction to her than saying Yoko was ever truly that bad.

Probably the funniest part of the film for me is when the Rutles take up tea drinking as a stand in for the Beatles drug use.  The serious way in which Idle as the reporter talks about their excessive tea drinking just tickles me.  Right behind that would be when he interviews Brian Thigh (played by Dan Aykroyd), the man who turned down the Rutles.  It's primarily the slow way in which he explains the mistake the man made, claiming that he thought guitar groups were on the way out, and then point blank asking "Why are you such an asshole?"  Not surprisingly, that was cut off when televised in America.

While I didn't count this film for my Bill Murray project as it was not played in theaters, it is worth mentioning that he is here as "Bill Murray the K," a radio DJ in America playing the Rutles.  It's essentially just him yelling into a microphone for a few minutes, but he's amusing in the role.

Besides appearances by Ron Wood, Mick Jagger, and Paul Simon, George Harrison plays a reporter in the film in one funny scene.  He was supportive of the project from the very beginning, and loved the results.  All the other Beatles are on record for saying they also enjoyed it.

This film also has a little extra bit of fun for me as a New Orleans native, as the reporter briefly visits the city to try to interview musicians who influenced the Rutles.

As a huge Beatles fan the film is really endless fun for me as I can recognize every reference and joke being done, but I do have to wonder how enjoyable it is for someone who isn't as large a fan.  In 1978 when this was made, most people probably still remembered the Beatles phenomenon pretty well, but as time passes I wonder how much life it will have for those who don't know the Beatles story.  I don't think you need to know the Beatles story to understand the film, but the humor is definitely more dry and subtle than laugh out loud hilarious.  I would still recommend the film to non-fans, particularly to people who enjoy mockumentaries in general.

Beatlemiscellania - Nowhere Boy

While parodies can be fun, biographies of real life people are always a little more difficult. A parody can sometimes reach into the realm of offense, but it's all done for the sake of a laugh and usually not mean spirited. Biographies on the other hand often go for sensationalism and therefore add a little too much fiction to the reality in order to create a "more interesting" story.

Nowhere Boy covers the section of John Lennon's life when he reconnected with his estranged mother. It also just so happens to be the same time when he met Paul and George and the Beatles were just starting. John spoke a lot about this time of his life, and many of the events are covered in the Beatles Anthology. But there is also a lot of sensationalism.

One strong element of the film is that John's Aunt Mimi, who raised him, is cold, strict, and basically averse to fun in all forms. When her husband dies near the beginning of the film, she shrugs off John's attempts to hug her in his grief, and later when she's angry at him she throws an apple and beams him in the shoulder. I've seen interviews with her before she died, and while you could say she softened in her older age, I can't see her ever being this ice queen. Paul McCartney reportedly also disagreed with this portrayal of her. It's done to create a strong contrast between Mimi and John's mother Julia, but that doesn't make it fair.

Julia on the other hand is a free spirit who loves rock and roll, let's John and his fellow bandmates drink and smoke in her house, and just all around acts more like a teenager than a mother. It's a little harder to say if her portrayal is accurate, as at least she never truly had the chance to speak for herself. Was she truly as bad a mother as she's shown here? It's hard to say. But since she's overall shown to be encouraging and loving to John in her own way, she doesn't suffer as much as Mimi does.

Despite these problems, I do think they do a good job of portraying just how lost and confused John was at this time in his life. Our relationships with our parents have a huge effect on us, and John was clearly deeply affected by the lack of his birth parents in his life, as well as the loss of his Uncle George, his surrogate father, and Aunt Mimi. He was a rebel and a bad boy, and music was pretty much the only thing that kept him focused. While he's certainly changed by the end of this film, he's still troubled, as he would continue to be even after the Beatles reached success. In that way, the title of the film is fitting and accurate.

While I expected a degree of inaccuracy, the one thing about the film that rubbed me the wrong way was the clear amount of sexual tension they included between Lennon and his mother. I don't think this was me looking into things the wrong way either, as some of the ways they would dance together or once as she leans close to him on the sofa just come off a little odd. On top of that, a bond forms between Paul and Julia, and the tension is there again, and John even seems jealous of it. Paul had lost his own mother a year before, so it's natural he might be drawn to Julia as well. Her death certainly built a bond between the two boys that could reasonably have led to them having the strong friendship they had, but they just took it a little too far at times and it creeped me out.

On the other hand, the part about the film I enjoyed the most was the music. It's a great mix of 50s classics from the likes of Screamin' Jay Hawkins, Buddy Holly, and Elvis, as well as covers done by star Aaron Johnson and a backup band called the Nowhere Boys. This is not a mix of Beatles classics, but rather rarities like "Hello Little Girl" and "In Spite of the All the Danger" which I've only ever heard on the anthology. It was nice to hear someone else sing those songs, and they did a good job of them. None of the actors look or sound like the Beatles, but they fit in well enough that it's not a jarring difference.

While this is a decent enough portrayal of John's youth, I'm not sure it would have much appeal to anyone other than Beatles fans. I could see showing this to someone to try to help them understand why I love John - that it's his flaws and difficulties that make me sympathize and relate to him - but I don't know if it's relatable beyond trying to understand John himself.

Beatlemiscellania - Pinky and the Brain - "All You Need is Narf"

The short begins as Pinky is listening to a parody of "I Am the Walrus," filled with even more nonsense lyrics than the original.  He's also gazing at a magazine that has what looks to be pictures of all four Beatles from that time period.

The Brain tells Pinky to turn the racket down as he can't hear himself think.  He's invented the lava lamp, though this variety overflows and holds you in place while you stare it, thereby allowing Brain to take over the world.  He needs a large amount of sandal root to carry out this plan, which he tells Pinky can only be found in India.  He says they will travel there the fastest way possible.  "By yellow submarine?" Pinky asks.  Nope, they're going by mail.  That's the advantage of being mice.  Pinky sings a line of a parody of "Magical Mystery Tour" before getting in the box with Brain.  This version of the Beatles, by the way, are called the Feebles.

Once they arrive in New Delhi, they see a man buying the last bit of sandal root from a dealer because he's going to see the guru.  They follow him to the Maharishi, but the Maharishi is gone.  When the man expresses disappointment that he can't get the answer to why are we here, Pinky answers that he often finds himself in strange places thanks to The Brain, and the man takes it to mean that our brains often lead us to unexpected places.  The people around then begin to worship as a guru and Brain asks them to give them sandal root.

It's hard to keep up with all of Pinky's non sequiturs, but most of them are Beatles references.  He ponders "giving peas a chance" and suggests that Brain call him "Mean Mr. Ketchup." Brain dubs him the Mous-arishi instead.

Walter "Concrete" proclaims the Mous-arishi as the leader of the Flower Power generation.  We see Frank Sinatra, the Beach Boys and the Smothers Brothers among the people there to hear him speak.  The Feebles lay tons of a sandal root in front of him and they begin to sing together: "All you eat is lunch, all you drink is punch, you don't have time to munch, brunch! All you eat is lunch!"

The Brain wants Pinky to keep seeing more followers to collect the sandal root, but Pinky tells him that he can't see anyone else for six months, because he and the Feebles and holding a sing in to teach people to love each other and brush their teeth.  The Feebles chime in about how peaceful and quiet it is up here in the mountains and how nice it is to get away from all the screaming girls.

The Brain figures he's ruined as he walks away.  He approaches a woman who looks like Yoko Ono waiting at the entrance.  She tells him he looks sad and offers to sing him her happy song, which is of course nothing but screeches and yodeling.  He leads her up to see them all in the hopes her noise will disrupt them.

The Feebles react:
George: "She's awful!"
Paul: "She's terrible!"
Ringo: "She can't sing!"
John: "I love her!"

Technically, John is called Jim here, and Yoko is "Yoyo Nono," but you get the idea.  The Feebles break up and the Mous-arishi is blamed for it.  Brain thinks they're okay because they still have the sandal root, but Pinky tells him that Jim and Yoyo took it back to England for Yoyo's latest performance piece.

They sing "All we are saying is take off your pants" because they want everyone to live without pants like the Mous-arishi did.  Yoyo covers the sandal root with paint or glue or something before screeching one more time for good measure. Brain plans to mail them back to America so they can once more try to cash in on the nexy big youth fad and take over the world.

The ending song outro is sung in a classic Beatles style ending with the "yeah yeah yeah" from "She Loves You" before Pinky shouts "I've got blisters on my fingers! Narf!" which all but the narf are taken from the end of "Helter Skelter."

It seems like the creative team behind Animaniacs weren't satisfied with just parodying the early Beatles with the previous short and so they added this parody of the later Beatles into the Pinky and Brain show.  The problem is that it largely follows the same old thing of making fun of Yoko and blaming them for their breakup.  Its just a little too typical, and the constant bits of her screeching wear thin very quickly.  I think the other little touches here and there are cute, but considering that Yoko wasn't there in India and the Beatles had quit touring a full year before going there, it just becomes a jumble of the facts and doesn't work as well.  I don't really expect them to be accurate here, I just feel like they went for the obvious too often rather than being creative.

Beatlemiscellania - Animaniacs - "A Hard Day's Warners"

As the name suggests, this short cartoon from Animaniacs is a parody of the film A Hard Day's Night. While not as chock full of references as "Meet the Beat-Alls" was, this is a still a good tribute with lots of fine touches.  Such a short was inevitable, really, not just because Animaniacs was a show that largely focused on parodying pop culture in the same way that some of the old Looney Tunes shorts did, but because Wakko Warner's voice is essentially Jess Harnell doing something of a mix of John Lennon and Ringo Starr.  It probably isn't any surprise that Wakko was always my favorite of the Warners.

This episode was made in the third season, and by that time Animaniacs was an extremely popular cartoon.  Maybe not as popular as the Beatles themselves, but strong enough to have a very loyal following both among children and adults on the internet, and so this short is as much a tongue in cheek teasing to those devout followers as it is a parody.

The short starts off just as A Hard Day's Night does, with the Warners running from a mob of fans.  The scene is presented in black and white except for their red noses, which was a common device used on the show whenever they presented the supposed shorts made in the 1930s.  They sing about how they are running from their fans to a tune very similar to the song "A Hard Day's Night."

Leaving the black and white behind them, they escape to the backstage area of a cartoon convention, where Dr. Scratchansniff gives them fan mail and tells them to behave.  None of the fan letters are for Wakko, and when he questions why, Yakko suggests that maybe it's his hat.  Ralph the Guard comes through the door carrying a large bag of fan mail, all of which is for Wakko.  This is an almost exact recreation of a scene in A Hard Day's Night, though in that case, it was Ringo and his nose that get all the fan mail.

Scratchansniff reminds them that they are the guests of honor at this convention and their fans on counting on them.  The fans bust through the door behind him, crushing him under it, and the chase begins again.  The Warners run out onto the convention floor where they pass a Tiny Toons booth, a Batman booth, and John Wilkes Booth (who apologizes over and over again) before ducking into a hall where a single female fan gasps in surprise when she sees them.

"You look just like them!" she exclaims, to which they reply that they aren't them, and this scene is a recreation of probably my favorite of A Hard Day's Night, that of the woman in the hallway with John.  After convincing her they're not themselves, they can't resist giving her a "Hello, Nurse!" before running away.  They approach a booth for The Mask and grab the three masks on display to disguise themselves to look like Elmira from Tiny Toons (who has been among the fans chasing them this entire time).  They switch to howling Tex Avery wolves and then have their eyes pop out before removing the masks, and Yakko grouchos to the camera that they did it all without the use of CGI.

They run and are ushered into the press room by Scratchansniff.  This is once again parodying the movie moment where the Beatles are interviewed by the press themselves, but quickly diverges into commentary when a guy repeatedly asks them why they don't make their "mean" and "nasty" cartoons more educational.  They drop heavy weights on him repeatedly before breaking out into a song about how their fans just want to laugh that reminds me a lot of "She Loves You" in particular. The animation behind the song parodies the multiple images of the group on the cover of A Hard Day's Night while also making a Jerry Lewis reference and poking a little fun at Disney's Beauty and the Beast.

The Warners are once again chased by fans, and in desperation eventually climb a replica of their water tower.  Yakko thinks up a solution and sends out a paper airplane that magically makes it all the way to Acme Labs and Pinky and the Brain.  The letter tells Brain that the Pope wants to see him and so the two of them head to the convention expecting to meet him.  Yakko tells the fans that they are just three silly cartoon characters and they should be focusing on more important things, like Pinky and the Brain!

And so the short ends very similar to the way it began, but this time Pinky and the Brain are singing the "Running from our Fans" song.  Also note some of the fans are wearing cosplay of the Warners, which I have to wonder whether or not was a thing people did.

This short is about half the length of the Powerpuff Girls short, but it still manages to be a really good tribute to the film.  I like that it also takes it a step further, using the analogy to both snub their critics and suggest to some of their crazier fans that they maybe need to relax a bit.  I think for some people, it may be easy to forget just how big this cartoon really was at the time since it's fallen out of the public eye now.  But as someone who currently has Christmas versions of Yakko, Wakko, and Dot out on display in my living room, this was a great mix of two of my favorite things.

Beatlemiscellania: Meet the Beat-Alls

With the Beatles being as popular as they are, references, tributes, and parodies of them have been made in many different types of media, television and film being no exception.  Welcome to Beatlemiscellania, another regular project I'm adding to the blog.

First up is the third season episode of the Powerpuff Girls - "Meet the Beat-Alls"

Song names will be capitalized where they are mentioned, and song lyrics provided in quotes.

Through the use of clever cuts where one villain is talking and the next completes their sentence, we see Mojo Jojo, Him, Princess Morbucks, and Fuzzy Lumpkins are all planning to destroy the Powerpuff Girls on the same night. All four of them show up at the Powerpuff Girls' house and argue over who will win until finally the girls come outside and ask them to be quiet so they can sleep. Mojo, Him, and the Princess all fire on the girls at once with energy beams, which leaves the girls defenseless and in pain until they fall to a height low enough for Fuzzy to throw his large rock at them and crush them. The four villains decide to band together, and while Him first suggests they should be The Silver Beatles (an early name the Beatles used), Mojo rejects this name and says they should be The Beat-Alls. The scene fades and we see the four villains in profile, much like the With the Beatles cover. It's accompanied by a guitar chord very similar to the beginning of "A Hard Day's Night."

A narrator with an English accent takes over at this point, and we see girls running and screaming (in terror) while the Beat-Alls go on a rampage. They cross a street that looks like the Abbey Road cover while the narrator tells us it was a Long and Winding Road for them to get here. They are also now known as the Bad Four (instead of the Fab Four). Mojo tells a bank teller “Now give me your money, that's what I want” and the narrator explains that the Beat-Alls have been providing hit after hit. He's talking about physical hits in this case.

The Powerpuff Girls arrive at the bank and a fight ensues, where all the dialogue refers to songs.

Him: “I Should Have Known Better”

Mojo: “Better Run for Your Life as fast as you can, little girls”

Him cries “Googoogajoob” as he fires an attack.

Princess: “You say stop, but I say go go go!”

Fuzzy (called the shy one by the narrator, therefore making him the George Harrison of the group): “I'm gonna let you down and leave you flat”

The narrator assures us that The Brutish Invasion has begun. The Beat-Alls look down at the defeated Powerpuff Girls in a image reminiscent of the Please Please Me cover. Eventually, the Powerpuff Girls give up fighting them and the Beat-Alls are therefore given a Ticket to Ride. In case all this sly stuff was just too subtle for you, the Beat-Alls beat up the cartoon versions of the Beatles themselves while Mojo asks “the people in the cheaper seats to leave and the rest of you to hand over your jewelry!” (this is not a lyrical quote but rather based on a statement John Lennon made on stage in 1963.)

Sgt Pepper (who looks much like the one in Yellow Submarine) makes a statement. “Help, we need somebody. Not just anybody. We need the Powerpuff Girls.” The narrator, now shown to be a reporter, questions if the girls will return. “Perhaps, perhaps not. Tomorrow Never Knows.” The TV show he is a part of is called A Day in the Life. The professor interrupts the girls watching the special and tells them “I read the news today. Oh boy” and hands them the paper. “Beat-Alls Crash Mr. Kite's Benefit” is the headline. The Powerpuffs are discouraged, and the professor talks to them. “Yesterday our troubles seemed so far away. Now it seems they're here to stay. Sitting here Eight Days a Week, everyone seems to think you're lazy, I don't mind, I think they're crazy. But you used to be running everywhere at such a speed, now you think there's no need.”

The girls think there's no point, they'll never save the day again. “Oh, You Can't Do That. What will the citizens of Townsville do when they look for the girls with the sun in their eyes and they're gone? ... Mojo Jojo was a man who thought he was a loner, but he knew it couldn't last. He's just getting by With a Little Help from his Friends.” When the girls ask if they should break up the Beat-Alls, he tells them “Yes, I'm certain that it happens all the time.”

“How?” they ask. “Listen, do you want to know a secret?” As he tells them, our regular narrator says he thinks the professor has some Magical Mystery tricks up his sleeve.

The Beat-Alls break into another bank and Mojo announces that he wants to hold their cash, but someone else is already robbing the bank. He's pointed toward a ladder and a hanging magnifying glass, much like the art exhibit John Lennon first saw of Yoko Ono's. On the ceiling in small print is written “This is a stick up” (Yoko's just said “yes”) and Mojo thinks it's brilliant. The responsible party turns and it's a chimp dressed just like Yoko Ono (specifically her wedding outfit to John) and it's clear the two of them are in love. Mojo exclaims “I've Got to Get You into My Life” and she replies in screeches. Her name is Moko Jono and she's a performance criminal.

The five of them have a bed-in titled Annoyance Crime No 9 and Mojo tells them to “Imagine all the people and how annoyed they will be that they can't reach their destinations on time” because the bed is in the middle of a busy street. They then steal only white items from a grocery store (It's all right because it's all white). The other Beat-Alls are not impressed. Mojo joins Moko in screeching loudly in the street in a mock form of primal scream therapy, but here the point is only to cause the various people on the street (including the Beatles from Yellow Submarine) pain. This finally causes the other Beat-Alls to quit.

When Fuzzy asks what they should do now, Him replies “Let's Get Back to where we once belonged.” The three of them are attacking the rooftops (because this whole sequence is meant to be like the end of the Let It Be film) and the mayor calls the Powerpuff Girls for help, saying the criminals “just won't Let It Be.” Once the girls hear that it's just three of them, they go to stop them.

Him: “Girls! Hello... Goodbye!”

Princess: “Sorry, but it's time to go!”

Fuzzy: “Cry, babies, Cry!”

The girls are once again flattened under a rock.

Him: “I'd just like to say thank you on behalf of the group, and I hope we passed the audition.”

But the girls pop right back up.

Fuzzy: “See how they fly? I'm crying.”

The villains are defeated and locked up, and Blossom declares “they're going Nowhere, Man.”

Mojo and Moko are walking along when Mojo points out signs “Here, There, and Everywhere” saying the Beat-Alls are over. “I've Got a Feeling, a feeling deep inside,” he says, “A feeling I can't hide. Oh no.”

“Oh yeah!” the girls respond, telling him that he and the Beat-Alls are done. He says he doesn't need them as long as he has Moko, and their evil will spread Across the Universe. The girls sigh and call “Hey Jude!” and Judy from the Townsville Zoo appears. She calls for Michelle (pronounced as it is in the song) and Moko sheds her clothing and joins the girls. Judy rubs salt in Mojo's wounds by telling him Michelle doesn't like him at all. She agreed to help break up the Beat-Alls because Mojo gives monkeys a bad name. Michelle isn't a criminal but she is a performer. Though Judy cautions that “One day monkey won't play piano song.” (This is the commonly misunderstood version of the French in "Michelle.") The girls take Mojo to jail and he is sad that they took his love away. Blossom says it's like the song “The love you take is equal to...um... oh who cares it's by some dumb old band anyway.”

Narrator: “I don't really want to stop the show but I thought you really might like to know that once again the day is saved thank to the Powerpuff Girls!” A note reminiscent of the one ending “A Day in the Life” fades out in the background. Those two ringing chords aren't the only musical tribute either; the entire episode is scored with songs very close in sound to the Beatles music.

I'm counting at least 57 references in all, more if you count all the various musical cues that sounds like their songs. The episode is a Where's Waldo for Beatles fans, with only maybe the “Free as a Bird” music video beating it in terms of number of references involved. I think Blossom's comment at the end is probably meant to acknowledge that most of the children watching this episode wouldn't understand most of the references, but it's still a cute enough story that I don't think the knowledge is required. But for those of us who do have it, it's an absolute treat.

Whenever I watch this episode, I do so with a big smile plastered on my face. I can only imagine how much fun they must have had in the writer's room, finding ways to inject the titles and lyrics and images all over the episode. It's a loving tribute to the band and a fun way to introduce this knowledge to kids. The portrayal of Yoko is harsh, but I think they did a nice tribute to her in their own way by including the references to her various performance art pieces. She speaks in screeches because in this world, Mojo is the only monkey who can talk. While it is a reference to her atonal singing voice, I don't think it's meant to be a flat out insult. Not to mention that in this scenario, being responsible for breaking up the Beat-Alls is a good thing.