for 28 August 1998. Updated every WEEKDAY.

Filler

Subject: other people's
reviews

Dear Sucksters:

Brilliant idea to have
uneducated, unhip,
unqualified people review
movies for the great
unwashed. Perfect for a
lemming society.

I remember a co-worker of
mine once went off on
"brainless, dangerous
cartoons like Beavis and
Butthead and that South Park
trash." After I gave her the
standard Comm 495 answer
about cause and effect,
perceived punishment, and
George Gerbner's cultivation
theory, she admitted she
never actually watched either
show. But, hey, as anyone who
works in media relations
knows, the media is never
wrong ... right?

I hate to admit it, but I
originally bought the media's
line when they trashed South
Park, until my brother
convinced me to watch the
Christmas episode with Mr.
Heinke the Christmas Poo.
Hilarious, intelligent, and
knowingly subversive. (Now we
have floating South Park
parties almost every
Wednesday.) Anyway, here was
a show that knew how to push
the right hot buttons.

So in a society where those
lacking other marketable
skills (Cf. Howard Stern,
Marilyn Manson) can get rich
and famous by exploiting free
publicity among the morons in
the media - and the bigger
fools who listen to the media
- your secondhand review idea
is a winner for losers. A
book review on Neitzsche's
Beyond Good and Evil or James
Joyce's Ulysses would be
entertaining indeed.

Pragmatically yours,

Tim Booktu

A talking piece of shit is
intelligent and knowingly
subversive?

Talk about a winner for
losers.

Off the Charts

Your diagnosis of chart
disease missed one of its
most tragic effects. Since
the funniest bits of Spy
could be read in 45 seconds
of flipping through the
magazine rack, no one ever
bothered to buy a copy.

Michael Straight
<straight@email.unc.edu>

Actually, probably what
killed Spy is that the
average potential reader
thought the charts were the
funniest bits, even though
they weren't.

Huck

Am i just a culturally inept
dink retard or was that whole
DFW chart nightmare
purposefully hard to
understand?

Please explain.

Cola Cessium
<discordiana@hotmail.com>

It might be that you'd find
it easier to understand if
you read the Wallace story.
Although that's really not
essential, because the chart is
more about how movie studio
piss-boys recommend material.
That is, every idea has its
optimal length - too short,
and its promise remains
unilluminated; too long, and
its weaknesses become too
glaring. With this new
information, try reading the
chart again. If you still
don't get it, don't get down
on yourself - you may have a
wonderful career as a movie
studio piss-boy ahead of you.

Best,

Huck

Dear Suck,

"Magazine" Name: What was I
thinking at moment when I
decided to buy (or read) it?
How often do I get a chance
to enjoy this fine sampling
of humor?

Typical reaction after
reading Mad: I should be
studying for test tomorrow
but somehow this seems more
relevant.... Can't have
enough good "poo" jokes. Hey
look - caricatures!

Spy: Sometimes this magazine
looks interesting. Why are
they obsessed with
"short-fingered vulgarians"?
Semi-naked covers feature
better art direction than
Lampoon. I am reaching a new
level of humor maturity....

Might: I am shocked. I did
not realize Adam Rich had
died tragically. Monthly.
Bi-monthly. Do you carry this
anymore? That's M - I - G - H - T.
Oh fuck it, I'll just
buy this Tragically Hip disc.
Adam Rich is not dead and I
am amused. Why are there so
few ads? Hard to find Spy,
therefore I am grateful to
have reliable, steady source
of humor. I really must
listen to more alternative
music.

Suck: What is this, Spy
online? Internet connection
permitting, plus must be a
slow day. Where is Spy? Where
is Might? Here is Suck. Thank
you for your precious little
charts. Now I really must get
back to work.

Chris Gray
Toronto, Ontario

P. S. Your artwork is cool.

The key to a chart is its
graphic design - if you had
access to Suck's Terry Colon
in designing your own
letter-as-chart above, I
think you might have
pioneered a new chart-only
policy for reader letters. As
it is, your letter now just
looks like one of the
"experimental poems" that
Suck readers seem so fond of
creating. But rest assured
that I recognize that it is
much, much more than that.
And I thank you for the
effort.

Huck

The trouble with charts and
graphs is that they are
two-dimensional and as a
result can be manipulated to
cause deception in the minds
of the viewers.

<ERICDAVIS1@prodigy.net>

The trouble? That's their
virtue.

Best,

Huck

Filler

In the interval between
deciding to click
File:New:Message and actually
doing it, I realized I'd only
be one small part of the
deluge you would get on this
topic, but I cannot remain
silent! It is AM-PM whose
commercial features that
husband ne'er-do-well, not
7-Eleven! Don't they cover
this stuff in Ad Age?

While we're on the subject,
maybe you could clear up a
dispute for me -hey, I read
your ads, you can read my
problems. My girlfriend and I
have had an argument. She
says that the husband in that
commercial actually goes for
a jog with good intentions,
but gets sucked into AM-PM
because they have "so much
good stuff." I say that he
actually sneaks out of the
house under the pretense of
jogging, but in fact he
intended to head straight for
the store. I recall (but no
one else around me does) an
earlier, longer, version of
the commercial where he tells
her he's going out for a run,
and he has a sneaky look on
his face.

Also, you indicated they were
married. That was my
impression, too, although its
never explicitly stated in
the shorter version of the
commercial. Is there a
wedding ring? My girlfriend
didn't think they were
married.

I should go back to work,

Tim Tolle
<valis-luminoso@usa.net>

You're right, it's AM-PM. I
guess the brand identity
aspect of that commercial
isn't working, although I've
increased my popsicle intake
substantially.

I haven't seen the "sneaky
look" segment you refer to,
and I've often wondered about
their marital status, mostly
because they seem so
unmarried, and she's so tall
and single-looking.
Prejudices, to be sure. At
any rate, I finally decided
they were married, due to his
calling her "honey," which no
unmarried couple in their
right mind would dare to do.

Too much thought over one
commercial? Most definitely,
but there's something about
it ... the lighting, the
angles ... God, I don't know.
All I know is that I've been
using that whiny "I got hot"
excuse constantly, and I'd
pay good money to see that
guy in a feature-length film.
In fact, I think I love him.

I should go back to therapy,

Polly

I quite enjoyed today's
column on movie reviews being
written by people who haven't
seen the movie yet. I
probably would have enjoyed
it more if you credited the
folks at www.hissyfit.com
with giving you the idea.
They've been publishing such
reviews for months now. What
with the Boston Globe's
problems of authenticity
being headline fodder for the
past week, I would think that
Suck would have given credit
when sucking off somebody
else's work.

David M. J. Wiebe
<dave@huh.net>

Trust me, I've never seen
that site, and wouldn't dream
of ripping off someone else's
ideas, since it's happened to
me more than once. The joke
in question doesn't exactly
take a genius to invent,
though - I came up with it
when a friend and I were
trying to decide what movie
to see and speculating
endlessly over what was worth
seeing and what wasn't. Blind
movie reviews have been our
little hobby for years now.
Sadly.

I'm sure hissyfit.com does it
better, regardless. I'll
check it out.

Polly

Can i do my own uninformed
review too? Saving Ryan's
Privates ...

It's about: War sucks and the
only honor is in saving your
fellow human ... we had to
pull the trigger ... oh my
god, a bloody limb! oh woe,
the cost of freedom, no
discount ... no outlet mall.
my god ... destruction! the
fruits of war! How it's approached:
Sugarcoated marshmallow
skulls fired point blank from
a shotgun into the gaping
mouths of the audience.

How it changes lives: - I'm
hungry ... but can't eat
after those special effects.
- Now i have something deep
and meaningful to say to that
babe i have been trying to
impress. - I'm hungry but
can't eat after hearing
people babble about it. -
I'll never go to war ...
unless i can't drive my car
and buy plastic.

-Now i know how to be a hero.

Howz that?

William Mauritzen
<mauritwd@email.uc.edu>

You know, William, your two
iterations of the word
"hungry" hit on my own war
movie brainstorm, and my
belief that, good as Private
Ryan was, it will ultimately
be considered the greatest
of all hell-for-leather war
movies, not a film that
made us truly understand what
war is all about.

War is all about hunger. In
any decent history or
realistic accounting, the
message is always the same -
starvation is war's constant
associate. But for all the
violence and horror you see
in war movies, you never,
ever see anybody going hungry
(unless they're pathetic
foreigners, who quickly get
handed candy bars by the
Americans). Which is why all
the explosions and mayhem
they show in the movies will
always be remote from us.
Because, let's face it:
Hardly any of us have ever
been shot in the head. But
we've all been hungry. Hunger
is something that everybody
can really identify with. And
it's the one misery that's
common to every war
everywhere throughout the
history of the world. But
it's the one thing they never
bother to show in war movies.

So there you go. If you want
to make a real war movie,
show hungry people. It may
not bring about an instant
end to the scourge of war.
But it'll end war movies on
the double.

yr pal,

bartel