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Monday, May 30, 2011

Return of the Jedi A-Holes

It's common knowledge throughout the Galaxy that the Jedi are complete a-holes, which is why we heroically ruthlessly murdered them all in surprise attacks. Mostly from behind. From as far away as possible.

They steal children away from their parents and allow those children to participate in incredibly dangerous pod races for their own personal gain. They lie constantly about all kinds of stuff that other people MIGHT consider to be a LITTLE bit important, like the fact that those people MIGHT have a father that's still alive and/or a sister they're weirdly attracted to.

So yes, the Jedi are a-holes, but we have to give these two guys some credit for at least being honest about it. Here's "Jedi A-Holes Strike Back".

The Doctor is the Worst Pacifist Ever

We all know the Doctor is a terrible, terrible person. But one thing he is very clear on is that he doesn't do guns. The Doctor outsmarts his enemies, not outguns them. Right? Wrong.







 
And here is a video that proves just what a straight up stone cold OG gangsta the Doctor really is.


Ghandi would be proud.

Via io9.

Respect

You have to admire anybody who can wear a cape to work and still command the respect of their employees.

 Kick ass art by Livio Ramondelli, via Coolvibe.

Fallout

Don't think of it as "planetary fallout".
Think of it as "pixie dust" or "dream sprinkles".
 

Friday, May 27, 2011

11 Reasons Why the Doctor Is A Terrible Person




You may think that just because he's saved a few worlds/universes/realities a couple of times, the Doctor is pretty great, but the truth is that the "Mad man with a box" is really a terrible, terrible person. Here are 11 reasons why:





11. He doesn't share


The Doctor travels around in the TARDIS, the most amazing piece of technology the universe has ever seen. Just imagine the advancements he could make in the technological development of planets across the stars if he shared even a fraction of the TARDIS's wonders: no more overcrowding, near limitless energy and universal language translation to name a fraction of the possibilities (without even mentioning virtually instantaneous travel throughout time and space). And this doesn't even begin to cover all of the knowledge he has rattling around inside that giant brain of his.

10. He's an arrogant bastard


Genius doesn't quite cover it. The Doctor's probably the smartest man in the universe. How do we know? Because he's constantly telling everybody. There's nothing wrong with being smart (particularly when you harness it for productive things like orchestrating a giant space war so that you can take over a galaxy or two), but you don't have to Time lord it over everyone all the time. Plus, he always speaks in impossible to understand technobabble, gave himself the pretentious title of "Doctor" and feels totally okay about making decisions that will effect entire planets without consulting the natives, presumably because they're beneath him.

9. He's a show off


Everyone knows the Doctor always saves the day. The Doctor knows exactly how he's going to horribly murder an "evil" alien species and stop their incredibly complicated plot to destroy Earth three minutes after he meets them, but does he ever stop to tell his friends about it? Of course not. He keeps them guessing right up until the moment he turns the reality bomb off at the switch with two seconds to go. Sure, he COULD have done it seven minutes ago and saved you a few heart attacks but where would the fun be in that?

8. He's a vagrant


The Doctor is the universe's most famous homeless person. "But he lives in his TARDIS!" we hear you say. Wrong. The TARDIS is a spaceship, a method of transportation designed to get you from A to B, not to be lived in forever. Just because someone lives out of the really big trunk of their really big car doesn't mean they can call it a house. Plus...

7. He always wears the same clothes


Bow ties and fezzes may be cool, but what's up with wearing exactly the same outfit for years at a stretch? At best, he has many versions of the same outfit (and an extremely worrying form of OCD). At worst, he has just the one, which you have to admit leads to some pretty major personal hygiene problems.

6. He's moody


You know what's hard? Dealing with a person who has constant mood swings. And nobody has more ups and downs and loops than the Doctor, except the rides at Disneyland. One minute he's being charmingly eccentric, the next he's manically weeping about being the last of his kind (get over it already! We've all got problems - the PR team is almost out of milk). In fact, he takes insane mood swings to a whole new level by regenerating, literally changing bodies and personalities every few years. Even more confusingly, these regenerations sometimes meet up and talk to one another. Make up your mind/s!

5. He's a creepy old man who kidnaps people


The Doctor is always stealing people away in his TARDIS, which if you think about it, is like a space combivan: beat up on the outside, you can't see into it, it's somehow bigger on the inside and most of the people who get into it are never heard from ever again. Worse, he almost exclusively travels with gorgeous young ladies who are several hundred years his junior. To accurately put that creepiness into perspective, imagine your grandad always asking attractive teenage girls to go on extended holidays with him, except the girls won't be born until the year 2897. That's Sean Penn dating Scarlett Johansson level of disturbing.

4. He's a public menace


Is there a bigger serial pest in the entire universe than the Doctor? Trespassing, breaking and entering, malicious damage of private property, identity theft, misrepresentation and corporate espionage are all a regular part of the Doctor's average day. And it's not like he's doing these things out of some noble reason like trying to feed his poor, starving children. Oh no. Most of the time he commits these crimes because he's bored and hey, it's fun to violate people's privacy, right?

3. He's speciesist


The Doctor has no problems slaughtering aliens (or "monsters" as he calls them) wholesale (see below), but if a human horribly murders an alien, he immediately turns a blind eye, or at worst gives them his patented Heartbroken Doctor Stare™. Likewise, the Doctor goes out of his way time and time again to save humanity... at the expense of poor, misunderstood aliens who may have been trying to take over the world, or maybe just trying to borrow some sugar for their tea.

2. He's a genocidal maniac


If wiping out entire alien races on multiple occasions isn't enough to make you a terrible, terrible person, then nothing is. As well as openly admitting to killing his own race, the Time Lords, the Doctor has also wiped out the Vervoids and the Racnoss (to name a few), stopped the Futurekind from ever having existed and taken several shots at permanently exterminating the Daleks. More recently, he's even encouraged the human race to follow his example by subliminally ordering them to kill the Silence wherever and whenever humanity encounters them. What a guy!

1. What has he done for you lately?


Sure, the Doctor has saved the world a few times but what has he done for you lately? Where was he when your cat Professor Mittens was run over, or you really needed to pop back in time to speak to Abraham Lincoln for a few minutes so you could pass your History exam? In fact, think about every single massively craptastic moment in your entire life. The Doctor could have hopped into in his fancy time machine and stopped all of them, but he didn't. So basically, he hates you personally.

The Greatest LEGO Diorama in the Galaxy

Imperial Employee of the Month Jay Hoff has been hard at work building the greatest LEGO Diorama in this or any other Galaxy. An impressive, most impressive 37,000 pieces of LEGO (as well as, presumably, a scary amount of time and money), including 388 mini-figurines, went into this custom commemoration of the Emperor's arrival on the second Death Star.


This great moment in Imperial history was made in 2011 for Science Discovery Day at Berkeley Preparatory School in Tampa. It uses an Imperial Shuttle Kit with custom designed Death Star hangar.

And yes, if you look closely enough, you might be able to spot a few Clone Troopers and a cameo appearance by Darth Maul, but only because they were really there at the time. Weren't you paying attention?

Thanks to Chris Nagle via Blastr for the tip.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

X-Wing Soapbox Derby Car

The Papier Boy has done the impossible, twice. Sort of. Firstly, he's made papier-mâché sort of cool. Secondly, he's delivered Earth it's first working X-Wing. Sort of. In that it doesn't fly, or shoot missiles at Death Star exhaust ports, but it does move and have a spinning, bleeping R2-D2 built in.



It's actually an X-Wing Soapbox Derby Car built for the 2011 Nazareth Adult Soapbox Derby for around $75, which really gives you a strong indication of the sort of funding the Rebellion are working with these days. Here's how it was done.


On behalf of all of us here in the Galactic Empire, we'd like to say well done, Papier Boy. Now we can definitely check the "Rebel Sympathizer" box for Earth and get the ball rolling on the whole planetary destruction thing.


In the alternative, if somebody would just build a Soapbox Derby TIE Fighter to shoot the X-Wing down, it would really help free us up to blow up other evil planets.

via Laughing Squid.

Monday, May 23, 2011

Clone Wars In Review: 1x02 "Rising Malevolence"

In our ongoing mission to bring truth and light (of the really bright green variety) to an otherwise dark galaxy, the Death Star's PR team continue our weekly review of episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

Episode 1x02: "Rising Malevolence"
Moral: "Belief is not a matter of choice, but of conviction."
Actual Message: "It's okay to do disobey orders if you think your reasons are good enough."

 

The Seperatists have a new secret weapon. The Jedi Council send Master Platoon Plow Koon Button Eyes Predator Face to investigate.

Using all of his amazing Jedi precognitive and empathic powers, Master B.E.P.F. guides his ships straight into a Seperatist "trap", which here means "floating in space a very obvious way, making sure to have a red sun in the background so as to be particularly easy to spot".


Count Dooku and General Grievous fire the new superweapon, destroying the Republic's fleet and forcing the survivors to employ Standard Jedi Emergency Protocol #1: When in doubt, run away and hide out!

Very perceptively, and using all of their great knowledge of the Force, the Council think everyone is dead. Skywalker's skimpily dressed sassy Padawan Ahsoka Tano thinks there could be survivors, and she isn't afraid to sassily tell the Council. They wisely ignore her. In classic Anakin style, he then gives her a lecture about following orders, before promptly ignoring them himself and going to investigate.


While Anakin, Ahsoka and ubiquitous droid sidekick R2-D2 search the debris for survivors, Master Plutonium and three of his clone soldier friends encounter a group of droids who just want to talk/throw them into the vacuum of space. However, Master Protein & co. have a surprise in store for the poor droids and throw themselves into space first, presumably so they can put their lives in the maximum amount of jeopardy possible.


Apparently one handy Jedi ability is the power to survive the sudden decompression, lack of oxygen and extreme cold for extended period of time without a suit or any kind of breathing apparatus.


Improbably surviving the improbable space shoot out, Master Potpourri and friends are rescued by Anakin and Ahsoka just in time to put them in more danger when Grievous returns in his flagship and superweapon, the Malevolence. It fires on them but due to some fancy flying on Anakin's part, the Jedi narrowly escape, once again bravely fleeing another battle. 


Overall, a fun episode with some excellent action, with Skywalker's final escape from the ion cannon's blast being a particularly high point.


Score Sheet:
Jedi Deaths: 0 (but plenty of fun Clone Trooper deaths to make up for it)
Death Star Superlaser Nods: 4
Darth Vader Moments: 0.5
Disgustingly Feel Good Scenes: 2


Rating:

You're Welcome

The Galactic Empire is pleased to announce that we're working on a new targeted laser.

Testing to begin immediately on people who wear Ed Hardy t-shirts.


You're welcome, Earth.

Brought to you by the Death Star Cares initiative.

Friday, May 20, 2011

FLOWCHART: How to Deal With Your Impending Doom

FORM 2B/N07-2B: NOTIFICATION OF IMPENDING DOOM

Dear Citizen of Planet ________________________,

It has come to our attention that your planet is due for apocalypse. The Galactic Empire understands it can be difficult to process this kind of news but DON'T PANIC.

We have prepared the following helpful instructional FLOWCHART to help you work through your wide variety of options in a thorough, yet timely fashion. Click to enlarge.



Brought to you by the Death Star Cares initiative. 

Thursday, May 19, 2011

The Worst Couple in the Universe

We've been saying it for a long time: Han and Leia are the worst couple in the universe. He's a cocky douche bag who loves his giant space dog more than real people, she's an uptight Princess with daddy (and brother) issues. Not to mention the fact that they're both terrorists, wanted throughout the galaxy for aiding and abetting Luke Skywalker in the destruction of the first Death Star. Basically, they're both terrible, terrible people.

Thankfully, the good folks of OneMinuteGalactica have released the following excellent instructional video to prove it.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Clone Wars In Review: 1x01 "Ambush"

In our ongoing mission to bring truth and light (of the really bright green variety) to an otherwise dark galaxy, the Death Star's PR team have decided to do a weekly review of episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

Starting with episode one, we will work tirelessly to restore balance to the Rebel propaganda embedded in the TV show and ensure that the Empire is fairly represented. Watch along with us, Sithizens!

Episode 1x01: "Ambush"
Moral: "Great leaders inspire greatness in others."


With the Clone Wars raging across the galaxy, both the Republic and Count Dooku's Separatists need allies. In a display of staggeringly bad scheduling, King Katuunko of the Toydarian fly monster people decides to meet gremlin Jedi Master Yoda and streamlined Sith lady Asajj Ventress at the same time. Ventress proposes a fair deal: if Yoda and his three Clone trooper strong escort can defeat her legion of 10,000 death robots, Toydaria will be free to join the Republic.


After bravely fleeing the obligatory opening space battle, or star war if you will, Yoda quickly sets about causing tens of millions of dollars in property damage by luring a bunch of droids into an ambush of his own, killing them all and orphaning countless toasters and Roombas throughout the galaxy.



Eventually the sadistic little goblin is forced by the superior numbers of the droid army to retreat, though not before doing some serious Force showboating. Employing a typical Jedi tactic of hiding in a cave, Yoda uses the Force to make snap judgments about the character of his three Clone troopers, which apparently inspires them to use a rocket launcher on some offending rocks later on. Take that, rocks!


In the climactic battle scene, Yoda proves once and for all that he shouldn’t be on a disability pension by almost singlehandedly dispatching the remaining droid army, saving King fly monster and cheating in a fight with Asajj Ventress by stealing her lightsabers. Thankfully, she escapes moments before Master Yoda can eat her intestines with his demon teeth (see below).


Overall, an action-packed episode to kick off the series with some exciting set pieces, classic Battle Droid jokes and a clever escape from Asajj Ventress, though not much in the way of storyline.

Score Sheet:
Jedi Deaths: 0
Darth Vader Moments: 0
Disgustingly "feel good" scenes: 2

Rating:

Saturday, May 14, 2011

10 Reasons Why You Should Work for the Galactic Empire




With more and more planets coming under the benevolent rule of the great Emperor Palpatine by the day, there's never been a better time to join the Galactic Empire. Here are ten reasons why you should work for us:





10) Earn good money



Well, actually, you’ll earn minimum wage (if you’re lucky) and you'll like it. But on the upside, that’s loads better than having Stormtroopers visit your house in the middle of the night and burning your house down because you decided not to join the Galactic Empire.


9) Great health benefits


Working for the Galactic Empire will ensure you remain in peak physical fitness at all times. After all, what better high intensity fat blasting cardio workout is there than running around doing the bidding of two extremely demanding sociopathic evil sorcerers? Plus, you can forget about Bikram Yoga once you get deployed to a desert planet in full body combat armour.



8) Plenty of opportunities for promotion



There’s literally nothing worse than slaving away day after day, being constantly overlooked for the promotion you so richly deserve. In the Galactic Empire, our on-the-spot employee performance appraisals and liberal use of Force chokes as part of our progressive disciplinary policy ensures there are always vacancies in key management positions for young go-getters. Particularly if you have a flexible approach to certain moral grey areas (like “murder” and “oppression”) and a high pain threshold.
 
7) Travel to exotic worlds

And blow them up.

6) Learn about other cultures


In your travels, you'll encounter diverse cultures, experience fascinating new customs, and be forced to listen to innumerable conversations in alien languages you don'have the time or inclination to understand. You'll also have plenty of time to study their combat methods and tactics in the event that you need to frame them for the murder of unhelpful moisture farmers.

5) Meet interesting people


The galaxy is a vast and wondrous place, teeming with strange and intriguing aliens you couldn't possibly imagine in your wildest dreams. And you'll get to oppress and brutalise them all personally. Or, for those of you who are more interested in hobnobbing with high society, why not consider joining the 483rd Legion, where kidnapping Princesses is their specialty?


4) Face exciting challenges


Most jobs are the same boring stuff day after day. Same cubicle, same coffee place, same small talk, then you die. However, some rare jobs make you continually challenge and better yourself, enabling you to achieve things you'd never have thought possible. Like trying to kill magic space knights with superpowers and laser swords before they can kill you while wearing insanely large helmets that are almost impossible to see anything out of.

3) Stick it to the Alliance


The Rebels talk a big game about fighting for freedom and equality and peace but their track record tells a different story. Would people who love peace really have blown up the Death Star, killing over a million people? Would people who believe in equality really only employ two women, neither of whom are allowed to get involved in the fighting? Why didn't Chewbacca get a medal as well? Will they see Han Solo brought to justice for drug smuggling and the murder of single father and soup kitchen volunteer, Greedo? At least with us you know what you're getting.

2) Work for "hands on" bosses


Most people working for big business or government bodies go their entire careers without ever meeting the men and women at the top. Thankfully, Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader both believe in spending time with their employees, getting to know them personally before choking, electrifying, or occasionally even beheading them to death. You call it "murder", we call it "micromanaging".

1) Be more than just a number


Here in the Galactic Empire, we care about our employees and their hopes and dreams. Unlike some corporations, we view our workers as distinct individuals who are so much more than just faceless, anonymous clone drones. You'll never be just a number to us. Because we care.