The Octopus That Keeps My Keys Safe

Key Stats:

• Made of porcelain
• Given as a gift at a sushi place
• Real Name: Postulio 
• Nickname: Little Postulio
• Has 3 mutual acquaintances with Cthulhu on LinkedIn

"Why do you need an octopus to protect your keys?"
That's a dumb question, and I won't respond to it.

Little Postulio here is such a badass that I leave him in charge of literally every lock in my life. I'm also fairly certain he's evil. Can't prove it. This fancy basket was designed to hold our keys, but without that special something it just looks like a basket full of crap. Little Postulio makes it a conversation piece, along with being the ever-vigilant, stone-walled, iron-willed guardian of my keys, flashdrives, spare change, and keyring-sized rewards cards. He's the best potentially Lovecraftian horror in our house.

So here is my overall rating for The Octopus That Keeps My Keys Safe:

Conversational-ism: 8/10 Mollusks: Not much of a talker, Little Postulio let's his actions do the talking.

Evil-ness: 6/10 Mollusks: He may very well be evil, but I still love him.

Ever-Vigilant-ness: 10/10 Mollusks: HE IS UNBLINKING.

Don't Touch My Stuff-itude: 7/10 Mollusks = Caution advised: He's WAY too tangled up in all my keys to be picked up safely anymore. Expect me to be pissed at you immediately for all the junk you just dropped on my floor.

Overall Rating: 10/10 Mollusks: How can anyone not like octopi?

This Tiny Bottle of Kraken!

Key Stats:

• Proof: 94
• Favorite Phrase to Say While Drinking Kraken: "Release the Kraken!"
• Ounces of Kraken I Drink Before I Write This Blog: Trick question. I drink them to get through the day.

 I. LOVE. Tiny versions of big things. It makes you feel like a giant. I like to use little cocktail forks and little condiment cups to eat my food instead of real forks and bowls while fee-fying all about my house. This thing is so perfectly teeny. It looks exactly like the big bottles, but fits in my pocket. Here's it next to a handle of Sailor Jerry:


















Adorable.

Kraken is the natural predator of other spiced rums: Sailor Jerry, Admiral Nelson, Captain Jack, Lady Bligh, Blackheart, Maritime McGuffey, and all other sea-faring boozes quiver in their boots in the Kraken's presence (figuratively. Sales figures and my liver both favor Sailor Jerry).


So here's my overall rating of This Tiny Bottle of Kraken!:

Adorable-ness: 10/10 Releases of the Kraken: I mean look at it! It's the booze equivalent of kitties!

Booze-ification: 10/10 Releases of the Kraken: 94 proof is pretty potent. It's not quite flammable, not quite unable to drink straight from the bottle.

Don’t Touch My Stuff-itude: 10/10 Releases of the Kraken = Hands off! This thing is both adorable and alcohol. I have it in a safe place for a severe booze-related emergency or a relapse.

Overall Rating: 10/10 Releases of the Kraken: Kraken is good every now and then as an alternative to my usual trip around the harbor with Sailor Jerry. But tiny bottles make everything taste better!

The Official Handbook of the Invincible Universe

Key Stats:

• Invincible created by: Robert Kirkman
• My copy signed by: Invincible artist Ryan Ottley
• Number of times Invincible has shown up on King of the Hill: 1

I love Invincible. It's a great story of a teenage superhero growing up. His actions have consequences and he progresses as a character. Since it's an original universe published by Image, it's not held back by any company continuity like Marvel and DC comics are. They can do whatever they want, as long as it's internally sound. Interesting bit of trivia: It's made by Robert Kirkman, the same guy who made The Walking Dead. He actually does really good super hero stuff, but mostly that's overlooked for the cultural phenomenon that is The Walking Dead.

The Handbook made as a parody of sorts to the Marvel and DC Encyclopedias. They've kind of become a thing of the past since the internet has all but negated the need for print materials about things only the most passionate of nerds would argue about. I still think they're cool, though. They usually feature some unique artwork, and they're great for getting a short, concise story of a character who shows up in a comic book that you don't recognize. I have some from the Archie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle series, and they're a great reference for that self-contained universe just as these are for Invincible.

Invincible the comic was started in 2003, and the Handbook was released in two parts in late 2006 / early 2007. Invincible is still running today, so the Handbook is INSANELY out of date. We're missing a lot of important stuff like Dinosaurus, the Viltrumite War, Conquest, etc. We're not even to where he wore just a blue/black suit yet!

I've perused this Handbook, and can tell why there hasn't been an update. As I mentioned before, the internet has all but made these things obsolete, but publishers have one thing over the internet: editors. Clearly no one read this thing before it was put to print. In the first 5 lines of Anissa's entry, there are like 20 grammatical errors. And keep in mind, one of them is that those 5 lines are just one enormous run-on sentence. It's basically like they just published the ComicVine page for each character, so why bother paying someone to write something "official" for it? They're also filled with fairly useless information. Aquarius is in like 5 panels of the comic, but gets 2 whole pages of text here describing how he is able to swim so fast by moving all his molecules forward at the same time and/or vaporizing the water around him to make an air pocket that he swims through. Sounds great, don't care. Dude's been dead forever. It even says in his stats, "Deceased". Two pages of text is more text than was in the series collectively before he first appeared in issue 7.



Page 1. This page should just say, "Dead". The next page should also say, "Dead".

So here's my overall rating of The Official Handbook of the Invincible Universe:

Official-ness: 8/10 Sequids - I guess it's official because it says it's official? The entries themselves aren't written by Robert Kirkman, but I guess if you stole his journal and wrote about what you read in it this is basically what you would get.

Signature-ination: 10/10 Sequids - I got this thing signed by Ryan Ottley, the man, the myth, the legend. The guy does some amazing artwork (even though he didn't contribute much to the Handbook).

Art-ification: 8/10 Sequids - Each character is drawn by a different artist, which is cool. Andy Kuhn's Isotope looks enormously bland though, a missed opportunity to make use of a very awesome monster artist by letting him draw a guy just standing there. How much does it pay to draw a single character for a Handbook?

Grammer Nazi-ism: 0/10 Sequids - Seriously, fucking proofread. The English language includes commas for a reason.

Don’t Touch My Stuff-itude: 5/10 Sequids = Please be careful. Books are meant to be read, so please feel free to pick up and read. But I like having nice things every now and then, so keep your drinks at least a foot and a half away.

Overall Rating: 7/10 Sequids - It would be much better if it was more readable. As it stands, this is a fun little thing to read in the bathroom or when I don't want to really get into something.

This Maestro Hulk Action Figure

Key Stats:

• Hair Style: Balding, yet beard is fabulous
• Underwear: Black briefs
• Footwear of choice: Silver snow boots with black soles
• Trophies: Captain America's broken shield; Thor's hammer Mjolnir; Dr. Strange's Cloak of Levitation; Wolverine's skeleton; helmets of Juggernaut, Ultron, Iron Man, Dr. Doom, and Nova

This is it. This is basically why I started this blog: To show you how badass an action figure one man is able to own. This is the 'Maestro' Hulk from the Future Imperfect timeline, created by Peter David's wicked brain and George Perez's wicked pencil. It's Hulk if the world were ravaged by a nuclear apocalypse and he set out to prove he was indeed the strongest there is by killing every other super powered being in the Marvel Universe. Not because he needed to; because he wanted to. And then he kept various trophies of them. Check out this splash page of Maesto's trophy room by Perez, which is still one of my favorite pieces of comic book art:



I find something different every time I look at it.

Back to the figure: This thing was made in the mid 90's, at arguable the peak of disc-shooting action figures. But this one just came packaged with himself and a bunch of death trophies. Badass. And he's able to stand up on his own, which is a big plus for a guy who grew up with a bunch of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle toys that couldn't stand for anything because they all had one foot bent upwards. But I don't quite understand why he's not wearing clothes. He wore a weird purple suit unless he had just finished fucking literal hordes of women, but this figure has him in his skimpies. And the boots are a weird addition. Why does Hulk even need shoes? Where does he find them in his size?

So here’s my overall rating of this Maestro Hulk Action Figure:

Comic Accuracy-ness: 9/10 Gamma Rays – Whoever designed this figure clearly liked the Future Imperfect storyline. This is a fan service figure. This is a figure I saw and fell in love with at a comic shop, then read the comic 10 years later because of how awesome the figure was, then wrote a review of the figure 15 years after first laying eyes on it. He misses a point because he never took his trophies out of the throne room to fight, but man does he look cool. The Mjolnir hammer on a chain is an extra special touch. This isn't a Hulk who can turn himself around, seek redemption and prove himself worthy of Thor's power. He's too far gone. This is a Hulk who drags around the weapon of a god to prove that he doesn't need it.

Badass-ery: 11/10 Gamma Rays – Do I really need to explain this?

Conversation Starter-ity: 10/10 Gamma Rays – "Is that the Hulk?" is generally the first reaction to seeing this guy, which lets me wax poetic about the Future Imperfect storyline and why I love it and why you should too.

Don’t Touch My Stuff-itude: 11/10 Gamma Rays = I MIGHT CUT YOU IF YOU TOUCH THIS – This thing is bordering on prized-possession, grab-one-thing-to-save-in-a-fire levels of my nerd love. I keep him posed on my bookshelf so you can see everything with your eyes, not your hands.

Overall Rating: 11/10 Gamma Rays – I love this thing in a way that only a grown man can love an action figure.

This Dr. Mario Amiibo

Key Stats:

• Number of times I've played Dr. Mario the video game: 0
• Number of times I've played Dr. Mario in Smash Bros: Something ending in '-illion'
• Nickname: Dr. 'Miibo
• Number of suppository jokes made since I bought this Dr. Mario Amiibo: Something ending in '-illion'

I initially was not going to buy any Amiibos. Then I got a few as a gift last year, and I've been out of money and shelf space ever since. When will I ever have another chance to own a Dr. Mario or Mr. Game and Watch or Diddy Kong toy? Probably never, and that's why I need all of the Amiibos!

I think originally Dr. Mario was just Mario as a doctor, but since he became his own character in the Super Smash Bros series, I like to think he's a parallel universe Mario. One where Mario led a slightly more privileged life and his parents could afford to send him to medical school instead of him landing a plumber apprenticeship. This Mario spends his time curing diseases in front of a video screen, while plumber Mario (or 'Mario Prime') slaves away in the sewers of Mushroom Kingdom. Maybe Nintendo is trying to say that a plumber is just as important as a doctor and we shouldn't judge people based on their profession because, at the end of the day, they are both productive and necessary members of society, or maybe I'm just reading too much into it. It's interesting to note that the only lifestyle consistency across Marios is his substance abuse: he loves pills as a doctor, and eats a disturbing amount of mushrooms as a plumber.

This guy came out as a Target exclusive, because collecting things shouldn't be easy in Nintendo's eyes. I got him the day he came out more on accident than necessity. But I'm glad I did! He's one of my favorite characters in Smash Bros, and nothing is cooler than just being yourself with 'Dr.' in front of your name.

So here's my overall rating of this Dr. Mario Amiibo:

Evil Clone-ism: 10/10 Megavitamins – He's not an inherently evil clone of a Nintendo character like Dark Pit, Dark Link, Dark Samus, Dark Meta Knight, Blood Falcon, etc. But it's much more fun to use a bit of imagination and think of an evil doctor version of Mario, isn't it? This Dr. Mario writes you a prescription for PAIN.

Mustache-ness: 10/10 Megavitamins – This thing is Ron Swanson levels of awesome.

Kick My Ass-itude: 10/10 Megavitamins – Amiibos get pretty broken in Smash Bros right around level 40. They take less damage, deal more knockback, and are somehow able to power shield every jab. Ridiculous.

Don’t Touch My Stuffitude: 5/10 Megavitamins – Amiibos are pretty awesome to look at, and pretty sturdy in general. While I would prefer you never touch any of my things ever, I might make an exception here.

Overall Rating: 10/10 Megavitamins – I was stoked to see Dr. Mario return to Smash Bros after having been absent for Brawl. This is definitely one of my favorite Amiibos. And it's really fun to say, "Doct-or 'Miiiboooo!" in a Mario voice when I play with him.

This Bender Talking Figurine

Key stats:

                Replacement eye sets:2

                Inside his torso compartment: Nothing. Just empty. Yet not hollow…

                Number of phrases: 12

                Favorite phrases: “Goodbye losers, whom I’ve always hated!”

I got this at the Denver Comic-Con last year. I waited to buy it until the last day of the convention because I wasn’t convinced I wanted it. By the way, I am a fool, and we all know damn well I wanted this thing. Bad. My lovely wife was willing to wait with me for the doors to open then rush to the vendor selling it, knocking over a hoard of sweaty cosplayers and socially anxious teens, to lay down a pretty penny for this baby. And what a pretty penny it was. 

I initially thought I would keep this thing in the box. Collector’s yadda yadda and whatnot. But after a night of one too many cocktails, I couldn’t resist. Thing is awesome. It makes me feel like I bought Bender's spoken word album and got a bonus talking Bender figurine like in ‘Fear of a Bot Planet’. Good episode.

So here’s a breakdown of my analysis of this Bender Talking Figurine:

Funnyness: 8/10 quatloos – Some of the quotes are too long. You’re a talking figurine, not an episode.

Talking Piece-ability: 10/10 quatloos – “Oh cool a Bender toy!” has been said by house guests at least 16 times. Also, he's a literal talking piece. Teehee, puns.

Ass Shininess: 0/10 quatloos – Ass is disappointingly matte finished, belittling said catchphrase.

Don’t Touch My Stuffitude: 9/10 quatloos = KEITH SUPERVISION REQUIRED – I'll leave one quatloo on the table so you can touch the talking button. Otherwise, hands off! Like seriously, do not bend his arms; those things never get straight again.

Overall: 10/10 quatloos – Of all the Bender toys I own, this is the only one. And it’s the best one.

This Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin

Key Stats:

• Diameter: 1 inch
• Drax Portrayed By: Dave Bautista
• Smells Like: Pennies

I was given this pin when I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy in theaters. I presume I received it sometime around August 1, since the pin says, "In Theaters August 1" on the the back. What a promotion!



They gave you one of the 5 Guardians of the Galaxy, which was great for all of you who saw the movie 5 times. I was very disappointed to get Drax. He's easily the lousiest of the Guardians of the Galaxy team. "Uhh we need a strong guy. What about this moron?" Why didn't they let him keep his totally awesome old-school costume with the purple cape? He has that one good line about being able to catch what goes over his head because his reflexes are too fast, but that's it. He's totally overshadowed by every other character. It's hard to be the boring one in a movie about a tree and his racoon friend. Space Thug #4 was more interesting than this guy. He also isn't quite as strong as the Hulk, and not quite as knive-y as Wolverine. He's the worst of both.

And finally, I am not in high school anymore. I'm no longer in a position in my life where I can cover my backpack in pieces of flair and maintain respect for myself.

So here’s my overall rating of this Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin:

Fall Off Of What I Put It On-ity: 10/10 Things Caught Over Your Head Because Your Reflexes Are Too Fast – The point on this thing sticks into a rubber frog that easily slides off. What I want less than a Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin is to have to look around the food court at the mall for the Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin that fell off my backpack strap.

Short End Of The Straw-ibility: 10/10 Things Caught Over Your Head Because Your Reflexes Are Too Fast – Instead of the lovable-yet-tragic racoon, his cute tree pal, the deadliest woman in the galaxy, or an insanely hot Chris Pratt, I got Drax the Destroyer. 'Nuff said.

Eye-Catchy-ness: 0/10 Things Caught Over Your Head Because Your Reflexes Are Too Fast – Only when someone is looking at all the other cool stuff I own are they like, "Hey, is this a Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin?" And I'm like, "Yeah, that's a Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin. You want it?" And they're like, "No," followed by an awkward silence where we experience a psychic link only two people who understand why you wouldn't want a Drax the Destroyer Collector's Pin would comprehend.

Don’t Touch My Stuffitude: 0/10 Things Caught Over Your Head Because Your Reflexes Are Too Fast = YOU CAN'T TOUCH THIS ENOUGH – Seriously, I do not care. It's only saving grace is that it smells like pennies. You're curious now, right?

Overall Rating: 1/10 Things Caught While Going Over Your Head – Really not into this thing. But I apparently really enjoy the smell of pennies, so I can't give this thing a 0/10.

This Aquaman / Black Manta / Also Batman (For Some Reason) Lego Set

Key Stats:

• Number of missiles attached to shark: 2
• Time spent putting together Black Manta sub: roughly 45 minutes
• Time spent putting together the rest of set: Exactly zero minutes. Still in the box. Apparently it came with scuba gear Robin. Who knew?
• Time spent making sure others don’t mess with it: All the minutes in all the days.

I think I got this thing at a Lego store in Kansas City after a Comic-Con. I already owned an Aquaman minifig (bought from yet another Comic-Con. Aside: Comic-Con is essentially a hybrid Christmas/Festivus/Labor Day/All Day Sauna for nerds.) One of my cats was playing with a piece I had dropped on the floor the other day, thus saving me the pain of stepping on a Lego. Cats are truly man’s best friend.

I love the sleek design of the manta ray sub. I’m not entirely sure that manta rays are evil, but years of Aquaman comics and SpongeBob* cartoons have shaped my impression of the dastardly manta ray. This submarine oozes evil. It’s even got long tubes connecting things that probably don’t need connected just like evil things always do. They mimic the tubes on Black Manta’s helmet, a cool design feature that helps differentiate it from the thousands of other manta ray shaped submarines out there. Black Manta’s minifig looks especially badass, emulating Ethan Van Sciver’s determined and intimidating pirate hate-monger instead of the Super Friend’s ‘why is his helmet shaped like a butt’ version.

I both love and hate the shark with missiles on its head. On the one hand, it’s a shark with missiles on his head, which is always awesome. On the other hand, it seems like that won’t work against Aquaman, a character renowned and renounced for his control over sea life. There is a little decal that shows some circuitry on the shark’s head, so maybe the idea is that Black Manta has overridden its brain, but come on. We’ve read this comic. Aquaman pushes himself to the limit, overcomes the circuitry, and the shark turns and shoots the manta ray sub with a missile. Also, the manta ray sub has missiles, so it seems like a lot of work to also capture, then brain rewire, then mount working missiles on a shark when you could just use your readily available submarine missiles instead.

So here’s my overall rating of this Aquaman / Black Manta / Also Batman (For Some Reason) Lego Set:

Shark With Missiles On Headiness: 8/10 mantas – Awesome yet impractical, but also somehow still impractically awesome.

Minifiguracity: 10/10 mantas – I bought it for Black Manta minifig, now I have Black Manta minifig. The rest of the Legos are superfluous to the minifigs in any given Lego set.

Fall Off The Bookshelfibility: 10/10 mantas – Seriously, give this thing a wide berth (Like that wordplay? Nautical, baby!). Nothing sucks more than Legos shattering all over the floor. And I like to keep it near the edge, too. Legos look best right near the edge of any wobbly surface. That’s science.

Don’t Touch My Stuffitude: 10/10 mantas = HANDS OFF!! – Nothing shows you don’t dust regularly quite like someone touching black Legos. I know you think it’s funny to write your name in it, Andy, but you’ve giving me a lot of grief.

Overall Rating: 9/10 mantas – I would have liked to save some money and just gotten the Black Manta half of this set. Why is Batman there? Why didn’t he bring any scuba gear like Robin? Wasn’t the Bat Boat one of the reasons we hated Batman Forever? What good is jumping action underwater?


*Microsoft Word offers a corrected spelling for ‘SpongeBob’. ‘Aquaman’ is just wrong no matter what. What a world we live in!