Netflix Friday #4: THE KING OF KONG

Saying the world can seem both very large and very small is hackneyed; however, I believe we've entered a period of time when those two conditions are interdependent.

This is a discussion we have in new media all the time -- who is famous, and what use is fame now? Paul F. Tomkins (thanks Wil) is a fine comic and well-known, but I wouldn't call him famous. And yet, he manages to get enough people in major cities to pledge to see his shows that he can make a living travelling from fan-cluster to fan-cluster across North America, summoned by people's need to see him perform. He has the respect and appreciation of a large enough group of people to fill his perceptual horizon. Does anyone need more? Is it even possible to rationaly understand what more is? Is that why famous people go mad?

I'm getting to the movie, I promise.

So we have Steve Weibe, an average guy who takes to practicing Donkey Kong after he's laid off. Anyone who's spent any time hacking away at video games can understand the impetus -- you spend time, you attain a goal, and the goals come at intervals short enough to reinforce the adrenal hit. I've occassionally floated outside myself while playing a video game at 4am, asking "what are you doing?", and getting the answer "Not failing to solve that Act Two problem."

Weibe gets good enough to consider going for the world record. He needs a damn win, in a way that we all understand.

That's when we go down the rabbit hole. That's when we meet Billy Mitchell, the reigning champion of that particular 80's arcade game (among others). While Weibe comes across as a somewhat obsessed hobbyist, a character all we geeks count among our friends, Mitchell has parlayed mastery --

-- I want to back up and take a run at this. Mitchell has parlayed mastery of an thirty-year old arcade game into a business empire that has nothing to do with that arcade game. A small empire, but one that fills his perceptual horizon. He has used that arcade game world record to fuel his own confidence, his own drive, his own success. That record may only be acknowledged by a small world, but its power within that world gives Billy Mitchell the lodestone he needs to survive and thrive in a big world where others become lost. Every morning, he wakes up "Billy Mitchell, world record holder in Donkey Kong", and that sustains him with a fierce power that would shame the faith of a Jesuit priest. In a world of losers, the lost and the damned, Billy Mitchell is a winner.

And Steve FUCKING Weibe is not going to take that from him.

You know what that is? That is the recipe for great. goddam. drama.

The relentless grind of small indignities. The cumulative blessings of small victories. Honor, cheating, ego, sacrifice, suspense ... The King of Kong is available for your Netflix Streaming enjoyment even as we speak.

Percy Jackson trailer

Seriously, if I were 12, this would have melted my brain. I love this trailer.

kfmonkey1

Hey, that spiffier Gamertag is available. If you're interested in the occasional showdown, switch over to kfmonkey1 from levrunner1.

Fine, Fine, I'll Comment

I have a lovely show on right now, and although the whole GF thing was a personal heartbreak, I wish the new guy all the luck in the world and many, many residual checks for Warren with which he can buy replacement robot parts for his ailing meat-being.

Ephemera 2009 (11): L4D2-sday

Lazy tab-dumping, because I got things to kill.

-- Somewhere in heaven, PT Barnum looks down on Sarah Palin and sheds a single proud tear.

-- I can't believe I yet again missed NaNoWriMo. The Doomed Pulp Novel remains unfinished. You know, when you look at what Wil's doing with his latest book, I am tempted to go just online and POD with it. Not like the odds favor me selling any more in bookstores than online. Nicely enough, other people continue to do my conceptual work for me -- although not all of the novel occurs in flooded New York. (h/t i09)

-- I created a public Xbox 360 ID. Add levrunner1 to your friends list, and if I pop up, it's for multiplayer zombie slaughtering goodness. Or M:tG. And yes, that is a monocle.

-- Scenes From An Alternate Universe Where The Beatles Accepted Lorne Michaels’ Generous Offer

-- The web series about Superheroes in group, The Sanctum, clocks in Episode Five.

-- Terrorists are not supervillains. They are grubby little transnational criminals. Do we really have to, yet again, discuss why I'm not scared?

-- Oh, hey, this is finally up on YouTube,



-- Plus, the geek viral of the week.