2011 California Dreams Tour - Why I Love Katy Perry

So it's been a couple of weeks since I've last posted and it figures I'm about to write about something that will make me lose my "Tarantino Card": Katy Perry.

Last night, Katy Perry performed at the UCF Arena for her California Dreams Tour. Yes, most of the audience was teenage girls and gay couples, but I still enjoyed it and totally recommend everyone to see Katy perform at least once in their lifetime. The concert was very theatrical and followed the story of Katy who lives in a colorless world wasting life cutting meat for a disgusting butcher. One night, Katy escapes her boring reality by falling asleep and visits a vibrant "Candy Land" in search for her pet cat, "Kitty Purry." Along her journey, Katy encounters many interesting characters such as a personified slot machine named "Slot," Mimes who feed her pot brownies, and her love interest, the Baker Boy. As Katy travels through this fantasy world, she performs her songs, with a set-list consisting of:

1. Teenage Dream
2. Hummingbird Heartbeat
3. Waking Up In Vegas
4. You're So Gay
5. Peacock
6. I Kissed A Girl
7. Circle The Drain
8. E.T.
9. Who Am I Living For
10. Pearl
11. Not Like The Movies
12. Only Girl (Rhianna cover)
13. Big Pimping (Jay-Z cover)
14. Friday (Rebecca Black cover)
15. Whip My Hair (Willow cover)
16. Thinking Of You
17. Hot N Cold
18. Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F)
19. I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Whitney Houston cover)
20. Firework
21. California Gurls

Katy Perry is a part of our pop culture with her whimsical sets, costumes, and lyrics. If I were to pick a favorite piece from last night's show, it has to be Hot N Cold - Not only is it my favorite Katy song but it had amazing costume changes in a similar fashion to the magician couple from America's Got Talent. By the vibration in the stands, you could tell the crowd favorites included Waking Up in Vegas, E.T., I Kissed a Girl, Firework, and Peacock.

Katy also showed she is more than an entertainer, but a musician as well. She played Thinking of You with her glittery guitar, swinging above the crowd in her "Cotton Candy Cloud." Katy also performed some acoustic covers of her favorite songs on the radio, including the annoying (yet hilarious) Friday by Rebecca Black.


Overall, I enjoyed the show and would definitely see Katy again when she visits "Whorlando" (a new name for Orlando coined by Katy herself). Although you usually won't find pop music on my play-lists, Katy Perry is a guilty pleasure and on my Top Five of Most Beautiful Women. Her music has enough "rock and roll" to keep me entertained and her personality is cute and quirky enough to keep me intrigued. Hopefully the next time she's in town, I get pulled on stage for a kiss as I won't mind whether her hair is black or blue.

So on Death List Five, Katy Perry's 2011 California Dreams concert ranks #5.

Now that I have this off my chest, please stay tuned in the very near future as I redeem my "Tarantino Card" by sharing some long awaited covers to Tarantino Comics!

Adam Carolla Improv Comedy Show - Autoerotic Asphyxiation

Get It On! Many will argue that Adam Carolla is the quintessential man's man. I definitely agree with this claim and will go one step further to say he transformed me from a crying wussy elementary boy to a disgusting raging-hormone adolescent. When growing up, I didn't have cable television or the Internet. However, with the ancient technology of the analog radio, Dr. Drew and Adam taught me everything I needed to know about the birds and the bees on Loveline (ranging from the horrific to the fantastic). And when I caught glances of Comedy Central at a friend's house, I didn't know how awesome women on trampolines could be. Oh, Adam, how you spoiled me.

However, when I got a little older and finally had Internet in my household, I forgot about poor Mr. Carolla. College came and went, and me along with most of America are now desensitized to the ramblings that use to be so taboo on Loveline. But as we all know, Adam is much more than a teenage corrupter, he is an entertainer.

So with the invention of podcasts, I rediscovered him on The Adam Carolla Show. I mainly scan through the episodes, picking from guest interviews that look intriguing to me. When I told a friend about the podcast, he too reminisced about the glory days and he became a faithful and loyal follower of the show. So, when Adam announced he was going to be in West Palm Beach for a comedy show at the Improv, my buddy bought some tickets and three of us went on a little road trip.

We were pretty smashed, but when Adam came on stage, he wooed the crowd. As he did his routine, he had a slide show in the background to compliment his act. I can't remember everything he ranted about, but here are a few things I can still piece together:

• His dog and children - Even the rich have family problems
  
• An old Man Show sketch - It was about him and Jimmy making people nervous by acting as drunken airline pilots
  
• A Bryan Cranston cartoon (I can't wait for Breaking Bad to start back up. It's my favorite show on Television)
• His yearly salary over the years - This was pretty funny. He showed he made nothing after high school, had some ups and downs, and is now richer than everyone that was in that comedy club.

Overall, it was a great show, especially for the first comedian I've ever seen live. However I was disappointed that he didn't do his trademark bit - "What Can't Adam Complain About." This is when the audience shouts out random things and Adam tells his opinion on it. The three of us were going to shout out "Autoerotic asphyxiation" (sadly tying back to my theme of Tarantino Comics through Kill Bill's David Carradine), but didn't get the chance to. It was for the best though, as it would of sounded like a drunken mess as we could barely say 2 syllables in sync, much less 10.

The next time Adam is in town, I'd definitely see him again. He's funny, has an opinion on everything, and brings back childhood memories of me secretly listening to the radio at midnight.

So on Death List Five, Adam Carolla's Improv Comedy Show Ranks #4.

Dead Space 2 - Movie Homages

I'm not the biggest gamer, but every once in a while I have to get my video game fix. When I get a game, I'll play the heck out of it until I beat it or get too frustrated. When I'm done, I'm good for the next 6 months. Recently, DC Universe Online was finally released and I almost got it until I realized there was a monthly subscription fee. For as much as I love Jim Lee, I'm going to pass since I don't want to spend the extra money and don't really have the MMO gaming discipline. However, since I already had the PS3 controller in my hands, I had to get a game. Persuading my decision, there's this intriguing advertising campaign I keep seeing: http://yourmomhatesthis.com/.

If you've seen the commercials, this marketing ploy is for Dead Space 2. I researched the plot for the first game and it seemed interesting. From what I've gathered, an alien construct called the "Black Marker" landed on earth and emits a frequency that prevents a virus from turning dead corpses into mutated monsters known as "Necromorphs." The government and Unitarian Church end up funding experiments in outer space to see what the virus can really do. As expected, things go wrong and the protagonist must escape from a secluded spaceship. Dead Space 2 picks right up from the previous game. The hero ended up escaping, his girlfriend didn't, and he is being interogated by some authority. Suddenly, he wakes up from a 3 month blackout, only to find Necromorphs are invading the facility he is contained in. It now up to you to uncover the mystery and escape hopefully unscathed.

As I've been playing, I don't believe it is intentional, but I do see some film homages (as you can see, I'm trying to link this back to my Tarantino Comics theme). So here are 5 movie homages I've encountered:

1. Alien: "In space, no one can hear you scream." In the game, if you are floating outside the ship, there is no sound. In addition, some of the Necromorphs remind me of face-huggers.
2. 2001: A Space Odyssey: A black monolith arrives on earth, similar to what Kubrick portrayed arriving before the apes.
3. Starship Troopers: Most of the Necromorphs have these horrific appendages, visually similar to the monstrous Bugs.
4. The Devil's Rejects: There are these huge behemoths that can tear off your limbs. If you are killed by one of them, there is a cinematic cut scene similar to Tiny dragging a corpse during the opening credits of Rob Zombie's film.
5. The Unborn: Look at the picture below and hopefully you see what I mean.

I am no where near finished, but this game is a lot of fun. It is challenging and intense. With surprise pop-ups and loud sounds, I haven't been this scared playing a video game since Resident Evil 2 on the original Play Station.

Since video games are a part of pop culture, I going to rate this game. Due to the horror and Sci-Fi elements, I give Dead Space 2: 4 out of 5 stars.