The Roasting of Nicholas Delatovic

When my twin brother Nick turned 30 he invited everyone to come to a party and insult him as much as possible.

If you've seen any of the televised roasts that comedians participate in you'd be familiar with the concept - a group expresses their affection for someone by humorously ribbing on them, often as brutally as possible.

I couldn't attend unfortunately - our birthday celebrations were temporally identical but geographically distinct - so I wrote something and had excellent mutual friend Luke McGrath read it aloud on my behalf.

I reproduce the roast below, in the hope that these burns can endlessly sizzle through the halls of time.

(Incidentally, you should visit lick-nuke.com to keep abreast of Nick and Luke's various artistic endeavours - it's a good place for people who like things that rule.)

***

Good evening everybody,

I’m sorry I couldn’t be there tonight; I know you were all looking forward to seeing me. I just felt it was important that, on his thirtieth birthday, Nick enjoy an occasion where he is not overshadowed by the superior twin.

Happy birthday brother; Enjoy this rarity.

I don’t remember the time we shared in the womb, but the evidence speaks for itself. Nick enjoys 20/20 vision while I have been saddled with spectacles since the age of two. Stealing all the eye juice out of the womb was an act of selfishness that predates consciousness itself. Also, thanks for the scoliosis bro. No wonder I got out first.

From that moment it was all downhill. Nick stamped his way through childhood like an impatient octogenarian. Childhood flights of fancy would grind to a halt whenever he arrived. The neighbourhood kids would try to marry two cats and he would sweep in to tell us they were brother and sister and thus unable to wed. The universal solvent we’d invented was just water, he’d announce, before telling hijinks of any type to get off his lawn.

There was one exception, of course: Nick’s famous imaginary stories.

He would spend hours a day in a rock garden at the back of our yard, stepping gingerly from rock to rock, his face set in a grim expression of concentration. If asked what the fuck he was doing, which he was often, he would reply ‘imaginary stories’. X-man action figure in hand, he would rattle off the 12 part epic run he had concocted that would serve as a fitting bookend to the Dark Phoenix Saga. His imagination was unbridled, but came at the expense of developing the skills necessary for social interaction. This main side effect of this hobby, however, was feet as leathery and unwelcoming as a crocodile.

I was happy to see Nick enter the field of personal training. Less welcome were his repeated sermons outlining that, given our genetic similarity, I too was capable of achieving a high level of fitness. These speeches were mostly delivered as he walked around on his hands. Quite the salesman.

Equally unwelcome were Nick’s student days, where he embraced a philosophy of anti-capitalism with the fervour of a Frenchman who’s invitation to the opera has been lost in the mail.

I, with a house full of things and a life full of job, was an easy mark. I accepted Nick’s teaching that he could live off the grid with nothing but a fully equipped recording studio with a pleasant smile.

Visiting his home years later to find the floor obscured by heaving piles of comics and musical instruments, I learned that to be anti-capitalist you just had to stop short of buying any fucking bookshelves.

I could go on and on, but have lost interest.

So I will stop short of mentioning Nick’s childhood fear of being enclosed in a beanbag – to this day he insists this was fakery on his behalf, but that makes it no less funny.

Neither will I mention that, when our father moved in with his third wife, he gave Nick all of his pornography, telling him to ‘share it with his brother’. Our father’s questionable ideas of paternal bonding aside, I never saw any of it. For a boy of about 16, this sin was unforgivable.

A few years ago, I sent Nick a message on our birthday to extend my best wishes. I wrote “Happy birthday!” He wrote back “thanks”.

Regardless of this, a mountain of evidence that could stretch to the stars themselves, I love you Nick. Happy birthday; sorry I couldn’t be there. See you soon.

Why politicians shouldn't promise

Rather than pouring hatred on politicians' broken promises, we should admit they're impossible to keep and give it all a miss

As a former journalist I can empathise with politicians, given that both professions occupy a regular place on 'least trusted profession' lists.

Both are held to understandably high standards. Both would need to be robots to avoid ever giving the appearance of bias, welded as they are to an unrealistic expectation that they are in no way humans of opinion. Both operate in the public domain, working for a public good, and thus the community feels ownership over their roles and work - often expressed as a license to complain bitterly.

Of course, the public should be holding both parties to account, just as each casts a critical eye over the other. Personally though, such accountability shouldn't extend to shouting at journalists at dinner parties.

But a big difference between journos and pollies is that the average newspaper reporter isn't required to make promises that they can't conceivably keep.

To make the obvious point; political promises are often broken, or, to adopt the Howard model, relegated to 'non-core' status.

Julia Gillard's entire career as Prime Minister has been coloured - and arguably hamstrung irrevocably - by her promise of 'no carbon tax'.

Tony Abbott elicited howls as he attempted to educate the public that measured press statements were fact, whereas heat of the moment promises veered 'gospel truth'.

Wayne Swan has been ridiculed for failing to produce a surplus that was only expected because he promised it would be so. Travelling back in time to become his own father would be no less torturous.

So, really, why bother?

Julia Gillard's promise of no carbon tax creates such anger because of its particular phrasing. Had she spoken honestly of not desiring a tax, but wanting to fix the issue, there would be no such lightning rod of a sound-byte  In fact, hanging politicians with their promises contributes to the broader problem of statements being cloaked in doublespeak, lest evidence be recorded.

Throughout Wayne Swan's surplus opus, did anyone really believe him? More accurately, did anyone honestly not foresee the possibility that delivery of such a thing may be outside his control? I don't think so. Instead, voters lampooned him for promising such a thing, then redoubled their hilarity when he failed to deliver.

There are a range of reasons why we now have a carbon tax and a deficit - some of them are out of the government's hands and some occurred after promises were made based on then-current evidence, rosily interpreted or not.

With the above in mind, wouldn't a more mature approach be to give promises the flick altogether? To have politicians stand up and say "this is my intention, and I will endeavour to see it through."

Such a system, of course, requires parties to have clearly outlined beliefs and ideologies, as well as a record of upholding those values we can trust. That way, rather than promises that are leaden with cynicism the moment they're spoken, we can vote for the party that is shooting for the Australia we most want to live in.

But that's a fight for another day.

  

Ultimate Chicken Victory

So the KFC in my hometown was just the worst.

Their lifeline, I think, was that in an isolated country centre of 20,000 people, they were serving a captive audience. It's kind of like when you buy a sausage roll on a country train and it costs $9.50 - what are you going to do about it? Grab a cheaper one as you rocket through the next town? 

So despite its awfulness, my friends and I would go to this KFC about once a week. What can I say? We were unhealthy nerds that needed a saturated fat fix on game night.

Each week, almost without fail, we'd meet at my house and catalogue how KFC and its dead-eyed denizens had mangled our order. One night they were out of buns. One night they were out of chicken. Most nights they'd just forget your fries or seemingly pile food into a bag at random and send you on your way.

This was such a long-running situation that, eventually, we had devolved into passive aggressive wolverines, rifling through the bag at the counter and checking for problems before leaving the store. I wrote an excessively long letter to head office and experienced a blissful two weeks where they paid attention to service before inevitably slumping back down into Hades.

See, I should point out that my standards for KFC are not super high. I'm not going to complain if the chicken is too dry, the burgers are too oily or if they give me massive heart disease - it's part of the deal. All I want is to point at something on the menu and then eat it.

After a kaleidoscope of complaints, I'd eventually figured out that asking for a refund was a no go, whereas asking for free food in compensation was a winner. I assume that monetary return could be tracked by head office whereas free food could be concealed, but I don't know. All I know is that if I ever asked for my money back they'd throw chicken at my mouth until I left.

So, one night, I order food for my fiance and I, and when I get it, I find her burger is not what I ordered. I gain the attention of the serving child.

"Hi dude. I ordered a Zinger burger and I didn't get it," I said.

"Yeah, we're out of Zinger burgers."

I explained that this could've been pointed out when I ordered a Zinger burger, been charged for a Zinger burger and been handed a bag under the pretence of it containing a Zinger burger, rather than what was, in reality, a bun with two crispy strips on it.

He was unmoved, unable to understand the source of my frustration.

In my mind, expected incompetence had now been reinforced by lies and false advertising, and my soul was seized by a white hot rage that could've incinerated any surrounding chickens into the rock-like, wafer-thin burger patties routinely pumped out by this particular establishment.

I asked for my money back. I was denied. 

"I ordered something. You took my money. I didn't get it. You lied and now you're arguing with me about it. Just give me my money back. That's totally fair."

The boy continued to act in all ways like his head was a fax machine that could only spit out the same faded message - "I can't give you your money back, EXPLANATION NOT FOUND" - over and over again. His instruction to deny refunds was clearly not reinforced by any subsequent knowledge.

So I attempted to force his hand by asking for the most ridiculous thing I could think of.

"Look, I'm not leaving until I get my money back. So either give me my money back, or give me all of your chicken," I said.

"What?"

"If you won't give me money, just give me all of the chicken you've got ready back there.," I said, gesturing at the bulging pile of cooked chicken pieces behind him.

"Sure," he said, and started piling the chicken into boxes.

I stood there dumbstruck. I was sure he was going to opt for a refund in the face of my ridiculousness. Nevertheless, I soon walked out with over 30 pieces of chicken. I beat a hasty retreat before the people in line behind me realised what my impotent point-making had cost them.

I called my buddies on the way home, telling them dinner was on me. 

I strode in the front door hoisting swelled, oily boxes of fried chicken above my head, bellowing in victory like a viking. I recounted the story with animated glee as I waved my justly-reserved drumstick like a broadsword.

We ended up throwing about half of the chicken away as we couldn't get through it before it spoiled. My victory, however, is immortal.

Religious people come to the door sometimes

"You're home! You know, I could've robbed this place a dozen times!"

That's what the greying, portly gentleman said when I opened the door. As an opening statement, I didn't think it was the strongest.

It was about 11am on a Wednesday and I was working nights, so until the knock at the door I had spent an energetic morning watching Star Trek Voyager in my bedraggled pyjamas.

Past experience suggested this man was here to sell me either pay TV or a new-fangled God. Given the awkward opener, I guessed God.

"Excuse me?" I replied as I blinked the sun out of my eyes, truly at a loss as to how to respond.

"Oh, I just mean I've visited your home three times in the last few weeks and there's never anyone here!"

"OK, cool. Don't rob my house," I said with a snark that only exists in Gen X cult movies and people who are being bothered the morning after night shift.

I clarified that I didn't really belong to any major religion but that I comfortably had my own thing going on and was not currently shopping around.

He assured me he would not attempt any sales and said "Hey look, can I ask you a question?"

I've never developed the ability to just flat out tell uninvited visitors to get lost. I always engage on some level, and regrettably my approach is usually to let all of my sarcastic, caustic, immature bullshit off the leash in the hopes of being too unpleasant to interact with. No matter the result, it always takes time.

I said he could, bid him to wait and went inside to grab a cigarette before re-emerging to light it and sit on the ground in a spot where I could still see Voyager playing in the background. I must have looked like the worst person in the whole world.

"Go for it".

"Do you see that house over there?" I did. "Do you know who built it?" I did not. "Well even though you don't know who built it, it is there. for all you know, God may have built it, and even though you didn't see him do it, you can see evidence of his work. Do you think maybe the world could be like that?"

I thought it was a pretty good approach, really - a made-up story to illustrate a broader point; you know, like the Bible.

I exhaled and considered.

"Dude, I work at the local newspaper. I think that if God built the house down the road, I would have heard about it by now."

He laughed. I laughed. He reiterated that the absence of evidence does not disprove the existence of a supreme being and that a rational mind would be open to such a thing. 

I replied that, to my mind, it was more likely that humanity was the result of tachyon particles reacting with a neutrino field in an asynchronies orbit with a distant star which inverted their polarity and fired warp plasma into the primordial soup. I had been watching Star Trek a lot.

The man put out in his hand as a way of saying goodbye.

As I shook his right hand and apologised, his left produced a bundle of pamphlet-sized magazines. He asked if I'd like to take them and I said I would,  hoping to expedite the whole process.

I reached for them and he recoiled sharply as if shocked. I stood there, once again befuddled, my hand outstretched like a cat's claw.

"Um, I … uh … you only usually get one," he said.

"Oh …. um …. sure, whatever."

"Oh no, I, uh, I suppose you could have, um, two?"

"That's fine."

"Oh look, I'm sure it's OK, I could probably stretch to giving you three?"

"It's really fine. Whatever you prefer." I had no idea how we'd become locked in this awkward battle of wills, but it was clearly too late to admit I would prefer to give the magazines a miss entirely.

He gave me two and left.

As I went inside, Captain Janeway was on the television, teaching Seven of Nine what it really meant to be human. I was immediately enthralled.

Six Word Obituaries

Office worker sang continuously; Body undiscovered.

Landmines hard to discover. Soccer cancelled.

"Live life", they said. Went skydiving.

Russian roulette suggested by fifth wheel.

"Brakes fixed?" He asked, in motion.

Second amendment prized above all others.

I ate the whole thing every time.

Office Life

One of my favourite things to do in an office, even though it makes people burn with hatred, is this:

If someone walks by in a hurry and asks, "have you seen Steve?" I'll fire back "Yep, he was over at the photocopier room" or some other place in the opposite direction. 

Once they steam off in that direction, and just before they're out of earshot, I'll yell, "but that was like three days ago!"

Every time I do this I break out into a huge smile while their fists clench up and go all red.

Review: Star Trek Into Darkness

Star Trek Into Darkness is an enormously fun movie that captures your attention and zips by at warp speed. It's a true successor to 2009's Star Trek, if not the franchise's history as a whole. This is not a big deal, because it rules

Much like JJ Abrams' first Star Trek film that rebooted the franchise, Star Trek Into Darkness is great example of a summer blockbuster movie. 

Of course, a summer blockbuster film doesn't have all that much in common with the Star Trek tradition, which seems to be the source of a bit of hate being directed its way online.

On the other hand, who cares? I walked out of this film on a cloud of happiness. I'm a huge Trek fan who can admit that the franchise had been largely strangled to death by the time of its demise. There's no point rebooting the franchise only to see it killed by reverence. (Although this film has a surprisingly large dose of that.)

Star Trek Into Darkness continues Kirk's attempt to live up to the whole Captain thing and again revolves around the Kirk/Spock relationship. The Enterprise crew go up against the excellently-named Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays a Starfleet Officer driven to terrorism by his anger at the Federation.

Cumberbatch is an excellent addition and does a cracking job as a madman with gravitas. He even seems to elevate the performances of the main cast when he's around. 

The acting is great in general and the cast continue their successful walk of the tightrope between inhabiting existing characters and bringing their own performances.

The visuals are excellent. Abrams really knows how to present a beautiful universe and it really feels established.

This movie moves quickly on a current of humour and action that keeps a smile on your face, doling out exciting scenes at a steady clip.

If traditional Trek fans were unhappy with this film's discordant relationship to the franchise, I wouldn't be inclined to dissuade them. Traditionally speaking, Trek's value has been in commenting on the present world (you know, like science fiction does). While there's some 9/11 terrorism military warmongering  lessons learned here, it's really a bangsplode piece.

There are also some bum story notes; there's a lot of moving parts that may put off some and I wanted more out of a particular alien race, as well as some mention of the sheer number of people who die. Of course, if you enjoy the game that I do of pretending actors are every character they've ever played, then this is a movie that involves both Sherlock Holmes and Robocop, and thar has to count for something.

Judged on its own merits, rather than measured against the rose-coloured achievements of the storied franchise, Star Trek Into Darkness is an enjoyable movie.

Celebrity Splash

Celebrity Splash is a thing that exists.

It's a show on Channel 7 where celebrities jump off of diving boards into a pool and are marked on their technique and their courage. That's it. Ratings have been alright but not great.

It's been eviscerated by critics for being a terrible idea for a show. It is shallow (hi-oh!) and pointless. I don't know who many of the contestants are and it's hard to see why I should care about any of this. It's ridiculous. I spent weeks seeing the advertisements pop up and laughing deridingly.

But the show is perhaps the most honest thing I have ever witnessed. It's people who you've seen on the telly before climbing up a ladder and jumping off. They get shit-scared and then they get wet and then they have a laugh about it. There aren't any booming voiceovers promising a dramatic twist that will crack the Internet in half.

Celebrity Splash is clearly a signpost indicating that we're near the end of the road for this society - that we've all opted in to a group narcotic that will lull our souls into the great beyond. But the show is so comfortable in this that it's somehow immune to criticism. It's not any fun to pay out that dumb kid swinging a cardboard lightsaber; neither is it satisfying to rail against Celebrity Splash. But mustn't we? Does it not deserve scorn and endless jokes about taking the water out of the pool next time?

This is a recursive loop from which I cannot escape.

Review: Iron Man 3

One of the most impressive feats of engineering within Joss Whedon's Avengers film is the climactic action scene in which a handful of weird heroes flex the full extent of their strength against an alien army.

The sequence is backed up by character work, obviously, but there's a certain fist-pump inherent in seeing, say, Iron Man streak across the sky blasting everything that moves.

If you're worried about the implication of starting a movie review by saying I really loved a different movie, well, yep. I was disappointed by Iron Man 3. It contains a lot of wonderful material that doesn't quite coalesce into a strong story.

Iron Man 3 is as much a continuation of The Avengers as it is the next Iron Man chapter. Tony Stark struggles with PTSD after nuking aliens right in the wormhole while he struggles to cope with the monsters created by his asshole past self. Traditional comics nemesis The Mandarin appears as an Osama analogue with Guy Pearce as a sleazy business science suit dude with literally the best hair in the Marvel universe. Gwyneth Paltrow and Don Cheadle both reprise their supporting roles and get some good material.

Shane Black directs the film with a strong authorial voice. It's unapologetically his film and that's to be admired. It's no surprise the man behind Lethal Weapon injects great energy into characters' banter but the level of humour and confidence in some great reveals was a pleasant surprise.

What I felt myself wanting when I left the theater though, was that fist pump of seeing Iron Man unleash at full force. Iron Man 3 tests Tony Stark mostly by taking away his toys. It's a usual 'part three' problem - just having a hero win things with their abilities is no longer enough - but dammit, 12-year-old inner Stefan wants to see Iron Man in action (and that dude runs my whole life). 

I feel bad making that complaint, as the scenes where Tony needs to succeed without his armour are some of the film's best. His infiltration of a complex using hacked together explosives and such is particularly strong, as is having to fight with one boot and one glove.

So what worked? 

Mandarin is amazing. The character has loomed over this series - they were never going to be able to import him straight from the books, given that he's a Yellow Peril stereotype that uses martial arts and magic rings. The approach here is a masterstroke of awesomeness over fan service and worthy of applause.

This is an enormously funny film: many laughs to be had. 

Robert Downey Jr remains excellent as Tony Stark. Much of the second act rests solely on his shoulders and he carries it well. 

That bit with the plane was pretty damn impressive.

There's a moment where Tony runs out of a bar and gets in his suit which shows it's just parked there on the street like a car. I love that. It's a great touch of world-building which reinforces something I really enjoy about the Iron Man franchise, which is there is no secret identity or even a hero identity. This is a story of Tony Stark, a man with amazing suits.

What didn't work?

Guy Pearce and his Extremis team were not very exciting in ability or motivation, especially when they're sharing screen time with Mandarin.

The movie gives the impression that the Iron Man suits are made of tinfoil always seconds from breaking.

A few things - such as Tony's emotional problems - weren't really resolved, and the ending was a bit rushed, conceivably to adopt a finality to the end of the trilogy.

In adopting the conventions of a shared storytelling universe, the Marvel movies have benefited from a momentum that transcends each individually. Interestingly, they've also encountered some of the issues comics have struggled with for decades. Once you start stacking stories on top of each other, how can you make sure everything makes sense? Once Iron Man tag teams an alien death ship with the Hulk, how do you make helicopters seem like a threat? By turning off his boots? 

Verdict: Iron Man 3 is a good movie that suffers mostly from me being a huge nerd who stamps his feet and says things like 'Jarvis controlling all those suits devalues the essence of the Stark character' when I should really be able to admit that it is a great, funny time and leave it at that.

Words out of nowhere!

I haven't posted here in over three years.

There's a grandiose post a little down the page that says I stopped posting to concentrate on bigger projects. I did not do this. I did, however, change city, job and profession. So that's something.

Top Three Things a person learns upon revisiting their blog after three years:

1. People love lists (and Arrested Development). My only post with a title approaching anything like good SEO practice, "Top 5 TV Villains: Lucille Bluth", still gets visitors every day. Also, my post Sporting Memorabilia gets a lot of visits, which I feel quite guilty about. Surely that's not what they're after.

2. I am not the best at spellcheck.

3. I am not an entrepreneur. It's interesting to me to see posts here that are attempting to do the things that twitter and instagram would do so well - but didn't work very well on blogger with a pre-smartphone phone. Sadly, I had the desire to present things in a new way, but missed the part of my brain that realised a tool to do such a thing would be popular and lucrative. Once I signed up to twitter though, my blog evaporated swiftly, as my itch to deliver zingers to a digital audience had been scratched in a more efficient fashion.