Noah Stinson

To celebrate me finishing my Blogs, please admire this man...

Paper Mario's Perfect Lemons!

                 Paper Mario has always been one of the most creative game series in the Nintendo line-up, but their newest title takes it to a whole new level. With the kingdom having had all its color taken away by bowser, Mario must repaint the world, or something. I honestly haven't played it yet, but one thing I can say for sure is that the animations and art style is the best Nintendo has to offer. With attacks ranging from lemons squeezing juice into the enemies eyes to blind them, to a good fortune cat charm from Japan crushing them, to a giant fan blowing them out of the solar system. Not only are they creative they are simply beautiful. I remember the announce trailer only had the lemon attack and I rewatched it 100 times trying to figure out how they made the lemons look so realistic. I was honestly speechless for some reason. The paper characters in extremely high res 3d modeled rooms also adds to the paper effect in a hard contrast type of way if you know what I mean. Since they have released all the finishing card attacks and they all look just as impressive, some even more so. I'm just trying to say this game is both insanely creative and visually beautiful.

Gangsta' Rappers speaking their Faith Part 2

The next I can think of was Puff Daddy. See Puff Daddy hated religion until the death of Biggie Smalls, A.k.a. The Notorious B.I.G, A.k.a. Christopher Wallace. He left the Rap scene for 2 years after Biggies death, in order to find what he was doing with his life. Puff reemerged with the album "Forever", a testimony to how God helped him get out of spiraling depression. Specifically "Best Friend" which explains his relationship with God,

"Been two and a half years since my man Big passed
Been two and a half years since my world crashed
I needed help, God gave me the power
Gave me the strength to go face to face with my darkest hour
Looked me in the eyes and ask "What you doing unhappy?"
"Don't you know why I'm here?" and started shooting at me
Back to the wall, is my faith gonna play out
Never wavered once, gave me no way out
Your time to die, don't even stress the date
You're coming with me, your soul I'm next to take
I told him "I'm too much blessed with faith"
"And living for Christ" and then he said "Manifest the great"
All of a sudden, what I'm remembering
Ground started to shake, everything trembling
The power of the truth was shooting through my Timberlands
Here was my Lord Jesus Christ, my best friend again, come on"

And that was only the second verse. This is one of the boldest things a thug rapper has done in as far as testimony. It's almost taboo to be this blunt about faith in the Gangsta Rap world.

This opened the door for future rappers to do the same. Rappers such as Kendrick Lamar, B.o.B. (sadly),and most recently and surprisingly J Cole on his new album that came out last week.

Gangsta' Rappers Testifying their Faith Part 1

When you think of thug rap I'm sure you don't immediately think, JESUS, but to both my and your surprise many rappers have started to give written testimony in their raps. This started with 2Pac back in the 90's giving credit to God and Jesus, through his songs, Changes, Wonder if Heaven Got a Ghetto, Until the End of Time, Only God can Judge Me, Ghetto Gospel and much more. He thought if he could at least share the light of christ with these kids who have literally nothing then he did his job. He wanted to bring hope to the ghetto and he did a in many ways, but this was the one that lasted. He saw the characters of the bible as straight gangsta's coming from nothing, to being leaders. He even once said, "Jesus was a bigger motherf****n G than I will ever be." So, it started with Pac inspiring the youth of Compton, saying if Jesus could make through the cross you can make it through the Ghetto.

Part 2 will be about Puff Daddy from the east coast....

Rich Mullins - Hold Me Jesus

While admittedly not my favorite Rich Mullins song, the music video that accompanies the song, while simplistic shows the struggle with trying to listen to God in times of struggle. The video was shot by Rich himself, and it depicts him pacing around an attic, with shots of him lying on the ground, sitting in the only chair in the otherwise barren room, sitting legs crossed on the floor, crying, and up close to the camera, as a silluette. The entire time he is speaking the lyrics of the song, like a prayer, which it is. In the song Rich once says, “Surrender don’t come natural to me. I’d rather fight you for something I don’t really want that take what you give that I need.” Which this video depicts very well.

There are a lot of shots of him walking away from the camera after hitting record, and the last shot is actually him turning the camera off, in order to show the raw type of feel he was going for. Many of his other songs, that have videos which is like 4, are out in the open fields of Wichita or Ireland, rather than a concealed attic. It reminds me of all the times I have had to escape and just be silent in the presence of God, and it is near flawless to me. All I would like is for it to be rereleased with a higher resolution, because it currently plays at 240p.

Here it is…

Piper - The Pixar Animated Short better than the Movie that it Premiered with

I remember going to the theater earlier this summer, eager to re-live my near perfect experience watching the original "Finding Nemo" through "Finding Dory". Sadly, it was what should have been a straight to dvd sequel in my opinion, it couldn't even come close to a mediocre Pixar film. But I did go a second time not to watch Finding Dory again, but because of the short film Piper which came before the movie's opening. In fact, the second time I went I left after Piper was over. So, what makes Piper such an amazing short? Well everything, from hyper realistic animation that still retains a artistic style, to score, to the beautifully captivated story told without a single word. In all reality it had more of what made Finding Nemo great than Finding Dory. Piper has the sense of adventure, a child that wants to discover beyond the shore, and a child that discovers that he/she can do something no one else had done before him/her that helps everyone.

See Nemo was focused on wandering the depths of the sea, it was focused on the journey, rather than the destination and I feel as if Piper did the same. Piper never had solidified answers to the problem at hand only small discoveries at a time, for instance the baby bird in the beginning hadn't even been near the water, and by the end he slowly discovers how to locate clams to eat. Where Finding Dory only focused on getting to the destination through convenient plot points Piper and Nemo focus on discovery and journeys without a super specific destination, but that is another blog. I am focussing on Piper in this blog.

Piper also has the ability to do something neither Nemo nor Dory could do. Create an environment that mirrors reality, while still putting their own Pixar touch to the characters. Piper is something you potentially could witness on a beach, it is super real both graphically and in the way the story is told. While you might not see a baby seagull dive underwater to discover the location of shells, you will see seagulls act similarly to how they move, shout, and generally interact. If anything it inspired me to go to Lincoln City that very weekend, (see I could do things like that in Oregon, so sorry Midwesterners, this won't be a direct connection for you.) and grab a cup of coffee and just watch the Ocean waves, Seagulls, crabs, and people all interact. It my experience doing that was very simular, although not created to spur feels in the aduince, I noticed the behaviors of the short film and real costal segulls were similar.

There is a link to the trailer below...

Kenny Rogers - The Last Ten Years (Superman) Part 2

After looking at loss Kenny, goes straight into the hills we climbed as a nation, starting with my favorite line, in most of music. “Well, the last ten years, look at the hills we've climbed. The best golfer's black, the best rapper's white an' it's about damn time!” In one sentence Kenny Rogers sums up racial equalities progression, even though its not finished you have to admit we have come a long way. This line is backed by broken cassettes and turntables. He then warns about a new segregation without even specifically saying it. With the line, “But we best beware, there's a brand new fight, you see. An' I hate to say we might be our own worst enemy” Which without the context of the video would leave you questioning what that new fight is. As he says that line in the video, a broken typewritten, followed by a broken laptop, symbolizing cyberbullying, internet wars, hacking, and the fight for traditional media in a digital world (that was the typewriters significance).

            The song continues, but I would suggest you just watch it. As it depicts American national disasters, 9/11, our future, and the losses of June Carter Cash, John Paul, and George Harrison. It is almost Kenny Roger’s personal “We didn’t Start the Fire”, only focused on the years after. While it mainly focuses on loss the song helps regain a hope for the future in a weird way.

Also, Kenny I hate to break it to you but….

      

Here is a link to the video…