Comparing Andy Singer Cartoons

     The cartoon that I chose from What Matters in America was by Andy Singer and it was titled quitting fantasies. It's on page 259, it shows how this employee wishes he could say to his boss and what he actually says to his boss. He wishes he could tell his boss how bad he is, and for his boss to tell him how important it is for him (the employee) to stay and not quit. In reality he asks to resign and the boss says "Good! Get the hell outta here!"


     This represents how what we wish would happen doesn't always happen, especially at work.
   
      The cartoon I chose to compare it to was another cartoon done by Andy Singer, and is posted below.
















     Both of these cartoons show that "you can't always get what you want". The caveman who wants more isn't happy and the business man of today who has practically everything isn't happy either. It shows how people who are happy from only materialistic items can never have enough and never be satisfied. The man in the other cartoon wants to tell his boss how it is and quit, but feel wanted by his boss. He ends up losing his job, but feels completely unwanted and doesn't even tell his boss what he wants to.

     These cartoons are about two different scenarios. One compares the past and the future while the other compares one's fantasies to his reality.

     I believe the similarity between these cartoons is in the message.

      I interpreted it to mean that happiness doesn't come from what you have but what you do with the life you've been given. People are always trying to have more, what they have is never enough. That's why people aren't satisfied even when rule the world and morph it into what's convenient for themselves rather than what's best for the world as a whole. Technology can always improve and people need to realize that people themselves as the human race can improve not only for themselves and the future of mankind, but for the world we live on.

Crucible: Kirk

      Crucible: Kirk The Star of Every Wandering, written by David R. George III, was published in 2007 by Pocket Books. This book starts off where Star Trek Generations left off, Kirk is dead on Veridian III, but the nexus (a ribbon of time and memory) flies over Kirk as he dies. This causes Kirk to time travel by jumping through significant parts of his life. You think he's traveling through time to change these events, but he's really there more as a witness of his past. The real point of his time traveling is to prevent himself from ever getting caught in the nexus and still help Picard (a future captain)  stop Soran (villain trying to use the nexus) on Veridian III.

     The best element of this book is surprise, you get to learn what happened behind the scenes of some Star Trek episodes, learn more about the characters you did and didn't know, and the biggest surprise is that the purpose of this is to make it not happen in the first place. Captain Kirk is definitely my favorite character in Star Trek, he's brave, smart, and almost perfect but yet he's a human like all of us. The author keeps a lot hidden from you and unfolds the story piece by piece.

     "I can best describe this place as a timeless dimension of the mind, through it must also have a physical component in it, since my body had survived within it,"(p.g. 234)  Kirk's description of the nexus is better than any one I can think of. This whole story revolves around the nexus so this is a very important description of what the book is based on.

     I like how continues where Star Trek Generations (William Shatner's last Star Trek appearance/movie) left off. That's what really separates this novel from other Star Trek books, other books have told of time travel but this happens after Kirk died in his last movie. I do enjoy how this story uses the nexus to have Kirk jump through his past, but I found it confusing how this time traveling adds up to him having to prevent it from ever happening. It almost defeats the purpose of the story to me, he's erasing what he's done by preventing it from ever happening in the first place. The idea of traveling back to witness some of the greatest moments of your life is something I believe everyone can relate to. I believe the time traveling through the nexus is a bigger part of the overall theme than his death. Unfortunately I get the same sad feeling I got at the end of the Generations movie when I finished this book, it's all over. This time it's not only all over but everything leading up to it happened but was erased from time.

     Overall this story was a little confusing for me, even as a Trekkie, so I definitely don't recommend this novel to anyone who doesn't know or like Star Trek. It's also important to have seen the movie Star Trek Generations because this novel is more and less of a sequel to that movie. With all of the time traveling and revisiting of his past events it only helps if you've seen some of the episodes so you can relate to what Kirk is going through. I say that this is a good book, very different than the average Star Trek or Sci Fi book, but with it being such a complicated concept I can't say that it's great. Still a thumps up on this one.

Dreaming to Dream

      I'm working on becoming a filmmaker, I hope to one day be a director. Writing stories and then bringing them to life is a great feeling. I would love to dream for a living, to create films to share with others today and tomorrow. Of course money is always nice, but I don't want to make films to become rich. I want to make movies so that my stories can be shared, a message can be told, I want people to be able see my films and hear my stories long after I am gone. A writer leaves their books, a musician leaves their songs, and a filmmaker leaves their movies. I want to bring what I write to life and share it for others enjoyment.

PBS Culture Shock

I believe that PBS could've used a better image, although this image isn't extremely violent it seems like they could've chose a better image. The video game violence "issues" seem to be directed to a younger age group, most likely kids in elementary school so in that case they could've put an image of a young child playing video games rather than some explosion going on in a game.

Video games are a form of art, they (usually) convey a story and stories are a form of art. I didn't find the images offensive, but it was difficult to decide whether this image belonged on the homepage or not. You really need to know who the audience is to decide whether or not this image is appropriate for them. I perceived the audience to be young children and that's why I believe that they could've chose a better image. None of the quotes swayed my position, they interested me but I didn't think that they connected to the topic directly enough to impact my opinion.

Murder and mayhem are part of entertainment in the media world. Action helps attract an audience, but whether the audience tries to reenact any of the violence they view is their decision. It's surely not the creators intentions to have the viewers become violent, but simply to entertain them and keep them on the edge of their seat. For certain people video games can be a social outlet for violent behaviors, but generally that's not what the designers try to do. They want you to follow their story and engage in it virtually not physically in the real world, they want you to enjoy the experience of playing as a character that you wouldn't be in real life. They want you to become that person in the game , they don't want you to actually (literally) become the violent character portrayed in the game.