I've been a fan of Aqua Teen Hunger Force for a while...most of the Adult Swim cartoons for that matter. So when I heard a while ago they were making an Aqua Teen movie I was happy.
I was also amused at how wierd the US has gotten when a publicity thing for the Aqua Teen show and movie went very wrong yesterday in Boston. A company had made a few dozen little electrical metal gadgets with blinky LEDs and motion sensors in the shape of a few characters of the show and put them all over the city wed night. Did it work? Well, the city freaked out and shut down major arteries and had police and fire departments out removing the "fake bombs" with their bomb squads. The people who did it were arrested, and the city wants them to pay damages for al the trouble caused. And the oddest thing about it was when the 2 guys were released on bail they were met by press on their way out. As they were advised to not talk about things by their lawyer they responded to all press queries with comments and questions about 70s hair cuts and styles. It was quite amusing. The press kept asking them questions after their lawyer said they had been advised not to talk and they kept giving joke answers. The lawyer finally said "if you feel your time is being wasted you CAN go you know" and they did leave, but the reporters kept asking questions about terrorism and if the men were happy at all the trouble they caused and made them come off as jerks. Maybe they did take it a little too lightly, but what would you do in a situation like this? It's just absurd.
I mean how can you hold them responsible for the city freaking out over this?
The signs were even lighting up with the shapes of one of the characters on the show (giving the finger). There's a photo of the display in the news articles I've linked to. Even if I'd never seen the Spacecataz character after looking at it I wouldn't think - "hey a bomb!".
Hopefully there won't be a stupid campaign against the movie from all this. I mean, it's just a cartoon...
This quote in particular bothers me:
"Russ Knocke, a spokesman for the Homeland Security Department, condemned the hoax.
'Hoaxes are a tremendous burden on local law enforcement and counter-terrorism resources and there's absolutely no place for them in a post-9/11 world,' he said."
So now the TV show is responsible for the fact that the public is so freaked out by terror alerts and all the other crap going on in the US that they thought it was a hoax? It's right up there with freedom fries for sheer bizzarity.
It's all a bit too wierd for me...if you ask me, this shouldn't have happened in the first place.
AMBER ALERT UPDATE: want to see them put them up?
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2a64964ab9
(sorry no link on mac...have to just copy and paste the old fashioned way).
5 comments:
Chicken Little meets McCarthyism, with some Witch Burning tossed in for good measure. Land of the free.
ps. We owe you guys a phone call but I am waiting for Kristi to be back in town.
Any likeness to the Paul McCartney awareness society is purely coincidental...
Yeah, but they were on bridges, hospitals, freeway supports. And noticed during the day, when the lights were not visible, and they were black boxes with tape and wires coming out. Seen from any distance, or from any angle but the front, they did indeed look like bombs
And, obviously, a bomb couldn't have an ad on it for camouflage. Had the cops just ignored it, and there had been a bomb... Maybe it was a little paranoid, but this is what we pay them to do, guard public safety, not "get the joke."
The guys hired to put them up are facing lesser charges, and I suspect will wind up on probation, or with suspended sentences. Turner Broadcasting is paying the costs - like if I did something stupid and needed wilderness rescue and was subsequently sent a bill.
The media got what it deserved, and it generally doing a poor job of reporting it. Even so, those two guys really should have just shut their traps, instead of coming across as tools. Maybe it was funny on the other side of the country, out of context, but right here, not so much.
And, no, I wasn't thinking it was foreign terrorists. But we grow our own violent nutjobs locally, abundantly, and that has nothing to do with Homeland Security (the Real New McCarthyism.)
Luke Helder and his plan to draw a Smiley Face across the US, in Bombs!
I suppose taking a step back it was a bit of a gut reaction, but I am one of those "believe the best" people. I know there are lots of nutjobs out there, but sometimes I wonder how paranoid we need to be?
I mean we had a "white" powder freak out here recently in my home town...which is a small city in the middle of nowhere.
I just don't want to turn into a world of paranoid untrusting crazies...maybe I'm just turning into a hippie or something. I don't know.
I suppose if Turner had just thought for a bit they could've notified the city about what was happening so they would've known what was up and it might've prevented a whole lot of hassle.
Yeah, good thing it only took them three weeks to spot the "bombs." I feel safer already.
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