Dum Dums: A Mystery Unveiled

Posted on June 5, 2012 by wellsdc

When I was a kid, every Wendy’s Kid’s Meal came with a Dum Dum lollipop. (Maybe they still do. I estimate that I last ate a Kid’s Meal circa 1986.) The Dum Dums weren’t as good as a Frosty, but they were a fixture of my childhood nonetheless.

The only flavor I remember anymore is the “mystery” flavor, complete with question marks on the wrapper. Flavors like lemon or cherry may be reliable candy mainstays, but what was that strange, elusive, ever-so-yummy mystery flavor? It actually never occurred to me to actually ask that question as a child, because I had a Dum Dum in my mouth and it would have been rude.

Now, thanks to Mental Floss, we have an answer to the age-old question of the “mystery” flavor. Actually, we may have already had an answer, since it’s right there on the Wikipedia page. Maybe a Mental Floss writer had a deadline and found an old “mystery” Dum Dum behind the fridge or something. Whatever, because now I know, and that’s what’s important.

First, we learn a little history, like how the Akron Candy Company invented the Dum Dum in 1924, and it gots its name from a sales manager named I.C. Bahr. The Spangler Candy Company bought the brand in 1953 and has manufactured it ever since. They’ve had numerous flavors over the years, but that “mystery” flavor has long enticed young & old alike with its puzzling deliciousness. (Am I overselling this?)

Some Dum Dums have wrappers with question marks where the flavor is normally printed. This was a marketing idea that made the production process run more smoothly and made eating Dum Dums more fun. The Mystery Flavor pop is a mixture of two flavors that come together when the end of one batch of candy meets the beginning of the next batch. Rather than shutting down to clean out the candy equipment between flavors, Spangler turned lemons into lemonade and made pops out of the combination of flavors – the tail end of the old, and the beginning of the new. The candy lines keep running continuously, and the Mystery Flavor pops are a surprise treat every time.

That’s fascinating, but it also helps me realize how much older I’ve gotten since I last truly enjoyed a Dum Dum. Rather than want to grab for the nearest available candy, I keep thinking of the cost-saving measure of making mystery candies rather than losing production time to clean out the machine.

I really hope someone has cleaned out that machine since 1953.

Photo credit: ‘Dumdums’ by Linuxerist [GFDL, CC-BY-SA-2.5, or CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons.

I suppose this was inevitable

Posted on June 4, 2012 by wellsdc

SyFy left quality original programming behind years ago, so I suppose a parody of a self-parody like Jersey Shore Shark Attack was bound to happen sooner or later.

It’s one thing for Gov. Chris Christie to urge people to “get the hell off the beach.” It’s another for Paulie Walnuts of “The Sopranos” to shout into a megaphone for everyone to flee the Jersey Shore before they’re eaten.

The movie “Jersey Shore Shark Attack,” premiering June 9 on the SyFy channel, is a mash-up parody of guido culture and summertime B-movie horror tropes. It features an odd assortment of actors: Paul Sorvino as the mayor, the aforementioned Tony Sirico as a boat captain, Joey Fatone as himself, and “Jersey Shore”‘s own Vinny Guadagnino as a reporter on the scene.

As for the plot, the title pretty much sums it up, but according to a news release, the film occurs during the Fourth of July weekend as “rare swarms of sharks are converging due to illegal underwater drilling.” The sharks begin to devour residents one by one. A group of Shore regulars open fire on the fishes while maintaining a healthy tanning regimen.

Remember, this is the same network, more or less, that ran Battlestar Galactica for four seasons, so you’d think it would know better. The network then proceeded to never really give Stargate: Universe a chance, so maybe this latest farce is part of a natural downward progression to oblivion.

Of course, this is also the network that foisted Shark Attack 3: Megalodon on us.

The lack of pictures in this post is deliberate, by the way.

Stan Lee Wept

Posted on June 4, 2012 by wellsdc

So, apparently this really exists:

ACC Studios has published the most politically divisive comic book ever written, Liberality For All #1 (in a series of eight issues) releases nationwide November 2, 2005 . It is an all-new take on the Orwellian future, this time with a captive society oppressed by doves, not hawks. It is the first comic book directly marketed to the “vast right-wing” audience.

While this action-packed, patriotic knee-in-the-groin to the embodiment of the ultra-left is a blatant satire of liberalism, it still asks significant questions about the end result of liberal political policies.

‘It is 2021, tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of 9/11. America is under oppression by ultra-liberal extremists who have surrendered governing authority to the United Nations. Hate speech legislation called the “Coulter Laws” have forced vocal conservatives underground. A group of bio-mechanically enhanced conservatives led by Sean Hannity, G. Gordon Liddy, Oliver North, and a young man born on September 11, 2001, set out to thwart Ambassador Usama bin Laden’s plans to nuke New York City.’

When first announced in late July, Liberality For All immediately touched off a controversy that is still raging. The resulting enthusiasm from conservatives, and simultaneous denunciation as neo-con indoctrination propaganda by those on the Left, continues to feed a firestorm on this provocative, full-color, eight-issue, comic book mini-series.

This press release is from November 1, 2005, but I had never heard of this epic controversy until just now. I had also forgotten just how stupid things got around the middle of the last decade. Lest anyone think we have presently entered an unprecedented era of self-styled conservatives completely losing their shit, I present Liberality for All. Things have been stupid for quite a while. (Incidentally, the ACC Studios webpage appears to have received its most recent update in June 2006. Perhaps its editors rage-quit after the Democratic victory in the 2006 mid-term elections.)

The “alternate cover” is pictured here. The fantasy-fulfillment element is quite remarkable. This appears to depict a one-eyed Sean Hannity, for some reason holding an Apple laptop and dressed sort of like an X-Man. The real kicker though, is G. Gordon Liddy, who would be 90 to 91 years old in 2021, riding a hog. The other cover also depicts a by-then 78 year-old Oliver North, but at least it shows him with a cane. Maybe he didn’t receive any “bio-mechanical enhancements.” It is impossible to look at this and not make a joke about how these three probably can’t look at these comic book covers without getting erections. Continue reading →

Thoughts on Game of Thrones: Blackwater Keep on Rollin’

Posted on June 3, 2012 by wellsdc

"Tyrion Battlecry" by ~Kanish, on deviantART

To all who lament television’s sharp descent into unscripted hell, “Blackwater” reminded us of what the television medium can do. This was epic storytelling at its finest. Any deficiencies in settings or backdrop, such as the facts that the magnificent city of Qarth appears to be little more than a series of rooms, and Jon Snow’s trek in beyond the Wall seems to involve walking back and forth across a single span of glacier, have led to the spectacle of the Battle of the Blackwater.

Who is the “good guy” in this battle? The lack of an easy answer to that question is at the heart of the story’s genius. We like Tyrion and want him to succeed, but his success most likely means the Lannisters’ success. We don’t much care for Stannis Baratheon, but we like Davos Seaworth. Same problem. The closest thing to a “protagonist” army that we have are those of Robb Stark and Daenerys Targaryen, and we’re beginning to see that they aren’t much better than anyone else.

This episode focused exclusively on the events of a single night in King’s Landing, so we got to see much more development of individual characters than usual. Tyrion got one of the best Braveheart speeches in television history, and finally served as a heroic character rather than a comic one (see last season’s battle fought while Tyrion was unconscious, the only time the show has ever overtly resorted to “dwarf humor.”)

Sansa demonstrated her own strength and leadership when Cersei fled their hiding place with Tommen. Unfortunately, she may have lost the only two people who ever truly protected her in King’s Landing: Tyrion, who is now wounded, and the Hound, who is running away. Cersei at least understands the importance of keeping Sansa alive, but we know that she will not step up to protect Sansa if Joffrey threatens her. Continue reading →

The Zombies are Here, and They are (Mostly) American. Or Not.

Posted on June 2, 2012 by wellsdc

Sometimes an event makes the news and it inspires reports on other similar incidents around the country. The incidents might be quite common, and only suddenly newsworthy because that first event piqued the public’s interest for one reason or another.

And then sometimes an event makes the news and is quickly followed by other similar, yet uncommon, newsworthy events. These subsequent events may or may not be related to the original one. They might simply be serendipitous (or anti-serendipitous) coincidences. Either way, the result is the same: we hear about something in the news, and then suddenly we start hearing about an ongoing string of similar events.

Events in the recent news have a theme: face eating, dismemberment, and generalized cannibalism. The question it raises is this: is there some sort of outbreak of zombie-like behavior going on; or is this something that actually happens now and then, and we’re only just now hearing about it?

To review:

A man in Florida was shot and killed by police when, in an alleged drug-fueled frenzy, he refused to stop eating a man’s face.

A man in Canada, who the press loves to keep mentioning was a gay porn star, is accused of dismembering a person and mailing body parts around.

A Maryland college student reportedly admitted to killing his roommate and eating his brain and heart. Continue reading →

Belated Memorial Day Tirade

Posted on June 1, 2012 by wellsdc

Memorial Day was observed on Monday, May 28. I was in Mexico at the time, paying for things in pesos and generally contributing nothing to the U.S. economy. Specifically, I was in Cancún, in a part of Mexico never once invaded, occupied, or wrested away from Mexico by the U.S. I’ve spent two 4th of July holidays abroad (Belarus and Spain, long story), but this was my first Memorial Day outside my home country.

I don’t usually make a big thing out of Memorial Day. I try to take a moment to appreciate the sacrifice others have made, sometimes in noble causes and sometimes not so much, that I don’t have the cojones to make. Typically, though, I find the holiday to be yet another opportunity for unabashed and shameless jingoism.

As we dive head first into what is likely to be an absurdly acrimonious election season, I expect to hear a great deal of rah-rah patriotism out of the Republican party, combined with accusations of Democrats hating the troops, blah blah blah. It’s worth a reminder of what Republicans really think of the troops.

Delegates to the Republican National Convention found a new way to take a jab at Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry’s Vietnam service record: by sporting adhesive bandages with small purple hearts on them.

Morton Blackwell, a prominent Virginia delegate, has been handing out the heart-covered bandages to delegates, who’ve worn them on their chins, cheeks, the backs of their hands and other places.

I am referring, of course, to the 2004 Republican National Convention. Continue reading →

Beware of cute things in the forest