Digesting And Spewing Pop Culture Into Your Face

That title may seem a little harsh, but this guy could hurt someone. What the fuck am I saying? This shit is hilarious. My favorite part is when he stops inside a grocery store to replenish his bananas. I always figured you just pick them up out of the sparkly boxes in the road but Mario (Remi Gaillard) proves me wrong. This is the second video in the real life Mario Kart series. Checl out his first below for even more wacky French hijinks. (via Destructoid)

I have a certain love for pixel art. It’s a great representation of a simpler time in video games. That bathroom up there is a great example of custom pixel art. Many an art project has been started with perler beads and the transition to tile only seems appropriate as YouTube user, dracoony1978sg, has taken on that task with spectacular results. It would be  a bit frightening while using the shower but who cares as long as it looks cool. If you’d like, you can check out the making of video below. (via NeoGAF)

Apparently this artwork is from a canned spec series that would have followed Bruce Wayne in his high school exploits. The art style is quite interesting, but an emo Joker? Really? This seems to partly inspired by Teen Titans and Smallville and could have been an interesting show. The artists who were tasked with the development of the show, Celeste Green and Jeffrey Thomas, have posted these pics and some info on their blog. I love to see concept art for stuff like this and it’s even cooler when it’s failed projects that would otherwise never see the light of day. Here’s the pitch that they posted:

The Story Synopsis:
We all go through incredible changes as teenagers: growth spurts, bad skin, a sudden insatiable need to uphold justice and avenge your murdered parents…. Well, that is if you’re Bruce Wayne.
As if being a freshman at Gotham High wasn’t tough enough, Bruce’s insomnia and technological fascinations are taking their toll. Instead of spending his time studying, he has begun to obsess over an emerging personality trait: Batman. But under the watchful eye of his guardian and steward, Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce is forced to put his intelligence to good use: graduating high school. But given his classmates, can Bruce survive Gotham High?

Hit the gallery below for some high res pics. (via io9)

Also, for today, Amazon has the complete Superman; The Animated Series for just $21. That’s a pretty good deal for a great show.

This is almost as cool as the last custom Yoshi I posted about. In fact if you are just going to go by Yoshi’s tongue, this disgusting looking thing wins. I mean, his tongue is hanging out of the side of his mouth through his teeth.

The artist, Kodykoala, who also happened to make Mecha Yoshi, has it up for sale on eBay. It’s got about a day left and currently sits at about $150. I’m sure this will go for quite a bit more so proceed with caution. Check out the gallery below for more pics. (via Game Sniped)

It look s like Yoshi has taken this whole Smash Bros. thing to the next level. In fact he may be able to kick the shit out of Samus. This is a custom 9″ vinyl Yoshi toy and it’s pretty damn cool. The artist, KodyKoala, has ideas to expand this with Mario and Luigi. I also know that there is a Donkey Kong vinyl this size out there so hopefully he hits that one up as well. He’s got a ton of pics up on his Flickr page and you can also check some out in my gallery. (via Tiny Cartridge)

I’m about as addicted as you can get with the iOS game, Angry Birds.  I’m guessing that, had this version been around in my youth, that addiction would have been ten-fold by now. Thankfully these great images are just a bit of retcon. I love the inclusion of the most recent Winter theme pack. (via Gizmodo)

I always liked the look of J.J. Abrams production company mascot. I like robots though so that isn’t really a surprise. What is a surprise, is that the mascot has been licensed into a 10″ maquette and given a limited run of 1000. The sculpt looks to have turned out fantastic and at only $89.95 it seems like a pretty good deal. You can check out the detailed pics in the gallery below. As an added bonus an alternate arm with everyone’s favorite fake product, Slusho, is included in its hand. You can pre-order here. (via Tomopop)

A little over a month ago, I showed you the prototype for the 10-Doh! resin toy by Squid Kids Ink. At the recent Designer Con show in Pasadena, Squid Kids commissioned some artists to have a go at their fledgling series and the results are pretty outstanding. The one above is by Paul Wilson and perfectly captures the video game crash of the early 80′s and Nintendo’s subsequent domination for the next few console generations. My favorite though has to be the Rumble cart and Soundwave NES console. These two characters are from Transformers and they have been artfully recreated into a video game version by the artist, Mike Petrosky.

The paint job on that NES is crazy. Here’s a picture of Rumble and Soundwave in their original Transformer’s incarnation just for some reference.

My original NES shit the bed recently and I’ve been wondering what to do with it so I now have an idea. Some of the other outstanding ones at the show were this Super Panda Cub version by Linda Hong. I really dig the addition of plush to it.

This Ash version from Army of Darkness and The Evil Dead series is killer and bloodily mangled. By Ayleen Gasper.

Here’s another 80′s cartoon classic in a Skeletor version.

Some of these may still be available to purchase but you’d have to get in touch with Squid Kids. They have blank versions for sale at their store for $35 if you’d like to take a whack at making your own funky version. Also check my gallery out below for some of my other favorites and the Squid Kids blog for all the details on the show.

A few weeks back I posted a story about a young boy, Aidan, who loves to draw. Aidan is also battling cancer. It sucks that he has to go through this at such a young age but he’s battling the cancer and the medical bills by selling outstanding prints of his personal art. My girlfriend and I decided on two of the prints that we loved and ordered awya knowing we’d get some great art and help this amazing kid.

Fast forward to today and our prints arrived all packed up. and ready for framing. It took about a month to get them but there is a great reason for that as Aidan’s story hit the mainstream press and orders for his prints went through the roof. From MSNBC:

My lucky number was 60; I just wanted to sell 60 prints,” Ostein (Aidan’s Aunt) said. “And now here we are at 2,460. … I have two printers constantly going in my dining room. In between taking care of my baby, I’ve been trying to fill orders.

That’s just fucking awesome and I’m glad to have helped Aidan out. You can still donate or order his prints at his website, Aid For Aidan, so if you want head on over to check ‘em out.

Lego builder extraordinaire, Benny Brickster, has that special Lego building skill I can only dream about or I can muster by reading some build instructions. He’s made a wearable Master Chief helmet out of the beloved bricks and I’m mighty impressed. His Flickr page is chock full of images of his build as well as some of his other Halo creations including a mini-fig scale Scorpion tank from the venerable FPS series. Check out some of his work in the gallery below and hit up his Flickr page for some truly awe inspiring images. (via The Brothers Brick)