In the earlier cases I mentioned, the titles, no matter how literal, came as a result of the film itself. The original title for Alien was Star Beast, yet for a movie so blue collar and industrial, Alien better served the tone and could apply to both the creature and the crew of the Nostromo being foreign in outer space. To go a different way with a Ridley Scott movie, Blade Runner is based on the Philip K. Dick novel, “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?,” which is a little long for a marquee, so it was changed to Blade Runner. Problem is, “Blade Runner” was a book about illegal smuggling of medical supplies in Africa, but Scott liked the title and so optioned the book just to use it in something. Aside from a couple of throwaway lines added to tie it up, Blade Runner has nothing to do with running blades or running on blades or blades at all. If someone asked you to describe Blade Runner the words “blade” and “runner” would never appear anywhere in it, but that’s not the point. The important thing is that Blade Runner is a fucking fantastic title and one that sits in the minds of people forever.

Describe Man on a Ledge. It’s about a man… who’s on a ledge. Other stuff happens, sure, but essentially it’s a man who is out on a ledge. The sequel will probably be Man on a Limb, about a man who climbs a tree and refuses to come down, but I fear it’d be too deep for people. Too many titles nowadays are neither intriguing nor clever; they’re literally just the pitch or general conceit of the film. What’s the concept? It’s snakes on a plane. I know, let’s call it Viper Flight or Cobra Cruise or Venom at 50,000 Ft. No, idiot, we’re calling it Snakes on a Plane because that’s what it’s about. There was a movie a few years ago about fighting and it was just called Fighting. They’re not even trying anymore!  Tyler Perry, the billionaire behind all those movies you’ve never seen, is coming out with a movie called Good Deeds about a guy named Wesley Deeds who does good things. For fuck sake! “See, his name is Deeds and he does deeds, so it works in two ways.” No it doesn’t! It’s the same obvious way twice! What about the new Disney movie John Carter? I’m aware the book series and film are about a guy whose name is in fact John Carter, but he goes to fucking MARS and fights in a gladiator arena with giant monsters and shit. But no, John Carter, that’ll be good.

And it’s not even just that the titles are too obvious. Some of them have zero to do with the movie. Safe House takes place in a safe house, fine, but the movie Lock-Out, about a guy having to rescue the president’s daughter from a prison in outer space, is not about being locked out from anywhere. But, boy, it sure sounds like something they’d do in a prison. Make up your mind.

The following are famous, good-titled movies and what they probably would be titled if they came out today:

Star Wars – Spaceships

The Silence of the Lambs – Fat Women Get Skinned

A Clockwork Orange – A Violent Delinquent Gets Reformed, Kinda

Double Indemnity – Insurance Fraud

Back to the Future – Old Car Time Machine

Reservoir Dogs – Men in Ties

Die Hard – Nothing Lasts Forever (which is the actual title of the novel upon which the film is based)

The Great Escape – Most Of The People Die

So the point of all this is that I’m easily irritated. The End.

-Kanderson wants to remind everyone that not everything needs a point. Follow him on TWITTER

As you can see below, there are LEGO representations of all nine members of the fellowship as well as several baddies. Playsets will start being released in June with ones based on Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey dropping this December.

Some of the cooler sounding sets will include: The Battle of Weathertop, The Mines of Moria, and, my personal favorite, the Battle of Helm’s Deep. I have neither the money nor the space for all these, but an adult male can dream, can’t he? Keep an eye on LEGO’s official LOTR site for descriptions when they become available.

The Fellowship

The Bad Guys

-Kanderson’s childlike glee about this can only be matched by the glee he gets when people follow him on TWITTER

Norman Wilson Edmund died Tuesday. He was 95, and he was a hero of mine. Oh, I didn’t know much about him, but there was only one thing I needed to know: He was the founder of Edmund Scientific, which, for a nerdy kid growing up in a faceless mid-Atlantic suburb back in the pre-Internet days, was the greatest catalog ever.

I was a science geek in my formative years. I was destined for a career in science until college, when Chem 102 (Organic), my creative streak, and my interest in the media pretty much wiped that out. But as a kid, one of the highlights of every year was when my father would return from the New Jersey Education Association’s Teachers’ Convention in Atlantic City with a copy of that year’s Edmund Scientific catalog. It was, along with the Phillies and Mets yearbooks I would annually procure and maybe The Sporting News, the single most influential publication of my childhood. (More adult publications came later. Get your mind away from there)

Photo: Halfblue (via Wikipedia)

What was it? It was, as the video above (from someone selling the 1972 catalog on eBay) shows, a thick pamphlet from a store in Barrington, New Jersey, somewhere in Camden County, showing off only the most amazing collection of science gadgets, gizmos, and curios I’d ever seen: weather balloons, microscopes, telescopes, drinking crows, little discs that would jump off the table, black lights, prisms, freaky lens filters, fiber optic lamps, all sorts of surplus optics…. There was not one thing in that catalog I wouldn’t have wanted. Not that I had any use for most of it, but I wanted it all. I wanted to see the stars, to bend light, to send a balloon to space, to… well, I didn’t know what I could do with a lot of it, but I knew I wanted it.

And I couldn’t afford any of that stuff, so the catalog was the best I could do. But it was the Edmund Scientific catalog that helped nurture a love of, and respect for, science that’s lasted all these decades, even though I ended up not really having the aptitude to do anything with it, or even retain the knowledge that college organic chemistry knocked out of me. (Whenever Chris gets on a real science roll on the podcast, I can only strain to remember all the things I once learned and eagerly absorbed. It’s been a looooonnnnng time) The Edmund family still runs the optics company; Edmund Scientific, run, it appears, by another company, still exists, and there’s still a catalog (the last time I saw one was in the studio at Y107 back when Chris was the morning co-host) but they don’t have the Barrington store and it’s not the same when you’re not a kid.

Or is it? When I heard that the founder had died, I went online and the current incarnation of the company has a lot of what I remember desperately wanting as a kid, and more. Drinking crows, Buckyballs, the star and planet locator, potato clocks, weather gear, magnetic stuff, it’s all there, and for a moment, I was a kid again, only, more dangerously, a kid with credit cards. If only I had those when I was 11 years old, paging through the Edmund Scientific catalog and dreaming of a house full of wonder.

Thank you, N.W. Edmund.

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Some parents want to embarrass their children. But not all parents can reach the level of humiliation that stay at home dad Dale Price did. If a “nerdist” is someone who turns their nerdiness into art, Price fits the bill perfectly. For over six months, he waved his son off to school like many other parents. But unlike other parents, Price added a superhero/gamer flair to those special moments. From Wonder Woman to Mario, he had a different costume EVERY DAY specifically for his 30 second cameo. Remember, there are no small parts, only small actors! Price’s dedication alone makes him an awesome nerdist, and even his son is now amused by the gag. Here are some of Price’s zealous creations.

Anjeanette’s BLOG

Anjeanette’s TWITTER

A lot of people ask me how I have a popular twitter account without being a celebrity. It’s really not that difficult, provided you having something to say. So here are some simple tips for being a noteworthy tweeter.

1) You have to be WORTH following. People ask me all the time how they can get a lot of followers. Why would ANYONE want to follow you? Are you interesting? Funny? Are you an expert in any particular field? No one wants to follow you to hear how awesome your weekend was (and let’s be honest, it probably wasn’t that awesome), or to read your conversations with friends. Be worthy.

2) Quality over quantity. If someone follows you it’s because they’re interested in you, not obsessed with you. Don’t tweet nonstop. Five or less tweets a day is a good rule of thumb (and a rule I just made up!)

3) Engage with other users who are similar to you. Follow each other and encourage one another. I know a lot of people like to have a clean timeline (myself included) and don’t like to have a bunch of “@” replies. This is fine, but if you are new to twitter I would definitely take the time to reach out via replies. They can always be deleted later. You can also direct message and/or “fav” tweets. Bottom line, be social!

4) Lastly, if you want people to follow you, you have to tweet regularly. Always stick to quality over quantity, but don’t go multiple days without tweeting either. This sounds easy but is actually the hardest one. I have personally helped numerous people set up twitter accounts and blogs where they are excited to start and then abandon the process a week later. No one wants to follow someone with little content who only tweets sporadically.

So to recap: Be Worthy. Quality over Quantity. Engage. Commit.

And if you have any other tweet-related questions (or any questions for that matter), just ask me!

And of course, don’t forget to follow me on Twitter.

Anjeanette’s BLOG

Anjeanette’s TWITTER

And… scene.

2011′s over, and at this writing, it’s already 2012 in some places. By the time you read this, it may already be the New Year. For me, a new year isn’t that big a deal, to be honest. It’s sort of arbitrary to measure things by this date, but, hey, any excuse to party, right? Not that I party. My wife and I will celebrate the New Year the way we always do, watching the ball drop in New York (three hours earlier than midnight here) on TV, watching some more TV, and falling asleep at a reasonable hour, because we have Teh Old. Besides, no way do I want to be on the road on New Year’s Eve. Driving around here is unsafe even when people AREN’T drinking.

In any event, it’s de rigueur to look back on the previous twelve-month period on December 31st, and 2011 was, by any measure, a huge one for Nerdist Industries. For one thing, Nerdist Industries became, basically, a thing. And then there was the continued success of the Nerdist Podcast, the addition of several new successful podcasts, the BBC America specials, the book, NerdMelt, the alliance with GeekChicDaily, the Nerdist Channel on YouTube, the live shows… I know there’s more, but it’s all mind-boggling. It seemed like I was always getting calls like this:

(phone rings)

ME: Yeah?

CHRIS: Hey, it’s Chris.

ME: Hey, Chris, what’s up?

CHRIS: Oh, nothing, just… we’re taking over Mars.

ME: Mars.

CHRIS: So… that’s cool.

ME: The planet or the candy company?

CHRIS: Both.

ME: Am I gonna have to commute?

At least, that’s what it seemed like. So it was a good year for Nerdist Industries and Nerdist.com, and we’re looking forward to more in 2012. And I suppose this is as good a time as any to thank Chris for letting me be a small part of this amazing thing, to thank our many contributors for their great work this year, and to thank you, our readers and listeners, for sticking with us and supporting all of our various ventures. Have a safe and fun holiday.

Okay, Zo and Joe, play us out:

But what you really want to hear is the same floppies playing “Party Rock Anthem,” right? No? Here it is anyway:

YouTube user MrSolidSnake745 has done a lot of these, many of themes from video games but also the infamous “Never Gonna Give You Up.” BECAUSE HE CAN. Go check out his library of treasured classics done noisy-floppy-drive style by clicking here. And no fair saying you’re too young to remember floppy disk drives.

HT: BuzzFeed

I seriously could not stop laughing at this. Thanks to @skydart for the link!

As part of the promotion for The Nerdist: The Year in Review, BBC America put together this behind-the-scenes video talking to Chris, Mike Phirman, Wil Wheaton, and some of the folks in the studio audience about the changing status of the nerd in society. It’s all about how we all got ostracized and/or beaten up and/or ignored in the past, but how nerds now rule the world. Although I’m still waiting to assume power, myself, so I’m not sure about the ruling the world part. Maybe I just have to wait my turn.

In any event, it’s a good video, and it’s another reminder that — can we say this in unison by now? — The Nerdist: Year in Review will be airing Christmas Eve, 9/8c, on BBC America.