In her MTV mini documentary “My Crazy Beautiful Life”, which was filmed by her brother and airs episode/part 5 tonight, a large part of her focus is on her intense fan base. In episode three, we meet Dante, a fan in his 30′s (a “Dinosaur”, a nickname from a Ke$ha song about older guys), who is pulled up on stage after Ke$ha sneaks a peak at an interview he did on camera before the concert. In episode one, a memorable fan speaks out, and makes Ke$ha choke up a bit, about how he is bullied in school and how her music gives him a place to escape.

The MTV mini doc is honest, gritty, and you are sure to walk away feeling a little more Animal-istic. Visit Ke$ha’s site and if you feel so inclined as to want to join her party in a more intimate way, become a “convert” or “missionary” on in her fan club, Ke$ha’s Family! She is touring America this summer, so be sure to catch her!

• “This One Goes Out To You” Backstreet Boys
• “Not Afraid” Eminem
• “Touch my Hand” David Archeletta
• “Paparazzi” Lady Gaga
• “Stan” Eminem
• “The Queen” Lady Gaga
• “Letter from a Fan” Barry Manilow
• more from Spinner.com
• more to be added soon!

from the Dearly Departed Facebook page

People of all ages and backgrounds pay billions to see movies, watch cable/satellite TV shows, or buy books having to do with murder or instances of violence. Whether they be fictional tales or re-imaginings of historical events, morbid curiosity is hard to deny.

It is worth asking then why the Dearly Departed Tour Line in Los Angeles, situated in Hollywood, gets some flak, as well as their fans, known as Death Hags. An atypical tour of Tinsel Town, the company focuses on the dark history of the film industry’s birth place. From murder to controversy and all in between, the tour’s namesake is a once-a-month Helter Skelter tour, exploring the history and locations of the Tate-LaBianca murders, or the Manson Family Murders, of 1969 (save for the Polanski-Tate house, which was torn down in the 1990′s).

from the Dearly Departed Facebook page

Putting aside the topic of the quality of the tour, which is spectacular and well worth the money spent, there is one overwhelming counter-point to those who call the tour abnormal, as well as the Death Hags who attend the excursions: Do you dare call Civil War re-enactors morbid, or those who gawk at the relics pulled from the tombs of those long dead now situated in museums weirdos, or anyone who chooses to become an undertaker or a crime scene investigator sick in the head?

Death is part of all our lives, celebrity deaths are part of our human history, and the Death Hags have a hobby that calls for no shame. To witness a Dearly Departed Tour in person, visit their site to book a trip, or check out their documentary on the Tate/LaBianca events on NetFlix,, Hulu or iTunes called “Six Degrees of Helter Skelter”. The Dearly Departed Facebook page is HERE.

photo credit TeamJack.com

In the vast landscape of podcasting available to internet users, there is no doubt many of the these feeds are devoted to aspects and opinions on the many channels of pop culture. Standing high above all of them when it comes to the point of view of what it means to be a fanatic is Team Jack, part of the Smodco  Broadcasting family brought to you by Kevin Smith. 

Jack Morrissey, the namesake of Team Jack, was approached by film maker Smith to podcast due not only to his knowledge of pop culture, but for his radio voice, as he dubs it. Instead of focusing directly on the mediums of film or otherwise that Jack and his co-hosts Matt Cohen and Greg Yolen are interested in, his podcast became focused on the voice of, the analyzation of, and the sense of community in being a fanatic. 

photo credit TeamJack.com

Jack has spoken in what has recently hit the fifty episodes mark of his show not only about the fandoms he is passionate about (he loves old movie theaters and “Battlestar Galactica”, to mention a few), but how he became more focused on the subject of fanaticism. Jack is the partner of Bill Condon, who directed the final two parts of the “Twilight” saga, and he very much involved himself in making sure the opinions of the fandom were heard in a direct way. He ended up walking away with much more by the time the second film was gearing up to be released.

photo credit TeamJack.com

Close knit members of the literal Team Jack, the ladies who help him handle fan feedback for his shows and fulfill many other duties, have become a serious part of his life. He has often had a few of them on individual shows, recorded in his home no less, to either talk about the “Twilight” fandom, other fan movements/communities, or in two cases, having a large amount of Team Jack members huddled into his hotel room to record emotional podcasts as they were gearing up for “Twilight” to come to a close. He even took it upon himself to camp out overnight with fans at San Diego Comic Con 2012, just so he could further try to understand the TwiHards better.   

 ”Everybody gets to pick their own flavor of obsession,” Jack said of literary and movie fandoms on Plus One Per Diem, which was his first appearance on a podcast before Team Jack came into being. “People form their own relationships with those characters through their own personal experience.”

photo credit TeamJack.com

The Team Jack co-hosts are also very aware of how fanatacism or major involvement in pop culture can change lives. Greg met his wife while working on the “Breaking Dawn” sets and Matt has not only been featured on the fan documentary “The People vs George Lucas”, but has revealed on the podcast that he has a Kermit the Frog tattoo symbolizing his lifelong love of The Muppets.

 Many times on Jack’s show, there is talk of pop culture changing one’s life. To quote Matt Cohen’s Kermit tattoo, it just may be possible that being a fanatic can help “Write your own ending.” 

LINKS: Official Team Jack show page HERE, the Team Jack fan-handled main site HERE and the Team Jack index of past shows HERE.

Photo Credit Amanda Rosenblatt

The sun is beginning to set on a Sunday evening in Rhode Island, but the
temperature is dropping faster than the light. Despite the cold, a small
group of fans waits outside the stage exit of Edwards Hall of URI.

Fan-Culture.org showed up at the scene first around 4 p.m., three hours
before Norman Reedus (“The Walking Dead”, “Boondock Saints”) was to show
up for a speaking engagement at the University. The fans slowly began to
trickle in, with one wearing a homemade shirt that said “go Norm go” and
another wearing a shirt that said “Keep Calm and Kill Zombies”. Everyone
was in great spirits and the quiet chattering exploded into excitement
when Norman pulled in around 5:50 p.m.

Photo credit Amanda Rosenblatt

Reedus, who is well known among fans to be very accomodating to them,
gladly took photos, accepted gifts, signed items and spoke with the early
birds, despite management politely reminding him they had to get in the
building to prepare.

Once Reedus had no choice but to go in, fans mulled about to either wait
to be let in, while others head over to the nearby student village where
little restaurants and shops are set up. Kim Knox of Massachusetts, who
proudly wore her signed “Daryl Dies, We Riot” shirt (Darly is Reedus’
character on TWD), talks about how TWD brought her and her boyfriend
together.

Photo credit Amanda Rosenblatt

“We knew eachother mutually, but then my friend at a party said to him
that I also watched TWD,” she states. “We got into an argument about
Andrea versus Michonne [TWD characters], and it just worked.” She also
gushed over her excitement that this was their first roadtrip, coming down
from mid-Massachusetts to the main URI campus.

The Reedus event started around 7:15 p.m., giving late-comers plenty of
time to be seated and not miss anything. The actor and artist was very
eager to please fans during the Q&A time asking for signatures or hugs or
to even run up to the balcony to take group photos for those in the “cheap
seats” (everyone paid the same price for tickets – URI students paid $12,
non-students paid $20, but you either had orchestra or balcony level for
either price, pending on availability).

photo credit Amanda Rosenblatt

At one point during the main moderator session, Norman was asked if he
preferred acting in feature films or in TWD, and he responded that he
prefers TWD because of the sense of community the actors and crew can
share with fans. “The actors feel like it’s our show, the producers feel
like it’s our show, and the fans feel like it’s our show. It’s not the
big-wig’s show. It’s OUR show.”

Follow Norman HERE on Twitter, and check out the following fan-culture.org
official videos from the event:
Reedus with fans -HERE
Main event with questions – HERE
Bonus footage – HERE

More photos from event HERE

Edward vs R: Why ‘Warm Bodies’ is not ‘Twlight’. Photo from ScreenCrush.com

Here we are again, dear readers. Another blog where I truly do not want to get personal, but this article is about more than the namesakes it features. This is about hopefully distinguishing some large arguments in regards to film comparisons by taking a fanatic point of view and applying it with facts as well as reasoning. Looking beyond aesthetics and dissecting the subjects at hand. Basically, in layman’s terms, I really hope after reading this, people stop whining about why “Warm Bodies” is the same thing as “Twilight”.

To start, those who were expecting “Warm Bodies” to be a box office failure – after opening weekend and months of advance/test screenings, as of Feb 5th 2013, the film is Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with a score of 77% with an 83% audience rating, a B+ CinemaScore, and even the very finicky folks of MetaCritic give the film a 58/100 (a “yellow” score means mixed reviews). The movie also made an unexpected $20mil opening weekend haul, which looks promising re: the film making back and surpassing it’s $30mil budget. This may be mostly thanks to the PG13 rating in the market on this opening weekend which was saturated with R ratings, but it’s impressive a zombie Rom-Com beat out a cinema veteran like Sylvester Stallone! If this is the only criteria you base a film off of for it’s worth, then thanks for coming, folks. Don’t forget to tip your waitress on the way out.

Anyway, to clear out some critical cobwebs I hear from other fellow fanatics online. I had seen a complaint that “Warm Bodies” would have been original if it was released “like, 10 years ago when Twilight first came out”. “Twilight”, the first novel in the series by Stephenie Meyer, was published in 2005 (not ten years ago) with the first film having been released 2009 (still not ten years ago), while “Warm Bodies” began as a short story by the author Isaac Marion who then developed it into a book in 2010 (yes, still not ten years ago). And in the positive reviews for “Warm Bodies”, one comes from Meyer herself! The “Twilight” creator obviously needs no help in the publicity department and doesn’t need to take the time to give public kudos to a story that is now cinematically being criticized as copying the vampire saga, but she did. Refreshing that Meyer did not take a Stephen King route in regards to literary competition.

One of three different covers for “Warm Bodies” by Isaac Marion

In terms of the story from the books and not the films, “Warm Bodies” is assumed to be a young adult book just because the movie was made by Summit, who churned out the “Twilight” series over the years. As someone who read “Warm Bodies” and the prequel “The New Hunger”, I can assure you that Marion’s tales are not young adult, or they could be under supervision of a parent who decides when it’s appropriate for their teen child (mid to late teens, I’d say) to read books containing many repetitions of the “F” word, detailed descriptions of zombies tearing apart humans, pot smoking, and even some zombie sex thrown in the mix. I am sure teens are no stranger to these concepts, but I hate thinking of overprotective parents coming back and blaming Marion for planting the ideas in their fragile little brains. Basically, if you think an 11 year old would have nightmares watching “The Walking Dead” on AMC, “Warm Bodies” is not appropriate yet. This is akin to “Breaking Dawn” in the “Twilight” literary series, which features the wedding night of Bella and Edward, consummating their marriage, as well as a very gruesome, violent child birth, and parents wondering when it is okay for their kids to read it. Needless to say, though, after research since I have not read the “Twilight” books yet, there appears to be no cussing or detailing of sexual encounters in Meyer’s writing (please correct me if I’m wrong, readers). Related, but I have to thank the Team Jack podcast and the ladies of Team Jack, as well as Nuttymadam, for their insight into the “Twilight” series in various forums for helping my research, by the way!

In terms of marketing and products, “Twilight” is a juggernaut. There are “Twilight” dolls, shirts, notebooks, jewelry, Burger King toys, and I’m sure any item you’d need in day to day life can be found in relation to the franchise. This is not an insult in anyway, but with all due respect, “Warm Bodies” had a very modest marketing campaign with very little merchandising before the release weekend (Hot Topic carried a few themed shirts with a promotion of free Valentines Cards if you purchased a “Warm Bodies” item), but it still did surprisingly well. Also, all the “Twilight” films have their own soundtrack for each installment, while “Warm Bodies” does not. You can, however, find the film track-listing here and it’s refreshing that you can buy all the songs from the film that you want on iTunes without being hit with the pesky “buy the whole album for that ONE song” ultimatum. I’d also suggest checking out the album “Holy Weather” by Civil Twilight, as I feel like all the songs together comprise a kind of unofficial soundtrack for the film.

A group of survivors scavenge for supplies in “Warm Bodies” Image from GameZone.com

Finally, I come to the heart of the matter: the story. What makes “Warm Bodies” down to the bone, no pun intended, different from “Twilight”. In Meyer’s world of sparkling vampires and menacing werewolves, life goes on as normal for those in Edward and Bella’s world, unaware of the mystery that surrounds them. Kids still go to high school, to their proms, drive in their cars, and eat at the local diner. Until Bella confronts Edward about his secret and had she not known Jacob, who planted the thought in her mind, she would have been none-the-wiser he was a vampire. The world of “R” the Zombie and Julie Grigio is drastically, heart-breakingly different. Complete collapse of civilization has left both communities, the Living and the Dead, scavenging for what they need to survive and very aware of one another. When I look at “R”, my first impulse isn’t to take him home to mom. Edward, while a bit moody for my taste, still appears human and imposes no immediate threat to his surroundings. “R” and his friends are, frankly, terrifying and blatantly not human. Sure, certain fans want to get into the aesthetic logistics of why the films are identical, but they are not sinking their teeth into the meat of both stories. Are these zombie analogies doing anything for you guys, by the way? Sorry. Anyway.

Basically, if you want to compare movies to this basic principle of the natural born killer taking a drastic personality turn outside their nature, then sure, “Warm Bodies” is the same as “Twilight”. Then “Twilight” is the same as “Terminator 2″ (a robot built for the destruction of humans who instead saves man kind), and “Terminator 2″ is the same as “Silence of the Lambs” (a cannibal psychopath killer spares Clarice, an FBI agent, who he’s enamored with), and “Silence of the Lambs” is the same as “Casablanca” which is the same as “The Green Mile”, and so on and so forth. As they say in “Fight Club”, everything is just a copy of a copy of a copy, right?

“Haxbee is a made up name, I’ll be honest with you,” he says. “But what I’d like for it to stand for is, if I do my job right, is to stand for honesty and excellence.”

Okay but seriously, what does Haxbee do? “We are primarily a company that deals with collectibles, pop culture and entertainment related. I’ve been doing this for 14 years, and this is me going out on my own, doing what I enjoy doing.”

If Fong looks familiar to you, then you might have seen him on Syfy’s Hollywood Treasure. The reality show was based on the inner workings of Profiles in History, which Fong parted ways with on good terms to start this new venture.

Fong has recently taken in an expansive collection of hero costumes from The Hunger Games starring Jennifer Lawrence, Elizabeth Banks, Stanley Tucci, and more powerhouse actors. Worthwhile pieces to mention are the leather hunting boots of Katniss Everdeen from the beginning of the film, colorful pieces from the character Effie Trinket, and wonderfully flamboyant outfits belonging to the charismatic Caesar Flickerman.

“What I really want to do is take this [the collection] out on the road and get engaged with fans,”  “Do things where I can interact more with fans.”

“I’m just trying to live in the moment,” Fong says humbly, despite a bright and involved year ahead of him of tours and more. May the odds be ever in his favor!

To listen to Fong speak more in depth about Haxbee, listen to his recent interview with the BlogTalkRadio channel of news agency Wormhole Riders here, and be sure to follow him on Twitter, as well as the Haxbee and Blacksparrow Auctions Twitter accounts.

A teenaged YouTuber with over 5 million views and over 55k subs, Laden is famous for his spoofs of the Travel Channel show “Ghost Adventures” and it’s charismatic lead men Zak, Nick and Aaron. His lampooning of the trio with his friends has even landed him on the show as a guest investigator after winning a music video contest.

Though he had made different videos before this outside of the spoof category, it seemed that the “GA” bits were a sure bet. Taking a leap of faith with his following over the last couple of years, Laden with help from his creative friends has continued to produce original content and more spoofs. Some pieces to check out would be his “Iron Man” spoof, his spoof of “Jersey Shore” called “Teenage TV”, and his “Dark Knight Rises” spoof.

The truth? Grant talks about it directly to the fans and inquiring minds  in this mini film, a Fan-Culture.org production featuring lush pieces of live music from CarpetShark, with a no-frills bonus video HERE with full interviews. Transcripts of videos can be made upon request.