“war. war never changes.” — call of duty death screen

but why? why shouldn’t war change for the better? i’m afraid the showrunners for war have simply run out ideas to keep the content fresh, preferring instead to rest on their laurels of such popular wars as the world war sequel and the classic, genre-bending “whodunnit” conflict between the US and entire middle east that ran from 2003 to like, yesterday. the decision to cancel that series was more bold than the last five to ten years of the show anyway, so i have to give props for that.

so with the genre becoming increasingly stale and viewer interest at an all time low, what can be done to revitalize war for a new generation?

obviously i have an answer for that question, otherwise i wouldn’t be asking it. first of all, get rid of the guns. they’re so old hat. second, turn the United Nations into referees. we’re all tired of this fantastical notion of a single world government, anyway. and don’t even get me started on their “peacekeeping” efforts. “The UN Condemns… blah blah blah.” nobody cares what the UN condemns. the UN would condemn this blog if they knew about it.

so no guns, UN as the zebras, now what? now we play tag. we play red rover, we play floor is lava, whatever the situation and warring factions call for and agree upon. i think the topography might have some influence on what war game is chosen, like if you’re warring in a forest you might choose to play hide and seek with all those awesome trees to hide behind. red rover would probably lend itself well to an open field. you get the idea.

“red rover, red rover, send vladimir putin” over! putin, knowing all along this was coming but unable to back down, wipes his brow and proceeds to sprint as fast as he can, choosing to try his luck running between joe biden’s skeleton arms linked up with mitch mcconnell’s curtains of fat. but much to putin’s chagrin, mcconnell is more muscle than you and i would ever assume, and he gets clotheslined flat onto his back, shitting his pants immediately. the UN blows their whistle, vladimir putin is “out” of this war and cannot participate until the next one.

journalists all over the world rush to publish their takes on this turn of events. “PUTIN KIA BY MCCONNELL, SHITS PANTS.” the AP publishes seven updates per day on what this development means for the world, while NPR begins work recording an hour-long podcast on the history of world leaders shitting their pants. surely this will be the end of the war now that putin is crying in the park’s public bathroom, trying to cleanse both his pants and his memory of what will surely be a pivotal moment in his life.

that is, until he hears outside, “red rover, red rover, send joe biden over!” putin hobbles to the door and wipes the tears from his eyes just in time to see biden take three steps forward and collapse.

question: how do you make rocky balboa—stupid, ugly, -3 charisma skill modifier rocky balboa—a protagonist that everyone wants to root for? if you’ve seen any sports movie ever made, you know the formula. what if we just… had no one expect him to win? the odds are so clearly stacked against him that even when he slowly cracks eggs into a cup while sniffling like a child with anti-vax parents, we still are like yeah, that was gross but i fucking love this guy.

but it’s not enough that rocky is expected to lose… his opponent also has to expect to win. what do we americans hate more than bullies? bullies with self-confidence. and yes, you might’ve guessed that americans hate foreigners more than bullies with self-confidence but there’s rocky IV for that crowd, which i feel like tastefully blends the rocky “underdog vs. bully” formula with the bubbling xenophobia of cold war era america, and by “tastefully” i mean with all the grace of a toddler falling headfirst into a coffee table.

so we’ve got the classic sports movie trope of underdogs vs. bullies, pick your adjective to describe the bullies and you can see how all these boring-ass sports movies keep getting made. “rich bullies?” we’ve got the sandlot, mighty ducks, etc., “mean bullies,” i think there’s rocky and like remember the titans or something, idk i’m not looking this shit up. the point is, the bullies are better than you and they know it. grr, we hate them!

but what if the bullies didn’t think they were better than you? what if, instead of ivan drago coldly watching apollo creed die in the ring, he got really defensive and started yelling at apollo for persecuting him for his beliefs and claiming that all he wanted to do was live his life the way he wanted to and free from the policing of the intolerant, progressive american boxing culture? yeah, that shit would get real confusing, real fast.

bullies who think they’re the underdogs of the movie are pretty hard to deal with, because they’re clearly the bullies that the underdogs must defeat, but they expect you to feel sorry for them when their team pulls up to the hockey tournament in a luxury-style team bus and they lace up their top of the line, brand name ice skates. they truly believe that they deserve to commit goaltender interference because there’s three minutes left in the third period and their rich team is down by two goals. i mean, if you’re going to do villainous shit, at least have the nerve to own it and call yourself villains. when the bullies are playing against a team that practices ice hockey on a baseball field and has one jockstrap to share between them, i don’t know how they still claim that the world is against them.

i guess it feels good to feel like the main character in the sports story, but perhaps some self-awareness is in order. the constant tripping and roughing penalties being called on the rich team are not inhibiting their ability to live their lives, they’re protecting normal people from their flagrant and unrelenting assholery. in simple terms, if your team’s mascot is a bleeding personification of victim complex, maybe it’s time to sell the team.

like the yearly school shooter drill, dreaming of becoming a rockstar is an american rite of passage. “thank you cleveland, you certainly don’t suck,” you say to thousands of screaming bouncing fans in your head. you then take a 20-minute break from imagining before coming back out to your daydream audience for an encore. what a show!

certainly the lifestyle is part of the draw as well. most people who’ve ever attempted plucking ‘smoke on the water’ on a $4,300 vintage amp in guitar center have also imagined what the after-parties must be like backstage. hundreds of fans in every city, waiting for hours simply for a glimpse of your face and awkward hat. your pick of the hottest women at every show. be real, the stuff you’ve imagined going on backstage might be too far even for brazzers. you’re suave, handle your coke well, and definitely don’t cum in three minutes. not even in real life, you say? thank you for writing in to clarify.

but apparently, the real life rock star is socially awkward to the point of being dangerous. for way too many artists, the motto seems to be “less consent, more cum.” thankfully, these pieces of shit are being brought to light by victims who are no longer socially shamed en masse to the point of silence. unfortunately, it turns out–there’s a lot of fucking creeps in the music industry. you’d think with all the fans and notoriety that comes with being a rockstar, you could also afford a single guy to check IDs at the door, or photocopy some surveys for distribution:

I AM [ ]

I AM NOT [ ]

interested in sex with that cringey guitar player.

don’t get me wrong though, i’m not putting the onus on the fans. it doesn’t seem so difficult to idk… NOT be a sexual creep? but apparently something about strapping on a guitar and having a microphone that can drown out conversations in the employee bathroom goes straight to a guy’s head. you choose which head i’m talking about, this is a surprise “choose your own adventure” post.

anyway, here’s peter’s tragically on-going list of artists who can no longer be supported thanks to their inability to comprehend the word “no.”

• arcade fire
• red hot chili peppers
• david bowie
• led zeppelin
• r. kelly
• the orwells
• real estate
• bob dylan
• crystal castles
• nelly
• elvis presley
• as i lay dying
• ryan adams
• daughters
• michael jackson
• Tekashi 6ix9ine (went ahead and ctrl-c ctrl-v-ed that one and used all the time i saved to write this note)
• pierce the veil

jesus christ there are so many that i can’t even find an article with all of them combined. i’m sure that’s not even the start of the list but i need to take a mental health break (and also run to target for bread, this post brought to you by target coincidentally.) feel free to write in with your most-hated perverted musician and i’ll add them to the list. i wish i didn’t have to, but until these coked-up neanderthals start minding their hands, here we are.

it takes a lot of consistent effort on my part to look like a decent human being. as many people throughout my life have observed (and generously shared with me unbidden), i look like a lumberjack returning from a two-year nature retreat, furious to learn that other humans continue to exist.

or, as other less imaginative people have put it, severe resting bitch face.

and thus, it is my curse to shave, trim, wash, cut, brush, and tweeze every hair on my massive head in an unending attempt to look even the slightest bit more inviting to other people who, despite my strongest wishes, must be interacted with daily. what was the greek myth about the guy cursed by the gods to push a massive boulder up a hill every day, only for it to roll down and have to start over? he probably had frown lines like mine.

anyway, this is how i learned that apparently every hygiene product on the market nowadays is required by federal law to have some inane scent attached to its probably slightly toxic residue. and now when i step out of the house, i have no less than 10 conflicting scents on my person, all competing for first strike to any olefactory senses unfortunate enough to come within 30 feet of me.

actually, i’m gonna make a list now because i was exaggerating before when i said 10 but now i’m really wondering what sort of numbers we’re looking at. over/under 6.5, place your bets now folks.

THE SHOWER:
1. head & shoulders: green apple scent
2. biore face wash: charcoal
3. irish spring soap: potatoes

THE SHAVING:
4. gilette shaving cream: generic man smell
5. armani aftershave: expensive generic man smell
6. beard oil: some type of wood smell, sandalwood or cinderblock or something

THE REST OF IT:
7. suavecito pomade: to be perfectly honest this hair product has a really strong smell and i can’t even tell you what it’s supposed to be, like this is probably the most aggressive smell i put on myself willingly and i don’t think it even has an official scent
8. old spice deoderant: “pure sport” no i am not kidding. it does not smell at all like what i know sports to smell like, which is 95% unwashed sweat-embedded equipment, 3% blood, and 2% chewing tobacco. this smells more like… generic man smell.

and there you have it folks, every singularly pleasant smell that i adhere to my body in a desperate attempt to obscure the fact that i do, in fact, sweat in the summer. if we ever come across each other in public, please don’t ask me why i look angry. i’m trying really hard to come across as friendly, but there’s only so many smells i can take.

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thank you for your interest in our open position in the disney scriptwriting department. as you can imagine, a multi-billion dollar conglomerate creating content for what is arguably humanity’s most iconic and ubiquitous sci-fi franchise is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and as such, we take our selection process very seriously. we thank you for your application and ask that you complete the following brief exam to assess your competency as a writer and creative thinker.

you may turn the page and begin your exam now.

1. our heroes narrowly escape capture by the empire/first order/GOP and land on a never-before-seen, impoverished desert planet, where locals toil away in mines for the profit of the villainous faction. the enemy ships are mere minutes behind, and our heroes must make haste. what does our protagonist say that can provide clarity of the situation for the audience and move the plot foward?

a. “we should head toward those mountains, surely we can find a cave to hide in there.”

b. “that was close, i can’t believe we made it! but it looks like we’re not out of it yet, c’mon!”

c. “this used to be a beautiful place. fields of green as far as the eye could see. the locals were happy, providing for their families in a non-capitalist society. i know, i’ve been here before on some business that wasn’t important. but what is important, is that the [bad guys] have destroyed what was once a beautiful world.”

C is the correct answer. it is important from a world-building perspective to describe the damage that [bad guys] have done to the galaxy. it is not simply that they are bad because they murdered four people in the last episode, or blew up a planet in one of those movies. we must be able to show that there are other bad things they do besides genocide, otherwise our audience may feel confused.

2. one of our heroes has been captured and taken deep into the heart of a secret [bad guy] fortress, far removed from hope of escape. they’ve been tortured for an undefined amount of time, but have remained strong thus far. unfortunately, [bad guys] have nothing but time to figure out ways of making our hero break. our scene opens at the tail end of yet another torture session. our hero crumples to the corner of a bare cell after the villain beats them down. the villain confidently threatens our hero, who has endured indescribable torment and humiliation thus far. how does our hero respond to the villain’s threats?

a. “okay, okay. god, please stop, i can’t take it anymore. i can’t take this anymore, i’ll tell you what you want to know if you just… stop. please.”

b. “is that the best you got? my friends are on their way here as we speak to rescue me in 22 minutes. you’ve lost.”

c. “we’re gonna be here a long time if that’s really the best you can do.” (stands defiantly)

C is the correct answer. A is incorrect because a hero would never give up valuable information if it meant it might hurt their friends. friendship is stronger than any psychological abuse, torture, pain, drugs, or force powers. B is also incorrect because there’s no way the captured hero would know they were about to be rescued, ya dummy.

3. our hero has been ambushed! the bad guy set a trap that hero’s unfailing moral code drove them into. now, the bad guy has the upper hand and it seems all is lost. our hero has been defeated in a lightsaber duel and is disarmed, on the cusp of death. suddenly, hero’s friend arrives and turns the tides, creating a minor distraction in order to start slowly, slowly pulling our unconscious hero away from the fight. how should our villain react to this development?

a. our villain taps into their vast array of established force abilities, throwing aside the hero’s friend and continuing the fight.

b. our villain calls upon the support of his seemingly endless evil resources, summoning a battalion of soldiers to capture both the hero and his friend and take them secret [bad guy] fortress.

c. the villain understands that this minor kerfuffle has perplexed them entirely, and forgets that they have a vast array of established force abilities that can remedy this minor inconvenience. they fume silently for a moment before turning away to do something else of assumed equal importance, allowing our hero to be dragged slowly away to safety, where the hero can recover and ultimately best them.

C is the correct answer. what are you gonna do, end the story already, stupid? remember the first rule of writing at disney: “it is always, without fail, better to lobotomize established characters for the sake of our hero’s success, than to have real consequences for our hero.” audiences do not like consequences. consequences are scary and off-putting, and must be avoided entirely.

EXTRA CREDIT:

if any test-taker asks why the answer is always C, it is safe to assume that they do not understand the basic writing principle of rule of three. please award them one point of extra credit for not understanding this elementary humorous convention. here at disney, we know that real humor comes from robots falling down, quippy one-liners from our heroes, and aliens farting. our audience does not have time to process wordplay and therefore, neither do our writers.

holy fucking shit bro stop, i can’t breathe. mispronouncing m. night shyamalan’s name, that’s fucking comedy gold. i can’t believe no one’s ever thought of that before, purposefully mispronouncing a famous celebrity’s name because it’s not “smith” or “jones.”

bendy-dick cum-a-batch? i cannot even.

timothee chardonnay? the fact that you know it’s “chalamet” but still choose to call him something that sounds similar but isn’t quite right makes it even funnier. i had a suspicion you knew m. night’s name because he’s been a household name since the sixth sense like 20 fucking years ago, but yeah, it is absolutely hilarious because he didn’t change his name to craig thomas or something and then you pronounced it wrong.

you are the pinnacle of comedy. please don’t ever flirt with self-awareness, you laugh riot.

i think it’s about time i’m honest with the world and say that i didn’t enjoy that one stone brewery double IPA i bought back in 2014. i just pretended to like it because i bought an entire six-pack of it and brought it to a party where the 2nd highest alcohol percentage in a drink was less than mine by double-digits. whenever people noticed and asked about the beer, i offered them a bottle because i knew they were beta and wouldn’t take a bottle of what was basically mashed hops. that being said, i didn’t enjoy it either and it’s been weighing on me ever since.

i’m not sure why i feel the need to act like there’s something enjoyable about every new beer i try. i’ve thrown out phrases like “complex flavors,” and “surprising aftertaste” like i’m getting sponsored by marlboro. perhaps it has something to do with the intense and deeply flawed beer culture that gatekeeps harder than texas border patrol, or the fact that a six-pack of craft beer is usually north of $13 so i’m financially obligated to find something i like about it.

and it has nothing to do with being able to look down on people who enjoy PBR and coors lite, because even when my liver finally gives out and i’m freshly stitched up after taking a liver from my least favorite son, i’ll still be out in downtown making passive aggressive comments about saving time by putting the miller lite tap right above the urinals in the men’s room.

but peter, you might say, why don’t you just buy beers that you’ve already tried and know you like? because moron, i say, settling into comfortable routines is the inscrutable first step down an imperceptible slope that ends in mediocrity, a sterile middle aged life, and voting republican. so i’ll pour one out for you and your coors lite, and also for my liver because goddamn that guy needs a break.

before you go and think i’m calling myself stupid, consider the fact that houseflies are evolving and adapting like those asshole girl scouts accepting venmo to eliminate the classic “no cash, sorry” escape. this fuckin’ fly this morning is perusing my bathroom while i’m trying to take my morning shit, bumping into things blindly yet undeterred like a person recording a concert on their phone from the middle of a mosh pit. i’ve had about enough after the fourth near miss with my face, so i grab the hand towel and start swinging (after i cleaned myself up, of course. in case that wasn’t assumed).

i hit the fly with a solid snap and it falls to the floor, belly up. dead af.
OR WAS IT? because i left the bathroom, satisfied with my opposable thumbs and logical brain only to return a minute later to find the fly was, in fact, still flying about uninhibited and happy. THIS motherfucker bro, this smart-ass fly was playing dead on me like a goddamn possum or my ex-gf back when i tried to follow her on insta post-breakup. i can’t believe this shit, flies have rational thinking brains now? was this part of its tiny plan when i first started swinging?

i mean, now i didn’t WANNA kill this fly out of respect for the hustle, but i HAD to kill it for my own pride. can you imagine starting your wednesday at 6:45am by being outsmarted by a housefly? that mf-er gonna make me look like an asshole when it can’t even discern the difference between a glass pane and open space? to be fair, i have walked into glass doors before but they were freshly cleaned and this window the fly was hitting hasn’t been cleaned since the cold war.

and hell, even if this fly deserved a second chance, it’s too powerful to be left alive to pass along its smart jeans to its 4,000 offspring. my logical human brain knows about natural selection, and this terminator-level fly would be the one to elevate the housefly to near-rat levels of survivability. we’re already dealing with rats, mosquitoes, and anti-vaxxers who boast astonishing levels of survivability. we don’t need to add houseflies to that list. so wednesday morning bathroom housefly: i posthumously award you this blog’s first ever Cunning Warrior Award. well met.

i’m a generous tipper. it’s something i pride myself on, giving my money away. i don’t know how that became part of my personality, but it did, just how i act like a cornered, wounded animal when someone points out a minor flaw of mine. it’s fundamentally peter.

now my barber is an S-tier motherfucker so don’t get me wrong, but i came into this relationship way too hot. i wanted to make a good impression on my first couple visits. barbershops are kind of triggering for me because they’re equal parts macho and catty and i can’t navigate those confusing, conflicting currents.

i may have tipped way too high the first few times i went in, which is basically my way of trying to buy affection like a lonely guy in a strip club. but i always forget that the initial tip on recurring transactions sets the bar for the rest of the relationship so yes, i’m pretty sure my barber likes me, but he also could be faking it like a goddamn stripper. i can’t even tell anymore.

and then of course there have been a couple times throughout the years where emergency haircuts have been necessary, and this S-tier barber fit me in his schedule at the last second so of course i tipped him even better and now dear god i’m gonna have to volunteer for experiments involving radiation so i can stop needing haircuts every two weeks. i’m literally taking on more hours at work so i can afford my extravagent tipping lifestyle.

at this point, i have a few options:

#1. fake my own death, find a new barber. start with small tips, go from there.

#2. move out of state, find a new job and girlfriend, abandon my family, find a new barber. start with small tips, go from there.

#3. stop getting haircuts, grow out my hair like a wizard and recapture my virginity.

#4. slowly but surely work my way into influential circles in LA and try to meet whoever People magazine’s sexiest male actors is this year, probably jake gyllenhall let’s be real. play it cool at first but make a good impression and leave jake interested in hanging out more sometime, then build a relationship and cement his trust in my tastes by taking him to contemporary art museums and thom yorke concerts, the whole time only drinking the most expensive wine and not ordering based on price when we go out to eat. then, once i’ve built a solid foundation i mention in passing that his jawline and facial structure could really support a buzz cut, not something that a lot of guys can pull off. never mention it again. wait for the seed to sprout and jake will eventually buzz off his hair and the media will be all over it, and just in time for the oscars too. buzz cuts become all the rage for the ’20s. i tell my barber, damn bro tough luck i’m sorry but you know me, on the cutting edge and all. i block his number and move out of state, abandon my family. find a new barber for buzz cuts, start with small tips, go from there.