Disney Universe Character Unlock List
In Disney Universe there are a ton of costumes and characters available to be won/unlocked. The costumes are won by completing all three sections of a level. Some characters are available the first time a level is completed and others on the second time. After they are unlocked, they must still be purchased, but gold Mickeys are pretty plentiful and easy to collect. My kids play it on PS3 and always collect tons.
Here is a list of all the characters available in the game and which level you have to complete to unlock them. More can be purchased as downloadable content, but these are the ones that come in-game on Playstation 3, Wii, & Xbox.
Pirates of the Caribbean
Angelica Costume Available at Start of Game
Barbossa Alice in Wonderland - Wonderland Woods
Gibbs Aladdin - Cave of Wonders 2nd time
Jack Sparrow Pirates of the Caribbean - Fountain of Youth
Blackbeard Pirates of the Caribbean - Fountain of Youth 2nd time
Alice in Wonderland
Cheshire Cat Costume Available at Start of Game
White Rabbit Lion King - Lower Pride Rock
Red Queen Pirates of the Caribbean - London 2nd time
Alice Alice in Wonderland - Inside the Red Castle
Mad Hatter Alice in Wonderland - Inside the Red Castle 2nd time
Lion King
Pumba Costume Available at Start of Game
Timon Monsters, Inc - Monster Training
Rafiki Alice in Wonderland - Wonderland Woods 2nd time
Simba Lion King - Upper Pride Rock
Scar Lion King - Upper Pride Rock 2
Monsters, Inc
Randall Costume Available at Start of Game
Celia Wall-E - Abandoned Earth
Sushi Chef Lion King - Lower Pride Rock 2nd time
Mike Monsters, Inc - Door Factory
Sully Monsters, Inc - Door Factory 2nd time
Aladdin
Jasmine Costume Available at Start of Game
Iago Pirates of the Caribbean - London
Abu Wall-E - Abandoned Earth 2nd time
Aladdin Aladdin - Agrabah Palace
Jafar Aladdin - Agrabah Palace 2nd time
Wall-E
Hal Costume Available at Start of Game
M-O Aladdin - Cave of Wonders
BURN-E Monsters, Inc - Monster Training 2nd time
WALL-E Wall-E - Axiom Captain's Deck
EVE Wall-E - Axiom Captain's Deck 2nd time
Red Shirt
Mickey Costume Available at Start of Game
Quorra Pirates of the Caribbean - Queen Anne's Revenge
Nemo Lion King - Elephant Graveyard
Clu 2 Alice in Wonderland - Over the Castle Wall 2nd time
Robin Hood Wall-E - Axiom Belowdecks 2nd time
Green Shirt
Tron Costume Available at Start of Game
Baloo Lion King - Elephant Graveyard 2nd time
Sam Aladdin - Streets of Agrabah
Rapunzel Aladdin - Streets of Agrabah 2nd time
Minnie Pirates of the Caribbean - Queen Anne's Revenge 2nd time
Blue Shirt
Donald Costume Available at Start of Game
Ariel Monsters, Inc - High in the Himalayas 2nd time
Stitch Monsters, Inc - High in the Himalayas
Goofy Alice in Wonderland - Over the Castle Wall
Tinkerbell Wall-E - Axiom Belowdecks
CPSIA IS BAD FOR AMERICA
That's not hyperbole, the CPSIA is set to do lots of bad things (most of them unintended) to the small businesses and home-based businesses that make children's products. At a time when our country's economy is in meltdown, the last thing we need is legislation that forces people out of business, no matter how good their intentions are. CPSIA makes children's products impossibly expensive to maunfacture and also declares that all previous inventory not tested to be contraband. Too many people had a knee-jerk support reaction for the legislation because it was intended to make toys safer and nobody read what the law actually says.
Other people sya it much better than I do, but you need to read about it and contact your representatives in Congress, seriously. Send them an email, call them on the phone, whatever you can do. It's gonna be bad if it goes into effect as written...and the date it goes into effect is Feb 10, 2009...just a couple days from now.
Change.org had a great deal of info about it, and so do a lot of other places. Just google "cspia" and you'll get a wealth of information about it. And then call people and tell them how much this sucks.
My New Favorite Thing On the Web
I love the web. I love the speed with which I can get information. I love the level of detail I am able to obtain about really obscure topics. I love the crazy people who hide in its dark corners and write about their obsessions with whatever. It seems like everytime I turn around I find a new thing that I love. This week is no exception.
I read about Harry Sherrer's video blog, where he posted funny videos of news folk doing stupid things when they think the cameras aren't rolling. Which was mildly amusing. BUT on the same site was a little thing called "
You Suck At Photoshop." A collection of vulgarity-filled "lessons" for different Photoshop techniques and applications, done by a guy named Donnie. Sounds awesome right? Well, probably not, because while the lessons are really useful, that's not why I love this.
I'll admit that I really do suck at Photoshop. I can do some basic things, but high-end stuff escapes me. So when I orginally clicked on this tutorial, my goal was to learn something about Photoshop. I didn't realize that I would stumble upon the funniest thing on the web. Donnie is apparently going through some marital issues and his lessons are peppered with his anguish and resenment. His pain is our gain. He sounds a good deal like David Cross, who is one of my favorite stand-up comics. They are well worth watching, whether you use Photoshop or not. You might actually learn a couple tricks while you laugh at his efforts to exact revenge on a picture of his wife's boyfriend's van or putting his wedding ring up on ebay. Hilarious.
So, admit to yourself that you suck at Photoshop and laugh as poor Donnie's marriage crumbles for your entertainment. And I'm serious when I say "vulgarity-filled."
Seeing Old Pals
I recently got to spend sometime with one of my best friends from grade school. We haven't been able to sit down and catch up in probably 12 years. I saw him at his wedding 11 years ago and he was at my wedding 5 years ago, but it was just a quick "Hey, good to see you. We should catch up."
Anyway, he's doing well. He works on the police force in my hometown, and is 2nd in command. Since he's been living here, and I haven't, I peppered him with questions about our classmates. "You ever see so-and-so? Where's this guy? What's she doing now?" And most of it was pretty much what you would expect. This guy got married and then divorced and then married again. That guy moved to Colorado. This girl now runs a such and such. All that stuff.
But then there was one. April. She was a girl I had a crush on back in the 7th grade. For a couple weeks, I walked her to her bus everyday after school. And everytime I was having an internal monologue/struggle convincing myself to ask her to "go with me." Everyday. We would walk and talk and I would have no idea what we were saying cause all I could think was "Ask her! No! Yes! No! YES!" Well, after a coupole weeks the Yes won. And when we got to her bus that day, before she got on the bus, before I even knew I was saying it honestly, I said "Will you go with me?"
And the crowd roarded and cheered, there was much high-fiving, and rejoicing...in my mind. "We did it! I asked her!" Anyway, the internal raucus was so loud, that I didn't hear what she said. Not a word. And she got on the bus. It was Friday. I spent the whole weekend wondering if I had a girlfriend or not. I had no idea. And I couldn't figure out how to ask her, I mean it took me this long to ask her to begin with, there's no way I can ask her again. I figured I would just play it cool and react to her in a similar fashion as she did to me. That way everything was cool.
So, we were back in class and everything was like it was before. We talked like normal and she never mentioned it. And of course I didn't either. And so, well, I still to this day have no idea what she said to me that afternoon beside the bus. She might have said yes and thought I was a total jerk for not acting like a boyfriend, when this was all my idea to begin with. Or she might have said no and wondered how I could just pick right back up like everything was totally cool even though she had rejected me. Or she could have said something about us just staying friends and I had the perfect response, by acting like we were totally normal. Anyway, like I said, I have no idea what she said. I've often wondered. I wondered if she would even remember that day.
I'll never know. She died a few weeks ago. Drugs...crack. Couple days out of rehab. My friend said he went to the funeral and that while she was barely in her thirties she looked like she was well into her fifties. Apparently it'd been a hard couple years. That really broke my heart. Not because I still pined for her (I rebounded quickly from the relationship we maybe never had), but it was so different from the girl I knew 20 years ago. I'm sure that I'm very different from the boy standing by that bus, too. I'm happily married, with children of my own, lots of confidence. My road through that two decades was decidely different than hers. Our lives take us many places, not all of them good. I hate to think of the places that life took her, and it makes me sad to know that hers ended like it did.
Indiana Jones and the City of the Gods
Wow, what a difference the writer can make! So, my pal Gorjus over at prettyfakes.com hated the Crystal Skull even more than I did. We spent a few hours on the phone bitching about script problems and plot problems and characters who served no purpose and characters who were nothing like their earlier selves. It was very cathartic, but I still was pissed at George Lucas. Then Gorj sent me a link to the script that Frank Darabont (Shawshank Redemption, The Mist, The Green Mile) wrote for the movie that Steven Speilberg loved and George Lucas rejected...and, wow, my whole perspective changed.
Darabont's script was called Indiana Jones and the City of the Gods and it is basically the same story as what became the Crystal Skull. There are a few BIG differences. One of my least favorite plot elements was the magnetism of the skull...that is not in the Darabont version. The military base deal is all there, but developed in a much better fashion that feels more like an Indiana Jones movie. They still have the whole nuke/fridge deal, but the rest was so much better I am willing to just go with it.
Darabont's script includes some McCarthy-style problems for Dr. Jones and some very nice nods to previous films...something that I felt lacked in the Crystal Skulls. There was also no Mutt...which might be the 2nd best thing about the Darabont script.
The action sequences were more interesting, the development of the quest was more driven by the characters than by luck or happenstance. The Marion/Indy relationship was a MILLION times better developed and Marion was more like the character from Raiders and less like a happy-go-lucky go with the flow extra character. Hell, even Indiana Jones felt more like Indiana Jones.
The actual climax of the film was much better handled. Still involved the same type of thing, but it made so much more sense and it all came together so well. In my head, it was awesome...of course my imagination can do some pretty nice special effects and stunt sequences when called upon, but then the special effects and stunts weren't my problem...for the most part (except for the cgi-monkey army, Mutt/Tarzan sequence).
When I was reading it, I felt like Darabont enjoyed the previous films and wanted to pay homage to them and build on what they had done. With the Crystal Skulls I didn't feel any of that. I felt like they wanted to gloss over the previous films and then never mention them again.
What really stuck out to me was how many of the things that I didn't like about the movie were added in after this draft. It's like Geroge Lucas had this version (which Speilberg and Ford both greenlighted) and he added in a bunch of extra things to make it suck and took out some things that were really great about it. A great sequence involving planes over the amazon, a giant snake encounter, Marion's husband and his relationship to Oxley, el presidente, the museum sequence, the turbines escape, the city of gold, the whole Nazca Lines relationship, Marion & Indy's banter, I could go on. But what he added...Mutt, the weak cemetary bit, the magnetic skulls, the strange oblong skulls, that quicksand bit, making Indiana Jones weak and sissy, that weird other dimensional ending, the sword fight on the trucks racing through the jungle, Mutt bringing his bike to South America for no reason, Mutt swinging on the vines with the army of cgi monkeys, Jones realizing that some scribbles on the floor were the map of a cemetary that he had never seen, the gunpowder toss, the long drawn out hotrod sequence at the beginning, tossing the bb's, the cgi prairie dogs...you get the idea.
The part with the giant snake was everything right that the bit about "Call it a rope!" was wrong. It still had humor in it, but it lost some of the pansy-ness.
But, my whole point is...the Darabont script read like a great movie and it redeemed the Crystal Skulls for me. I'm totally not pissed off about it anymore. I feel like I got to see the movie I was hoping to see, albeit in my mind, but still...
If you can find the script on-line, read it. It's great. If you can't find it I might know where to find a copy. And I think that Darabont was completely justified in his indignation at Lucas's rejection of the script. He rocked it on this one. He also did a great job with the Mist...up until the last 3 or 4 minutes.
Indiana Jones & the Quest to Out Indiana Jones Himself
Man, I love Indiana Jones. The idea of an archeologist fighting Nazi's and bad guys across the globe to stop their maniacal plans for world domination or what have you is just plan awesome. Then you make him a smart-ass and it's even better.
I saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull last night. And, well, it had all the stuff I wanted from an Indiana Jones movie...and then some...actually it had too much. It felt like they were trying to top everything they'd ever done and in the process they lost some of what made it so fun to begin with.
It was self-referencing, which I love. There were subtle and not-so-subtle nods to Raiders & Last Crusade (there might have been some to Temple of Doom, but I didn't catch them). We got some of the expected "I'm getting too old for this" type of moments. And plenty of Jones franchise staples...gory deaths, creepy critters, over the top action sequences, etc.
Time for Spoilers
Seriously, I'm gonna spill the beans.STOP READING...I'M ABOUT TO GIVE AWAY THE STORY! Ok, you were warned. If you want to read it, you have to highlight the text with your mouse.The main thing that I didn't like about Crystal Skull was the level they took it to. I love big action, I love ridiculously over the top escapes and such, but surviving a nuclear explosion at ground zero in a refridgerator? I mean, come on. Indiana Jones never required this level of suspension of disbelief before. Temple of Doom falling out of a plane in a life raft and then off the cliff into the whitewater rapids? Sure, why not. It was totally plausible and not completely outside of the boundaries of reality. The pulling out the beating heart, Holy Grail, thousand year old knights, spirits in the Ark...that was all the mystical side of the Jones stories and I am totally fine with that. I was totally fine with the Crystal Skull having some sort of powers and being able to do things. But, the nuclear explosion was just bad science...and it looked hokie, not funny or even cheesy funny, just hokie. I was also fine with the waterfall stuff. It was ridiculous, but still not clung to a certain level of reality.
Another problem I had: there are a lot of boring parts. I just watched the other films recently on TNT or Spike or something. And maybe because I've been reading so much Emerson LaSalle lately. But the story in this one kind of dragged.
Unfortunately, I've been reading alot about the real Crystal Skulls lately, too. The whole Mitchell-Hedges skull story is really kind of cool...without bringing in Area 51 and aliens. And then interdimensional portals? Really?
And where is the prologue little mini-adventure? That was always one of the best parts. A straight action sequence where we see Indy doing something that has little to do with the actual story, but involves him with a big action sequence. This one jumped right into the main plot (after a too long sequence of some kids in a hotrod racing with an army convoy). Then we get a boring bit in the fabled warehouse. Then some Mexican standoff play. Then finally a short chase and the bomb gets dropped.
The whole Indiana Jones and Marion thing was good I thought. I liked the kid for the most part. I thought the Russians were fine for baddies. The ants were cool. But the alien/interdimensional portal thing felt weak.
I think this is most assuredly the last Indiana Jones movie and I guess we can all be thankful for that. I really blame George Lucas for this. As I understand it, there were a couple other plots for Indiana Jones movies that Spielberg and Harrison Ford were ready to do over the last 20 years, but Lucas vetoed them. George Lucas is the one who came up with the initial idea for this one, and I think they agreed to his lame-ass, ridiculous mess of a plot, just so they could finally do another Indiana Jones movie.
Overall, I think it was an ok movie. It was fun to see Indiana Jones again, but after it was over I wished they hadn't made it. I'm not usually bothered when a movie gets "weird," but this time I was thrown for a loop. Oh well. Do I think you should see it? Well, if you are still reading this it means either you saw it already or I just totally ruined the plot for you. Either way, I say no. Don't bother seeing it. Maybe rent it or more likely just wait and it will come on television much sooner than usual. Some network will try to make a big deal about it debuting on television and you can see it then...I promise.
Blogging From the Grave
Well, not quite. The recently deceased novelist Emerson LaSalle's blog
In Last Mine Heart is Murder... has sprung back up again. I had it on one of my RSS feeds and never thought to take it off after he died in November. Imagine my surprise when a new post popped up the other day. I guess some of the people who worked for him or were friends with him or both are updating it now. They said that they are pulling stuff out of his personal archives...unpublished works, unfinished stuff, photos, sketches, etc. and they are going to post some of that. Awesome. I can't wait to see what they've got. They are also posting some interesting stories about him, which I am sure there are plenty of.
