A dirty bum stretches out on 2nd Ave, making the section of sidewalk his own. The population of the East Village treats him as damage and routes around him.
He pulls out a cyan packet of tobacco and sloppily rolls a cigarette. His head relaxes on the concrete step as he lights the cigarette, closes his eyes, and takes a long drag.
He doesn’t matter to the world, and the world doesn’t matter to him.
Ladies and gentlemen, I come to you with important news.
For a number of people in my generation – plus those generations one above and one below me; people roughly between the ages of 18 and 30 – the impending DVD release of [The Wizard](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0098663/), the 1989 video game opus was welcome news.
I came across a copy of the DVD today, and I nearly squealed in joy to pick it up. The actual release isn’t scheduled until August 29th, and while the store is notorious for breaking street dates, there’s always a rush to get your hands on something early. But something struck me oddly: why was it only $11.99? I turned the DVD over, and noticed very quickly: *there were no extra features listed on the back*.
I bought it anyhow. Hey, $12 for a piece of my youth is chump change – and besides, there might be features on it and they just didn’t list it.
I inserted the disc when I returned home a short while ago and was greated with this menu:
My jaw dropped. Okay, fine, no special features, but…no scene select?
I clicked Languages with the slightest hint of hope. It was quickly eliminated.
So congratulations, Universal Studios Home Video – you had a chance to do some serious cult-market long-tail sales with this film. People wanted commentaries with Jenny Lewis and Fred Savage, making-of information, **anything**. And you blew it. You didn’t get the star.
And if you don’t believe me and my screenshots, Rotten Tomatoes confirms it.
I cannot love this DVD. It’s so bad – in the exact opposite way of the Power Glove. Fellow gamers, heed this warning well – The Wizard DVD will break your heart.
This was the second of six concerts and shows scheduled loosely over the next month. Next up: [Revenge Of The Bookeaters](http://bookeaters.org/).
Both bands impressed me live. Peeping Tom – Mike Patton’s [six year project](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peeping_Tom_%28album%29) – managed to keep the same level of energy shown on the album in a live show. Mike did seem a little exasperated that he couldn’t get the crowd into a complete frenzy, but this may not have been a total shock given the headlining act. Gnarls Barkley, it seems to go without saying, put on an enchanting show, mixing covers (they opened with Another Brick in the Wall) with their album material. I don’t think anyone left disappointed. I have some video recorded of them closing with *Crazy*, but it will have to wait until tomorrow until I can pull it off my unauthorized recording device.
A word about the pictures: Summerstage is not a large venue, but I was probably about as far from the stage as you could be. On the upside, this provided me with the height to get good shots of the stage. On the downside, between having to shoot almost entirely at 300mm and the rapidly decreasing daylight, I only managed to convert just over 10% of my shots into upload-worthy material.
The remainder of the pictures are available as part of my Flickr set, [Peeping Tom + Gnarls Barkley](http://www.flickr.com/photos/remydwd/sets/72157594241479738/)