“˜All your base’ phenomenon just another passing fad

Andy Garcia All your comments are belong to me,
so send them to [email protected].

Oh no, somebody set up us the bomb! For those of you who are
confused by that grammatical nightmare, let me just say (in my best
Laurence Fishburne impersonation) “Welcome to the real
world.”

Like the Matrix, “All your base are belong to us” is
everywhere ““ it’s all around us and, until now, society
just hasn’t seen it. According to a short online video, this
phrase has been printed on everything from the TV game show
“Wheel of Fortune” to old Firestone Tires.

However, the phrase really isn’t as cool as everyone makes
it out to be. Just like other pop culture sensations, it will be
undoubtedly be looked upon as if it were as pathetic as the New
Kids on the Block.

For those who aren’t familiar with the “All your
base” debacle, I suggest you take the red pill and follow me
as I take you on a little historical tour.

Back in 1989, a not-so-nifty, downright mediocre video game
called “Zero Wing” came out for the Genesis video game
platform ““ you remember Genesis, right? It was the system
with the little hedgehog that could probably outrun Jesse
Owens.

Anyway, “Zero Wing” was your typical, side-scrolling
“look at me in the spaceship blowing up other space
ships” shoot-’em-up game. It was nowhere near as great
as that Genesis hockey game seen in the movie
“Swingers,” where Vince Vaughn’s character makes
his opponent’s head bleed.

In fact, the game would probably be completely forgotten like
most of the other outdated games (such as “Double
Dragon,” “Double Dragon 2″ and “Double
Dragon 3″) had the people who wrote the script for
“Zero Wing” passed UCLA’s English 2.

With grammar mistakes so terrible that they will either send an
ESL teacher into a nervous breakdown or become a pop culture
sensation, the designers of “Zero Wing” have probably
found the darkest corner of the world and are hiding there.

Of course, the most obvious example of the programmers’
mistakes is the oh-so-catchy phrase “All your base are belong
to us.”

What was it supposed to mean? How the hell should I know? It
doesn’t really matter.

Ever since the word broke that it is no longer nerdy to talk
about outdated video games, the world has embraced the phrase that
has no meaning. Of course this is also due to a small music video
created in honor of the error and all of the places it has
allegedly been printed.

The video, which is hosted by a myriad of Web sites, comes in
two versions: instrumental and with vocals. I personally prefer the
latter, which sounds as if it is being sentimentally sung by none
other than Stephen Hawking.

The short film starts innocently enough by actually replaying
the notorious scene in “Zero Wing,” where the villain
says those infamous words. However, what would have been a humorous
reproduction of a past medium suddenly turns into a
propaganda-esque collage of images of various personae and places
where one can allegedly find the collection of words.

And who, you might ask, would say such a preposterous phrase?
Well, the video depicts a billboard quoting God, as well as an
incredibly serious Al Gore (as he gives the finger to the camera).
Assuredly, these are all fake pictures, doctored up to enhance the
intrigue surrounding the phrase.

Ultimately, however, people will realize that the overall
message of “All your base” is ““ to be concise
““ lame.

Of course, senseless cult followings of particularly stupid
things has always been a part of American culture.

Take for example the “Kilroy was here” phrase that
is seen in almost every World War II picture ever taken. There are
many rumors surrounding the now legendary Kilroy. But no matter
what the background story was, many members of the U.S. armed
forces took the pleasure of increasing the number of locations
where Kilroy had already been by tagging boats, tanks, walls and
anything else that was going to be photographed.

In the late ’80s and early ’90s, entire blocks of
streets were littered with Andre the Giant posters prominently
displaying only his name and picture. Who were the culprits
responsible for the mess? No, it wasn’t an obsessed wrestling
fan or an elementary school principal (or both in the case of the
freaky guy from “Billy Madison”).

It was simply a bunch of skateboarding punks who thought it was
trendy to put up posters of an overgrown ogre who is now only
remembered for appearing in that dismal effort of a movie, “A
Princess Bride.”

So what’s wrong with having “All your base” as
the trendy fad of the new millennium? Well, for starters,
let’s look at the degeneration of these catchy phrases. Those
involved with the Kilroy trend had the intelligence to make a
coherent sentence.

The members of the Andre the Giant posse said to themselves:
“Hey, maybe the English language is a little tricky,
let’s just stick with introducing a subject and leave off the
verb in our underground pop culture sensation.”

Okay, maybe they didn’t say that, but that’s
probably what they were thinking.

Also, it should be noted that some of those skating twerps must
have put their heads together because some of the later posters did
actually make a grammatically correct sentence: “Andre the
Giant has a posse.”

This, of course, brings us to the grammar mess of today’s
society. I know we all have our qualms with the English language
(what’s with “phonetically” not being spelled the
way it sounds?) but does that mean we have to celebrate the English
mistakes of an uneducated foreigner?

It’s gotten so bad that I have seen mugs, sweaters, hats,
and t-shirts, being sold with the idiotic denunciation printed
gracefully on them. What’s worse, I saw someone wearing one
of the shirts.

I guess when it all boils down (in some twisted patriotic way),
this country is not only the land of opportunity, it’s also a
land where game designers are elevated to icon status for their
mistakes. Personally, I’m not too down with the phrase, and
would prefer if it was kept behind the closed doors of video gaming
fiends.