Bug Bash

The nice thing about the “If Bugs Were People, You’d Be China” joke is that it’s almost infinitely extensible. Really, try it: “If Bugs Were _____, You’d Be _____.”

When the “If Bugs Were” comic ran in the internal newsletter of a large Northwest software company, I used it to incite just such a company-wide contest. Funny how when you open the gates like that, you learn that your readers are actually funnier than you are.

The best lines from that particular contest are included below. (Individuals aren’t credited only because no one gave me explicit permission to expose their names beyond the firewall – but the writers are encouraged to claim credit if they happen to be reading this.)

10) If bugs were coffee, you’d be Starbucks.

9) If bugs were reruns, you’d be “Gilligan’s Island”

8) If bugs were money, you’d be Bill Gates.

7) If bugs were Elvis sightings, you’d be a supermarket tabloid.

6) If bugs were tornadoes, you’d be a trailer park in Kansas.

5) If bugs were cholesterol, you’d be having a heart attack.

4) If bugs were motorcycles, you’d be Sturgis.

3) If bugs were big hair, you’d be Texas.

2) If bugs were compact discs, you’d be AOL.

1) If bugs were snakes, you’d be on a plane.

Try it – it’s fun! Submit your best “If Bugs Were _____, You’d Be _____” line(s) in the comments.

What’s going on here?

The backstory: MSNBC.com runs marketing campaign. As part of said campaign, MSNBC.com creates “NewsBreaker” video game that’s sort of like a charged-up version of Breakout, but with news headlines as part of the game. Then the twist: The game is set up in select movie theaters, where it’s projected on the big screen and motion sensors are used such that entire audience can control the paddle by moving their arms in unison this way or that. Much buzz ensues.

That’s all well and good, but frankly it raises a serious question: Namely, why haven’t we all been playing giant audience-controlled video games at the local cinemaplex for, like, years now? No seriously, how many minutes, if not hours, have we all spent waiting for the movie to start with nothing to distract us but a clunky slide show plodding through faded five-year-old movie trivia and blurry ads for local muffler shops? Who in Hollywood knew we had this technology and when did they know it?

The problem of declining movie attendance has been on Hollywood executives’ agenda for years now, and there’s a reason: The movie theater experience sucks, sucks big time, and every year seems to find a way to suck even more. If there were a giant, audience-controlled video game before every showing, now that would be a reason to put down the DVD and the Internet and the TiVo and get out to the actual theater. Now quick, someone in Hollywood get on that.