Magazine Mayhem

Author: Angry Monkey

Why It Stinks: Okay, it's a magazine for nerds. I can take that. What I can't take is people being lazy and not doing something that requires literally two clicks in Photoshop: Anti-aliasing. Seriously, if you right click over text in PS, you get multiple Anti-Alias options, three of which prevent your text from being all jagged and ugly as an old prospector's ass. I actually improved the image by compressing it some, since that smoothed things down a bit. It also doesn't help that this image isn't particularly laid out well. It's not as bad as some past images to grace the hallowed halls of shame, but it still sucks. I'm a bit confused as to how someone could do a decent job working the "VIRGIN" title into the image, but not know how to Anti-Alias text. I guess that's one of those weird mysteries I'll spend the rest of my life struggling to comprehend until I finally die as the result of complications relating to fifteen fetal gunshot wounds to the head on my deathbed five years from now. I know, that's depressing, but with any luck my deathbed will be located in a harem and I won't die right away.

How Badly I Want Angry Monkey To Die: More than I like chocolate, which isn't that much. I would like to see him get attacked by bats one day while ordering a #4 at McDonald's.

Crapometer Score: -2/-10 (Flawed Execution of a Decent Concept)

Author: Kepot

Why It Stinks: Kepot is another victim of the "I Don't Know How To Do Very Basic Photoshop Operations But I'm Still Participating in Photoshop Phriday Club," which meets every Tuesday right after Special Ed class. Kepot's layout isn't too terribly bad, but his font usage is bland and unimaginative. You can get away with using the fonts that come with your computer pretty easy, but you at least have to take steps not to make them look more jagged than Tetris blocks. The scorpion picture in the background isn't the best source either, but it's mostly the text that's the problem. The background can't support the text and the text can't support the background, so everything just goes to hell and we're the victims.

How Badly I Want Kepot To Die: A lot, and by Scorpion. I would first like him to be speared through the chest, then uppercutted into a vat of acid.

Crapometer Score: -4/-10 (Stinky Pants Execution of a Not-So-Fantastic Idea)

Author: Ninja Monkey

Why It Stinks: Ninja Monkey helps prove that this week is a bad week to have "Monkey" in your name. Look, can we just get past the awe-inspiring and oh-so captivating sight of a man spreading his anus? There are finer things in life to dwell on, such as everything that isn't a gaping anus, so why not focus on that for a change? This exact joke has been done about ten thousand times over the last two years, so it's not really necessary to do it again. This may sound crazy, but reaching for new jokes instead of using ones people have done to death isn't that bad an idea. I know, it sounds crazy, but it's true. On the technical side, this doesn't look anything like the magazine it's supposed to be. And really, when's the last fucking time you saw a magazine with a goddamn word bubble on the front? Wizard and other comic magazines don't count, of course. I guess it's kind of funny just on the pure stupidity level, because I honestly doubt Ninja Monkey realized that magazines don't tend to use word bubbles on the cover. The black background with random splotches where he did a lousy job erasing are also quite eye catching. If he wanted to make this piece of crap at least look more consistent he could have easily blended all the text he added with a simple blur, but that really wouldn't have done much good. LOST CAUSE!

How Badly I Want Ninja Monkey To Die: MUCH! DIE! I want to throw rocks at you until you die of rock poisoning.

Crapometer Score: -7/-10 (STUPID, STUPID, STUPID)

Author: Shatwag

Why It Stinks: When I assigned this theme, I suggested all the goons take a look at magazines they have around the house or pictures of magazines they find on the Internet so they can get a general feel as to what a magazine actually looks like. I didn't do that to be condescending or anything, as I know pretty much all of them know damn well what a magazine looks like. A lot of people just aren't good with text, so I wanted them to realize that most magazines are very conservative when it comes to text usage. In other words, you usually don't see ten thousand fonts and gobs of filters mucking up the readability. More importantly, you don't see black text put against a nearly black background. The color scheme of this image has to be one of the most repulsive I've ever seen, and I've been looking at terrible pictures for awhile now. The ugly mint text sure as hell doesn't benefit from those impressive layer effects, either. The joke behind this picture doesn't really do much for me since it seems like a lot of other "let's mention vile sex acts" gags that get thrown out once or twice a week. This image really does kind of make me sick, but not because of all the dirty sex and talk of poorly zoned defecation, just the look of it. It succeeds in that category, but fails in that it's not really that funny and it looks way too much like the leftovers from a liposuction clinic. Comedy tends to suffocate when you bury it in the fat vacuumed out of some obese lady's thighs.

Crapometer Score: -10/-10 (EYE CANCER)