Rated PG-13
- contains some strong language.
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Playing Time:
Approximately 26 minutes.
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A radio
station contest,
a bad costume,
a VHS camera,
and a crappy boat.
These are the things that teen director dreams are
made of. Everyone's gotta start somewhere right? Well, this was my
entrance into film making, and rather than have my old videos be dug up
some day by someone who is just trying to embaress me, I figure, what the
hell, I'll save everyone the effort and just embaress myself! So here, for
your viewing pleasure, see me, the young Blackout in my formative years.
Once again, everyone's gotta start somewhere right?
Now, in order for you to grasp what Y-Man Returns is about, a little
history lesson is in order; Here in south Florida there is a radio
station called Y-100 that used to have show called the Y-Morning Zoo. The
hosts were Bobby Mitchell, Footy, and Captain Y (who was the newsman and
the person I targeted to make fun of in my videos). Bobby and Captain
Y are long gone, but Footy is still there and I'm sure he remembers my Y-Man
exploits.
Back in 1991 and 92, Y-100 held a "do something outageous" contest, where
contestants had to do something wacky in the name of Y-100, and video tape
or get pictures of it. Then, the winners got an all expense paid one week
trip to Hedonsim II in Jamaica. Now If you've never been to Hedonism,
you've missed out on one of life's great pleasures... but I'll put that
story up another day. Grin.
I was 16 when Y-100 had the first contest and I was determined to win,
so I dressed up in a cheesey Zorro like outfit, grabbed some friends and
my video camera, and concocted a basic story line that went something like
this: I was an insane person who thought I WAS the real Captain
Y, and when I found out there was a Captain Y at the radio station Y-100,
I swore to destroy his image by going out in public and doing bad things
in his name that would eventually get back to the radio station, and get
him arrested. Then, after I got Captain Y in trouble, I dubbed myself
Y-Man, super villan extraordinaire, and arch nemesis of the radio station
Y-100. Follow everything so far? Well, that was the first Y-Man movie,
which was entitled simply: Y-Man. Unfortunately
(or perhaps fortunately), it has been lost to the ages (it burned in a house
fire), but I actually did win the trip to Hedonism,
TWO years in a row! So what you are about to see now is the second
video that I entered the second year that Y-100 had the contest,
hence the name Y-Man Returns. Batman Retuns was
out at the time and I thought the parody was fitting.
The first Y-Man ends with me jumping across apartment rooftops and
into the night, gloating about how much trouble I got Captain Y into. Then,
an unexpected and unrehearsed scene was caught on tape; my mother had heard
me jumping around on the roof and when she stuck her head out of my bedroom
window to see what the hell was making all the thumping noises at two in
the morning, she saw me jumping around from rooftop to rooftop in my Y-Man
outfit and started screaming every obscenity at me that you could imagine
in a voice that could shater glass around the world. This was no acting,
this was true, raw emotion, this was my crazy, angered mother at her best
and I felt it was a fiting end. Y-Man Returns picks up a year later.
After a brief flashback to Y-Man 1, I wakeup, and hear that Y-100 is having
the contest again, and so the foolishness begins all over. I wanted to top
myself in the stunt department, so the middle part of this video involves
me, a boat, and a local mall. That's all I'll say. I think I was successful
because I was on several local news programs that night, and Y-100 heard
about my stunt through the news before they even got my tape. I won
again, and got to go to Jamaica again right around my 18th bithday. That is
where I came to love a drink called a dirty banana
One last thing before you watch this....a disclaimer of sorts. Please
remember that this was in 1991 and 92. A bad time for young, would be filmmakers.
Kids a generation before still had their parent's 8mm real film cameras,
and kids now have access to incredible digital editing. I had niether. At
the time, all that was available was VHS, which I now call very horrible
storage or very horrible shitty video. To edit this together I had to
stack VCRs, tape decks, tons of RCA wires, radio shack mixers, video
processors, and an old Amiga 500 computer. All that to get a low resolution
VHS master that would degrade over time and multiple plays. I was in awe that
I was actually able to get some computer generated titles and credits to
work. To make the edits and mix in the music correctly, I had to go into a
zen like trance and hit play, pause, and record buttons on multiple VCRs at
exactly the right moment, while hitting play on tape and CD decks and mixing
levels with my pinky finger at the same time - repeating the process over
and over and over again untill I got the timing together as best I
could. So for what's it's worth, here it is, from the Blackout's Box
archives and now preserved digitally for all time, my VHS epic: Y-Man Returns.
Credits:
Michael Biggins (Y-Man)
Cheryl Bigansky (sister Cheryl)
Adam
Maysonet (Y-Man's assistant)
Jason Malicoat (Janitor)
Shane
Bushman (camera)
Further credits listed in film.
(c) 1991, 1992 -2003 Blackout's Box Studios
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