1412: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

|< < Prev Comic #1412 (August 25, 2014) Next > >|

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Title text: My upcoming album, 'Linked List', has covers of 'The Purple People Eater', the Ninja Turtles theme, 'Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini', and the Power Rangers theme, with every song played to the tune of the next.

Explanation

This comic is a reference to the recently released Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. It is a list of Wikipedia article titles that are in the same syllable-stress pattern as the first line of the theme song of the 1987 cartoon series.

The list is compiled in alphabetical order from top to bottom, without respect to the left or right column. Some of the items on this list (e.g. Ace Ventura: Pet Detective) are drawn as headlines in the same style as the logo from that series. These articles are not in alphabetical order with the surrounding small face text, but these headlines are in alphabetical order with the other headlines from top to bottom, without respect to the left or right column. Some of these phrases are not actually the titles of Wikipedia articles, but are redirects. For instance, the article on Woodrow Wilson "Woody" Guthrie redirects to Woody Guthrie, and Former Arctic Monkeys members redirects to Andy Nicholson.

The syllable-stress pattern of this line is long-short-long-short-long-short-long-short, known in poetry as trochaic tetrameter. Randall has previously authored comics dealing with trochees, namely 856: Trochee Fixation and 1383: Magic Words.

A similar idea was performed by Jimmy Fallon in 2001 at a concert for New York city where he demonstrated singing "any 80's song" over the tune of MC Hammer's song "U Can't Touch This".

The title text suggests an album of songs (The Purple People Eater, the aforementioned Ninja Turtles theme, Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini and the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers theme), the title or primary refrain of which have a large number of verses in trochaic meter. Randall suggests that these refrains are so interchangeable that the lyrics of each could be sung to the melody of the song following it in the tracklist. Randall would title the album Linked List as each song would melodically reference the next song. The refrains of the songs, respectively are:

• "One-eyed, one-horned flying purple people eater"
• "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"
• "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini"
• "Go go Power Rangers"

The Wikipedia links

There are 6 headlines and 9 other article links in each block next to a headline for a total of 60 wiki links:

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective	Biggest Loser: Second Chances Cayman Island blue iguana Central Texas pocket gopher Church of Jesus Christ Creator Climate change and meat production Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Daylight saving time in China Denver Airport People Mover Easter Island spiny lobster
Edgar Allan Poe Museum Engine failure after take-off English as a second language Former Arctic Monkeys members Fowler's Modern English Usage Georgia Game and Fish Department Golden-mantled howler monkey Greater Cleveland Film Commission Hairy flower chafer beetle	Asian Human Rights Commission
San Diego City Council	Harland David "Colonel" Sanders Human Tissue Resource Network Klondike class destroyer tender Legal code of North Dakota Lesser knapweed flower weevil Lockheed Martin Atlas rocket Maple syrup urine syndrome Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers Nablus mask-like facial syndrome
Neo Geo Pocket Color New Year's Eve with Carson Daly Newton's second law of motion North Korean Workers Party Orange County Business Council Over/under cable coiling Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater Places named for Adolf Hitler Proton-proton chain reaction	Single payer health insurance
Spotted giant flying squirrel	Puerto Rican lizard-cuckoo Quantuum vacuum plasma thruster Rocky Mountain spotted fever Royal Flying Doctor Service Russian Women's Fascist Movement Semi-active laser guidance Seven Brides for Seven Brothers Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon
Trailing suction hopper dredger Vector graphics markup language Viti Levu giant pigeon Voting rights in Puerto Rico William Henry, Duke of Gloucester Windows Vista startup process Woodrow Wilson "Woody" Guthrie Yaba monkey tumor virus Zack and Miri Make a Porno	Women science fiction authors

Transcript

WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE TITLES With the right syllable stress pattern to be sung to the tune of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective	Biggest Loser: Second Chances Cayman Island blue iguana Central Texas pocket gopher Church of Jesus Christ Creator Climate change and meat production Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Daylight saving time in China Denver Airport People Mover Easter Island spiny lobster
Edgar Allan Poe Museum Engine failure after take-off English as a second language Former Arctic Monkeys members Fowler's Modern English Usage Georgia Game and Fish Department Golden-mantled howler monkey Greater Cleveland Film Commission Hairy flower chafer beetle	Asian Human Rights Commission
San Diego City Council	Harland David "Colonel" Sanders Human Tissue Resource Network Klondike-class destroyer tender Legal code of North Dakota Lesser knapweed flower weevil Lockheed Martin Atlas rocket Maple syrup urine syndrome Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers Nablus mask-like facial syndrome
Neo Geo Pocket Color New Year's Eve with Carson Daly Newton's second law of motion North Korean Workers Party Orange County Business Council Over/under cable coiling Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater Places named for Adolf Hitler Proton-proton chain reaction	Single payer health insurance
Spotted giant flying squirrel	Puerto Rican lizard-cuckoo Quantuum vacuum plasma thruster Rocky Mountain spotted fever Royal Flying Doctor Service Russian Women's Fascist Movement Semi-active laser guidance Seven Brides for Seven Brothers Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon
Trailing suction hopper dredger Vector graphics markup language Viti Levu giant pigeon Voting rights in Puerto Rico William Henry, Duke of Gloucester Windows Vista startup process Woodrow Wilson "Woody" Guthrie Yaba monkey tumor virus Zack and Miri Make a Porno	Women science fiction authors

Trivia

• Randall mistyped the word "album" as "alubm" in the original title text but it was fixed later.
• He did not correct the word Quantum, which is mistyped Quantuum in the comic.

 add a comment! ⋅  add a topic (use sparingly)! ⋅  refresh comments!

Discussion

Looks like they renamed the Wikipedia article mentioned as "Maple Syrup Urine Syndrome" to Maple Syrup Urine Disease.Keavon (talk) 05:03, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

This rythmic sounding has to do with metrical foots feet, I think. Maybe someone more into it than I can explain... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_%28prosody%29 108.162.229.164 05:21, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

It's just a 4-foot trochaic ("trochaic octameter"?) meter. ^- ^- ^- ^-. Also, I'm curious now, is "foots" the proper plural when discussing meter, or is that just a typo/misunderstanding? 199.27.128.150 06:37, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Oh, right, the plural must be "feet". I just had a brain fart. 108.162.229.164 10:23, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

It is a trochaic tetrameter. Tetra = 4, octa = 8.108.162.216.38 12:26, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Right, it's number of feet, not number of syllables. My mistake. 199.27.128.150 15:04, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

This one is definitely related: http://xkcd.com/856/ --141.101.104.68 08:08, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Unless "Gloucester" is two syllables, Randall made a mistake/wanted to see if we're awake.--108.162.246.224 06:33, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Depending on where you're from, it can be pronounced (quasi-phonetically) as "Glow-ster". Jarod997 (talk) 13:24, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Actually it is. Silly British accents. It's pronounced roughly "Gloss-ter". 199.27.128.150 06:37, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

In that case, I retract my previous statement and apologize.--108.162.246.224 07:20, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

With regards to the roll-over text, mention could be made of the long-running BBC radio show "I'm sorry I haven't a clue" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I%27m_Sorry_I_Haven%27t_A_Clue ). It is comedy panel game, and one of the regular rounds is 'One Song to the Tune of Another'. It may be coincidence, but one panellist of the show is Barry Cryer ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Cryer ) who happened to have recorded Purple People Eater... 141.101.98.184 08:26, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Why isn't Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the list? 103.22.201.120 11:41, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

There's a typo in "Quantuum vacuum plasma thruster". 141.101.98.184 12:08, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Dang someone beat me to writing in the transcript. Oh well, you did a much better job than I was doing anyway. =8o) Jarod997 (talk) 13:24, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Is it just me, or do these lyrics not REALLY match the TMNT title song? The first three lines are OK, but the following lines just repeats the pattern - the TMNT song has a different rhythm. 141.101.98.169 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Each title is meant to be sung only to the "TMNT" part of the song. They aren't meant to be sung one after another to match the whole song. 173.245.52.211 03:09, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If you speak with a western US accent like me, museum is pronounced with 2 syllables (myoo zahm). I guess if you pronounce it correctly, its more like myoo-zee-uhm, which would make 'Edgar Allan Poe Museum' fit. 108.162.246.213 03:18, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Please check with your friends and relations about the pronunciation of museum. All dictionaries show /mjuˈzi.əm/ (myoo-ZEE-um). 108.162.238.144 19:49, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

It's a shame that "Infra Turbo Pigcart Racer" has a syllable too many, because that would've been perfect. 141.101.104.197 08:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

What's the extra syllable? I count In-fra Tur-bo Pig-cart Ra-cer. 108.162.238.144 19:50, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Is there any particular need to have a separate section for the wikilinks, rather than just embedding them in the transcript?--Marcus Hill (talk) 09:26, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I wouldn't think so - that's how they were originally... Jarod997 (talk) 13:19, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

This makes me think of "We Didn't Start the Fire" by Billy Joel. 108.162.216.150 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Damnit Monroe, for two reasons: 1. Now this all I can think about whenever I find a phrase that fits the syllable stress pattern, and 2. Why couldn't you have held off until 1413 for this - XKCD fourteen thirteen fits the stress pattern as well. 108.162.250.204 06:15, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

I still don't know what the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme sounds like, but I can't look at more than one or two of these tetrametric trochees without immediately thinking of the Peter Gunn theme [1] (which then stays stuck in my head for hours...). —Scs (talk) 17:25, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Does anyone know how Randall compiled the list? 199.27.129.119 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Deleted pages

"Places named for Adolf Hitler" was deleted recently, which makes me wonder, how many other pages on Wikipedia that are linked here were also deleted? 108.162.237.135 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Missed articles

Is anyone compiling a list of articles that Randall missed, but that fit the rhythm? I can think of at least one: "Random number generator". Promethean (talk) 09:58, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

I know Béla Viktor János Bartók fits the scheme. 162.158.74.249 19:10, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

"Universal basic income" fits. It's just a redirect and not a proper page though. 172.69.69.206 19:40, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

FC Bayern Munich (women) 162.158.203.15 14:48, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Category:Monday comics, Category:Tuesday comics, etc, Also don't forget disambiguation pages.

And Category:Airplane banner. I27.O.O.I (talk) 02:13, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Planet Killer Margarita. -- I27.O.O.I (talk) 06:12, 3 March 2023 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Honey thieves with test tube baby, and also Category Oscillators. ColorfulGalaxy (talk) 12:44, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Another example is "User:Memo Spike Connector". 2659: Unreliable Connection (talk) 23:39, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

What kind of English are you speaking? I27.O.O.I (talk) 23:03, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Today I was at Multi Router Traffic Grapher and it immediately reminded me of this comic... —Scs (talk) 20:58, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Does "Category:Gallifreyan" fit? Or did I mispronounce the word?

Another example is "US State Abbreviations".

On my Neography Wiki, there is an active user called "User:Omniglot Errata". ClassicalGames (talk) 01:09, 11 September 2023 (UTC)