Ailing former-Tonight Show personality Ed McMahon has died at the age of 86. He will be remembered for his lengthy career with Johnny Carson, as well as his work hosting 1980s sensation Star Search.

I read McMahon’s autobiography, For Laughing Out Loud, a few years ago and found myself really impressed with the life of this ex-fighter pilot. Beyond being the funny guy who yells, “heeeeeere’s Johnny,” he was a great man.

It’s a shame that his last few years could not have been more peaceful, with all the legal and financial troubles he’s faced. His health has been shaky for the past couple years too.

But McMahon has already carved out his place in American history as one of the greatest television icons of the last generation.

Don’t think about it. Just watch.

Wakawaka Mojo was selected by Joe Maddon, Tampa Bay Rays manager and manager of the upcoming AL All Star team, to be a coach on the AL staff. It’ll be nice to have more than just Ichiro representing us in St. Louis.

In my first post back in a while I shouldn’t write too much, don’t want to pull anything. But here’s a sweet video I found of Wak doin’ his thing.

DonWakamatsu

Another Electronic Entertainment Expo has come and gone. This year, the show made an attempt to retain its former glory, and from what I’ve read, it sounds like it has been successful. Certainly, from a reader’s view, there was plenty to read and fantasize about playing. Here are links to some of my favorites that I haven’t touched on yet, if you’re interested.

There was that crazy opening cinematic for The Beatles: Rock Band, which is like the best thing I’ve ever seen. Seriously, watch that shit multiple times.

Speaking of great trailers, Bioware really nailed it this year. Dragon Age: Origins, Mass Effect 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic all looked spectacular.

The biggest surprise of the show was Project Natal, of course, but one thing I did not see coming was Scribblenauts, the game with the insanely large lexicon. Looks hella fun.

We pretty much had already seen the trailer, but The Last Guardian sure does look spectacular. It’s like they’re combining what rocked about Ico and Shadow of the Colossus into one epic.

Ubisoft showed off the new Splinter Cell: Conviction, and I was surprisingly about it. Like, I’m trying to play it, about it. It’s got a great visual style and looks pretty fun to play.

Speaking of Ubisoft, Assassin’s Creed II looks just about right.

So does Uncharted 2: Among Theives.

That’s everything that immediately leaps to mind, but E3 was pretty solid this year and we’ve all got a lot of great games to look forward to in the coming months.

David Carradine
1936-2009

I was shocked to hear this morning that actor David Carradine has passed away at the age of 72. Found in his Bangkok hotel room on June 3rd, (He was there to shoot his latest film) Carradine was found with a rope tied around his neck, reports are saying it was a suicide… Wow, that’s pretty devastating.

Known most famously for his Golden Globe nominated performance of Kwai Chang Caine on the 70s TV show Kung Fu along with his performance as Woody Guthrie in the 1976 film Bound for Glory and as racer Frankenstein in the original Death Race 2000, Carradine had become known in more recent years for his Golden Globe nominated performance as Bill in the excellent Kill Bill films. The eldest son of the late great actor John Carradine (Stagecoach, The Grapes of Wrath, and over 200 B-Movies) and older brother of actors Keith Carradine and Robert Carradine (All three brothers starred together in Walter Hill’s 1980 western The Long Riders) David Carradine had built a strong cult following over the years with a whole slew of projects.

I was always disappointed that his great performance in Kill Bill didn’t nab him an Oscar nomination. He was probably my favorite part of Tarantino’s epic and it really showed that he was truly a gifted actor. It’s a shame that it all had to end this way but I suppose we’ll always have the movies and through those, he’ll always live on.

Yesterday was the first official day of the E3 extravaganza, as well as the date of Nintendo and Sony’s press conferences. Since there probably wasn’t anything that will catch your attention like more info about The Beatles: Rock Band, I’ll just throw a bunch out there and see what sticks.

Nintendo was the first one up yesterday, at the early hour of nine in the morning. They announced the most retarded thing ever, Wii Vitality Sensor. You know those little clips that you put on your finger and it measures your heart rate? It’s one of those. How the Hell is a game going to use that? What is this? At least they showed off more of Wii Motion Plus, the upgrade for the Wiimote that makes capable of doing what we always wanted it to do. Sounds like and and Wii Sports Resort are going to be bundled and out soon.

Nintendo also showed off a bunch of games with their classic characters. There’s Super Mario Galaxy 2, which we all saw coming, and New Super Mario Bros. Wii, which no one saw coming. This new game is going back to classic Mario sidescrolling, with four-player simultaneous co-op included. How about that? They showed some more of that Zelda train game… Still not sure if I’m down for that. The DS is just not where I want to play Zelda. The biggest announcement of the morning was Metroid: Other M, a new sidescroller from Team Ninja, the people who brought you Ninja Gaiden. Looks great.

Sony finally announced the PSP Go!, which maybe someone will buy. It forgoes UMDs for a 16GB HD, and I guess all future games will be at retail and downloadable because of that. The PSP-3000 is staying around too. They announced a slew of new PSP games, like a Gran Turismo and the next piece in the Metal Gear Solid story.

On the PS3 front, we saw more of games we knew about, be desperately want. I’m looking at you, Uncharted 2, Assassin’s Creed 2 and God of War III. Sony also unveiled their new motion controller (that’s 3-for-3 for the press conferences), which looks like a black Wiimote with a little ball on the top of it. The ball changes color and the EyeToy is able to detected it, making for some very precise motion gameplay. It looks pretty neat, but it’s hard to compete with Project Natal at this point.

Then, in E3 fashion, the show opened up and way too much information came out. At this point, just pick a game and search for it. There’s just too much out there. But I love it.