Overall positive impression of the closing ceremonies, except for that wretched little Chinese girl who lip-synched on the lantern. The song scared my cats and they ran away and hid and I was sad.
The speech from the organizer lady was terrific, hitting all the right notes. She seems from the little we’ve seen of her to be a total class act. The IOC president could have gone a little easier on the doping talk in his speech. Supposed to be a celebration, not a lecture.
The medal ceremony for the marathon was very touching. de Lima conducted himself beautifully in the face of what has to be enormous disappointment and pressure to be gracious. I was sort of hoping they’d show the Coubertin medal presentation as well (mostly because I have no idea what it looks like and it would be interesting to see).
I liked the pageantry of the closing better than the opening. Less oblique mythological references and more everyday people/history/culture. I still don’t like the awarding of the 2008 Games to China (stuffed Olympic mascots made with slave labor anyone?) but with the exception of the aforementioned cat-scaring rugrat the Chinese presentation was gorgeous.
I liked hearing what I could of the Greek pop music, in between the yet again incessant and completely unnecessary rambling of the idiot commentators. You’ve been asking the athletes for two weeks what it’s like to win a medal and/or be at the games. No one who hasn’t won a medal is ever going to know what it’s like to win one and hearing the same clutch of athletes (Rulan Gardner, Michael Phelps, etc.) giving the umpteenth variation on “it’s amazing” and “I’m loving soaking up the atmosphere” is not preferable to hearing the music you paid a billion dollars to broadcast so SHUT THE FUCK UP ALREADY!
The little girl blowing out the giant doobie was cool.
Oh, that was the torch? I noticed they didn’t show the torch before and after every commercial this year. I think it was because it did look like a big, giant joint.
Ok, good. I wasn’t the only one. I was flipping channels, and I see these three girls holding something that looks like an egg from Ork up to what looks for all the world like a giant, flaming doobie. When I finally stopped laughing, I surfed elsewhere.
The look of the torch got commented on a lot in threads discussing the opening ceremonies. I don’t even smoke tobacco, but the first thing I thought when I saw that torch was “He’s lighting a giant joint!”
I didn’t catch the doobie resemblance at the time, although with my perfect hindsight I give myself a :smack: for missing it.
All I could think when that giant flame-cannon was pointing at the three people on what appeared to be a sacrificial altar was that the flame was about to surge outward and consume them and how brave they were to be facing a certain painful death.
I was making fun of the idiot commentators, especially during the part where you could see a small chinese girl singing while standing on top of a huge red lantern and the commentator said something like: ‘and now, a small chinese girl is standing on the giant red lantern and singing.’ :mad: I can see that for myself! What is this, radio??? Tell me something I can’t see, like the name of the song, or the girl, or the significance of anything! You can’t can you? You don’t have any information, do you? Then just shut up! :mad:
What if the Rose Parade commentary went like this:
‘OK, now here’s a big float. It’s covered with flowers. And there’s a dragon on it, and it’s moving. OK, now here’s some people riding horses. Boy, they sure are wearing some colorful costumes. OK, now here comes a marching band. What stirring music!’ :wally
Rose Parade commentary is pretty much like the Closing Ceremonies of the Olympics.
I thought the little girl with the Ork egg was going to put out the flame by jamming into the flame to smother it. But that likely wouldn’t have been too effective.
Did anyone else have a flashback to Robert Palmer’s video of Addicted To Love when the long-legged look-alike Chinese women were onstage, dancing while pretending to strum their guitars?
Meh. I like the closing of the Sydney Games better. This one just seemed more boring than tacky. (Yep I still get misty over the *Love is in the air * conga line and Waltzing Matilda.) I lost interest around the time of the virgin sacri… er, the 10 year old orphan getting all sparkly and the atheletes started wandering around looking for more ouzo.
Heh. Virgin sacrifice - that’s exactly what I thought, too.
And I thought the little girl on the giant tomato was kind of goofy. Whatever song she was lyp-synching sure sounded like a lady *trying * to sound like a little girl.
But I loved the way they had the athletes swarm the field, rather than marching in. It looked like a big ol’ party.
Opening ceremonies: Look at the depth of culture in our ancient history from sports and drama to philosophy and art!
Closing ceremonies: Look, we went from a backwater hick fascist state just a generation ago to a modern Eurotrash discoteque!
Forget about closing ceremonies, let’s talk NBC’s wrap-up montages: I have one thing to say to them… Cael Sanderson! He won a gold medal. Why do you not acknowledge that? Did you do all you montage editing the day before he won and you’re too lazy to edit him in now? Idiots.
Peace.