VALERIE STEVENSON: THE FORGOTTEN ANIME CLUB

 

Valerie Stevenson: i didn't become famous. far from it. instead i became very obscure, a very niche singer. the type of singer whose songs you've heard before in an oft whisper at a Volvo dealership at midnight in the '80s searching for a family wagon. that song that sways in your memory as you wonder why there wasn't Pizza Doritos in the '80s. 

Jen R: that doesn't matter. what matters is that you DID the thing, woman!!! you made those songs, those songs exist, those songs will remain forever in special hearts. you can't help it that Madonna blew everyone else out of the water.

me: your voice HAUNTS me. 

Valerie: thank you, that is the kindest compliment.

me: your voice makes me cry. your voice makes me wish i hadn't wasted my life.

Valerie: i composed two very powerful songs that have deep-seated meaning for me.

Jen: deep-seeded if the songs are about plants...

Valerie: both for '80s anime movies. one for the first Project A-ko movie, one for the first Urusei Yatsura movie.

Takahashi: i creamed my pants when i heard you say that, pleased to meet you. 

Valerie: i don't want to shake your hand.

Takahashi: i know those two songs well, they raised me.

Valerie: hopefully not into one of those anime perverts. the pain and sadness in my songs, the longing, fit well with my despair and the themes of those two forlorn movies.

Ben Affleck speaking Spanish: that's sexy.

Ben Affleck: i got fluent living under i mean with J Lo. don't worry, J Lo and i are getting back together, we're gonna try it again, did you see us all chummy at the Kiss of the Spider Woman premiere? 

William Hurt: not about Spider-Man...

Ben: i know a lot of people are counting on J Lo and me making it, it's their only proof that waiting for love works...

me: baseball makes me think of you.

Jen R: Superman slide into home!!! no it's more like the quiet moments of Vlad Guerrero when he thinks about Vin Scully, Tommy Lasorda, and Fernando Valenzuela.

me: you make me wet.

Jen R: that's disgusting, dude.

me: no, you make me cry all day whenever i think of you.

Jen: oh. well, that does prove that it's love, right?

firefighters: nice cops.

Anthony Bourdain: i'm alive. i'm lead singer of Pet Shop Boys as you'd expect...

Ana Golja: remember, we did Clue as a show first...

Wikipedia: the principal wants a word with you...

me: whenever i think of school projects, i think of you.

dad: remember when it needed to be a rushjob so i cooked up an idea for one of your school projects at Don's Plum at 9PM at night over cold hot-links?

the Stabbing Westward drummer: i'm not the guy in all the porn riding videos...

wet pants: they're not wet from pee, they're wet from the washer...

CBS: only we venture with our media.

NYPD Blue: okay fine, our intro song borrows heavily from the drums ad pops of the Miami Vice intro song...

Drano: you thought it was gonna be actual gel...

Chrissy Snow: i'm gonna visit my parents.........for a few days...

Arnold Horshack: ma, how could you? why did you sexually-harass Jack Tripper like that?

Ellen Travolta: this family needs a father, Arnold!!!

Baby from Dragon Ball GT: Mac Tonight from McDonald's on a bad day...

Gene Rayburn: see every BLANK on Match Game is penis...

black and tan: now that's a sexy-looking drink.

Jack Nicholson: the nut factory is not a place to fear, it's a place to go to retire...

Proactiv: now you can be an actor...

Gene Rayburn: notice how there's never two men contestants on Match Game at the same time? ask Dawson about that.

Richard Dawson: yeah i couldn't perform under those conditions. only women think i'm funny.

Chloe Fineman: i flashed an intern but it wasn't an HR thing, the breastplate was fake. valkyries were real but my tits aren't. 

Marcello Hernandez: hey Chloe, sorry i couldn't be with you. it's just my mom wants me to marry Lili Estefan.

Genndy Tartakovsky: when studio heads kill off your character, make your character a zombie...

Jen R: don't you see? you're a LEGEND!!!

Valerie Stevenson: to whom?

Jen: all those fucking nerds at those anime conventions!!! strangely there're no Asians there, only white, black, and Lithuanian men all 25 years old.

Valerie: you mean i dreamed of being a Madonna singer and my fate is to have to go to anime conventions the rest of my life?

Jen: you'll be worshipped as a space queen at those places in Anaheim. those seedy convention halls in Burbank. the part of Burbank only studio heads park in. 

Valerie Stevenson: i don't know. will they really like me? look at me, i'm old now. my face is haggard from lost love and not being recognized. my body is broken from traveling to Tucson.

Jen R: but you still got the spirit. the spirit of that spiked hair and spiked belt that cinched the waist long before a snatched waist. it's not a sad stuck-in-the-'80s appearance, it's an '80s REVIVAL!!!

Valerie: i want to SING. you know? i don't care where or to whom, i just want to SING!!! i want to feel the vibrations of my torch-ballad voice shimmering across the corners of a brick wall at night.

Jen: an anime convention is the only place they'll let you sing those boutique songs of yours live. even Shakey's Pizza said they'd be closing the door on anime and focusing solely on Stranger Things from now on.