Ice Cube...Straight To Video

I'm curious to see the new 2005 Oscar-eligible Ice Cube comedy entitled, "Are We There Yet?" It's about Ice Cube playing a gentleman who gets sexually aroused at the sight of a particular single mother to the degree that he'll even drive with her rotten kids across the country alone just to get within a nose length of the mom's panties. This is the same Ice Cube that was a member of one of the scariest, hardcore rap groups of all time, the NWA, the N-words With Attitude. A group so ferocious that I can't even say their name on the internet. Now he's in the black Home Alone. Homey Alone.

Don't get me wrong. I think it's high time we had another film that takes a look at the inherent fun of being the child of a single mother. Nothing better than being 6 and competing with a big horny man for your mom's attention. Great times! And I hope at the end the kids will realize what a gem this fellow is and gladly roll out the red carpet to their mother's vagina.

My biggest worry is that Ice Cube has really done his fellow gangsta-rappers a disservice. Who's going to take them seriously when the public thinks they're auditioning for the lead in the next heartwarming illegitimacy comedy? Then violence will erupt as the gangstas try to get their credibility back. People will die. Ice Cube was safer when he was rapping gangsta.

In TV, the phenomenon of a show running way past it's prime years has been identified with the term, "jumping the shark" in honor of the past-it's-heyday episode of the series "Happy Days" in which Arthur (Fonzie) Fonzarelli, portrayed by Henry Winkler, jumps a tank filled with sharks while riding his motorbike, because, well, that's what people did in the 50s. I'm tired of that phrase.

I personally prefer to point out which shows have gone stale by saying, "Rudi's got her period!" based on the episode in the 80th season of the Cosby Show, where Cute Little Rudi Huxstable, portrayed by Miss Keisha Knight Pullam, got her first period. Say it with me: "Rudi's got her period!" Pretty fresh, huh?

"Hey, did you see Desperate Housewives last night? Special Guest Star Monica Lewinsky blew all the husbands at the office."
"Naaahh. That Rudi's got her period, man."

Anyway, getting back to Ice Cube and his new cinema venture, I came up with a similar term for the as-yet-unnamed phenomenon of hardcore rappers who turn soft. I know there's "sellout" but that's inaccurate. They are actually selling in. IN to a better lifestyle. And the word is always spoken with the acid of anti-capitalism. From now on this phenomenon will be referred to as "Going to the Barbershop" in honor of the very hilarious "Barbershop," and being that it was the last time Ice Cube kept together any assemblage of real.

Dig now with me please:

"Yo, did y'all see the new Coolio movie?"
"Naw man, that dude went to the barbershop a long time ago."
End scene.

"Are We There Yet?"
Yes, you've arrived. Time for your haircut, muthafucka