Blog Posts by Joe Dodson

It's SO on. Have you ever heard the phrase, "It's on like Donkey
Kong?" Nintendo sure has, and they want it trademarked...like Donkey Kong.

Crazy, but true. The company has officially announced
the filing of a patent with the U.S. Patent and Trademark office "to
trademark the pop-culture phrase 'It's on like Donkey Kong.'"

Why now? As Nintendo puts it, they filed the trademark
"in honor of the upcoming Nov. 21 launch of Donkey Kong Country
Returns." Or, as they'd like to
put it, "On Nov. 21, It's on like Donkey Kong^TM!"

But while Nintendo obviously owns the rights to the world
famous video game gorilla, their claim to the catchphrase is a bit dubious.

For one thing, "it's on like Donkey Kong" is the

Even if you don't follow video games, you've probably heard of Metroid, or seen the intimidating orange power-suit worn by its protagonist. But did you know the bounty hunter inside is a woman named Samus Aran, one of the first heroines in the history of video games?

Created by Makoto Kano in 1986 for his action video game Metroid, Samus was originally intended to be a man -- until someone on the staff noted that it would be interesting to have players discover that they'd been playing as a woman the whole time. A vote ensued, and the “he” became a “she.”

A tough, alien-fighting heroine. Sound familiar? Metroid co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto took much inspiration from Ridley Scott’s 1979 sci-fi