The Appalachian State University Promotional Video
Allow us to exhibit the various properties of our school by which it could be legitimately qualified as "Hot, Hot, Hot!"
written by Jon on December 6th, 2005

I didn't graduate from college.  I spent about a year at the University of Louisville, an urban campus in which students come to attend classes, wordlessly shuffle out of their seats, race-walk to their cars while steadfastly staring at the pavement so as to avoid any eye contact that may occur, and drive away.  I wouldn't say that no on-campus extracurricular activity is allowed, but one time I was walking to the library and passed some guy.  He looked at me and said, "Hey," and I punched him in between the nostrils, spraying blood all over my jacket and sending him sprawling on the sidewalk.  Then the President of the university walked up to me, handed me a crisp $1 bill, smiled, and walked away, giving the guy a robust kick to the ribcage as he did.

It was perhaps this type of business-oriented atmosphere and "fuck you, stranger" campus philosophy that turned me off to college for a while.  I just might go back someday, who knows.  I think I would have stayed if I could have found a campus that made learning fun.

Well, I sure wish I had happened to watch this video before I made my decision on a college.

Download HOTHOT.wmv (5.7 MB)

What we have here is the official promotional video of Appalachian State University for prospective students and parents.  Production-wise, it ranks just below the PowerPoint production of the Trail of Tears I did when I was fifteen that swooped various pictures of crying Cherokee from the bottom of the screen to racecar noises, and just above that weird episode of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon in which Raphael has a New York accent.  But what it loses in professionalism and adequacy, it more than compensates for in the amount of time you will spend waiting for it to download.

The video opens with a title sequence that was likely created with the help of WordArt and features a crimson meteorite throttling toward Earth and threatening to low-res it to death.  What follows is a tragically short list of reasons why Appalachian State University is "Hot, Hot, Hot!".  By deciding to make the entire thing what is, in essence, a slideshow, the video producers didn't really take advantage of the medium of the moving picture.  A prestigious, industrious university such as Appalachian State surely could have invested the time and money into a camera and some film hours, so the only remaining explanation for this is that somewhere within the confines of Appalachian State University, Max Payne is diving headlong into something.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #1
IF YOU ATTEND OUR UNIVERSITY, WE WILL THE ENCOURAGE THE TELLING OF JOKES ABOUT HEAVY BOXES TO OLD PEOPLE IN POLKA-DOT PANTS

In case you're not watching the video yet, these slides are set to the tune of what I guess is the campus glee club or something.  They thoughtfully caption the lyrics at the bottom of the screen, which is really great if you want to sing along and are deaf.  I wonder if they thought they were clever when they put the "growing" next to the old people and "living" next to the young people.  That's kind of cold.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #2
OUR HALLWAYS WILL PERMIT YOU AND YOUR FRIENDS TO WALK THREE ABREAST

You'd better stay in rank, or you'll be stuck watching the girl you have a crush on from behind as she makes and maintains eye contact with #02 from the football squadron.  Looks like another night alone in the dorm playing Halo and sniffing your roommate's girlfriend's bra, Chucky.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #3
ANY MINORITIES WHO MAY VENTURE ON CAMPUS ARE, TO THEIR ABJECT HORROR, PROMPTLY SURROUNDED BY HOLLERING WHITE PEOPLE

Look at that poor guy in the middle.  Most other people shouting there are smiling; he's clearly terrified.  Also of note is the kid wearing Foakleys to the lower right who appears to be drinking out of a wine glass. 

TONIGHT WE DINE ON COLORED FLESH

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #4
MULTIPLE FONTS

Does that look like a middle-school classroom to you?  Because it does to me.  Under no circumstances should a bulletin board be given elaborate decoration when the students are past the age of 9.  Not pictured: fatty pencils and cubby holes.  I mean, granted, for most college students campus is a second nursery; a sheltered conclave from the real world in which they get to sit down and learn things instead of work for a living and then bitch about how hard it is.  But they don't have to make it that obvious.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #5
LIBRARIANS WILL LAUGH AT YOU WHEN YOU CHECK OUT BOOKS

"H-hello ma'am, I'd like to check out a--"
"Oh, what do you know?  Fucking elven Charlie Brown wants to check out a book."
"Yeah, it's some poetry about--"
"Poetry?  Are you a faggot?  The fag section is through the door there."
"Uh...okay.  Whatever." [exits]
"SIKE! THAT'S THE DOOR TO EXIT THE BUILDING AND TO GO OUTSIDE"

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #6
A GIANT BEARDED MAN STALKS THE WOODS ENCIRCLING OUR UNIVERSITY

Seriously, guys, look behind you.  That behemoth's mocking you, are you just gonna stand there and take that shit?

Appalachian University is full of nondescript whitebread college kids who like to goof off and have a good time...wait a second.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #7
WE SHRUG WHEN QUESTIONED ABOUT OUR PROPENSITY TOWARD CROPPING IMAGES IMPROPERLY

Do you think that maybe they just couldn't quite figure out how to crop or "stretch-skew" images in MS Paint?  Difficult to say.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #8
WE WILL TAKE YOU ON CAMPING TRIPS (YOU CAN ONLY GO CAMPING IF YOU ARE ENROLLED IN COLLEGE)

I think it's noteworthy that the gentleman on the far right is wearing a skirt.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #9
I HOPE YOU'RE COOL WITH US CONSTANTLY MONITORING YOU OVER YOUR SHOULDER WHILE YOU WORK BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT WE ARE GOING TO DO

No promotional college video is complete without at least one shot of a kid looking unnerved as a faculty member stands behind him and conveys through body language that he is doing something wrong.  At least he didn't do that thing where he puts his hand on the student's shoulder and they both look solemnly up at the camera, like it's some sort of juvenile-abuse counseling center. 

This photo is the beginning of a sequence of the song in which a few different instruments are given solos, and photos are shown of someone playing the instrument currently being played as the solo.  This photo is the exception - oddly enough, there's a guitar solo playing here, and apparently they couldn't trouble themselves to take a picture of someone playing a guitar.  Maybe that's what the instructor is coaching him on.  "Timmy, that's a great job you're doing there.  The one thing I would advise you on is that this is a course on guitar playing, and you're actually holding a keyboard.  Timmy!  Timmy, look at me.  Timmy?  Shit, get the kid some more pills."

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #10
WE PLAY THE SAXOPHONE IN OUTRIGHT DEFIANCE OF THE EARTH'S GRAVITATIONAL PULL

This marks the first time anything's done to jazz up (get it?  Saxophone?  Jazz "up"?) the presentation.  Someone must be reeeeeally proud of their newfound ability to make a picture rotate.  At least the song's playing the right instrument this time.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #11
WE PUT FAT GUYS IN DIMLY-LIT ROOMS WITH KEYBOARDS AND OBSERVE THEM THROUGH ONE-WAY GLASS

If this video didn't take itself so seriously, I'd suggest that the juxtaposition of this spunky, energetic keyboard solo with this picture of a faceless lummox staring blankly ahead as he pounds on a keyboard is a masterstroke of comic genius, but I know better. 

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #12
UH

I have absolutely no idea of what is going on here.  It looks like some sort of team-building exercise, and I just don't trust it.  It does, however, remind me of a particularly funny story.  Right before my freshman and only year of college, we spent the night at the University of Louisville for orientation.  We were split into groups and while my friends all managed to get in a group together, I was thrown into a group with a bunch of quiet assholes I didn't know.  I'd try to start conversation, nobody would talk.  Even the group leader, who was some senior or RA on campus, was pretty shy.  Nobody talked.  We sat for a minute doing a forced "tell something interesting about yourself" exercise, and what followed was a two or three minutes of silence.  The group leader fishes the itinerary from his pocket and reads, "Trust Fall.  One member of the group stands on a chair, folds their arms, closes their eyes, and falls backward.  The rest of the group is there to catch him or her."  He looks up from the paper, says, "So...let's...", and appears as though he's going to rise from his seat for a minute, and then just doesn't.  We all sit there staring at each other, then the ground for another ten minutes or so.  We then declared a bathroom break and I took the opportunity to ditch them and drive home.  Kind of set the tone for my experience there.  I'm always a sucker for a good awkward moment.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #13
WE ARE NOT TERRIBLY WELL-INFORMED WHEN IT COMES TO THE RULES OF FIELD HOCKEY

Hey.  Uh, people?  I think it's out of bounds now.  As a general rule in sports, a yard-thick stripe of white means "OUT OF BOUNDS" and not "WHAT? NO YOU'RE COOL, KEEP ON PLAYING".  Maybe I've got it wrong, though.  I haven't played field hockey in ages and would likely embarrass myself if I attempted to fit into my old skirt and knickers.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #14
WE SPENT HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS ON THIS VAN DE GRAAF GENERATOR.  FUCK SPENDING MONEY ON A COMPETENT PROMO VIDEO PRODUCTION CREW, I WANT WACKY HAIR

The kid touching the Van de Graaf generator is one of the great everlasting clichés of stock education photography.  Except the thing is...you typically see this kind of stuff in photos of third-grade field trips.  How could this possibly be a research tool?  Do they plug it in every morning just to make sure the laws of electrical behavior still apply?  At Appalachian State university, you will also learn how to make a sailboat out of a milk carton and build a real live volcano out of baking soda and vinegar!  S-S-S-S-SCIENCE RULES!

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #15
WE ASSEMBLE INTO LARGE CROWDS OF PEOPLE ON OCCASION

I can't really be sure of what they're gathered together for, but that wave is kind of all over the place.  Straighten up, people.  This picture kind of turns my gut upside down, because as a guy who attended his fair share of Christian youth events when he was a kid, I know a True Love Waits "Through The Roof Rally" when I see one.  Basically these kids get all amped up for Christ and fill out a card with their name in a legally binding contract that states that they won't make with the fuck until marriage.  If you decide to try to weasel your way out of the situation, you get stared down by all the leaders from your youth group until you do it anyway because you're eleven and you don't give much of a shit yet anyway.

This is a little off the beaten path, but it's interesting to touch on anyway.  When I was twelve, I got this special Bible for teens called the "Youth Walk Devotional Bible".  Every few pages it would have a story with a message and a devotional.  The thing is, the story would be about real stories that real teens face!  So splitting up 2 Timothy chapter 3 was a story about Michelle, a 14-year-old who had slept with four guys and who had an itch downstairs that she was nervous about.  And prefacing the book of Psalms was a story about 16-year-old Bob, whose dad was gay and had AIDS, and who cut on himself because he felt ashamed.  Heavy stuff.  Heavy stuff for a kid whose greatest shame was jacking off to newspaper lingerie ads.  That's the kind of strategy that Christian youth groups have these days -- they assume that every kid likes to drop 8-balls and snort coke while banging transvestites inside of a makeshift house built of various wiccan books and copies of the Koran which were cemented together with Gak.  The church youth groups would have "devotional nights" in which we were encouraged to confess our sins, which at that age just amounts to diddling yourself in the shower. 

As a result of these experiences, I have kind of a distrust for large gatherings of people that are not sporting events or concerts, and an outright fear for such gatherings of people who are exclusively young people bathed in the sort of purple light that suggests that they're probably playing the "Are Y'All Ready For This" song.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #16
WE WANTONLY SET FIRE TO THINGS

Here we see an Appalachian State University student testing to see if fire still works by reducing what apparently used to be a lecture hall into a raging inferno.  Good call on the goggles; you don't want a piece of fire shrapnel to cut you in the eye!

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #17
I'M SORRY ABOUT THAT GUY WITHOUT THE TIE, I'M NOT SURE HOW HE GOT IN THE PICTURE

Beneath every stagnant, cost-ineffective, money-grubbing university in the nation is a foundation of crotchety old white men.  So these are the guys who green-lighted this video.  That explains a little bit.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #18
WELCOME TO APPALACHIAN FAMILY PUTT-PUTT GOLF AND GAMES

At this point, it's worth mentioning what the captions have been reading the last few seconds:

Building our hopes upon a brave tradition.
Speaking the language of a brave new year.
Telling the world about a new day dawning.
Spreading the spirit of the Mountaineer.

I can just imagine the scene at one of the great federal intelligence houses, such as the Pentagon or NORAD.  They're standing around, asking each other if maybe the Sun will come up the next morning, when an Appalachian State grad student bursts through the facility doors, clutching a handful of papers, and gasps, "Everybody!  Big news!  If you touch this big metal ball, your hair will stand on end!  Oh, and we transformed our lecture hall into fire!  Oh yeah, and we played the keyboard, and went camping, and...and..." The student would then collapse to the ground in exhaustion, flinging the papers to waver slowly through the air and settle upon his motionless body.  A scientist would remove his thick-rimmed glasses, stick them in his lab coat, look at the other men, and say, "This man...is a hero." 

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #19
WE ENFORCE MANDATORY PARTICIPATION IN THE DEADLIEST OF HOPSCOTCH GAMES

At first, you look at this and you think the chick is playing an intensely elaborate game of hopscotch.  Then you look a little closer, and it looks like maybe they're doing some elaborate Broadway number.  Still closer, it looks like a sailboat.  One thing's for sure: it's odd.  It makes me wonder what sort of selection process they had for these photos.  Surely they had hundreds, if not thousands, to choose from.  Did they just leaf through reel after reel of slack-jawed kids not having fun, when all of a sudden, someone picks up this one and says, "Look!  Someone having fun!  In the middle!  Get it on there!" 

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #20
AS ALUMNI, WE HIGH-FIVE EACH OTHER FOR NOT BEING TRAITOROUS ALUMNI, WHATEVER THE SHIT THAT COULD POSSIBLY ENTAIL

Time to check the Clunky Sentence/Phrase Leaderboard!  This one climbs all the way up the ladder to #2.

1. The part in "Captain America and the Avengers" for the Sega Genesis in which the first-level minibosses say "DON'T DISTURB US" and Captain America replies, "WHY SHOULD IT GO WELL?"

2. "Students and teachers, best in the country, loyal alumni, we've got a lot." from the Appalachian State University Promotional Video

3. "Rollllller-rider, it's a scootboard!" 
"It's a what?"
"It's a scootboard, that's what it is!"

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #21
WE ARE AS PROUD AS AN ANIMAL WHICH, ACCORDING TO ALL PUBLISHED BOOKS AND SCIENTIFIC JOURNALS WE HAVE ENCOUNTERED, DOES NOT DEMONSTRATE ANY UNDERSTANDING OF PRIDE OR THE HUMAN CONDITION

Huh.  Well, here we go, here's a relatively normal photo.  I guess there's not really much to say abou

LORD GOD IN HEAVEN IT'S A MOVING PICTURE

1.5 hours into the 2 hour video creation process, the guy apparently figured out how to do the circle-wipe thing.  In case you've been wondering, yes, I am condescending upon the filmmaking ability of someone despite having zero experience with such things myself.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #22
BEING AN AN AMERICAN PUBLIC UNIVERSITY, WE SPEND A CRIMINALLY AND IRRESPONSIBLY SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF TUITION FUNDS TOWARD THE SPORTS PROGRAM

Appalachian University helps to reinforce the stereotype that if you are a black quarterback, you have to scramble, because you lack that special dose of Anglo precision and patience!  No, but seriously.  I'd really like to see a black QB come along who is slow as shit, stays in the pocket, has a passer rating of like 120, and gets sacked like 7 times every game.  Like that guy jamming on the keyboard from earlier.  He'd be awesome at getting sacked.  I enjoy seeing stereotypes defied.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #23
WHEN GIVING YOUR GRADUATION SPEECH, YOU WILL BE AFFORDED TO OPPORTUNITY TO TURN TO THE SIDE AND GIVE A "SHOUT OUT" TO YOUR "MOMS"

This is perhaps the funniest part of the entire video.  If you'll recall, the previous photo was of a black guy.  This photo is of a black guy.  Apart from this, the ratio of white people:black people in the video is like 390:1.  Listen to the songs.  The second they show these guys is when the black soul singer starts belting out a tune in the song.  It's otherwise entirely out of place, like just about every other element of the song.  Before I saw/heard this, I thought these guys were just lazy or inept.  Now it's apparent that they just don't have a clue.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #24
YOU CAN GRADUATE WITH A DEGREE IN "LOOKING PRETTY AND DANCING AROUND"

I've noticed this phenomenon at certain schools.  I don't know how, and I don't know why, but some schools are chock-full of chicks who look like horses.  Indiana University, for example.

REASON WHY APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY IS HOT, HOT, HOT #25
WHEN WE GO CHRISTMAS CAROLING WE NEED A CONDUCTOR

Waaaaait.  Wait just a second.  Hold on here.  When we saw "Hot, Hot, Hot", are we talking "Hot" in a literal sense?  I thought it was meant in a more abstract sense, as if to say that Appalachian State University was "happening" or "sensational" or maybe "fun".  But it's being used in a strictly literal context here.  "Even when the weather is cold, cold, cold"?  How would that even be relevant unless we were discussing the modifier "hot" literally? 

Well, that's one final dagger in the gut that was my understanding of this video.  Apparently, this video was met with overwhelming resistance within the campus, as the student body seemed to value the ideal of not being made to look like a bunch of douche rockets.  The university president ultimately liked it a lot and decided to distribute it anyway, and it ended up somehow setting itself apart as the most terrible out of an ocean of terrible college recruitment videos.

The amount of time and effort it would take are what has lately kept me from enrolling in college recently.  But if shit like this can fly, then hell.  Maybe I'll be all right.