Megawhinge

Another thing I don't understand (long list) is the concept of a musical based on pop bands. I'm not talking about your Tommy/Quadrophenia style 'rock opera' where they're nice enough to write new songs and attach some kind of sensible plot but rather these new fangled things like 'Abba the Musical' and 'Queen the Musical'. Pretty soon it'll be epics based on the life of Vanilla Ice and Plastic Bertrand, but I digress.

The most offensive thing, to me, about these travesties are the plots. Such poor excuses for a bunch of D-Grade actors to get up and belt out the famous songs that we all know and love (?). The ABBA one involves some flimsy backstory about a wedding and some "who is my father?" shenanigans to clear the way for two hours of "Waterloo" and "SOS". You can see just how this thing goes,

Bogan A: "Oh look, the phone is ringing...."

Entire Cast: "Ring! Ring! Why don't you give me a call!"

Adam: "Puke!"

The Queen one, "We Will Rock You" (no you won't) is even worse. I can't remember the exact details, and let's just say that I'm not keen to look them up, but it's seriously futuristic SHIT about a planet called "Borhapsodia" (or something) having their music stolen and the quest of some jabrone to bring it back to the tune of "I Want to Break Free", or possibly "Radio Ga Ga". Noooo! And people actually pay $80+ to watch this. I don't understand it - if you want to hear the songs the way they were supposed to be played then buy a greatest hits CD (Queen have three, it's not too hard to find one), if you desire greatly the chance to dance around like a fool and sing along in public then there are about four and a half million tribute bands playing around the shop. Sure, it's not Freddie Mercury - but then again neither is the guy who played "Thug #5" on Stingers who's singing the songs on stage is it?

And don't get me started on Ben Elton. I remember when his entire career was built on ripping the piss out of pretentious crap like this - now he's writing it. Sell out!