Salieri? No thanks, I already ate.

Tracy: I can't understand those charts, break it down to me in Star Wars
Frank: Okay, on the one hand, we have R2-D2 and C3P0
Tracy: I like them, they're nice!
Frank: On the other hand we have Han Solo
Tracy: I like him too, he acts like he doesn't care, but he does.
Frank: And somewhere in the middle we have a CGI storm trooper or Tom Hanks in Polar Express.
Tracy: I'm scared! I want to go home!

30 Rock touched on the theory of the Uncanny Valley, which has always interested me. Basically, people don't mind things that we know aren't human. But when we see something that is very close to being human, but isn't (robots, corpses, zombies, etc.) we get very uncomfortable. People have used it to explain why movies like Wall-E are very popular, but The Polar Express did so poorly.

Here are a couple articles on it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley

http://www.gorelets.com/uncanny/theory/30-rock-popularizes-the-uncanny-valley/

anyway, I thought of all this, when I went to a site promoting Bruce Willis' sure to be terrible movie, The Surrogates. You can make your own virtual version of yourself. I think the one I made for me looks like me, but also not. And it creeps me out. You can make your own here.

PS - yes I do have a job, and occasionally do work.
PPS - the title of this post refers to the conclusion of the above posted conversation. Tracy accuses Frank of not wanting him to succeed, like that guy in Amadeus who was jealous of Mozart. Frank asks "Salieri?" And Tracy, thinking Frank was referring to some type of Italian food says "No, thanks, I already ate."
PPPS - Sitcoms are even funnier when you write out the joke and explain why it's funny!