Must-watch online TV
NMA TV
www.nma.tv

YOU haven't really made it if Taiwanese animation website NMA TV hasn't spoofed you in one of its inimitable online cartoons.

NMA - which stands for Next Media Animation - is the online animation-market leader for the wackiest yet informative presentation of headline events from around the world.

From politics to celebrities to sports to especially gloriously crazy characters - like that Italian guy dubbed "Captain Coward" in the Costa Concordia cruise-ship disaster - NMA's Mandarin-language video clips (some are dubbed in English, most have English subtitles) have become the newshound's idiot's-guide classics.

The site first gained worldwide attention and notoriety for a hilarious re-enactment of Tiger Woods' bizarre car accident in November 2009. Its graphic depiction of the then Mrs Elin Woods chasing the car with a golf club went viral and everybody got the big, nutty picture.

Life is always so much funnier as a cartoon. Check out my paper's pick of videos now playing.

Arsenal's Ramsey and his celebrity death goal curse
http://www.nma.tv/arsenals-aaron-ramsey-celebrity-death-goal-curse/

Anybody can give the Kiss Of Death, but the Kick Of Death, it seems, can be administered only by Arsenal's Aaron Ramsey.

The Welsh midfielder may have acquired the craziest licence to kill because, every time he kicks in a goal, somehow someone famous kicks the bucket right after that.

So far, Ramsey's scores have been linked to the deaths of Osama bin Laden (who left us the next day), Steve Jobs (three days later), Colonel Muammar Gaddafi (the next day), and, most recently, Whitney Houston (just hours after Ramsey scored against Sunderland on Feb 11). They all checked out after he checked the ball in.

Capitalising on British tabloid The Sun's morbid revelation of either the sheer coincidence or voodoo curse of the player's supposedly jinxed foot, NMA's graphic account of "Celebrity Death Goal Curse" is currently one of its funniest and most bizarre videos.

"When Arsenal's Aaron Ramsey gets near the goal, famous people around the world get nervous," reads the script.

The man in black on the pitch the animation depicts isn't a referee with a whistle but Death with a deadly scythe.

The funniest thing about the cryptic clip is how the unhappy celeb conk-offs are all tied to a football bouncing happily through.

The way the video ends - with the Grim Reaper asking chirpily who's next while smiling eagerly over the very aged Queen Elizabeth II and the very threatened President Assad of Syria - makes this spooky death-score video a real, er, kicker.

Xi Jinping wooed by Obama white house
http://www.nma.tv/xi-jinping-wooed-obama-white-house/

The love-fest between President Barack Obama and Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping during the latter's recent trip to America was so date-night perfect you could practically have put it to cheesy music, which NMA does.

In NMA's clip, the two make goo-goo eyes at a romantic dinner, caress each other's cheeks, hold hands and, ultimately, make nice in the bedroom of power, with Xi wearing a spiffy People's Liberation Army uniform.

Taiwanese NMA probably looks at this make-out session as a gigantic sellout, since the animation studio has Obama gleefully dumping a photo of famed imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo into a dustbin.

That's biting, but not as hilariously biting as a dinner scene where Obama's zero-credit American Express card gets duly rejected while Xi's Chinese Loanshark card is given the royal treatment.

Wonder what Michelle would say to this particular pairing.

Jeremy Lin: The childhood years
http://www.nma.tv/jeremy-lin-childhood-years/

Right now, basketball sensation Jeremy Lin is dominating NMA's made-in-Taiwan videos due to his Taiwanese heritage. The latest is about his childhood years, and how he was so destined for basketball he could even spin the ball on a chopstick.

"Nooooo! He didn't choose the calculator!" the NMA clip has his mother and relatives gasping, as little Lin fatefully picks up that most un-geeky round object as a toddler.

This Childhood Years video is quite a goofy but informative historical snapshot which leads to two more Early Linsanity clips - High School Years and College Years.

It's a simple and straightforward summation of his journey to the big time with graphics that make you chuckle.

For instance, the dude, looked after by a Yao Ming-tall Jesus.

That's totally Linsane.

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