A wise man, I forget who, once said, "monkeys equal comedy." Certainly E-Trade knows this, since their funniest Super Bowl commercials have featured our simian friends. In fact, there have been a lot of interesting monkey searches lately, so we thought we would take a look at a barrel of monkey searches.
Here are last week's top 20 searches involving monkeys:
1) Monkeys
2) Escape From Monkey Island
3) Planet of the Apes
4) Monkeybone
5) Monkey pictures
6) Gorillas
7) Webmonkey
8) Chimpanzees
9) The Monkees
10) Spider monkeys
11) Guano Apes
12) Apes
13) Scopes Monkey Trial
14) Sea Monkeys
15) Gorilla pictures
16) Bushorchimp.com
17) The Monkey's Paw
18) Brass Monkey
19) Pinkmonkey.com
20) Chimpanzee pictures
Here is a little explanation behind some of these searches:
Escape from Monkey Island is the fourth game in the Monkey Island computer game series. It came out in November, and like most video games, searches peaked just after Christmas.
Recent interest in Planet of the Apes stems from a remake coming out this summer. The remake is directed by Tim Burton (The man behind Batman and Edward Scissorhands) and stars Mark Wahlberg in the Charlton Heston role. Searches have doubled since December as pictures and gossip have leaked from the production. No truth to the rumors that Wahlberg will be performing a hip-hop version of the Simpsons classic, "Rock Me Dr. Zaius."
One rumor which is probably true says the Planet of the Apes trailer will debut in a couple of weeks when the film Monkeybone is released. It's a combined animation-live action film with Brendan Fraser playing a cartoonist trapped in his imagination during a coma. The wacky TV commercials have people searching - the movie's queries went up 600 percent last week. And hey -- Pee Wee sighting! -- Paul Rubens is the voice of the cartoon monkey Monkeybone.
The Monkey's Paw and Scopes Monkey Trial are likely driven by student searches. The first is the classic American short story by W. W. Jacobs; the second is the 1925 trial of Tennessee teacher John Scopes on the charge of teaching evolution that was the basis of the play Inherit the Wind.
Brass Monkey seems to refer to a number of things. It could be two different rock bands, or a motorcycle rally, or an alcoholic beverage, or a Beastie Boys song.
A few more explanations: Guano Apes are a European rock band? Webmonkey is a site full of tools for web developers, and a proud part of the Lycos Network? Pinkmonkey.com sounds like a porn site, but it is actually a website full of literature summaries for students.
Finally, Bushorchimp.com seems to be the latest web craze. It really is just what it sounds like -- a website devoted to showing that our President looks like a monkey.
The Lycos 50 team is off Tuesday. A new Lycos 50 will appear on Wednesday, when we will reveal whether XFL and Survivor can stay in the top ten. Then, Thursday, join us as we take a look at the most popular Oscar nominees online.
