Not That You Care

2009-11-02T08:06:00.000-06:00

Not often you see an homage to the Ghostbusters animated series, but here goes:

2009-10-03T20:15:00.000-05:00

The Power of Meanwhile... : Heroes returns

Perhaps it is the power of lowered expectations, but I was quite impressed by the season premiere of Heroes. I have been going through the listings deciding which shows live or die, who will make the cut and who will get sent to the island of lost toys. Sorry Grey's Anatomy, abuse my favorite characters for too long and I have to say NO MORE! Heroes had been on the chopping block. I feel like I could have skipped all last season and would not have been the worse off. People criticize Lost for having bad seasons, but even in their worst times, they still introduced terrific characters that altered the show and stayed on. Beginning of last season vs. beginning of this one? Not one person made it. And several of the stalwarts are (thankfully) absent. Good luck with that hanging out at a military base and watching old home movies project of yours Suresh. Don't call us. No seriously, don't call us.

Back in the slimmed down show, the mandate seems to be “Let's take a breath” and I couldn't be happier about it. All the characters have had a chance to hang out, get into their surroundings, have conversations that aren't about metaphysics and genetics and just breathe. What a wonderful idea. Each of them now feel more alive and awake then they have in years. Claire is still trying to fit in, but is not the whiny teen anymore. HRG is feeling the damage of years of secrecy. Hiro has turned his gaze outward, not trying to make himself the bestest hero of all time. And Peter, my long lost favorite character, has actually found his place in the world, and its a pretty good one. In what should have been the classic heroic refusal of the call to action, Peter really sold it, convincing us and HRG that his way was much better. When he told HRG that they should let Darth Maul have the magical dingus, it was one of those wake up moments that the show would never have stopped for last year.

We are not without issues, however. We still have the dreadful arc of the many named blonde. So through the break, she'd been a relentless killing machine, assassinating all those who hurt her. She meets up with HRG after botching her attempt on him and in a couple hours, now it's all good, water under the bridge (heh). I know you were trying to kill me yesterday multiple murderer lady, but would you like some soup? And all is well. Um, what? It's not that I dislike Ali Larter, but it seems no matter what they do she is always in the worst storylines. And the Petrelli Power Players are running the same scripts from the start of the show. Having Sylar hiding in plain sight is an interesting idea, but how is this going to play out? I don't really want him or Nathan back, so it's never going to end well. Having Sylar as Head Sylar, ala Number Six and Scorpius, gives him a chance to ham it up and torment Parkman, but will eventually lead to him getting his act together and then we're right back to 'what the hell do we do with the villain we created?' problem that has plagued the show since the second season.

But overall, I'm very impressed. The show has lightened up, opened up and seems to be going in new directions. I don't know what to make of the carnival of freaks, and I'm pleased with that. Gray areas and complex choices are what the show should have been making use of all along. As long as they keep focusing on the core characters, don't feel the need to bring back those who have drifted off into the margins (have a good life in fanfic Maya!), and let them have real conversations with each other, I won't be embarrassed to admit I watch the show anymore. And that's not something I could ever have imagined.

2009-09-21T08:53:00.002-05:00

Today's episode was brought to you by the number 9

At this time of year, I don't ask for much from movies. Have an interesting plot OR a cool effect. Have a pretty actress OR a cool ending. I don't expect anything to cover more than one base. 9 doesn't do everything right, but it does so much right that I am simply amazed.

The movie is right in my wheelhouse, a cool sci fi flick about automatons trying to survive in a post apocalyptic world all done in state of the art CGI. You'd have to tie me down to keep me away. All I wanted was for it not to be lame. The movie itself is gorgeous. The visuals look like the best stop motion animation you've ever seen, which is a step up from the glib slickness of most off the shelf computer generated films. You know it's not live action, but it's also not Madagascar. But aside from art direction, which is astonishing, the movie moves well. Action is well shot and paced and is more exciting than anything in Transformers 2. That's not a cheap slap at the latest Bay Blast. While I enjoyed TF2, a session in well choreographed action it was not. Here you are close up with the characters, and get to see each of them doing their part, often in slo-mo, harkening back to the thrilling moments of 300.

If you read the cast list, it's seems pretty safe. Need a crazy guy? Call Crispin “Creepy Thin Man” Glover. Need a sensitive youngster for a quest? Call Elijah “Frodo” Wood. Gruff leader? Christopher “Edelweiss” Plummer's your man. But in concert, they all work so well together. Highlights are John C. Reilly's ultimate sidekick character, and the uncredited, but household favorite, Kevin Michael Murphy's over eager bodyguard with a fetish for magnets. Each of them do a lot with a little, which leads into the central problem of the film.

Slight spoilers here, but we learn that each of the numbered golems, are not in fact whole people, but each is an aspect of the same original person. This way they each represent one primary emotion or goal from their creator. This is clever, but leaves each of them as incomplete. It ties into the overall theme, but still leaves the characters a bit, ahem, threadbare. The same goes for the story. The only knock against the movie would be the plotting. It's very primary colors. The group starts from A, travels to B, then back to A, then to B again and finally returns to A for the finale. And all of this takes place in about a mile square. Toy Story did show us that much can be done when the small world is seen as big, but it does feel small scale and thus makes the stakes seem equally low. This has a twofold effect of thin characters in a thin storyline making the movie feel lighter than the events would have you believe.

But oh those visuals. Having glimpsed the opposite in theaters, that being Delgo, I'll take this mix any day. Movies are predominately a visual medium after all, all that other stuff got added later. I'd highly recommend this to anyone who was interested in it. While the blockbusters this year have been either dumb, dull or entirely predicable, it is these little movies, smaller budgets and more creativity that has renewed my faith in the medium. Let's hope a couple more can sneak through before we're deluged with heavy historical dramas, poignant movies about adultery and my personal windmill, rich white people with problems. Here's to a small check and a big idea.

2009-09-19T00:54:00.000-05:00

2009-09-14T19:42:00.001-05:00

Rest In Peace, Patrick Swayze.

2009-09-11T14:25:00.001-05:00

2009-09-08T20:39:00.002-05:00

And now you want me to WHAT?

I have been ticked off, and so I turn to my ever trusty and ever ready blog to vent. Video gaming, like any other medium, is constantly evolving. It might be doing so at a faster pace but much like comics or TV or movies, it has to change with the times. What is hip and awesome one day is old and tired the next. You must incorporate the amazing new feature your competitor implemented in his last game or you run the risk of being behind the times. This can be a frustrating thing for developers. The video game industry is more dependent on sequels than most other art forms, and they must skate the razor's edge of innovating while not alienating.

As consoles age, games advance and looking back can sometimes make us wince at what we put up with. For me, the best thing to die off was the timer. Why can I only stay in a level for a set amount of time? Besides exploring, maybe I need some more time to master that tricky jump? I was happy when that hit the dust bin of history. Same thing with lives, like picking up 1UP mushrooms. I was shocked and saddened when after being gone for almost a decade, Super Mario Galaxy decided to resurrect the concept with all the ensuing aggravation. Another of these terrible trends has resurfaced, one I hoped had gone extinct.

I remember playing through and loving Sly Cooper. It was a staple on the PS2, a cel shaded platformer about a raccoon thief. It was funny and clever and kept you on your toes. In most levels, the object was not to destroy your enemies, but to sneak through the levels undetected and make off with the object of desire. By the end of the game, I was a ninja, swinging above the heads of the guards, hiding in potted plants and never tripping an alarm. I had mastered my skills and so I charged into the final battle ready to best the boss. And I found out I had to fight him in a jetpack, flying over the city.

I'm sorry, what?

Yes, for the final battle they introduced a whole new concept, one that had been absent from the rest of the game, and demanded you learn a whole new set of skills to beat the game. "Aggravating" does not cover it. All of the work I had done meant next to nothing. And this wasn't an isolated occurance. Halo, that celebrated series of first person shooters, ends their games with driving sequences. Bioshock, the moody atmospheric study of morality and society has you run in a circle and shoot a guy a bunch of times. I thought the game industry had moved on from this practice, but I was wrong.

To be fair, the game in question, Batman: Arkham Asylum, always had a strong combat element to it. Many places in the game, you had to fight your way through a bunch of guys to progress. But the game was about sneaking, detective work, not being seen and fighting your way out when you had to. I was good at all of these things, except combat. It's not that I was terrible, but I never got a rhythm for it, I always felt I was mashing buttons and hoping for the best no matter what combos I bought or upgrades I used. So I come to the end of the game, and what is it? They lock you in the room with a bunch of guys and you have to punch your way out. How very Batman?

And worse, you have to be pretty near perfect to do it. You get no help, no reprieves and no health regeneration. You have to take out wave after wave and do it on one health bar. Here I had gotten through the whole game, beat every boss, solved every riddle and I might not be able to beat the game because the one aspect I never mastered is the only one that ended up mattering. I don't hate the game. I've had a pretty fun time playing through it. But not being able to see the ending of a game I worked so hard on is pretty frustrating when it seems like the last part is out of character both for the game and for the universe it is set in. I won't go as far as BATMAN WOULDN'T DO THAT! but I do feel like the World's Greatest Detective is not really using his smarts. I know asking What Would Batman Do is ultimately pointless, but I'm pretty sure standing in a room full of thugs and punching them out one by one is not it.

Oh well, maybe they'll fix it in the sequel.

2009-09-02T21:40:00.001-05:00

Inglorious Basterds

First off, it's a bad title. No, strike that. The title is fine, but inaccurate. That, plus the advertising, would lead you to believe that the movie is about this group of Nazi hunters, how they got together and showing you their early missions together, leading up to one great Dirty Dozen final mission. This is far from the truth. While the Basterds are a major part of the movie, they are only one part, I'd say, a third of the movie. We get to see their origin, the end of one of their missions and a big operation toward the end. But to suspect that this movie is all Brad Pitt and the boys killin' Nazis is wrong and could lead to disappointment.

Which would be a shame, because this movie is stunning. Like most Quentin Tarantino films, it does tend to have his obsessions writ large. Conversations tend to go on and on, even though seldom do they end up being boring. The reason I started this piece off with a warning is that going in thinking this movie is wall to wall action can be dangerous, because this is a different set of muscles QT is flexing. Instead of blistering violence, we have him showing us nerve twanging suspense. Double agents, false accents, hidden identities, you are enjoying the wonderful rhythms of QT's writing while at the same time asking, does he know about her? Did that mean anything? Do you think he noticed that slip-up? It sizzles, it crackles but only rarely does it explode.

From the long view, this movie ends up being a series of people sitting around tables talking. But in close up, each one is as intricately choreographed as a John Woo shootout, and as unique. I mean that both ways. If you'll permit me a bit of film school, the motifs tend to recur, like how every character has intense and diverse feelings about movies. Was this really what they were talking about in wartime? That leads to another point. Leave history at the door. This movie is no more accurate than any western. It touches on actual bits, but remixes it all. The War is the backdrop, not the subject of a History Channel special.

What it comes down to is character. Besides his fractured storytelling and his penchant for over the top violence, what QT excels at is creating three dimensional characters. And in setting this in the familiar backdrop of WWII, it allows him to work with larger character types. It's my opinion that in this movie, QT has found not only his Darth Vader but also his Darth Maul. He has created his iconic, gigantic bad guy who dominates and fascinates and oppositely the person that the fans will love who gets far too little screen time and leaves the film much too quickly. I've never wanted spinoffs and tie ins to a QT movie until now. It positively demands a 6 issue comic miniseries. Are you listening Boom Studios? Somebody buy Mark Waid a ticket.

The movie is not without its flaws. I found myself much more interested in the margins, in the things hinted at but not shown in several scenes. Rarely do you find a movie with so much story that it spills out into the cracks. It's got some pacing issues but never feels like it's almost 3 hour running time. While some scenes do drag, often their importance is revealed later. It was a much different movie than I expected, but I so rarely get surprised at the movies that it ended up being a pretty amazing time.

2009-06-11T01:47:00.001-05:00

2009-05-19T13:59:00.003-05:00

Here's the LAST WORD from the creator of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. RIP Cameron and Co. Long may you live on in Digital Heaven.

2009-05-18T14:00:00.001-05:00

2009-05-17T21:22:00.003-05:00

TV and Thee

Wanted to give a quick update on the fates of several shows as of today:

Dollhouse RENEWED!
Chuck RENEWED!
Scrubs RENEWED! (I'm as shocked as you are.)

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles CANCELED!
(That one really hurts, what with that game changing season finale.)

Lots of shows still on the bubble and we probably won't know more until the new schedules are announced in the next few weeks. Keep the torches lit.

Unhappy answers: X-Men Origins - Wolverine

2009-05-06T00:10:00.001-05:00

If you love Hugh Jackman and his portrayal of Wolverine, I would recommend seeing this spin off. If not, stay away, as his performance is the only consistently good thing as the movie checks off box after box on its long list of what it thinks people want answered. Stryker at one point warns Logan not to follow this path as he won't like what he finds at the end. I say the exact same thing to you now.

Yes, questions are answered, but you will not like these answers. They range from bizarre to stupidly simplistic to ham fisted revisions but none will give you that tingle of satisfaction when the pieces fall into place. More often than that, you'll find yourself saying 'Really? THAT'S what you're going with?'

Heading into spoiler territory here. I'm a fanboy, I admit. But it wasn't my inner Comic Book Guy voice that had the issues. Wolvie and Victor are bros? OK. It was the fact the movie seemed to have been plotted by bullet points. Each scene ended with a black check mark on some piece of backstory then they dutifully moved onto the next. No narrative flow or momentum. I'd say its like a video game, but I'm playing the game and its better than the movie.

The movie starts badly. Of course the movie would begin with an adaption of Origin. Thing is, this miniseries is generally regarded and tepid and even dull by most fans, at least the ones I have heard from. And the big dramatic moment, the first use of the claws, was so awful I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing out loud. I was holding my head down to stifle the giggles. Not an auspicious beginning. From there, things get better. The title sequence was very well done. Showing the claw brothers fighting for AMERICA! in various wars through history was cool, but the trouble is I would rather see a movie based on any of these battles than what we actually got. Wolverine & Sabertooth killing Nazis? Yes please! Their military career over, the brothers get to meet the team 'o freaks. Enjoy this, because it's the highlight of the movie. It's all down hill from here. The characters are interesting, funny in Wade's case, and we get to see them strut their stuff in a big attack sequence. Once Logan leaves the group though, the movie starts to sputter.

Skipping to the end, it all comes down to a fight between Wolverine, Victor and Deadpool on the top of a nuclear cooling tower. I'd throw a spoiler alert in front of that if it wasn't in ALL OF THE PREVIEWS! But midway threw the fight I realized I didn't really care about it. Why? No stakes. All three of them are immortal healers. Any wound, short of decapitation, would be healed including a fall from the top of a nuclear cooling tower. Why have the fight up high when it doesn't matter if they fall? This was cemented when at the end as the structure is collapsing, Logan and Victor have a calm discussion before Victor jumps to the ground.

And then the gun. Seems like late in the process, the creatives realized they had to scramble Logan's memories. Their solution? A gun with Adamantium bullets, a Deus Ex Magnum if you will. Stryker explain that shooting him in the head with it will scramble his memories. First off, how does he know? Its a first generation solution for a first generation problem, how the hell could he predict what it would do? And how would he know what memories would be affected? Blam! No more 6th birthday party. Blam! Now you can no longer ride a bike. Blam! What is your favorite color? YOU DON'T KNOW! MWA HA HA! No nanobots to erase memories. No use of Stryker's psychic son. No mind wave bomb. Nope, big gun, shiny bullets. Lazy writing, folks.

If I had to give one piece of advice to filmmakers doing these movies from here on out, it would be this: USE SOMEONE ELSE. When you are writing a movie like this and you want to take a popular character and vastly change his history, powers and personality, then use a different character. Yes, I am a Deadpool fan and was annoyed about the lame alterations they made to him at the end. What's worse is that there are so many characters in the X-universe that would have worked for this. What about Omega Red? Hell, use Fantomex. Nobody'd blink if you tore that dude to pieces and you get points for obscurity. Now if they want to do a spinoff, they have to do the saran wrapped face, ginsu armed x-bot version with bizarre shushing action.

I didn't hate the movie, I was just massively disappointed. In the large buffet of X-stories, why do they keep going for the bad shrimp and avoiding the sirloin. Hugh emerges from all this pretty much unscathed. His Logan is great all the way through, especially when he keeps it simple. His 'crap' and 'damn' moments are highlights. Speeches? Not so Wolverine. The acting is pretty top notch all around, esp. Ryan Reynolds and surprisingly Will.I.am. It is the laundry list feeling of the rest of the movie that hurts the most. Next time, how about letting the filmmakers make the film rather than the beancounters.

2009-05-01T07:15:00.002-05:00

A little ode to spring, very appropriate for the day. And also very NSFW! Earmuffs for the kiddies please. Enjoy!

2009-04-29T18:00:00.000-05:00

Character Studies: The Whipping Boy

In this series on character, I haven't mentioned the most important part of the equation: you, the audience. Without the people watching, all the writing, acting, producing is all for naught. And when the magic happens, you get people to fall in love with a fictional construct and watch that creation's adventures from week to week, year to year. But this is not without some dangers.

Good drama is all about conflict. We watch people in their worst moments, on their worst days. Sometimes they rise to the occasions, sometimes they fall. And we curse the fates their lives should be so terrible, and bless them that we get to watch the struggle. But in all this, we must believe that it is the universe causing these situations to occur. When the veil parts, when we get a peek behind the curtain, this can be the beginning of the end of the character love affair. Let me give you an example of what I mean.

I loved ER from its first episode. This was a medical show, dime a dozen even today, but it really focused on the individuals. And through its history, it has created many memorable characters. I can only talk about the ones from the start of the show for reasons that will become apparent. It would be easy to talk about Dr. Doug Ross here. It's the birthplace of the phenomenon know as Clooney. Much could be written here about character, how this handsome young actor had tried and tried to catch a break, but just couldn't catch one. But here in this show, with these writers, these directors, these costars, the settings were right for him to create a fantastic, memorable man that audience have loved for over a decade. But that's not my focus. My guy was Dr. Mark Greene.

While Clooney got the spotlight, Anthony Edwards (the BMOC when the show launched) was creating just as memorable and fascinating a creation. His Doc was smart, savvy, passionate and wore his heart on his sleeve. He was the one I was always waiting to show back up on screen. But as the years went by, things changed. While Dr. Ross got his hero moment, his self sabotage times, his loves and his fights, Dr. Greene seemed to be on God's S*** List. He was unlucky in love, savagely beaten and eventually had that long staple of lazy "what do we do now?" writing: cancer. After a time I had to stop watching the show. Not because it had gotten bad, but because I couldn't stand to see what the writers were doing to this character I adored.

I'm not naive, I know how the system works. I've watched Buffy die twice. But in all the shows I watch, with characters I care about, it felt to me like the universe was acting on them, that the story was in control. The more the writers heaped abuse on Dr. Greene, the more aware I became of the almost sadistic joy they seemed to be taking in knocking him down again and again. Joss referred to Alyson Hannigan as The Queen Of Pain because he knew whenever he did something to Willow, she was golden, that she could convey anguish and hurt and make the audience feel it. But it was always in the service of the story, not just a series of punishments just to fill airtime. None of this is factual, to my knowledge. I'm speaking here of how I felt about the situation. But as time passed, I couldn't stand to watch the beatings they put this noble soul through week after week. I had to walk away.

It's a fine line. You have to put characters in conflict. It's the heart of drama and comedy. But in shows like ER, which became more of a machine to feed characters into as it ran on (and on and on), all things serve the franchise and it becomes more grist for the mill rather than putting beloved characters under the knife to carve them into better, more realistic people. And with a character I cared about, it just hurt too much to watch him beaten for their amusement.

2009-04-28T18:00:00.001-05:00

Character Studies - The Troublemaker

It's been a long time since I posted about something really embarrassing I enjoy. A guilty pleasure, if you will. I have seen, and willingly sought out, all three High School Musical movies. I can pause for laughter here.

I'm a big fan of modern musicals, so it wasn't that big a stretch. Plus the idea that the biggest thing in tween entertainment would be a musical was too bizarre to not investigate. I can't say I'm a fan of the series though. I find most of the music to be too similar and sanitized. And while I respect the alternate universe, clean and safe, that the movie was set in, having the main problem being that the leads are too good at too many things! just doesn't engender my sympathies. I can easily recall the names Troy and Gabrielle, but that's mostly because of the relentless marketing Disney does. As lead characters, they are fairly thin. But into the scene walks a fully formed, head turning dynamo: Sharpay Evans.

Rich, beautiful, spoiled, talented, this pink clad shark cuts through the school leaving everyone in her wake. What I love is that she plays it as if it never occurred to her that she's not the lead of the movie. Every scene, your eye is drawn to her. She commands attention. And while I applaud Ashley Tisdale and wish her all the best, it's not just her acting, it's the whole package. And all this without a single great song in the first movie. It's not until the sequel she gets her show stopping number "Fabulous". The creators also knew what a find they had here, as she became the de facto villain in HSM2, and all under the guise of doing what she thought was best for everyone, but mostly her. Every villain is the hero of his (her) own story, as the saying goes.

In most musicals, according to Ashman and Menken of the great '90s Disney animated movies, the heroine gets to sing an 'I Want...' song. In Little Mermaid, you get "I want to be where the people are." In Beauty and the Beast, "I want adventure in the great wide somewhere." And in HSM 3, Sharpay gets her own 'I Want' song. And what does she want? "I WANT IT ALL!" It's a show stopper.

Am I saying that you should all watch HSM now and you'll love it? Sadly, no. The movies are fun and sweet, but ultimately shallow. The music gets better as the series goes on, but it most likely won't win over anyone who is not predisposed to the type of material. What I'm saying is that character is something that can show up regardless of the material that surrounds them. You never know when one is going to catch fire.

2009-04-27T18:00:00.000-05:00

Character Studies

In anticipation of the Wolverine movie hitting screens this week, I wanted to take a moment to talk about character. Not characters, but in the creation and maintaining of a character in films and television. It's not something that is essential. I loved the Michael Bay Transformers movie, but none of the characters were really that interesting. Everyone had their moments, but all of them came out at maybe 2.5 dimensions at the most. Think of it this way: what was Megan Fox's character's name? Right off the top of your head. See? Now there was Sam and Bumblebee, Optimus and Megatron, but as for the rest of the team, it's a bit fuzzy. I know Prowl and Ironhide were in there, but if you put all the robots next to each other, I'd have trouble picking them out. Even what I consider to be the best character in the entire G1 series, Starscream, had one line. He blew some stuff up, but you could have called him Thundercracker or Blitzwing or Skywarp and it wouldn't have raised an eyebrow. That's because the movie was light on character.

0n a recent Facebook list, I put down Ben Linus as one of my top 5 favorites from Lost. It raised some eyebrows. But he's a murderous, lying, manipulative zealot! they cried. True, but every time he's around, the story gets better. He's got a plan. As one of my friends put it, he's always going to move the ball. I'm not the president of his fan club, but I know when he shows up, the show is going to be the better for it. Even in a show like Lost, now 100 episodes strong, not every lead character is full and complete. Sawyer is the most compelling, even if he is not the lead. Kate changes depending on the whims of who is writing her, but Sawyer is always Sawyer. And it's not even about time on the show. We've seen Claire for 5 seasons now and she's still not interesting. But Desmond shows up and in his second episode, he's already a fantastic, fascinating character. It's like that, lightning in a bottle, and like porn, you know it when you see it.

It's a hard thing to do. I'm not singling out writers or directors or actors here. To create a compelling character, it takes the bizarre alchemy of all three. It's not a make or break situation either. But a show won't last if people don't glom onto at least one. Shows like Law and Order and other police procedurals seem to do just fine with bare sketches of real people. They can be switched out time and again, because people watch for the mechanism not the characters. Even taking a show like Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Sarah is not an incredibly interesting character. Turns out it was the actor/director-writer combo from the films that made her sing. In the TV show, she's neat, but not attention grabbing. Same with John. The most compelling character is the machine, Cameron, followed by Derek, soldier from the future. Each of them seem to be living their lives, doing things beyond what we see. The others are like animatronics, only coming alive when we are watching them, otherwise dark and still.

I'm bouncing all over the map here, but in the next few postings, I'm going to be singling out characters that have risen up past their original purposes and elevated from their source materials. It'd be easy to say that Patrick Jane on The Mentalist is a fascinating character, but that's fish in a barrel. It'd be like saying that Monk or Columbo is a great character. Of course they are, without them the whole show would fail. I'm going to be casting my net a bit wider to show you what I mean. Follow along, won't you?

2009-04-25T15:09:00.000-05:00

Rest In Peace, Bea Arthur. Thanks for the laughs.

Found Wisdom

2009-04-24T20:52:00.001-05:00

From an ad for a board game:

"You won't believe what your friends can do!"

I like that. It's hopeful.

2009-03-03T01:42:00.000-06:00

From Crackle: Angel of Death Ep 1 "Edge" starring Zoe Bell

And now we celebrate...ourselves

2009-02-23T23:25:00.001-06:00

Another Oscar season come and gone, mostly met with apathy. Seems no matter what, the Academy (all 5000 of them) will continue to champion movies that only they go to see. And the generational tendencies mean your best shot at winning is to set your movie in World War II or show how awesome the 60's were. But this is not about that but about the other thing.

There is a world of difference between the awards and The Show. I started watching the ceremony in high school when I got bitten by the film bug, wanting to know more about the people that made the movies than just their names. I followed the season pretty religiously but soon lost my faith when terrible, overhyped Oscar Bait movies kept winning. Blame Darth Weinstein for that. But I kept, and keep, up with the show not only to put names to faces, but to keep up with how Hollywood feels about itself. And to see the veneer crack.

In a town all about illusion and appearances, the rare moments are the honest ones. It is not every time, but once in a while, you get to see an honest moment from these practiced liars. And I use that term respectfully, honest. Julia Roberts cackling 'I love it up here!' Tom Hanks talking about Heaven being crowded with angels. These have real power. It's what I hope for. And they delivered.

The show told a story, which was very cool. It went through the steps as if a movie was being made right in front of us. Once a step was completed, the award was given, from writing being the first to directing being the last. It was very classy, with nimble host Hugh Jackman noting at each group of people 'They make movies.' It is not just about stars but about craftsmen of all stripes. Very classy.

But what really got me, and appeared to really get the nominees was that instead of last year's winner introducing a series of clips, 5 former winners of that category came out and each one spoke directly to a nominee about their performance. Pure, uncut star power ladies and gents. This was a chance to see actors actually acting, delivering solilliquies at apparently unsuspecting actors. Was it back patting and self congradulatory? Sure. Was it at times honest and moving? Absolutely.

As for the speeches, a couple good ones. I'm not a Penelope Cruz fan (search for my discussion of Sahara for details) but her emotional memoir was pretty moving. Same goes for Kate Winslet. This, like Julia and Denzel, was much more for body of work but it was still her time and she seems honestly surprised. As the only movie of the crop I saw, I was pulling for Slumdog, and so was rewarded. I think Danny Boyle is one of the greats working right now. If Slumdog is not your cuppa, try Millions. Sure it's a Christmas movie, but only in the way that Love Actually is a Christmas movie.

All in all, this had to be my favorite Oscar broadcast. Triple the star power, no lame bits, three amazing musical moments (one by Baz!) and not one mention of Jack Nicholson. If they repeat this same format over and over again, I'd be content. It'll be interesting to see what they do in a good movie season. Either way, top hats off to a great three plus hour show and congrats on bringing luster back to the Oscars.

2009-02-21T01:11:00.000-06:00

Mass Effect 2 'Debut' teaser

2009-02-11T14:07:00.002-06:00

Motion in the ocean

I'm fascinated by this concept, the idea of animating comics to make them into micromovies. It's nothing new, as they did the same thing to Kirby art in the '60s but it's still pretty cool. Plus full voice, unlike the narrator ala Watchmen Motion Comics. What I'm concerned about is another new idea totally reliant on iTunes. I think this would be great to go mobile with, but for those of us who abstain from the Cult of Steve Jobs, doesn't that make it just one more thing to watch when you are at the computer? I'm hoping they cast their net wider than just Apple, but we'll see. Anyway, take a look and see what you think.

Heroes on the run

2009-02-05T00:05:00.001-06:00

Here we have it, the pilot episode 2009 edition. A radical revamping of the show in an attempt to shore up the gaps through which the viewers keep slipping through. Forget everything about time travel, doppelgangers, or power potions. (Oh, but prophecy via Tim Sale art? That we're keeping.) Now, it's people with powers on the run from Johnny Law, excuse me, The Hunter. It's a kinder, gentler Days Of Future Past sans giant robots. Know what? It actually works. I'm interested in where they are going with this. And I love anything in the show that brings them together. So for that, bravo. Doesn't mean there aren't problems though.

Time to roll out the geek. My issues are about their powers. I don't mind the Hiro depowering. I knew from the first few episodes they were getting into deep water. The way they introduced his abilities, he really didn't need any help to take care of any troubles that might show up. Make him a flatscan for a tick? Sure. It's the mimics I don't quite get.

In the Claremont era of X-men, a period the writers like to, ahem, borrow from, one of his recurring tricks was in each issue when a mutant would first use their power, they would describe it. Ask any X-fan of that era what Psylocke's Psychic Knife is, and they can rattle it off with nary a thought. Annoying in retrospect, it served a solid purpose in letting new readers catch on to why the short hairy guy with the claws could shrug off a cannon blast to the face. Now I wish the creatives in question would salt a little of this into the new volume, not because we've forgotten what the powers are but because they keep changing them.

First. Sylar. Last season, if I remember his powers went a bit awry as he tried to control The Hunger and eventually found he could learn new abilities by osmosis as opposed to cutting and pasting from brain wrinkles. (Sylar: the first wiki villian?) Now back in control, he could have up to a dozen powers that are undocumented, besides the fact he rarely uses any of the ones we saw him aquire in seasons 1 and 2. Hey, once you have TK, who needs superhearing? But where did he get immune-to-darts? What's that one? It isn't a TK shield and it isn't healing. When did he get so tough?

My bigger issue is Peter. When we met him, he got his powers from meeting people and then remembering them. Then he got stripped of the mimic power and apparently his hard drive was erased. Now he can get only what he touches and then only one at a time. Except flight. In a conversation with big brother Senator Judas, he revealed the only power he has held onto was flight. So why is it the cliffhanger is him about to be sucked out the side of a plane? That is the one situation we know he will be fine. I'm beginning to like the simplicity of Mohinder: tough or Tracy V3: ice. How about a Tommy Lee Jones pep talk explaining to his cape-killer squad what each one can do? That'd be a nice bone to throw new watchers and get the rest of us up to speed on the new status quo. Overall, it's a nice soft reboot. They've just got some more clean up from the last party.

2009-01-29T01:25:00.003-06:00

Need another item for your "Why BBC shows rule" paper? We get another season of According to Jim. They get: