Just as Blade was Marvel’s first foray into big budget Hollywood movies, Blade 2 was Marvel’s first foray into bigger budgeted sequels, and it showed. Another important factor of this movie was the inclusion of director Guillermo del Toro. While this wasn’t his first American movie (that being the easily forgotten Mimic (1997)) it was a movie that made a lot of people take notice.
Picking up shortly after the end of the first movie, it opened just as the first one did with a fight scene. Though not nearly as cool as the rave fight, it was still very nice to have it open like this. Very quickly it became obvious that the budget for this movie was jacked up remarkably with the vampires’ lair and even Blade’s base of operations being incredibly complex compared to the predecessor. Del Toro, with help form Mike Mignola (Hellboy) as a visual consultant, and again David Goyer writing, crafted a world of stark shadows and creepy atmosphere that looked perfect.
As its own movie, Blade 2 was good, even though it was incredibly predictable that the super vampires would turn out to have been created by the vampires and what not. To me the only real plot hole was that even after Nomak succeeded in his mission, and after he claimed that he and Blade were on the same side, they still had to fight at the end instead of Nomak simply letting Blade kill him to end his suffering. They did however do a good job of not necessarily creating a romantic relationship for Blade so much as a counter point to his obsession with his mission of wiping out all vampires when Nyssa points out and honestly lives by the idea that those born as vampires didn’t have a choice to be what they are. Cheesy, yes, but also well done.
Comparing it to the first Blade however it’s a drastically different movie. The bigger budget, bigger story, bigger special effects (including costumes and weapons) moved it from looking gritty and realistic to dark and a bit sci-fi-ish. This actual alienates it from any relation to the first movie in terms of watching them back to back but does not ruin it on its own merit.
Marvel Movie Scale = 8.5
Why That?: While becoming a little more unbelievable and strange, it’s a gorgeous looking movie with again great fight scenes. It’s a fun ride, at many points not taking itself seriously and just having fun (Blade gives a soldier a stalled suplex while giving Ron Pearlman a dirty look) while at others being very serious without being overwhelming, and all without ruining each other.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Thursday, January 17, 2008
X-Men (2000)
The year 2000 brought with it not just relief from Y2K freaks, but also relief for X-Men freaks! The months leading up to it were wrought with fanboys having heart attacks over everything they could think of, from the leather costumes that they considered dominatrix-y, to the guy who plays Wolverine being too tall (for those who don’t know, in the comics Wolverine is 5’4”). On opening night none of that mattered as theaters around the country were packed with as many nerds/geeks/dorks as they could support, and there was much rejoicing.
I was one of those. Not one of the nay sayers, I understood that you shouldn’t put effort into finding a really short guy to play Wolverine. And out of it we got Hugh Jackman (sorry, Dr. Cox). I also understood the costume thing, addressed a little obviously by Cyclops at one point in the movie. So I was one of those there on opening night gitty like a kid on Christmas. However I’m not a big fan of Wolverine. Sure I think he’s a fun character, but as a comic fan he’s just been saturated into the comic world, be despite of this I didn’t mind how much the movie focused on him. In fact in the end it made a lot of sense to focus on the new guy coming in from the cold to this already formed family/team. Besides it would be hard to focus on the whole team as much as say the Fantastic Four, since the FF are and have always been a family. So in the end it worked, and again Jackman was awesome. In fact all of the casting was amazing, none beating Patrick Stewart as Professor Xavier, but I think it’s safe to say it’s impossible to ever do a better casting job for any comic character ever after him.
Now years later it has become nearly impossible for me to enjoy this movie if I watch it alone and I honestly feel it has a lot to do with Singer as the problems just become worse in his following movies, but I digress. Up until the end I don’t really have a lot of problems with it, but the end just falls apart into inconsistencies (and of course Storm’s great line about toads) that are just too great to ignore.
First of all note that I am not complaining about Rebecca Romijn being practically naked throughout most of the movie. In fact anyone who thinks I’m complaining is a communist. There, I said it. But for a movie that’s trying to make mutants believable in the real world, it’s just so hard to believe that a shape shifter can be so good as to imitate clothing and accessories on that clothing that no one would ever notice. In honesty this is something I’ve always found a bit absurd about Mystique, even with the explanation of unstable molecules in the comics. But the thing that bothers me most is how she was able to kick Wolverine’s ass. Great martial artist or not, he has two hands with three double sided blades on each, the fact that the only damage he did was cut off her fake claws (which somehow didn’t cut off anything of her mass when she reverted to normal) is ridiculous. Approaching it as a knife fight, rule number one is control the hand that has a knife and cause as much damage with the rest of your body as you can. Rule number two is if the person has a knife in each hand, run. Oh, and let’s not forget that Wolverine is a trained soldier whether he remembers it or not.
Then there’s the big one of the Rogue/Wolverine/Magneto ending. It has already been established that from just a few seconds of contact, Rogue’s powers put Wolverine, a guy with a healing factor, into a coma for a few hours, yet Magneto just get’s a little sleepy and still has full use of his powers. How did no one stop to notice that that didn’t make sense?
So they stop the machine and Rogue is sitting there dead, Wolverine crawls to her in tears (because crying is cool) and tries to get him to absorb his powers again so she’ll revive. It works but this means Wolverine no longer has a healing factor and all his wounds from the recent fights open up. That would be the wounds that are completely healed already. That’d be like lying in bed one day and having a ten year old surgical scar completely revert to its worst state of being from said surgery without any sort of reason for it.
Marvel Movie Scale = 7.5
Why That?: It’s an enjoyable movie up until the end, and even that is mostly enjoyable if you can keep yourself from thinking about things too much. When I first saw it I would’ve given it a 10, but that’s just something that happens with movies that actually aren’t that good, eventually people realize it.
I was one of those. Not one of the nay sayers, I understood that you shouldn’t put effort into finding a really short guy to play Wolverine. And out of it we got Hugh Jackman (sorry, Dr. Cox). I also understood the costume thing, addressed a little obviously by Cyclops at one point in the movie. So I was one of those there on opening night gitty like a kid on Christmas. However I’m not a big fan of Wolverine. Sure I think he’s a fun character, but as a comic fan he’s just been saturated into the comic world, be despite of this I didn’t mind how much the movie focused on him. In fact in the end it made a lot of sense to focus on the new guy coming in from the cold to this already formed family/team. Besides it would be hard to focus on the whole team as much as say the Fantastic Four, since the FF are and have always been a family. So in the end it worked, and again Jackman was awesome. In fact all of the casting was amazing, none beating Patrick Stewart as Professor Xavier, but I think it’s safe to say it’s impossible to ever do a better casting job for any comic character ever after him.
Now years later it has become nearly impossible for me to enjoy this movie if I watch it alone and I honestly feel it has a lot to do with Singer as the problems just become worse in his following movies, but I digress. Up until the end I don’t really have a lot of problems with it, but the end just falls apart into inconsistencies (and of course Storm’s great line about toads) that are just too great to ignore.
First of all note that I am not complaining about Rebecca Romijn being practically naked throughout most of the movie. In fact anyone who thinks I’m complaining is a communist. There, I said it. But for a movie that’s trying to make mutants believable in the real world, it’s just so hard to believe that a shape shifter can be so good as to imitate clothing and accessories on that clothing that no one would ever notice. In honesty this is something I’ve always found a bit absurd about Mystique, even with the explanation of unstable molecules in the comics. But the thing that bothers me most is how she was able to kick Wolverine’s ass. Great martial artist or not, he has two hands with three double sided blades on each, the fact that the only damage he did was cut off her fake claws (which somehow didn’t cut off anything of her mass when she reverted to normal) is ridiculous. Approaching it as a knife fight, rule number one is control the hand that has a knife and cause as much damage with the rest of your body as you can. Rule number two is if the person has a knife in each hand, run. Oh, and let’s not forget that Wolverine is a trained soldier whether he remembers it or not.
Then there’s the big one of the Rogue/Wolverine/Magneto ending. It has already been established that from just a few seconds of contact, Rogue’s powers put Wolverine, a guy with a healing factor, into a coma for a few hours, yet Magneto just get’s a little sleepy and still has full use of his powers. How did no one stop to notice that that didn’t make sense?
So they stop the machine and Rogue is sitting there dead, Wolverine crawls to her in tears (because crying is cool) and tries to get him to absorb his powers again so she’ll revive. It works but this means Wolverine no longer has a healing factor and all his wounds from the recent fights open up. That would be the wounds that are completely healed already. That’d be like lying in bed one day and having a ten year old surgical scar completely revert to its worst state of being from said surgery without any sort of reason for it.
Marvel Movie Scale = 7.5
Why That?: It’s an enjoyable movie up until the end, and even that is mostly enjoyable if you can keep yourself from thinking about things too much. When I first saw it I would’ve given it a 10, but that’s just something that happens with movies that actually aren’t that good, eventually people realize it.
Monday, January 14, 2008
The Marvel Movie Scale - Blade (1998)
I’ve been wanting to do this for a long while now, back when I was updating ADH at least once a month, but single movie reviews never felt right there. You’ll notice that whenever we did do movie reviews it was a list of a few at a time and more of a recommendation system. Then of course my life got a little more complicated with the whole getting a real job, getting married, and buying a home thing which all led to not having enough time to maintain the necessary upkeep on ADH.
(NOTE: Katie, hon, when you read this know that I’m not blaming you for its death. ADH was a really fun ride and all but obviously I was also growing out of it )
Having some downtime now and I figured I’d finally do it, review every single Marvel movie released ‘till now. I have to wait ‘till May for Iron Man, and then a few more months ‘till Incredible Hulk and Punisher: War Zone, so I should have time to get caught up with all of them by the end of the year.
You may be asking, “Luke, just what is this Marvel Movie Scale you talk about?” Well even if that’s not what you’re thinking, I’ll tell you. I rank my Marvel Movies on a scale of 0 to 10, while it may seem strange that I would start at 0 instead of 1 you have to understand that so far the only movie to get a 0 is Roger Corman’s Fantastic Four (1994), a movie so bad that even I can’t watch it all in one sitting. As a contrast to that the first movie to reach 10 is Spider-Man, so while telling may spoil your expectations of my review of Spider-Man you now have an idea how just how the scale works.
I’ll be going in chronological order here so you’ll notice a pattern once I reach sequels. I’ve decided to first judge each sequel by its own merit and then do a review of how it fits in with the previous movie(s). Oh, and I will not be doing the made for TV movies such as Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. staring The Hoff, no matter how fun it would be to review.
So let’s do this thing!
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BLADE (1998)
In 1998 Marvel started its foray into big budget action movies with the surprise hit, Blade, but at the time hardly anybody knew it was based on a comic character let alone one owned by Marvel. I can recall several times of people being shocked when I mentioned it while naming all of the Marvel movies currently released. Two things defend this:
1) Blade was never really popular before the movie. He was created in the 70’s and was a little black-sploitationish and actually started out as a human only much later in the 90’s being turned into a hybrid of sorts after being bitten by Deacon Frost.
2) Considering the lack of spandex and a story revolving around vampires instead of a standard super villain it’s easy to understand why people wouldn’t think it to be based on a comic (see 300 and Sin City).
Directed by Stephen Norrington and written by David Goyer, Blade was dark and realistic looking, almost feeling like it had no budget and therefore needed to rely on pre-built sets to film on. The story was also straight forward: a group of eviler than normal vampire punks are sick of the old ways and want to take over the world by releasing an ancient vampire god. Standing in their way is the good guy who happens to be a freak of nature that shares their strengths. Not a whole lot of surprises with manipulative governments or being unsure of who the bad guy is. Just here’s the good guy(s) and here’s the bad guys. Then they threw in some awesome fight scenes, the first one in a blood soaked rave party is to this day one of my favorite fight scenes ever, with Blade just showing up in the middle of the crowd and without saying anything just proceeds to wipe out every vampire that he can.
Even with some very predictable plot elements, my only real complaint is of N'Bushe Wright. The human caught in the middle that seems to be there to give us someone to relate to, but her acting is just way too wooden for me to care. On the plus side the character in general didn’t feel forced in there, though near the end her presence felt a little too dues ex machina for my liking as right when the bad guys look like they’re going to win, she is able to free Blade and let him drink from her (because she trusts him) to regain his strength and save the day. But again aside from her acting just alienating me, any problem I have with the movie is nitpicking.
Marvel Movie Scale = 8
Why That?: The rating has nothing to do with the drastic character change from the comics because nobody cared about that, to me it just felt like a good action movie and for my part, good action movies rarely rate higher than 8.
(NOTE: Katie, hon, when you read this know that I’m not blaming you for its death. ADH was a really fun ride and all but obviously I was also growing out of it )
Having some downtime now and I figured I’d finally do it, review every single Marvel movie released ‘till now. I have to wait ‘till May for Iron Man, and then a few more months ‘till Incredible Hulk and Punisher: War Zone, so I should have time to get caught up with all of them by the end of the year.
You may be asking, “Luke, just what is this Marvel Movie Scale you talk about?” Well even if that’s not what you’re thinking, I’ll tell you. I rank my Marvel Movies on a scale of 0 to 10, while it may seem strange that I would start at 0 instead of 1 you have to understand that so far the only movie to get a 0 is Roger Corman’s Fantastic Four (1994), a movie so bad that even I can’t watch it all in one sitting. As a contrast to that the first movie to reach 10 is Spider-Man, so while telling may spoil your expectations of my review of Spider-Man you now have an idea how just how the scale works.
I’ll be going in chronological order here so you’ll notice a pattern once I reach sequels. I’ve decided to first judge each sequel by its own merit and then do a review of how it fits in with the previous movie(s). Oh, and I will not be doing the made for TV movies such as Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. staring The Hoff, no matter how fun it would be to review.
So let’s do this thing!
------------------
BLADE (1998)
In 1998 Marvel started its foray into big budget action movies with the surprise hit, Blade, but at the time hardly anybody knew it was based on a comic character let alone one owned by Marvel. I can recall several times of people being shocked when I mentioned it while naming all of the Marvel movies currently released. Two things defend this:
1) Blade was never really popular before the movie. He was created in the 70’s and was a little black-sploitationish and actually started out as a human only much later in the 90’s being turned into a hybrid of sorts after being bitten by Deacon Frost.
2) Considering the lack of spandex and a story revolving around vampires instead of a standard super villain it’s easy to understand why people wouldn’t think it to be based on a comic (see 300 and Sin City).
Directed by Stephen Norrington and written by David Goyer, Blade was dark and realistic looking, almost feeling like it had no budget and therefore needed to rely on pre-built sets to film on. The story was also straight forward: a group of eviler than normal vampire punks are sick of the old ways and want to take over the world by releasing an ancient vampire god. Standing in their way is the good guy who happens to be a freak of nature that shares their strengths. Not a whole lot of surprises with manipulative governments or being unsure of who the bad guy is. Just here’s the good guy(s) and here’s the bad guys. Then they threw in some awesome fight scenes, the first one in a blood soaked rave party is to this day one of my favorite fight scenes ever, with Blade just showing up in the middle of the crowd and without saying anything just proceeds to wipe out every vampire that he can.
Even with some very predictable plot elements, my only real complaint is of N'Bushe Wright. The human caught in the middle that seems to be there to give us someone to relate to, but her acting is just way too wooden for me to care. On the plus side the character in general didn’t feel forced in there, though near the end her presence felt a little too dues ex machina for my liking as right when the bad guys look like they’re going to win, she is able to free Blade and let him drink from her (because she trusts him) to regain his strength and save the day. But again aside from her acting just alienating me, any problem I have with the movie is nitpicking.
Marvel Movie Scale = 8
Why That?: The rating has nothing to do with the drastic character change from the comics because nobody cared about that, to me it just felt like a good action movie and for my part, good action movies rarely rate higher than 8.
Friday, January 4, 2008
2007 In Review
One of the more common hold ups to getting the Golden Monkey Head Awards posted on ADH was simply all the problems that came up trying to think of people to give certain awards to, especially worst album and video as I try my best to avoid music I will remotely dislike let alone listen to a whole album of it, and do they even still show videos anymore? So now I don’t have a format to stick to so I’m just going to go on a little rant about the best and the worst of what Hollywood and the media gave us in 2007. And like usual this is all based on things I’ve seen/read/heard myself so if you’re shocked that I don’t have an opinion on something, I probably just haven’t seen/read/heard it yet.
Movies
As usual the bad ones stick out in my head the most: Transformers, I already explained what I didn’t like about that one, Ghost Rider was really lame with a lot of great possibilities they hint at but never do anything with, and Rescue Dawn though very well acted just felt really hallow and pointless.
And the biggest disappointment for me this year was Spider-Man 3. While I didn’t hate all of it, I just have a lot of issues with it. I absolutely loved everything with Eddie Brock as they did a great job of making him absolutely insane, and I mean that in the truest sense. He had a cup of coffee one night with a girl and his mind honestly translated that into an “incredible night” and had him believing they were then in a relationship. I am also one of the few who really liked the new goblin outfit and the tandem fighting at the end. However that’s about it. Fortunately I don’t feel I need to explain what I didn’t like sense everyone else on the interweb has already said it, but here’s a break down of topics: Keep your mask on (same goes for Venom), stop crying, why did the butler wait ‘till people were almost killed several times over, Sandman should be a villain through and through, there was no reason for Gwen Stacey to be in there, and why was evil Peter sporting an emo haircut when he’s not going to cry when he’s evil.
Now for the good stuff.
Fantastic Four: Rise of The Silver Surfer while it had a few plot holes, they were easily forgivable because it was a fun movie. If they make a Spider-Man 4, the people doing it need to watch this movie. Lots of action and not a lot of drama, they trusted the audience to have figured out the characters well enough from the first movie to not shove character development down our throats and just let us enjoy it. Shoot’ Em Up was so perfectly over the top cliché that it’s delicious. Super Bad was another “shut down your mind and just enjoy it,” movie for me. And despite a horrible director (they invented steady cams for a reason you pompous @$$), the Bourne Ultimatum was a fantastic addition to the Bourne story which started as a total sleeper hit.
But my hands down favorite movie of the year is easily Knocked Up. Combining a fantastic story about growing up and becoming responsible with honest humor and raunchy humor, this movie was just perfect to me. Judd Aptow is slowly working his way into my ranks of favorite story tellers with people like Jim Henson, Mike Mignola, and Dwayne Gay.
It looks like we’re going to be in for a real treat in 2008 with both Iron Man and The Dark Knight! There are a few other movies coming out that look interesting, but these two should be the standout hits of the year.
Television
Much like with music, I try to avoid things I know I won’t like. But this year I picked a few duds to watch; Bionic Woman, Flash Gordon, and Moonlight. The best of the three was Bionic Woman, which isn’t horrible, it’s just bland and I in no way care about any of the characters. Woman gets bionic parts from clandestine military group, woman helps said group run covert ops because she can, that’s it for motivation really. Flash Gordon is one of those shows that’s related to the source material in name only. No space ships and a ridiculously unimposing actor for Ming the Merciless are just the two most obvious problems. And Moonlight is just another attempt at, “vampires are real but what you think you know about them is wrong,” and yet it’s painfully clichéd with the vampire falling for a human. That same vampire also works as a detective and refuses to drink blood directly from humans (he picks up bags from a coroner).
On the same note there have been three stand out hits for me this year: Human Weapon, the Dresden Files, and Burn Notice. What I love most about Human Weapon is the history they cover, and the ancient forms of training they go through. The Dresden Files was an incredibly fun show about magic and monsters in modern day Chicago (see Other Stuff for why I said “was”). And Burn Notice, man, everything about the show is just fantastic, and it’s a lot of subtle things that do it for me. Like how nearly every episode is book ended with things involving the over all story arch. I’m so glad Bruce Campbell is in this or I may have not heard of it, but as huge a Campbell fan as I am even I’ll admit that him being in the show is just an added bonus because Jeffrey Donovan is simply amazing. My favorite subtle moment of the first season was when Donovan’s character is talking to his new Russian land lord and the land lord says, “So you’re the real Michael Weston? The KGB tells stories of you; they say you make too much trouble to be just one man.” Now while that may seem like a lot when you read it, they presented it in a way that it seems like casual conversation between the two of them yet it goes a long way towards establishing just how good Weston is in the spy world.
What I can’t wait for in ’08 is the return of Burn Notice, the new season of Doctor Who, and finally getting the third season of The Venture Brothers!!!
Music
I honestly don’t remember what came out this year because there is only one album that mattered: Dethalbum by Dethklok, the Metalocalypse soundtrack. Such an insanely good album from a “fake” band, and to me nothing is better than when you can tell a band is really having fun making an album. This has that in spades with phenomenal music coupled with goofy lyrics.
Now I’m not sure what’s in store for the music scene in 2008 other than a new album from Weezer, which I hope is fantastic because as a long time fan I was very disappointed with Make Believe.
Other Stuff
The only book that I read that came out in ’07 was Baltimore: or The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire by Mike Mignola and Mark Compass, which was fan-freaking-tastic. A dark yet beautifully told vampire story set during the post World War I flu outbreak in Europe, and at the same time a reflection of The Steadfast Tin Soldier by Hans Christian Anderson, and still so much more.
The sports world gave us more than our share of train wrecks. From Barry Bonds breaking the home run record with the help of more drugs than I have fingers (and an arm brace that actually enhances his swing) to the sick tale of Michael Vick and the resulting humor from those defending him (especially Deon Sanders) or showing concern for his career, and oh so many other things that make the NFL forcing the cancellation of Playmakers because it portrayed football and athletes in general in a bad light, all the more funny.
Over at the Sci-Fi Channel, studio president Bonnie Hammer showed off why a lot of people think executives, producers, and presidents live in a reality all of their own. Even though it constantly got tremendous ratings the Sci-Fi Channel cancelled The Dresden Files after its first season because those ratings came in from “the wrong demographic.” So it was getting better ratings than they thought they would, but since it was with a different group of people than they thought it’d appeal to, they’re cancelling it. And who the heck did they think the show would appeal to? It clearly isn’t a family show, and it feels like it was very much geared to males from 16-50, that’s a wide range there, and as far as I know that’s who was watching it. So instead they shove the new Flash Gordon down our throats, where everyone I know who were looking forward to it, stopped watching after 3 episodes (and they only watched that third to remind themselves why they wanted to stop watching after the second).
And since it is no secret that I love self induced train wrecks I must send a shout out to the person who provided more entertainment than anyone: Britney Spears. Because even though I love hearing about train wrecks, I hate the idea of actually putting effort into finding out about them through trash magazines and gossip shows. However she has been such a complete wreck that I find out things through my normal, casual daily activities. For my part she capped off the year perfectly with her release of a new video where she takes shots at the paparazzi, you know the people she herself calls before she leaves the house so they can follow her and take pictures of her, oh and one of whom she is currently paling around town with. Fantastic. Simply fantastic. But look out Britney, the year has ended with your sister ramping up the crazy and could take your throne by the end of ’08.
I must throw out an honorable mention to my friend Kristen’s former neighbors though. My only regret is that she had to deal with them. Here’s the breakdown: moving in a few apartments down from Kristen was a woman and her two kids. Moving in on the floor below her was the father of those kids with his girlfriend who turned out to be a legitimate pimp and ho duo and were arrested for such in Minneapolis. Though I feel bad that there were kids involved, the stories Kristen told such as coming home to the guy’s belongings being thrown out onto the front lawn during a fight kept me smiling for weeks on end.
So here’s to you 2008, and the inevitable train wrecks you will contain. With an election there in, you know it’s going to be good.
EDIT: I wrote this blog up on December 28th, making only a couple adjustments over the following days, mostly grammatical, but after this morning I have to throw this information in: HAPPY FREAKIN’ NEW YEAR TO ME!!! Britney Spears has gone completely insane!!! Three hour stand off!!! WOOOOOOOO!!!
Movies
As usual the bad ones stick out in my head the most: Transformers, I already explained what I didn’t like about that one, Ghost Rider was really lame with a lot of great possibilities they hint at but never do anything with, and Rescue Dawn though very well acted just felt really hallow and pointless.
And the biggest disappointment for me this year was Spider-Man 3. While I didn’t hate all of it, I just have a lot of issues with it. I absolutely loved everything with Eddie Brock as they did a great job of making him absolutely insane, and I mean that in the truest sense. He had a cup of coffee one night with a girl and his mind honestly translated that into an “incredible night” and had him believing they were then in a relationship. I am also one of the few who really liked the new goblin outfit and the tandem fighting at the end. However that’s about it. Fortunately I don’t feel I need to explain what I didn’t like sense everyone else on the interweb has already said it, but here’s a break down of topics: Keep your mask on (same goes for Venom), stop crying, why did the butler wait ‘till people were almost killed several times over, Sandman should be a villain through and through, there was no reason for Gwen Stacey to be in there, and why was evil Peter sporting an emo haircut when he’s not going to cry when he’s evil.
Now for the good stuff.
Fantastic Four: Rise of The Silver Surfer while it had a few plot holes, they were easily forgivable because it was a fun movie. If they make a Spider-Man 4, the people doing it need to watch this movie. Lots of action and not a lot of drama, they trusted the audience to have figured out the characters well enough from the first movie to not shove character development down our throats and just let us enjoy it. Shoot’ Em Up was so perfectly over the top cliché that it’s delicious. Super Bad was another “shut down your mind and just enjoy it,” movie for me. And despite a horrible director (they invented steady cams for a reason you pompous @$$), the Bourne Ultimatum was a fantastic addition to the Bourne story which started as a total sleeper hit.
But my hands down favorite movie of the year is easily Knocked Up. Combining a fantastic story about growing up and becoming responsible with honest humor and raunchy humor, this movie was just perfect to me. Judd Aptow is slowly working his way into my ranks of favorite story tellers with people like Jim Henson, Mike Mignola, and Dwayne Gay.
It looks like we’re going to be in for a real treat in 2008 with both Iron Man and The Dark Knight! There are a few other movies coming out that look interesting, but these two should be the standout hits of the year.
Television
Much like with music, I try to avoid things I know I won’t like. But this year I picked a few duds to watch; Bionic Woman, Flash Gordon, and Moonlight. The best of the three was Bionic Woman, which isn’t horrible, it’s just bland and I in no way care about any of the characters. Woman gets bionic parts from clandestine military group, woman helps said group run covert ops because she can, that’s it for motivation really. Flash Gordon is one of those shows that’s related to the source material in name only. No space ships and a ridiculously unimposing actor for Ming the Merciless are just the two most obvious problems. And Moonlight is just another attempt at, “vampires are real but what you think you know about them is wrong,” and yet it’s painfully clichéd with the vampire falling for a human. That same vampire also works as a detective and refuses to drink blood directly from humans (he picks up bags from a coroner).
On the same note there have been three stand out hits for me this year: Human Weapon, the Dresden Files, and Burn Notice. What I love most about Human Weapon is the history they cover, and the ancient forms of training they go through. The Dresden Files was an incredibly fun show about magic and monsters in modern day Chicago (see Other Stuff for why I said “was”). And Burn Notice, man, everything about the show is just fantastic, and it’s a lot of subtle things that do it for me. Like how nearly every episode is book ended with things involving the over all story arch. I’m so glad Bruce Campbell is in this or I may have not heard of it, but as huge a Campbell fan as I am even I’ll admit that him being in the show is just an added bonus because Jeffrey Donovan is simply amazing. My favorite subtle moment of the first season was when Donovan’s character is talking to his new Russian land lord and the land lord says, “So you’re the real Michael Weston? The KGB tells stories of you; they say you make too much trouble to be just one man.” Now while that may seem like a lot when you read it, they presented it in a way that it seems like casual conversation between the two of them yet it goes a long way towards establishing just how good Weston is in the spy world.
What I can’t wait for in ’08 is the return of Burn Notice, the new season of Doctor Who, and finally getting the third season of The Venture Brothers!!!
Music
I honestly don’t remember what came out this year because there is only one album that mattered: Dethalbum by Dethklok, the Metalocalypse soundtrack. Such an insanely good album from a “fake” band, and to me nothing is better than when you can tell a band is really having fun making an album. This has that in spades with phenomenal music coupled with goofy lyrics.
Now I’m not sure what’s in store for the music scene in 2008 other than a new album from Weezer, which I hope is fantastic because as a long time fan I was very disappointed with Make Believe.
Other Stuff
The only book that I read that came out in ’07 was Baltimore: or The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire by Mike Mignola and Mark Compass, which was fan-freaking-tastic. A dark yet beautifully told vampire story set during the post World War I flu outbreak in Europe, and at the same time a reflection of The Steadfast Tin Soldier by Hans Christian Anderson, and still so much more.
The sports world gave us more than our share of train wrecks. From Barry Bonds breaking the home run record with the help of more drugs than I have fingers (and an arm brace that actually enhances his swing) to the sick tale of Michael Vick and the resulting humor from those defending him (especially Deon Sanders) or showing concern for his career, and oh so many other things that make the NFL forcing the cancellation of Playmakers because it portrayed football and athletes in general in a bad light, all the more funny.
Over at the Sci-Fi Channel, studio president Bonnie Hammer showed off why a lot of people think executives, producers, and presidents live in a reality all of their own. Even though it constantly got tremendous ratings the Sci-Fi Channel cancelled The Dresden Files after its first season because those ratings came in from “the wrong demographic.” So it was getting better ratings than they thought they would, but since it was with a different group of people than they thought it’d appeal to, they’re cancelling it. And who the heck did they think the show would appeal to? It clearly isn’t a family show, and it feels like it was very much geared to males from 16-50, that’s a wide range there, and as far as I know that’s who was watching it. So instead they shove the new Flash Gordon down our throats, where everyone I know who were looking forward to it, stopped watching after 3 episodes (and they only watched that third to remind themselves why they wanted to stop watching after the second).
And since it is no secret that I love self induced train wrecks I must send a shout out to the person who provided more entertainment than anyone: Britney Spears. Because even though I love hearing about train wrecks, I hate the idea of actually putting effort into finding out about them through trash magazines and gossip shows. However she has been such a complete wreck that I find out things through my normal, casual daily activities. For my part she capped off the year perfectly with her release of a new video where she takes shots at the paparazzi, you know the people she herself calls before she leaves the house so they can follow her and take pictures of her, oh and one of whom she is currently paling around town with. Fantastic. Simply fantastic. But look out Britney, the year has ended with your sister ramping up the crazy and could take your throne by the end of ’08.
I must throw out an honorable mention to my friend Kristen’s former neighbors though. My only regret is that she had to deal with them. Here’s the breakdown: moving in a few apartments down from Kristen was a woman and her two kids. Moving in on the floor below her was the father of those kids with his girlfriend who turned out to be a legitimate pimp and ho duo and were arrested for such in Minneapolis. Though I feel bad that there were kids involved, the stories Kristen told such as coming home to the guy’s belongings being thrown out onto the front lawn during a fight kept me smiling for weeks on end.
So here’s to you 2008, and the inevitable train wrecks you will contain. With an election there in, you know it’s going to be good.
EDIT: I wrote this blog up on December 28th, making only a couple adjustments over the following days, mostly grammatical, but after this morning I have to throw this information in: HAPPY FREAKIN’ NEW YEAR TO ME!!! Britney Spears has gone completely insane!!! Three hour stand off!!! WOOOOOOOO!!!
Thursday, January 3, 2008
My Holidays
Happy New Year everyone. Just a little update of what my Christmas and New Years were like.
My Christmas this year was very interesting as this was the first year that Katie and I were completely alone and left to make our own plans. It was a very pleasant and surreal experience that I loved. The Saturday before Christmas we gathered some friends together over at our friend Chuck’s place (as he has a bigger place than us) where Katie organized and cooked us all dinner (with help of our friend J and other’s bringing munchies) that turned out fantastic. We then exchanged gifts and watched the New Zealand comedy/horror flick Black Sheep (which was fantastic). And of course some Rock Band was played.
Christmas Eve was spent with Katie’s other family (long story) and then we spent Christmas Day just sitting on the couch watching Doctor Who all day. It was fantastic.
And then the following weekend is when we did things with my family. Caleb and his girlfriend Cass staying with us a few nights while my parents stayed elsewhere, so that was awesome as I don’t get to see Caleb nearly often enough. All in all, a great time.
And now a breakdown of everything I am incredibly thankful for receiving:
Other
Katie got me a lot of much needed clothing
FM Broadcaster for our portable DVD player
Funny Page a Day desk calendar
CD player for the shower with a fogless mirror
Scene It - Marvel Comics edition
Books
World War Z
Serenity Found
The Prestige
MST3K Amazing Colossal Guide
DVDs
The Master (the TV show staring Lee Van Cleef)
Spider-Man 3
Fantastic Four 2
Ratatouille
The Dresden Files complete series
Adventures of Young Indiana Jones Vol. 2
Pixar Shorts Vol. 1
And a box set of 50 old Sci-fi movies from the 50’s-90’s
For New Year’s Eve we went out to dinner with Mike and Lauralye at a place called Cameron’s Steakhouse. This was my third visit there so I knew what to expect. I was wrong. Our waiter screwed up so much stuff that I could write an entire blog about it. But even if the service had been perfect like it was on my previous two visits that would not have changed the fact that the lobster bisque that Katie ordered didn’t agree with her stomach so we just went home and spent the night in bed watching TV (which was honestly very nice).
On New Year’s Day we did the standard evening at my Uncle Wally’s (actually my dad’s uncle, but you get the idea). Caleb and Cass had actually gone home for New Year’s Eve but they came back up for this which was cool. They then joined Katie and I in out own New Year’s tradition of going to see a movie. We saw National Treasure: Book of Secrets and we all enjoyed it.
So that was my holiday and bad dinner aside I had a fantastic time with family and friends. I hope you all had the same. Have a wonderful ’08 everybody!
My Christmas this year was very interesting as this was the first year that Katie and I were completely alone and left to make our own plans. It was a very pleasant and surreal experience that I loved. The Saturday before Christmas we gathered some friends together over at our friend Chuck’s place (as he has a bigger place than us) where Katie organized and cooked us all dinner (with help of our friend J and other’s bringing munchies) that turned out fantastic. We then exchanged gifts and watched the New Zealand comedy/horror flick Black Sheep (which was fantastic). And of course some Rock Band was played.
Christmas Eve was spent with Katie’s other family (long story) and then we spent Christmas Day just sitting on the couch watching Doctor Who all day. It was fantastic.
And then the following weekend is when we did things with my family. Caleb and his girlfriend Cass staying with us a few nights while my parents stayed elsewhere, so that was awesome as I don’t get to see Caleb nearly often enough. All in all, a great time.
And now a breakdown of everything I am incredibly thankful for receiving:
Other
Katie got me a lot of much needed clothing
FM Broadcaster for our portable DVD player
Funny Page a Day desk calendar
CD player for the shower with a fogless mirror
Scene It - Marvel Comics edition
Books
World War Z
Serenity Found
The Prestige
MST3K Amazing Colossal Guide
DVDs
The Master (the TV show staring Lee Van Cleef)
Spider-Man 3
Fantastic Four 2
Ratatouille
The Dresden Files complete series
Adventures of Young Indiana Jones Vol. 2
Pixar Shorts Vol. 1
And a box set of 50 old Sci-fi movies from the 50’s-90’s
For New Year’s Eve we went out to dinner with Mike and Lauralye at a place called Cameron’s Steakhouse. This was my third visit there so I knew what to expect. I was wrong. Our waiter screwed up so much stuff that I could write an entire blog about it. But even if the service had been perfect like it was on my previous two visits that would not have changed the fact that the lobster bisque that Katie ordered didn’t agree with her stomach so we just went home and spent the night in bed watching TV (which was honestly very nice).
On New Year’s Day we did the standard evening at my Uncle Wally’s (actually my dad’s uncle, but you get the idea). Caleb and Cass had actually gone home for New Year’s Eve but they came back up for this which was cool. They then joined Katie and I in out own New Year’s tradition of going to see a movie. We saw National Treasure: Book of Secrets and we all enjoyed it.
So that was my holiday and bad dinner aside I had a fantastic time with family and friends. I hope you all had the same. Have a wonderful ’08 everybody!
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