…nothing too great.

Finally finished up Noir(anime) and it gets a resounding meh. It wasn’t bad by any means, but I never thought to myself…”Wow I can’t wait to see what happens next.” or any thing like that. It was just a lot of blah. Just interesting enough to keep you watching but not good enough to consider purchasing. If you’re a big anime fan, by all means check it out. If not, then it’s probably a pass.

Spoiler…
Kirika should have died

Igby Goes Down – Starring Kieran Culkin. The brother of the more famous yet less talented MaCauley Culkin of Home Alone fame. Sporting an all-star cast with the likes of Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Susan Sarandon, Claire Daines(always had a thing for her) Amanda Peet, and Ryan Phillipe. Phillipe is ass, but he wasn’t offensive here as the holier-than-thou, high society, douchebag brother. I love anything Goldblum does. I’m a fan of quirkiness. All in all a decent movie. About a young man trying to find his way amongst a dysfunctional family who he all but hates. Worth a rent.

Human Traffic – Ass piled upon ass. It tried to be Trainspotting(a brilliant awesome movie that you need to see if you haven’t)…it failed. It tried to be clever…it failed. It tried not to suck…I assume…it failed. Nothing redeeming about the movie whatsoever. Near the bottom of my shitlist of films. Just pure unadulterated ass. Pass! Unless you are into self-inflicted torture that is.

Project A 2 – Jackie Chan doing what Jackie Chan does best. Fun movie, nothing overly great. Worth a rental, I’ll likely buy eventually.

Bodyguard from Beijing – Jet Li doing what Jet Li does best. Really enjoyed this one. Some good action in this one. I’ll definitely be buying.

…or just a visual representation showing that Dr. Manhattan was becoming detached from humanity. Things that we freak over, have zero meaning to him as he’s no longer with us. If you’re confused by the opening of my post then you suck for not reading The Watchmen. My opening statement is based on the movie however. I can’t believe how many people are so shallow/stupid/short-sighted/small-minded/etc. that something like a blue penis makes a movie unwatchable. He no longer felt anything for the human race. Blue penis…get over it and grow the fuck up. I’m done preaching now…so on to happy happy fun time review movie time!

Watchmen(Imax) – Better than I expected and Imax is still amazing. My biggest complaint…the horrible music choices throughout the movie. The main two being the hallelujah song during the sex scene between Nite Owl and Silk Spectre and the most out of place piece of music imo was easily Jimi’s “All Along the Watchtower”. Just came out of nowhere and didn’t fit the scene at all. What works in print does not always translate well to screen.

Overall the changes didn’t bother me too much. I think it helped that I went into it knowing it could never meet my expectations so I just enjoyed it for what it was. One other minor complaint was the fact that apparently they were all expertly trained ninjas with super strength but I could let that go too. It made the fight scenes pretty enjoyable.

Good points. They could not have picked a better person to play Rorschach. That was pretty much the greatest casting EVER. Ozymandias, Dr. Manhattan, and The Comedian were great as well. Silk Spectre was ass. All in all, I can’t wait for the DVD. If I were to rank the current crop of comic-book movies it’d go…

1. The Dark Knight
2. Iron Man
3. Watchmen
4. Spiderman 2
5. Batman Begins

…here’s some more half-assed reviews…

Live Free or Die Hard – Mindless, over-indulgent, small on story big on over-the-top action. Just a fun, turn your mind off action flick. Is it better than Die Hard? No, but really. What action movie is, well besides Commando. Rent before you buy.

Home Movies Season 2 – Totally overlooked piece of genius. The conversation’s between Brendan and coach McGuirk are some of the funniest moments of any show ever. Ok, maybe not ever, but they are damn funny. Hell anytime Brendan starts rambling and justifying anything it’s comic gold. The episodes with him in therapy with his dad and his dad’s fiancee are just too fuckin’ funny. With that said, it’s still an acquired taste for some. The animation throws people off right away as it’s very rough, but I think it adds to the overall charm of the show. I say definitely check it out, but don’t blame me if you hate it. It just means you suck. Here’s some life lessons from the venerable Coach McGuirk…

Coach McGuirk: Liquor before beer, never fear. Beer before liquor, throw up quicker.

Brendon: Coach, do you think I’m stupid?
Coach McGuirk: Of course you’re stupid, Brendon, all kids are stupid.

Coach McGuirk: There’s a tornado coming. So I’m gonna stay down here with the baby, you guys go upstairs and play.
Melissa Robbins: Shouldn’t we stay down here with you?
Coach McGuirk: No, it’s not safe for everybody to be in the same place during a tornado, Melissa.
Melissa Robbins: But I thought you’re supposed to go together.
Coach McGuirk: No! The rule is, Melissa, you separate.
Melissa Robbins: Are you sure?
Coach McGuirk: Yeah. If you get sucked into the funnel and everyone’s separated it’s just like a fun ride. But if you’re all in a group, in a cluster, you start banging into each other, then your heads collide and you die.

Coach McGuirk: Melissa, get in there and replace Janeane.
Melissa Robbins: Coach, my arm’s broken, remember?
Coach McGuirk: Your *arm* is protected by a cast. It’s safer than it was before, now get in there.

Coach McGuirk: Life sucks, Brendon. That’s your lesson. Go enjoy it.

Coach McGuirk: Brendon there’s nothing wrong with lying to women. Or the government. Or parents. Or God.

Back to the reviews…well…not really a review. More like a comment.
Hard Boiled – Asia’s Clint Eastwood, Chow Yun Fat blowin shit up. Need more be said?

That is all…for now.

And by British, I of course mean reviews. Books, comics, games, and movies…mostly movies. While on my “vacation” I had lots of time for movie watching and did just that, as well as read a few books and comics so over the next few weeks, I will be reviewing said media. Upcoming for review…

Ultimates V1-2
Anita Blake – Vampire Hunter – Guilty Pleasures
Star Wars Darth Bane – Rule of Two by Drew Karpyshyn
Legacy of the Jedi 01 – Legacy of the Jedi (by Jude Watson)
Jedi Apprentice 01 – The Rising Force (by Dave Wolverton)
Chuck & Larry
Sansho the Bailiff
Live Free or Die Hard
Superbad
Home Movies Season 2
Boondocks Season 2
Outlaw Star
Hard Boiled
Election
Clerks 2
Replacements
3:10 to yuma
The Kingdom
Band of Brothers

I”ll start with the bad and mediocre. The bad being, “I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry”. I laughed a total of two times during the movie. It was just one long gay joke. The only saving grace…oh I think you know. Jessica Biel’s fine, fine ass. In the immortal words of Adam Sandler in the movie Billy Madison…”Soooo hot, want to touch the heinie.” That might be the best ass in Hollywood.

Want to touch the heinie

On to more bad. Next is the boring, pointless, uninteresting pile of literary feces by the name of “Legacy of the Jedi” (by Jude Watson). It was a 3 part series. After reading the first, I skipped it’s sequels. So bad. Nothing more needs to be said…skip it!

On to mediocre, we have the straight to DVD “Big Stan” starring Rob Schneider. It had everything I like in a comedy. It was crude, politically incorrect, violent, and nonsensical. It also had Bob Sapp, Don Frye, and Randy Couture in it who are all big names in MMA. Also stars Jennifer Morrison(House) and David Carradine. It’s not a movie I’d buy, but worth checking out with some friends.

And one last mediocre. Jedi Apprentice 01 – The Rising Force (by Dave Wolverton). It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t good. Hence…mediocre. I’m just gonna copy&paste a review I put up elsewhere…
“Much better(referring to the craptastic “Legacy of the Jedi), but still a bit slow. Gave some pretty good insight into Obi Wan and Qui Gon Jinn’s early relationship and how he came to be Qui-Gon’s Padawan. Nothing terribly interesting.” If you’re bored, it’s raining, the spank bank is empty, the electricity is out, you own the book, and have nothing else to read…give it a shot. But don’t go out of your way to read it.

And that’s it for today. Live long and prosper…or don’t, whatever.

Stephen loses Time’s Top 100 most influential people to Korean pop star Rain.

Rain shows up at the studio for an after hours dance-off with Stephen.

So I can’t seem to stop watching all this celebreality TV Vh1 keeps throwing out there. I mean I haven’t stooped as low as watching Flavor of Love, but it’s still bad…in a good way…I think.

First up is Celebracadabra. A bunch of C and D level celebs compete in a magic competition. This had me interested cuz I dig me some magic. It fascinates me.

The biggest celeb is easily C. Thomas Howell and he hasn’t been relevant for nearly 20 years. When one of your recent movies is “Mutant Vampire Zombies from the ‘Hood!” things are not going well.

It also stars Kid from Kid ‘N Play, a hip-hop duo from the early 90′s and “stars” of the House Party trilogy. Now I ain’t hatin’. I own House Party 1 & 3 and do in fact enjoy the hell out of both of them. I’m just sayin’.

Also stars…well starred that annoying fucker Ant. I only know him as the host of other even crappier reality shows. He got the boot this past week which as much as I hate him, it could kill the show’s trainwreck factor.

The rest of the cast consists of a who’s who of “who the fuck is that?” Not great reality TV but the magic will keep me coming back

Next up is Miss Rap Supreme. Same exact setup as last years MTV show “The White Rapper Show”. Only this time as you could probably guess, MC Serch is Serching(see what I did there…clever) for the next big female rapper. Easily the best part of the show was Khia, the one hit blunder and singer/rapper of that shitty ass song “My Neck, My Back” being eliminated. For those who missed out on the greatness of the White Rapper Show and “King of da Burbs”, at the end of every show one of the teams is up for elimination. They must write an original 16 verse rhyme on the subject of Serch’s choosing. Well Khia’s dumb ass not only didn’t write an original verse but spit 16 lines off a song she had already recorded and put out. Needless to say she was sent packin’. It’s ridiculous that Lady Twist was sent home this past episode. I think she had the most potential.

I forgot what else I’m watching…hmm. Well I already dedicated way too much time on these shows this post anyway, so I’m out!

…wish it was Sunday, that’s not funnay, I don’t have to runnay…Just another media Monday.

Sorry, the song(“Manic Monday” I think by Bananarama ) has been stuck in my head all morning. Anyway, I don’t have a life to speak of so here’s a recap of shit I’ve watched…

House returned and it’s still all kinds of awesome. I’m liking the dynamic with House, Wilson, and Vindictive Bitch even if it is a bit childish. Also Kumar is starting to grow on me…he’ll always be Kumar but he’s starting to find his way.

Of course The Office is always great and last Thursday was no different. I missed some of it thanks to Mother Nature and frequent cut-ins by the local news weatherman to tell us about said Mother Nature. Stanley was great and Michael actually handling it well in the end really helped this episode. Kind of disappointed they didn’t follow up on Toby from the previous week and his oh so creepy knee rubbing.

Earl is Earl. Consistent but nothing you have to see.

Scrubs is still very funny and I’ll say it again. Scrubs final season yet ER is still going on.

Finished up Neil Gaiman’s Eternals. Good stuff. Looking forward to the upcoming series. Hopefully it’s a continuation of Gaiman’s work. Gonna read Live Wire next.

Went and seen Iron Man yesterday and it is fuckin’ awesome! Robert Downey Jr. played the role great. They sorta touched on Stark’s drinking problem which I’m guessing will play a bigger role in the sequel. As I’m sure War Machine will also make it’s first appearance as alluded to in the film, with Terrence Howard looking at the Iron Man prototype suit and saying…”Maybe next time.” And the teaser in the end credits was sweet. Ultimate Nick Fury!

Good year for for comic nerds, what with Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk reboot, Dark Knight Returns, Hellboy 2 and the new Indiana Jones flick all hitting theater’s this summer. Can’t wait. I might go see Prince Caspian this month as well, depending on finances.

That is all…for Media Monday.

Just some random musings on things I’ve watched, read, and plan to watch, read.

I’ll start with Thursday night on NBC. A nice return of the Office we all know and love. Michael’s odd form of crazy, Creed’s awesome one-liner’s…”Then I’ll have 2, only one more to go.” lol. The sweet relationship between PB&J. Just good stuff last night. My favorite line/moment of the night was Michael’s conversation with Oscar. When he called Oscar, “Oscar Meiner Wiener Lover” and referenced his homosexuality as “your condition” I was rollin’. And of course the end with PB&J was great, and love those little moments in the show.

Earl had one of it’s better shows of recent. Funny and touching. Really, really enjoyed this weeks episode.

Scrubs has yet to be watched, but it’s almost guaranteed funny.

Next up is movie time! First up is Transformers. I was a HUGE Transformers freak as a kid. My favorites being Soundwave, Starscream, and of course Optimus. So initially I was excited as hell when I heard there was a live action version coming out…then I saw the character designs and my excitement was gone. I loved it when Megatron would transform into a gun for one of the Decepticons to fire. Anyway, so I decided to boycott then new movie. I was sick of Hollywood raping my childhood with half-assed uninspired remakes of things I loved as kid. Then I suddenly had a munchkin(Tre’) to entertain and had just bought the HD-DVD add on for my 360. So I broke down and bought Transformers in HD-DVD. I figured it’d at least be pretty and you can’t go wrong with giant fuckin robots beating the shit out of each other. So I watched it, and was pleasantly surprised. It wasn’t a Transformers movie as I knew it, but it was a fun action movie. Not gonna lie, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Needed a little more robot on robot action, but what can you do.

Also watched Stardust. Originally a book written by one of my favorite writers Neil Gaiman. I had a longer post concerning this movie but something fucked up and I lost it, so in summation, I will be buying this movie in the near future. Great fantasy movie.

I read The Secret Garden for the first time in like 20 years. Great book…for tweens. Next up in the literature department is The Eternals by the aforementioned Neil Gaiman or Live Wire by Jay MacLarty, the third book in the awesome Simon Leonidovic series.

In more pressing matters, is the sudden relationship between anime and Hollywood. We’ve already got Speed Racer coming. And according to Attack of the Show, Steven Spielberg is doing a live action version of Ghost in the Shell, M. Night Shyamalamadingdong is doing Avatar, and in the biggest head scratcher is Leonardo Dicaprio producing and starring in Akira. Fuck you Hollywood! So little creativity, so many greedy suits. I do however have a small interest in a live action Avatar, though finding someone good enough to fill the title role will be a bitch. He’s so damn likeable in the series.

That is all.

I should be back to posting regularly soon. My laptop went in to be fixed today and I’m also ordering a new Dell. I’m done with alienware. Unfortunately the new Dell has Vista instead of XP. I’ll get used to it I’m sure, but I really liked XP. 100x the improvement over Windows98, and from what I hear Vista is a step back. I thought about getting a Mac for like a quarter of a second. Then my irrational hatred of all things Apple stepped in and slapped the shit out of me. Anyway for you techno geeks, here’s the skinny on the laptop.

XPS M1530 – Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.4GHz/800Mhz FSB, 3MB Cache)
Operating System – Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition
Memory – 4GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz (2 Dimms)
LCD, Color and camera – High Resolution, glossy widescreen 15.4 inch LCD(1440×900) & 2MP Camera
Video Card – 256MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8600M GT
Hard Drives – Speed: 250GB 7200rpm SATA Hard Drive Free Fall Sensor
Combo or DVD+RW Drive – Slot Load Blu -ray Disc (BD/DVD/CD read/write)
Sound Card – Integrated Sound Blaster Audigy HD Software Edition
Wireless Networking Cards – Intel Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-card
SECURITY – Finger Print Reader XPS M1530
Bluetooth and Wireless USB – Dell Wireless 355 Bluetooth Internal (2.0+Enhanced Data Rate)
Not too shabby and about 2 grand less than my alienware.

Next item up for debate…The Office returning. Has there ever been a more uncomfortable or awkward episode than this last one? Just brutal…ly funny! Poor, poor Michael and his 13 inch LCD Hi-def TV. Not to mention his Dundee…his Dundee for God’s sake! He needs to get out of that relationship as soon as possible. Horrible sitch…shit, I just said “sitch”…I’m watching too much Kim Possible. Anyway, great return episode. Can’t wait for tomorrow. Earl was just meh, and Scrubs continues to bring the funny. Shame it’s in it’s final season yet ER just keeps on going.

Next, is the Clinton campaign so desperate that the worst dirt they can find on Obama is a small speech about a bunch of gun-toting, Jesus freaks. The “bitter” comment may have been off…a little, but he was right on again. I live right in the middle of it and it’s a bit ridiculous on the attitudes that still exist around here. I have no problem with religion…well almost. If believing in an all-powerful omnipotent being, makes you a better person, or gives you purpose in life, who am I to argue? BUT if you do follow the bible and it’s teachings, it should be the whole Bible..with a little common sense. Of course it contradicts itself a number a times. You can’t just pick out the parts you like and ignore the rest. Love thy neighbor. Not just the white ones, or straight ones, or Christian ones. Nowhere in the bible did I read that only the aforementioned are worthy of God’s love. Ok, I know, there’s some harsh things about the gay folk, but they are still your fellow man(or woman).

Like Chris Rock said, “If it ain’t white, it ain’t right.” That’s pretty much the feeling in these parts. I’m clearly not saying everyone is like that around here but it’s a very real feeling and attitude. Of course I’m only speaking of the Christian religion cuz it’s all I know of, what with being raised that way. Nowadays, my faith is all but gone. I don’t deny that there may be a God, but I’m not convinced of it. At this point, it would take a lot to convince me. Damn it, now I’ve gone off on a tangent and got away from my point…if I had one…hmmm. Anyway, I don’t know a lot about politics, and what I do know is based on just what I pick up here and there on the Jon Stewart Show and the Colbert Report. I do know, I am not a fan of Hillary. I know very little of McCain, who I’m sure is our next President by default. America’s not ready for a female or black president and that’s a shame. I know the most about Obama. Not his policies but the man…and I like the man….so there really wasn’t a point as I’m not even voting.

I had more to talk about but this post is long enough with my inane ramblings and whatnot.

That is all.

…continue to kill it on America’s Best Dance Crew.  The MTV crowd continues to show it’s stupidity by having Kaba Modern in the bottom half this week.  Status Quo is fun, but it’s time for them to go.  Just let Jamal from Status Quo join JabbaWokkeeZ.  I totally wanna hang out with him for a day.  He seems to have a lot of fun.

It’s a shame that BreakSk8 is at home, and SQ is still around.  They got screwed.  Dreamgirls for 5 dudes on skates?  Come on!  I smell a conspiracy!  BreakSk8 was easily the most consistent(and talented) crew not named JabbaWokkeeZ or Kaba Modern.  If the final two don’t come down to those two, I’ll…ummmm….well, I’ll do nothing, but MTV can fuck itself….even if the final two are Jabba and Kaba, MTV can still fuck itself.

I’m gonna stop typing now, before my computer freaks out and blows up.  Peace!