An introduction to my addiction…and a surprise return writer..

So, it’s been a while since I first wrote something on here, I have a stack of ‘drafts’ on here that I’ve never really published – So I’ve decided to adopt a new tactic.

I’m going to run a series of smaller, bitesized posts over the course of a few weeks. I’m tired of using the excuse that I don’t have enough time.

If I have enough time to spend hours and hours running around Dalaran, then why can’t I spare some to doing a bit of blogging?

So, here I am – the first series of posts I’m going to run are going to cover some of the detail of my newest addiction – WoW.

I suspect by this point, most people reading know what WoW is – so I won’t explain this.

If not, do a google for wow, take a look and then come back…. I’ll wait… Done? Good.

So over the past month, I’ve been sucked in. I basically got given a level 80 char by a good friend, who wanted me to start playing so much that he actually went ahead and levelled a character for me.

I picked up at level 78, so technically I got it to 80.. hah.

I’ve been so skeptical of wow for so long it hurts, I used to play a rather old mmo by the name of Dark Age of Camelot (Which surprisingly sounds sadder than world of warcraft, doesnt it?). And I’ve found out the hard way that a first MMO is very much like your first love – you’ll not find something *quite* the same ever again, but will make constant comparisons.

In the previous game I played, I was basically playing it purely to progress with the PvP elements of the game, and WoW had nothing quite as exciting PvP wise upon release.

On top of that, I wasn’t remotely interested in the lore or in the graphics – the design team appear to have made it into what could almost be described as a cartoon, it really doesn’t look that good.

So, how did this game, six years after release, suck me in? To the point where I’m now online daily, even if I’ve nothing to do.

Well…you’ll have to read the next article to find out more.

PS, I’m back Oz

CD

Highschool of the Dead – Zombies and Pantsu!

Scene – Highschool (you figured that though, right?) front gates, some dude is banging on the gates to try and get in.  The (obviously) muscular male PE teacher is agitated and grabs said punk by the scruff of his shirt collar and tells him to beat it.  Oh no! the punk grabs his arm and bites it, spurting blood all over the screen (god I love a good bit of ultraviolence).  Thus ensues infection of the ENTIRE school in a matter of a couple of hours, tops.

Panasonic announce new handheld console.

You read that right!  I was lying in bed last night tinkering on my phone checking my twitter feed like I do every night and I came across this bit of info that was very surprising, to say the least.

It’s been called “The Jungle”, which is the most retardedly weird name for a games console I have ever heard of (yes, more than the WII) and it looks pretty….weird.

More info over at IGN, though theres not much info on it over there neither to be fair.

http://uk.gear.ign.com/articles/112/1125473p1.html

What the THE?

So what’s going on here, I hear you ask.  No updates for quite a while, no movie reviews, nada.  I know, I know.  I’m a bad man.  I just really have not had a great lot to say about the movie scene as of this year to be quite honest, It’s been ok at best with only The Expendables giving me a good amount of enjoyment at all.

Also,  I kinda figured that I’ve somehow transformed this blog into a movie-specific blog when I wanted it to be more a geek-central.  If that makes sense.  However, I’ve talked nothing about the games I’ve been playing, the comics I’ve been reading or any other general geekery that transpires in my life on a daily basis.  So I have a question for you!  (all 3 of you who read this).

The question is, what kind of content would you guys like to see on here?  for those of you who know me personally, what kind of stuff would you want me to blog about to enrich your overly-busy days with?

If you guys could leave me some comments it would be greatly appreciated, because even though I have gone through a drought here, I do want to carry on with this site.  I will also ponder on how I can improve on things here.  So, thanks to you that come and comment, or even read this.

I’ll be back with new ideas soon!

EL.

Inception – The start of something new in Hollywood?

How do you write a review about a film where the trailers kinda sorta maybe tell you what it’s about but don’t?  And you then run the risk that if you accidentally mention something that hasn’t been revealed by the trailers and such, then you are potentially going to spoil the whole movie for some unaware reader?  Damned if I know tbh, but Ima damn well try!

As you can see, this review has started with lots of questions and I will advise you, there are more to come.  You see. that’s what this movie does, it asks questions.  Questions that make you genuinely think about the answers, genuinely think about the possibilities and which way it actually is going and which way it could go.

How do you define what genre of movie this is?  On seeing the trailers I immediately put it into one of my favourite but most sparsely populated genres;  the headfuck movie.  This genre of mine has very few movies in there, movies such as Donnie Darko, The Butterfly Effect and Memento.  You know the sort, you walk in to watch the movie and ask yourself “What the hell is this movie about?”.  You walk out of the movie and ask yourself  ”What the hell was that movie about?”.

I sure as hell was asking the question when I walked in, but when I walked out I certainly was not.  I had a very clear genre in my head which I’m not sure to divulge with you guys just yet, I will know by the end of this review, maybe you will, maybe you won’t.

Anyhows, first and foremost let me say I will endeavor to NOT tell you anything that has not been said before by trailers about the story.

Let’s start with the Director/Direction.  Nolan is quite a well-known name now, having made his  mark with Memento (What’re the chances!) and Insomnia, it became apparent that this guy knows a thing or two about 1. writing headfuck movies and 2. directing headfuck movies!  But hark! He knows a thing or two about action movies as well it seems.  I must admit, I didn’t know his movie history as a director till I just IMDB’d him but I am mighty impressed for sure.

I think, that this movie is his best movie to date in terms of direction.  A lot of people who have yet to see it will cry out “THE DARK KNIGHT” but I have to be honest, I think the hype machine bigged it up far more than it really was.  This movie on the other hand, is a masterpiece of direction.  IT truly is a work of genius, not just in the story or the characters or even the casting, but the total package, and that’s the bottom line when all is said and done.  The pacing and building of atmosphere is so masterfully done that I kid you not when I say that the audience in the packed cinema were literally on the edge of their seats the whole time, I heard many large exhales of breath at key points and the most amusing part for me was when the guy next to me uttered “UH OH” at a particularly key point (made me LOL inside).  Conversely, BFGirl and the girl sat next to her seemed to be extremely unimpressed by the movie, so much so that the girl sat next to her was asleep at certain points in the movie (she did however, still manage to explain the movie to her seemingly retarded boyfriend even though she was napping!).

I have never felt so tense with the “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING TO HAPPEN NEXT/WILL THEY MAKE IT/OH MY GOD HOW WILL THEY DO IT!?!” scenarios in all my cinema going days.  Granted FD2 was my fave experience ever for audience reaction, but it was the SAME reaction, shock.  Here, there’s a plethora of responses coming from the audience and it really shows how superlative a job Nolan has done with the pacing and atmosphere of the film.

Now on to the cast, and what a cast it is!  Di Caprio is a damn good actor, as are Caine and Murphy.  There are no weak links in this cast for sure, even those who you may recognise but aren’t big time (Eames played Shinzon in Star Trek Nemesis, for example) are very strong.  All are cast perfectly and there are no weak links in this chain.  Yes, even Joseph Gordon-Levitt after his ropey performance in GI Joe.

There are elements of this movie that are fairly generic for sure, the problem is I can’t really talk about them?  I’ll give 1 example but I promise it will not affect your experience of the movie, I swear!  He (Di Caprio) has to gather a team for something and thus ensues the usual naming of the “best of the best” and the tedious task of getting hold of these people.  Do these people not keep phone numbers and email addresses or what? surely it would be easier to take advantage of the communications available in todays age?  Surely just throwing each other a tweet would be the easy way, it’s would most definitely be cheaper to both their pockets and their health bars!

OK, time to wrap this up.  I hope I’ve kept my word and not given anything away that hasn’t already been revealed.  I’ve done my best to actually not talk about the film at all and just comment on the aspects of the film as a whole in order to give you an impression of it as opposed to telling you the story and the plot/character advancements. Overall, this movie is very good.  I definitely do not think it falls into the headfuck category as strongly as the aforementioned movies of said genre but at the same time, it does reside within it quite competently.  The end of the movie prompted lots of groans of frustration and LOADS of conversations about the outcome.

I like the cast and I absolutely LOVE the direction.  That for me, is what steals the show.  The way Nolan uses his devices to create a movie with such atmosphere and depth is inspiring, especially during this dark age of reboots and remakes.  I think it’s fair to say that this man is making his way to standing up with the greats of hollywood movie directors, if he carries on the way he is currently going, his name will be in the same breath as those that paved the way such as Cameron, Coppola, Scott et al.

Moreover, it wasn’ t that surprising for me.  I kinda figured out where the story was going and the best thing about it is the fact that this realisation DID NOT spoil the movie-going experience for me at all.  And that in itself, is something that  does not happen very often in this movie industry.

EL.

Predators – The next generation!

A reboot, they said.  Taking the movie in a direction it’s not been in before, they said.  I groaned.  I groaned the collective groan evoked by thousands of lovers of El Pred who were NOT enamored by AVP1.  Lovers who appreciated the retarded violence of AVP2 but still were NOT enamored with it being cheapened, who would still watch it but not expect anything other than a cheapass cash-in attempt by the big bad producers of the western cinema world who have seemingly lost the ability to produce anything remotely new and exciting in this modern era of technological dominance in an industry where the ability to tell a good story is overtaken by expensive effects and too many jump cuts during action sequences.

The original Predator was made back in the glory day of action movies, 1987.  a decade where badass wasn’t just the aftereffects of a night out topped off with a spicy curry, but actually a breed of man.  A man like “Dutch”, the single-named hero amongst a band of hero’s who was merely the man who feared nothing; “If it bleeds, we can kill it”.

So, where do you go from there? The second movie, whilst not being anywhere near as good as the first 1, was still definitely a Predator movie.  How can you tell? There’s actual predatoring (is that a word?) in it. actual stalking and scaring the shit out of those that are predators on others, proving the philosophy that there is always something bigger and badder out there.

The AVP movies were lame.  I was going to rant, but I can’t be arsed, it’s as simple as that.  They are just lame and at best the second movie is amusing for the comical deaths.  That and begging for the blonde girl to die through the whole movie.

So, Robert Rodriguez wants to do a reboot.  But wait a minute, it’s not actually a reboot at all. it is actually a third movie if you look at the grand scheme of things.  There is a significant reference to the first movie which makes it definitely not a reboot, as from what I know, reboots are not logical sequels? (correct me if I’m wrong of course).

I was uber skeptical of this movie and tried my best not to pay it any attention at all.  I didn’t want to entertain the idea of it and was having my silent protest and that was to be the end of it.  Well it was to be that way until I read a little something over at aintitcool.com (can’t find the link now I’m afraid) saying something about Rodriquez doing loads of research on the first movie to try and get the feel right, which got me real interested.  A Producer (I thought he was directing it ) who actually is trying to give enough respect to the original?  Hell I’m game to check that out.

So here’s the breakdown of the movie, a bunch of Predatory people (mercenary, RUF fighter, Jailbird, Yakuza, hispanic right-hand man type dude) are dropped into a jungle on a diff planet.  They are being hunted by some bigger, badder, predatorer than them!  OH NOES, WHAT WILL THEY DO?!?!

Kudos to the Production team, they did 1 thing right and that is….the feeling of the movie.  Doomy and gloomy with a side order of jungle stickiness!  The focus of the movie is on the people in the situation and how they respond to it, and not on the Predators technology and shiny new ways of killing people, they keep it traditional.

The big thing that made the first movie was the feeling of it, imo, when a bunch of baddasses are scared, then its something that is really damn scary.  Now this was really apparent in the first movie as ALL of the group of baddasses were genuinely BADASS.  Here however, the cast didn’t portray that feeling to me so much, well not all of em anyhows.  The RUF fighter looked significantly big and badass.  The Yakuza looked significantly small and EVEN MORE BADASS IN A SUIT WITH EXPENSIVE SHOES (Especially when he gets his toy (you will know what I mean when you see it)), at this point I was very gleeful at his discovery and cheered his “moment” (trying SO hard not to give anything away!).  Danny Trejo was big and baddass as usual, no questions asked.  However, my issue is with the main guy, Adrien Brody as mr big badass of the lot.  I just can’t get his poncey act out of my head, the 1 he put on in King Kong.  I mean fair enough he is BUFF and has worked out for sure, but he just doesn’t cut it for me.  He just doesn’t have that badass look about him.  To me he will always be a poncey poet-type.  Nothing wrong with that, he just didn’t fit for me(tho to be fair, he has an impressive voice).  The token female character is strong but has female qualities.  A badass with a heart, whilst it’s cool and stuff, I would have loved it if she was of the school of Private Vasquez” from Aliens, now that my friends, would be badass.

So yeh, the characters are semi strong but the lead is not strong enough imo, but its not a lost cause for sure.  The technology used in this movie is thankfully scarce.  It does its job, you can’t see it stand out and you can’t see it trying to take over the movie, it performs it’s job very well and that’s the way it should be, invisible.

Overall, the pathos is right, the characters are kinda right, the Predators are right and the overall feel is very reminiscent of  the original.  In fact, the homage to the original is what makes this film respectable, it openly shows it’s respect to what came before it and that my friends, is something that needs to be done more often in the shitty Hollywood of today.

Oh! 1 more thing!  Laurence Fishburne, funny guy!  Great little piece done by him, had me chuckling for a good while.  Almost worth it for him alone!

EL.

Iron Man 2 (Yes, I’m back with a sequel. Ironic?)

Well then. It has been a while hasn’t it?  Feels weird to be sat here typing something I actually enjoy typing!  Good job I’m back for the summer movie season huh? Seems like it was almost planned!  Anyhows, enough of the inane ramblings, lets get down to business.  This is a movie I Have been looking forward to seeing for quite some time!

I must first, however, talk about my “love affair” with this series. I put it in speech marks because in actual fact, when the first movie came out in 2008 the advertising campaign did nothing whatsoever to catch my attention.  The trailers left me feeling totally indifferent towards it.  Now let me hastily add that this by no means meant that I was not going to go watch it at the movies, hell I’ve seen pretty much every comic-book movie adaptation I could at the movies and that ain’t gonna change anytime soon.  When I say indifferent, I mean it just did absolutely nothing for me, it looked like another action movie by numbers.  A comic-book action movie by numbers.  Like the first Spider Man,  Fantastic Four, X-men;  you get the picture.  An almost-offensive attempt to keep both the actual fans and the mass market happy.

In hindsight, the fact that I had no excitement for it whatsoever was the best thing that could have happened for me and Tony.  I was totally blown away by the whole thing, the characters, the story (Well ok, the story wasn’t amazing),

THE CHARACTERS..  Yes it was the characters, the arrogant got-it-all-could-give-a-shit billionaire, the caring assistant, the true friend who just happens to be military top brass.  It just worked.   So damn well that I maintain that it is definitely my favourite Marvel movie, hell my favourite Comic book movie of all time.  In my humblest of opinions, it was significantly better than the other comic book movie that came out that summer (Dark Knight, anyone?).

And so we come to this movie, sadly I was MAJORLY excited about this, this was the debut movie of a character that hadn’t been just about ok, damn this was unchartered territory.  I was so comfy in my cynical corner, talking about how comic book movies never do well past the second in the series whilst I was secretly hoping for one thing and one thing only.  DON’T LET DOWN THE FIRST MOVIE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.

It was a real simple (ha?) task in my eyes, just don’t let down the awesome work done by the first movie, which had put down 1 hella set of foundations for future movies.  When I sat down at my seat I was anxious, not like exam-day anxious, but like dentist-visit (please don’t tell me you have to pull my teeth out and I will smile like Ilenka Ganush from Drag me to Hell for the rest of my days) anxious.  Why?  2 words…Mickey Rourke.  I know some of you are all eyebrow-raising at me right now, but hell, did you see him in that trailer? he looked weird as hell, as in abomination minus the CGI.

Damn I’m Rambling.  Heres what I thought of the movie with my best efforts not to give spoilers…

Arrogant Tony is back, and why wouldn’t he be? He was arrogant before but now not only is he the richest techy in the world, but also he’s a bona fide superhero.  The character flaws shown once again by Downey jr are so damn realistic its scary.  It’s quite easy to see yourself going out of control (again) when you come from the brink of death to not only shine again, but save the world in the process (Watch and learn X-men people who try the Phoenix saga in the future).  Neglecting and ignoring friends who are trying to help him, he gets into a whole world of hurt.  The same world of hurt that Ivan Vanko is in on the other side of the world when he decides to topple the Iron Man.

But hark! Not all enemies are emotional creatures, some are just bloodthirsty businessmen (Sam Rockwell) who want what you’ve got at any cost and any price and will fund emotional creatures to help them get it, get me?  I must comment on Rockwell’s performance at this point, a lot of people say he’s brilliant in it. A lot of people say he’s as awesome as he ever is.  I don’t think I’m going to be one of those people.  To me he was a mere carbon copy of a previous character, Eric Knox from Charlies Angels back in 2000; back then, I agree, it was a genius creation of a character.  Now it’s a rehash of a character from a person who is seeing definite heights in his career.   Hell, who am I to judge, isn’t Downey jr doing the same thing?  It’s good, it’s just not brilliant.

I think that’s the winning formula here.  The fact that the cast is full of solidly “Good” actors who do a decent job of their part adds up to make a fantastic overall movie that is heightened by the fact that the action and FX do not sell the movie (*cough* Wolverine *cough*), but the whole cast and crew do.

A friend told me that he knew someone working on the CGI on that film and that the Jon Favreau was úber indecisive and never knew what he wanted.  That made me wonder tho, how important a factor is that?  Whatever the answer, he got it right in my eyes.

Don Cheadle made me laugh.  How many times have you heard that be said about him?  It just really amused me that when he eventually got into his suit, he seemingly grew 6 inches in height!  I have to be honest, I preferred Terrence Howard in the part of Rhodey for no honest reason other than I feel he just fitted the character better.  I feel bad for the guy after how excited he was at the end of 1 when he said “I need to get me one of those” (or something like that).

Final 2-character analysis – Black Widow – a bit non-existent in my opinion, that scene that Harry talks about where he saw nothing but her ass….I HEAR YA BROTHER!   Man…. erm yeh, Nick Fury, Sam L J shouting, who’d a thunk it!?!  Again, just there to tally the story along, Marvel telling us the Avengers ain’t as near as we think/hope? possibly.  Marvel teasing us?  Definitely.

And so it comes to my original concern, does this movie let down the first movie?  In a word…HELL NO.  Rourke’s Russian accent is fantastic, when he speaks Russian he actually looks like he’s living them words.  When Rockwell is slimeballing all over Vanko to get him to help him beat Tony, he sure as hell is convincing.  Makes me wonder if he was like a car salesman or something in a previous life.  Paltrow’s love is something pure, something true, something he doesn’t deserve but he has.  Cheadle is his 1 true friend, 1 who see’s through all the bullshit and knows that the man at the front needs a wingman, ever Maverick needs an Iceman for a wingman (See what I did there? ).

Go, Watch, Drink and be merry, for this movie brings nothing but good things for the 2 hours of escapism that it offers.

EL.

Initial 24 thoughts…..potential spoilers..

I’ve followed 24 for the past few years, though typically i started mid-season 3 so had some catching up to do.

I’ve looked forward to every episode of every season since. Though to be honest by day 6 it got a bit ridiculous. How much shit can go wrong in this guys life? I can only assume this is a balance of how awesome he is – it’s offset by the bad shit that happens to him.

Anyway, I’ll keep it short!

Google – Playing data monopoly

Been a while..well, ages frankly since my last post! So following on from the recent change in google’s stance on their operation in china I felt it a good time to blog about something that has had me thinking about how much google knows about us all for some time.

Sherlock Holmes, (aka Industrial-age Iron man)

Over the Christmas holidays I managed to get to the cinema to watch the seasonal blockbuster release of Mr Holmes.  Directed by Guy Ritchie, starring Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law and Rachel McAdams.  Interesting cast I think, Downey Jr is well on form at the moment and can seem to do no wrong, Oh how the fallen have become mighty!  America does love a reformed individual don’t they.