"I'm Cold Blooded, Check It And See! Got A Fever In The Minus Degree!"

This review contains a punny title and spoilers, as usual.

Why, oh why do I surf the internet before watching Doctor Who? I went on one of my favourite websites (people on Facebook have gotten better at not letting stuff leak in their statuses...I wonder if I have anything to do with that?) and immediately learned what happened at the end of the episode. This, coupled with the opening narration, made actually watching the episode itself unnecessary for me.

In a way, this episode reminded me of a farce, such as Fawlty Towers. Many elements were planted throughout the episode so they could come back later to bite the main characters in their collective arses. Fawlty Towers uses much the same formula for comedic effect, and this two-parter conclusion for
The Doctor, Amy and Rory does the same. Every element that makes the 'stinking apes' (which The Doctor calls them indirectly; Homo Reptilia would imply they evolved from apes like we did*) look bad comes into play at the worst possible time.

I will say this in the writer's favour though: the characterisation for the episode was top notch. One of them was written to be the Resident Idiot (how do you say that in Welsh?) but the thing is, I think that any one of us could easily see ourselves in her situation. All she was doing was trying to help her family...in absolutely the worst way possible. Just when things are looking up, Drigiannydd Idiot (yes, I looked it up...what of it?) comes blundering in and sounding like the most racist human imaginable (I would say Hitler is the most racist human imaginable, but he didn't know about the Underground Space Reptiles From Space).

I don't like any story where the characters are forced to be stupid for the sake of the story, but sometimes (as appears to be the case here) it is unavoidable. I just wish it wasn't, but it is hard to see how the writer could have done it any better when the characters were firing on all cylinders mentally. As it is, this show made me want to punch the gung-ho lizards (good name for a rock band) through the screen.

All in all, this was an okay episode. Nothing particularly spectacular, but it was an interesting piece on how reasonable people can go to pieces in an unfortunate set of circumstances. If I might draw on my vast nerdish leanings, I'd almost say that this episode was meant to share something with The Killing Joke (I bet that's a comparison that you don't hear every day), as it proves the point that the Joker was trying to make in that publication. And the ending was pretty surprising and effective (I can't think of a more horrible fate for anyone to suffer, it's literally a fate worse than death). Or it would have been if I could take my own advice and not spoil myself before I see the actual episode.

*Science Bonus!

Spirits, Sootballs and Mr Miyagi...

Hayao Miyazaki's 2001 Spirited Away is, to put it in the oft-quoted words of Oscar Wilde, "fuckin' weird!"
It chronicles the tale of a spoiled girl named Chihiro who stumbles upon an abandoned theme park with her parents. They explore, but then darkness falls, and Chihiro must grow emotionally to save her parents from a piggy fate...

This tale of spirits seems like it was written when Miyazaki was really, really high. There are a whole bunch of really bizarre events and characters, such as the arachnid boiler-man and the little soot people carrying the rocks. Which is understandable, because it is a film about spirits and the growing obsession with wealth and power.

The thing I love about the film though is the little details, such as what the big baby looks like later on in the film, along with the little bird helping him fly. I also love when her parents are turning into pigs, and you can still see the trousers and how they look vaguely human in a way. Also, it's probably just me, but

I found my heart stopping when it was intended to and I really found myself laughing at the antics of the little balls of soot. Any film that makes you genuinely intrigued as to what happens next and makes you care about the characters has done its job well.

The vocals seem to be pretty well done (although not being an expert on anime I wouldn't know, for all I know the English dub is reviled among the die-hard anime community), with the voices suiting the characters. The only other anime I've seen is Death Note, which was pretty good and lent itself to some truly epic moments (chips, anyone?).

The bathhouse for the spirits seems really authentic to how such a place would work in real life, with the stresses of working so hard showing in everyone's manner and so on. I thought that the characters were really well done and the character development, not just for Chihiro but for everyone else as they come to respect her was done superbly. Okay, the character development was also formulaic in places but that's only really obvious to the hardened movie-goers such as myself, and it's really a fairy tale in some ways.

This is the kind of movie that everyone should watch when they're young, as it's definitely a coming of age movie and one that could help mould a young person into the adult they will shortly become.

Although I think that Miyazaki looks like Thunderbirds villain The Hood in disguise (seriously, have you seen that guy?), he has created a fantastic movie that will stand the test of time (which grossed more than Titanic in its native Japan when released). I for one would not be averse to watching more of his works, although I'm not the kind of person who will actually go looking for it. Much like music, I don't explore, but I let the ones I like come to me.

Mr Miyazaki (almost called him Mr Miyagi), I was truly Spirited Away. Well done, sir.

I Feel Re-Bourne...

In 2002, Team America retard Matt Damon* received a vehicle in the form of The Bourne Identity, a death and explosion packed film that served as an inspiration for the grittier direction in which James Bond has gone.

The trilogy (Identity, Supremacy and Ultimatum) centres around an amnesiac killer (Jason Bourne, hence the ‘Identity’) trying to find out who he was and what he did in his former life. This ends up leading him on a road trip with Obligatory Love Interest #1.

The film left some questions unanswered (the most important of these is who he actually was) but the ‘tard gets the girl and he seems pretty satisfied with how the whole business concluded.

Then they made another movie. (awkward cough)

I feel that it was with the second movie that the franchise went from an interesting concept (how would a killer feel if he lost his memory and learn what he did) to a generic revenge plot action movie franchise. They killed off his girlfriend early in the second installment to make the audience feel sorry for him, a known killer. This was the problem with the whole trilogy though, not just the second film.

Another thing that bugs me about the second film is the scene at the end where the CIA woman does Bourne a favour and tells him his name, birthday and where he’s from. Thereby robbing the audience of any reason to see the third fucking movie!

The last movie (not that you’d know it from the dvds, I had to guess), The Bourne Ultimatum, depends yet again on our villain protagonist being targeted by the EVIL GOVERNMENT while he doesn’t want to hurt anybody and live a normal life. Well, tough. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, I have no idea why execs expect audiences to sympathise with killers as protagonists!

While the Bourne movies were a reasonably entertaining way to spend an afternoon, they’re nothing special. Any of them beyond the first is just a generic action movie and the third one, as I’ve established, was entirely pointless. You would be better off (although not by much) watching Casino Royale or any of the preceding Bond movies (but not Quantum of Solace). Overall, if you have to watch any of them, the first one is the best way to go, don’t bother with the other two.

I’ve put The Bourne Identity in highlight-able text here: His real name is David Webb, no relation to Robert Webb. SPOILER ALERT!!
*“MATT DAMON!”

The Earth Is Hungry...OM NOM NOM!

The 8th episode of Series Fnarg, The Hungry Earth (which puts the image of a Sarlacc into my mind) features the return of the ever-popular space fish (okay, they’re space reptiles, but to me they look like green space fish), The Silurians. Actually, now I come to think of it, a lot of the ‘Monster Of The Week’ examples in Doctor Who seem to be some sort of Space Fish. Episode One had the weird Space Eel thing, Episode Two had the Space Whale, Episode Six had Vampire Space Fish and this one has Space Reptile Fish things. So, half of the episodes have space fish. Methinks I spot a theme here.

The setting is a Welsh Mining Village (no mention of ‘the only gay in the village’) in 2020, where an ambitious drilling project is going on. The Doctor, Amy and Rory land, expecting Rio. Surely if you were the Doctor, you’d consult the scanner before going outside and proclaiming “RIO!” like a nonce.

Rory goes to play Sherlock while Amy and The Doctor check out the aforementioned drilling project which has just penetrated more than 21 kilometres (more than 13 miles, measurement fans!) under the ground. Rory is almost staggeringly incompetent at this, and the only child in the village has to do the detective work for him, even quoting everybody’s favourite detective while he does so. This child explains that the bodies that have been going missing from graves have been clearly dug up from below and taken.

Meanwhile, the Doctor and Woman Assistant #4 (discounting one shot companions and not counting the classic series, that number is actually correct) go to the drilling site (The Doctor should’ve used the time away from Rory for some drilling of his own, IYCMD*). Hilarity ensues when some holes in the ground open up and start eating Amy and some random fella who she tries to save (to her credit, she did save him). She ends up being eaten by the Earth (hence the title, presumably), but any savvy viewer will know that she’s not dead, due to it: A) Being the 8th episode and B) Being less than 25 minutes into the episode.

My complaints with the episode are as follows:

1) Nasreen (mining lady) never actually learns the Doctor’s name, much like Rufus in Bill & Ted (he never tells them his name at any point during the movie), yet is calling him The Doctor and singing his phrases. This one was pointed out to me in my screen-writing class by a friend as I didn’t notice it myself.

2) How stupid the aforementioned child, who is dyslexic, got in the last bit of the episode. Kid goes out to get some headphones from his house when there are unknown creatures about to get to the surface any minute. I would understand if it was a hearing aid or an inhaler but headphones seem counter-productive.

3) In fact, the stupidity in general on behalf of most of the characters bugged me. Drill (RedShirt) Guy #1 stuck his hand into a steaming hole in the ground, the previously mentioned child and headphones incident, and Rory not clocking where the dead bodies went from their graves…what a moron.

This episode was decidedly average. It’s the first of a two parter though, so hopefully the next one will be better. It’s worth watching, but not by much.

*If You Catch My Drift. I’m starting this up!

Know How Butterflies Are Normally Pretty*? This One Isn't...

My stoner buddy recommended the time travelling epic, The Butterfly Effect, the other day so I borrowed it. And I am so glad I did.

This 2004 sci-fi film stars Ashton Kutcher, he who is not to be confused with Ash Ketchum. The premise of the film is showing how changes you make to the past can come back to haunt you in the future (present/whatever). And it is done really well, as most of the details mentioned early on are later relevant in some way. The main character suffers blackouts, and both the viewer and the character discover what happens during the blackouts together. In that way, it's quite immersive and makes you want to find out what happened to him.

As anyone who knows me knows, I love the idea of time travel and this film shows exactly why we shouldn't be allowed to have it. It shows the downsides and it is very harsh on Kutcher's character, Evan Treborn. Seriously, extremely harsh to him. It's weird to think that in an alternate timeline, I wouldn't have seen this movie and you wouldn't be reading this.

I recognise some of the other characters from other television programmes, like Callum Keith Rennie, (whom aficionados will know as Ray Kowalski from the excellent Canada-Em-Up Due South), Kutcher's co-star, Amy Smart (Starsky and Hutch and Scrubs) and Almost-Marty-McFly, Eric Stoltz. It took an imdb search to find out where I recognised these people from (except for Rennie). I do like that in a film as it gets me thinking.

If I have one complaint, it's that the sequence at the beginning seems out of place and unnecessary, even foolish, since it spoils you slightly to what's going to happen at the end. And in a way, some of the flashbacks turn out to have obvious conclusions or repercussions, but that's part of the fun; to be able to say "what an idiot."

The Wikipedia entry (since I have not yet had time to watch all of the alternate endings) tells me that there are four endings to the film, and the Director's Cut one (from the sounds of the others) is the one that I prefer by far. It fits the overall tone of the film and makes more sense within context. I wonder why they didn't go with that ending in the cinema. There are also two sequels to this film which deviate from the plot and might as well be completely unrelated, much like the Highlander movies (I'm only counting Highlanders 3 and 4 here. Highlander 2: The Quickening isn't worth mentioning).

The Director's Cut ending, which I watched, might well be one of the most depressing things committed to film if you think about it, like It's A Wonderful Life gone horribly wrong. And yet in spite of this (or perhaps because of it), the film works. It's a powerful film that keeps you guessing what's going to happen next and ramps up the tension. This one is definitely worth investing both your time and money in. Don't let some stupid butterfly stop you from watching this fantastic movie.


*I did not say pretty! MANLY! MANLY BUTTERFLIES!!

You Are Surrounded By Armed Bastards For The Last Time!

The follow up to the brilliant Life On Mars, Ashes To Ashes has managed to outlive its predecessor while having roughly the same level of love for the time it is set in while still showing its bad points. They managed to do this by taking as long as they needed to clear the story up, which is evidently three seasons' worth of story.

Tomorrow evening will be the end of an era. Yes, the day will finally come when we no longer see Gene Hunt's brand of misogyny and light prejudice. However, as seen with the recent Labour and Tory posters, I feel that the viewers have somewhat missed the point of Gene Hunt's character. When he started out, he was a character who was supposed to be respected begrudgingly, to show how policing styles of today contrast with the early 70's. The public have somehow come to love him, as shown by his character growing progressively more awesome as the show moves on, with lots of bad-ass one liners and a large amount of tyre-squealing, gun wielding fun.

By the end of tomorrow's episode, we should have found out exactly who Gene Hunt is, what Alex is doing with him and all the plot threads that are hanging at the moment should've been cleared up. All of this had better be cleared to the fan's satisfaction, as they have one hour to do it in. The problem with this is that the trailer shown at the end of last Friday's episode doesn't seem to come close to clearing it all up. Mind you, I suppose they couldn't show us a lot if the alternative would spoil the show for us.

For all that viewers may have missed the point of Hunt's character, it's not actually a bad show. Yes, the opening narration for the first two seasons verges on boring, but they've trimmed it down to shorter than Life On Mars' narration for the final season, which is a blessing.

Conspiracy seems to be the order of the day, because where the arc question for Life On Mars is "How do I get home?", the arc questions (for there are many) seem to be "What's wrong with this world and how can I fix it?". Whereas Sam Tyler's motive was to get home, that is now an afterthought (in at least the third series) for Alex Drake, the protagonist for Ashes To Ashes. This is another example of how brilliant the shows are at portraying the differences in mindset between the two, as the shows take place in their respective minds and the details within are examples of how they think.

I do like how the characters were developed further in Ashes To Ashes, as they didn't have much time to work on giving each character a day in the spotlight in Life On Mars; in a way all the characterisation has built to what is coming tomorrow.

Unless they utterly destroy the character of Hunt in the last episode, I suspect that he'll be back with a spin-off along the lines of Starsky and Hutch. One Man And His Quattro? Could that work? If they don't bring him back (and the actor has said that this is his last time as Gene Hunt) then on the part of this blogger at least, he will be missed.

A Writing Experiment...

Permit me if you will, readers, to conduct a little experiment. I’m going to show how it’s possible to review something that you don’t think is all that great (still worth watching though) and still make it sound good. I will remain non-specific throughout, the challenge is to see if you can guess what I’m reviewing. If you guess what it is before I reveal it in the text below, I owe you a Coke.

Oh, and no spoilers for those who haven't read it yet.

This epic drama follows the life of one man as he finds out how connected (the character interconnectivity is on a par with Heroes) he is to a web of deceit and lies that stretches very far back but also comes full circle back to him. It’s hilariously funny as well as being a moving piece on how easy it is for people to come to violence, how quick they are to spring to anger.

We are introduced to a number of glamorous and sexy women, as well as several tough men who are going about their normal lives when the drama kicks off.

And there is a lot of drama. The action is split across several episodes, each of which ramps up the tension to unbelievable climaxes. And no, I’m not referring to the sex that you get to see every once in a while (although sex is related a few of the cliffhangers, I won’t say how) to show how awesome and attractive the main character is.

This main character is a well known star who has achieved some notoriety but hasn’t let that affect his work, which shows as he takes this project completely seriously. I suspect he sees himself as a model to youngsters, which is evidenced in the aspiration factor of this series. For example, he never goes anywhere without his cool suit on.

Bottom line: this is worth watching if you have some free time and could do with a laugh (and most people can). It’s a cautionary tale to show how one mistake can lead to a whole lot of trouble for you and the people you love. By making this, he has effectively said “don’t make these mistakes and be careful how you handle your life. Don’t let it get out of hand.” It’s certainly worth the investment on dvd if you can find it.

Have you guessed what it is yet? Highlight to find out: It was R Kelly’s Hip-Hopera (seriously, that’s the term he uses), Trapped In The Closet. The great thing is that pretty much everything I’ve said in here applies to it when you think about it.

Death By Boredom Lies In Wait For The Doctor And Co...(spoilers)

“Nothing ever happens here,” is Rory’s description for where The Doctor and the gang end up this time around. It’s five years after Amy and Rory travelled in the TARDIS and they have settled into the mind-numbingly dull (and fictional) village of Upper Leadworth. Amy is approximately the size of a dwarf star due to pregnancy and Rory has acquired (since I refuse to believe that he grew it) a strange mullet and ponytail combination.

Then the truth emerges that they are flipping between dreams and reality, and they have to decide which is which before the TARDIS crashes into a star…

This episode had a number of different effects on me, one of which was to put me off ever living in a nice and quiet village like that shown in the programme (a desire that I’ve had since Hot Fuzz, funnily enough). I thought I wanted a nice and simple life but that one was as boring as hearing about how cider is made.

Another was that it made me laugh many a time at how the team were working together, with lots of banter while still being serious and working towards a good conclusion. It featured the usual struggles for Amy’s affections between Rory and the Doctor (although in the Doctor’s case it’s more a struggle to get rid of them) and it added to the overall atmosphere and the inconvenience of the whole thing.

Say what you will about this show, but there is something inherently funny when you see who the gang have to face this week and how they treat them. Specifically the old people, I’m not referring to the Dream Lord, who is the main villain of the episode, seeing as he puts them into that situation in the first place.

This illustrates well how the show can treat various real world stereotypes in a fantasy setting. Because the old people are an alien menace, it’s okay to beat them in the face with a large plank of wood. That sounds like an excellent (read: shit) defence for one of these old people beaters you read about in the paper “But your honour, she opened her mouth and some lethal breath came out!”
Doctor Who specialises in fantastic mundaneness, I’d say, and it really shows in this episode.

Like most murder mysteries, it is obvious in hindsight why it turned out the way it did. You can see hints to this effect and I suspect you’ll kick yourself for not getting it sooner.

The latest episode in Moffat’s Doctor Who run was an interesting one, a mystery that the viewer is trying to solve along with the characters and that you’ll have a fun time trying to solve. I think that the answer will surprise you in the end and that this episode is well worth the 45 minutes it takes to watch it. I think this episode is one of the best yet and that it is an instrumental one for character development.

Time To Open Pandora's Box...

Being a cutting edge amateur critic, I didn't watch the highest grossing film of all time when it first came out in the cinema. No, I had to wait until Dad bought it on dvd yesterday. I have to be honest here and say I don't appreciate what the fuss is about. For all the hype, you'd think James Cameron had personally resurrected Jesus and convinced him to create really pretty graphics for Avatar.

Apparently, this film was amazing in IMAX cinemas and watching it in 3D. If so, then you'd think they would release it in 3D with the silly glasses, wouldn't you? But they didn't. What they did was release a dvd that had nothing but the film, subtitles and the menu. Not only is the film 2D (causing it to lose one of its major selling points), it has no featurettes on the making of the film and no director commentaries.

I will not limit my reviewer-hate to the quality of the dvd release, however.

When I watched the film, I couldn't help but notice how much it all just felt like CGI. I realise that is exactly what it is, but after so much time and hearing people gush about how pretty it looks, it seems like a letdown to me. I was expecting to have my mind blown by the pretty graphics, but I didn't even notice the difference between the quality of Cameron's graphics and (for example) those of the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy.

The plot revolves the Navi (not that annoying fairy from Legend of Zelda), a race native to the planet Pandora. The antagonists come in the form of an army of douchebag Americans who threaten to tear down the Navi's beloved forests and landscapes to mine some precious metal (called Unobtanium). A crippled marine goes undercover as one of the Navi to find a way to get them to relocate before America wages another pointless war. Among other things, I noticed a distinct similarity in plot to the PS3 game Haze and even heard the in-game words (specifically, 'Get Some!') repeated a few times. Things are complicated when he falls in love with the princess of the tribe, and living as one of them would mean that he could get the use of his legs back.

The morals in this movie are so heavy handed that you will end up as a Looney Tunes-style stain upon your chair. I agree with the messages brought forth in the movie, in that man should be more in touch with nature but after a certain point it becomes grating. It's such an obvious allegory that it's pointless to even mention that it's fusing a message about the pointlessness of war with a message about being in touch with nature.

Good thing I didn't mention that then.

Visually, there is a lot to see here. There is always something colourful jostling for your attention, and it certainly looks nice. But therein lies the problem. It doesn't look particularly outstanding, just slightly better than average.

The actual interaction with the Smurf stand-ins was pretty clever to see, merging live action and CGI as it did but it doesn't stand out as anything revolutionary. I'm not going to spoil anything for you here, but G.I. Cripple and Smurfette have sex. And I don't know about you, but if I wanted to watch blue people having sex, I would watch Smurfette Does Smurftown¹.

Anyone who wants to buy this would be better off waiting for the bulkier re-release and opting for a 3D version if they release one.

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¹ I hope I've just made that up but it's more than likely that I haven't.

Doing A Little Irish Gig Over Here...

For you, my dear readers, I go above and beyond the call of duty. With that in mind, I went to my first¹ gig this week.

First off, I was not as uncomfortable with this new thing as I thought I would be. Makes me think I should try more of this.
The gig took place in a darkened social club and featured the cream of Slough’s local bands². While I didn’t entirely agree with what they chose to play, I appreciate that the gig wasn’t thrown for my benefit³, and I’ll go as far as to say that the music wasn’t the din that I expected it to be. It was almost agreeable. And I did receive a pleasant surprise when the DJ put on Joy Division’s Love Will Tear Us Apart.

The evening was accompanied by the usual bout of up-chucking among drunkards (one of whom is my friend who won’t kill me for mentioning her in here, God willing) and loud music, as can be expected at a gig. There was fighting on the dance floor and crazy sons of bitches running around like kids who haven’t taken their Ritalin.

I believe that gigs are things better done with a group of friends by your side, just like clubbing, socialising and dogging.

The bands ranged from good to bad, one of which possessed a lead singer who looked like Rik Mayall⁴. I ended up missing the band that I was dragged there to see, due to being square enough to have a temporary curfew imposed for that night (parents had to get up in the morning).

In conclusion, I had a good time. There were good people, good food and relatively okay music. I won’t say good drinks, because I don’t drink alcoholic drinks and the only drink I had was a pathetically small Coca Cola for £1.10. Everything you want from a good gig, really.

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¹ Well, second, but we’re not counting Busted here.


² I have absolutely no frame of reference for this.


³ Unlike Live Aid.


⁴ That’ll tell Thatcher!

Time Is Breaking...As The Cullens Have Travelled Back In Time!

This is a given by now, but this review contains spoilers.

As you may know, the title of this week’s Doctor Who is Vampires Of Venice. Not really a subtle title there, but mercifully they don’t run into Cullen and the Gang (not least because it’d be incredibly anachronistic)¹. Or so you’d think…turns out they’re not actually vampires at all. They are space vampire fish (ye gods, I never thought I’d say that). That’s Doctor Who for you though, always going beyond the mundane² and subverting your expectations.

This episode introduces Amy’s beloved (no, not the Doctor) as a companion, where he turns out to have a few moral speeches to serve the Doctor with. Reminds me a bit of Season Two, where they were foreshadowing that someone would have to pay for the Doctor’s actions sooner or later. Got two words for you, Rory:  Time. Machine.

It was refreshing to have a male companion in the TARDIS again, because as a perverted individual, I’m always anticipating that the Doctor and Hot Totty #2 will traumatise millions of children by getting it on within the TARDIS. Having a male companion dissipates the sexual tension. Or increases it, I’m not sure with.

I found the bit at the beginning highly amusing, because of all the ways for Rory to find that his fiancée tried to kiss a Time Lord, said Time Lord telling him was certainly not expected. The tension between the Doctor and Rory was done very well and it was certainly believable. Same again with Amy and Rory.

The action scenes were fairly exciting, even if it was quite obviously set up what was coming and the best bits were spoiled by last week’s trailer. There were some funny moments in the action as well, which is always worth seeing.

Now, onto the Cullen-lites themselves…they’re space vampire fish. That’s all you need to know really.

No, seriously. Doctor Who has difficulty doing monsters of myth and I have no idea why.

In the 44 years of televised Doctor Who, we have had six ‘vampire stories’ and maybe one or two legitimate vampires. A brief rundown of encounters follows: (legitimacy means honest-to-God Hammer Horror³, Bram Stoker style vampires)

1) Dracula kills some Daleks in the First Doctor serial, The Chase…he’s a funfair robot. Non-legitimate.

2) Space Vampire called Axos tries to pull a Galactus during the Third Doctor’s tenure. Non-legitimate.

3) Giant Vampires from Space try and kill the Doctor (or something). King Vampire receives the Ming the Merciless treatment. Space dweller indicates non-legitimacy.

4) Sea dwelling vampiric creatures which can be killed by a stake to the heart and are averse to symbols of belief. So, in effect, they are space fish (like this week’s episode). Similar enough to warrant legitimacy due to the stakes and belief things.

5) A space vampire, called a Plasmavore, which sucks blood to survive. Similar in that respect, no other. Non legitimate.

6) This week’s creations were set up to be a lot more menacing than they actually were. Rather bizarrely, they are less legitimate than number four, which is almost the same concept. Non legitimate
In summary, this episode has a lot in common with previous Who tales, and it’s quite weird that they still haven’t done a confrontation with a Hammer Horror style vampire or something. Good episode though, certainly one to watch.

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¹I’m worried about the anachronistic possibilities should the Cullens appear in Doctor Who? Good lord, I need to sort out my priorities.


²Because vampires are so mundane.


³1930′s production house which churned out horror movies such as Dracula and The Mummy.

"We Have Ze 'Artwarming Rodent Film As A Special..."

Ratatouille is a 2007 Pixar film that concerns the unlikely and unhygienic story of a cute rat who becomes a chef in a Paris eatery. Some small spoilers may be found within, but those who have already seen it, I may put up a piece on all the little things about the film that I noticed.

Some of you might be surprised to hear that this heartwarming tale of vermin in Gay Paree is known among film buffs to be a classic example of a superhero movie. The basic components are all there: an origin story, a moment where the hero must decide between his old and new life, and an arch nemesis. There’s even a sidekick (Linguini)!

Well, I say arch nemesis, but that’s not strictly true. There’s an arch nemesis and a minor villain, a very stereotypical head chef played by Lord Of The Rings’ Ian Holm. The character is very much played for farce and comic relief purposes, although, do you need comic relief when the whole point of the film is comedy?

Remy the alliteratively named Rat is blue, to make him stand out in any crowd shots. As a superhero, he plays the part very well, with an uncanny sense of taste and smell, which at first aids him in his duty as poison checker. I think this could’ve been done with more tragedy, such as Remy coming back to his pack later to find them all dead from food poisoning. Ah, foolish Scott. How dare you ask for tragedy in a Pixar film?

The arch nemesis comes in the form of a snooty food critic (played by veteran actor Peter O’ Toole) who is the kind of critic that is designed to be despised. However, as an aspiring critic myself, I took almost personal offence to the way in which this guy was portrayed as a capital douchebag. I mean, the guy is called Anton Ego! His character motivations seemed to be more concentrated on ripping the restaurant to shreds, which is not what the job of critic entails. Sure, if there are flaws in something (like in Ratatouille, for example), then yes, you may go to town on pointing them out. However, if you are actively looking for the flaws, then you are doing your job wrong.

The obligatory romantic sub plot comes in the form of the sidekick and one of the other characters building up a relationship in a fast-paced kitchen. In my opinion, that particular plot worked well (and indeed, could’ve supported a film on its own) and was quite convincing. Of course, the necessary conflict was still there, but I found it worked.

Unfortunately, as befits a children’s film, most adults can see the heart-warming ending coming a mile away. However, Pixar tried to go above and beyond by surprising the viewer with a different ending…which I also saw coming. I ended that film feeling not only that I had lost the capacity to be surprised, but also that any kids watching the film would need to use serious suspension of disbelief…for the next three decades.

Ratatouille, for all its predictability, is still a good film to watch if you want to get an idea of what exactly goes into making a top notch kitchen, or even just wanting a good film to watch.

Go Go Dalek Rangers! In Space!

As I write this on my friend's infuriatingly small notebook keyboard, the fourth episode of New New Who has aired about 8 hours ago and I have just watched it and the Confidential. Since everyone and their mothers have most likely had a chance to see at least one episode, I thought now would be a good time to present my opinions on Tweed Doctor (Matt Smith) and Amy Pond (Karen Gillan). Blog contains spoilers.

Four episodes of thirteen and so far I think they have come into their roles admirably. Amy Pond actually works as a companion, with none of the irritating chavvyness of Rose and (so far) none of that whole "we're not a couple!" that Donna and the previous chap had going for them. She also actually does stuff to prove her worth as a companion, such as being fanservice for the adults and lonely teenagers, asking the right questions and mostly listening to the Raggedy Doctor.

Tweed Doctor himself is also shaping up well so far and I like him. He can be funny, intelligent and seems quite eccentric on occasion, which is what you want in a Doctor (any kind of Doctor, really). The little details are good as well, such as his first words in The Eleventh Hour ("Can I have an apple?"). That line made me laugh, as it's so Doctorish yet I really wasn't expecting it. Another great moment is when he convinces three Daleks that he's holding a TARDIS self destruct ring...which is actually a Jammie Dodger.

I won't say he's better than David Tennant was in the role, but that's because Tennant very much made it his own role, surpassing Eccleston and leaving Smith as the new guy who nobody was expecting to like. So naturally it'll be interesting to see whether fans are considering him better or worse by the end of this series (I'm guessing worse but not by much).

The enemies the new Doctor has faced in the four episodes that he's had are The Daleks (which Moffat appears to have redesigned with the Power Rangers in mind, pretty though they are), Prisoner Zero and the Atraxi, The Beast Beneath The Big StarShip Britain Thingy and last but not least, this week's two parter sees the return of the Weeping Angels. The species of Weeping Angels is one of Moffat's scarier creations so it's good to see them make a return for a two parter. I eagerly await the resolution episode.

Now, it can't just be me who's noticed the sexual or romantic chemistry between not just the characters, but the actors as well? I don't expect this to end in the last episode with her madly clawing at his tweed as they have a passionate fumble on the TARDIS floor (although now I've said it someone will inevitably have written a fanfic about it), but what I've seen of their behaviour behind the scenes, as well as the slow-motion, Twilight-like bit in the first episode makes me think that he's giving her a bit of the old 'taking her through time and space' on the side. A bit in Confidential is (deliberately?) fuelling this suspicion with the following exchange, which contains spoilers:

Gillan: "The Doctor bites my arm, and I'm not really sure how we're going to do that; is he actually going to do it?"

Smith: "Absolutely I'm going to bite her arm! Yeah, for sure!"

See what I mean?

My main gripe with this series is mainly to do with the writing of some of the Doctor's lines. While the writers have worked around the clock to ensure final lines are nothing short of awesome, it also means that you can often predict what he's going to say in epic moments, which typically amount to "I'm the Doctor, and you do not fuck with me. Here's why."

All in all, I'm pretty happy so far and am eagerly looking forward to seeing some more Tweed and Pond life on screen, and I hope you are too.

"Watch This Film? You Dizzy, Blud?"

When I heard 'Mickey The Idiot' (Noel Clarke) from Doctor Who wrote the screenplay for his own film, Kidulthood (great name), I wasn't sure what to think. My main thought was 'oh, it's another Brit film showcasing the plight of the poor minority/druggies/idiots (delete as appropriate) '. Sure enough, that's exactly what it was, but it was actually pretty good. Clarke played Sam, the tough young black kid, from the block, who knows the streets and who is also from da ghetto (how many white guy clichés were in that sentence? You decide!).


Adulthood (see what they did there?*) is the story of Sam (Clarke again, reprising his role from Kidulthood) seen from his perspective after his release from prison for a crime committed in the first film. The film would have you believe that he is a changed man and that he doesn't want any trouble.

Unfortunately, where the film falls down is failing to convince you that he should be viewed as a sympathetic protagonist, with the film going almost out of its way to show you that he is in fact a complete douchebag. It's hard not to be prejudiced when the guy murdered someone who was going to be a father. That crossed some sort of primal line. This same child is mostly in one scene when the mother is talking to Sam at the door of her house. The mother calls the child to the door, mostly so Sam can get a look at her and then she dismisses the daughter. Who then goes and sits in a corner where her main duty is to look sad. Seriously, she's a kid. Are they telling us that she didn't have anything better to do in the slightest? Kids like jumping and noise, she could've done either of those things!

One main gripe that I had with this film is that the 'urban' music (I presume it's urban, mainly because I do not want to call it 'black' music) that occasionally pops up is much louder than the rest of the fucking film. I mean, the rest of the film consists of characters quietly slagging off or beating one another, and then CRANK THAT FUNKY MUSIC, YOU THE MOVIE VIEWER, HAVE UNWITTINGLY ENTERED A RAVE!

Like its predecessor, it tries to showcase the life and poverty of teens and young adults in London. The problem is, it succeeded. How is that a problem, you may ask? Because it made me want to bang my head against a brick wall due to the way they portrayed Black London.

And it is Black London, because out of a cast of about ten to twenty, I counted maybe two to three important white characters. There are a couple of Minor Whiteys, such as Nick Briggs (he who Exterminates Doctors...) and Danny Dyer, who helps contribute a "this is definitely London, 'cause I'm a Cockney, guvnor!" feel to things. Like we needed more of that. Thank you, Danny Dyer**.

My overall verdict, in case it wasn't obvious by the tone of the review is: Do not watch this movie. It is not healthy for you by any stretch of the imagination and it makes you despise your fellow man. Kidulthood, while much the same, is at least more tolerable and is just a better movie. If you have to, read the Wikipedia synopsis that I have helpfully linked to below.

Here there be spoilers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adulthood_(film)#Plot

*Don't worry, if you didn't, the film's tagline will leave you in no doubt.
** Never thought I'd say that...

"Jim-Bob, Get 'The Boys'. Time To Blog..."

About five minutes ago, I saw an unintentionally funny news piece that grabbed my attention. I laughed my ass off and came straight here to post a blog about it.

Turns out that racism is still around in Wal-Mart. Some cheeky scamp got into the public address system at one of their stores and – I’m not making this up – asked all the black people in the store to leave. On the face of it, that doesn’t sound funny, but if you read the article linked below, you’ll see that ‘a male voice calmly addressed the customers and asked all the black shoppers to leave’. That’s the funny bit. Rather than being a nutjob who wasn’t restrained properly, the article implies that the guy not only was in full possession of his mental faculties, but that he was calm and collected. I like that image, because in all honesty it was probably a Wal-Mart employee doing it for a joke or dare.

The article didn’t say whether there was a burning cross outside with sheet-wearing figures standing around it, but it wouldn’t surprise me. It also puts into my mind an image of a couple of red-necks toting guns while standing around the PA system and sending Jim-Bob to wait outside for anyone who ventures out of the store.

They are currently looking through the security tapes to see who did it and prevent others doing it in the future. To be honest, their guard would probably be let down again after a while and you’ll probably be reading about a relapse from the same people in about a month or two.

You can read the article of unintentional hilarity here:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35910010/ns/us_news-life/?gt1=43001

I've Heard Of Laying Down Some Pipe, But Jeez...

I came across some very odd stories the other day and immediately thought to blog about them, as they are quite weird.
The first one is ‘Man Marries Pillow’. A man from Korea has married a large huggable pillow with an anime image on it. It is called a dakimakura and you can buy them legally (or so I’m told). I have no idea if it’s legally binding, but for the sake of my faith in humanity it really shouldn’t be. I mean, I’ve heard of lonely people kissing their pillows (sometimes I do it myself) but that’s taking it too far, surely?

The article that I have linked to below does not say whether he intends to have ‘relations’ but to be honest I suspect he already has. Sex before marriage is tolerated now, after all.

Gay marriage is only now starting to become tolerated (and twice I’ve seen Yahoo use the word marriage in air quotes when describing male-on-male marriages; as in “the two men were ‘married’ this morning”)

The next story is a little closer to home (unless you are somehow reading this from the moon). In our fair isle (Southampton, to be exact) a man got his penis trapped in a stainless steel pipe. God knows what he was doing (he apparently ‘did not explain to hospital staff how exactly the pipe got stuck around his penis’).

Doctors at the Southampton Genital General Hospital couldn’t wrench off the pipe and secure his release, as the restricted blood flow caused his penis to become erect. I could be wrong, but I presume that was the general idea behind what he was doing in the first place. Maybe he just wanted to be able to use some porn lines on his womenfolk (such as “Hey, I have a pipe to give you!”)

After the doctors failed to get his pipe out of the pipe, they brought in some firemen who used an angle grinder to cut him free. Yes, you heard that right. An angle grinder. Rather wonderfully, the Metro article concerning this just shows a picture of ‘an angle grinder at work’ so you can get some idea of how he must’ve felt. When Boy and I read the article, we both winced when we read the descriptions.

The best part of the whole story was the firefighter’s statement at the end of the article. Specifically, the words “I’ve only come across this type of thing three or four times in my 17 years as a firefighter. It’s not a daily occurrence.” Well, duh.
Happily(?) the penis was only bruised and swollen, so no lasting damage was done by his idiocy. I’m saying idiocy because it’s incredibly hard to get your penis caught in a steel pipe by accident.

Man Marries Pillow article: http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/816601-man-marries-pillow

Man Gets Penis Pipe Extension: http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/808171-mans-penis-freed-from-metal-pipe-with-industrial-grinder

"I Will Try...To Blog You..."

Right, just a short post to say that for fans of Coldplay, they are offering a free download of their live album on their website. It has stuff like Fix You, Clocks and Viva La Vida. I am informed that Coldplay are quite good, so any fans may want to grab this.

Link to the site: http://www.coldplay.com/lrlrl/lr.html

Enjoy, chaps and ladies.

How Not To Man Up...

Some time ago, being the scrawny man-child I am, I decided to put on some weight and muscles, so I could ‘level up’ from ‘man-child’ ’scrawny guy’ to ‘MANLY ADONIS!’

I started out with the best of intentions for gaining a hot new bod, but about two to three months in I am seeing no discernible difference. I gained at best a slight muscle mass and definition on my pectorals. Which is still good, but not as good as I could get.

One of the main reasons for my body maintaining a status quo of sorts is sheer laziness, if I’m honest. It is far easier to lie doing stuff on the laptop than to drop and give God twenty.

Plus, in the winter weather it’s too damn cold! That is a big part of it, as who wants to leave their warm bed to go and work out on the cold floor?

To give you an idea of my fitness, I’ll describe how I do things. I do 100 hundred press-ups and 200 sit-ups in a day. I like that number because it’s not too big and I can typically get it out of the way in four sets. Two problems are the coldness and the fact that it is really hard to get motivated when you are seeing no immediate results. It’s nice feeling fit and all, but since my body doesn’t gain much of a belly anyway, it’s really hard to have my body go to pot (so to speak).

I know that there will be somebody who suggests joining a gym, but I don’t have the money for the membership fees (which they’d take from my bank account, surely?) and I’d probably never go. Plus they might strain my weakling body too hard and we all know what a disaster that would be.

I do think that I should shape this attitude up, as my plans for being older include living forever and eating my way to an early grave. I’m so glad that those two things contradict because to be honest I’d probably enjoy them both too much for one lifetime. If I could find some way to do them both  it would truly be a perfect world. My ideal scenario would be to eat all I like, and my (obviously very latent) immortality would ensure that I suffer no consequences.

Due to either a fast metabolism or the fact that I don’t eat very much anymore, I find myself consistently staying around the same weight (11 stone) and looking much the same. Whether this is a side-effect of my immortality has yet to be seen, so for now the lack of workouts aren’t affecting me as much as they might if I was older. Far more likely is that my thinness is a result of my height (6 foot summat) evening out what I eat into a thin form.

Overall, I’m not exactly happy with my scrawny man-child body but to be honest I’ve lost the motivation to do anything about it. Maybe in the summer months (in particular, the pointlessly-wander-around-with-your-shirt-off month known as July) that desire will return.

Highway To The Dubious Legality Zone...

For some reason, my blogs are taking a piracy theme this week. I am an advocate of piracy, I admit that. Not the ’sail the seven seas and rape all the cabin boys’ kind of piracy, the digital ‘you wouldn’t steal a handbag’ kind. But I like to call myself a ‘legal pirate’, no matter how much of an oxymoron that is.

I only torrent stuff that I can’t get legally, as I cannot afford it or can’t find it over here. For example, I really wanted to acquire The Man From Earth on dvd, but I went into HMV (willing to pay the extra £10 that they charged in store) and was told that they couldn’t even order it in. As my parents do not like ordering stuff over the internet, I was screwed. Until I discovered the magic of torrenting! And yes, I realise how much I sound like a spokesperson.
“Torrent now and we guarantee your penis will be marginally longer* overnight!”

I am of the honest persuasion and I think that if I can afford the item and obtain it legally, I will get it that way. If not, I’ll try it before I buy it. For example, I bought Scott Adam’s book God’s Debris after reading a free copy the author put up on his website (links to my thoughts on this book will be at the bottom of the blog), after which I went out and bought the sequel. I also have a load of Project Gutenberg eBooks on my computer, which are free to read because the copyright has expired on them. At some point, I will buy the books in a hard copy, because I like having a physical copy and because I don’t like reading them on the laptop that much. I may end up buying a Kindle or something like that.

I also review some of the stuff that I download, like Family Guy Something “” “” Dark Side and the Robot Chicken Star Wars II special. Both of these will be bought on dvd when I see them cheap enough. Both of these I was unsure about before downloading, so it’s nice to see that I wouldn’t have wasted my money.

I am currently torrenting Adobe Photoshop for my laptop, as I will need it for photography work (editing photographs and such) and it is way too expensive to buy as software for someone with my budget. So I believe I am in the right here.

I do think however, that I am one of a small minority where legality is concerned. Not that I have a lack of faith in humanity or anything (I really don’t!) but I believe that most people couldn’t care less about the people they’re pirating from.

Plus, who among you can say that you haven’t downloaded something illegally at some point? I know I certainly can’t. And this is one of the reasons why the adverts mentioned in yesterday’s blog annoy me, because if I had the money, I would order everything I bought legally.

So that’s my feelings on piracy. I like the way certain authors and bands have embraced the new online media now, with one notable example being that Lars Ulrich, one of the members of Metallica, has illegally downloaded his own album! (link at the bottom)

*Or shorter.

Thoughts on God’s Debris: http://scottv2.wordpress.com/2009/12/09/damn-now-i-need-a-new-unblowupable-mind/

Lars Ulrich downloaded his own album by a file sharing service:http://torrentfreak.com/metallica-frontman-pirates-his-own-album-090305/

Project Gutenberg: http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page

"Piracy Is A Crime, But This Message Will Be Lost In The Annoying Advert When It Backfires..."

For many years now, we have been warned of the evils of digital piracy through irritating adverts. “You wouldn’t steal a handbag,” the copyright warnings claim. If I would, I doubt I’d be typing this or watching the fucking adverts in the first place. I’d be in prison being shown what guy-love truly is…

The things that really annoys me about the adverts are that they are on dvds that you have spent your money on. This could be the only dvd you get in about a month or more. And you are subjected to reasons why you shouldn’t pirate and why you should support the industry legally. In other words, exactly what you’re doing! It makes it a little easier to bear if you think of the advert as essentially saying ‘keep up the good work!’. Although that message would be better received if it wasn’t playing horrible music louder than the dvd itself.

The other thing is that they put time and man-hours into meetings and hiring people to make the adverts. These people needed paying, you know. Where’d the money come from? It certainly didn’t come from piracy, I can tell you that much. If I’m right, they’ve got money from previous dvd sales and put it into making adverts to tell people to keep doing exactly what they were doing in the first place! It’s like breaking into somebody else’s house, yelling at them really loudly (“YOU’RE DOING FINE! KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!”) and departing while telling them to keep on living.

And the other types of anti-piracy advert are no less annoying. Take, for example, the one with the guy with a brander. You know the one, “Don’t let the pirates brand you with their mark.” This one is not as bad, as it’s found at the end of certain dvds rather than the beginning, but it still bears talking about.

The advert says ‘piracy funds organised crime’. That is sort of fair enough, except organised crime doesn’t require a lot of money to keep it going. And they don’t do it through selling hooky dvds. It also claims that ‘piracy funds terrorism’. Okay, fair enough. Wait, WHAT?! You are seriously suggesting that piracy funds terrorism? As in, acts of terror frequently taking the form of mass catastrophes and deliberately perpetrated to terrify?! Show me the statistics that say Bin Laden funded 9/11 by selling illegal copies of Shrek! This blatant attempt to play to post 9/11 paranoia disgusts me!

The overall message (other than ‘piracy is bad’, obviously) is “Don’t let the pirates brand you with their mark.” That would be okay after the terrorism claim, but I’m pretty sure it’s trying to associate branding with digital piracy (ahh, you see? Piracy, like those “Yarrrr!” kind of pirates!). And as far as I can tell, pirates never actually made it a point to brand people. And it wouldn’t be seen as a mark of your support of piracy, it would tell the viewer that you got on the bad side of some pirates.

The advert that is the main focus of this blog post: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmZm8vNHBSU&feature=related (incidentally, after the girl cancels the download, she gets her bag and goes somewhere. Where, to get a life? Download rehab?!)

Unfortunately I couldn’t find the ‘branding aids terrorism’ one, so here’s a Futurama parody of the above advert: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWPfcEOr2Yg&feature=PlayList&p=9452EC2C7AC0D34B&index=7

"I'm Going To Be A Roast-Ted Man...Roasted Man!"

As my friends know, I’ve been a fan of William Shatner’s works for a while, so I decided to watch Comedy Central’s Roasting of The Living Legend himself.

For those unfamiliar with a roast (not to be confused with a roast dinner, which by the looks of him, Shatner would prefer), it’s where a roomful of the person’s friends and acquaintances get together and poke fun at him with the intention of showing how good-natured the Roastee is. In this case, Shatner got to say something as well and respond to the jokes.

The host of the roast is Jason Alexander (sounds like a mythological hero), who breaks up the guests with some jokes of his own before introducing the next one.

Such Star Trek actors as George Takei (rhymes with toupee) and Nichelle Nichols appear, along with a whole other bunch of people that English people probably recognise vaguely. The role of these comedians (as most of them were) was seemingly to do nothing but mock the other comedians, with a token acknowledgement of how Shatner influenced them, or how they know him.

Most of the comedians were pretty damn funny, and they certainly got laughs from me. Although with George Takei being there, there was a strange preference for gay jokes, which I found a bit odd. Surely there is tons of stuff that you could say about The Shatman? Another complaint is that a lot of their humour seemed to be aiming for shock value, which is a peeve of mine. Sure, I like rude comedians as much as anyone, but when there’s more gasping than laughing, you know something’s wrong. Only one of the comedians made fun of the fact that he rode in on a bloody horse! I realise there’s a reason for that but still!

My picks of the show are Shatner himself (naturally), Betty White was pretty funny too, but I think my favourite has to be George Takei. You have not lived until you have heard Sulu himself making gay jokes and on top of that he was genuinely funny, which you don’t expect from a serious actor (“Bill Shatner…if my boyfriend could suck that hard, I’d never leave the château.”).

The last five minutes or so is The Shat himself taking the stage to talk about the others and how he felt about being roasted. He was one of the funniest acts on the show, although as any true Trekker (Trekkie?) will know, he got the opening voiceover of Star Trek wrong when he performed it here.

The performers were George Takei, Nichelle Nichols, Farrah Fawcett (there’s a blast from the past!), Andy Dick, Greg Giraldo, Betty White, Patton Oswalt, Lisa Lampanelli, Artie Lange, Kevin Pollak (he does impressions of Shatner, pretty funny), Fred Willard (the newspaper editor from Anchorman) and Jeffrey Ross.

There are some nice nods to Star Trek in the mix, such as the green Orion girls tending bar, or his famous expression during the ‘KHANNN!’ bit as one of the big pictures of Shatner on the wall.

All in all, if you are a casual fan or a devoted fan, you could do a lot worse than seeking out this hour and twenty minutes of laughter. It’s on dvd or you can go the cheapskate route and watch it on the internet.

Did This Movie Take My Breath Away?

I have broken my before-now unmentioned one post per week rule to bring you a review of the manliest homosexual movie of all time. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it’s time for a review of Top Gun (1986). Based around an actually-existing school of pilots, it shows their training processes built around a love story between Maverick and Iceman his woman whose name I forget. Actually, I’m not sure that her first name is ever mentioned.

On paper, this movie had everything that makes a manly movie manly. You have your shots of aircraft taking off, your volleyball scene, a rockin’ soundtrack and several mid-air dogfights. Arguably this movie popularised the aviator style of glasses and allowed men to look cool with those for decades to come. So where did it go wrong?

Well, for starters, I found a recut trailer of Top Gun on the internet that means I will never be able to look at it in the same way again (link will be at the bottom of the blog). And the locker room scenes give off huge sexual undercurrents for the dudes, which supports my ‘the characters are all gay’ theory. Which is not in and of itself a reason not to watch the movie, but I think some guys may be put off.

The main character of the film is Maverick (real name Pete Mitchell), a fighter pilot played by Tom Cruise. He gets his shot at a place at the best-of-the-best-only Top Gun flight school. What follows is a love story that starts when he meets the main woman in a bar and sings ‘You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling’ in what is actually a funny moment. His character is played with a hint of sadness over losing his father in Vietnam in what everyone else views as incompetence. I just viewed this as the mandatory emotional baggage that characters are required to have. Other than that, Maverick just came off as a jackass, rather than the cool and great pilot that the film tried to portray.

The antagonist is played by Val Kilmer, also known as ‘Iceman’. I say antagonist, but as they’re all on the same team there is no real bad guy. Strictly speaking, he’s like the school bully who turns out to be okay when you get to know him. Val Kilmer himself has referred to Iceman as one of two gay characters that he’s played.

One of the ways that this movie is actually good is in the soundtrack department. Highway To The Danger Zone and Top Gun Anthem by Kenny Loggins and Harold Faltermeyer respectively are two of the best things to come from this movie. Anyone who has done this will know that blasting down the road with Highway To The Danger Zone playing is an epic thing to do.

Showing that audiences are easily influenced, many people signed up for the Navy after seeing this movie, despite the death that occurs late in the movie that completely destroys Cruise’s morale (this would be a spoiler but frankly if you haven’t seen it you’re not missing much). One would think that it would put them off, but no…

The reasons that this movie isn’t so good in my eyes are that they tried too hard to create an atmosphere of manliness, what with the rockin’ soundtrack and the guns and all, but then they added the Cruise love story angle, which clashes with the overall feel of the film. Plus the shots of the hot allegedly hot men in flightsuits and sweat glimmering off their bodies seems at odds with the awesome dogfights and suchlike that they added to the movie to appeal to the male audience. It’s a movie that doesn’t know what it is, an awesome guy movie or a female romantic movie. And I feel that is to its detriment and that they should’ve picked one audience to play to really well, rather than become a multi-demographic lacklustre film. If you take it seriously, it just falls flat and doesn’t quite work. But I also feel that if you view it with undertones of a hidden romance between Maverick and Iceman that it becomes hilarious to watch, which redeems it in a small way.

So yes, if you like movies that don’t try for any kind of artistic undertones and just concentrates on cool stuff, then along with Die Hard, Top Gun is a good movie for you. But I would generally recommend not seeing it. Other than some great music and one great scene, you’re not missing much. Give this one a miss, watch a truly great 80’s movie instead (I for one recommend The Terminator).

The homosexuality supporting trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekXxi9IKZSA

How I Blogged Your Mother (and She Loved Every Second)

Boy introduced me to the sitcom ‘How I Met Your Mother’ last night. It is excellent on pretty much every level. Yes, it’s pretty much a F.R.I.E.N.D.S clone, but it doesn’t suffer for it. The action revolves around a group of four friends and their relationships with one another/other people.

The show has a framing device of a man telling his kids of the future how he met their mother, hence the title. At the time of writing, he still hasn’t met her. And it’s been going for five seasons. Seriously.

The protagonist of the show is Ted, a commitment-ready (and how!) over-thinker of relationships. Sounds like me. He has one of those faces where you think you’ve seen him before, but you can’t remember where.

The on-again, off-again, on-yet-again girlfriend of the protagonist is Robin, a local news reporter, who I’ve definitely never seen before. They use a Friends-style ‘will they, won’t they’ plot to tease the viewer into watching it, and if it wasn’t for Wikipedia, the show might still hold some surprises for me on that front.

Moving right along, Ted’s flatmate and best friend (“ONE of his best friends”) is Marshall, a six foot four Mountie of a man. His fiancé is a smaller woman called Lily (more on her later) and one of the ongoing plot lines is their relationship as they go through the upgrades, much like Friends. He is studying to be a lawyer, but is still very much a ‘lad’. He is played by the star of the unfunny comedy (there’s an oxymoron if I ever heard one) ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall’. However, don’t let this fool you. In this, he is very funny.

Barney Stinson is played by Neil Patrick Harris, a former child actor and one of the stars of the recent ‘Dr Horrible’s Sing-a-Long Blog’ and is on top form here. He plays a womanizer whose antics are legen-(wait for it)-dary! One of my favourite moments will be linked to at the bottom of this blog. It’s one of my favourite character moments and one of my favourites of all the shows I’ve seen so far. He tries to be the embodiment of awesomeness and living your life to the fullest, and I say that he succeeds.

Lily is Marshall’s partner, and is an embodiment of the things that some women want, such as to seem grown-up and sophisticated, as well as keeping the romance alive within a relationship. Which is no bad thing, as it helps contribute to the ongoing story lines of the show and how they evolve as a couple and separate people.

All in all, this is a great show to watch. There will be many laughs spread right across the episode, much like The Big Bang Theory. It sometimes includes references to its framing device within the show, such as some of the times that the father of the device (Ted) wasn’t there to see the event, and so the events changed in the telling. This show boasts an impressive guest cast list (which will also be linked at the bottom of the blog) and is genuinely funny. It may not be to everybody’s tastes, but at only twenty minutes per episode, it’s well worth checking out and seeing if you like it.

The context of this clip: Ted and Barney are going to a Halloween party. You won’t guess how they show Barney’s costume… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20YNcMmwdPg&NR=1

And here’s the guest cast list, just scroll down a little bit and you will notice Britney Spears was in two episodes, people!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460649/fullcredits#cast

Scott Dislikes This...

A large bulk of my internet-faring day is spent on Facebook, sifting through the hordes of fanpages and groups that should be named in my honour that exist on this social networking website and that I am exposed to through the ‘Live Feed’ feature. On the surface, it sounds pointless, but knowing what fanpages and groups your friends have joined is addictive in a weird way. Knowing what your friends are up to and being able to comment and like statuses (stati?) is quite entertaining, when they have something of value to say. When the statuses are typed by drunkards or idiots, then it’s not so entertaining.

It is very annoying to see the constant groups that pop up (I saw a couple for ‘I was on Facebook on a snow day!’) that are absolutely pointless. I also dislike (something you can’t do on Facebook itself) all those groups that say “1 Million against Facebook becoming a paysite!” First of all, anyone who thinks that the heads of an international social networking site with many millions of users will listen to what said users think is mental. The next part is, why would it become a paysite? They make many millions from advertising anyway, and most of the groups have their own agenda, like spamming the users or doing a bit of advertising of their own.

Same goes for all the ‘Facebook finally has a Dislike button, add it now!’ groups. If they had a button added, why on Earth would you need to join a group to add it? You wouldn’t get a choice in the matter, much like when the ‘like’ button came into use. This groups ask you to invite all your friends (by which they mean spam them) and you’ll get some sort of magical button that totally doesn’t spam you or anything, yeah?

Plus, when Facebook changes their site layout and adds new features, the same users, who were crying out for some changes and calling it shit (basically complaining like old biddies), start moaning that they want the old Facebook back. They must feel like they can never please people.

Facebook has also gotten on the instant message bandwagon with their chat program. Naturally, people can’t be happy about this (considering that our parents had nowhere near this level of technology, that’s somewhat baffling), instead just concentrating on the slowness. Which, to be fair, is true, but that doesn’t excuse that people are taking such things for granted today, and that they don’t consider the past anymore.

All in all, Facebook is a pretty useful social utility, and one that is immensely unhelpful if you’re trying to work, since you get distracted by procrastinating. I enjoy using it, it’s just that the fact that it bares the open stupidity of people that never ceases to amaze me.

But according to the Daily Mail, Facebook is giving me cancer anyway, so it doesn’t matter. Would’ve thought that it was because I’m resting my laptop on my groin, but there we are.

Linkage: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1149207/How-using-Facebook-raise-risk-cancer.html

"Leave It Freddie...It's PeckhamTown..."

The nonsensically-named Rock & Chips is the latest Only Fools & Horses spin-off show, a (presumably) one-off special that serves as a prequel to the regular series, which started in 1981 and ended with a Christmas special back in 2003.

What really baffles me about this is that there is no point to doing this prequel. Everything of interest here was already covered in the original series’ run and any dramatic elements and tension are completely pointless, as the result is a foregone conclusion. There are no new revelations here, and nothing much of interest is learned, except maybe for die hard Only Fools fans.

Nicholas Lyndhurst takes one of the leading roles in this ninety-minute episode as the local ex-con and challenger for fair lady’s heart. He has some shining moments, such as proving near the end that he’s not just a typecast plonker and that he can act. Points go to the wardrobe department for supplying him with a really non-obvious toupee (that, or he has a visible seam in his hair naturally) [/sarcasm].

Said fair lady is Joan Trotter and the obvious focus of this episode. She also pulls off some good acting as the really-quite-dense woman who somehow captures Freddie Robdal’s (Lyndhurst) heart. There are some cracking moments where you see just how stupid she really is, like taking hours to get a joke, or mispronouncing ‘c’est la vie’.

Speaking of cracking moments, the comedy moments in this episode were there but you get the feeling that they were unfulfilled and that they couldn’t be expanded on to their full potential. One particular moment that stood out for me was when Joan and her friend were in the pregnancy clinic (that is NOT a spoiler, foregone conclusion and if you didn’t see the fact that she gets pregnant coming, you probably weren’t going to watch it anyway). To take the test, a man announces your name and you go into a cubicle to do your thang. She gives her name to the clinic as ‘Gloria Ming’ with the justification that ‘no-one’s gonna be called Smith, are they?’. Cue “SMITH…(many heads look up)” They could’ve cut it there or gone to a reaction shot and shifted between scenes, but they didn’t. Instead, three repetitions of the same joke are used, and then some humour based around the fact that ‘Ming’ bears a resemblance to ‘Minge’.

When you hear the concept, and the fact that That Bloke Who Plays Jay From The Inbetweeners Is Filling The Role Of Del-Boy, you assume it is going to be some sort of teen humour based comedy around Del’s antics in the 60’s. Instead, it’s a Drama-Comedy (emphasis on the drama). As a result, so much feels like missed opportunities. Having said that, when you laugh, you laugh…hard. Another scene that stood out for me was when Robdal and Trotter have shacked up together (again, NOT A SPOILER) and he makes a death-related joke that goes over her (and initially my) head. When she starts to catch on, so do I, and the expression on both their faces only serves to increase the laughs.

This bizarrely unpublicised prequel is not a bad thing to watch, just don’t go in expecting a bundle of laughs per minute, and you won’t be disappointed when you get a decent-quality drama. This could’ve been a great show, it just needed some slightly better writing and direction.

Eventually Wolverine Will Get Cybernetic Components And Become A Terminator. Fear This!

I had a busy morning (by my standards), so I took a leaf out of my dad’s book. This involved coming home and relaxing by putting on a movie or two. I picked X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

Much like Die Hard, this is a movie that mainly concentrates on the action with a story façade. The story itself was surprisingly predictable once all the pieces fell into place, and as it’s a prequel you knew what was going to happen anyway.

As an action film, this does not disappoint in the slightest, although an incredible suspension of disbelief is required to make sure that you enjoy it to its full potential. There was clever directing here, especially in the opening montage of James Logan’s early life, from the 1840s to a time about 6 years after the Vietnam War, which is when the rest of the film takes place. It made clever transitions from scene-to-scene here, which is always refreshing to see in a film that should be just concentrating on absorbing you in the action. There are many explosions here, which should satisfy any fire-lovers who watch it.

Something that confuses me is the amount of shirtless men in action films, which are after all marketed at men who like that sort of thing. This one was particularly notable, as it had a known ‘hunk’ in the leading role. He did workouts and weight training for all those shots where he is shirtless in some capacity and it shows. This film, aside from being a good action film, can also be regarded as a vehicle for Jackman’s man tits. There is one scene in particular, where in what I can only assume is an unintentional Superman shout-out (which would be weird, as they’re different comic companies entirely), an old couple who don’t give their names (Ma and Pa Kent?) find a naked Hugh Jackman in their barn, which I’m sure the woman would’ve appreciated if she was younger. They immediately start outfitting him with their son’s old clothes, which just so happen to fit/make him look cool.

Turns out the entire purpose of that scene was so the bad guys could blow up the barn and kill the old couple with a fiery deathball from which there could be no escape. Oh, except for Wolverine, of course. To be precise, he escapes through the side of the barn on a motorbike. Then he somehow takes down a helicopter with his bare claws. He then proceeds to crash this helicopter, and blow it up, which involves him making use of an old cliché and staple of action films; namely a straight-up, honest-to-God walk towards the camera in slow motion while something blows up behind him.

My overall verdict is that if you go into this expecting a masterpiece of filmmaking, you won’t be happy, but if you just go in expecting an action film and not too much story, then you will love this movie. This film promises action and boy, does it deliver.

This should have played over the end credits, shame it didn’t :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqz5dbs5zmo

Tonight Kids, We Bring You A Very Special Episode...

In one of the most ‘loved’ traditions of television, the time has come where the laughter (what laughter there was) stops, while I talk about a subject that is understandably close to my heart.

When I was little, I was put on the special needs register at my school, I never quite understood why. Now I know, through talking to my parents about it, that I am on the Autistic Spectrum, and that I have ‘Higher Functioning Asperger’s Syndrome’. In a nutshell, it means that I am technically disabled. Why do you say technically, Scott, you incredibly clever and handsome man? I say it because several people have expressed surprise that I am autistic.

It is not obvious from looking at me, like some other disabilities that I have seen over the course of my relatively short life span, but the autism is there. It is mostly internal, with very little effect on my body. There are quite a few mental effects, but thanks to the way I am around other people, these mostly go unnoticed. For instance, my heartbeat gets quicker whenever something out of the norm happens during my day, like getting a phone call (even one that I’m expecting) or going somewhere other than college or staying home. I occasionally get panic attacks, which I thought I’d got over in secondary school but apparently not, as I found out a while back.

I spend a large amount of time being undermined by my own insecurities, or staying awake either imagining or replaying bad moments of my life. I spend a lot of time thinking that I’m a horrible boyfriend because I can’t remember anything that anyone tells me, but it’s my tolerant girlfriend (who I’m very lucky to have) who notices this most of all. This is part of why I can’t get to sleep very often and why I am even now lying awake typing this while talking to a friend about this subject.

I crave social contact above nearly all else, but the asperger’s makes it hard to establish friendships and relationships. Even then, I’m quite withdrawn from the few friends that I make. Fortunately, college seems to be going quite well in this regard, in that I’ve found a core group of friends whose company makes me never want to leave.

This was actually one of the reasons why I left my secondary school early, as I was both being bullied and being unsupported by the staff, who took me off the special needs statement much to the outrage of my mother.

I continually feel ashamed of pretty much everything that I have done over the course of my life, and there are rare times where I wish I could just die. Not turning towards suicide (because rather contradicting what I just said, I have a fear of death), you understand, but the thought is sometimes there.

It’s not all doom and gloom, of course. What my brain has lacked (and I believe, started to build) in the social department, it more than made up for by giving me the capacity to enjoy reading and a good memory for facts, figures and knowledge. It has also given me a distinct personality that sets me apart from other people (although never superior to others, I’d never be that much of a wanker to consider myself better) and I’ve developed more of a humorous personality and jocular nature.

In a way, I’m fortunate to have been given a perspective into the lives of disabled people that others don’t often see, due to spending a year or two on a college course with them.

Plus, I’m a budding writer with a girlfriend and quite a lot of friends. Life is not that bad. Whether this is the kind of person I would’ve become without autism will probably never be known (unless we get some kind of Star Trek mirror universe stuff going on), but I’ll live with this version of myself.

"He Took The Daytime Train Goin' Anywhere..."

After reading one of Bill Bryson’s amusing travel books (Notes From A Small Island) and taking several trips to London for days out with friends, my desire for travel and enjoyment of such has been reawakened. Part of this is that my grandfather used to take me on trips down to the beach when I was an infant. I enjoyed the mystery that he layered the trip with, not knowing where we were going (incidentally, we once went to a place called Broadstairs, I really have to go down there again to see if I can jog any memories), merely inviting my curiosity by answering my questions with ‘you’ll see when we get there’. Thanks to modern events, the idea of an old guy taking two infants out to a beach town probably sounds a bit dodgy, but it was a better time without any of this modern worry.

Listen to me, I sound like an old man, reminiscing on a long-gone relative. The fact is, I’m probably not much older or younger than a teenager reading this blog and my granddad is still with us. I remember going to the London Eye with him once, so it was a joy to be able to share a similar experience with my girlfriend recently, when we went on the Hype Park Giant Wheel Thing together.

I have devised a plan to get a daily travel card and go round London for the day, stopping at whatever stations I feel like (although there will be a few preplanned ones). I want to capture the old feeling of making a day of it, rather than the commute from home to college that I normally take. This reminds me, I go to college in Windsor, a historically interesting and beautiful place. And yet I don’t spend nearly enough time exploring and taking a stroll around, which I aim to fix soon. I plan to make this trip alone, mainly because I’m worried that as I have no fixed destination in mind and no real idea where I’m going once I get there, that the other person or people wouldn’t enjoy it very much and that I would just bore them.

The little trips that my granddad took me on gave me a lifelong love for travelling on trains that I still have to this day and will probably continue to have for as long as I live. We don’t see him so much anymore, but the love of travel is an enduring little legacy that he left on my young mind.

I said in the introductory paragraph that I took several trips to London with friends. All of these helped me feel happy, journeying into London for the first time in a while and recapturing how I enjoyed similar trips when I was nothing but a child, so for that I thank them. Particular shout-outs go to my girlfriend Annie and my friend Sam, because one of the best ways to see a new place or revisit an old one is with loved ones around you.

There Can Be Only One Good Highlander Film...

For the purposes of this review, we shall be ignoring the rest of the franchise and concentrating solely on the original and best film. When I re-watched it this movie, I tried to approach it as a newcomer would and I think that I mostly succeeded.

The 1986 movie Highlander is a movie of love, immortality, violence and an awesome soundtrack. The main concept of this film is that there are immortal humans living out their lives, fighting among themselves, all the while going unnoticed by ordinary mortals. These immortals can only be killed by decapitation, so they battle it out with swords to reach the foretold time of ‘The Gathering’ where an unknown Prize will be awarded to the last immortal left alive, giving the film the tagline ‘There can be only one’.

The film introduces the protagonist, an immortal called Connor MacLeod. With the help of his mentor, Ramirez (played by Sean Connery), he must defeat the strongest of all immortals (the Kurgan) in 1985. It all comes to an exciting climax with explosive special effects and stunts.

The director created some of the best scene transitions I’ve seen in a long time, with such examples as a fish tank changing to a lake in Scotland, or going through the roof of an underground car park to 16th Century Scotland.

The sword fights (which are, let’s be honest, the main attraction of this film) are well fought and executed. In the same vein, the special effects aren’t too convincing (you can see the harness on MacLeod at the end of the film) but they have a certain charm to them and they are still pretty epic.

The Kurgan makes a great villain; you can tell that Clancy Brown (also the voice of Mr. Crabs in Spongebob Squarepants) enjoyed his role as the 3000 year old savage warrior, who rapes MacLeod’s wife (off-screen) and goes on one of the best joyrides ever seen to Queen’s rendition of ‘New York, New York’.

The rest of the casting is relatively well done. Sean Connery makes a good cultured mentor for the main protagonist (and laughably claims that he is an Egyptian while speaking with a Scottish accent). Christopher Lambert (Macleod) does a pretty good Scottish accent in the flashback scenes and makes a good complex and mysterious hero.

The music in this film is bloody excellent, with both an orchestra and Queen making appearances on the soundtrack of the movie. The orchestral pieces suit the atmosphere of the movie really well, especially in scenes of Connor’s early life. It is almost universally agreed that whatever you can say about Highlander in general, the first one had the best music by far. Queen provides some suitably awesome music for the film, which can be found in an album called ‘It’s A Kind Of Magic’. For example, ‘Who Wants To Live Forever’ is possibly one of the most depressing songs about immortality ever made.

The word on the street (of Wikipedia) is that they are planning to remake this film to be released at some point this year, with Vinnie Jones rumoured to be in the hot seat for The Kurgan this time around. Hands up who thinks that sounds awful?

Super Mario All-Stars. Sounds Like A Baseball Team, Plays Like A Good Game.

I submitted this piece to the Geeks.co.uk website (which I located from Simon Reed's blog), and it was accepted there. I present it here too for the link-averse reader:

I think that the time is right for a re-release of the Super Nintendo classic compilation package ‘Super Mario All-Stars’.

Released in 1993 over here, it combined the original Super Mario Bros, Super Mario Bros 2, 3 and The Lost Levels into one handy package with remade graphics and a save facility. A later version also released in 1993 included Super Mario World as part of the package. It served as the basis for the Super Mario Advance remakes, so this makes me think that it’s time it receives a DS or Wii release (as the DS is roughly up to Nintendo 64 specification standards).

Hardly any mainstream shops sell Game Boy Advance or older games any more, so it would be a good way to make money from their existing games while embracing their new systems.

They could claim that the games are a bargain compared to buying them all individually, and that you could have them all on one handy disk/cartridge. I know that Nintendo has released all of the games on the Virtual Console, but they don’t have a save facility and the priginal Super Mario Bros. is allegedly a poor conversion to the Virtual Console format (according to NGamer magazine). I would buy it myself to test this out, but I’m not spending the few Wii points that I have on a game that is apparently a poor conversion.

I bought Lost Levels last year as both part of the compilation and the Virtual Console version. The Lost Levels version is far superior, as it lets you save your progress if you die (the Wii version lets you do this too, but only if you go to the Wii Menu when you die) and the graphics are very well done, keeping more to the standard of SMW than SMB. The infamous difficulty level of The Lost Levels would no doubt be something very much appreciated by the crowd that believes that the Wii or DS are just for casual gamers.

Would I buy this hypothetical re-release? Well, here’s the situation as I see it: it’s convenient being able to access any of the Mario games that I want, but it is inconvenient to set up the SNES. Therefore, a Wii or DS version would be much appreciated. These games (with the possible exception of Super Mario Bros. 2) are all tried and tested classics and I’m sure many gamers, new and old, would appreciate another chance to play them all at their best in one handy package.

It's Not Christmas Anymore. So Why Does It Look Like It Is?

I look outside at the white blanket of snow covering my fair town of Slough, and I wonder why the hell we are so attracted to it? Here we are, in the beginning of January, seeing landscapes that look like they belong in a Christmas card. I half expect to hear a robin tweeting away irritatingly in the background and to see a big banner that says ‘Merry Christmas!’ Actually, that does sound plausible. Only we call it ‘forgetting to take down the decorations’.

We have a transport system that is woefully underequipped to deal with snow on the tracks. Over in Japan, if a bridge collapses they will get people working around the clock to restore it to full working order. So why can’t they do that with snow? I can appreciate how a bus would have trouble with this, but the roads seem to be relatively ice-free when I go outside in the morning. But surely it can’t be that hard to attach a plow* to the front of a train for such situations. It would make the journey safer and cause less delays. **

That’s another thing I hate about snow days; when you have them you generally get the day off from school or work due to poor weather conditions. So that’s great, you think, I’m free to do whatever I want! Except the trains and buses will be affected, so any travel needed will likely be about ten times harder than it needs to be, and the roads are quite unsafe due to the ice that has built up on them.

Don’t get me started on the ice that inevitably follows a snowfall. As an adept former ice-skater myself, it was quite a surprise to end up flat on my arse, watching the luggage case I was carrying slowly glide away across the ice. It’s happened a few times before, but I don’t expect it to happen when I’m walking home, for the love of God! I hate the fact that the pavements don’t get cleaned as well as the roads do, so that it takes twice as long to walk anywhere than normal.

Another somewhat obvious thing that comes with this is the affected areas being damn cold to walk through. Even our houses aren’t safe from the scourge of coldness. I suppose in a way in a way it echoes the spirit of Christmas, a family lovingly huddled around a fire together to escape the cold. Did I mention this is January? The time for such festivity has been and gone.

The snowfall, when it comes properly, looks beautiful, pristine and gloriously untouched. Until everybody and their mothers go out and trample all over it and spoil the perfect ground. It gives us an insight into human nature, if we cannot see a nice piece of scenery without wanting to leave our mark on it and reduce it to a mere shadow of its previous beauty.

I don’t have anything against snow, per se; I think it looks beautiful and picturesque. What I really have a problem with is the fact that there is never snow when you want it, and when you do want it you don’t get it. If this is global warming in action, surely it could pick a better time?

* Call Mr. Plow, that’s my name, that name again is Mr. Plow!

** Or end horribly. I’m not sure which…