You Sons of Bitches...

Normally I wouldn't post at this time of the week, but I must get this out....

I'm quite the fan of the Die Hard films. So, naturally, when I heard of plans for Die Hard 4.0, I was pleased. But of course, Sean has no reason to be pleased now does he? They just announced that Die Hard 4.o will be directed by none other than Len Wiseman. Well that's just fuckin' peachy. Hand a franchise I love over to the jackass who directed both Underworld films. Directed AND wrote may I add. I'm not a fan of the Underworld movies, mainly because they suck.

You see that's the bad thing about shitty movies. Not only do they spawn shitty sequels that clog up the rental racks, but the movie studios see these successful shitty movies and mistakenly think that the movies aren't shitty and hire these hack writers and directors to "better" existing goodness. let me list some other examples of hacks being given projects they don't deserve:

Eli Roth, the "genius" behind Cabin Fever and Hostel has been hired to direct The Cell, a movie based on Stephen King's latest book. By the way, Cabin Fever was one of the dumbest movies I've ever seen.

Jonathan Lemkin, who wrote Lethal Weapon 4, was hired to write a script for Superman Returns before the current movie's idea was accepted. His idea was to have Superman impregnate Lois Lane right before he dies. Lois then gives birth, dying during childbirth, resulting in a fully-grown new Superman that takes over where his father left off to save the Earth. I'm not kidding. I can't make this shit up people.

Along the lines of Superman, McG, hot off the success of Charlie's Angels was also supposed to direct Superman Returns but dropped out for personal reasons and to direct Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle.

Aliens Vs. Predator did so well at the box office that Fox seems to be moving ahead with AVP2. The early script, has the story taking place in present day in a small Texas town infiltrated by "Predaliens." The Predalien Hive is rumored to be a Super K-Mart. Once again, I shit you not. This is the horrible truth. In fact, take a gander at the possible movie tagline: "For the first time ever, an ALIEN FOOTPRINT forms on American soil.” If it wasn't the continuing death of another franchse I loved, I'd laugh.

Of course, I could be wrong on the whole Die Hard / Wiseman thing. Disney hired the guy who directed The Mexican and The Ring to direct Pirates of the Caribbean and that turned out great. He also directed The Weather Man, a truly entertaining film. I gues I'll just have to wait and see.

So my job is boring.

At least it pays more than yours.

So I said in the last post that if I had time, I'd quickly review a made-for-tv movie I saw last week. Well here goes.

Last Wednesday, ABC premiered their film version of Stephen King's book Desperation. Normally, ABC is prone to create mini-series' out of King's work, mainly because most of King's books are frickin' huge. Desperation was only a one-shot however, which was fine by me because I think a mini-series would have been way too drawn out.

Most of these ABC King films are pretty weak production-wise. Sure, they do what they can, but one can always tell that it's just a made-for-tv movie with a tiny budget. Sometimes the special effects blow, as with the Langoliers, but more often than not, the acting sucks too, also as evidenced by the Langoliers. Desperation didn't really showcase any special effects so that was fine. As for the acting, it wasn't too terribly bad with Tom Skerritt and Ron Perlman as the main actors. Ron Perlman being especially good as the psycho sherriff. The woman who played the distraught mother of the boy was pretty damn bad though. And the boy? Oh what a craptastic child actor. ABC NEVER casts good child actors for the King films. Once again, refer to the Langoliers and that girl they picked to play the blind girl.

The boy's character also pissed me the hell off. Basically, God is showing his "will" through the boy in response to the evil entity which has taken over the town of Desperation. I'm sure this worked well in the book, but I got sick and tired of hearing this little bastard say "It's God's Will" every 5 goddamn minutes. I was hoping that It would be "God's Will" for the kid to fall down one of the town's mine shafts and die. Too bad that never happened.

Honestly though, this movie ends up being semi-enjoyable due to Ron Perlman and King's original writings. Perlman's character name is Collie Entragian and honestly, isn't that just a cool ass name? King has always been good at characterization and it shines with this character. Also, being one of the many who has read the epic which is the Dark Tower series, I picked up a few references to that which I'm glad they kept in the movie. King is notorius for somehow tying his Dark Tower series in almost every book he's written.

Although this film was somewhat interesting, I don't think I'd watch it again. If you have a few hours to kill, then by all means watch it, but don't be surprised when the child actor drives you insane with his constant God-speak.

All right, I'm done.

Go then, there are other worlds than these.

The X-Men Cometh

There may be minor spoilers in this, or major ones. I'm not sure because I haven't written the review yet. And really, it's less of a review than a rant on the idiocy of idiotic idiots.

So critics and X-Men fans alike have been bashing M-Men III. Does it deserve such harsh criticism?

Fuck no.

How about all of you anal-retentive, fat, donut-sucking, parent's basement living nerds shut the hell up already.

Sure, I think that X2 was better. Sure, I think X3 was too short. However, the criticisms these people are throwing out are absurd. Ratner is getting a lot of flack for his different directing style. Guess what? I really couldn't tell that it had a different director. People say that this movie focuses more on acton tha n character development. Yes, that would be bad if this had been the 1st film in the series, but this is the third film. We've already had 2 films that have set-up the major players. We already know their personalities, motivations, and character traits. We finally get to see the payoff of the X-Men in action, and in a lot of action at that. It's nice and refreshing, like Sprite.

Let's see, what else are these people bitching about? Oh yes, they think there are too many characters added. Really, only a few major characters are added and some of them have only minimal parts. Ratner didn't try to focus on every character which would have been a shitty thing to do.

These people also bitched that too many characters died. Have you mooks ever read the comics? You people bitch and bich that Ratner doesn't follow the comic, yet when people die, like in the comic, YOU STILL BITCH!

You people are complaining that certain characters have powers that they don't have in the comics. Would you rather have had Ratner add 10 more characters? Personally, I don't give a shit if Callisto has a few more powers than she does in the comic. What does it matter?? It doesn't affect the plot, and she's a minor character anyway. Sure, if Ratner had Cyclops shooting acid out of his tits I'd have a problem with it, but not Callisto.

The look of the characters is another rant. Juggernaut doesn't look like he does in the comics eh? I thought it was pretty much established in the first film that these characters have a drastically different look than in the comic. These characters are actually costumed to not look like freakin' idiots. Yeah, Juggernaut running around in a red suit of armor with his whole face concealed isn't going to work on film. Film is a different form of media than comic books so things have to be changed. If the costumes were comic accurate, we'd end up with an X-Men movie that looks like that Marvel Superheroes MasterCard ad that aired a year or two ago. Yeah, that looks real professional.

Ypu people are allowed to have as many complaints as you want, as long as the complaintes make sense. Yes, I have complaits about the film, but they're complaints that are legitimate, like the length of the film. If you haven't seen the film, go see it. If you have seen it already, then thank you for your patronige, and drink Sprite.

Alrighty, on to the DVD reviews for this coming Tuesday:

• Alf: Season Three - Yeah......I don't think I'll be spending my cash on this.
• Date Movie - I'd actually take a date to this film if I wanted to give her the impression that I hated her and had horrible taste.
  
• The Dukes of Hazard: The Complete Sixth Season - Hell No.
• Joey: The Complete First Season - I Hate NBC for this reason.
  
• The Kids in the Hall: Complete Season 4: Now this is some quality DVD material right here.
• Riddick Trilogy - Like anyone bought the Chronicles of Riddick when it first came out? Oh yeah, Samantha did. That bitch. Now, we're supposed to want to buy it along with Pitch Black and the animated Riddick movie? Fuct that. I'll stick with Pitch Black and the XBox game that kicks ass.
• Will & Grace: Series Finale - JUST DIE ALREADY!!! STOP MAKING THESE DVDS!!!

That it for DVDs this week. Pretty shitty I dare say. Honestly the DVD releases kinda blow until June 20th.

If I'm bored on Monday, i'll review a made for TV movie I saw last week, if not, I'll post here a week from now and you'll like it that way.

Perform your Civic Duties

I'm not talking about voting, or military service, or even jury duty. I'm talking about going to see X-Men 3 this coming Friday. It's been widely stated that this will be the last regular X-Men movie made. That is, unless it makes an assload of money at the box office, in which case, the money-grubbing whores at Fox will continue the series. Sure, they haven't confirmed or denied this, but let's face it, they like their money, and continuing a proven series is better than taking a chance on the next shitty idea some hack comes up with.

So go see it and bask in its mutanty goodness.

On to entertainment news: The CW network has apparently passed on the series Mercy Reef. Mercy Reef, if you didn't know, was the Smallville-ized version of Aquaman. Smallville fans are all pissing and moaning because this series wasn't picked up and from a leaked trailer, it appears as if this show would have been good. But it isn't good, and we all know it. Sure, Smallville has a large fan base, but personally, I think it's a rather shittty show. Mercy Reef wouldn't have been any better. Let's put it into perspective. The CW network is a merger between the WB and UPN networks, both of which pretty much sucked except for a few kick-ass cartoons on the WB. I can't even begin to list the shitty shows that were aired and were ultimately cancelled on these two networks. Even the shows that lasted are crap. 7th Heaven my ass, more like 7th Level of Hell. The WB picked up the show Reba, yet the CW passed on Mercy Reef. That has to tell you that Mercy Reef is worse than Reba. How that's possible, I'm not sure. No one can say that the CW admin passed on it simply because it's a "comic book" property. In fact, since comic book properties are in demand right now, you think that would have pushed them to put it on the primetime lineup. I mean, the WB aired Birds of Prey. Fucking Birds of Prey.

Stupid MotherFucker of the Week
Only the winner of this award would scream obscenities at a copy machine because it doesn't do exactly what he wants it to do. Only the Stupidest MoFo would perform this display of childish testosterone in a library. People come to a library to study? Balderdash! Why, it's not your fault the copier is spitting out 100 copies, I mean it's not like, in your ignorance, you actually told it to make 100 copies. So really, it's only fair that you have the right to yell at the copier in a quiet library. It's only right that you start slamming the copier around in a vain attempt to cease its mindless copying. You could have just gone quietly to the library staff and informed them of the problem, which could have been quickly and easily resolved, but you're too efficient to bother with that nonsense. Now, everyone who was in the library at that time knows that the copier is a fucking piece of shit, in fact, people who were out in the hall at the time probably know it too.

Well, I have some advice for you as well as the award. Grow the fuck up. You're a researcher in a medical institution so instead of acting reasonably, you throw a tantrum like a fucking 4 year old. I don't give a rat's ass how shitty your day was up until that point, because no excuse is good enough to allow your behavior. And as for the severe beating you gave the copier: It isn't your wife so knocking it around isn't going to make it cook you dinner faster or stop copying at your command. I'm sure your boss would love to get the repair bill had you actually broke the copier. You not only win the award this week, but you win my contempt. Congratulations.

DVD Releases
Like the bolded section header eh? I'm getting pretty good at this "typing" thing. This is also the Special Your Mom Edition of DVD Releases. See if you can spot the cleverly concealed mom jokes.

• The 4400: The Complete Second Season - I'd watch this, unfortunately I never saw the 1st season. If I'm correct, it's a documentary about your mom and how many people she's had sex with.
• BloodRayne (Unrated Director's Cut) - Another Uwe Boll classic! If I were given the chance to punch one Hollywood director in the face, this would be the guy I'd hit. Video game movies are bad enough without you making them even worse. Just stop. Please, just stop.
• The Boondock Saints (Unrated Special Edition) - This film has a pretty big cult following. I almost feel ashamed that I haven't seen it yet. It, like your mom, is on my to-watch list.
• Boston Legal: Season One - I've given my positive review of this show before and it's definately worth a rental if you have the time.
• Cheaper by the Dozen 2 - Like the 1st film needed a sequel. Don't bother ever seeing this film. I'll be generous and let you make the mom joke for this title since it has so many possibilities. Post the joke in the comments section please.
• Deadwood: The Complete Second Season - Once again, a show that has been praised that I've yet to see. I can't make a mom joke about Deadwood, but I can sure make a joke about you.
• Hollow Man 2 - What? More than 6 people liked the 1st one? Obviously, this is a direct-to-video title. Oh sweet, it stars Christian Slater! If that isn't a reason to see this film, I don't know what is.
• Kingdom of Heaven: 4-Disc Director's Cut - Four fuckin' discs for this film? That's a bit of an overkill if you ask me.
• Samurai Jack: Season 3 - Once again, a show I haven't seen. I feel so alone.
• TransAmerica - Wow, a film about a pre-operative male-to-female transsexual. Gee, I wonder how this film relates to your mother.
• Will & Grace: Series Finale - This show is finally over! Sure, it will always torment me through reruns, but there will never be another new episode of this piece-of-shit show ever again!
• WWE: Wrestlemania 22 - Your mom was originally scheduled to perform is this annual tradition, but unfortunately, she could couldn't get her weight down enough to qualify for the Heavyweight class.

That's it for now. Feel free to advertise both my blog and any of my sexual accomplishments on any bathroom stall you see fit. There should be space on the stall wall right next to your mom's phone number.

The return of your savior

Not Jesus Christ, but me. We all know Jesus Christ isn't real you silly fools! I have returned from my vacation and let me say, it sucks to be back.

This post may be a bit long for some of you with a short attention span. I will get to both the DVD reviews and a review of MI3 if you stick with me.

So, after going on my vacation and having to come back to Denver, I've realized how great Denver really is. Sure, it has its issues, but it's certainly no Nebraska. I do miss aspects of Nebraska, such as the friends I've left behind in the squallor, but it's really nice not being a hick anymore. And believe me, even with my education and upbringing, I was still partially a hick. Living in Denver, I don't hear the redneck analogies that I used to hear all of the time in Nebraska. Here's a list of analogies I've heard while in Nebraska:

"Cute as a sack full of puppies."
"It's been hotter'n a goat's ass in a pepper patch."
"She's uglier than homemade soap."
"I'm on it like a pack of dogs on a three-legged cat."
And one of my personal favorites: "He's moving faster'n a striped-ass ape with his balls on fire!"

As for that last one...COME ON! Now you're just making shit up! The rest kind of make sense, but really, the last one? First of all, what is a striped-ass ape and does it really move all that fast in the first place? Secondly, with its balls on fire, would this ape move fast or would it just stand there screaming while pounding his gonads with his fists in a vain attempt to put out the fire? I'll give credit where credit is due for the creative redneck analogies, but they have to at least make sense. Even though I've lost a lot of my hick-heritage, I can at least create some good analogies. Take this one for instance: "It's slicker'n a greased up pig in a wicker basket." You see, that's what makes a redneck analogy good, the repitition of fact. I could have just said that it's slicker than a greased up pig, and you would have gotten the idea that it's pretty damn slick, but I took the extra step and added the wicker basket part. Does it make a lot of sense? Well of course not, but no one hearing that statement would ever think that a greased up pig in a wicker basket wouldn't be slick.

Let's move on to someone who isn't very slick, for it's time for:
Stupid MotherFucker of the Week
This award goes to a woman who was in line in front of me at a Target in Kansas. She put her debit/credit card into the little keypad thing. This is how the transaction went down:

Checker: "If you don't want to run it as a debit card, tap Cancel, then tap Credit."
Stupid Bitch: "So I tap Credit now? Oh, so you'll just send me a bill for this?"
Checker: *Stunned silence*

It's a fucking bank card you ignorant slut. Sure, it's Kansas, but Kansas has had electricity and bank cards for at least 3 years now. Learn the basics you freakin' moron! This is why I'm glad I don't work retail anymore.

So yes it's movie review time. I saw Mission Impossible 3 the other night, or as the young hipsters call it: MI3. So, the question is: Is this film any good?

Well, the general feeling on the first two MI movies is that the first, while good, was a bit slow and confusing, while the second one was a piece of crap filled with unexplainably unperformable action scenes. MI3 is definately the best in the series, but like I said, that isn't saying much comparing it to its predacessors so we'll judge it on its own merits.

First of all, the director J.J. Abrams knows how to set up the tension and develop characters. He, unlike John Woo, doesn't need to fill the entire movie with explosions to entertain the audience. The television show Lost, which Abrams created and produces, isn't filled with a lot of gunshots or explosions, but when they do appear, they mean more because we truly care abut the characters and what happens to them due to good development. Abrams really can't develop Cruise's character very much, but he sets up the supporting characters as much as possible without slowing the film down.

As for the tension, Abrams starts it from the very beginning. The opening scene isn't an action packed intro to Ethan Hunt's character like we've seen before, instead it's a tense scene that lets you know how fucked Ethan Hunt is going to be as the film progresses.

The acting is pretty good. I still think Tom Cruise tries to be Tom Cruise a bit too much. I can't explain it any other way than that. It's not an unbelievable performance, but it could be better. As for Hoffman's performance as the main villian Owen Davian, Sweet Christman that Hoffman guy is good. He transforms what could be a third-rate villian into the guy that would beat you to death with a burlap sack full of puppies just by his protrayal of the character. A side note of trivia about the villian: Originally Kenneth Branagh was to be the villian but had to drop out due to other commitments. THANK FUCKING GOD. Hoffman makes the movie better with his acting where as Branagh would have just pissed me off with his "Oh look at me, I'm so damn good" attitude.

This film does have a problem or two. J.J. Abrams likes throwing plot twists into his shows. Watch Lost or Alias for many examples. The main plot twist is obvious from the start. If you're going to throw a plot twist at us, at least make it a bit less obvious. I didn't hear a single person in the audience make one of those "I'm so shocked" gasp that you can hear if you really listen in a crowded theater.

Overall, it was a darn good film. Another plus is that you don't have to watch the first 2 to watch this one. Each movie is its own self contained story.

Put on your funny hats because it's DVD time! Tomorrow's releases are:

• Con Air: Extended Unrated Edition - An entertaining film, but I've always been annoyed by Cage's stupid-ass accent that's completely unbelievable.
• Enemy of the State: Extended Unrated Edition - Once again, not a terribly bad film, but it has its problems. Chances are the extra footage won't amount to much.
• Napoleon Dynamite: Like, the Best Special Edition Ever! - So many people have told me that I need to see this film that I've rebelled against those tools and haven't watched it yet. Maybe it's good, and maybe it sucks, but when everyone tells me I "Need" to see it, I don't really feel like I "Need" to see it as much.
• The Producers (Widescreen) - I'm not too sure about this one. I like good theather as much as the next artsy-guy, but sometimes theater-to-film transfers end up feeling like just another attempt to make more money. Take Rent for example. I couldn't watch more than 20 minutes of that crap. Just pay your GodDamn rent and shut the fuck up.
• When a Stranger Calls - We've traced the shitty movie, and it's coming from inside this DVD! That was a forced joke, but face it, it was mildly funny.

That's it. I'm spent.