It's Gonktacular!

Rockstar Ruins It For The Rest Of Us

2005-07-22T06:53:00.000-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, Rockstar has officially opened the can of worms.

The government and parent's groups have been waiting for some real ammunition against the games industry for years. Rather than admit that the vast majority of game-related problems are really due to irresponsible parenting (you know, the ones who think video games make great babysitters), they basically want to make it impossible for anyone to buy anything other than Reader Rabbit and Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, if such software could actually be construed as entertainment.

Well, they've got it now.

Leave it to Rockstar, the bad boy of the gaming industry, to finally take their continual boundary-pushing over the proverbial line. The Grand Theft Auto series has been the frontliner in the battle against violent/criminal/sexual themes in video games ever since its conception and especially since its breakout onto the console systems.

Here's the back story: Apparently there is a "girlfriend" minigame where the ultimate reward is heading back to the girl's place for some hubba-hubba. In the actual game this reward is visualized by an external shot of the house and some random (probably bad) audio of the dirty deed in question. Cue the clever PC hackers, who manage to turn this little reward into a minigame of its own, with controllable simulated sexual acts in glorious Direct3D -- I understand that no body parts are actually shown per se, but your ultimate goal in this little game is, of course, reaching your "ultimate goal", so to speak.

Of course, it doesn't take long for this to leak out, and before you know it Hillary Clinton is on CNN demanding for the game to be destroyed with an ICBM. In response, Rockstar chuckles and says, "Those dadgum hackers!"

Well, the hackers, not wanting to be the whipping boy on this soon-to-be-congressional outing, responded, saying that they only unlocked code that was already in the game. As the above article says, this was confirmed by unlocking the game in the PS2 version, which is unable to be modified by an end user.

Thanks, Rockstar. Gamers and video games have been under fire since the days of Wolfenstien 3-D, and you've really broken it open now. You snuck some content not fitting to your rating past the ESRB and now it's out. You thought you were clever, I bet. You thought it would be funny. But now the government wants to get involved and you know that it won't be pretty. Video games are now going to be situated slightly behind the porn videos at Hastings where only the deviant and perverted go.

I appreciate that, I really do.

There's an argument here that I'm not going to get into about the furor about game content among the government and other groups, given that the game is indeed rated M, the "rated R" of the video game industry, and the acts depicted in the secret little game are apparently tame compared to some rated R films; not to mention the fact that at most stores anyone can buy a rated R or even an unrated DVD while many of the very same stores require you to be 17 to buy an M-rated game. Also let's mention the fact that anyone too young to see this material shouldn't have been playing an M-rated game anyway and someone needs their parents' license taken away, the point of all that being this -- I don't see the same people getting into such an uproar about the same content in films.

I don't even really want to get into all of that, but it should give you a taste of what's wrong with the whole situation, anyway. There's not really any standards, and apparently only a few parents who manage to pay attention to ratings and tell their kids "no" once in a while (my in-laws are such parents, so I know a few actually exist). Then there's the ESRB, whose rating system is less than perfect.

Personally I don't think content like that is necessary in any video game, but if the software is properly rated I think it has a right to be sold, as long as everyone involved in the process is responsible and follows the way the system should be. Unfortunately, that rarely happens. Stores don't restrict the sale of M-rated games (should they? Well, why not? You people don't get all up in arms about showing ID to a ticket clerk at the theater). Parents not only buy the product for their kids but also fail to monitor what their kids are playing or watching. The ratings only work when people pay attention to them.

We didn't need subversive game companies thrown into the mix. I will say this for Rockstar -- it's possible that they added the content, didn't like it, and cut it out of the game. Sometimes that happens and programmers just turn the feature off while leaving the code in place. Hackers accessed the code on the PC and turned it back on. The only problem with that is that somehow the content is accessible on the PS2 without a hack, which suggests that Rockstar intentionally left in a way to get to it.

This doesn't bode well for us gamers.

Review: War of the Worlds

2005-06-30T21:15:00.000-07:00

I honestly don't know what to think about this movie.

It's well-made. It's a good movie. It's nice and personal and the acting is good and the special effects are top-notch and it's a decent storyline, even the ending. So why don't I know if I like it?

That's a good question. I just don't like how it made me feel, I think.

You can get the details and the good/bad about this movie from many other reviews. That being said, instead of talking about whether the movie was good or not, I'm going to get down to how I really felt about it.

You see, it really all goes back to September 11th and how it affected the movie industry. Lots of projects were scrapped or put on hold or reworked after it because of how the event affected the American psyche. Movies like Spider-Man were wildly successful, I believe, because at that time America was desperately in need of a superhero, even if it was just in the movies.

War of the Worlds is the first movie I've seen since then that really jars the emotions people felt at the time back up again. That might have been their intent. That might just be a side effect of how the movie was made. It obivously was made well because it did manage to evoke such emotions. The problem is this: I don't really know if I wanted to feel those emotions again.

A lot of people idolize September 11th as a national holiday; a day of mourning and loss and the like, much like December 7th probably was for a previous generation. I don't really know if I subscribed to that -- I memorialize 9/11 like most people do, but I don't live my life based upon it. On the other hand, I cannot deny that it changed some fundamental things I felt in my life, especially my attitude towards death.

War of the Worlds is different from the typical "disaster movie" because it focuses on the people rather than the event, which, in turn, makes the death of said people more impactful, even if it's just the people on the street. I cared about them. It really was terrifying and gut-wrenching at the same time. This movie sucked me in to the point that I was relating to the movie like it was really happening, and I don't know if I liked it at all. I felt a bit of the terror on those people's faces, and you know what I couldn't help but think of? You guessed it. September 11th.

Perhaps it's that I could never relate to a disaster movie before because we had never really witnessed a disaster unfold in front of us on national TV (or for some it unfolded just outside). But the looks on the faces of the people in the movie were looks I had seen before, in real life, and I just don't think I was comfortable seeing it in a movie that was supposed to be entertaining me. I might never be again. It just means something different now.

Reading this and thinking in restrospect, the movie obviously worked -- otherwise I wouldn't have been so involved that it actually upset me. There were a few things that did yank me out at times (Dakota, no more screaming, please). And perhaps I was a little more focused on the scariness of it all than the main characters, because I walked out of the movie haunted by the victims rather than remembering the survivors.

So I'm not sure what I think about it. It was good but I didn't like it. It makes no sense, but in a way I suppose it does.

Now, for a bit more review-ish talk.

Much has been said about the ending. It's too happy. It's too abrupt. I think a lot of people, including the filmmakers, missed some underlying themes in H.G. Wells' original work.

****NOTE: SPOILERS ARE AHEAD. DO NOT READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE ENDING. I WARNED YOU****

If you've seen the ending, you know that the aliens are done in by bacteria. A lot of people are thinking that this is a cop-out. In reality, it was how the original work ended and it was Wells' full intention of ending it that way. Why? Well, there was a point to the ending, and that was a simple one: Humans, don't get too big for your britches. We may think we're in control and all-powerful, but then something bigger comes along that we can't stop. But to really hammer the point home, something tiny and insignificant can defeat that something that we can't. That's the whole point. Remember that this book was written at the height of the industrial age. It was machines vs. nature, and nature won.

I think the inherent problem is that the movie doesn't really even touch this idea and so the ending feels abrupt. They kept the motions but forgot the point of it.

To round this out, here's a few things that worked and some that didn't:

What worked:

The music. Williams kept a low key on this one, and the complete silence during the entire Tripod emerging from the street sequence was simply terrifying. There's something to be said about a composer (and perhaps an editor or director) who knows when to not play anything.
Performances: Aside from Dakota Fanning's hideously annoying screaming, everyone did really well, even our friend Cruise.
Special Effects: ILM's work has been hit-or-miss over the last few years. They were back to form for this film, and it was good to see.
Morgan Freeman!

What didn't:

Character development -- Honestly, the jerk-dad-to-nice-dad routine is old and tired, and they really didn't do much to change it up other than throw aliens into the mix. They could have done a lot better than this.
Explanations!! -- Come on people, you can't tease us with the info that the aliens had already been here for thousands of years and not tell us HOW! I wanted to know how, when, and from where. Yes, I understand that the mystery was part of the scariness, but I was really intrigued and was pretty let down when they let it go. Other examples: The red weed! In the original the aliens were from Mars, and at that time no one knew why Mars was red (late 1800s). So Wells said it was covered in red weed, and the Martians came and grew it here on Earth to make it more like home. So if they're not from Mars, what's up with the red weed in the movie? What purpose did it serve other than to look scary? Inquiring minds want to know. Again, I understand that the story is told from the standpoint of the characters, so if they don't know, we don't know. But how about a Morgan Freeman explanation at the end? We find out what it was all about eventually, right? Right?

So there you have it. A lot of people are saying now that this is the film to beat this summer, just like they said about Batman Begins two weeks ago, but I honestly can't say this was a better movie than Batman Begins. I don't know if it had the heart that Begins did.

Finally, some movement on Jurassic Park IV?

2005-06-27T18:15:00.000-07:00

Everyone's got their guilty pleasures, right?

I probably could stay on the safe side here and say that I really loved Jurassic Park. I think most people would agree with me on that. But my unabashed love of The Lost World and Jurassic Park III tends to be where most other people get off the dinosaur bus. Like I said, though, everyone's got their guilty pleasures.

Jurassic Park IV tends to be, in movie fan circles (as far as I've read around the intarweb) a title that doesn't evoke much more than a sigh and the usual "Do we need another one of those?" comment. My answer to these naysayers is unequivocally YES! We do. Okay, so maybe we're not all dying for another sequel. But I'd sure like one. I have my own ideas on what should really happen (go back to the original island!!!), but one way or another I'd loves me some more ILM dinosaurs on the big screen.

As some (or most) of you know, rumblings of a script floated around a while back that Moriarty at AICN got his hands on and posted a summary of. This script polarized what fans the franchise had left; it contained such wild elements as genetically engineered dino-soldiers with cheeky names. Not my cup of tea, folks -- I want to see people running from dinosaurs in the jungle, not some Saturday morning cartoon Dino-Riders extraordinaire (needless to say, I wasn't a fan).

So since then there's been little to no news regarding the film. Some were starting to wonder if it had become stuck in development and Spielberg & Co. had lost interest. Personally I was kind of hoping that at least something was going on with the flick, and apparently I was right.

Enter Film Rotation. As part of their War of the Worlds coverage, Gazz got a friend who was interviewing Steven Spielberg for a radio station to drop in some choice tidbit questions, including these:

What about Jurassic Park 4? Is that actually going ahead?
John Sayles has just handed in what we'd like to consider the final draft a few weeks back.

So the script review that surfaced on the internet last year...
[laughs] ... It was probably written by the same guy that wrote and reviewed all those Indy 4 scripts. There's only one Jurassic Park 4 script and one Indy 4 script and I have both of them!

So what can you tell us about Jurassic Park 4? Will you be directing it?
I can tell you it has dinosaurs in it and I can tell you I won't be directing it. My job will be exactly the same as it was on number 3, no more no less.

Needless to say, I'm a happy dinosaur. Sayles doesn't exactly have a bunch of hits under his belt but I'm hoping for the best. And at least it's not that off-the-wall script we all heard about before.

Site Status Note

2005-06-20T21:09:00.000-07:00

I've decided to shift the focus of Gonktacular to strictly film and media related writing. My original intention was to have this be a little bit of everything, but I've found myself focusing more on movies and TV when I write. That's not a bad thing, for sure. I've been noticed a bit (Film Rotation picked me up on its newsfeeds). So I've decided to move all personal related updates (pictures, posts, etc) over to Gonktacular Too, a new personal blog. Feel free to visit.

Review: Batman Begins

2005-06-20T20:25:00.000-07:00

Does anyone remember Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith at this point?

That was only a month ago, you know.

That's what I thought.

In the critical summer movie season, memorability and staying power are what eventually crown champions. Quick -- name a movie, off the top of your head, that came out the same summer Jurassic Park did. How about Independence Day? Some of you might, but most probably won't.

While there's still plenty of steam left in the summer, I'm putting my money down that two or three years from now people will look back on this summer and remember Batman Begins. Will they think of other films? Maybe. But this one has defined this movie season. Star Wars set the tone and the stakes, and Batman has already managed to steal its thunder as THE movie of the summer.

Can we talk about this film fanboy to fanboy for a second? I'm going to step out of the persona of a reviewer and jump into my own comfortable fan skin. This movie is ten pounds of awesome in a five pound bag. It's got enough awesome for all the people in the theater to take home some awesome of their very own when it's over. It's not just awesome, it's generous with its awesome. It's the Carnegie of awesome.

Now that I've got that out of my system, I'll be a little more succinct: Batman Begins is so far the best film this summer and perhaps this year. It is a well-written, well-acted, well-directed film. I don't even want to call it a comic book film, because if the costume wasn't there it wouldn't even be considered a "comic book" film. It's far beyond being pigeonholed into the same category that the previous Batman films and far worse have been relegated to.

It's practically two movies, one relating the origin of Batman and the other relating his first appearances in Gotham. These stories, which almost neatly divide the film, are tied together by Ra's Al Ghul and his League of Shadows, who train Wayne to become what he is today and then later are the shadowy puppeteers behind the plot to wipe out Gotham. Both are spectacularly shot, mostly on location, which give it a vibrant imagery in the first half and a gritty realism once we get back to Gotham.

Christian Bale has turned in some great performances in the last few years yet still manages to be relatively unknown -- until now, of course. His Batman/Bruce Wayne is much truer to their source material than previous incarnations and he plays the part with a manic intensity that almost spills off the screen and assaults the viewer -- and that's a good thing. He is focused, determined, and yet reserved at the same time. Director Christopher Nolan manages to make a great performance better by surrounding Bale with an all-star cast of great actors -- Michael Caine, who brings life to Alfred in a fatherly way (somewhat missing in the previous films); Gary Oldman, almost stealing the screen from Bale at times as James (future commissioner) Gordon; Morgan Freeman, who always manages to make any move better; and even Rutger Hauer, who isn't onscreen all that much, makes his character (Earle, who runs Wayne Enterprises) perfectly hatable. Cillian Murphy, a relative unknown, makes a great unhinged doctor. And then there's Liam Neeson. This guy can do anything. He certainly isn't Qui-Gon any more.

Which brings us to a weak point in the film: Katie Holmes. She's really trying not to bleed Dawson's Creek while she's onscreen. Her performance is good, but could have been played by anyone (and better). She's forgettable for the most part, and is more of a prop. The film would have been better served by a enthusiastic D.A. named Harvey Dent (who might pop up in the later films anyway).

The effects in this film are invisible, which makes them incredible. Believability was the mantra of Batman Begins and most of the effects work was traditional stuntwork and models -- adding yet another layer of realism to the film. What CGI there was managed to be inconspicuous and seamless.

Much has been said about the music in this film, especially the lack of a traditional theme. I really enjoyed how the music played out in the film, though I have yet to listen to the soundtrack by itself (curse you, retailers, for not stocking it around here), so I don't know how well it stands on its own. The collaboration by two of my favorite film composers -- Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard -- has produced a deep, moody, perfectly scored background. There is somewhat of a theme that is prevalent throughout the movie, though it lacks structure -- a rhythmic drumbeat/note sequence that underscores much of the movie. I walked out with it in my head, which is a good sign. Perhaps they didn't want to step on Danny Elfman's memorable theme from the Burton films -- which is wise. Perhaps they were trying to move away from the traditional superhero meme in film music, which would fit with the tone of the film as it also tries hard not to be a superhero movie. Either way, it fit the film excellently.

What's not so great about this film? Well, not much, really. The "wipe out Gotham" plot is spread a bit thin and moves almost too quickly, as it is compressed into the latter half of the film -- a symptom of the amount of time they spend at the beginning with the origin story. But it still works, though it could have been developed a bit better. I thought Scarecrow was actually pretty underused. And while Holmes was a weak point, her performace is far from bad.

It seems, as I wondered a few weeks ago amid the Star Wars hype, that this movie will end up being the one to beat this summer. Perhaps Star Wars will make more money (it probably will), and perhaps War of the Worlds will steal its thunder in turn as it did to Star Wars (likely, but not on the same level). But when we look back on this movie summer, I'm willing to bet that it's Batman that we'll remember the best.

X3 and the Temple of Doom

2005-06-15T19:45:00.000-07:00

Yeah, so X-Men 3 is looking like it's going to be a disaster. With an out-there script that effectively takes four of the main characters out of the running, by death or otherwise, and gives the focal character of the first two practically nothing to do (script ruminations based upon this review), and a director who's less than impressive, AND given the fact that Tom Rothman at Fox tends to have something akin to the Midas touch with a twist (instead of gold, everything he touches turns into excrement), this is one franchise that might be dead in the water before it even leaves the dock.

Now they've got a teaser poster out, and it's less than impressive and obviously timed to staunch the flow of PR blood that they've been gushing since Matthew Vaughan left the project (possibly even since Bryan Singer left the project to direct Superman Returns). Judging by fan reactions, they're not buying it. These folks (including me) were already turned from the project the minute they started bantering around Brett Ratner's name for replacing Vaughan. Ratner's not the antichrist (this guy continues to be, while this guy is obviously his evil minion), but he's not exactly someone people wanted to see on this project -- especially after the fun the fans had tearing his involvement with Superman into shreds.

Which leads us to a funny set of parallels here. At one point in the past, Bryan Singer was attached to direct X3. Directors had long come and gone for Superman but suddenly Ratner's name was attached and there was this script. Oh yes, that script. The J.J. Abrams draft. The one where Lex Luthor is an alien from Krypton and various other atrocious concepts were bandied about like it was a great update to the franchise when all the fans really wanted was another good Superman film. The crapstorm that followed that saw Ratner off the project, and guess who they snagged to replace him? Bryan Singer. So that left X3 with an opening that would eventually be filled by Matthew Vaughan and subsequently vacated for dubious reasons.

And now we have Ratner, who somehow managed to land the X3 job. Funny, ain't it? At some point in the past X3 was looking to be good and Superman was the unmitigated disaster. The irony never ceases.

Have you heard George Lucas' latest little blurb about the new Star Wars TV show? Apparently he approached Daniel Logan, our favorite mini-Fett, now well into his teenage years. So could we see Boba Fett return to his roots and show up on the small screen? It's where he was introduced, after all, though Lucas would rather you forget that (Star Wars Holiday Special, anyone?).

I don't know about it, really. I don't think I want a TV show about Boba Fett -- the mystique that made him cool in the first place is long gone, thanks to the prequels. Of course, the same could be said about Darth Vader. He doesn't seem quite so menacing in the Original Trilogy once you know the whiny brat-child that's inside that suit. Anyway -- I'm thinking the new series should follow an original character, with cameos from famous ones. It wouldn't be hard to get Vader onscreen. Some of the other characters would take a little more work (i.e. there's no way they could get away with replacing Ewan McGregor with someone else as Obi-Wan).

Regardless, it needs to take a fresh look. It needs a new angle. Star Wars has been around for nearly 30 years now and they can't get away with just re-hashing the old stuff like the EU novels have been doing for years. Let's hope they do so.

Batman Begins soon for me. Possibly Friday. I'm looking forward to it.

Profundity

2005-06-09T21:26:00.000-07:00

Flowers die in 100 degree heat when they're not watered. Just a bit of botanical wisdom there for you.

Wow, it's gotten hot. Unfortunately the April showers and May flowers never really came (neither did the pilgrims, for you wise guys out there). However, the showers did manage to show up rather late to the party in the last couple of weeks of May, and then the weather got a little warm. Welcome to my outdoor sauna.

Slow week. Not much else to say. Check out Film Rotation if you're bored.

That is all.

Return!

2005-06-06T19:24:00.000-07:00

Well, all that's finally over with. It's been almost three solid weeks of traveling for me -- both business and vacation, but unfortunately mostly business. The traveling does get hard to handle after a while; I just don't like being gone so blasted much. Unfortunately that's an inherent part of my job.

Not much has really been going on as of late. The hype around Revenge of the Sith seems to have calmed, and the Batman Begins media machine is beginning to kick into it's final deluge, but right now there seems to be a bit of a lull (at least in my limited field of view). There have been a few waves, most notably the soap opera that X-Men 3 has become, but the next big bang is still a week away when Batman Begins opens. To say I'm looking forward to the movie is an understatement, but it's really been tempered by its proximity to Revenge of the Sith and therefore has not had a lot of time to work on me on its own. That is being remedied, though.

And after that, of course, comes War of the Worlds. About time Spielberg did some evil alien goodness, I say.

The media slate has been unfortunately light for the last few weeks, what with Alias ending and my lack of gaming fundage. I did manage to sneak in The Phantom of the Opera on DVD. I'm not particulary a musical fan, and there were parts of it that I was really pretty bored -- while songs are great for stage musicals, they tend to bring the pacing of a movie to a screeching halt. So by the third verse of "Masquerade", I was singing "Get On With It Already". But it really has grown on me a lot, and I think overall I like it. It was well acted and sung, and the production values were superb. Really, it was much more than I would have expected from Joel "I Put Nipples On Batman" Schumacher.

I'm currently working through Morrowwind again. Does this game ever get old?

Whew!

2005-05-28T15:35:00.000-07:00

Well, that was a fun week. Film Rotation, in linking my Revenge of the Sith review last week, caused a pretty significant (in terms of this site's traffic) spike of visitors through last weekend. Looks like it's leveled out at this point, but it was a much-appreciated nod. If you're not reading Film Rotation as part of your daily movie blog intake, get to it. Don't say I didn't tell you about it.

Spent most of last week in Wichita Falls, and will spend most of next week in Del Rio. This travel thing does get old from time to time. Subsequently, updates will likely be light.

However, a small media update for you at the moment:

Alias finale, anyone? Betcha didn't see that coming at the end, right? Even though we all know they're making this stuff up as they go along (if you don't believe me, look at the lame excuse for explaining the Season 3 cliffhanger at the beginning of this season. It didn't even make sense!) I have a sneaking suspicion that next season may be Alias' last, especially with the breakaway success Lost is having. Plus they're moving it to Tursday. It rode Lost's coattails well enough, but Thursday? We'll see, I guess.

Syberia, if you haven't heard of it, was a little adventure game that came out for the PC and Xbox a while back. Adventure games, unless their name is Myst, don't get a lot of media play nowadays, even though fifteen years ago they had the PC gaming market cornered (wherefore art thou now, Sierra? And what happened to you, Lucasarts?). Of course, this was before a little game called Doom reshaped the face of PC games. Regardless, Syberia got a lot of acclaim, even if it wasn't very publicized. I picked it up cheap at the local EBGames last week and Mrs. Gonktacular and I played through it. Pretty good, if you ask me. Luckily, we're far enough behind the times that the sequel is on the cheap rack too. :)

This weekend's movie rental: Final Cut, a small film with some big names (Robin Williams and Jim Caveizel). Great premise: an implant can record everything you see and hear all your life, and people like Robin Williams cut a funeral film called a "rememory" together after you die for your family. Basically Robin Williams gets the data from someone that has a lot of secrets and a thriller ensues. But the real meat of this film seemed to be missing. It clocks in right at 90 minutes which is barely a feature-length film. It felt like a lot of character development and the like was cut and the film was barebones plot -- which also felt like it had a few points missing. A missed opportunity, really; the film attempted to explore the implications of such an implant on people's lives and culture but kind of missed its mark.

Anyway, that's all I've got. Have a good Memorial Day weekend.

Revenge of the Sith

2005-05-20T11:36:00.000-07:00

Warning: Here Be Spoilers!

Now that I've had a day to digest it, I can most certainly say I loved it. I initially loved the two previous prequels, but after a day or so of simmering they just didn't satisfy completely. This one surely does.

What worked:

The opening battle/rescue/crash: For those first 20 minutes or so I felt like I had finally found OT-caliber Star Wars again. The banter, the action, heck, even R2-D2 was entertaining and nostalgic, in a way. This part I am most thankful for because it absolutely HAD to work. Most of us came into this movie expecting it to be at least disappointing. We figured the writing would be bad, the acting would be wooden, but we'd enjoy it anyway -- though with a longing for things gone. But this sequence showed us something different; the lines were good, and Ewan and Hayden did some good work with them. It really allayed any apprehensions I had and let me really get invested in the rest of the movie.

Anakin and Obi-Wan's relationship (during the first half of the film): This was so good that it almost hurt to see the missed opportunity that Episode II was. Attack of the Clones should have been filled with this kind of stuff, giving Obi-Wan a reason to tell Luke in Episode IV that Anakin was "a good friend". This working so well makes the Duel that much more painful.

The Temple Slaughter/Order 66: The tears hit me here first. Watching all those people die, even though you knew it was going to happen. It was just flat out painful to watch, culminating with Anakin in the Council chamber with the kids. You knew what he was going to do, yet you still held out some shred of hope that he wouldn't. And then he did, and it was like a kick in the face you knew was coming.

THE DUEL: I'm glad that this worked much more on an emotional level than a physical one. This wasn't as acrobatic or "wow" as the Maul/Kenobi/Jinn fight in Episode I, but it shouldn't have been. Hayden did have a few turds here -- occasionally he sounded more like a teenager emoting than a Sith Lord, but the rest of the time you don't have any doubt that he's evil. And Ewan played this perfectly. You can see the pain in Obi-Wan's face as they begin the fight. Once again, you knew this was coming. And it hurt to watch when it happened anyway. It was stunning to realize that this moment was the pivotal piece of the entire saga, the Duel That Changed Everything, the end of all ends, the hurt that would not be resolved until Return of the Jedi. It was powerful.

Williams: We knew this guy was a genius. But I don't think we would have been nearly as emotionally invested in the slower parts of this film without his masterpiece of a score.

What didn't work:

Intercutting the Duel with the Yoda/Emperor fight: This was jarring and not well-placed. We go from the power and emotion of Obi-Wan and Anakin's climactic battle to Yoda bouncing a couple of Royal Guards off the wall. Everyone in the theater was tense and quiet during the Duel, and then they all laughed at the Yoda thing. It totally destroyed the weight of the Duel. Which leads me to my next point:

The Yoda/Emperor fight: Well done, yes. Spectacular, yes. The point of the movie? No. This fight was auxiliary to the Duel yet got just as much screen time. It had no weight to it. While we knew the outcome of the Duel, we were still invested in it because we had experienced the relationship and history that led us to that point. There was no relationship with Yoda and Sidious. No weight to it at all. We knew that Yoda had to lose and since there was no emotional level to it, it was flat and all it did was break up what we did care about like a commercial in your favorite TV show.

Really those were the only gripes I had. I loved this movie. I loved it like I love A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. Finally, we got what we had been waiting for all these years. Thanks George.

UPDATE: Mediamelt over at Film Rotation linked me! Woooo! Thanks Melt. :D

I have seen Episode III

2005-05-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

...and it is good.

Very good, in fact.

I'm itching to write a bit about it, but I'm really exhausted at the moment, a combination of vacation lag and staying up late last night watching a combination of 2 hours of Alias as well as both Episode I: The Phantom Menace and Episode II: Attack of the Clones in preparation for today's viewing of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.

Why yes, I have had a lot of Star Wars in the last day or so.

Regardless, some quick notes:

I have come to the perception-altering (i.e., this was not my perception until I watched them last night) conclusion that Episode I is better than Episode II. Watch them back to back, you'll see.

Alias is getting better. Lena Olin is back! I wonder how much of their production budget was spent on that little transaction...

Yes, I know I promised some mountainblogging. Not yet. Soon.

And with that, I bid you a good evening.

P.S. -- I know you read this, my counter says so. So comment already! Sheesh.

Mountainblogging ensues soon!

2005-05-17T21:07:00.000-07:00

Just got back from a 4-day vacation with Mrs. G in the mountains. We've got lots of great pictures; I'll share some tomorrow. For now, though, I've got to get some rest since work marches ever onward in the morning. Unfortunately, our air conditioning has decided to not work, so it will be a warm night for us.

Hooray.

Flowerblogging!

2005-05-12T16:35:00.000-07:00

A visual demonstration of Mrs. Gonktacular's birthday present, if you will:

The lot beside our humble home has sprouted quite a few Indian Blankets, a native Texan wildflower that (apparently, given our current rain situation) is pretty drought-tolerant. These were taken by both of us, and ended up coming out really well.

Busy bee

Rabbot!

The Joy of Inappropriate Marketing

2005-05-09T12:28:00.000-07:00

Have you seen the new TV spots for Revenge of the Sith?

Talk about marketing faux pas. On one hand, you've got Lucas saying that he always knew this one would be darker, that he was okay with the PG-13 rating, that it wasn't for kids, that it was bad business but he had to tell his story this way, blah blah.

And then, on the other hand, you have the new ROTS TV ads. Plastered all over Cartoon Network, no less, in the middle of a Saturday afternoon -- because we all know that's the time that discerning teens and adults are watching quality, thoughtful animated entertainment that CN so graciously provides.

What's that, you say? CN Saturday afternoons are populated with shows appealing to younger kids, like the badly animated Mucha Lucha and the incredibly vapid way-to-give-a-great-body-image-to-young-girls Totally Spies? Say it isn't so!

Oh, my friends, but it gets worse. The announcer on the TV spots has to be heard to be believed.

"On May 19th the Jedi must band together to defeat the evil Sith!" (or something similar) a booming Trailer Voice (tm) exclaims in an exuberant tone.

I can't help but wonder what the kids would think if he finished that sentence the way it should be.

"...except that they DON'T, and they ALL DIE! And Anakin BURNS! BURRRRRRRRRRNNNS!!!! AND KILLS ALL YOUR FAVORITE CHARACTERS!"

Kids rarely make the connection to the Original Trilogy; they don't ask why only Obi-Wan and Yoda are left and even they are in hiding.

"Mommy? Where's Mace Windu?"
"Oh, he must be resting, dear. After beating all those bad droids in the Clone Wars, he was really tired and had to sleep for, oh, forty years!"

Makes you wonder how many kids are going to be looking longingly at their Kit Fisto and Plo Kloon Jedi action figures next month, wondering where everything went so wrong.

Weapons of Mass Randomness!

2005-05-04T09:22:00.000-07:00

Okay, okay, so I'm not so great at keeping this updated. My apologies. :P

It was spring here for about three weeks. And then it was summer! And now it's spring again. I imagine that summer will return sometime very soon. It's finally raining -- we didn't get any all through April. Here's hoping that we have a wet May, or things might be getting very dead around July time. I really don't mind living here but the sheer desperation that plants around here display as they hopelessly cling to life without water gets really sad. I adore green when it relates to the outdoors. Unfortunately that color does not live here; it's been usurped by a kind of mottled greeny-yellow that usually fades into brown, the death-shade of plants everywhere.

Unless you're a cactus of some sort, of course. Or a mesquite tree.

I suppose that my love of outdoor plant-related life should extend to those inhabitants, seeing as they're the most common in the area, but alas, they are relegated in my mind to the same general area as weeds -- i.e. they're everywhere, and they're obnoxiously ugly.

But enough about that.

Mrs. Gonktacular turned 21 yesterday. Legality at last! Though we're not alcohol-type people, so it didn't really matter in a practical sense. I did manage to wrangle her parents into town to see her on her birthday and that made her really happy, which in turn made me really happy. I got her a sweet digital camera, the fruits of which might end up on here at some point. There's a great picture of Abby (Gonktacular dog #1) sitting on the couch with a gift bow on her head, looking at me like, "I really hate it when you people use me as a photo prop." Regardless, Happy Birthday, dear. :)

Moving on:

I got some Pepsi Blue! No kidding. Unfortunately for me, it's undrinkable. Like "out of date in November of 2002" undrinkable. See, the inherent problem with soft drinks is that they are destructive. And I'm not talking destructive in a "I drink too many so the calories are going to my waistline" way (even though they are). Do you ever wonder why soft drinks in 20oz plastic bottles only have a shelf life for a few months? Of course you don't -- but you should. After its expiration date, the soda in the bottle starts to actually break down the plastic, leeching out the carbonation. Thus, two year out of date Pepsi Blue = seriously flat. Undrinkable flat. Shame. And yeah, I tried it. Other random soft drink facts: Drinks in cans taste better than drinks in bottles because the plastic bottles absorb odors in the air and leech it into the drinks. Yummy! Also, drinks left in aluminum cans over the course of two years or so will actually eat through the can. No kidding. That stuff spends time in your body when you drink it, you know. Nevertheless, I am still hopelessly addicted to A&W Root Beer and that tropical Sprite (curses!).

And now, some random media-related comments:

Alias is getting better. Apparently they waited until the end of the season to start dropping the "holy crap!" type bombs. Patience is a virtue, I suppose, and it looks like it might pay off. Have to tape it tonight though 'cause Mrs. Gonktacular gets another birthday party this evening. :)

Ocean's Twelve, which we rented last week, was pretty good. Don't know if I liked it as much as the first, which tends to be the case with sequels, though many reviewers thought it was better than the first. I think the characters didn't adhere as well -- in the first they all had specific jobs, but in this one they were all pretty much just accomplices. And the "ha! We had you fooled the whole time" thing worked ok in the original, but it was just tired in this one. Reveals have to have clues worked in, like M. Night Shyamalan's earlier movies -- this one just drops it on you and says "haha we didn't tell you."

Minority Report was good. I have no idea why I hadn't seen it until now. My movie education is far from complete -- I really didn't start being a big movie guy until a few years ago. I really need Netflix, I think. Anyway -- I enjoyed the movie. It wasn't the best I've seen, and it was really a bit too long (2 1/2 hours!) for the story it told.

I have never had a game that made me want to put a controller through my TV like The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age has. It's fun, it really is, and compelling, too. Until you get to Helm's Deep, which is the same problem The Two Towers game had. It's freakishly impossibly hard. The last battle consisted of orcs that got two turns for every one you had. I finally got past it after a week of random battling and leveling up. Now I'm in Pelennor Fields, and I've come up against two Mumekils (yeah, the giant elephant things) at once. After three or four rounds they get like 10 turns in a row -- easily enough to wipe out your entire group. Hello frustration. I don't really know if I want to spend another week leveling up enough to get past them.

Just 15 days until Revenge of the Sith! I am totally psyched for it. The last Star Wars! It better kick some serious butt. According to a lot of early reviews, it does. Here's hoping.

My Secret Vice

2005-04-15T12:17:00.000-07:00

Curse you, Coca-Cola.

You devious fiends reintroduced (albeit under a new name) the sole Coca-Cola product that I really enjoyed. Indeed, Tropical Sprite Remix was once the drink that filled the black hole in my drink habits that was so painfully vacated by the late Pepsi Blue (sigh). Yet soon even that was replaced by some combination of berry-ish flavors that slightly resembled clear liquified Froot Loops ("Berryclear" or some other purple-ish abomination), which I disdained.

But now, oh yes, you seek to undermine my loyalties.

Once upon a time I was not tied the way I am now. I could consume Coca-Cola products with little compunction or twinges of the corporate conscience. It was in this state I was first introduced to Tropical Sprite Remix, and I, hurting from my recent loss of the eclectic Pepsi Blue (sigh), was quick to embrace it.

Now you, the Coca-Cola Company, in all your deviousness, have re-introduced it as "Aruba Jam" Sprite Remix. Thank you for the more clever name, at least. I am compelled to drink it, as its flavor does hold some place in my beverage-related heart. But, you see, now it's different that it used to be.

Now things are more complicated.

You see, there are three major soft drink companies that dominate the market today: Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and Dr Pepper/7up.

And I work for the two that aren't Coca-Cola.

Curses.

Flat lands make for Flat trips.

2005-03-31T20:25:00.000-08:00

If you've never been to the Texas plains, you probably don't know flat. Sure, you might think your desk is flat, or maybe a tennis court, or perhaps you think the entire world is flat (hey, there's a few left). But Texas, well, that's a whole new level of flat. I spent much of the day today perusing the flatness of north-ish West Texas, hunting down some vending machines and counting the dollars inside them. Sometimes it's not so humorous when you count more money in ten vending machines than you're going to make that week. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my job, but there are some not-so-perky aspects of it, just as I suspect there is with any job.

Regardless, much of the land north of here is flat. Like flatty-flat-flatter flat. Like "Look! I see the next town in the distance! Oh look! The sign says that town is 25 miles from here! Wow!". Except it's much less "Wow!" and much more "Big Deal." after you've seen it a million times (because it's where you live).

The bluebonnets are blooming. Spring must be close. Someone needs to tell that to the cold front that just moved in this evening, though -- I don't think it got the memo.

Novel news: I did a little fleshing out of chapter 1 tonight, and the first few paragraphs of chapter 2. I know where I'm going now, but there's some blank spots between here and there I need to think about. Interested in reading it? Send me an email. I'm interested in any and all feedback. Novels should entertain others, not just myself, so the more the better.

Follow-ups from last time:

Alias was decent last week, as it was this week. It's just not as spectacular as it used to be, though. Since we always catch the end of Lost (which we're not watching because we missed the first half of the season -- waiting for the DVD), I'm getting the feeling that J.J. Abrams is really focusing more energy on it than Alias.
Clone Wars: Volume I was pretty decent. A lot of people are hailing it as more like the original Star Wars than its theatrical predecessors, but I just don't feel it. Volume I was a very short, limited story with lots of stylized animated action -- which was an enjoyable watch, no doubt, but it doesn't compare to the original Star Wars any more than the new prequels do. Overall, though, I liked it quite a bit. Bonus: I caught all the episodes of Volume II on Cartoon Network back-to-back over the weekend. Excellent as expected.
I've already finished Fable, but it has a lot of possibilities that I can go back and revisit, so I feel there's more play time in there that I can get out of it. And if not, it was only $20. One way or another it was very good, though the combat system could have been better. When you give enemies unblockable weapon combos and then allow them to attack the player in groups, you get a player flat on his back frequently and very frustrated for it.
The next (and hopefully final) installment of the lawn mower saga has been postponed until Saturday, when I really have some time to work on it. We shall see if it actually starts.

On the slate for tomorrow:

Nothing. Bwahaha!

And with that, I bid you adeiu. Until next time. Which hopefully will be more timely than this post was.

Paradoxical Structures

2005-03-23T20:27:00.000-08:00

Part of my job includes performing audits of vending machines, which is almost as fun as it sounds. I had the distinct privilege (sarcasm) of spending most of this afternoon in a hospital, tracking down and auditing random drink machines. I didn't find it fun -- I'm not fond of hospitals at all. They are a strange breed of institution; they are a paradox by nature. Most lives begin there; many lives end there. They're distinctly built as to not evoke any emotion, yet it's possible that the widest range of human emotions possible are present in the same building. It's an interesting thought that human culture has managed to bring all of that together in one place.

Unfortunately for me they're more on the negative side of emotion. I suspect that partially that's because I don't have kids; I've never experienced the usual joy that gets expressed in hospitals. I have, unfortunately, experienced the pain that gets expressed in hospitals. I saw it today and it reminded me of my own experiences. I can't help but notice all of the little quiet garden nooks or skylit corners with comfortable seats -- you don't go sit and reflect in them when you're happy.

But enough of that. I audit vending machines, not write black artsy poems about dark subjects and whatnot.

The novel (the one I'm writing, didn't you know that?) is coming along nicely. I finally got the motivation to do something with it last night, but I'm not entirely satisfied with the results. It feels rushed, and that means it probably is. But the framework is there, at least, and that's a good start. I can fill in the meat later.

On the slate for tomorrow:

The Alias episode I taped tonight (Mrs. Gonktacular was out, and we watch it together)
Star Wars: The Clone Wars Vol. 1 DVD, rented it and intended to watch it tonight but didn't get to it
Fable, which I found at Hastings for $20 (score!) -- but that's if I can get Mrs. Gonktacular away from the highly excellent Kingdom Hearts. Yes, we are waaaay behind the video game curve, I know.
The continuation of the lawn mower maintenance saga, in which I scored a major victory today after being defeated by a cheap shot to the back on Sunday. More about that later.
Perhaps I'll find some time to write. I hope so.

So It Begins.

2005-03-23T20:06:00.000-08:00

And so it does.