Those2geeks’ Weblog

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Best. Fight. EVAR!!!!!!!!

Whut up everyone. Dancing with the stars ended 30 minutes early tonight, so I decided to hop online and open up my video vault to one and all. Tonight, I will be delving into what I consider my all-time favorite films. Now, this is favorite not best. My top 5 best films is different and maybe I’ll post those later. But tonight, I will be glossing over the 5 films that I could literally watch everyday…no problem.

5. Empire Strikes Back - Easily one of the finest science fiction films of ALL time. You know you’re about to get your ass handed to you by a movie when it starts out with giant walking robot battles in the friggin arctic! There could be a completely different list of reasons this movie is the shiznit, but in the interest of time (and carpel tunnel syndrome) I’ll spit out some randomeness: Giant f*cking walkers, lightsaber duels, Ton-tons (they’re smelly on the inside too, apparently) oh and the most awesome twist ending (spoiler alert: Luke, I am your father)

4. Mission Impossible III - Okay, now before you roll your eyes and start looking for something else to read…hear me out. I am fully aware that Tom Cruise is officially bat sh*t crazy. I get it. However, the man knows how to make an action flick. Say what you want about his cooky religious beliefs and equally cooky behavior…but the bridge scene with Tom and his good buddy, Mr. G36, is the SHEEEEEIT!! I mean, you really had the trifecta, the perfect storm of awesome if you will, on this one. You have the venerable Ethan Hunt…super-spy extraordinare. You also have Phillip “Scotty J” Hoffman as the strangely believable villain and the mastermind of it all, Mr. JJ Abrams at the helm. Extra Kudos to director JJ for not making Hoffman some kind of martial arts master at the end. He gets his pudgy ass beat by a semi-crippled, yet still superiorly trained Ethan Hunt, as he should have.

3. Goonies - Heeeeeeeeey Youuuuu Guuuuuuuuys!! Sorry, I had to. DO I even really need to explain this one?? Tell me you can be flipping through the channels and see this on it’s 9th airing on TBS and NOT stop and watch it. I will tell you this, I sure don’t want to live in a country where people DON’T stop to watch Goonies. Just look at the cast for crying out loud! Firstly, you have pre-Rudy, pre-LOTR Sean Astin. Slightly annoying…but he gets some from the hot chick, natch. You also got Josh “No Country” Brolin, the asian kid from The Temple of Doom and even Joey Pants! Who cares about the plot…there’s some shit about treasure, a map and a dude named Copperpot.

2. Rainman - Ooooh…who’s this?? Tom Cruise…again!! I told you this dude brings it!! To be honest I could have put any number of “TC” flicks. Days of Thunder, War of the Worlds, Top Gun, Minority Report….all good times. I chose Rainman because : a.) It was a multiple Academy Award winner and b.) Dustin Hoffman kills it in this one. Awesome performance, awesome movie.

1. Seven - Speaking of awesome movies…this is the ring leader. Long before M. Night blew our minds with a little kid that could see dead people, David Fincher visualized this little gem starring Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman and the NEVER HOTTER THAN SHE WAS IN THIS Gwyneth Paltrow. This was on of the first movies that really screwed me up….I mean, REALLY screwed me up. I think I was 14 when this came out. Now, for those who haven’t seen it, I won’t give away too much detail…but basically a seriously twisted serial killer goes around killing people based on the 7 deadly sins. There are at least 3 or 4 scenes in this shiznit that have the potential of completely wrecking you mentally. Saying that, I still demand that you take the time to watch this masterpiece…even if you’ve seen it…see it again.

For the longest time, David Archuleta reminded me of someone (or something) that I just couldn’t put my finger on…until now.

I don’t understand how this could have happened, I LOVE this movie!

For me, this movie had everything going against it. The trailer was awful; there were scenes in it that made me cringe because the dialogue was so campy. The shot of John  Goodman spinning some ninja above his ahead was almost enough to make me boycott the movie. There was “camp” written all over the trailers, and I just didn’t’ want to see another campy flick with spruced up special effects. However, I loved the Matrix trilogy and V for Vendetta so much that I HAD to give this movie the benefit of the doubt.

I wont bore you with a long plot synopsis, but I will hit the major points.

Story:

Well done. I really don’t ever recall watching a full episode of the cartoon, but the movie has a strong base, and that is the focus it places on family. This is truly an ensemble piece where all the characters are really balanced and add to the story, no one is wasted. It’s a simple story, but as I reflect on it now, the Wachowskis must have really took their time with this one. The dialogue is deep, and every scene has a purpose. As for the “camp” factor, I must say that it was virtually non-existent, or so well integrated I didn’t even notice. The film plays out like a live action cartoon, but the characters are so deep, and the dialogue so well written, that the “campy” scenes actually play out more as comedic bits to remind you its just a movie, and that we’re supposed to have a good time watching it.

Acting:

The kid who plays Speed Racer pulled off the role perfectly; you really get to know the kid, and are rooting for him throughout the movie. Also, it is really nice to see Mathew Fox in a role different than Lost…never was I reminded of Jack Sheperd, he really is Racer X. John Goodman also turns out a heartfelt performance, I haven’t seen much else of his theatrical work, but he shows here that he’s got the acting chops to pull anything off. Everyone pulls off the role they are given… “Bravo” Wachowskis… “Bravo”

Visuals:

I was really expecting the worse, a la Batman and Robin. Any trailer that shows me more than the average color spectrum reminds me of the clusterf**k that was Batman and Robin; where Joel Schumacher decided to put everybody and their mom in the movie, and dress them up with colorful rubber suits and nipples. Speed Racer has a visual style all its own. What I love about the Wachowskis, is that they truly put you in a world all its own; and that is the reason I go to the movies. Again, all the crazy stuff seen in the trailer like jumping cars and gravity defying stunts are perfectly executed in this movie; because it truly sets up another world and draws you in where everything you see is accepted.

In the end, I was really rooting for Speed Racer. Admittedly, it does take a while for the movie to find its purpose, but I think that was just the time it took for me to let go and accept this movie for what it was. After I let go, and became involved in the story, the movie truly reveals itself and you become the experience. “Thank you” Wachowskis, for giving me a truly enjoyable movie going experience…best $10 I’ve spent in a long time.

Howdy everyone!  This be my first official blog post….EVAR!!  Sadly, it took a death in the family to get me motivated enough to write.  Yes, I was perfectly content with having my co-blogger, Mr. Yellow, doing all the blogging footwork, while I just sat here and openly criticized everything he wrote.

*sigh* and yet, now I feel compelled to write about a dear, dear friend of mine who passed away about, oh, 11 minutes ago…my Xbox 360.  Now, I must confess, I was actually looking to sell my beloved 360 not even a week ago.  You see, I met someone else.  I recently came across my new love….a fine piece of PC gaming ass known as the Nvidia 8800 GTS 512mb…indeed, I had moved on from the 360’s world of over-priced games, shoddy (at best) frame rates and pay-to-play online services to a world of silky smooth visuals displayed at what the geniuses at Nvidia call “Extreme HD”.  Yes, my Xbox and I….a relationship that was once fruitful and full of dreams…now non-existent, my eye caught by the beauty of another…..oh, and it didn’t have Crysis….plus, once you have a mouse and keyboard…the 360 game pad is like  taking home a fat chick from the club, it’ll work, but you KNOW you can do better.

But I digress…this evening I decided that I would attempt to rekindle the love I once had for my 360.  I would forget about it’s faults and focus on the positive.  The good times, if you will.  Would I go for the wine and dine, or simply be straight forward and be like, “look baby…let’s be honest, this thing isn’t gonna work out in the long run, besides, Mass Effect isn’t gonna be released for like another month, so let’s do what I came to do and be done with it”.  In the end, I decided to just try and have a good time and hope the 360 didn’t get attached.

So, like any guy in his mid to late 20’s would do in this situation….I grabbed my fake, plastic drum set and prepared to thrash through a session of The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ “maps” on Expert….and, of course, by expert, I mean terribly off beat and with a few more 4 letter words than the actual lyrics call for.  So, there we were, my 360 and I….alone.  I was gripping my drumsticks ever so gently as my foot seductively caressed the bass pedal.  My fingers moved slowly across the rubber-like material of the drum surface.  I was starting to feel like maybe, just maybe, we would be able to work things out and enjoy each others company for years to come.  A rush of emotions ran over me…either that, or it was the wind from outside, cause my window was open and there are gale force winds in these parts.  No matter, I was getting to throw down…super gamer, nerd-style.  I focused on the silvery button on the center panel on the drums and pressed it with all the love and affections as if it were our first time together. The button lit up…just as I remembered…the whine of the cooling fans was all that could be heard…then……..and THEN!?!

Nothing….the f*cking thing is broke and is going back to Microsoft…..bitch.

Some people are just born without a clue…

What a piece of crap.

Every now and then, I like to entertain myself with a flick I know will suck. Not sure what it is, but I just get a kick out of watching bad stuff sometimes. D-War aka Dragon Wars falls into that realm.

From what I know, D-Wars is a Korean made film, with American actors and dialogue, set in the United States, namely, Los Angeles. There’s a girl, a guy, the guy’s mentor, a bad guy, and of course…the FBI. I would give them names, but who cares really?

Girl and guy are basically previous lovers in another lifetime, namely Korea hundreds or thousands of years ago (again, who cares?). The girl has some kind of destiny to stop the evil dinosaur sized snakes of the time, but fails, and the earth is doomed to be roamed by these snakes again in the next thousand years. Guy and girl are reincarnated, and with the help of the guy’s mentor, must stop the uber sized snake and it’s evil army that bares striking resemeblance to Sauron’s army of LOTR.

The uber snake and army basically tear the crap out of Downtown LA looking for the girl. I’ll admit, it looked pretty cool, but that’s it.

After escaping LA, guy and girl end up being captured by the evil army. All I remember is that at one point, there were outside LA, they were captured, girl blacks out, and then she wakes up in what looks like Mordor in Middle Earth (LOTR reference). I kid you not people, they end up in front of a Mordor looking castle, in the middle of nowhere. As she is about to be sacrificed, the guy unleashes some kind of super energy from his super necklace he got from his super mentor. This kills just about everybody in the evil army (I estimated about 10,000 evil minions and creatures), with the exception of the uber snake. Uber snake goes to kill girl, but then a good uber snake comes from nowhere to fight the evil snake. They fight and fight, and in what seems like the good snake’s last dying moments, the girl merges with the good snake, forming… a dragon, yeah, a dragon. And not your standard dragon, it looks exactly like the ones you see in ancient asian folklore.

So the battle wages on, and of course the dragon wins. The girl however is dead, but her spirit lives on. The guy is saddened of course, cause that’s his soulmate or whatever.

Watching this movie will give you that “WTF!” feeling. But not the WTF you get out of seeing The Matrix for the first time, its more like the WTF you get from watching a cow get slaughtered, then eating a hamburger. Do I recommend this film? Hell no. Even just to pass the time? I’d rather dip my balls in acid. The End.

I love it…but I hate it.

A good reviewer usually writes a full review, covering all aspects of what he is reviewing. It shows he’s a good writer, because he’s writing for the people out there that care what he has to say. I make no claims to be a good reviewer, especially when it comes to Half-Life 2, Episode 2.

I never finished the game. Yeah that’s right, I’m writing a review on something I haven’t even finished yet, but I figured, what the hell. I got some stuff to get off my chest so here goes.

I bought the Orange Box as a preorder to save myself the $5, and so that I could be playing HL2 Ep2 the day it was released. I have followed the series since the very beginning, and there was no way I’m gonna give up now. I can’t say I fully love the franchise, its just that I’ve invested so much time in it, I’ve got to see it through. Well, Orange Box was released October 10, 2007… my first day playing HL2 Ep2 was 5 months later. Yeah, I know…5 months. Give me some credit, I did play Portal all the way through, as well as a good number of rounds on Team Fortress 2, but fact is, I couldn’t get HL2 Ep2 to play, or even load for that matter. So I just let it be.

5 months went by, and the 8800Gts 512mb was kind enough to make its way into my life, along with a nice little Quad Core Processor from Intel. That meant a new rig, with a new home for my HL2 Ep2. With so many titles on my shelf, I had to install them all and play them through a 2nd time, cause this time, there was no longer any visual contraints, I was playing my games as they were meant to be played. HL2 Ep2 got a test run to verify it was working, indeed it was, but I waited 5 months, so I was in no rush to play it yet.

Finally, when I got around to it, I loaded up Steam and was on my way to continue the journey.

First of all, the cinematic real time narrative that is used throughout the game really puts you into the action. What does that mean? Basically, the story literally unfolds in front of you as you play. Characters are talking, environments are changing, all in real time. There are no prerendered CG cutscenes to take you away from the experience. The game played out pretty well for the first hour or so, as it gets you back into the action. However, as the game progressed, I found myself beginning to resent the game.

I hate dislike games that have some kind of alien creature or bug coming after me. I don’t know what it is, but that stuff really freaks me out.  I prefer 1000 Nazis coming my way, as opposed to a gigantic tripod beast chasing after me. Maybe I just dislike anything that has more legs than I do, I dunno. Well anyways, what Hl2 Ep2 has that I dislike HATE, is spiders. As if the developers couldn’t stop at my borderline arachniphobia, they had to push it over the limit, and make their spiders glow, and spit some kind of acid at me at 60mph. AND, genetically enhance their spiders to play hide n seek as I go after them with my shotgun, only to jump from the dark corners of the slimy infested cavern from which I forced to explore. What makes it worse it that these caverns are lined with oversized glowing caterpillars, they pose no danger, but are a source of light and energy. However, their energy is extracted by squishing them, I can’t say if that is cool or disgusting, but when added with the fact that gi-mongous, acid spitting spiders are after me, having to run around looking for more bugs to squish to stay alive doesn’t make me feel any better.

I will even go as far as to say that the hour or so that I spent killing these spiders, was probably my worst gaming experience ever (that I can remember anyways). You know that feeling when your calmly sitting around, minding your own business, then you feel something crawl on your skin…only to find that its a humongous spider ready to feast on your flesh? Well, take that feeling, multiply it by 60, and then you’ll have an idea of what I’m talking about.

I eventually made my way out of those caverns, but the experience stayed with me as I went to bed that night. Those spiders must have become self aware, left the bounds of their computer world, and jumped into my human consciousness as I slept, only to continue the chase in my dreams.

After taking a couple days to recover, I made the attempt to finish the game. Basically, I ran into another problem where I couldn’t get the game to load again. Someday, I’m sure I’ll finish the game, but the purpose of this review was only to share my horrifying experience. Acid spitting, gi-mongous spiders don’t belong in video games. The End.